New Worlds
AvalonReeseFanFics
A/N: Well my wonderful readers, it's going to start getting interesting from here on in. Are you guys exciting? I know I am! I just recently got a BETA for this series, who is looking over the first two stories in the series at the moment. The plan is to update the current stories with the edited versions, and then I'll be posting them to AO3 – so if you're on that platform too, look out for this series popping up on there. As always don't forget to leave a review or drop a fav or a follow and I'll see you guys next week!
Chapter 10 – The Sickly Sixes part 5
They walked all through the night and well into the morning. It had rained through the night as well, soaking the men through and through, but once the sun came up the jungle humidity basically dried them all off.
Roland's job was to get as many of these men to safety as he could. He was expecting some casualties along the way but he wanted to minimize it. And he very much wanted to make sure that the two children he had with them made it as well.
But it was the red-headed woman, Dr. Harding, that Roland was most watching. First because she was the only one who could control or speak to the little wild girl.
She was the only person she'd listen to.
The little girl kept running off into the bushes, climbing up trees to swing through the branches and then landing on one of the men.
She liked to drop onto the Earth First Bastard's back. He would always try to catch her in this playful way, to snatch her off of his back but she would scramble off with this strange keeling laughter that sounded a lot more like a chuffing sort of bark. He played it off as he was letting her get away, but the truth was that girl was slippery and hard to catch.
She also really liked messing with Dieter. If he caught her, he'd hurt her, so Roland and Ajay were both keeping an eye out, to intervene when necessary.
Every time she'd be a little too quiet for too long, or if Dr. Harding hadn't seen her in away, she'd call out and the girl would appear. She would listen briefly went told to leave Earth First and Dieter alone, but it never lasted long.
But the other thing he had noticed was blood. Traces of it, brushed up against leaves and trees. Someone in their group was injured, and after half a day he figured out who it was.
He called for a break, let the men settle in to relax and ten went to kneel in front of Dr. Harding.
"Are you injured?" He asked but when she just stared at him confused, he pointed to the wet blood on her jacket. Honestly she was covered in it, how had he not noticed it before?
"Oh, no. It's the baby's. I set it's broken leg," she said. "It won't dry. The humidity."
Ah, yes he knew about that. Mainly because he was the one who injured the baby Rex. Probably shouldn't mention that to her though, he had had enough lectures from these people, he'd like to avoid another.
Luckily he got a distraction.
Above them the branches creaked and that familiar high pitch chittering was heard.
Roland almost smiled, and might have if he were prone to things like that. He liked this little girl. The little girl that ran around in the grass and the bushes. Who seemed at home in the jungle. Who liked climbing into the trees and disappearing in the canopy. But always came back.
He wasn't sure where she was though. Normally he could tell by the way the branches moved, but it didn't look like she was over head again.
Then she popped out of the bushes right beside Dieter roaring loudly. As per usual, the man had not been expecting it, so with a cry of surprise Dieter fell over.
This had everyone around him laughing, and as Dieter's man-hood and pride were both very fragile he got very angry.
He lashed out again but she was already part way up the tree and out of reach before he could try, her braying laughter echoing after each attempt.
"If I get my hands on you, I'm gonna wring your stupid neck!" he shouted up at her.
She might not have understood him, but he understood tone clear enough. From her perch on a high branch, sitting much like a monkey did, she hissed at him before disappearing into the canopy again.
Roland glanced back to Dr. Harding who was shaking her head. She used to apologize to Dieter every time she startled him, but she had since stopped doing that.
He deserved it, she'd say if he said anything to her about controlling the little girl.
The child was obviously attached to her, so Roland was assuming that she knew the girl, well.
"You must have some idea of what took her in. Young like that, there's no way she's surviving on her own."
"I have my theories," Harding said. "None of them make sense though."
"What's your plan for her?"
"Take her with us, I suppose. Not sure how she'll acclimatize, but I figure she's young enough to learn how to… uh… human."
He glanced up to the canopy again. He could see her clearly this time, perched on a branch nibbling on a stolen something or other. If it wasn't edible she'd drop it and someone would pick it up.
Her hair had fallen out of the hair tie, it was shoulder length curly brown hair except it's edges were all over the place.
It looked like someone went at her with a machete.
"Is the hair your handiwork?"
Dr. Harding glanced up sigh and then gestured for her to come down and the little girl started to make her way down the tree with the thing in her mouth
"Yeah, best I could do with my pocket knife," she said. "She had hair almost as long as her when she showed up. It was so matted I couldn't get a brush through it, so I just hacked most of it off."
He nodded. That denoted a length of time on this island that she had managed to survive, it also implied that she was being raised by something with no understanding of hair… and therefore fur.
It didn't change a thing though. He still very liked that little girl. She was brave. She was a survivor.
Maybe if no one claimed her, he would.
He wasn't known for being good with children, but he had toyed with the idea of being a dad every now and then. This little girl looked to be just the kind of daughter a man like him should have.
Before the little girl could get to Dr. Harding, Ludlow came up to him. He wanted to know where they were because he was still trying to command a position of control. Ludlow was not the kind of person who should be in charge of something like this.
But he was still paying Roland and it would be play along.
He did note the way Ludlow stared at the little girl, he actually stared at her a lot, no doubt day dreams about experiments and studies and attractions they could center around her. So basically all the money that girl could make him.
Roland wasn't going to let Ludlow put that little girl in a cage. He'd leave her on this island before letting Ludlow take her.
Though he'd like to know what her surrogate parents were before leaving her. Just to make sure that she'd be safe if he left her.
-JP-JP-JP-
They walked all day all the way until night fall. It wasn't at a breakneck speed but it was grueling. They took breaks to stop but by the end of that first day everyone was exhausted.
Everyone except Una.
Una had loved it all.
So, she had to be from some kind of herd that always moved.
She did get tired eventually, and when she did, Nick had her on his back and he carried her the rest of the way.
Ian had a feeling that Roland would have wanted to carry her, seeing as he seemed fond of her. But he had left part way through hike to find Dieter, the man that had hit Una. He had gone missing at some point and Roland had gone back to look for him, leaving Ajay in charge.
Ludlow had tried to take control back but his band of Malboro men were not listening to him. They listened to Nick though. Ian had tried not to snort when that had happened, but he figured he covered it well enough.
Eventually they made camp, right where Roland had told them to, and Una was put to bed in the tent. She lay, curled up on the ends of the sleeping bags all wrapped up like some sort of snuggly cat.
Eventually everyone else went to sleep, they were all exhausted after all. Though, Ian was tired too, he didn't want to sleep. He didn't trust this jungle, it was when they least expected it that shit hit the fan. So sleep was not a good idea, not until he knew he was somewhere safe. Which would be off the island or in some kind of bunker, not out in the open like they were at that moment.
Hammond had a bunker on Isla Nublar, Isla Sorna would have one too, no doubt. They just had to hope this facility they were going to with the radio would have one.
By the time Roland made it back to the camp, night had firmly fallen. Ajay had rushed to his side to give him water and check in with him, and Ian followed because he couldn't help but notice that Dieter was not with them.
He had asked if he had found him, and he had, or well, the pieces that they didn't like. Ian had winced, even though he didn't like the guy, it didn't meant that Ian had wanted him to get eaten. Poor man.
Roland had also found the building they were heading towards. HE was going to let everyone sleep ten more minutes then they'd be moving again. There was a steep climb down, apparently, and he was worried about moving them down it, but he also didn't want to stay in one place for too long.
Roland Tembo was a smart man and Ian really appreciated that.
But it also meant that there was no point in trying to sleep now. So he figured he'd go check in on the tent and then go sit somewhere until it was time to wake up.
But as he was walking, he could feel it. The earth tremoring.
In a little puddle near is feet he could see the water rippling with each tremor. And he knew exactly what that was. It was an impact tremor.
He had nightmares about those, because it was the hallmark of one of the worst and scariest twenty minutes of his life. And it happened twice!
Now it was happening a third time and no, it had not grown on him.
Alan Grant's words echoed in his ears.
Keep absolutely still. It's vision's based on movement.
And he froze in place, his breathing shallow and rapid and he prayed he was wrong.
But he wasn't.
Ian turned around just as the Rex was rounding the tent. The tent that had Kelly, Sarah and Una in it.
He stood there, still unable to breathe, watching this all happen. Watching as the other T-Rex came out of the trees on the other side, and one of the Rexes stuck it's head right in the tent. He wanted to scream, he wanted to get it's attention, but the last time he had done that a Rex had almost killed him.
Grant had tried to help him, but he couldn't. He did, however, end up saving the kids so that was something.
Ian was not going to have that happen again. He couldn't save his girlfriend or his kid if he got himself chased down by a Rex again.
The only movement he saw in that tent was Una backing out of the camp. She was low to the ground, bear walking backwards under the Rex's throat being sure not to touch it. Once she got far enough away, she scrambled under it's belly and she just froze. Just like Ian had.
Wow.
She was really super smart.
That was probably the safest place to be.
She stared up at the great bulk of the beast, as if waiting for it to move, to figure out where it would go next and how best to escape it.
But the other Rex was just beside the one who's head was in the tent, so really, what was going to happen?
Someone must have woken up, because suddenly everyone was screaming and scrambling away. Ian tried to tell them not to move but they were all running away.
The two Rexes turned towards the screaming and the running people ready to chase after them. One had to shake the tent off it's head first.
Ian, unfortunately, fell over. Though the roots he tripped over gave him cover to hide from the Rexes, he unfortunately lost sight of everyone.
When he managed to get away, he had no idea where Una was, or Nick or Sarah, and worst of all, he had no idea if Kelly was with them.
-JP-JP-JP-
The Pack showed up just as the Tyrannosaurs hit the camp. They had been circling the camp, trying to determine where Una's scent was coming from. Because it had been there.
They knew the Tyrannosaurs were near-by though, they just didn't think that they'd come right into the camp. But they did, and that ruined Rela's plan.
Once the Tyrannosaurs walked into that camp she had to pull them back and away. She had to call them back because she couldn't ask the pack to fight off an impossible predator to win her hatchling back. No matter how much she wanted to charge into the camp calling for her hatchling to get her out before a Tyrannosaur gobbled her up.
They retreated to familiar hunting ground and cover. A patch of tall grass between the jungle and a biped facility that Rela frequently went to with Una to look at the biped things and to find her new second skins to wrap her up in seeing as she kept ripping up the old ones.
"They had her there, I could smell her."
Her pack were all trilling. A Tyrannosaur being around made them nervous, the fact that the mated pair were hunting so far out of their territory made it worse.
But Una being somewhere around that same pair of Tyrannosaur was what was making Rela so upset.
None of them knew what to do. Yes Una's scent had been there, but no one had managed to find her before the Tyrannosaur's breached the camp. There was no telling she survived or if the bipeds still had her.
She just wanted her hatchling back. She should have gotten her out of that camp the second she was showing signs of being better.
There came a clamour of biped calls and cries and then they were all rushing into the tall grass. Rela couldn't believe her luck. The Bipeds had finally come to them.
The rest of the pack turned to the sound of the bipeds crashed through the tall grass and then turned to Rela for instructions.
"What do we do?" Roc asked.
"Find her. Take her back. And kill any biped that stands in your way."