[M - C02] Past and Parallel

[rodiziorobs]

Location: C02 (Hunston)
Tags: Military Building

Recap: Previously, Jex had gone to the MSS Strata to find more information about Scorpio's missing sister so that she could receive his final belongings after his funeral, including several weeks' worth of back pay. While there, she discovered that Scorpio had caught a prisoner, which, according to MANTIS' prisoner regulations, made him ultimately responsible for the prisoner's fate. Before Jex was able to interrogate the prisoner, there was a breakout in which two slavers--who had hidden their acts by disguising themselves as Zoids--tried to escape. Scorpio's prisoner had also escaped her cell and, in an apparent act of revenge against the slavers, killed one while the other managed to get away in the ensuing chaos. To bargain for her own freedom, the prisoner had then taken Jex hostage until General Teague had shown up and settled the scene.

In the hours that ensued, mysterious forces set themselves to discover who this prisoner was, and how she might present a threat to their unsavory operations.

Meanwhile, Scorpio has awoken, but is not sure where or when, or most perplexing, how.

****************

The prisoner was muscled into a small room and cuffed to a chair. A woman entered the room, whom she recognized to be Seliman, the commander who had halted the prison break."You cannot keep me here!" she shouted. "Your general himself granted me clemency when I swore to hurt no MANTIS personnel, and that my only wish was to catch that scumbag slaver you let escape!"

"Yes, but the general isn't here now, and I need information you might have..." Seliman responded, brandishing a glowing red prod. The prisoner noticed that it looked nothing like any MANTIS technology she had ever seen. "Tell me who you were working for when you were taken prisoner."

"I answer to no one," came the terse reply. "Not anymore."

"Then why are you listed in our records as being a Kawa prisoner, yet were initially apprehended in an Octan uniform?"

The prisoner said nothing.

"Tell me!" Seliman roared as she jammed the prod into the prisoner's leg. She screamed as the rod burned her flesh.

**********
"Do you see?" Farrs Farkas inquired. "Come closer! She is more restless than ever!"

Scorpio looked on helplessly. "Should we wake her?" he asked.

"I don't know if it would kill her," Farrs replied. "I knew it was safe to awaken you because your color had returned."

**********

Seliman waited a few moments, then stabbed the prisoner with the rod again, in the same spot. "Tell me who you are connected with in Andromeda," she asked simply. "As you have been in this prison for over a year, I am guessing that no one will come even notice if you never turned up again. But I am curious, and the people I work for even more so, so I am going to give you one more chance."

The prisoner managed to see through the blinding pain and looked up at her captor. And remained speechless.

"Fine then, the hard way it is." Seliman raised the rod, almost bringing it down on the prisoner's chest, when a voice interrupted through the intercom.

/\/\/"Seliman, we have an urgent order from General Teague. The prisoner has a guest--a Ms. Jessica DuBois--who has requested an immediate visit. General said to comply ASAP."/\/\/

"Don't you think we're through here..." Seliman groaned as she walked out. To the guards she said,"take the cuffs off and put her in visiting room C."

**********

"She stopped. She is peaceful once more...what does that mean?" Scorpio wondered aloud.

AG week 68 by rodiziorobs, on Flickr

"Perhaps her bad dream is over," Farrs mused.

Scorpio thought to himself. The last time he had seen his sister she was a prisoner at MANTIS. He hadn't had a chance to negotiate her release before Laszlowe had sent him on that fool's errand. What had happened there? He had been spying on Octan with Jex, when they had escaped on their boat and ...

Oh no.

He remembered suddenly. The crushing pain, the suffocating vertigo, the slow agony and tears and then...

...and then nothing.

That was it then. He was dead.

Except he wasn't. Obviously, he was still here. Or, he was Here, as Farrs had said. And if he had died, Jex would probably be Here, too. Unless of course she had survived. But then why was his sister Here?

"I'm going to try and wake her," he said, over Farrs Farkas' protestations.

****************
Even though the vignette is small, C&C is always welcome!

[Henjin_Quilones]

I love all of the lime green in that interrogation chamber! Good work!

[LucByard]

Nice build and great storytelling. Is that another MANTIS emblem I see on the wall? Creative approach!

[Andromedas Gates]

The judges awarded you 4 points.