Elizabeth Cutter | Primeval

S4 E1 - Home Is A Metaphor

My name is James Lester.
Five years ago, I was put in charge of the ARC, a top-secret government project investigating rips in time known as anomalies. These anomalies allowed long-extinct creatures from distant eras to cross into our own time. Our leading research scientist was murdered by his insane wife Helen, who planned to wipe out humanity. She's gone to kill the first human, stop our evolution in its tracks. Danny Quinn, Elizabeth Cutter, Connor Temple and Abby Maitland went through an anomaly to stop her. No one knows what happened to them, but as the human race survived, we must assume they succeeded.

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Twigs snap under my feet as the trees whizz past in my peripheral. Every now and then I feel the jab of shrubs as they cut into my arms but I can't stop. The pain in my leg increases with each bound I take, my jeans soaked through with blood. Swinging a right, the whole forest spins and I find myself tripping over a root, pain shooting through my leg.

"No no no no no," I mutter, clambering onto my knees and practically falling forwards as I try to start running again.

Up ahead, there's an old fallen tree with a hollow trunk. If I can get far enough away that I can hide in there, maybe they'll leave me alone. Maybe I'll be safe.

One year. I've been here for one year. In those 12 months, there's only been a few interactions where I've encountered some unpleasant visitors but, besides that, it's been just me, myself and I.

I scramble into the trunk and lay on my back as I try to catch my breath. Outside, twigs snapping alert me of their closeness to my hiding spot and I cover a hand over my mouth to prevent me from squealing in fear.

All goes silent. I wait. Nothing. I remove the hand from my mouth and slowly inch myself out when a claw smashes through from above and a scream erupts from my lips.

Again and again, the bark is slowly disintegrated by the claws digging in. As it penetrates through all that's keeping me from it's teeth, I feel a claw scratch at my forehead and I shut my eyes, knowing this is it. This is how I'm going to die...I'll get to be with Dad again...

"Lizzie?"

My eyes shoot open at the voice and I look up to see, "Abby?" I whisper.

I blink a few times. It must be a hallucination; it has to be. One year. One whole year I've been alone. We've never crossed paths. I assumed they made it home but here Abby is standing right in front of me.

She pulls what's left of the bark off and takes my hand, pulling me out. Once standing, I let go of her and brush myself down, wincing as I brush over the injury on my leg.

"You're bleeding," Abby says, concern filling her face. She steps forward but I put a hand out to stop her.

"It's just a cut," I whisper, still out of breath from my marathon through the cretaceous. Looking around, I notice the raptors are nowhere to be seen.

Abby notes my confusion. "Connors distracting them," she tells me and all I can do is nod. Connor's alive too. "Where's Danny? Is Helen dead?"

I lower my head. "I don't know, he sent me back- told me to find you guys...but I couldn't."

"Do you reckon he did it?" She asks.

I shrug. "We're still here, aren't we?"

"Abby!" Connor yells from somewhere within the trees and she sets off running.

I sigh. Really? Running?

I finally catch up to her and she pulls me behind a tree.

"Stay here, I've got an idea." With that, she runs.