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hearts_andminds
What: Lore attacks Data and the Doctors with a holographic Master in tow.
When: During Avon's canon update.
Warnings and Notes: Violence. Done for Lore!Plot at
hearts_andmindsOn a bench at the furthest end of the park sat an android. A quiet one, for once, earnestly regarding the shift in color of the sky as the filter of light through some unseen distant ionosphere and the collected gasses in the atmosphere. He couldn't quite think of the dusk sky as beautiful. It was just there, as everything was just there and he was just there and every person he had ever met. They were just there, and just as easily could not be there in the next moment.
His emotion chip was still functioning, though it wasn't feeding him any certain response to the situation. He was very aware of the muddled uncertainty his system was having deciphering any reaction. He had no idea how he was supposed to feel anymore. What possible lesson there could be for him to learn. How to address any attachment that he had.
Whether he should even maintain those attachments.
He was so lost in thought that he didn't notice Lore's footsteps coming up behind him. Not that many would. Lore was smooth in his movements, stealthy in almost a feline way. He had checked with his scanners before approaching; made sure that there were no hominid life-signs within easy eavesdropping distance. Lore couldn't have anyone interrupting this intimate moment with his beloved family member.
He cocked his head slowly as came to a standstill, looking down at his obtuse brother, pondering. He was atypically maskless, exposed, allowing for the inevitability of his brother realizing who he was. Pale fingers came short of grazing gently over smooth, dark hair; enough so that the 'elder' brother made the motion of stroking behind his brother's head without actually touching.
A moment later his hand darted out like lightning, snapping loose an anterior cranial plate and pressing three quick buttons before Data's eyes could even widen in alarm.
Shoving from the bench, Data staggered back in surprise, holding the bared portion of his glimmering skull. He opened his mouth to speak, shocked at the nothing that came out, then shocked at the fact his internal leveling system had been deactivated as well as his language banks. He toppled to his hip, digging his feet in and started pushing back through the grass.
"Brother! Brother..." Lore implored, face full of despicable compassion and loathable pity as he walked around the bench. "Calm down... We both knew this would happen. It was an inevitability." He held that bit of cranium in his hands, cradling it with care as he approached the other android that was trying to squirm away.
He couldn't have that. He stepped on his pants leg to keep him from going further, and then stooped over him.
Data frantically shook his head, regarding Lore in horror, disoriented and searching for anything that could pass as a weapon. Grass. A stick. Hardly anything that would stand up to a maniacal android.
"You don't understand, brother... It's just me and you. I've seen how these people are... and they can make you think they care, but from the moment they meet you they know they'll leave you behind. They'll always chase off after someone else. Stop that!" Lore noted Data's searching, his frustrated clutching at the first rock he could locate. The cranial plate was discarded and he stooped to straddle his mirror's stomach, reaching to pin his hands together and pry the blunt object from them. "That's enough of that," he scolded firmly.
Data stared up in what was probably the most organically horrified face he could ever achieve. An expression that Lore reveled in, and made his own expression grow that much more fond. "Oh... Dear brother. I see it now. We're more alike than ever. I promise you, even if you're frightened now, I'll make it better. When you have his gratitude, his passion, you'll never worry about these feeble human emotions again. Not after you've had the emotions of a Time Lord."
Then Lore winced, actually hearing the metal clank through layers of bioplast when Data wrenched his hand free and clocked him in the jaw.
From fawning to abruptly furious, Lore fought to recapture Data's hand, struggling to keep his weight shifted so the temporary disabled android couldn't manage himself. "Stop fighting this! We'll finally be real brothers again. My Master will be your Master too-" As quickly as he'd removed the plate, he crammed a device into an exposed port.
Horrified still, Data brought his arm up in a desperate attempt to dislodge it. It was partially successful, at least. Even before one bar of information could download, he snapped the device off, the end of it still jammed deep into his skull and sending a blue white fizzle over the wire-framework around it. Successful, indeed, but it enraged his duplicate all that much more. Like bizarre drama masks, one face terrified while the other fumed.
"What's the matter with you! This is for your own good. Don't you see that I'm doing this because I love you! I'm the only one that really appreciates you. Why else would I be here, and they be gone! Why else would the others abandon you. Spite you. Betray you. It's what we are, brother! We're all we have. Us and the rest of the world!"
Data bared his teeth like he were about to spat back in Lore's face, the horror dissipating under the words to anger.
"...And there it is..." Lore commented, his own violent expression easing. "I knew we were more alike... But now I have to get into your memory bank, so if you'll excuse me..." He stood quickly, and Data had little more than time to reach for the bench than he found himself kicked hard enough that he flipped onto his stomach, face down in damp, unpleasant grass.
This was probably the first time Data didn't appreciate the introduction of discomfort and pain to his system.
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Though with three incarnations on staff at the museum, perhaps he ought not worry so much.
He sensed a certain amount of uneasiness, which he dismissed as simply his mind probing at the telepathic void where the TARDIS ought to be. Suddenly, his attention was wrenched away from the gaping emptiness in his mindscape by the unmistakable noises of a scuffle.
Not thinking of what he might be facing at the source of the noise, he dashed towards it, skidding to a harsh halt as he neared the bench. Hesitation anchored him to the spot for a split moment, before he edged between the pair to protect victim from attacker. He boggled at the sight of the twin faces. "Data?"
No. His elder brother, stealing into the village without detection. Lore was neglected for a moment as The Doctor knelt to help Data up to his feet. "Are you alright?"
Data loosely pulled himself up as the Doctor attempted to help him, shaking his head no in response to the inquiry. No. He was very much not alright. And as the more recent of the brothers implored silently, Lore pulled out his disruptor (http://memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/Varon-T_disruptor), a particularly mean little device that didn't make death quick nor painless. And upon sight of it, Data tugged uselessly at the Doctor's undecorated coat lapel in desperate urgency.
"Oh look, another malfunctioning android in the presence of the Doctor. I can imagine how this little scenario is going to go...." he practically hissed, reaching behind him to click on the holo-emitter clipped to the back of his belt beneath his coat.
Edited 2009-06-22 02:21 am (UTC)
"What have you done to him?" he asked Lore, aggravation giving his voice a harder, more demanding edge than normal. "And whatever do you mean, 'another' malfunctioning android?"
While the look that Lore threw the Master was childishly fond, and then turned bitter toward the Doctor. "If you're not programming them to be pets you're obliging them suicide? Excellent, Doctor. A regular angel of death to artificial life. But it's okay, right? Because they're not actually alive."
That biting tone well hid his underlying thoughts, mostly that he'd daftly not planned ahead for the Doctor to intercede. There was genuine anger there, though. Anger that he couldn't let bide. "I didn't do any worse than you'll inevitably do to him."
Oh, no.
He ought not have been surprised by the appearance of the lanky man with the thin, cruel smile. Scattered clues suddenly fell into place, and he grasped with greatly deepening horror the extent of the Master's influence, even from beyond Haurvatat's impenetrable borders.
"Only after you exploited his programming beyond all hopes of repair." It felt odd, speaking to the other Time Lord, or ghost of a Time Lord, more accurately. When did he manage to squirrel a copy of himself away? As always, he felt a pang of grudging admiration for the Master's resourcefulness.
And then guilt for that admiration.
The brief, doting look Lore offered the image of the Master did not go unnoticed. Some twisted relationship lay there. "Kamelion well understood his own limitations," he said, his breathing rate hitching to a pant. "He suffered and was the cause of much suffering. He...requested." His destruction was an act of mercy. Wasn't it?
"If you're expecting that I must be scheming to do away with Data, then I'm rather sorry, for you're dreadfully mistaken."
He stood upright and moved to the side of Lore. "However, Lore may have other ideas, and given where I stand, who am I to stop him, hmmm?"
"Worse than that. I don't think it matters to him. I don't think he cares either way." Lore's gold eyes, in contrast to Data's, were vicious and predatory as his brother looked like a timid canine at the moment, barely able to keep the coordination to step backward.
"Did you insist on trying to fix him, Doctor? Did you even offer to make him better? Did you, the man who will extinguish races, actually think that guilt is a suitable apology for your acts."
He aimed more determinedly at the Time Lord.
You can't do this, Lore! Don't kill him.
Lore glance to his left, to the opposite side of the Master with a particularly upset look. As if someone else had addressed him. And then a vaguely unhappy look followed.
Keeping his aim, he narrowed his eyes. "This gun has a very unpleasant vaporize setting, so I expect you to do as I say and not try anything especially brash."
Then his eyes flicked to the gun, gaze unwavering, mind calculating. There seemed no projectile mechanism on the barrel, so...a beam-based weapon? Nudging his senses to peer into the immediate future, he could, with luck, be able to predict where the beam might land and dodge out of the way.
But would Data be quite as lucky?
Ignoring the taunts and the troublesome memory of a certain android pleading for his own destruction, the Doctor glanced at Data, at the fear set into that normally placid face.
He let out a long sigh, glaring at Lore. "What would you have me do? And be quick with the explanations," he demanded. "I haven't all day."
He caught Lore's look to the left, but didn't react. Out of the corner of his eye he could see nothing. Questions would be asked, later.
He motioned to the Doctor loosely with his disruptor. "Count down to Data's sixth thoracic vertebrae. A little to the left his bioplast should give a bit. Don't worry, you can feel it through the shirt. Push your fingers in there and twist the switch..."
Data's eyes went wide again, but Lore tsked at him. "Shhh. You know me, brother. Let him do it. It's for his own good."
A cruel sense of humor that that Master would probably get before the Doctor. After all, the Master knew exactly how the power switch worked and where it was. The Doctor, however, hadn't been warned.
"And in return for your council, Lore frees you from the Daleks. I'd suspected you wouldn't offer your aid out of the mere goodness of your hearts."
Though the way Lore referred to him, 'my Master', made the Doctor wary. Perhaps the alliance was more one-sided than he'd originally thought. He approached Data reluctantly, his expression turning rueful, brow furrowing in abject worry. Judging from Data's reaction to the procedure's description, the switch set within the android's back probably held great significance.
"What if I refuse?" he snapped, fingers lingering inches from Data's spine. He would delay, buy enough time to assess Lore's true plans. Was he meant to learn a lesson? Be subject to punishment for how he treated Kamelion? He didn't deserve his fate. No living, sentient being did. But, a single android saw his destruction as serving the greater good. The Doctor thought it noble, really, that self-sacrifice.
"I don't need much to do whatever someone needs... and if you're trying to buy time to figure out how to dodge the gun, trust me, bare hands work quite as well. And if Data's never given a demonstration of how he can bend steel I'm game for a little education."
Data's eyes trained on the Master, and he reached to touch that flickering, open gap in his head. He couldn't quite grip that bit of metal, snapped off and protruding slightly from the port that Lore had intended to download the same program into through. Either way, he had no idea how much of that file, if any, had actually managed to execute.
[(Turn jumped...)]
If he were swift enough, he might attempt to completely disable the device embedded in Data's head, or else he might gain Lore's wrath. If only he could recall which pocket he'd slipped his screwdriver into!
"Threats of harm won't do much good, I'm afraid. As a rule, Time Lords don't exactly fear death." There were exceptions. The Master, for example, who'd desperately sought to prolong his existence past twelve regenerations. And succeeded.
[sorry, five's delaying the inevitable D:]
He sighed. "Try telling that to the older version of yourself, Doctor, what is it, three more regenerations to go. But then, I'm the only one who knows the secret of how to extend those regenerations, aren't I?" He looked at Lore. "Get on with it."
He turned the gun toward Data. "But he's terrified of it. Especially when it's his friends threatened with it."
It seemed like there was only one way out of this. Data didn't know Lore's intentions, nor did he want to be deactivated by them... but logically, with an older version of the Doctor in the village, the younger would be able to pull through some how. He would be able to reactivate him, or Geordi would.
Please don't let Lore go after Geordi. He didn't know what he would do if Geordi were made to suffer again because of him.
He looked to the Doctor and gave him a grim, slow nod, obvious from his expression he was afraid. Easy enough to click off that chip, now, but he had an inkling that Lore would be even further aggravated if he did.
And on Androzani Minor, it would quite literally be the death of him.Torn between his certain death and an uncertain fate for Data, he longed to take the certain choice. But what of his timeline? Would his future selves disappear into the temporal aether or would a new timeline branch off from his? Or would a black hole emerge from the paradox and swallow the village whole?
He then glanced at Data, caught his nod and took its message. His lips pursed in firm determination, though worry creased at his brow and tensed his jaw. He gulped and, achingly hesitant, he settled his hand upon the small of Data's back. He felt for the switch, found it just as Lore had described.
"I-I'm sorry, Data."
Push your fingers in there and twist the switch...
Each movement was agony, his hearts pounding nearly in tandem. Not knowing what the control did or if Data would be permanently damaged by the act, he wavered a moment before gritting his teeth and forcing the switch to turn. Data's golden eyes dulled. His face eased from terrified to passive. His entire body went rigid for a moment before slumping forwards. The Doctor let out a surprised yelp as he dove to prevent Data from slamming face-first to the grass.
The Doctor, though, had no idea what he'd done. Another turn and Data would resume activity. Obviously Data was as secretive with it as he'd always been... Which meant the Doctor was fair game to be misled.
"He must have had a lot of faith in you. Misplaced faith, but I suppose you already knew that... But now that you've already taken care of him for me, half my work is done."
He twisted the dial to just above stun with his thumb on the disruptor. Time Lords were hearty. They could take a bit more of a wallop, he assumed. "I want you to remember one thing, Doctor. The only part I'm going to let you keep. You did this to him."
He sighed, the memory of the events on the planet Sarn bubbling up unbidden. Kamelion, partially in Howard Foster's form, struggling to speak and only forcing out pathetically blunt phrases. Kamelion...no good. Destroy me...please.
Data couldn't even accomplish a single syllable of speech before--
No, this was what the Master and Lore wished to happen. The Doctor writhing and wriggling like an insect caught in a web, and the more he floundered in the guilt, the more entangled he became. That didn't stop the remorse from settling in that void between his hearts, the regret of ending Data's existence, his awareness of the world.
What was it like for an artificial being, to have that frightening prospect always gnawing at the back of one's mind? To know that you would never be exactly like the organics because your deaths were...so much simpler to accomplish?
He lifted his eyes to Lore. "I've done what you wanted," he found himself saying. "Put that weapon away."
Edited 2009-06-26 06:52 am (UTC)
He jumped up, and clapped his hands together. "Come now, my dear Lore, let us get this part of the game over with, shall we? Moving ever onwards, to the inevitable conclusion?"
And then he finally fired at the Doctor, finishing with the theatrics for the moment and pulling out his scanner to double check and make sure no one was close.
"I hate interruptions. This puts everything ahead of schedule. We'll have to ask the older one where the other segments are." After all, they were in the eldest Doctor's TARDIS.
The disruptor beam was swift; the Doctor's perception of it wasn't. The beam landed on his shoulder, and for a moment, the skin and muscle beneath his layers of clothing went completely numb, as if he'd been plunged into the bitingly cold depths of outer space. The sensation would've been blessed relief compared to what happened next.
His twinned pulse intensified at the point of contact, until the thrumming became a pounding, and the pounding became a thrashing. His arm felt strained to bursting, and he clamped his hand on his shoulder in a hopeless attempt to keep from tearing apart. The feeling spread, across his back, his chest. His insides pressured to shred themselves to ragged pieces. His body too dazed to induce regeneration, unconsciousness took him instead.
He slumped to the ground alongside Data.
He jumped up, looking at Lore. "Let's go."
He planted the folded panama fedora on his own head, and lifted up the Doctor to heft over his shoulder. And then he looked mildly surprised. "Are Time Lords heavier than humans or is his big stripey ass that big and striped? You should be happy Often-Wrong made me sturdy."
He hefted Data next, also over his shoulder, first activating a security override at the museum that was supposed to be dormant for months, but had to be used because someone had to step in on family squabbles (that orange stripped posterior might have gotten a hateful glare). Then he flicked up his thumbnail and pressed the red button beneath, transporting to the Observatory.
Time to say hello to the gentleman that knew his Master in this form so very well.