Jurassic World: Return to Isla Nublar – Chapter 16: In the Field
A/N: I hope everyone is enjoying the story so far! Thanks to everyone who's been either commenting on, following or favoriting my story. As you might guess based on the last chapter, this chapter's going to involve one of our bands of scientists venturing out into the field to learn some more about Isla Nublar's wildlife. There's also a high chance of seeing a familiar Jurassic Park predator that has . . . you know what, I'd better not say anymore because I'll give away the creature that's making its appearance!
Disclaimer: I don't own anything related to Jurassic Park except the very characters I've made up.
Tim sat in the back left seat of the jeep-01 as the vehicle started to exit the area around the Visitor Center. In the front left was Captain Ryan (he was driving), and to Ryan's right sat Dr. Sorkin. In the middle section there was Levine on the right and the two other soldiers to the left of him. In the far back is where Tim sat next to Kailey.
As to be expected, he had an overwhelming desire to be "alone" with her (not in a bedroom, of course). He had already determined that she was probably his type. Not sure I'll have much time alone with Kailey while we're on the island, he thought. Maybe when this expedition is finished. He could only hope.
Ryan turned to Dr. Sorkin and asked, "Where exactly am I going?"
The scientist could only shrug. "Not sure. If you see a sparser area of the island there are likely to be dinosaurs there. I'm not sure exactly what to look for because it's been so long since I was last here."
"Look for any signs of disturbance in the jungle," Levine suggested.
"What kind of disturbances?" Kailey asked.
"The typical stuff: you know, snapped tree branches, fallen trees, dinosaur trackways–"
"You know, I think these roads are often used by dinosaurs when they want to travel through the forest," Tim pointed out. "Otherwise, don't you think that it's rather odd that the roads would have stayed this drivable after 20 years of no road maintenance?"
"He's got a point," Dr. Sorkin agreed. "Maybe if we continue driving along this road we'll see something."
"Hey! I think I see some sparser forest up ahead!" Ryan pointed out. He was right – ahead of them the jungle did get more spacious and more light entered through the forest canopy. It was still jungle-habitat, of course, but it was much easier to see through the trees, both horizontally and vertically.
"Let's stop here," Levine instructed.
"Here's another email," Lex alerted the others. Grant and Taylor came over to where the computer was located and looked at the screen.
"Before you read," Grant began, "did Lester call you again?"
"No, not yet. He said he was going to alert me when the weather cleared where he was. The transmission was bad as it was due to the weather. Must be a large storm, but I'm sure they'll get through it just fine."
"Why can't I go with the others and see the dinosaurs?" Taylor complained.
"You'll get in the way," Grant told her before looking back at the screen. "So let me get this straight: by 1989, InGen had produced a large amount of dinosaurs on Isla Sorna. That was around the time they decided to construct the park on Isla Nublar rather than in San Diego, correct?"
"Yes," Lex responded. "They began construction in 1989 on Nublar and as soon as the paddocks were completed, they began moving dinosaurs and more construction on the other areas of the park between 1989 and the time this email I'm about to read was sent to Hammond in 1992.
Lex read the next email: " 'January 4, 1992
Dear Hammond,
Hope you had a good time at your daughter's place for New Year's! How are Lex and Tim doing? Anyway, things at the park are going well. Many of the dinosaurs are settling in to their new enclosures on Nublar. The Baryonyx we've been maturing on Sorna aren't ready for transportation yet, as they've been experiencing some major issues – for one thing, as they're growing up, they're beginning to develop a humped back that seems to be developing into a sail, similar to what's seen in related species of dinosaurs, such as Spinosaurus and Suchomimus! As far as we know, Baryonyx didn't have a sail and Gerry Harding recommended that we wait before transporting them to the island to see why they're developing this way. Perhaps we have misclassified this species? Anyway, I hear you're coming back to the island soon! See you then!
Sincerely, Henry Wu.'"
Lex turned to Grant. "So, is that part of the Spinosaurus mystery solved?"
Grant nodded. "It might be. That could be why the Spinosaurus wasn't included on the list – perhaps they had accidentally recreated a Spinosaurus instead of Baryonyx and since the sail wouldn't develop until long after hatching, the Jurassic Park scientists wouldn't know they were infant Spinosaurus. Perhaps as the sail continued to grow, they reclassified it as Suchomimus and added that species to the InGen list of species. Of course, they probably weren't in operation long enough to see the dinosaurs mature into adult Spinosaurus. Therefore, Baryonyx and Suchomimus might never have been cloned at all."
"Think there are any Spinosaurus on Nublar?"
"Probably not, because the scientists might have wanted to study the dinosaurs further and find out why they were sprouting sails before transporting them here."
After getting out of the vehicle, Levine and the others began walking through the jungle. Kailey took a few more pictures of the exotic plant life.
All this flora is so beautiful! she thought. She bent down near a small, tender green shoot to take its picture and realized that the top of it had been taken off. That's funny, maybe something ate it.
"Hey guys," she called. "I think I found something."
Everyone, except Levine, walked over to where she stood. "What are we supposed to be looking at?" Ryan questioned.
"This shoot looks like it's been nibbled at."
Dr. Sorkin bent down to look and nodded. "Yes, it's been nibbled. I'm not sure by what even though it–"
"Every tracker's dream!" Levine exclaimed from his location. "I think I've found reptile droppings of some kind!"
Ryan grimaced. "Did you say . . . dino . . . droppings? Droppings?"
"Yeah, we might be able to get an approximate classification of the animal or animals that were here. There's tons of stuff you can learn by looking at an animal's dung."
As the others approached, they eyed the small bit of crusty-looking white goop on the ground. Kailey crouched in front of it, grabbed a pair of twigs she found on the ground and began using them to slowly split the dung apart. Then Levine bent down just enough so he could smell only a hint of it.
"Not too unpleasant actually," he commented.
As Ryan watched Kailey continue action, he shook his head in disgust. "That is just not right," he said.
Ignoring the comment, Kailey said, "Looks like we've seeds . . . bits of plant shoots . . . oh, I think I even see a bit of an insect body part in here . . . I think we've got an omnivore, a creature eating mainly plants and small animals." She stood up to her full height and looked over at Ryan, who still had a grimaced expression on his face. "What?"
"Nothing," Ryan told her. But as she walked back over to Levine, Ryan leaned toward Dr. Sorkin and said, "She's . . . uh . . . tenacious."
"You have no idea," Dr. Sorkin acknowledged.
Ryan turned back toward Kailey and said, "You will remember to wash your hands before you eat anything!"
The group found themselves walked a bit through the forest for at least another half an hour. They followed what seemed to be a trail made by some group of animals. They also identified relatively small dinosaur tracks made in some mud.
"Theropod," Dr. Sorkin identified.
"What kind of dinosaur is that?" Ryan asked.
Dr. Sorkin shook her head. "Not a particular species – that's a group of dinosaurs that contained creatures such as Velociraptor, Troodon, Ornitholestes, Yutyrannus, Allosaurus, Tyrannosaurus and Nanotyrannus. Most theropods were carnivores. But a few ate plants or were omnivores."
"How reassuring."
"Looks like a herd of dinosaurs moving through here," Levine noticed. "So maybe we're following a–"
All of a sudden, the forest in front of the group came alive with loud bird-like squawks and shrills. Everyone tensed as the foliage began to move as if something was approaching. The same thought was going through everyone's mind: what could that be? They didn't know whether to run or hide.
A moment later, a flock of relatively small dinosaurs rushed into view and came to a stop in this area of the forest. They were very ostrich-like in shape, had sharply clawed forearms, strong back legs and a long tail. Our group was looking at a flock of seven Gallimimus.
"We saw some of these guys earlier, didn't we?" Ryan asked. Dr. Sorkin nodded.
"Yes, they're Gallimimus." The Gallimimus stood only a couple yards away, but despite looking small from a distance, or even compared to other dinosaurs, these creatures were quite large when compared to a human. They stood some nine feet tall and stretched 20 feet in length.
"They were running from something," Tim observed, "but whatever it was is faraway by now, otherwise the gallies would still be running."
Everyone relaxed as the flock of Gallimimus looked curiously at Dr. Sorkin and the others standing nearby before they resumed feeding.
"Wow!" Kailey exclaimed. "More dinosaurs. I love it!" She raised her camera and snapped a photograph.
Dr. Sorkin watched closely as the dinosaurs fed – bending forward, they began to look through the foliage for little tidbits that looked appetizing. When one of the dinosaurs found something, it used its front claws to scrape the ground off of its meal. Then it gobbled up what looked like some sort of insect.
Levine smiled. "Looks like a healthy herd," he noted. "All the dinosaurs we've seen so far is a good indication that the island has a healthy population of a majority of species."
"That's true," Dr. Sorkin said. "The herbivores haven't even eaten up all the island's plant life yet."
Wincing, Levine's next statement was, "What does that have to do with anything. The island has plenty of flora for the dinosaurs to eat."
"Exactly, and every healthy ecosystem has a way of monitoring the herbivore population."
"Yes, I know that, but what's your . . . point . . .?" A frown appeared on Levine's face when he figured out what Dr. Sorkin was getting at. She's right, carnivores keep down the herbivore population. Let's hope that we won't run into any in a place like this . . . out in the relative open!
"'. . . so like I said, I'm sorry that I wasn't able to get that official species list to you, but I'll do that as soon as I can. My computer's been having issues lately with opening files. Catch you later!
Sincerely, Henry Wu.'" Lex concluded reading the letter and looked up at Grant. "So are we actually succeeding in our search for information, Dr. Grant? Because I'm not sure we're getting anywhere."
Grant chortled. "Oh, we're getting somewhere, alright! Like I said, we need to understand what was going on before the Jurassic Park Incident–"
". . . to be able to understand what happened since the incident," Lex finished. She smiled. "Yes I remember. You know, you're starting to sound like Dr. Malcolm – him and his chaos theory models."
"Yeah, he seems to have that affect on people. But as I was saying, perhaps we can piece together the middle part of the story by matching what was going on before the incident to what we can observe now. It seems to me that InGen was always having problems with their dinosaurs; they never had the control that they believed they had. They were too undermanned for this kind of operation if you ask me."
"Not to mention the fact that everything was automated," Lex pointed out. "Almost everything in the park could be operated by the push of a button in the Control Room."
Grant nodded and looked out the window. Then Lex turned and looked over at Taylor; the little girl stood quietly in a corner of the trailer. Lex got up off her chair and went over to her.
"When am I going back?" Taylor asked curiously.
"Hey," Lex began, "we'll get you back to your family soon."
"Oh, I figured that," Taylor answered. "Don't suppose I can stay a little longer to see some dinosaurs, huh?" Lex shook her head.
"I'm afraid not. You're family's probably worried about you. But we'll get you home soon. If another Jurassic Park is ever built, I can guarantee you can be one of the first people to check it out."
Taylor still remembered that her parents were getting remarried pretty soon, of course, but she figured that she still should have a little more time to stay on Isla Nublar to see some dinosaurs. Technically, the only dinosaurs she's seen since she's been on the island were the Compsognathus, because the mosasaur that almost ate them earlier wasn't a dinosaur at all. Rats! Maybe that ship won't be able to come yet so I can stay a little longer. Maybe I'll get to see a dinosaur fight or something.
With that, Lex went back to the computer and began looking through another computer file for more emails.
The Gallimimus continued to forage through the leaf-litter for food. Levine and the others watched from nearby.
"This isn't their ordinary habitat," Dr. Sorkin explained, "so I wonder why they're here in the first place."
"What's their normal habitat?" Tim asked.
"Well, our gallies prefer open plains where they can browse and graze on low-growing plants and feed on small animals. Maybe this is just one of their foraging spots where they find a type of food they like. Maybe a certain type of mineral or something."
Tim nodded and then with a grin he said, "It's so much easier to admire the Gallimimus when they're not stampeding around you."
"Oh yeah," Kailey giggled. "I forgot, you guys were caught in the middle of a stampede when you were on the island before."
"Why didn't Ian include that in the book?" Levine asked. "That would have been an exciting scene . . . oh yeah, Ian replaced the Gallimimus thing with a hadrosaur stampede." He then looked back at the feeding Gallimimus. I wonder if they'll let me approach, he wondered.
Slowly, Levine started walking toward the feeding dinosaurs.
"What are you doing, Levine?" Kailey asked.
"Just going to see how close these guys will let me approach," he answered. He got his camera out and snapped a photograph of the dinosaurs. One of the dinosaurs heard the metallic click and looked up at Levine.
Blinking its eyes slowly, the creature cawed quietly; it was closely studying Levine. Wow, there really haven't been many, if any, humans to this island since the incident. They're not even afraid of me . . . but I guess they wouldn't really need to be, considering the size of these dinosaurs! I wonder if they'll let me feed them.
Ryan shifted his body uneasily. "Dr. Sorkin, are you sure these dinosaurs aren't dangerous?"
"Positive," the scientist answered. "If InGen had spent time actually studying the animals they created like I was instead of trying to build this fantastically undermanned park, they might have figured out a way to ride these animals. They're quite docile, despite their size. They don't even have teeth in their beaks."
"And they can't peck?"
"No, well at least, they don't peck people. They're completely safe."
Kailey smiled to herself as she watched Levine attempt to approach the dinosaurs. "Think they'd accept another person over there without becoming spooked?"
Levine turned to face her. "Yeah, they're pretty friendly. Watch this." Levine was already on his knees when he dug into his pocket and extracted a packet of trail mix. He opened the baggie, poured some of the trail mix into his hand and after removing the bits of chocolate, he stretched out his hand toward the dinosaur standing with its head no more than a couple feet in front of him.
Never having eaten trail mix before, the dinosaur was a little unsure of what this food was. It stuck its snout into the palm of his hand and once he figured out what it was, the Gallimimus was munching on the snack. Levine chortled lightly.
"He likes it!" he said quietly as Kailey approached him. Kailey smiled and took a photo of the feeding Gallimimus.
"They're kind of cute up close," Kailey observed. A second later, Tim was by Levine and Kailey's side once again, not only to look at the Gallimimus up close though . . .
The Gallimimus Levine was hand-feeding emitted a chicken-like clucking noise and this got the attention of the rest of the flock. They also made the clucking noise as they turned toward Levine and approached. Soon, all six of them were eating the trail mix from Levine's hand. Within seconds, a whole baggie's worth of trail mix was eaten. The Gallimimus looked at Levine expectantly.
"Wait! Hold on a second. Let me get some more." Levine quickly got another pack of trail mix and before he knew it, the dinosaurs were eating the trail mix once again.
One Gallimimus looked up at Kailey and created a gurgling-like sound. She looked curious about something.
"What are you looking at?" Kailey asked the dinosaur. Then the Gallimimus began lightly pecking at Kailey's little earrings. "Hey! Stop that!" Kailey said playfully with a giggle as she tried to shoo the animal away.
Tim laughed. And she's got a nice laugh, he thought.
Ryan shook his head. "They're having too much fun," he told Dr. Sorkin. She shrugged in return.
"Hey, just because it's a scientific investigation doesn't mean that you can't enjoy yourself," Dr. Sorkin explained.
"So," Ryan began, "are we making progress? I mean, we haven't done a whole lot since we've been here. I mean, we've seen a variety of dinosaurs, but we haven't actually started studying them."
"Actually, we have. We've seen a lot that's helping us understand this place – the dinosaurs we've seen so far seem happy and healthy. They're also in good-sized herds, so the population of herbivores definitely isn't low. The presence of this much plant life on the island seems to suggest that the herbivore numbers are being kept at a manageable level by a fair amount of carnivores. The presence of Compsognathus also seems to suggest that the island is a healthy, balanced ecosystem, because since much of their diet consists of carrion, there must be a number of dinosaurs being killed by carnivores or natural instances. We're definitely getting the information we've been looking for."
Ryan nodded. After a moment of silence, he added, "Maybe you should call Dr. Grant and tell him our progress."
"Good idea." She got out her walkie-talkie radio and after setting the frequency, she heard . . .
"Hello? This is Ronald speaking, over."
Dr. Sorkin winced. Who on earth is Ronald? "And . . . who are you?"
"I'm a Lexico soldier."
"Oh, alright. Guess I never took the time to remember the names of you soldiers other than Ryan. Could you get Grant on the other end please?"
"Sure thing. Give me a moment."
Dr. Sorkin waited as the radio was passed to Grant. Soon, she heard his voice on the other end, "Hello, Dr. Sorkin."
"Hey, Grant. How is your research going?"
"Ah, pretty good actually."
"What have you learned?"
"Well, it turns out Wu played a major role in the park after he was promoted; he was also running operations on both Nublar and Sorna."
"Yeah, I knew all that, go on."
"We were reading that seemingly the 'Baryonyx' InGen cloned were developing sails as they matured, which is completely not a characteristic of Baryonyx."
Dr. Sorkin grinned. "That's why Spinosaurus isn't on the list – they misclassified the Spinosaurus they cloned as Baryonyx, and then as the sail continued to grow, they misclassified again as Suchomimus. Therefore both of those species may or may not have really been recreated at all."
"Exactly. As we're reading these emails, we're getting a real sense of the lack of control Jurassic Park had."
"Yeah, they depended too much on automation if you ask me. And if they had decided to make a nature preserve rather than a theme park, I'm sure the whole incident and the deaths of countless people could have been avoided. But no-o-o-o-o, they just had to build the park to raise money."
"You making any progress?"
"Yes actually, based on what we've seen so far, the ecosystem is healthy. We've bumped into a flock of Gallimimus and–"
"Oh, sorry, Dr. Sorkin. I have to go. Lex found an email she wants me to read."
"Alright, catch up with you later."
The Gallimimus continued to eat their way through 15 ½ bags of trail mix over the next few minutes. Levine looked back at Tim and Kailey.
"Have anymore trail mix?" he asked. "These dinosaurs are hungry!"
Tim and Kailey both shook their heads. Just then, one Gallimimus looked up and scanned the forest with his large eyes. It let out a loud shriek and this got the attention of the other six dinosaurs. A moment later, the Gallimimus turned tails and ran out of the area, leaving the humans alone in the forest.
"Hey! Where are you guys going?" Kailey asked, knowing the dinosaurs wouldn't answer.
Tim grinned. "Maybe they're getting tired of trail mix."
"Yeah, I guess so . . . or maybe they like it too much!" All of a sudden, the forest came alive again as the Gallimimus reentered the area and ran toward the group. "Yikes!"
Dr. Sorkin, Ryan and the other soldiers gasped as the dinosaurs came back in their direction. "Duck!" Dr. Sorkin exclaimed. The seven humans dashed out of the way of the running dinosaurs and hid behind a moss-covered log. "I wonder what got them running."
Soon, Dr. Sorkin and the others learned that they had ducked behind the log just in time – suddenly, no more than a second later, a quiet gurgling-like sound was heard from the grove of trees to the group's right. The trees slowly parted as a large dinosaurian creature stepped into the area – its dark shadow was cast out over the forest floor. The group gasped at what they saw and their eyes widened.
The dinosaur before them stood almost as tall a two-story house and walked on two legs. Its head was a massive five-foot head and had a large mouth filled with dozens and dozens of banana-sized, sharp teeth belonging to a carnivore. The dinosaur must have been over 40 feet in length and the tail stretched out behind it. Its feet were sharply clawed and attached to powerful legs, but its arms were rather small for its size, only as long as those on a human. Dr. Sorkin and the others knew exactly what dinosaur they were observing – they were looking at the most infamous predator ever to exist on the planet: the "tyrant lizard king" – Tyrannosaurus rex.
A/N: Well, it turned out T. rex only managed to make a cameo appearance in this chapter, but be expecting more of him in Chapter 17! In this chapter, I was intending to write more about T. rex in this chapter, but I turned out to be longer on the Gallimimus part than I originally thought. Oh well! How was this chapter? Please let me know via commenting! I really do love reading all of your comments. Be sure to read Chapter 17 when it's up, because the most infamous dinosaur that ever existed, Tyrannosaurus rex, will be making one of its star appearances! Also be sure to take part in my poll to choose which Jurassic World character you like the most.