The two men entered the bridge. "Away team," Apollo called as he made his way to his chair, "What's your location? What do you have for me?"
"Admiral," Circe said, "we found some of the crew members on deck four. Not a very welcome sight." Her voice sounded strained.
"Commander, are you having problems?"
"You'd be having problems too... if you came into a room... where dead people... have been festering... for about a week." This was from Sam. Her statement was punctuated by coughing.
"I see," he replied solemnly. "Do you want us to send you some breathing apparatus?"
"No no, we'll be fine. Just have to get used to the smell. Actually, I've been exposed to worse. It's just been a while."
Apollo smiled grimly. He heard the doors open behind him. As he heard clopping, Kellara said, "Captain, could you describe the cause of death at all?"
A chuckle came from the other end. "I don't think it's all that hard to spot. They died just like Prentice did... their chests were blown open from the inside. Circe, get your hand out of there!!" Sam sounded more than a bit disgusted on her last statement.
"Sorry, Captain. I thought I saw something weird."
"Weird like what, Commander?" Apollo inquired.
"Well... it's like that goo the doctor found in Prentice. Only it... it seems a bit fresher is all."
"Could you take a sample of it? I'd like to compare it to..."
A scream cut Kellara off. "Sam!" Apollo snapped. "What's going on down there!?"
"Stand by, we're checking. It sounded like Bruebaker." Sam sounded like she was running.
Apollo looked as though he was ready to jump out of his chair and head over to the Gilgamesh that very instant. Kellara's soft hand on his shoulder prevented him. He looked up at her face; the concern in his eyes told him she felt the same way, but the hand on his shoulder told him to have faith in his subordinates, especially since he was married to one of them. He sat back in his seat.
He didn't have to wait long for an answer. "It's Bruebaker. He seems to be having some respiratory problems."
Even as Apollo was getting up, Kellara showed surprising agility by spinning around and heading into the turbolift. "Transporter room," she said, "beam him directly to Sickbay."
It didn't take long for them to make it to Kellara's territory. Even still, as they rushed in, two nurses were at Bruebaker's side. He was sitting on the edge of the bed, sounding as though he were trying to cough up a lung. "All right, all right. You're here. You'll be all right," Kellara said, grabbing a tricorder from a tray on her way over to his bed.
As she scanned him, Apollo said, "What happened over there? Where are the other two?"
"We're right here," Sam said as she and Circe entered Sickbay. "We were beamed to the transporter room. Stan, what happened to you?"
He was still coughing, but not as hard now. "I was in another room down the corridor from them. I saw these weird pods on the floor. At first, I thought they were plants... one of them even opened like a flower getting ready to bloom. But then this..." more coughing, "this thing practically flew out of the pod! Before I knew what happened, it stuck to my face. I think one of its... its... legs, or whatever it was, landed in my mouth. It was disgusting, all slimy and everything. Anyway, before I knew it, the thing jumped off my face and skittered away. I tried to chase it, but I couldn't stop choking."
Circe snorted. "It probably wouldn't have stuck a leg in your mouth if you didn't open it to scream." She smirked.
Sam smiled too. "He probably bit a piece of it off in reflex. Maybe that's what caused him to gag."
"You'd scream too, if something just jumped out at you like that!"
Apollo waved them down. "All right, knock it off. Doctor, prognosis?"
She finished scanning. "He'll live. I'd actually have to go with Sam's assessment. He might have reflexively taken a chunk out of it; there's some kind of foreign substance in his stomach. But I've scanned it; if it was toxic to him, it would've shown up. I think he'll be all right."
Apollo nodded solemnly. Then he looked at Bruebaker, and smiled. Patting him on the shoulder, he said, "Next time," he winked, "keep your mouth shut."
Bruebaker looked chastened at first, then smiled. "I'll try to remember that. Hey Doc, I still don't feel too well."
She checked him again, then filled a hypospray and injected him in the neck, "This should help your nausea. I think you should take a couple of days off, get some rest." Apollo nodded his agreement.
"Thanks, Doc." He hopped off the bed and left Sickbay.
Sam turned to her husband. "We still have a lot to look for over there. Permission to return and resume the search."
"Granted on one condition..." he said. He knew she thought he was going to tell her he was going with them, and silenced her protest with a gesture. "You... go over there wearing environmental suits. That way, you'll be better protected from... unexpected circumstances."
"I think we can live with that," Sam replied.
"You'd better. It's either that or I go with you," Apollo said.
The tone he used didn't allow Sam to know whether or not he was serious, so she said, "Okay, we'll wear the suits."
"And no taking them off as soon as you're over there or at the first sign of inconvenience." As soon as he said that, another memory flash hit Apollo. This one was of a time in his childhood. He and his sister would prepare for school. Their mother told them to wear their boots during the winter. They would fuss and they would whine, and eventually they would put their boots on and go to school. But no sooner were they a block away from home, then they would sit down in the cold, wet snow, take off their boots, reach in their backpacks and pull out their normal shoes, which they had secreted away for just such a reason. After putting their shoes on, they would run through the snow, laughing all the way to school. Apollo chuckled. He also remembered they caught many an illness that way.
"Admiral?" Sam asked. "Something funny?"
He smiled at her, and showed her the memory through their bond. She gave him a "naughty boy" look. Kellara and Circe looked at each other, then rolled their eyes at the couple.
Twenty minutes later, Apollo was back on the bridge, and the away team was back aboard the Gilgamesh. This time Xanax was with them. "We're back in the room where we had found Bruebaker. Something odd. Those pods Brue described... when we were here before, only the one was open. They all are now."
"Any critters nearby?" Apollo asked.
"Not that we can see... hang on." There was silence for a minute. "Circe found one. It appears to be dead. We're having it beamed to Sickbay so Kellara can take a look at it."
"All right. Doctor?"
"I heard, Admiral. Receiving it now. I have it behind a class 5 forcefield, just in case."
"Understood. Let me know..."
"GEEZ-um!!"
Apollo's head jerked up. "What!? Sam! Circe! What happened?!?"
He heard heavy breathing on the other end. "It's... it's okay. One of those damn things came jumping out at me. Circe got it with a phaser blast." Apollo exhaled the breath he was holding and, realizing he had jumped to his feet, sat back down. "Guess you could call it a crispy critter now."
He could tell she was smiling. "Very funny. Be very careful there, Captain. You've already established there's alien life there."
"Understood. Our next stop will be the auxiliary bridge." Sam's breathing slowed to an even rate. The team remained mostly silent along their journey. Only the occasional mention or instruction broke the silence.
The waiting was starting to get on Apollo's nerves. He was getting very antsy. Suddenly, he got, :You know, when I get back, we're going to have to find a way for you to work off all that energy.:
Apollo's mood brightened. :Oh? I take it you have some ideas along that route?:
:Mmmmm... some.: Sam's playful tone told him all he needed to know. Unfortunately, it just made him even more fidgety.
They made it to the auxiliary bridge without a problem. However, they found signs of trouble. "Highlander, you're not going to believe this."
"What is it?" Apollo said.
Sam studied the entrance to the bridge. "Something's been here; something nasty. The doors to the bridge have been eaten totally through."
"Eaten??"
"Yeah. As though a really powerful acid was put to work on them."
"Captain," Xanax said, "someone was in here, too."
"Ewww... are you sure?"
"What did you find, Xanax?" Apollo said, concern in his voice.
"It looks as though an officer was in the battle bridge, but whatever ate through the doors got to him, too. There's not much left of him."
Sam grimaced. "So I guess it's safe to say that there may not be anyone left alive on this ship."
"Do you think those critters did this?" Circe asked.
Sam thought about it, then rejected the idea. "If they did this, they probably would have done the same thing to Brue."
"We don't know that. Maybe Brue scared it off before it did anything."
Sam shrugged. "In any case, we need to find out what happened to this crew. If we have to search every inch of this ship to find out, we will. Now, let's go. There's nothing else we'll find here."
~ * ~
The Highlander was diverted from its mission from a distress signal from a shuttlecraft belonging to the USS Gilgamesh. After extrapolation, we managed to find the Steamrunner-class vessel. She didn't look to be in bad shape, a few hull breaches here and there, but the power levels were low, and the away team I have there have yet to find a single surviving crew member. We've spotted several crab-like creatures skittering around the ship. Doctor Kellara has been unable to find very much about the dead specimen beamed over.
In the meantime, I decided to visit our prisoner. He seemed none too disappointed by our detour, finding any stay from his sentence a welcome one. Even if he does have to stay in the brig. I have to admit, he seems to be treated better here than he was at the mining colony.
Captain Racer is on her third day of searching the ship. So far, all she has found are critters, as we have taken to call the crab-like beings, and corpses. In every case, the corpses were found either with holes in their chests, dissolved by some type of acid, or both. They have decided to search back toward Engineering to see if they have any better luck.
Sam shivered. "I always thought that when the ship's warp core wasn't running, it seemed... dead, somehow. Gives me the creeps."
Circe looked uncertain. "What gives me the creeps is... I feel like we're being watched."
Sam looked at her tricorder. "I'm only getting readings from us."
"Yeah, well, if you noticed, we couldn't get readings on the critters, either."
Sam stopped. "You know, you're right. That's very strange. I wonder if the Highlander's found anything out yet." She activated the link to the ship. "Racer to Highlander. Have you..."
Suddenly, a dark shape appeared from above. The next thing Sam knew, she was flying backward until she slammed into a wall behind her. She grunted in pain as her shoulder struck hard. Another of the beasts slammed into Xanax knocking him into the dilithium chamber. His head slammed into the chamber with an audible crack, and the helmet lights winked out. He used his three legs as leverage and pushed the thing away from him. As he put the chamber between himself and the alien, he found it difficult to breathe; the suits respiration equipment must have been damaged. He worked off his helmet and tossed it aside.
Circe was also confronted by a creature, but her reflexes were quicker. She managed to avoid the blow that would have sent her flying. She kicked the thing in the side of the head, and as the thing was reeling, she rolled, coming up with her phaser in hand. She fired at the creature, and it's upper body exploded, sending greenish ooze everywhere. As it hit her suit, she heard sizzling. Then she heard her personal alarm. "Warning. Suit integrity compromised," said the computer voice.
"Nuts," Circe snapped. Where droplets of the goo struck her helmet's faceplate, she could see holes being eaten in the material. With a whoosh, she realized her suit lost it's air pressure. If she were in vacuum, she would have been dead. Instead, as she saw another ugly thing drop down, she pulled her helmet off and chucked it at the monster. But it just batted it away. They got a good look at what attacked them then.
The thing was large, about two or three meters. It was covered in a black type of chitinous exoskeleton. The head was large and oblong, with a formidable set of sharp teeth in front. They couldn't see any eyes or other opening on the creature's head, save the jaws. It's arms were long, ending in long hands tipped with sharp talons. The tail was whiplike and looked equally sharp. Sam surmised that this was the ultimate xenophobic race in that everything about them was geared for one thing and one thing only: the eradication of anything they met with.
Sam managed to get her phaser free, but not before the ugly before her walloped her on the side of the head with such force that it tore her helmet loose. The internal pressure blew it free from her head, and debris from the helmet scratched up the side of her face. Her ears rang with the blow and from the abrupt decompression, stunning her.
From Circe's standpoint, it's looked as though the alien had torn off Sam's head. "Captain!" she screamed and shot at the creature, bisecting it with her phaser. Sam shook her head clear after being shouted at... seeing what had happened to the earlier beast, had scrambled out of the way to avoid getting showered with corrosive. The two managed to stand back to back, as two other creatures started coming down out of the ceiling. "I think now would be the best time to pursue the better part of valor," Circe said.
"I fully agree," Sam replied. And together, they both turned and ran out of the room. The creatures tried to follow, but Sam managed to use her device to close the door and lock it. They heard the thumping of several bodies slamming into the door from the other side. "That doesn't sound like it'll hold for long," Sam said. She looked at her team, and noticed Xanax was bleeding from his ear. "Xanax, are you all right?"
"It's just superficial, ma'am," he replied. "I'll be all right, as long as they don't get a hold of me."
"What should we do," Circe said. "We saw that they have access to the crawlways. Can we have the ship beam us back?"
Sam shook her head. "Those things destroyed our helmets, and our communicators with them. We're stuck here. I say we put as much distance between us and them as possible."
"I have to admit, Captain, I like your thinking," Xanax said.
As they turned and sprinted down the corridor, Circe had an idea. "What about your link with Admiral Racer. Can't you use that?"
"I've tried. I can't get through to him. Sometimes I wish I were a telepath like he is. I'd have better luck. But I'll keep trying."
"Just so long as you stay with me enough to keep away from those creeps."
"Believe me," Sam said, "I don't think that's going to be a problem."
After several attempts to stay busy, Apollo had just given up and decided to try and get some rest. Kellara had insisted on giving him something to help; he told her he didn't think anything would affect him. She surprised him by telling him that since his trip back from the Delta Quadrant, and the Q's subsequent retooling of his powers, he was more easily scanned than before, and as such she was able to determine a proper sedative. He shrugged but figured it couldn't hurt.
He tossed and turned for a while, but managed to lapse into a somewhat deep, if fitful sleep. He was being plagued by a particular nightmare. He was in a dark room, with Sam and Circe cowering in a corner; they weren't alone. The reason for their fear was facing off with Apollo. He couldn't see it well; it seemed to be all teeth and shadows. He grappled with it. There was a sharp pain, and he looked down to see the tip of a tail, tinged in blue; that the blue happened to be his blood was coincidental of the fact that this tail was protruding through his chest.
He managed to grab hold of the things jaws; he could feel the teeth pierce through. But he managed to pry the jaws apart, until they broke away. He felt a searing pain, as though he were being burned. A final thrust, and the thing's neck was broken. They fell to the floor together. He felt cold, fading. He vaguely saw Sam's face, heard the words, "You can't die, dammit!"
His response sent chills through his spine. "Who wants to live forever?"
Apollo bolted upright in his bed, drenched in a cold sweat. He had visions before, many times. But never did they hint at his own death. He was actually surprised to find himself shivering, as though the temperature in his quarters dropped several degrees. Apollo decided there was no way he was going to go back to sleep, so he started to get out of bed. That was when the com system went off. "Dr. Kellara to Admiral Racer."
He looked at the ceiling. "Racer here," he answered, still a little groggy, "go ahead."
"Sir, I'm sorry to wake you, but we discovered something I think you should see."
He grinned slightly. "Actually, Doctor, I had just awakened anyway. I'll be there shortly. Racer out." The link closed, and he went to the closet for a fresh uniform. In a short time, he was out the door and heading for Sickbay.
As the doors opened, he saw the doctor gesturing him to follow her. She preceded him into the morgue where she kept a body in stasis. At first, he thought it was Prentice, or the body from the shuttle. Until he looked at the face. "My God, that's Bruebaker! What happened to him?"
Kellara shook her head. "Still trying to figure that out. Although I can tell you one thing. It has a direct connection with the substance we found inside him earlier. I no longer believe that he had somehow bitten a piece off of whatever it was attacked him."
"Keep looking into it." He tapped his badge. "Racer to bridge. Any contact with Captain Racer and the away team?"
"No sir. They've been overdue for almost half an hour now."
He looked at Kellara. "I don't like the sound of that. You would think they would check in."
Kellara nodded in acknowledgment. "And even if for some reason their communicators were out, Sam would try and contact you."
Apollo did a facefault. "D'oh! She wanted so much for me to stop micro-managing her, I raised my mental shields so I could give her some peace." He instantly brought his shields back down to their normal levels.
No sooner did he do that than he caught a mental shout. :Help us, PLEASE!!:
Apollo went rigid, and Kellara didn't have to be a genius to know that something was wrong. He tapped his badge again. "Bridge, this is Racer. The away team is in trouble! Do whatever you can to try and get a lock on them and beam them aboard!"
"We've been trying to do just that, sir. Something aboard that ship is interfering with our sensors."
"Just keep trying! Racer out." He looked at the doctor, worried.
The concern was evident on her face. She simply said, "Go."
Apollo understood and nodded. :Sam, honey, I'm on my way: In a flash, he disappeared from Sickbay.
As they were running, Circe looked over at Sam to make sure she was all right. The captain was grinning, and Circe thought she was getting delirious.
Sam noticed Circe's look. "The cavalry's coming."
As soon as she said that, a flash appeared in front of them. The darkness was suddenly chased back by two glowing blue eyes. "Greetings," Apollo said, "May I be of service?"
"You sure..." Sam started. "Look out!" she finished.
Apollo looked puzzled. He turned around, and froze.
It was a thing straight from his nightmare. It dropped from the ceiling and pounced toward him. Yet as fast as it was, before it could do anything, Apollo snaked out, grabbed an arm, swung the thing around, and threw it away from them. It struck another of its kind and they both smashed into the far wall. He instantly slammed his badge. "Highlander, lock onto my coordinates!" He barked, as the three others scrambled close. "Four to beam up, now!!"
The creatures had recovered, and charged toward the group. They leaped, but only managed to sweep through a stream of fading particles.
As they appeared on the transporter pad, Sam audibly let out a breath. "That was a close one." They started toward the door, then stopped and turned back toward the pad. Apollo was still standing there, his face pale. "Admiral?" Sam said. "Apollo? Are you all right?" She then could see a fine sheen of sweat on his face. Now she knew the threat they faced on that ship was serious, because she had never, ever seen her husband as terrified as he looked now. She walked slowly back and gently took him by the arm. "C'mon. Let's get you to Sickbay," she said soothingly, and led him out of the transporter room, with the others in tow.
After everyone was examined, Kellara patched up Xanax and decided the ladies were uninjured. She joined Sam over by the bed on which Apollo was sitting. "Doctor, what could possibly have Apollo so pale with fear? I've never in my whole life ever seen him this scared. I mean, this man drove a starship into annihilation, and I don't think he was as frightened as he is now."
Kellara scanned the admiral with a tricorder again, but shook her head. "His pulse is racing extremely fast. Blood pressure almost through the roof. If he were human, his heart would've exploded by now. I'd definitely say he's in shock, though." She took a hypospray from a nearby tray and after checking the contents of an ampoule, inserted it into the device. She applied it to his neck, and it softly hissed. Color started returning to his face. "Admiral, how do you feel?" Kellara asked.
He shook his head vigorously, then looked from Sam to Kellara. "I'm... I'm all right now. Thank you."
"You had me worried, Apollo," Sam said, "What in God's name happened to you down there."
He looked straight into Sam's eyes. She felt as though his gaze was boring into her soul. "I Saw my death."
"What?"
He hopped down from the bed and began to pace. "While you were over there, I tried to get some sleep... and I had a vision; a nightmare," he said with a nervous chuckle. "In it, I perceived my death, at the hands of a shadow with teeth. It was one of those... those things over there that I had seen, though I hadn't realized it until I went over there." He seemed to visibly gather himself. "Did you see anyone alive over there?"
Sam was caught off guard by his sudden return to normal. It took her a moment to answer the question. "Ah... no... not that we had seen."
He looked at her, nodded once, and then left Sickbay. It happened so fast, Sam only had time to exchange a puzzled glance with Kellara before she found herself running to catch up with him. She just barely managed to get into the turbolift with him before it closed. "Apollo, what are you thinking? What are you going to do?"
He was silent, though, all the way to the bridge. As soon as they arrived, he looked at the Tactical officer. Circe still had not yet started her shift. "Mr. Bentley, have we downloaded the Gilgamesh's logs?"
"Yes sir. We just finished a few minutes ago. I need..."
"Pearson, move us away from the Gilgamesh," Apollo said, interrupting Bentley.
"Aye, sir." A few adjustments, and the Gilgamesh started to recede in the viewscreen.
"Bentley, arm photon torpedoes and lock onto that ship."
They looked at him in alarm, but Bentley said, "Y-yes, sir."
Sam looked very concerned. "Admiral, do you realize what you're doing?"
He turned to look at her; his eyes were nothing but cold fire. "Yes I do," he said with conviction. He ticked of the distance in his head. When they were far enough away, he said, "All stop. Mr. Bentley... fire torpedoes." There was silence. He turned his cold gaze to his Tactical officer. "Now."
Bentley felt chills down his spine as he sent the commands. Three bright pinpoints of red light streaked from the ship. They struck the Gilgamesh at key points, and she buckled, exploding in a brilliant succession of flashes. All that remained were debris floating around the asteroid.
Sam moved to stand in front of Apollo. "Admiral, I would probably be one of the last people to tell you this, but I think you were just a little bit hasty. I'm sure if we did it properly, if we had to, we could have eliminated them while keeping the ship in one piece."
He glared at her. "Captain, those things are living death. You saw what they did to the Gilgamesh's crew, you saw what they could have done to you. How can you stand there and defend them?"
"Because despite how evil they seemed, they also seemed intelligent. And I'm sure you know Starfleet doesn't just up and destroy intelligent life without first trying to discover its motivations and intentions."
"It's motivations are to eat a hole into your skull, Captain! It's intentions are to dissolve you in their acidic blood!! What more do you possibly want to learn from them?!!" Apollo stopped, and realized his voice had raised into a shout. Sam was visibly shocked by his tone, as were the rest of his bridge crew. He forced himself to calm down, and instantly regretted his outburst. "I... I'm sorry, Captain. I... I don't know..."
"Security to bridge!"
Apollo looked to Bentley, whose station had issued the transmission. "Bridge here," he said, "go ahead."
"We have an intruder on board!" the security man yelled. "Some... kind of thing. It dropped down into Nash's cell. It killed him and went back into the ceiling. We turned off the forcefield and went to investigate. It grabbed Rogers and... oh, God... it was horrible..."
Apollo was already back in the turbolift, with Sam close behind. "Get a team together. Groups of three or four. Don't ever find yourself alone, you got that?!" To the turbolift, he said, "Deck 12." Then he tapped a control on a padd in the lift. "All hands, this is Admiral Racer. We have an intruder on board. It is extremely dangerous. All non-essential personnel go to an open area of the ship and stay there. No one, I repeat, no one is to be left alone. As long as you're in a group, you should be safe. If you see the intruder, and you'll know what it is when you see it, you are to get as far from it as you possibly can. Racer out."
The lift stopped and the doors opened. It was only a short run to the Security section. "Bremmel," Apollo said, addressing one of the men there, "where are the casualties?"
"In Nash's cell, sir," he replied.
The two Racers walked into Nash's cell. Nash was sitting on the bench, a large hole driven clean through his face and out the back of his head. Rogers' legs were lying on the floor. Apollo judged that his torso was up in the ceiling, as his entrails were hanging partially down in the cell; he had been literally ripped in half.
"This creature's strong," Apollo commented.
"And fast too. But how did it get on the ship?" Sam said.
"I think I have the answer for that," Kellara replied, making her way into the brig. "Remember those crab-like critters you saw on the Gilgamesh? It's an egg carrier. It's deposits an embryo into its host and then dies, having fulfilled its purpose. When the creature grows, it takes the shortest route out of the host body, which is usually through the chest cavity."
"Which explains why the people had their chests opened from the inside," Apollo concluded. "Good Lord! That means..."
"That means Bruebaker inadvertently brought this thing aboard the Highlander." Kellara said.
"That must have been exactly what happened to the Gilgamesh. Someone was implanted with one of these things and made it back aboard," Sam said. "But if that's so, how did they get so infested with them? Do these nasties develop those pods that the critters come from?"
"They didn't look as though they were designed for that." Apollo replied. "But you did say they seemed intelligent. How intelligent?" When they could only answer with silence, he continued. "I think it's time we look at those logs to see what we're up against. But first, we need to take care of this thing on our ship." He turned to Bremmel. "Am I right in assuming that this creature doesn't appear on sensors?"
"Not very well, sir, no," the security officer replied.
Apollo nodded. "Groups of three. Start combing this ship. Equip yourselves with rifles." He glanced at Sam, then said, "I want this thing incapacitated if possible, destroyed if necessary. I'll not lose any more crew members to it, understood?"
"Yes, sir!" Rogers said, and moved off to give his men the orders.
Apollo turned to Sam. "I want all department heads to meet in the conference room as soon as possible. Let's go over those logs."