[ChicletPrime]

as mentioned, this is not a place of honor. i dunno what chapter three has in store for us, but hopefully i won't embarrass myself.

Chapter Three

• So the command transfer is complete but problems are expected. i am .. interviewing? .. a Vice Captain of Tuum who has a number designation. He backtalks me which would never happen in a military organization of any repute. i might be a civilian contractor but this kind of disrespect would be indicative of a much larger failure. he's also apparently strapped into the interrogation chair which makes the grandstanding even weirder.
  
• ah, so this guy 'opted out' of the required medical exam. 
  
• why am i the interrogator, exactly? i know, i know, i am reading too much into it. don't question, just accept.
  
• wow, okay. so he's not interested in being turned into a monster. so, is it, like, everybody in the Fleet in on this clandestine medical experimentation and absolutely nobody is spilling it to the newspapers in Linkon or Skyhaven? 
  
• "Monster... are you talking about the Toring Chip?"  "That chip is just the beginning of their twisted modifications!"
  
• Girlfriend seems kind of out of touch here. She did scout the lockdown areas where the experiments were being eliminated and she knew they were being eliminated/cleaned up/disposed of AND that Caleb was in charge of that very gruesome duty. why is she being kind of obtuse here? 
  
• yeah, Tuum Officer No. 3997 is adamant he's having nothing to do with either chip or modifications. It sounds like we've already done the examinations on everybody else and now we're rounding up the dodgers?
  
• "The Fleet's real big shot will return soon. Let's see how long your monster colonel can keep this up." 
  
• i have faith in him. as long as he needs to, is my answer out loud, but yeah, i'm worried too.
  
• so we compare some medical notes on other people and the girlfriend notes that Before and After being transferred to Caleb's fleet and undergoing the exam show different results. "The chip rewrote Kevi's memories and now it's causing drastic enhancement in these officer's physical capabilities."
  
• so. huh. okay. you get the chip installation which wrangles your memories, overwriting your thoughts and personality. you then get physically enhanced somehow during a "medical exam". Then the third step is "modification"? 
  
• now we flash back to "three days ago" - the Tuum Officer 6025 that just handed us some more files, nicely organized, was fighting, yelling that he wouldn't take the exam. "Caleb can only pull this off because he has someone's backing! You monsters... nobody wants to be like you!"  but he's completely different now, with an altered personality.
  
• We go after the officer to try and get more answers, but Caleb's  right there. and we know he won't tell us the truth if we ask about 'the modification' right now. i try and keep the files i've been looking at out of his line of sight but yeah, that flies like a lead balloon. also, we blurt out that we thought he was gonna be in a meeting still so now he knows we're keeping tabs on his whereabouts.
  
• hmm, he's going to be busy tonight with another meeting about the fleet merger, i should eat dinner alone and he'll pick me up at nine. yay, i think! i can ransack his office for more stuff related to this 'modification' business. i am.. i am so naive. somebody really needs to explain to her about what 'enough rope to hang yourself with' means.
  
• there we go. universal key, activate! form of... open Caleb's office!
  
• i have to say that is a really cool office. 
  
• yeah, i'd have opened his personal file too. let's see. brother dearest graduated from the DAA, but was involved in secret training during his third year, achieving outstanding results. due to his exceptional performance in finding new patrol routes within the Deepspace Tunnel, he was promoted to be the Fleet's colonel. Recommended by Prof Lucius.
  
• ah. there's a full body scan image. his right arm is marked in an abnormal shade of blue.
  
• I KNOW WHAT THAT IS. 
  
• oops. caught. the account is forcibly logged out and a notification that the device's login permissions have been revoked.
  
• as i turn to jet, i end up opening a serendipitous desk drawer. "Chip Implanter. For Clinical Trials Only."
  
• i... hide it in my shoe's secret compartment. well, go go gadget us. 
  
• Caleb is letting us get away with so much. does he want us to know? so he doesn't have to tell us himself? EDIT: going through this again, that's has to be what's happening. Caleb CAN'T talk about anything 'classified' and its ALL classified. all he can do is stay out of the way and let us figure it out from the stuff he is doing his best not to guard.
  
• niiiiiiice
  
• okay, yeah. that was sweetly done. "Aren't you going to ask me (about what I was doing here in places I'm not supposed to be in using a key you gave me that opened it)?" and his reply "About why you're in my office? Or whether you found the thing you were looking for?"
  
• wow, yeah. so Caleb intended for me to take the bait, there will be no repercussions for me entering his office because unless he says otherwise, i had his permission, but that covering up the traces in the system from the breach of security 'will be a hassle'. he takes the terminal decryptor from me inexorably. "I doubt you'd put me between a rock and a hard place. Right?"
  
• well, if you put it that way.  "The face, the voice, the actions - I know them all too well. Yet, the person standing before me is like a stranger."
  
• i straight up ask him what trouble he's in and he says he can't talk about anything classified. so i ask if he'd be sent to Atley Island to become another abandoned pawn. 
  
• and he asks me somebody totally random about my hair, completely shifting the conversation. 
  
• ... chip? its your chip futzing you out? or are you trying to flip switches before the chip can interfere.
  

FUCKING HELL.  the beginning of this whole thing. DO I HAVE A CHIP? did it rewrite my memory of Caleb because of something that's going to happen?!?

Chapter Four

• "The Fleet's Colonel, secret training, the Toring chip, modifications - whatever these terms really mean, they're the strings that bind Caleb's hands and feet. These strings compelled him to reappear before me. And one day the unseen hand controlling these strings will pull him away from me once more."
  
• hey, re-used background wallpaper, i missed you so!  we're at a banquet to... celebrate the fleet merger? yeah. Caleb, the rising star of the high echelon Fleet personnel.
  
• he says my hair is messy and starts to fix it. i have a hairpin he gave me before the event. i bet its tracking my location, body temperature and resting heart rate.
  
• so, the merger was NOT going well with most of the Tuum fleet people unwilling to cooperate.. until two days ago when they suddenly were.
  

• "Are you asking me where Colonel Heath, Tuum Officer No 3997 and all those opposing the handover went?"
  
• yeah, i guess i am although we both know they went to Astley and whatever horrors are being perpetrated there.
  
• "Do you hate it when I'm like this?"  you mean when you're ruthlessly cutting through anything resembling opposition because you know the clock is running out, and even if i'm here to watch, you can't stop to make it any more pleasant for me to see? 
  
• "If I throw a wrench in your plans, will you lock me up like you did before?"  "... You wouldn't force me to do that."  "Yeah... I've got your back. It doesn't matter what you do. Why are you still not telling me about your plan?" 
  
• DANGER WILL ROBINSON
  
• i draw my gun but Caleb is faster.
  
• eeeeeee
  
• "Suspended in front of his forehead, defying gravity, is a bullet."
  
• shit, he really is fast. i grab gun tighter and his hand and trying to get him behind a pillar. but he stops me. (of course he stops me.) his eyes linger on his palm instead, lips pressed into a thin line.
  
• oh boy, is the arm reveal about to come up?!
  
• nope, jumping the gun there. apparently this must be a diversion, actual target has to be elsewhere. He looks out the window at the Alpha and Beta fleet bases. (Alpha, Beta, Caleb, Tuum - who names these things? Weirdest version of the Greek alphabet ever)
  
• how would someone 'take over' a fleet base.
  
• so Caleb has already sent people to check the Alpha base, and after a power struggle engaged by eye contact alone, I will check out the Beta base with Liam.
  
• i bet you a dollar right now that Liam is a double agent.
  
• "The girl's figure fades into the night. She's heading in the opposite direction of where the real danger lies. The veins in Caleb's neck bulge and then recede. He narrows his eyes at the bullet in his palm for a long while. He slowly tightens his grip around it."
  
• so.. am i to read that as Caleb being the real danger? 
  
•  ah, Heath. sitting alone in a dark armory as footsteps approach. "You're quick on your feet... ugh!" i think he was expecting his assassin to be coming back for payment. before i advance this, let me guess... Caleb? nobody collapses a guy to the ground like our favorite petty military officer.
  
• woo! go get him, black hole boyfriend!   i am super pleased to know that my fanfic attempt was right on the character money.
  
• "At the same time, numerous red dots light up, all zeroing in on Caleb's figure that's concealed among the shadows."  "Who said you could start it when she was around?"
  
• oh FUCKING HELL. "No gunshot rings out and the expected explosion never comes. Caleb locks eyes with the dumbfounded man as he walks into the light, one deliberate step at a time. The gun barrels aimed at him are twisted downward. The crisp sound of breaking bones cuts through the air as he steps on the man's wrist, pinned to the ground."
  
• this is fantastic. superlative, no notes.
  
• It was okay as a plan, old man. I die here, I provide the excuse to the old men at the top to purge everyone i've gathered under me. 
  
• 'After slowly putting on his gloves, Caleb leans down and grabs the man's distorted, reddening face. "Too bad you picked the wrong target."  Caleb's hand moves to the man's throat. Heath's eyes bulge with pain as Caleb's grip tightens, and the bones in his neck creak under the pressure. 
  
• i shall take a moment here to say that Heath's VA is doing a fine job. well done! you sound deranged, pissed off and scared all at the same time.
  
• he wouldn't dare? why wouldn't he dare? you've already set it up to be a barely plausible accident in a firearm's armory. and who is the Fleet going to protect afterwards - a valuable (and living) Colonel or the dead corpses? 
  
• ex-Heath. can't say i'll miss you.
  
• oh hey now. exit Heath, intro unknown voice. "Colonel Caleb, it's been a long while." 
  
• NO NO NO
  
• whoever or whatever it is, it gave Caleb pain voice! and his evol disappeared!
  
• "With a flick of that person's fingers, dark blue veins abruptly surface on the side of Caleb's neck. He's brought down to his knees." 
  
• "I thought destroying the Toring chip would be difficult... I'll just use your dead body as a greeting gift to Professor Lucius then."
  
• did.. did this guy just implode the chip inside Caleb? which is going to kill him?! what the hell is happening?
  
• "The incandescent lightbulb suddenly goes out. With a flash of lightning outside, Caleb's pupils contract in an instant."
  
• you know, lightning turns up a lot when Caleb is overwrought. dramatic writing for ambiance you think? or actual barometic pressure inversion? 
  
• "I was wondering how Heath would dare to act so recklessly. Turns out it was you. Even with you involved... the outcome will still be the same."