FicWad

I was sitting on my stool, looking into the microscope in front of me. I yawned as I heard the lab door open behind me. I didn’t care to look up, thinking it was just another geneticist.

“Come along, Henry. I think you’ll enjoy some time...out of here.” An elderly man in white suddenly urged me. I looked up from my microscope drowsily.

“But my lab, sir-” I began, but the man laughed and grabbed my arm.

“Codswallop, Henry! Come, you need fresh air!” The man, John Hammond, my boss, dragged me off my stool. For an old man, he was quite strong, I would give him that. Also, among other things, he was ambitious and stubborn. There wasn’t a point arguing with him. A young women, Izabella Ling, who like me, was a Chinese-American, looked up from here clipboard. Izabella was three years younger than me, and I had worked with her for the past three years. She tended to be quite energetic and laughed easily. Both traits I found nice...quite nice.

“He’s right Henry, you look like you need fresh air. I can run the lab until you get back.” She smiled, a dazzling smile, her beautiful white teeth showing. At the moment, I had a ‘small’ liking to her. She was very attractive, and besides from being energetic and having a great sense of humor, she was friendly and outgoing. John turned to face her.

“Nonsense, Ms. Ling, you’ve been in here about the same time as him, come along, I’m sure you’ll have fun. It’ll only be for a couple of minutes.” John assured her. She looked uncertain, but finally set down her clipboard and took off her goggles. She smiled again and came towards us.

“If you insist Mr. Hammond.” She grabbed my other arm and along with John Hammond, practically dragged me out of my lab.
We went outside of my lab into the corridor and I got some water from one of the many vending machines. It was only then that I realized how thirsty I had been. A couple of machines over, John was probably explaining to Izabella his dreams...again. I heard some footsteps down the hall and turned to see Ed Regis, our publicist. He was still wearing his usual black baseball hat with the Jurassic Park logo, casual jeans, and a black t-shirt. I smiled and nodded to him. He was a fairly decent fellow, and he was always usually smiling or happy. He stopped a distance from me and went wide-eyed.

“Henry? I thought you died ages ago in your lab?” Ed asked sarcastically. I rolled my eyes.

“Very funny, Ed.” I replied. Sometimes he could be annoying.

“I’m serious. You weren’t at breakfast today...You didn’t hear the announcements.” Ed frowned and crossed his arms over his chest. I tilted my head and frowned.

“What announcements?” I asked quickly.

“Robert’s gonna load in the raptors next week.” Ed replied. I nodded and kept my frown. Robert Muldoon was the park warden and he said that some of the creatures he used to work with in Africa seemed like house pets compared to the raptors.

“I’ll be honest...I don’t know how I feel about that.” I honestly admitted, adjusting my lab coat.

“So...what’s keepin’ ya from everyone else?” Ed asked casually. Ed was never formal, I soon found out, shortly after I met him.

“I’m sorry, but I’m so close to cloning a new species.” I whispered to him as I walked over to him. His eyes widened and he leaned in.

“Which one?” He asked. I smiled and shook my head.

“You can’t know, it’s a surprise.” I pulled away and started heading back to my lab, but Izabella and John stepped in my way.

“Come on Henry, let’s go have something to eat. I’m starving.” Izabella grabbed my arm and started leading me away from my lab, John following us.

“But, the new species.” I reminded her.

“Oh, just for a couple of minutes...We haven’t eaten all day.” She said as we walked down the stairs, to the cafeteria. As much as I wanted the new species to be cloned, I was starving as well. We entered the cafeteria and found that it was empty. Izabella forced me to sit down while she looked around for some food in the kitchen. I took another large sip of water and capped the bottle and wiped the sweat from my forehead as it was a hot, sticky afternoon. Typical for the island, I knew, but I wasn’t used to it quite yet.

“A bit hot, isn’t Henry?” John asked me as he pulled out a white handkerchief and began wiping his forehead. I nodded.

“Quite.” I said, taking another sip of water. John chuckled.

“Well, you should get used to it, I mean after all Henry, there’s nothing you can do about it.” John reminded me as I nodded.
Thankfully, I didn’t have to wait long until I heard footsteps and looked to see Izabella coming out of the kitchen with three sandwiches. She sat down next to me and handed John a sandwich, then handed me a sandwich. I muttered a quick thanks and started eating it greedily, actually feeling a lot hungrier than I had initially realized.

“It’s a peanut-butter sandwich, it was the only thing they had in there.” She explained and I nodded.

“How are the eggs?” John asked me. I was confused for a minute, but realized that he was talking about the eggs in the incubator.

“They’re alright, but after they hatch, they only have a fifty/fifty chance of surviving due to stress.” I told him. He nodded and set down his sandwich.

“Well, Henry, you have to remember that we are talking about extinct creatures here.” Izabella reminded me. I nodded and set down my sandwich. John had a grave expression on his face. I knew he that he was...obsessed with the animals, so to speak.

“True. I just wish that the chances were higher that they would survive.” I sighed and ran my hands through my hair. I needed a shower soon, but only after the new species, which would hopefully be done by tonight. That sounded good...a nice, hot shower.

“Well...Maybe someday.” She stood up and brushed the crumbs off her lab coat. She would probably need a new one, due to the rules of the lab. I stood up and did the same, drinking the last of my water bottle and throwing it away. I quickly said good-bye to John, as did Izabella. I walked towards the door and opened it for her. She walked through it and thanked me.

“Thanks for lunch.” I said gratefully to her as we headed up the stairs.

“Anytime.” She glanced at me and winked. I felt my cheeks warm up as I absentmindedly picked up the pace.

“Where’ve you been Henry?” I smelt smoke and turned around to face John ‘Ray’ Arnold, the island’s chief engineer. He was alright, but he smoked...a lot. I was rather concerned for his health, but didn’t bring it up.

“Oh, hi Ray. Wish I could talk more, but got to get to the lab, you know how it is.” I started walking away, knowing that the sooner I resume my work, the sooner I’d be done, but I knew Ray was following me.

“You remember the one time that Robert dragged you, Ed, and Gerry over to my station and forced me to stop working.” Ray reminded me. I smiled vaguely and nodded.

“I’m gonna have to do the same if you don’t get out of that cursed lab sooner or later.” Ray threatened, but I laughed.

“Don’t worry, in about three to five hours, I’ll be out before you know it.” I told him as he nodded and started digging through his pockets to find a new cigarette. You could always tell when he was looking for a new one. He’d look up at the ceiling with one or both hands in his pockets.

I walked and as I had made it to the door of the lab by now, I quickly slid my card through the card slot next to it, waiting until it glowed green and allowed me access into the lab. Izabella was already at her desk when I walked in, and at least for the moment, we were the only two people. I sat on my stool and continued my job. Cloning dinosaurs. It was a hard job, but I’ve managed to create fifteen so far. I smiled at the thought. I found myself getting drowsy...very drowsy.

I don’t honestly remembered what happened. I knew one moment I was looking through my microscope, peering into the blood that we had sucked out of a sixty-five million year old mosquito, and then the next, Izabella was shaking me, waking me up. I blinked a couple of times, trying to think where I was. I looked up and saw Izabella. She had a relieved look on her face.
“Good morning, ‘sleeping beauty’.” She teased as I rubbed my eyes.
“What time is it?” I asked wearily as I stretched in my chair.
“Seven o’clock, evenin’.” She told me as she took off my lab coat.
“Grand. I’ll be done before no time.” I mumbled sarcastically as I began looking into my microscope, only to find out that the slide was gone.
“Where’s my slide?!” I asked as I stood up, almost tripping over the stool. Izabella turned around and smiled.
“You’re done. The sixteenth species has worked.” She told me. I could hardly believe my ears. The new species was successfully cloned! I smiled and took hold of both her hands.

“Izabella, I could kiss you!” I said in pure glee. Only after the words had left my mouth, I finally realized exactly what I had said. I let go of her hands and pulled back a bit, blushing.

“I, I mean, any geneticist could.” I stammered I smoothed out my shirt, not daring to look up at her. I heard her step closer and could tell that she was about two feet away from me.

“You know, Henry Wu-” She began, but I looked up, confused as why she was calling me by my full name.

“Why are you calling me by my full name?” I asked quickly. She took a step closer.

“Cuz I can. As I was saying, you know, Henry Wu, I’ve takin’ quite a liking to you.” She lightly jabbed a finger into my chest. I stepped back, shocked. She...liked me back?

“You, you do?” I said, stammering. She nodded and giggled, stepping closer to me.

“Yes and I know for a fact that you like me back.” She said, stopping. We were close enough that we could kiss.

“I’m not that obvious.” I told her confidentially.

“Oh yes you are.” She said, and before I could say anything, she kissed me on the lips.