Surefoot 84: Duel

Weynik took it in. Any other time, he might have basked in his victory: identifying the design flaw in the intermix chamber of the Defiant-class starship's warp cores, a susceptibility to failure from neutrino contamination, a design flaw that would be identified and corrected, but only after the time when the Dallas had been reported lost, a flaw those who found and appropriated it didn't know about. It was risky to try and bring down the Dallas' shields with the Surefoot Pounce, and keep the neutrino beam sustained on the chamber long enough to trigger the failure, but apparently it worked.

Now, however, he didn't give a good Goddamn about the victory; there was a brave young male out there worth a hundred enemy ships. "Launch a shuttle!"

"The Shuttlebay's infrastructure's damaged from the Pounce, Sir!" Zetee declared. "We can't launch anything!"

He turned back, facing a dead viewscreen. "Contact the Tailless! Use an EM real-space band! Hurry! He can't last out there forever!"

*

" Katana to Tailless : Lt Mori was blown out of the breach! We can't find and retrieve him!"

Sasha didn't bother to respond, focusing on letting her fingers move into action over the console, allowing her ship to locate and track him, even as she was rising and racing to the equipment locker by the hatchway, knowing what the next response would be.

She was right. "Target located, currently 10.3 metres distant on port side, subspatial interference inhibiting transporter lock or tractor beam recovery."

She keyed in the EVA sequence countdown, even as she strapped on a thruster pack, not having time to get into her exosuit. She forced herself into hyperventilation, oxygenating her blood as much as possible as she tightened the pack harness, and the hatchway slid open, the doorway border glowing to confirm the atmospheric shield in place.

She saw him, an outline against the hull of the Katana.

She pushed through the shield without hesitation.

Frick me...

*

Mru Mori wished this feeling could last forever.

Not the horror he had felt when the hull overhead was breached, and his very sensitive ears popped as the air rudely and rapidly escaped. Nor the pain when he broke his tail in his attempt to save Lt Holtzmann, and ended up getting unceremoniously blown out into space.

No, it was that unbelievable experience of hurtling into nothingness, without a suit, without any more protection than his uniform and furred skin. He looked out, saw so much: his own ship, battered and broken but still fighting; the enemy vessel, trying to escape, but thanks to Captain Weynik's plan and his own efforts, having doomed them; further distant, flickering lights that could have been Sasha in the Tailless, kicking ass and taking names.

But around all of them, the tableau of the Infinite and Eternal: the Deertail Cloud, and the stars and galaxies beyond. He had tried to imagine it all, ever since his days as a cub, lying out on the cliffs by home at night, looking up at the stars, feeling his dream to be out there strengthen into determination to make it reality.

But even when he did make it into Starfleet, immersed himself in Astrogation classes and holographic starmaps and crossed hundreds of light years, the vastness, the sheer vastness of it all, and his place within it, felt out of his grasp.

Until now: swimming in space, taking it all in, eyes wide, Mru Mori felt, not an insignificant speck like he expected, but a part of it, as relevant and necessary as the Cloud and the starships and the stars and the Galaxies around him. He never felt so at peace.

No, wait, that was the hypoxia.

The classes he took in the Academy, and the stories from Sasha and Commodore Hrelle, had warned him what to expect. He had nothing left in his lungs, hadn't thought to breathe in as he was blown out into space, and now his body was wringing any remaining atom of oxygen in his bloodstream to keep him going.

But that was okay, in fact not having air in his lungs meant they wouldn't rupture, so all he had to expect now was an agonising swelling of the skin tissue due to the loss of atmospheric pressure, the moisture in his mouth boiling, and the comfort of knowing his body would remain intact to be brought back to the Motherworld to be cremated.

I'm sorry, Moms. Sasha will be there to comfort you, I know.

He considered what to expect after he died. Caitians didn't believe in any eternal Afterlife, believed that no one ever truly died, until all the lives they had touched, all the good they had done, had also passed. Still, he had studied the eschatological beliefs of various races. The Klingons' Sto-Vo-Kor with its endless fighting and feasting sounded tiring. The Ferengi's Divine Treasury would probably throw him over the precipice for lack of profit. The Terrans' belief in Heaven, in beautiful winged angels that came to collect the dearly departed, sounded absurd beyond belief, and he couldn't imagine-

His dying gaze caught a vision, racing up to him, with red fiery wings and a celestial aura shimmering. It looked... actually, it looked like a human female. In fact, it looked like Sasha, crossing through space to embrace him. She even had that pissed-off expression she wore whenever he did something stupid, like get himself killed from exposure.

What a way to go...

*

"The viewscreen's back online!" Zetee announced.

Weynik faced forward again, in time to see the starfield, the remains of the Dallas, and the Tailless. Before he had to order it, the viewscreen magnified, to display Mori being dragged back to the flyer by Sasha - lacking any exosuit, just a thruster pack.

Son of a...

*

...BITCH!

Sasha tried to curse as she plunged through the hatchway, Mori in her arms, trying to keep him from being slammed into the nearest wall from their momentum, succeeding only in banging her own shoulder. Instead, it was all she could do to force her lungs to work again and stay conscious, as she unbuckled and shucked off the pack and dragged the Caitian to the rear of the ship, where the Holographic Hospital Bay had been erected beforehand. Fricking thing got more use than the holographic Hot Tub...

Her legs barely worked, and she was struggling not to stop and throw up as she lifted Mori up onto the waiting biobed, the system's autodoc already scanning his medical status and replicating the necessary drugs, cellular regenerator patches and Nanites. She went to work, ignoring her own injuries, wanting to keep straight and free of painkillers.

Her combadge beeped, as her ship delivered a tightbeam transmission. " Katana to Tailless : what's your status?"

She cursed as she paused long enough to smack her combadge, far too roughly. "Busy! Hrelle out!" Still, she focused a calming mantra within; she couldn't help Mru by panicking. She winced, seeing the broken capillaries on her hands, feeling her bloody vision, the pulled muscles in her thighs... and noting that, yes, she'd also soiled herself, too.

None of that mattered now. Follow the medical protocols: stabilise the patient, prioritise the most vital systems, don't try to do too much at once, the less vital systems can be dealt with afterwards-

Above him, the readings began to move into the Green Zones. Mru was breathing on his own now.

Sasha stepped back, turned, dropped to all fours and finally threw up in the corner of the Bay, coughing and sputtering and sobbing with a battered, pained relief.

When she recovered, she helped herself back to her feet, wiped her mouth on her sleeve and checked on Mru again: the damage to his lungs was almost repaired, Nanites were moving to knit the broken tailbones and torn muscles and ligaments, and oxygenate his blood.

She shifted him onto his side, facing her, to relieve the pressure on his tail, making him comfortable before stroking the fur on his head. He made a ragged sound deep in his throat and began shifting.

She rested her hand protectively on him, her free hand reaching for a sedative and injecting him. As he settled down again, she drew in closer to his left ear, until it started twitching instinctively at her proximity. "Just sleep, Bubulah. Sleep and gather your strength. You're gonna need it later, when you recover, and we talk about getting married... and having cubs together." She drew back again. "I think I need to recover, too..."

She turned away and retched again.

*

Claudia Vargas dropped to all fours onto a cold metal floor and retched, feeling like she had been turned inside out. Dead. She was dead. There was no other way someone could feel this horrible and still be alive.

She opened her eyes, but only saw stars, and thunder pounded in her ears... and a figure nearby blandly announcing, "Welcome onboard, Captain Kazan. If you and your companion would like to follow me to the Infirmary?"

Distantly, she felt a presence, a presence that was suddenly at her side, strong hands holding her up, and a voice, deep and familiar, cutting through to her. "Keep breathing in, and swallowing. There are treatments awaiting us, to recover from the Shift."

She followed the advice, despite a thousand questions demanding answers. Seconds before, she had accepted that she had failed, that the subspatial contortions from the Nine-Killers were still too great to allow the jump to warp, and that they would be crushed. It was inevitable, but it was an end she had been prepared for, and her experience had taught her that there were far, far worse ways to die in space.

Except the end didn't come.

Vargas helped herself back to her feet, staring first at Kazan, who appeared equally fatigued but otherwise in control of the situation, then around them, recognising they were in some sort of transporter room on another ship. She looked at the third figure in the room. "Where are we?"

The figure, a bland, generic-looking humanoid male, responded, "The courier ship Ace of Wands, Madame. Would you care for refreshments or-"

"Deactivate," Kazan interrupted.

The figure vanished, revealing its holographic nature. Kazan turned to Vargas. "It's a vessel I arranged to be here, sitting hidden on the edge of the Deertail System, about two light years from where we lost the Molotok."

She froze, frowning. "Transporters can't reach such distances! And with the subspatial contortions, we couldn't beam two metres!"

The bald Siberian man nodded in agreement, producing some sort of small control PADD. "The Inverter I secured onboard this ship relies on dimensional shifting, not transport through space or subspace. And it can carry small amounts of matter across greater distances than what we have just accomplished." He pocketed the device once more. "But the Inverter is not without its side effects: molecular degradation, especially in organic matter. To be used only in the most dire of emergencies... the last few moments certainly qualified as such.."

Vargas regarded him, touching her arms and face, as if half-expecting to have ended up some sort of monstrosity like in ancient speculative fiction. "What about the others? Crosby, Danetha, Traxin-"

"Lost, along with our ship. If we attempted to shift any more than ourselves, the degradation to us would have been untreatable, and fatal. An unpleasant necessity, I'm afraid."

"Oh." She tensed. "I suppose I should thank you for saving me then. Why did you, though? If you're expecting something physical in return-"

Kazan smirked. "Let me guess: you're not that type of woman, right?"

"No, I am, but I'd rather get a shower and meal first."

His smirk grew into a smile. "I saved you because you're useful and dependable, you handled yourself well during our mission, and I need someone like you for the next ship I command."

"Thanks again... assuming they don't kill you for losing the last one. It was our first and last mission, and we didn't even meet our objectives and save the operatives and intelligence from Salem One."

His smile broadened. "There will be other ships. And who said we didn't meet our objectives? Come."

He led her to another section of the ship, a medical bay manned by several more holograms, where they encountered Fantomax, Orlok, and what remained of the Rat Pack, the last seemingly down to a half-dozen. The elderly human female was sitting up on a biobed, the Vulcan female stood, and the rats gathered in the corner, the lead rodent hissing, "Captain Kazan! I've lost half my family thanks to that infernal teleporter of yours!"

"My condolences, Benjamin. I will ensure you have the opportunity to breed replacements." He looked at the women. "Lady Fantomax, Doctor Orlok, I trust the doctors have treated you for the aftereffects of the Inverter?"

"Your minions were barely adequate," Orlok declared haughtily. "I can improve on the applied genetic regeneration techniques."

"That would be welcome." He looked at Fantomax. "And you, Milady? You survived?"

She glared up at him, her expression tight. "Barely. My ship, and computer, didn't. When that cybernetic monstrosity of yours invaded the mainframe, it killed my AI as well."

"Try not to take it personally, Milady; Mickey had its priorities, which included retrieving the Salem One data and relaying the onboard lifeforms and itself here through the Inverter, and to make it appear to the Fleeters that you had been destroyed." He paused and added, "Or would you rather we had saved your computer and left you behind to die?"

"You could have left the Vulcan behind," Ben suggested.

Orlok shot the rat a look, as Kazan asked, "Where is Mickey? He should have been carried by the Inverter remote placed on him to collect all of you."

"The holographic crew have confined the robot in this ship's cargo bay and removed the transport sled. It had grown quite angry at not being able to use or access the Inverter again to escape from here. It has promised a painful death for us all."

"We all have dreams. We will be at Elba II in six hours; I suggest you all rest after the treatments for your Inverter experience, while my associate and I receive treatment ourselves." He offered Fantomax a final assurance, "We have all had to make sacrifices for the Bel-Zon, Milady. I lost a ship of my own today, and forty-seven crew. We live to serve."

"Yes. We do." She rose and strode out, quickly followed by Ben and the remains of his Pack. Orlok remained behind once the others left, informing him, "You should be aware that she and the rodents were preparing to surrender, or flee to Orion space, rather than fulfil the mission."

Kazan nodded curtly. "I will give your words all the weight they deserve, Doctor. Leave."

Orlok regarded him curiously, clearly expecting a different response from him, before departing.

"Do you trust what she said?" Vargas asked.

"I trust everyone, and no one, beyond what I expect of them." As medical holograms appeared, he indicated a nearby biobed. "Lie down. This will be unpleasant, but necessary."

She breathed out. "Sounds like a theme for today..."

*

Weynik chose not to hold another conference, preferring instead to walk around the ship, meeting with his crew and getting their reports while they continued the repairs, to keep them intact until the Surefoot and Tangshan arrived as promised by the Commodore to help them get back to Salem One, once the Thin Ice Effect had subsided and they were far enough away from its epicentre.

He left no part of his ship ignored. It, and his crew, deserved no less. Even Engineering and Chief Maryk, who was too tired to swear at him, a state he never expected to see in his short-legged life.

He found Sasha in Sickbay, ensuring Lt Mori was secured in one of the recovery beds, and followed him out into the corridor. She looked like she had ridden through all Seven of the Caitian Hells, but kept her professional stance as she noted, "Congratulations, Captain. Your plan worked."

He grunted. "Save it. We got lucky. It could have gone wrong a thousand different ways."

She smiled wearily. "Deja Vu: my first day onboard the Ajax as your Second Officer, I ended up injured while fighting those Klingon hijackers. I said something similar then. You told me it can always go wrong, and that some of the greatest victories past Captains were as much down to sheer dumb luck as it was to their abilities and experience."

Weynik grunted again; that felt like another age. "That's sweet of you to remember that."

"Not sweet - smart. I know to learn from the best. You should get some rest, you look like shit."

"Says the woman who went for a walk without a spacesuit. Shouldn't you be lying down in there beside Lt Mori and getting some rest yourself?"

Sasha smirked. "If I'm lying next to him, neither of us will be getting any rest, if you know what I mean." She winked and made clicking sounds with her mouth, before her weary, sober expression resurfaced. "I can't sleep, not now. Give me something to do, Sir. Please."

Weynik nodded, understanding. "Prepare a report for your father to pass onto Starfleet Intelligence about the Dallas, including the cloaking device, and that subspace weapon they employed. I don't know what SI has been doing to prevent this sort of thing from happening, but it's clearly not been enough. I'm going up to collect a certain bulldog who's probably pissed on every square centimetre of the Ready Room for being left alone for so long."

*

As it turned out, he hadn't done this... because he wasn't alone. Counselor Vestri had let herself in, the Denobulan woman sitting on his couch, while Ajax lay on his back on her lap, getting his fleshy belly rubbed by her. "Who let you in here?"

She never looked up. "Oh, your little friend here did. He, ah, had an accident, but I cleaned it up."

"You look comfortable with him; I thought your people don't keep pets."

"We don't," she admitted, lifting Ajax up and setting him down on the seat next to her, patting him as he whimpered in protest. "But we find it fascinating how other races let themselves get manipulated into becoming the willing caretakers of such creatures." She moved to the replicator. "You've had quite a day, Captain. Sit."

He was about to argue, to ask that she leave him alone, but words failed him as he took her place on the couch, letting Ajax slide onto his lap now. "Thank you for coming in and keeping my dog company, Counselor, but I'm not ready for another session just yet."

The replicator made a sound, and she returned with a tray containing tea cups, a teapot, and a plate of shortbread biscuits. "That's good to hear, because frankly I'm fed up doing that. I want a break. A break from being seen only by my role. I'm not just a Counselor, you know."

"No?" he asked dryly, rubbing the dog's belly.

"No. I'm a spouse to three husbands and two wives, a mother to six children and ten grandchildren, I enjoy silt baths and subatomic physics and full-contact nude wrestling." She set the tray down on the table in front of Weynik, dragging a spare seat closer to him. "And the two of us are the oldest crewmembers onboard, having served in Starfleet longer than most of the kids onboard have been alive. Can we not just talk casually, without you worrying I'm going to play Mind Detective and use some remarks you might make against you?" She sat down, smiling. "Because, for the record, we're off the record. And I'm on your side, even if you don't believe it."

He regarded her, while also trying to keep hold of Ajax, who had noticed the biscuits and was risking falling by leaning forward over Weynik's knees to sniff and slobber. He pulled the dog back, recognising now how much he had resisted seeing her as anything more than a potential adversary. "I'm... sorry if I've been hostile to you, Counselor-"