negative positions ➹ zach mitchell [DISCONTINUED]

• one •

• 2 YEARS LATER •

“Hold!” Owen Grady yells, making all four raptors stop running. The small, pink pig runs to safety. Owen clicks his pen rapidly, grabbing the attention of his raptors, Blue and Delta.

“Hey,” Reagan shouts. “Echo! Charlie!” The two raptors finally look up. Owen clicks his pen again.

“Okay,” he says. “Eyes on me.” All the raptors, but Blue, look at up at him. “Blue. Blue!” She looks up and chrips. “Watch it.”

Charlie begins to snarl and growl. The young teen gives her raptor attention. “Charlie, hey.” She grabs Owen’s pen and starts clicking. Charlie snarls once more. “Hey--no! Don’t give me that shit!”

Delta follows Charlie’s lead. “Delta, lock it up!” Grady points at her with a warning finger and takes his pen back from Reagan. He clicks it. “Good.”

The honey-haired girl holds up her hand. “And, we’re moving.” She and Owen walk towards the bucket filled with dead mice. The raptors follow, occasionally bumping into each other.

“Hold!” Owen yells once more. “That’s good. That is damn good.” He clicks his pen as Reagan grabs four mice out from the bucket.

Reagan grins. “Very good! See? That’s what you get!” She calls out each raptor’s name, throwing the mice to them before stopping at Blue. “Blue?”

The raptor stares at her. “This one’s for you.” She tosses the mouse at Blue, which she caught and ate. She nods at Owen, leaving the rest to him.

He nods back, holding up his hand. “Hold!” The raptors stop. “Eyes up!” They look up at him. “Go.” They take off running.

Barry soon walks towards them, giving both a hug. “You finally did it, guys.” They both smile at their friend.

“Owen! Reagan!” Reagan looks to see Vic Hoskins walking towards them with a huge grin on his face. She rolls her eyes and huffs. Owen softly elbowed her.

Hoskins pats a guy on the shoulder as he passes while laughing. He points at them. “I was starting to think I hired the wrong people, but damn you got them eating out of your palm!”

“You came on a good day,” Owen says, shaking Hoskin’s hand. “Not usually a good ending.”

Reagan tunes out the conversation, focusing on Hoskin’s personality. He cared not one bit about the raptors. All he wanted to do was use them for the money. He wanted to know what he wanted to know about them. She was letting him use them over her dead body. Barry notices her staring at Hoskins and nudges her a bit.

“Uh, what do you need, buddy?” Owen asks. Reagan already knew the answer and began walking away.

Hoskins sighs. “A field test.” Owen turns around and starts walking in his younger co-worker’s direction. Hoskins follows after him.

“Hey. I’ve just seen that they can respond to commands. We can take research, and get it on it’s feet.”

“They’re wild animals, Hoskins. Trust me. You don’t want them in a field.”

“I just saw a bond, a real bond between man and beast. Come on. We’re the same. We’re dogs of war. We know that the military needs to reduce casualties.” He steps in front of his two employees with a hopeful twinkle in his eyes.

“You’re in our way,” Reagan hisses at him. He started talking again, but the two just push past him and continue walking.

He continues to trail after them. “Look, nature gave us the most effective killing machines 65 million years ago. And now we know they can take orders.”

Barry shows up next to them. She guesses that he took the other way down. “We finally make progress and that’s the first thing he says? Make a weapon?”

“Shit.”

He sighs as does Owen. She continues walking, the three of them doing the same. “Come on, guys. It’s grown-up time. Drones can’t search tunnels and caves. And they’re hackable. The minute a real war breaks out, all that fancy tech is gonna go dark.”

“That fancy tech is not gonna eat them if they forget to feed them,” Owen deadpans.

Hoskins motions a hand towards the raptors. “Look at these creatures. They’ve got millions of years of instinct in their cells, instinct that we can program. Their loyalty cannot be bought. These guys are gonna run straight to the enemy’s teeth and eat them, belt buckle and all.”

“What if they decide they wanna be in control?“ Reagan asks.

Hoskins shrugs. “Well, then we remind them who is. We terminate the rouges. Promote only loyal bloodlines.”

Barry laughs at his statement and starts walking off, Hoskins questioning him about what is so funny.

Owen shrugs. “I don’t know. You come here and don’t learn anything about these animals except what you wanna know. You made them and now you think you own them.”

Hoskins looks at him. “We do own them. Extinct animals have no rights.”

Owen rolls his eyes. “They’re not extinct anymore, Hoskins.”

“Exactly. We’re sitting on a gold mine. Masrani is using it to stock a petting zoo.”

They walk down the stairs as he states, “He just wants to teach people some humility. He doesn’t make weapons.”

Hoskins chuckles. “You think that the eighth richest man in the world is only into oil, telecoms, and family fun parks? He’s so diversified. He doesn’t even know what he owns.”

“How long has InGen been practicing this pitch?”

“Since the day we hired you out of the Navy. You know the end game. These animals can replace thousands of boots on the ground. How many lives does that save? War is part of nature.”

The teen and the former Navy soldier enter the gate, and she slams it shut behind them, pressing a button to lock it.

Hoskins leans against the locked gate. “Look around, guys. Every living thing in this jungle is trying to murder the other. Mother Nature’s way of testing her creations, refining the pecking order. Without that, we end up with places like this, charging seven bucks for soda.”

Reagan slowly walked towards Hoskins, her stare becoming more intense with each step. She could see the she was intimidating him. She leaned close towards the gate.

“Do you hear yourself when you talk? You’re not getting any of mine and Owen’s raptors. Not Charlie, not Blue, not Delta, not Echo. None. You should think before you act. That’s just my advice.”