Chapter 8

The Lost World

Manic drug through the back of his car, hands shaking as he took out his camera's. There were dinosaurs here, actual goddamn dinosaurs!

"Oh-my god!" Snively gasped, "It's a dinosaur! An actual dinosaur! This is what InGen was working on the whole time?"

Malcolm nodded, "Yes, yes."

Manic walked quickly forward, turning on his camera, "This is magnificent!"

Malcolm sighed, "Oh yeah, Oh, ah, that's how it always starts." He said, crossing his arms. He watched solemnly as the stegosaurs climbed up onto the road and into the stream on the other side. "But then there is running and screaming."

"You knew about this?" Manic breathed as he took pictures.

"I told you it was too abnormal to explain."

"But this – this, oh my god," Manic said.

"Mm-hmm," Malcolm sighed.

"Wow…" Snively whispered.

Manic set down his camera bag, and moved across the road to a knocked down tree. Climbing up he zoomed in his lens to get a better shot of the magnificent creature. As he was taking a few shots, suddenly from out of the blue:

"Hey Manic!"

Manic cried out in surprise, jumping. His foot slid out from under him and he fell onto the mossy tree. Looking up as laughter filled his ears, he smiled. "Heh, Damn. I guess you got the jump on us didn't you Rouge?"

Rouge Harding was still laughing as she climbed up the other side of the fallen tree, "Yeah." She pulled herself up and stopped laughing as her eyes fell onto Malcolm. Malcolm returned her gaze with an angered glare.

"Shadow I thought never in a million years Hammond could get you to come here." She said. She giggled some more, hoping down from the tree. "Hi Snively!"

Snively waved timidly, "Hi Rouge."

She jogged up, "You have anything to eat? I'm starving."

Snively, sensing the tension in the air, "Yeah, we have some energy bars in the car, give me a sec," he quickly hurried off

Rouge walked up to Malcolm, "Shadow did you see those animals over there. A family group, a pair-bond and a sub adult. Every egg site I've seen has had the shells crushed or trampled. A clear sign that the infants stay in the nest for an extensive time." She laughed, "God this place is so amazing, I'm so glad you came here!"

Malcolm remained silent throughout her whole speech, before lifting up her backpack, "You weren't attacked?" he asked with a frown.

Manic eyed the backpack, on closer inspection; one could see the backpack had multiple rips, holes, and what looked like claw marks all over it.

Rouge looked down at the backpack, her smile vanished. "Oh, no. That's my lucky pack. It's always looked like that."

"How come I've never noticed?"

"Because you never look,"

He stared at her hard a moment before lowering the backpack, "Ok, Rouge-"

Rouge turned to Manic, "Hey is that a Nikon? Can I borrow it really quick?"

Manic paused, and then slowly nodded; "Yeah sure," he hopped off the tree and handed it to Rouge. She smiled, and quickly started walking after the heard.

"I'll be right back I promise,"

Manic heard Malcolm growl, and then suddenly the ebony hedgehog was walking past him, following Rouge. Snively walked up a moment later, "Hey, where are they going?"

Manic swallowed, "Following the heard, but let's stay a few feet behind them, shall we?"

Shadow followed Rouge in a fuming anger, how could she do that? Say a quick hello then take off as if they were just meeting on the street and not on some hazardous island.

"Hey, Rouge. When Hammond called you," he shouted after her, "Why didn't you say something to me?"

"Because I knew you would deny what Hammond was saying," she called back, not slowing her pace, "And if you didn't do that, you would have surely stopped me from coming."

"I would have-"

"I figured how the animals survived without lysine," Rouge interrupted.

"I really don't care about that, What I'm saying-"

"If you look at the diets of the herbivore species that are thriving, they are eating mostly agama beans, soy, anything lysine rich, and the carnivores eat the herbivores which keep them alive as well." She said before stopping, "Wait, stop walking." She slowly advanced towards the herd of stegosaurs.

"Rouge," Shadow began as he followed, "Rouge, Rouge, No!"

She glanced back at him, hopping over a log, "Stay there," she said, with a wave of her hand for emphasis.

Shadow shook his head, "Get back here! Are you crazy?" he called as he and the others came to a stop, leaning slightly over a fallen tree.

Rouge paid him no mind and crept along the river bed, closing in on the massive spiked dinosaurs. The stegosaurs let out a low moan and came to stop by the river's edge, eating from the low hanging branches or trees and bushes.

Rouge stepped out of the river edge and into some foliage, getting on her hands and knees she crawled a few more feet towards the herd.

Suddenly a baby stegosaur appeared, it's little head rising up above a stump. Shadow heard Rouge giggle a bit at the sight of the creature, and frowned as she began to take pictures. After she took a few shots she lowered her camera and smiled at the creature.

Shadow shook his head, calling out to her softly, "Rouge….Rouge!"

Thorn had stood up from his crouched position and flipped open his video camera, recording the magnificent animals. Shadow glanced at him before looking back to Rouge, he tapped his fingers nervously against the tree, "She's too close, way too close."

"What the hell is she doing?" Thorn asked.

Shadow shook his head yet again, "Too close too close."

The baby dinosaur snorted softly as Rouge reached out slowly. It sniffed as her hand got closer, taking in the foreign scent, Rouge moved in inch by inch, before gently placing her fingers on the snout.

Shadow growled, "Does she have to touch it, why is she touching it?"

"She's going right up to it," Carr whispered, "Wow…"

"She cannot touch!" Shadow hissed. "Once she sees something, she just- she just has to touch it doesn't she?"

Thorn shrugged, "You tell me, she's your girlfriend."

The dinosaur let out a playful roar, Rouge's hand pulled away as it's head reared back. She smiled and let out a giggle.

Carr shook his head, "Is this even possible?"

Shadow looked down at him, "What?" he pointed at the herd, "This? What did you think you were documenting? What did you think you were going to see?"

Thorn shrugged, "Animals, maybe uh, some large lizards."

Shadow glanced at them both before looking back towards Rouge, "Fruitcakes," he mumbled with a sigh.

Rouge lifted the camera once more to continue her photo shoot, but only got a few shots in before the camera let out a loud whir as it began to rewind the film. The baby stegosaur backed away, letting out a whine.

Shadow cursed, "They get very angry when they run out of film, Snively grab your gun!"

The adult stegosaurs turned their heads as the baby let out another cry, Rouge stood backing away from the infant.

"Rouge!" Shadow called, "Rouge!"

She turned to him, waving him away as the one of the adults let out a howl, she ran towards the rest of the pack as an adult came in from behind, cutting her off from the group.

"Rouge!" Shadow was moving in a heartbeat, throwing himself over the fallen log, he raced down the stream, the others following after. Thorn grabbed his arm, yanking him backward.

"You're going to kill yourself!" he cursed, "Snively shoot it!"

Carr seemed hesitant, as he lifted his gun, "They're just protecting their baby."

Shadow flashed him a look, "What do you think I'm trying to do?"

The all winced as Rouge stumbled around a stegosaur, ducking as the spiked tail swung at her, the lethal weapon missing her by mere inches.

Rouge quickly scrambled up, running back as another adult charged at her, running a few feet from the monstrous herbivore she dived into a hollow log. The female bat crawled through it at a rapid pace, yelping in surprise as a spike impaled the log. It nearly hit her right thigh before pulling out.

The trio watched as the stegosaur, seeing no sign of the intruder, back away, herding the baby along with them.

"They're leaving…I think they're leaving," Carr said.

Rouge peeked her head out of the log curiously, as Shadow ran up to her. She climbed out grabbing on to Shadow to hoist her up. She gave him a cocky smile as she regained balance. "See?" she said.

"Totally fine."

"Wow," Snively sighed as the group walked back towards the jeeps.

Manic was just as excited as he was, not only was this an exceptional island, he had footage to prove it! "These images are incredible, legendary even." He waved his camera proudly, "People will be studying and exploring their whole lives and never get data this good. You can give me the polls right now," he laughed, "Competition's over, I'd like to everyone who lost." He grinned.

Behind them, Malcolm and Rouge were not as enthusiastic, well Malcolm anyway.

"We're here to observe and document Shadow, that's all, no harm done," Rouge explained.

Malcolm flashed a look. "Which by the way is a scientific improbability, whatever you study you also change."

"Oh, honey would you relax?" Rouge sighed. "I'm sick of hearing from the people who sit in the dirt, this is a chance of a life time."

"You know the people who dig in the dirt darling, have it a lot better than we do right now."

Rouge sighed, "Give me a break Shadow; I've worked around with predators and other animals for ages. Lions, jackals, hyenas…..You." she laughed, "I think I know what I'm doing."

The group walked towards the car, "What I'm trying to say Rouge is that you didn't see-"

Snively leaned over the dashboard glancing at the build in tracker, "Hey Manic, did you tack the radar of off Rouge's phone?"

The green hedgehog tilted his head, "Yeah why?"

"The radar is picking up another one of our trackers."

Malcolm's eyes narrowed," Another tracker?"

Manic leaned into the car, "Yeah, all our trackers have the same frequency, but I don't see why we would get another signal, unless..." He trailed off.

"What?" Snively asked, "What is it?"

Manic pressed a few buttons on the dash, "The signal is pretty weak but let's see if I can pick up the I.D. code so we can see who's signal we have,"

From the dashboard, there was a high pitch beeping. On the GPS map, a blue grid was overlaid, with a flashing triangular point marked LEVN.

"Oh my God, are you serious?" Manic mumbled.

"Who's LEVN?" Rouge asked.

"The man came to me a few months back wanting some equipment for an expedition, pain in the ass if you ask me," Manic looked up, "That's Vector Levine's signal."

Shadow could have shot himself then, "Levine is here? How did he-" He paused.

"Know him?" Snively asked.

"Levine came to me awhile back asking about a 'Lost World' saying in was real and connected to InGen somehow. He knew I worked with InGen awhile back and he wanted to know if I knew anything," Shadow explained.

"To which he said, 'No'" Rouge added.

"And I didn't," Shadow retorted, "I only knew about Jurassic Park, Site A if you will. I was only aware of Site B until recently when Big Hammond summoned me," he tapped his chin, "But Levine did call me a few weeks ago, saying he had a breakthrough in his research. He must have found the island somehow and came here."

"We'd better find him then," Manic said, "Snively do you still have the signal?"

"Yeah, it looks like it's coming from a valley not too far from here." Snively said climbing into the first car with Rouge, "Let's go, I want to get the hell out of here."

With a flick of a switch, Manic turned on his car, "I'm going back to get the trailers, Wait here." Wipping the car around he drove off with Malcolm.

He came back twenty minutes later, trailers in tow and Explorer towed to in the back, rolling down the window he waved to Snively, signaling him to move, before shifting gears and following after the Explorer.

The jungle closed in around them again, close and suffocating . The trees blocked out nearly all sunlight. As he drove the beeping on the monitor became irregular. He glanced down at the monitor and saw the triangle flashing, disappearing then reappearing, and then it was gone again.

"Are we losing him Snively?" Manic asked.

"Doesn't matter if we do," Snively said, "We've got a location on him now, and we can go right there. In fact, it should be just past the road here, beyond that guardhouse or whatever it is."

Manic looked past the Explorer, and saw a concrete building and a tilting steel road barrier. It did look like a guardhouse. The whole structure was in disrepair however, overgrown with vines. They drove on, coming onto a paved road. It was clear the foliage on either side had been cut back, fifty feet or so on either side. Pretty soon they came to a second guardhouse, and a second checkpoint.

They continued on another two hundred yards, the road curving slowly around the ridge. The surrounding foliage becoming sparser, through the gaps in the ferns Manic could see wooden outbuildings, all painted a foliage green. They seemed to be utility structures, perhaps sheds for tools of equipment. He had a sense of entering a substantial complex.

And then, suddenly they rounded a curve, and saw the entire complex. And spread out below them. It was about a half-mile away.

"Great Empire City," Snively mumbled, "What is that?"

Manic stared astonished. In the center of the clearing he saw the flat roof of an enormous building. It covered several acres, stretching away into the distance. It was easily the size of two football fields. Beyond the vast roof was a large and blocky building with a metal roof, which had the functional look of a power plant. But if so, it was big as the power plant for a small town.

At the far end of the main building, Manic noticed loading docks, and turnarounds for trucks. Over the to the right, hidden slightly by the foliage, there were a series of small structures that looked like cottages. But from a distance it was hard to tell for sure.

Taken together the whole complex had a functional quality that reminded Manic of an industrial site, or a fabrication plant. He frowned trying to put it together.

"Malcolm do you know what this is?"

"Yes," Malcolm said, nodding slowly. "It's what I suspected for some time now."

"Oh?"

"It's a manufacturing plant," Malcolm said. "It's a kind of factory."

"But it's huge," Manic said.

"Yes," Malcolm said, "It had to be."

Over the radio, Eddie said, "I'm still getting a reading from Levine. And guess what? It's coming from that building."

They drove past the covered front entrance to the main building, beneath the sagging doorway. The building was of modern design, concrete and glass, but the jungle had grown around it. Vines hung from the roof. Panes of glass were broken; ferns sprouted between cracks in the concrete.

Manic said, "Snively you got a reading?"

Snively nodded, "Yeah, inside. What do you want to do?"

"Let's set up base camp in the field over there," Manic said, pointing to about two miles to the right, where once, it seemed, there had been an extensive lawn. It was still clear from the darkness of the jungle; there would be plenty of sunlight for the solar panels, "Then we'll look around."

Snively parked his vehicle, turning it around to face the way they had come. Manic maneuvered the trailers alongside the car, and cut the engine. He climbed out into the still hot morning air. Malcolm got out and stood with him. Here closer to the center of the island, it was completely and eerily silent save for the buzz of flies.

Snively came over, slapping his cheek, "Great place huh? No shortage of blasted mosquitoes. You want to go get Levine now?" Snively unclipped the reciever from his belt, "Still in the building." He said pointing to the large complex, "What do you say?"

"Let's go get him," Manic said.

The three men and one female climbed into the Explorer and, leaving the trailers behind, drove off to the giant ruined building.

Inside the trailer the sound of the car faded away and there was silence. The dashboard glowed, the GPS map remained visible on the monitor; the flashing X marked their position. The electric readouts all glowed bright green.

In the living section where the kitchen and beds were located, the recirculation water in the sink gurgles softly. Then there was a thumping sound, coming from the upper storage compartment, located near the ceiling. The thumping was repeated, and then there was silence once more.

After a moment, a credit card appeared through the crack of the compartment door. The card slid upward, lifting the panel latch, unhooking it. The door swung open and a bundle of white padding fell to the ground below with a dull thud. The padding unrolled, and Miles Benton groaned his small body stretching out.

"If I don't pee right now, I'm going to scream!" he said, jumping up and rushing on wobbly legs to the small bathroom.

A flush later Miles came out of the bathroom. He sighed with relief. It had been Ex's idea for them to go, but she left it for him to figure out the details. And he had figured everything out perfectly, well almost. Miles a correctly predicted it would be freezing cold in the cargo plane, and they would have to bundle up; so he'd stuffed their compartments with every blanket and sheet in the trailer. He'd predicted the flight would be at least twelve hours, and he put aside some cookies and water. In fact he had anticipated almost everything, except at the last minute Snively Carr had gone into the trailers and lock the compartments from the outside. Locking them in so for the next twelve hours there would be no bathroom breaks. For twelve bloody hours!

Behind him, he heard muffled shouts, crouching down by the compartment beneath the bed. He quickly unlatched it; another bundle unrolled and Ex appeared beside him.

"Hey Ex," he said proudly, "We made it."

"No time, gotta go!" She yanked the bathroom door shut with a bang.

Miles said. "We did it! We're here!"

"Just a minute, Miles. Okay?"

For the first time, he glanced out the window of the trailer. All around them was a grassy clearing, and beyond that, the ferns and high trees of the jungle. and high above the tree tops he saw the curving black rock of the volcanic rim.

So this was Isla Sorna.

All right!

Ex came out of the bathroom, "Oh. I thought I was going to die!" she gave him a high five. "By the way, how'd you get your door open."

"Credit card." he said.

Her eyes narrowed and she frowned. "You have a credit card."

"My parents gave it to me in case of emergencies," he said. "And I figured this was an emergency." He tried to make a joke out of it, to treat the whole thing lightly. He knew how sensitive Ex was when it came to the matters of money and he tried not to talk about it.

Miles couldn't fit in well with people, he wasn't good at sports and he wasn't dumb. Some of his classes were so boring it was hard to stay awake. He wasn't into things the other kids liked, the cool TV shows of the 49ers. That stuff wasn't important to him.

But Miles learned quickly that it was unpopular to say so. It was better to keep your mouth shut. Because nobody understood him, except Ex. She seemed to know what he was talking about, most of the time.

And Dr. Thorne. At least the school had an advanced-placement track, which was moderately interesting to Miles. He wasn't into photography and explorer equipment, but Thorne had made it enjoyable somehow. Miles found himself eager for school for once.

"So this is Isla Sorna, huh?" Ex said, looking out the window at the jungle.

"Yeah," Miles said, "I guess so."

"Did you hear what Malcolm and Thorne were talking about when they came back for the trailer."

"Not really, too much padding."

"Me neither," Ex said, "But Thorne seemed pretty worked up about something."

"He did?"

"It sounded like they were talking about dinosaurs." Ex said. "Did you hear anything like that?"

Miles laughed shaking his head, "No, Ex." he said.

"Because I thought I heard..."

"Come on, Ex."

"I thought Thorne said 'triceratops.' "

"Ex," Mile said, "Dinosaurs have been extinct for sixty-five million years."

"I know that...:

He tilted his head towards the window, "You see any dinosaurs out there?"

Ex didn't answer. She went to the opposite window. She saw the adults enter the building. But there were four, not three. Her eyes lit up, could it be Rouge Harding?

"They are going to be pretty annoyed when they find us," Miles said. "How do you think we should tell them?"

"It could be a surprise."

"They'll be mad," he said.

"What can they do about it," she replied.

"Maybe they'll send us back."

"How? They can't."

"Yeah, you're right." Miles shrugged casually.

Ex had migrated over to the fridge, she took out a wrapped sandwich out. Moving over to her, he looked briefly inside and grabbed the first one he saw.

"You don't want that," she said.

"Yes, I do."

"It's tuna salad."

He hated tuna salad. He put it back quickly, and looked around some more.

"That's egg salad on the left," she said, "In the bun."

"Thanks."

"No problem," sitting down on the cough Ex wolfed down her sandwich hungrily.

"At least I got us here," he said, unwrapping his own carefully. He folded the plastic neatly and set it aside."

"Yeah. You did."

Miles ate his sandwich. He thought he had never tasted anything so good in his entire life. It was even better than his mother's sandwiches.

The thought of his mother gave him a pang, she thought he was on some camping trip in the mountains. Yet here he is, all the way in Costa Rica, and she didn't even know better.

"I'm getting another one," Ex said, going back to the fridge. She came out with two, one in each hand.

"You think there is enough?"

"Who cares? I'm starving," she said, tearing the wrapper off the first one.

"Maybe we should eat-"

"If you're going to worry so much, perhaps you should have stayed home."

Deciding she was right. He looked down surprised that he had already finished his first sandwich. So he took the other one Ex offered him.

"I wonder what the building was the adults went into," Ex stated, glancing out the window. "It looks abandoned."

"Yeah probably for years."

"Why would anyone build something way out here?" she wondered.

"Maybe they were doing something secret."

"Or dangerous."

"Yeah or that." the idea of danger was both thrilling and unerving. Miles felt far from home.

"I wonder what they were doing?" she said. Still eating Ex got up and went to look out the window. "Sure is a big place." her eyes squinted, "Huh," she said, "That's weird."

"What is?"

"Look out there, everything looks abandoned. The grass in this field is pretty high too."

"Yes..."

"But right down here," she said. pointing near the trailer." there is a clear path."

Chewing Miles got up and looked. She was right, just a few yards from the trailer, the grass had been trampled down. It was a narrow but distinct trail, coming from the left, going off to the right across the open clearing.

"So," Ex said. "If nobody has been here for years, what made the trail?"

"Animals?" He suggested, it was all he could think of, "It must be a game trail."

What type of animals?"

"Deer or something," Mile said with a shrug.

"I haven't seen any deer."

He said, "Maybe goats, you know wild goats, like the ones in Hawaii."

"The trail is too wide for deer or goats," Ex said.

"Maybe it's a whole herd of wild goats."

"Too wide," Ex said. She shrugged and turned away from the window, she went back to the fridge, "I wonder if there is anything for dessert?"

Speaking of dessert," Hey, Ex?" Mile said.

"Yeah?"

"Do you think Dr. Thorne packed an extra toothbrush?"

"Why?"

"I think I forgot mine."

Ex sighed, "Oh Miles, live a little." she came back to the couch and shook her head.

"No dessert?"

"Nothing. Not even frozen yogurt. Adults. They never plan right."

"Yeah. That's true."

Ex yawned and Miles felt himself yawning too. Sleep was overtaking him fast, he went back to the living compartment, and crawled onto the mattress beside the window.

He saw Ex stretch out on the bed opposite of him, and then his eyes closed. He immediately went to sleep. He dreamed he was back on the airplane, feeling the gentle rocking motion, hearing the deep rumble of the engines. He slept lightly, and at one moment woke up, convinced the trailer was actually rocking, and that there was a really low rumbling sound, coming from right outside the window. But almost immediately he was asleep again. Now he dreamed of dinosaurs. Ex's dinosaurs, and in his light sleep there were two animals, so huge that he could not see their heads through the window, only their thick scaly legs as they shook the ground and walked past the trailer. But in his dream the second animal paused, and bent over, and the big head peered in curiously through the window. Miles realized he was seeing the head of a giant Tyrannosaurus rex, the great jaws working, the white teeth glinting in the sunlight, and in his dream he watched it all calmly and slept on.

Ugh not happy with the beginning of this chapter, not happy at all. I'll fix it later though.

Hey everyone, long time no see. I'm pretty sure you all want to shoot me with a gun or something worse, but things have been busy for me, that and I was a little lacking on insperation, but all is good now. That and our good keyboard is unavailable so I'm stuck using the flat, painful for your hands keyboard.

Anyway hope you enjoy, I'll see you soon, and try to get around and review all of your stories which I've noticed you've been popping out and updating like crazy.

P.S. I'm keeping you in tabs by updating my profile when I can. So if you need to get up to date just check the Update section of my profile page.