Author's Note

Whelp, this is it, my friends. The final update day. And the final battle with the Indominus. I can't even begin to tell you how many times I rewrote this chapter and the epilogue but I think I finally got it to a place I like. Hope you like it too.

Now, go onward and enjoy!

Survival

Sitting atop the steps of the Innovation Center, Liv's eyes have been focused on the lagoon for the past several minutes. The Mosasaurus still lurks within its waters, having been abandoned in the main tank when the Pterosaur attack began. The whale-like dinosaur is upset to have missed her last several meals since there have been no shows.

So she is hungry. Very hungry.

Liv smiles. "It looks like she's very on board with our plan. All we have to do is lure the Indominus to the edge of the lagoon and she'll take care of the rest."

"Perfect," Owen says, just taking off the last camera from Delta's head. The raptors chitter happily, glad to be rid of the uncomfortable harnesses. "How much longer till the Indominus gets here?"

"She should be rounding the corner any minute." Liv stands, brushing her hands against the bottoms of her jeans.

"Alright, let's go over the plan one more time. Me and the raptors will take on the Indominus head on. Liv, you'll provide backup and heal the raptors when you can. And the rest of you will hunker down in one of the shops until it's over. We'll lure the Indominus over to the lagoon where the Mosa will swim up and eat her. And then she'll be dead."

"Hopefully," Zach mumbles. No one says anything. They really are just guessing and hoping here.

"So, any questions?" Owen asks but then the ground shakes with rumbling steps. "Okay, never mind. Claire, kids, get in a store. Liv, stay back and try not to catch her attention. If she decides to start chasing you, do not try to lure her to the lagoon yourself. The Mosa will eat you too if you get too close."

With that lovely thought in mind, Liv ducks behind the wall of a store in the opposite direction Claire, Zach, and Gray run, because this is going to get messy real fast and she doesn't want them caught up in the middle of it, not if she can help it. The footsteps are getting louder and anticipation prickles along her skin and down her spine. This is it. The final showdown. The last-ditch effort. Do or die time.

Owen and the raptor squad stand in the middle of the street and she really hopes it's not die time. At least, not for them.

The Indominus finally steps onto Main Street and when she sees Owen and the raptors she pauses, glaring, if animals are capable of such a thing. She's really angry that the raptors would side with Owen over her, and when she starts the growling rumble of the language they share, Liv can't help but think that this is the part where the supervillain monologues. Except the raptors are having none of that, Blue just bites out what sounds like a scathing remark, the Indominus roars, and the raptors attack, Blue and Echo leaping into the air to land on the Indominus's sides, Charlie and Delta circling around behind her. The Indominus roars again, swishing her tail and knocking Delta away. She lands with a sickening crunch against a wall and Liv goes to her, hiding her aura so the Indominus is less likely to notice her.

Liv works quickly, petting Delta soothingly while she heals her and keeping an eye on the fight at the same time. Owen keeps a careful distance away from the thrashing animals, firing his shotgun whenever he gets a clear shot, which is pretty often since none of the raptors seem to be able to stay on the Indominus's back for very long, either getting thrown off or jumping off themselves in order to avoid a swipe of teeth. Liv finishes and steps back into the outskirts again, Delta immediately launching herself back into the fray.

Only for Echo to be launched into the air, hurtling towards one of the restaurants and it's grill.

Thinking fast, Liv reaches out to her plants. The plants she used to capture the Pterosaurs are still all over the street, broken and dying from when ACU must have cut them up in order to cart the dinosaurs off, but Liv brings them back to life now, surging upward to catch Echo and bring her gently back to the ground. The raptor snorts in frustration and then charges at the Indominus once more.

No one is doing a whole lot of damage but that's not the point right now. The point is to back the Indominus up to the lagoon. Normally, corralling prey where they want it is something the raptors excel at, but they've never had to maneuver an animal so much bigger than them before. For every step she takes back, the Indominus then takes another two steps forward in retaliation. The raptors are just too small and can't get in enough leverage long enough. They can't keep her on the defensive because, to the Indominus, them alone is not enough of a threat to make her retreat.

They need help. They need something bigger.

And apparently, she's not the only one thinking it because she spots Claire sprinting down the street towards her, flare and radio in hand.

"Where are you going?" Liv asks when she runs past.

"To get more teeth!" Claire shouts over her shoulder and keeps going before the Indominus spots her.

Trusting Claire to handle it, Liv turns back to the fight. Charlie is dancing around the Indominus's feet, keeping her occupied while Delta tries to hop back on the larger dinosaur's back and Echo is biting between the Indominus's shoulder blades. She just starts to wonder where Blue is when the Indominus turns and she spots her, hanging onto the dinosaur's side with her claws. The Indominus roars in frustration, surging sideways into a building in order to dislodge Blue. Liv gasps, taking a step forward, but then she sees Blue get up, shake her head a little, and then joins Charlie in her merry dance. It's not working as a very good distraction all of a sudden, though, because the Indominus is more focused on something inside the building she purposefully crashed into. She leans down and sticks her huge snout inside, jaws snapping at something.

There's yelling and then she realizes that the building isn't empty like she thought it was.

Zach. Gray.

Ignoring Owen's warnings, Liv runs towards the Indominus, flinging her hands out to direct her plants towards the Indominus's tail. The plants wrap themselves around a good couple feet at the base of the tail and then Liv uses them to pull.

The Indominus makes a sound that can only be described as a yowling cat and her head rounds on Liv, destruction in her eyes.

"Oh, crap."

Apparently the Indominus took offense to that.

Liv is the first to move, running down the street towards the Innovation Center, away from the Indominus. It's away from the lagoon, too, but Owen said not to try to lure the Indominus herself and right now it's a moot point anyway.

The Indominus chases after her and she gets a feeling this could go on for a while.

At the end of the street Liv makes a sharp right and ducks into a store, feeling the Indominus's hot breath waft her hair. The Indominus's feet skid across the concrete as she tries to stop and change direction, almost falling but righting herself at the last second. Echo is still on her back, Blue and Charlie with her now as well, all of them attacking the Indominus's tough hide furiously, but the Indominus just keeps going like she doesn't even feel it at all.

Liv is wondering if it would be safer to keep running or try to whole up in the store when a loud roar echoes through the air and through her bones, a roar she recognizes.

She grins as Claire comes into view, tossing a glowing flare right at the Indominus, hitting her in the side. The raptors seem to get what's going on and scramble away from the Indominus as the T-Rex stomps onto the street, all aged power and fury, but not old in a way that makes a person weak, where her power shrinks. Rexy is the kind of old where her power grows, the wisdom of her time on Earth making her stronger than any dinosaur on the island, including the Indominus. This is what their plan needed, the final cog in the machine, and Liv reaches out her aura to Rexy's, telling her of their plan. Rexy understands immediately and draws herself up for another roar, ready to eliminate the threat to her territory.

This is her island. It's time the Indominus learns that.

The raptors bark in agreement, standing by her side and ready to fight with renewed vigor.

The Indominus snarls at them all and attacks.

It's a ferocious battle of claws and teeth, Rexy and the Indominus going head-on, and the raptors working with the T-Rex smoothly, as if Rexy has always fought alongside them. Rexy is careful not to hurt them as she goes after the Indominus and the raptors use Rexy as a jumping-off board to get to the Indominus's head and back.

And the plan is working. They're getting her to move steadily backwards, towards the lagoon.

As soon as the dinosaurs have cleared the building, Liv rushes inside to collect Zach and Gray. They look a little shaken up but mostly okay, so she grabs Zach's hand, Zach grabs Gray's, and together they rush towards Owen and Claire where they're hiding behind a couple of pillars in front of one of the stores.

The five of them huddle together, unable to do anything but watch, as the T-Rex gets a good hold of the Indominus's neck, all but dragging her further down the street. The Indominus struggles out of it only for Blue to get on her face and start clawing at her eyes. Roaring in pain, the Indominus shakes her head back and forth until Blue is flung off, but the distraction is all Rexy needs. The other raptors jump down from the Indominus and Rexy rams into her, shoving her to the ground and taking out part of the fencing along the lagoon.

Rexy and the raptors stand firm, keeping the Indominus from moving away. The Indominus opens her mouth to roar but is cut off when the Mosasaurus breaches the water, shooting herself up into the air and half onto dry land to grab the Indominus's neck in her massive jaws.

The Indominus tries to kick her off but the Mosa definitely has a lot more teeth.

The Mosa drags her prey down into the water with her and Liv closes her eyes to watch her aura. Now that she knows to look for it, she can see the Indominus's aura trying to heal itself, even as the Mosa tears into her flesh. Steeling herself, Liv reaches out her aura to the Indominus's. The Indominus immediately latches onto her, trying to use Liv to save herself or at the very least take her down with her, but Liv doesn't give in. The Indominus may be bigger than her, has more teeth than her, but when it comes to their mutation, Liv is a lot stronger. She wraps her aura around the Indominus's, creating a thick, solid bubble that puts the dinosaur completely under her control. Liv then manipulates the Indominus's aura, suppressing her natural ability to heal.

She doesn't let go until the Indominus is in pieces, some of them down the Mosa's throat, and her aura fades from existence completely.

"It's finished," she says, opening her eyes with a sigh of relief. "The Indominus Rex is dead."

Everyone else sighs in relief as well, but instead of whooping for joy they all remain quiet, subdued. They've fought for survival all day and the exhaustion is starting to weigh down on them now that it is finally safe.

Stomping feet make their heads turn upward and she amends that. Maybe it isn't quite safe, after all.

Rexy towers over them, and Liv suddenly feels very small and fragile. Rexy could easily eat them whole, but she's not feeling animosity in her aura and the raptors are standing at her feet companionably without any worry for themselves or her and their alpha. Liv reaches her aura out to her, poking her questioningly but not getting invasive.

Rexy lowers her head towards her, large nostrils flaring and taking in her scent. The breath blows over Liv like a warm wind, she's so close. But Rexy doesn't move to eat her. Instead, Liv feels her gratitude.

"It's okay," Liv says to the others without looking away from the giant dinosaur. She definitely doesn't need to look to know Owen is pointing his gun at Rexy. "She's just thanking us for the help and for letting her out to stop the Indominus."

"That's great," Owen says tensely. "Can you tell her to please go back to her paddock or something?"

She rolls her eyes but nods, asking Rexy to please leave so they can get out of here. She doesn't ask Rexy to go back to the paddock though. She knows better.

Like she would actually go back willingly.

But she does ask if Rexy would like her to heal her wounds before she goes. All Rexy does is snort in her face and stands, heading off back down Main Street with her head lifted proudly.

Looks like she wants to keep the wounds and the scars they will become.

The raptors don't care either way, though, allowing Liv to go to them one by one and heal them. They're not too bad off. The worst wound is a broken rib from Blue when the Indominus crushed her against the building but that's it.

"So now what?" Gray asks, sagging tiredly into his brother's side.

"Now, we head to the helipad," Claire says, holding up her radio. "Lowery said he'll be waiting for us there with a chopper to take us back to the mainland."

"What about after that?" Liv asks, stroking Blue's neck. "What will happen to the park?"

Claire sighs. "Well, that depends on a lot of things, especially how much the public knows about what really happened. The odds are good no one knows about the Indominus, though, only that there was a breach at the Aviary and the Pterosaurs escaped. More than likely, InGen and Masrani Global will sweep the Indominus under the rug. But people still died and a lot were hurt, very publicly. I don't know how successful they'll be in keeping the park from being permanently closed."

"Will they close down the park? What about the dinosaurs?"

She doesn't want to leave the raptors, her pack, her family.

Claire, of course, has already been thinking ten steps ahead, like always. "Once Zach and Gray are back with their parents, I'll go to the mainland branch of InGen in order to coordinate and oversee the cleanup. We'll send some people here to get any escaped dinosaurs back in their paddocks and the Pterosaurs taken care of. Once it's safe, we'll get our people back here and looking after the dinosaurs until a decision is made."

"What about InGen, though?" Owen asks, slinging his shotgun on his shoulder. "They took all the embryos and are still probably pretty bent on getting a weapon out of all of this. Not to mention, they need to pay for all the people who died because of the Indominus. How do we stop them without dragging Jurassic World down too?"

"Carefully," Claire answers, leading them back towards the Innovation Center. "The best way to take care of InGen is to get Masrani Global on our side. It would be easier if Simon," she clears her throat slightly, trying to hide the emotion from thinking of Mr. Masrani, "if Simon were still alive, but I've dealt with the Board of Directors many times and they know better than not to listen to me."

"So they'll be able to help?"

"Yes. So long as Masrani Global was completely unaware of InGen's goal to make dinosaur weapons, they should be able to cut off InGen and leave them to hang. They'll have to rebuild their security and sciences divisions but I don't imagine them having too many objections considering it's their best option in order to save their own skins. They'll want to make sure it looks like they had as little involvement with this as possible and have everyone believe they completely condemn InGen for what they did. It shouldn't be too hard. They're a big company and InGen is just one small division."

"That's good to hear, but," Liv stops at the base of the stares, the raptors a comforting presence around her as she looks up at Owen, "what happens to me now?"

Owen's brow furrows in confusion. "What do you mean?"

"My…Vic is dead. Where do I go now?"

She doesn't want to go back to her mom. She will if she has to, since it will only be temporary, but she doesn't want to.

"You're coming with me," Owen says, sounding surprised that she thought she would be going anywhere else. "I'll find us a hotel on the mainland, we'll rest up for a bit, and then on Sunday we'll head back to the States together to take care of your mom like we planned." He ruffles her hair, smiling affectionately. "Everything's going to be okay, kid."

She smiles, that final worry laid to rest, so she steps up next to Owen and turns around, both of them facing the raptors. They seem a little sad and she knows they know her and Owen are leaving. "You girls be good while we're gone," she tells them, scratching the tops of their heads one by one. "We'll be back. I promise."

"You got that right," Owen agrees, patting the side of Blue's neck. "Even if InGen fires me after everything's settled, we're still coming back."

"Oh, don't worry about that," Claire reassures. "I'm sure Masrani Global will be more than willing to take up the behavioral project. You'll still have a place here with us."

"Good." Owen looks his beta sternly in the eye. "You take care of them. Take care of each other."

Blue barks sharply in affirmation, the others joining in, and then they're off, racing across Main Street to head back into the jungles of Isla Nublar. Liv's chest constricts a little, watching them go, but she knows she'll be back, that this isn't the end.

It's only the beginning.

The sun is just barely starting to rise by the time they make it to the mainland. All of the Jurassic World refugees are gathered at the docks still, one of the larger warehouses converted to house them all for emergence triage. Cots are lined up in rows, medical personnel from local hospitals and volunteers willing to help flitting around among them, bandaging wounds and comforting all they can.

There are stoic faces, crying faces, some just plain blank. All of them wondering why and how, trying to process and put themselves back together again.

There's a lot of blood. Liv can feel the pain in their auras, smell it as if it's an expensive perfume. She can't help with the pain in their hearts, but she can help with this. The question is, does she? If she decides to help, she'll have to officially out herself as a mutant. Plenty of people probably saw her yesterday during the Pterosaur attack. She wouldn't be surprised if there's even some shaky cell phone footage up on YouTube already, showing her controlling the plants and bringing down dinosaurs. But this is a lot more public, a lot more permanent. She'll end up on some government list of mutants and there will be no going back.

She looks up at Owen and he nods his encouragement.

Yeah. It's worth it, to finally use her abilities for more than just herself. To make a real difference.

Scanning over the crowd, she goes to the first person in a white doctor's coat she picks out, a middle-aged woman with dark hair and olive skin. "I want to help," Liv tells her before she can lose her nerve.

The woman glances up at her as she cleans a nasty cut on a little girl's arm. "Great, we could use all the help we can get. You can start by helping to pass out water bottles. I think Ben is handling it?"

"No, you don't understand." Liv kneels down next to the doctor, catching her gaze and holding it. "I'm a mutant with a healing ability."

The doctor blinks at her, looking skeptical. "Are you serious?"

"Here, let me." She moves the doctor's hands away from the little girl's arm and gives the girl a small smile. "Hey, sweety. Everything's going to be okay. This won't hurt a bit."

As soon as she heals the girl's arm, things move a lot faster, the minutes and patients all blurring together. They take her to the worst ones first and then going from there. Owen stays by her side through it all, making sure no one pushes her too far once people realize what she's doing. Barry joins them eventually, and she's so happy to see him safe she has to stop before healing a broken leg in order to hug him. She then gets straight back to work with the both of them keeping people back.

Eventually, Owen puts an end to it, when all that's left are people with a few scrapes and Liv is wavering dangerously on her feet. He just picks her up and carries her to the cot next to the one Claire, Zach, and Gray are resting on. She passes out as soon as her head hits the pillow, but she feels good. Like she's really accomplished something and can be proud of what she's done.

She can be proud she's a mutant.

Liv wakes to the sound of panicked babbling and when she opens her eyes she realizes Zach's and Gray's parents have arrived. She takes a moment to study them. Their mom looks nothing like her sister, her blonde hair so different from Claire's red, but she can see where some of Gray's features come from and Zach gets his from their dad.

Both parents are hugging their children and one another, obviously scared after almost losing them. She wonders if it'll last, if it'll get them through finding out Zach is a mutant and turn their marriage around.

Liv sees Claire turn away from her family and follows her gaze to see Owen near the warehouse doors. Quietly, she gets up and goes to Claire, exchanging small smiles, and they both go to join Owen.

"How you feeling?" Owen asks her, trying not to show how worried he is since her exhaustion is normal, but failing.

"I'm fine, Dad," she says with a smile, the word coming easy to her now, and he grins at it. "So what do we do now?"

He pulls her into his side, hugging her close. "We stick together for survival, of course." He looks over at Claire and holds out his hand to her. "What do you say, Claire?"

Claire's eyes shine hopefully, but they go a little worried when they turn to Liv. Liv just smiles broadly and nods her head.

Claire slips her hand into Owen's and Liv's smile gets even wider, all teeth and aching cheeks and happiness. And it is happiness. This is what happiness truly feels like, not that uneasy contentment she felt when Vic first started working at Jurassic World. And this is what family feels like, a family that loves each other no matter, loves her no matter what, and she is glad to see Claire joining it.

This. This is home.

Author's Note

And so the Indominus is finally dead. It's definitely been a long struggle against that dinosaur. The raptors are all safe, Rexy got to be a badaft, and the park is going to be saved. I hope my version of saving the park makes sense, I go into it a bit more in the epilogue. It makes sense in my head that the Indominus would be swept under the rug. I definitely don't think the park would be closed, they're planning an actual sequel to the Jurassic World movie after all so they can't close it. So this is how I think it happened. Well, plus a few added things next chapter.

Next chapter will be coming up in a few minutes. It's the epilogue and is short like the prologue, but it's basically just to tie up the loose ends.

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