Chapter 1
July 1993; Off the western coast of Costa Rica
Miguel glanced over his shoulder at his latest set of clients. They weren't his regular excited, brash Americans. No, this time he had a strange family of overly uptight, and rather rude, Brits. Miguel tried not to judge people, truly he did. But it was impossible not to judge these people and find all of them lacking, save perhaps the green-eyed youth. The mother was a shrill harpy of a woman with the long face of a horse and the neck of a giraffe, her husband only needed a set of tusks and he could pass as a walrus, and their son! Oh, the son. He was a fat, shorter version of his father, but with an even worse temperament. The boy whined constantly, and spoke nothing but ill words about the too skinny waif with green eyes, and about Miguel and his crew. If he had been Miguel's son he would have been bent over a knee long ago to have some manners imprinted onto his backside. But they were customers, surprisingly good paying customers. So he kept his mouth shut.
He had asked for a high price to let them rent out his boat for the day, but only because so many tourists bargained the rates down as low as they possibly could and he needed to make money to feed his family. So he had asked for a price that no tourist would accept. Except they had. At first he had felt a trifle bad, but he had soon realized that it wasn't that they didn't know to bargain, it was simply that they wanted the other tourists within hearing distance to know they could pay such a high price to rent his boat for the day. He had felt less guilty then, and by the second hour out at sea with them, he felt bad that he had not demanded a higher price!
When the parents were not looking he spared glances for the other boy, who did not look to be related to them. The boy's hair was a wild mess of black hair that looked as if it could have been curls like a cherubs if only it had been brushed regularly. The boy was far too skinny, especially when compared the other boy, and he seemed far too pale as well. As if he never stepped out into the sun. Miguel had been contemplating calling the police to be waiting for their return in a case the boy was a kidnapped child, or in a case Miguel or one of his crew could get the boy to admit that he was being abused. But so far the boy had said not a word. He just sat there starring out at the water as the walrus tried to reel in a swordfish and the beach ball of a boy whined some more.
Miguel looked away, sighing. The water was a deep aquamarine today and the boy seemed entranced by the way the light was reflecting off it, or perhaps there was a fish near the surface. Miguel did not know which it might be, but if it kept the child quiet enough that the others ignored him it seemed perhaps to be the better option for the child. He had already spotted a hand shaped bruise on the boy's arm the one time the boy had leaned over to trace his finger through the water in their wake. He was not sure how old green-eyes was, but he thought the boy was perhaps older than the 10 years he was guessing. Considering the boy looked about well fed as a street beggar he was beginning to suspect he wasn't fed well, which Miguel knew could stunt the growth of a child. He simply hopped that was not the case. Somehow the thought the child might have been kidnapped was less horrifying than imagining that he had spent his whole life being starved, beaten and locked out of sight.
Hearing the walrus curse, as the fish he had caught broke free, Miguel silently sighed and went about steering the bought to another location. The fish would have swum away from here after such a struggle; they would likely not catch anything here for the rest of the day.
Miguel looked up at the clouds before glancing at his first mate. They shared a tired look before looking over their equipment, hoping the old beat-up fish finder might show something. They became so distracted talking it over while trying to ignore the angry, bigoted ranting of the walrus, that they never heard son hit the green-eyed boy, knocking him off the boat with a splash.
*~*~* HP/JP *~*~*
Harry wasn't sure what to think when he had been snagged at the train station by his Uncle and told they were going straight to the airport. It was obvious his Uncle was not happy about the situation, but then his Uncle was never happy about anything if Harry was around. And for what was definitely not the first time since he had met Sirius, he cursed Professor Dumbledore for not allowing him to stay with Sirius over the summer. Even if they had been forced to live in a cave and eat bugs, it would have been better than another summer playing house elf to the Dursleys.
The ride to the airport, the waiting, and the flight itself had not changed Harry's mind about his dear family. But for a moment as he had sat on the boat in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, his family forgetting him momentarily, he could almost forgive them. He had never seen anything quite so soothing and lovely as the tropical ocean water with the sunlight dancing over the waves. Watching the sunlight on the ocean surface, feeling the water curl about his fingers almost playfully, it had been almost as amazing as his first sight of Hogwarts from the boats on the Black Lake. The only way it could have been better was if his family hadn't been there with him. Harry was a realistic boy though and knew such an idea was only a fantasy, not something that would come to pass. At least not in the way he would want.
Instead it would come about because Dudley was tired, bored, and hungry. Three things that had never led to anything good happening to Harry Potter. A tired Dudley was easily irritated, a hungry Dudley was angry, and a bored Dudley was violent. Not any good on their own, but all the worse for Harry since all three seemed to come along at once.
So while he was busy trying to ignore his family and just enjoy the ocean at his fingertips, Dudley was watching him, a viscous glee lighting up his piggly little eyes as he shuffled closer and closer. While some would say Harry never knew what hit him, that would be a lie. True, he did not see his cousin sneak up behind him, shoving at Harry's back so hard that Harry was knocked off the side of the boat and into the water, barely missing being pulled under by the force of the motor. But Harry knew as he spun about in the water, desperately trying to figure out which way was up, that it had been Dudley all the same. His Uncle would not have been so stupid as to do harm to Harry in public, and his Aunt would rather abuse him through pretending he didn't exist. Only Dudley would be stupid enough, and violent enough, to think he could get away with pushing Harry overboard.
Twisting in the water Harry lost hold of his breath, a small mistake that could have cost him his life, but saved it instead as he caught sight of the bubbles from his escaped breath moving away from him and closer to the light. Kicking his legs Harry tried to follow the bubbles up through the water to the surface, surprised by how deep he had been. His lungs were screaming at him as he struggled not to release anymore precious oxygen, his clothes felt like lead weights strapped to him, pulling him deeper and deeper even as he struggled up to the surface a little at a time. The salt in the water stung his eyes, water was pressing against his ears so that every sound around him, above him, was dulled into being almost absent.
With a last desperate kick of his legs he broke the surface. Wheezing and gasping he expelled the air out of his lungs only to be refilled with the sweet taste of the tropical sea air. The first taste of air was practically orgasmic. Nothing had even felt so good as that air filling his lungs did in that moment.
But like all good things in Harry's life, it was a fleeting pleasure. Because as far as his eyes could see was nothing but blurry water. Without his glasses he was nearly blind, but even he could tell there was no blurry shape on the horizon that could possibly be the boat that he had been on not that long ago.
'Surely,' he thought, 'I wasn't down there that long! One of them must notice that I'm not onboard and turn the boat around.'
Fate, however, was never that kind to Harry. It would make him struggle even if in the end he survived. That cold thought shivered down his spine as he kicked his legs trying to figure out what to do. He wouldn't be able to keep himself up above the waves forever, but he knew he had to try. If he didn't try then he was giving up before there was even a chance for a search party to come looking for him.
Forcing back the tears that wanted to gather in his eyes, Harry turned in the water, looking for anything that might keep him above the waves once his strength gave out. There was nothing, nothing but water. Almost giving in to the sob rising up in his chest, Harry mentally kicked himself. He had survived a Troll, a possessed teacher, a thousand year old basilisk, the ghost of his enemy, an escaped convict, a werewolf, and countless Dementors. His cousin of all people wouldn't take him down this easily. It would make the Dursleys too happy if he were to give him and let himself be swallowed by the sea. Steeling his resolve Harry looked up at the sky hoping for some sign of which way to go. A plan, setting sun, even a –
"Merlin's balls," cursed Harry as he started to swim. Above him a small flock of birds were heading what might have been west, or possibly east. He wasn't too sure. Either way they would likely lead him to land.
He hoped.
*~ * ~ * HP/JP *~ * ~ *
Northeast Side Dock; Isla Sorna, Costa Rica
Ramon often found himself wondering why he took the security job with InGen, when he was going between the labs and the helicopter pads, escorting the monsters the scientists were making. He used to cross himself every time he saw one of the creatures, but his boss and Dr. Sorken were quick to tell him not to. He did not see why he wasn't allowed that one little thing when he had to pretend these westerners weren't playing God, building monsters from little tubes. Scowling, Ramon dropped his cigarette onto the gravel path, stomping down on it until the tiniest flicker of fire was extinguished.
He knew why he was still here, even after seeing the monsters, even after losing a finger to one of the newly hatched ones, only two days into the job. The pay. Here he could make a year's wages in a month. He could afford good healthcare for his family, he could make sure his parents farm was protected from the money grubbing men at the bank, and he could set aside money for his children to go to a good school to have a future that was better than what he had ahead of him.
Climbing back in the Jeep, Ramon turned on the engine and continued on his way to the dock. They weren't expecting any deliveries this week, but one had to be careful. The nightshift guys had caught a trio of men all dressed in black sneaking onto the island through one of the three underground docks. The Big Man, Mr. Hammond, had not been happy that one of his rival companies had tried to sneak onto the island in order to learn exactly what InGen had hidden here. Ramon often wondered why they had not simply killed off the monsters after the incident last year on the other island. But he supposed the company had too much money locked into the creatures and the plans for the park, to simply let Mr. Hammond do away with it all. Ramon had heard some of the doctors talking after the incident about how Mr. Hammond had wanted to destroy them but had been stopped by the men who had helped finance it all.
Ramon detested what was being done here, but he couldn't dislike the money. So he supposed he had to try harder to ignore the way it all seemed unnatural.
Speeding over the rough, dirt road, he made his way to the first underground tunnel leading to the dock closest to the helicopter pad. This one was one of the smaller docks, used mostly to shepherd employees to the mainland or the other island. As such it got more regular traffic through it now that they weren't moving dinosaurs to the other island, than the larger docks did. That was a good thing in Ramon's mind. Few dinosaurs being moved meant less likelihood that the monsters would kill him or one of his team.
True he called the dinosaurs monsters, but more recently he had started to wonder if the scientists weren't the true monsters. Especially Walter Ness and Markus Rand. Ramon had seen the eerie intelligence in the eyes of the dinosaurs, especially the Raptors, and he knew they weren't just the dumb beasts that Ness and Rand were constantly going on about. They felt things, they learned, and most terrifying of all they understood. Ramon had watched them take the big female; the one Robert Muldoon had named Clever Girl. That one was the one Ramon had feared the most. She was smart, cunning, and violent. She hated. She hated them the way he had only seen other humans hate.
So Ramon feared her down to the darkest pits of his soul because he understood her hate, could sympathize with it, when he thought about what it must be like to be one of the creatures held captive in the labs, experimented on day after day. But he did not think her evil. No, he had been slowly coming to realize that it was the scientists ho were the true evils of the island. They played God without stopping to think of the outcome. They created Life without true comprehension of its intricacies.
Silently praying to God that nothing further would go wrong, that something like the incident on the other island wouldn't happen here, Ramon slowed down as he pulled into the parking space near to the dock. The lights hanging from the cave ceiling flickered as he stepped out of the Jeep and headed down the short path to the dock. The cavern had a small strip of sandy beach leading up to the rocky shore. Two short wooden piers stretched out from the rocky landing to the deeper water. The one small emergency boat was still tied up to the left pier and the metal locker that held three inflatable rafts was still securely locked. Nothing seemed out of place, but Ramon still hesitated before getting back into his Jeep. Something was off, he just wasn't sure what.
Letting out a long huff of a breath, Ramon turned away from his Jeep and walked back towards the water. Ignoring the docks, he walked down to the sand. It would take no more than three minutes to check the small beach. It would be faster if the lighting was brighter or if it was open air, but for security purposes a cavern was better. Less likelihood a rival corporation could get a satellite to scan the compound as they moved the dinosaurs, the opening to a cavern was small enough that many of the dinosaurs couldn't get through it, and the natural walls of the islands cliff-faces would keep the dinosaurs from getting off the island on their own, and would slow down people trying to get onto it as well. It was like a natural fortress.
Cursing, Ramon came to a sudden stop. There was a dark figure lying in the sand, half hidden by the shadow of one of the piers. Running toward the body, Ramon pulled out his radio calling to the base to advise them. Carefully he turned the body over, noting the stiffness of the too large clothes, and the salt that was crusting over the fabric. The body, the boy, was young, white, and obviously hurt. His skin was red and raw from hours, maybe even days stranded at sea. His lips were chapped and cracked, his breathing labored, and Ramon could already see the edges of a scar peeking out from under the hem of his shirt. Slowly he lifted the shirt, taking in the sight of several pale white scars that looked similar to marks left by a belt.
Leaning closer he dropped the shirt and reached out to press his fingers against the boys neck, checking for a pulse. It was there, faint, but steady.
The sound of two other Jeeps skidding to a stop on the rocky landing above caused Ramon to look away from the boy. Dereks and Bartell were already hopping out of the first Jeep, and Hjordson was right behind them. The two doctors Ramon hated most were with him, grumbling and cursing about the rough ride as the lagged behind. Ramon prayed for the strength not to strangle them both as he ordered Dereks and Bartell to help him get the boy onto a stretcher. They had a helicopter due in two days from now, so they could take the boy to the med bay and if the docs argued about it he would simply suggest the boy be kept in a drugged sleep until they could get him off the island.