Cat in the Bag

Posted on Sun Sep 27th, 2009 @ 3:22pm by Lieutenant Jimmy Cooper

1,664 words; about a 8 minute read

Mission: The Shining Truth
Location: Medbay
Timeline: After "A Feline Sense of Direction", Before Lane's 'Escape'

=A= This is Lieutenant Doctor Mabren for Commander Arkham, please respond. =A=

Arkham paused for a moment -- hearing the message. It had been quite a while since she'd last heard from the Doctor; having Catherine as a primary care physician meant that she would not often interact with the ship's Chief Medical Officer. Sighing a little -- it had been an exhausting day; after all how often does one take over a ship?-- she tapped her commbadge.

=A= Arkham here. What's the issue? =A=

=A= Commander, There is a... person... in sickbay 1 requesting to see you, he said Lieutenant Warner gave him that order. =A=

Arkham's brow furrowed slightly in confusion. A person in the sickbay looking for her? Rarely did anyone intentionally seek out the Archimedes' cold and callous First Officer turned Commander, and it was always a surprise to Arkham when it occurred. Rising from her place on the bridge, Arkham tapped her commbadge as she turned toward the lift.

=A= I'm a busy woman these days, Doctor. You best have an explanation for me when I arrive. =A=

---

(In sickbay)
Doctor Mabren turned to T'kaarch. "Well, ready or not, here she comes."
T'kaarch obviously had no idea who he was going to meet next, and therefor had no reason to be anything but his curious, but clumsy, self.
"Now, as you meet the commander, It's very important to..." Doctor Mabren stopped as at that point the door slid open.

"Commander." Mabren immediately stiffened up.

"Doctor," Arkham rasped coldly, running a hand down her crippled jawline. Looking over the newcomer with her one functioning cobalt eye (the other being rheumy and sightless), she smirked as she continued, never removing her gaze from him for even a moment. An Intelligence operative of mythic proportions, Arkham was legendary for her ability to take in even the most subtle of clues from bearing, gesture, and minute detail. "Thank you for notifying me. I understand that this is a most...interesting situation. You've handed this rather well, considering."

"Thank you, Commander. This man is new on this ship." Mabren nodded towards T'kaarch. "Hello ma'am" T'kaarch nodded kindly.

"I've noticed he's new. I think, Dr. Mabren, that though I may be blind in one eye, the other one is in perfect working order, and I would have noticed a Caitian aboard my ship prior to this. Now, young man, i've heard interesting things. Why don't you start explaining, before I start prying into places you probably don't want me? I have no record of you, and no transfer papers."

Unexplainably, a cold shiver ran down T'kaarchs splene. Something just didn't feel right with this woman. Still, she demanded answers, and T'kaarch decided to play it safe, keeping some details to himself. "Well, yes, where to begin..." He smiled, but the genuine kindness had numbed a bit. "I'm an explorer. I go around with my shuttlecraft, together with Holly - she's a hologram, you see - we go around the galaxy looking for beautiful sights, and we tend to take care of ourselves..." T'kaarch thought for a second, then continued: "The captain... Lane? He said we could land for provisioning and I was hoping we could make use of the ship's hospitality... It surely is a wonderful vessel you got here, if I say so myself, and I would be honored if I could at least take a look around."

Arkham smirked a little, taking all of this in. Clearly, the Caitian was uncomfortable with Arkham; though to be fair, few were. "Mr...T'kaarch is it? Well, I shall be the bearer of bad news and inform you that since you last spoke with Mr. Lane, there has been a regime change, so to speak. The Commanding Officer here, is me. And I do not respond well to pandering, for future reference."

T'kaarch looked in confusion, and thought about this new information. "Well ma'am, I had no intention to pander... I would just like to see the ship..." T'kaarch, losing his confidence, was now looking down, twiddling with his fingers.

"I suppose I can allow you to have a look around," Arkham said coolly. "But I have terms. Your ship will be provisioned, yes. But until your business is finished here and you have been cleared to leave, you will not have access to it. You will be required to surrender anything that could be considered a weapon to me, and I'm certain, under the circumstances, you understand that I will be looking into your background."

"I... I have no weapons..." The only reason that it didn't sound convincing was because he felt unconfident. "And I have nothing..." T'kaarch started sweating, "to hide."

Arkham raised a single silver eyebrow. "People don't just pop onto ships without a cause. If you are hiding something, I will find it. And will turn you over to whoever, without a second thought and without losing a moment of sleep over it. So are you sure you've told me everything necessary?"

"Well... I..." T'kaarch was positively panicking now, "Ok, there has been an... accident when I was young. But I swear, I can explain it."

"Well, get to it," Arkham said coolly. "I don't have all day."

Suddenly, Doctor Mabren stepped in. "This man is clearly, medically speaking, not fit to answer your questions right now. Mister T'kaarch, please, sit down here for a bit, just relax and tell her your story, calmly."

"Dr. Mabren," Arkham said coolly. "This is not a doctor's matter. It's mine, and being the ranking officer here, I'm going to take this opportunity to --politely-- order you to get the hell out of this office while I deal with this man."

"Commander--"

"NOW, Dr. Mabren," Arkham boomed, fixing her gaze on the Doctor for the first time in the course of the discussion. Without another word, the doctor vacated the office. While normally this may have earned her a talk with Lane, this was a new regime. Before continuing on, Arkham paused. "Computer. Tag all monitoring devices in this room as Classified Level 5, authorization: Arkham-Alpha-3-1-6-8-5-6-Theta."

The computer chimed, having successful executed the order and beginning to encrypt the data that was now passing into the ship's systems -- for now, the only one who could review the data would be Arkham alone, an act that would surely earn her no points with Captain Harwood.

T'kaarch steadied his breath, and relaxed a bit. While he was by no means happy about what was happening, at least it gave him a minute to think and get anything he wanted to say in a proper dialog.
Finally, he spoke: "It started about 20 years ago. I was a young cadet with lots of hopes and dreams. One day, I ended up in a shuttlecraft, belonging to earth's drydock, in space. I love tinkering, you see, so I was adjusting the dampener to see what it's effect would be on the warp drives..." T'kaarch seemed more relaxed, in fact he seemed so into his own life story that he forgot everything around him. "I must have spiked something bad, cause at some point I was laying on the floor, knocked out cold, you see, so when I woke up, I was in warp. I checked where I was, and I was like lightyears away. At first I didn't worry, but then I got this news message, that I was missing and wanted for stealing a shuttle--"

Arkham raised an eyebrow. "I'm sure I can piece together the rest. So you have in your posession a stolen shuttle."

"I did not steal the shuttle, miss, at least not intentionally..." T'kaarch answered, "but I guess you are right, it's not rightfully mine... But I assure you, there's nothing dodgy on my shuttle except for a warp drive which doesn't make warp signatures, and a bunch of holo emitters."

Arkham nodded. "Interesting. Why didn't you simply go back and explain? I'm sure this whole mess could have been avoided."

"Miss," T'kaarch said silently, "I never did anything wrong... I was... terrified... and things just... happened."

Arkham simply nodded, her features inscrutable, eyeing the Catian suspiciously with her single working eye.

"I... I understand... Can I at least keep Holly? And my holo programs?" T'kaarch realised his shuttle was unsave-able. "And what am I supposed to do now? I'm homeless..."

"Well, Mr...T'kaarch, was it?" Arkham said, pulling at a loose thread on the tunic of her uniform. She loathed shoddy workmanship. "I suppose we can arrange something for you here, if you're so keen to remain on my ship. I do suppose you had some sort of speciality during your time in Starfleet?"

"Yes, well... My official training was in Engineering, miss, but I was also good at Science and Navigation... And well, lately, you see, on my own, I've been mostly busy with Science... so..." T'Kaarch still looked shook up, and the whole gravity of the last remark hadn't really sunk in yet.

"All right then," Arkham said. "Arrangements will be made. However, there is a caveat to what I say, as there always is. I do not take deficiencies in one's work lightly. And know that should you disappoint me, the consequences could be very dire indeed. Do I make myself clear?"

"Yes miss, I assure you I will do the utmost-"

"I didn't need a response," Arkham snapped coldly. Turning to leave, Arkham said coolly, "Welcome to the Archimedes, Mr. T'kaarch. Enjoy your stay."

T'kaarch looked, still shocked by the whole experience, to the back of commander Arkham dissappearing through the medbay doors. It would take a while until he'll realised that he just got what he wanted when he first contacted the Archimedes, an actual place on a science vessel.

OFF:

Prov. En. T'Kaarch
Soon to be Assistance Science officer
USS Archimedes

AND

Commander Rowena Arkham
Acting Commanding Officer
USS Archimedes

 

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