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Post by Brie on Feb 7, 2005 13:32:29 GMT -6
Brie was excited to see Boleman come to her cell, but was immediately worried when he wouldn’t come in. “This will only take a micron,” he explained.
“Is it Amy?” Brie asked quickly. Boleman nodded. “Is she...”
“No,” Boleman interrupted. “She’s still alive. There’s no brain activity. Something about a mind wipe and her memories being on some discs, but they don’t know how to fix things.”
“So when can I see her?” Brie asked. She didn’t know why, but she was sure that Amy would respond to her, even if just a little.
“You can’t,” Boleman said with a sigh. “I can’t arrange it.”
“But you promised!” Brie insisted.
Boleman looked at Brie the way a parent looks at a small, misbehaving child. “Promises don’t always come true.”
Brie wasn’t going to let him off easily. “The only reason I agreed to the modified charges was that you promised you’d do whatever it took so I could see Amy!”
“I had to say something to get you to sign. You could have ruined everything.” Immediately Boleman regretted the words.
Brie stared at him in disbelief. “What did you just say?”
Boleman glanced at his chrono. “I have to go. I’ll send word if there’s any change.” He almost ran down the hall. Brie watched him as long as she could. She had a hard time believing that she had put her life in Boleman’s hands. She had a feeling that she would never see him again.
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Post by Brie on Feb 8, 2005 13:03:20 GMT -6
"I made a huge mistake," Boleman was saying. "I told Brie that I had needed her to sign the modified charges or it would ruin everything. I don't know what I was thinking, it just slipped out."
"If it's a problem, we'll deal with it," was the reply.
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Post by Brie on Feb 8, 2005 16:58:12 GMT -6
Brie couldn’t stop thinking about what Boleman had said. “I had to say something to get you to sign. You could have ruined everything.” What did he mean by that? What could she have ruined? Only one possibility came to mind. Pierce had mentioned having “new followers.” Could Boleman actually be working with Pierce?
It made sense. The Tribunal had looked so favorable for Brie until the protection started. Pierce had wanted Brie’s nervous breakdown to become a matter of public record, and Boleman during their first meeting had immediately stated that unsealing her record would be her best defense. It all fit together like a neat little puzzle except for one thing. Commander Apollo had recommended Boleman to Brie. There were few people whose opinions Brie respected more than Commander Apollo’s.
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Post by Brie on Feb 9, 2005 12:57:33 GMT -6
It was a bit of a surprise to Brie when Lieutenant RaycerX came to the cell door. She hardly even knew him, past his name. “Major Brie,” he said, holding something through one of the holes in the door, “I have something for you.”
Brie sighed. “Please don’t refer to me as ‘Major.’” She had lost her rank, she wished that everyone would respect that. She reached for the note. “Thanks.” Knowing that RaycerX was in Black Squadron, she was pretty sure whom it was from. She slowly opened the envelope, trying as hard as possible to look like she didn’t care.
“Brie, Put me on report for contacting you if you want but I want you to know something. What happened on the Galactica shouldn't have happened, but it did. I am not sorry it did either. What has happened to you is criminal itself. Whatever happens, I will be a loyal friend to you and should you ever need my help all you have to do is ask. You wont receive any further contact from me until you ask for it.
JustinB”
“Tell Major JustinB,” she thought for a moment, “that I’ll appreciate the silence.”
“You’ll appreciate the silence?” RaycerX repeated.
“Those words exactly,” Brie said. “He should understand, if he remembers the last part of what he wrote, that is.”
“I’ll let him know right away, Major,” RaycerX said, starting down the hall.
“I’m not a major anymore!” Brie called after him. The lack of military decorum was really starting to get on her nerves.
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Post by Brie on Feb 13, 2005 17:01:30 GMT -6
Brie had never been much for watching IFB, but there wasn’t anything else to do. She had only been incarcerated for a few cycles, but it felt like yahrens. She had two choices. She could see what was on IFB or she could reread JustinB’s note. She turned on the monitor. An interview show with Zerra was about to begin. Brie was glad to see that it wasn’t that stupid General SickBay that Millie and Tanya were trying so hard to get her hooked on.
“Welcome to our show,” Zerra was saying. “My first guest today is someone who has become familiar to all of you recently. Please welcome Protector Boleman, from the Battlestar Galactica.” Brie’s mouth dropped wide open as she watched her former protector take his seat. “Thank you for joining me. I said that you’re from the Galactica, but like so many of us you decided to stay on the Callisto because of the return of Captain Amy and Captain Lazant.”
“Yes,” Boleman replied. “I decided to stick close, in case Brie needs me.”
“Need you?” Brie screamed at the monitor. “I need to FIRE you!”
“Plus we don’t really know what’s happening with Captain Amy yet. I hope and pray that she gets better, but if she doesn’t...” Boleman’s voice trailed off.
“Please explain the terms of this new arrangement with former Major Brie,” Zerra said.
Boleman cleared his throat. “It’s quite simple. If Amy returns to normal, Brie’s sentence is two yarhens. If Amy physically survives but with no brain function, it’s seven yahrens. And if poor Amy doesn’t survive, which would include the decision to take her off of life support, Brie spends the original ten yahrens in the brig.”
“I’m surprised that Brie didn’t push for a new Tribunal,” Zerra commented. “It was well within her legal rights.”
“Well, Brie and I discussed that at length,” Boleman explained. “She thought that since she had already been convicted, nothing would change with a new Tribunal.”
“What a fracking liar!” Brie screamed. She didn’t care who might have heard.
“And since she knew she would be convicted again, there was the possibility of a harsher sentence,” Boleman was saying. “So Brie eagerly accepted the modified charges.”
Brie shook her head in disbelief.
“I’ll have to say that I was surprised by the conviction,” Zerra told Boleman. “A warrior with her experience and credentials...”
“A warrior with her experience should have known better than to put an emotional young girl in a position of authority,” Boleman said.
Zerra looked confused. “You almost sound as if you agree with Brie’s conviction.”
“Not at all,” Boleman replied quickly. “But I wasn’t surprised by it, and you’ll have to admit that mistakes were made on that mission.”
“Let’s see you go on a suicide mission,” Brie yelled. “See how well you would do.”
“Mistakes are made on MOST missions,” Zerra pointed out. She changed the subject slightly. “What did you think of Major Pierce’s performance? It was the first time in yahrens that he tried a case himself.”
“I think that Pierce did an excellent job,” Boleman said. “He won, didn’t he?”
“Do you still believe that he was biased?”
“Duh!” Brie said loudly.
“Pierce doesn’t like Brie,” Boleman said. “There’s a history there that’s hard to ignore. So yes, I think he was biased. But Military Inquiries agreed with him, and Major Curemode DID press charges.”
“Speaking of which, any idea where Major Curemode is?” Zerra asked. “I’d love to have an interview with him.”
“Last I heard,” Boleman replied, “he was in hiding. There are an awful lot of bad feelings amongst the warriors, and they’re looking for someone to blame.”
“Any last words?” Zerra asked.
“Yes,” Boleman replied. “I have a personal message from Brie to everyone out there.”
“What??!!” Brie shouted.
“She wants everyone to know that she’s sorry for the mistakes she made,” Boleman lied. “She accepts full responsibility and admits that she never should have put Captain Amy in charge of anything. She said that she was wrong, and that she deserves to be punished. She’s glad that she received such a light sentence, she thinks that she deserved life on the Prison Barge.”
“What a fracking liar!” Brie repeated even louder.
“Thank you, Protector Boleman,” Zerra said. “My next guest...” The monitor went dead mid-sentence.
Standing outside the cell door was a guard that Brie hadn’t met before. “IFB is a privilege,” he said with an accusatory tone. “If you can’t watch without making a racket, then that privilege will be taken away from...
“Go to Hades,” Brie interrupted, turning her back on the guard. Her suspicions about Boleman were growing.
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Post by Brie on Feb 14, 2005 15:24:58 GMT -6
After the interview with Boleman and losing her IFB privileges, Brie started to pace. She felt mad, angry, hurt, betrayed and a million different emotions, none of them positive. She kept rubbing her temples, her head was pounding. When Turner died she had managed to keep her sanity while everyone thought that she was insane, but now she was beginning to doubt herself. How she was going to survive up to ten yahrens of this she had no idea.
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Post by Brie on Feb 15, 2005 13:34:02 GMT -6
Brie was still pacing when her food tray was brought to her. She didn’t even acknowledge the presence of the man carrying it. As he went to put the tray on the desk her tripped, and food went flying everywhere. “Great,” Brie mumbled.
“Oops, sorry,” the man said. He stooped down and started cleaning it up.
“Don’t worry, I’ll get it,” Brie said.
“You sure?” He asked. Brie nodded. “Okay, I’ll be back soon with another tray.”
“Don’t bother, I’m not hungry,” Brie told him as he left. She started to pick up what she could, but then out of sheer frustration she threw the tray and watched it bounce off of the door.
In no time at all both Millie and Tanya were there. “What’s going on?” Millie asked.
“Nothing,” Brie replied, sitting on the floor. “Nothing at all.”
“Brie, you’ve already lost IFB for the next three cycles,” Millie said. “You don’t want to lose any more privileges.”
“What privileges?” Brie asked sarcastically.
“Well, like visitors,” Tanya said.
“Yeah, right, I wouldn’t want to give Charybdis a legitimate reason for not seeing me.”
“You were pretty happy to see Captain Lazant,” Millie reminder her.
Brie thought for a micron, then changed her tone of voice. “That’s true. Okay, I’ll behave. I promise.”
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Post by Brie on Feb 18, 2005 15:24:18 GMT -6
Once again Brie started to pace. She wasn’t sure why it made her feel better, but it did. She couldn’t help but laugh slightly at the thought of losing her visitor privileges. Besides Lazant there wasn’t anyone that she really wanted to see. She had tried her hardest to push both Skyler and Justin away, and Charybdis...
Charybdis. Just the thought of him made her nauseous. For all these yahrens she had believed that he was her friend but now, when she thought about it, he had never brought anything but problems into her life. Charybdis had been Turner’s friend, she wouldn’t deny that. After Turner died they pretended that they had some sort of bond because of him, but they didn’t. Not really. Charybdis was nothing but trouble. He had never believed in Brie. He had readily accepted her nervous breakdown. Even Pierce had figured out that she had faked it, but not Charybdis. He was more than willing to think that she had been insane. When she finally told him the truth he was actually surprised. It seemed to be easier for him to think that she had been crazy than that she had always been sane.
Then there was her taking over Gold Squadron. All she had ever received from him were questions and doubts. It started with Astraea. Brie had always felt that Charybdis blamed her for Astraea’s death. Then when he started seeing Amy, he didn’t have the decency to let Brie know what was going on, even though it was obvious that SOMETHING had been tearing poor Amy up inside. After the relationship became public Charybdis was even worse. Every assignment, every mission, EVERYTHING to do with Amy was questioned.
Brie shook her head. Charybdis had no respect for her. He never had. No respect for Brie, no respect for Amy. Otherwise he wouldn’t have confused Amy the way he had before the most important mission of her young life. They hadn’t been saying good-bye, he had wanted to make sure that she died with HIM on her brain. If anyone deserved to be serving time for negligence, it was Charybdis, not Brie.
A thought briefly crossed Brie’s mind. Was Charybdis working with Pierce? In some ways it made sense. There had been no further retaliation after Turner’s death. Charybdis had always kept an annoyingly close eye on Brie. Working his way into a position of authority...no, Brie didn’t really believe that. Pierce would have told her. He would have relished in it.
There was just one simple answer. Charybdis was NOT Brie’s friend. His testimony had cost Brie her freedom. A friend would have tried to explain. Even if he couldn’t come in person, he could have sent a message. Hell, Justin had managed to get two messages to her plus had taken every opportunity possible to see her, and they barely knew each other. But Charybdis didn’t care. Charybdis just wasn’t the person that Brie had always believed.
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Post by Brie on Feb 21, 2005 18:30:10 GMT -6
As she paced, Brie decided to stop thinking about Charybdis. He wasn’t worth it. She decided instead to concentrate on Boleman. There had to be a way to find out if he was a member of Pierce’s new organization.
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Post by Brie on Feb 22, 2005 13:39:05 GMT -6
Brie couldn’t stop thinking about Boleman. It just all fit into place. There was no way that she should have lost the Tribunal, the charges to begin with were ridiculous, plus Pierce hadn’t even come close to proving his case during the Opposition. It wasn’t until the Protection that things looked bad for Brie. When Amy and Lazant were later found alive, Boleman refused to even consider a new Tribunal, even though it was well within Brie’s legal rights. He tricked her into signing the new charges by promising to arrange for her to see Amy, a promise that he never intended to keep. The next time Brie saw him he accidentally admitted that he had “needed” her to sign, and would have said anything to get her to do so. It just all fit into place.
There had to be some way to find out the truth. Someone who knew him well enough...Trula. If only Brie could talk to Trula again. “What the heck,” Brie said out loud. She called for a guard, and was glad to see that it was Millie who answered her. Brie really liked the young woman, although she seemed to have a bit of a self-image problem. “Millie, could you do me a favor?” Brie asked sweetly. “Please?”
“I can try,” Millie replied.
“I just want to get a message to Trula, Boleman’s wife,” Brie said. “Ask her to come visit me. On the Galactica I stayed in their quarters, and she had said that she would be stopping by from time to time.”
“Trula,” Millie repeated. “I’ll see if I can track her down, but I’m not making any promises.” Millie smiled at Brie. “See, those visitor privileges do come in handy.”
“It depends on who the visitor is,” Brie replied.
A centar later Trula was led to Brie’s cell. “Brie!” she exclaimed. “I know I said I’d be by, but I’ve been so busy.”
“That makes one of us,” Brie mumbled. “Do you want to come in?”
“No,” Trula replied. “I only have a few centons. Is there something I can do for you? Anything you need?”
“I’m okay,” Brie told her. “Or as well as can be expected. But there is something I’d like to talk to you about.”
“Anything,” Trula replied with a smile.
Suddenly Brie felt very foolish for even approaching the subject, but she was determined to figure everything out. “How long have you and Boleman been sealed?”
Trula was obviously surprised. “About ten yahrens. Why?”
Brie ignored the question. “Is he good at what he does?”
Trula laughed slightly. “It depends on what he’s doing. If you’re asking professionally, I’d say yes, although I think he fracked up your Tribunal towards the end. I was really surprised that you lost.”
Brie paused, knowing that the next question was going to sound strange. “How well do you know him?”
Trula shook her head. “I don’t understand.”
“Is he easy to know, or does he have, I don’t know, very private times. Times when he disappears for a while, or is very secretive. Stuff like that.”
Trula stared at Brie. “Why are you asking me this?”
Brie decided to tell Trula at least part of the truth. “I can’t help but wonder if the reason that I lost was that Boleman was actually working with Pierce.
There were several microns of silence before Trula started to laugh loudly. “You have GOT to be kidding me! A stupid jerk like Boleman, one of the Chosen? His ideals, his perception of right and wrong, have NO place in the New Secret Survival Society.”
Brie couldn’t believe what Trula had just revealed. “You’re working with Pierce,” she said quietly.
“I have been all along,” Trula said, smiling. “The Great Traitor, your late husband, died because of a last micron change in assignments. Who do you think was responsible for the food poisoning in that batch of Bovine Stew? I’m proud of my part in his execution.” Brie remained calm, hoping Trula would continue to give her more information. “And you know what else? It doesn’t matter that Elmer is dead, we’re still going to get aboard and carry out our plans. It’s time for a change, and nothing is going to be able to stop us!”
“Get aboard what?” Brie asked. She mentally filed away the thought of Elmer being dead, so much was being said that she couldn’t process everything.
“I’ve said too much,” Trula suddenly realized. “Don’t bother saying anything to anyone, they wouldn’t believe you anyway. Last time they thought you were crazy, even though everything you tried to tell them was right. And if you do say something, I’ll come back here and kill you myself. I don’t care if you ARE scheduled for public execution.” Without saying another word Trula walked quickly down the hall.
Brie sat down on the bed. She had a lot of thinking to do.
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