Fact Finding "
By: Maxine Lucinda Tapert, Computer Specialist, [PC]
Dr. Alyssa Caitlin Northrop, Acting Chief Intel Officer, [PST]

Stardate: 58205.25 1635

Alyssa left Sickbay grumbling. Yeah...maybe Atwood did beat the crap out of Mason.....and yeah...maybe he shouldn't have....but this guy just tripped each and every one of her warning bells. Something wasn't right here. Definitely not right.

Once she made it down the hallway a little ways, she tapped her Comm Badge. "Northrop to Tapert. I have a job for you."

"Tapert here," Maxine was a little startled to hear from the Intel Commander, but her answer was prompt. "What did y'need, ma'am? I'm at your disposal."

"Ensign....I need you to dig something up for me. In Sickbay right now is a Federation POW....by the name of Matt Mason. He's requested Asylum with the Maquis....but something's not feeling right here. Anyway...what I need you to do is this: One...find the sensor logs from Mason's interrogation back on Qul Tuq. Two...find anything you can that resembles a report on Mason from a Lieutenant Atwood. And three....see if you can find anything at all on Mason himself." She waited a tick before adding, "Thank you, Ensign. You're helping me out of a bind here."

"Give me a couple hours ma'am, and I can have whatever I come up with ready for you," Maxine told her. "Would y'like to meet me somewhere then?" Max was already accessing the computer as she spoke to Alyssa and activating Krystal.

She mulled that over for a moment, "Just let me know when you've got something. I'll come to you. I'm not sure where I'll be in a few hours. And just so you know....the sooner you can get the digging done the better. Time is a factor, Ensign."

Alyssa hoped that Tapert didn't think she was avoiding her. She just had a feeling that she was going to be all over the place today.

"I'll get back to you ASAP, ma'am," Maxine assured her and ended her transmission.

"Thank you, Ensign. Contact me when you're finished." Northrop flashed back to school...remembering all the times she'd sent her Grad students off to dig up some obscure item from the gigantic library on campus.

Max's estimate was purposefully longer than she knew it should take. Although depending on what she found, digging could take more time that even she realized. She loosed Krystal into the system on a hunting mission while she accessed anything she could find of the prisoner's time on Qul Tuq. Instead of the "few" hours she estimated, Max was back on the comm within forty minutes.

"Tapert to Northrop. I've got that information you wanted, ma'am," she announced.

The archeologist set down the PADD she'd been reading and tapped her comm badge. The search of the desk had revealed several items that Atwood hadn't gotten around to processing.....assuming he even knew they were there in the first place. After reading the reports herself, she'd forwarded the important ones to Hunter. "If you wouldn't mind Ms. Tapert...could you come by my office and show me what you've got?"

"Wouldn't mind a bit, ma'am," Maxine told her. "I'll be there in just a few minutes." And true to her word, Maxine showed up at Northrop's office within five minutes, PADDs in hand and ringing the chime.

There was a larger anteroom between the Chief's office and the door. Since she was currently all alone in the department, Alyssa had taken to leaving the door to her office open. Yelling through the door, the main doors opened to admit Ensign Tapert into the mostly empty department offices. Empty save the tables, desks, chairs and dark terminals. The brunette in grey waved the computer specialist into her office through the glass divider that seperated them. "Thank you for coming....and good afternoon."

"Afternoon, ma'am," Max smiled as she walked into the office and stood at the opposite side of Northrop's desk. "Took a bit of doing, but I managed to retrieve the interview between Lieutenant Atwood and Mason. Seems the Lieutenant deleted it... Not that I blame him... Right nasty bu--- er..." she stopped and smiled a little wryly when she realized she was just about ready to speak ill of an officer. Not that he didn't deserve it but....

"Bugger," Krystal provided as she poofed into view on Maxine's shoulder.

"Uhh... Hush, Krystal..." Max told the small pixie. "Pardon me, ma'am. I didn't deactivate her before heading here," she explained and handed Alyssa the PADD with the interview file on it.

Alyssa smiled, "Would you please stop with the Ma'am stuff. I may be the Chief Intelligence Officer here on the Zion.....but I'm not an officer. I'm enlisted." Pulling her hair back, which was definitly not regulation, she revealed the three black pips on her collar. "One gold pip beats any number of black ones, Ensign." She smiled, "Technically, I should be calling you Ma'am."

She didn't add that she wasn't about to do that. She barely called anyone Sir or Ma'am....other than the Captain. Maybe she'd simply spent too much time in charge....but she couldn't make herself do it. "Don't worry about your little holographic friend. I heard about her through the grapevine."

Reaching down and into a drawer, Alyssa pulled open one of the lower drawers. "If my memory of my mythology classes back in school serves....Pixies like shiny things."

As she finished the statement, she lifted her hand up and showed Krystal a small silver colored anklet. "I found this when I was going through the mess that Lieutenant Atwood left. I'm not sure why this of all things was in here....but it's your's Krystal if you want it." She smirked a little, "Call it a thank you for helping me out."

"Ooooooohhhh!" Krystal clapped and giggled and flew over to the Intel Officer where she ran her hands over the chain. "Ooohhh.. It's beautiful! Thank you! Thank you!" She tried to take it, but of course couldn't, so she looked over at Maxine who rolled her eyes a bit and reached out to accept the anklet from Northrop with a smile and a "Thank you," before slipping it into her pocket. Krystal crawled right in after it.

Looking at the PADD that Tapert had given her, she scrolled through it quickly. One thing that Teaching had taught her was how to speed read. You had to...or else you could never get through 150 term papers in a reasonable amount of time. "How about you give me a rundown, Ensign?"

"Roight... Concerning the other things you wanted... I was able to find out that Matt Mason was captured in the recent battle over the defecting Federation scientists. He was listed as a tactical office on the USS Lynx which was also captured," Max told her. "Lieutenant Atwood did make a log entry. There's a copy on the PADD there," she nodded to the PADD she'd already given Northrop. "It was short... Krystal if you could please..."

The pixie poked her head out of Max's pocket and blinked huge blue eyes at them. "OH!" she nodded and cleared her throat as she climbed out of the pocket decked out in the shiny metal chain. It went around her neck and criss-crossed over her breasts and wrapped several times around a tiny waist. She was exceedingly proud and preened a bit before Atwood's voice emerged from the tiny hologram.

"Lt. jg. Matt Mason, prisoner. I interviewed prisoner Mason and found him combative. It was necessary to bind him and at times use force to control him. After a lengthy interview the prisoner did admit he was a spy for the Federation and he was to infiltrate the Maquis and await further instruction. I recommend that this prisoner be sent to Rura Penthe." Krystal grinned and curtsied dramatically. "He was very mean to the sick person," she confided in Alyssa.

It was Max's turn to clear her throat and look pointedly at the winged hologram on her shoulder before turning to Northrop. "You'll find the recording pretty clear. There's one part I couldn't restore to 100%, but I don't think it'll matter..."

"I don't suppose there's any possibility of cleaning up that section? Wouldn't want to miss something important." Looking at the PADD again, she activated the file.

"I tried. The best I could do was just fleeting images of Atwood and Mason," Maxine explained. "But I have a copy Krystal and I are going to keep playing with it."

When Alyssa replayed the interview file the images of Atwood and Mason appeared on the screen. Mason was seated at a empty table, his hands were bound.

"Lieutenant Junior grade Matt Mason," said Mason.

Atwood laughed, "Well, you're idiot prisoner Matt Mason now," he said.

Mason said nothing.

"Prisoner Mason, this interview is to determine if you should be sent to Rura Penthe with the rest of the hardened criminals or if you have something useful to share with the Maquis. What do you have?"

"I am a tactical officer, I have noting secret to give you," said Mason.

Atwood slapped Mason upside the head hard enough that Mason leaned to his right. "That was the wrong answer, prisoner Mason. "Tell me the positions of the Federation fleet," demanded Atwood as he sat him back up in the chair.

"I only knew the positions of my mission group, and you have defeated them all ready you idiot," said Mason.

"You are lying prisoner Mason," said Atwood, his eyes focused on Mason.

"I'm not, I have nothing to tell you," said Mason again.

Atwood shook his head. Suddenly, he pounced at Mason and grabbed him by the throat. Mason struggled against Atwood's choke hold, but his bound hands could not find their mark. Finally, just before Mason was about to black out Atwood released his hold. "Let's try again, what is your mission," demanded Atwood. Atwood walked around behind Mason.

"We were instructed to recover the freighters and return the defecting scientists to the Federation," said Mason.

Atwood kicked Mason's chair out from under him causing him to fall forward his head bouncing off the table in front of him before falling to the floor. "I meant your mission spy!"

The images on the screen distorted and the sound became garbled. After a few minutes the screen cleared and Mason sat in the chair with a dazed expression on his face, "What do you want me to tell you," pleaded Mason.

"I want you to confess that you are a Federation spy," said Atwood. He now held a Klingon pain stick and was pacing around behind Mason.

"I am just a tactical officer," said Mason wearily.

Atwood's eyes glimmered with sadistic ecstasy as he pressed the stick against Mason's chest and discharged the weapon. Mason howled in agony until Atwood removed the stick, "What did you say?"

"Ok," said Mason trying to catch his breath, "if you want a spy I'll be a spy. I'm a spy."

"Thank you," said Atwood, "I am afraid that all spies will be sent to Rura Penthe. Our interview is over." Atwood arrogantly strode from the room.

"I will kill you Atwood if I ever get the chance," muttered Mason to the empty room.

Once the file ended, she looked up once again. "Well...this would be consistent with what Mason told me earlier. There is evidence that he was beaten. But....something about this really doesn't sit right with me. I would really like to know what's on that missing part."

She scowled a little. "Maybe I'm just being paranoid....but how could a Tactical Officer not be aware of Fleet movements? Wouldn't it be part of their job to know things like that? Unless you were about to be planted. Then you wouldn't be told anything that could hurt them.....because they'd have to know that all prisoners are interogated."

Looking back at Tapert, "What do you think, Ensign? You've seen what's there......what's your opinion?"

"Well.... On the surface it looks legit," Max said. The fingers of one hand drummed in a rhythmic motions on her thigh as she thought and put her musings to words. "But it's rather like code hidden within code. Y'can't find it, but y'know it's there.... I'm a skeptic. To me it seems *too* legit, if y'get my meaning.." she offered. "If I wanted to infiltrate the Federation computers I'd write a very benign program and hide my stealth code inside the legit code. If y'get my meaning... So maybe Mason really *is* legit and even believes he is.... And he's just chocked full of stealth code... Waiting."

"You mean like brain washing or something?" Northrop scowled. That prospect would make it very hard to trust anyone wanting to defect ever again. "I'd hate to think that the Federation would stoop so low....but I know that the Cardassians would."

Her fingers tapped on the desk, "And....well....if you'll remember, that battle with the Lynx's battle group was fairly easy."

Maxine nodded in agreement. "I just don't think y'can always judge a program by it's surface code... And anything's possible," she said.

"I'm not a tactician... But I do know it's fool hardy to underestimate your enemy. It's like underestimating a hacker, if you get my meaning. Just when y'think they can't, or won't do something... They've already done it and you're left trying to salvage what you can...."

Alyssa nodded again. Apparently she wasn't the only one that Mason bothered. Or maybe it was just the entire situation. She shrugged inwardly. Something felt off. That man was here for a reason....and defecting because of a pack of lies simply wasn't it. That was the biggest crock of horse manure she'd ever heard. Too many things just didn't add up here. And now...she had another opinion on the matter...which meant she wasn't making it up.

"Thank you for your time, Ensign....I appreciate everything you and Krystal did. I hope we can work together again soon." She smiled....and let Tapert know she could go about her other duties. That was one smart lady....the Zion was lucky to have her around.

Once she was gone, Alyssa decided it was time to go find the Captain.