Author's Note: Having watched Fallen Kingdom and completely loved it, my mind was spinning with potential stories. This is what I came up with. Please bear in mind, right from the get-go, this will be majorly AU for the new movie as I try to explore how far this rabbit-hole can go. Having said that, previously established lore, such as dates, and facts that have helped to establish this universe I will remain true to. There will be some spoilers for JW:FK, especially in later chapters. So if you don't want spoilers, go watch the film first.
Please remember to review. I want to know if you guys think I should continue this. Enjoy!
My Father's Sins
August 30th, 2008
"Sir? I report that we have a viable result for you."
Benjamin looked up. The constant shake in his left knee stilling for a fraction of a second. A woman in a white lab coat stood before him, an impatient tick in her right heel made it click against the tiles. Her dark skin, greying hair and thick accent suggested she was originally from a middle-eastern country, but Benjamin could never remember which. All he could remember was that her name was Dr Moroe, and that she was expensive. The woman jerked her head, not looking at him, scribbling something on her notebook. She turned on her heel and briskly walked back the way she'd come, not waiting for her employer to even stand.
Braced for the familiar lick of pain along his aching bones, he pulled himself up with the use of his cane. His housekeeper, ever faithful Iris, was quick to offer to help him, but he waved her away shortly. He was not crippled just yet. The disease hadn't completely taken from him the use of his legs. And until he was wheelchair bound, he was determined to make his own way. The strike of the cane on the floor echoed down the hall like the chime of Death's bell.
A chill swept down the hall and he struggled not to give in to the urge to shiver. He hated it down here. The tiled white floors shone like bone. The concrete walls, smoothed to perfection, had been leeched of colour. Florescent lights above did not flicker once, their eye-piercing brightness constant and unyielding. In another part of the basement, the sound of distant machines beeped and whirred like whispers just beyond the edge of his hearing. Benjamin wanted nothing more than to go back to the sleek mahogany staircases and rich oak floors of the levels above them. He wanted the sun shining through the stain-glass windows, he wanted the familiar tick of the great grandfather clocks on every floor. Despite the new splash of paint and modernisation of the equipment down here, Benjamin could still see the ghosts of the past lingering behind every brick and door.
He opened the door that Dr Moroe had slipped through. Before he could prevent her, Iris held it open for him so he wouldn't have to shoulder its weight. Benjamin tried to remember his patience and say nothing. Iris meant nothing by it, she was just a caring woman by nature. The pair of them stepped into the room, their senses suddenly bombarded with even brighter light, the scent of disinfectant and a scorching heat. Eli Mills was already here, stood off to the side and taking note of everything that happened with a critical and observant eye. Benjamin immediately made his way over to him. It felt good to have the young man here. Mills knew how important this was to Benjamin, and as with everything he asked of him, the younger man did everything possible to follow Benjamin's every wish. It was Mills that had found Doctor Moroe, as well as the team that had updated the old labs and worked them to the bone.
Mills nodded his head in greeting to his boss. "Sir, I think we're almost ready to–"
Benjamin's eyes had caught on a group of Doctors and scientists crowded around something. His heart clenched, and the older man found his legs moving, pulling him forward without his permission. Like a fish on a hook, he was reeled in. Nothing would hold him back, he was compelled to see what was the centre of attention. Not even when Mills tried to catch his sleeve with a whispered: "Sir! I wouldn't just yet–"
He brushed the younger man off sharply without looking back. The scientists parted before him, and Benjamin found himself looking into an incubator: an ordinary looking box, like you would see in any maternity ward in any hospital. Laid out on the blanketed bed of the incubator, was a small wrinkled baby. Its features and skin were slightly swollen and pruned from the constant submergence in liquid it had endured whilst growing. An oversized diaper was the only thing it wore, the pinched and cut umbilical cord poking over the top, looking slightly blue and off where it had been hooked to an artificial feeder. Benjamin pressed his hand against the glass top of the incubator, wanting so badly to reach inside for the tiny life within. The ghastly sight of needles, wires and tubes sticking into the soft new flesh of the infant wrenched his heart in two. He could see the little chest quivering as it attempted to breathe. A pinprick mark dotted the baby's heel where blood had already been drawn. He'd given strict instructions that he was to be summoned the moment she was brought out of the tank… the moment she was "born". The Doctors had worked fast in order to get her to this state before he'd even come in the room.
"How bad is it?" he heard himself ask in a hollow voice.
The other scientists had the decency to look saddened for his predicament, their heads bowed as they each wondered who would tell him. Dr Moroe was at her desk, looking through her microscope at the blood samples she'd taken and deferring to her notes. "Considering the state of the DNA I had to work with, the subject is as rampant with the disease as its original counterpart was when the sample was collected."
Which wasn't very good at all… Benjamin pressed his lips together and closed his eyes, breathing deeply. "I thought… Mills, you told me this would work…"
"With all due respect, Sir," Mills reminded him softly with a slow step forward. "You were adamant that most of the DNA strand remained unchanged. You didn't want anything different – aside from the removal of the disease. Tests were done, but we couldn't do it without majorly defying your wish."
"I cannot make a silk purse out of a sow's ear." Moroe muttered to herself as she scribbled further, the pen scratching so loudly it seemed like it would tear through the paper.
"Will she… will she live?" Benjamin forced himself to ask, trying hard not to remember when he'd uttered those exact same words…
"The subject is stable," Moroe said before Mills could. She spun her stall so that she faced Benjamin, her dark eyes hard behind her thick rimmed glasses. "I was able to work some miracles. The disease was slowed during incubation, but now only time will tell if that holds. In any case the subject will need constant medical treatment going forward."
The one thing she hated so badly… His stomach was knotted, but he forced out the words. "Do whatever you have to. More funding will be provided for you to find a cure."
Moroe perked up a little, and she hurriedly spun back around to her desk to scribble again in her note book. Mills took another step closer and gently suggested: "Do you have a name for her, Mr Lockwood? I don't think it would be appropriate for Dr Moroe to keep calling her the subject from now on."
Names were permanent. Names allowed for attachments to grow in your heart because a name made something real. Could he risk that if he was so close to already losing her again? Benjamin cast one last look inside the Incubator – so small, so fragile, and already beset by wickedness caused by him. Her hair was dark, and when she fleetingly opened her eyes, he caught a glimpse of those same eyes he remembered from so long ago…
It's like she never left… he thought, and then said: "Maisie. Her name is Maisie."
August 31st, 1973
"Her name is Maisie," Benjamin proclaimed to the trio of nurses crowded around him.
They applauded, and one hurried off to get done the essential paperwork. The other two quickly set to work on cleaning up his wife. Carmine Lockwood lay on the surgeon's table, her eyes closed in peaceful slumber. For as long as Benjamin had known her, Carmine had never been good with pain; she practically limped for a whole day every time she stubbed her toe. So she had vehemently argued that there was no chance on heaven or earth that she would go through the pain of labour. Despite the fact she hated the idea of the scar it would leave, she'd insisted on a C-Section. And having a millionaire for a husband had seen to it that it was secured for her.
Benjamin hoped the nurses would let her wake up soon. He couldn't wait to show her their beautiful and perfect baby girl. Carmine had liked the idea of having a daughter she could shower with clothes and pretty baubles and parade her at pageants just like she used to as a girl. Benjamin was certain he wanted a more enlightened and educated upbringing for his daughter, but would humour Carmine a little. He wanted to encourage the new mother as much as he could, for she'd been more than a little reluctant when she'd first found out about the pregnancy.
It was actually a little bit of a relief that she was still unconscious. Carmine was of a… sensitive disposition. She was constantly fretting over Benjamin's attention, she'd greedily had him all to herself for six blissful years of marriage. She hated change, and she was constantly fussing over her appearance. Having been brought up in high society, the woman was obsessed with being seen "the correct" way by those of higher ranking circles. Weak-willed and liable to fall easily to an insurmountable level of insecurities, Carmine Lockwood always needed to be handled with care when approaching anything new. Benjamin had feared she would become jealous of their daughter if the first thing she saw when she woke up was him cooing delightedly over the baby instead of devotedly attending to her. But that wouldn't happen, he would see to it that both his girls got all the love they needed and more.
"Well, Maisie," Benjamin murmured softly to the pink-towel-wrapped bundle in his arms. "You're going to meet Mummy very soon! And then we're all going to go home, we're you can have the biggest garden to run around in, and all the toys money can buy. Spare no expense for my little Maisie-daisy. We already have a governess all picked out for you. Iris is her name: she's a lovely lady and she'll be in charge of teaching you everything you're going to need until you can come and run the company with Daddy!"
The babe blinked open wide dark eyes that seemed to smile up at him.
Benjamin's heart melted with so much love, he didn't know what to do with it all. He tucked the little baby against his chest and began to rock her softly. "Just you wait, my dearest heart. You're going to take the world by storm."
September 28th, 2008
Benjamin stared into the Incubator, his hand pressed against the glass. Inside, Maisie slept on fitfully, her face scrunched up as if she was uncomfortable, her feet and hands flinching as if her dreams were filled with the same prodding needles that also haunted her waking hours. A machine beside the Incubator droned on to echo out her heart beat to the room. Despite the stuffy heat, Maisie's pale and bruised skin seemed cold and lonely.
Almost a month old, and he hadn't been allowed to hold her once yet.
Things had just gone from bad to worse since day one. The disease was already trying to make a foothold, to squeeze the life out of its small host. In her one month of life, Maisie had already needed two blood transfusions just to introduce clean blood where her liver was already starting to malfunction. Dr Moroe had been doing her absolute best to stem the growing strength of the disease, and had been countering it with as much injections, steroids and radiation pulses she could force in that wouldn't kill Maisie. This morning had yielded somewhat satisfying results for her efforts, for it seemed last week's dire news had been averted – for now. Moroe had only once suggested "scrapping the project to start fresh". Benjamin had almost screamed the mansion down, threatening not just to fire the scientist but to bring hell's fury on her if she even dared such a thing! Thank goodness Mills had been there to calm the situation, or else Benjamin might've murdered the woman with his cane.
It was the only time Benjamin had shown any significant emotion since Maisie's birth. He'd been in a state of numbness after he'd first seen her. A part of him expected awful news to come at him every morning. If he allowed his emotions to rule him when he so often felt such fear and despair for what the next hour would bring, he'd be a living wreck of a man. No, he had to keep everything bottled up and tightly held in check. But the Doctor had struck a nerve that had flung open the gates to his pent up fears and unleashed them with vengeful fury. Despite the fact that nothing was like the idolised little picture he'd sold himself, he would never allow anyone to hurt Maisie. If he lost her then… well, that would be God's will and ultimate cruelty to him. But until her heart stopped beating of its own accord, no one was pulling the plug on his little Maisie.
"Sir?" Mills' voice murmured softly, careful not to be too loud and cause Maisie to stir – she was an incredibly light sleeper. "May I have a word?"
Benjamin slowly pulled himself away from the glass and followed Mills out into the hallway. He told himself he did not notice how Mills slowed his usual brisk pace so that Benjamin's limp could keep up. The young handsome man escorted Mills into an office across the way from the labs. Mills offered Benjamin the chair, but he shook his head. Eli leaned back against the desk, rubbed at the light stubble dotting his jaw. The man was rather handsome, and brilliant. Benjamin had spotted him several years ago, straight out of college, and had seen so much potential. He'd trained him up, made him his personal assistant, and when Benjamin's disease had finally started to make its presence known in his aging body, he'd appointed Mills as an acting authority over his fortune. A younger mind, a younger man, to make sure Benjamin's wealth and legacy would be ushered into the future. In return, Mills was a fiercely loyal man who had devoted himself to Benjamin. But perhaps these past few years had been too much? Mills seemed more tired than he used to, he spent too long agonising over paperwork.
Maybe Benjamin had been wrong to involve the young man in such a personal affair. But Mills was almost like a son to him…
"If you're going to give me bad news, then just say it." he told him grimly.
Mills sighed and rubbed his hands together. "I don't want you to give up, Sir. But if we're going to save your daughter… we need to start looking at more drastic options."
Benjamin shook his head. She had always hated it when the doctors used to get creative with their techniques. Too invasive, she used to say. How could he do that to a baby?
The door opened behind them, and Benjamin cocked a bushy brow when Dr Moroe marched in, notebook closed and held securely at her side. She looked sharply over at Mills. "Have you told him?"
Mills rolled his eyes. "I was about to–"
"Mr Lockwood," Moroe said briskly, cutting straight over Eli as she stepped closer to the billionaire philanthropist. "The subject – Maisie – requires more than is humanly possible to give."
"I hired you because you said you could push the boundaries of human possibilities," Benjamin growled out, the grief threatening to overwhelm him in a compelling wave. "And yet you tell me I'm still going to lose her?"
"You misunderstand. I said the subject requires more than is humanly possible to give. But there are other ways to cheating God."
Mills took that moment to step in, clearing his throat to grab Benjamin's attention before he could snap back at the woman. "Dr Moroe has come up with a theory that I believe could hold… potential." There was a brief moment of pause, as if Mills was calculating whether the line of no-return was safe enough to cross. "Dr Henry Wu has been approached by Masrani. They want him to concoct some type of experiment. A completely new animal."
Benjamin didn't need to ask how Mills knew about this. He himself had authorised the proposed network of spies within Masrani Global. After poor John's death, Masrani Global had snatched up the old man's assets and shouldered Benjamin's attempts to assist in this matter. He'd helped start this dream, after all, he wouldn't just relinquish his and John's vision to some stranger he didn't know and a company he didn't trust. But he was ignored and rejected, so he decided to keep an eye on things from within. So far, Simon Masrani had almost done John proud.
"Simon Masrani wants a new attraction," Mills went on to say. "But we've struck a deal with Wu, to see if we can alter this design into something similar but different, that will be grown here, for our own investments."
"And how does this have any relevance to our current situation?" Benjamin asked testily. He didn't want to think about the ball of disapproval he had in his stomach at the mention of that decision. He thought it wise not to ask. He didn't want to know how Mills would have Dr Wu turn on Hammond's dream.
"The new organism is a hybrid," Dr Moroe interjected. "I said it is not humanly possible to save the subject. But it is not an impossibility."
"What are you saying…?"
"Wu's 'miracles of life', have always been accidents," Dr Moroe spat with clear dislike, "side effects to his need to cut corners. He has never pushed for these results. Let me push where he won't. The natural immune systems of animals have always been superior to ours, their physiology is what makes them ideal for medical testing. If I could have that raw potential closely linked with the subject, we could have an infinite resource."
"What Dr Moroe is trying to say," Mills said. "Is that she believes this hybrid Wu is going to make, if given a piece of Maisie's DNA could potentially yield–"
"I can't believe I'm hearing this!" Benjamin stumbled back, horrified. The sting of irony was clear in his mind, for he remembered Hammond's exact same words to him so many years ago. "You can't! That's crossing a line!"
"It will save her!" Moroe said, and Benjamin froze. "We wouldn't use enough to make the DNA of any significance. Just enough so that medicine tests, even blood samples could pass. With these genetics we might even unlock the cure!"
The cure… a fable, a fairytale that Benjamin had deluded himself with so many times but could not bare to believe in anymore. It was the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, the light at the end of the tunnel. Yet still he was held spellbound by them, even now. Was it desperation? Madness?
"And," Mills murmured. "Once we have that cure, we can still sell on the asset for profit. We lose nothing."
He didn't ask the finer details. He didn't press them for specifics. He purposefully left it at their vague and magical description so that he could wash his hands clean of all this once he had what he wanted. In the years to come, he would bitterly regret such a decision. So much could have been avoided if he'd just said no. But if he had… his heart would've have died along with it. So instead, he just told them: "Do it."
March 14th, 1983
The promise he'd kept to Maisie was always the spine behind every decision he made. She would want for nothing, and the knowledge of the world would be taught to her. She was the centre of his entire world.
Perhaps that was why his marriage had not lasted. Carmine had not taken to motherhood, perhaps even worse than Benjamin had feared. A severe case of what would later be called Post-natal-depression had hit her hard. She couldn't stand it to see Benjamin shower Maisie in love and affection, thinking that the baby was stealing the love that was rightfully hers. Benjamin had tried to explain that there was room in his heart for both of them, but Carmine wouldn't have it. Only once had Benjamin – when Maisie was three – suggested they have another child, so that Maisie would grow up with a friend (and maybe so that Carmine could bond with this one). His wife had almost divorced him over that, and so no mention of more children was ever brought up again.
Maisie seemed to know that her mother was emotionally distant from her, and so kept herself away and mostly with her father or her nanny, Iris. This had caused more of a rift between the husband and wife, as Benjamin hated to see his little girl be so disappointed. Carmine had felt she was exceptionally lonely, and worst of all, she thought motherhood made her appear old. So in a bid to "recapture" her youth, she'd begun to socialise with the wrong type of rich crowd. She was out all the time, and more often than not, Benjamin would wake in the mornings to find that his wife had not returned home at all. The late seventies were filled with experimentation and sampling new substances. And Carmine's weak-willed spirit made her unable to say no whenever anyone offered her anything. Maisie had just turned six when her mother had accidentally overdosed herself and died. The funeral had been held but not many were in attendance, and Maisie wasn't as distraught as Benjamin had feared she might be. The little girl had hardly known the woman, she said, so why should she cry over her?
So Benjamin had later, in the safety of his own room, cried for her.
It had been just them three for a while, Benjamin, Iris and Maisie. And then, in 1981, Benjamin had run into an old friend: John Hammond. The two had first met when John was just starting to gain real traction amassing his wealth, and Benjamin had just come out of university. John was a couple of years older than Benjamin, but the two of them had become the best of friends over the course of a single evening. The two had dreamed up various schemes together over the course of the next few years, and John was even Benjamin's best man at his wedding. However, with John's projects and game parks all across the world needing his attention at various stages, it became increasingly hard to keep in touch. Neither friend would hold that against the other, they were grown-up enough to understand that sometimes life finds a way of getting complicated.
John had come to Benjamin and had once more spun his dreams so grand over a night of drinks that Benjamin was swept away by it. John had become recently fascinated by the science of DNA that had started to really take off in recent years. He imagined what it would be like to set up a park filled with the fantastical… and Benjamin had fallen for the dream too. The pair had decided right then and there that they would take up one last adventure.
Their research teams had taken several weeks to turn up anything useful, but once the fossil and amber samples started to come in, the pair of them got to work. Benjamin had dabbled in this kind of research in his earlier years, so it was no leap for him to grasp the science of it. They'd hired the best minds and in the labs set in the basement beneath the Lockwood Estate, they'd begun their exploration into the powers of godhood.
Finally, one of the lab technicians came in and handed Benjamin a sample in a dish and the papers that went with it. Benjamin read it through first, his eyes scrutinising every word. His fingers began to shake. His face turned white. "John!"
"What is it?" Hammond asked, sounding almost panicked.
Benjamin's feet shuffled, numbed. "The sample… it's viable…"
John just stood there slack-jawed. They'd done it. They'd actually done it! John was the first to break out of his stupor and scream for joy. He bounded over to Benjamin a wrapped him up in a fierce bear-hug, jumping up and down on the spot. Benjamin laughed, then threw his head back and shouted with cheer. They'd done it! The impossible, and they'd done it!
"Daddy? Uncle John?" called a small voice. The pair turned to find Maisie, her brown hair pulled back in a tight braid, standing in the doorway. Iris stood dutifully behind her. Maisie frowned at the pair of men, confused. "What are you doing?"
"Celebrating!" John crowed with delight. He ran forward and swept Maisie off her feet and spun her round. The child startled but then shrieked with laughter. John had always adored Maisie, he claimed she reminded him so much of his own daughter, and he had always been called 'the favourite uncle'. He took Maisie's hand and led her over to peer into the dish Benjamin held. "Come quick! Look! You see that? That, Maisie-Daisy, is the key to life."
Within the next year, John and Benjamin managed to successfully clone their first prehistoric animal. With this proof, John and Benjamin began to actually start to set up the dream that was slowly materialising in their heads. A park, a sanctuary, where extinction didn't have to be forever… Sometimes Benjamin struggled to comprehend what it was they were trying to achieve. But Hammond never wavered, not once did his vision ever faulter, his dream was always there and when he spoke of it he made you believe that such a glorious thing was possible. The year after that, 1985, the pair of them set up a meeting to attract investors to create a company they would call INGEN: International Genetics Incorporated. Benjamin, with his wealthy connections long set up by his family for generations, was able to attract the best investors, who followed his example when he threw down his money for Hammond – just like they'd rehearsed. The Ingen company was established within that same year. In 1986, Ingen took the research that John and Benjamin had started with, and managed to successfully clone the very first dinosaur: A triceratops.
Benjamin brought Maisie along with him to where the magnificent animal was being kept. He escorted her in, hardly able to keep his own excitement in. Maisie, like most children, had always been fascinated with dinosaurs. Carefully through the glass, he'd shown it to her. She hadn't spoken for an awfully long time, and then slowly, she turned to look back at him, tears in her eyes but her mouth opened wide with pure awe and joy.
And Benjamin vowed to always do everything in his power to keep that wonderful smile there!
February 2nd, 2010
The time it had taken for Wu to finish the DNA splicing, and for Dr Moroe to further tweak his original design with her own extras, had tested the limit of Benjamin's patience. Between that and then the formation of the embryo and incubation of the egg, time ticked on. Time that Maisie did not have. It became a race a against the clock that no one wanted to acknowledge. Moroe tried to give herself some time, performing whatever measures she felt was necessary in order to keep Maisie alive until they could see if the fruits of their labour was worth it. For some of these procedures, Benjamin couldn't watch.
Maisie was just under eighteen months old when finally, the end was in sight. In a room right next door to hers, separated only by a wall of glass with a sliding door, another lifeform was being born. A single egg was laid on the table underneath the heat-lamp. A crack appeared on the off-white shell. From inside, a creaking squeak sounded. No one was in there with it. Wu had passed on a message to Mills when he'd handed him the embryo DNA. Apparently, this Hybrid was purposefully designed to be dangerous, but the exact outcome wasn't guaranteed yet. All caution was taken and so the scientists had vacated the room to wait behind a pane of glass until the newly hatched creature was docile enough for them to swoop in with sedatives.
A tiny hand poked out through the egg and flopped lifelessly against the shell. The monitors that read the signatures taken from the egg told them it was not dead, just resting. The talons were long and curled like the Grim Reaper's scythe, the scales black, the flesh twitching uncontrollably. In her Incubator, Maisie began to stir, possibly for food. She wriggled around, having been kept in the Incubator for most of her life, she had only just learned to sit up by sheer force of will. When no one came to give her food straight away, her little pale face puckered and then she began to cry out. In the other room, the occupant inside the egg was stirred to life by the noise. It reached out blindly with hooked claws in the direction of the noise. Slowly, more of the egg was pushed apart as a small black head poked its way out with a mouthful of mismatched needle teeth. It squawked indignantly as it fell out of the egg and onto the cold table.
On wobbly legs, the creature stood, tapping its raised toe-claws on the ground as if sending out some signal. One-Two. One-Two-Three. Its head, with quill-like-feathers twitching along its neck and behind its skull, twisted around as if looking for something. Maisie cried out again. The black monster with its far-too-bright golden eyes snapped its gaze in the direction of the noise again, toe-claw tapping again, and its mouth chittering loudly.
Dr Moroe was the first to approach it. She snatched it up and roughly began to turn it this way and that. The creature shrieked in outrage and wriggled, but it was already exhausted from hatching and so quickly grew tired. Benjamin was still a little put off by the dread he felt in his stomach at such profound anger in that creature's gaze. Dr Moroe dictated to her underlings who took down notes on measurements and weights and other things Moroe took note of. Benjamin tapped on the glass for her to get on with it. She immediately pulled out a syringe and took a blood sample. The Hybrid hissed at the pain, but Moroe didn't take any heed.
Quickly taking the sample to her desk she ran tests that lasted twenty minutes. In that time, the creature was fed and properly looked over to make sure it was healthy. In the end, whatever Moroe found, it made her go completely still for a moment, before slowly turning her chair to stare Mills and Benjamin in the eye.
"It is viable!" she proclaimed with a triumphant gleam in her eye.
Benjamin felt like he could collapse.
A few hours later, Moroe had managed to distil a form of the creature's blood so that it would be safe for human use. Once it was done, she immediately came into the adjoining room and gave it immediately to Maisie. The infant had screamed when her sensitive skin had been pierced hastily. Now they awaited results. Maisie had been coming up for her next blood transfusion anyway.
Within an hour, there was a noticeable improvement. Maisie's skin looked brighter, her hair that had been eroded to patches on her head from a lifetime of constantly laying down, looked shinny again. Samples Moroe took said that the blood was overall looking cleaner, which meant the liver had responded well. Benjamin silently allowed his tears to fall. A year and a half old, and only now was he allowed to hold her for the very first time. This wasn't a permanent cure, but it was a step in the right direction. He told Mills and Moroe to make immediate accommodations for the creature so that further testing could be done. It'd saved Maisie's life, so therefore it would stay and continue to do so. What they did with it, he didn't know. Benjamin cared for little else in the world as he held Maisie in his arms for the first time in twenty-five years.
As the creature was carried out sleepily in the arms of scientists, it stared over their arms to look through the glass and stare directly at the young pink life-form lovely held in the arms of The Father. Dark brown eyes glittered open and stared right back at him. He chittered softly, but she made no reply. All she did was weakly reach out with her hand. He mirrored the gesture, extending his claws in her direction as if to meet her across the growing distance between them. And then, his jailors carried him around the corner and she was out of sight. Already the world felt cold.
"What is this thing?" he heard a voice, the thing who was carrying him, said.
The other one shrugged. "Moroe mentioned something about an Indoraptor…"
