Love is in the air
Disclaimer: None of the characters are mine, but belong to Impossible Pictures™.
The woods of the middle Permian were dark, damp and misty. They reeked of moisture and of rotting vegetation. Captain Becker was beginning to hate this time period completely. "This is ridiculous," he muttered to Matt Anderson (to the latter's displeasure). "I'm a soldier, not steampunk explorer!"
"You know steampunk?" Matt was impressed despite his irritation. "Really?"
"No! But there's plenty of steam here, and Connor probably can take care of the punk end of things-"
"Actually, that's fog," Matt explained patiently, but Becker wasn't co-operating.
"What it is, is pea soup, rather like the ones my family used to make. I hated it, and I hate this. The moisture here is thick enough to raise the possibility of rust – oxidization as someone like you would call it-"
"These two are not similar," Matt shook his head, "I think."
"I don't care. Let's contact Connor and Abby and get out of here. This trip is going to be wrapped-up starting now!" Becker pressed the button on his communication device. "Do you hear me?"
"Are you feeling déjà vu too?" Abby asked Connor as the two of them walked between the moss-covered coniferous trees. "Like, for real?"
"Gesundheit," Connor muttered absent-mindedly. "You know, I never realized it, but all time epochs were, or are, different. I mean, this looks sort of like the Cretaceous, but it's not – there's too much brown and too little green, and it just doesn't feel... homey."
"Excuse me?" Abby blinked, incredulously. "Homey?"
"Well," Connor took a deep breath, ready to point out that after spending a year in there Cretaceous had to feel homey, at least just a little bit, when something crashed through the trees into their clearing – a big, massive reptile that looked like a mix of a dinosaur, tortoise and toad. Connor, for one, had immediately identified it, for this was the beast (well, one of its species, actually) that he and Abby had encountered in the forest of Dean a long time ago.
"Abby!" Connor exclaimed delightfully. "That's a scutosaurus! Abby?" he turned to face his girlfriend (for the lack of a better word), and saw her hiding away behind a tree trunk. "Abby?"
"Connor, get away from it!" Abby hissed. "That animal looks half drunk and half sick!"
"Um," Connor turned back and looked at the scutosaurus in greater detail. Sure enough, the animal seemed to be unhealthy: its cheeks were flushed with blood, it exhaled air in deep, hoarse bellows, and saliva was dripping from its jaws. In short, it didn't look like the calm and harmless animal that Connor and Abby had encountered in the forest of Dean at all.
Gulping nervously (the animal looked as big as a bus and as solid as a tank), Connor began to back away, successfully, until a dry branch cracked under his foot. Emitting one of its deep, hoarse bellows, the scutosaurus charged.
"Abby!" Becker and Matt burst on the scene, stun guns at ready, "where's Connor?"
"In here, mate," the latter coughed, as Abby helped him to get out of some thorny bushes. "Got tossed by a scutosaurus, though, so I am definitely not as fine as you'd think I would be."
"Scooter-whasis?" Becker repeated incredulously, even as he shifted his grip on his weapon.
"Scutosaurus," Matt explained, "a cousin to the tortoises, died out by the end of this time period. I thought it was a peaceful plant-eater, though."
"That makes three of us, actually," Connor winced, clearly favouring his right ankle, "we've seen them once or twice in the forest of Dean before, but this time there was something wrong with this one. It looked kind of sick – flushed, aggressive, rather crazy..."
"And it went that way," Becker pointed out to a large path in the forest, created by a large amount of trampled undergrowth and damaged trees. "There's no sign of blood, but plenty of signs of emotional or physical agitation... I think Maitland and Temple are onto something with their disease theory."
"There's no blood, but there was some liquid," Matt thoughtfully said as he looked at the moistened patch of tree bark.
"Yeah – it was salivating at its mouth," Abby explained helpfully. "I think some of it got on Connor when the animal tossed him away – it may have no horns, but it got an awesome head butt!"
"Abby!" Connor responded to that, "I, uh, I don't feel so good, I think. I think I have a fever. I think that the scutosaurus might have bit me."
"So? Cross-species disease is very rare, especially between mammals and reptiles," Matt said, almost absent-mindedly, but Abby wasn't so flippant.
"It may not be sickness that Connor has caught!" she exclaimed, angrily. "What if it's venomous, or has bacteria in its mouth? This can be very bad!"
"Point," Matt agreed. "Abby, take Connor back through the time anomaly, Becker, you're with me – we need to get a sample of the saliva."
"Can't we use some that's at hand?" Becker wasn't enthused about the possibility of gather saliva or vomit of a sick prehistoric beast.
"No, this one's too old and contaminated, most likely," Matt shook his head.
"Well, can't we amputate Connor's leg instead and thus save his life by proxy?"
"No! No amputations! Abby, we're going!" Connor yelled loudly, as he half-hopped, half-dragged Abby back to the time anomaly.
Matt turned and faced Becker. "You're evil."
Rex was bored. Ever since Lester and some other funny people moved him from Abby's flat to the Center, he was bored. He felt a need to get out, but how? The doors seemed to be locked, and there were much fewer windows in the building. The air conditioning too seemed to be grated and sealed securely, and Rex was never a big fan of the air conditioning pipes to begin with.
As the coelurosauravus whirled around Abby's lab, he suddenly noticed some sort of a new hatch, closed, but not locked. Sure, getting his jaws around the latch was a bit tricky, but once that was done, well, Rex was quite a bit stronger than he looked. Within moments the hatch was opened, and a new round tunnel beckoned. Chattering eagerly, Rex climbed into it, and was off.
"And this," Jess Parker was proudly telling James Lester, "is our new communication tube! Isn't it awesome?"
"There was nothing wrong with good old fashioned messenger service," Lester said in his usual snooty manner (it needed working). "Seriously, it is beginning to look as if Philip is just looking for excuses to install even more of his, err, stuff into the ARC. What does he think this is? A TV show or one of Temple's numerous comic series?"
"Um," Jess was unable to reply, as Rex burst from the open tube, spreading his wings and using the momentum that he had gathered on his very speed journey, he flew off, straight across the ARC main floor and into the open time anomaly.
If looks could kill, Jess Parker by now would be dead and gone twelve times over. Instead, she was still alive, but looking as if she would rather be not. "Once Temple and Maitland get here," Lester began to speak in a rather conversational tone of voice, "they will use this tube to send you to Philip, most likely, it appropriately-sized bits and pieces, of course."
"Um, they're not here," Jess began, when life being what it was, Connor and Abby stumbled right back into the ARC. "Eeep!" she ran out of Lester's office and to her own control center seat.
"Run rabbit, run," Lester called after her, and then shifted his seat to better watch the show. But then he frowned. Something was wrong with either Abby and/or Connor. "I hope that it's not contagious," was all that he muttered.
Rex was home! Well, he was at his other home, his home now being the ARC (in the Holocene), but it's been ages (literally) since he was able to come back and just enjoy himself, flying at a high speed through his usual haunts and habitats, snapping damselflies and other insects in mid-flight. Now this was sweet!
Suddenly, a certain sound reached Rex's (admittedly, rather primitive) ears – a call of his fellow coelurosauravus in danger! Reacting quickly, Rex shifted his flying stance and raced to the rescue!
"Ah, Connor, Abby, glad to see that you're back," Philip Burton chose this moment to appear on the scene, adding to Jess's misery. "Where are Anderson and Becker, and why are you looking so poorly?"
"A scutosaurus was able to toss me into the bushes," Connor admitted, "and we got worried that it might be venomous, or sick, or something, so now Matt and Becker are tracking it, just in case."
"That's not good," Philip replied, thoughtfully. "I knew that that exploration idea of Anderson's was going to lead to nothing but trouble! Parker," he shifted to Jessica, "contact them and tell to hurry it up, would you? The last thing we need is to have some sort of a prehistoric sickness unleashed on the modern world. Abby, we need to get Connor to the medical wing."
"Yes, sir," Abby nodded, in a rather subdued for her tone of voice. "Lead the way, please."
As the odd trio led by Philip went off to the medical wing, Jessica looked weakly at their retreating backs, and desperately tried to contact the other members of the ARC's latest field team. "Where are you?" she whispered desperately. "Becker, I need your help!"
Rex's keen hearing and instincts proved to be correct: there was a coelurosauravus in question: a youngster, barely independent, and clearly harassed by a very unsympathetic and grouchy representative of the same species, who clearly had no intentions of sharing that tree. Rex's appearance, however, has changed all that, as the latter landed squarely in the middle between the two and hissed a warning of his own. Rex's older, darker opponent wasn't backing down either; another hiss or two, raising and lowering of the head crests, and the two reptiles tore off into the air, engaged in a vicious dog fight.
"So, this is the medical wing," clearly, not unlike Jess, Philip Burton had all the skills of a tour guide. "I'm aware that your old building had one as well, but we have rebuilt it into a bigger, improved model. It is run by several specialists, and-"
"Hello," a tall, rather stately woman with light brown hair and matching eyes had quietly approached Abby and Connor. "I'm Fia Fiessole, and I am very pleased to see that for once we seem to be dealing with something else than the usual physical damage sustained by captain Becker's soldiers. Pleased to meet you."
"Pleased to meet you too," Connor muttered mechanically. "Sorry if I can't shake your hand – I seem to have caught something, that's why I'm here in the first place..."
"So I see," Dr. Fia nodded as she looked thoughtfully at Connor. The young man was indeed covered in large red blotches. "I think that this looks like an allergy of some kind, though. Please, follow me." She grabbed Connor by the other arm (Abby was still holding to the first one) and began to help Abby lead him into the medical wing proper. Surprisingly, Philip Burton followed suit.
"There it is. The whatever we've been following," Becker said wryly, as he and Matt looked at the scutosaurus that appeared to be slumbering, leaning against some Permian pine tree. "I remember that it's not a dinosaur, really."
"I believe you, truly," Matt nodded, wryly.
"So, do we stun it now or what?" Becker pressed on. "If we're to stick samples into the mouth of a giant reptile the size of a Volkswagen Beetle, I want it unconscious!"
"Fair enough," Matt nodded. "Ready, aim-"
A pair of winged things, dog-fighting each other like dragonflies, but clearly not insects zoomed before the two men before they were able to discharge their weapons. One of the two fighters was unable to stop in time and smashed into the forest floor, clearly losing the fight. The other turned around steeply on the wing and flew off back into the forest.
The noise of the sudden albeit small aerial battle had apparently startled the scutosaurus as much as it had the two men – the much-bigger animal woke up, clearly startled, and emitted a loud, albeit a bit hoarse, cry. And it was answered by a matching shout – another scutosaurus with flushed cheeks and salivating mouth appeared in the clearing and charged at the first.
"Eureka!" Matt exclaimed excitedly, "Becker's, the scutosaurus is not sick and neither is Connor – certainly not from the scutosaurus. It's either spring or autumn here, which means – mating season. This is a clash for the territories and harems of females-"
One of the scutosauruses fell down with a crash. Immediately, several lean animals that seemed to be combining features of both mammals and reptiles emerged from the forest's depth and began to circle it. "That's it, we're leaving now," Matt muttered to Becker sotto voce. "Fighting a pack of gorgonopsids is not a good idea right now."
"So, doctor, what does he have? Is it contagious?" Abby asked nervously, as Dr. Fia wrapped-up her tests on Connor and was looking at them through a microscope. "Um, can you please answer?"
"I am not sure," the older woman replied as she finished her tests, "I really need more samples to make a finite conclusion, but... this looks like an allergy."
"Allergy?" both Abby and Connor spoke as one.
"Yes, allergy, similar to one experienced from exposure to poison ivy or similar plants," Dr. Fia explained willingly. "You didn't get in contact with some native plants, or something?"
"Actually, I did," Connor admitted, "or rather the scutosaurus has tossed me in them when I got in its way. So, it's not fatal?"
"Probably not," Dr. Fia admitted. "Allergies tend to kill quickly, and since it's been over an hour since you got it, it's safe to think that you'll make it. I'll give you some anti-allergy cream just in case."
"Thanks," Connor said with relief.
"Mr. Burton?" Jess's voice sounded weaker than usual, "Becker and Matt are back. They don't look so good, oh dear..."
Connor and Abby exchanged looks. "I think we may need to borrow some more of your cream, doctor," Abby said weakly. "Please?"
Becker and Matt did indeed look poorly – all covered in dark red blotches and scratching, about as bad as Connor did. "Oh, I see that you're allergic to my shrub as well," Connor Temple said guiltily. "Want some anti-allergy cream?"
"Yes, please," Becker snapped, as he eagerly grabbed the tube in question. "This isn't the best condition when one is trying to outrun gorgonopsids, you know?"
"Oh, you poor dears," Lester said sarcastically, as he joined the rest of the crew at the manifestation site, "how will you manage? Ms. Parker, everyone seems to have made it back safely, isn't there something-"
"Yes, I know," Jess took a big breath and turned to Abby."Listen, about Rex-"
Something winged and green flew through the time anomaly and landed on Abby's shoulder. "Rex!" Abby exclaimed. "You're back? Wait – you've left?"
"Well, um, he might've visited that time period, it is his native time, after all," Jess said weakly, breaking away from her discreet suggestions to Becker regarding her help in application of the anti-allergy cream. "But he's back, so no harm no foul?"
Abby turned to the other woman, ready to explain to her what she thought about Jess's suggestion, when another coelurosauravus, this one smaller and lacking a head crest landed on Abby's other shoulder instead, before crawling over to Rex, chirping and rubbing his neck and chin in a very feminine way.
"Oh look, he even got himself a girlfriend," Jess added, enthusiastically. "Isn't that nice?"
It was when several more coelurosauravuses arrived, also landing on Abby. This was followed by a loud crashing sound, as if a tank was about to storm the Center.
"It's spring in there," Matt explained as he sealed the time anomaly, taking over from the grateful Jess. "Or autumn – mating season, put otherwise, both among Rex's species, and the scutosauruses..."
Matt trailed away as it became obvious that no one was listening anymore: Connor took Abby back to the animal wing, explaining or theorising about Rex's new success with his kind, while Jess took Becker to help him with his allergies instead, so all that was left was Lester. "I hope that you don't expect any help with your allergy," the civil servant said coolly, "'cause you won't find any of it from me." He turned and left back to his office now that the potential crisis was over.
Matt just shrugged and left for his own office as well – to apply the cream and to write a report to Mr. Burton as well.
End.