News

Sanjeev rushed from his house towards Ratan's, newspaper in hand.

Ratan rushed from his towards Sanjeev's, newspaper in hand.

Midway, on the busy street, they met.

"The news, you read it?" Sanjeev asked.

"Yes. Who hasn't?"

"What do you think?"

"Crap. All of it, crap."

"Really?"

Next to them a cycle belled angrily, as if the road was all his. They bustled to the side-walk and waved him on.

"Why?"

"You believe it? You're usually a sceptic about all these new scientific findings. You, old man, sir, prefer old school science."

"That's very judge-mental."

An old motorbike, the type which needs to be pedaled at on an incline, wheezed beside them up the slope, but a car blared its passage, leaving the motorbike straggling, and it had to be pushed at to reach the high end.

"What do you found you're judgments on?"

"The science park," Ratan laughed, "You knew shit about genetics. Remember? I won't be surprised if you say 'Hey, what's all this about quantum physics, nuclear science? Don't you believe in the five elements any more?' !" He began laughing again.

A truck dominated the road, and a car horned madly while he shifted gears on the slope. Some day, with all the nanotechnology, perhaps trucks wouldn't be needed at all, and extremely compact, extremely economical devices would be used. Yet sometimes it was useful to have big things just in case...

"And what has made you such a skeptic of modern science?"

Ratan didn't answer immediately. "This doesn't fit into the puzzle."

"Oh, but it does. You get the same newspaper, you would have read the same article as me. The article explains it fully."

"I don't know..."

The news: Dinosaur fossil carbon-14 dated to approx. 3rd century BC