A/N: I know this is being done/has been done, but hey. This is a good story line with some intense back-story, if we'd seen more of it. The relationship between Grady and the squad is ridiculously drawing to me for some reason. So here is my take- my little contribution- to the reason they function like they do. AND besides that, Owen Grady is beautiful and his raptors are something else and together.. *whistles* Hard to beat. Read on and enjoy. ALSO- unbeta'd as of right now, so all mistakes are mine.

Disclaimer: I'm the one who wasn't even aware of Jurassic World's release. Okay. My grandma took me to see it, alright? The second movie came out the year I was born. So I don't own/have any rights to any of the Jurassic Park/Jurassic World storyline/characters/etc. And unfortunately, no, I don't make any money from this, although they have plenty to spare from their new record of biggest opening weekend in movie history...

No. He wasn't afraid; his heart was just racing. He wasn't trembling; it was the four AM chill sneaking it's way beneath his clothes. The wind whispered across Owen's skin, blowing the murmurs from the men behind him into the wind. His boots rapped sharply on the concrete as they crossed the yard to the nursery. A wispy fog had laid itself over the area, lit eerily by the bright light posts. There was a gentle hum from the nearby generator, and it all made him even more on edge. The call had come fifteen minutes ago, and he'd made the ten minute drive from his trailer off-site in less than five. He'd gotten a funny look from Joel when he climbed off his motorcycle. "You regularly wear your shirts inside out?" Joel was the head of feeding, supply management and population monitoring. He took care of rations, ordering shipments, choosing which predators to let loose and which ones to hold back. He'd been there for a while before they'd hired Owen, and was aware of more than he let on. People generally seemed to respect him, even those higher-up in the food chain. He'd helped Owen find his way around the first week, and was exceedingly useful and knowledgeable on anything to do with dinosaurs of all sorts. A good guy, but probably too smart for his own good. Ever the military man, Owen calculated everyone he met and he knew if something went wrong, (he wasn't born yesterday, he knew what he was getting into,) he'd hope Joel was on his side.

Owen watched as the two security guards fell back with Lowery, who had pulled out his tablet and was looking at what Owen halfway recognized as a diagram for the new paddock. He wished Ms. Dearing and Joel would've followed suit and remained outside, but he wasn't going to complain. Imprinting was the important part, and they both knew better than to get in the way of something quite so vital. Quite so scary.

The eggs were in an incubator, of sorts. The nursery was a protected building next to the area where the paddock was being built for the new additions. It would be a strictly velociraptor-only area, once it was built. In the nursery, there were heat lamps and controlled-temperature nests, feeding bins, a crash cart, and nothing else. It was meant to be as homely as possible-although Owen had never seen a regular nursery quite as surveilled as this. Cameras in every corner and fingerprint-only doors. Owen knew how it worked- these were GMO eggs if he'd every seen one, and only God knew what the scientists had done to get them in there. No living dinosaur had made those, and no-one was willing to risk losing them. The eggs were all slightly different, clustered together in the straw. It was silent in the nursery, the hum of the lamps and the rain on the roof the only sounds. Claire sighed, breaking the silence. "Every time I see them, I just.. they're so unique. We made something from nothing, you know?"

Owen glanced at her. Joel gave him a look, knowing Owen was more likely to shoot his mouth off than to just leave it. "Not from nothing. They're a little bit of this, some of that, but one hundred percent something."

Claire was silent for a moment as they studied the eggs. Two of them were gently twitching. "And you're here to make them that something."

He shrugged, and didn't reply. Who knew how this would go. He could only hope for something new and surprising. Retired Navy, he wasn't as naive to think he'd have done well with a normal civilian job, and wasn't brave (or maybe dumb) enough to pry too far into what else was going on at the large-scale amusement park. As long as he could stick to training and being generally disliked by people because he could do what they wouldn't- he'd be at home. It'd work out.

An hour later, the first one hatched. The air was tense, and crackling with excitement and worry. Owen was sure his heart was beating loud enough the others could hear it on the other side of the glass isolation doors. He waited until it broke free from the shell, and then held the reptile to his chest, slime and all. She was a cloudy black and grey, with a dark blue stripe down her back. A small cry came from her throat, and Owen almost laughed. "Hello, Blue."

"Blue?" Claire turned to Joel behind the glass, a questioning look directed his way.

"She's his beta," Joel suggested.

"So?"

Joel motioned to the other eggs. "Each one is a little different. Each one will have her own name. They're his team. He's going by what you would know as the NATO phonetic alphabet. You know, Alpha Bravo Charlie. Whiskey Tango Foxtrot. Whatever. I guess his second in command gets a little more personalization." He gazed at the firstborn raptor, grinning. It was a moment not many got to witness- the birth and imprinting of such a... unique species.

"She's a pretty one," Claire said. They watched as Owen interacted with her on the other side of the glass. Claire wasn't fooled by his reputation- the gentleness in his hands and the slow, calming manner he was using was obvious to anyone looking on.

"Her main DNA strand came from a Black-Throated African Monitor lizard. She'll probably live up to her name," Joel commented.

"I thought their stripes mostly ran the other direction."

"She's not actually one of them." Joel scratched away at his notepad, writing down the weight and distinguishing markings on the reptile's body right next to time of birth. They would get weight once Owen was done, and do general health checkups and everything else that was absolutely required when breeding and raising such an aggressive and unusual species.

The next two came together- Echo, and then Delta. They were both equally as slimy, but the latter was greener and more wiry. As Owen held Echo, Delta was emerging into the small world of the nursery. He picked her up in his unoccupied arm and began talking to her in muted tones. There was almost a squabble between the two- Echo lunged for Delta, and Owen intercepted the small mouth with his hand. He'd have a nice bruise on his wrist for a few days.

Charlie came last, and almost not at all. Owen almost took charge and broke the egg- but there was no need. Blue, making clucking noises and calling loudly, broke the egg herself and pulled pieces out from the crack. A smaller and weaker looking velociraptor crawled out of the egg, falling into the dirt and straw of the incubator. Owen picked it up- and ended up not putting it down much at all for the next two weeks. She was small, long. They said it was because of the multiple stands of Green Iguana DNA they'd used, but Owen knew there was some sort of defect that they wouldn't fess up to. He cared for her without ceasing, scared to lose her but not naive enough to think he could stop her from dying. There was one night when she started hacking, a cough that turned into a gurgle, shudders wracking her green body. He'd been most scared then, but once it was over, he'd felt relieved. It couldn't get worse than that, when he could physically feel her lying limply in his hands, almost gone. Owen hadn't spent more than three nights away from the nursery since they had been born. Nobody interfered, nobody objected. They considered him doing more than his job at that point; Owen Grady knew better. He knew this was his job, and he was simply giving it the most he could. So it began. Claire would look in on them every couple of days, to remind him of a training schedule he needed to come up with, of the parameters he was allowed to break and of the ones he couldn't. Charlie got steadily better, gathering her strength and growing rapidly in the next month. They became more like their grown-up counterparts, all limbs and teeth and danger. Owen did make a training chart eventually, writing down goals in his leather-bound moleskin.

1. Gain a mutual respect.

2. Come to terms with receiving commands (and following them, eventually.)

3. Build a two-way communication- a team as a whole to their Alpha, the Alpha to the squad.

4. Protect them from outside influences!

The last one was a big one. He could fail, given one person making a singular wrong move. They were so fragile, for such strong creatures. So touchy. They needed to be handled carefully, every move deliberately thought-through. You could ruin potential twice as fast as you could save it. Owen knew that well because he knew himself- and somehow, the situation with his new squad wasn't far from relatable.

"They'll be amazing some day," Claire had breathed, watching them that night in the nursery after all was said and done. Lowery had joined them around sunrise, and Owen was standing beside him watching his new charges. He didn't disagree with Claire, but it was more than that. They were already amazing. Awe-inspiring. His hands were still trembling, but for different reasons. As he'd held each of them to his chest, watching their body cues and feeling the wet, sinewy skin beneath his hands- it was as if they were each a silent cry of wilderness, a new land, wild and free and untamed- and he was the explorer, discovering it. Discovering them- and maybe somewhere in there, discovering himself at some point.

So. R&R. Can't wait to flesh this out. Let me know what you guys think!