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Interrogation

Posted on Thu Feb 7th, 2019 @ 9:14pm by Lieutenant Commander Mnhei'sahe Dox & Lieutenant Asa Dael & Death & Baroness 2nd Class Schwein von Alcott

Mission: Earthly Visitation
Location: Medical Brig
Timeline: 2396, during Shore Leave

It had been an inordinately long day for Lieutenant Mnhei'sahe Dox, which began with the Romulan Pilot intercepting a distress signal from her friend and the HERA's CMO, Asa Dael.

Dael had been kidnapped by a group of mercenary criminals targeting some sort of gaseous energy being that Asa had befriended and was trying to protect. Asa was currently in the Hera's main Sickbay recovering from intensive injuries caused by an extended series of assaults carried out by the men.

The men, however, we're currently incarcerated in the medical wing of the Hera's brig... put there by Dox when she discovered what they had done to her friend.

All this information was conveyed as Dox had contacted the Baroness Schwein Von Alcott on orders of the Captain who had ordered Dox to bring in Schwein to interrogate the prisoners in order to discover the identity and location of their patron, someone referred to only as 'the Collector'.

But the Captain made one thing clear. She didn't give these orders to 'Lieutenant' Dox. She gave them to 'Baroness' Dox. Meaning this wasn't a Starfleet investigation and Dox was there as a Baroness of the Artan Pirate family. As.such, this was going to end badly.

Waiting in the hall outside the secured hospital wing of the brig, Dox was still wearing her green Artan uniform pants, black tank top and green denim jacket she had been wearing all day as the turbolift dinged announcing it's arrival.

As the turbolift doors opened, Schwein stepped out in her blue pirate outfit with a large wooden case on her back, followed by the literal personification of Death who waved cheerfully to Dox. "The Collector's goonsquad, is it? We'll have to make sure at the very least. The Princess also won't be happy unless we do to them what they did to Asa, which isn't very Starfleet. I'll understand if you want to sit this one out."

Nodding at the pair, Dox replied. "I'm not here as Starfleet. And I wasn't acting as Starfleet when I put them in here." She remembered seeing what those men did to Asa and her stomach churned with anger. "Only one of them will be in any way responsive. The leader Asa said called himself Jake."

"Then that will make things easier." Punching in her entry codes, Schwein entered the medical wing of the brig and led the trio to the cell with the one called Jake in it. "This is him?" she asked, setting down the large wooden box and opening it up to reveal all manner of barbaric torture devices pirates were rumored to use.

"Yes." Dox replied. In the cell in front of them, Jake was laying on a medical table, his right side bandaged from surgery to stabilize the date Dox had done to his liver and and IV drip attached to his arm. Behind them, across the hall, the two goons we're in their own cells, also propped up on hospital beds.

The first's left leg was in a cast as Dox had shattered his kneecap and twisted the limb hard enough to tear the bones free of their connective ligaments beneath the skin and his jaw was wired shut.

The second's face was heavily bandaged as Dox had crushed both orbital bones, his nasal passage, hard palate and jaw. A breathing tube had been inserted down his throat.

Continuing, Dox elaborated loud enough for the half asleep prisoner to snap awake at the sound of her flat, emotionless voice. "He and his associates beat Asa repeatedly. Multiple kicks to the head and torso causing major bruising to their internal organs. They threw Asa across the room repeatedly, breaking their ribs. But this one. This one slashed Asa's hands with a knife and shot them once with a metal projectile firearm. He almost killed Asa. This one was the leader."

"You nearly killed the personal physician to the Princess of the Artan Pirates." Schwein spoke just as loud as Dox so they could hear her as she leaned on her box of implements. "Then you had the gall to try to sell them off into slavery to some collector? How about you tell us straight up who you were working for and I don't have to get creative? Which Collector? Kivas Fajo? Morba Daln? Trako Hast? If you lie to me one of your friends will die so be sure you tell the truth the first time."

Keeping her face neutral, Dox was slightly concerned by the statement. Baroness or not, she couldn't just execute, or allow to be executed, a prisoner on a Starship. She was still an officer first and foremost. But as Dox looked at Jake and remembered seeing what he had done to Asa, she had to fight the desire to want to kill him herself.

The fight seemed to have gone out of Jake, or maybe it was just the painkillers talking, as he stared bleerily at Schwein.

"If I tell you, I'm as good as dead anyway. This is a Starfleet brig, trust me its not the first one I have seen, which means you won't hurt me. It's not the goody goody way. In fact I bet that one," Jake said, motioning to Dox, "gets in trouble for her actions earlier, the half breed mutt that she is."

"Ouch. Trying to call my bluff." Schwein sneered as she pulled one of the curved blades from the box. "Well guess what. This Starfleet vessel is assigned to Intel Command. We specifically do Section 31 work. You're familiar with them, right? We make monsters disappear so normal people like you don't ever have to know about them. Guess who the Captain is."

The augmented human pirate grinned wickedly as she turned to one of Jake's two goons. "You've already vanished. This ship doesn't exist. You're all listed as missing now so we can do whatever we like."

Trying to suppress the fear from showing on his face, Jake took a gulp and wiped hisnpalms anxiously. Once the customary sneer returned to his face he replied, " You know I did your little friend a favor, right? We were only there for the gas creature and they had the bad luck to be together. I could have just shot them and left their body in the cave where I found them. The fact they are alive at all is generous enough, dont you think? Now if you ciuld just return ne to my base, I'm sure I can make it worth your while."

Hearing that, Dox felt herself beginning to shudder in place as her blood went hot. Thinking of Asa's injuries, glanced at Schwein's box of torture devices. She wanted to use them. She wanted walk into that cell and make him choke to death on his own bile as she fed it to him.

But she paused, let out a breath and a wave of anger and tried to remember what they were really there for. "This gas creature. Why were you there for it? What is it and why does this Collector want it?"

Jake rolled his eyes at the question, turning to face Dox and answered, "I had been tracking that green bastard for two weeks. No idea what it is besides a paycheck. The boss gave us a spectographic tracker, only things like it give off a certain signature. The collector has a whole host of weirdo trackers. He likes unusual life forms, the rarer the better. Once he has them, he sets about making sure they get more rare, increases their value you see. And me? Well, man has to make a living somehow. Might as well defreak the galaxy and get paid fot it. But i doubt someone like you would understand."

Dox smiled slightly, but it was a mirthless and cold thing. She had gotten a wealth of information from Jake is very few words. The Hera had his transport in lockdown. With it, all of their equipment. Equipment she now knew could lead them to Asa's friend to insure they were okay. But it was also equipment Jake procured from the Collector and could possibly be traced back to whoever they are. It was good information.

But Dox didn't want to let him enjoy his sad justification. "Oh, Jake. We've been authorized to remove three... freaks... from this galaxy, and I will enjoy it. So I think we understand each other more then you think." She grinned at him, but her eyes were icy cold.

"You wouldn't dare, " he said, turning his back to the pair in arrogant disregard.

"Jake, you three are only alive right now because I wanted you alive. Because I wanted to know what you just told me. We have your ship, Jake. We have your equipment. Everything the Collector gave you. Everything we can trace back to them. You staying alive is simply dependant on if we think you might have something useful to tell us."

Dox put a hand on the wooden box and leaned just enough of her weight on it to have it let out an eerie creak in the echoing brig. "If my friend and I feel there's no more information to be gleaned from you, then we'll simply take you from this room onto my personal ship and discard you like so much space trash... after we're satisfied."

"I think I might like that. What about you, Jake? Are you ready to meet the third person that came in the room with us? She looks eager to meet you." Schwein was of course referring to Death, who was grinning this whole time like a cat that had eaten a shop full of canaries. She knew these men's fates and how soon they would be departing. She was surprised that they couldn't yet see her though - they were that close to their ends.

Jake turned back to face Dox and Von Alcott. Glancing around he sneered, "I was dead the moment I told you anything about the Collector, you will be doing me a favor to just make it quick. No need to lie about there being three of you. It's not like I can do anything to you in here."

"So tell us where to find this Collector and we'll end you quickly and painlessly," Schwein promised, her grin widening.

"Risa, southern continent, seaside resort near a small town named Klavast," Jake replied dully. He saw something flicker from the corner of his eyes. A tall woman loomed as he turned to look, her face was hollow and dead, and her eyes shone with an infernal fire. The woman wore black rags covered in chain mail and carried a huge sword.

"Who in the name of the gods is THAT?" Jake screeched.

"Jake, meet Death. Death... If he's not lying, dig in." The Baroness returned the torture implement to her wooden box and closed it back up as the dark woman literally floated through the forcefield and hovered over Jake for a moment before reaching into his chest and pulling out a black ball of light and quickly extinguished it. Instantly, the man was dead. "Now... About the other two..."

At the sight, Dox's knees went weak and she stepped back in shock. "Oh my God..." She whispered in Rihan but could say nothing more, frozen in place.

The other two goons were cowering in the adjoining cell, trying to look small as they listened to the interrogation.

"Please, we don't know anything, it was just a job!" One wailed painfully through his shattered jaw, staring at Death. The other goon, unable to see what was occurring and unable to speak simply soiled himself in mute, uncomprehending terror.

Death quickly repeated her task of snuffing out the lives of the other two goons as Schwein tossed the large wooden box on her back and headed for the door. "Want to go with me to end this Collector?"

But Dox just stood there, still in shock. They were dead, just like that. She had wanted it. She wasn't even upset that they were dead. She was upset that she failed. "We... killed prisoners in custody in a Starfleet brig."

"Those men were already dead." Turning to look at Dox, Schwein grabbed her by the jacket and physically picked her up by it. "Look... They got a better death than they deserved, we got the information we needed... If we patched them up and let them live they'd either spend their lives in jail, get killed painfully for betraying their client, or keep doing the same shit for the rest of their miserable lives. This is the kind of things we do as Baronesses sometimes."

All nearly three hundred pounds of the portly pilot dangled effortlessly in Schwein's grip as Dox realized just how far this path would lead her.

Setting Dox back down, she smoothed out the other woman's jacket. "Though I have to admit, this is only the second time I've done it in a Starfleet brig..." Pulling a datapad out of her back pocket, she pressed a few controls on it, initiating a transport sequence that whisked away the three bodies. "Now... Do you have any further complaints? Or can we go take revenge on the one actually behind all this?"

If Dox said nothing and went along, she was turning her back on Starfleet. On being a Lieutenant on the Hera. On everything Rita Paris had been trying to teach her. But Rita wasn't the Captain..and the Captain had given her orders.

Or, more correctly, the Captain gave 'Baroness' Dox orders. Her exact words were 'Relay everything about this to Baroness von Alcott. Have her interrogate the prisoners and... Handle... the Collector.'

"I can't go with you. The Captain's orders were for you to find and take care of the collector." Dox looked at Schwein and Death as her heart sank a little. She was throwing both lives away. "I need to stay here. I let this happen and there are going to be consequences."

"Ah, yeah... You are Starfleet too, aren't you? Sorry... I shouldn't have let you come to the interrogation." Now it was Schwein's turn to look apologetic.

Death raised her hand. "If I may? They each only had about a week left to live anyway. I know it's no excuse to you, but as part of my job, even for blackened hearts like theirs, I'd rather ease their suffering fast than let them be tortured for days."

"I knew I didn't have to be here." Dox said, her shoulders slumping. "I knew this could happen. I knew this was likely to happen." Then she looked directly at death, who somehow seemed more beautiful in that moment to the guilty young woman. "I wanted it to happen. I guess I have a long time to try and live with that."

"Go. You have your work. I have mine. I need to deal with that now. I'm sorry." Dox said, as her eyes fell to the floor.

At the door, Schwein paused, causing Death to almost bump into her. "One more thing? I looked over the security logs of the Princess giving you those orders... I trusted you but something about them... They sounded more like they came from her mother. That footage? She kind of reminded me of her mother... Don't... Don't tell her I ever said that though. Turning into that woman is one of the things I know she fears more than anything. And heavens help you if you do ever cross that woman. No power in existence could save you." With that grim warning, the duo finally left the brig medical wing, leaving Dox alone with her thoughts.

Thinking on Schwein's words, Dox couldn't help but remember her meeting with her own mother just a few days ago. How she left her in tears and the she dealt with her by becoming her. But that was the least of her concerns at that exact moment.

The Romulan pilot looked up at the security cameras that she knew would relay everything that had happened to the new head of the security department, Commander Rita Paris. She thought about the time lost Android Kodria Mizu who once told her that in the future, she would be a Captain and knew that there was now way that was going to be a Starfleet Captaincy now.

Hanging her head, she walked out of the brig. It was time to make her report and deal with whatever would occur now.

 

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