Down The Socio-Path

Posted on Jun 03, 2015 @ 10:49pm by Selyara Chen
Edited on on Jun 03, 2015 @ 10:49pm

Mission: The Lights of Hyperion

"Down the Socio-Path"
(cont."Pawns")

* * *=/\=* * *

“I'm an 'intelligent' sociopath. I don't have problems with drugs, I don't commit crimes, I don't take pleasure in hurting people... I do have a complete lack of empathy. But I consider that an advantage, most of the time. Do I know the difference between right and wrong, and do I want to be good? Sure. ... A peaceful and orderly world is a more comfortable world for me to live in. So do I avoid breaking the law because it's 'right'? No, I avoid breaking the law because it makes sense.”

― M.E. Thomas, Confessions of a Sociopath: A Life Spent Hiding in Plain Sight
* * *=/\=* * *

Location: USS PHOENIX
Stardate: 2.150601.2212

Scene: A corridor, deck 19

Michael Turlogh Kane was on his way back to the bridge, a place he didn’t see much of these days. He was still thinking about Jane Hakeswill, and not quite sure why. Could it be, he wondered, that I’ve been in the fleet so long, surrounded by Starfleet people, that civilians are exotic to me? He thought back to his time away from the fleet, listlessly travelling around the core worlds, and realised that those days were a memory even more vague than his days as a junior officer. Those memories were insubstantial things, colours or feelings or flash-memories of scenes frozen forever in memory-time.


"Michael, a moment?" Selyara materialized at Kane's elbow in the unsettling manner she'd developed. She had emerged from an adjacent corridor with no preamble, like she was lying in wait. He briefly wondered how she knew he was going to be walking this way. Perhaps it was something she'd worked at, or maybe it had come naturally to her, like using her telepathy to steal secrets.

He kept going, and she fell into step alongside him. "Of course. What's on your mind?"

"I would like your permission to remain in the shuttle bay with the refugees for the duration of the trip." Her diction was comically formal, like she'd rehearsed it a dozen times.

"What? Why?" Kane stopped and turned to look at her properly. She had changed out of that skimpy Limbo dress into something more modest - a dark green, short sleeved sweater dress with a cowl neck a couple shades darker than her eyes, fastened with a thick matte gold belt. She had added a pair of long gold gloves that covered up her hands, presumably to allay any fears of her mental powers. Her expression was impassive, remote and cold as a glacier, but her dark green eyes looked... something. He wasn't sure.

"Because I am of far more use to you there than I am sitting around in the lounge or poking through your computers? More importantly because I'm cut off from my data streams while we are this far from civilization, and I'm getting bored." She crossed her arms and cocked her head to one side, a bland smile on her lips.

"You being bored is hardly a good reason for me to agree to let you into a cargo bay with several thousand murderers, rapists, thieves and bounty hunters. Especially since you're currently a highly valuable asset." Kane folded his own arms, unconsciously mimicking her posture. He had been able to see her awkwardness attempting to integrate with the crew, and she'd clearly expressed her discomfort being back amongst Starfleet during her visit to his quarters, even if she hadn't said it in so many words. "Do you really feel so out of place with us up here that you'd prefer to be crammed in there with several thousand people and no creature comforts?"

"I *am* out of place with you, Michael,” she said, a little sharply. “If you don't see that you're either blind or deluded." Her expression hadn't changed, but Kane thought he saw sadness lurking in her eyes. "The fact of the matter is you are all nice people, good people. I, on the other hand, am a narcissistic psychopath, and that is unlikely to change."

"I don't think that's true," Kane countered. "One event in your life doesn’t define you, any more than one event defines me."

"Ah, see? There's the optimistic, idealistic Michael Turlogh Kane I used to lo - know. You’re not quite so mired in unrelenting grimness as you pretend to be." The misspeak was so slight and she recovered so quickly that Kane wasn't sure he'd heard it. Love?

She pursed her lips in a sardonic smile. “If you aren’t careful you’ll start launching into impassioned speeches about the beauty of life and the power of friendship.”

“Would it help?” Kane asked dryly.

She snorted. “It would annoy me. I have already spent what feels like hours so far with the dog from counseling in an attempt to see whether I could fake it until I make it, but I all I really learned is that I have no ability to empathize with anyone anymore. So I’m asking you again, let me stay in the cargobay and be your eyes and ears down there.”

Kane shook his head. “Selyara, I’m not stupid enough to think that you won’t do whatever you want to do. But there’s no point in exposing yourself to the mess in the cargo bay. It’s a veritable quicksand of strong shifting emotions. And besides, we have a liaison down there now - that ex-diplomat, Arthur Embry. He seems to have his finger on the pulse down there.”

“Are you’re telling me that you trust Arthur Embry implicitly to tell you everything that’s happening? Because speaking as a manipulative bitch, I can tell you that he’s very, very good. Almost as good as me, maybe.” She chewed thoughtfully on the nail of her index finger, her eyes fixed ruminatively on his face. “Definitely not as smart as me, though. Otherwise he wouldn’t have wound up on Limbo.”

Kane refrained from pointing out that she’d wound up on Limbo. “He’s been invaluable so far, very helpful, and seems to have every intention of keeping things running smoothly. Do you think that’s likely to change?”

“He’s on your side because it’s what’s best for him right now. Some free advice, Michael - never, ever trust anyone who is able to charm everyone into liking him. No-one can be universally liked, and if they are, it’s because they’re someone different to everyone.” Selyara removed her finger from her lips. She reached forward absently to straighten Kane’s collar and plucked a stray hair from his uniform. “Someone who is willing to tailor their behavior just to be liked is someone who thrives on control and adoration. That is a very dangerous type of person, because they always want more acclaim, more adulation. That is the type of person that sets a house on fire just so they can be a hero and rescue the people inside.”

“So you’re saying you think he’ll start manufacturing crises in Shanty Town just so he can swoop in and fix them?” Kane frowned. He hadn’t gotten that impression from Embry. Thus far the man had mainly been something of a pain, always trying to demand Kane’s direct attention, rather than going through what Kane saw as the proper channels. On the other, he could think of no conceivable gain Selyara would make by maligning Embry’s name.

When he looked back up her eyes were fixed on him. Kane met her gaze and held it for a moment, before Selyara quickly averted her eyes. He got the fleeting impression of embarrassment.

She blushed green and became absorbed in picking invisible pills off of her dress. “I’m not saying he will, I’m saying he could. I never started a riot while I was in the Jaros Stockade because it was never to my advantage, but I could have.” She tried to make it sound matter-of-fact, but there was a hint of brag to it. Her eyes flicked up quickly and then quickly away again. She coughed slightly. “Do you not trust me, Michael? No, actually don’t answer that. You shouldn’t. But he’s playing a game down there. I like games. I like winning games - and winning this game will keep you safe.”

Kane nodded. “Then be careful down there.”

Selyara smiled, nodded and backed away into the corridor she had come from. They shared a look before she turned her back and made her way through the ship.

Kane stood there in the corridor, still feeling the touch of her hand on his collar. “I trust you, Selyara,” he whispered. Then he turned and made his way to the turbolift.

* * *=/\=* * *

Scene: Shanty Town

Selyara watched Embry walking around the cargobay with hawks eyes from her newly staked territory on top of one of cargo lifts. She was impressed in spite of herself - Embry was *good*, very good. This wasn’t just going to be something to stave off boredom, this was actually going to be FUN. She’d never really had the opportunity to pit herself against a worthy opponent before. Maybe Rawyvin Seth, but he didn’t really count, because it had been an uneven contest by its very nature- she always had to be on the defensive, never able to attack properly.

Embry had time on her, he’d already insinuated his way into every corner of the Shanty Town. He also had experience, a more reputable appearance, and a human face, which always helped. Humans still tended to trust their own species more readily.

Then again, she had her abilities, even if recent experiences had shown her that they were not as foolproof as she might have liked. Use them sparingly and use them judiciously, she told herself.

She shuffled her deck and began to build a card house as she thought. Unfortunately she found herself preoccupied with thoughts that weren’t particularly germane to the problem at hand, nor productive in the long run.

They mainly involved one Michael Turlogh Kane, and the tangled mess of feelings he evoked in her. She’d begun to notice recently that she had great difficulty in parsing out her of emotions, that beyond the very strong, visceral ones like anger or fear, she often felt things that she couldn’t put a name to. Very vexingly, the Captain of the USS Phoenix seemed to stir up more than his fair share of those, and it didn’t seem that she’d ever unpack them all. If she’d still been a counselor she would have diagnosed herself with alexithymia, but now she thought it hardly mattered whether it had a name or not.

She knew the old feelings, the ones she’d nursed her long years in the stockade. Hurt that he’d tossed her aside like everyone else, angry that she might have stood a chance of regaining her old life if he’d been there. The new ones were the ones that gave her trouble. Resentment, nostalgia, desire to make some sort of meaningful contact with another being, a desire for approval or at least not to disappoint, fear of the devastation the inevitable rejection would cause.

She drew a ragged breath and tried to push her nagging need to ruminate over her feelings about Michael aside. Whatever they were, they on a fast track to becoming a serious liability - she couldn’t think clearly. Maybe she should kill him just to make them sto-

“Excuse me,” a man’s voice broke into her thoughts. She welcomed the distraction and leaned over the edge of the cargo lift. It was the younger of the two gargantuan men that had been talking to Kassandra Thytos, the MCO earlier. “Aren’t you the one Kassandra-”



“Quiet, no point in spreading my business all over,” Selyara said with annoyance, and gestured for him to get onto the lift with her. “Come on up and we’ll talk. I think it would be best for you to call me Sela, Mister…?”

“Barnes.” He grabbed ahold of the edge of the lift and hauled himself up. He made it look far easier than it was. He got to his feet and looked her over as though taking her measure. “The Marine Major seemed to know you. Old war buddy?”

“No, just somebody that I used to know,” Selyara returned his measured stare. She’d seen him making reports to Embry, he seemed to be his right hand man on the security front. It would be bad news if she was made already.

“If I had a nickel for every-” Barnes shook his head, his long hair swaying with the motion. “I haven’t seen you during my rounds here. Your neighbors seem to think you’ve been here for a while, but I am certain that you haven’t. I think the first time I saw you you were assisting the Marines handing out supply boxes. You aren’t actually one of us- us refugees, are you?”

Selyara stared at him, trying to figure out what his game was. She saw his eyes flick to the side, and she followed his gaze - one of his security deputies was watching them. The deputy was trying to be inconspicuous, but was failing. She saw Barnes’ lip twitch slightly with worry. She knew intrigue and sneaking around when she saw it. Barnes was up to something behind Embry’s back, and Embry didn’t necessarily trust Barnes enough to not have eyes on him.

She pulled Barnes into what would appear to the deputy as a passionate embrace. No better defense for prying eyes than to create a scene too embarrassing to watch, and the position was perfect for holding conversations you didn’t want anyone to hear. He tensed up, and she had the feeling that it had taken every fiber of his self control to not react violently to this sudden and unwelcome invasion of his considerable personal space.

“Sorry for this,” Selyara whispered in Barnes’ ear as she grabbed a solid handful of his rump for appearance sake. “But I get the impression you don’t really want that man over there to know what you’re up to. Why are you so interested in who I am, Mister Barnes?”

“Because I think we may both be on the same side,” Barnes’ voice was muffled through her hair. “I think Embry’s planning something, and if you’re sympathetic to the crew of this ship…”

“I have a vested interest in making sure the crew of this ship stays the crew of this ship, yes.” Selyara arched her back so she could look him in the face, pretended to laugh as though he’d said something funny to her, and toyed with the end of her hair. “More than that, I really think it's unfair that Embry is playing his little games in here with no opposition. I have the uncontrollable urge to join in and make things difficult for him."

"Uh, good. Can you - would you mind letting go of my- he's not looking anymore, you can stop," Barnes said awkwardly, all but pushing her off of him. She gave him an amused smile. “So, if I were to tell you that I wanted your help, because Embry is planning a mutiny…?”

“I’d say count me in, and warn you that the Major has rigged the outdoor corridor with enough anesthezine to keep us all asleep for the rest of the trip.” Selyara smiled, thinking about the changes to the security protocols. “She’s remarkably cutthroat for Starfleet. I don’t think she’d have the slightest compunction about everyone in this cargobay out into space the moment they became a threat to her people.”

“I figured as much,” Barnes gave her that searching look again. “You seem to come and go here as you please. You wouldn’t happen to have command codes, would you?”

“I should probably mention my status here is more… something between prisoner and guest.” Selyara sidestepped the question neatly. Michael seemed to be willing to give her a great deal of free rein, but she had a feeling that giving up his command codes was far beyond what he was willing to tolerate. Although she could possibly get away with giving the information away and then telling him that he needed to change his codes. “Why do you need them?”

* * *=/\=* * *

“Mister Embry?” Selyara asked sashaying to her best effect over to the ex-diplomat. “Jacen Barnes said I ought to come over here to see you.”

“Did he? Are you a friend of his?” He said in an unctuous tone, with a charming smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes. “I haven’t seen you around before, I would have noticed a lady as striking as you.”

“I guess you could say that I’m a ‘friend.’ “ Selyara smirked at Embry, using her fingers to put euphemistic quotation marks around the word. She scowled, as though remembering something that annoyed her greatly. “And you wouldn’t have seen me around before because up until about four hours ago, I was up in one of the VIP suites.”

“Oh dear, how did you wind up here?” Embry said, his voice full of concern, gently laying his hand on the bare skin of her arm. She did her best not to flinch away, but his mind was collected, cool, and didn’t leak thoughts and emotions everywhere. She did, however, get the impression that he was secretly hoping for some salacious story, preferably about Michael. She’d been going to spin him a tale about being kicked out for breaking the rules, maybe gambling or selling illegal goods, but she sensed that if she really wanted to hook Embry, she’d need to give him what he wanted, or else he’d file her away as little more than someone he could use as a snitch.

“Captain found a new favorite. Some sweet, innocent piece of human ass named Jane Hakeswill.” Selyara winced inwardly as the name popped out. Why on earth had she come up with a name like that? Hard to remember, and unique enough that it would be far too easy for him to fact check if he somehow had any of ‘his’ people among the civilians in the safe zone. Why had she used that name? Did she know a Jane Hakeswill? Had she met one somewhere along the line? Nevermind. Roll with it.

“Ah, you poor thing,” Embry tut-tutted in a fatherly manner and patted her shoulder reassuringly. She didn’t move, although she wanted to. She found the man awfully handsy.

“Well, he may have also found out he wasn’t my only ‘friend’ among the crew.” Selyara darted her eyes up at him as though to see whether or not it shocked him. “But I’m not worried, he’ll come slinking back as soon as he’s finished corrupting her, even if it’s behind her back. You Human males all think you want innocent, nurturing mommy material in a woman, but once you have one you always seem to realize that you can’t bear to do the things you really want between the sheets with her, and then you find yourself back in bed with women like me. He’ll definitely be back, he has some… tastes… that I don’t think poor little Jane is going to be willing to fulfill.”

Selyara could practically feel the glee rolling off of Embry in waves, even though he outwardly remained solicitous and worried. He’d taken the bait, thinking that she could possibly be used as part of his little plan. She let out a little half hearted breath, as though she secretly didn’t believe what she said, and was far more put out then she let on. She hoped it screamed ‘daddy issues’ to him. Embry was on it like a dog on a particularly juicy bone.

A nagging voice in the back of her mind suggested that she’d better hope this particular deception had better not get back to Michael. He would almost certainly not appreciate her spreading slander.

“Oh now, never you mind, Sela. It sounds like Captain Kane has been an awful heel, I knew he thought very little of us refugees but it never crossed my mind that he might be so callous as to use and discard our young women.” He shook his head sadly. “Don’t worry, I’ll make sure you’re taken care of, my dear. Even if that cad of a Captain doesn’t come looking for you again, I assure you I’ll take good care of you, you have no need to worry.”

She allowed her face to relax into an expression of relief, and smiled shyly at him, as though she was beginning to see him as some sort of savior.

Hook. Line. Sinker.

* * *=/\=* * *

Scene: Deck 12, Drive torpedo magazine

Kassandra opened up what felt like the millionth photon torpedo access panel of the day and began the finicky process of disconnecting the detonation systems. After the fiasco in the armory earlier she didn’t want anything that could potentially cause an explosion still active.

The Marines had already put all of their explosives into blast proof safes, with extra radiation shielding, but Kassandra worried about the photon torpedoes. They were on a powered down section of ship, so she had gone by herself to do the work on the torpedoes. Besides, all her Marines were needed in Shanty Town to distribute protein cubes.

“Farewell and adieu to you fair Spanish ladies, farewelll and adieu to you ladies of Spain,” Kass sang under her breath as she gently detached a biochip from the circuitry. She didn’t indulge in singing often, and certainly not when anyone could hear her, but with everything that had happened recently she felt the need for cheering herself up. She only wished that she could have a couple of beers to help. She hummed the chorus. Suddenly her nets picked up a surge of radiation in the corner of the bay. She focused her sensors on the radiation and fumbled for the pad of paper and pencil she’d brought along with her to help her refocus between deactivating torpedoes. Boredom and repetition made for accidents.

Sensor nets fixed on the ball of glowing light she began to sketch what she saw, along with random bits of information that her sensor nets were feeding her that seemed like they might be important. Of course, she wasn’t sure what she was picking up, but she very much hoped that it might help the science officers.

The ball of light began to flicker and move, and she paused to really study it. It was beautiful. Or at least, she imagined it was. The form and waves and colors were something splendid.

Then, just as suddenly as it had appeared, it shot through a wall, leaving radioactive goo on the wall. Kassandra looked at her chronometer. Half an hour had elapsed, and she was feeling nauseous. She sighed heavily, and tapped her communicator.

“Kassandra to sickbay,” Kassandra winced slightly, she was going to get a royal teasing from Cade. “Hey, is it true that if I come in ten times I get VIP status, and Cade actually uses his bedside manner when he sees me?”

There was a long pause.

[[Well, well, well, well, Major Pain.]] Cade’s voice echoed around the bay. [[I take it you’ll be gracing us with your presence again? Need a boo-boo kissed?]]

“Shush you,” Kassandra grumbled. “I’ll be down in a few minutes. Might want to get that radiation decontamination chamber up and running if it isn’t already.”

[[How much exposure?]] Cade’s voice was suddenly very serious.

“Half an hour.” Kassandra picked up her notebook and walked towards the door.

[[Are… Are you an idiot?]] Cade said incredulously.

“Probably. Do me a favor and ask Kane and whomever is acting as the Chief Science Officer to meet me there?” Kassandra sighed. “And get everyone to clear the route between me and you. Don’t want to contaminate anyone else.”


* * *=/\=* * *


NRPG: Upwards and Onwards!


Alix Fowler

as

Selyara Chen (AKA "Sela")

Kane's eyes, ears, and slanderer


Kassandra Thytos

MCO who really doesn't understand the dangers of radiation.