AKuz
Been Better
- Location
- A Rising Tide of Horrors
- Pronouns
- She/Her
It's a treaty that apparently involves anime in some way! No idea how but some are mentioned in the text of the treaty for no reason
(The reason is that the prop peeps were NERDS)
To Boldly Go... (a Starfleet quest)
- Thread starter OneirosTheWriter
- Start date
- Sci-Fi
-
- Tags
- star trek exploration fully automated luxury gay space communism top level canon (canon) #hashtagcontent all-encompassing space amoeba cardassian boy bands cardassian magical girls darkest bureaucracy debate makes the qm cackle like palpatine hoh is an empire quest it has to be foreign infiltrators more ships ship happens singers delenda est starfleet this is not an empire quest ur waifu is collective?
It's a treaty that apparently involves anime in some way! No idea how but some are mentioned in the text of the treaty for no reason
(The reason is that the prop peeps were NERDS)
The Sotaw may be best courted as an established neutral. They could see economic benefit from middlemanning trade, and future diplomatic efforts with the RSE could be facilitated by them, in cases where direct talks don't work anyway. Literal neutral ground. I don't think a closer relationship should mean pushing them to affiliate status, and it should be pursued bilaterally with the Romulans.
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There's actually bear-people in TAS: Ursinoids.
Only I'd make them look more like @KnightDisciple 's art above
Only I'd make them look more like @KnightDisciple 's art above
AKuz
Been Better
- Location
- A Rising Tide of Horrors
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Maybe one of our snake pit write in option things should be "Talks with the Romulans and Sotaw to establish trade relations"? It would be a great way to help our defrosting of Romulus without pushing their freak out buttons too hard
As I said, making Tzenkethi and Sydraxian different names for the same species/polity is a nice elegant solution to that issue.
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- Location
- The Middle of the Howling Wilderness
Well, yeah, but we mostly focused on heading spinwards. If this were a game of Space Civ, the Cardassians would be bitching about the Federatpon player aggressively forward-settling him.
Nah, the Sheilakids are a different race. They're a species of goat-people from a desert planet notable for its low gravity and large number of deadly arachnids. (not to mention the predatory ursinoid animals that hunt by pouncing on their prey from the trees)
Tzenkethi have been seriously expanded on in STO:
The Tzenkethi Are Coming | Star Trek Online
Designing The Tzenkethi Starships | Star Trek Online
They seem kinda cool t b h
The Tzenkethi Are Coming | Star Trek Online
Designing The Tzenkethi Starships | Star Trek Online
They seem kinda cool t b h
KnightDisciple
Love God. Do Right. Fear No Man.
- Location
- Midwest, USA
Those look more like Wolf People than Bear People.There's actually bear-people in TAS: Ursinoids.
Only I'd make them look more like @KnightDisciple 's art above
- Location
- Patriarchova
Hmm. Remind me of krogans.
- Location
- Nova Scotia, Canada
We were talking a while back about needing to meet with the Romulans to discuss extending the Neutral Zone to account for the Gaen and our growth coreward. We could propose a deal at the next snakepit with the pacifists and have the Sotaw host it as a neutral party. We'd confirm that both sides would respect the Sotaw as a neutral party and fix the Neutral Zone growth issue in 1 deal. Sadly I doubt we can afford to do it for the next snakepit and probably not the one after that.
AKuz
Been Better
- Location
- A Rising Tide of Horrors
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Just as canon as TBG. And we don't have to shoe horn them in anywhere.
And I really don't want to set a president for STO narrative elements. Or at least not the constant "Bigger fish"inhabited of the storyline that is starting to annoy me.
I know a lot of players seem really worried about this, but I don't actually want to extend the Neutral Zone. The Neutral Zone is a relic of a war fought over 100 years ago. Our long term goal should be to do away with it and just share borders with the Romulans like we do with everyone else, not to expand it.
EDIT: This is different from negotiating areas of expansion from either side's borders, which I am happy to do. But I see no need to have a huge zone of space that neither side is allowed to enter.
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- Location
- USA
Potential minor races: Trill, Bolians, Denoblians are the three off the top of my head that show up multiple times.
They kinda look like some sick fuck in the Mass Effect universe created a Krogan/Yagh hybrid and then used a modified mass relay to shoot it into an alternate dimension.
I don't think they have to be shoehorned in anywhere - they could be another nice member of the Federation of Fear in addition to the Sydraxians. Although I do wonder how the Lecarre are going to copy them this time.
I'm more for ripping them off aesthetically. Most of the STO stuff doesn't even happen for another century so I'm not sure what narrative elements could be ripped off, if any.
Night
Widow Null
- Location
- Hoff
I'm perfectly fine with bringing in all the minor one-note races we can lay our hands on, because for the most part they're just a name and an appearance; enough to form some kind of base to start with, but still plenty of room left to be creative in.
I mean, that's what we've done with TBG's Orions more or less.
I mean, that's what we've done with TBG's Orions more or less.
- Location
- Patriarchova
Omake - Death of a Starfleet Oficer - Const
- Location
- unspecified
A/N As Ajam recently got the most awesome command in Starfleet, this seems like a good time to flesh out some of her adventures. Also, this is my first post, so I apologize for any noob mistakes.
There was a bang, and Maryam whirled in the captain's chair to see her science officer fall amidst a shower of sparks. She spun back to order her helmsman to go to warp, but he was slumped over his smoking control panel, his arms dangling limp. In two strides, Maryam was at his side, adrenaline making it easy to lift him off the panel. Fingers trembling, she punched in coordinates as fast as she could, ordering the ship to flee.
At least let me save my crew.
With a sputtering crackle, the panel went dead. Maryam's heart sank as the stink of smoke filled the air. The entire bridge crew lay still, and over the intercom, her engineering officer declared all systems dead. Maryam slammed her fist into the panel, cursing. On the viewscreen, the final torpedo grew to fill the screen as it neared, steadily, inevitably.
Maryam slumped into her chair, her teeth grinding.
Slowly, the red of emergency lighting faded to white, a soft hiss filling the air as fans activated to clear away the fake smoke. Wordlessly, the "dead" crew rose from their places and filed out of the simulation bridge through a broad doorway, and as they departed, a towering andorian walked in, his arms folded behind his back, snowy beard meticulously trimmed. Maryam scowled up at him from her seat, feeling betrayed. Instructor Th'rhaalrihr had been one of her favorite teachers. Didn't he understand how this bullshit simulation would look on her record? The explorer corps was so competitive nowadays, one black mark could be the difference between captaining an explorer someday or swabbing the decks on a soyuz.
"You seem angry, for a dead woman" he said.
"Permission to speak freely, sir," she said.
"Denied."
She bit back a torrent of arguments - about the unfairness of the test, about how nothing could realistically destroy a starship so quickly, about how she would have won the simulation if he hadn't designed it so poorly. Instead she swallowed hard and focused on keeping her hands from forming fists. The andorian pursed his lips.
"Are you familiar with Andorian poetry?"
"No sir."
"Then your poet, Homer, will have to do. From his Iliad - 'it is entirely seemly for a young man killed in battle to lie mangled by the bronze spear. In his death all things appear fair.' What do you make of that, cadet?"
"Entirely seemly? How in the- sir, with all respect, I can't tell you what I make of that without breaking decorum."
"I take it you disagree."
"Absolutely." Maryam stood, gesturing sharply around the bridge. "Everyone on my ship is dead. Same for the crew of the Kobayashi Maru. Nothing about this is 'fair' for anyone! Frankly, sir, I don't see what you or this test is trying to teach. Fatalism? Hopelessness? I can do without."
"The Kobayashi Maru teaches you how to die bravely, and with pride. Can you not see the need for such a test?"
"Look, this kind of doomsday scenario you've set up just isn't likely. I'm not saying I'll always be able to win, but there are always options. I'll be able to fight back, to save my crew, to escape - something. Your stupi- with all respect, sir, your unrepresentative, unhelpful test gave zero options, and now I've got a loss on my record! If you want to teach someone archaic principles about giving up, go find another cadet."
She stormed past him out of the simulation room, not bothering to ask to be dismissed.
=====
"Captain's Log, USS Courageous, Stardate 23187.3."
Maryam paused, grinning. Whenever she said those words, she couldn't keep the smile off her face. An entire excelsior, as beautiful as a mountain peak, all power and speed and adventure, all hers. The bridge crew bustled around her chair in their dance of perfect efficiency, every one of them explorer corps, the elite of Starfleet. Maryam covered her mouth before T'Pari, her vulcan comm officer, could catch her grinning like an idiot. She continued the log.
"The plan is to warp into the system's outer reaches at very low warp factor, launch shuttles which will get close to the station and transport over to gather details on the unusual module, then bring down the shields from within. My first officer, Commander sh'Sharthaan, will lead the infiltration team, joined by a set of special operatives from Starfleet Intelligence."
On the viewscreen, the Syndicate station was barely more than a speck in the distance, sliding through the scattered asteroid field that concealed the Courageous as well. It was a fitting backdrop for a covert mission. The black mountains of space rolled silently by, splitting the ghostly grey of the distant sun into shifting patterns of shadow and light. The smile faded from Maryam's lips, the knot of anxiety returning to her stomach. sh'Sharthaan and the intelligence spooks had actually taken the shuttles out more than an hour ago, and by now were no doubt trying to bring down the shields from within. It was the riskiest part of the mission. Maryam had offered to go in sh'Sharthaan's place, but the brave XO wouldn't hear of it, and now Maryam could do nothing but worry and wait, her fingers tapping nervously.
It wouldn't be so bad if Tabarec would stop pacing behind her. Ever since the intelligence personnel came aboard, the amarkian security chief had taken to hanging around the bridge - an implicit sign of distrust for what he termed "orders from outside the rightful command structure." Maryam had reassured him that, although their orders came from intelligence, she was sure they'd run the mission by Kahurangi first, but from the grimace on Tabarec's face, Maryam knew he wasn't convinced, and now the tap-tap-tap of his boots on the deck was compounding her own nerves. There was a feeling in the air that reminded her of climbing a cliff face, and feeling, for no reason in particular, that her safety harness was about to snap.
Tap-tap-tap went the boots. Maryam spun her chair and fixed the amarki with a frown. "Mr. Tabarec. Would you please stop-"
A noise interrupted her. No, not just a noise - it was so loud that it was an ache in the bones as well, in the flesh. A screaming pain in the skull. No captain could bear the shriek of her ship's hull twisting apart, nor the vibrations of its bones snapping that ran through Maryam's body. A captain's heart breaks with her ship.
A moment of weightlessness, and Maryam slammed into the deck behind her chair. She gasped, a warm metal taste gushing in her mouth. Bits of machinery skittered across the deck, sparks glowing in the blood red of the emergency lights. She felt the sting of shrapnel in her cheek, saw T'Pari staggering across the deck, blood gushing around a metal spike in her throat. Maryam shuddered. The entire left half of the bridge was roiling with smoke, flames devouring the comm station.
Maryam pulled herself up by the back of her chair, trying to conceal the tremor in her legs, trying to look anywhere but at the collapsing vulcan.
"Damage report," Maryam said. "Helm, damage report!"
But helmsman Michaels did not move. Maryam looked closer, and flinched when she saw the hole where shrapnel had blown through his skull. She ran to his station and leaned on it for support, fingers shaking as she called up the damage report. The result was a mess of flashing red on the screen, parts of the ship winking in and out of existence - a reflection of a dying computer system rather than the state of her hull, but more than enough to bring a lump to her throat. The only solid reading was that they were on impulse power without weapons or even shields. She punched up the external cameras, bringing a half-dozen views of the hull onscreen.
The port side of Courageous's saucer was a shredded ruin, gas and particles bleeding into space. The secondary hull was breached on every deck, and one nacelle spun lazily a dozen kilometers aft. Maryam ran back to her seat and pressed the intercom. With that level of damage, it would be a miracle if the warp core was intact.
"Engineering. Report. How is the warp core? Engineering. Engineering!"
She tried once more, panic in her voice, and then punched the command to eject the core. Anxiously, she looked back at the screen. The core was nowhere in sight, and from the ventral view of the secondary hull, the ejection port was blackened, almost melted-looking. Oh God. She pressed the intercom again, working to keep the tremor from her voice.
"This is captain Ajam speaking. We have a possible warp core damage with failed ejection. Proceed to the starboard escape pods immediately. Abandon ship. I repeat, abandon ship."
Maryam rubbed her forehead, her fingers coming away bloody. If the Syndicate picked up those pods, her crew would wish they had stayed to die with the warp core. She had to get a distress call out, but the comm station was ruined. She whirled, looking for anyone alive. Her yeoman, a boy barely into his twenties, stood frozen by the entrance, weeping. Maryam spoke to him, and when he didn't respond, she shook him, shouting,
"Get to the secondary bridge. Deck seventeen. Do you know how to send a distress call?"
He shook his head. She instructed him how, and he stumbled away, leaving Maryam alone with the dead. She turned back to the viewscreen and saw a pair of Syndicate-modified freighters closing in, each with a weapons blister grafted onto its back like the fin of a shark, tractor beams lancing out to snatch the first few escape pods from space. The strength went out of Maryam's legs. She collapsed into her chair, and this time, when she pressed the intercom, she couldn't keep the tremor from her voice.
"This is Captain Ajam. The Orion Syndicate is capturing our escape pods. In order to keep Courageous out of enemy hands, I am activating the self destruct sequence. Abandon ship or remain at your own discretion. I. . . recommend. . . remaining aboard."
She switched off the comm, flipped up the cover of the self destruct button, and, after a deep breath, pushed it.
"Computer, this is Captain Maryam Ajam of the Courageous. Internal sensors will verify that my senior officers are dead, and cannot input their codes."
"Acknowledged," the computer said. "Protocol 881 initiated. Awaiting Captain's code."
She blinked rapidly. A captain shouldn't cry on her bridge. She closed her eyes, breathing without sobbing, trying to envision Raelin, to imagine being with him on some lonely trail in the mountains, and forget the reek of burning wires and smoke.
Beside her, she heard the click of boots. She looked up, and through the smoke saw Tabarec at attention beside her chair, as stiff and composed as if they were on a routine mapping mission.
"I apologize for my lapse," he said. "I lost consciousness, but am now prepared to resume my duties."
Numbly, Maryam said. "We're self destructing."
"Excellent. By keeping Federation technology and crew out of Syndicate hands, you protect all our peoples. It is a worthy end we go to."
Through the thickening smoke, the blue tint to his skin made him look almost like Instructor Th'rhaalrihr. Maryam sighed.
"Ever read The Iliad?" she asked.
"I'm afraid not, Captain."
Maryam traced the rim of the destruct button with her finger, thinking. Finally, she said,
"I gave it a try once, as a favor to an instructor. Not really my thing. It glorified war over, well, everything, and all the characters would rather die than be dishonored."
"A fitting text to recall, at a time such as this," Tabarec said.
"Maybe. . . But I preferred The Odyssey. That one's about Odysseus and his crew, just trying to survive and get home, fighting astronomical odds, with even gods pitted against their survival."
She leaned forward, glaring at the Syndicate ships onscreen. "And you know how Odysseus survived?"
"Enlighten me."
"Deception. Lies, disguises, tricks, until his enemies couldn't trust their own eyes. And in the end, there was no noble death for Odysseus. He won."
"All very well, Captain," Tabarec said, "but may I remind you that we are running on impulse power against more maneuverable opponents? We cannot escape, and any attempt to ram the enemy, though a glorious sentiment, would be easily evaded before we got up to ramming speed."
Maryam crossed the bridge, lifted Michaels onto the ground, and took his place at the helm, cycling through cameras, familiarizing herself with the rocks tumbling around them.
"I need you to blow something up for me," Maryam said.
"Our weapons systems are-"
Maryam cut him off. "Something inside Courageous. Can you do that?"
". . . Yes captain."
"Good. Head to deck sixteen. I'll be on your communicator when you get there."
As he headed out, Maryam pressed the intercom. She guessed that there were boarding parties on Courageous by now, so she gave no hint of the change of plans, only asking that anyone who knew one end of a wrench from the other take a look at the warp core and work to eject it if damaged. Then she sat poised at the helm, waiting, every hair on end. Her comm beeped.
"Captain, I'm in position," Tabarec said.
"Set a couple hand phasers to overload and throw them into the starboard auxiliary impulse capacitors."
"As you command."
A minute later, a concussive thump raced through the hull, and Maryam rolled Courageous to port, putting an asteroid between her and the Syndicate ships. To the enemy, it would look like the death throes of a deteriorating hulk - no cause for alarm. The asteroid would slide out of the way again momentarily. Maryam smiled, predatory, and punched the impulse to maximum. Courageous shuddered in protest, a deep whine building in the thrum of the impulse engines.
Maryam braced herself, pulse rising. "One last dance, Courageous. Almost there."
Courageous gave her captain full impulse, rocketing toward the asteroid as the stony bulk tumbled aside. By the time the Syndicate saw her, she was barely two seconds from impact, and though she'd never thought herself a warrior, now, in the smouldering heat, surrounded by murdered comrades, she felt a war cry building in her chest. She unleashed it, a wordless scream, Courageous plummeting toward the foe.
She slammed into the first enemy with a thundering boom, plowing the first into the second, Maryam's hair flying in the g's of impact as she braced in her chair, blood flying off her face, out of her roaring mouth as explosions rocked the viewscreen, fragments of Syndicat hulls spinning in the shifting twilight of the asteroid field, air streaming from their wounds. Hands flying on the controls, Maryam drove all three ships into an onrushing rock, and with a final shattering crunch, they came to a stop, each ship drifting in a glittering cloud of its own rubble.
Maryam's roar ended. Sweat dripped down her face as she studied the viewscreen. One Syndicate vessel was dead, broken in half. The other limped away, its weapons blister crushed. Maryam shouted and pumped her fist. Swiftly, she lay in a course for the edge of the system. The Syndicate would be back with more ships, but if Starfleet arrived fast enough, there was a chance Courageous could be saved.
Maryam's comm beeped. It was Tabarec, his words interlaced with the hiss of phaser fire.
"Captain, Syndicate boarding parties are attempting to gain access to the bridge. I am holding them for the moment, but they are extremely numerous. I cannot last long."
Maryam's heart sank. "Is the secondary bridge secure?"
"Yes Captain, and the warp core has been ejected. May I advise-"
"-I know," Maryam said. "Don't worry. I'll do it."
If the boarding parties took the bridge controls, they could fly Courageous straight into the arms of Syndicate reinforcements. Since Maryam could not defend the bridge alone, both she and Tabarec knew that only one option remained. She made her way to the rear of the bridge, opened the weapons cabinet, and set all six phasers to overload. One by one, she placed them at the control panels, and felt a little reverent doing it, like she was laying flowers on a grave. Over the comm, to Tabarec, she said,
"I guess we got our noble death after all."
The amarki's voice was rough, fading. "I am sorry you could not make it home."
"At least there's hope for Courageous, and my crew."
A choking sound came over the comm as Maryam placed the final phaser on the captain's chair. Her chair. The overloading phasers were beginning to scream, higher and higher as they neared detonation, an awful chorus to herald her fast approaching immolation. She stood in the center of her bridge. She felt melancholy, or maybe it was peace. She'd done all she could.
Her comm beeped again - a female voice this time.
"Is this the Federation Captain? Listen. Your security team is dead, and we're coming up. If you cooperate, we'll sell you somewhere nice. Fight, and it's the highest bidder."
Maryam chuckled. "You're welcome to sell whatever bits of me you can scrape off the deck."
". . . What?"
Maryam clicked off her comm and dropped it. She didn't want to spend her last moments talking to Syndicate thugs. She wandered toward the viewscreen until it filled her vision, and all she could see was space. The Syndicate ship had paused a ways off, probably waiting to beam Maryam aboard once she was captured, but Maryam focused beyond, on the stars. Her craving to explore the stars had driven her to space, to the academy.
Maryam could almost hear the door of a simulation room sliding open behind her, the hum of fans beginning to clear synthetic smoke as the light shifted from emergency red to white. She imagined T'Pari, Michaels, and the rest rising to file out, and Th'rhaalrihr standing stiffly over her. Maryam mumbled into the screen,
"Well Instructor? Do all things appear fair?"
Death of a Starfleet Officer
There was a bang, and Maryam whirled in the captain's chair to see her science officer fall amidst a shower of sparks. She spun back to order her helmsman to go to warp, but he was slumped over his smoking control panel, his arms dangling limp. In two strides, Maryam was at his side, adrenaline making it easy to lift him off the panel. Fingers trembling, she punched in coordinates as fast as she could, ordering the ship to flee.
At least let me save my crew.
With a sputtering crackle, the panel went dead. Maryam's heart sank as the stink of smoke filled the air. The entire bridge crew lay still, and over the intercom, her engineering officer declared all systems dead. Maryam slammed her fist into the panel, cursing. On the viewscreen, the final torpedo grew to fill the screen as it neared, steadily, inevitably.
Maryam slumped into her chair, her teeth grinding.
Slowly, the red of emergency lighting faded to white, a soft hiss filling the air as fans activated to clear away the fake smoke. Wordlessly, the "dead" crew rose from their places and filed out of the simulation bridge through a broad doorway, and as they departed, a towering andorian walked in, his arms folded behind his back, snowy beard meticulously trimmed. Maryam scowled up at him from her seat, feeling betrayed. Instructor Th'rhaalrihr had been one of her favorite teachers. Didn't he understand how this bullshit simulation would look on her record? The explorer corps was so competitive nowadays, one black mark could be the difference between captaining an explorer someday or swabbing the decks on a soyuz.
"You seem angry, for a dead woman" he said.
"Permission to speak freely, sir," she said.
"Denied."
She bit back a torrent of arguments - about the unfairness of the test, about how nothing could realistically destroy a starship so quickly, about how she would have won the simulation if he hadn't designed it so poorly. Instead she swallowed hard and focused on keeping her hands from forming fists. The andorian pursed his lips.
"Are you familiar with Andorian poetry?"
"No sir."
"Then your poet, Homer, will have to do. From his Iliad - 'it is entirely seemly for a young man killed in battle to lie mangled by the bronze spear. In his death all things appear fair.' What do you make of that, cadet?"
"Entirely seemly? How in the- sir, with all respect, I can't tell you what I make of that without breaking decorum."
"I take it you disagree."
"Absolutely." Maryam stood, gesturing sharply around the bridge. "Everyone on my ship is dead. Same for the crew of the Kobayashi Maru. Nothing about this is 'fair' for anyone! Frankly, sir, I don't see what you or this test is trying to teach. Fatalism? Hopelessness? I can do without."
"The Kobayashi Maru teaches you how to die bravely, and with pride. Can you not see the need for such a test?"
"Look, this kind of doomsday scenario you've set up just isn't likely. I'm not saying I'll always be able to win, but there are always options. I'll be able to fight back, to save my crew, to escape - something. Your stupi- with all respect, sir, your unrepresentative, unhelpful test gave zero options, and now I've got a loss on my record! If you want to teach someone archaic principles about giving up, go find another cadet."
She stormed past him out of the simulation room, not bothering to ask to be dismissed.
=====
"Captain's Log, USS Courageous, Stardate 23187.3."
Maryam paused, grinning. Whenever she said those words, she couldn't keep the smile off her face. An entire excelsior, as beautiful as a mountain peak, all power and speed and adventure, all hers. The bridge crew bustled around her chair in their dance of perfect efficiency, every one of them explorer corps, the elite of Starfleet. Maryam covered her mouth before T'Pari, her vulcan comm officer, could catch her grinning like an idiot. She continued the log.
"The plan is to warp into the system's outer reaches at very low warp factor, launch shuttles which will get close to the station and transport over to gather details on the unusual module, then bring down the shields from within. My first officer, Commander sh'Sharthaan, will lead the infiltration team, joined by a set of special operatives from Starfleet Intelligence."
On the viewscreen, the Syndicate station was barely more than a speck in the distance, sliding through the scattered asteroid field that concealed the Courageous as well. It was a fitting backdrop for a covert mission. The black mountains of space rolled silently by, splitting the ghostly grey of the distant sun into shifting patterns of shadow and light. The smile faded from Maryam's lips, the knot of anxiety returning to her stomach. sh'Sharthaan and the intelligence spooks had actually taken the shuttles out more than an hour ago, and by now were no doubt trying to bring down the shields from within. It was the riskiest part of the mission. Maryam had offered to go in sh'Sharthaan's place, but the brave XO wouldn't hear of it, and now Maryam could do nothing but worry and wait, her fingers tapping nervously.
It wouldn't be so bad if Tabarec would stop pacing behind her. Ever since the intelligence personnel came aboard, the amarkian security chief had taken to hanging around the bridge - an implicit sign of distrust for what he termed "orders from outside the rightful command structure." Maryam had reassured him that, although their orders came from intelligence, she was sure they'd run the mission by Kahurangi first, but from the grimace on Tabarec's face, Maryam knew he wasn't convinced, and now the tap-tap-tap of his boots on the deck was compounding her own nerves. There was a feeling in the air that reminded her of climbing a cliff face, and feeling, for no reason in particular, that her safety harness was about to snap.
Tap-tap-tap went the boots. Maryam spun her chair and fixed the amarki with a frown. "Mr. Tabarec. Would you please stop-"
A noise interrupted her. No, not just a noise - it was so loud that it was an ache in the bones as well, in the flesh. A screaming pain in the skull. No captain could bear the shriek of her ship's hull twisting apart, nor the vibrations of its bones snapping that ran through Maryam's body. A captain's heart breaks with her ship.
A moment of weightlessness, and Maryam slammed into the deck behind her chair. She gasped, a warm metal taste gushing in her mouth. Bits of machinery skittered across the deck, sparks glowing in the blood red of the emergency lights. She felt the sting of shrapnel in her cheek, saw T'Pari staggering across the deck, blood gushing around a metal spike in her throat. Maryam shuddered. The entire left half of the bridge was roiling with smoke, flames devouring the comm station.
Maryam pulled herself up by the back of her chair, trying to conceal the tremor in her legs, trying to look anywhere but at the collapsing vulcan.
"Damage report," Maryam said. "Helm, damage report!"
But helmsman Michaels did not move. Maryam looked closer, and flinched when she saw the hole where shrapnel had blown through his skull. She ran to his station and leaned on it for support, fingers shaking as she called up the damage report. The result was a mess of flashing red on the screen, parts of the ship winking in and out of existence - a reflection of a dying computer system rather than the state of her hull, but more than enough to bring a lump to her throat. The only solid reading was that they were on impulse power without weapons or even shields. She punched up the external cameras, bringing a half-dozen views of the hull onscreen.
The port side of Courageous's saucer was a shredded ruin, gas and particles bleeding into space. The secondary hull was breached on every deck, and one nacelle spun lazily a dozen kilometers aft. Maryam ran back to her seat and pressed the intercom. With that level of damage, it would be a miracle if the warp core was intact.
"Engineering. Report. How is the warp core? Engineering. Engineering!"
She tried once more, panic in her voice, and then punched the command to eject the core. Anxiously, she looked back at the screen. The core was nowhere in sight, and from the ventral view of the secondary hull, the ejection port was blackened, almost melted-looking. Oh God. She pressed the intercom again, working to keep the tremor from her voice.
"This is captain Ajam speaking. We have a possible warp core damage with failed ejection. Proceed to the starboard escape pods immediately. Abandon ship. I repeat, abandon ship."
Maryam rubbed her forehead, her fingers coming away bloody. If the Syndicate picked up those pods, her crew would wish they had stayed to die with the warp core. She had to get a distress call out, but the comm station was ruined. She whirled, looking for anyone alive. Her yeoman, a boy barely into his twenties, stood frozen by the entrance, weeping. Maryam spoke to him, and when he didn't respond, she shook him, shouting,
"Get to the secondary bridge. Deck seventeen. Do you know how to send a distress call?"
He shook his head. She instructed him how, and he stumbled away, leaving Maryam alone with the dead. She turned back to the viewscreen and saw a pair of Syndicate-modified freighters closing in, each with a weapons blister grafted onto its back like the fin of a shark, tractor beams lancing out to snatch the first few escape pods from space. The strength went out of Maryam's legs. She collapsed into her chair, and this time, when she pressed the intercom, she couldn't keep the tremor from her voice.
"This is Captain Ajam. The Orion Syndicate is capturing our escape pods. In order to keep Courageous out of enemy hands, I am activating the self destruct sequence. Abandon ship or remain at your own discretion. I. . . recommend. . . remaining aboard."
She switched off the comm, flipped up the cover of the self destruct button, and, after a deep breath, pushed it.
"Computer, this is Captain Maryam Ajam of the Courageous. Internal sensors will verify that my senior officers are dead, and cannot input their codes."
"Acknowledged," the computer said. "Protocol 881 initiated. Awaiting Captain's code."
She blinked rapidly. A captain shouldn't cry on her bridge. She closed her eyes, breathing without sobbing, trying to envision Raelin, to imagine being with him on some lonely trail in the mountains, and forget the reek of burning wires and smoke.
Beside her, she heard the click of boots. She looked up, and through the smoke saw Tabarec at attention beside her chair, as stiff and composed as if they were on a routine mapping mission.
"I apologize for my lapse," he said. "I lost consciousness, but am now prepared to resume my duties."
Numbly, Maryam said. "We're self destructing."
"Excellent. By keeping Federation technology and crew out of Syndicate hands, you protect all our peoples. It is a worthy end we go to."
Through the thickening smoke, the blue tint to his skin made him look almost like Instructor Th'rhaalrihr. Maryam sighed.
"Ever read The Iliad?" she asked.
"I'm afraid not, Captain."
Maryam traced the rim of the destruct button with her finger, thinking. Finally, she said,
"I gave it a try once, as a favor to an instructor. Not really my thing. It glorified war over, well, everything, and all the characters would rather die than be dishonored."
"A fitting text to recall, at a time such as this," Tabarec said.
"Maybe. . . But I preferred The Odyssey. That one's about Odysseus and his crew, just trying to survive and get home, fighting astronomical odds, with even gods pitted against their survival."
She leaned forward, glaring at the Syndicate ships onscreen. "And you know how Odysseus survived?"
"Enlighten me."
"Deception. Lies, disguises, tricks, until his enemies couldn't trust their own eyes. And in the end, there was no noble death for Odysseus. He won."
"All very well, Captain," Tabarec said, "but may I remind you that we are running on impulse power against more maneuverable opponents? We cannot escape, and any attempt to ram the enemy, though a glorious sentiment, would be easily evaded before we got up to ramming speed."
Maryam crossed the bridge, lifted Michaels onto the ground, and took his place at the helm, cycling through cameras, familiarizing herself with the rocks tumbling around them.
"I need you to blow something up for me," Maryam said.
"Our weapons systems are-"
Maryam cut him off. "Something inside Courageous. Can you do that?"
". . . Yes captain."
"Good. Head to deck sixteen. I'll be on your communicator when you get there."
As he headed out, Maryam pressed the intercom. She guessed that there were boarding parties on Courageous by now, so she gave no hint of the change of plans, only asking that anyone who knew one end of a wrench from the other take a look at the warp core and work to eject it if damaged. Then she sat poised at the helm, waiting, every hair on end. Her comm beeped.
"Captain, I'm in position," Tabarec said.
"Set a couple hand phasers to overload and throw them into the starboard auxiliary impulse capacitors."
"As you command."
A minute later, a concussive thump raced through the hull, and Maryam rolled Courageous to port, putting an asteroid between her and the Syndicate ships. To the enemy, it would look like the death throes of a deteriorating hulk - no cause for alarm. The asteroid would slide out of the way again momentarily. Maryam smiled, predatory, and punched the impulse to maximum. Courageous shuddered in protest, a deep whine building in the thrum of the impulse engines.
Maryam braced herself, pulse rising. "One last dance, Courageous. Almost there."
Courageous gave her captain full impulse, rocketing toward the asteroid as the stony bulk tumbled aside. By the time the Syndicate saw her, she was barely two seconds from impact, and though she'd never thought herself a warrior, now, in the smouldering heat, surrounded by murdered comrades, she felt a war cry building in her chest. She unleashed it, a wordless scream, Courageous plummeting toward the foe.
She slammed into the first enemy with a thundering boom, plowing the first into the second, Maryam's hair flying in the g's of impact as she braced in her chair, blood flying off her face, out of her roaring mouth as explosions rocked the viewscreen, fragments of Syndicat hulls spinning in the shifting twilight of the asteroid field, air streaming from their wounds. Hands flying on the controls, Maryam drove all three ships into an onrushing rock, and with a final shattering crunch, they came to a stop, each ship drifting in a glittering cloud of its own rubble.
Maryam's roar ended. Sweat dripped down her face as she studied the viewscreen. One Syndicate vessel was dead, broken in half. The other limped away, its weapons blister crushed. Maryam shouted and pumped her fist. Swiftly, she lay in a course for the edge of the system. The Syndicate would be back with more ships, but if Starfleet arrived fast enough, there was a chance Courageous could be saved.
Maryam's comm beeped. It was Tabarec, his words interlaced with the hiss of phaser fire.
"Captain, Syndicate boarding parties are attempting to gain access to the bridge. I am holding them for the moment, but they are extremely numerous. I cannot last long."
Maryam's heart sank. "Is the secondary bridge secure?"
"Yes Captain, and the warp core has been ejected. May I advise-"
"-I know," Maryam said. "Don't worry. I'll do it."
If the boarding parties took the bridge controls, they could fly Courageous straight into the arms of Syndicate reinforcements. Since Maryam could not defend the bridge alone, both she and Tabarec knew that only one option remained. She made her way to the rear of the bridge, opened the weapons cabinet, and set all six phasers to overload. One by one, she placed them at the control panels, and felt a little reverent doing it, like she was laying flowers on a grave. Over the comm, to Tabarec, she said,
"I guess we got our noble death after all."
The amarki's voice was rough, fading. "I am sorry you could not make it home."
"At least there's hope for Courageous, and my crew."
A choking sound came over the comm as Maryam placed the final phaser on the captain's chair. Her chair. The overloading phasers were beginning to scream, higher and higher as they neared detonation, an awful chorus to herald her fast approaching immolation. She stood in the center of her bridge. She felt melancholy, or maybe it was peace. She'd done all she could.
Her comm beeped again - a female voice this time.
"Is this the Federation Captain? Listen. Your security team is dead, and we're coming up. If you cooperate, we'll sell you somewhere nice. Fight, and it's the highest bidder."
Maryam chuckled. "You're welcome to sell whatever bits of me you can scrape off the deck."
". . . What?"
Maryam clicked off her comm and dropped it. She didn't want to spend her last moments talking to Syndicate thugs. She wandered toward the viewscreen until it filled her vision, and all she could see was space. The Syndicate ship had paused a ways off, probably waiting to beam Maryam aboard once she was captured, but Maryam focused beyond, on the stars. Her craving to explore the stars had driven her to space, to the academy.
Maryam could almost hear the door of a simulation room sliding open behind her, the hum of fans beginning to clear synthetic smoke as the light shifted from emergency red to white. She imagined T'Pari, Michaels, and the rest rising to file out, and Th'rhaalrihr standing stiffly over her. Maryam mumbled into the screen,
"Well Instructor? Do all things appear fair?"
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AKuz
Been Better
- Location
- A Rising Tide of Horrors
- Pronouns
- She/Her
The Federation might not need this, but the Romulans sure as hell like having it.
In mechanical terms it reduces the "Borders are touching" relationship maluses that we would otherwise have with them.
Our best course is to slowly integrate stuff over time like the Athos V shared research site or a trade hub through the Sotaw.
Up and changing something radically like that is going to set off all the wrong alarm bells. The Romulans are going to wonder what is suddenly so important about [wherever the Federation draws the line]
The Romulans are almost always going to assume there is always a game at work. Some advantage sought for our side or theirs. You just have to let the Senate think that they're winning a game of chess against us. Except the winning move isn't the checkmate it's the
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- Location
- Mid-Atlantic
I guess it's mostly that the Tholians have acquired at least SOME degree of flavor because of their popularity as beta-canon antagonists. The Sheliak... not so much, as far as I can tell. Bringing them in doesn't bring in much new.
Actually, if it weren't for the schtick that the Tholians live in a very incompatible environment with humans, whereas the Sheliak coveted a human colony world... there's no fundamental reason the Sheliak couldn't BE the Tholians.
I don't think the Romulans are ready for that. They're still the same empire that in canon held to a near-hateful paranoia for another fifty years. They are only very slowly learning to trust the Federation.
I don't know if the Romulans can feel confident with the borders without a neutral zone. At the least, I doubt they can learn to be good neighbors with us until some time after the Romulans whose formative experiences were the Earth-Romulan War and its immediate aftermath have died. And all those who are in senior positions are those who were at most mid-rankers during the Biophage Crisis.
Which, given Romulan longevity, is going to be some time in the late 24th century...
Yeah, but Oneiros also seems quite capable of making up his own species (Amarki, Gaeni, Apiata, Dawiar), and we the playerbase have detailed out some others (like the Yrillians) that we're having a lot of fun with. I mean, would you really want to trade away the Apiata, whom we have come to know and like, in exchange for the Bolians or something? Give up the Amarki for the Denobulans?
AKuz
Been Better
- Location
- A Rising Tide of Horrors
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Gib Boliams
(Yes I am mostly attached because in my fic a Bolian in Tala's Academy roomie)
And don't you remember? The Denobulans all died out in 2250 because it was the "will of evolution"
> : V
Like I said, it's a long term ambition. However I think expanding the Neutral Zone is just going in the wrong direction. Let them get used to having little bits of our borders touching with the Neutral Zone still covering most of it, and we can work from there.
Night
Widow Null
- Location
- Hoff
Do you think they'd somehow be less known and liked because they have a name we recognize? That we'd write about them less, flesh them out less? Do you think Onerios would?
AKuz
Been Better
- Location
- A Rising Tide of Horrors
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Jenny
anonymous user
- Location
- maryland
- Pronouns
- She/Her
o:< "It's satisfying for our superiority to be acknowledged like this!"
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- Location
- Patriarchova
Working on a Sotaw overview, to give us something to work with. Got their history with the Kadeshi figured out, but struggling with what kind of physical look to give them.
So, putting this to a vote: "humanoid," "semihumanoid," or "the preservers missed a spot."
So, putting this to a vote: "humanoid," "semihumanoid," or "the preservers missed a spot."