Carlo lay lazily on the ground, basking in the sun and savoring a peaceful afternoon.
He cast a secretive glance at the nearby mother Parasaurolophus. She seemed to have thinned out quite a bit from the strain of incubation, though it was equally likely she was just terrified by the fact that he was constantly looming over her.
He stood up, "borrowed" a cluster of leaves from a nearby tree, and carried them over in his mouth to drop them in front of her. To avoid spooking her further, Carlo pointedly avoided eye contact.
Perhaps because she had grown accustomed to his presence, the mother Parasaurolophus didn't panic as he approached, though her body tensed instinctively. Once Carlo dropped the leaves and retreated to his spot to feign sleep, she hesitated for a long moment before finally lowering her head to eat.
It seemed that from this moment on, a strange sort of harmony had formed between the two dinosaurs.
Not long after, Carlo felt something nudging his cheek.
Is it her? Has she finally gathered the courage to get close?
Carlo opened his eyes to find the Parasaurolophus calf standing before him. Seeing him awake, it let out a cheerful chirp and nudged him twice more, as if saying: I'm hungry, where's the food?
Oh, right. She's already dead.
Carlo sat up and shook his groggy head. He had grown used to sleeping curled in a semi-circle, mainly because a group of tiny Parasaurolophus hatchlings loved to huddle against his side for warmth.
It had been three days since the little ones hatched. Every day, Carlo would chew up leaves to feed them, but since he wasn't a natural herbivore, his ability to pulp greenery was limited. The hatchlings seemed to realize this; survival instinct had pushed them to develop their own chewing abilities rapidly. By this morning, they were already tucking in before Carlo could even process their "meal" for them.
Before fully standing, Carlo carefully checked his immediate surroundings. He had nearly crushed one of them once, with his footpad practically hovering over it. Luckily, he had been treading lightly so as not to wake them, or that little one would have been "deceased" for real.
Honestly, the fact that these little guys had survived this long was a testament to their sheer luck.
Fortunately, this time the hatchlings were all huddled in the hollow beneath Carlo's neck, well out of the way of his feet.
Carlo looked down from his towering height at the calf begging for food. He considered whether he should teach her to forage for herself as he plucked another branch from a tree that was already looking suspiciously bald.
Wait, she was raised by the mother Parasaurolophus. She definitely knows how to find food.
He dropped the leaves on the ground, and the calf immediately scrambled over to feast. The hatchlings, noticing the commotion, woke up from their nap and descended upon the leaves like a tiny, voracious army.
Carlo hunkered down again, watching the little things and thinking he ought to give them names, otherwise the readers would never keep them straight.
Emmm... first, the calf that came from the mother Parasaurolophus. I'll call you "Kid." The others I raised myself... I'll just call you the "Toddlers."
Wait, does that make me the "Uncle"? Whatever. I'm sending them off eventually anyway, so these names will do for now.
Once the "Toddlers" had finished eating, Carlo herded them and the "Kid" toward a small den, the former territory of the Simosuchus that the Indominus rex had snacked on earlier.
Turning his gaze toward a Stegosaurus drinking by the Great Lake, Carlo let out a soft huff.
Hey, Stego-bro. Keep an eye on the kids for me while I go grab some lunch, yeah?
Carlo gave a low roar as a greeting and then departed. The Stegosaurus looked back, wondering when that goofy kid had grown so large, and why he still insisted on roaring at nothing all the time.
…
"There it is again... that buzzing sound."
Brooklynn pushed through the thicket, pressing steadily toward the Great Lake.
Earlier, while scouting for shelter materials, she had heard an unusual noise and followed it to find a patch of frozen flowers. But when she tried to lead the others back to see it, the frozen flora had mysteriously vanished.
Now that she heard the sound again, she wasn't about to let it go. She was determined to get to the bottom of the weird occurrences on this island, seemingly forgetting that she was supposed to be in survival mode.
She wasn't being entirely reckless, though. A GPS tracker she'd scavenged in the park showed an active signal coming from the Primeval Ecological Zone. After consulting with Darius, she had mapped out a relatively safe route.
Do dinosaurs really just hang out peacefully at the Great Lake?
Rustle...
Stepping out of the brush and onto the grassy plain, she took in the sight. The Great Lake was no longer the bustling spectacle it once was; only the Brachiosaurus family and a few scattered stragglers remained. Even so, the sheer scale of the place was breathtaking for a first-time visitor.
"Darius... you were being way too modest."
Brooklynn stood frozen. If Isla Nublar was currently a multi-level hell of prehistoric predators, this place felt like a sanctuary.
"Why didn't we build our shelter here?" she whispered to herself. She had asked Darius that before, but he had been uncharacteristically evasive.
Shifting her gaze, she spotted two overturned, modified SUVs nearby, likely belonging to the Asset Containment Unit (ACU).
"Nice."
She approached the vehicles and climbed in through a shattered sunroof.
The interior was a mess, littered with debris and broken glass. Despite the chaos, Brooklynn immediately spotted several useful items.
"Shock batons, walkie-talkies, and... body armor? Why would they even need that here?"
She quickly cataloged the supplies. There was too much to carry alone; she'd have to bring the others back later.
"There are meds here too... Yaz might need these."
Yasmina had injured her ankle while distracting the Mosasaurus, and it hadn't improved over the last three days, leaving the group worried. Brooklynn stuffed the promising-looking medicine into her bag and grabbed a shock baton before climbing out.
Suddenly, her eyes caught a glint in the distance, a cracked helmet with a GoPro-style recorder still attached.
She picked it up and inspected it. "Maybe I can fix this."
As a tech enthusiast, anything with a screen excited her. It was a shame almost every communication device on the island was dead; otherwise, they would have been rescued days ago.
As she turned to leave with the recorder, she failed to notice a Triceratops skull lying silently in the shadows of the trees nearby.
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