Sticking together…for survival

[Disclaimer: I claim no ownership or rights to the creation of any characters/situations/plot points by Universal and the creative team behind Jurassic Park and/or World.]

**Claire Dearing and Owen Grady deal with the aftermath of the June 12th incident at Jurassic World…together.**

Act Now, Questions Later

Clever, cunning, fast…and one hell of an attitude. That about summed up Blue.

In the aftermath of the Indominus attack, most of the animals had been fairly easy to round up, even the T-Rex whose age and declining speed proved advantages for the ACU in their efforts to use non-lethal tactics to recapture Jurassic Park's original alpha. Most of the pterosaurs, unfortunately, had been shot down or injured in the wake of the assault on Main Street that had killed, among a handful of others, Claire's assistant, Zara Young. And Owen had watched with his own eyes the very life drained out of the majority of their Apatosaurus herd. But while the Indominus had wreaked much havoc on the island, hundreds of animals had survived, and Owen knew it would be only a matter of days before the park was secure enough to reopen portions of attractions for stubborn, asshole guests and perimeter fences were restored to keep out the remaining threats. Of course, none of that guaranteed that it'd be easy to find Jurassic World's only remaining raptor.

From the moment they were born, he had worked hard to position himself as the "alpha" of their pack, using half studied-half improvised tactics he'd learned both in the navy and at NSU. Handpicked by Hoskins for his work with SEAL teams stationed in both jungle and undersea environments and his ethology studies at Nova Southeastern, Owen Grady was InGen security's ideal choice for their disastrous dino-weapons program.

At the time (and the way it was pitched of course), InGen's offer was a no-brainer for Owen: early discharge, completion of his degree, and a chance to study and perhaps successfully train a pack of de-extinct velociraptors from birth? Plus Central American climate? food? women? What was not to love about this idea? It was only after he and his right-hand lieutenant, Barry, started reading between the lines of the company memos that they'd figured out Vic's real endgame. These raptors were being studied with the idea in mind that, one day, enough control could be achieved to turn the Cretaceous period's most notorious theropods into an on-command pack of military huntresses. Whiskey…Tango…Foxtrot.

"Still tracking her?" Owen yelled into the small microphone attached to his lapel as his Scrambler roared over the smooth terrain of the abandoned park's dirt roads.

"50 meters!" came Barry's voice through his earpiece, and Owen glanced to either side, noting Barry atop his four-wheeler to his left and Leslie to his right, trailing slightly behind them in the cruiser with Sal, Rick, Jesse and Big Deek. Theirs was a dangerous mission, but carefully planned. With no one left in her pack, Blue had turned rogue which meant she was vulnerable and liable to be suffering from extreme separation anxiety. This would have made it very difficult for her to hunt this past week, for although she was one of the most aggressive dinosaur species left on the island, she was also among the smallest. Without Charlie, Delta and Echo behind her, Blue on her own was no longer a match even for the gentlest stegosaurus. Owen knew she would have resorted to preying on very small indigenous mammals or scavenging. It explained her presence at the island's edge near the sight of the old park as John Hammond and InGen's abandonment of that sight had restored much of its natural ecosystem. Therefore, Owen was fairly certain Blue would have found ways to survive (after all, she didn't need the nice humans tossing her dead rats in order to eat). What Owen was most worried about was the likelihood of finding her social interaction index substantially devolved. She would most likely recognize Owen, and probably Barry too. But would she respond? The day Indominus escaped was the very first day he'd made measurable progress in securing and invoking his alpha status. Would any shred of that connection remain after a week on her own?

He'd been sharing these very concerns with Claire about an hour before they'd set out: "You'll know what to do when you find her," she'd told him, offering as encouraging a smile as she'd been able to muster for a mission that involved his pursuit of an animal who days ago had smashed its head through the driver's side window of the med van she'd been driving and tried to bite her hand off. "Just like Main Street," she'd added with a nudge.

Main Street, he thought now, shaking his head, reflecting on the moment he'd regained Blue's trust just before she, Echo and Delta had finished them off. He knew Claire had just been offering support, and he couldn't – wouldn't – fault her for that, but this was so not the same thing.

"We're closing in! 15 meters!" shouted Barry and the entire team came to a halt just short of the ridge from which they'd planned to launch their capture. Motors quieted, his team dismounted, and – armed with tranquilizers and (as a last resort) Taser sticks – they crept toward the edge of the ridge and crouched before the small valley where, in a clearing of trees, lay Blue.

"Well now we know why she hasn't moved much in 40 minutes," whispered Leslie, nodding toward her hand-held infrared tracking beacon. "How lucky is this that she's sleeping?" But Owen appeared not to be listening. Since laying eyes on the raptor, he could already tell something was wrong. "Owen?" Leslie nudged his arm. "Hey, what's—"

"She's not sleeping," Owen said quietly, lowering his weapon and slowly rising to his feet – way above the sight line of the ridge and killing any chance they had of a stealthy approach.

"Owen!" hissed Deek. "Get down!"

But he'd already made up his mind; Owen glanced down at Barry who also seemed to understand, and the two of them, laying their weapons on the ground, started trudging down the embankment.

"Wha—guys!?" spat Jesse, shrinking away from their group. But as the two men drew closer and Blue remained still, the sad truth was soon clear to all of them: this velociraptor was no longer a threat.

Owen reached her first, his heart sinking to his stomach as he crouched beside her. Breaths labored, wheezing, Blue tried to arch her neck around to see him, her movements a vague echo of predator instincts as her claws extended and her nostrils flared. She barked in agitation as Barry also settled near her; Owen placed a hand along the ridge of her spine and, much as he did with the Apatosaurus, made soothing shushing noises as he and Barry inspected her injuries.

"Bite marks," said Barry, pointing to several deep, triangle shaped gashes around her neck. One such wound seemed to have penetrated a crucial artery– the fatal blow so to speak – from which blood oozed down her reptilian skin.

Owen recognized the shapes all too clearly. He had some of the same shaped scars on his back. "Pteradons," he shook his head.

"And dimorphs," Barry acknowledged other crescent-shaped gashes in the skin near her ribs. "The wounds are recent," he added, peering hard at the trickling blood from fresh wounds.

"Dammit," whispered Owen. Indeed, it appeared – quite distressingly – that a few of JW's escaped pterosaurs had zeroed in for the kill, pecking and slashing at the lone raptor, without her pack to counter them, leaving Blue to waste away on the jungle floor of the old grounds of Jurassic Park…only hours, it appeared, before they'd found her.

Barry glanced up over Blue's body at Owen, whose face had grown eerily stoic. He was trying hard, Barry knew, to remain calm, to assess what needed to be done. But inside he knew that his old friend's heart was breaking – that Owen blamed himself even more so than Hoskins or Wu. "Easy girl," he whispered as Blue tried to arch up even further, snapping her jaws in a few defensive bites that necessitated Barry jerking backwards. "Easy," he said again. But the raptor's old trainers seemed to be making things worse. Blue screeched and writhed in an aggravated state of anxiety. Viciously she clawed at the ground, kicking up her feet then trying to dig into the dried-out dirt to find her footing. Owen sprung up and staggered back, Barry doing the same directly opposite. They gave her a wide berth, waiting to see if she'd be able to haul herself upwards, but she crashed back to the ground with a terrible thud and continued to wheeze. Only now did Owen take a good look at his surroundings and noted long trail of blood behind them. The sight of it froze him in anger, so much so that he jumped when Leslie grazed his arm.

"Sorry," she said for startling him. "Didn't mean to—"

"It's fine," he mumbled, then approached Blue once more.

"What's the damage?" he heard Deek asking her behind him.

"Bad," she said quietly. "Looks like something bit into its carotid artery."

Owen and Barry crouched down again, both having recognized that Blue's attempt to stand would be her last.

"What do you think?" Barry asked him as he watched Owen scoot right up to her backside again and place his hand on her scaly, wheezing chest cavity. This time Blue didn't seem to mind, and in fact arched back to look at her old alpha, making those soft clicking noises Owen had come to understand as an acknowledgment that he was not a threat. He reached in his vest pocket and drew forth his own clicker, the one he'd used to train them since infancy. He replied with a few clicks of his own. "Good," he whispered. "That's damn good, Blue." Tiredly, as if she'd spent too much energy to even crane backward, Blue's head fell to the jungle floor and she let out another painful whimper. Owen shook his head and drew back, closing his eyes and steeling himself against what he knew needed to be done. "Christ," he mumbled as he met Barry's gaze, and he could tell they'd reached the same conclusion.

"Is what's best," Barry said quietly.

Owen nodded as Blue rasped another life-draining breath. "Yeah," he sighed. "It is."

Claire knew it was probably a better idea that she leave him alone. After all, he'd raised Blue from birth and – well, while raptors weren't exactly puppies – she knew he'd felt entirely responsible for what had happened to the entire pack. She'd seen this before, of course. The bond between trainer and animal can be sometimes just as strong if not more so than that of your average domesticated pet. Having spent six years of event planning at Sea World before Masrani hired her on here, Claire had seen more than her fair share of trainers growing attached to their dolphins, orcas, otters…you name it. But while many of those connections ended through relocation of man or beast, illness, or non-fatal accidents in controlled environments, she had a feeling that nothing compared to Owen having to put her down himself – having to terminate Blue in order to spare her pain.

"By the time we found her...was nothing we could do," Barry had explained to her when they arrived back at the paddock, raptor-less and without Owen himself. "He didn't hesitate."

He didn't hesitate, she thought to herself now as she pulled the company Mercedes into the small dirt area that served as a makeshift driveway for his seaside bungalow. She wasn't at all surprised, really. Owen Grady never hesitated. From the moment they'd met he'd always been an 'act now, ask questions later' kind of guy. That used to irritate the hell out of her. After wrapping up the joint staff meeting between park directors and Masrani's new raptor research team, he'd walked right over without ceremony and flat out told her they should go out to dinner. She'd driven here at Masrani's request and he'd wasted no time in lecturing her about the importance of recognizing the assets as living, breathing animals. They'd arrived at the I-Rex's paddock and he instantly pointed out the flaws in their design and upbringing of the creature…She'd asked him to help find her nephews, and he'd taken her straight to his car.

Now as she climbed the clunky steps of his small hut on the island's shore, she knew it was this very tenacity of his that had led to such success with the raptor program in the first place. How could a man, day after day, enter a paddock full of predators and expect not to be ripped to shreds with anything less than 100% confidence? And how could that same man pull that trigger today without knowing, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that it was the right thing to do for Blue?

"Owen?" she called out then gulped in surprise at how meek her voice sounded. She clutched tighter to the small brown bag in her hand, cleared her throat, and called out louder. "Owen?" Faintly she heard some shifting in the distance, but in the darkness of night, she could barely see anything in the small shack, and the attached trailer to the left showed no signs of life either. She stepped carefully, fearful of bumping into something valuable. Then a shadowed figure caught her eye and she peered through the small bunker, spying a sort of makeshift porch through the back door at the other end of the room. And there he was, leaning over a creaky railing, looking out at the shore. Act now, questions later, she told herself and, with a firmer grip, walked through to the back door, pushed it open and stepped out on the porch next to him. "Hey," she said softly.

Owen barely answered, managing only a grunt and a nod while continuing to stare at the waves lapping up on his small plot of Costa Rican land. She looked down at the half-empty beer in his hand and frowned, propping up one elbow on the wood railing to face him. Yep, she thought, feeling foolish, probably should have left him alone. But she'd come this far, and she would offer him what she could. "I um…Barry told me what happened."

Again he nodded, shifting his weight from one leg to the other and rolling the bottle between his palms. "Uh huh."

She glanced down again at the package in her hand, "Did you um…I mean do you—"

"No offense Claire?" he said quietly, his voice strained and uneven. "But I'm not in a real chit-chatty mood right now."

Claire stepped back, rushing to answer. "I know. I'm not here to chit chat."

At that, Owen scoffed, set his beer to the side and finally glanced down at her. "Really."

"Really," she assured him, then dropped her gaze and took another huge gulp as she pulled from her bag…a brand new bottle of tequila. "I just thought," she held it before him, "you might need a bit of therapy."

Owen stared at her.

"I um," she swallowed hard, "I've been told it's the...best kind."

He watched her nervously holding out what was actually a pretty decent brand of tequila, and a very faint smile snuck up on him, cracking through his hardened façade.

"In all honesty," she started rambling, "I don't even know if it's the right kind. I really don't drink this stuff, but the guy at the counter said—"

And suddenly he was kissing her. She barely saw him coming, he moved so swiftly. But she stepped easily, naturally into his embrace as he plucked the bottle from her hands, set it down on the railing, and wrapped one arm around her waist. Claire smoothed her hands up his chest and pulled him closer, circling her arms up around his neck as he cupped her cheek in one palm then slid his fingers through her hair, massaging her nape.

He kissed her soundly, almost violent in his need for her, and just as Claire started to feel like he'd never let her up for air, he tore his mouth from hers and buried his head in her shoulder. There was a desperation to his embrace that she hadn't felt before, a sense of urgency that she dare not deny him now as he held her so tight she could barely breathe. "I'm so sorry, Owen" she whispered, her voice hitching as she squeezed back.

He shook his head, forcing himself backward in embarrassment. "No," he rasped, finally releasing her. "I'm-I'm sorry…that was…I don't know what—"

This time, she cut him off. Letting instinct guide her, she clasped the lapels of his vest and yanked him toward her, claiming him with another kiss, coaxing his lips apart with her own in a less-than-subtle hint that she not only didn't mind, but needed him as much as he needed her.

He crushed her to him then, gripping her by the arms and kissing back fiercely while a single tear trickled down his cheek; weeks of pent up stress and frustration over so many things gone wrong had finally reached their breaking point. She slid her arms back around his neck as he traced the curves of her body, settling his hands at her waist. Only then did he even register her change in outfit from earlier that day. Gone were the tight, confining apparels of corporate life. She was standing there in a pair of jeans and sneakers, with an open flannel blouse tied near the bottom in a knot over a…very thin tank-top. Reaching down, he unknotted the flannel and slid it down her shoulders. She shrugged out of it then similarly went for his vest, and before they knew it, they were frantically maneuvering themselves out of each other's clothing and stumbling toward the bed of his trailer.

His overall physique did not surprise her. Even when she couldn't stand him, Claire always allowed that Owen Grady was a devastatingly good looking man with an equally devastating body. But as he pressed her into the mattress, raining kisses down her neck and across her collarbone, Claire found herself completely unprepared…for the scars. His arms and chest were covered in them – some looked like bullet wounds, but most were healed-over gashes and scratch marks. No wonder he was the only man of his entire rag tag raptor team who never walked around without a shirt on. Delicately, she traced her fingers along healed bruises and cuts, and he gasped, abruptly pulling back and propping up on his elbow beside her.

Mistaking his reaction, she jerked her hand back. "Sorry," she whispered.

He smiled and brushed a lock of hair from her forehead. "Don't be," he said, glancing down at the admittedly nasty scar that trailed from his neck to his right shoulder. "Perks of the job."

Timidly, she reached up again, smoothing her fingers along the healed skin. "Was this…her?"

Pulse racing at her gentle touch, Owen swallowed hard. "Who, Blue?"

She nodded.

"Nah, this one was Charlie," he explained. "First time we were with them in the new paddock. Only ten weeks old but she already had a mean right hook."

She chuckled and continued down his arm, pausing at another, more faded gash just above his elbow. "And this one?"

He shook his head and smiled. "That was Blue…but she wasn't attacking me. Happened at two weeks—"

"Two?!"

He nodded. "She was trying to climb up my back. Wanted a higher view of the guys looking through the observation window."

She blew out a sigh and laid her head in the crook of his arm. "Wow."

He cocked his head to the side. "What?"

Claire bit her bottom lip. "Nothing, it's just…" she trailed off, struggling to find the right words. Her mind flashed back to that horrible night; when everywhere they turned, man was fighting beast and beast was winning. They'd all narrowly escaped the pterosaur raid on Main Street and sped toward the raptor paddock where Hoskins was waiting to unleash the pack. Stay away from my animals! he'd said. Even then. MY animals. She brushed the backs of her knuckles over another similar scratch on his forearm and then met his gaze. "They were obviously…so much more than research to you."

Owen gazed down at her, eyes brimming with unshed tears. He closed his eyes with a solemn nod. "Yeah," he rasped after a time. "Yeah they were."

She studied him carefully, feeling a bit of the "old Claire" sneaking in as she thought perhaps they should just call this off – gracefully retreat before they went too far, did something they'd regret. But as hard as she looked, contemplated, rationalized, she could find nothing to regret about this man. In fact, against all odds – and certainly in screaming opposition to every shred of logic left in her brain – she probably loved this man. She couldn't possibly tell him that of course. No sense in completely ruining—

"I love you, Claire," he whispered– suddenly – fiercely, opening his eyes and letting tears roll down his cheeks.

She gaped at him, butterflies swarming her stomach as he gazed down at her. Was he kidding? (Was he psychic?!) She reached up and brushed a few tears away with the pad of her thumb. He grasped her hand in his as she did so, kissed the inside of her palm then held it to his heart. Claire came undone. She arched upward and kissed him again as he wrapped her tightly in his arms, slipping both hands underneath her and caressing up and down her back. He loved her, she thought. Without ceremony, without caveat, without the hemming and hawing and obligatory nonsense that seemed to precede this declaration every other time in her life she'd heard it. He loved her…how in the world— but as she pulled back and held his face in her hands, the incredible but plain truth was there in his eyes. Act now, questions later. Owen Grady still didn't hesitate. He loved her.

She kissed his forehead, his eyes, his tears. "Show me," she whispered as her own eyes welled up in turn.

And he spent the rest of the night...proving it.