- CHAPTER 4 -
- Borg Research Center A875 34B9-001, 11:28 PM -
Ulysses continued to toil in the bowels of the Borg station. Over the long hours, his rage had settled down from a white-hot firestorm to a slowly smoldering fire deep in the pit of his stomach. He had also modified his original plans. Instead of challenging McBride the instant he got back, he would attack when the time was right, when he was in better condition and not nearly falling over from lack of sleep. He set his tool carefully back into his repair kit. With a final grunt of satisfaction, he made his way over to a control panel, his fatigued frame leaning against the wall for support. As quickly as his exhaustion-hazed brain would allow, Ulysses punching a specific sequence, he was rewarded with all lighting and controls in the central room coming fully online. Hull breaches were sealed with emergency force fields and internal atmosphere was brought up to normal levels. Ulysses yawned as he consulted his tricorder. They indicated an atmosphere that was holding steady at two kilopascals above Terran normal, so there were no unstopped leaks. They also indicated that while gag inducing, the atmosphere was breathable. With those results checked and double checked just to be sure he hadn't misread them the first time through, Ulysses cracked the seal of his suit helmet, lifting it off and attaching it to the rack on the front of his space suit.
The foul tasting mixture hit him like a slap to the face with its higher concentrations of methane and carbon dioxide. Ulysses made a face, but forced the rising bile in his throat to subside. He consulted his tricorder again, this time shifting the readout to a different set of easily measured phenomena. The humidity and heat were high, hitting 92 % and 39.1 degrees Celsius respectively. Everything looked right on line for normal Borg constructs atmospheric conditions. Ulysses allowed himself a tired smile. Now that the enviro controls are working properly, it's time to modify them to Terran standard. Another sequence of commands was entered into the control panel. It beeped sourly and the lighting dimmed fractionally for a second. Ulysses thumped the panel and the lighting went back to normal. Humidity levels quickly dropped, as did the temperature. The air also became sweeter as the methane and CO2 were replaced with increased ratios of oxygen and nitrogen. That's better, Ulysses old boy, he thought to himself. Now cross your fingers and pray that you fixed main power as well as well as the enviro controls and the auxiliary reactors.
Punching in a final series of commands, he was rewarded with an increasing whine that eventually subsided into a subsonic rumble more felt than heard. From the Hopolite, it looked like a sleeping giant had awoke from slumber. The slow tumble of the research center gradually stopped as its station- keeping thrusters came online. The surviving portions of the center came on line, ominous and foreboding as their internal light shone through the greenish gray latticework of conduits and passageways enclosing them. It was hard to believe that something that looked so fragile could absorb so much punishment and still be functional. His job finished, an extremely tired Ulysses stretched and yawned at the same time. Then he tapped his communicator.
"Ulysses to Hopolite, mission complete. One to beam up." Within seconds, he felt the familiar tingle as the transporter began disassembling him at the molecular level. Soon he would be back on the Hopolite, soon he could sleep, and soon afterward he could extract his revenge.
-The surveillance cruiser hid under stealth, keeping the new arrival at the very edge of its passive sensor's reach. It had noted the appearance of the alien vessel in the system over ten hours ago. The new ship could only be of another new species. The design of their ship was significantly different from both the ships and structures of the other species encountered in this system. They, unlike those initially encountered, did not seem to posses the massive and powerful cubic ships that the others had. This new species, if the single vessel seen was any indication of the norm, built their vessels to as different a style from those know as those whom flew in the cube shaped ships. Both styles of ship were radically different than those encountered by the race before. All known previously had flown in ships at least similar in form to that of their own. Yet these species flew in ships totally different, much like the space that surrounded the surveillance cruiser. It to was totally different than anything the Race had known before. The new alien ship must have entered through a closed warp point in the outer system. The picket cruiser's standing orders were to observe and report, not to engage the enemy. But those orders had been issued before the only known warp point of the system had destabilized and closed itself.
It had ceased to exist not that long after the battle line left back to friendly space through it, leaving the lone cruiser to act as a tripwire. It was to remain on station until an exploratory mission could be mounted to plot the newly conquered systems warp points. But the collapse of the warp point and the subsequent lack of any friendly vessel's return to the system meant that the cruiser could not report its findings to a higher authority. The cruiser had initially tried to find either another warp point on its own. None had been located, despite a thorough search. Finding no new warp points, the cruiser had tried to find a way to fix the original one. But being that there was no known reason for, nor any record of, a warp point collapsing, no success was found in that plan either. So reverted to its standing orders and waited and watched. And for the longest time, there was nothing to watch but the drifting debris cloud of the enemy station. But now a single ship of about destroyer size had entered the system. The event had been logged and now the cruiser watched its actions, recording them for possible use. -
- ISS Hopolite, Deck 2, outside Captain's quarters, 8:00AM ship time, ETA till 24th Fleet's arrival: 11 hours -
Ulysses stalked towards the lair of his enemy. He had slept the sleep of an exhausted man. His dreams had not given him another solution to the problem he faced. The time was ripe to end this, however distasteful the method was. His hand dropped to finger the dagger in its hilt on his left hip. He let slip the rage inside him, harnessing its power towards his aims as best he could. It had not abated a bit from the white-hot rage that had gripped him on the Borg complex, nor had he expected it to. It and he were well used to each other by now, yet he refused to let it dictate his actions. It would do him no good if he lost himself in his anger, for he had done so before finding the Teachings of Spock and it hadn't done him any good. A man enraged was liable to make mistakes, as a young Ulysses had discovered. With an enemy as cunning as Garret McBride, mistakes could easily cost him his life. But by holding a tight rein on his rage, he made it a tool to be called upon at need. He was its master, choosing when and how it manifested itself. He would use every tool at his disposal if they helped him win the coming duel with McBride. And still a small part of him cried out that taking the path he was went against all he believed in.
Ulysses could only unfortunately agree with that, but these were the cards he had been dealt. He had found no way out of the situation, despite searching nearly continuously since he had been transferred to the Hopolite. When he had first met the captain, his automatic and irrational anger towards him had narrowed his possible paths considerably. Of the few that remained, he had exhausted them one by one. None had yielded success. That left him with only one remaining option. It was the most abhorrent, the most against what he had strived so long to become, and thus Ulysses had left it till the very end. Now he had no other choices. McBride had backed him into a corner, and the rage inside of him wouldn't let him sit and continue to take the abuse any more. Ulysses had been forced into a situation where the only outcome was death, and he was determined that it wouldn't be his.
A century earlier, the fastest ticket to promotion had been to assassinate your superior and claim his post as your own. But the Imperial Council had seen that this way lead to inexperienced junior officers in command of their warships when the time came to make war. These officers most often lacked the abilities of those they assassinated. This caused conflicts and rebellion suppression to last longer and cost more in both human and mechanical terms than would have been the case. So the council set about to find a way to still have the safety valve of assassination was in place, but to limit it so that when time came for action, most of the war fleet had experienced and capable officers in command.
Under the rules they eventually laid down, assassination was all but outlawed. Only senior officers could ascend to command by killing the captain. And even then, only in a fair duel with normalized boundaries was it to be considered. This allowed for experienced commanders to remain in command relatively securely, without spending most of their time watching their own back. It was a good plan from that respect. Combat records of the fleet as a whole took a massive jump as seasoned officers were at most of their helms from then on. But from Ulysses point of view, it made his job considerably harder.
Finally, he was in front of the door. He forcefully pressed and held the admittance chime. He longed to exercise the more physical means of announcement of pounding on the door. But interior doors and bulkheads on a modern starship were solidly built. He could pound for hours, and no sound would penetrate into McBride's sleeping ears. So he was forced to settle for abusing the door's buttons. After a few seconds, the highly pissed off voice of Captain McBride assaulted his ears.
"Whoever the hell is pestering me at this hour is gonna whish they were dead!" The sentence came out like a growl, meant to intimidate lesser men into submission.
"Captain Garret McBride, I formally challenge you for the right to command this ship." Despite the butterflies in his belly, Ulysses got the sentence out in an even tone. Silence reigned in the hall for what seemed like an eternity.
"So, its you." The growl was still there, along with something akin to eager anticipation. "I didn't think you would have the balls to try something like this. Not that I care mind you. It gives me a legal reason to kill you myself. That is infinitely preferable to having you killed by other means. I shall be out directly."
In less than a minute, McBride entered the hall in full uniform. The two combatants stepped into the middle of the hall. Facing each other with mirror image masks of hate, they stood with feet spread and within striking distance of each other.
"Your challenge is accepted Lieutenant Commander Ulysses Vanguard." This was merely perfunctory. Accepting a challenge with anything else was a capital offence, and as such was punishable by immediate execution. Thus even those commanders fearful of losing had no choice but to take their chances in combat.
Both drew their daggers from their sheaths, the metal making a rasping sound as it was drawn past leather. Even in the low light of the hall, the polished metal of the blades reflected the lighting like mirrors. At the same time, both pulled the edge of their blades across their left palm, drawing a trickle of blood as each closed their hand into a fist around the wound.
Then both turned their attention on each other again. Ulysses waited, searching for the slightest hint of when the first attack would come. He could tell that McBride was used to overeager or desperate opponents, ones who always tried to strike first. The fact that Ulysses merely stood there, dagger at the ready, waiting, unnerved McBride. Second after second ticked by, with neither man so much as twitching. Ulysses could feel the neuro toxin that coated the daggers blade begin to take hold, sending a slow numbing creeping up his left arm. The same thing was happening to McBride. Ulysses could tell that by the way his left arm hung limply from his shoulder down. If he didn't take action soon, he would be unable to. Once the toxin reached the heart, it stopped beating.
That was the reason for use of the poison. If neither combatant took action, the poison would kill them both. The antidote was in a hypo spray mounted in the pommel of the dagger. No one had ever dared to go for it until after a challenge was ended though. Taking the time to open the pommel left you wide open to attack if your opponent was still alive.
Finally, after what seemed like hours but was only a mere eleven seconds, Ulysses saw it in McBride's eyes. That decision to take action, that predatory instinct to attack awakening, to both initiate and finish the duel. Nearly in unison, both combatants charged towards each other. Their headlong rush brought them careening into each other, the short distance between them closing in a heartbeat. A look that was a mixture of utter surprise and terror spread across Ulysses features.
- Borg Research Center A875 34B9-001, 11:28 PM -
Ulysses continued to toil in the bowels of the Borg station. Over the long hours, his rage had settled down from a white-hot firestorm to a slowly smoldering fire deep in the pit of his stomach. He had also modified his original plans. Instead of challenging McBride the instant he got back, he would attack when the time was right, when he was in better condition and not nearly falling over from lack of sleep. He set his tool carefully back into his repair kit. With a final grunt of satisfaction, he made his way over to a control panel, his fatigued frame leaning against the wall for support. As quickly as his exhaustion-hazed brain would allow, Ulysses punching a specific sequence, he was rewarded with all lighting and controls in the central room coming fully online. Hull breaches were sealed with emergency force fields and internal atmosphere was brought up to normal levels. Ulysses yawned as he consulted his tricorder. They indicated an atmosphere that was holding steady at two kilopascals above Terran normal, so there were no unstopped leaks. They also indicated that while gag inducing, the atmosphere was breathable. With those results checked and double checked just to be sure he hadn't misread them the first time through, Ulysses cracked the seal of his suit helmet, lifting it off and attaching it to the rack on the front of his space suit.
The foul tasting mixture hit him like a slap to the face with its higher concentrations of methane and carbon dioxide. Ulysses made a face, but forced the rising bile in his throat to subside. He consulted his tricorder again, this time shifting the readout to a different set of easily measured phenomena. The humidity and heat were high, hitting 92 % and 39.1 degrees Celsius respectively. Everything looked right on line for normal Borg constructs atmospheric conditions. Ulysses allowed himself a tired smile. Now that the enviro controls are working properly, it's time to modify them to Terran standard. Another sequence of commands was entered into the control panel. It beeped sourly and the lighting dimmed fractionally for a second. Ulysses thumped the panel and the lighting went back to normal. Humidity levels quickly dropped, as did the temperature. The air also became sweeter as the methane and CO2 were replaced with increased ratios of oxygen and nitrogen. That's better, Ulysses old boy, he thought to himself. Now cross your fingers and pray that you fixed main power as well as well as the enviro controls and the auxiliary reactors.
Punching in a final series of commands, he was rewarded with an increasing whine that eventually subsided into a subsonic rumble more felt than heard. From the Hopolite, it looked like a sleeping giant had awoke from slumber. The slow tumble of the research center gradually stopped as its station- keeping thrusters came online. The surviving portions of the center came on line, ominous and foreboding as their internal light shone through the greenish gray latticework of conduits and passageways enclosing them. It was hard to believe that something that looked so fragile could absorb so much punishment and still be functional. His job finished, an extremely tired Ulysses stretched and yawned at the same time. Then he tapped his communicator.
"Ulysses to Hopolite, mission complete. One to beam up." Within seconds, he felt the familiar tingle as the transporter began disassembling him at the molecular level. Soon he would be back on the Hopolite, soon he could sleep, and soon afterward he could extract his revenge.
-The surveillance cruiser hid under stealth, keeping the new arrival at the very edge of its passive sensor's reach. It had noted the appearance of the alien vessel in the system over ten hours ago. The new ship could only be of another new species. The design of their ship was significantly different from both the ships and structures of the other species encountered in this system. They, unlike those initially encountered, did not seem to posses the massive and powerful cubic ships that the others had. This new species, if the single vessel seen was any indication of the norm, built their vessels to as different a style from those know as those whom flew in the cube shaped ships. Both styles of ship were radically different than those encountered by the race before. All known previously had flown in ships at least similar in form to that of their own. Yet these species flew in ships totally different, much like the space that surrounded the surveillance cruiser. It to was totally different than anything the Race had known before. The new alien ship must have entered through a closed warp point in the outer system. The picket cruiser's standing orders were to observe and report, not to engage the enemy. But those orders had been issued before the only known warp point of the system had destabilized and closed itself.
It had ceased to exist not that long after the battle line left back to friendly space through it, leaving the lone cruiser to act as a tripwire. It was to remain on station until an exploratory mission could be mounted to plot the newly conquered systems warp points. But the collapse of the warp point and the subsequent lack of any friendly vessel's return to the system meant that the cruiser could not report its findings to a higher authority. The cruiser had initially tried to find either another warp point on its own. None had been located, despite a thorough search. Finding no new warp points, the cruiser had tried to find a way to fix the original one. But being that there was no known reason for, nor any record of, a warp point collapsing, no success was found in that plan either. So reverted to its standing orders and waited and watched. And for the longest time, there was nothing to watch but the drifting debris cloud of the enemy station. But now a single ship of about destroyer size had entered the system. The event had been logged and now the cruiser watched its actions, recording them for possible use. -
- ISS Hopolite, Deck 2, outside Captain's quarters, 8:00AM ship time, ETA till 24th Fleet's arrival: 11 hours -
Ulysses stalked towards the lair of his enemy. He had slept the sleep of an exhausted man. His dreams had not given him another solution to the problem he faced. The time was ripe to end this, however distasteful the method was. His hand dropped to finger the dagger in its hilt on his left hip. He let slip the rage inside him, harnessing its power towards his aims as best he could. It had not abated a bit from the white-hot rage that had gripped him on the Borg complex, nor had he expected it to. It and he were well used to each other by now, yet he refused to let it dictate his actions. It would do him no good if he lost himself in his anger, for he had done so before finding the Teachings of Spock and it hadn't done him any good. A man enraged was liable to make mistakes, as a young Ulysses had discovered. With an enemy as cunning as Garret McBride, mistakes could easily cost him his life. But by holding a tight rein on his rage, he made it a tool to be called upon at need. He was its master, choosing when and how it manifested itself. He would use every tool at his disposal if they helped him win the coming duel with McBride. And still a small part of him cried out that taking the path he was went against all he believed in.
Ulysses could only unfortunately agree with that, but these were the cards he had been dealt. He had found no way out of the situation, despite searching nearly continuously since he had been transferred to the Hopolite. When he had first met the captain, his automatic and irrational anger towards him had narrowed his possible paths considerably. Of the few that remained, he had exhausted them one by one. None had yielded success. That left him with only one remaining option. It was the most abhorrent, the most against what he had strived so long to become, and thus Ulysses had left it till the very end. Now he had no other choices. McBride had backed him into a corner, and the rage inside of him wouldn't let him sit and continue to take the abuse any more. Ulysses had been forced into a situation where the only outcome was death, and he was determined that it wouldn't be his.
A century earlier, the fastest ticket to promotion had been to assassinate your superior and claim his post as your own. But the Imperial Council had seen that this way lead to inexperienced junior officers in command of their warships when the time came to make war. These officers most often lacked the abilities of those they assassinated. This caused conflicts and rebellion suppression to last longer and cost more in both human and mechanical terms than would have been the case. So the council set about to find a way to still have the safety valve of assassination was in place, but to limit it so that when time came for action, most of the war fleet had experienced and capable officers in command.
Under the rules they eventually laid down, assassination was all but outlawed. Only senior officers could ascend to command by killing the captain. And even then, only in a fair duel with normalized boundaries was it to be considered. This allowed for experienced commanders to remain in command relatively securely, without spending most of their time watching their own back. It was a good plan from that respect. Combat records of the fleet as a whole took a massive jump as seasoned officers were at most of their helms from then on. But from Ulysses point of view, it made his job considerably harder.
Finally, he was in front of the door. He forcefully pressed and held the admittance chime. He longed to exercise the more physical means of announcement of pounding on the door. But interior doors and bulkheads on a modern starship were solidly built. He could pound for hours, and no sound would penetrate into McBride's sleeping ears. So he was forced to settle for abusing the door's buttons. After a few seconds, the highly pissed off voice of Captain McBride assaulted his ears.
"Whoever the hell is pestering me at this hour is gonna whish they were dead!" The sentence came out like a growl, meant to intimidate lesser men into submission.
"Captain Garret McBride, I formally challenge you for the right to command this ship." Despite the butterflies in his belly, Ulysses got the sentence out in an even tone. Silence reigned in the hall for what seemed like an eternity.
"So, its you." The growl was still there, along with something akin to eager anticipation. "I didn't think you would have the balls to try something like this. Not that I care mind you. It gives me a legal reason to kill you myself. That is infinitely preferable to having you killed by other means. I shall be out directly."
In less than a minute, McBride entered the hall in full uniform. The two combatants stepped into the middle of the hall. Facing each other with mirror image masks of hate, they stood with feet spread and within striking distance of each other.
"Your challenge is accepted Lieutenant Commander Ulysses Vanguard." This was merely perfunctory. Accepting a challenge with anything else was a capital offence, and as such was punishable by immediate execution. Thus even those commanders fearful of losing had no choice but to take their chances in combat.
Both drew their daggers from their sheaths, the metal making a rasping sound as it was drawn past leather. Even in the low light of the hall, the polished metal of the blades reflected the lighting like mirrors. At the same time, both pulled the edge of their blades across their left palm, drawing a trickle of blood as each closed their hand into a fist around the wound.
Then both turned their attention on each other again. Ulysses waited, searching for the slightest hint of when the first attack would come. He could tell that McBride was used to overeager or desperate opponents, ones who always tried to strike first. The fact that Ulysses merely stood there, dagger at the ready, waiting, unnerved McBride. Second after second ticked by, with neither man so much as twitching. Ulysses could feel the neuro toxin that coated the daggers blade begin to take hold, sending a slow numbing creeping up his left arm. The same thing was happening to McBride. Ulysses could tell that by the way his left arm hung limply from his shoulder down. If he didn't take action soon, he would be unable to. Once the toxin reached the heart, it stopped beating.
That was the reason for use of the poison. If neither combatant took action, the poison would kill them both. The antidote was in a hypo spray mounted in the pommel of the dagger. No one had ever dared to go for it until after a challenge was ended though. Taking the time to open the pommel left you wide open to attack if your opponent was still alive.
Finally, after what seemed like hours but was only a mere eleven seconds, Ulysses saw it in McBride's eyes. That decision to take action, that predatory instinct to attack awakening, to both initiate and finish the duel. Nearly in unison, both combatants charged towards each other. Their headlong rush brought them careening into each other, the short distance between them closing in a heartbeat. A look that was a mixture of utter surprise and terror spread across Ulysses features.