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  1. In Memory of LAJ_FETT: Please share your remembrances and condolences HERE

Story [Multi-Fandom] DANL thread

Discussion in 'Non Star Wars Fan Fiction' started by Sith-I-5, May 16, 2015.

  1. Sith-I-5

    Sith-I-5 Force Ghost star 6

    Registered:
    Aug 14, 2002
    DANL – Dead Agents, New Lives
     
    The Idea: Four deceased agents from shows that I have watched, are resurrected by alien intervention to fight disasters, but faltered because I could not think of anything serious enough for them to deal with, and devolved into video clips featuring them: Torchwood’s Toshiko Sato, and Owen Harper; NCIS’s Caitlin "Kate" Todd, and Spooks's Danny Hunter.

    Premise: Doctor Who two-part episode, "The Stolen Earth", had the Daleks (genocidal mutants in personal armoured tanks), steal several planets and moons, and collect them within the Medusa Cascade to power a reality bomb.

    One moon, the Lost Moon of Poosh, I think, had a defensive computer which studied Earth records, including its television shows, and built a copy of Space: 1999's Moonbase Alpha on its surface, and populated it with copies of four agents.

    Then the Doctor arrived and sorted everything out before the agents could be deployed.

    Compared to the Dalek plot, quite hard to think of something of the same threat level.

    So what now? DANL agents are going to be inserted into situations at my will.
     
  2. Sith-I-5

    Sith-I-5 Force Ghost star 6

    Registered:
    Aug 14, 2002
    OOC: Thanks to the Internet Movies Firearm DataBase (didn't even know there was one) for assistance in identifying Umbrella trooper weapons.
    Amazon used to identify outfits and shoes.
    Also, my old friend at Google Translate. :)

    Caitlin Todd – female Caucasian agent with shoulder length dark hair. American.
    Toshiko Sato – female Anglo-Japanese with black hair. Age 34.
    Baille Hart – petite female human, redhead. Age 25 standard years. Corellian.

    [​IMG]




    Resident Evil - Saviours

    The lights within the armoury lit up as soon as it detected movement, bathing the white walls, black weapons racks and the three women in bright illumination, so much that shadows were almost non-existant.

    The women shared the black and white theme. Two wore short versions of the traditional LBD – little black dress, with matching black shoes. All were bare armed, but only two were here in bare-legs.

    Toshiko Sato, the Anglo-Japanese former Torchwood operative pairing a black bodycon stretch party dress with stilleto-heeled t-bar court shoes. Of the three, she was the only one in semi-opaque black tights.

    Kate Todd, formerly of NCIS (the Naval Criminal Investigative Service) special agent, rocked a black strapless skater dress with heeled black ankle boots.

    All wore Vortex Manipulators (VMs), a chunky wrist-device on brown leather straps of masculine-style thickness, that had teleported them in here from wherever they normally resided.

    Kate looked around. “A lot of weapons here.”

    The youngest of them, all of 25 years, stepped to the nearest rack, and ran fingers over one of the weapons. She put her head back, closed her eyes and sighed with heartfelt-sounding relief. "Ah, I have dreamed of something like this for so long."

    “Nice outfit.” Tosh directed this towards her, eyeing the younger woman's Chinese-style abbreviated cheongsam of black silk or satin, with very fine gold dragon detail across her chest. The outfit only went down to a few inches above her knees, so the left and right side slits essentially meant that below her hip level, there was simply a panel at the front and back that would leave little to the imagination.

    “Thanks!” Baille Harte smiled.

    Kate was looking lower down, where Harte had white ankle socks with frills, and shiny black flat-heeled t-bar shoes, minute ventilation holes in a pattern over the toe and foot area.
    “Yep, very cute.” She looked up and asked a question that her old partner agent, Anthony DiNozzo had asked off a probie agent. “Who dressed you?”

    Baille frowned down at her ensemble. “I think it looks alright.”

    “Get a sidearm and cover the exits.” Tosh ordered,

    “On it.” The brown-haired woman nodded and paced along the nearest of the aisles, the racks on either side of her filled with vertically placed automatic weapons. Machine guns, SMGs, variations on the theme.

    Tosh watched her sashay away, then turned back to Kate. The girl looked heavily tanned, but Tosh suspected it was not natural, though she had not seen any tell-tale marks indicating a spray tan.

    Kate exchanged a look with her remaining companion. "No Danny and Owen." She noted.

    "No." Tosh agreed. She and Todd shared an apparent base on the moon with two other DANL agents, but neither man was here, yet this third woman was, whom neither of them had seen before.
    Still, they were all here at the whim of I-5; all would be revealed later. Probably...possibly...well actually, perhaps not at all.

    Tosh activated the audio briefing part of her wrist device, their master’s voice, Sith-I-5, coming from the tiny speakers so the three could listen: “Girls,” he called them ‘girls’, “you are in the secret underground headquarters of the Umbrella Corporation under Tokyo. Most of the personnel here are like Star Trek borg; as long as you are wearing black-” Tosh and Kate glanced at each other, ticking mental boxes, “-and not actively trying to kill them, they will ignore you as intruders, and treat you as one of them.

    “Neato.” Baille’s voice floated back to them.

    Just be sure to stay clear of anyone wearing sunglasses, and anyone trying to kill you.

    Kate rolled her eyes. “Thanks, Dad!”

    Tosh smirked at the remark.

    The briefing continued: “This base is about to fall under imminent attack. Your mission is the preservation of life. There is an executive helipad containing a jet-copter, and a self-destruct device set into the wall of the hangar with the capacity to ruin this base, as well as a significant portion of the city above. Your mission is to make sure that device goes on the chopper. Failure is not an option. Briefing ends. Oh wait.

    Tosh and Kate looked at the raised device in surprise.

    Miss Harte is not fond of being treated like a child, and will need hearing protectors if you can find them. Okay, that's it. Bye!

    The holograph dissipated from sight, and both women exchanged glances, the taller Kate trying to fight off a grin. "Baille, honey?" She called into the Armoury.

    "Frag! Not you too!"

    Kate put a hand over her mouth for a silent laugh, while Tosh smiled and punched her softly on the arm.

    "How does he know?" A young girl's voice enquired from nearby.

    Kate and Tosh spun round, and stared down at a semi-transparent hologram of a serene-faced little girl of about eight years old, blonde hair cascading over the shoulders of her light blue full length nightdress.

    Both stared wide-eyed at the child, temporarily mute.

    The girl raised a loose-sleeved arm, to almost touch Tosh's VM. "The voice that spoke; how does he know there will be an attack."

    "Who are you?" Kate asked.

    "The Blue Queen-"

    "Oh right," Tosh interrupted, disinterested now. She stepped to a rack and unlatched a P-90 recoilless rifle and placed the black strap over her neck, talking about the child without looking at her. "She's a holographic representation of the artificial intelligence running the base. Design usually based on the daughter of a chief scientist. The Umbrella base under Raccoon City, for instance, had a Red Queen."

    [​IMG]

    Tosh and the Red Queen

    "She's not real?" Kate queried.

    "Nope." Tosh stalked away, turning sideways to shoulder her way inbetween Kate and the stacks, her gaze roving over the stacked weapons looking for a handgun and some ammo clips. "Baille, arm up. And look around for headphones to protect your ears."

    "Alright!"

    Todd was left with the creepy-looking child. "Uh, we don't know how he knows there will be an attack, and we don't know when it will be, since he did not say. You got any hearing protectors round here?"

    "Not in the Armoury. There will be some in the shooting range. Right next door. Loss of life, detected."

    The last announcement was made with no change in tone or inflection and it was a moment before Kate absorbed what the Blue Queen had said. "Loss of life? Who and where?"

    "Akira Ueno. A sentry outside. Cause of death unknown. Elevator Two is descending from the surface."

    Kate looked scandalised and started arming up herself. She looked over to the child. "It's starting. You have hostile intruders. Sound an alarm or something!"

    In the distance, a faint two-tone klaxon started moo-whooing.

    "I better go." The hologram disappeared.

    "Hey, wait!"

    The child reappeared in the same spot. "Yes?"

    "There is an executive hangar-"

    "Oh yes, from your briefing."

    A loud male voice echoed from an unseen public address system: Security Platoon Four. Prepare to intercept Lift Eighty-Two at the Garage Level. It then repeated it in gutteral-sounding Japanese. Sekyuriti shōtaitsu. Garējireberu de rifuto 82-ko o bōju suru tame no junbi.

    "Five floors up. North East Wing." The Blue Queen's face managed an expression of reluctance. "I should really go."

    "Okay, thanks for your help." Kate ran her fingers lightly over the handles of the shelved handguns as she walked their aisle, eventually spying a Sig-Sauer P226R that was near to, if not the same as she would have used as an NCIS - Naval Criminal Investigative Service - agent.

    She located a black velcro holster that she could strap round her left thigh, and proceeded to do just that, putting a mag clip into her chosen pistol and placing it in the holster.

    At the doorway, Toshiko found that Baille had armed herself with just a pistol in a thigh holster, as well as a couple of spare clips.
    "That's all you are taking with you?"

    Baille glanced from the doorway. "I'm really more of a fighter pilot than an agent, and the only firearms we had were a holdout blaster in our flightsuit. In case we had to ditch."

    Toshiko was surprised by this revelation. "Sounds exciting. Why did you stop being a pilot?"

    "My squadron were betrayed and ambushed by the people we thought were our colleagues and friends. I got away, but many of my team didn't."

    "It happens."

    The door slid open with a snap, and a Japanese soldier type in black fatigues bearing the red-and-blue Umbrella logo, stepped through and stopped dead, upon spotting them.

    "Kon'nichiwa. (Hello.)" He frowned down at them. Several of his colleague started to appear in the corridor behind him. "Anata no on'nanoko wa koko de nani o de yatte imasu ka? (What are you girls doing in there?)"

    Baille had no clue what the man said, and just stared up at him, her mouth open. "Uhhhh."

    Toshiko stepped into the breach. "Do you speak English?" She retorted, brusquely.

    "Of course!" He looked and sounded affronted at the query.

    "We are here to hand the weapons out. What do you need?"

    He pointed to a rack of rifles to Tosh's left. She looked in the indicated direction. "The M4A1 carbines, please."

    Tosh smacked Baille lightly on the arm, rousing her. "C'mon, give me a hand."

    To be continued...
     
    Last edited: Jan 9, 2018
    metophlus likes this.
  3. Sith-I-5

    Sith-I-5 Force Ghost star 6

    Registered:
    Aug 14, 2002
    Umbrella Facility - Tokyo


    Toshiko made a silent count as she handed the carbines across to the Umbrella troopers, and noted a healthy supply of them wanting arms when she hit the twenties.

    “Right, we need to go. You guys can take over.” Hand-signalling to Harte, she squeezed between the troops to reach the corridor, checking over her shoulder to ensure Baille was following.

    In the clear, the Anglo-Japanese woman moved down the corridor to a quieter spot, and raised her wrist so she could speak into her VM. “Kate. Tosh. We saw you leave.”

    I’m on the Garage Level.” Tosh frowned in concern; she could hear machine gun fire in the background. “Up here to get some intel on the threat. You two going for the hangar?

    Baille arrived next to her and crossed her arms as she regarded her.

    “Yeah. Had enough of handing guns out.”

    The little computer girl said it’s in the North Wing, five levels above us.

    Tosh’s eyes flicked to Baille as she mouthed, What little computer girl? at her.

    “Copy that. Did she say where the shooting range was?”

    Right next door to the armoury.” Kate’s voice advised. “The intruders seem to be a pair of women in black full-body stockings. Armed with swords and shiruken. Throwing stars. The Umbrella guards cannot seem to land a hit on them.

    “Thanks, Kate.”

    Baille uncrossed her arms and wandered down the corridor, away from the troops lining up to enter the armoury, their black fatigues contrasting with the sterile white corridors as much as the girls had.

    She checked the walls and doors, then her gaze alighted on a rectangular strip of glass from waist-height to over head height, stretch a hundred metres along the left wall, following it’s left curve.

    Through the transparency, she could see several side-by-side alcoves, with ear-protectors on a hook, a clutch for a handgun, and several metres down-range, some paper or cardboard targets, black silhouettes of armed figures, and red and black concentric circles to help the aim.

    ****
    Stairwell

    To the youngster’s sulky annoyance, which secretly pleased Toshiko, they were eschuing the lifts.

    “But its five floors,” Baille moaned dramatically, sides of her mouth turned down as she comically dragged her feet the few metres from the shiny, new-looking lift doors. She was already wearing her headphones, the black half-spheres connected by a black plastic band over her scalp.
    The nifty device would protect her from being deafened by a weapon discharged indoors, while still allowing Sato to chat to her.

    “Didn’t you hear those sounds?” Tosh asked, stopping by the door that led to the stairs. “A lot of things being thrown about up there.”

    She swung the P90 so that it was suspended out of the way behind her, drew her Sig’ handgun, and used her free hand to pull open the door, which refused to open as quickly as she pulled, as if reluctant to give up access to the stairs.

    She poked her gun into the darkness beyond, but like inside the armoury, sensors detected the movement, and flickered on the lights, illuminating stark concrete stairs, some white painted lines to break up the monotony, and each safety railing was a set of diagonal triple metal bar set that went up to the narrow intersection. .

    Using her foot to hold the door open, Tosh got a double-handed grip on her weapon, aiming it first, up the stairs, then down.
    “I cannot believe this place goes down even further.” She dropped one hand from her gun, and pointed her index finger into the darkness down there. “Keep us covered against anything coming up from below.”

    Harte was already custodian of two extra headphones taken from the shooting range, these riding in the bend of her left elbow, though now they slid down her forearm to her wrist as she dropped her hand to her thigh holster and un-velcroed her sidearm.

    “I’ve not held a gun in months,” Baille announced, more to herself than to an audience, “My Dad would freak if he could see me now.”
    Her right fist aimed her gun over the top railing down into the dark, while her left held onto the railing to help guide and secure her while she stepped backwards up after Tosh, who in turn, reached back from two steps up, and pulled one of the spare headphones off Harte’s wrist, sliding it one-handed over her hair until she could settle both cups in place over her ears.

    Toshiko resumed her double-handed grip on her Sig, aimed it up the stairwell, and proceeded up cautiously, one step at a time.

    After several steps, she looked back to check the young woman's progress.

    "Walk up the steps properly, otherwise you will be here all night."

    "How am I supposed to do that, and cover our back at the same time?"

    Tosh sighed. "Alright, you take the lead, making sure to stop on the fifth floor up." She paused while Harte stepped up. "I'll take care of the confusing walking and chewing gum at the same time, malarkey. Hold on." Toshiko placed a hand on the other's arm as she drew level. "Any experience clearing stairwells?"

    Baille shrugged, looking up the stairs. "Swoop in low enough with a fighter, you can clear a lot of things, rooftops, stairwells, bowels..."

    "Thank you for the lovely image. What did you used to fly?"

    "Super Etendardes"

    "Really?" Toshiko glanced at the former pilot, surprised. She bad not heard of them since the Falklands Conflict between Britain and Argentina. "Didn't think any of those things were still flying."

    Baille had been taught to give that answer if asked what she flew, and to answer in the affirmative if the follow-up question involved the word "French" in it, but this second comment did not, so she remained quiet.

    "When flying, you have to continue moving forward, to avoid your engine stalling. You can be threatened from literally any angle, from underneath, behind, ahead, the sides. But here, you can stop. Stand still. And you have to check your angles of threat, so apart from where you are looking now, where can you get shot from? "

    She watched her student turn her head up and to the right, and point up to the top of the stairs above and behind them.

    "Good girl!" Tosh smiled. "Now rather than going up to the corner and turning to cover that part, you need to do it from here, so each step that you go up, affords you a better angle of view. Okay, take us up to the next level."

    To be continued...
     
  4. Sith-I-5

    Sith-I-5 Force Ghost star 6

    Registered:
    Aug 14, 2002
    Umbrella Facility - Tokyo


    Kate Todd had discovered that she could still scream like a little girl, if someone picked up twelve jeeps with their mind and tossed them at her.

    Frag this! She had hidden round the back of a concrete pillar, hunkered down in the L between the pillar and the floor as a black Umbrella-logo’d jeep skidded upside-down and crashed into the grey wall opposite her at the back of the garage.

    Planting a palm on the floor to lever herself up, with the other hand hold her Sig, she fled headlong towards the glass-walled open plan office suite she had spotted earlier, full of empty desks, cupboards, etc.

    Granted it was underground, but for all the internal space between the Armoury and this level, the office area did look very 1970s with it’s close desks, and dim lighting.

    Not at all like NCIS’ Major Case office space at Norfolk naval yards in Washington D.C.
    Maybe she had been spoiled by her time there.

    She stalked down the grey-carpeted aisle between the rows of metal desks, looking about for somewhere to hide.

    She could hear muffled automatic gunfire and masculine sounding shrieks in her wake. The gunfire was getting louder, which meant the invaders were coming this way.

    Of course they are. She thought resignedly, approaching a floor to ceiling glass wall at the far end of the office space, and stopping at it, placed one hand against it while she looked through.

    It looked over a deep glass-walled abyss of that looked like floors and floors of similar office spaces.

    “A lot of effort to make drokking umbrellas.” She turned from the window and looked back at the secretarial-type furniture. She must have gotten turned around, unless there really was no way out apart from the one entrance she had entered by. “Japanese fire regulations must be pretty lax.”

    Kate frowned to herself, considering that her comment about the effort to make umbrellas; she should have had a related thought earlier about the armoury. A lot of arms to guard the umbrella-making process.

    The audible burst of automatic gunfire echoing somewhere, galvanised Kate into action, her circle skirt swishing at her knees as she beelined towards a tan, wooden cabinet about her height, with double doors.

    A grey metal plaque adhered to one door, bore the Umbrella logo, a circle cut into four white and four red slices, as well as a row of Japanese brushstroke lettering, with the word ‘Stationery’ underneath.

    She did not know if the two languages were duplicating the word, or if the calligraphy was saying ‘Bloody Expensive’, so that the whole thing was identifying its contents as ‘Bloody Expensive Stationery’.

    Kate holstered her Sig, and used both hands to pull both doors open and wide.

    Three metal racks held cardboard files and digital discs in square plastic cases.

    She ignored the top shelf, and grabbed armfuls of files from the lowest two, tottered them over to the nearest desk and slapped them down on the surface, ignoring if they started sliding and cascading.

    “Sorry ‘bout the mess, but this is survival, not bleeding Jenga.” She muttered, stealing anxious glances towards the direction the sounds of fighting and dying were coming from, and went back for more crap.

    Once the shelves were cleared, she leaned into the cabinets, examing the shelves’ left and right edges and their corners, lifted them a couple inches of their hooks, carefully dropped one end to angle them diagonally compared to the doorway, and pulled them out, thus creating a hopefully safe spot for herself beneath the remaining shelf.

    The DANL agent pulled one door closed, stepped into and sat down on the base of the interior, pausing to brace herself against the side while she tucked her skirt under herself.
    She then leaned out and tried to pull the second door shut, but the best she could do was to the width of her fingers.

    Well, it would have to do.

    Five minutes later, the office suite was filled with the cacophony of gunfire and breaking glass, the two leotarded women with hair pulled severely back, twins from the glimpse that Kate got through her thin viewpoint, ran through the space while firing back with SMGs – sub-machine guns – in both hands, back towards presumably the Umbrella troops.

    They took cover behind concrete pillars, which instantly got pockmarked and cratered by heavy calibre bullet hits.

    Despite all the gunplay, no stray rounds hit Kate’s hiding place, she was pleasantly relieved to note.

    Then she noted metallic sounds, and spotted two cylindrical black and metal objects, small enough to fit into a fist, bouncing across the floor, left to right.

    The firing paused.

    KA-BOOM!!

    The door slammed on her, plunging her into darkness as the cabinet rocket backwards under the pressure of the explosion, the agent praying it didn’t rock forwards as well, for if it fell on its front, she would be trapped in the cabinet!

    She did not hear much after that, her ears ringing like she had been too close to the speakers at a music festival.

    ****
    Executive Hangar – North Wing

    Toshiko Sato and Baille Harte had made it up the five stair levels, and following maps on the walls, had worked out that the general installation layout was a main central area spanning dozens of floors, with the girth of a traditional tower block, and eight outlying areas, featuring habitation, entertainment, hydroponics, research, and yes, hangars.

    Both women, guns drawn and waved up and down the sterile corridors, reached the short fifty metre ante-hall, for some reason the walls, floor and ceiling, as well as the sealed square doorway, four metres high and wide, that they were walking towards, were in matt black.

    Tosh stopped and looked up at the red DO NOT ENTER sign slapped across the door.

    “Mm.” She mused, glancing at the subtle lighting near the doorway. She stepped to the wall, and used her fingernails to start prising a panel cover free. “Baille, keep an eye out. I’ll run a bypass.”

    “Right.” Harte acknowledged, taking two steps back to the corridor, which provided most of the light they were working with, then, “Oh, is this the little computer girl, Todd mentioned?”

    Toshiko glanced over from her work, seeing the blue holographic child back again. “Yes, that’s her. The Blue Queen.”

    The girl looked up at Baille. “Hello. Pleased to meet you.” Before the younger agent could respond, the holograph snapped her head round to face Toshiko. “Might I ask what you are doing?

    “Trying to get in here. From our briefing, remember.”

    I told your friend, North-East section. This is the North section. Not the same thing at all. I really would not recommend opening the door.

    Tosh stepped back from the wall, and gave the girl her full attention. “What is so important? Not one of your bio-weapon experiments.”

    The child looked serene. “Someone tried to fly out with a drugged Licker, and the beast woke up way too soon. I was able to seal it inside the hangar before it could get into the rest of the base.

    Toshiko looked horrified, but recovered quickly, announcing with to much enthusiasm, “SOOO, North East, you say.” She stepped to the wall, and eased the panel cover back into place, making sure it was flush.

    Baille, who was still standing beside the Blue Queen, protested, “Hold on, I want to see!”

    Tosh walked out past her. “No you don’t.”

    “Really, I do.”

    “No you don’t.” Toshiko stepped out into the corridor, looked left, then right, then disappeared to the right.

    To be continued…
     
  5. metophlus

    metophlus Jedi Padawan star 2

    Registered:
    Jun 30, 2015
    Fascinating concept. Did I-5 resurrect them? Fake their deaths for them? Where is the "wherever" they normally reside? A lot of pressing questions pop into the reader's mind instantly, but I'm sure those will be answered later. My theory is that the VMs work like miniature TARDIS's, as in teleporting wearers to different timelines.

    *searches 'vortex manipulator' on Google*

    Not to brag or anything, but... yeah. >=D

    The Charlie's Angels homage to the whole thing is cute. Tosh and Kate seem to have similar personalities so far, or at least senses of humor. Tosh is more knowledgeable about the outlandish than the other two. Kate running off to follow the holo-girl's intel suggests she's the independent type (I've read a bit of chapter two, mind you). Given Baille's demeanor here, maybe it would be a little hard not to treat her like a kid.

    The story so far has strong characters and a gripping, mysterious plot. Now on to my complaint:

    You went overboard with screen-time devoted to fashion. And some of the descriptions, as in the bolded above, kinda lost me. Please don't make me search for obscure outfits or designers.

    Needs reworded.

    She finger-checked the masses of available handguns and found a Sig-Sauer P226R that was near to, if not the same as, the kind she would have used as an NCIS - Naval Criminal Investigative Service - agent.

    I'll r/r the next entry soon! Good stuff!
     
  6. Sith-I-5

    Sith-I-5 Force Ghost star 6

    Registered:
    Aug 14, 2002
    metophlus

    Many thanks for reviewing. I will amend the fashion issue over the next couple days.

    I had missed the Charlies Angel's element, and I should try to bring Kate's personality more into it, so she is not so similar to Tosh.
     
  7. Sith-I-5

    Sith-I-5 Force Ghost star 6

    Registered:
    Aug 14, 2002
    Umbrella Facility - Tokyo - inside a stationery cabinet


    Kate squealed in surprise as I-5's voice spoke up out of the darkness!

    "Sorry about this, but I am taking you away from these two. Another mission has come up."

    "What mission?" She whispered in the claustrophobic dark of the cabinet, her back against the wood backing, and threatening to bow it out.

    "I'm sending you to a seabound castle. A elderly-looking fellow called the Doctor is trying to punch through a twenty-foot thick diamond wall before he is hunted down and killed by a malevolent entity."

    "And you are sending me there?"

    "Far as I can tell, it won't harm you. I expect it is keyed to the Doctor's DNA or something."

    Kate scowled. "You are not exactly filling me with confidence here!"

    The voice fell silent, but the space around her gradually brightened, too fast and too bright to be the cabinet doors being pulled open, and then it was so bright that she had to squeeze her eyes shut to protect them, but after a while could see the pink blush of light permeating through her eyelids, a chill wind washing over bare arms and legs, and a sense that she was outside rather than in.

    She cracked open her eyes, cautiously looking around to find herself alone, sitting crosslegged on a slightly sloping lip of grey rock, which went down to the rippling dark water of a man-made lake.

    Around the lake were the grey-tan blocks of stone that formed a massive sea fort that stretched up as her gaze followed their upward progress.

    Kate uncrossed her legs and stretched them out before her, rubbing at her biceps with her hands, trying to get some warmth into them.

    Looking round, she could see, beside her, a neatly folded pile of some unfamiliar grey material, that when lifted up, proved to be a lilac and grey drysuit for diving, with a diagonal zipper from the left shoulder to the right hip. There was a valve of some sort in the centre of the chest, and a DUI logo on the right arm.

    Also sharing the bit of rock with her, was a big bag of self-raising flour and a set of black flippers, a set of black rubber gloves, and black string net.

    Unless she was sorely mistaken, the assignment that I-5 had for her, was going to involve her putting that lot on, and diving into the water for some reason that she would a net to facilitate.

    The flour...perhaps it was to help her get the drysuit on.

    Kate had learned a lot from talking to Abby, the Goth girl at NCIS at the, the Navy Yards.

    The agent frowned. She could not, for the life of her, remember name of the Navy Yards that she used to work at. Had it been Bethesda? There had been a hospital by that name, nearby.

    Several dozen metres ahead of her, a wooden stool fell out of the sky, and hit the water with a medium-sized geyser of water!

    She looked over to it. What the-?

    A person fell out of the sky and sploshed loudly and violently into the water.

    The water calmed fairly quickly, while Agent Todd stood anxiously waiting for the man to surface.
    When it became clear that he was not, she kicked off her shoes, or at least tried to. "Dammit." She dropped to one knee, unzipped one then the other, then dove in after him, quickly zeroing in on the vertically floating form, several metres below the surface.




    Umbrella Facility - Tokyo


    For her part, Baille Harte had dallied too long at the sealed doorway to the North Wing helipad, and retracing her steps back to the stairwell, discovered that she had lost sight of Toshiko.

    She trotted down several flights of the claustrophobic concrete stairs, and pushed open a non-descript door to....the outside!

    "But that can't be!" The young pilot muttered to herself, a cold breeze batting at the front and back flaps of her dress as she stared up at garish and gaudily-colored illuminated signs on tall, otherwise dark buildings that stretched up in vain to a night sky.

    She had been given the impression that the facility was subterranean, meaning that by rights, she should have to go up several levels, to exit the Umbrella facility, instead of going down as she had just done.

    The thoroughfare that she stood on, came right up to the foor that she had come through, no apparent sidewalk or pavement for pedestrians, and the main road, which was all she could see at present, was choked with vehicles of unknown description.

    Interesting. The speeder manufacturers of this world had fitted the sides and undersides of their ground vehicles with circular buffers, so if the repulsors gave out, they would not scrape and damage their undersides on the ground. Neato idea.

    Yellow vehicles, unfamiliarly lettered signs on their roofs, police speeders, multi-passenger hoverbuses, cluttered the highway, but it would be relatively easy to walk down the centre of the road between the parallel lines of vehicles, or, a bit tighter, to hug the sides of the building.

    Despite her findings, she chose the latter approach, hoping that if she stayed on the outside wall of the Umbrella building, she would eventually come across the lobby at the front.

    Harte started shuffling sideways alongside the dark wall, right hand pinching the lower front of her dress to prevent it snagging on the side or bumpers of the parked vehicles, almost a constant job.

    kkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkk

    She heard the dragging sound, like something scrapping on ferrocrete, in the distance.

    A dozen pencil-thin beams of blue light played over the yellow roof of the taxi cab that she was shuffling past, creating a kneeling image of the little holographic girl she had seen earlier, from lined bare knees under the ruffled hem of her nightdress, up to her blue-blonde tresses and her anguished face.

    "Get out, get out, you cannot be in here." The Blue Queen implored the moment her image completed.

    "In here?" Baille echoed, looking up at her. "So I'm not outside?"

    "This is the testing facility, deep in the lower levels."

    She looked away from the holograph as she got distracted again by the kkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkk scraping sound, which sounded like it was getting closer, "What the hell is that sound?"

    "Your presence has triggered activation of the Bio Hazard."

    Now the youthful redhead gave the holo her full attention. "Biohazard? Do I need a breath mask?"

    "No! You need to run. Try to get to the other end of the chamber. And get out into the open where you can manouevre better!"

    Most of the response was lost on Baille, who was thinking about the threat being some sort of biological or chaemical agent, but the Blue Queen's assertion that she should be in a position to move around better, struck a chord.

    There was clearly a physical threat here.

    KKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKK

    Whatever it was, was louder now, and that meant it was closer.

    Three steps brought the young woman level with the taxi's bonnet, and she pulled herself backwards onto it, lifting her legs up and swinging them round 180 degrees so that she could slide on her bum down to stand on the vehicle's road side, rather than face the wall.

    [​IMG]

    Baille sees the Axeman

    Then she saw it, to her right, several car lengths away, a tall humanoid...or she assumed it was humanoid, dragging a huge, long-handled, frag-off axe behind it.

    She froze, her breath stopped in mid-inhalation, for the thing had not yet noticed either her or the glowing hologram.

    Baille resisted the urge to call, "Cooiee" though to be fair, it wasn't that much of an urge.

    * * * *

    Umbrella Facility - Tokyo


    Toshiko Sato, creeping along the sides of corridors, and studiously avoiding conflicts and groupings of Umbrella staff, which were the invaders' only targets of opportunity, found her way to the Northern Wing, and looking round the corner into the octagonal vestibule, nipped inside to get to work on the security lock with the small multi-tools and equipment secreted into the lining or pouches on her outfit.

    The security door slid silently aside, the dark space now revealed brightening as out-of-sight lights started to flick on, humming distantly.

    She set the controls to re-close the door after her, so as not to rouse the suspicions of whoever came to this place whilst she was inside.

    She skipped forwards and turned her body to let her, already snug within the tight bodice of her little black dress, get through the shrinking gap before it sealed and clicked home.

    Tosh looked around to see the slope-fronted matt-black Bell-Boeing V-22 Osprey, or in her non-plane spotter parlance, "jetcopter", that dominated the cube-like hangar, the ceiling far above her.
    Shaped like a military transport helicopter without the main overhead rotors, it instead had smaller props on the stubby wings which could be aimed either forward or up to give the craft a VTOL (vertical take-off and landing) capability.

    Well, the 'copter was not her primary objective, so she turned to scan the blank white walls for some sign of the bomb that I-5 had advised would be there, and her gaze quickly alighted on a pink square consisting of a package about head height, a T-shaped lever of the type that she imagined would be used alot on marine vehicles, and an LCD (liquid crystal display) counter.

    "Gotcha." She muttered to herself, stepping over to the wall device.

    Pulling the handle a couple inches towards her, then after a brief experiment, turning it ninety degrees clock-wise, was enough to release what she took to be the explosive device, into her cupped palm, and she turned to carry it quickly but carefully over to the jetcopter, gratified to find it already open, a bi-valved hatch with boarding steps on the lower part, and part of the fuselage on the upper part.

    She laid the bomb package carefully on the top step and unslung the compact P-90 PDW (personal defense weapon), sliding the black strap down her arm to bring the weapon to bear. It was a solid black block of moulded plastic, with a thin nozzle at the business end. None of the sticky out bits that normal carbines had.

    She and Baille had been interrupted in the Armoury before she could get the pistol that she would prefer to be checking the aircraft with, so she was stuck this Belgian death-dealer.

    Careful not to kick the bomb off the steps, the former Torchwood operative's shoes tapped audibly on the metal rungs as she ducked inside the craft and found herself in a long, empty-looking fuselage with the pair of flight seats to her right, facing the pilot controls.

    Toshiko quickly aimed the weapon towards the empty cockpit, then arced her gun arm down towards the floor, then up at tail end of the fuselage; managing that all with the minimum of movement.

    Empty.

    Satisfied that she was alone, she put the strap back over her shoulder, and turned back to the bomb.

    "Now." She muttered. "Where to hide this."

    Opposite her, a curtain of webbing - a "net" formed of wide strips of black rubber - secured several boxes and bundles of fabric to the bulkhead, to stop them flying about the place if the aircraft rolled or hit turbulence. It looked like the perfect place to stuff this thing.

    It had been clear from the briefing that whomever flew this craft next, should not expect the device to be aboard.

    The muffled sound of automatic gunfire spurred her to step towards the webbing and stick her hands through it to clear a space in the luggage to insert the bomb.
    If the fighting was getting closer, then that increased the chances of the pilot deciding to evac on this thing, and discovering her.

    She thought of Baille, who ought to be here covering her back. Where is that child?

    That thought was quickly followed by, Frag it, why not comm her? She lifted her left wrist up to speak into the microphone on the leather-strapped vortex manipulator. "Baille? This is Tosh. Where are you?"

    The response from the girl was worrying. "Shhhh! Can't talk. No idea where I am, but when I lost you, and went back down the stairs, I went through a door, and I seem to be outside at night. Roads, buildings, abandoned vehicles."

    Toshiko wiped her hand down her face as she turned on the spot in the middle of the empty fuselage. She had an idea where the girl was from her description. "Uh, I think you are in a test facility."

    "A test facility? What the frag could they be testing? Staff's night vision?"

    "L-look, just be careful of any large non-human lifeforms wandering through the place. I will wrap it up at this end, and try to get to you." She winced at a crashing sound in the background of wherever the girl was. "Baille, honey? You still there?"

    "I gotta go! It's seen me!" The line went dead.

    The former Torchwood member was not happy. If she was not already aboard the jetcopter that was the whole focus on this mission, she would blow it off to go help the team's third member. She turned to the bulkhead webbing and stuck her hands through the spaces, snapping open the latches of the green plastic medical kit that she had found beyond it.

    She grasped a fistful of sealed plasters and dressings and pulled that through the rectangular space between the criss-cross of strips, and with the other hand, negotiated the bomb through, getting the edges past the fairly rigid strips, and inside the box, the lid closing on the back of her open hand, resisting with a sort of overbite as she tried to retrieve it.

    "Damn it." She really did not need this. What she needed was a third hand, but without an unscrupulous limb surgeon who could work to an impossible deadline, the next best thing would be to free up her right hand, but the pilot would likely notice a spill of medical supplies across his aircraft, and investigate.

    Scowling, the Anglo-Japanese woman stuffed the handful down her decolletage, the paper and plastic squares scratching at the sensitive flesh on the insides of her breasts. Lucky that I-5 hadn't put her in an outfit that hugged her throat.

    She used her free hand to release her left hand from the medikit, latched it shut, her gaze snapping to the vortex manipulator on her left wrist at the single urgent bleep from it, which was to indicate that someone was at the hangar's door lock!
    She had used her skill to link the wrist device to the security device enough that she would get a heads up!

    Tosh snatched her hands free of the webbing, whirled back to the opening and jumped the four steps down to the hangar floor, dropped to her knees and fell onto her forearms and tummy, and rolled under the Osprey's belly out of sight to the other side, the P-90 loud as it knocked against the floor. Her pistol was safe, strapped to the inside of her thigh, but she could do nothing about the PDW on the shoulder strap.

    She lay still, hoping that whomever came in, did not bother to encircle the aircraft, checking the outside fittings like a sensible pilot with all the time in the world.

    It was no problem for her to roll back under the craft, away from whichever side he or she was on; she could do that till the cows came home. But she could not do it quietly.

    Left cheek to the cool floor, she could see under the craft, enough to spy black shoes and slacks striding purposely up to the craft, and straight up the steps into it, and then, all she could do was lie still as the fin turbines for the upward-facing prop blades began to whine into life, the rotors slowly turning, each casting a thin line of grey over her and the deck, thanks to the powerful lumis far above them.

    Soon after, she heard a gaggle of female voices entering the hangar, and could see their polished black boots under the chopper.

    They stopped well short of the aircraft, but her puzzlement was short-lived, as the deafening chatter of automatic sub-machine gun fire and the plink plink plink plink of ricochets told her that these were probably the invaders of the underground base.

    The jetcopter motors rose to as crescendo, not quite downing out the weapons fire, and the Osprey's wheels lifted gently from the deck, quickly rising into the air above her, the cold downdraft from the props whipping the hem of her dress her dress against the back of her thighs, and battering at her head and shoulder-blades, as well as pressing her hard into the floor.

    Toshiko made the hard decision to try to evac the situation, getting her right hand to the wrist device, and pressing the emergency beam out button.

    She and the others had not been overly keen on their first DANL missions, so had tried pressing it in the first instance, only to discover that there was often a mission-sensitive aspect to it working.

    Primary or Seconday objectives had to have been achieved first, for the button to work. She should be good here, for she had achieved what they were sent here to do.

    The world disappeared around her, fading to white, and the frigid hurricane battering her ceased.

    "Are you alright, Tosh?" Owen's welcome voice said urgently into her ear, and she could feel that she now lay on her back, on a softer surface than the hangar deck. "Say something!"

    "Something." She obliged with a murmur, opening her eyes.

    Owen Harper, her fellow operative and unrequited love from Torchwood, and a DANL agent with her, knelt beside her, whilst standing over them, but behind Owen, the Danny Hunter, formerly of Britain's Security Service, MI5, watched on.

    She looked away from Owen, at the by now familiar low flat ceiling, and curve-edged, functional furniture and equipment in off-whites and few primary colours.

    She was back in Main Mission, the operating centre of Moonbase Alpha, their home base since being resurrected.

    Her eyes rolled back to Owen, and she managed a gentle smile. "Hey."

    "Where did she go?" She heard Danny ask.

    "I'm right here, you know." Toshiko reminded testily, experimenting with sitting up, and groaning with the exertion. "Kate, Baille and I were at an underground Umbrella Corporation facility in Tokyo-"

    "Whose Bail?" The boys enquired together.

    Tosh yawned and rubbed at her eyes. "Young girl...woman really, straggly red hair. Said she used to be a fighter pilot. I-5 had her there alongside Kate and I. We got separated." She looked from Owen to Danny. "Are they here?"

    Danny had his arms crossed, and wore an olive-green sweater with crumpled blue jeans. "They are certainly not in Main Mission."

    Owen, in a light blue chunky jumper, turned on his haunches to glance up to Danny. "It is a big base. If they are here, they could be anywhere."

    [​IMG]




    Umbrella Facility - Tokyo


    KKKKKKKKKKkkkkkkkkk

    The sound of that giant axe-cum-meat pulveriser scraping along the roadway diminished as the huge humanoid trudged ponderously up the road, having not detected her standing beside the police car.

    The irony was not lost on her. For all her recent efforts to side-step being treated like a kid, the 'Statue" game that she played as a little girl, had probably saved her butt just now.

    What in the- She stopped herself in time, less the Thought Police that I-5 had warned her about, were listening in. Even if the disembodied voice was being paranoid, a deal was a deal. She had an emotion to vent, even if it was in the confines of her mind, so she tried again. What in...Umbrella's Name, is that thing?

    She smiled at that. She could say it around Dad, and he would have no idea what she was talking about. So even when she was stuck around him - every day basically - she would have something she could feel was her own.

    The being was a biped, two arms and two legs, wrapped in chocolate brown coverall, calf boots, and a tall person's weathered leather apron. Most disturbing of all, a cloth sack over its head appeared to have been nail-gunned to its skull.

    How it was still alive, let alone able to see, was a complete mystery to her.

    She literally had a heart attack when Toshiko's voice burst loudly out of the communicator on her wrist: "Baille? This is Tosh. Where are you?"

    Harte's eyes were as wide as they could go, as she scrambled round the back of the police car, squatting down between its rear bumper and the dented chrome front one of the parked vehicle behind it. She brought up her wrist, lifted the palm that she had cupped over the vortex manipulator, and whispered harshly, "Shhhh! Can't talk. No idea where I am, but when I lost you, and went back down the stairs, I went through a door, and I seem to be outside at night. Roads, buildings, abandoned vehicles." She was amazed that she had managed to impart all that detail. She had only meant to shush the caller.

    "Uh, I think you are in a test facility."

    Baille brushed some hair that was drooping onto the device, back over her right ear, and stared at it's simple layout. "A test facility?" She echoed. "What the frag could they be testing? Staff's night vision?"

    The girl realised that she had not heard the axe scrape for a while, and while she could no longer had line of sight on its owner, she instinctively felt that it would be a good idea to-

    CRRROOOOOSSSSHHHHH!!!!

    Glase and shrapnel rained down over her head and shoulders as the deadly crescent blade scythed over her head, having emerged catastrophically from the back of the patrol car's cab, and chunked into the windscreen of the car to her right.

    She shot out of her space horizontally, landing on hands and knees in the middle of the road, letting momentum take her across as her attacker tried to free his axe from the crumpled metal and glase holding onto it!

    The pilot veered hard left at the last moment before she attempted to jump through the vehicles on the other side of the road, recognising that that would slow her down!

    "I gotta go! It's seen me!" She screamed, hoping that that was loud enough to be heard by the vortex manipulator's voice pickup, even though she was too busy sprinting up the middle of the nocturnal street to bring it up to her mouth.

    She took the chance of taking a quick look over her shoulder.

    The thing was coming, and goodness, it had such long strides.

    She turned back, and kept going, putting on an extra burst of speed, glad that she had been outfitted in such flat footwear. She'd have twisted an ankle and skidded headfirst into a parked speeder if she had been wearing those heeled boots that Kate had on.

    A wide crossroads looked up ahead of her, an 'X' of black-and-white stripes bridging the space between the four pavements.

    Baille Harte veered another left, and risked a glance back to the Axeman, just in time to spot a glint of multi-coloured lights hitting the airborne weapon spinning towards her at head height. Pure reaction, she ducked beneath it, the action unbalancing her forward progress as her world, at that point, basically the two-lane blacktop, her knees and shoes, and the lower flanks of what vehicles appeared momentarily in her peripheral vision, faded to white.

    She ducked headlong into something, the impact sprawling her onto her back, the surface burning her bottom through the back of her dress, but she did not stop, did not pause, rolling to her side and pushing one-handed against the bunk-bed to get herself upright-

    She did a double-take, noting the blue quilts of her bunk-bed, and that she was back in the starship cabin that served as her bedroom!

    Held breath exhaled though her mouth, and she drew in a relieved and ragged breath that hurt her throat to do, and went to her just adopted exclamation: What in Umbrella's name?

    "Baille, Honey?" The male voice, too much bass to possibly come from the person that had adopted her, intruded into her sanctum from the discrete baby monitor in the corner. "Have you fallen out of bed again?"

    Hearing her Dad's voice panicked her, lest he find her dressed! She was supposed to be in bed, asleep, not gallivanting through alternate realities with Tosh and Kate! And her thoughts were using entirely too many exclamation marks!
    Besides, what did he mean, again? She wondered angrily as shaking fingers fought to undo the armpit-to-neckline fastenings on the front of her cheongsam. She had never fallen out of bed. She had to say something, otherwise he would come down to investigate. "No, something dropped when I crossed the room."

    "Really? Did you turn up the gravity in there? That sounded like an asteroid strike."

    Harte pulled the silken ebony frock over her head, rolled it into a fat cigar, and frantically stuffed it and her hearing protectors into one of her drawers under her day clothes, then turned to snatch the knee-length white tee that she had gone to bed in from reached under her pillow, thrusting her head and arms up inside.

    "But you're okay though?" The voice continued.

    "I-I'm fine, D-dad. No need to come down. I'm climbing back into bed as we speak."

    "You sound out of breath, Sweetheart." The disembodied voice observed. "Have you got a boy in there?"

    The unexpected interrogative was so out there that she stopped, the t-shirt mostly on, the white cloth contoured against her face as that was as far as she had gotten.
    She looked blindly in the direction of the monitor. "Where...where would I find a boy? What sort of question is that?"

    "Alright, not my finest hour. It's just that I cannot imagine what you could be doing in bed to make you breathless. Goodnight."

    "Goodnight, Dad." Baille prompted, hoping to bring the exchange to an end. She continued changing, getting her head through, and pulling the t-shirt down past her torso and hips.
    Her adoptive parent treated her like she was eight; he probably couldn't imagine what she could be doing.

    She climbed into the lower bunk, shoes and all, wrapping the quilt over her shoulders. Just in case he was on his way down.

    Her head settled into the pillow and she relaxed in the dim light for several minutes, thinking excitedly of the adventure she had had, even if the last part of it had been gut-wrenchingly terrifying.
    Reminded of the impossible horror of the Axeman, she turned on her side, and curled up into a protective position, knees together.

    "Mm." She murmured softly, not wanting the baby monitor to relay her words up two decks. "Either that's a canoe in my pocket, or I'm still packing heat."

    Reluctantly, she pushed the covers aside and sat up, dangling her shod feet down to the carpet. "And I'm still wearing that vortex manipulator." Something, not pain as such, made her touch her right cheek, and she pulled her hand away to see red wetness on the pad of her forefinger. Her gaze fell upon the pillow. "Aaannnddd, I'm covered in glass."


    [​IMG]

    FIN - end to the Umbrella Intervention
     
    Last edited: Jan 7, 2018
  8. Sith-I-5

    Sith-I-5 Force Ghost star 6

    Registered:
    Aug 14, 2002
    Wine and Dine (also a NSWFF Prompt Entry)​

    Genres: Doctor Who, NCIS, DANL
    Research: How to open and serve a bottle of red wine
    Characters: Kate Todd - female Caucasian agent with shoulder length dark hair. American.
    The 12th Doctor - male Caucasian Time Lord. Slim, grey hair, cranky.


    Kate Todd sat at the rough-surfaced wooden table in the isolated sea fort, looking at the empty chair on the other side of the rectangular bit of furniture.

    This was a strange and exhausting assignment, diving for bleached skulls in the central water inside the castle, bringing to the abbreviated stone ramp, and ferrying them up to the tower which contained a crystalline barrier that the sometimes cantankerous, elderly fellow known as the Doctor, had taken to trying to punch, bare-knuckled, mind, through.

    Her Boss, I-5, felt that slightly better, less painful, progress could be made if the Time Lord was able to use the pile of skulls that were piled at the base of the fort, instead of his bare knuckles, though as far as she could see, if the material making up the barrier was harder than diamond by several magnitudes, bare fist or using a skull, you were not getting through.

    She had been pulled out of a multi-person DANL (Dead Agents, New Lives) operation at the Umbrella Corporation's Tokyo facility, and the two bottles of red and white wine that she was able to procure with the boxes of warm pizza, were stamped with the red-and-black Umbrella logo.

    Sometimes she ate alone; sometimes the Doctor joined her, leading the hooded Claw Thing to the far end of the castle then scampering back here to buy himself ninety minutes peace to get a sit-down meal in, and a chat.

    Kate had little idea from day to day whether her dinner mate would be a version of the Time Lord that remembered her, or a new one generated by the wierd-looking chamber elsewhere in the castle.
    Obviously she preferred one who knew her, because they did not need to waste time on his understandably suspicious Q&A (question and answer) sessions.

    The rough wooden door squeaked open, and the man himself rushed in, his expression brightening as his gaze alighted upon her.

    Very slim, grey frock coat and pants, weathered face, and spiky grey hair.

    "Ahh, Caitlin. Still here?"

    She breathed a sigh of relief at the recognition. Any dinner partner was better than having to eat alone, but a partner that still recognised her was a prized event, no matter how often it happened. She didn't even mind that he refused to call her 'Kate'. "Doctor."

    He flipped open the white pizza box, and took a slice, which came out without the melted cheese stretching, a sure sign that it had gone cold.
    The Doctor took a bite and grimaced, although he still chewed on his morsel. He put the slice back in the box, and pulled his sonic screwdriver out from his jacket pocket, gave it a little snap flourish, and aimed the business end down at the meal, the green bulb at the end glowing to a high-pitched sound produced by the metallic device.

    Steam rose from the pizza after a few seconds, the cheese getting shiny and visibly softening.

    The Doctor applied the same action to the other pizza box, and slid it down the table to her, his thick grey eyebrows as he studied her.
    "Why are you wearing that?" His Scottish brogue was most obvious with the 'w' words'.

    The loose-sleeved red number, tied around the waist with gold-threaded rope, wouldn't have been out of place on Maid Marian, she had thought upon discovering it in the wardrobe of her room in the fortress.
    She had subsequently learned from one of his previous selves that his Clara had worn it when they were adventuring with Robin Hood.

    "Far too much banter!" He had groused off the man.

    "We discussed this, Doctor. This is your Confession Dial. It is your mind which supplies the clothes available to me, apart from the black dress that I arrived in, and the drysuit and flippers."

    There was also the white skirt and suit jacket that she had worn at NCIS in Washington D.C., but that was work wear, to her mind, and her work here was carried out in the grey-and-lilac aquatic gear. Off shift, she wanted something comfortable to relax in.

    While he munched away, she rose from her seat, and reached for the wine bottles. "What would you like, this evening?"

    "Well, there isn't really a wine that goes with pizza," He expanded, waving his first slice of pizza at her, "regardless of species or timeframe, so I will go with my usual."

    "Red it is, then."

    "And if you are going to do it, do it properly, Caitlin."

    She stood there and cocked her head at him.

    "Come on, come on. I am on the clock here."

    "Alright." She stepped round the side of the table and carried the red bottle and the corkscrew up to him, then balanced the bottle on her forearm so that he could see the label.

    "Chateau Batailley Grand Cru Classe Pauillac 1955." He crooked his index finger, and laid the outside onto the glass side. "Good. Room temperature."

    "Well, of course it is. There is no fridge around here." She momentarily arched her eyebrows at him.

    The Doctor glanced up at her under his own. "Can't this Boss of yours spring for an icebox?"

    She picked at the dark red paper covering the cork. "There is no rhyme or reason to what he provides."

    She tore off the paper, inserted the corkscrew and expertly uncorked the Umbrella Corp' bottle, practice making perfect, and poured him a decent slug in the long-stemmed wine glass, and put it before him.

    "Thank you."

    "No problem, Doctor." She returned to her chair, and reached for the white wine.

    "Do you want me to chill that?" The Time Lord waggled the sonic.

    "I'm having it with pizza. Why bother?" She opened and poured the golden liquid for herself, before seating and reaching for lukewarm pizza, the cheese stretching as if her slice was making a desperate attempt to stay in the box. "How are you coming with the barrier."

    "I have taken a leaf out of Steve McQueen's Cooler King in that film-"

    "The Great Escape." Kate smiled as she imagined her old NCIS partner, Tony DiNozzo, nodding and smiling at her film knowledge.

    "Yes, precisely." The Doctor finished chewing on his mouthful, then washed it down with some red. "I have tightened the molecular bonding on the skulls to make them considerably harder. I have taken to sitting on a pillow from my room, and chucking the skulls at a particular part of the barrier to wear it down without breaking my knuckles. Enough of the skulls roll back to me that I do not have to get up for quite a while."

    "Well, don't get carried away. You don't want to get trapped in there by the Hooded Claw." She shivered at the thought of the terrifyingly ominous thing. Despite that it had never shown any interest in her, even when she opened fire on it, it still scared the pants off her.

    Her reminder of the thing, killed the conversation, until, he finally stood, wiping his hands on a cloth and dabbing it at the corners of his mouth. "Thank you for the repast, Caitlin. Back to the coal face for me, I am afraid."

    Agent Todd nodded sadly, took a sip of her wine, and watched him go.

    [​IMG]

    Kate and the Doctor in a diner
     
  9. Sith-I-5

    Sith-I-5 Force Ghost star 6

    Registered:
    Aug 14, 2002
    Placeholder
     
    Last edited: Jan 7, 2018
  10. Sith-I-5

    Sith-I-5 Force Ghost star 6

    Registered:
    Aug 14, 2002
    Current - Kate and the Doctor

    Note. This is actually an intro to a larger crossover project that I cannot post here.


    Kate Todd looked up, brightening at the squeal of the rough wooden door opening, seeing the Time Lord scamper across the flagstones, his expression brightening as his gaze alighted upon her.

    "Ahh, Caitlin. Still here?"

    She breathed a sigh of relief at the recognition. "Doctor."

    He paused halfway to the table, catching sight of the fare. Bushy grey eyebrows went up. "You're supervisor is treating us today, isn't he? Are you leaving us, or more specifically, me?"

    She frowned at him. "Doctor?"

    "Oh come now, Caitlin." The Time Lord waved to illustrate his point. "Normally he provides simple stuff, pizzas, fish and chips, sometimes something he picked up at a fast food emporium. But this looks like someone actually took time to prepare it." He touched his crumpled white shirt with a bony finger. "Now, I am nowhere close to making an impression on the barrier, so it is nothing to do with me! And I doubt our hooded friend has a special date red circled on a calendar. So that leaves you." He raised an eyebrow, appraising her. "And it looks like you have found some new clothes."

    It was true. She had returned from her underwater skull collecting to find, in the sea-fort's basement room with the armchair and roaring fire, that I-5 had laundered and pressed her white A-line suit skirt (leaving her hand-washed suit jacket), and paired it with a chunky white knitted long-sleeved jumper, and folded both items over the arms of the armchair.

    [​IMG]

    Twelve and Kate share a meal



    The Doctor approached the table, roving over the patterned porcelain bowls and rectangular plates with an interested eye. A hand plucked a greasy piece of green-brown meat from a bowl, and the Doctor made ah and oh sounds that drew a small smile from her as the burning morsel made its way to his mouth.

    "I'd blow on that, if I were you." She warned, a dubious expression on her face as he popped it into his mouth, initially blowing out of his mouth to remove heat, then chewing rapidly on the meat.

    "Gae King. Stir Fried Lamb with Ginger."

    Kate bounced in her seat as I-5's voice burst up from her lap: "Kate?"

    She brought up the hands that had been sitting in her lap, and laid one forearm on the table edge while the other slid the knitted white sleeve back to reveal her leather-strapped vortex manipulator, the device by which she and her DANL colleagues travelled and communicated with each other, and how they received instructions.

    The Doctor scampered over like a Strider from the Labyrinth fantasy, and bent down so low over the device, that the former NCIS agent had to lean back to avoid a concussion.
    "Is this the Big Man then?" He yelled cordially down into the device' microphone.

    "Kate? Your voice has gone husky all of a sudden-"

    "This is not Kate. As I am sure you very well knoor."

    "Doctor." The disembodied voice acknowledged. "Pleased to finally hear from you. I wish you the best of luck with your endeavours."

    "Thank you. And thank you for all the imported food by the way. Better than what I could scrape up by myself, even given your young lady's assertions that my own mind made all this up. Now," The 12th Doctor continued without pause, "Why are you taking ma Caitlin away?"

    "It's only for a short while Doctor." I-5 assured.

    "Why, only for a short while?" Kate queried, "I don't want to come back here." She glanced up into the Time Lord's ear. "No offense, Doctor."

    He straightened and stepped back a pace, gesticulating as he towered over her once again. "Well, of course you don't want to, Caitlin. It is hardly the Crowne Plaza Changi, is it?"

    "You have enough skulls to be getting on with, Doctor. You won't need Kate here collecting more from the waters for a while. Now Kate, another operation has come up, one that should last a few days, and for which I am bringing your whole team together, along with two other individuals, and some droids."

    "Droids?"

    "Robots."

    "So, you can finish your meal together, before that stuff gets cold. Then collect together your things, both what you brought with you, that I supplied, and that the Doctor's mind put into your wardrobe. Then signal me, and I will beam you to the next location."

    "I'm ready to leave now!"

    "Now do as you are told. And another thing. One of the additions to the new team, will be the one that joined you and Tosh at Umbrella."

    Todd frowned, recalling the childlike redhead who had materialised with them inside a locked armoury within the Umbrella Corporation's Japanese facility. "Baille?"

    "She'll be there with her father, who doesn't know that I am secretly sending her on missions with you."

    "That would explain why she was so excited to be around guns. I was tempted to hand her a Kleenex."

    "I'll be needing you to keep schtum that you recognise her."

    "Schtum?"

    "He wants you to pretend not to know her." The Doctor stepped to the table and slid the two clean dinner plates apart. "I'll be Mother then, shall I?"
     
    Last edited: May 9, 2018
  11. Sith-I-5

    Sith-I-5 Force Ghost star 6

    Registered:
    Aug 14, 2002
    Pending for a future mission #2
     
  12. Sith-I-5

    Sith-I-5 Force Ghost star 6

    Registered:
    Aug 14, 2002
    Pending for future mission #3