Jurassic Heart by Anna Martin

Author:Anna Martin [Martin, Anna]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi

Chapter 11

I NEVER intended for there to be a divide between the work I was doing in the “Beyond Zero” grid references, as they had been dubbed, and the rest of the team, but it appeared nonetheless. As we got deeper and deeper into the dig, we were pulling things up, interesting things, good things that brought a steady stream of funding into the project. I was proud of them.

There could be little doubt that there were two digs going on at the same time, though. Raven had slipped into the role of coordinator at the top of the hill as easily as River had taken charge of the lab, and she was doing a great job. Better than I had been doing, I was ashamed to say.

Boner and I had become obsessed with the patch of land we had been working from scratch. It was slow going at first, doing all the grunt work, moving the topsoil until we got down to a level similar to that of the other finds.

This time, my gut instinct had been spot-on.

Within a few days of working the layer, I found an infant Ornithopod, almost perfectly preserved. I estimated it had only been a few months old at the time of death, and because it was so tiny, identifying the species was difficult.

“Jesus,” Boner breathed when I called him over, after most of the dirt had been brushed away from the bones with a soft artist’s brush.

“Yeah,” I said, sitting back on my heels.

“I’ve never seen one that small before.”

“Just what every man wants to hear,” I said drily, and he snorted and punched my arm.

“Shut up. That’s incredible, Nick.”

I picked up my camera and took a few more shots. I’d been steadily photographing the excavation process for my own records, and I wanted to make sure I had everything before lifting the bones out of the ground. Once I was confident I had all the pictures I needed on, I took a few backup shots on my phone and attached one of the photos, the clearest one, to a text message and sent it to Sam.

He replied a few minutes later with a two-word message: Holy shit.

Then, a few moments later: Get me a goddamn report ASAP, Eisenberg.

I replied to tell him I would and stood, stretching out muscles that ached from being hunched over the find for so long. A quick glance at my watch told me it was probably a good time to break for lunch and update the rest of the team. I expected they’d all want to come down and look at it.

“Here, help me cover it up,” I said to Boner. He brought a good-sized tarp and helped me nail it into the dirt around the find, protecting it from the elements while we ate lunch. It was a quick job, and we were soon walking back up the hill, collecting the team as we went. I let them chatter away about what they were working on, the different excavations currently in progress.

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