GRE-MA Headquarters: Cornielian Dilemma

[kahl]

Her eyes blinked but twice at the image on her wallscreen. It was clear who she was looking at, who stared back at her, but that this man would risk everything to contact her seemed beyond illogical and therefore contrary to everything she knew about this man.

"Enuka..." she murmured. "I really don't know what to say."

The man's grey eyes held hers, years of wisdom, sorrow and maturity suddenly present, as if he had left her side a child and returned a forty year old man. "Mnala...I know that all this is a lot to swallow, and I'm sorry to have to place it at your feet, but the truth is that I simply do not have the resources needed to create this vaccine let alone to follow through with the research to create a cure. I must lay this burden on you--and I can most assuredly tell you that Kaur will breath hellfire when she finds out."

Enuka raked a hand through his hair. Mnala studied his face. He'd not been eating properly. His eyes were deeply shadowed and he looked thin. Brow furrowing she turned to look as Ahsan entered the office. In the past months he had progressed very far in his studies and was becoming a more reliable asset to the lab. Their relationship, too, was progressing steadily and strongly.

"I...where are you? You could just come back--"

"No, I can't," he shook his head minutely, holding her gaze with an intense stare. "After what I did at Freemantle...the GRE, Kaur...they'll put Meat Hooks on me."

"No one died, Enuka," Mnala stressed, her voice pleading.

"True," he replied, "but more than half the OR knows now that the GRE may not have created the virus, but were most definitely using it to thin the colonial population."

Shaking her head, Mnala grimaced, "that really sounds like paranoid speculation--"

"Human testing? JACK testing?" Enuka's face flushed red with restrained anger, none directed at Mnala. "And...I watched a woman blown up with a containment grenade--because they BROADCAST it throughout the compound. This place had multiple cases of civilian gang rapes not to mention the daily threat of imprisonment or execution."

He gestured with obvious emotion. "This isn't some prison colony on the Edge, Mnala--this is Freemantle, on NovPro. These people were brought there because they were sick and needed help and the GRE treated them--US like animals. I'm sure Freemantle wasn't-- isn't the only such compound."

"Okay....okay Enuka. Calm down." Mnala used her soothing voice, the one that put him at ease when his emotions and rants got out of control. "What about the others? I was made aware that Dr. Kiran is back on RDT...but I've yet to hear from Dr. Cole--"

"Carlos will be coming to you soon. I think it best to talk to him first before contacting Anju again. Carlos has a lot to tell you. I need you to do something else for me as well," Enuka's face grew serious. "Dr. Teala Fahr has...vanished. I am less and less confident that she has been transferred or simply moved on. The woman was...one of those I mentioned earlier and then, quite suddenly, disappeared. She's a psychologist, so not really helpful to the tasks I've asked of you--but she is an old friend, of myself and Carlos."

Nodding solemnly Mnala murmured, "I'll see what I can do."

"I have to go now."

"B--...Enuka, where are you?? You've not told me how to contact you--" Mnala gaped in distress.

Shaking his head, the man grimly replied, "I'll contact you."

The screen went black leaving Mnala to stare at it in disbelief. After a moment she turned and looked at Ahsan. "How am I supposed to do any of this? If I do as he asks, I risk our careers, our freedom...our lives. If I do not, I risk my friendship with Enuka, Carlos, Anju...and do a great disservice to the people suffering with this plague, and those who are in hiding from Freemantle."

Mnala's eyes filled with tears as she looked to Ahsan. "What do I do...?" she gasped into her palm.

[Melara]

Ahsan grasped her hands lightly, crouching to look into her eyes. "We will figure this out together. We have resources, Mnala...ones that cannot be traced to you. There are certain people with a bit more freedom to go looking for this Dr. Fahr."

He meant, of course, Laurie and Rhys Bavarti. "Ask them to go. As for the rest, you are the smartest woman I know. There are ways to help without it being tracked back to you. If anyone can figure it out you can."

[kahl]

Resting her head on his shoulder, Mnala exhaled slowly. "I suppose I grew complacent. Began to live as though none of this nastiness existed. I wanted to believe it didn't."

Lifting her eyes to him she frowned. "Enuka is...deeply changed. I do not know what happened to him in that place...but I barely knew the man on that screen."

Seeing in Ahsan's eyes the faint glimmer of worry that plagues all men when their partner speaks caringly about a past lover, Mnala leaned forward and tenderly kissed him. Meeting his eyes again she whispered, "I need you. I cannot do this alone."

[Melara]

"You don't have too," Ahsan told her with a smile. He touched her cheek lightly, then straightened. "I'll contact our friends. Get the ball rolling."