by Michael Blakeney and Gem Lassiter
90923.17
Immediately following Out of Control
-=USS Zenith=-
90923.17
Immediately following Out of Control
-=USS Zenith=-
Rising slowly from the floor at last, Gem lifted reddened eyes that refused to spill tears. After all, no matter what happened to her, Gemini Lassiter did not cry.
She still gripped the small book tightly and wouldn't let it out of her sight. It was the only thing she would take with her now, from his quarters.
She just couldn't risk it getting lost.
She tucked it into the bag she'd brought with her from the Serendipity, which contained PADDS holding changes in assignments aboard ship and throughout the Project, another PADD containing instructions from Dr. Hartcort about her new 'equipment' and a simple change of clothing. Now, it also contained one of the most significant gifts she'd ever given to her son, though he died never having known it.
The knowledge that he never would know it now burned inside of her, driving her onward through the ship with a renewed and ever more destructive anger, spreading through her like poison.
She ignored the greetings of several officers working the skeleton crew as they encountered her, and she boarded the turbolift headed for the bridge.
-=/\=-
Commander Daniel Yeager, who had known Lassiter awhile and her infamous ex-husband Jonas Vox even longer, stood from the captain's chair he currently occupied when she entered the room.
"Admiral," he greeted her anxiously. The last time he'd seen her, she was falling over before him, her heart stopped still as stone within her chest. "I wasn't told you'd be coming to the bridge...is there something that I can do for-"
"Yes.” She growled, interrupting. Her eyes were eerily calm; her expression deadly serious. “Don't disturb me." She quickly entered the Ready Room of former Captain Jennings Grey. "Computer," she requested, "lock the door and override security lockouts of current command staff. Authorization Charlie Bravo zero eight zero three."
The computer chirped its compliance and then she set down her bag. She thought about the book inside of it and about Nicholas as she fought to focus her eyes upon the large, framed portrait of Grey that was mounted on the wall; displayed prominently behind his desk.
She stared at the image of him with complete and utter revulsion. "My friend." She lamented bitterly. "Some friend you were to my family, Jennings. You were supposed to protect him."
She reached for the nearest object she could find- a very heavy piece of amethyst geode that had been turned into an ostentatious tabletop fountain, and hefted it upward. "You were supposed to protect them ALL!"
She threw the heavy stone as hard as she could, smashing the glass of the framed portrait and driving the shards into the now torn painting beneath.
The noise immediately drew the attention of the security detail on the bridge of the Zenith, and also the man currently babysitting its bridge.
He mumbled an expletive under his breath. He'd been afraid something like this might happen.
It only got worse as the noise inside the room grew louder; the smashing of glass, the rending of fabric that he only hoped wasn't one of the prized flags that had been in Grey's collection; and lastly, he feared, the destruction of the small, wall mounted tank which held Grey's unofficial ship's mascot; an enormous goldfish called Cleo.
Things got even worse when he realized that he couldn't override the command lock-out on the door.
"Should we open it by force?" a young ensign in Security asked him, but Yeager swiftly shook his head.
"God, no. Not unless you want to be the next thing that gets hit with a large piece of something else."
"We can't just leave her in there." The second security officer stated, though his tone made it much more a question that conveyed that he really wished that they could.
"No, we can't. Damn it." Yeager's brain reeled with possible actions and probable consequences. Suddenly, something occurred to him. "There's one person we can call who might be able to diffuse this without Lassiter having all of our heads on a stake tomorrow morning."
"Who?" Asked both security officers, in eager unison.
Yeager turned to the young woman at the communications station. "Carmen," he requested, "find Captain O'Sullivan for me." The sound of Gem's continuing rampage increased in volume, and Yeager visibly cringed, adding, "quickly."
Inside the Ready Room, Gem's mind continued to grapple with thoughts of the only other time in her life that she had ever felt so completely out of control, and hated it just as much.
-=Flashback, 2357 Current Timeline: Earth=-
"Son of a bitch."
Gem stomped around the confines of her stylish accommodations; to her little better than a cold, empty cell in any Starfleet brig. Confinement was confinement, and a cell, after all, was still prison no matter how lovely the upholstery on the furniture.
"Son of a BITCH!" She searched the cushions of that fashionable couch again, finally pulling them all aside, then at last tossing them clear across the room and shoving her hands into the works of the piece, hoping against all reason that her comm device hadn't really been lifted by Blakeney before he'd sent her here.
She finally gave up thinking that it had fallen out of her pocket when she'd accidentally allowed herself to fall asleep for a little over an hour.
She’d slept for seventy-three minutes and twelve seconds, to be precise, and Gem was always nothing if not precise about what she was doing, where she was going, what she'd do when she got there and how long it'd take for the return trip.
"How could you do this to me?" She complained as she flopped down into the closest chair in frustration, taking her head in her hands and mumbling, she was certain, like the madwoman she was becoming after being thrown into a situation where she was forced to work with someone like Michael Blakeney. "I thought Jonas was bad. But you, Blakeney, you..."
Her anger was masking a deeper and more upsetting sensation than the wounding of her pride: the more disturbing and unfamiliar sensation of injury to her feelings. She felt hurt at being tossed aside, even if he thought he was protecting her, and that made her angry. Gemini Lassiter had always adamantly refused to be anyone’s liability but this was one time where not being seen as an asset stung just as much.
She hated this. She was certain that she was now going to miss the endgame of their investigation, and so may never know the truth about the imposter posing as Braylan, let alone stop the forces behind the ruse from succeeding at whatever dastardly plan they had already put into action. Dastardly really was the only word she could find for what she’d observed of this particular foe. They weren't beyond murdering one of their own; that meant they were truly capable of any treachery.
She deeply wished that were all that was bothering her but she couldn’t even be allowed that single small mercy. She thoroughly chastised herself for the fact that beyond all of that, what she feared most was never knowing the truth about the identity and purpose here of the man who she knew only as Michael Blakeney.
Finally she sighed, completely at a loss as to what she should do. Every piece of training and every scrap of her sense of identity that she still had left told her that the answer was simple; she should try to find a way out. It was no use just sitting here, staring at the dull walls of her gilded cage. Yet she found herself wondering what use she could have otherwise. There was no chance of a winning hand when Blakeney had taken away the entire deck.
She had to accept, at this point, that he had her comm unit. That meant that any information that he had on the files from the imposter's computer were...
Wait a second, she thought, suddenly sitting up straighter. He has my comm unit...
Quickly she scrambled up out of her chair and attempted to access the communications panel in the far wall. Frustratingly but just as she expected, it was locked out and she didn't know the code to release it.
She did, however, know a few tricks yet.
Suddenly she was inspired. She rolled up her sleeves and then ran into the kitchen, allowing herself this small chance to feel excited while no one was watching. She knew that he'd have been too smart to leave her in a place with any obvious tools she could use to manage an escape, short of setting fire to the building which he obviously trusted her not to do out of a desire for self-preservation as all points of exit were locked, shuttered windows and all not even allowing in any light from outside or a view by which she could begin to try to figure out her location.
Still, there had to be something here she could use to get access to that comm panel. From there, it was only a hop, skip and a jump to create an uplink to her computer at home, and once she did that...she could locate the homing beacon inside of her comm unit. If it was anywhere on the planet, she'd be able to find it, and him along with it. More to the point, she reminded herself of what should be but she was realizing wasn’t her greatest priority, she could use it to contact someone else and get herself the hell out of here.
She pulled out the kitchen drawers, one by one, not even bothering to push them back in when she was done. All they seemed to contain was cutlery made of plastic. Again, she cursed him, but she was not beaten yet. She needed the strength of something made of metal to pry the casing on the wall unit open, and cut the wires so she could reroute them.
She raced into the bathroom next, and then to the small bedroom. There was nothing, anywhere, that she could use to do the job...
...and then she saw it.
She laughed, slowly, and out loud. "You're a good player, Blakeney," she mumbled to herself, "But I believe this is what they call 'checkmate'."
No stylish apartment would have been quite complete without at least the illusion of a fireplace to light the room. Knowing Blakeney as she did, she suspected he’s chosen a location with such a triviality purely for its romantic associations.
Of course it was only illusion, an artificial construct designed to provide atmosphere with a trick of the light while the more modern technology provided all of the heat. She had determined this when she had first arrived and had her hopes dashed that it could provide an opening through which to contact the outside world. However even the artificial variety still required at least some basic fire maintenance tools to make the illusion complete.
There were tongs, a poker, and a small ash shovel all hanging from a thin, elegant iron device designed with a place for them all. Of course he’d never be foolish enough to allow these things to be forgotten if they were free for her to use. They were strictly ornamental with the iron device fixed to the floor and the others quite irremovable from where they hung upon it, at least they were supposed to be. The small shovel she had noted was coming loose.
She grabbed hold of its handle and began to pull on it. It was indeed loose and it would move but it still remained attached by the thinnest of connections of a stiff, plastic-type substance that appeared to have once been glue. Most but not all of it had by this point worn away. With all her strength she pulled and though at first it seemed to be resisting Gem was determined and beneath the strength of her arms and of her will the shovel finally broke free. She allowed herself a little smile of pride as she slipped it off of its hook. She didn’t allow the smile to last too long though as she hurried back towards the comm panel.
In proof that newer and better weren’t always synonymous words the simple shovel made quick work of prying the casing off of this light weight, twenty-fourth century console. To her relief she noted that there was nothing in here beyond her technical expertise. In fact it was a remarkably simple device, the sort designed for people who lacked even the most basic of understanding of how they worked and so didn’t know any better than to think they were secure.
The code was of course not going to be written on the inside of the casing for all to see but after a point the code really didn’t even matter. The type of person who would trust the security of their communications to a code in a device this simple was also inevitably the type who’d forget that code now and then.
Of course their response would be to call the company who made it to ask how they’d reset it. Assuming they weren’t too far away the company would then send someone over, usually for none too light a price, who would open it up and turn it from ‘code active’ to ‘no code’ mode so they could wipe out the restrictions before restoring it.
Naturally, that required a special key to fill an appropriate slot which when turned would redirect the power flow to a secondary location around the component that checked the code and then back into where the power was supposed to go. These keys were extremely complex, virtually unmatchable and completely unnecessary when you could just manually connect the wires around the code checking component yourself in about a minute; sort of like hotwiring a car.
The shovel wasn’t exactly a delicate tool but it was sufficient to sever certain wires with just a little difficulty when Gem needed to do so and soon she established the power connection, bringing ‘no code’ mode online. She smiled at how simple it’d been, not wanting to ruining it by asking why she didn’t think of this earlier when she was just trying to escape, as she placed the casing back where it belonged and found the controls were blessedly free for her to use. With it she could once again make contact with the outside world, but there was something she had to do first.
She quickly began inputting the commands necessary to create the uplink with her home computer. The interface wasn’t strictly designed to support this connection but it would support it well enough for her purposes. Soon she had access and she was just one command away from having her computer track his location and send the data here. Then she stopped herself and her rapid momentum, pausing with her hand in mid air, a problem had occurred and she’d need to be prepared for it.
That was the problem, she had always been prepared. She had been prepared for this; for someone trying to activate the homing beacon in her comm unit and tracking her down. She’d taken measures so she’d always know as soon as it happened because the unit itself would notify her. That way, if it were someone who shouldn’t be tracking her, she could discard it and be gone before they arrived. Blakeney could be gone before she arrived.
She made herself step quickly back from the panel, feeling a little panic, realizing what she’d almost done and just the ramifications it could have had. After all of this, she could still never even see him again. She couldn’t risk that happening.
She also couldn’t leave this place, while clearly the comm panel wasn’t his concern as he didn’t disconnect it, there was every chance he had sensors operating here which would notify him as soon as she left and before she could track him down. The only place she could go when she left here would be straight to his side or she really would never see him again.
She decided she would simply have to make sure that as soon as she knew where he was she’d be taken there, even though there was every chance it would be somewhere she’d really not want to go.
He’d be there, so she wanted to be.
That meant she’d have to contact a transporter hub with instructions that she be beamed between the two locations she’d send through, but first she’d have to actually figure out the coordinates to provide them with for her current location. She couldn’t trust them to figure them out from tracing her comm signal, it could easily be being diverted and she didn’t have a second chance to risk it. It wouldn’t be a hard task to find them out first but would take a little time to do.
-=Old Mining District; San Francisco=-
As Michael materialized once more on the Earth his immediate thought was simply a feeling and it was a feeling that something wasn’t right.
The first thing that felt wrong was that he was alone. Not just alone without Gem but alone in the sense that there was no one else here: not for as far as he could see in the distance, not that there was a whole lot of distance. It was much more than that though, everything about this place felt off.
The coordinates this supposed source had provided him with were underground in the mine’s entrance. What light existed on the surface shone through the opening a steep climb several hundred meters above them. That light only served to illuminate the dust floating through the air. This place had not been used in a long time, likely that entrance had until recently not been opened in the same amount of time.
He was faced with large walls both in front and behind him, one of them was made of rock and the other appeared to be a hard place. Both looked to be practically impenetrable and stretched up to sky, or rather the ground given his current location, and neither was more than ten meters away from him.
To his sides he noted there were what had once been tunnels but they’d both been sealed off now by large metal doors, likely locked when the mine was closed up so they could prevent people wandering down here and getting lost. Sensibility told him he should get out of there now, but then you didn’t get to be Michael Blakeney by always just doing what seemed sensible.
There was little machinery left here, most of it likely having been taken away when it was no longer needed. There was a small area of shelving for storage of equipment nearby, which now stored nothing except those things not worth taking. There was perhaps a medical kit, an old uniform or two, but nothing of the sort needed if they’d even been considering reopening this place; which he knew for a fact they hadn’t.
An industrial turbolift sat behind him across from the shelves, its shaft running up to the ground showing that this was how the miners would have gotten in and out. The miners were gone now and the turbolift likely long powered down. There was definitely some life here though, as Michael noted at the base of the turbolift what appeared to be a control panel, likely for the doors to the entrance above, the controls were active. It was a good indication that whoever he was dealing with had gone to the effort to have them opened to allow him here, or more correctly to have Gem here, and it seemed they wanted them there alone.
He knew he should have left. He knew this felt wrong and every instinct told him to get out of there. He trusted those instincts but he also trusted that he had no other leads and that he needed to find out what was happening. He decided that whatever was going to happen, prolonging his waiting was doing no good.
“You're wasting my time!” He called boldly out into the distance, never one to be timid. His words simply fell flat against the walls with no one there to hear them.
This place was far too quiet. Michael moved swiftly towards the panel, hoping that the one sign of life here could provide him with some clue about what was happening next before it happened to him. His hands moved across the controls, knowing better than to touch them without knowing what they’d do even though from best he could tell they were locked anyway.
Stepping back again, he reached his hand down and confirmed he still had the transponder in his pocket, knowing that he might have a need to get out of here very quickly.
The silence encompassing him seemed more unbearable by the moment, reminding him louder than any warning klaxon could they should definitely have been here by now. Then as he felt a hand clamp down on his shoulder, he knew that they were.
Lt. Commander Michael Blakeney
Temporal Investigations
and
//// Gem Lassiter
Director, The Alchemy Project
Temporal Investigations
and
//// Gem Lassiter
Director, The Alchemy Project