before anyone asks, NO, I have not been smoking anything

Once upon a time, there was a girl named Beatrice. Beatrice was British (naturally) and hated her name, except for when her father called her "Sweet Bea."

Beatrice wished she had a lovely, normal name, like her new pet Bill. Bill was a time traveling dinosaur and lived under her bed. Obviously, he was not a fully grown dinosaur. Not yet anyway. Beatrice assumed that a fully grown brontosaurus would eventually present some problems, especially since her parents didn't yet know about Bill, but for now he was perfectly happy squeezing his bulky body under her bed.

Beatrice went to the kitchen and made wheat toast with blackberry jam for herself and white toast with butter and honey for Bill. She carried her tray of toast and juice (orange for her, grape for Bill) to her room, tiptoeing past her slumbering parents' room. They'd thrown a loud party last night and sometimes her mother got the flu after parties like that, so Beatrice wanted to be extra quiet.

"Morning, Bill!" she said when she got to her room. He was stretched out on her bed so she shut her bedroom door.

"Morning, Princess Fiona," Bill said.

"Hmm, I'm not sure I want to be Princess Fiona today," said Beatrice. "After all, I was Princess Fiona all day yesterday."

"Alright, then, who shall it be today?" Bill asked.

"I think . . . Amelia."

"Bedelia?"

"No, silly, EARHART," she said.

"Oh, of course." Bill yawned and rolled off of the bed to do his morning jumping jacks. Beatrice winced every time he landed and the whole house shook.

"Bill, I wish you'd do your jumping jacks outside," Beatrice said.

"I know, Amelia, but it's raining again." Bill wasn't used to England's cold, rainy weather, since he was originally from Utah. Of course, it wasn't called Utah back then.

"Bill, where should we go today?" Beatrice asked.

"It's up to you. I've been everywhere."

"Well," Beatrice pondered. "We could go back to the African safari."

"We could. Although, last time we were almost eaten by a pack of lions," Bill said. He stretched and yawned.

"I know, it was so exciting!"

"Can we go somewhere we're not on the menu, please?"

"OK," Beatrice sighed. "How about London?"

"Darling, we're in London."

"I KNOOOOW we're in London, I meant FUTURE London," Beatrice said and rolled her eyes.

"Circa?"

"Um . . . 2067?"

"OK, let's go," Bill said and put on his favorite vest. It was green and fuzzy and had huge purple buttons.

"Brilliant! Just a second, though, I need my time traveling goggles."

"You realize those are really swimming goggles, don't you?" he asked.

"Not when I'm wearing them to TIME TRAVEL, they're not."

"Of course, how silly of me."


To be continued. Maybe. If I don't forget about it.

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Today on The Collective, Heather gets the shit kicked out of her by love.