Oops, he did it again…
The smell of fresh coffee roused him, and he woke to see a green hand holding a mug under his nose.
"Time to wake up sleepyhead." She smiled down at him.
"What time is it?" he asked, taking the mug, then realised he was in her bed and his chest was bare.
"0630." She replied. "You have time for breakfast and a shower, a shit and a shave before you're on duty." She sipped from her mug of herbal tea as she perched on the bed beside him.
"How did I? We didn't? Did we?" he asked with a worried frown.
She rolled her eyes. "That's turning into your catchphrase Reg. Along with 'oh boy'." She copied his intonation as well as the words.
"Do I say that a lot?"
"Yes." she replied with a smile. "Don't panic, I tried to make you more comfortable with a cushion and you stood up and walked in here. I didn't think you were properly awake so I just went with it. You stripped off and literally fell into the bed."
He peered under the covers. "Oh boy!" he said on realising he was stark naked and drew the covers to his chest protectively. "Did I say anything?" he asked with a worried frown.
"You mumbled a bit, and tried to pull me into bed with you."
"Oh boy." he looked mortified and she smirked. "Did I hurt you?"
"No. You were sweet actually." She drained her mug. "Time to hit the shower Tiger, or you'll be late for your morning briefing."
He rubbed his eye with the heel of his hand and sipped his coffee as he watched her walk from the room. It was just how he liked it. He sighed, she seemed to be his perfect girl and she was real. The only problem was it was utterly hopeless.
…
Reg swore, it wasn't something he did often. He was above all a gentleman and was raised to believe manners maketh man. In this case man was being sorely tested. He grasped the edge of the terminal to drag himself up from the floor as the red alert klaxon sounded. From the feel of the way the ship suddenly skewed sideways, knocking him to the floor they had either hit something, or something had hit them. The panel flashed like a Christmas tree with damage throughout the power system before it blew and he was knocked flat on his back, his arm over his face instinctively to shield him from the blast. Everything went dark aside from the flames until emergency lighting came on.
"You okay sir?" Ensign Michaels shouted as she extinguished the terminal with a hand-held fire suppressor.
"I'm fine." he said and stood up. He grabbed another extinguisher and helped her, the fire suppression system was apparently offline on top of everything else and the shields were taking a hammering from something from the way the ship was bucking around. He tapped his communicator. "Barclay to Bridge."
"Where a little busy Reg, is there a problem?" Janeway responded.
"We're in the dark down here, is the Engineering console on the Bridge online?"
"Looks like it."
"Thank you Captain." he responded. "Head to shield control. Prioritise keeping the shields up." he told Michaels. "I'll head to the Bridge to coordinate damage control."
"Aye sir." she replied and took off at a run, her blonde braid flailing behind her.
He tapped his communicator as soon as he was on the turbolift. "Barclay to Guest Quarters five."
"I'm here Reg, are you okay?" Taryn replied, the baby shrieking in the background.
"I just wanted to check on you both." he replied as he steadied himself against the wall.
"We're fine apart from making a fuss over the noise. You just take care of yourself Lieutenant."
He sighed with relief as the turbolift opened on to the Bridge. On the main viewscreen there was a small Orion ship circling, taking pot shots at them. Reg headed to the Engineering Station, fortunately things weren't as bad as they seemed from the panel in Auxilliary Engineering before the power went out.
"Mr Barclay, can we get a tractor beam online?" Janeway asked, approaching his station.
"I..I think so Captain. It'll just take a moment." He rerouted power rapidly and turned towards the Ops Station. "You should have power, but you'll need to reinitialise the graviton generators." he told the officer.
"What? How?" the young officer looked up wide-eyed.
"It's the…" Reg ran across to the Ops Terminal. "Like this." he leaned over to key in the sequence.
"But that procedure isn't in the manual. You'll overload the…" the Ops Officer protested with a frown, then looked surprised as the tractor system came online. "We have tractor power."
"Mr Tuvok, grab that ship and knock down their shields." Janeway ordered. "Thank you Mr Barclay."
"Don't thank me, thank Montgomery Scott for designing the tractor systems over spec." Reg stated and returned to the Engineering terminal.
"Dead for eighty years and the man's still working miracles." Janeway mused.
"We have them Captain. There are two crew aboard, I have transported them to the brig." Tuvok reported.
"Thank you Mr Tuvok, you're with me." Janeway stated as she left headed for the turbo lift. "Let's see what variety of fish we caught."
…
"Yes, I know them. They attend school with my cousin Lural on the Homeworld." Taryn stated as she looked at the faces of the two boys on the screen in the conference room, via surveillance camera. She rubbed the baby's back to quiet him as he snuggled in his papoose on her front. "I wouldn't call them small fry, but they're certainly not of age. The older boy is Beren, first born of the Tahedri of the Caj Corvas and the younger is his brother Endar."
"Are you saying we were attacked by two rich kids out on a joy-ride in their Daddy's ship?" Janeway asked incredulously and exchanged glances with her senior team.
"Essentially, yes." Taryn stated. "They're a pair of spoiled brats in a hurry to prove themselves to their father. Too young and foolish to care about the consequences."
"The question is, what do we do with them?" Tuvok intoned.
"There's a bigger picture here." Taryn stated and switched the screen to a view of their captured ship. "This ship is a prototype."
"Are you sure?" Reg asked looking at the image carefully.
"It's a hybrid, it has components of three different ships. The torpedo launchers, the nacelles and the nose cone…they don't go together." Taryn explained.
"I believe Miss Prior is correct." Tuvok replied. "The differences are subtle, but they are apparent." he brought up the specifications of the three original ships.
"Also it has the Corvas insignia… and three of these access codes you found on board are for known Syndicate outposts." she said as she continued slotting each of the handful of isolinear chips they had discovered on searching the vessel into her Orion padd to decode them. "Make that four." she handed the device to the Captain.
"My God." Janeway intoned as she examined the readout before passing it to Tuvok.
"I don't see the problem?" the CMO an older doctor named Jones with a grey beard asked.
"They've outed their father and by extension his Caj as part of the Syndicate. Something my Grandmother has suspected for a while but been unable to prove. They've also entered Olvid territory. The original Corvas was an Olvid slave and there has always been bad blood between their families. They feud at the drop of a hat. They've also breached the Imperial Neutrality Covenant agreed by all Tahedrin by attacking a Federation vessel and add to that they're in an experimental ship? Also if word gets out that I'm on board a ship they attacked the Caj Barin will seek revenge. I'm Edara's intended heir. For the moment anyway." Taryn explained, with an apologetic look to Reg that she hadn't told him she was next in the line of succession.
"The Corvas will destroy us to save face." Janeway stated. "They won't want anyone to find out what we know."
"From an Orion point of view you have four options." Taryn began and counted them on her fingers. "Keep hold of the two little toerags and wait for Corvas to come looking for them and kill us all. Send them packing with a flea in their ear and wait for Corvas to come after us to cover it up by killing us all." Taryn explained. "Abandon the ship. Get everyone on shuttles or runabouts, anything with warp dive and get out of Bayleron's Dagger as fast as we can. Once the word is out on subspace there'll be nothing left to cover up."
"And the fourth?" Janeway asked.
"Kill the boys, destroy the ship. Deny all knowledge of them if the Corvas ask." Taryn replied. "That would be what Corvas would do. Admittedly it's not the most moral or palatable option. Option two would buy you the most time. The boys will probably lie before they admit to their father they got caught, but they'll tell eventually. They're still only kids."
"We could send one shuttle to transmit a message?" Tuvok suggested.
"I'd prefer not to involve my Orion family if avoidable. I'd hate to trigger a blood feud." Taryn stated.
Janeway nodded her assent. "Thank you Miss Prior, you've given us a lot to consider."
"I'm sorry I don't have better news. If I can be of further help please let me know Captain?" Taryn stood and stepped out of the room.
"Could she be wrong?" the Ops Officer, a young man named Landry asked. "She's very young."
"She's being groomed to be the next Tahedri of her Caj." Tuvok stated. "Her knowledge of Caju politics is likely to be unsurpassed."
"I have to ask this, can we trust her?" Dr Jones asked. "She is Orion."
"She's also half-Human and a Fleet Brat, raised within the Federation." Janeway added. "She knows the score, she's not playing games, unlike the two idiots in our brig." Janeway rubbed her temple and walked over to the window.
"If it weren't for the Academy entrance age she'd be a cadet instead of a student at Daystrom." Reg added. "She aced the entry exams and has a deferred place waiting. She's loyal to her Caj but she'd never betray the Federation."
"Let's hope we live long enough to see her in uniform." Janeway muttered. "Can anyone see any other options?" she looked at the collection of blank faces. Janeway tilted her head. "Very well. Mr Barclay, please prepare a shuttlecraft. I want it fast and I want it armed to the teeth. Mr Tuvok and Ms Bennett, you will pilot the shuttle at maximum warp out of this nebula and sent an encoded transmission to Starfleet, not a distress call. There are enough sharks in the vicinity without alerting them to blood in the water." Bennett, the Conn Officer nodded her agreement.
"What about our prisoners Captain?" Counsellor Fraser asked. "Mr Doon and McCavity." he added wryly.
"Are those the names they gave?" Jones laughed mirthlessly. "Ben Doon and Phil McCavity? At least they have a sense of humour. I haven't heard that one in years."
"Orion culture has absorbed a number of alien influences over time." Tuvok noted. "Including Earth humour."
"Their jolly jape is liable to get us all killed." Janeway pointed out shaking her head. "Unless we can scare the living daylights out of them." Janeway turned up the audio on the custody suite. It sounded as though the boys were singing to each other. "They're singing?"
"No, it's definitely a language but the universal translator is struggling with it." Duncan stated. "It's based on Orion but we believe it's too nuanced for the UT to grasp. Given time…."
"Do we have any Orion speakers among the crew? We've been working the border for some time now." Janeway asked.
"Orions rarely speak their own language in front of others." Reg explained. "They're speaking High Kolari. Even among their own people few speak it. It's a dialect reserved for ritual and diplomacy. Ta… Miss Prior told me." he added, blushing. "She tells the baby stories in the High Tongue. It seems to soothe him."
"Then it appears we need more of her help." Janeway commented.
…
"You understand what we need Miss Prior?" Janeway asked in the observation room beside the interview suite.
"Yes, Captain. I'll try and draw them to speak Federation Standard if I can. I know they know it, they're just being snobs. I'll need to be… assertive with them. Possibly more than you would a Human of their age." She handed the baby to Reg and he settled into the crook of his elbow. Reg stood beside Duncan to watch the interview, on screen the boys were already sat on the far side of the table.
"You're sure they won't be more responsive to a male officer?" Janeway asked.
"Despite outward appearances Kolari culture is matriarchal. They'll stamp their feet and beat their chests about it but they will defer to a high-ranking female. They'd see a male as a challenge. Someone to outwit. Beren is nearly thirteen, he may just be old enough to be affected by my pheromones, Endar certainly isn't, but they will have seen older males respond to the influence of females and should associate my scent with that behaviour."
"In that case if you're ready?" she indicated with her hand and the two women entered the corridor.
Taryn's body language was certainly assertive as she entered the room. In fact, Reg almost didn't recognise her image on the screen. She glared at the boys then turned her glare on Captain Janeway.
"I was given to believe you were holding men here, not suckling pups!" she snapped.
"I'm no pup, you quarter bred whore!" Beren shouted and rose to his feet. "I should cut you open to prove you're pink on the inside F'deraxt'la!"
Taryn cuffed him hard around the head despite him being much taller than her, even his younger brother was taller by a head and they were both muscular and bare chested in tight pants with decorated bracers on their forearms. Their hair cropped short as it wasn't the tradition to shave your head until you were of age, if you had head hair which not everyone did. Strong androgens in green Orions lead the males to be heavily muscled but also caused loss of head hair in adult males. Many who retained their hair removed it to appear more masculine although fashions were changing. A few of her trendier cousins wore their hair long or braided, mohawks were another recent trend in male grooming. "Learn your place boy-child!" she hissed. "Are you too stupid to realize the trouble you're in?"
"Our father will come for us and obliterate this ship!" he yelled.
"Your father will disinherit you when he learns his heir and spare can't even take a crippled vessel without getting caught." she drew back and gave him an earnest look. One that said 'do you get it now, idiot?' "If you were my sons I'd blow you up along with this ship to be rid of your worthless hides."
"I'd sooner die than be your son, mongrel bitch. Our father will be proud that we told them nothing." Beren defended and slammed his fist on the table.
"I'm sure he'll be thrilled to learn you were so ashamed of the name he gave you, you used another. You are princes, not slavers or pirates born in the gutter! Did your mother teach you nothing of our ways? Of what it means to be of high birth?" she berated them. "Then there's the matter of using the High Tongue before outsiders." she clicked her tongue repeatedly. "You should know better than that Beren." She paced around them with her arms folded, shaking her head.
"What are you going to do with us?" Endar asked softly.
"Sorry?" Taryn touched her ear as she paced.
"What are you going to do with us, my Princess?" he corrected.
"Good question little Prince." she mused as she continued to pace, returning his courtesy to at least some extent. "If it were up to me I'd throw you both out of the nearest airlock. Send you floating home." She continued pacing for a moment to let this sink in. "Fortunately for you the Olvid object to people jettisoning refuse in the Dagger." she looked shrewdly to Captain Janeway. "What's the maximum Federation punishment for piracy?"
"Thirty years in a penal colony." Janeway replied.
"Thirty years." Taryn repeated appraisingly. "And the embarrassment of course. It's hardly surprising most Captains and crew commit Vyun-pashan rather than be caught. Pity you missed your chance for that option. You'll be forty-two, all the best high-born females will be long taken by the time you're released Beren. Even the dregs will be married off." She smirked. "You'll have to pay a courtesan to give you an heir."
"We'll never tell." Beren whispered as he sat, then met her gaze steadily. "Let us go and we'll never tell, my Princess."
"You're brighter than you look, my Prince." Taryn smirked briefly towards Janeway, out of the boys' sight. "But that's not up to me." she looked to the Captain.
"I'm sure we can take pity on these two pathetic wretches, as it's mutually beneficial. It will save on paperwork if nothing else." Janeway intoned sternly
Taryn leaned in between their seats, her face close to theirs. "Remember this my Princes. Remember that you owe your continued existence to me and the F'deraxt'la. Your lives belong to us and if you cross us your father will hear of your shame along with the entire Tahedrin. I swear that on the Mother."
…
"Will they tell?" Reg asked as he walked them back to their quarters, the baby still in his arms.
"Probably." Taryn replied. "I think Beren will cave first. Endar has the more cluros of the two."
Reg suspected cluros translated as balls, but was a little afraid to confirm this. "You said it was wrong of them to speak High Orion in front of outsiders."
"Hmm?" Taryn replied, a little distracted, he assumed by their predicament.
"You speak it in front of me? To him?" He looked down at the boy in his arms as they stopped outside her quarters.
She smiled, an open and unguarded smile that warmed his heart. "You aren't an outsider, not to me."
A smile to match hers spread over his face. "Are you packed? All ready to go if need be?"
"I have ten days' worth of his feed as well as blankets and clothing for him in a bag by the door." she smiled. "My bag is always ready to go. They told me I'm allowed a bag for each of us."
Reg nodded. "If the call comes, don't wait for me." he grabbed her upper arm with his free hand to settle her objections. "I mean it. Promise me if I'm on duty you'll get your behinds onto your assigned escape vessel?"
"But Reg?" she pleaded.
"I won't be far behind you. I have no plans to go down with the ship. I'll take care of myself but I need to know you'll do the same."
She nodded, "I promise." she stepped closer to him and rested her head against his chest. He wrapped his arm around her shoulders and she held him tight around the waist. He wanted to reassure her, to tell her everything would be alright but they were both well aware that it would be a lie.
