At the main street, there was a petting zoo that housed several different kinds of baby plant-eating dinosaurs such as Apatosaurus, Gallimimus, Stegosaurus, to Parasaurolophus, even the three horned Triceratops. Many little kids were riding, petting, and even hugging the dinos. Zara had taken Zach and Gray to look and pet the young reptiles; Gray was trying to get a good look at the infants but was stuck behind a crowd of people and couldn't see them.
"Zach, lift me up. I can't see!" he said.
"I'm not Dad. And you're not five." said his older brother.
"I can still ride the Triceratops. I'm 47-and-a-half inches." said Gray climbing up on a bench to get a better view.
Zach just rolled his eyes.
"This place is for little kids." he said.
"Yeah, I know." replied Gray. "You wanna ride the spinning dinosaur eggs?"
"Nope." said Zach looking at Zara.
She was busy talking on the phone and not paying attention to the boys, this gave Zach an idea.
"Gray." he said.
"Yea?" replied Gray.
"Run." said Zach.
"Huh?"
"Quick, scatter. Go! Go, go!" said Zach urging him forward.
The two boys ran off ditching Zara and disappeared into the large crowd in the main street. They didn't stop till they were sure they had lost Zara. They were passing by the Carnotaurus exhibit when they heard the announcement for the midsized theropod.
"The next Carnotaurus feeding show will begin in 2 minutes." said the announcement.
This got Gray very hyped up.
"ZACH COME ON!!!" he shouted. "The Carnotaurus lets go!"
"Okay I'm coming!" said Zach.
"Come on hurry up!" said Gray.
"I am, chill out bro." said Zach.
"Parents beware, this show may be disturbing for smaller children." said the announcement.
The two entered a big gate that had big bold letters spelling out "Carnotaurus Forest" at the top of the gate. The pen had walls made of stone that were around 13 feet tall with glass windows around 10 inches thick. Inside the pen were several trees around 40 feet tall with several small berry bushes growing on the ground. 20 feet away from the glass windows was a sheep chained up to a small pole, it was grazing on a small patch of grass. Zach and Gray stared through the window looking for the killer along with several other people.
"Where is it?" asked Gray excitedly.
Just then there was a loud hissing roar, everyone turned around to where the roar came from.
"Over there!" said a random person pointing at some sort of animal.
The animal stood about 10 feet tall and 25 feet long. Its color was mostly grey but had red all over its back, it had a short snout with sharp teeth sticking out of the upper jaw, two stubby horns above its eyes, tiny arms on its chest, and many small bumps running down its back.
"Zach look, the Carnotaurus!" said Gray pointing at the animal.
"I know I see it." said Zach
The sheep started panicking and tried to run away, but had no luck thanks to the chain leash on its neck. The Carnotaurus raised its head up and then lunged down biting the poor sheep on the head. The Carno's strong jaws crushed the sheep's skull killing it. Some of the people watching turned away or shielded their eyes from the grossness while others clapped and cheered for the carnivore's successful kill.
"Okay, that was pretty cool." said Zach.
Just then he heard his phone go off. Zack looked at the screen and saw it was their mom calling, he answered the call.
"Hey mom." said Zach.
Their mom was at work and was calling from her office.
"You were supposed to call me when you landed." she said. "Are you having fun?"
"Yeah, I guess." replied Zach.
His mom could hear the Carno eating through the phone.
"What's that munching noise?" she asked.
"Oh we're watching the Carno...........saurus?" said Zach asking Gray how to pronounce the name.
"CarnoTAURus." said Gray.
"The Carnotaurus feeding show." finished Zach. "Aunt Claire gave us passes so we don't have to wait in line."
"Wait, wait. She's not with you!?" she said a bit surprised.
She suddenly hung up on Zach.
"Mom, mom?" said Zach confused.
Elsewhere on the island, Claire was driving in a small car on her way to the raptor paddock. She was humming to herself when her phone began to vibrate. She looked to see her sister/Zach and Gray's mom calling, she decided to put her phone on speaker to talk to her sibling while driving at the same time.
"Hey, Karen!" said Claire.
"Hi, Claire. How's it going?" said Karen.
"Yeah, everything's great. The boys are having fun. Everyone's... Yeah, everyone's good." said Claire through Karen's phone.
"Really? Because I just hung up with Zach and he said that you weren't even with them." said Karen.
Claire sighed.
"Yeah, look. Today turned out to be a really bad day for Me." she said. "They're in great hands. They're with my assistant. She's British, so, like, they invented nannies."
Claire chuckled a bit but then thought she heard Karen crying.
"Wait, are you crying?" she asked.
She was.
"This was supposed to be a family weekend, Claire." she said. "You haven't seen the boys in forever. And I know how Zach will treat Gray if they're by themselves. And he can just be so mean."
"Okay, I'm sorry." said Claire. "Tomorrow, I'm gonna spend the entire day with them. I'll take off work and I will not leave their side. I promise."
"Well, a promise tomorrow is worth a lot less than trying today." said Karen.
"Oh boy, you're using Mom's lines now?" said Claire in a joking way.
"Damn right I am." replied Karen. "They actually work you know. You'll see when you have kids."
"Yea, "IF"." said Claire.
"'WHEN'." said Karen.
Claire had arrived at the raptor pen.
"Alright, I gotta go now. I'll talk to you latter." she said.
"Bye Claire." sighed Karen.
"Bye." replied Claire.
The two of them hung up their phones and Claire got out of her car. Owen was talking to Dr. Grant.
"Anyhow that's how they hired Me." said Owen finishing a story.
"Ahem." said a voice.
Everyone looked over to see Claire.
"Well, well." said Owen smiling. "Look who it is."
"Mr. Grady?" said Claire.
"Please, call me Owen." he said.
"Owen, yes. Is Dr. Grant with you?" asked Claire.
"They need me?" asked Grant.
"Actually I need both you and Owen." said Claire.
"Dr. Grant, Billy, Ian, this is Claire Dearing." said Owen.
Claire shook hands with the three of them.
"I need one of you and Owen to come take a look at something." replied Claire.
Grant was getting confused.
"Wait, what do you mean? Is there another kind of dinosaur Masrani wanted me to inspect?" he asked.
"Yes actually. A new species we've made." replied Claire. "Masrani thought that since you're an expert on dinosaurs you could enlighten us on the creature."
"You just went and made a new dinosaur?" asked Ian.
Yeah, it's kind of what we do here." said Claire. "The exhibit opens to the public in three weeks. Mr. Masrani wanted you two to evaluate the paddock for vulnerabilities."
"Hold on, I get why you need Grant, Billy, or Ian but why do you need me?" asked Owen.
I guess Mr. Masrani thinks, since you're able to control the raptors..." Claire was interrupted.
"It's all about control with you." sighed Owen. "I don't control the raptors, it's a relationship. It's based on mutual respect."
"Right." said Claire rolling her eyes.
"Excuse me uhhh, Claire is it?" asked Grant.
"Yes." she said.
"About your new dinosaur, what exactly is it made of?" he asked.
"The base genome is a T. Rex, the rest is classified." said Claire.
"You mean you don't even know what it's made of?" joked Ian.
"The lab delivers us finished assets, and we show them to the public. Thank you." said Claire a bit annoyed. "Can we just focus on the main topic, please?"
"Look, we get it." said Owen. "You're in charge out here. You gotta make a lot of tough decisions. It's probably easier to pretend these animals are just numbers on a spreadsheet. But they're not. They're alive."
"I'm fully aware they're alive." said Claire.
"You might have made them in a test tube, but they don't know that." said Owen.
"He's right." said Billy. "These are aggressive living things that have no idea what century they're living in and will defend themselves. Violently, if necessary."
Claire sighed getting more and more annoyed.
"Dr. Grant would you like to be the one to come with me and Owen?" she asked.
"Alright." he said. "I am quite curious on what it looks like."
"What about us?" asked Billy.
"Mr. Masrani would like you to head back to the visitor center and tell him what you think of the raptors."
"So it looks like I'll meet up with you boys latter I suppose." said Grant.
"Guess so." said Billy.
"We'll see you later Dr. Grant." said Ian.
Owen and Grant got into Claire's car to check out the new dinosaur while Eddie took Billy and Ian back to the main visitor center.