![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
fredbassettAuthor : fredbassett
Fandom : Primeval
Characters : Stephen, Ryan, Connor, Abby, Lester, Lyle & others
Rating : 18
Disclaimer : Not mine (except Lyle), no money made, don’t sue
Spoilers : None
Summary : Dark and nasty and still getting worse ….
Tags : fic, slash, Stephen, Ryan, Lester, Cutter, Connor, Abby
The words to The Parys Mountain Mine are owned by Adrian Duncan. Hope you don’t mind me borrowing them! From the CD Karst Fever, by the wonderfully named Dangerous Dick and the Duckbusters. Find it, buy it, enjoy it!
And again, many thanks to Deinonychus_1. The mistakes are still mine!
So let’s all take our headlamp’s glow
Where the moonlight never shines
And we’ll sing this song as down we go
To the stopes and the levels far below
Where the mud lies thick and the waters flow
In the
Connor bent over the body and gave a low whistle. “Oh shit.”
“What is it?” demanded Ryan. “And don’t say dead.”
“Dead sounds good to me,” muttered the student, forgetting he was wearing a helmet and trying to run a grimy hand through his hair. “You’ve seen
Ryan nodded, knowing that he wasn’t going to like whatever was coming next. This thing, or one of it’s friends, had ripped out the old guy’s throat and somehow managed to make a fucking great big hole in his guts as well.
Ditzy had taken one look at the poor sod and shaken his head. Feeling for a pulse when most of the neck was missing was pretty pointless. He was a medic, not a miracle worker. A long slime of yellow entrails lay untouched on the muddy floor. Trying to stuff them back wouldn’t help either.
“So which part of the cast’s arrived to haunt us now?”
“Remember the scene near the end with the raptors? Well, this lot are like them only smarter and more dangerous.”
“Those buggers could open doors!”
“Well, these buggers could probably change the locks as well. Deinonychus. If you want it in English, Terrible Claw. They’re predators. They’re smart and they’re mean.” As an afterthought, he added, “The debate about whether they actually hunted in packs hasn’t been settled yet.”
“Looked like a pack to me,” muttered Stephen, watching in horrific fascination as Connor gingerly lifted one of the dead beast’s hind feet and displayed a large, curved and distinctly blood-stained claw which seemed to take the place of the second toe. A claw that was longer than Connor’s entire hand.
Ditzy walked over and provided a welcome distraction from contemplation of the claw.
“Can they walk?”
“One yes, the other no. The guide’ll need help. I can carry one kid.”
“Get’em out of here. Take Dane. Come back after if you can.” Ryan wished he didn’t have to ask the next question, but he had little choice. “Connor, Mary, will you stay?”
“There are kids missing and you don’t know your way around,” said Mary. “I’ll stay.”
“Me too,” said Connor. He gave a shaky laugh then shot a glance at Stephen, half scared, half excited. “I’ve always believed they were pack hunters, but I never thought I’d find out the hard way. Can you track them?”
Stephen Hart looked down at the muddy floor of the chamber.
The deinonychus’ prints stood out at a distance of several metres. Blood pooled in one of them. Obscenely bright and wet in the lamp-light.
“I can track them. The question you should be asking is whether they can track us.”
The Devil’s Crowll. 9.15am.
The pile of rocks grew rapidly in inverse proportion to the shortening of Helen Cutter’s temper.
Neither of the men had been willing to explain why they’d suddenly abandoned the place they’d spent the last hour excavating, in favour of another spot, no more than two metres to the left. Which looked identical. Absolutely fucking identical.
Her questions had been met with an irritatingly impenetrable silence coupled with some even more annoying shared looks. If these two weren’t screwing yet they bloody well soon would be, in her view.
What the hell was it with men these days? Had half of the
In his first year he’d cheerfully screwed his way round half the campus, or so it had seemed. The combination of cornflower blue eyes, black hair and eyelashes long enough to make Bambi weep with jealousy had ensured a steady stream of girls through his bedroom door. But by the end of the first term, Helen had known he was hers for the taking. She’d played with him a while longer, feigning indifference, amused by the way his natural ability to flirt deserted him completely as soon as she came into the room.
When she’d finally made her move, the look in his eyes had been an intoxicating mixture of hope and anticipation, with a side-order of lust. He’d not proved to be too bad in bed either, although he’d needed some education.
She sighed and glanced over her shoulder.
The anomaly was taking it’s time reappearing. It had surprised her by fading so quickly, she couldn’t deny that, but what had surprised her even more was finding company down here. That really hadn’t been something she’d expected. She’d only popped through for a quick look around, to check if anything had changed and the damned thing had caught her out. And even she had to admit that on this occasion, she was glad that she hadn’t been alone, just in case it didn’t reappear on schedule.
Her hand went automatically to the rucksack at her side and she felt the comforting lump of the lodestone.
The two men were still taking it in turns to work, ten minutes on, ten minutes off, unless it took both of them to drag out a particularly stubborn boulder. She contented herself with keeping an eye on the glistening surface of the pool, checking to make sure they weren’t about to be graced by a return visit from the mastodonsaurus. The damn thing should have found the way back to its own time by now, but you could never tell when the lure of easy prey would cause the beasts to hand around.
The soldier lent back on his heels, filthy and panting. “There’s airspace beyond. I can see it.”
“What’s the roof look like?” asked an equally grimy Lester. That had been another surprise. She hadn’t thought the slimy little toad had it in him to have risked his neck like this.
“OK. Seen worse. Another few rocks and we can give it a try.”
They set to again like a pair of terriers trying to make a break for freedom under a fence.
She doubted if anyone in
Ten minutes later, Lester slithered backwards hauling one large, sharp-sided rock out with him, seemingly oblivious to the fact that he’d gashed the back of his hand and blood was now mixing freely with the mud. The look of triumph in his eyes said it all.
“I can get through, but it’s not fat bastard size yet. Do you want me to shift a few more rocks?”
Lyle grinned. “Who got stuck on the pitch?”
“Leg length, dear boy, that was the only problem. This is a straight squeeze into the next churn, and it looks a decent size through there. Shall I take a look?”
“Be my guest. I’ll keep an eye on Mrs. C. Don’t want her running off with the kit, do we?”
“And where do you think I might run to, lieutenant?” asked Helen, raising one, clean, well-defined eyebrow.
“The Permian, the Cretaceous, the Fuck-Knows-Where ……… you name it, I expect you to run to it. And I’d rather you didn’t do it with my assault rifle, thank you very much. And I take it your taxi’s late?”
“What makes you think I know when the anomalies will reappear?”
“The use of re-appear, rather than appear, is a bit of a give away, in my opinion, but hey, I just shoot things for a living, so what would I know?” Abruptly, his attention shifted from her to Lester’s boots, as they slid through the hole and disappeared from sight. “Does it go?”
“Sure as hell does,” came back the faint echo of the civil servant’s voice from the other side of the squeeze. “Big churn, at least two passages leading off. Life’s looking up, Lyle! Give me five, and I’ll be back.”
“Watch yourself!” Lyle positioned himself by the rock pile, his hand resting protectively on the rifle. “So, looks like we’re out of here. Coming along for the ride?”
Helen Cutter stared at him, unable to disguise her curiosity any longer, “So why did you change where you were digging?”
“We’d chosen the wrong spot.”
“Obviously, but how did you work that out?” Without discussing it?
Lyle grinned. “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”
“Try me.”
“You’re not my type, sweetie.”
Helen sighed. “What does a girl have to do to get some attention around here? Grow a penis?”
Lyle’s grin broadened, “I can’t imagine that’d be an improvement, but you’re welcome to try.” He leant down to the hole, listening for any noises carrying back from the other side. “So, how do you work out when and where the things will appear?”
“So, how did you work out you were digging in the wrong place?”
“We saw a ghost and he showed us the right place.”
“And I read the Anomaly Timetable on the Internet. Pull the other one, Lieutenant Lyle. Are you going to tell me the truth or not?”
“I just did, Mrs. Cutter, but I rather suspect you wouldn’t recognize the truth if it was served up on a plate with a sprig of holly on top.”
Her retort was lost in the sound of rocks being dragged out from the other side of the squeeze.
Two minutes later, Lester wriggled back through.
“Don’t say I never do anything for you, sweetheart. You should make it now without too much problem. Both passages go. So, do I take it we aren’t just going to sit around here waiting to be rescued?”
“Too bloody right, we’re not. I haven’t been rescued from a cave yet, and I don’t intend to start now.” Lyle glanced over at Helen, “You’re not exactly dressed for this, you’ll have to watch your head.”
“And where do you think you’re going to end up if you go off through there?”
“The bottom end of the Clearwell System, I hope.” Something very close to alarm flickered across Helen Cutter’s face and Lyle’s hazel eyes narrowed sharply. “What’s bothering you, lady? The thought of a couple of hours inappropriately dressed clambering around in the mud, or something a little bit more specific?”
“I’d prefer to take my chance on the anomaly returning rather than dash off into the wild brown yonder following you two.”
Lyle glanced over at Lester. “Your call, sir.”
Lester shrugged. “We can hardly drag her along kicking and screaming.” His expression was dismissive, designed to irritate Helen. “So how far do you think we’ve got to go, Lyle, and are we just going to get stuck at the bottom of a pitch?”
“How far? Difficult to be sure, but according to the surveys, the bottom of Clearwell is no more than two thousand metres from the bottom of the Crowll, and we must have covered about half of that under water. Clearwell isn’t particularly vertical, unlike the Crowll, so if we’re lucky, we might be walking out of the show cave in the next few hours.” He was answering Lester’s question, but watching Helen at the same time. “The only ladders are the fixed ones from the Deep Levels up to the main tourist areas.”
There was still something about the expression on the woman’s face whenever he mentioned Clearwell that Lyle didn’t like. Acting on impulse, the soldier shot out a hand and gripped her wrist, yanking her towards him, off-balance and vulnerable.
“Is there another of your bloody anomalies through there, Mrs. Cutter? Are we just going to walk straight into yet another re-run of
“Call your fucking animal off, Lester!”
“I seem to have mud in my ears,” remarked Sir James Lester, quietly.
“You had your chance,” muttered Lyle, giving Helen’s wrist a sharp twist. “Now stop holding back before I really do hurt you. What’s waiting for us on the other side that you seem so keen on avoiding?”
“There’s always been more than one anomaly in this area,” panted Helen, a look of pure venom in her eyes. “If Clearwell is where you say it is, then the chances are that something else may have come through. This area seems to have been unusually active recently.”
Thinking back to a close encounter with seven tyrannosauruses, Lyle couldn’t help but agree with her. “They take tourists into Clearwell,” said the soldier, in a calm, dangerous voice.
“Then they’d better have good insurance cover,” said Helen, as she tried, and failed, to land a kick behind Lyle’s knee.
Hazel eyes met brown, and a slight nod from Lester was all that Lyle needed.
A second later, Helen Cutter stared down at her right hand in surprise, seeing her little finger sticking out at an unnatural angle to the side of her hand. Knife sharp pain penetrated her brain a split second later and she wasn’t able to choke back her scream.
“You fucking bastard, you’ve broken it!”
“Tell me what might be down there, or I’ll go for the matching set. I haven’t the time or the patience for subtlety and I’m gonna count to three ……. one ……… two ……….”
“Dromaeosaurs called Deinonychus … …Related to raptors!” She spat the words at him like a curse, cradling her hand in the crook of her arm, tears of pain springing treacherously into her eyes. “But I doubt they can climb ladders.”
“They take trips into the Deep Levels as well. Adventure caving, it’s called.” With a look of pure disgust on his face, Lyle caught her hand again and made another sharp movement. To Helen’s amazement, the stab of white hot pain subsided into a dull ache. “I only dislocated it. But give me half an excuse and I’ll break the next one, believe me.” Ignoring her muttered obscenities, he turned to Lester, his voice now urgent, “They take kids on those trips, sir. And this bitch doesn’t seem to care.”
Lester’s eyes flickered to the hole under the rock wall and he nodded. Without another word, Lyle shoved his rifle into the squeeze, and followed it through, leaving Lester to stare thoughtfully at Helen Cutter. “Do you really not care what happens to children, Dr. Cutter? Or does survival of the fittest apply to the young of the species as well, so far as you’re concerned?”
As he dragged himself through the squeeze, the civil servant barely heard her final words.
“Mind their feet, Lester. Deinonychus don’t clip their toe-nails and they can disembowel you with one swipe. And contrary to your trained ape’s opinion, I do care. Although I’ll make an exception where you two are concerned.”
“What happens if we shout?” asked Ryan.
“Then they’ve a better chance of hearing us,” said Mary. “Or wasn’t that what you meant? Connor, how will your beasties react?”
Connor shrugged, his mud-streaked face pale, but composed. “I wish I knew. If they’re hungry it might attract them. But the one thing in our favour is that they’re out of their natural habitat, it’s dark, cold and muddy. They won’t be liking this.”
“They’re not the only ones,” muttered a grim-faced Ryan. “OK, we take a chance and start yelling. Is there any way of searching this warren systematically, Mary?”
The caver shook her head. “Not with our numbers, not if we don’t split up. And there’s no way we’re doing that, so follow me.” And with that she was off again, pausing every minute or so to yell, “Hello! We’re here to help you! It’s safe to come out!”
They found the first child quickly, a boy of about ten, cowering in a small alcove so close to the ground that they almost missed him. He was curled into a ball, his head tucked into his arms.
Kermit hauled the lad out and settled him on one hip like an overgrown baby. “It’s OK, we’ve got you. What’s your name? … … Jason? Hi, Jason, I’m Kermit … … yeah, like the frog. Do you know where any of your friends are?”
The boy shook his head, displaying a face streaked with mud, snot and tears. From somewhere, Kermit produced a large handkerchief, like a magician hauling a rabbit out of a hat and proceeded to mop the lad’s nose and eyes.
With a swift look round to make sure they hadn’t missed another kid in the vicinity, they moved off, Ryan now bringing up the rear with Stephen in front, staring intently at the ground.
“The deinonychus went into the chamber from this direction,” said Stephen, still focussed on the trampled mud floor, “but they didn’t leave it the same way, which probably explains why Jason’s still alive. I want to back-track to where we started. I can’t see any other prints here. Mary, how many ways out of that chamber are there?”
“The way we went in, plus four more.”
They rounded the corner back into the chamber. Ryan stopped abruptly, Connor almost piling into the back of him.
Four of the creatures were still there, three of them clustered around the body of the dead cave guide. Feeding. The fourth, bigger than the others, appeared to be standing watch. In one shockingly quick move, it leaped towards him, bringing both hind legs up in a slashing attack.
The soldier fired his assault rifle from the hip. One short burst, followed by a single shot.
“Two more down,” he announced, with grim satisfaction. The other two had scattered back into the darkness. “That’ll serve the greedy sods right coming back for a second helping. Kermit, don’t let the lad see, it’s not nice in there.”
Stephen slid alongside Ryan, keeping his voice low. “This isn’t going to work. We’re moving too slowly to be effective. Leave Kermit and Connor somewhere safe with the kid, somewhere they can defend. If we find any others alive we can bring them back here.”
Safe was a relative term in circumstances like these, but an alcove reached by clambering two metres up one wall was the best they could find.
With Jason stowed safely behind them, Connor and the soldier settled down to wait and watch. As the others moved off Ryan heard Kermit ask, “And if the buggers come back? I presume even the professor wouldn’t expect us to try and keep this lot alive?”
“You shoot ‘em and I cheer,” said Connor. “Got any pom-poms? We won’t be keeping them as pets, that’s for sure.”
Lester leant against the wall, dragging air into his lungs in great heaving gasps. They’d been moving fast. It had been fairly easy going for the most part, but an awkward wriggle had taken it out of him and he was desperate for a few minutes respite.
By unspoken agreement, both men had been pushing the pace, neither of them able to rid their minds of the thought of more creatures loose in an area of the mine visited by unsuspecting tourists. Worse, by children.
A sense of nagging, haunting unease had gripped both of them almost as soon as they’d cleared the squeeze into what was clearly a different part of the system.
There was no way Lester wanted to stop now, but there was equally no way his legs would carry him another step without a rest.
Lyle saw the look of desperate frustration on the other man’s face and shook his head. “Forget it, sir. We take a ten minute break.”
The two men slumped next to each other, arms touching and without even being conscious of what he was doing, Lester let his head slide sideways to rest on Lyle’s shoulder. The soldier shifted position instinctively and tucked an arm round the other man’s neck, drawing him down into a more comfortable position.
“If we ever get out of here, lieutenant, I am never ever going into so much as a basement again for the rest of my life.”
Lyle’s breathless laughter was warm on his ear. “I’m beginning to agree with you.” Unless it’s a guaranteed critter-free zone.
They were both too exhausted to realise that even after five minutes, their breathing wasn’t getting any easier.
The passages that connected the Deep Levels with the Devil’s Crowll were home to a killer ever bit as deadly as anything the past could produce.
Stephen shoved another clip into the Browning and as soon as Ryan heard the noise of a round being chambered, he reached for a fresh magazine for the M4.
The soldier swore that the fucking things were getting better at dodging.
Hart had missed his target twice now and there was certainly nothing wrong with his lover’s reactions or his aim. It was just that the deinonychus seemed to have mastered the art of drawing their fire and then bounding back into the shadows while another one attacked from a different direction.
Ryan had lost count of how many they’d hit. Five were down and wouldn’t rise again for certain. But they also had a nasty habit of playing possum. He had a hole in his right thigh to prove it. Stephen’s first aid had been basic in the extreme. Leaving Mary to keep watch, he’d taken off his helmet, shrugged the boiler suit off his shoulders then dragged his shirt off, and proceeded to use it as a pressure pad on Ryan’s thigh, holding it in place with the straps of the gun holster.
Just as Stephen was re-fastening his helmet strap, Mary said, almost casually, “Incoming!” Her Browning spat into the darkness. Once, twice, three times. “Try again, losers.” A moment later, she remarked, “I’m starting to think I watch too much crap TV.”
“What did you do before going into the hotel trade?” asked Stephen.
“Brought up three kids. The techniques are similar. Don’t give ‘em chance to argue and don’t threaten what you ain’t gonna do.”
“If you want a change of career, let me know,” said Ryan. “OK, folks, two found, two to go. Let’s move it.”
A burst of gunfire some distance away told him that Kermit and Connor had come under threat again. When the hell were these buggers going to give up? It was almost as if the bastards were out for revenge now. They were unlikely to be still after food. When they’d returned to the chamber with the second child, a girl with her left arm torn almost to shreds, Ryan had noticed that the deinonychus had dragged Fred’s body out of the churn, leaving a snail-trail of blood and guts behind as mute testimony to the man’s death.
If they survived this, he knew it’d be a hell of a long time before he got the sound of the little girl’s cries out of his ears. Even after they’d delivered the child to Connor and Kermit, he could still had her pain echoing in his head. A high-pitched frantic keening that nothing could quieten.
He found himself praying to a God that he didn’t even believe in for the arrival of Jim Mitchell’s group. If they didn’t get the injured kids to the surface quickly they’d lose at least one of them. Maybe more. Kermit had run out of anything resembling bandages and had now started cutting clothing into strips.
The only thing in their favour was that the fuckers seemed to be concentrating on hunting them while they hunted for the children.
Ryan hadn’t worked out yet whether that was a good development or a bad one. But it might mean the last two missing kids still stood a chance.
That is if they weren’t dead already.
For fuck’s sake, just another few minutes rest, please.
Lyle shrunk away from the hand shaking his shoulder and his arms tightened round Lester’s strangely unresponsive body as he tried to settle back into much-needed sleep.
The rasp of his own laboured breathing sounded harsh in the silence of the cave and the soldier became dimly aware of a pounding in his head. The hand shook his shoulder again and Lyle’s eyes suddenly snapped open.
He and Lester were alone in the small chamber. And he was still having trouble dragging air into his lungs.
Shit! Lyle, you’re a stupid bastard! And you were bloody nearly a dead one. Still cursing himself, he started to shake the other man as hard as he’d just been shaken. “Wake up, for fuck’s sake wake up!” His movements were sluggish and the pain in his head was getting worse, but from somewhere Lyle dredged up enough energy to slap Sir James Lester hard on the face, leaving behind an angry red mark and even more smeared red mud.
The other man groaned and tried to roll away from the blow. Lyle shook him again and started to drag his companion upright.
“Move! If we don’t move we die! Bad air … … come on, shift yourself.” He hauled one of the man’s arms over his shoulder and half dragged, half carried Lester out of the chamber.
Why the hell hadn’t he realised this sooner? He’d had experience of high C02 levels before and should have recognised the signs, but they’d been pushing the pace so hard that he’d put the panting down to the fact that he was knackered. That they were both knackered.
That mistake had nearly killed them.
The passage came to an abrupt end and Lyle found himself staring at a blank wall.
Jesus H. Christ.
For a second, the soldier’s resolve came close to snapping and he slammed his fist into the rock, breaking the skin on his knuckles and mixing blood with ochre. Red on red.
This time, the hand that shook his shoulder was attached to someone he could see, as well as feel.
“Don’t give up on me now, Lyle,” demanded Lester, his voice rough. “There’s a way up, I can see it. Give me a leg up.”
It took fifteen minutes and some inventive combined tactics, but eventually, they reached the top of the climb and found themselves breathing better air. Carbon dioxide levels were still high but nowhere near as bad. Lyle’s best guess had the level down to about 2%, rather than 4%, which at least took it below the fatal mark.
This time it was Lyle who slumped for a moment against Lester, his arms trembling from the effort of hauling his companion’s entire weight up the last section of the chimney. They’d run out of footholds after the first two metres and Lyle himself had only got up by standing on Lester’s shoulders, while they were balanced precariously on a small ledge.
“Knew you were a fat bastard,” muttered Lester. “I think I’m an inch shorter now. Next time, I stand on you.”
“And you could have pulled me up?”
“Details, details, you military types are all the same. Obsessed with fucking details.”
“It’s Mister Detail who’ll keep you alive, laddie,” intoned the soldier in a mock parade-ground voice, “ Remember the Six Pees …..Planning and Preparation Prevents Piss Poor Performance.”
Lester raised an eyebrow, even though the gesture was largely pointless in view of the mud caking his face, “So, we’re god only knows where, in an area riddled with foul air, with no tackle, no survey, no-one who knows where we are and you’re trying to tell me you planned all this? Next time we go on a date, Lieutenant Lyle, I get to choose the venue.”
The look of amusement on Lyle’s face faded abruptly as both men heard the faint but unmistakeable sound of gun shots.
It looked very much like they really had succeeded in connecting the Devil’s Crowll to the Clearwell System.
Mary Mitchell’s shoulders shook and tears streamed down her face. She’d cradled the little girl in her arms and talked to her even after she’d known the child really was dead. Hearing is the last of the senses to go and Mary wasn’t taking any chances.
Ryan took off his gloves and gently closed the child’s eyes. Stephen wrapped an arm round Mary’s shoulders as she held the small, torn body. Silent tears ran down his cheeks.
“I really thought we were going to save them all,” said Mary, in a voice no louder than a whisper. “Even knowing they’d killed Fred, I still thought we were going to save them all, I really did.”
Ryan brushed a tear off her cheeks with the same gentleness as he’d closed the little girl’s eyes.
“You can’t always save them all, Mary, but we have saved some of them.” Or at least I think we have. But it’s the ones you can’t save that you remember. All of them. Every single one.
He could still remember their faces, even now. And a blonde twelve year old whose name he didn’t even know had just found her way onto that list.
The caver stared up at him, her face white underneath the smears of red mud. “How do you cope, Ryan?”
“You try to remember the ones that you did save,” answered the soldier.
“And does it work?”
Ryan hesitated, and then told her the truth. She’d fought at his side, she’d earned it. “No. But it helps a bit. And that’s all you can hope for in this job.”
Mary looked up at him from eyes that were, for the moment, beyond fear. “We’re going to leave her here, aren’t we? Even though those bastard things might come back and eat her.”
The Special Forces captain nodded. “There’s nothing we can do for her now, but we might still be able to help the last kid.” He held his hand down to her. “Come on.”
She grabbed his fingers and let him pull her to her feet. Beside them, Stephen arranged the child’s body as decently as he could, and laid the helmet over the small face, covering a long rip down one cheek. He left her light on.
Mary met Ryan’s gaze and asked one last question, “Do you ever cry, Captain?”
He smiled, but his eyes were as bleak as a midwinter sky. “Yes, and sometimes it even helps.”
She smiled back. It didn’t reach her eyes, but it was a start.
“One last route to check,” said Stephen, drawing the Browning again and starting to move off down the passage, back the way they’d come.
At the edge of the main churn, Ryan caught Stephen’s arm and held him back. The soldier stepped out cautiously, telling his lover to cover him. They’d been ambushed here twice already and he wasn’t taking any chances.
When nothing launched an immediate attack, he called, “Connor? Kermit? What’s the score?”
“I wish we fucking knew, mate, but it looks suspiciously like a score draw from up here!” replied a voice he wasn’t expecting to hear. Stringer. “We got here ten minutes ago. Abby’s riding shotgun for me. Kermit and Pippin are heading out with Jim and the kids. Cutter and Phil are with them. Phil’s got a broken arm. Fiver’s stuck a way back down the passage. One of the fucker’s took a sodding great big lump out of his thigh and ripped his lower leg to shit as well. Fizz’s covering him. It’s gonna take a stretcher to get him out.”
“They keep coming back,” said Abby, from the ledge next to Stringer. “They know we’re here. They come in from one of the side passages, one of them tries to distract us, then they attack. They’re not just smart, they’re sneaky.”
“There’s still one kid we haven’t found,” said Ryan. “Stay there and keep picking off any you see. There’s only one passage we haven’t tried, so if you can stop them following us, it’s a bonus. Are either of you injured?”
“Joel’s got a bloody great big rip in his side,” said Abby, calmly. “I’m OK.”
“I’ll live,” said Stringer, equally calmly, “but they like the smell of blood. You can see ‘em sniffing.” And we’ve heard them ripping a body apart round the corner, but it’s probably not the time to mention that right now. Not in front of the children.
“Abby, anything else about their behaviour?” asked Stephen, already casting around on the ground near the final passage, hoping that Abby’s observations might tell them something useful.
She hesitated a moment before answering, “I don’t know. Maybe. Look at the carcasses. Some of them are smaller. Juveniles, I think. I’m almost getting the impression that they’re being taught to hunt. Taught to think, even. Jesus, Stephen, they’re fucking smart.”
In spite of the situation, Stephen grinned. Of all of them, Abby rarely swore. He’d wondered what it would take to shake her habitual composure. “I thought you liked lizards.”
Her irritated reply, “They’re not lizards!” followed him down their last, unchecked, passage.
Ryan looked down at the thick, heavily trampled mud on the floor of the passage and wondered, not for the first time, what traces Hart was finding to follow. Then he realised that the other man was looking more at the walls than the floor and that he was actually tracking marks left by small, bloodied fingers, as a child’s right hand was thrown out for balance as it had run blindly down the passage, stooping height for adults, but not for a kid.
Did they stand a chance of finding the child alive?
From behind them came the sound of Stringer’s assault rifle.
Ryan exchanged a glance with Mary, then they pressed on.
no subject
Date: 2007-10-04 06:16 pm (UTC)*sends e-cake and e-booze to help sustain you*
And from what I've seen of your Numb3rs stuff, Primeval would be a doddle for you :)