Chapter 16

"Claire!" Lowery exclaimed, looking surprised to see her when she walked into the control room. "What are you doing here?"

"What do you mean?" Claire asked, instantly worried at his tone. She quickly scanned the monitors as she continued to walk towards him but nothing was looking out of the ordinary. "I always come by around this time. Has something happened?"

"Um," Lowery hesitated, looking over at Vivian like he wasn't sure if he should say something. Claire followed his gaze.

"We thought you'd be over at the med center," Vivian finally said.

"Why would I be there?" Claire asked, her patience starting to run thin as Vivian and Lowery just shared another look. "What don't I know?" she demanded, her gaze darting between the two as her worry built. "Spit it out."

"There was a medevac from Sorna this morning," Lowery finally confessed. "Owen was–"

Claire didn't hear the rest of what Lowery was saying as she'd already spun on her heel and was hurrying towards the elevator. As she rode it back up to the main level, she pulled out her phone. There were no new messages, just as there hadn't been when she'd looked at it on her way down. She called Owen, tapping her foot impatiently as it rang. What had happened? Why hadn't anyone told her? How badly was he hurt?

He didn't pick up. And so she called again. And again.

She hadn't realized she had started shaking until she reached her car and was struggling to slide the key into the ignition. She took a couple of deep breaths, forcing herself to let them out slowly. It wouldn't help if she crashed her car on her way over. It took a couple of minutes before she felt a little steadier and was able to finally slide the key in and turn on the car.

The drive to the med center passed with a blur as she mostly drove on autopilot. After she parked behind it, she practically ripped the keys out in her haste to escape before she tore up the couple of steps to the back entrance and rushed inside.

As she entered, she slowed to a stop, her gaze darting around the hallway. Claire wasn't sure what she had expected to find, but, she realized, it wasn't this. There was the quiet hum the building always seemed to contain, but that was it. It felt too quiet. She realized she had been expecting noise and chaos. That people would be rushing about and shouting for various tools or bandages or something. That there would be some obvious indicator that something was wrong, that someone was injured. She remembered the chaos post the Indoraptors incident, when people had been rushing around, trying to stitch up the few who'd managed to survive their encounter.

A thought struck her and her legs suddenly felt unsteady. What if it was too quiet because Owen wasn't… She couldn't bring herself to finish the thought, worried that even just thinking the words would make them true. After all, it had to be serious if they had sent a helicopter to bring him over.

But… she still didn't understand why no one had contacted her. It wasn't like the fact that they were dating was a secret. Everyone knew. And if Owen was fine, why hadn't he phoned her? She pulled out her phone again, confirming that there were no missed messages from her drive over and that she still had a full signal.

Feeling like her legs might give out, she backed up against the wall and let it support her as she took a few shuddering breaths. She was overreacting, she told herself. He was probably perfectly fine. She just needed to get it together and find someone to ask.

"Ms. Dearing, what are you doing here?"

Claire snapped her head up to see that one of the nurses had entered the hallway and was now looking at her curiously. But before she could say anything, another voice chimed in.

"Oh no, who told you?"

Looking past the nurse Claire saw Owen standing in the hallway.

"Owen," she breathed out. She felt her heart stutter for a moment before racing ahead as her brain tried to catch up with what she was seeing. Even though her legs still felt ready to give out at any moment, she propelled herself forward, passing the nurse and barreling straight into him.

"Oomph," he huffed as he caught her, an arm immediately wrapping around her, keeping them both upright.

"Mr. Grady," the nurse interrupted, her voice stern. "You're injured. I told you to wait for me–"

The nurse's words had Claire springing backwards from Owen, her gaze sweeping over him a couple of times. His hair was tousled and he was still wearing his dark khaki pants. However, he had been stripped down to his undershirt and there was a large bandage covering most of his left forearm. She could see some streaks of blood on his shirt, but she ignored them for now, focusing instead on the fact that he was alive. And that he was standing in front of her.

She reached for him, her hands tentative now, afraid of hurting him, focused on the bandage for a long moment before she looked up and met his gaze. The boost of adrenaline she'd got when she saw him started to fade, and the questions she had temporarily forgotten all sprung forward, tumbling out one after the other. "What happened? Are you okay? Why didn't you call me?"

"I'm fine," he said, emphasizing the word. He held his bandaged arm out towards her. "See? Already all stitched up and good to go."

"What happened?" she pressed. "You can't be fine if they sent for a helicopter."

"I am fine," he insisted again. "It's just a scratch. Barely a flesh wound."

"It's not a scratch," the nurse spoke again. "And we still haven't finished checking you over. Mr. Grady, please, can you go back into your exam room now."

Claire could see he was about to protest and so she jumped in. "What one?" she asked the nurse, who pointed to the doorway just behind Owen. "C'mon," Claire said, directing Owen back into his room.

She stopped a couple feet in. She'd been in the various examination rooms before, but they had never looked like this. Normally they were spotless, everything clean, sterile and organized. This time, it was clear that people had been rushing about recently. There was still one of those paper sheets covering the examination table, although it was all wrinkled and there were blood smears on it. On a portable cart, there were tools scattered about and it was covered in empty packages from gauze and bandages and whatever else they'd used to fix Owen up.

Claire swallowed heavily, although she regretted it almost immediately, the scent of disinfectant and blood filling her mouth and nose. She fought back her instinct to gag.

"I'm fine," Owen's voice slowly penetrated the haze that had taken over her mind. "Claire, seriously, I'm fine."

She took another deep breath, closing her eyes briefly before focusing again on Owen who had moved to stand in front of her. He reached up, cupping her cheek with one hand, tilting her head up until her gaze locked with his.

She wanted to believe him. She did. She just didn't trust him to always be the best judge of his own health. His definition of "fine" rarely seemed to line up with hers. And, she really did hate the word fine, her mind always flashing back to the definition in the The Italian Job: Fucked up, Insecure, Neurotic and Emotional.

"I really am fine," he repeated, and she had to suppress her instinct to twitch at the word.

Before she could respond, another voice chimed in: "I think I'll be the judge of that."

Claire and Owen turned together to see that a doctor had joined them in the room.

"Dr. Graham, what happened? Is he okay?" Claire asked.

"Ms. Dearing," Dr. Graham greeted her. "You know I can't discuss other patients' medical records."

"Just tell her I'm fine," Owen pleaded. "She's not listening to me."

"And I can't tell her that until you let me finish my examination," Dr. Graham said, gesturing towards the exam table.

"Fine," Owen grumbled, walking to the table and sitting down on it.

"Ms. Dearing, you need to wait in the waiting room," Dr. Graham added, as he walked over to a side cabinet, hunting around for something. "Mr. Grady can come find you when we finish."

"I–" Claire started to protest, before fumbling. She knew she had no right to be in there, but even though she could see that Owen seemed to be alright (well, at least alive), she wasn't quite ready to let him out of her sight.

"Wait," Owen jumped in, seemingly understanding her reluctance to leave. "I want her here." He hopped off the bed, only to let out a groan and a wince at the movement, his good hand reaching back to the table behind him as he used it to steady himself.

"Mr. Grady," Dr. Graham huffed, looking over at him. "Would you just stay still."

Owen let go of the table and took the couple of steps towards Claire, reaching out to grab her hand and then pulling her after him back to the examination table. The doctor looked ready to protest but before he could, Owen countered: "Let her stay and I'll let you do whatever tests you want."

Dr. Graham cocked his head to the side as if debating whether it was worth continuing to argue, before nodding. "Okay. We're almost done as it is. I'm still concerned that you might have a concussion."

"I don't have one," Owen said with a quick shake of his head. Although the immediate grimace followed by his face taking on a slightly green tinge wasn't supporting his claims. "I told you I didn't hit my head," he continued.

"I thought you just said you'd let me do whatever tests I wanted?" Dr. Graham said, coming to stand in front of Owen, a small penlight in his hand.

"Fine," Owen grumbled.

"Owen," Claire warned, her tone soft but stern. She was standing just to the side of him, her hand still tightly gripping his. "Listen to him, please."

"Have at me," Owen said to Dr. Graham, before he turned to look at Claire, a grin emerging: "So, didn't think we'd get a chance to see each other again so soon."

She knew she shouldn't laugh. That there really wasn't anything funny about any of this. He was clearly injured, no matter how many times he was going to tell her he was fine. But she couldn't help herself, the laughter bubbling up and out as she sagged against his side, the final remnants of her panic mostly subsiding. He let go of her hand to wrap his arm around her, pulling her in closely, as he dropped a kiss onto her head.

"Ahem," Dr. Graham interrupted them, and Claire stood back up, pulling away from Owen's side. She felt him reaching for her hand again and she laced her fingers together with his, squeezing it reassuringly, before backing further away. She didn't want to give the doctor any reason to complain.

"Thank you Ms. Dearing," Dr. Graham nodded towards her, before turning back to Owen. "Now, Mr. Grady, I need you to answer some questions. I know you said you didn't hit your head, but when you were brought over someone mentioned that you lost consciousness briefly, is that correct?"

o-o-o

It was another hour before Dr. Graham was finally willing to let Owen leave, which Owen was pretty sure was because the doctor was feeling vindictive. He didn't fully believe that every test the doctor had put him through was entirely necessary, although anytime he'd been about to protest, Dr. Graham had just looked over at Claire and raised an eyebrow. It had been a smart move, Owen had to admit, because even though Claire had relaxed more and more as each test came back negative, he could still see the traces of worry lingering, and he couldn't forget just how shellshocked and relieved she'd looked when she'd first seen him.

Before they left, the nurse had returned with some extra bandages, antibiotic cream and a bottle of pills. As the nurse had explained what to do and what to watch out for, Owen had actually thought that Claire was going to whip out her phone and start taking notes, she was paying such close attention. He knew it was her default course of action, to try to learn everything she could so she could maintain her sense of control, and he'd resisted from reminding her in the moment that she wouldn't need to know all this. That he was going to need to head back to Sorna relatively shortly. (As for himself, he'd mostly dismissed the instructions. He'd had stitches before (more than once, actually) and he knew how to take care of them.)

But, now that he was finally leaving he could tell that he was fading quickly, his adrenaline no longer pumping through his system and keeping him alert and the pain pills making him drowsy. All he wanted to do now was to go home, lie down — preferably with Claire — and sleep.

As they exited the med center out the back, he followed Claire over to her car, before pulling open the passenger door and climbing in. Settling back in the seat, he raised his hand to cover his yawn.

"You still haven't told me what happened," Claire said, turning on the car before backing out of her parking spot. "I mean, I'm assuming it involved a raptor, but…" She left the rest of her statement hanging as she glanced over at him, clearly expecting him to fill in the blanks.

"It was nothing," Owen tried to wave away her concern. "Fern and Pepper were having a fight and when I picked up Fern to pull her away, she got me with her toe claw. She didn't even know she'd done anything. She was just squirming to get put down. It was an accident."

"An accident?" Claire scoffed. "Dr. Graham said he put in over 30 stitches, Owen! That's not something minor. And not just that, they medevaced you here! If it was nothing, surely someone could've taken care of it over on Sorna." As she spoke, her voice got louder and louder, her worry and fear finally being expressed, and Owen winced. He knew she was right, but, well, he'd had more than his fair share of injuries over his lifetime, particularly over the time he'd spent working with his raptors, and this one really did feel pretty minor to him.

"They only did that because I was bleeding and it wouldn't stop," he finally said, looking down at the bandage on his arm. While he couldn't see anything now, he could still picture what it had first looked like, the blood running down his arm and soaking his shirt and Fern squawking because he dropped her. "Zia tried to help, but she didn't feel comfortable sewing me up."

"Of course, she wouldn't," Claire exclaimed, throwing an exasperated look towards him. "She's a vet. She's not supposed to sew up humans."

"So? What's the real difference?" Owen shrugged. He wanted to reach for Claire's hand to reassure her, but it was his left arm that was injured and he was holding it tightly against his chest. While the pain medication had helped, the arm was still throbbing, and the bumps from the road weren't helping.

"Owen…" she drew out his name, before letting out a sigh as she finished.

"Claire…" He mimicked her tone and she immediately shot a glare in his direction and he chose wisely to shut up, getting that she wasn't in the mood for teasing and he stayed quiet for the rest of the short drive to their place.

It wasn't until they were riding the elevator that he dared to speak. "Shouldn't you be at work?"

"I should," Claire agreed, nodding curtly, but still not looking at him, and he fell silent again.

He was starting to fidget, growing more uncomfortable every second as she unlocked the door and he trailed after her into their condo. "You don't have to stay," he finally said.

"I–" she started, before huffing and falling silent.

Owen wasn't sure what to make of her silence, but he was also feeling too tired and wiped out to care as much as he knew he should. He brushed past her, heading for the couch, where he half collapsed, half sat down onto it. "I'll be fine. I am fine, you know. You can go back to work." He let his head drop against the back cushion, his eyes falling closed. He could hear Claire moving about.

"Here."

The sound of her voice startled him. He hadn't heard her come near and as he blinked his eyes opened, he wondered if he'd fallen asleep for a minute or two and hadn't realized it. He looked up to see Claire standing in front of him, holding out a glass of water in one hand and a pill in the other.

"They gave me a pain pill already," he told her, confused. He was pretty sure it hadn't been long enough for him to need another yet.

"It's not a pain pill, it's the antibiotic," she told him with a roll of her eyes. "Weren't you paying attention?"

Not wanting to admit that no, he hadn't been, he accepted the pill and placed it on his tongue before reaching for the glass of water and using it to swallow it down. "Thanks."

As she continued to stand in front of him, Owen suddenly clued into the fact that she was fidgeting. Or, well, Claire-style of fidgeting. She was clenching her hands into fists before letting them relax, and she couldn't seem to meet his gaze. He reached around her to put the glass of water onto the coffee table.

"Are you okay?" he asked, his brow furrowing.

"I'm…" Claire started, before trailing off and shrugging loosely, finally meeting his gaze. He was surprised how lost she looked.

"Hey, c'mere," he reached for her hand, tugging her down onto the couch beside him, wrapping his arm around her shoulders and pulling her into his side. She buried her face against his chest and he ran his hand up and down her arm soothingly. "I really am fine, you know."

"Would you stop saying that?" she said, suddenly angry, pulling away from him, and he watched her, his eyes wide. "You're not fine. You were… you needed stitches, Owen! A lot of them!" She reached out tentatively towards his bandaged arm, before pulling her hand back and pointing instead. "That's not fine. Not in my book."

"It could've been worse," he said, only to wince as she turned on him, her eyes flashing.

"It could've been worse?" she repeated, her voice filled with disbelief. "As if that makes this better?"

"I work with raptors, Claire. There's always an inherent risk in my job. Stuff happens." Owen shrugged, looking at her apologetically, not really sure how to make any of this better. He tentatively reached for her, but she shifted and he took that as a sign that she wasn't ready. "This isn't even the worst thing I've ever had happen, you know. Charlie took a swipe at me once. And when Delta was little, she managed to bite me. Echo's tripped me more than once and Blue's whacked me with her tail. Fern's still a baby. She's getting used to her body and what she can do. I honestly don't think she meant to get me. She was just kicking her legs. And even if she was? Well, she doesn't get that I'm more fragile than her sisters."

Claire gaped at him for a long moment. "And that's supposed to make it okay? It's not like she's going to get less dangerous as she gets older."

"No, I'm just…" he trailed off, looking around the room briefly before he met her gaze again. "I don't know what you want me to say. We work hard to keep stuff like this from happening, but we can't plan for everything. I wish I could say that it won't happen again, but I don't want to make promises I can't keep. And I can't promise that."

"Sure you can. You don't have to go into the cage," Claire said, her voice matter-of-fact.

"I do, actually," he told her. "If I'm going to be able to train them, if I'm going to be able to get them to trust me, I need to be in there with them while I can. This time is really important. Actually–" He stopped mid-sentence as a thought struck him and he patted his pockets, searching for his phone, although he came up empty. "I need to get a hold of Barry. And I need to get back to Sorna."

"Sorna?! Are you crazy?" He looked up to see that Claire's jaw had dropped open and she was looking at him stunned. "Owen, you were just stitched up. Dr. Graham said you lost a lot of blood. What you need is rest. And plenty of fluids." She reached for the glass of water and handed it back to him, watching intently until he took an obligatory sip.

Still holding the glass, he shifted on the couch until he was facing her and could meet her gaze head on. He then stated firmly: "I need to know what's happening. I need to know how the girls are reacting. And I can't stay away too long. I'll lose all the progress I've made. I need to stick to my training schedule as much as possible."

"You are not going back today," she stated equally firmly. "No way, no how. I won't let you."

"No, not today," Owen agreed readily. "But I do need to talk to Barry. In all the hassle, I think I must have left my phone on Sorna."

"That reminds me," Claire said, looking up at the mention of his phone before her gaze darted away again. "Why didn't you call me? Why didn't someone call me?"

"Oh, that," he winced. He knew she wasn't going to like his answer. "Everything happened so fast. I was focused on trying to get it to stop bleeding. I wasn't thinking about anything else."

"But once you got here? Once they started to stitch you up? Or when you were on the helicopter? All of that took time, Owen. Why did I have to find out from Lowery?" He was ready to reply but she continued, her gaze locked on his and a finger pointed at him. "And don't tell me you didn't think about it or didn't have time. I heard what you said at the med center. You stopped someone from contacting me. Why?"

Owen looked away from her, trying to figure out how he could answer that question without making her mad. He'd kind of hoped she hadn't heard his comment earlier, especially when she hadn't said anything about it at the time. Or that she'd forgotten it if she had.

"If it had been me," Claire said, regaining his attention when he didn't reply, "how would you feel if I hadn't told you?"

The thought of her being injured by a dinosaur, or getting into a car accident, or, really, anything, made his face pale. He didn't want to imagine any of that, his stomach rolling at just the thought.

"I didn't want to worry you," he finally told her. "I knew you'd panic and there was nothing you could do. I thought it–"

She cut him off. "Of course I'd worry and panic. You were attacked by a raptor, Owen!"

"She didn't attack me," he repeated. "It was an accident."

There was a long pause while Claire just stared at him, like she couldn't believe he was repeating that line to her again. Finally, she sighed before looking down at her hands which he noticed were fidgeting again. "Were you ever going to tell me? Or were you hoping to just disappear back to Sorna before I could find out?"

"I was going to tell you," he said and she looked up at him, her disbelief clear. "I was. And I wasn't going to disappear on you. I was just waiting for Dr. Graham to finish up before I told you. I didn't want to interrupt your day. I know how busy you've been lately with the opening getting clos–"

"I don't care how busy I am," she interrupted him. "If you're injured, I want to know about it. I want to be there for you."

"You're right, I should've told you," he said, feeling chagrined. "I'd want to know if things were reversed. I guess I'm still not used to having someone who wants to be there."

"I do." He looked at her confused. "Want to be there," she clarified.

He started to nod just as a yawn escaped him before he could suppress it.

"We don't need to talk about this now. You're injured and you need to rest," Claire said, standing up from the couch. "C'mon. You'll sleep better on the bed."

She gestured for him to stand up, and he half-heartedly tried to move to get up, before just sinking back further into the cushions. He knew she was right, but at the moment, he was mostly just too tired to care. She reached out a hand when he didn't get up, and he let her pull him to his feet.

As he attempted to follow after her, his body felt uncoordinated and his limbs felt extra heavy. It felt like he was trying to walk through swirling chest-deep water, everything pushing him in different directions. Entering their bedroom, he sat down on the edge of the bed, looking down at his shoes. He needed to untie them, he thought, but he couldn't muster the energy to lean over. He focused on his belt, but his fingers weren't obeying his brain. Giving up, he contemplated just going to sleep like that.

"Let me help," Claire told him, coming to stand in front of him.

She quickly unlaced his shoes and pulled them off before undoing his belt. She helped him back to his feet long enough for him to shimmy out of his pants. After he climbed into the bed, he immediately turned onto his side, and pulled the pillow closer. As his head settled, he could feel himself slipping away, but he fought it back.

"Wait," he called out, seeing Claire heading for the door. "Where are you going?"

"I just need to make a couple of calls. I'll be right back," she promised, stepping back towards him, reaching out to run her fingers through his hair. "Sleep."

Owen wanted to protest. He wanted to tug her into the bed with him. He wanted to wrap himself around her. But the feel of her hand in his hair, the comfort of their bed, and just knowing he was home — even if only temporary — did him in. He was asleep before she made it out of the room.

o-o-o

Hoskins groaned as he picked up his ringing phone. Who was calling him now? He was surprised to see Eli's name on the caller ID and he glanced around his office confirming he was alone before answering.

"Hello?" he greeted cautiously, not sure what Eli was going to want now. It felt like Eli was phoning him with increasing frequency and it was starting to get on his nerves. Especially because invariably Eli had some new problem to raise.

"Oh, good you're there," Eli replied in a rush. "I was talking with my buyer today and we've got a problem."

"What kind of problem?" Hoskins asked as he leaned back in his chair.

"He's saying the Compy's hard to control. That they can't get it to listen to them or follow any of their commands."

Hoskins waited for Eli to say more, but the man remained silent and so finally he said: "Well, yeah, that's not surprising."

"It isn't?" Eli's shocked tone had Hoskins not even attempting to hide his scoff at the other man's ignorance.

"There's always a learning curve," Hoskins told him. While he still didn't agree with all the choices that Owen made with his training, and he still thought that James had been able to make more progress in less time, he couldn't completely disregard Owen's results. "Hell, Owen works with the raptors day in and day out and it still took him about six months before he had his first real breakthrough. Trust me, I remember because I was starting to lose all hope in the project. We were actually discussing whether it was going to be worth it to continue."

"Six months?! There's no way the buyer is going to be okay with hearing it'll take six months!"

Hoskins thought he could hear Eli gasping, like the other man was on the edge of a panic attack or something. "Surely if the guy can afford to buy a dinosaur, he can afford to invest in a good trainer — who should be saying all of this to him." Hoskins picked up a pen and started doodling absently on a piece of paper, only half paying attention to Eli.

"Maybe he is, I don't know. But it doesn't change the fact that he's on my case about all of this. I need something to tell him, and it can't be that he just needs to wait six months."

Hoskins wanted to ask Eli how any of this was his problem. He'd done his part — getting the Compy off island and to the buyer. And what did Eli really think Hoskins was going to be able to do? It's not like he could just snap his fingers and the dinosaur would be trained.

"They don't all respond the same way, I know that much," Hoskins informed him. "Take the new batch of raptors we've got here now. I know it's still early, it hasn't even been two months, but they aren't acting the same. They don't seem to have the same bond the others did with Owen and Barry. I'm not sure if it's just their personalities or something about their genetic makeup… I mean, even with the others, Owen has always gone on and on about how important Blue is to his success and that he wouldn't be able to do what he does without her."

"Blue?" Eli echoed, clearly confused.

"One of the other raptors. He's always talking about her ability to empathize." Hoskins rolled his eyes at his own words. He could still remember the feeling of Delta's teeth sinking into his calf muscle. Just the thought made his leg ache and he bent over so he could massage it. "Says she's the leader. The one who keeps the others in line. I haven't heard him talk that way about any of the new batch."

"Hmm," Eli hummed. "I didn't know that. Interesting."

"Owen likes to tell me you get out what you put in," Hoskins replied after a brief pause. "I think that's mostly BS, but you can tell your buyer that."

There was a longer pause, then, and Hoskins wasn't sure what Eli was going to say, but he really didn't have any more advice for the guy. There was a reason that Hoskins had hired Owen and Barry and James. It was his opinion that it was better to hire the best people you can for the job and then push them to be even better.

"Did I tell you he complained about the size?" Eli finally spoke up again and Hoskins's brow furrowed, the question feeling like it came out of left field.

"The size?"

"Yeah," Eli let out a bit of a laugh. "He asked what's the use of a dinosaur that's the size of a soccer ball. Said that there's nothing remotely threatening about something you could probably kill with a solid kick."

"Obviously that guy's never gone into the cage," Hoskins said. "Those things have a hell of a bite. They may be small, but they're fast. And they usually travel in packs."

"Yeah, I mentioned the bite," Eli agreed. "And I reminded him that he only had one. He once again asked about when I could get him more."

Hoskins perked up. "What did you say?"

They'd agreed to move forward on setting up the Lockwood Estate as a new lab. In doing so, they'd also agreed to pretty much give up on trying to move any more dinosaurs off island; that it wasn't worth the hassle. He knew that Eli had been working on the lab, but they hadn't actually had much discussion as to what Eli would say to potential buyers who would be wanting to move forward now and not in a few months to a year.

"I mentioned that we had a new plan in the works that would allow us a lot more flexibility in what we can offer and that would actually speed up our timeline from ordering to delivery. That definitely piqued his interest. And when I mentioned that we'd be able to offer more custom solutions too, well…"

"Custom solutions? You're thinking of selling hybrids?" Hoskins asked, his brow furrowed. He couldn't remember being involved in a discussion with Eli or Henry about hybrids.

While Hoskins knew that Henry wanted to get back to doing more customizing — or at least tweaking of the genes versus just reproducing more of the same — after the Indoraptors, Hoskins himself had to admit that he no longer felt completely okay with the idea of hybrids. He wanted to, though. While he still thought there was a lot of potential for the raptors to be used by the military, they weren't, by any means, perfect. While the raptors were highly intelligent and continued to show impressive problem-solving abilities, they lacked thumbs. Without them, they were limited in their ability to manipulate objects, and they couldn't pick up most things. He was pretty sure the military would be knocking down InGen's door to sign a contract if they created a raptor that could do that.

"Possibly," Eli said. "But, it sort of depends on what we classify as hybrids. I mean, based on talking with Henry, technically everything he's created is one. I'm not sure we want to go as far as the Indoraptors. Not initially, anyway. We've got to save some of our ideas or 'features' to entice buyers back. But, Henry and I were thinking we could start with smaller tweaks. Like accelerated growth rate. Or colours. Or size. Henry has assured me that those should all be possible."

"Right, those are all things he does now," Hoskins said. "There's nothing new there."

"But our buyers don't know that," Eli agreed with glee. "And selling is often about the illusion you create and not the actual reality that exists."

"While it's great that you've got a plan on how to sell," Hoskins said, "we won't have anything to sell if we don't get that lab up and running. What's the status of that project? Are you getting any pushback from Lockwood?"

"He's too sick these days to pay much attention to anything outside of his granddaughter and the research institute. It's actually Maisie and Iris that are potentially more of a concern. I can't hide everything from them. But, they don't go down into the basement — it's off limits for them — and so far I've been able to brush them off with comments about cleaning it out and getting organized for the next project for the foundation." Eli let out a little chuckle. "It's actually amazing how easily people will trust what you say even when it counters what they see."

"Everyone just wants to be right," Hoskins agreed. "And they'd prefer to accept lies that let them think they are, than grapple with the truth."

"Right. On that note though, a truth we do need to deal with, is how we're going to actually get any of the embryos and such off the island. It doesn't sound like they're less tracked than the eggs or dinosaurs. And it's not like we can fake deaths for vials."

"I've actually been thinking about that," Hoskins admitted, sitting up straighter in his chair. This was a topic he'd enjoyed working through. "And the big thing I keep coming back to, is that we only need to do this — and be successful — once. It's not like our previous plan, where we needed something that would work repeatedly. Instead, we just need to get our samples, and then we're set. Henry can move forward from there."

"Okay. So what are you thinking?"

"Well, the other big thing is that we don't want anyone to suspect any of us are involved. I mean, you're in the clear, but both Henry and I have access to Sorna. If stuff goes missing, everyone's going to be a suspect. They're going to scrutinize everyone and everything that has happened here."

"But as long as they don't find anything on you guys, it'll be fine," Eli said.

"Sure, but I don't think we want them looking too hard anyway," Hoskins replied, picking up his pen again and fiddling with it. "While I don't think they can find anything, it wouldn't be good if they found out that Henry fudged the numbers about the Apatosauruses or figured out the inconsistencies in the Compy numbers."

"So, how do you think we get around that? I mean, like you said, you both are on the island."

"The solution, I've decided, is that we get someone else to steal it. And, we make sure we all have strong alibis when it happens."

"You want to get more people involved?" Eli asked. "I thought we agreed that more people was not a good idea."

"We don't need a lot of people," Hoskins said, leaning back in his chair and turning slightly, so he could look out the one small window his office had. "It's not like we're asking them to steal any of the dinosaurs, although… Well, we can come back to that. We just need a crew to arrive with a boat, steal what we want, and then get away before any help can arrive. Even though the crew on the island has grown, it's still, overall, pretty small. And there's still nowhere near the security level here as there is on Nublar."

"Do you think we could steal some of the dinosaurs?" Eli asked, latching onto Hoskins' comment and sounding intrigued. "I mean, that would be a boost as we'd have some we could sell right away. What about that new batch of raptors? They're still young, but they would have some training. Or… what was the raptor you mentioned? The one Owen said is important?"

"Blue. I don't know if we want to try to get her. She's fully grown, so it would be a bigger job. But, yeah, maybe the new batch. Actually…" Hoskins trailed off, tilting his head to the side for a moment in thought. "Actually, it might be a good idea to try to take some of them. A… distraction, if you will. We could probably make a mess of the lab so it's less clear if samples were taken or if they were just destroyed."

There was a pause on the line as Eli considered the idea.

"What do you think the timeline is for this? I mean, this sounds even more complicated than what we were thinking before. How soon do you think we can do this? The lab will be ready in a few weeks."

"Which actually works out perfectly, as I think we'll have the perfect opportunity coming up next month…"


I love Hoskins and Eli scheming. I will forever say that I think they're kind of "fun" bad guys to have, and it's too bad neither of them survived to be in a sequel.

Hope everyone is managing to stay healthy and that you're practising social distancing and following all the advice out there. All of this is pretty scary stuff, but the actions we all take individually will determine if we're part of the solution or if we make it all worse. So *do your part* because I *do* want JW3 to eventually get made.

In the meantime, I hope these chapters each week help brighten your day a bit. Thank you to those who favourite, follow, and most of all write a comment, because those are what brighten my day.