Notes
Soundtrack suggestions:
The arrival of Mills' and Eversol's guests:
- Patron's Arrive and The Gala - John Debney, Relic.
The French agents:
- The Medallion — John Williams, Raiders of the Lost Ark (From 00:52 to 02:05).
Mills' auction:
- Shock and Auction — Michael Giacchino, Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom (Up to 02:05).
-o-
While the auctioneer announced the next lot, Guillaume jotted down in his notebook the buyer who acquired the previous one, enlarging a list he intended to send to his subordinates at the WDMC as soon as he would return to San Francisco.
There were a few whispers here and there but overall, the gathering was fairly quiet and the voice of the auctioneer could be heard while some of his assistants stood to the side or behind the buyers, on the alert and ready to point those raising their hands.
Contrary to what they had expected, InGen had a much harder time selling the larger dinosaurs, once quite popular with Jurassic World's visitors and therefore prime attractions for any zoo on the planet. At least in theory. Having listened carefully all the way, Guillaume had heard various worried whispers. Some buyers feared that the large predators and the biggest herbivores would be too risky for their park's security, others feared that certain species would be targeted by criminals who would seek to poach them, others considered the prices as too high… After a brief consultation with InGen's management, the auctioneer had even been forced to lower the latter and the event's organizers were then reassured to see hands finally rising.
About an hour into the sale, Mills got a message on his phone, checked it, and sighed softly in relief. One of the guards had just told him that Maisie and Iris had returned to the estate. It had been a small cause for concern, and he was glad he didn't have to ask the man he had sent to watch them to make them return. Seeing the time in the upper part of the screen, he knew he had to leave the marquee to take care of some important business and he turned to Susan, seated next to him. They exchanged a knowing look and he stood up, heading for the exit. When he came within sight of the manor's entrance, he saw Iris and Maisie climbing up the steps and crossing the threshold.
While waiting for dinner, Maisie retired to her room and for long minutes she sat on her bed, with all her thoughts turned to her grandfather. She was worried, deeply worried. She was afraid he would never wake up. If he died, what would become of her? After her misadventure the previous day, she didn't want to stay at the manor, which was yet the only home she had ever known. Now Eli scared her though she had always seen him as a surrogate father… She wanted to go down to talk to Iris and beg her to take her away, to take advantage of the evening to disappear. But if she ever decided to do that, she knew she had to do something very important first: She had to find out more about her mother.
Despite his benevolence towards her, her grandfather had always been stingy with information about her. Although sadness played a big role behind this restraint, Maisie had the impression that some things were being deliberately hidden from her, like if the truth threatened to hurt her or that she was too young to understand it. Whatever, she had to know. With the answers being in her grandfather's room, Maisie considered going there during the evening and if someone stopped her, she would find a way to get there.
The door of her balcony being open, she suddenly heard a trampling of gravel, coming from the base of the manor. Then she discerned Eli's voice.
Taken by a curiosity mixed with a great mistrust, she got up, moved on her balcony and slowly, she approached the railing to look down as discreetly as possible. Just outside the front stairs, she saw Eli with this Eversol. They were looking towards the bridge and beyond, where a line of black vehicles was moving past the lawn-turned-parking lot.
The black cars pulled up by the entrance's stairs, letting well-dressed men and women get out and be greeted by Mills and Eversol while security guards ensured that no one from the official auction came there, although signs indicated that the manor was a restricted area for the entirety of the event's duration. As their guests took the stairs one after another, Eversol pointed to an arriving group, telling Mills about their identities.
"That man is Ricky Rathrow, a representative of Darius Pharmaceuticals."
"Fantastic."
"And the bearded man is a proxy for Gregor Aldrich, a Slovenian arms dealer."
They then spoke of another individual, some man named Magnus.
"What is his interest?" Mills asked.
"Strictly personal. His son wants a baby herbivore, something like a Triceratops preferably."
They then welcomed a man in his thirties with dark hair and a short trimmed beard, Anton Orlov. He was accompanied by his girlfriend, a blonde woman in high heels and wearing a little too much makeup for the occasion in Mills' opinion.
Eversol exchanged a few words in Russian with the man and the latter then took the stairs with his girlfriend.
"He only wants carnivores. Two of them," he told Mills. "I think we're going to have a great evening."
Eversol then greeted their next guest, a tall young woman wearing a suit and a pair of trousers.
"Madame De Mafart," the auctioneer said in French without any accent.
"Good evening," she told them, straightening her glasses.
The DGSE agent exchanged a handshake with the two men then went up the stairs, following the other guests. Eversol turned to Mills.
"Sophie De Mafart, French government."
"The French government?" The manager of the Lockwood Foundation repeated not without concern. "You didn't tell me that you were going to bring in government representatives."
"I know what I'm doing, this isn't the first time I've dealt with Secret Service agents. These kinds of evenings are a godsend for them. They can acquire very important information and assets without triggering an outcry or a scandal. And their Minister of the Interior used to hang out with mobsters when he was younger... Neither she nor her superiors are going to denounce us, don't worry. Since the fall of Isla Nublar, France is very interested by InGen's latest research. If things go well, you will even allow Mrs. Lynton and Mr. Torres to obtain a very juicy contract..."
"You told her about…"
"No, she already knew about it when she came to see me. She is ready to pay the full price."
"Let's hope then that she has no competition…"
"Does Professor Wu know about our evening?"
"No, and he doesn't need to..."
Inside the manor, De Mafart had started crossing the museum and while heading for the elevator at the back, she took out her phone and wrote the following message:
I'm inside the manor.
She sent it and while she went down to the basement with other guests, she received a response:
Good. We have the visual and the audio. Remember, it's like poker. Don't hesitate to bluff but when the jackpot will appear, then you will give all you've got. If you succeed, the boss will reward you.
The elevator doors opened and its passengers exited, stepping into the conference room in the second basement. Starting from a large double door at the opposite end, a conveyor stretched in the centre of the room and on either side, rows of chairs were aligned. At the back, in the corner to the left of the conveyor, there was a platform on which a small table had been set up with a chair and a podium. In each of the room's back corners, a large screen was fixed to the wall.
As soon as she sat down on a chair near the conveyor, from which she was separated by an aisle, De Mafart wrote:
I will succeed!
She sent this new message to her contact, whose name appeared higher on the screen: Nicolas.
Nicolas Prieur wasn't far away, just at the edge of the estate, in a van parked on the side of a road. Having just checked his phone, he turned to their colleague, Hubert Hunebelle. Like Prieur, the latter was tall and attractive but he was broader-shouldered, his black hair was shorter, and his clean-shaven face had a square jawline. Sitting in an office chair, he stared at the screen in front of him, where part of the conference room was visible. They could see some of the chairs and guests sitting or already seated as well as the conveyor and one of the screens. Suddenly the angle of the camera taking these images changed, adopting a low-angle shot, filming the legs of a woman's pants and a cell phone, that of De Mafart. They saw the phone being put away and the angle changed again, to face the back of the conference room. Through a micro-camera hidden in the frame of their colleague's glasses, Prieur and Hunebelle were going to be able to attend Elijah Mills' little evening live. They also saw the latter settle behind the table on the platform while Eversol joined the podium. Prieur checked the time: It was five-thirty. They were on time.
The DGSE agent looked at his colleague and asked him:
"It's recording?"
"Yup."
Hunebelle then handed him a bag of Haribo sweets.
"Sit," he said. "It will last at least two hours if I'm not mistaken. If you want, you also have some crisps."
Prieur settled into a second chair, picked up one of the Haribo bears, and ate it while watching Eversol clear his throat.
"Ladies. Gentlemen. Welcome to this extraordinary evening," the auctioneer said, looking at the gathering. "Let's start now with the first batch."
A security guard started the conveyor, and the large double doors to the right of the platform opened, revealing a stand on which stood a cage containing the baby pectinodons Maisie had seen the previous day. At the same time, the two screens in the corners lit up and displayed a lot of information about this species, including pictures of adult individuals and the scientific name: Pectinodon bakkeri sorkini.
"Baby pectinodons. A small nocturnal carnivore. Don't let yourself be moved. As adults, they are extremely dangerous animals. Not only do they hunt in packs but they are also venomous. They are worse than the famous dilophosaurs and some say that many larger predators fear them."
While looking at the gathering, blinking frequently due to the over-brightness of some of the spotlights, the dinosaurs emitted worried chirps. When the cage reached the end of the conveyor, the latter stopped and Eversol announced the lot's initial price. A number of hands rose, then he increased the price and the number of hands went down. When there was only one left, he said:
"...once, twice..."
With no one else deciding to raise their hand, the auctioneer banged the podium with his gavel.
"Sold!"
The security guard at the conveyor's controls started it up again, but this time in the opposite direction, bringing the pectinodons back to the large door. As soon as their cage passed through it and back into the adjacent corridor, other men in Mills' payroll removed it from the conveyor and placed the next batch on the base. Meanwhile, the manager of the Lockwood Foundation stared at his computer screen, where the profit from the pectinodons' sale had just appeared. He smiled.
While the dinner break approached and Lord Clayton and Xun Sung debated about the Yi qi, each claiming that it would have been better in their park than in the other's, Guillaume got up, claiming a desire to go to the toilet . He left the marquee and in order to confuse the suspicions of Lynton or any other member of InGen's management who had seen him suddenly leave, he went to the toilet, stayed there for a few minutes and flushed before leaving. Then moving away from the tents, he crossed the bridge opposite the manor's entrance and returned to the lawn where he had left his vehicle. On the way, he did not see the black cars that had dropped off Mills' and Eversol's guests but from her balcony, Maisie had seen them turn around, cross the bridge again and turn right, as if to go to the old factory. However, despite his serious doubts about the Lockwood foundation's manager, Guillaume was still unaware that he had organized his own little evening in the manor's basement. That would soon change, but the cabin was his primary objective.
In his vehicle, Guillaume went to take his backpack and then, first making sure that no one was looking at him, he quickly crossed the driveway and disappeared behind the nearest thickets. After getting deep enough into the estate's woods, he stopped and unpacked his backpack's content. There was a pair of combat boots, a black T-shirt, sweater and cargo pants, a pouch containing recording materials, another containing an annotated map of the estate, not one but three balaclavas, a first aid kit and mercurochrome, another kit containing screwdrivers, as well as a pistol and its holster. The WDMC director changed, taking off his evening clothes to put on those he had just taken out before putting on the boots. He fixed the holster and his pistol to his belt, put one of the balaclavas over his head, and put the rest of his belongings in his bag. Having turned into the Interpol agent he once was, Guillaume Vuillier headed for the ridge. Along the way, he passed in sight of the old factory's unloading bay and the large gravelled area that stretched between it and the wood. Guillaume was surprised to see a number of vehicles, mainly large black cars, parked on this surface. At the entrances to this area as well as on the platform, he saw several armed guards and knew that something was going on under the manor. But first, he had to free Claire Dearing and her boyfriend.