A short time later Claudia and Helen came face to face in the reception area of the zoo. The Home Office representative had been trying to give instructions to one of the SAS soldiers about sealing the area, but true to form, Helen was quick to interrupt.
‘If you want to find its lair, you’re going to need dogs,’ she suggested breezily.
Claudia hadn’t managed to talk to Helen one-to-one since the Pterosaur attack at the club house and decided now was as good a time as any. She asked the soldier to leave the room.
‘You saved my life… thank you,’ she said, addressing the scientist. ‘Although now I come to think of it, you did leave it rather late.’
‘You were doing so well without me,’ Helen said sarcastically. ‘It was only when Nick… ran off… that I thought I should intervene.’
‘He didn’t run off,’ said Claudia, rising to the bait. ‘He went to get help. He did everything he could to protect me.’
Helen glared at her younger rival. She knew Claudia and Cutter liked each other, and it irritated her. She might not have been a part of Cutter’s life for a long time, but Helen didn’t like thinking she’d been replaced.
‘It’s obvious you like him,’ Helen continued.
‘It’s really none of your business!’ Claudia replied hotly. Helen’s attitude really bugged her. She couldn’t just go abandoning her husband, work and friends for eight years, letting them think she was dead, and expect to pick up where she’d left off!
But this wasn’t helping. Controlling her anger, Claudia counted to three. ‘Can we stick to the point?’ she said, changing the topic. ‘What can you tell us about this creature?’
‘It’s fast,’ replied Helen. ‘Incredibly fast. And it can camouflage itself in almost any environment. To survive in the Permian it’s had to be highly adaptable, which is bad news for us.’
Helen shrugged her shoulders, keeping eye contact with Claudia as she continued speaking.
‘Who knows? Maybe that’s how humanity meets its end – by becoming the food source for a more successful species.’
Over in the woods beside the zoo, Cutter, Connor and Stephen were desperately trying to come up with a plan of attack. Unlike the situation with the Pteranodon, Cutter was sure that killing the Future Predator was the only answer. Captain Ryan and Helen walked beside them, along with dozens of SAS personnel and their dogs.
‘This one’s too dangerous,’ he reasoned. ‘If we kill it, we can’t affect the past or the present.’
Without warning, a scream rang out across the forest. Soldiers rushed forward to the empty spot where one of their own had been standing just seconds before. An unearthly clicking noise drifted through the trees as several soldiers shot into thin air.
The sound was all around them now, moving through the forest at lightning speed. The Future Predator materialized on a branch directly above Cutter, allowing him to register its twisted features for the first time. But it didn’t stay put for long. As the soldiers shot again, it vanished.
‘We need a bigger gun,’ Cutter gasped, catching his breath. His heart was racing. Somehow he knew the thing had been coming right for him.
As the group gathered together in a clearing, Cutter tried to keep his thoughts together. The creature seemed to be one step ahead of them all the time.
‘I warned you it was smart,’ Helen said, leaning casually against a tree and crunching into an apple.
‘What we need is something that gives us an edge. Some weakness in its defences,’ Stephen reasoned. ‘Otherwise it’s going to pick us off one by one.’
‘The dogs went crazy before it attacked,’ Connor remembered, as Helen smirked behind him. She obviously knew the answer. ‘What’d make them go off like that?’
‘It can’t be smell,’ decided Stephen. ‘If there was a scent trail they’d have followed it.’
Cutter suddenly clapped his hands together. ‘Hearing!’ he shouted. ‘That’s why it managed to stay ahead of us. It can detect physical movement before it’s within visual range!’
‘And the dogs detect a higher frequency,’ Connor said. ‘They know when it’s nearby.’
‘High frequency soundwaves!’ the professor nodded. ‘It’s like a sonar system. Some animals use it to detect prey.’
‘Like a bat,’ Stephen added carefully. ‘So that’s where the blood in the lion enclosure came in.’
‘That’s it!’ Connor realized, getting excited. ‘This thing must be some kind of… I don’t know… super-bat!’
Helen had been watching the conversation with amusement. She seemed satisfied they’d finally figured it out.
But Cutter had a plan. Turning swiftly to Connor, he asked him to go and retrieve the oscilloscope from the truck. They’d be able to use the tracking device to find the Future Predator before it found them, then lure it into a trap and kill it.
Connor ran through the forest to the car park. He found the oscilloscope thrown carelessly on the floor behind the driver’s seat. As he switched it on, the machine began to beep incessantly.
Connor’s eyes widened with panic. If the tracking device was registering a high reading, then it could only mean one thing.
The Future Predator was right there.
Connor reached over and pulled the door shut. The truck shook as something dropped on to the roof. The student gulped as everything went quiet.
Connor reeled back in terror as the mutant head of the monster smashed through the front windscreen of the car, letting out a high-pitched howl of fury as it tried unsuccessfully to push its bulk between the seats to reach him.
He had to get out of there. Connor threw himself out of the side door, tumbling backwards into the dirt car park. But the creature quickly spotted him. In one rapid move it leapt from the bonnet of the car as shattered glass fell in all directions, hungrily pacing round the side of the vehicle towards him.
Suddenly, a voice rang out from the other side of the car park. Connor looked up with relief as Abby came running from the direction of the zoo. The Future Predator growled contemptuously at the interruption before turning back to Connor. Spit dripped grotesquely from its mouth. Without thinking, Abby picked up a rock from the ground and threw it, striking the creature’s back leg.
Furious, the Future Predator turned and hurtled towards the missile thrower. Abby gulped. Desperate to save Connor, she’d forgotten she had nothing with which to defend herself. Now it looked like they were both going to become lunch.
Just as the creature crouched to dive at her, a single shot rang out. The Future Predator let out an ear-splitting cry, immediately retreating with several bounds back into the forest. Abby and Connor gasped for air as they watched Stephen lower his gun. That had been almost too close.
Connor turned to Abby as the two of them met beside the truck.
‘You just saved my life!’ he said, desperately trying to catch his breath.
‘I had to,’ she replied, trying to raise a smile. ‘You haven’t paid this month’s rent yet!’
Connor sighed as Abby walked back to the zoo. Trust her to think of something like that at a time like this!
∗
A little later, in a clearing in the forest, Cutter, Stephen and Helen watched the SAS swarm through a storage shed. Connor stood in the middle of them, holding the oscilloscope as it beeped wildly.
It wasn’t long before they made a frightening discovery. There, in a makeshift nest on the floor, was a group of five tiny Future Predators, squealing in delight as they clawed and bit at each other. The creature had given birth – here in the present!
‘We’ve got company!’ Connor shouted, as the oscilloscope suddenly went into overdrive. A massive thud sounded on the roof above them.
Captain Ryan raised his gun towards a giant black shadow that was now darting around the room. But before he could shoot, the creature attacked one of the soldiers. Another soldier took aim and fired, but it was too quick for him. Stopping for the briefest of moments, the Future Predator
perched on a crate, ready to strike again.
Cutter’s mind raced wildly. If he didn’t do something now, this creature was going to kill them off one at a time, just like Stephen said. Without a second’s hesitation, he grabbed one of the ugly, squealing babies from the nest and headed for the exit. The predator roared in outrage and took off after him.
Sprinting ahead, Cutter ran into a massive old greenhouse on the other side of the clearing. It had obviously been empty for a while, as weeds and long grass snaked along the sides. Cutter ran towards the far end of the building as the Future Predator appeared in the doorway. He desperately hoped his plan would work.
As the salivating creature began creeping forward, Cutter scanned the top of the structure around him. Then, with the Future Predator’s baby shrieking in his grasp, he lifted his pistol and fired at a glass pane above the creature. As the Future Predator roared in anger, glass rained down upon it, confusing its sonar senses and ripping into its leathery hide. Cutter continued to shoot out the glass panels as the creature spun its head from side to side, trying to distinguish the shards of glass from its prey. Snarling, the Future Predator tried again to move forward. But the professor was too quick. Raising his pistol one final time, he took aim and fired.
With a heavy heart, Cutter prodded the lifeless body of the creature as its baby squirmed in his hand. Even though he knew the predator would have killed him given half a chance, he wished there had been an easier way to deal with it.
Now, the only thing left to do was to send the rest of these creatures back to the future.
‘If you kill them now, you’ll be making a big mistake.’
Helen Cutter was with Lester and Claudia, striding down a corridor of the Home Office. Lester walked ahead with a scowl on his face.
‘Then what do you suggest?’ he quipped. ‘A sympathetic foster family?’
‘A dangerous anomaly to the future is open in the Permian,’ Helen warned. She had no time for small talk with stiff government people like James Lester. ‘Predators could come pouring through.’
‘But why do we keep these animals alive?’ asked Claudia, puzzled.
‘To pinpoint the exact location of the anomaly,’ Helen explained. ‘All bats have extraordinary homing instincts. They’ll know their own environment. They can lead us to it.’
‘And what happens to them then?’ asked Lester, hating being caught up in all this dinosaur gobbledygook more by the minute.
Before Helen could answer, a familiar voice came from the doorway.
‘We kill them,’ Cutter said firmly as he walked into the room. ‘To let even one of them loose in the Permian era could be a potential catastrophe. They could wipe out whole species – they could change things in ways we can’t even conceive.’
‘And afterwards we keep a permanent guard at the future anomaly?’ Lester asked, for once genuinely interested.
‘The threat’s too serious to be ignored,’ Cutter said earnestly, nodding.
‘Serious enough to warrant a permanent intrusion into the past?’ Claudia frowned.
Cutter looked at her curiously. Even though he knew she had to ask these questions as part of her job, he couldn’t tell whether Claudia was on his side or not with this one.
‘With the correct restrictions, yes,’ he answered solemnly.
Lester sighed audibly. Not for the first time, he wished he’d never met Nick Cutter in the first place.
‘All right, we’ll do it,’ he grimaced, turning away. ‘I just hope you’re right.’
Helen caught Cutter’s eye as her mouth turned up into a smile. Claudia watched with envy as Cutter returned Helen’s grin. She knew that no matter how interested she might be in the dinosaur phenomenon, she would only ever be an observer. Claudia could never hope to have the same scientific understanding Helen shared with Cutter, and their professional alliance made her squirm.
Late the next day, a team of SAS soldiers prepared to take the tiny Future Predators back into the anomaly. Helen and Cutter were hitching up their rucksacks, ready to make the trip as well. Cutter, as usual, was busy shouting instructions.
‘Be careful with them,’ he said, as two soldiers lifted the large steel box containing the shrieking baby Future Predators and walked into the shimmering light ahead of them. As always, the anomaly grew brighter for a second as the men went through.
Claudia walked up to the professor. She looked worried.
‘What happens if it closes while you’re on the other side?’ she asked gravely.
‘We wait until it reopens,’ he said confidently, smiling at her. Claudia had the same vulnerable look now as when she’d lost her sight at the golf club. Cutter suddenly felt protective and wanted to reassure her.
As Connor, Abby, Stephen and several SAS soldiers studied equipment and tracking devices behind them, Helen jealously watched Cutter and Claudia from the other side of the clearing. Since her return, Cutter had made it very clear that he no longer considered her his wife, and it made her blood boil.
‘I think we should get going,’ she said loudly. She didn’t want to give Claudia and Cutter any more time together.
Hearing Helen’s instructions, Claudia suddenly grabbed Cutter’s arm. Something about the bad dinosaur and anomaly dreams she’d been having made her uneasy.
‘Don’t go,’ she said urgently. Cutter looked surprised. ‘I think this is a mistake. I’ve got a really bad feeling about this.’
Cutter looked at her calmly. ‘It’ll be fine,’ he said quietly, his green eyes sparkling warmly. ‘I’ll see you soon.’
Cutter picked up his bag and made his way to the anomaly. Claudia watched him go. Even after their conversation she didn’t feel any better. Something wasn’t right.
Elsewhere in the clearing, it was Abby’s turn to feel uneasy. She’d just noticed Helen catch Stephen’s eye as she waited by the doorway into the Permian era. Something about the familiar way they looked at each other made her anxious. It was only a fleeting glance, but it was almost as if they had an understanding. Abby frowned. Maybe she’d just been imagining things.
As Cutter and Helen turned to follow the SAS through the anomaly, Claudia couldn’t hold herself back. If Cutter wouldn’t stay, she at least needed to let him know she hadn’t forgotten what happened at the golf club. Claudia ran and kissed the surprised professor. Cutter smiled at her and then kissed her back, as Helen scowled at them with contempt. Everyone else just looked on in astonishment. No one knew about their kiss in the club house, and they certainly hadn’t been expecting this!
As the group disappeared through the shards of light, Connor’s mobile rang. After a hurried conversation, he hung up the phone looking confused.
‘The creature’s autopsy proves beyond any doubt that it was definitely a male,’ Connor said, frowning.
Stephen shook his head, trying to make sense of it. The creature had to be female – it had given birth! And if it wasn’t, then that meant the creature Cutter had killed in the greenhouse wasn’t the only Future Predator to get through the anomaly.
Over on the table, the oscilloscope suddenly began beeping again, going into overdrive as a dark shadow paced through the scrub. Stephen thought he saw a blur shoot past out of the corner of his eye, but as he spun round, nothing was there. Abby shivered. Once again, she could feel a presence watching her. A second later, all three of them turned in the direction of the anomaly, as it let out a bright glimmer, just as it did every time something went through it. But surely they would have realized if something had gone through?
Stephen breathed in sharply, knowing from his encounters with the first Future Predator that it moved fast. There was a chance another could have just darted through the anomaly without any of them seeing it. And if there really was a female creature on the loose, she’d be looking for her babies.
‘Did you see something?’ Claudia asked urgently, striding across the clearing as the SAS soldiers raised their weapons. She felt like she was about to snap. This whole
thing was just getting weirder by the second.
‘Nothing,’ replied Stephen honestly, as Connor held his compass up and confirmed the anomaly was stronger than ever. He just hoped something else had unsettled it.
Inside the anomaly Cutter was looking around in utter fascination. He’d been here before, but the Permian era still took his breath away – it was incredible! Finding himself in a landscape created over 250 million years ago, the professor scrunched up his nose as the familiar smell of rotten eggs wafted faintly through the air. Everything was exactly as he remembered it.
Gazing in wonder at their dry, barren surroundings, Cutter helped Helen, Ryan and the SAS soldiers make camp among a sparse green patch of vegetation and shrub. It was a change from the vast stony hillsides they’d trekked over to get here, and allowed them at least some protection from any creatures that might come across them. The soldiers had dumped their heavy supply boxes, leaving the crate of baby Future Predators sitting beside some equipment in the sun.
Helen rolled down the top of her overalls and stood in a dark khaki singlet and neck scarf, taking photos with the camera she had found on the table at Cutter’s house. She’d recognized it as her own, and realized Cutter must have picked it up when he travelled through the anomaly and into the Permian era the first time. It was good to have it back again.
‘Hey, Nick!’ she called out from her vantage point on top of a hillside. ‘Come here!’
Cutter excused himself from his conversation with Captain Ryan and walked through the maze of rocks embedded in the ground.
She threw her camera to him and smiled. ‘May as well take a souvenir,’ she grinned, posing.
Cutter held up the camera and looked through the viewfinder, trying to include the distant herd of giant Gorgonopsids in the shot. Cutter thought back to several months ago when he’d seen one walking through the Forest of Dean. It was the first dinosaur to come through any of the anomalies. The professor smiled. They might look cumbersome and harmless right now, but they were carnivores and could attack and move with deadly speed.
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