Disclaimer: I do not own the copyrights to Star Trek Voyager, Trigun, or any other copyrighted information. All Copyrights belong to their respective owners.
Reader's Note: This is a re-posting.
Star Trek Voyager
&
Trigun
Reminiscence
Chapter 2: Vash the Stampede
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"Vash the Stampede?" Janeway asked, "Odd name."
Vash, Hugh, and the bridge crew met in the briefing room after Vash underwent surgery to remove the pieces of metal from his body. Not only was there that metal mesh on his left breast, but there were bolts that stuck out from his shoulders, his back and his ankles. The doctor was disgusted when he found this, he wanted to know whom it was that operated on this poor man and give him a good beating.
After the surgery the Doctor ran a dermal regenerator over the scars, they didn't heal completely but at least a half reduced their size. During the whole procedure, Seven and Hugh were they're watching the doctor operate on Vash. The doctor did examine Hugh but found nothing wrong.
The thing that Seven wanted to know was why the killer of the Borg was out here.
"The Stampede part is strange." Vash agreed, "But I like the name Vash."
"Alright." Janeway agreed as she lay back in her chair, "Would you mind explaining what you're doing way the hell out here?"
Vash and Hugh looked at each other.
"We're on our way back to Federation space." Hugh explained.
Tuvok raised his eyebrows, "Interesting that a Borg drone would wish to return to Federation space."
Hugh turned his Borg implant filled face towards Tuvok, "I know it is, but that is where I belong."
"Unusual."
"That's where we're heading." Vash explained, "Until our ship ran out of deuterium."
"You can dock your ship here and we'll help you find a source of deuterium for your craft." Janeway offered, "Or you can travel with us since we're heading back to Earth. So why not stay with us."
Vash and Hugh looked at each other, "Sure," Vash smiled, "I'll go along with that."
"Explain yourself." Seven asserted, "Vash, the Killer of the Borg."
"Killer of the Borg?" Tom asked, "This guy?" he pointed to Vash with disbelief.
"Yes." Seven answered, "In many species assimilated by the Borg in the past 10 years, Vash has been known as the Humanoid Typhoon, the Borg Slayer, Killer of the Collective, or simply the Killer of the Borg. According to the Borg he came willingly into Borg territory and destroyed the center of the Borg collective."
"This man," The doctor stated, "When I found him physically was unable to fight. He was only armed with an old fashioned gun. How could a man with a single gun be called a killer of the Borg?"
"It was an accident Doctor." Hugh backed up; "Within my memory banks I have video record of the event in which Vash had accidentally killed billions of Borg drones."
Vash's face turned down to the briefing room table in shame. The corners of his mouth turned downward as if pulled by magnets, his eyebrows drawn close together and his eyes closing. It looked like he was on the verge of breaking down or coming apart at the seams.
"I have one question for this man." Seven asserted, "Vash, have you ever come into contact with a ship known as the Raven?"
Vash placed his brown glove covered hands over his face and brought his attention up to Seven of Nine. He took away his hands from his face and look at her.
"No." he replied, "But it's true, I am responsible for killing all those Borg drones."
"How?" Harry asked, "not even an army could kill that many Borg drones or ships, so how could one man do it?"
Vash was about to explain, he pulled up a chair and sat down, "I was on a Borg ship being chased by them and I came to a place that they call the transwarp conduit. I was hiding there and a drone fired at me and caused the conduit to explode. Hugh and I barely escaped alive, but the expanse that was the Borg Hive began to self-destruct. We simply hit warp speed, headed for Earth and never looked back."
"I find that hard to believe." Seven refuted
" B'Elanna, Harry," Janeway commanded "Check the memories within Hugh, we'll try to see if they're story is true."
"Aye." Harry complied
"Aye." B'Elanna repeated
"Dismissed," Janeway stated as the bridge crew of the Starship Voyager got up from their seats and left the briefing room. The room was nearly empty except for Vash, Hugh and Janeway. She was nearly out the door until she turned to look back at them. The Borg and the humanoid standing side by side as if by some force of fate or nature.
"What is it?" She asked
"Captain." Vash called standing straight up like a soldier at attention, "I can understand your skepticism but realize this, that we mean no harm to the crew of this vessel."
"I can believe you with that, please report to the science lab. My officers would like to examine the memory module within Hugh."
"We understand." Vash said.
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"What do you all think of them?" Janeway asked the present bridge crew on the bridge. Only, Chakotay, Tom, Tuvok and Janeway were there. They looked towards Janeway like an audience of an amphitheater looking down to the center of the stage.
"I don't buy that story." Tom stated, "How can one man destroy the Borg Hive on his own, a misfire in the transwarp conduit? Give me a break."
Janeway nodded, "I agree." She said, "It's too hard for me to believe that a single man could take out the Borg with just a simple accident."
"We shall find out with in a short time." Tuvok stated.
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Vash and Hugh walked down the hallways of Voyager with a security guard behind them at all times. Vash kept looking back at the security guard that was on the two of them like a hawk to a mouse. His blue eyes kept looking at the yellow uniformed security guard wondering when he was going to draw his phaser out.
"You're uncomfortable Vash." Hugh stated
"I am." Vash replied still walking and looking back.
"We have to remember that they are not as open to the Borg as you are right now. Though you were hesitant of me when we first met."
Vash nodded, "Yeah. That's true."
"We simply have to be patient with them."
Within the next few minutes the guard behind them called, "This is the science lab."
Vash and Hugh turned to look at another steel door, a door that was like every door that they had passed. Simply a copy of a copy, they wandered in to find a lab with equipment, monitors, lab tables and three people, Harry Kim, B'Elanna Torres, and Seven.
Hugh and Vash came in and smiled.
The sight of a Borg smiling made Harry and B'Elanna grimace.
"I see that you are displeased with a Borg drone here." Hugh stated as he looked at the disgusted faces of Harry and B'Elanna.
"I was Borg." Seven added
"You do not have the full implants that I do and that is what makes them uncomfortable around me."
"Perhaps."
Vash rose his hands, "Alright!" He shouted, "Let's get started."
Harry was covering his ears, "Yeah."
Hugh stepped over to B'Elanna who had a data extractor in her hand ready to find the memory module.
"I've heard about this drone." B'Elanna stated, "A single Borg Drone found among the wreckage of a scout ship."
"Correct." Seven stated as she stood by and watched B'Elanna work with the extractor, "He was taken in by the crew of the Starship designated Enterprise. During that time he became sentient of his own existence, using I instead of we. He was returned to the Borg in the hopes that individuality would spread through the collective. Their efforts failed."
"I disagree Seven of Nine, Tertiary Adjunct of Unimatrix Zero One." Hugh interrupted
"You will refer to me as Seven." She snapped calmly
"I apologize, Seven." Hugh said, "We didn't fail, there were those of us within the Borg who wanted to be both individual and collective at the same time. So we started our own colony in which we could use our Borg technology yet still maintain our sense of our own individuality."
"That's when I met him." Vash stepped in, "I was just wandering through the Alpha Quadrant and I happened to meet him."
"What made you come out here?" Harry asked
"We accidentally traveled into an area known as the Badlands and were suddenly pulled here into the Delta Quadrant." Vash answered
"That's how we got here." Harry smiled
"In that case, we share a certain bond."
"I've found the module." B'Elanna called out as she copied the data into the computer, she punched it up on the screen.
"Set it to five years ago." Hugh commanded
B'Elanna begrudgingly accepted and punched in the date into the computer. All they saw on the science stations screen was static like watching a TV on a non-existing station. Until they began to hear voices, garbled voices that sounded as if mixed together in a melting pot. Hugh stepped forward to clear up the reception.
"During the accident my memory module was damaged." Hugh explained, "So there will be fragmentary clips."
On the screen it was suddenly clear, the saw an unclear picture but a very distinct vision. They saw Borg alcoves like a beehive, stretching endlessly, and the view seemed to bounce up and down as well as left and right as if it was a home made video. The angel turned and they saw a Borg woman who looked as if she was wearing a dress of Borg implants from her shoulders down.
They heard her voice, a seductive tone even with the static, "Why have you come here?"
"I've come…" The voice was lost only to be replaced by static
"Irrational to find one individual among the Borg." This woman said.
Seven looked at the screen with her lips parted and her eyes narrowed as if reading small print, "It's the Borg Queen." She whispered.
"You will be assimilated." The Queen stated, "Your resistance is futile."
From the camera's point of view it saw drones coming in left and right marching in like ants. The sounds of their footsteps and the whirring of their implants going on like a church choir. Then from the mesh of sounds of the Borg a voice began to scream and a pulsing white light began to burst out from behind the camera.
"Run Hugh!" The voice screamed, "RUN!"
Static, the memory was over.
Hugh explained, "After the transwarp conduit began to malfunction the cube itself was destroyed and so was the hive that it was stationed at."
Another meeting was called among the bridge crew and the video was shown to the senior staff. They watched the Borg Queen having a short conversation with someone near the camera, the Borg drones marching in from all around and then the light that ended with static.
"After we came here to the delta quadrant." Hugh explained, "At least 11 years ago, we've been making our way with a small ship all this way to earth. It has taken us this long because of the troubles we've had to face and the extensive damage that the Angel Arm had to face. We were lucky that you found us even at such a crucial time."
"We are happy to lend a hand." Janeway smiled outstretching her arms, "Now that I've seen your story first hand, I'm willing to allow you to stay on board, but I need a guarantee from Hugh."
"What is that?" Hugh asked
"That you will not assimilate my crew."
"I no longer possess the ability to assimilate anyone, Captain."
"That's right." Vash smiled, "I helped remove those things a long time ago, but I think that my Borg friend here needs to get some energy back. Do you have anything where he can regenerate?"
"I have my alcove on Voyager." Seven volunteered, "You can regenerate there in Cargo Bay 2."
Hugh smiled, "I thank you, Seven."
Vash turned to Hugh, "While your doing that, I'm going to go get something yummy to eat."
"Then it's settled." Janeway said to Vash and Hugh, "Welcome to Voyager's crew."
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Vash headed down the mess hall, though it took some help from the computer to get there. He walked through the doors into the mess hall to find Starfleet officers eating and conversing. He even saw B'Elanna Torres and Tom Paris eating lunch together at one of the smaller tables. Yet when he walked through those doors he saw the faces of the officers start to stare at him. Could it have been because of his coat that caught their attention, was it his hair or was it because he was dancing his way into the mess hall?
He didn't care he was just moving or rather grooving his way to the mess hall counter.
"Yeah." He smiled as he looked at the bountiful food that lay in front of him.
A slightly pudgy Talaxian came up to Vash, "Oh, it's you Vash." He smiled, "We we're never properly introduced in the briefing room." He reached out his hand to Vash.
Vash reached his gloved hand over to him and shook it.
"My name is Neelix, I am Voyager's chef." He introduced
"You already know me." Vash smiled as he began to pose muscularly, "The man who will slaughter the innocent, does the most evil of evil deeds with the price of 60 billion double dollars on his head? Yes, I am that man."
He began to pose so comically that Neelix began to laugh like an alien Santa Clause.
"That always works." Vash smiled
"well, what can I get for you?" Neelix asked
"Oh, I would like two dozen doughnuts please."
"Two dozen?" Neelix asked, "What kind?"
"Oh, an assortment would be alright."
"Coming right up." Neelix went to the replicator in the kitchen and began to prepare the order that Vash asked for.
Meanwhile not too far away from Vash, B'Elanna and Tom began to speak with each other about these new editions to the crew, Vash and Hugh.
"It still gives me the creeps to look at a drone that close." She stated, "But this guy, all I can say is that he's probably the biggest goof ball I've ever seen in my life."
Tom looked at him, "Yeah, I still don't buy that story of him making a small accident that blew up the whole Borg Hive."
"As Janeway once told Harry, weird is part of the job."
Back with Vash, he looked over and saw Neelix bring over a plate stacked with the assortment of two dozen doughnuts. Chocolate, glazed, jelly filled, nut covered, cream filled and cake doughnuts. Vash went over to one of the tables with the plate of doughnuts in front of him he took one of the cake doughnuts. He began to speak softly but it was loud enough for Tom and B'Elanna to hear.
"Ah." He exhaled, "A large ship at last, it's so wonderful to be around so many happy people. Yes, it's a lucky, lucky day." He sniffed the aroma of the cake doughnut, "Bonjure, Chatme. That's smell so tasty, it smells like cake baked in honey. And without further adieu."
He sank his teeth into the doughnut with a smile that stretched from ear to ear on his face. When he swallowed the tasty morsel he began to laugh loudly like a little child.
Just then, a child walked into the mess hall it was Naomi Wildman. She came to see Neelix about one of the holodeck stories that she wanted him to go to. She came in and gazed at the beautiful red coat that the blonde man was wearing. She saw him sink his teeth into one of the two dozen doughnuts. She heard him make his loud laugh, she smiled at it and walked over to Neelix.
Neelix saw her out of the corner of his eyes, "Naomi." He smiled, "have you met this man that just came on board Voyager?"
"I just saw him." Naomi reported, "He's eating doughnuts."
"Two dozen of them to be exact."
She began to look speculative and confused, "Can he eat all that?"
"That's what I'm going to find out."
Vash sat with the doughnut in his hand as he began to listen to the conversations going on around him like an echo in an old English church.
"I need help to recalibrate the EPS conduits." A voice called out
"I'm going to fix up the frequency of the transporters." Another reported
Vash began to shiver and shake as if a cold breeze just pasted him, he suddenly began to loose the grip on the cake doughnut. It fell softly onto the small pile of sweetened goodness that he asked for.
"These are good." He began to cry softly, he placed his face into his gloved hands.
B'Elanna and Tom stood up looked over at Vash with confusion.
"Now that's weird." Tom whispered to B'Elanna, "A moment ago he was eating doughnuts and laughing. Now he's crying like a little kid."
"I know." B'Elanna sneered, "I've never seen a man cry like that."
Neelix and Naomi were having the same experience,
"He's a grown up." Naomi observed, "I thought grown-ups didn't cry."
Vash was only a few feet away, yet he heard both comments about him.
"Is there something wrong with that?" He asked both parties about his crying, "Everyone feels like crying sometimes." He never moved his face from his gloves he stayed perfectly still with the small pile of doughnuts in front of him yet he could only see darkness.
Naomi stepped forward and asked, "Why are you crying, mister?"
"Someone I loved had taken away from me. I miss her so much."
"Did she die?" Naomi asked placing her hand on Vash's red sleeve
"No, she was kidnapped."
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Seven of Nine was not satisfied with what she saw on that screen in the science lab. Seeing the Borg queen, drones and a light wasn't enough for her. She was working frantically on the data that was extracted from Hugh's memory module. She began compiling, extracting and compiling, but she didn't want any kind of distraction from anyone, so the door was locked.
Someone override the command and opened the door, it was Commander Chakotay.
"Seven." He called, "It's three in the morning why are you still in here?"
"I am not convinced of the story that was given by 3rd of 5 and Vash the Stampede." Seven answered
"So you decided to stay up all night to prove them wrong?"
"Correct."
"Not very trusting are you."
"I don't trust a man who is known through out the collective and several species as a Borg Killer."
"He gave his story that it was an accident." Chakotay shrugged
Seven kept working and working, with the computer screen moving objects and replaying the video back and forth without sound. The video itself had more within it.
"I still don't believe him." Seven stated, "I've already compiled data from Hugh's memory module that we haven't seen before. As a matter of fact there's pieces of data in the video and audio, which I believed was covered up."
Chakotay shook his head, "Alright Seven. Let's see it."
The video played back full screen in the astrometrics lab and was viewed by the only two audience members.
They saw the Borg Queen, "Vash." She said, "Why have you come here."
"I came here looking for a girl you assimilated." Vash voice rang out with static crackling it's reception.
"Irrational. Searching for one individual in the Borg collective."
Here was the part that Seven had found,
"Give her back to me!" Vash's voice screamed,
The camera turned to Vash and the next series of events made Chakotay take Seven's side instantaneously. They saw Vash draw out his gun and point it directly at the Borg queen, but he didn't pull the trigger, the rectangular area above the barrel began to emit a light and it's metal sidings began to pop off with the screws. Within the concealed area was a black cylinder suspended in mid air as if by magic. It began to spin and spin like a toy top with a sphere of yellow sparks coming from it.
Vash's sleeve began to rip off revealing his skin turning from its fair complexion to a gray scaly texture. His arm began to merge with the gun in a singular cannon arm with it's gray scaly texture covering all of it. Within a matter of seconds the center of the cannon began to bulge as if a sphere began to grow inside of it. It expanded holding the two parts of the arm cannon by three strands. In the center of this bulge was a sphere of light that began to block out the green glow that was familiar to the Borg ship.
The Borg drones stopped in their march and began to step backwards.
Vash pointed this arm cannon upward
"Run Hugh!" he screamed, "RUN!"
Suddenly the cannon fired, in a shot of white light it consumed the field of vision that the camera had, and all that was left was static.
Chakotay watched the replay with the sound going and watching over and over again Vash's arm merging with that gun.
"Why was he lying?" He wondered
"I suggest we call the senior staff." Seven said while the replay kept playing on and on and on, over and over again.
To be continued…
Author's Notes: Now things seem to be growing a little more complex then what some might think. The qeustion is what is Vash hiding that could be so horrible that he'd have to go to great lengths to hide it? Seven on the other hand is having her own doubts about this man. She already knows that he's the Killer of the Collective, but after hearing his story she's still not convinced and now she wants to prove that she's right. But at what cost will the truth bring to Vash or Hugh?
Come back for more chapters of this odd couple.