Michael Crichton - The Lost World

(Egg Maintenance Phase, Hormone Enhancement 2G/H).

Komera swing arms have been replaced and re-sleeved on

robots 5A and 7D, but needle replacement must still be done

daily in accordance with sterile conditions (General Manual:

Guideline 5-9).

During the next production cycle (10/12-10/26) we will sacri-

fice every tenth egg at H Step to test for contamination. Begin

set-asides at once. Report all errors. Stop the line whenever

necessary until this is cleared up.

"They had problems with infection, and contamination of the production line,' Malcolm said. "And maybe other sources of contamination as well. Look at this."

He handed Thorne the next memo:

INGEN PRODUCTION UPDATE 12/18/88

From: H. Wu

To: All Personnel

Subject: DX: TAG AND RELEASE

Live births will be fitted with the new Grumbach field tags at

the earliest viable interval. Formula or other feeding within the

laboratory confines will no longer be done. The release pro-

gram is now fully operational and tracking networks are acti-

vated to monitor.

Thorne said, "Does this mean what I think it means?"

"Yes," Malcolm said. "They were having trouble keeping the newborn animals alive, so they tagged them and released them."

"And kept track of them on some kind of network?"

"Yes. I think so."

"They set dinosaurs loose on this island?" Eddie said. "They must have been crazy."

"Desperate, is more like it, Malcolm said. "Just imagine: here's this huge expensive high-tech process, and in the end the animals are getting sick and dying. Hammond must have been furious. So they decided to get the animals out of the laboratory, and into the wild."

"But why didn't they find the cause of the sickness, why didn't they - "

"Commercial process," Malcolm said. "It's all about results. And I'm sure they thought they were keeping track of the animals, they could get them back anytime they wanted. And don't forget, it must have worked. They must have put the animals into the field, then collected them after a while, when they were older, and shipped them to Hammond's zoo."

"But not all of them…"

"We don't know everything yet," Malcolm said. "We don't know what happened here."

They went through the next doorway, and found themselves in a small, bare room, with a central bench, and lockers on the walls. Signs said OBSERVE STERILE PRECAUTIONS and MAINTAIN SK4 STANDARDS. At the end of the room was a cabinet with stacks of yellowing gowns and caps. Eddie said, "It's a changing room."

"Looks like it," Malcolm said. He opened a locker; it was empty, except for a pair of men's shoes. He opened several other lockers. They were all empty. Inside one, a sheet of paper was taped:

Safety Is Everybody's Business!

Report Genetic Anomalies!

Dispose of Biowaste Properly!

Halt the Spread of DX Now!

"What's DX?" Eddie said.

"I think," Malcolm said, "it's the name for this mysterious disease."

At the far end of the changing room were two doors. The right-hand door was pneumatic, operated by a rubber foot-panel set in the floor. But that door was locked, so they went through the left door, which opened freely.

They found themselves in a long corridor, with floor-to-ceiling glass panels along the right wall. The glass was scratched and dirty, but they peered through it into the room beyond, which was unlike anything Thorne had ever seen.

The space was vast, the size of a football field. Conveyor belts crisscrossed the room at two levels, one very high, the other at waist level. At various stations around the room, clusters of large machinery, with intricate tubing and swing arms, stood beside the belts.

Thorne shone his light on the conveyor belts. "An assembly line," he said.

"But it looks untouched, like it's still ready to go," Malcolm said. "There are a couple of plants growing through the floor over there, but, overall, remarkably clean."

"Too clean," Eddie said.

Thorne shrugged. "If it's a clean-room environment, then it's probably air-sealed," he said. "I guess it just stayed the way it was years ago."

Eddie shook his head. "For years? Doc, I don't think so."

"Then what do you think explains it?"

Malcolm frowned, peering through the glass. How was it possible for a room this size to remain clean after so many years? It didn't make any -

"Hey!" Eddie said.

Malcolm saw it, too. It was in the far corner of the room, a small blue box halfway up the wall, cables running into it. It was obviously some kind of electrical junction box. Mounted on the box was a tiny red light.

It was glowing.

"This place has power!"

Thorne moved close to the glass, looking through with them. "That' s impossible. It must be some kind of stored charge, or a battery…"

"After five years? No battery can last that long," Eddie said. "I'm telling you, Doc, this place has power!"

Arby stared at the monitor as white lettering slowly printed across the screen:

ARE YOU FIRST-TIME USER OF THE NETWORK?

He typed:

YES.

There was another pause.

He waited.

More letters slowly appeared:

YOUR FULL NAME?

He typed in his name.

DO YOU WANT A PASSWORD ISSUED TO YOU?

You're kidding, he thought. This was going to be a snap. It was almost disappointing. He really thought Dr. Thorne would have been more clever. He typed:

YES.

After a moment:

YOUR NEW PASSWORD IS VIG/ amp;*849/. PLEASE MAKE A NOTE OF IT.

Sure thing, Arby thought. You bet I will. There was no paper on the desk in front of him; he patted his pockets, found a scrap of paper, and wrote it down.

PLEASE RE-ENTER YOUR PASSWORD NOW.

He typed in the series of characters and numbers.

There was another pause, and then more printing appeared across the screen. The speed of the printing was oddly slow, and halting at times. After all this time, maybe the system wasn't working very

THANK YOU. PASSWORD CONFIRMED.

The screen flashed, and suddenly turned dark blue. There was an electronic chime.

And then Arby's jaw dropped open as he stared at the screen, which read:

INTERNATIONAL GENETIC TECHNOLOGIES

SITE B

LOCAL NODE NETWORK SERVICES

It didn't make any sense. How could there be a Site B network? InGen had closed Site B years ago. Arby had already read the documents. And InGen was out of business, long since bankrupt. What network? he thought. And how had he managed to get on it? The trailer wasn't connected to anything. There were no cables or anything. So it must be a radio network, already on the island. Somehow he'd managed to log onto it. But how could it exist? A radio network needed power, and there was no power here.

Arby waited.

Nothing happened. The words just sat there on the screen. He waited for a menu to come up, but one never did. Arby began to think that perhaps the system was defunct. Or hung up. Maybe it just let you log on, and then nothing happened after that.

Or maybe, he thought, he was supposed to do something. He did the simplest thing, which was to press RETURN.

He saw:

REMOTE NETWORK SERVICES AVAILABLE

CURRENT WORKFILES Last Modified

R/Research 10/02/89

P/Production 10/05/89

F/Field Rec 10/09/89

M/Maintenance 11/12/89

A/Administration 11/11/89

STORED DATAFILES

Rl/Research (AV-AD) 11/01/89

R2/Research (GD-99) 11/12/89

P/Production (FD-FN) 11/09/89

VIDEO NETWORK

A, 1-20 CCD NDC. 1. I

So it really was an old system: files hadn't been modified for years. Wondering if it still worked, he clicked on VIDEO NETWORK, And to his amazement, he saw the screen begin to fill with tiny video images.

There were fifteen in all, crowding the screen, showing views of various parts of the island. Most of the cameras seemed to be mounted high up, in trees or something, and they showed -