Unofficial Literary Challenge #13: In A.D. 2410, War Was Beginning

[Deleted User] · July 2015

Welcome to the thirteenth monthly edition of the Unofficial Literary Challenge!

Prompt #1: "The Arrival" ~ submitted by ambassadormolari

They are finally here. For decades, the Iconians have been quietly manipulating events in the Alpha Quadrant from their seclusion, subverting and weakening the galaxy. It was by their machinations that the Undine launched their war against solid-space, through which they pitted the Federation against the Klingons in a mutually destructive conflict. It was their servants who triggered the Hobus Detonation that saw the virtual collapse of the Romulan Star Empire, and the subsequent abduction of Romulan colonies. And it was their recent influence that saw the resurgence of the Vaadwaur Supremacy in a conflict that set the Delta Quadrant ablaze.

And now, they believe the time is ripe for their invasion. Hidden gateways now tear open, and massive, ancient warships and warrior-constructs enter our galaxy as the Heralds of the Iconians make their presence known. Against them, the Federation, Klingons, Romulans and their allies stand united.

Write about where your captain is, and what he/she is doing when the Herald invasion begins.

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Prompt #2: "The Odd Couple (a.k.a. Buddy Cops)" ~ submitted by proteusrex

Your Captain is ordered to a newly established research outpost to investigate a series of bizarre occurrences that is now threatening the scientists. With time a critical factor, Command has ordered that you work with another ship to complete the investigation. Unfortunately, the captain of the other ship is the polar opposite of your Captain. With different attitudes, command styles and beliefs, you could not be a more mismatched pair. Will there be a struggle for the lead? Can they work together without killing each other? Or will they?

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Prompt #3: "Origins of Boffs" ~ submitted by worffan101

Everyone has a story--but we've all heard the backstories of what seems like every Captain in the galaxy, from Kirk wannabes to self-styled Janeways to bad Picard ripoffs to people who really, really need to have the f*cking universe get off their case for a while, even those who really don't give one single iota of care about basically anything else in the universe and are just trolling everything there is for laughs.

Let's hear your Captain's most trusted officers' stories. Why did they join [insert faction and faction's fleet here]? Why do they tolerate working for this crazy monster/space gigolo/revenge-bound Determinator/giant lizard badass who makes everyone else look bad/incompetent fool/head-scratchingly stupid madman/terminal nerd? Do they have family outside of their comrades? Friends? Lives that they left behind?

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Usual cardinal rule applies: Don't post anything NSFW. However, after discussion during the redux ULC, I've decided to drop the rule on entries per author. Have fun!

The discussion thread is here.

Index of previous ULCs:

gradii · July 2015

"WHAT HAPPEN!?"

"CAPTAIN! SOMEONE SET US UP THE BOMB!"

"ALL YOUR STARBASE ARE BELONG TO US, OUR GATEWAYS WILL CAUSE YOUR DESTRUCTION. MAKE YOUR TIME. MUWAHAHAAA!"

"WHAT YOU SAY??"

"TAKE OFF EVERY PHOTON TORPEDO! FOR GREAT JUSTICE!"

jonsills · July 2015

Rule 88 Pt 2: Enemy of My Enemy

Personal Log, Grunt
Commanding RXS Latinum Princess

It's been months now, and Witzick hasn't made his move yet. On the plus side, our trade has been largely profitable - currently, we're ferrying troops and supplies to a Starfleet base on Kobali Prime, in the Delta Quadrant. The Human at Traffic Control made his displeasure at letting the likes of us "cashiered personnel" through his precious gateway, but orders are orders, and he had his. We should arrive at Kobali Prime sometime tomorrow evening, ship's time; we're having a special meal in the officer's mess tonight, for all passengers who've coughed up the minimum five-slip fee to dine with the Captain. Yes, there's an admission fee - I am Ferengi, after all.

"And that's when I bought the horse a prostitute!" Ruben Manalang finished. The table erupted in laughter; even the Klingon first officer Roclak, normally reticient in the presence of passengers, roared his approval.

"Of course, none of that actually happened," Grunt smiled, with just a hint of uncertainty in his voice.

The Human grinned back. "For two bars, I'll tell you!"

Grunt laughed again. "And for three bars, you'll tell me the truth?"

The chuckling around the table was interrupted by the whoop of an alarm klaxon. "Proximity alert," the computer said in neutral tones. "All hands to stations. Captain Grunt, your presence on the bridge is requested."

Grunt sighed. "Well, gentlebeings, duty calls," he said regretfully. "At least the disaster waited until after the meal. Please return to your cabins; if we need Starfleet assistance, we will contact you." He and the other crew of the Latinum Princess pushed back from the table, making their way to the turbolift.

"Admiral on the bridge!" Mycroft, the ship's AI, called out moments later, as Grunt stepped briskly out of the lift, followed by the other bridge crew. Grunt caught an extra motion from the corner of his eye; when he looked, though, the motion was gone. Must be tired, he thought.

He settled into the command seat. "What's the situation, Gydap?" he asked the ship's navigator, who had been assigned the conn during the meal.

"Unsure, sir," the Andorian replied. "We were cruising along, when suddenly a spatial rift dropped us out of warp. And the proximity alarm pings, but sensors haven't found anything yet."

Roclak bent over the science console. "Not exactly 'nothing'," he rumbled. "Mass sensors show there's something there - something bigger than us. No tachyon emissions, so if it's a cloak, it's not Romulan. Strange spatial effects, though."

Zoex, the Ferengi weapons officer, spoke up from across the bridge. "Targeting sensors aren't getting a lock, sir, but tying them in with the main systems should be able to get us an image... there!" As he spoke, ghostly green lines spread across the main viewscreen. They outlined something big. Something ugly. Something dark. Something...

"Incoming transmission, sir," Manalang said from the communications console.

"Put it through - speakers."

"We are the Harbingers of the Iconians," a thick voice snarled from above. "Stand down and surrender your craft. Failure will result in your annihilation."

"Yeah," Grunt said. "A surrender demand. Anyone here want to take them up on that? No?" He looked around, seeing only negation. "On speaker. This is Captain Grunt, commanding RXS Latinum Princess, out of Ferenginar, on a peaceful trade mission. We respectfully decline your offer of surrender. Please stand aside and let us pass."

"Captain Grunt. You will surrender."

"No, as a matter of fact, I won't."

"Then you will meet your doom." A vertical slit seemed to open in the air directly ahead of Grunt's seat, pouring purple-black smoke out around it. A tall, vaguely humanoid figure stepped through, holding some sort of complicated staff aloft, as other hominids moved out around it.

Grunt smacked his armrest. "Intruder alert! All hands, intruder alert! Starfleet, now's the time!" he shouted, scrambling to move behind the chair. A bolt of energy struck the seat moments after he moved, sending shredded faux-leather lining flying like brownish confetti.

Grunt's fingers moved in a rapid, familiar tattoo on the console on his wrist. The built-in transporter buffer responded to commands; phaser turret, attack drone, support drone, biomolecular pulsewave phaser. Around the bridge, he could see the others retrieving their weapons from various compartments. He popped up from behind the chair, steadied his pulsewave across what remained of the headrest, and fired. The pulse knocked the tall being - the Harbinger, I suppose - back toward the gap it had come through, setting its defense fields wavering. The phaser turret, sensing the target's relative weakness, sent bolt after bolt sizzing toward it.

Roclak's disruptor whined, its compression-bolt setting blasting into the large armored figure menacing Grunt from behind. It fell, a smoking hole drilled through the back of its head. Another such head flew by a moment later, courtesy of Security Chief Shelana and her preferred weapon, a custom bat'leth. Energies lanced across the ship's luxurious bridge, tearing into mahogany control consoles and melting gold fittings. The large armored beings seemed to be taking the worst of it; the expression on the Harbinger's face, featureless other than its six eyes, was of course unreadable, but its motions seemed hesitant. Then another hole opened, and a larger figure, graceful despite the curves of metal surrounding it, stepped through. It gestured, and the survivors of the attack fled through the original gate.

"I am T'lex," it intoned musically. "I am Iconian. And I am your new master. Bow!" Another gesture, and a forceful wave of pressure swept the bridge.

"Dammit!" a male voice shouted. "I had this all set up for Grunt, and you spoiled it!! Eat gravitons, b**ch!" A patch of air at the rear of the bridge wavered, and a Human male appeared, holding what seemed to be a weapon. He pressed a stud. A blaze of energy shot forth, striking the Iconian in the center of its - chest? Its torso, anyway - and sending it reeling.

T'lex stood again. "You are allowed one mistake, mortal," it said. "And that was the one mistake. Put down your weapon and--" It was cut off, as the weapon blazed again. T'lex looked down, at the hole where its torso had been. "You think we are defeated," it said. "You are mistaken."

Grunt cleared his throat. "You collectively, maybe not. You in particular?" All the weapons on the bridge at that moment energized. The coruscation of power tore through its torso, sending the body to the floor before evaporating it. "You in particular are very defeated," the Ferengi finished. He turned to the Human with the strange weapon. "Donald Witzick, I presume?"

Witzick looked at the ruined mass of spent weapon in his hand. "Yes, Admiral. This was meant for you, you know - avenging my family, after your masters destroyed Earth Spacedock. But that - that thing was an even greater threat to the Federation than you are. And you know what they say - 'the enemy of my enemy is my friend.' I'll be nipping off now--"

"Or not," Shelana growled behind him, one blue arm circling the Human's neck. "I rather think you'll be heading to the brig - unless it's the Admiral's pleasure to escort you out the nearest airlock?" she added hopefully.

Grunt considered the matter for a moment. Then his hand shot out, removing a box from Witzick's belt. "No, I rather think we'll let Drake have him," the Ferengi said thoughtfully. "It's really his mess, after all - he should clean it up." He leaned in closer to Witzick. "You quoted the wrong saying," he said quietly. "Maxim 29: 'the enemy of my enemy is my enemy's enemy. No more, no less.' Oh, and Rule of Acquisition 88: 'Vengeance will cost you everything.' I think you should consider the wisdom of the ancient Naguses during your probable incarceration." He waved at Shelana. "Show our - guest - to his new quarters, if you please."

[Deleted User] · July 2015

Past Continuous
by StarSword-C and Gulberat

“Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.”
― Søren Kierkegaard

The placards carried by the demonstrators two floors below my temporary office in Hathon’s central Militia station spell it out pretty clearly. “We Will Not Be Slaves!” “Klingons Go Home!” “Phekk the Federation!”

I turn away from the Klingon across the desk and throw the window open. “Shut the phekk up!” I bellow at them in Hathoni dialect. “I’m trying to get some work done up here!”

I slam the window shut again and click the power switch on the white noise generator. Been needing it a lot. The city’s angry. I don’t know which bureaucrat’s d*mn fool idea it was to put us here instead of Camp Charna, the Militia base below Mount Kasi a hundred klicks northwest, but as it is we’ve got Klingon-on-Starfleet brawls in half the restaurants, Nationalist-led protests that grow every day this drags on, and some putz from the KDF got caught trying to bug the Militia station’s infirmary and I’m having to negotiate his release with this Captain Kagran of the House of … whatever he said.

Oh, and the doc’s complaining I’m replicating too many aspirins. Gee, I wonder why. “Where was I, Kagran?”

“I believe you were about to explain how you could not possibly release Commander Yarik despite his bird-of-prey being set to lead the first wave in… What was the name of this operation, again?”

“Operation Whimsical Targ,” I answer, shaking my head at the randomly generated codename. Kagran snickers, and I don’t blame him; that doesn’t translate particularly well. “Look, qagh’ran HoD, technically we’re still at war and…” I pause to force some unpleasant memories back where they came from. “… I realize Imperial Intelligence was just doing its job, but what in the world did you honestly think you were going to find in sickbay?”

“Well, that was all Yarik,” he admits.

“All right, look at my side of this. You’re not going to get any useful data; you’re just going to p*ss off the Militia. We’re supposed to be working together on the Jem’Hadar issue. After that we can go back to hating each other, but until then, I want your word you’ll keep K’men’s people in line. You give me that, and I’ll release Yarik.”

He lets out a breath. “Very well.”

“Good. Because Field Colonel Harka told me that if he catches any more of your people where they’re not supposed to be, like in the police intelligence mainframe”—I glare at him, holding up a bug, and his mouth twitches—“he’s going to shoot first and not ask questions.” I press the intercom key. “Lieutenant Relmira? Start processing Commander Yarik out of detention.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“He’ll be out in a couple minutes,” I tell Kagran.

He stands. “You will be with us in the coming battle, qanrIl HoD?”

“Wouldn’t miss it. Especially not after this,” I add, gesturing to the three PADDs of paperwork on my desk.

Hey, there’s an idea. Shoot all bureaucrats.

The door clicks shut as Kagran leaves, then I hear a muffled thump as something hits my window outside. I look over my shoulder. Moba fruit, I think. Protest is getting rowdier.

But those are my people down there. And that was my uniform, worn by my brothers and sisters in arms, drawing their truncheons and wading into the crowd after an angry and scared young woman my cousin Sharya’s age. Her hair’s dyed green and gold, Nationalist colors.

I wore those colors myself a decade ago, some political rally when I was on shore leave from the Kira Nerys. Seems like another lifetime now.

The intercom chirps behind me and I turn and press the key. “Kanril.”

“Admiral Tayben Berat to see you, ma’am.”

Great, more trouble. Possibly the worst trouble I’ve had all week. He’s been on my schedule for two days. I told Marconi and Kurland to get somebody else, but he bounced it back down to me. Phekk’ta politics, as if this job wasn’t complicated enough. I do not need this, even if the 77th is the biggest fleet unit in four sectors…

Outside…

Oh, chaos, I should have told Starfleet to beam me straight in, damn the imposition, Berat thought, trying his best to keep his head down, not make too much eye contact, and ignore the increasingly vulgar chanting echoing down the block. But it was definitely getting closer. And closer. I know forty years isn’t a long time—

But it still was worse than he’d expected. He’d tried to tell himself it wouldn’t be like that, even after it had taken two days to get solid confirmation of his appointment with Captain Kanril when they did not have that kind of time to waste. This should have been scheduled before he’d even left 75-Tau, he shouldn’t have kept getting bounced to Kurland...

Now that he was here, it was everything the dual-commissioned Cardassian officer had dreaded about setting foot on Bajor, and then some.

Almost there. Admiral Berat turned the corner—

—smack into a massive protest. True, maybe it wasn’t all that massive, based on holos he’d seen from worlds with a more raucous makeup than Cardassia, but it certainly felt massive as his ears fought to pick out the separate words and phrases that were all doing their best to run together into one angry buzz.

“Bajor for Bajorans!” “We will not be slaves!” “Phekk the Federation!” Coincidental resemblance to English aside, he knew what that one meant.

A Bajoran Starfleet officer with a flame-red ponytail shouted out the window—something that also had the phekk word in it, though he couldn’t make out what exactly she was saying.

Then someone caught sight of her. And him.

“Prophets-damned collaborators!” Rage contorted the man’s face as he hurled a pink, roundish object up at the window where the Starfleet woman had just been.

He didn’t have time to track the thing to see if it made contact. Finally, there was the Bajoran Militia, pushing back against the crowd. As for the crowd—the mob—their shouts were turning personal. He knew that multifaceted, yet somehow unified growl of rage. He’d heard it whenever the authorities in the old days would stoke the fires on purpose, usually at… an execution. They were almost all political executions in some sense, but the ones for ‘traitors’—they were always the most vicious. The kind where even children cast stones at their uncles and fathers—

“—a Cardie!” he heard all of a sudden. He gasped. His eyes darted over, he started to turn—but he resisted. Barely. Blood rushed through his ears with a roar. His heart pounded. Don’t provoke them. He knew what he would’ve seen, though. Someone was pointing right at him.

He sped up his pace, forced himself to stare straight ahead, all the while keeping his bioelectric sense finely tuned for anyone that might shove themselves far too close. “That arrogant TRIBBLE!” someone shouted. Get out, get out, getoutgetoutgetout—

A woman picked up where the other left off. “You were in the Guard, weren’t you, ‘old’ man! Murderer!”

“Phekk the Federation occupiers!”

He’d almost made it to the door. Just a few more seconds—“Ye’phekk maktal kosst amojan!”

Something smacked into the back of his head, hard. Not hard enough to make his ears ring, thank Fate, but hard enough that whatever it was squished and burst on impact, lending a sudden chill to the air rushing past him as he half-ran, half-staggered the last few steps into the temporary headquarters, past a group of gold-uniformed Bajoran peacekeepers pulling stun batons from their belts as they headed the other direction.

All eyes in the front lobby aimed squarely at him. Admiral Berat froze stiff for the first second. The stares—he didn’t like it—too much like Gul Marak’s men—

Whatever the cold wetness was, some of it slid down off his hair and onto his neck, leaving a slime trail on its way down to his collar.

The sensation snapped him out of it. These weren’t Marak’s men, that hadn’t been a Fist of Revenge mob out there—bad enough, why didn’t they control it—

Berat took a deep breath, willing himself to calm. These were Starfleet officers, most of them, or Bajoran Militia, and none of them shared the same burning outrage as the mob outside. In fact, a Starfleet ensign, a Betazoid with brown hair, had snapped to attention. “Attention on deck!”

“Carry on,” Berat acknowledged. Good, his voice sounded reasonably steady to his ears, and that rushing sound was gone.

The slime was on the move again. Unthinking, he reached up towards the back of his neck, avoiding the sensitive ridges out of habit, about to wipe it off with his hand.

“Can I get you a towel, sir?” the Betazoid asked.

Berat nodded. “Yes, thank you.”

The ensign marched over to a replicator and keyed something in. A grey hand towel materialized, which she promptly handed over to the Cardassian.

The admiral wiped down the back of his head with a couple quick strokes of the cloth, glad for a fleeting second that he’d been in Starfleet uniform and wasn’t having to pull off his cuirass to get at any remnants that could have dripped underneath. He glanced up at the wall chrono. No time for anything else—that would have to do.

He handed the towel back, presenting the young woman with the clean end. “Thank you again, Ensign…”

“Kav, sir. Jirelle Kav.”

Berat nodded. “Please let Captain Kanril know I’m ready to see her.”

“Very good, sir,” a dark-skinned Bajoran in a gold-and-brown Militia uniform said, pressing a key on her desk. “Kanril,” a low-pitched, but definitely female voice answered after a moment.

“Admiral Tayben Berat to see you, ma’am.”

“Send him up, Lieutenant.”

Berat nodded and turned for the stairs.

How did they let it get so out of hand? thought the part of him that didn’t want to let him relax all the way. That would never be tolerated on Cardassia, even with the new government—

Well, the first thing you do is, don’t say that, the rational part of him interjected. Don’t even think it in there. Best not mention the protest at all. He didn’t know about Bajorans, but for a Cardassian, making one’s host lose face in her own ‘house’ without a very good reason was about the worst thing a guest could do. And after what he’d witnessed outside, this definitely called for his best behavior, no matter how much he outranked her.

There—he’d reached the top of the stairs. He glanced down the hallway and caught sight of a door at the end of the left hall with a temporary nameplate on the door that read, Captain Kanril Eleya, Starfleet.

It was an old wooden door, matching the classic stone and stucco construction of the building. The Cardassian didn’t see a buzzer, so he lightly rapped on the door. “It’s open!” he heard.

He turned the TRIBBLE and opened the door, and the woman he’d seen yelling out the window two minutes earlier surged to her feet behind her desk.

“Captain Kanril,” Berat greeted, inclining his head just slightly in the Cardassian acknowledgment, but not the bow one would give a superior officer or elder. He spoke a bit softly, but clearly.

“Welcome to Bajor, Gul Berat,” she answered, a little stiffly.

He paused, momentarily taken aback—not just by her calling him gul. Kanril spoke his language, albeit not particularly well—her pronunciation was a little off and she had used the wrong pronoun case. But that didn’t get in the way of his understanding—and he wasn’t exactly in a position to criticize anyone for their accent. “Much appreciated, Captain,” he replied in Cardassian, careful to avoid the more typical phrasing that given their ranks, would have required him to use the subordinate address. It wouldn’t have been the contemptuous address, true, but based on that mob outside, he doubted that would make much of a difference in how it came off to her. He switched to his Scottish-inflected English, which still mingled with a slight Cardassian accent. “I wish it had been under better circumstances.”

“Don’t we all, sir. Have a, uh, seat,” she said, gesturing at a wooden chair across the desk from her. “I gather you encountered some of our, erm, local color on your way in. I hope it wasn’t too much of a problem.”

Truthfully, he wondered if the Militia hadn’t eased up a bit when they realized what the shouting was all about. But it wasn’t his command, and even less his place to comment. “I’ve seen worse,” he said, and left it at that.

“So, sir, what exactly is the composition of the 77th’s contribution to the fleet?”

Berat straightened in his seat, recalling the list by memory. “I will be leading two Galaxy refits and two Sovereigns as capital ships for the fleet. The rest of our contribution is made up of science vessels and escorts. There will be eight science and recon ships, ranging from our two Vestas--including my flagship—to the Polaris class. I am also bringing fourteen escorts, including Sabre and Gryphon classes, and a Phoenix in non-standard reconnaissance config—”

She shook her head and he stopped. “No, I mean how many Cardassian ships are involved. Because I’m already up to my neck in Klingons—two carrier battle groups are coming in from Omega Leonis and a Vor’cha wing is already here.”

Inwardly, Berat bristled. They had a critical engagement to fight against nearly three thousand Jem’Hadar warships, and she, too, believed he was out to restart the Occupation? Was that why she had been stonewalling him practically until the second he pulled into orbit? If they lost because of this—

He met her eyes with an intent gaze. “Captain Kanril, I am here in my capacity as a Starfleet field commander, not Cardassian Defense Force. I have no designs to do otherwise, nor do my CDF superiors. A situation severe enough for the Cardassian Union to make an exception on the Treaty of Bajor would be one where both the diplomatic solution and an attempt to destroy the Jem’Hadar command vessel have failed and the Quadrant is facing a grave crisis.”

He just barely bit his tongue before he could add: A grave crisis as in swarms of Jem’Hadar probably having already overcome Bajor once they figure out you’ve “reneged” on the Non-Aggression Pact, setting up a beachhead just like they did to Prime, churning more soldiers out of their vats by the hour, and launching large-scale attacks against the Union and the Federation both.

He hoped Kanril would get the point. If not even the Starfleet elements could cooperate with each other, then they might very well be looking at such a crisis after all.

To her credit, she did seem to get the point: she pressed her face into her palm tiredly. “I’m sorry, sir, that came out wrong. I didn’t mean—” She sighed. “I need a drink. You want a drink?”

It wasn’t that Berat was insensitive to the reason for Kanril’s reactions. Goodness knew he was very aware of it. But time was at a premium, and if Loriss decided to strike now… there might not be any left. Best not to belabor it, he figured. That—and a proper Cardassian did not refuse hospitality offered, even from a replicator. “Just a glass of cool water, thank you, no ice.”

She kicked her swivel chair over to the Federation-style replicator bolted to the left-hand wall and said, “Special program Kanril Five-Seven, plus one glass of cool water, no ice.” A red beverage in a martini glass materialized in the tray next to the nondescript clear glass. As she handed Berat his glass, she took a sip from her own and commented, “I think there was a 12th century Perikian poet—yeah, Chen Silesi, said spring wine was the Prophets’ way of showing they love us.” She took another mouthful. “‘Course, this is a Hathon hammer, but same idea.”

Real alcohol, he suspected. Hopefully she would keep it to just one—it wouldn’t do to bend the rules about drinking on duty too far. “I’m not familiar with that poet,” Berat admitted. “But I know your world has a rich heritage. One I would not want to see compromised.”

She pushed her chair back over to the desk. “I wish those idiots outside could hear you say that, sir.” She took a PADD off the stack on her desk. “I mean, my father was Resistance, I know where they’re coming from, but I don’t know what the phekk they think they’re going to achieve. Pardon my language.” She took a closer look at the screen, then shoved the PADD across to him. “Since you’re here, can you give me a second opinion on these Jem movements? Because it looks to Marconi and me like that Loriss character may be planning a breakout, maybe try and bring in what’s left of Lamat’ukan’s Alphas out in the Badlands.”

Berat studied the formations for a quiet moment. The perspective and symbology were completely different, and yet… “I almost cannae believe it,” he muttered half to himself at first. Then he looked up at Kanril, the certainty growing. “I recognize these formations. They kept us in the dark most of the time, but that doesn’t mean we didn’t notice things…”

He pointed to the symbols denoting escorts versus cruisers and capital ships. “Under normal circumstances, I’d say you were right. But during the War, with relations between Cardassia and the Dominion… as they were, at the time Loriss went missing, a convoy running from—” He caught himself about to say ‘Terok Nor.’ True, it had been that for a brief time during the war, but it wouldn’t do to say that in present company. “—Deep Space 9, to Cardassian space, would only bring enough escorts to guard against flank attacks from Federation forces. The Cardassian Rebellion wasn’t in full force then; they wouldn’t be set up to press the attack all the way through Cardassian space.

“These formations aren’t set up to deal with a hostile Cardassia. And Cardassia is permitted to fight an invasion that crosses its borders. Judging from this… it looks to me like Loriss’ distrust of the historical record goes so far that she doesn’t even believe Cardassia has regained its independence. That, or even if she does have reservations, that Founder programming of hers won’t let her acknowledge it without them telling her to use her brain and trust her eyes.” A haggard grin peeked its way through memories of war and darkness. “Who knows what else she can’t let herself accept.”

By now the Bajoran was smiling, too. “See, that is exactly why the CDF should be involved. Starfleet only fought them—there’s only so much you can learn that way. You’ve got a perspective we’re missing, sir. I’m sending this over to Admiral Marconi.”

Now that wasn’t what Admiral Berat had expected to hear at all. “You…wanted us to be here.”

“Part of me did, yes, sir. The soldier in me did. My first ops chief was a Vulcan, really believed in that ‘Infinite Diversity in Infinite Combinations’ thing. Little bit of it rubbed off.”

He released a slow breath through his nose. “That’s…” For the love of Cardassia, the words just wouldn’t put themselves together right. But maybe I’ve been holding back too much with her. “A position I hoped we would have earned by now. And that’s what those thrice-burned terrorists don’t understand that they’re doing to us. They think they’re proving Cardassian strength with their attacks, but all they’re doing is showing the Federation that we still haven’t reformed enough to be trusted. They don’t understand that being trustworthy isn’t a sign of weakness. That it’s what would give us strength enough to take care of ourselves. But until we do earn it…”

She snorted and took a swig of her cocktail, then wiped her mouth on her sleeve. “I feel the same way about the Circle. And you’re looking at somebody the True Way put a six-figure bounty on after that business on Algira III.”

“I know how that feels,” he said. He remembered it every time he thought of his beloved, and why they still dared not declare their love, or even associate too closely. He tried to shake off that morose turn of thought. He set his right hand on his chest, near his commbadge. “There’s a twenty-five percent bonus on me if I’m taken in Starfleet uniform.”

“Well, way I see it, if idiot ye’phekk makteru kosst amojan hate us that much, it means we’re doing our jobs right. Personally, I think if we could all just sit down and have a quiet drink instead of fighting,” and she raised her glass to him, “we’d be better off.”

“And that’s the kind of basic reasoning our current enemies have been deprived of,” Berat commented. “For us, anyway, there’s at least a little hope. But we have to survive these coming days to get there. Now—we have a Jem’Hadar fleet to decapitate. And I have some thoughts on how to identify the lead vessel…”

So they worked, sharing ideas, sending them on to the mission planners with the fleet that was massing hundreds of kilometers above their heads. The world outside quieted as the sun went down and a Militia curfew started. “...So after the Klinks half-destroyed the best pub in town,” Kanril was telling Berat, “Colonel Kubus wanted to keep a tighter lid on at least that part of this mess.”

Berat winced with sympathy at the mention of the Klingons. He was glad the 77th hadn’t had to take any Klingon units in their formation—that was one job he didn’t envy Captain Kanril in the slightest. He couldn’t imagine Kanril or Kubus had enjoyed dealing with their brutish belligerence in the slightest.

But another thought escaped him—one that a few hours ago, he wouldn’t have dared venture aloud. “‘That part’…” His sky-blue eyes grew distant as eidetic memories merged and past and present shifted in and out of each other. “He didn’t disperse the mob here, though. Not even when the violence started.”

Kanril’s mouth twisted. “I wasn’t told what he was planning, exactly, but he’s got a fine line to walk between order and freedom of assembly. I think he’s letting them vent as long as they don’t start… Wait, you mean violence besides them throwing food at the building?”

[Deleted User] · July 2015

Past Continuous (part 2)

So that’s where the moba fruit I’ve been smelling all this time was. I knew that window was shut… “Phekk, they went after you, didn’t they?” He nods wordlessly. I press a hand to my face in annoyance. “Prophets, which idiot’s idea was it to bring you in the front door with that going on? Sugihara’s?”

“I don’t think that was going on when we first pulled into orbit,” Berat said, “not like that. We were able to get hold of Captain Kurland for a few minutes here and there, while he was running from meeting to meeting, but we never could get a contact on this side of town, other than this ensign who looks like she’s barely out of the Academy. She didn’t mention anything--and Lieutenant Gredevel took a security scan of the area shipboard, before beamdown. There weren’t any anomalous gatherings in front of your campus then. It must have happened fast...”

I shake my head. “Phekk, this is ridiculous. I’m sorry you got put through that, sir. Would it have killed somebody to turn on frakking FNN…?”

“FNN is being kept back from all of the headquarters facilities—I don’t imagine Starfleet was keen on letting Loriss triangulate on an unsecured live broadcast intercept and figuring out exactly where we’ve set up. Even for a lightspeed signal, DS9’s only fifteen minutes out. So no help from them. Based on what we had… I misjudged the situation.”

“Mmf. Well, let me see if we can’t get you out of here a little safer than you came in. Least I can do.” I click my intercom switch and change over to my NCO voice. “Relmira! Get an unmarked aircar ready for the admiral, please. And I want three peacekeepers or Starfleet Security you trust as pilot and bodyguards.”

“I trust all of them, ma’am.” She sounds annoyed at the implication.

“You know what I mean, Lieutenant. Get on it.” I click the intercom back off and stand, tugging down the hem of my uniform jacket. “I really hope this works out, Admiral. You get a chance when this is all over, there’s actually a kanar distillery in the next town north of here. My treat.”

“You… still distill kanar?” Berat asks, eye ridges lifting in astonishment. And a flash of what looks like anger. “That little vole of an ambassador the Detapa Council can’t seem to get rid of—you make that now, and he wanted the Occupation vintage—” The Cardassian officer stops. A sly grin tugs on his lips. “He did not like the way in which I informed him that was not going to be happening.”

I snort. “If you’re thinking of the same self-important *ss I am, last I heard the proprietor had banned him for life.”

“How I would like to get him banned from his position… I almost got myself a disciplinary action after that incident, but when I explained to Admiral ch’Harrell exactly what Skyl let fall out of his big mouth, I got off with a verbal warning, ‘this once.’ Legate Sa’kat… after he got dressing me down and expressing his astonishment that a senior gul might have grabbed ‘our’ ambassador by the collar...well, he told me he plans to report what Skyl said to the Council itself. I would not be surprised if the True Way was propping Skyl up somehow, and if Sa’kat can put on enough pressure for them to get rid of him somehow—”

I can’t help it, I start snickering and he stops to give me a funny look. “I’m sorry, sir, I know that was important but—you threatened your own ambassador?” By now I’m really laughing. “Whoo! Did I get you wrong!”

Berat finally cracks and starts laughing himself. “That doesn’t leave this room,” he sneaks out between guffaws, “but yes, I… did something very out of character. I haven’t been that angry at someone in years—all I wanted then was… to make him shut up... as expediently… as possible! Not like I could make the True Way… angrier! The look on his face… like a frightened… bald baby gettle—”

That’s where we are, laughing our butts off, when a very surprised Lieutenant Relmira opens the door behind him. I struggle to get my face back to something resembling decorum but it doesn’t quite work. Berat is only faring slightly better. I nervously brush a stray strand of hair back behind my ear before turning to her and saying, “Um, yes, Lieutenant?”

“The admiral’s… car is ready, ma’am.” She’s still glancing back and forth between us and I can see the question in her eyes, but she doesn’t say anything.

“Ahem. Um, thank you, heh, Lieutenant.” She salutes me, then turns on her heel and steps back out.

“I’ll not keep them waiting long,” Berat says. “But if we survive the Jem’Hadar...I wouldn’t mind speaking again next time I’m on Deep Space Nine. Although…” A little glimmer shines in the Cardassian’s eye. “If you should happen to find anything in your antiterror ops that links to Rugan Skyl… do give me a call right away.”

“I’ll do that,” I agree, smiling. “Walk with the Prophets, Admiral.”

cmdrscarlet · July 2015

Gloaming of Light

“Stop!” Kathryn skidded to a halt. The sand at her feet coughed up a cloud as she raised pistols pulled from holsters on her hips. Wearing a brown cloak, it wrapped around her legs and brushed away any sand that would have risen further. A high collar protected her head up to her ears from local weather and under the cloak she wore civilian pants and shirt that was a collection from different sources, yet still within the local style.

She noticed another turn ahead of her mark only a few meters away. Getting tired and impatient, Kathryn decided more force was needed in order to subdue the Orion. For his part, the large male kept running and twisted at the waist to blindly shoot at Kathryn. The pursuit had taken them from the open streets of Paradise City on Nimbus III to the closed and claustrophobic back alleyways used by darker elements of scum and villainy.

As the green disruptor beam raced above her head, Kathryn ducked instinctively, and then squeezed the trigger to both pistols. Orange beams lanced to either side of the Orion, blasting holes in the walls flanking the lawbreaker and creating a ferrocrete shower. Covering his head slowed his run, even stumbling on the blocks that fell from the walls Kathryn shot.

This was her chance. Kathryn sprinted into the alleyway. With only a few steps between them, she launched into a high kick that caught the Orion in shoulder. Bone cracked and both fell to the ground. Kathryn recovered and pointed a phaser to the Orion’s head as he groaned from pain. Holding his left arm, he rolled onto his back. His grungy brown vest was tattered at the sleeves, exposing a long scar that ran down his right arm.

Kathryn bristled at the sight of the scar and willed herself to stay calm. “You are under arrest by the authority of the United Federation of Planets.”

“Hmph. Bested by the Scarlet Scorpion,” the Orion growled.

Kathryn grinned, took a step back and raised her other pistol. “This is your chance to talk.”

“Or what, you’ll kill me?”

Lowering the power setting on one pistol, Kathryn fired a beam onto the Orion’s left leg. He yelped from the attack and the alley quickly filled with the acrid smell of burnt clothing and flesh.

“Seriously, now is not the time to be tough with me. Tell me where the shipment is.”

Breathing in through clenched teeth, the Orion was defiant. “If you plan on rescuing them, then you’re too late.” He put his good arm down and started to push himself up.

Kathryn stomped onto his hand, shattering bones. She quickly raised the other leg and placed a knee to his head which snapped back. He fell flat to the ground. Kneeling, she kept her foot on his hand, grinding more bones. Seeing the Orion groan, revealed she was running out of time: he was on the edge of either unconsciousness from shock or staying awake from pain.

She placed one phaser emitter to his head, the other to his groin. “Listen, Rastu. Disintegration is only a trigger-pull away. Just tell me where the girls are and I’ll be happy to turn a cheek to your … indiscretions.”

Rastu rolled his eyes and coughed as he spoke. “Ten <kaff> kilometers east, Highhold Pass, shuttles <kaff> expected to pick up <kaff, kaff> the shipment.”

She pressed the phaser to his groin deeper. “When?”

The Orion opened his mouth and then passed out.

“Damn”. She stood and looked around the alley. Not spotting anyone. She holstered her pistols and reached for her communicator tucked to the inside of the cloak’s collar. “Solaris this is the Captain. Have a medical team available in the transporter room. Two to beam up.”

“Acknowledged.”

+++

On the transporter pad, Kathryn stepped over the body of the battered Orion as two nurses entered the room. First Officer Anythi Ythysi arrived as Kathryn pulled off her cloak.

The Andorian’s words were terse. “Welcome Captain. Word of Iconian invasion has reached us.”

Everyone in the room looked to Kathryn. After a few seconds, she looked to the crew in the room and responded, “as you were.” She looked to Anthi and nodded toward the door. Once in the hallway, she turned to head to the main shuttle bay. Anthi anticipated her Captain’s action and didn’t miss a step to walk alongside Kathryn.

“Commander, unless Admiral Quinn himself has ordered me to deal with this, then we are going back down to Nimbus to get those slaves.”

“I understand, Captain. I think it’s best if you review the message.”

antonine3258 · July 2015

ULC 13.1 The Arrival

By antontine32358

Note: ULC 13 entry – what is a Captain up to as the Iconian War starts.

************

The bridge of the Demonslayer was subdued for a Klingon vessel. There was a tradition of order repetition and call-outs that had fallen out of favor in Starfleet thanks to their lead in communication and command systems, but for now there were no orders to give. The Mogh-class battlecruiser sat as a fat mother targ surrounded by its pack, with two of the Vor’chas as fast attackers flanking a Chontay fleet support ship and one of the old Corsair demi-carriers.

The ships were swinging constantly in motion at sublight, and low speeds, engaging in emissions protocol. Something on the level of Q might detect the flare of light-speed tightbeams between them on laser link, but otherwise, they were lost in the vast emptiness, circling a point with no value beyond that pricked on a chart.

D’ellian sat as the watch passed lazily, looking over training reports and waiting for strategic simulation results to finish gathering. None of this squadron were of her House, or even allied with her House. The commanders were complete unknowns to her beyond service records, which had the sort of discrete blanks that indicated service in the Empire’s darkest parts. A pair of Letheans driving the Vor’chas, another Orion on the Corsair, and something unpronounceable, but clearly fierce running the Solanae-derived ship.

This was a KDF-gathered group, part of Gamma Flight, and they’d only been gathered for a few days, but their orders were to expect a long deployment, so the engineers had been busy setting up linked private communications and setting the ship’s tactical systems to coordinate most effectively.

The ships buzzed with rumors, of course. D’ellian had learned the futility of trying to stop them enitrely long before becoming a captain. Anyone skilled in sensors, was an officer, or even had a brain could see this was a counterstrike formation, but as a reserve squadron it was located too close to Q’onos and too far from the Empire’s frontiers. Rumors spread of treasonous Houses, always a problem for the Empire at peace.

D’ellian was content to let the current rumors fester, as she would have had to create them herself otherwise. The art of shaping the dialog was not just held by Orions. Klingons prided themselves on their straightforwardness, and reminded each other of it constantly. Guilt was funny, that way.

“General,” K’Gan, her second said suddenly, “We are receiving a request for two of our replicator assemblies from stores to the Merry Widow.” D’ellian sat up a little. Apparently loaning a few of their shuttlebay personnel to Commander Travik had paid off. “Was this attached to the report on their most recent combat squadron results, or was it from engineering?” she asked. The Corsair had done tremendously poorly readying their second flights when called on for any speed.

“Engineering,” K’Gan said grimly. D’ellian pursed her lips. Travik was an unknown quantity, but an Orion unknown quantity. Acknowledging the gift of staff by sending the update directly would have been polite, but plenty of KDF captains would have preferred it sent by back channel to help a subordinate save some face by instead showing dramatic improvement rather than officially noting how. K’Gan was a second, and so simply would prefer greater honor for ship and crew. And, certainly, the engineering stories between all ships were swapping tales as they tried to balance their non-replicated part allotments to best effects. Stars only knew the next time a friendly shipyard would be seen.

How Klingon was everyone else playing at today, though? D’ellian mused. “Best simply acknowledge it,” she said aloud, “His old commander may have preferred to not have mistakes acknowledged or learned upon. Ask Ch’gren to receive the faulty units and identify the problem.”

“It will be done,” K’Gan said. “We have an authorized transmission window arriving in seventeen standard hours. I will attach this to the outgoing reports.”

D’ellian nodded, “Thank you exec.” Within real-time distance from command and they were having to shuffle messages.

It felt like an Academy problem. How do you plan a war when there are no frontiers, no enemy supply lines, and they can attack multiple strategic targets simultaneously or in series at their desire, with a complete grasp of the initiative and ability to ignore reserves? And not to forget, the enemy’s strategic points were hidden, as well. The question as stated was impossible. But one solution was to hide the reserves.

Relaying communication through bands of buoys at odd times helped obscure their presence further though, and the Iconians couldn’t drop a gateway onto the ship’s bridges if they had no reason to suspect the bridges being present.

This was the other half of the plan, beyond the mass elite reaction force at Earth Spacedock. Worlds would burn, distress calls would sing by the hundreds, and they would have to ignore them all. Because they were Klingon, and that meant they engaged in glorious war to best effect… and they were not Klingon, and so could be safely ordered to remain on standby for less loss of face, in order to join battle at its best moment.

Because the Iconians would strike, and every indication said the strike would be large and against all points. They had all the advantages in the unanswerable question. Klingons would die well. D’ellian would prefer to make selling herself so dear the cost would not be called, and Starfleet agreed that the answer existed – it was to change the question.

Using a technology D’ellian did not understand, nor wish to, they would suborn the gateway activation temporarily… their squadron and dozens funneled from other locations would hit the Iconian staging areas, either as they were empty or their first waves were returning for refit. The Iconians saw space only for its treasures, and underestimated its vastness. Those who had to tread its black trails did not, and a thousand tiny dark shapes would flare as suns, and strike back against the demons.

They would smash all they could, and they would likely die, but the Iconians would be beaten back, possibly never risking such a large strike again. Or if they could, then everyone would die, but at least they would be remembered, and she was Klingon enough for that.

Now though, was the ordinary reports on the last ordinary day.

aten66 · July 2015

Past Sins: Part One, Prompt #3

{A/N: Had to Split Due to Length}

2408

Her shuttle rocked in space, the unknown ship having decloaked to her right, revealed to be a Romulan T'Varo Warbird, and had begun to fire on her, thought to be, hidden location. She had parked out in a sizable asteroid field after she had failed to infiltrate the Romulan station. She had thought she had lost the ship, but the cloaking technology must have improved within the past three decades since their universe had met.

Her Boss, James O'Brien, ordered her to infiltrate this station, as it was a perfectly out of the way location to stage an infiltration in Romulan culture with the Terran Empire's 'allied' Romulan forces. J'ara Zinuzee was supposed to be the one to start all this, the half Romulan-Trill would replace one member of the station by disguising her Trill markings, but now she had failed O'Brien and the Empire. Perhaps it was wrong for her to feel a little bit of satisfaction in this, but fear of being found and killed by this worlds Tal Shiar, muted that satisfaction. If her current pursuers were anything more organized than the Romulan Navy Intelligence she knew on the other side, she had plenty to fear.

Daring to activate her view screen, fearing the energy transfer would alert her pursuers, J'ara was able to view the location of the warbird searching for her, as it moved away from her location. Sighing in relief, J'ara began to prepare for a quick relocation to the beta site, and fitted her transdimensional transponder to open a rift between her world and this one. The whirr of a transporter startled her, and as she went for a gun, she felt the sting of knife in her back. 'Die half breed,' the guttural voice of a Klingon says, 'Fortune smiled on us when we discovered this gateway into our territory, though I don't know how the Romulan's built a space station under out noses..." Kicked in the stomach, the force flipping her over so she could see her attacker, the knife being wedged further in, J'ara came face to face with the last person she thought she would see. Captain Eri'nosa, an alien rumored to have won captaincy over his ship by killing his traitorous captain in the act of defecting to the Empire.

He was ruthless, cunning, malicious, and barely tolerated as an honorable man among Klingons, he was said to take the less moral assignments the honorable Klingons wouldn't take, or so Terran Intelligence claimed. Seeing an orange glow envelop his pale face, J'ara figured she was beginning to slip into unconsciousness from blood loss, and having colorful hallucinations. She heard her attacker move in the darkness, the ringing in her ears muffled the conversation he seemed to then have. When she had the energy to open her eyes and focus on her attacker, she noticed the orange glow, earlier muted from looking the other way, was emanating from her view screen in the form of an orange symbol she recognized as the Terran Omega symbol. Turning back to the woman on the floor, Berg grabs her neck, turning it roughly towards him as he had to lean down. 'Be happy petaQ, as my incompetent science officer realized the portal you made to enter this space is destabilizing,' he says to her, 'My superiors, though, have contacted me through your ship, and inform me that they wish me to send you from here into Terran space, as a warning of sorts.'

He lets go of her, moving to a console at the front typing coordinates in, before moving to a secondary console in the back. He walks back to her, again leaning down over her, when she feels a sharp pain that causes her eyes to widen. 'Sadly though, they want you alive, and that should tide you over until the Federation finds you injured; the Terrans should be able to get you a new host in time,' he heartily bellows a laugh, 'Or you may just die, either way they'll learn of the Empire's interest in this universe, and hopefully discover O'Brien's invasion plans one way or another.'

Cackling to himself, he transports off of the shuttle, and J'ara begins to feel again in her body, though the pain is still ever-present. Working through the pain, she drags herself to the front of the ship, slowly at first, before realizing her shuttle was going to warp on auto pilot. Pulling herself up into the chair, she notices a small, pulsating, orange Omega symbol at the bottom of the screen, and punching it, a document is brought up, which makes her eyes widen. She smiles, and passes out on the console, blissfully unaware of the pain anymore.

****

She remembered her first joining, it was in 2024. 384 years of memories being joined over eight lifetimes. It all started with an Outcast.

89 years lived, Araxis - The Outcast, The Medic

2024, The Year of Joining

Walking through the bright forests of Trill, Araxis took her sack containing bread and water, and began to rummage for food in the form of roots and edible plants or mosses that she knew grew in the forests. She had been outcast by her village some weeks ago, the primitive colony brought to this primitive world some four thousand years ago by their space faring ancestors, was one of the few and far between places left on this plague world.

Kurl was harsh after a plague was introduced that killed off a large percentage of the Trill population, and all hope of being rescued by their birth home died out centuries ago. Their were also once legends of parasitic beings that inhabited Trill hosts, but they too were killed by the plague, weakened to where they could not survive joining. It was her interest in history that got Araxis outcast, while she was training to be a medic, she knew that their were reasons for Trill to have post-birth pouches, and her questioning of that caused her to be outcast. To believe a once space faring civilization, was reduced to a few wooden huts and cultural taboos, was surprising to say the least.

Suddenly Araxis stumbled upon a river, the water flowing from it milky white instead of clear. Interested by this, wondering what would case such a phenomena, she begins to follow it back to it's source. Arriving at a mountain, she ascends a rocky cave that hides behind a waterfall, the milky substance leaking from it and mixing with the fresh waterfall causing the effect downstream. She was not careful though in the dark, and slipped and fell. Cursing her sprained foot, she wobbly sat down, intending to merely dip her foot into the hopefully cool, milky substance, only to feel bones break beneath her hand as she sat down.

Freaking out, and having already put her foot in the milky waters, she attempts to move herself away from the dried corpse she hadn't noticed, only to lose balance and splash into the milky river, only to realize it had been deeper than she thought, as she sank beneath the substance, left to drown. Suddenly feeling a mass of slithering objects cover her, one such object goes beneath her clothes, and finally slips into her pouch. Unprepared for this new sensation, and quickly losing consciousness and breath, she fights her way to the surface, hoping to escape death. And so Araxis Zinuzee, now joined Trill, rediscovers the Lost Pool of Kurl, the first and last colony of ancient Trill, the only pool to escape the plague that devastated their world thousands of years ago, the Solanae born plague making this small pool more resistant, than weak.

75 years, Karis - The Teacher, The Guardian of Knowledge

2113, The Year of Joining

Karis surfaces from the pool, her joining complete, and her possession of the Zinuzee symbiont is confirmed. Araxis had died peacefully in her sleep the night before, her teacher having chosen her to take over the title of Guardian of the Pool of Tears. Karis Zinuzee would continue her previous life's work, to restore relations with Trill Prime, to let them know they were out there, that they had survived and now destroyed the plague, and wished to rejoin their brethren. Araxis, using the Elder Symbiont's knowledge, had been able to heal herself, tell her people of the Symbionts, breakdown prejudices and fear, and even begun to recover and salvage their peoples ancient technology, and built a working subspace transceiver out ancient ships.

It would be some years before they would receive a response, but it was not Trill that would respond, instead a single ship would appear, it's dark, rusty exterior, it's hues of red and oranges and browns, would set down in a populated city, and would send out a representative. Captain K'ager, of the Bird-of-Prey ship that landed, representative of the Klingon Empire, had come to take this world for the Klingons.

69 years, Sardia - The Warrior, The Honored One

2188, The Year of Joining

After waging a guerilla war for over a year, K'ager, now ruler over this realm, would exonerate the rebels, instead asking them to become this world's protectors. K'ager would go on to explain that the Klingon only interest in this world was to add it under their wing, so they could keep it safe from an arrogant, young Cardassian Union, which was a strict, military regime that had resurged back out into the universe in current years. K'ager wished to cease pointless hostilities, and would allow them to rule themselves, as their society was still primitive and would need to build up for itself defenses. Leaving plans, and the promise to return within a years time to see if they would accept annexation, or face annihilation.

Choosing to use this time to create a shuttle that they could use to send an emissary, the people of Kurl decide to send one of their own to find out what had transpired on the home world between the vast time they had been separated. Choosing an unjoined woman training in their rudimentary security forces, she is sent to discover the welfare of their original Trill race. Using ancient star charts unearthed from the technologies they had salvaged and comparing them to the Klingon's information, a course would be plotted and set out for.

Landing on the planet, masquerading as a foreign colony born citizen, the young volunteer would learn that the people of Trill were enslaved by a Terran Empire taht had risen fast, it's harsh rule evident. Narrowly escaping with her life, the young officer manages to avoid them with the use of cloaking technology. Returning, the Trill of Kurl had made their minds up, they would join the Klingons in battle.

After joining the Klingons, and warning them of another new threat, the Terran Empire, for thirty years Karis would rule as interim regent of Kurl before her death, and Sardia, a young lieutenant under the new Kurl Defense Corps. would join with the Zinuzee symbiont. She would be given a ship to control and after joining in many battles against the Terran Empire, Sardia would die a glorious death against Terran Empire ship, which they would win against, before an emergency transplantation of Zinuzee would be needed to a new host.

35 years, Ghestia - The Diplomat, The Silenced One

2257, The Year of Joining

Ghestia, having been chosen at the time to replace Sardia, was originally training under the Klingon Diplomatic Corps. choosing to help bring a coalition of other races under the Klingon banner, rather than a life of subjugation to the evil Terran's. Ghestia Zinuzee, interested in this new branch of warfare, using words instead of a Bat'leth, would continue in this work for decades, being one of the diplomats to help bring about the Klingon-Cardassian alliance, before being silenced on a diplomatic mission to Terra Prime; a colony world said to hold a cell of rebel insurgents. Not knowing it was a trap, Ghestia would be killed in an ambush, though the Zinuzee symbiont would secretly be transferred to a Trill cadet, who had recognized the Kurl woman as being of Trill descent and that she was joined, and who had an operation which would preserve the coveted symbiont.

29 years, Minerva - The Cadet, The Agent

2292, The Year of Joining

Minerva, daughter of one of the many high offices on Trill, descendent of the best fighter pilots and spies within the Terran Empire. In a test of her skills, she was sent to Terra Prime along with a handler who would make sure the job was finished, whether by her hand, or the handler's. Only one of her ancestors were ever joined, but when Minerva stumbled upon the alien woman who looked so much like a Trill, she could see the signs of a joining between the host and symbiont. Telling her handler this, her handler, a Vulcan man named Tuvok, he quickly activated a small device in his possesion. Turning to Minerva, he quickly proceeded to use the Vulcan nerve pinch on her, surrendering her to darkness.

Upon waking in an unfamiliar ship Minerva, confused at the two opposite sets of memories in her head, realized the Symbiont had been joined to her, creating Minerva Zinuzee. Tuvok, later apologizing to Minerva for the deception, would go o to explain his position within a shadow organization at works within the Empire, set up by Emperor Spock himself. Minerva was given the choice, die with this knowledge, or continue as a spy for Memory Omega, as neither the Klingons would accept her back as her host was Trill, not Kurl, and the Terran Empire had recently exterminated all Joined Trill due to a kill order issued in 2287, due to a parasitic infection released by archaeologists studying ancient virus samples.

Spending the next decade in training under Tuvok, she would eventually be sent to the Romulan/Terran Empire border to study the rumors of an conspiracy in the works.

45 years, Haji - The Prisoner, The Amnesiac

2321, The Year of Joining

Imprisoned by the Romulan Tal Shiar for incursion in their space, the now acting Trill mercenary, agent of Memory Omega, would be interrogated ruthlessly for months before her death. Kept with survivors of a failed Terran Empire colony, which was conquered by the Romulans a few months later, Minerva would learn of Haji, a young male Trill and his sister Verra. Entrusting them on her deathbed, she asked for one of them to take the symbiont before the symbiont died. Verra would later be taken away and never return, while Haji remained, and was joined to the Zinuzee symbiont.

By 2349, Haji would become a servant for a Romulan general, whose mistress was a Terran woman who wished to escape the brutal treatment and imprisonment by the Romulans. Helping the woman and her daughter escape, Haji would commandeer a shuttle, and attempt to help her escape. The young daughter, not understanding what was going on would cry out, alerting the guards to their attempt at escape, Haji would then lay down fire with a plasma pistol, though the mother would be lost in the resulting firefight.

Consoling the young child, he would escape successfully with the child, and would contact agents within Memory Omega, revealing the circumstances behind the new face, and the existence of the hybrid child. Leaving her on a backwater planet to be raised by a Vulcan agent within Memory Omega; Haji would continue on, rejoining Memory Omega in their cause, returning to Trill as a sleeper agent.

35 years, Karla - The Fighter, The Enchained

2366, The Year of Joining

The Klingon-Cardassian Alliance, learning of the joined Trill/Kurl man, would imprison him, unsure of whether or not this would mean a resurgence of parasitic infection or whether this joining was clean. Sending the second in command of the Klingon-Cardassian Alliance, Worf, personally to inspect and interrogate the Joined Trill man, he would be kept prisoner for over a decade, forgotten as Worf ascended to become Regent. Eventually he would be interrogated by a member of the Obsidian Order, who had brought him to the brink of death. Warned by the Intendant of the Trill sector, he was not killed right away, instead out of respect for the symbiont, he was killed quickly, the symbiont removed and placed in an artificial chamber that would mimic the Caves of Mak'ala. High Legate Dukat would then take possession of the canister, in order to study it.

Karla, Dukat's Trill Slave, would then be forced to become host to the Zinuzee symbiont, the threat of her family being killed hung over her head. After years of being abused under Dukat's hand, his death, and High Legate Damar's ascension, allowed Karla Zinuzee to be freed from her position as a science experiment. She still though, was under guard of by the Cardassians, and was not allowed to leave, until she was secreted away to Romulan space by a Memory Omega agent, using a jaunt-drive enabled shuttle.

She would return to the failed colony, now freed by Mac Calhoun's Terran Allied Forces, she would learn the fate of her previous host's sister, Verra, and that her descendants still existed in the colony. Deciding to stay, she would then live a happy life, watching her distant family from afar. News would reach the colony of the successful attacks against the Klingon-Cardassian alliance, and the eventual restoration of the Terran Empire. Karla, being up in years, and her health generally declining, eventually revealed herself to her extended family, and was welcomed inside, and would stay until her death.

8 years, J'ara - The Hybrid, The Experiment

2401, The Year of Joining

Eventually years would go by, and the war would cause conscriptions to go out across the worlds the Empire had control of. As of yet their little colony had been forgotten, but soon a new uprising would occur. James' bloody takeover had caused the Empire to fracture, the Romulan's all but withdrawing from the new Terran Empire. The Empire would invade their world, take men and women of all ages, and conscript them into service. Karla, being too old, would not be conscripted, though she tasked herself with watching over those too young to be conscripted. J'ara was one such girl among many children, though Karla would always keep a special eye on her, as she was the granddaughter of Verra, who had married a Romulan officer.

Finally J'ara would reach maturity, and a Terran ship would come to take her away. Knowing this, Karla, who went to hide the remaining children, would defend them with her life, dying in the process after being hit and falling against a wall in her house. After sufficient time had passed, according to what she had instructed beforehand, J'ara and the others would find their dying protector, and calling the only physician, and elder Romulan who remained neutral due to his professional code, he would discover the Trill woman had been carrying a symbiont. Using what little knowledge he had of the Trill's home world, he would create a device that could house the symbiont, entrusting it to J'ara.

She was found month's later, protecting the ragtag group of orphans and the symbiont as best she could. Being phasered into submission with the rest by ruthless Terran security, she would then be used by James O'Brien as a test subject for a new form of conditioning, meant to mold the mind into an obedient servant of the Terran Federation. She would be conditioned before eventually being chosen to join with the very symbiont she had protected years prior. O'Brien would not know what the symbiont was, but realizing its parasitic properties, decided to implant it within J'ara, as the genetic code between the two was compatible. Not knowing the symbiont's experience could break the mental conditioning; J'ara Zinuzee knew to play her part as an obedient agent, for fear of threat against the small group of children she grew to call family, as they could be used as leverage.

And now it led to the situation she was currently in.

*****

2408

Even though she had slipped into unconsciousness, she smiled at the last words she had read.

To Agent K-T 16984,

We would like to inform you that your service to Memory Omega has been invaluable, the Intel gathered these past few decades has proved crucial for our plans in removing James from power. In response to your current plight, we apologize for the ruse our less the reputable Agent had to put on, mainly because of the monitoring from both Klingon and Terran Federation spies, but we truly hope you survive your experience. We learned of your mission, and maneuvered our Agent to intercept so as to disrupt James' plans and add credit to your death. Good luck on your new life Agent K-T 16984, and may you never return to our universe. Oh and about your 'family', they have been relocated to a safe, non-aligned colony world in good standing with our forces.

Sincerely Director 'Frank',
Memory Omega.
Activating Omega Protocol....

*&%S#ting Down(^#@%!
D@ta Era$*ng*..

aten66 · July 2015

New Beginnings: Part 2, Prompt #3

{A/N: Had To Split Due to Length}

2408, The Year of Joining
Vega Colony,

Lexis Zidire was enjoying her afternoon lunch with her aunt aboard her ship. She had dreams of joining the Academy since she was young, but 23 year old Lexis instead joined Vega colony's security force, which she was currently in training for. The Blazing Ion, the ship her aunt was posted on as head medical officer, was stopped at the colony for a few weeks, and had just dropped off medical supplies and other things for the colony.

The shuttle had been stopped by the Miranda-Class ship in orbit, the Blazing Ion using tractor repulsors to slow it down, before brining the unidentifiable ship into it's cargo bay. Noticing a failing life sign onboard, an emergency transport was requested to sickbay.

Joining her aunt in sickbay, bringing lunch to the busy woman, she was stopped when she noticed her aunt hovering over what appeared to be a Romulan, which was unusual due to the current hostilities between the Romulan Star Empire, the Federation and Klingons. Putting aside her tray of lunch, she is asked by her aunt to help her by grabbing the tools she would need. Scrubbing in, as no other nurse was on active duty in sickbay, and the situation her aunt's patient was in with blood loss, time was high sought commodity as life was slowly ebbing out of the Romulan girl, who was about her age as far as she could tell. Noticing another strange detail, she brushes back a wisp of hair, and shows the strange dermal markings to her aunt. Both recognizing what this could mean, Lexis' aunt checked more detailed vital signs, and her look turned sour. Calling in another nurse, she hurriedly explained the new predicament.

Helping where she could, Lexis was noticing the same signs her aunt was with what basic medical knowledge she knew. The symbiont was dying along with the host. The knife penetrating the host's back was meant to not cause permanent harm to the host, and were easily fixable with multiple surgeries. Of course in a normal humanoid or unjoined Trill it would mean very little, but in a joined Trill it was very dangerous and could harm the symbiont. And of course, this symbiont happened to have been cut by the sword, and was in need of emergency corrective measures. That meant removing the Symbiont from the host, which would kill the host faster, and leave the symbiont without a host.

"We've managed to slow the bleeding, but it will only prolong her life by hours, and by the time we find a Trill host on the ship, we couldn't make it back to Trill in time to transfer the symbiont safely," Her aunt is talking to the Captain, an elder male Denobulan, "We'd need the Symbiosis Commission's approval of a new host, though I don't think they would, since I don't believe this is a normal symbiont." The Captain nods, looking over at the patient from her aunt's office, where Lexis sat watching over her.

"Tell me, have you thought about asking any of the crew about this, explain it to them; couldn't you just, transfer the symbiont into a secondary host as we transport it to Trill," he asks seriously, "Or what about the research Doctor Bashir did during the crisis on Trill?" Her aunt shakes her head.

"I've already considered those options; a secondary transfer of a healthy symbiont would be fine, but as much damage as this symbiont has had, and having surgery within such a short time, I believe it could die, and possibly damage the new host as well," her aunt says, "And I've also considered Bashir's serum as well, but the time it would take to create the necessary components for the serum would take too long, and both host and symbiont would be dead." Sighing, her aunt runs her frail hands through her graying hair. "I would take the symbiont myself, I've been tested by the Comission before and am able to be joined, but I'm the only specialist on ship dealing with this kind of surgery," she says, "And none of the other medical personnel could be trained in time to safely complete the surgery." Nodding, the Captain turns his attention to Lexis who has listened in on the conversation from the doorway behind her Aunt.

"What do you think Ms. Zidire?" the Captain asks the young Trill woman. Nervous, the young woman bites her lip.

"Well, if there are no Trill able to join on board, unwilling or otherwise, and if the Symbiosis Commission needs to be authorize the Joining, What aout me, I am unjoined..." she says, "While the officers aboard your starship have rights, I'm a civilian and can volunteer out of my own free will and out of concern for preservation of life; could we contact the Commission over subspace and see if they would allow a Joining for these unusual circumstances, if there is a way to prove I could be joined?" Cringing, quickly becoming self-conscious at her suggestion, she shies away from the view of her aunt and the Captain.

"Quite a brilliant young girl you've raised up, Doctor," the Captain says, "With you as her doctor, and I as acting interim guardian as Captain of this ship, we could make a case with the Commission, don't you?" Nodding, her Aunt and the Captain turn to draw up the necessary channels.

1 Hour Later...

After much discussion and being drug through backwater channels, the Joining was approved, and the surgery was about to begin. The dying host had woken up in a sweat, been made aware of the options, and had gladly agreed to the transfer of the symbiont, whose name she gave as Zinuzee. Currently Lexis had been put under, along with J'ara, they symbiont being transferred with care to a micro-pool that would allow the necessary surgical fixes be made.

After another hour of intense close calls, J'ara nearly dying before stabilizing for a miraculous reason, Lexis Zinuzee was awoken from her anesthesia induced state. Her eyes fluttering open, she was allowed to sit up, and see her former host on the opposite bed. J'ara, opening her own eyes for the last time, smiled seeing the surgery as a success, before finally breathing her last.

Lexis Zinuzee was crying for a few moments, before she suddenly fainted for no reason.

****

Six Months Later

After these few grueling months fighting insanity, the Psychological experts had to agree with the conclusion Lexis' aunt, and Lexis' Zinuzee personality had already come to, that the neurological overload caused by conflicting memories of Zinuzee's memories of the other universe causing 'glitches' when confronted with Lexis' own knowledge of history and of recent and ongoing events. The resulting confusion caused the Joining to be incomplete, the two personalities, the symbiont and the host, to manifest as Multiple Personality Disorder or Dissociative Identity Disorder, causing the two personalities to seemingly vie for control. Zinuzee's personality seemed to dominate, though Lexis' memories and thoughts, as well as feelings, seemed to bubble up on random subjects, or personal opinions.

She had a goal at least though, to join Starfleet Academy, and that was enough for her to determine her future.

****

2410, The Present,
Kh'tar, Delta Quadrant

0815 Hours

Throwing another punch, aiming for her opponents shoulder, she was easily deflected as her opponent sidestepped her attack. Tapping her shoulder after deflecting her attack, Gregs quickly moves around her, giving her room to ready herself again. Angrily huffing, she prepares to attack again, then decides to taunt Gregs into an attack. "Come on, big boy, afraid to hit a girl?" she taunts, "Why don't you make a move, and we'll see who gets tapped out this time." Smirking, Gregs merely motions for her to attack again. With a cry of rage, she goes to fake out Gregs, only for him to just suddenly stop, surprising her for a brief second, which Gregs then takes advantage of.

Grabbing her wrist, Gregs twists her arm behind her back, while quickly grabbing her other hand and doing the same. He then leans on her shoulder, while Zinuzee tries to break free from his grip. "You were the one needing an ear and a pair of fists, not a professional counselor, right now at least," he says to her, "I'm doing my job, I'm your punching bag; I didn't say I would attack back, but I didn't say I wouldn't defend myself either." Releasing her, Zinuzee stumbling forward a few steps, she takes a few moments to center herself, her anger and guilt subsiding for a moment, before taking the time to find a pattern to Gregs moves and moving back into the fight.

**

Earlier

0700 Hours

Waking to pale brown and pink walls, she runs her head over her face to rub the sleep from her eyes. Removing the coverings from her bed the pale, brown haired woman of twenty five, rose and walked through the Spartan bedroom to the even more basic bathroom, which held the items that allowed her to prep for the long day ahead. Realizing her shift wouldn't start until 1200 hours, she had plenty of time to use the impromptu holodeck that had begun to be incorporated into the ship for her use today, having reserved it for this morning.

Dressing for a workout, the Trill woman put her short hair into a makeshift bun, enough to keep her hair out of her face for the duration of her sparring program. Grabbing a towel and water bottle from her replicator, the Trill woman left for the morning to grab a bite when passing by the mess hall.

Impromptu Mess Hall, Deck Ten
0732 Hours

The Mess Hall had been split into two adjoining rooms with separate kitchens, one permanent, the other makeshift until a permanent one could be rebuilt. Today the group of senior and junior bridge officers of beta shift, ate their meager, if you could call a Talaxian feast meager, breakfast together in the makeshift mess hall. The Captain was already inside with others already enjoying breakfast or dinner, beta shift and the night watch respectively. Gregs had decided to join his men and women, helping Alib in the kitchen, having already half finished the breakfast by making accompanying dishes to go with the omelet and coffee, in the form of hash browns, various kinds of toasts, and all served with a variety of fresh jams from hydroponics, made a few days ago on the Captain's off time.

With Alib taking control of the kitchen, practically pushing Gregs out in a flurry, telling him to enjoy the appetizers, while he prepared the main dish and fixed the brew of coffee up. Sitting with a few of the Kobali officers, Soria, and some Voth who decided to join them in partaking of the unique Delta Quadrant delicacies; Gregs began to chat it up with his crew members. After some minutes, Gregs realized Zinuzee was shouting at the replicators, which had been taken offline the night prior due to glitches caused by the Heralds attacks, which had finally manifested only last night. She had managed to get them working again, only for them to spit out the wrong substances, or making them too hot, or freezing them in a block of ice, which had begun to try her patience.

Snickering at her predicament, Gregs quickly went to the kitchen, avoiding Alib at all costs, and retrieving something he had set aside earlier before making other things. Gregs brought a bowl filled with a cooked grain of some kind, topped with berries, and a glass filled with milk into Zinuzee's view. Showing her to an empty table, he left her to cool down, not wanting to upset the clearly agitated Trill, clearly knowing better. Finishing her light breakfast, Zinuzee quickly moves on, returning her dish to the kitchen where it could be recycled, and moved on to the holodeck.

**

Later...

"So the topic of the morning will be the reasons for joining the Kh'tar and Gregs Son'aire," Alib relates to the others, after Gregs had taken his leave of course. He sits down waiting to see if anyone would volunteer their stories, as it was only himself, Soria, Jeysesia, and Zar, with Z'yrich having slipped in after Zinuzee had left, munching on the last of the omelet and finishing the second pot of coffee. "No takers? Fine I'll start," he says, "I've only come on in the past few months, but as you know I'm a tactical based intelligence officer, my expertise on the current state of affairs of the area, among the Kazon, the Hazari, and the Hirogen, especially in their tactics and weapons type, I'm the guy for finding and exploiting weaknesses and advantages." He takes a sip of his coffee again.

"What some of you may not know, is that I joined Gregs after a failed attempt on selling him out to the APU's in exchange for freedom; we know how that went though now," he chuckles, "Picture this: Me without a ship, being blackmailed only to be betrayed, by said blackmailing robots." He has the attention of Zar and Jeysesia, who had joined up afterwards, though Soria had begun to roll her eyes. "Left in your sell out-e's care after you beat the robots back, with no where to go, and an alliance on the way," he continues, oblivious to the others, enthralled in his own story, "I got offered the job and well, I obviously took it and I don't regret it, yet." He looked around the room, expecting another round of tales, after warming everyone up. Soria then coughs, all eyes turning to the Liberated Borg officer, whose cheeks turn a light green in a blush, before she starts to speak.

Z'yrich quickly gets up to return her dishes, while Alib follows, bringing back the third pot of coffee. "I previously served as an ensign on the Grey Star before my assimilation and sequential liberation, before I was assigned to Gregs previous ship the Oregon, as an impromptu engineer; as I had nowhere else to go," Soria continues, "And well, I've gotten so good at engineering I'm as good as a Main Engineer, behind Sharvan, Deiso, and Chassidy herself." Alib whistles at that, while the others merely nod, as they know how trusted the main engineers were to keep their ship in shape.

"You also may not know I work with Ms. Brighton on most days as the School's science and engineering consultant," she continues, "I don't work much in engineering, even though I am a senior officer aboard, I do help around when necessary in covering an odd shift or two." She giggles next. "We do seem to be turning into a ship worthy of the Corps of Engineers, rather than one meant for war," Soria says, "We're patching people and ships up though out in the front lines so much it seems, I'm glad to get a little break and help in the science aspect of this war." Nodding all around, the conversation loses momentum; the topic they had tried to avoid made them all uncomfortable to the war raging over a good 70,000 light years away.

"Yes, well, if we are all done feeling sorry for ourselves," Jeysessia pipes up, "But I bet we're all dying to know Z'yrich's story, how did you join Gregs' crew?" Perking up, the others all wondered the history of their newest, most mysterious, member of the crew seen around the ship, who had apparently appeared out of thin air after Gregs encounter with the Krenim. Turning to the brown haired alien, she was surprised at first, but with a smile, she opened her mouth to speak.

*****

Meanwhile...

Punching the sandbag in the holodeck, she releases all her pent up rage into the photonic dummy. She'd rather use the assortment of holographic weapons at her disposal: the Mek'leth, Bat'leth, Vulcan Lirpa, a basic dagger, a pair of Eskrima Baston's, an Ushaan-tor, a pair of brass knuckles, boxing gloves, and a whip. She was currently just using her knuckles in wraps, and punching the sand bag. Sweat was beading up, she was tiring out from the exertion, and she knew she should stop.

Stress and anger boiled in the back of her head. She knew it was potentially serious, that the deaths of her fellow crewmen and friends impacted her more than she knew they should. Perhaps it was that tiny voice in the back of her head, the fear and doubts she had when they began this war, eating away at her confidence now. 'You aren't even from this universe,' it reminded her, 'Why should we stay here? Why not return begging on your knees to whatever remnant of home there is on the other side of the mirror. Perhaps the Iconians wouldn't be able to follow you, and you can make a home there.'

Home. Perhaps that was what worried her the most, with her world being in danger from threat of attack. Trill was a potential target early on in the war, but they hadn't been attacked since the first wave of the Herald Ships. Perhaps her fears were true; she knew this war was tough on everyone, and that the same questions no doubt echoed across everyone's minds: Am I good enough? Am I worthy of being here? Will I die today? Will this war end?

With that last question ringing in her mind, she leaves her water bottle and towel behind, and punches the heavy bag with her hands, not stopping until she sees blood splattered onto the holographic bag. Sighing in frustration, she had forgotten she removed her bandages; the light protecting surface kept her knuckles from splitting, and now a few of her knuckles were split open and bleeding.

"Here, let me get that," a voice says from the holodeck's doorway. Zinuzee turned to see Gregs grabbing the emergency med-kit held in a compartment in the arch. Grabbing a dermal regenerator, Gregs then walks over to her spot. Grabbing her hands, Gregs firmly holds her left hand, applying the dermal regenerator, before moving on to her other hand, checking it until he was satisfied it too was not hurt.

Ripping her hands away from his grip, her indignation at Gregs for being forced to not feel the stinging pain of the hurt for a few seconds more, and being treated like a child, she quickly moved to her bench, readying herself to begin anew with the bag. Feeling her shoulder being grabbed, and already in a fighting mindset with her training; she nearly reacts by trying to throw her assailant over her shoulder, before the hand quickly withdraws, and her realization that Gregs sensed her attack through his training in Vulcan Suus Mahna.

"I think if that bag could talk, it'd be begging you to end it," Gregs jokes half-heartedly, before turning straight, "Seriously though, you need a sparring partner, or next you'll be breaking your ankle after trying to kick the bag into submission. How about I be your punching bag, okay?" Blushing furiously, mostly in anger, Zinuzee merely nods, pointing to the tape on the bench. Gregs sheds his jacket in favor of his basic undershirt, a grey tank top.

**

Back to The Present

As she struck out at Gregs, her cool facade began to break, the emotions she held back having to be faced. Anger at the losses the Alliance has been facing, loss of life, the deaths of allies. Sadness at the loss of friends and family, of innocents and civilians being hurt and injured. Guilt over being on one of the few ships not destroyed in the fleet, of being sent into the Delta Quadrant instead of being in the middle of it all.

Fear that she may become too influenced her predecessors, their past actions catching up to her. Fear that this war would result on her leaning too heavily on her past lives for emotional assistance. Fear of strength at the cost of feeling compassion, weakness' like that having been drove out of her past lives by decades of training. Some times she hated being so old, to know suffering and oppression, and to know that what she faced in her many lifetimes was nothing compared to the Iconians plans for the universe to lay waste to worlds, and knowing they have the power to do so.

She didn't even notice that she had started crying, or that Gregs had grabbed her in the hug; all she knew was she wasn't going to stop soon, and was happy to have a shoulder to cry on. She had her memories, she had a life, she had a career under a great captain. Maybe she needed this shoulder too.

marcusdkane · July 2015

Prompt # 2:

Drozana Station, 28 March, 2408...
Daimon Bradh entered the gloomy bar and glanced about. Searching the crowd in the dark venue as much acoustically as visually, he heard a voice booming:

"... You know what the Klingon told me?? This is better than the targ I just tried to f*ck..."

Hearing raucous laughter, Bradh also heard tones below the audible ranges of most species, and knew he had found the source of his search. Changing course, he found himself approaching a gaming table, where representatives of half a dozen species were engaged in a tense game of Roladan wild draw.

"Too rich for my blood..." a huge Markalian declared, flinging down his cards.

A dark haired Hew-mon sighed, "I'm out too, looks like I'm not winning my watch back today either..." and tossed his cards to the table.

The slender Pentaxian male to the other side of the table grinned modestly, leaned forwards, and scooped the considerable pile of latinum slips and an antique timepiece towards him with his forearms.

Ignoring the alluringly-clothed female behind the Pentaxian, Bradh drew himself to his full height and approached him.

"Congratulations on your win, may I request a moment of your time?"

"Okay," the Pentaxian replied, before glancing to the woman behind him. "Shall we sit over there?"

Bradh nodded, and the trio made their way to a side-booth. As they sat, the Pentaxian slipped the ticking stainless steel bracelet over his wrist and secured the clasp, before beginning to quickly sort the slips of latinum, the tips of his claws snikking over the sides as they dropped into neat stacks, each a dozen high, while silently observing the Ferengi before him.

"Allow me to introduce myself, I am Daimon Bradh, of the Ferengi transport Latinum Wing, and I understand you are H'kT'r, captain of the Federation cargo ship Stellar Envoy?"

The Pentaxian nodded, "I am, what interest is that to you?"

"I wish to propose a business opportunity -- a partnership -- to you," Bradh offered. H'kT'r made no acknowledgement, merely sat silently, so Bradh continued. "You have a good reputation, Captain, and I believe that an alliance between us could be both lucrative and extremely profitable."

"Why should I trust you?"

"As the second Rule of Acquisition states: The best deal is the one that makes the most profit," Bradh said. "I'm a businessman, you are a businessman, we both seek to be profitable. While the sixty second Rule of Acquisition states: The riskier the road, the greater the profit, the fifty seventh Rule of Acquisition also states: Good customers are almost as rare as latinum...treasure them."

H'kT'r turned to his female companion. She was clearly older than H'kT'r, and Bradh took his being able to secure an older female as a sign of his maturity. "What do you think, S'gW'n?"

"I'll get you boys some drinks," she replied quietly, before turning and walking towards the bar. "Behave yourselves."

After watching the towering female walk away for a socially polite period, Bradh returned his attention to H'kT'r. He leaned forward, his voice lowering, admiration clear in his tone. "If I may say, you have a fine woman at your side, she's clearly well trained!"

H'kT'r's lips quirked lop-sidedly as he also leaned forwards conspiratorially. "That's not my woman -- that's my mother..."

Bradh slapped the plastex tabletop in amusement as he rocked back.

"Ha ha!" he laughed. "Oh you Pentaxians and your sense of humor! Even funnier than the Hew-mons! Your mother! Your woman, your mother, I know it's all the same thing to your people! Ha ha!"

H'kT'r shook his head, clearly amused by Bradh, his quirky grin not disappearing.

"My life belongs to another," he said. "Tell me more about your proposal, or to quote the twenty ninth Rule of Acquisition: What's in it for me?"

"Ha ha, to business!" Bradh exclaimed jubilantly. "I do a modest amount of trade in this part of the quadrant, but I’m a small operator, only two ships, so I have to, by destitution, watch costs," Bradh shuddered at the shameful admission. "Thirty percent of my able crewmen are Hew-mons from Moab or Cold butte, because I was picky when I hired them. They work for almost nothing, and I can’t hire Ferengi that cheap -- not even relatives -- and they work hard. They don’t pilfer or slack, they don’t eat the profits, and they stay out of trouble in port... However, there are certain elements who are, uh, prejudiced, about doing business with Ferengi. I also have, ah, contacts, who might not ordinarily seek to trade beyond the Dynasty's border. If we were to work together, we would both expand our client bases. You would bring the credibility that the more, shall we say, Conservative Minds, seek in their dealings, I would bring a network able to provide more, uh, exotic merchandise to yours..."

H'kT'r nodded slowly as he considered the Ferengi's words

"I'm no Slaver," he said firmly. "I don't trade in flesh. My j'laa is applying to attend Starfleet academy, and I won't do anything which would embarrass her or potentially compromise her career through association. If we were work together, anything I touch would have to be legitimate."

Bradh grimaced.

"The sixth Rule of Acquisition states: Never let family stand in the way of opportunity," he admitted, before quickly holding up his hands placatingly. "But I completely understand. Rest assured that all our transactions will be legitimate and trackable. My word to you as one businessman to another. What do you say?"

hawku001x · July 2015

The Intrepid-class U.S.S. Crucial trekked blissfully through space as Captain Menrow was sitting with Commander Lara in his Ready Room.

"Thanks for letting me onboard to study the Rolor Nebula, Captain," Lara continued, as they both sifted through padds. "Ever since last year's Borg frenzy, it's been unavailable on my ship's galactic map."

Menrow nodded. "Since all of us on the Crucial are a time-displaced crew, we've been way behind and are still on the old maps, not to mention all the Level IV gear."

"I'm not sure how that works, but after we crunch this data, would you like to have dinner, tonight?" Lara asked.

The Captain was caught off guard. "Huh? Oh. Lara, I had no idea. Well, yes, sure; I'd like that."

"Great!" Lara responded, satisfied. "I've been meaning to ask you for some time now, and now that I have, I'm fulfilled with an elated sense of accomplishment."

Despite her jutted honesty, the two of them high-fived.

---

Later, on the Bridge, Menrow, while sitting in his Captain's chair, was suddenly confronted by his first officer, Hatcha.

"Sorry, Captain, but Elise and I have to cancel our double date, later. She's got a Ceti eel situation that needs immediate attention," Hatcha reported.

Menrow looked at her quizzically. "Tonight? That was tonight?"

"Yeah, you wanted us to wing-woman your date with Lieutenant Commander Jenny, from Astrometrics, remember?"

Menrow slapped his palm against his chair. "Damn! I double-booked like some kind of horrible Ferengi arms dealer. I'm going to have to cancel on one girl, immediately."

"Sir, comm systems are down for the next two hours due to those old, sectioned-off maps compromising our systems," Grunley alerted.

Menrow looked at him. "Dammit, Grunley. You had one job."

---

Walking briskly through the corridors, Menrow was suddenly interrupted by Ensign Leanna.

"Captain, I wanted to talk to you about the other night? Despite it being amazing, I think we should--"

"--Keep things professional," Menrow finished her sentence. "Yes, I was about to suggest the same thing. Frankly, I'm surprised there aren't any Starfleet rules against fraternizing with crewmembers."

Leanna shrugged. "Well, we did check for all but 2 seconds. Anyway, I also just wanted to let you know the prisoner is ready for release to guest quarters. You said you were going to do that this afternoon?"

"Dammit-again. I was just on my way to straighten my schedule out. Fine, I'll have to make this quick," Menrow cringed. "Being a two-steps-behind crew better not lead to anything. By the way, thank you," he said, placing an affectionate hand on her shoulder.

---

Entering the Brig, Menrow was met with an Orion female prisoner, a remnant of DiaMon Cide's collaborations at Vandor IV.

"Captain, you're not going to keep me prisoner here forever, are you? A woman needs to feel free," Chatelaine pleaded, alluringly. She wore rip-torn fabric all around her green body.

Menrow tapped at a console. "Well, clearly, since you're dressed that way. But, you're right. We've got mostly all the information we need from you about your people's operations with that Ferengi and, besides agreeing to testify, you've been great with us."

"Oh, Captain, you have no idea how many Federation-Italians there are in the Syndicate right now. Please, allow me to repay you for your hospitality," she asked, honestly, as he let down the force field.

Menrow shook his head. "No time. I'm escorting you to guest quarters and then I have to rain-check a date tonight--"

But he was suddenly hit with a waft of the Orion's scent. She immediately put her arms around his neck.

"Anything you say, Captain," she smiled, closely at him. "But I repay all my debts, and your business is about to get a boost."

---

That night, not thinking clearly, Menrow was met with Commander Lara in his quarters. The two took a seat on his bed to talk.

"Another great accomplishment for me, today," Lara bragged. "I'm two for two. Computer, make note of that."

Menrow squinted as the computer acknowledged it. "Now that you mention the day as a whole, I feel like I was supposed to-- Oh, no, Jenny from Astrometrics! --Damn those Orion pheromones?? I've seen beetle-snuff less damaging??"

"Less talk, please. It's not one of your strong points." Lara immediately moved in for the kiss, not hearing a word he just said.

After a few seconds, the door chimed and he pulled away. "I'll get that," he cut-out, quickly and nervously. Menrow got up and left his room.

At his door, as expected, Lieutenant Commander Jenny stood, dressed in a low cut, one armed, diagonally-ridged, futuristic, odd-looking dress. "Captain, I'm a bit early, despite it taking me an hour to get this on." She let herself in. "I wanted to engage with you before the double date."

"Actually, I'm sorry, Jenny, but there's something you need to know about our more-than-destined, ill-fated plans--"

She turned to him and then moved in to his chest. "You feel the connection between us too? Oh, I knew jumping to conclusions regularly would make me happy."

Jenny kissed him, but then the door chimed again.

"Oh no," she panicked. "Hatcha and Elise will have a Krudge if they find me here. You've got to get rid of them." She quickly ran into the washroom to hide.

The doors spread, revealing Ensign Leanna, in uniform.

"Captain, I know we said to keep things professional, but that hand on my shoulder, earlier, was more than I could handle; it's more than any Ensign could handle."

Menrow tilted his head at her, unsure how to take that. "Thank you?"

But instead of continuing, she attacked him with an embrace and deep kiss. Pulling away, Menrow was knocked out of it by an odd sound coming from his room.

"Damn, caracals; it's like they're Vulcans without katras," he gritted. "Just one second, please."

Entering his room, Menrow found Lara, sitting up, eyes closed, getting a shoulder massage from the Orion slave girl, Chatelaine. "I told you I repay my debts, Captain. Instead of choosing just one girl, I enabled a situation in which you get both." Then, truthfully: "Is polygamy a Starfleet thing? I actually forget."

"What? I thought you were Menrow??" Lara turned to the Orion, behind her, in shock. "Clearly, I've had too much green drink."

Menrow sputtered, suddenly aware of the whole situation. "Bloody Cold Station 12 chambers! I've finally entered into the fabled no-exit, no-win, Kobayashi Maru scenario, of which no Captain has ever been able to deny?"

"I thought," Lara hiccupped, "that there were no no-exit, no-win scenarios?"

He shook his head. "Every Captain stumbles into one during his illustrious career, in which such is proved either true or false. It appears that I've reached those crossroads today."

Trying to think of a way out, Menrow tried helping Lara off the bed. "Let's get you transported--" But her off-balance and grip pulled her and him back onto the bed. He fell, clumsily, over both occupants.

At that, the three turned their heads to see Ensign Leanna enter the bedroom; the end evidenced as more nigh than naught.

"--Oh, sir, I had no idea you were into... this?" Leanna said, in surprise. "But, I am a young, impressionable Ensign, so I suppose I should perceive everything seemingly odd as normal in the interests of personal growth."

Menrow's jaw dropped at her. "Leanna??"

As Leanna approached the bed, she awkwardly attempted several pre-joining motions, unsure at how to tackle things. She then elected to start with a hand on his shoulder.

"--Captain," Jenny suddenly entered the room, preoccupied with trying to fix an unaligned ridge in her dress, "I may be an expert in the stars, but I'm no wiz at these flashy clothes---" Then she found all the other women in there with him in some odd position. "Oh, hello? Is this a sex convention?"

Menrow glanced up. "Jenny??"

And then, Hatcha and her partner Elise entered the room. "Turns out the Ceti eel and Elise are happy together, so we're just going to go with it, and--" Then, noticing the bed full and another woman undressing: "Whoa! Is this a Cadet's lights-out fantasy or what??"

"Hatcha, Elise??"

Everyone turned their gaze to Menrow for both an explanation and an end-game reaction. His annihilation was almost complete.

"Oh, this? Heh, heh. Well, you see, the thing is--" he started, nervously, unsure as to how to finish that sentence, but willing to attempt to disbelieve in a no-win scenario. "You see, sometimes a Captain needs to sleep arou--"

But he didn't like where that sentence was going.

"You know, a Captain's libido is one of legen--"

No, that was a bad direction too.

"Space: It's not the only frontier one means to expl--"

And, so, he just decided to stop talking all together.

"Bridge to Captain Menrow." --Then, a call blurted through the comms. "We're picking up a priority alert from Starfleet. It's the Iconians."

There was a moment of differed-shock as Menrow took a second to process it.

"The Iconians?"

And now, relieved, he turned to all six women in his quarters: the exit, now clear.

"The Iconians! Ha!"

No longer having to deal with the situation, Menrow got up, off the bed.

"Sorry, but it's the Iconians! Ha! Hahaha!"

Running out his quarters and into the hallway, he high-fived a passing Cadet. The remaining women stared on, blankly, in his direction as he left.

---

Later, the Intrepid-class U.S.S. Crucial shook violently from intense and over-the-top Herald and Iconian attack. The ship was enveloped in viral software.

"Sir!" Barley yelled out, over the unrelenting noise and sparks. "We're losing systems all over the ship; Weapons, shields, propulsion!"

Menrow relaxed, now having regained that feeling of control and a satisfaction of passing the ultimate test. He breathed with a heavy air of relief and nodded. "And I wouldn't have it any other way, Mr. Barley. Take us right into that swarm. Take us right in."

[Deleted User] · August 2015

Ok, I'm not finished yet but I wanted to get at least the first half of this out.

Prompt #3: Emael Mosekhesailho, Part I (translation: "Unforgivable")

A set of spindly docking arms around a central hub floated silently in the nothing of space, hundreds of kilometers above a verdant, barely inhabited world. Ch’Mol’Rihan, the rebels called it, “homeworld of the newly Declared”.

Rebels. Looking out at the green world from the shipyard, past a D’deridex-class warbird with scaffolding rigged over a rent in the hull atop the great beaked prow, Sahuel t’Khnialmnae supposed she, too, was now a rebel.

How far I have fallen. Can I ever climb back up?

Phi’lasasam, Aeihmn Ih’nhaih, Direx Archipelago, ch’Rihan, 15 April 2379 Earth Standard

Graduation. Two thousand swords glinted in the mid-morning sun, held aloft by two thousand hands on the parade grounds of the Rihan Imperial Fleet Academy. Two thousand voices repeated the ancient oath to country, Deihuit, and Elements, and chanted the anthem of the Shiar ih’Saeihr Rihan in a discordant shout that echoed off the salt cliffs towering above the Phi’lasasam.

Three years on from the end of the Akh nnea Htirrnen Anna’erien (the War of Foes United, what the Lloann’nasu so boringly referred to as the Dominion War) the Galae s’Shiar Rihan was almost back to its pre-war size. Rumor had it that in the wake of the Grand Alliance’s post-war collapse, the Klling'hann Nneikha was busy with political infighting: a whole generation of Klivammsu had fallen in glorious battle, a ridiculous notion, and many houses were facing succession crises. How typically Klivam. But troubles for the honorless thugs, the catspaws of the Lloann’mhrahel, meant opportunities for the Rihannsu, and rumor had it the Deihuit had its collective eyes set on further destabilization and eventual conquest.

And opportunities for the Rihannsu meant opportunities for Sahuel t’Khnialmnae, a mathematics major who stood in the front row with the other neerei’riovir of her graduating class. Which was a good thing for her: as a daughter of the renowned House Khnialmnae, and a direct descendent of the Aidoann t’Khnialmnae who had fought with Rh’Rhiyrh Ael, she had much to live up to.

Finally, the graduation ceremony broke up, which suited Sahuel—her legs were beginning to get sore from standing in place for so long and she and several friends and their families were to have a celebratory picnic out on the seashore. Whomever had put the Phi’lasasam in the equatorial archipelago had been a had been a wise man: the higher elevations were nicely cool and excellent for physical training, and the alternately rocky and sandy coastline made for fine swimming.

She was headed to the dorm to change when a large, bald jowly man in the service uniform of an upper-ranked officer, grey, with finely worked metallic beadwork and the collar tabs of an erei’riov, appeared in her path. “Eredh t’Khnialmnae,” he greeted her in a respectful tone, appropriate to a commoner addressing the daughter of a deihu. “Oh, my apologies, you graduated today, didn't you.”

“I did, rekkhai,” she said in a carefully neutral tone. “May I ask who you are?”

“Unimportant. The important question is who are you?”

“Pardon? You know who I am.”

The large man smiled, a smile that didn’t reach his eyes. “I know your name. I know your title, your parents, I know everything in your file.”

“Then as I said—”

“What I do not know is, are you a Rihanha who would sacrifice her honor in a greater cause, for the security of our people?”

“Do you take pleasure in asking questions you already know the answer to? As a soldier I may be called upon to give my life at any time.”

“I did not ask whether you would give your life; I spoke of your mnhei’sahe.”

Sahuel froze. Who would ask—Of course. “You’re Tal’Shiar, aren’t you?”

He gave her a toothy smile. “Your file said you were sharp; I’m glad to see it didn’t exaggerate.”

“I have no internet in joining the Tal’Shiar, rekkhai. Good day.” She stepped around him and started away.

“Hear me out,” the spy said, following.

“No. You ask soldiers to betray their sisters.”

“On occasion,” he allowed. “We also save lives. In the War we stopped the D’Nneikha from causing mass-casualty events six times that I am aware of. Elements willing, we’ll stop a seventh within the next—My apologies, forget you heard that.”

“Daie, rekkhai,” she quickly agreed, though she couldn’t help being amused at the spy letting her hear it. Cute trick. “The answer is still ‘no’, however.”

“I wouldn’t expect you to make up your mind here and now, Erein t’Khnialmnae; I was given the same choice.” He suddenly sped up and stepped in front of her and she stopped short. The spy drew a small card from his jacket pocket and handed it to her. “My office comm code, for when you make up your mind.”

She looked down at the card. Naturally it was a Ki Baratan number. The name, Hakeev tr’Droall.

She looked back up, intending to tell Hakeev what he could do with the card, but he was gone.

* * *

Sahuel didn’t give the man from the Tal’Shiar much thought for the next several weeks. She’d thrown away his business card and was way too busy settling into her new gig in cryptography at Grand Fleet Headquarters.

But then on Stardate 56844.9, her mother was reported dead, along with the rest of the Deihuit. The official story from Raenasa blamed it on a terrorist attack, likely a Unificationist cell, and in public statements the new fvillha, Shinzon, said the attack “will not impede my peace talks with the Temmana nnea Rehvieen.”

Sahuel didn’t buy it. Certainly the Unificationists were capable of anything, but the logistics of such a massive assassination plot seemed implausible for them: where could they acquire such a precise radiation bomb as must have been used? Then there was the curious phrasing by this Shinzon. Even the Deihuit always called the Federation the “Lloann’mhrahel”, even in official documents, not by the direct translation of its name. Finally, who was Shinzon? No house-clan in his name, no records of his life apart from a military personnel dossier, and even that raised more questions than it answered. A commander of Havran shock troopers with twelve battlefield victories and no losses, certainly a fine record but hardly politically palatable. And she’d had to ice a fairly strong firewall to learn even that much.

Also curious, by breaking the same firewall she learned that Tal’Aura t’Kaveth, the deihu from Mirhassa’s seventh administrative district, had conveniently left the Hall of State to meet with the Tholin ambassador moments before the radiation bomb detonated. Granted, approximately a hundred other deihur had also been absent—the representative of House Thavrau had been offworld attending the birth of her third grandson, for example—but the timing of t’Kaveth’s meeting was almost too obvious. Clearly she was involved.

But who to report her findings to?

* * *

Sahuel awoke lying on her back in a dark room. She couldn’t see a thing, but she could feel that she was strapped down, and that she was naked.

A bright light suddenly shone on her eyes and she snapped them shut against the glare. Before anyone else could say anything, she shouted, “Sahuel i‘Tlhira ei’Sarrakesh t’Khnialmnae, erein, Raenasa s’Galae s’Shiar Rihan!”

“We know your name, spy,” a disembodied voice, male and gravelly, and familiar, answered in Federation Standard. “Who are you really working for? The Klingons? The Federation? The Dominion, perhaps!”

“I am not a spy!” Sahuel yelled back, hoping she sounded indignant instead of terrified.

Somebody stuck a hypospray in her neck and it pinched painfully, then a damp cloth was suddenly slapped over her face. She struggled but a hand gripped her forehead, holding her in an ungentle iron grip. Ice-cold water poured on her face and she screamed. She screamed for so long, struggling, trying to dislodge the cloth or the hand, trying to keep the water out as her lungs burned.

The cloth came away and she coughed, hard, spraying water. “I’ll ask again: who are you working for?”

“The Galae!” she managed between coughs. “I’m a cryptologist at Raenasa!”

“Liar!”

“No, don’t—AAAUUGH!” Now her whole body was on fire. She screamed like a little girl, screaming for them to stop, then screaming for her mother, then finally just screaming.

Finally the pain stopped. “You broke into classified files. Who are you spying for?!”

“I’m not a spy!” she wailed, and coughed up more water. The hand on her face suddenly let go and let her head fall sideways, leaving her gasping and sobbing.

The light abruptly went out, sending her back into pitch darkness. “We will try this again in a few minutes, spy.”

“I’m not a spy,” she whimpered. “I’m not a spy.”

The light soon came back on, dimly this time, backlighting a bald head and prominent Rihan ears. “I’m inclined to believe that. My… associate does not, but I do.” His arm lifted and there was a click as the restraints around her wrists and legs retracted. She pushed herself up and curled up in a fetal position, covering herself with her legs. “Oh, my apologies. Here,” and a rough, heavy fabric object landed on her. Seemed like a bathrobe. She draped it over herself. “Given your career track you did not receive much counter-interrogation training at the Phi’lasasam,” the voice continued. “And your records are solid going back to before you were born, so either you have the best backstopping from Starfleet Intelligence ever—”

“I’m not a spy!”

“—Or you’re genuine,” he continued, ignoring her protestations. “Which leaves the question of why, then, you felt it necessary to view files for which you had no need-to-know.” Sahuel shivered and muttered something. “I’m sorry, I didn’t catch that.”

“He killed my mother. This new fvillha, Shinzon, he killed my mother.”

“Aha. Hee hee hahahaha!” he cackled unpleasantly. “So straightforward. I believe I need to have an analyst executed for incompetence. No, not you,” he clarified to her. The man shifted in his chair. “In answer to your question, yes, he was involved in the Deihuit assassination. He leads a faction of Havrannssu, thrice-damned goblins trying to rise above their station—they’ve been lobbying the Deihuit for citizenship in secret for months now. He had help: we suspect two riovir of the Galae.”

Sahuel coughed again. “I think Deihu Tal’Aura was involved.”

The man leaned forward slightly. “Tal’Aura? Of Kaveth Ship-Clan? Why?”

“The timing of her leaving the Hall of State—”

The man’s ears twitched. “We suspect she pulled the actual trigger. You guessed well.”

“That was an easy one, Erei’Riov tr’Droall.”

Hakeev chuckled humorlessly. “I’d wondered if you would recognize my voice. How long did you know?”

“From the beginning, rekkhai.”

Hakeev made a pleased-sounding grunt. “Not bad, t’Khnialmnae. Despite my associate’s best efforts you kept enough presence of mind to study your surroundings.” The lights flicked all the way up suddenly, but the whole room was lit now, not just the gurney she was perched on. “My previous offer still stands, if you want it.”

“One condition. I want Tal’Aura.”

Hakeev shook his head. “That, I cannot allow.”

“Then no deal.”

“You misunderstand me, t’Khnialmnae. This isn’t just some Havran rebels and a few traitors—this required a massive conspiracy, and that means we have to deal with all of them, and deal with them quietly so the Shiar isn’t further destabilized.”

“Rekkhai, I have to make her pay,” she growled, her fear now replaced by anger.

“And if you accept my offer, I can be reasonably sure that you will have that chance. Though, I suspect the Lloann’nasu may deal with Shinzon, at least, for us: Raenasa s’Lloannen’galae sent the Enterprise to negotiate with him.”

“Picard’s an idealist. Why would—”

He glared daggers at her. “Don’t push your luck, t’Khnialmnae; you don’t need to know. In any case, once Shinzon and his co-conspirators are dealt with, I think a decent pogrom on ch’Havran might be in order. You might enjoy that. Though, given your qualifications I think you might do better with t’Rukhahr over in Counterintelligence. Don’t worry, though, you’ll have your chance to deal with Tal’Aura either way.”

antonine3258 · August 2015

ULC 13.2

“The Odd Couple”

Set in the Iconian War, probably before “Broken Circle” but after “Time in a Bottle”. Personal timeline wise anyway. Time travel’s bad enough before the history eraser button comes into play.

Lieutenant Commander Tervan of the U.S.S. Aquila was doing his level best to focus on what was important, during the current issues with the Iconians. The tea helped, of course.

“Maintain current speed at half-impulse,” he ordered, “Maintain probe launch rate towards mines on revised trajectory based on data.” The Rigelian sipped his tea and studied the tactical plot. The small Nova class had excellent science labs, but at its size, they could only do a few things. The passive capacities of its secondary and primary deflector combination were excellent, and a small occlusion in the probability cone for possible Iconian mines was a worthy risk for keeping an eye on the far more interesting background radiation anomaly in the Draco dwarf galaxy.

After all, the Iconians were winning. Why would they even bother spreading terror weapons? This was one of dozens of potential warp-out points to reorient and get a navigation and timebuoy fix. Once, there had been a refueling station in the area, and its wreckage was still scattering out from the destruction of its fusion reactor by the Iconians two weeks ago. Fortunately, the debris was beyond the usual traffic zone at this point, but they’d laid some warning markers, tedious and simple work.

He wouldn’t complain exactly. The Federation depended on Starfleet for rescue and traffic control just as much as dramatic space battles, and it was a logical use of a small, fragile ship in these times. Oh, his ship was in all qualification ranges for tactical, but the tip of a spear was a brutal place to be, and no place for one Walking, either, in his opinion. “Violence was the refuge of the incompetent”, he’d heard once.

Starfleet agreed with him, and they’d slowly and quietly been making their way through the war zones. This was Federation space once – primarily Bolian mines and trade depots, and it would be once again, and a ship that would be illogical in combat could prepare for the Federation victory.

“Captain,” Ensign Torek, Vulcan, promising future command material, and currently his tactical officer, “We are receiving a distress call at bearing three-six mark two-seventeen. Civilian passenger freighters under attack by a Herald strike group.” He was hunched over the board, apparently eager to have something to do and was back-ranging the trace.

“Rebroadcast on secure channels to Alliance Command,” Tervan said sharply. “Estimated time to point of origin given current subspace conditions?”

Riiku, the smooth skinned Saurian at the helm answered with commendable promptness. “Sixteen hours at maximum non-emergency speed. Six at maximum survivable stress” Alertness to surrounding conditions in standard conditions showed potential for being promoted out of a piloting slot, and Tervan made a mental note to put a favorable comment in her personnel file.

“Continue rebroadcast – there are ships that will be able to reach survivors before us,” Tervan said.

Riiku hesitated, then spoke, “Captain, the Iconians may ignore escape pods. Six hours would greatly increase the ease of rescue operations.”

“Or,” Tervan said sharply, “the Iconians may still be engaged in clean-up operations. We will arrive with strained deflectors and minimal power reserves, and be unable to even run.” The Saurian stiffened and stared forward. Tervan felt a trace of amusement. Were they hoping for meaningless heroics? Had they checked his record.

He’d spent ten years reaching this command, passing all his evaluations – even the test of command had proven navigable to an organized mind, with the experience of hundreds of Starfleet captains to be applied. And though the Nova-class was a little snug, such matters were easily placed below surface concerns by the Vulcans and Rigelians who made up her crew, free to fill their aspirations to serve the Federation without too much interaction with the noisy and disorganized member races.

And, the short missions, delivering rescue supplies, coordinating disaster relief, and the (now, sadly) less-common planetary survey gave him time for his side-project into mapping the small gravimetric eddies and anomalies common in any well-travelled region. Any ability to improve navigation and ship speed helped bring the Federation closer together, and was also, logically, one of Starfleet’s important activities, in peace or war.

It’d been his thesis as well. While the close-range sensors looked for metal or magnetic suspensions, the subspace array was free for a bit of larger research.

And occupied thusly, they could pay less attention to distress calls they could hear but would never be able to reach. The ship was too slow, and the Iconians were able to strike too quickly. They simply relayed them on to other authorities and continued their work, as dependable as they could.

And besides, they were only in a small survey ship, not one of the modernized battleships the shipyards had been producing rapidly. Even the Iconians were unlikely to deal with something so minor, and if they did, they were almost certainly dead, so it was a matter unnecessary of consideration.

So, the work continued. Minutes of nothing aggressive, highlighted by tiny variations in the galactic medium millions of light years away.

“Captain,” said his tactical officer, Ensign Torek eventually, “We have a priority-coded request for navigation information and a rebroadcast request from an Alliance ship.”

“Send it,” Tervan responded, and gave it no more mind. Some mission was coming to a conclusion no doubt.

Thirty seconds later, space screamed as gateways erupted all around the Aquila. Unheard on the red alert, Tervan’s tea cup shattered on deck.

************
Approximately five minutes earlier time-wise, and fifteen light-years or so as the Warbird flew, things were perhaps more exciting. A dozen small freighters carrying refugees had been routed together by some idiot Admrial An’riel she’Virinat was hoping she’d be allowed, politically, to have shot. At least that many ships together had managed a distress call out, but they should have never been gathered enough to become a target.

The Iconians, true to form, had slammed into the concentration of fleeing civilians, but they couldn’t resist playing with their food. The Simurgh had been close enough, with some considerable effort on the part of Veril, her chief engineer, to make it with four of the ships still relatively intact. Propelled on a wave of profanity from two Reman dialects, and radiation cascading from nacelles, the Caprimul had dropped a minute outside combat range from a small squad of a Quas and a handful of Baltim popping in and out of reality.

The Quas was taking pot-shots at the freighters’ engines, antiprotons smearing gamma radiation, contaminating the next generation even if the survivors were rescued. An’riel felt a twinge in her gut at that, these were Bolians, not her people, but even the Tal Shiar she would not condemn to end their bloodlines.

An’riel would normally consider the odds fairly decent, but the freighters weighed against her. “Any luck at all establishing a tactical link?” she asked, studying the holographic main display. Ship positions on it stuttered and telegraphed positions, any data from the freighters was being relayed on a vocal link, and their rapid transit and Iconian interference was polluting their own sensors. The friendly freighters themselves showed a hash of status codes indicating systematic and cascading failures. There had been almost a dozen, but five were left.

The Trill shook his head, “The Iconians aren’t having any trouble keeping those tubs completely locked down. About the only things their engineers can manage is containment, and I’ve got some reports they’re being boarded. I’m not getting any bandwidth anywhere and Starfleet’s grabbed so many technicians lately they haven’t even been able to tune their dampers.” The Trill tapped controls, shifting channels, and listened on a directional pickup.

Tovan, at tactical, cursed briefly. “Sorry,” he said as heads turned, and more formally, “Cruiser just locked weapons on us and the Baltims just changed their attack patterns. Energy gateway opening. Subspace gateways opening. They’ve learned enough to go to attack posture quickly, at least.” Portals opened up on the near side of the freighters as the raiders angled, taunting. The portals would break up any attack run, and despite all the Alliance’s efforts, there was no indication where an opened subspace gateway would deposit its travelers, yet.

Jalel reported as Tovan finished, updating status indicators on the displays, “I’ve verified on all the freighters, they’re reporting Herald forces falling back on all ships, and retreating to gateways.” He frowned, “Even without allowing for exaggeration, the enemy count is low.” Jallel winced briefly. “Veril is reporting singularity circuitry still recovering from warp, at least a minute until we can begin charging.”

“All right,” An’riel said, “Perhaps Imperial Intellligence was right and the Heralds are reaching the limits of their Reserves.” She smiled, briefly at that. “But the Republic would still like to verify, sensor priority after targeting is for emission profiles and energy signatures.” Her tactical and science team signaled affirmation. One of the worst problems for fleet morale was that simply they had very little idea how well they were doing against the Heralds, when ships could disappear and then reappear in attacks hundreds of light years away. Factor in the easy manufacture of ships like the Beltims and tracking fleet strength was nearly impossible.

“But there are a half-dozen ships calling for vengeance, so these Heralds must end here. Battle alert.” The chimes sounded, formally, the ship was already ready for combat but there was a comfort to such theatrical gestures.

It also gave her time to wonder on her luck. If they’d arrived late, vengeance was relatively easy in a battleship against the opposition. But they’d arrived early, and so the responsibility to the survivors gave the Heralds a better chance of surviving. The Republic could not ignore innocent victims, even when they probably would be unable to save them.

And there were no reserves in the sector to use either to attack or draw off the Heralds. A few hundred survivors were worth risking their ship, but she could not expose Federation fixed assets that had remained unassaulted to attack. Veril was working miracles on decontamination, but they didn’t have warp or singularity tricks at the moment to cut the distance where their cannons were most effective.

“Jalel – coordinate evacuation with our transporter rooms. Also - what bounced the signal to us? Are any ships available?” An’riel asked. She added, “Engage tactical mode, prepare for close-range combat – ready cannons for rapid-fire. Satra, best estimates for transporter range and time.”

The ship rattled as it focused purely on combat – they really needed some proper downtime; this was not a long-range exploration vessel with plenty of endurance. But it held, for now. The tactical display updated – half the Raiders popping into subspace and returning to reality near them, the others jumping backwards farther out of their weapon range, but still in range on the freighters.

Satra, tapped her console – months against the Elachi meant she knew how to breakdown a transporter evacuation like the back of her hand. “Nine lifts at minimum, with all the radiation, forty-five seconds to minimum transporter range. Five seconds to weapon range.”

“Ready EPS induction tap against Baltim – closest target. Helm, bring us up six degrees and be ready for it to break,” An’riel said. “Let us hope if we look ready for a dogfight we can break into close range – Jalel, how long do they need to prepare?

“They’re not ready to evacuate. They want us to clear a warp exit corridor now that the Heralds have stopped boarding,” the Trill said glumly.

There was silence at that, briefly, broken by the sound of the polaron cannons opening at maximum fire – one of the Baltims glowed, shuddered, and collapsed. “Are their sensors work- no, cancel that,” An’riel said angrily. “Send them our specifications, we certainly have the space and capacity! And strongly recommend, based on our tactical assessment, that they evacuate! And use Federation Standard!” she said, as an afterthought.

Jalel listed on a local pickup for a while, and then replied, “Admiral, they prefer to take their chances over boarding an Alliance military vessel.”

That was greeted by silence, followed by a set of warning chimes as the Raiders opened fire. The Iconians had an advantage, but “Target priority by proximity! Tachyon beam, EPS induction. All cannons, rapid-fire,” An’riel snapped. “Transfer the strategic assessment to my console. Tovan, you have the board – try and drift the dogfight towards the freighters. Transporters have maximum priority for computer and power demands.”

An’riel had only glanced at the current status of Alliance forces briefly to confirm they were the closest available ship before responding. They’d been a sector over, slinking their way to a hidden dock for some downtime. The Simurgh’s Solanae-derived tricks and Federation-provided quantum slipstream emitters had given them the best response speed, though, and that had been the important thing a few minutes ago.

Unfortunately, things were stretched pretty thinly in both sectors. A few ships engaged in covert or local defense operations – a response fleet in full retreat from a major colony; they were in no shape to help. A few science outposts that hadn’t been gobbled up yet. Actually, come to think of it, what had been in shape to relay that signal? “Computer,” she said quietly, “Display communications routing table for received distress signal four-seven slash four, please.”

She’d been enjoying the distributed control setup of Simurgh’s bridge; a dozen wells of controls surrounded by holograms in a sea of grey metal. It came in advantage again, she opened a private channel to Jalel. “Lieutenant Commander, has Starfleet reported any planned offensives in this sector in our data update?”

Jalel, elite officer that he was, took a moment to verify before stating the obvious, “I wish, Admiral. We’re down to deep raids at best and supply runs of medical aid along this entire cluster.”

“A Nova planetary survey vessel relayed the distress call. They must be an injured heavy ship using a fake transponder to be this deep. Send a request for a wide-broadcast of targeted navigation data for warp-in. Whatever battleship is there, should reply if it is not on a priority mission,” An’riel decided, “We will catch them in between our talons, and we should be able to expedite their warp drive repairs afterward.”

Jalel nodded, and An’riel refocused on the battle. Two more raiders had been shattered, but there were always more – the Iconians seemed to roll them out like fighters from a carrier bay. One more freighter had been picked off, antimatter containment either collapsing from damage or its engineering team losing out to the Iconian’s virii. Perhaps four, maybe as many as eight hundred more gone in a flash of light, and she could, Elements help her, give them no more acknowledgement then that if she was to save any of them.

She snapped orders, small adjustments to their attack approach and utilizing Simurgh’s marvelous and overtaxed systems that much more finely as they slowly clawed their way towards transporter range. Every meter was paid in Heralds, but cost them time, energy, programming reserves… which equaled that much fewer Bolians. This was the calculus of lives that had kept her going through the early days before the Republic had been recognized by the great powers, where saving anything as worlds died was considered a victory for those who wanted to live free under the Raptor’s Wings.

It had, apparently, merely been practice. But it had been useful and effective, at least today. She felt the change before it showed on scanners, the tempo of battle suddenly slacking, the Raiders breaking off attack runs early.

Satra reported it first, “Long-range gateways opening – the cruiser is retreating, Admiral!” A moment later, the galaxy-pattern of the Iconians Sphere-protected gateways made itself visible to the eyes. The Raiders gutting the freighters ceased and pulled back towards the gateway as well, seeking larger game. A brief cheer went up.

“Emergency evasive power, current course for five seconds, then turn one-eight-zero. Revert from tactical mode, ready torpedoes and cannons for scatter volley. Start gravity well induction,” An’riel said calmly. Simurgh lurched, briefly free of Newtonian physics as it dashed free of melee and spun, deploying projectors and advanced sensors to capture and twist a knot of gravitons among themselves until reality shrieked. The Raiders turned, but were unable to escape gravity’s embrace, shear wracking at their hull integrity.

To add to the humiliation of the natural laws of the universe, high-speed torpedoes and heavy polarized energy bolts smashed into the cluster of Herald ships, ripping open more micro-singularities. The combined tidal effect overwhelmed containment on one, then a second Baltim, their warp core detonations spilling over the other weakened ships, and finishing them in a titanic wave of fire.

Three freighters remained, leaking plasma and spot fires erupting and then ceasing as free oxygen was consumed, and Simurgh, white hull covered with scars from spot burn-throughs on the shields, lights flickering in several sections as polymorphic virii were wiped out, but still intact with some fight left.

“Drop shields, tell Veril to expedite radiation cleanup to prepare for brief period of high warp speed. Work with medical – full power to hazard emitters to expedite isolation and containment of EPS point overloads. Get Hiven to assemble a team to convert environmental sections over to Bolian standards,” An’riel said, radiating calmness. “We can prepare a full damage report later.” Circuits were overloaded through the outer wings, shields were busy cycling, power levels were fluctuating, and the warp coils were still cooling off, but Simurgh had chosen its name well, coming through the fire again. In the grand scale of battles, this was barely a skirmish. It would be if they could get to a repair bay.

She had other points of Duty than just her ship though. “Tovan,” An’riel said calmly, “Lock weapons on the freighters, and ready security teams for boarding, if needed. Jalel, get me visual communication please to the remaining ships.” Given that the Admiral had apparently scared off a Herald squadron with force of presence, even Jalel did not protest this violation of Starfleet protocols.

Fortunately, they weren’t Starfleet. The captains of the refugee ships apparently remembered this as well as they opened their protest and immediately stopped, seeing the ridged brows and pointed ears of the majority of the Simurgh’s crew, either Rihannsnu or Reman. The bridge was dark, alien in origin, and the dark skinned captain at its center sat leaning forward, head resting on folded fingers, waiting in anticipation.

Silence was as good an opening as riposte, one of her debate teachers had said. “Captains. You are to have your crews abandon your ships and come aboard. Your preferences and feelings of the Alliance fleet’s combat effectiveness are immaterial. Failure to comply will result in my being forced to bring your shields down and force compliance. You have thirty seconds to begin evacuation procedures.”

The one on the right spoke up, “The Federation will never allow an act of piracy to-“

An’riel cut him off, “Captain, I am sure the Republic will arrive at an appropriate figure of compensation. You are welcome to submit your complaints to your representative on the Federation Council and have a Board of Inquiry opened into my actions, should you attempt to continue. However, without even a detailed sensor scan I can see how poorly your warp engines are responding – do you believe in your current state you have the engineering capacity to change your warp signature before the Heralds track you down again? Ten seconds”

Silence met that. A moment later, with a brief look towards each other, the shields on the freighters dropped. An’riel dropped the link. “Begin evacuation, order security crews in transporter rooms to assist and initiate triage. Satra, you are released to sickbay. Prepare a casualty list as soon as possible. Jalel – pass navigation broadcast from the Aquila to navigation to prepare to assist. Tovan, log the location of the freighters – we will leave them unscuttled, perhaps the Heralds will ignore them and their captains’ will be at ease.” She checked her board, “Rest easy children, we have a brief rest but we must leave within five minutes to balance our luck.”

Cont. next post

antonine3258 · August 2015

ULC 13.2 Odd couple continuation:

******************

Even total shock didn’t last long to a Rigelian. “Red alert. Emergency Evasive pattern alpha-three,” Tervan ordered as the bridge’s lighting shifted to alert status. “Transfer power allocation to defensive plan two. Prepare sensor dispersion probes. Return fire, priority to targeting incoming probes. Torek, generate a threat assessment.” Shields snapped on automatically as the first beams struck them, the lurch of impact overwhelming even the rumble of the impulse engines reaching full speed. Shields strained, but held, barely, from the first wave. Phasers lashed back, barely warming the first of three enemy cruisers.

He tapped on his command console – updating the log to confirm procedure had been followed by his officers, he would not have them disparaged in death. All was approaching battle readiness on the Aquila, for all it would do them. Simply in the raw physics of energy, they were absolutely outmatched. He checked his orders were followed, and frantically looked if there was some gap left uncovered they could spin their warp drive up in.

“Redistributing shields – overall at forty-three percent, shields three and five have temporarily collapsed. Radiation damage reported through section seven on deck five!” Torek said with the expressionless urgency that passed for panic among Vulcans. “Three Quas-class cruisers, at least eight Baltim raiders, so far. Assigning identifiers to enemy ships on tactical plot.”

“Adjust our vector fifteen degrees to starboard,” Tervan said, “Prepare probes for sensor scramble package on cruiser target Beta.” They didn’t have guns, they didn’t have shields, and they didn’t have the warp capacity to sprint away, but by all that was just, his team could rig a fake sensor signature set. And it would be easier if they could drift the middle and starboard cruiser together a bit closer.

Some luck was still with them, and their probe, equipped as perfectly as his crew could manage for local conditions, shot at high speed, burning its impulse engine out in seconds to avoid counter-fire, and then exploding in a wave of mass and subspace-shadows, throwing dozens of Aquilas onto Herald targeting scopes and throwing wave-guides out of alignments. Weapons fired wildly across space, a few impacting other Herald ships, but mainly, not hitting the real Aquila.

“Navigation calculations, find minimum point where we can prepare for warp-out. Any direction will suffice – Starfleet tactical briefings indicated the Heralds rarely pursue via warp,” Tervan said, sweating slightly.

Riiku reported, “Navigation report still running, Captain – I have a complete view of local space out sixteen light seconds. Submitting three best vectors and originating points for minimum interference with light boundary to primary tactical.”

“We’re still transmitting that status report?” Tervan said, concerned. He’d not considered it was on-going, just one of the many requests of the larger Starfleet.

“Yes sir, on high-band encrypted,” Riiku said without worry. The Saurian was doing her job, and knew her captain had a better grasp on the strategic situation. He was the one on board who had a chance of getting them out of this.

“Sensors – overlay the vector for the navigation request on tactical,” Tervan ordered. “Change encryption to second alpha set, and await response.” The second round of fire came in, attenuated by the distraction they had caused, but still blowing down the port shield. This was not in the tactical manuals.

“Correct response received,” Riiku stated, holding, barely, onto her station through the fire. “They are requesting a hazardrous terrain update for our current location.” She tapped her console in irritation once the dampers stabilized, “Timestamp’s odd – they must be at high warp.”

“What?” Tervan said, as his mind switched gears. “Label the Herald ships as radiation sources and transmit – bring us onto their approach vector.” Tactical showed that the Heralds had thinned their own numbers and were still confused, but some of their light units were on the approach. “Torek – maximum array fire, clear away the probes nearest to us.”

The Vulcan bent to his task – flooding power to the phaser arrays, emitters firing sequentially as targets briefly locked. The Vulcan methodically switched through the targets. Tervan opened his mouth to yell as one of the two cruisers firing blindly appeared on the viewscreen, but was too late before the phasers lanced out.

Now knowing exactly where the Aquila was, the Heralds targeted it with renewed fury, and what shields they rebuilt collapsed under the strain.

“Ensign Torek!” Tervan said fiercely, “Stand down from tactical and let your relief take over.” Torek’s face was smooth as he stood to comply, though other bridge officers shifted uneasily.

Before Torek could move away to be replaced by another Ensign, the ship gave an especially fierce lurch, and he fell against the console, arm breaking with an audible snap. Ensign Salmer bent to help him, tactical console beeping for attention but ignored for the moment.

“Captain, helm is not responding – we’re in some sort of generated ion field and the impulse coil is overloading!” Riiku said excitedly. “Our speed is at three percent of full impulse. Orders?”

“Sensor officer, can you tell which ship generated it?” Tervan said, mind clicking through possibilities. He’d heard some specialty ships had been outfitted to disrupt impulse drives for intelligence operations, but it hadn’t worked its way down to line briefings yet. He grabbed the arms of his chair as another beam hit somewhere on the ship, hearing a deep thud being conducted through the ship’s hull.

“Negative, Captain, but the field appears to not be perpetuated – field strength is decaying – given time, engineering may be able to tune our engines to compensate,” the sensor officer reported. Judging by the current shower of sparks, engineering had its own problems. “Herald attacks slowing, sir.”

“Prepare for boarding combat,” Tervan said, automatically. “Riiku, did the Alliance ship give any sort of ETA?”

“I’m not sure, Captain, it was all via navigation protocols,” the Saurian answered miserably. “But it may not do any good - their reference frame to Newtonian space has drifted – the timestamps on the messages were a minute in the future.”

“All remaining power to shields and ready to link tactical computers on Alliance protocols,” Tervan said, trying to regain his mask of command.

Torek had finally gotten out of the way, and Salmer was able to sit down and bring their rudimentary tactical systems back under control. “Captain, tactical got a data packet update on side-bad with recommended shield and communication frequency settings.”

“Implement,” Tervan said, and turned to look at his sensor officer, who bent over to check the ignored long-range sensors. “Captain – gravimetric array is picking up a subspace energy spike. Something is breaking the FTL barrier, and it’s absolutely massive.”

“On screen,” Tervan said – and the screen switched from tactical to show a flash of light as a starship returned to reality. “Not the Enterprise, then,” he said aloud, faintly disappointed.

It was a Republic warbird, oversized compared to Federation tech for its power, and the usual overdone avian styling, their singularity cores forcing plenty of open space into the hull design. This one wasn’t blood-colored, at least. The cream-colored plating was burned and discolored in places, apparently having seen recent action, but it seemed intact from quick inspection. After another second’s inventory, he placed it as one of the knock-offs of the Federation’s Dyson program, the fleet support ships that had gotten rammed through as ‘science destroyers’.

Tervan admired a very neat warp insertion – whoever piloting knew their ship, but wondered what they were thinking at arriving at such close range when power was still flowing from the warp drive to shields and engines. Then, things then got very busy for several seconds, and Tervan was only able to reconstruct the sequence in memory later.

Given the positioning data fed earlier, the warbird had been able to drop into weapon’s range, catching the Heralds by surprise, and space shimmered as several Republic battleships were summoned into being as photonic allies, providing cover as their weapons lanced into the Heralds. The Aquila’s tactical board fairly whined as the warbird swept space with a high-energy sensor sweep, followed by a blast of tachyon and proton energy lanced from the main deflector at the center Herald cruiser. The Quas’s shields shuddered and inverted, shields spilling energy out that the Aquila’s grid, having been forewarned, was prepared to receive, restoring their shielding.

Even as that pulse rang out from the Quas, a singularity appeared behind it, tearing at the Herald ships that had been gathering to board. Space itself began to spark – some new technique Tervan wasn’t familiar with, though it didn’t seem healthy for anything material in range. The warbird’s signature spiked as it dumped power to weapons – and opened up with a polaron barrage and salvos of proximity torpedoes.

The shielding matrix of the Herald ships had been hit from an unexpected angle, and the matrix itself had been heavily disrupted by Romulan tricks – they offered little resistance as swarms of torpedoes exploded, and containment of the smaller ships was overwhelmed, adding to the chaos. In a blaze of radiation and confusion, hundreds of Iconian battle thralls died in seconds.

The young bridge officers on the Aquila could only stare as the situation went from death to victory in a scant few seconds. Tervan felt a spike of jealousy he worked to suppress at the speed of the warbird’s systems and its crews’ reaction speed as a dozen systems coalesced into an angel of death in mere moments.

“Incoming hail,” Riiku reported. Tervan nodded, and a creature with unusual coloration for a Romulan – dark-tan and auburn-haired, though the brow ridges indicated no unusual cross-pollination appeared in her family tree.

“Admiral seh’Virinat,” she identified herself, “Of the R.R.W. Simurgh. Many thanks on behalf of our crew for your response, Captain. You saved hundreds of lives with your response, and I will note your bravery in my report to your government.” She hesitated briefly, studying a readout, “What is your ship’s status? My engineers need some time for emergency repairs, but I expect they will have the quantum slipstream system available shortly and we can return to Alliance-held space.”

She looked up somewhat grimly, “We did very well thanks to your help, but we are carrying refugees and can expect a Herald response shortly, and I do not believe they will be so obliging. Our little opening salvo works very well, but requires optimum conditions.”

“Bravery?” Tervan managed, surprised. Yes, they were going to die well.

“Your volunteering your location for a navigation update lured the Heralds to try and attack an Alliance squadron, and then gathered them closely enough the Simurgh was able to launch a concentrated strike.” The Romulan admiral briefly patted an armrest. “Unfortunately, this ship is unable to sustain that level of damage output, or the Heralds would be less of a problem. We should, perhaps, continue this conversation elsewhere. Is your ship warp-capable?”

Bait. He inwardly seethed, but went into the captain’s business of arranging a nearby rendezvous and return to spacedock. “Yes, the Heralds were arranging for capture, it seems – my mission in the area must be necessarily cut short,” he said curtly.

The Romulan winced, briefly – perhaps a trifle theatrically. “I apologize, but you will have the thanks of New Romulus Command and the Bolian government.” Tervan gave a dubious look.

***********

Several days later, he finished giving his report to the strategic analyst who’d cut his orders originally. Given several hours to patch their worst hurts, the Simurgh had been able to let them ride in their slipstream (the Admiral, apparently, knew many of the right people as much advanced tech had been stuffed on her ship) thanks to the vast size disparity between a Nova and well, anything built by the Romulans.

“I apologize I was unable to finish my survey for mine debris, though it is clear the Heralds still had gateways on standby in the area,” Tervan said, standing at attention, “Though I do need to protest having my mission co-opted, even by an allied government.”

The analyst nodded, “Yes, and the Aquila requires at least a week to be considered mission-capable again, the shipyard tells me. You should probably forgive the Admiral, she’s one of the Republic’s officers without portfolio, and has access to the Alliance’s latest technology, it’s easy to forget how the rest live.”

Tervan sniffed at this, “Regardless, she was playing very fast and loose with our group’s lives, and the refugees, is my understanding. Saving any of them was a near impossibility, without disrupting other operations. The manual exists for a reason.”

The analyst smiled, “Yes – the combined experience of thousands of captains, but there are situations that are not covered very well. Are you familiar with Article 14 of the Charter?” The human waved a hand when the captain opposite him shook his head hesitantly. “I may have to tell you more on that later.”

Franklin Drake turned on a screen showing a section of space near the old Argama sector. “I’m sure you’re not familiar with our work in the Kyana system, but have you ever read Professor Manheim’s research?”

The Rigelian nodded in response. “Naturally, the man was a visionary, and time-space interactions are at the heart of deep-subspace observation.”

“Excellent,” Drake said with a slight smile, “While your ship isn’t prepared for this mission, I’d like to put your name forward for a special assignment. There is a Federation lab that does limited chroniton research. We did not want to move them to cause any interruptions, as their work may be vital against the Iconians, but the base missed its last check-in. Being in old Romulan space, I’m afraid you already met your escort, but your report on her behavior will be viewed very carefully.”

Tervan grinned, ferally at that.

***********

A/N : May follow-up on this later for the two having to work together far more closely, or if Drake’s just providing ‘motivation’, heh.

marcusdkane · September 2015

Author's Note: The following story deals with adult themes and emotions...

Prompt #3: Pt I

M Y . B R O T H E R ' S . K E E P E R

You got me looking
At that heaven in your eyes
I was chasing your direction
I was telling you no lies
And I was lovin' you
When the words are said
Baby, I lose my head

And in a
World of people
There's only you and I
There ain't nothing come between us in the end
(Haa-oow can I hold you when you ain't even mine?)
Only you can see me through
I leave it up to you

Do it light
Taking me through the night
Shadow dancing
Baby, you do it right
Give me more
Drag me across the floor
Shadow dancing
All this and nothing more

[Instrumental Interlude]

All that I need
Is just one moment in your arms
I was chasing your affection
I was doing you no harm
And I was lovin' you
Make it shine, make it rain
Baby, I know my way

I need that
Sweet sensation
Of livin' in your love
I can't breath when you're away
It pulls me down
(O-hh, you are the question and the answer am I)
Only you can see me through
I leave it up to you

Do it light
Taking me through the night
Shadow dancing
Baby, you do it right
Give me more
Drag me across the floor
Shadow dancing
All this and nothing more

And in this
World of people
There's only you and I
There ain't nothing come between us in the end
(Haa-oow can I hold you when you ain't even mine?)
Only you can see me through
I leave it up to you

(oh-h)

Do it light
Taking me through the night
Shadow dancing
Baby, you do it right
Give me more
Drag me across the floor
Shadow dancing
All this and nothing more

Do it light
Taking me through the night
Shadow dancing
Baby, you do it right
Give me more
Drag me across the floor
Shadow dancing
All this and nothing more

Do it light
Taking me through the night
Shadow dancing
Baby, you do it right
Give me more
Drag me across the floor
Shadow dancing
All this and nothing more

Do it light
Taking me through the night
Shadow dancing
Baby, you do it right
Give me more
Drag me across the floor
Shadow dancing
All this and nothing more

Do it light
Taking me through the night
Shadow dancing
Baby, you do it right
Give me more
Drag me across the floor
Shadow dancing

Words and Music by Andy, Barry, Maurice and Robin Gibb - Andy Gibb - "Shadow Dancing"

Commercial District, ShiKahr, Vulcan, 2352...

"You can't make someone love you, Alix," Doctor Benton Crane observed, as the willowy seventeen year-old reclining on his therapy couch balanced the heel of her right foot on the toes of her left.

A well-dressed, somewhat heavyset middle-aged man with a high forehead and thinning sandy hair, Benton projected an air of educated, sophisticated, paternal compassion which tended to set his clients at ease.

"I don't need to make him love me," Alix Kane observed with assurity, staring sightlessly up at the duck-egg blue ceiling, her fingers loosely inter-woven over her diaphragm. "He already does... He just hasn't admitted it yet... Besides, in ancient Egypt the royalty would often marry members of their own family in a bid to preserve their royal lineage. In fact, some historians believe that the practice was common in all classes of Egyptian society..."

Benton took a deep breath, and consciously let it out gradually, rather than sighing in exasperation. Privately, he acknowledged that in his thirty years of practice, Alix was likely his most challenging client. He was also aware what a rare opportunity it was to undertake sessions with someone who had undergone extensive genetic resequencing, resulting in several socially challenging tendencies, yet was able to live outside of an institutionalised environment. She provided ample material for publishing, and once one got past the mercurial shifts of her moods and lack of social graces, she really was quite a sweet girl. She could also be damned hard work...

"We don't live in ancient Egypt, Alix," he noted, his voice warm, cultured and erudite. "In contemporary times, such relationships are considered by most to be unhealthy."

"Why?" Alix asked.

"At the most fundamental level, the risk of genetic defects is significant, and thus morally selfish for a couple to consider inflicting such complications on any potential offspring," Benton began. "Even with contemporary medicine, genetic therapies are-" remembering to whom he spoke, he caught himself, but not before Alix fixed him with a glacial glare, daring him to finish the sentence. "-not looked upon favorably, as you well know. Moving aside from biological reasons, there are also moral taboos." Alix opened her mouth to say something, and Benton quickly continued. "Which I acknowledge can shift from culture to culture or era to era, but must still be respected."

Alix frowned, and looked at the psychologist with an expression of utter confusion.

"But why?" she insisted innocently, her genuine lack of understanding clear in her tone. "I'd say that to love someone is the most natural thing in the world, yes? It's the most fundamental of emotions, isn't it? So what could be more pure than making love to someone you truly love?"

While he considered his response, Benton glanced discretely at his Patek Philippe wristwatch. Only fourty seven minutes to go... "Alix, you don’t owe anyone an explanation for your relationship choices," he acknowledged. "But that doesn't mean that others will necessarily be accepting of your choices. Ordinarily you would be quite right, but in this instance, I'm afraid that it's a subject which you will find most to be somewhat, dare I say, old-fashioned about."

"So do I ignore my own feelings because of the objections of everyone else, or do I ignore everyone else's objections, and be free in my choice?" Alix asked.

This time, Benton did sigh. "I'm sorry, Alix, but I don't think I can give you an answer you'll consider satisfactory."

"You asked me to talk about my feelings, so I'm talking about my feelings," Alix said, her voice now tight and irritated. "I'm also asking for your opinions, not just telling you mine, isn't that the point of these sessions?"

"The point of these sessions, is that your father wants to help prepare you for dealing with others, with new people, for when you get to Harvard," Benton clarified. "He's told me that you haven't made many friends since moving here, and he's concerned that you might be equally lonely whe-"

"I'm not lonely," Alix interrupted sharply. "I have Marcus and all the friends I need. I'm not lonely at all."

Benton sighed again. Marcus... The boy so emotionally disturbed by his mother's death that he had to be psychologically re-built with the Vulcan practices... They almost deserve each other... Benton thought uncharitably. The blind leading the blind...

"Perhaps 'lonely' was a poor choice of word," he conceded, his voice warm and conciliatory. "Your father doesn't want you to be isolated while you're studying."

"I thought I was going to Harvard to study business dynamics and economics, not enter popularity contests," Alix muttered sulkily, playing with the hem of her wheat-colored t-shirt. Like most of her outfit, it was vintage. The slogan across her small bust read:

Holden Caulfield Thinks You're a Phony

Benton nodded. "That's right, Alix, you are, but you're also going to have to deal with other people -- new people -- who won't be as familiar with your -"

"Social difficulties?" she interrupted demandingly. "Eccentricities? Weirdness?"

"I was going to say 'quirks'," Benton countered tolerantly. "I want to help you understand that family members, friends, and even total strangers, often feel entitled to an opinion on the things you do. You might feel obliged to respond about some things, and some others really are no one else’s business and you don’t owe anyone an explanation at all, but sometimes, it's easier to not make waves. As the Japanese say, deru kui wa utareru. Translation: a stake that sticks out will be hammered. Do you understand?"

Alix smiled slyly, "The Japanese also have a legend that lovers who commit double-suicide get reincarnated as twins in their next lives..."

Benton coughed, embarassed how easily she had countered his point with relevant expertise of her own. "Uh, yes, well, reincarnation is another debate entirely," he acknowledged. "I think you'll like Boston. I earned my undergraduate degree at Harvard university, then my graduate degree at Harvard medical school. It's a fascinating city, with a rich culture."

"My family's from Boston," Alix said. "As in my ancestral family, not the recent generations, but I'm not expecting to fit in..."

"Why do you think that, Alix?" Benton enquired. "What do you mean?"

Alix sighed, "I can't explain what I mean. And even if I could, I'm not sure I'd feel like it..."

Recognizing her borrowed words, Benton gave a nostalgic smile and brief chuckle, then picked up a PADD and said, "Alright, let's try something else. I'm going to ask you a series of hypothetical questions, and all I need you to do, is answer them as you feel appropriate."

Alix nodded, "Okay..."

"It's your birthday: Someone gives you a calfskin wallet. How do you react?"

Pretty pointless gift in a cashless society... Alix thought, before remembering the times Mama had scolded her for being ungrateful, before firmly imparting simple but fundamental social niceties which she would otherwise have been incapable of considering, and she replied, "I would thank them for the wallet."

Observing her momentary pause, Benton made a note on the PADD, and continued.

"You're reading a magazine when you come across a full page nude photo of a girl. The girl is lying on a bearskin rug..."

"Nice..."

"I havn't finished the question..." Benton observed. "But for the sake of clarity, could you explain your response?"

"I'm not a TRIBBLE, if that's what you're thinking," Alix snapped. "Fur's soft. I thought it would feel nice to lay on, even more so if I were nude... I was trying to empathise, to put myself in the girl's position."

"I see... To continue with the original question: Later, you show the picture to your husband. He likes it so much, he hangs it on your bedroom wall."

Alix thought about the engineering diagrams on Marcus' bedroom wall and shook her head.

"He wouldn't do that," she said decisively, before clarifying. "He wouldn't disrespect me like that."

Benton nodded. Reasonable answer...

"Describe in single words, only the good things that come into your mind about your mother..."

"My mother?" Alix repeated, before taking a deep breath and sighing. "Let me tell you about my mother..."

* * *

As she glided lazily towards the residential area of district nine on her hoverboard, Alix saw one of her classmates, T'Haan, a few meters ahead and walking in the same direction, and she put a foot down to stop herself.

"Na'shaya, T'Haan," she called out, gaining the Vulcan girl's attention.

"Na'shaya, Alix," T'Haan replied as Alix jogged to catch up, her pink and green hoverboard tucked under her arm. "Do you wish to collaborate on the statistical ecology project Professor T'Pel assigned us today?"

"Yeah, that'd be cool," Alix agreed, as they began to walk south. "Do you have any subject ideas?"

"Not as yet," T'Haan admitted. "Would you care to discuss it this evening?"

Alix nodded, "Sure, I'd love to," she said eagerly, before grimacing. "Oh, wait, I can't... Marcus is performing in some harp recital tonight... Dad's out of town, and I promised I'd go."

"Quite understandable," T'Haan acknowledged. "I shall make some preliminary contingencies, which we can discuss at another time."

"Thanks, I'll think about it as well," Alix promised. "I can always make some notes if anything good comes to me. Oh, look, a fruit stall!"

Moving through the orderly pedestrian flow, Alix made her way over to the stall, and cast an eye over the selection, while the vendor waited with quiet attention.

"Is this fresh?" she enquired.

The vendor nodded, "Of course," he replied.

"I meant non-replicated, not just freshly synthesized," Alix clarified. Receiving another affirming nod, she said, "Then I'll have a piece of that, please," and pointed to long slivers of a pale green fruit.

Swiping her credstick across the contact, Alix turned to T'Haan, "This paradan melon is a real taste of home, do you want a piece?"

"Given the sodium levels it contains, I think not," the Vulcan girl replied.

Alix shrugged, "Your loss..."

* * *

When she entered the apartment, Alix heard a gong, followed by a droning, rhythmic chanting. Pulling off her low-tops, and leaving them where they fell, Alix padded barefoot down the hallway towards Marcus' room. Although she would never admit it, she did find the chants of the monks of T'Panit strangely relaxing, and as she drew closer, she caught scent of the sharp, intense fragrance of incense.

Poking her head through the arch, she saw Marcus sitting cross legged on the floor, his back hunched and his head dipped, clearly undertaking some task.

"Whatcha doing?" she called out.

"A tattoo..." he replied, not looking round.

"No way!" she exclaimed, crossing the threshold. "Lemme see!"

As she came round beside Marcus, she saw his right arm held up, bent back at the elbow, clenched fist pointing towards his shoulder, while in his left hand, he held a dermal stylus. Its tip illuminated as it manipulated the pigment in his skin, darkening it immediately to a bold black hue as he steadily worked down the edge of his forearm towards his wrist. His fingers flexed, deftly guiding the stylus through the flowing forms, and leaving crisp, swirling black lines in its wake.

"Dad's gonna go nuts when he sees that!" she pointed out, brushing her hair from her face before sinking to her knees and sitting back on her ankles. "Does it hurt?"

"Not really," Marcus replied, not lifting his eyes from his task as he completed the third glyph. "It just feels hot. Tingly, really."

Finishing the terminating horizontal strokes, Marcus scrutinized the result, before holding his arm out, his eyebrow raised in silent question.

"That looks amazing!" Alix admitted. "Rata, tafar, tapan -- right?" Even though she had not embraced Vulcan philosophy to the extent of her twin, she still recognized the hand-written forms of what she knew constituted one of Vulcan society's most central tenets. The meditative root concepts from which all focussed thoughts grew, and which frequently appeared in stylized forms on clothing, jewellery, and other items of cultural significance.

Marcus nodded, "It seemed the logical selection," he admitted, before pursing his lips and blowing over the indelible markings.

"I love it," Alix said, as an idea formed. "Can you do one for me?"

"For you?" Marcus replied questioningly.

"Mama's Huguenot cross," Alix clarified. "It is her birthday, Polo, I think she'd like that."

"Okay," Marcus agreed, knowing the image to be within his capability. "Do you want it on your arm like Mama's?"

Alix shook her head, before reaching up and pulling off her t-shirt. "No, here, on my right shoulder-blade," she said, reaching over her shoulder to tap on her back. "I don't want Dad seeing it and getting upset..."

Averting his gaze as he moved toward the replicator, Marcus nodded, understanding what Alix meant. She did not fear reprisal from their father, but knew that the tattoo had been how their mother had been formally identified, and she did not want to remind him of that terrible day.

"You'd best lay down while I replicate the stencil," he suggested as he entered the file parameters. "I don't have two stools we can sit on to get the correct working height."

Alix complied, gasping momentarily as her stomach and TRIBBLE pressed against the cool marble flooring, then hugged her arms round her t-shirt and rested her head against the makeshift pillow.

"Damn this floor's cold," she muttered as Marcus returned from the replicator and sat cross-legged beside her.

Reaching out, he brushed her wavy hair off her shoulder, and she smiled.

"That feels nice," she murmured.

"Ali, I'll need to concentrate," he said as he laid the stencil in place, before rubbing his hand over the backing film to transfer the carbon image to her skin.

"You don't find me distracting, do you?" she enquired with faux-innocence. When he didn't immediately reply, she asked. "Have you given any thought to what I said earlier?

"I have," Marcus admitted. "While requesting to borrow Sotek's ka'athyra for tonight's recital, I asked T'Jenn for her advice."

He recalled the conversation he had had that afternoon with the mother of his best friend, Selek.

"Is it logical to consider a relationship which others might find... controversial?" he had asked.

"Love is rarely logical, Marcus," T'Jenn had said. "Your father could tell you that as easily as I."

"This is not something I can discuss with him," Marcus had admitted. "He would most definitely not approve."

"You fancy her," Alix stated, her tone brittle, a mixture of accusation and hurt.

"She is an attractive woman," Marcus conceded. Seeing Alix's lips tighten, he rested his hand on her shoulder, and she angrily shrugged it away. He replaced it again, squeezing reassuringly. "But she is not the one I love."

Alix smiled, and closing her eyes, relaxed again. After a moment, she felt Marcus touch the tip of the stylus to her skin.

"So what did she say?" she asked, trying to keep her breathing steady, barely aware of the warmth of the stylus as it moved over her skin, creating the outline of the ancient symbol.

"Marcus, what transpires between two people is the business of nobody but them. If you live your life according to the expectations of others, you will never be content."

"She advised against living my life for the expectations of others," he replied, shading the inside areas of the cross. "And said that what happens between two people is their business."

"Sooo, you've come to a decision?" Alix pressed, the eager hopefulness in her tone raw in its sincerity.

"I have," Marcus said, as he applied the final delicate outlines of the dove. "What will be will be, and it'll be no one's business but ours."

Turning, Alix sat up and flung her arms round Marcus, burying her face against his chest, "I've waited so long for you to say that, Polo! I knew you felt the same," she admitted triumphantly. "I love you so much!"

Her embrace engendered a wash of conflicting emotions in Marcus, which his training easily and automatically suppressed. It would have been proper to disengage, to move away a little. Proper, but not nearly so satisfying. And as T'Jenn had said, what happened between two people was only their business. He put his arms round Alix's shoulders, holding her to him and resting his cheek on the top of her head.

"I know, Ali, I love you too," he assured her. "I'm sorry it's taken me so long to admit it."

marcusdkane · September 2015

Author's Note: The following story deals with adult themes and emotions...

Prompt #3: Pt II

Life is a moment in space
When the dream is gone
It's a lonelier place
I kiss the morning goodbye
But down in-side
You know we never know why
The road is narrow and long
When eyes meet eyes
And the feeling is strong
I turn away from the wall
I stumble and fall
But I give you it all

I am a woman in love
And I'd do anything
To get you into my world
And hold you within
It's a right I defend
Over and over again
What do I do?

With you eternally mine
In love there is
No measure of time
We planned it all at the start
That you and I
Live in each other's heart
We may be oceans away
You'll feel my love
I hear what you say
No truth is ever a lie
I stumble and fall
But I give you it all

I am a woman in love
And I'd do anything
To get you into my world
And hold you within
It's a right I defend
Over and over again
What do I do?

I am a woman in love
And I'm talking to you
You know I know how you feel
What a woman can do
It's a right I defend
Over and over again

I am a woman in love
And I'd do anything
To get you into my world
And hold you within
It's a right I defend
Over and over again

Words and Music by Barry and Robin Gibb, sung by Barbra Streisand - "Woman in Love"

Louisburg Square, Boston, Earth, 1 April, 2356...

"How're you feeling today, Ali?" Karen Lester asked, entering the master bedroom, where her niece lay on the top of the bedding.

"Nauseous," Alix muttered. She wore a faded-grey t-shirt and high-cut panties, her legs pulled into a foetal position, and she hugged her arms around herself as her aunt moved closer.

"You can't lay there like that, you'll get cold," Karen chided. From an ottoman at the foot of the bed, she pulled out a tartan blanket, and draped it over Alix's legs. It was light blue and green, with thin red and yellow lines, and black cross hatching.

Sitting on the edge of the bed and brushing Alix's hair from her face, she asked, "Is that better?"

Alix nodded silently, her slate grey eyes fixed on a point beyond the wall of the room, although she was clearly aware of her aunt's presence.

Karen glanced at the unlocked vintage iPADD on the bedside valance and sighed.

To: A.L.Kane@HBS.Edu
From: M.Dougherty@SFC.Starfleet.gov
Subject: Notification of MIA Status

Miss Kane,
I am writing to you, as designated next-of-kin, to inform you that your brother, Cadet First Class Marcus Kane, has been officially listed as Missing in Action following the loss with all hands, of the USS Harrington, in the Bajoran system. Certain aspects of the Harrington's destruction are politically sensitive, but I am authorized to inform you that the Harrington was tasked with essential operations.

As you are no doubt aware, Marcus was very active in the community of the academy. He was a keen student, and it was always a pleasure to have his presence in my Ethics and Morality lectures, where his unique education always created stimulating debate. His personality was one of promoting teamwork and positive motivation in his classmates and peers, and his loss will be greatly felt by all who know him.

Marcus was definitely a first class cadet, in both rank and comportment. As you know, he was selected from among his peers as a member of the academy flight team, as well as a valued researcher. I wanted you to know how much we regret the loss of your brother, and the entire faculty joins me in sending our deepest sympathies and understanding during this difficult time. Please know that we share in your pain and sorrow and pay our final respects to one of our best friends and comrades. Marcus will certainly be missed by all of us.

Yours,
Matthew Dougherty,
Commander,
Starfleet Academy

In the eight weeks since Alix received the communique, and having moved into the house to keep an eye on her, Karen had watched her niece fall into a deep depression, despite her best efforts to keep her engaged and upbeat.

"You're not still fixating on this, are you, Ali?" she sighed. "It's been nearly two months. We're Kane women: this isn't how we behave."

"You're not a Kane!" Alix snapped harshly in reaction to the rebuke before sitting up. "You gave your name away when you married that pig, and haven't even had the decency to change it back since you got divor-"

She was silenced by her aunt slapping her full across the face.

For a moment, she sat wide-eyed and open mouthed, and raised a hand to her stinging cheek, seeing a look of equal shock and surprise on her aunt's sharp features.

"Oh Ali, I shouldn't've done that," Karen exclaimed. "I'm sorry!"

Rather than moving away, Alix shook her head and leaned forwards to cling to her aunt, "I deserved that," she acknowledged. "I'm sorry, Auntie Kay, I shouldn't have said that, I don't always think before I speak, and I-"

"It's alright, Ali, I understand," Karen assured her, returning the embrace and smoothing Alix's hair. "When Paul -- your dad -- died, I was upset too. I know you're going through a painful time."

"It's not the same," Alix murmured.

Karen sighed and held her niece more tightly, "How do you figure that, Ali?" she asked, rocking her gently. "He was my brother, just like Marcus is yours..."

Alix shook her head, "I ...love Marcus..."

"Oh Ali, I loved Paul, just like you love Marcus," Karen assured her.

"No, it's different," Alix insisted. But how could she explain why? How could she admit why? "Marcus isn't just my brother, he's a part of me... I'm a part of him... that's just what it's like when you're -" in love"- a twin. I can't explain it... But he's not dead, Auntie Kay, I'd know... I'd feel it..."

"Good luck doesn't always run in our family," Karen admitted as Alix sat back from the embrace, but still holding her hand. "But sometimes, there are little glimmers of it," she fingered the edge of the woolen blanket. "Do you know what this is?"

"It's a blanket," Alix replied. "It was here when I inherited the place from Dad..."

Karen smiled.

"Yes, Ali, it's a blanket," she acknowledged. "It's also the MacLeod tartan. Do you know anything about the MacLeods?

Alix shook her head.

"Well, in the Twenty First century, a man named Richard Kane, married a lady called Justine MacLeod," Karen explained. "We're descended from them, the Kanes and the MacLeods. In fifteen thirty six, there was a battle between the MacLeods and another clan, the Frasers. Legend says that one of the MacLeods, was struck down in the battle, but as if by magic, his wounds later healed and he didn't die. The townspeople thought it was witchcraft, and wanted to burn him at the stake, but his cousin, the clan chieftain, spared his life and he was only banished from Glenfinnan instead."

"There's no such thing as magic, Auntie Kay," Alix insisted.

Karen laughed gently.

"Oh I know, Ali, I'm sure there was a perfectly rational explanation," she agreed. "Perhaps his wounds weren't as serious as they were later claimed to be -- there was probably more than a bit too much drinking after the battle... Either way, if that MacLeod blood runs through our veins, even if just the smallest, most diluted amount, then we also have to have a bit of that luck which spared that warrior."

Alix nodded, "Marcus is still alive, Auntie Kay," she repeated. "I can feel it."

"I hope you're right, Ali, I really do," Karen said. "I tell you what: How about you put your jeans on, and we got out for lunch? Have something nice to eat and a few glasses of wine to take your mind off all this?" Picking up the iPADD, she closed the app then locked the device. "What do you say?"

Alix nodded, "I'd like that," she admitted, throwing back the blanket and swinging her legs over the side of the bed. "Maybe you could tell me some more about the history of our family?"

Boylston Street, Boston...

"Wow, I'd never have guessed that," Alix exclaimed, as Karen concluded another story from their family tree. Not taking her piercing gaze from her aunt, she reached out, picked up her glass of Chevalier Montrachet, and took a mouthful. "So he was actually the Baron's son all along..."

Karen nodded, "And once he emigrated to America, he founded the Baron chain of hotels, and never realised that William Kane was his benefactor."

With a wry smile, Karen picked up her own glass, and looked briefly around the Crystal Room, before looking out the floor-to-ceiling windows, which were filled with the air-traffic of Boylston Street.

Refilling her glass, Alix heard a ping from the khaki and cacao Louis Vuitton shoulder bag which was slung over the back of her seat. Without thinking to excuse herself, she turned, took out her iPADD, and saw a received message imposing over the wallpaper.

To: A.L.Kane@HBS.Edu
From: M.Dougherty@SFC.Starfleet.gov
Subject: Revocation of MIA Status

Miss Kane,
It is with the greatest pleasure of informing you that subsequent to my past communique, your brother, Cadet First Class Marcus Kane, has been located alive and well on Bajor, and is being repatriated to Federation space aboard the USS Laconia. During the period 3 February through 31 March 2356, following the loss of the USS Harrington, Marcus received the hospitality of the Bajoran People and has been well treated. I extend an invitation for you to visit the Medical facility at Starfleet Command, where Marcus will be assessed and supported through his recuperation from his experience upon his return in a week's time.

Please know that we have all shared in your pain and sorrow at his feared loss, and cannot be more relieved to learn that Marcus is being returned safely to us.

Yours,
Matthew Dougherty,
Commander,
Starfleet Academy

With a gasp, Alix looked up at Karen, with an expression of beautific joy on her face.

"I told you Marcus was still alive!" she exclaimed, before thrusting the iPADD forward for her aunt to see. "I told you!"

Feeling a wave of relief wash over her as she read the message, Karen nodded and smiled.

"Yes, you did, Ali," she agreed. "It looks like Marcus inherited some of that good luck after all."

Sub-Orbital Shuttle, en-route to San Fransisco, Earth, 9 April, 2356......

Thump!Thump!Thump! Thump!Thump!Thump!

After over an hour's delay on the ground at Logan Spaceport, and further degraded by nervous excitement, Alix's patience was even more transient than normal, and she tried to distract herself from the jarring of her seat by reading some reviews.

All the soaps I've purchased, either for myself or as gifts for others, work to a beautifully creamy lather which leaves the hair and skin clean, refreshed, powdery-soft, and elegantly fragranced. The soap is incredibly gentle, and not at all drying, as other soap brands I have used in the past had been. These truly are an exceptional product, and worth every penny. My thoughts on the various scents are as follows.

Frankincense and Leather:
Warm, indulgent, sensual and inviting. A distinguished and regal masculine scent, which could also be worn by a confident, assured lady.

White Flower Lei:
An amazingly delightful floral scent, with a variety of subtle notes which gently introduce themselves.

Mandarin and Lime:
An intensely clean and refreshing scent, but by no means over-powering. I think this scent would be ideal for any time of the year, but especially refreshing in the

Thump!Thump!Thump! Thump!Thump!Thump!

summer.

Aniseed and Fennel:
The projection of the scent of the soap bar, is much more intense than how the scent settles onto the skin. It settles into a very subtle, intriguing, warm scent. Not at all overpowering, and something completely unique.

Lime Flowers:
Sharp, refreshing, calming, this scent is elegant and subtle. Ideal for men or women and any time of the year, but especially fitting for summer months.

Meditation:
Sophisticated, nuanced and elegant. This perfume is ideal for men and ladies, and due to the presence of frankincense, makes an excellent companion to F&L.

Rei-Kii:
Warm, sensual, elegant, fruity, floral, this scent is the prize of the collection for good reason, and it is indescribably lovely.

Thump!Thump!Thump! Thump!Thump!Thump!

With a sharp exhalation, Alix gritted her teeth and put the iPADD on her lap.

"I-f you're go-ing, to San-Fran-Sisko..." a female voice behind her began to sing softly.

Alix hated people singing. Mama used to do it all the time, and she always sang along to the songs Alix liked and wanted to listen to. She remembered one time Mama did it when she was little, and she had run up, punched her in the a*s and told her to shut up. Rather than getting mad, Mama had scooted down and given her a cuddle.

"Be sure to w-air, some flo-wers in your hair..."

Thump!Thump!Thump! Thump!Thump!Thump!

"I-f you're go-ing, to San-Fran-Sisko..."

Her patience exhausted, Alix spun round. Kneeling up in her chair, she glared at her tormentor, a bored, blonde haired boy of maybe eight years old. In the seat beside him, was a woman maybe a few years older than Alix. Her dirty blonde hair was twisted into dreadlocks and pulled back into what looked like some kind of mutated plant display. Alix noted the tye-died clothing the woman wore with a look of distain. F*cking hippies... she sneered mentally.

"Are you going to keep that up all the way?" Alix demanded.

"He's just excited, he's not doing any harm," the woman replied.

"If you don't show some consideration for the other passengers and shut up -- or he kicks my seat one more time -- I'll make sure you regret it when we land!" Alix snapped menacingly. She glared at the woman until she looked away, before dropping back into her seat.

"Niles! Sit still!" she heard the mother insist in a hushed tone. With a satisfied harumph, Alix returned her attention to her iPADD and the reviews she had been reading.

Starfleet Command, San Fransisco...

As she entered Starfleet Medical, Alix suppressed a shudder. She hated hospitals. Nothing good ever happened in them, and this would be the third time she'd had to visit Marcus in one.

Taking a fortifying breath, she adjusted the shoulder-strap of her bag and approached the desk, where a Ktarian receptionist eyed her curiously.

"I'm here to see my brother," she said.

"I'm sorry, visiting hours are finished for the day," the receptionist said, her face contorting regretfully.

"But I've come all the way from Boston," Alix protested. "The shuttle was delayed on the ground for over an hour!"

"What seems to be the problem?" a voice behind her enquired.

"The young lady wishes to visit her brother, Doctor Crusher," the receptionist explained. "I was just explaining that visiting hours were over..."

"Who are you here to see?" Beverly asked.

"Marcus Kane," Alix replied. "I'm his -" girlfriend "-sister. I was invited by Commander Dougherty, but the shuttle was delayed, and-"

"I think we can make an exception on this occasion, Nesta," Beverly said, before gesturing to Alix. "Come with me."

* * *

"How is he?" Alix asked, as the turbolift began to move.

"Oh he's fine," Beverly said. "The majority of his injuries had been treated, and his broken leg healed by itself during his time on Bajor, there's not really much more we can do for him other than nutritional supplements to make up for the deficiencies in his recent diet. We just need to keep him under observation for a few days to make sure everything's okay."

The turbolift doors opened onto a corridor which lead to the recovery rooms. Seeing Marcus through the window of one, Alix gave a cry and ran over. Throwing her arms around him, she kissed him passionately.

"I was so worried," she said, resting their foreheads together and feeling his fingers clenching hungrily against her shoulders, holding her close. "But I knew you weren't dead. I just knew it!"

In the corridor, Beverly made an expression of surprise, and muttered, "So that's how it is in their family..."

marcusdkane · September 2015

Author's Note: The following story deals with adult themes and emotions...

Prompt #3: Pt III

Shadows falling, Baby
We stand alone
Out on the street
Anybody you meet
Got a heartache of their own
(You gotta be a leaver)
Make it a crime to be lonely or sad
(You gotta be a leaver)
You got a reason for livin'
You bat-tle on
With the love you're livin' on
You gotta be mine
We take it away
It's gotta be night and day
Just a matter of time

And we got nothing to be guil-ty of
Our love
Will climb any mountain
Near or far
We are
And we never let it end
We are devotion
And we got nothing to be soh-rry for
Our love
Is one in a million
Eyes can see that we
Got a highway to the sky
I don't wanna hear your
Goodbye

(Ooh Oooh)

Pulse's racing, Darling
How grand we are
Little by little we meet in the middle
There's danger in the dark
(You gotta be a leaver)
Make it a crime to be out in the cold
(You gotta be a leaver)
You got a reason for livin'
You bat-tle on
With the love you're buildin' on
You gotta be mine
We take it away
It's gotta be night and day
Just a matter of time

And we got nothing to be guil-ty of
Our love
Will climb any mountain
Near or far
We are
And we never let it end
We are devotion
And we got nothing to be soh-rry for
Our love
Is one in a million
(Eyes can see)
Eyes can see that we
That we
(That we)
Got a highway to the sky
I don't wanna hear your
Goodbye
Don't wanna hear your
Goodbye

I don't want to hear your
And we got nothing
And we got nothing to be guil-ty of
Our love
(Our love)
Will climb any mountain
Near or far
(Near or far)
We are
(We are)
And we never let it end
(Oh we never)
We are devotion
And we got nothing to be soh-rry for
(Sorry for)
Our love
(Our love)
Is one in a million
(Eyes)
(Eyes can see)
Eyes can see that we
(That we)
(That we)
Got a highway to the sky
(We got a highway)
Don't wanna hear your

And we got nothing to be guil-ty of
(Guilty)
Our love
(Our love)
Will climb any mountain
Near or far
We are
And we never let it end

Words and Music by Barry, Maurice and Robin Gibb - Barbra Streisand and Barry Gibb - "Guilty"

Oakland Spaceport, San Fransisco, Earth, 15 January 2363...

Stepping out of the terminal and into the noonday sunlight, Alix saw Marcus leaning casually against the cargo-compartment of a Triumph Imperial hoverbike, which sat idling on its electromagnetic induction field. Rather than his Starfleet uniform, he wore a casual jacket of burgundy leather over a grey shirt of Coridan linen, and casual black pants.

"Hey! Polo!" she called out, attracting his attention. Boosting himself away from the matte-black aerodynamic form, Marcus quickly crossed the distance between them with long-legged strides. Dropping her shoulder bags to the floor, Alix flung her arms round Marcus' neck, kissing him as his arms locked around her ribs and pulled her to him, breathing in the elegant scents of Violet, Frankincense, Myrhh, Amber and Herbs of her perfume. Safe in the anonymity of the crowd, Marcus returned the kiss with equal passion, before Alix stepped back. Not breaking the embrace, she rubbed her fingers briskly over his bearded cheeks and grinned.

"I like it..." she admitted, before looking past Marcus' shoulder to the hoverbike. "Now as much as I love that," she said, leaning back against his hands which still rested on the back of her hips. "What about my bags? They're not going to fit in there..."

Letting go of Alix, Marcus reached into his jacket, took out a pocket PADD, and with an enigmatic expression, began tapping on the screen, before running his thumb up and down it.

Moments later, Alix heard a scintillating warble, and saw her bags vanish in the shimmering glow of transporter beams.

"One of the benefits of being a Starfleet engineer, is unimpeded transporter access," Marcus observed, before returning the device to his pocket and leading Alix by the hand from the bustle of the crowd to the hoverbike.

Swinging a leg over the bike and handing a helmet to Alix before pulling on his own, Marcus brought the bike's repulsorlift engines from standby to active with a twist of the handlebar.

"So what's the plan?" she asked, securing her helmet, sliding close to Marcus and gripping his torso securely. "After that trip, I really need to have a shower and get cleaned up, but what then?"

"I have a table reserved at the Pyramid Club for eight thirty," Marcus replied over the helmets' comm, bringing the hoverbike up and away from the spaceport, and into the Oakland traffic flow.

"Perfect," Alix said. "Let's just go out to dinner, and then just nail each other..."

Residential Facility, Starfleet Command, San Francisco...

Laying on his back, the thin sheet bunched at his waist, Marcus looked across to where Alix lay dozing on her front, her wavy hair spread out across the pillow. His eyes fell on the tattoo on her shoulder which he had put there a lifetime ago.

Throwing off the sheet, he rolled silently from the soft mattress, pulling on a robe of midnight blue Bolian cotton, before padding across the small apartment to the large bay window. Sitting on the faux-wood ledge of the window sill, Marcus sat with one foot on the floor, the other on the ledge, his forearm resting against his upraised knee, as he watched the afternoon sky shifting towards dusk.

"You're not going to get dressed for dinner?" Alix asked as she walked towards him, pulling on a robe of shimmering Tholian silk. "I know they say the outside ensemble is almost always a true symbol of what's underneath, but that's a bit casual for where we're going."

Marcus nodded silently as Alix sat on the other side of the window sill.

"I can tell something's on your mind, Polo," she said.

I've resurrected as an Immortal and will never die... he thought, but the timing didn't feel right, and the words would not come. Reaching out, he took hold of Alix's hand and squeezed it tenderly. "I love you, Ali."

"I love you too," she assured Marcus. "Whatever it is, you can tell me." Reaching out and resting her forearms on his shoulders. She raised her hands to his face, before leaning her forehead against his.

(Ahh)
I know your eyes in the morning sun
I feel you touch me in the pouring rain
And the mo-ment that you wander
Far from me
I wanna feel you in my arms again

And you come to me
On a sum-mer breeze
Keep me warm in your love
Then you softly leave
And it's me you need to show
How deep is your love

How deep is your love, how deep is your love
I really mean to learn
'Cause we're livin' in a world of fools
Brea-kin' us down
When they all should let us be
We belong to you and me

I believe in you
You know the door
To my very soul
You're the light in my dee-pest dar-kest hour
You're my saviour when I fall
And you may not think
I care for you
When you know
Down inside
That I really do
And it's me you need to show
How deep is your love

How deep is your love, how deep is your love
I really mean to learn
'Cause we're livin' in a world of fools
Brea-kin' us down
When they all should let us be
We belong to you and me

[Vocal Bridge]

And you come to me
On a sum-mer breeze
Keep me warm in your love
Then you softly leave
And it's me you need to show
How deep is your love

How deep is your love, how deep is your love
I really mean to learn
(I really mean to learn)
'Cause we're livin' in a world of fools
Brea-kin' us down
When they all should let us be
We belong to you and me

(Ahhhhhh)

How deep is your love, how deep is your love
I really mean to learn
'Cause we're livin' in a world of fools
Brea-kin' us down
When they all should let us be
We belong to you and me

(Na na na na na na)
(Ahhhhhh)

How deep is your love, how deep is your love
I really mean to learn
'Cause we're livin' in a world of fools
Brea-kin' us down
When they all should let us be
We belong to you and me

Words and Music by Barry, Maurice and Robin Gibb - Bee Gees - "How Deep is Your Love"

Unofficial Literary Challenge #13: In A.D. 2410, War Was Beginning

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