Jason sat on the table, feeling grateful that Thermian surgery at least resulted in him wearing clothing while he was recovering. His head felt terrible, it tasted like his tongue had a fur coat, and his knee had a weird throbbing feeling, not quite an ache and not quite a bruise. They'd probably given him drugs.
Vampires. Cordelia had a vision of vampires attacking the landing party, of him being killed by one. It sounded unreal, like something that belonged in a movie. Right beside evil witches, psychotic terrorists and alien invasions. Except that the Thermians and the Dominionites were real. Except that he'd seen what had happened to Angel's face, seen the sharp teeth as he'd growled.
Couldn't he just wake up and find that this wasn't happening? That there would just be... No, that would be too easy. He was stuck in this strangeness, again. Only this time, things were even stranger than before. It wasn't a simple mess of the bad aliens trying to kill the good aliens. Some of the bad guys this time were Thermians, who were supposed to be the good guys. And it wasn't a mess fought somewhere deep in outer space, it was a mess right here on Earth. Right in his city, his home.
What would Commander Taggert do in a situation like this? What if this were just a scripted episode? He'd probably be looking a lot less groggy, charge boldly into danger, end up with his shirt off somehow, and kissing Cordelia by the end of the episode, bad guys defeated, crisis averted, and everyone close enough to safe. He didn't think it would be that easy in reality.
First, the bad guys would have real weapons, not just props. They would really want to hurt him. And she'd said vampires... He shuddered. "How do you fight vampires?"
"Fire, sunlight, decapitation, stake in the heart. Those are all pretty good." Cordelia offered, sipping at a cup of water. She looked almost gray, and one of the nurses wrapped a blanket around her shoulders.
"Where are they going to be? Do we have a target area?" He wanted to be logical, to be brave. No, what he really wanted was to let someone else fix it all, but there wasn't anyone else. So he'd settle for looking like he was being brave and courageous about this. "Do we know how many of them there will be?"
"There's one bug-man. And an orange octopus, and at least six vampires, but I'm pretty sure there will be more than that." Cordelia offered, sipping again at her water. "There's normally more minions than that."
"You seem to be recovering nicely, why don't the lot of you take this elsewhere? This is a medical facility, not a chamber for planning battle strategies!" One of the doctors scowled, his hands making little flapping gestures as he tried to encourage them to get out.
"Alright then, we'll go plan for the battle." Jason slowly slid down from the bed, tensing in anticipation of his knee hurting again. It really hadn't been quite right since the Fangor beast had clawed him. But the expected flare and popping sensation was absent. He just couldn't quite feel his foot.
"Not the Princess. She needs to stay so that we may be certain our treatment has worked and carries no complications." The nurse was glaring at him.
"errr... Right." Shaking his head, Jason started towards the door, feeling slightly better as people began to follow him. "Why's she so mad at me?"
"She was one of your surgical nurses, and said that you really should have had proper medical attention for your knee immediately." Willow offered, looking far too calm about the whole thing. As if she dealt with vampires everyday. Maybe she did.
"What else do we need to worry about? Vampires and illegal Thermian weapons..." He was pretty sure things would have at least one more complication.
"She said it'll be underground, in some tunnels." Guy recalled, and then frowned. "Isn't it pretty hard to get sunlight in tunnels? Is it going to be sewer tunnels?"
For a moment, Jason closed his eyes, hoping that Guy wasn't claustrophobic. A panicking security guy in tunnels would not be a pretty sight.
"I think, considering everything, that it might be best if I remain on the ship this time." There was something in Alex's voice, as if he was trying to hide something. Maybe just the fact that they were all frauds? "Dr. Teirell can recommend a good choice for the landing party, possibly a doctor with combat experience?"
"Right, and then at least one of us will be safe on the ship." The comment came out a bit louder than he'd intended.
"Safe? Safe? You think the ship will be safe? There's a plan in motion where they will try to seize control of the Protector, which will mean killing any and all resistance, especially those of us from Earth. I wouldn't call that safe." Alex was glaring, and either the makeup was going or he'd picked up some dark circles under his eyes.
"But we know about their plan, and can stop it." He tried to give the confident Taggert grin, and pointed at Guy. "You're on top of stopping this plan, right? Everything's set?"
"I still want to have a few words with my security guys. It shouldn't be a problem, but if someone manages to digitize their way in... different situation entirely." Guy frowned, and cracked his knuckles. "I think we should be able to manage those."
"Good, take care of that." He nodded, thinking that it was good not to be the one who had to think of everything. "How do we deal with the vampires quickly?"
For a moment, the room was quiet, and then the doors whooshed open behind him.
"Pardon, is the Handmaiden... Ahhh, there is the Handmaiden." A strange Thermian in a dark blue uniform had just opened the door, and was giving them all the wide, somehow flat Thermian smile. "Can you offer any ideas on how vampires would react to laser fire?"
end part 29.
Guy took advantage of the interruption to stand up, commenting "I'm going to go talk to my security people."
Being here, back on the Protector was intense. They noticed him, he wasn't just some nobody wanna-be actor when he was here, he was Guy Ingersoll, Chief of Security. It was great. And it was terrifying, because he was the Chief of Security, and they were putting their lives, everybody's lives into his hands. And he wasn't trained to do that, he didn't know how to organize and run security and defense, he was just an actor who'd taken some self defense classes and learned how to shoot. And if they ever learned that truth, it would be a disaster.
He took a deep breath as he walked down the halls, hoping that his efforts to learn the plans and diagrams of how the ship was put together would pay off, that he could find his way to the Security centers. He'd both hoped and dreaded that a day like this would come. They must never learn that he was a fake, and he'd have to be the best damn Chief of Security that he could manage. And the first step, after he got to the right place, was to make sure they knew how to deal with a few basic tricks. Like wounded strangers in the docking bay, or the 'oh, look behind you' trick.
He almost wished that he could live in a place where such tricks were unknown. But they weren't completely unknown. Not if the bad guys had them. Didn't these people ever play cops and robbers when they were kids? No, they didn't have that make-believe concept among the Thermians.
The feel of the corridor beneath his feet kept reminding him that this was serious. It made an almost quiver and clang with every step, something the sets had never done. The air was slightly more humid, and had a strange faint smell that he couldn't quite describe, a smell that he'd only encountered here, and the lighting wasn't quite florescent, but something just a little gentler, without that headache inducing flicker.
"Sir." The voice of one of the Thermians brought his attention back. "What are your orders?"
"First, I want a group of you to gather together. I've received some information of probable tactics that the pirates will be using, and I want to try to prepare all of you for them. If they don't try those tricks, I'm sure there are other bad guys in the galaxy who might." He let his breath out slowly, and hoped that he'd remember how to use the screen and light-tracing thing that they had instead of chalk and a blackboard.
Thermians began to enter the room, all wearing the uniforms of Security. As they took seats in front of him, a few more came in, wearing different uniforms with insignia that he didn't recognize. From the way that his boys – when had they become his? – Considering the way his Security people moved for them, he assumed that they were of some sort of higher rank. He could figure that out later.
"Right, glad that you could all get here so promptly." He decided to begin, and hoped that the technology didn't trip him up. A click of the little button, and the tip of the not-chalk glowed orange. "There are a few tricks that the bad guys might use, and according to the Princess, they're going to try at least one of them."
Slowly, he traced out a rough diagram of a docking bay, complete with the shuttle and the doors, the lockers, and little blobby boxes where the computer and control panels were. "First, we're going to pretend that this is a good representation of the docking bay. Normal procedure is for two Security personnel to be on hand at any time when a shuttle might be expected to land. The reason for this is that if something happens, one of you should be able to sound an alarm."
"An alarm?" The words came from one of the guys in the second row. "But if one of our shuttles comes back..."
"Can you tell who's in the shuttle just by looking at it?" He asked.
"But the computers can tell us who went out." It sounded as if the Security officer knew that he was missing something, but not quite where.
Smiling, Guy nodded. "Yes. The computer can tell you who went out in the shuttle. But the shuttles go to planets or other ships, often into dangerous or hostile situations. They aren't that difficult to pilot, someone else could slip into the shuttle and fly it to the ship."
This was greeted by worried and unhappy murmurs, and one clear comment "They are law breakers, they will not care that that is unauthorized."
"That's right, your job is to defend this ship and the people aboard from law breakers. From people who will do things they shouldn't. And they might try to trick you. Not just by being on a shuttle that they shouldn't, but... Here's an old trick that has been used a lot on Earth. The shuttle lands, and a couple guys stagger out. Their clothing's messed up, torn, dirty, maybe bloody. They look like they need help. So the guys watching go over to help them. He paused, and tapped the board to make sure he had their attention. "And here's where the trick comes in. Sometimes, people fake being injured. Then, when the Security comes over, they straighten up, bash you on the back of the head, and take you down. They then have access to your ship, and you are captured, possibly injured or killed. We want to avoid this."
The murmuring stopped, and all of them were watching him. It was a little unsettling, actually.
"Sir?" The Thermian had that slightly awkward expression of uncertainty. "How should we react to the situation that you have described? With two apparently injured people emerging from a shuttle?"
"The first thing to do is send word to the medical area that a shuttle has arrived that appears to have wounded personnel. This lets someone know there's a shuttle, and that something's wrong, even if we don't know what the details are yet. Then one of you should go to offer assistance and learn more. If they're really injured, then the other can request a medical team come to the docking bay, and if it's a trap, the other is still by the comm. And can raise the alarm." He explained, and then looked to see if anybody was having trouble processing that.
"The next old trick that I want you to know about is one that really doesn't have a name, and it comes in a lot of variations. Say you're moving towards a guy. He suddenly looks behind you, seems very afraid, and ducks." Guy resisted the urge to tell them all about the rules for evil overlords, and how many that scenario violated.
"We don't turn around and look?" The Thermian seemed to be catching on as he asked the question.
"Exactly. Instead, you make a move, preferably shooting with some sort of stunner, or tackle him." Guy paused, considering what he'd been saying. One thing was trying to set off a warning in his mind. "And always remember that females can be just as dangerous as villains as males can. The injured woman could just as easily be trying to trick you as an injured man."
As he continued, he noticed that some of the Security guys pulled out little hand-held computers and started taking notes. It gave him an odd warm feeling, and he smiled as he continued explaining basic tricks.
End part 30.
Willow blinked, considering the Thermian's words. He didn't have the same uniform as the crew of the Protector, which matched the ones worn by Alex and the other actors, but it looked like he was someone semi-important. Maybe one of those other people that had come with Malthesar? From some sort of Security Council... Willow wondered if that was like the UN or NATO or something.
"I'm not entirely certain. If we could go to somewhere that I could study the blaster shorts, or if you have the energy frequencies in English... I can't read Thermian." The question was actually pretty good, and she was curious about it herself, now that it had been brought up.
"As you are, at least for the moment, considered a civilian consultant, it would only be prudent that you have at least a small understanding of our standard weapons." The vice sounded almost emotionless, but his aura hinted at amusement. "Perhaps you should accompany me to the firing range?"
"That sounds good." Willow nodded, wondering if that was actually the meaning of the not-quite uniforms that they'd all ended up in after their medical examinations. "Please, lead the way. I'm not sure where everything is in the ship."
"That's two people who've slipped out now." Jason's mutter was barely audible.
They walked quietly through long silvery corridors, and Willow glanced at him, noticing that even for a Thermian, he looked a bit tense. "So, umm... what exactly does the Security Council do?"
"Recent years have seen a time of great tragedy for the Thermian people, and we we are forced to rebuild, and to try to take greater measures to ensure that there is no recurrence. It was decided that an organization for the protection and defense of the Thermian people was needed, and that is the purpose of the Security Council. To defend our people from all threats, external or from within." He sounded as if he was trying to avoid painful memories.
"I'm sorry for that. For whatever the bad thing was that hurt your people so much." Willow offered. It sounded like they were a combination of the CIA and the UN all in one.
He nodded tensely, and they continued down the hall. Eventually, there was a larger door, which opened to a small antechamber, with a rack off what looked halfway between sunglasses and those protective safety glasses from chemistry class. "You will need a unit of protective eyewear."
"Right." Willow began trying them on, discovering that for all their near uniform appearances, there was apparently variety in the size of Thermian heads. Eventually, she found a pair that fit comfortably, sliding them over her eyes as she took a deep breath. "Okay, on to the firing range. Oh boy."
She tried to listen very carefully as he outlined the safety precautions, feeling relieved to know that she couldn't accidentally hit anybody else as she tried to learn a little about the weapon. Closing her eyes, she tried to get a feel for the weapon, to see if she could sense the energy that it drew from the charge unit, which sounded an awful lot like a battery to her. She could feel it, but as it was, it was something that she didn't know how to manipulate. "Okay, on to the firing area."
Willow carefully set the unit to the lowest power setting, double checking to make certain that she remembered the settings. Glancing down at the line of targets, she wondered if there was a particular reason why they'd made the circles alternating rings of greens and blues, and then dismissed the question for later. Taking a deep breath as she tried to forget how she wasn't very good with a crossbow, Willow fired off a shot.
There was no recoil at all, which was much more enjoyable than the crossbows, which always felt like they were trying to escape. Remembering that she wasn't just here to watch the pretty lights, she raised it again, and this time closed her eyes so that she could try to feel for the energy. It really didn't matter if she actually hit the target or not.
She could feel it as the bolt gathered and left the gun. It hummed in her mind, sort of like the fan in her computer, and she thought that maybe... The bolt hit the target and dispersed. Okay, try again. She pushed with her mind, trying to deflect the bolt's path.
"You changed its direction!" His voice was astonished. "How... What technology did you use for that?"
"Quantum manipulations." Willow grinned. "From the feel of it, it should work just fine against vampires, it might burn a little on the lower settings, but the higher levels... umm, let me check the feel of those."
She turned her attention to the gun, adjusted the power to high, and fired down the range, closing her eyes to feel for the intensity. "That should practically vaporize a vampire."
Willow returned the weapon to its lowest setting, and handed it back. Her mind was considering all the protection spells that she knew of, and debating the relative merits of each. If she could make a shield that would stay on far enough away, that could protect against those energies... Maybe.
"You seem very quiet, Handmaiden." His voice interrupted her thoughts.
"Please, call me Willow." She smiled, hoping to keep everything sorted out in her mind. "I'm assuming that the bad guys will have weapons that work like that?"
"Most likely they will." He agreed.
"I'm trying to figure out a way to offer some protection to the people who go down to the planet. So that if they get hit, they might not be killed." Willow explained.
"Can you do that with your quantum manipulations?" He sounded very impressed.
"I don't know. You said that it bent? One of the shots?" Willow asked. "Because, if it bent, then that means that I can affect the blasts, at least when I'm close. The hard part is trying to find a way to protect them if I'm not with them."
"It did bend." He sounded thoughtful, and perhaps a bit worried. "Are these quantum manipulating abilities very common?"
Willow considered the best way to answer his question, remembering all of the things that she'd done with her gift. Angel's soul, the enjoining, fighting Glory, bringing back Buffy... "To have any at all isn't very common on earth. To have enough to do some of what I can... That's even less so. Doctor Teirell already asked if I could see if any Thermians have the ability to learn a little."
"I have to say that the ability to bend blaster fire being uncommon is reassuring." His tone was just a bit dry.
Willow couldn't quite keep from giggling.
End part 31.