Ana holds Blake’s good hand in a death grip as they carefully make their way through the macabre village towards the outer treeline. She tries not to focus on the dark stains littering the dirt or the drag marks leading back to the firepit—thunder claps in the distance. Ana’s grip on Blake’s hand tightens.

“You think it’ll rain soon?” Ana asks—she pauses and turns towards what looks like some kind of rudimentary wooden cage big enough to fit a small bear… or a family of four. 

She shakes her head to perish the thought. It’s obviously some kind of animal cage. The edges are even decorated in a series of pearlescent pink horns. 

Ana furrows her brow. Why pink?

“Probably,” Blake replies after a long beat, staring up at the narrow gaps between the towering canopy—Ana follows his gaze. The sky is grey and definitely darkening, “We should—”

“No way,” Ana interrupts, squeezing his hand as she returns her gaze to the village’s end. They resume walking, “That woman—it’s not safe here.”

Thunder cracks overhead. Blake brings them both to another halt.

“Blake—”

“Think about it, Annie. We can’t afford to be caught in the rain,” he says, tightening his grip on her palm, “At least here we have… shelter—”

“She tried to kill you, Blake!” Ana exclaims, turning to face him with horror etched into her brows—the lip of his orange turtleneck sweater is stained dark red, “This place is way more dangerous—!”

“But she didn’t,” Blake shoots back, “She let us go—”

“We are not staying overnight in an abandoned village occupied by a deranged psychopath,” Ana retorts, flinging her unoccupied hand out wide, “You didn’t see her, Blake. She was—she was—”

“She was what, Annie?” Blake snaps.

“She was covered in blood, Blake!” Ana claps back—something snaps behind her. She spins on her heel—her eyes dart between the stained huts, the stained dirt and the towering trees but no one is there. They’re still alone. She balls her unoccupied hand into a fist, “I couldn’t really—see much, but her eyes… Blake, she was going to kill you.”

Blake visibly swallows, the fabric of his stained turtleneck shifting with the movement.

“That’s… my point, Annie,” he replies after a long moment, his tone strained, “If she wanted to k–kill me, I’d already be… fuck, okay.” He takes a deep breath and turns towards the edge of the village, “I’m alive right now. We’re both alive right now. Clearly that’s… intentional.”

“Monsters like to play with their food, Blake,” Ana states, staring directly into the brunet’s eyes, “And they always get bored of it eventually. I’d rather risk the rain.”

“Annie—”

Crash! 

Their heads snap towards the sound—it came from within the nearest log hut. Ana and Blake share a wide-eyed look. 

“You think that was a—?”

“Maybe,” Ana replies, staring at the dark trails leading down the circular hut’s three log steps, “Stay here—”

“Absolutely not,” Blake interjects, tightening his grip on her hand, “Just because that woman let us live doesn’t mean we should talk to her.”

“And what if it isn’t her? What if it’s a survivor?” Ana asks, gripping his hand equally as tight.

“What if it’s an accomplice? Or a wild animal?” Blake shoots back, his tone strained. “Hypotheticals won’t—”

“Solve anything?” Ana finishes in a sharp tone, “What happened to giving monsters the benefit of the doubt?”

“I never said—you’re a nurse, Annie. You know how dangerous it is for us to get caught in the rain right now.”

“I’m not a nurse, I’m a student!” Ana cries, her vision blurring as tears spill out onto her cheeks, “Do you think we’re trained to handle any of this? I’m not a first responder!” She furiously wipes the tears from her eyes, “You’re asking me to choose between a murderer and the chance we won’t find somewhere safer to hide.”

Blake hesitates before reaching forward and pulling Ana into an awkward hug—she feels his gasp in pain against the top of her head. She squeezes her eyes shut and tries to stop the torrent of these useless tears. 

Another crash sounds, followed by the distinct sound of a humanoid groan.

The couple freeze and separate, staring at one another with wide eyes.

“Who’s… who’s there?” grunts the raspy voice of a woman distinctly different from the one who threatened their lives at the burnt firepit.

“Survivor,” the pair mutter simultaneously, their heads moving in unison towards the circular log hut.

“Please… help me…”

Ana’s feet begin to move before the thought enters her head and she’s climbing the log steps one sticky step at a time before coming face to face with the stained and shredded canvas drape acting in place of a door.

“Ana!”

She takes a deep breath and goes to push it aside, her other hand clutching the strap of her shoulder bag in a deadly grip. Blake’s right—she’s a nurse in training. A future medical professional. What kind of awful nurse would she be if she ignored a cry for help?

She takes a deep breath and pushes aside the blood-stained canvas.

“H–hello…?”

───※ ·❆· ※───

“That accursed—“ Aerys curses—he whips his head towards Damhan, “Give the boy to Riain and find the girl!”

“No!” Allen shouts, tightening his grip on Damhan’s shoulders, “Don’t put me down!”

“Mr Lasker—!”

“Please!” Allen begs, staring directly into  the glass eyes of Aerys’ gas mask, “I know I’m a liability right now—I get it—but please. She’s my best friend. Don’t leave me behind.”

“You can’t even walk,” Riain balks.

Allen grits his teeth, “I am aware.”

Aerys stares at him for a long beat before turning his head towards Alexios—the doctor. The man nods and Aerys turns his head back to Allen.

“First sign of danger and Damhan drops you,” Aerys grits out, “Do we have a deal?”

Allen’s fingers flex around the purple fabric tightly gripped between them.

After a short beat, he nods.

Aerys nods back—he turns his attention to Damhan, “Make sure the girl doesn’t get herself killed.”

“Yes sir!” Damhan replies—he turns his head to Allen and tightens his grip on the Englishman’s thighs, “Hold on, kiddo!”

“Oka—ah!”

The large man breaks into a shockingly fast down the path, leaving the rest of his teammates in the dust. 

Allen clings to his shoulders for dear life. For such a strong man, Damhan is fast. Faster than Jenna. Allen grits his teeth and holds tight. 

Damhan will definitely catch up to her—he knows it.

───※ ·❆· ※───

The raptor thrashes against the ropes holding it in place as Jenna watches the line slowly slipping through the ex-screaming woman’s grip with every violent tug. Cold sweat runs past the blood on her forehead to the tip of her jaw as she watches the rope’s end get shorter, and shorter—the strawberry blonde’s grip is too weak. She can’t—she’s going to be the one to break the chain—

The raptor roars and Jenna scrambles to her feet before she can even process what the hell she is doing. She leaps at the ever-shortening rope, grabs the ends and pulls.

“Wh—?” The woman seems to glance over her shoulder and balks, “Where in the seven circles is your mask?!”

“Don’t have one!” Jenna shouts back with an incredibly strained grin—the orange dinosaur thrashes and she digs her heels into dirt. Even with both of them pulling it with all of their might, they still lose an inch of rope—the sweat on Jenna’s hands is screwing up her grip, “Why the hell are you people trying to catch a freaking dinosaur?!”

“Who are you?!” A long-haired man screeches from the dinosaur’s opposite side.

Tug. Slip. Tug. Slip. They’re running out of rope. Shit.

“Wouldn’t you like to know?” Jenna snarks back.

“Yes, obviously, I would,” The man snaps, “If you’re relying on a gift, it’s not going to hold out for long!”

“The hell’re you talking about?!”

“Cube’s up!” A second woman shouts from the edge of the forest, a well-timed raptor stomp parting the fog enough to reveal a masked purple-haired woman fiddling with some kind of weird sci-fi rubix cube. She grabs a series of ground spikes from within and slams one into the ground right next to the cube.

She scrambles to her feet and races a few feet away to slam the next spike into the ground.

“What’s with the tent spikes?” Jenna shouts, the rope slipping down to half a foot between her hands as the raptor thrashes, screams, and writhes—the two men holding the other two ropes leap back to keep their lines as taut as possible. 

“They’re anchors,” the strawberry blonde replies as she leans far enough back that her thick, puffy hair touches Jenna’s chest, “We need to capture it alive—no!”

“Ah!” The purple-haired girl shouts as the dinosaur swings its fanned tail at her head, snatching the last of the rope from between Jenna and the strawberry blonde’s hands—the raptor’s tail hits, slamming her body straight into a nearby tree and knocking her out cold.

“Nina!” the long-haired man shouts in horror—his grip on the rope falters. 

The raptor rears back, fighting harder now that it finally has the freedom to move—it spins on its heel, its tail violently whipping through the haze. Jenna barely manages to tackle the strawberry blonde into the dirt before the tail slaps past their heads with a loud crack!

“Are you okay?!” Jenna shouts, covering the shorter woman with her entire body before—shit! She grabs her by the waist and rolls them out of the way before a massive reptilian foot has the chance to slam down onto their spines.

“The pylons!” The long-haired man shouts in a panicked voice, “Someone grab the pylons!”

“I don’t know where they are!”

“Sappho!” 

The woman under Jenna’s arm flinches—she shouts back, “I don’t know!”

“Useless!” The man snaps.

The raptor screeches, yanking hard against the final two ropes around its neck.

“Watch your mouth, asshole!” Jenna snaps back on the woman’s—Sappho’s behalf. She feels something sharp jab into the palm of her hand and yanks it away with a strong curse—the fog parts just enough to reveal the black and silver objects lying in the dirt all around them.

The tent pegs.

“The pylons,” Sappho breathes. She reaches forward to grab one before shouting in pain the second she pushes her arm too far forward, “Ow—!”

“What’s wrong?” Jenna asks, pulling herself off of the woman’s back.

“My rib—” she gasps, “I can’t—!”

Jenna stares at the woman for a beat, before snapping her head towards the raging orange dinosaur winning the tug-a-war match between the two idiots who tried to capture it. She scratches her nails into the dirt.

“What do I need to do?”

“What—?”

“What do I need to do?” Jenna repeats, staring into the eyeholes of Sappho’s mask, “Stab them in a circle around the raptor or what?”

The raptor screeches a deep, blood-curdling caw. Jenna swallows against her dry throat.

The woman seems to stare at her for a long beat before turning her face back towards the metal pegs, “Yeah. Then press the red button on the cube. You… you can’t miss it.”

“Sappho. Get up and help already!”

Jenna nods and gathers the three metal rods into her hands and pushes herself onto her heels. Right. She’s really doing this. She grips the metal rods tighter between her palms and lets out the breath she’d been holding.

It’s just baby parkour with a dinosaur. Nothing to worry about. Nothing at all.

“Sappho—!”

“Shut the hell up and focus on keeping the dinosaur still!” Jenna snaps.

“You—!”

She slams the first one into the ground by her feet, “I’ve got your stupid pylons. Now focus on doing your fucking jobs before you get me killed too, got it?!”

Jenna tunes out the man’s snarky response and gets into position. If they’re so hellbent on catching a freaking dinosaur, then so be it. 

These idiots better make sure they finish the job.