Felarya Park

A good source of character names are the numerous "baby name" websites. There are too many to list, but here's one that's not bad:

Baby Boy Names
Baby Girl Names

There are some others that are more sophisticated, allowing you to filter based on nationality, word meaning, etc.
A web search with "baby girl names" should result in more than you probably care to look at in this lifetime.

When it comes to human names (for characters from Earth), I use this site, and have done so for many years. It's a list of national football players by nationality, so it has names from every country. It only gives you family names and male first names, but it can be quite useful.

Thanks all ^^ Working on the story now.. do you think that Gerridi would be able to make their own flutes if given the time? thinkin that I could use one of them ^^

Wow this is awesome... I wonder what will happen to Joseph and Maria... Will Xulia eat them? Maybe I should introduce my character into the story for a whole new perspective lol...

i am liking where this story is going.. and the storm seems to be a key part to most of the problems going on.. and Xulia is a personal favorite so far. i cant wait to see what happens..

if anyone is wondering on the progress so far I am officially half done with my addition.... now to wait and see when I finish it up o__o... not gonna be nearly as long or epic as Timing2's addition, at most it'll be half as long

This has been a great set of stories! I've been mulling over an idea myself too to maybe add in at some point as well to join in the fun, but first I want to see how it develops some .

all the stories were great, and i realy wish i wasn't so horrible at writing or i would also post a chapter...
and karbo, just wondering if you might add a chapter?

errm well this is very unlikely sadly XD

I'm not a writer so writting something takes me ages, especially in english.. But yeah, when I see this thread, it makes me wish I was

Hehe, liking the plot so far, Would it be alright if I posted a part of the story I have got up one he forums. Its almost done now (around 60%) so it shouldn't take too long.

Wildthing wrote:

Hehe, liking the plot so far, Would it be alright if I posted a part of the story I have got up one he forums. Its almost done now (around 60%) so it shouldn't take too long.

Things got busy here so I wouldn't be bugged if you submitted one before me ^-^ I say go for it.

Karbo wrote:

errm well this is very unlikely sadly XD

I'm not a writer so writting something takes me ages, especially in english.. But yeah, when I see this thread, it makes me wish I was

dang...
well do you think you'll be writing anything any time soon?
because after reading you're story on eka's, i was hoping to get to read more...

OK, heres my part of the story. Cowritten by me and Timing2 - I forgot, be warned, it contains harsh language and a big ego!:

Felarya Park: Greed is Good

Jerald stabbed furiously at the keyboard with his finger. He was insulted beyond belief! He, who had designed the massive containment and defence systems, who had come to the very island to fix the bugs, and had on his own solved them all, he had been refused pay! It was an outrage.

Designs

It had all started around just over a couple of years ago. I had been approached by a strange corporation that needed an intricate, multi-layered defence system capable of holding huge creatures. When looking at the required specifications, I had been stunned. The systems they wanted were huge, over a hundred feet tall in some places. Nothing on Earth was nearly that big. As far as I could tell it was ridiculous overkill. I had pointed this out to the corporation representatives and had been told they were necessary and that the pay would be good. That finally caught my attention. I had been struggling for funds and jobs in the area had dried up. I pretended to give it much consideration, then accepted.

If I’m honest, I didn’t know why they’d come to me specifically. I had done some basic security systems before for office buildings. I’d even made a small exhibit for a zoo before but since that one was designed to hold chipmunks for a family section it was slightly out of context. I think I knew the real reason in the back of my head however. I had been the cheapest option, the one most desperate for work. Would I admit that to anyone – Not a chance.

I started with the fencing; it drew me in as it was by far the biggest project and would be the largest challenge, the most fun, and most importantly, the thing I could truly gloat over once it was finished. To be honest, however, saying it was the biggest project I had worked on was a gross understatement. It was required to be at least two hundred and fifty feet tall and around twelve feet thick! Not only that, but it needed safe areas in which anything contained inside could be viewed. It was gargantuan and even with the perfect design it would be almost impossible to get the materials needed.

However, even with my doubts about the whole point of the task I set to work and within two months had designed a set of double-layer fencing, fourteen feet thick with several transparent rubbery plastic screens to view. Each of the screens was almost as thick as the fencing, designed to repel blunt attacks and allow piercing strikes to bounce harmlessly off. Even with all this, it was still perfectly clear and ideal for viewing through. Just to make sure it was extra secure, I also ran redundant high voltage lines around the whole system, minus the screens. It was one of my better pieces of work.

What was infuriating about the whole project however was when I asked, several times in fact, what could possibly be so dangerous to need this kind of security, I had been rebuked each time. Everything was on a need to know basis, and the specifications I’d been given were all I needed to know. I’d even been ignored when I asked where the park, at least I assumed it would be a park, would be. Eventually, I gave it up as a lost cause, as it was obvious they weren’t going to answer my questions.

My curiosity had been raised, however, by every subsequent containment unit I was given to design. I moved on from electric fencing to simple steel inter-crossing bars that could contain anything shorter than forty feet tall. Then they gave me requirements for giant aquatic enclosures that were the size of several Olympic swimming pools and needed steel reinforcements along the whole structure. After that was a giant aviary hold, except this one needed to be several hundred feet high and had be extremely resistant to cutting or slashing attacks. Even after that, the oddities continued to mount. Among the remaining tasks for me was a cage that needed to repel slime and had to have anti-stick qualities. I had wondered to myself at the time what they were going to keep in there, giant slugs?

On each and every structure, I had been tempted to ask again what was going to be kept in them, but each time I kept my silence, not that I ever had many chances to ask anyway. The corporation only turned up to collect my designs, state changes that needed to be made and leave my meager pay; they said that I would collect the full payment on completion. So over the next year and a bit, I toiled over the designs, making them perfect, true masterpieces to be admired - comparable even to works of Da Vinci and Shakespeare. One could never be too proud of one’s work, after all.

I had of course heard snippets of information about what was going to be contained in the super structures. If they thought I was stupid enough to not try to gain any information about my work, they were fools. I learned something about a ‘Felarya,’ and I assumed it was some foreign hellhole where they’d be getting some kind of obscure bug no one cared about for people to look at and pretend they were interested in. I’d also seen slip ups in the documentation that mentioned such things such as ‘Orchid Mantoids’ and ‘Bolas Dridders.’ Whoever was responsible for redacting the information should have been fired. I assumed that they were some vague subspecies that were rarer and more interesting than the common varieties. Admittedly, I had no idea what a ‘Mantoid’ or ‘Dridder’ was, but since they weren’t paying me to ask questions I kept my curiosity to myself. At any rate, I had never understood why, just because something was rarer, it was more interesting. I’d hated that ever since I was a kid. It just didn’t make sense to me.

Of course, the day finally came when I finished the last design. It was a simple one in comparison to the rest of the work I had done. Just a dozen smallish cages around five feet long and three high that needed to be resistant to a range of basic effects such as corrosion or cutting. After sending the plans off, the corporation left me the rest of my wage, a healthy sum of money that I quickly put to use. I had been eyeing an Alfa Romeo 159 for a while, and I finally had the money to get one. I traded in my old, aging, pathetic Volvo and finally bought myself a proper set of wheels. I might have been a little overweight and not the best-looking guy around, but now, in my own miniature Ferrari, I had the wheels all the ladies would adore. Life was good.

I had thought that I would never see the corporation again, and that things could only get better. I couldn’t have been more wrong.

The money I had earned quickly dried up, mainly thanks to my little investment into the car, and jobs were still sparse around the area. I quickly found myself running low on money again. Just when things were beginning to become desperate, salvation came - and it did so from an unlikely source.

Journeys

Once again the corporation turned up at my flat and made an unusual proposal. They offered me further employment as long as I agreed to design a new system for them and fix a few bugs in the ones I had already masterminded. I explained the bugs were the result of their lack of allowing me to properly test the integrated systems, and they were surprisingly understanding. I should have kept my mouth shut, anyone acting that agreeable had to have ulterior motives.

Accepting eagerly, I did not anticipate there being a catch. I was told that I would have to go to the park itself to design the system. It was fair to say I was rather surprised when they grabbed me by the arms, took be outside, and forced me into their 4x4. It was also fair to say that I had not taken being blindfolded too kindly either. However, the men who grabbed me were not the kind I wanted to tussle with. I was told that it was imperative that I did not know where I was being taken, since it was apparently top secret. My protests were completely ignored, all they would say is that I would not be harmed and for me to remain calm. I did calm down a little once they told me there was a lot of money to be made, as long as I cooperated. I ended up enduring a four-hour drive until the two men decided that we were secluded enough. I had no idea where we were. They muttered something about a ‘portal’ and then dragged me out of the car.

I was forced forward and then marched through something cold to the touch. It gave me a strange feeling, like being squeezed from all sides. I didn’t like it and was glad when it ended a few seconds later.

At first, I thought I had been pushed into a sauna or something, the place was boiling. It was also humid and I quickly started to build up a sweat. I was able to guess that I was still outside however, I was able to feel the wind and I also heard strange bird calls in the distance. They pushed me forward and I guessed I walked for about five minute before entering a building. I could no longer feel the wind and the air seemed even hotter inside. After standing still a couple minutes, I finally had my blindfold removed.

I had been standing in an office the whole time. It was very grey and the only furniture in the room was a shelf row adorned with several fossils, pieces of amber and strange pictures. There was a desk that had a chair on either side. One of the chairs was occupied by a man in a suit. He beckoned me to sit and apologised for my treatment, saying it had been necessary. He went on to explain that I was no longer in England or indeed anywhere I knew and that I would have to sign a contract before I left the room if I wanted to stay in his employment. I basically had two options, work at the facility and be unable to leave for an undetermined length of time or go back home, once again blindfolded, and have no job. Needless to say, despite how annoyed I was at my treatment, I accepted his offer and signed the contract.

I wish I’d known then what was to happen over the next few months.

He advised me to get some sleep and I took up the offer. I didn’t sleep well, but some sleep was better than none at all. The next morning I was woken early by one of the staff and told to get dressed. I was to be taken on a tour of the park and shown why the safety precautions I’d spent so long designing were necessary. I had to admit, I had been curious and put on the clothes given to me, they looked like some sort of ranger’s clothing. Whatever they had been, they were ghastly. Once dressed appropriately, I was shown around the park. Given a million guesses, I would never have gotten close to what I saw.

They were what appeared to be humans. Except they weren’t. Every single one of them had the lower body of an animal. Half-snakes, half-spiders, half-slugs, even half-fish, all captured for the park. The other thing about the women (they were all women, the park did not want the exhibits to start breeding) was that they were all huge. Suddenly, my countless hours of work made sense - the defences, the size, the scale. And that was before I got to the main attraction.

It contained what the park managers called a Mantoid, a half-human, half-mantis behemoth. I wasn’t even slightly interested in that though when I saw her. I cared more for the fact of her immense size. She was well over twenty times my size and that was just in height. I finally realised what the enormous fence was built for and I could see that I had done a bloody good job. I had asked the park manger if she had ever escaped, and was told that, despite numerous attempts, she had so far not succeeded. I felt a rush of pride at that moment - I was beyond good.

I continued on the tour of the park and was finally told why I had been re-employed. Apparently, it was connected to the Mantoid. A large reformation of the staff had taken place, something about her learning to speak or something, and I was required to build a kill system for the main exhibit and maintain the site defences from any problems that arose.

I achieved this with little problem over the course of around a month. A simple system involving distribution of highly toxic gas (@ Timing – unsure what your kill system is – feel free to change it if necessary) into the enclosure over the course of several minutes would easily kill off the mantoid regardless of its size. Once again the corporation was happy and I had been paid. Then the problems started.

It was all the new head of the main exhibit’s fault. He was a man named Gower Cuthwill. I can honestly say I had never met a bigger asshole in my life. He talked down to everyone, but for some reason he took a particular disliking to me. He treated me like scum, like some idiotic boy who knew nothing about anything except computers. He continuously criticised my work and had my pay cut again and again, until he finally went too far.

I had been working on the external security system of the main exhibit when something had gone wrong. A part of the electric fence had deactivated and gone down for a few minutes. By lucky coincidence, the freak inside had been at the other side of the exhibit at the time, and although she somehow sensed that something was amiss, she was unable to get to the downed section of the fence in time before I had repowered it. Gower had been furious and docked my pay for the whole month. I couldn’t even appeal against this, he easily had more authority than me and the head honchos of the corporation would do anything to save every penny they could. They had agreed with Gower and left me penniless for the month, I was completely reliant on the corporation’s catering service now. It was humiliating!

and Part 2:

The Storm Begins

Jerald Watson finished the rewrite of the mainframe he’d been working on. It was easy, dull work and he was hating every minute of it. Cursing to himself under his breath, he rose to his feet and shuffled over to the window. Looking outside, he saw an odd sight. There appeared to be a storm rolling in. That in itself was not unusual; the island was located far out to sea after all, so storms were to be expected. It was the clouds that were unusual. They were in a strange formation, like they were encircling the island. Not only that, they were incredibly dark, almost pitch black. He frowned at them, whatever they were, they weren’t normal. He quickly walked back to the desk and picked up the phone. He dialed the number for the park manager, and put the phone to his ear but was met by a wall of static. Whatever those clouds were, they seemed to be disrupting the phone lines.

Cursing to himself, he slammed the phone down. Useless piece of junk, nothing here ever worked when you needed it to. He started pacing around his room. There wasn’t much else he could do. There was barely any work around the park for him now because his systems were too good. He decided that just about the only thing he could do was get a coffee from the vending machine down the hallway.

Jerald sighed to himself. “How empty is my life if the only thing I can think to do is make a coffee,” he muttered, wishing that he had never signed the contract that forced him to stay here for another nine months. One year he’d signed for and he’d achieved everything he’d needed to do within a month and a half. That’s what you get for being a genius, he supposed.

Jerald reached the vending machine and stared at it blankly for a few seconds before reaching to his pocket and pulling out one of his embarrassingly few tokens. The park used its own currency since so many foreigners passed through. He didn’t understand the portal system or how in hell he wasn’t on Earth any more, he just took it for granted. The tokens were a good idea though; some of the currencies the visitors brought through were incredibly strange. He could swear he’d once seen a strange man who appeared to have cat ears and a tail trying to pay with a bag of what looked like catnip. That had not gone over to well with the manger who was called in to deal with the angry cat man.

Shrugging to himself, he went to put his token in the machine when an almighty roar whipped through the air. Thunder. Jerald jumped out of shock and dropped his token. That was by far the loudest bit of thunder he had ever heard in his life. What was worse was that it had cost him his coffee! Cursing to himself he got on his hands and knees and found that the token had rolled under the machine.

“Great!” he muttered sarcastically.

He was about to reach for it under the machine when another roar of thunder crackled. Jerald could have sworn the vending machine shook that time. There was no way he was putting his hand under it now, it could fall on him any minute. Standing up, he backed away from the machine and scuttled back to his office. He looked out of his window again and was amazed. The clouds had now completely covered the island, but it had only been a couple of minutes since he had last looked out. No normal clouds were that quick.

A flash of blue lit the sky in front of him, causing Jerald to jump back from the window. That bolt had been huge. Surely lightning wasn’t normally that thick or had that many forks. Another branch of lightning hit the ground, this one caused him much more worry than the last.

Out of the corner of his eye he noticed something on his computer screen had begun flashing red. He hurried over to it and started to panic. Power around the park was slowly dying off. The main generator must have been hit. Backup generators could keep the majority of the human facility systems up but there was now one big problem. The powerful electric current through the Mantoid exhibit was rapidly deteriorating. He watched as the numbers slowly started to sink lower and lower. At this rate, the fence would be dead in around twenty minutes and having heard of the mantoids numerous attempts at escaping from other members of staff Jerald decided he did not want to be around when that moment came. In fact, if this exhibit’s security system was failing, it was likely happening all over the island. That realization brought real fear.

It was at that moment that a new sound rent the air. A wailing siren flared on and off, the noise almost as loud as the thunder, only deadened by the speech that kept came over the intercom.

“Evacuation. Would all guests please get to the nearest portal immediately. Would all staff please get to the nearest safe house unless required elsewhere. Evacuation.”

Panic really started to set in now. There was no way he was risking his neck on the island if the evacuation order had been given. He was going to take his chance and hightail it as fast as he could, he was too good for this place anyway. He was already halfway down the hallway when an idea struck him. Since he was leaving, he might as well get his pay plus a little bonus. He knew the perfect way to make an easy profit from this situation and get back at the bastards, especially Gower, who robbed him of his hard-earned wage.

In anticipation of the grand opening, the park had ordered its exploration team to journey into Felarya once more and retrieve two more infant specimens. These would be used to attract crowds by offering them a chance to see real predators in their infancy. The team had returned around two weeks ago with two specimens, a desert naga and a coneweb desert spider, both obtained with difficulty from the Akaptor desert. Most importantly, at least to Jerald, both were worth a fortune of anyone’s money.

They were being stored in the building next to his for quarantine. The park staff couldn’t risk any chance of disease spreading throughout the exhibits. This suited Jerald perfectly, in the panic they were the least deadly specimens in the whole park that meant they were least likely to be guarded. He rushed through the building as fast as he could and ran outside, straight into a tropical thunderstorm.

The rain was coming down in shear torrents, it was almost like walking through a waterfall. Then there was the wind that lashed at Jerald’s face and seemed to change direction as if on a whim, rarely blowing the same way for more than a few seconds. The quarantine building was only about twenty strides away from the office block but it still took Jerald almost two minutes of struggling and fighting to find his way inside.

Once there, he collapsed against a wall and tried to catch his breath. He was soaked from head to foot and his face was stinging slightly from the rain that had been hurled at him by the wind. He was frozen and numb from the crossing and it had been only what, twenty yards? He took in a large breath and started shakily walking towards the building’s hold. Sitting around wouldn’t help with his escape plan. He was in luck, the whole thing was deserted, and on the way there, he didn’t see a single soul. He could almost laugh at his luck - this was too easy.

After a minute, he finally reached the double doors leading to the hold and rushed through them. The room was quite large, it could easily hold up to twenty small trucks and was about twenty feet high. Jerald guessed that in its early days it would have been packed to the brim with an array of all the freaks that the park had. Now however it contained only two small cages at one side of the room, a Range Rover near the service door, and a small cage transporter. He recognised the cages, they were among the last designs he had made, but he was more interested in their contents. Inside one was a naga with a bright yellow tail broken up with a brown spiral pattern, while the other contained a dridder that had the light grey lower body of a spider. Its spider half was rather hairy but remarkably skinny compare to the other dridder freaks in the park. Neither could have been more than a couple of months old but already they looked like human children of around three or four. Both looked at him curiously, probably wondering what he wanted.

Jerald face broke into a smile at the sight of them. He normally did not like children but for once, he reckoned he could put up with these for a bit. Looking around, he spotted the nearest cage transporter - basically a sort of shopping trolley that allowed easy movement of a loaded cage. He loaded the dridder’s cage first, figuring she would weigh the least. He discovered he was wrong, she weighed a ton! With great effort, and a lot of shouting, he finally heaved the dridder onto the transporter and almost ran with her towards the 4x4. He was thankful that it was already set up to load specimens, he was running late into his plan already. He quickly put the cage into the boot and almost sprinted back to the naga to load her as well.

He unfortunately found out that he had been right, the dridder did weigh less. He swore loudly as he pushed with all his might to get the cage onto the transporter. Finally, after what seemed like hours the cage slid into place. Jerald stood panting with his hands on his knees, sweat pouring down his brow. He hoped he wouldn’t have to do that again anytime soon. He started pushing the transporter towards the Range Rover, leaning on it to support himself as his legs suddenly felt very weak. Still panting, he loaded the naga into the car and started strapping them down.

“Belt up kids, won’t do for you to get hurt now,” he grumbled. All this exercise couldn’t be good for him. Still, with the payout he’d get from these two, he wouldn’t be having to do too much running around for himself.

He set off to the front door when he saw something from the corner of his eye. A gun lay inside an emergency safe-box near the service door. Every building had at least one, it was in case of a breakout. It was behind a sheet of glass labeled ‘BREAK GLASS IN CASE OF EMERGENCY.’ Thinking to himself that a soon to be free one hundred fifty foot long predatory insect defiantly classed as an emergency, and that it was defiantly better to be safe than sorry, he jogged over to the case. Smashing open the glass with the provided hammer, he reached in and took the gun. He had never held one in his life before, but figured that when a target is that big it would be hard to miss.

He dragged himself back to the car, hopped into the driver’s seat, and buckled in, laying the gun on the passenger’s seat. He had had it easy so far, he hoped the roads were in a good enough condition to allow him to easily make it to the nearest portal. In normal conditions, it was no more than a few minutes away but today was far from normal. He pressed the remote control to open the service door and started the engine. Looking over his shoulder, he checked that the two kids were safe, god he was sounding like a parent. Luckily he’d be ditching them soon enough. And with that, he set off onto the island’s roads.

And part 3:

Driving lessons

Or what was left of them at least. Although all areas that were accessible to the public were well paved, many staff-only roads were simple dirt tracks. In the storm, these had simply been washed away. Jerald could see that the one leading away from the building was now nothing more than a beaten path, boggy with mud, and hideously uneven. He cursed to himself, his escape plan was being delayed with every step now and it probably wouldn’t be long before somebody realised either he or the freaks in the back were missing. Resolving that there was nothing more to it, he started slowly navigating the pathetic excuse for a road.

Jerald had done very little off-roading before, his previous cars had been rather unsuited for it. Never the less, he made good progress through the muddy path. The dips and rises in the rapidly deteriorating road weren’t that steep and while the mud made traction a problem, the four wheel drive system kept the car going forwards. Jerald was sweating a little inside the vehicle now - who would have thought driving could be so taxing. The humidity probably didn’t help matters.

He kept a good pace up and after a few minutes finally left the service road, entering onto one of the minor roads leading to the nearest portal. Any sense of accomplishment he had gained from this quickly evaporated when he saw the road’s condition however. It had basically become a river of mud. Water gushed across it, ripping up bits of the road as it went. It was little more than a mire.

However, it was the only way to the portal without going along a main road, which would surely get him spotted. He had to get through this, so he gunned the engine and drove straight into the remains of the road. And straight into a problem. This road had much higher crests and drops than the other, he was putting all his effort into keeping as many wheels on the road as he could. Progress was painfully slow and Jerald was growing frustrated. What was starting to make it worse were the freaks in the back, they were starting to cry softly in response to the harsh jolts and bumps in the road. His patience was now wearing thin until after one particularly bad jolt one of the freaks started openly sobbing.

This drove Jerald over the edge, he floored the throttle and the car lurched forward, right over a huge crest in the road.

Suddenly they were airborne and Jerald’s eyes opened in surprise. The fall seemed to happen in slow motion and as they fell the short distance to the floor, Jerald wondered what could happen next.

The front of the car pitched into the muddy ground, crumpling slightly as it did. But the car’s momentum caused the back end to keep going forward. The car rolled forward, throwing everyone inside around. Jerald and the naga were held down by their straps but the restraints on the dridder’s cage came loose, catapulting the cage around the back of the truck. The car continued to roll, finishing a complete flip before landing back on its wheels with a crunch.

Inside, Jerald slowly opened his eyes and let out a low moan. He checked himself out. He seemed to be fine. The crash had just dazed him slightly. He looked into the rear of the car. The trip would have been wasted if his prizes were injured. He cursed loudly when he saw the dridder cage - it had been overturned. He unbuckled himself and crawled into the back. Crouching down, he peered into the cage and checked inside.

The dridder was laying there on what had been the roof of the cage. He could see her breathing, so she wasn’t dead and he couldn’t spot any injuries. She seemed fine, but he couldn’t be sure and there was no way he was sticking his hand in there to check. The freak would probably eat it or something. Jerald had heard stories of their animalistic behaviour. All he could do now was to strap her back in place and hope for the best.

Upon doing that, he jumped back into the front. He then noticed something he hadn’t seen before the crash. It was another road, this one surfaced with tarmac. It led to a different portal, slightly farther away, but with surfaced roads leading to it. Jerald tried to think what it led past, he was sure he had been down it before. Then it hit him, the mantoid exhibit, it was one of the four roads around the exhibit. It was also the farthest from the staff entrance and almost certainly vacated.

Jerald looked back at the dirt road in front of him. If anything, it only got worse the farther he looked. As far as he could tell, it was an unassailable trek and right now, the road past the Mantoid exhibit seemed like a good idea. He decided that he would give it ago and hit the accelerator. The wheels simply spun in the mud.

Cursing loudly, he tried again with the same result. The car was stuck. He unbuckled himself again and got out of the vehicle. A quick check of the wheels showed him they were completely off the ground with the undercarriage resting on a large hump in the washed away road. He was about to give up hope until he saw the motorised winch mounted on the front. His heart jumped, there was a way out after all. Running to the winch and releasing the rope, he began the slow task of attaching it to the nearest tree.

*****

Inside the vehicle, the dridder girl stirred. She couldn’t remember what had happened to her but she could feel that something was wrong. Opening her eyes she saw that the thing she was in, her captors had called it a ‘cage,’ had been thrown upside down. That must be the source of the pain throbbing at the back of her head. She let out a low moan and heard an excited squeak in response.

It was the other one, the other child brought from the desert. They’d been taken away from their broods and brought to that building and now they were here, where ever here was. The last thing she remembered was being thrown around the back before she banged her head on one of the bars on the cage. She looked around the thing she was in and located her friend, the ‘naga’ as her captors called her.

“Nya-ga?” she said softly. She was still slightly dazed from the crash, and she didn’t want any captors to hear her. She was punished badly when they did.

“Dri-da,” replied the naga excitedly, pointing to a part of her cage. The dridder spun around to what she was pointing at and gasped. The crash had warped some of the bars, there was a sizeable gap between two of them now. She slowly pulled herself over to it. If she could fit through it, she would be free from her prison for the first time in months. Upon closer inspection, she saw the gap was easily big enough for her top half but maybe slightly too thin for her bottom half, even if she was rather skinny for her kind. She would only find out by trying.

She threaded her upper half through first, figuring that it would be best to get the easy bit out of the way first, before starting on the tricky part. It fit through easily and allowed her to turn her attention to her abdomen. She placed it against the bars and started pulling with her arms. Rather quickly, her first set of legs came through, followed rapidly by her second. Her third pair proved to be somewhat trickier, as they were located at the most bulbous part of her abdomen and no matter how hard she pulled, they would not fit. She was about to give up when suddenly the thing she was in lurched forward, something was making it move without the captor in the front.

The little lurch gave her just the extra push she needed and the rest of her body slipped through the bars. She chirped with excitement, she was free! Stretching her legs, scuttling around the back of the thing she was in. Her friend watched enviously as she did. Feeling a little bad about the naga, she went to her cage and tried pulling on one of the bars. No good. She sighed a little and looked mournfully at the naga, there was nothing she could do.

Suddenly she jumped, the car had stopped moving and she could hear a voice outside. It was getting closer, she could feel it with her special sense. Panicking, she dove behind her old cage, trying to make it look like she was still in it. The door swung open and the man who had taken them from the building jumped in, swearing but seeming to be in a much happier mood than before. Her precaution was unnecessary; he didn’t even look back at her.

*****

Jerald ran back to the 4x4, the winch had worked surprisingly well, the wheels were now on solid ground and he would be out of here in no time. It was just a quick drive past the mantoid exhibit, he figured he still had plenty of time before she broke out and he was home free. He smiled to himself, he liked it when a plan was working out.

He swung himself into the driver’s seat and turned the key. “It’s a fucking good day to be me,” he sung to himself, very happy with how things were now shaping out. The tires easily found grip on the surfaced roads, so he accelerated towards the portal. Within a minute, he was already approaching the mantoid exhibit. He saw a sign at the side of the road, it read, “APPROACHING MANTOID -XULIA- EXHIBIT. DRIVE VERY CAREFULLY. ELECTRIFIED FENCES AHEAD.”

He scoffed at the sign. He couldn’t afford to drive carefully, he reckoned he was around five minutes from the portal, about the amount of time the backup generators could hold the power for. He floored the throttle and accelerated even faster.

*****

The dridder eyed the captor warily. He had not even glanced at her as he had entered and had started the thing she was in again. She hated the noise it made, a feral snarl as it got faster, but most of all hated the movement, it bucked and bounced horribly and she already had a few cuts and bruises from when she was inside the cage.

She was surprised however when the thing did not bump around as before, instead it was rather smooth and comfortable. This gave her a bit of confidence. She tried walking, gingerly taking a step. To her delight, she found it was quite easy for her to do so. Growing rather brave, she took another and saw something that caught her eye.

*****

Jerald could see the fence now. It was a monolithic structure, towering above the car, making it appear to be more of a building than a fence. Jerald could only guess at what it cost or where they had gotten the materials from. He marveled at his own design. Everything about it was genius, from the alloys used to make it, to the gaps engineered in to save money and time. These things were big enough to fit the Range Rover through and then some. He had figured the enclosure was meant to hold something around as big as the mantoid, there was no other need to make it so tall, and had decided that it did not really matter if there were gaps in the fence as long as they weren’t small enough. Then he came into sight of the generator.

He gasped at what he saw. When he realised it had been hit, he had assumed that a wire had short-circuited or something. What had actually happened was the thing had been completely wrecked. It had exploded. Bits of it were laying all over the place, shattered remains of the machine giving testament to the power of the lightning. Whatever the storm that still raged above his head was, it was unlike anything he had seen before.

*****

The dridder had seen something brown around the captor’s waist. It reminded her of something she had been given by them after she did something they wanted. She stealthily started to approach it - maybe she could sneak some without the captor knowing.

Almost giggling with excitement, she started to creep towards the captor. The naga looked at her inquisitively, she did not seem to know what the dridder was doing. Closer and closer the dridder came until it was within arm’s reach. She stretched out her arm to grab it. The naga gave an excited squeak.

*****

Jerald heard a noise from the back. He turned around to tell the freak to shut up and almost jumped out of his skin. The spider thing was out of its cage and was reaching towards his belt.

“Shit!” he shouted, lurching away from the animal, panic blocking his thinking. His right hand swung towards the dridder, striking it in the face and causing it to recoil away from him. The freak cried out on pain. The other one, the naga, reared up in panic and did the first thing that came to her, she bared her fangs and shot venom straight at his face.

It hit him directly in his right eye. He screamed in pain, feeling as if his face had been set alight. He let go of the steering wheel and clutched at his eye.

Despite his intense pain, Jerald realized his mistake and tried to grab the wheel to prevent a crash, to no avail. In a panic, his foot accidently struck the accelerator, instead of the brake. His frantic attempt to regain control only succeeded in forcing the car sideways, causing it to veer directly towards the fence rather than avoiding it.

Screaming now in both fear and pain, he glimpsed in horror as the car stuck a fallen slab of concrete that acted now as a ramp. The car went airborne, clearing the lower concrete base and narrowly missing one of the enclosure’s massive retaining pylons. Jerald’s screams were matched by those of the dridder and naga, who found themselves flailing about in the back of the car. The dridder managed to clasp her legs firmly into the bars of her cage and held on for dear life as she felt them plummet. Her eyes locked with those of the naga’s – neither understanding exactly what was happening.

The exhibit for the mantoid was at a slightly lower elevation than the surrounding land, but luckily, the car landed atop one of the many massive bushes that filled the area. Momentum carried it through the thick, leafy limbs and down until it rolled, amazingly upright, back onto the ground. With his one good eye, Jerald watched with astonishment as it softly came to rest at the base of a huge tree, steam and smoke spewing from under the hood.

The engine was dead, and several frantic attempts to restart it failed to register. Jerald felt a chill go down his spine. They were now trapped in what was likely the most dangerous exhibit in the park...

Like said ond DA, that's an awesome continuation ! I think you did a very nice job on descriptions especially ^_^

That's a really good addition. Great work!

Does anyone want to do the next part? If not, I'll probably do it when I find the time.

Thanks for the comment. I'm personally waiting for Timing to finish his part 2 before I get started on mine since they kind of overlap so I'll wait till then.

heh... I'm still working on my part.. it's.. half finished X_X, nobody would mind if I put in refferences from the other stories in just to tie it all together... would you? hehe I'm onlyhalf way done with it and the storm hasn't even shown up yet ^_^;;

Natsume wrote:

heh... I'm still working on my part.. it's.. half finished X_X, nobody would mind if I put in refferences from the other stories in just to tie it all together... would you? hehe I'm onlyhalf way done with it and the storm hasn't even shown up yet ^_^;;

Sounds good. Of course, feel free to refer to anything that happened in my part. And to use my characters, if you like.

Will we keep a pattern for this, having the same authors rotate?

Well, that would depend on whether everyone agrees to writing on rotation. Otherwise, those who feel inspired at a particular moment can simply leave a message here to say they'd like to go next.

heh, wouldn't work with me...... I take waaayyy too long to post a story...

Work hit me like a ton of bricks, and for the last while I've been in Switzerland working on a project that was sold before being developed - gotta love that.

The next part with Xulia is probably 60% done and I hope to find some free time this week or early next to work on it - maybe even finish it.

It'll bring events up to where Xulia is about to meet Jerald and his two "kids."

Good luck with the work timing, hope you do get it finished this week.