Before we begin, please note that this is a parody, bordering crack. Dr K's personality quirks are taken to the extreme – the reason why will be explained. Know that she is an unreliable narrator, and not everything she says and describes is what is actually happening/has happened.
Do have fun piecing together what is going on here through Dr K's mind :D
Of Abductions and Alternate Dimensions
Dr K blames one of her lab assistants for her current predicament.
She can't recall why, only that it is definitely their fault. It always is somehow. At anywhere from between midnight to three am, the four inch thick, reinforced, galvanized steel door with a digital deadlock, two deadlatches and a retinal scan is blasted down with some kind of energy weapon. She makes a mental note to include 'add force-field to sleeping quarter defences' before proceeding to panic. Never let it be said that Dr K isn't diligent about improving security, not like Professor Q who would just proceed straight to panic without any of the useful insights and observations that a proper researcher should take note of. Really it's an affront that anyone would even – never mind, getting side-tracked, where was she again?
Oh right.
Panic.
A perfectly logical reaction to seeing strange and armed men in dark navy uniforms storming into her sleeping quarters.
Screaming is also a perfectly reasonable response to such a thing.
"Hey hey hey! Shh!" the one in the red beret has the audacity to shush her like she's the one being illogical, he whips his head back towards the door nervously (where, Dr K notes, the other two men are pointing their guns towards), "Dr K! We're here to rescue you."
Of course he's here to abduct her, it isn't exactly the first time it's happened. She is a genius, and quite a number of people would like their greedy paws on her brain and – wait a minute.
"…you mean kidnap right?" she asks hesitantly, because even if it is the first time she's being taken by people so stupid they mix up definitions of basic words, it's probably not smart to tell the armed men that to their face. Also where the hell is security? They should be swarming the place now.
His eyebrows knit together as his face screws up in concentration, perhaps physically pained at the sensation of using brain cells, "No, we're here to rescue you," he insists on his incorrect definition of the word, "You know…from Alphabet Soup?"
Now it's her turn to be confused, it's quite a strange sensation. She doesn't like it.
"…this is Alphabet Soup right? Faceless government suits forcing genius' to develop military equipment for them?" A horrified expression slowly spreads on this face when she continues staring at him gormlessly because nothing he just said made any sense.
Alphabet Soup isn't faceless, everyone has a designation, or else it'd get really confusing, she doesn't know why he'd even say that considering he even knows that hers is 'Dr K'. As far as she's aware, no one is being 'forced' into doing anything. You just disappear if you don't do what you're supposed to. Dr K never really thought about where people who don't do what they're supposed to go, she does what she's supposed to, so why would she care? And they don't just make military equipment, they make all manner of other equipment too.
Red Beret starts muttering manically under his breath about timelines, divergences, verifying information, and alternate dimensions. Huh, ignoring the inane ramblings that make no sense, it sounds like these paramilitary guys had been given information on security by Project Gemini-A (who eccentrically insists on being called Gemma). She had been right (not much of a surprise there, she usually is) about one of her lab assistants being responsible for this mess.
"Did Gemini-A hire you to test security? Because I know for a fact that she and Gemini-M were murmuring about 'testing security patrols' last week, only I assumed they meant adding explosives to the traps and…Oh…" Dr K trails off as it dawns on her.
They meant throwing explosives at the hapless lot Alphabet Soup called 'security'. Which of course reduces the number of guards patrolling tonight, so now intelligence thieves can make away with the most valuable asset in the building – Dr K. Wonderful. This is what she gets for not paying closer attention to their side projects. In her defence ninety-nine, point nine nine percent of all their side projects had something to do with things that detonate and or involve rapidly releasing extreme amounts of energy, normally in a controlled environment. Apparently the other zero point zero zero one percent involves hospitalising the guards in the name of security. Perhaps she should've convinced Agent P to let them watch Saturday morning cartoons, that might've staved their violent theatrical impulses.
"Damn Agent P and her 'cartoons rot the brain' policy. Agent D3 let Professor Q watch movies. Although that's not a ringing endorsement for watching mundane entertainment considering how Professor Q still hasn't managed one doctorate and she's already eighteen," Dr K pauses her rant, brightens and turns to the man staring at her with a bewildered expression etched onto his face, "Say, why don't you go four rooms down that way and 'rescue' Professor Q? I'm sure she'll appreciate it."
Red Beret removes his face from his hands and looks at her with something akin to hopeful befuddlement, "'Agent P?' 'Professor Q'? So this is Alphabet Soup then?" of course that would be what he latched on to.
"Yes," she agrees impatiently, "I thought we'd been through this."
"So they took you as a child, and you grew up here developing weapons for them?" he presses.
"My parents signed me up for the gifted program, and my specialities aren't limited to just weapons," she sniffs, both unimpressed about being reduced to a mere plebeian weapons designer and wanting to make sure that her potential kidnapper knows she's useful, though no need to get into detail on the one-in-a-trillion chance that she can't do what they want, just in case this isn't one of her assistants' hare-brained schemes.
"Great, we're here to rescue you. Let's go," Red Beret seems to have hit reset-to-factory mode because he's rambling about a daring rescue again. She supposes merely contemplating the sheer vastness of her intelligence had been enough to fry his poor dis-used brain.
"Why would I need to be rescued from my employers?" Sure the hours are long and tedious, and she doesn't always get to pick her own projects, but she has her own lab, they provide board, food and security (usually anyway), the healthcare package has dental and optical, and they even gave her competent assistants, who are mostly annoying and talkative, but competent nonetheless. Even if they did get her into this mess. If she didn't have them trained so well, she might look into getting new ones. But that would be too troublesome.
"Hurry up! We gotta move before they realise we're here!" Blue Cap 1 – the man on the left side of the door hisses, and Dr K would very much like to know how security doesn't know they're here yet.
There's a possibility that her explosion-brained lab assistants reduced the number of night guards, but the other non-human security measures should still be in place. There should be alarms, grid lasers, cages from ceilings, knock-out gas at least! It's a personal affront. She designed those security measures. They're perfect. Well, she begrudgingly admits that it's not as perfect as it could be considering her current situation. If only she could cross the room and open the mini-fridge without any potential abductors noticing…
Red Beret sighs, takes off his ridiculous black sunglasses (seriously, how did he even see in those at this time of night?) and says, "I'm sorry about this Dr K but we really have to go," and then she finds herself hoisted over his shoulder like a sack of flour.
"What the—? Hey! Put me down!"
Her reasonable request is denied of course, and she's currently being dragged through the corridors of the sleeping quarters. How is it that they'd run into zero patrolling guards? Maybe Gemini-A and Gemini-M removed all of them? This is looking more and more like an initial experiment, a control to test future variables on. AKA 'let's see how fast people can kidnap Dr K when all the security is gone' vs 'security measure x' in the future. She's going to be having words with them about running experiments without informing her.
They'd even disabled the motion-sensor triggered lasers at the door. She'd scream and yell, but that would be embarrassingly cliché of her, not to mention useless because all the walls and doors are sound-proof. Honestly she is surprised that she's even still awake at this point. The last five attempted-kidnappings had set an expectation of how things are supposed to unfold for her, and so far, this isn't it. Another reason why her assistants should've told her, she would've provided a framework for how a kidnapping is supposed to go.
"You're a terrible abductor," she says in Red Beret's ear and he nearly drops her. Thus proving her point.
"What are you talking about? We're rescuing you," Blue Cap 2 has apparently decided to play the 'we're rescuing you' ploy, somehow unaware that Red Beret has already unsuccessfully tried that earlier.
They really are the worse kidnappers she'd ever encountered.
"Right, you're 'rescuing me'. Sorry, I forgot. Three armed men who are clearly private-army-for-hire broke down my door and carried me against my will outside to what I assume would be a getaway vehicle as part of a 'rescue'. Huh, is that why I haven't been chloroformed yet? Because this is a 'rescue'?" or maybe boom-happy twins do have some self-preservation instincts after all.
"Chloroformed?" Blue Cap 1 sounds rather alarmed, "Wes! What did you tell her?"
"The truth!" Red Beret insists – ah clever, staging the old 'overhear us talking, we're spilling our nefarious plans like batman villains, honest' routine.
"She thinks we're kidnappers!" Blue Cap 1 does a remarkably believable 'offended' voice. Dr K might actually believe him, if well, she isn't the one being thrown into the back of a station wagon.
Red Beret rambles on about the multiverse theory, indoctrination programs, the Project Venjix Virus, Stockholm syndrome, butterflies, it's starting to blur together and in Dr K's defence this is definitely within her designated sleeping hours, she's allowed to be tired and – her brain abruptly slams to a halt.
How do these monkeys know about the Project Venjix Virus? That was top secret. As in no one except her and Agent F2, the handler assigned to the project knew about it – and well, probably the superior(s?) who commissioned it, but that was it. Even for Alphabet Soup the level of secrecy had been absurd. Well there goes the idea of this being a security experiment by her trigger-happy assistants.
Agent F2 took an extended leave package shortly after the project had been deemed a success. Four months later Dr K had read a brief obituary for him in the staff's weekly updates email, he should've known better than to brave New York's crime statistics, such a shame, she had liked working with him. Useless sentimentality aside, that means the only people who know about Project Venjix is her and the commissioner.
So these guys are the Project Venjix commissioners? That doesn't sound right. They don't look too intelligent. That being said, there's no prerequisite for commissioners to be intelligent – that's her job – they only need money, or else political power. Neither of them appear to be politicians…lackeys? No way, who trusts lackeys with information about a top secret project?
"Hey, you do know that Alphabet Soup doesn't exactly pay for ransom right?" she tries, and is easily rewarded when Blue Cap 1 turns around and grins.
He jerks his thumb in the direction of Red Beret, "No amount of money is going to matter to Wes. We didn't kidnap you for ransom."
Absurdly rich commissioner then. One who is apparently offering her work again, and apparently he's decided to cross out the middleman that are her employers and hire her directly. 'Rescuing' is clearly a euphemism for 'poaching'. Well, she should probably compare her two prospective employers, no point committing to one, only to realise that there are better offers.
"What's your healthcare package like?" start off easy. Rich private employers are usually generous about healthcare. At least, according to Dr X they are, Dr K has never freelanced before on account of her sun allergy. Speaking of which, she should mention that.
"What?" Red Beret says cluelessly.
"Healthcare package. As part of my contract? You want me to work for you right? What are you offering? Because Alphabet Soup had dental and optical and I'm not settling for less. You should also be aware that I have a sun allergy, so you're going to either provide UV-proof glass or an enclosed area with no windows."
"I thought you said they were brainwashed? She doesn't sound loyal at all," Blue Cap 1 says and Dr K ignores him because he has no idea what he's talking about.
'Brainwashing' as he calls it, is reserved for the Super Soldier sub department of the Gemini Project. Researchers need to keep their brains functioning at a hundred percent, and thus any such modification would be detrimental to their efficiency and Alphabet Soup is efficient if nothing else.
"Er…sure. We have all of that. And the therapy too. I'll throw in therapy on top," Red Beret says quickly.
Huh, he must really want her help. The therapy might actually be useful after this whole 'rescuing' thing. Also the previous kidnappings. They've been plaguing her mind whenever its free, so she has a tendency to keep it extra busy.
"Working for Mr Collins is great," Blue Cap 2 says cheerfully, "We have fourteen sick days and four weeks annual leave. It's the best work package around."
Well that's rather generous, Alphabet Soup only ever offered seven sick days and that's for their very best doctors. She would know, she often got into childish arguments with Dr G about who was the best researcher at the Soup when they were young. Then one year they both took seven sick days. She got cough medicine and a hot cup of tea, Dr G got transferred, and that was the end of that argument. She'll have to dig around later to see what 'annual leave' is, best not to show ignorance while negotiating, though if he's as generous with that as he is with the sick days, it bodes well.
"I also need my lab assistants. They're kind of irreplaceable, which is ironic because they're part of Project Gemini, but they were faulty, which makes them amusingly one-of-a-kind," they didn't have a problem disabling security to get her, going back to grab Gemini-A and Gemini-M shouldn't be too hard – well, if they inform them of their intentions first and not just pick them up like flour sacks, because faulty or not, her lab assistants still came out of Project Gemini and capturing them will be quite…impossible without the element of surprise and enough tranquilisers to knock out an elephant.
"Gem and Gemma? Already got them back at base," Red Beret says, and any niggling urge that Dr K had of escaping and running back to Alphabet Soup vanishes.
"How did you manage to kidnap them?"
"Not easily. We had to morph," Red Beret says, sounding half embarrassed, half incredulous.
It takes Dr K a few moments to process, "You had to what exactly?"
Because she's only ever heard the term 'morph' be used in the context of Project Ranger, and how would he know about – "Did you commission Project Ranger too? Is that what this is about? Because I was only halfway done creating the Ranger Prototype Series Covert Infantry Biosuits before we got shut down. Apparently some rival government faction funding a military op called 'Lightspeed' claimed it as their jurisdiction. Wait, so that's why you kidnapped us out of Alphabet Soup, because the Soup's been barred from experimenting with the bio-field, so you're doing this as a privately funded research. Genius."
Red Beret and Blue Cap 1 exchange glances, clearly surprised that she was able to easily figure out their scheme. Honestly, she has close to ten PhDs, they know that, why else would they have chosen her to work on Project Ranger. Though clearly they've hired someone else before her, if they're already talking about live-testing.
Red Beret nudges Blue Cap 1, who coughs into his hand and says, "Er…yes, Lightspeed were always cagey about how they made their Rangers. Did you say you already made a ranger suit?"
"No," she says, and Blue Cap 1 looks oddly relieved at that, "I made a series of covert infantry biosuits. Gold and Silver are complete, but I was only done designing Red, Blue and Yellow before they locked up my research. Did you steal that too? Because it'd be nice to start from scratch, it's possible of course, but I'd rather not."
Red Beret looks so impressed he might pass out on the steering wheel. She supposes he didn't keep up with her reports, if she were any less professional she might've submitted reports in past the deadline because it appears the commissioners don't bother to read them at all. The absurdly rich ones at any rate, she suspects the politicians might be more anal about that.
"Actually no, we didn't get the research. Though I suppose I could go and get it," Red Beret muses, as if collecting information that's so buried, it's likely turned to diamond would be so easy, "One of Tommy's kids is a tech genius right?"
The question is clearly directed at Blue Cap 1 who shakes his head and says, "I think kid Dino Blue is more into programming. I'll see if I can contact Overdrive Pink, or maybe Ninjastorm Green, one of them should be able to do it."
"Well then, that's sorted. Just in time too," Red Beret says, as the car pulls up to a…clock tower of all places? "Are you on board with working with the Silver Guardians Dr K?"
"I suppose you are adequate employers. I look forward to working with you gentlemen," Dr K declares with a grin. She almost doesn't even care that they'd technically kidnapped her. Project Ranger was an experience that she cannot pass up – there's something about working in such close proximity with the bio-field that's just purely invigorating. And added bonus, she even gets to keep Gem and Gemma.
Agent P is going to have an aneurism when she comes to work tomorrow and discovers that the entirety of her best research team is missing.
How misfortunate.
Essentially everything is Gemma's fault. Alternate RPM reality Gemma anyway. I had this idea when Dimensions in Danger came out, but I never knew what to do with it, so kinda-not-funny one-shot it is.