Ripper: An Indoraptor Story ✓

Highway

About a half hour had passed before the sounds of another intersecting highway roared in my ears. Except this one seemed more alive than the one I trekked upon. In spite of the pain and the anguish I had endured, enough curiosity bestowed on me allowed a chance to examine what laid waiting in the distance. I lifted my head to stare downwards a few meters away from a long bridge where numerous cars of all sizes dashed willingly across the vast desert horizon. Some of them drove to the right, heading to the clear blue skies ahead where the end of the world laid waiting. Another group drove left, slow and calm unlike the others while a dark storm brewed in the distance of their destination.

The sights were overwhelming enough, for I'd never seen an interstate so close to my location. Then again, I didn't really see its purpose so much as to watch and listen for the beeps, howls, and rumbling noise given off by the cars. Nearby this highway were three signs my eyes had picked up, flapping in the storm winds with their green reflectors glowing brightly. But it was dim enough for me to see, and being an indoraptor I was lucky enough to read it in the human language.

"Sacramento and San Diego, California," I muttered, sniffing the first pointed sign from afar with a sigh. I looked in its direction, realizing it headed right back from where I had escaped from. I didn't believe Wu could be hiding there where a population of a million humans or more could reside. In fact, if this were to happen I would've never found him in time- or a quite unlucky scenario- become the center of a human conflict.

I glanced at the other sign and sniffed it in surprise, seeing how the road moved south toward the blazing sunlight afar.

"Tahoe National Forest," I grunted before snorting, knowing that I'll find nothing there besides a few tasty morsels and wild mammals hunting about. Besides, I knew that a person like Wu wouldn't hide in a forest, for I would've killed him easily. But there was a third sign heading in the same path as the first, but instead, the road of its path curled diagonally towards the raging storm cloud in the distance.

"Palo Alto, California," I whispered.

I felt an odd feeling grow inside me when I mentioned this place. It was old like the others, but rather than being still a working area, the InGen company there was abandoned for years. But it wasn't significant because of its demise, or it's downfall thereafter the first Jurassic Park. It was significant because of an old faint memory, a past life that sank into my bones and clouded my charred lungs.

I was born there.

A sharp bark, not that of a dog or of a person, pierced the air, and not a moment later a quick whiz swished by my snout, startling the once quiet atmosphere I had previously invaded. The gunshots, as I quickly realized, rented the still country air - too powerful to be a backfiring car or a crash on its own. The noise reverberated into my eardrums, reminding me of the danger I was still in ever since I left Colfax. Though there wasn't any need to worry or tremble; I didn't need to guess a thousand times to know who it belonged to.

Large black cars and trucks tore up the dusty landscape in the distance as they surfaced onto the true blackened asphalt a mile away, screeching and growling as they slowly sped toward me on the rippling horizon. I stood still, watching in awe as more bullets flew past me, interested in seeing how desperate these men were by going so far outside their limits to kill me, even when their numbers were significantly low.

But for the first time in days, the humans had successfully put me in a conflicted position, for when I turned around with a small smirk more gunshots sounded from the opposite side of the bridge as two more black trucks thundered toward me with their eyes blazing.

They don't give up! I snarled in annoyance, backing up and wincing as some of the black stones skimmed my flesh, when will they learn?