Helen's Hi-jinks Part IV
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Intermission IV
"Okay, I am all for sticking it to Lester and what-not, but this is ridiculous; this is the oldest trick in the book!" Abby Maitland rasped, as she and Connor made their way through the northeast London to Caroline's establishment.
"I know," Connor replied mournfully, as the especially savage gust of wind made itself felt even through the coat, sweater, gloves and scarf that he wore. "Still, cannot exactly blame her for trying to ditch our assignment. This is the kind of weather when my grandma always tried to get me to wear a second pair of pants underneath the main ones."
Abby blinked. "Connor, this is too much information. And, for the record, if you will ever try to get me to wear a second pair of pants, I'll slap you so hard, that you will get so dizzy, that you will mistake Rex for a UFO!"
Connor blinked. "That's an interesting pic that you've described to me, Abby. I guess I have been rubbing off of you, eh?"
"Well, if that's how you want to describe this, uh-uh," Abby nodded sagely. "Anyways, getting back to the less pleasant topics..."
"Well, she could have gotten sick," Connor said uneasily. "I mean, yesterday you didn't feel so fine either, you know?"
"Yes, Connor, but then Lester does have a point on having us check it out – it is all too closely spaced to be a coincidence," Abby shook her head. "At the worst, well, Caroline can be really sick... in which case we'll help her with her dogs and stay away from Lester and his hissy fits. One good turn deserves another, after all, and Caroline isn't exactly the bitch she was supposed to be, after all."
"So, do we want her to be sick or not?" Connor asked, genuinely confused. "I mean, the way that you're saying it-"
"Connor," Abby interrupted her boyfriend before he could get hopefully confused himself, "let's go and see how Caroline is doing. After that, we can play it by ear, all right?"
"Yes, Abby," Connor nodded thoughtfully. "At any rate, I genuinely hope that it won't start to hail or anything like that. That would just ruin the day!"
"Oh gosh, Connor, aren't you the keen one!" Abby said flatly. "Now let's go already!"
The young couple continued to make their way on foot through the grim, grey and cold London streets of early December, unaware that they were being watched...
"Ah, the benefits of civilization!" Jenny Lewis sipped a cup of warm coffee and closed her eyes in relaxation. "That, and the cold concrete statement of reality too, I suppose."
Nick looked at his female cohort with conflicted emotions, as despite his better intents, his solid Scottish upbringing was not impressed by this blatant disregard and flippancy for the rules. He honestly did not like Lester but the man was their leader, at least speaking bureaucratically, but this did imply that the man had better concepts of how the human society worked... or maybe not. Leek, who had been as subtle as a cricket bat, had been able to fool them both equally easily – therefore...
"Jenny," he spoke up suddenly, startling the woman. "Can I ask you something?"
"Oh dear," Jenny shook her head. "Nick, you are going to ask something responsible, aren't you?"
"I just wanted to ask you what you think we should have done yesterday after the time anomaly just blew into our face," Nick said, put back by Jenny's questioning response.
Jenny blinked, also put back by Nick's admission. "Look," she said quietly, "I, like you and the others was not impressed by that plan of James – but, until we know more about Eugene, Phil and others of that merry band – we are at a disadvantage of figuring out what to do. We need some muscle of our own, but until my cousin and James sort out the paperwork and reconfigure our finances, we're going to have to improvise." She paused and added. "Of course, I don't know what Abby and Connor told you while Caroline was driving me home, but when we were driving to your place, she let it slip that Eugene was wanted by the Interpol for a number of murder-related cases back in the state, so yesterday, after James had dismissed us in that high-handed manner of his, I contacted their London office about Eugene's personal information. I suggest that you get ready for some interesting reading while we wait for the storms to clear up and the airport to start working again."
"Nonsense!" a rather pleasant baritone spoke up instead of Nick's Scottish brogue. "I can tell the two of you anything you two care to hear about my goddamned life – and it won't be an edited version either. And after that, I can give the two of you your last cigarettes."
The mischievous smirk froze on Jenny's lips as she and Nick turned around to face the new interlocutor who had snuck up so quietly on them and with such a murderous intent...
"Caroline!" Abby yelled into the door speaker. "Open the door or speak up! It is Abby and Connor! Come on! We're not leaving until you do!"
"Abby. Connor." Caroline's voice was devoid of any expression what so ever. "I... don't think I can't."
"Say what? You got a bug in the computers or something-" Connor began but didn't finish, as the gates opened with a clang. "Ah, that's better."
"For you two – probably not," another voice from behind the young adults. With worry etched on their faces, Abby and Connor turned around to be confronted by a barrel of a sniper's rifle, held, on the other end, by a woman who looked like Eliza Dushku in her middle years.
"Hello there," Abby waved her hand as Connor just stared at the ranged weapon. "And who are you?"
"She's with Phil," Caroline said in a miserable tone of voice. "Abby, Connor, why don't you say hello to Phil, instead?"
There was a pause, as Nick and Jenny finally met the much-reputed Eugene Flint face-to-face, and discovered that they would have preferred to delay the meeting as long as possible. The man was quite tall, after all, taller than Nick or Stephen at least by half of a head and had equally long ape-like arms and hands that reached to the knees of his long legs. The similarity with apes was furthered by the fact that the hands, at least, seemed to be very, very muscular and bony, much more so than the hands of a human being were ought to be. The face, however, was nothing at all like an ape's - with its prominent beak-like nose, big ears, and a prominent chin it looked like a gargoyle's instead.
In short, Eugene Flint seemed to be something of a bits-and-pieces man, one that could be considered funny or scary, if it was not for the eyes – they were the most disturbing bits of all. Big, yet set deeply into the face, they were as black as the ink of a squid of a cuttlefish, but devoid of any human warmth or expression whatsoever. These were dead eyes, and looking at them with the eyes of his own, Nick began to understand why Caroline had sounded so scared when she talked about Flint – the man clearly did have issues with his sanity.
Next to Nick, Jenny sounded like she had reached the same – or a very similar – conclusion. "You won't dare," she muttered here, "not in a public place. You're not that crazy!"
Eugene smiled – with his mouth alone – a feat that made him look rather like a shark. "Want to bet?" he asked cheerfully, lifting his sombrero from his forehead, revealing that it bore scars – too many scars for that part of the human body.
However, Eugene was not finished. "But wait!" Eugene said cheerfully, "you haven't heard the best part yet – I am going to strangle the two of you without any noise, and then leave. No noise, no one paying attention, and I am the crazy one! Pretty neat, eh?"
Nick jumped up and tried to hit the other man in the face. Eugene dodged the blow easily and jabbed a return blow into Nick's solar plexus. The pain was probably similar to one caused by a steel rod driven into that spot. Nick doubled up and fell onto his seat.
With eyes brimming from tears, Jenny looked up at Eugene. Unless some sort of a divine miracle happened right away, she and Nick were doomed.
Very slowly, and without doing any threatening movements, Connor and Abby turned around. Sure enough, there was The Cleaner, flanked by two more men. All three were armed with solid-looking submachine guns, aiming at the young couple. Caroline too was there, but from the way she stood, it was clear that she was not in charge of anything.
Silence fell. "Well, aren't you going to say hello? After all, isn't it what people say to each other after a long period of separation?" The Cleaner inquired, nicely.
Abby blinked. "What is the meaning of this?" was the first question that came to her mind, and it was probably not the smartest one. Surprisingly though, The Cleaner nodded as if understanding her meaning and replied.
"The boss has decided that it was time to make a move," he explained calmly, "before the weather took a turn for the worse, let us say."
"But you already took out the center!" Connor could not help but exclaim. Surprisingly again, The Cleaner looked almost embarrassed by that exclamation.
"That wasn't us," he explained, as the riflewoman poked the pair into their backs, suggesting that the pair moved on. "The time anomaly was supposed to draw you some time else instead – but your equipment misfired, self-destructing."
"Uh," Connor almost admitted that the following damage had resulted from him pulling the fire alarm at a wrong time, but decided against us. "So what are you going to us?"
"I'm not sure," The Cleaner shrugged. "The boss wants you alive at that point, but since your gang had split and he sent Eugene after the professor and the PR chick, odds are that they are going to be dead before long."
Caroline made a small gasp; so did Abby, but probably for a somewhat different reason. "But Helen wants Nick to be alive, most likely!"
"That bitchy flibbertigibbet isn't in charge of us anymore," The Cleaner this time smirked for real. "All she had was a bunch of fascinating futuristic techno-toys – but we have Eugene who's got just the right aptitude to figuring them out. Once that was done and gone, that Indiana Jones wannabe with the approaching menopause became redundant. We tried to track her done, but she went to some time before the dinosaurs and we lost track of her then. No matter, her time will come. For now though, take them to the gaol. Heh, always wanted to say that – take them to the gaol!"
Abby twitched. It was an accidental muscle spasm, but the riflewoman behind the two was taking no chances. Adjusting her grip on the rifle, she clubbed its' butt into Abby's left ear. Fireworks exploded inside Abby's skull and then it was nothing but darkness.
"Any last words," Eugene Flint asked conversationally, as he bent towards tearful Jenny and still gasping Nick. "'Cause if there aren't I can always start right away."
Jenny inhaled and decided that her last act on this world would be to drive one of her long heels into Eugene's foot. Not that it would do much good – the man wore solid, paramilitary boots that could probably handle any footwear damage that Jenny could send that way, but it would be the principle of things that counted. However, something else happened instead.
A sudden wave of dry heat raced through the airport, briefly evaporating the dampness that saturated the buildings through the storm season. As Jenny, Nick, and even Eugene turned to see what was going on, they saw another one of the altered, semi-transparent oversized time anomalies, this one leading into a dry, rocky desert, and out of that desert charged something that could only be described as a rhino-sized pig, easily two meters tall in the shoulders. Moreover, it was charging straight at them!
"Jenny, run!" wheezed Nick, as he pulled Jenny out of the way and the two stumbled out of the way, into the crowds, ignoring Eugene, who, in turn, seemed to be completely fascinated by the charging beast.
As the pair half-ran half-stumbled through the crowds, Jenny heard that she heard a shot or two. Then they had cleared the airport's doorway and she did not really care anymore.
Abby woke-up with a lot of pain on the left side of her face, and it felt as if something wet was stuck there as well. However, as she tried to move, a feeling of virago came over her and she fell down onto her butt.
"Careful," she heard Connor speak. "You received a nasty blow onto your ear, you know?"
"Connor," Abby winced, as her last conscious memory returned to an unusual extent, "what's that sticking to me?"
"Caroline managed to get some first aid supplies from The Cleaner," Connor said, sounding definitely upset. "Then we spend most of the time here fixing you up."
"Oh. Thanks," Abby turned to the left where Caroline was sitting.
"You're welcome," the other woman sounded about as cheerful as Connor did. "It was something to do while we wait..." her voice trailed away.
"Ah, relax, and try to think cheerful thoughts instead," Abby said, her own worries not too far away.
"I'm trying to," Caroline's clipped tones hinted that Connor had suggested something along similar lines. "So far I've been imagining James Lester swooping in on his flying pig, slaying Phil and his cohorts with a torch of liberty and being proclaimed the greatest hero since James Bond by Connor and you. I'm afraid that it doesn't really work for me."
"I don't know," Abby blinked, as she visualized that image herself. "That sort of imagination does have potential, I believe. Certainly I couldn't have imagined something along those lines."
"Fine, so what do you offer?"
Abby opened her mouth then carefully thought about what she should say, and spoke at last: "So, you think that Nick and Jenny have no chance?"
"The odds are stacked against them," Caroline's voice was just as carefully controlled. "They are not expecting a frontal assault for a start, and, well, it's not their thing, is it?"
"No, but they – we – had confrontations like these, and... you were there. Hah," Abby scratched her head. "This has a kind of a familiar feel, doesn't it?"
"Yes, but with Eugene being involved it has been cranked-up a notch," Caroline nodded in reply.
"What are you two are talking about?" Connor exploded.
Caroline and Abby looked at him as if he was daft.
Contrary to Jenny's expectations, Nick did not take her to their vehicle; instead, he went and motioned her to hide behind another car instead. Normally, Jenny would try at least a token protest, but right now, the memory of Eugene Flint with his cold, dead eyes and scarred forehead was too fresh in her mind, so she followed Nick's lead without even that, only hissing:
"Just what are you doing?"
"See that big grey van?" Nick hissed back. "It is similar to the car that Caroline drove around yesterday. And since she knows this man it's possible that there's some sort of a connection."
"You mean she betrayed us again?" Jenny's voice was a bit too shrill for a hideout.
"I don't mean anything," Nick shook his head, "and until we figure out what is going on, let's not start making assumptions. That's what almost undid us last time, remember?"
Jenny exhaled, chastised by that memory. "You're right," she said softly, "but what if that pig did Eugene in?"
"It was an entelodont of some sort," Nick shook his head. "It was – or it is – a cousin of the modern pigs and had the brain the size of an orange. It lived in the Oligocene, approximately 25 MYA in Mongolia and had never seen any primates and died out long before man had evolved from australopithecines and spread out from Africa."
"Your point?" Jenny spoke up, somewhat irritated.
"I am not going to bet any money on it," Nick shook his head. "Unless it bore down on Eugene in its initial charge, all the man had to do was to follow us through the crowds and leave the airport security to deal with it."
Jenny nodded, realization dawning in her eyes. "I'm guessing that yesterday's rant-" she began, but Nick interrupted her.
"Yesterday's rant was exactly that – a rant," he said flatly, "but, on the other hand... You and I, or Connor and Abby or even Stephen – we were not killers either, but regular people, and yet we defeated all prehistoric monsters that life threw on us. Even Lester managed to kill a future predator by setting our mammoth upon it. In truth, Jenny, nature has a simple rule: the biggest, strongest and heaviest animal wins any battle. An elephant is heavier than a rhino, a hippo is heavier than a shark, a crocodile is heavier than a lion – they win. It is only people who use their brains instead to defeat their opponent, and that's how we became the dominant species of our world."
"Yet Stephen died," Jenny murmured slightly.
"Stephen died," Nick said, feeling incredibly weary, "because of Leek. Who was a human, albeit a conniving, ratty one. We are all humans, and we-"
He stiffened and dragged Jenny down, underneath a car. A word of protest died on Jenny's lips as she saw from her vantage point a pair of paramilitary boots walk into the garage, followed by a very familiar voice.
"No, boss, they got a reprieve," Eugene's baritone did not waver for a moment. "Another time anomaly opened up, and a big pig got out. Yes, I think it is a pig though it had a head like a crocodile. Yes, I have dealt with it. No, you are right. It is onto plan B – we did get the blonde and the moron after all."
In absolute silence, Nick and Jenny watched how Eugene turned off the cell phone, climbed into the big grey van and drove-off.
"Now what?" Jenny hissed to Nick as the two of them hurriedly climbed from under and into their own car.
"Now – we follow him."
Jenny nodded. "Should I call the ARC and tell them what's going on?" she asked, checking.
"Why don't you be the judge of that," was the reply.
"Hey, you three – don't try anything fancy, it's just lunch time!" two of the men that'd been with The Cleaner earlier in the day came into the door, bringing in some sandwiches and mineral waters. "The three of you have got a reprieve – a professor and his woman are still out at large, so the public execution will have to wait."
"All right!" Abby spoke-up in much better spirits than before. "Now you're talking, right guys?" She was rewarded by a similarly bright grin from Connor and a more subdued one from Caroline.
"Don't be too sure," the man said, ruining the moment. "Eugene's on the case – he knows what to do."
Caroline seemed to refuse to rise to the bait. "Can we have Michael in here, please?" she responded instead.
"Sure," the man rolled his eyes. "You won't able to figure it out until Eugene gets here, and besides, Cyra has an eye on you."
"Nice try, Norke," without Eugene around Caroline seemed to be somewhat more confident than vice versa. "But we know that Cyra's just a bit better than a crazy exhibitionist with tattoos, and that I can take her."
"And then Eugene can take you," Norke shook his head.
"I'll cross that river when we get to it," Caroline shook his head. "Now bring Michael over here, please."
"If you haven't patched us up after Eugene would knock us down..." Norke muttered and left, closing the door with a click.
Abby and Connor stared at Caroline, who stared back.
"You seemed to have made a good recovery," Abby said, old suspicion creeping back into her voice.
"Yes, well, we've got a reprieve and Eugene isn't going to be focused on us," Caroline shrugged. "Plus, Michael's company boosts my self-confidence. And Cyra, well... we'll wait and see what'll happen."
Abby and Connor continued to drill Caroline with their gazes, when the door to their cell opened once again, and in jumped a dog – the same one that had been with Caroline and helped them fight off the giant scorpion from the Silurian. "Michael – stay! Sit! Good boy!" The last words were said in a near giggle, as the large canine licked Caroline's face. "Now say hello to Connor – you remember him, right?"
Michael turned around and with a thunderous bark stretched one of his paws in Connor's direction.
"And the same to you, mate" Connor nodded in a mock-importance and shook the offered paw. "Long time no see since the Silurian, eh? And this," he said a bit nervously, "is Abby. She's also very glad to meet you."
Michael leaned forwards his massive head, sniffed tentatively at Abby's face, and then gingerly licked it.
"Oh! Ow! Wow! That's a big dog!" Abby exclaimed. "And it tickles!"
Caroline snorted softly. "Look," she slowly began, "I don't know you, you don't know me, so let's don't pretend otherwise," she paused. "Anyways, do you have any ideas of what to do? Because I don't have any."
This realization somewhat dampened the mood of the other two. Silence fell once again, and they could hear the rain drumming outside of their imprisonment chamber.
"Nick, just where are we doing?" Jenny inquired, as Nick drove them away from the airport.
"We're following that man!" Nick rasped, as he kept Eugene's vehicle in his sights.
"To what end? He seriously outclasses you as a fighter!"
"Then what do you suggest? Stop following him?"
"Why not?"
Nick almost released the steering wheel as he turned to face Jenny, and the car almost drove into a street lamp. "Just what are you saying, woman?" he rasped.
"Look, we know that that's Caroline's car, right?" Jenny continued, ignoring the tone of Nick's outburst. "And, I, at least, happen to know where she lives. Now, it does take a leap of logic to assume that Eugene's home base is at Caroline's spot, but why won't we go there and investigate all the same? This is not some prehistoric monster, like the rhino-sized pig in the airport, Nick. This is human stuff, and we can call for help, if worse comes to pass from other branches of the government, let us say."
Nick paused, stopping the car at the same street light. "Jenny," he said after a while, "you may be right. It is just that I have already lost Stephen. I do not intend to lose anyone else – not while I am still able-bodied and conscious."
"We won't," Jenny nodded just as seriously. "But let's go and visit Caroline's compound first."
"Very well. Where is it?"
The sound of the rainfall had actually produced a somewhat soporific effect on the prisoners, as the three of them began to nod off in the twilight, warmed by Michael's furry body. Therefore, the sound of their door opening once again had startled them. This time, it was The Cleaner himself.
"On your feet, the three of you," he said curtly, without any good cheer of their previous conversation. "Oh, and I see that Michael's with you as well."
"So he is," Caroline said, getting on her feet. "What now, Phil?"
The Cleaner's gaze was seriously cold. "Don't get cocky with me, Caro," he snapped. "Eugene is here."
"And so he is," Caroline's own voice gone completely flat. "Heard that he had some trouble, though."
"No, just an oversized pig," The Cleaner shook his head. "Now you three will go willingly – or else?"
"Ah, I'll need some help getting up," Abby said sheepishly. "I still get dizzy if I stand up too quickly."
The Cleaner's glare intensified. "I'll help," Connor said quickly, as he – and Caroline – did help Abby get onto her feet. "We're going. Slowly."
"Just get a move on," The Cleaner snapped, as his body language made it clear that few more minutes of delay and he would start shooting – and not just his mouth. "The three of you, honestly, could tire-out a machine!"
Michael bared its teeth and snarled. The barrel of The Cleaner's gun began to move in the dog's direction.
"Michael, heel!" Caroline barked. "Stop! Stay! Good boy!"
The big dog obediently stood at attention at Caroline's side. "Good boy. Abby, why don't you take Michael by the collar here and follow his lead?"
"'His'?"
"Oh yeah," Caroline nodded sagely. "Or didn't you see the rear-end view?"
"..."
"Are the four of you going to try my patience anymore?!" The Cleaner snarled, but with somewhat less menace than before.
"No, we're good," Abby said quickly, grabbed the dog by the collar and leaning onto it. "Guys, let's go."
Finding Caroline's place, where the woman lived and trained her dogs was quite easy, especially if you have a good road map and an initial idea of where it was to begin with.
"And you've been here how?" Nick muttered, as he and Jenny climbed out of the car.
"I dropped off her sweatpants from the other day," Jenny explained helpfully. "Remember, Nick?"
Nick ignored the subtle dig and instead concentrated on the wall. It was somewhat high and solidly built, but there were trees growing alongside it. Nick eyed one of them as if measuring its size against his strength and dexterity.
"You're not serious!" Jenny hissed as it became obvious that Nick indeed was.
"I am," Nick sounded resolute. "All this time I just was on the defensive – we were on the defensive – and this is the result. Now I am taking initiative into my hands – are you with me?"
"Yes," Jenny sighed, as she joined Nick at the tree. "I am coming with you."
"In those high heels?"
"Watch me."
The rain, which sounded so pleasant inside, was rather cold and uncomfortable outside. The only satisfaction that the captives felt was purely moral about the lack of umbrellas or raincoats, and so their captors were getting just as wet. Sadly, it did not seem like they were slowed down any by these circumstances.
"So, which one's Eugene?" Abby muttered, as the three of them stood outsider, on a small clearing in the middle of the compound.
"He's not... there he is!" Caroline gasped, once again clearly nervous.
Abby and Connor turned their heads in that direction. Sure enough, another mercenary, indeed on a rather tallish side, was busy talking to The Cleaner. Both men seemed to be in a midst of an argument, with The Cleaner being clearly more aggravated than his interlocutor was.
"This Eugene is one unshakeable character," Connor said thoughtfully.
"From what I've heard," Caroline muttered under her breath, "and saw glimpses of, Eugene has his excitable periods as well. During those periods, people die – even more so than when he is as calm as he currently is."
"Caroline," Abby nervously said, seeing how she was closer to the other woman than Conner was, "but I think you're exaggerating somewhat."
"Oh? Look at Michael."
Abby and Connor looked. Indeed, the big dog, which had courageously attacked a giant scorpion and stood up to The Cleaner, looked very nervous, huddling at the feet of its mistress.
The young couple looked nervous at this development, and then, as the tall man approached them, they began to feel rather nervous themselves.
"Hello, Caro," the man said softly, the upper half of his face hidden by the shadows of his sombrero.
"Don't call me Caro!" Caroline snapped, her hands clenched into fists so tightly, that they turned white at the knuckles. "And what's with the sombrero?"
"It keeps rain out of my face, and makes me feel American. What should I have worn – a baseball cap?"
"No, you have the wrong head for that," Caroline nodded sagely. "So, what now's going to happen?"
"From what I've gleaned, your bosses, feeling as wise and confident as any dilettantes that had a reprieve through external circumstances, will probably try something heroic," Eugene's voice was warm, and his lips formed a slight smile, but his eyes were as dark and cold as two pieces of old iron, and just as dead. "The Scotsman is itching for a fight, and so's his girlfriend. Well, we'll just how to oblige them, don't we?"
Caroline just bit her lip and did not say anything; instead, Connor spoke-up. "So, what happens now, mate?"
"Well, the boss wanted to give the Scotsman a big speech about mice and men, but since that oversized pig interfered, he decided to give to a James Lester instead and drove-off with some of our men to confront him instead."
"So, what's going to happen to us?" Connor pressed.
"Well, we're going to wait till the clever dilettantes that had followed me here will try to attempt a rescue, therein will grab 'em, book 'em, and put them into a pen."
Abby blinked, as Caroline turned to her and Connor, silently mouthed something ineligible, and then turned to Michael, slapping the dog firmly on the hipbones. "Michael," she muttered, "run."
The dog took off. Abby, who was still holding onto him, was towed after it before anyone could even blink.
Actually, Eugene did blink, and when he shifted back to Caroline, his voice was considerably less friendly. "And just what did you do?" he asked, his baritone voice turning on some decisively deeper undertones.
Caroline shrugged and tried to look innocently cute at the man. "I have no idea," she admitted, as she slipped her right hand into the pocket on her jeans and squeezed something in the pocket hard.
"Nick, this is ridiculous – I feel like we're playing cops and robbers, for keeps!" Jenny hissed, as she and Nick huddled behind some cars parked outside of Caroline's small garage. "I mean, you're not exactly the greatest warrior on this planet, while those men seem to be armed – well, they are armed with submachine guns or something!"
"Jenny, please," Nick growled, "I am sort of making it up as we go along. What would you have me do – call Lester?"
"No, but-"
An animalistic growl from behind interrupted the fledging argument. Slowly, Nick and Jenny turned around to be confronted by... something.
A long time ago, before the future predator had come to the present for the first time, when captain Ryan was still alive, Nick Cutter had unwisely let Connor use one of the ARC's computers without proper supervision. Connor Temple, being who he was, used this possibility to go to what he and his friends knew as "furraffinity", a.k.a. a site that demonstrates anthropomorphic versions of modern and extinct animals. This action did not endear Connor to anyone, not when the site infested the ARC computer network with a virus that flooded the e-mail systems with a river of spam, usually of a hentai porn variety. It took several weeks to flush the viruses from the system, and even longer for the women on the ARC stuff to re-start talking to Connor again. Now, Nick and Jenny were looking at something that seemed to have come from that furaffinity site – an anthropomorphic sabre-tooth cat.
"Cutter," the anthropomorphic monster growled extending rather impressive claws from her fingers. "Die!"
Before Nick could say anything like "Hah?" or begin to move, something else intervened: Abby Maitland was flung into his arms, as something almost as big and mottled as the anthropomorphic animal slammed into the latter.
"Abby?" Jenny asked the obvious, as Nick tried to get up, winded once again by Abby's fall into him.
"Guys," Abby got unsteadily onto her feet, the left side of her face heavily bandaged, "we need to help Caroline and Connor – and Michael! What's the dog doing?"
As Nick got onto his feet and Jenny turned around, the big dog trotted up to them, its teeth stained with something dark. The nature of that stuff, though, was not a mystery, as it also leaked from massive, jagged wounds on the anthropomorphic sabre-tooth's head and right arm. Otherwise, the creature lay still and dead.
"Ah, good dog?" Abby said meekly, and awkwardly rubbed its head. The dog whined in pleasure and bent so that Abby could have a go around its ears as well.
Suddenly, one of the cars emitted a loud beep and a clicking sound of unlocking doors.
"Guys?" Abby frowned deep in thought. "Any of you know how to hotwire a car?"
"Actually, I do," Nick frowned deep in thought. "Jenny, Abby get into it – and take the dog with you."
"What about Connor? He and Caroline are still out there," Abby waved her hand.
The look on Nick's face was pure savagery. "Oh, we're taking them with us as well."
"Caroline," Eugene literally loomed over her and Connor. "Just what were you thinking?"
"Nothing," Caroline flatly said. "I just wanted to send Michael away – it's not my fault that Abby over there got taken along for the ride."
"I think that you are lying," Eugene shook his head.
"I think that I've gotten beyond the point where I care about your opinions," sweat ran down the woman's face but she stood her ground. "I also feel like reminding you about glass houses and stones – urk!"
Eugene's face did not change as he grabbed Caroline by the neck and lifted her off the ground, slowly squeezing her. "Caro, you're redundant and I had my temper exhausted by an oversized pig. Now, you are going to die."
With a flash of its lamps and with the squeal of the tires, a car burst out of the deepening murk of a late afternoon storm. Instinctively, Eugene threw Caroline at Connor and jumped in the opposite direction. Connor caught the wheezing Caroline, but they both fell to the muddy ground hard.
The car's left hind door opened. "Get into here, you fools!" Abby shouted, just as Jenny yelled, "Nick, go down!"
Like a crack of thunder, the fired bullet smashed through the windows of the both front doors of the car – and if Nick had not dodged, it would have smashed his skull and brains instead. Now, though, as Connor scrambled inside, dragging the semi-conscious woman with him, the van whirled around, and the next shot hit the car's rear doors instead.
"Now what!" Jenny shouted as she saw other mercenaries prepare to fire at them as well.
Suddenly, the gates of Caroline's compound began to open. "Cutter, floor it!" Connor shouted shrilly, as he pressed down hard on the remote control he had fished out of Caroline's pocket. "Now!"
And Nick did just that. The van smashed through the still-opening gates, whirled around and tore off through the streets under the staccato sounds of gunfire. However, the still opening gates took most of the bullet damage, and soon the van disappeared in the ever-deepening twilight of an evening storm.
Phil and the others looked at Eugene. "Now what?"
Eugene smiled back – a sharp, predatory smile. "Now we go to Lester's."
To be continued...