Chapter Two

'No, of course it's not going to be that simple,' West thought, cursing her earlier naivety. It was a quality she thought she had drilled out of herself a long time ago, but apparently London was making her soft. She watched the gigantic dinosaur wriggle its tail feathers, taking out the top three floors of an office block as it did so. They fell to the floor with a crash and a small mushroom cloud of dust and paper, capturing the raptor's attention for a whole five seconds before it lost interest. West thanked whatever Gods there may or may not be that it was a Sunday.

A crumbling noise, not dissimilar to that of rocks falling down a steep hill, came from behind her and she turned, not even considering the possibilities. She was pretty sure, however, that if she had bothered to make a list, a second Gigantoraptor wouldn't have been on it. She tapped the person standing next to her; Connor; and he also turned, uttering a quiet whimper that got the attention of the rest of the team.

West was barely aware of Becker telling Jess that there were now two creatures as her mind raced ahead of the situation. They needed to get the raptors back through the anomaly before it closed, but they needed to do it quietly and without any fuss, otherwise Lester would be on their backs for months because of a re-construction bill. An idea came to her.

"If anyone has any ideas, now would be a good time to share." The rest of the team said nothing. West realised that although her plan was stupidly dangerous, the team's silence said that it was the only thing they had. The risk, therefore, was irrelevant.

"I have something," West announced slowly, making sure it worked in her head first. "But I doubt you're going to like it."

The team listened. None of them seemed particularly happy about it and Matt looked like he was close to saying no, but the undeniable fact still remained: they had no time, and no other alternative available to them. So it was agreed; they'd give it a try.

West sent Abby, Matt and Becker's three men to the tops of the nearby buildings and positioned herself some way in front of the anomaly, running the scenarios through her head all the while. In theory, the plan was simple and easy to execute. In practice, there was just too much that could go wrong.

'She's completely insane,' Becker thought to himself as he listened to West's plan. She had just got to the part where she allows two, many-tonned, prehistoric creatures to chase her towards a time portal to an era billions of years in the Earth's history and, to quote her words exactly, "Jumps out of the way just before they get there." It was, Becker thought, completely ridiculous.

"And you're sure this is going to work?" Matt asked, his expression mirroring Becker's thoughts.

"Not entirely, no." West informed them. "But what else do we have?" She stood in the centre of the little circle they'd formed, staring at Matt with one eyebrow raised a micro-fraction above the other, daring him to say no to this. Matt turned to Becker and silently asked his opinion.

"It's insanity," he replied. "But," his deep-threaded sense of Mission Before the Man kicked in and made him reconsider. "It's a lot better than allowing them to rampage through half of central London before the British Army arrives." The last part he said slowly, carefully, knowing that he was signing West's death warrant as he did so. And probably Connor's and his own as well. After what seemed like an age, Matt nodded and the team grimly dispersed. Becker caught up with West.

"Do you know what you're doing?" he asked, trying to make the concern he was feeling stay out of his voice. He needn't have bothered even worrying.

"I've done this before you know," she grinned, checking over her EMD. "Okay I was jumping through a fifth-floor window away from a very angry dog and I had given it no thought whatsoever beforehand, but the general idea is the same."

"Do you have any idea how much that doesn't reassure me?" Becker wondered with a resigned sigh. West's grin only broadened.

"The chances of this plan working one hundred per cent to the letter are about a thousand to one. However, the chances of this plan going just a little pear-shaped and still getting the dinosaurs through the anomaly are about forty-sixty, so you have absolutely nothing to worry about."

"Where did you get those figures?"

"I made them up. Now can we get going?" she looked at him expectantly and Becker sighed again. There was going to be no getting through to her on the dangers of this, he could tell. Before he could tell her not to do anything really stupid, Matt's voice came over the Com system.

"We're all ready up here. It's your call, West." With a final clap on the shoulder, West jogged over to her position in front of the anomaly and raised her EMD. Becker got out of the way; not so far that West wouldn't be able to throw him her EMD, but far enough that he hopefully wouldn't get trampled by a raptor. One look at their feet told him that he did not want to be anywhere near them when they started running. Connor, pale and wide-eyed, knelt with one hand on the locking device behind the anomaly. Becker didn't envy him in the slightest.

"No point delaying any further," West said eventually with a nonchalance that could not have been real. After a moment, a single EMD blast fell from the rooftops onto a raptor, quickly followed by another before they were raining on them from all sides but one.

"Remember not to hit their heads. We don't want them knocking the buildings down." West reminded them over the sudden noise. The raptors were feeling it; they snapped as high up as they could but even at their great height they couldn't surpass human engineering.

As per the plan, the Raptors tried to get away from the small white bursts of energy and made their way towards the anomaly, fluttering their arm feathers and making odd gargling sounds at each other as they did so. When West was sure they could see her, leaving it a little close for Becker's liking, she fired.

The first one she hit immediately lowered its head and waved the fan of feathers on its tail at her, obviously as some kind of threat. The second raptor hesitated and gargled a few times at the first before doing the same. Shots continued to batter them from the rooftops and West fired again, this time gaining more of a reaction. The raptors roared in unison and, after a final flourish, charged. West managed to fit one more headshot in to each creature before her EMD flew through the air and she sprinted towards the anomaly. Connor's hand slammed down and the anomaly sprang open. West slid to an abrupt stop in front of it and turned to face the raptors. They were still coming at her, but to everyone's horror, they had changed direction and were now coming at her from the sides rather than head-on, leaving her no escape route.

Becker saw realisation cross West's face as she tried desperately to think of a way out and his hand clenched into a fist at his side. His heart pounded in his chest and he had to fight the urge to take a shot at the raptors, distracting them from West. But he couldn't do that. They had a plan to correspond to.

"Matt, hold your fire!" he yelled into the Com system, but it was too late. The raptors saw West as the threat and were not going to stop until she had been eliminated. Her words repeated themselves in Becker's head: "The chances of this plan going just a little pear-shaped and still getting the dinosaurs through the anomaly are about forty-sixty..." He should have known she wasn't factoring her own survival into those statistics. West closed her eyes and, in a desperate attempt at self-preservation, stepped backwards. Becker let out an involuntary shout as she disappeared, taking the raptors with her two seconds later.

Jess pressed a few keys that cleverly directed all traffic in the area away from the Square and leant back in her chair. She was already regretting being so cool towards Becker, and she missed the feeling of his arms around her shoulders. She hadn't realised she was so addicted to those little things that he did. Relationship with West or not, her feelings toward him hadn't changed.

Becker's voice, suddenly loud in her ear made her jump out of her seat for the second time that day.

"Matt, hold your fire!" he yelled, causing Jess to sit bolt upright and fix her undivided attention on the screen; Becker didn't shout like that unless something very bad was happening. Sure enough, West had been backed up against the anomaly, and the jumpy CCTV gave Jess a not perfect but good enough view of the two Gigantoraptors sprinting at her from the sides. She couldn't run anymore, as had been her plan. All she could do now was step back into the anomaly.

The silence left by the raptors' disappearance was shockingly loud and left a ringing in Jess' ears. It was broken, albeit only slightly, by Connor.

"The anomaly's closing," he said. He sounded scared. Jess realised he was staring at Becker and her own gaze drifted to him too. He was standing motionless, EMD raised and pointed at the anomaly, his back to the CCTV camera so Jess couldn't see his expression. Matt, Abby and the three ARC security members entered the screen and stood silent, also watching Becker. Jess knew why. They were all worried about what he might do if the anomaly closed and West wasn't on the right side. The anomaly flickered and began to fluctuate. Still no one said a word but they were all thinking the same thing. If West hadn't come back by now, she had been caught by the raptors. There was no other explanation for why she was taking so long.

The silence dragged on for the longest three minutes of Jess' life before the anomaly gave a final flicker and then disappeared altogether. Jess couldn't watch. As much as she despised West for getting between her and Becker, she didn't want to see his reaction. He would be devastated...

"What the hell took you so long?" Becker's voice thundered through Jess' earpiece and her head snapped back up to the camera feed. West was... She'd made it back. Jess was too overwhelmed to even be confused at how she'd done it.

"Sorry about that," West apologised, breathing heavily. "The anomaly opened right on the edge of a very steep hill."

"Remind me never to agree to one of your plans again," Matt said with relief, getting a laugh from the team.

"And the raptors?" Becker asked.

"No idea," West reported, no longer out of breath. "But if they're not here anymore I'm going to assume they went through after me. See, Captain. Forty-sixty."

"Don't ever do that again," Becker ordered. West chuckled and slung a backpack over one shoulder. Jess hadn't realised she'd been carrying it before. "Jess, give the all clear. And start spinning something clever about the destroyed buildings, will you?" Jess didn't think that worthy of a response. She disconnected the CCTV link, already fuming once again at West, and began re-routing traffic.

"Uh, guys, tourists at that-way o'clock." Connor said, pointing.

"Why is it always the Japanese?" West wondered in an undertone.

"Just walk away everyone," Matt told them.

"And don't agree to take pictures. We'll be here all day." Abby continued.

"What, take pictures or have pictures taken?" West joked.

"Both."

A roar interrupted their banter, causing the whole team to stop talking, and then a scream. Jess hastily pressed buttons, trying to get her video feed back up.

"Guys, talk to me, what's going on?" she pleaded into the Com system. No one answered for a few moments and the speakers filled with EMD shots and more screaming. "Repeat, what's happening down there? I've lost CCTV... Matt? Becker? Anyone?" Jess was only greeted with static. Finally, her frantic button-pressing was rewarded, but only for a second. The screen was filled with the face of another Gigantoraptor, a juvenile, before it too went to static and Jess was left blind and deaf.

"Would someone like to explain to me why my very important weekly conversation with the Minister was just interrupted by that annoying beeping you get when the phone lines have been disconnected?" Jess groaned inwardly. She was far too busy to be dealing with Lester at a time like this.

"I don't know, I've just lost the team too," she didn't even turn away from her search for another CCTV camera in the area.

"When was this?" Lester appeared at her shoulder.

"About a minute ago. They gave me the all clear but then some tourists showed up, and I couldn't get the CCTV back in time until another raptor destroyed the camera."

"Another raptor? There were more?"

"So it would seem." Lester was silent for a moment.

"You keep trying on the CCTV. I'll find someone to figure out our sudden communications problem." He strolled off, mobile phone still in one hand. Jess found another camera that watched over Trafalgar Square but that too was only displaying static. She hoped they got Coms back up quickly otherwise they'd have the entire London police force arriving at the anomaly site, and with more raptors in the area that was not going to end well. A third and fourth camera also came up blank, and Jess was getting frantic.

She pressed more keys to direct her back to the CCTV mainframe and her computer froze.

"Not now, please not now..." she begged it. It seemed to respond to her wishes, although the next message it gave her wasn't nearly as encouraging.

System cannot connect; no signal.

"No signal? What do you mean 'no signal'? You always have signal... Lester!" she shouted over her shoulder, hoping her boss hadn't gone too far down the corridor to hear her. Running footsteps approached her chair and he reappeared behind her.

"What..? Oh." he took in the message on the screen. "How is that possible?"

"I don't know. This thing is connected to its own satellite, there is no way anything can be intercepting it." As the words left her mouth, a possibility came to her. "Unless..."

"Unless?" Lester picked up on her hesitation.

"Unless someone is deliberately blocking the signal." The Hub was silent for a lot longer than Jess felt comfortable with.

"Can anyone do that?" Lester asked eventually.

"With the right technology you can do anything from your garden shed. You don't need to be a NASA scientist; you just have to have the brainpower."

"But who would want to block us off? Who even knows about us?"

"I don't have all the answers, Lester; I'm just making educated guesses."

"Right. I'll get on to Whitehall... No I won't, the phones don't work. Okay, I will drive to Whitehall and sort this out. I will be back in no more than two hours." He turned and strode smartly up the stairs and into the lift, leaving Jess wondering what on Earth she was going to do until he came back.

Becker turned in the direction Connor's gloved finger was indicating and smirked. Three Japanese tourists, a man, a woman and a young girl, were talking in excitement at the sight of nine people with guns.

"Why is it always the Japanese?" West wondered in an undertone. Becker's smirk widened.

"Just walk away everyone," Matt told them.

"And don't agree to take pictures. We'll be here all day." Abby continued.

"What, take pictures or have pictures taken?" West joked.

"Both." The two of them laughed and headed off towards the pickups. Becker was glad West was getting along so well with the rest of the team; it just made things a whole lot easier.

A roar bellowed behind them and the whole team turned in microseconds, those still with EMDs raising them. Becker felt himself go numb as a Gigantoraptor, smaller than the ones they had just been dealing with, bent down and snapped up the Japanese man. His scream stayed in Becker's head long after he had become incapable of sounding it. They had never even thought to look for more; they had all assumed that if there had been any more creatures they would have all been together. He heard West shouting orders behind him but all he could do was watch as the Gigantoraptor, joined now by three more all of different sizes, bit down on the woman. One of its friends picked up the other half of her body, and a third went for the girl.

Something hit him hard across the face and brought his attention back to the present. West was standing next to him, a cold fire in her eyes. He had a feeling she had just slapped him.

"Come on!" she shouted, and Becker looked beyond her to where the rest of the team were running for cover. He followed her, still completely numb, into one of the terraced houses just off Trafalgar Square. She turned back at the entrance to prop the door back up against the frame and he went into the front room.

"Matt? Matt, come in. Connor? Abby? Jess, respond. Can anyone hear me?" West muttered a long string of words in Spanish that Becker didn't think were all that polite. "Coms are down." she informed him, coming into the room. He ran a hand over his face and turned towards the window, taking a few deep breaths as he did so. Three innocent people had just died because of their indolence, three people that hadn't needed to die... 'Don't think about it now,' he told himself. 'Fight first, mourn later.'

"What the hell was that?" Becker turned to face West standing across the room from him with a confused expression on her face. He sighed.

"We should have checked..."

"Yeah, you're right, we should have," she unfolded her arms and stepped towards him, her voice getting progressively louder as she continued, "But we didn't. And there is nothing we can do about it so behaving like a delusional nabo isn't going to get anything done."

"Do you think I don't know that?"

"I'm starting to get the impression." Becker turned away from her again. She just didn't get it... "Look, people died and you're upset. I get it, really, I do. But don't you think we can prevent more people from dying more effectively if we go out there and find the rest of the team rather than sitting in here feeling sorry for ourselves?" Looking back at her, Becker saw that her coldness had gone and she was giving him a 'you know I'm right really' look.

"You're right. Sorry. Do you know where everyone else went?"

"Matt, Abby and Connor are about four or five doors up from us, I don't know about Hadley, Pitters or Larton."

"Have you got an EMD?"

"No, you had it. And then you dropped it."

"Yes, I did. I suppose we'll just have to do without." They went back through to the hall and West carefully removed the door from its balanced position against the frame; she had smashed it clean off its hinges when they'd come in.

"A delusional what?" Becker suddenly inquired.

"Hm? Oh, turnip. Delusional turnip."

"Right. Thanks."

"No problem."

"On three. One, two… Three!" They sprinted out of the house and down the street, Becker following close behind West. A Gigantoraptor looked up at them and began chasing after them, clearly thinking this was a whole lot of fun. West suddenly dropped and Becker thought she had stumbled but she was up again in less than a second and handing him an EMD. He had to admit it, she was good. There was no way he would have seen that. She pulled him through another doorway and he fell off balance, landing heavily on something inside another house. EMD shots, some of them his own, blasted through the doorway until the raptor turned and fled.

"Becker," Connor gasped from underneath him, "You can get off me now." Becker rolled over and Connor, suddenly able to breathe again, sucked in a long, panting breath.

"Have any of you been able to raise Jess?" Matt asked immediately.

"No. My guess is the whole Com system is down," West told him.

"So we have no way of knowing if backup is on the way or not, great."

"Matt, the raptors have taken out all the CCTV cameras I can see from here." Abby said from the front room. "And they seem to have taken everything surrounding them out as well. There are four of them, juveniles, ranging from half to a quarter of the size of the adults."

"Have you got sights on the others?"

"No... Yes. I have." Becker didn't like the tone in Abby's voice and joined her at the window. What he saw made him suddenly need to sit down. Two of the four raptors were enjoying snacking on Larton and Hadley. The other two, the biggest of the group, were fighting over Pitters. Becker couldn't actually tell that it was him anymore. He closed his eyes and put his head in his hands, fighting nausea. He had known those three men for a long time. Larton had been in his class at Sandhurst. When he looked up again, the rest of the team were dishing out EMDs and formulating some general plan of how to get back to the trucks. They were all deliberately paying no attention to him, all of them except West. She stared at him, holding his gaze, making sure he was fit for more action. He nodded once, a gesture she returned before turning back to Matt. Becker stood up and joined them.

"So we just have to make sure we get there as fast as possible, and no driving off without anyone," Matt was saying. "Once we get there, stun the raptors, then Connor, Abby and I will get back to the ARC while Becker and West stay here to watch them. Any questions?"

"Yeah, I have one," Connor announced. "What happens if we get back to where we left the cars and they're not actually there anymore?"

"Then we run like hell," West declared before Matt had a chance. Connor didn't look reassured.

"Good luck everyone." With those final words of encouragement, the team headed for the door.

So yeah, Chapter Two.

Please let me know what you think. I am loving this fic but that doesn't mean anyone else is.

So please review!