Hostile Takeover

Posted on Feb 16, 2016 @ 11:03am by Commander Jacob Crichton
Edited on on Feb 16, 2016 @ 11:03am

Mission: Promethean

= Hostile Takeover =

(cont’d from “Ensuing Chaos”)

LOCATION: LAVENZA II Facility

SCENE: Command Center

STARDATE: [2.16] 0216.0031

TIME INDEX: Slightly after “Ensuing Chaos”

Jake pushed his way through the smoke, catching up with the rest of the crew. The explosion had killed the power to the command center’s heavy metal doors, but Jos and Kass had already disengaged the mag-lock and were forcing it open by hand. When they’d created a wide enough gap, they ducked through it, away from the acrid smoke of the ruined Promethean Device.

Then had come the trek through the corridors. Jos and Eve supporting the semi-conscious form of Thomas Varn (or the thing that looked like Thomas Varn, anyway), and Jake keeping a careful eye on his cyclopean duplicate. For his part, the other Jake was suffering this marathon in stubborn silence. As they moved, the facility shaking underfoot the entire time, the thing wearing the shape of Thomas Varn drifted back into something like consciousness.

“What’s going on?” the thing that looked like Thomas Varn asked.

“Welcome back,” Jos said, breathlessly.

“Commander Jos…” Varn said. “Did you say I was dead?”

“No time, Mr. Varn,” Jos said, through clenched teeth. Jake notied that Jos had spoken to Varn without looking right at him. There was a lot on the Andorian’s plate just now, but Jake thought that maybe Jos didn’t want to acknowledge the resurrected Varn for much the same reason Jake didn’t. Thomas Varn was dead. They had grieved for him.

More tremors shook the facility, and Jake put the question of Varn out of his mind for now. If they made it back to the PHOENIX alive, there would be plenty of time to come to terms with... whatever Varn was.

“Which way to the turbolift shaft?” Jos asked. “We need to make it back to the upper levels of the facility.”

Russ BaShen looked up from his tricorder and pointed down a dark corridor to their left. “This way!”

“Let’s hope Mr. Barton made it back to the shuttle,” Jos said. “Move!”

They started off at a jog. Jake moved, letting his one-eyed double bring up the rear. The other Jake was running awkwardly with his hands bound behind his back. When the facility rattled around them again, nearly shaking this other Jake’s feet out from underneath him. He fell hard, cutting his chin on one of the slim slivers of metallic grating that made up the corridor’s floor. Ahead of the, the PHOENIX crew rushed on, oblivious.

“Goddammit, you can’t leave me like this!” the other Jake cried, leaning against the wall to stabilize himself as the PHOENIX crew disappeared into the darkness ahead. A few feet away, Jake Crichton stopped and looked back to see his double trying to gain his footing so he could continue to run. Jake hesitated, then cursed under his breath as he went back.

“Keep up, speedy,” Jake said as he approached the duplicate, reaching out to help him regain his feet.

“Don’t touch me!” the other Jake said, violently shrugging away Jake’s attempt to help.

“Fine,” Jake frowned. “Good luck with Conniston’s pets.”

The other Jake stared at him, his one eye burning a smoldering ember in the darkness of the corridor. Then, he nodded, and Jake reached out and pulled him back to his feet. Then they were off again, Jake taking up the rear this time in case his double had any more problems staying upright.

=[/\]=

Scene: Back at the Command Center

Evaer and Brass stepped through the gap the PHOENIX crew had left in the doors to the command center. The smoke had started to clear somewhat, thought the shriek of the alarm was still going, loud enough that it was starting to hurt Evaer’s ears. Evaer ignored the discomfort and narrowed his eyes, trying to pick out any sign of movement from inside the command center. He stepped around some piece of runed machinery that reminded him fleetingly of a sarcophagus.

“Captain Rainner?” Evaer asked the darkness. No sound, save the steady shrill droning of the alarm klaxons. Evaer tightened his grip on his blaster and kept moving forward. “Cassidy? Are you here?”

“This is a waste of time,” Brass growled from behind him. “You’ve felt the tremors, Bolian. This base is coming down.”

“Shut up,” Evaer said, not looking back at him. He swept his blaster left, then right, ready to fire at any hideous thing that might leap out of the darkness at him. He heard a shuffle ahead, and moved cautiously forward. Through the smoke, Evaer began to make out a humanoid shape.


It wore the tattered remains of spacer clothing, through which folds of skin had burst through like expanding bread dough. The figure’s outline was impossible: jagged here, curved there, with what looked distinctly like spine climbing out from beneath the collar of the clothes it was wearing. The figure turned and leaned forward, its face catching enough light for Evaer to recognize who it was. The Bolian’s eyes widened, and his grip on the blaster loosened somewhat.

“...Cassidy?” Evaer murmured.

“You’re still here,” Cassidy Rainner said. Her voice was a low, wet rumble, as if she were speaking through lungful of phlegm.

“By the gods,” Evaer said. “What have you done to yourself?”

Cassidy’s face split into a hideous smile that showed too much teeth. As her lips parted, runnels of thick, black blood poured down the sides of her cheeks. When she spoke again, more of the inky muck leaked out, staining the remains of her uniform.

“Conniston…” Cassidy rasped. “Did this… to me..”

Cassidy Rainner moved forward, taking one more shaky step out of the smoky shadows that remained of the facility’s command center. Evaer could see her more clearly now: the lumps of meat bulging underneath the remains of her familiar clothing, just enough of it left to remind Evaer of what she’d once been. The gulf between the Cassidy Rainner he’d known and the twisted thing standing before him now threatened to shatter what little remained of his sanity.

Behind him, Brass was not left so speechless.

“I will not take orders from that… that… *thing*!” Brass said. Evaer spared a glance over his shouler; the Ferengi was staring at the thing their erstwhile captain had become, his beady little eyes widened in a combination of fear and revulsion.

“Shut the hell up, Ferengi,” Evaer barked, cutting his eyes back to Cassidy. Her face had contorted in an expression that looked like pain. As Evaer watched, her hands - twisted things now, with jagged, misshapen nails tearing their way out of ruined fingertips - came up to clutch roughly at her stomach.

“Must have… made a mistake,” Cassidy said, trying to laugh despire her obvious agony. “Fucked up a… calculation… here or there.”

Cassidy’s voice burbled and rasped, and she had to pause every few syllables to suck in a wet, wheezing breath. Each time she exhaled, more of the black blood oozed out of her mouth. Evaer saw that it was starting to drain from Cassidys nose as well.

“Stupid, but... understandable...” Cassidy said with a shrug. It managed to look casual, even with her hideous new form. “Desperate… times. Working under… pressure. Mistakes… happen.”

“What... ?” Evaer started.

“Killed… me…” Cassidy wheezed. “Felt myself… dying. Then… was alive… again. In... there.”

She raised a twisted claw to indicate the ruined sarcophagus that Evaer had stepped around. Both Evaer and Brass stared at the burnt out husk with renewed fear. Brass even took a careful step away, as if to ward off a fate similar to the one that had befallen his former captain.

“Should… have passed… on this job…” Cassidy said, her voice now almost so thick with phlegm that Evaer could hardly understand her. “Old… friend…”

“Where’s the money?” Brass demanded. Evaer might have shot the Ferengi right then and there, for his lack of tact. But on reflection, Evaer had to admit that Brass was at least keeping a practical view of the situation.

Cassidy lurched forward, one arm shooting out to steady herself against the remains of the sarcophagus machine. Evaer saw that Cassidy’s arm was bent in three places, and knobs of bone had forced their way through the skin at each bend, further shredding Cassidy’s clothing and staining it with blood.

“Doesn’t… matter…” Cassidy managed to say. Her legs had started to give out, and she sank to the ground. She looked up at them, and Evaer saw that the black muck and now started oozing out of her eyes, mixing with the blood pouring out of her nose and mouth, transforming her face into a madly grinning black smear. “You’ll never… escape…”

“The money!” Brass repeated. “This madness can’t have been for nothing, Bolian! Ask her about the money!”

“I told you to shut up!” Evaer screamed, whirling on Brass. The instant the blaster was off him, Cassidy was moving. She suddenly lunged forward, one of her impossibly-angled arms whipping out to slam against Evaer’s face. Evaer felt searing pain as he fell, and blobs of purple blood stained the floor. The blaster fell out of Evaer’s hands as he reached up. and felt three jagged lines slashed into his cheek.

Then Cassidy was looming above him. Her smile widened, though Evaer didn’t see how that was possible, and she fell on Evaer, her clawed hands extended. Evaer slapped the ground nearby, searching for his dropped blaster. Cassidy pinned him savagely down, then her mouth opened, wide, then wider. Evaer could hear what must be the tendons in Cassidy’s jaw snap, heard the creak and groaning of bone warping as her mouth yawned open, impossibly wide. Cassidy leaned in, angling Evaer’s head into her mouth…

There was a shriek of blaster fire, and Cassidy screamed as she was forced off Evaer. Evaer looked up and saw she was already starting to rise, but another blaster bolt shrieked through the air to slam into the captain’s now badly misshapen torso. It staggered Cassidy, but only for a moment… then three more shots, in rapid succession, ripped their way through her body. Cassidy Rainner managed one more shaky, uneven step, before falling forward to land, face down, on the floor. More of the thick black bood oozed out from beneath her. She shuddered once, and was still.

Evaer stared dumbly at the misshapen thing for a moment, but turning to see Brass standing nearby, blaster held in both outstretched arms, trained on the mess on the floor. When Brass was satisfied that Cassidy wasn’t going to move again, he finally turned to look at Evaer. Much to Evaer’s chagrin, Brass did not lower the blaster.

“Now then, Bolian,” Brass said, giving Evaer a wide, ugly grin. “Let us renegotiate the terms of my employment.”

=[/\]=

NRPG: Seems like Evaer's grip on his crew has grown even more precarious. Plus: a coming reckoning between the Jakes? Meanwhile, how's Barton? And where's Bronski?

Shawn Putnam
a.k.a.
Jake Crichton
Chief Engineering Officer
USS PHOENIX

and

Jake Crichton
Chief Engineering Officer
The Annabelle's Lament