AN: I'm back! Even I wasn't expecting to get this done so soon, but things just happened to work that way. I hope that people enjoy this one and review (please).
My thanks to Squabble for my FIRST EVER review. And such a wonderful one as well! =-) And of course, to X-Mrs-Scott-X for support/persuasion.
Disclaimer: I don't own Primeval. Though if the current owner wants to give me it...
The second Captain was much better, probably (in Howard's opinion) due to the fact that he'd been told about the presence of dinosaurs before he'd been allowed to come into the ARC. Jenny, finally settling in after the giant worm incident, had handled the hiring of the man and thus was able to spend more time answering important questions, such as 'How real are these dinosaurs?'
The man had walked in, without real purpose, and seemed perfectly happy to spend some time being nosy, while waiting for Lester to finish a phone call with the minister. He entered the parade room, which was roughly in the same state that Andrews had encountered in about two weeks earlier. His reaction to it immediately set him apart. Far from starting a row, the Captain strolled up to one of the groups of men and joined in their conversation about the TV the night before. It was only when Stephen came into check his position on civilian employees using guns that the chat ended and the day's work began.
The only issue was the man, a red-head whose fair skin placed him younger than his 32 years, had promptly formed a very strong friendship Connor.
While it was nice that bonds were being made between colleagues, Howard couldn't help but feel that this particular friendship would end in disaster. Connor was, after all, extremely over-exuberant sometimes, but also impressionable and the constant smile, verging on the dangerous side of a grin, that filled Captain Sanders' face had ominous qualities.
However, this was one fault and not even an obviously harmful one yet. No, Sanders drilled the men at regular intervals, but always allowed a decent and relaxed atmosphere and accepted that these men were more like part-time security guards than men in a regiment, such as he had just left. A heated conversation between Sanders and Hart resulted in an amicable chat, once it was established that although Stephen had a gun and often went into the field first, he was not about to undermine the Captain's authority.
And so it was that Howard was calm and thankful that the burden of Captain's paperwork was no longer his.
As far as Sanders was concerned, this job was perfect. The potential for adventure and danger, with good friends and a warm bed at the end of the day. He was enthralled by Connor, though. The young man had so much Life and so many weird quirks, Sanders found it impossible to be bored in his presence. The two had been introduced to each other by Lester on the first day, though the civil servant did add 'He's possibly more bother than the dinosaurs'.
Indeed, the half of his second day was spent in Connor's lab, under the pretence of learning more about the science-y side of the ARC. Sanders had never been that into science, an old bag of a Chemistry teacher putting him off for life, but Connor made the subjects he was talking about far more interesting.
Yes, this place was simply incredible. So far.
Now all that was needed was something to do.
The call came in at noon, four days after Sanders first arrived.
"Hello, police?"
"Yes. How can we be of service?"
"You might not believe this, but there's a weird ball of light in my living room. My husband tried to poke it with a broom, but the end... It just disappeared! And it's throbbing..."
"Ma'am, please stay calm. Help's on its way. We advise you leave your home."
"Right, guys. You've practiced this drill, which, at the moment, is more than I have, so I want you to show me how well it can be done. Got it!" Sanders said in a loud voice.
"Yes sir!" came the response, not in unison, but as separate men acknowledging a leader in their own time. Many were already buzzing around, carrying equipment which could possibly be of use once.
Satisfied with this, Sanders turned to Howard. "Remind me, we don't need to bring anything else, do we?"
"No," said Howard, shutting and clipping a box of tranquilisers. "We fire when they're in danger, but the scientists are the ones who carry their own equipment." He smiled. "We tried to help them once and found that scientists are actually pretty possessive. At least, they are in this place." He tugged the box off the table and it opened with a crash, spreading glass, liquid and silence across the room. A quick glance up by Howard restarted the hum of activities, as soldiers remembered that gawping at their Sergeant's mistakes wasn't their job.
"Never mind, Howard. You can... catch us up," he smirked, and, grabbing a gun, left to organise the others who were just tying the last of the boxes down to the vehicles.
Howard groaned.
"Good afternoon. My name is Jenny and I'm part of the operations currently taking place in your house. Do you mind if I ask you a few questions?" The worried couple, holding a griping toddler, turned their heads from the scene of the men in black charging into their new home with guns.
"Only if you'll answer some of ours," grumbled Dan, the husband. Jenny smiled her best public smile.
"Of course. Now, have you heard any unusual noises coming from your house since you left it?"
"Like what? The whole experience is unusual!" complained Tracy, repositioning her toddler.
"Like growling?" butted in Cutter as he passed. Jenny bit her lip in annoyance.
"What? No! Why, should we done?"
"Absolutely not; he was only joking," improvised Jenny, making a mental note to have a stern word to the members of the ARC about conversations with the public. The idea mainly revolved around leaving it all to her. "Errr... got anywhere to stay – just for a few hours. This could take a while." Jenny watched the mother open her mouth and added hastily, "Though, everything is completely in hand and under control."
The house was searched but no creatures were found nor were their any sign of disturbance, slightly to Sanders disappointment. However, the anomaly was still going strong, its fluid movement entrancing the Captain. No wonder these people were so interested in them. They were beautiful, in a naturally dangerous and mysterious way.
"So, what do you think? Pretty sexy, eh?" asked Connor, heaving his equipment box onto a coffee table. The legs of the piece of furniture buckled, then collapsed, sending an ornamental vase crashing to the floor where it splintered into a hundred pieces. Connor tapped his eg a few times, then looked to Sanders.
"Don't go to me looking for forgiveness, mate. It's not my table. Or my vase." Connor was just about to respond when Cutter entered and took in the sight. The Scot smiled in understanding.
"Either a creature's come out here or Lester is going to dock your pay."
Connor sighed and tried to haul the box onto the sofa. Sanders took the handle in one hand and pulled it onto the cushions. He frowned.
"Blimey! What on Earth have you got in here?" Connor, still staring at the case, tried to pick it up one-handedly and failed.
"We found the anomalies affect radio signals, so we wasn't to record some results in order to help us devise a way to detect them," supplied Cutter, once it became clear Connor was absorbed in working out how Sanders picked it up. Sanders nodded; he'd remembered Connor rambling about radio waves and testing it, though it was interspersed with random comments at the time.
"CUTTER!" cut in Stephen's voice and the technician, followed by Howard, cam running in. "Lester's just phoned. Said there's a report of a serious creature incursion the other side of town."
"Serious?"
"Multiple animals, according to the noises they're making. Abby's all ready to go." Cutter glanced back at the still-open anomaly, clearly indecisive about leaving this one or staying behind to help with it. Sanders decided now to provide support.
"You go. This one doesn't seem to be spewing out anything, so Connor can take the readings and I'll cover him. Howard." The sergeant snapped to attention. "Take the men to assist Cutter and Hart."
"Well, that's settled then," stated Cutter. "Just one thing, Sanders."
"Yes, Cutter?"
"Protect Connor, rather than being pulled into his usual shenanigans." And the scientist strode out, an 'OI!' ringing in his ears.
"All I'm saying is that it might not be the best idea to leave Sanders and Connor alone with something important."
"They'll be fine, Abby. Just think of it like this. Connor will be too obsessed with his work to cause Sanders any problems. They get along, yes. However, that does not mean that they're going to turn into twins," Cutter reassured her. Abby was more than a tab dubious about the plan and had even phoned up Howard to get a second opinion of Sanders. Unfortunately for her, Howard simply reminded her that while Sanders was very sociable, he had earned his promotion to Captain and now had several years of experience behind him.
Stephen hit the nail on the head with his next comment. "Still worried about this Caroline girl?" He had sat through hours of Abby complaints about the woman. "Look, Abby, just because Connor can make bad choices, doesn't mean that he does all the time." He smiled. "Wow!"
"What?" queried Cutter.
"Listen to me. Putting faith in Connor." The travellers all breathed out in laughter, as they approached the house where the call had been put in.
Half an hour after they others had left and Sanders was lying on his back, throwing his phone up and catching it, growing steadily more and more bored. Connor was fiddling about on his computer and an amicable, yet stale, silence had formed as the younger man concentrated on adjusting a spherical object that Sanders wasn't particularly sure about.
A clock struck 2.30. Sanders groaned and got up sharply.
"Listen, mate. I'm off to the 'toilette'. Shout if a T-rex decides to appear," as he stretched his back out.
"Alright, mate. I've just got to find the natural frequency of the anomaly and then, we can relax a little. Only I'm worried the anomaly will wink out before I get there."
"Can't you just find another one later?"
"NO! That one could be different. The whole point is is that we testing to see how much difference there is between anomalies." Sanders held up his hand in mock surrender and Connor smiled at his friend's antics. "It's serious work, this."
"I get it. It's cool."
Just as Sanders exited, Connor's phone rang.
"Temple."
"Connor, it's Abby. It turns out that what a woman thought was a bunch of vicious beasts was actually her neighbour's sound system being affected by some feedback. Stephen's not best pleased, but personally, I'm pretty pleased. We'll be back soon."
"Sure." Connor hung up as he heard the dialling tone, and chucked his phone onto sofa. It promptly collided with a set of spanners, one of which hit the resonating ball (that Sanders had failed to identify), which dropped onto the floor and rolled away.
Straight through the anomaly.
Connor closed his eyes and his head fell back. Great. He was going to get charged for that as well. This was turning into an expense trip.
However, with his eyes closed, Connor's hearing picked a warning rumble for the anomaly. Quickly jerking his head back and snapping his eyes open, he watched the anomaly flicker in a fashion that was becoming only too familiar.
"SANDERS! MAY NEED SOME HELP!" cried out Connor; then, as he backed to the side of the room, he added more quietly, "Fairly quickly."
Sanders, hearing the call, suddenly came through the doorway and literally ran into a lumbering reptile-like animal, about two and half feet off the ground, that was just about to attack Connor. Unfortunately, Sanders attempts to brake failed and he tripped over the hefty bulk. Twisting as he fell, Sanders landed with a thump to face the beast, which immediately lost interest in his previous prey and locked onto this collapsed victim, struggling to sit upright.
The pain that Sanders felt as the creature sunk his teeth into his leg culminated in the soldier seeing red. The room seemed to dim slightly, but as abruptly as the pain started, it stopped and the Captain felt the teeth withdraw.
Connor, having quickly recovered from being pinned against the wall by a creature which millions years ago, had taken the initiative and brought one of the broken table legs down over the head of the creature. While he knew the thick skull would have prevented any damage to the reptile, though he also knew Abby would still complain, he had distracted it and this meant he could lead it away from his injured friend.
However, as the creature swung around, its tail whipped out behind it and just caught Sanders on the side of the head. The soldier was forced onto the floor by the power of the blow and lay there dazed, his mind blank to his surroundings, until a second pain, briefer than the last, but agonising none the less, shot through him. The creature, in its bid to follow Connor, stepped on Sanders' new wound.
"Come on, beastie. Nice Lycaenops. This way." Connor coaxed the creature into the hallway and then realised that he had nowhere to lead it to after. The snapping jaws gnawed at the air just in front of the young scientist, who leapt back and the vicious attack. The attacker was loosing interest, though, and turned around.
Or at least, attempted to turn round. This particular house had not been built with a 3 foot long extinct beast in mind, and this particular beast had never encountered any especially narrow passageways in which it had to turn in. The Lycaenops, for that was what Connor was 90% certain it was, writhed in the space, allowing Connor to distract it again, which he did by lobbing a cream coloured high-heel shoe at it.
The roar that erupted was deafening and the creature lunged towards him in anger.
The roar was what brought Sanders to action. Up until that point, he was just sitting there, rubbing his eyes, willing the heat in his leg to subside, which it stubbornly refused to. But now? Now he was needed to do his job, and he felt useless; it was obvious his leg wouldn't support him, yet he needed to reach the attacker.
The attacker in question reached out to Connor, it's sharp claws slicing the air, where Connor had been a milli-second before. Connor was getting desperate now, though. His back pressed painfully against the frontdoor and the door handle dug into his back, yet he was the wrong side to open it and let himself out; besides he could hardly leave Sanders with this monster.
Then, it collapsed. Its legs no longer seemed to support it and, like the coffee table the Lycaenops slumped to the ground, dribbling on the carpet.
Connor looked up and saw Sanders, lying on the floor, the tranquiliser gun propped up. The man himself had a ghastly pale hue to his face, whiter than normal even, and green eyes filled with pain. The grin, though, remained.
Scrabbling over the heap, Connor took Sanders in his arms and helped the man sit up. Sanders grunted in effort.
"I'd ask if you are OK, but..." Connor started, but the comment died on his lips. "Can I borrow your phone?" The soldier nodded mutely and so Connor was able to call for help.
Sanders just watched the conscious mass, daring it to move.
When the Professor arrived, Sanders was gone and Connor was just being checked over by the field medic. After a brief summary by Connor, he went over to view the downed creature.
"Lycaenops. Late Permian."
"A reptile?" asked Jenny, walking up behind. Cutter smiled at her.
"Now there's a debate. A Synapsid; my best description is a cross between a reptile and a mammal, though palaeontologists argue what they are."
"Whatever it is, it had very negative opinion of Sanders. Still, the family will get a new carpet for their pains."
"She, not it. That's probably why it came through. I fear the resonating ball may have bounced too near her nest. Will Sanders be alright?"
"He'll live," shrugged Jenny, before being pulled over to the watching public, an excuse formulated in her mind as she strutted across. The job here and now, that's what had to be dealt with first.
Three days later saw Howard visiting Sanders in hospital. His superior's expression as the Sergeant walked through the door was one of surprise.
"How are you?"
"Me? Fantastically. I'm thinking of holding a party today. Invite everyone and we can have a dance," said Sanders, sarcastically. Howard frowned; he had a feeling something was up. "Sorry. The doctors say I'll be out in a couple of days, but that I'll have to come back." Now Sanders recognised the element of bitterness in the Captain's voice. He wasn't sure he wanted to ask the next question, but did anyway.
"What for?"
"Help with my leg. Apparently, some of the important muscles were torn and a few nerves and some others things that I didn't catch and the net result is... I'm not coming back."
"What? But you were perfect and I thought you enjoyed it..." Howard trailed off, realising he wasn't helping.
"I do," said Sanders, sadly. "It's the most amazing job, but I'm no good for it any more. The doctor says, at best, I'll be stuck with a limp the rest of my life and running is certainly out of the question. Lester offered me a place elsewhere in the ARC, but I have a feeling I'm still going to need to escape one day so..."
"Oh." Howard studied the floor. They'd ruined a good soldier within a week; it wasn't something he really wanted to face up to.
"I'll leave you with one consolation I have, though." Howard's head twitched up. Typical. This man could always find a little golden light to grin at.
"What?"
"I'm not much of a paperwork guy, so I'm going to hand it all to you."
Howard slumped in his chair.
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