Kimberly Key was so over school trips.

The bus ride made her stomach lurch. Her classmates were too loud, chewing gum and singing stupid pop songs close to her face.     

“Has nobody heard of aHollywood Undead?” Kimberly wondered.

She plugged her earphones in and leaned against the window of the school bus. When she listened to music, she found peace. The teachers telling the students to quiet down, the students making out a seat behind her, the bad singers on the backseats. Everything became a blur.

Outside, Kimberly saw the museum sign and the building coming into view. The sign was in front of the driveway, where a bunch of similar yellow school buses stopped. In large black bold letters, the sign read ‘Welcome to the Museum of National History (MONH)’. The building itself was impressively big, light brown and cream color alongside huge columns. A banner draped over the columns, with all sorts of animals, knights in medieval armour, and inventions like the telephone depicted.

The bus stopped, and a trip monitor checked everyone’s names off their clipboards as each student got off the bus. 

The only thing Kimberly wanted to see was the dinosaur exhibit. She loved dinosaurs, ever since her grandma introduced her to the world of dinosaurs. She heard many stories about them. How they didn’t exist anymore but how grand and predatory they used to be. How large, how different each dinosaur species was from one to the next. Kimberly was still not happy about having to take a school trip but the fact that today they were seeing a museum exhibit including dinosaurs was not too unfortunate. 

The museum guide’s name was Henry. He was the goody two shoes kind of person. Gelled hair to perfection, horn-rimmed round glasses, brown loafers and neatly pressed trousers. He greeted the students and asked them questions, giving soft candy to whoever knew the right answer. Kimberly didn’t like him one bit. He was fattening the kids up with candy before devouring them, like the witch from Hansel and Gretel. Or the witch’s brother. Either way, Kimberly didn’t like Henry. After the introductions, Henry brought them on the tour of the museum. 

His shoes squeaked against the clean tiles, and the students followed after him. 

“This here, is the model statue of King Alfred the Great, the first king to become king of the Anglo-Saxon…” 

With a sweeping motion, Henry began talking in what he probably thought was a mysteriously low voice. It was greatly irritating for Kimberly, but enchanting for the rest. They listened as if he were about to take them up for the rapture. Kimberly thought about how she could escape. If she could pull it off, then that would make the best day ever. As Kimberly pondered, her gaze trailed around the room.

A loud wailing resounded around the main hall, and everyone in the room turned to look a few feet away. 

There was a young mother cradling her toddler. She dropped him while struggling to open her museum map, and now he was on the floor. The toddler rolled from side to side and bawled his face off. Seeing as this moment distracted everyone else, Kimberly’s eyes lit up like a karaoke machine. She finally saw the dinosaur exhibit sign on the left. Unsure of when they would pass into the exhibit, Kimberly wanted to get a first look. 

So when the trip monitors and the guide Henry both stepped in to help the woman and her toddler, Kimberly snuck off into the dinosaur exhibit hall. It helped that Kimberly was known to be a sneaky person. In the middle of homeroom class, people would ask where Kimberly was, and she would have been halfway to the dining hall or library by then. Often in performances, Kimberly would be in the back, so hidden that nobody noticed.

People were good at that, not noticing Kimberly, just as she was good at not being noticed. 

Kimberly stepped into the dinosaur hall and as soon as she did, her hands went to her cheeks. Squishing herself, Kimberly surveyed her surroundings. It was majestic. From the ceiling hung models of blue, orange, and yellow pterodactyls. There were a couple of big models of different dinosaurs like stegosaurus and triceratops. There were even some of the mini dinosaur egg models. But what really caught Kimberly’s eye was the biggest tyrannosaurus rex she had ever seen up close. The books and films were nothing compared to the real thing. 

Kimberly took her time reading each label and absorbing information about the dinosaurs in the hall. But she avoided the T-rex, until the end of her visit when she realized it was about time to rejoin the group otherwise they would do a roll call again and go looking for her. 

There was just something about that dinosaur. The T-rex stood tall and proud, with a scary set of teeth atop the skeletal bones. Kimberly noticed the jawline almost looked down turned into sadness. She walked closer and closer until she was standing right in front of the whole structure. In awe, Kimberly gazed up at the dinosaur.

Suddenly, a cracking sound came from above and Kimberly yelped. She narrowly avoided a bone fragment smashing into her skull. Kimberly covered her head but the fragment landed a couple of inches from her feet. Kimberly looked at the precious exhibits around her, to see if anybody noticed.

Now that she thought of it, why weren’t there any guards and museum visitors in this hall? Just then, the fragment glowed beside Kimberly’s heel.

Kimberly rubbed her eyes, checking if she was dreaming.  

The fragment was shaped like a wishbone, and almost looked like it was inviting her to touch. Kimberly considered running away to tell the trip monitor. In a trance, Kimberly went closer to the wishbone.  

Then she bent down and reached out her hand to touch the fossil fragment. 

Instantly, the fragment hummed and whirred to life. Kimberly gasped as the fragment floated into the air as if looking for directions. Kimberly’s eyes widened when the fragment pointed at her. With a whistling sound, the fragment sped straight towards Kimberly’s chest. Colliding with her chest, the fragment dug itself into her skin and Kimberly cried out, trying to tug the fragment off her chest.

 It was too late, the fragment disappeared within her body with a green flash. 

At the same time, Kimberly disappeared from the Museum Of National History, along with the dinosaur fragment.

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