Jurassic Park - Crichton Michael - Страница 72

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Its electric motor whirring, the cart raced forward down the dark underground tunnel. Grant drove, his foot to the floor. The tunnel was featureless except for the occasional air vent above, shaded to protect against rainfall, and thus permitting little light to enter. But he noticed that there were crusty white animal droppings in many places. Obviously lots of animals had been in here.

Sitting beside him in the cart, Lex shone the flashlight to the back, where the velociraptor lay. "Why is it having trouble breathing?"

"Because I shot it with tranquilizer," he said.

"Is it going to die?" she said.

"I hope not."

"Why are we taking it?" Lex said.

"To prove to the people back at the center that the dinosaurs are really breeding," Grant said.

"How do you know they're breeding?"

"Because this one is young," Grant said. "And because it's a boy dinosaur."

"Is it?" Lex said, peering along the flashlight beam.

"Yes. Now shine that light forward, will you?" He held out his wrist turning the watch to her. "What does it say?"

"It says… ten-fifteen."

"Okay."

Tim said, "That means we have only forty-five minutes to contact the boat."

"We should be close," Grant said. "I figure we should be almost to the visitor center right now." He wasn't sure, but be sensed the tunnel was gently tilting upward, leading them back to the surface, and-

"Wow!" Tim said.

They burst out into daylight with shocking speed. There was a light mist blowing, partially obscuring the building that loomed directly above them. Grant saw at once that it was the visitor center. They had arrived right in front of the garage!

"Yay!" Lex shouted. "We did it! Yay!" She bounced up and down in the seat as Grant parked the cart in the garage. Along one wall were stac animal cages. They put the velociraptor in one, with a dish of water. Then they started climbing the stairs to the ground-floor entrance of the visitor center.

"I'm going to get a hamburger! And french fries! Chocolate milk shake! No more dinosaurs! Yay!" They came to the lobby, and they opened the door.

And they fell silent.

In the lobby of the visitor center, the glass doors had been shattered, and a cold gray mist blew through the cavernous main hall. A sign that read WHEN DINOSAURS RULED THE EARTH dangled from one hinge, creaking in the wind. The big tyrannosaur robot was upended and lay with its legs in the air, its tubing and metal innards exposed. Outside, through the glass, they saw rows of palm trees, shadowy shapes in the fog.

Tim and Lex huddled against the metal desk of the security guard. Grant took the guard's radio and tried all the channels. "Hello, this is Grant. Is anybody there? Hello, this is Grant."

Lex stared at the body of the guard, lying on the floor to the right. She couldn't see anything but his legs and feet.

"Hello, this is Grant. Hello."

Lex was leaning forward, peering around the edge of the desk. Grant grabbed her sleeve. "Hey. Stop that."

"Is he dead? What's that stuff on the floor? Blood?"

"Yes."

"How come it isn't real red?"

"You're morbid," Tim said.

"What's 'morbid'? I am not."

The radio crackled. "My God," came a voice. "Grant? Is that you?"

And then: "Alan? Alan?" It was Ellie.

"I'm here," Grant said.

"Thank God," Ellie said. "Are you all right?"

"I'm all right, yes."

"What about the kids? Have you seen them?"

"I have the kids with me," Grant said. "They're okay."

"Thank God."

Lex was crawling around the side of the desk. Grant slapped her ankle. "Get back here."

The radio crackled. "-n where are you?"

"In the lobby. In the lobby of the main building."

Over the radio, he heard Wu say, "My God. They're here."

"Alan, listen," Ellie said. "The raptors have gotten loose. They can open doors. They may be in the same building as you."

"Great. Where are you?" Grant said. "We're in the lodge."

Grant said, "And the others? Muldoon, everybody else?"

"We've lost a few people. But we got everybody else over to the lodge."

"And are the telephones working?"

"No. The whole system is shut off. Nothing works."

'How do we get the system back on?"

"We've been trying."

"We have to get it back on," Grant said, "right away. If we don't, within half an hour the raptors will reach the mainland."

He started to explain about the boat when Muldoon cut him off. "I don't think you understand, Dr. Grant. We haven't got half an hour left, over here."

"How's that?"

"Some of the raptors followed us. We've got two on the roof now."

"So what? The building's impregnable."

Muldoon coughed, "Apparently not. It was never expected that animals would get up on the roof." The radio crackled. "-must have planted a tree too close to the fence. The raptors got over the fence, and onto the roof. Anyway, the steel bars on the skylight are supposed to be electrified, but of course the power's off. They're biting through the bars of the skylight."

Grant said, "Biting through the bars?" He frowned, trying to imagine it, "How fast?"

"Yes," Muldoon said, "they have a bite pressure of fifteen thousand pounds a square inch. They're like hyenas, they can bite through steel and-" The transmission was lost for a moment.

"How fast?" Grant said again.

Muldoon said, "I'd guess we've got another ten, fifteen minutes before they break through completely and come through the skylight into the building. And once they're in… Ah, just a minute, Dr. Grant."

The radio clicked off.

In the skylight above Malcolm's bed, the raptors had chewed through the first of the steel bars. One raptor gripped the end of the bar and tugged, pulling it back. It put its powerful hind limb on the skylight and the glass shattered, glittering down on Malcolm's bed below. Ellie reached over and removed the largest fragments from the sheets.

"God, they're ugly," Malcolm said, looking up.

Now that the glass was broken, they could hear the snorts and snarls of the raptors, the squeal of their teeth on the metal as they chewed the bars. There were silver thinned sections where they had chewed. Foamy saliva spattered onto the sheets, and the bedside table.

"At least they can't get in yet," Ellie said. "Not until they chew through another bar."

Wu said, "If Grant could somehow get to the maintenance shed…"

"Bloody hell," Muldoon said. He limped around the room on his sprained ankle. "He can't get there fast enough. He can't get the power on fast enough. Not to stop this."

Malcolm coughed. "Yes." His voice was soft, almost a wheeze.

"What'd he say?" Muldoon said.

"Yes," Malcolm repeated. "Can…"

"Can what?"

"Distraction…" He winced.

"What kind of a distraction?"

"Go to the fence…"

"Yes? And do what?"

Malcolm grinned weakly. "Stick… your hands through."

"Oh Christ," Muldoon said, turning away.

"Wait a minute," Wu said. "He's right. There are only two raptors here. Which means there are at least four more out there. We could go out and provide a distraction."

"And then what?"

"And then Grant would be free to go to the maintenance building and turn on the generator."

"And then go back to the control room and start up the system?"

"Exactly."

"No time," Muldoon said. "No time."

"But if we can lure the raptors down here," Wu said, "maybe even get them away from that skylight. It might work. Worth a try."

"Bait," Muldoon said.

"Exactly."

"Who's going to be the bait? I'm no good. My ankle's shot."

"I'll do it," Wu said.

"No," Muldoon said. "You're the only one who knows what to do about the computer. You need to talk Grant through the start-up."

"Then I'll do it," Harding said.

"No," Ellie said. "Malcolm needs you. I'll do it."

"Hell, I don't think so," Muldoon said. "You'd have raptors all around you, raptors on the roof… "

But she was already bending over, lacing her running shoes. "Just don't tell Grant," she said. "It'll make him nervous."

The lobby was quiet, chilly fog drifting past them. The radio had been silent for several minutes. Tim said, "Why aren't they talking to us?"

"I'm hungry," Lex said.

"They're trying to plan," Grant said.

The radio crackled. "Grant, are you-nry Wu speaking. Are you there?"

"I'm here," Grant said.

"Listen," Wu said. "Can you see to the rear of the visitor building from where you are?"

Grant looked through the rear glass doors, to the palm trees and the fog.

"Yes," Grant said.

Wu said, "There's a path straight through the palm trees to the maintenance building. That's where the power equipment and generators are. I believe you saw the maintenance building yesterday?"

"Yes," Grant said. Though he was momentarily puzzled. Was it yesterday that he had looked into the building? It seemed like years ago.

"Now, listen," Wu said. "We think we can get all the raptors down here by the lodge, but we aren't sure. So be careful. Give us five minutes."

"Okay," Grant said.

"You can leave the kids in the cafeteria, and they should be all right. Take the radio with you when you go."

"Okay."

"Turn it off before you leave, so it doesn't make any noise outside. And call me when you get to the maintenance building."

"Okay."

Grant turned the radio off. Lex crawled back. "Are we going to the cafeteria?" she said.

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