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English
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2021-08-08
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1,213
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1/1
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Next Time

Summary:

On clean up after an anomaly callout, Abby has a few realisations.

Notes:

Written for goldarrow in the Denial Summer Fic Exchange, very loosely using the prompt "I still haven't managed to work out just what the f*** you're intending".

Work Text:

It figures that after an afternoon spent chasing a small dinosaur around a nearly-finished show home that Abby is left managing the clean up.

To be fair, the gash on Connor’s arm had been pretty nasty, so Cutter had taken the role of designated adult dealing with the paramedics while Claudia had long since dragged Stephen off to help charm the property developers into not doing anything that would lead to even more paperwork than she was already facing.

Ryan’s SF team are guarding the second-floor landing where the anomaly has been lazily blinking in and out of existence for the last several hours. This one seems to be operating on a steady thirty-eight minute cycle, and one of Ryan’s men is poised ready for the next go-round.

Downstairs in the kitchen, Abby fills another bucket and takes it out into the hallway where Ryan is waiting. “How much longer?” she asks.

“Twelve minutes,” Ryan tells her. He takes the bucket upstairs and Abby takes a moment to lean against a wall and get her breath back. The tiny ornithopod had defied identification by Connor’s database but oh god, it had produced enough vomit to put both Connor’s uni halls and Abby’s lizard house to shame.

There are traces of soil and petals all over the place – not exactly difficult to see what had set the creature off. There was something to be said for culture shock, Abby thinks, taking her rubber gloves off to run a hand through her hair. She’s pretty sure if she’d been transported a couple hundred million years away from home, she’d have trouble digesting the local cuisine too.

Still, the creature has been safely repatriated through the anomaly and it had been Abby’s call – soundly backed up by Cutter – to get as much of the detritus back through as possible to prevent any more contamination. Minus, of course, a few very small samples for some of the Home Office boffins to analyse in more depth.

Two hours of shovelling prehistoric vomit is far from how Abby had envisioned her Saturday afternoon going, but she thinks she can’t complain too much. Aside from the smell. And the texture. And the sheer volume.

Abby’s smelled much worse in the lizard house. And at home. But it’s still pretty bad.

The house is going to have to be fumigated once they were all done here. Personally Abby would vote for tearing it down, saying a few prayers and rebuilding from scratch. Probably a good thing she doesn’t have any say in things like that.

Ryan reappears with the now empty bucket and waits for Abby to put her gloves back on before handing it back over.

“Great,” Abby says dryly. “I think we’re nearly done here.”

That they are. It takes three more round trips with the bucket before Abby is satisfied there was no more mess that hadn’t been caused by the anomaly.

They just make the next anomaly window, and Abby hangs back while one of Ryan’s men uses his improvised delivery device – a wheelie-bin someone had nabbed from a half constructed house three doors down – to haul the last lot of vomit through the anomaly.

“Good job, everyone,” Ryan says. He dismisses the rest of his team to get some fresh air and takes up position in front of the anomaly. Abby hesitated for a moment then leaned against the banister next to Ryan.

In front of them, and in front of a bedroom door, the anomaly shimmers away.

It’s an easy silence until Abby hears noises from downstairs. She nods at Ryan before going to check it out. In the hallway she finds Claudia with her hand over her nose.

“That is a lot worse than when I left,” Claudia manages, pointing at the kitchen.

Abby grins despite herself. “I never met anyone who liked peonies.”

Claudia makes a half laughing, half snorting noise. “I told the manager we’d cover the cleaning costs. Goodwill and all that.”

Abby nods. “How’s Connor?”

“He’ll live,” Claudia says wryly. “There’s an A&E not too far from here, they’re going to patch him up there.”

“Oh, good.”

“And the anomaly?” Claudia asks.

“Still going,” Abby says. “We’re going to have to stay here ‘til it doesn’t come back, aren’t we?”

Claudia nods. “All the more reason for us to oversee the full clean up.”

Not for the first time Abby wishes they had some way of knowing how long anomalies stayed open. There’s a permanent team stationed in the Forest of Dean now, both monitoring and trying to make sense of the recurring anomaly there.

Claudia coughs into her sleeve. “Your work here is done now, I think. Tell Captain Ryan we’ll have someone out to relieve him and his team within a couple of hours.”

“Okay.” Abby heads back upstairs and relays the information to the captain who nods, eyes still trained on the anomaly. Abby takes one last look at it herself, and then a somewhat more awkward glance at Ryan.

“Guess I’m heading off now,” she says.

Ryan looks over at her. “You did good today.”

Abby nods, definitely feeling much more awkward now. “Thanks... you too.”

A flicker of something crosses Ryan’s face before settling back into bland professionalism.

“Bye,” Abby tells him before going back downstairs as fast as she can without running. It’s never occurred to her until now that she has no real idea what to say to him outside of the strictly professional. Hi, good to see you again? No, because that means there are more dinosaurs running around where there shouldn’t be any. Looking forward to next time? Absolutely not, Abby’s not mad (but the work certainly is).

And oh, there’s a new thought. Is she looking forward to next time – a next time with more anomalies and dinosaurs or a next time with Captain Ryan?

She’s a little concerned that if she thinks too long about it that the answer to at least one of those questions will almost certainly be yes. She definitely likes the work – a lot of it can be absolutely terrifying, yes, but there’s also no denying the sheer wonder the anomalies possess.

Abby knows on a deep, fundamental level that she would have happily cut her own arm off for the chance to explore the Permian with Cutter and Ryan, that first time they’d gone through. She also knows, on another equally deep and fundamental level that going to the Permian with them would probably have left her completely overwhelmed and questioning anything and everything she thought she knew.

And then there’s Ryan. The man himself. Who went to and came back from the Permian with no visible signs of distress and seemingly secure in himself and his place in the universe.

It’s a nice anchor, Abby thinks. Even if most of the time she has no idea what Ryan’s thinking. It’s probably what they teach his lot at Sandhurst, how to get yourself and everyone else through the weird shit.

Maybe she’ll ask Ryan out for a drink sometime and ask him how he does the things he does.

She’ll have to try and work him out first.

Oh. Abby realises she’s smiling now.

Maybe she’s looking forward to next time after all.