The ARC - London

[itsananomaly]

It had been a very long and busy several days once Cutter and Connor had returned to London. Even though they were no longer involved with the field work, there was still a lot of research to be done both with the ARC and Prospero.

Cutter and Connor had been given an office to work out of while they were back for the summer, since Cutter’s old office now belonged to Danny ,and there were papers and books all over the office. Cutter was still trying to figure out what some of the numbers from the anomaly prediction model before they had left Fandom and the numbers and data was starting to blur together and he rubbed his eyes tiredly.

“I’m starting to think we might need a break,” he remarked with a sheepish smile from where he had taken a spot on the floor, surrounded by a pile of papers and notebooks.

[for Connor and SP! NFB due to distance]

Comments

[anomaly_research_nerd]

"I'm not sure if that is worse or the alternative...that however is there came in with the anomaly..." Connor said with a worried look of his own before grabbing the handle and pulling it open slowly.

As soon as the door opened, the voices were louder and clearer...

"Emm, I don't care where this is... It's worth exploring and seeing what we can get from it before going back..."

[itsananomaly]

Cutter leaned in closer, trying to see who was talking,

“Ethan you know the rules,” Em snapped, “we can’t stay in a place to long, especially if there’s signs of life, we could be interfering with history,”

[anomaly_research_nerd]

Connor's eyes went a little wide and he turned to look at Cutter, silently mouthing the words "time travelers?" to him.

He leaned against the shelf in front of him a little more, trying to get a view of who was talking... when suddenly a stack of books on the shelves shifted and fell to the ground with a loud thud.

"Oh bloody hell..." Connor muttered as he closed his eyes and whinced at the noise.

[itsananomaly]

Cutter jumped when the books fell, he still couldn’t see who the voices belonged to but they had stopped talking and he still couldn’t tell where the anomaly was.

“We need to leave Ethan,” Em said sharply after a few moments had passed.

[anomaly_research_nerd]

"That's what's wrong with you Emm" the other voice said with a mocking scoff. "Too 'by the rules' too 'goody-two-shoes' to actually enjoy anything. We're here. I'm going to look around!"

[itsananomaly]

Cutter didn't hear Em's reply at first, there was a lot of frustrated grumbling, "we need to stay close to the anomaly Ethan, there's no telling when the next one will appear, we really should try and go back to where the others are,"

Cutter looked puzzled at that, "others?" he looked over at Connor as he mouthed the word, could there be more people about to come through?

[anomaly_research_nerd]

"Stay if you want. I'm going to go see what this place is" Ethan said as he started to walk away, his back still to where Cutter and Nick were. "Besides..." he said, giving a half glance over his shoulder for a brief second before turning back to her, "...you know I don't like being watched." And with that he started to walk away.

"Now we call Danny?" Connor whispered as he fished out the coms from his jacket pocket.

[itsananomaly]

"Should we stop them?" Cutter asked worriedly as Connor got the coms out, he had worked with the anomalies enough to know how the smallest change could have untold consequences, "we don't want them doing damage to the timeline,"

He wasn't sure how they were going to stop them but he knew they had to do something

[anomaly_research_nerd]

"Yeah, we need to try and talk to them" Connor said as he got the coms and started punching in the number for Danny's direct line and started talking in a hurried and hushed whisper.

As he did, Connor signaled for Cutter to go and try and talk to them and stop them from leaving.

[itsananomaly]

Cutter nodded and began to slowly approach Em and Ethan, raising his hands to show that he wasn't a threat, "hey, um ... it's okay, we want to help you," he said softly, "we're not going to hurt you,"

Em had immediately tensed when Cutter had approached her, "my name's Nick," he said, "Nick Cutter,"

"I'm Lady Emily Merchant," she said crisply, still not trusting anything around her.

[anomaly_research_nerd]

Connor passed along the anomaly alert to Danny and then joined Cutter, standing beside him and giving a small awkward hand wave. He started to say something, but then his eyes met Ehtan's, and the next instant, the man turned and bolted, vanishing through one of the doors in the hallway.

"Oh bloody... that's not good..." he said as he started to run after Ethan, only to stop almost immediately, realizing he was far too fast to try and catch up with that big of a lead.

[itsananomaly]

"Ethan!" Emily called out after him but Ethan showed no signs of even hearing her, "You need to find him, there's no telling what he'll do in your timeline," she told them.

Cutter bit his lip, it really was a far gap to try and track him down, "we work for an organisation who can track him down," he assured her, hoping that they would him before any damage was done.

Lester was going to love this latest development wasn't he?

[anomaly_research_nerd]

"We are going to find him" Connor said as he slipped the coms back into his pocket and looked over at Cutter. "Danny and Becker are on their way" he said, a lopsided grin and shrug, having already gotten a partial lecture from Danny and knowing they were likely to get more once they were face to face.

[itsananomaly]

Cutter could only imagine the lectures they were about to get, "they'll be able to secure the location and I'm sure they've already told Jess to start a city wide search," he said, hoping to reassure Emily who still didn't look convinced.

"What year is it?" she asked suddenly.

"it's 2012," Cutter told her.

Emily looked a little stunned, "I'm from 1867," she said, "I'm over a hundred years into the future?" after everything she had seen, this was still all too strange for her.

[anomaly_research_nerd]

Connor's eyes went wide at that and he tried not to stare. Even after everything they had gone through and seen... it was still weird talking to someone from the past.

"So you and... Ethan was it... are from the past" he said as he tried to wrap his brain around it all. "Well, maybe then he won't cause too much trouble... maybe he will just kinda hide out and watch?" he asked hopefully, though he wasn't sure that was even something they could count on this time.

[itsananomaly]

"Ethan is closer to your time," Emily said softly, "we found him and he joined our group, he doesn't talk much about his past but I know he wanted to go back and ..." she hesitated, "I don't think it was for good intentions, he is full of anger and rage, one of the members of our group used to be able to keep him calm and focused but she ...she passed a few days ago and I fear there's no telling what he'll try to do,"

Cutter looked worriedly at Connor, "that doesn't sound good at all," he said, "we'll need to tell Danny and Becker this when they get here,"

[thearcfamily]

"Tell us what when we get here?" Becker asked as he and Danny walked up to them. He only needed to take one look at their faces to know whatever it was, it wasn't going to be good.

"Even more bad news than what you had already told Danny?" Becker asked as he gave a quick glance at Danny then met Emmily's gaze. "I'm Becker" he said with a small nod.

[itsananomaly]

"Lady Emily Merchant," Emily introduced herself as she looked curiously at Becker and Danny, "and I was telling Mr Cutter and ... " she looked blankly at Connor, realising she didn't know his name, "about one of my travelling companions, you're going to have your work cut out for you if you don't find him, there's no telling what he'll do,"

[thearcfamily]

"Right, wonderful" Becker said as he rubbed the back of his head. "Connor, you over here with me," he said as he stepped over to the side a little and started talking to Connor.

In the meantime, Danny walked over and started talking to Cutter and Emily.

"So when you say no telling what he will do... like is he violent to just... michevious and a trouble maker?" He was already dreading having to call Lester with that first update.

[itsananomaly]

"A bit of both but Ethan can get quite violent, he does have a temper on him and now that we don't have Charlotte ... she was our other travel companion, he has years of pent up rage and ..." Emily looked at Danny and Cutter, "he'll find something or someone to take it out on,"

Cutter really didn't like the sound of this Ethan, "we've got to be careful about the timeline as well," Cutter told Danny, "Lady Emily is from 1867, she said Ethan was closer to our time but still in the past,"

[thearcfamily]

"Oh that is brilliant...." Danny said with a sarcastic sigh as he rolled his eyes. "More time line insanity, just what we don't need."

Danny then looked back at Emily. "Has Ethan given any indication or clue about where more precisely he's from? Time-wise? Ever mention family or what his motivation or goal is?"

[itsananomaly]

"He never talked about his family, it sounded like he wasn't from a happy home," Emily said softly, "he did say he was from London and an anomaly appeared while he was out with friends and that's how he got stuck, I don't know much else beyond that," she said softly, "his surname was Dobrowski but that was also he ever said about who he was," she said apologetically.

"I wonder where the anomaly appeared in London?" Cutter wondered curiously, "or when that could give us some more insight to how frequently these anomalies had appeared,"

Emily shook her head, "we kept asking him for details but other than his name and that he was out with friends, that was all we could get out from him,"

[thearcfamily]

Danny listened closely to what Emily said and he glanced towards Becker and Connor and it looked like they were about to head out to go try and look for any sign of where Ethan had gone.

"Thank you, that information does help us some" he said looking back at Emily and Cutter. "I cant help but feel... I feel like I should know that last name...But I don't really recognize it off hand," he admitted, somewhat frustrated and confused. "I guess in the meantime, until we get a good lead on where Ethan ran off, we should head back to the ARC?"

[itsananomaly]

Cutter nodded, "I guess we need to go and debrief James about everything that has happened, he's not going to be happy, is he?" he sighed, not looking forward to that meeting.

Emily was looking curiously at them, "the ARC?" she blinked, "what is that?"

[thearcfamily]

"The ARC is our headquarters, it's where we work from- The Anomaly Research Center," Becker said as he and Connor walked over. "And I agree, you all go back and let Lester know what is going on. Connor and I will see if we can track down any sign of Ethan. We'll meet up this evening."

Danny nodded and handed over a fresh set of coms to Becker and Connor. "Alright, you two be careful. See you in about.." Danny glanced at his watch, " Four or five hours. Let us know if you find Ethan or run into any trouble."