Anomaly Research Centre
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Anomaly Research Centre
3x3 TwoCutters
"Two versions of Cutter?
Sounds like some kind of nightmare."
This article is about the new world timeline Mac Rendell who worked for Cross Photonics, not the alternate timeline version of Mac Rendell who worked with the Anomaly Research Centre.


Mac Rendell was a Cross Photonics employee, a friend of Evan Cross and a member of Cross' Special Projects Group.

Biography

Background

Mac originally lived in council flats in East London;[1] he described his life there as "shite" and bleak, and once implied that he was a vandal. He originally planned to join the British Army as the only way to get off the estate. (Fear of Flying, Truth) However, sometime after 15 September, 2006, (The Sound of Thunder: Part 1) Evan Cross visited Mac in England and gave him a better offer, as a security guard for Cross Photonics in Vancouver; Mac accepted. (Truth) This would, over the following five - six years, forge a strong friendship between Mac and Evan.

The New World

One day in December 2011 - January 2012, when Mac arrived for work with Evan at Cross Photonics, when Evan learned how quiet Mac personally found his current position as security guard, Evan decided to promote Mac to Special Projects Group. Evan subsequently took Mac to the Tank (with the two encountering Angelika Finch over a missed meeting with Dave Simmons on the way), where Mac met Toby Nance and was introduced into the SPG's task of tracking and studying Anomalies.

NW1x1 MacIntroducedToSpecialProjects

Mac is introduced into the Special Projects Group and the Tank. (The New World)

Mac, Evan and Toby then left and went to Stanley Park, to set up a magnetometer network in the Park to locate a local recurring Anomaly. There, Mac helped Toby with setting magnetometers up in trees, advising her on where to position them (while also looking her over). Mac and Toby then began discussing Mac's past and how Evan had both originally hired him and then that day promoted him when Mac had seemingly done nothing to impress Evan into doing so.

Later, back at the Tank, when Evan revealed photos of the Stanley Park Anomaly and a Utahraptor to Mac, Toby, Ange and Dylan Weir which confirmed that the Anomalies were spacetime portals, Mac was cool-headed and collected about this discovery and more shocked at the fact that Evan had used a 35mm camera. Shortly afterwards, when the Special Projects Group learned that Tony Drake was tracking a creature at a SkyTrain service tunnel, Mac rushed to the scene by car with Evan and Dylan, but were too late and arrived to find that the creature had killed Drake.

Afterwards, when Mac and the SPG learned that a boy, Trevor Molison, had been abducted by a creature in Stanley Park, they returned to the Park to track and save Trevor, but the police initially refused to let the SPG in until Ange got them access through her contacts. Mac then armed up along with Evan and Dylan with weapons that he had taken after Drake's death, and went into Stanley Park and searched separately from Evan and Dylan for Trevor.

Mac eventually found Trevor at a Pteranodon's nest, and when Evan and Dylan's tranquilisers failed to knock the creature out in time, Mac resorted to coming out of hiding and drawing the Pteranoson's attention while Evan rescued Trevor from the nest. After the Pteranodon had passed out from the tranquiliser, as Mac watched, a Utahraptor arrived and attacked Evan and Trevor, until the Pteranodon recovered and the two creatures killed each other. Mac later helped Evan and Toby store the Pteranodon's and Utahraptor's bodies in Cross Photonics' freezer room while telling Toby about the creature incursion, then discussed with Toby getting his own office or desk at the Tank.

Sisiutl

NW1x1 MacVsFirstCreature

Mac battles his first creature (the Pteranodon in Stanley Park). (The New World)

One morning a week after the Stanley Park incursion, while Toby was setting the Special Projects Group's new citywide Anomaly detection system, Mac did pull-ups beneath the Tank's stairs and tried to get Toby's attention, until Evan arrived. The three then activated the detector, which detected dozens of Anomalies across British Columbia, but Evan ruled the majority out as false signals from radio towers and hospital MRI scans. However, Mac noticed one of the signals was on a bay by a Merison Oil loading facility where there was no radio signals or hospitals to generate a false Anomaly signal, and Mac and Evan realised that that signal had to be an actual Anomaly; so Mac and Evan left and drove to the coastline where the bay was, immediately.

There, Evan and a laid-back Mac tracked the Anomaly signal along a cliff overlooking the bay, and found that the Anomaly was underwater in the bay. As Evan and Mac discussed the Anomaly being underwater and whether or not this meant that any creatures could have come through, Dylan Weir arrived with Leo John and joined them. The group then noticed a Titanoboa swimming in the bay straight towards a kayak, but the creature ignored the kayak and swam by under it. Evan subsequently had Mac go out onto the bay and isolate the Anomaly, and Mac got Evan to give him several Cross Photonics credit cards for that. Mac then went and got a motorboat, and drove it out onto the bay and to the Anomaly and placed a marker out above the Anomaly to stop anyone else coming near. Mac discussed containing the Anomaly and the Titanoboa from the boat with Toby over the phone, until the Anomaly's interference broke up the phone signal.

Later, Toby warned Mac over the phone that the Anomaly was becoming unstable and that he had to use his boat's motor to lure the Titanoboa back to the Anomaly site, and Mac then began driving his boat in loops around the Anomaly at full-power. Eventually, Evan ordered Mac over the phone to move the boat closer to a storm drain at the bay shore to get the Titanoboa's attention away from noisy protestors. Mac succeeded in drawing the creature through the storm drain back into the bay, but just as Mac turned his boat around and drove it back to the Anomaly to lure the Titanoboa back through, the Anomaly closed; forcing Mac to turn the boat's motor off to avoid getting attacked by the Titanoboa.

NW1x2 MacOnBayWaters

Mac driving a motorboat around the underwater Anomaly to draw the Titanoboa back. (Sisiutl)

Seconds later, the Anomaly briefly reopened, giving Mac one more chance to get the Titanoboa back through, but Mac could not start his boat's motor back up to draw the Titanoboa back through due to interference from the Anomaly. Mac then came up with another idea, and filled a box with wireless, noisy objects such as a drill and other items and threw it into the bay, so that this would draw the Titanoboa back to the Anomaly instead. The box failed to sink down to the Anomaly, forcing Mac to dive into the bay waters to tie weights onto it to weigh it down to the Anomaly. This worked, and the Titanoboa went after the box and swam back through the Anomaly with it just before the Anomaly closed.

Fear of Flying

While Mac and his unofficial girlfriend and partner Samantha Sedaris were biking out on Route 31 outside Vancouver, they were called by Toby, who informed Mac of a new Anomaly at Spring River Airport. Mac suffered complications with getting to the Airport to meet Evan, and so was forced to bring her along to the Anomaly incursion and reveal the Anomalies to her as well. Evan was upset with Mac over the fact that Sam too now knew of the Anomalies, but Mac thought that Sam's marksman skills could be useful if any creatures came through the Anomaly (because the Anomaly was several storeys high and could have therefore let very large and powerful predators come through).

When the SPG learned from Toby that Eastern Airlines Flight 443 had disappeared through the Anomaly at the Airport, Evan set about going through the Anomaly with Dylan on a search-and-rescue mission to bring the plane's crew back from the other side, and Evan had a reluctant Mac stay behind at the Airport in the present with Samantha to guard the Anomaly in case any creatures came through. While Evan and Dylan were on the other side, Mac and Sam guarded the Anomaly at the Airport and discussed the Anomaly operation as they waited for Dylan and Evan to return. Mac had Toby stop any more planes from arriving at the Airport, and Mac began to grow worried and impatient and wanted to disobey Evan and go through the Anomaly after him and Dylan (out of fear that the Anomaly could close while Evan and Dylan were still on the other side and maroon them in the past), though Sam tried to convince him against it and get him to relax about it.

NW1x3 Mac+SamHuntJurassicBeetleQueen

Mac and Sam hunting at Spring River Airport for the Jurassic Beetle queen. (Fear of Flying)

Eventually, just as Mac was about to make up his mind and go through the Anomaly for Evan and Dylan, a giant Jurassic Beetle queen came out of the Anomaly and attacked Mac and Sam. The two were unable to stop the giant Beetle with their tranquiliser guns due to the creature's armoured carapace, and so tried to first take cover from the Jurassic Beetle's attacks and then come out to fight it. However, the Beetle escaped over to the Airport's nearby warehouses, and Mac and Sam immediately set about following the creature to stop it before it caused an infestation.

Mac and Sam searched among the Airport's hangars and warehouses for the Jurassic Beetle, discussing the status of their relationship on the way, until they saw the Beetle dragging a local airport mechanic into a warehouse and went in to rescue the man. Mac and Samantha found the Beetle queen with the unconscious mechanic, and tried to capture the Beetle queen while it was distracted by lassoing it around the legs with cables. However, the Beetle noticed the two and tried to fly off, but Mac managed to knock it out. After binding the captured Jurassic Beetle queen, Mac and Sam tended to the mechanic, retrieving a sac of Beetle eggs from down his throat and learning from this that the Beetle had been attempting to use him as an incubator. Mac and Samantha then set about driving the Beetle back to the Anomaly to send it back through, but as they did, they were alerted that Evan and Dylan needed help when a flare fired out of the Anomaly from the other side.

While the Jurassic Beetle queen escaped and began flying around and causing havoc for Mac and Sam, Mac caught a makeshift anchor Evan and Dylan were sending through the Anomaly, and used his truck with the anchor to pull Evan and Dylan back through the Anomaly to the airport in the present. Mac and Sam immediately after set about dealing with the rampant queen Beetle, and Sam managed to shoot it down and send it back through the Anomaly. Afterwards, Mac compared scores with Dylan and Evan, and Dylan noted that they'd failed to save the plane's two crewmembers, but that they still wouldn't be forgotten.

Angry Birds

After the Tank had gotten a new Anomaly alert, Mac arrived late to find that Evan and Dylan had already left twenty minutes ago to deal with it, while Toby intended to come with him so that she could finally see an Anomaly in the field. Though Mac was surprised to learn Toby was coming, and jokingly warned her that he wouldn't be able to look out for her, he let her come. Mac and Toby drove out for the New West Warehouse district where the Anomaly was located; but on their way, they had confirmation of a creature incursion when Mac's car non-fatally hit a Terror Bird on the road, followed by confirmation of a fatality when Mac and Toby found the remains of a drug courier whom the creature had run off the road and devoured earlier.

NW1x4 MacFindsDeadCourierRemains

"Let's just hope the crash killed him first..." (Angry Birds)

Though Mac had wanted to take an insistent Toby back to the Tank so she'd be safe, at Toby's insistence, he had continued with her on to the Anomaly site, where they found Evan and Dylan's car was mysteriously abandoned and neither of them were answering their cellphones. Mac went ahead to search for Evan, Dylan and any more creatures inside one of the warehouses at the old train yard, instructing Toby to stay put in the meantime. He found Evan and Ken Leeds in time to save Evan from an attacking Terror Bird, killing the creature with a tranquiliser overdose by repeatedly firing on it. Moments later, another Terror Bird arrived and chased after the trio, forcing them to take cover inside a train cart, and trapping them inside with the creature trying to break in.

With Mac's ammunition having all been spent on the other Terror Bird, he, Leeds and Evan were forced to use tools they found in the train cart as weapons with which they could fight their way out before the Terror Bird could get in, but fortunately, the creature gave up in the last minutes and left in search of easier prey, allowing Evan, Mac and Leeds to escape the cart and meet up with Dylan and Toby. The group all fled outside from the Terror Bird's pursuit, then while Leeds and Toby went off to locate and contain the Anomaly, Dylan came up with a plan on how she, Mac and Evan could neutralise the Terror Bird: they would use a cannabis crop at the train yard to turn one of the carriages into a hotbox, then would lure the Terror Bird in, and trap it to pass out from the drug overdose. They pulled the plan off, with Mac being responsible for sealing the Bird in the carriage once Dylan had lured it in and gotten herself out.

NW1x4 MacHighAfterIncursion

Mac is heavily stoned at the end of the day thanks to being near the hotbox. (Angry Birds)

With the Terror Birds all neutralised, Ken Leeds helped the SPG to send them back through the Anomaly and then contain the Anomaly site. The group afterwards returned to the Tank at the end of the day to fill Ange in on the incursion, with Ange being exasperated to find that Mac was heavily stoned from being so directly exposed to the cannabis smoke from the hotbox.

Undone

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Clean Up on Aisle Three

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Babes in the Woods

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Truth

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Breakthrough

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The Great Escape

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The Inquisition

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The Sound of Thunder: Part 1

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The Sound of Thunder: Part 2

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Personality

Mac was shown to be charismatic, sassy and mischievous, and possessed a large, extensive knowledge on firearms. Mac was also known to love exhilaration and adrenaline rush, and activities which caused these such as sky diving and dangerous motorcycle maneuvers. Mac was usually calm and cool-headed against the Anomalies and the creatures, and felt that his Anomaly-combatting job with the Special Projects Group was his place in the world. Mac was also a loyal and selfless friend to his comrades, although Mac sometimes questioned his friendships and relationships during emotional hardships.

Mac personally felt that the Special Projects Group should use deadly force against the creatures rather than attempt to keep them alive to send back through the Anomalies, and came to believe after Samantha Sedaris' death that it was sparing the creatures that got people killed; although Mac was usually willing to tolerate Evan's policy to keep the creatures alive to avoid unravelling the timeline out of loyalty to Evan.

Following Samantha's death, Mac was left angry and bitter towards Evan and the creatures, although he eventually managed to recover from Sam's death and return to his normal self. After Mac learned of his alternate self and the truth about why Evan recruited him, Mac became much less self-confident; feeling that his entire life onwards from when Evan had recruited him was a lie, and that he was a copy and the alternate Mac was the real him, and Mac came to question his life and his loyalty to Evan and the SPG. However, Mac was encouraged by Connor to not think about his alternate self's life and that his current life was real.

Relationships

Evan Cross

Mac was a good friend to Evan Cross, who'd pulled him out of his poor life in London for a good job at Cross Photonics. Mac was very loyal and grateful to Evan for pulling him out of his "shite life in London," and he would normally tolerate Evan's methods of dealing with the Anomalies and the creatures over Mac's own. After Samantha's death, Mac initially blamed Evan and became very angry with him for not killing the creatures on sight, although as he began to get over his grief, his loyalty overrode and healed his anger. After Mac learned the truth about his alternate self and why Evan had really recruited him, it caused a serious rift between them; Mac resented Evan for what he'd done, feeling that Evan had stolen his life and turned it into a lie, although everyone assured Mac that it was his current life that he should be focusing on and not his other self's. Mac ultimately still remained a true and loyal friend to Evan right to the end, sacrificing his own life to save Evan in the past.

Dylan Weir

Mac and Dylan were close friends, and Dylan was a sympathetic and understanding friend to Mac. They could talk to each-other about personal matters and feelings concerning their jobs in the SPG, and they worked well with each-other and Evan.

Toby Nance

Mac enjoyed frequently teasing Toby and getting on her nerves with sexual joking comments, while also caring about her very much. When Toby was in serious, life-threatening danger, Mac's childish behavior towards her would disappear and quickly turn to deep dread and concern, before getting back to his more teasing and childish self once she was safe again. As once commented by Toby, if the sexual elements were extracted from her and Mac's relationship, Mac would be like "the brother [she'd] never wanted."

Angelika Finch

Mac and Ange initially did not interact much, but they did not seem to get on with each other very well, although Mac was still respectful around her as one of his bosses. But after Ange left Cross Photonics and joined Colonel Hall, Mac lost any sympathy or respect he'd had for her, declaring that she'd made herself the SPG's enemy by choosing Project Magnet, and viewing her as a very bad influence whom he didn't want anywhere near his friends. Mac's spite and disgust towards Ange for choosing to work with Colonel Hall after leaving the SPG was to a point that he vented his distress on her over Toby's condition during the Brontoscorpio incursion, accusing her of only wanting to see Toby for usefulness to Project Magnet and declaring she'd lost the right to be concerned for Toby when she'd joined the enemy.

Samantha Sedaris

Mac and Samantha were in a sexual relationship, which Mac felt was also an emotional one while Sam didn't. When Sam began helping the Special Projects Group with handling the Anomalies and the creatures, Mac usually tried to keep Sam out of it out of concern for her safety. Mac also initially underestimated Samantha's mental strength and cool head and spirit against the creatures until he saw it for himself. When Sam was killed, Mac was left devastated, and angry, and took longer to get over it than Evan.

Appearances

References

  1. Mentioned by his description
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