Notes
Soundtrack suggestions
Benito on the phone:
- Godfrey - Marc Streitenfeld, Robin Hood (From 00:57 to 01:27).
The betrayal:
- Double Cross to Bear - Michael Giacchino, Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom (starting from 01:30).
The pectinodons:
- Goblin Swarm and Goblin Tunnels - Bill Brown and Jamie Christopherson, The Lord of the Rings: Battle for Middle-Earth II.
The therizinosaur:
- Trex Showdown - Daniel Pemberton, Prehistoric Park (Up to 01:10).
- Blade Brothers - Benjamin Bartlett, Walking with Beasts.
- Bodies and Bungalows - Michael Giacchino, Lost: Season 4.
Asterion's arrival:
- Go with the Pyroclastic Flow - Michael Giacchino, Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom (from 01:40 to 02:45).
- The Savage Ettenmoors - Inon Zur, The Lord of the Rings: War in the North.
"Off-ground tag" with Asterion and Yuriko:
- Trex Showdown - Daniel Pemberton, Prehistoric Park (Starting from 01:11).
- Trex and finale - John Williams, Jurassic Park (Up to 03:18 and then from 04:20 to 07:07).
- The Raptors appear - John Williams, The Lost World: Jurassic Park (starting from 00:55).
- A Dimetrodon a dozen - Michael Giacchino, Jurassic World: Dominion (from 01:47 to 03:41).
Asterion chase Franklin :
- The Carnotaur attack - James Newton Howard, Dinosaur (From 01:16 to 02:47).
- Thanator Chase Pt 1 - James Horner, Avatar.
-o-
"...We just left the station," a voice said on the radio, that of the ACU helicopter's pilot. "Hold on!"
While Claire and Franklin coordinated Site D's teams as best they could, Jocelyn stood silently behind them, doing nothing but staring at the screens, following the various dots.
The male Apatosaurus was moving along the Cretaceous Plain but the others were still in their paddock, which had just been closed; Horatio and Vinny had closed the Asian Plain's gate but attacked by one of the carnotaurs, they had to seek refuge in the paddock, where Bucephalus was chasing them; the other two horned predators were just north of the Ark, with one in the aviaries' area and the other by the parking lot near the keepers' office; the therizinosaur was south of the Ark, and the Pegomastax was still wandering in the building's hallways. Beyond the southern limits of the facility, the MVU carrying Blue had just left the wood where the day's first deadly incident had taken place.
Another disastrous day in InGen history. And this time, I'm the one in charge. Ordonez was just waiting for this. He'll send the cops after me and Lynton will want my head.
Franklin's agitation from stress snapped her out of her thoughts.
"Take this job, son. Develop your social skills. Yeah well thanks dad!" He grumbled, wishing he was somewhere else.
Benito being slow to return, the manager headed for the exit to see what he was doing.
Outside the security offices, in the hallway, the guard was still on the phone:
"Rankin? What's all this?" he asked in an alarmed tone. "I thought you weren't supposed to act now."
"Before accusing me, can you at least explain why you're panicked?" Inquired a male voice speaking with a British accent.
"Several animals were freed by undercover saboteurs. It's shit here! I thought your plans concerned only the train!"
"And that's the case!" Rankin replied irritably. "Who are those infiltrators?"
"Temporary workers, who arrived as reinforcements two days ago."
"Neither I nor my employer sent them! Your temps must be probably some fucking spliff-smoking hippies sent by PETA or some other stupid animal rights organization! Bollocks! Those morons are going to ruin everything! InGen will be extra careful because of them!"
"What do I do?"
"Stick to the plan. Notify me if there are any changes."
"Rankin? You intend to have the train evacuated before... right? That's what we agreed. There will be people on board I know and I..."
But Rankin hung up without answering that question and Benito put his phone back in his pocket.
"Benito. Who were you talking to?" Jocelyn's voice asked him.
Startled, Benito jumped and spun around to face her.
"Torres, ma'am," he lied.
"Don't think I'm an idiot, Benito," the manager said, annoyed and disappointed. "Torres doesn't speak with a British accent. Who was he? You were talking about the operation and the train! What is this man planning to do?! Answer me?!" She questioned him in an increasingly alarmed voice.
Caught in the act, Benito said nothing and froze for a moment, not daring to look his boss in the eye. Then he exhaled loudly and let out a nervous laugh.
"Fuck…" the guard swore under his breath before reaching down to his belt.
"Benito?" She asked in a scared voice.
He had just drawn his pistol and was pointing its barrel at her.
"I told you to be suspicious of the employees too, Jocelyn," he told her.
Instinctively, she put her hands up but it was then that Claire came out of the offices, looking for the manager:
"Jocelyn. We must..."
Seeing her threatened with a gun by Benito, she froze and her eyes widened in stupefaction and fear. The guard immediately pointed his gun in her direction.
"Stay still, Mrs. Dearing," he told her before motioning Jocelyn to move forward, so they could get to Claire's level.
"Benito, don't tell me...," the latter began.
"No, I'm not in league with the saboteurs!" He cut her off before taking her earpiece off and stomping on it. "I'm just as surprised as you are on that matter. You see, their action turned not only InGen's plans upside down but mine too..."
With the two women now side by side, Benito ordered them to stand with their backs to him and return to the office.
"Put your hands down, act like nothing happened. Proceed calmly. No sudden moves."
They complied. Claire entered first, followed by Jocelyn and Benito brought up the rear, keeping his barrel aimed at the manager's back. When they were back within earshot of Franklin, still seated at the ACU station, Benito shifted to the side and aimed his gun at the DPG IT technician and the station before Claire could silently indicate to him with some sign that they were in danger.
"What the…" he began.
"Sorry Franklin, you're a good lad and I wish you hadn't gotten involved in this. Move away from the station and come! Now!"
Slowly and shaking, Franklin got up and joined them, keeping his hands up in the air.
"Give me your phones," the guard ordered them. "One after the other."
They passed them their phones as requested and he put them in his pockets.
"Good. Walk past me. The first one who'll try something will regret it. Understood?"
They nodded weakly.
"We're going down to the warehouse. Come on, move!"
He waved his gun sideways and they set off, heading for the same staircase Owen, Zia, and Wheatley had taken earlier. If either of them had remained in the CCTV room, they would have been reassured to see that Horatio and Vinny had managed to escape Bucephalus, slipping through the bars of a barrier in the barn just in time.
"At the warehouse?" Claire repeated. Why?"
"My car is nearby," replied Benito. "We're leaving."
"To go where?" Jocelyn asked.
But the treacherous guard did not answer.
"Where?" The manager repeated insistently while Claire and Franklin were about to walk down the stairs.
"I don't know!" Benito replied irritably as he locked the landing's door behind them.
"You're taking us hostage but you have no plans?" Claire raised.
"It wasn't planned! I intended to be off when the time would be right, but Jocelyn had the good idea to follow me. This is what it costs to spy on people."
"Then why are you doing this? Maybe we can work out a deal," Jocelyn stammered. "If it's a money issue..."
He grabbed her arm sharply and put his gun on her spine.
"It's too late to try to redeem myself, Jocelyn. What is done is done. None of us can go back."
He released her and ordered her to move on.
"Thinking about it," he added, "I might have killed two birds with one stone. I have here two executives at my mercy. I could ransom you for a nice sum."
"You've got problems with Jocelyn? Alright," Claire said, "I wasn't here those past months so I don't know about the state of your relations and I don't care to be honest! Could you at least release Franklin? He did nothing to you. I didn't do anything to you either."
"You didn't do anything to me?!" the guard exclaimed. "Are you at least aware of the issues I'm facing?"
"You won't be eligible for a transfer and InGen will cut your job?" The fallen park director guessed. "You are not the only one in that situation. I even want to say: Welcome to the club!"
Keeping his gun pointed on Jocelyn, Benito grabbed the back of Claire's neck with his other hand, stopping her in her tracks.
"Keep your sarcasm, Dearing! The cutting of my job, and that of many others, is a consequence of your actions! If you hadn't behaved like a megalomaniac empress, the crisis would have been less dire and we might still have our jobs!"
"Take that!" Jocelyn muttered.
"Don't get smart with us, Jocelyn, because you would have behaved exactly like her!" Benito told her.
Having descended one level, they stopped on the landing, and while Franklin opened the door on Benito's order, Claire gave Jocelyn a reproachful look.
You imbecile, you could have used this moment to give him a blow!
They went through the door, emerging into a wide hallway, and Benito closed it behind them before locking it.
"But in the end, you're just puppets," he said, leading them to their right, toward a double door at the end of the hallway. "The real culprits are higher up in the hierarchy. All this madness must stop… Hammond and Masrani wanted to make children dream with their parks? Smoke and mirrors! Their family parks were built with the sweat and blood of Costa Rican workers, whom they saw in the same manner as the pharaohs of Egypt saw those who built their pyramids: Sacrificial labor force! InGen sent men to die by the dozens in the wars it had started, whether those against dinosaurs and those against Men!"
Franklin opened one of the panels and the guard and his hostages passed into the warehouse beyond. The exit being close, Benito didn't even bother to close behind him and didn't pay attention to the noise he heard, a footstep, very light, as if a small animal was walking in the corridor behind them.
In the opposite end of the warehouse, daylight poured in abundantly through the large opening left by the raised gate.
"InGen claimed that its work would benefit the world? Lies!" the guard continued. "It's a factory of nightmares where merchants of death work! And it couldn't be content by acting like the Creator by resurrecting extinct animals, it had to start making monsters from scratch! The Indominus at Jurassic World! Its probable successor here, in Burgo Nuevo, in the abandoned house! And this is without mentioning the abominations they created in the Jurassic Park era and drove to the depths of Isla Nublar, where they thought they were locked up until the end of times."
"But what are you talking about?" Franklin asked him.
"Pectinodons!" Benito exclaimed. "Perhaps you know them as Troodons?"
"I thought they were just an urban legend, made up by old employees to scare newbies," Claire said.
"I thought so too! Until the proof of their existence appeared before my eyes. While innocent people wandered the aisles of Jurassic World, while children enjoyed the attractions, these creatures recovered their strength in the abyss, under the subterranean city of the kings of old and its necropolis, waiting for the day when God... or rather the Devil would allow them to return to the surface and devour the survivors of Mount Sibo's eruption. They took Filip and Kilian! They must have laid their eggs inside their bodies while they were still warm! Adrian didn't lie, he was telling the truth! InGen kicked him out and made him look like a madman! Then Torres ordered Wheatley's guys to capture some. Many never returned. That's one of the reasons why Wheatley hates him."
"But if several of these pectinodons were captured, where are they since they're not here?" Claire raised.
As they walked between the rows of shelves, they heard a whirring sound, that of a helicopter. The ACU had returned.
"I don't know, probably where the monster born in the garage was also sent," Benito replied before urging them to move faster. "Another conspiracy!"
But as they were halfway between the hallway's door and the warehouse's entrance, they heard footsteps outside, quite audible and succeeding each other rather quickly. Benito and his hostages froze when they heard them because they weren't those of a human but those of a much larger being. A dinosaur, probably running away from the helicopter they were hearing too. And the sound didn't seem to be that of a quadruped…
"Shit. It's a carnotaur. It's a carnotaur!" Franklin moaned.
"Shut up!" Claire hissed.
Noting that the animal's steps were too noisy, she added:
"It's not a carnotaur. Probably…"
Turning towards the warehouse's entrance, the animal appeared before their eyes and revealed itself to be not a Carnotaurus but a creature that the average person would have described as a giant giraffe-sized paunchy goose with non-webbed broad feet, each equipped with four clawed toes.
"See, it's not a carnotaur," Jocelyn pointed out to the IT technician.
Despite its fear of the helicopter, it was unable to run very fast, its sturdy legs preventing it from doing so, and it could only trot while prancing in a rather comical manner, like a goose. But the resemblance with geese, swans and ducks ended there because the tail, bushy like that of an anteater, was longer than those of Anatidae and the feathers were only a fluff, dark brown streaked with buff on the back and the arms, and cream-colored on the chest. And that was without mentioning the large arms and their scythe-like claws. A Therizinosaurus.
"Yuriko... I'm not sure if it's better," Claire said in a low voice.
Having just crossed the warehouse's threshold, the Therizinosaurus continued and only stopped a few meters further ahead, looking behind to make sure that the helicopter had not spotted her. In truth, the ACU knew she was near the southern side of the Ark but neither the helicopter's pilot nor the shooter aboard had seen her enter the warehouse. Moreover, the carnotaurs were their priority, not her.
The strange theropod looked around her refuge, probably thinking of going deeper into it in order to hide. She perceived a noise, that of the breathing of four humans, and turned her small head in their direction. It was elongated and narrow, ended with a beak and its skin was blue, except around the eyes, where it was black. The Therizinosaurus' dark eyes stared at the quartet.
"That big obese goose isn't going to scare me," Benito said in a voice that was a little too loud for his hostages' liking.
Yuriko arched her head backwards and Claire then remembered what Horatio had explained to her during the week, that this manifestation reflected a beginning of annoyance in therizinosaurs, and that it was necessary to be very careful, as it could be precursory of an attack. She saw her sniffle. She must have sensed their fear and nervousness, which many dinosaurs and other animals interpreted as a sign of aggression. She motioned for Franklin and Jocelyn to start backing up slowly.
"It's obvious that you've never been chased by an angry goose…" the manager of Site D replied to the disloyal guard, remembering a misadventure she had experienced when she was a child.
As Benito still hadn't moved, Yuriko spread her arms and Claire added:
"And that one has Freddy Kruger's claws…"
She shuddered at the sight of the claws, long as katana blades. As she imagined what they could do to a human body, the fallen park director felt her heart rate quicken and a strange, tingling sensation soon began to be felt on her chest and the scarred half of her face. Yuriko might have no connection to the Indominus, but her claws were enough to send Claire back to the final hours of the Fall of Jurassic World, when Masrani's Bane had mauled her.
Her annoyance growing, the Therizinosaurus stretched forward her scarred black-striped beige neck. Under it, a pink wattle hung but unlike that of the males who lived in Jurassic World, it wasn't very developed and was almost reduced to a small flaccid fold of skin. Along the spine, a column of protofeathers bristled and those, long as a human forearm, formed some kind of a thick mane reminiscent of that of the striped hyena. If they didn't move away soon or provoked her in any manner, she was going to attack.
"Benito! Step back for god's sake, you moron!" His boss hissed. "You're going to be turned into a salami if you stay there!"
Keeping her neck outstretched, Yuriko moved her head up and down and simultaneously, she opened her mouth to let out a hiss. Her attack was imminent.
Benito finally decided to copy the attitude of his hostages. While not taking his eyes off the dinosaur, he took a step back, then another, but suddenly he heard a succession of tips tips and a sound of rubbing in the shelves on his left.
He looked towards the origin of the noise, somewhere in the shelf at the level of his head. He scanned the boxes and crates but saw nothing at first. Suddenly, as he was about to bring his gaze back to the giant herbivore in front of them, Benito noticed the presence of something strange between two boxes: A head, motionless and oriented in his direction. Said head was not very large, about the size of a tennis ball, and for a brief moment the guard thought it was that of a toy that someone had pulled out of the boxes and left there or even that of one of the stuffed animals kept in the warehouse, as the texture seemed to be too detailed to be that of a toy. As his gaze lingered, Benito's eyes widened in surprise as he saw the head move slightly but before he could look at it carefully, the little being backed up a little in the shadows, leaving only the front part of its head in the dim light.
All Benito could see was a short beak and a sturdy lower jaw with a pair of protruding canine-like teeth.
Oh, here's the chupacabra!
Benito then decided to bring his gaze back to the aisle, towards the Therizinosaurus which had made a step or two since he had stopped and looked at the smaller creature. The guard turned pale and thought he'd better go join the others and leave the shelves' imp alone. The others will take care of him. It was no longer his business.
But suddenly, the so-called imp rushed forward, having sensed the fear that the brown giant who had spotted him felt towards the Kaiju that Yuriko was in its eyes. Startled, Benito barely had the time to take a step back and let out a well audibly curse that the animal leapt off the shelf, straight towards his face with its beak wide open.
"Benito!" Jocelyn shouted.
Helpless, the two women and Franklin watched Benito endure the attack of the creature that was clinging to him, and Yuriko growing angry beyond them. About the size of a howler monkey, the attacker was a small bipedal dinosaur with a black-mottled light grey body whose top was covered with long structures similar to the spines of a porcupine, with yellowish tips and alternating black and white bands. The horrible head that was trying to bite Benito evoked that of a parrot that would have evolved in an environment as inhospitable and nightmarish as Skull Island from Peter Jackson's King Kong remake or Mordor. It was the runaway Pegomastax, the one some had thought it was right to call Caerbannog, in reference to Monty Python and the Holy Grail's terrible man-eater rabbit. As a member of the Heterodontosauridae family, Pegomastax only ate plants, small animals and sometimes carrion, but its nasty temper and the fact that it didn't hesitate to attack anything larger than itself for sometimes petty reasons had given it a bad reputation among InGen employees and for the keepers, working with a Pegomastax was like working with the hybrid of a sneaky monkey, a moody parrot, and a vindictive porcupine.
"Go away, you hellspawn!" Benito yelled at his small opponent while trying to move him away from his face before he bit it.
The Therizinosaurus had enough. She honked and walked towards the fighting guard and Pegomastax.
"Benito!" The manager of Site D shouted again.
But the costarican's attention was totally focused on his little opponent. He had just bitten a finger, causing the guard to cry out in pain, and the dinosaur's tail began to whip his abdomen, thrusting some quills in it. Like David against Goliath, the Pegomastax was winning the fight and Benito knelt, groaning as he moved the little omnivore away. Thus, he didn't notice that Yuriko had reached them and raised one of her arms. Under the powerless eyes of Claire, Jocelyn and Franklin, the Therizinosaurus struck the guard with her claws and those passed through his body as easily as sword blades. Benito was killed instantly and his shredded body slumped on the concrete, raising a scream of terror from both Jocelyn and Franklin. Caerbannog, who had been miraculously spared by the claws of the larger dinosaur, landed on his feet as nimbly as a cat and immediately scampered towards one of the shelves while uttering a succession of dry and gravelly sounds which evoked a jeer to human ears.
"Run!" Jocelyn cried.
She and Franklin began to flee and having heard the small brunette, the Therizinosaurus rumbled and moved towards them. But Claire remained frozen. She wanted to run away too, but to her dismay, her body couldn't move, as if her feet had been nailed to the ground, and her eyes couldn't turn away from the drops of blood that were running down from the animal's claws and Benito's mauled body. She punched her thigh with her fist. Nothing changed.
Dammit, move away you dumb bitch! She internally insulted herself while hyperventilating.
Helpless, she saw the Therizinosaurus close the distance between them. Each of her heavy footsteps on the concrete rang in the fallen park director's head like hammer blows. Dark thoughts flashed through her mind.
I can't die in such a stupid way! Odin will throw me out of Valhalla! I cannot leave a widower and an orphan behind me!
Something suddenly grabbed Claire's arm.
"Claire!"
As if freed from a dark spell, Claire regained control of her body and immediately turning to flee while the Therizinosaurus had already raised her arm, the fallen park director noticed that it was Jocelyn who had returned to help her. The claws cut through the air just a few centimetres from Claire's back and running at full speed, the two women fairly quickly left some distance between them and Yuriko who honked in frustration.
At the other end of the aisle, Franklin had stopped to wait for them.
"Franklin! In the hallway!" Jocelyn shouted at him.
But at the moment he rushed towards the opening left by its open door, which Caerbannog had taken earlier when their backs were turned, the other door was pushed from the inside and surprised, Franklin stopped dead in its tracks before shuddering in terror when he saw what had pushed the door.
Asterion, the black Carnotaurus with the broken horn, entered the warehouse and sniffed the air attentively, picking up and differentiating the scents of four humans, a Therizinosaurus and a Pegomastax. Turning to the scent of humans, his gaze met Franklin's.
"Oh shit…" the latter swore before rushing towards the nearest shelf and starting to climb it.
The carnotaur targeted him and caught between the predator and the therizinosaur, the trio had no choice: They had to go up or it was certain death. But with the large-clawed herbivore on their heels, Claire and Jocelyn could not stay in this aisle and spotting holes or objects that seemed easy to move at the bottom of the shelves on either side, each went to one side, Site D's manager on their left and the Jurassic World's fallen one on their right. They threw themselves under the shelves to escape Yuriko and crawled to the other side.
While heading towards Franklin, who had already climbed one half of the shelf, with fear giving him wings or something like this, Asterion had stopped when he saw the two women separate and did not know who seemed to be the easiest prey. But the trio's scattering was not the only problem he faced because only a stone's throw from him, Yuriko stood and already quite irritated, she became angrier when she saw that the carnotaur had approached.
She honked and while taking a few steps forward, she began to slash the air in front of her with her claws, deterring the predator from approaching. He snarled and looked at Franklin, who continued to climb and threatened to escape him if he didn't rush at him immediately. But the therizinosaur didn't care about his intentions and speeding up, she rushed towards him and raised her hand to prepare to strike the other dinosaur. As she passed him, Franklin flattened himself against the shelf and prayed that she would ignore him. Against such a demonstration, Asterion immediately backed away and left the aisle, letting Yuriko position herself at its entrance. Having reached the top of the shelf, the IT technician was now beyond the carnotaur's reach, but the latter still had two other potential prey.
Going around the shelf on his right, he entered the next aisle and further, he saw Jocelyn climbing the shelf. Having already climbed three meters, she only had one and a half or two left before reaching the top. Hearing the carnotaur growl in excitement at her sight, Jocelyn turned her head, saw him, and let out a small cry of terror. He lunged forward and opened his jaws to grab her. Those closed with a sharp snap only centimetres from Jocelyn's feet. In the next moment, Site D's manager pulled herself up to the last shelf, where she joined the DPG IT technician. As the two managed to escape him, Asterion growled in frustration.
For her part, Claire had also reached the top of her shelf and was now standing on top of it. In the aisle, Yuriko had started to turn around and she walked past the fallen park director, heading back towards the warehouse entrance. Claire then saw Jocelyn and Franklin walk to the opposite end of their shelf, the one closest to the warehouse's large entrance gate. The young man turned around and called her.
"Claire!"
At the moment, she thought it would be a good idea for her to join them and then looked at the top of her line of shelves. Seeing no object likely to hinder her run, she rushed forward, running to gain momentum, which did not fail to attract the attention of Yuriko, which turned her head towards her, following an instinct that told her to be wary of any agile animal overhanging her. When Claire leapt from one shelf to another only a few meters from her head, the therizinosaur arched her neck back in surprise and then growled as she watched the fallen park director land on the other shelf. Suddenly, while Franklin helped her up, Yuriko walked towards them, hissing in her advance.
"Watch out!" The IT technician shouted.
As she just put her knees on the top of the shelf, Claire looked over her shoulder and turned immediately to avoid being bitten in the side by the therizinosaur. As the latter snapped her beak, Claire crawled backwards on her elbows while Franklin tried in vain to get the herbivore's attention with screams. In the aisle below her back, Asterion sat and watched the scene with some interest, hoping for one of the humans to fall. To parry another of her attacks, Claire kicked the therizinosaur's snout. But the latter, reaching her irritation's climax, hissed loudly at the fallen park director, who froze in fright. Yuriko also leaned with her hands against the shelf with all her weight and doing so, she destabilized her and Claire crawled back, afraid of slipping just like some items. When some of them landed on the carnotaur's skull and back, he growled, shook his upper body, then looked up, watching the shelf tilt under the therizinosaur's action. Cautious, he moved away a few meters before resuming his observation.
Seeing that Claire had only retaliated to defend herself, Yuriko finally moved her head back and walked away from the shelf, which stabilized again. Then, the therizinosaur headed for the back of the warehouse to get away from Asterion, whose presence was unbearable. The fallen park director went to find Franklin and Jocelyn at the end of the shelf.
"What do we do now?" The young man asked, looking at the warehouse's entrance, a dozen meters from their position.
"We grin and bear it while waiting for the ACU," Claire replied. "I don't think she will come back to us. She believes she intimidated us," she added, watching the therizinosaur disappear down the aisle between the back wall and the opposite end of the shelves.
"He might be a problem, though," Jocelyn said, looking at the carnotaur lingering near their shelf.
Site D's manager couldn't help but think they were like castaways stuck on a raft around which a shark was swimming. It was then that Asterion noticed the presence of the guard's mauled body. He went to the aisle where he had fallen, approached him and leaned over to take a closer look. A few meters from the slain, Jocelyn saw Benito's pistol, which he had dropped when the Pegomastax had jumped on him. She watched the predator's jaws brush against the body.
Eat him. Please, eat that traitor. Perhaps your hunger will be satisfied, you'll no longer be interested in us and you'll walk away. We should be able to escape the therizinosaur. She's much slower than you, Site D's manager hoped.
But the carnotaur noticed that Benito had quills stuck in his abdomen. Pegomastax' quills. He looked up and lost interest in the body, which surprised Franklin.
"Why doesn't he eat him?" he asked.
"Because of the toxin in the quills," Jocelyn recalled with a sigh. "It's not enough to poison him but it apparently gives the flesh a bad taste. I believe he ate something quilled by a Pegomastax in the past and had an unpleasant experience."
Claire looked at Site D's manager in surprise.
"How do you know that?"
"I sometimes listen to my subordinates."
"Or maybe he's not hungry and just wants to play..." Claire assumed while Asterion looked back at them.
Franklin suddenly got tired of doing nothing and turned toward the warehouse entrance. He approached the edge of the shelf and shouted at the top of his lungs:
"Hey! Is someone there?! We're trapped! Come and help us!"
But Yuriko, who had just reappeared near the warehouse's corner where several forklifts were parked, turned to them, honked and took two steps in their direction while spreading her arms.
"Quiet!" Claire told him, having noticed that shouts irritated the therizinosaur.
Franklin agreed to be quiet and the therizinosaur returned near the forklifts, watching them and the carnotaur, which was going back and forth around their shelf. It was then that the carnivore leaned against the shelf with all his strength, growling in the process. Then he backed up a few meters and then, having gained enough momentum, charged the shelf and at its top the trio staggered. They realized that he was trying to destabilize it to bring them down and they knew that they had to find a way out or a shelter. They scanned the warehouse.
Claire's gaze was first drawn to the warehouse office to the right of the door, but not knowing if its door was locked or not, she crossed out the idea of joining it, not to mention Asterion. Not only would he catch them effortlessly as soon as they would climb down, but if they ever managed to enter the office, nothing would prevent him from destroying its window, putting his front body inside and reaching them. She turned to her two companions and shook her head. Pivoting, they then turned towards the entrance to the corridor from which they had come but thought that if Asterion had arrived from there, nothing prevented them from stumbling upon Ariadne or Toro in the maze of hallways. They had to find a place where a carnotaur would be unable to follow them. Remembering the Ark's maps, Jocelyn set off for the opposite end and her two companions followed her while Asterion hit the shelves intermittently. When they were near the end, Jocelyn turned her head to the left and saw a door in the northwest corner of the warehouse, near the hallway where the stuffed styracosaur was. If she wasn't mistaken, the door led to the ACU garage and from there they might be able to walk back up to the offices. The door being of regular dimensions, she knew that a carnotaur was not going to be able to cross it and she just hoped that it was not locked.
The trio discussed what to do next. They would jump from shelf to shelf until they were closest to the door, climb down, run to it, and pray for everything to go smoothly. However, the fact that the carnotaur was going to follow them quickly came to mind and they realized that at least one of them had to stay behind to distract the predator long enough.
"I'll do it," Claire volunteered, not out of a sense of sacrifice but because she knew she was the one in the trio who had the best chance of accomplishing that task successfully.
Leaving Jocelyn and Franklin at that end of the line of shelves, Claire began trotting toward the southern end, making various noises to get the carnotaur's attention.
"Asterion… My big sweet carnotaur, come over here…"
Being almost back to the southern end, she then clung to the edge of the shelf, on the side of the aisle where Benito was, and stretched an arm, and then a leg in the air.
"Look, I'm going to offer myself to you as a sacrifice…" she said to the predator while Franklin prepared to jump to the other end of the line. "I'm sure I'm delicious with bechamel sauce."
Rising almost vertically, he stretched upwards and reached for her. Still standing near the forklifts, Yuriko watched this strange scene curiously. It was then that the fallen park director and the carnotaur both heard a crash, a scream, and then a thud. Intrigued, Asterion began to turn away from Claire, who feared the worst.
"Hey! Hey! You want me! Not him!" She barked at him, waving her leg with more energy.
But he didn't care about her and as he rounded the end, she climbed back onto the shelf. When he passed the latter, he saw Franklin at the other end of the aisle, struggling to his feet after having failed his jump. The carnotaur looked at Claire, growled, then rushed to the young man. The fallen park director stifled a curse and tried to follow Asterion, yelling at him to get his attention.
"Run!" Jocelyn shouted at Franklin from the top of the shelf."
The young man began to run towards the door at the northwest corner. A few seconds later, the carnotaur reached the spot where he had fallen and arriving at the intersection of the alley and the corridor along the northern wall of the warehouse, he turned but its species having difficulty taking sharp turns. , he swerved to his right and hit the wall, which delayed him and bought Franklin a few seconds. Accelerating in the last few meters, the IT technician rushed for the door leading to the ACU garage but pressing the handle, he realized with horror that the door was locked and that their whole plan had been for nothing. He turned and saw Asterion let out a small roar as he charged towards him. Franklin mumbled a swear but at the last moment he swerved, darting down the hallway to his right and then right in the middle of his charge, the carnotaur couldn't slow down in time and he slammed into the wall.
He growled in displeasure and shook his head before turning to follow his prey, but when he saw the aisle the young man was in, he growled again, facing an unpleasant surprise. In the middle of the aisle, a Styracosaurus stood, blocking his path. Asterion roared but the ceratopsian made no reaction and didn't even move. If he wasn't going to move, the carnotaur was going to make him move. The young man scurrying past the herbivore like if he didn't considered it as a threat and threatening to escape, Asterion charged and expecting the styracosaur to seek to thrust its long nasal horn up in his throat, chest or abdomen, the carnotaur swerved to the side when he reached its level and then attacked the herbivore on the side, opening his jaws wide to grab the herbivore's back. His teeth punctured the skin, sank into the body and with a powerful move, the predator tore off a section of the styracosaur's back. But quickly, while Franklin crawled between two crates a few meters away, Asterion realized something was wrong. He did not feel the blood flowing in his mouth, the piece did not have the slightest taste of flesh but an artificial one very unpleasant. The Styracosaurus was a fake. Asterion spat out the torn piece and angrily charged the shelf under which Franklin had disappeared moments earlier.
The shelf being smaller and frailer in build than the others, it bent under the carnotaur's onslaught and Claire, who was standing in the aisle along the northern wall of the hall, saw crates and boxes falling right on the DPG IT technician, who had just reached the other side of the shelf. He raised his arms above his head to protect himself but he disappeared under the cascade of boxes and Claire saw him fall backwards.
"Franklin!" She screamed helplessly.
In the second that followed, he was buried under part of the shelves' contents and with a heavy crash, it tipped over and came to lean against the one opposite the aisle, which was much more solid and together, they formed some kind of a triangular tunnel. On the other side of it, Asterion approached, knowing that Franklin was under the collapsed shelf. The carnotaur lowered the front of his body to enter the "tunnel".
"We can't do anything for him. To the hallway! This is our chance!" Jocelyn shouted at the fallen park director.
Following her voice, she saw that Site D's manager was standing near the hallway's entrance. Reluctantly, she decided to join her.
Under the shelf, Asterion spotted Franklin, stretched out and unconscious amidst Jurassic World-stamped toys and other merchandise spilling out of the open boxes. He tried to get closer to him but the shelf was too low. He squatted down even more and was able to move forward, almost dragging his stomach on the floor. His jaws ended up less than a meter from the IT technician… It was then that he heard light footsteps on his right.
Shortly after, the warehouse resounded with yelps, those of the carnotaur and they were similar to those of a dog bitten by a bug. Intrigued, Yuriko turned towards the aisle the predator had entered and saw him come out, advancing with the front of the body bent while shaking his head. The therizinosaur noticed that Pegomastax quills were stuck on his snout. Suffering failure after failure, the predator was irritated and frustrated, and noticing that the therizinosaur was watching him, he raised his head to roar at her aggressively. Yuriko, thinking he was going to attack, braced herself, spread her arms and claws, arched her head back while hissing... Positioning himself between her and the alley where Benito laid, Asterion looked at the claws of the Therizinosaurus and stepped back. Then, hearing the strides of Claire and Jocelyn, he turned around, observed them for a short moment and then brought his gaze back to his opponent, tilting his head slightly to the side, before turning around. Between two harmless humans and a five-ton adult Therizinosaurus and her deadly claws, he had made his choice. He was aware that attacking Yuriko would have been sheer foolishness.
As her opponent seemed to have chickened out in her perspective, the therizinosaur lowered her arms and let out a rumble while watching the carnotaur step over Benito's body to rush towards the hallway. Yuriko didn't care about that but between the carnotaur's irruption and the two women's escape, the guard's gun had disappeared.