Fic: Valued (Ryan/Jess, Team)

[goldarrow]

Title: Valued
Author: goldarrow
Word Count: 2,459
Characters: Ryan/Jess, Team
Rating: 12
Disclaimer: Everything from Primeval belongs to Impossible Pictures. I will return them all when I’m done, slightly mussed but in superb spirits nonetheless.
For fififolle's primeval_denial 2025 Secret Santa
 

Valued
 
Jess felt the headache starting, the pain moving from her shoulders up her neck, across the back of her head, and finally ending up thumping behind her eyebrows.

There was so much to do: the ADD needed updating, the procedures for monitoring needed to be rewritten, the wiring needed to be untangled so she wouldn't have to crawl around under the tables to check what was starting and ending where, whenever anything started glitching. She knew that there were other things that were needed as well, but right now her mind just wasn't capable of pulling the rest of the list out of her over-stressed memory.

If only Connor and Abby hadn't taken leave over both the Christmas and New Year's weeks, maybe she wouldn't be feeling quite so put-upon. She wanted to have some time, too, but with Conn away, it was down to her and the night technician, which meant longer shifts for both of them.

She sighed, stretching out her neck as well as she could whilst still keeping an eye on the slightly flickering left-side monitor. Ah, that was one of the other things on her list: fix the damn thing so it would stop making her headache worse.

The raucous sound of the Anomaly Alert caused her head to give a particularly vicious throb. The first thing she did was wince, the second thing was to slap the button to silence the alarm, and the third was to rapidly type in the commands to narrow down the area where the anomaly was located.

She was concentrating so hard on the data showing on her screens that the feeling of someone close behind her made her jump.

"Sorry, miss." Captain Ryan moved back a couple of inches, his tone apologetic. "Didn't mean to startle you."

Jess barely controlled the shiver that went down her spine at the warmth of his body so near. Bugger. It seemed that her attraction to him was starting to become a problem. At least for her. Why, oh, why, did she have to have this inconvenient feeling? Once she'd realised that Becker would always put his career over any feelings he might actually someday be willing to acknowledge, she thought she'd got over her attraction to soldiers. It seemed that her body had other ideas.

"No problem," she replied, keeping her voice as steady as she could and concentrating on the screens so she didn't have to look at him right away. "It looks like it's in Warwick."

The maps zoomed in closer as the ADD analysed the data.

"Barford, right on the River Avon, southeast of Birmingham." She typed in a few more commands. "It's a fairly small one, so hopefully not too likely to have anything too large coming through. It's not far from a lot of small towns, though, so it might be a good idea to get there fairly quickly. It will take at least an hour and a half by road."

Ryan nodded, tapping her on the shoulder in thanks as he turned to his team. "Right. Lyle, who's on pilot duty today?"

"Tyler, boss," Lyle replied slightly distractedly as he checked one of the pockets on his tac vest.

"Get him here. I'll let Lester know we need the speed."

"On it. He's in the rest rooms, I'll turf him out whilst the lads gather the gear."

Lyle headed toward the exit as Jess held back her grin. That would be amusing. Both Lyle and Tyler shared the same rather outré sense of humour, and tended to wind each other up.

-=-=-=-

The flight was quick, the landing even quicker as the team leapt from the helicopter and it took off again, buzzing across the fields like an oversized hornet.

"Location?" Ryan barked, not liking the look of the sky to the northeast.

Finn fiddled with the hand-held anomaly detector. "Over that way," he pointed, "looks like it might be under that old bridge."

"Fuck. That means under water?" Lyle bitched.

"No. The river is fairly shallow there," Jess' voice came over their comms. "If I have your location right, it's Barford Bridge Arch. It's a local tourist site, so keep your eyes peeled for people wandering around looking lost."

"Good thing it's shallow," Lyle replied austerely. "I didn't bring my wetsuit."

"You don't wear a wetsuit any more unless you're diving," Blade snarked back. "If Jess says it's shallow, it won't be deep enough for that."

Lyle grinned as he headed across the slightly squishy field toward the river they could see just north of their landing spot. Ryan shook his head and followed his men, his own grin slightly wry.

The men gathered at the bridge and stared under it at the anomaly, sitting there looking almost smug, with its sharp shards serenely circling the cloudy centre. The time-rip was hanging underneath one of the side arches of the bridge, the top almost touching the stone, the bottom only about ten centimetres above the water.

Lyle's muffled bitching about cold water made Ryan's grin widen. "I thought you caving lot didn't have any problem with getting chilly."

Lyle glared. "Maybe you'll want to go first, fearless leader," he grumbled.

Ryan laughed. "Sure, why not?"

"Sorry to have to tell you this, guys," Jess chimed in again, "but there's some hard rain to the northeast, and my information says that the river there does tend to flood. Keep your eyes peeled."

"Will do," Ryan replied. "Thanks, Jess."

"Any time," she replied merrily.

After hearing that, Ryan made sure his weapon was secured and his tac vest tight. He traded a quick glance with Stephen, who was backing away like a kitten facing a pool of spilled perfume. Ryan smirked, knowing that Stephen didn't have any problem with rough ground, but he really wasn't keen on open water unless he had diving kit. Hopefully the tracker wouldn’t be needed.

Stepping forward slowly, making sure of his footing with every step, Ryan moved down the bank and toward the anomaly. The grass wasn't too slick, but once he reached the water, the mud was like a greased pig. And the water was freezing. After coming close to landing on his arse for a thorough soaking twice, Ryan made sure his next step took him next to the upright of the bridge so he had something to hang onto.

The anomaly spun slowly. If Ryan had been of a poetic bent, he'd've been thinking that it was sneering at him. But he wasn’t, so he simply waded two more paces toward it. By now, the water was over his knees, and he shivered at the temperature, thanking fate that it wasn't any deeper right here.

"Strength, Finn?" he asked.

"Still good, boss," the soldier replied cheerfully.

One deep breath later, Ryan got close enough to stick his head through the anomaly. For all the good it did him, actually. It looked almost like the Balkans. Nothing but a vast field of grasses and small scrub, with a dark green forest a kilometre or so away. He backed out quickly when he saw a large herd of some sort of herbivore, with the unwanted addition of what looked like a clowder of some sort of predatory big cats.

When his head came clear, he realised that either he'd sunk into the mud, or the river was higher. He was wet most of the way up his thighs. And even colder.

He turned to head back. "Modern environment. I don't think we need to go through."

"No dinos, then?" Blade asked, trimming a hangnail with his smallest knife.

"No dinos," Ryan agreed. "Lots of herbivores and some feline-like predators."

"Crap." Blade traded the current knife for his largest one.

"Move back," Ryan ordered, wading toward the bank. "If the water rises any further my balls are going to notice."

"Status check." Jess' voice sounded worried now, making Ryan stiffen.

"Modern on the other side, everyone clear," he replied, just before Lyle yelled, "Incoming!"

Ryan spun around, seeing two things at the same time – the anomaly bulging as something not too large, but with lots of fur and some pretty damned big teeth and claws came hurtling through, and the sudden rise of the water as a wave came boiling down the river.

"The weir upstream has given way," Jess said urgently over the comms, "Get out of there."

Ryan lunged for the bank, catching Lyle's hand as the lieutenant grabbed for him. He was pulled out quickly enough that the water's rise barely missed pulling him away, but he did get smacked by a branch across his shin. Grunting, he grabbed Lyle's arm with his other hand and made it to the shore.

A couple of deep breaths dissipated the adrenaline rush, giving him a chance to trade grins with Lyle. As one, they turned to look up the bank, then glanced at each other in slight consternation.

At the top of the bank was Stephen, blood dripping from one hand as he glared balefully at it. At his feet were Finn and Blade, both lying on top of a wildly thrashing, clawing, and biting creature – one of the catlike things that Ryan had seen through the anomaly.

"Tranq the fucking thing, Stephen," Blade bitched as the claws on one large paw came close to slicing his cheek open.

Still complaining, Stephen had his tranq pistol out and aiming at the creature. "Hold it still," he snapped.

"How?" Finn moaned as he was almost thrown off.

"Never mind," Stephen replied as he fired, the dart missing Finn's hand by a centimetre as it buried itself in the creature's flank.

Finn glared at him for a second, then grinned. "Good shooting."

The creature gradually relaxed on the bank and was lying still, breathing slowly but steadily, by the time Ryan and Lyle made it to the top.

Stephen had his phone out and sent a couple of pictures to Jess, shrugging as Lyle gave him a questioning look. "Sabre-tooth cat of some kind," he said casually. "No idea what species, exactly. But it doesn't really matter. Cats are nature's perfect predators, and nothing to play games with."

-=-=-=-

The moment Jess saw the photos, she did her best not to freak out. Sabre-tooths weren't anything to play around with, she knew, not realising that she was echoing Stephen's words. A quick search through Connor's creature database confirmed her fears.

"Xenosmilus," she said into the mic, doing her best to keep the worry out of her tone. "Early Pleistocene, subset of sabre-tooth cats. Their teeth are serrated like a scimitar toothed cat, only not just the canines, but all of them. And they can clamp together, so watch the bite. It can snap shut and take a big chunk out of you."

"Ouch," Finn muttered.

"Yeah," she replied, the soldier's comment pulling a grin from her. "They nicknamed it the Cookie Cutter Cat, so I'm sure you get the idea."

-=-=-=-

By the time Lyle, Finn, and Blade had the cat bundled up, given it the antidote to the tranquiliser and tossed it back through the anomaly, Ryan had cleaned and bandaged the slice on Stephen's hand.

"How did you get that?" he asked. "Doesn't look like cat claws or teeth."

Stephen made a face, looking a bit embarrassed. "I caught my foot on a bramble climbing the bank, slipped and sliced my hand on a rock."

Ryan held back his chuckle by the skin of his teeth. "At least you caught yourself. If you'd slipped any further, you'd have smacked your head on the bridge."

"Would have hurt less," Stephen grumbled, then grinned shamefacedly as Ryan gave him a cock-eyed look. "No, don't say it, Ryan. I know what you're thinking."

Ryan laughed, then stood and signalled the team to pack up.

They watched until the anomaly flickered and closed. After informing Jess and receiving her confirmation, it only took about ten minutes for the ARC's helicopter to buzz over the trees and land in the field.

-=-=-=-

Jess spent the team's flight back to the ARC doing her best to get her heart rate back under control. She didn't think that the soldiers had known – or more probably had even cared – just how close they'd come to disaster twice. Then she started berating herself as they came strolling into the Atrium as if they'd been out on an afternoon ramble. They were experts. And she was really, really tired. Which meant her emotions were a little bit off piste right now.

When she heard what they were arguing about, she had to smile a little, though.

Who knew that Finn would have cared about local legends, and the ruination of them?

"I'm telling you, Blade," he was complaining. "The Beast of Barford is well known. And if we've stopped a regular sighting by not letting it through the anomaly, I'm not sure what's going to happen to the locals."

Blade gave him a look that combined exasperation and pity. "Finn," he said patiently, "I doubt if one missed sighting would be enough to destroy a legend. They'll just think it was really sneaky this year."

Finn stopped. "Oh, right. Good thinking." He tapped Blade on the shoulder and headed back out, leaving the other soldier staring after him in confusion.

"I sometimes wonder about those two," Jess muttered as she turned back to her keyboard, only to see a hand placing a cup of coffee and a warm croissant on the desk beside her.

Too frazzled to take it in for a moment, she stared at it, then shook herself before looking up quizzically to see Ryan standing beside her.

"I thought you could use these," he said quietly, placing a gentle hand on her shoulder. "You've been working overtime, and still managing to be one hell of a coordinator on the shouts."

Jess couldn't help blushing as she smiled at him. "Thanks, Captain," she said softly, holding back tears at the caring expression on his face.

"Ryan," he said. "Just Ryan." After a hesitation, he asked, "Would you like to go out to dinner some time?"

The shock had her staring at him for a second, but then her smile widened enough to make her cheeks hurt. "I'd love to! Friday? We're both off duty that evening."

Ryan nodded, grinning back. "Trust you to know everyone's duty schedule. Pick you up at your place, 7:00?"

She laughed. "And trust you to know where everyone lives. 7:00 is great."

The tap on her shoulder before he headed up to Lester's office to give a quick preliminary report had her smiling as she turned back to work, feeling a little less frazzled.

The coffee and croissant didn't hurt, either.

 

Comments

[fredbassett]

That was lovely!!

I adored all the little louches like the banter between the soldiers, the Beast of Barford and Ryan's thoughtfulness. Jess was great. She came over as thoroughly competant and utterly exhausted, which was a pefect combination.

[goldarrow]

Thanks so much.

I enjoyed the chance to show how everyone gets along.

[telperion-15.livejournal.com]

You can always count on Ryan to notice when someone needs a bit of a pick-me-up!

And that was a lovely scene on the shout too — the team is a well-oiled machine!

[goldarrow]

Indeed. Our Captain is very observant!

Thanks so much!

[fififolle]

Awww! Thank you!!! That was so lovely.
Fantastic team shout, lots of drama and bonus wet!Ryan *g* and plenty of Finn and Blade and Lyle, and that cat with a mouthful of serrated teeth was quite a handful! Really great action.
And cute Jess, so hard-working and crushing on Ryan, hee!! I think he noticed!!! Adorable.
I loved this, it was so vivid, thank you!!

[goldarrow]

Thanks so much, I'm so glad you liked it!

[nietie.livejournal.com]

Soldier Ryan and considerate Ryan. I love them both.

[knitekat.livejournal.com]

Lovely bit of team fic and I think Ryan might have noticed Jess' interest.