Who?

Eric lay back on the bio-bed and listened to the sound of Ven moving around the room. The rustle of her clothing and the muted sound of her footfalls told him she was moving briskly around a carpeted and reasonably large room. His mind painted in some details. The room was probably painted a soothing magnolia or pale green. Ven's movements were largely unobstructed, so there probably wasn't much in the way of furniture -- and what there was, more than likely, was of the easily moved variety. Eric guessed there was probably a small pile of those hard, plastic chairs that hospitals and clinics always seemed to have in abundance. It was probably off to his right, in the corner. It couldn't be to the left -- that was where the door was. Nor could it be at the other end of the room -- that seemed to be where most of Ven's movements were centred, which probably meant cupboards or other storage, or possibly some kind of work bench. Whichever, it meant it was unlikely a pile of chairs was also going to be down there, they'd be in the way.

At that point in his thoughts, he heard Ven approach the bio-bed, followed by a rattling noise as she set something down on a hard surface just to his left. Bedside cabinet or table, there, then.

"OK," she said. "I'm not going to do a full exam tonight. It's getting late and I think you've about had enough excitement for one day."

"A medical exam is not what I'd define as exciting," Eric retorted, a small smile on his face.

He heard her give a chuckle. "You know precisely what I mean."

Eric shifted a little until he guessed he was more or less meeting Ven's gaze. "Guess I do. So what's up, Doc?"

If Ven was puzzled by the reference, she didn't say. "To answer your question, what I'm going to do now is draw a little blood -- I'm pretty certain they've been pumping you full of drugs, so I need to find out what they were to counter-act their effects."

Eric frowned. "I don't remember being injected with anything."

"You wouldn't," said Ven. She took hold of his arm and traced the marks that indicated where the manacles had been. "It was intravenous. The shackles contained the delivery mechanism of a hypospray." She lightly touched the inside of his left wrist and he hissed in pain -- he hadn't realised just how much that spot hurt. "Because it was constantly pressed against the Cephalic vein in your wrist, the valve was constantly open..."

"And they could pump whatever the hell they liked into me," Eric finished.

He felt her press something against the inside of his left elbow. "You'll feel a little sting," Ven warned. She pressed harder and sure enough, there was a brief tingle as they hypospray did its job. "There. I can put that on to analyse over night and by tomorrow morning, I will know pretty much every chemical they've put into your blood stream. From there...I can start treatment."

Eric hesitated a beat. "Are you saying that I'm not permanently blind?"

Ven sighed. "At this point," she replied, "I'd rather not say anything too firmly, but there are definitely certain aspects of your situation that are presenting as drug side effects."

Eric could hear the caution in her words. "So I shouldn't get my hopes up of being able to see to rip Hordak's head off?"

He heard Ven sigh again. "Unless there is physical damage to your optical nerves, you should regain your sight. But, until I've done your blood work and done a full physical, I can't give you any kind of timetable or make you any promises."

Eric offered her a smile. "I understand that. So what happens now?"

"I'd like you to sleep in here for tonight -- the bio-bed will monitor you overnight..."

"Better safe than sorry," Eric observed.

"Right," Ven agreed. "Kimberly will be back any second with a blanket for you; when she gets here, I'll get out of your way and let you sleep." Almost as if to prove Ven's point, Eric heard Kimberly's light, quick footsteps in the hallway outside the medi-centre. "And here she is."

"Hey," said Kimberly from the doorway.

"Hi Kim, c'mon in -- I'm done," said Ven.

With his concentration on the conversation no longer required, Eric felt a wave of tiredness overtake him. Ven had been right -- he wasn't up to having a full physical just yet. For the first time in two weeks, he was drifting off into proper sleep and not even Kimberly was going to be able to keep him awake now.

~*~

A bizarre sound, something between a roar and a howl, penetrated the darkness. Wes groaned. His head...

It came back to him in a rush. Katie... Wes opened his eyes and tried to sit up, but a gentle hand at his shoulder restrained him. "Easy, my young friend," said an unfamiliar voice.

Wes squinted in the glare of the desert sun, blocking the light with one hand. Before him, seated comfortably on a yellow-brown rock, sat a hooded man in a dark brown cloak, his fingers wrapped around a walking stick.

What did it matter? Wes let his hand fall. "Katie," he whispered.

The cloaked man got to his feet and reached down a hand to help Wes up. "If you refer to your friend there," he nodded toward a very dirty Katie, leaning tiredly on a rock, "she's a bit banged up but otherwise fine."

"Katie! Thank God." Relieved nearly to the point of losing it, Wes limped over to his friend, pulling her into a hug. She squeaked a protest when he touched her arm, and the cloaked man cleared his throat.

"I suggest we get going," he said, arranging the sleeves of his robes. "This desert is unsafe for travellers and tourists, and I can care better for a broken arm at my shelter."

"Hope it's not far," said Wes, helping Katie along. She hadn't said a word, and he knew what that was likely to mean. 'Banged up' wasn't in it. He only hoped her arm wasn't actually broken, regardless of what the stranger said.

Which recalled Wes to his manners. "We owe you some thanks," he said. "How did you manage to fend off those whatever they were?"

The stranger smiled mysteriously, scratching his salt-and-pepper beard. "The desert people are superstitious," he said. "I simply made them believe I was hungrier than they were."

"Hungrier?" said Katie, stopping in her tracks. "You mean they were going to -- oh, disgusting."

The stranger shrugged. "Life is harsh in the outer waste," was all the reply he made. "Here we are."

They came around an outcropping, and Wes stared. A sort of craft, resembling nothing so much as a souped-up dune buggy without wheels, floated there.

He scratched his head, wincing when he ran across a burned area on his scalp. "This reminds me of something," he muttered under his breath. Aloud Wes said, "I'm Wes, and this is Katie. We really appreciate your help...?"

The stranger smiled, tugging off his hood. "You can call me Ben."

~*~

Kimberly sat, Indian-style, on one of the two bio-beds in the medi-centre and looked across to the other one. Eric was still asleep, but rest was something that had essentially eluded her. Ven had decided against doing a complete physical the previous evening, saying that Eric was too worn out, and much as Kimberly agreed and understood, it had left her with a restless night while she worried over Eric's condition. What had they done to Eric? Would he be all right?

She found herself studying the changes that two weeks had wrought. Not as gaunt as the clone, he was still markedly thinner than he had been; two weeks of starvation rations had seen to that. His face showed far more lines than it had two weeks ago and between them, the thick, uneven growth of beard and stubble and the liberal streaks of grey in his hair, he looked old and frail; two words Kimberly had a hard time associating with Eric.

He wasn't asleep any longer. Instead, he was 'staring' up at the ceiling, obviously concentrating on something. Knowing him well, he was probably straining with every last nerve to make use of his remaining four senses to try and determine who, if anyone, was in the room with him.

"Kim?"

"I'm here," she answered, not a bit surprised he'd guessed.

A smile crossed his face. "Did you get any sleep?"

She uncurled herself from the bio-bed. "Yes." He just shot her an 'are you kidding me' look, all the more disconcerting because he contrived to meet her eyes, even without being able to see her. "I did!"

He shot her a smile. "OK."

"Just not as much as I ought to," she admitted. "How do you do that?"

"What?"

"That." She stood up and started to move towards his bed. She barely made a sound, but he started to reach for her all the same. It was disturbing to say the least. "Make me tell you the truth."

Eric chuckled. "Kim, I know you -- and I guess this isn't exactly the first time we've been here." His chuckle died. "I'm sorry Kim."

"Hey. Not your fault." She crouched beside the bed, taking hold of his hand, and gently kissed him.

"Doesn't stop me from feeling guilty." He sighed. "I know you, Kim."

"I can't lie," she said softly. "It's been hard. I've been worried about you. There's been stuff going on here...the trial's almost done."

"And me nowhere near a courtroom," said Eric dryly.

"You've been cloned," Kimberly answered.

"A lot of that about lately," he replied lightly.

"I knew it wasn't you, though. And it wasn't because the clone was bad." Kimberly kissed him again. "I'd just know you anywhere. You're a one of a kind, Eric."

~*~

Rick concentrated on stirring the contents of the pan, careful not to let it stick. If he was doing that, he wasn't worrying about Alice, or his father and Katie, or Eric, or any of the other craziness that had happened in the last forty-eight hours. Besides, no-one would thank him if breakfast was burned!

"Hey."

Rick looked round and felt a surge of relief to see Alice walking into the kitchen. Her hair was still damp from the shower and was hanging, loosely, around her shoulders in soft, golden waves, while she was wearing an oversized sweatshirt with leggings. It was a combination that shouldn't have looked sexy, but somehow, on Alice, it did. Or it could just be the relief of realising she looked none the worse for the previous day's events.

He smiled at her. "Hi." Abandoning the pot to its own devices, he crossed the room to meet her, bent down and gave her a good morning kiss. Out of everything in his life, at least this was something going right.

And then Alice winced into the kiss as he made to wrap his arms around her.

"Ali?" Rick tried not to sound hurt and concerned as he stepped back, letting his arms drop back to his sides. He didn't really succeed.

Alice, for her part, winced again, and offered him a sheepish look. "Sorry -- not your fault." Rick lifted his eyebrows. "I'm a walking bruise this morning. Don't think even Taylor's Grade A heavies managed to hit me in as many places as I managed in that vent."

For a second, Rick stared. Part of him wanted to make her pain go away. Part of him wanted to hunt down the people that had made yesterday necessary. He wanted to yell at her for going through the vent in the first place. He was livid with himself for not being able to do it for her.

"Rick, if you've got an 'I told you so' in there somewhere, say it and get it over with," Alice groaned.

"Wish you'd told me sooner," Rick finally managed.

"Didn't feel it until I got up," she answered, moving to lean against a nearby work surface and wincing as she did so. "Combination of too tired and too much adrenaline last night."

"About..." But Rick trailed off as a smell of burning reached him. "Oh crap!"

"What's burning?"

"Breakfast." He hurriedly turned back to the pan, but it was too late. The contents were well and truly carbonised. "Damnit."

Alice appeared at his elbow, nose wrinkled in disgust. "What was it supposed to be?"

"Eggs." Rick grimaced.

"Hmm." Alice glanced at him. "What time is breakfast supposed to be ready?"

Rick glanced at his watch. "Half an hour."

"Well," she said, removing the pan and heading for the garbage disposal unit, "at least we've got time to start over."

Rick sighed. "I am such a doofus."

"Nah." Alice chuckled as she returned and set the dirty pan down on the side. "Your talents just lie in a different direction."

He had enough time to wonder at her statement, then she leaned up and kissed him and the thought of cooking breakfast vanished from his mind.

~*~

Ven studied the toxicology report and groaned. This was all kinds of wrong.

The blood sample she'd taken a from Eric had been put through toxicological analysis over night, and she should be looking at a neat set of conclusions now, except that she wasn't. The report was 'incomplete'. It identified particles from four truth serums and will suppressants in the sample, but it also identified particles from a fifth substance. A substance that wasn't in her database of known narcotics and yet, as she stared at the chemical breakdown of it, it looked familiar.

And whatever it is, Ven mused, it's the cause of the damage. It has to be.

The four identified chemicals were drugs that actually came from Time Force Medical and that had been designed to work in concert with each other. They were not designed for torture, but for helping with witness interrogation. There were strict rules controlling their usage, and they were emphatically not available commercially.

Which means someone from Time Force has supplied this operation, she realised with another groan.

"Sounds pretty heavy," observed a voice.

Ven didn't need to look round to know that Rob was standing in the doorway of the lab giving her one of his patented stares.

"Want to talk about it?" he continued as she made no reply.

"Can't," Ven answered. "Doctor/patient confidentiality."

"And last night?"

"Last night, what, Rob?" Ven was grateful that she hadn't turned round. At least it meant he couldn't see her wince.

"Ven, you knew what had happened to Wes and Katie." Rob was hesitating. Then softly, he added, "If I was guessing..."

"Yeah, well don't bother, Rob," Ven snapped. "Leave it."

"I can't." He sighed. "Ven, you need to tell them what happened to Martin."

"Martin has nothing to do with this!"

"Doesn't he?"

Ven span round in her seat, intending to refute Rob's charge, but Rob had already gone. She slumped back in her seat and wished Rob's 'guesses' were a little wider of the mark. But then he's always been sharp.

She turned back to the toxicology report, but instead of the graphs and figures she saw the clinic. Saw the masked men bursting in. Saw...

"Ven?"

Ven jumped. Spinning round, she found Kimberly and a much cleaned up Eric standing in the doorway. It had, she realised, been Kimberly who had spoken.

"It's breakfast time," Kimberly continued.

Ven glanced at the chronometer on the wall and cursed. How had it got so late? "Yeah -- I'll be along in a moment. Just need to finish up here."

"OK."

Ven couldn't help but wince as she watched Eric and Kimberly move on towards the living area of the complex. It just brought her mind back to the toxicology report. It was all wrong.

All messed up and no place to go.

~*~

Lucas sat back in his seat as breakfast came to an end. Ostensibly, it had been a friendly meal, but beneath the pleasant banter lurked tension that could be cut with a knife. Al had said no more than five words to anyone, which Lucas had more or less been expecting. What had surprised him was Rob's unusually taciturn demeanour. Ven's preoccupation wasn't a shock -- he didn't know what Eric's medical condition was, and, while Eric's presence at the breakfast table probably indicated it wasn't life-threatening, it had to be relatively serious. But that thought just brought Lucas' mind to Eric and to Kimberly. Both were giving a creditable performance, but Lucas saw through the act -- something was worrying them both, and Lucas had the feeling that it wasn't necessarily Eric's physical condition. Only the trio of kids weren't obviously preoccupied -- and even of them, Alice was only half joining in conversation.

"So what's the plan?" asked Rob, suddenly snapping out of whatever he'd been worrying about.

Lucas recalled himself to the present. "Hawking has a preliminary report for me. Everything else is pending what he has to say. When Hawking's done, I'll call a full meeting."

That seemed to be the cue for people to start leaving the table. After a brief exchange of looks, the trio of kids started to clear up. Ven, Eric and Kimberly departed in the direction of the medi-centre. Rob, after a moment's consideration, headed in the direction of the holding cells, closely followed by Al.

Lucas shook his head as he stood up. Heading out of the dining room himself, he entered Ops. I hope Hawking has good news for me. But that thought died a death when he saw the expression on the temporal analyst's face.

"I have bad news and I have worse news," said Hawking without even waiting for Lucas to ask.

"Hit me," said Lucas.

"The bad news is that despite getting a good, strong trace last night, I can't pinpoint Captain Collins or Katie Drake. Somehow, all my attempts are being deflected. If I was at TFHQ, using the scanners there, I think I could break through the interference."

Lucas grimaced. "But until I -- we -- can unravel The Master's plot, the chances of any of us being exactly welcome in TFHQ are slim."

"Not necessarily," said a new voice.

Lucas jumped. He hadn't realised there was a live comm. connection in the room, leave alone the fact that Director Kerin's florid countenance was visible on the comm. screen.

"Director Kerin..." Lucas began.

"Skip the phoney politeness, Kendall -- we both know you don't like me, and God knows, I don't like you." Before Lucas could say anything, Kerin continued, "But, I know that you and your department are very good at what you do, and at this point, you and your little team up in Whereverthehecksville might be about the only thing standing between us and complete disaster."

~*~

Alice collected together the dirty plates from breakfast, her mind only half on the task.

An early morning wake up, thanks to more than twelve hours of sleep, had enabled her to query LIA thoroughly about the Vengeance Morphers and she now knew everything about them -- about how they worked and just what they could do. Some of it wasn't news -- she'd known that the red morpher carried extra comm. sensors to enable the Red Ranger to play the roll of communications officer and she'd guessed that seeing as Namir had been programmed to be an espionage expert the blue morpher probably carried some form of stealth or camouflage mode. That the pink morpher had extra sensors for detecting weaponry and booby traps was also not a shock -- it stood to reason that the demolitions officer would be the one to disarm any traps they ran across. Nor was she entirely surprised to learn that hers was the only morpher with the 'full' version of LIA installed -- the team strategist would have far more need of the ability to query a tactical database in the way she'd been doing almost instinctively the day before. The other morphers all had the passive sensing that had alerted her to Rick's computer phantoms.

What had surprised her was learning that the black morpher's extra mode was a medical scanner. She could see John really appreciating that. Not.

What had also surprised her was learning of the existence of a sixth morpher. That morpher, unlike the other five, had no specialised programming -- in essence, Alice realised, it was intended to be a template for general 'troops'. A utility ranger.

And I wonder how useful that'll be to us in the long run, she mused.

All that was information she knew she ought to share with Rick and Namir, but seeing as John and Lexia also needed to know it, she was inclined to hold off until she could tell everyone at once. And she had a feeling that might prove to be sooner rather than later. But there were other things that Rick and Namir needed to know. Things that were likely to be even more immediate than that. Things like the existence of the Alice-clone.

But how did you break the news to your boyfriend that the chances were good that he'd been cloned? She sighed. There was no easy way of doing it. Looking up, she realised that both Namir and Rick were looking at her, worriedly.

"Ali?" Namir prompted.

"You are OK after yesterday?" Rick asked.

Alice smiled faintly. Best just to come out with it... "Yeah. I'm fine. But...there's something you guys need to know about yesterday..."

~*~

Kimberly watched from the other bio-bed as Ven began Eric's physical by taking a series of basic readings. Blood pressure, respiration, reflexes -- the sort of thing that Kimberly could well imagine Jackson doing at the SGHQ.

"Blood pressure's a little high -- given the circumstances, that's understandable," Ven commented as she finished taking the readings. "Reflexes are excellent..."

"Good to know I haven't lost those," Eric put in with just a hint of cockiness to his smile.

Kimberly smiled at that -- a left over piece of the Eric she'd first met.

Ven, too, seemed amused more than annoyed by the interruption. "Respiration is a little congested," she continued, "which also doesn't surprise me. You are also suffering from malnutrition. Both of those," she finished, "are easily fixed."

"Should I be waiting for the other shoe to drop?" Eric asked. "That doesn't sound too bad."

Ven shot Kimberly a slightly puzzled glance. "Most people," she said, "would consider that was enough."

"And most people," Eric countered, "haven't just been told all that in what's fairly obviously a 'good news' tone of voice."

"Touché," Kimberly said sotto voce.

"Besides," Eric continued, ignoring Kimberly, "you said last night you were going to run blood tests on me to figure out what the hell drugs they had me on."

"Game set and match, Eric Myers," Kimberly murmured. To Ven she added, "I could have told you trying to feed him information piecemeal was a bad idea."

"Oh, I'd been well warned about that by Lucas, amongst others," Ven admitted. "I just didn't entirely believe them." She shook her head. "Yes, there is more," she continued, "but I wanted to get the definite information out of the way first."

At that, Eric's eyebrows lifted. "Now I know I'm not going to like this."

Kimberly looked across at Ven. "Me either; Ven, what's wrong?"

Ven sighed. "The toxicology was incomplete."

"Incomplete?" Kimberly echoed. "What do you mean incomplete?"

"There are five chemical substances in Eric's bloodstream at this time. Four of them, are easily identifiable..." And Kimberly listened with mounting horror and anger as Ven defined what they were and where they had to have come from. Ven finished by saying, "They'll have been the drugs that've kept you 'docile'."

Eric snorted at that, but said nothing.

"And the fifth?" Kimberly prompted.

"Doesn't match any known narcotics," Ven answered.

"What?" Kimberly opened her mouth to voice more of a question, but she realised Eric was frowning. Instead, she said, "Eric, hon?"

"Ven, define 'known' narcotics," Eric requested quietly.

Kimberly started to feel queasy. She recognised the tone of voice. It was the one that said he'd realised something about the situation and he was now violently hoping he was wrong. The first time she'd ever heard it was in an SUV, heading home from the park on his twenty-eighth birthday. On that occasion, he'd simply said 'I have a bad feeling' -- but he'd been proved right all the same. And I don't think I've known him be wrong since, she realised, frantically hoping that this might be the first time he was wrong.

"The known narcotics list is based on a database that was first designed by an FDA agent in early 1990. It is comprehensive but not infallible. Anything that was never given FDA certification wasn't in there, and while attempts have been made to bring in and update the list..."

"There are still gaps," Eric finished. Kimberly's heart sank like a stone when Ven nodded. "And this is one of them."

"Looks that way. There're other lists I can try..."

"It's Tmazacol." Eric sighed. "And I'm probably screwed."

TO BE CONTINUED...