Jurassic World: Return to Isla Nublar – Chapter 11: The King of Sorna
A/N: Alright folks! Here's the 11th chapter of this story. I hope you all are liking it so far! Based on the last chapter, you'll already know that Dr. Alan Grant, Dr. Laura Sorkin, Richard Levine, Lex Murphy and the rest of their team are headed to Isla Sorna on the way to Isla Nublar so the USS Mars' mechanic can make an urgent, but quick "pit stop" and make sure everything's running smoothly. This is where we'll finally get some dinosaur action, dino-fans! Please enjoy this chapter!
Disclaimer: I don't own anything related to Jurassic Park except the very characters I've made up.
Alan Grant loved dinosaurs; he loved the dinosaurs of Isla Nublar and Isla Sorna, but after his first adventure on Nublar, he was positive he'd never have to encounter real-live dinosaurs again. After his adventures on Isla Sorna, he wasn't so sure he could stay away from Jurassic Park-related adventures anymore. The bones he dug up in the ground were so much easier to deal with – they were, of course, long-dead, stayed in one spot and weren't likely to jump out and eat you.
His eyes narrowed as he glared out at the island that laid before him – the dreaded Isla Sorna. Apparently, as Lester told him, they had to make an urgent pit stop on Isla Sorna before making the final push to Isla Nublar. Levine and Tim stood by his side on the deck of the USS Mars as the three men looked out over the ocean as their ship approached the island.
Levine grinned at Grant. "So, what's Isla Sorna like, Grant? Is it really as dangerous as you said or were you exaggerating?"
"I wish I was exaggerating," Grant answered. "This island is really too dangerous for humans to explore carelessly. The soldiers Lester's got on board the ship had better do their job and get us off this island alive."
"It's not like we're exploring the island, Grant," Tim told him. "We're just going to one of Sorna's docks, the mechanic's checking the ship and we'll be safely back on the water before you know." Grant lightly nodded at what Tim said, but he was sure his words didn't offer any comfort to Grant at all.
I can't believe we're going back to Isla Nublar! Tim thought. It had been years since his encounter with dinosaurs at Jurassic Park when he was only a mere kid. He remembered the event vividly . . .
Around two decades ago, all he knew was that he'd be spending another summer with his sister, Lex. He was around eight at the time and "a real dinosaur-nut" as his sister put it. Then, sometime in June, his mother informed him that he and his sister would be spending the remainder of that month with his grandfather at his theme park. "What kind of roller coasters will they have at the park?" Tim had asked.
His mother, not knowing much about the park, could only shrug and say, "I'm not sure if they have those kinds of rides. I think he owns some kind of animal park or something." From the moment his mother said that, he was really curious.
He thought, What kinds of animals would Grandpa have at a theme park? Must be a pretty bizarre theme park!
Finally, the time to depart had arrived and he and Lex were on their way to the island they'd soon know was Isla Nublar – Jurassic Park. Once they reached the InGen airport, the kids were greeted by a nice man named Ed Regis, Jurassic Park's head publicist. Ed Regis led the kids to the helicopter they'd use to reach the island. Now Tim was extremely intrigued as to why the theme park would be far out over the ocean.
"Mom said the park has animals," Lex began, "what sorts of animals do they have?"
Regis grinned and rubbed his chin. "Oh, lots of exotic animals! So exotic in fact, they're not found anywhere else on earth . . ." and then under his breath, he added in a voice too low for the kids to hear, "until we open Jurassic Park: Europe that is!"
"Do they have elephants there?" Tim asked the publicist. Regis shook his head. "Tigers?" "Lions?" "Alligators?" "Grizzly Bears?" "Giraffes?" "Hippos?" "Zebras?" "Komodo Dragons?" Lex and Tim guessed animal after animal, but to each question, Regis smiled and shook his head.
"You'll see when we get there," he told them.
Soon enough, the helicopter arrived to Nublar and Regis led Tim and Lex off and into a jeep that said Jurassic Park on the side with a picture of a T. rex skeleton above it. Maybe they have a lot of animatronic dinosaurs here, he thought. Regis drove the kids through some heavily forested roads and past an electric fence to a large paddock in the middle of a grassland and Regis stopped the car next to another electric fence.
"Why'd you stop the car?" Lex asked. "We're not even close to the theme park, unless it's in the middle of the jungle."
"We're already in the park," Regis answered. "Take a look to your right."
Tim and Lex looked through the glass of the jeep's windows when Tim noticed six strange animals near a pond in the middle of the enclosure – they were birds and had a small, beaked head that ended in a long ostrich-like neck and had strong-looking arms and . . . Wait a minute! Tim exclaimed through his thoughts. Ostriches don't have arms and these animals aren't even feathered! Then it occurred to him: these weren't birds at all! The beaked head, long neck, strong and clawed forearms, well-muscled back feet and tail that trailed out behind was characteristic of . . . a dinosaur! An ornithomimid to be precise.
"Timmy . . .?" Lex started. "Are those . . . dinosaurs?"
Tim slowly nodded. "I think they're ornithomimids."
Regis burst out in laughter. "That's right kids, we've got dinosaurs!"
Tim fumbled for words, "But . . . how did . . .?"
"You know what they are?"
Tim snapped his fingers. "Um . . . either Struthiomimus or galli . . . galli . . ."
"Gallimimus?"
"Yeah, that. Cool! Dinosaurs! Grandpa's park has dinosaurs!"
"Do you have more of them?" Lex enquired.
"Oh we've got plenty more. Kids . . . welcome to Jurassic Park!"
The rest was pretty straight forward: after driving away from the Gallimimus enclosure, Regis drove the kids to the Visitor's Center where they ran in to meet their grandfather. After that, they went on the park tour with Malcolm, Grant, Ellie Degler and Genaro (John Hammond's lawyer), the dinosaurs escaped that night . . . and we already know the rest of the story. The Jurassic Park Incident happened so long ago, but Tim remembered the events very clearly. He hadn't had the chance to see a living, breathing dinosaur since then, but now, he was going to get that chance.
Grant chuckled to himself. Tim cocked an eyebrow and asked, "What?"
"Oh, nothing," the scientist answered. "I was just thinking about the fact that you were only a little tyke when we first got to Isla Nublar."
Suddenly, Levine slapped his hands on his pants. "Oh drat!" he exclaimed. "I think I forgot my binoculars in my room. I'll be right back."
"Why in the world do you need binoculars?" Grant asked him. "We're not going sightseeing, we're just letting the mechanic check the boat and we're getting out of this place. I don't want a repeat of the Kirby Incident."
Levine grinned. "There's a slight chance we might see something, and I don't want to miss any. I'll be right back."
"I'll come with you," Tim offered.
Levine and Tim went back to their room, grabbed the binoculars and opened the door and stopped in the doorway.
"It will be interesting once we finally reach Nublar," Levine told his co-worker and friend. "We'll finally be able to answer some questions I've been wanting answers to for ages."
Tim asked, "Like what?"
"Oh, you know: if the lysine contingency would have really worked to contain the animals in the first place – even if they weren't able to eat lysine-rich foods; why they didn't drive themselves to extinction due to a non-balanced ecosystem with more carnivores than herbivores; did InGen clone more animals they . . .?"
Levine continued talking, but Tim mentally left the conversation when he saw, looking over Levine's shoulder, Dr. Laura Sorkin and her assistant leaving their room. Tim suddenly felt lightheaded as a weird feeling went through his body as he eyed the raven-black-haired creature with fine facial features and average body-frame walking by Dr. Sorkin's side. Wow, was the only word that came to mind in his thoughts as he watched her and Dr. Sorkin walk past. He was completely awestruck by this girl's beauty. Kailey, who apparently caught him staring at her looked up, smiled and continued to follow Sorkin down the hall.
". . . so that's why I think the Velociraptors on Isla Nublar are larger than the ones in the fossil record," Levine concluded. He looked over at Tim and realized that he didn't hear a word he said. "Hello? Tim?" He waved his hand in front of Tim's face and Tim snapped back to reality.
"I'm sorry, what did you say?"
"What was the last thing you heard?"
Tim looked thoughtful. "Um . . . something about there being more herbivores than carnivores on Isla Nublar when they first cloned them."
Levine sighed. "That's all you heard? Gee . . . well, no use going through it again. I'm sure it will come up again when we get there. Where'd you go while I was talking?"
"Oh . . . well . . . I . . . uh . . ."
Levine rolled his eyes. "Never mind. Let's just make sure we're ready to get off the ship once we reach Isla Sorna so Lester doesn't have to go through his speech on why we should have been ready to disembark if we were going to do that."
The USS Marswas directed to a dock on the west side of Isla Sorna. As you might recall, the mechanic said what he needed to check was urgent so this really was their best choice, rather than go back to the mainland, which was out of the way. The coast of this part of Isla Sorna was a wide stretch of beach that was next to dense forests – Grant knew very well the dangers these dense forests held. Much unlike the dock that Cortez and his friends stopped at a few chapters back on Isla Nublar, this dock wasn't very sophisticated and there was no coast guard's office, just a long dock. The sounds of various types of birds, insects and frogs echoed from the jungle.
Richard Levine was one of the first to hop off the boat.
"And where do you think you're going, Mr. Levine?" Lester asked in a stern tone.
"Oh, just going to scout around and look for any signs of animal life," Levine answered. "I'm not going far."
Lester sighed. "Fine, I guess. Captain Ryan, go with him please."
"Yes, sir," the soldier answered.
"You coming, Grant?" Levine asked.
"I guess . . ." Grant knew about the dangers this island held, but even he was curious as to what they could find out here. "We're not going far though."
With that, Dr. Sorkin, Grant, Levine, Tim, Kailey and Captain Ryan walked off the dock and onto the beach itself. Ryan held his gun in front of him, ready to fire in case the need arose.
"I hope there's aren't any bullets in there," Dr. Sorkin told the soldier.
"No, Lester explicitly told me no bullets. Tranquilizers only." He paused before turning to Grant and saying, "Well, you've been here before. Lead the way."
From the ship, Lester and Lex watched Grant and the others walk into the jungle. The mechanic came up from behind them. "You think they'll be safe? We should probably hurry up and get off the island so–"
"Yes," Lester agreed, "and we'd be able to do that if our handy-dandy mechanic would get to work and stop standing around doing nothing! You're the reason we're here in the first place, so get started!"
"Oh, uh . . . yes, sir." The mechanic quickly left to do his "pit stop".
"You don't always have to fuss at people you know," Lex told Lester.
"I know, but if we're going to get anything done around here, people need to pick up the pace and do what need's to get done."
As Grant and the others walked into the forest. The jungles around them was dense and very wet or rainforest-like, much unlike the forests off the eastern side of the island. These forests are just like I remember them, Grant thought. They're the perfect cover for predators.
Just then, a large fern-like plant came alive with a loud rustling – something was in the bush. Everyone froze. "What sort of dinosaurs could hide in that fern?" Kailey asked.
But before anyone could answer, a cackling sound was heard from the fern. Knowing there were plenty of predators on Sorna that this fern could be concealing, Grant gestured for everyone to stand back. Ryan aimed his gun at the plant . . . and a small creature covered in colorful feathers, large wings and a beaked mouth flew from the large plant and with great flaps of its wings it shot to the tree branches above. Soon, it was out of sight.
Levine, Tim and Kailey laughed. "Oh well, I guess dinosaurs aren't the only creatures on these islands!" Kailey joked.
Grant nodded. "Still, keep your eyes and ears open. There are plenty of dangerous creatures in these jungles."
Dr. Sorkin looked over at Ryan and asked, "How much experience have you had at this?"
"I've been working with the military for several years now," Ryan answered. "I've been working mainly in the field but–"
Suddenly, a loud roar echoed through the jungles of Sorna. Grant's breathing increased as the sound entered his ears; he knew exactly what dinosaur that roar came from.
"Tyrannosaurus?" Kailey asked nervously.
"No, it sounds bigger," Tim answered. "Believe me, I've heard a T. rex roar many times in the past, and that wasn't a T. rex. We should probably get out of here."
Dr. Sorkin agreed, "Yes, let's do that–"
Everyone looked to the left when they heard a loud shrieking sound as a dinosaur ran from the foliage and out into this area of the forest. It was around seven feet in length, had a large bald-looking head which was covered with bumps on the snout area. Its body was a typical dinosaur though, with short arms, strong legs and a thick tail. A pachycephalosaurid of some kind, Grant thought. He wasn't sure exactly what species it belonged to, but at least it was an herbivore.
Then the foliage seemed to explode as an even larger dinosaur exploded into view! It was a large theropod, but it was much different from theropods. This creature sported a long, crocodile-like jaw with sharp conical-shaped teeth. Unlike T. rex, its arms were long and bore terrible nine-inch claws and its legs were well-muscled and ready to pursue after prey. The characteristic six-foot-tall sail on the dinosaur's back gave away its identification – Spinosaurus aegypticus, the largest carnivorous dinosaur ever to stalk the earth!
The group watched as the Spinosaurus tore after its prey, the young pachycephalosaur and opened its immense jaws nice and wide and prepared its claws to attack . . . SNAP! It's jaws snapped closed on air as the pachycephalosaur barely dodged the attack and ducked under a propped-up log. The Spinosaurus jammed its jaws under the log to attempt to catch its prey, but the lithe smaller dinosaur was quick enough to scamper out of sight into some nearby foliage. Disappointed by the disappearance of its prey, Spinosaurus let out a loud roar of frustration.
"Holy moly!" Levine whispered. "Spinosaurus right?"
Grant nodded. "Yeah. You're looking at the largest carnivorous dinosaur . . . scratch that, the largest carnivorous animal, ever to walk the earth."
The Spinosaurus'flared its nostrils, sniffing the air. It clicked its claws as it processed the smells that entered its nose. Slowly, its left eye swiveled in its socket as it noticed a bunch of possibly easier to catch meals standing a hundred yards away. Its head slowly turned to face Grant and the others, considering its next course of action.
Out of the corner of his eyes, Grant noticed Ryan slowly raise his gun, preparing to shoot. "Don't shoot yet," Grant ordered quietly.
"Why not? It's my job to keep you guys alive."
"I know, but shooting isn't always the answer."
Kailey clenched her fists – her eyes never left the giant creature that was watching them with its cold, reptilian stare. The only movement the creature made was the rise and fall of its chest and the occasional swivel of its eye. "I don't think we can outrun it," she said.
Opening its jaws, the Spinosaurus emitted a loud, bloodcurdling roar and charged toward the humans!
"We'd better start running!" Levine exclaimed.
Lex was reading some business papers to Lester when the mechanic approached the pair.
"Yes?" Lester asked impatiently.
"I've finished checking the ship," the mechanic answered proudly. "Good thing I did too, because–"
The mechanic's voice was interrupted by the loud roar of a large predatory dinosaur somewhere in the forest. Everyone on and around the USS Mars froze at the sound. Lex spoke up.
"We'd better evacuate."
Lester looked over at the mechanic, who was standing since the roar was heard and said, "What are you doing just standing there? Help get everyone out of here!"
"Oh, sorry, sir." The mechanic ran onto the dock via the ship's ramp just as Grant's group exited the jungle, running at an alarming speed.
Grant, Dr. Sorkin, Levine, Tim, Kailey and Ryan ran for their lives out of the jungles of Sorna. They could hear the biggest super-predator that ever roamed the land thundering after them. Dr. Sorkin risked a look back to see the trees explode and chunks of timber fly in every direction as the hungry Spinosaurus burst from the forest in hot pursuit. It let out another loud roar as it charged after its prey. Its yellowish-green eyes were steadily watching its targets as they tried escaped.
I haven't been through this much expertion since I barely outran raptors when I was back on Nublar, Dr. Sorkin thought. Grant, who was originally in the lead, suddenly tripped on an uneven board on the dock and fell forward, using his hands to brace his fall. Everyone stopped and ran to his aid.
"Don't stop! I'll catch up!" Grant cried. The vibrations from each of the Spinosaurus' footsteps drew closer and closer. As another roar exited the monster's mouth, Levine and Kailey obeyed and ran toward the fleet of soldiers who were running onto the ship. Ryan cocked his gun.
"No! Don't shoot!" Dr. Sorkin hollered.
"It's only tranquilizers!" Ryan answered back. He raised the gun and was about to pull the gun's trigger when Dr. Sorkin knocked into Ryan and the gun missed its target. The Spinosaurus roared in fury as it continued its steady approach. "What in the world do you think you're doing, woman?!"
"How would you feel if someone was shooting needles into you?"
"Never mind, come on, Grant!"
Back on his feet, Grant and the other three started back on their run toward the ship. Like all predators, Spinosaurus prefers the slowest, weakest or youngest members of a group of prey – Grant fit the title of "slowest" perfectly. As the dinosaur continued to catch up, he began closing in on Grant. Grant realized just how close he was to the terrible monster when he could actually feel the creature's breath on his neck. Little dobs of saliva dribbled from the Spinosaurus' mouth. Grant was beginning to think that there would be no chance of escape. No, the dinosaur was too close and the ship was too far away.
"Come on, Alan!" Lex urged from the ship. "You can do it! Keep running!"
After letting out another loud roar, the carnivore's head zoomed down toward Grant, jaws held agape . . . SNAP! Grant leaped out of the way just as the dinosaur's jaws closed shut. Then, with a great swipe, the Spinosaurus attempted to lash at Grant with his fearsome nine-inch claws and barely missed. The breathless scientist raced onward after the rest of his team. The dinosaur behind him was catching up to Grant at an alarming rate.
As Tim, Levine, Ryan, Dr. Sorkin and Kailey reached the ship safely, Levine looked back and yelled, "Watch out, Grant!"
"That's sort of what I'm trying to do, Levine!" Grant responded.
"Not the dinosaur, the dock!"
CRACK! All of a sudden when the Spinosaurus took the next step, a large split appeared in the dock and Grant just managed to avoid the weak spot in the dock that the dinosaur plunged into with a loud splash. There was now a very large hole in the dock that the theropod dinosaur was half-way submerged in. Now Grant was still one step ahead.
Spinosaurus, with half of his body still submerged, looked up and made a loud roar as his prey escaped. He'd have to be more careful next time when he hunted on these docks. But the dinosaur wasn't finished with this hunt just yet. He used his strong arms to pull himself out of the water and onto the part of the dock that could hold his weight. Soon, he was back on his feet; after getting his bearings, the Spinosaurus growled and continued to pursue his prey.
Grant risked a look back and saw the large predator coming his way. With all of his might, the paleontologist leaped onto the ramp of the ship and started running up it.
"Pull that ramp up!" Lex ordered.
"Yes, ma'am!" one of the soldiers answered and after pressing a button, the ramp moved upward and retracted into the ship.
The Spinosaurus stopped dead in his tracks. Seeing he had no hope of getting his prey, he emitted an T. rex-frightening roar and turned to head back to the forest to find a more suitable meal.
Levine sighed in relief. "Alright, let's get out of here." He turned to Lester. "Did the mechanic do his job?"
"Yes, yes he did," Lester answered.
Soon, the USS Mars was back on the water en route to Isla Nublar. Dr. Sorkin, Grant, Tim, Levine and Kailey were relaxing on the deck of the ship, catching their breathes as they watched Isla Sorna disappear behind them as they got farther and farther away.
Tim smiled. "You think that was the same Spinosaurus that attacked you, Grant when you were on Sorna before?"
Grant shrugged. "Possibly. I don't know how many Spinosaurus InGen cloned."
"That was one of the many species not on InGen's list of creatures they recreated," Dr. Sorkin explained. "Had I been chief geneticist instead of Wu, I would have stuck to the list and not gone tampering with DNA that no one knew what it belonged to."
"Why would they not have put it on the list?" Kailey asked.
"Well, I have several theories. My first one is that perhaps it was confused with a related dinosaur called Baryonyx. At the time, scientists weren't really sure what Spinosaurus looked like and so when the Spinosaurus they cloned hatched, they might have classified it as Baryonyx instead of Spinosaurus; the baby Spinosaurus would have probably lacked the sail which would grown in as it grew up. I believe that's the most likely theory."
"In that case," Levine began, "Baryonyx, which is on InGen's official list, might or might not even exist on Nublar and Sorna if they confused it with Spinosaurus."
"Correct. My next theory is that they merely got some DNA of a dinosaur they didn't know what it belonged to and recreated the beast, not telling anyone about its existence. Can't say how many exist on the island, but it's likely that they made more than one."
The others nodded in agreement. Then Tim asked, "But why was it so ferocious? Grant was telling me that the Spinosaurus followed you guys until you reached the coast. Isn't that a bit strange animal behavior?"
"What do you mean?" asked Grant.
"Well, it not only followed you until you got to the coast and based on what you told me, it was acting extremely territorial. It seems to me that it was acting a bit ferocious, even by animal standards."
"Oh, well it could have been because it was coming into the dinosaur equivalent of musth," Dr. Sorkin explained. "During the mating season, male elephants have increased testosterone levels and charge at and/or attack quite literally anything that moves, be it another male elephant or a harmless giraffe. Perhaps the Spinosaurus Grant ran into in 2001 was in a condition similar to musth. It also could have been because of the animal's relatively young age. Younger male carnivorous animals can often seem more dangerous than they should be."
Lex approached the group from behind and overhearing their conversation said, "Either way, that dinosaur still presented a dangerous encounter for you guys."
"Oh, hi Lex," Tim greeted his sister.
Levine interjected, "And that Spinosaurus wasn't even a full grown one."
"It wasn't?" Kailey asked in surprise.
"Nope, mature Spinosaurus could grow almost 60 feet in length, weighed over 20 tons and stood over 20 feet tall at the top of the head. Spinosaurus was not only the largest carnivorous dinosaur on the planet, it was also one of the deadliest dinosaurs ever to walk the earth . . . for good reason!"
Meanwhile, while the USS Mars continued en route to Isla Nublar, the beacon on the side of the ship was still alert and active. Halley and Malone walked into a private office in San Diego where Halley's brother, Dodgson and Howard were waiting for their arrival.
Halley looked back at Malone who was walking behind her. He was stuffing his face on a slice of pepperoni pizza covered in fried egg yokes that he just got from a pizza restaurant. Halley rolled her eyes. "Do you ever stop eating?" she asked.
"What? Oh, yes, I do."
"You do know that you're going to get fat by eating all of that."
"No, I'll burn it off very quickly once we reach Isla Nublar."
"So the beacon is on the ship?" Dodgson asked once Halley and Malone were inside.
"Yes," Halley answered. "The beacon is fixed onto Lexico's ship and by using our tracker we can locate where Lexico's ship is and reach Nublar."
"Excellent!" Then Dodgson looked over at Malone, who was still eating his pizza and asked, "You're still eating?"
"Well, I'd like to be nice and stuffed up so I'm prepared to burn off fat in case we run out of food while we're on Nublar," answered Malone. "Besides, I'll be able to keep warm in the coming Ice Age."
"There isn't another Ice Age, Malone," Halley told him.
"We're not here to talk about Ice Ages!" Dodgson interrupted. "We're talking about the future of Biosyn. Now, I've got a good-sized boat preserved for tomorrow. We'll track down the Lexico ship and reach Nublar. Everyone clear up to that point?" The others nodded and Dodgson continued. "After we get the eggs from a certain number of dinosaurs, we'll get back to the mainland. We'll hatch the eggs and . . ."
Howard inquired, "And what?"
"I'm not quite sure what we're doing with the dinosaurs we'll have, but the important thing is actually getting the dinosaurs in the first place."
"Well . . . alright, Dodgson. But remember: this is our last chance to save the company. If we don't succeed, we're finished; done for! We need to succeed."
Dodgson nodded understandably. "Don't worry. Trust me. This time we'll succeed."
A/N: Lately, I've been reading a lot about why a lot of Jurassic Park fans REALLY dislike the Spinosaurus from Jurassic Park III. One complaint I read was that the Spinosaurus chased Grant and the Kirby's till they reached the coast. The person who made this complain felt that they made it like a Hollywood monster rather than an animal. That's when I decided to write a bit about the Spinosaurus in this chapter and decode its strange behavior, because I really like Spinosaurus. I hope you enjoyed this chapter. Next week, we'll finally reach the moment we've all been waiting for: Grant, Lex, Levine, Dr. Sorkin and the others will finally reach Isla Nublar! R&r till then!