Chapter Text
It was over. After intense weeks of heartache, betrayal, breakups, and splitting apart, it was finally all over. The atrociraptor program was destroyed and burning; all they had left to do was find Bumpy and get the hell out of there.
However—when had a plan ever worked for the Nublar Six?
The ground shook as dinosaurs rampaged through the forest at full force, sweeping away everything in their path. Kenji and Ben were trapped beneath a fallen tree, clutching Smoothie’s backpack for dear life. Yaz and Brooklyn hid behind the flipped jeep, while Darius dragged Sammy behind a massive boulder.
Yaz grabbed Brooklyn’s hand. “We’re going to be okay. We have to be.”
Brooklyn squeezed back. “Don’t worry. We’ve been through worse—and we always get out somehow.”
Yaz sighed. “I know. It’s just… I can’t let anything happen to Sammy without telling her how sorry I am, and how much I love her.”
“Yaz,” Brooklyn said softly, “she knows. We all know how much you love each other. It’s that kind of love that’s so disgustingly real and cute you can’t help but want someone to love you the same way.”
“It’s just—” Yaz swallowed. “We were both angry about all of this. She was really pissed that I defended you. We said some pretty messed-up shit, and now we’re here, about to get stepped on by a fucking dinosaur.”
As if on cue, a triceratops slammed into the jeep, knocking them to the ground.
“And I never even told her why I went to Wyoming,” Yaz continued breathlessly, “or about my plan to go back to the farm. I should’ve talked to her from the start. Instead, I just fucked everything up.”
Brooklyn saw it then—her friend’s regret, love, and fear all tangled together. “You’ll tell her,” she said firmly. “You’ll make it right.” With one last squeeze of Yaz’s hand, Brooklyn stood and climbed onto the jeep.
“B! What are you doing? Get down from there—you’ll get hurt!”
Brooklyn didn’t look back right away. When she did, her eyes were shining, wild and resolute all at once. “No, Yaz,” she said, voice shaking but firm. “I’m making it right. I’m making sure you get your happy ending. Like Sammy said—none of us would be here if it weren’t for me.”
Her fingers dug into the metal of the jeep as she climbed higher. The shaking ground nearly threw her off, but she stayed upright through sheer force of will. She looked back one last time. Then she screamed. It wasn’t fear—it was everything else. Anger. Shame. Guilt. Months of regret ripped out of her chest in one raw, broken sound. When she saw the dozen ancient herbivores charging through the forest, their massive bodies tearing through trees like paper, she froze.
And in that frozen second, she accepted it. This was the price. This was how she made things right.
But Yasmina refused to accept that, her heart slammed violently against her ribs. Panic flared sharp and immediate, drowning out everything else. She couldn’t—she wouldn’t—lose Brooklyn again. Not after everything. Not after already losing her once.
“BROOKLYN—!”
Even after leaving track because of her injury, Yaz had never stopped training. Her body still remembered speed, timing, sacrifice. Reflex took over before thought. She ran.
With practiced ease, Yaz vaulted onto the jeep, grabbed Brooklyn around the waist, and threw her full weight forward. They crashed down together, rolling hard, scraping skin and knocking breath from lungs, until Yaz shoved Brooklyn behind a smaller boulder near where Sammy and Darius were hiding.
The ground shook violently as the herd thundered past. They stayed pressed together, dirt in their mouths, ears ringing, hearts pounding, until the forest finally—mercifully—settled. Silence fell like a held breath.
Then Yaz snapped. “What the fuck were you thinking?” she screamed, voice raw as she shoved herself upright. “You could’ve died!”
Brooklyn pushed herself up too, tears already streaming down her face. “I was trying to make it right!” she yelled back. “I just wanted everyone to forgive me!”
“And you think dying would fix that?” Yaz shot back. “You think that would make anything better?”
Her voice cracked, anger bleeding straight into fear. “Yeah, you did some shitty things—but you’re still family. You tried to protect us. It wasn’t right, but we can’t lose you again. I can’t lose you again.” Her words hit harder than the fall.
Yaz wiped furiously at her eyes and turned on the rest of the group, who stood frozen, shame and fear written across their faces. “And all of you—I get that you’re angry,” she said, voice shaking but strong. “But don’t act like you wouldn’t have done the same thing to protect us. Maybe in a different way, but still.” She gestured sharply at Brooklyn. “She’s alive. And that’s all that matters. So stop being assholes and keep it together until we get out of here.”
Something inside Brooklyn finally shattered. Months of bottled-up emotion broke free as she lunged forward, wrapping her arms around Yaz and clinging like she might disappear if she let go. “Thank you,” she sobbed into Yaz’s shoulder. “Thank you… thank you…”
Yaz hugged her back just as tightly, grounding her, breathing through the adrenaline still roaring in her veins. But her eyes drifted past Brooklyn’s shoulder—straight to Sammy.
Sammy met her gaze, worry still etched into her face, but there was a softness there too. A fragile hope. Yaz smiled faintly and added a single, soft click of her fingers—their old code, carried across years of shared history.
Sammy’s hand was halfway up, fingers hovered to return the signal.
But a deafening crack split the air as a stegosaurus burst through the trees, its massive body plowing straight through the group. The earth trembled violently. Trees snapped. Someone screamed—Kenji, maybe—but the sound was swallowed by the thunder of its footsteps.
“MOVE—!”
Too late. The spiked tail sliced through the air with brutal, merciless force. Yaz barely had time to turn. The impact was bone-crushing.
She felt herself lift off the ground, weightless for a terrifying second before everything slammed back into place. Brooklyn was thrown in the opposite direction, crashing hard into the dirt, the breath knocked clean out of her lungs as pain flared through her ribs.
“Yaz!” someone screamed.
Brooklyn gasped, clawing for air, vision spinning. She forced herself upright, heart hammering. “Yaz—?” She turned. Yaz was still.
She lay twisted on the forest floor, one arm bent at an unnatural angle, fingers curled uselessly into the dirt. Her chest rose and fell in short, uneven gasps that sounded wrong—too shallow, too weak.
For half a second, no one moved. No one breathed. Then Sammy saw it. “No—no, no, no—” she choked, sprinting forward.
A broken spike from the stegosaurus’s tail jutted from Yaz’s right side, slick with blood. Dark red spread rapidly across her shirt, soaking into the ground beneath her.
“YAZ!” Sammy dropped to her knees beside her, hands hovering, shaking violently, terrified to touch her and terrified not to. “Hey—hey, look at me, okay?” she pleaded. “I’m here. I’ve got you.”
Yaz tried to breathe in. She couldn’t. A strangled, broken sound tore from her throat as pain ripped through her body, white-hot and overwhelming. Her vision blurred, the edges darkening as the world began to tilt. “S—Sam,” she rasped.
Sammy’s breath hitched as she grabbed Yaz’s hand, squeezing hard, refusing to let go.