Fight or Flight » JW / Avengers

chapter seven

[ chapter seven ; ]

"No, no, no--" Claire was practically moaning as she picked up what appeared to have been one of the boy's cellphones.

Owen wasn't even bothering to hush her. He was a little busy prying a ginormous tooth from the remains of the Gyrosphere, examining it with critical eyes. He shifted his hold on it eventually, looking around studiously as Wanda hung back, near the jeep.

Eventually, he spoke. "There," he said, pointing toward the mud.

With a second look, Wanda realized shoe prints could be seen.

"Good news is, they made it out," Owen declared, beginning to follow the tracks. Claire was quick to follow him, and after a quiet, resigned sigh, Wanda did, too.

She'd be a pretty bad hero if she just let them go wandering after a murderous dinosaur by themselves, after all.

She caught up to them right as Owen was declaring, "I was with the Navy, not the Navajo!" and she had to try her very best not to start snickering at the sentence, much less the response it got out of Claire.

"Look," Owen said, "you should really just head back. Wanda and I can take it from here . . . I'm not even sure you can, uh, go through the woods in . . . your getup."

Claire's expression instantly transformed to one of complete insult. Wanda figured it was best if she stayed out of this conversation, and instead watched in slight amusement as Claire adjusted what she was wearing, then placed her hands on her hips, a smug smirk curving her lips.

Owen looked her up and down bewilderedly. "I--I don't know what that means."

Claire sighed in exasperation, "It means I'm ready. Let's go."

"Yeah, all right, whatever. But you do what I say, whenever I say, got it?"

Claire opened her mouth, evidently about to protest, when Wanda spoke up, "Unless I contradict him. Then . . . it is okay."

Owen shot her a look before heaving a sigh and shaking his head, adjusting his hold on his rifle. "No worries, ladies. It'll be like taking a walk through the woods . . . sixty-five million years ago."

Wanda rolled her eyes and trooped after him, making sure Claire was a good few steps ahead of her as they went. She figured it was best for her to be the caboose. She also hoped they'd find the younger boys soon . . . because she got the unnerving feeling that the danger they were in was increasing by the second.

There was a hunter out there, after all.

And as much as it pained her, she expanded her telepathic barriers, reaching out for any thought processes they could encounter in a much wider radius. If this Indominus Rex wanted to attack them, they would not be surprised, Wanda would be sure of that. She didn't care if she had to take on the thing herself -- she wasn't going to watch more people die because of some stupid mistake humanity made.

She'd had enough of that in her life.

::

Owen wasn't really sure how he'd gotten himself into this situation, much less with two ladies who knew next to nothing about tracking, or dinosaurs, or safety in the woods . . . Though it came as a considerable relief that one of them was a mind reading super hero. That helped. Kind of.

It mostly had just given him bad news so far. And also been kind of annoying. He supposed befriending a super hero was something that would take getting used to. But the thing was, it wasn't like Wanda was terribly pompous, or annoying. When she spoke, she was confident, and she had a reason behind what she did.

Even now, she'd taken up the end of their little party, and was avidly watching everything around them. He'd checked; just a quick glance over his shoulder at her. She had a sort of distant look in her eyes as she looked around, he'd picked up on that, but it didn't take him long to deduce why that was.

All it really took was him thinking loudly that she had pretty beautiful eyes for her attention to snap to him in an instant, and when he caught her staring, he flashed a crooked smile before turning back around. He knew what she was doing. She was monitoring their surroundings. Probably searching for the boys . . . hopefully monitoring for Indominus.

That was one dinosaur he did not need sneaking up on him. Especially now that he knew it had velociraptor DNA in it. No wonder the information had been classified; no wonder Indominus was so smart. Raptors were brilliant, he knew that for a fact; he'd been training and taking care of four of them for quite some time now. They were brilliant, but he knew how they thought. Just enough, at least, to stay one step ahead of them. It was why he was still their alpha.

He slowed when he recognized what looked like a building that had been reclaimed by the jungle, about to put up a hand to signal they stop, when he figured 'why even bother,' and just marched up the stairs.

They'd left the door open; that definitely wasn't the doing of a dinosaur. He crept through the structure, eyes taking everything in . . .

"This is the original one, isn't it?" he asked Claire as they headed down halls. He could barely make out what looked like prints in the dust, but it was better than nothing.

"Uh huh," Claire said quietly, drinking in everything in quiet awe. "It . . . it wasn't worth saving. It wasn't in an ideal location, either."

"Yeah, I'm sure they cared very much about that last part when they first built it," Owen muttered, pausing when they came to a garage. He could see right away where a vehicle once had been, there was no more; tracks tearing down the path were visible from their position. "How'd they even get one of these started?" Owen wondered aloud as he pried the hood open on the remaining jeep, peering inside before looking over at Claire and Wanda.

Claire snatched up a jacket off the ground, hugging it to her chest and staring at the path; "They were here . . . that path leads straight back to the park. Oh, thank--"

"Quiet," Wanda suddenly hissed, and both Claire and Owen turned to her in an instant, stilling.

It was only then that Owen realized just how fidgety she was. He could see her eyes glowing red now, her brow creased at the middle, Her fingers were flexing, as though to form fists, before stretching, and abruptly she whispered, "Hide!" and she ducked under a nearby table as Owen yanked Claire around to the front of the jeep with him.

Seconds later the snout of the Indominus Rex was pushing it's way into the garage. Owen made eye contact with Wanda, whose irises were still bright red. He didn't like the look on her face, and he rapidly shook his head, before going completely still when he felt a breath flutter his clothing and tickle his ear.

Wanda was staring intently at the Indominus, her hands starting to glow red, when it withdrew.

Owen was about to get up when Wanda viciously shook her head.

In the next second the Indominus let out a roar as it broke through the ceiling, sending all three of them rushing out toward the nearest exit.