Pis Aller

Posted on Wed Apr 19, 2023 @ 8:46am by Lieutenant Commander Zachary Addams & Lieutenant Penelope Naroot & Fleet Captain Rhea Kennit

1,346 words; about a 7 minute read

Mission: We Will Take Care of You
Location: Cargo Bay 2

Penny re-materialized and looked around the cleared cargo bay. She spotted her doppelganger quickly; the unfamiliar look of fury on her all-too-familiar face made Penny’s skin crawl.

“Just when we think we’ve accounted for all of the insane stupidity organics can throw at us,” Penelope snarled, “they go and show how much lower they can sink.”

“Yeah…don’t underestimate them!” Penny said, sounding defiant, but realizing she probably just insulted everyone she ever knew.

Penelope scowled. “And I see they’ve dragged you right down with them. Fine. They can have you.”

“So they managed to overload the entire collective?” Penny said, almost cheerily.

“No, just the local cluster here,” Penelope said. “But I’ll have it sorted soon, and we’ll put the toddlers back in their cribs.”

“Why do you hate them so much?” Penny said.

“Why don’t you?” Penelope shot back. “I’ve read your reports. I’ve seen what you’ve seen. Felt the heartbreak, the betrayals, the deceptions. They’re the worst! They--” she paused. “We had this conversation.”

“Did we?” Penny said, tilting her head. “I don’t seem to recall.”

“Yes, we did,” Penelope said, getting irritated. “And you know that.” She gave a sigh of frustration as she realized. “You’re stalling.”

Penny smiled and shrugged. “I had a sneaking suspicion you’d grab me again, so I sent a signal to the Captain. She’ll have backup here in the next few seconds.”

“Then I’ll have to act fast,” Penelope said, and ran towards her double.

---

Cargo Bay 1 had been a bust, and Zach was running full tilt towards the second cargo bay. As he rounded the corner, he stopped short as he saw the Captain coming from the other direction.

"Kennit to Security: I want a full tactical team at Cargo Bay 2, now!" Kennit was saying via the modified comms as she spied Dr. Addams approaching.

"On our way, Captain!" Tanaka said. He immediately sent a message from his station instructing a squad of officers to meet him at the cargo bay. He ran quickly and jumped into a turbolift.

"I don't think she's alone," Addams said as they approached the cargo bay door, "but all the other androids are immobile around the ship."

Hearing his announcement, she nodded at him and added, "also, Mister Tanaka, start rounding up the Androids which have been immobilized and get them secured. Use additional force fields to hold them in one location, and I want transport inhibitors up around them to prevent any rescue attempt. If there's too many to secure safely and be certain they will be held in place in the brig, then use Cargo Bay One, and set up defensive force fields around them there. Get on it fast before they reboot and come after us again!"

"Yes Ma'am!" Tanaka said. He tapped his combadge, closing the channel, then opened a new one. "All security officers, locate the androids and restrain them in Cargo Bay One. I need transport inhibitors, all officers armed with phaser rifles and our strongest restraints. Level 10 forcefields as well." A series of acknowledgements gave him some comfort as the lift sped on.

Kennit tried to use the internal sensors to get an idea of who was inside the Cargo Bay, however the system access here was still offline. "I can't tell how many individuals may or may not be inside." she said to the doctor. "Are you ready?"

Zach took a breath. "Not at all. Let's go."

As the doors to the cargo bay opened, the sound of a struggle emerged. Blonde hair was flying and two cranberry red uniforms were a blur as the two twins tussled. Penny had wrestled with Humans, Orions, Klingons, a Gorn and one very drunk and belligerent Naussican, but she had never been up against one of her own before, and she was a bit intimidated. She was initially relieved to have had Starfleet training, but realized that her twin had downloaded all of her training and was equally matched. She tried not to get distracted by her feelings of being violated, having all her personal memories and feelings disseminated throughout the Collective, but she resolved that once this was over, she'd have Torres disable her remote access. She had no intention of being used again.

Zach watched the struggle and wanted to break it up, but knew he'd be the one getting broken. He was tempted to throw something but if he struck their Penny, the other one might get the upper hand.

Taking in the fight taking place in a swift assessing glance, a number of options crossed the Captain's mind for how to respond to the situation before her. Most of which would likely result in injury to Lt. Naroot, which she did not wish to risk. "I am getting too old and too intolerant for this shit.." she muttered then turned to a control panel set a few paces from the entrance hatch. Like all cargo bays, the console gave access to a number of specialized systems which allowed the handling and movement of cargo of multiple types and weights. Cargo Bay 2 did not have an external access door leading to outside the ship unfortunately, or she'd have just blown them both out of the airlock and retrieved them separately. Androids would not be harmed by exposure to vacuum. A quick check of the cargo bay systems told her that the specialized transporter unit used to move cargo into and out of the bay however, was operational. Quickly, Kennit brought the cargo handling system online and then locked onto both combatants, then beamed them into the transporter system buffer and just..held them there.

Looking at the Doctor, she said "What do you think.. I have their signals identified and separated. Beam each of them into a separate high security cell in the Brig and sort out which one is which, or chuck them both into space with a locator beacon and worry about them later once we have the ship fully back under control?"

Zach felt a shudder run down his spine so strongly that he physically shook. "Not into space," he said, giving her a slightly haunted look. Androids or not, he'd never subject anyone to being alone in a large, dark void...

He pulled himself back together and was going to respond further when something caught his eye. Where the two women had been struggling, there was something glinting on the floor. He walked over and found a long, thin, silver wand. He picked it up and it lit up like a Christmas tree, multiple series of small, colored lights dancing up and down and blinking in various patterns. He wasn't sure, but he felt like there was some order to it, but he couldn't tell what it meant.

"Have you seen this before?" he said, holding it up. "I think they were fighting over it."

“I believe it is a personal item belonging to Lt. Naroot.” the Captain answered. “Though why they would be fighting over it, I could not speculate.”

"No idea either," he said, looking at it curiously. "However, to answer your question, now that they are contained, I would suggest the brig. That way, we can interview them both and see if we can tell who the real one is."

“The brig it is then...” the Captain replied. “I can’t access the brig security settings from here. We need to go down there, ensure that the security settings for their cells are set for maximum holding lock down and then we can beam them into separate cells.”

"Then let's go," Zach said, tucking the silver wand up his sleeve of his lab coat, next to his other tricks. He followed the Captain out of the cargo bay as the security team arrived.

"Stay with us, Lieutenant," Zach said, "We're going to the brig."

"Aye, Sir," Tanaka said, directing his people to flank them and keep an eye behind them as they set off to meet their prisoners.

 

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