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Jurassic Park: X Factor (Chapter Four -- Approaching Zero Hour
By drucifer67
Jurassic Park: X Factor
Chapter Four – Approaching Zero Hour
Alan and Lex hardly had time to get out of the car when Wallace hailed them. He was tall and thin, wearing a brown jumpsuit two shades lighter than his skin. He strode purposefully toward the two, scowling. Beads of sweat stood out on his hairless brow.
Alan took two quick steps to close the distance, extending his hand in greeting.
“Dr. Alan Grant,” he said graciously.
When Alan realized his offered hand was being ignored, he slowly lowered it. “And this is Lex Murphy,” he continued uncertainly. After a pause, he added: “And you are?”
“I am…the poor S.O.B. who got a 2 a.m. phone call from one John Hammond, the guy who owns the company I work for—owns it this week, anyway. As long as he doesn’t have any more suicidal jackass nephews anywhere, I guess he’ll own the place next week, as well. I am also the guy who’s been busting his buns for the last thirty-six hours trying to put together a boat, two armored vehicles, a high hide, and a trustworthy communications network. My name’s Charles Wallace. I’m the Special Equipment Development Supervisor for InGen. Forgive me if I don’t shake hands.”
Grant nodded, still not certain what to make of Wallace. “Mr. Wallace, we really appreciate all you’re doing here for us, and on such short notice—“
“Short notice is no problem. Hammond does things on short notice all the time. And at the risk of sounding rude, Dr. Grant, I’m not doing this for your appreciation. This is my job. It’s the reason my ex-wife has a nice place in Lake Tahoe. All that aside, thank you for taking the time to express your appreciation. Most people around here don’t.”
Grant nodded, growing more puzzled by the minute.
“So, now that we got our prom queen speeches out of the way, take a walk with me and I’ll show you your equipment.”
Stepping inside the warehouse, Grant and Lex were greeted by a deafening jangle of sounds: the hiss of welding equipment, metal banging against metal, instructions shouted, questioned, and clarified. The stillness on the other side of the door gave no hint of the beehive inside. No less than sixty workers were present, hurrying about their tasks.
“This is some operation,” Grant said.
“I’m running a full crew,” Wallace answered. “We got a short deadline. Hammond was near panic when he called this in. I was pretty sure the whole company was gonna get a day off to go to his funeral, the way he was huffing on the phone.”
“So did he tell you what this is all about?” Lex asked.
“No, Ma’am,” Wallace answered, “and I didn’t ask. I do what I’m told and I get paid for it. Mr. Hammond said he needed some equipment for an expedition to Isla Sorna, and I’m the man in charge of that sort of thing.”
“Dr. Ian Malcolm is supposed to meet us here,” Grant said. “Have you heard from him?”
“Dr. Malcolm and the Mission Team are waiting for you with the vehicles, on the other side of the partition” He pointed at an enormous accordion door that divided the warehouse in half. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have people to supervise. If you need anything from me, you can go to the nearest worker. Everyone here has a radio.”
“Thank you, Mr. Wallace,” Lex said.
Malcolm greeted Grant with a firm, businesslike handshake. He turned and waved a hand toward the five rough customers assembled behind him. “The ah, the cavalry is here.”
Alan studied the group briefly. “Ian, how well do you know these men?”
“Hardly at all,” Malcolm admitted.
“My confidence is soaring.”
“They come highly recommended,” Malcolm assured him. “They’re the best John Hammond’s money can buy.”
Just then one of the team members stepped toward Grant. “Hey, Malcolm,” he called out. “Who’s the old man playin’ Indiana Jones?”
Grant opened his mouth to speak, but found himself at a total loss for words.
“That, ah, that’s Dr. Alan Grant. Dinosaur expert. He could, ah, could be the difference between life and death, so I suggest…ah…play nicely.”
“Just havin’ some fun, pop,” the mercenary said, smiling. He extended his hand. “Ramirez,” he said simply.
Grant took the offered hand, pumped it once, and let it go as if it might be covered in a rare strain of deadly fungus. “Do they have first names where you come from?”
“That’s funny,” Ramirez said, nodding slowly and thoughtfully. “I like a sense of humor.” He then turned to Lex. “Boutchoo, baby? You gotta nice sense of humor? To go with that nice ass?”
“Now, just a minute,” Grant spoke up indignantly.
Then a second mercenary stepped up and slapped Ramirez on the shoulder. “Easy, there, man,” he cautioned. “We don’t want to get off on the wrong foot.”
“Cool,” Ramirez said, shrugging. Then he looked at Grant. “Peace?”
The predatory look in Ramirez’ eyes was intimidating, and it surely frightened most men. Most men, however, had never been surrounded by velociraptors.
“If you’ll be so kind as to apologize to the young lady, then we can continue. A clean slate, shall we say.” His smile was supposed to look benign and accommodating. It didn’t.
“You heard the man, Hector,” the second mercenary said suddenly. “Apologize. Let’s behave like gentlemen. Don’t forget what we’re here for.”
Ramirez looked from Grant to his fellow mercenary and back. “Sure thing, Rick,” he said at last. “Let’s be gentlemen.”
His apology to Lex was clumsy, clearly not a familiar practice for him. Grant decided he was probably not the only one in the group with a problem in that department.
“Now, Doctor Grant,” Rick continued, “Let’s meet the rest of the team.”
Neons and taillights and traffic signals tinted the wet pavement all the colors of the rainbow. A light rain had painted the streets reflective black and made the shadowed places in the corners and alleyways even darker than normal. Among the shadows, a figure stood, smoking, glancing occasionally down the street, then down the alley, then returning to the business of smoking and waiting.
A taxi pulled up to the corner half a block away and idled there for a moment. Then the cab turned left up the street and rolled slowly to a stop in front of the building where the stranger waited.
The man stepped from the shadows, flipping his spent cigarette into the wet street, where it died a quick, hissing death.
The curbside window lowered with a groan. A voice from within called: “Need a cab, mister?”
“I could use the right cab,” the stranger answered.
“I’m the right cab,” the driver assured him.
“You’re sure about that?”
“Oh yeah,” the cabbie answered. “I can get you where you’re going.”
The stranger opened the door and slid in.
“Where to?”
“Tenth and Information,” the stranger replied.
The cabbie turned to face his passenger. He flipped his long, dark-blond ponytail back and rubbed his stubbled face with his free hand. “Nice to meet you in person, Eichmann. Boy, have I got some stories to tell,” he said, smiling.
He turned the meter off and sped away into the night.
“Look over these printouts,” Wallace instructed. “This is an inventory of all the items being stored in the vehicles and on the boat. Everything from rations to radios, and your requests have been met, within reason. The wit who asked for a thermonuclear device will be disappointed, I’m afraid, but I think we’ve managed to secure pretty much everything else.”
Grant glanced at the five-page, single-spaced printout. “The gas grenades?”
“Five cases, as requested, Dr. Grant,” Wallace replied.
Grant nodded and handed the list back to Wallace.
“Don’t you want to look over the rest?”
“No,” Grant replied, “that won’t be necessary. Best to leave the killing to the experts.”
“And the, ah, the High Hide,” Malcolm asked. “It’s ready, and, ah, tested, ready to go?”
“Ready. Stowed on the ship.”
Two Toyota SUVs sat before the group, but they were hardly recognizable. The windows had been replaced with shatterproof Plexiglas and caged with steel. The factory grillwork had been removed in favor of a series of three-centimeter diameter steel rods, and armor plating had been added all around, from the bottoms of the vehicle windows to a point just below the original waterline. Both SUVs were painted with a mixture of coal black and dark green, speckled in a texture that looked out of place in the industrial atmosphere of the warehouse but would blend quite well in the jungle. One of the vehicles had been outfitted with a .50 caliber machine gun. The other had dual tubes mounted parallel to the roofline. Grant guessed they were some sort of grenade launchers.
“The armor is twice the thickness of what you might find on a modern tank, but since it’s not meant to repel munitions, it’s constructed of a much lighter polymer. This is the anti-rhinoceros armor we experimented with in Kenya, with great success.”
He opened the door on the nearer of the two SUVs. “Both vehicles incorporate a hatch in the floor, for use in the event a large predator is above you, or to use as a means of escape in the event you’ve been overturned.”
Wallace leaned inside and pulled out a telephone handset. “Satellite phones. Both vehicles are equipped with them, and each of you will be given one of your own. One thing we’ve learned in the past with these islands is that you can never have too many ways to communicate.”
Grant smiled cynically and nodded slightly.
“Unit One, as you can see, is equipped with a fifty-cal, which can be operated by the rear-seat passenger using this hatch,” he leaned in and pressed another switch, and a great rectangle of steel flipped back and slammed against the reinforced roof of the vehicle.
“Ah,” Malcolm said dryly, “A sunroof. We’ll take it.”
Wallace ignored him and crossed to the second SUV. “Unit Two is equipped with two grenade tubes, designed to accommodate incendiary, concussion, or gas grenades. Canisters are chambered from inside, again from the rear seat. They can be fired by two separate pistol-grip triggers, located near the center of the rear seat—so that it’s your choice whether to employ one operator or two.”
The Mission Team members were clearly excited by the prospect of the rolling fortresses. They talked quietly among themselves, pointing and elbowing each other. They were five kids in the world’s biggest toy store.
Grant, of course, was skeptical, as was Ian Malcolm. Both had seen how the creatures of Isla Sorna tended to treat vehicles.
“Look over the lists, now, people,” Wallace advised. “If you want anything added you’re going to have to let me know within the next couple of hours. Everything has to be packed up and secured on the ship by dawn.”
“Gentlemen,” Malcolm said. “You have a lot of, ah, a lot of nice toys here, but, let me give you a little advice. Where you’re going, you’ll also want to take several changes of underwear, ah, because…well, because you’ll need to change often.”
Grant smiled, just a little, in spite of himself.
1/4/2003 11:01:29 AM
(Updated: 1/15/2003 12:58:05 PM)
(Updated: 1/15/2003 3:45:33 PM)
(Updated: 2/11/2003 3:12:39 AM)
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