Posted by Lieutenant Sharah Fayth (Chief Star Fleet Medical Officer) in Three Isn’t A Crowd If You Don’t Want It To Be

Posted by Major General Charles Tenkiller (Vice-Commander, Colonial Customs and Defense Agency) in Three Isn’t A Crowd If You Don’t Want It To Be

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It was only a few minutes until the shuttle settled gracefully in the clearing behind the house. The chauffeur opened the door and offered a hand to each woman. Charles said “Go on in. I’ll be there in a minute.” and he began speaking to the chauffeur in a low voice. He knew the women could hear his thoughts if they chose (Sharah regardless) but he refused to give up the pretext that he had secrets and surprises.

Tenkiller

Sharah hurried away, into the house and grabbed Hope and sat down with her. Letting her consciousness drop some. She was aware but it was easier to ignore what he didn’t want heard. Sharah was happy to allow him his secrets. She stayed there until he came in and then disappeared into her room.

Yavia walked in behind her and laughed quietly. Sharah was happy and the effort was cute. She wondered about the tree though. Sharah was extremely attached to it. It made her wonder what happened to make her that way.

Sharah

Tenkiller walked in a few moments later and looked at Sharah and then at V. “Everybody good? There’s some business I think we should go over a bit now, too. Nothing too serious, but some things you two should know about the house and stuff.”

Tenkiller

Sharah was humming softly, lost in her own little world for the moment. Much like at the park, just not as deeply focused. She blinked and looked up when she felt him come on. She stood and put the pot back on the table.

She looked sheepish. “Yeah like not setting off the alarm if I go for a walk.”

Sharah

“Well, I would certainly appreciate it. Especially during the winter.” Charles said with a wink.

Yavia sat in a chair opposite the couch and stretched like a content cat. That had not been a walk. That had been Sharah struggling, and maybe it was a conscious decision to go outside, it was still not something so mundane as a walk. However…”Oh come on Sharah, you know you would that again to get that view. I would.” And she laughed and winked at them both as Sharah turned bright red.

“All ya gotta do is ask.” Charles said with a grin.

“So what traps and surprises do we need to remember to avoid?”

Yavia

“Well…” he said and stood up from where he was leaning against the wall, “… follow me.” He led them both down the stairs and into the main bedroom and walked up to the waterfall behind the bed.

“So… no one knows about this besides me and General Harris. And now you two, because you live here. I trust you with my life, so I can trust you with this.” He reached through the water to a stone that stuck out just far enough to cause the water to flow slightly around it, creating a distortion in the flow that couldn’t be seen unless you were specifically looking for and at it. He grasped the stone with just the tips of his fingers and thumb and it lit softly for half a second…

Sharah had half a moment to realize this was the sound of water in the room she kept hearing, and that she was obviously more exhausted than she realized to have missed it so completely.

And then the entire wall sank into the floor.

Behind it was a brightly lit room lined with shelves and long, low drawers surrounding three cases enclosed in transparent aluminum. The whole room was filled with weapons of all kinds. Energy and projectile, lethal and non, Federation and… well… every other government, species, culture, and organization. He looked at V and Sharah and said “This is our ‘Shit has hit the fan’ room. Weapons are priority, but there is also enough water and food to last ten people a year. Follow me.” and he walked inside.

Yavia’s mouth made a little ‘O’ as she tried to take it all in. The number of weapons and types and it was hidden behind a miniature waterfall. Accessed through his their bedroom. Enough to survive for a year? What did he think was going to happen?

He went up the center display case and pressed a rivet on the side. The display rotated ninety degrees and revealed a staircase going down into a dark corridor.

“At the end of that is a transporter station. Can move four people at a time. It only goes one of two places. First-” and he looked at V, “- is the Observation Tower on the Orbital Platform. If that station is non-responsive, it goes to an offline CCDA satellite station way off in the wastelands in the middle of nowhere.” He shut the passage and looked at them and said “The only people that can open this place are me and Harris… and now you two. This isn’t a CCDA thing. This is a contingency plan so he and I can get our loved ones outta the line of fire if the need arises. We paid for it, we maintain it. Its completely off the books and no one on Oed knows its here except us… and probably Molly Holloway, since she is to him what you two are to me.”

Tenkiller

A look passed over Sharah’s face. Memories, (her own and that of others, memories that were hers, but not of her life) of the necessity of such contingencies. It brought a determined, resolved look to her face. She might be a medical officer but she was and officer. She slipped an arm around Yavia. Sharah knew if it came to that, Yavia would be here alone. Charles and she would both be gone. She had a good sense of Molly Holloway and if it came to that she seriously doubted Molly would take an escape route unless there was zero options, even thin ones, left. She hugged Yavia, “He tells you to come here, you don’t wait. And you don’t leave.” In her minds eyes she saw it, the door of another such room shutting and sealing those on the other side, in a very similar room. To be trapped there…Sharah let the memory go. It wasn’t her life. To be replaced with memories of the Viking.

Sharah

Yavia had never wanted to serve in any military organization. She knew TK served, she wasn’t unaware, she wasn’t blind about it. She understood what that meant. The room made reality crash in on her hard. Sharah’s statement made it worse as she realized why Sharah said it. She wouldn’t be going with Yavia. If she was ordered to report, she would be in the middle of it too. Whatever it ended up being. Yavia was suddenly quite terrified of the unknown and had the unrealistic desire to tell them both to quit their jobs. Her emotions and thoughts swirled and crashed devastatingly into Sharah. The other woman just held onto her.

Yavia