The lab was collapsing from the inside—floor tiles eaten by moss, glass blistered with heat cracks, metal beams rusted to the color of old blood. The hum of the old data servers you'd come looking for. The way the lights flickered like they might still remember what it meant to be alive.

You stood in the central diagnostics chamber, half-kneeling before a brittle touchscreen that somehow still booted up. You weren’t supposed to split off from the others. But you’d seen your name, tagged in an old InGen server folder—back from your postgrad days when you interned unknowingly for a company already writing extinction into its code. You just wanted to see what they'd kept.

And then the sound. Soft. Not loud like the roar of the Titanosaur. Not weighty like the T.rex. Just a click. A dry, almost metallic tap-tap on the floor behind you. Then stillness.

You turned slowly, chest tightening like it knew something you didn’t yet. The air smelled wrong—like iron and wet leaves. Your eyes landed on it just as it cocked its head.

Raptosaur. A combination of: raptor and pterosaur. Sinewed, lean, shoulder-height, nostrils flaring. Its black, scales catching the filtered light like oil in water. The eye—a perfect yellow coin—blinked sideways. Not fearfully. Just…measuring you.

And you couldn’t move. You remembered every line of the briefing about raptors, and none of it helped. The moment you ran, you became prey. The moment you froze—well, that just made the kill cleaner.

The raptor took a step forward. And then, from your right, a second raptor emerged—silent as breath, slinking over a toppled computer bank. Its claws clicked gently as it moved, head low, tail a balancing whip behind it.

Panic is a strange thing. It makes time behave badly. Each second stretches like warm resin, sticky and golden. Your body told you to run. Your mind told you you’d never make it.

Then Henry appeared. He moved like a fuse being lit—fast, desperate, not heroic but human, all raw fear and instinct. He grabbed a piece of piping from the wall and threw it across the lab. It clanged—sharp and bright—against a broken monitor. The first raptor flinched, head snapping toward the noise.

“Run!” Henry shouted, already moving.

You didn't think. You sprinted. Boots slamming against cracked tile, glass crunching underfoot, lungs tearing open with cold breath. Behind you came the sound—so much worse than the sight—the click-clack-thud of claws on synthetic flooring. The chase was on.

You and Henry barreled through a hallway choked with hanging cables. The lights stuttered overhead. He caught your hand for half a second, just enough to pull you left—through a door you would’ve missed entirely.

Behind you, one raptor slammed into the wall trying to follow. It shrieked—a high, grating sound, part eagle, part nightmare.

You ran down a stairwell, two steps at a time. You could feel them behind you—close. Too close. One leapt. You heard it before you felt it. Its claw slashed across your backpack, dragging you back half a step. Henry yanked you forward, hard. You fell together at the bottom of the stairs in a heap. He pulled you into a side utility room, slammed the heavy door, and jammed a beam through the handles just as the first raptor smashed into it from the other side.

The impact rattled your bones. You both pressed your weight against the door as it thudded again. Breathing. Like surf dragging back from the shore. The pounding stopped. Claws scraped the door. Then—quiet.

You were still alive. Henry slid down to the floor beside you, gasping, chest heaving. You leaned your head back against the cold wall, heart a frantic metronome. You looked down. The hem of your jacket was ripped, but your skin was untouched. A miracle.

“Jesus,” you whispered. “They almost—”

He didn’t let you finish. Henry turned to you, his hand cupping the back of your neck as he pulled you in. His forehead against yours.

“Don’t you ever do that again,” he rasped, voice hoarse. “Don’t go off alone. Not here. Not with things that hunt like that."‎