~~oOOo~~
"There is a sacredness in tears. They are not the mark of weakness, but of power. They speak more eloquently than ten thousand tongues. They are messengers of overwhelming grief...and unspeakable love." Washington Irving
~~oOOo~~
Connor knew as soon as he returned home from shopping that something was wrong. Jess' things were piled in an untidy heap by the front door and he could hear soft hiccupping sobs coming from the direction of the bedrooms. He left the grocery bags on the worktop in the kitchen. Abby was due home from the gym shortly so he could always put them away after she arrived. Jess was more important.
He stood quietly for a moment just watching from the doorway to her bedroom. Jess was curled up on the floor beside one of the windows. Her hands were clenched, white-knuckled, around a crumpled grey piece of fabric in her lap. Connor could see the wetness of tears seeping from beneath her closed eyelids. He was finally drawn across the room as he heard her stifle another sobbing breath.
"Here now, Jess. What's all this?" Connor spoke softly as he folded himself onto the floor beside her.
Jess shook her head, hiccupping again as her shoulders shook silently. Connor gently placed his hands over hers, trying to remove the mass of fabric, but she swatted him away. He settled for scooting closer to her and wordlessly offering a shoulder. If she wasn't ready to talk that was fine, so long as she was willing to accept the comfort he was offering.
When Abby arrived home, she followed the same trail of clues he had into Jess' room. She peeked around the doorway, throwing a questioning look in Connor's direction. He waved her off, his expression telling her that he still didn't know what had upset their flat-mate. Abby nodded grimly. She had a sneaking suspicion though she sincerely hoped that she was wrong.
Half an hour later, Connor came out of Jess' room alone and quietly shut the door behind him. He looked over at Abby where she'd been curled up on the couch with a book. Nodding her agreement to the unspoken question, she followed him into the kitchen.
"Thanks for putting away the groceries, love," he murmured pulling her into the circle of his arms.
"What on earth happened?" Abby asked.
"The short answer? Captain Neurosis," Conner replied jaw clenched in frustration and anger.
Abby could certainly empathize. She'd had her concerns from the start about Jess' interest in the emotionally stunted SF captain. But things had seemed to be going well between them so Abby chose not to voice her worries, letting her friend enjoy every hard won inch of new found intimacy. Now she could kick herself for having not warned Jess sooner. Better still, she could kick Becker.
Pulling out of Connor's embrace, she looked at him seriously.
"I've a mind to go over and give Mister Becker a good swift talking too."
"While I'd be tempted to join you, I think that might not be wise, Abs. We really shouldn't get in the middle. He's made his mess, let him fix it or rot in it this time," Connor said with a hard, malicious tone that Abby rarely heard from him.
She thought about it for a few moments before nodding her agreement and sinking back into his embrace. The entire situation was a strong reminder of all the times when she'd let her own emotional baggage get in the way. Much as it angered her to see Jess hurting like this, Abby really wasn't one to call the kettle black. It'd taken being trapped in the Cretaceous for a year before she saw how much she wanted and needed Connor in her life. She only hoped that it didn't take a reality check that severe for Becker to either patch things up or offer an apology to Jess.
Abby checked on Jess an hour later to find the tiny field coordinator had fallen asleep finally. Beside the tangled mess of auburn hair on her pillow was Jess' hand, still clutching what Abby could now identify as a silk scarf. Abby gently uncurled Jess fingers then smoothed out and folded the scarf before placing it on the bedside table. She turned off the light before returning to the lounge and Connor's company.
"She's asleep," Abby whispered.
Connor nodded and handed her a bottle of beer.
"What are we going to do about them?" Connor asked, looking for insight where his own failed.
"As much as I would like to set Becker straight, it's not worth doing. He's got to figure this out and make amends for himself or else he's just going to make the same mistakes again."
"Then what do we do about Jess?"
Abby sighed. In the 6 months since they'd returned from the past, she'd grown very fond of their flat-mate and field coordinator. While she was a good deal younger, Jess had proven to be practical, calm, and very capable. After they'd worked out the kinks, she'd also proven to be an excellent flat-mate, leading to Abby and Connor's continued presence. There had been no reason for them to hunt for a flat of their own when the living arrangements turned out to work so well for them all.
Before their time in the Cretaceous, neither Connor nor Abby had known Becker well enough to have an opinion of him outside of his working persona. Now that they were living with someone he'd been dating, Abby was beginning to wish she could go back to knowing only the surface of the man. Much as she had missed Becker (and all her colleagues) while trapped in the past, the insight Jess had provided as she'd slowly peeled away the man's defenses had not pained a flattering picture so far.
"We've work tomorrow, Conn, and poor Jess is going to have to deal with that fool like it or not. The best we can do is to act as a buffer whenever possible. Keep him away from her as much as possible and comfort her when she needs it. There's nothing else we can reasonably do for now."
~~oOOo~~
It was Monday and Jess had settled in to catching up on a week of missed work while Connor had taken Abby off to show her some of the projects he was working on in the lab. He'd just finished the prototype for the new dating calculator and was eagerly awaiting an opportunity to test it out in the field. When the anomaly alert sounded the tactical team ran by Jess' station in rapid succession, each grabbing their black box and earpieces. Connor had seen Becker snag his kit without saying a word to Jess. She'd kept her head down but Connor could see from the tight set of her shoulders that she was barely holding herself together beneath Becker's cold demeanor. As he'd grabbed his own kit, Connor laid a comforting hand on Jess' shoulder.
"Just breath, Jess, and keep focused on the work. He's not worth a thought to you."
She nodded her reply and turned back to checking each of the outbound tactical team as they turned on their boxes and she saw them show up on her display.
"It's at a prison. ETA should be 8 minutes…"
~~oOOo~~
Abby looked through the door slit and saw a pale anomaly unlike any she'd ever witnessed before. Mindful that there was still a terror bird on the loose, she whispered, "oi, Becker."
He turned to look at her with an irritated glare. Ignoring the attitude in favor of their jobs, Abby canted her head toward the closed door in front of her. Becker gave the door a push and saw the faint glitter of the anomaly for himself.
"How on earth could the ARC not pick this up," he grated.
Before Abby could respond, a terror bird tore out of the anomaly, screaming its anger and fear at them both. Becker slammed the door shut, sliding the barrel bolt home to keep it contained.
"Jess, we've got a terror bird and another anomaly in a store room," Abby said into her earpiece.
Jess' confusion was clear in her voice as she responded, "I'm only registering the first anomaly. Are you sure?"
"Yes, Jess, " Becker snapped as he put his back against the door which shuddered and shook under the bird's assault, "pretty sure."
Suddenly the door stilled and the bird stopped screeching. Becker looked over at Abby before making his decision.
"One, two,,,," he counted, then swung the door open.
The room was empty yet again. No terror bird. No anomaly.
~~oOOo~~
It had been a rough couple hours as they tried to piece together the puzzle of this anomaly. They'd all been relieved by Danny's return and Ethan's capture. Matt and Becker left the prison to drive Danny and Ethan back to the ARC, leaving Abby and Connor temporarily alone to work on the puzzle of the satellite anomalies.
Abby dragged a stunned terror bird into a storage closet just off the ward room where the anomaly still shivered with ever changing light.
"Right, that should hold him until you figure out what's going on and we can send him back home for good,"
"If I figure out what's going on," Connor said dubiously as he looked at the still open anomaly.
"You will," Abby replied with certainty. "I'll do another circuit make sure nothing else has popped through."
She smiled as she turned back toward the main hall. Connor had begun muttering to himself. She'd always known he was brilliant. In some ways, the past year had made him even more so, allowing him to think so far outside of the normal view of the world that he'd draw wild conclusions unreachable by anyone else. She wouldn't have thought it possible a year ago, but she loved him more each and every day. Questioning the boundaries of time and physics had expanded Connor's minds in a way that no one else on Earth could comprehend.
She was still preoccupied by thoughts of Connor when Abby rounded the corner into the main area of the prison so it took her a moment to comprehend what she was seeing. Abby stared in wide-eyed wonder at close to a dozen pale shimmering anomalies occupying the first and second floors of the prison. She was struck by the painful irony of the moment, knowing how Stephen and Cutter, both now close to 3 years gone, must have felt when they saw the anomaly nexus in the Permian. It was hauntingly beautiful and she had to shake herself with the reminder that it'd be something far more deadly than a Coelurosauravus that came through this time.
"Connor you need to come and see this now" she said, knowing that her earpiece would pick it up.
Connor came round the corner with his gun out to see the multiplicity of anomalies. He stared at them as Abby had, eyes wide with confusion, fear, and a touch of awe.
"What the-?"
Abby took a deep breath, trying to think rationally with the part of her mind that had learned scientific method while working with Professor Cutter.
"Connor, start from the beginning; what do we know?"
Connor shook himself out of a daze and tried to consider the pieces in a linear fashion. He'd never been much for linear thinking but it'd become much harder since the anomalies came into his life. They were the embodiment of the medieval concept that time happened simultaneously; occupying every moment and none at the same time.
" Okay we showed up and the tourist was missing. I got the wrong date and the anomaly wouldn't lock."
Abby nodded her encouragement, "okay," she prompted.
Connor stared at the anomalies for a few more moments, lost in thought.
"Come with me," he said, turning swiftly back the way they'd come to the room where the larger anomaly still shifted and sparkled. Abby followed without a word, waiting to see what he'd come up with.
Connor theorized that there were not one but two anomalies to deal with. Using the two anomaly locking devices at the same time, he and Abby were able to separate them. Connor's dating calculator showed one leading to the Pliocene and one leading to 1867.
Emily's reaction when Jess told her about the anomaly leading back to her own time was understandably conflicted. Jess was sympathetic. The mutual attraction Emily shared with Matt didn't make the prospect any easier. Emily had experienced so much in the past 3 years, that she would be returning home a changed woman, to a future which was completely uncertain.
Jess sighed as she returned to her post at the ADD. She wished that Emily's decision could be easier. Unfortunately, Jess reflected, life didn't seem to dish out easy when it came to the members of the ARC. Sliding back into her chair, Jess scanned the security feed to make sure nothing had changed. Her keen eyes immediately spotted the shape of a man moving cautiously down a corridor that should have been deserted at that time of day. Even as she was pulling the cameras in for a closer view, Jess hit the security alert.
"Intruder alert all units to corridor five."
Jess watched in horror as Emily came out of her room and walked straight into Ethan's path. Scrolling furiously through the rest of the security feeds, she was relieved to see Becker less than a corridor's length away. He stopped short when he saw Ethan holding an EMD to Emily's head. Jess couldn't hear the exchange but she saw Becker's body language shift from challenging to conciliatory. She gasped and her hand flew to cover her mouth when Ethan shot Becker and dragged Emily past, shooting Becker a second time along the way. Hands shaking, Jess summoned the medics and sat waiting with her eyes glued to Becker's unmoving form on the screen.
~~oOOo~~
Becker was surprised when Connor turned up to check on him at the med centre a little while later. He'd been expecting and half hoping that Jess would come to see him though he realized he'd forfeited that privilege through his own poor behavior. Connor looked harried and scattered but waved off Becker's concern saying the current anomaly puzzle had given him some new ideas about the artifact map that Cutter had been working on before he died.
"Look, mate, I hate to hit you when you're down, but we really need to talk."
Becker smirked at him, "you know Connor, and if we were in a relationship that phrase would worry me."
"Yeah, well you're not in a relationship, are you?" Connor shot back viciously and suddenly Becker knew what this conversation was going to be about.
Becker crossed his arms against his chest, wincing when the muscles spasmed despite the relaxant the medics had given him earlier. He waited, knowing that Connor would say his peace one way or the other and it was best to just let him get it all out at once.
"I don't know what's going through that head of yours, Captain," he said, emphasizing Becker's rank as if it were a dirty word, "but from now on you'll have to get it sorted out on your own, you hear? As far as you're concerned, Jess Parker is off limits. I've had enough of watching you jerk her around while you try to decide whether or not you want her in the first place. She's a sweet girl and doesn't deserve that sort of treatment so just lay off."
The only part of the entire exchange that truly surprised Hilary Becker was that it was Connor delivering the ultimatums, not Abby. He knew that he was completely deserving of the other man's anger. He'd panicked with over something trivial. Used it yet again as a way to put distance between himself and Jess. He'd missed her so much while she was away. Had been enjoying her closeness since her return. And he was completely puzzled at his own behavior in sabotaging the relationship that had been growing between them. Connor was right; Jess didn't deserve this, she never had. If Becker truly wanted her in his life, he needed to get himself clear of the mess inside his own head. He needed to find a peaceful grave in which to bury his demons before they destroyed him from the inside out.
~~oOOo~~
"It is better to conquer yourself than to win a thousand battles. Then the victory is yours. It cannot be taken from you, not by angels or by demons, heaven or hell." - Buddha