Rossiter sighed. “Not again….”
“I know, Jeff. I know how you feel. I admit, there is some history here.”
“History? The only history is you failed – time and again. We’ve tried this, back door and front door. Hell, we even tried to buy the company when it was in Chapter 11, because you told us it would be available. But it turned out it wasn’t. The Japanese wouldn’t sell.”
“I understand, Jeff. But let’s not forget – ”
“What I can’t forget,” Rossiter said, “is that we paid seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars to your friend Nedry, and have nothing to show for it.”
“But Jeff – ”
“Then we paid five hundred thousand to that Dai-Ichl marriage broker. Nothing to show for that, either. Our attempts to acquire InGen technology have been a complete fucking failure. That’s what I can’t forget.”
“But the point,” Dodgson said, “is that we kept trying for a good reason. This technology is vital to the future of the company.”
“So you say.”
“The world is changing, Jeff. I’m talking about solving one of the major problems this company faces in the twenty-first century.”
“Which is?”
Dodgson pointed out the window, at the barking dogs. “Animal testing. Let’s face it, Jeff. every year, we get more pressure not to use animals for testing and research. Every year, more demonstrations, more break-ins, more bad press. First it was just simple-minded zealots and Hollywood celebrities. But now it’s a bandwagon: even university philosophers are beginning to argue that it’s unethical for monkeys, and dogs, and even rats to be subjected to the indignities of laboratory research. We’ve even had some protests about our ‘exploitation’ of squid, even though they’re on dinner tables all over the world. I’m telling you, Jeff, there’s no end to this trend. Eventually, somebody’s going to say we can’t even exploit bacteria to make genetic products.”
” Oh, come on.”
“Just wait. It’ll happen. And it’ll shut us down. Unless we have a genuinely created animal. Consider – an animal that is extinct, and is brought back to life, is for all practical purposes not an animal at all. It can’t have any rights. It’s already extinct. So if it exists, it can only be something we have made. We made it, we patent it, we own it. And it is a perfect research testbed. And we believe that the enzyme and hormoiie systems of dinosaurs are identical to mammalian systems. In the future, drugs can be tested on small dinosaurs as successfully as they are now tested on dogs and rats-with much less risk of legal challenge.”
Rossiter was shaking his head. “You think.”
“I know. They’re basically big lizards, Jeff. And nobody loves a lizard. They’re not like these cute doggies that lick your hand and break your heart. Lizards have no personality. They’re snakes with legs.”
Rossiter sighed.
“Jeff. We’re talking about real freedom, here. Because, at the moment, everything to do with living animals is tied up in legal and moral knots. Big-game hunters can’t shoot a lion or an elephant – the same animals their fathers and grandfathers used to shoot, and then pose proudly for a photo. Now there are forms, licenses, expenses – and plenty of guilt. These days, you don’t dare shoot a tiger and admit it afterward. In the modern world, it’s a much more serious transgression to shoot a tiger than to shoot your parents. Tigers have advocates. But now imagine: a specially stocked hunting preserve, maybe somewhere in Asia, where individuals of wealth and importance could hunt tyrannosaurs and triceratops in a natural setting. It would be an incredibly desirable attraction. How many hunters have a stuffed elk head on their wall? The world’s full of them. But how many can claim to have a snarling tyranosaurus head, hanging above the wet bar?”
“You’re not serious.”
“I’m trying to make a point here, Jeff: these animals are totally exploitable. We can do anything we want with them.”
Rossiter stood up from the table, put his hands in his pockets. He sighed, then looked up at Dodgson.
“The animals still exist?”
Dodgson nodded slowly.
“And you know where they are?”
Dodgson nodded.