25 Chapter 25

Chapter 25 Kyle flapped his arms and raised his chin. His flying reptile soared toward the sky. The game was responding like his cousin's Xbox, only Mr. Lemoncello's body-motion sensors were, as Kyle had suspected they might be, much more sophisticated and sensitive. He tilted his body sideways and his dino-bird sliced through the narrow opening in a vine-tangled clump of prehistoric trees. After clearing that obstacle, Kyle quickly ducked left to escape the gaping jaws of a lunging Tyrannosaurus rex. Eight of those screeching,

凯尔拍打着双臂，抬起下巴。 他的爬行动物飞向天空。 这款游戏的反应就像他表哥的Xbox一样，只是莱蒙切罗的身体运动传感器，正如凯尔所怀疑的那样，要复杂得多，也敏感得多。 他把身体斜向一边，他的恐龙鸟从藤蔓缠绕的史前树木丛中穿过狭窄的开口。 在清除了那个障碍后，凯尔迅速向左转躲避一头猛扑过来的霸王龙张开的大嘴。 其中8个在尖叫，

short-armed monsters had appeared to snap at the eight flying pterodactyls. Three of Kyle's competitors went down, including the kid from Marjory Muldauer's team. Angus Harper and Abia Sulayman were just off Kyle's wings. He cleared the T. rex trap and reached a sandy beach where some smaller dinosaurs were building nests. Kyle waved his arms and soared across the choppy sea. On the distant horizon, Kyle could see a volcano spewing molten lava. The finish line. He flapped his arms faster. When he did, the battery icon on the back of his pterodactyl dipped down to three-quarters. Dr. Zinchenko had been right. Flying fast drained your dino-bird's life force even faster. Suddenly, another "flying reptile" from the dinosaur books appeared in the sky: a giant Pteranodon with a thirty-foot wingspan. It was four times as wide as the other fliers and shrieked at the runts in the pterodactyl pack.

短臂怪物似乎在咬那八只飞翔的翼手龙。 凯尔的三个竞争对手倒下了，包括玛乔丽·穆尔道尔团队的那个孩子。 安格斯·哈珀和阿比娅·苏莱曼就在凯尔身旁。 他清除了雷克斯霸王龙的陷阱，来到一个沙滩上，一些较小的恐龙正在那里筑巢。 凯尔挥舞着双臂，飞过波涛汹涌的海面。 在远处的地平线上，凯尔可以看到一座火山正在喷出熔岩。 终点线。他更快地挥动双臂。 当他这样做的时候，翼龙背上的电池图标降到了四分之三。 津琴科博士是对的。 快速飞行更快地耗尽了你的恐龙鸟的生命力。 突然，另一种恐龙书里的“会飞的爬行动物”出现在天空中:一只翼展有30英尺的巨大翼龙。 它的宽度是其他飞龙的四倍，对着翼手龙群中的矮子尖叫。

Kyle kept his cool and aimed his reptile into what he hoped would be the Pteranodon's blind spot. The bigger beast gobbled down one flier, which freaked out Stephanie Youngerman from the Mountain team. She shrieked, jumped off her floor mark, and crashed into the ocean. Only Kyle, Angus, and Abia were left in the race. "If I was flying any faster," Angus shouted, "I'd catch up with tomorrow!" "Where you would meet me!" cried the girl. The two kids flailed their arms furiously. Both of their avatars shot off like rocket ships, streaking the cloudless sky with white contrails. Kyle could see Abia tuck in her arms and shoulders, making her profile sleekly aerodynamic. She inched ahead of Angus. Kyle tried his best to mimic Abia's moves but was buffeted in the wake created by her back draft. He moved his arms up and down and up and down until he looked like a berserk bicycle pump.

凯尔保持冷静，把他的爬行动物瞄准了他希望成为翼龙盲点的地方。 更大的野兽吞下了一张传单，这吓坏了山地队的斯蒂芬妮·扬格曼。 她尖叫着，从她的落地标上跳了下来，掉进了海里。 比赛中只剩下凯尔、安格斯和阿比亚。 “如果我飞得再快一点，”安格斯喊道，“明天就能赶上了!”“你会在哪里遇见我!”女孩叫道。 两个孩子愤怒地挥舞着胳膊。 他们的两个化身都像火箭飞船一样飞驰而去，在万里无云的天空留下了白色的尾迹。 凯尔可以看到阿比娅缩起她的手臂和肩膀，使她的轮廓圆滑地符合空气动力学。 她慢慢地走在安格斯前面。 凯尔尽力模仿阿比娅的动作，但却被她的后风所造成的尾流所打击。 他上下上下地挥动着他的手臂，直到他看起来像一个狂暴的自行车打气筒。

He whooshed forward faster but his battery icon dipped down to one-quarter. Its green light was on its way to red. And the volcanic island was still miles away. No way would Kyle make it without running out of juice. He pulled back on his speed, wishing this flying pterodactyl game came with power pellets of some kind. In most video games, there was some way to restore life force after you'd been weakened, and play on. But in this game, there was nothing except the two other pterodactyls, the ocean, and the distant volcano. Then Kyle remembered something from his library research. The pterodactyl was a carnivore. It ate meat and fish. Maybe there were some virtual fish in the virtual ocean below. It was worth a shot. He lowered his chin and sent his dino-bird swooping into a dive, then leveled it out when it

他加速前进，但电池电量下降到四分之一。 它的绿灯即将变成红灯。 火山岛还在几英里之外。 凯尔不可能没电就撑过去的。 他放慢了速度，希望这个会飞的翼手龙游戏能有某种能量球。 在大多数电子游戏中，玩家在被削弱后都可以通过某种方式恢复生命力，继续游戏。 但在这场游戏中，除了另外两只翼手龙，海洋和远处的火山，什么也没有。 然后凯尔想起了他在图书馆查过的东西。 翼手龙是食肉动物。 它吃肉和鱼。也许下面的虚拟海洋里有一些虚拟的鱼。 值得一试。他压低下巴，让他的恐龙鸟俯冲下来，然后把它放平

was just a few inches above the video ocean's churning waves. The water was swarming with fish. Kyle opened his mouth. The pterodactyl opened its long spiky jaws. Kyle did a goosenecked head bob. The pterodactyl bobbed and scooped up a mouthful of fish. Kyle heard a WHIRR-DING! sound effect as his red battery icon glowed green and grew from nearly empty to completely full. Raising his head, Kyle gained altitude and zipped across the sky. He leveled off and aimed for the volcano. Abia Sulayman, who was maybe three hundred feet ahead of him, stalled in midair. Her battery icon was solid red. Kyle shot past her. She dropped like a chunk of fossilized dinosaur bone. Ahead, Angus Harper appeared to be flying on vapors—barely sputtering, lurching and jerking forward. His battery icon went red just as Kyle zipped past him.

就在视频中翻腾的海浪上方几英寸。 水里满是鱼。 凯尔张开嘴。翼龙张开了长而尖的下颚。 凯尔做了个鹅脖波波头。 翼龙上下摆动，抓起了一口鱼。 凯尔听到了呼呼声!音效是他的红色电池图标变绿，从几乎空到完全满。 凯尔抬起头，上升到一定高度，迅速掠过天空。 他保持平稳，瞄准火山。 在他前面大约三百英尺的阿比亚·苏莱曼在半空中停了下来。 她的电池图标是纯红色的。 凯尔飞快地从她身边走过。她像一块恐龙骨化石一样掉了下来。 前面，安格斯·哈珀似乎是在蒸汽上飞行——几乎没有溅射，蹒跚着向前颠簸。 就在凯尔从他身边飞驰而过时，他的电池图标变成了红色。

"You must've cheated!" Harper screamed right before his pterodactyl plummeted to its watery grave. "Nope!" shouted Kyle, executing a pretty nifty barrel roll by swiveling his hips. "I just did my homework!" When Kyle's pterodactyl reached the volcano, a hot-air balloon rose from the smoldering basin. In the balloon's wicker gondola was a video-game image of Mr. Lemoncello dressed like the Wizard of Oz. "Hearty and splendiferous congratulations, Kyle Keeley," boomed Mr. Lemoncello. "You played hard but you studied harder. You are the true Lord of the Fliers. Therefore, by the power vested in me by the electric company, even though they didn't know I would be wearing a vest today, I hereby award you the Olympian Researcher medal for meritorious fish mongering. Tonight, at Olympia Village, in honor of your cleverosity, you and your teammates shall feast upon fish sticks and Filet-O-Fish sandwiches."

“你一定是作弊了!”哈珀尖叫着，然后他的翼手龙掉进了水里的坟墓。 “不!”凯尔喊道，扭动臀部做了一个漂亮的桶滚。 “我刚做完作业!”当凯尔的翼手龙到达火山时，一个热气球从闷烧的盆地升起。 气球的柳条吊舱里放着莱蒙切罗先生的电子游戏形象，他穿着绿野仙踪的服装。 “衷心祝贺你，凯尔·基利，”莱蒙切罗先生大声说道。 “你玩得很努力，但你学习更努力。 你才是真正的飞行之王。 因此，以电力公司赋予我的权力，尽管他们不知道我今天会穿背心，我在此授予你奥林匹克研究员奖章，奖励你有功卖鱼。 今晚，在奥运亚村，为了表彰你的聪明才智，你和你的队友将享用鱼条和麦香鱼三明治。”