You are in the floodplains of Mongolia, Asia, 96 million years ago.

The humid air of the Cretaceous forest smelled of pine and damp earth. You adjusted your pack, pausing beside a massive fern to check the map. That’s when the silence hit—the abrupt lack of insects chirping.

A sudden, soft thwip-thwip-thwip sound, like leather slapping wet dirt, drew your attention to a small clearing.

Three of them emerged from the undergrowth. They were smaller than you expected—hardly three feet tall at the hip—but they carried themselves with incredible elegance.

Archaeornithomimus.

They were far more bird-like in their movements than you imagined, lacking wings but possessing long, graceful legs and slender necks that constantly turned from side to side, scanning the area.

Their dark, feathered bodies contrasted with the brighter stripes of color on their long tails, which they held straight out for balance as they ran. One of them stopped abruptly, its small, toothless beak only a few feet from you. It didn't seem scared, just curious, tilting its head in a way that reminded you painfully of a flightless bird you once knew.