Abby couldn't say if she had actually gotten any sleep.
Her eyes were closed and her brain had definitely blanked out a few times, although she was always jerked awake within minutes by some roar in the distance, or some imagined rustle in the leaves surrounding her. Something about being nestled in a tree in the Cretaceous Period wasn't conducive to a good night's sleep. The threat of rolling over and falling, combined with the reasonable terror of being stuck in the past, no way home, with an injured Connor had made this one of the longest nights of her life.
She could hear Connor breathing deeply, and opened her eyes to a squint, giving up the attempt towards sleep completely. The night was dark, unbelievably dark. None of the streetlamps or glows of electronics that she had taken for granted back home. Only the smallest sprinkling of stars managed to shine through the dense tree branches above her. Nonetheless, Abby's night vision had always been better than average and the tree was hardly a large one. She could easily make out Connor, his forehead pressed into the trunk of the tree, his mouth slightly opened, his injured leg sticking out from his body. It was hardly a comfortable position, but still he was deeply, soundly asleep.
Abby grinned despite herself and opened her eyes completely to eye her flatmate. She had lived with Connor for a lot longer than the original week he'd promised and yet it had never stopped being amusing that Connor could fall asleep just about anywhere, no matter how exposed or uncomfortable. The whole of a great new (old?) world of discoveries surrounding her and Abby found herself spending the night watching Connor. Grateful that one of them was going to get a good nights sleep. Grateful that he was alive. Grateful, for some reason, that out of everyone she could have been stuck sharing a tree with in the distant past it was him who was sleeping across from her.
Abby must have fallen asleep at some point, because sunlight shone red through her closed eyelids the next time she had a conscious thought. She could feel Connor moving slightly, mumbling in his sleep. With some difficulty Abby opened her eyes, wiping sleep and probably what was left of her make-up out of them, she shifted towards Connor, planning to wake him up before he ended up falling out of another tree. His face was screwed up, in pain or fear...she couldn't tell, his mumbles had increased in volume. Abby didn't want to imagine what kind of dream he was likely to be having. She prodded him gently.
"Connor -wake up Connor..." no response, his groans became more desperate and she figured the time to wake him gently had passed.
"Connor!" she said as loudly as she dared, not wanting to attract unwanted attention from whatever prehistoric beasties were lurking around.
"Abby!" Connor yelled as he shot awake, his eyes terrified, looking in all different directions before settling on her. He looked at her, taking her in, still half inside his dream and very confused. She smiled in reassurance and he breathed a sigh of relief.
"Bad dream?" she asked
"Horrible...dreamt we were stuck up a tree in the Cretaceo-" he stopped, studying the green foliage surrounding them before glancing over his shoulder to the steep drop below "Please tell me the bit with you in a bikini was real as well?"
"Sorry"
"Well, then did I really fall out of a-" his breath hitched sharply as he moved his leg, bumping it against a jutting branch, "Never mind...that's the question answered then—ow!" he said wheezing slightly, his eyes watering up in pain.
"Let me take a look" Abby asked reaching for his leg.
"What're you gonna do?" Connor asked slowly, his leg twitching away from her slightly
"I'm just looking now...what's the matter, you don't trust me?" she said teasingly, leaning over his leg and gingerly moving it onto her lap.
"I do"
Abby paused in her examinations at the seriousness in Connor's voice, her eyes flicked up to his face as he finished his thought
"I trust you"
His dark brown eyes locked onto her blue ones, no trace of jest in them, just fact. He held the gaze for several seconds, his mouth set and determined, before he quickly looked away...suddenly embarrassed. Abby stared at the place where those warm brown eyes had been for another second before she looked back on the job at hand, both of them reaching a silent agreement not to mention whatever the hell that had been.
"It's not broken...but we definitely don't want you moving it around too much. I guess we're gonna have to make-shift a cast" she said, moving her hands on his leg gently, putting up her barriers once more.
"Right -I mean...you've done this before? Fixed up like tigers and such?" He asked, his voice all good-natured Connor again, not a trace of the strange overtly serious Connor that had taken control a few seconds previously.
"Sure, tigers, zebras...even a monkey once." She looked up at Connor with a teasing grin "He fell out of a tree too." Connor's pained expression grew more pronounced, a blush spreading across his cheeks.
"Abby, you think when you tell the story to Becker and the guys you can leave the whole 'Connor fell out of a tree' part out? Bit embarrassing is all..."
Abby's grin faltered at this innocent question, at that almost naive faith. There was literally no question in his mind that they wouldn't be going home. If Connor had noticed this slight change in demeanour, and there was little doubt in Abby's mind that he hadn't, he didn't let on, giving Abby time to compose herself and plaster a too bright to be real grin onto her face.
"Sure Connor...if you like. I'll just skip straight to you taking down a Raptor singlehandedly, shall I?"
"That'd be great, thanks...course we'll still need to stop Danny talking-"
There was that silence one again, the mention of their friend acting as a grim reminder of what their mission had been about, why they were stuck millions of years in the past. Abby staring straight through the leg she was meant to be nursing, and Connor looking awkwardly to the side, seemingly focused on something far out in the distant prehistoric landscape, they stayed this way for just a shade too long to be comfortable before Connor finally spoke the question that needed to be voiced.
"You think he did it though? Think he stopped Helen? I mean, we'd know if he hadn't wouldn't we? We'd be, like, blinked out of existence by now if he didn't do it"
There was nothing to say. Figuring out the logistics of Time Travel was more Connor's area of expertise than hers, thinking about it too hard was enough to make anyone's brain hurt. Who was to say that they'd know if the entire human race was wiped out. Maybe they'd be excused from the extinction being in a different time period all together? Who was to say that even if they somehow found a way back home they would still have a home to go back too?
So many different questions and possible answers chased each other around her mind until she stumbled upon one fact to cling too. This was Danny Quinn they were talking about. The man had a tendency to see things through the end, no matter how dire the end may seem, as well as a harrowing ability to save the day at the last second. She couldn't have Connor's faith that they'd live to see their world again, but she had to have faith in something.
"He did it." she said finally, as sure of this as she was of anything "He stopped her..."
"Broke my leg once before. Skateboarding...musta been 9. Don't remember it hurting this bad. Actually don't remember much of it a'tall to be honest..."
Abby looked around for a couple suitable branches. Looking up at Connor and nodding at the appropriate moments, but really only half listening as she focused on the job. Connor needed to talk his way through this and she was very content to let him.
"Showing off to me friends, we made this ramp and-well, stupid really. Crash landing. Looked down, saw my leg looking all crooked and everything sorta blanked out after that. Next thing I'm in the hospital, all bandaged up...Mum brought my stuffed T-Rex in, Doctors bandaged his leg up as well so we'd match."
Abby tore her skirt, ruined clothing was starting to become characteristic of this job, She began to wrap Connor's leg as best she could, Connor started speaking quicker verifying her suspicions that he was just trying to take his mind off the pain she was causing in his leg, she winced knowing how horrible this must have felt for him.
"Course it didn't really work out that way, more like I was angry that they made him look less terrifying. Who's frightened of a limping dinosaur-ow,"
"Sorry"
"S'okay...really. Thanks Abby." He attempted a smile that turned into something of a grimace, Abby's attempt to do the same turned instead into a look of pity.
"You think you can climb down?"
"I climbed up, can't be much more difficult" he hoisted himself up and almost immediately wavered, he leaned his back against the tree trunk trying to keep his body upright "I take that back-ow, ow o-okay, I'm fine. Just, let me..." he gripped the trunk of the tree, leaning a bit too heavily for Abby's liking. "Okay."
"Let me help you..." Abby climbed down a ways in order to guide Connors injured leg to each successive branch. If he felt any embarrassment about being helped down a tree he didn't voice it. Nor did he give any indication of the pain that must have been shooting through his leg with each step. Together, step by step, they reached the ground.
"Well, that wasn't too-" Connor cut himself off mid-sentence as he noticed Abby wasn't looking at him, but at something over his shoulder, "What?" he finished eyes widening as he reminded himself for the tenth time that day that he wasn't exactly in Kansas anymore. Judging by the massive crunching of the plants on the ground behind him and the sudden disappearance of sunlight in the area surrounding him he was about to meet one of the locals.
"Connor look" Abby said breathlessly, her face, to Connor's immense relief, showed no trace of fear. Connor turned and found himself face to massive body with a large reptile. He took several steps back towards Abby, before he realised they were in fact quickly being surrounded. The one nearest to them was standing on its hind legs and seemed more interested in the leaves on the tree they had just vacated than in them.
"Well...it doesn't seem to be looking for dinner, so that's a plus..." he tore his eyes away from the massive scaly beasts, "maybe we should just leave them to it before one of them trips on us, eh? Abby?"
"Beautiful..." Abby breathed staring at the beast, her blue eyes shining, mouth open in the faintest of smiles. Connor stared at her, and completely agreed.
I don't know if I want to continue this or not. Since I'm sure the actual writers of the show will do a much better job making all my effort for nought. I've got an idea where I think the story will go (Helen did drop something pretty crucial in the Cretaceous after all) but I'm not sure I want to take to where I think it should go only to be disappointed come series 4.
Post S04 premiere edit: Wow...that was actually frighteningly close to what I thought would happen. They even mentioned Connor having faith and Abby remaining practical bit that I figured I was just going to have to assume and didn't expect would literally be addressed in-show. Very nice.