[Daniel] The Unpleasant Announcement

[fikgirl.livejournal.com]

Who: Daniel
Where: Medical Facility, Kitchen #2
When: Day 23, noonish
Invited: Open to everyone at the Bunker
Status: Incomplete

"I'm letting them go."

The announcement, predictably, was met with shouts of outrage and protest, which was precisely what Daniel had expected. The archaeologist merely steepled his fingers together, and watched the gathered group of castaways and waited for the uproar to die down.

"They know everything about us," someone pointed out.

"They don't know anything at all," Alex said quietly. The girl had been moving in the shadows the past few days, working hard to avoid notice. She seemed convinced that there were those in the bunker who would lump her right in among the DHARMA scientists, and she worked hard to stay under the radar. "They're just . . . useless."

"She's right," Daniel interjected before anyone could challenge Alex's words. "They are what they appear to be – support staff. They don't know anything about the inner operations of DHARMA or even this facility. Letting them go isn't a problem. Even if they fall back into DHARMA's hands, it's not as though DHARMA doesn't already know *everything* about *everyone* here. Keeping them here is simply putting a drain on our supplies.

"Dr. Wilson, Dr. Sakai and Ethan on the other hand, are going to be our guests for a little while longer."

Comments

[Daniel] Plots within Plots

[fikgirl.livejournal.com]

Daniel was grateful for McKay's support, but he wasn't about to justify himself. This meeting was only an effort to go through the motions anyway; the decision had been made. He was pretty sure that with the announcement of releasing the prisoners that McKay and Raelle had likely figured out what the homing beacon he asked for was for. It would provide a quick and easy way to track their target – and DHARMA's source. One that didn't have to risk any more of his people.

What annoyed him was that no one seemed to get it. It didn't matter if they kept the prisoners or let them go; they didn't know anything that DHARMA didn't know. The prisoners weren't a danger to them; DHARMA would come back and try to take the bunker eventually if they released the prisoners or not – and the prisoners themselves were trapped as much as the castaways were. Yes, they had been compliant, but complaining was one thing; Daniel doubted anyone here had the courage or guts to carry out a sentence on them.

(And I want DHARMA to think we are that weak and lenient and forgiving.)

Unfortunately, he couldn't say any of that to the room at large. Along with DHARMA thinking that he was that much of a bleeding heart – (and once upon a time, I was so it has credibility) – the prisoners had to think so; and to be certain that it didn't get back to DHARMA that went double for most of the castaways.

(When did I start playing cloak and dagger?)

"I'm not going to sit for a kangaroo court. We have the people in charge, those who gave the orders, even if they didn't pull the triggers. We don't need to keep the rest of them. They can't give us any information, and they can't endanger us by giving the enemy information.

"But, in deference to the objections, that I've noted, we'll store them in the buffer. How long can they be held there, Rodney?"

Later, Daniel would take Rodney aside and inform him that there was to be a little mishap with the storing in the buffer: he wanted half of those prisoners free, more than half of them if at all possible.

[McKay] What's not to understand?

[lost-mckay.livejournal.com]

See, remarkably, Rodney *got* it. He understood immediately, but he was in no position to announce the making of the homing beacons. Nope, that was Jackson's job, and if he wanted to announce it, sure. He was quite happy in the role of support, as long as he was recognized for it. Not hard. A pat on the back, a 'Thanks, Rodney', and he would be good.

When attention swings back around to him, he straightens in his chair and looks around the room briefly before bringing his attention back to the anthropologist. "In the buffer? Um... I don't know. We've never tried it, really. I have no idea how long it would take before the lifesigns began to degrade. It's not meant to be a long term storage, per se. Buffers are designed to be fluid, to be rewritten, not to hold information for periods of time. It'd be like-like... sending something to memory, then holding it there for days. The system will begin failing after a time."

McKay held up a finger to forestall any interruptions before he continued. "Now, we can put them into longer term storage, in... for lack of a better description for those assembled, a hard drive."

Easy enough to orchestrate the 'mishap'... and the seeds are sown.