Sumana sez, "'Let Us Now Praise Awesome Dinosaurs' is this week's fiction offering from Strange Horizons. Leonard Richardson got tired of editors saying 'this story didn't grab me,' so 'Let Us…' starts off with a thymomenoraptor trying to buy a gun. Reviews are calling it 'The best dino-related fiction to come out since Overdrift,' 'everything that daredevil dinosaurs from Mars should be,' and 'Finally, the first Infernokrusher story!'"
"I want to buy a gun," said the Thymomenoraptor. He moved his foreclaw along the glass case of pistols, counting them off: one, two, three, four. "That one." He tapped the case; the glass squeaked.
"Why would a dinosaur need a gun?" asked the shop owner.
"Self-defense."
The owner's gaze dropped to the three-inch claw that had chipped his display case.
"These are killing claws," said the dinosaur, whose name was Tark. "For sheep, or cows. I merely want to disable an attacker with a precision shot to the leg or other uh, limbal region."
"Uh-huh," the owner said. "Or maybe you figure humans shoot each other all the time, but if someone turns up ripped in half the cops are gonna start lookin' for dinosaurs."
Tark carefully pounded the counter. "There used to be a time," he said, "when gun dealers would actually sell people guns! A time . . . called America. I miss that time."
"I don't sell to foreign nationals."
"Racist!"
Let Us Now Praise Awesome Dinosaurs
(Thanks, Sumana!)
