Disclaimer: I do not own Terra Nova, this is purely a non-profit fan-made story.

Chapter 26

ON either side of the rover the jungle sped past like nothing more than an indistinct green blur. Despite being tossed from left to right now and then as their transport took a sharp turn to evade rocks and mud-filled ditches, Hera sat motionless in the backseat, eyes cutting from one tree to the next, narrowing occasionally to make out any movement up ahead. She cradled her sonic pistol with a determination that almost felt nostalgic as the thought of Croft getting away pumped more and more adrenaline into her bloodstream; the hatred of the target they were chasing was boiling just under the surface like nothing short of hot rage. Nevertheless a chill ran down her spine as she sensed Nathaniel's piercing stare fixed on her, making her clench her jaw and increase her tight grip on the pistol in her hands as she bent all of her willpower to keep from looking back at him through the mirror.

She was done being crippled by the trauma of taking a life. Of losing Evans' in that same devastating moment. She was done being haunted by that particular ghost, especially now it was time to finally turn the tables on the one who was really responsible for it all. Although there was no way in hell Nathaniel would believe her in his present state of mind, Hera actually felt like herself again. Like the real her had once again taken the reigns in hand. And now she was determined to finish what she'd started. Croft might've been after the colony, its Commander thrown into the bargain too, but the moment she'd taken over after Nathaniel had slipped into a poison-induced coma, it had become a fight between the two of them. And it was a duel Hera was dead set on winning..

A battle she thought herself a fool for picking, however involuntarily, was her current one with Nathaniel. She needed his support now more than ever and her sheer stubbornness to do it on her own combined with his –if possible- even more dogged determination to protect her had effectively driven a wedge between them. And now, regardless of being annoyingly out of tune, they were heading further into danger as Dunham pushed the rover to its limits and it tore through the lush green undergrowth and ferns with roaring engines.

Instinctively turning her head, it took her a few seconds to realize that the sudden drumming noises were caused by Nathaniel, who impatiently tapped with his fingers on the screen of their navigational system. Unable to resist, Hera cautiously peered around the shotgun seat to get a better look at what was bothering him.

"Damn thing's malfunctioning again." Nathaniel muttered under his breath, continuing to hammer the weather-beaten device irritably.

"Actually, Sir, I don't think it is.." Dunham cautiously disagreed.

"Come again?" Fingers frozen in their previous restless movement, Nathaniel gave his driver an impatient look.

"Uh.. The motorcycle stopped.. Sir." Dunham stated in a somewhat wavering voice, his eyes cutting back and forth between the jungle ahead and the navigational system.

"Croft stopped knowing full well that we're coming after her.." Nathaniel repeated, a hint of suspicion mingling with his tone of utter disbelief as Jim, one hand on the side of Dunham's chair, leaned forward to study the outward expanding and then retracting red circle on the screen they were rapidly nearing.

"Yes, sir. I don't know why, but the Major has definitely stopped moving." Dunham asserted more certain this time despite both his CO and the seasoned sheriff's undisguised incredulity.

"Maybe the bike broke down." Shannon weighed in from the back after a tense silence.

"Hmm.." A dissatisfied grunt was all he initially got from Nathaniel before, rubbing chin in thought, he grudgingly gave in to the theory now forming in his own mind, "Or maybe she ditched it in order to lure us in closer. A diversion to give her more time to prepare her next move."

"Use it as bait you mean?" Jim suggested who, following this train of thought seemed to have arrived at the same conclusion.

Nathaniel nodded, "Playing fair ain't exactly the Major's style. She's outnumbered. We've got more speed and gun power too. Nah, she's lying in wait alright.. Preparing an ambush or-"

Mimicking Jim next to her, Hera leaned closer after the abrupt silence, careful not to touch Nathaniel's seat and keep enough of a distance between them not matter how childish she felt she was being. She spotted the outpost in the far left corner of the screen just about the same time as Nathaniel resumed sharing his thoughts.

"That's where she is holed up. She's going to use it as a fort against us when we discover the bike's just a distraction. But there's no way out of that facility. We'll make sure of that.." Nathaniel's voice acquired a unmistakably vengeful quality to it as he unstrapped, motioning Dunham to stop while he thumbed the settings on his blaster to the max.

As soon as the rover had come to a rather rough standstill, mud and twigs flying everywhere, Nathaniel turned in his seat, fixing her with a stare. Anticipating his order, which she didn't doubt included her staying behind in the rover to go bike hunting with Dunham, Hera was out of the back of their transport before he had a chance to even open his mouth. Heading north-east in the direction of the outpost Croft would be awaiting them in at a brisk, determined pace, she hadn't gotten far when she could hear the slamming of a door followed by Nathaniel's curt but clear command that made the rover tear off again with a predatory roar. His second command, a single bellowed word, made her halt on the spot regardless of her preceding resolution to disobey it. Fists clenching and teeth grinding she waited for Nathaniel to catch up to her, which only took him a few seconds. Once again stubbornly avoiding to look at him directly, she was almost unable to move when the tirade she'd expected didn't come, effectively and ironically rooting her to the spot just as effectively. Instead, Nathaniel restricted himself to a terse and almost inaudible 'stay close' before taking the lead. Mentally kicking herself into action, Hera followed suit, her heartrate increasing every step she took with the occasional erratic spike as she dodged every attempt he made at establishing eye contact whenever he looked back over his shoulder at her, making sure she was still closely behind.

Relatively recent training for her and years of experience on his side, both of them knew how to navigate through the dense jungle and they deftly chose their way avoiding the treacherous pitfalls the wilderness tried to ensnare its victims with. As a result, they had reached the outpost in what seemed no time at all. Perceiving his raised, closed fist, Hera automatically halted, then leaned back against the large trunk of a massive, centuries old tree. After having assured herself with raised sonic pistol that there was nothing creeping up on them from behind she chanced a careful glance around her cover. Nathaniel had crouched down surrounded by a family of thick-stemmed and broad-leafed ferns, his binoculars trained on the rectangular, nondescript building further up ahead. The small, concrete facility was hemmed in by two strangely misshaped rocks, gray fangs jutting out from the green world and dark mud as if a creature had buried itself beneath it and had only to snap shut its powerful jaws to crush the life out of its unsuspected prey.

Returning the binoculars to his belt she could tell he'd been on the verge of relaying his findings to her when there was the tell-tale crackling of a radio bursting into life. From her current position all she could hear was Nathaniel's inquiring growl as he answered it. She impatiently waited while either Jim or Dunham's report increasingly deepened the frown creasing his forehead.

Tensing up at once, Hera nonetheless responded instinctively when Nathaniel had turned around to gesture for her to come closer. Making her way over to him she only caught his last, brusque 'Taylor out' when there was a final grating noise of static being mercilessly cut off and he reattached the radio on his belt, right next to the slim pair of binoculars.

"Seems I was right. They found nothing but the bike, it was a diversion.." he informed her without the least bit of satisfaction that his hunch had paid off then, pointing ahead, said, "The main entrance shows signs of a recent forced entry. She's here alright.." Momentarily lost in thought as if he struggled with the pressing urgency of that fact, he continued to stare at the outpost, brows furrowed in uneasy indecisiveness.

"Then we'd better find a back door." Hera simply stated, partly to finish the sentence he'd allowed to trail away into silence, but also to ignore the recognition of his apparent reluctance to act on the one hand and the powerful perseverance to stop Croft once and for all this time. She was but all too aware that because of her presence the usual balance in him was upset. He wanted to protect and fight at the same time. And that particular realization was as tricky to her as it seemed to be to him.

Despite something close to bitterness having crept into her voice as she'd said it, for a moment she could've sworn there was a grin briefly tugging at the corners of Nathaniel's mouth. A second later he'd already repressed it and the expression on his face was again morphed into an anxious, even painful, apprehension that sent shivers down her spine.

Next instant he'd raised himself up, grabbing her by the wrist in the process so, taken by surprise, Hera almost tripped over her own feet as he dragged her along with him in the direction of the outpost. Expecting a surge of anger, of annoyance at least, she felt strangely taken aback when it felt more like relief, his hold on her resulting more from a careful consideration not to hurt her than a rough and pride-driven remonstrance.

Without a word he released her from his grasp the moment they reached a rust-covered back hatch, no more than half the size of a normal door. Nathaniel placed both his hands on the round door handle, muscles in his arms strained and poised to force it to open while she increased her grip on her weapon now she had both of her hands free again. As it creaked and groaned, revealing the shady interior of a not much used science lab, Hera eventually crawled inside, shoulders hunched, head retracted and elbows tucked tightly to her sides as she scanned the room carefully with her pistol. She could just hear Nathaniel clambering through the small opening behind her when something moved in the shadows up ahead. Without time to think, instinct took over and she'd fired the shot before the sound of it reached her ears. Next instant there was the heavy and somewhat fleshy thud of a human body landing hard on the concrete floor followed closely by an infinitely louder and much closer grinding wail as of steel violently imploding. Only when she'd hastily swiveled around did the puff of air rushing past her temples not two seconds ago make sense to her.

The back hatch had been practically blown off its hinges and was now badly dented and deformed as if one of those bone-headed dinosaurs from Ghost Valley had rammed into it head first. There was a flurry of movement as Nathaniel rushed towards her, pulling her with him the next instant as they hunkered down behind a dust covered and powered down workstation. Eyes linked he cupped her face with his free hand. Apparently it took a near miss from what would've been a fatal sonic blast to the head, to make the both of them see sense again, tune into each other's frequency and ride the same wave length. Everything was understood and said with the single look exchanged between them now. Looking up into his intense gaze accompanied by a heart-piercing worry that must have been etched on her own face all those times she'd stood next to his eerily still form in that biobed, she swallowed down a lump in her throat, unable to find her voice to utter even one of the many thoughts and emotions flooding her heart and mind.

"Maybe we need to thank the Major for the wake-up call there." Nathaniel whispered hoarsely, a feral grin splitting his face and a inextinguishable hunger sparked in his bright blue eyes, glinting hard as steel.

As if waiting for those words addressed to her, Croft chose that moment to revive just enough from the direct hit she'd taken to the chest to throw away the non-responding blaster in her hands and start thrashing about, reclaiming their attention at once. Immediately getting to their feet they raised their weapons as one but before they could approach their mutual target the Major had scrambled backwards and disappeared into the next room.

"Damn it!" Despite the grave situation Nathaniel threw her a bemused look now they'd each cursed under their breath simultaneously.

"If I didn't know any better I'd say I rubbed off on you, Sergeant.."

"I don't know, could be the other way round, sir." Hera countered, briefly grinning in answer to his contagious smile before nodding solemnly when Nathaniel nudged his chin in her direction, telling her to take the back seat on this one. On her guard she followed him closely as he eased forward cautiously. The moment they turned the corner ready to start their hot pursuit and inevitable confrontation, the sight that met their eyes couldn't have been more unexpected. The roof was partly caved in, exposing the rubble buried laboratory to the outside elements, which in this case included a massive, full-grown carnotaurus..

Poised Like a sentinel, or watch dog left there unintentionally, and now remembering its instructions or more likely its instinctual urge to feed, when it spotted the human backing towards it. Oblivious to the danger she was nearing, Croft held her eyes fixed on the both of them as they'd rounded the corner. She sneered maliciously while brandishing the army knife she'd taken from one of the guards back in the brig, completely unaware of the absurdity of that futile gesture. Before Hera or Nathaniel next to her could respond or even move a muscle the giant predator let out a deep, reverberating growl and stamped the ground once to anchor itself better as its head dipped forward. Croft looked up in indignant disbelief when the carnotaurus strained its neck and snapped its powerful jaws shut around its target. There was a terrible crunching sound of bones breaking and blood sprayed everywhere as if a gruesome fountain poured it onto the surroundings while the dinosaur tossed its head to the sky swallowing what remained of their enemy with one greedy gulp.

Hera unfroze the moment the carnotaurus became aware of the presence of more than one prey. As she groped around to clasp Nathaniel's hand it shifted its gaze and stared directly at them, breathing in through its nostrils as it gauged their scent and potential to provide him with another easy meal.

"Better leave the way we came in.." Nathaniel said, finally getting hold of her hand and taking a few steps back as he talked.

"Couldn't agree more.." Hera didn't need to think twice when, on his sign, they increased their pace and fell backwards into the room they'd entered the facility through. There was a loud roar and the building shook all around them.

Quickly getting to their feet they retraced their steps, dodging upturned desks and chairs, ducking before jumping through the back hatch and into the relative safety of the jungle, the lush vegetation of which soon swallowed them into its surroundings.