"Sanctuary One to Lophelia, do you copy?" Helen called from the helicopter to the ship we were above.
"Still no answer Mom." Ashley told her.
"Take us down." Helen ordered and I lowered the copter onto the ship. We all got out and went inside. Helen, Will, Ashley and I stood at the top of some stairs and looked down into the dark interior of a ship.
"You see anybody?" Will asked us.
"Let's hope they're below." Helen said as we made our way down the stairs.
"What did the message say exactly?" Ashley asked us.
"Just that Eric was bringing back something we'd never seen, and to meet him in the harbor." I told her.
"Only they never made it to the dock." Will said. Helen moved forward and we followed her to see a body torn up.
"It's Eric." she said.
"Yeah." Ashley agreed.
"Make sure Will is covered." Helen told her daughter. Ashley and Will left while I stayed with Helen.
"Come on." Ashley told him. We eventually walked behind them and found more bodies.
"Six dead." Helen said.
"They weren't just killed. They were half devoured." Ashley said as we looked over the bodies.
"Whatever it was, it was powerful." Will said. We moved through different sections with our guns drawn. When we got to the next section of the ship we saw empty cages all around the room.
"Whatever specimens were in these are long gone." Will said as we continued looking around.
"Makes you wonder what was in these cages." Helen said.
"You think they could've broken their way out?" Will asked us.
"Looks more like something clawed or chewed its way in." I told him inspecting the cages.
"Mom, Liz, come check this out." Ashley said to us. Helen, Will and I walked to her and saw a cage with two transparent creatures inside of it. We moved our lights around the cage a bit and the creatures revealed themselves. They were furry with large yellow eyes. We then heard a growl and turned to a different part of the room.
"Tranquilizer rounds only." Helen told us.
"Are you sure?" I asked her.
"Eric paid with his life to bring this creature back. We owe it to him to preserve it." Helen said.
"I think we owe it to him to kill it." Ashley told her. Helen switched to tranqs, then Ashley and I did the same. Something charged us and Helen fired twice and the creature fell to the ground.
Ashley Will and I stood around a table Helen had set her laptop on waiting to hear what she'd learned.
"Now I know why Eric was so excited about these creatures. Their hyper camouflage makes them all but invisible." Helen told us.
"Plus the fact that it's present in both the predator and the smaller abnormal." Will said.
"The Nubbins." Ashley told us smiling.
"You gonna make me ask?" Will asked her.
"Ashley's name for them, scientific name Nubina Atelerix, according to Eric's log." I told him.
"Do we know what triggers this camouflage?" Will asked.
"It seems to be a function of both fear and aggression." Helen told us.
"That makes sense. Hide to avoid being stalked, and as an aid to the hunt." I said.
"So obviously it was the predator who was responsible for killing Eric and his crew." Ashley told us.
"Actually track wounds on each of the victims show biological evidence of both species." Helen told her.
"Come on, there's no way those adorable things could have attacked anybody." Ashley told her.
"I'm not saying that they did." Helen told her.
"So how could they have left traces on the bodies?" I asked her.
"I'm theorizing that some of the Nubbins might've escaped and survived by feeding on the dead crew members, hence the mingling of the DNA." she told us.
"Well, that's creepy." Will said leaning on the table.
"What's creepy is that a bunch of them were eaten by that nasty-ass monster." Ashley told us.
"All but our two little survivors, probably on their way to becoming the carnivore's next meal." I told her.
"I'm gonna go see how they're doing." Ashley said before leaving.
"You okay?" Will asked us.
"Eric was one of the world's great hunters of abnormals. He called them "evolution's experiments"." I told him smiling.
"Am I reading a personal relationship? For either one of you?" he asked glancing at us.
"I don't want to see his sacrifice go to waste." Helen told him before going back to her work.
I was in my room when I heard my phone go off. I looked at it to see a number I hadn't recognized.
"Hello?" I asked into the receiver.
"Hello darling, I was just checking up on you." the man's voice said on the other end and I sighed.
"Just going over the newest abnormal find." I told him.
"Tell me about them." he said and I shook my head at him.
"I haven't been able to read about them yet" I told him.
"Oh? Then what do you know about them?" he asked me. I dropped my phone from my ear and rubbed my temples.
"Why do you want to know?" I asked him.
"Can't a husband be curious about his wife?" he asked me and I could hear the smirk in his voice.
"You don't call or write in around 100 years and suddenly you want to get to know me again?" I asked him.
"Of course." he told me.
"Liar." I said thinking about the possibility.
"Am I really a liar now?" he asked me.
"How should I know?" I asked him going to my window and looking at the city.
"You look beautiful tonight." he said and I quickly scanned the area around the house but didn't see him.
"Where are you?" I asked him.
"Goon night, my love." The phone when dead in my hand and I never noticed the shadow on the roof close to me move away from the moonlight.
Will, Ashley and I walked quickly to Helen who was working through the observation window at the Nubbins.
"Are the Nubbins okay? Henry said the female kept going in and out of camo mode, and then swelled up like a blimp." Ashley said.
"She gave birth just after dawn. They're all fine, all 14 of them. It took them only minutes to adapt their camouflage." Helen told us and we all looked into the cage to see the very large family.
"Oh, boy." I said staring at them.
Helen was sitting at her desk with Ashley, Will and I on each side of her. Ashley was playing with a baby Nubbin that was in a glass cage.
"The juveniles are putting on weight so fast I'm projecting they'll reach maturation within a day." Helen said.
"That rate of metabolic growth is scary. We should find a way to discourage their mating." Will suggested.
"Not yet. I want to document a full reproductive cycle first." Helen told him and I shook my head at her.
"How did I know you would say that?" I asked her.
"I'm keeping this one as a pet, just so you know." Ashley told us and I smiled her her playing with the baby.
"In the middle of a breeding cycle, they may not be as nice as they look." I told her.
"Oh, come on, I can handle a baby Nubbin, Liz. Right, little guy; you're so cute." she said fawning over it again.
"What about the predator?" Will asked and the three of us looked at the screen to see it pacing by the door.
"He showed marked signs of agitation throughout the night. Only came out of camouflage for all but a few moments." Helen told us.
"I don't think he likes the Nubbins." Will said and we watched him carefully.
A little later Will, our guest Sophie and I were sitting in chairs around Helen's desk with her on the other side.
"But you can't say for sure?" Sophie asked after Helen reported her findings on her grandfather's autopsy.
"No, not yet, but I can say that I've never seen brain structures quite like your grandfather's. Sophie, the blood I took from you as a control sample, I should tell you, I found similar biochemical anomalies to your grandfather's." Helen told her and the woman was stunned.
"Oh, my God." she said.
"It's too early to read anything into it." I told her.
"Yeah, but if he was an abnormal..." Sophie started saying looking at us.
"In 24 hours, all this will be much clearer." Helen told her.
"Okay, well, look, since I've gotten here, no one has told me squat about what this place actually does, and now you're telling me I'm some kind of freak of nature, too? You guys are hiding something from me, all of you! Why should I believe a single thing you tell me?" Sophie asked looking at all of us. Will just looked to us and I glanced at Helen out of the corner of my eye and sighed.
"Sophie, we find ourselves in a very rare situation. I'm about to do something that I normally wouldn't even consider." Helen told her.
"I don't understand. What?" Sophie asked her.
"Trust me, you'll understand soon. Will, would you like to show Sophie around?" I asked him and he gave me a confused look.
"Ah...yeah…sure." he said and they walked out.
"Are you sure about this?" I asked Helen.
"Of course." she told me but I just gave her a look and she smiled at me. We'd known each other too long for her to lie to me.
"You should know, he's calling me now." I told her. "Not only that, but I think he's watching the Sanctuary."
"Why now? Why not years ago?" she asked me.
"I don't know but I want to find out." I told her.
I looked out the window looking for the man who'd taken up stalking me after years of separation.
"Liz, we've got a problem." I heard Helen say through the intercom.
"What is it?" I asked her.
"The nubbins are missing." she told me and I grew confused.
"Not just camo mode?" I asked her.
"No." I grabbed my jacket and walked out of my room and went to the nubbins cage.
"At first I thought they were just camouflaging, but I swept the entire cell feeling for them." The Big Guy said as I walked up to him, Helen, and Henry.
"How did they escape?" I asked him. He showed us the damage to the cell.
"Something gnawed through the ventilation grate from the outside." he told us.
"Mayday." Henry said before sneezing.
Helen, Henry, Will, Ashley and I were all walking down the hallway to Helen's office talking about our newest situation.
"I'm going to err on the side of caution. I want the building sealed. Nobody goes in or out." Helen instructed.
"Threat level "holy crap". Check." Henry said moving to another hallway as we walked into the office.
"These creatures escape the Sanctuary, and we'll have much more than a pest control problem on our hands." Helen told us.
"Can we not turn this into a planetary crisis just yet? - They're 14 little fur balls." Ashley reminded her.
"Invisible fur balls." Will corrected.
"We'll round them up, okay?" Ashley said looking to her mother.
"If they reach sexual maturity as fast as they've reached full size...well do the math." Helen told her.
"But they haven't overrun their native habitat, right?" Will asked us.
"Camouflaged or not, they wouldn't be much of a secret and that's the one saving grace. Something must control their number." Helen said sitting behind her computer.
"What about the predator Eric brought back?" I suggested to her.
"That's one of a number of theories I'm working on; though their shared trait of camouflage doesn't necessarily define their relationship on the food chain." Helen told me.
"Well we could try to draw them out, if we could just figure out what they crave. You know, besides other Nubbins." Will told us.
"We know they're hungry little suckers. I'll make sure our food stores are protected." Ashley said as the Big Guy walked in.
"Too late for that. They've already wiped out the pantry and the walk-in." he told us and I shook my head.
"What? There's nothing left?" Will asked him.
"We go floor by floor. Snares, tranquilizers, whatever it takes." I said getting my gun and switching it to tranquilizers instead of live rounds.
A little while later I was in the Medical Wing with Helen, Henry and Ashley because Henry was bitten by the Nubbins.
"I'm going to schedule a full rabies series, unless we can confirm its absence in every Nubbin out there." Helen told Henry.
"Isn't that, like, super painful?" Henry asked her.
"I'm not going to lie to you Henry." Helen told him.
"No, it's okay, please. You can lie to me." Henry told her and I smiled.
"Then no, it wont hurt a bit." I told him and he smiled a little at me.
"That didn't help, thanks though." he told me.
"Those poor things must've been pushed to the limits." Ashley said and I gave her a strange look.
"Hey listen, I know you're all about saving the whales and everything, but these guys just happen to be a pack of vicious, over-sexed, hyperthyroid, invisi-rodents." Henry told her.
"Stop demonizing them. They were just afraid!" Ashley said defending them.
"Ash we don't have a history with this species. We cannot take this attack lying down." I told her and she gave me a look of betrayal.
"Now, how many have we re-captured so far?" Helen asked us.
"Three.., - Or so." Ashley said after a moment.
"Three?" she asked looking at us in shock.
"Almost four." Henry told her.
"Out of 14?" Helen asked.
"Actually, I'd go up about five...times or so." I told her.
"What did you see?" she asked me.
"I'm not sure "see" is the right word, but by the way they rippled, I'd say we're looking at several litters of newborns." I told her.
"But, they won't be doing the horizontal tango for, like, hours." Henry said trying to bring up the atmosphere in the room.
"We need to corral them all as quickly as possible. Henry I'm taking you off the front lines. I want you working on a more... technological solution." Helen told him.
"I'm good with that." Henry said.
"Tell me you're not talking about exterminating them." Ashley asked us.
"I'd like nothing more than to see them all back in their cell unharmed." Helen told her.
"Yeah but…" Ashley tried begging us.
"We wouldn't be having this discussion had you shown better judgment." Helen said jumping on Ashley. We heard a knock on the door and it was opened to reveal Sophie.
"Come in." I told her. Henry got off the table and walked past Sophie as he walked out the door.
"Hi" Henry greeted her.
"Hi" Sophie said to him.
"Could you give us a moment?" Helen asked Ashley.
"Yeah sure." Ashley said getting up and going to the door to leave.
"Thank you." Helen said to her.
"Hey." Ashley greeted her.
"Hi. Dr. Magnus. Miss Elizabeth..." Sophie greeted us and sat on the table Henry had just been on.
"Hello, Sophie." Helen greeted while I offered her a smile.
"Will said you might be able to help me." Sophie said to her and I glanced at the computer to get a little more background. "He told you about the headaches, and the spins and all that?" she asked us.
"Yes, he did." I told her.
"If it's all right with you, I'd like... to conduct a few simple tests." Helen told her.
"Simple, like brain scans?" She asked us slowly.
"Probably, given the circumstances." I told her.
"I know you have more important things to deal with. You're in the middle of a crisis." Sophie told us mentioning the Nubbins.
"Actually, by Sanctuary standards, this is just another day at the office." Helen told her and I smiled.
"What did my grandfather die of?" Sophie asked her.
"A brain aneurysm." I told her.
"Oh…and you said that we have similar anomalies." Sophie asked getting worried.
"Well let's just see what's happens before we anticipate, all right?" Helen asked her with a smile.
"Okay." Sophie said smiling back.
"It's going to be okay, Sophie." I told her holding her hand.
"There's nothing that threatens your health. You're fine, Sophie." I told her after we ran the tests.
"But you did find something." Sophie said looking at us.
"It's completely benign, similar to what we found in your grandfather's brain, a tissue structure that bridges your frontal lobes." Helen told her.
"Like a tumor!" Sophie asked alarmed.
"No, no, nothing like that." I told her.
"There's a nerve bundle that links this unusual organ to the thalamus. I think it may be used in pre-verbal communication." Helen explained to her.
"Oh, this is unbelievable." Sophie said shocked.
"I suspect it's some sort of empathic ability. In my world, it's a genetic expression that may well preview an evolutionary advance." Helen told her.
"I just always attributed it to Maurice. It only ever happened when I was with him." Sophie told us remembering.
"He wanted to bring out your gifts. - That's what the will was about." I said looking at her.
"This condition that I have, assuming that you're right, what... what does that mean I can do?" she asked us.
"That's for you to explore. With our help, if you'll trust us." Helen told her.
I was hunting the Nubbins when my phone rang. I looked at the number and sighed.
"I'm a little busy right now." I told him.
"What are you hunting for this time?" he asked me.
"None of your business." I told him.
"A creature that puts you in the mood to dance? That is my business." he told me and I froze.
"What do you know?" I asked him.
"I make sure I know what I need to now about you." he told me.
"That's no answer." I told him.
"What do you want me to say? That I'm stalking you?" he asked me and I could hear the smirk on his voice.
"That's crossed my mind." I told him.
"Well the effects of your new visitors haven't left the Sanctuary walls. So your safe from me." he told me.
"So you are outside." I said.
"Well I'm not inside the building." he told me.
"Tell me where you are." I ordered him and he hung up the phone. I sighed and hung up before continuing my hunt.
"We have Nubbins in four out of five infrastructure systems; computer, cooling, electrical, air purification. They're not in the water…yet." Helen told us in her office.
"I don't think it was an accident they brought down the computer system." Will told her.
"Come on, they're smart, but not that smart." Ashley told him.
"I don't know about that. A couple get sacrificed to bring down the entire server? Air vents clogged?" I said looking at her before turning to Helen. "Drones sent out to protect the survival of the hive."
"Yeah." Will agreed.
"These aren't bees. They just reproduce as fast." Ashley told me.
"Hive mentality means tradeoffs between individual survival and that of the group. We've seen it in orders higher then insects." Helen told her.
"Yeah, like every time soldiers go into battle." Will said.
"So what does that tell us about what they'll do?" Ashley asked us.
"Everything they can to ensure inter-species domination with them on top." I told her.
"You know, this "catching them one at a time" is not working." Will said looking to Helen.
"The more I watch our predator, the more I'm beginning to think that it is what controls the Nubbins in their native habitat." Helen told us.
"You're not talking about turning that killer loose?" Ashley asked her.
"Not loose Ashley. We can implant it with a device so we could track it and control it. The vast majority of the Nubbins would be stampeded into the open, and we could herd them to safety." Helen explained to her.
"It's just not fair. I mean, Nubbins are only doing what their instincts tell them." Ashley told us.
"All we'd be doing is replicating the predator-prey dynamic that already exists." Will told her.
"Of course; like the lions and the Christians." Ashley said looking at us.
"We have them contained right here, right now, because if they get out and this expands beyond the Sanctuary, we could be Ground Zero for a plague of furry locusts." I told her.
"Liz?" I turned to Helen walking up to me.
"Yes?" I asked.
"Are you alright? You seem distracted." she told me and I smiled.
"I keep getting phone calls from him." I told her.
"Do you want Henry to try tracing the call next time you get one?" she asked me and I wanted to laugh.
"No, no. Let him be secretive. You know as well as I do, he'll show up sooner or later." I told her.
"Well, I don't know him as well as you do but you are right." she told me. I smiled at her and relaxed slightly.
"Releasing the predator...wow, look at him go." Henry said as we watched on the large screen..
"Team One, predator moving from Utility Five, herding Nubbins toward residential corridor. - Shut down air vents." Helen told them over the walkie.
"Copy that" Ashley said. We watched the predator come across three nubbins and kill them all.
"Predator 3, Nubbins 0." Henry said.
"Hey! Where's he gone?" Will asked when we lost visual of him.
"I'm not seeing him." Henry told us.
"Track the device." I told him and he looked at his screen to find him.
"Level 5, north corridor; he's moving fast!" Henry told us.
"Checking level 5, north corridor, primary and secondary cameras." I told them messing with the screen in front of me. "Nothing on the primary corridor. Negative on B and C." We all looked up as we heard the Nubbins running.
"Oh, Nubbins on the move." Will said.
"Oh wait a sec. The predator's stopped. A dead stop." Henry told us and we looked at him.
"Where?" Helen asked.
"Just outside the library." He answered her. Suddenly the lights started to flicker and go out. "We're losing power on the main grid." Henry told us.
"Go to auxiliary." Helen told him. The lights came on reduced strength but then we out again.
"And we've lost auxiliary. Okay, women and geeks first. Oh, no, wait, that's all of us." Henry said trying to leave.
"See what you can do, Henry. Will, Liz, let's go." Helen said and the three of us left Henry alone. We followed bloody tracks into a room where we saw the predator move into another room.
"They're tranquilizer rounds. One shot won't do it." Helen told Will handing him a gun. We entered the room and found the remains of the predator with the tracker blinking.
"Looks like our predator just became prey." Will said as we lowered our guns.
"Why do I have the feeling that we're next?" I asked looking at them.
"I guess we can skip the midnight feeding." Will said.
"So we were wrong about our predator keeping the Nubbins in check in the rainforest?" Will asked us.
"Not necessarily. Predators can become prey all the time." I told him.
"Hyenas, for example, have been known to kill lions. Apparently we underestimated the Nubbins' strength in numbers." Helen told him.
"Can you imagine what ten times the number of Nubbins will do? - Or a hundred times?" Will asked us.
"If they can rip a creature the size and strength of the predator to shreds, I've no doubt they'd give us no quarter. We may have sealed ourselves in with our executioners." Helen told us.
"Their hive behavior isn't just intelligent, it's strategic. Sooner or later, they're gonna find a way out." I told them.
"And they're reproducing faster than we can capture or eradicate them." Helen said.
"Doesn't anybody have some good news?" Ashley asked us.
"I've got wood." Henry said and we just looked at him as we walked in with an arm load of fire wood. "You know... for the fire."
"Hey when we were aboard the Lophelia, do you remember the hold - where we found the Nubbins?" Will asked us.
"The refrigerated dry hold." Helen said.
"Yeah" Will confirmed.
"Although it was either turned off or malfunctioning. A cryogenic transport's fairly common for a bioresearch vessel." Helen told us.
"Yeah, but the thing is, is...the setting on the control panel... it was for 50 degrees, which is cold, but well above freezing." He told us.
"So maybe it was their intention to slow their metabolism, moderate their growth and mating cycles." I said looking at them.
"Ashley, you and Henry round up as many fire extinguishers as you can." Helen ordered.
"On it." Ashley said. We looked at Henry, who was staring at Sophie, before he was drug away by the ear by Ashley.
"Still, even if we are right about the cold, unless we can drive them into the open, I don't see how that by itself will do the trick." Will told us.
"You are right about the cold. They don't like it." Sophie told us.
"Can you tell what they're feeling now?" Helen asked her.
"Crowded... afraid...threatened...they're sending warnings." she told us.
"They're sounding an alarm?" I asked her looking to Helen.
"What are you thinking?" Will asked us.
"That we try and mimic the frequency of their distress call. If we're successful, we could strategically place emitters powerful enough to flush them out, stampede them, and funnel them towards capture." Helen told us.
"What are you getting, Henry?" Helen asked him.
"Just over 19 kilohertz." he answered.
"Ultrasonic, beyond the range of human hearing." Helen told him.
"19.5... 20... 21.5... and stabilizing." Henry told us.
"There's your distress call, 21.5 kilohertz." I told him. We had placed speakers around the Sanctuary and spread out in different areas with fire extinguishers. The plan was working and the Nubbins all moved to the place where we waited with the extinguishers.
"Time to chill, guys." Ashley said as we swept across the Nubbins.
"So what'll happen to the Nubbins now?" Sophie asked after we stored away the Nubbins.
"Now that low temperature has slowed their reproductive cycle to a crawl, they can live out their days in relative peace." Helen told her.
"They're not thrilled about the cold." Sophie told us.
"Hey, thrilled Nubbins is what got us into this mess." Will reminded her with a smile.
"It was very brave of you to share your gift." Helen told her.
"Well in the end, Henry's allergies were a better detector than any of my paranormal abilities." Sophie said.
"The difference is, is that you can sense a lot more than Nubbins." I reminded her.
"Yeah, I'm still not sure how I feel about that." She told us.
"I think we know what your grandfather wanted for you." I told her.
"Yeah. I guess, in a way, he'll always be guiding me." Sophie said smiling.
"And so will we." Helen told her.
