The Amanda Rose Snatchers

Posted on Sun Mar 29th, 2026 @ 3:04pm by Lieutenant Amanda Rose & Lieutenant Percival Bálor Ph.D

2,165 words; about a 11 minute read

The first thing Counselor Amanda Rose would have been able to register once she came to would be the humidity of her whereabouts. Sweat had clung to her skin, warm and oppressive. The air was also thick with the scent of rot and the sweet odor of decay.

She had been taken, subdued, and stuffed in an aging greenhouse dome with transparent panes. Its frame was overtaken by vines that webbed over it like a wild canopy. Amanda was left unconscious on a bed of damp soil. A faint shimmer of a containment field flickered around the perimeter, sealing her in, a reminder that she was captive.

Juvenile plants adorned the tables in the greenhouse. They unfurled, and wiggled around with curiosity. A pale vapor drifted from their glands, almost beautiful in the filtered light, but it was that vapor that was intoxicating, causing Amanda to be in an altered state of mind.

Something felt wrong about all of this to Amanda. She could not put her finger on it, but something just seemed off. However, as more time passed, the less she could focus on it. A pleasant perfume hung in the air and she giggled lightly as she sniffed at it.

As Amanda laid there, a voice. "He loves me, he loves you not. He loves me. He loves you not," almost as though a narcissistic child were picking petals off a flower and tossing them onto her nearly motionless body.

On an empty table were a set of legs swinging. A playful whistle. As she began to stir “Now this,” came a familiar voice behind Amanda. It was dry and amused, “is what I call a hostile therapy environment.”

Percy stood there, immaculate as ever. His hair artfully disheveled, uniform collar open just enough to suggest rebellion. His expression was that perfect blend of brooding intensity and insufferable wit. "You look more awful than usual, Counselor. Radiant of course, but awful."

"Why must you talk in riddles, Percy? Why must you torture me so?" Amanda asked feeling more bold than normal with him. "And you think that I look radiant? Why would you say such a thing, let alone that I look awful?"

He crouched down studied her. "Talk in riddles? I may talk artfully, but I don't talk to people that aren't here. And yet you do. You're entirely bonkers, but ll tell you a secret. All the best people are" commented Percy, or rather the Percy her mind created.

"Come on, Amanda. Get up. Get up now, and look around you. Where are? What happened? Think. You're in danger girl!" he said clapping inches from her face.

"You're the Mad Hatter now, Percy? That actually makes a good amount ot sense. And next you're going to tell me that our realities are different." She shook her head and complained, "God! If I was going to have a dream, at least it could have involved someone other than Percy! Where's tall, dark, and handsome?"

"Hallucination," corrected Percy. "Are you asleep? No. Then, that means you must be that hallucinating. Why Amanda? Stop thinking about your disappointing love life for a moment. This is important!" added the half-Tellarite. "And why me? What would cause you to conjure me?"

"Only insanity would cause me to conjure you," Amanda shot back at Percy. "You're probably the most infuriating being that I have ever encountered. And if you were a hallucination, you would not be commenting on my love life."

"Why not?" countered the manifestation of Percy. "A hallucination may just be your subconscious surfacing. We all know you fear being alone, Amanda. You know yourself better than anyone. Captain Michaels, Lieutenant Commander Yivliph Ra-Gruvloveii, oh and of course let's not forget Jason. Yeah, Commander Jason Striker. Your love life is a tragedy, but there's more important things right now. Stop pining after boys!"

"Wait ONE minute there!" Amanda replied, foisting herself into Percy's personal space. "I've never talked to you or anyone else on this ship about Striker. Just what have you been doing in my personal logs?" She then huffed, "I am not afraid of being alone, you know...."

"Percy would not know these things. Therefore, I must be who or what? You. Your mind. Percy is not here, but seriously... you are in danger. Think, Amanda. Look around. What's here? How did you get here?"

"I don't know," Amanda admitted. "What I do know is that I hate plants, especially plants raised by you."

"We can hug this out later," replied Percy. "Yes, you hate plants. That's good. These aren't my plants. I didn't grow these. The plants Amanda. They took you. These aren't normal plants. They are doing this to you, making you hallucinate. They put you in here, trapped you."

"Um, Percy, I'm pretty certain that you have hit your head on something hard. Plants cannot move. Sure, there are plants like a Venus Fly Trap that can engulf something, but you have to walk into the trap. I did no such thing. Besides, I have a tracker on me, so no problem. Ontario will beam me in a heartbeat."

"Not if they can't find your signal, Counselor" Percy said sighing. He gestured around them. "You are contained in here. Do you think they'd put you in here if they felt you coukd escape?"

Though he was not real exactly, he was still trying to be helpful in his own way. "There are hundreds of Federation worlds, thousands of others. Plants dont move? Malarkey Amanda! Rocks don't move, plants dont move, but you know better than to be so two dimensional."

"Horta, Exocomps, Star-jellies, Crystalline Entities, Phylosians!" excalimed Percy. "Look around you. Sometimes the improbable is possible."

"You made your point, but how would a plant suppress a tracking signal? Come on, Percy! That's unrealistic. However, let me take you seriously for half a second. If they can't find me and I'm contained, as you say, then exactly how am I going to get out? Eat my way out, as if it is a salad? It has to be stronger than that to hold me, right?"

"You aren't the predator here," he replied simply. "Where did all the people go, Amanda? Why are the plants growing so well?" Percy scoffed. "If they are sentient and can move, they can use technology. There also are plants that use bioelectric rhizome communication. Yada yada, stuff I say that you cant be bothered to learn."

"I'm not a botanist, I'm a counselor, Percy! As to where the people went, who knows? That's what we were investigating when I volunteered to be kidnapped. I do remember from basic biology courses that plants could communicate through electrical transmissions, mostly underground. OK. But just because something is sentient and can move does not mean it can create and use technology. If that were the case, then dogs and cats would have done that long before humans and be the dominant species on Earth. Even more flawed in your logic is that plants, which were on Earth long before then, would have developed this ability and then where would we all be? Hmmm?" Amanda seemed pleased with herself for destroying Percy's logic.

"Isn't arguing with yourself a bit... counterproductive?" replied her manifestation of Percy. Yes, you can make your dogs and cats argument all you want. To which I will counter what are Gorn but giant reptiles? The Voth? Dinosaurs."

He shook his head. "Stop limiting yourself. You are wasting previous time here. Unless you are looking to feed yourself to Seymour, I recommend you push disbelief aside and concentrate on how to get out of here. The Ontario hasn't beamed you out of here yet. So, they must not be able to."

He cupped his ears. "Listen. That low humming buzz. A generator of some sort, probably keeping you in here with some sort of containment field, and undoubtedly providing these young plants things they need to mature."

"What young plants?" Amanda asked Percy somewhat annoyed. "These manifestations? Or are you saying that these are not manifestations. Honestly, you're being rather confusing."

"I am the only thing not here," he replied. "The plants in here with you are real. Juvenile, but still dangerous. As much of a pleasure it is to haunt your mind, I'm your mind in survival mode Amanda. You've been taken, secured in this greenhouse, breathing in a mind altering vapor these plants use to lull victims. Fortunately, you arent prone to paranoia, but staying in here much longer isn't really ideal." Percy continued to push her.

"So, let me ask this, what part of me is being fed to these plants? I mean, let's assume what you're telling me is accurate, why am I not restrained in some way to make it easier for them to eat me up? How am I up and about?"

"Look at them," Percy replied. "They arent exactly the size for swallowing your giant head. You make a much better protein shake absorbed into the soil, becoming fertilizer, supplying nutrients through a root system."

"Again, that does not answer why am I not restrained and being liquified? How am I up and about?"

"Would the Borg restrain you?" countered Percy. "Are you a threat, Amanda? A lone counselor?" Percy shook his head. "Not your first time being dismissed, pushed aside, discarded, underestimated."

"The Borg would have injected me with their nanites or whatever and converted me by now if they desired that." She then sneered at Percy, "Now you stop psychoanalyzing me! I've had many a successful away mission on the Avenger. I just have not been used much here," she said with her voice becoming more morose.

"Good! Get agitated and annoyed with me!" Percy fired back and smirked. "What can we do to get you out of here? Some sort of containment field... can we disrupt it from the inside?"

"Are you certain that I'm in a field at all?" Amanda asked, completely annoyed with the allegedly hallecuinatory pig. To test the theory, she start walking in a straight line to see if she would be stopped in any way. After all, she saw no barriers.

"Careful," Percy replied said cautioning here. Soon, she'd hit the barrier and feel a good jolt. "Yeah, keep going. Maybe you'll snap out of it and start believing your subconscious."

"Well, that would certain confirm or deny the existence of what you're telling me and then I'll know what to believe."

Percy just gestured ahead with his hands. "Commit to the bit. Really throw yourself at it."

"No need to be reckless!" Amanda protested. "If what you're saying is true, there's no reason to put myself in a position where I knock myself out! Then I'm more likely to be plant food and as much as I could use losing a few pounds, this is not the way I want to do it."

"Well then... let's get you out of here. At the very least, if you can find a way to cause fluctuations in the containment field, you may get lucky. Clearly, the crew is out there looking for you. That means eyes are in sensors and tricorders right?"

Amanda did not answer. She merely held out her hand and walked towards the exit, hoping to God that the halleucinatory pig was not correct about the containment field.

The Pig was indeed correct about the containment field. Amanda with her hand held out would soon come to realize just how correct her subconscious manifestation of Percy was, and if he or rather it was correct about the containment field, perhaps Amanda's subconscious was worth listening to.

"OK," Amanda looked at The Pig, frustrated. "Since you seem to have figured this out, what do I have in here that will cause fluctuations?" She was far from an engineer, but she looked at her commbadge and considered it.

Percy mimicked her voice, "I've had many a successful away mission on the Avenger" he said mockingly. "Then wake that Lieutenant Rose up. She's needed. Look around, assess your surroundings. Juvenile plants need food. They need water. They need light. There is a lighting system to this greenhouse, and there must be a hydro line."

"And I'm in a containment field," Amanda countered in an annoyed voice. "Fine!" she growled at the hallucinatory Percy. "Let's see what's within the field besides me and this damn bed that I was laying on."

"It sure isn't a bed of roses" commented the hallucination. He observed Amanda for a few moments. "Well, that's all folks" he said with a small chuckle. "I did my part. You're on your own now. I bid you adieu."

"Always giving me more questions than answers," Amanda growled at Percy. "Have I ever mentioned that you're a pain in my butt?"

"My pleasure," was the last words uttered by the hallucination.

Lieutenant Percival Bálor (hallucination)
Chief Science Officer
USS Ontario

Lieutenant Amanda Rose
Chief Counselor
USS Ontario

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