Jurassic World: Return to Isla Nublar – Chapter 18: The Effects of Frog DNA
A/N: Hello everyone! I hope you all had a splendid Christmas! Now in its 18th chapter, I'd say we're making great progress with this story. By the way, before we start the story, I just wanted to let all my readers know that, in case you didn't read last week's A/N, I've started a poll where you can vote which Jurassic World: Return to Isla Nublar character is your favorite! Be sure to check it out sometime! But for now, please enjoy Chapter 18.
Disclaimer: I don't own anything related to Jurassic Park except the very characters I've made up.
Grant pushed against the door and entered the hatchery. The room was pretty large and had several desks and tall round tables. Grant, Taylor, Lex, Ryan and the two other soldiers looked around in awe as they walked to the room's center. The room was dark, since the thunderclouds outside blocked the sun's light from entering the laboratory's windows (which is why the soldiers turned on their handheld lanterns to light up the place). The tall round tables near the center of the room had large bowl-like shapes of vegetation and several cracked eggshells in their middles. Near the other side of the room was a large rectangle-shaped broken window in the wall – Grant remembered that this was the same window he peered into 20 years ago on the same ride that Hammond used to explain how Jurassic Park cloned its dinosaurs (A/N: to help jog your memory, this was the same ride that showed the Mr. DNA video clip explaining how the dinosaurs were cloned and the ride that would have enabled visitors to look through the glass windows to see the hatchery and the Control Room).
Even though the room was recognizable as the hatchery, the tables, desks and chairs were covered with fungus and mildew. There was also extensive evidence of water damage on the walls and the ceiling.
Lex walked over to one of the tall tables. She then fiddled one of the broken eggshell pieces in her fingers. Wow! This thing once contained the embryo of a dinosaur!
Taylor glanced at Grant. "So . . . this is where they cloned dinosaurs?"
"No," Grant said, "this is how the created the ultimate fate of the island."
"What happened to the eggs?" Ryan asked.
Grant shrugged. "Who knows. They either hatched and left the hatchery or were eaten by some predator."
"Hey! There's a few computers here too!" Lex gestured toward the three computers sitting on a long table in a far corner. She, Grant, Ryan and Taylor rushed over to it.
"Think you can make it work?" Grant asked.
Lex shook her head. "Not the computer itself, but if I can extract the memory chip, I should be able to retrieve information on it. Want me to try?"
"No, we'll wait for the others to arrive before we start exploring this area."
Ryan winced. "You think they'll get the note that we attached to the trailer?"
"It was right on the door, I don't see why not."
A few minutes later, Dr. Sorkin and the rest of her group entered the hatchery. Dr. Sorkin gasped upon their entrance.
"Wow!" she exclaimed. "Almost just as I remember it!"
Levine said, "Amazing! The exact place where the dinosaurs were created was right in this very room."
"Not exactly," Dr. Sorkin corrected as her group joined the others. "The dinosaurs were actually cloned on Isla Sorna and later shipped to Nublar."
"Then what's the point of having the hatchery on this island?" Kailey asked curiously.
"I'm not exactly sure what Hammond had in mind, but I think they made the hatchery either to show how the dinosaurs were cloned to tourists and/or they were eventually going to clone the dinosaurs for the park right here so we could be less dependent on Sorna for our dinosaur supply. However, a few dinosaurs were cloned in this hatchery while the park was being built up. That's why it was so easy for Hammond to be present at the birth of every creature on the island."
Kailey looked at Tim and asked, "Did you go in this room when you were here before?"
"No," Tim answered. "We met up with Grant and the others when they were just about to take the jeep ride. By then they had already been into the hatchery and watched the video of how the dinosaurs were made."
Lex walked over to a desk with an old clipboard on it. Attached to the clipboard was a piece of paper that looked like a schedule of some kind. I wonder what this says, she thought. After she noticed that the schedule had a chart listing feeding times on them, she assumed that this must have been the schedule for feeding the hatchery's baby dinosaurs."
"So how do you make a dinosaur anyway?" Taylor asked.
Dr. Sorkin grinned. "Well, it wasn't an easy task to accomplish, but we managed to do it."
"Don't tell me you forgot!" Levine exclaimed, anxious to hear Dr. Sorkin's version of how the dinosaurs were cloned.
"No, I didn't forget. It's been impossible for me to forget! I can't tell you how many times I listened to that "How to Clone a Dinosaur" clip featuring Mr. DNA."
Grant chuckled. "I remember that guy."
"So in order to clone a dinosaur, you'd obviously need DNA, the building blocks of life. See, DNA is the blueprint for building a living thing, and sometimes, animals that went extinct so long ago – like dinosaurs – left these blueprints behind for us to find. We just had to know where to look for it. Before the dinosaurs went extinct, there were mosquitoes, just like today. And just like today, they fed on the blood of animals, including dinosaurs. Sometimes, after biting a dinosaur, the mosquito would land on the branch of a tree, and get stuck in the sap. After a long time, the tree sap would get hard and become fossilized, preserving the mosquito inside."
Grant leaned over to Tim and said, "This is starting to sound strangely familiar."
Dr. Sorkin continued as everyone else listened with interest. "Using sophisticated techniques, they extract the preserved blood from the mosquito and we had our dinosaur DNA."
"Speaking of DNA," Grant interrupted. "I think you've been listening to Mr. DNA for too long, because this is sounding familiar."
"I guess you're right. But the cloning process was a little different than how Jurassic Park normally portrayed it. For instance, mosquitoes stuck in amber weren't our only source for obtaining DNA – we'd also use unusually well-preserved dinosaur bones if we could find some that contained DNA."
"Question," Kailey said. "The mosquitoes must have bitten multiple species of animals before getting stuck in the amber. How were you able to find the DNA of one species of dinosaur?"
"Easy, we used sophisticated computerized technology to separate the dinosaur DNA we wanted from the other stuff we didn't want. Another myth that seemed to get around was that our amber all came from a mine in the Dominican Republic. In reality, we actually got the amber from quite a few different locations. Most of the dinosaurs we recreated didn't even live in the Dominican Republic! Where was I . . .? Oh yes, after we extracted the DNA from the amber or dinosaur bone, use hi-tech super computers to break down the strands of DNA in minutes. And this is where we had a hot debate back in the day before the park even began construction."
"What do you mean?" Ryan questioned.
"Well, originally, as you'll all recall, I was InGen's head geneticist. The technique we used to clone the dinosaurs up until this point was my idea. I was the person who actually did all the researching I could to see if my technique would work. But that's when Henry – Dr. Wu – comes in. In order to clone the dinosaurs, we'd need to fill in the gene sequence gaps. My recommendation was to take more time to research on how we could fill the gaps with dinosaur DNA – I didn't want to use any add-ins or cross-referencing genetic information. This was would have been a safer and more predictable approach. But the Board of Directors didn't want to spend that time on figuring out how to accomplish this, so when my assistant at the time, Dr. Wu, brought up the idea of using frog DNA to fill in the gaps, the Board was interested. I told them I didn't think this was a good idea and I refused to do it. So the Board demoted me and placed Wu as the head geneticist. I couldn't believe his behavior! I mean, he was one of my best assistants – I taught him everything I knew about this field and yet, when he got the chance, he turned on me! I was devastated. So, having no place in the labs anymore, I took to the field where I could study the animals I helped create.
"Wow," Levine commented. "Why frog DNA? Wouldn't some kind of reptile DNA have been better?"
"They used frog DNA because it was easy to obtain and relatively cheap. I tried to warn the Board of the risks of toying with DNA, but they really wouldn't listen. That's why I think many of the dinosaurs are slightly different from the ones in the fossil record."
"Like the larger size of the Velociraptors!" Levine suggested.
"Yes, the Velociraptor fossil skeletons are only around three feet tall and seven feet in length. The ones recreated for the park are almost twice as big! A myth going around is that the raptors were actually Deinonychus and not Velociraptor. But this is incorrect, as our DNA supplies came from Mongolia and no Deinonychus remains have been found in Mongolia. I'm telling you, the frog DNA had some strange effects on the dinosaurs!"
"The frill and venom-spitting behavior of the Dilophosaurus was probably frog DNA-caused too!" Kailey said.
"Yes, there's no evidence for that stuff in the fossil record. The ones we find fossilized are also larger in size."
"That could be because they're a different, yet-undiscovered Dilophosaurus species," Grant mentioned.
"True, but we don't know for sure."
"We were also reading the emails earlier," Lex said, "and they definitely noticed the strange appearance and behaviors in the dinosaurs. I guess they had less control over what they were doing than they thought."
"And as if that wasn't worse enough, that's not the only thing they did to the dinosaurs: they also made them lysine deficient. That way, in case the dinosaurs ever got off the island – which in over 20 years of no human supervision has never happened – the dinosaurs wouldn't be able to survive in the outside world because they wouldn't be fed lysine by the Jurassic Park staff. That upset me greatly because I felt that these animals had a right to live, just like the rest of us! InGen didn't feel that way so they limited them."
"If that's the case, why didn't they, uh . . . 'kick the bucket' on this island?"
"Because lysine doesn't only come from InGen's food – the dinosaurs also found sufficient lysine from eating specific types of plants that produce lysine. The carnivores in turn eat the herbivores and get the lysine passed onto them. Just like what happened on Isla Sorna, as Dr. Harding said when we were at Hammond's place."
Lex nodded.
"There was also another question I had," Tim said. "Some species of dinosaurs took several decades to reach full size. Yet, it seems like most of the dinosaurs were already full-sized in the park within a few years!"
"Dr. Wu gave the dinosaurs some special diet to enable them to grow faster and in less time," Dr. Sorkin told the others.
"You mean like growth hormones, the kind they give to non-organic livestock and plants on farms?"
"No, fortunately. They had originally considered giving the dinosaurs growth hormones in their food, but I recommended taking a more natural method. I told InGen that it would be better to feed the dinosaurs some sort of calcium-rich supplement in their food – forgot exactly what it was – and it made the dinosaurs mature at a much faster rate than they would normally, but naturally at the same time. That was one of the only pieces of advice InGen took, pretty much everything else I suggested they sort of shrugged off. InGen really messed things up when creating these creatures, but it seems things have kind of corrected themselves."
Levine nodded. "Life finds a way," he quoted.
One of the soldiers raised his right hand and said, "I have to take a bathroom break, mind if I go back to the trailer?"
"Fine, just hurry back," Ryan told him. The soldier nodded and left the hatchery.
After exiting the hatchery, the soldier walked down the hall, past the Control Room, climbed down to the floor of the main rotunda via the bungee cord (which was still attached to the top of the staircase) and walked briskly out of the Visitor Center. Lightning flashed and thunder clapped as he walked out.
I forgot about all the rain! he thought, covering his head with one hand (he was holding his gun with the other hand). I hope all this rain is cleared by tomorrow, rain's no fun. I was expecting bright sun shiny days since we're only 120 miles from Costa Rica!
The solider walked up to the door of the trailer but stopped when he thought he heard some rustling in the ferns nearby. He froze. I wonder what that is.
Quietly, he slowly walked toward the sound. He stood in front of the ferns for a few seconds, but nothing happened. Maybe it was just my imagination. But suddenly, he heard something on the other side of the trailer. Holding his gun firmly in his hands, he tiptoed toward the sound.
With his back to the forest, he made his way to the trailer's left side and gasped when he saw it – crouching beside the trailer was a dinosaur with the front half of its body investigating behind one of the large crates that had been left outside by accident, so the front half of its body couldn't be seen. From what could be seen, the creature stood on two strong back legs, had a long tail that was held rigid for balance. Yikes! That can't be friendly! I'd better quietly get out of here and tell the others.
So using his better judgment, he slowly started backing away. He still was holding the gun aimed directly at the dinosaur, just in case. But he forgot to look about his surroundings and before he knew it: SNAP! His foot incidentally stepped on a small stick and the animal's head immediately shot up and looked at the soldier. Now the dinosaur's full 10-foot body could be seen – it had an elongated head, a neck held in an S-shape, sharply clawed forearms and thick reptilian skin. An enlarged retractable claw was on each foot. The back of its neck and both arms were lined with a row of quills. The animal's skin was a shade of tan with vertical black stripes going down its back neck and tail – and when the creature opened its mouth to issue a ferocious-sounding hiss, it was obvious that this was most definitely a predator!
The animal shrieked and let out a loud combination of bird-like calls before it began charging the solider. The soldier ran back around the back end of the trailer, but as he reached the other side, he found the dinosaur already on the same side of the trailer as he was! The initial charge was merely a mock charge to start him running!
"This dinosaur's fast!" the soldier exclaimed. The carnivore before him issued a few bird-like calls and she slowly began stalking him. Get ready for nap time, dinosaur, the soldier thought as he readied himself to pull his gun's trigger, when he heard another call behind him. He glanced around just in time to see another of the same dinosaur dashing up from behind. The soldier screamed in alarm. He quickly wielded the gun around to shoot this dinosaur, but he too slow. Soon the animal leaped from 10-12 feet away and the soldier felt sharp claws and teeth gripping to his body.
Still screaming, the soldier felt immense pain as his body fell to the ground with the theropod dinosaur still on top of him. His gun fell to the ground with a splash as it landed in a muddy puddle beside him. The dinosaur that the soldier saw first also began using its teeth and claws to also attack him and soon . . . well, in order to avoid changing the rating of this story from K+ to T, I'll skip the dinosaurs' "carnivorous actions", but I think we all know what happened to the soldier next!
A few minutes later, one of the two dinosaurs looked up at the Visitor Center and snarled softly. The scent of prey had drifted into her nostrils and she was ready for the hunt. She lifted her snout towards the sky and began issuing an almost gulping-like call – she was calling for the rest of the pack.
Grant and the others waited patiently for the soldier's return. While they were waiting, Levine and Lex busied themselves with trying to get the memory chips from the three computers.
"Do we have to wait for your soldier to come back?" Levine asked. "Because after I get this last memory chip out, we should probably start heading back to the trailer anyway."
Grant nodded. "Yeah, we probably should. But first I want to look at something." He slowly walked toward a large map on the wall – it was the geographical map of Nublar. "This might come in handy." Carefully removing it from the wall, he rolled it up and held it firmly in his hands. Then he looked to his left and saw another room.
"That's the embryonic storage room," Dr. Sorkin told him. "Where all of our dinosaur embryos on Nublar were kept, safe from harm until Nedry tried to steal them." Grant nodded and opened the door to the room. This room was much smaller than the main part of the laboratory and at the room's center were two tall structures. Dr. Sorkin pulled on a latch at the top of the structure and revealed dozens of embryos inside, each in its own little bottle.
"How cute," Grant commented. He closely studied the names printed on each bottle sorted by species: Tyrannosaurus, Stegasaurus (obviously a typo, as it should have been spelled, "Stegosaurus"), Velociraptor, Triceratops, Metriacanthosaurus, Gallimimus, Baryonyx, Dilophosaurus . . . etc.
After Levine and Lex got all three memory chips from the computer, they met back with Ryan, Taylor and the other four soldiers.
"How long are we going to be in this room?" Taylor asked. "It's getting dark in here and it's making me nervous."
"Not too much longer," Lex answered. One of the soldiers turned one of their hand-held lanterns on.
Ryan winced. "Taylor's right. We should probably get back to the trailers. It's already pretty dark outside. We'll leave right after Dr. Grant and Dr. Sorkin are finished in that room over there." Out of the corner of his eye, Ryan thought he saw a shadow move at the same side of the room as the large broken window. Yeah, it's definitely time to leave, because my mind's playing some serious tricks on me . . . I hope.
Grant walked up to another side of the wall and noticed a switch. "I think this might turn on the main lights in the Visitor Center," he said.
"I think those just turn on the lights in the hatchery," Dr. Sorkin answered. "The park was run on geothermal power; since the source of the geothermal power – volcanic activity – is still active, that might mean the power in here could work as well."
"Then why is everything off?"
"The park's systems automatically turn off when left alone for too long. See if the lights in the hatchery turn on."
Grant flipped the switch.
As lights lit up in the room, a loud dinosaurian call was heard. Levine, Ryan and the others looked over at the large broken window in alarm and saw not one, but two dinosaurs in a crouched position! These dinosaurs were using the darkness to stalk them!
"AHHH!" Taylor screamed.
The dinosaurs let out a chorus of loud shrills as their cover was busted – they stood five feet tall on their strong and muscular legs, had sharply clawed dexterous forearms, a terrible set of jaws and a sickle-shaped claw on each foot! Grant and Dr. Sorkin heard the noises and looked out the embryo storage window to see a pair of some of the most dangerous dinosaurs Jurassic Park ever recreated – Velociraptor!
A/N: That's right! The next chapter is going to focus on a dinosaur Jurassic Park made famous – Velociraptor! I can't believe it's almost the end of 2013 already! I mean, it just got here. Oh well. Be sure to stop by next week as our team will try to escape from the ferocious claws and teeth of the infamous raptors and see what other unique species might be lurking nearby . . .