The Only Way Out is Through You - Part 3

Posted on Mon Jun 22, 2015 @ 9:40pm by Civilian 'Key Holder' Dorian Gabriel & Civilian 'Key Holder' Yolanthe Ibalin

1,844 words; about a 9 minute read

Mission: Eye of the Beholder
Location: Many decks below the Promenade

::OLD::
She turned a spring green and looked round at him. He was now actually starting to look ill enough that even she could spot it. He wasn't going to be doing any delicate stuff anytime soon. Damn. "Just how much is this going to hurt if I get this wrong?"

"Don't worry..." he huffed, "You'll be too dead to feel anything." He said flatly. He reached into the inside of his jacket and withdrew a small cylindrical device. He pressed the sides of the device two and a small green light activated.

She turned to the cargo bay doors, and pulled the manual release.


::NEW::

The mechanical servos worked with admired efficiency as they slid the two solid doors away from each other until the cargo bay was completely revealed. Dorian summoned his strength and managed to gain his balance and move forward the necessary 10 feet to cross the boundary of the cargo bay.

"Don't touch anything..." He said in a low half-serious tone as he made his way past the Bokkai and into the larger facility. He was familiar with just about every item inside of the bay as well a the corresponding consoles did it did not take him long to make his way to the nearest panel and activate the overhead lights. Within several moments the cavernous cargo bay was entirely illuminated for the two individuals.

"Damn it, Dorian , what did I just say about carrying you?" She muttered to herself when he brushed past her, but the sentiment was lost to surprise when she saw just how full the bay was. Rows and rows of crates and boxes of different shapes and sizes, some still neatly stacked. Others more jumbled where the sudden drops and lurches of the station had shaken them loose.

The various crates that were lined along the wall had the same words written across the front. The crates themselves had the same style of language drawn across their surfaces, but in different variations. Regardless of the context, the language was undeniable in its blunt and direct appearance.

Dominionese.

Yolanthe had only been a child when the Dominion war had swept across the Federation. It never touched her own world, isolated as it was on the edge of the quadrant, but she had seen enough news footage to recognize the strange script that looked like someone had coloured in a diagram of wavelengths. "This is Dominion tech?" her body turning a sharp pure cyan. "What does your boss need with that?"

"The Raddon Corps has a pharmacological division that focuses on developing treatment to various diseases and infirmities across the Federation." Dorian quickly responded. "Mr. Raddon wanted to ensure that another epidemic like the one on the station could never occur again." Dorian said.

It was all a lie.

He had rehearsed that speech over a hundred times and had given it dozens of times to various individuals that had ever questioned why the company spent its resources on gathering Dominion technology.

Yolanthe swallowed the lie whole, even slightly impressed that so much stuff could be dragged across half the galaxy. "Good for him." She turned to Dorian. "You can not be standing up." Turning to the nearest set of crates, she heaved one down with a thud to the floor, and pointed to it. "Sit. Then tell me there is something in here we can use to get out."

Dorian wanted to argue with the alien for having the audacity that she could order him around like some Vulcan. But he was too weak to put up much of a verbal spar. He merely leaned against a large-size crate and caught his breathe slowly before standing up again.

"There is a low-level communication relay that. . .our corporation uses for internal. . . communications." He said as he gestured towards a console that was illuminated by the Raddon Corp insignia.

"The original plan was for us to make contact with a docked Raddon Corp vessel and begin unloading its cargo into this bay." He continued, only slightly lying this time. "There's no telling if our vessels were destroyed along with every other vessel docked with the station." He added.

"But. . .we can use the short-range transporter to transport Rene to Sickbay." Dorian said in a strained voice as he made his way over to the console. He sighed deeply as he brought his hands to the console and began to enter his designated authorization code. He began to activate the short-range sensors to find out what was happening.

"I'm searching for Rene....." Dorian said. In actuality he was searching the station's docking manifest to determine if the Niberite Industry vessel "NI Jentara" had departed from the station. If it had, then it was more likely that it still possessed the special cargo that Mr. Raddon had originally sent Dorian and others to retrieve. As he was scanning for more information he noticed a transmission was coming through to the console. He quickly activated it and was welcomed to the sight of Melvyn Raddon himself.

"Dorian. . .? Are you there?" the voice asked due to the lack of a visual connection. It took several seconds before Melvyn was able to see Dorian on the viewer. "Thank God you are still alive. What is your status?" Melvyn said in a tone mixed with relief and rushed concerned.

"Sir, Elliot died in the initial collapse. Rene is critically injured. I was able to make it to a secured facility and activate the communications system." Dorian reported, his shoulders sagging slightly as he continued to breathe in a labored effort.

Melvyn nodded in response. "My God. . .once we learned that the station had discovered a planet emerging I initiated the immediate evacuation of all essential Radoon Corp persone----" the elder human stopped his sentence short as he noticed the presence of the alien bartender.

"Dorian, while I am grateful to see you alive, my boy, I'm concerned that a Bokkai is standing within my facility." He said with evident concern in his voice. "...are you armed..?" Melvyn asked in a lowered tone.

Seeing Dorian refuse to follow an instruction meant for his own good, Yolanthe had turned a dirty sand, but left him to call for help. The man had no quit in him whatsoever, stubborn jackass. She sighed, and went looking for a first aid kit. If he keeled over from the pain before he got hold of anyone she had no idea how long they'd be stuck here.

She wandered amongst the crates, all marked with the same oscillating script as the first boxes she'd seen. Natural curiosity was itching at her fingers, wondering how much dominion tech was actually here, what it all looked like, but she had more important things to do. besides, she'd have no idea if she was opening a box of medical supplies versus opening a box of live grenades.

Eventually she found what she was looking for, in a small locker set into the side wall. She grabbed the small case of medical supplies and headed back towards Dorian. Who sounded like he was talking to someone. Fantastic. She started to turn blue again. "Dorian? Who are you talking to? Can they get your friend out?"

"Dorian, do whatever you need to do to get yourself and Rene to safety as soon as possible, but I want that alien out of my facility" Melvyn said as he leaned closer to the screen and used a lower tone. "Use whatever means necessary to get rid of her...." He said as he the Bokkai walked back within viewing distance of the monitor.

As Yolanthe returned, Mr. Raddon sat upright in his chair and narrowed his eyes on the Bokkai for several moments before the link was terminated and his face was replaced with Raddon Corp logo.

"He doesn't look happy," she observed. "What's wrong?"

Dorian glanced at the woman before turning back to the console. "He has his reasons, I wouldn't expect for your kind to understand what motivates him to serve his people." Dorian responded as he continued to work on the current situation.

"My kind?" The blue reverted to yellow. "My kind? Hell's Bells, Dorian! What crawled up your arse and died for you to spout such bilge?"

My employer thinks that you are a spy and wants me to summarily execute you and disintegrate the body, but I'm trying to be nice and not carry out that specific order. Dorian thought to himself. He figured now would not be the time to practice absolute honesty.

"Look, we can sit here squabbling, or you can let me get back to the more important task of getting us the hell out of here." Dorian said, attempting to deflect the conversation. The sooner he could get her out of the area, but better it would be for everyone all around.

She held up her hands in a gesture of defence and exasperation, her skin becoming a much more subdued ochre. "All right, fine. you don't have to be a prick about it though. Neither of us want to be here."

Dorian was working to try to find a way around the congestion caused by the evacuation. The planetary emergence was saturated with polaric energy, it was causing interference with the transporters re-sequencer. To make matters worse, the high usage of transporters throughout the station had pushed the transporter's pattern buffer to near max capacity. Dorian wasn't an engineer, but he knew enough to know that trying to force a transport without enough room in the pattern buffer could affect the re-materialization sequence. The matter stream would degrade to such a state that no one would safely transport.

"There! I was able to get a lock on Rene and transport him to sick bay." Dorian said with relief. It was easier to get one signal through than to attempt a large beam out. Dorian knew that he would be able to attempt a second beam-out, but he would have to limit it to just two signals, which meant that Elliot's body would have to be retrieve at a later time.

"I've got us out of here..." Dorian reported to the obviously still upset Bokkai. "You will forget everything you saw in here." He said in a serious tone. He knew that Mr. Raddon was going to take further precautions now that he had seen the Bokkai within the secured facility. Dorian turned back to the console and activated the security activation protocol. It would take about 60 seconds in total for the facility to re-secure itself, including partial decompression of the immediate area, thus making it inhabitable for anyone who stayed behind.

"Ready?" He asked rhetorically as he selected a destination just inside of the station's habitation ring.

She hated transporters and started going a pale brackish green. "Yeah Sure. This has been fun." Sarcasm dripped from the words. "We should do it again sometime."



Yolanthe Ibalin
Owner, The Box of Delights

Dorian Gabriel
Raddon Corporation
Former Chief of Security

 

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