Clone Phishing

Posted on Sat Jul 30th, 2022 @ 9:41pm by Lieutenant Xavier Leiko & Ensign Kateyo Fenn & Lieutenant Commander Finnley Keating VII & Senior Chief Petty Officer Mason Malone

Mission: Shore Leave
Location: Various
Timeline: Right after "Interesting Investigations"
3743 words - 7.5 OF Standard Post Measure

"Hey! Xavier!" Finn yelled down the hall as she caught up to the ops officer and Fenn. "I know I said just a minute ago that you guys should go down to the surface, but could I get your help with something first? It shouldn't take long. We had a power surge on one of the lines and it looks like it's becoming a systemic issue. I could use some help tracing out the paths of the surges to find what's actually causing it." The clone lied. She knew exactly what was causing the problem, an injected error she had placed in the system. As much as she didn't want that found, Finn needed any excuse to grill them on what exactly they'd seen in the transporter room.

"Sure," Xavier replied, nonchalantly. He did the maths in his head, Finn had had enough time alone in the transporter room to reconstruct the deleted files and now she clearly wanted answers. Tey was a good engineer, but Finn was a great one, no doubt she was on to them as much as they were on to her. If only he still had his telepathy, this would be much simpler.

"Give me a shout when you're done," Teyo said as he continued to head towards the turbolift. Someone had to raise the alarm and if Finn was going to distract Xav, then he would have to be the hero of the day.

Finn weighed the pros and cons of asking Fenn to join too. She might be more successful with just Xav, but clearly, Fenn had seen the same information, but by the time she looked back towards him, he had run out of sight. It would certainly cause too much suspicion to go running after him. "Well I was going to ask him to join, but I guess he was in a hurry to get his vacation started..."

After picking up some repair kits, the engineer and ops officer entered the first set of jefferies tubes. "The first one was recorded just down here," Finn led the way. "So what were you guys actually doing in the transporter room? if Fenn was trying to convince you to go to the new bar he wouldn't have still been in uniform and knowing him he'd have had a change of clothes for you in his hand." She chuckled, trying to seem like she was curious but not actually suspicious of anything major.

Smart Xavier thought as he followed Finn down the Jefferies tubes. That's exactly how he would go about things too, try to press information in a friendly way first before revealing his own hand. P'rel would be impressed hr thought to himself before he remembered that the Intelligence officer was no longer with them. He hadn't known her well, but her reputation had definitely preceded her.

"That was my first question too," he said with a chuckle. "Apparently it's harder to skip out on work when you're dressed in civilian attire," he lied doing his best Teyo impression. "Anyways, the bar he wanted to take me to was a nudist bar," he continued to lie, "so the uniform wasn't going to be a problem when we got there, can you believe that? He said something about wanting to show off his spots, typical Tey."

"Man, he really is somethin', isn't he?" The clone chuckled. "Ok, here is the first stop. Check out the readings," Finn popped open a tricorder and showed her ops counterpart the erratic energy spikes. "You see what I mean? It's happening in a few locations, but I've been having some trouble narrowing down it's source."

"How strange," Xavier replied as he flipped open his own tricorder and checked the readings. How strange that this would happen whilst we're in a drydock with repair crews running all over the ships was what he really wanted to say but he had a part to play. Distract Finn and give Tey time to speak to the Captain or Commander. "You're right, this is definitely a power surge of some kind but I can't trace the source. Maybe if we split up we'll have more luck?" He casually proposed, mostly to see her reaction.

Finn opened her mouth to respond, but instead, let out a sigh, thinking a quick reaction would do nothing but confirm Xavier's suspicions. "You're right, we might have more luck, but...honestly, I could kind of use the company." The clone said. Though Finn didn't often open up to others, perhaps a feigned plea for help would be enough to keep him lured in. "Besides, the next one is on the way to the others. Even if we split up, we would both pass it. How about we check out the next one together and split up after that?"

"Sure," Xavier replied, not wanting to seem too eager to get away from the engineer. "Not like you to want company, I must be growing on you," he laughed.

Finn smiled and led the way once more, formulating a plan as they crawled. "So tell me. Are you actually going to go with Fenn to the nudist bar?" She asked, making conversation as she strategized.

"I've got nothing to hide," he replied with a chuckle. He was trying to stay one step ahead of the woman but he couldn't help but think he was being led into a trap. "They're quite common on Betazed, one day I'll tell you the story of when I first took Teyo to one. It should be the next junction along."

Finn tried to exude a sense of calm as they approached the junction. She had a plan. Hopefully, it worked. She pulled out her tricorder and took another set of readings as they approached. "This one is slightly different," she furrowed a confused brow. "See if you can open the panel and we'll get a better look," Finn motioned towards the area in question while feigning an extreme interest in the readings showing up on the tricorder.

"You're right," Xavier said as he pulled out his tricorder again. He maneuvered himself into a sitting position as he mirrored her confused look, though his confusion was trying to work out how she had done so much damage in such a short amount of time. It must be a trojan horse program. She must have had this rigged for days, waiting for the time to use it, and if the time is now then I'm in trouble, he thought to himself. "Yeah, let's get this panel off," he said as he pressed the release button and moved the panel to one side so he could get some clearer readings. As he did so, he subtly tapped his combadge two times in quick succession, activating the security silent alarm feature. "I see what you mean," he said as he continued to scan.

"Stop," suddenly Finn's voice had turned from chipper to a serious, more dark tone as she held up a small phaser that she had concealed in her uniform. "I saw you tap for the silent alarm. You're not as clever as you might think, Xav. Clearly, you've figured out my secret through your little side venture in the transporter room. No doubt Fenn is headed to alert the Captain? Unfortunately for you, I know a million places to hide on this ship." Finn gave a mischievous grin. It wasn't ideal, but she could still weasel her way out of this.

"Toss your combadge over here," the clone commanded while maintaining her phaser's aim on the ops officer. They didn't have much time, but she could lead anyone pursuing them on a wild goose chase for a bit while she grilled Xavier and figured out her plan to escape off of this ship.

The alert drew Mason's attention as he was working at his desk. "Computer, locate origin of alert," he ordered and listened as the ship's computer told him where it had come from and whose comm badge it had belonged to. Mason frowned, while he didn't know Lieutenant Leiko very well, he assumed the man would have to be in serious trouble to send a silent alert. He grabbed two additional security officers as he made his way to the armoury and issued them a sidearm. "Set to heavy stun, just in case," he told them.

"Where's the real Finn?" Xavier asked as he pulled his combadge from his uniform jacket. He was almost relieved the charade was over, it was getting tiresome playing nice with this cheap imitation version of his friend. He threw the combadge on the floor and it hit the deck plating with a loud clanging noise that echoed along the lonely Jefferies tube. "If you were going to kill me, you would have done it by now, so you clearly want something?"

"I want to know what you found in that transporter room," she motioned with the phaser towards the perpendicular Jefferies tube signaling for him to start crawling in front of her. As he moved, the clone picked up the combadge and placed it inside the panel. If someone came to look for Xavier, they would only find his bodiless badge.

"To answer your question, I have no idea where the real Finn is. Most likely blown up on the station along with P'rel. That's my hope anyway," she said with a sinister grin. The two stopped in an empty engineering lab for just a moment and Finn tied Xavier to a chair while she replicated a device that could be used to mask their trail.

"The transporter room?" Xavier asked, playing dumb. He was trying to buy some time, he knew the security section would have traced his combadge by now, but Finn was a great engineer and if this clone had her memories and abilities, she wasn't going to make it easy for them. "We were purging some old files while Teyo was convincing me to ditch."

"That's bull and you know it. Tell me what you found out. Now," Finn didn't yell but added enough emphasis to let Xavier know she wasn't playing around before she connected the anti-tracking device to the back of his uniform.

"And if I don't? Are you going to kill me?" He asked, putting on his most defiant voice. "Do you really think you can get away with offing a senior officer on a starship?"

Finn untied the ops officer as she responded. "Do you think I really care?" She shot him in the arm as he stood. Not enough to do any real damage but enough to let him know that she wasn't joking. "Move!" Finn motioned towards a hatch on the other side of the room and pushed him towards it as her mind raced with ideas.

Xavier clutched his arm where he was shot, he could feel the heat from the wound but thankfully Ki would be able to sort him out, if he made it out of this situation alive. Xavier moved as instructed as he tried to come up with a way of escaping this situation. "What is your overall goal here? What do you think you're going to accomplish?" He asked as he shuffled through the hatch.

Finn laughed. "You think I'm dumb enough to tell you everything I have planned? Maybe I should find a way to leave a note for the real Finn and let her know just how little you think of her." She pushed him along the corridor. Stopping first at a communications panel. She'd found out enough intel from Sam's loose lips to send a message back to the upper echelon about what was known so far on the clones. She only hoped that no one would catch on to an encrypted outgoing message.

She nudged Xavier to move once more. "You're running out of time lieutenant. Tell me what you found in the transporter room or I'll leave you for dead when I get off this wretched ship," the clone threatened as they moved towards the shuttle bay.

So she is looking to get off the ship Xavier thought to himself. They were heading to the main shuttlebay and he was willing to bet his life she was desperate to find out what the transporter records had revealed so that she could report back on any imperfections in the cloning process. She couldn't be allowed to leave the ship, he knew he would never tell her but there were other ways to extract that kind of information out of someone. "I'd rather die than help you and your plan to take over Starfleet."

"Take over Starfleet? You're the traitors!" The words spat out like venom as the anger inside built up. It was all she could do to keep from killing him right then and there. "Either tell me what you found or keep your mouth shut and wait to die," she said as she pushed him along further.

"Why don't you just kill me and get it over with," Xavier said as they approached the doors to the main shuttle bay. They stepped inside and found the room empty, Xavier wasn't sure if that was a blessing or a curse. This was his chance, if he didn't do anything now, then the clone would escape and who knows how many deaths would be on his hands. "Computer!" He yelled, "security emergency, shuttle bay lockdown. Leiko charlie-tango-four-delta-nine-nine."

"Acknowledged," the computer replied as Xavier headed behind one of the crates to avoid being shot. He knew that Finn, his Finn, would be able to break the lockout, so he had to assume that this Finn would too. But could she do it before security arrived? He doubted it.

Finn gave him a menacing glare. It was clear that the operations office wasn't going to share the information she needed, at least not here. She raised the phaser and shot him directly in the chest. Luckily for him, it was only on stun. He was still more valuable to her alive than dead.

Just as the security team were moving out, a second alert came in, warning them that the shuttle bay had commenced an emergency lockdown, autorized by Leiko. "Great," Mason said, "at least now we know where he is and we don't need to track the badge." Just in case, he sent a message to Zade, telling her where he'd taken a a small team to investigate. It still took them several minutes to get there.

Finn immediately started working to override the lockout and within a few minutes of wading through back doors, she had the system back in her control. "Time to go," she muttered to the unconscious ops officer as she grabbed his arms and started to pull him across the floor towards a shuttle.

The bay doors opened, somewhat unexpectedly as the small security team approached. For a brief moment, Mason hesitated as he saw the chief engineer drag the ops chief across the deck. "Lieutenant?" he called out, not knowing what was going on. His left hand tightened unconsciously around the handle of his phaser. "Is everything alright ma'am? What happened to Lieutenant Leiko? Security received an alert from him, as well as a lockdown order."

"Mason! I'm glad you're here. Something is wrong with Leiko. He started acting a little paranoid and then it just spiraled out of control. I'm the one that actually set off the silent alarm, I was hoping someone would show up before he went off the deep end. He ran to the shuttle bay and I followed him but before I couldn't talk him down, he initiated the lockdown thinking he could trap me here so I ended up stunning him. I was afraid he'd run to another area and damage a system or something," the clone feigned relief as she dropped Xavier's arms and told her tale. "Do you think you can get him to sickbay? He messed with something in that shuttle over there. I'll go and check it out and make sure everything is stable."

"If you set off the alarm, why didn't you use your own badge?" Mason asked, "and if you stunned him before he got to the shuttle then the shuttle is just fine. Why don't you step away from him so my boys here can make sure he's alright? Then we can get you calmed down." Something wasn't right, her entire body language was setting off alarm bells with him, but somehow, Mason couldn't quite pin the feeling down.

Finn took a deep breath and put her hands up. Mason could read her too well and she needed to sell her part, and quickly. "He had taken his badge off because he didn't want to be tracked so it just made sense to use it and when he got in the shuttle bay, he went straight inside the shuttle. I tried to talk him down, but he thought I was out to get him or something so he ran out of the shuttle and set off the lockdown." She backed away a couple of steps and shook her head. "Sorry, I'm just a little high on adrenaline, it was quite the chase. Xavier isn't chief of ops for no reason you know. I just want to make sure he's ok and that he didn't do something that's going to damage the ship."

"We received no alert that he was off kilter," Mason said, raising his phaser to aim it at her. "Stop moving lieutenant, get away from the shuttle. "It makes no sense at all to use his, yours would've been closer to you at any given time." He watched one of his team kneel at Leiko's side and give him a thumbs up to indicate the Betazoid was still alive. Mason breathed an inward sigh of relief at that news, his eyes never leaving the chief engineer. "Why don't we all get down to security, and get this sorted?"

It was clear that this was a losing battle so Finn did the only thing she could do. In a swift movement, she pulled out her phaser and shot directly at Mason before tearing off towards the shuttle. Neither real nor clone Finn had been the most accurate with long-range shots and she missed the security officer completely, but it was enough of a distraction for her to make it to her escape vehicle.

"Stop!" Mason called out, diving aside despite the wide miss. He didn't really want to shoot her in the back, but he really had no choice if she didn't stop. "Stop!" he called out a second warning, then pressed the trigger when she didn't stop. It was only on stun, so he reasoned it safe to approach and he kicked her weapon aside. "Who are you," he demanded as he knelt at her side.

"Mason it's me! Why are you doing this?" She hoped the plea might throw him off guard just enough as she grabbed him by the collar and spun him over, grappling with him for control of his phaser. The clone turned and dug an elbow into his ribs, loosening the phaser just enough to take hold. "Sorry Mason, she pointed the weapon at him and changed the setting to kill.

The security officer felt winded as he was spun over and landed on the deck. He grunted as she elbowed him and felt the phaser being pried from his fingers. He mentally berated himself for such a rookie mistake, but he didn't have time to mull over it. As soon as he saw her point his own weapon at him, he reached for his left boot. "You're not Finn," he wheezed as he plunged his dagger into her heart.

The clone's hands came up to meet her chest where the dagger now stood and she looked down in shock. A tear rolled down her cheek as the realization hit that this was the end of her story and that she had ultimately failed to complete her mission. The clone then fell to the side and drew her last breath, hoping that she had done enough.

With a grunt, Mason crawled over to the body and quickly examined her. He left his dagger in place as evidence, disturbing the corpse no more than having checked it for signs of life. His first priority now, was the chief of operations. "Lieutenant," he called out, gently shaking the man to rouse him. "Lieutenant, wake up." His visible injuries looked minor, but he couldn't be sure. Still, he wanted the man conscious before he'd summon a medical team that might not be necessary.

"Finn, Finn, no, stop," Xavier mumbled as he fell in and out of consciousness. He realised that someone was over him and woke with a start, recoiling in pure fear. As the fog lifted and his eyes began to focus he realised it was a man. "Keating, it's a clone, stop her," he said as soon as his mouth could form words.

"Easy lieutenant," Mason all but ordered, "she's gone. You're safe now, she can't hurt you anymore. Can you sit up?" Concern crossed his features. "I think we should get you to medical while the rest of security logs all of this."

Xavier nodded his head groggily as he clambered to his feet. The phaser blast had left him feeling strange, as though his whole body was tingling with energy that had no release. He swayed a little as he stood up and had to quickly grab Mason in order to stop himself from falling over. She's gone. You're safe now. Mason's words rang in his ears. "Finn," Xavier muttered, an obvious lump in his throat, "the real one. We need to find her."

"Obviously, but we'll let others handle that sir," Mason said, easily holding the other up on his feet. "You're not going anywhere but to sickbay for now. You're in no condition to be looking for anyone. My team will call the chief so they can log this and I'm taking you to sickbay. Do you need anything while we head there?"

"Just find Finn," Xavier replied as he let himself be carted off to sickbay for treatment.