[Brig:] Security Announcement

[ten_fwd_npcs]

It's not very often a passenger is taken to Deck 33, and for good reason. Deck 33 is where the brig is located.

Should a passenger make an inquiry to one of the computer terminals, or access the directory on their PADDs, the locations of three passengers will be noted as 'BRIGGED' in bold font, with the following statements:

MACK GERHARDT has been taken into custody for breaking quarantine, entering a restricted area, and engaging in disorderly conduct. He will be brigged for three days assuming he cooperates with the officers in charge.

KHAN NOONIEN SINGH has been taken into custody for disorderly conduct and the assault of another passenger, following an enforced stay in Sickbay. He will be brigged for two days assuming he cooperates with the officers in charge.

DYLAN HUNT has been taken into custody for disorderly conduct and the assault of another passenger, following an enforced stay in Sickbay. He will be brigged for two days assuming he cooperates with the officers in charge.

There are officers standing guard outside the brig, as well as one stationed inside. The men are celled separately by forcefield to prevent further incident, and while it looks and sounds like there is no barrier between their cells and the room at large, there is no crossing-over until the forcefields are lowered. Visitors are allowed entrance after they check in with the guards on duty, and no one is allowed to be alone with the prisoners.


[ooc: Open visiting log for the brig. All security personnel are NPCs and should be treated as there in the background unless they're called on to answer questions or engage with other characters.]

Comments

[whistles_loudly]

Pike wasn't particularly interested in the other member of the fight but he had to walk by Khan's cell to get to the one that held Dylan Hunt. As far as the Admiral was concerned, that part of the story wasn't particularly important right now. He wanted to hear Dylan's side first.

But he did spare the other man a passing glance as he made his way passed. He had no idea that this was the John Harrison who, in a few hours, would cause his end.

[savagemind]

Khan, however, does remember. His gaze sharpens as Pike passes his cell, and finds himself smoothly rising to his feet, hands laced behind his back. The last he had seen of this man had been the green flash of the targeting laser and the squeeze of a trigger - another of Starfleet's power structure removed. And more than that - Marcus's own protege.

It had felt good, at the time. Marcus's family for his own.

"Admiral Pike," he calls, but there's little respect in his tone. "You're looking well."

Better than he had when Khan had finished his attack, for certain. He must predate Daystrom.

[whistles_loudly]

And he knew who Pike was. That was unsettling, probably more than it should be. It reminded him a lot of Nero's greeting on the Enterprise and that wasn't a good thing. But it did cause Pike to actually come to a stop in front of the cell.

"That's about as good as I get and as far as I know, we've never met."

[savagemind]

"We haven't." Not officially, anyway. But Khan is acquainted with Pike by reputation, and Kirk's zealous defense of the man in front of him. Khan cocks his head, not hiding the blatant assessment he's giving the Admiral.

"Admiral Marcus sometimes spoke of you." There's disdain in his words, and Khan makes no attempt to hide it. He'd done his research, knew the names of every officer that would be near enough to respond to the emergency signal. Pike hadn't been a surprise.

[whistles_loudly]

That assessing look continued to make Pike's discomfort worse, but he wasn't about to give any indication that it made him uncomfortable at all. Instead he set his jaw, and responded to the disgust that the other man had for Marcus.

"And how well do you know Marcus?"

To Chris, it made sense that Marcus would talk about him. He and Pike talked at length about his career over the years, and Marcus was one of the men that showed Pike that a planet posting wasn't the end of his career.

[savagemind]

"Better than you do," is all he says in reply. It's true, in some ways: Khan knew more about Marcus's motivations than the man himself was willing to admit. Khan had seen his kind before - desperate for power any way he could have it.

"Unless, of course, you were aware of his little side operation." Unlikely. Oh, he had certainly told the Admiralty that his secret division was producing something - he'd never have been able to introduce Khan's weapons otherwise - but he sincerely doubted that this man knew the full extent of his mentor's ambitions.

[whistles_loudly]

His comment caused Pike to raise an eyebrow, the only indication that something unsettled the Admiral that Pike allowed to show. Pike knew Marcus for over thirty years, so the comment was a little unusual.

"That would entirely depend on the side operation." Pike did, of course, know of Section 31. He had to as the person in charge of Strategic Operations, though he did request to be left out of the loop of any specific activities. But he wasn't at liberty to say he knew of the division, so he planned on choosing his words very carefully for the rest of the conversation.

[savagemind]

"Section 31," Khan replies, not bothering to hide the disgust in his tone. Pale eyes watch the Admiral's expression closely, searching for recognition he already knows he'll find. "You might know the USS Vengeance project better, though that's hardly all I've created for your Starfleet."

All those little modifications that had snuck their way into upgrades for the fleet, all those new 'peacekeeping' weapons that were given to security forces. His torpedoes. His ship. Even their intelligence on the Klingons had come from his missions.

[whistles_loudly]

Pike returned a hard look back at the other man. Section 31 was a rumored division, but he spoke with a certainty Chris only heard other people with the security clearance to know about it use. Which probably meant he was somehow involved.

"I know of Section 31. The specifics were all handled by Admiral Marcus."

Pike knew that something was happening in a shipyard near Jupiter. But, Marcus respected his wishes and kept him out of it until he needed to know about it for sure. Pike often felt, through the hours and hours of meetings that he sat though, that Marcus was more paranoid than Pike ever thought was warranted. Even after Nero.

[savagemind]

Pike's hard look was met with clear skepticism on Khan's part. The Augment restrained the derisive noise he wanted to make, instead shaking his head. "How very convenient."

Sanctioning Section 31 without even knowing their actions, their mission - in a way, it was worse than Pike knowing about the entire operation. Khan offers the man a cold smile, before turning his back on the Admiral, pacing away.

"He never told you what he found in drifting in space, did he? Or how his advancements were coming so very quickly?"

He already knows the answer.

[whistles_loudly]

Pike didn't exactly view it as sanctioning. He thought of it more as tacit (and many times not so tacit) disagreement with Marcus. He used the organization to prepare for war, weapons, ships, and the like.

He knew, despite what the world and the Federation thought, sometimes backroom dealing, under the table deals, and other arrangements needed to be made to win wars and stop devastating consequences. The last thing anyone wanted was something like World War III but on a much grander scale. If a few unorthodox methods needed to be in place to accomplish that goal, well then....

"No, he didn't, but I imagine you do."

[savagemind]

"He found me."

It's not a boast. If anything, it sounds like an accusation. When he turns back to face Pike, there's plain hatred in his eyes, in the curl of his fingers. "Myself and my crew, asleep and adrift."

He stalks forward, eyes narrowed. "Tell me, Admiral, what do you know of John Harrison?"

An abrupt shift in topic, perhaps, but one that was vitally important. It would date the Admiral, give Khan context for their little talk. For what he was going to reveal to the man.

[whistles_loudly]

Pike took the tone of the whole conversation to be an accusation at this point. Obviously, Starfleet and more specifically, Section 31 did something to Khan or someone Khan was close to, and this was his opportunity to remedy that.

But as Khan moved forward, Pike didn't even flinch, though he could use a chair, as he sensed this discussion was going to take quite a while.

"Nothing as far as I know," Marcus may have mentioned a commander by that name in passing, but nothing about it stood out to Pike.

[savagemind]

"Before the archive bombing, then." It's tossed out as an afterthought, Khan clasping his hands behind his back as he surveys the Admiral. It's odd, talking to a dead man. Particularly one that you had killed, personally. And he didn't even know it yet.

Time to remedy that.

"Your friend Marcus has been holding my crew hostage to force my service to Starfleet. The weapons and warships he's been presenting you? Are mine. The intelligence from Qo'noS is mine. Commander John Harrison is a fabrication."

[whistles_loudly]

The whole offhanded comment was strange to Pike. The word bombing was not something anyone should use casually. "The Archive Bombing?" He questioned, "What the hell are you talking about?"

The rest of it took a minute to sink in. Alexander Marcus was basically keeping a hostage. Pike knew the mandate for Section 31, he knew where he got their name, but this was completely uncalled for. Chris planned on letting the 'fabrication' part of all this go for now. He'd come back to that later.

"How many?" Pike was a ship commander for the better part of two decades. If his crew was held hostage by someone, regardless of their state, he'd do everything he could to get them back.

[savagemind]

"Seventy-two." Khan's voice is icy. "All that's left of my family."

His crew was everything. The last of the Augments, his brothers and sisters.. They'd trusted him, and he'd let them into Marcus' hands. Marcus was keeping more than one hostage - he had seventy-two, and one augment captain willing to do anything to keep them safe. Khan doesn't break Pike's gaze.

"In your near future, the Kelvin Memorial Archive in London is going to be destroyed. Marcus is going to tell you all that Commander John Harrison has gone rogue. That he's declared war on the Federation and needs to be put down."

He scoffs. "And all of you will believe him."

[whistles_loudly]

"How many did you start with?" The tone of his voice was one that said he knew what losing crew members was like. Twenty plus years in the captain's chair would do that.

Pike thought back to who would be in a meeting that would take place if something like the Kelvin Archive was destroyed. None of those people, regardless of whether or not Marcus was their superior officer would let that fly and even if the rest of them did, he wouldn't and most likely Jim Kirk wouldn't either.

"So, Marcus lied to us. Or will lie to us," he hated time travel. "And we all believed the lie."

[savagemind]

"He's been lying to you for over a year," Khan replies, finally stepping away from the barrier. There's a defiant tilt to his jaw, a current of ill-hidden rage behind his eyes. He looks ready to snap at any moment, shoulders tensed and spine rigid.

"Marcus used me to prepare for his war. He's been militarizing Starfleet right under your noses, with your approval."

He finally gives in to his need to pace, prowling the edge of the barrier. "We were eighty-five when we left Earth. When Marcus found my ship, seventy-three."

Twelve lost to cryotube failure. They were 20th century technology, ancient by modern standards. It was a miracle that more hadn't been lost, but Khan hadn't had time to grieve for his dead comrades - not with Marcus ready and willing to leash him like a dog.

[whistles_loudly]

Not only had Marcus been lying to Pike and everyone else in Command for over a year, he'd been lying to the entire fleet, which, in turn, made Pike lie to years' worth of Academy Classes while he spewed whatever party line he was given during all of those recruiting speeches. All of it didn't sit right with Pike, and it certainly didn't work with the 'humanitarian and peacekeeping armada' that the 'Fleet made itself out to be.

"Militarizing is one thing. We need to do that with Klingons, Romulans, and whatever the hell else is out there. Something has to protect this part of space. Doing what he did to get it? That's...." he shook his head once "....that's unforgivable."

What's more is, Marcus was a ship commander himself. He knew how most commanders felt about their crew, how they had to feel about their crew to be effective and he exploited all of that.

When Pike spoke again, he was genuinely apologetic, "I'm sorry that you lost them."

[savagemind]

Khan wants none of Pike's apologies; they're worthless to him, and there's no use in apologizing to the dead. Augments have long - and perfect - memories. Khan doesn't forget, and he certainly doesn't forgive. Not where his family is concerned.

"Save your platitudes, Admiral," he growls. "Your Starfleet is responsible for my family's deaths. They survived Marcus's machinations only to be killed by Commander Spock."

Something hollow and dark is eating at his heart, and Khan doesn't care enough any more to even bother to fight it. The smile on his face is humorless, vicious, and his words are doubly so. "So I responded in kind."

By ramming a starship into the rotting edifice of Starfleet's supposed morality.

[whistles_loudly]

Pike didn't view what he said with any sort of insincerity. He was genuinely sorry for the loss of Khan's crew and all of the feelings associated with it.

Chris never thought that Spock was a killer, despite what Khan and Nero said about him. As far as Pike knew, Spock tried to be a good person, not one that murdered people.

But that look made Pike raise his guard again, something about it said he didn't want to know the question that he was about to ask."And how did you do that?"

[savagemind]

"I think you know, Admiral." Because if Khan was willing to attack others here, injured and lashing out over his sudden arrival, what must he be like when he's in full control? When he's just found out his family has been killed?

"I always thought it strange that after an attack - say, a bombing - all of your senior officers would gather in one concentrated area. Daystrom presents a rather tidy target."

All the heads of Starfleet, right there for him to cut down.

[whistles_loudly]

Pike would have been in that meeting, which also meant that if that bombing happened and if that meeting was called, he would be one of the ones that was attacked.

If he was at 100% the likelihood that he'd get out of a fish in a barrel situation such as that would be decent enough, but since he wasn't, well he could fill in what probably happened to him.

"That wouldn't mean you won."

[savagemind]

"I didn't."

He knows this. That had never been the plan. Daystrom hadn't been about victory - it had been about taking down as much of Starfleet as he could, cutting off the head of the snake. Khan isn't the type to quietly roll over and accept his fate. Backed into a corner with no chance of winning, he'd taken the path of mutually assured destruction.

"But neither did you." He means Starfleet in general, but it's equally true of Pike personally. How does it feel to meet your future murderer, Admiral?

[whistles_loudly]

Pike got the implication and his stomach dropped to the floor. Sometime, in the near future, he is murdered by this man.

"As long as you didn't."

The idea of his death didn't scare Pike. He'd been living with that as a possible outcome of his life in space since he enrolled in the Academy. He wasn't sure what he'd feel if he was actually dying. But the idea wasn't as terrifying as it could be.

Bu the idea of someone like this person destroying something that, regardless of Marcus' leadership was designed to do something good, was scary. Who knew what would happen to Earth and the rest of the universe if that were to happen.