Star Trek: Anachronisms, Chapter Eight

STAR TREK: ANACRONISMS

By T'Layna MacMathain,

Tigris Euphrates,

and CMage

This is a crossover story is based on the Star Trek universe created by Gene Roddenberry and the Gargoyles universe created by Greg Wiseman and Michael Reeves. All vessels and characters that have appeared in Star Trek, Star Trek: The Next Generation, Deep Space Nine, Star Trek Voyager and related movies are registered trademarks of Paramount Pictures. Gargoyles and related characters are registered trademarks of Buena Vista Pictures and Walt Disney Studios. The stories and characters not described above are original creations of T'Layna MacMathain, Tigris Euphrates, CMage, and Poison Thorns Productions. Copyright (c) 2000 All rights reserved.

Chapter Eight

Egg Hunt

Jana sat in the command chair of the Joker's Luck II deep in thought. For the past week, she and Aria had been training Greystone and the others in basic spacecraft ops. Amazingly, all three of the Scottish Gargoyles proved to be amazingly adaptable and had taken to learning the Joker's Luck II's systems like the proverbial duck to water. Greystone in particular had taken to engineering, while Selena and Titan focused on various other systems under the tutelage of Jana and Aria. They were also taught how to use the LCARS system and the three scottish gargoyles read up on the events that they had slept through all those centuries ago.

Jana was also deep in thought about her life as well. For one, she never expected to ever sit in the command chair of a spacecraft, even a bucket like the Joker's Luck II. She had entered the Academy primarily to learn computers and information systems. Apparently fate had other ideas and decided that Jana was more suited for wearing the burgundy of command rather than the gold of engineering. The New Maquis certainly considered her command material after the way she had handled herself on the Rock earlier. She fingered the over insignia on her collar with her talons, feeling the three angled bands designating her as Lieutenant Commander. Even the Starclan now looked on her more as a clan leader than just another gargoyle.

She was also thinking about Captain Janeway and all her old friends back on the USS Voyager. It was almost like a homecoming of sorts to see her old friends like Leta Zeedak and even Harry Kim, whom she remembered from her days at Utopia Planitia. Part of her wanted to remain behind on Voyager, but she also knew that was wrong. The Starclan needed her, and besides, if Captain Janeway couldn't get USS Voyager back home, nobody could! Like it or not, she had more-or-less become the leader of their fledgling clan. Aria came onto the bridge and sat in the tactical chair next to Jana.

"Something wrong, Jana?" she inquired.

"I'm kind of missing the gang back on USS Voyager." Jana replied wistfully, "Voyager was my first posting. Remember the Doctor? I wrote much of his program! I was so amazed at how he had evolved from an emergency hologram to a person. As far as I am concerned, he is no different than us."

Aria smiled. "You sound like a proud parent."

"I guess I do," Jana chuckled at her lover, "I know that I only helped to create him, but he grew and evolved with Voyager's crew. If anyone deserves to be called the doc's mother, it would be Captain Janeway. She is probably the only Starfleet officer I would absolutely trust other than Captain Picard."

"I can see why you respect her. She is the kind of Starfleet officer I hoped to serve before all THIS craziness started." Aria smiled, remembering her days serving under Picard.

"If I was to be a captain, I would want to be like her."

"Perhaps you already are, my love." Aria smiled at Jana's wistful idol worship. "I see her qualities in you."

Jana erupted in laughter. "I doubt very much Captain Janeway would wreck a bar on two different worlds and deck an Admiral!" Or start a civil war that could destroy the Federation and all I hold dear...

"That doesn't exactly fit her image, does it?" Aria replied with a smile. "Where are we headed, anyhow?"

"Back to the Rock, of course."

"Back THERE? What in the galaxy for?" Aria yelped, "We're going to get killed there one of these days!"

"Doubtful." Jana replied as she studied a readout on her LCARS terminal. "The Bajorans claimed rights to the Rock seventy years before the Cardassian Occupation, and they declared their space a safe haven for us."

"There's another reason, Jana, I know it." Aria shot back, "We'd be safer on DS-9 - even the Federation wouldn't dare hit DS-9. The Klingons would raise unholy hell and probably pound a few starbases to dust in retaliation. It's an honor thing, and you know how Klingons are about honor. They are already talking about blockades and protecting the breakaway world, and they have the ships and manpower to do it. Jana, I know you too well already. Something's going on in your mind, no what is it?"

Jana sighed heavily. "Titan told me something very disturbing back on Wyvern." Jana muttered angrily as an alarm beeped it's doleful tone. "That damn port stabilizer... acting up again... adjusting phase variance... there. Anyway, he said there may be a clutch of a dozen or so eggs back on the Rock."

"Eggs?" Aria blurted, her eyes taking on an alarmed look, "Gargoyle eggs?"

"Yes. According to Titan, they hid most of the eggs centuries ago when their mage and prince turned on them and destroyed their clan. They got caught trying to hide the last two eggs. The mage turned them to stone cast them to the winds of the universe. Titan even told me as he was turning to stone, the prince - whom he played with as a hatchling while the prince was still a young boy - was smashing an egg with his mace!" Jana's eyes flared and she growled, glancing at Aria to note her eyes had taken on a similar glow. "Titan thinks they are still on the Rock, and believes that maybe Selena or the Wyvernians could return the eggs to life."

"After all these centuries?" Aria asked dubiously.

"I doubt it myself, they're probably dead... but then again, Greystone and the others survived. There is only one way to find out."

"Can we get this tin can to go any faster?" Aria grumbled with anxiety thick in her voice.

"We'll be there in a week. I am already at maximum warp."

"A week my EYE!" Aria shot back as she started to tap a few controls on the engineering board, "we're going to get there sooner even if I have to climb on the hull of this thing and flap my wings!"

The trip back to the Rock was uneventful. The arrival was another story entirely. When their ship entered the sector, the proximity alarm sounded, and Selena immediately awakened Jana and Aria who had been given bridge watch. Jana and Aria took the command and tactical seats and started tapping controls as usual.

"Four warships." Aria reported. "Three Bajoran Resolute-class destroyers and a Trill Defender-class light cruiser." Aria no sooner heard that when another beep sounded. "We're being hailed."

"Weapons status?" Jana inquired.

"Their shields are up, but their main weapons are offline."

"Raise shields, but do not power weapons unless they do." Jana replied as she tapped open a channel to the Trill vessel.

The viewscreen came alive with a handsome, raven-haired Trill male in a Trill Defense Forces uniform. "This is Captain Hodan of the Trill Defense Force. This system is under the protection of Trill and Bajor, and closed to all Federation vessels. Please leave now before we are forced to open fire."

"Captain Hodan, this is Lieutenant Commander Jana Deenax, commander of this vessel and citizen of Trill. This is the Joker's Luck II, and we are not, repeat NOT, a Federation vessel. We are on a peaceful mission to Rockingham's Planet."

"The Joker's Luck II disappeared weeks ago without a trace," Captain Hodan stated flatly as he raised an eyebrow under the M-shaped forehead ridge that is characteristic of native Trill hosts.

"Look Captain, I really don't have all day to argue with you," Jana shot back, "How many winged Trill do you know?" She then spread her wings briefly for effect. She then noticed that Captain Hodan muted the channel and discussed something briefly with an older female officer.

"My apologies, Commander Deenax. You are free to enter and we promise full protection to you and your crew. Thank you and welcome back." The four warships redeployed their formation to form a protective cordon around the Joker's Luck II and escort it safely to Rockingham's Planet. Less than four hours later, they had landed the Joker's Luck II on the outskirts of Dengali City.

, , ,

Admiral Ross couldn't believe the reports he had just received. Starfleet Command must be out of its mind! He reread them again and went through the unusual step of verification. Starfleet Command's answer was as brusque as it was simple. They had sent two task forces to Delta and Betazed as a demonstration of the Federations's commitment to maintaining the Federation. At that moment, a young Bolian commander entered his office to deliver some reports. He was not at all pleased to see the look on the Admiral's face.

"Something wrong, Admiral?"

"You're damn right something is wrong!" Admiral Ross shot back derisively, "Those assholes at Starfleet Command went over my head and got a bunch of people killed over this Deenax mess, and there is absolutely no reason for it!"

"What happened?"

"We got our asses kicked, that's what!" Admiral Ross fumed, We deserved it too, I might add! I warned them that the Klingons weren't playing. I ought to know... I fought alongside them during the Dominion War! We lost three ships in Delta, and seven in Betazed. I tried to warn them, but those idiots would not listen.

"How many casualties?"

"Too damned many! Eleven hundred killed and twice that many hospitalized in both engagements. What are you going to do?"

Choke the living SHIT out of Morris Falcone if I ever get my hands on that traitorous asshole! Second on my list is the President of the Federation Council. Those assholes are so afraid of Romulan Conspiracies, the Borg, and the Dominion that they are willing to throw the Articles of the Federation into the recycler tanks! One of these days I am going to tell you why I think those BIGOTS ought to be phasered on sight!"

, , ,

"Comrades!" Narin excitedly called out when the Joker's Luck II opened up to reveal the Starclan. "We heard you had been lost! We heard the USS Nimbus had destroyed you!"

"Not hardly, laddie!" Greystone replied with a wide grin, "We're a wee bit harder to kill than most."

"What's been happening here?" Aria inquired, stretching her wings a bit in the open air.

"The Federation has shoot-to-kill warrants out for all of you, especially you Commander Deenax. Open warfare has broken out! The Federation tried to send two fleets to Betazed and Delta. A combined armada of Trill and Vulcan ships in the Deltan system blasted three of them into vapor before the idiot leading the force realized that the breakaway worlds aren't playing. Wisely, he retreated. The taskforce that went to Betazed fared far worse. They ran into Betazoid and Klingon warships, and the Klingons had five-to-one superiority. Don't be surprised if you wind up encountering a few Vor'cha-class warships in the neighborhood. Chancellor Martok is even backing up the New Maquis."

"Oh GODDESS!" Aria cried out as she went down to her knees and buried her face in her paws crying. "How many just died over the five of us?" At that moment Jana spread her wings to their maximum spread, clenched both her fists, held them partially upraised, and threw back her head, and loosed a terrifying roar - eyes glowing with crimson flame. Titan and Selena followed suit with roars and displays of their own. Oddly enough, Greystone seemed to be the calmest of the gargoyles, placing his arms around Aria in a fatherly way to try and comfort the sensitive girl. Narin and the other New Maquis people had nearly jumped out of their skins. They had never seen an enraged gargoyle before, much less three of them, and now understood for the first time why gargoyles would be formidable and dangerous foes.

"Their deaths will be avenged!" Jana roared defiantly, "Those responsible for this will pay, I swear by the gargoyle blood in my veins they will pay dearly!" Nobody doubted Jana's oath for even a nanosecond. Greystone smiled like a proud father as he stroked his beard with his talons. The wee lass may have been born a human, but she is wholly a gargoyle now. For the first time in centuries, Greystone felt hope.

, , ,

For the first time, Aria had the chance to see where the other members of the Starclan first came to life in this century, and Jana had gained her current... exotic appearance. However, what they found was just a room filled with shards of gargoyles and stone eggs. Aria kept herself scanning the room.

"There's nothing here, Lassie." Greystone sighed in frustration as they scoured through the chamber.

"Over here." Aria motioned to something she had spotted near the floor. On one of the shards of pottery, was a little trace of dark stain - someone had scraped their skin on the sharp egg shard. Aria held the tricorder up to the the blood stain. "It's human. About my age. Male."

Jana growled. "CANMORE. There's nothing more we can do now than pilot the Joker's Luck II after the USS Nimbus."

, , ,

"It's all propaganda! The federation would never condone either the murder of innocents, genocide, or genetic engineering! All of those accusations are absolutely preposterous! We learned our lessons years ago in the eugenics wars!" the Federation President's words were quite convincing, and Aria quietly considered them. "I beg you! Think about what you are doing! Think about all the lives you are destroying!"

Jana flicked the LCARS unit off. Aria glanced up at Jana, revealing the tears in Aria's eyes. "Talk to me, Aria."

"As a kid, I was totally into sentience rights. I wanted to save lives. Now I'm destroying them!" Aria went on tearfully. "We're the ones who are responsible for the attack.

"No sis, Morris Falcone is responsible for this, as well as the President of the Federation Council. Those are the ones who sent good people to their deaths in the name of a cause they did not fully understand. It's best to remember that..." Jana began, before being suddenly interrupted by Titan's voice on the intercom.

"We're being hailed. Jana and Aria to the bridge."

The two were on the bridge in moments, Aria's tears momentarily forgotten - pressing matters at hand. Titan read the readout like a cadet fresh out of the academy.

"Uh... looks like a Super-Dreadnought Class starship."

"Fuck." Jana cursed. "Everybody strap in, this could get nasty if they want to play rough."

"I think they do." Aria replied. "They're locking phasers."

"When did you see them?" Jana asked, hurridly. "Raise shields!"

"They just... APPEARED off the starboard side..." Titan struggled. "Shields shields shields..."

The alarm in the Joker's Luck II began to sound. "INTRUDER ALERT! INTRUDER ALERT!"

"FUCK!" Aria echoed Jana's curse, pushing Titan aside, and activating the shields - unfortunately too late. "It registers the USS Harry Benjamin, NCC-30285, lost to Starfleet in a Dominion battle..."

"FREEZE!!!" came a voice from behind them. The three gargoyles paused, eyes aglow and growling, and turned to face...

Three gargoyles. Holding large romulan hand phasers at them.

Paws were raised in the air. Greystone and Selena were roused and collected, as their captors deactivated the shields. Greystone was muttering Scottish obscenities under his breath as Aria attempted to comfort Titan, who felt that the entire capture was his fault. She put her arms around his shoulders to console him that it was not his fault as a total of seven armed gargoyles watched them. An eighth gargoyle appeared from the cockpit to the lobby that was now the Starclan's holding area. He tapped a communicator on his weaponsbelt. "Lt. Comm. Aquarius to Harry Benjamin - mission accomplished. Ready to transport crew and engage tractor beam."

"We're gargoyles... you don't need to fear us!"

"Are you?" Lt. Comm. Aquarius asked with a raised eyebrow, a fairly stocky but intelligent looking blue male. "We'll see."

, , ,

The transporter room of their captor's ship looked just like Jana and Aria had expected it to - like a Galaxy Class ship's transporter room. Back during the Borg scare and the Dominion war, many ships had been thrown together for the fighting, such as the USS Defiant, but the Super-Dreadnought class was not even a new design - simply a Galaxy Class starship refitted with multiple engine cores, a weapons array on the saucer section supporting two additional warp nacelles. The four warp nacelles and the ship's massively overpowered weapons systems were powered by three warp cores in the saucer, and three in the stardrive section. Such redundancy would have been useful to the Starclan during that episode with the USS Nimbus, Aria reasoned.

There was a gargoyle at the transporter controls.

How many gargoyles were on this crew? Where did these gargoyles come from? Jana's mind was reeling. Aria was feeling confrontational. "Who are you? What ship is this? What do you want with us?!!!"

"YOU ARE TO BE OUR GUESTS, PROVIDED YOU BEHAVE." said a new, male voice.

The Starclan turned to find itself facing a yellow ball of light hanging in the air in the transporter room.

"WELCOME TO THE USS HARRY BENJAMIN." the voice continued.

"What do you want done with them, Captain?"

"GENTLY NOW, MR. AQUARIUS. WE WOULDN'T WANT THEM TO FEEL UNWELCOME. SHOW THEM TO THEIR NEW... QUARTERS."

As Jana and Aria expected, those "quarters" turned out to be the brig. Aria had experimented a little before with Duranium. Sometimes it was pliable to gargoyle talons, sometimes now - usually depending on it's reinforcement. For example the outer skin of a ship's hull, like the Joker's Luck II, was impervious to a gargoyle's talons... the same as the walls of the brig.

Once inside the brig, the Starclan began to talk amongst themselves. "Who are they?"

"More gargoyles." Aria mused. "For a race officially dead to the federation, they sure seem to be alive to me. Us, Wyvern..."

"...and this nasty little lot." Greystone finished. "Lass, best ye don't mention Wyvern. We don't know who these... creatures are yet, but so far I doubt they are gargoyles."

"They could be some kind of clones... based on us..." Jana mused.

While the others sat, Aria paced the floor - worried about her egg safely stowed away on the Joker's Luck II. The other gargoyles outside the brig looked on with their weapons in hand, listening to music from the main computer. Aria recognized a song from her youth she had liked, The Moon Over Rigel VII[1], and hummed along to try and calm herself.

"YOU HAVE A LOVELY VOICE, LT." Came that voice again. "I WISH YOU WOULD SING A LITTLE LOUDER."

Aria paused, silent, looking around. That ball of light was there again, this time inside the cell. Jana stuck her paw out, and it went right through the ball. A hologram. Nothing more than a ball of photons. The sound, she deduced, was coming from the P.A. system.

"Who are you?" Aria asked, a little hostilely.

"TEMPER TEMPER, MY SWEET. WHATEVER HAVE I DONE TO DESERVE SUCH A HARSH TONE?"

"Let's see... Where shall I start? Stopped, boarded, captured, imprisoned...?" Jana began.

"WHAT MAKES YOU THINK I HAD ANYTHING TO DO WITH THAT?"

"The others seem to look up to you." Aria observed, referring to the enemy gargoyles.

"THEY CERTAINLY DO, PARTLY BECAUSE I AM THEIR CAPTAIN."

Jana snorted. "A holographic captain? Boy, Doctor Z will love this!"

"I AM GOING TO ASK THIS ONLY ONCE, SO I SUGGEST YOU LISTEN. I NEED TO KNOW YOU ARE INDEED DEENAX AND THE STARCLAN, NOT SOME CLONED IMPOSTORS. RIGHT NOW ME AND MY CREW TRUST NO ONE, SO I WILL ONLY ASK THIS ONCE."

"Ask what?" Selena asked.

"WHO WAS THE EVIL GARGOYLE?"

"There have been many evil gargoyles." Selena observed.

"No." Jana retorted. "He knows that, it's a trick question. He means THE evil gargoyle."

"Lass, you mean...?" Greystone began.

"Demona." Aria finished for him.

"AH, YOUR WISDOM IS MATCHED ONLY BY YOUR BEAUTY, MY DEAR." Aria blushed furiously. "YOUR ANSWER IS CORRECT. ONLY A GARGOYLE WOULD BE PRIVY TO THAT INFORMATION." At that moment, the forcefield vanished. The grunts were standing there, weapons clipped on their belts, waving them out. "GIVE THEM SOME REAL QUARTERS. I EXPECT THEM TO BE TREATED APPROPRIATELY. SHOW THEM THE FILES. AND SEE THAT THE YOUNG BEAUTY HERE IS SHOWN THE LOCATION OF THE ROOKERY."

"Yes, Captain."

"You have a rookery?" Aria inquired.

"OF COURSE."

"How many gargoyles are aboard this ship?" Jana inquired, probing.

"NINE HUNDRED SEVENTY SEX BEFORE THE FIVE OF YOU ARRIVED." The Starclan stopped dead, jaws agape.

"All born gargoyles?!!!" Selena exclaimed in surprise.

"BARELY. SECTION 113 HAS BEEN DOING THEIR DAMNDEST TO DESTROY THEM."

Greystone and the others snorted. "THAT we understand all too well, Captain Lad."

The floating glowing yellow ball followed next to the grunt as they moved down the hall, the Starclan following peacefully.

"When can we get back to our ship?" Jana inquired a little pointedly.

"YOU NEED US. WE ARE HERE TO HELP YOU."

"GAH!" Greystone snorted, reminding Jana heavily of a Klingon. "You are federation!"

The grunts, male and female, twirled and growled, eyes glowing crimson and white. "EASY HEMINGWAY, AUSTEN." came the Captain's voice. "WE ARE MOST CERTAIN NOT FEDERATION. YOU MIGHT CALL US... PIRATES." The two grunts smiled slightly, continuing down the corridors to a turbolift. With the lift full, the ball hung over their collective heads and wingtips. This is, except the yellow female grunt the Captain had called Austen - she had underarm wings.

"But... this ship..."

"WAS BUILT BY THE FEDERATION, YES. IT WAS APPROPRIATED BY SECTION 113 AFTER IT WAS DISABLED IN A DOMINION SKIRMISH. WE TOOK IT FROM THEM. WE'VE MADE A FEW... SPECIAL MODIFICATIONS."

"No shit." Jana snorted. "To just appear to off our Starboard side like that takes technology the federation doesn't have. It looks like you don't have much against romulan technology... like cloaking devices."

"WELL DONE, LT. THAT IS, HOWEVER, THE BAREST POTENTIAL OF WHAT THE USS HARRY BENJAMIN HAS BEEN DEVELOPING. THERE WILL BE TIME FOR THAT LATER."

The turbolift doors opened, and they were shown to a large double-bedroom suit with five beds already arranged, two in one room, three in the other. Laid out were all of their things - which were not many. Aria's case with her things was there, with her medals, a few pads, some uniforms, a hologram crystal of her family, and her weapons. Aria put one of Captain Picard's tetrion pulse rifles and a tricorder on her belt. Jana and the others did the same.

"THERE, FEELING MORE COMFORTABLE?"

"Where is my ship?" Jana prodded.

"Follow us." Hemingway instructed.

"YOUR SHIP WILL BE AVAILABLE TO YOU, BUT WE ASK THAT YOU REMAIN WITH US. WHEN YOU SEE WHAT WE HAVE LEARNED, WE BELIEVE YOU WILL WANT TO STAY WITH US. FOR NOW, TRUST US THAT OUR INTENTIONS ARE GENUINE."

"Oh, give me a BREAK captain!" Jana blurted out. "You don't trust US, you really expect us to blindly trust YOU?"

"THAT IS WHY YOU HAVE YOUR WEAPONS." Jana was clearly not happy, but did not saying anything more until they reached their next stop.

"This is our rookery." Austen said proudly and militarily, showing the way.

The rookery was a converted cargo bay on Deck 6 near sickbay, which normally stored vital supplies and emergency medical equipment and supplies. The interior was well lit, but the lighting was indirect. There was a heavy amount of moisture in the air, leaving a fair amount of mist in air.

"HERE IS THE FUTURE OF GARGOYLES." boasted the captain.

Austen gently took Aria's paw and led her to a table at the end of the room. Every table - and there were at least twenty - contained a variety of ferns, mosses, and grasses. Buried among their leaves were eggs - maturing gargoyle eggs. The Starclan was once more aghast. Austen led Aria to a table with one egg on it - one that looked suspiciously like...

"MY egg!" Aria exclaimed, caressing it's surface. It had been laid among the evergreens and ferns. Austen gently smiled. Aria considered taking it, but she turned to the floating ball. "Captain... I am going to trust you for now." Aria left the egg where it was. "My baby appears safe enough where it is. Show us this... information."

"HEMINGWAY, AUSTEN - TAKE OUR GUESTS TO THE BRIDGE. I WILL MEET YOU THERE."

"Aye sir." Hemingway nodded automatically.

, , ,

The bridge of the USS Harry Benjamin was pretty large, but still resembled that of a Galaxy Class starship. It was nicely carpeted in blue and almond, and the original Starfleet plaque was still on the wall, reading "USS HARRY BENJAMIN - NCC 30285" and it's commissioning dates. There were a cluster of new gargoyles here.

"Captain on the bridge!" Snapped the watch officer.

"AT EASE, LT. COMM. THOROUGH, MEET LT. MAZA." the Captain said, floating over by Aria's head.

A young male gargoyle stood from the engineering console and approached Aria with trepidation. "Uh... hi! I'm Thorough - you know, like the writer?"

Austen and Hemingway rolled their eyes. "Original." Austen put in.

Thorough blushed. "I've been reading a lot of your theories, and I wanted to say it sure is a pleasure to meet you at last!" he bumbled.

Aria blinked. She... had a fan? Jana and the others could not help but smile a little. "Uhh... thanks... Does everyone here know me?"

"If you are who you claim to be, we're all fans of what you have been doing." Hemingway put in gruffly.

"You didn't think you were the only gargoyles left in existence, did you?" Austen laughed.

Jana made a face, looking at her companions. "There was a time when we wondered."

"As did we." Austen observed.

"What is your story, lads and lassies? Dunna make our curiosity wait a moment more!" Greystone insisted with a lighter mood. Sometimes his experience and level-headedness was sanity saving, Jana mused silently.

Thorough turned to the console, and motioned for Aria to sit down. The chairs had been modified to allow a place for a gargoyle to slide their tail through comfortably and work. The others gathered around Thorough and Aria to watch.

Thorough began to read. "During the wild and glorious days when the famous captain kirk was still a captain and flying the first enterprise, the federation knew about a planet of gargoyles, populated by gargoyles flung to the winds of the universe in much the same way as you three." Thorough referred to Selena, Titan, and Greystone, folding his wings around his shoulders. "They were not at that time warp capable, and the federation at that time did not know they were from earth. They assumed them to be just another alien race not yet warp capable, and so therefore bound by the Prime Directive as off-limits to everyone.

"This planet, Cirres-12, called Laicon by it's inhabitants, finally gained warp capacity early this century, and was given the traditional invitation to join the Federation of Planets, and it was revealed they were from earth. The Federation Council clamped down on all knowledge of the planet, fearing societal crisis. Human being have this thing... about fearing what they don't understand... and if it turns out this 'frightening' thing was from earth, well I hope I don't need to paint a picture." Thorough grumbled to himself, as he brought up copies of top secret reports on the screen.

"What happened, laddie?" Greystone pressured.

"Orbital nuclear bombardment. They used primitive fusion bombs to make it looks like Laicon had destroyed themselves. Except for a select few that escaped, the entire population of the planet was killed in seconds."

Jana's head went back, wings wide, and fists clenched once more, roaring furiously at the ceiling. "BASTARDS! When will they LEARN?!!! How many MORE innocents have they slaughtered in this genocide?"

"Too many. One of the ships participating in the bombardment was one with a young captain who I believe you have met."

"Let me guess." Selena snarled. "Morris Falcone."

"Bingo." Thorough echoed her tone. "He was promoted and given a station in Section 31, and eventually leadership of Section 113 when it was first formed to deal with gargoyles specifically."

"Are there any gargoyles left outside of this ship?" Jana asked, carefully being cryptic about hiding the existence of Planet Wyvern.

"Only Planet Wyvern, knowledge of whose existence is limited to the those on this ship." Thorough sighed. "All the rest were hunted down by Section 31 and captured. Most were killed when they refused to comply. When they discovered Adam, Falcone used him very carefully, not wanting to get on his bad side. Then Aria started poking into things she... wasn't supposed to, and found him, and well... I believe you know the story from there."

Aria's head fell, and she began to weep. Jana's arms encircled her lover. "It's okay, sweetheart... it's okay..."

Thorough looked at her, heavy hearted. Austen, Hemingway, and the Captain had left them a while ago. Thorough put a paw on Aria's. "We were all... so upset to hear of Adam's death. Everyone here respects you and puts you on a pedestal in their minds. Falcone has been trying to hunt us down and capture us for years now, and few like - let alone trust - humans..." he glanced at Aria and Jana, "To them you are not human anymore. You have proven yourself more gargoyle than human, especially in your fight for acceptance and equality. That is why we want to support you."

"Fat lot of good your doing us, detaining us." Jana growled a little. "I appreciate your information very much, but..."

"There's more." Thorough cut her off.

Aria was accessing some of the record Thorough had been showing them. "Since they've had trouble getting willing volunteers as subjects for their experiments, they were doing everything possible to manipulate me and Adam into believing they meant well. They did not like it when Jana came along and started mucking up their plans." Aria summarized. Jana smirked coyly. "Without any actual willing victims to work on, they've been doing genetic experiments to try and make a gargoyle out of a human being. It looks like most have been failures except for..."

Aria's monitor suddenly went blanked. She tried tapping the console controls, but it was off. "Computer... restore power to this station."

The power came back on, but try as Aria might to find the file she had been looking at, she could not find it. Thorough was silent as he secretly locked it away.

, , ,

"The captain has given you free access to the ship. We're making some... repairs to the Joker's Luck II, it won't quite be running at the moment." Austen told them.

Jana's eyebrows were up. "Oh really? Anything I could do to help?"

Austen nodded. "I imagine. You'd have to ask. You have to understand that we have more R&D labs here on the nimbus currently functioning than you'd believe, and what we're working on here would make many at Starfleet Intelligence green with envy."

"The cloaking device." Jana hypothesized.

"Among others." Hemingway nodded.

"They are increasing it's power output and shield capabilities." Thorough noted.

Aria spoke up. "You hacked our files."

Austen smiled. "Yes... captain's orders. Thorough... is our resident hacker."

"BUT!" Thorough put in. "Captain also said to stay out of personal logs.

"How courteous." Jana mumbled dryly.

"One other word from the captain." Hemingway instructed them. "Stay OUT of Holodeck 3. No questions. Captain's orders."

The Starclan glanced at one another dubiously.

Once back in their assigned quarters, the Starclan was gathered around the table in the livingroom eating dinner from the replicator. The food it replicated was better than most starfleet food dispensaries, much to their surprise.

"Thank god they had the wisdom to fix the replicators so they can make a decent tasting meal." Selena smiled, setting down a plate in front of Aria, who was still a little teary eyes, and staring out the window into the starfield as starsystems passed by at whatever warp they were traveling at. "Please, eat Aria."

Aria steadfastly refused to move. Jana sighed, trying to comfort her between bites of her replicated Bajoran Lameteses. "Eat Aria."

Aria shook her head. "Too many deaths. If what those files say is true, then millions of gargoyles and at least a thousand or more humans have died because of what Section 113 is doing."

Greystone motioned Jana aside, and sat down beside Aria on the couch. "How is your starving yourself going to change things."

"I need to think. There has to be some way to stop this."

"If you could stop this, what would it accomplish? Fear, prejudice, and media manipulation would continue, and so more deaths would follow. If we carry through with what has started, then there is a chance."

"Only after more people pay the price." Aria put in snidly. "A great human once said, 'There is no avoiding war - it can only be postponed to the advantage of others.'"

Jana snorted. "Niccolo Machiavelli. Fifteenth century earth. Hence the word 'Machiavellian Scheme', which perfectly describes Section 113."

Aria was silent, stood, and left the room.

Selena leaned over to Jana. "I am worried about her. Of all the clan, she is the most vulnerable."

"Aye, she does vulnerable very well." Jana sighed, uncertainly. Then Aria appeared back in the room with a replicated dish of Macaroni and Cheese, and ate in silence. Jana shrugged. It was soft food, but it worked for the moment.

"Doesn't anyone else find it odd that a file just suddenly disappears when I'm looking at it, and they don't even seem concerned."

"That was odd." Jana nodded. "I'm going to see what other information I can pull up." she announced, sitting down with the LCARS. "...It looks like we're going to be here for a while."

Aria sighed. "Selena... I want to go see my baby. Would you come with me?"

Selena nodded. It was not an unusual habit for the sorceress and her young prodigy to take long walks together. It seemed like a prudent move to help Aria clear her head. They never made it to their destination.

Partway to their destination in the turbolift, the lift stopped and opened to reveal three gargoyle officers who stepped on board, and demanded an emergency override to Holodeck 3. Aria and Selena remained in the background as these three officers hurried to some kind of medical emergency.

"Can we help?" Selena inquired.

"I'm Commander Centuarius, first officer of this ship." he introduced himself to the two members of the Starclan. He was a small, but fairly respectably browner tan male of older years. I'd appreciate it if you two would remain out of this and continue on about your business."

The car stopped at Holodeck 3, where medical teams were assembling and rushing inside. Aria and Selena looked at each other once, and followed them slowly. They wanted answers - no more of these half-truths and cryptic answers.

There were gargoyles gathered all around, inside a holographic depiction of serene forested setting. The gargoyles there were mostly medical teams and were assisting a couple of doctors. The rest looked like command figures, who were watching from the sidelines.

"There are just too many bio-toxins in his system! We can't filter them out fast enough!" one of the nurses reported.

That was when the two gargoyles caught sight of who was laying on the table. It was not a gargoyle - nor was it a human. The best word the describe it was deformed. It was like a human, but with skin the color of Bolian cattle dung. It had limp and lifeless wings that looked more like clothes than wings. It's hands looked like someone had tried to twist human hands into a gargoyle shape. It was quite plainly disgusting to look at, but underneath it there was someone - a person who was obvious suffering pains unknown.

He turned to the gargoyle known as Commander Centaurius. "Computer. Turn over all command codes to Commander Centaurius, authorization Blade-Alpha-114."

"The starship USS Harry Benjamin now under the command of Command Centaurius." the computer reported.

"I will be with you, as long as I can." Centaurius held the man's hand. It was obvious he was dying. That was when the man on the table suddenly looked up at the two members of the Starclan. "GET THEM OUT OF HERE!"

It was the Captain. They could tell by his voice.

Several security grunts turned to them, but Selena suddenly shouted. "WAIT! We can help!"

The grunts looked ready to pull the two members of the Starclan out of the room, but the Captain began to laugh - a painful sound. "Sure. They can't make things any worse."

The grunts circled around behind Aria and Selena, supposedly ready to cut the two women to pieces if they so much as looked at them funny. Selena took Aria's paws. "Exactly like I taught you." was all she said. Both gargoyles closed their eyes, and Selena began to chant.

"Am fear a thuit

Sona agus glic!

Tha e 'na shlainte

Laidir! Laidir!"

It was not latin, Aria recognized, but Gaelic. There was something about the natural and simple way it rolled off her tongue that the universal translator choked on. A white glow began to form around the two women as they spread their wings, and began to hover in the air slightly.

"We're losing him!" the nurses continued. "Cortical stimulator! The cancer is overrunning his nervous system, cutting off circulation!"

"There is an increase in hyper photonic energy..." one of the nurses reported... "...like nothing I've ever seen before!"

"LUATH! Dràsda!" Selena continued.

"There's a tremendous energy surge..."

The body of the tortured captain began to glow in a similar manner, and he began to arch his back, screaming. Aria and Selena's eyes opened, radiating a brilliant red light. Streams of energy began to rush between the two sorceresses and the ailing captain. Selena threw her head back. "Cha'n eil!!!" Aria twisted in a sickly manner. "NOOO!!!!"

Centaurius moved forward. "Something's wrong!"

The grunts unsheathed their phasers... only they had been modified with some kind of device. They pressed a button on the phasers, and a beam shot out, but only about a meter long. They held these phaser-swords ready to cut Selena and Aria to pieces.

Something began to form in the air space between the captain's bed and the two sorceresses. It began to coalesce and take form... some kind of half-corporeal creature, as tall as the holodeck itself! It snarled and half-slashed at the grunts, who began to turn towards it.

"KILL IT!!!" Selena and Aria screamed simultaneously, as the white-hot energy around them vanished, and the two sorceresses passed out onto the forest floor. The demon had fully coalesced into physical form now, and picked up one of the gargoyles, growling and roaring as it came...

...but it was too late for the demon. The other gargoyles sounded their battle-cries and with their phaser-swords at the ready cut the beast to pieces.

, , ,

Aria groaned painfully as she stirred back to consciousness. She was laying on an examination bed in sickbay, surrounded by Titan, Greystone, Jana, Thorough, and Centaurius. She blinked her eyes, feeling a strong desire to just fall back to sleep.

"Welcome back to the waking world, my dear." came Centaurius's voice.

"So tired..." Aria muttered. "What happened?"

Centaurius leaned over. "You saved the Captain's life, that's what you and your sister did."

"And excised some kind of demon in the process, it seems - locked it into a physical form, so that the other gargoyles could cut it down." Jana explained.

"The captain... he was one of the experiments... Section 113 was trying to turn him into a gargoyle, weren't they?"

Centaurius nodded. "Captain Blade was in a prison colony in New Zealand when Section 113 found him. They used him for their experiments, but since they could not emulate the magical part of a gargoyle, they could not create one, but instead created the tortured creature you saw who had so many boils and cancerous growths on his skin he could not get out of bed. Yet, in his name, he brought together this crew."

"How is he?"

"See for yourself." Centaurius nodded to an adjacent bed, where a very built blue male gargoyle Aria had never seen before was sitting up, looking particularly relieved.

"A gargoyle?" Aria asked, puzzled. "We were trying to return him to his humanity..." The Captain walked over to Aria's bed, with a medical blanket wrapped around his waist, and his massive wings hung at his shoulders. "I guess we'll have to try again..." Aria began to think aloud.

"No." the Captain said. "Like I always say, don't tempt fate. Besides, at least I fit in with my crew."

Aria chuckled a little, turning to Jana. "We have another mutate..." Jana smiled a little, caressing Aria's hair and horns as she gently drifted back to sleep.

The Captain held a paw up to Jana. "Captain Blade, at your service." Jana blinked, and took his paw, wrist-to-wrist in the gargoyle manner. "If there is anything I can do to repay the service Selena and Aria have done..."

Jana looked at Aria and Selena, resting peacefully on the medical beds, and turned back to the Captain.

"Imagine something, Blade. Six gargoyle eggs." Jana began. Blade nodded. "Now imagine them in the hands of Morris Falcone."

Blade's smiled evaporated. "Tell me you aren't serious."

"That was the mission you... diverted us from."

Blade's eyes blazed white, his wings going wife, and he roared. "BLADE TO CENTAURIUS!" he shouted. "SET A COURSE TO INTERCEPT THE USS NIMBUS, MAXIMUM VELOCITY! ENGAGE CLOAK!"

, , ,

"The Joker's Luck II has been refitted with cloak, new Plasma Injectors in the warp nacelles that will allow you to get more speed out of them, and we've repaired your Tetrion Pulse array and Phase Compression Emitters. We've also enhanced your shield grid with metaphasic subspace shielding, which should allow you to fly into the ionosphere of a star if you had to." Hemingway gruffly reported to the assembled crew at the table. The Starclan was seated on the one side, along with The USS Harry Benjamin's command crew on the other. Captain Blade sat at the head of the table, attempting to readjust the collar of his uniform.

"I sure hope you fixed the chairs in there." Jana laughed. Aria was glad to see her mood had picked up. The Clan was starting to feel more at home on this ship, in spite of the shaky start.

Hemingway chuckled, a deep merry sound. "I'll get some engineers on it right away."

"Good." Blade nodded, turning to the Starclan. "Here's the situation." He turned to the monitor, where a starchart came up. "In this debris field is a junkyard of discarded starships. Just about everything is in there, except for possibly Borg and Romulan. Before we captured this ship from Section 113 in a supply raid, we used several smaller ships. As our numbers grew, we needed more and more ships, but the USS Harry Benjamin allowed us all to live together in one large 'castle' as the others put it." The other gargoyles smiled approvingly. "And it gave us the chance to put all our creative efforts into enhancing just one ship which would go with us wherever we traveled. However, there are plenty of other, older warships hidden in that field, and only we know where they are hidden. There are plenty to make a substantial contribution to the war effort, and hundreds more that just need a little work and can be made operational again."

"So what's the problem lad?" Greystone inquired.

"Crew." Centaurius put in. "We are settled and at home in our present castle. We do not have the manpower to run this ship, and a whole different fleet."

"That's where we come in." Jana spoke up. "The New Maquis alliance consists of Trill, Betazed, Deltan, Vulcan, Klingon, Bajoran, and a few other mixed forces mixed in for good measure. They are even some dissenting Federating crewmen who believe the Federation is in the wrong and have joined us." Jana reported, going through a PADD as she spoke. "Why the entire Federation doesn't join us is a little beyond me."

"Arrogance will get you nowhere." Selena laughed.

Jana smiled and continued. "What we lack are ships, but we have crewmen aplenty. I think we can arrange a... mutual alliance."

Captain Blade bowed formally. "I offer our services to the New Maquis Alliance."

Jana nodded. "Give me an encrypted channel and I can contact the necessary people."

"Thorough is our resident Hacker and my security officer. Usually we can cut down on unnecessary violent confrontation through his genius." Blade nodded to Thorough.

Jana nodded. "I have a few ideas I was to share with you."

"I've already been looking at some of Aria's notes." Thorough smiled. "I think we can make a complete crack of the Nimbus's computer before they even know we're there. I recommend running a 'shadow' program until the crack is done, echoing their every move so that even if they do detect us, they will think we are some kind of sensor ghost."

Blade nodded. Aria protested. "HEY! I wrote that program!"

Thorough blushed. "Well... I... made some improvements."

Aria rolled her eyes and sighed. Jana chuckled. "I think we're gonna feel right at home here."

"Captain Blade?" came a voice from the intercom. "We're now approaching the USS Nimbus."

, , ,

[2]The Meridian Class starship hung on the viewscreen. It was so inviting to just blow it out of the water right now. No, Captain Blade thought. This is a rescue mission, not a search and destroy mission. "How's the hack coming, Thorough?" he inquired, testing the movement of his tail in anticipation.

"One minute captain. Program's still running. They've got about the usual level of Section 113 blocks to get through but with Aria's little contributions we can get it all done a lot faster than it would... AH HAH!" Thorough rubbed his paws together with excitement, and made a little gun out of his right paw, pointing at the console. "GOTCHA!!! Running the first diversion program now, captain."

Captain Blade turned to the Starclan and the other team leaders that had assembled on the bridge at his command. "Okay, first priority here is search and rescue. This mission is right up your guys's alley. Besides I won't give Falcone the easy out - I'm gonna see to it that he rots in prison for decades." Aria and the others nodded succinctly. "Okay, your teams are ready? Good. Unit 1 will deploy here." He made a motion with one talon towards a particular part of the starship on the screen. "2, here, 3... and 4. Remember, we HAVE to get those eggs at ANY COST." He faced his crew very seriously. "We've talked about a day possibly coming when I'd ask you to go to your deaths. This might be that mission for some of you. That's the way life works, but I only make that call when it's worth it."

Captain Blade turned back to the image of the USS Nimbus. "These eggs... the youth of gargoyles... are VERY worth it, every one."

The other gargoyles nodded, deadly serious.

Captain Blade turned back to them. "Pierce, Adams, King - demonstrade some of our weapons to our newest crewmembers." he nodded at the Starclan. This time even Jana smiled in acknowledgement. They were finally feeling at home here. "Remember this is a gun fight. No knives." He smiled a little. The gargoyles nodded. "Then go make me proud."

The gargoyles marched, like out of the academy. Their movements were precise, and they followed the Starclan without question. Hemingway was there. Heading down a hallway towards the transporter room, he barked something, and they replied in unison. Aria actually felt a little overwhelmed. She felt like she was leading elite soldiers, and she was green out of the academy! She felt misplaced - a regular fish out of water.

, , ,

"Admiral?"

At the sound of Canmore's voice, the Admiral turned from his introspective pose reading some important documents, and looked up at the young Lieutenant. "Yes?"

"We're getting some odd resonance vibrations in the warp core conduit controllers. Engineering recommend we drop out of warp long enough to investigate the problem." he reported.

The admiral nodded. "But tell them to hurry but still do a good job. I don't want serious problems later, but Section 113 is going to expect us to deliver."

"Aye, yessir." he snapped, typing quickly into the console.

Several long minutes went by, in which the Admiral continued to read his documents, but the time began to drag. After twenty, perhaps thirty minutes, he turned back to his helmsman. "Canmore - are they done yet down there?"

"They're having some difficulty, sir. They replaced the unit, but the new unit is having the same problem, and the old one appears to check out, sir." Canmore reported. "They're looking into some kind of computer glich..."

That was when the lights went down. The running noises a starship normally made stopped. The ship was dead silent. "What's going on...?" The admiral insisted. The viewscreen flickered on. An image of a skull and crossbones appeared, laughing. Then the ship was filled with the sound of a haunting, evil laughter. "What the HELL?!!! Get more teams down there! Get this problem fixed! I want..."

"HELLO, ADMIRAL."

The admiral was silent, stopping dead in his tracks. That voice...

"Oh come now... don't insult me by pretending you don't know who I am."

"Impossible..." Falcone muttered - half to himself - then louder, "Impossible...!"

The image on the viewscreen changed, and Captain Blade appeared. "Hello, Falcone. Remember me?"

"BRIDGE!" one of the Admiral's crewmen's voice came on the speakers. "INTRUDER ALERT!!! We've got intruders on decks five, six, seven, and twenty one! Firefights have broken out on each of those decks! They've got WINGS sir!"

Canmore punched futily at his console, but it remained black and unresponsive. "The computer is DOWN, sir! Somehow it's locked everyone out."

"Computer! Override command lockouts, authorization Falcone, Theta-Kappa-117."

"Unable to comply. Invalid authorization code." the computer replied.

Canmore spoke. "Computer, who is in charge of the ship, then?"

"The USS Nimbus is current under the command of Captain Blade of the USS Harry Benjamin."

"WHAT?!!!" Falcone exclaimed, blood vessels in his face practically bursting with apoplexy. He turned back to the built blue gargoyle on the monitor.

"Oh don't look so surprised, CAPTAIN Falcone. I told you I'd be back, didn't I? And I'm not alone. Perhaps you'd recognize their names?" Blade leaned closer in the image. "Selena, Greystone, Titan, Aria Maza..." Canmore's fists clenched. "...and Jana Deenax."

"IMPOSSIBLE!"

"You seem to be using that word a lot for a man who no longer commands his own ship."

"Whatever it is you want, you aren't going to get it!" Falcone returned, eyes filled with fury.

"CAPTAIN!" came a voice on the intercom. "All our weapons have somehow deactivated! Hand to hand combat has broken out... ACK!!!" ...and the voice was gone.

Blade was struggling to hold a straight face. He reminded himself to promote Thorough on this one - he sure had a sense of the melodramatic.

Falcone's reaction was almost automatic. "All crews! Lock down the eggs!"

The second Falcone cut off the signal, Blade turned back to his people. "REPORT!"

"Teams two and three encountering heavy resistance in their engineering and weapons areas."

"MAZA TO THOROUGH!" came Aria's voice on the comm. "I know this isn't the time for bright ideas, but I think you need to hear this one."

"I'm always game, sister." Thorough replied. "What is it?"

"So, I'm punching the lights out of this security officer, right? I swear my head has never been this clear before! I can almost see the schematics in my head! Quadritic power couplings, Thorough! Isolytic subspace weapons use a quadritic power coupler, right?"

Thorough blinked, typing something into the computer. "I hardly think this is the time..."

"I just realized something. In order for a Quadritic power coupler to the EPS system to work, there would have to be a physical secondary power connection to the coupling, right? That second connection would be shunted by computer control, right? GRRRRRR... TO YOUR LEFT! WATCH YOUR HEAD!" Something crashed in the background, and human scream was heard. "So just reverse the flow on one and it should short out, right? Oldest trick in the book!"

Thorough grinned. "Shunt their full engine power through the coupler using the computer and WHOOSH the whole system melts in it's housings! Aria, you're a FUCKING genious!!!"

"Remind me not to come up with good ideas when I'm not trying to -- GRAAAAGH!!! -- beat up humans, next time!"

"Advice noted. Thorough out."

Blade smiled. "Inspiration strikes at the oddest times, doesn't it?"

, , ,

Jana delivered a wicked uppercut to some grunt's upper jaw and brought the tetrion pulse rifle hanging from her shoulder around and fired off three successive shots in the direction of a new cluster of security rats on the hallway to her left. The shots went right into the duranium ceiling, and began to shower the poor fools underneath with fiberoptic cabling and isoliner circutry. Jana's eyes were blazing with rage.

"THIS WAY!" Aria directed, pointing at a large cargo door. She tried the emergency release handle, but it was somehow locked tight. "BLAST IT!"

The Starclanners dropped to a kneeling position and fired off several successive rounds at the cargo door while the other gargoyles stood watch, looking in all direction, and occasionally firing off shots with modified Romulan hand disruptors. The cargo door groaned and complained, teetering in it's housings. Jana gave it one good kick, and it tore apart at the weakpoints the tetrion pulse had put in it. Jana roared, wings spread... only to find an empty cargo bay. Selena swung her tricorder around. "This way!"

As the Starclan filed inside the cargobay in question, as the others watched the doorway, withdrawing to the door to maintain their watch in a defensive posture instead of offensive. Selena's scan swung to the right, stepping through the rows and crates of equipment. Sure enough, she moved to a wall and began to scan it thoroughly. "They sure aren't making this easy." she commented.

Jana, pumped full of adrenaline, shoved her claws into the duranium mesh alloy, and ripped it aside, and was rewarded by a blast of warm wet air. Jana looked down at the table of gargoyle eggs with a puzzled look. "This is too easy. Something's wrong."

Selena looked down at one of the eggs, to pick it up, and it shattered to little peices of empty plastic. "Fake." she reported.

Jana snarled, frustrated. "Now we're screwed."

Aria looked around the room with a look on her face that betrayed an idea. "Not quite yet." She moved to a panel on the far wall, and began moving her paw across it. "Selena?"

Selena touched the wall she was referring to. "Yes, youngling - I feel it too."

"Shall we?" Aria smiled to Jana, and opened fire on the wall in question... to no effect.

"WAIT." Selena instructed. She touched the panel again, and after a few moments it shimmered and turned to dust.

"That was unlike any door I've ever seen." Jana noted.

"Nor I." Selena noted. "But it was made by science. Magic can detect it."

The Starclan filed in through the hole made by the open panel in the wall, and found several a vacuum sealed recess door. Aria contacted Thorough once more, and they hacked it open without the need for phasers, and once inside, they finally found them.

"These are real." Selena smiled without touching them. "Their energy is right."

"Get the others in here. Everyone grab one and file out." Jana ordered. "DEENAX TO BENJAMIN... Prepare to transport...!!!"

, , ,

"We've gained access to the computer control circuitry, captain." Canmore reported. "Access will be restored shortly."

"Excellent!" the Admiral smiled. So much for Blade's strategy. He sat in his chair as the lights came back up again. "Scan for the USS Harry Benjamin, and lock Isolytic Torpedoes on target."

"AYESIR!" Canmore and the other bridge crew shared in his energy. They were back in business now!

"I want a full systems status report! What's going on with my ship?"

"Intruders are in four groups, and are beaming out. They appear to be on the run, Admiral!" a female officer replied with a big smile.

"Captain, there appear to be no other ships in the area." reported another, more sensible sounding young male.

"That can't be! Find them!" Canmore put in.

"Open a channel." Falcone ordered. "Perhaps we can flush him out."

The blue gargoyle was there again, hugging what could only be Deenax and Maza. "You wouldn't happen to mind telling me how you've survived all these years, subject 13217?" Falcone asked.

Deenax, Maza, and Blade turned to face the view. "So you DO remember. Wouldn't you like to know?" Blade chuckled.

The view changed, and the enourmous shape of the USS Harry Benjamin flickered into view. Falcone's smiled twisted. "FIRE."

The bridge of the USS Nimbus was suddenly filled with a rain of sparks and the weapons officer was thrown across the room and knocked out cold.

Falcone began to shout and cough in the smoke. "WHAT HAPPENED?!!! DAMAGE REPORT?!!!"

"Isolytic torpedo launch system compromised sir! Some kind of computer feedback error!"

"Have a nice life, Falcone. Pray you never see this face again." Blade's voice came through the air. Falcone did not even look up at the viewscreen, but held his head in his hands.

"They've gone to warp, sir!"

"Track them?" Falcone asked, a royal headache forming.

"Aye sir!"

"SIR!!! Deck Five reports the gargoyle eggs are missing!"

Canmore spoke up. "Impossible! How could they crask the psyionic doorway?"

The female officer spoke up. "Sir, receiving a message from Section 113. They want an update on when we'll be there to deliver the eggs."

Admiral Morris Falcone sighed. "Oh shit..."

, , ,

While the two males of the Starclan were on duty, while the three women tried to control seven miserable hatchlings as three nurses and the doctor of the USS Harry Benjamin tried to give all the hatchlings medical exams. The scene was - to say the least - chaotic. Children were screaming, some crying, and their caregivers... well...

"Well, based on the five of you, I can only guess that..." Doctor "Becky" Allison had to quickly dodge a young male hatchling grabbing for her tricorder. Even as young at they were, they probably could have easily destroyed the medical instrument. She was a matronly young woman with a pleasant smile, green wings, and a pleasant blue complexion. "All of them are healthy. I would recommend you take steps to make sure they're all taken care of, even if it means taking one or more of you off duty until further notice, is that clear?"

"Doctor, take all three of us off duty." Selena requested curtly. "In our clan, all the clan mothers help until the hatchlings are taken care of. It is not only a tradition, it is a biological necessity."

"Besides, we need three just to watch them all and still sleep." Aria nodded, holding her own little orange double‑winged hatchling with her father's horns barely budding on the infant's brow.

The doctor turned her scanner to Selena and Jana. "I see what you mean. Somehow you are each experiencing the hormonal fluxuations that normally accompany post-delivery. Interesting."

Selena and Aria nodded, but Jana looked baffled. "What does that mean?"

"It means, Deenax, that since the hatchlings have all hatched, your body considers them YOUR responsibility, just as much as the others. As a result, your bodies are adjusting your own hormone levels to compensate." She showed the tricorder to the young gargoyle commander. "I bet all my training you start feeling your breasts ache before this week is out."

"But I can't be worrying about this - we've got a WAR to fight! We've got too many ships to refit...!"

"Didn't you hear me, Commander?" the doctor shook her head. "You, Selena, and Aria are off duty until the hatchlings are AT LEAST nursed. Between your prolactate levels, adrenaline surges, and pure estrogen, you aren't going to be clear thinkers on the bridge, let alone with a wielding torch. You will be perfect, however, for taking care of YOUR rookery. Don't make me suspend your rank as well, Deenax. Take care of your new rookery, Deenax - this is a MEDICAL order."

"We're in the middle of a war! Greystone and Titan aren't trained to build the new weapons arrays on all those ships!"

"I know that. Gargoyles are not going to win this war ‑ the rest of the New Marquis will. You've given us the ability, now it's up to us. Right now the most important thing YOU can do is care for those HATCHLINGS! This discussion is OVER!" The doctor paused, returning her eyes to normal. "I know you were born human, but Selena's right - when a gargoyle clan had more hatchlings than it can handle, the women's bodies react. It's not unique to our kind either."

Score one for the doctor.

Jana slumped down on one of the beds, and one of the little male hatchlings crawled up into her lap to play with her hair. The doctor gave each adult gargoyle woman a specimen cup. "When the milk comes, I want a sample for hormone tests, and for replication."

"Replication?" Aria inquired.

"Three women - seven babies. You do the math. That's a lot of baby bottles, lieutenant." The doctor replied. Selena smiled. Score two for the doctor. "Do you have names for them yet?"

Selena blinked. "Gargoyles do not have names."

"I am well aware of that, sister. Captain's request. For the sake of nicety."

Aria spoke up. "Me and Jana kinda got stuck with that task. First, the strawberry colored female by the office is Elena, the dark blue male next to her is Daniel, the emerald green female here is Prosperina, the black male on Jana with the arm wings is Winston, the large yellow female next to Jana is Jennifer, and my hatchling..." Aria lovingly caressed her baby's still‑bald baby head. "...will be Elisa."

, , ,

24 HOURS LATER

"Oh my Goddess!" Jana exclaimed, looking in the mirror. "I'm bloated! I'm lactating! My body is making MILK!"

"Doctor Becky told you so." Aria noted. "Take a sample cup and do like the rest of us." Aria and Selena smiled at each other - enjoying the moment.

Jana returned a moment later from the bathroom to the main room of their quarters. "Fine. My breasts still hurt. Now what?"

Selena scooped up little Prosperina who was squalling and sucking on her tail. "Give to the next generation."

After a little awkward instruction in how to hold the gargoyle child, Jana nursed Prosperina. Aria chuckled a little to herself. "All the vast knowledge of the trill, and you don't know how to be a mother?"

"Hey! My last host was a MAN! Jana never planned on having kids because she was never the 'motherly' type. I've never had any other hosts - my symbiont is too young!"

"Oh..." Selena nodded, understanding. "So this is your first time."

"Worst part is, the doctor examined my symbiont and it looks like it's only compatible with another gargoyle - it can't interface with a human anymore. There's only one adult gargoyle in the Starclan that I can join with if the worst happens." Jana explained, as she watched the little winged girl in her arms suck on her nipple. There was something in Jana's eyes for the first time - the feeling of motherhood filling her. She gently smiled.

"Who's that?" Selena blinked.

"Aria." Jana motioned generally in Aria's direction.

Aria sighed. "Hopefully by the time that happens, one of the hatchlings will be old enough to do it."

Jana found this reaction a little disturbing, and so confronted Aria about it later when Selena had gone off to bed to try and catch some much‑needed sleep. That was one disadvantage to the lack of a stone‑sleep cycle: they didn't get their in‑force naps and had to make time to grab small snatches of sleep between breastfeeding just like human women.

"Oh it's nothing you did, Jana." Aria replied, gently. "I sorta think of you as... a lover..."

Jana's eye dropped. "I didn't want to hurt you, or realize..."

Aria cut her off. "I'm there for you as a person, but I'm not excited to BE you... or loose you..."

Jana hugged her lover tightly.

The doorbell signal rang. "Come in!" Aria and Jana said almost simultaneously, breaking from the hug, and turning to the door.

There stood the blue skinned Captain Blade in all his masculine glory, finally outfitted in a redtop uniform he felt comfortable in. "Am I interrupting anything?"

"Unless you count entertaining squalling youngsters, no." Jana sighed, defeatedly.

"Keep it down. They're sleeping - old and the young." Aria whispered.

"Our fleet is almost ready. The ships from Quo'nos, Bajor, and Trill should be arriving inside of a few hours." He sighed, sitting down on the couch. "We'll join up with the Bajoran/Trill taskforce in section nine by next week."

"Perhaps you should drop us off someplace safe." Aria suggested.

Blade reached over and hugged the nursing mother, smiling gently. "Trust me. This is the safest place in the galaxy for you right now. We'll see to that. I swear it."



[1] This song actually exists. It was featured in Star Trek V: The Final Frontier. If you want, I can provide an .MP3 of it, or you can find it on the ST5 soundtrack CD, under it's "Earth Title"; The Moon's A Window To Heaven. *grins*

[2] Origonal Title: Jolly Roger

Album Title: Independence Day

Artist: David Arnold