Chapter 19

Three weeks. It had been three weeks and they still had nothing. Not even a hint of a lead as to where the boat may have been going, or who could be involved, or why now and not three months ago.

Owen was at a loss as to what to do. As they still had two raptors, Hoskins had been on his and Barry's case to keep their research going. That now everything would hinge on what they could do and learn with just Charlie and Echo. Owen had almost laughed in Hoskins's face when he'd said that, but had managed to hold it in. What could Hoskins possibly think they could do with just two? It wasn't even that there were only two, but that he didn't have Blue. Blue who had been essentially the glue that had kept everything together and had allowed him to do his work. Without Blue… well, to say that Charlie and Echo were being uncooperative was more than an understatement.

Leaning on the railing, Owen scanned over the paddock below, but he couldn't see either of them. And, these days, it was never just one, as Charlie refused to let her sister out of her sight.

He knew part of it was that they were grieving — again — as they had now lost another sister. And Charlie was still traumatized from being left in the harness and then getting tranqued. Echo wasn't much happier about whatever drug combination she'd been given. It had taken her much longer than Charlie to wake up and shake off all the lingering effects. Whatever cocktail they'd fed her had definitely thrown her for a loop.

Which just made Owen even more concerned about Blue. Was she okay? Was she even still alive? He didn't like to think about that too much. And he refused to give up hope. Not yet. Not until they heard something from whoever had taken her.

He also felt kind of guilty. He'd spent the last three weeks fretting over Charlie and Echo and worried about Blue and had barely spared even a few seconds of thought for Sky, Fern, Pepper, and Snow. He knew he should probably be even more concerned about them. They were still little. Still learning about their own capabilities. They probably had been somewhat trusting of whoever had come and taken them, having spent their whole lives interacting with humans.

He just… he'd never really bonded with them. Not the way he had with his girls. He'd tried. He really had. It just wasn't the same. They weren't the same. Which should've been a good thing. He didn't want a set of clones. But… it wasn't all new and exciting with them the way it had been with Blue and the others. This time he knew what he was getting into, and he had so many other things already on his plate. He just hadn't had the time for them that he probably should have.

Speaking of time for things… he was also feeling a tiny bit guilty about canceling on Claire the previous week. Actually, what he really felt was guilty over how little guilt he felt about cancelling. It wasn't the right time for him to take a few days off island. Not with Echo and Charlie practically out of control.

Sure, it was their one-year anniversary but… what did that really matter? After all, they both agreed they had had real feelings back when they had been fake dating. So… how were you really supposed to count how long they'd been together? Also, it wasn't like the date was only a marker of good memories. It was also the marker of the Indoraptors' escape and the fight that had led to Delta's death. It wasn't easy to just focus on the good, especially with Blue now gone.

He knew Claire had been disappointed. He could tell in the way she'd hesitated when he'd told her. And in the way her replies had been short and clipped afterwards, like she was trying to keep from saying what she really wanted to say. He knew that she'd actually scheduled the days off and offloaded her calendar so that she really would've had the whole time for just the two of them. And not just that, but that she'd been looking at places on the mainland, so that they could actually put the park behind them for the few days. He hadn't realized that she'd booked something until she'd made a comment about canceling.

While her clipped replies had clued him in that she was upset, it was the fact that she hadn't even pushed back, forcing a happy tone to her voice as she kept telling him "no problem" that had made him feel like a jackass. And for a brief moment, he'd almost told her to not cancel, that he'd somehow make it work. But he'd been standing on the catwalk at the time, and at that moment Echo had lunged at Charlie, probably pissed off that Charlie still refused to be more than a couple of feet away from her, and the two had started fighting. He wasn't even positive that he'd actually said goodbye, having hung up so fast as he had shouted for Barry and for some tech to bring them some damn rats or something, before yelling down at the raptors, trying to get their attention and break them up.

When they'd spoken a few hours later, he'd kept waiting for her to bring up their cancelled plans again, but she hadn't, and so he hadn't. And… well, that was the last time they'd talked about it. And everything had seemed fine since. They still talked regularly, she continued to fill him in on the steps they were taking as they tried to figure out who had been on the boat and what happened, and when the day had come that he was supposed to have gone over, she hadn't said anything as though it didn't matter.

It hadn't been until the following day, what would've been their first full day off together, that he realized he didn't know if she had chosen to still take those days off. She'd never said, and he'd actually found himself kind of expecting her to show up on Sorna with a picnic basket, trying to take his mind off everything or to celebrate. He'd been half-distracted all day, his gaze continually scanning the horizon, expecting to see a helicopter, but nothing had ever emerged. Even now, a couple of weeks later, he couldn't decide if he was more disappointed or relieved that she hadn't shown up.

When they'd talked later that night, she'd mentioned a story about something that had happened that day at work, and he'd gotten his answer. In the moment, he'd been mostly feeling disappointed that she hadn't chosen to come visit him instead. And while he knew that she'd never take the helicopter over to visit 'just because,' he'd still been hopeful that she'd have figured out a way to come see him. That she'd have understood that just because he couldn't leave, that it didn't mean he didn't want to see her. He was sure that she could've come up with something that she needed to come to Sorna to check on in person, if she really wanted to. But the raptors had kept him busy all day, and he knew that if she had shown up, he wouldn't have been able to pull himself away from the paddock for long, if at all.

He also couldn't decide if her not showing up was her being petty over him canceling or if she was genuinely busy. Owen didn't think of Claire as someone who would do something like that, but he was also kind of disappointed at how well she'd taken him cancelling. Shouldn't she have been more upset? Shouldn't she have at least fought him on it a little? (Did he want her to?)

Of course, there didn't seem to be one way to deal with what had happened. Hoskins had just become more insufferable over it all, what with his extra pushiness that they needed to continue to do everything as before, regardless of the fact that they were down another raptor. Zia had become over-attentive to all the animals that remained, particularly the youngest of the babies. He knew she felt guilty for having taken so long to check on them. And one of the cooks had asked to be reassigned, saying he didn't feel safe on the island anymore.

Even Wu had behaved unexpectedly. While he'd stuck around for the lab clean up, the moment it was done, he'd taken some vacation time himself, saying he needed a break. He was supposed to be back next week, if Owen had heard correctly. There were rumours that his "break" was actually him just working out of one of the labs in California, just not wanting to be on the island for a bit. Owen was a bit suspicious about that, wondering if there was actually another hybrid or something in the works and Wu needed access to something from somewhere else, but when he'd mentioned those thoughts to Claire, she'd said that she hadn't heard of anything like that and that, to her knowledge, he really was on vacation.

That had actually been the first time that Claire had mentioned the two of them taking a vacation again. Not that they'd ever referred to their original plans for their anniversary as a vacation. But she'd made a comment that maybe they should follow Wu's lead and get away for a week or something. That the holidays were coming up and, well, they both had lots of unclaimed vacation time remaining.

In response to that, Owen had just raised his same objections that he had earlier. That until they had some news on Blue, and until he and Barry figured out how to deal with Charlie and Echo, that he couldn't get away. Not yet.

He'd tried to soften it, by saying that they should plan something for next year. And by saying that he missed her. Only to have it backfire, when she'd reminded him that he could've seen her if he'd just come home as planned, that the reason they hadn't seen each other in weeks was not because of her choices. She'd changed the topic before he could reply, and since he hadn't been sure how to respond to that, he'd happily gone along with it.

He did miss her, though. He hadn't expected him not getting away to mean that they wouldn't be seeing each other.

But, before he could start to dwell on that again, there was a screech from below and he looked down to see Echo staring up at him, baring her teeth as she growled, Charlie standing a few steps behind her. When he didn't move, Echo's gaze darted from him out the holding pen before back up to him again. He looked down at her blankly, and she repeated the movement more forcefully, letting out an even louder growl.

"Right, food." Owen finally clued in to what she wanted. "Sorry. Sorry. I'm on it."

o-o-o

Claire had never wanted to be able to time-travel as much as she did right now. She didn't even want to go all that far back. Just four weeks or so. Sometime before the incident on Sorna. Before Blue and the raptors and other dinosaurs had been taken. Before it felt like her world had been upended once again.

The last few weeks had been hell. And the next few weeks were looking to be more of the same. She'd been working pretty much nonstop since everything had happened. That bit, she didn't really mind. She could handle the extra workload. What she did mind, was that she had absolutely nothing to show for it. There were no leads. No reported sightings. Nothing. Just… silence.

She was now wondering if she'd made a mistake in agreeing with Simon and Hoskins that they should keep the incident as quiet as possible. Not that she wanted to be dealing with all the media attention that they would receive if people knew what had happened. But maybe they'd have some leads if people at least knew to be on the lookout for dinosaurs.

However, they had been equally concerned with potentially causing mass panic everywhere (since they had no idea where the dinosaurs had ended up) and the negative hit Jurassic World would take as more stories would once again flood the news and claim that they were unable to keep people safe. Thankfully, since no one had been badly injured, and the only people involved had been Jurassic World and InGen employees, it had been easy to keep the whole incident underwraps.

That being said, they had reached out to the proper authorities and to their insurance. It wasn't that no one knew, just that they were trying to keep it quiet. The good thing was that this meant she wasn't the only one trying to figure out what happend. However, so far, their investigations had been just as fruitless as hers. She'd gone through all the employee files of everyone who had ever even stepped foot on Sorna, from those who worked there, to the temporary construction workers they'd hired, to those who flew the helicopters or were crew on the boats. So far, nothing had turned up.

And, the people she was inclined to be most suspicious of — Hoskins and Henry — well, both of them had a lot of people to vouch for their whereabouts during it all. Hoskins had been at the reception with her and Owen. And Henry had been one of the ones captured on the island, tied up with all the others. She was still suspicious, reminding herself that they could've shared intel with whoever was there, but considering their own work was part of what had been affected, Henry's research left a mess and most of the raptors missing, she felt like she was grasping at straws.

What she hated the most, was how it was affecting her relationship with Owen. Between her being busy at all hours, and Owen now dealing with two extremely moody and unhappy raptors, their nightly phone calls had become more sporadic, while also significantly decreasing in length when they did manage to happen. Since that night, Owen had chosen to remain on Sorna and Claire had been unable to find time to get back there, though she had tried (something she wished it felt like Owen was also doing). It felt almost ironic that she'd been concerned she'd never see him with the addition of the baby raptors, and it was turning out that it had been easier to see him then, than now that he only had two.

The only upside to everything, was that the research institute was now open and humming along. Everything she'd heard about it so far was positive. The rest of the grand opening events had gone off without a hitch, and Jurassic World had received a lot of positive publicity out of it all. Even some of the usual critics had had something good to say about the institute.

She just wished she had the time and energy to actually take in the praise.

And someone to share it with.

o-o-o

A large screech followed by "Oh my god, would you just SHUT UP!" had Henry looking up from his work. He turned towards the doorway, unsurprised to find Eli stomping his way into the lab, a scowl on the man's face. The screeching was abruptly cut off when the door finally closed behind Eli.

"I don't know how I'm supposed to keep all of this hidden from Ben and everyone if that damn raptor won't cut if out," Eli fumed, stalking over to Henry. "It can't seriously keep this up every day, can it?"

"Probably not," Henry replied evenly, acting unperturbed because he knew it would annoy the other man. "She's not used to being here yet. Give her time."

"We don't have time," Eli growled. "The moment any of this gets found out, it's over. And Wade has said we can't keep tranqing her. Not if we don't want other problems."

"Have you tried feeding her more?" Henry suggested, looking up. "Maybe she's hungry?"

"She's barely even eating what we give her," Eli sighed, sinking down into a chair beside him. "If she wasn't an animal, I'd say she was on a hunger strike."

"She's also used to more freedom and a much larger space," Henry said after a moment. "And, of course, having her siblings. Maybe we should've kept the baby raptors. Or at least one of them. Given her some company."

"Well, it's too late for that," Eli scowled. "Although you could make more."

"I can," Henry nodded, "but not anytime soon."

Eli frowned, confused. "I thought you said the lab was good to go? That you'd be able to get eggs incubating before you left?"

Henry rolled his eyes, turning back to his work. "There will be eggs incubating. But an egg is not the same as another dinosaur. Blue'll have to wait at least eight weeks for that."

"Eight weeks?!"

"This isn't new information," Henry just said, fed up with Eli's theatrics. While he'd been enjoying his time up there and getting to work on a bunch of ideas he'd had laying around but hadn't been able to execute under the constant scrutiny he'd been under on Nublar and Sorna, he was not enjoying the easy access Eli had to him. He was, surprisingly, actually looking forward to getting back to Sorna. At least Hoskins was slightly more tolerable. "But, if you really do want any eggs incubating, you need to actually let me work and stop interrupting me."

There was a huff before Eli stood up and walked away. Henry braced himself for the noise as Eli left. As Blue's screeches echoed around the lab briefly he found himself tensing. Until he'd moved to Sorna, he'd rarely spent much time near any of the dinosaurs after they were more than a few weeks old. But, on Sorna, with the nursery right there and the raptors the only large dinosaurs around (and the whole area relatively small, making it difficult to avoid them) and with there not much else to do outside of his lab, he'd found himself observing all of them. He'd avoided the raptors at first, but after they'd escaped and it was discovered that they'd essentially used a tool to do so, he'd found his interest piqued.

From the moment the first egg had hatched almost 30 years ago, Henry had found himself enthralled by the whole new field that had opened in front of him. The one thing science never lacked was more questions and paths to pursue. Bringing back the first species had just made him even more eager to bring back others. It had never been, for him, about the wonder and awe of dinosaurs, specifically. It had been about the challenge of breaking through the known scientific limits. All of his creations were, really, hybrids, as they had yet to ever encounter a complete DNA strand to work from and had always had to fill in the gaps. As he'd started to get sort of bored with his work, he'd actually been the one who first proposed creating their own. The day Masrani had finally agreed, wanting something "bigger, louder, more teeth," Henry had been more than happy to leap at the challenge.

But, after the fallout from the Indominus and then with the Indoraptors, and then the more time he'd spent observing the raptors on Sorna, Henry was starting to look at his research a bit differently. He was still interested in hybrids, and he still wanted to push his research further, but he was now beginning to get more interested in the outcomes. Not just whether or not he could bring something to life, but what would happen once it was there.

Owen's success with the raptors (and James's success with the Indoraptors) both felt like they had opened new avenues for exploration. And as much as working with Hoskins and Eli was frustrating and pushing him to his limit, the opportunity to more fully explore the domestication of dinosaurs was alluring. In his observations of the raptors, he'd been able to see what Owen had always been talking about when it came to Blue and how she was different. And now he had Blue. He was excited to test out some new theories with his next batch of raptors.

o-o-o

As she sat at her desk, Claire stared at her phone lying in front of her. She knew what she needed to do, but she really didn't want to do it. She'd been trying to psych herself up to call him all day.

Turning away from her phone, she looked out her office window and down onto Main Street. It was dark, the sun having set over an hour ago, but the street was brightly lit and tourists were still hurrying up and down it, ducking into the various stores and restaurants. Across the lagoon, she could see the hotel, many of the windows lit up.

She should've gone home, she was thinking now. Maybe this conversation would be easier if she phoned him from their place. Or maybe out at his lot. Although the cell connection out there could be spotty. And, she didn't really want to have this conversation in their place. She didn't want it to be possibly tainted by the fight she was sure to come.

Her office was quiet. Everyone else had left hours ago. Zara had been looking at her concerned all day and had been the last to leave, poking her head in a few times, confirming that Claire really was okay and that she really didn't need her. Before Zara had finally left after seven, she'd checked in on Claire one last time and had simply said, "If you need to talk — now, later, middle of the night, whenever — call me. Okay?"

Claire had nodded, but she knew she'd never call her. She still found it difficult enough when she was talking to her sister to always fully express what was on her mind around Owen. Partly, because she knew a lot of her thoughts were irrational. She knew Karen would (rightly) call her out, but she also knew Karen doing that wouldn't change how she felt.

How was she supposed to have a conversation like that with Zara? Claire was her boss. She was supposed to always exude confidence and control. She already felt slightly off kilter just knowing that Zara had picked up on her mood all day and seemed to have a pretty good idea what it was about. There was always a downside when you let someone have that much control over your calendar — they knew of every change, no matter how seemingly insignificant or massively big.

Gritting her teeth, Claire turned back to her desk and picked up her phone. She needed to get it over with. Continuing to think about it was just going to make it harder. Before she could talk herself out of it again, she unlocked the phone and tapped on Owen's name.

As the phone rang, she stood up, pacing the length of her office. Maybe he wasn't going to answer. Maybe she'd got herself all worked up over this, and he wasn't even going to be available to talk. She was about to hang up, when he finally picked up.

"Claire?" Owen asked, his voice sounding breathless.

"Hey," she replied, trying to keep her voice steady. "Is now a bad time?"

"Bad? No. I'm just lying on my bed."

"You sound out of breath," she said, confused. "Everything okay?"

There was a long pause and her anxiety shot through the roof. What was he covering up? "I was in the bathroom," he finally admitted. "I was trying to get to the phone before voicemail picked up."

At that, she let out a short laugh, feeling some of her tension drain away. "You could've just called me back, you know."

"I know, but I didn't want to miss it," he said, before switching the topic. "How are you doing?"

"I'm…" Claire wasn't sure how to answer that. It didn't feel okay to say "not great." But, she also needed to be honest with him.

"What's wrong?" Owen asked, and she could hear him shifting about, probably sitting up on his bed. She could picture the way his forehead would crinkle when he was worried. The way he'd raise a hand and scrub it along his jaw. She hated knowing she was the cause of it. "Claire, seriously, what's wrong?" he asked again, when she didn't answer.

"I wanted to talk to you again about going away for Christmas," she finally managed to force out.

There was a long pause on the line. "That again?" he said. "I already told you that it's not a good time to be going away. Not with Blue still missing and Charlie and Echo still completely out of sorts… I can't go away now."

She could feel her irritation rising. "Owen… it's been a few weeks–"

"This isn't the sort of thing you can get over in just a couple of weeks," Owen interrupted, and she could tell he was getting frustrated. Not that she could blame him, she was frustrated, too. And it felt like they'd been stuck in a loop, having this same conversation over and over again.

"I'm not asking you to get over it. I'm just asking you to realize that I'm still here," she replied, trying hard to keep the waver out of her voice, although she couldn't help it when it broke near the end. "I'm still here," she repeated. "I know it's not the same, but…"

Passing by her desk, Claire grabbed a kleenex, angrily wiping away at the tears that had started to slide down her cheeks. For once she was glad of the crappy internet on Sorna that made video chats almost impossible and that Owen couldn't see her. She didn't want to cry. She just wanted him to understand that she missed him. She waited for him to say something — anything — but he was silent. She could hear him breathing on the other end, the only sign they were still connected.

"I get why you didn't come back last week," she told him. "I know that it's tough–"

"No, you don't know," Owen interrupted her again. "You can't get it."

"I'm trying," she cried. "I've been trying. I'm chasing down every lead I can. I'm doing my best to find her. To find all of them."

"Well, it's not enough," he said firmly. "Every day they're still missing, the chances of us finding them get worse."

"I–" Claire cut herself off, not really sure how to respond to that. This isn't what she wanted to talk about. "I know that. Owen, I really do. And I really am trying my best. Simon has pretty much given me a blank cheque to pursue any leads we can find. Blue and the other raptors aren't the only things that were stolen, Owen. The amount of potential proprietary knowledge that is now out there… It could be a devastating blow to Jurassic World."

"Dammit, Claire. Who cares that Wu's research is getting out there? They stole BLUE. Can you at least pretend to care about that for one goddamn minute? Fuck Jurassic World!"

She froze at his words, her hand clutching the phone so tightly she thought she might snap it in two. No, no, no, no, no. She tried to force herself to take a deep breath, but her lungs felt incapable of expanding. He's just upset, she told herself. He's been on edge for weeks now. He doesn't mean it. He knows you. He knows that you care.

Claire reached out for her desk, resting a hand heavily on top of it. She could feel her heart pounding in her chest, her breath escaping in short gasps. She covered her mouth with her other hand, her phone still clenched in it, trying to regain control. She wasn't sure if Owen was saying anything, but she wasn't ready to hear it even if he was. After a minute, she raised the phone back to her ear.

"I just… I don't know how else to help," she said, desperately trying to keep her voice even, but knowing he was going to see through it anyway. "I thought a break would be good. A change of scenery for a few days. We didn't… I…" She paused, trying to force another deep breath, before finishing. "If you can't get away, that's fine. Karen's been asking me to visit. I think I might book a trip to go see them."

She held her breath, unsure what Owen was going to say.

"Claire…" he started, before trailing off. "Maybe that's a good idea." She felt her hopes rising, that maybe she'd finally got through to him, only for his final words to bring it crashing down. "Go see Karen. You deserve a break."

Biting back the sob she could feel building in her chest, swallowing over the lump in her throat, she barely managed to get out "Okay," before quickly hanging up the phone. She knew she couldn't stay on it any longer. Not if she was going to maintain any semblance of keeping it together.

She let her phone drop to the desk, her shoulders shaking as the sob finally broke through. Almost immediately, the phone rang, skittering across the desk, but she didn't budge. She counted out the rings, waiting for the voicemail to kick in, but instead of falling silent, the phone just immediately started ringing again.

Turning away from her desk, she walked over to her window and looked back down onto Main Street. She wasn't sure how long she stood there, staring down at the colourful blur of the tourists, but when she finally turned away from it, pulling herself back into the present, her phone was silent.


😭 I'm sorry. I wasn't expecting to put this in, in my original plan, but it just worked out. And I really do love writing angst. I'm going to go run away and hide now.