Episode 420: GULag, Part Five

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Arden goes right over and grabs Joshua and shakes him out of it.

Joshua: Wa-oah!
Arden: So what’s that about?
Joshua: (blinks) What?
Arden: You looked like you were … high on something.
Joshua: (sappy) Oh yeah … On love.

Behind them, Roskov stirs.

Roskov: I don’t like Mr. Foreman being … untended. You should take the good doctor back to the infirmary.
Arden: He’s not untended. Nika’s looking after him.

Joshua grabs Arden’s arm and pulls him out of there. Back to the infirmary we go! Arden protests as he’s dragged along.

Arden: What? (humphs) That was very unsatisfactory.
Joshua: I’m sorry I didn’t provide the happy ending you were looking for Arden.
Arden: Why are you taking me back to the infirmary? We weren’t finished talking to them.
Joshua: Wait—what?
Arden: Why are you taking me back to the infirmary? I wasn’t—
Joshua: We’re going back to the infirmary? (looks around) Shit. You’re right. Shit. You’re right.
Arden: So?!
Joshua: Remember how I mentioned before that … (gestures)
Arden: They needed code words to do that to you before, though.

Which lovely phrase Nika hears as they walk through the door of the infirmary. She groks to it immediately.

Nika: Remember how I mentioned to do it somewhere outside of the range of him, where you couldn’t feel him coming?
Joshua: (under his breath) I don’t know what his range is! (louder) You’re asking me to—could you, by the way, calculate the—
Nika: So you think that standing right next to him when you can feel him coming down the hall is a good plan?!

Joshua holds a finger to his lips.

Joshua: Shh-hhh. Sh-hhh. Shh-hhh.
Arden: So, what you’re telling me is you had no idea you were taking me back to the infirmary. And based on what I’ve seen, Roskov made you take me back to the infirmary.
Joshua: Yes, and yes.
Arden: Now the only time I’ve seen somebody do that to you, they had code words.
Joshua: Yes.
Arden: He doesn’t have any code words.
Joshua: He doesn’t need them. And I’m not sure I’m not the only one he can do that to. I think he’s … I think he’s a me, but he’s a … broadcaster.
Arden: As sender, instead of a receiver.
Joshua: In some respects, yeah. I don’t know how or why.
Arden: So I guess tin foil around your head really won’t help. (thinks) Are there any drugs that might help?
Joshua: Yeah. Flomoxipan. You have any of that?
Arden: (smartass) Fine. I can maybe slice away the connection between your right and left hemispheres.
Beglan: Or a lobotomy.
Arden: That’s a little more drastic than what I was thinking.
Joshua: Wait. So … I’d just like to know that the doctor thought that the lobotomy that Joshua can have is slightly less drastic than slicing the connection between his left and right brains.
Arden: It’s actually the other way around. The lobotomy is more drastic.
Joshua: All right. Stop talking about lobotomies! (deep breath) Roskov’s done it to me again. Maybe I should just walk into the snow.

Meanwhile, Rina’s working on the generator. She has help. Beglan was able to help her during some of it but there was also a fair amount of heavy lifting that only some of the inmates could assist with. Aware that she literally is only one of two women for untold miles around and likely the first the prisoners have seen in untold months or years, she’s understandably nervous around them and watches their behavior toward her like a hawk. Nothing happens. In fact, they seem kind of afraid of her.

Why? That doesn’t make sense to her. Not that she wants anything untoward to happen but … dude, that’s just not a normal reaction out of your typical male inmate. After about an hour or so, she can’t stand it. She flat out asks them about it. It’s not her, exactly, they admit to her. It’s Rasputin.

Roskov.

Rina: So you call him Rasputin?
Prisoner: He said you were off limits. The women were not to complain about us. We’re kinda afraid that you might.
Rina: Well, respect goes a long way, yes.
Prisoner: I hope so.
Rina: (pointing) Could you move that over there, elsewhere?
Prisoner: This? Across the room?
Rina: Yes. Thank you.

And she gets back to work getting the generator running again. Which she does after three hours. It belches smoke but hums to life and the power starts flowing. All over the complex, the lights come back on. The furnace coughs and resumes pumping out the heat. Rina thanks the men for a job well done and send them on their way. She rejoins the rest of her crew in the infirmary.

Joshua and Nika are glad to see things come back to life but they wonder at Roskov’s lack of reaction to it. After all these months of preventing its repair, he doesn’t interfere with it now. Why?

Joshua: Why would he stop us? I’m not kidding. Why would he stop us?
Nika: Because he’s kept them from doing it before.
Joshua: Do you know why? It wasn’t time. For the generator.
Nika: Well now it’s time for the generator.
Joshua: Now it’s time.
Nika: And the broadcast beacon.
Joshua: I’m not doubting your plan. I’m just saying that he’s got his own reasons for letting it happen. Just be warned. I don’t know what they are but he’s got his own reasons. And he can sense me. Which is good information to have.
Nika: You keep tellin’ me he’s not Readin’ you.
Joshua: I don’t know if he’s Reading me.
Arden: Oh, he’s doing something.
Joshua: I think he can sense me. I don’t know if he’s Reading me. There’s a difference.
Nika: (to Arden) Could you knock his ass out.

Meaning Roskov.

Joshua: Sure he can.
Arden: Yeah.
Joshua: You can keep me unconscious. You can kill me.
Nika: Why the hell would I do that?
Joshua: That would keep him from using me. I’m just giving you all the options.
Rina: What if we did a honey trap?
Nika: What?!
Arden: (gets it) There’s only two honeys here in the neighborhood.
Rina: Yeah, I know, but if anybody was going to claim dibs, it would be the Big Man on Campus. We could knock him out that way.
Arden: I get the feeling he’s too close to God to really care about such things.
Nika: What?!
Rina: Yeah … well.
Joshua: It’s not even that, per se, it’s … well, maybe it is that. He’s got purpose.
Nika: Yeah. You got purpose too.
Arden: You gotta have purpose or you’re not getting anything done.
Nika: You hiking up or am I?

She looks at Rina and jerks a thumb upward.

Rina: I would have a better reason to. I could claim I’m looking for an obscure part to fix something else on the generator, perhaps.
Nika: Considering how much of a walk it is up there, I’m not really sure anybody’s going to notice. So go for it.

It’s a little slick but when Rina gets up there, she checks the lines going in and out of the transmitter, looking for any signs of anything being unplugged, or cut or otherwise damaged. It looks like someone’s taken a fire axe to it. However, while they have severed a couple of lines, the primary boards have escaped damage. It looks bad but it’s not as bad as it looks. Not knowing how much time she’s got before she’s discovered, Rina starts stripping and splicing the lines back together.

As soon as Rina leaves, Nika goes off to find the Director. She finds him in his office talking to someone who looks like a guard. Kinda young, but a guard. She waits to the side, hoping to catch his attention. Which she does.

Posen: Ah, Captain! Come in.
Nika: How are you?
Posen: I’m good. (to Guard) Dmitri, go take care of that.

The guard leaves.

Posen: So have you thought anything about what I’ve said.
Nika: I don’t know how much time you’ve got. My engineer’s up at the transmitter.
Posen: The transmitter? Okay. Now we just need somehow to distract Rasputin to send out a transmission. He seems to be fascinated by your crewmember.
Nika: Mm-hm. Yeah, we can play bait. So yeah, I’ll tell him. She’s headed up there now. We’ll get someone in control. And I will go play bait.
Posen: This will do it.

She leaves Posen’s office and goes back to Joshua.

Joshua: So what are we doing?
Nika: Playin’ bait.
Joshua: You’re playing bait?
Nika: No. You’re playin’ bait.
Joshua: I’m playing bait. Oh-kay.
Nika: Well, he doesn’t really want me, does he?
Joshua: No, I guess not. What do you want me to do, Captain?
Nika: Keep him busy.
Joshua: Okay.
Nika: I’m thinking I couldn’t keep him busy. Me and the girls? Got no time.
Joshua: Rina?
Nika: Yeah, she’s up there.
Joshua: Okay.
Nika: And for God’s sake, do not let him turn you into a vegetable.
Joshua: If I do, it will be my choice.
Arden: How would you know?
Joshua: Uh …
Nika: That’s about the dumbest thing you’ve said recently.
Joshua: Not in this case.

Joshua leaves to find Roskov and play bait. He finds him. Roskov seems pleased to see him.

Roskov: Ah! You’ve come to me. You have a look of purpose in your eyes.
Joshua: Oh really.
Roskov: However I sense that … well …
Joshua: Guess what?
Roskov: You tell me what you wish.
Joshua: I don’t know what I wish. I’m trying to figure it out. You keep talking about—
Roskov: Do you want me to give you some instructions?
Joshua: No.
Roskov: I wish you to do the opposite of whatever your friends have told you to do. For all of our own good.
Joshua: No.
Roskov: You tell me. Has someone … Posen has talked to one of you. Is that right?
Joshua: I have no idea.
Roskov: Has he put a plan in someone’s mind?
Joshua: There’s always a plan floating around somewhere. I can’t believe that two weeks can go by without someone coming up with a plan for something or other.
Roskov: (reproving) Joshua.
Joshua: (annoyed) What?
Roskov: You must trust me.
Joshua: You keep saying that. They said that. And they used me for really bad evil things. So you can see where I am not all that excited about turning to Rasputin and trusting you that everything will work out for the better good of mankind. Or even for me.
Roskov: Are you a Romanov?
Joshua: Not that I’m aware of.
Roskov: Then you don’t need to worry about trusting a Rasputin.
Joshua: God, you drive me insane. Not literally, I hope.
Roskov: Who does the sheep think is evil?
Joshua: The wolf.
Roskov: Is the wolf evil?
Joshua: No.
Roskov: If the grass could think, who would the grass think is evil?
Joshua: The sheep.
Roskov: Is the sheep evil?
Joshua: I feel like I’ve got this weird Circle of Life thing going on here.
Roskov: You must think beyond these things. Your consciousness is standing in the way.
Joshua: My consciousness is standing in the way?
Roskov: It is.
Joshua: My consciousness is what makes me who I am.
Roskov: (dubious) Mmm.
Joshua: Ah-huh. I guess not.
Roskov: What you do is not what makes you.
Joshua: And what I do is listen to my moral conscience which tells me doing x is wrong and doing y is right. You’re saying you want to become my conscience, is basically what you’re saying. I’m to trust in you to make all the right decisions. And I have no reason to believe that you know better than my conscience does.
Roskov: When you do as I wish, you will not have these difficulties.
Joshua: (fed up) Because I won’t be making any decisions. I won’t be listening to my conscience. I’ll be listening to you! I won’t even be listening to you, I’ll just be doing … bullshit making my ….
Roskov: Mm. You are frustrated. I sense that.
Joshua: Wow. I was doubtful about your powers that you said you have but clearly, you’re right on top of things. No wonder they call you Rasputin. You’ve got magic going for you.

Can you hear the sarcasm? Yes, I thought you could.

Roskov: Perhaps like steel, you need to be tempered.
Joshua: Into a weapon? I don’t want to be a weapon. And I have the feeling that’s what you want to make me into.
Roskov: You were made into weapon long before.
Joshua: So at least we’re arguing about the details. I was a weapon. I am not a weapon anymore.

Up above, Rina’s got the transmitter up and running. Mission accomplished. She turns to climb down and sees Joshua’s there to greet her.

Wait. That wasn’t part of the plan. She’s immediately hinked—is it really him? It looks like him but he has a serene look on his face, the serenity of one who is filled with purpose.

No. Oh no.

Rina realizes what’s happened and plants a smile on her face as she comes up to him.

Rina: Hi, honey.

And she swings for him, hoping to KO him and get off the dome. He grabs her with an Aikido move. She counters and does it rather well, turning the tables on him. Her options are to evade him, kill him or disable him without killing him. Evading puts her at risk at getting captured again. Killing him is out of the question. She goes for disable and puts a submission hold on him. Joshua is still wounded and recovering from surgery but he’s still struggling. Rina can put the clamp on him and risk injuring him further—something she doesn’t want to do—or she can try to convince him to cease and desist.

She knows he’s under some sort of mental compulsion. She knows he’s not himself. She also knows that he’s six days off his drugs and he’s wide open. She’s made a mental connection with him before. If she can speak and think hard enough at him, she might break through to him. She chooses her words carefully and puts all the force of conviction she has into her voice and thoughts.

Rina: Stop what you’re doing.

Joshua stops what he’s doing and goes limp.

Rina takes stock. They’re on a dome, slicked with ice with creaking glass underfoot. It’s a killing drop through the glass to the mine below. The wind is brutal up here, kicking up ice and snow. All around her is countless miles of trackless waste, buried in white. There’s not another soul in sight. She’s alone, with the man she loves under someone else’s mental control … She needs to get off the dome. She steels her voice and her resolve and says:

Rina: Come with me.

She can’t frog march him down the dome. It’s suicide. Rina releases him from her submission hold and takes him firmly by the upper arm. He doesn’t make a sound. He doesn’t bat a lash. He’s limp one second and lashing out the next. He had no scruple against making her believe she’d gained the upper hand. His moral compunctions are no longer a consideration. Rina is an obstacle. She must be dealt with. Decisively.

After all, that is his purpose.

After Nika sees Joshua off to distract Roskov, she heads back to Posen’s office. There is a prison to take back from the inmates. She arrives and sees he’s already on the comms, talking in Russian to someone on the other end. Looks like Rina got that transmitter running. She can only make out a word here and there, thanks to Rina’s casual use of the language, but the rest of the conversation might as well be Greek to her. Nonetheless, she can gauge the overall tone and it seems to her that Posen is … up to something?

Posen concludes the conversation and cuts the channel.

Posen: Ah, Captain. I just got word. They’ll be sending a contingent here to retake the prison. We just need to wait, hold the fort, and we’ll be fine.

Nika has looked into the eyes of a lying man before and she doesn’t need Joshua here to tell her that Posen is lying. He’s also not a moron—he’s got two armed guys with him. Looks like he broke out the party favors a little early. She smiles and decides to play along for now.

Nika: Well, good. Between your guys and us, we can hold it down. You said you had a weapons cache and I have the feeling that his guys are going to start rushing us very shortly here. So I think if you can pull out your men and the weapons we should be able to hold it off.
Posen: Why don’t you go get your friends and bring them back here and we’ll be safe.

That doesn’t sound too safe to Nika.

Nika: Actually, mine are running—I’m taking you to them.
Posen: No no no, I’ll stay here.
Nika: Why?
Posen: It’s where the communication is.
Nika: Well, I can’t bring my people back here cuz I’ve got them fixing the transmitter and making sure it continues to run.
Posen: We’ve made the transmission already.
Nika: Oh, well, then we don’t need to be in here.
Posen: Right. So you will get them and bring them back.

Hello? Did anything she just said even register with the man?

Posen: It’s the safest place to be in the area.
Nika: Oh, I thought we would be able to hole up far more safely in the mine.
Posen: If you wish to, go ahead. Perhaps splitting up is a good idea.
Nika: Okay.

She gets out of there and goes to the infirmary to round up Arden and Beglan and see about meeting up with Rina. She finds Arden casing the med supplies for sedatives and delivery vehicles. He finds one or two doses, maybe not enough to take out Roskov but certainly one of his men. Or Posen’s men, for that matter. He holds the syringes up as she enters the room.

Arden: Look what I put together—
Nika: Good. Because we’ve got a problem.
Arden: Oh? Just one? Great. Things have gotten simpler.

Not.

Arden: (give it to me) What’s going on?
Nika: Yeah. He lied through his teeth.
Arden: Who lied through his teeth?
Nika: The Director.
Arden: About?
Nika: Let’s get to Rina and Joshua if we can.
Arden: I don’t know where Joshua is but the last time I saw Rina she was going up to the top of the dome.
Nika: Yeah, I know. She put the transmitter back on line so asshole director could get a’hold of his people. I don’t know who he was talkin’ to but I’m pretty sure it’s not boding well for us. And Joshua is talking to Crazy Guy.

Arden packs his syringes in his med pouch.

Arden: Let’s go.
Beglan: So, do we want to bring Foreman with us?
Arden: He’s kina unconscious. He’d be pretty much hard to bring. He’d be a liability right now.
Nika: But Foreman dying would be a bad thing. According to the other guy I didn’t really want to believe.
Arden: Right … but he’s safe here at the moment.
Nika: Yeah, until the Director’s guys comes in with the weapons that they’ve got.
Arden: The Director’s guys got weapons?
Nika: Yeah.
Arden: You saw them holding weapons?
Nika: Yeah.
Arden: Great. (sighs) I could stay here and protect him to the best of my ability.
Nika: Might not be a bad idea. How much you wanna bet the Director is the guy in charge of the weapons ring?
Arden: What weapons ring?
Nika: The arms dealer.
Arden: What arms dealer?
Nika: That’s why we were coming in, in the first place. There was a whole big thing about a guy who was running weapons through here and Foreman’s the only one who knows who’s the main contact—

She doesn’t get to finish as a clinking rattling sound hits their ears. The lock-down system has been activated. The level of suck just went up. Arden runs to the infirmary door and it swings open but further down the corridor is a more secure looking door. He turns back.

Arden: Maybe we should wake up Foreman.
Nika: How much you wanna bet that the Director is the arms dealer and that they came in looking for him?
Arden: You can have all the money on my body now.
Nika: That’s gonna do me a helluva lotta good.
Arden: Any time.

Arden preps the wake-up dose.

Nika: We gotta get out of here and find the rest of our crew.
Beglan: What do you want me to do? I’ll do whatever I can.
Arden: Check the computer and see if you can get any information with it.
Beglan: I can do that. I’m good with computer stuff. I’m a bit of a computer specialist. Let’s see, what do you want to know?
Arden: Um. Everything?
Beglan: Everything. All right.

The power’s on and the computer in here is running. Beglan gloms to the keys and gets to work. Arden suggests he find out what he can about the arms dealer business and Beglan tells him he doubts that sort of thing would be on a medical computer.

Arden: I’m thinking you might be able to hack into the system.
Nika: Maybe the comm system?
Beglan: Find out who he was talkin’ to?
Nika: Yeah. Can you get the transmitter back off-line? Not that it would do us much good at this point.

Arden wakes up Foreman. The man is a little tender from the surgery. He shakes off the cobwebs and asks:

Foreman: (groggy) What’s going on, here?
Arden: You’ve been medically tended to and you seem to be on the mend.
Foreman: (sighing) Ahh. You’re from the Alliance, I guess. You wouldn’t believe what I’ve been going through here.
Arden: No.
Foreman: No? What do you mean, no?
Arden: I’m not from the Alliance.
Foreman: But you have a Core accent. You’re speaking English.
Arden: Well, no. I’m not speaking in Russian, that is true. The Russians that do—anyway—long story short. How did you get injured?
Foreman: I was jumped. Tried hittin’ me with somethin’ and I … passed out.
Arden: Okay, well, those are some pretty serious stab wounds. I suggest not moving around very quickly. However, be ready to move around because we may be moving … quickly.

Nika pauses in her pacing to comment.

Nika: That’s a very Arden thing to say.
Beglan: Captain?
Nika: (turning) Yeah.
Beglan: You might want to have a look at this.
Nika: What have you got?

Nika leans over his shoulder. Looks. Sees Beglan’s found the comms logs.

Beglan: There’s only been one message in the last couple of months.
Nika: Do I even want to know? (a beat) Tell me.
Beglan: See for yourself.

His finger taps the screen right under the name: Joseph Potemkin.

Outside in the foul weather, a ship is approaching the prison dome. It sinks to land near the prison and if one looks carefully, one can see a couple of figures on top of the dome. It’s Joshua climbing down and he has his lover by the wrist, dangling her over the side. Rina hangs over the drop, her other arm stunned by a nerve pinch, and she dares not struggle lest she fall and drag Joshua with her. But there’s no telling if he’ll drop her first.

There’s nothing left to doubt now. Posen’s working with Potemkin. Roskov was the guy we should have thrown in with. Nothing he’d told us was an actual lie while Posen was using us all along. Now Potemkin’s here and he and Posen’s men have all the guns. Our party is split up, Joshua’s Roskov’s puppet, and we’re all facing a rather painful and messy death from our enemy. All thanks to fixing that damned transmitter.

Dear God, what have we done?

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