Legit don't know how this chapter came out but I hope you guys enjoy anyway!
Disclaimer: I do not own Jurassic Park/World. All OC's with the exception of Kavita, Trawleny and Brent belong to Macx.
"Lowery!" Claire barked as soon as she returned from watching the helicopter lift off, carrying Owen and ARU. "We need to find out where Dr. Wu hid that information."
"Uh, sure," said Lowery. "Uh, but where would he hide it?"
"Since the mercenaries are in the enclosures, it's a good bet they're there. I want you to pull up the blueprints of each enclosure and find out if there's any place he might have been able to safely stash a hard drive."
"On it," said Lowery. "But as I recall, Wu didn't actually have access to the enclosures right? He was just involved up until the nursery. Once the baby dino's got moved into their enclosures they were under their handlers."
"So you don't think that it'd be in the enclosures," Claire replied, frowning.
"Not really. I mean, no one would really bat an eye if he were there, but the only places to really hide something that long would be in the enclosures and even he wasn't allowed to go in. Only the handlers and vets are."
"Maybe in the veterinary building?" Vivian suggested even as she tracked both ACU and ARU.
"Lowery," said Claire.
"On it!"
Lowery brought up the blueprints for the veterinary building and Claire leaned over his chair scrutinizing it.
"There seem to be a few possibilities," Lowery admitted. Lorenzo, Carter's computer tech came over and squinted at the blue prints as well.
"I think so as well," Lorenzo said. "I can see a few places that you could store a hard drive safely in there for a long time without worrying that the data would get wiped by equipment or be randomly discovered."
"Show me," Claire demanded and they pointed out the places. Claire promptly dispatched one of the ACU teams in reserve to check out the veterinary building.
As the men started moving on the building Claire bit her lips. What other building did Wu have access to, where he could hide the hard drive? After a moment's thought her eyes lit up.
"Lowery check the clinic!" she said.
Lowery blinked and then pulled up the schematics. Lorenzo, Lowery Vivian and Claire all squinted at the blueprints.
"Two places," Lorenzo finally said. "The storeroom and the reception area."
"I'm going," said Claire.
"What?" said Lowery. "Claire that's not safe!"
"My responsibility," said Claire. She didn't want to mention the itchy feeling she was getting between her shoulder blades. Something was going to happen and Claire needed to be there for it.
The group checking out the veterinary building, reported not finding the hard drive so Claire re-directed them to the clinic and went off to join them.
Halfway there she was joined by the group from the veterinary building. They nodded at her and surrounded her as if they'd been doing it all their lives. Claire scowled at their backs because she wasn't a fragile doll but didn't say anything because these men were trained and she was not. Besides she highly doubted that she would be able to change their minds anyway.
They stride into the clinic and are almost instantly bombarded by trainers asking her what's happening.
"Debrief later!' she barks when she had a tiny break in the chatter. The trainers stop and Claire sees a couple of them cock their heads at her in a movement that isn't human then they retreat back into the waiting room. She catches sight of Zach just inside the room and he gives her a slight nod. Like the other's he knows something is going down and isn't going to get in her way. The way he holds his body though tells her that he is ready to jump into the fray if necessary. His experience with the Indominous, however briefly, had left its mark. Zach didn't scare easily anymore.
Claire nodded back and then directed half the men to search the reception area. The next half she took with her to the storage rooms at the back of the clinic. The men went down the corridor in front of her and when they had ensured no one was in the room, let her in. Claire stormed into the room and took careful stock.
Like all medical storage rooms, the clinic's was filled the brim of an amazing amount of odds and ends. From medications that didn't need to be refrigerated to bandages, to cleaning supplies, to acids and corrosives ticked away in their special cupboards, they were all there.
Claire dismissed the acids and corrosives drawers. Wu wouldn't have risked the chance that there might have been a spill. The cupboards with the cleaning supplies got knocked out for the same reason. The boxes of bandages she crossed of her list next. Bandages were used with ridiculous frequency in the park and thus wouldn't be a very good place to hide anything.
She rifled through the cupboards that held the medications, tapping the sides and back for any hidden spaces but finds none. She turns biting her lips as she tried to figure out where next to search. The itch between her shoulder blades is getting more pronounced and she feels like she's running out of time.
She lets her eyes roam the room again and finally she notices a box tucked under one of the shelves. Of course. It's a box that holds the spare parts for one of the machines they use in the clinic. Claire has forgotten which one. It doesn't matter. She dives for the box and yanks it out haltingly. It's heavy and dusty but as she finally pulls it out from under the shelf Claire can see the slight demarcation in the dust that said that the box had been pulled out before but not replaced in the exact position as before.
She knows she's hit the jackpot even before she tears open the cover and finds the smooth case tucked in-between spare parts. The uninitiated wouldn't have noticed anything out of the ordinary and Wu is clever for hiding it here. Of course, if he'd managed to somehow sneak information to a rival company under their noses, he definitely wasn't stupid.
Claire rises with the hard drive in hand and turns to tell her team to move out. She doesn't get the chance however. There's a commotion from outside and then the guards at the back door are firing.
Her team instantly forms up around her and hurries her out of the room. Two go forward to help their comrades who are guarding the back door while the others creep down the corridor with her. Claire tucks the hard drive down the front of her shirt and into her bra feeling very glad as she does so that she has always had an adequate bosom and that the hard drive is a compact design. Once her hands are free, she pulls the gun out from her shoulder holster hidden under her jacket and holds it firmly in both hands to stave off any potential trembling. She's a good shot, but she's not sure how comfortable she feels shooting another human being no matter how terrible a person they might be.
They have almost reached the other half of their group when gunfire erupts form the front of the building. The mercenaries have them boxed in from either side. Even as she watches the doctors and nurses corral all their patients toward the center of the clinic and into the safest rooms they have.
Zach is in the rush of the people heading to safe are but once he catches sight of her, he changes direction. Claire shakes her head at him but he doesn't listen.
"Aunt Claire!"
"Zach get to the safe rooms!" she says frantically. Gunshots haven't made it inside yet but she has no doubt they'll start flying through the room in a minute.
"What about you?!" he demands.
"I'll be fine!" she said. "I have a lot of guards. You have to be safe!"
"So do you!" he said stubbornly.
"Yeah well you don't have to explain to your mom what happened if I got hurt," she said. "Zach please!"
"Yes, I will," he said, but finally looks to be heeding her words. "Be safe!" he tells her fiercely and to her surprise hugs her hard before following the rest of the clinic's residents. She watches him go with barely disguised relief before turning her attention back to the problem at hand.
The head of her guards, Trawleny, she thinks his name is, glances at her and then says, "They'll have a hard time getting in here. They want in they'll have to fight for it."
"That's the problem," Claire says crouching down next to him. "We have civilians in here. And this is what they came for above all. They're not going to leave without it. They will fight."
"Let them try," Trawleny says grimly but Claire shakes her head. If it were anywhere but the clinic, if there weren't civilians, she might let the two forces duke it out. But she can't. The clinic was going to be needed once this crisis was over. She couldn't let stray un shots ruin the equipment or hurt any of the doctors. She especially couldn't let any of the civilians or her staff get hurt, particularly the ones with a strong connection to their animals. She needed to move this fight out of here.
Trawleny looks at her with slight trepidation and then says. "We can't move from here. They have us pinned down on either end."
"But not the middle," Claire said. "I can get out a window."
"Ma'am that's suicide."
"Not if you cover me," Claire tells him.
"Let one of my men do it!" Trawleny says urgently but Claire shakes her head.
"You can cover me. I can't cover you. You're all better shots than me."
"Hell if you think we're going to let you go it alone!" Trawleny states and Claire sees the resolution in his eyes and gives in. He's right anyway.
"We won't have much time," she warns.
"Two or three is better than none," Trawleny replies and Claire acquiesces.
They leave four more men in the front putting up a good defense and a better show while the remaining five plus Claire make their way to a side window.
Claire tentatively pulls up the shade and after making sure no one is looking at them, releases the alarm on the window and then the lock. She slides the bulletproof glass up and glances around quickly before jumping out the window.
She lands hard but not too bad considering they were still on the ground floor. Three of the five men eel their way out quickly but that's as far as they go. A shot dusts the ground next to Claire's shoe and she squeaks and jumps back. They've been spotted.
Instantly return fire comes from the window behind them and then they're moving.
Claire is sprinting forward one arm up to shield her head and the other holding out her gun and firing whenever she has the chance. Her earlier hesitations are gone because if she doesn't shoot, the three men beside her could die. They're already on this suicide mission because of her.
She doesn't actually hit anyone, she's never tried shooting at a dead run before, but her shots keep the mercenaries back, keep them from making shots they otherwise would have. Trawleny and the other two guys are beyond amazing. They're grim and efficient and they're not panicking unlike Claire. A firefight is, she discovers, an entirely different experience than being bomb dived by pterosaurs. Behind them, the men from the clinic are still covering them, keeping half the mercenaries' attention away from them. It still isn't enough.
One of the men, the one who'd gotten winged three seconds into their mad run, lets out an 'oof and then he's tumbling to the ground. There's literally no time for them to stop. Claire tries but Trawleny grabs her arm and hauls her forward until she keeps running. She glances back at the fallen fighter still shifting slightly on the ground and then turns back, puts her head down and sprints. There's nothing she can do for him and if she tries, it'll all have been for nothing.
Trawleny takes up the flanking position on the side of her ensuring that she's boxed in safely and they finally make it among other buildings. The whole hellish sprint has only been about a hundred meters. Trawleny shoves her down and then he and the other remaining soldier, Brent, she sees on his uniform are leaning out and shooting from around corners.
The mercenaries are forced to split their forces between the group from the clinic and the two men beside her but there's enough of them that it almost doesn't matter. Even she catches her breath though, she notes that the gunshots are moving progressively closer.
"Looks like your plan's working ma'am," Trawleny said after a moment. "They're leaving the clinic alone. They'll be out of range of my boys there in a minute or two and too close to us."
"Then we better keep moving," Claire says, steadily.
"We can't keep this up," Trawleny says. "There's only two of us, and we'll run out of ammo soon."
Claire absorbs this information and then asks. "What about uh, reinforcements?"
Trawleny taps his comm. "Pinned down by their reinforcements," he says.
"Son of bitch," Claire hisses. She bites her lip. She can't let these two men die defending her and she can't let the firefight continue to progress among these building that are no doubt stuffed to the brim with civilians. She needs a chase and an ambush.
She flips out her phone and dials the control center.
"Lowery!" She barks.
"Claire?! What the hell are you doing!" he shrieks.
"I don't have time for this!" she snapped. "When I tell you too, open paddock nine!"
"Paddock nine!" Somehow his voice is more high-pitched than before. "I can't do that!"
"Man up!" she snapped. "Once we're all inside you close that door!"
"That's murder!" he cries.
"You want me murdered or them murdered?"
"How is that even a choice?"
"Open the paddock door Lowery!"
"Fine!" he yells back. "At least I'll get a better boss!"
"Good," she breathes and then turns to Trawleny and Brent. "Draw them in but give me enough of a head start. They have to see me but not be able to catch me, or shoot me. Once you give me that, scatter and rendezvous with your men."
"Ma'am, with all due respect we're not doing that," Trawleny said.
"Yes, you are," Claire nods. "I can't do this with more than one person. And I'm not having any more of my people die. So you're going to do this and if Carter gives you hell, you tell him come take it up with me."
Trawleny and Brent glance at each other and then Brent says, "I sure hope you know what you're doing ma'am because if you're dead, Carter can't take nothing up with you."
Claire huffs out a laugh but nods firmly to them. "I know what I'm doing."
Trawleny and Brent do a good job. They let the mercenaries in sight of her but keeps them just out of range before they split to either side. The mercenaries shoot after them but it's really half-hearted. Claire has the prize they being paid for and it's her that they want. They charge after her and she turns and runs.
The chase is hell. Strategic bullets pelt after her and often enough she just manages to slip out of the way. She's never been so close to death so many times and in such a sort period. She ducks more out of instinct and feel the burn of a bullet sear across the back of her neck. She cries out, almost pitches forward but regains her feet in time to keep moving. Another shot stakes a gate in front of her and she pitches sideways to avoid the ricochet. Inside the building she can hear the cries of tourists.
She forges on, trips over a child's bag, tumbles hard and rolls to her feet in the next second. Her face, arms and legs are bruised. Her ankle is complaining from the fall. Claire kicks of her heels without a second thought and pelts headlong down the road towards paddock nine.
She keeps enough presence of mind to weave side to side as she runs. It saves her life from more than one bullet and then she's almost in front of paddock nine.
"Lowery!" she screams into her phone, the phone she's somehow managed to hold onto all this time. She doesn't get a verbal reply but the warning wails sound out and with a hydraulic hiss the door slides open.
She doesn't wait for it to open all the way. She rolls through the gap and scrambles upright the second she's through. Rexy Sue isn't here right now but with how agitated she'd been since the attacks started she was probably already on her way to investigate.
"Lowery," Claire hisses into her phone, "I need you to listen to me carefully."
The mercenaries waste no time following her in. Claire has wasted no time not trying to leave tracks. Her footprints are clear to see in the dirt. She also hasn't wasted time getting to where she needs to go. Sure, she can't take the direct route or she'll run straight into Rexy Sue's waiting jaws but she's taken the fastest route to get there.
The mercenaries are hot on her heels. They're faster than she is and, in a terrain so uneven they're definitely gaining. Still she has enough trees for cover so they can't get a shot off and they haven't tried. She'd pretty sure they're wary of attracting the attention of any dinosaur that might be in here as well. If they can get the hard drive and get out quickly and quietly so much the better for them.
Claire however doesn't plan on giving them that option.
"Now," she breathes into her phone and in the distance a flare goes off, shooting into the sky. She thinks she hears a few of the mercenaries curse and her mouth splits into a savage grin.
She leaps over a fallen tree trunk, skids under a brush, darts behind a tree and waits hopefully for the telltale vibrations of heavy footfalls. It's not long in coming. She hadn't been particularly quiet while tearing through paddock nine and the flare had just helped the inevitable along.
She puts on a final burst of speed and makes it to the clearing.
It's the feeding area, where the guests come to watch Rexy Sue devour her snack goat. Claire dearly hopes that no enterprising tourists are somehow still there because the show they're about to get will haunt them for years to come.
She skids onto the goat trapdoor like a baseball player trying to reach home base. She hurriedly scrambles to orient herself properly. She's on her hands and knees, scrunched a little to fit onto the whole thing when the mercenaries burst out from the tree line.
The leader levels his gun at her and says, "Throw it over!"
Claire just grins and jerks her chin to indicate behind them. The echoing boom that comes on the tail end of her gesture has the men's eyes widening. They turn frantically guns pointed but it's too late.
Rexy Sue is wickedly fast when she wants to be and right now she's riled beyond all hell.
"Now! Now! Now!" Claire shrieks and the goat trap hisses and begins to descend with her onboard. Claire covers her head as bullets whizz over the clearing as mercenaries scream and run for their lives firing as they go. None of their bullets have much of an impact on Rexy though Claire cringes about the lecture she's sure to receive from Laurel and Josh.
With a loud roar and a harsh snap of teeth, the gunfire cuts off abruptly. The silence reigns for a few seconds and then thundering footsteps are coming closer.
"Lowery!" Claire says panicked.
"It's going down as fast as it can!" he screeches back. The trapdoor only manages to descend a couple more inches before Rexy Sues' snout is pushing at the opening. Claire shrieks as the T-Rex tries to burrow into the opening to get to her. Teeth bigger than her head snap menacingly above her and though they haven't arrived yet, Claire can't help but feel assured that she's going to die from them.
The edges of the shaft are just beginning to bend under the assault when the goat trapdoor finally reaches it's end and spits Claire out into the underground room from where they usually load the goats to go up.
"Close it!" Claire yells and the doors at the bottom of the shaft slam shut. There's a few more rattling knocks but eventually Rexy Sue gives up.
A loud, bracing roar echoes through the park as she screams her dominance.
Tell me what you think! I love reviews!