Here we go again!

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When the sun rises, the group gets back to work. First, though, they go back to the present to retrieve something useful

As midmorning approaches, several Allodesmus begin swimming out into the open ocean. Before they get far, though, they are startled by the arrival of something they have never seen before: a boat. Across its bow are the words Ancient Mariner.

"Where'd Nigel get the boat from?" asks Michelle.

"It the one he used on Sea Monsters," remarks Alice.

While the teens enjoy the ride, Nigel is already looking for sea lions to catch. There are plenty of targets to choose from, but none are getting close to the boat, thinking it might be a predator.

Luckily, Nigel has one way around this: bait.

"Now, I have fish up here on the deck, and the Allodesmus know this, cause they've been staring at the deck for a while. I'm not going to throw it into the water like a seal trainer, otherwise they might go away. Instead, I'm going to try and lure them on board with the fish, and hopefully, some will stay aboard with us, giving Prehistoric Pak its first sea lions."

Just then, Nigel hears a loud caw. Looking up to the mast of the ship, he finds himself looking at the park's Pteranodon.

"Oi, Pterry, see anything?' he asks the pterosaur.

The pteranodont responds by shacking his head in the 'no' gesture.

"Well, keep watching. (to crew) You see, we trained him to be our spotter. He sees something, he squawks to us and we start looking for trouble. I think he's hungry right now."

Nigel promptly throws the pterosaur some fish, before turning toward his younger recruits.

"Listen, I'm going to try and bait the Allodesmus into coming aboard the Ancient Mariner, so don't panic if they start jumping onto the boat.

"THEY ALREADY STARTED THAT!" remarks an annoyed Michelle.

To Nigel's surprise, five of the pinnipeds already have. One of them, though, is significantly larger than the others.

"I think that group's a male and his harem. This male, he isn't that big yet, must be his first time in breeding season. This is great for us, it means we can start breeding these animals the minute we get back to the park."

Suddenly, Pterry starts squawking. Nigel looks around, but doesn't see anything in the water. Then, suddenly, several large shapes fall out of the sky and join Pterry on the top of the Ancient Mariner, causing the boat to rock for a moment, spooking the ancient pinnipeds and the crew. Luckily, neither man nor beast plunges over.

Nigel takes a moment to examine the new arrivals. There are seven of them, and they appear to be giant hybrids of gulls and pelicans, with toothy beaks. Fittingly, all of them are staring at the fish Nigel brought.

"Whoa, what a surprise. These are Pelagornis. Scientists aren't really sure who these guys are closer to: its either storks and herons; or ducks and geese. Still, I'm surprised to see them here."

The birds are STILL looking at the fish. before they can react, though, Pterry starts pecking at them. This gets them to back down, but they don't fly off. They won't give up an easy meal just yet.

Meanwhile, more pinnipeds have started jumping aboard the Mariner. Most are female, but when the occasional male arrives, a dominance battle breaks out. The young male refuses to be second to any of the challengers, and so far, he hasn't lost.

Suddenly, several giant shapes jump on the boat. This causes the boat to sink for a moment, but, to everyone's surprise, the boat doesn't rise again.

It looks like the boat is reaching its weight limit.

Nigel quickly takes stock of the new comers, as does Tristan. The rest of the group is trying to keep the ship from capsizing.

"What are those?" remarks Alice, perplexed by the arrival of the new creatures.

"They're Pelagiarctos and Neotherium. They're early varieties of walruses," replies Tristan.

The newcomers arrival has not gone unnoticed. The pinnipeds already onboard seem to forget about their early dominance battles and unite against this common foe. The walruses, though, are not backing down. They don't try to attack, though, and seem rather edgy, even nervous.

"They're not fighting with the Allodesmus," remarks Tristan. "That doesn't exactly fill me with confidence."

"Why," asks Vera, "I think its good they aren't fighting."

"It would be," replied Tristan, "except that these walruses normally see our sea lion friends as food. The fact they aren't fighting means that something else is holding their attention. So what is that?"

Just then, one of the ship's crew calls down Nigel: Something's showing up on the sonar. Going down to check it, Nigel finds a couple dozen blips appearing on the screen.

"What is that?" he wonders.

Quickly, they activate the ROV. This takes a little while, as the machine hasn't been fully fixed from when a mosasaurs ate it. Luckily, it is soon active, revealing the source of the disturbance:

Its a pod of whales. Or, rather, several pods of whales belong to various species.

"Well, this is amazing," remarks Nigel. "I can see so many whales out here, its spectacular. Now, there are many species of whale today, but, during this time period, there were more than 20 different genera of whales in the oceans. There were sperm whales, like the Aulophyseter we're seeing right now, and there are also dolphins, such as Loxolithax. This is truly a time of success for the whales."

The presence of the whales might also explain the behavior of the early walruses.

"Maybe the walruses were fleeing the whales. After all, they're no match for a grown sperm whale."

Unfortunately, interest in the whales has distracted Nigel to other issues.

Namely, that one lone dot has appeared on sonar.

And its head right toward the boat.

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Meanwhile, at the park, Bob is dealing with Nigel's newest arrivals.

For once, it isn't too much of a hassle.

At the park's beach, Bob is watching the Desmostylus graze. The creatures are joined by one of the park's modern residents, a group of flamingos.

"Now, these fellers aren't actually too hard to deal with. You see, I wasn't sure if they ate sea plants or water pants, so I put them in an estuary, which has both. Turns out, they can eat both. So no problem there."

Just then, another of the parks modern residents (an osprey), flies by the herd and snatches a fish out of the water, spooking the herd for a moment and sending them into a panic. They swim around for a few minutes before realizing that they have nothing to fear and return to feeding.

Bob can only laugh at this.

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Meanwhile, in the ocean pens, one of the older residents is acting odd.

It's Jaws. Normally, he moves rather vigorously around his exhibit, always searching for food and rivals. Now, though, he's slowed down for some reason. Something has put him off, but the staff doesn't know what.

Unknown to the staff, Jaws instinct is talking to him. Its warning him that something new is about to happen, and that what happens next will probably be very important to his survival. What it is, though, eludes both him and the staff.

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Back in Miocene California, Nigel is still watching the whales, and his team has joined in.

"They're amazing!" exclaimed Michelle, and the rest of the teens and younger members had to agree with her: the whales were indeed amazing. Some were just swimming, others were chasing after fish and the occasional pinnipeds. So far, though, they hadn't caught any.

Then, Alice noticed something. Due North of them, all of the whales, pinnipeds and fish were swimming right toward them.

"Hey, look at this."

Turning North, everyone watched as the marine creatures swam first toward them, then below them.

"Wonder what spooked them," remarked Lucas.

Then, the boat shook. It listed on its starboard side but, thankfully, didn't capsize. Lucky, too, as some of the pinnipeds crew members had almost fallen overboard.

"WHAT WAS THAT!" screamed Vera.

"I'm not sure..." answered Tristan.

Then the boat shook again. Again it listed starboard and again it righted itself. Then, the bow of the boat started to raise into the air. The cause was soon apparent: several sea turtles had some how catapulted themselves onto the boat.

Nigel and his crew were getting worried not. Whatever was hitting them was big and clearly didn't like them. Additionally, the extra 'crew' were now in real danger if they fell overboard. So, to prevent that, Nigel threw some fish into the crew areas of the boat. Sure enough, the pinnipeds flowed, with the teens shoving the turtles in after them, much to the turtles' distress.

Just in time, too, as a THIRD impact hit the boat. This time, though, the attacker jumped out of the water during the attack, revealing itself to be a great white shark.

Well, it would be one, except that it was significantly bigger than a great white.

The newest staff could only stare confused at the giant predator, unable to recognize it out of fear. For the older staff, though, it was a familiar, if unwelcome, face.

"WHAT IS THAT THING!?" yelled every single one of the younger recruits (well, except for Tristan).

Nigel could only answer with one word, but it was more than enough to convey just how much danger they were in.

"Carcharocles megalodon."

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AN: Uh oh, that isn't good. Also, cliffhanger.

Anyway, I checked, and yes, all of the animals I've portrayed in this segment are from Miocene California (thank you Fossilworks). Seriously, check out that website, its every detailed about fossil sites and what specimens have been found in them.

And yes, the Pteranodon is named Pterry.

So, read and review. Again, I am still accepting OC's.

This is Flameal15k, signing off.