OSI Interview: Selyna Braeden

Posted on Tue Apr 30th, 2019 @ 11:19pm by Special Agent Mathew Richards & Civillian Selyna Braeden & Special Agent Mark Badger & Special Agent Brick Johnson

Mission: Interlude 1
Location: Cheyenne Mountain: Project New Dawn (Conference Room)
Timeline: Current

Matthew sat at the conference table and waited for Doctor Selyna Braeden to arrive. They were almost done with the interviews of SG-1, which was good, because there were a lot of other interviews to get on with. Other agents had started getting into those while he and Mark and Brick conducted the interviews of SG-1.

Williams had warned her about this meeting, but she still felt nervous. She hadn't done anything wrong, but it still felt like being called into the principal's office back at school. Thus, she likely looked a bit nervous as she entered the room, exactly on time, and stood by the table. She wasn't sure whether she could sit or was supposed to wait for permission, so she assumed nothing and stood waiting."You wanted to talk to me, sir?"

"Welcome, Doctor Braeden," Matt said. "Please, sit. And relax, if you can. We're just here togather some information. Obviously information leaked to someone outside of Project New Dawn, and we're trying to determine what happened. For the moment, we're just going to ask you about the mission, the incident, and your activities and interaction prior to the mission, especially but not limited to people outside of Project New Dawn. Just answer our questions as honestly and truthfully as you can, and there shouldn't be any problems. By 'as you can' I mean that you should give us all the information you can in answer to our questions to the best of your ability. This is intended to be a fairly friendly conversation, though it may seem like we're getting little intense at times. Mostly, we're just trying to make sense of events that we weren't there for. Since everyone's body camera's were taken, we don't have any video or audio feed from the mission, and of course we're also looking into things that neither SG-1 or ourselves were present for, so we'll have to ask a lot of questions. Does any of that make sense to you?"

Matt's usual approach in early interviews was to make the interviewee feel like everyone was on the same side so that they feel like they're helping to solve a mystery. Coming on strong in the beginning usually just put even innocent people on the defensive.

Selyna sat down as instructed, listening to both the man's words and his tone. Words were important, but the tone they were spoken in often told her a lot too about not only the intention of the words but the nature of the person. In this case, she got that he was trying to put her at ease. She nodded when he had finished. "Yes, it makes sense. I'm not sure how much help I can be, but I'll do what I can." she told him, settling into the chair but wishing she'd brought a coffee with her. Well, no help for that now, so she just awaited the questions.

"Can we get you anything to start?" Badger asked, "Coffee, juice, tea? There were donuts, then cops showed up. There may be a crueller left."

Was he reading her mind? She smiled slightly. "Coffee if it's no trouble." she requested. "I did eat before coming, so it's okay about the donuts."

"While Mark is getting that," Matt said. "Let's get started. After you found out that you were going on the mission with SG-1, did you share any information with anyone, in person, on Twitter or Facebook, or any other social media platform about your trip? I'm assuming you didn't Tweet 'going to another planet, back soon' but did you tell anyone you were going out of town or anything like that?"

Selyna frowned and shook her head. "No. For one thing, I barely use Facebook anyway, mostly just to keep up with people I haven't seen in years. And second, I never tell social media when I'm not home. I always thought that was pretty stupid since thieves and the like then know when your house is empty." Maybe it'd gotten more secure, but she still didn't take the risk. "And since I came here, I don't really have much contact outside of this place in person or over the phone." Now that she said it aloud, it kind of made her sound like the crazy old lady, but it was true, as sad a commentary on her life as it was.

"Alright," Matt said. "Let's move on to the mission. You went with Major Asher, Captain Hawkins, Doctor Andrews, and Doctor Azad to the Altar shortly after arriving on... P3X-842, correct?"

She nodded. "Yes."

"So you wouldn't know if anyone opened the gate and attempted to communicate with someone somewhere else, prior to Sergeant Corvus reporting the infection to PND?"

Selyna shook her head. "No, sir. I'm sorry. The altar location was about a half hour walk from the Gate." she answered, offering the distance as explanation of why it would have been impossible for her to know this. And where the hell was that coffee?

As if on cue, the large statuesque man who had been standing beside the door only moments ago was now at Selyna's side with a paper cup of a pleasing aromatic brew in hand. "Ma'am," Brick said out of courtesy before setting the cup of coffee on the table, followed by some packets of sugar and little pods of creamer in case she desired either. Then without another word, the man of imposing stature returned to the door where he could once again watch over the proceedings.

Badger entered with the remainder of the coffee for the room. "That Mama, she sure knows how to brew a cup," he said, tasting his cup. He also had a large, thick file in his hand as he resumed his seat at the conference table.

As the big man set down the cup, she was slightly surprised, but cleared her expression quickly as her brain did the math. No, the man was no mind reader; and it was not coincidence. Somewhere in her subconscious, she had done the math and figured out the time it should take for him to complete the task and return, and that had prompted the thought.And on his end, obviously no interruptions had delayed him, creating the seeming coincidence. Still, it felt uncanny.

She smiled at him. "Thank you." She then took a sniff of the coffee followed by a sip. Oh, yes, indeed. This was definitely not that stuff that could strip linoleum that military bases usually mislabeled as coffee. "He's right; it's very good."

"Doctor Braeden," Matt said. "When you met the CDC doctors and nurse, did you have any reason to believe that they were... not right? That something was off about them?"

Selyna paused with the cup halfway to her mouth for a second sip, thinking about that. In her mind, she went back to the moment she'd met them. "Not really. What they said seemed reasonable enough. They seemed to know what they were doing. And since I'm not a medical doctor, I just... I wouldn't really know if what they did in that capacity was off or not." she admitted. "Sorry."

"Not a problem, Doctor," Matt said. "Mark, any questions for the doctor?"

"Did you get a cheek swab as well?" Badger asked. That part was worrying him, he could understand why they would the non-human members of the group, but why the straight up earthlings?

That question made her freeze. Until that moment, she had not really thought about that since they'd done it to everyone, but the way he'd asked it made her suddenly uneasy. A cold fear started deep in her gut, planting a rock in the pit of her stomach. "Yes. They took them from everyone." she answered, coffee forgotten on the table in front of her now. As she remembered the incident, she frowned as the next thing came to memory. At the time, it hadn't seemed off, but now it did. "I don't know if it means anything, but after that, he asked to see the terminal we were using to study the illness. In fact, he studied it with us for about an hour before the whole thing with the horny wolves." It might mean nothing, but now she was questioning everything so she told them. "We had no reason to suspect anything at that point." she reiterated lamely, feeling small and as though she had done something for which there would be some form of punishment... like a school child called to the principal's office. Not that these men had made her feel that way, but her own analysis of things in hind sight did. She looked down at her coffee cup, though she wasn't really seeing it.

"Doctor Braeden," Matt said. "Just so you know, those Jaffa at one point were actually officers in the Public Health Service assigned to the CDC's Epidemic Intelligence Service. They knew exactly what to say and do to put you at ease with them, exactly how to sound and act like EIS officers, because they were, before they disappeared, EIS officers. The cheek swab seems to have been a miscalculation on their part. I'm guessing they thought they could play it off as part of SOP, but both Captain Hawkins and Sergeant Corvus noticed it as being odd. In her report, Sergeant O'Connor remembered thinking it was strange but being distracted because of the infection. And Hawkins was a fluke. As far as we can tell, there wasn't any reason at first for any of you to be really alarmed." Matt got back to his questions. "You say the officer with you at the altar examined the terminal you were using? Did he appear to learn anything from it? Did he say anything that indicated that he did?"

Selyna was actually grateful for the man's assurances, though she still felt a bit stupid. She knew she shouldn't. Besides not being medical, she had also been under the influence of the illness. She now tried to think back, remember everything Chow had said or done after that. "Not that I remember. There was the hour that we examined it with Chow, then it all got interrupted by the call about the wolves. And after that, I lost track of them. I'm sorry."

"Alright," Matt said. "I don't have anymore questions. Mark?"

"How did Dr. Andrews get along with them? Since she's coming across as notoriously 'prickly' and it seems they were invading her work area." Badger asked, enjoying the last of his coffee. He was glad there was more in the carafe. Today was shaping up to be one of those days when he really needed a lot of good coffee.

Selyna paused, again going back in her mind. "She didn't seem all that 'prickly', as you put it." she stated in a voice that seemed just a bit far away as she was more inside her memory than she was here. "She explained some of what we had learned, and she was a bit annoyed, but it didn't seem that it was directed at them... more of a general annoyance with our inability to figure out the situation." Her eyes came back to the here and now and looked between the two men once before she took up her cup and finished the contents. "We were all a little... edgy, though, given what the hologram had told us and what little we'd been able to translate off the stones." she said, putting Andrews' 'attitude' into perspective for them.

Badger nodded, "I'm not sure there's anything of value here regarding our focus on the investigation."

"Agreed," Matt said. "I think we're done here. Thank you for your help, Doctor. Agent Johnson will show you out."

"Ma'am," Brick said politely, if somewhat creepily with how he seemed to appear behind her without a sound to indicate he'd moved from his position by the door.

Selyna actually jumped, not having heard him approach. For a large man, he moved like a specter! "Holy shit!" she breathed. "You really need to wear a bell or something so people know you're there." she commented teasingly as she rose and then looked to the others. "I'm sorry I wasn't able to be more help to you." She inclined her head to them respectfully, then followed the large man from the room.