San Diego Harbor. The air is thick with marine fog and the smell of saltwater. In the distance, the glowing skyline of the city stands oblivious to the maritime disaster steaming toward the dock at twenty knots.
High atop a pier piling, nestled in a mess of twigs and discarded fishing line that shouldn't logically support their weight, three birds sit silhouetted against the moonlight.
George, an adult bird with the weary eyes of a father who has seen too many migration cycles, is currently refereeing a wrestling match between two chicks.
"Get him, Shorty! Go for the beak!" George chirps, nudging his sons. "That's it! Only way you'll learn to survive in this world is to take what's yours."
Buster, the self-proclaimed tough guy of the nest, has Shorty pinned under a wing. "I'm the king of the pier! I'm joining the circus! I don't need this nest!"
"You're just a fuzzball, Buster!" Shorty squeaks, kicking wildly. "And look! The big floating nest is coming back! It's early!"
Buster lets go, squinting into the fog at the massive, dark silhouette of the SS Venture cargo ship. The vessel is silent—eerily silent—and moving far too fast for a ship entering a restricted harbor.
"It ain't early," Buster scoffs, puffing out his chest to look older than his three weeks. "The schedule says midnight. It's barely eleven-fifty. That boat is right on time. My internal clock is flawless. It's a survival trait."
"It's totally early!" Shorty counters, flapping his tiny, useless wings. "Look at the water! It's making a giant 'V'! That means it's rushing!"
"It's on time!"
"It's early!"
"It's—"
"Quiet!" George snaps, his head tilting 180 degrees with a sharp, mechanical click. "Both of you. Listen."
The birds fall silent. The sound of the city fades. In its place comes a low, rhythmic thrumming—not of an engine, but of something heavy shifting behind thick steel plates. Then, the sound of the wind whistling through a bridge that had been torn open from the inside.
"Does it seem early to you, boys?" George asks, his voice dropping an octave as the massive bow of the SS Venture looms like a skyscraper made of rust, mere feet from the concrete pier.
The ship doesn't slow, doesn't signal. It simply erases the dock.
CRUNCH.
The sound of grinding metal and exploding concrete fills the air. The pier buckled like a toothpick under a boot. The SS Venture plows into the San Diego waterfront with the grace of a falling moon, sending a shockwave that knocks the birds six inches into the air.
As the dust settles and the echoes of screaming metal fade into the night, Buster and Shorty look down at the wreckage of the harbor, then back at their father.
Buster & Shorty (In Unison): "Yes, daddy."
The scene transitions from the vibrant, slightly-too-bright colors of the birds to the desaturated, rainy grit of the San Diego docks. The "Lost World" has officially arrived.
On the deck of the ship, there is no sign of a living crew. Only a severed hand remains gripped to the steering wheel in the bridge. Below deck, in the dark belly of the hold, a massive, scaly eyelid flutters open. A pupil slits.
The Apex Predator of the Cretaceous is awake, she is hungry, and she has no idea that she is about to meet someone who doesn't play by the rules of biology.