Jurassic Park
Disclaimer: Same as before. I don't own the Jurassic Park franchise either. This chapter is based on the Jurassic Park island of Islands of Adventure and assumes that the Park opened without a hitch…
---
"This is what DiZ meant when he said all wasn't what it seemed." Samantha remarked, "Somebody usurped Ansem's research…"
"Ansem Reports 1-8?" Bryce asked, "Where the hell are we going to find those?"
"You won't," Cole said, appearing out of thin air in a shimmer, "Another shall find those reports…"
"Who?" Bryce asked.
"That's not important now." Cole replied, "But what's important is your next quest."
"Another bloody quest?" Hyde asked.
"Where are we going?" Bryce asked.
"Does it matter?" Cole asked.
"Yes." Hyde and Bryce both replied, "We'd like to know what we're up against."
"In a land where animals from Earth's distant past still roam, vipers seek the means that brought these animals to life." Cole replied.
"COBRA." Bryce replied.
"What?" Samantha asked.
"A terrorist organization, led by Cobra Commander…" Bryce replied.
"Oh I remember…wasn't he the guy who sang that 'Pretty Fly for a Bad Guy' song." Samantha said, "Everyone said it was the worst Offspring knockoff they'd ever seen."
"He was also the guy parodied in the VH1 show I Love Toys." Bryce replied, "Vaquero Security Enterprises actually ranks him as 150 out 151 of the world's terrorist organizations…So he's an idiot, unfortunately an idiot with quite a lot of power."
"So even some guns-for-hire company has that much of a disregard for Cobra Commander?" Samantha asked.
"What else do you expect from a former used car salesman?" Bryce asked.
"Really? I heard something about him being from some ancient race of snake people from Cobra-La, displaced by the last ice age and seeking to displace man…" Samantha began.
"Sources in the CIA state that story is about as legitimate as the existence of Bigfoot." Bryce began. Damn I said too much. Hope that didn't wake the journalist instinct…
"Two questions." Samantha replied, "First, how do you know the CIA opinion? And does the CIA believe Bigfoot exists, or does it have concrete proof?"
"First of all, how I know the CIA opinion is classified." Bryce replied.
Uh-huh, that seems like a standard government agent denial…Samantha thought. There was obviously more to Bryce than the disaffected ex-serviceman turned 'military contractor' and she was determined to find out what.
"Second of all, the CIA won't confirm or deny the existence of Bigfoot." Bryce replied, with an ironic grin.
"I hate to interrupt your witty repartee Bryce." Cole interjected, "But there are some particulars of where you're going next. First of all, this will require a good bit of discretion. Where you are going is a tourist's attraction, I don't think they'll be too happy about you carrying a long barreled firearm around."
Bryce nodded, it made sense. "And also it might be best that you not destroy any landmarks…" Cole continued.
"First of all, the place was already in ruins to begin with…" Bryce replied.
"However Poseidon's Temple didn't need a new skylight." Cole replied.
"Destroy one ancient landmark and you're marked for life." Bryce quipped.
"And," Cole continued, "Mr. Hyde, I really think you might attract a little too much attention walking around barefoot, with torn trousers and part of a suit jacket. However the top hat is very becoming…"
Cole waved his hand and two items appeared. One was an overlarge trench coat and shoes for Hyde and a concealed holster with a two magazine pouch for Bryce. Cole vanished just then, leaving the three heroes to their task.
---
"Hey Falcon." Chuckles said, "I just got hold of some very important information from HQ, regarding the Korean mercenary that the patrol killed last week."
"What do you have?" Falcon said.
"Apparently there was a tattoo on his left shoulder. It was a NKPA tattoo." Chuckles said.
"There are a few ex-NKPA regulars who hire themselves out as mercenaries." Falcon said.
"True, but there aren't that many from the Black Dragons…" Chuckles said.
"Black Dragons? Sounds like a South-Central LA biker gang." Falcon remarked.
"A good bit more dangerous, actually, Lieutenant." Tucker said, "The Black Dragons are an elite force, numbering about as much as an under strength American infantry battalion. They're the strong arm of the North Korean Intelligence, comparable to the Spetsnaz of the old Soviet Union."
"What are North Koreans doing all the way in Mexico?" Falcon asked.
"I don't know, this seems highly unusual for them." Tucker replied, "Anyway, the tattoo that Chuckles mentioned isn't an officially sanctioned practice, but almost every Black Dragon operative has it tattooed onto them."
"This is something we'll have to follow up on." Falcon said, "I'll contact the Pit and see what we know about this Black Dragon organization, you do the same on your side?"
Tucker nodded, "I'm afraid Langley doesn't know that much either, just some vague reports of their numbers and possible involvement in a few incidents of procurement for illegal scientific research."
"What kind of research?" Falcon asked.
"Genetic research. Most recently Black Dragon operatives attempted to break into a genetics lab in Seoul, South Korea. They managed to take several computers from the facility, but failed to steal any samples before they were run down and killed by South Korean security forces." Tucker replied.
---
"This place is incredible…" Bryce remarked. The jeeps had stopped on a dirt trail, beside a grassy field.
Bryce stared in unabashed admiration. Standing before him was a sight he never imagined he'd see in his life. The Brachiosaurus nibbled at the pine needles in the tall conifer, rearing up on its hind legs to get to some choice branches.
Samantha couldn't help but be awed as well, remembering memories from her childhood, trips to the Field Museum when she was a little girl. She smiled at the awed expression on Bryce's face as he stared at the dinosaurs, the herd of Brachiosaurs and Hadrosaurs playing near the lagoon, where some yellow and orange tiger striped tour boats moved near them.
The jeeps started moving again and parked out in front of a large white building with a safari lodge type façade. Several panels in the wall had fossil impressions them, and as two massive mahogany doors opened the tourists could see two dinosaur skeletons, that of a Diplodocus and an Allosaurus about to battle one another.
Bryce, while awed by what he was seeing, still was on his guard. He noticed a pair of armed guards walking towards a back room, both of them were carrying Glock pistols, judging by the shape he guessed they were .40 caliber weapons. The way the guards moved showed they were experts with their weapons.
He glanced around for any sign of suspicious characters, none so far. The tour guide, a Japanese-American man in his early twenties, said, "This is the Visitor's Center and the center of the island, "It is the start for all the tours, even the River Cruise. Shuttles will head to the River every quarter of an hour."
"The Visitor's Center is also the entranceway to Cretaceous Courtyard, where your accommodations are…" the tour guide continued.
Samantha nudged Bryce who said, "We'll head to one of the hotels and I'll get us a room." Bryce replied.
"I'm not sharing a bed with you two." Samantha replied.
"I'll see what I can do." Bryce replied as they followed the gaggle of tourists out into a large courtyard with several planters full of short palms, ferns, and other flora. "I'm going to want to get the lay of the land, we'll meet at the Visitor's Center after we get the room. We'll use that place for all our meetings."
They walked into the nearby hotel and Bryce walked up to the hotel clerk and asked if there was a room available. "We have a two bedroom room, sir." The clerk, a middle aged woman, said cheerily, "How long will you need it?"
"Two days." Bryce replied, giving them a cushion of time before.
Bryce reached into his pocket, fingering a CIA issue government credit card. Use only for emergencies, well, they'd consider this an emergency. It isn't as if the Agency will trace the bill to another dimension.
Bryce pulled out his card, hoping to God that it worked and inwardly sighed with relief when the machine read that it took his card. The trio headed back to the Visitor's Center to find out some more information.
"We should split up." Samantha suggested.
"Huh, are you nuts…" Bryce replied.
"No, I'm serious." Samantha replied.
"Whenever you've gotten separated from the group, bad things have a tendency to happen." Bryce replied, "Need I remind you of two dragons…Or the battle against Miseria…"
"This is a completely different situation, Bryce." Samantha replied, "Besides there are thousands of tourists here…"
"The lass is right, we can cover more ground that way." Hyde replied.
"We'll meet at the Visitor's Center before dinner." Bryce replied, glancing at his watch, "We've got a little over half a day. I want to see the layout of the island, so I'll take the road tour."
"It doesn't cover the River at all…" Hyde replied.
"Go see the River then." Bryce replied.
"I'll check out the Visitor's Center." Samantha replied, looking through a brochure, "I think I can use the journalist's touch and find out some more information about this park."
"Sounds good." Bryce replied, "Meet back here before dinner?"
"OK." Samantha replied.
Hyde grunted with a slight nod and the three went their separate ways.
---
Bryce waited outside with a group of tourists in front of the Visitor's Center for the pair of electric Ford Explorers on the thin metal track in the road, the ones that took them through the dinosaur exhibits. Hyde was taking the River Cruise, which passed near the coastline, and the island's artificial harbor. There were only three places boats of any kind could dock, the rest of the island was surrounded by sheer cliffs.
How would the Black Dragons try and get on this island covertly? Small boat? Seems likely, but if the island's security is as top notch as they say it is, then not likely. Air drop? No, the airspace seems too controlled. Bryce's eye caught a trio of Koreans wearing the typical garb of twenty-somethings on vacation. They were talking to each other in low voices, muttered words in Korean that could not be deciphered. Damn, I wish I studied Korean at some point in my CIA career...
For all intents and purposes the trio appeared to be no different from any of the international guests, but there was something suspicious about them. The way their reading the island maps! For all intents and purposes they're reminiscent of a company commander planning an attack on a position.
Bryce looked away afterward, not wanting to be caught staring, lest any of them recognize him as the one who iced two of their buddies with an AK-47 and a hand grenade. He wound up sitting in the rearmost of the two vehicles with a rugged looking, outdoors man type with a beat up brown fedora hat, a very sardonic fellow with curly black hair, clad from head to toe in black, and a young man in his early twenties.
"So Tim," the rugged outdoorsman asked the college kid, "Which graduate school wound up picking you?"
"I got into the University of Montana's Paleontology Graduate program." Tim replied.
"Congratulations." Alan Grant replied, "It's a good program."
Hmm, Bryce thought, This sounds very similar to the movie Jurassic Park. Except in this reality Hammond must've been successful and the characters are a bit older...
The sardonic man in black added, "I'm amazed paleontology exists as a science, Dr. Grant." Ian Malcolm stretched lazily in the front seat as he spoke.
"With Mr. Hammond's park, paleontologists have a new way of studying dinosaurs only previously dreamt of." Grant replied.
"But then again there is the Heisenberg Uncertainty principle. Whatever you study also changes. Mr. Hammond and his scientists studied the DNA, then added frog DNA to the sequence in an attempt to create a dinosaur, but all he wound up creating..." Malcolm replied.
"Dr. Malcolm brings up a good point, actually." Bryce replied, "How can we tell if the behavior of the dinosaurs in the paddocks is genuine dinosaur behavior?"
Grant and Tim turned to Bryce from the front seat, "That is a good point Mr..." Tim began.
"Bryce Lightfoot, just call me Bryce."
"If you look to the right you will see a herd of the first dinosaurs on our tour called Dilophosaurus..." Richard Kiley's recorded voice could be heard saying.
"Your grandfather's still using the same voice recording?" Bryce asked.
"How do you know that?" Tim asked.
"I've been a Jurassic Park enthusiast for several years." Bryce replied, which wasn't really a lie, he did have the Jurassic trilogy, special edition on DVD at home.
"One of the earliest carnivores, we now know that Dilophosaurus is actually poisonous. Spitting its venom at its prey, causing blindness and eventually paralysis, allowing the carnivore to eat at its leisure. This makes Dilophosaurus a beautiful but deadly addition to Jurassic Park..." Richard Kiley's recorded voice began.
"Interesting." Bryce replied, "Dilophosaurus were always assumed to be scavengers because of their rather delicate jaw muscles."
"So what is it you do, exactly, Bryce?" Alan Grant replied.
"I test off-road vehicles." Bryce replied.
---
"Excuse me, miss," said a Chinese-American man in a white lab coat, "I believe the tour route is that way..."
"Oh, I'm really sorry." Samantha replied, "I got separated from the group."
"It's OK, I can lead you back to them." the man replied. Definitely college age, cute coed, the sort of girl I would have a thing for in college.
Time to pull the slightly flirty card. Samantha replied, and smiled, "Samantha Grayson, I'm a Senior Staff Editor for the Daily Husky, the Great Northern University campus newspaper. I'm here to write an article on job opportunities at InGen..."
"Dr. Henry Wu, lead geneticist." Wu replied, smiling, "Do you have a press pass?"
"I forgot it at home." Samantha replied, innocently.
"That's OK." Wu replied, "I'll go take you over to talk to Robert Muldoon, our security officer and game warden..."
"Game warden? Is this a hunting park?" Samantha asked.
"No, not at all. This is a biological preserve where we keep extinct animals the like of which the world has not seen for 65 million years." Wu replied.
Wu took an electronic card from his pocket and inserted it in an electronic lock. He led her through a warren of corridors until they stopped outside a room that had Security Officer stamped on a square metal plate on the door.
"For God's sake Wu, the press is here?" an English accented voice sounded, "Third bloody group this month."
"It's only one reporter, Robert." Henry replied.
"Right, I'll need to see this phantom reporter." Muldoon replied irascibly.
Samantha walked into the office to see Wu talking to a lean, hard bodied man with receding blondish brown hair wearing khakis and hiking boots.
Muldoon issued Samantha a Jurassic Park press pass and a park map, together with a small device about the size of a keyless entry remote. "It's a personal alarm, if you get into any trouble, click on the red button and we'll be along to help you." Muldoon explained.
"Are you expecting trouble?" Samantha asked.
"When dealing with wildlife, especially predatory wildlife, luck favors the prepared." Muldoon said.
"Predatory wildlife?" Samantha asked.
"Several of the species here on this island are predators, the T-Rex, the Compies, and especially the Velociraptors..." Muldoon replied icily. In his mind's eye, Muldoon was trying to keep the images of the last time a raptor escaped. It had killed two workers, and severely mauled a third before it was recaptured. He was lucky it hadn't made it out of the Raptor Containment Area.
Henry Wu had already left the room, talking of something he had to do in the hatchery. Samantha left the room to follow him when a man in his thirties in a business suit, with thick glasses, and a half crown's worth of light brown hair. Something about this man raised Samantha's journalistic interests. She had seen Peter Ludlow in the Jurassic Park movies a long time ago, and knew him as one of those weasel-like corporate types with no ethics, the sort of people honest journalists lived to expose. She put an ear to the door...
"Robert, who was that young lady with the press pass?" Ludlow asked.
"Her name's Samantha Grayson." Muldoon replied, "She's a reporter with Great Northern University's newspaper, the Daily Husky."
"What was her purpose here? It wasn't about that raptor incident one month earlier..." Ludlow replied, and with an icy tone added, "...was it?"
"Not at all." Muldoon replied.
"Good, ensure she finds nothing out regarding that incident, because if word leaks out to the press about the dangers of the Raptor Containment Area, Jurassic Park could suffer and you could also suffer..." Ludlow began.
"Yes Mister Ludlow." Muldoon replied.
"Very good, we wouldn't want a few sordid details of your past coming to light, especially considering you are a wanted man in certain parts of Africa. And in those certain parts of Africa war criminals tend to die in especially heinous ways..." Ludlow warned.
Samantha moved away from the door and made an effort to disappear around the nearest corner, hoping Ludlow wasn't about to head that same way.
"Miss Grayson?" Henry Wu said.
"Yes?" Samantha replied.
"Right this way." Henry Wu said, opening up a computer locked door.
Samantha found herself looking at a room filled with banks of computer consoles. "This is the brains of Jurassic Park..." Henry Wu began, "The Main Control Room and...ah, the head honcho of the operation."
Standing nearby was a slightly potbellied African American man with a beard and mustache, with his collared shirts' sleeves rolled up with a lit cigarette in his fingers.
"Ray Arnold," Wu said, with a smile, "He's our chief engineer for Jurassic Park. He designed all the systems..."
Wu's introduction was cut short by a derisive snort. Sitting at a computer was a fat man with curly brown hair and black plastic framed glasses. Candy bar wrappers, half drunk sodas, and assorted scraps of paper covered his desk.
"Not all of them..." the fat man began.
"Dennis Nedry, integrated computer systems." Wu replied, with an incredible degree of civility.
"Who's the chick?" Nedry asked.
"Her name is Samantha Grayson, she's a student journalist with the Daily Husky." Wu replied.
"What's its circulation, five people?" Nedry remarked.
"It's a student publication at Great Northern University, in Chicago." Wu replied, "She's doing an article about careers at InGen."
"Dennis, the headlights on the tour vehicles..." Ray Arnold began.
"I'll debug the tour program when they get back, OK? OK? It'll eat a lot of computer cycles, we'll lose part of the system, and there's a finite amount of memory..." Dennis argued back.
Wu gently escorted Samantha out of the control room saying, "I'd better get you out of here before those two kill each other. Don't get me wrong, Dennis is a brilliant young man, but he has that arrogance that comes from knowing that he's good..."
Wu unlocked another door. The room was more than a bit foggy, not to mention humid. "What's this place?" Samantha asked, she could see several round tables lined with some sort of vegetation and machinery with several white coated lab techs attending to it.
"This is my part of the park." Wu replied, "This is the hatchery. If you notice its slightly hotter in here than usual and more humid. We also keep the atmosphere at a higher O2 level, so that's why you feel slightly springy."
Samantha peered at the eggs as Wu began, "Kathy, what do you have for me today?"
A young woman, a couple years older than Samantha's twenty-two years, with brown hair walked over. "Nothing really, Henry, just a baby raptor."
"Can we see it?" Samantha asked.
"Sure." Wu replied.
The trio headed into another room. Several areas were penned off by baby gates, and the pens had several rags and toys in them. A small animal, about a foot and a half long was in one of the pens. It looked like a yellow lizard with brown tiger stripe patterns. It had a lizard's elongated snout and head, but stood on its hind legs like a bird. It's small front legs were drawn back as it quizzically cocked it's head, regarding the three humans in the room.
The baby raptor sprang upward, landing in a surprised Samantha's arms.
"They can jump. The babies and the adults as well." Kathy began, "This one's about six weeks old."
"Will she bite me?" Samantha asked.
"No, she's very friendly, at least until she's a bit older. Anyway, raptors don't have any teeth as infants, even egg teeth." Kathy replied.
"Egg teeth?" Samantha asked.
"Kind of a rhino horn like structure that helps baby dinosaurs break out of the their shells. Velociraptors don't have them. They have to use their snouts to do that." Wu replied, "And sometimes we have to help them out."
"What about the ones born in the wild?" Samantha asked.
"Actually they can't breed in the wild." Wu replied.
"How is that?" Samantha asked.
"Because all the animals in Jurassic Park are female. We've engineered them that way. You see all vertebrate embryos are inherently female anyway, they just require an extra hormone development at a given stage to make them male. We simply deny them that." Wu replied.
"Deny them that?" Samantha asked.
"There's no unauthorized breeding in Jurassic Park." Wu declared.
The little animal didn't weigh very much, maybe about a pound or two. It's face was inches away from Samantha's as its forked tongue flicked in and out. The baby animal sniffed at Samantha's neck and began to burrow its face in it. Samantha giggled slightly.
"She's very friendly." Kathy said, "She'll stay that way until she gets to eight months old, where we can release her into the raptor pen...Right about then she turns into a huntress..."
Samantha stared at the little animal as it cuddled against her, hard to believe something so little and innocent looking could be such a lethal predator...
---
Hyde wandered down the queue for the Jungle River cruise, after about fifteen minutes in line he decided to say bollocks to it and go somewhere for a drink. He was annoyed, annoyed at the heat, annoyed with Bryce for coming up with this stupid idea, and annoyed that Bryce had even dropped into his swamp to begin with, not letting him live his self-imposed exile. Well one good thing that came along with this was Samantha...However big of an irritant Bryce turned out to be...
"Oi! 'O the bloody 'ell are you?" came an English accented voice. It came from a muscular man with a shaven skull, tattooed on his right forearm were the words Mad Max. Tattooed on the other forearm was the word Death.
"Wot's it to you, wanker..." Hyde snapped, right about then he was ready for a fight, against anyone, Bryce Lightfoot in particular.
"This bar's our turf, mate, so unless you're a supporter of the greatest football team in the wold, bugger off!" Mad Max said.
"And wot team is that?" Hyde demanded.
"Manchester United. So please enlighten me...who the fuck are you?" Mad Max demanded.
"I 'appen to come from Manchester originally..." Hyde replied.
"Really," Mad Max said, "And I assume you support Manchester United..."
"If it gets me to the bloody bar." Hyde replied, "Yes."
Mad Max grabbed a bottle of Newcastle Brown Ale, put it to his eye, and squeezed his right eye shut.
The Manchester United fans all shouted like a bunch of maniacs and started drinking more alcohol.
"My baby takes the morning train. He works from nine to five and then...he takes another home again..." The jukebox began.
"To find me waiting for 'im!!!" The Manchester United supporters sang out.
Hyde forgot all about his assignment from Bryce as he drank like no tomorrow, singing himself into a stupor.
---
"Bryce?" Samantha asked, when she heard the door opening.
"Yeah." Bryce replied as he walked into the room.
"What have you found out?" Samantha asked.
"Well short of a federal prison or a nuclear missile silo this place is pretty well built up." Bryce replied, "The dinosaurs seem contained in the perimeter."
"That's good news." Samantha replied.
"Or not." Bryce replied.
"Do you always have to bring up the worst case scenario?" Samantha asked.
"Hope for the best, unfortunately experience teaches you to expect the worst." Bryce replied, "I took stock of the guards. They're pretty heavily armed for a biological preserve, and they seem tense about something...Maybe external sabotage?"
"Or a breakout." Samantha replied, "I did some eavesdropping and they were worried about some place called the Raptor Containment Area."
Bryce took a map, covered with several markings on it, tracing out routes, fencelines and the like. "Can you show me on the map?" Bryce asked.
"It's not like they sat me down and told me where everything was." Samantha replied.
"Maybe Hyde saw it when he was on the River Cruise." Bryce replied.
"Bryce, I'm worried, the River Cruise is shorter than the Land tour, Hyde should be back by now." Samantha replied.
"You're right." Bryce replied, checking his Glock, "I'll go out and look for him."
"My baby takes the morning train. He works from nine to five and then...he takes another home again...TO FIND ME WAITING FOR HIM!!!" The song echoed from out in the corridor, the booming loud voice of Mr. Hyde joined by several dozen singing English accented voices.
Bryce and Samantha headed for the door, opening it in time to see Hyde and several severely intoxicated Englishmen wearing red shirts with the words Manchester United written on them. At least one had a hooded sweater with the words Kill Something written on it.
"Soccer hooligans..." Bryce remarked.
Hyde was staggering around with an empty bottle of gin, which he promptly broke over his head. The words Manchester United were written in red marker on his forehead.
"So what the hell are you guys doing here?" Bryce asked.
"Wot do you mean what are we doing 'ere?" Mad Max asked, "We're here to drop off your mate, who's pissed as a fart roight now..."
"We appreciate it." Samantha remarked, quickly, glaring at Bryce for being less than diplomatic.
"No, I meant here on Isla Nublar." Bryce asked.
"Were 'ere to see the mighty reds (AN: Manchester United football team) do the Costa Ricans in San Jose next week!" Mad Max replied.
A severely intoxicated Hyde staggered into the room as another drunken Englishman regarded the scene and belched loudly. The door closed and the soccer hooligans could be heard singing loudly down the hall, "Danish boys we are 'ere!!! Ooh oh! Ooh oh! Danish boys we are 'ere!"
Hyde staggered onto the couch, crooning, "England 5, Germany 1, Michael Owen is number One!!!"
"First Nobodies, then dueling gods, then dragons, the Dr. Seuss, the Grinch, and now a bunch of drunken soccer hooligans." Samantha remarked, "If I still have a job when we get back to our world, Elise is never going to believe this..."
"A hell of an excuse for a boss, but there's something else that I'd have to worry about..." Bryce replied, heading out into the hallway with a bucket.
"Where are you going with that?" Samantha asked.
"I'm going to give Mr. Hyde an instant hangover cure." Bryce replied, heading to the hallway ice machine.
"Bryce, no..." Samantha began, grabbing his right arm.
"Look, Hyde simply screwed the pooch just now." Bryce replied, half dragging her out the door to the ice machine.
"Oi lads! That wankers got a 'Tican football t-shirt on! Let's give this nancy a fuckin' good kicking!!!! AAAGGGHHH!!!!!" Mad Max shouted.
Bryce filled the bucket with ice, and then went back into the room, filling it with water. "Bryce, maybe you could be a bit more..." Samantha began.
Bryce promptly dumped the bucket of ice water onto Hyde. "Whoa! Wot!!! PTUU!!!" Hyde sputtered.
"...diplomatic..." Samantha began, wincing.
"Ahem, " Bryce began, "I assume your little fact finding endeavor was a success."
"Piss off wanker!" Hyde shouted, "I'm sick o' you throwing orders about..."
"We needed that information, and fast. And now thanks to you I have no idea what the area around the River Cruise is like." Bryce replied.
"Piss off mate." Hyde replied.
"Hyde, you very well may have screwed us all over, because that river goes through a significant portion of the island and I now have no idea what's along it, thanks to your drunk-a-thon." Bryce replied.
"Bugger off!" Hyde shouted.
Samantha, meanwhile glanced at her watch. Damn. She thought. 6:45, I was supposed to have a dinner interview with John Hammond tonight...at seven.
"Look, Bryce, maybe I can find out the information you need tonight." Samantha said.
"How?" Bryce asked.
"I have an interview with Mr. Hammond, InGen's CEO, tonight." Samantha replied, "In about fifteen minutes."
"We still have to talk, Hyde..." Bryce began.
"Guys, argue later when you're in clearer states of mind. And Bryce, Hyde is right, this isn't the Army and we aren't soldiers you order around." Samantha replied.
"I'm trying to get you both through this..." Bryce began.
"And we appreciate it. But you do have two other brains to call on too." Samantha replied as she headed out the door.
---
Samantha Grayson entered John Hammond's bungalow, noticing she wasn't alone in the spacious foyer. There were others in the room, sitting or standing in small groups. She took in the sights, a tall, self effacing man in black; a slim blonde woman; a balding, wiry fellow; a young man and woman roughly her age; a rugged cowboy type; and of course Peter Ludlow.Ray Arnold and Henry Wu were talking in the other corner of the room. Wu greeted her with a wave and a friendly grin, Arnold said nothing.
"Ah, Miss Grayson," Ludlow began, "I see my uncle has also invited the press."
"The press. Let me guess, John hired you for another bit of publicity?" the man in black said.
"Lay off the kid, Ian..." Grant replied.
"I'm twenty-two years old..." Samantha protested.
"Sorry, my fiancee's a bit on the gruff side." The blonde woman began, and offering a hand said, "Dr. Ellie Sattler."
"Samantha Grayson."
"So what form of media do you specialize in?" Ellie asked.
"I write for our student newspaper at Great Northern University." Samantha replied, "The Daily Husky."
"So do you think you'll stay with print media or go onto television reporting?" Ellie asked.
"For the love of God, don't go television reporting." the sardonic man in black chimed in, "It may work for the young and beautiful women, but once you reach menopause age consider yourself replaced as co-anchor."
"That's not my passion anyway, mister..." Samantha replied.
"Malcolm, Ian Malcolm." The man in black replied, taking a long sip of his drink.
"Sorry, Ian's had a few too many." Ellie replied, "He suffers from a very overinflated ego."
"I can tell." Samantha commented.
"You know what they say," Ellie commented, "The bigger the ego the smaller the..."
"Then that must mean Dr. Malcolm's...uhm...list of privileges, is small." Lex Murphy, a young blonde woman around Samantha's age, remarked.
"Hell hath no fury greater than that of woman." Malcolm remarked.
"They're intriguing anyway." the young man in his late teens remarked before introducing himself, "Tim Murphy."
"Careful," the lawyer remarked, "They're full of surprises."
"But more pleasant ones than unpleasant." came an English accented voice, "Dinner is served."
Hammond opened a large wooden door in the sitting room and the group filed through, to a large table, with several elegant place settings. The bungalow was spacious, with many large windows and skylights, giving the impression of dining under the stars. Samantha had been raised in wealth, her parents owned a fairly successful winery in Upstate New York, and she could see Hammond had exquisite tastes. One of the large windows overlooked the lagoon area of the River Cruise, where several of the Brachiosaurs were drinking water or taking a quick dip, the large window directly in front of Samantha, plus the bungalow's high position, gave her a commanding view of the river.
Exquisite tastes, but definitely high security ones. I wonder what Bryce would say about the way this house is built. Samantha thought. She recognized the thick bars on the skylights and the windows, and noted the glass seemed thick enough to be part of a commercial aquarium.
Dinner was fairly relaxed, with small jokes and remarks, and not a little money talk in between. "So, Mr. Hammond, what drove you to create Jurassic Park?"
"Having been an enthusiast about dinosaurs for many years I often envisioned such a concept, where anyone who desired could see animals only previously dreamt of." Hammond replied.
Ludlow looked impatient, as if his uncle should be discussing financial matters, and not wasting his time talking to some young crusading journalist.
"How did you create them?" Samantha asked.
"If you'd seen the video at the Visitor's Center that we show all tourists, you would know that answer." Ludlow remarked snidely.
Hammond gave his nephew a warning look before saying, "I apologize, my nephew, though a brilliant businessman, sometimes can fall short when it comes to tact. Wu?"
"We bring the dinosaurs to life using reclaimed DNA. Fossilized tree sap, called amber is our source. You see mosquitos fed on dinosaur blood, and occasionally became trapped. This blood in the mosquito's stomach is our building block to creating dinosaurs." Wu replied.
"There are flaws to their methods, however." Ian Malcolm began.
"Dr. Malcolm, let us not argue this point again..." Wu began, "My methods are flawless. There is no unauthorized breeding in Jurassic Park."
"As I've said in my book, Chaos and the Jurassic Equilibrium..." Malcolm began.
"Dr. Malcolm, this is noplace to be advertising yet another of your critical attacks on..." Donald Gennaro began.
"Again, I'll tell you about the scientific power at your fingertips. It didn't require any discipline to attain. You read what others had done and you took the next step. Before you even knew what you had you patented it, packaged it, and slapped it on a plastic lunchbox and now you're selling it, you're selling it..." Malcolm continued.
"Condors. Condors are on the verge of extinction. If I was to create a flock of condors on this island you wouldn't have anything to say about it..." John replied.
"John, this isn't some species that was obliterated by deforestation or the building of a dam, dinosaurs had their shot, and nature selected them for extinction." Malcolm countered.
Samantha listened intently as the scientists debated with Gennaro, Ludlow, and Hammond. It seemed that the scientists had their share of concerns regarding the handling of extinct animals they knew very little about, and keeping thousands of tourists in proximity to them. Little did she know that a storm, literally and figuratively, was brewing...
---
As much as he wanted to trust that Samantha could find out some good information at Hammond's dinner, Bryce decided to carry out a solo recon of his own. Hyde was currently passed out on the couch, covered over by a blanket, with a trash can near by and a few large bottles of water for the hangover.
He headed out of the hotel courtyard, following a maintenance path towards the queue area of the Jungle River Cruise. He took care to skirt the Hammond Bungalow, knowing the large windows and bright lights could easily expose him.
Bryce began his trip to the River when he saw DiZ in front of him. "You again?" Bryce demanded.
"Yes, me again." DiZ replied.
"What the hell do you want?" Bryce asked.
"I could ask the same of you." DiZ replied.
"I want to get the hell off this world, this dimension, this reality, whatever you call it." Bryce replied.
"No, I ask what does your heart desire." DiZ replied.
"And why does this matter again?" Bryce asked.
"Because the Heartless feed on hearts, specifically the darkness in them." DiZ replied, "I sense a wanderers heart in you, Bryce, considering you wandered much of your life. You wandered into the military, and back out, wandered before you were recruited by the CIA for their Special Activities Division..."
"Look, mister, I don't need to be psychoanalyzed by a weird fellow in red robes and bandages." Bryce replied.
"Be wary, Bryce, for one of your number shall not survive the journey." DiZ replied, before vanishing.
Not survive the journey. What does that-? Dear God, that means Hyde, Samantha, or I won't live to finish this journey. Let it be me then, I really don't want the poor girl to be dead on some godforsaken world that no-one has ever heard of...Bryce thought.
---
Dennis Nedry idly punched away at some commands on his computer keyboard. In less than twenty-four hours, when the supply boat pulled in, he would be one point five million dollars wealthier.
"Seven-fifty." Lewis Dodgson, BioSyn Corporation, said, "On delivery seven-fifty for each viable embryo, that's one point five million if you get all fifteen species off the island."
"I'll get 'em all." Nedry replied.
"Remember, viable embryos, they're no use to us if they don't survive." Dodgson replied.
"How am I supposed to transport them?" Nedry asked.
Dodgson handed him a shaving cream canister, "The bottom screws open, there's enough coolant in the compartment to last seventy-two hours."
"That's up to your guy on the boat. Seven-fifty two nights from now on the East Dock, make sure he gets it right." Nedry replied.
"How are you planning to beat security?" Dodgson asked.
"Oh I've got an eighteen minute window. Eighteen minutes and your company catches up on ten years of research..." Nedry began.
He was simply killing time until the S.S. Venture pulled into the harbor, where he could drop of the shaving cream can in his sports bag and walk away a far wealthier man. Eighteen minutes. The control room would have no idea that he was gone...
Little did he know that he was under observation himself. Watching in his office was Peter Ludlow. Scheme all you wish, Nedry. Ludlow thought, You think yourself a king, but in reality you're little more than a pawn, a convenient patsy for which I can blame this entire 'accident' and after Uncle John steps down as CEO of InGen, the entire enterprise will be mine...
---
Samantha walked into the room, her head spinning from the dinner debate and maybe a glass or two of from dinner. Hammond definitely had excellent taste in wines, and this particular vintage was to die for.
She saw Hyde was still snoring noisily on the living room couch. She headed for the bedroom, glad that both Bryce and Hyde had agreed to let her use the proper bedroom. Bryce was sleeping in the fold-out bed in the living room of their hotel room.
She could see him twisting and turning underneath his blankets. Occasional grunts and other noises, sounding like conversation could be heard. She was just about to write it off as simple sleep talking when she heard him say, "Flanagan, DiStephano, get sarge to the medics..."
Samantha put her handbag down as she watched Bryce in the middle of his dream...
Iraq 2004 - Captain Bryce Lightfoot, 1st Infantry Division, sat on top of an empty ammo can as he thumbed through a battered, careworn copy of Alan Lightman's Einstein's Dreams when the call came out for QRF over the radio.
Before First Sergeant Mike Horvath, Kilo Company's first sergeant, could even poke his head into the lean to shelter Bryce was already grabbing his helmet and his M4 carbine, buckling his load bearing vest.
"Report?" Bryce asked as he headed for one of the wide bodied Humvees.
"Supply convoy took a hit, IEDs on the MSR (main supply route), just outside of the village of Karbalah." Horvath said.
Already several QRF soldiers were hopping into the Humvees and the two Bradley fighting vehicles, racing for the scene of the attack. Horvath checked his Beretta M9 9mm semiautomatic, he'd already handed his M-16 off to a soldier whose weapon jammed so often that they turned it over to the armory for maintenance.
As the Humvees neared the scene, the sounds of gunfire and grenade and what had to be mortar fire sounded.
"This isn't an IED, it's a fucking ambush." Bryce replied.
Already the MK-19 grenade launcher on one of the Humvees was firing towards the direction of the insurgents. Bryce and several members of his company dismounted the vehicles, assaulting towards the direction of the enemy fire. He watched as soldiers ran short distances, before hitting the ground, firing, covering for their buddies who were running ahead of them, reloading magazines on the run.
The fire was coming from several buildings directly to the left of the supply convoy, and Bryce gestured his troops to attack the buildings. He watched with grim satisfaction as several soldiers stacked up on a door while one of them kicked it open, throwing a grenade inside. After the grenade detonated the stack of troops charged into the building. Gunfire could be heard as they entered.
Bryce and Horvath headed towards the building, with the radioman, PFC Bob Manetti, telling HQ about the attack in progress. Just then an insurgent staggered out of a hole in the floor, blood pouring out of his nose, evidently he'd fallen victim to the shockwaves of several grenades being flung around. He squeezed off a burst of fire at around the same time Horvath saw him and fired almost half a clip into him at less than fifteen meters. Both Horvath and the insurgent hit the ground.
"Sarge!!" Bryce began, "MEDIC!"
"Sir, God damn it! I'm OK!" Horvath said from the floor. Bryce looked down, Horvath's legs were covered with blood.
"Bullshit." Bryce replied. "Flanagan, DiStephano, get Sarge to the medics."
"God damn it, sir! I'm alright." Horvath began as Flanagan and DiStephano supported him between them.
"Kingpin, this is Bishop One-Niner." Bryce began, "We have arrived on scene, confirm source of attack came from the village of Karbalah. I have four wounded, none killed...still securing objective."
The flimsy building shook as a grenade exploded upstairs. Several insurgents had fled upstairs, and were now trapped, fighting elements of the QRF. Shooting was lessening upstairs as several of the trapped insurgents were being cut to ribbons by fragmentation grenades thrown into the rooms, followed by infantrymen charging in and shooting steadily.
"Building secure! Building secure!" Came the shout from three floors up. The word passed from room to room and from floor to floor before.
"Casualties? Ammo?" Bryce shouted.
"Running low!" the loud voice of Sergeant Watkins could be heard.
"Squad two, one wounded."
"Medic!" came a shout.
Presently the medics came, bearing a collapsible stretcher. "Who is it?" Bryce shouted.
"It's no one sir." Watkins said.
"Bullshit its no one, Watkins." Bryce replied, "It's one of our god damn own."
"Sir, really, it's no one." Watkins said.
Bryce took a step towards the stretcher, noticing the stretcher was covered over by a tarp and that there was movement underneath it.
"He's dead, sir." the medic said.
"Bullshit he's dead! He's alive, damn it!" Bryce replied, and drew back the sheet. He found himself staring right back at a Heartless, clad in the desert tan fatigues of a US Army soldier. The creature's eyes glowed bright yellow as it let out an ear piercing shriek.
Bryce sat up in the foldout bed embedded in the wall, suddenly, his Glock in hand, scanning the hotel room for any threats. He turned to find himself face to face with Samantha.
"Whoa! Bryce!" Samantha began, holding up her hands.
Bryce blinked and said, "God, I'm sorry."
"'I'm sorry,' you almost blew me away and all you can say is I'm sorry." Samantha replied.
"I did not almost blow you away. I have enough training that I can instantly assess a threat when I see one, and you didn't pose a threat." Bryce countered.
"Bryce..." Samantha began, looking at him, "You look like hell, I think you should get some sleep."
"That's what I was doing when you walked in." Bryce replied, laying the gun back under his pillow.
"Does your training say you deal with bad dreams by pointing guns all over the place?" Samantha asked.
"How long were you in here?" Bryce replied, sliding out of the covers, and realizing he was in his boxers, grabbed his jeans and slid them on, heading for the kitchen for a glass of water.
Samantha followed him, Bryce wasn't losing her that easily. It was that part of her nature that made her a promising young journalist. As he walked, Samantha couldn't resist a look, Bryce had the compact, well muscled build of a dedicated swimmer. Compared to Tyler, her boyfriend, Great Northern University's star quarterback, he was smaller, but clearly an athlete.
"Bryce?" Samantha asked, "What was it about?"
"Look inside yourself and you'll understand." Bryce replied.
"Bryce, come on, you're the one who keeps saying we need to be honest with each other." Samantha began.
"It's fairly self explanatory, my last statement." Bryce replied, "You're an idealist, Samantha, that's what makes you want to pursue the truth as a journalist."
"We're not talking about me, we're talking about you." Samantha replied. Bryce turned to sip his glass of water and Samantha could see the tattoo on Bryce's right arm, around the shoulder area. It was written in an elaborate script, in plain black ink. She winced as to how painful sitting still for that had to have been.
The words tattooed into Bryce's arm were: Zu Soldaten und Vaterland immer treu.
"What does that mean?" Samantha asked.
"It's German." Bryce replied, "It means 'To Soldiers And Fatherland, Always Loyal'. I had it tattooed into my arm when I transferred into the Army after two years in the Navy, reinforcing a statement that was already my motto. I was never in the mood to win medals, I was there to do a tough job"
At Samantha's quizzical look, Bryce added, "I'm half German, on my mother's side."
"Fatherland? Doesn't that sound somewhat fascist?" Samantha asked.
"Not at all." Bryce replied, "Considering that an officer's duty is to his soldiers and his homeland, or fatherland. And considering I'm part German, the word just made sense. Anyway, that was the ideal I believed in for all eleven years I spent in ranks."
"So what made you switch from the Navy to the Army?" Samantha asked.
"At the time the Navy's surface warfare community, which I found myself after graduating from Annapolis was becoming too much like a corporation, getting away from the warrior roots that were part of its foundation. I wanted to follow that citizen-soldier ideal that drove me since boyhood, and the Army seemed like the place to do it."
"What happened?" Samantha asked.
Bryce told her about the dream he had just recently had, recounting every detail.
"So who was the guy under that sheet?" Samantha asked.
"His name was Levy." Bryce replied, "He was only twenty years old..."
"What happened?" Samantha asked.
"He was the kid every platoon commander complains about." Bryce replied, "I still remember he was assigned to our company, Kilo Company, 1st Platoon, 2nd Squad. Everyone in his chain of command complained about him, how he was a screwup, inconsistent, but not lacking in heart."
"He wasn't trouble, he earnestly wanted to be there, but adapting to military life had a few headaches for the guy, it does for everyone." Bryce continued.
"Sir, I want to be here. I want to stay with the company..." Levy said, as he sat on an empty ammo box, facing Lightfoot, sitting on another box.
"That's all well and good, private. But I've been getting a lot of complaints from your NCOs and your platoon leader." Bryce replied, "What's the issue with you?"
"Sir?"
"Private, speak honestly." Bryce replied.
"I joined because I had nowhere left to go." Levy said, "I could've finished college, but there were emotional reasons that made it too hard. I couldn't go home, I'd be the only kid in my family to fail college, so the Army was my only place..."
"Levy." Bryce replied, "I'll move you over to second platoon, give you a chance to get somewhat of a fresh start."
"Did it work?" Samantha asked, "Moving him?"
"Yeah. It turned out first platoon never gave him a chance. Not a single one of those guys even bothered to befriend the kid, not even found out if he had a pet dog, a goldfish or whatever. Just because he was different..." Bryce replied, "He had one week left before we were due to be out of Iraq...I'll never forget seeing the kid on that stretcher, pulling back that tarp, knowing it was one of my guys on that thing."
"Bryce, I don't know what to say..." Samantha began.
"You don't need to say anything." Bryce replied.
"Look, it's obvious that something's been bugging you for a while and I..." Samantha replied.
"It's really kind of you to care." Bryce replied, "But honestly, I'm fine."
Hyde slowly had been waking up, watching the whole exchange. He saw how Samantha was around Bryce, regarding him with those soulful brown eyes. He felt his blood turning icy, through the hangover.
Bryce took a look at Samantha then, she was definitely a looker, with that auburn hair, those lovely brown eyes and smiled faintly. Maybe if we'd met a few years earlier...Bryce thought.
Hyde still lay there as the two spoke to each other. Samantha had taken a couple steps closer to Bryce. Bryce didn't have his shirt on. Wanker. I'll dismember you. I'll bloody tear you in 'alf. Rage and jealousy ran red hot through Hyde's veins. That rage and jealousy was mixed, with a good deal of self pity. Wot did you expect, that she'd go for a chap like you, a malformed bloke of brute muscle? Of course she'd bond with Bryce...I don't want to 'urt 'er, so I can't just tear Bryce limb from limb, though I want to more than anything...
"Bryce," Samantha said, touching his arm, feeling the compact muscle beneath, "If you ever need to talk..."
"You're sleeping just down the hall. I know." Bryce replied, "I'm fine for now, and thanks for your compassion."
Samantha walked down the hall, to the bedroom to get some rest. Bryce watched her go, feeling sorely tempted. He remembered she had a boyfriend she mentioned, and that the two were deeply in love. God, such a nice girl. Beautiful. Intelligent. Idealistic. Things that used to attract you back in the past...
---
The next day Bryce stood in line for the Jungle River Cruise. In front of him, about a couple turns ahead, was Samantha. She was taking that tour with one of the people she'd eaten dinner with the night before, a Dr. Ellie Sattler.
It would be well and good that Samantha would know where everything was on the River, but Bryce wanted a look for himself. He wasn't expecting a twenty-two year old journalist fresh out of college to be able to pinpoint natural ambush sites or anything of that sort.
Bryce sat down in his seat as the boat started on its track. Samantha was unfortunately on the boat directly in front of him. He could at least keep an eye on her, unfortunately that was about all he could do. The three North Koreans from yesterday were on the boat with her and Ellie. Maybe they were on a reconnaissance mission of their own, but Bryce couldn't help but imagine something serious was about to erupt and today. Behind them was the Baroness.
Little did he realize how right he was. Benny and Kevin Volchak, two brothers, two members of the Friends of Humanity walked onto the boat. At an approved signal they would start a hostage situation on the boat. They and other cells of FoH members, and personnel from COBRA and a small NKPA contingent would cause acts of sabotage and disruption throughout the island, creating distractions for Jurassic Park's Security Forces. On the East Dock, the main COBRA and NKPA task force would seize and take the genetic's lab...
Samantha Grayson took several photos with her digital camera as they passed into the area called Sauropod cove. Two Brachiosaurs were soaking in the large lake, big eyes looking at the tour boats with mild disinterest.
The boats continued around another bend. "The Maiasaurus or good mother lizard lives up to its name. Infant Maiasaurs stay in the birth environment for extended periods of time. The infants you see amongst the adults are not natural births. They are new arrivals from the hatchery, and the adults instinctively raise them as their own..."
It was just then that the boats stopped in the middle of the Maiasaurus' paddock. Bryce reached a hand for his concealed holster.
From a maintenance building on the shore of the lake, an FOH saboteur sent a text message to several cellphones on the two boats.
Samantha wanted to say something to one of the three Korean men sitting behind her, when she found herself facing a pistol to her face.
"All of you! Stay where you are! Do not move or you will be shot!" One of them declared, pressing the weapon to Samantha's head.
Samantha blinked her eyes, tears streaming down her eyes, noticing an utter lack of pity in the eyes of the man pointing the gun at her head. She closed her eyes tight again.
"Don't kill her, yet. She might prove to be of use." The Baroness began, "After all she is associated with the strongman and the paramilitary man that killed some of your colleagues...
Damn it...Bryce thought as he saw the other boat. It was then that two FOH thugs drew handguns from their belts.
"Nobody move!" Kevin Volchak shouted, raising his pistol and firing a single shot into the air.
Just then, one of the Maiasaurs' nearest the first boat was alarmed by the noise and rammed the first boat, sending it off the tracks and drifting in the strong currents towards a large, walled compound that Bryce knew to be the Raptor Containment Area.
"You there!" Kevin shouted, "Get your hands where I can..."
Bryce knew that now was the time for action. Volchak hauled Bryce to his feet just as Bryce drew his weapon and squeezed off half a dozen rounds at point blank range into Volchak's chest and abdomen. Volchak staggered back several paces.
Benny raised his weapon, aiming it at Bryce. Bryce turned around rapidly and squeezed off two rounds to the chest that staggered Benny. A third shot was fired, drilling the FOH thug through the head.
Bryce scanned the area for threats, seeing only frightened people. "Calm down! I'm here to help..."
The first boat had already drifted through into the Raptor Containment Area and Bryce knew that only one option remained to him. He stuck the Glock back into his holster, grabbed his pack, which he'd put several improvised floatation devices into, and swam towards the far bank and the underbrush...
Samantha felt the boat drift through the canals. "JP01, this is Control, we're sending a launch to pick you up at the East Dock..."
No, don't send anyone...Ellie thought.
---
"The National Weather service is tracking a tropical storm, about 200 miles west of us." Muldoon began.
"Aye yi yi yi yi, why didn't I build in Orlando." Hammond began.
"I'll keep an eye on it, maybe it will swing south like the last one." Muldoon replied.
Just then an alarm went off. "Two hostage situations on the Jungle River Cruise. Gunfire reported."
"Deploy the Reaction Force." Muldoon shouted.
"What the hell! What the hell!" Arnold shouted.
"What now?" Hammond asked.
"One of the boats, JP01 has just breached the Raptor Containment Area." Arnold replied.
"The fences?" Muldoon asked.
"They seem to be holding for now." Arnold replied.
Dennis Nedry watched this all occur, planning how he would use this disruption to hide his theft. If they didn't tighten security up all over the park. So far Jurassic Park was at Code Yellow, the second level of Threat Reaction. If it got so bad that it was Blue or Red, Nedry might not be able to carry out his plan.
But this could well work to his advantage. If the reaction units were racing all over the park trying to contain threats or escaped dinosaurs then it would give him some more opportunities to sneak off to the East Dock.
---
Samantha Grayson watched as the two North Korean soldiers hauled the dead body of the Jurassic Park River Patrol Boat man and tossed it into the canal. Another soldier stood guard while the Baroness filed her nails, regarding Samantha the way a crocodile regards a meal.
"So, Miss Grayson," The Baroness asked, "What do you know about this man, this Bryce, who attacked some of their colleagues."
"I only know his name..." Samantha said, innocently, "I don't know anything about him."
"A likely story, considering you've been traveling with him and that big lout." The Baroness replied.
"I've only known him for a couple of days." Samantha replied.
"I would suggest you be more honest with me, Miss Grayson." the Baroness said, "Before I turn you over to these three. They are very angry with Bryce killing some of them. And I'm sure they would love to take out some of that fury on you."
Samantha felt her blood turn to ice with fear. The Baroness reached across the distance between them and fingered the lapel of Samantha's white blouse. "Such a nice blouse...I would hate to see it stained with blood..."
---
Miguel Cruz chambered a round into his 12-gauge shotgun as Anthony Garcia, his team leader, loaded a clip into his Beretta 92FS. There had been yet another security alert sounded. This one took place in the Cretaceous Courtyard Hotel bar.
The other eleven members of the reaction force were scrambling out of the armory, heading towards the bar.
Meanwhile at the bar, several FOH infiltrators, armed with knives and a few handguns, had tried to take hostages amongst a bunch of easily annoyed Manchester United fans and Mr. Hyde.
Hyde picked up one FOH member by the legs before body slamming him head first into the floor. "That's for shooting my drink you prick!" Hyde shouted. Right about now he was eager to take out some wrath and these FOH bastards were giving him a perfectly legal excuse to dish out some.
Mad Max broke a bottle over the head of an FOH thug trying to brain Hyde with a lead pipe. He followed up the bottle strike with a hit from a set of brass knuckles he was wearing on his right wrist.
An FOH thug shot the beer tap shouted, "EVERYBODY DOWN! NOBODY MOVE!"
He instantly regretted his action as he was smashed into the wall by a barstool flung by an extremely angry Edward Hyde.
Three hooligans were currently bashing the crap out of another FOH man that had shot one of their number.
Hyde was currently airplane spinning another FOH member over his head before flinging him through the bar window like a javelin.
Just then Cruz shot the door hinges out with a shotgun and kicked the door down. The twelve man squad smashed in the door just in time to see the Manchester United fans attacking the FOH.
"Oi! Those wankers destroyed the beer!"
"'old that one still Cecil, let me clobber 'im!!!"
"Oh thank God!" one of the FOH members said, "Security's here. Please arrest us! We started the fight! Arrest us! Please!!! These people are insane...HELP!!!"
The FOH member yelled as Hyde grabbed him by his ankles and swung him like a bat just before one of the security men hit Hyde with a taser...
---
"All incidents have been contained." Muldoon reported, inwardly he wasn't so sure about the Mexican standoff going on in the Raptor Containment Area, but it seemed like the little incidents going on around the park were being contained.
He couldn't help but imagine something worse was about to occur. And then there was the message regarding the SS Venture, the large supply ship that gave Jurassic Park its supplies on a weekly basis.
Muldoon glanced at the screen for a grand total of one second, as he returned to sorting out the half-a-dozen other assorted crisis' going on in Jurassic Park. According to initial reports the attackers were from an organization called the Friends of Humanity.
Had he looked at the screen showing the Venture of the dock, he would have seen several armed soldiers sneaking off the vessel...
---
Denis Nedry knew he had to put his plan into action and he clicked the mouse, executing his plan that cut Jurassic Park off from the rest of the world and secured power to all but the raptor fences. He quickly made his way to the genetics lab, where, as he anticipated, most of the staff was at dinner, before stealing fifteen samples and running out of the room to a gas jeep where he started off into the park.
---
Meanwhile Bryce was making his way down the maintenance road, looking for a narrow enough point to swim across the River or better still find a bridge or small boat to try and get to the Raptor Containment Area and help Samantha.
He had already reassembled his AK-47 and donned his combat webbing. Something told him that a great disaster was going to hit when the storm struck violently. He got off the road and into a small, concrete structure just off the trail.
He heard more noise just then, coming from the direction of the Visitor's Center. It sounded like gunfire.
---
Samantha looked behind her as the large boat drifted inside the boat house. She was thankful that the Baroness had ordered the two NKPA soldiers to shut the door behind them. Unfortunately they had closed it in front of the third soldier who had several recently freed Velociraptors chasing him around.
The man was banging against the heavy doors with desperation, "Let me in! Let me in!"
"No! No! AAGGHH!!!!" The screams came a few seconds later with a wet ripping sound abruptly cutting them off.
"The attack has already begun." The Baroness replied, smiling.
"Attack? What attack?" Samantha replied.
"Why to steal some important genetic material from InGen, their research is years ahead of us and a third interested party...or two." The Baroness replied.
"But you'll release those dinosaurs, on all those people and..." Samantha began and within moments realized, "That's the point, wasn't it? You don't care about collateral damage..."
"You are perceptive..." The Baroness replied, sarcastically as the water in the boathouse began to ripple, as if from an impact tremor.
---
The Jurassic Park Control Room was a scene of pandemonium. Blood sprayed as Wu had never seen it before. Several strange looking men with cobra heads stamped on their uniforms together with North Korean soldiers with assault rifles had stormed into the lab, killing or severely injuring several technicians.
Kathy was currently holding onto him for dear life. The poor woman was terrified, and bleeding. A stray round had skipped off the floor and grazed her arm. Wu set to work trying to patch up her arm with strips torn from his lab coat.
Elsewhere gunfire could be heard as some Jurassic Park security personnel were exchanging shots with the attacking COBRAs and North Koreans, who were quickly withdrawing with the genetic material and information they had come to steal.
---
Meanwhile Bryce had climbed up a rusting old set of metal rungs up the walls of the Raptor Containment Area. He climbed down into the compound and headed for the boathouse, hoping to God he wasn't too late. He'd passed at least three dismembered bodies of Jurassic Park guards.
The large doors were barricaded from the inside, but there had to be a way in somehow he just had to look up. Bryce glanced upward and noticed the ventilation ducts. He looked around the building, finding no ladders, but a tall palm tree nearby.
Bryce climbed the palm tree, to the top, readying himself to jump to the roof of the building. Within a few seconds he was airborne and remembered how the parachute landing fall worked, rolling and letting his body shunt the shock away. He recovered his weapon and then opened the ventilation duct, climbing inside, finding himself in a small office. He felt the floor shake under his feet when the roof caved in and a deafening roar sounded.
Bryce stared out of the small window, helpless as the Tyrannosaurs' head poked down through the roof and clamped its arm around an unsuspecting guest, hauling the woman screaming into the air before the loud crunch of bones could be heard.
The two surviving North Koreans fired their pistols at the dinosaur. The Tyrannosaurus didn't even blink before grabbing one of them and then the other and devouring them both.
Bryce flung the door of the tiny office open, waving his arms and shouting, running along a metal catwalk.
Samantha looked up from the boat, hearing the racket from upstairs, seeing Bryce running along the narrow catwalk.
"Samantha! Run!" Bryce shouted before jumping from the catwalk, towards the water with a loud splash.
Bryce swam downward, kicking downward and forward as the T-Rex poked its head into the water, as if bobbing for apples. Bryce kicked until he was underneath the dock, feeling the burn as he exhaled, slowly letting the air in his lungs out. He watched from under the dock as Samantha and several other tourists, ran or swam away from the T-Rex's snapping jaws, hiding among cargo containers and barrels.
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TBC - Coming up next, the rest of the Jurassic Park Chapter and our heroes journey to a land of old cartoons.