Disclaimer: Primeval does not belong to me, this is fan fiction, not for profit.
Any references to people, places, businesses etc is entirely fictitious.
3.11 Connections
"I don't know how to find the anomalies."
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Danny watched the young Professor and his assistant. The Scotsman turned back towards the cairn. He kneeled down, holding a hand out towards Stephen. His assistant kneeled down beside the Professor and started handing the man rocks. Cutter began carefully placing the stones on top of the pile. The man began talking to Stephen as if Danny wasn't even there.
"After we finish here," said the young Scot, "we'll need to backtrack… go back to where we lost Helen."
Stephen handed the Professor another stone. The young grad student glanced over at Danny in sympathy. He raised his hands in a helpless gesture.
"How do you open an anomaly?" Danny growled in frustration. "I've got to get back to my friends… they're stuck in the Cretaceous…"
Cutter stopped adjusting the rocks for a moment.
"If you left your friends in the Cretaceous," the man replied in his rolling brogue "then they're dead already."
"No," denied Danny vehemently. "I won't believe that. I can't. I've got to go back and find them. I'm going to get Abby and Connor home."
The young professor rocked back on his heels and turned to look at Danny once more.
"Do you want to tell me what a detective constable is doing out in the Pliocene?" the Professor asked Danny.
The lanky redhead looked down at the two men before him. Pointing at the cairn behind them, Danny replied sarcastically "I already told you, chasing a madwoman… trying to save the world from destruction… you know typical super hero stuff."
Stephen snorted in laughter, but the young Cutter frowned.
"I heard you the first time," replied the Professor "but I don't believe you. Helen wouldn't do that."
Danny tilted his head and looked at the man. "Were you even listening to me," Danny asked incredulously. The man continued to stare at Danny suspiciously.
"I know you, I know Helen," continued Danny, "and I know about the anomalies!"
"But you don't know how to find them?" asked Cutter. "How is that even possible?"
"And why don't you know me?" asked Stephen.
"My main focus has been on locking the anomalies," snapped Danny at Cutter "you know… super hero… trying to keep creatures from killing people."
Turning towards Stephen, Danny added harshly "I don't know you, because you're dead."
The young brown haired man rocked back on his heels, looking shocked. Stephen and the Professor exchanged a glance.
"Helen went through an anomaly in 1999," Danny explained "by herself, when she came back, she wanted to change the world… you were just a casualty of her mad schemes."
"I don't believe you," said Cutter "Helen would never do anything to harm Stephen… he's like a son to us."
Danny stared at the stubborn Scotsman. Danny opened and closed his mouth, trying to say something, but before he could think of words to say, another voice spoke.
"I believe him," said a young Helen Cutter as she approached the three men. "Being lost in time by yourself for more than a few days would drive anyone mad."
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James Lester and Vivian looked at the list they had drawn up. All known changes from what Vivian remembered of her childhood history lessons were marked.
"We ought to put these details in a database," suggested Vivian "see if we can find a pattern…"
"Hmmph," grumbled Lester. "If Connor were here, I'm sure he could figure it out… but right now, we are fresh out of technical geniuses."
"What about that young technician," asked Vivian "the one who survived the racetrack anomaly with Becker?"
"He quit," replied Lester "ran out screaming actually… said he didn't sign up to be killed."
"Can't blame him really," sighed Vivian.
"We need someone with Connor's technical expertise," mused James "and as brave as Becker."
Vivian spoke slowly. "There was a woman, in my history…but not now, later in the timeline… her name was Jess."
"We've got so many other changes," James mused reviewing the list yet again. "Maybe we should see if she's available…"
"It might disrupt the timeline even more," sighed Vivian "Connor's little sister appears to never have been born, and there is no sign of Jenny Lewis."
"But on the plus side," reminded Lester with a cheeky grin "we have Cutter and Christine Johnson still alive… and that dodgy inventor Philip Burton… whoever he is…"
"We just have to make sure the team, Cutter, Claudia, Sarah and Becker don't do anything rash and get themselves killed," said Vivian "We've just got to wait three days for the Hyde Park anomaly to open."
She placed her hand on the list, as if by holding the paper she could hold the lives of the people named there safe. Lester placed his hand atop hers, drawing closer.
"Two days now," said Lester "actually."
"There's one other change that we haven't listed," said Vivian. Her lower lip trembled as she looked at James.
"What?"
"You and me," said Vivian "married with three children… that was never in the history books."
Lester arched his eyebrows. "Well of course not," he chuckled as he leaned towards Vivian, "we'd be found in the romance section."
His lips met hers and for a time, neither worried about anything.
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Cutter, Claudia, Sarah and Becker were arguing. The soaring rods of the research model filled the living room.
"That's ridiculous. Just because a piece of plastic tubing doesn't snap together like you want," said Becker "doesn't mean anything… whether the anomaly can or can't be mapped isn't determined by plastic."
"It's not just the magneto-plastic tubing that won't come together," huffed Cutter "it's the same in Connor's tracking program… the coordinates don't align."
"What program?"
"He was charting all the anomaly coordinates," explained Sarah "the program he made draws lines between the anomalies… sort of like a graph."
"The image looked more like the hologram picture," added Claudia "to me than a graph."
Becker snorted in disbelief. "Seriously?" he asked "Are we back to that hologram again?"
"Yes!" exclaimed the Professor. He sighed tiredly, suddenly looking older than his forty years. "That artifact is the key to everything."
"Well I sure hope you're wrong about that," replied Becker grimly.
"Why?"
"When we went through the racetrack anomaly," said Becker "we followed Abby, Connor and Danny's trail to a building… in the lower levels, there was machinery… and the artifact… it was broken, shattered to smithereens really…"
"You should have brought the artifact back," said Cutter.
Becker stared at the Professor incredulously. He rubbed the bandages on his left shoulder.
"We were a little busy," said Becker with a sigh. He sat down on the sofa. "That's when the predator's attacked."
Professor Cutter looked abashed at his comment, but then resumed arguing with Claudia and Sarah about the anomaly map. Becker watched them for a moment, then reached into his pocket and pulled out his cell phone. He dialed Sarah's old number. He put the sound of her cheery voice mail message on loudspeaker.
"Hi! This is Sarah. I can't come to the phone right now, so leave a message. Ta!"
Sarah, Cutter and Claudia turned at the first sound of her voice.
"What's that?" asked Sarah.
"I called your old number," answered Becker. "Jamal was telling you the truth, the telephone company didn't update your old number.
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Abby looked at Connor. He was paler than usual, but whether that was from the macabre sight on the other side of the road or the pain in his legs, she wasn't sure.
"How long do you want to wait before we open the anomaly again?" she asked.
"At least an hour," replied Connor. "The raptors will probably follow the herd. I can't imagine them waiting around for us to come back."
"Hmmph," nodded Abby "Good."
She knelt down in front of him and started opening the rucksack, searching through it.
"What are you looking for?" asked Connor.
He shifted his body to lean back against the tree trunk nearest him. His movement left a smear of blood on the stones. Abby was worried about Connor's bleeding leg. She pulled a small pocketknife out of the rucksack and held it up triumphantly.
"I knew we had one," Abby answered with a grin. Connor's brown eyes opened wide.
"What are you gonna do with that Abby?" he asked as she advanced toward him.
"Need to see your leg," she replied grabbing the heavy black denim clinging to his leg. She brought the sharp knife to the fabric.
"Abby!"
"Hold still," Abby ordered as she began to cut the fabric.
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Connor's right calf had puncture wounds on either side of the muscle, but the thick fabric and the anomaly closing abruptly had kept the raptor from closing its bite. The teeth marks left a crescent line on either side of his calf, but at least the muscle was intact.
"It looks sort of like a smile," joked Connor "can you imagine how I'm going to explain the scar to people?"
"Can't tell what it looks like," replied Abby shortly "it's too bloody… need to clean it."
She stood up and quickly turned away from Connor. Abby hoped that her face hadn't betrayed her shock at the sight of his wound. She took a deep breath. Then, Abby grabbed the empty water bottle out of the rucksack, and strode resolutely across the stones to the woods on the other side of the road.
"Where are you going?" asked Connor.
Abby pointed down the embankment. "There's a river," she said "I can hear it. I'm going to get some water so we can clean up your leg."
Connor sighed, and then nodded, settling back against the tree trunk. If Abby hadn't been worried already, his quiet acceptance of her departure would have alarmed her. She looked at the head on the spike to avoid looking at Connor's subdued posture.
"I don't like the way he is looking at me," said Abby as she moved off the far side of the road and headed down the embankment towards the river.
"How do you know the head was a he?" Connor called after her. "And without any eyes, how do you know which way he's looking?"
Abby grinned. Connor's curiosity was unquenched. Maybe his leg wasn't as bad as she thought it was.
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