round 4 MSNPC Delavigne - Sing To Me A Song Of Sorrow

[Blueheart]

((Temporal Rift))

::Lieutenant Commander Franklin Delavigne – Frank to his friends – sat in the fathomless waste of the rift in time, petting the head of an infant no more than a few days old.::

DELAVIGNE: There, there, Elizabeth. Don’t cry. I will find you some food if we can ever get out of here.

::Her name wasn’t Elizabeth. It was Debra or Diana or something. But that didn’t matter. He mother had been here, sometimes she was full of spite and hormones, sometimes she was lying down, covered in the mess of birth, cooing and nursing the child. Sometimes the baby was born, sometimes it wasn’t. Sometimes he was alone here, sometimes he wasn’t. Things did not flow in a straight line within the rift.

That’s why Frank liked it so much. It was as if his past had never happened. As if it was fluid, changeable. He longed for the life he was denied. It was something that had never come out over the course of his duty. He was always so put together, so parental. He was everyone’s favorite grandfather that they didn’t have, which only struck them as odd when they realized that he had no family.

Had no family left, to be precise.

He thought in a naive way that he had gotten over it. That he could put the past behind him. That was, of course, before the accident tore through the science lab and he had been left at the mercy of temporal flux and polaric radiation. It was now nearly a century that he had been living in limbo, forward and backwards, moving through the ages like a drunken wanderer desperate to forget the past and yet inextricably tied to it.

He realized all too soon that the accident has been a direct result of his own hubris. Sure, Starfleet had commanded his team to do research into polaric energy, but he was the one who threw caution to the wind, believing they could control any reaction within their labs.

However being at the epicenter did give him freedom, for the scientists who were not immediately evaporated in the explosion found they had a mobility through the time rifts that the others did not. Most of the crew were caught endlessly replaying the same scene over and over again, from a few seconds to a few hours. He had started out trying to communicate with the crew, get the ones who were experiencing a longer loop to make changes and try to correct things in the vain effort to throw the Christopher Pike out of the anomaly. At one point he thought he had it – he was sure it would work, bringing the ship out only a week or two after the incident.

And then the Romulans came.

Frank bared his teeth to the darkness, swallowing bile at the thought of the species. The Romulans, the [...]s. They who had taken everything from Frank and continued to take, and take and take.

In his arms little Diana coughed and gave a weak gasp. She needed nourishment, which the void of the rift would not provide. Frank shivered. How many times had the girl died in his arms, only to have time reversed and to find her anew?

How many times would she die again?

~*~

((Flashback – New Dakota Colony, 112 years prior))

::Warmth flooded his body as his wife pressed against him::

ANGELA DELAVIGNE: Must you go? Can’t you just tell Starfleet that you’re taking early retirement?

FRANK DELAVIGNE: ::he chuckled:: I wish. This will be my last mission, I promise. But I feel the border defense is important. You know, I’m keeping colonists just like you safe!

ANGELA: ::She smiled softly:: Technically you’re keeping us safe, too.

FRANK: ::He waved her concern aside:: The Romulans would have to come pretty far past the borders to harass New Dakota. Besides, with Elizabeth walking now, you won’t have time to worry. You’ll be chasing her all day and night!

ANGELA: ::letting out a soft sigh she turned towards the child sleeping on the sofa:: She’s getting so big. I’m glad you got to see her first steps.

FRANK: I am, too. ::He walked over to the little girl, petting her hair back and kissing her head:: Tell her Daddy will be home before she knows it.

ANGELA: Will you? ::She watched Frank, questioningly. All too often Starfleet had a habit of making short mission stretch out for years::

FRANK: Captain Hassalet knows I intend to be home for Christmas. I’ll be here, even if I have to steal a shuttlecraft!

ANGELA: ::chuckling softly, she rose to her feet, drawing Frank up with her:: You promise?

FRANK: ::He nodded, gazing back at her:: I promise. ::With a mischievous smile:: But I want something from you…

ANGELA: ::Raising a brow, curious:: What’s that?

FRANK: I want a tree. ::He smiled:: All dressed up in pretty lights and tinsel!

ANGELA: ::In mock protest:: Frank! There’s no evergreen trees on this whole planet!

FRANK: You’re a clever lady, I’m sure you can think of something!

ANGELA: ::with a sigh, she leaned into him, wrapping her arms around his waist:: All right, I’ll make sure you get a tree.

FRANK: ::Kissing her gently:: I’ll see you in four months.

ANGELA: ::Kissing him back:: Come home safe, Frank.

FRANK: I will. ::A pause:: I love you.

ANGELA: ::Whispered, through unshed tears:: I love you, too.

~*~

((Temporal Anomaly – Present time))

::The rattling breath in the infant’s throat was getting worse and Frank shivered. Part of him wondered if it was better to keep her here, or if he should have left her with her mother.

DELAVIGNE: Come on, Elizabeth. Hold on. Maybe we can get on that shiny Romulan ship and steal some food for you.

The other part of him, the one that was damaged by radiation and pain, coveted her. Wanted her to replace the family he had lost.

When his mind started failing, he had gone to sickbay and found one of the orderlies was caught in a loop, tending a young baby boy. The kid had a respiratory ailment, nothing major for this day and age, but enough that his parents brought him by sickbay. That’s what started the yearning inside Frank, the longing for something he had lost. And while the orderlies could not break out of their time loop, he could move through it. It was a simple thing to simply lift the child from their hands and take it with him.

And yet on a failing starship, caring for a child was hard. Frank was constantly moving to find a working replicator, and enough supplies for both himself and a helpless child. It focused him and yet consumed him. Maybe it was his fault the time loop wasn;t broken and not the Romulans.

No. It had to be the Romulans. Romulans were the root of all evil.

Somewhere along the way Frank had lost the boy. Maybe it was in engineering? Maybe it was on the bridge? He really couldn’t remember. He had searched the ship, but by that point his mind was failing into an endless cycle of torment, time loops and pain. He never found the baby boy again, and for days (or was it months? years?) he wandered alone.

~*~

((Flashback – New Dakota Colony, 111 years prior))

::The shimmering haze of the transporter faded as a cold wind blew through the desolate streets of the burned out colony. The reports had not done this justice. It wasn’t a strategic strike, it was a massacre.

Commander Jolani cast a wary glance towards Lieutenant Delavigne. She knew all too well that this was the settlement his family had been in, and with comm lines down the chances for survivors didn’t look good.

Their boots crunched through sand that had been melted into glass by orbital fire. Smoke still rose for a few building on the horizon, though it appeared any fires in the local vicinity had long since burned themselves out. The Romulans had called it retribution for the unintentional destruction of a cargo freighter by a trigger happy gamma shift on patrol in the neutral zone. Jolani called it murder.

Delavigne was shaking as they moved their way through the empty streets. There was no sign of survivors rushing out to meet them. Unless they found some way to get underground and hadn’t yet found the courage to come up for air, it was looking like all the medics could do was start tagging bodies.

They crossed a high street and without warning Frank Delavigne broke into a full sprint. Security Officer Connel reached out for him, but Jolani put a hand up.::

JOLANI: Let him go…

::She understood all too well the need for closure. The need for answers, even if those answers were not good ones. As her team circled around looking for survivors, she followed Delavigne into the gaping burned out hole of a colonial habitat.

Inside was the same chalky black burn pattern the rest of the colony displayed. No one saw it coming. Maybe the settlements on the far side of the planet would have survivors, but it was clear this city had been caught in the middle of broad daylight by seven decloaking warbirds.

A scream ripped out of Frank’s throat, raw and bitter as he collapsed next to the ashed remains of what appeared to be one of the leafy fern trees. Spatters of gold and silver were melted to the ash, piled around the charred remains of two corpses.

The man crumpled like a marionette with all the strings cut, screaming into his hands until he coughed up blood and the screams lapsed into tears. She could make out one word: ‘no.’

JOLANI: Frank… ::She started as soft as possible::

DELAVIGNE: There is no justice for this! There is no sense! My baby! My wife!

::The Commander’s brows knit and she lay a hand on his shoulder and he started to sob incoherently::

~*~

((Temporal Anomaly – Present time))

::Baby Diana gasped again, her face turning blue. Frank felt his heart leap into his throat::

DELAVIGNE: No, Elizabeth, hang on. ::He looked up, feeling a surge of fear tear through him as the strange shiny ship came back into view. He didn’t want to go there. He was afraid. Terribly afraid. But as the baby in his arms gasped, he felt tears sting his eyes. How many times did she have to die?:: Dear God, please hang on…

::Frank Delavigne took a deep breath and stepped through the rift, onto the USS Atlantis…::

~*~

OOC – any ideas on where he should land?

Tbc!

~*~

MSNPC Lt. Commander Frank Delavigne

Science specialist

USS Christopher Pike

as simmed by

Lt Shar'Wyn Foster

Chief Medical Officer

USS Atlantis