Let the Games Begin

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Chapter 54 - MONKEY BUSINESS

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Jess spotted the tiny monkey at the same moment Emily did, and they both took off for the stairs without thinking. They passed through the long geometric sails hanging down from the top of the stadium and started running up the stairwell adjacent to the women's toilet, keeping an eye on the hyperactive monkey as he continued to climb higher and higher.

However, before the team reached the second landing, the monkey suddenly made what appeared to be a suicidal leap directly over the transparent purple railing. Jess and the others ran to the edge to see where he'd fallen, but he'd actually only dropped a metre or so, landing on a metal grid, atop which loads of cables were suspended. The grid, which had horizontal pipes suspended across it like playground monkey bars, seemed to stretch on and on in either direction, curving around the stadium for as far as the eye could see, suspended over a long and currently empty corridor.

Empty of people, that is.

A small troop of monkeys could now be seen cavorting along the grid in a tight group, happily swinging from rung to rung above the corridor. Jess simply stared, thankful that they weren't chasing dinosaurs but stunned nonetheless. How were they ever going to collect them all?

Out of the corner of her eye, Jess saw Emily start to raise her EMD, aiming at one of the rambunctious animals. Abby hurried over, lowering Emily's weapon as she ordered, "No! No weapons! Remember?"

Of course, Abby was often advocating for limited weaponry at incursions, but this was different. This time she was actually the one in charge, even though, at the moment, she was simply repeating Matt's order from earlier.

For one or both of these reasons, Emily lowered her EMD before asking, "Then how do you suggest we capture them?"

Unfortunately Abby didn't have an immediate answer.

However, Becker had an immediate question. "What the hell are they?" he asked frantically through the comms.

"Tiny monkeys," Jess quickly responded, knowing how frustrating it could be not to see what was going on.

"Apidium, I'm guessing," Connor elaborated. "An early species of tree-dwelling monkeys from the Eocene. Daytime hunters. Travelled in small groups. Hind feet especially adapted to-"

"We don't need a science lesson, Connor," Abby snapped. She then took a steeling breath, stating, "There may be more than we'd like, but at least they're fairly contained. Any brilliant ideas?"

Connor shrugged. "How about the world's oldest motivator?" he suggested, holding up a discarded bag of McDonald's chips. Leaning over the railing, he held out a few to the creatures below, calling, "Here, monkey monkey monkey. Don't you want to try some of these tasty-?"

His sentence ended in a high-pitched yelp as a monkey suddenly swung down from the girder above, snatching the chips from his hand. Connor startled, tossing both the chips bag and his handheld dating calculator; the bag fell noiselessly onto the stairs at their feet, but the calculator went over the railing, bouncing between several metal girders before shattering into numerous pieces upon the cement floor of the corridor down below.

"Oh well, at least we already know what time period we're dealing with, yeah?" Connor said with a shrug, always the optimist.

Jess and the others then turned their attention up to where the tiny stealth monkey had gone, and there, swinging from staircase to staircase above them, were at least twenty more of the hyperactive creatures.

"Shite!" Abby mumbled under her breath before pulling herself together, obviously remembering she was now in charge. "We've got to get this locked before any more come through. Connor, you and O'Rourke go find the anomaly - Becker, can you help lead them to it?" Connor and O'Rourke quickly grabbed the briefcase containing the locking device and hurried down the stairs to the ground level as Abby continued, "Now the rest of you-"

But before she could get out her remaining orders, the stadium was suddenly engulfed in a deafening cheer as Mo Farah was introduced for his big race. The excited roar sent the monkeys scampering in either direction along the corridor - just what they didn't need!

Abby waited a moment, obviously expecting the cheers to reduce in volume, but that didn't seem to be happening. Finally the temporary team leader gestured for everyone to tighten in around her on the stairs so they could hear her as she hollered out her orders. "We've no choice. We're going to have to split up and use the EMDs to bring them down."

Jess waited, half expecting Abby to jump in with her usual protestations before remembering it was Abby herself giving the orders.

"EMDs? But the creatures are on all sides of us," Emily pointed out, gesturing all around at the monkeys. "Are we not likely to shoot one another?"

The thought terrified Jess - she'd seen Becker shot with an EMD, and she knew he was far stronger than she. "How about... what if we all went down to the corridor below?" she quickly suggested. "That way we'd all be shooting up instead of across, meaning we wouldn't be in the crossfire."

"And we could easily travel back and forth as needed," Emily pointed out, "which is difficult from upon these stairs."

"Agreed," Abby said. "And we've got to hurry. We've only got- how long do you think, Jess?"

Jess instantly knew what Abby was asking. "Mo ran the 10K in 27 minutes, so we probably have...say, 12 or 13?" she interpolated.

Abby gave a frustrated sigh, obviously wishing for more time to deal with the incursion before the masses were unleashed. But she gave a resigned nod, ordering, "All right, then let's-"

But her sentence was drowned out by the starting gun - the race had officially begun.

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"Becker, mate. ... hear me? ... to?"

Temple's voice could barely be heard above the wall of sound coming through the comms. Becker looked at the map, trying to figure out which dots belonged to him and O'Rourke, as Lester came scurrying back over.

"What'd I miss?" Lester asked anxiously, practically shoving Becker out of the hub chair.

The soldier, however, had his own questions. "Did you get everything sorted? Are they going to release Matt?"

Lester nodded as he reached for his earpiece. "It took bloody forever, but I finally got through to them. It were almost as if they hadn't even heard of 'identical twins' before - have they never seen an episode of Neighbours? Finally I had to tell them to simply call off the entire detention, but of course who knows how long it'll be before that message actually gets relayed." He suddenly jumped at the blast of an EMD sounding through the comms. "What on earth are they shooting at?"

"Tiny monkeys," Becker explained. "And Temple and O'Rourke were sent to close the anomaly, but I can't give them directions because no one can hear a bloody thing."

Lester nodded and started tentatively tapping out something on the keyboards. Suddenly a loud screech of interference sounded, and Becker yanked off his earpiece, glaring at Lester.

"Sorry," the bureaucrat mumbled under his breath as he continued tapping away. "Try that."

Becker reluctantly put his earpiece back in. While he could still hear the cheers coming through the comms, they were much diminished, and Becker could clearly hear Connor asking, "A little help here, mate!"

"Sorry," Becker said, looking at the map on the monitor. "You need to head right."

The dots started moving...in entirely the wrong direction!

"The OTHER right," Becker snapped.

"Cardinal directions please," Connor suggested.

"West."

The dots turned and started making their way along the south end of the stadium. The other dots had spread out along the eastern side, and Becker was anxious to know how things were going with the rest of the team...and specifically with Jess.

"Here," he said, yanking his earpiece out and handing it to Lester, figuring it was far easier on the eardrums to simply switch earpieces than to have Lester attempt to change the connections. Becker then pointed to where Temple & O'Rourke were on the screen, tracing a path with his finger to the blinking light of the anomaly, and Lester nodded.

"This is Lester," he announced into the comms. "Just keep heading 'round in that same direction till..."

Becker mentally blocked out Lester's voice as he tried to concentrate on the sounds coming through his new comms. The roar of the crowd was much louder than a moment before, as it was now coming through multiple earpieces instead of just two, and there were intermittent shots to be heard as well. He looked at the monitor, which was now at an awkward angle since he was no longer sat in Jess's seat, and tried to get his bearings. Abby, it seemed, had stayed roughly in the centre of the group, no doubt so she could easily get to any of the team who needed her. The others were slowly spreading out in either direction, presumably chasing the monkeys as they scattered. Emily and Jess were the farthest afield, heading north from the others till they were almost to the far curve of the stadium.

Suddenly an EMD was heard, followed immediately by Emily swearing, "Blast!" Two more shots were fired in quick succession before she complained, "What is wrong with it?"

"Do you want mine?" Jess was heard to say. After a moment, another shot was heard.

"They cannot be out of range," Emily grumbled, releasing several more shots, obviously to no avail.

Becker couldn't help but smile. After Emily had showed him up last week at the Royal Artillery Barracks, it was nice to know that she wasn't quite as perfect a marksman as she'd thought.

But then it hit him. The reason she'd done so well shooting at the birds was because she'd no proper weapons training and had thus aimed straight for them. While that had been exactly what was needed for those long-distance shots, it wasn't working for her now, and Becker guessed why.

"Emily," he said through the comms, "these creatures are at close range and presumably moving fast, so you need to lead your shots."

"Lead my shots?" she snapped. "What does that even mean?"

Knowing how tense things could get in the field, Becker took a deep breath, trying not to snap back. "Don't aim AT the monkey," he patiently explained. "Instead, aim where the monkey will be in half a second. It's needed because it takes time for the charge to-"

He was interrupted by the blast of an EMD followed by an excited "Yes!" and "Good shot, Emily!"

Becker smiled, pleased with himself for both having recognised the problem and solving it long-distance. Perhaps he wasn't quite so useless here at the hub as he'd thought.

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to be continued