Ch. 36 Four Years

Ch. 36 Four Years

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= ONCE AGAIN, it has been four years since the San Diego incident and everything seemingly turns to normal. Ian stayed living with Kelly while Sarah was off doing work in Africa, Nick was taking photographs of the environment along side her.

Currently a man in his mid-thirties sat on the grass front garden with a young child. Both playing with dinosaur toys. You could hear the child's play noises.

"RRRRROW! GRRRRRR!" The boy, Charlie, a three-year old boy, plays in a sandbox with his favorite toy dinosaurs. The infamous Alan Grant squats next to him and watches with great delight.

His old female companion, Ellie Sattler stands over them, an infant cradled comfortably in her arms it was like a picture of the perfect family from those happy but also sad movies.

"Oh, actually, Charlie, those two are herbivores." Alan sheepishly smiles at the three year old, gesturing a finger towards the two toys in his tiny hands. "They wouldn't be interested in fighting each other. But these..." he picksup two other dinosaurs, they were both meat-eaters.

"See, these are carnivores. And this one here, see its claws, this one here uses its claws to gouge at the throat of its opponent..." The famous palaeontologist demonstrates with some grunts and groans of his own but unfortunately he only succeeds in frightening the boy.

Ellie wanders over to interrupt the man before he further frightens her son. "Uh, Alan?"

"Hmm?" Alan hums as he turns to look at her. Eyes softening at the sight of his companion.

"He's three. Why don't you wait till he's a little older?" She tells the male with a warm chuckle.

"Oh, right." Alan goes back to Charlie with a short smile. "Happy dinosaurs." He bounces them along the sandbox edge.

Then, the sound of a car engine turning off and a door slamming is heard from the drive through. You could practically see the sudden glow adorning her face. "That must be Mark." She then calls out to the man. "Mark, we're back here!"

Ellie and Grant turn to see Mark Degler coming through the gate carrying a briefcase. He's their age, handsome but not annoyingly so, with a friendly, balance demeanor. He and Ellie quickly kiss tenderly on the lips.

Smiling up at her husband, she asks "Good day?"

"Keeping the world safe." Mark smiles, glancing down at the infant cooing in her arms. "Here, let me take her."

"Mark, this is Alan Grant." Ellie introduces the pair to one another as she hands off her child and Mark frees up a hand to hold to the Paleontologist.

"Nice to meet you, Alan. I've heard a lot about you." He smiles and the two men shake hands, and little Charlie runs to his father, showing his dinosaur.

"Daddy, this is a herbabore." Charlie tells his father in a child manner while Grant smiles uncomfortably, obviously being a third wheel in this situation.

Standing above a parrot in a large cage. Alan Grant is currently teasing the bird with a cookie, holding a it just out of reach. A smile over his face.

"What's my name? Come on, Jack, say it. Is my name Alan? Say my name." He tells the parrot but the bird doesn't respond, sighing, Alan let's put a 'tch' sound.

"He used to know me."

"Sorry, Alan it's been six years." Ellie responds with loud laughs. Grant shrugs, gives Jack the cookie, and heads towards the table. The three adults are finishing their dessert and coffee and the children have been out to bed.

It was awkward to say the least, as the two men were seemingly trying to intimidate one another although Alan was more awkward.

Mark coughs, interrupting the awkward tension and picks up the cup. "More coffee?"

"Yes. Great." Ellie nods with a moment of relief so Mark stands and collects their cups. "So, Mark's working at the State Department now."

"Really?" He turns to Mark with curiosity. "What do you do there?"

Laughing, Mark shakes his head in a quick manner. "I could tell you about it, but than I'd have to kill you."

"Indeed." Alan laughs. Mark smiles, nodding. Then he goes up when the infant began crying. Another uncomfortable silence ensues.

"So what are you working on now?" Ellie breaks the silence with a question.

"We have a new site in Montana. At least until the money runs out." Alan reveals, the man had been struggling terribly with the funding of his camps and knew that sooner or later he'd have to go bankrupt probably.

Ellie leans over in curiosity. Like it was almost instinct. "Anything good?"

Her former male companion nods eagerly. "Raptors, mostly." He tells her, watching as a look of remembrance falls upon her face. She pulls back.

"My favourite." She utters.

Grant leans forward, realizing Ellie's one of the few people he can talk to about this."You remember the sounds they made?" He asks.

Ellie reluctantly nods. "I try not to."

"We've done cranial scans, and raptors actually had a quite sophisticated resonating chamber." He reveals, showing that Ellie still had an interest into the creatures. "I have a theory that their ability to vocalize is the key to their social intelligence. The way they can work together as a team."

"You think they could talk to each other?" She whispers out of curiosity and Alan nods while a smirk falls over his face once more.

"To a degree we never imagined." The Paleontologist tells the woman as they both stare at one another with excitement.

"Bullshit!"

Both humans look back at the parrot, swinging comfortable in its own protective cage. Ellie laughs and smiles."You taught him that."

Later on during the evening, both Ellie and Alan heads toward the rental car parked in the driveway.

"Good luck with the fund raising." Ellie gives the man good luck as she rubs her thumb across his forearm in a comforting manner.

Grant chuckles softly. "It was never easy, but before Jurassic Park, you could find money. Somewhere." He tells her, stopping for a silent moment before continuing. "Now fossils are out. Everyone wants to see a real live dinosaur."

"Times change Alan. But you're the still the best. I mean that." Ellie pats his arm with an assuring smile and her former companion laughs.

"The last of my breed." Grant says and then a long moment passes between them as both consider where they've ended up.

Sighing, Alan rubs his forehead while opening the door of his car. "I'd better get going."

Ellie smiles warmly. "Let me know if I can help, Alan. You're bad about asking for help, but please ask me. Anything, anytime."

Awkwardly nodding, Alan pats her shoulder. "Okay. Goodbye, Ellie."

"Goodbye, Alan." Not sure what the right thing to do is, they finally end up with a friendly hug. They keep it short. Grant gets in his car. Starts the engine. He's about to pull off when Ellie knocks on the window. He rolls it down.

"When I met you, I thought that one day millions of years ago, all the dinosaurs became extinct. Wiped out." She informs the man, making him remember the day he had met the blonde woman. "But you told me otherwise. When conditions changed, dinosaurs changed. They became other things. They evolved."

Alan smiles and nods. Giving the woman a thumbs up. "A well-accepted theory."

"Alan don't be afraid to evolves."

Grant hears her, but Ellie knows it didn't really get through. A forced half-smile, than Alan waves goodbye and Ellie watches as he drives off.

Rolling up his window, Alan's mind is foggy just like it always has been. His hands tightly grip his steering wheel, knuckles buzzing white and pale.

The last stop on Grant's fund-raising tour, it's a public lecture hosted by some foundation. There are scientists and students here, but also a lot of dino-fans, some even with costumes.

Grant finishes his speech to what was a full house - some attendees are grabbing their coats and sneaking out. This wasn't the exciting guest speaker they were all expecting. Anew slide comes up. Just black and white, and indecipherable.

"It's through the painstaking study of the Interior chamber in multiple specimens that we can determine this exciting correlation between the larynx and the upper plate." He begins once more, telling the group more about "That lets us theorise -- theorise, mind you -- that the raptor might have been capable of bird- like vocalisations. Which as you can imagine, would be a tremendous breakthrough."

He's finished, but no one seems to notice at first. Then a woman with dark hair stands up, leading a smattering round of applause that Alan unlucky for him, did not even gain any.

"Thank you very much Dr. Grant. Now does anyone have a question?" She asks the audience and nearly every hand goes up but Alan didn't seem surprised.

Taking the microphone from the woman with a thanks, bowing his head respectfully and then turns to the audience. "Does anyone have a question that doesn't relate to Jurassic Park?"

Quite a few hands go down.

"Or the incident in San Diego, which I'll remind you, I did not witness." A few more goes down and Alan sighs heavily. "Or, Madison Faye Hammond who I must say I haven't seen for over eight years apart from video calls around four years ago."

Now most of the hands are down. Picking one of the few remaining, a male student stands triumphantly. "Your theory on raptors is good and all, but isn't all this conjecture kind of moot?" The students classmates nods in agreement.

"I mean, once the U.N. and Costa Rica and everyone decides how to handle the second island, scientist will just go in and look for themselves."

"Isn't paleontology itself in danger of extinction?" A reporter beside the student then quickly fires a question although they hadn't been picked.

Recognising those as fighting words, the woman was about to step in. But Alan holds a hand up to her. Stopping the woman in her approaches.

"No, and let me be perfectly clear on this point. Dinosaurs lived 65 million years ago. What's left of them is fossilized in stone the actual scientists spend years to undercover..."

"what John Hammond and InGen created are theme park monsters. Nothing more, nothing less." The class clearly disagrees with his assessment. And another student stands, nearer to the front.

"You're saying you wouldn't want to study them if you had the chance?" She asks. A notebook held out and everything.

Sighing heavily, Grant realised this was a moment of much needed thoughts. Whatever he says could have a harsh response.

"No force on this earth or in heaven could get me on that island."

END OF CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX