A/N: This was written as a Secret Santa for rain_sleet_snow on Primeval Denial. It is gen but background pairings include Becker/Abby, Sarah/Stephen, implied Ryan/Lester, and the tiniest smidge of Caroline/Lorraine. There are some brief scenes of violence and a spoilery warning that I will put at the end of the fic for anyone who wants to check. Obviously many of the superpowers I used have been used in other types of media, I figured as they all borrow it would be okay for me to, as well. Lyle and Blade are soldiers created by fredbassett, used with her permission.

The Hero of This Story

Every superhero had a tragic back story. It basically came with the job. Becker was pretty sure that not having one put him at a distinct disadvantage.

All of his new colleagues (fellow superheroes? That sounded stupid even in Becker's head) had one. Abby, the orphan who had raised her little brother herself only for him to turn out to be an ungrateful wanker, or so Becker had heard. Cutter's wife had disappeared into the past only to return with a vendetta against him and a serious anger management problem. Stephen was mixed up in that too, as apparently he had terrible taste in women. Danny had lost his little brother as a kid and went on to dedicate his life to finding him. Also to saving the world, as one does. Becker was a bit hazy as to how Danny expected to find his brother when he'd been officially declared deceased, but whatever. Dead people came back in comic books all the time and Becker was fast discovering that somehow his life was turning into one.

Anyway, everyone had something, except for Becker. He didn't think 'stern father who didn't hug me enough' quite cut it, especially considering he had grown up well-off and with a mother who kept a scrapbook filled with everything remotely good he had ever done. She liked to pull it out to proudly show off to friends and strangers at precisely the moment Becker thought he couldn't be any more embarrassed. (It was definitely for the best she didn't have the clearance to know about the whole superhero thing.)

"Becker, mate, we're going for drinks, you want in?"

Becker looked into Connor's cheerful face and shook his head. "Another time, maybe."

"Suit yourself."

Wait, maybe Connor didn't - Oh, no, he was an orphan, too. Damn it. 'Orphan' and 'superhero' were almost mutually exclusive. Sometimes Becker wished he was an orphan, but he didn't think that counted.

The story of how Becker came to work for Sir James Lester and his team involved Troodons in a shopping centre and a few well-aimed tins. He had only been there to buy apples and toilet paper but somehow he'd ended up with a new job. In the weirder moments of Becker's new life (which were most of them, to be honest), he frequently found himself looking back on it and wondering if he should have done something differently.

Not that it mattered. Too late to change things now.

Looking back, it had really been fairly straight-forward, considering (kind of a boring origin story, really, which he figured was another disadvantage). At the time, however, the sudden appearance of the big sparkling lights show in the middle of the shop had been quite a big surprise. The dinosaurs that came out of it were even more of one.

There was a lot of screaming and running. Becker very much regretted not having a shotgun.

Fortunately, Becker didn't need real weapons to be effective. He had this… he hesitated to say 'power', because that sounded ridiculous, but growing up, he'd always known he could do things other people couldn't. His reflexes were quicker, his balance better, and his aim was perfect. He could assess a situation and just know what to do, he could see the path that needed to be taken to arrive at the desired outcome, and he had the motor skills to be able to do it. Nothing flashy, it wasn't like he could fly or anything, but it had served him well in sport and even more when he'd gone into the military.

The dinosaurs looked like small raptors, with those vicious, sickle-shaped claws and sharp teeth. Becker counted five of them. He quickly assessed the biggest threat and took off at a run, grabbing a stray shopping cart and pushing it with all his strength into a pair of dinosaurs, sending them sprawling and giving the young mother they'd been cornering time to scramble away with her children.

Becker kicked one in the face before it could right itself and swung his bag of apples at the other, knocking it into a shelf of tinned food. A third dinosaur came running straight for him but Becker picked up two of the fallen tins and heaved them at its head. The dinosaur crumpled.

"Don't be frightened," a woman's voice said into Becker's ear and suddenly the strangest sensation came over him, like the world had blurred, but only for a second.

He blinked and fell to his knees, feeling woozy. When he looked up, he was outside the shop and a pretty blonde with short, spiky hair was peering at him.

"Sorry, it can be rough the first time. You okay?"

"What the hell?" Becker said. "What did you do to me?"

The girl rolled her eyes. "Saved you? No need to thank me." And then she was gone, like she had vanished into thin air.

Sod this, Becker decided and got back to his feet, running into the shop. He didn't need any saving, thanks, particularly not from a girl who looked like she weighed 40 kilos sopping wet. However, everything seemed to be well in hand inside the shop, as black-clad figures raced about. He ducked a random tin coming at his head that didn't appear to have been thrown by anyone.

"Sorry, sorry!" A dark-haired bloke wearing a pair of fingerless gloves and a long-sleeved shirt underneath a vest skidded to a stop in front of him. "Sorry. Accident. But your reflexes are brilliant! I thought for sure I was going to give you concussion."

Becker arched an eyebrow. "You do that often?"

The guy shrugged sheepishly. "More often than is exactly healthy. I get distracted and it's, well, not good."

A man in black combats with blond hair in a short, military-style haircut walked up from behind them. "Connor, you're supposed to be helping Abby."

"Right, I'm on it. Sorry again, mate!" The guy ran off.

"Captain Tom Ryan," the man said, offering his hand to shake. "I've got a lot of civilians outside talking about you."

"Captain Becker. Are you going to tell me what all this is about? Because I'm no expert, but I'm fairly certain those were dinosaurs."

Ryan rubbed the back of his head. "About that… I'm going to need you to come with me."

Becker narrowed his eyes. "Why?"

"Well, you aren't going to believe any PR story I feed you, are you? So you're going to have to fill out some paperwork."

"And then you'll tell me the real story?"

Ryan hesitated. "Okay, here's the truth. My boss might kill me for this, but I like you, Becker. I think you're exactly the sort of person we need. If you come back with me, I'll explain everything, but in return, I want you to consider joining our team."

"You don't even know me."

"Not as such, no, but I know you can learn a lot about a person by seeing how they react in a situation like this."

"A situation where dinosaurs storm a shopping centre."

Ryan gave him this crooked little half-smile. "Exactly. You're like us, aren't you?"

Becker shifted and crossed his arms over his chest. "I don't know what you mean."

"Oh, so you didn't notice that Abby got you out in less than the time it takes you to blink, or that Connor nearly brained you with a tin that he wasn't throwing with his hands?"

"I might have noticed a few oddities."

"Our team is full of people like that. People like you. Interested?"

Becker looked over Ryan's shoulder to where the cute little blonde (Abby) and the geeky bloke (Connor) were assisting a small group of people (Ryan's team?) in dragging the dinosaurs into a heap in front of the sparkling light. "Suppose I am."

Three hours, several phone calls, and one loud disagreement between Ryan and his boss (the stuffy, supercilious, tailored suit wearing Sir James Lester) later, Becker shook Lester's hand and said, "I'm in."

Strings were pulled and instead of getting ready to ship back to Afghanistan, Becker found himself part of a team for which there was no better word than 'superheroes'.

His life, really. There should be a movie.

As far as Becker could tell, Ryan's 'team', as he called them, was almost like black ops, except for the fact that not every field agent had military training but they did all have some sort of special ability. A superpower, if you will. Abby's enhanced speed, Connor's telekinesis, Ryan's enhanced strength. And while there were civilians, like Abby and Connor, there were soldiers like Ryan as well. Most of them seemed to have come from the SAS, as Ryan had, and, coincidentally, as Becker had as well.

They were based out of the Anomaly Research Centre, which was basically just a cover. The anomalies were what they called those big flashing light displays, like the one Becker had encountered in the shopping centre. They actually were, essentially, rips in time and space.

If every superhero needed a supervillain, they had two. Helen Cutter (yes, the ex-Mrs Nick Cutter) and Oliver Leek. Helen could manipulate the anomalies - her gift was time travel. She opened an anomaly, something nasty came through, the team was forced to deal with it. Leek was sort of like her sidekick, Becker supposed, except with delusions of grandeur. Then again, maybe every supervillain's sidekick had delusions of grandeur.

Becker still couldn't quite believe they were managing to keep it as under wraps as they were. Dinosaurs in the street? A team of people with superpowers? It should have been front page news and yet somehow it wasn't. This seemed to be mostly due to the combined efforts of James Lester, who had a knack for getting what he wanted, and Claudia Brown, who was responsible for most of the cover-ups.

They didn't have superhero names, thank God. Becker wasn't sure he could have stomached it. Of course, that didn't stop certain members of the team from thinking up what they wanted to be called, the names they'd leak to the media when the inevitable reveal happened. Connor had a new idea every time the subject came up.

Danny Quinn, the annoying ex-cop, knew exactly what he wanted his name to be. He could manipulate fire, which even Becker had to acknowledge was awesome. Of course, Danny still managed to ruin even that.

"Pyro? That's what you want them to call you? Like in the X-Men?"

"Hey, you don't mess with the classics. Frankly I'm more interested in the fact you admitted to knowledge of X-Men, you giant nerd."

"Maybe I just saw the film." At Danny's scoff, Becker added, "I was a boy who figured out he wasn't like the other boys. What did you expect me to read?"

"Well, if we're taking into account that you actually are a nerd who reads comic books, I don't know, Iron Man? Rich guy who thinks he's better than everyone else." Danny had this way of smiling that made Becker want to punch him in the face. An overreaction, admittedly, but Becker still maintained the urge was justifiable.

Be the bigger man, Becker, he told himself. Rise above. He had a feeling he was going to be doing a lot of rising above where Danny was concerned. He wasn't entirely convinced the fire thing was Danny's only ability.

Becker flicked a piece of rubbish off his arm and scowled. "This is not what I signed up for."

"But hey," Connor said cheerfully. "That thing you did, with the ramps and the old clothes line, that was brilliant! Shame you had to land in the dumpster, really," he added, sounding, to Becker's ears, not all that sympathetic. "How did you know it would work?"

"I don't know, I just see things. Then I do them." And hoped like hell it actually worked.

"I suspect it's something like the way you move things with your mind, Connor," Stephen called over, and then he looked at Becker. "You smell absolutely awful, by the way. Not a chance in hell you're riding back in the same car as me." He sneaked over to come up behind Sarah, wrapping his arms around her waist and burying his nose in her air. "But you smell amazing, as always."

Sarah laughed and swatted him. "Get your nose off of me."

"You don't smell that bad," Abby assured Becker. "Not to anyone without Stephen's senses, at least. Though you've got a little…" She reached her hand out and picked something Becker was in no hurry to identify out of his hair, giving him a big smile.

Becker wished he could crawl under a rock until he recovered what was left of his pride.

"You have the most adorable pout."

Maybe it wasn't recoverable.

Personally, Becker thought that using their abilities on each other was a bit of a low blow. This had nothing to do with the fact that aside from being confident he could beat everyone in the ARC at darts, there wasn't much he could do. Not everyone had Becker's strong moral compass, however.

Sarah had her fingers curled around Becker's arm, her long, painted nails resting against his skin. She was looking right into his eyes and Becker was fairly certain he had never, ever met anyone with more beautiful eyes than hers, large and dark. She was talking to him and Becker wanted her to never stop, he wanted to do everything she said, he wanted nothing more than to please her. He wanted it with a desperation he rarely felt about anything and he wanted her to be happy, to be happy with him.

"Sarah, are you at it again? Stop teasing the new boy."

Sarah smiled and drew her hand back, breaking eye contact with Becker to look over at Stephen. "But it's so much fun. He's blushing."

Becker blinked rapidly, feeling like he was coming out of a fog. He shoved his chair back and rose to his feet, fighting the heat in his cheeks. "I'm going to…" He waved vaguely in the direction of the corridor. "I'll just go." He marched off to the sound of Sarah and Stephen laughing behind him.

Bad form, he told himself. Really bad form. Just because she could make a person do whatever she said didn't mean she could mess with people's heads, especially people who were supposed to be part of her 'team'. What kind of -

"Are you all right?" Abby asked, coming from around the corner.

"Fine, why?"

"You look a bit flushed, that's all."

"Came from the gym," Becker mumbled, fiercely aware of the fact that he wasn't making eye contact and he seemed to be blushing harder. This was ridiculous. He never acted like this.

The way Abby's face was crinkling up in amusement told Becker she was thinking, Bollocks. Becker decided he hated his new teammates.

Even if a part of him quite wanted to ask Abby out for a drink.

All right, well, considering honesty was the best policy (or so Becker had been told), he might not have been exactly truthful about what good his ability was. And about using it. In his defense, it wasn't like he could turn it off, and anyway he wasn't messing about in anyone's head, unlike some people he could name.

The point was, it had gone a long way towards earning Becker the respect of the soldiers who worked at the ARC. He had floored everyone who wanted to try their hand at taking him down, including, memorably, Ryan. He wasn't betting on besting Ryan every time, but once had been all he'd needed. He was also fairly certain that if he hadn't been able to duck that last right cross he would have had concussion.

Or possibly a crushed skull, as Ryan could probably bench press Becker one-handed or something. Supposedly Ryan knew how to pull his punches but Becker liked his head the way it was and thus would prefer not to take any chances.

At the moment, Becker was engaged in a little knife-throwing contest with Blade. Blade, as his nickname suggested, was really good with a knife. His power was something to do with metal (Becker's embarrassingly geeky inner child liked to shout, Magneto! whenever he thought about it) but mostly he was just really good with a knife.

Of course, Becker's aim was spot-on. He had never lost a precision game like this in his life. He threw his last knife at the target and prepared for his victory.

It landed a few centimetres to the left.

"You moved it!" Becker exclaimed. "I saw that, that's cheating!"

Blade just smiled his disconcerting smile at Becker. "You've got your advantages and I've got mine."

"But mine only work on me! I'm not changing what you do. That isn't fair, it's cheating."

"Lighten up, new boy," Lyle called out. "No one likes a sore loser."

Becker opened his mouth to make a comment about what else no one liked but Lyle stiffened and squeezed his eyes shut, his knuckles whitening around the arm of his chair.

Lyle had an ability just like the rest of them. He saw things that hadn't happened yet. It wasn't always very clear or even helpful, but he was always right.

In an instant the atmosphere changed. Fun and games were over as the soldiers became all business. "What is it, Lyle?" Ryan asked as Lyle opened his eyes, rubbing his temples.

"Something big. Lester won't be pleased."

"He never is."

"Then clearly you're doing something wrong," Lyle said with a hint of the smirk he wore more often than not.

Ryan made a rude hand gesture and then reached to get his buzzing mobile. "That'll be the ADD. Time to suit up."

"He means that figuratively, right?" Becker muttered. "I draw the line at tights and spandex."

"And the ladies wept," Lyle said, clapping Becker on the back.

Becker was grateful it hadn't been his arse.

Caroline Steel showed up on a Tuesday, demanding to see Lester. She was installed in an interrogation room, flanked by Ryan and Becker, and kept waiting for what was no doubt a precisely calculated length of time. Lester finally arrived, looking bored, with Claudia following him.

"Ms Steel," Lester said, taking the chair across from her and folding his hands on the table. "To what do I owe the pleasure of this unexpected visit?"

"I want out," she said, picking at her fingernails. "Thought this would be the place to go."

"Pardon?" Lester looked slightly startled, as if that was the last thing he had expected to hear. He glanced back at Claudia before returning his gaze to Caroline.

"I'm done with Helen and Leek. I want out."

"May I ask why?"

"They wanted me to infiltrate your operations through seducing Connor," Caroline spat. "That was going too far."

Lester nodded sagely. "Yes, I can see how you would have such a reaction. However, I'm not sure how that translated into you being here. Why should we help you?"

"Because I can help you. Quid pro quo."

"What makes you think we would be interested in your help?"

"Oh, please," Caroline snorted. "You need all the help you can get."

Becker winced. That was definitely not the right way to go about getting Lester on your side.

Lester had got to his feet, his eyes narrowed, looking down his nose at Caroline. "I think we're done here, Ms Steel. I'm afraid you're on your own."

She tilted her head to the side. "Then I suppose you wouldn't be interested in hearing about what Leek and Helen brought back from the future with them."

Lester stopped halfway to the door and turned back around. "What?"

"It's nothing. I'm sure you'll do fine on your own."

"Ms Steel," Lester said, planting his hands on the edge of the table. "I have no patience for games."

Caroline didn't back down, meeting Lester's eyes squarely. "I want your guarantee that you will help me. Make me an official consultant. Put me under your protection because I know they'll send someone after me."

"How do I know this isn't some elaborate set-up?"

She shrugged. "You don't. But I'll tell you everything I know."

The silence stretched. Finally Lester nodded. "Fine. We'll start on the paperwork and you had better hope your information is worth it." He drew Claudia aside and spoke softly to her, after which Claudia left the room and hurried down the corridor.

A few minutes later, Claudia returned with Lorraine, Lester's assistant.

"This is Ms Wickes. She'll get you sorted," Lester said.

Caroline ran an appreciative gaze over Lorraine. "Now, if they'd asked me to seduce you, it would have been a different story."

Lorraine's mouth quirked. "This way, Ms Steel."

"Call me Caroline." She followed Lorraine out of the room, and at Ryan's nod, Becker went after them. If Caroline tried anything funny, he guaranteed she would regret it.

"What you're saying is," Becker said, looking around the table, "they went to the future, found some kind of mutated super predator, brought them back, and stuck a device in their brains to control them? You've got to be joking."

"Really, Captain?" Lester asked, arching one perfect eyebrow. "You agreed to join a team of superheroes but this is what you can't believe?"

Becker shrugged. "Superheroes aren't hard to believe in when you've spent your whole life with a superpower."

"Even if it is a shit one," Danny said, flicking his lighter and making the tiny flame twist into shapes.

Becker flipped him off and Lester sighed. "Children, please, let's try to concentrate on what's actually important. The people who would like to kill us, perhaps?"

"I don't know how you aren't dead already," Caroline said.

"Thank you, that's very helpful. Need I remind you that you chose to come to us?"

"Must've been mad," she muttered. "But that's all I know. I wasn't exactly privy to their plans."

"So what does Helen want? What's the point of it all?" Ryan asked. "Why go to so much trouble with the predators?"

"She's doing what she's always done," Cutter said, sounding as though he was thinking out loud. "She's running experiments, she's playing games with time."

"But if that's true, why release them at all?" Connor questioned, "Surely she must realise the sort of havoc they'll wreak? Makes it a bit hard to continue running experiments. Pointless, too, if everyone's dead."

"I never knew Helen as well as I thought I did," Cutter admitted. "I don't know what she wants. Maybe it's all a game, a test to see what we'll do, to see what happens. I don't think she really cares who gets hurt."

"That's obvious," Connor said, then raised his eyes guiltily to Cutter.

"Helen's never been overly fond of people and she's more of a practical, ends justify the means sort of woman. Walking through time the way she does has only made it worse, she's seen things no one should. She's traveled so many different paths it's made her…"

"Psychotic?" Becker volunteered.

Abby smacked him.

Cutter only shook his head. "I don't know. Maybe it's not even her, maybe it's Leek. He's the wildcard in all of this."

"Leek?" Lester scoffed. "He hasn't the wits to come up with anything on his own. This is all well and good, but it's still only conjecture. If Helen wants to take over the world or destroy it or just play games with us all, so be it. I'm more concerned with how we're going to prevent her releasing the predators on an unsuspecting public."

The room fell silent until Stephen said simply, "Caroline tells us where she is, we go there, and we stop her."

Somehow Becker had a feeling it wasn't going to be that easy.

Twelve hours later a bomb went off in the ARC. Lyle sensed it in time to get the immediate vicinity mostly cleared, but a good portion of the ARC had been reduced nearly to rubble and fifteen employees were in hospital. Among that number was Hart, who had shielded Cutter with his body, taking the brunt of the damage from the blast. Cutter had made it out with nothing worse than a concussion, unless you counted the massive guilt trip he was on.

Considering ground zero was Cutter's office, it was pretty clear what the main goal had been. As best they could work out, Leek and Helen had got one of their lackeys smuggled in with the bomb. He was, as of yet, the only casualty. Caroline claimed to have had no knowledge of the plan.

"What we really need is a mind reader," Becker said.

"Yes, let me just put out an advertisement." Lester tapped a finger to the side of his chin. "'Wanted: one human lie detector. Your country needs you!'"

"To save the world!" Becker added.

"The pay's shit and you might die, but you'll be able to rest easier, knowing you've made a difference," Ryan said, his tone all but putting capital letters on his last words.

"Just don't tell anyone or we'll have to kill you."

"If you've quite finished," Lester said pointedly.

"Ah, the life of a superhero," Ryan said, running his hand over Lester's back as he moved to leave. "Not nearly as glamorous as I'd been led to believe."

"You're telling me," Becker said, following after him. "A load of false advertising."

Ryan grinned at him. "You didn't think it would just be rescuing grateful, swooning women, did you?"

"No, but one grateful, swooning woman would be nice."

"She'll smack you if she hears you talking like that," Ryan said and Becker pretended to have no idea what he meant.

The bomb had left everyone shaken and the ARC in shambles, but if anything, it strengthened their resolve to keep going. If Helen thought they were going to simply roll over, she was very much mistaken. By planting that bomb, Helen had made the most direct attack on their lives she'd ever done. She'd made it personal.

Sarah, given that her boyfriend was unconscious in hospital, was given the opportunity to sit the mission out. Of course she refused. Becker felt bad about how thankful he was, but Sarah was always useful for breaking into places. Cutter, on the other hand, was staying behind. It was a toss-up as to whether the concussion or the guilt would have made him more useless, in Becker's opinion.

The car park was a bustle of activity as they readied to leave, checking weapons and loading up the vehicles. Ryan oversaw everything with his usual calm competence; had Becker ever been able to choose his commanding officer, he would have picked someone like Ryan.

"Is everyone ready?"

Connor jumped at the voice and visibly recoiled from the woman who had walked up next to him, a tall brunette with ample cleavage. "Claudia! Stop that! I hate it when you do that."

Claudia grinned with Helen Cutter's face, the expression looking far more feral than it ever would have with Claudia's features. A moment later her face flickered, her features morphing into a weedy, weasely man with thinning hair. "Is this better?"

"No!" Connor held his hands out in a warding gesture. "No, that is not better, not at all."

Finally Oliver Leek faded into the pretty Claudia Brown herself, brown eyes full of mischief. "Just thought I'd lighten the mood."

"I thought it was funny," Becker said and climbed in the driver's seat of the nearest vehicle.

"Thank you, Becker," Claudia said, smiling at him, while Connor muttered under his breath.

"You would," he said, and got in the passenger side.

Helen and Leek, according to Caroline, had set up shop in an old, disused MOD base. It turned out to be a lot easier to get into than anyone had anticipated. A lot.

"Why is there no security?" Becker asked as they all piled out of the cars, suspicion settling in and making him wary. "There should be guards or, or something. This is ridiculous." He peered upwards into a security camera and wondered if Helen was sitting behind a row of computer screens, watching them, or whether the bloody thing was just turned off.

"She's got a building full of the future's most highly evolved predator," Danny pointed out, so very not helpfully. "What's the point of having guns?"

Ryan ignored him and pushed the gate open, his expression mirroring what Becker felt. "She wanted us to come here. That's the only explanation. She knows Caroline went to us and she knows we want to stop her. She wants us here."

Connor voiced what they were all thinking. "She thinks we can't do it. She thinks we can't stop her."

"She's in for a shock then, yeah?" Lyle said, squeezing Connor's shoulder. "Where do you want us, boss?"

"Fan out and sweep the building," Ryan said, starting to move in. "We've got to find those predators."

They moved in small teams so as to cover more ground, Becker ending up with Abby and Lyle. Everyone was quiet and focused because they all knew what would happen if they screwed this up.

"Wait," Becker cautioned, holding his hand out until they all stopped. Noise was coming from just ahead of them, low growls and chattering. Becker sighted down his gun and started ahead once again, slowly and carefully.

They stepped into a large, open room and the source of the noise was readily apparent. The room was filled with creatures in cages, pacing and testing their restraints. Becker didn't know what most of them were but he recognised what looked like two raptors as well as a sabre-toothed cat - Smilodon, a small voice in his head that sounded like Connor corrected. Becker was really in trouble if he was starting to get commentary from a Connor that had set up shop in his brain.

"We need to move on," Becker said. "They're not causing any harm in these cages; we'll deal with this later."

"Some of Helen's experiments?" Lyle asked, eyeing some sort of giant bird with a lethal-looking beak.

Abby's expression had hardened. "It's disgusting. They don't deserve to be treated like this, taken out of their time and locked up."

Becker let his hand brush her back as he passed. "We'll fix this, don't worry."

The three of them continued on through the building, Becker still feeling ill at ease with the lack of resistance. He hoped that everyone else was okay, that they hadn't been swarmed by all of the predators that Becker hadn't even seen yet.

Of course, it turned out he had spoken too soon. "Fucking hell!" he said, raising his gun up at the large, vicious (and ugly, Christ, it was hideous) creature staring right at him. Staring, but not moving. Becker slowly circled around, taking it all in. Four of them and if Caroline's intel was even half on-target about these things, four was too many.

"They won't attack you," an unfamiliar voice said and Becker jerked around to see where it was coming from. His eyes alighted on the figure of Leek on a balcony above them. "Not unless I tell them to, of course," Leek went on.

Abby was tensing beside him and Becker took a firm hold of her arm. "Don't even think about it. He'll have those things on you in a second and it won't matter how fast you can run."

"Least I'd take him down with me."

"You are not an acceptable loss," Becker said sharply, sparing her a quick glance.

"Captain Becker, isn't it?" Leek's voice drifted down. "I'm so glad we can finally meet face-to-face. It would seem you're more than just muscle and a pretty face, after all."

"I wish I could say the same about you."

Leek's tone sharpened immediately. "You might want to remember who the one in control here is and keep that smart mouth of yours in check."

"Where's Helen?" Becker threw back at him even as he thought, Shut up, Becker, what's wrong with you? Even Lyle's managing to keep his mouth shut. "Isn't she the one pulling your lead?"

"Helen has her own agenda, she has nothing to do with me!"

"Someone's defensive," Lyle said under his breath.

"You think this is all there is? I have predators placed all around London, just waiting for my order to be released. You're too late; you can't stop it."

Bugger. That changed things. Becker caught Lyle's eye and jerked his head in a tiny nod towards one of the predators. The eagerness in Lyle's expression was enough to communicate his understanding and Becker slid his hand down Abby's arm, tugging her slightly. Her face was full of worry but her eyes were clear and she poised to move on Becker's signal. She was quick enough that with the element of surprise, she should be able to get behind one and take it out. With any luck, they could kill three of the four predators before Leek could react.

"Now," Becker mouthed and faced the closest predator, aiming straight at its head. The world narrowed until it was just Becker and his target and he fired three times. Becker never missed.

The predator collapsed and Leek was shouting commands at the others, but Becker was already moving. He heard gunshots and then a scream. Oh, fuck, that was a girl's voice, that was Abby. Becker whirled around, trusting Lyle to take care of himself, and was in time to watch a predator rip Abby's throat out. Blood gushed out to stain her white shirt red and she fell to the ground, motionless.

From behind him Lyle's shout turned into a pained cry and the sound of his gun faded to nothing. Becker tore his eyes his eyes away from Abby - shit, Abby, oh, fuck - and let everything fade again, let it all fade out to the target. Nothing mattered but the target and Becker could see what he had to do.

He aimed his gun and ran forward, shooting, and as the predator fell Becker used its body as a lift to catapult himself up into the air, twisting round until he could see the third predator. As he came back down to the ground he fired once into its open mouth.

Becker landed softly in a crouched position and only then did he allow himself to look. Lyle was nearly in two pieces and Becker winced and looked away. He half-walked, half-crawled to where Abby was stretched out on the ground, her eyes still open but with no life in them.

A whimper sounded in the silence and it took a second for Becker to realise that no one could have made it but him. He dragged her limp form into his lap, her blood staining his hands, and pushed at the gash in her neck like he could fix it, like he could fix her if only he tried.

"It isn't real," said a voice close-by but it couldn't be, it sounded like Abby and Abby was -

"Becker, whatever you're seeing, it isn't real." Abby's small hand clutched his shoulder and Becker finally turned to look.

She was there, her beautiful face etched with concern, and Becker jerked back around but the bodies were gone, the room was empty save for three dead predators and the two of them. Becker and Abby, still breathing, still completely alive. His breath hitched and he grabbed her arms.

"Abby," he said desperately. "Abby, I thought... You were dead, I saw you, I..."

"It wasn't real," she said quietly, brushing her hand into his hair and soothing like him like she would an animal. "That's what Leek does, he makes you see things that aren't real."

"I could smell it, I could smell the blood." Becker didn't think he would ever be able to forget it, the wave of nausea that rolled through him, the sight of Abby's frail broken body. He looked at his hands but they were clean.

"It's okay," Abby said and pressed her lips to his, soft and gentle. She drew back after only a second, a small and private smile touching her mouth. "We took care of it and now we have to go."

"Yes," Becker agreed, giving his head a shake to clear it. He needed to know what had actually happened while he'd been, well, hallucinating, but that could wait. "Where is he? Leek? Have we lost him?"

"Lyle went after him. He can't have gone far."

"All right. Abby, I need you to call Lester, tell him what Leek said. He's got to send in teams to subdue those creatures. I'm going after Leek and you can catch me up, yeah?"

She nodded, mobile already in hand. "Okay."

"Be careful," Becker said, giving her shoulder a squeeze before he ran off.

There was another dead predator in the corridor just beyond where Leek had been. Becker didn't know how Lyle had managed it, but evidently he had. Blood was spattered along the floor, indicating that Lyle must have been hurt, but it was a good sign that he was still on the move.

Abby caught up to Becker not long after that, startling him something fierce as she appeared by his side from out of nowhere, but he was hoping she hadn't noticed. (Her smirk, unfortunately, said that she had.) "Lester said he'd take care of it," she said.

"He always does," Becker said absently. You could say what you wanted about Lester, but he knew what he was about.

A few more steps forward and they had reached what looked like a makeshift lab, instruments strewn on tables and some suspicious stains on the floor. It wasn't empty, either, as Lyle was standing with his back to them, his gun kicked across the floor to lie at Leek's feet and another predator looming over him. Lyle was favouring his left leg, the thigh slashed right across. He had tied a ragged piece of his shirt around the wound but the blood had soaked through.

Leek wasn't paying any mind to Lyle, however - he was talking to Helen Cutter. Becker tried to hide in the shadowy corridor, yanking Abby back, but it was too late, they had already been seen.

"Oh, you again?" Leek sighed. "You're bloody difficult to kill, aren't you?"

"It's a failing of mine," Becker said as he came farther into the room, pressing his hand gently at the small of Abby's back. "Terribly sorry about it."

"I hope you enjoyed my little show," Leek said, lips curling into a sneer, and Becker had to restrain himself from leaping at the man.

Helen, who had turned to watch them come in, gave Becker a wink. His eyes widened but he made himself glance away from her and back to Leek.

From over Leek's shoulder Becker could see Ryan creep silently in. While Leek's attention was focused elsewhere, Ryan smashed in the back of his skull. Leek dropped like a stone. Ryan squatted down, checking Leek's pulse, as Helen morphed back into Claudia.

"Go team," Sarah said, smiling, as she stepped into the room from the same corridor Ryan had entered from.

"I think he should have read some more comic books," Becker said, glaring distastefully at Leek's unconscious body. "Everyone knows once the villain starts blabbing out all his plans he's just going to lose."

He turned in a slow circle around the predator left guarding Lyle, the device clamped into its brain clearly still keeping it in check. Becker raised his gun to its ugly elongated head, aiming for the ears in the centre of its face, and fired. Brain matter splattered out behind it and it fell in a heap. Becker shot it again, and then once more. Just to be sure.

Abby was watching him uneasily, as if she was anxious about his mental state, but she only asked, "Where's Helen? Did you find her?"

"We lost her," Ryan said. "She escaped through an anomaly."

"I think Cutter was right," Sarah added. "This wasn't anything more than a bit of a diversion to her; it was Leek who really wanted those creatures to get out." She walked closer to Lyle, offering him a shoulder to lean on as she used her jacket to wrap around his leg.

"Thank you," Lyle said in a much maligned tone. "Thank you for caring, as clearly no one else does."

Blade's voice crackled over the comms. "You'd better get out here, boss."

Ryan responded immediately. "What's wrong?"

"Your boyfriend's worst nightmare."

"Christ," Ryan muttered, glancing from Claudia to Leek to Becker. "We need to restrain him, can you…?"

"Sure thing," Becker said and exchanged a glance with Abby.

She took his hand. "Come on, I'll take you."

In the span of a heartbeat later, Becker found himself outside the base with Blade, Danny, and Connor, surrounded by…

"A film crew?" Abby said, mouth agape. A blonde reporter was speaking excitedly into a microphone while several cameramen roamed around. A dead predator lay on the ground, what looked like a knife wound in its skull.

"Someone must have tipped them off," Blade said, eyeing the cameras.

Becker immediately thought, Parting gift from Helen. Bloody bitch.

"I'm afraid they might have caught some things they shouldn't have. Especially, er…" Connor winced. "You know that bloke Helen's got, the one that can make doubles of himself? We might have run into him, out here, only it wasn't really him, so the doubles might have vanished on camera. Also Danny might have been a bit too flashy."

Danny just shrugged, completely unapologetic, while Becker rolled his eyes. It figured.

"Possibly I was, too," Connor admitted and met Abby's eyes. "And now you just gave them something else to see."

Abby's cheeks reddened slightly and she raised a hand to her hair, brushing her fingers through it.

"I think our secret identities have gone public," Danny said, sounding thrilled.

"What do we do now?" Connor asked, bouncing a little on his toes, clearly more eager than anxious.

"Smile and wave, boys," Abby said, ever practical, and proceeded to do just that.

Becker sighed and looked into the rolling cameras. His life was a comic book. He might as well get used to it.

End

A/N: SPOILERY WARNING: Contains character death that does NOT actually happen, it is only an illusion.