The reaction element is still very much a part of this. Mostly it's because I thought the mini- series, in its zeal to portray Marion as the only female character of note, seriously dropped the ball regarding Romana. It's also because I like to wedge hideously non-canon stuff like the mini- series back into continuity. A hopeless task, I assure you.
This takes place at some point soon after the miniseries ended, and is entirely AU to the show.
The character of Chaz is borrowed, with apologies, from Alan Dean Foster's excellent novels Dinotopia Lost and The Hand of Dinotopia, which are easily the best of the junior books. Most of the secondary characters are based on those seen in the miniseries; I just gave them names and personalities. And some of them I just made up. :)
Revision Notes: I have never been happy with this fic, never. I finally hit critical mass with my unhappiness and revised the elements that bothered me the most - basically, chapter eight. I still hold the books to be gospel and the miniseries to be heresy, but for this story it works better the other way around.
David was talking with his father in the guest room - the latest in a series of long-delayed conversations about their lives in general - when Zippo poked his head around the door and coughed politely. "Begging your pardon, David, but there's a message for you."
He looked at the green stenonychosaurus, curious and a little puzzled. He never got messages. "A message?"
Zippo bobbed his head in the dinosaur version of a nod. "I believe it has something to do with the Skybax Corps."
That explained it. David stood, offering his father an apologetic glance, and followed Zippo to the large front room of the librarian's apartment. He was expecting a postal bird, or maybe a written letter, so he was surprised to see the uniformed figure of Romana Denison standing stiffly in the middle of the room and exchanging even stiffer conversation with Marion and Karl. Romana's eyes, however, were firmly on the portrait hanging on the wall across the room - the woman who had been Zippo's human life partner.
"David," Romana said the second he came into view, forestalling his own greeting to Marion. He nodded acknowledgement to his fellow skybax rider, and Romana stood to attention, then handed him a scroll with solemn formality. He took it, breaking the seal and unrolling it; the words were written in the Dinotopian footprint alphabet, and as he deciphered it, Romana recited the message from memory: "You are hereby ordered to report to the squadron at first light tomorrow, at the city rookery. We are returning to Canyon City."
"Tomorrow?" he asked, dismayed.
"At first light," Karl said, looking not at all dismayed. "Bummer. We'll miss you."
David shot his brother a dark look. "I'm sure you will."
Romana cleared her throat, dragging the two brothers out of their unspoken squabble. "I have other riders to notify. Breath deep, seek peace," she said, making her way to the door, where she paused. In the same stilted, forced politeness that she'd been using when David entered, Romana said to Marion, "Please give my regards to Aunt Rosemary."
"I will," Marion said, matching the other girl's tone. David looked at her, a little confused by the sudden change in her attitude. He was used to Romana's intenseness in all things, but he'd never seen Marion be anything other than warm and gracious... But there had been that once, he realized suddenly, during training, when she'd mentioned Romana. He'd chalked it up to jealousy (realistically or not), but now it looked like there was more to it.
Romana nodded, cast a last, wistful glance at the portrait, and left without any further comment.
" 'Aunt Rosemary'?" Karl asked immediately, before the door had barely closed. "She's related to you?"
"My cousin," Marion said, bending down to pick up the baby chasmosaur that had just escaped, again, from her crib. 26 honked and wriggled with happiness, and Marion gave her frill an affectionate pat.
David, mindful of the chilly tension between the two girls, hesitated before saying, "But in Canyon City... You acted like strangers."
"That's family business," Marion said, rather curtly, turning away from him and handing 26 to Karl. "And not any of yours. Excuse me."
She, too, left without further word, shutting the door a bit too hard on her way out. Karl turned to David with a broad grin. "Ouch. Guess the magic's gone."
David scowled. "Shut up."
Karl looked down at 26 in his arms, saying, "What do you think, kiddo? Should we go cheer up Marion?"
26 blinked her big dark eyes and honked a clear affirmation. For an infant creature with no human language, 26 was amazingly expressive, modulating the pitch and tone of her honks and chirps to communicate precise - if not always understandable - expressions. David missed half of what she said, though, simply because he was more in tune with the squawks and caws of his skybax.
"You might as well," David said, unable to keep a stab of bitterness from his voice. "I have to pack everything and get my uniform prepped."
"Well, then, let's go," Karl said. He flashed David a victorious smile, then sauntered out of the apartment humming "Feelin' Satisfied" with a vigorous chasmosaur accompaniment.
David did not hate his brother. He didn't. His brother wasn't evil. There wasn't a Cain-and-Abel dynamic going on between them - and if there was, he would have been the first to claim that he was the victim, not the aggressor.
It was just that, sometimes, and especially when it came to Marion, he really wanted to smash Karl's face in.
"Jerk," he muttered now, stopping himself from saying anything stronger only because cursing wasn't Dinotopian, and he was trying very hard to be Dinotopian. It had certainly brought him more fulfillment than being American.
Zippo, who had disappeared as he always did when sibling unpleasantness threatened, reemerged and cautiously approached David. "I'd be most glad to help you pack, although I'm sorry you have to go. It will be lonely without roommates now."
"Thanks, Zippo," David said with a conscious effort to stop brooding and focus on the friend standing in front of him. "I need all the help I can get. But what do you mean, no roommates? What about Karl and Dad?"
"Oh, well, I thought you knew," Zippo said. His long, slender tail danced back and forth anxiously. "Karl and your father are going to Vidabba in a week's time. Karl has been accepted as an apprentice at the hatchery."
David nodded, smiling what he knew was a sour smile, and started to make his way back to the guest room. "And Marion's going there too."
"Well, yes," Zippo confirmed, following after him. "Her mother has just decided to take her on as a temporary assistant - to give her some experience of running a large farm."
"Fantastic," David said, and pushed open the door to the guest room.
His father was staring down at a footprint book in intense concentration; the alphabet, he'd said, was not difficult to remember, once you saw the pattern. Now he looked up at David and said, "I heard some doors slamming. Trouble?"
"No, not really." David picked up his bag from its place on the floor and went to dig his uniform out of the closet. "But I have to go back to Canyon City tomorrow. And we leave at first light, so I need to get ready now."
His father, who had been in the Marines before becoming a millionaire businessman, put down the book and chuckled. "Welcome to the life, David. Want some help with the uniform? I still know how to iron."
"Yeah, okay," he said, but his mind was on the blue skies and soaring cliffs of Canyon City, and the fact that Marion would be nowhere near them.