The serpent beneath the flower by Bernice Low

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THE SERPENT BENEATH THE FLOWER, Part 2
By Bernice Low

Twenty minutes later, Devon, Danzinger, Walman, Yale and Morgan were huddled in Alonzo's tent, Devon and Danzinger both had grim looks on their faces. Julia looked pre-occupied with her own thoughts. Alonzo looked back and forth between Julia and Devon.

And Morgan?

He was trying to keep his dinner down. "Are you saying Daniels is a Council spy?" he asked Julia nervously. Julia looked up.
"I don't know Morgan. He may not be." "Well.." he spluttered "Can't you make an educated guess?" "I thought you didn't approve of educated guesses Morgan" Julia shot back, reminding Morgan of all the times when he had pointed out to her that educated second guesses weren't good enough for him.

"I can't be sure without asking Reilly." she added quietly. "Can't you tell if he's one of yours?" he asked tactlessly before mumbling 'sorry' when Alonzo stared hard at him.

"Julia's not one of them Morgan." he snapped irritably. "I'm sorry - I know that. It's just that all this talk about the Council and Reilly - I'm telling you - it's making me very nervous. I mean this guy could kill us all in our sleep tonight." he spluttered. "We all know what security around here is like - Walman's always falling asleep on watch." A cold sweat broke out on his brow. His hands felt twitchy and his shirt felt sticky on his back despite the low temperatures outside. Visions of Alex Daniels and near certain death at his hands kept flashing in his mind's eye.

"I told you not to ask him Adair." Danzinger muttered irritably. Morgan looked at him in horror.
"You mean you weren't going to tell me?" he shrieked. Danzinger immediately regretted voicing his thoughts. They probably would have to shoot Morgan to shut him up now.

"He probably wants to kill me - I mean I'm the Level Four Government Liaison - I'm the politician. Oh, I knew there was something about him - what is it they teach you in Medical school these days? Espionage? How could you not tell me?" he raved hysterically.

"Morgan." said Julia through gritted teeth. "He's going to kill me. Oh my god, Bess? What about Bess?.. ." Morgan raked his long hair with his fingers.

Julia reached over to Morgan and grasped him by the shoulders and shook him hard.

"Morgan!" she yelled.
Shocked by the violence of Julia's action, he stopped momentarily. He swallowed hard.
"Yes?"
Julia's blue eyes were icy cold as they stared at him. "Shut up." she said through gritted teeth and dumped him back in his seat. Completely startled by the violence of her actions, Morgan sat there in silence, while Alonzo looked slightly concerned at Julia's reaction. The doctor was normally calm in the face of Morgan's hysterics.

"Devon?" Julia looked to her.
"Are you sure Alex Daniels is who you make him out to be?" she asked with concern.

Julia nodded grimly. "I'm very sure. The question is whether he's been sent out here as an operative and if so, why."

"I say we grab Daniels and ask him." chipped in Danzinger. He was irritated with Morgan's self induced hysteria but even Danzinger couldn't help feeling edgy. If Daniels was true to the description Julia gave them, Danzinger wanted to be as far away as possible from someone trained to do the Council's dirty work.

"He'll talk if he's face to face with the barrel of a Mag-Pro." he added. "We cannot do that John. Not without any evidence." Yale remarked. "Yale's right. I mean what right do we have to hold him prisoner and question him? The guy hasn't done anything to incriminate himself." said Alonzo, who had been quiet so far. He buried his hands in his pockets.

Devon took a deep breath.
"We don't want to give away the fact that we know he's a Council agent." she warned. She had learnt, despite their few encounters with the Council, that the upper hand made all the differance in keeping the Council at bay.

"Adair." Danzinger growled.
Devon held out her hands.
"John, we can't do anything."
"That's easy for you to say, he's not after you." Morgan protested jabbing a twitching finger at Devon." Can't we just lock him up for a little while? Just long enough for us to find out what he really is?" he asked pleadingly.

"No one is after anyone Morgan." Devon said, trying to calm him. "And no one is going to be locked up without reason. Let's just keep what we know under wraps and inform the others to be cautious about talking around the new-comers. And keep the kids away from them."

She looked around to gauge their reactions. "I agree. I think we have to sit this out and wait for Alex to give an indication of some sort before we.." Julia's voice trailed off.

"Do anything." Devon finished for her - both of them remembering how they had voted to leave Julia behind.

"So everybody just stay calm." she said. "We can't just stay calm. You heard Julia, Devon - this guy has no reservations about killing anyone. We're entitled to protect ourselves." Morgan asserted nervously.

"Danzinger, you know what I mean.." Morgan said, looking over to Danzinger for support.

Danzinger shifted on his feet and adjusted the weapon strapped to his waist. "Come on Morgan, I'll walk you back to your tent." he said gruffily. "But we haven't finished discussing..." Morgan started. Danzinger cut him off. "I said let's go." said Danzinger quietly, signalling to everyone that the meeting was now definitely over. He walked over to the tent flap and stood there, waiting expectantly for Morgan, who stood up and moved slowly to the entrance of the tent.

"I'm coming." he muttered as Danzinger threw him an irritated look. "We're all going to die..." he mumbled under his breath." He'll pick us off one by one as we're sleeping..." as he slouched past Danzinger.

"That's enough Martin." growled Danzinger. He firmly propelled Morgan out of the tent before he could utter any more paranoia-inducing remarks.

[Everyone was on edge for the days after that. Camp life became tense. We stopped gathering round the campfire and joking. No one wanted to talk about what they were thinking, feeling. People kept to themselves much more, and stayed in their tents all the time. We were all frightened, and waiting for something to happen to someone - waiting for Daniels to make his move. ]

Bess slipped into the tent that she and Morgan shared to discover her husband under the thermal blanket and from all external evidence, asleep quite soundly. It amazed Bess that Morgan was able to fall asleep so easily despite not having actually done anything other than sit on his butt the whole day and complain - in this case, about his paranoid delusions.

She got ready for bed and turned down the lamp on the ground. Snuggling under the thermal blanket, she huddled close to Morgan and felt him turn around.

"Bess?" Strangely, Morgan didn't sound sleepy at all. "Hmmmmm?" Bess wrapped her arms round his waist and moved closer to him She felt Morgan stiffen up.
"Bess!" Morgan's voice raised ever so slightly and sounded tense. Bess sat up and turned the lamp up slightly. "Morgan - what's wrong?" she asked, just a little bit exasperated with her husband's tone of voice.

Morgan sat up and edged himself away from her slightly. "You haven't given me the code word." he said tightly, his eyes fixed on her. "Morgan what are you talking about?" Bess replied, a frown creasing her brow. She was really not in the mood for Morgan's little paranoid fixations.

"The code word - we talked about it two nights ago." he replied slowly. "Or have you forgotten?" he murmured to himself, and starting to inch even further away from her as his hand reached for the weapon he kept under the pillow.

"I mean how do I know you're really Bess my wife? I know about mind control chips and don't think you can use Bess to get to me.. ."

Before he could reach the gun, he felt the full force of his wife's annoyance in the form of a resounding thump on the face with a pillow.

He stared open mouthed at Bess and felt a premonition of something horrible and nasty. Bess had her Devon-look on - the one reserved for people who managed to really infuriate her.

"Bess - honey - it's really you." he stammered, changing tact quickly. "Morgan."
"Yes dear?" Morgan cowered ever so slightly. "Honey.." she added the deliberate endearment." I know you're worried - after all, you were quite high up in the administration on the space stations, and obviously someone familiar with all the goings ons in government." she began gently.

"Well, there's a lot of valuable information in here." he said, pointing to his head and was about to continue explaining to his wife just how important he was and why he was a prime target for any assasin.

But the survival instinct in Morgan, honed by years of experience in politics told him at this time, shut up and listen was probably the best policy. He cleared his throat and looked at his wife. "You were saying dear."

"Morgan - no one is going to come for you in the night. You're quite safe from assasination honey. Now, why don't you get to sleep.." she pushed him gently down onto the pillow and covered him with the blanket. ".. and forget all this codeword nonsense alright." she cooed gently.

Morgan closed his eyes and let his wife's reassuring words wash over him. "You're right honey. I'm sorry I ever suspected you. I mean what was I thinking.." he hugged Bess closer to him after she switched off the lamp and lay down next to him.

"Bess?"
"Yes Morgan?" came his wife's muffled voice from his side. "When did we get married?"

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Danzinger was wiping the oil off his hands on his overalls when he heard the sound of the ATV approaching the campsite. He looked up and saw Walman and Baines pulling up in the vehicle, having left earlier in the day on a scout for water.

"Hey Walman! Baines! Did you find us a supply of water?" he yelled as he approached the two men, who were walking towards the MedTent.

They stopped and waited for Danzinger to walk up and join them. "Definitely - a nice, medium sized stream, a short distance from here. Water looks clean but we're gonna get Julia to check it out first." Walman said.

Danzinger nodded.
"Yeah - you know she's a real stickler about these things." he said with a smile, remembering the last time True had drank from a stream before Julia had checked the water quality. Eventhough the water eventually turned out to be quite drinkable, the lecture Julia handed True on bacteria and germs was enough to make the little girl feel sick.

Baines grinned at Danzinger's remark. "Man - that lecture had me feeling green all day!" he joked as they walked to the MedTent. The sudden swell in medical equipment and doctors meant that Julia's tent could no longer double up as the Medtent, which Danzinger had no doubt thrilled Alonzo to no end. The doctors now worked in an open shelter, sharing the space and equipment. As the three men strolled to the tent, they noticed that only the two male doctors were present.

"Something I can do for you Walman?" Dr Daniels inquired, seeing them standing outside the shelter.

Walman looked at the doctor suspiciously and debated what to say. "We're looking for Julia." Danzinger said neutrally. "Dr Heller hasn't been here all afternoon. I believe she went somewhere with Alonzo." he replied. "Is there a problem?"

Baines exchanged a tense look with Walman, who wondered if perhaps they should consider asking Dr McCann, who sat there, seemingly preoccupied with something green bubbling in a test-tube.

"Well.. ." said Walman uncertainly. He didn't want to be anywhere near this Daniels guy if he could help it. And especially not go out into some lonely spot with him.

"I assure you I'm just as qualified as Dr Heller." Daniels said in a reassuring tone.

"Julia's a little more familiar with the drill doc..." chipped in Danzinger, his voice low.

"I presume it's just a simple water test." he said perceptively. "I heard you speaking to Devon this morning." he explained when he noticed Walman's ill concealed surprise.

To their relief, Julia chose that particular moment to appear at the MedTent, carrying her duffle bag of equipment.

"Julia!" Walman said, a little louder than he wanted. She dropped the bag on the ground and looked at him, surprised by his tone. "We need you to come and check out some water samples." Baines said hastily. Julia looked at them and caught Danzinger's guarded look. She looked at Alex and back at Danzinger again.

"I'll take this one Alex." she said, picking up her bag again and heading out to the vehicle, with Walman and Baines in tow. Danzinger stood at the tent entrance and Daniels and him exchanged looks. Danzinger turned his heel and started to walk back to the vehicles - but he couldn't help but feel Alex's eyes boring into his back as he walked away.

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Julia was in her laboratory examining some slides when Alonzo slipped into the tent. She hadn't heard him so when he whispered 'hi' in her ear, she jumped and dropped her slides onto the sandy ground.

"Whoa! Steady doc." he said as he helped her pick up the slides that had fallen onto the ground.

"Damn!" Julia swore. "Look what you've made me do!" she said, yelling at Alonzo.

Alonzo was taken back by the force of anger in her voice and the hostility of her tone. He had first hand experience with an angry Julia, but never on a level like this. It was then that he realised just how much Alex Daniels presence disturbed Julia. It worried him - because he couldn't understand why Julia was so rattled, why she felt such an intense feeling of fear. Surely she knew that he would never let anyone harm her.

She turned to face her work table, breathing deeply, arms crossed - regretting her outburst immediately.

She faced him." I'm sorry Alonzo. That was unfair." He reached for her and pulled her into his arms and hugged her long and hard. Julia closed her eyes and wrapped her arms tightly round him.

"It's ok Julia." he said soothingly and running his hands up and down her back gently. He held her for a long time in his arms, then drew away a little and looked down at her face. Dark shadows hung under her eyes, betraying sleepless nights and she had a haunted look that made him feel protective and angry.

Angry at the person who was making her feel this way, hurting her this way. Angry at not being able to do anything to calm her fears. And angry that there was nothing they could do about Alex Daniels.

"Better?" he asked softly, his arms still curved around her waist, tightly. She nodded silently.
"You want to tell me about it?" he inquired, trying not to sound too forceful.

She didn't look him in the eye, instead, she looked down to the ground and made no reply.

"Hey.." he tilted her head up gently so that she looked at him. "you know you can tell me anything."

"I.. Alonzo... it's..." she began uncertainly, tortured by the emotional turmoil she was feeling. She looked down again. She couldn't look him in the eye - couldn't tell him the secret that she nursed in her heart.

She buried her face in his shirt and held on tightly to him. She couldn't tell him, not yet. She wasn't ready. Soon, soon she would tell Alonzo - but now, all she wanted to do was cling to him and feel secure in his arms and not have to think about it.

Alonzo held her tightly - sensing her need for security. He would wait for her to tell him, whatever it was that was disturbing her. He had to trust her not to shut him out.
Again.

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"It was your fault!" wailed Uly, looking at the container of water that had spilt over when he knocked into it after a particularly rough game of catch with True.

"Was not!"came the denial.
"Was to!"
"Shut up you little brat!"
"No *girl* is going to tell me what to so" "Oh yeah?" True challenged, giving the shorter Uly a push on the chest. That drew an instant response from the fiesty little boy, who pushed the much taller True as hard as he could.

By the time Bess separated them, Uly had a cut from scraping his knee on the sandy ground and True nursed a bloody elbow.

"True! Uly! Stop it now!"she said in her sternest voice. The two children stopped and glared at each other with hostility. "Who started this?" Bess inquired, looking from one sulky child to the other, before glancing round to see if Devon or Danzinger had spotted the two having a push fight in a corner of the camp.

"She did."
"He did."
Bess straightened up and put her hands on the hips. "OK, wrong question." she chided herself.

Looking at the blonde haired little girl "True, I'm going to make a deal with you. If you apologise to Uly, I promise I won't tell your father about this."

Her face fell and she looked down on the ground - the stubborn Danzinger pride at work.

"But he started it!" she protested, before mumbling 'Sorry'. Bess turned to Uly.
"Now young man, you apologise to True. No gentleman would ever push a lady, no matter how provoked."

The little boy put his hand forward." I'm sorry. Are we still friends?" he asked.

True stood there solemnly before reluctantly shaking Uly's hand. "Yeah, I guess so."
"OK, let's go get Julia have a look at those cuts. Come on." said Bess, trying to be cheery. As she walked the children to the Med Tent, she got the feeling that their little tiff had something to the way the everybody else was behaving of late. She looked around the camp - Walman sat hunched on a plastic Eden Advance container, hugging the Mag Pro close to him - he probably fell asleep hugging it at night Bess half suspected. Baines looked unhappily at the equipment in the Communications Tent - probably wondering if he should barrel himself in the TransRover again. Magus was checking the inventory lists, and looking extremely irritated while Danzinger was sullenly tinkering with his beloved vehicles. Only the new Technical support personnel were talking together in a group but they seemed to keep well away from the Eden Advance crew. There was no banter, or good natured grumbling that usually accompanied life on the camp.

People were on edge, irritable and keeping to themselves - and it was affecting the children thought Bess.

She lifted up the plastic flap leading to the Med Tent and let the two kids in before stepping inside herself. Julia had her back to them and was hunting for something inside on of her plastic boxes located under her worktable.

"Julia." the little boy ran up to her. In her haste to respond to the little boy, Julia straightened up, forgetting where she was and banged her head against the underside of her worktable. Wincing and silently swearing, she crawled from under the table, her hand clutching the top of her head.

Case in point, thought Bess. Even Julia seemed extra jumpy these days. "Are you alright?" asked Uly with concern. "I'm fine Uly." she replied, her face still wrinkled up in pain. She noticed Bess and True, and the two kids in their dishevelled condition and noting their scratches.

"What happened?" she asked, looking at Bess. Both True and Uly started to open their mouths, undoubtly to explain their side of the story, but Bess quickly jumped in and stopped them.

"It's a long story Julia - I'll tell you about it sometime." she said firmly, looking at the blonde doctor meaningfully.

"Yeah.." Julia nodded, understanding. She sat on her stool and turned to Uly.

"OK Uly - let's have a look at that knee then."

It took Julia just a few minutes to clean up their scrapes and send them on their way.

"Race you to the vehicles Uly!" challenged True and started running. Uly sprang off the box he was sitting on and was out of the tent screaming after True.

Julia shook her head, marvelling at how quickly they forgot their differances. "Kids." she said, smiling at Bess, her palms resting on her knees as she sat on her stool." You're very good with those two." she said softly to Bess.

Bess, who was sitting on one of Julia's supply boxes, smiled and bowed her head in modesty.

"I've had a lot of practice over the years." she said. They both laughed out loud as Julia realised what, or rather who Bess was referring to.

Morgan.

Julia smiled to herself. It was good to be able to laugh again. The last few days, she had felt herself weighed down by the burden of her secret - too much a reminiscence of the times when she hid her identity as a Council agent from the group. The arrival of the Intermediary ship, and specifically Alex Daniels, cast a cloud of gloom over the group.

Julia shook her head." How do you put up with him?" she asked, half curious, half admiring how Bess managed to tolerate, much less fall in love with Morgan." Morgan's..." Julia struggled for the right words, trying her best to be tactful." You... You're both so..."

"Different?" Bess finished the sentence. Julia shrugged and smiled wanely.
"I suppose the same way you and Alonzo have overcome your differances." Bess stated simply, as if it was the most obvious thing in the universe. "Morgan absolutely infuriated my father, and sometimes, he really manages to infuriate me."

Julia leaned back against her worktable and listened intently. "But when you love someone, you love everything about them. Don't ask me how but Morgan can be endearing even when he is a complete and utter pain." she said smiling.

"When I met him, he was utterly charming and.. well.. so handsome to me." Like Alex, thought Julia. Her mind turned back to the first moment they met. "I was extremely flattered by the attention he paid to me.." So was I, thought Julia bitterly.
"He swept me off my feet. My father was convinced Morgan was just a smooth talking politician and worse yet, a slimeball lawyer with eyes for his little girl. He thought Morgan had a face only a mother could love." A warm smile played over her lips as she thought back to that day when her father first met Morgan.

"But I knew that behind all that, Morgan, no matter what he did, had a sense of right and wrong in him and that he was a good man and someone I was happy to spend the rest of my life with." she finished.

Bess looked at the young doctor, who now was seemingly pre-occupied G889 dirt, and sensed there was something in the air, something unspoken that was just waiting to be said. She watched Julia deep in thought from her position on the supply crates, that uncanny sense of intuition in her telling her to stick around.

"Bess, have you ever lied to Morgan?" Julia asked suddenly. Bess tried not to look too surprised - uh-uh, this she wasn't expecting. "Weeeeelllllll..." Bess stalled for time, trying to think how she could best answer Julia's question.

"Not really lied." she tried.
The doctor's blue eyes focused intently on Bess, waiting for the rest of her reply.

Owch, Bess winced inwardly - not the right answer there. "More like been... errr... careful with the truth." she said uncertainly. Julia looked puzzled, a frown creasing her brow as she tried to reason out Bess' answer." So you have?" she asked, looking at Bess pointedly.

"No!" Bess replied, a little more sharply than she liked, then decided it was pointless to pussyfoot around.

"There have been times when I've withheld stuff from Morgan. But never to deceive him or hurt him in any way." she asserted. "But you know, I've found that sometimes honesty is the best policy. Keeping secrets bottled up inside only hurts you and the person you're keeping them from. It's a hard thing to do and it gets to a point where you don't know who you're lying to anymore." she added almost knowingly, looking at Julia.

Julia looked down again but not before Bess caught the expression on her face - a very confused and uncertain Julia. And Bess didn't have to know a lot to guess that this had something to do with Alonzo.

Bess stood up from her make shift seat and went over to the doctor who was deep in thought. She gently put her hand on Julia's shoulder.

"It's not so bad to have someone you can trust Julia.. ." she said, echoing the words she had said to Julia not so long ago.

Julia looked up, the message registering in her mind. But before either woman could say another word, they were distracted by loud shouting coming from outside the Med Tent. Exchanging concerned expressions, they both made for the tent exit, emerging in the bright sunlight to see Danzinger, Baines and Walman trying to break up a fight that had broken out amongst the newly arrived Tech personnel.

Julia, anticipating bruises and broken bones, ducked back quickly into her tent and emerged with her bag, before jogging over to the band of men gathered in the centre of the camp.

Baines and Walman had managed to restrain the two trouble-makers and Danzinger stood between the two of them. Julia pushed her way through the crowd of Techs and was horrified to see Walman trying to restrain a visibly enraged Alonzo from attacking a six foot two, dark haired mechanic, who was being held back by Baines and another man and who seemed equally determined to beat Alonzo to a pulp.

"Back off Jameson." Danzinger barked to the dark haired mechanic. "Hey man, I don't have to take orders from you." spat Jameson. "You do now." Danzinger said firmly. "So back off." Baines released his hold on the mechanic, who brushed his overalls, glaring at Alonzo.

Danzinger moved to Alonzo and firmly grasped him on by the shoulder. "Come on buddy - let's go." he said calmly, urging Alonzo to move back. Julia emerged from the crowd and quickly checked Jameson, who looked fine except for a bloodied nose, no doubt the handiwork of Alonzo. He stalked off before she could treat his nose.

"What happened here?" she asked Alonzo as she neared where he stood, flanked by Danzinger and Walman. "Are you alright?" she asked him with concern.

"I'm fine." he mumbled as she gently examined his face. "Are you sure?" she persisted.
"I'm fine!" he snapped and stomped off wordlessly. Julia turned to Danzinger and Walman but neither could provide an explaination - the fight had already been in progress when they arrived.

"I don't like this" mumbled Danzinger. "Things are getting real nasty around here."

"Yeah." piped in Walman.
Julia nodded. The fear and paranoia was driving them all crazy and turning them against each other.

"We've got to do something about this before it rips the camp apart." Danzinger declared firmly.

"John.. ." Julia wanted to caution him against acting too quickly against Alex.

"We can't put it off any longer Julia.. ." he said, watching the retreating figure of Alonzo.

"Soon. Real soon."

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