Crimson 11
DISCLAIMER: All Star Trek characters, locations, technology, ship designs, designations, races, dates, histories, and paraphernalia are property of Gene Roddenbury and do not belong to myself. The basic plot and shamelessly borrowed title are from a tremendously fun movie that is also not mine. The Crimson Assurance, her crew, and their respective backgrounds, are my intellectual property and anyone who tries to steal my ideas without my permission will answer to Major Harper's Schnaurs.
AUTHOR'S NOTE: This fanfic is a sequel to my prior work "The Flight of the Crimson Assurance" which !!!MUST!!!be read for any of this to make any sense at all (this story can be found under my personal page. So go and click my name link, scroll down to read "Flight" and then you can come back here for "11"). Again, I am writing this in first person narrative, so all bold writing goes on in third person, outside the main character's perspective. Italics denote thoughts, and regular print is the Protagonist's viewpoint.
Prologue
"You sure that this'll work, Spock?"
"These are the directions I was given if I ever needed to make contact again, Captain."
"But will it work?"
"I cannot know for certain until contact is established."
"Could you at least guess? 'Cause we really can't afford to be wrong."
"We have even odds of either succeeding or failing in this endeavor as contact will be established or it won't. There is no middle ground."
"But Jupiter? It just seems so…illogical."
"I have long learned, sir, that pirates are rarely logical."
Chapter 1
The Backdrop
"So you begging for a partner, Keath, or did he already leave?" I looked up from the table I was sitting at to the large form of my CMO.
"Neither, I just like to win," I replied, grinning. I pushed aside the 3-D chess set and gestured to the chair opposite me. "You wanna sit, Doc?" Carpenter slid in and casually fingered one of the black rooks.
"'You just like to win'?" He picked the rook up and looked at carefully. "You do understand that you're also going to lose this game as well, right?"
"Well, now that's an interesting metaphysical question, Doc."
"Has psychological implications too." Carpenter grinned almost maliciously. "Maybe I should bump up your next psyche exam."
"Now, hold up, that ain't exactly fair," I said, leaning back in my chair and trying to distance myself from the incriminating evidence. "'Sjust a game and besides, I'm a pirate."
"Yeah, so?"
"Doc, we don't even HAVE psyche evaluations." Carpenter chuckled and put the rook back.
"It was worth a shot."
"So, you here for a reason other than making mischief?" The doctor was about to answer when the com unit interrupted with it's annoying little beep.
"Major Harper?" I half jumped over to the wall. It was Hannah, the Assurance's communications officer, and, from the tone of her voice, she sounded…disturbed.
"Keath here, what's up Hannah?"
"Ma'am, I'm getting a really…weird signal over our emergency frequency. You might want to come up here." I glanced over at Carpenter who was intently following the conversation.
"Right, on my way." I nodded at the doctor and we headed for the turbolift.
DXVJKE
The turbolift doors opened onto my bridge. Duo, Pilot, and Gunner were on deck along with the little lady ruining my discussion on the philosophical implications of playing chess against one's self. "Okay, Hannah, what's this signal that's got you riled up?" The redhead snapped around, low levels of ire in her eyes.
"Not riled, ma'am, confused. Big difference." I grinned, Hannah had a certain way of…expressing herself. "As for the signal, well…listen." She reached over and touched the volume control for the bridge, transferring the signal she was hearing on her headset to the more general public.
What flooded over the radio was a piece of music. Classical music. Specifically, it was "Jupiter, the Bringer of Jollity" from Holst's The Planet Opus. It was at the beginning of the second movement, some three and a half minutes into the piece: the majestic strains of viola and clarinet, the deep bass of the oboe and cello, the soaring flute and violin, they blended and intertwined into one of the richest pieces of music ever penned by man. Damn, I loved it. It was like…air, like swimming in air, like flying, like breathing in water; it was paralyzing and invigorating at the same time. And I stood there, eyes closed, drinking in Jupiter for nearly a minute, feeling a smile slowly creeping across my face.
"I know that smile, Keath," Carpenter said, his bass voice blending in with Holst's enough to break into my mind. My eyes slit open and the smile widened to a grin.
"Hannah, this is coming over frequency gamma-117, right?" The com officer looked up sharply at me and then nodded.
"Keath?" the doctor asked. "What's going on?"
"Excellent. Pilot," I said, turning to the front of the bridge still ignoring the now annoyed doctor, "Set a course for…38617-mark-02…4."
"You haven't given me an answer."
"Course's laid in, boss," Pilot replied.
"Then get us there and don't spare the horses," I said, moving towards my chair.
"You got it," she turned to her brother and exchanged looks of utter mischief known only between siblings.
"Keath." The doctor put himself right in my path with a stern glance that said he wasn't about to move until I gave answers. "Where. Are. We. Going?" I looked up at him and grinned.
"Why, to see an old friend, of course."
DXVJKE
"Far be it from me to question the thinking of the great boss lady herself, but how the hell do we get a rendezvous with Fed ship from some piece of classical music on a subspace channel?" We were sitting, cloaked, some two million leagues away from the vessel in question, still listening to Jupiter being played. The senior crew had taken their stations a few moments after I had altered our course and then had to sit through some eight repetitions of Holst's work during our travel time. I had kept tightlipped over exactly who we were meeting, prompting the above quip from my chief engineer.
"First of all, Duo, it's not just any ship, it's the Enterprise." That caused quite a stir.
"The Enter… We're going to see Saul?" The look on Duo's face could only be described as excitement, a look that was mirrored on most of the crew's faces; excepting André's, of course, as the Titan rarely smiled let alone looked excited.
"That's what I'm hoping for, yeah."
"But how could you tell all that from a piece of early 20th century Earth music?" Katra asked, finally raising the question that I know had been on everyone's mind since Hannah first picked up the transmission.
"I told Saul that if he ever needed to contact me, this was the way to do it."
"But how can you be certain?" the young man pressed.
"Kat, think. How many sentient beings do you know would be willing to play the same piece of human music CONTINEOUSLY for an hour and a half?"
"It does sound rather singular, major," he replied.
"Damn straight." I settled back in my chair. "Hannah, open up a channel; let's see how our friend's doing now that he's gone straight."
DXVJKE
Kirk was not exactly happy. Two hours of the same broadcast on the same channel in the same space could make them a target. He was never, EVER, happy when the Enterprise was a target. It didn't matter that this…music…was an integral part to his orders; that it was the only way to contact an unscrupulous, deadly, and whacked out pirate; or that said pirate, who had completely crippled his vessel and also saved his best officer and closest friend, was absolutely necessary to the survival to the Federation itself. What mattered was that they had been playing the same eight minutes of music over and over and over and over and over again in a manner that could draw all kinds of unsavory, yet curious, persons to his position. Thus, Kirk was not happy.
"Captain?" Lt. Uhura spoke up, her long fingers were resting on the earpiece that connected her to the subspace communications systems. "I…I think we're being hailed, sir."
"Hailed?" Kirk looked up on the viewscreen, seeing nothing but black, empty, space. "Hailed by whom? There's noth—"
"Vessel decloaking off the port bow, captain," Spock announced from his hunched position over the scanners. He straightened and turned to face the command chair. "It's the Crimson Assurance, sir."
"They're repeating the hail, sir," Uhura said quietly.
"Put it on screen, lieutenant." The screen went from the familiar starfield to a picture of a young lady who hadn't seemed to change since their last meeting. Her raven black hair, white skin, and icy gray eyes were still set off by the black trench coat and blue jeans. A smile was playing on her lips.
"My dear Captain James Kirk. To what do I owe this lovely meeting?" Kirk hearkened back to the day he first met this young woman who introduced herself as Viper. That meeting was far from "lovely"; degrading, humiliating, touchy, infuriating, anxious, testy, and maddening, yes, but hardly lovely. Then Spock showed up on her bridge, and his opinion of this ferocious commander changed. He now hoped that her opinion of him had changed as well, or this was going to be a very short, and possibly disastrous, meeting.
"Good to see our…message…go through, Major Harper. And as for why…we need a favor." Thin black eyebrows arched up on the major's face.
"A 'favor', Captain? Pirates don't do favors, except for one of our own. So unless you're first officer is willing to come back to the Assurance…" She trailed off ambiguously as Spock stepped down to the lower level.
"That is not likely, Major," the Vulcan intoned.
"Hey Saul, howyadoin?" Harper grinned.
"Quite well, Analise."
"You sure I can't convince you to come back?"
"Very," Came the droll response.
"Damn. Oh well, worth a shot." She shrugged as Spock continued the proposition that Kirk left off.
"If a 'favor' is not possible, then perhaps hiring you would be more acceptable?" Her head cocked to the right.
"Hiring me for what?"
"Something we can't discuss over an open channel," Kirk cut in. "Could we call truce to lay it out in person?" Harper looked up in mock aghast.
"Captain! Truce is a term used between enemies with the same goal and I would hate to consider our persons to be in such a position."
"As enemies?"
"No, as having the same goal," She flashed a grin. "We're about to have supper over here if you want to join us and set down your proposition."
"And what confidence do I have that you won't shoot us?"
"The simple truth that the majority of my time is spent being a mercenary, not a pirate, and the first rule of being a mercenary is that you never, EVER, shoot your employer until he has signed the cheque." Harper's wicked grin snapped into pure laughter at the look of shock plastered on Kirk's face. "Come on, we're having spanakopita and souvlakipita. My Tzatziki sauce is to die for."
DXVJKEAfter my white lasagna, spanakopita is perhaps the most favored dish I can prepare for the bridge crew. The dish, which translated from Greek means "little spinach pie", is a combination of chopped spinach, egg, feta cheese, onion, spices, and olive oil wrapped in a light and flaky philo dough and baked until golden brown on the edges. I came across the pie in a seedy bar as it was served as an appetizer to cut the heavy taste of ouzo, a Grecian, liquorice flavored, alcohol, and instantly asked for the dish's recipe. Because the base of the pie had no meat in it, it could be easily inserted into a vegetarian diet, incase one was serving Vulcans.
However, the one complaint that my crew had with spanakopita (well, the male half at least) was that it was vegetarian. And after sitting through the umpteenth complaint (primarily from Duo) for the lack of seared animal flesh, I began making souvlakipita to accompany it. Souvlakipita, or little meat pie, was a combination of roasted lamb, olives, occasionally humus (ground chickpeas, sesame seeds, olive oil, lemon juice, and garlic) served on pita bread with tzatziki sauce (pureed cucumber, olive oil, garlic, and yogurt). Together, these two dishes were high on the list of "foods to make when we take the Romulans down a notch", and what I chose to make when we finally established contact with the Enterprise. Though this was against the traditional celebratory meal, in my mind, having Saul back on the Assurance was worth the extra time to make supper.
Thus, when the Enterprise officers came onboard, they were met with real food, not this dreck that came out of a replicator. Sure it was good for the everyday sustenance that we needed to get by, but for a meal such as this, it was not worthy. André volunteered to escort our guests up to the specially designated conference table so that I could finish setting everything up. The spanakopita came out of the oven crispy, golden, and perfect; the lamb was roasted (well, pan-fried, seeming how I didn't have a spit to set up for a traditional roasting) to perfection; the tzatziki sauce was ready; my officers were spit and polished as much as I could get them, and we all waited for André to arrive. He did, followed by the only three persons that I recognized from the Enterprise. Saul was there, of course, along with Kirk, and trailing behind them was their doctor…McCoy, I think his name was.
I stepped forward, shook hands, welcomed, the usual stuff, and then began to make introductions. My people were seated at their usual places, so all the names would be easy, almost reflective of the time Saul first ate with us.
"Gentlemen, I'm going to make names a little brief, so if you forget things, don't worry, I don't issue pop quizzes. That's Pilot, my helmsman, and her brother Gunner, my weapons exec. The guy with the braid is my chief engineer Duo and the blonde next to him is his brother Katra, high priest and grand wizard of all things with circuits. Together they keep this bucket of bolts flying when Pilot and Gunner continually threaten to wreck it." Both sets of siblings flashed grins at each other. "The big guy is Doctor John Carpenter, the Assurance's CMO, and one of the few formally educated persons on this ship. The young lady next to him is Hannah, my com officer and next to her is Bek'h, who is the only person I've ever met who adapted to the SINS faster than you did, Saul."
"I suppose then that it is a good thing I am no longer here, or the young lady would be out of a job," the Vulcan mused quietly.
"The giant's André, my first officer, but I suppose he's already introduced himself to you. And that just leaves me, so, shall we eat?" Everyone took their places, with Kirk on my right, McCoy on his other side, and Saul taking a seat next to André on my left. Food was passed around and eaten with gusto while small talk ensued, until halfway through, Kirk asked a more direct question.
"I'm curious, Major, as to how you came into possession of a Kriosian Battlecruiser."
"You mean, you want to know how a Klingon protectorate vessel could beat the snot out of a Fed warship, right?"
"Well, yes, but that would have been a rude question to ask someone who made dinner," he replied shamelessly. I laughed as he continued. "Besides, I have a hunch that to tell me what I really want to know, you would have to answer my original question, so I just decided to start there."
"You sure you're not a pirate?" I sipped my wine (Cabernet-Sauvignon, bit lighter than my traditional Merlot, goes better with lamb) and began to answer. "First off, props for being able to distinguish the original model of this ship. I've slapped and swapped so many parts it's hard to tell what the Assurance really is. But yes, you're right, she was originally a Kriosian Battlecruiser. I came across her in some scummy nameless spaceport…what was it, André, ten, eleven years ago?"
"Twelve, I believe, major," the giant replied. "And I think the port was called Ecstasy near the Romulan border."
"Really? Yeah I guess, that sounds about right…Anyway. The Assurance was stunning, streamlined, clean, little roughed up and—what are you laughing at?" My comment was directed at André, who was, in fact, laughing, in his stone-faced manner, imperceptible to anyone who hadn't been around him for nearly twenty years.
"'A little roughed up?' Major, the Assurance was a in worse condition than most Klingon garbage scows, she was slime covered and—"
"HEY! Who's telling this story?" I said, returning the Titan's smirk with a toothy grin. "Whatever the condition she was in, I wanted her. Unfortunately she was currently in the possession of one Ozar Valrush, an Orion pirate of questionable origin and hard drinking habits. He had taken the Assurance as a prize and was trying to sell it off for entirely too much money, nearly quadruple the price of a mint condition battlecruiser. Valrush was pandering to nearly fifteen different captains to take the Assurance and no one, wisely, was biting. When me and André came in, he was drunk as a skunk and slurring like someone had shot novocaine in all his facial muscles.
"So I came up with half a bottle of Mot'loch and sat amongst the other captains, who were also besotted, and started complaining, rather loudly, about the lack of liquid in this bar. Most of the captains were tired of Valrush and, for some reason, started listening to my ranting. One of them, I think he was Rigelian, not sure though, asked how much 'liquid' I considered to be 'enough'. And I replied 'I need a couple of oceans to drink.' This caught Valrush's attention, because he had always bragged he could out drink anyone, even proved it once, by sucking down about thirty gallons of water in one sitting. He staggered up to me and said it was impossible to drink an ocean. I replied that not only was it possible, I could do it in one gulp.
"Valrush scoffed and I said that I could drink three entire oceans, one after another, in less than a minute. He said prove it and I said, 'I will, but let's make a bet on it. If I can down three oceans in under a minute, I get that hunk of junk you've been hawking for the last four hours. If I can't I'll give you double your asking price and you keep the ship.' Valrush laughed, we shook on it, and in the presence of witnesses, I led them across the street to another, smaller, bar.
"There's a drink amongst the more seedier sides of the galaxy that consists of two shots of bourbon, three shots of vodka, a shot of gin, a shot of Grand Mariner, and eight ounces or Romulan Ale served in a chilled martini glass with a sliver of pickled ginger."
"That's a lot of alcohol," McCoy said, with raised eyebrows.
"Yeah, but it's a legitimate drink, served in most spaceports, recognized by pirates everywhere, and it's called an Ocean. I had the bartender make three of these and I knocked 'em back in about forty-five seconds. Once the pirate captains had figured out what I had done, they started laughing." My crew, who had heard this story some half hundred times, was enjoying the reaction of the Feds. I continued.
"Now Captain, it can be a very dangerous thing to make fifteen pirate captains laugh, unless they are dead drunk. They laughed so hard some of them started falling over, and even Valrush began to crack up. The mood was so jovial that he agreed to the bargain, rather than shooting me there on the spot for making a fool of him, and gave me the Assurance scot-free.
"Right before I pulled out of port, Valrush contacted me and told me that I had best hightail it out of his turf or he was going to fry this run-down scow."
"Why didn't he do it then and there?" Kirk asked, more interested than I believe he wanted me to see him.
"Hangover. Pretty bad one, and only matched by the one I had at the time. 45 ounces of hard liquor in less than a minute gives you a killer headache. I think now Valrush wishes he had overcome the aftershock instead of giving me the grace period."
"Why's that?" McCoy asked.
"Cause I kick his ass every third day of the week. Valrush has never really forgiven me for conning him out of the Assurance, but at least now he can't do anything about it," I grinned.
"Because of the upgrades?" Kirk asked. I looked sideways at him, knowing that he was after info on the advancement of the Assurance.
"You're way too sly for a Fed, James Kirk, and yeah, it's partly because of my upgrades," I leaned back a bit, "But more because of my crew." Kirk nodded.
"I know the feeling. There are days I would have never seen without the men and women of the Enterprise."
"Machines ain't worth a plugged nickel if there's no one to guide them," I agreed. Dinner was mostly over and I felt it was okay to move forward a little. "So, James, what's this job you need done?" Kirk leaned back from the table and twisted a little to look me square in the face.
"Well, Major, the Federation would like to hire you to steal something from the Romulans."
DXVJKE
YES!! Keath is back and badder than ever! Reviews will keep her from coming after you, so why not write one and slip into the little box in the left hand corner? Later,
DarkX