Jurassic Island
Chapter 20 – Under Control
With the locking mechanism not working, the control room door burst opened without hindrance. Kate swept in first, holding the shotgun up and at the ready. Her eyes narrowed as she scanned the dimly lit room. The overhead lights had turned back on with the surge of electricity, and all the monitors were a glowing black, the words '/SYSTEM READY' still blinking up in the right hand corner of the screen. The difference a day made was startling. Once the hub of activity, the control room was as silent as a tomb. The only sound was the low buzzing hum of the computers.
"Clear," she declared after sweeping the room with her eyes.
Castle stepped through the threshold with the kids in tow. He ushered them on as he turned around and closed the door behind them. Kate stalked down the ramp, legs moving quickly, already knowing which computer terminal she was heading for. The others followed without question. Shifting her hold on the shotgun into a more relaxed position, Kate stepped down into the right corner of the control room and made her way over to Nedry's workstation.
"We can call for help!" Charlie exclaimed, spotting the phone sitting on the desk. He grabbed the phone out of its cradle and held the receiver up to his ear. He paused, waiting for a dial tone, and when none came, he frown. "Nothing."
"We have to reboot the system first," Kate said, handing Castle the shotgun as she slid down into the seat in front of the computer station. She remembered Mr. Arnold sitting in this exact chair not too long ago. The memory of his severed arm landing on her shoulder, deep in the maintenance bunker, flashed through her mind. Kate could still hear her own scream mixed with that of the raptor's bone chilling snarls. She clenched her eyes shut for a brief moment, summoning up some of the coping methods Dr. Burke had taught her to help ride out emotional memories and regain control.
"Kate?" Castle prompted, gently touching her shoulder as he noticed her hesitation.
"Yeah, I'm fine," she said, pursing her lips and glaring at the screen. After a minute or two, she sighed and scrubbed a hand down her face in frustration. "Where's Ryan when you need him? He's always better at the tech stuff."
Castle nodded in agreement.
"Zoe knows stuff about computers," Charlie chirped in. "She always goes straight to her room after school and doesn't come out until dinner. Always doing stuff on her computer."
Kate exchanged a look with Castle; both well aware that a teenager could be doing lots of stuff in their room that had nothing to do with a computer. Still, if Charlie's assumptions about his big sister's computer skills were founded, then Kate would be remiss if she didn't take advantage of that resource. Arching her neck, she glanced back at Zoe, the teen's eyes large, looking slightly skittish, like a deer caught in the headlights.
"Is that true, Zoe?" Kate questioned.
The teenager bit her lower lip and nodded.
"Okay, then," Kate said, standing up, and gestured for Zoe to take the vacant seat.
The girl rubbed her arm self-consciously, and then stepped around her little brother, sliding down into the seat. She reached up and brushed back a loose strand of hair out of her eyes, before focusing on the computer monitor. "I'm not familiar with this system. The OS appears to be custom made."
"You can do it, Zoe," Charlie urged, standing beside his sister, his facial features filled with absolute faith.
Zoe slowly placed her hands over the keyboard and typed out '/REQUEST: ACCESS MAIN SYSTEM'. She paused for just a moment, and then pressed the ENTER button. A beeping noise emanated from the computer, and the words ACCESS GRANTED. Everyone lit out a collective sigh of relief. Zoe typed in '/ACCESS MAIN PROGRAM GRID', and the computer beeped, once again presented her with an affirmative.
"Okay, okay," Zoe nodded her head. "I'm getting an idea of how this works."
Kate raised her eyebrows, thoroughly impressed with this young woman skill. The operating system was obviously a custom design. She couldn't fathom how the teen was even coming up with the command queries to gain access to the appropriate programs. She glanced up at Castle and discovered that his eyes weren't riveted on the screen, but on her. She gave him a soft reassuring smile, and reached around Zoe to curl her fingers against his shoulder. He smiled back, and shifted closer to her.
Zoe chewed on her bottom lip as she typed out her next command: /RUN: START UP PROGRAM. The computer issued a series of beeps, and then the screen flashed, turning blue. Rows and rows of code scrolled past, followed by a line of hashtags, and then the screen blinked back to black.
"What!? Did she break it?" Charlie's mouth dropped, and he reached out, punching the top of the monitor with his little fist before Castle could grabbed his hand and pull it back.
"Hitting it won't make it work," Castle chided, giving the boy a stern look.
"Zoe?" Kate asked, leaning in, concerned.
"It's just running the program," the teen replied. "Then it'll reboot. Think of it like a hard start after a crash."
"Okay," Kate bobbed her head like she understood, when really it had just all gone over her head. She had no idea what things like 'hard start' meant, but Zoe seemed like she knew what she was doing, so Kate wasn't going to worry herself. The computer beeped once again, and this time, when Kate looked at the screen, she recognized the user interface from when Mr. Arnold had been trying to bypass the virus Nedry had put into the system.
"We're in!" Zoe exclaimed, smiling, unable to hide her pride.
"Great job, Zoe," Castle patted the teen's shoulder.
Kate inclined her head, and nudged Castle's arm, taking the shotgun back from him. She adjusted her hold, feeling a little more secure with it back in her hands. Scanning the room, she wondered what had happened to all the technicians and support staff. She tapped Castle's shoulder to let him know she was going to look around, and he nodded. Kate left them to handle rebooting the system.
Stepping up onto the center platform, Kate finally took her first good look at the entire control room. In a way, it reminded her of the underground CIA operations center during the case where she had discovered she hadn't been Richard Castle's first muse. She stared at the three large screens on the wall, all still blank, but glowing with the start-up menu. The computer banks lining the room were all starting to boot back up, and the screens were flickering to life. Kate turned around, letting her eyes survey the entire room, looking at it with detective eyes. That's when she saw it through the windows along the opposite wall.
It was a flash of dark brown, but it was enough of a warning.
"You've got to be kidding me," she exhaled in disbelief, hooking the shotgun into a secure hold as she ran up the ramp, her feet pounding against the metal grating. "The door locks—Castle! Boot up the door locks! Boot up the door locks!"
Gritting her teeth, Kate lowered her shoulders and rammed against the door just as the flat handle began to turn. Something powerful hit the door, hard, from outside, and despite her efforts, it jerk violently inward, sending her stumbling backwards, the shotgun falling from her grasp, clattering uselessly on the floor. The blood-curdling snarl of a raptor penetrated the air, and the kids let out a cry of terror, having thought they'd escaped the fiend. The raptor roared, snapping its jaws as it continued to push the door open. Kate dug her feet into the floor, but with each strike, she was pushed back, rapidly losing ground.
"Castle!"
Before she even finished crying out his name, her husband was heaving himself up the small steps, and running up the ramp, throwing himself against the door, adding his weight to hers in an attempt to keep the velociraptor from gaining entrance. The large raptor hissed and honked, ramming itself against the door, trying to force its way into the control room. Kate sucked in a deep breath, and tensed her muscles, intent on keeping the door shut. Her eyes flicked over to meet Castle's and she could see he was doing the same thing. But he was struggling with his bad knee. Kate knew that they could only hold back the door against the raptor's onslaught for so long. It was taking all they had just to hold steady as the door bucked against them with each vicious strike by the raptor.
"Kate…," Castle grunted, breathing through his nose. "Get back and boot up the door locks!"
She shook her head. "You can't hold it by yourself." Besides, Kate knew she would be useless in that endeavor. They had to trust in Zoe to see that through.
Castle let out a sigh, but inclined his head in acknowledgement of her statement. His eyes flicked down to the floor, where the shotgun rested… just out of reach.
"Kate," he gasped. "Try and reach the gun."
"I can't get it unless I move," she replied, gritting her teeth and pushing back against the door with all her weight as the raptor violently rammed against it, snarling and hissing in anger over being thwarted. Castle looked over at her, his brow beading in sweat and she could see the fear he tried masking behind his eyes but failed. "I'm not leaving you," she declared, giving him a fierce and determined look. "We're in this together, Castle."
He inclined his head and agreed, albeit reluctantly, "Together."
XXX
Her breath hitched and her chest heaved as her heart pounded with fear. Zoe stared up in horror as she watched Mr. and Mrs. Castle struggle with the door, using all their strength to hold it back against the large velociraptor. She had thought they'd seen the last of those cursed beasts in the kitchens, but apparently she had been mistaken. Beside her, Charlie was bouncing up and down, hands on his head as he fought against the rising terror. Closing her eyes, Zoe tried to steady her breathing and find her inner calm. She blocked out all external sensations and focused on centering herself. She had to remain focus on the task fate had assigned to her.
Opening her eyes, Zoe quickly turned the chair back around to face the computer terminal. She stared blankly at the computer screen as she worked at getting her thoughts into order. The screen winked out and then, following a digital chime, rebooted, and she grinned to herself. Finally something goes according to plan. Zoe watched the computer go through its startup routine, before it loaded the startup program interface she had opened a few moments ago.
"Zoe? What is it?" Charlie asked, his hand nervously tapping the back of her chair.
She narrowed her eyes and stared at the screen, trying to access what she was seeing. What she saw was similar to what she'd see if she was initializing a personal computer for the first time, just a little more complex and detailed. A list slowly scrolled onto the screen, presenting her with several options with how to proceed, similar to what would occur with Microsoft Windows after a hard reboot after the computer has froze. If this operation was similar she would press the F12 button on the keyboard, but this OS was different. She looked over all the options, trying to her best to ignore the struggle at the door.
"Zoe?"
"Shh," he hissed, needing her brother to remain quiet so she could concentrate. She was tempted to select the option labeled SYSTEM DIRECTORY; the thought being that she could then find the right set of files to engaged the overall system. But in reality, that sounded like a lot of work, like looking for a needle in a haystack. She opted for the less daunting option and selected SYSTEM INITIALIZATION. The screen flashed, and the cursor turned into a spinning wheel, until the program loaded.
Zoe was staring at an Unix-like OS, but customized. She wasn't all too familiar with Unix, since Linux had over taken in popularity before she was born, but she knew enough from what she'd read on the internet to navigate around it. Grabbing the mouse, she moved the cursor down, finding a box labeled SET GRID DNL.
The computer buzzed, and a warning popped up: COMMAND EXECUTION ABORTED (AUX POWER LOW).
"What does the mean?" Charlie asked, leaning over her shoulder and squinting at the warning.
"It means the control room is still running off its backup generators," Zoe replied. "I need to switched back over to the main power grid."
"How do you do that?"
Zoe moved the cursor down the list, and found one that looked right. She clicked the mouse, selecting ELECTRICAL MAIN. The screen flashed to another set of options, and Zoe quickly scanned the list, this time selecting MAIN. Nothing happened. The screen continued to flash. She moved the cursor down, and right-clicked on the mouse, opening up a drop-down menu. From there, she selected MAIN GRID P. She nibbled on her bottom lip, worrying she'd made a mistake. Maybe she was overestimating her abilities?
The screen gave her several options, and she narrowed her eyes, hunching forward as she read down the list. Not entirely sure she knew what she was going, Zoe selected MAIN SET 1. The screen flashed 'MAIN POWER ACTIVATED', and suddenly all the lights in the room shifted from low to full illumination.
Pressing the ESC button on the keyboard, she was returned to the main menu. Following her original path, Zoe let out a sigh of relief when she selected 'SET GRID DNL' and, this time the program loaded. The cursor blinked in a text box, giving her the option to write in the command she desired to execute. Placing her fingers on the keyboard, she typed out: /RESET GRIDS. Nothing happened for a moment. She arched her neck over her shoulder and glanced back at the Castles, seeing them losing their struggle against the raptor.
Stifling down her fear, she returned her focus to the screen, seeing that her command had been successful in pulling up the desired menu. Using the mouse, she quickly went down the list, clicking each box to activate the grid number. There were over 100 systems and she went as fast as she could.
"C'mon, Zoe," Charlie urged. "Faster… faster."
"I'm going as fast as I can," she snapped. Reaching another menu Zoe spotted a box on the screen that was labeled 'SECURITY DOORS'. "This is it. I got it." She moved the cursor down and quickly clicked each box. Reaching the end of the list, she pressed enter. The computer buzzed and chimed as a window popped up, prompting her whether she wished to proceed or not, warning her that initialization would wipe any programs currently running in the memory buffers:
PROCEED WITH INITIALIZATION: Y / N?
Zoe used the arrows on the keyboard to select the Y, and then pressed enter.
XXX
Chest heaving, sweat pouring down her forehead and stinging her eyes as her muscles strained with the effort to keep the door closed, Kate steeled herself against the door. After five minutes the raptor still hadn't given up. Her breath was coming out in pants, and fatigue was beginning to set in.
"Kate…," Castle grunted, glancing over at her. "I… I don't think I can hold it anymore."
The raptor redoubled its efforts, undeterred by the delay, the anger at being denied its prey only seeming to intensify its determination. It pounced against the door, and Castle slipped, skidding backwards. The door opened an couple inches and the raptor's clawed hands wrapped around, seeking to secure its grip. The door groaned, and inched forward. Kate heaved in a breath, summoning up all her reserved strength and pushed, ramming the door back, and striking the raptor's clawed hands against the frame. The raptor howled in pain, withdrawing its hands, allowing them to shut the door again.
The door latch panel buzzed. Kate exchanged a surprised look with Castle, and together they put everything they had into it, holding the door shut. The tumblers clicked, and they heard the satisfying sound of the bolts slamming into place, locking the raptor out.
The velociraptor snarled in outrage, pounding the door with all its might, but now with the locks secured, it didn't budge. Castle let out a loud sigh of relief, and slumped down against the door. Kate followed him down to the floor, leaning against him as they both heaved in deep gulps of air. She turned into him, and raised her hand to his face, her muscles quaking with relief from the strain they'd been under. Quickly closing the distance between them, Kate pressed a sloppy, relieved kiss to her husband's lips, and smiled when he kissed her back, laughing with joy.
The door vibrated with the raptor's continued blows, but still didn't move. Slowly, using each other for support, they pull themselves back up to their feet, clinging to one another. Holding hands, Kate led the way back down to the ramp, pausing only to snatch the shotgun back up off the floor. They descended down into the right corner of the control room where Zoe and Charlie were bouncing up and down, hugging each other and crying with triumph.
"She did it! She did it!" enthused Charlie.
Kate and Castle smiled like proud parents.
"What works?" Kate asked.
"Lights, doors, phone… you ask for it, we got it!" Zoe exclaimed, her face still flushed with victory. "Jurassic Park is finally coming under control."
Kate untangled herself from Castle, handing him the shotgun as she reached for the phone. She yanked it out of its cradle and held it up to her ear, lips stretching wide in a beaming smile when she heard the dial tone. She looked down at the number pad, and punched in the code for the emergency bunker she had memorized earlier in the day with Muldoon, before they went out to look for Castle and the kids.
It rung for only a few seconds before the call was answered.
"Hello?" came a confused voice.
"Mr. Hammond, she answered. "The phones are working."
"Mr. Castle and the kids?" he asked, and she had to bite her tongue, least she chew him out for feigning concern. "They're fine." She paused, and glanced back at her companions, noticing the fatigue and exhaustion on their happy faces. "Call the mainland. Tell them to send the damn helicopters—" Kate's voice trailed off as she noticed some movement in the corner of her eye. "Castle! The window! It's coming through the window!"
Caught off guard, Castle fired blindly at the window, the shots resounding around the room as he missed his target. Zoe and Charlie screamed as the raptor launched itself through the window, shattering the glass. Shards flew everywhere as the ancient predator landed perfectly on the surface of a workstation, knocking over several computer monitors, which broke apart the moment they crashed to the floor. The raptor parted its jaws, snarling and grinning wickedly at them with rows of razor sharp teeth, its yellow eyes alight with wicked glee.
Kate dropped the phone and shoved Castle back, the shotgun falling from his hands, expended shells bouncing off the floor. "Run! Run!" she screamed, her veins filling with terror. She grabbed at Zoe and Charlie, yanking them away from the raptor as it jumped down off the terminal, the metal ramp clanging loudly under its clawed feet. It lowered its head and roared, slowly stalking towards them. Kate glanced around frantically, trying to find a quick escape. She couldn't see anything. She clutched Castle's hand and, believing this was it, that they're luck had finally ran out, stared up at him, trying to convey with her eyes just how much she loved him.
But he wasn't looking at her. Castle was gazing up at the ceiling, his features slowly manifesting hope. It stole her breath. How could she forget? With Castle by her side, there was always hope.