PLOT LOG | "A Tangled Web" | Lieutenant Pettygrove, The "President"

Posted on Tue Jul 2nd, 2013 @ 9:41am by

1,113 words; about a 6 minute read

Mission: Secret Meetings
Location: Main Hangar Deck/Shuttlebay

The shuttlebay was mostly quiet as it could be. For many, the day had worn itself away, and only the most dedicated or unluckily scheduled officers remained anywhere near the massive hangar. The multiple levels rose upward, and Shayna couldn't help but spend a moment looking high into the air. The roof of the shuttlebay seemed impossibly far away, and shuttles lined the walls like bees in a honeycomb. It was far and away the most impressive spectacle on the Vindicator in her humble opinion.

The fact she was only there to complete a mandatory inspection of their runabout maintenance was just that, mandatory. The scheduled detail was normally someone else's to attend to, but given the oddly energetic buzz she felt currently, it seemed worth the time to stay up and get it over with. It wasn't like she had anything better to do anyway.

A crewman on the way towards the maintenance checkpoint smiled and gave her a quick nod. "Good evening ma'am, how are you?" For such a young officer working the night shift, she was pleasantly surprised at his cheery attitude. Most enlisted personnel couldn't wait to curse the name of their superior who scheduled them for a night shift. She certainly didn't assign the duty roster, but she was his superior nonetheless.

"Thank you, petty officer, I'm just checking up on the sickly birds. How are you holding up?" She returned his smile, continuing in towards the storage compartment. The small room was at the center of the gargantuan hanger deck, filled with all the parts and scanning equipment she could ever hope to need for her task. Sometimes a tricorder just didn't cut it.

He laughed a little, watching a worker-bee take off at the far end of the bay. "I've got 20 minutes then I'm done, I've been in here since 0600 today... well, I guess it's yesterday now."

Shayna made a face, pushing a loose strand of her hair out of the way as she continued to search through the storage compartments for the right scanner. "You're kidding! You should have been relieved hours ago! Where's your next shift operator? Oh! Found it!" She beamed as she pulled out a mark 6 dipolymer resonance scanner. Hopefully she would be able to track down whatever was causing the frequency malfunctions in a few runabout sensors. They seemed to be new enough, yet almost too new to run properly.

A quick moment passed as she thought about what it would be like to have nothing to worry about all day except keeping an eye on maintenance holds. The young man behind her was responsible for little more than just keeping his eyes open, and she found herself a little... jealous? Yes. Jealous. Of course, her rank and position had their perks. She didn't want to imagine what kind of quarters the young petty officer would be running back to once someone finally came to send him home.

Shayna quickly snapped her mind back to work, the in-between feeling of not wanting to sleep, and actually being tired had already started to set in. Hopefully she could continue to muster the energy she'd need to finish up for the night. "Well stay strong, young soldier," she smiled as she rose and turned to face him, "In no time you'll be ba-"

A cold strike rattled up her spine like the coldest of winters.

Her body froze in place, and the scanner dropped from her hands. It all seemed to happen slower, the device slipped from the ends of her fingers and crashed at the corner into the ground. The lights on it flickered for a moment before going out, illuminating the pool of blood that had built up beneath the slumped over form of the young man she'd been speaking to a moment before. She wanted to reach out and help him, to check his vitals and call for help. Something made her stop, though. A paralyzing fear strangled her will to aid her crewman, or to cry out.

"Shhh." A low whisper came from behind her.

A fragile whimper escaped her lips as she felt a warm breath float across the nape of her neck. Her shoulders clenched and her hands balled into involuntary fists as she could feel the presence behind her.

"What have you done?" Was all she could manage, the realization that the person who had killed the petty officer was now immediately behind her pressed into her skull. It was all she could do to keep her eyes from clamping shut in terror. "Please. Why."

The voice was self-assured, calm and cool. Almost at ease, really. It only horrified Shayna more, and a wetness ran down her cheek as tears began to well up in her eyes.

"This wasn't exactly how I planned to do this either. I prefer my operations to be a little less messy. But hell, once this is all over no one on this ship is going to care one way or the other.

"And just because I like to keep myself entertained I'll tell you everything. I walked in here, stole a uniform, posed as an engineer and eliminated anyone in the hangar who would stop me from taking a runabout and getting the hell off this ship. You're the last one left..."

Shayna couldn't even manage a sound as she felt the cold metal slip into her back. A sensation of warmth and dizziness overcame her, and she lost her footing. One foot gave way before the other, her head spinning, and she reached out to catch herself. The deck seemed to leap up at her, as the strength bled from her muscles.

As she looked up at the man, her killer, she fought past the dizzy haze overtaking her senses and peered at the figure. With the bloody knife in his hand, she recognized the face. "Undercover decoy agent... the president... We trusted you."

The man smiled, cleaning off his blade on a nearby towel. "I know. You were supposed to. The Federation requires its subjects to make sacrifices sometimes. Often it's better if the offering doesn't know they're at the chopping block."

He chuckled a little to himself, as if deep in though, "You really are better off this way, Ms. Pettygrove. You don't want to be on this ship in a few hours. So sleep tight."

All she could hear after than was the sound of footfalls, a runabout engine revving up, and a flashing red light filled her sight...

Until the darkness overtook her.

=/\= END LOG =/\=

Lieutenant Shayna Pettygrove
Air Traffic Control Operator
USS VINDICATOR

Decoy Intelligence Agent
"The President" (apb Landon)
Starfleet Intelligence

 

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