Ueda looks up at the others. "As Doctor Essex says, we debated this action at great length. But I have always believed that, if death must come, then a brief and unexpected one is better than an end that is slow and looming." He looks down at the gun for a long moment. "And as the one who initiated the final decision, I felt it only correct that I should pull the trigger."
He turns to Agent Wells. "Please, as Brass says. I believe now is the time to lay all our hands on the proverbial table."
At Jade's suggestion that they could restore the other prisoners to their original genetics, Griffin shrugs, Kitty waves her hands in front of her to ward off the suggestion, and Ursus growls eagerly.
Wells tries to answer, but one of Moreau's socks is stuffed into his mouth.
Brass frowns, “I would have done it outside of the ship, and wouldn’t have minded doing it myself” he turns to wells and looks at him squatting down and takes the sock out of his mouth. “Give us a reason for you to live, you’re death is something we would like to avoid but can happen if it needs to.”
Wioth the decision made Scera followed Brass to the ship and saw the situation. She thought it was quite amusing really but that changed quickly when Moreau was quickly, and efficiently, executed. She saw Kitty's reaction to it and had to agree that taking him outside first would have been better. She moved over towards Kitty and said, "If you need to talk later I'll listen."
As the discussion of changing people back to their own form came up Scera noted who seemed for and against it. She also noticed Agent Wells' reaction to the execution and said, "If it helps any I think I found Argos' grave outside. It has a piece of metal on it that says 'Here lies Argo. He was a Good Boy, a Very Good Boy'. Could that be the person you were looking for?" She looked at the altered people and asked, "Do any of you know who Argo was?"
Brass frowns, “I would have done it outside of the ship, and wouldn’t have minded doing it myself” he turns to wells and looks at him squatting down and takes the sock out of his mouth. “Give us a reason for you to live, you’re death is something we would like to avoid but can happen if it needs to.”
"He killed Argos!" shouts Wells. "And you killed him! And I was supposed to take him back! But he killed Argos! And I was going to kill him! And you killed him! And I was ..."
Wells shouts each of these facts, and begins to slow down only after he realizes he is repeating himself.
Kitty and Ursus are muttering to each other. "...Yeah, but you wanted to be a cat," Ursus is saying. "He made me a bear because my name was Barry. Seriously. I didn't ask for this."
"Being practically invisible is kind of cool, but I wouldn't mind not having scales," says Griffin.
"So, now can I shoot Wells?" asks Milo.
"Why on earth would we want to kill Wells? As far as I know, he hasn't done anything to deserve execution"
To the others
"I told Kitty this and I'll stand by it. We'll try and restore those of you who want to be changed back but its YOUR choice. If you want to stay the way you are, who are we to say that you shouldn't?"
“Wells will live if he can prove he is not a threat and can be let go with no plans of retribution on us or the them.” . He says pointing to the three altered humans. “Your bloodlust is slightly concerting considering Carson has been avenged.” brass turns to look at Milo, trying to get a read on his mental state
"He tried to order me to abandon you here and fly back to his future," says Milo glaring at Wells. " Said he outranked me. I don't know if you noticed, but he's a bit of a jackass."
Milo doesn't seem particularly serious about shooting Wells, but he is annoyed with him.
"So," Ueda says, turning to Wells. "It was revenge you were after, not justice. I cannot say I am not disappointed, but I also cannot say I am surprised." He pockets his gun and grabs Moreau's corpse under the arms, moving to start dragging him outside. "Please do as my companions ask. Explain yourself, honestly and with candor. If you are truly a devoted officer of the law, I hope that you can do the right thing."
Wells pulls himself together.
"I told you the truth. I was responding to a distress beacon and rescuing this woman from her lifepod," Wells nods towards Scera, his arms still stuck together by the glue Milo showed you. "when I received a transmission regarding a prison break. The file said that a group of prisoners--including a doctor imprisoned for selling illegal augmentations--had escaped. Dr. Moreau was to be brought in alive as his research was valuable. If the others--his creations, his monsters--weren't brought in alive, they were to be completely destroyed; no genetic trace left behind. I've told you this ..."
He looks annoyed and like he's going to stop talking, but Milo gestures with the oversized pistol he took from Ursus that Wells should continue.
"I detected their ship. While giving chase, we exchanged weapon fire. They came out of the Shuffle in this timespace and I followed them, smashing my ship into theirs. They ambushed Argos and I when we tried to board their ship and the next thing I knew you were waking me up from the lifepod. These degenerates must have stripped me and put me in there," he says nodding to Kitty, Ursus, Griffin, and the streak of blood that was Moreau.
"While you were gone, that pig told me what he had done to Argos ... He bragged about it!! Tried to make him into one of his pets!!" Wells starts to shout. Milo gestures with the gun.
"I was here for this part," Milo says. "Moreau told him that since Argos was such a loyal partner, he had tried to add some canine augmentations, but he messed up and killed him. He said it just like that, too, with a little disappointed shrug, like he was more bothered that it didn't work than that Argos died. When Moreau said this, Wells lost it and I had to gag them both."
Griffin and Ursus have the good sense to look remorseful at this point. Kitty seems unphased."Yeah. Sometimes they die," Kitty adds. "About 2 times out of 3, actually."
"Those are not good odds." Jade remarks. "Moreau was a bad scientist." She turns to Wells, curious now. "Your government would have allowed that many to perish at his hands for the possibility of becoming 'enhanced'?"
"Well, ... I mean ... " says Wells trying to understand Jade's point-of-view and failing. "Sure, but they were prisoners. In a Research Penitentiary. They must have done some pretty awful things to get put in there. Like, umm, Ursus, what did you do?"
"My name is Barry," says Ursus testily. He pauses before adding "and I was arrested for stealing thoughts ... I used to have a telepathy rig ... I'd skim security codes from people's heads and resell them."
"See!" says Wells. "Major crimes!"
"I stole ships!" says Kitty, happily, without being asked. "Big ships, small ships, red ships, blue ships, old ships, new ships, that ship, and almost this ship!"
"Clearly incorrigible!" Wells points out.
"The fact that these people may have committed crimes certainly does NOT excuse cruel and inhumane punishment on them. Criminals can and should be rehabilitated, turned into contributing members of society. And the death penalty should never be used by a government, every government has shown that it is not capable of using that power wisely and correctly.
I know it sounds hypocritical given what we just did but we certainly do NOT have the resources of a government.
But to allow any government the power to conduct medical experiments is several long strides too far."
Scera listened to what Wells described of the crimes of Barry and Kitty with interest, and a little surprise, and finally said, "So your government thought letting Moreau experiment on people with such useful skills was a good thing?!" She seemed utterly shocked at the idea and why they didn't find a better way of dealing with them. "You realize that they could have recruited these two don't you? He," she pointed to Barry, "would have been incredibly useful in interrogating enemy spies/personnel, can't get them to talk? Let him swipe from their minds instead. She," Scera pointed to Kitty, "could have been paid to do what she already did, just have her target enemy ships. Sneak her into port, steal the biggest ship she could, bring it back and put it into the fleet or reverse engineer it to learn how to better take down others like it or to use it's technology to improve your own designs."
Scera, having said her piece, moved over to Kitty and said quietly, "Think you could teach me how to hi jack ships like that? If I knew I might not have ended up in that Vesk deathtrap of a pod when I tried to kill my Master and take the ship." Scera put heavy scorn in contempt into "vesk" and "master" making her views of the vesk in question obvious. "Besides that, I rather like the look Kitty, I could very much get to enjoy waking up to it."
Brass stands listening, thinking for a moment. He knew combat, he’d seen the viciousness of species and just how brutal everyone could be. He remembers realizing why he was developed, to win a war that his creators were struggling to win, he was one of the most sophisticated killing machines ever created. It made things very messy when you thought of just how many lines they were willing to cross to survive. Yet he did the same thing when given a choice of crossing a line or death when he was activated.... But as he begins to think about the place they are in, years in the past. With all sorts of possible outcomes coming from releasing them into the time stream, hell with the wreckage here who knows what could happen to the time stream now.
“They may have done bad things but that does that mark them as irredeemable, or worthless. A second chance is worth giving to most people, though how and if we give them a second chance should be, thought out carefully. Leaving them in the past may pollute the timestream even more. Perhaps they could help us? Or even you in the future? As Scera said they could possibly have been used due to their own skills. But desperation can make someone do unspeakable things to survive.” He looks to Wells, “Just how bad is this Tower, how great a threat of is it?”
You realize that they could have recruited these two don't you?
Wells: "You don't understand what we are facing. There is a war going on. The futures are closing in. I've seen the ends of time. They are constantly getting closer. Year Zero HQ retreats more every year. We will use every tool at our disposal to protect this reality."
“Just how bad is this Tower, how great a threat of is it?”
At the specific mention of the Tower, even Kitty shudders a little. Griffin and Barry already looked thoughtful.
Wells: "Technically, you're timecops, regardless of what we, in the future, know about your methods, so telling you this does not violate the Continuity Security Protocols."
Wells: "The Tower is an intrusion of an extradimensional entity. The psychics sense it first; it manifests in their dreams ... always as a dark tower surrounded by thunder, lightning, and winged creatures. It gets worse for them ... many go mad or hurt themselves."
Wells: "Then, the more ordinary people begin to despair in great numbers; this is often when people begin to believe something is coming."
Wells: "It doesn't matter what we do. The rifts appear soon after. Towers--always the same Tower--start to physically manifest in the places where the psychic energy is strongest. They slowly begin to destroy everything around them."
Wells: "I've always been pulled back and reassigned at this point in time. I haven't fought more than a skirmish or two with the dark things the Tower sends at us. I fought shapeshifting demons in 2656 on New Toyota and an evil cybernetic sludge in 2553."
Kitty interjects: "Wait, I was arrested in 2460 and taken to that weird prison!"
Wells nods: "We are always pulled back, ordered to an earlier decade to try again; to try to prepare better, faster, to find something that works. I don't know what happened to the time I was born, but ... as far as I know the time I grew up in no longer exists."
Griffin interjects: "These bastards come from the future and start ordering everyone around but won't tell us what is coming ...!"
Wells shouts over Griffin: "I joined Temporal Enforcement to see a little bit of history. I didn't know we would soon be at war for the future. Year Zero HQ evacuated my family to your past! I haven't seen my son in years!! So, yeah, if building an army that can defend reality means getting one criminal to experiment on a few others, I'll do it. The future gets closer every year, and I will do anything to stop it."
"Think you could teach me how to hi jack ships like that?"
Kitty laughs, "If they let me go, I was thinking of becoming a cat burglar!"
Barry and Griffin roll their eyes, obviously having heard this joke before and exasperated with Kitty's inability to sense the mood of a room.
It isn't a surprise to Jade that Wells doesn't appear to respect them - he'd indicated as much with his behaviour already. She watches his small movements as he tells the tale, and her eyes narrow programmatically when he speaks of the psychics. "What aren't you telling us, Wells?"
"Well, the Lashunta ... it doesn't go well for them. The Tower almost always manifests on their homeworld first. I've seen the reports from Castrovel in decade before decade. It's never good news."
"I don't think I understand. You mean that you fought and lost in your time, and then retreated to the past. And then lost there again in the past? And so on? And the time of these towers keeps getting earlier and earlier?
Have you tried communicating with the towers to find out what they want?
Have you tried going WAY back and making MAJOR changes to the timeline?"
"You understand perfectly," says Wells. "The end of the world is creeping closer and Temporal Enforcement is trying to stop it. If we knew what changes to make to the timeline, we would, but we'd just as likely hasten it as slow it. Yes, we've tried to communicate with it. It speaks back in the form of telepathic assaults on those who try. Nothing we do seems to stop its progress backwards through time, but we sometimes slow it. Anyhow, Moreau's experiments were just one of many things being tried to prepare for its arrival; hopefully it wasn't a significant one."
He looks condescendingly at you as if he hadn't been ready to shoot Moreau himself only moments ago and like you've possibly endangered all of reality with your negligence.
"So, now that you know what I'm up against, will you help me repair my comms so I can call for evacuation? asks Wells. "Or, am I to be interrogated further about things you are barely authorized to know about?"
"What?!" says Kitty leaping to your defense. "They're the original timecops!"
Wells ignores her. "You don't need to concern yourself with this further. The Tower is still centuries away from your timespace. We'll stop it long before it becomes any threat to you."
"Bold words from someone 'trying' to stop it." Ueda steps back into the room as Wells finishes his speech. He hadn't caught everything, but between the conversation's start and the summary at its conclusion, he understood the concept of things well enough. "If this is the case, you have my apologies for disrupting your work. I see no reason to hold you further. But I believe Griffin, Kitty, and Barry should be allowed their own choice. Return to your own time and face your sentence there, or come to ours and face whatever sentence may be passed there. I assure you that your actions during this period will be reflected in my report."
Ueda offers a smile that would never really qualify as "comforting," and falls even shorter given the faint bloodstain on his turtleneck and the ominously empty chair in his hands.
Scera thought she should have felt more terror at the recurring fate of her kind by she had been around so few of them that the thought of her species home world being destroyed so didn't bother her that much. She felt a certain sympathy for Wells and his situation and glanced at Kitty when she came to the other's defense. She listened to what Ueda had to say and considered it carefully.
"I think you should let him go too, though we should probably get out of here before he makes contact so they can't try to drag us back when they come for him." She looked at Wells, "But I also agree that these three get a choice in what happens to them," she looked at Ueda, "Though I don't feel that they should be given a new punishment. They've suffered enough for what they did before." She looked at the three sternly, "But new crimes are new crimes," while she tried to look tough the fact she was still in the skimpy haremgirl outfit they'd found her in didn't lend much be credence to her stern expression.
Brass gets up from squatting down, looking around at the scene then nods “I think we have come to a partial agreement then on what will happen, we shall release wells to contact his people. The three should be given a choice, though they will be held accountable for their actions.” brass looks to wells “Good luck in your war, I hope you fight well.” brass then turns to the group “Should I contact TAROT headquarters to inform them of that’s has transpired?”
"My orders were clear about one thing," says Wells, pushing his luck. "If I did not return with the results of Moreau's experiments, I was to destroy them, leaving not a single strand of their augmented DNA. You should follow those orders."
Ueda steadies his emotionless gaze on the man. "And we all know that you were going to follow all of your orders to the letter. How long do you think it would take you to free yourself from those restraints, Agent Wells? Certainly long enough for us to be long gone. Long enough for some natural predator to find you? Long enough to start dehydrating?" He shakes his head. "You do not strike me as a very wise man. Return to your time and do as you please. We will do the same."
Kitty suddenly gets serious: "I want to go with you. Don't send me back to my time. I didn't want to do anything wrong. Moreau told us we could go anywhen we wanted. That's what he would have wanted for us. Anywhen is better than then."
Griffin and Barry agree. Barry says, "From the sounds of things, my time might not even exist now. It was unpleasant before Temporal Enforcement took it over. It is even less fun now."
Griffin nods: "Given a choice, your time sounds better. Kitty made us watch some of the holoflix about you after we stole the timeship. What year was it? 2222? It looked better than when we started."
"WE are famous? And in holoflix? Wow. So, tell us what we're going to end up doing?
And, Brass, held accountable for WHAT actions? It isn't THEIR fault that they travelled in time and they're not going to commit the crimes they were originally arrested for for a few centuries. I don't see that they'd have to answer FOR"
"WE are famous? And in holoflix? Wow. So, tell us what we're going to end up doing?
Kitty looks like she has been waiting to tell Vonash all about the holoflix, but then Wells interrupts.
"You can't just take them. They cannot be allowed to contaminate the timestream." Wells shouts.
"But your family can be evacuated to their past? I heard what you said. Continuity matters when you can't control it!" responds Kitty. "'Your timestream isn't special. It's not the original timestream. It's not even the ONLY timestream. The only thing you like about YOUR timestream is it's the one YOU'RE in charge of. 'We don't have to live in the shadow of their future' That's what Moreau used to say."
"Even if Temporal Enforcement doesn't come after you," says Wells, ignoring Kitty. "There are other agencies. Someone will stop you."
Brass looks at. Vonash, “They may have been dealt, what’s the saying, bad dice? But a second chance is more than enough. Not everyone gets a second chance and those that do should take advantage of it. If they abuse it hurting people or stealing then they deserve the consequences.” as he speaks about the second chance his voice starts to raise, a little in volume before quickly coming back to a monotone voice. “They won’t come for us if they think they’re dead. Tell your superiors you dispatched and you can live. And think, if you lie we will know and we will come back here to this moment to ensure you don’t live to see the future.... you would want to see your family again right?” after speaking to Vonash he turns and address Wells no longer enjoying his logic or company.
Wells sulks silently at Brass's threat, knowing that he's lucky to be wearing clothes at this point.
“Do we have a deal Agent Wells? Your life is far to valuable to waste on something like this.”
Wells nods silently and then adds, "If they show up in the timestream, my superiors will know."
"To be fair, it sounds like your superiors have much larger things to worry about, Agent Wells."
"I agree with Brass," she says, nodding to the other android, before looking at the 3 experiments. "Not everyone gets a second chance to make up for their mistakes. Moreau learned nothing and squandered his, and I sincerely hope you will not do the same."
"If any of you wish to stay in your present forms, I will not stop you, but for anyone who wants to return to their previous appearance, I will use Moreau's research to assist you when we are back to our present. The facilities there are much more... well, clearly labeled, organised, sterile, and safe, for starters."
"Agent Wells." Jade begins, turning back to the man, and shaking her head. She again contemplates their responsibilities. They knew more about the future than they were meant to, and in knowing, did they have a responsibility? And was it not every generation's responsibility to make things better for those who would come later? Certainly her previous incarnation believed that when she fought for android liberation. But her current responsibility was to clean up the past. She's silent for a few seconds. "...I believe we will see each other again, and I do hope that next time we are able to be of considerably more help to you and your efforts."
Ueda reflects on the notion that taking the prisoners with them could effect the timelines. Certainly, there's danger in doing something so brash, and without the guidance of Gabriel and the master copy of the original turn of events. But his mind returns to his theory on the nature of time: resilient, self-correcting, even stubborn in a way. The team's own mere presence in the past could be considered a violation of the natural order of events, but they had gone back without a great deal of debate. And for all they knew, it was correct for these four to return to the 23rd century with the Chariot.
And if it triggered some cataclysmic change, well, Gabriel could always have them returned.
"If problems arise, they can be corrected, Agent Wells. As Doctor Essex says, there are more pressing matters than this. And while I do not know what advances in temporal theory have occurred by your time, I should hope they are capable of properly directing resources and actions where they will most make a difference." Ueda blinks and offers a thin smile. "Should we meet again, I also hope we are on the same side in all things. We all have the best interests of existence in mind. With time, I believe our methods will become more aligned."
Wells recognizes the only possibility of a graceful exit and thanks Drs. Ueda and Essex. "Until we meet again, then," he says, nodding.
"Oh, and if you need to find me ... perhaps you change your mind about returning this lot of strays ... you can find me through Year Zero HQ. Look for us in 2425; if you find 2425 isn't there, then we will have pulled back to 2399 to set up again."
Vonash definitely wants to look through any genetic samples that Moreau had. If he created hybrids of people and animals, it makes sense that he has the animal DNA, right?
Oh, and when a chance occurs, she takes Kitty aside and again asks her what the Holoflix showed about The First Timecops (that really feels like it should be capitalized :-))
Kitty talks excitedly to Vonash about the holoflix, but confesses they may not be "historically accurate" particularly now that she's talking about them. "Like the one where you went back in time to find out whether the writers of a popular cartoon show about a family were from the future ... because, like, they had made some weird future predictions ... that was funny, but I don't think it was real."
"I like it when you zap people to make them forget," Kitty says, looking over at Milo who is still playing with the neural stimulator, "Ohhhh! And you zap them with a reconfigured stimulator ..."
Griffin jumps in at this point excitedly, "...a stimulator reconfigured to work as a neural inhibitor preventing short-term memories from becoming long-term memories. Holy thrunk! That looks like the exact one! This must be when you got it from."
"I know! We're part of history!"
Wells and Temporal Enforcement will happily take care of both crashed ships. Wells suggests it and then begins to make the argument that Moreau's research belongs to Deepwell Research Penitentiary. He stops making this argument when he sees the looks he gets from just about everybody.
Temporal Enforcement will take whatever you leave of the two ships back to Year Zero HQ.
Well, then I guess we just have to say the magic words first
We loot the ships to the ground :-). Seriously, any weapons or armor or the like we should take. Together with all of Wells equipment, of course
Wells’ stuff contains:
- a repair kit Wells says he will need to repair his ship’s radio
- a flashy device that Wells was going to use to wipe your memories
- Temporal Enforcement Flight Suit (equivalent to kasatha microcord)
- Arc pistol, static (1d6 E 50 ft. Arc 2 20 charges 2 L Stun)
Argos’ stuff:
- Arc pistol, static (1d6 E 50 ft. Arc 2 20 charges 2 L Stun)
- Ifrit-class flamethrower: (1d6 F 15 ft. Burn 1d6 20 petrol 4 2 Analog, Blast, Unwieldy)
- Temporal Enforcement Flight Suit (equivalent to kasatha microcord)
Moreau’s stuff:
- injection glove
- Several of Moreau’s serums, some of which were previously mentioned, all of which cause some genetic resequencing; none properly labelled.
- a Holoskin 2 500 — L 20 1/10 minute that Moreau had programmed to hide the side of his face that was deformed
- a neural stimulator Moreau primarily used to play with his brain
The Deepwell ship has Moreau’s medical lab; you could move it over to the Chariot, giving up a cargo bay for it. Both the Deepwell ships and and the Temporal Enforcement ship have ship weapons. It would take about 4 days to get it all; two if you got the assistance of Kitty, Griffin, and Barry. If you wanted to do it in one day, you would have to choose between the weapons and the medical lab.