| Do You Know God? |
| Summary: | The Five has a freak-out of the religious and violent kind in the brig. |
| Date: | 27 Nov 2041 AE |
| Related Logs: | Enter C-27; The Bull and the Sparrow |
| Players: |
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| Main Brig - Deck 6 - Battlestar Cerberus |
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| Tiny and cramped, the Main Brig seems designed to be claustrophobic. The steel bars lining the three cells have been set into the steel bulkheads on each side. Inside each cell is a stainless steel toilet and a bunk that might be too short for some of the taller crewmembers. The dreary conditions don't seem to be helped by the presence of a Marine guard who is there twenty-four hours a day, as long as a prisoner is in custody. The whole room is under surveillance via camera system in the Security Hub and every visitor must sign-in and abide by the rules. |
| Post-Holocaust Day: #274 |
The chronometer has just ticked past 22:00 hours. Drawing out another long night in the battlestar's brig. Its latest guest, the "model Five" skinjob the Marines took into custody after discovering her on Tauron, sits in her cell. Her face still bears the traces of cuts and bruising she acquired during her long months of capticity with the Taurons. And yet, there is nothing beaten about her. She sits on what passes for her bed, staring at nothing and everything outside her cell. She's said little since she was brought in. She just sits, stares, an odd, rather smug smile lingering on her face. It's a regal face, of a dark and patrician woman in her late forties or early fifties. To look at her, it doesn't seem she thinks she's a prisoner. She just sits as if waiting. Though what for, nobody knows.
Fight crime! Seek justice! Investigate stuff! Oh. And stand outside a Cylon's cell as stiff as a board and try not to bore yourself to death. That is the part of joining the Military Police that they didn't tell Kincaid about when he signed up. The MP is standing at a parade rest, staring off into the middle distance? Penny for his thoughts? Who even knows anymore.
A throaty chuckle escapes the Cylon as she stares off into that same middle distance. Presumably, her thoughts in a quite different place than Kincaid's, though she does stare at the same point. That low chuckle never rises to a full laugh or cackle, but it continues for some time. It's the only sound the creature regularly makes. What the joke is, again, she's not seen fit to say.
Kincaid turns his head towards the Cylon at the laughter, the sound punctuating the relative silence that they shared. He seems locked in indecision for a moment. Does he say something? Does he let it go? Finally, he asks, "What's the big joke in there?" His voice is filled with vague annoyance, whether or not he welcomes the chance to say something.
The Cylon's chuckling takes on a satisfied note as Kincaid engages her. But she doesn't answer him. She just stares at him and chuckles in that gloating way. Smiling at him. Teeth flash in that smile, but there's nothing 'friendly' about it. It's a decidedly predatory look. And the chronometer keeps ticking. Past 22:10, toward 22:15…
Kincaid's breath quickens slightly at that look. Well, then. "Frak," he whispers under his breath. "Dammit. What is going on, Cylon? What is happening that you know about and I don't, huh?" He seems to have a hunch. Well, a guess, maybe. Or perhaps he's just asking questions. But his voice is raised, not quite a yell. More like a tense bark.
Minutes pass and the Cylon continues to say nothing. But then, as the chronometer does tick to 22:15, her laughter stops. Dark eyes widening in some manner of surprise. And confusion. She stands, shaky on her legs. She doesn't walk around much in there. Whatever the Taurians did to her left her with a limp on her left side. Not that she seems pained now. Just confused. She limps forward to steady herself against the bars, attention on Kincaid again. "May I…have some water…please?" Her husky voice comes as if a little breathless.
Kincaid seems leery. Cylon trick? Or actual pain? But he knows one thing for certain — he's not taking the Cylon out of her cell without some sort of back-up. He makes his way towards the telephone in the room, one eye on the skinjob. He takes it off the cradle, waiting for the connection to the Security Hub desk NCO. "Hub, Kincaid. I need back-up in Isolation Two and a corpsman. Over."
"Kincaid…" The Cylon purrs the name in a low contralto. There's a growl in it, but it's speculative as well. She blinks at him. As if she's having trouble focusing her gaze. "Do you know God, Lance Corporal Kincaid?" There's an intensity to the out-of-nowhere question. She does not seem to pay much attention to anything he says over the phone. She grips the bars of her cell, as if having trouble steadying herself.
Kincaid hangs up the phone after he receives an acknowledgment from the Security Hub, making his way closer over to the cell, but hopefully out of Lunging Range. "I can't say I've had the pleasure," says the Marine finally, keeping his voice steady. "Why do you ask?"
"He is here…" There's touch of ecstasy in that husky voice. And a touch of something the creature has not shown even a hint of since being brought here. Fear. "He is here…" Suddenly, she throws her head back, eyes wide and staring at the ceiling as she intones, "…I am late. Forgive me, o God, that I did not see. I pray for your favor, that I am not too late…"
"Where the frak is that back-up?" asks Kincaid, looking over his shoulder, as if expecting it would actually make it appear. But he doesn't dare open the cell, instead kneeling by it, as if by getting a better look at her he'll have a better chance of figuring out what's going on.
Constin arrives from the Deck 6.
"Forgive my blindness, o God!" The Cylon screams. Her eyes stay wide and fixed on the ceiling for a moment, posture going ramrod straight. And then, she collapses. Falling heavily on her back on the floor of her cell. The fall sounds painful, but not actual cry of pain escapes her. Her eyes are rolled back in her head so only the whites are visible. But she's not unconscious. If she was silent, apart from that strange smug laughter for days, she's chatty as can be now. Though none of it's coherent. She's rambling. "The sparrows…the sparrows did nest here. But not here. Migration. The bull tramples the path…to migration…WE SHALL ALL KNOW HIM BETTER YET, LANCE CORPORAL KINCAID!" And then she laughs again, a full, mad cackle this time.
It's getting onto 22:20 hours now. It /was/ a quiet night in the brig with Kincaid on Skinjob Guard Duty. She's not quiet just now, though. Kincaid has just used the phone to radio for back-up and a corpsman.
And in short order both arrive- the backup first, in the form of Sergeant Constin with three more marines behind him, weapons at the ready. "Status?" he barks curtly upon entry, glancing aside to Kincaid, before the enraptured cylon draws his eye back. "Clear the hatch," he instructs those behind him to clear the way for the oncoming Corpsman.
"What you see, Sarge," says Kincaid, getting off his knee where he had perched himself down low by the writhing Cylon, trying to get a better look at her. He stands up off to the side, going to the control pad so that he can give the corpsman access to the cell. "All was quiet until she started laughing. When I asked her what was so funny, she starts going off, asking if I knew God and starting to rant about how He was here."
"HE HAS LEFT HIS MARK ON THE ANCIENT GROUND OF THE BULL!" The Cylon screams. Heedless of Constin's entrance. She does not even seem aware of Kincaid's presence anymore. She's caught in the throws of whatever madness or ecstasy has taken hold of her at the moment. "AND LO, WHEN HE HAS TAKEN THE KNIFE TO THE THROAT OF THE BULL AND CUT. AND IN ITS DEATH HE POINTS THE WAY!" The corpsman can do what he will with her. For the moment. She won't notice him, either.
"Huh," the sergeant grunts wordlessly as Kincaid's summary. As donut prepares the cell, Constin instructs two of the marines who followed him in, "Ready tazers." Muttering under his breath, "Always wondered what'd happen if you zapped a machine." A nod to the Corpsman, and the Corporal, in turn. No order to hit the cylon is given, just a precaution against more crazy, for now.
Kincaid pulls his taser from the other side of his body — the one that the pistol isn't on — and pulls it out once the corpsman has been given admission to the cell. "No idea what she's going on about, Sarge. Not even the slightest."
"Ground of the Bull?" Constin echoes bone-dry, words directed to Kincaid, even as his eye remains rivtetted to the cylon. "No points for guessing that means Tauron. Something about the destruction here ties in with their God-crap. No big surprise there." A short sniff, as the big man drawls, "Who'd have thunk it? The machines are looking for direction, too."
"GOD FORGIVE ME THAT I DID NOT SEE! WE ARE NOT TOO LATE! THERE IS STILL TIME!" The corpsman will find little conclusive as he tends her. Elevated blood pressure, certainly, but apart from the many, many injuries and effects of malnutrition she received on Tauron, she's not unhealthy. She's not really having a seizure or any other physical attack, as such. Her body stays rigid but she stops yelling. The corpsman might miss the focus coming back into her eyes, for they are still fixed on the ceiling rather than directly at him. And, when she moves, it's in a flash. Whipping upright, hands jutting out to the corpsman's throat. Trying to choke her poor benefactor. Well, it seems she's for-real conscious again.
"Frak!" Kincaid makes the first move in the room, bolting for the corpsman that's now being grabbed by the Cylon he was trying to tend to. "Break it the frak up," he commands her, trying to get between the two and shove her away from the Marine. No taser. At least not yet — too much risk that he might hit his comrade, perhaps.
"Hit it!" Constin barks out, as soon as he is able once that hand flashes toward the Corpsman's throat. Physical touch won't transfer the current, one tazer might be enough, but in that instant, Constin sees no reason to chance it. Click. Flash.
The Cylon is strong. Incredibly strong. Far moreso than a human woman that size should be. And she does not particularly want to let go of the corpsman. The man's face is turning blue. "Do you know God?" the Cylon breathes. Hard to tell who the question is to, but there's still that fierce intensity to it. The corpsman gurgles. The skinjob's hands tightening around her neck…and then spasming off of it as she's hit by Constin's tazer jolt. It does throw her back on the floor, shaking, though she struggles spasmically upright. Another jolt might be prudent.
Kincaid has shot at centurions from afar in three-round bursts, but this is his first time trying to take on a skinjob up close. It is perhaps why he thinks that just him could yank away the throes of religiosity skinjob from the corpsman. He's wrong. Once she's sent back by Constin's taser, he grabs his and jolts her again to finish the job, touching the contacts to her skin. Not making that mistake twice.
As Kincaid hits the cylon with a second jolt, Constin stands ready to send another pulse through the leads, should she stir again too soon. "Private Jenkins, assist the Corpsman out of the cell, and double check the seals on the Sec Hub hatch," he instructs one of the other marines at his back. "Kincaid, prepare to exit."
The second jolt does the trick. The Cylon is downed properly now. She lays on the floor, shaking and breathing hard with post-mini-electrocution spasms. Dark eyes fixed on the ceiling again.
"I stand relieved, Sarge," gasps Kincaid, holstering his taser back into his sheath. And he means that statement perhaps in both the literal and figurative ways of speaking. He nods once, composing himself, getting ready to head out.
Once Kincaid has backed out of the cell, Constin will pull the tazer prongs and follow suit, seeing the cell door clanked back into place and secured before dismissing the team. Looking up at the camera through which Sec Hub monitors the cell, he raises his voice and instructs through the cameras, "Order duplicate tape of the last ten minutes and forward to Command, immediately."
"I should — uh. I should see if I can find any references to that ranting she was doing," says Kincaid, trying to put his thoughts back into a logical order again. "Ancient grounds of the Bull. Maybe a Temple site or something?"
The Cylon doesn't move from the floor, and won't tonight unless she's prodded to. That remnant of fear still lingers on her patrician features. The first sign they've seen of anything but smugness and hatred since she was brought here. Whatever she just experienced has left her chilled.
"Cross reference any religious sites on Tauron that got nuked. Course the whole damn Colony could be their frakking bull," Constin states with distaste. "Got a nasty feeling the Cylons are about to take a whole lot more interest in this rock," he nearly spits.