Cynthia couldn't help but feel happy as she sat upon a bench within the Maevarano Formation exhibit zone. She observed the area around her, as she thought about everything that had happened over the past months - to call it a whirlwind of activity would have been an understatement. After all this time, opening night was soon to arrive.
Whistling softly, she shook her head, rubbing a hand through her hair, as she thought of all the hard work she'd been put through lately – her keeping duties and assistance with the opening preparations, helping with construction, and assisting the technicians about a programming anomaly at the La Pampa plains exhibit. Yeah, her life was busy.
She scanned the area around her, smiling – the park was a beautiful place. Even now she could remember how irritable she'd been on the day of the inspection, how irritable shed been – after being both being forced to stay behind and being snubbed by both Drew and Fiona. But those days were behind her - she'd been working very hard to repair her reputation… in particular, having made friend tih jack and .
She let a warm smile come on her face. Part of her was still surprised – she'd initially viewed Jack as an annoyance and had been wary of Adrian, because of. But now, she considered Jack to be a surprisingly good friend (even though she didn't quite share his sense of humour) and Adrian himself she'd turned out to be surprisingly wrong about in her initial assessment of him in that he'd turned out to largely be a more neutral figure rather than a guaranteed Drew sympathizer and had also more than once disagreed with Drew on several of his worst actions; and naturally, Adrian himself was slowly becoming a bit more willing to let her try to befriend him now that she herself was willing to extend the same courtesy to him.
The rest of the park staff she got on with now – to a degree. She – after some initial tensions – got on with the heads of staff, who she respected for their diligence and professionalism (and she hoped respected her in return). Leon, Alice, Collete, Yolanda and most of the others seemed to get on with her. She nodded her head – yeah, things had started to get better.
The sound of a low theropod bellowing from behind her caused her to turn her head to look behind her to see a majungasaurus looking inquisitively in her direction. She smiled at the sight of him. This adolescent male, who had been named Mahazatra, after surgery and recuperation from nearly being mauled to death (twice) in Cretaceous Madagascar (where he'd seemingly befriended Terence), had been kept in a separate paddock to the rest – the female pack would attack him, sensing him as a threat to their young, and Goliath would attack him as a rival. In the months since she'd arrived, she'd come to view the abelisaur as a kindred spirit – both were outsiders in their own way – and they'd bonded surprisingly well. "It's good to see you, buddy," she said as she looked at Mahazatra through the heavy-duty chain-link fencing. The adolescent majungasaurus rumbled, before leaving to patrol his "territory".
These happy thoughts still on her mind, she thought about the grand opening. She had to admit she was quite excited about the idea – this was a game-changing moment in history and sharing it with the world was only logical. And Drew seemed to share that view – he was throwing himself into the preparations, as if he knew that everything had to go smoothly. To be honest, she liked this side of him.
She shook her head – now was not the time to focus on trivial matters. There was a lot of work that still needed to be done – and, besides, there was no chance she would ever get back with Drew. That ship had sailed – both she and Drew knew it – and a good thing too. She sighed, "Stop looking to the past," she said to herself under her breath. "Right now, it's the future that really matters.."
. . . . .
Adrian smiled as he leaned upon the railing surrounding the quetzalcoatlus aviary. It seemed like a long time since the announcement had been made – after all this secrecy, the park would finally be revealed to the world. To be honest, he was ambivalent – this was going to happen eventually… what was the point of dwelling on it? Whilst Adrian preferred his own company – and kept people at a distance – he could easily blend into crowds when he needed to – he'd been that way back in school and he had no doubt he could adapt to the crowds at the park.
He then looked back into the quetzalcoatlus aviary, observing the animals, and he reflected on how, in all fairness, he did have some of friends. He had rekindled his friendship with Drew and Leon – whilst he preferred to keep them at arm's length (as he always had done), he was still quite close to them (even if he wasn't afraid of calling Drew out when needed).
Jack had come to grow on him - even if he didn't quite get Jack's sense of humour, he still respected his skill and professionalism. Jack's friends in the herper division were also quite fun to be around. Horace and Cass he didn't mind, even if Tina could be a bit of an acquired taste, whilst Mohinder was pretty fun.
Yolanda was also good to hang out with – even if he suspected that she and Leon had something going on - whilst he was forming a surprising friendship with Cynthia. Alice's three friends in the research division were also good to hang out with. And then there was Alice herself...
He let a warm smile come on his face. Of all the people he'd befriended, Alice was the one he felt closest to. In all honesty, he'd felt strangely drawn to her since he'd first met her. It made sense – she was his type, tough, confident and fearless. At this, he chuckled awkwardly as he thought about how he'd started to think that his feelings for her stronger than friendship. Well, who wouldn't like her? However, there was the inconvenient detail that she didn't quite feel the same way about him.
At this, he shrugged – whilst it stung a little, he wasn't heartbroken either. It was just a small crush, it didn't matter; and, to be honest, they were doing just fine as friends, and he didn't wish to make things awkward for something that was, really, quite minor. And, to be honest, everyone had enough on their plates.
The sound of a warbling drew Adrian's attention back to the quetzalcoatlus aviary in time to see Cirrus staring at him. Adrian chuckled, flashing the azhdarchid a thumbs up. "Good to see you to Cirrus." Cirrus warbled, and placed his head against the chain-link covering. Adrian chuckled and placed his hand upon Cirrus's crest through the chain-link fencing. At this point, he added Cirrus to the list of friends he made. This reminded him – the quetzalcoatlus pairs had started building their nests in recent weeks, including the four adolescent pairs. Another success for the breeding programme.
All in all, he had to admit, it would be interesting to see how things unfolded – he didn't know what the future held. He just had to see what happened.
. . . . .
Alice was hard at work, her eyes narrowed in concentration as she worked on placing the meat in assorted locations throughout the cave hyena paddock. This task was something she took very seriously indeed – whilst she wasn't one to play favorites, she still had to admit that the cave hyenas were animals that she'd particularly come to enjoy working with. This was to be expected - she'd always been fond of the hyaenid group… much to some people's confusion. She rolled her eyes. "Their loss," she whispered under her breath as she continued placing the prepared servings of meat in the locations she was choosing to hide them in for the sake of providing enrichment for the cave hyenas. The sound of whoops, yips and snarls from the entrance to the cave that served as both in-door viewing and holding area for the cave hyena clan soon proved enough to cause Alice to quicken her pace somewhat.
Fifteen minutes later, Alice was safely outside the paddock and watching with a satisfied smile on her face as the cave hyenas, now outside their den, went skulking about throughout the paddock in search of the meat she'd hidden for them to find…. or at least, the females were, with the adult males irritably waiting their turn and the male cubs were all playfully wrestling. If Alice had gotten her calculations right on, there'd be just enough meat left over for them.
Satisfied, Alice nodded her head and looked to the horizon in the general direction of Sarasota, thinking about what was to come. She was not ashamed to admit that, while still reasonably cautious, she was pretty excited about the prospect – what they had done was spectacular and it deserved to be shared with the world.
Her thoughts then switched over to Will; and an amused grin came on her face as she remembered how, on the day before Christmas Eve, Will had apparently been involved in a secret lock-in at the park bar alongside Jack, Colette, and Yolanda that had ended up going somewhat awry when a steppe bear cub (later named Koda) had arrived through… mysterious circumstances. She then let out a brief chuckle as she remembered how the day before the lock-in, Will had invited her to join in with him for a "unofficial Christmas party" at the park bar. but she'd been forced to turn the offer down. On the bright side, she'd not only managed to avoid the craziness that had ensued over the course of the apparently rather ill-fated lock-in, but she'd also aided in Koda's integration with the resident steppe brown bear population; getting him "adopted" by Nita, one of the adolescent females, since the adult females had cubs of their own to feed.
She shook her head to clear her thoughts, and then looked to the horizon, once again thinking about how excited she felt about the opening. And as she had those thoughts, she couldn't help but smile on how things had changed. When her employment at Prehistoric Park had first begun, she'd only had her family, Will, and Matt to keep her company; and the latter two she'd been largely starting to drift away from. But now, not only had her friendship with Will and Matt been very much rekindled, but she'd also made a lot of other friends. There was Kaisumi, whom Matt and Will had met and befriended at Novum, and Yolanda, whom she'd first gotten to know quite early on. Whilst both girls were far more extroverted than she was, she still enjoyed hanging out with them. And they weren't the only new friends she'd made since she'd started working at the park.
She nodded her head as she thought of the multiple other park staff she'd befriended, or at the very least become acquaintances with. Cass and Tina were always nice to spend time with and Horace was pleasant company… even if he considered Jack to be a pain in the arse (couldn't say she disagreed there). Mohinder could be pretty fun in small dosages, but could get a bit overwhelming after a while. Aaron, Carmen, Maria, and Hugo she was reasonably familiar with… but they were definitely more Jack's type of people.
And then there were her teammates on the rescue team. Adrian she definitely liked hanging out with - it certainly helped that he was one of the calmest and most level headed members of the team. Leon had come to grow on her – somewhat paradoxically, he reminded her of Jack. Drew she respected, but there were still also a lot of moments where he honestly rubbed her the wrong way a little, and she thus considered him more of a well-respected acquaintance than a friend.
But of course, there were two people who she'd had a complicated relationship with. To start, there was Cynthia. Whilst Cynthia had been bossy and uptight initially, qualities which Alice disliked, she'd started to make an effort of improving herself lately – which Alice had come to respect…. Even if they weren't friends just yet.
And Colette? She sighed – it had been…. complicated. In the early days, she and Colette had what could be described as a mutual dislike – and Alice wasn't the only one who'd felt that way. The fact that Jack seemed to have a crush on her had not helped matters – whilst she'd tried to avoid discussing the matter… because, really, who would, it was still a bit unnerving.
She'd come to respect Collete's competence – and was grateful for how she'd watched out for Jack during the Shutdown… however, she'd remained a bit guarded and wary around Colette…. Until that blowout argument. It had been silly, really – Collete had sidled up to her one day for a chat and she'd verbally lashed out… which had led to her being temporarily suspended from missions. Now, the two kept a distance from each other – acknowledging and respecting each other… but they weren't friends. Not by a long shot.
She took a deep breath, and then exhaled, her eyes closed as she did so. "No point in dwelling on these things," she thought to herself. "The past is past… if you'll pardon the pun". Pushing her thoughts about Cynthia and Colette as far to the back of her mind as possible, she looked back at the hyenas, her earlier smile returning as she saw that so far things were still looking fairly peaceful. Nodding her head, Alice reached for her communicator to do a status report and see if there was anything else that needed to be done.
She nodded her head, successfully drawing her communicator out of her belt and getting it ready for a call. All in all, things were going well – and she couldn't be happier.
. . . . .
Jack was in very high spirits that day. At that moment, he was currently on the way to the Wahweap Formation exhibit zone, planning to get the scorpioraptor pack more accustomed to his presence. But even in the midst of his walk, he also had the upcoming opening weighing heavily on his mind. It was no secret how he was very excited – what they'd done was spectacular. It deserved to be shared with the world.
Of course, not everyone shared this view – some were on the fence, some were incredibly nervous by the whole prospect… others were simply ambivalent. To be fair, he saw their point - there was plenty of potential for something to go horribly wrong, but, in his view, the rewards would outweigh the risks in the end.
He nodded his head, smile remaining on his face as his thoughts shifted to how his life had unfolded ever since he'd first come to work at the park. Much like Alice, he'd hadn't had many true friends –but now, not only was his friendship with Hugo, Carmen, Maria, and Aaron stronger than ever, he'd also managed to strengthen his camaraderie with Will and Matt, strike up a rapport with Nikolai (who he appreciated for having faith in him) and earning the respect of the other chiefs of staff, and form strong new friendships with Kaisumi, Yolanda, Adrian, and even Leon… despite not getting off to the best start. And not only could he say all this, but he'd even potentially found love in Colette.
At this thought, he rubbed the back of his head, a small blush forming on his face. He had to admit, when he'd first met Colette all that time ago, they hadn't had much time to socialise – they'd only properly interacted on the day of the Smilodon populator mission. And he had to guiltily admit, he'd initially been offput by her seemingly haughty attitude – however, he'd eventually become rather intrigued by her and came to understand that her attitude, while hardly polite, was actually more of a result of her being a natural loner. He subtly communicated to her that, whilst he was interested in befriending her, he did understand that - and as a result, she'd allowed him to be one of the few people she'd ever willingly let her walls down around. And now, a full year and a half later, not only did he consider Colette a close friend to him… he'd also started to think he'd fallen in love with her. Which was a complication.
His attempts to impress Nikolai had come independent of this - he didn't believe in the whole "dad's approval" crap (What was this, Jane Austen?) – but he understood that Nikolai viewed Collete as the closest thing to a daughter he'd ever had.
He nodded his head up and down. Already he was finding himself remembering his past once more; he'd not had the best luck with women… he'd been burned before. But the benefit to being burned is that you take it as a learning experience.
He briefly paused in his walking, thinking carefully to himself some more as he realized once more how he'd so far largely kept quiet in general on how he currently felt, or at least believed himself to be feeling, about Colette… for reasons he knew she understood. As different as they were, they were both in agreement in that, if you need to remind someone you care about them, you haven't done a good job of showing it. And with all the stuff going on, there just wasn't the time – it made more sense to wait. He then let an amused smile come on his face – he wasn't alone in this regard…
The sound of snarling and hissing broke through Jack's slightly distracted thoughts, and he turned his head in time to see that, without even realizing it at first, he'd made it to his destination – the scorpioraptor paddock. In that moment, he breathed out and marched over to the wall to take a look inside the paddock, seeing that the whole pack were staring at him. Clearly one of them had managed to get a whiff of his scent before he'd even got there – and they were all tense and alert, as if nervous of him. Jack nodded his head. "Nice to see they're already prepared," he muttered under his breath.
As he continued looking at the scorpioraptor pack, he once again took note of the alpha pair, named Alex and Sabina, who were glowering threateningly at him. Jack sighed – this was unsurprising. In general, while not as aggressive as the velociraptors, they were definitely too strong-willed to be trained in the same way he had the dromas. But Jack was not too worried yet - after all, the scorpioraptors were getting slightly more accustomed to his presence. He sighed, before chucking - life was only going to get busier, and he planned to hit the ground running.
. . . . .
Leon had a lot on his mind as he sat on a log near one of the two holding area entrances in the cave lion paddock. To tell the truth, the grand opening was something that he was both nervous and excited about – on the one hand, what they had achieved deserved to be shared with the world. On the other hand, he'd never really been the best with crowds, and he was not looking forward to having to deal with crowds of strangers.
A low grunt from nearby caused Leon to look towards the secured holding area entrance to see Simba standing right by the chain-link barrier, a confused look on his face. Leon let a small smile come on his face. "You and Nala are lucky," he said out loud. "You have no idea what's coming – no reason to worry about it." Simba grunted again, to which Leon chuckled. He had to admit, he'd really come to enjoy working with the cave lions – and all the time he'd spent with Simba during his recuperation certainly helped. In fact, it seemed awfully familiar… "A real case of déjà vu huh?" Leon thought to himself in amusement.
The sound of another growl from the second holding area entrance caused Simba and Leon to look in that direction in time to see Nala standing at the chain-link entrance barrier of her own portion of the holding area, an expression of confusion and irritation on her face. And in all fairness, it probably was about time for him to end his impromptu break, leave the paddock and let Simba and Nala out. "Don't worry," he said as he got up from the log and headed off to the staff paddock entrance so he could release the cave lions from their holding area. "I'll let you out real soon."
Five minutes later, Leon was at the balcony-like viewing area for the cave lion paddock, watching with a look of pride on his face as he watched Simba and Nala running around their respective halves of the paddock 'hunting' the slabs of frozen steak he'd placed in the paddock.
Chuckling, Leon looked away towards the horizon, thinking about the grand opening again. This prospect somehow became less daunting – despite the changes, the animals would still be there for him to take care of, and there would still be rescue missions with the rest of the team. A bit of certainty in his life – and, of course, there would be his friends.
His smile widened at the thought of them. He could still remember the days when Drew and Adrian had been his only friends in the world - now, not only had he rejuvenated his friendship with them, but he'd made more friends with some of the other members of the staff. Cass, Horace, and Mohinder were good to talk to (and hang out with on occasion), as were Will, Matt, and Kaisumi. In addition, there were the four chiefs of staff, who he respected and who he hoped respected him in return. However, Yolanda and the Denhams were the people he now considered to be among his closest friends. And of course, he couldn't forget the fact that he'd bonded with Diego and Simba.
Granted, there were some people at the park that he at best tolerated – particularly Cynthia and Colette. He'd never particularly gotten along with Cynthia – even when they were at school, so her showing up at the park had been quite a shock. However, she seemed to be trying to make an improvement, so he. Colette, on the other hand, he'd initially strongly disliked, due to her icy and haughty attitude, but he had come to respect her competence and appreciate the fact how she was friends with both Jack and Yolanda. Not to mention he appreciated how she'd stuck up for him during the inspection. But even so, her normal personality still rubbed him the wrong way. But even Cynthia and Collete, he felt like he could trust. He nodded his head - yep, all in all, life was pretty good. However…
He paused, a thoughtful look on his face as he found himself thinking about Yolanda once again. He had to admit, even with how good a friend she was to him, it was strange as to how often he ended up thinking about her… something which he didn't really mind. And it certainly wasn't the only thing he liked about her either. He liked her kindness and friendliness, he liked her laugh, he liked her smile, he liked how she was always willing to listen to anyone who needed her, he liked her beautiful blonde hair, her dazzling hazel eyes, how she was always willing to try to help those in need, how she usually always tried to see the best in everyone...
He rubbed his hand across the back of his head, a small blush starting to form on his face as he realized what he had been thinking. It was honestly enough to make him wonder...did he like her? Or more specifically, did he like her in that way? He had to admit, the way he was currently feeling for her seemed to have very uncanny similarities to how he'd once felt for Drew...
He gritted his teeth, closed his eyes, and shook his head side to side. "Now's not the time to be thinking about things like that," he growled under his breath, before sighing and looking pensively – his flaws and inadequacies that he tried not to think about came flowing in. "Besides," he stated in saddened resignation. "Even if I do like her that way, there's no guarantee she feels the same way."
The sound of eating from inside the cave lion paddock caught Leon's attention, and he lifted his head to look back into the paddock just in time to see the cave lions feeding on the meat. They seemed rather more tolerant of each other than they had been – perhaps they'd become mates soon.
Leon began to ponder an idea he'd had for a while – many of the Pleistocene animals, had gone extinct in what was, in purely evolutionary terms, a blink of an eye. The world had changed comparatively little between then and now – aside from the fact that it was now sprawling with humans. Perhaps, once a good enough population had been built up, they could reintroduce these species back into their old haunts.
However, he filed those ideas to the back of his mind and readied himself for when he'd need to resume work. After all, he had a busy future ahead – warts and all.
. . . . .
Drew was in a very good mood as he relaxed at the main herbivore paddock in the Morrison Formation zone, leaning directly against the railing built at the top of the paddock wall. And quite naturally so, all things considered. He chuckled as he thought about what was to come – after all this time, the park was finally ready to be revealed to the world. And he also welcomed how busy life at the park had become – after all, they had to get it right, didn't they?
He nodded his head. Even now, it was still kind of a shock as to how much he and everyone else at the park had accomplished. Over the course of approximately two years, they'd rescued dozens of formerly extinct species – and, very soon, opening night was about to arrive, which he, most of the staff and Theodore were enthusiastic about. At the thought of Theodore's name, he smiled - in a lot of ways the kindly CEO of Novum felt like some kind of father figure. And with what was on the horizon, he couldn't help but hope that he'd continue to give Theodore good reason to have faith in him.
At the sound of grunting, Drew turned to see Gideon staring at him. Drew chuckled – he and the Stegosaurus had started to form a bit of a bond – whilst it wasn't as strong as the bond he had with Terence, it was still pretty close. Chuckling once more, he reached forward and patted Gideon on the head, "Good to see you too, buddy", to which the stegosaur snorted. He looked to the horizon, smile coming back onto his face as he thought of the accomplishment – and he started thinking about all involved in it. This had all been a team effort, and he couldn't have had a better team – Kyle, Nikolai, Linda, and Khatin he greatly respected and, whilst he didn't have strong opinions either way on most of the others, he respected them for their competence and diligence.
He smiled once more at the thought of his team. He had to admit, it felt nice to have reconnected with Leon and Adrian after all this time apart. Adrian had always kept people at arms-length, preferring to observe rather than interact… but he was still a good and loyal friend, even if he was willing to call Drew out at times, something which Drew didn't mind at all; after all, even he could admit that sometimes he deserved a little kick to the ego. And he greatly appreciated Leon's loyalty and patience – and how he'd made an effort of coming out of his shell and befriending and interacting with other people besides him and Adrian, with Yolanda and the Denhams being the standout examples.
As for Jack and Alice… Alice seemed to view him as more someone to be respected than a friend – at the same time, he really appreciated how she was competent, level-headed and could take care of herself in dangerous situations. And, hey, she was another person who could tell him when he was fucking things up – Drew needed more of them in his life.
Meanwhile, Jack had really come to grow on him; for even with how insanely reckless he could be, Drew couldn't deny that Alice's younger brother's methods certainly got results. And for that matter, he wasn't going to deny that he felt very confident he'd made the right decision to, effectively, make Jack his "number two" on missions.
Then he thought of Cynthia, and his smile briefly faltered as he thought of their tumultuous past, before he nodded. He had to admit, albeit reluctantly, he no longer had anywhere near as big of a problem with Cynthia being at the park with him. The fact that she'd improved her attitude, befriended Jack and Adrian and had done pretty good around the park. He let a smile come on his face. Perhaps her near-death experience in the sandstorm had changed her - at the very least, he knew it had helped remind him how, even if he was annoyed at her, he didn't want her dead. And simply put, whilst rekindling anything was dead in the water, at least they could be friends.
Chuckling, he nodded his head, smile firmly on his face. Simply put, life was going well – no matter what the future held, things'd get better. The worst was behind them and they could move forward into a bold new era – he couldn't see any clouds on the horizon.
Little did he know…
