Author's Note

Alright, I'm making doubly sure that I don't forget to update today by doing it this morning. It also helps that I finished the Uncharted Trilogy so I don't have anything to distract me now. I'm glad you all liked the last chapter though. The changes I made to the movie started right there with the Indominus, besides Liv's existence of course, and they're just going to keep coming.

This chapter, though, it has something you all have been waiting for. I'm sure you can guess what it is.

Go onward and enjoy!

Mutant

Things continue on as normal, at least relatively.

Liv keeps Owen from finding out about her healing ability after getting hurt. It turns out to not be that difficult. They wake up late, considering they didn't fall asleep until maybe four in the morning, but that makes them almost late for work at the Research Center. They rush through getting ready, especially since Owen insists on driving her back to the hotel himself so she can get changed and make sure she uses her feet as little as possible, meaning there's no time for him to check on her wounds. Once at the paddock he then plops her down in her chair on the catwalk and practically orders her not to move from that seat all day. He does let her throw the raptors the rat treats though, so she decides to keep the injured charade going.

Then when it's close to time for her to go, Vic shows up, demanding the reports on the new training exercise. He keeps Owen sufficiently occupied, enabling her to slip away and bumming a ride back to the main facility from a maintenance worker on a golf cart. She doesn't hear from Owen until she's about to board the helicopter, a text demanding she let him look at her feet the moment she gets back for her next visit. An easy enough promise to make considering that, if she weren't a mutant, her feet would have been healed by then anyway.

As for the new threat, well, things settle down into an almost-peace. The dinosaurs are more skittish than usual, especially the herbivores. They don't like the idea of such dangerous predators being so close, beings that can easily eat them if they want to. The carnivores are dealing with it a bit better.

The raptors are settling okay, probably because the predators are nowhere near what the raptors consider their territory, which consists of the Research Center, their paddock, and surrounding area. They also have the strong presence of their alpha, Owen, keeping them in line when they act out, so they stay relatively indifferent.

The T-Rex is a bit grouchy since she considers the entire island her territory. She's the oldest dinosaur on the island, the same T-Rex from the original Jurassic Park John Hammond built and the one who reigned quite a bit of terror during the incident that shut the park down. She doesn't like the thought of something potentially bigger and badder stepping in on her island.

The rest of the carnivores are...anxious at best.

But no one else realizes that there's a new presence in the park that's making practically all life on the island bristling with fear. Liv has learned to push it to the back of her mind to where she barely notices it anymore, but it is still there, a constant reminder that there is something wrong and it is only a matter of time before wrong turns to worse.

Whatever they are, they're locked deep within the restricted area of the island, far beyond her reach. Not even her VIP bracelet will get her past the gate. She tries asking Owen and he doesn't know, so she goes to Claire, who then refuses to talk about it. The thing is, that tells Liv all she needs to know because if Claire won't talk about it, they can only be one thing: new assets. It follows along with her own suspicions, that the two creatures are new dinosaurs cooked up in the lab, and the possibility of being right scares her.

They could turn out to be anything. They could be worse than a T-Rex.

And they can still see her. When she tries to get into the restricted area where they're being kept, getting that close to them causes them to turn their eyes to her with such intensity she quickly drives off in the opposite direction. It's like they can sense her, just as she senses them, but how can that be possible?

There's nothing she can do about it though. Even if she were to tell someone how dangerous they are, these are the park's new assets, their new money makers. They won't be willing to get rid of them, so she tries to brush it aside while keeping a close eye on the infants.

Simple in theory but not in practice.

Normally, her ability to see auras only works a certain distance. She has a range of one, maybe two miles, she's never really tested it before, but that means two things are obviously true: When she's on the island, she can't see anyone on the mainland, and when she's on the mainland, she can't see anyone on the island. But she can still see the new dinosaurs no matter how far she goes. She can feel them all the way in Miami, and she knows they can see her, too. She'd thought at the very least she would get a reprieve from those eyes whenever she goes back to her mom's, but no. She can escape the island's fear but not her own.

So maybe things aren't quite as normal as what Liv likes to try to believe, but she keeps pressing on despite everything because time surly isn't going to wait for her.

The following weeks pass by in almost a blur, her fifteenth birthday and the raptors' first coming and going before she can blink. Liv, the raptors, Owen, and Barry all celebrate with a sort-of party, only sort-of because there's not that many of them and they have to keep things quiet so Vic doesn't find out. Then, all of a sudden, school is ending for the summer once again. It means the end of her internship as well. It's sad to see the internship end, though all of the trainers, not just Owen, assure her she's more than welcome to help out whenever she wants. An offer she definitely plans on taking up, she's loved working at the Research Center, especially helping with the raptor training, but will Vic allow it? He barely tolerated the internship, always looking on with silent disapproval. But she won't stop going, she's not going to stop spending time with Owen and the raptors. He'll have to physically try to stop her, because she's not going to let him keep her from who she really considers her family.

How far she's willing to go, though, she's not sure.

On the other hand, there are some good things that come to the end of the internship, like being able to go out to her paradise again. She hadn't had much time before, only able to go out for maybe an hour every weekend, just enough to ensure none of the plants would die, especially the ones not native to the area. Now, she can go out whenever she wants to again, at least, whenever Owen has time to take her. And she has missed it, terribly, so her first free weekend without the internship she asks Owen to take her out there. Owen readily agrees, they're not doing much at the Research Center today anyway since it's a report day and he actively tries to avoid writing those, so they saddle up on his bike, her with a helmet because he's overprotective like that, and then they're racing off towards Gyrosphere Valley.

It's a beautiful day out. Sunny. Cloudless. Gentle sea breeze. Hot as an oven considering summer is just around the bend again but that's to be expected and, really, between living here and Miami her entire life she's gotten kind of used to hot weather. Well, she's never exactly been in cold weather before so she can't mourn the absence of something she's never experienced. Anyway, all in all, it looks to be a perfect Friday afternoon.

Of course, it's the seemingly perfect days that turn out to really not be perfect at all.

She feels it as soon as they enter the Valley, a pulse of pain and fear. It's not like what happened when the two new predators were born, it's not widespread, but singular. A dinosaur is in trouble, the kind it can't get itself out of. Liv opens herself up to the auras and sees that they're headed right for it so she stays quiet, just hanging onto Owen from behind as she tries to figure out what's wrong. The orange aura is weak, shaking, fading at the edges like it's threatening to disappear, and she recognizes the signs for what they are.

It's not like this is the first time a dinosaur has died on the island. But this is the first time she's ever been close enough to sense its encroaching death.

When Owen begins to slow she knows he sees it. It would be hard not to, it's right in the middle of the route they take to her paradise. He comes to a stop, using his legs to keep the bike balanced, and she can feel the tension in his back. Liv takes a deep, bracing breath, and then climbs off the bike. The breath leaves her shakily as she gazes upon the downed Triceratops. She's hurt, badly, lying on the ground on her side with gashes oozing blood, hide mottled with bruising, and one horn broken in half.

Liv pulls her helmet off, gazing into the trike's eyes. They look so sad and scared. She can sense it in the dinosaur's aura, she doesn't want to die but knows she will.

"What happened to her?" Liv asks, tears brimming in her own eyes as she kneels next to the trike's head. She's slow, careful to telegraph her intentions so as not to scare the animal, but the trike is in no condition to lash out anyway.

"Based on her wounds, I'd say she was attacked by another Triceratops," Owen says, kneeling down next to her and petting the trike's frill, expression grim. The trike lets out a sound a lot like a pained moan, trying to lift her head but not getting very far before she settles back down again. "She probably challenged the herd's leader and lost, a lot like Echo and Blue fought to be beta."

Liv strokes the side of the trike's face gently, trying to give some kind of comfort. Her big eye rolls towards Liv and her aura pulses, pleading. "But why did they just leave her?"

"This may be a larger version of a zoo, but to these animals they still think of this as the wild. And in the wild it's survival of the fittest. Anyone not strong enough, the weakest links, are left behind."

"She's going to die," Liv mumbles softly, tears spilling over. She doesn't have to look at the blood pooling in the grass or the hazy look settling into the dinosaur's eye, she can see it in the fading glow of her aura, like a fog clearing with the sun's rays.

"No, she's not," Owen insists, pulling out his phone. "We'll get the vets out here and they'll patch her right up."

Panic engulfs her and she grabs Owen's wrist to stop him from dialing. "No! You can't!"

He stares at her incredulously. "Liv, I have to."

"If you do that, then you'll have to stick around until they get here, meaning I'll be stuck here too. If I'm stuck here, then the vets will see me and then Vic will find out. He'll find out I'm out here and he'll...he'll…."

He'll demand to know why she's out in the Valley riding around on the back of Owen's bike. There's no plausible excuse she can come up with to cover for that, none that Vic will believe and won't lead to a severe beating. After that, he'll probably ban her from ever seeing Owen again. She promised herself she would do whatever it takes to fight against Vic keeping her from Owen, but he will be far more aggressive about it if this is what makes him put his foot down. She wouldn't put it past him to lock her in her room, a prisoner only allowed out when it's time to go back to her mother.

"Liv, I'm sorry," Owen says, voice cracking slightly and face completely heartbroken. "I'm so sorry and I promise I'll do whatever I have to in order to protect you, but if I don't call the vets now this dinosaur will die."

She understands where he's coming from, she doesn't want the trike to die either, but she still shakes her head. "It doesn't matter. It'll take the vets at least ten minutes to get out here. This dinosaur will be dead in five."

"There's no way to know that. Even if it is true, I have to try. I can't just do nothing."

"But I do know!" And she does. The trike's aura is fading fast, too fast. "Do nothing and she's dead. Call them and she's still dead. It doesn't matter what you do."

But what about Liv?

If she does nothing, Owen will call the vets, the trike will still die, Vic will find out she's out here, and she will be severely punished.

But there is something she can do. She can use her mutation and heal the trike. She's never done it on an animal so large, and never on wounds so extensive, but she knows she can do it. And if she saves the dinosaur's life, then Owen doesn't have to call the vets and Vic will never find out. Plus, the trike will actually live; she has a chance this way.

But what about Owen? Is she really willing to expose herself as a mutant in order to save herself from Vic?

Is she really willing to let this dinosaur die to keep her secret though?

Owen's thumb slides across the screen of his phone. "I'm calling them."

"No! Wait!" She grabs the phone from him, stopping the call.

"Liv-"

"I'm scared," she says, chin wobbling as tears drip from her face. "I'm scared either way this goes but I...you're right. I can't let this dinosaur die." She sets the phone down on the grass, well out of his reach, and places both her hands on the trike, one on her muzzle and the other on her side next to one of the gashes. She looks up at Owen, fear shaking her far worse than when the entire island cried out to her, but her resolve is clear. "Please, Owen, don't hate me. Please."

She closes her eyes so she can concentrate, but mostly so she doesn't have to see the look on his face when he realizes what she is. She shakes her head at herself. Now is not the time. This Triceratops is dying. Save her life, worry about the ramifications later. With a deep breath, she focuses on the dinosaur's aura and the points of pain that signify her wounds. Liv then reaches deep within herself and starts feeding her own aura into the trike's, allowing the two of them to meld and then using her aura to shape the trike's, manipulating it to do what she wants. She soothes the pains and sores, gently closes the gashes, and helps the dinosaur's body to replenish the lost blood. She even prods at the broken horn and gets it to reform into a perfect, pointed shape.

When the Triceratops is completely healed, Liv disengages her aura from the trike's and sits back on her heels with a deep sigh. She feels really tired, like she hasn't slept in over twenty-four hours. She's never felt a drain from using her abilities before but, then again, she's never done something so…big and extensive. Gradually growing a tree over the course of several weeks is child's play compared to rapidly healing a several ton animal.

And she is healed Liv sees when she finally opens her eyes. The trike is just trying to get on her feet, breathing steadily and stretching her muscles. Blood still stains her hide but it's all old, the gashes completely sealed without leaving even a scar. Now that she's not all banged up Liv can tell the trike is a fully matured adult but only just, still relatively young. Young enough to still be a hothead, thinking she has what it takes to take on the older leader of the herd, but that's Triceratops for you. They may be herbivores but they can be as mean and aggressive as a T-Rex when they want to be.

The Triceratops nuzzles Liv's head and she lets out a wet laugh, scratching underneath the dinosaur's chin. "You're okay now, girl. Just don't go picking anymore fights." She reaches out to the auras again, searching, and then she points off into the distance where she sees a large group gathered. "Your herd's that way, girl. Go on back to them."

The Triceratops nuzzles her one more time, her nice, strong aura beating in gratitude, and then goes off in the direction Liv pointed. Either she understands or her own instincts guide her, Liv doesn't know, but the trike will soon be back with her family and Liv smiles as she watches the massive animal trot off.

Her smile soon drops though, dread constricting her chest as she finally turns to Owen.

He must have fallen out of his crouch at one point because he's sitting on his butt in the grass now, leaning back on his hands with his legs spread out in front of him, and openly gaping at her. It'd be funny if the situation were different, if it wasn't her he was freaking out about. And it does look like he's freaking out, his eyes are wide with shock, mouth hanging open, and he's yet to say anything at all.

She sits down as well, staring at the tears splashing against her crossed legs, darkening the fabric of her khakis. This is what she's been wanting to avoid, that look on his face right there. He's thinking to himself that she's a mutant, that she's a freak of nature that he's not going to want anything to do with anymore. He's horrified at what she can do, at having spent so much time with her, opening his home to her, at simply touching her. He'll tell Claire, Barry, the other trainers, whoever. The entire island will find out. And then they'll all ostracize her. She's seen it happen to other mutants at school all her life and now it's going to happen to her, with the person she cares about more than she's ever cared about anyone before.

She thought she finally had a real dad and now she's losing him.

It's been several minutes and he still hasn't said anything, so Liv slowly stands up so as not to startle him and starts to back away. "I'll just go now," she says, voice hoarse from holding back her sobs and avoiding looking at him still. She can't bear to see that look on his face again. "You'll never see me again. I promise."

"What? No!" Owen says, finally snapping out of his shock and quickly standing before she can even turn around to head back in the direction of the gate. "Why would you say that?"

She closes her eyes, hands clenching at her sides. "You know what I am, don't you?"

"Yeah," he says quietly but not with the disgust she expects. "You're a mutant, right?"

She nods, throat too tight to speak anymore.

This is the first time she's ever admitted it. To anyone.

"But what does that have to do with you saying I'll never see you again?"

Her head snaps up in surprise and…there's no horror in his face, only confusion and maybe a little fear, but not of her. There's concern and worry, but no revulsion like she's seen on the faces of other mutant-haters. He's just…Owen, still the same as if he still doesn't know she's a mutant and the words stumble out before she can think them through, "I'm a freak. You're not going to want to have anything to do with me anymore…right?"

He blinks in surprise for a moment and then he's pulling her towards him, Liv stumbling over her feet before crashing into his chest. His arms tighten around her in a crushing hug, as if he's afraid that if he lets go she'll run off.

She was close to doing just that a moment ago but she thought he would want her to, doesn't he?

"No, no, no, no," Owen soothes, like he's trying to reassure a child that there is no monster under the bed. "I don't think you're a freak, Liv. You're not a freak; no mutants are freaks and it's disgusting that some people believe that, but I don't. I never have. You just surprised me, that's all. I've known you for over a year now and I never even suspected you were a mutant. I…I thought you would have told me by now, if you were."

There's actually a little bit of hurt in his voice at that and Liv is struggling to comprehend that this is really happening, that he's not pushing her away right now. "I…I thought you would hate me," she mumbles into his shirt. "You don't hate me?"

"No." He holds her even closer, if that's possible, and runs a soothing hand through her hair. "Never. I don't hate you, I don't think you're a freak, I don't think any of those things. I know there are a lot of mutant-haters out there who do think those things but I am not one of them. I love everything about you, inside and out, mutant or not."

She tilts her face up to look at him, eyes blurring again. "You really mean that?"

"Of course I do."

"E-Even the loving me part?"

His eyes soften and he smiles. "Yeah. Especially that part. Liv, you…you're like the daughter I never had and didn't know I wanted until I met you."

Light and happiness and hope blooms inside Liv, filling her up so much she can barely stand it. She buries her face in his chest, arms wrapping around his middle with her hands curling in the back of his shirt. She tries it, because she can't just not, not after that, "I love you too. Dad."

And then there's nothing else she can do but cry. She cries out her fear and anxiety and grief over everything she's ever seen mutants endure from normal people who hate them and all the grief she's endured from Vic because of what she is.

Owen holds her through every second of it and a long time after.

When all the tears are dried, Owen's too though neither of them say anything, she takes him to see her paradise for the very first time.

Sure, Owen has taken her out into the Valley numerous times to drop her off but she's never actually invited him inside, instead just giving him a parting wave and watching as he rides back off towards the gate. This time, she takes him by the hand and shows him all she can do and all she has created using her mutant abilities.

He watches her make a flower bloom in the palm of her hand with such child-like wonder that she has to question how she ever thought he would reject her for being a mutant.

"Did you know that you glow a little bit?" Owen says a while later as they lounge in the meadow at the center of her forest. "It's faint but there's like this red outline that appears around your body. And the plants glow green. And the Triceratops glowed orange. Is that normal?"

Liv frowns down at the flower crown in her hands, using her abilities to grow them into a natural weave. "Huh. I never realized that the auras manifest when I use my abilities. I mean, me seeing them when I do stuff is normal for me so I just never realized that they were actually there or thought that anyone else might be able to see them."

Holy crap, it's a miracle she's never been found out before, then, if she glows every time she does something.

"It's not very noticeable," Owen reassures her, sensing her growing anxiety. "You have to pay really close attention and kind of squint in order to see it, but it's there, and I think it's only when you manipulate the auras, not just you looking at them."

Her shoulders relax and she lets out a relieved sigh. "That's good. I never manipulate auras while around anyone else anyway. Well, except when Echo was healing, but I was really careful then."

"Hah!" he shouts triumphantly. "I knew Echo was healing weirdly fast. And the scientists tried to claim it was thanks to their superior gene splicing."

"Yeah, I could have done it a lot faster, like I did the Triceratops, but, obviously, people would have definitely gotten suspicious at that. So I just helped her out a little bit whenever I could."

Owen lays back in the grass and flowers, folding his hands behind his head as a pillow. "I have to admit, kid, those are some pretty awesome powers you've got there."

She rolls her eyes at him. He insists on calling them powers, no matter how many times she corrects him. She doesn't like that term, it suggests her mutant abilities are magic or something when that was proven false back during World War II when Nazi scientists were a big fan of human experimentation, especially mutant experimentation. It's all just a sort of more complicated kind of science that normal humans have yet to replicate, whether it be biologically or technologically.

Although they do say that magic is just science not yet understood.

"So why are you so mellow about all of this?" she asks, stroking one of the delicate blue flowers of her crown with a forefinger. "I mean, seriously, you freaked out a lot less than I thought you would, even if you are pro-mutant."

Which she will forever be grateful for but still, like he said, he just found out someone he's known for over a year is a mutant. Shouldn't he be acting like she just told him the sky is really purple or something?

Owen just shrugs and simply says, "You're not the first mutant I've ever met."

That surprises her, but, really, it shouldn't. It's not like mutants are all that uncommon. So she just arches a brow at him and waits for him to continue.

He shrugs again. "There was this old man back at the stables where my dad worked. He'd been working there for years, before my dad started working there, so I grew up knowing him. And then when I was twelve I caught him in the stables levitating food into the horses' stalls."

She nods thoughtfully. "Okay, yeah, telekinesis is definitely crazier than what I can do and you knew him for a lot longer. What did you do when you found out?"

"Nothing. The ranch owner already knew and was perfectly fine with it, and he made me promise not to tell anyone else, a promise I kept till his dying day."

She looks over at him through the sweep of her hair. "Are you willing to do the same for me?"

He sits up on his elbows and looks at her very seriously. "Liv, I would never tell anyone you're a mutant unless I had your explicit permission." He then sits up all the way, shifting around nervously to face her. "There is one thing I want to ask though." She bites her lip but nods at him to go on. "Can we tell Barry?"

The fact that he says "we" instead of "I" is comforting, but only a little. "Why?"

"Well, for one thing, he's my best friend. I don't want to have to lie to him unless I absolutely have to." He takes the flower crown from her and places it lightly on her head, tilting it just right so it won't fall off whenever she moves. "And two, his grandfather was a mutant, a man he was very close to even though he didn't pick up the gene himself, so he gets it."

"What could his grandfather do?" she asks curiously, avoiding the actual question.

"He could teleport. Used to drive Barry nuts by popping up without warning and trying to scare him." He takes her hands in both of his, rubbing circles against the back of her hands with his thumbs. "He won't tell anyone you're a mutant either, Liv. I promise. He cares about you, too."

She knows Barry cares about her. He's been in her corner since that day she got sick and Vic did nothing to help her. Barry's been running interference for her so she can spend more time with Owen without Vic getting in the way ever since. "You really trust him enough to where you can promise me that?"

"I trust him with my life. Any less, and I wouldn't even suggest it."

She takes in a deep breath and then exhales slowly. "Okay." Getting that one word out is difficult, but when she does she feels...better somehow. "Yeah, okay. We can tell Barry. But no one else, alright? Not even Claire."

How Claire would react...Liv really isn't sure. Either she'd be really chill about it, because she's always chill about everything no matter how hectic things get running the park, or she'd totally flip.

"That's fine. I'm not trying to push you or anything. But I'll support you no matter what you decide, okay? Whether you decide to tell anyone else or not." He looks down at his watch and then cringes, quickly getting to his feet. "I should probably get back. You want to come with or stay out here?"

She thinks it over for a second and then raises a hand for him to help pull her up. "I think I'll go with."

She doesn't feel like hiding out here anymore.

Owen isn't completely honest about why he wants to be able to tell Barry she's a mutant. At least, he doesn't tell her the whole truth.

Barry is his best friend, they went through the Navy together and came out the other side alive, and he doesn't want to have to lie to him, but that's not the only reason Owen wants to tell him.

Liv being a mutant puts some things into perspective, especially once he finds out she can not only heal animals, but also herself. He's always wondered why there are no physical signs on Liv's body if Vic is abusing her, and this explains why. She automatically heals them within minutes, leaving no evidence. He's tempted to broach the subject with her again, now that he knows she's a mutant, but ultimately decides not to. If she's ever going to admit anything, it has to be her choice, not because he pushes her.

That doesn't mean he's just going to do nothing though.

So he needs Barry to know, because if they're going to get Liv away from Vic, they're going to have to come up with a new plan.

Author's Note

So, Owen now knows she's a mutant. I know a lot of you were thinking it would happen because of some sort of accident and Owen would see her heal, but I didn't want to go that route. Honestly, I though it important that she be the one to willingly show him, even though her hands were tied. Saving that dinosaur was more important to her than keeping her secret.

But things aren't just going to be fine and dandy now. Her being a mutant, needing to keep that secret, it was a big reason why she wouldn't tell Owen about the abuse but it isn't the only reason. So we still have a bit of a bumpy ride ahead of us.

Next chapter is Friday.

Hope you enjoyed, PLEASE REVIEW, and see you all next time!