Maintenance Tunnels - Beneath Isla Nublar
Owen, Barry, and a number of ACU personnel had nearly reached the geothermal power plant. The maintenance tunnels might have been a mixture of old and new, but Jurassic World's power plant had been built right into the blasted ruins of the old one, so no matter which tunnels they took, they would reach the plant one way or another.
But when they finally reached the blast door, they were taken aback.
"This doesn't look like ours," mused Hamada, running a hand down the sleek, white metal. The structure was clearly a door, but there wasn't an access pad, a button, or even a handle—nothing to open it with. As he touched it, Hamada noticed that it felt warm. No, not quite warm, but...not cold. It was as if the metal matched the temperature of his own skin.
"I don't know about any of you, but I'm thinking this is not '80s tech," added Owen.
"It's not from the old Park or Jurassic World. Could it be from our future?" Hamada suggested. "We've got people and assets from the past. The future isn't that much of a stretch. Maybe our eruption wasn't the final event."
Barry spoke up. "Everything in the mural has come to pass already. The volcanic eruption was the last event predicted in it. If future events on this island were predetermined past this, we would have seen it. No, I do not think this door is from our future. It comes from somewhere else."
The group searched the surrounding area for any way through, but the walls near the door held only unrecognizable symbols. An air of frustration settled over them.
After about a minute of searching, Owen approached the door again, unholstering a stun gun. "If you're not gonna let us in, I'm gonna have to find another way. I do not like a door I cannot open." He fired off one shot at the door's base, getting everyone's attention. The charge seemed to sink right into the metal, but the door emitted a groaning sound and shuddered, lifting just enough to let them see light coming from the other side.
"Everybody push from underneath," said Hamada as they approached together. "We might be able to get it up."
They gripped the door by its exposed underside, pushing it upward as a group. As they felt it rise slowly, they could now hear sounds from the other side—weird rattling and rasping sounds, something very alien.
Owen found that he could now reach the other side of the door just a foot or so away. He felt around for any kind of handhold or lever, but before he could get a grasp on anything—
"AAAAAGH!"
Something had taken a hold of his wrist, digging in like a jagged saw. He fought to pull his arm back, but even as Barry swiftly grabbed him by the waist and fought against Owen's attacker, something else snapped onto his arm closer to his elbow. The rasping sound was much louder now, intermixed with ferocious snarls. A clicking of claws on the floor announced the approach of dozens more of the creatures.
Owen's left arm flew instinctively to the defense of his right before he could think to stop it. This involuntary action cost him: more jaws locked onto his other arm, and he was quickly dragged halfway under the door. ACU and the creatures were now engaged in a deadly tug-of-war with Owen as the prize.
But now, suspended on his back with his head on the other side, Owen could see his attackers. They were hideous raptor-like animals with bulging white eyes, ratty black feathers on their backs, and long, lanky arms. There were at least a dozen of them, growling and clucking with carnivorous fervor. Owen had never been so terrified in his life. He desperately twisted his head away from a particularly large creature's jaws, which snapped experimentally at his face. It wasn't in any rush to bite, but kept its blank eyes facing him, a low growl escaping its throat.
Managing to free his left arm from the creatures that had grabbed it, he swung half-blindly at the animal near his head and connected with its misshapen neck. It gave a high-pitched wail like an elk's cry and backed away, two of the other creatures rushing to its side. In a moment of clarity Owen realized that this large creature was their alpha—he recognized the defensive behavior from his raptors. For the moment the animals were distracted by their leader's call, and Owen took advantage of this to smack another of the creatures on his right arm. His friends on the other side were able to overpower the remaining few animals grabbing at Owen, and he felt himself move back under the door.
But one of the bizarre dinosaurs remained steadfastly clamped onto his right arm, which was now spilling blood all over the pristine white floor. Even as its fellows detached, the one remained as Owen was pulled back to his companions. The creature's head and neck were dragged under the door, its clawed hands flailing at the floor. It let out a snarl, and Barry rushed at it and pointed the barrel of his stun gun directly between its milky eyes. But then he rapidly spun his gun around and, not wanting to shock Owen along with the dinosaur, struck it in the head with the butt of his weapon instead.
With a howl, the creature finally let go, drawing back under the door. Clawed feet paced back and forth beneath the gap, but none of the creatures seemed to dare stick their heads underneath for fear of injury.
Owen's right arm was looking terrible. It was torn clean open in multiple places, a mess of skin and muscle and blood. His right hand hung limply, seemingly unable to move. Austin had already wrapped a tourniquet around his arm to staunch the flow of blood, but Owen had lost a lot already and was beginning to look faint. His left arm wasn't as bad, but the multiple ragged bite marks were still bleeding profusely.
Barry firmly patted the side of his friend's face. "Owen. Can you hear me?"
Owen groaned. "They messed my arm up real good..."
"Stay awake," implored Barry. "Concentrate on anything."
"Blood all over the damn floor...Claire's gonna be pissed..." Owen didn't seem to be joking. "Gotta clean that up..."
One of the ACU members named Miller was holding up Owen's arm. "There's bruising on the other side of the wounds that look like there's a toxic effect taking place," he said. "Somebody grab a med kit, we need to treat this right now."
"Barry, if I die, I'm leaving my bike to you," mumbled Owen. "Leave my golf clubs to Claire and my...ah...shit, leave everything else to the raptors."
"You're not dying," insisted Barry. "Quickly with the med kit!"
Cooper, another of the troopers, rushed over with a kit. "We've gotta disinfect the wound before we can do anything else," he said as he removed a can of disinfectant spray. "He needs treatment back in the park. We've gotta get him there, fast. He might stay conscious with a shot of adrenaline—"
"No—don't do that!" A new voice interrupted them. They turned to see a blonde-haired woman in a lab coat rush in their direction. "Give him adrenaline and you'll exacerbate his condition! He needs to have a sedative administered, as quickly as you can!"
"Ma'am, he's on the edge of consciousness, if we sedate him he could go into a coma," said Cooper, finishing the disinfection and preparing a syringe.
"The venom works in multiple stages. First is bradycardia and elevated body temperature, then an adrenaline surge and severe hallucinations. If you give him adrenaline now, when the venom triggers the surge it'll be even more severe. If you administer a sedative now you'll prevent the manic hallucinatory stage entirely. With this number of bites, the toxin levels will be higher, so the process is accelerated. He needs immediate action."
Cooper's hand hovered, still holding the syringe.
"Do what she says," insisted Barry.
The woman approached closer. "You're carrying nonlethals. Animal control personnel? Do you have carfentanil?"
"Of course," said Austin. "In the tranq darts. Standard issue for ACU."
"Give him a quarter milliliter," the woman said. "That should suit his body size. Get it in him before the convulsions start—if he survives the manic stage he'll never recover."
Cooper had already withdrawn a tranquilizer dart and was measuring out the indicated amount, but a look of concern passed over his face. "A quarter-mil? That—a human couldn't survive that dose."
"She knows what she's talking about," said Barry. "She's seen this before. Am I right?"
The woman nodded. "Unfortunately I've dealt with this in the past. They're never supposed to leave the pens—the eruption must have caused damage—"
"Explain later," interrupted Barry. "Cooper, the injection. Do it now."
Cooper complied, puncturing the skin of Owen's upper arm past where the wounds were. Owen's eyes had already snapped open, but they were unsteady and strangely discolored. He had begun to twitch convulsively by the time the syringe pierced his arm, and Austin had to hold it down while Cooper performed the injection.
But within a few seconds, Owen had begun to steady. He blinked a couple times as his eyes returned to normal.
His voice was uncertain, but he seemed lucid enough. "Guys," he managed to say. "What the hell just happened to me?"
***
Beneath Mount Sibo - Northern Isla Nublar
Owen was left with Barry and a few of the ACU while the scientist, who had identified herself as Laura Sorkin, sought out a quarantine cage. Somehow they managed to lure the animals from behind the door into the cage using a stray cow that they placed in the cage. After the last of the unsightly things had passed through the gap and into the cage, they locked the door, trapping the creatures once again.
"I am so sorry about all of this," Sorkin apologized for the dozenth time. "I put them behind the door, I never thought anyone else was going to try and open it. I haven't even seen anyone else around here, I thought it was just me after the eruption."
Hamada had been about to once more delve into an explanation of what was going on, but something else caught his attention. "Hold on. You know how to operate the door?"
Sorkin looked surprised. "Of course. It's fairly straightforward, why? Is this that new system Hammond keeps talking about, the new security protocol? Is that why you're here?"
"No, it's more complicated than that. How do we get inside?" asked Hamada.
Sorkin walked up to the door and touched one of the symbols, a dark blue triangle. She moved her hand upward and the symbol moved with it, as though the entire wall were a giant touchscreen. The door began to move silently as she withdrew her hand, sliding up into the ceiling and out of sight.
"It's really an incredible piece of technology," she admitted. "If only Hammond put as much money toward research as he did to renovating the maintenance tunnels for no reason, we might actually get things done on this island."
As the door lifted, it revealed an interior room that was just as white as the walls that surrounded it, with the exception of some dirt tracked in by the dinosaurs and the blood left from their struggle. In the back was a large transparent blast window, beyond which they could see a bright light. On one of the walls was the only real damage that the room seemed to have, an opening where a mass of wires and more unrecognizable technology spewed forth onto the floor. The opposite wall was curved and went beyond where they could see from here. No light fixtures appeared to exist anywhere, but the metal of the walls themselves seemed to brighten the room on their own.
"That is definitely not our power plant," Hamada mused.
Barry supported Owen to the door. "What is going on in here?" Barry asked, bewildered at the sight.
"Apparently Hammond had the power plant renovated, too," said Sorkin, shrugging. "InGen has always had cutting-edge technology, but this is beyond what I would have expected. I know that they've been reducing my funds to pay for something, but I'd hoped it was more useful than just implementing strange architecture."
"I don't think this was InGen's doing," said Austin. They had approached the transparent wall—he tried to put a hand on it, but couldn't quite touch it. On the other side, a fountain-like spring of white-hot liquid metal streamed forth, winding around itself at near-impossible angles before fading into a fine mist and rising up or sinking down away from the center.
"That fluid is suspended in exactly the place where Mount Sibo's magma chamber should be located," said Hamada. "We're in the heart of the volcano right now—both the one we know, and the mirror version Owen saw on the island's underside. And I don't think it's a volcano anymore."
"Maybe it never was," said Owen, speaking up at last. "You're right, this doesn't look like InGen's doing. This doesn't look like human doing."
His last words rung in the air for a minute. Everyone was silent. They'd all been thinking it, but it had taken Owen's statement to realize this obvious truth in their minds.
"Call Hoskins," said Barry. "Tell him we have found what he wants to see. Bring Atlanta as well."
"I'm on it," said Hamada, bringing up his radio.
"Hey, fellas. Look at this." Meyers, one of the troopers, had summoned them toward the barrier. "If you look at it just right...there's images in there."
She was right. For brief moments in the white fluid, flashes of movement and color were visible—and not just anything random, but familiar scenes of the geography of Isla Nublar. Most of the people were unknown to them, but on occasion—
"Was that Mr. Masrani?" Cooper asked, stunned. "I swear, I just saw him in there."
"I think I just saw Henry Wu and myself," said Sorkin. "I remember that argument, it was a few days after I was transferred here to Jurassic Park."
"Well, I think I know where Atlanta's ancestors found their inspiration," said Owen. "I may not know what the hell this stuff is, but I know one thing for sure. It's real."
