Catastrophe

twelve

• 12 •

Claire Dearing: "So, now what do we do?"

Owen Grady: "Probably stay together. For survival."

— Jurassic World

•••

AS SOON AS THE GROUP ENTERED THE VISITATION CENTRE, which had turned into a makeshift hospital, people approached them with blankets and bandages and whisked them off to get checked out. A nurse examined a few of the gashes Liana had acquired all over her face, arms, and legs, and pulled her away to clean her up. She turned around and saw that Zach and Gray were getting pulled away too, but by their aunt.

Zach turned around to meet Liana's eyes. He raised his hand as if to say 'goodbye' and smiled at her. She smiled weakly at him before the nurse tugged her into the crowd and she lost sight of him.

Liana let out a hiss as the nurse dabbed some rubbing alcohol on a particularly large cut on her forearm.

"Sorry 'bout that," the nurse said.

"It's okay." Liana was more focused on looking for her family. Once she sat down and fully took in the fact that she was safe, a different type of panic set in and she felt helpless all over again. The last time she had seen her family had been hours ago, when she left them and ran into Zach and Gray. She hadn't seen them in the chaos before Zara was killed, and she was yet to spot them in the visitation centre. She didn't want to think of the worst case scenario, but her mind couldn't help but wander.

She was craning her neck and turning around to try and see any of her family members, but to no avail. The nurse, however, noticed her squirming, and set down her bottle of rubbing alcohol.

"What's wrong?" The nurse asked, raising an eyebrow.

"I, uh, I haven't seen my family since, well, yesterday, I guess," she said, taking note of how the sun was beginning to rise outside.

"I'm sure they're in here somewhere," the nurse smiled. "I'll send you over to the front once you're all patched up. That's where most people have been finding their parents."

Liana nodded, but she still had this sinking feeling in her stomach. The nurse was placing butterfly stitches on a small cut on her cheek when she heard a familiar voice, and she felt as if the weight of the world had been lifted off her shoulders.

"Lia!" Her little sister Ryleigh was running towards her, and her parents and her brother Daniel were close behind.

Liana hopped off the table she was sitting on, quickly thanking the nurse but not caring about whether or not she still had wounds or scratches that needed to be attended to. Her little siblings reached her first and threw their arms around her waist. She bent down and hugged them back, tears streaming down her face.

"I'm so glad you guys are okay, I'm so sorry," she said.

Her parents reached her next and pulled her tight. Her father was holding back tears, though her mother was openly sobbing.

"Liana, I-I thought you had died, we were so worried," her mom said, clutching Liana's face in her hands.

"I'm sorry I scared you, but I'm okay, I promise. I'm okay," she said. "I'm so sorry."

She and her mom hugged one another and cried into each other's shoulders for a few moments before they both calmed down.

As the Clarke family reunited and sipped on hot chocolate, a voice came over the PA system and announced that ferries would be slowly but surely taking everyone back to the mainland, and that more were arriving.