Bend It Like Becker

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Chapter 11 - MEADOW MISCHIEF

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Becker sometimes wished every incursion involved G-Rexes. Not that he liked seeing people get hurt, but G-Rexes had a lot of advantages. First off, he was allowed to shoot them, and in his present mood that would've been a welcome task. Also, they were so big, they were easy to find. In addition, the team usually only had to deal with one at a time.

None of this could be said about the bloody lizards that had chosen to come through this anomaly.

While technically they were carnivorous - Abby had given them the facts on the species during the drive - they were so small that they weren't likely to eat anything bigger than an insect. Most of the team therefore hadn't even bothered to carry their EMDs with them, which Becker felt was unnecessarily risky, since another, more aggressive creature could come through at any moment. But since Matt was one of those who'd entered the meadow unarmed, Becker couldn't really yell at the others.

The lizards' relatively small size - less than 40 centimeters from head to tail - also made them difficult to find. That meant the team was forced to wander about the meadow with their eyes to the ground, searching the grass for the annoying creatures. It was exactly what the team didn't need after spending these last few days at practice trying NOT to be constantly staring at their feet.

And because of the long distance the team had had to travel to get here, there'd been plenty of time for an entire lounge of lizards to invade. At last count they'd already returned almost twelve to their own time, and there were still plenty more roaming about the meadow. Of course, the fact that some of the reptiles had wandered back again after being sent home didn't help. To further prevent this, Becker called Emily over and placed her at the gateway to keep any lizards from returning - he figured that, at the very least, she could get in some goalkeeping practice this afternoon.

As Becker returned to the meadow after giving Emily her assignment, he suddenly heard Jess's voice through the comms. "Becker? I was just thinking about practice."

Okay, seriously, this mindreading really needed to stop, though at least he hadn't been thinking about Jess this time.

"I did the math," Jess continued, "and even if you wrapped everything up in the next few minutes, you'd never make it back here in time for practice. And most of the footy team is there with you anyway. So I was thinking I should just contact the others and cancel, but I wanted to check with you first."

Becker quickly glanced around the field and realised Jess was right - most of the footy team was here at the anomaly site. The only ones left behind were Lester, Ghani, and Scott.

"Definitely cancel."

Although Lester needed the practice, Ghani clearly didn't. More importantly, Becker didn't relish the idea of Jess being stuck alone with Scott - not that she'd ever fall for one of his cheesy pick-up lines, but Becker didn't want to have to kill the soldier if he even attempted to hit on Jess.

"Will do," she replied. "Thanks, Coach. Good luck with the...lizard things."

Becker laughed - it was nice to know that he wasn't the only one who got all the Latin taxonomy confused. "Thanks, Jess."

He suddenly saw one of the said lizard things crossing the towpath towards the canal. Becker ran after it and found where it'd been headed. In the reeds near the water was a small bird's nest, and several lizards were helping themselves to the brown speckled eggs inside. Although having been rudely interrupted from his own lunch, Becker felt no qualms about cutting short their dinner party.

"Hey!" he said, stomping his combat boot near the nest, causing the lizards to scatter. He trapped them betwixt his feet and started herding the lounge back towards the anomaly, feeling rather ridiculous.

Up ahead, he was surprised to see Emily dive and catch a lizard that was actually heading towards the anomaly. He realised they'd definitely made the right decision by making her the goalkeep, but he doubted her own decision-making skills at the moment.

"Emily! What are you doing?" he called to her, continuing to struggle towards the anomaly with the group of creatures scrambling around his ankles. "You're supposed to stop them coming back the other way, not when they're going through."

"Not when they're from this time," Emily insisted as she stood up, holding the reptile.

Becker was confused, but Abby wasn't. She hurried over to Emily and took the lizard from her hands. "You're right, Emily - this is a great crested newt, not a Petrolacosaurus. It most definitely does not belong in the Carboniferous. Good catch!"

"You mean there's two types of these bloody lizards?" Becker asked, thinking this was only getting worse.

"It's okay, Becker," Abby teased, gesturing to the ones at his feet. "All the ones you're 'dribbling' can go back."

"Good," Becker said, resisting the urge to simply kick them through. Instead, the two girls stepped aside, and with only a slight nudge the reptiles quickly scurried through the anomaly by themselves.

"But we are going to have to be careful about what we send through," Abby insisted. "These newts are a protected species - they're rare enough as it is, without us sending some of them through to the past."

Stupid wildlife advocates. "Fine," Becker said peevishly. "Then Abby, you stay here with Emily and make sure that the little darlings are kept safe."

He turned and stomped back to the meadow in search of the rest of the annoying creatures. He wanted this incursion to be over soon, even though that meant several more hours in the car. And it wasn't like he had anything dire to get back to - practice was cancelled, which meant he'd simply be going home to an empty flat.

"Hey, Coach - I mean Captain," O'Rourke quickly corrected as he gestured Becker over towards a fallen tree. "I just saw a bunch of the creatures scurry down in here - I think it's an otter's den."

Becker sighed with frustration and hurried over to help O'Rourke extract the lizards, though he was fairly certain his current bad mood had more to do with the fact that he wouldn't be seeing Jess at practice this evening than the task he had ahead of him.

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Neela was ecstatic when she got the news.

"You needn't sound quite so pleased," Jess teased.

"Oh no, it's not that," Neela quickly explained. "Tonight's my boyfriend's birthday, and originally I'd planned to cook dinner for him, but when this whole footy thing came up, I had to cancel. Luckily he understood, since he plays himself, but I still felt bad. But if practice is cancelled, I can do it after all. Oh, and if I leave now, I can stop at the grocer's and pick up everything - you have perfect timing, Jess."

"Glad I could help. Have fun tonight."

Jess felt a pang of jealousy as she rung off. She wished she had a boyfriend to cook birthday dinners for...even though she didn't really know how to cook!

Scott was next on her list.

"Cancelled?" he repeated.

"Yes, most of the footy team's out on a call."

"But you're not," he pointed out. "Maybe you and I could get together for a little...one on one. What do you say?"

"What's that, Becker?" Jess quickly improvised. "Oh yes, I'll send the coordinates through right away. Sorry, Scott - what were you saying?"

But Scott wasn't a complete idiot. "Never mind. See you tomorrow, Parker."

Jess couldn't help but smile as she rung off. She was tempted to mention it to Becker when he got back, but Scott would probably need both his legs for the match so perhaps she better not.

Now that Neela and Scott were taken care of, Jess had only Lester left to deal with, but she had something different in mind for him. She got up from her chair and headed for his office. Knocking on the door, she peaked her head around.

"Yes, what is it, Jess? Everything all right at the anomaly?"

"Oh yes, everything's fine. A lot of small lizard things, so it's taking awhile to sort them all out. But everyone's safe."

"Good, good," Lester mumbled.

"So...what are your plans for this afternoon?"

Lester looked up from his papers. "You tell me - whatever you and that bloody coach of yours have got planned, I suppose."

Jess laughed. "I meant here at work. Do you have any meetings scheduled? Any conference calls?"

"No, my slate's clean," he said, sitting back in his chair and crossing his hands in his lap. "So what did you have in mind, Ms. Parker?"

"Well," Jess began, "I thought perhaps you and I could do some footy practice here at the ARC. The others won't be back in time for a real practice, but if the two of us are stuck here anyway, I figure we might as well kick the ball about for a bit. What do you say?"

Lester frowned. "I say, don't you have a job, Parker? Coordinating the team whilst they're out in the field? Ring any bells?"

"There's no CCTV coverage of the reedbed, so there's not much I can do besides managing the comms," she explained, pointing to her earpiece. "I'm practically all alone in Ops, since we sent out two teams due to the distance. And," she added, knowing how much trouble he'd gotten into last night, "if we practice now, you can get home to your wife nice and early this evening."

Jess thought she saw a slight smile reach his eyes, though his frown remained intact.

"But isn't it a bad idea to be kicking a ball around inside, with all this expensive equipment and such? I seem to remember my mum insisting 'no ball in the house'."

"We'll be careful," Jess insisted, adding with a smile, "And I promise not to tell your mum!"

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to be continued