THIRTY SEVEN

After hours of lying awake in tense silence, gazing into the darkened jungle and waiting for the alarm to signal the arrival of a dangerous intruder, exhaustion finally overtook the two scientists who finally managed to drift off to sleep well into the night. They slept undisturbed for less than four hours before the very vocal howler monkeys in the treetops heralded the dawn with their loud calls.

Howler monkeys have a territorial habit of starting and ending each day by inquiring through their raucous calls where their nearest neighbors are. The calls are answered by other males within hearing distance, establishing boundaries and foraging rights. It was those loud calls that penetrated Ellie’s slumber, bringing her awake.

With a yawn, she rolled over onto her back and gazed up into the treetops overhead, mildly surprised that she had gotten any sleep at all. She could not see the noisemaker, for it was not directly above them, but perhaps a quarter mile away, and she understood that as long as they were in the monkeys’ territory, they would likely be awakened each morning by their calls.

Turning her head, she looked over at the sensor panel to assure herself that all was well. A tremendous sense of relief washed over her at the sight of that tiny green light that glowed on Hammond’s generous and thoughtful gift. They had made it through the night with no events. Moving her eyes to Alan, she saw that he too was awake, his hands folded behind his head.

"We’ll start down the mountainside today, and hopefully we’ll be out of their territory soon," he said, obvious indication of the monkeys.

"Good! That is not the kind of alarm clock I want to wake up to each day!"

"Well," he said cheerfully. "I guess nothing came into the camp last night. I’m a little surprised we didn’t see any visitors at all, not even a curious monkey or kinkajou."

"Speaking of which, I’m glad some native species have survived," Ellie said, then looked up into the treetops and added, "Although I’d like to wring that howler’s scrawny little neck for waking us up at the crack of dawn! Especially since I had trouble going to sleep last night."

"Yeah, I had a little trouble myself," he admitted. "Our first night out in the open. I kept my ear cocked toward the console, expecting the alarm to go off."

"Same here."

Alan yawned and sat up, dragging his hand slowly across his bristly face. "I imagine I’m starting to look like a bum. If we find a fresh water source like a steam or river, I need to shave. I don’t want to use our drinking water for that."

Ellie grinned, amused. She had rarely seen him so scruffy-looking. Even on dig sites, his morning routine had always included a shave. "I don’t know, I think you’re kind of cute with the hobo look." Then she glanced at her legs and quickly changed her mind. Rubbing her hand up and down the stubbly hairs, she sighed. "Maybe I’d better join you at that creek."

Now it was Alan’s turn to be amused. "What, the hobo look is okay for me but not for you?"

She pretended she had not heard that. "When we do find that fresh water source, think it would be okay to take a bath in it?" she asked, longingly. "I brought some soap with us, but I guess I didn’t give much thought to just how sweaty and grimy we would get out here. Do you realize how many days it’s been since either of us have had a shower?"

"Sure, I don’t see why we couldn’t bathe in a river or stream when we reach one," he agreed. "The animals probably drink from the tributaries, but the current will dissipate the soap pretty quickly, so it shouldn’t have any effect on them."

"That’s something to look forward to," Ellie said. "It wouldn’t hurt to rinse out our clothes, either. I never really thought to ask; where does the water in the streams and rivers come from? This is an island, after all, and rivers don’t have a lot of space and tributaries to build from."

He shrugged. "I never really thought about it, either. There’s a lot of runoff from all the rain around here, plus there may be some underground streams that make their way to the surface."

"Well, I guess I’d better rustle us up something for breakfast, since there is no way we could get back to sleep with all that racket going on!"

While Ellie rummaged through the packs for something to prepare for their meal, Alan withdrew the map from his pack and plotted their course over the next few days. Unfortunately, the map did not have a mileage scale, making it difficult to calculate how far they could travel in a given amount of time, but he supposed there was no rush anyway. By the time he had decided upon the route and direction, Ellie was passing out fruit and nut bars.

-()-

Most of the day passed almost as uneventfully as it had the day before, with endless walking through the jungle in the shade of the high canopy. Occasionally they saw smaller inhabitants of the rain forest; tree frogs and poison dart frogs clung to the trunks and fronds with tiny suction-cup feet, a beautiful Blue Morpho butterfly rested on the lacy leaf of a fern, and the colorful but deadly coral snake was curled in a mossy nook beneath a shrub. Sometimes they saw hummingbirds flitting and darting among the jungle flowers, and they heard many cicadas in the trees calling incessantly for a mate. With each sighting of a native species, they stopped to record it on film.

"This must be the most beautiful spot on the island," Ellie commented as she stopped to watch a hummingbird moving from one flower to another, its tiny wings a blur of motion. "We’re seeing nature in its purest form up here. We’ve heard frogs near water sources on the flatlands, but the colors of all the creatures up here are amazing. And I’ve never seen a blue morpho butterfly in the wild before. I’ve only seen them pinned to a mat and framed in museums."

"I’ve seen some frogs and different colors of butterflies in the lower elevations, although not this abundant," Alan told her. "The only dinosaurs that are small enough to bother with trying to catch them would be the compies, and I imagine they learned quickly to stay away from the toxic amphibians and poisonous snakes. I’ve seen them go for the butterflies and dragonflies, though. You know, we still haven’t seen any ground-dwelling mammals."

Ellie sighed. "So, we’re back to the fact that the only animals here are those who tend to stay in the trees or have toxic defenses. As a human, that doesn’t build much confidence, you know."

He shrugged. "Curious, isn’t it? Especially since we haven’t seen any evidence of the dinosaurs yet." He looked around the jungle that surrounded them. "Still, I have the strangest feeling that they’re up here, somewhere."

Ellie felt a shiver run up her spine. "I wish you hadn’t said that."

They proceeded in the same general direction throughout the early morning hours, traveling along the mountain range’s natural line, but she knew Alan was plotting a route down the slopes using the map to determine the safest path. A few hours before noon, they shifted direction and began their trek down the mountainside. Some of the slopes were steeper than indicated on the diagram, forcing them to travel out of their way seeking a path that was more suitable for foot traffic.

"Unless there is an easier way up and down these slopes, it’s no wonder we haven’t seen any dinosaurs!" Ellie exclaimed as she maneuvered her way down a rocky grade. "It didn’t look this steep from the air."

"The foliage is deceptive when viewed from the helicopter or airplane," Alan agreed, several yards ahead of her. "You can’t see beneath it, so you have no idea what the terrain is. And this map isn’t much help, I’m afraid. It’s incomplete in some areas."

He reached the bottom first, and reached up to offer his hand. She gladly accepted, placing her hand in his, and picked her way carefully down the remaining grade. The path leveled off again at the bottom, and they continued their way through the jungle.

The mountainous regions of Isla Sorna were very diverse, and by late afternoon, the jungle through which they were passing had increased in density. The towering ceiba trees grew farther apart, allowing smaller trees and shrubs access to light and forced Alan and Ellie into single file in some places just to get through the dense tangle of foliage.

Birds of varying species made their unique calls from the treetops and from the shrubs all around them. Sometimes one would take flight from a shrub as they pushed through it, startling them with its nearness, and one fluttered along the path in front of them, making distress calls and attempting to lure them away from its nest.

As they passed through one particularly dense section of the jungle, Alan paused to allow Ellie to take the lead. Using both hands, she pushed the fronds aside and pushed her way through. As he fell in line behind her, Alan heard a rustling in the foliage on his right and a twittering call that sounded similar to the many bird calls they had heard that day . . . and yet it sounded different enough to attract his attention.

Coming to a complete halt, he turned to his right and studied the many trees, ferns, and shrubs that made up the dense undergrowth. No bird materialized, but of the corner of his eye, he thought he detected the barest illusion of movement through the brush before it vanished, leaving him to wonder if he had seen it at all. Narrowing his eyes, he peered intently at the densely crowded cluster of jungle flora, but his careful scrutiny failed to pinpoint any living creature. He saw only the quiet trees and the gently nodding fronds.

An uneasy feeling crawled up his spine, like the feeling one has when being watched by an unseen entity. The jungle was unsettlingly eerie if one thought about it too long, and his puzzlement over the lack of ground-dwelling animals on this island was enough to spook anyone. They had seen no sign of dinosaurs at all in this location; no tracks, no droppings, no vocalizations. It would be easy to conclude that there were none at this altitude. But Alan was not convinced. His many months on the island had afforded him an instinct about the creatures that lived there, and at that moment all his senses were on high alert. Something was out there, and he knew it was near and probably watching him.

"Alan?" Ellie’s voice reached his ears from the other side of the frond-covered path. She had apparently stopped ahead of him to wait.

Alan flinched, startled by her sudden query, but covered it well. "I’m coming," he replied, keeping his voice neutral, although he suddenly felt very anxious to keep her close to him. With one last glance around the jungle, he pushed his way through the fronds and branches until he caught up with her.

She was waiting for him on the other side of the clump of foliage, and smiled when she saw him. "Find anything interesting back there?" she asked. She was totally unconcerned that he had fallen behind, for he had occasionally stopped to scrutinize the ground or broken fronds more closely looking for tracks, scat, or other indications of animal or dinosaur habitation. Sometimes she stopped with him, sometimes she continued on, apparently finding some comfort in the fact that they had yet to encounter any danger and knowing that he would quickly catch up.

"No," he lied, electing to keep his worries to himself for the moment. "Nothing yet."

A guilty feeling washed over him like an unwelcome tide. He did not like withholding things from her, but he really had no tangible confirmation that anything was out there, only his gut feeling, and it seemed pointless to alarm her until he knew for certain. As they resumed their walk, he kept his eyes and ears tuned to the sounds of the jungle. From this point forward, he would have to be extra cautious.

They continued on for several more hours. The jungle began to open up a bit more, allowing room for the two humans to walk side by side and providing better visibility through the trees and shrubs, but Alan did not breathe any easier. He heard the peculiar calls again, this time on his left, and felt the hair on the back of his neck lift in response to it. His head automatically turned toward it, his eyes moving from shrub to shrub in search of it, but again he saw nothing. Whatever it was, it was not as near as the first time, but it seemed to be either following them or moving in the same general direction.

Without stopping or allowing Ellie to get ahead of him, he carefully reached behind and unzipped the side pocket on his backpack and reached inside, verifying that the pistol was within easy access. His hand closed briefly around the handle, but he did not withdraw it from the pack. Satisfied that he could get to it quickly, he removed his hand and zipped it only part way up, just enough to keep it from slipping out during the trek.

Ellie noticed the movement, but remained unsuspecting of its source. "Something wrong?" she asked, noticing that he had moved his hand from his back.

"Back pack’s getting a bit heavy."

His reply was rather evasive, but she did not seem to notice. "Yeah, so’s mine." She paused to listen as the peculiar twittering calls resonated through the jungle again. "That’s a strange sounding bird, isn’t it?"

If that’s what it is, Alan thought.

He stopped walking and placed a hand on her arm to stop her as well. If it was following them, then it was time to get to the bottom of it. "I’ve heard it several times, but I can’t place what it is. Let’s see if we can flush it out, just to satisfy my curiosity."

She nodded her agreement, and they moved cautiously toward the direction of the sounds. Alan withdrew his shock prod from its loop and held it ready in the event of attack. For several moments, there was no sound at all, and then there was a sudden flutter of wings as an emerald toucanet burst from the brush and took flight, startling both humans into taking a quick step back to avoid the beating wings. At the same time, Alan’s sharp ears detected something else retreating through the brush in the opposite direction.

Ellie instinctively ducked as the bird soared past her head so close that she could feel the breeze generated by the flapping wings. Recovering from the surprise, she gave a shaky laugh. "Well, I guess that solves that mystery! I’ve heard it several times too, but had no idea what it was."

Alan scanned the area, his eyes moving slowly from tree to shrub. "I don’t think that’s what made the sound, but whatever it was, I don’t think it’s here any more. At the same time the bird flew, I heard something else in the brush over there." He pointed to his left. "It sounded like it was moving away from us."

She eyed him carefully. She knew him well, and realized he wasn’t telling her everything. "Are you thinking it was some kind of dinosaur?"

"I don’t know," he answered honestly. "I’ve seen and heard a lot of dinosaurs since coming to this island, but I’ve never heard one make a sound like that before. But we also know there may be species we’ve never seen before up here."

They stood quietly for several moments, both of them contemplating the lush tropical foliage that surrounded them, observing and listening carefully. Except for the normal hoots and screeches of the birds in the trees and the shrill trilling of the cicadas, it was calm and quiet. The creatures in the tree tops were not disturbed, indicating that if it was a dangerous predator, it was not a large one.

Finally, Alan shook his head slowly. "Well, whatever it was, it’s gone," he said with reasonable certainty.

Ellie rubbed her bare arms as if to smooth down the gooseflesh that had risen. "Maybe there was nothing there at all except the toucan we saw," she said, hopefully. "Or maybe some small mammal scurrying away."

"Maybe," he agreed, but both of them knew he was not convinced.

After casting one last look around the area, Alan and Ellie resumed their original path. Alan continued to be extra observant of his surroundings, and his alert demeanor was a constant reminder to Ellie that he believed the animal in question was probably a dinosaur. Whether it was carnivore or herbivore, there was no way of knowing.

A short time later a small clearing opened up before them. Dominating the small open space was a tall, craggy bluff that rose more than twenty feet high, high enough to provide excellent protection against attack, and jutting off to one side was an extension that formed an L shape before bending back and continuing onward into the foliage. The area inside the L was more than ten feet deep.

Alan glanced at his watch and saw that it was only a little after four o’clock, far earlier than he had intended to stop, but the uneasy feeling persisted, and he was anxious to get settled within the protective laser barrier. Giving a cautious glance behind him into the jungle, a look that Ellie did not fail to notice, he said, "Well, it’s a bit early, but we’d be foolish to bypass a campsite like this one. This is better than I could have hoped for."

His voice seemed a little too jovial for a casual observation, but Ellie was pleased that they would be making camp early. "That’s good," she said. "My feet are getting sore."

Alan looked at the bluff, his eyes tracking its position until it disappeared into the jungle. "Unfortunately, we’ll have to find a way around it in the morning," he added. "It looks like it goes on for a long way in both directions."

They walked into the L shape area of the bluff and deposited their gear near the earthen walls, looking around at their campsite. The walls were rough and ragged, and high above were trees growing near the edge that shaded the area below.

Ellie immediately sat down to rest. "Why haven’t we seen any streams or creeks?" she asked, her hand going to her shoulder to massage the soreness. "We’ve been walking for three days, and I know these animals have to drink!"

Alan sat down beside her. "Well, they’re here. Our path just doesn’t seem to be taking us close to one." He indicated her shoulder. "Did you injure yourself?"

"No, it’s just sore from the weight of the pack. It’ll limber up. The blister on my foot hurts worse. Dipping it in a nice cool stream sure would have been nice."

He gave a nod of understanding. "I know what you mean. My broken ribs are feeling a bit sore. The backpack rests right on that spot."

Ellie was immediately concerned. It had been barely five weeks since he had been butted by the Pachycephalosaurus. He had not complained and many things had happened since then, so it had easily been forgotten, but obviously it was still causing some discomfort. "Maybe we should stay here for a few days, just until your ribs get to feeling better," she suggested. "This is a pretty good spot, as far as shelter goes."

"Nah, I’m all right. Besides, we haven’t yet seen any of the animals we’re looking for yet, so I’d rather not waste the time. There is a box canyon on the map that I’m thinking will make an excellent base camp once we get there, and it’ll give us both a rest from carrying all this gear around. There’s a water source there," he added with a smile.

She perked up considerably. "Really? How far away is it?"

"I think a couple of days, if we make good time." He knelt down and started gathering up stones that littered the ground inside their protective barrier. Ellie knew he was gathering stones for the fire pit, and squatted down to help. The stones were piled in one spot, and when they had enough they began clearing out a circular area for the fire pit, leaving plenty of room behind it for them to move around within the camping area. Then, to her surprise, Alan began making a second circle about ten feet away from the first one and closer to the bluff.

Ellie felt a sudden chill in spite of the warm temperature, understanding that he was making a fire barrier. For some reason he wanted extra protection that night. "Alan, did you see something out there that you haven’t told me?"

He paused briefly, confirming that he felt apprehensive about something, then said, ""Not really."

"What do you mean, ‘not really’?"

"It’s more of a feeling. I don’t want you to feel alarmed because it may be my imagination, but . . . "

"But what?" she prompted when he paused. "Alan, you’re scaring me!"

He looked up. "I’m sorry. That isn’t my intent. I just can’t be sure. For a while when we were walking out there, I had the feeling that we were being watched. I never saw anything and I never heard anything except rustling in the bushes and that strange birdlike call that we couldn’t identify. I just felt . . . uneasy."

Ellie’s scalp prickled, like an unseen hand tickling the roots of her hair, and she rubbed her hands nervously up and down her arms as she looked out at the jungle around them. It was dense, crowding close to their bluff in a formidable fashion. "Why didn’t you tell me?" she asked, feeling somewhat offended and more than a little nervous.

"I didn’t want to scare you because I couldn’t be sure there was anything out there. It could be the density of the jungle making me jittery. I haven’t seen anything at all to make me think it was a predator, so we’ll just go about our business as usual, but with a fire barrier between us and the outside. Just in case."

Absently, she rearranged some of the rocks in the first fire pit, even though they were perfectly fine the way they were. After a few moments of silence that indicated she was still miffed, she nodded. "Okay, but don’t keep things like that from me again. If you feel there is danger out there, I deserve to know about it. I’m a part of this team, remember?"

He nodded. "I know you are. I just didn’t want to alarm you if it was nothing."

"I appreciate that you wanted to spare me from worrying, but you aren’t being fair to me. I’m a scientist too, and I can’t be an effective part of this team unless you’re honest with me. Knowing there is danger out there is not going to make me panic or behave irrationally. I might be scared, but I am level headed, or at least that’s what you used to tell me."

Alan smiled in response. "You are indeed level headed," he agreed.

"Okay, now that we’ve got that straight, let’s get those sensors set up right away, before it starts getting dark."

Without delay, they removed the sensors from their case, extended the rods, and began placing them in a semi-circle in front of the bluff, beginning at one side approximately thirty feet out, and ending at the other side of the bluff, still maintaining the thirty foot margin throughout. Because they were not completely encircling the campsite, they placed the sensor rods closer together. When they were all in position, they tested them to make certain it was working properly, then, as they returned to the camp, they paused to gather some dry wood from a nearby downed tree. Using dry leaves as kindling, Alan built a fire in the first pit, but placed both kindling and wood in the other pit, preparing it for use later in the night. Extra wood was gathered and stacked against the bluff. Alan hoped they would not need it, but he did not want to run out of wood at a crucial moment.

Then as they settled in for the evening, Alan leaned back against the stone wall of the bluff and withdrew his journal from his pack. After pressing the barrel of his ink pen against his lips for several moments in thought, he applied the pen to the paper and began documenting the strange sounds he had heard in the jungle and his feelings of being watched.

It still wasn’t dark yet, but Ellie opened up the ice chest and looked through the packages of food items to make a selection for supper. After a few moments of consideration, she withdrew the packet containing the chicken breasts. There was no flour or batter to fry them in, but they could be browned in the skillet and seasoned. She set them aside and withdrew the packet of instant mashed potatoes as a side dish. Again, there would be no gravy for them, but they could make due with the seasonings.

Just as she was grasping the packet of chicken above and below the small nick in the foil to aid in opening, she suddenly stopped. Turning it in her hand, she looked at the label with a sudden felling of trepidation.

"Damn it," she said.

Ellie was not inclined to curse, so when she did it was unusual enough to make Alan look up from his journal. "What’s wrong?"

She turned the packet around for him to see. "I was going to fix us a chicken dinner, but if those things out there turn out to be predators, the smell of our food cooking will bring them right in."

"They already know we’re here," Alan mused. "They were either following us or going the same direction we were. But you’re right, if they hadn’t been inclined to come into the camp, cooking meat over an open fire would certainly be too tempting to resist. I guess we’d better save items of that nature for camps that are more secure, like that niche up on the bluff."

"Camps like that are going to be few and far between, if we ever find another one at all," Ellie said. With a sigh, she returned the packets to the cooler. "I guess its peanut butter sandwiches tonight, just to be safe."

He smiled. "Chicken would have been good, but you’re right. Peanut butter is the safest choice."

"We haven’t come across any of the dinosaurs yet," she said. "Even if there are some in the area, they might not be predators."

"That’s true," he agreed, turning his attention back to his journal, but even though he was looking at the page, he wasn’t actually seeing it. It was true that they hadn’t seen any predators yet and as of yet there was no confirmation that the creatures they had heard in the jungle during the day were predators either, but that did not mean they weren’t there. They both knew all too well that caution was the key to survival out here.

Ellie opened the bread bag and withdrew four slices, then spread peanut butter on them. As she worked, she cast frequent glances into the jungle that surrounded them. The sun was beginning to slip behind the western mountain peaks, and dusk was settling over the campsite. "You know, anything we cook on the fire is likely to attract predators and scavengers, regardless of whether it’s meat or not" she mused. "Even something as mundane as pork and beans, which everyone knows doesn’t have any real pork in it, except that little bit of fat."

"Pork and beans are good right out of the can."

"What about those boil and serve packets?" she asked, her mind still pondering how she would keep them well-fed in such a dangerous area. "They’re heated inside the plastic, and won’t have any smell until we open them."

He considered that for a moment, and the impact of John Hammond’s generosity was becoming clear. "You know, anything we fix, cooked or uncooked, is going to be detected by animals that are nearby. Their sense of smell is greater than ours. Look at all the predators that converged on the Spinosaurus, many of them from miles away."

"Yet we have to eat."

He gazed out into the darkening landscape for several moments, pondering the necessity of feeding themselves in a dangerous jungle. "All right, I guess we will do better to not cook anything unless we have a really safe place, like we did that first night. Even though predators might smell anything we eat, the fire and smoke will carry the smells farther into the jungle."

"Okay," she agreed. Completing the task of preparing their sandwiches, she secured the lid on the peanut butter jar and put it and the loaf of bread away.

Alan put away his journal, carefully securing it inside his backpack, and took the sandwich that Ellie offered. "You know, this is going to be the biggest book I’ve ever written. It’s going to take me a year just to go through the notes I’ve made in the journals to sort out what is relevant and what isn’t."

"I’ll help you," she offered. "And there are the photographs, too, for illustration. We’ll have to get those developed and decide which ones you want to include in the book. And the video we have would make a great television documentary."

He looked up and quickly tried to swallow the bite of peanut butter sandwich, not an easy task for something that has a tendency to stick rather stubbornly to the roof of the mouth. "Television?"

"Sure. Why not? You know they’re going to ask."

Alan gave a shrug and took a drink of water to wash down the bite of sandwich, giving the impression to Ellie that he was not interested. After a few minutes of thoughtful silence, he said, "There are a lot of legalities to muddle through."

She looked up. "Hm?"

"With doing a television documentary. There will probably be a bunch of squabbling suits from the different networks vying for my attention." He shook his head, apparently shying away from the idea. "I don’t know about this."

"Are you actually considering it?" she asked, surprised.

"Maybe. I don’t know. I had been thinking more along the lines of using the footage as a teaching film for students of paleontology, not an entertainment venue."

She looked at him for a long moment, recognizing again the longing in his eyes that she had seen many times since her arrival on the island. "You miss it, don’t you?"

"Yeah, I do." He sighed, heavily. "I guess a teaching film for students is a moot subject, since I don’t know if paleontology courses will ever be offered again."

"It can be made and produced as a documentary, which is still a teaching tool, even if we have to do it for the general public. Almost everyone is interested in dinosaurs. Alan, you’ve worked hard, even risked your life for this. There is nothing wrong with bringing it into the entertainment world. I keep thinking about something John Hammond said when we first arrived on Isla Nublar. He was very excited about what he had, and he made the comment that everyone in the world should be able to enjoy these animals. Of course I’m totally against opening another theme park, but they could see them on film. See what they are really like."

Alan was quiet for several moments, thinking about that. It was true that people all over the world were interested in dinosaurs, and presenting them in a documentary had the potential of reaching a huge audience. But for some, he knew, seeing them on film would not be enough. There were always the daredevils and fools. "What if it makes everyone and their grannies want to come down here to see them for themselves? Then I’ve created something that could lead to a lot of deaths. I don’t want that on my head."

"The Costa Rican government has already taken precautions by restricting the airspace and the surrounding waters. They’ve been pretty diligent about patrolling and enforcing it, especially after what happened with Eric and that guy parasailing near the shore last year. Besides, everyone already knows that this island exists and they know there are dinosaurs here."

"And there have been deaths from curious fools who want to see them for themselves. A documentary might just make some people want to try to get under the radar, even some who might not otherwise do something so foolish."

"Yeah, I know. That is something that will have to be considered. Maybe Hammond’s people should try to help come up with some new technology to help keep people away. After all, these are really InGen’s responsibility."

"But if I release these images as a public documentary, then I bear some responsibility as well for generating more interest," Alan insisted. "I have to reconcile myself with that. And then there are still the executives who know absolutely nothing about these animals, but will most certainly have their own idea of how it should be presented, which probably will not be anything akin to fact."

She leaned forward eagerly. "You can lay out your own terms and stick to them. I guarantee, these guys are going to be falling all over themselves and each other to get your presentation on their network! They’ll almost certainly start out trying to play hardball, but you just wait and see. They’ll give in if you stand your ground. You have something here that no one else has ever done before, and they’re going to want it bad!"

"Everything I’ve done here, I’ve done for science, for knowledge, for learning. Not some kind of media sensationalism. And mark my word, that’s exactly what they’ll be shooting for. Some kind of melodramatic fictional account of life on this island. Monsters and theatrical exaggeration. Jaws meets Godzilla."

"I’ll have Mark’s attorney review any contract they bring up, and we’ll make absolutely certain that it’s done OUR way."

"If I decide to do this, and I haven’t made up my mind yet, there are still a lot of details to work out. You’ll help me with that?"

"Of course! You know I will!"

"Then I’ll think about it."

After they finished their meal, they leaned back against the earthen walls of the bluff and listened to the sounds of the jungle, all the while keeping an ear cocked to the control panel. For the moment, it was silent.

"You’re sure that thing’s working, right?" Ellie asked, observing the tiny green light on the console.

"Positive. We checked and double checked."

She yawned. "I’m pretty sleepy, after lying awake most of last night."

"Maybe we should retire early. Get an early start in the morning."

"Sounds like a good idea."

Taking a burning twig from the main fire, he carried it to the second fire pit and ignited the kindling that he had already placed in it. He then added some more wood to both of them so that they would burn a while longer, then they spread their blankets on the hard ground and retired for the night.

-()-

Alan and Ellie were jolted from a sound sleep by a high pitched mechanical sound, so abrupt, loud, and foreign in this remote location that it seemed confusing and terribly out of place. Both sat bolt upright on their blankets, their eyes instantly drawn to the control panel; the source of the startling noise. The small green light had been replaced by a larger, bright red light that was blinking urgently, alerting them to the fact that something had broken one of the laser beams that marked the perimeter of their campsite.

Ellie’s heart leaped into her throat, making it suddenly difficult to breath for its anxious pounding. "Oh, God," she groaned.

After the initial shock of being so suddenly awakened wore off, Alan felt surprisingly calm and composed, and his scientist’s mind quickly took control. First, they had to determine what it was and what the danger level was. If it was a dinosaur, then it was what they had come here for and what he had expected would eventually happen. It had been only a matter of time before something broke the sensor.

"Its sensor number three," he said, pointing toward his left, to the area between #3 and #4. "It’s coming from over there." He knew without looking at Ellie that she was likely very unsettled at being awakened so suddenly. "We knew this would happen eventually," he reminded her. "It may be something harmless, and if it isn’t we have time to react."

The piercing sounds from the console continued to buzz in a distracting fashion, so he reached for the control panel and pressed the button to cancel the alarm. Instantly, silence fell over the camp.

For several moments, both of them peered in the general direction where they had placed the sensor, listening carefully. They saw nothing in the intense darkness of the jungle, but they could hear the sounds of something moving through the brush. Ellie felt the hair on the back of her neck come to attention.

"It’s coming toward us," Alan confirmed.

The fires had died down to embers, which glowed dully as they struggled to stay alive as it consumed the last of the wood they had placed on it before retiring for the night. Quickly and calmly, Alan went to the woodpile and began adding sticks, dry rotted wood, and twigs to the embers to build up the fires again. Within moments, he had brought up the first fire enough that illuminated the campsite without turning it into a bonfire. Then he moved to the other fire pit and added wood to that one as well. His shadow flickered like a ghostly specter on the stone wall of the bluff behind them as he moved, and occasionally the burning wood popped and crackled as it greedily consumed the fresh fuel.

Ellie did not have to ask why he had built up the fire. Wild animals were generally wary of fire, and could be held at bay by a strong blaze. She remembered an incident in Montana where they had kept a curious mountain lion at bay by utilizing their campfire. She would never forget the wild beauty of the big cat as it had circled their camp, drawn by the smell of their food, or the hair-raising screams it made as it tried to get past the fire.

The strange twittering sounds they had heard earlier broke the silence of the jungle, attracting their attention again. Whatever the creature was, it was just out of reach of the light from their fire.

"Can you see it?" Ellie asked.

"Not yet."

"Those are the same sounds we were hearing earlier," Ellie observed. "You were right; they were obviously not a bird."

Scooting backward to the gear she had stored against the bluff, she reached into her pack and groped around for her flashlight. When her fingers closed around the smooth object, she withdrew it and flipped it on, aiming the strong beam of light in the direction indicated by the sensor. For several moments she and Alan stared into the jungle, following the flashlight beam as she moved it slowly to the left, searching for the creature they knew was there. She stopped the beam briefly on a boulder that stood fifteen yards out before identifying it and proceeding again.

The first pass of the flashlight failed to reveal anything ominous, and for a few moments she dared to hope that perhaps the intruder was something innocuous, perhaps a lumbering sloth that had made a rare trip to the ground to change trees, but as she moved the light slowly back to the right the beam found a radiant yellow orb shining at roughly shoulder height and the dark silhouette of an unidentified creature some twenty yards back. The glowing orb briefly disappeared, and a second orb replaced it. Gooseflesh rose on her arms, and she could not suppress a shudder of fear. It had stopped, and was observing them, first through one eye and then the other, indicating that the eyes were on the sides of its head, confirming the genus but not the individual species.

"I can’t tell what it is," she said, her voice trembling slightly at the eerie silhouette that was standing so near, watching them with those luminous eyes. "Can you see it?"

"Not very well. It’s bi-pedal, but I don’t think it’s a raptor."

That was only small consolation, and Ellie took no great relief from that knowledge. The raptor was the most intelligent of the predators, but there were others that were just as deadly.

The alarm sounded again causing them both to jump in startled reflex, and they both glanced down at the second red light that was blinking on the control panel, indicating that another beam had been broken almost directly in front of them. Ellie’s heart took another leap. "There’s another one!" she exclaimed. There was a note of panic in her voice. "Number eight!"

Alan bent down to silence the alarm. Rising up again, he squinted into the darkness, seeking the identity of the intruders. As before, he could hear it moving through the brush. It did not step heavily, as a Tyrannosaurus Rex would, but moved slowly through the brush. It clearly was not trying to conceal its movements, indicating that it felt no need for stealth. It was almost certainly a predator.

Ellie’s flashlight abandoned the first creature and moved to the second, its beam quickly detecting the eerie eye shine, and experienced the same shudder of fear and revulsion that it had inspired before. Apparently apprehensive about the bright light shining in its face, it immediately came to a stop, as if trying to determine if they were dangerous to it.

Alan kept his eyes on the creature as he pulled his backpack toward him with the other, and fumbled inside it for the other flashlight. When he found it, he withdrew it and flipped it on, shining it directly at the first creature, the one on his left. While their attention had been directed at the second one, it had moved closer and now stood in full view, not more than eight yards from the campfire. It opened its jaws and roared as the bright light temporarily blinded it. Its mouth, he noticed, were filled with sharp teeth.

It was close enough now to distinguish physical characteristics, and Alan observed it carefully, noting the long neck and the pair of bony, almost semicircular crests on its head. "Dilophosaurus," he said quietly. "A young one, from the size of it."

Ellie’s scalp prickled, for it was another dangerous predator. "You haven’t mentioned them before. Is this the first one you’ve seen here?"

"Yes. I’ve been all over the area near the compound, and I’ve never encountered one. I know they had at least one on Nublar, but we didn’t get to see it. Malcolm’s expedition did not encounter them either. I was to the point of thinking that none had been released on this island. They must have established their own colony up here, away from the raptors and Rexes." He glanced briefly at the fires, assuring himself that the protective fire barrier would continue blazing for a while. The fires were not extremely high, but he was confident that the wild animals would be stopped by the heat and flames.

Ellie was less convinced of that fact, for she backed away as far as she could, pressing her back against the stony bluff behind her, and wishing desperately that the face of the bluff was not so steep. The two fires offered a wall of flames to protect them, but she would have felt much better had she been able to climb out of reach.

The Dilophosaurus advanced a couple of steps, but then stopped, reluctant to approach the fire. It gave a low rumbling growl, a very different sound than the happy twittering noises it had been making before.

Alan picked up the pistol from its place beside his blanket, and joined Ellie against the bluff. Quickly, he checked the clip and released the safety, and then picked up the shock prod. "Did you bring your mace?"

In the confusion of being startled awake by the alarm on the console, she had forgotten about the mace that she kept in a pocket on her back pack, and she quickly knelt and withdrew it. She held it up so he could see that she had it.

"I don’t think they’ll get past the fires, but should one of them manage it, I’ll shock it first with the prod," Alan said. "If that doesn’t stop it, blast it in the eyes with the mace. Just be careful that it doesn’t spray toward the fire, or the flames might travel up the fumes to the can."

She nodded quickly.

"I don’t want to have to kill them," Alan continued. "If I do, then we may have more, maybe even worse predators converging on us, interested in the kill. We’ll just hold them at bay and hope they’ll get tired of us and go away."

"Do we have enough firewood to hold them back?" she asked.

He glanced at the stack of wood they had gathered. There was still enough to feed the flames several more times. "Let’s hope so." He tucked the pistol into his belt, and knelt down again to withdraw the video camera from his pack. As he stood up, he pressed the "rec." button. "It’s three twenty five a.m.," he said to the camera after glancing quickly at his watch. He focused for several moments on each dinosaur, first one and then the other, obtaining close-ups through the zoom lens for later study. Then, to Ellie’s surprise, he placed the camera on a small rocky protrusion that existed naturally on the face of the bluff. With the camera recording from its perch, he picked up his weapons again and waited.

Ellie’s eyes held the camera for a long time, feeling strangely disturbed by its watchful, impartial eye. They were on a fact-finding mission in the mountains, to view, study, and document the animals, so it was not surprising that Alan would record this encounter. But if the creatures found a way to breach the fire, the camera could end up recording their deaths. With that troubling thought in mind, she set her mouth in grim determination to help Alan prevent that from happening. Clutching the can of mace in one hand and the flashlight in the other, she focused her attention on the danger at hand.

The heat from the fire was oppressive against their bodies and they were soon perspiring, but it also seemed to be bothering the two dinosaurs. The second Dilophosaurus moved into the light of the fire, and began pacing back and forth in front of it, but it was apparently frustrated and intimidated by the blaze, for it repeatedly dipped its head and shook it, as if irritated by the heat from the fire. The first creature continued to hang back farther than the other, but like its companion, it seemed uncomfortable with the blaze.

"They don’t like the fire," Alan said, easily interpreting the behavior. "They’ve never felt anything that gives off heat like that."

"I guess now we know why we haven’t seen any mammals on the ground," Ellie said, shakily. "These things have been picking them off, so they’ve learned to stay out of reach in the trees."

"Yeah," Alan agreed. "I don’t think there is a large population, though, because if so then we should have seen evidence of them before now."

"How many do you think there are?"

Alan shrugged. "There’s no way of knowing that. These two are juveniles, possibly siblings learning to hunt on their own, so there is at least one breeding pair out there, and probably more." He paused, wiping his brow with the back of his arm. "Their youth is in our favor, I think."

The second Dilophosaurus continued to pace back and forth in front of the fire, and once it paused to snap at its slightly smaller sibling, as if warning that it was dominant and therefore claimed feeding rights.

Ellie’s body shuddered violently at the fact that the dinosaurs thought of them as fresh food, and a moment later she felt Alan’s arm go around her shoulders, drawing her into a comforting embrace. "It’ll be okay," he promised. "I have the gun to use as a last resort."

Her arm encircled his waist, grateful for the physical contact as they settled back in the corner of their camp, both of them keeping a wary eye on the two predators.

After ten minutes with nothing new occurring in their behavior, Alan decided to turn off the camera to conserve the batteries, and he and Ellie had sat down, their backs against the earthen wall behind them, and watched as the two predators lurked on the other side of the fires. They remained like that for more than an hour, and during the entire time the two dinosaurs paced back and forth in front of the fires, as if trying to find a way to get around them.

"How long is this going to go on?" Ellie asked.

"I figured they would have given up by now," Alan replied. "On the other hand, that mountain lion hung around the whole night that time in Montana. The fires are dying down," he observed.

Leaving her, he moved to the wood pile and fed the flames again, depleting the size of their reserves even further.

"What will we do when the wood’s gone?" Ellie asked.

"We’ll have no choice but to take the offensive," he said as he sat down beside her again.

"You mean shoot them, or throw rocks?" Ellie asked in an attempt at humor.

He chuckled, and to her surprise he picked up a small smooth stone and hurled it over the fire at the dominant creature. It was not a hard throw, but the rock glanced off its shoulder, and the young Dilophosaurus bellowed in anger and confusion, unable to determine what had caused the blow. It snapped at its sibling again, apparently thinking it had nipped. This time, the sibling snapped back resentfully, and a brawl ensued.

Immediately interested, Alan stood up again to better see what was going on, and after a moment picked up the video and turned it on again to record the scuffle. Dust and fronds were tossed into the air as the two juveniles fought, growling and snarling, sometimes rolling and tumbling. Neither seemed to have a clear advantage over the other, and it was apparent that it was not a serious fight, for neither inflicted any meaningful bites or scratches to the other. They were merely settling a dispute.

The skirmish finally ended when a louder, deeper cry erupted from farther out in the jungle, attracting the instant attention of the juveniles. Abandoning their quarrel, they stared into the darkness for several moments, then abandoned the dispute and trotted away. The console alarm sounded as the pair broke the laser beam again, this time going the other direction, and Alan quickly silenced it. The video camera was turned off and returned it to its place inside his pack.

Then he and Ellie stood listening to the fading sounds of the two dinosaurs as they retreated through the foliage into the darkness.

"So are the parents still feeding them?" Ellie wondered aloud.

Alan shrugged. "They’re not infants, but maybe they haven’t learned the skills yet to survive on their own, and mom is still looking out for them. I’ve seen a number of first time moms who looked after their young longer than experienced moms might. Most likely, though, the species travels in family units. These two may have wandered off, and the pack leader is calling them back. The group structure within each species is very interesting."

Ellie sank down onto the ground again in relief. "That bigger one sure has a hair-trigger, doesn’t he?"

Alan sat down beside her, laying his pistol beside his blanket again. The shock prod was placed nearby. "Yeah. It’s amazing how these things all have their own personalities. Some are playful and docile, while others are dominant and easily angered. Permanently puts to rest the old theory that dinosaurs are stupid lumbering giants."

"Think they’ll come back?"

"I don’t know, but I hope not."

He held out his arm, an invitation for her to snuggle closer, and she was only too happy to oblige. Resting her body against his, she laid her head on his shoulder. "So, we survived our first nighttime visit."

"We’re a good team."

"And don’t you forget it."

"Yes, ma’am," he said with a smile as he rested his cheek against the top of her head.

THIRTY EIGHT

Alan awakened shortly after sunrise with an unexpected headache throbbing in the back of his head and neck. He was not prone to headaches of any kind, so whenever he was plagued with one, it was a great annoyance and inconvenience. An even bigger surprise was when he lifted his head, wincing at the crackling sounds coming from his spine, and discovered that he and Ellie had fallen asleep sitting up against the bluff, and both of them had slipped down a bit into a very cramped position. No wonder his vertebrae crackled and popped like breakfast cereal when he had moved it!

Careful not to awaken Ellie, who was still propped against his shoulder, he massaged and kneaded the stiff muscles in the back of his neck with his fingers, and then rested his head against the hard wall behind him, trying to relax the knotted muscles. With his spine straighter, he felt the pain begin to lessen almost immediately, and decided to just rest in the hopes that it would go away on its own.

The fires had died all the way down, leaving only charred blackened remains in the shallow pits and a pile of grayish ash in the middle of it. He did not get up to start the fires again. As soon as Ellie was awake, they would pack their gear and resume their hike anyway, so it seemed a useless endeavor, unless some form of danger presented itself again, and he felt that would not be the case.

Curiously, there were no howler monkeys in the treetops this morning, and he decided they must have finally made their way out of their territory. Ellie will be pleased about that, he thought with a fond smile. The headache lingered, less intense, but enough to be bothersome.

While he waited, his mind drifted back to the old days, when they had spent summers on dig sites. Ellie and some of his students had marveled at his ability to work for hours on end in the sun and sweltering heat without suffering the headaches that sometimes plagued others. Huge bottles of pain relievers had been stored in the trailer to ease the headaches and muscle aches that came with that type of work, but the students’ desire to be selected for his field teams was so great that few of them had ever complained about discomforts of any kind. They were good students, and he would always miss taking the groups out each year in search of new dig sites. He drew in a deep breath and released it in a wistful sigh, longing for something he would probably never again enjoy.

Ellie felt the rise and fall of his chest when he sighed, and she raised her head, groaning at the stiffness in her back and shoulders as she straightened up. With her weight off his shoulder, Alan shifted into a more comfortable position, cringing when his back popped.

Almost at once, Ellie remembered the events of the previous night, and she sat up abruptly, her eyes darting to the calm green light on the console. Relief washed over her. "I guess they didn’t come back," she said, just before giving a huge yawn. She stretched, her hand going to her lower back. "My back is sore!"

"And I have a bit of a headache," he replied. "I must have slept with my neck in a cramped position."

"Did you take anything for it?" she asked.

"I didn’t want to disturb you."

She smiled, caringly. "You’re sweet, but if you’re in pain don’t worry about waking me." She pulled her pack toward her and pulled out the bottle of pain reliever, handing a dose to him and getting another dose for herself. They were quickly washed down with a drink of water from their water bottles, then she rummaged around inside their provisions for a quick breakfast.

Alan watched her as he twisted the cap back on his bottle of water, thinking again that she had never looked more beautiful to him, and determined that he would always make sure she understood how much she meant to him, and how much he appreciated her. He was proud of the way she had maintained a calm demeanor the night before, even though he knew she had been terrified. He was well aware of her worth as a co-worker, but was it sexist to single out her composure during this one event by acknowledging it? Men generally found women confusing, and he understood that the sentiment was mutual; women felt the same way about men. They liked to be complimented about some things, but wanted other things left unsaid. It was sometimes difficult to sort it all out. Had she been a man, would he be trying to think of ways to compliment the work? Probably not. But this was not a man. This was Ellie.

After several moments of struggle, he reached out and took her hand. She looked up, surprised, and their eyes met briefly before his eyes slipped down to her lips, which were parted slightly, waiting for him to speak. The fire ignited inside him again, but he was careful to tamp it down. They could not risk being careless, especially after last night, so it was better not to tempt fate, no matter how inviting her lips looked.

Tearing his eyes away, he focused on her eyes again. "Ellie, I just want to say that you did good last night. You’ve always been such an asset to me, and last night was no different. I just . . . I wanted you to know that." He winced. That didn’t sound quite the way he had wanted.

She seemed to understand what he was thinking and why it had been so difficult to say it. She smiled, apparently pleased, and gave his hand an affectionate squeeze as she leaned forward to give him a quick peck on the lips. "Thanks, but I was scared to death!"

He smiled in response. "Yeah, me too. I didn’t think they would get past the fires, but they’re so unpredictable that I knew it might happen."

"I knew you had the gun and that you would never have let them hurt us, even if you had to kill them, so that helped. But it was still one of the scariest things I’ve ever been through."

Alan turned his head to look at the pistol that he had placed on the ground beside him, and he picked it up to examine it. The clip was kept in place, but the safety was on to prevent accidents. Its presence had given him a great deal more confidence in walking in the open on this island and in dealing with its dangerous inhabitants. "It does level the playing field, but I hope I never have to use it," he said after a few moments of thoughtful silence.

Ellie’s expression was one of understanding, her smile perceptive. "You’ve accepted that they’re here and you’re using the opportunity to study them, but you’re still torn about them, aren’t you? You still have reservations about their existence, yet you really don’t want them destroyed."

"Except for the blood that Hammond’s people found in mosquitoes that was preserved in amber."

"Yes, but it wasn’t one hundred percent viable, which is why the frog DNA was used," he reminded her.

Ellie fell silent for several minutes as she resumed her search through the packs of supplies for breakfast items. When she found what she was looking for, she passed Alan a granola bar. "When I first got here, you said that the dinosaurs are cleansing themselves of the frog DNA with each generation."

"They are, but will they ever be able to completely eliminate it? Will the dinosaur’s own DNA eventually destroy the foreign DNA completely, or will residual traces of the frog DNA continue to influence their genetics?"

She shrugged. "That’s impossible to predict."

"Exactly. Once we get into the lab, we can analyze the skin and flesh samples of both the dinosaurs and the frogs that were used to fill in the gene sequence gaps, and perhaps gain a better understanding of exactly how much of the frog DNA is still influencing their structure and how much is left of the original dinosaurs. I’ll need to know exactly what species of frogs that were used. Maybe Hammond can provide us with the original scientists’ records to see how each species was created and the levels of alternative DNA that was used. InGen should still have those records stored away somewhere. That should help give us an idea of what is going on with their cell structure."

Ellie took particular notice of the fact that Alan had said "we" instead of "I" and "us" instead of "me" when he was speaking of the lab work, and felt pleased that he was automatically assuming she would be there to help with the research. They were falling back into their familiar routines, almost as if they had never been apart. "Sounds complicated. It’ll be a new direction for your research."

"It may take years to get it unraveled," he agreed. "It still amazes me that they found viable dinosaur DNA to begin with. And not just one species, but so many! I just never would have thought it possible. It’s likely that differing amounts of amphibian DNA was used for different species, dependent upon how much viable DNA was found in the amber."

"Maybe we can hire some geneticists, perhaps even some of Hammond’s original scientists, to help us unravel it faster," she suggested. "They could explain in greater depth how they managed to extract the DNA from the mosquitoes. That little film and cartoon they showed during the Jurassic Park tour was just a general idea of how they went about it, and more than a little vague about the specifics."

Reality tempered his sudden burst of enthusiasm, reminding him that he no longer had access to a laboratory, nor did he have the funds necessary for that kind of research. "Well, it’s a good idea in theory, but I’m afraid it would cost money that I don’t have. I’m among the unemployed, remember. I can’t afford to pay employees to help in my research. I can probably get an advance from my publisher, but I need to get the book published before I’ll have any substantial dollar figures."

"I can help you with the money," she said, eagerly.

He stared at her for several moments, having apparently forgotten that Mark’s death had left her a wealthy woman. He had accepted contributions and funding for his fossil digs from various sources, but taking money from Ellie was another story. He shook his head firmly. "Ellie, no, that’s your money, money you need to live on. I can’t take it for my research."

"Why not? We’re a team, remember? I want to help."

He sighed and looked away, remembering that he had no job to go back to once they completed their research on the island. "I know you do, but at this point, I don’t even have access to a lab."

"Then we’ll build one!"

His eyes darted back, staring at her in total shock and disbelief, but for a moment, he allowed himself to imagine what it would be like to work inside his own lab, The Alan Grant Center for Paleontology Research. With his own lab, he could not only study the living specimens, but also continue with digging if he wished. He could not deny the appeal, but quickly brought himself back to earth. "Ellie, don’t think for a moment that I don’t appreciate your offer. You can’t imagine how much it means to me, but do you realize the kind of money it would take to build a research lab?"

"There is more than enough money for the lab and for me to live on, trust me on that. You can’t imagine how much money Mark had. His parents were obscenely wealthy and gave him a huge trust fund when he turned 25, plus the money he made at the State Department and high-end stocks. He was one of those people that money just seemed to gravitate toward. There was also a sizeable life insurance policy. When he made out his will, he left a great deal to the kids, but with them gone, it all reverts back to me. Plus, I can’t bring myself to live in that big house after . . . . " Her voice faltered only briefly before continuing, "I’ve asked Dad to put it on the market. I’m not sure what its worth, but it’s a huge house on a good sized piece of property in a prime location, so it will be in the millions. Alan, I could never even begin to spend the kind of money he left me! This is what you want, what we both want. Let me help make it a reality."

He started to speak again, but she cut him off.

"Don’t try to talk me out of it, Alan! Please. I want to do this."

He smiled. "I was just going to say ‘Thanks’. Let me think on it a bit, and we’ll decide what to do about it later."

She nodded. "Okay, that’s fair enough."

But as they tossed dirt on the remaining embers in the fire pits to extinguish them and began gathering up their gear in preparation for their journey, Alan’s mind was already thinking ahead. A lab would be a dream come true for him, something he had never even dared to dream about. For the first time ever, he was offered a chance to work for himself, taking only the directions he wanted to take for the benefit of scientific discovery, and it was Ellie who was making it possible.

-()-

The last thing to be packed was always the sensors and their rods, all of them carefully stored in their case for their use at their next campsite. After they had gathered up their gear, they paused to scan the area for any items that might have been misplaced. Everything appeared to be packed, so Alan made one final check of the pistol before placing it within easy reach in the side pocket of his backpack, then they started walking.

It took nearly an hour to skirt the bluff that had provided them with such a perfect camping site, but eventually they found a saddleback gap over which they could easily pass. The other side was more of the same, many trees and tropical vegetation, all falling close together.

"I’ll be glad when we’re out of this," Ellie complained as she pushed her way through the closely growing fronds. "I’m a little worried that those Dilophosaurus might decide to follow us, and all this foliage would give them excellent cover."

That had been on Alan’s mind as well, and he had kept an ear cocked, listening for the peculiar sounds he had heard them make the previous day. "Well, we haven’t heard any unusual sounds or calls. We didn’t start hearing their vocalizations until late afternoon. Maybe they like to sleep late."

Ellie turned her head to look at him and found him smiling, clearly a joke. "I think we all like to sleep late. I used to when I was younger, but once I had Charlie my peaceful mornings came to a screeching halt. He was a sweet toddler, but he got a lot of colic when he was an infant. I remember one pretty bad bout with it. I walked him all night long, me crying right along with him."

There had been a time when Ellie’s occasional discussions about children had set him on edge, instantly bringing up his defenses to ward off any suggestions that he might be a willing participant, and even now he felt his body tense slightly in automatic reaction. But he knew that was no longer an issue, and felt a twinge of guilt at his physical response. Even if he was not cut out for fatherhood, Ellie obviously loved motherhood, and he understood that she would feel the need to remember and talk about the children she had lost.

"Did that happen very often?" he asked.

"With Charlie, yes. I don’t know why some kids just seem to get it more than others. Thankfully, he eventually outgrew it. Mark wasn’t much help," she added. "He was always arguing with me to hire a nanny to help with the kids, but I was adamantly against it. They were my kids, you know? He provided well for us and he loved the kids, but he believed their upbringing should be someone else’s responsibility. It’s just the way he was raised, I guess."

Alan fondly remembered the time he had spent in a sand pile trying to teach Ellie’s son the difference in the various dinosaurs he was playing with. "Charlie was smart as a whip. He learned quickly what the names of the dinosaurs were, and could pronounce them better than most adults."

"Yes," Ellie smiled tenderly, remembering the same afternoon that Alan was thinking about. "He was such a smart, funny little kid. He liked to try to scare me by climbing out of his bed and hiding in the closet, forcing me to hunt for him. I started figuring it out pretty quick when I would hear this muffled giggling coming from the linen closet. Then I would see that the door was cracked open with this little eye peering out of it. I played the game," she admitted with misty eyes, "even though Mark said I was encouraging it. When I walked toward the door, Charlie would jump out at me and start laughing when I pretended to be scared. He never realized that finding his bed empty was far more frightening to me than him jumping out of the closet. And my beautiful, sweet little girl. She was learning some things from her big brother that I’d rather she hadn’t!"

"Like what?"

"Like how to get into things she shouldn’t. I left them alone in the bedroom just for a few seconds to get something out of the bathroom, and when I got back she had somehow gotten a bottle of my perfume off the vanity and absolutely drenched herself with it. She smelled like Obsession for a week!" She heaved a deep sigh and lowered her eyes to the ground in front of her. "I miss them, Alan. They were such good kids."

He placed his arm around her, drawing her close. "I know." For the briefest of moments, he considered telling her that they would always live in her heart, but that seemed pointless and sappy. The memories could never replace the children she had loved, so he merely gave her a one-armed hug and a kiss on the side of the head meant to convey his understanding.

She took another deep breath, this time to sooth the ache of longing in her heart, and changed the subject. "So, when are you going to look at the footage you shot last night?"

"Not for a while yet. I don’t want to run the batteries any more than necessary, so I’ll just be shooting footage on this trip. I do have an extra battery, but we don’t know how much information is out there needing to be filmed, so I won’t be able to review anything until we get back to the compound."

She had known that would be the answer, but it was the first thing that had popped into her mind to change the subject, but as they fell silent again her thoughts drifted back to her two small children. She still felt sad whenever she thought about them, but she was finding that it was growing easier to remember the good times. Even the bad times, the nightly feedings and bouts of colic, really didn’t seem that bad. She would have gladly gone through it all again, and so much more, just to have them back. But that was not possible. It was time to look to the future, a future she knew would include Alan Grant.

-()-

As they continued to push their way through the dense foliage, sometimes single file, sometimes side by side, Ellie remained alert to Alan’s demeanor. She had always been well-tuned to his moods, but ever since coming to the island she felt she was growing more attuned to his body language than ever before. Most likely, this was because they were together so much without outside involvement. It was just the two of them.

Most people found Alan Grant to be a unique and enigmatic individual who rarely opened up to others. Few people had ever gotten to know him as she did, and he bared his soul to her in ways that he never had with anyone else, except probably his late wife. It was with this knowledge of him and his moods that she kept an observant eye turned his direction at all times for that was the best way to gauge the level of danger that they were in. He had promised to keep her informed if the danger level increased, but she also knew he was cautious; he would want to be sure before alarming her.

For the time being, at least, he seemed relaxed and comfortable. Occasionally he glanced over his shoulder as if verifying that they were not being followed, or he peered into the jungle’s undergrowth with alert eyes or searched the treetops for native species, but there was no indication of any particular concern.

It wasn’t until late in the afternoon that Alan’s demeanor changed. They had paused for a rest stop and a water break after navigating a rather steep grade, and she noticed a strangely thoughtful frown had passed across his ruggedly handsome face, now bristling with a four day old beard.

Instantly she thought of the Dilophosaurus and felt a sense of alarm work its way into her stomach.

"Listen," he whispered before she could speak.

She cocked her head in concentration, listening intently to the jungle sounds, but for several moments she heard only the cicadas, birds, and other normal creatures that made up the continuous wall of sound that she had grown accustomed to. She shook her head slightly, marveling that Alan’s hearing was so great that he could detect things she couldn’t, but then, her concentration finally managed to single out a different sound from the others, one she had heard before; the chittering sounds that were unmistakably dinosaur. She understood then that it wasn’t so much that his hearing was better than hers, merely his ability to concentrate on the individual sounds in the jungle, and isolate them for closer scrutiny.

"Compies?" she whispered back.

He nodded. "They seem excited, like they’ve got something cornered." He listened a moment longer, then reached into his backpack for the camera. "Let’s have a look."

Ellie gave him a wilting look, less enthusiastic at the idea of seeing some helpless creature being torn to bits and devoured by the pack of diminutive predators. However, they were on a fact-finding expedition, and that mean observing the bad along with the good, so she stood up to wait as he turned on the camera and checked the battery level.

Suddenly, without warning, an alarming scream resounded through the jungle, so very near and so very much like the scream of a woman that the hair prickled on the back of Ellie’s neck. With wide eyes, she whirled toward the sound, then looked back at Alan. He was on his feet now, his attention focused on the direction of the scream.

"What the hell?" he said. Shoving the camera back into the pack, he exchanged it for the pistol and quickly released the safety. "Get your mace," he instructed, securing the shock prod on his belt. Then, abandoning the rest of his gear he rushed into the jungle toward the scream with Ellie on his heels, her can of mace clutched tightly in her hand.

Shoving the drooping fronds and branches aside and protecting his face with upraised arms, Alan rushed blindly through the dense foliage, something he rarely did on this island. The danger of running headlong into a large predator was always a risk, but he was confident that would not be the case this time. The only predators nearby at this moment were the compies, and his need to reach their intended victim spurred him on. Behind him, he could hear Ellie keeping pace, knocking aside the fronds and limbs that snapped back toward her as he pushed through them.

But as he neared the area where the compies could still be heard, he prudently slowed his pace, deciding it was better to assess the situation before rushing in. When he reached the area of the attack, he finally stopped and parted the foliage with his hands, observing the small clearing just on the other side.

It was not a woman.

Realistically, he would have been very surprised if it had been, but he still felt a sense of relief wash over him at the visual confirmation that no curious or adventuresome humans had evaded the radar in search of living fossils.

Instead, it was a sloth that had apparently attracted the attention of a band of hungry compies during one of its rare trips to the ground. Alan’s knowledge of the sloth was limited, only slightly greater than that of the average individual, for this was a species to which he had not devoted much study. He did know that they lived most of their lives in the treetops, coming to the ground only rarely to relieve themselves or to change trees, and he suspected the latter in this case, for it had been caught between trees and was completely surrounded by the chittering, bouncing compies that had not yet worked up the courage to go in for the kill.

As he and Ellie watched, the sloth took a surprisingly hard swipe at the nearest of the compies with its clawed front foot, sending three of the offending dinosaurs rolling snout over tail in the moist soil. Slightly bloodied from the encounter, the tiny creatures jumped up and shook themselves off, then backed up a bit, inspiring the rest of the pack to retreat several yards to regroup. The ones on the other side of the sloth temporarily rejoined the band, apparently seeking the safety of their numbers.

With its path to the tree clear, the incredibly slow mammal lumbered toward it. Any other animals would have easily made an escape at this time, but Ellie and Alan knew that the sloth was unlike any other creature on earth. Had its metabolism been that of other mammals, it could have probably scurried to the tree with ease, but its bland diet of leaves that were severely deficient in nutrition created movements that were slow and deliberate, making it very vulnerable.

Realizing that their prey was escaping, the band of compies spread out again, surrounding the sloth. With another startlingly human cry of alarm, it took another swipe at the little predators, expending valuable energy, but this time its defensive strike came up short and the nearest compies jumped back out of the way. They had learned respect for those claws and to anticipate the defensive maneuver. It turned its strange looking head and moved in a slow circle, trying to keep an eye on the lizard-like creatures that had surrounded it. One compy bravely sneaked up behind it and attempted a bite on its posterior, but secured only a mouthful of long algae covered hair. Feeling the tug on its hair, it turned around and took another swipe with its paw.

Ellie looked away, understanding that it was only a matter of time before the sloth was too exhausted to continue the struggle. "I can’t watch this," she said grimly. "This has nothing to do with survival of the fittest in a natural environment, only a native species being obliterated by an introduced species. It has no chance at all."

Alan glanced at her as she moved back a few yards, where she would not have to witness the event. Then he turned back to the sloth’s desperate struggle for survival in an unnaturally hostile environment and felt sympathy for it. The sloth’s only natural predator should have been the jaguar, which they had not yet seen on this island, another species apparently wiped out by the dinosaurs. In any native environment, Alan would never interfere with nature, and he wasn’t even certain if it was proper to do so now, but he made a snap decision, the one he knew Ellie wanted him to make.

Withdrawing the shock prod, he activated it and moved toward the crowd of compies. The attention of the ones that were facing him instantly went from the sloth to him, clearly wondering if he was a larger predator or if another meal had just walked into their midst. The others, for the moment, were unaware of him.

Extending the prod toward the first one he came to, he gave it a mild jolt to the tail. The tiny creature shrieked and leaped several feet into the air before it scurried into the brush. Several of the pack members abandoned the sloth and followed it. The others waited uncertainly. They chattered and chirped, and a few jumped up and down or pawed at the ground with their back feet, gestures Alan interpreted as uncertainty and aggression. They were tentative about him, and could not decide whether to stand firm or flee.

Alan shocked a second one with the same result, and again several more followed it. However, most of the band continued to stand their ground. They were particularly stubborn, and had obviously never seen a human before. Throwing out his arms in an abrupt gesture, he leaped toward them with a shout, and this time they scattered in all directions.

The sloth, seeing its chance, lumbered to the tree and began to climb. When it was high enough to be safe from the compies, Alan turned to find Ellie smiling at him, ample reward for his interference.

"You’re a softy," she accused as he joined her.

"It was that scream," he said in defense of his actions. "It sounded so human-like. Unfortunately, by saving the sloth, some other creature out there will probably die."

Ellie hadn’t thought of that, but hoped that might not be the case. "Maybe they will be able to scavenge off an already existing kill."

He chuckled softly. "You’re a hopeless optimist."

"I can’t deny that," she agreed. She paused a moment to watch the sloth as it slowly picked its way up the tree into safety regions. "Thanks, Alan."

"Well," he replied, following her gaze. "I’m afraid that was terribly unprofessional of me, but I’m glad it’s safe, at least until the next time it comes to the ground." He placed his arm across her shoulders and drew her closer for a quick hug. "Let’s retrieve our gear before some curious monkey decides to carry it off."

They moved out of the small open space and back into the denser areas of the jungle.

Behind them, the band of compies slowly filtered back into the clearing. Spreading out, they investigated the area, searching for indications that their prey was nearby. It was gone, safely up the tree and out of reach.

Regrouping, the compies turned in the direction where the two humans had gone, their sharp ears detecting the hushed conversation. After several minutes of indecision, the band’s leader moved into the jungle, following the voices.

-()-

Their gear was still on the ground where they had left it, so they collected it and resumed their journey.

They were still traveling down the mountainside at an angle, rather than straight down. The broad, vegetated slopes were often too gradual to be noticed, other times so steep that it was necessary to go out of their intended route to find a spot more easily traversed. Alan referred to the map occasionally, selecting a route that would take them out of the trees, and as they neared to the valley, the low growing, thick grouping of trees and shrubs finally gave way to open spaces, where visibility was better in all directions.

"I thought going downhill would be easier than this!" Ellie panted when they stopped to rest at the bottom of a steep grade. The ground was made of loose gravel and imbedded boulders, and after shedding her gear to take a breather, she dropped to the ground and untied her shoe to remove the pebble that had somehow found its way inside.

"Just wait until we start uphill to cross the next mountain range!" Alan said with a wry smile. Like her, he placed his gear on the ground, but instead of sitting down, he placed his hand on his hip and leaned his body backward, stretching out the stiffness in his back from carrying the heavy pack.

Ellie froze, holding her shoe upside down as the pebble tumbled onto the hard ground. Her expression of consternation at his casual comment was enough to make him laugh with amusement.

"I’m teasing you," he told her. "There is a gap through the mountain ahead of us that will be easier to navigate than going up and over. We’ve learned that the dinosaurs are not in the highest elevations, so there’s really no point in wasting our energy by climbing when there is an easier way to go. Once we get onto the valley floor, we’ll be nearing one of the places where we dropped off food and supplies. Tomorrow, we will hopefully reach that box canyon I told you about."

"That’s the place that will be our home base for a few days?"

"Yes. It’s tucked nicely between the mountain ranges, a little south of us, so I’m hopeful that we’ll see some species there."

She put her shoe back on and tied the laces, then they resumed their hike, moving along an easier grade. By the time the long shadows of late evening began to stretch out in front of them, they were most of the way down a gradual incline, moving toward the lush valley that was nestled between the two mountain ranges, and still they had not found a good spot to make camp.

The sun was sinking below the mountain peaks behind them when Alan withdrew the map from the pocket of his backpack and stopped to examine it in the waning light. Ellie stopped beside him to wait, her eyes scanning the terrain that surrounded them.

From the gently sloping ground on which they stood, she could see the valley stretching out below, a long wide flat area with open fields and forests scattered throughout. Beyond it in the distance was the next mountain range, and she could easily see the gap through which they would travel. If all went well, they would be on the valley floor by noon the next day.

Turning her attention back to Alan, she knew he was searching for a suitable location to spend the night, and she also knew from his expression that the news was not good. After the dangerous encounter with the Dilophosaurus the night before, she felt very apprehensive about the growing darkness and the possible absence of a sheltered area in which to set up camp.

Alan folded up the map again and returned it to the zippered pocket. Then his gaze settled on her. "I had hoped to reach the valley before setting up camp, but the sun will be down before we could reach the bottom and I sure don’t want to try to get down these slopes in the dark." He indicated a spot behind them and to the right. "The ground is level over there, so let’s get the sensors in place and get a fire going."

She nodded silently, and even though she voiced no verbal objection, he understood what she must have been felling.

"We’ve been lucky so far," he said, regretfully, "but I guess we both knew we wouldn’t always have something solid at our backs."

"I had hoped," she replied as she trudged toward the flatter area.

When they reached it, she lowered her gear to the ground, feeling terribly exposed. With the exception of a few shrubs scattered about, there was absolutely nothing around them except the gently sloping, rocky ground. There were no trees or boulders; they were totally in the open.

Somberly, they measured out the proper distance and set up the sensors, for the first time forming a complete ring around them. The mechanism was then tested and determined to be working properly.

"Let’s set up three campfires, forming a triangle around us," Alan suggested. "That should give us a little extra protection. You start making the fire pits while I collect enough wood to keep them going."

"Okay. Just don’t go too far, okay?"

He heard the concern in her voice, and he nodded as he retrieved the small hand ax from his pack. "I won’t," he promised.

Moving away from her, he passed through one of the sensors as he searched for downed trees and brush to fuel their fires, and after flinching at the sound of it, Ellie reached over to silence the alarm. Alan collected some wood in the form of broken tree parts and shrubs that over time had been slowly moving down the slopes, pushed by rainstorms and wind. They were carried back into camp, cut into manageable pieces, and stacked on the ground within easy reach. It was getting darker by now, and even though it was not as much wood as he wanted, he was forced to give up the search, reluctant to get caught outside the protective barrier in the dark.

They prepared all three campfires, but only lit one, saving the others in the event they were needed. Then, after preparing peanut butter sandwiches, they spread their blankets out on the ground. But as they lay down on their blankets and settled in for the night, neither saw the small glittering eyes that watched from just beyond the reach of the campfire’s flickering light.