<USS Avalon> Eavesdropping

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Eavesdropping
by Joshua  McEntire, JD Garrity, Li Zachan Kabuki, James McEntire, & Moria  
McEntire-McKenna
 
JoshieMac paced angrily as his brother James and cousin JD  scanned again for 
his uncle's missing shuttle. How could they have been so  stupid? His father 
had regaled them time and again with tales of his  uncle's ability to think 
outside the box and accomplish whatever needed  to be done despite remarkable 
odds. How had they thought, given the tools  they'd left to him without a 
second 
thought, to keep him still once they'd  shown him what was at stake? 
 
He'd taken quite a tongue-lashing from Grace when he'd told her  of the 
escape, though he'd gotten off easy by comparison to the officer  guarding the 
shuttle.  Still, he suspected they'd both be let off easier  than Grace herself 
would be once she informed the captain of the Avalon, who  she was on her way 
to 
speak with this very moment, that they had lost his  chief engineer.
 
Zachan's usual light hearted bounce changed to a purposeful  stride as he 
entered Engineering.  He had all his temporal mechanics  information on a heavy 
duty PADD and his own ideas buzzing around his  head.  "Whatcha got so far, 
Joshie?" 
 
"Not a goddamned thing," Joshie growled, frowning. "Jaimo? JD?  Anything?" 
 

"Go fishing?" Zachan asked.  At the odd looks, he shrugged,  making his 
earring shake.  "You know..throw out a line and see what you  catch?"

"I swear, this guy is slipperier than an eel," James  muttered.
 
"Remember what dad said. Swore all the guy needed to make  whatever you 
needed to have happen was chewing gum and bailing wire. Just our  dumb luck we 
made 
sure he had them." Joshie's frown deepened. "How the hell  did he just 
disappear? Even with a cloak, there should have been an ion trail  or 
something. I'm 
not finding anything."
 
Zachan pinched the bridge of his nose and closed bright blue  eyes.  "No 
cookies...no crumbs.  If you have no power then you don't  leave a trail." 
 
"Okay..but we should still read distortion," Joshie muttered,  searching yet 
again and coming up blank. So he's either recalibrated his cloak  and shield 
to hide from ours, which I'm not sure can be done, or he's actually  completely 
vanished, which I'm sure can't be done. Okay,  Zachan...fishing...what do we 
use for bait?"
 
"You tell me.  I've heard the same stories you guys have  but you must have 
better insights.  How do you bribe a guy who can't  be bribed?"
 
"Oh, yeah." Joshie grumbled. "We've got such great insight, we  showed him 
what would be lost if the future were altered, then push him to do  it anyway, 
as if that'd work. And of course, never once consider he might  decide to take 
curtain number two and try to keep the fucking thing intact.  Sure, 
Z-man...we're freaking geniuses, the lot of us."
 
"I don't know about Z, but J&J were dropped on their heads."  Moria piped in 
from the doorway. Then she simply added.  "Annabelle."
 
"How are we supposed to get Mom on the ship?" JD snapped. "And  why would I 
want to subject her to the pain of losing him again?" 
 
"Fish...bigger fish..." Zachan had developed the habit of  thinking out loud. 
 He blinked blue eyes them again.  "Whose a  bigger fish than him?"
 
Moria chewed her lip. "I talked to my Mum, why can't we talk to  yours? Use 
her as bait. Get her to talk to Uncle Josh." Turning to look at Z  she 
answered, "Ketchum. Grace and Andy just left to speak with  him."
 
JoshieMac winced at the thought and muttered "I don't envy  them that 
discussion..." even as JD whirled on them. "You can't ask her to do  that! 
Don't you 
remember how much losing him hurt her? You can't use her that  way...if he 
doesn't come back then she'll  be sure it was because he  didn't love her 
enough 
to, don't you see that?" He glared hard from one to the  next. "You are not 
asking my mother to do this."
 
"Ease up, guys," Zachan said, seeking to make peace as usual,  "Mo's got a 
good idea.  He can blow off kids but he can't blow off the  boss."
 
"Which boss? His Captain or his wife?" Moria asked with a smirk.  She knew JD 
was upset, so she didn't say anything about his rant.
 
JD's eyes narrowed at MoMo. "...his captain..." he clarified  clearly.
 
Zachan placed a warm hand on the younger man's shoulder.   He wasn't going to 
repeat the fact that Uncle Josh said he wouldn't go back to  her if it would 
hurt them.


Moria held up her hands. "Take  it down a notch, JD."
 
"By the way, Mo, I was never  dropped on my head.  My weirdness is all 
Celestial," Zachan said, still  frowning in his attempts to ponder a solution.  
"Too 
bad we don't know how  to contact this Ketchum character."
 
"Sure we do," JoshieMac  responded absently, still absorbed in the search on 
his screen. "But who's to  say that the minute Grace told him of Uncle's 
disappearance,  assuming they've gotten that far in the conversation, he didn't 
come  up with the idea to look on his own. In the few communications between 
the 
two  ships he's taken part in, he didn't strike me as a fool. If he's got any 
ideas  we can rest assured he'll try them." 
 
"My scientific soul says it  would like to be sure that's being done," Zachan 
told him.
 
"Okay..."Joshie answered  slowly, bringing up the surveillance in Grace's 
ready room so that they  could monitor the situation between Grace and Ketchum. 
After monitoring a  moment, Joshie frowned. "Damn it...they're not there...hang 
on..." He began  coding in a security query then swore a blue streak before 
informing them.  "They've gone over to the Avvy! After all that bullshit about 
keeping history at  a distance and not contaminating the timeline any further, 
they've gone directly  over to commune with our past and shit. Who the hell's 
harebrained, halfwit dumb  ass idea was that? I mean...as if we hadn't fucked 
things up enough already,  let's just go over there and see if we can screw 
the past up further? Maybe  Grace can visit her  mom or her long lost aunt and 
just FUCK HER HEAD UP  TOO? What the hell...." He continued swearing and 
seething in this manner as he  called up all the historical data on the Avalon, 
locating her security codes,  and tapped into Ketchum's ready room, determined 
that they should be aware  how things were progressing.

"And breathe," James said with a  smirk.  "Who's going over with her?"
 
Moria shook her head. "Joshie's  spent to much time being my brother." 
Looking at the screen she hissed softly.  "It's Andy."

James flinched.  "Fuck, he'd better come back."   His eyes met Moria's for 
the briefest moment and he frowned.  He'd made his  peace with Andy, he wanted 
the guy to be there for his little  sister.
 
"He will, James, don't worry."  Moria said softly. 
 
"I know too many more celestial  people," Zachan said quietly, his hand 
making a gesture his father used.   "Andy's coming home and JD's dad is going 
home 
to be his dad.  I won't take  anything less."
 
"Then we're going home."  Moria added. Please let us be able to go home. 
 

JD was no longer listening to  the others as he scanned and rescanned the 
area frantically. He wasn't sure what  he wanted to do more - scream or cry.  
How 
had they come to this? In trying  to talk his father into following his first 
instinct and returning to his own  ship, they had proven to him why he 
couldn't. Had it always been so? Had his  interference always been the reason 
his 
father had never come home? Was fate  really capable of so cruel and vicious an 
irony?
 
Spying the boy's  expression, JoshieMac placed a hand gently on his shoulder, 
reassuring him  quietly. "Don't worry, kiddo. We'll find him." God, please 
let that be  true...




"Hey, come on, little man," James attempted  to soothe.  It felt awkward 
coming out of him, he was more the pick up the  pieces afterward sort, rather 
than 
the deal with it as it happens sort, that was  what Victoria was for.  "How 
about we try a different algorithm."   Stepping up, he started adding things to 
the boy's scans, not actually getting  anywhere, but hoping that if they at 
least tried, JD would feel better. 
 
Watching the video feed of  Grace's meeting on the Avalon, Moria blinked. 
"Did you guys hear what I just  heard?"
 
"No," Zachan said softly.   "We are going home."
 
Sighing Moria moved over to  another screen and called up the section of the 
feed she'd just heard and played  it for the others. 
 
Grace read over the PADD and  sighed deeply. "Your telling me that not only 
are we 40 years in the past, but  we're in the wrong reality?" 
 


 
"That's what it  appears.  Based on our timeline, your ship was monitoring 
the Solar Flare  of Timericus.  And it could have been worse, this could have 
been a mirror  universe or one that war had destroyed almost everything.  At 
least this is  probably close to what it was.. is.. well, you get the picture.  
Two things  that need to occur, one in rather short order, locate Mr. Garrity, 
and then two,  we try to get you home."
 
Looking at her brothers and  cousin she pointed to the screen. 
 

JD paled, looking  stricken. "He's out there because of us...because of me." 
his voice was filled  with grief." I can't find him...I keep...I've modulated 
the sensors every  way I can think of...he's just gone. He's not supposed to 
be out  there...we're not supposed to be here...we did this..." His voice 
seemed to  fade as he paled further, the guilt hitting hard,"Is this where 
their 
timeline  and ours diverged before...when I interfered? Did we always lose him 
because of  me?" He looked at each of them in turn, as if believing one of them 
could  possibly have the answer.

"Didn't you hear the manny?" James said,  putting a gentle hand on JD's back. 
 "In their reality, this never  happened.  In their reality, we're miles from 
here.  We had nothing to  do with it the first time around, not in their 
reality.  And not in  ours.  In ours, Uncle Josh just never came back.  I 
mean... 
does any  of you actually remember your parents telling you about an invasion? 
 Mum  never said anything to me and neither did Dad.  Z, did your Mum say  
anything about you being born when there was fighting outside in the hall?   
Coz, quite frankly, that's one hell of a story and I'd have liked to hear  it.  
But I never ever have, have you?"
 
"I heard him," JD  mumbled, unable to face them anymore. "He was surprised my 
father wasn't with  Grace. He was supposed to be. His report didn't tell him 
he'd disappear...or  where to find him."
 
"Mom and Dad never  said a thing about my being born in anything other than 
the usual times, just  that I was the first Avalon kid.  Mom would never talk 
about Uncle  Josh.  It made her cry and even Dad was very vague about things," 
Zachan  finally said.
 
"Can we broadcast  this?" Moria asked. "Send it out and maybe he'd pick it 
up? We got to let him  know that by going back he doesn't mess up our lives." 
 
"Well, I could try  that but you never like what I do to stuff to make it 
work, Mo," Zachan said  mildly.
 
Moria rolled her  eyes. "I'll make an exception this time, Z. She might not 
be 'our' Aunt Belle,  but there is a Belle Garrity over there who needs him, 
plus the us from this  time line."
 
"Sorry, James,"  Zachan said as he took off his jacket.  Work like this 
required a bit of  elbow room.  He pried off the panel cover in front of him 
and 
stared  intently.  Reaching over into his jacket pocket, he took out a small 
thin  tool and touched it to a resistor.  It sent out a slight spark but it 
also  
forced misbehaving comm relays into broadcasting where they weren't supposed  
to.  "That ought to have the comm open on frequencies you'd never  expect."
 
"Send the message,  Bro," Moria told James.

Taking the recording that Mo had made of that  tiny piece of very vital 
information and looping it, he sent it through the  relays Zachan had set up.  
Smiling at his own foolishness and knowing none  of his family would 
understand, 
he sent the message along with a tiny prayer to  whoever was listening.  Oh 
God, he  thought, if you really can hear me, send him  home.  Then he sat back 
and nodded to everyone.  "All done,  just gotta keep our fingers crossed now."

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