Nedry started back, heading toward the glow of the car’s headlights. He was drenched and miserable. He heard the soft hooting cry once more, and this time he paused. That hadn’t really sounded like an owl. And it seemed to be close by, in the jungle somewhere off to his right.
As he listened, he heard a crashing sound in the underbrush. Then silence. He waited, and heard it again. It sounded distinctly like something big, moving slowly through the jungle toward him.
Something big. Something near. A big dinosaur.
Get out of here.
Nedry began to run. He made a lot of noise as he ran, but even so he could hear the animal crashing through the foliage. And hooting.
It was coming closer.
Stumbling over tree roots in the darkness, clawing his way past dripping branches, he saw the Jeep ahead, and the lights shining around the vertical wall of the barrier made him feel better. In a moment he’d be in the car and then he’d get the hell out of here. He scrambled around the barrier and then he froze.
The animal was already there.
But it wasn’t close. The dinosaur stood forty feet away, at the edge of the illumination from the headlamps. Nedry hadn’t taken the tour, so he hadn’t seen the different types of dinosaurs, but this one was strange-looking. The ten-foot-tall body was yellow with black spots, and along the head ran a pair of red V-shaped crests. The dinosaur didn’t move, but again gave its soft hooting cry.
Nedry waited to see if it would attack. It didn’t. Perhaps the headlights from the Jeep frightened it, forcing it to keep its distance, like a fire.
The dinosaur stared at him and then snapped its head in a single swift motion. Nedry felt something smack wetly against his chest. He looked down and saw a dripping glob of foam on his rain-soaked shirt. He touched it curiously, not comprehending.…
It was spit.
The dinosaur had spit on him.
It was creepy, he thought. He looked back at the dinosaur and saw the head snap again, and immediately felt another wet smack against his neck, just above the shirt collar. He wiped it away with his hand.
Jesus, it was disgusting. But the skin of his neck was already starting to tingle and burn. And his hand was tingling, too. It was almost like he had been touched with acid.
Nedry opened the car door, glancing back at the dinosaur to make sure it wasn’t going to attack, and felt a sudden, excruciating pain in his eyes, stabbing like spikes into the back of his skull, and he squeezed his eyes shut and gasped with the intensity of it and threw up his hands to cover his eyes and felt the slippery foam trickling down both sides of his nose.
Spit.
The dinosaur had spit in his eyes.
Even as he realized it, the pain overwhelmed him, and he dropped to his knees, disoriented, wheezing. He collapsed onto his side, his cheek pressed to the wet ground, his breath coming in thin whistles through the constant, ever-screaming pain that caused flashing spots of light to appear behind his tightly shut eyelids.
The earth shook beneath him and Nedry knew the dinosaur was moving, he could hear its soft hooting cry, and despite the pain he forced his eyes open and still he saw nothing but flashing spots against black. Slowly the realization came to him.
He was blind.
The hooting was louder as Nedry scrambled to his feet and staggered back against the side panel of the car, as a wave of nausea and dizziness swept over him. The dinosaur was close now, he could feel it coming close, he was dimly aware of its snorting breath.
But he couldn’t see.
He couldn’t see anything, and his terror was extreme.
He stretched out his hands, waving them wildly in the air to ward off the attack he knew was coming.
And then there was a new, searing pain, like a fiery knife in his belly, and Nedry stumbled, reaching blindly down to touch the ragged edge of his shirt, and then a thick, slippery mass that was surprisingly warm, and with horror he suddenly knew he was holding his own intestines in his hands. The dinosaur had torn him open. His guts had fallen out.
Nedry fell to the ground and landed on something scaly and cold, it was the animal’s foot, and then there was new pain on both sides of his head. The pain grew worse, and as he was lifted to his feet he knew the dinosaur had his head in its jaws, and the horror of that realization was followed by a final wish, that it would all be ended soon.
BUNGALOW
“More coffee?” Hammond asked politely.
“No, thank you,” Henry Wu said, leaning back in his chair. “I couldn’t eat anything more.” They were sitting in the dining room of Hammond’s bungalow, in a secluded corner of the park not far from the labs. Wu had to admit that the bungalow Hammond had built for himself was elegant, with sparse, almost Japanese lines. And the dinner had been excellent, considering the dining room wasn’t fully staffed yet.
But there was something about Hammond that Wu found troubling. The old man was different in some way … subtly different. All during dinner, Wu had tried to decide what it was. In part, a tendency to ramble, to repeat himself, to retell old stories. In part, it was an emotional liability, flaring anger one moment, maudlin sentimentality the next. But all that could be understood as a natural concomitant of age. John Hammond was, after all, almost seventy-seven.
But there was something else. A stubborn evasiveness. An insistence on having his way. And, in the end, a complete refusal to deal with the situation that now faced the park.
Wu had been stunned by the evidence (he did not yet allow himself to believe the case was proved) that the dinosaurs were breeding. After Grant had asked about amphibian DNA, Wu had intended to go directly to his laboratory and check the computer records of the various DNA assemblies. Because, if the dinosaurs were in fact breeding, then everything about Jurassic Park was called into question—their genetic development methods, their genetic control methods, everything. Even the lysine dependency might be suspect. And if these animals could truly breed, and could also survive in the wild …
Henry Wu wanted to check the data at once. But Hammond had stubbornly insisted Wu accompany him at dinner.
“Now then, Henry, you must save room for ice cream,” Hammond said, pushing back from the table. “María makes the most wonderful ginger ice cream.”
“All right” Wu looked at the beautiful, silent serving girl. His eyes followed her out of the room, and then he glanced up at the single video monitor mounted in the wall. The monitor was dark. “Your monitor’s out,” Wu said.
“Is it?” Hammond glanced over. “Must be the storm.” He reached behind him for the telephone. “I’ll just check with John in control.”
Wu could hear the static crackle on the telephone line. Hammond shrugged, and set the receiver back in its cradle. “Lines must be down,” he said. “Or maybe Nedry’s still doing data transmission. He has quite a few bugs to fix this weekend. Nedry’s a genius in his way, but we had to press him quite hard, toward the end, to make sure he got things right.”
“Perhaps I should go to the control room and check,” Wu said.
“No, no,” Hammond said. “There’s no reason. If there were any problem, we’d hear about it. Ah.”
María came back into the room, with two plates of ice cream.
“You must have just a little, Henry,” Hammond said. “It’s made with fresh ginger, from the eastern part of the island. It’s an old man’s vice, ice cream. But still …”
Dutifully, Wu dipped his spoon. Outside, lightning flashed, and there was the sharp crack of thunder. “That was close,” Wu said. “I hope the storm isn’t frightening the children.”
“I shouldn’t think so,” Hammond said. He tasted the ice cream. “But I can’t help but hold some fears about this park, Henry.”
Inwardly, Wu felt relieved. Perhaps the old man was going to face the facts, after all. “What kind of fears?”
“You know, Jurassic Park’s really made for children. The children of the world love dinosaurs, and the children are going to deligh
t—just delight—in this place. Their little faces will shine with the joy of finally seeing these wonderful animals. But I am afraid … I may not live to see it, Henry. I may not live to see the joy on their faces.”
“I think there are other problems, too,” Wu said, frowning.
“But none so pressing on my mind as this,” Hammond said, “that I may not live to see their shining, delighted faces. This is our triumph, this park. We have done what we set out to do. And, you remember, our original intent was to use the newly emerging technology of genetic engineering to make money. A lot of money.”
Wu knew Hammond was about to launch into one of his old speeches. He held up his hand. “I’m familiar with this, John—”
“If you were going to start a bioengineering company, Henry, what would you do? Would you make products to help mankind, to fight illness and disease? Dear me, no. That’s a terrible idea. A very poor use of new technology.”
Hammond shook his head sadly. “Yet, you’ll remember,” he said, “the original genetic engineering companies, like Genentech and Cetus, were all started to make pharmaceuticals. New drugs for mankind. Noble, noble purpose. Unfortunately, drugs face all kinds of barriers. FDA testing alone takes five to eight years—if you’re lucky. Even worse, there are forces at work in the marketplace. Suppose you make a miracle drug for cancer or heart disease—as Genentech did. Suppose you now want to charge a thousand dollars or two thousand dollars a dose. You might imagine that is your privilege. After all, you invented the drug, you paid to develop and test it; you should be able to charge whatever you wish. But do you really think that the government will let you do that? No, Henry, they will not. Sick people aren’t going to pay a thousand dollars a dose for needed medication—they won’t be grateful, they’ll be outraged. Blue Cross isn’t going to pay it. They’ll scream highway robbery. So something will happen. Your patent application will be denied. Your permits will be delayed. Something will force you to see reason—and to sell your drug at a lower cost. From a business standpoint, that makes helping mankind a very risky business. Personally, I would never help mankind.”
Wu had heard the argument before. And he knew Hammond was right; some new bioengineered pharmaceuticals had indeed suffered inexplicable delays and patent problems.
“Now,” Hammond said, “think how different it is when you’re making entertainment. Nobody needs entertainment. That’s not a matter for government intervention. If I charge five thousand dollars a day for my park, who is going to stop me? After all, nobody needs to come here. And, far from being highway robbery, a costly price tag actually increases the appeal of the park. A visit becomes a status symbol, and all Americans love that. So do the Japanese, and of course they have far more money.”
Hammond finished his ice cream, and María silently took the dish away. “She’s not from here, you know,” he said. “She’s Haitian. Her mother is French. But in any case, Henry, you will recall that the original purpose behind pointing my company in this direction in the first place—was to have freedom from government intervention, anywhere in the world.”
“Speaking of the rest of the world …”
Hammond smiled. “We have already leased a large tract in the Azores, for Jurassic Park Europe. And you know we long ago obtained an island near Guam, for Jurassic Park Japan. Construction on the next two Jurassic Parks will begin early next year. They will all be open within four years. At that time, direct revenues will exceed ten billion dollars a year, and merchandising, television, and ancillary rights should double that. I see no reason to bother with children’s pets, which I’m told Lew Dodgson thinks we’re planning to make.”
“Twenty billion dollars a year,” Wu said softly, shaking his head.
“That’s speaking conservatively,” Hammond said. He smiled. “There’s no reason to speculate wildly. More ice cream, Henry?”
“Did you find him?” Arnold snapped, when the guard walked into the control room.
“No, Mr. Arnold.”
“Find him.”
“I don’t think he’s in the building, Mr. Arnold.”
“Then look in the lodge,” Arnold said, “look in the maintenance building, look in the utility shed, look everywhere, but just find him.”
“The thing is …” The guard hesitated. “Mr. Nedry’s the fat man, is that right?”
“That’s right,” Arnold said. “He’s fat. A fat slob.”
“Well, Jimmy down in the main lobby said he saw the fat man go into the garage.”
Muldoon spun around. “Into the garage? When?”
“About ten, fifteen minutes ago.”
“Jesus,” Muldoon said.
The Jeep screeched to a stop. “Sorry,” Harding said.
In the headlamps, Ellie saw a herd of apatosaurs lumbering across the road. There were six animals, each the size of a house, and a baby as large as a full-grown horse. The apatosaurs moved in unhurried silence, never looking toward the Jeep and its glowing headlamps. At one point, the baby stopped to lap water from a puddle in the road, then moved on.
A comparable herd of elephants would have been startled by the arrival of a car, would have trumpeted and circled to protect the baby. But these animals showed no fear. “Don’t they see us?” she said.
“Not exactly, no,” Harding said. “Of course, in a literal sense they do see us, but we don’t really mean anything to them. We hardly ever take cars out at night, and so they have no experience of them. We are just a strange, smelly object in their environment. Representing no threat, and therefore no interest. I’ve occasionally been out at night, visiting a sick animal, and on my way back these fellows blocked the road for an hour or more.”
“What do you do?”
Harding grinned. “Play a recorded tyrannosaur roar. That gets them moving. Not that they care much about tyrannosaurs. These apatosaurs are so big they don’t really have any predators. They can break a tyrannosaur’s neck with a swipe of their tail. And they know it. So does the tyrannosaur.”
“But they do see us. I mean, if we were to get out of the car …”
Harding shrugged. “They probably wouldn’t react. Dinosaurs have excellent visual acuity, but they have a basic amphibian visual system: it’s attuned to movement. They don’t see unmoving things well at all.”
The animals moved on, their skin glistening in the rain. Harding put the car in gear. “I think we can continue now,” he said.
Wu said, “I suspect you may find there are pressures on your park, just as there are pressures on Genentech’s drugs.” He and Hammond had moved to the living room, and they were now watching the storm lash the big glass windows.
“I can’t see how,” Hammond said.
“The scientists may wish to constrain you. Even to stop you.”
“Well, they can’t do that,” Hammond said. He shook his finger at Wu. “You know why the scientists would try to do that? It’s because they want to do research, of course. That’s all they ever want to do, is research. Not to accomplish anything. Not to make any progress. Just do research. Well, they have a surprise coming to them.”
“I wasn’t thinking of that,” Wu said.
Hammond sighed. “I’m sure it would be interesting for the scientists, to do research. But you arrive at the point where these animals are simply too expensive to be used for research. This is wonderful technology, Henry, but it’s also frightfully expensive technology. The fact is, it can only be supported as entertainment.” Hammond shrugged. “That’s just the way it is.”
“But if there are attempts to close down—”
“Face the damn facts, Henry,” Hammond said irritably. “This isn’t America. This isn’t even Costa Rica. This is my island. I own it. And nothing is going to stop me from opening Jurassic Park to all the children of the world.” He chuckled. “Or, at least, to the rich ones. And I tell you, they’ll love it.”
In the backseat of the Jeep, Ellie Sattler stared out the window. They had been driving through rain-drenched
jungle for the last twenty minutes, and had seen nothing since the apatosaurs crossed the road.
“We’re near the jungle river now,” Harding said, as he drove. “It’s off there somewhere to our left.”
Abruptly he slammed on the brakes again. The car skidded to a stop in front of a flock of small green animals. “Well, you’re getting quite a show tonight,” he said. “Those are compys.”
Procompsognathids, Ellie thought, wishing that Grant were here to see them. This was the animal they had seen in the fax, back in Montana. The little dark green procompsognathids scurried to the other side of the road, then squatted on their hind legs to look at the car, chittering briefly, before hurrying onward into the night.
“Odd,” Harding said. “Wonder where they’re off to? Compys don’t usually move at night, you know. They climb up in a tree and wait for daylight.”
“Then why are they out now?” Ellie said.
“I can’t imagine. You know compys are scavengers, like buzzards. They’re attracted to a dying animal, and they have tremendously sensitive smell. They can smell a dying animal for miles.”
“Then they’re going to a dying animal?”
“Dying, or already dead.”
“Should we follow them?” Ellie said.
“I’d be curious,” Harding said. “Yes, why not? Let’s go see where they’re going.”
He turned the car around, and headed back toward the compys.
TIM
Tim Murphy lay in the Land Cruiser, his cheek pressed against the car door handle. He drifted slowly back to consciousness. He wanted only to sleep. He shifted his position, and felt the pain in his cheekbone where it lay against the metal door. His whole body ached. His arms and his legs and most of all his head—there was a terrible pounding pain in his head. All the pain made him want to go back to sleep.
He pushed himself up on one elbow, opened his eyes, and retched, vomiting all over his shirt. He tasted sour bile and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. His head throbbed; he felt dizzy and seasick, as if the world were moving, as if he were rocking back and forth on a boat.