The State Border between Nevada and California.
She had been driving for well over 5 Hours. Now, it was quite the Distance from San Diego to Reno, even if the highways were absolutely perfect it was still a 10 Hour Drive between the 2 Cities, and Reno was where Doctor Raegis supposedly was. She had been hoping that the Drive wouldn't be that bad, but this ended up proving incorrect. Even in her relatively New Toyota Landcruiser it was still proving to be difficult, she passed a Sign that said 'Gas Station, Exit in 2 Miles' and she decided it might be best to refuel.
She ended up taking the next exit, and then pulled into the Gas Station. She couldn't see many cars there, there were 2 in the lot and none at the Pump, and she ended up being at Pump 2. She got out of her Car, the Heat was unbearable and it had to be 100 at least. Once she was inside she quickly bought some gas for the Pump.
"We've had a Lot of Dinosaurs come through here." She heard one of the Staff of the Station say, "Some of those Tiny Hornless Triceratops came through here yesterday, brought a Dozen of those Stupid Little 2-Legged ones with them."
"Protoceratops." She whispered.
"Proto-what now?" One of them asked.
"You know the species of Dinosaur?" One of the others asked.
"Yes, I am….er, a Dinosaur Expert." She said.
"Can you tell us what they want?" The Cashier asked.
"Protoceratops lived in Desert Environments." She explained, "They evolved to live in areas like the one we are in now, they likely are looking for a place to settle, although I never recalled them moving in herds like you described…you said there were multiple of them."
"Yeah, like 6." He said.
"Huh." She said, " Well, I suppose it's possible that they could move in herds."
"We have one in the back still, we captured it earlier today just a few hours ago." One of the Workers of the Gas station said, she suddenly looked at the Gas Station worker with Surprise.
"You Captured one?" She asked with disbelief.
"Yeah, one of the Smaller little two-legged ones, wanna see it?" The Workers said.
"Yeah, I should see it." She responded, the Worker gestured for her to follow them, she was led near the back of the gas station into a Room, she could clearly see one of the Small Dinosaurs, perhaps standing at about a Foot tall, had indeed been captured by the Gas Station workers.
"Compsognathus." She said, she could recognize the Dinosaur pretty quickly. The Theropod chirped, it had a Collar on and was tied to a Pole with a Leash. She knew these guys were pack hunters, and probably this one wanted to return with its pack.
"You said the Protoceratops came through yesterday along with these guys?" She asked the workers, one of them thought for a moment before speaking.
"Yeah, there were like 11 of these Compsantwhatevers." The Worker said, "They came just after the Frilled ones."
She thought for a moment, before speaking.
"Well, Compsognathus are mostly Scavengers." She said, "They also likely didn't co-exist with the Protoceratops, so they are unfamiliar with these animals. They probably don't think the Protoceratops can't handle the environment, so they are following after them waiting for them to collapse and die, they don't know that the Protoceratops will likely outlast them." She said, the Small Theropod chirped louder, letting out a Little Screech.
"She wants to be with her herd." She said, she could tell the animal was visibly distraught, probably because it was tied up to the Pole, and also because it had been separated from its herd. Compsagnthus were very social animals, and often would be together in large groups.
"So…you want us to release it?" One of the Workers asked.
"Yes." She said, "Compies are Pack Animals, so they should never be separated, keeping the animal here both decreases the animals chance of survival and ruins its Mental state."
"Oh Damn." one of the workers said, he quickly began undoing the ties, and took the collar off, the Compy squeaked, running freely around the room. The Worker opened a Door that led outside, and the compy ran out, letting off little chirps, she watched the little green therapod run out into the distance, before vanishing among the Desert Landscape.
She ended up paying them for the gas and went out to top off her Landcruiser, after that she departed the lonely gas station, driving along the highway North. The Next few hours were Hell, just straight driving, occasionally stopping at a Gas Station, but the worst part was just how Empty Nevada was, beyond Reno and Las Vegas that was hardly any civilization, and while the Landscape could be pretty that wasn't what she was here for.
When she began to finally approach the City of Reno she was relieved, after hours and with the Sun now setting the nightmare was almost over, she took an exit off the highway and drove towards where her GPS told her the address was.
Edward Raegis didn't like living close to anyone else, he had been through too much after Site-C, he had been questioned extensively, silenced by InGen, not allowed to tell the proper truth and as a result his Career as a Geneticist was ruined, now he worked as a Graphic Designer.
Raegis, at the moment, was off work luckily. His job was stressful, he liked to enjoy every day he had off, today was his freetime, a Perfect Saturday that was for him to bask in. He couldn't go outside, unfortunately, it was 108 Degrees Outside after all, that would give him heatstroke. Especially since he was in his 50s now and wasn't in his prime, the only reason he wasn't retired was because he didn't have the money
So Raegis had resigned himself to watching TV, he preferred Dramas, and basically any Comedy Movie as well as 3D Animation, there were a lot of great movies out there that were 3D Animated, but he steered clear of any Dinosaur Movies, he would rather never open that Can of Worms again.
He had a bag of chips on his lap as he watched an Old Drama Movie, the characters on screen were having an Argument about whether there was a Murderer in the Woods, he was enjoying the old movie, that was until he heard the Familiar sound of a Car pulling into his Driveway. He got up off his couch, spraying the Bag of Chips everywhere, he ignored that for now and walked up to the Window Blinds. Peering through them, he could see the Car was a Toyota Landcruiser, a New Looking one. He could see a woman stepping out, she wore a Jacket that had 'InGen' printed on it, and he shuttered the blinds quickly.
InGen was still approaching him? He didn't want anything to do with InGen, he thought not returning letters was proof enough to make that clear to them. He had already heard of what happened at Loockwoods Manner, and he was nervous enough of them already, he didn't want to have more nightmares about dinosaurs, and he didn't trust InGen.
He heard footsteps, followed by a quick knock at the door, he quickly manoeuvred his way to it and made sure it was locked.
"InGen is not welcome at my house." He said harshly, "I do not want to ever be a part of your corporation ever again."
"I am not here as InGen." He heard the woman say, "I'm here as someone you know."
"I have never seen you before in my life." Raegis responded, although something did seem familiar about her, he had never seen her before, he was almost certain of that.
"Dr Raegis, do you not remember me?" He heard her ask.
"I don't." He said.
"I didn't either, but you were my Aunts friend." She said, "Her name was Doctor Jane, remember?"
"Doctor Jane…" He whispered, he remembered Sierra very well, he spent about a Month with her, but they were very close friends for that time, he didn't ever meet her family since they were on a Remote Island, but he didn't imagine that they would actually care about him. He decided, against his will, to open the door.
"Thanks." She said, "It was a Long Drive from California."
"From San Diego?" He guessed.
"Yeah, that's right." She said, she sounded surprised, he guessed she didn't expect him to correctly guess where she came from. That theory was confirmed when she asked how he knew that.
"Jacket Says InGen." He pointed out, "InGens only office in California is San Diego, I used to work there after all, I would know."
"Ah, that's right." She said, sitting down on a Chair.
"So." He said, sitting down on the couch next to the chair, "Why are you here exactly?"
"Well, I know you and Dr Jane were very close." She started, "They told me you guys worked together for about a month and a half, and that the only real conflict you guys had was over what dinosaurs to add to the Site."
"Yeah." He said, "She was really firm about which Dinosaurs could really be introduced, we wanted to introduce the Diplodocus, but she spoke against that a lot, she said that since we already had the Alamosaurus that it would be too much for both us and the island to include the Diplodocus, I disagreed, Isla Muerta was a pretty big Island after all, but she refused, and eventually we agreed not to add it."
"Mhmmm." She said, "Of course, she was supposedly pretty big on the island being actually a nice place to live for the dinosaurs, she had a special love for Theropod Dinosaurs right?"
"Yeah." He said, "She was said they were the most misunderstood dinosaurs of them all, always going on and on about how they were just animals trying to survive, I guess she wasn't wrong, but I can never understand why she cared so much for them specifically."
He looked at her, she was making notes on a little notebook he hadn't noticed yet, and as she wrote she began to ask more questions.
"I know she had a special…affection for a baby Tarbosaurus." She said, he nodded.
"So the Tarbosaurus, what was special about it." She asked.
"I am not sure." He said, "She seemed to be so willing to protect that thing, she had to be in order to jump off a ship in the middle of a Tropical storm, I think she just didn't want the baby to get hurt."
"Well, apart from a more complete Genome, not much was different, so I guess your speculation must be right." She said, and at this point Raegis was starting to question why she was here, she didn't seem to be asking much that she didn't already seem to know.
"Are you here for an Interview or for something else?" he asked.
"Well….I am here to ask you to accompany me and a Team to an Expedition to Isla Muerta." She said, "You are exactly the kind of Guy we need, and we can assure you will be compensated for your time."
"Of course." He said, "You just came here to cozy up to me and get me to come on your little Jumanji adventure."
"Mr Raegis, I can assure you that it will be worth our time, you will be compensated by a large margin for your assistance." She said, and this made Raegis's interest peak.
"How much compensation?" He asked.
"About Thirty Million Dollars." She said, he guessed InGen wanted whatever they needed really badly and would be willing to do anything to get him to assist, and banked on the fact Money typically worked.
And InGen had guessed correctly.
"Alright." He said, "When do we leave?"
San Diego, California.
"Great!" The Ceo of InGen said into the phone, "Yeah, you can send a Chopper, there's a Airfield out in Reno we can operate out of, Looking forward to this." The Phone was hung up, and he sighed, he looked outside his window, the San Diego Beaches were sparkling in the distance and he could see them clearly. He loved the view, it was one of his favourite things about being the CEO of InGen, whenever he felt stressed he could just look out the window and take in the view.
The job of being CEO of InGen, of course, was indeed rather stressful. Running a Genetic Engineering firm was much harder than a standard company, ever since the 90s new regulations had been introduced by the government and several other nations regarding Genetic engineering and de-extinction technology, and as a result InGen had a lot less to work with than when it was founded. After the San Diego incident, InGen, hit with hundreds of Lawsuits, had to resort to a lot of corporate selling out and negotiations to stay afloat. After the Illegal dinosaur breeding was exposed in the early 2000s InGen had to make a statement, and just barely managed to stay in existence thanks to being bought by Masrani Global.
After Masrani Global Ceased to Exist, InGen was purchased by Him, Rick Morgan, he just barely had enough money to do it, he had a number of reasons to believe in InGen, it had a great deal of assets, and it could make a lot of money if it set its goals and profits higher.
So Rick had devoted all of his time making some deals behind the scenes, selling off some assets for money, and slowly began the process of working towards a New Future for InGen. Rick had spent the last day or so dealing with some issues regarding getting individuals together for the Isla Muerta expedition, and that had been a hassle, he had to go through a lot of lists, and a lot of people had either turned them down or were just able to be found.
His phone rang, and with a groan he picked it up.
"Ceo of International Genetics, how can I help you?" He said.
"Hi, it's Robinson with the Costa Rica team." He heard a Familiar voice say.
"Robinson?" He said, "I appointed you as the New Head of Island Security to make sure our assets don't get stolen, why are you calling me?"
"Well, as you know we can't exactly closely monitor the island." Robinson said, "The UN, Costa Rican and United States Government mandated that InGen would lose the ability to directly set up any more facilities on the island without direct approval from them after what happened at Jurassic world, and especially now after what happened with Lockwoods manner, so it's a lot harder to make sure no one gets on or off nublar, we aren't the US Navy either, so there isn't much we can do besides patrol it, and given our limited ships and Radar Range there is always a chance that someone slips through us-"
Rick suddenly began to get where Robinson was going with all of this, and before he could finish he began to speak rather angrily.
"Are you telling me someone stole our assets?" He asked.
"Well, yes." Robinson said, "They got in through a pretty quickly and parked in a treacherous part of the island, it was pretty hard to even detect them as they left because they timed everything with our patrol movements, once we did detect them we began a pursuit but they had such a headstart that the only reason we even knew where they went was because the ship ended up wrecking on a Costa Rican Beach."
"Wait, it wrecked?" He asked, "Does this mean it sank, or did it crash into a beach or something?"
"It crashed into a beach." Robinson said, "It ended up wrecking pretty close to a dockyard too."
"Does this mean any assets could be recovered?" He asked.
"Sadly, they all managed to escape us." Robinson said, "We questioned one of the local dock workers, but they didn't say much, all they said was that it was a nightmare."
"Do we at least know what kind of Assets we lost?" He asked.
"Well, that's at least answerable." Robinson responded, "We checked the manifest and cameras, and we know we lost about a Dozen Raptors, 2 Rexes, some herbivores, 2 Carnatorus, 2 Ceratosaurus and a Small Flock of Gallimimus."
"Which Rexs?" He asked
"Well, the big Green one looks like the Offspring of that Rex that went through San Diego back in 97." Robinson said, "The Other one was that one was one of the Original Rexes we bred on Sorna."
"Damnit." Rick said, "Well, do your best to get em back, you will face the consequences later."
"Yes Sir." Robinson said, and the phone hung up.
Rick put his head into his Shiny, Wooden Desk. The Stress was definitely building on him. Those Rexes could sell for a Lot of Money, Millions, perhaps Tens of Millions, and together they could make enough money to buy half a Dozen Mansions, he was looking forward to that money, and now that money would never come. They now had at least 3 Rexes loose on the mainland, those 2 and Rexy, and the 2 that went missing could be on the mainland, combine that, the other Lockwood dinosaurs and now these ones made this a true disaster.
Both for his wallet and everyone else.
This Expedition to Isla Muerta would be their last chance at making a lot of money, if they failed then InGen would be Toast.