Chapter 8

Cathy woke up with a distinct sense of dread hanging over her. It wasn't an ephemeral, unknowing feeling either. She knew exactly why she wasn't looking forward to today.

Today, they were being shuttled off to the next part of the tour; the genetics lab.

Headed by none other than Dr. Henry Wu.

She had done extensive research on the man, read his work even. He was nothing if not meticulous. Even his book, which normally would have had numerous omissions of ease, made reference to notes that were available from the scholastic community. Those notes in turn were carefully organized and with clear documentation and line of thought.

Dr. Wu didn't let a single thing slip him by, and so she doubted that had changed in the almost two decades since the first park.

Glancing at her shelves, she caught sight of the blue spined book, his name scrawled in golden inset on the side. The man was a veritable genetic genius, second only to his precursor, Norman Atherton. His skills had been the ones needed to make the jump over to the first iteration of the park. Though the original products were...slapdash, it wasn't even his fault, as Jurassic World proved.

Given the nigh unlimited freedom and budget of the new park, he had made the creation of dinosaurs almost rote.

There was plenty of reason to be nervous. Wu had been there when the park had gone under, and was responsible for the preservation of many of the theories and practices that had survived until Jurassic World pursued them. Here, in her bedroom, she possessed almost everything else that had made it out of the park.

The two of them knew more about the old park and the dinosaurs than anyone else on the planet. If there was any one person who would remember her or see through her, it was him.

Entering into the blue light of the hall made her blood freeze, but not from the AC. She had staked out the main hall, once again sliding in on the heels of one of the waves, ensuring she wouldn't get solo'ed out for being early or late.

Wu wasn't here right now, but it would only be a matter of time.

In the meanwhile, Cathy watched the opening shifts. A few attendees moved through the lab, checking various interfaces and dials, adjusting a couple of things, or leaving notes. Some of the senior members were floating between the incubators, inspecting the eggs, clipboards rested in the crook of their arms. A small, proud smile would flit across their lips and some of them even leaned in, half-crooning to the eggs.

Sickening.

"Glad to see you all showed up in time."

The honeyed voice immediately caught Cathy's attention, and she barely managed the nigh impossible feat of keeping her face neutral.

Dr. Wu has stepped out of the lab, looking ever the part. His long sleeved shirt reached his mid-forearm, giving him the eccentric artist look. Perfectly combed and gelled hair faded into an immaculately maintained face, free of blemishes or facial hair. Despite his casual looking outfit, his watch was undeniably expensive, giving the charade away. He held his hands plaited in front of him, evoking an almost matronly figure as he stepped from the nursery.

The smile he cast over them somehow managed to crinkle around his eyes, but didn't reach in them. They were coldly inspecting them, and she could see it in his jaw. Despite the smile, it was locked tight; forced.

"Now, before we begin, I must remind you that there are rules to the tour, even for prospective applicants. Because our nursery is top of the line, we try and take the best care of it. Try to avoid touching anything or leaving anything anywhere unless told otherwise. Do not bother the working staff unless they have offered themselves for questions. Understood?" Once everyone nodded, he clapped his hands in apparent joy. "Excellent! Follow after me."

Wu waved them after him, like a teacher leading a bunch of school children. They filtered through the door, and Cathy shadowed in between two people, focusing her gaze away from Wu, who was holding the door open.

"This is our nursery, the top of the line anywhere worldwide," he began, gesturing grandly. "Every component is custom designed and ahead of competitors in the field. And all of it designed according to precise research. Even the intensity of the light is measured."

Wu slid past the crowd, his passive command allowing him to move unchallenged. Once more, they followed after him as he lead them towards another area of the lab.

"Are the parts all produced in-house?" one of them asked.

"Many parts are produced by Masrani owned companies, so in a manner of speaking, yes. This also ensures we can share our research with them in order to improve the technology. Speaking of, here we have the genetics analysis lab," Wu introduced, sweeping his hand towards the room.

There were rows of tables, each covered in microscopes, centrifuges, computers, and other technology. All technology she had familiarized herself with, but it was still impressive to see this many of them in one place. Very few companies around the world had access to anything nearing one of the devices, let alone multiple of them and several copies.

"Here, we take samples obtained from around the world and run them through advanced analyzers in order to preserve as much of the genetic material as possible. In previous decades, we would have destroyed much of the DNA in the retrieval process, but now we can recover record amounts, not to mention detect tracers in the rock in order to get more information about the lost portions."

"So if we work in here, what does our job look like?" spoke another member, and this time, Cathy recognized the person. Maria, the up and comer.

Wu smiled, seeming to recognize her as well. "Well, anyone working in this lab spends time drilling out the materials from the fossilized fragments, and then processing it through the machines. From there, they use advanced imaging software to get complete images of the sequence and can see the gaps. We then use multiple copies of the same species in order to fill in the gaps."

He paused a moment before narrowing his eyes slightly, his movements becoming more measured. "Garcia, right? I read your paper on genetic synthesis. I imagine you are used to using high-throughput microscopes, yes?"

Maria nodded, and Wu smiled like a spider. "Imagine those, but several times more powerful. We're able to investigate the ends of the genetic strands to determine breakages."

At this point, Wu was just showing off, but Cathy had to admit, it was pretty impressive. Any genetics institute or company in the world would have killed to get tech like this. Too bad she wouldn't be working with anything near as nice when it was her turn. Still, they'd done it with less in the first place.

"Once the genetic material is retrieved, we can then begin working on the next stages of the process. I won't bore you with all of the specifics, but once the DNA is rendered into a usable form, it is passed on to the factory floor."

Wu continued narrating as they walked down a pristine hall. "Originally when Jurassic Park opened, we used artificial eggs patterned after ostrich eggs. At first, Jurassic World did the same thing. However, once the first generation of dinosaurs was born, we were able to take the egg cells they would normally lay and analyze them."

The air got noticeably colder as they stepped into the lab. It only made sense. Being in such proximity to the genetic samples, they would have to be kept reasonably chilled, even if the eggs needed to be warmed later.

The factory itself was fashioned almost like the showroom, with several table-like stands cupping nests. However, the tops were clear and sterile, with only the cold table beneath the eggs. Benches along the walls were lined with computers and spreadsheets, marking progress points.

A few of the technicians glanced at them, but most were busy. A couple were inspecting one of the robotic arms, while another was injecting something into one of the eggs. Actually, Cathy amended, it looked more like they were taking something out.

"Once we got the egg samples we needed, we were able to recreate the eggs on our own, adjusting them to match the dinosaur itself. It results in higher birth rates due to facilitating the growth of the fetus."

Cathy quirked an eyebrow at that. She hadn't actually thought about that concept. It only made sense; using better eggs would yield better results. She looked at one of the tables with newfound appreciation. Despite the barcode on the egg, it was still a close analogue to its original form.

Perhaps she would have to adapt the strategy. Her fingers twitched, and she could feel a pull towards the eggs. The need to inspect them. Her own mind, and Wu's words told her to stop, for now.

Considering this was a Jurassic World lab, it likely wasn't too confidential, or at least, not to park employees. Reading protocol wouldn't be too much of an ask. She pushed the thought from her mind for the moment; she would need to plan more before doing that. She wasn't going to do anything flying by the seat of her pants.

"How did you determine the components of the eggs?" Another random person.

"While I'm afraid I can't go into the details, a large amount of the work is done by the egg cell itself. Much like a human embryo, the egg has a lot of information encoded into it."

In retrospect, it made sense. The stem cell was able to differentiate into a multitude of forms, all simultaneously encoded within. If the egg cells were similar, you would only need a few of them before the egg was able to form. Feeding it the material in order to grow and develop a calcified shell would be hard, but not impossible.

She noted it for later.

"In order to increase the rate of growth, as well as to reduce costs, we insert the embryonic cells into a ready egg, which is then shipped to the room we started in," Wu elaborated, moving them along the loop. Soon, they had returned to the starting room. "Once here, the eggs are watched and tracked along growth curves we have fashioned, both by manufacturing and study."

Wu checked his watch. "Well, it seems we still have a little bit of time. Why don't you take a look around? I'd be more than happy to introduce you to a few of the technicians here."

To his credit, Wu kept up a decent pace, stopping to make commentary or answer questions now and again, but still moving along. It was almost enough to make her miss some other details.

Like all the doors they passed, and the heavy locks on them. Or how beyond the ones she did catch a glimpse of, the lab was almost an entirely different world of darker rooms and racks of computers and terminals.

Things like the other lab technicians seeming to move around their group, aside from a couple of senior members who Wu had probably planted in order to talk about their jurisdiction.

And of course, the most obvious sign; the different tags.

All the low-level, basic level techs were wearing Jurassic World badges. But anyone of an appreciable level was wearing a InGen badge. The tags looked similar enough, but it was an important difference. It marked who was in the circle, and who was not.

Wu himself wore one on his shirt, carefully clipped to a pocket on his chest to avoid wrinkling the shirt. His was the only one with Chief Geneticist written on it. Even when they swung by his office, she could see the heavy set door tucked into the back wall, accompanied by a hefty looking biometric lock.

Just like the first park, there was a showroom, and then the actual factory floor. This time, the factory just happened to be in the walls, rather than on another island. And subject to less oversight, if Sarah was any indicator.

She wasn't the only one who noticed. "What's in the other labs?"

"Those are specialized research. Unfortunately, in order to preserve company secrets, we can't show those to you," Wu excused with a confident smile and a practiced line. Before it could be processed, he continued. "However, I can tell you about some exciting upcoming attractions. Recently, we acquired the rights to a South American fossil bed. We are going to begin pushing the limits of the age of dinosaurs we have brought back."

The end of the tour was almost a quiet affair, and Wu gave some canned speech about the future strides in genetics and development. He also elucidated the requirements for working in the lab in no short terms.

As Wu dismissed them, he swept his eyes over the crowd, and for a moment, her breath hitched, but he swept over her, just another person in the crowd. It was almost anti-climactic, but she wasn't going to look a gift horse in the mouth.

She wasted no time in hurrying away from the labs, though not at such a pace that she would stand out. Even though she knew the time, she glanced at her phone. It would be time for food soon enough, and then she could get some more work done.

The others would be headed to the restaurants now as well, which was a problem. She didn't want to get dragged into that, but there were a place where she could actually use her card.

Fortunately, she suspected they would be headed to Margaritaville. Cathy wasn't even tempted in the slightest. The biggest draw would be the alcohol, and she couldn't even drink it. She briefly contemplated her options before deciding it wasn't worth the time investment. She just needed to eat something and get moving.

Cathy sat on one of the benches, staring out of the reinforced glass as she ate. It had been relatively easy to get a meal to go, and one to her needs, but the idea to come to the Trex Kingdom to eat had been a split second one.

The Trex brought a special kind of attention. Her feeding was an especially popular attraction, and one that brought people in waves, but the Rex didn't have the same regular draw. She was big, impressive, and boring.

Shovelling another bite of noodles and soy, Cathy could admit she would understand why, had she not known better. Many of the dinosaurs were an odd hybrid of warm and cold blooded. Warm blooded enough to regulate some of their body heat, cold blooded enough to mean they didn't have to eat as much. So the Trex spent most of its time wandering. Most expected it to be an active, alert hunter, constantly making aggressive motions, but they clearly misunderstood.

This was more like watching a crocodile than a wild dog. After eating, the Rex would likely let the meal digest rather than simply continue hunting. It wouldn't turn its nose up at carcasses, or potential meals though. And it certainly didn't waste energy on things as frivolous as destruction.

The image of Godzilla popped into her head, and she couldn't help but chuckle. No, the Rex wasn't some kind of mindless destroyer. Looking out into the trees, she could see the signs of its inhabitation. Areas of bark completely rubbed off, scattered bones, and the obvious footprints.

A few people flitted through now and again, peering through the glass to try and spot the Rex. Boredom would drive them move along, hoping the next window revealed the animal. If she had to guess, the Rex had likely memorized the locations of the glass and generally avoided them. Enough flash photography would do that to anyone.

A deep thump told her that it was moving, and she let the feeling move through her. Just like with the Mosasaurus, there was an undercurrent of something deeper, an infrasonic communication. Briefly, she wondered if maybe it was responding to the carnivores up north. Studies with elephants had shown that low frequency sounds could travel for several square kilometers and still be detected.

She paused in taking another bite, a thought striking her. She had been unable to measure the infrasonics of the animals on Sorna. It wouldn't hurt to try and collect some data while she was here. There would have to be some scrubbing, but she had time.

Taking her phone out with one hand, she made a note to try and get some infrasonic data when the opportunity came by. She would have to see about getting some of the materials needed to the island, but it wouldn't be too hard. Besides, audio equipment was just a personal thing. She could easily fake an interest in sound design.

Putting the phone away, she closed her eyes, just enjoying the feeling of the Rex's not to distant presence. Each thudding footfall jolted her slightly, and the ambient rumble was felt, but not heard. More like the sensation of skin crawling than anything else.

Letting the sound move through her body, she thought about the frequencies, knowing full well she wouldn't be able to pinpoint them until she got some equipment. Even so, part of her was curious what vocalizations in human range would be the most analogous to it.

Eventually, the Rex drifted away, and she lapsed back into reality. The moment over, she finished her meal hurriedly, not wanting to waste any more time. She still had to throw in some extra shifts at the Gentle Giants if she wanted to ensure her role here.

And so she tossed the trash from her meal away, growling notes under her breath, tuning out the crowd as she headed for another shift.