#Tricleidus
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suryp · 2 months ago
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It was a calm day.
The water was clear, the waves calm, and the sun shined through them. Mothers dark dorsal absorbed the light, but her pale belly was painted with the shine, even as far down as we were.
"Are you ready to go out today?"
She'd been pressing me. I was two meters long by then, and had yet to see open water.
"Um..."
"There's no need to worry. Predators don't like calm days like this, and we don't need to go far."
"...alright. Lets go."
So we went. Even to the outer reefs, hunters avoided mother. Small fish crowded around the flotsam, some like islands more than twice her length, casting shadows down below. We continued onto the barrens, then the jelly fields, avoided stingers as we went, and eventually made it to the wall.
"..."
"...It's alright sweetie. I'll be right behind you."
"...ok."
We swam slowly, cautiously. I curved my neck in every direction, to see what was out there. Above us, only driftwood. Below... I flipped over to get a better look.
Nothing.
Just shadow. the light slowly fading in the dark water. I turned back. My dappled gray skin wasn't so obvious as mothers black, but I had spots that might give me away.
We rose to breathe, I stayed just below mother, her flippers curved under to cradle me, the hard skin at their edges could cut sharks.
I lifted my head up, out of the water...
Something cut my sides.
In a panic, I thrashed and dove, before quickly finding cover on the underside of the driftwood, clinging to it with fins.
And I looked to the void.
And then I looked for mother.
Blood... her blood. Mothers blood was around me, it was still falling into the water. I could taste it...
...Falling?
Cautiously, I crept to the side, preparing to look up and out of the water...
A great pile of flesh crashed into the waves. The taste was intoxicating, and filled me with fear...
So I swam. Away. I didn't know where. Open water wasn't familiar, and there were no landmarks to tell where home was.
...I'm lucky to be alive.
The people I swim with now are not like me. They do not speak my language, cannot speak it, with only two flippers and no neck, and I can only sing a fraction of their songs over a fraction of the distance...
But they are kind. They have learned my strengths, and support my function in the pod. Together, we are more effective hunters.
But not really a family. I guard their pups with my agility, wrestle large game with my size, and am allowed to eat first with hunts I help with, but I can not sing their songs, and there is nowhere to write or draw in this abyss.
But there are drifters.
The things that took my mother.
And I could not make them pay without my pod.
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Cast in the same (overall) world as my previous short story (singular paragraph of a story) but with a different main character.
I'm sure at least some of you will be able to figure out whats actually happening here, but if you need help:
The narrator (and their mother) are Plesiosaurs. for a rw species I'd liken them to Tricleidus seeleyi, particularly the illustration by @ddinodan (twitter) on their plesiosauroidea chart, which is also featured on wikipedia.
The pod, who takes the narrator in, are cetaceans most similar to Acrophyseter deinodon, if a bit smaller.
the drifters are... well, it should be pretty obvious. no-one else really uses boats in this setting, since they can't or don't need to.
well. thats a wrap, folks! :3
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ancientmarinereptiles · 6 years ago
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Tricleidus ‬seeleyi
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Art by: AlternatePrehistory, https://www.deviantart.com/alternateprehistory
Name: Tricleidus ‬seeleyi
Name Meaning: ‬Three collarbone
First Described: 1909
Described By: Andrews
Classification: Chordata, Tetrapoda, Reptilia, ‬Sauropterygia,‭ ‬Plesiosauria,‭ ‬Plesiosauroidea, Cryptoclididae
Tricleidus was a cryptoclidid plesiosaur discovered in England in Norway. This plesiosaur swam the Middle Jurassic seas and most likely hunted for fish. We have unearthed a skull and some of its post-cranial skeleton.
Sources:
http://www.prehistoric-wildlife.com/species/t/tricleidus.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tricleidus
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