I like Owen Grady. Actually, I love him, if I'm being completely honest. So you might be wondering why I found myself in a situation where I wanted nothing more than to rip his face off.

Yes, literally.

Well, it's a long story, but it all started with a terrible car accident. The crash itself was bad enough on its own, but it was only the beginning of my troubles. At the time, however, I believed that I had reached the direst moment of my life, and quite possibly the last. I mean, I was literally bleeding from the throat, having somehow fallen over the shattered windshield at full force. The glass they use for car windows is designed to shatter into itty-bitty ovals to prevent injury, but for some reason, the base of the windshield remained mostly intact, so when I was launched forward by the unexpected impact, it cut through my neck like a reverse-guillotine. I started choking uncontrollably shortly after. At first, I assumed that I was just winded from the fall, but with each cough, red flecks peppered the car's hood, which meant that I was bleeding internally.

I'm making it sound like I was completely lucid during this time, using reason and logic to figure out what was going on, but while it was happening, my thoughts were racing, bumping into each other, and generally functioning like static-charged ping-pong balls in a fully-inflated bouncy house.

Or something.

Once I realized that I was hurt- hurt badly- my first thought was, "Oh, god, don't let Maisie see this." The poor girl had witnessed so much death already, seen more than any child should ever lay eyes upon . . . You know what I'm getting at. I didn't want her to watch me die as well. I mean, we had only just started to grow close, and I was afraid that this tragedy would plant seeds of mistrust in her heart, make her fear the cruelty of the world around her . . . stuff like that. I didn't want to die, not for my own sake, but for hers. If I died that day, her future would be even more uncertain than it already was.

Like I said before, I love Owen, but he is NOT ready to raise a child on his own. Not a human child, anyway. He managed just fine with Blue, I guess. Thank god he wasn't successful in bringing her back into the mix. I mean, can you imagine having to deal with an adopted child AND an unpredictable prehistoric animal? Of course, Owen was about to face something far worse than a raptor. Worse than the Indominus Rex, worse than the Indoraptor . . . a real monster. I can't even begin to describe it.

There is nothing deadlier than an intelligent creature who knows how to effectively manipulate its human peers on a personal level. It's cruel. It's completely and utterly amoral. There is nothing forgivable, nothing human about what I did, and I don't think I can ever move past the shame I feel now, having done such terrible things. And it all began when that strange woman got out of her car.

"Holy shit, HOLY SHIT!"

Owen, meanwhile, was holding my throat closed. I think I may have coughed blood on his shirt, but my vision was blurring at the time, so I can't say for certain.

"Call an ambulance!" Owen barked before turning back to me, "Hang on, Claire, hang on . . ."

"I don't have a phone, but I have- OH! I think I can save her!"

"Are you a doctor?"

She clicked her tongue.

". . . No."

"Then what are you?"

And that's when things got weird.

"Listen, I'm from a world adjacent to yours. I came here because our former Queen, who I am a projection of, went missing, and our records indicate that she passed through this world, causing a car crash at the end of a Lord of the Rings crossover special. I came here to find her, but inadvertently caused a car crash of my own, meaning I ruined the ambiguity of wondering which car crash she caused at the end of the story, but the good news is, if she indeed came here many years ago, odds are, you're all infected with the Volatus Virus."

I'm not sure that explanation would have made sense even if I was in good health.

"What the hell are you talking about?" Owen snapped, "What virus?"

"The one that's gonna save Claire's life, thank you very much!" she crowed, "A while back, the other former Queen had an accident where she impaled Bryce Dallas Howard on her horn, meaning she would have been infused with Stegoceratops DNA prior to the filming of Fallen Kingdom, and by that logic, this Claire is similarly infected."

Owen blinked. The strange woman started pacing back and forth.

"Crossing over to this world, I used a fission-powered time machine, and if I let out a wave of nuclear energy, it will activate the virus in those who were infected over the years. If we shock Claire using those car-cable thingies, she'll start changing into a Stegoceratops, and the virus will read it as her being killed by a dinosaur, which she will then become, and thus recover from her untimely death. It's simple."

Owen shook his head.

"You're out of your-"

"I promise, it makes sense. Just let me do my thing, and we can save her. There's no way an ambulance will make it here in time, so I'm your last, best hope."

Why did Owen agree to her nonsense? Perhaps it was desperation. The knowledge that this haphazard plan was the only feasible (and I use that world incredibly lightly) way to save my life may have been enough to convince him that it was at least worth a try.

And try, they did. Owen had Maisie bring him the booster cables (irresponsible) and hooked them up to the car while she wept over my soon-to-be-dead body (very irresponsible), and the strange woman got ready to press the button that would send a nuclear wave rippling through the entire world (probably the most irresponsible thing of all). When she hesitated, Owen clenched his fists.

"Well?! What are you waiting for?!"

She crouched over my body, biting her lip.

"Nothing. It just occurred to me that the Volatus Virus has been in this world for a decade, more or less, and has perhaps had time to mutate unpredictably. That, combined with the fact that literally everyone on Earth will be affected . . ."

"Save Claire," Owen said flatly.

"Yes, but I'm just warning you that the damage control-"

"Save. Claire."

She sighed.

"Fine . . . Oh, Lord, what horror hath I wrought-"

"JUST DO IT!"

She closed her eyes tight and pressed the button. I didn't feel a thing, but I guess it must have worked. They hooked me up to two metal clamps and moved to the other end of the cables, and holy shit, I don't think I've ever felt pain like that in my entire life! It ran through me like- Well, like electricity, I guess, and my vision faded from bright red to black.

And that was how I died.

It didn't last long, however, because I suddenly found myself gasping for air, interrupting a loud argument between Owen and the strange woman. I coughed up some kind of fluid- probably more blood- and rolled onto my front. What came next was by no means as painful as the electrocution, but it wasn't exactly a bucket of laughs, either. There was a kind of muted aching all over my body, which had begun to shift in different ways. All I could see was my hand in front of me, which was grabbing at the roadside gravel, only that distraction didn't last. I thought I might be hallucinating, because there came a point when I didn't have any fingers to grab with. I settled on pawing the dirt with a disgusting elephantine foot, surprised and frustrated and terrified all at once.

If there was one improvement, it was in my health. The extra ventilation hole in my throat closed up, so I tried to say something, except it came out as a moo. I don't know why, but this was what shocked me the most. I went rigid, then turned to look over my shoulder. I did not like what I saw.

"Oh, hey! Her frill is different!" the strange woman chirped, "I guess it's because she grew out her hair before changing."

"Is she okay?" Owen breathed, "She looks like she's not okay."

What do you do when you wake up from a near-death experience and discover that you're living in a body that's not your own? Well, I'm not sure what the sensible reaction is, but personally, I lost my shit. I remember bucking and screaming and rolling around in the dirt, probably putting Owen and the others in a very dangerous situation, since I wasn't yet in control of the spiked tail fastened to my rear. They tried to calm me down, but to no avail. I was fat, green, and ugly, and it was not a happy change, I'm sorry to say.

All this panic came to a sudden halt when I felt another shift happening. I dug my front legs into the dusty gravel, petrified. Something was horribly wrong.

"What the- Oh, shit! Her knee!"

The strange woman must be talking about me, I realized, so I tucked my head between my legs to see what the hell she was on about. My injured knee, the one the Indoraptor punctured with its claw, seemed to be burning. Actually, my scales were just turning black- and yes, I had scales now. One by one, the little green ovals on my leg darkened, spreading out in a honeycomb pattern. My joints began to ache, and I heard a disconcerting cracking sound.

"Oh my god . . ."

I'm not sure who said it, but they were absolutely right. This was NOT normal. My toes hurt like hell, and when I kicked my leg, they felt heavier than before. My back started to itch, and as I tried to bend my head over it, I found quills poking out of my hide, slivering between my plates (PLATES, OH GOD!), as though a porcupine was trying to inflate through my back. Those spikes weren't there before, I was sure.

I jumped as my spine began to pop. Bumpy segments shot up from the base of my neck, all the way down to where my tail met my body. And then the feeling moved down my arms, and I saw fingers sprouting from my feet once more, except they weren't human fingers.

They were claws.

I stretched them out, turning them around . . . testing them. These, I liked. These, I wanted to use. I didn't even notice what was happening to my neck and face, I was so enthralled by my talons. As sharp teeth slid out of the corners of my mouth, I noticed something else.

Owen.

He was standing there, watching me. He was afraid. He was ready to run. And I-

Well, I was ready to use my claws.

In that moment, I realized just how much I wanted to kill him.

I think the worst part about it was that I wasn't baring my teeth or growling or anything like that . . . I was smiling. The idea of killing him . . . well, it was just a game to me. And I was ready to win.

As I lunged forward, however, another force brought me to my knees. The strange woman had somehow managed to sneak up behind me and clip the booster cables on my plates. The same shock as before ripped through my chest. It hurt like hell. But worse than that, the strange woman started clobbering me with a large, blunt object. I might be misremembering, but it looked like a massive . . . um . . . phallus. It took a few blows to the head before she managed to knock me out.

***TSJWFKFEW***

When I awoke, I was lying in a cage. I leapt to my feet, looking around for any sign of Owen, but he was nowhere to be seen.

Damn it. He had gotten away from me.

Pacing back and forth, I tried to find a way out. I was too- erm- large to fit through the bars, save my slender arms, and biting them wasn't doing much for me either. There was a keypad within my reach, but after a few attempts at guessing the code, I decided not to risk locking it permanently. Even if it didn't operate like a smartphone, there was no use wasting my time guessing. My best bet was to wait for another person to show up. Luckily, it wasn't long before someone did.

The strange woman entered from a door on the opposite side of the room, which as a whole appeared to be some kind of abandoned laboratory. My cage was located in the center of the lab, obviously a new addition among the dust-covered tables. She trotted up to my cage with a pained smile.

"Hi, there! I'm glad to see you're awake. How are you feeling?"

I tried to say something, but it came out as a kind of growling bark.

"Great!" she chirped, "Happy to hear it. I don't think we were properly introduced. My name is Moonwatcher. I'm kind of in charge of this place, since our former Queen went missing-"

I snuffed.

"This isn't unusual, no. She's very eccentric. I'm just worried that it's permanent this time . . . Anyway, I've been charged with, well, pretty much everything, so you can probably guess why this little hiccup reflects poorly on my record. I mean, in literally less than an hour, I somehow managed to fuck up the entire canon of Jurassic World, heehee . . ."

Those last few words sounded like something out of a broken webpage. I cocked my head, rumbling with confusion.

"I'm sorry, that's all the exposition you're getting, darling. I don't know how else to explain it to you. I poked my nose into your world, and somehow you're a dinosaur now. But don't worry. You're not alone. Turns out, that little stunt I pulled created fifty shades of havoc, so you're gonna be making some friends over the next few weeks."

I whimpered, gesturing to my body.

"Oh, yes. We can fix that . . . I think. We took a blood sample, so in a few hours, we'll see just how reversible this . . . condition is. Don't worry. If all else fails, we can go looking for the former Queen. She'll know how to fix this."

I lowered my head.

"Like I said, don't worry about it. We've dealt with this kind of thing before, believe you me, and we-"

When she was close enough, I lashed out. She fell backwards, eyes wide.

"Holy shit . . ."

I had miscalculated the distance between us. I snapped my jaws in frustration. She didn't seem impressed.

"Yeah, we're gonna need to work on that attitude, missy. I assume you're still somewhat sentient, so you should be able to pull it together if you try hard enough."

It was true, I hadn't lost my sentience. I still had all of my memories, and I still thought like a human. It was just that overtop my usual self was a layer of bloodthirsty monster, and combined with my human intelligence, it was a dangerous mix. I think that was the scariest part: knowing that I wasn't a pure monster. If it had been some primal instinct driving me to kill, I could have at least excused it by saying that the real me was shouting "STOP!" at the back of my mind. But it wasn't. I was still myself. I was still Claire Dearing, but it was a version of Claire Dearing that wanted to rip open whoever crossed my path, just for the fun of it.

"Well, I'll leave you to it, then."

I hadn't realized that that would be it. I thought she would have more to say. As she slammed the doors shut, I yowled to get her attention, but if she heard me, she didn't care to answer.

I was alone.

The only thing that got me through that night was thinking about Owen. I imagined what would have happened if Moonwatcher had been slower in zapping me, if I had had the chance to reach Owen unhindered. I thought about how good it would feel to sink my claws into his chest and pull down until his flesh was bloody ribbons. I imagined doing it again and again in different ways until I fell asleep, dreaming of much the same thing.

***TSJWFKFEW***

I regained consciousness to the sound of voices. Familiar ones. Owen and Maisie were sitting in folding chairs on the other side of what appeared to be a hastily-painted yellow line on the floor, backs turned to me. I was surprised that I had slept through their entry, but my drowsiness combined with three pinpoints in my chest indicated why that might be.

"When she wakes up, is she coming home with us?"

Owen put his arm around Maisie's shoulder.

"Of course she is, sweetheart. Why wouldn't she?"

"I don't know. Maybe she changed her mind."

"About what?"

"About being a family."

"What makes you say that?"

"I don't think she likes me."

Owen laughed.

"Of course she likes you. Why wouldn't she like you?"

"She was going to let them die."

He shook his head.

"I promise, she's not mad at-"

"What if she thinks I should have died, too?"

There was a long silence. I should have been horrified by this revelation, but I was busy formulating a plan to draw them closer to me. Owen, on the other hand, just sat there in stunned silence, mouth agape. He shook his head, stunned.

"Maisie . . . Claire doesn't think- I mean, she'd never-"

"She didn't want them to live. She thinks they don't belong here. And I'm like them."

Owen crouched in front of her, holding her shoulders.

"There is a huge, huge difference between a dinosaur and a human being, Maisie."

"What about Blue? You raised her like a human being."

He sat down again, shaken.

"It was more like raising a dog."

"But she was like a daughter to you."

"Only because she didn't have a fam-"

He realized that that was precisely the wrong thing to say. Unfortunately, Maisie had picked up on his meaning, so he tried to brush it off instead.

"Maisie, I promise that Claire loves you very much. Once she recovers from her accident, she can tell you herself."

"What if she doesn't get better?"

Owen's eyes flicked over to my cage briefly.

"She'll get better, I promise."

I wondered if Maisie could hear the lump in his throat, too.

"Will she be mad at me?"

"No, sweetheart. She won't be mad at you."

"But if it wasn't for me, none of this would have happened."

Owen shook his head.

"This is NOT your fault. I mean, if anything, I was the one driving . . ."

"Do you think that's why she attacked you?"

"Maybe. I've seen her get angry before. She might just be upset with me. But let's not get too close until we're sure it's safe, okay?"

Maisie turned to face me, and I tried to look as innocent as possible, despite my terrifying appearance.

"I feel sorry for her."

Owen took a deep breath.

"Yeah, me too. But she'll get better in no time, you'll see . . ."

It was then that Moonwatcher burst into the room, carrying a tangle of scrolls in her arms.

"Good news, everyone! We found out that Claire's situation is completely reversible!"

Owen let out a sigh of relief, and Maisie squeezed his hand.

". . . There is one hiccup, however. We need to purge the Indoraptor-bits from her system before changing her back, or she could revert back to this state as a human, which is not ideal. We're working on a fix right now, but it's probably gonna take a few weeks before we get her back to her normal, green self."

Owen's face fell.

"A few weeks? . . ."

"Yep. In the meantime, we'll be patching up all the other . . . missteps in the canon. We've got a lot of un-dead people to deal with, and most of those people are dinosaurs. We'll have them brought in here over the next few days. I'm glad we're finally putting this location to good use. It's a nice callback."

As the conversation went on, I learned a few things. First, I was being stored in an underground facility that had a long history in what Moonwatcher called "The Narrative", which roughly translates to "things that have happened" and "things that are happening right now". Following this reveal, I learned that Moonwatcher fancies herself an author, or at least a writer, and had taken on the challenge of "narrating" current events in lieu of her missing former Queen. She was cocky, this one, and I was sure I could use her arrogance to my advantage.

As they left the room, I decided to try my luck with Maisie first. She had strayed behind the pack, and was just within hearing range. I made a sound to approximate her name, hoping to get her attention. She turned, and I smiled at her. Instead of coming closer, she whipped around and ran to grab Owen's hand, disappearing as the doors slammed shut once more.

She was a clever girl, this one, but so was I.

And Owen was not.

***TSJWFKFEW***

The next day, I set my trap. When Owen came down for a visit, he found me lying on my side, wheezing in pain. He rushed over, dropping a dish of fish heads that was probably meant for me. I whimpered, reaching through the bars with one paw. He held out his hand, grazing his fingers over my pronated palm, tears stinging at his eyes.

"Claire, hang on! I'm going to get help!"

As he turned, I let out a pained wail. I couldn't let him escape. Luckily for me, he listened to my plea and turned around apologetically.

"I'll be back, I promise."

I made a dolefully churring sound, gazing up at the keypad with a glazed expression. Owen gulped.

"I . . . I'm not sure I can let you out. I don't even know the code . . ."

I winced, grabbing at my chest. As he turned away once more, I screamed and reached out for him, tears pouring down my cheeks.

I've always been proud of my ability to cry on command, but this whole situation was so messed up.

"Claire, Claire, Claire . . ."

He grabbed the bars with both hands, making eye contact with me.

"I saw her punch in the code when they tranquilized you. I don't remember all of it, but there were four digits, and it started with a three . . ."

Poor, gullible Owen. Love was his greatest weakness. It's what brought him back to the island, after all.

"Three, two? . . . Three, one? . . . It was one of those, but I can't remember the rest."

Slowly, a smile spread across my face.

What is the most obvious, most poetic four-digit code a wannabe author would program into a holding device?

C-A-G-E

3-1-7-5

With a triumphant snarl, I pounced, jamming my arm between the bars and hitting the keypad with deadly accuracy. The door clicked open. Owen was mine.

Naïve as he was, Owen was no longer fooled by my ruse. Not when I was practically salivating over his head. He sprinted across the room, making a dash for a set of cattle prods lined up neatly along the walls.

There was no way I was letting him reach them.

I leapt out of my enclosure, barking furiously. My claws snapped against the concrete as I gained on Owen, promptly knocking him down and digging my talons into his back. He screamed. Oh, how I'd enjoy this.

But as I opened my jaws, something hit the side of my head. I turned and saw Maisie standing by a stack of paint jars. Two hunts in one day. I wasn't at all unhappy to see her.

I lifted my foot from Owen's back, but before he could get up, I sliced his ankle, preventing him from trying anything funny. He screamed as his pant-leg was stained red, but I was too excited to care. I had my sights set on another quarry.

As I prowled towards Maisie, her eyes began to fill with tears, and she stumbled backwards, unsure of whether to run away from me or stand completely still and appeal to my nonexistent better nature.

Oh, this would be SO easy.

"I'm sorry, Claire."

Her words meant nothing to me. I was ready- so ready- to kill her.

"I didn't mean to make you this way," she sobbed.

Drool was dripping between my teeth, hitting the floor with a gentle thwack.

"I've let you down again."

Something fluttered in my heart.

"I love you."

And she was just standing there, waiting for me to kill her, as though it was the most natural thing in the world. She believed that I truly and sincerely wanted her dead, that I was trying to exterminate her like the last of the dinosaurs. I was validating her worst nightmare: it must seem like I didn't view her as worthy of occupying a place in this world. To her, this must seem like an execution. Like something I wanted. And I did. Only-

At the very last second, I swerved away, instead scampering towards the open cage. I didn't know how long I would last, but I refused to waste a single second of awareness. I slammed the door shut and pressed myself against the opposite side of the cage, as far away from Owen and Maisie as possible, and for the first time since I changed, I spoke.

"Run! Run! Get away from me!"

And they did.

I continued to lean against the cage, hoping to keep myself away from them for as long as possible, but I didn't have to worry about that. They were long gone by the time I found myself sliding down the bars, collapsing into a weeping mess of a dinosaur.

I haven't seen them since then. In a way, I'm not looking forward to any future encounters. What I did . . . Well, what I almost did . . . I just don't know if I can ever fix that.

And that's why you agreed to go through with this program, correct?

Yes. I was hoping that you could help me get rid of . . . get rid of the parts of me that I don't like. Get me back to normal . . . if that's even possible . . . I know it won't be easy, but I'll do anything- and I do mean anything- to make up for the things I've done.

Alright, then this concludes our first meeting. We'll start making preparations for Week One.

Thank you . . . and if you see Maisie . . .

. . . Tell her I'm trying to get better.