Beep—beep!
Night had draped its heavy shroud over the land, and faint lights flickered amidst the dense forest.
Claire had managed to locate one of BioSyn's outposts built within the ecological zone. Its exterior bore a rough resemblance to a mushroom, and its purpose... well, it was presumably meant for monitoring and scanning dinosaurs.
Rustle...
A sudden disturbance rippled through the trees, the faint rustle of leaves... Perhaps some small creature?
Electric whir…
A motorized access ladder extended from the outpost, slowly descending toward the ground. Claire cautiously moved toward the ladder, weaponless, scanning her surroundings with high vigilance.
"Hoot... hoot..."
An owl's call echoed from the tree canopy, and right alongside it came a soft, whimpering sound, much like a puppy.
Claire halted in her tracks.
It was a Dilophosaurus.
According to the records from the old park, they used venom to paralyze their prey before swallowing them alive and whole.
The range of that venom far exceeded expectations and almost always found its mark in the victim's eyes, so much so that Hammond had gone to the trouble of installing multiple decontamination stations so that employees accidentally hit by the venom could flush it out immediately to prevent lifelong blindness.
A curious, daring Dilophosaurus approached Claire like an ugly yet strangely cute puppy. She had no choice but to slowly back away. Wait, should she close her eyes right now?
No, that would be even more dangerous; a Dilophosaurus's venom could also paralyze a victim's muscles to a certain degree. Just one hit, and she'd be a goner.
"Hiss..."
The Dilophosaurus's frill flared open abruptly! Revealing a gorgeous yet lethal pattern!
Here it comes! Here it comes!
"Kak..."
The Dilophosaurus opened its jaws as wide as possible, only to let out a weak, dying wheeze as if its breath had suddenly given out.
Owen lunged forward, clamping a firm grip directly around its venom sacs! Forcing its mouth shut. Thick, black liquid dribbled down the corners of the creature's jaw, though fortunately, Owen was wearing his protective wrist guards.
Electrical crackle.
Kayla timed it perfectly, thrusting a cattle prod against the Dilophosaurus. Outnumbered and outmatched, the creature could only let out a pitiful squeal before bolting back into the safety of the woods.
"Oh god, I thought you were dead..."
Claire lunged forward, throwing her arms around Owen in a tight embrace, prompting him to briefly recall that helpless feeling he'd experienced when facing the Indominus rex.
"Uh... you two, it looks like this isn't over yet."
Claire pulled back from Owen, and he removed his venom-stained gloves, turning alongside her to follow Kayla's gaze.
It was still a Dilophosaurus... Except that it stood nearly a full story tall, perhaps even exceeding the height of a two-story building.
It simply stood there, quietly looking down at the three of them, its massive form seemingly melting into the obsidian night. Only its bright pupils, emitting a faint luminescence in the dark, offered a glimpse of its true contour.
"Shit..."
They'd run into the real deal... and a hyper-scaled individual at that.
Yet the creature didn't seem the least bit hurried, locked in a standoff with the trio for quite a while without making a single aggressive move.
Suddenly, it raised its head and sniffed the air twice as if catching onto something, then decisively melted back into the brush.
Its silhouette was slender and graceful.
"Fooo…"
The three of them let out a collective breath, but... what on earth had scared the Dilophosaurus off?
Thud...
The ground abruptly began to tremor, the epicenter dangerously close to where they stood!
Carlo dropped his stealthy, creeping routine and stood tall in the dead of night, his towering frame making the surrounding deep forest look diminutive by comparison.
Thud...
"ROAR—!"
His massive footfalls slammed into the earth, leaving behind a gaping crater. He threw his head back toward a distant building in the distance, loosing a long, defiant roar!
The humans had tried to stop his arrival, but he had come anyway.
Having just endured the shockwave of Carlo's previous roar and suffering from ringing ears, Owen had only one thought running through his mind:
"Why is it always you?"
The human structures glowed resplendently beneath the night sky. The floodlights could illuminate the darkness, but they couldn't cast enough light to diminish his colossal form.
He pressed forward. The perimeter fences were smashed aside as if made of mere paper, and the idea of tripping him was nothing short of a delusional pipe dream.
Beep—beep—beep!
Alarms and warning lights wailed in frantic unison, echoing across the entire Paleontological Medical and Monitoring Center, echoing across all of BioSyn.
Red emergency lights flickered on and off, finally allowing people a clear glimpse of the titan's terrifying visage.
Bang, bang, bang, bang!
The last remaining security detail of BioSyn marched out onto the open clearing, forming a single-file line as they raised their rifles and opened fire on Carlo.
When the red warning lights dipped into darkness, they couldn't even make out the giant's silhouette, seeing only the continuous flash of muzzle fire erupting in the gloom.
When the red lights flared back on, they saw the colossal beast standing firm and unshakable, the bullets couldn't even scratch his hide.
Beep—beep—beep...
The alarms were forcefully cut. Power to the entire Paleontological Medical and Monitoring Center was abruptly severed, plunging the lights and sirens into silence, leaving behind only the chaotic symphony of gunfire.
That was just Dodgson still trying desperately to cover his tracks.
Bang, bang, bang, bang…
As the gunfire finally sputtered to an end, the security personnel dropped their weapons in a dazed stupor, letting a heavy, suffocating silence reclaim the night.
The dinosaurs kept captive here had been startled awake by the commotion. Dodgson frequently intercepted foreign dinosaurs at airports under various pretexts, and this so-called "Medical Center" was actually the primary site used to house, research, and plagiarize foreign cloning technologies.
That was precisely why, among all the world's superpowers, only BioSyn had managed to acquire complete dinosaur genetic sequences.
Perhaps their internal R&D technology was only mediocre, but their ability to work backward from the answers was world-class.
Metal tearing sound…
One of the security guards felt a shift in the vibrations rippling through the dark. He remembered the direction of that sound... It used to be a vehicle?
Boom!
A deafening explosion echoed across the surroundings! Flames soared into the night sky, instantly flooding the Paleontological Medical Center with artificial light once more!
"ROAR!"
Carlo didn't need light to see things in the dark, though it wasn't the clearest view, he needed to make some noise to wake these dinosaurs up... or rather, to terrify them into action.
Thwack!
His massive tail swept across cage after cage. The captive dinosaurs inside instinctively slammed into their enclosures, only to find that the previously impenetrable doors shattered apart with the lightest touch.
More fortunate still were those whose iron cages had their bars literally ripped apart by Carlo's jaws, leaving them crouching in the corners of their cells, too paralyzed with fear to even twitch.
The ones in the plaza were dealt with... Next came the ones inside the building.
Thud...
The underground cavern vibrated violently out of nowhere, and fine clouds of stone dust drifted down from the cracks overhead, sending a chill straight down Grant and his companions' spines.
The transit train they had been riding had been halted, forcing them to disembark with torches in hand, desperately trying to find an exit from the cavern where they had been stranded.
"This tremor... could that be him?"
"Are you talking about... him?"
"What on earth are you two talking about?"
Grant and Maisie launched into an encrypted conversation that only true dinosaur enthusiasts could comprehend, leaving Dr. Sattler completely baffled.
"Hiss-roar—"
Suddenly! Dimetrodon erupted from the dark caverns with piercing screeches, scrambling wildly out of the tunnels, thoroughly terrified by the earthquake.
"Oh, what the—!"
Help! The air conditioning is killing people!
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This fanfic is now complete! If you want to read the whole story ahead of everyone else, head over here ——— pa-tre-on.c-om/AlexandrusTL [remove the hyphen for normal access]