Scene 2
"Um, okay," Zane stood up, watching the sky. They stood there for a bit, and it started to feel to Jo as if time had slowed to some molasses-like experience.
"I promise," she said, quietly, staring at the sky. "There was something there that was not normal."
"Could you tell whether it went it front of the scope?" Zane asked her, eyes scanning the skies.
"Yeah, I think it did," she said, shooting him a quick glance.
"It's been recorded, then. We can check the footage to see what it was."
Jo felt a rush of warmth for him. He hadn't dismissed her apprehension. He hadn't said, "Oh, it was probably nothing" or tried to find some logical answer that made her response an overreaction. He was taking her seriously. And that was nice, but also a little weird.
Even weirder, though, was how she was feeling. Her adrenaline hadn't faded—if anything it was getting worse. Her heart was beating so quickly and so loudly that she could almost hear it in her ears. Her stomach was knotting up, as if something horrible was about to happen.
She licked her lips, and then reached back and touched her gun again for the reassurance. She glanced over at Zane. He was still staring at the sky, his breath a little too fast, a little too shallow.
She reached out to him and put her hand on his arm, clenching it tight. "Are you scared?"
"No," he answered automatically, defensively. "Of course not."
"No, really," she insisted, shaking his arm a little. "Are you scared?"
He looked at her, puzzled. "I—yes, maybe?"
"When's the last time you got scared?" she asked, turning to put her back to his and scanning the room slowly. The doorway was dark, but with the lights on, she could tell that there was no one else in the room. There was nothing here. Nothing to be scared of.
"Uh…" There was a long pause.
Jo thought back over all the times she and Zane-either Zane-could have, maybe should have been afraid. He'd been attacked by a wolf, and shrugged it off. Mansfield sending him back to prison-he'd acted like he didn't care. There'd been the bariogenic radiation poisoning when the whole town might die of old age-he was just excited to set off a nuclear weapon. And that time with the second sun, when he truly did act like driving headlong into a fiery death was everyone's idea of a good time. "Yeah, that's what I thought. Never, right?"
"I'm sure I've been scared. I don't exactly like being arrested. Although I don't much mind when you do it," he shot her a quick grin, then returned his gaze to the night sky.
"Yeah, not the same thing. I'm not talking rational awareness of something unpleasant in your future, I'm talking…this. Whatever's happening right now."
"You think something's causing the way we feel?" He was still watching overhead, and Jo took a quick glance up herself before starting her slow scan of the room again.
"I don't know but I really want to get a look at whatever that thing was that flew by."
"What did it look like?"
"Like…I don't know. It was just a big black shadow. It went by really quickly."
"Mechanical or biological?"
"How would you feel about supernatural?" Jo's heart was starting to slow down, her sense of anxiety easing.
"Seriously, there's no such thing."
"Yeah, yeah, I know. Only dumb people believe in something beyond tachyons and particle accelerators." The feeling was almost gone now, and Jo was starting to feel foolish. Had she really felt what she thought she'd felt?
"Well, I suppose it could be a Reaper. You did mess with the time-line after all," Zane said cheerfully, turning to face her.
"A what?" Jo looked lost. Zane had pulled her hair band out earlier, so her long hair was flowing down her shoulders. With that, her casual clothes, and her confused expression, she looked more like a teenager than the serious security professional she was.
"You know. Dr. Who? Those big creepy flying monsters that eat people in that episode where Rose saves her father? They're like some kind of weird bacteria that are trying to heal the time-line by destroying everyone associated with the paradox." Zane was trying to keep a straight face, but Jo could tell by the mischievous glint in his eye that he was teasing her.
"Oh, you…" Shaking her head at him, she grabbed a handful of his t-shirt and twisted, pulling him toward her, and then reaching up and taking his mouth. He was smiling and the kiss was at first light, but it quickly deepened. With a murmur deep in her throat, Jo let go of her grip on the front of his shirt, and let her hands slide up, over his broad shoulders, before pulling away. "That's not possible, right?"
"No, it's not possible," Zane laughed. "It's just a television show. Although…" he shrugged, seeming to consider the possibility. "Well, time travel is theoretically impossible, too. But no. No, no, definitely not. There's no way…" he glanced up at the ceiling again.
"So…picnic or back to GD to look at the telescope recordings?" Jo asked.
Zane considered the question, looking from the picnic foods spread out on the floor to the open dome. "You're positive you saw something?"
Jo nodded. "Yes, I definitely saw something. And I think it did something to us. You were breathing too fast, my heart was racing, that wasn't natural…"
"Breathing fast around you, Jo-jo, is totally natural." Zane murmured, brushing another kiss against her lips. But then he straightened and sighed. "Yeah, it was a weird feeling. There was something going on there. All right, back to GD it is. But we can't tell Vincent. He'd be so bummed to know that we wasted his picnic."
