Chapter 28W - Lazant the disc jockey

[Amy81]

Lazant insisted on getting into medlab, but the nurse there wouldn't hear of it.

"I'm sorry" she said, "nobody's getting in there without permission!"

Lazant threw his arms up in frustration. If he'd been wearing a hat, he would have thrown it on the floor in disgust. He looked at the two warriors that had been escorting him since his return. "How can I get through to her?" he asked, not really expecting an answer.

"Seems to me like you don't look too good yourself" one of them observed.

The other nodded. "Manatee, you are right. Lazant's never looked worse. And that's really something if you think about it."

Lazant looked at them. Grammit and Manatee, what a pair to be stuck with! Then he went with it. He was about to go into a hurt routine when the door slid open and a dejected doctor walked out.

The doc ignored Lazant's presense and spoke to the nurse. "We tried. Tried everything. She just isn't responding..."

Lazant rushed up to him. "I've been trying to tell you people I have information that can help!! It's more than just the concoctions Amy was fed!! Her brain's been wiped..."

"Wiped?" the doc asked. "That would explain the lack of brain function. Though I did watch the trial. I wasn't sure she had much function to start with..."

Lazant looked at him. He'd heard people sometimes dealt with stress with odd humor. He ignored the comment and pulled out the discs. "Captain Amy was in a cold cell. Her memories were ripped from her. I managed to download what was taken!" He paused for breath. "It would have come out in my debriefing but I felt there wasn't time to wait for one. The commander is unavailable, and I have no idea where the Colonel is." He looked at Manatee and Grammit. "And these two haven't been much help at all..."

"I told you to just drop the discs off..." Grammit began.

"Drop them off?" Lazant hissed, "After all I went through..." He took a menacing step toward Grammit.

"What exactly did you go through?" Manatee asked, stepping closer himself.

"A cold cell, you say, eh?" the doc pondered, ignoring all the bickering. "Question is, even if the information is there as you say, how in the 12 worlds can we get it back into her head?"

And for once the normally glib Lazant had no answer...

"We'll take those discs" the doc said suddenly, yanking them from Lazant's hands.

Lazant reached out quickly and pulled back the bottom three from the stack. "These hold other information. The commander will want them."

The doc nodded, and held up the remaining discs. "And I'll pass these along to Doc BKJ". He looked at Lazant more closely. "Has anyone checked you over since your return? Come with me son. Amy's stable as long as she's on life support. Let's take a look at you now." He led Lazant into medlab, an arm around his shoulder. "You look like you've done battle with the devil himself."

Lazant's mind flashed back to Baltar. The doc wasn't all that far off, when you came down to it.

[Brie]

After being poked and prodded and subjected to just about every medical test in the history of science, Lazant was given a clean bill of health. Upon leaving the examination room he was accompanied by Grammit and Manatee once again. “Frack,” he muttered under his breath. “So why exactly are you two keeping such an annoyingly close eye on me?”

“Commanders orders,” Grammit replied. “She wants to be able to find you at a microns notice.”

“Any idea where Major Brie might be?” Lazant wondered. Grammit and Manatee exchanged a strange look. Lazant quickly grew worried, it dawned on him for the first time that he hadn’t heard anything about any of the other members of the infiltration team. Maybe he and Amy were the only survivors, and Amy just barely that. “What happened to Major Brie?”

“She ain’t a major no more,” Manatee informed Lazant.

“Court-martialed,” Grammit answered.

“Gross Negligence on that last mission,” Manatee continued. “She’s in the brig.”

“What?” Lazant was furious. “I need to see her immediately!” He took off down the hall, Grammit and Manatee having to run to catch up.

[Brie]

After her session in the simms ended Brie returned to her cell to do what she had been doing since her arrest, nothing. She was getting so used to being bored that she never even bothered to pay attention anymore when she would hear footsteps in the hall. It was probably the food cart or the laundry cart or one of the guards just making rounds. She barely even noticed the latest round of footsteps approaching her cell.

“Brie?” She looked up and noticed Captain Lazant standing outside the cell with Millie and Tanya. Brie immediately jumped up and ran to the door, unintentionally letting her guard down for the first time since she had been arrested. She had thought that after leaving them behind, she would be the last person that Lazant would want to see. “Will you open the fracking door?” Lazant ordered with all the arrogance that Brie had remembered. “I refuse to just stand here in the hall.” Millie opened the door and Lazant entered. “A little bit of privacy, if you don’t mind.”

“There’s no such thing as privacy around here,” Brie said, glancing at the cameras.

Lazant stood by the door after it had closed again, watching Millie and Tanya as long as he could. He then turned and faced Brie for the first time. She was still obviously unsure of what he was thinking. He smiled, then put his arms around her, hugging her tightly. Brie returned the embrace, happy to see her friend once again. Why he was hated by so many people on the Callisto escaped her at that micron, she had never been so happy to see anyone in all her life. She blinked back a few tears, pulled away, wiped her eyes with her hand, then punched Lazant hard on the arm. “Ow!” he said, surprised. “What was that for?”

“You told me to leave!” Brie exclaimed. “You knew how much time we had, you even sent a message back for us to stick to the schedule. If I had known you were alive...”

“You would have stayed, and the entire infiltration team would have died.” Grammit and Manatee had filled him in on what they knew about the mission. “I don’t blame you, Brie, so don’t blame yourself. I’m just glad that you had the chance to see this handsome face again.”

“You’ve looked better,” Brie commented with a small laugh. “Everything check out?”

“Just a few bruises,” Lazant said. “Amy’s in bad shape, though. She’s on life support. I really want to fill you in, but I don’t think I should talk about it until after my debriefing, and the Commander is in the middle of something right now.”

“I understand,” Brie said.

“Speaking of looking better, I’m not used to seeing you like this,” Lazant said.

“What, I think I look great in Prison Barge gray!” Brie sat down on the bed, and Lazant sat next to her. She turned slightly so that the cameras would be focused mostly on the back of her head. What Pierce had said about lip-reading had stuck with her. Lazant realized what she was doing and turned as well.

“It’s not the gray,” Lazant said, “I guess I’m just used to a warrior’s uniform.”

“I didn’t even own any civilian clothes,” Brie said. “It wouldn’t have made a difference, since they deployed my will when they thought I was dead. You’d better check it out, they probably did the same with yours. Even if they hadn’t, though, I would rather have spent my cubits on a better protector than on a new wardrobe.”

“A better protector?” Lazant repeated. “Brie, what they frack is going on? I heard you were court-martialed because something that happened on the mission, but no one has really told me too much. Why are you in here?”

Brie laughed, the whole situation seeming so ridiculously funny at the moment. “You didn’t know? I’m in here because I was responsible for your death!”

[Brie]

“My death?” Lazant repeated.

“Yeah, yours and Amy’s,” Brie said. Thinking about Amy and her condition was enough to make her stop laughing. “The original charges were Gross Negligence in the Deaths of Captains Lazant and Amy. That’s what I was convicted of.”

“But we’re not dead,” Lazant said, realizing the stupidity of the whole situation.

“Imagine that. When you turned up alive Pierce had the charges modified to Gross Negligence on the Pangara Moon Mission. How long I’m in here depends on Amy’s condi...”

“Wait a centon,” Lazant interrupted. “Did you say Major Pierce? From Military Inquiries?”

“One and the same,” Brie informed him. “He holds a grudge against me because...,” she chose her words carefully, there was so much that she couldn’t tell him about Pierce and his grudge, “...his recommendation wasn’t followed after my nervous breakdown. He even decided to try the case himself, the first time in over a decade that he’s acted as Chief Opposer. I’m pretty sure the transcripts for the Tribunal haven’t been sealed, but even if they have I’m sure you could find a way to read them if you wanted to.”

“You weren’t negligent,” Lazant said, trying to let everything sink in. “I can attest to that. Maybe we can get your conviction overturned.”

“Forget it!” Brie said a little bit too quickly. “I agreed to the modified charges. I just want to serve my time and then get on with my life.”

“What does Charybdis say about all of this?” Lazant asked. He personally hated the Colonel, but knew that he and Brie went way back.

Brie shook her head. “You’ll find out when you read the transcripts. I haven’t even seen him since he testified.” She decided to change the subject. "Things have been really crazy around here. Remember Captain Hawke, the one who was actually trying to break into my file? I've only heard bits and pieces, but from what I understand he went totally insane and they're keeping him in a drug induced coma."

"Hawke," Lazant muttered half to himself. "Oh frack, I forgot."

"What?" Brie asked.

"Nothing," Lazant replied. "I guess I have some catching up to do. No one told me felgercarb when I was on the Galactica."

“So did you see Martinzi while you were there?”

Lazant looked at Brie like she was crazy. “Brie,” he said, “the only Martinzi I ever knew died several yahrens ago. You know that.”

Brie smiled, glad to have some good news to share. “Nope. He’s on the Galactica, probably still in the Catharsis Center. He was in pretty bad shape when I last saw him.”

Lazant was obviously stunned. Martinzi had been the best friend that he had ever had. “How?”

It was the closest to speechless that Brie had ever seen Lazant. She grinned. “He was the prisoner that you rescued back on the base.”

“Martinzi...wow.” Lazant thought for several microns before something dawned on him. “What can you tell me about a Lieutenant Astraea?”

“Astraea?” It had been a long time since Brie had even heard the name. “She died on one of the first missions that I ever staffed. Why?”

“Time’s up!” Tanya said outside the cell door. “Captain Lazant, you’ll need to leave immediately.

Both Lazant and Brie stood, and they hugged again. “I’ll be back again soon. Hopefully with some good news about Amy.”

Brie watched as long as she could as Lazant disappeared down the hall. Although she knew she should have pushed him away like everyone else, it felt good to have a friend.

[Amy81]

Lazant emerged from the brig area, where Manatee and Grammit waited for him.

"How's the Major doing?" Manatee asked.

"As well as could be expected" Lazant replied, shaking his head. "Seems I've missed a lot since I've been away."

"You being away was half the reason so much went on" Grammit observed.

"So I'm learning" Lazant said, nodding. "Come on boys, back to Medlab".

"Got more aches and pains?" Grammit asked.

"Slipped disc maybe?" Manatee said with a smile. He and Grammit shared a laugh. Lazant just looked at the both of them, then walked off, leaving the two escorting warriors to catch up.

Medlab was less restricted this time when Lazant walked in. He could see a doctor and nurse talking to a cadet through an open doorway. The cadet looked miserable. Lazant looked away. Grammit and Manatee noticed too.

"That's Captain Amy's room, isn't it?" Manatee asked Grammit in a low voice. Grammit nodded but said nothing.

"I need to see the doctor that gave me the check up" he announced to the nurse at the main desk.

"Right behind you" said a voice, and Lazant turned to see the doctor he was looking for standing there. "What can I do for you?"

"I've learned you have a warrior under your care, name of Hawke" Lazant stated.

"Yes" the doctor replied, "Not under my care personally, but he is here."

Lazant pulled out the remaining discs, and the doctor rolled his eyes. "I'll have you know" the doc said, "that those discs are unreadable. They'll be as useful as a three legged daggit in treating Captain Amy."

"I don't understand..." Lazant began. "They contain all of Amy's memories..."

"If you say so" the doc said. "But none of it can be read with our equipment. It's an alien format. And even if we could read it, it's about as useful as a vid from Amy's 10th novayahren as far as helping her recover goes. We don't have the technology to read the discs, let alone get the information back inside her."

Lazant looked dejected as he sat down heavily in one of the waiting room chairs. He sat in silence, his gaze focused on something a million miles away. The touch of the doc's hand on his shoulder brought him back. "Now" the doc said, "if you know something about Hawke, let's hear it. Maybe you can help him."

Lazant held up the remaining discs. "These discs you'll be able to read. It's just data. No memories. But they detail, among other things, the cylon capture of a certain Lt. Hawke..."