Thank you to everyone that has already read and reviewed!
A special note to Kathy2378: Thank you so much for the corrections on my German. I do speak German, however I learned it by ear from my dad and therefore I don't have all the spelling/grammar and whatnot down. As for the other stuff, I'm simply a bad speller, and my computer doesn't spellcheck German or make the umlaut. I tried. Do you think you could help with that stuff? (Be my spellcheck, in a way.)
"I hate you," Kim grumbled, wrapping his arms around himself. He shifted, trying to get more comfortable on the hard concrete underneath him.
Paris scowled back. "Hey, it's not my fault! How was I supposed to know the holodeck was on the fritz?!"
"Oh, I don't know, maybe you could have taken a hint when there was a power surge that temporarily knocked all of the holodeck's systems offline!"
"Hey, you agreed to keep going with me."
Kim sighed, irritated. "I guess that's true."
"Good. So stop whining, and help me find a way out of this." Paris peered closer at the lock keeping the metal door tightly fastened. "It looks like normal old fashioned manual lock."
"Well, I don't think they had voice recognition locks in the 20th century," Kim said, rolling his eyes.
"Hmm." Paris ignored his friend's sarcasm. After a moment, he too sighed, and sat back down on the ground. He leaned against the wall and scowled.
"I just don't see how Beilschmidt's perception filter could have corrupted so much that he immediately recognized that this was an artificial environment," Paris complained. Kim shrugged, brow furrowed in thought.
"Maybe the power surge did more than just overload the buffers," he said slowly, thinking it over. "It's possible that it got into the character database and temporarily overrode the filters."
They both thought back to the continuation of the confrontation with Beilschmidt.
Paris and Kim glanced at each other warily. The albino saw their directed gazes, and snarled with impatience.
"Why is everything but you two not real?!"
Kim glanced back at Paris again, eyes wide. That was new. Paris's face was blatantly shocked.
"What did you say?" the blond Starfleet man demanded in astonishment. The albino tightened his grip on the handgun, eyes narrowing.
"You heard me. You two are the only living people I've met in this damn place. And I want to know why."
Kim stared at the ground, thinking furiously. Obviously, the perception filters were offline. It had probably been the power surge they had seen earlier. And if that filter was offline…
"I have no idea what you're talking about," Kim said flatly. "Do you think everyone else is a ghost or something?" Paris shot him a subtle questioning look. Kim tilted his head in return, sending the message- Go with it. Paris coughed, turning fully back to the other man.
"Yeah, you must be mistaken. Maybe you're feeling just a little… paranoid?" Paris suggested. The albino's eyes gleamed with a feral light.
"You want to play like that? Fine." He gestured with his gun. "Get moving. We'll see what the real Gestapo has to say about you two."
And so, they had ended up at the nearest headquarters. Not Gestapo (the man seemed to have an aversion to them), but military police. That had been another intriguing incident.
"Yes. Gilbert Beilschmidt," the albino sighed in annoyance. He tapped the desk irritably, ignoring the equally annoyed gaze the private behind the desk gave him.
"So, Mr…. Beilschmidt," the young man said, eyeing him suspiciously. "Can you show me your identification papers?"
"No, I already told you that," Beilschmidt grumbled. "They were stolen. But if you just called the Chancellery, then they could tell you-"
"I'm sorry, but I can't admit you or let you use the cells without proper identification," the man sniffed, turning away in his chair. Beilschmidt growled, slamming his hands on the desk. The private turned back, mouth open to indignantly tell him off, but choked as the fuming albino grabbed him by the collar and hauled him partially out of his seat.
"Look," Beilschmidt hissed, his nose less than a foot away from the other man's. "I have two very dangerous prisoners here"- he gestured with one hand to a slightly confused and wary Paris and Kim who were currently being covered by the two guards that had been standing inside the building when they had come in-"and it is of the utmost importance to the Third Reich that I keep them under guard." He shook the young man once with a quick, fierce shake. "Understood?!"
"Y-yes." The private's eyes flitted away from the other man's face.
"Good." Beilschmidt dropped him unceremoniously. "Now make the call."
Paris scrutinized the albino as the private quickly dialed a number into the rotary phone. It was odd. Beilschmidt looked to only be in his late 20's, but he gave off a much more confident air. He seemed older, the way he commanded respect.
"Yes. This is Private Gruber at the Police Headquarters." Gruber glanced up quickly at the albino. Beilschmidt raised an eyebrow at him, nodding. Gruber swallowed and turned back to the phone. "I have a man here; he says his name is Gilbert Beilschmidt? I was wondering, could you give me authorization to-" Gruber paused as the person on the other end of the line said something. He quickly looked up again, surprise written on his face. "Y-yes. He does."
Paris and Kim watched in interest as Gruber's face grew paler and paler as the man on the other end of the line continued. "Yes, at once! I'm very sorry to have disturbed you, sir." There was an audible click as the phone line disconnected. Gruber put the receiver down very slowly, looking shell-shocked.
There was a pause as the two men stared at each other in silence, the private looking terrified, Beilschmidt with a small smirk on his face. Then Gruber shot to his feet, saluting furiously. "Heil Hitler!"
"Yes, yes, heil Hitler." Beilschmidt waved the man down, looking amused. "Can I use your cells now?"
Gruber got out from behind the desk, stammering. "O-of course sir! At once!" He frantically gestured to the guards, who were watching the proceedings with an amused air. One got the sense that Gruber was not well liked. They brought Paris and Kim forwards with them and headed for the back of the hall.
Paris craned his head as he was marched down the hallway, trying to catch a last glimpse of Beilschmidt. The last thing he heard was Gruber bowing and scraping to the other man.
"I am so sorry, sir, I didn't know… if there's anything else you need…"
Kim nodded before grinning lopsidedly. "If that's the case, then you don't have to re-write the whole program. We can just reset the character's parameters and reboot it."
Paris sighed in relief. "Well, that's good news. We may as well do that now, while we still have time." He glanced around their small concrete cell. "It's not like we're going anywhere." He raised his voice. "Computer, end program."
Nothing happened. Paris frowned, getting to his feet. Kim followed suit.
"Computer?" Paris glanced at the ceiling. "Computer, respond."
Kim made a frustrated noise. "Great. We're stuck."
Paris scowled at his friend. "I thought you said that the power surge would have just overloaded the buffers!" Kim threw up his hands, making a face.
"Well, I don't know for sure, because I happen to be stuck in a 1940's cell!" Kim crossed his arms in exasperation. "It's safe to assume that it knocked other auxiliary systems offline as well. Including communications."
"Yeah, well there's one way to find out." Paris reached under his overcoat and tapped his communicator. The guards had searched him, but they didn't appear to have noticed the 24th century technology. So far, only Beilschmidt's program was malfunctioning. "Paris to Engineering."
"Torres here." The half-Klingon engineer sounded amused as she responded. "Already tired of your new toy?" Paris turned to Kim triumphantly.
"See? Communications are fine." Kim rolled his eyes.
"Actually," said Torres, who appeared to have overheard. "I just got them completely back online a minute or so ago." Kim gave Paris a smug glance. Paris scowled in return. "That turbulence you felt? It was a small, localized temporal anomaly that knocked most of the secondary systems offline." An irritated snort was heard over the line. "My morning's probably been a lot busier than you boys."
"Yeah, well, we're having a bit of trouble right now." Paris winced, glancing at Kim, who gave him a sarcastic No, really? look. "Harry and I have a malfunctioning program we'd like to re-write, and the computer isn't responding. Do you think you could shut down Holodeck One?"
"Sure thing. Just give me a moment; I'll cut power to the holo-emitters." The pair currently in the cell waited patiently as Torres tapped away at some unseen computer screen in Engineering. "Okay, I found you. Holodeck One?"
"Yup."
"Got it." There was a pause. "Who else is in there with you? You already mentioned Harry. Did you rope some other poor unsuspecting crewman into it?"
"What? No," Paris said, puzzled. "It's just me and Harry in here." There was another pause from the Engineering end.
"Are you sure?" Paris and Kim exchanged a wary glance.
"Yeah, why?"
Perhaps the longest pause of all. A full five seconds passed before Torres responded, suspicion in her voice.
"Because the temporal anomaly impacted the exact spot on the hull that is perpendicular to your current position." Torres took a shallow breath. "And I'm readings three life signs in Holodeck One."
Prussia got up quietly from where he had been sitting, leaned against the outer door of the cell. This was… definitely interesting.
He had been right, the two Americans had started talking freely the instant they had thought they were alone. With his above average hearing, it had been a simple matter to listen in. His lips twisted in a wry grin. They certainly weren't very good at their job. Saying their codes aloud (okay, so only he had been capable of hearing them in that setting, but still) and giving away blatant information like this without checking first if they were bring watched were both rookie mistakes. That gave him a small sense of relief. If he was being held by some hostile secret American organization (and it was starting to look that way more and more) then at least he had the upper hand. They clearly didn't know fully what they were dealing with.
Prussia kept walking out of the small building. He needed to think about this, and he definitely wasn't going to get any reasonable thoughts out with that Gruber sniveling all over the place. The nation snorted in amusement. That had been fun. He hadn't pulled rank in a while.
Prussia took a deep breath of the cool air, absentmindedly noting the harsh, almost metallic taste of it. He made a face. Ugh, was even the air fake?
He was almost positive now that this was some sort of man-made world. The way that Paris and Kim had spoken about it to "Torres", whoever that was, heavily implied that they had created it. And apparently they had tried brainwashing him in some fashion, but it hadn't worked. They knew that he knew.
Prussia swore softly under his breath. He hadn't even known that America had had this technology. How long had the western nation been hiding this?
Prussia was going to find out.
The door to the Astrometrics lab swished open with a faint hiss of displaced air. Torres glanced over her shoulder to confirm who it was before turning back to her console. Seven didn't even do that much; she just kept methodically inputting data.
"You wanted to see us, B'Elanna?" Janeway looked slightly intrigued and a tad worried at the same time. Chakotay had followed her in, and stood, hands behind his back, glancing around the room. Tuvok's face was impassive, but that was the Vulcan Security Officer's default expression. Torres nodded, turning fully around as she leaned slightly on the console.
"Yes, I wanted to show you all this." She nodded at Seven, who raised an eyebrow in return and pressed the appropriate sensor. They all looked up as a chart of data flickered up onto the room's main screen.
"This is our sensor log of the moment of impact from the temporal anomaly we encountered at 0800 hours." Seven explained. "I did not think it was significant. However," here she gave Torres an appraising look. "Another matter was brought to my attention, and so I ran a deeper scan." A soft series of beeping was heard as Seven deftly zoomed in on the image, rotating it and warping it. "The anomaly was precisely 1.77 meters long, and upon further inspection…" With a final twist the golden glowing outline stopped and assumed its final shape. "This was its exact outline."
With varying degrees of surprise, the room's five occupants found themselves staring at a very familiar image. The silhouette of a tall human man rotated gently in space. Janeway looked at Chakotay in mild alarm. "And you think…"
"Immediately after receiving this image," Seven interrupted coolly, "I ran a scan concerning the crew complement onboard. Currently, we have one hundred and forty-six crew members onboard. However," she pulled up another screen and turned around, facing the captain. She inclined her head meaningfully. "Sensors are reading one hundred and forty-seven humanoid life signs aboard Voyager."
"Look like we have another unintended passenger," Chakotay remarked dryly.
"Do you know where this individual is currently located?" Tuvok inquired, ever mindful of security risks.
Torres grinned wryly. "We don't know for certain, but we're pretty sure he's on Holodeck One. Harry and Tom found think they found him. They called me when they couldn't shut down their program from the inside."
Janeway chuckled. "What, was someone not acting German enough?"
Torres shook her head, the beginnings of a worried expression setting in on her face. "He was acting a little too German, actually." At the other's startled expressions, she nodded. "Yeah, according to the two of them, they found a man, "Gilbert Beilschmidt," while they were going about in the normal program. They said he arrested them because he knew that something was wrong and the world wasn't real. But he looks and acts like he belongs in that time period." She snorted. "He even pulled rank to get to use the jail!"
"That is why we wanted to discuss this with you," Seven said calmly. Tuvok nodded.
"If he is from that era in human history, then he will most likely be hostile," Tuvok theorized, the Vulcan equivalent of concern appearing for a moment. He exchanged a glance with Janeway. "We should have a security team standing by to apprehend him if the situation becomes dangerous."
"Agreed," Janeway said, face contemplative. "But first we should try talking to him." Making up her mind, she looked up and nodded at the Engineer. "Stand by to cut power on the Holodeck." Janeway gestured to her second and third in commands. "Chakotay, Tuvok, you're with me. Tuvok," she turned to the Vulcan. "Have a couple of your men accompany us and stand by in case anything goes wrong." Tuvok tilted his head in acknowledgement.
"Alright." Janeway shrugged her shoulders. "Let's go meet our new guest."
Prussia was absentmindedly leaning against one of the older buildings when it disappeared.
After his initial (manly) yelp of surprise, he caught himself with the reflexes born from hundreds of years of fighting and managed to stay on his own two feet. He looked around him with a touch of panic, eyes widening as he took in this new development.
The entire world, people included, had vanished. In its place stood a small room, rigidly aligned into perfect corners and edges. The same, consistent black and gold outline stood out vibrantly from the walls in steady squares.
His senses caught up with him, and he froze as he realized that, of course, only the things that hadn't been real in the first place would have disappeared. And behind him…
"Take it easy, Beilschmidt." Prussia turned in a swift jerk, eyes narrowing. Paris held out his hands in a placating gesture. "Let's talk for a minute." He and Kim both stood a few meters away, despite the fact that he had left them all the way on the other side of town. The nation's eyes flashed downwards and took an involuntary step backwards when he saw that they both had regained their weapons.
"Was habt ihr gemacht?" he hissed tensely.
Paris blinked. "What?"
"The universal translator should have translated that," Kim muttered under his breath to his companion. Prussia paused for a second, wrong-footed. He hadn't realized that he had said that in German.
He tensed and pivoted again at the new sound behind him, trying to keep both dangers in view at the same time. A metal door that he hadn't previously noticed had opened with a quick hissing sound, showing a bright hall outside.
An unusual trio had entered the room. Prussia's gaze skimmed over them, noting their strange, uniform-like clothing and ready, professional stances. Their body language clearly stated that this was their area of expertise. He glanced behind them, and swore silently at the sight of two more men blocking his only visible way out. The metallic guns they were holding might not be anything he had encountered before, but Prussia was experienced enough in the ways of warfare to know weapons when he saw them.
His eyes shot back to the front trio, and he almost choked at another, almost invasive feeling that curled up through his chest. The man on the far left was staring him down with a calm, set gaze. Prussia caught his breath. That man wasn't human.
Prussia recoiled, his mind screaming at him to fight and get out of there now.
"Mr. Beilschmidt…" The women in front had stepped slightly forwards. Her face was sympathetic and diplomatic, and she spoke reassuringly. Prussia took another step back, keeping a steady distance from the people on both sides. Paris and Kim hadn't moved since the others had entered the room.
"I know that this is strange and confusing to you, but I'm going to ask you to calm down and listen what I have to say." The women placed a hand over her chest. "My name is Captain Kathryn Janeway." Janeway held out her arms, palms up. "We're not going to hurt you."
We're not going to hurt you. Those last six words rang bitterly in Prussia's ears. He flinched at the sudden reminder of a particular voice, in that particular place. Barbed wire and blood. And pain. Oh, he remembered pain.
The final twig snapped.
"That's what they all said," he whispered hoarsely. Not giving them any time to react, he snarled and sprung forwards from a standstill, charging for the open door. He barely registered the women and her companion's shocked expressions before slamming into another warm body. An impossibly strong hand clamped down on his shoulder, and he knew that if he had been human, he would have been brought to his knees. As it was, the unexpected counter-attack made his head swim and Prussia faltered for a second, suddenly dizzy.
He growled and broke the unwelcome hold, staring up fiercely into the dark eyes of the inhuman. Prussia practically tasted the other's surprise as he twisted, slamming a powerful elbow directly into his ribcage. The alien (for what else could he be?) doubled over, and the nation took advantage of the moment to heave him as far away from him as he could manage, which turned out to be the opposite wall. The black and gold clad man hit it with a satisfying thud and enough force to knock out a normal human. Which unfortunately, he wasn't, but Prussia was taking the small victories today.
The two men stationed outside had brought their weapons up the instant Prussia made a move, but he was like enraged whirlwind, blowing through them before they had time to draw breath. Ignoring the unknown weapons that had been dropped and the havoc he had just caused, Prussia bolted down the unfamiliar hallway towards a dubious freedom.
Janeway pivoted on the spot, a shocked and perturbed look drawn clearly on her features. She took in the scene that had only taken the span of a few seconds, and tapped her comm-badge, issuing a ship wide alert.
"This is Captain Janeway. Red Alert." Janeway glanced around grimly. The two security officers that had been stationed outside were gradually pulling themselves together, and Tuvok had already regained his feet on the opposite of the Holodeck.
"We have an Augment on board."
Yay, another chapter! Yeah, I know this one is a lot shorter than the other one. Oh well. I kind of needed to stop here.
Also, I know that this is kind of a weird crossover, and I don't really expect that many people to read it… But I just really wanted to write this because I feel that some things just match up perfectly. So it's fun.