Chapter 4 Stardate 82974.23. Thursday, November 13, 2408
"Charlie, all systems are reading green. We can proceed to the wormhole for the next run."
Flight Engineer Miranda Nichols, a Ph.D. holder in Spatial Engineering Design from Stanford University in California, had just completed the pre-flight checklist and notified the pilot. The thirty-year-old blue-eyed blonde had crammed her lithe, 6'2" frame into a specially-designed form-fitting seat that made her wonder about blood circulation.
Nichols was also admiring that man who was now in the comfort room peeing once again, the man whom she had developed a major crush.
Tom Paris.
Older men were never her thing. But this sixty-two-year-old guy had swept her away like a torrential flood. Maybe it was that he had spent hours in a Wichita gym, losing twenty pounds and rebuilding muscle. She considered that perhaps it was because he was a living legend, the first person ever to break the Warp 10 barrier. Or maybe it was how those blue eyes of his saw right through her. She wasn't really sure.
What she did know was that Tom cared about her. He was always inquiring about how she was doing after busting up with her computer geek boyfriend or asking about her sick little sister, Tammy. She had never known anyone who cared so much about others. And she just knew by his inquiries that he definitely cared about her.
The red flight-suited Paris came back to his seat, the portside one directly in front of Miranda's station. Tom's hand brushed her chair as he struggled to move into position due to his stiff back. Intentionally she leaned backwards just a bit, allowing his hand to graze her right shoulder. Electricity immediately shot though her body, straight into her pubic area.
"Sorry, Miranda. Not as limber as I used to be." Tom eased an aching back into his chair and buckled in.
The flight engineer gave him a quick grin in response.
"Oh, I wouldn't really know about that, Tom." But I would like to. "And congratulations are in order, Captain Paris. Today is your birthday!"
Birthday? He forgot.
Charlie slapped his buddy on the right shoulder, narrowly avoiding Tom's painful area.
"Hey, that's right! Happy Birthday, buddy. Heard from B'Elanna?"
Miranda grimaced involuntarily at that name but no one noticed. She was looking down at her screen and carefully watching the pre-flight data.
"Not today, although I sent out my traditional morning message to her. I am not sure about these comms and if they are getting through. MIDAS is really breaking up near the wormhole due to interference so I will check again once we reach the Gamma Quadrant and find a better relay."
Another year older. Tom rubbed a sore arm and turned to his life-long friend.
"I am glad that this is the fifth run of six, Charlie. For some reason, I really miss B'Elanna more than usual. It will be good to get home even if it is Q'onoS." He spun his wedding ring, a habit he had picked up years ago on Voyager when B'Elanna and he had reconciled. To him, touching that ring was like caressing her.
"Heard from Neenah?"
Tom's running buddy nodded in the affirmative.
"2300 last night," he said. "She sends her love. The message originated in Seattle, Washington, so she is probably visiting Charlie Jr. Our son is now stationed at Starfleet Bainbridge Island. He is on staff at the hospital there. Internship. Nearly over."
The comms crackled. 'Davis to Day.'
That Davis was Rear Admiral Ambrose Burnside Davis. He captained the USS Nashville, the quatum-engined escort vessel for this test. There were more than a few dignitaries aboard and a lot of mighty pleased ones so far. The way things were going meant that Starfleet would soon have an engine and a ship faster than anything in the known history of space travel, something that would revolutionize matters in the Milky Way galaxy and gain a significant operational advantage over the Undine in fluidic space. Of course, nothing could touch what the Gen possessed but thankfully there had been no contact with that species in decades.
'Day here.'
'Charlie, we are ready to proceed again. Follow the same procedure, as before. But ask Miranda to keep an eye on hull pressure and the heat displacers. Our science team has picked up a microfracture in the hull coating near the starboard exhaust port. Nothing to worry about yet nor are we sure what caused it.'
The transmission had no sooner ended when the blonde flight engineer hit a key pad button and replied.
'Admiral Davis, this is Miranda. I saw that report and just went over the numbers. I believe the microfracture was caused by intense heat being deflected off the central engine exhaust port when we last transitioned to fluidic space. That event meant the heat had to disperse to either the port or starboard exhaust ducts or maybe both. In this case, it went to starboard to join with that engine's exhaust, doubling the heat intensity and deforming the underlying metal shielding to bubble the coating. That would cause those cracks. We will need to make a few modifications later.'
Nichols smiled. She had responded precisely without deviating from the endless streams of data scrolling across her monitor.
Tom was impressed. She sounded a lot like his wife. One smart and focused woman.
"You sound a lot like my favorite engineer, Miranda!" Tom laughed approvingly but the Stanford grad did not appreciate his comment. She knew exactly who he was talking about and sighed. Miranda wanted to be Tom's favorite engineer. How was she going to get this guy alone?
Day flipped some switches and pressed keypad buttons.
'Engines start up. Proceeding to the wormhole. All systems remain green.'
Davis acknowledged and ordered the Nashville to move ahead of the experimental pitchfork-designed ship. The fluidic vessel had an elongated white fuselage along with three engines in the back and steerable rear fins for use when entering an atmosphere where air maneuverability was necessary.
The ship's logo, the Starfleet insignia, was prominent on both sides of the pointed nose, as was its named designation, 'BN-1.' When a Starfleet admiral asked what that large decal stood for, Tom sheepishly looked at Charlie. Charlie was the designer and pilot-in-command so he could christen the ship. He simply said, "B'Elanna-Neenah. Number one in our hearts."
With a slight waggle as a final adjustment of attitude, the Nashville entered the wormhole under full impulse power to move through first and then to its designated intercept point. Davis was always apprehensive about wormholes; they were not the most stable of space phenomena. Sure, they cut travel time and distance considerably but were subject to sudden collapse, high radiation, and foreign matter. The Bajoran wormhole was the most stable known to Starfleet and for that reason had been chosen for this test. But that did not mean it was 100% safe.
When the USS Nashville entered the wormhole for Mission Five, everything appeared to be normal for several minutes. Nearly two-thirds of the way in, however, the ship experienced what could only be called a jolt. Collision alarms sounded as the onboard dampeners compensated. Admiral Davis could not stop the vessel to assess matters because the wormhole acted like a reversible current depending upon direction of travel, pulling the ship along at tremendous speed until it shot out the other side. Besides, the Nashville was not moving forward in a straight line anymore but was slowly spinning to starboard to exit facing rearwards. Helm control barely kept the ship steady and the crew was tossed about as if in rough seas.
'All stop. Damage report.' Davis calmly requested an assessment while contemplating the look of sheer terror on the faces of the Federation dignitaries. More than one were on the deck checking themselves over or praying to their gods. Thankfully there were no casualties on the bridge other than a few bumps and bruises.
Although the indicator lights showed weapons, engines, shields, transporters, and life support to be online, Admiral Davis heard no response from his Section Chiefs because comms were totally fried from an electrical overload. The turbolifts no longer worked, which meant each Section reported in by having a representative climb up the Jeffries tubes.
Below on Deck 10, Lieutenant Diana Smyth was in spatial geosciences evaluating the data as she tried to make sense of what had just happened. A red-headed MIT graduate holding a direct commission, her green eyes watched the mission information run once more through the computer. Then she saw it. It was so obvious to her skilled eye that she pointed right at the screen and tapped it with a fingernail.
Precisely where the incident occurred was a 'bulge,' what she would later describe in her report as a very large speedbump. It was as if the wormhole had burped internally. For the Nashville, as large as it was, the hull simply hit that bump and scraped its port side at an angle, which caused the ship to turn and then slowly spin as it moved along at tremendous speed. The anomaly was not large enough to do more than that.
But then a thought crossed her mind. The shuttle!
'Lieutenant Smyth to Captain Davis.' Nothing.
Her boss yelled from his office. "Comms are out, Di. Only way to report is to go in person. You will have to climb up to Deck 1."
Smyth slammed his fist on her desk and screeched in frustration. After gathering a printout she ran for a Jeffries tube access hatch. Son of a bitch!
On the other side of the wormhole, the BN-1 spacecraft attempted to raise the Nashville without success. Comms had been an issue within the wormhole so Day was not concerned. Using impulse, Day flew the ship into the spatial distortion the same as always; slowly, deliberately, and with enough forward momentum to be grabbed by the flow.
Feeling the effect of the pull in his skilled hands, Charlie reached for a panel and pushed the correct keypad buttons to place the ship into fluidic space. The vessel leaped forward immediately, its engines eagerly sucking in plasmatic-enriched gas as the bubble formed and the hull turned into a semi-solid gelatinous mass.
As with the Nashville, the ship moved rapidly along until it struck the speedbump. But unlike the very large and heavy Starship, the small and light experimental craft was moving at what would be considered Warp 125. When the fluidic bubble struck the anomaly it deformed, as did the ship's hull.
The crew barely noticed the vessel's exterior distort awkwardly and turn the ship slightly to starboard. Nor did they know that the experimental hull coating began to peel off in sheets as tremendous friction caused heat to build up instantaneously after the collision. All they knew was that several red indicator lights and alarms went off at once.
"Problem here." Charlie's announcement to the crew was followed by his skillful hands sensing something very odd. It wasn't good. Things were clearly amiss because the helm just did not feel right to him.
In the seat to Charlie's left Tom Paris felt it as well and watched the pitch and yaw indicators suddenly begin to oscillate wildly. He knew from experience that the ship was beginning a tumbling motion to starboard and tremendous velocity.
The experimental vessel was now thrown off course and moved at incredible speed. The force of the movement caused the ship to slice right through the starboard wall of the wormhole as if it was a hot knife through butter.
The fluidic space bubble contorted crazily as the ship passed through the wormhole's wall and into the Delta Quadrant without a hiccup. None of the three people aboard knew that they had entered the wrong quadrant. Moreover, they had no idea as to what had just happened. Nichols was shocked as she reported the ship's cosmic indicator showing they were now one calendar year's travel away from their original point of departure and moving at enormous, uncontrollable speed.
For Day, Paris, and Nichols within the doomed BN-1, all three were trying to do something, anything, to regain command of the ship. Charlie calmly tried to adjust the ship's attitude thrusters but to no avail. A still cool Tom thought through every possible scenario he had experienced in his career, actual or simulated, only to come up with no possible solution. At the engineer work station, the spinning ship had caused Miranda to smash her forehead into an access panel and then tossed her head backwards with violence. Bleeding profusely and with a concussion, she heaved her guts, spewing vomit all over the place. But she stoically remained at her station, adjusting fuel flow and engine cycles in an unsuccessful attempt to reverse the tumbling effect.
Soon a massive green blob suddenly appeared to their front, coming into view then going and returning again as the ship spun around and around. The two pilots looking through the forward observation panel knew that the object was in actuality a large planet approaching faster than either of them had ever experienced. They understood immediately what that meant, for they were tumbling into it with no hope of regaining control. Deep down inside, they both knew that this was it.
When facing death people sometimes consider past events or pray for salvation. Charlie recalled an old Starfleet axiom: 'There are no atheists on a battlefield.' In truth, there were three Christian believers sitting in their form-fitting seats praying to God. But each one was also thinking about different things.
Tom Paris was recalling his past experiences with fluidic space while on Voyager and how strange it was to be dying within it. He knew of only one lifeform that could even exist there and that was Species 8472, the Undine. He had a run in with them once a long time ago, recalling Voyager's Captain Janeway and her forced alliance with the Borg to kill these things. Back then their research showed that Undine bio-ships were vulnerable to advanced nanoprobes so Janeway had helped the Borg to develop the Nano-weapons that drove the species back into fluidic space. Tom recalled the Borg then unsuccessfully turning upon Voyager and how Janeway avoided assimilation while patching things up temporarily with the Undine. 'Temporarily' was indeed true, for they were now at war with that species.
Tom managed to grab Charlie's left hand with his own left and forced his twisted back to reach behind to touch Miranda with his right. He noticed that his best friend had his eyes wide open, a professional retired admiral who would face eternity with honor and courage.
Charlie prayed that his family would be taken care of. That was it. That was all he could think of at the moment.
Miranda was calm but gripping Charlie's shoulder tightly and praying silently to God to make it quick. Then the brilliant engineer almost laughed, as she considered her life such as it was.
Nichols had no husband to worry about; a busy career cost her that life and potential children. That pitiful boyfriend of hers wanted her only for sex. Then an image entered her brain, one of a guy who had chased her for months. He was a Federation Marine Corps Major by the name of Steve Bennet. The officer was stationed at Starfleet Headquarters in San Francisco and she had met him while doing some work for a black operations ship design. Miranda had mentioned him once to Tom, relating how that Marine had given her a globe and anchor pin to wear to the 2407 Marine Corps Ball, a formal dance that she refused to attend. Miranda had kept that pin for some reason but ignored Steve despite his asking her out many times thereafter.
After weeks of trying, Bennet gave up. Now Miranda wished he hadn't.
But none of that mattered anymore because the collision warnings were sounding and red lights flashed as their quickening pulsations illuminated the cabin. The ship was entering the planet's atmosphere at the wrong angle and in less than twenty seconds it would all be over. They would explode long before they hit the ground.
Of course the entire crew knew the deal by now but it was Tom's voice that suddenly spoke over the comms with calmness. He mimicked imperfectly a strained conversation he once had with someone he loved while floating in space with her so long ago as their oxygen was about to fail.
"Don't worry, I'm here. It will all be over soon."
Then that beautiful woman's face was there in his mind's eye. B'Elanna was standing right before him now, her arms outstretched and that infectious smile warmed his blood just as it always did. He broke contact with Charlie to reach out to her but she was gone.
Suddenly a piercing white light engulfed them and all went dark.