A New Beginning Ch. 12

That evening Doc Yves circumcised Justin and Joshua.

My baby girl was born three days after it stopped raining and Aleks gave birth to a boy two days later.

When I woke up I knew my baby was going to come sometime that day. I talked to Doc Yves. He put me in the infirmary and told me to just stay there until I delivered.

Wouldn't you know it, when it came time to deliver he was in the camp area joking around with Joshua. Beth and Chantelle were with me. Chantelle called down to him to come up. My baby was born a few seconds after he climbed the steps of the James Cook. I had a cramp, I pushed and my little girl just popped out. Everyone was surprised that I delivered so fast, especially me and Doc Yves.

Two days later I was in the infirmary. I was still bleeding a little and Doc Yves was examining me; he wanted to make sure everything was alright. But no sooner had he determined that there was nothing wrong with me when Aleks came into the infirmary. Her water broke while she was sitting down making crossbow bolts. Beth helped me off the table and into one of the seats from the James Cook, while Doc Yves helped Aleks onto the table.

She had a hard labor but delivered about two hours later. Her boy -- which she named Joshua -- is just the opposite of Justin. The baby has Joshua's hair and eyes and the rest of him belongs to Aleks.

I named my baby girl Dawn Marie, after Chantelle's middle name and my mother's first name. I don't know who she looks like but everyone says she looks just like me. When I told Chantelle that I named the child after her she cried.

While Aleks was in labor, Beth helped me to my sleeping area. Dawn was with Chantelle. The way my lesbian lover acts you would think the child is hers. She is as proud as any mother could be. She showed my baby to everyone in camp. I have to practically beg her to give Dawn back to me so that I can breastfeed her.

But I am overjoyed that Chantelle has taken so to my baby. I can hardly wait till hers is born. That's about five months away.

Dawn is three days old; right now Chantelle is playing with her. Everyone is watching the evening movie, a 2122 romantic-comedy, Wedding Bells. It's about all the things that can go wrong when planning a wedding. It won all kinds of academy awards when it first came out. But I'm not interested in watching it. Besides, I want to write about Joshua's hunting trip and the nice scare we had late this afternoon.

Joshua's team had just returned from a hunting trip. We were all sitting around listening to their tale of how they killed a Stegoknob. Dave and Josephine were frying some steaks from the Stegoknob. Chantelle, Beth and Regina were babysitting. Natalie, Leonard and I were working on an alligator skin we were tanning. Anthony shot one yesterday at the lake just outside our fenced off area.

All of a sudden there was a loud popping noise. Well, it wasn't a loud pop; it was more like a loud swish. But it was enough to give us all a scare. It even scared the PrimusPrimates. They all scampered to the top of their tree. It also frightened Fur Ball. He climbed up onto Beth's shoulder and hid in her hair. He had been watching Beth breastfeed Yves Adam.

Fur Ball has really taken to our babies. Whenever any of us is nursing our baby he will sit and watch almost as if he were in a trance. When one of them begins to cry he will cover his ears and screech. He sits on the fence we have around the nursery -- we've fenced off a small area next to our dining area and use it for a nursery -- and watches the babies all day.

He won't let any of the other PrimusPrimates come anywhere near the babies. As soon as he sees one of the others coming near the fence he will chase it off with a stick. Whenever he does that, Boss Hog will watch him intently. We are all of the opinion that Fur Ball will someday rule the troop, if Boss Hog don't kill him first. Like I said, we keep Boss Hog away from Fur Ball.

None of us can figure why Fur Ball has taken so to our babies. The standing joke is that our babies are the only humans his size.

Anyway, for several seconds no one knew what the source of the noise was. We all looked from one to the other. At first, I thought that David or Josephine had accidently thrown something on their cooking fire. But when I asked them, they both denied it. Then Thomas discovered the source of the "explosion."

It seems one of the James Cook's tires couldn't take the pressure any longer and just gave out. Joseph had let some of the air out of all the tires soon after we landed. But apparently he didn't let enough out. He and Doc Yves went and inspected the blown tire.

"I can bandage that," Doc called out. "Nurse Beth, get my emergency kit."

"No you can't," Joseph answered him. "I'm the chief engineer here. That's my job. Let me do it."

"Nooooo!" hollered Thomas jumping up from the table, "fixing tires is a job for 'Super Construction Man.' Let me do it."

"Out of my way you rascals, can't you see that this is an emergency? Nurse Beth, hurry up with that emergency kit."

"But I'm Super Construction Man. I'm here to saaaaave the daaaaay," Thomas sang out.

Joseph answered him, "You can't save the day Super Construction Man. The day's almost over." He then grabbed Doc's nose and pinched it. He tried to do the same to Thomas but Thomas got his ear first.

"Someone call the police?" Doc said. "This man's attacking me."

"I'm Super Construction Man; I'll saaaaave you." Then pointing to Chantelle, Thomas called out, "Officer, arrest the Doctor for attempting to bandage a tire without a Cretaceous license."

The three of them then proceeded to give us their rendition of the Three Stooges. We watched a movie of the mid twentieth century vaudeville, slapstick comedy team the other night.

They put on a great impromptu show. They had us all laughing. In the end they decided to let all the air out of the other tires. Joseph "complained" that the spaceship will never fly again. We all laughed.

As for the Stegoknob, Joshua's team came upon a small heard of them just northwest of our camp. Joshua, remembering his first encounter with a heard of them, told his team to give them a wide birth. They were doing just that when they noticed a juvenile that had wandered away from the heard.

For several minutes they debated among themselves whether or not to kill it or go after some other dinosaur. It was about thirteen hundred hours and they hadn't seen anything all morning. They decided to kill the Stegoknob.

Again, I don't believe Joshua had to do very much arm twisting to convince the others on what to do. When out on a hunt most of us will usually follow his advice. But any time he has a choice between a large dinosaur or a smaller one, he will almost always go after the larger beast. I guess that's to be expected of our best shooter.

This time Joshua made sure they were upwind of the dinosaur. Then they split into two groups. Joshua and Leonard were on the beast's left, Louis and Joseph on its right. On cue from Joshua, they all shot their bolts into the animal's head.

One bolt hit it in its right snout and a second went into the right side of its neck, right behind its jaw. Another bolt hit it directly behind its left eye and a fourth bolt hit it in its left eye. I'm sure that bolt was from Joshua's crossbow but he didn't own up to it. But then that's just like him.

The Stegoknob let out a cry and then fell over dead. Joshua immediately pulled out the .45 and prepared to shoot any of the other Stegoknobs that looked like it was going to attack them. But they all ran off.

I am very happy with the way our little community is prospering. Fruit, vegetables and game are abundant. We have plenty of fresh water. Doc Yves has a plant that he can use to help him ease our pain and he's started to look for other plants that he can use for medicine. He brought his microscope and he says that he has a vague idea of what to look for. He adds that he took a course on medicinal plants and herbs while in college.

Some of us are already talking about teaching our children their alphabet and arithmetic. Whenever they go out hunting and foraging, the men have also started to look for slate or some other smooth rock that we can write on.

I think we're going to make it.

It's late. I've got to feed Dawn. Then we're going to bed.

Chantelle, Beth, Regina and Vickie have more or less become our babysitters, nannies if you will. While the rest of us go about our daily chores, they take care of the babies. The four of them just sit in the nursery with the children and play with them while they make crossbow bolts, sew dinosaur hide together or do some other mundane chore.

Chantelle and Vickie can't do anything else anyway. They are both due in a couple of weeks and can hardly move around. Also, Veronica is so big that Doc Yves confined her to bed until her baby is born. Whenever she does come downstairs, she just sits in the nursery or at one of the dining tables. Her baby is due in a couple of weeks too.

Doc Yves says she might have twins. He says that he can hear two heartbeats with his stethoscope. But he can't be sure without an ultra sound.

Vickie has become our resident pyromaniac. At least that's what everyone teasingly calls her.

Whoever gets up first will usually throw some wood or bone onto the fire. That's frequently me, as I'm almost always the first one up; if I'm not sick or something. Sometimes Doc or Vickie will get up before me. At such times they will replenish the fire.

While adding more wood to it, twice now she has almost caught our kitchen on fire, once about a month after we got here and then again this morning. The first time the kitchen table was burned so bad that David and Yves had to build another one out of bamboo. To Vickie's credit that fire really wasn't all her fault.

The night before David had spilled some grease on the table and didn't thoroughly clean it up. When Vickie got up she naturally put some more wood on the fire. Then she went upstairs to go to use the toilet. When she came back downstairs the whole bamboo table was on fire; it sits right next to the fire pit.

She screamed, "Fire! Fire! Come quick!" waking us all up. Louis and Joshua each grabbed a leg of the table and pulled it out from under the James Cook's wing. Luckily they were able to pull the table out from under the James Cook before the fire spread any further. Louis had a small burn on the back of his hand and Joshua's hair was singed a little bit but that was about the only damage other than the table. It was totally ruined.

David told everyone that it was his fault but Vickie wouldn't let him take the blame. She confessed that she should not have gone back upstairs without making sure the fire wouldn't spread beyond the fire pit we have for it.

David and Josephine built the rock lined fire pit when we first landed. It took them a few days to finish it. It's about three meters long by about one meter wide. It has three spits, each equally spread apart and running across the width.

"I think we ought to have three spits instead of two David."

"Why? Two are plenty enough. Besides, if we have three there won't be enough room for the oven Joseph intends to build for us next week."

"We can put that on the far end next to the smokehouse Joseph is going to build for us." Then turning to me she asked, "What do you think Toni, should we have three spits or two?"

"Don't get me involved in your argument Josephine. But since Doc is helping y'all cook now, maybe you should ask him."

"We can't he's upstairs bandaging up Laci."

"Maybe you're right Josephine," David cut in. "With three of us cooking for twenty people it might be better to have three spits. We can keep the backside of the pit for heating water cans, the kitchen table next to the near end, across from our patio and eating area and the smokehouse and the oven near the far end."

"That's what I've been trying to tell you David. I also think we ought to make it longer."

"OK, but it'll be more to clean out and I think we ought to exempt Doc Yves from cleaning out the ashes. He's got he James Cook's windows he has to clean off every two or three days."

"That's alright by me," Josephine answered him. "After we clean out the ashes we can shower together," she added rather sensuously. David just smiled.

David and Josephine have to clean the pit out about once every month. That's a chore I don't envy. It's not a hard job. They just scoop the cinders out, put the refuse in a bucket and throw it on the garbage heap out on the lake bed. But the two of them get full of soot and ash whenever they clean out the fire pit. That's what I wouldn't like.

After they finish, they take a shower together. That part I would like. Doc doesn't help them. He has to clean the windows of the James Cook about every two or three days. So while they clean the fire pit, he cleans the windows. Then he joins them in the shower. Yes, the two of them take turns screwing Josephine after they wash each other off.

Anyway, David had spilled the grease all over the rocks, the table and on the ground around the table. When Vickie threw some more logs on the fire, the grease caught on fire and quickly spread. We were lucky; we only lost a table.

Thankfully this morning's fire wasn't nearly as destructive. Vickie came downstairs and threw a log onto the fire. Again, she went back upstairs to use the toilet. This time she said that she checked to make sure the fire wouldn't spread. But she hadn't noticed a BuckToothus skin someone left on top of a water can.

When she came back downstairs the skin was smoldering; there was smoke all over the place. She picked it up with a stick and threw it into the pool near the tail of the James Cook. But as she was carrying it to the pool, Louis came downstairs. Remembering the other time she caught the table on fire he jokingly asked her if she was again trying to burn down our camp.

Now we all call her Ms. Pyromaniac. She calls us all lazy firefighters for not wanting to put out the fires she starts.

Chantelle gave birth to a beautiful baby boy this morning. The child has Joseph's nose, mouth and chin but the rest of him is all Chantelle. She named him Joseph. Joseph is proud as a peacock.

As she did with Dawn, I paraded him all around the camp and showed him to everyone. When I brought him back to Chantelle she asked me if she could hold Joseph and Dawn together. Then she nursed them both, one sucking on each of her breasts. She's going to make a great mother.

Two days after Joseph was born, Vickie gave birth to a very large baby boy which she named Louis. Louis is his father; that's what Vickie says anyway. No one is sure who the child looks like. Vickie says he looks like her own father. But I think he has Vickie's eyes.

It was a hard birth. Vickie was in labor for ten hours. The whole time Louis was pacing back and forth and around under the James Cook. About every ten or fifteen minutes he would come upstairs and ask, "has she delivered yet?" In exasperation, Doc Yves told him that he would let him know the minute the baby was born but if he came upstairs again to inquire about Vickie or the baby he was going to give him a sedative.

Doc Yves was about to perform a Caesarian and was talking it over with Beth when Vickie finally delivered.

Six days later Veronica gave birth to two baby girls, twenty minutes apart. The older one has black hair and the younger one has red hair. She said that she is pretty sure that Anthony is the father. They both look like him. She named the first one born Jacqueline and the other girl Juliet, after her two younger twin sisters.

None of us are worried about who exactly is the father of our children. We all treat all the children as our own. We've discussed this topic a couple of times now and we are all united in our desire to raise the children as one large extended family. We want to teach the children that it doesn't matter if we are a society of twenty people or twenty million people we are all dependent upon each other for peace to prevail.

We all feel that is the best way for us to survive. We all believe that only by sharing what little we have and living together cooperatively will we be able to develop a prosperous community. It's the only way we'll ever be able to overcome the beasts.

We want to teach our children that while each of them is unique and deserving of love and respect, we are all one people; each with different likes, dislikes and personalities. We want to teach them that they can each have their own personal goals but collectively we all have to have the ultimate goal of eradicating ignorance, hate, prejudice and other evils.

But more importantly, we all have the same hopes and dreams for our children's future. We all want them to grow up safe and happy. Toward this end, we've all come to a consensus that if we teach all the children that we are all their parents then they'll grow up as a close knit society. They will develop the idea that we are all one people, one family.

Doc Yves came down with a fever the evening after Jacqueline and Juliet were born. He had a high temperature and kept breaking out in cold sweats for two days. At one time or another almost all of us have caught this "bug." Doc Yves says that he does not know what it is. He's sure that it's a bacterium unique to the Cretaceous Period.

He took some saliva and blood samples from everyone who has caught the disease. After looking at it under a microscope, he said that it looks like a miniature paramecium but with little appendages that look like toes. He confesses that bacteriology wasn't his strong suit in medical school.

As he did with everyone who caught it, he quarantined himself in the infirmary and told us all to keep our babies away from him. He took some antibiotic pills and after two days his fever broke. The next morning he was fit as a fiddle. He stayed in the infirmary another day just to make sure he didn't infect the babies or any of us with whatever he had. But it seems that once you get infected you are immune to further infection. Doc is not sure.

I woke up this morning with the strangest dream. I normally ignore my dreams. But this one . . . well I thought I would write about it.

I was tracking a Marineosaurus and came upon a meadow. There towards the center was a giant Marineosaurus. I aimed my crossbow at the beast but it cowered down; it was afraid of me. It begged me not to shoot it. I then ordered it into its bamboo cage. It begrudgingly crept into its cage, cursing me the whole time.

I locked the cage and then grabbed it. Suddenly it the cage was the size of a baseball and the Marineosaurus had turned into a roach. I threw it onto the garbage heap. I could hear it cursing me and crying. It wanted me to let it out of its cage.

Ignoring its pleas, I turned around. I was back in my mother's high rise condominium. I was a little girl again but Dawn Marie and Little Joseph were with me. I was breastfeeding them both. Then I woke up.

If I remember correctly, this adventure started with a dream of me swimming in the nude with a gorgeous hunk of a man in a tropical lagoon. Well that dream came true . . . sort of. While Doc Yves isn't "Mr. Universe," he is pretty good looking and I do swim in the nude with him -- and everyone else.

I wonder if this dream will come true. But then I can't see me locking up a Marineosaurus in a bamboo cage. I'd kill it.

Akira gave birth to a fat baby boy last night. She said that Leonard was the father. She asked him if it was alright with him if she named the child after her father, Chan Xing. Leonard said that it was alright with him. He then jokingly asked if she was going to name their second boy Leonard. She blushed and said yes. She's very passive and giving but she has a strong spirit from which she draws her strength. I admire that.