Noah's Ark - The True Story
Excerpt
Prologue: (This means the part of a story before the beginning.)
Hundreds of excited people packed the auditorium. Not an empty seat remained in the whole place as TV and newspaper reporters crowded the aisles and spilled out the open door. It was Homer's first public appearance. The whole world waited to meet the famous dog.
A group of scientists, dressed in smart white lab coats, filed onto the stage. Dr. Max stepped up to the podium and adjusted the mike to speak. The audience grew quiet with anticipation.
Dr. Max wasn't a medical doctor who helped sick people. Instead he was a scientist who studied animal behavior: things like how female wolfs picked husbands, why male elephants weren't the bosses of their families, and how dolphins learned to surf. Dr. Max knew all about animals.
Dr. Max was also Homer's best friend.
"We have quite a turn out for Homer's first public appearance!" Dr. Max said.
The audience applauded with enthusiasm.
"As you know Homer is the most successful of all animals in the bio-intelligence engineering project so far. Homer's IQ is a miraculous 160 plus, if you eliminate his somewhat lower math scores. He added with a hint of disappointment, "Homer hates math. Still, he is smarter than most people."
The audience rustled with murmurs of amazement. It was hard to imagine what such a smart dog would be like. Scientists had discovered how to make animals smart in a human kind of way. Homer was their prized pupil; a super intelligent dog.
A high, sweet voice sounded from the side of the stage, just out of view, "Humans think too much of intelligence. A good nose and kindness are way more important.”
Max chuckled nervously. "As you can hear for yourself, we finally managed to activate Homer"s computerized voice box. His verbal acuity is very pronounced!”
"Can"t shut me up," Homer explained what Dr. Max's big words meant.
Dr. Max and indeed all the scientists involved in creating the intelligent, talking dog, still marveled at the unfolding miracle of Homer. Perhaps the most fascinating aspect of Homer was that somehow the dog was full of stories, stories about dogs and people and lands long ago forgotten; Homer stored the collective history of his species like a memory. Homer wanted very much to share one of these stories with the audience today.
To this end, Dr. Max called Homer on to the stage. "Ladies and gentlemen, it is my pleasure to introduce my remarkable friend, Homer."
Homer came out prancing. He was quite simple a lovely dog: a huge, white and black longhaired Newfoundland dog. The audience went wild. People stood as a thunderous applause filled the auditorium. TV cameras rushed forward to get good shots.
Dogs can smell about two thousand times stronger than humans and Homer drew the tantalizing scents of the crowd deep into his lungs. He found himself swimming in a delicious scent-stew of soap, perspiration, excitement and human breath all mixed up.
He wanted to rush down into the crowd to check out individual folks. A person's smell conveyed as much information as reading a whole book about her. He could tell where the person had been, what he ate, if he was having any physical problem, and what kind of pets he had. People's smells told him a dozen other interesting things, emotional things, like if the person was excited or frightened, fear gave off the biggest scent, or if the person was in love, happy, or tired. He felt sorry for humans who had such a weak and poor sense of smell.
The crowd finally quieted.
"First, and despite my smarts and the gift of gab, I want to remind you that I am still very much a dog at heart," Homer began, winning the audience over instantly. "Do you realize that canines are the only species on earth that prefer another species to that of its own kind? We can't help it, you humans are such lovable goof balls!"
The audience laughed with Homer. Dr. Max and the other scientists behind him beamed with pride, as if Homer were their very own creation.
"And because of my affection for you humans, I feel compelled to tell you this story."
"We call the story Noah"s Ark", Dr. Max put in.
"Noah! Huh! When I first heard you made Noah the hero of the story I could scarcely believe it. Noah was a nice guy, but...
"Homer thinks the real hero was Noah's dog, Cali", Dr. Max rolled his eyes heavenward.
"Cali was the hero! Of course there were other creatures that helped: Americus, Meg, Liza and
"You're getting ahead of yourself, Homer. Start at the beginning."
Homer nodded and drawing a deep breath, he began the true story of Noah's Ark.