No Grave But The Stars, part 6

Posted on Tue Sep 20th, 2022 @ 1:06am by Lieutenant JG Miraj Derani
Edited on on Tue Jan 3rd, 2023 @ 1:25am

Mission: WHAT IF?
Location: Bassen Rift
Timeline: Another lifetime
3004 words - 6 OF Standard Post Measure

Previously in No Grave But The Stars

There were vibrations in the floor plates, people running close by. Their hunters had found their trail. The two men crowded into the crawl space at the back of the lab and scampered down as fast as they could. A few minutes later the whole chunk of broken ship gave an aborted jolt as the explosives did their best with the limited oxygen in their own structures. But it was enough; the artificial gravity failed, and they were floating. They shared a grin, and turned on their repulsor boots, now able to fly in the tiny space.

The crawl space ran almost to the end they came in on, and they pulled themselves out to make the last sprint to free space. It was just a quick dash across what had been a two-storey open space, but the Borg Cube could be glimpsed tantalisingly through gaps in the far wall. As one, they put on speed, planning to make a break for it.

Which was when their boots cut out, and they crashed down into the Myriad's waiting gravity trap.

And now the conclusion

---

The three mortars weren’t coming directly at the Stranger Tides, but at a point above and just in front of them that was covered with pipes and rails and tubes and all manner of potential flotsam. There was a flash, somewhat curtailed as the mortars hit, and broke open something that flamed into the darkness until whatever oxygen it had cut out, and she saw tumbling towards them a massive chunk of the Cube. Even if it didn’t hit them, it would trap them in the alcove.

“I have to move!” she screamed, hands hovering over the conn.

Ilon’s hands were moving as fast as he could, but too rough and he could break the very connection he was looking for. “Stay still. Only a couple more!”

Miraj eyed the flotsam tumbling towards them. It was maybe two hundred meters away. “I can’t!”

“Yes, you can!” Ilon slid his probe into another connection, and his tricorder flashed red for the umpteenth time.

It was a hundred meters and closing. “Avast below!” Miraj shouted and pushed forward on her sticks, whipping them out from their hiding spot just as the flat plane of the flotsam, twice as large as they were, sliced through the space they’d been occupying.

The Tides lurched forward, sending everything loose jerking forward. That included Miraj’s nodding dog, the unsecured space helmets, and the dead Borg. Ilon caught himself on the side of the replicator housing, grabbing the straps holding it down, which saved him from falling over completely, and just managed to catch the defrosting body. He swore when he saw his probe had jammed deep into the socket connecting to the brain, fearing it had broken something vital. But the light on his tricorder was blinking green. He scooped it up from the floor. “Mij, we’re in business! Can you sneak us a bit closer, so I can deploy the umbilical?”

“Sneaking is not an option!”

The other side of the con was flashing. The blasted Myriad ship had succeeded in flushing them out, had managed to lock on to their presence thanks to the thrusters firing, and now was sending its disruptors their way.

Miraj wrenched at the con, the ship twisting and spinning on its axes to squeak out of the way. The manoeuvrability upgrades helped, but there was still just not enough room inside this hollow section of Cube to move.

There was a rattling behind her and Ilon came into the cockpit. “Shit.”

“No shit,” she muttered back, swing the Tides to the left suddenly. “I can’t put the receiver down! One wrong move and it will break off.”

“Then wait for a good moment, and try Plan B. I can drop the receiver manually.”

“Plan B?” Miraj’s tone conveyed the rest We’re going to die!

“Plan B.” Ilon he confirmed, voice steady, reassuring. If anyone can do it, you can. Then he moved to execute his part of the plan.

***

Mal hit the ground hard. It hadn't been far to fall, but the speed of his boots drove the impact deep into his bones. He slithered across the floor, grateful that it was at least smooth, and his EVA suit wasn't ripped to shreds. The boundaries of the gravity trap pulled him up short, and for a moment he could only lay there gasping, a moment that was interrupted by Zh'erim thudding into his side and knocking his remaining breath out of him.

Lights slammed on, blinding them after the darkness of the wreck, and by the time they struggled up on their knees, assorted weapons were pointing at them, and the scout ship they had arrived in was hovering over head, its space lamps turning the rest of the Cube as black as hell beyond.Mal held up his hands in surrender, letting his gaze fall, trying to look beacon. There was a scraping in his communicator that indicated a foreign signal breaking into their frequency.

"Well, Malcolm,” said a familiar voice, smugly oozing condescension. “You've pulled off crazier things in the past, but this certainly has to be your most stupid."

Mal swore internally as he recognised the speaker as one of the Myriad's more dangerous trouble-shooters, and last person he wanted to see. Looking through the visor of the EVA suited figure took away his hope he was wrong. He was glaring at the smirking face of Manim tr'Khaell.

"The Twins!" Zh'erim grunted, also recognising the mocking voice. "We're so fucked."

Kharis tr'Khaell, the second of the twins, rested his head on Manim's shoulder coquettishly. "Possibly, Andorian. You're all so very pretty, after all."

"Where's your sister, Malcolm?" Manim's eyes were scanning all around the broken structure, hunting for the rest of his prey. "We've heard she's a perfect little doll. We're so looking forward to playing with her."

Mal gritted his teeth, “I think you'll find Z and I much more to your speed." He had to keep them talking, give Mij and Ilon time to ride to the rescue.

"Maybe." Kharis was looking him up and down with open hunger. "But we’d take good care of her too. We're ever so good with our pets."

Mal knew they were trying to get a rise out of him. He looked around, noting the twins only had three others with them. Far fewer than would have crewed that scout ship. "Where are all your buddies, Manim? Not like you to travel without an audience."

"They'll be here. When they've found your other little boyfriend." The Romulan's smile was cruel. "You boys are like herpes. If we don't get rid of all of you all at once, you'll just keep coming back."

"It’s just us," Mal said. "Ilon didn't want to risk getting caught. He took Miraj back to FreeCloud."

"Malcolm," Manim said, disappointment in his tone. "I think we both know who was at the helm of your ship when we chased you in here. If it was you, we'd have got you with the first shot. So, I ask again. Where is the rest of your crew?"

"Go fuck yourself."

"So uncivilised," Manim sighed. "Alright Kharis, you can kill him."

“Already?” Kharis pouted. “You don’t let me have any fun.”

Manim flashed his twin an irritated scowl. “The other two are still out there. Easier to find them if we’re not keeping an eye on these two.”

Kharis gave a sigh. “You’re sooo boring when you’re right.” He unclipped a slender blade from his own EVA suit. “How do you want it, Mal? Fast?” he tapped the blade against the helmet of the human’s suit, before moving the knife point down so it caught on the armoured fabric of the suit, just above his heart. “Or slow? Ish.”

Mal was saved from answering by the hovering Myriad ship suddenly spinning on its axis, the ports on its disruptors glowing a rich emerald and then firing into the void. Kharis turned to watch it, the smile on his face growing. For a second, Mal saw the Stranger Tides illuminated, pirouetting and twisting fast around the incoming fire, doing its best to stay ahead of the streaking green shafts that were causing yet more damage where they managed to hit something.

The human couldn’t help but grin. His little sister was poetry in motion, ballet in the sky, making their little freighter skip and jump, acrobatic and graceful. Even Kharis and Manim were looking impressed as she cut it finer and finer on each successive dodge, spiralling up and up in complicated moves to avoid protect their injured orlop whilst avoiding collisions with the insides of the Cube.

And then it seemed her luck run out. There was a lance of disruptor fire, and then a terrible amount of sparks and plasma venting and smoke billowing from the Tides.

The Tides started to drift down, pitch black and belly up, smoking gently. Mal snapped his eyes down to the floor, jaw clenched, body going rigid.

“Well,” Manim said after a moment. “I won’t deny that was magnificent. While it lasted. Someone follow it, see if she survived.”

“Oh, I do hope so,” Kharis breathed. “That’s a talent too good to waste.”

Manim looked down at his two prisoners, “We’ll make her an offer she can’t refuse.”

“Does that mean I can’t kill them?” Kharis pouted.

“Not for the moment.”

“Lucky you,” Kharis said to Malcom, voice rich with sarcasm, and used the blade on his dagger to tip the human’s chin up again. “I genuinely hope she’s alive, you know. That was amazing. I wonder how far she’d go to keep you safe. Would she work for us, do you think? Run the dangers of the neutral zones, and taunt the Klingons at their borders? Smuggle slaves from the Orion flesh markets to their new owners?”

Mal jerked his head away with a glare, using the movement to get a glance at Zh’erim. The Andorian’s face was carefully blank, but he knew the twitching of the antenna pressed against the face plate for the question it was. He answered with the tiniest circling of his finger. Play along.

Kharis let out a delighted laugh. “Would she come to my bed?” he mused, “Or Manim’s? She wouldn’t regret it. Both of us are generous lovers. I promise you, she’d be well taken care of, by either of us.”

Mal knew the Romulan was trying to get a reaction out of him, probably looking for an excuse to kill one or both of them. But that could work in his favour too. The minions would be far less likely to rush to Kharis aid if they were hoping for Mal to do something stupid. “Don’t touch her,” he snarled.

“Well, that would be her choice, such as it is, with a gun to your head.” Kharis purred. “But as we said, we take good care of our toys. And we’re very good at sharing, Manim and I. We’d ruin her for other men. She’d never want anyone but us again.”

Mal ground his teeth, delighting the gloating Romulan. “You must be going through a dry spell if you’re resorting to this to get a date." He spat back. "Manim not putting out enough for you?”

Something dark filled the Romulan’s face, and it was his turn to tighten his jaw and squash down his emotions. “I’ll make you watch, I think. See if you can joke so much when she’s screaming my name and begging for more.”

Mal risked a look at the other Romulans. Manim was talking on another channel, his lips moving but as Mal couldn’t guess what he was saying. The other guards were watching them, but as gloating bullies, not attentive guards, losing their alertness as Mal submitted to the taunts. “She wouldn’t touch you willingly in a thousand years.”

“Oh?” Kharis’s smile was perverse. “But we have a Reman. We could make her think whatever we want; she’d never even know it wasn’t her idea. Instead of her seeing us while we take her apart until she’s mindless with pleasure, we could make her think its whoever we want. Not us, but maybe… her brother and his pretty friends?” The Romulan’s eyes got brighter as he contemplated the scenario. “The only question is would she be repulsed by the whole idea, or would it just tip her over the edge faster? Which one do you think, Malcolm?” Kharis’s voice dropped to a whisper. “Which one do you hope for?”

Zh’erim punched him in the balls.

The Andorian surged up from his feet and slammed his fist hard into the Romulans groin with all the strength he could muster. Too caught up in their boss's gloating at the human, they had ignored the Andorian to their cost, and Kharis went down like felled tree, curled around the centre of his agony.

A pile of Romulans pinned the Andorian before he could grab Kharis’s disruptor and another jammed the business end of his disrupter rifle into Mal’s helmet, whilst Kharis tr’Khaell got unsteadily back to his feet. “We don’t need both of you.” He hissed, voice cracking with pain and raised his disrupter pistol at Zh’erim.

Which is when they all saw the point of red light traveling across the Andorian’s body. Kharis’s rage forgotten, everyone looked up to see a red dot glowing in the space beyond the wreckage of the Scimitar. Then another, then a third, and a fourth. Lights blinked on everywhere around them, pin pricks in the darkness, casting red lasers through the Cube. The Borg were coming to life.

Mal would remember the sound the Kharis made with pleasure for the rest of his life, however short that maybe. The high-pitched girly squeal of pure fear was absolutely delicious.

“We need to go!” Manim grabbed his brother's arm, jerking him away from Mal and Zh’erim, their prisoners forgotten in the face of an awakening Borg army.

Their men seeing their leaders move, broke and ran for the edge of the gravity trap, engaging their own repulsor boots and zipping for the scout ship, keen for the escape, leaving the Human and the Andorian to the Borg. The Scout ship’s impulse manifolds glowed once and they hurtled away, leaving the two men alone in the derelict Cube.

Red lights were appearing everywhere, baleful stars in a firmament that was growing lighter as machines deep within the Cube started to wake. As more and more lights came on, turning the murk luminous through the thalaron fallout.

“Mal?” Zh’erim asked.

Mal had worked to the edge of the wreck and looked out, searching the darkness for the Stranger Tides, for any sign that he’d read Miraj’s flying right. But there was nothing. As far as he could tell, they were alone in vacuum, in the middle of a Borg Cube. Mal wished he could feel the ship, wished for the clunk-clunk of machinery to make it feel real. But there was only silence.

He touched his communicator. “Mij?” Was his sister even still alive? His friend? “Ilon?” He’d been so sure they were fine. Had the Borg got to them. “Are you out there?”

“Maybe we can find a working escape pod?” It was a slim chance, Zh’erim knew. More like a drawn-out death, lost in space.

Mal was even more aware of the odds. “Think I’d rather stay here.”

“With the Borg?”

“With you. With Mij & Ilon.”

The Andorian knocked his shoulder into Mal’s companionably. “Good answer.”

After a few more moments of watching the red lights swirl gently, Mal found something like hope rekindling. “Z, why aren’t the Borg coming to get us?”

The Andorian looked around, considering, trying to see the pattern in the movement, in the changing glows. He started grinning, realising what was happening. “Because we have the best friends?”

And then, finally, the Stranger Tides peeked over the edge of the wreck of the Scimitar, rolling up like a rising sun. To Mal it was a sight just as beautiful as any dawn. The cargo bay doors were open, and Ilon was leaning out making urgent beckoning gestures. Miraj slid the Stranger Tides up to the edge of the wreckage, and they jumped aboard, Ilon swinging them up.

“Plan B?” Mal asked as Ilon heaved him onto the hatch and grabbed him into a fierce hug.

The Risian nodded. “Worked like a dream. Though Mij is already complaining about getting the chaff in the manifolds.”

They hauled Zh’erim onboard together, Ilon gripping him close.

“Mal!” Miraj threw herself onto him, holding tight like he’d vanish if she let him go. “Don’t do that again.”

“Told you you’d rescue me right back.” He squeezed her close, not wanting to think about how close it had bean, “lets get out of here before you really do wake up something nasty. Take us home.”

She didn’t have to be asked twice, practically skipping back up to the cockpit to get them underway. She’d barely moved towards the hole in the Cube before she heard him shouting.

“Mij! Why the hell is there a Borg queen on my ship!?”

End

 

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