John stood inside the engine room for the first time. What he saw before him almost took his breath away. The room was vast and stretched out as far as the eye could see. It had to be the size of at least three hangar bays or maybe more. But it was beautiful, well at least to him. He watched pulses of coloured light move up and down each of the four quad drives. Red, blue, orange, the light kept changing in colour and strength. It seemed to pulse in time with the sound coming from the engines. Each drive stood like a tower reaching up to the ceiling of the ship, all brand new and glistening under the lights. He watched the engineers go about their duties (about 250 staff in total on this shift), not even noticing he was there.

His eyes turned to the back of the room and his gaze fell upon the chamber. They called it the chamber because that’s what it was, a cylindrical metal chamber that covered at least a third of the room with a blue force field covering the whole structure. This was the wormhole creation chamber (second generation) it created multiple wormholes inside the chamber, stabilized them one at a time, charted their destination and then projected the wormhole into space for the ship to travel through. All this was done in a matter of seconds.

Suddenly a blue light appeared in front of him and expanded to form a flat shimmering beam. A man appeared in the light.

"Chief Engineer John Q, pleased to make your acquaintance. I am Seeker, the chief weapons officer aboard the Penelope. I have been running diagnostic checks on the MagRail batteries and 47P is having a reloading issue. Would you have a member of your staff investigate the problem? I would appreciate it greatly.

"See you at the staff meeting."

John pressed the ship’s com system.

“Acknowledged Seeker, I’ve despatched a team of engineers, I reckon about 2 hours to fix it.”

The peaceful rhythm of the engines was replaced with orders from the bridge. The Captain’s words echoed around the walls like bullets ricocheting off metal.

“Navigation maintain distance... bring the ship to standby alert... code 1... engine room, prepare damage control parties”
The ship began to shake and shudder under fire. John looked towards his staff and watched them all look upwards with fear in their eyes. He had to say something, tell them it was going to be fine, tell them everything was going to be alright.

He opened a com link to the engine room.

“This is the chief engineer of the USS Penelope addressing the engineering staff. Some of you may be feeling a little scared right now, even feeling uncertain as to why this is happening. But you have no reason to be afraid, no need to fear the unknown, why... because I believe in our Captain. “

Two hundred and fifty people cheered and shouted. John carried on with his speech.

“Turn to the person next to you.” He said “That person is relying on you to keep them alive, this ship is relying on you to do your duty, the Captain is relying on every single one of you to keep this ship together... don’t let him down”

Another cheer went up as John switched off the com link. Once again the ship shuddered as another wave of plasma hit the side of the Penelope.

“God Captain” thought John “I really hope you know what you’re doing”

Chief Security Officer nenothtu Found the situation to be near overwhelming. First, the shock of the very vessel they came in search of turning the tables and finding PENELOPE instead. At least it wasn't a rock-turning-over hard search.

But what kind of 'freedom fighter' drives a full-grown Starship? In neno's experience, 'freedom fighters' were not prone to initiating battles against folks who hadn't agressed against them, particularly when the outcome wasn't likely to be a decisive as most 'freedom fighters' strove for. Furthermore, a true 'freedom fighter', in general, didn't much care who knew he was free. How could we 'know too much already' when what little we DID know made no sense? And there was the problem of a Federation Starship, evidently commanded by a Federation officer, firing on another Federation starship, whose only 'aggression' was to drop out of a wormhole. Then there was that 'freedom fighter' claim. It didn't add up, and nenothtu was immeddiately suspicious of the entire situation.

At the moment, however, neno had matters that required his attention to be elsewhere. He left the inter-empire incident mess unfolding in the hands of those best equipped for it, Captain, Weapons, and Marines, and scurried down a corridor towards his OWN mess.

Moments before, an 'excited' member of his security staff had reported finding a body in a storage area during a routine patrol of the ship. It was Chief Navigator Fook. Nenothtu reported the finding immediately to the bridge, and ordered a security detachment to seal off the storage area in question, nobody in, nobody out, pending his arrival. The remaining security staff on duty were placed on alert in anticipation of possible boarding parties, and half of those off duty were called to duty and placed on alert at battle stations.

Scurrying down the corridor, neno noticed that most of the security staff that remained 'off duty' had armed up and dutified themselves anyway. When he queried a security person he passed as tho why he was arming up off duty, the individual replied "Anybody gets shot today, I don't wanna be the LAST one". Fair enough, nenothtu reckoned.

Running toward the door, neno drew up short when the door guard drew himself to attention and saluted him. Before the man could spit out what he was about to say, nenothu barked at him. "Son, you wanna keep yourself perpendicular, that better be the last time you throw a salute at ME!"

Looking confused, the youngster dropped his hand immediately and replied "Yessir!, Body's in there. sir!" He'd heard through the grapevine that this new security Chief could be... unstable. No sense upsetting him at the moment. For neno's part, well, he'd deal with that 'sir' buisness later. Presently, he had a job to do.

Fook's body lay facedown, no blood evident. What WAS evident was a well-carbonized hole in the center of his upper back, directly behind his heart. Poor guy never knew what hit him. The shot had burned through his spine, obliterated his heart, and all the way out the front of his tunic, cauterizing the catastrophic wound as it burned through, Hence no blood. A tendril of smoke curled out of the wound as neno examined the body.

"Not done too long ago" he muttered. He called one of the interior guards to him, who reported that the area was clear, and the culprit had not been seen by anyone.

"Great. Just scroggin' great" muttered nenothtu. "Not much to go on here. Call in the forensics team, and alert Sick Bay. I don't think it's necessary personally, but the doc might want to autopsy him. Man gets his heart burned out, he's pretty much done. Still, doc might find something I ain't aware of." At the moment, Chief nenothtu hadn't a clue whether the culprit was one of US, or one of THEM who had somehow gotten in under the radar. He found the timing to be a bit too 'convenient', however.

Activating his comm on the security channel he issued orders to his personnel. "Security Chief nenothtu here. All hands keep your eyes peeled for boarding parties, particularly in the area of the launch bays, as they're open for buisness at the moment. But for the love of Penelope, stay outta the way of the Marines up there. They got enough to do right now WITHOUT trippin' over One of MY knotheads. Be unobtrusive, and watchful. nenothtu out"

This wasn't shaping up to be a good day, and nenothtu hadn't even had lunch yet.

[edit on 2009/3/22 by nenothtu]

The good thing about being a Carpet was you pretty much went unnoticed until someone dropped something on you.
The best thing about being a Carpet was claiming whatever was dropped.
In this case its was a S.I.L.O.
Ok, so no one had actually dropped the S.I.L.O on Carpet, thought millions of tiny minds in synchronicity, and yes, it was true the Silo had fainted dead away and landed on Carpet, but Carpet didn’t care.
Silo now belonged to Carpet.

Millions of tiny like fingers caressed Silo‘s body, smoothing her skin, comforting her as she lay unconscious.
“What if someone comes” a consensus of concern radiated through Carpet in waves.
More strands grew instantly over Silo’s inert form creating a denser mass, protecting and hiding her from casual onlookers.
“She’s hurt. Should we go for the Healer Antar," Carpet wondered?
“No, Antar helps Carpet after the Dead One and rests now.” A rustle of pain spread through them.
“What about Whisper! Whisper will help our Silo!”
Carpet began patting Silo, millions of tiny stalks thumping her skin in a unison of agreement.

“What the...!”
Silo’s senses blasted from dull to overload in a nanosecond, millions of little thoughts, masses of little voices bursting in on her conscious all chorusing concern, care and inexplicably something akin to ownership.
Silo tried to jump to her feet, a clinging weight held her fast, keeping her low and close to the...Carpet?
“Stop that You!” she growled, remembering the struggle over her two-skin and recognizing Carpet for what it was, a Milli-Being.
“Let me go!” She commanded.
Carpet held fast.
So tightly Silo involuntary began her morph into Carpet.
“Stop that! She screeched, forcing will into her hands to form and push her trunk off Carpet, her arms and knees next to gain some height, the rest of her form snapping into place once she got her head higher into the air.

Falling back on her heels, half sitting half crouching Silo felt the Milli-Beings agitation swirling about her feet and toes, trying to pull her back down.
Poor little things Silo thought, instantly sympathetic, it must be her bare feet.
Building her eyes up the length of her antenna Silo spied just what she needed, an open crate belching packing materials.
Skipping nimbly across to the crate, perching atop it with her feet above the floor Silo wound the packing strips about her skin from below the knees to her toes protecting them from interfacing too intimately with the Milli-Being.
Reaching down behind the crate Silo found her two-piece and slipped into it carefully not to disturb the wrapping on her legs.
Stepping off the crate the Carpet didn't respond to the touch of her bound feet.
The barrier of material worked just fine.

Bending down Silo laughed and stroked her fingers through Carpets soft silky strands as they rose up tugging gently at her hand.
“Stop that and listen up, I need your help.” She felt as if millions of little ears opened in wait.
“What can you tell me about the ship?”
They responded through the touch of her hand in a holographic reply, the interior of the Ship flashing in her minds eye.
“Ship is alive. She’s named the SS Yydryl.“ Silo sensed the deep affection they had for the Ship.
“Few are yet aboard. There's Antar the Healer and Whisper of Special Operations. Whisper passed the door before you fainted.“ Silo shuddered remembering the Long Arms wondering how she’d ever get over her loathing of them.
“Scurvy’s here. Scurvy works in weapons to protect Ship. The Yydryl trusts Scurvy.
Navigator Sky Floating is in his Holosphere at the moment and there’s Ensign Loam who‘s just come aboard. He’s resting at the moment after his kjovil’um restorative.”

“What about a Captain? Does Ship, I mean Yydryl have a Captain?” Silo’s hand shook waiting for a response.
“We hear the crew leaving communications for Captain Cadbury’s on the Verbalizer outside his quarters. We can’t tell you if Captain is on board Ship. We're forbidden to pass on information concerning our Captain until we‘re given orders.”
“Come on, you can’t tell me anything about the Captain?" Silo smiled down and fluffing her hand there, affectionately coaxing them to give up more information.
“We regret we cannot say more of the Captain Silo.”

Not wanting to offend the Milli-Being Silo didn’t push. Instincts told her Carpet could be an invaluable friend, even if a rather strange one.
“You think you can you show me to the Captain's quarters without getting me seen” she asked twining her fingers in the soothing strands.
“Yes, but...” The Multi-Being turned hard and cold under Silo’s fingers causing her antenna to whip around in alarm.
“What!? Is someone coming?” Silo began her morph into the wall, leaving only her finger touching Carpet near floor level.
“Silo we did not tell you of the Dead One...” Carpet relayed a feeling of deep sorrow.
“The Dead one? What do you mean?”
“One of the crew.” Carpet whispered, blocking the visual from Silo’s mind.
“One of the crew spilled their life-force all over Carpet. Carpet had to be healed by Antar”
“You mean one of the crew took their life on purpose!” Silo gasp nearly falling from the wall.
“We think so, yes. Antar healed most of these memories, but we remember something of the Death”
"Creator help us." She said, the Milli-Being echoing her sentiment.
Whispering words of comfort and gently pulling her hand free of them Silo morphed completely into the wall for privacy.

Silo could not conceive of it. For someone to take their life here on a living Ship where others would suffer was beyond anything she could fathom.
Her soul reached out questioning, searching for a trace of the dead crew member.
The answer came back cold and empty, dark and desolate.

Had anyone passed near the spot Silo remained secluded they'd of wondered at the droplets of moisture falling freely down the storeroom wall.
And why the droplets disappeared when they hit the floor.




[edit on 22-3-2009 by silo13]

The news came like a slap in the face.

Fooks was dead.

Fooks.

Luder sat there for valuable seconds and stared at the report. He shook his head quickly and snapped out of his reverie.

"Seeker, you may open fire on the Nimitz. Aim for the shield generators and weapons control modules, we want to keep her and her crew in one piece as best as possible. There may still be loyal Federation crew aboard."

"Studious, get off my bridge and get your marines ready for boarding."

Luder picked up his personal communicator and contacted neno.

"Neno, order an immediate lockdown of all non-essential personnel. Seal off the fighter launch bays, the engine rooms and all life support systems until we finish with the Nimitz. I don't need someone taking the entire crew down with Fooks. I trust you can get to the bottom of this? Oh, and Neno, watch your back."

Luder tapped a few controls on his station, sealing the command center down from outside access for the time being.

Luder put the communicator down. Hell, there were holocams all over the major common areas, there had to be some coverage of the storage bay. He felt this in the pit of his stomach. At first, he wanted to instinctively blame Theresa or even the Cents but that was folly. The murdered had come with them and was among them still. There was no way he or she had gotten on board during the battle.

Luder sat at his station silently as the storm raged between the Penelope and the Nimitz.

Someone was going to pay for this.



[edit on 22-3-2009 by mf_luder]

[edit on 22-3-2009 by mf_luder]

"No!!!"

"What are you doing!?"

"The crew of the Nimitz has obviously been compromised. But those fighters are ours, we cannot fire on our own people."

Seeker, the enhancer, opened up on the fighters. Maybe the enhancer project was not only bad for those in it, but for the rest of us to. Maybe he was hammer that did not know when to stop.

Then the enhancer asked permission to open up on the Nimitz herself. To ask to open up on 15,434 people on the Nimitz and to fire on the 76 pilots.... it was unthinkable.

It would be different if these people had willingly chosen to fight us, but after listening to the Nimitz captain over the intercom it was obvious they were being controlled. The ominous question lingered.... How?

Studious realized that if we withdrew Earth Command would send a different captain, one with out a personal connection that could compromise the mission. Not only that EC, would send ships, far more ships. Then all those aboard the Nimitz would surely be lost.

He was torn however, a drop ship attack on the enemy carrier could be very costly for his men but if he refused this mission the others would destroy the Nimitz.

Originally posted by mf_luder

"Studious, get off my bridge and get your marines ready for boarding."

Studious yelled over the clatter and noise. "If we board using the dropships we can stun the Nimitz crew. Then maybe the good doctor could figure out what the [another blast hits the ship] is going on here. If we destroy that ship we will never truly know what happened here."

Studious left the bridge quickly, there was no time to await a reply in person he could receive over the radio.

Just then an armed group of Marines approached him. It was good they were already ready for action. One of them yelled "Colonel, there's been a murder aboard." As this marine approached Studious could read, on the marines properly kept uniform, Lt. Jones.

Lieutenant "Lock down the ship."

Holding his hand up to his right ear with the small earpiece in place, Studious told the captain.

"Sir, I suggest we go to Full Alert Code 2. There has been a murder."

Full Alert Code 2- Intruder Alert. Studious thought it did not that accurately portray what was going on. This was not an intruder from outside the ship. He had been on the bridge at the start of the attack and he had not seen anything get close enough to board. Studious knew it was something more sinister, perhaps it had something to do with the Nimitz crew becoming compromised.

Then it hit him. Again he called over the radio to the captain.

"Captain, I think some chemical or biological agent is aboard. The crew is probably beginning to suffer the same effects as the Nimitz crew."

"I'll have to delay any dropship attack. This could get serious very quickly. We don't know how many of the crew could be affected."

With that Studious raced off to find the Security Chief. After all, as Nenothtu had said

Originally posted by nenothtu
Intruders on this boat are my baliwick, not yours.

[edit on 22-3-2009 by Studious]

"Aye aye, Skipper. Launch bays are already under guard, Security is on station at the rest of the problem points. I'll just have to get these strap hangers back to their quarters until the dust settles. Nenothtu out."

Watch your back, the man says! Just a few hours ago, hadn't that Colonel Studious just walked right up on him, as if neno were a greenhorn? Neno felt his age creeping up on him. Maybe he'd made a mistake taking this assignment. War was a game for young men, in their prime. He shook it off... something he could fret over later. Right now, he had a job to do, and he was damn well going to do it, as well as he could.

He considered assigning bodyguards to the command staff. Naw, that would take personnel away from critical tasks at hand, and might foster an atmosphere of fear. THAT they could do without. Security would just have to be looking EVERYWHERE, all at once, himself included. He took up his comm.

"Chief nenothtu to security personnel. All On Duty staff, grow eyes in the back of your heads, right now. All Off Duty staff, get out of my corridors and into your quarters, right now. I don't care if you clean your weapons or cut your fingernails, Either way, we're on Security Lockdown as of this notice. Unauthorized personnel found in the wild will be dealt with rough. Don't let that be you. Nenothtu out."


[edit on 2009/3/22 by nenothtu]

"Semi Hemispherical exit wound. Typical of a suicide however this just does not feel right to me."

"Intracranial tissue has been cauterized, fused is more like it."

Standing alone in the Communication Officers living quarters speaking softly into her voice recorder, antar takes out a small white crystal and waves it over the entire body of the dead crew member.

"Yydryl, please maintain temps in this living quarter at 6.1 degree's Celsius until further notice."

Placing the crystal back into her side pouch as she rose slowly antar closed her eyes and placed her right palm facing up at breast level and the left down and slightly lower and waved it over the lifeless form.

"As I feel the energy signature on the departed spirit, there is most certainly a resonance of struggle that happened moments before death."

"Yydryl, inform me immediately upon the Captains arrival."

"Yes Doctor", came the soft female voice of the ships computer system.

Reaching into the pouch once more she retrieved a small cylinder with two small creatures to gather a sample of the exposed brain tissue for examination later back at the Recovery Bay.



Slipping one of the two into the area of the spongy gelatinous exposed matter and retrieving a sample, she quickly exited the room.

Neonthtu's comm unit chirped again, causing him to jump. He swore, loudly, and hoped he could eventually get used to that.

After receiving the Captain's orders, he sent a squad to Sick Bay with orders to find and put a 'protective' guard on the doctor. If somebody was running wild in the Penelope punching holes in people, he wanted to make sure the Doc wasn't one of the ones that got perforated. They were probably going to need the Chief Medical Officer shortly. He further instructed the squad that should they not find the doctor in sick bay, the were to start pounding hell out of doors from there outward until they did find him.

Almost as an afterthought, he sent another squad to reinforce the guard at the entry to the bridge. Most of the officers were there, dealing with this crisis, and wouldn't THAT just be a pretty target for an assasin? Neno wasn't about to issue general orders to bodyguard officers yet, though. He could cover his actions so far under the general heading of the current troubles.

He finalized his current round of orders with " Everybody watch your six, and your buddy's six. We got trouble aplenty afoot. Nenothtu out"



[edit on 2009/3/23 by nenothtu]

"Lieutenant who has been murdered." I asked

The Lieutenant was anxious, I could tell he wanted to find whoever did this. This sort of thing does not happen on a Federation Starship. The Lieutenant wanted revenge.

The Lieutenant responded Ensign Fooks sir, a plasma burn was found on his back.

"What!? Are you absolutely positive?" I was shocked.

"Yes sir. I saw it with my own eyes, Ensign Fooks is dead, is there a problem?" The lieutenant responded confused.

"Where was this murder, lieutenant?" Studious asked. This was starting to worry him.

"The storage bay sir. Storage compartment 4A131 to be exact. Are you alright? It looks like you've seen a ghost." The Lietenant asked concerned about the Colonel.

"That's....That's impossible. I was on the bridge not 2 minutes ago. Fooks was alive, I was there." Studious became concerned. He had read Fooks profile after the run in with Nenothtu and knew what the bridge crew members looked like. He was sure he had seen him, Fooks had been on the bridge.

Studious recalled his scouting walk down the halls just after he had been assigned to the Penelope. He remembered that it would take far longer than that to get halfway across the ship. It was just not possible. Studious relived in his mind what had just happened, so he could be sure.

1. I entered the bridge and Fooks was among the staff there.

2. I recommended a course of action to the captain.

3. Then the attack began, but Fooks was still there.

4. I left the bridge ran not 10 feet and the Lieutenant came up and told me there was a murder.

How could Fooks have gotten halfway across the ship been murdered, then been found by the Marines. Then you have to give those Marines enough time to get halfway back across the ship near the bridge so I could meet them as I ran out.

Just then the captain came on, yelling in the earpiece. This was nothing new, after all Studious had disobeyed orders before. Luckily experience made Studious set his earpiece volume on low.

Touching the earpiece with his right hand he asked the Captain.

"Captain, I trust Fooks is not on the bridge. He's the one who has been murdered."

"You and I both know he was alive and on the bridge not more than 2 minutes ago, now he is dead in the storage bay."

"As this is not possible, our memories may have been altered."

"Sir, with all due respect I suggest the order to board the Nimitz be rescinded."

"Oh and Captain, where is the Doctor I think we are going to need him."


[edit on 23-3-2009 by Studious]

[edit on 23-3-2009 by Studious]

Originally posted by Studious
"Sir, with all due respect I suggest the order to board the Nimitz be rescinded."

"Oh and Captain, where is the Doctor I think we are going to need him."
[edit on 23-3-2009 by Studious]

"Dammit Colonel. The only other course of action is to disable the Nimitz and sit here with it while the rest of all of Alpha Centauri comes after us. Is that what you suggest? Either prepare your boarding parties or I'll have someone else do it."

"I don't know where the doctor is. Security is searching for him now. No one has seen or heard from him since we left Earth."

Luder didn't like getting confrontational with his senior officers, but the current situation warranted no room for questions. Either the Nimitz had to be boarded or abandoned and as he knew nothing of the fate of the normal crew on board, he couldn't just destroy the Nimitz.

Luder thought a bit longer. Wait. We have special ops marines on board right?

"Colonel Studious. If you aren't willing to launch full boarding force, then prepare a force of specops marines and send them over to get control of that ship. Do you understand? The end result of this is going to be the control of the USS Nimitz. We can not afford to settle for less."

[edit on 23-3-2009 by mf_luder]

[edit on 23-3-2009 by mf_luder]

[edit on 23-3-2009 by mf_luder]

Originally posted by mf_luder
"I don't know where the doctor is. Security is searching for him now. No one has seen or heard from him since we left Earth."

Hearing that scared Studious. The Doctor is gone. Our doctor disappears and we have mysterious disappearing crewman. Without a doctor it looks like we are going to be sitting ducks for whatever is causing our memory loss.

Studious thought to himself:

"Strange the captain had not mentioned Fooks. Did he even remember who Fooks was. Perhaps the effects were worse than I thought."

Originally posted by mf_luder
"Colonel Studious. If you aren't willing to launch full boarding force, then prepare a force of specops marines and send them over to get control of that ship. Do you understand? The end result of this is going to be the control of the USS Nimitz. We can not afford to settle for less."

I had read the file. The Nimitz's captain Theresa Jackson had been close to mf_luder. I could tell he would not, could not wait for action. I knew what he was feeling. I...

The Colonel steadied himself. Then said.

"Lieutenant Jones you have command of the Marines on the ship I am taking a special ops team of Marines over to the Nimitz. When I come back I expect her spit shined."

"Yes..... sir." The Lieutenant was confused. The Colonel looked as if he was going to have to be dragged off the ship and then, he just totally changed.

As Studious ran to the Launch bay for the drop ships he radioed to the captain.

"I am heading out with the spec ops Marines but you have to promise me one thing.... When I get back this ship had better not be full of forgetful Centaurian drones."


[edit on 23-3-2009 by Studious]

[edit on 23-3-2009 by Studious]

Originally posted by mf_luder

"Seeker, you may open fire on the Nimitz. Aim for the shield generators and weapons control modules, we want to keep her and her crew in one piece as best as possible. There may still be loyal Federation crew aboard."

There was no stopping it. Once unleashed, Seeker diverted focus from the flimsy Centaurian triangles, of which only two remained. As the Penelope maneuvered around to begin a boarding sweep, Seeker make a split-second cold calculation and released a Quantum Buster destructor missile into the cloud of enemy fighters.

It detonated in an area which would have maximum enemy causalities and minimum friendly fire, but some of Penelope's fighters were consumed as the QB ignited into a hyper-intense ball of plasma kilometers in width.

With a hunter's clarity, Seeker opened fire on the Nimitz with a vengeance.

As Penelope pulled in close so boarding operations could commence, Seeker selected a desirable combat strategy.

The distance was at perfect for the plasma lances and grapeshot, the firing of which began to reverberate throughout the cabin.

Broadsides boomed and grapeshot speckled the Nimitz, it's shields weakening by the second.

Something from the bridge's chatter caught Seeker's ear. There had been a murder aboard the Penelope. Mind-altering agents or possibly a new type of drone warfare was proposed as the culprit.

Analyzing the information at hand faster than any AI ever had, Seeker's enhanced neural network took over his conscious mind.

[execute order: Adamant Resolve]

[concurrence]

The Penelope could not be lost. His creators back on Earth had realized this and programmed Seeker to take appropriate action to protect the Penelope, with or without the Captains orders. If it were to come into enemy hands, Earth could literally be compromised by the information on board.

No crewmember from the Nimitz could be allowed aboard the Penelope, lest some new and unknown form of warfare could capture her.

Emotionless and cold, Seeker launched a full rack of five Luminal torpedoes at the Nimitz's reactor core.

Each in succession pounded the Nimitz's shields mercilessly. The fourth and missile made it past the shields and was vaporized on the enemy ship's hull. The fifth stuck in exactly the same place one second later.

It burned through the hull at 9/10 the speed of light and ruptured the carrier's reactor cluster.

The explosion was immense. The Nimitz disintegrated into particulate matter from within and all fighters, friendly and otherwise were obliterated.

The Penelope's shields shouldered the blast enough to keep the ship from being consumed as well, but some damage was expected.

[Terminate Order: Adamant Resolve]

Seeker reverted to standby to wait for the remaining triangles to close to range.

Luder came out of his station and stormed over to the weapons "chamber." He yanked the connections from their emergency release on the backside of the pod and spun it around facing him.

"YOU JUST KILLED OUR OWN PEOPLE!" He yelled. Luder let go of the edge of the chamber and slowly walked over to the tactical readouts.

Everything was gone. Except the 24 triangles still coming in from AC 1.

All 72 fighters from the Penelope were gone, as well as the Nimitz and the triangles from before.

What the hell did Seeker just launch?

"How can I explain this to Earth command? How?" Luder asked, not really expecting an answer.

"We were in the middle of boarding....... Oh Christ." Luder turned to the communications relay.

"Colonel Studious, are you still on board? Please respond. Colonel Studious, if you are on board, please respond at once."

Originally posted by mf_luder
"Colonel Studious, are you still on board? Please respond. Colonel Studious, if you are on board, please respond at once."

Colonel Studious awoke slowly with something ringing in his ear. Wait, that was not ringing it was the earpiece. He reached his hand up to respond but it was broken. As he pulled his hand away it felt wet. He looked but could barely see it in the darkness. Then light from the stars outside flashed for an instant, and a glimmer of light entered into the cockpit. His hand shimmered......it was blood.

The spec ops Marine dropship had been severely damaged by the Heavy Destructor Missile Propulsion Pod or "Quantum Buster." It knocked out every system including life support on the small craft. Colonel Studious had been knocked unconscious in the blast.

As Studious got up he looked around the small now dark quarters of the dropship. It was smaller than the normal 50 man size dropship each spec ops craft only carried 5 men and 2 crew. Fitting the "Light, Fast, Silent" motto of the spec ops. The bloodied Colonel looked around and checked each of the five man team for signs of life. They were all dead.

The Colonel staggered over to the pilot and co-pilot. The co-pilot was unconscious and barely had a pulse.

Studious thought to himself "Great, this is the perfect time to have no doctor."

The co-pilot soon started to crash however. The Colonel rushed to get the defibrillator on board only to find it broken. Studious gave the co-pilot CPR for 12 minutes but the man was too far gone. This cold alone man saw a small piece of paper held in the co-pilot's hand, he had not noticed it before but it was a picture of a woman. The paper was signed "Your dearest, Evelyn."

The Colonel sat down in the cockpit section, and said to himself "Why Captain, Why?"

Studious sat for a moment in the silence. This was silence not total silence, but Studious realized that it did not always mean comfort. He was alone, so alone. Like he had been...

His mind drifted off for a moment. He was losing consciousness again. As he slumped onto the floor he heard a voice. This voice sweetly said "Get up." "C'mon, get up." As Studious opened his weary eyes he thought he saw something, a familiar silhouette. As soon as he thought that however, it was gone.

Climbing up Studious looked out the window.

"By God, No." Pieces of the fighters from both the Nimitz and the Penelope floated by. Studious read as one floated by "Ct. John Walters" The piece tilted and The Colonel read the nose art which read "Rookie First Class."

Studious looked down unable to comprehend what had just happened.

Something then caught Studious' eye. It was a glimmering piece of the Nimitz's reactor cluster. Studious dropped to his knees and roared into the void "OUR MEN ARE NOT TOOLS."

After a moment Studious gathered himself and set about making repairs in the cold, dark space each breath harder than the last.


[edit on 23-3-2009 by Studious]

Luder shook his head and stared off into the wall. He stayed that way for a couple of minutes, not saying much.

The chrono on the screens displayed 15 minutes until the 24 triangles from AC 1 arrived. Luder blinked and turned, facing Seeker.

"I can understand the protection of our vessel being paramount, but at what cost? We weren't even in danger of being taken, Seeker. We had taken on no boarders, the damage to our shields and weapons was minimal, we were winning that fight, for God's sake. Not only are we out an ENTIRE WING of starfighters AND pilots, but we lost our marine commander out there as well." Luder flopped down into the command station.

"Lieutenant Commander Varlas, run a sweep of the debris outside the ship and see if by some chance there are any survivors - any...." The science officer acknowledged and turned to his instruments.

While Luder waited on the science report, he turned back to Seeker.

"You are an enhanced man, Seeker. You are more in tune with machines than anyone on this ship, but inside you are still a MAN. You have to have feelings and desires all of your own. You have to be able to discern when is the right time to carry out such protocol, you have concious choices to make and the ability to determine whether those choices are moral and right. I can't have you blowing our people out of the void left and right because of a hidden subroutine from Earth Command."

"Sir!" Varlas' voice came from the science station.

"What is it, commander?" Luder rose.

"I'm picking up one damaged drop ship with three, no - two life forms aboard. It may be Colonel Studious' drop ship."

Luder picked up his communications relay.

Engineering, prepare a shuttle for rescue and haul the damaged drop ship off our port bow back into the launch bays. On the double men, we are running out of time.

He looked back up at Seeker and thought for a long time.

"You can plug back in. But in the future watch what you're doing or I'll have to find a new weapons officer."

Luder watched the chrono.

12 minutes.

Jesus, what a way to get back into the nav business.

An enhancer in control of the most deadly weapons system ever known to humankind, a disobedient marine officer questioning every order, and his nav partner and pilot murdered. Sadly, this was actually NOT the worst start to a mission he'd ever personally seen. No time to think about the past now though, he'd rather turn his focus on making sure there's a future.

Captain, WhiteRabbit requesting permission to assume the responsibilities formally held by Ensign Fooks.

This mission may just turn out to be a lot more fun than he'd have wagered it would be.