Manipulation

Posted on 17 Dec 2015 @ 9:56pm by Lieutenant Commander Temerant Bast

774 words; about a 4 minute read

Mission: Rude Awakening
Location: O'Carroll Bridge
Timeline: MD9 - 1130 Hours

Temerant looked around the bridge of the O'Carroll. The place was fairly empty, and was staffed by a mere skeleton crew - some junior officers from the ship itself, but also people from the Black Hawk, assigned to key positions to ensure the ship remained in control. Helm, Tactical and Engineering, for instance, were being handled by Black Hawk junior officers, currently under Temerant's command.

The ship was currently flying in formation with the Black Hawk, and the senior staff was scheduled to be interrogated. Captain Geisler had left Bast in command of the O'Carroll, and assigned him to extract every information as to the ship's whereabouts over the past three months, with special focus to determine the status and location of O'Connell's Consortium allies.

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Deep Space 11 - Gamma Command
Promenade
Three weeks prior
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Captain Juliana Terlexa walked through the sparse mid-day crowd, focused on finding her target. Aliens of various species, shapes, colors and sizes wandered about, interspersed with the Starfleet staff, most of whom were off-duty.

K'Worl, the Selamat Ambassador, was close on her heels. For his height, towering at over seven feet, he walked lightly, as if gliding over the floor, instead of lumbering about. His piercing yellow eyes scanned the crowd, even as his telepathic mind probed each and every person on the Promenade. He was the first to spot their target, and mentally pointed Terlexa in the right direction. She found the Trill Operations officer sitting in a Vulcan restaurant, enjoying his lunch sitting at a table, with a data padd displaying an Engineering document of some kind. She fetched two glasses of wine from the replicator - one for the young Trill, and one for herself.

"Lieutenant," she greeted, walking up to him.

Bast looked up sharply at the sound of his name. He started at the sight of the station's commanding officer, and stood at attention. "Captain," he replied.

"As you were," she said, smiling. "Have you met Ambassador K'Worl?" she added, extending a hand to the Selamat Ambassador.

"No, I don't believe I've had the pleasure," replied Bast, extending a hand. The Ambassador didn't return the gesture, but merely gave a short bow.

"I'm just giving him a tour of the Promenade," said Terlexa dismissively before turning back to Bast. "The Black Hawk is on approach to the Station, and Captain Geisler has requested a new Chief of Operations. I can think of no one better suited for the job." She raised her glass of wine in a toast, prompting Bast to do the same.

Bast smiled. He'd heard of the ship's imminent arrival, but the news of an opening on its staff was unexpected. He thanked the Captain, and took a sip of wine.

As Terlexa exposed the details of the assignment and the transfer, K'Worl waited patiently behind her. At least outwardly. Terlexa had made it seem as if she was simply delivering the news to the young Trill on her way to showing the Ambassador around the station, but his presence was more than a simple coincidence.

The Trill was young, idealistic, somewhat naive, but also resilient. And his Joining was also fairly recent. The integration of the Symbiont with the Host had yet to reach its full potential. As such, he was more susceptible to the agent that Terlexa had spiked into his wine. The chemical was designed to disrupt the link between Host and Symbiont, making him susceptible to telepathic manipulation. Biologically, the Symbiont would be safe, but it would also be blind and deaf as to the actions of the Host.

Leaving the Host vulnerable.

K'worl inserted himself easily in the Trill host's mind. Once there, it was easy to manipulate his thoughts. Changing a fact here, altering a conclusion there, and planting the seeds of doubt in the right places.

By the time Terlexa had finished her conversation with him, K'Worl had completed turning his mind around. Temerant Bast was now an agent of the Consortium. One that they would need, if they could hope to gain control of the Black Hawk.

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USS O'Carroll
Main Bridge
Present Day
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Temerant smiled. The information he was gathering would prove to be invaluable for the Consortium. His portable storage unit was now filled to the brim with navigation logs, communication holorecordings, and deployment strategies. For the O'Carroll, those ships were marked as Allied.

It was a simple matter to turn that information over to the unwitting Captain Geisler and Commodore Terlexa, who would both hunt them all down - and eliminate the Consortium's enemies.

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