Plot: While Ian Malcolm recovers from the events at Isla Sorna, he and Sarah Harding begin getting close. Although both of them know that a romance is unlikely and inconvenient, neither can control the emotions that catch them by surprise.

Disclaimer: All characters and ideas belong to Michael Crichton. I am not making any money of this story. No copyright infringement is intended.

Ian Malcolm mumbled incoherently. He twisted in the hospital bed, the sheets crumpling beneath him. In his dream, he saw himself falling - rushing through blackness toward the front of the trailer, the windshield speeding toward him. A tyrannosaurus roared like thunder in the background. Lightning flashing and then he lay gasping for breath on the wet grass on the cliff. The stars twinkling and Sarah telling him she would have to clean his wound. Her voice, soft and gentle, soothed him and kept him conscious.

And then he was awake. The mix of anesthesia and morphine made his mind fuzzy, and his movements slow. He turned on to his side and saw a young woman in her early thirties sleeping in a hard plastic chair. She had short black hair that fell over her forehead on to her cheek.

A nurse entered, adjusted Malcolm's IV and checked his chart. "How are you feeling?" he asked through a thick Spanish accent.

"I think I need more morphine..." Ian mumbled. The nurse laughed and shook his head. Sarah Harding frowned.

Malcolm looked at her blankly. "Have you heard about Richard?"

Richard hadn't stopped complaining about his possible DX infection the whole way to Puerto Cortes. He was practically hyperventilating by the time they reached the hospital. Malcolm seriously doubted that his fears were justified.

"They had a lot of questions about the source of infection," she said, yawning, "But they don't see anything wrong. They've taken a blood sample."

"And Arby?"

"He needed blood, nearly thirty stitches, and to see a dentist. They think he'll be fine now, though."

Malcolm nodded weakly.

It was nearly midnight. They had arrived at hospital early in the morning, and Malcolm had been rushed almost immediately in to surgery. Doctors thought they had rectified the problem and prevented infection but they wouldn't know for a few days.

He presumed that Thorn and Kelly had returned home. Richard would need to spend the night for sure, and Arby would probably stay for a few days in recovery. Perhaps Kelly would stay with him...

Sarah yawned again.

"You're tired, you should go home." He said, closing his own eyes and leaning his head against the bed's wooden background. It felt very cold. He probably had a fever.

"The earliest flight is tomorrow night. I called the airport while you were sleeping. " she paused for a moment, "Besides, I wouldn't want to leave you here alone."

"Richard is here..."

"For the moment. But the instant he realizes he's in no danger he will be on the first flight back to the Santa Fe."

Malcolm waved his hand irritably, signaling her to stop talking.

It was a times like these that Sarah really disliked Malcolm. He had the ability to be intelligent and deep, as well as charming and funny – but the majority of the time he concealed it effectively by being an egotistical asshole.

It was when Malcolm was at his best that Sarah sometimes felt a flutter of her old love for him. And sometimes, when she looked deeply into his eyes at the right moment, she could see a flicker of the same feelings in his dark expression.

But this was not one of those moments. If it weren't for the fact that he was so heavily sedated and in obvious pain, she would have said something about it. But as it was, she remained silent, letting out a long sigh.

Once again, Malcolm fell into menacing dreams. Memories flickered before him – of sitting in the heat of the high hide waiting for Sarah to arrive, of being alone in the trailer consumed by euphoria of the morphine and breathing in the scent of sulfur, and of laying on the raft floating down the river to the nearest town...