Disclaimer: Primeval does not belong to me, this is fan fiction, not for profit.
Any references to people, places, businesses etc is entirely fictitious.
3.8-3 About Time
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Becker eagerly signed for the delivery. He opened the box and peeked in. A grin slowly spread across his face.
"Take it to the car park," he told Stephenson. "We'll need to get it mounted on the armored Hummer." The heavily plated vehicle wasn't the tank that Becker had wanted, but it would transport the ARC's team in relative safety. It had only taken a small reminder of Tom Ryan's injuries from a predator encounter to convince Lester that increased safety precautions were needed.
In addition to the new transportation, Lester had approved the purchase of one Long Range Acoustic Device (LRAD). The round black device had been express shipped from the manufacturer. The LRAD was designed to amplify and broadcast sound waves in whatever direction deemed necessary.
Becker pressed the intercom button, pushing the numbers for Abby and Sarah's office.
"Yeah," answered Abby.
"The LRAD is here," said Becker "have you got the sound card ready?"
The race track anomaly was still holding strong after a week and showed no signs of weakening. Hopefully, they would never need to go back to that terrible place. But if the ARCs team ever had to re-enter the predator's world, Becker planned on being ready.
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Sarah had brought Cutter the CCTV security photo of the hologram as soon as Becker had given it to her last week. That same night, Sarah and the professor had begun comparing the photograph with their research model. There were obvious gaps in the model.
Cutter had tried to tie in the latest anomaly at the race track to the model with no success. The rod kept snapping, breaking apart every time he tried to attach it. Finally, Cutter had given up for the evening telling Sarah that they needed another set of hands.
"Bring Connor with you next time," directed Nick.
Connor had come with Sarah on Monday after work. It was the first time in quite a while that he had seen Cutter. They had been chatting, catching up a bit, when Claudia had entered the room. Connor did a double take.
"Whoa," said Connor, "you got big."
Sarah started to berate the young man, but he had realized his mistake. He was blushing, a bright shade of red, his brown eyes wide, his mouth opening and shutting in an attempt to find something else to say.
Claudia was laughing. She placed her hand on her huge belly and said, "And I'll get bigger before the baby is born, she's not due for another two months."
"You'll be going out on maternity leave," said Connor "just as the Professor gets back to work."
Claudia and Nick exchanged a glance.
"What?" asked Connor. "You are coming back Professor, aren't you?"
"Connor," said Nick gently "we've been talking with Lester about me taking more of a research role…"
"No!" Connor exclaimed, "We need you, it's not the same since you've been gone."
At Connor's bereft look, Nick sighed. "Come on now," Cutter said "help me attach this rod to the research model."
Four days later, they still hadn't attached the rod. Connor had measured and recalculated every curve, comparing his results against the professors. The numbers matched. But the flexible tubing kept breaking every time they tried to attach the ends to the rest of the research model. The last time they tried, the rod had splintered into a dozen fragmented strips pointing in all directions.
Connor stared. Cutter swore. Sarah tried to pick the broken pieces off the carpet, while Claudia went for the vacuum.
"Maybe it's not supposed to go there," said Connor thoughtfully.
"What do you mean?" snapped Cutter "Of course it goes there, we've measured all the time points. It has to go there."
"Not if it's the beginning of another universe."
"What?"
Connor began pointing to some of the intersecting parts of the research model.
"You said those were absolute fixed points," Connor reminded Cutter. "It's what you based your prediction on. What if this spot is an absolute unfixed point… a… I don't know… time flux, if you will… a point where anything might happen and the world could evolve in any of several different manners."
"Hrrumph," said Cutter as he turned to stare at the research model.
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James Lester was worried. How Christine Johnson and her military group had obtained Professor Morton's work was beyond him.
Vivian had brought the children into the city on Wednesday. She and the children had stopped by the flat to have dinner with him before returning to their main home.
"I can't remember any military involvement in the ARCs history," responded Vivian to his questions as they chopped vegetables together in the kitchen. A sudden cry from the living room brought them both running.
Their youngest daughter was standing, tears pouring down her face, pointing her finger accusingly at Connor. The young man was sitting on the couch, frozen in position, his brown eyes wide, staring back at the child.
"He sat on Hermione!"
"I'm sorry," apologized Connor as he brought the brown haired doll out from beneath him, "really, I didn't mean to sit on her."
Lester had comforted the little girl, enlisting the aid of his older two children in making a number of keep off signs to distract the child. By the time dinner was ready, Connor was surrounded by a slew of red and white signs with all sorts of warnings that the children found hilarious.
After dinner, Lester walked his wife and children to the car. After checking that seatbelts were buckled and giving goodbye kisses, Lester was left facing Vivian.
"Do be careful," she whispered as he leaned towards her for one last kiss "Christine Johnson's as dangerous in her way as Helen Cutter."
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Danny Quinn rubbed the red streaks on his throat where the baby predator had clawed him the previous week. The scratches had closed up, but the skin still itched.
He was spying on that dodgy inventor Philip Burton. Danny knew the man was involved with Christine Johnson in some way. Tomorrow, Danny would be checking out Christine Johnson's headquarters again.
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Abby was frustrated and nervous both and she didn't know which feeling was worse.
She was frustrated because she had been trying to see Connor in private ever since Jack had moved out, but all week Connor had been busy.
First, Lester had tasked Connor with creating an anomaly cloaking device. If Christine Johnson's military group had one, Lester wanted one. But more importantly, he told Connor to figure out how to get anomaly readings from Christine's anomaly in spite of her cloaking device. The ARC needed to know what time period the military's anomaly led to.
Then, Becker had given Sarah some old security photos to take over to Cutter's home office. The professor had demanded that Connor come and review the photos of the hologram with him. Sarah had been taking Connor with her to the Cutter's after work every day. Where Connor went after leaving Cutter's home, Abby didn't know, and that made Abby nervous.
There hadn't been an anomaly all week. It had been unusually quiet. Today, Abby had been determined to catch Connor in the cafeteria, but Lester had his PA send in Connor's lunch. Later, when Abby had stopped by Connor's lab at tea time, Sarah had already brought Connor his afternoon tea. A few moments ago, he had finally come out of his lab and poked his head in the office Sarah and Abby were sharing. Sarah had promptly tossed him her keys and told him to go start her car.
"Cool," Connor replied "do I get to drive?"
At Sarah's fierce frown, he said "I'll take that as a no."
Then Connor quickly turned, heading down the hallway before Abby had a chance to say anything. She stared after him. It wasn't like Connor to ignore her like that. Abby glanced to the side, watching as Sarah packed up her bag, taking files from her desk and shoving them haphazardly into the large shoulder bag.
"Sarah," said Abby "I know that Cutter's research model is supposed to detect anomalies, and you're tying in the past myths as sightings, but why does Cutter need Connor?"
"Oh," Sarah replied distractedly as she searched her desk for yet another file "Connor's measuring the curvature of research model pathways against the mapping from the hologram picture."
"What?"
Sarah chuckled. "Connor checks the intersections to make sure they actually align with the anomalies we have located and then we can see what we're missing."
Abby sighed. Sarah stopped what she was doing and turned to look at her friend.
"Are you all right?" Sarah asked kindly.
"Yeah," replied Abby "it's just… I was hoping to get a chance to talk to Connor, before he goes back to his mates place again tonight."
"Abby," said Sarah softly, "Connor's not staying at a mates."
Abby tried to control her facial expression as she stared at Sarah in surprise. Abby's worst fears appeared to be realized.
"You and Connor…" Abby began.
"No Abby," replied Sarah sharply. Her dark hair flung back, as she straightened up, pulling the strap of her bag over her shoulder. "It's not like that, not at all. We're just mates. But you should know… Connor is staying at Lester's flat."
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Connor was busy scribbling notes down on a pad of paper as Sarah drove him back to Lester's flat. Tonight's conversation with Cutter as they worked on the anomaly research model had brought up several new ideas.
"Hmm?" he asked as Sarah said something.
"I said," repeated Sarah with a sigh "are you going to answer that?"
"What?" Connor asked, and then realizing what Sarah was talking about, he scrambled for his cell phone. Abby had called, and he had missed it. As he stared in dismay at the cell phone, the message indicator lit up. As Connor listened to the voice mail a smile spread across his face.
"Abby's coming over tomorrow morning," he told Sarah happily, bending back over his note pad.
Sarah smirked to herself, thinking… it's about time.
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