Chapter 1: The Proposal
John Hammond raced up the stairs, his cane clicking on each stair as he continued his way up. He had one hand on the banister of the winding stairwell, his other hand guiding the cane as he took it one step at a time. He was moving so fast with his condition because he was already late to his meeting, and a CEO being late is not something that is welcomed with open arms. Hammond was in his sixties, and working tirelessly to close all of the open odds and ends that were still plaguing him and his newest business venture plan.
Hammond had recently discovered and met a new geneticist to the field, right out of school, top of his class and managed to convince him to sign with INGEN to work on a brand new project. Hammond's scientists had recently made the amazing discovery that would propel his new idea into fruition. After close inspection of amber and the mosquitoes locked inside, INGEN scientists discovered that they could tap into the amber and retrieve this information, locked away for millions of years. Hammond needed a team leader, and that's when he found Wu.
Naturally it took a lot of convincing and fast talking, but seeing as how Hammond was offering Wu a high paying job right out of school, he felt practically obligated to take it. Once Wu had been brought in and allowed a good look at the material, he jumped right in and finished the task of completing genomes, something Hammond's other scientists had failed to succeed in completing.
That's why he was racing now, because with a more complete product to sell, he had a better chance of getting what he wanted. And knowing the board directors, convincing them was going to be no easy matter, as was evident at the amount of worthwhile and expensive projects that had been turned down over the years. But Hammond had confidence. And a good sales pitch.
He stopped outside the door and took a second to compose himself. An old man running up stairs, he needed a quick breather before entering the board room. He took out a handkerchief and wiped his face, before adjusting his shirt collar and entered the room.
He opened the door, and walked into the meeting room, in which all of the board members of his company, International Genetics, or Ingen for short, were already seated. They had a look of impatience and agitation on their faces already, which was not an ideal place to start out on.
"I am sorry gentlemen" he says out of breath, "I had something I needed to check on downstairs"
Once again he composed himself, and started to slowly pace around the outside of the board members, recalling the sales speech that he had come up with earlier that morning.
"Now, I am here today to present to you our newest project" explains Hammond, fidgeting with his cane a bit. "Members of the board, we have discovered the presence of dinosaur DNA in the stomach cavities of mosquitoes, trapped in amber, or fossilized tree sap. By digging deep into the amber with special tools, we have been able to extract the contents. It is obvious that the genome sequence will not be complete, as it has decayed for millions of years. We have found that inserting frog DNA into the holes of the code will complete it, and eventually lead to recreating or cloning these extinct animals, or in our case today, dinosaurs," he said, jolly like from the sheer excitement of the idea.
"Dinosaurs!? Stop lying John, they have been extinct for millions of years!" shouted one of the red faced board members, loosening his tie and slamming his fist down.
"Believe me, it is possible. We have not cloned any yet, but we are close, oh so very close to cloning the initial animal."
The board members were eyeing him wearily as he continued his presentation.
"Okay, let's say this works," started one of the boardmen. "Where do we go from there?"
"Excellent, excellent question," Hammond replied. "We have begun construction on an amphitheatre, located on the San Diego waterfront. It is close to the building sites of some other famous animal attractions, including the San Diego Zoo and Seaworld. Our park will fit in perfectly with the surrounding venues.
We will be ready to house animals in a few months. However, the reason I have come before today is for funding purposes. The initial funding has gotten us this far, but we cannot complete the project with the current funds. With your consent, we can move forward with the project and have it up and rolling that much sooner. The sooner the park is on it's feet, the sooner the profits will come in, and you will all relish this day as the day you made your amazing financial commitment."
He finished speaking and gave the committee a big grin, hoping the idea of money would bring them around. The head of the table stood up and in a raspy, cigarette affected voice said, "All those in favor of John Hammond's proposal?"
Four hands rise up, which is enough for consent.
"As the CEO of Ingen, I declare that majority wins, and the project will continue on with an increased funding" he said, with the Santa Claus grin and laughed.
"Okay John, we are behind you on this, but we want progress reports every three weeks or so" snarled one of the board members, who promptly got up and left after his threat.
John remained his chipper self and picked up his materials and headed for the stairs, a wide grin across his face.