Begin at the Beguine

Posted on Fri 18th Sep, 2020 @ 4:39am by Lieutenant Damion Ildaran

732 words; about a 4 minute read

Mission: Resolution
Location: Section 49A
Timeline: MD3, Eventing

"For me, it began with a white whale," Chlamydia Addams said. "I was a Lieutenant then, and the chief medical officer -- the only medical officer -- aboard USS Archimedes. The captain, Harold Balzac -- yes, go ahead and snicker; we all did at least once -- had fallen under the influence of an alien artifact which brought out the worst aspects of his psyche. Fortunately for all of us, Captain Balzac was fundamentally a good person, so the worst aspects of his psyche involved a sexual dalliance with the helmswoman, a tendency to rush head-long into danger, and the consumption of too much beer."

Damion blinked. He vaguely recalled the name Balzac from a long-ago Earth literature class. Couldn't remember any of the man's books. Clearly, Addams was not only educated but also extremely well read. He made a mental note to look up her literary references and nodded. "What did you learn of this mess on the Archimedes?"

"That the cathedral in Notre Dame was not constructed in an hour," Chlamydia answered. She walked the passage between beds to the far end, stepped through into the nurse's station beyond. "The Captain had not come upon this alien artifact in the usual fashion, through exploration of the unknown. It had been a present... a gift... from someone he ought to have been able to trust: his aunt."

Chlamydia took one of the seats at the nurse's station, gesturing to the other as she went on talking. "When we finally realized that something was altering the Captain's behavior, his emotional state; when we finally isolated what the cause was and removed Harry from its influence, he was infuriated and obsessed. And so, we pursued the Aunt."

And this story would be told like building the cathedral in Notre Dame, Damion concluded, whatever that was. Well, he was the one who'd asked her to stay after for a bit. If she wanted to tell him a story in her own good time, he'd best sit and listen. Damion took the empty seat at the nurse's station and got comfortable as he glanced at the console. "Interesting. These workstations look rather old," he said. "All right, so you went after Captain Balzac's aunt. Was she a xenoarchaeologist or just out shopping one day and came across a 'wonderful conversation piece' at the market?"

"No; she was a neurologist." Addams sighed. "We pursued to Deep Space Fifteen, on the Tholian border. We arrived to discover that someone had invented a process for erasing the minds of Humanoid species, replacing them with formerly holographic personalities." The Doctor's eyes looked haunted... more than usually so. "Ninety-two percent of Starfleet Officers retire from service without major trauma. But that other eight percent tends to come in rather large batches."

Thank God Elizabeth is ethical, Damion thought with a faint shudder. "Would I be correct in thinking the holographic personalities transferred by that process were not pleased by it--else no one would have been the wiser?" he asked.

Addams shook her head. "Very much the contrary. They were programmed to be super-soldiers; a battle ensued. Very few station personnel survived. Samuel Clement, a Starfleet retiree now living here on 109, survived, along with a little girl he adopted afterward." Addams sighed and rubbed her forehead. "At the time, I believed it was an event of limited scope: a rogue scientist pursuing a mad agenda. With later, wider experience I realized that it had been a test. Someone wanted soldiers possessed of absolute loyalty and no fear of death."

Damion started to quirk an eyebrow upward--and then he froze. "Deep Space 15. That attack happened what--ten years ago, at most? Are you saying that the blaggard who created Zelda's ring and who presumably did experiments in this room, is the same person who transferred holographic personalities into the bodies of mind-wiped people?"

"Eight years ago. But I assert nothing," Addams countered. "I am simply laying out the pieces I have, which seem to me to interconnect. You must draw your own conclusions."

Damion nodded. "I'll test them and reality check. This goes back farther than I imagined--which was short-sighted of me, because projects the likes of what this bloke does take years, decades to perfect. What was the next link in your chain?"

"A cry for help," Addams said. "From out of the darkness."

 

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