It has taken the convoy a few minutes to reach their destination, which is a four story circular building with dinosaur skeletons etched into the walls and a roof designed to have a thatch appearance, even though it is just slabs of wood connected by steel straps and strong sealant. The entrance is a pair of metal doors with small glass fragments that make a sun with its beams extending to the edges, and surrounding the structure is a small moat with little islands and floating plants, and it is occupied by ducks swimming and quacking. The convoy crosses the moat by going over a small arching bridge and they stop next to a group of griffins that quickly open the doors for them.

“This is the Visitor Center, which also serves as a hotel,” says Test Tube. “And before you ask, we already have your luggage in your rooms.”

“And what if we want to sleep alone?” asks Tempest.

“Easy fix at the front counter.”

“Is this where the gift shop is?” asks Pinkie Pie.

“It is, but first we're going to watch a video that will explain how I was able to bring dinosaurs to life.”

Test Tube leads the group through the double doors and the first thing they see in the spacious lobby is the black skeleton of a thirty foot tall beast with a large head, tiny arms and a big tail and legs standing in front of a large glass wall that shows the open field and distant mountains of the island. The skeleton is positioned to look like it is roaring, and above it is a yellow banner with green stripes and WELCOME TODINO-PARK printed on it.

Rainbow Dash tilts her head up and whistles. “Neato.”

Test Tube stops and smiles at the skull, but the smile is not the relaxed one he has usually displayed. This one is burdened with a weight that dims the brightness in his eyes.

“My wife dug that up in the Equestrian Badlands,” says Test Tube. “It was her first big find after she graduated from the National Paleontologist University. I actually met her on the digging site when I was doing work in Equestria.”

“Where's your wife? I'd like to meet her,” says Twilight.

“Buried at the Highland Community Cemetery back home.”

Twilight's ears droop. “Oh. I'm sorry.”

“It is all right, but let's get your keys and then we can watch the video and continue with the tour.”

Test Tube goes ahead and the rest of the group follows after him, but Twilight stays behind to stare the skeleton, feeling ashamed of having been so careless about her question. Twilight sighs and walks closer to the skeleton, taking note of how it is held together with glue and bolts and surrounded by rocks and fake grass to give it a somewhat authentic feel. There is also an obsidian plaque with gold letters that read:

Twilight smiles thinly and brushes her hoof against the letters and looks up at the skeleton again. However, before she can make any decent observations she hears Test Tube calling her, so she takes a few paces, gives the skeleton one last look, and then gallops to the group.

---

The group is led to a small theater with red chairs and cold gray walls with strips of lights running along the ceiling, and the park logo with a pink tint is projected on a screen.

“Everyone have a seat,” says Test Tube.

The ponies all take a seat, but Guillermo walks up to the older griffin and whispers in his ear. The doctor nods, bids him a farewell and after Guillermo leaves he smiles at the group, who are giving him confused looks.

“Guillermo has other tasks to do. We'll see him again in a little bit,” says Test Tube.

“What kind of tasks?” asks Applejack. “Will he need any help? I can be helpful.”

“I think he can handle his task.”

“I'm just saying maybe he needs help. Plus, it can count for the park inspection.”

Pinkie Pie kicks the back of Applejack's chair. “Hey! Quiet! I want to see the movie!”

Applejack glares at Pinkie Pie and Test Tube sighs, goes to a podium in the back and pushes a few buttons. First, the group is locked in their chairs by a bars that slide out from the back of the chairs in front of them. After that the lights shut off, the screen goes dark, and then a loud, ear shattering hum and horn shakes the chamber, followed by a bland logo of CCSS, followed by the park logo replacing it a few seconds later.

“The audience is now deaf,” says Pinkie Pie in a deep voice.

After saying this, a sequence of numbers begins counting down, with each number being accompanied by a beep.

“Hello, tourists! Are you ready to put your friends and family to shame with knowledge!?” says an aggressively energetic male on the blank screen. A voice that is recognized by most of the group.

“Is that Iron Will?” asks Fluttershy.

“As a matter of fact it is,” says Test Tube. “It cost a lot of money and a serious headache to get him to do this.”

“Good! Learning is fun! It is the gym of your brain and for the first exercise to make you smarter than your inferiors we are going to learn about DNA with my friend, Mr. D,” says Iron Will.

A swirl of colorful blocks fly into view and create a loosely connected stick figure with big round eyes, a bright smile and white gloved hands. “Hello, I'm Mr. D the DNA Strand.”

Pinkie Pie giggles while Applejack looks side to side with an uneasy smile and Tempest slouches in her seat and snorts out hot air.

“So, Mr. D, what is DNA?” asks Iron Will.

“Well, Mr. Narrator, DNA can either have a complicated answer, or an easy one,” says Mr. D. “If we were to talk about all the complexities of DNA then we would be here for hours, and I know you don't want to sit here and listen to me talk for very long, so I will use the simple version.”

Mr. D slides to the side and waves into existence a drop of blood, which then zooms in to show an innumerable amounts of him crammed inside, all talking and pushing against each other.

“DNA holds the blueprint of life, and just one drop of blood contains billions of strands of DNA like me!” says Mr. D. “And some of the animals that went extinct, like dinosaurs, left their blueprints behind for us to find.”

“And where did we find you, Mr. D?”

“I'm glad you asked!”

Tempest rests her cheek on her hoof, but it does nothing to alleviate the growing blood pressure and the need to find any reason to walk out on the terrible acting. Judging from the expressions of everyone else, Tempest knows she is not alone in her loathing of the acting. However, unsurprisingly, Twilight and Pinkie Pie are fully engrossed in the video with the former having a wide smile and the latter eating from a bowl of popcorn that she managed to pull out of thin air.

Meanwhile, the video zooms out and Mr. D pulls out a photo album, flips it to the page he wants and turns it so the audience can see the picture of a mosquito.

“65 million years ago there were mosquitoes just like we have today-”

He flips the page to a mosquito sucking the blood from a generic, chubby and long necked green dinosaur eating a leaf.

“-And they would suck on the blood of dinosaurs-”

The page flips to two pictures. The first is of the mosquito flying away full of blood, and the next is it landing on a branch covered in sap.

“-And sometimes they would land on a tree, get stuck in its sap and be perfectly preserved for us to find.”

“That's awesome! They used the blood from mosquitoes to make dinosaurs! But how did they do that? Won't all that blood mixing be like trying to separate fruit punch from cherry soda?” asks Iron Will.

Tempest blows a steady stream of hot air through her nose as her drooped eyes stare ahead and her armored hoof digs into her cheek. Not even Pinkie offering her some popcorn can save her from the agitation she is facing.

On the screen, Mr. D closes the book, makes it disappear with a snap, and then he pulls the background away, and with it goes the screen to show a group of griffins and ponies wearing white labcoats and thick gloves carefully working at lab stations crowded with test tubes, bulky equipment, charts, graphs, models, and so on. Some are even working on equipment with data scrolling across the screens and typing information on pads. The walls in the area are white washed and brightly lit, and behind them is a large locked tube with the biohazard symbol painted on its entrance, plus a thermostat on its door.

“Here at Dino-park, the specially trained geneticists and the super computers built by the finest minds are able to separate and recreate these DNA strands,” says Mr. D over the speakers. “And with the power of genetic technology they are able to bridge gaps in the DNA sequences using frogs, giving the world the first dinosaurs in 65 million years and the greatest leap in scientific discovery!”

And just like that, Twilight's smile disappears, and Rarity looks at Test Tube curiously.

“Are those real scientists? Or are they actors?” asks Rarity.

“They are real scientists. The best in the world,” says Test Tube.

Fluttershy coughs into her hoof, now wishing she remembered about the medicine and internally kicking herself for being distracted by the brachiosauraus. Then comes a sudden jolt that feels like a punch to the gut and a severing of the brain. The seats move along a rail system, and Fluttershy rests her head on the chair in front of her, trying to suck in air and ease her light head. In doing so, she notices an elevated platform with a thick patch of hay and a ring of heating lamps shining down on them. And in the hay are a group of eggs that are being observed by a gray unicorn stallion with an ashy black mane and white spots on his ears and around his eyes.

“On to the next part! We're going to talk about herbivorous dinosaurs!” says Iron Will over the speaker. “They are friendly, like a house cat or parrot, and they eat their vegetables because they care about their health.”

“Wait, I want to see the eggs!” says Fluttershy.

“And I want to get a closer look at the lab,” says Twilight.

“Sorry, this is a ride. We can look at the lab when this is over,” says Test Tube.

Twilight's horn glows and her bar is forcefully pushed back to its original position, which brings the ride and audio to a sudden stop, and all the lights snap on while the other bars return to their original position. Twilight then leaps out of her seat and trots towards the entrance of the lab with the rest following close behind, except for Fluttershy since she is still in her seat, at a loss of whether she should follow to see the eggs or obey the rules.

“Or you can completely ignore me. That's fine, too,” says Test Tube.

He flies over Fluttershy and bullies his way through the ponies to get to the door, and Fluttershy sighs and walks after them, keeping close to the walls for support.

It takes a moment for Test Tube to punch in the code on the door, but after it is successfully entered a trio of thick metal rods slide to the floor and ceiling and it takes a lot of the old griffin's strength to push the door open. A rush of cold air slams into them, wrecking their manes and feathers, and after stepping through the doorway they are sprayed with a foul mist.

“Don't mind that. It is just a sanitation procedure,” says Test Tube. He leads them down a winding staircase, smiling politely at the scientists that stop their work to watch the group. The scientists don't spend too much time staring at them, and the old griffin leads them to ashy maned unicorn. “Girls, this is my protege, Dr. Wayward.”

“Hi,” says Wayward without looking up from his notepad, using his magic to guide the pen on the paper.

The group returns the greeting with the same level of enthusiasm.

“He is actually the one that figured out how to successfully bridge DNA strands of the dinosaurs and frogs,” says Test Tube. “Using my research as a base, of course.”

“Really?” says Twilight. “And how did you manage that?”

“Classified,” says Wayward.

“You can tell me. I am a princess, after all,” says Twilight.

She unfurls her wings and the unicorn glances up from his notes to give her a critical eye.

“Hint hint. Wink wink,” says Twilight.

“Classified,” says Wayward.

Twilight frowns and folds her wings down. “Not much of a talker, are you?”

Wayward walks past her without a word and pulls out a probe to measure the heat of the air underneath the heat lamps, followed by him putting on a stethoscope to listen to the eggs.

“He's like a rude Big Mac,” says Pinkie Pie. “Only smaller. And with a horn. I think I'll call him Sour Mac.”

Tempest goes towards a group of four scientists, both griffin and pony. One is using a syringe to carefully extract the blood from a mosquito trapped inside a solid case of solidified sap; another is extracting blood from a frog; and the last two are at a device that is spinning a dozen tiny tubes at a blurring speed. Though, when they see Tempest standing by them they all stop and look at her fearfully.

“So, do you geeks spend all your time in here doing this stuff?” says Tempest. “Do you even have a life? How about security? Who's watching you to make sure you comply with the rules and regulations of this facility?”

“Hold on, they're nerds, not geeks. Geeks are more into the fictional stuff whereas nerds are more into real science and uh...” Rainbow Dash taps one of the computer towers with her wing. “Whatever this thing is. Totally different breed. But they look fine, so I don't see what the big deal is.”

“Whatever,” says Tempest. “Now, answer my questions, nerds.”

“You don't have to be hostile. Everything is secure,” says Test Tube.

“You're displaying your research for everyone to see on a ride, and all that stands between this room and a threat is a glass wall and a door. How is that secured?”

“I should have you know that this area is monitored all day, every day by our control center with a team of security on standby. And yes, the scientists have a life and they are searched before they go anywhere. Do you honestly think I would risk everything I worked for with lax security?”

Tempest and Test Tube have a cold blooded staring contest, and Twilight's group watches them, eyes flicking left to right and anticipating the worst.

“Wellll~ I'm glad you got it all under control,” says Pinkie Pie, wrapping her hoof around Tempest's neck and gently pulling the unicorn away. “How about some lunch?”

“Later,” says Test Tube.

“I got a quick question about this place,” says Applejack.

“Yes?”

“How much power are ya using? I ain't ever seen anything like this before, and with all the stuff ya got here I would think ya'd need a few strong generators. I mean, everything looks safe from what I saw, but I'm kinda worried 'bout what'll happen if there is a power outage.”

“That is a reasonable question for once,” says Test Tube, “and it is one that we can discuss when I show you the main power plant.”

Applejack nods, and then Wayward comes to Test Tube's side and points at the batch of eggs with his clipboard.

“We got another one,” says Wayward.

Test Tube's moody expressions brightens in a snap and he speedily walks towards the eggs, with Fluttershy following close behind and the rest trailing them. Only one egg is shaking in the batch, and with perfect timing the shell begins to crack and pop up near its tip. All cold feelings have thawed in the room and the group crowds around the eggs, murmuring in excitement and trying to squeeze past each other to see the scene unfold.

“This, right here, is my favorite part of this job,” says Test Tube.

The shell pushes higher and a beady eye obscured by a string of bloody slime looks out into the world for the first time.

“Come on, push,” says Test Tube gently. The creature's reptilian snout pushes the egg fragment higher and the griffin chuckles and plucks the piece off, fully exposing its slit pupils and little maw full of teeth. “There we go.”

The creature squeaks and closes its eyes, and a slender hand with three curved talons slide into view, breaking off more of the shell. It extends its neck and makes another weak, raspy cry while it pushes the egg to its side, giving it the opportunity to crawl out into the hay and reveal the rest of its scrawny body, from its sharp snout to its thin tail.

“That is nuts,” says Rainbow Dash.

Test Tube rubs its stomach with the blunt edge of his talon. “That is science. Do you want to pet her?”

Rainbow Dash pulls away. “Maybe when its not slimy.”

Fluttershy extends her hoof and feels the baby's smooth skin. The baby makes another call and opens its eyes again to look at Fluttershy. Its tiny talons hook into her flesh and its stubby tail As she does this, a cold shiver runs through her spine and she looks at Wayward, hoping that the answer she gets will be different than what she is fearing.

“Excuse me, but can you please tell me what dinosaur this is?” asks Fluttershy.

“A velociraptor,” says Wayward.

A cold block drops in Fluttershy's stomach. “You're breeding velociraptors?”

Wayward arches a brow. “Why wouldn't we?”

Next Chapter: 06 Estimated time remaining: 54 Minutes