Ch 11:

Sierra managed to get a couple dozen decent photos as she took the Gondola up to the highest point of the island and back down again. She snapped a few photos of the Gallimimus Valley far below before feeling satisfied with her collection for the day. She was just putting her camera away when her phone rang. Checking the screen, the caller ID showed Owen's photo.

"Hey, Owen, what's up?" she answered the phone.

"Sier-…need…paddock…-Danger-"

"Wait, Owen, hold on. What?" Sierra asked into the phone. "I'm up in the Gondola. You're cutting out."

"Get bac-…paddo-" The line went dead and Sierra pulled her phone from her ear, staring down at the screen with a sinking feeling in her stomach. She'd only caught a few words amidst the static, but she definitely heard the word "danger".

"This sucks, though. I mean, we stood in line for over an hour and were almost at the front of the line." the girl behind her was complaining loudly. "Then the scrawny guy running the ride just randomly says the ride's closed. Like, what the hell?"

Blinking, Sierra turned and looked over her shoulder. "Sorry, what ride was that?" she asked. They rarely shut down rides unless something was wrong with the machinery or the dinosaurs.

"The Gyrospheres." the teenager answered.

Sierra's brows furrowed in confusion. Sure, the Gyropheres had technical difficulties from time to time, but shutting down that whole ride was almost unheard of. There had to have been something with one of the dinosaurs in the valley for that to happen. At least, that was all she could think of.

Looking back out the window, Sierra tried to think of what she was supposed to do. Should she head back home? But Owen said something about a paddock, didn't he? Did he want her to go back to the raptor paddock for something?

Her distracted eyes caught movement in the valley below. There was a lone Gyrosphere driving around the valley among the dinosaur herds. If the girl behind her mentioned the ride being closed, that had to have been at least fifteen minutes ago for her to currently be on the Gondola. That Gyrosphere should've already headed back by now.

A sinking feeling in her stomach continued growing. She tried calling Owen back two times with no answer. She guessed either Owen or herself had poor signal, which was fairly common on this island. When the Gondola stopped at the next station, she made the abrupt decision to get off. Putting her phone away and shouldering her bag, she stepped out onto the station platform and glanced around. She was now at the base of the mountain.

Approaching the nearest employee, she said, "Excuse me? Can you tell me what's wrong with the Gyrospheres?"

The frazzled employee turned to her. "Sorry, miss, just some technical difficulties. Should be fixed sometime soon."

Sierra flashed her wristband at him. "My brother, Owen Grady, works here. Can't you give me a bit more information? Is something wrong with a dinosaur?"

"Look, I can't talk about it right now. If you want more, talk to your brother." the man answered, getting impatient.

Sierra pursed her lips. "Okay, fine. But you should know not all the Gyrospheres came in. I saw one out in the valley just a couple minutes ago."

"Look, I have a lot I need to do right now." the guy finally snapped. "I'm sure the Gyrosphere you saw is on it's way back." With that, he turned and marched away.

Sierra glared after him, frustrated that she wasn't being listened to. She was used to it by now, working with a bunch of men at the paddock, but it was still frustrating. Looking around, she spotted a park UTV, which she used to just call golf carts on steroids.

"This is a terrible idea." she mumbled to herself, glancing around as she casually made her way toward the vehicle. A peak inside revealed that someone had left the keys in the ignition. "Sorry, Owen. Please don't kill me." she mumbled again, swinging her bag into the back seat and getting in. She started the ignition and drove off before someone could stop her.

It took her about ten minutes to get to the Gyrosphere Valley, and another few minutes to find the general area where she'd last seen the Gyrpsphere.

"What the hell?" she mumbled, her eyes scanning the valley around her. Normally, the dinosaurs tended to mingle out here. Sure, they stayed somewhat close to their herds, but not to the extent she was seeing now. They were all restless, bunching closely together in defensive huddles. Something clearly had them spooked, and it couldn't have been a single Gyrosphere since they were used to them.

Sierra slowed the car to a stop, leaning out of the nearly-nonexistent driver side door to look at the ground nearby. There was a patch of mud. Right in the middle was an enormous footprint.

It was huge! It had three long toes and had to be bigger than the T-Rex.

That sinking feeling in her stomach completely dropped out. Swallowing the lump that appeared in her throat, Sierra pressed on the gas again, continuing on her way in the hopes of finding that Gyrophere. There was definitely something wrong out here. Maybe being out here was stupid, but she couldn't leave some stupid tourist out here to be eaten.

Sierra wasn't in the Navy, so she wasn't as adept at tracking as her brother. Especially when the Gyrospheres left weird, nearly-nonexistent tracks. But she finally found the signs she was looking for in a most unpleasant place.

Nearing the perimeter fence, Sierra found one of the doors that only employees could access. It looked like it had been smashed open. The door was hanging open, the lock appearing to have been slashed off by something with sharp claws.

Sierra sat there, staring at it and chewing her lip. She looked down at the churned up mud and moss on the ground in the doorway. Sure enough, she saw a chaotic overlap of footprints, suggesting several dinosaurs had gone through, but overtop of that she was pretty certain she could make out the familiar tracks of a Gyrosphere.

She pulled her phone from her bag and tried calling her brother again, unsurprised when she got no signal once again. She put her phone back in her bag and took a deep breath.

"Looks like I'm doing this. Sorry Owen." she whispered, hands gripping the steering wheel tightly in her fists before pressing the gas.

In the dense jungle, it was harder to pick up on any tracks, especially from inside the UTV. But Sierra could barely pick out the calls of a few dinosaurs, possibly Ankylosaurs, so she followed that. If these people were dumb enough to go this way, they were likely looking for dinosaurs to watch. Hopefully. And the occasional footprint in the mud or crushed bushes reassured her she might be going the right way.

A deafening roar made Sierra slam on her breaks, followed by what sounded like a kind of bouncy ball. The Gyrosphere. The ground started rumbling with the sound of several pounding feet, and more roars and dinosaur calls.

Against her better judgment, Sierra pressed on the gas and followed the sound of chaos, rounding a few more trees and bushes until she slammed on her breaks once more at what she found.

An Ankylosaur stood nearby, almost facing her.

But what it was facing is what made her freeze.

She'd never seen any dinosaur like this. It was bigger than the T-Rex, with a longer face and ghostly white skin.

The two creatures roared at each other before rushing in. That was when she noticed the Gyrosphere. In their haste to get out from between the two dinosaurs, the idiot driving drove right into the Ankylosaur's clubbed tail. The glass cracked and the ball went spinning away into a tree, ending up upside down. Looking into the glass, she made eye contact with the driver, her already-wide eyes getting bigger.

Zach. And Gray.

In her distraction, Sierra didn't notice how close the fighting dinosaurs were until she saw a tail swing at her. She ducked down in time for the tail to smash into the UTV, sending it tumbling and rolling across the ground. She got whipped around, but thankfully the seatbelt kept her mostly in place. It only stopped when the driver side door ended up on the ground.

Heart pounding, Sierra looked around and tried to figure out what to do. How to escape without getting killed. Unbuckling the seatbelt, she scrambled to climb out the open roof of the car, crawling out on her hands and knees with one eye on the fight while trying to sneak toward Zach and Gray.

She was sure the Ankylosaur would be fine. It was an armored dinosaur with a bludgeon for a tail. As long as it didn't get flipped onto it's back-

It was on it's back. The other dinosaur rolled it over. It took the Ankylosaur's head in it's jaws and-

Sierra's stomach churned at the crunch of the neck being snapped. Looking away, she hurriedly snuck around a few trees until she reached the glass ball. Zach and Gray were hanging upside down, still buckled into their seats. She met Zach's eyes, putting one hand on the glass and using the other to point at the buttons on the controls. She was trying to show him how to open the door without making too much noise. He glanced from her face to the controls, seeming to try and figure out what she was trying to say.

They were interrupted by a high buzzing sound inside the ball. Sierra looked down while the boys looked up. Zach's phone was sitting on the glass roof of the ball. Claire's picture was on the screen as the phone buzzed.

"Shut it off." she hissed, mostly to herself since they couldn't hear her. Both boys were stretching and trying to reach the phone, but it was just out of reach of Zach's long arm.

A rumbling sound made Sierra freeze and peak up. She was frozen in place, staring up in horror.

The dinosaur, which could only be the Indominus Rex she'd heard about, was ducked down and looking right into the glass. It slowly blinked one large, amber eye. She glanced into the ball to see that Zach and Gray had frozen, too.

When the Indominus stood up, Sierra unfroze and stumbled back, hitting a tree trunk and pressing into it.

The Indominus used her front hands to turn the ball, like she was working out how to get it open. She then turned it so the boys were facing the sky. Facing her. She lifted a huge, clawed hand…

And brought it down, puncturing the glass with the longest claw. Sierra covered her mouth to keep from screaming. Part of her wanted to do something, stop the dinosaur or get her attention off the boys. But part of her argued they were safer in the Gyrosphere than she was outside.

The Indominus opened her huge jaws, and Sierra watched in horror as she got her mouth around the ball. She hoped for a few moments that the ball was too big for the dinosaur to get a good grip.

That hope was shattered when the Indominus' teeth punctured the glass. Using that new grip, she lifted the ball and started slamming it into the ground.

Hearing the cracking of glass, Sierra looked at the ground and realized the back of the Gyrosphere had shattered. They could get out.

"Get out! Zach, get out!" she screamed. She wasn't sure if he heard her, or if he had the same idea, but Zach reached over and unbuckled both his and Gray's seatbelts. When the Indominus next lifted the Gyrophere, the boys fell out onto the leaf-littered ground.

Her hands flew up to her face as she watched the ball get slammed back down on top of the boys. Thankfully, Zach seemed to have the sense to shove Gray into the ground until the ball lifted again.

"Run!" she yelled, a bit unnecessarily. She started running in some random direction, and the boys scrambled to their feet and raced after her. Over the pounding of her feet and heart, she heard the dinosaur roar behind them, but she didn't look back. Zach caught up to her easily, and she peaked back just to make sure Gray was keeping up. He was.

They soon broke through the trees and into an open clearing. She glanced around, trying to decide where they should go next. She considered running back into the trees to try and lose the bigger dinosaur, but then she heard the Indominus break through the tree line behind them.

Then, she realized the roaring she heard wasn't just the dinosaur or the blood roaring in her ears. There was a waterfall up ahead.

"There!" she yelled, pointing straight ahead. "The river's deep enough below. We can jump."

A few seconds later, they were stumbling to a stop at the rocky edge of the waterfall, looking down about 30 feet to the water below.

All three of them looked back to see the dinosaur pounding toward them, her enormous jaws parted.

Zach grabbed Gray's shoulders and turned him to face him. "We have to jump!" he yelled.

"I can't!" Gray yelled back, shaking his head.

"We have to go now!" Sierra yelled, grabbing Gray's shoulder partially overtop Zach's hand. "You can do this! We're all jumping!"

"On three!" Zach added before counting. As he reached three, the two teens each grabbed Gray's hands and all three jumped. Sierra felt the hot, smelly breath of the dinosaur at her back before air was rushing in her ears from below.

She sucked in as much of a breath as she could, given the air seemed to be stealing her breath as she fell, before she hit the water.

Her body froze for a second before she started kicking her feet and arms on instinct. She knew how to swim, she just wasn't used to these circumstances.

A hand closed around her wrist and she forced her eyes open against the cold water. Her blurry vision cleared enough for her to focus on Zach's face. He was holding both hers and Gray's hands, keeping them from swimming to the surface. When he had her attention, he let go of her to hold a finger to his lips and then point up toward the surface.

She glanced up before nodding. He wanted them to stay underwater until the Indominus hopefully wandered off.

She counted in her head, feeling her chest start burning from lack of air. She heard a muffled roar at about ten seconds before what she thought was the receding, thundering footsteps.

She met Zach's eyes and they both nodded before kicking to the surface. They all three broke from the water with gasping breaths. They all looked up and back toward the cliff they jumped from, and sure enough the dinosaur was gone. Sierra thought she heard the distant roar, but it was hard to tell with the waterfall right by their heads. The three started swimming toward the opposite bank, letting the water push them into a small, shallow pool at the bank.

When her hands and knees touched ground, Sierra crawled her way up out of the water onto the muddy bank. She scooted and rolled a bit to one side, helping Zach pull Gray up between them. She dropped her head down onto her arm, turned to look over at the other two. All three were drenched, muddy, and panting for breath. Zach's eyes were wide as he looked at his younger brother, then back over his shoulder, and back to Gray again.

"You-you jumped." he said in disbelief.

Sierra laughed slightly at the random statement. Of all the things to say, that was what he focused on? They all laughed breathlessly for a moment, Zach's arm going around Gray's neck to pull him close as they laid there.

When Sierra felt like she'd caught her breath, she pushed herself up onto her knees before standing up. She sank into the mud a bit when she did so, but she just took a few steps until she could sit on a nearby log. She leaned back to dip her hands in a small pool, trying to wash most of the mud off her hands before she pulled her hair out of it's braid, which was mostly undone anyway. She then just pulled it back into a messy ponytail to get it out of her face.

Zach and Gray took seats on the log next to her, all three of them silently brushing themselves off and wringing the excess water from their clothes.

After wringing out her t-shirt, Sierra rested her elbows on her knees, just sitting and trying to figure out what to do next.

Next to her, Gray had pulled something out of his little fanny pack on his waist. She heard the familiar sound of a plastic wrapper and figured the kid was hungry. Her own stomach was rumbling now that the panic had passed.

Something touched her arm and she looked down. Gray was holding out what looked like about a third of a candy bar. She glanced between him and Zach, who also had a piece of chocolate.

Gray was sharing his food with her? A practical stranger?

Smiling softly at him, she took the offered food. "Thanks." she whispered, taking a bite. "So, what were you guys doing out here?" she couldn't help asking now that everything had calmed down.

Zach grimaced slightly, looking down at his knees. "That was my fault. The ride said it was closed and we needed to get back, but…" he glanced down at Gray guiltily, "I…I just wasn't ready to head back." he finished lamely.

Sierra had a feeling there was more to it than that, but she didn't comment.

"What about you?" Gray asked, looking up at her with chocolate smeared on the corner of his mouth. "What were you doing out here?"

"Well,…I was on the Gondola heading back to Main Street when I heard a girl complaining about the Gyrospheres being closed. And then I looked down and saw one out in the valley…and I just felt like something wasn't right. Didn't help that I got a call from my brother about that time. I think he was telling me something about danger before the line cut off."

"Yeah, our Aunt Claire called while we were out in the valley. I couldn't make out what she was saying, but it was probably something similar." Zach admitted.

"I tried asking an employee what was going on, but I just got the runaround. And I tried telling him there was a Gyrosphere out in the valley, but he wouldn't listen. So, I took a UTV and went out myself. Probably not my smartest move." she admitted, smiling weakly. The boys smiled in return.

"Probably." Zach agreed. "But I'm glad you did." He blushed when he realized what he said, and Sierra did, too. "What was that thing, anyway?" he asked hurriedly, looking at his brother. "T-Rex?"

"Definitely not a T-Rex." Gray shook his head. "I didn't recognize that dinosaur."

"Because it's not a real dinosaur." Sierra answered grimly. "I'm only guessing, but Mr. Masrani announced a new dinosaur hybrid a while back. It would probably be close to full-grown by now. They call it the Indominus Rex. A hybrid of different dinosaurs or something."

"Great. So we almost got eaten by Frankenstein's dinosaur." Zach joked wryly. "So, what do we do now?" he asked, looking around at the jungle around them.

Sierra took a deep breath. "Well,…we could stay here and wait." she suggested. "I'm sure most of the ACU has been sent out to find that thing, but I bet my brother will be out looking for us soon, if he isn't already."

"And how's he supposed to find us?" Zach asked sarcastically.

Sierra narrowed her eyes at him. "He was in the Navy for almost a decade. He knows how to track people through terrain exactly like this." she added, waving her arm to indicate the surrounding jungle. "Plus, here we're close to where our vehicles and phones are. There might be someone he can communicate with in the Control Center that could track our phones."

Zach thought for a moment before a distant roar made them all jump, even though it was clearly far away. "We can't just stay here." he finally argued. "We're sitting ducks out here. Anything could come along and eat us. If your brother can find us, so can that thing that almost had us for dinner."

Sierra pursed her lips, at war with herself. Owen had always told her to stay at the site in situations like this, but Zach did have a point. They wanted to be found, but not by the wrong party.

She huffed, forcing herself to stand up. "Okay, well, we're still near the Gyrosphere Valley. The main park is Southeast from there, so…" she wandered to the nearest tree and circled the trunk until she found some moss growing on one side. "We need to head that way." she announced, pointing almost in the opposite direction from the mossy side.

Zach gave her a perplexed look. "Why?"

Gray sighed. "Because moss grows on the north side of tree trunks, obviously. Southeast is almost in the opposite direction."

Zach gave him an annoyed glance. "I don't need two of you acting like I don't know anything."

Sierra fought a small smile. "No one said you don't know anything. The moss thing is something my brother taught me on one of our camping trips. Anyway, do we wanna get going?"

Meanwhile:

Owen had an eerie feeling as he drove the park Jeep through the broken open door of the perimeter fence. When he agreed to help Claire find her nephews, it'd been an obvious choice. Finding a pair of kids on this island was important enough, but with that creature they cooked up in that lab on the loose, there was no way he was leaving them to wander around lost on this island.

Especially after the scene they left behind in the Gyrosphere Valley. All those dead Apatosauruses. This creature, the Indominus Rex, didn't hunt for food. It killed for sport. A whole herd, at least several that they counted, all slaughtered mercilessly.

The sun disappeared as Owen drove the car under the trees and over the bumpy, muddy jungle paths. It was easy to find what they were looking for, but it wasn't the sight they were hoping for.

The Gyrosphere was broken, glass shattered and metal frame bent and dented. Wires were sparking. Owen got out of the car and approached it warily, shotgun in hand. A real shotgun, none of that non-lethal nonsense. He heard Claire follow him as he approached the destroyed device. Using his hunting knife from the back of his belt, he pried a tooth loose from the metal. It was almost as big as his hand.

Glancing around the wreck, Owen tried to find some clues. There was no sign of blood, so that was a plus.

"No, no, no, no." Claire started muttering, making Owen look down to see her shakily scoop up a broken cell phone. But then Owen caught sight of another vehicle.

"Hey." he called, hurrying over to the overturned UTV. "Was there another employee out looking for them?"

"No, not that I know of. Everyone was too busy trying to find the Indominus." Claire called, hurrying over to him where he was searching the car.

Owen bent down to look inside through the roof and froze. Slowly, he reached into the back seat and pulled out a bag.

It felt like a stone had dropped in his stomach. Trying to stop his hands from shaking, he reached into the bag and searched around until he pulled out a familiar cell phone.

"No." he breathed, head shaking in denial.

"What? What is it?" Claire asked frantically.

"Sierra." he answered quietly, head going up and eyes frantically searching the area. "This is Sierra's." His head kept turning, searching for any sign. Looking down at his feet, he spotted familiar tracks. "Look." he pointed down. Explaining this out loud was giving him something to focus on. "She crawled out of the car here." he followed the tracks, partially ignoring Claire following him. "She stood up. Made her way over here." he stopped talking and scanned the chaos on the ground. It was hard to tell for sure what all happened over here. Judging by some of the deeper, round indents in the mud, the Gyrosphere was slammed into the ground. "Here. Two sets of footprints." he called, finding said footprints, one a bit smaller. Probably Gray, Claire's younger nephew. After a few yards he found a third set of footprints joining the other two. "All three. They all got out and ran."

The two adults hurriedly followed the tracks out of the jungle and toward a waterfall. Soon, the mud turned into dirt and grass, and then rock as they reached the end.

"Oh my God, they jumped." Claire guessed as they looked out over the waterfall.

"They were brave." Owen agreed. 'Or stupid,' he thought.

"Zach!" Claire screamed her voice echoing through the jungle. "Gray!" Owen rushed over and shushed her. "Hey, I am not one of your damn animals." she snapped irritably.

"Listen," Owen urged, "they're all still alive, but you and I will not be if you continue to scream like that."

Claire looked away, probably unwilling to admit he was right. "So, you can pick up their scent, can't you?" she whispered, at least taking his warning seriously. "Track their footprints?"

"I was with the Navy, not the Navajo." Owen snapped back.

"Then what do you suggest we do?" Claire asked.

"You get back, I'll find them."

"No, we'll find them." Claire argued.

"You'll last two minutes in there. Less in those ridiculous shoes." Owen argued impatiently.

Claire gave him a look, a look he thought meant something along the lines of 'challenge accepted'. She then proceeded to rip open her button up shirt and tie the bottom across her stomach, then fold up her sleeves to her elbows. Finished, she put her hands on her hips and waited.

Owen stared at her for a moment. "What is that supposed to mean?"

She looked thrown by the question. "It means I'm ready to go." she answered obviously.

Owen gaped wordlessly for a second before responding. "Okay. But let's get one thing straight; I'm in charge out here. You do everything I say exactly as I say it."

He wasn't risking Claire dying because she didn't listen to him.

"Excuse me?"

"Just relax." Owen joked, pulling his shotgun back around to his front. "Like taking a stroll through the woods. 65 million years ago."

Claire took a deep breath before walking in the direction Owen gestured to, which he figured would be the easiest way down to the river's edge below. He paused before following her, turning to look down at the mud right by his feet.

The Indominus' footprint completely overlapped the kids' footprints. It was bigger than the T-Rex's.

They had to find those kids before the dinosaur did. He had to find his sister.

He wasn't losing his sister.

AN: Dun Dun DUUUUUNN! Sierra has had her first run-in with the Indominus, and now has to trek through the jungle with Zach and Gray. I hope you guys like my idea of her finding the boys. Let me know what you all thought!

I watched a lot of the movie's deleted scenes for ideas for the next chapter, which will show Sierra and the boys' trek through the jungle, as well as Owen and Claire's.