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Entry tags:
- !plot: lirath,
- allenby beardsley,
- angie spica,
- anwei ayles,
- applejack,
- ash ketchum,
- cassie,
- chell,
- daniel jackson,
- dean winchester,
- dhianeila,
- eleventh doctor,
- eva,
- feldt grace,
- hank pym,
- hit girl,
- hoshi hikari,
- jamie hemeros,
- jono starsmore,
- kaya,
- lash,
- lord zetta,
- martha jones,
- midna,
- nightwing,
- nokosi,
- phillip,
- rapunzel,
- red xiii (nanaki),
- ren akiyama,
- river song,
- ruffnut thorston,
- sandy marko,
- satellizer el bridget,
- schmuz 44356,
- setsuna f. seiei,
- shoutarou hidari,
- son of satan,
- spider-man,
- stature,
- sumeragi lee noriega,
- tenaya,
- the master,
- wheatley
Lirath - Ship Survival
As the battle raged outside, those remaining aboard Stacy had their hands full preparing for the incoming flood of refugees.
Positioned near the Bleed-Gate orbiting Lirath, Stacy stood ready to receive the refugees. Ship after ship ascended as quickly as they could, some of them making a break for the Bleed-Gate itself while the smaller ships were forced to dock at Stacy, unloading their cargo of refugees before setting off again for the planet's surface again to take on more passengers.
Several small units of GIA soldiers were also sent up to help the Transmigration crew take in the massive amount of refugees, many of whom were tired, wounded, and scared. It wouldn't take long for the ship to begin filling with people.
With the battle raging outside, and the Ohm clambering outside, trying to get in, it would be a tall order to keep all of the refugees safe and calm, but the crew didn't have much choice.
[ooc: Open!]
Positioned near the Bleed-Gate orbiting Lirath, Stacy stood ready to receive the refugees. Ship after ship ascended as quickly as they could, some of them making a break for the Bleed-Gate itself while the smaller ships were forced to dock at Stacy, unloading their cargo of refugees before setting off again for the planet's surface again to take on more passengers.
Several small units of GIA soldiers were also sent up to help the Transmigration crew take in the massive amount of refugees, many of whom were tired, wounded, and scared. It wouldn't take long for the ship to begin filling with people.
With the battle raging outside, and the Ohm clambering outside, trying to get in, it would be a tall order to keep all of the refugees safe and calm, but the crew didn't have much choice.
[ooc: Open!]
no subject
Getting up so close to the Cultist without the confusion of combat would show Eva he probably wasn't lying. His face was riddled with far more scars than even Eva herself had, most of them self inflicted and far deeper than the wounds she had suffered.
"But that is irrelevant. Do you really think we would send a device of any importance in the care of a single, unarmored, unarmed man? We may be zealous, but we are not fools."
"I am here to deliver a message to you from my master."
no subject
He couldn't figure it out. What was getting into her? Because this wasn't the woman he'd met back on XaXing. Sure, she'd had some words for him; told him off, actually but only because Daniel was the one who'd opened his big mouth first and let his hatred for the Goa'uld run his tongue. But using her past as a weapon, threatening to torture him? It occurred to him that this could be a bluff. A very convincing, very scary bluff. If it was, Eva sure fooled him.
The scary part was that Daniel believed she could do it. Make good on her threat. The terrorist didn't seem nearly so concerned. He did something that Daniel had been hoping he wouldn't, which was laugh at her. Daniel couldn't think of a worse thing to do at this time. The woman had deliberately maimed him after all. She still had a bullet left. He could feel this slipping out of control. The man either didn't realize the danger in or didn't care, and it looked like Eva knew and was this close to embracing it.
Daniel cleared his throat uncomfortably in the silence, hoping to break the tension even if just by a little. Hopefully he could get them to both stop, to think.
"If you have to experience pain every day for your master, what does your master even offer you to make it worth the trouble? And why even involve pain?" Daniel asked. It could be a form of devotion, but Daniel wasn't quite seeing it. It wasn't as if ritual scarification was an unknown. Several cultures back on Earth practiced it. The Suri and the Maori among a number of other cultures, and then you had cases like the Jaffa, proof that scarification was not something confined to Earth. They could be within any context, such as a right of passage or in the Ichi's case, to indicate someone had joined the ranks of the Nze na Ozo. Or it could be used to denote ownership, like marking slaves and cattle.
Or punishment. If this was the case, this particular terrorist still hadn't quite learned his lesson.
Daniel hesitated when the man asked them a question. Knowing how today was turning out so far, it was going to be the world's worst joke. He could just picture Jack's reaction now; ' What? Knock knock, Who's there, then this device blowing up in our faces. Great!'
"I don't know. You might be?" Daniel said. "What's the message?"
no subject
"Yes, well, your master better have sent us some information on how many of your people are aboard this ship and what the primary mission was, because I can't really be bothered with another attempt at evangelism."
She casts a look at Daniel. She appreciates his attempt to defuse the situation and pull some information out of it, she truly does, but at the same time, she can't help but find his questions impractical and academic. Let Daniel study their culture later; at the moment they have god knows how many explosives on the ships among innocent people, among delicate machinery and Stacy's esoteric innards, and there is no time to deduce motivation or appreciate cultural relativity here. Given time to process, his keen mind would likely be of great use to them against the cultists - but in this moment, now, they need only information they can rely on.
"Start talking. Now. Without any of the hellfire and brimstone."
She has no doubt this man has suffered greatly, but she also has no doubt that given fifteen minutes, with or without Daniel's horror, she can break him. She's seen greater men and women than sniveling bootlickers scream for mercy. She's been one of those greater women. The cultist may have been using his faith as a shield against pain, but there are ways around any shield, she's certain.
no subject
"This attack is merely a greeting. My master merely wants to give you a taste of what's to come. He knows we won't be able to take this ship or kill many of you. That's not the point."
He laughs again, as much as he could with Eva holding his lip.
"He knows you, knows all of you. He has plans for all of you, and he will be coming for you."
"Many more will die. More worlds will be consumed in fire. You cannot hope to stop him."
"You and all others will be consumed in his grand plans."
no subject
This was a start. The prisoner was talking. Sort of. Not so much talking with them as talking at them,and not so much talking at them as either ranting or preaching, or possibly a combination of the two, depending on how you wanted to define the terms. But it was something.
So they had another enemy besides the Ohm. One who didn't mind sending his own to their deaths, which meant he either had numbers on his side or, Daniel was sincerely hoping there was no "and" there, he was so supremely confident in his grand plan that it didn't matter if he sacrificed his men. He seemed to know something about them too. Unless he was very good at reading them and extrapolating or making wild guesses. That was a possibility too.
"Um. Well. Hello back to him?"
This was bad. It wasn't like Daniel had scoured the databases seeing how many species were out for their blood. Did Leon or anyone know about this enemy? Or was he a newcomer.If he knew about them all, that was a problem. A big one.
"I mean, what's the point of all this in the first place? If he's so certain he can destroy us, it seems pointless to waste the time and energy on this attack. Obviously if we're going to die, he's got nothing to prove, and if he's in such a superior position anyway, he shouldn't need to stoop to seek our attention anyway. So why not just destroy us at will?" Daniel asked, although he knew it was a bad idea the moment it came out of his mouth. He quickly continued, hoping to keep the man going before Eva did anything more drastic."Why is he doing this? What plans?"
[warning for violence]
She closes her eyes while Daniel talks, hoping to God he can find the right question to ask that would make it worthwhile to keep talking to the cultist. But instead he asks about plans, which she figures full well will evolve into another diatribe on on consumption in flames and the coming apocalypse and some further iteration about just how stupid they are to defend themselves. Her eyes snap back open.
"And here I thought I'd just told you to serve us useful information, hold the 'Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God'," she says, lips pursed. She pulls her hand away from the man's mouth and flexes it in front of her face for a moment, running the other hand over his hair as if petting him. "Que bajón.*"
Then she jerks her hand back out like a snake catching a rat and jams two fingers up the man's nostrils, thrusting with her wrist and pushing past membranous tissue and crumpling cartilage. She holds his head steady by a handful of hair, forcing his face and sinuses to meet the full strength of her arms. Blood gushes from his nose, streaming down her wrist and into his mouth.
Her thumb hooks back under his lip. She puts her shoulder into it and pushes. Her first knuckles hit the nasal bone, and curling her fingers rips up more tissues and lets her literally hook her hand into his nasal cavity and the skull's nose socket. There are nerve endings there, pain receptors, sensitive ones usually protected by the face she's now destroying from the inside out.
She doesn't bother to look at Daniel. She doesn't want to register what a normal person would think she's doing now. It's not even that she doesn't care, or that she isn't aware, but that there is a part of her that wants to cry and hide and drink right now until everything goes away. And looking to someone who might say 'Eva, that might be the better idea' could bring that guilty, fearful part bubbling to the surface, and she can't afford that now.
Besides, she chose this method because if Daniel tries to physically separate her and the cultist, he'll only succeed in ruining the man's body more.
"I said no fire or brimstone." She tilts the man's head forward so he won't be able to choke on the blood and tissue draining down his throat. "Now give us useful information before I try to literally pick it from your shriveled little brain."
*Slang: 'What a letdown.'
Re: [warning for violence]
Sort of. It was kind of hard to laugh with a broken nose and blood gushing down your face.
See, it was rather hard to hurt a man whose pain receptors were all burnt out on purpose. Makes it rather hard to interrogate the guy on your own terms. The fact that he was able to walk and talk despite his nervous system being so fucked up was solely testament to the level of cybernetic enhancements available in the multiverse's black markets.
"Really?" he sneered. "Head wounds on someone you're trying to interrogate? Not very bright, are you."
He turned and spat out a tooth before talking again.
"Killing you isn't the point, it's just an eventuality. My master has many plans and uses for all of you. He will admit as much himself. Master?"
Apparently the cultist had left his comms open the entire time, as another voice crackled from a device hidden on his person.
"Very good, number....673." said an unsettling, almost oily voice over the comm. "I'll be sure to put a gold star on your record. And give you a stirring eulogy."
There was the sound of a button being pressed over the comms, and suddenly the cultist's head jerked back, his eyes going wide, before his entire body went slack. He was dead, apparently, thanks to some sort of kill-switch the person on the other end of the comms activated.
"Something something he was such a wonderful person blah blah blah," the voice continued irreverently. "Now, as for you two, I'm sure this is all very frustrating."
"Sudden attack! New enemy! Vague, annoying taunts! But really, I just want you to know, I do take using all of you very seriously. I've got big, big plans for you and your friends, so I can't go killing all of you off yet. Maybe one or two, just for kicks, but that's it."
"I really am looking forward to this. I hope you are too."
Re: [warning for violence]
"Eva! That's ENOUGH! Daniel surged to his feet, and was on Eva almost as fast as she'd jumped the cultist earlier. It was the only time he'd ever used his height against her, or against anyone on his side, really, but Daniel didn't hold himself back. The archaeologist roughly grabbed Eva by the shoulder, fingers digging the fabric in a knot. Hauling her up easily, he pulled her away from the dead body. Daniel crowded her back into the wall behind her.
The only saving grace was that Eva hadn't actually killed the man. Barely.
"What the hell are you doing?!" he growled. The archaeologist glanced back at the corpse. The man's face was a mess. His stomach roiled again. Geez, as if the bullet wounds weren't bad enough. If that other person hadn't somehow killed the man remotely, there was a good chance he would have bled to death anyway. He wasn't that kind of doctor, but it looked like a lot of blood.
Daniel shook her with one hand. "What's gotten into you?! We don't do this, not to an enemy, not to anyone, not ever! We aren't like that!"
no subject
She doesn't fight when Daniel pulls her away from the body. She just lets go. Her hand, her blood-covered weapon, goes as slack as the body and slides out his nose like toothpaste from a tube. She lets Daniel move her and only reacts when he crowds her up against the wall and shakes her.
"Don't touch me, don't touch me!" She shoves him, leaving a bloody handprint on his shirt. He's trapped her against the wall, trapped in this room with her own devilish handiwork. She shrinks into the corner like an animal that doesn't know whether to attack or hide.
The enemy is dead. Good. He deserved it. He was a brainwashed waste of carbon who attacked innocents, adults and children, to do nothing but inspire fear and hate. He was the mindless puppet of an evil force who likes inflicting pain. Like her.
But she knows better. She knows it was never about the cultist. It wasn't about her when she was tortured either - she was just a vehicle, a storage unit for someone else's rage and punishment. It's never about the one in physical pain.
She's dripping another person's blood. In a futile gesture, she tries to wipe it off on the sleeve of her jacket. She makes a whimper-like noise as she does so, then raises her eyes to meet Daniel's.
"You aren't. You aren't like that."
Maybe Daniel has some refuge in ignorance or naivete. Maybe he would be so strong regardless, if he'd lived like her. Like his wife. Maybe he would just buckle under the strain and give up. She always told herself she wouldn't give up, but it strikes her clearly now that for so long, she's been mistaking hatred and rage for progress. Don't get sad, get mad. Get so mad you're nothing but a tightly-wound ball of wrath and injured pride.
She stares at the body, face stern and still brimming with anger. Her voice is flat when she asks "did we get a recording of that chatter?"
no subject
He tried very hard to ignore the blood she'd wiped on his uniform, or the fact it soaking in and starting to touch his skin. He tried even harder not to think of where it came from, which was next to impossible, considering the man with the torn face was right behind his ankle.
"How the hell should I know?!" Daniel's voice sounded a little wild. She'd practically tore this guy's face off and she was asking if they recorded the questioning? It wasn't like he'd planned for any of this to happen. He hadn't even thought to come prepared for an interrogation, you know with things like cameras, an actual interrogation room. He'd have thought things human rights were at least a no-brainer!
Daniel was practically shaking with the effort it took to keep a lid on his fury. "Give me your gun. Now."
no subject
She wonders if there will be dried blood under her fingernails for a long time. Probably. Maybe she'll pick it out with a nail file, or maybe if she washes her hands soon enough it won't be a problem.
She finds it absurd that that's dominating her thoughts right now.
She pulls her gun out, pops open the chamber, removes the sole remaining bullet, and holds them both out to Daniel. She's more scared of him right now than she was during all the chaos that preceded now. He has her trapped, powerless. He saw her in a moment of passionate evil, and he can judge her now. Worse, he could judge her and then tell Marco.
Oh God, what is she going to tell her son?
That thought manages to obliterate any concerns about the blood from her mind.
no subject
"Go get a scientist down here to check this thing out," he indicated the device the man- the dead man left. The one that he hoped wasn't connected to whether the cultist was alive or not, or set on some timer. What he knew about explosives couldn't fill up a page. Jack was going to kill him if he ever found out he was going to babysit the thing. It was risky as hell but he couldn't leave it unattended. Others might stumble on it or worse if they found it sitting out on its own.
Daniel couldn't bring himself look at the body again just yet. "And bring a medic to take care of him."
no subject
"I'll find a scientist, but our medics have to tend to the living before they waste their time on the dead," she says, affect flat and detached. "We'll need a scientist to deal with this one. Someone who can find out what the killswitch was in his body and why he didn't feel pain."
Because God, shoving your hands up someone's face should cause them pain. She's still angry it didn't. But they can still get intel from the body.
She's going to have to report herself, she realizes. Either she will or Daniel will or whomever she finds to examine the body will. She feels a lump in her throat at the thought. She'll be caged, trapped, fettered in a jail cell. A prisoner again. How can they do that to her? How can she do that to herself? But at least if she turns herself in she can do it on her own terms, rather than hunted like an outlaw.
Before Daniel has a chance to protest she rushes out of the room.