LTCmdr. Quentin Collins - Turn Off, Tune Out, Drop In.

[Justin Partridge]

((Interior. The Caves of Theta 122. The "Sacred Waters". Liminal Space.))

Quentin Collins was no stranger to these sort of "out of body" experiences, but that didn't make the experience any more pleasant.

In fact, it just reminded him of the skin crawling cold of Karek Tor and the "contact" he had with the Crack'd Orb. How it pulled his soul and mind to another place entirely, allowing him the awareness he needed to save his own life, but not everyone else's who had traveled with him to the damnable leftover scar of the Dominion War. That experience had been...urgent. Charged with the energy of an important turning point.

This one seemed...far quieter. Thus making it feel all the more unsettling. Quentin seemed to still occupy the same "space" as his body, still holding silently at the waterline, elbows deep into the water. He looked toward the wayward "flock" and they too were held in a sort of eerie repose, moving but as if by frame-by-frame, still aiming toward the inky black and sickly yellow of the now still waters. Quentin felt himself "blink" heavily, wondering exactly how and why this...for lack of a better term, astral projection...

oO Mother would have a FIELD day with this...Oo

still was making and allowing him "breathe", "blink", and "move" but he wasn't going to look a gift freak psychic phenomena in the yawning void of a mouth. He was going to need all the information he could get, sensory and empathic, so he was going to "play with the space" as his unfortunate theatre teachers would often tell him throughout endless rehearsals of forgotten plays. 

He "whirled" his "body" the other way and saw...most of his crew. Though DeBarres had moved away slightly from the group, Mister Wilde seemed to be standing next to...two shadows? One was the lithe form of the Counselor he presumed, but the other was...less familiar to him. Perhaps their new charge Kal, but he couldn't be sure.

oO Hold on, might HE have some sort of psionic abilities? He talked about contact with orbs himself, maybe...but now I have-Oo

He turned and faced directly into the incomplete eyes of an Iconian. 

Despite his lack of actual organs in his liminal space, his heart rate spiked, spilling himself backwards across the "sand" of his shared mindscape. Had Quentin Collins, Third of his Name and Eldest Son of a Dying Empire been able to see his physical form, he would have seen it trembling in fear. But even with his rising fear and uncertainty, he continued to drink in the data available to him. The Iconian's body had...changed in the heightened awareness. Though great patches of its body were still incomplete, they were held in a sort of...wirework modeling. Like a half finished holo-construct. It's head, hands, and perished away torso seemed wrapped in the wirework of the energy. Energy that seemed to be semi-tethered to the water in slightly arcing trails of glittering energy.

The very same energy they had seen arching with the crash of the mining vessel.

Quentin's panic flattened with the realization. Somehow the Iconian and it's body, using the two portals it crashed with, were assiminaling the organic matter of the cultists. Disassembling it and disseminating the parts required down and into the still-in-construction REconstruction of the recuperating alien, held in a ramshackle bio-gel by the strange waters of the planet's interior ecosystem. Quentin felt an icy dread hit him. It wasn't going to stop with the cult. It would need more. Worse still, it would need far more energy. Odds were the blast from the Sheliak had just expedited it's awakening, but NOT it's healing. Now it was awake...but not whole...and it was in

oO Pain. Oo

The creature's grasp halted slightly, curling it's bony hand slightly just inches away from Quentin's "face". Though his fear persisted, he tried to lock eyes with the creature. He was woefully outmatched as to the number of the eyes he had to bring to the table, but that did nothing to lessen his conviction.

Collins: I am right, aren't I?! You are in pain.

The creature's arm retracted further, as if...shocked something like him was even able to see what was happening. It took a shuddering step back allowing Quentin to "rise" from his prone position, holding out a placating hand as he did so.

Collins: You are in pain and you've been trying to reach out. And this was the only way you could. Am I getting warmer?

It seemed to regard him for a moment. Quentin wondered if he was being too colloquial, but then realized that he wasn't actually speaking with his real vocal cords so it probably didn't matter all that much. It swept it's head up and over the cave ceiling and the rock melted into a...hazy point of view of the impossible. A massive explosion across all spectrums of awareness and realities, pulling the Iconian and his grand works into a singularity that had marked the skin of his homeworld until it's death.

But after the darkness was a piercing light and bitter sudden cold. He swept his massive head back toward Quentin.

Thet: ggaaaatteeeesssss....mal-funnnn.ction. Foooorrrrmmmmmm compromittzzzzeeesdddd. Thheeeeeeeeeee fleesshhh heeealllssssssss.

Collins: But you are controlling them! Bending them to your will! You have to know it's unnatural! You are perverting your own creation to extend your life. You were a scientist once, you have to know it's wrong.

The energy around the creature seemed to darken as he raised himself up in a fury, reminding Quentin just how small he really was, even on this plane of awareness.

Thet: MUSSSSTTTTTT HEAAAALLLL. RRRRRRETURN and REPAIR!

Collins: I understand, but you can't do it this way! You are killing innocent people! You are endangering the whole of the planet!

That only seemed to enrage him further, lashing out quickly and suddenly with his powerful (and mostly still complete) lower extremity, hammering Quentin down to the metaphorical sand and pushing him down harder as the "flock" continued closer and closer to their dooms. He "reached" out in vain, trying to "will" his projection to telegraph some kind of danger or warning. But he was no Betazoid.

The Iconian's face was millimeters away from Quentin's.

Thet: loooosssssssssss...isssslooolation. Whhhaatttt do carbbbbbon forms knooooow of thisssssss?

Collins: m-more than y-you would think...reach into any of our minds. Trust me. You'll find all you need to know...

Quentin Collins didn't know if astral projections could be choked to death, but judging by the pressure of the alien's hold on him and his increasingly swimmy eyesight, he got the feeling he was about to find out.

Kal/R'Ariel/Wilde: RESPONSE

--

TAG/TBC

LIEUTENANT COMMANDER 

QUENTIN COLLINS III

FIRST OFFICER

U.S.S. ARROW NCC-69829

ID: E239512QC0

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