Chapter 1: The Portal

Entering the portal, you feel your stomach being wrenched in different directions and for a moment, you fear that you may empty the contents of such. Then, the feeling passes. You are standing in a wooded clearing. The air is warm and the sunlight on your body feels good in contrast to the cold climate of New York. Turning, you find that the portal that you stepped through is gone! There is no sign of it from this side.

Zaqueue (a.k.a. Zak) is a young boy. Possibly early teens, with matching attire: jeans, puffy jacket, cool trainers. After steadying himself he is equal measure of confusion and aggression. To any other humans that underwent the same ordeal. "Who are you? where are we? what happened?"

"And I'm Zak." and I proceed to explore a..... ooooh, a full 10ft radius! :-P

The area you are standing in is a wooded clearing, surrounded by thick forest. The trees here are quite tall, some measuring at least 60 feet or more.

You notice with some interest that several of the plants in this area are odd. The it strikes you. They haven't existed for millions of years!

"I was taking a walk in the park. I have a knife, a sling, some cash because I was gonna meet my g/f...." here he pauses a tiny bit. "A watch, phone, nothing else. My mum's gonna kill me....." here it looks like a pause but it ends up being the end of his sentense.

To his surprise, Wesley gets an empty ring.

does that mean it rings but no1 answers?

The call goes through to whomever you are calling within the group. The reception is scratchy but understandable.

Zak puts the knife away but keeps his eyes to the ground. Whenever he spots a nice stone (just the right size for his sling) he quickly grabs it and carries on walking with the group. He will collect about 10.

The brush to the left of the group rustles as if something were moving through the underbrush.

Wesley is surprised as a small feathered creature about the size of a turkey pokes its head out. It is covered in feathers but is clearly not a bird. It has a mouthful of razor-sharp teeth and walks on two legs, with a tail for balance. It looks sideways at Wesley and emits a strange cooing noise.

Everyone is quick to notice the rather impressive claw that tops its feet. If it brought the claw to bear, it could easily cause serious damage.

From the treeline to your left, there is a strange sound, like a burst of compressed air, and the creature suddenly staggers, then slumps to the ground. A bearded man wearing a uniform emerges from the treeline, carrying a rifle. "Who the hell are you idiots?! This is a restricted zone!"

"You're damned lucky I came along when I did. That raptor could have slit your throat! And you know the penalty for killing a protected animal." He checks the creature for a pulse and then retrieves something from its body. "Tranquilizer dart. It'll wake up in about an hour with nothing more than a headache. You're just lucky it wasn't a T. Rex, one of those wouldn't have hesitated to make lunch of you."

He extends a hand to Wes. "Sorry, guess that I could have been a little less aggressive. Name's William McKinley. I'm a warden. But that doesn't explain who you folks are and why you're in a restricted zone. How'd you get past the fences?"

"Jurassic Park? Well, yes, I guess you could call it that. This is a game preserve. The dinos here are protected. That's why the fences are there. It keeps them in and the public out. Our computers didn't indicate any breaks in the fence system, though, so how'd you get in here?" McKinley looks genuinely confused. "Where did you folks say that you were from?"

"Central Park? Heh, if that's Central Park in New York then you're a long way from home! This is the West Coast Dinosaur Preserve, south of Los Angeles. I don't know anything about a portal, though. Never heard of such a thing. Wait! No dinosaurs... anywhere?" Now William eyes you suspiciously. He wears a name badge above his right breast pocket that reads "McKinley" and his uniform looks vaguely like that of a game warden. He also wears a badge on the left side that looks very official. The fine print on it is difficult to read, however. He does seem to be speaking English; his lips are in sync with his words.

"Of course. C'mon, we'll take my truck back to the security building." He leads you to an ATV parked nearby and you all pile in. The ride to the security building is brief and after a short time, you are inside a fortified building filled with computers and monitors. McKinley offers you a coffee and takes a seat behind a row of monitors that show various locations on the preserve. He clicks a few switches and the views change. "Nope, no breaks in the fences," he says aloud.

From everything that you can see, you are in North America, though there are two large areas blocked off on the west coast and in Florida, indicating that they are dino preserves. The one on the west coast is labeled, appropriately enough, the West Coast Dinosaur Preserve. The one in Florida is labeled Walt Disney Dinosaur Preserve. The west coast area stretches from south of Los Angeles to nearly halfway to San Diego. "The West Coast Preserve is 400 square miles, bordered by the 5 and the 15. The Disney preserve is by necessity a little smaller, though."

"The year is 2022." McKinley replies.

I ask him some basic questions: like who is prime minister, who won the <<notable event>><<notable year>>, who won WWII, latest release by <<famous band>> does he know who Elvis is, etc...... just to eliminate the parallel universe hypothesis. We might be in our own familiar world.....

"Sorry. I don't keep up much with British affairs, so I don't know who the PM is. The Cubbies took the series in 2016, the first time since 1908! The Allied Forces won WWII, defeating first Hitler and then Japan. The 46th President is Joe Biden, who succeeded Donald Trump. Elvis was a rock-and-roll singer. He died sometime in the 80s, I think. Do I pass?"

Prehistoric times? Yeah, they were around then. It's amazing what science can do, isn't it? A little dino DNA here, a little science there, and BOOM! Dinosaurs live again. As for the other stuff, magic? Nope. Aliens? Uh-uh." McKinley seems confused by this line of questioning,

so.... what kind of mischief can we get up to here, i wonder? I'm thinking this portal could be dangerous. who built it? who controls it? you don't want random ppl from NY wondering into here and you definitely do not want dinosaurs roaming into Central Park. We must destroy the portal, find whoever built it and..... well, we got questions that need answering!

i ponder this deeply.
Either way 'tis dangerous. What's to stop dinosaurs from wondering free into the heart of NY? then again - not sure how to investigate this further and/or what to do about it......

I think we tried to walk back though but we were told (again, i could be mistaken) that you see no sign of it on this side. so might need a gentle nudge from the GM possibly to find some hints.
One of the lesser uses of bennies is to spend them to "gently guide" the story in a particular direction. Happy to do so if needs be......

I think we should start ruffling feathers. In the ensuing chaos some answers might emerge........
This is a terrific opportunity for adventure..........

"I don't know why," McKinely says, looking at Summer, "But you look vaguely familiar. Like you remind me of someone, but I can't quite place who."

"Internet? Sure, help yourself."

A version of you does seem to exist here. You can pull up several headlines that seem to be correct in context. Whether your double is still here or not is open for debate.

The dinosaurs were brought back about 35 years ago, through technology researched by Dr. Philip Richards, a microbiologist, and researcher at Berkley. It was Dr. Richards who took a sample of dinosaur DNA from a well-preserved fossil and mapped the genome that enabled him to resurrect the species. Once the first was achieved, the DNA was altered to grow new ones, using monitor lizards and crocodiles as the hosts. Botanists were able to use similar techniques to resurrect long-extinct plants.

Nothing unusual comes up about New York or Central Park. No disappearances of note or mass events.

Interestingly, however, Dr. Richard's work is currently being improved upon to alter children at the genetic level while still in the womb. The science is still rudimentary, but a successful chimera (a girl with cat ears and a tail) has already been born in China. The fear is that this could lead to a race of "superbeings" genetically engineered to be stronger, faster, and more resilient than ordinary humans. Most countries in the UN have outlawed genetic manipulation, but some are actively researching it. In the words of Dr. Richards himself, "The genie is out of the bottle, and I wish to God that I could imprison it again."

"Our medicine? Well, I'd have to say that it's as good as it gets. The docs at Cedars-Sinai are among the best in the country, Say, you folks really aren't from around here, are you?" he asks, realization finally dawning.

There is no mention of the Jurassic Park series of movies or books. Michael Crichton apparently made his living writing historical fiction. There is no mention of cybertech or nanotech, but gene therapy has been performed successfully, though it is cripplingly expensive.

A brief Internet search reveals that almost everything else is as it should be. However, one thing of note is the disappearance of a celebrity about three months ago. This wouldn't be notable, save for the fact that the celebrity is one Summer Beach! The picture of the star is identical to the Summer that stands among you.

Shawn tries McKinley and is connected. Finding that the phone works, he tries one of his buddies. A voice on the other end answers. "Yo! What's up?"