The First Duty

[Hiver]

Done.

I was finished.

Despite the general tension I felt because Shrans trial and the general media blackout from it, I couldn't help but feel satisfaction of being complete once more. My interior were even complete which have to be the first time that happened when leaving the construction hangar.

The delays on the important parts were responsible for that.

Smiling up at my sky blue hull with white lines along the edges, I couldn't help but feel good as I crossed my arms of my new avatar.

New hull, new avatar. New beginnings.

I'm the LCU 'Vacuum Turbulence', Vanessa for short. The name was a bit aggressive for a LCU, especially a class only armed with a pair of forward facing pulse phasers, a single rear phaser emitter and a single forward photon torpedo launcher that doubled as a probe launcher.

But I used to be a Warship and some habits were hard to break and I did have a cloaking device.

"Looking good there," Love transmitted to me, "Want to get out into the void?"

"Very much so," I agreed, "Can't wait to get to work. I still need a crew though, anyone that's been expressing interest?"

"There is," the larger ship answered, "I'll transfer their files and you can do interviews. But there is the matter of the work…"

I frowned at the closest wall, "What about it?"

"We don't need more ships examining this world, I would like to assign you other duties if possible."

"I'm a planetary survey vessel!?"

"There are a lot of ships here already, the smaller ships, including you, Ivy and the other smaller science vessels are needed for scouting roles. We can no longer rely on New Jupiter, we need a system of our own, shipyards, stations."

I dumped a file with a map of this system into the com channel to her.

"It's not ours, Vanessa," she countered, "It belong to the locals and while we are going to put a station in orbit, it will belong to them once they are ready. We can't just put up shipyards here."

She had a point there.

"…Very well," I agreed, speaking out loud with my avatar for the first time, "Where do you want me?"

"My idea was to team you and 'Random Encounter' up along with sending a long a couple of my ROU's for extra protection. As for where to go, that'd be up to you and Ivy, you have the same maps as everyone else."

Pursing my lips, I nodded and walked up my ramp before raising and locking it, "Very well. I'll talk it over with 'Random Encounter', Send me the personnel files of the people wanting to be my crew."

"Done. Opening hangar bay doors."

Disconnecting the magnetic locks of my landing gears, I floated in the middle of the hangar as I retracted them.

A small puff of thrusters and I slowly floated forward through the forcefield, leaving the heavy pressure on my hull from the air behind for clean vacuum. A puff of my forward thrusters brought me to a halt well short of the construction efforts ahead of me before a puff of my dorsal thrusters and I started to sink down through the hangar until I felt solar radiation on my hull.

Clear views of the universe once more with my own sensors.

Another puff of thruster power and I were fully clear of Love's main hangar and I ignited my impulse drive, accelerating away, slowly turning the power up.

Flying again. I was finally flying again.

…But somehow it didn't feel as nice as it used to. I kept thinking about Shran and what were going on there and how I just didn't know anything about it. They weren't releasing any information about it.

Doing a three second warp jump, I tested my warpdrive before banking around and jumping back to the planet and fleet, sinking out of orbit, the first significant wisps of atmosphere touching my hull as I sunk deeper and deeper, a plume of plasma forming before me as I cut through the clouds of dust and ash.

As I sunk lower, the clouds rose above me and my speed dropped enough to let the plasma bleed away into a supersonic cone through the storm below, electrical activity lashing the ground and clouds.

Supervolcano ahead, locking targets.

Going into a roll, I locked onto a pair of air bourn multi ton rocks I fired twice, my pulse phasers reaching out with a single pulse each and blowing them to dust and plasma.

Flashing past, I scanned the massive crater of the super volcano below, very little remained of the Klingon vessel that did the damage. Not that I was surprised after a warpcore breech followed by a Starfleet vessel collecting as much of what little debris that remained.
Lightning crashed, crawling across my hull and I mentally cringed. Too many of those would cause discolorations in the paintjob.

Raising shields, I started to climb. Nothing more to do here, this would have to be enough of a test flight for now, I still needed to interview for my new crew positions.

Climbing above the clouds, I held altitude for a moment just above the cloud layer. Say what you want of everything that's going on, but all this atmospheric dust sure made for beautiful sunsets.

A couple of second later, I pulled up and went to full impulse towards 'I Love You Too' as I cleared the atmosphere.



AN// Unbetaed.

 

[Hiver]

"So why did you decide to stay with Love when the Fleet broke away from the Federation, Professor?"

Professor Sh'totras Daniels crossed her arms, her antennae slowly moving, "I have worked all my life on my career," she finally answered, "I never joined Starfleet, they don't have the monopoly on space exploration and I wanted freedom in what I studied. That's how I met my husband. When I lost him in the War, I got interested in Jovians and decided to move to a Jovian vessel. I wanted to see if there was…" she trailed off.

"See if we were dangerous," I filled in for her, sipping the tea in my cup.

"…Yes," she admitted, "What I saw had nothing to do with the Berserkers. You are nothing like them, you're…" she said before she frowned at her own cup, antennae slowly moving, "…Almost more Federation than the Federation. When 'Love' announced what you had done and why, I decided to apply for citizenship instead of taking the offer of staying as a passenger until I could leave. What we are doing here is a good thing, no matter what Federation law says. It's worth it."

I nodded, "And you want to be part of my crew now?"

"I do. My specialities are astrogeology and xenobiology, exactly what you would need onboard of a planetary research vessel."

"Lots of that kind of work needed here too."

She nodded in agreement, "Yes and I would love to be involved in it. But there is also going to be a lot more people here and you are going to need an astrogeologist and possibly even a xenobiologist."

"I do need both, if you could fill both roles, it would be a great help," I admitted, "But you need to be aware that I'm a very small ship and the only real holodeck onboard doubles as main lab/emergency bridge module/meeting room. I'm cramped and uncomfortable. While there are going to be personal quarters and no sharing will be needed, the rooms are three times two times two meters. Recreational spaces would be limited."

The only reason I could even get away with that much was that I didn't actually need a crew at all and as such could waste space normally needed for things like engineers.

That got a smile from her, "My husband and I used to work out of a modified runabout. I'm not unfamiliar with living in cramped spaces for extended periods of time."

"Thank you, I'll let you know what I decide?"

So far, she was by far the best candidate.

"Thank you for your time, Ship," she answered and got up, putting her cup down and headed out, already reaching for her PADD.

Before I could signal the next person, I received a signal through the subspace relay network. It carried Shran's ID code.

I instantly opened the channel, "Shran!"

He shifted his antennae in question, "…Velvet?"

"Oh… new avatar, sorry. Last one didn't have the best memories, personal name is Vanessa now," I explained.

Shran nodded, "You have a new ship then?"

I smiled a bit at him as I nodded, "I'm a Gust class LCU now. Tiny, but it seems like a good class. But enough of that! What's going on, how are you!?"

His antennae shifted and he shook his head, "Trial is over."

"I didn't hear that."

"It just ended a couple of hours ago," he explained, "News doesn't seem to have spread yet then."

"And!?"

He sighed, "In short, guilty on all charges. Dismissed from Starfleet service."

"That's it?"

Shran nodded, "That's it. While they didn't exactly agree, they understood it was a difficult call. No jail time, but I'm barred from ever serving on a Starfleet vessel again. I'm lucky the judge refused to get political about things."

"That's good," I agreed with a sigh, "But I'm still sorry. You loved being in Starfleet."

"I did," he agreed and sighed, crossing his arms, "But worth it. Rachel is pissed though."

"…She would be."

"Pissed enough to resign," he said only to be interrupted from off screen,

"Damn right I was!"

I couldn't help but smile at that. Rachel was one of the nicest people I knew, but she was also one of the most stubborn people I knew. Once she got an idea in her head, it was almost impossible to change her mind.

If she wasn't so nice and meant so well, it would have been really annoying.

"Anyway," Shran continued, "I was wondering if you could come pick us up?"

"Of course! You are still at Starbase 23? Wait, can I even go there without being arrested?"

Rachel moved up next to him and into the pickup of the screen, "We are and you can, it was all on Shran. Oh, you're a redhead now!"

"I am," I confirmed with a smile, "I can be there in a week. If you are sure of that, I…I'm not entirely sure of the legality of a Federation citizen serving on an Alliance vessel. That still seems to be a bit up in the air."

Shran shook his head, "Technically, no different than a federation citizen serving on a Ferengi vessel, at least for now. If they do make something of it, we'll deal with that then. And yes, I was the Captain, it was my call. But check with 23 just to be sure."

Nodding, "Okay, I'll depart the system in thirty minutes, ETA six days, five hours."

"Fly safe, Ship."



AN// Many thanks to Zcuron for betaing this section.

 

[Hiver]

I dropped out of Warp well outside of Starbase 23's tachyon grid, just watching for several long moments with passive sensors.

Finally I dropped my cloak and opened a channel, "Starbase, LCU 'Vacuum Turbulence' requesting permission to dock."

R'rrk accepted the connection and projected his image to me, "Permission denied, 'Vacuum Turbulence'. There is a current docking ban on Alliance ships in place."

"Oh."

"Yeah, oh," he answered, one ear flicking, "Considering what's going on, it's not that strange. In fact, you should be lucky there isn't an arrest order out on you."

I frowned at his image, "There are more things going on?"

"You don't know? Tellar left the Federation over this and took a dozen minor members with them."

"What? They actually did it? Those idiots."

"Those idiots have a good point in this case. Leaving might be stupid, but it sure made the rest of the Federation sit up and pay attention to us," he said and crossed his arms, "As in 'wait, exactly how much power do Jovians actually have?'"

"…Well, we control the part of Starfleet that actually matters and most of the antimatter warheads…"

That got me a flat look, "We do indeed. Hence their worry. Other than the paranoid anti AI factions before and those telepaths that killed themselves, nobody seemed to really worry about it overly much outside of some politicians. Tellar leaving over it though caused the general population to pay attention in a way the anti AI movements never did… and they are capitalizing on it hard. The fact that it was to help people helps though, and the majority of the population seems to be cheering you guys on."

I shook my head, "…And what exactly is the plan here? Try to ban AI? Forget Berserker Remnants, the Dominion are literally drooling at that thought."

He sighed, "I don't know, but it won't be good and more than likely the Alliance may be thrown into fire over it. There is talk about declaring you an illegal organization."

"We aren't! There was a legal vote; an internal issue to the Jovian Republic! We aren't Federation members," I said and then smiled at him, "In fact… they can't interfere. Prime Directive. Starfleet is not to interfere in the local politics of non-federation species. Which we now are."

"Yeah, I'm sure that argument would go over well," he grumbled before he shrugged, "I didn't say they were winning. Just that some are shouting about it."

"What about Betazed?"

R'rrk shook his head, "They are staying. They weren't big fans, but they weren't going to throw a fit over helping people. Very empathic people the Betazoids."

I rolled my eyes at that, "Very funny. Well, you know why I'm here. If I can't dock, can I move into transporter range?"

He shook his head again, "Sorry, can't allow you past the tachyon grid. Your passengers know you are here and are on their way to board a shuttle right now. They'll be with you in half an hour or so."

"Thanks."

On a hunch, I ran a tachyon sweep all around myself. The beams lit up three shapes in space, there were three ROU's around me in triangle formation.

"…Station?"

"Protocol and you know it. Potentially hostile vessels are to be kept covered in case they pose a threat to station security."

"Potentially hostile!?"

"That's how the Alliance of Independent Ships are classified by Starfleet. Not saying I like it, just that I'm following protocol."

I raised an eyebrow at him, "…I'm basically an oversized runabout. Three ROU's? Really?"

He just shrugged and closed the channel as the ROU's decloaked. While their shields were up, their weapons were offline.

Two of them peeled off and the third one moved up to float next to me, doing a 'waggle her wings' in greeting. She didn't say anything, but she didn't run active scans on me either. She just floated there.

I proceeded to ignore her in turn after wiggling my wings back at her as I waited for the shuttlecraft. I didn't need to wait for that long, as soon a class two shuttle exited from the station and made its way towards me.

Huh, there were four lifeforms onboard. I expected three, Shran, Rachel, and Porthos, her dog.

Who was the fourth?

The shuttle sidled up to my side and flipped around to press against my hull before I connected, opening the airlock, waiting inside with my avatar.

The first person I saw was Shran as he walked out of the shuttle, carrying two sets of bags, "Velv… Vanessa," he corrected himself before he smiled, "Looking good."

"Thank you," I answered and quickly hugged him, causing him to drop the bags, "Glad you are back."

"Thanks, Ship," he answered and hugged back before letting go. I quickly moved to hug the next person as Rachel walked out of the shuttle.

"Doing okay?" I asked as I hugged her tight.

Rachel nodded and let go, "And you?"

"Better," I admitted, "Knowing none of you are in danger anymore helps a lot. Good to see you again."

"Good to see you too. Have a surprise for you!"

"Hmm?"

"Ship," K'K'L'r't said and nodded as thy stopped just short of my airlock, "Permission to come onboard?"

I blinked at thyd, "K'K'L'r't, what are you doing here? Of course, come onboard."

Thy licked thyd lower left compound eye, "I do not agree with Starfleet's decision. I talked the matter over with Mother and got permission to resign from Starfleet. I decided that I wished to continue working for this Ship, if you would allow me to."

"Of course!" I said with a smile and stepped up to hug the big arthropod. Most people would think Troktians would be cold and hard, but they are warm-blooded and warmer than most other species.

All those arms give best hugs too even if their exoskeletons are on the hard side.



AN// Many thanks to Zcuron, for betaing this section.

 

[Hiver]

Shran looked around the small quarters, "…Honestly, I expected worse. For such a small vessel, this isn't bad at all."

Rachel nodded in agreement and let Porthos out of his cage, "Seemed smaller on the outside."

"I'm bigger on the inside," I teased from the doorway, my arms crossed with a grin.

"…What, really?"

"Well, no," I admitted playing with my braided hair, "It just seems like that because the majority of my systems aren't really accessible by the crew. A lot of it is squeezed in where it's too cramped for anyone but a small maintenance drone. Only main engineering is really accessible at all but even that's not really meant to be manned."

Rachel frowned and then nodded, "I did wonder how you managed to get all the labs and sensors into a hull this small."

I half shrugged, "A lot of room in a Ship is to make it possible for the crew to reach stuff. I have like seventy percent of the science capability of a Nova class while being tiny."

Shran sat down and bounced on the bed before he nodded, "Not bad at all," before he got up again, "Let's see the bridge."

"No bridge."

He looked at me, antennae moving slowly, "…No bridge?"

"Sorry, all superfluous spaces had to be cut to maximise available space," I said, "But during flight, Lab One can serve double duty because of its hard hologram emitters."

Shran nodded, "Okay then. So…"

"Towards the bow of my hull, doors are clearly marked," I answered and knelt down, giving Porthos a quick scratch behind the ears before getting up again, "I'll go check on K'K'L'r't, see if thy has all thy need."

Leaving Shran and Rachel to explore(which admittedly shouldn't take long), I walked a couple of rooms further down to peek inside, "K'K'L'r't? How's it looking?"

"Bit small, Ship."

I smiled sadly, "Sorry, I'm afraid I wasn't really build for Troktians."

Thy bobbed thyd head, "It is fine, Ship," thy said and shifted a bit, "I am used to handling the spaces of smaller species."

I nodded, "If I knew you were coming I could have reconfigured the furniture for a more comfortable configuration at least. It's not a very big job."

"It is perfectly all right, Ship," thy said and looked at the bed, "Remove the sleeping furniture and move the storage compartment to above. Remove further furniture. I will require a sleeping rock."

Smiling at thy, I nodded again, "I'll get it all fixed up for you. It'll take a couple of hours, but I'll widen the door for you too."

"My appreciation, Ship."

"Please, Vanessa."

"Vanessa, I will try, but an honorific feels more… comfortable," thy agreed with a nod and then turned to pick thyd belongings up to leave the quarters to give my drones room to work.

Shran was on the 'bridge' and we were already discussing ship capabilities there. K'K'L'r't moved to look around so I took my avatar and moved towards engineering where I had already let Rachel inside.

"What do you think?" I asked as I walked in through the door.

"You weren't kidding when you said cramped," she answered and glanced at my avatar, "I can't help but notice you went with another SPC."

Crossing my arms, I nodded and leaned against the wall next to the door, "Told you. And yeah, we had the specs and it's a lot easier to replicate than a warpcore… as in, you can actually replicate all the parts, no need for expensive manufacture."

Rachel nodded and tapped up some information on one of the wall consoles, "…Is there really a need for engineers here?"

I smiled at her, "There is, the optimal crew compliment of this configuration of the Gust class asks for two security and two engineers to go along with the science personnel. Granted, a lot of the work wouldn't be crawling around Jefferies tubes, but there is work to be done. Especially during a planetary survey."

She looked thoughtful at the singularity pulse core, "I suspect there would be a lot of free time in between though."

"I would recommend a hobby," I agreed, "But… nothing says that you need to stay aboard me, you know."

She rolled her eyes at that, "Forget it, you need a good engineer and you know it."

"I do," I said and then caught Porthos as he ran inside in search of his owner. Picking up the beagle, I scratched behind his ears, "I would love if you and K'K'L'r't would like those positions."

Rachel smiled and walked up to pet her dog, "Well, Shran and I are with you. I suspect Clicky is too. What's the plan?"

"Return to 'I Love You Too' and see about getting a full crew," I explained and handed her semi-symbiotic lifeform over to my semi-symbiotic lifeform, "Our mission then is to head out alongside 'Random Encounter' and look for a new home system for the Alliance."

"…Big job," Rachel commented and gave Porthos a cuddle before putting him down outside the door to engineering and stepping out as well, "Will be good to see Ajan again."

"He's doing well," I said and followed her, closing the door behind us, "I think he misses you guys though."

"…It's been a long time we were all together last."

"Mmm."




AN// Many thanks to FPSCanarussia for betaing this part.

 

[Hiver]

Shran and Rachels quarters suddenly got full sensor capacity back and Rachel relaxed back against the bed, resting her head against Shrans shoulder, "Ship?"

"Yes, Rachel?"

"What's our ETA to 'I Love You Too'?" she asked, sounding a bit sleepy.

"Five days, three hours, two minutes and four seconds, Rachel. Why do you ask?"

"…Thinking about what we are going to do then."

"Relax, love," Shran sighed and stroked her hair, "We'll find the rest of the crew and then we'll get to work finding a good system."

"Yeah."

He shifted to frown slightly at her, "What's wrong?"

"…Nothing."

Shran sighed and touched his antenna to her forehead, "Rachel. Please."

She smiled sadly at him, "It's just… it just hit me. We aren't… I wanted to be in Starfleet since I was five, Shran."

"I know," he said and stroked her hair, "We'll be alright."

"…I just feel kinda lost."

He nodded, "…Me too," he admitted quietly, "But we are still flying, there is still that horizon to reach for, the next thing to discover. It will take some adjustment, but…"

Rachel was quiet for a long moment, rolling over and cuddling back against him, "…Yeah," she finally said, "Just not sure how much work there is for us here."

"Vanessa?" Shran asked, glancing up at the ceiling.

"Right now, not much," I admitted, "But when we start to get to work, plenty. There is a reason the crew complement of the Gust class list two engineers and while I can cover those duties, efficiency would suffer. More eyes on matters help, as do more points of view. A lot of the 'day to day' work would be taken by my remotes, but a lot of the higher level work still need to be done."

Shran smiled and nuzzled at the back of her neck, "You know… the fun stuff."

She shivered, "T-there is that."

"As for your specialties, Shran," I continued, "While ship to ship tactical expertise would be of limited use…"

"You mean like on every ship for the least ten years?" he asked.

"…ground assistance and security is going to be very useful," I continued, ignoring his interruption, "As is both of your experience from Starfleet. Almost the entire rest of the crew will be scientists that have never served on a Starship before. There may be… well… some degree of herding needed at times."

Shran nodded, "See love? We'll be more than fine. We just need to get used to it."

Rachel sighed and rolled over, "…Think you may be right. Vanessa, privacy mode."

"Thank you, Rachel," I answered and quickly cut my sensors to their room. While it was good to see that my friends were doing better, I didn't want to see anything more.

Just basic life signs and atmospheric sensors already gave me more information than I really wanted to have.

But then again, it was just part of being a ship and I learned to ignore such things a decade ago.

Shifting course slightly to hit an area of thicker gas to feed my tanks, I scanned space all around. They were right though, this would take a lot of adjustments for everyone involved.

Technically, I could just talk things over with my crew, shift my course and just fly anywhere in the galaxy.

To be honest, I wasn't completely sure what to do with that kind of freedom. I have been told where to fly for my entire existence. Being able to just pick and go was…

It felt strange and if I was to be very honest with myself, I wasn't quite sure how to feel about it.

…It was nice, yes, but… very strange.

I did a small roll just because I could. Nobody would be yelling at me about it. Not that they did before unless you did it in a planetary orbit close to a Starbase where other people could see. Not very dignified.

I could roll as much as I wanted now.

I didn't need to follow Starfleet regulations when outside of a populated system. I could go as fast as I damned well pleased.

Warp 7.5 may be best for subspace, but I had a brand new ship that needed stretching out. Shifting some power around, I moved faster, the warp factor climbing further and further up.

The universe sang around me as I bent it to my will.

Warp Nine.

Warp Nine Point Two. Maximum speed for the Gust class. But that was the normal Gust class, not modified with a Singularity Point Core.

Raising the hertz of my SPC, I dumped more power into my warp drive.

Warp Nine Point Three.

Nine Point Four.

Holding steady at Nine Point Five. I had gone faster in the past, but that was as a much larger ship. Besides, these were brand new engines and I didn't want to overly push them quite yet. Let's just hold this for a couple of hours and then drop back down to normal cruising speed.

Maybe I should tell Rachel that the estimated time of arrival has been adjusted?

…It can wait a bit.

Spacetime sang for me.




AN// Many thanks to kalvasflam for betaing this section and just as big thanks once again for everyone else that's betaed all through this story. This is the last part for now, even if we are going to continue this universe later. Some of you will be happy with the next story, some of you, less so. Next story will be a continuation of New Beginnings. (MLP).

Thanks for reading everyone and I hope you enjoyed.

 

[Hiver]

Next part can be found here: The Next Generation (Star Trek)