Disclaimer: I do not own Terra Nova or any of its characters
A/N: Well, here's chapter four! I have all the way up to chapter five written, and chapter six's under way. It was interesting to find this on my computer because I wrote this last year... I haven't edited it too much so any tips are welcome!
Chapter Four
I woke just as the sun was starting to rise, and promptly tried to fall back asleep, groaning. My sleep-deprived muscles caused my arm to flop around limply as I tried to disable the high-pitched beeping noise that had started me awake. The digital clock shut up after a few half-hearted slaps, at which point I sat up, resigned to the fact that it was morning and I had to get up. Seeing that it was seven o'clock and that meant I'd only managed to grab two hours of sleep, I groaned aloud and tried to swing my legs out of bed. They wouldn't budge.
Zoe was fast asleep on the foot of my bed, curled up on top of my legs. I smiled, shaking my head, and instantly forgot about how tired I was. She was just so damn cute.
"Hey, Zo," I whispered, smoothing her hair back from her forehead. "Good morning."
Her blue eyes blinked sleepily up at me. "Good morning Bhaiya," she smiled, and sat up so I could get out of bed.
It was at that very instant that Mama and Daddy threw open my door, looking frantic. "Zoe's—" began Daddy in a panicked voice, but they both stopped dead when they saw us.
"Stupid," Mama said to herself, smacking her forehead. "Of course." Oh, they must have thought something happened to her when she wasn't in her bed this morning.
"Guess which beautiful little girl somehow found her way back to my room last night?" I asked, kissing the top of her forehead. Zoe smiled and hugged me around the waist.
"What?" asked Daddy of Mama, confused.
"They're very attached," she said to him in a low voice, beaming at us. "She can't sleep if he's not there."
"Because I'm his jitterbug!" Zoe chirped, and we all laughed, even Daddy.
"Yes, you are," I said, nuzzling her nose with mine. "C'mon, let's have breakfast."
So I carried her in on my back, holding my arms out to the sides and making whooshing noises like I was an airplane. She shrieked with delight, urging me to go faster. With a laugh, I plopped her into her seat at the table and went to find some decent food.
"Who hid the Cheerios?" I yelled from the pantry.
"I did," Maddie said, appearing from her bedroom with two glasses of—my stomach roiled at the sight of it. It was a putrid green color and smelled God awful. "Your stomach needs help to adjust to the new diet."
"I'm supposed to drink that?" I asked, frowning. "Maddie, you know better than to attempt cooking!" Seeing her vile look, I dodged her swat and put my hands in the air. "Kidding, kidding!"
"It's good for you," insisted Maddie. "Now—"
I couldn't believe my luck when someone knocked on the door. "I'll get it!" I shouted, scrambling to reach it.
It was the same young soldier who'd been at the stairs yesterday, I noted with confusion as I spoke. "Wh—"
Without a word, he grabbed my arm and began dragging me away from the house. "What are you doing?" I asked uncertainly. "Am I in trouble?" God, hadn't Taylor and I been over this already?
"Taylor," he said shortly. "You're late for work."
I broke away from him. Oh, work. I totally hadn't forgotten that I had work. "Can I at least put a shirt on?" I gestured down at my clothing, which consisted of a pair of sweatpants and nothing else. "It's cold out."
He shrugged. "Your fault for sleeping in."
"Seven o'clock is freaking early!" I said incredulously. "Sleeping in is, like, noon!"
"Maybe that's so back where you came from," he said, shaking his head. "But this place is different." He made as if to take my arm again.
"I can walk," I snapped, heading towards the central building.
"You're going the wrong way," he called after me.
Infuriated, I swung around, hands on hips. "Where does he want me to go then?" I knew I had no right to be mad at him, that I was really mad at Taylor, but Taylor wasn't there and he was.
"The research labs," the soldier said mildly, somehow still unoffended. "You don't know where those are, which is why he sent me to escort you."
I folded my arms and remained unconvinced.
He relented. "…and that he didn't think you'd…arrive," he said. "To put it delicately." With that, he turned and started walking away. It was clear that I was to follow him.
"Oh really." I glowered at nothing in particular, reluctantly following him. The occasional pebbles poked my feet, causing me to wince and try and step more carefully. "I said I'd show up," I mumbled to myself as we walked. "I don't go back on my promises."
The labs were all one building, two stories high, and made all out of white metal. I jumped as the door slid shut behind me, instantly uneasy with the place. Sure, there were plenty of windows and everything was very open, but the whole thing reminded me of a hospital, especially with the white tables and shelves full of scientific equipment everywhere. The people in white lab coats, working diligently at their tables, didn't even bother to look up as we passed. I caught glimpses of holograms of DNA, what looked like a dinosaur egg, and manymanymany different plants and bugs and such.
The soldier led me up to one of the tables, where a man was sitting hunched over a microscope. He had scruffy blonde hair and some stubble on his chin, with bags under his eyes and rumpled clothes. It seemed as if he'd stayed here all night.
The soldier cleared his throat, and the man jumped, glancing up from his work. "Malcolm, this is—what's your name?" the soldier asked, turning to me.
I scowled. "Josh."
"Right, Josh," he said, turning back to the man. "He volunteered—"
I rolled my eyes. Yeah, volunteered.
Catching my look, the soldier tried again. "He's here to help. Taylor sent him; said you had needed help with filing papers?"
Malcolm brightened. "Oh, right, this way," he said to me, jumping up from his chair and scurrying over to the next room. I left the soldier with a dirty look and followed him to what turned out to be the largest, dirtiest room I'd ever seen.
"We're not exactly the most organized facility," Malcolm said sheepishly, as I stared in horror at the papers. They were everywhere. I doubted there were any in the actual file cabinets—a whole wall full of them—and instead on the floor, counters, and—I sighed, wondering how on earth they'd managed to stick some to the bloody ceiling. "The files are labeled, and the papers are headed," he continued, failing to note my distress. "They should have numbers printed at the bottom; those help you organize them into packets, and those packets go in the appropriate files. Arrange them chronologically, and then alphabetically, since there are multiple packets per day."
"How long have you been here?" I asked, barely catching on to what he was saying.
"A couple years," he said distractedly. "I'll leave you to it—" and he was gone.
I stared after him in disbelief. I was expected to do this for the whole entire day? Grumbling and mentally cursing Taylor every way I knew how, I stooped and began to pick up papers.