Chapter 6 - Perception And Reality
Jack and Hank exited the turbolift on Deck Twelve and saw a group of security officers standing guard. One of them ran up to Hank and tossed him a hand phaser.
"Where did it go?" Hank asked.
"We don't know yet, sir," the sandy haired young officer said. "We found several of the guards from cell block four unconscious outside the secure area. We believe the machine is still in there."
He turned to look at Hank. "We wanted to wait for you before we moved in."
"Good thinking Tommy," Hank replied with a smile. He turned to Jack. "You better stay here until we secure the area."
"I'm going with you, Hank."
Evans sighed. He didn't have time to argue. "Okay, but stay back with my guys."
They began to move forward, but Jack stopped.
He thought he'd heard something, but when he looked around he couldn't see anything.
He started to follow Hank and his men who were now more than fifteen feet ahead of him.
"Captain..." whispered a soft voice.
He spun about and from around a corner of a corridor junction he saw Ahwi Dasari.
"How the hell did you get on my ship?!"
"I don't have time to explain," she said quickly, looking beyond Jack to where Hank and his men had gone. "For once in your life, just listen, okay?"
Jack saw the weapon strapped to her leg and cautiously took a step away from her.
"Okay," he said. "I'm listening."
"That machine in the brig," she began. "I know you think it's your wife, but..."
A faint pinging sound caught her attention from down the corridor. Ahwi's hand instinctively reached for her weapon, but once she was certain it wasn't Hank and his men, she relaxed again.
Jack decided he wouldn't wait to see her put the weapon to work on any member of his crew. It was only a matter of time before Hank came back.
He took advantage of her momentary distraction and reached for her weapon, but was a quarter of a second too slow. Ahwi got to it first.
Jack grabbed her wrist and tried to keep her from taking aim with the weapon.
"What are you doing?!" Ahwi screamed as Jack yanked her forward, slamming them both against the corridor wall. "Stop it!" she shouted.
They rolled on the floor, both holding onto the weapon as hard as they could. Ahwi let go with one of her hands and touched a spot on her outfit just above the other wrist.
Jack's body convulsed and jerked backward as a jolt of energy shot through every muscle in his body, leaving Ahwi in sole possession of the weapon.
"Now, stop it!" she ordered him.
Jack forced his muscles to obey and reached for the weapon again, but he wasn't fully recovered from the shock to his system. Ahwi knocked his hands away and pointed the weapon at his head.
"Stop now, or I'll..." she said, her eyes full of rage.
Jack heard a power cell on the weapon come to life just a few inches from his skull.
It hadn't been activated, Jack thought. Good move McCall. Maybe she really did just want to talk.
Ahwi looked into the resigned eyes of the man she had her weapon pointed at.
"Oh my god..." she said, her rage now gone. "I'm sorry!"
"You mind if I get up?" Jack asked, seeing she wasn't going to kill him… at least not at that moment.
Ahwi started to move away from him, but...
"No, you just stay put, Jack!"
Ahwi looked up at the source of the voice and saw Hank Evans taking aim at her with his phaser. She reached for a panel on the forearm of her body armor, but the stun blast from Hank's weapon hit her before her fingers touched the control she was seeking.
Her body went limp and fell to the floor.
"I wondered where you had gone to," Hank said. "How the hell did she get aboard?"
Jack stood up. "I tried to ask, but she seemed to have something else on her mind."
"Well," Hank said as he motioned some of the guards over. "The way the two of you were on the floor I figured she was either going to kill you or it was something best done behind closed doors."
Jack frowned. "Give it a rest, Evans. She's just sixteen. I do have a few morals."
"If she's only sixteen, I'm the king of the Universe," Hank said as his men removed Ahwi's weapon and the few other items they could from her body armor.
"Well, your highness," Jack said with a smirk. "According to Federation records, she's sixteen years old."
Hank twisted his mouth, thinking it better to keep the comment he had about the Federation to himself.
"What about Mei… I mean the whatever it is?" Jack asked.
"She's still in the holding cell," Hank said. "The guards were just unconscious. My guess is Osmand's brat here is responsible for that."
"You might keep Miss Dasari over on the port side of the security section to put as much distance between the two of them as possible," Jack suggested.
Hank nodded. "My thought exactly," he said. "And I'll triple the guards."
"Hopefully when she wakes up, we can get some answers," Jack said.
"I wouldn't get my hopes up if I were you."
***
"I'll have the results of genetic scans within the hour, sir," Preston said as he walked across the threshold of the security cell. A moment later, a crackle filled the air as the energy field, the equivalent of a jail cell door, came to life.
"Very well, Doctor," Jack replied, staring at the young woman inside the brig as she stirred from her slumber. "Bring them to me as soon as you have something."
Ahwi's eyes widened, but she said nothing.
After Preston left the security area, Jack turned to Hank. "You sure you got all of her weapons?"
"I think so," Hank said. "She had five energy, and three blade weapons."
"Keep her under heavy guard," Jack told him. "Osmand sent her here for a reason."
"Osmand?" Ahwi blurted.
Jack and Hank looked at her as she stood to her feet, rubbing her neck.
"Osmand's a narrow minded fool," she stated. "A useful one, but still a fool."
"That's funny," Jack mused. "Aren't you a true believer in the cause?"
"Oh, I believe in Osmand's goal, just not his means," she smirked. "But then I never was one to follow a crowd."
"Mind telling us why you're here?" Jack inquired.
"What would you like me to say?" she asked with a smart-ass grin.
"How about the truth?"
She seemed about to say something; her earlier attitude faded. A moment later, the grin returned.
"I don't think that would be a good idea," she told him. "How about a truth?"
Jack sighed. "All right, it's a start."
"You shouldn't trust that... that machine."
Hank smiled as Jack raised an eyebrow.
"But I should trust you?" Jack asked with his own grin.
"It might be a good idea," she responded, almost playfully.
"Says you," Hank interjected.
"How can you know anything about the machine, unless you're somehow connected to the G'voda?" Jack asked.
"I can't tell you," she said. "You should trust me."
Jack's eyes narrowed. "Right now, I don't trust either of you."
"Good."
"I say chuck this one out an airlock," Hank told Jack.
Ahwi pointed a finger in Hank's direction. "Is he supposed to be an example of Starfleet's finest?"
Jack frowned, but didn't turn to Hank. "Just an example of human exasperation, young lady."
Her eyes narrowed. "Or inhuman barbarism."
Hank looked down a moment, knowing she was just trying to goad him. He wasn't about to let that happen.
Ahwi turned her attention back to Jack. "That machine is not your wife."
"My ship's counselor thinks otherwise."
"Akala Wilmarza doesn't know your wife. How can she judge anything about the consciousness within that construct?" Ahwi asked, passionately.
Jack's eyes narrowed. Something about this "girl" had never set right with him, and now that feeling was growing into a full blown, unsettled feeling in his stomach.
Ahwi's tone softened as she took another step toward the field separating her from Jack McCall. "Your wife was more than a set of memories, Captain," she said in a voice Jack found difficult to doubt.
"Sure, it may say the right things, act in a similar way to your wife," she said. "But just because my shadow moves the same way I do, doesn't make it me."
Jack almost wondered if she was some sort of telepath herself. A part of him actually wanted to believe her. He knew he'd have to be on guard in case he felt his mind being manipulated by means other than mere words.
"Each of us is more than simply what's locked away up here," Ahwi said, pointing to her own head. "We're the totality of our bodies, minds, memories, and if you like, our souls."
The momentary spell was broken. Jack turned away from her, shaking his head. He didn't have time for a regurgitation of Janus Osmand's religious fanaticism.
"Captain!" she shouted, hoping he would stop. "When you speak to it, does it feel in your gut like it's her?"
Jack stopped and turned back. "If I relied only on what my gut told me, I'd still be locked away in a Glazyalan prison camp. In that case, my gut told me Starfleet would eventually come and rescue us."
Ahwi smiled. "I've been told it was your quick thinking and intuition that allowed you to escape."
"Whoever told you that, didn't know me very well," Jack said with a frown.
Her smile faded as Jack finally walked away, followed by Hank Evans.
I've failed, she thought. My one chance, and I've failed.
Ahwi sat down in her cell, lost in the realization that for all the technology at her disposal, and her ability to plan for various possibilities, that it had been her own inability to persuade which had caused her mission to fail.
Out in the corridor, Jack and Hank walked toward a group of Hank's guards.
"Keep her under constant surveillance," Jack ordered.
Hank stopped and held up a tricorder. "There was something I wanted to mention to you, but not around her."
Jack turned to him as the other security personnel listened.
"There's more to that body armor of hers than you might think," Hank said. "It's literally embedded into her own skin, straight through the dermis into the subcutaneous layer where it connects to her nervous system and muscles."
Jack motioned to see the tricorder. Hank handed it to his captain.
"It's got a power source, but I can't seem to pin it down to any one spot on the suit, or I'd have torn it out already," Hank told him. "Preston thinks if we try to remove the armor it would pull her skin off. He's afraid of killing her, but I think we can figure a way to get it off."
"No," Jack said, looking up from the tricorder.
"Jack, there's no telling what that armor might be able to do."
"You are not going to put her life at risk, Hank."
"Look, she's got to be some sort of assassin," Hank stated. "Trust me, I know how they work."
"All your knowledge of 'how things work out here' isn't nearly as impressive as it used to be," Jack said. "I'm really not in the mood to indulge you again."
Hank took a deep breath. "You want to know what else my scans show, or you still want to bust my balls a while longer?"
"Let's hear it."
"That armor is some sort of modified Borg technology," Hank told him.
"Borg?" Jack asked. "Why would they share their technology with anyone?"
"Good question," Hank responded. "If you let me interrogate her with my own methods I'm sure I can find out."
"Absolutely not," Jack said. "There are clear rules for the treatment of prisoners."
"Those rules may get us killed."
Jack thought a moment, then shook his head. "No. I let my fears about what had happened to Mei get the better of me when I went along with you to Antenora. That was a mistake."
"Jack..."
"No," Jack repeated. "You will follow to the letter the regulations concerning the treatment of prisoners. Is that understood?"
Hank sighed heavily and shook his head. "You want to blame me for what happened to Mei, fine. But don’t let that pain cloud your decisions now. You know I'm right about this girl."
"You’re always so right about everything, aren't you?" Jack asked. "You ever think the rest of us poor jerks in Starfleet might know a little something once in a while?"
Hank stood silent.
Jack shook his head. "I didn't think so."
He turned to leave. "The regulations concerning prisoners will be followed to the letter... and that's a direct order," Jack said loud enough for the rest of Hank's security personnel to hear.
"So what do you suggest I do, Captain?" Hank asked with just enough sarcasm in his voice to let Jack know things were coming to a head between the two of them.
But Jack knew this wasn't the time for that conversation, and in front of Hank's security staff, certainly wasn't the place for it.
"Hoffman's looking for something to do," Jack answered. "Get him down here to examine that armor while you and your people keep her in that brig."
"Aye, aye, sir," Hank said through clenched teeth.
After Jack left one of the guards walked up to Hank. "He'll get us all killed."
While Hank agreed, the last thing he wanted from his people was disrespect toward their CO. "Stow that, Tommy," Hank chided. "He's still the Captain."
"Well?" Tommy asked. "Are we going to interrogate her?"
"You heard our captain," Hank spat. "We have to follow regulations, so we follow them."
Tommy and the others frowned as they walked back toward Ahwi's cell.
As Hank Evans turned to follow them, he was troubled by a nagging suspicion. He was worried the two individuals he had locked up in his brig were both exactly where they wanted to be.
***
A half hour later, Kyle Hoffman, the Chamberlain's chief science officer walked into the brig area with a tricorder in hand. Two security guards waved him over to the cell where Ahwi was confined. A few moments after Kyle stepped away from them, one of the guards mumbled something the other laughed at.
"Well," Kyle said smugly as he stopped a few feet from the energy field across the entrance to Ahwi's cell. "I always did think you belonged in a cage."
Ahwi shook her head on the other side of the field. "Come in here and say that."
Kyle frowned as he pulled out his tricorder. "No thanks."
"Well, at least you've finally learned how to shave," Ahwi said with a smirk. "You should be proud."
Kyle opened his tricorder and powered it up. "I've gotten compliments on my new look."
Ahwi chuckled. "It would have been difficult to make it much worse."
He touched several controls on the device, beginning his scans of Ahwi. He watched the tricorder analyze different levels of the electromagnetic spectrum. "Anything you want to tell me about that uniform you're wearing?"
"Not really," she said. "I wouldn't want to tax that little pile of mush you call a brain."
Kyle dismissed her with a glance. He wasn't about to fall for this child's poor attempts to goad him. "How about telling me how you got aboard?" he asked as he made an adjustment to his tricorder.
"How about we talk about you, Hoffman?" she asked with a sly grin.
"I'm here to get answers from you, little girl," he responded.
"But I know a lot about you... Kyle," she said, nearly spitting his name. "For instance, I know you're a first class asshole." She grinned wide, almost daring him to turn off the security field and do something about what she said.
"And you're still the same warm and personable little angel you were the last time we met," Kyle said sarcastically, with a frown. "Osmand's doing such a great job of raising you."
Ahwi shook her head, almost laughing. "You are such an idiot, Hoffman," she said, stepping closer to the field. "But I suppose you've got an excuse for that one too." She got within a few inches of him. "After all, banging little Ensign Fowler probably takes all the mental abilities you have."
Hoffman's eyes widened. "How the hell do you know about that?!"
Ahwi took a step back, her smile wider than ever now. "Like I said, I know a lot about you," she responded. "Such as that astrophysics exam you took your first year at the Academy... the one you stole from the instructor's computer the night before."
"Shut up!" Kyle shouted, now in a complete rage. He lunged for Ahwi, but hit the field instead. It flared to life and threw him back several feet.
"Damn it!" he howled as he hit the floor.
The two security guards ran up. They looked at Kyle, then at Ahwi who now wore a look of total innocence on her face. The guards returned to their posts frowning.
"Hey," Kyle called to them. "How about a little help?"
"Stay away from the damn field, Hoffman," one of the guards grumbled.
"You've got friends every where, don't you?" Ahwi asked with a giggle.
"Shut up!" Kyle growled as he made it back to his feet. "You'll regret this, girl."
Ahwi's face grew fearful. "Oh what will I do?" she asked mockingly. "Commander dumbass has threatened little ol' me!"
"Give it a rest Hoffman," she said with a sigh. "You're afraid to take on a twelve year old boy let alone someone who could rip your head off in one motion."
"We'll see about that, Miss Dasari," Kyle said with a scowl on his face. "We shall see."
Kyle stormed out of the detention area.
"What a dipshit," Ahwi whispered as she rolled her eyes.
***
On the starboard side of Deck Twelve, Jack McCall looked at the figure inside another detention cell.
"You've blamed yourself for what's happened to me, haven't you?" the machine said.
Jack grinned and shook his head. "Well, you say what I'd expect to hear from Mei."
"What happened wasn't your fault, Jack," the electronic voice tried to assure him. "Just as what happened to Robin and Larissa wasn't your fault."
"I was responsible for..."
"Only your own actions, my love. You didn't beat Robin to death, or fire that phaser blast at Larissa. You have to accept that events rarely unfold the way we'd like," the machine turned away. "I learned that when I woke up in this... in this... this walking prison."
Jack stared at the glowing red eyes and did his best to fight the belief this was Mei-Wan, but everything it said… she said, confirmed to him it was her. But there was still a tiny doubt that kept him from walking into the brig and holding her.
"Mei, I'm..."
The machine's face formed a smile. "Thank you! I've wanted so much to hear you call me by my name."
Jack smiled and stepped as close as he could to the field without touching it. Looking at the metal body on the other side, his smile faded as he realized any life they had together would be nothing like it was before. The reason for his doubts became clear to him. The idea of this metal thing, this artificial object being his wife, repulsed him. He didn't know if there could be a future for them.
Evans' suggestion of genetic labs and strange Kel-j'na Region technology filled his mind again.
Maybe… he thought. Maybe we could…
No, he told himself. He wouldn't do that; he couldn't do that. Despite Hank's guarantees of success, Jack would always know it wasn't Mei-Wan--- not really her. If he was going to have to accept her as an artificial thing, the machine was better--- it was more honest than the "lie" of a genetically engineered replacement.
"After Kristy Bishop finishes her scans and we're sure it's safe, we'll have you moved to regular quarters," Jack said.
"Thank you," the electronic voice said. "This place is a little confining."
"I'll be back a little later, okay?"
"Don't be gone too long. It gets lonely being locked away like this."
Jack forced a smile and walked toward the exit. He had some more questions for Hank Evans about the security measures they'd have to put into place for...
For Mei-Wan's quarters, he forced himself.
He also wanted to find out exactly how Ahwi Dasari had gotten aboard his ship undetected.
***
"I don't have a damn clue," Hank said.
"Did you go over the Tactical logs?" Jack inquired.
"No reading of any ships in the area."
"Osmand has Romulan friends, how about a cloaked ship?"
"I considered that," Hank said as he leaned back in the chair behind the desk in his office. "I know a few tricks for detecting Romulan ships, and unless they've substantially improved their cloaking technology in the last six months, that wasn't how she got here."
Jack ran his hands through his hair, frustrated he wasn't getting many answers.
"You know, if we increased our orbit enough, the planet's magnetic field wouldn't cover up things like ionized gas trails nearly as much," Hank said with a slight grin.
Jack smiled and tapped his comm badge. "Mr. Negev."
Negev's voice replied back over the comm. "Yes, sir?"
"Increase our orbit to seventy thousand kilometers."
After a moment. "The Corps of Engineers probably won't appreciate that very much, Captain. It will increase the travel time to the spacedock to..."
Jack interrupted. "They can learn to live with it."
"Aye, sir."
Hank nodded. "That should help out. I'd also like to hear Preston's opinion about our little guest."
"You think she's something other than human?"
"Borg technology implanted into her flesh, the ability to move around this ship undetected, and the look of someone who's not at all concerned about being locked up--- you could say I have my doubts about trusting appearances," Hank answered.
