Chapter 14~the Beginning of the End. Sort Of.
"This had better be good," Becker announced as he practically marched down the ramp and into the Operations Area. Maria, who was following at a more civilised pace, smirked. Jess looked up from the screen of the Anomaly Detector.
"The old anomaly at the racetrack has opened," she said. Becker frowned, directing it at Connor who was lying on his skateboard underneath the Detector to see if this was in fact a technical error or not. He decided it wasn't and stood up.
"And yes, we all thought that that particular anomaly had never closed, but it turns out that Wilder gave us a parting gift. For some reason," Connor paused and leaned over Jess' shoulder to press a button or two on the keypad before continuing. "He decided to upgrade the Detector so that it picks up anomalies unlocking as well,"
"And then he went over to the future anomaly and unlocked it, even though he knew we would be able to find him? That makes no sense." Abby spoke up from the other side of Jess' chair. A camera feed sprang up on Jess' monitor showing the anomaly, as open as open can really get, and the locking mechanism in more pieces than Connor had built it to come in. The two guards Lester had re-posted just that morning were nowhere to be seen. Everyone groaned inwardly. They had been hoping to get at least one good night's sleep before chasing after Wilder again.
"If you think about it," Maria said slowly, "Wilder has always seemed to tell us what his next move is before he does it. Well, either his next or his last, but still, he always tells us what he has just done, like he wants us to follow him or something," She had a point.
"Well, yeah, I guess so, but why?" Connor asked. He knew no one had the answer, but there was no harm in asking.
"I have no idea, but what do you think would happen if we didn't follow him and just left him to it?" Maria shrugged, already liking her plan, mainly because it involved her seeing her flowery bed linen that night. She looked at Becker. "It's at least worth some experimentation," she said. Realising that everyone was looking at him expectantly, and remembering for the first time in the entire week that now Danny wasn't around he was in charge, Becker nodded.
"Fine. He clearly wants us to follow him, so let's throw a spanner in the works," he declared, relaxing quite a bit. In fact, everyone smiled. Connor actually grinned, the most mischievous look he had ever come up with written on his face. The moment was ruined by Burton's first appearance in what seemed like months.
"Excuse me for asking," He said sarcastically, "But why are we all standing around here when there's clearly something far more important going on? I thought those sirens actually meant something." Connor and Abby shared a look. He was evidently getting tips from Lester on how to annoy everyone you work with just by being in the same room.
"Wilder seems to be encouraging us to follow him around on his little magical mystery tour of the anomalies," Becker told him. "So we have decided to do the exact opposite and see what happens." there was silence for a few seconds while Burton tried to figure out what to say.
"Ok then, good idea. Well in that case, you can all go home, you deserve the break, I'll get James to get more security down there, just for now," He nodded and strode back up to Lester's office. Connor and Jess had to bite their lips to stop themselves from laughing until he closed the door. Once he had, however, it was a wonder the ceiling didn't come down. Once the laughter had subsided and Jess had wiped a mascara stain off the Detector's keyboard, Maria stood up.
"Well I, for one, am going to do as told and go home, if that's ok with you all. I'm going home regardless of whether you lot agree or not, actually, so goodnight." She gave them a cheery wave and scooped a set of car keys off the table before striding out of the main doors. The rest of the team shared a look before following her out.
The sun dropped behind the smallest of the high-rises and the figure turned back towards the old, rusted iron stairwell. She didn't want to get caught out in the darkness. When the sun sets the fun begins. Or at least, that's what her mother had told her. Back then everyone thought that the Predators were stronger at night, more deadly. Only a week ago, when a group of them had attacked the settlement in broad daylight, did they even stop to think that it doesn't make a difference. That they are just as vicious in the light as they are in the dark. But of course, that knowledge didn't matter now that there was only two of them. Two out of the original thirty who had managed to survive. The only two to realise that, in the end, they would always be outsmarted by the Predators.
The following morning, the atmosphere in the ARC was amazingly relaxed and calm. It hadn't been like this since before the whole thing with Helen and Johnson started, and no one could really be bothered to remember how long ago THAT was. Abby was in her lab doing something clever with some prehistoric plants, Connor was tinkering with a new contraption that he wouldn't tell anyone about, Jess was creating a programme on the Anomaly Detector that would notify them when an anomaly closed as well as when it opened, just without as many loud noises and flashing lights, and Becker was in the armoury with someone from Prospero who was introducing the newest and best non-lethal weapon available to anyone anywhere. Rumour already had it that Becker wasn't impressed. Maria had even brought Natalie along and was giving her the whole tour of the site. But as cheerful and relaxed as it appeared to be, it didn't take a genius to figure out that it was only a surface performance. Smiles and laughter rarely showed themselves, and when they did, they weren't quite as easy coming as the wearers would have liked to believe. And it was quiet. Not many people were talking, and even fewer were speaking above whispers. The truth of it all was that everyone, even the cleaning staff, were affected by the deaths the mission had caused.
It wasn't until mid-afternoon that Jess finished her programme, and it went off almost immediately, scaring the living daylights out of half the staff. The team, clearly not as preoccupied as they claimed to be, rushed over to hear what was going on.
"Wilder has left and locked the anomaly," Jess announced. And, true enough, the camera feeds showed the anomaly, nicely locked and complete with two perfectly healthy, if a bit unconscious, security guards. Which left one burning question, sitting waving a flag above the pile of mundane, 'what's he up to now?' sort.
How the heck had he managed to lock the anomaly?
"I for one, am suitably curious to go check it out already," Natalie said, breaking the silence. Becker was all for agreeing with her, but didn't notice Burton standing behind him.
"And since you're not an official member of the team yet, your opinion doesn't count." Maria and Natalie both shot him the same vehement look, which he pointedly ignored. "However, I am of the same mind, which is why everyone besides young Miss Holland and Jess will be going to investigate." Natalie's glower deepened. "You will take the new EMDs; bullets cost money and we seem to be using an awful lot of them recently." he threw a pointed look at Becker, whose expression clearly told him that they were going to take this up at a later date. "It will be a scout mission, far too many people were killed last time, so only the four of you will be going. You will leave as soon as you can prepare everything you need." Looking unbearably pleased with himself, he turned to leave. Maria didn't even wait until there was a closed door between them before commenting.
"Do you think he enjoys himself? Or is it some weird sub-clause in the job description?"
"I don't think he quite realises what the phrase 'Free-Lance Staff' means," Natalie decided, still glaring at the back of Burton's grey suit. Maria shrugged in agreement.
"He has a point though," she said, her tone softening. "You are in no way ready to take on a pack of angry future predators. It's better if you sit this one out and explain your father's new tracking devices to Jess. Again." Natalie laughed. Seb had given her a handful of small black boxes that he claimed would send a signal to the central command box (which was currently hooked up to the Anomaly Detector) even if it had gone through an anomaly, so long as the anomaly was still open. He didn't know if it would work with a locked one. They would have to test that for themselves. Natalie did not get what Jess didn't understand about the whole thing. It wasn't like she was talking Russian or anything.
"EMDs?" Connor asked Becker.
"Hm? Oh, yes, the high-tech Tasers. To put it bluntly, the man from Prospero who was telling me about them was convinced to the point of blindness that they were far better than ordinary weaponry and was far too busy telling me how amazing they are to actually tell me what EMD stands for, so don't ask. If you ask me, using them against Predators is a suicide mission." There was an awkward silence that lasted for at least a minute.
"Well," Maria chimed eventually, "After those fantastic words of encouragement from our team leader, let's go!" she was really overdoing the sarcasm.
"Yes. Let's." Becker said sardonically. The rest of the team shared looks and dispersed from around the anomaly detector, grabbing tracking devices on their way.
She watched with open curiosity as the old man leaped with seemingly no regard for his own personal safety over the burnt out car shell and down the trench. She hadn't noticed that before. This was the third time he had seen him roaming around the city now, and she was uncharacteristically curious to see what he was doing down there and how he had got there in the first place. She thought for a moment about finding out but eventually decided against it. As brilliant as finding another human colony would be, she had other responsibilities and couldn't go gallivanting off on some potentially suicidal investigation into something that clearly wasn't her business. And besides, she had figured out that it was safer in smaller groups. The old man could do whatever he liked down in that ditch, as long as it didn't tell the Predators the location of their hideout or endanger anyone's life. She would have loved to know where he was coming from though. Later, maybe. Not now. Now she had to get back.
"So what's our plan again?" Maria asked. She hadn't been paying the slightest bit of attention to Becker's last briefing, and the one before that she hadn't even realised that he was talking, so had gone off in search of some sterilisation wipes. She hoped he wouldn't take it personally. She had been insulting him far too much today. He threw her a look that made her feel really, really guilty about it and recited for the third time in fifteen minutes their plan.
"We go in, we cover Abby while she tracks down Wilder and, that accomplished, we follow him. Once he is found we capture him if possible, tag him if not, and then get the hell out of there. If anything goes even slightly wrong, we abort. If we see even hide or hair of a predator, we abort. Am I understood?" He would have given Maria a pointed look if he hadn't been driving at the time. Instead, he aimed it at the tarmac in front of him.
"Yes, sir," Maria declared.
"Good." Becker didn't sound the slightest bit amused. Maria made a mental note to apologise when all this was over and done with.
Soon enough, they were pulling up at the security barrier at the racetrack and, now that said racetrack was owned and manned by the ARC, they sped straight through and up to the garage at the other end of the compound. Squealing to a stop, everyone climbed out of the pickup and began assembling the EMDs from the back. Connor made his way over to the anomaly and examined it, trying to determine what Wilder had used to keep it locked. Finding nothing, he poked it, to find that it rushed open as soon as his finger got within three inches of it. He moved backwards, and it sprang closed again. He spent the next minute grinning like an idiot and moving backwards and forwards in front of the anomaly, before Jess' voice in his ear told him to stop it; he was setting all the alarms off in the ARC more times than necessary. Undeterred, Connor went back to the others and explained Wilder's evident use of future technology to lock and unlock the anomaly. Maria didn't have the heart to point out to him that motion and proximity sensors weren't all that futuristic. They did one last check to make sure that everything they were likely to need was in their rucksacks, shared a glance and a silent 'good luck,' and stepped through the anomaly.