All bracketed italics will be raptor speak. Owen's the only one who speaks raptor. Everyone else will just look at him funny when he's talking to them. XD It will be fun.

Also, my knowledge of the raptors was based solely on the scenes from the movie. And when typing this up and looking online for confirmation on their raptors colors for descriptive purposes, I read a bunch of crap I didn't know. Charlie's the youngest and Echo fought Blue when they were younger for control of the pack. And I could change and swap them out. Except I'm way ahead in writing. I'm on like chapter 9 or 10 in writing. And I have some stuff written towards the end of the story. Because I work on things way out of order. So... I'd probably way confuse myself. And everyone else. So I'm going to ignore everything I read on the internets. So there.

Raptor
Chapter 5: Bravo

The shell cracked and a piece fell away as the tiny claw moved. And then another tiny piece fell away. The hole grew bigger way too slowly. Owen bent down and saw a tiny eye blinking at him. He touched the tiny hand with the tip of his nose. And the tiny hand was quickly retracted. He snorted softly and touched the egg gently again. He heard a tiny squeak and the claws reappeared and started pulling at the shell again.

Owen stood back and waited patiently, offering encouraging sounds as she went. He hoped, at least. He wanted her to hurry, he couldn't wait to meet her. But he didn't rush her. He let her go at her own pace. Finally, the last of the shell fell away, completely exposing the tiny raptor. She was this weird blue gray color with these nearly identical blue stripes outlined in white that ran from her eyes down her neck and back. Blue! The raptor was blue! How odd. He tilted his head, watching her. Was that odd? Well... from what he could see of himself, he was like a golden brown blond something color. So what did he really know about raptor colors?

He dipped his nose forward and touched it to her tiny belly. She opened her tiny mouth and licked him. He licked her back, up her belly and neck and she made a weird, almost purring sound in her throat and rubbed against him. Yeah. That was awesome. It was the cutest, sweetest thing he'd ever seen, in his whole life. Then she opened her tiny mouth and made another sound. His human mind didn't understand but something else told him.

[Hungry.]

He glanced towards the small kitchen area. Okay, that he really couldn't do with claws. At least not without tearing through a few things. He took a deep breath and concentrated hard. Really hard. Like super, really duper hard. He gritted his teeth against the struggle. Slowly, he was able to shift back. Pain shot through him and he collapsed on the ground. He breathed deeply for a moment and scraped himself up off the floor. He grabbed the blanket off the back of the couch and tied it around his waist.

"Hey little Blue." He breathed out, smiling down at her.

She perked up immediately at his voice.

He nodded. "Weird, right?" He picked her up gently and brought her closer to his face, studying her with his human eyes. She looked beautiful. And perfect. And he just couldn't get over those blue stripes! She reached up and licked the tip of his nose, like she had done before. He smiled again and touched his nose to her belly again. And she purred and rubbed against him. And it was the best feeling in the world.

"So you don't really look like a Bravo to me." He said after a moment. "Can I call you Blue?"

She rumbled again and let out a squeak. He got the feeling she was saying something like, [Whatever. Just feed me.]

He nodded again. "Okay Little Blue. Let's get you something to eat." She ate easily with little prompting. He held the dish up to her and told her to eat it. And she did. And then she fell asleep, curled up in a tiny, tight ball on his chest on the couch. It was just... indescribable.

Owen reached for the remote to the TV slowly and flipped the box on. He turned the volume way down low as he looked for something random to watch. The TV there sucked. But since Dr. Wu's limited access to them required an internet connection, Owen had a kickass internet connection. And that meant endless hours of just vegging out on Netflix. He hit the original Star Trek and smiled as the theme music popped up.

A few episodes later and Blue was up, figuring out how well her tiny legs worked. She bounced and hopped and dashed around on the couch and him. She stopped on the edge of the arm rest. Her eyes caught the incubator and the three still intact eggs. But it was more than a foot from her.

"Blue! No!" Owen said when she started wiggling like she was preparing to jump. She stopped and looked back at him. She blinked and tilted her head. He reached up and grabbed her. "You'll fall and hurt yourself." He said, setting her down on his chest. She let out a whine and started wiggling again. Owen rolled his eyes and stretched out his arm towards the incubator. His intention was to pull it closer to the couch. He had no clue why she wanted up on it. But Blue didn't wait. As soon as he moved, she immediately hopped up on his arm and ran across him like a bridge.

Yeah, that was cute. She darted towards Charlie's egg and knocked into it, toppling it over. Then she opened her tiny mouth and Owen's eyes widened. "NO!" He yelled.

Blue immediately stopped and ducked down. She looked back at him and blinked, looking confused. Owen let out a sigh as he sat up. He quickly righted Charlie's egg and rubbed Blue's back in apology. "You have to be patient." He said softly. "Charlie will hatch when she's ready. You might hurt her if you crack her."

He wasn't sure how much, if anything the newborn raptor understood. But her eyes widened and she turned back to the egg. She touched it gently with her nose. And then licked it. She turned and hopped over towards the broken pieces of her egg. She looked over at Owen and tilted her head.

He nodded. "Yes, you can play with your egg. But not theirs." He said, pointing to the eggs. She looked back at them and then bobbed her head like she was mimicking his nod. She turned around, wiggled her tiny tail, and jumped on the pile of egg shell pieces. She let out a squeak as she stomped on them. Just like a little kid playing.

Already he could see the difference between her and Lala. She was fearless and smart and she was only like five hours old. But there was intelligence in her eyes. This was going to work. As long as at least one of the others survived too. He wanted all of them to survive. But Blue needed one to.

At some point, Owen dozed off. It'd been an exhausting couple of days. And Blue seemed to be okay. He'd pulled the incubator and tables closer to the couch. She was enjoying hoping between them all. He'd hoped she'd wear herself out but so far, nope. The little thing seemed to have an endless amount of energy. But he didn't. So he closed his eyes and drifted off.

Sometime later, a loud squeak woke him. Blue was on his chest, jumping and chittering away. [Break, break! Delta, Delta!]

Owen blinked and stifled a yawn as he shook his head. "No, Blue. You can't break Delta. Or Charlie or Echo. You can't break any of them." He mumbled as he closed his eyes and settled back down. "You have to wait. Now please. Nap time. Alpha is tired."

Blue puffed up her little chest and dipped her head down to nip at him. It wasn't hard but her little teeth were still sharp and he still felt it.

"Blue!"

She bounced away before he could catch her. [Break Delta! Break Delta!] She squeaked.

That woke him up. He sat up quickly as she jumped on the incubator. "No! Don't break Delta!" Blue was jumping up and down in front of the egg. And then he heard the first crack. "Ohhhh..." He strung the word out, nodding his head. "We gotta work on your grammar, Blue. Delta break, not break Delta. Actually... crack is better. Or hatching. Delta is hatching. Not break Delta..." His eyes widened. "Oh shit!"

Blue bobbed her head, looking pleased with herself. She crowded in close and reached out touched the shell with her nose. Owen pushed her away. "Let her do it herself, Blue." Blue huffed angrily and Owen bopped her lightly on the tail. "Stop it." He bent down, his attention on the third egg. He oddly thought they'd hatch in order. Why, he didn't know. They were probably just randomly set in that order. Echo would probably be next and Charlie would probably be last. If Blue doesn't break her first.

Owen smiled as he watched Blue. She was literally wiggling from head to claw. Her whole body. He quickly grabbed the camera and pulled it over. There was another crack and a small piece of shell fell away. Blue instantly darted forward and pressed an eye to the hole, peering in. Owen smiled and bent down. "Let me see." Blue moved out of the way and Owen peered inside. The amber eye inside blinked at him. He pulled back and let Blue forward again. This time, she stuck her nose right into the hole and let out a chirp. Owen pulled her back by her tail. "Blue!"

Delta pushed her little nose through the hole and let out a garbled squeak. Spurred on by Blue, Delta made quick work of her shell. Pieces fell off and Blue pounced on them excitedly. Finally, the last piece fell off and Delta blinked up at him. She was more of a teal green color, solid with no other colors or markings that he could see.

Blue stepped closer to her, inspecting, and let out a few squeaks and chirps. [Squishy!]

Owen stopped for a moment and frowned. Squishy. He distinctly understood the word squishy. And she said it while looking at him. "Did you... did you call me squishy? Seriously?"

Blue tilted her head to the side. [Squishy Alpha.]

He crossed his arms and leaned back slightly. "I'm not squishy!" He said.

Blue turned back to Delta and rubbed her head against her. Delta returned the gesture and looked back at Owen. He swore she looked confused. Owen rolled his eyes and shook his head. "Fine." He quickly stripped down, trying not to feel weird about it. They were animals. Clothes were weird to them, he was sure. He quickly shifted into the raptor, feeling barely the slightest prick of pain in his spine.

Blue chirped happily and Delta bounced over to him. [Alpha, alpha! Squishy alpha!]

Owen bared his teeth and let out a growl. [Not squishy!]

Blue let out a snort. [No squishy now.]

He shook his head and turned his attention to Delta. She'd stopped bouncing and was watching him expectantly. He dipped his head forward and touched his nose to her belly. She rubbed against him and licked him. He gently returned the gesture.

No sooner than he pulled away and consider shifting back to get food for both of them, Charlie's egg wiggled. Blue gently nipped at Delta and bounced over to Charlie's egg. Delta followed a bit more slowly on shaky legs.

[Break Charlie, break Charlie!] Blue squealed in delight.

Owen shook his head and let out a snort. [Hatch. Charlie hatch.]

Blue let out a long whine. [Charlie hatch.] She corrected.

Delta let out a chirp and rubbed against the egg. Blue bounced around and Delta stepped back out of her way. Man! She had a lot of energy for such a tiny thing. And she was just going to get bigger. And soon there'd be four of them. He was fucked.