I couldn't take much more of it.

I was maybe, like, half a second at the most away from leaning over and ripping Leek's watch off his wrist if he looked at it and sighed one more goddamn time. I held my arms down at my sides and told myself, over and over in my head, that it wasn't a good idea.

Leek huffed impatiently, looked up from his watch again– but before I could say something very rude Nick interrupted.

'We're just waiting for Connor,' he explained calmly, 'he'll be here in a minute.'

When Connor burst through the doors a couple of seconds later, I sighed in relief. 'Sorry!' he yelled, tripping over his own feet as he stumbled towards the detector, 'sorry, I'm here! Mr Khan–' He passed Siddiq, slapping him on the shoulder before he came to a final clumsy stop in front of his devise. 'Would you put me in the driving seat, please.' He pressed a couple of buttons on the keyboard and the monitor came to life. 'Aha…' he beamed, as he turned back to team. 'I'd like you to meet the anomaly detection device. Or… A.D.D for short. Actually, that's probably not the best acronym is it, sorry–'

Beside me, Nick laughed under his breath and stepped forward to perch on the edge of Siddiq's desk.

'Sorry,' Connor repeated without slowing down. 'What you're looking at is a fully integrated graphic representation of the radio communications matrix, networking the whole of the UK's transmitters.'

'Is that why it's taken…' Leek paused like he was trying to work it out but didn't understand numbers. 'How many months has it been since you started.'

I didn't know.

Connor's head dropped. 'Like… 3 and a half. 4 if you're counting. But we had to make sure we were doing it right, you didn't want us to rush it did you? And this thing is seriously sophisticated it's got every inch of the UK mapped out.'

'Congratulations,' Jensen interrupted dryly, 'you've built your own Sat Nav.' Stephen peered around Leek to frown at him, but Jensen was too distracted by Leek's chortle to notice.

'I believe you can get them dashboard sized nowadays,' Leek jibbed.

Connor mimicked their laughter sarcastically. 'This watches over the U.K 24/7,' he explained, 'so…' he leant back and pressed a button on his keyboard, and a siren sounded.

My eyes widened slightly, as with it, came bright red flashes of light. And even though I wasn't sure it was completely necessary I had to admit it was cool.

'What's that?' Leek asked.

'That…' Connor responded, 'is just a demo. But when a real anomaly appears this machine can alert us within seconds.'

Nick grinned. 'Good work,' he said sincerely. And I couldn't help but smile; I knew how much it would mean to Connor hearing that come from him. I put my hand on Nick's back and tapped in a silent expression of thanks before I pulled away.

'Here's one I made earlier.'

Connor held up a second devise, much smaller than the A.D.D machine and almost accidently poked himself in the eye with the antennae.

Leek's phone beeped.

'This is a palm–held detector,' Connor continued, 'for use in the field.' He handed it over to Nick. 'It's a short–wave radio receiver. It's got an effective range of 100 meters or so.'

I felt my lips curl up into a smile. A P.H.D– I realised. Of course he called it that.

'I was hoping for something a little bit more compact,' Nick replied.

Connor just shrugged, 'it's a prototype,' he explained. He glanced at me and I nodded back reassuringly. Good answer. 'We can work on it.'

'Have you tried beaming up with it?'

He turned to Jensen. 'Are you here to help or just be sarcastic?' he snipped defencively. 'This is a serious piece of kit. Or at least it will be once we've ironed out the kinks.'

'Technical question,' Leek then said.

'Yes?'

'This is an anomaly detector?'

'It is.'

'I see. Is it detecting now?'

'Yes,' Connor grinned.

'So why have I just been told of a new creature attack?'

Nick and I shared a look.

I wanted it to be some sort of misunderstanding for Connor's sake more than anything, but even I had to admit after looking at the body that there was no way a person could have done it.

'You seen enough?' Nick questioned, one hand already on the zip of the body bag ready to pull it closed.

I nodded.

Connor was only a few feet away. He had the P.H.D in his hand and he was twirling somewhat desperately in search for some kind of signal.

'Claw marks everywhere,' I said lowly, 'ripped to shreds. At a zoo would have said it was a lion, but the bones have been gnawed.'

'Alright,' Nick replied, 'big cat then?'

I nodded. It seemed like it.

Connor turned back, chewing nervously on his lip as he finally found the courage to look Cutter in the eye. 'No radio interference,' he said. 'No magnetic field. No sign of an anomaly.' He took a deep breath. 'I checked… double checked… every chip and circuit board. It's working. If there was an anomaly, it'd have shown up. Stake my life on it.'

'You might have to,' Nick returned.

'Maybe he has a point,' Stephen said, 'perhaps there's another explanation for all of this.'

'Thousands of big cat sighting every year…' I continued, 'leopards, pumas, lynxes…'

'You think they could be big enough to do that?' Nick asked.

Honestly, I didn't. But I wasn't about to explain that in front of Connor. 'Escaped from a private zoo?' I suggested.

'Can you find out if anything's been reported?'

I nodded. My laptop was in the car. Just as I was about to turn back and get it, Stephen's phone bleeped.

He pulled it out of his pocket, looked down to read the message, and I watched his face concertina with confusion.

I slipped my radio into my pocket and tried not to think about what possible reason he could have to be acting almost suspiciously.

'Stephen,' I called. He snapped his head up. 'Everything okay?'

'Yeah, yeah, yeah,' he replied, locking his phone and putting it back in his pocket.

'Are you insane? This is peak season!' The managing director– a Peter Campbell– demanded. 'Do you have any idea how much money we're talking about?'

Nick caught my eye, and we shared the same look of aggravation as our group split down the middle to allow a flow of tourists through.

The park was busy. It occurred to me that I had no idea what month it was though it seemed like summer, which was probably why there were so many children hanging around.

'A big cat just mauled one of your guests to death,' Nick replied.

'You sure?' Peter responded. 'Did you see it?'

'No not yet.'

'Then this conversation is over!'

I felt my mouth drop open with disbelief as he happily continued sticking smiley faces onto the children who walked past him.

'Look,' Nick started, this time more firmly, 'you have to evacuate this place.'

'Peter, he's right.' Valerie Erwin, the deputy manager was walking beside me biting her lip. Jensen had told me she was the one who had helped the guest who found the body. She was a quiet woman, softly spoken, sort of gentle in a way that had made it very easy for Jensen to bully her into not talking to the press.

'When I want your opinion, I'll ask for it.'

'Hey,' I said, bringing his attention snapping around to me, 'don't talk to her like that.'

Peter looked me up and down. Idiot. He was fast working his way through pissing everyone here off.

'What if I close the park and nothing happens, hmm?' he directed at me. 'It'll cost us millions in compensation.'

He didn't know that he'd picked the only person there who could understand the feeling of having that much money and who honestly didn't care about owning or losing it.

I cracked my knuckles, more than happy to give him the argument he was so obviously looking for but before I could tell him I didn't give a fuck about his money Jensen opened his mouth.

'He's got a point,' he said.

Nick sighed. 'What?'

'You don't want to create unnecessary panic,' Jensen continued. 'How about we shut off the paintballing area. Keep everything else open, how'd that sound?'

I stared at him in disbelief.

'I can live with that,' Peter said. He slammed a hand down on Nick's lapel, ambushing him with a big sticker and grinned, 'keep smiling.' Then, leaning in, I heard him whisper, 'and if you say the words "big cat" out loud again, I'll sue you.'

Nick glared at the back of Peter's head as he walked away. Valerie smiled weakly at us before she scampered after him.

'I really want to kill him,' Nick announced. And I imagine he was expecting me to de–escalate the situation but I just hummed in agreement. I reached over, ripped the smiley face sticker off his jacket and screwed it up.

'Evacuate and we've got media meltdown,' Jensen explained, 'how am I supposed to keep a lid on that.'

'Right,' I replied, 'easier to explain how something's killed half the people here.'

'What if the press stumble into an anomaly in the woods?'

'Look, this animal's gonna kill again,' Nick said, 'it's inevitable.'

'Perhaps,' Jensen responded.

I groaned loudly and rolled my eyes.

'I happen to think running that risk is the lesser of two evils.'

'Yes, but if we keep this open people are going to die,' Nick said.

'It's your job to see they don't.' Jensen folded his arms across his chest. 'It's my job to protect the integrity of this operation.'

'At any cost?' Nick finished. He drew his attention away, around at all the people bustling back and forth between amusements and rollercoaster rides. 'Maybe we'll get lucky,' he said, though his tone suggested he didn't believe it, 'maybe the noise will keep the predator away.'