Passing Time (Helen, Lyle)
“You’re not going to like this,” Helen said pressing buttons, making quick calculations on the A-Map while her senses were alert to every little noise around them.
“You have no idea how much I hate it when you say that,” Lyle said not looking at her, eyes searching the woods for hiding predators.
“I have a good, a bad and a very bad news,” Helen smirked at him, eyes alight with excitement in a way they never were in their own time. “Which do you want first?”
“About in that order,” Lyle muttered just as he thought he heard something moving too close for comfort and prepared his gun. Helen pulled out her knife, just in case, and lowered her voice.
“We will only have to spend about an hour in the next era.”
“Lovely, I’ll be home for dinner, then,” Lyle grinned but his grip on his weapon never loosened.
“The bad news is we don’t have much of a choice but to go.” This much was obvious, they could see calculated movement everywhere around them as a pack of deinonychus was closing in on them.
“And the very bad news?”
Helen smirked.
“You ok with snow?”
“Oh fuck!” Lyle cursed as they could feel the air ripple ever so slightly in their back, the first sign of an anomaly opening any second.
Just as the flickering light appeared behind them there was sudden movement in the foliage. Lyle opened fire as soon as the first deinonychus jumped out from behind a tree. It got hit and fell to the ground, which seemed to halt the others for a few seconds at least; this gave Lyle a chance to follow Helen through the anomaly. He fell to his knees in the thick snow on the other side but quickly turned around, readying his gun in case any of the creatures were following them but Helen was quick enough to lock the anomaly with their portable Anomaly Locking Safety Device, Connor’s latest innovation. Lyle let out a breath he didn’t realize he was holding as the anomaly flickered once and shrunk into a glittering ball.
“I could fuck that thing I love it so much,” he said, getting to his feet.
“I’ll make sure to let Connor know,” Helen smiled. “He’ll be very pleased.”
Lyle threw her a mock-venomous glare and looked around in the white desert of snow with obvious distaste.
“I hate the Ice Age.”
Helen rolled her eyes putting away the Anomaly Locking Safety Device (affectionately called LSD by Connor) in her rucksack and getting a thick pullover out.
“You hate every era, Jon. You use Cretaceous as a swear word.”
“With good reason,” Lyle shivered and put his arms around himself. “So where will that bloody anomaly open, I’m freezing my balls off.”
“Just about 500 metres from here,” Helen said after checking her A-Map again. “In exactly 53 minutes.”
“Fuck,” Lyle’s teeth were already chattering but then his face lit up with mischief. “See children, that’s what happens when you don’t listen to your mummy about always taking a sweater with you.”
“Never heard James Lester be called that before.”
“Oh I’m so sorry,” Lyle said in a very exaggerated tone, “I didn’t mean to plagiarize Becker’s name for you.”
Helen’s lips twitched in amusement.
“We need something to keep us warm,” she said, looking around for a cave for shelter but there was absolutely nothing in sight just infinite whiteness.
“I may have an idea.”
“Something that doesn’t involve excessive nudity?” Helen smirked and barely managed to suppress an honest smile at Lyle’s outraged and slightly nauseous expression.
“I can go without sex for 24 hours, thank you very much.”
“Gossip begs to differ.”
“Well, I draw the line at cuddling with you.”
“Very wise,” Helen grinned. “So what’s the idea?”
Lyle’s eyes lit up with boyish mischief and suddenly Helen wasn’t so sure she’d survive the next 50 minutes.
***
Exactly 50 minutes later Becker stepped through the anomaly, followed by Ditzy, Bentley, Kermit and Blade, who were carrying stretchers and medical kits just in case. They had been prepared seeing their friend and Helen lying wounded and half-frozen in the snow but the sight that welcomed them in the Ice Age left them gaping and not quite believing their eyes.
Just a few metres from the anomaly there were two metre-high defence snow-walls behind which Lyle and Helen were crouching, quickly gathering the snow into hard little snowballs, coming out of their hiding places now and again to open fire at each other. They seemed so engrossed in their fierce fight that they didn’t immediately notice they had company, which was rather fortunate for the others who had time to wipe the incredulous looks from their faces.
But suddenly they couldn’t take it anymore and one after the other they all burst out laughing. Helen and Lyle suddenly realised they weren’t alone and the next moment their rescuers were covered in prehistoric snow.