16: Crazy Train

The last month has passed quietly, again. It seems that in Ravnica, like many places at war, you get 6 months of sheer boredom puncuated by 6 minutes of sheer terror. In other words things are running smoothly ... too smoothly. With the exception of the angels. At least Razia's newly reincarnated daughters. Recently, they all seem to be looking at me when my back is turned. And no, I'm not being paranoid. I checked the sensor logs of my corridor movements and sure enough, each angel I passed had to pause and check me out after I go by.

Sara and I had shipped over with a team of engineers to get the joint space station back up and running. It was slow going, but it didn't take long to find out why the angels had taken an interest in me when I returned to by quarters after the day shift ended. The corridor had sprouted a guard. Nevena was actually volunteering to stand guard a shift - as if that would help against a planeswalking gorgon. I watched Nevena as I entered my quarters and sure enough, I got that look. "WHAT?" I had to ask.

"Well it's true..."

"What's true?"

"What Aurelia stated. You do have a cute ass," was Nevena's final reply.

"And when did this happen?" I had to ask.

"Um... well... " Nevena turned an interesting shade of pink. "She did mention it after she settled in under Razia's new assignments. After she found out it was your idea, Aurelia warmed up to the idea of working directly with mortals as crew."

Since that allowed all the angels to save face, and join in with the "new agenda", Arelia, apparently, isn't plotting my untimely demise.

The station's reactor had a problem. "Why didn't this show up in the scans?"

"That's because it didn't occur before the 'mending' happened, and didn't crack the containment bottle until the shutdown and flipping out of antimatter happened.

Unfortunately we didn't have a repair to the space stations' reactors until a complete rebuild was available. But then, that's what we were expecting, and a complete rebuild will cooincide with a refuelling from an antimatter tanker bound from the shipyards of Wa-Lu and doing a round trip from Ravnica that includes 1 building, 1 space port, and 1 space station, as well as three ships and a rebuild of a spaceport.

"So it's chill time", I stated. "We are in a wait and see pattern untill the refuelling ship gets here – For the containment bottle, it's just somebodies' welding job. No biggie."

I woke up with Sara wrapped around me. But his morning I was a little pissed off at her. I had finally clued in to what I expecteed was her and Toki's conspiracy. There was no way that a human-angel hybrid could come about without genetic help from a specialist - and the fact that Toki would go along with this was particularly bothering me this morning.

It didn't take long for Sara to realize something was wrong - we were telepathically linked after all. "Good morn. . . ." was all she got out before stopping. She gingerly put a hand on my shoulder. "Don't be mad. . . please?"

"Why not? I don't like being played." I stated.

"But I didn't intend. . .I didn't think you would. . .mind. . ."

"And whatever gave you that idea?" I had to respond. "When in the last 12 years did I indicate to you that I wanted any children?"

"Umm, ... well, ... you told me about your years as a teacher..."

"And I told you about how that was the best contraceptive ever," I growled, cuting her off. "Besides what the hell do you know about raising children - and an angel child at that?"

"Well, Kenediderm was raised..." "I could give a child a good upbringing. ...I didn't think that that you would mind an angel child with the help that we could bring to bear..."

"But an angel child is impossible, between us, unless it has medical interference..." I stated.

" Ummm..."

"Exactly. Toki had to play a role as this file shows," I had put the file up on the screen. It was the same technique that was used to create captain Spock...

"But isn't that what human sexuality is all about?" I think Sara was genuinely puzzled by my current emotional state.

"Not . . . exactly. That's just part of it. There's more to human sexuality than you think. You do get a truncated viewpoint by hanging around me all the time, and that stereotypical viewpoint you got during your previous angelic career."

"It was not. . ." Sara stopped and pondered for quite a while. "I guess it was stereotypical. How many humans would act completely natural and truthful around an angel they are usually in awe about. So what makes you so - nonchalant in the first place?"

"Simple. I come from a manaless universe with an overabundance of technology, and I'm jaded. Not as jaded as Liliana Vess, but still jaded."

"Who is this Vess person? That's the second time I've heard that name."

"Apparently another planeswalker who hangs out with Jace. It seems he has a small cadre hanging out at his mansion, and she is one of them. Apparently they did some mission in Innistrad soon after we left. And that place turned into a real mess. Sounds like the phyrexians invaded it or some such thing. Creatures being turned inside out or into aliens or some such."

"Sounds like the phyrexians..."

"Lost most of the angels we met too. We should look into a humanitarian spacelift," I mentioned. By now I had calmed down, but then again I was getting an angelic backrub from Sara. By now she knew which buttons to push when I needed calming down.

So, Sara wanted to become a parent. Who was I to be a spoil-sport?

If that's what Sara wants, then I will have to go along with it. It's not my body after all, and if Sara is willing to bring a new life into being then it's her decision. After she finally figured out my total involvement, there was Kenidiern and Xantcha who had experience with bringing an angel child into existence. So I ordered them into our sphere of influence in case of emergency, and let them know, that they are about to become 'uncles' to a new angel child.

The Edison was arriving at the space station. I was on the command deck watching it's arrival. On board was Pense and Caladea, here to do thea welding job on the containment vessel. There was a third passenger onboard ... Razia. I was not expecting her arrival but that was OK. As I returned to my temporary quarters, Razia appeared in the doorway, reminiscent of my first encounter with a desperate angel...

At least this time I wasn't tossed across the room onto the bed. That was Razia's first reaction to her needs, but the latest was more gentle. I still wasn't going anywhere for a while...

"So . . . Sara has a secret . . ." Razia has finally asked me. She has a telepatic link to the both of us so she had detected our argument and the responsibility behind Sara's pregnancy. "Does that mean I get you exclusively for the next nine months or so?"

"Um . . . no . . . I guess. I don't know how an angels gestation affects their sexuality. For all I know Sara might become super-sexual for the next few months. That has happened to some humans in the past. It comes down to this: I am going to be there, for either of you." I hugged Razia...

I was paged to the station's command center. "We have a transmission coming in from an inbound freighter. It detected a sporatic energy signature off its Starboard, even though it didn't detect any ship. But . . . that means that there might be a ship deep in Ravnicvan space that has nothing currently to do with our landings. What that ship might be up to..." the technician stated.

"Well, what do you think? Do we send out the Parhelion-3 or delegate this to our fleet?" I asked.

"Delegate!? Seriously?"

She yanked me off my feet and gave me a smooch, kind of like a reverse tango, and I massed twice as much as Razia! She set me upright, and then, after scanning the crew in the station's command center she stated, "We're going! That exploration bug has bitten me too." The rest of the bridge crew was now trying to look inconspicuous.

We had a new job. There was a sensor echo out in the depths of Ravnica's universe. It was intermittant, and sporadic, when compared to the usual traffic. Teysa had her spaceport at least on light duty with freight from my universe. The tricky part was the sensor echo that basically was only an echo. As in a flash in the pan, a ghost of an inage. It was still . . . more than nothing, but just barely...

We were approaching the scanner echo. Whatever it was it was big, and cold. "It's . . . a cube. Approximately 3000 m on a side," Pense stated from ops.

"That makes it a Borg assimilation cube," I replied. "Red Alert! Turtle up and arm multi-phasic torpedoes," I commanded.

"It's still cold," Pense stated. "Average temperature is . . . 12 Kelvins. That's only a Kelvin above Ravnica's background."

"Energy Sources?"

"Only batteries if any. It's pretty dead over there. Way too cold for drones," Sara stated from sciences. The cube was slowly rotating about its vertical axis in the main viewscreen.

Razia was hanging off Sara's shoulder and nodded at that. "I think it's dead. So, who's seen a Borg cube close up and actually survived the experience?"

"Uhm, basically nobody. . . Something about getting infected by Borg tubules before you can get the hell out..." I stated. I still wanted nothing to do with that ship at this point in time. "There are a couple of strategic incidents on record . . . The retreival of Captain Picard." I was checking the library computer. ". . . and several encounters with the USS Voyager. Apparently culminating with transphasic technology. And in the Delta Quadrant."

"And just where would we find some of this transphasic technology?" Razia pseudo-sarcastically asked. The cube rotated into view with a massive section missing - the cube had a multiple sections missing - many cubic kilometers that have dissapeared, holes blown into the structure.

"There are precicely two ships equipped with transphasics, and the second one just happens to be sitting in the shuttle bay of the first," Pense mentioned from engineering. "We have not had the time to refit the rest of our fleet." Pense seemed to totally miss the sarcasm. "And the Seventh Sister is just larger than a runabout and would be the perfect ship to penetrate the borg cube, just in case. . ." definitely mising the point.

If I was going aboard a Borg cube I wanted a starship within 20 meters. That actually meant taking the 7th Sister out. . .

"All aboard! Ha. Ha. Ha. Haaa!

"All aboard what?" Sara had to ask.

"All aboard the Crazy Train!" I replied. I had to be crazy to think I would be going aboard a Borg cube regardless of the circumstances. There was no way I was going - unless dragged by the angels, of course. . . * * * * *

Crazy, but that's how it goes. . . And that's how I find myself aboard a Borg cube. Taking the 7th Sister into the structure of the Borg ship, we slipped into space suits and wandered through the passageways of the cube. It was as dead as Pense predicted. We were tooling along empty and dead corridors, which clearly were designed to be inhabited by Borg drones.

Eerie was the best way to describe it. There were no drones inhabiting this cube. However there was . . . something . . . out there. I'm going off the rails on a crazy train. After awhile, we recieved a garbled signal from the Helion3. Something about a subspace interferance pattern. One person conditioned to rule and control. . . . The media sells it and you live the role . . . And then it hit us. Literally. The last thing I remember was a bright yellow flash before the blackness came.

I woke up in the 7th sister's sickbay. Toki was looking down upon me. "Welcome back to the land of the living. It seems that putting you back together is now a hobby for me."

"Since when wasn't that your job?"

"Yes but you didn't start out with trying to physically protect your angels. You do realise that Sara is tougher than you. So trying to protect her from that blast was pointless. She should be trying to shield you, not the other way around. Quit trying to be chivalrous and get used to being the weaker sex!" Toki scolded.

"Not going to happen."

Razia was there as well. "Typical! I've known you long enough - heck so has Sara - you NEED to just let us be angels, the protectors of humanity, and that includes you. Damned fool. Angels can handle vacuum - you can't. At least it was only a shrapnel hit. You won't need another set of lungs! Besides... we have both some good news and some bad news."

"Well, hit me with the bad news first," I stated.

"Typical," Razia winked at Toki, "The bad news is that we were attacked by this large cone shaped object which seemed to be after that Borg cube. However, the cube did sport a living lifeboat, in the form of a sphere. That sphere, the conical object, and the remains of the cube after it was fired upon, transited a rift to your manaless universe. We think the sphere created the rift. That cone thing destroyed the cube, and is currently following, or chasing, the sphere. The 'Sister got sucked through the rift and we are currently following that conical object, which seems to be on a trajectory to the heart of your galaxy. That's wherever the sphere is going"

"Al right. What's the good news?"

"The good news is that Sara's fetus had survived in this universe regardless of the lack of mana. . . That is good news . . . isn't it? . . . to you?"

"Absolutely! What were you thinking?"

"You seemed prettty mad at her earlier."

"Only at the decision not to discuss this with me beforehand. How could you think I would wish ill on a new angel child?"

Razia pulled me out of the sickbay bed and gave me a hug. A really long hug. "Just be glad the 'Sister was pulled through with the other ships. Otherwise we wouldn't have even a small home here..." Razia reminded me.

...But The 'Sister was chasing an automatic conical object, which was following a Borg sphere.

"All aboard the crazy train"