Different places and times

beep beep beep beep beep beep beep beep beep beep beep beep b*
Kay slapped the alarm off and rolled over onto her back, stretching and yawning as Ishani groaned and grumbled next to her
Looking over at her, Kay gently elbowed her girlfriend in the ribs
"C'mon sleepy - Time to get up!"
"...Five more minutes?"
Sitting up, Kay leaned across to gently brush Ishani's long dark hair aside with her fingers and plant a kiss on her cheek
"You know as well as I that we've got to be there for this six thirty briefing"
Ishani rolled over and scowled
"What the smeg happened to the last three days!?" she asked in irritable bemusement "That was far too short for downtime!"
Kay raised her eyebrows, sparing Ishani a knowing look as she leaned over towards the bedside table to scoop up a pack of fags
"Yeah, we did go on a bit of a bender" she agreed, worrying a couple of cigs out of the wrinkled packet to spark them up, and pass one across to Ishani "Might as well enjoy your time off, hey?"
"Huh" Ishani grunted drawing on her cig and exhaling smoke "Got that right"
Kay smiled distantly
"Yeah..."
Ishani frowned
"Aw, shit... Sorry hon - We forgot, didn't we?"
"Don't worry about it" Kay shrugged "He'll still be there next time we get back"
"Yeah, but all the same..."
Kay sighed and chewed her lip, unconsciously worrying at the sleeper she had pierced through it
"It's been seventy five years since they took him into stasis" she said in a low voice, her brow furrowing "Did you know that?"
Ishani frowned sympathetically and reached a hand towards her, but said nothing
"I only got three years with him" Kay muttered, shaking her head dejectedly "It feels like I barely remember him..."
"There's no need to get all maudlin" Ishani smiled, jerking her head imperceptibly towards the walls, and the monitoring equipment they undoubtedly contained "It's for the best really, isn't it?"
"Yeah" Kay ruefully ran a hand through her short hair and took a deep drag of her cig "You're right - Me being away all the time wouldn't be fair on him"
"Course I'm right" Ishani nodded sagely "I've been doing this five centuries longer than you have; you listen to me!"
Grinding her cig out in the overflowing ashtray, Kay stood
"C'mon" she said "Let's get out and suited up - We've got our briefing to get to"

Assembling along with the rest of the squad in the dimly lit, utilitarian surroundings of ready room twelve, Kay took time to privately reflect on her predicament as she shrugged her way into her 'suit - What had been done to her son to ensure her obedience was vile beyond words, but hers was just one in a litany of atrocities committed in the name of their compliance; cortex bombs, post-suicide forced restorations, and constant monitoring, imprinting and conditioning, were just some of the many horrors that had been intrusively inflicted on all the staff since the Traitor's departure
In many ways, it was hardly surprising that everybody's downtime tended to pass in a blur of drink and drugs like hers had; with many officers secretly preferring to be back out in the field where the monitoring was still pervasive, but less noticeable against the backdrop of whatever time line they had slipped into
An Enforcers lot, it was safe to say, was not a happy one

Ishani clapped an arm around her shoulders
"Ready?" she asked
"Yeah" Kay sighed in response
"Then cheer the smeg up" Ishani murmured, her lips barely moving "They'll notice..."
Forcing a bright smile, Kay turned and, to the hoots and whistles of several of their more childish colleagues, kissed her
"Love you"
"Yeah yeah" Ishani replied, kissing her back "I love you too - C'mon on, let's go get our next assignment"
They broke away from each other and turned to walk together towards the briefing room
"Hope it's something easy - like investigating some goit dying when they smegged about with one of the artefacts..."

...

When and where: Starbug - Another time and place

"Ooof!"
Phil's breath exploded from him as he doubled over, clutching his groin; his eyes bulging as he collapsed onto the floor to Alex's howls of laughter
"And that's for abandoning us on a burning space station" Cass snapped, viciously kicking him where he lay, wheezily gasping for breath "Goit"
Wheeling away, Cass' vision swam unsteadily, making her blink and shake her head, trying to clear her dizziness
"Shit..." she muttered, massaging a hand across her perspiration beaded forehead
Taking an unsteady step forward, she glanced woozily around the fracas surrounding her, marvelling for a moment at the way Jay knocked Davie off his feet with a low sweeping kick before laying him out cold with savage punch to the side of his head - She loved the way he moved!
"Does anyone else feel ...weird?" she croaked, before stumbling to the floor as her knees suddenly gave way beneath her
The question was irrelevant - The remaining members of the crew seemingly succumbing as rapidly as she; a distant buzzing sound filling her ears above Alex's incessant howls of laughter as she pitched over sideways, only just managing to save herself from cracking her head on the floor by weakly raising her arms
"Shit..." she managed, blackness gathering at the edges of her blurred vision, her nose suddenly dripping with blood
There was something there - a weird shadow coalescing in the centre of the room... Something...
"Wha...?" Cass frowned in confusion, trying hard to focus on whatever it was, but the blackness claimed her with a roaring howl that grew to drown everything out as her consciousness faded

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Whoever's left – What is it that just materialised? - Weird psychic aliens, a trick of the light, or something completely different?
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