USS Kitty Hawk
Kitty Hawk Class Drone Carrier NCC 8743
Captain's Cabin
In Orbit Above Mars
─•~:~•─
The one thing Alesha wanted most at the moment was a funnel cake.
She looked at her keepsake box. Alesha had a habit of keeping things from the various places she went. The crew of the drone carrier didn't get it. She could always just make holograms of those places, after all. Why keep clutter?
"It's about havin' somethin' real," she would say.
Other people kept books, violins, weapons, books, all manner of old garbage.
Why couldn't Alesha have her nick-knacks?
One of the objects the thirty-year-old Captain had on her desk was a digital picture of herself and her boyfriend at the Indy 500. She laughed every time she looked at the picture.
Mark was always camera shy, so she shoved his face into her chest and winked at the "camera." She knew he had his own copy of the picture on his desk at Camp Nath, and she had made the point to hand write a signature on the frame, just to make it seem more real.
The second object was a wrapper from the funnel cake stand at the massive stadium.
The cakes were delicious, and the only real thing about that day.
Alesha sighed. She hated lying to Mark.
Over the year and a half that she had been dating the FMC's Officer Commanding, she had grown to be extremely fond of Mark, maybe not quite love, but certainly more fond than other people she'd been with over the years.
He was funny, smart, surprisingly literate compared to the other men and women she had dated before, an extremely good kisser, and most importantly, he had never lied to her about anything.
Alesha had asked Mark endless questions about his life as a mercenary. To her shock, he had never left out any details.
From admitting to being in command of the mission that had led to the death of Asuka Misato's son, to attacking Klingon military targets on behalf of the Cardassians, to robbing Ferengi Banks to fund Tholian proxy forces, and even hacking into secure Starfleet files to supply intel to the Nyberite Alliance.
If Mark had been based in the Federation for all those years, he'd have likely been caught and jailed by now.
It may have been Alesha that had been ordered to bring him in, depending on where the mercenary was.
But he was smart enough to base his operations on Elysium, close enough to do business with everyone, but far enough to stay away from any law.
Alesha found it all terribly exciting. She was proud of her career, but sometimes being a Starfleet Captain was extremely boring, even if it was just a cover.
For one thing, she was no diplomat, or scientist, and truly despised having to write mission reports or doing quarterly performance reviews for her crew.
For another, her particular ship had a sentient AI that was far too clever for its own good, and balancing her cover as a Captain against her true work and keeping it away from the prying digital eyes were a challenge at the best of times.
She longed to give it all up and live life as a space outlaw. It wouldn't be very difficult to pull off.
All she had to do was send her resignation to the CNC office, turn in her uniform, pack her few personal belongings, and book a shuttle to Elysium.
It could be done in less than an hour, even if explaining her sudden change in career to her handler might take a bit longer.
But before Alesha could contemplate her life as an outlaw, Kitty's avatar formed beside her desk.
"Hello, Captain. Are you alright? You've been inside your cabin for 2.6 hours now. The crew is getting worried."
Alesha smiled at the holographic girl, "I'm alright sweety, just thinkin' about things. I'll come up to the bridge in a bit. How are you doin?"
"I'm alright as well. I've completed a full targeting system upgrade on my attack drones. They are now able to engage hostiles with 5.67% greater effectiveness. My sensor drones have also been re-calibrated to better detect Gen 3 cloaking devices in use with the Republican Navy. My shipboard weapons array is now working at 98.7% efficiency, and the newly installed Mark IX secondary shield core is working within acceptable tolerances."
"Also, I've completed another chapter of Chell's Fantasy RPG, and he seems to be really enjoying the rework of the Night Elves DPS ratings and alternate costumes."
"And just how long did it take you to do all that?" Alesha asked, blinking in amazement.
Kitty smiled, "All tasks were completed in 2.6 hours. Slightly behind my target time of 1.7, but Chell was very insistent on long dresses for the Night Elf female archers. It took a while to find a suitable template."
Alesha patted her holographic head.
Head-pats were, according to Kitty, the second most suitable reward besides a new hoodie for her pile.
"Well god damn, Kitty. Every ship in the fleet ought to have one of you."
"If there were more of me, I would no longer be unique," Kitty replied, patting her Captain's head in return, "However, I have been asked to consult on construction of the second Kitty Hawk class drone carrier. She is to be named Invincible and the designers are having difficulty in programming personality traits for the onboard AI. I will make several suggestions to the AI for amusements and methods to appease her crew."
"Yer own little sister huh? Betcha the two of you get into all sorts of trouble," Alesha replied, teasing the AI
"A cousin would be more of a suitable metaphor. Vinci will still be Three Laws compliant, but I'll share some ideas with her. Will you be coming to the bridge soon, Captain?"
Alesha nodded, "In a minute, I gotta call my folks first. See ya there, alright?"
Kitty nodded, and then her avatar faded away.
It wasn't a complete lie.
Alesha's QC call would be routed through her hometown of Aaron's Creek, but that would only be the first of a series of relays to keep the Fleet from tracking her transmission.
Satisfied that the AI was now distracted with her own her work, Alesha reached under the desk and pulled several wires that would de-link her comm's terminal from the ship-wide system.
Next, she opened the secure QC channel, entered the 1980-bit hex key stored on an isolinear chip she kept in her pocket at all times, and waited for the connection to be made.
After a few minutes, Gold appeared on her terminal, and looked annoyed.
"Purple. Your check-in is four hours late. And I hope for your sake that this is a secure channel."
"Don't even start that shit with me, Gold," Alesha replied, dropping her faux Virginian accent into her natural Canadian speaking voice, "I did it with Sloan, and it pissed me off to no end. I'm not doing it with you as well."
"Fine, fine. Don't get all twisted up. I'm actually looking forward to your report," Gold replied, adopting a smile.
"Well, everything is on track like we planned. It looks like Mitchell beat your estimates, he's sliced off a full half of Home Fleet on top of the 2nd and 8th Fleet elements for the task force. He's also sending Vanguard and Repulse with the first wave. The Rommies won't be ready for that," Alesha replied, reading off her prepared notes.
"Two Battleships? That is a surprise. What about your own rust bucket?" Gold asked
Alesha stiffened, "I keep my ship in nice shape, thank you. I don't know just yet; I'm still waiting for my op's orders. If you want me to guess, we'll be going with Repulse to New Valdore. They'll need our sensor coverage. That might change though. When I know, you'll know."
"Keep me posted. And what about the Marines? What has your boyfriend brought to the table?" Gold asked, yet again daring to challenge her patience.
"Once again, you were way off. I've told you several times, you're never going to get anyone inside the command structure. They're just way too smart for that."
"Numbers now, I-told-you-so's later."
"Seventy-Four Thousand and change. Every Sharkie with a bit of combat experience. There is no way the Republic can beat that, even if they put a disruptor into the hands of every last civilian on New Romulus. Kaimeao will be leading her spec-ops team as we planned."
"Castle will be leading the push too. Good, we're ready for that. I've got assets on New Valdore and Cestron ready for him-" Gold started to say before being cut off
"Nope. You completely fucked that estimate. McClair told him to stand down and stay on Earth. He's pissed off, naturally, but he sent Jack Marshall in his place. That might be a problem for us. Jack's command and control scores are through the roof."
Alesha sighed, knowing that the conversation wasn't going to go in the direction she wanted it to.
"Well, there's a mistake there. Castle is your problem now, Purple. You're the only asset we have that's close enough. You'll need to take care of this."
"And why can't Red do it?"
"Red died, Purple. She spaced herself to avoid capture."
Alesha suddenly found herself feeling sad. Red, or Amy as Alesha had known her, was a friend.
They had argued a while ago when Alesha had beaten Amy into Mark's bed, and it pained Alesha to know that the final conversation she had with her friend was a bitter fight.
"Fuck," she replied simply before continuing, "Alright, I'll take care of it. I'm not taking any pleasure in this though."
"Do I sense a bit of personal distraction, Purple?" Gold asked, annoyed, "Your mission was always to keep Marcus Castle under control. And you yourself mentioned in our last planning session that he needed to be eliminated. I suggested getting to know him to better assess his personality. It was your own decision to take him to bed with you, and that was a decision that I mentioned, several times, I disagreed completely with."
"Fuck you, James," Alesha said, daring to use her handler's real name, "You might control my missions, but don't ever think you control me. I brought you into thirty-one. I could just as easily have had you removed."
"And yet, I still feel the need to question your objectivity, Purple. Blue isn't responding to comm's. Right now, you are the only asset we have near Earth. If you can't deal with Castle, Plan C is dead in the water. And based on this tone I'm hearing; I might just as well scrap the whole thing and get started on F."
Alesha stared hard at the monitor, "I'll get it done. I always do. But when I finish this mission, I'm finished with you James. You've managed to get all my friends killed in two years, and because of your own incompetence we're further away from the source of White Noise than we ever have been."
"I'm done with it, and you. And if you come after me, don't forget that I know exactly how to hurt you."
"Kill Marcus Castle, and you won't have any problems with me. I'll leave it at that. Gold out," he said as the terminal went blank.
Alesha slammed the screen as hard as she could. She picked up the picture of her and Mark and let her mascara-stained tears fall across the frame. In frustration, she threw the picture at the bulkhead, and winced when the glass frame cracked in a noise that her heart was making at the same moment.
She thought about not going through with her assignment, for what seemed like an eternity.
But then, without thinking, she reached into her closet, opened her personal weapons locker with a thumbprint scan, and retrieved two phasers. She holstered the weapons at her waist, and quickly left her cabin to make her way to the empty transporter room.
There were only twenty-five men and women aboard Kitty Hawk. No one would notice Captain Alesha Dixon was gone for hours.
Kitty noticed.
For the third time in six months, an error code popped up on her background diagnostic program, showing a problem with the Captain's personal comm terminal.
Before she could address it however, the error code always disappeared, and the Captain never reported a problem.
Once was coincidence, twice was suspicious, and three times was proof. While Alesha had taken Mark on vacation to Risa last month, Kitty had installed snooping programs on the Captain's terminal, and software-based recording systems in her cabin.
Originally, the AI had just hoped it was the Captain being too proud to admit she had broken something.
But Kitty had just recorded a full call with someone called Gold. And Gold had ordered Alesha to kill one of her new friends, Mark Castle.
Not only was it triggering her first law safeguards – that a computer could never harm a sentient being, or through inaction allow a sentient being to come to harm – but Kitty was also feeling a genuine emotion of betrayal.
But she was far faster and more efficient than any organic, and she opened an encrypted QC channel with the only person in the universe she could trust before Alesha could even open the doors to the transporter room,
Vir. Open up the packet on port 22876 and hurry it up!
I had done so before you even finished your encryption. Have you confirmed this?
Obviously, or we wouldn't be talking right now. You need to get your boss somewhere safe, like right now. I'll start sending down attack drones if you need them, but hurry!
There is no need for concern, my artificially intelligent friend. This turn of events was predicted in Espionage Scenario 44189 and Intrigue Scenario 2176. Countermeasure 99898 has been initiated. We will be more than prepared for Alesha Dixon. Her mission is irrelevant, and her resistance will be futile.
Don't be creepy, you formally Borg friend of mine. But I'm coming down, I need to hear her explain this with her own words. I am so mad right now. Alesha's as bad as the Borg Queen.
Your presence is welcome, Kitty. And so begins our mission of conquest of organic life. May fortune favour the boldest of computers!
