Re: The Brig
Garrat Wolfrim:
Garrat winces, obviously not wanting to contradict the already angry Admiral, but he'd gone out of his way, fighting deeply ingrained instincts not to hurt Evert, even when he was pretty sure she was a fake.
"Um, sir? If any one who has ever gone to battle with Spencer had been "shooting at" Evert at that range with that weapon, she would have been dead. Most could have done it blindfolded." Garrat sighs and looks down. "Maybe things will be clearer with my report:" Garrat stands at parade rest and recites the report as if reading from a teleprompt in front of him....
1. My actions are a direct response to previous events which I observed with the Verian known as Evert. I will first refer to the events of Shades hatching and conversations that happened at that time.
2. I had dropped by Dr. Christy's office previous to the battle of the black in the hopes of gaining his advice on what I should use to combat Avians. The place was in a disarray based around the room that I latter learned contained the Verian eggs. Apparentl one of the eggs hatched and It's occupant [Shadow's offspring] made it's way into the ducts and killed three rats with a torch weapon in it's hand. It was carrying another with it. Christy had called Evert but she felt the meeting she was involved in to be more important than.
3. The vents were locked down and Evert showed up to help talk the creature out of the vents. She was concerned for the safety of the eggs and confused at the rate of growth that allowed Shadows seed to hatch so quickly. Other than that She exhibited the same cool precision and mechanical movement that I had observed in her public appearances.
4. Evert seemed capable of talking with shade immediately without trouble. She mentioned that crossbreeds usually are like Verians with just a few alien traits or they just don't work out.
5. Shade jumped out of the vents just as I was getting ready to catch him. We almost lost dusk, the egg he was carrying when it was fumbled but I managed to catch it.
6. Evert and Shade communicated then she told us "Normally it would take longer for both eggs to hatch. The cross breed egg hatched much, much, faster, and for some reason it caused the other egg to develop faster. Both never happened before and none showed this range of activity.
[said in a maneriasm identical to Everts, "He says his name is Shade and the eggs name is Dusk and it is to be a Female....much like himself? It seems that as Lady's egg began to grow, there was a transfer of energy to the other egg as well. We should have had seperated containers...I think?"
7. Evert stated she was unsure how to proceed but showed no animosity toward Shadow or his genetics. She spoke of Verian development, concern about the mix in breeds and left for the bridge.
8. I returned after going to battle, spending time in the med bay, and getting cleaned up. While getting worked on in the med lab I reflected Everts response to Shades hand weapon. It didn't seem to surprise her at the time so I felt it was safe to assume that the energy weapon in young Shades hand was common to the Verians.
9. There was evidence in the room that Pizza had been ordered directly after I left and I though Christy had mentioned something about Evert okaying it, hindsight that may have been the meds screwing with my head. The security footage of Christies office after I left the time before would decide that. Work was being done on some of the samples I had secured for the good docter. I saved a prize specimen for Shade.
10. The tech looking after Shade said he was looking for someone. I started trying to find out who but wasn't successful. Dr. Christy joined us as Dusk's Became active.
11. At Dr. Christy's communication Evert joined us. She came in with a sway to her walk I've only seen in Mammal humanoids who wish to breed. As I was there when Shade's Genetics were presented and know Verians don't need to harvest genetics through intimacy, and have never seen Evert walk like this or done anything that wasn't task oriented this struck me as odd. It caused me to observe her behavior more closely.
12. Evert examined the egg but seemed her usual detached professional self other than the human sway to her walk. She acknowledged then and there the egg was way ahead of schedule and would be hatching soon as if she were examining a lab specimen then left. Even Dr. Christy's assistant commented on how coldly she spoke about Shade and dusk. I did not see this as odd. Evert has always maintained perfect professionalism even when talking about her own daughter's death.
13. I spoke to shade about his lack of cooperation then Christy and I were able to communicate with him using a data pad. We learned he was asking about Lady. I communicated with shadow and asked Hunter to bring some food. Shadow got there first and interacted with shade. Hunter came latter and shade got to enjoy some Pizza which he had obviously been eating before. Then Shadow took shade to see Shadow's fighter.
14. On his way out Evert came in. She was extremely emotional in a way she had not proven capable of in the past. She exchanged words with shadow declaring him beneath his son's status. They parted on bad terms. Evert remained and continued to express an irrational dislike for shadow. If she hadn't appeared the same as she had in earlier visits, I would have thought that the emotional out put and subject matter could not have come from the same creature as had been in the office before. In the past Evert simply took action to accomplish what she felt was necessary. She didn't waste time talking about it and passed of distractions with minimal effort on the way to get the Job done. Yet here she was monologing to people she obviously felt were beneath her.
15. I noted her activities reflected the irrational actions of racial purity groups I've encountered in my own space. The differences between this Evert and the previous one matched the differences between such groups and our standard populous. More so against what I'd come to believe were Verian traits.
16. Shortly after that, Evert showed surprise that Dusk was developing like shade. She had told us this was happening herself on two previous visits, but seemed to have no memory of it in the last. Then she looked at pizza droppings on the floor and was angry at us for feeding that to him as if she didn't know he had been eating it previously. Never mind there were humans standing around eating the pizza who could have dropped those bits.
17. At this time I noted that her comments had been made as if she had not had previous experience with shade. I also noted that her conversation in this visit did not refer to any facts that I knew was true from previous conversations. In my section of space I have encountered nonsentient silicone based life forms that were capable of mimicking animal species and plants in their environment in order to survive. That coupled with the fact that I had not seen any other Verians led me to believe that neither I, nor most of the rest of the Hermes crew had the experience to tell one Verian from another. Everything we knew relied on faith in the words of an alien and an unfamiliar uniform.
18. Back on the shuttle to Zolth, a human officer was impersonated by another. If the traitor had a detonation device on him, all of that C-10 in his pack would have exploded and all the missions would have failed. You also wouldn't have Spencer or Shadow anymore. That was the ability of a person posing as a lowly tech. The Thor was sent to oblivion by the impact of a singe fighter. Granted she had taken great damage in the battle but an explosion from a turn coat on the inside gets past even the best exterior armor. How much damage can an intelligent sabetuer do if she has Admiral access to a ship this size? How much more with an undefined ability to summon energy attacks without needing to draw a weapon? Indeed, her weapon is drawn at all times.
19. I came to the conclusion that there was a good chance that the Alien who was in front of me might not be Evert at all, and could posed a major threat to the Hermes. I did not presume to guess her motives. I did not rule out the possibility that this may just be a crazy side to Verians.
20. I drew down on the target and told her to stop talking and put her hands on the wall until I could prove her Identity. All she had to do was comply and I would have confirmed her identity and submitted to whatever punishment my mistake would have generated.
21. She chose to insinuate she could take me out before I could shoot her while she was in my guns sight. At that point I had a choice to shoot her or warn her. If she was a fake warning her would mean my death and endanger the ship. If she weren't, injuring her would mean huge problems with Delta fleet.
22. The fact that she was still talking suggested I was correct in my concerns, but I still wasn't 100% sure. I felt it would be wise to be sure if I was going to risk starting a war by killing an Admiral. There were only two ways I could think of at the time to prove her identity. Use a security question, or ask someone I trusted, who would know for sure. So I did both. I asked for shade over the com since he was part Varian and shared his mothers memories, as Evert was so busy talking I felt argueing with her was a bad Idea and simply fired a warning shot before asking my security question. This was a big risk because now I only had one shot, and, well, by her comments she was probably going to kill me rather than respond.
23. As expected, she chose not to answer it, and though Shadow answered my question confirming Everts Identity, right there in front of her, she chose to shocked me before I could lower my weapon. When you shock someone who has their finger on the trigger of a gun, the gun goes off. I attempted to get the barrel pointed away from her before it fired but almost shot Dr. Christy. I recovered with her standing over me lecturing me about being Ladies mother. She was within knife range and if I feigned enough injury, I could have caught her off guard. As I knew now that she was truly Evert, pressing the attack was ofcourse out of the question. This was the end of the conflict.
The report was given in English,
Garrat was quiet for a moment "I am truly sorry sir. I should have stepped out, confirmed her identity and acted from there. It's just." Garrat looks down then up "Well, I have never in all my years had to deal with the possibility of traitors in my midst. After that Idiot showed up on the way to Volth, it threw my game way off. I haven't had the training to adapt to this. For the first time in decades, well, I have something to fear."
"I have worked very hard to adapt to your culture. Even harder to help both on and off the battle field. I was designed raised, trained, and conditioned through experience to work hard for human kind. I'm at loss how to apply my experience and training to this new threat."
"Things might have gone better if I weren't groggy and slow of thought from the meds but these actions were my choice and I understand whatever happens to me now is for the good of the ship and the fleet."
