17: Doomsday Machine

We were following the planet killer as it pursued the Borg Sphere. It would take about 4 days for the cone to catch up with the sphere and be able to fire upon it. In that time we had learned a few things about the probe. For the first thing the probe has a close in range for defences. With our little ship following, we apparently got too close to the cruising cone which was following the Borg Sphere. A single shot from its force beam and we were following from a safe distance. Something about a side shot that wasn t in the records. Pense and Caladea are still affecting repairs. Not Fatal, as we were still in the game. However major repairs to the warp core take time.

At least we were able to keep up with the other ships. Apparently the Borg have a limitation when it comes to standard warp speeds: they max out at warp 9.3. The planet killer cone has a slightly higher speed (9.325) and that means about 4 days to close to killing range.

Razia was basically keeping me company as I had watch. Usually that means she has plans for this evening, and plans that I expect to enjoy immensely. However, currently I was still trying to figure out that side shot. Even a planet killer s force beam pure anti-proton should not be able to get through the neutronium hull, either way. And it was a pretty low powered beam from what the records say. A full powered shot would have crippled a ship as small as the Sister.

"The sphere has just changed course. Now heading 323 mark 14. Give me a minute."

Even with standard sensors and displays, somehow the angels could see details that were invisible to the human eye.

"Got it. It appears that the sphere has found a transwarp conduit, and is following it. Just a matter of time until it jumps away"

"That s if there is a transwarp entry point within 4 days," I mentioned. Razia gave a quick grunt in acknowledgement, apparently sucked into the sensor display.

The rest of the shift was uneventful in this long stern chase, and I expected Nergat to come relieve us in the next half hour.

Razia noticed an event that I completely missed. "That's interesting," Razia mentioned. "We just ran over a subspace anomaly. Looks like a subspace conduit entry. So why didn't the sphere jump in and leave us behind?"

It took a minute before it hit me: "That subspace interference is deliberate."

"Excuse me?" Razia stated more than asked. She was still on the ops console. This small bridge can be manned with only one (and sometimes left on autopilot) but there are a total of 4 stations.

"The planet killer; the subspace interference is deliberate" I iterated. "Its subspace interference effect prevents the Borg sphere from entering a transwarp conduit. The jamming of subspace communications is probably a secondary effect."

Nergat appeared in the doorway to take over the next shift. A brief explanation about the subspace interference told him everything he needed to know. "I'll kick you out of bed only if something surprising happens. Other than that, go have fun!"

If Nergat could have winked he probably would have. . .

However, when we returned, cleaned up for our next shift, Nergat had a surprise for us.

Apparently, in normal space when Pense and Caladea get us fixed, we are the fastest ship around. There's no way either the Borg or that Planet Killer can catch us, unless we let it! Nergat beamed.

"Hmm..." Razia trailed off.

Uh oh. When Razia does that things usually get dangerous At least we were not in range of anybody who was in the path of the planet killer which was apparently ignoring local systems as long as the Sphere was in its sights...

Off shift, we wandered up to deck 2 to check in with the rest of the crew. Anezka was in the crew lounge, with what looked like a stack of peanut butter sandwiches.

"Hungry are we?" I quipped. "Where's Astinus? In fact where s everybody?"

"Here I have to eat, she replied. Anyway Astinus is downstairs, doing a diagnostic on the transporter. Caladea is still in engineering. Pense and John are in their quarters, as are Toki and K'Tee. At least they have each other.."

"What is this, the love boat?"

"Says the Captain who has 2 Angels!" Anezka wasn't being serious.

We were interrupted by a change in pitch from the engines and, it seemed, a slight twist in the artificial gravity.

"We are slowing. Did we lose a nacelle?" I asked no one in particular as I headed for engineering. Both Razia and Anezka followed. Caladea was waiting by the port access port.

"I need to check on the port nacelle when it cools. I think we have some cracked warp coils." Caladea anticipated my question.

I waited with Caladea while Anezka and Razia went below. Caladea handed me an engineering tricorder, and as soon as we had a green light into the Jeffries tube we went.

"This brings back memories," I mused.

"Memories?"

"Yes, two; crawling around the first Seventh Sister, and getting ambushed by you in the nacelle of Future s Bounty."

Caladea grabbed me, spun me around, and gave me a big hug and smooch. "That will have to do until Parna shows up." We did find some hairline cracks in the warp coils, and the engineering computer configured a maximum speed of 9.45 by leaning on the starboard nacelle fully.

Four days later we had a new contact.

Another unknown ship was moving in from starboard-aft. At this time the ship was fixed, and we turtled up with the transphasic shields . . . and a transphasic torpedo in the first cylinder in the tube, just in case. We were about only 3.5 hours until the sphere was in range of that force beam, and expected all kinds of blasting...

... and ... it was a Daystar class. An Orion freighter not much bigger than the Mission class courier we were currently in. However, its tech base was well below us, being the stock gen-5 construction of that type.

Beep. We have an incoming transmission. We were just outside the subspace relay network of the era so the message took over two days to reach us. The Helion3 had entered our universe and was inbound. And they are bringing the whole fleet with them. Eta is 6 days. You know you are far from a subspace relay when your ship can almost keep up with its subspace message. When the fleet arrives the shooting will be over.

I had spent extra time on the bridge. Razia entered and gave me a kiss on the forehead from behind. "Well Caveman?"

"Caveman?"

"I found this Meme , you would call it. Primitive people of your past lived in caves, and the stereotypical picture was the caveman clubbing his girlfriend before dragging her to his cave." Razia had an interesting look on her face.
"But..."

"You blasted me out of the sky...caveman! And now it's my turn..."

Uh oh. But her response was a breath taking smooch from hell. Then as I was losing consciousness, I felt myself being carried back to our quarters.

"Better than the first time," I mentioned.

"Why," Razia responded.

"If you missed the bed the first time you tossed me, I would have broken something hitting the deck or bulkhead."

"My aim is never that bad. But your past is ... interesting," she replied.
"It's not really what cavemen did, you know."

"Yes I do know. I ve also viewed some cartoons, The Flinstones come to mind." Razia had an amused look but at least dropped me directly on the bed.

"Huh. I grew up watching that cartoon, amongst others," I replied.

"Wasn't that during your planet s 20th century?"

"That's when I was born, latter half of the 20th century, lived into the first half 21st, died, was frozen, and rocketed into the outer solar system," I mentioned.

"I know. It was your frozen journey to the world of starships...and me." The smooching began.

Morning came too soon and I was back on the bridge again. Sara was with me as well. "That Daystar hasn't bothered to communicate with us."

"Did we try to contact them?" I asked.

"Nergat tried a couple of times during the night watch."

"Second contact: multiple ships." Razia on sciences.

The Romulans, In this case it was a pair of Winged defenders in company by a pair of Whitewinds. Probably new construction, as they have construction of level 6 at current levels. Those Mogai s are remnants from the past An irreplaceable commodity, one that the Tal S hiar had commandeered. And lost.

We finally received a communication from the Orions. "Wait until all the players get here!" They kept a discreet distance from the planet killer, well outside both our and the Romulan's radius.

As the planet killer entered range of the Borg sphere a fleet from the Old Humans entered range. Yet another splinter group from the UFP.

"It looks like the Klingons have decided to pass on the current situation," the commander for the Daystar broadcasted. "Just wait until the fireworks have ended...Then Captain Votto of the Rimrunner has a deal for you."

That did not take long. The Borg was firing torpedoes down the machine s maw, but apparently to no effect. The machine methodically sliced the Borg sphere onto chunks, and devoured them. It was all over in minutes.

Instead of heading for the nearest system, the machine turned towards us, as the closest starship. We cleared away for action, if necessary, and veered away from the machine. Then a communication came in.

"I have this device! Captain Votto stated. See it and make your conclusions! It's up for auction." The video changed. In the cargo bay, on an anti-grav pad, was a miniature cone shaped machine, about 5 m tall and 1 wide at the open end, which was facing down.

The machine was slowing down. Still interested in us, it was returning to warp 6, the cruising speed that the Enterprise reported in the first encounter with its kind. We still lead it away from the other ships.

Then Sara noticed something, and pointed it out on the screen, "What's this thing?"

"What thing?" I replied. She did point out what wasn t more than a single pixel in apparent size, something us humans would have missed at this distance...

"This object. It s orbiting the cone device thingy." Sara replied

"Thingy? That s new."

"That's because I hang around you too much!" The wink proved otherwise.

"Just a sec..." I looked up the scanner logs. "Well, well. That s how we got side shotted by that device. That miniature cone has an anti-proton beam similar to its big brother. If we want to capture it, we will need a shielded containment field."

We spent a few hours reconfiguring the cargo bay, and began a run on the object. A quick pass and the small cone were sitting in our cargo hold. So much for participating in the auction. We did break away enough that the doomsday maching ignored us and proceeded to the nearest star system, which at least according to our records, was uninhabited. Unfortunately three systems beyond weren't.

I awoke to a page from Nergat. Yet another splinter group from the UFP has appeared, a group unknown to us. The second party was the one that got Nergat to kick me out of bed early. I reached the bridge with Razia on tow this morning.
"Is that who I think it is? And what the hell are they doing here?" I had to ask.

"I don't know. Have I seen them before?" Razia queried.

"No you haven't," Nergat interjected. "Sara has. Those are Sidon ships. Looks like the same tech when we encountered them in the Faraway Quest. Or the Narcissus."

"I know that story. Aren't they well out of their own playground?"

"Ummh actually maybe . . . not. It appears that there is a new spot on the isolation space that the planet killer is headed. It is currently heading galactic south and galactic coreward. The Romulans, Old humans, Neuvo sidons and others have an interest at least after Ectair III gets destroyed."

However our own Caladea and Pense are prying and prodding at the cone miniature in our cargo hold . . . until it retaliates.

And it decides to break out of the matrix during the middle of the night shift. I awoke to a series of alarms sounding through the ship.

"Keep him down! I heard ordered; Razia was on the bridge. Then Sara climbed on top of me.

"Don't jump up. Our daughter can't take it," Sara had whispered into my ear. So I gave her a hug and we just cuddled in bed until Razia came in. One of the alarms was for a hull breach . . . and that means escaping atmosphere, amongst other things. It appears that the deck 1 corridor was airtight at least. Razia, rather delicately, came over and put a hand on Sara's stomach.

"Did you know that we have a daughter?"

"Oh crap. Yes. Well, you two do. . ." Razia admitted.

"You don t get away that easily! Aunt Razia will have to help out here. besides What just happened to the Sister?" I asked.

"Well, the mini-cone decided to break out of the hold, so Caladea dumped it out the cargo hatch. The second one carved its way out of the Rimrunner. That ship has broken up . . . no survivors," she responded.

"That's what you get for trying to sell what you don't understand. But that doesn't explain the alarms..."

"With the break up of the Rimrunner, we were the only target left, so that planet killer targeted us...The second deck got a hull breach ... right under John s nose. Pense tossed him into the head so he didn't have to suck hard vacuum for more than a second or two..."

"So no lung transplants for John."

"No, He is more conservative than you, doesn't jump into the line of fire . . . and lets his angel protect him, not the other way around!" I was interrupted by a big double smooch before I could respond. That left the night crew to determine what happened, while my angels put me to sleep.

I awoke alone, still a rather uncommon event these days. I grabbed a quick breakfast, synthesized coffee and bagels, as I had an eerie feeling this morning. I headed to the bridge to find Razia, Sara and Anezka staring intently at a screen.

Anezka turned to me, "we have a new ship inbound. It s a Daedalus class ship, and its course wouLd make it from Ectair III."

"That would explain the length of time it took to arrive," I replied. There was an odd look on Anezka s face.
"What did you say a Daedalus class is armed with?"

What an odd question. Then I realised they were staring at a deep scan of the ship. "Advanced lasers, officially designated type seven phase cannons. The Romulan War refit also mounted photonic torpedoes."

"...oh, so you knew that all along..."

"Yes, but as we have moved onto better beam technology we simplified the term. Current beam weapons are called phasers, as both have a laser component." I explained.

"But why a laser component?" Razia chimed in.

"You didn't study did you-," Sara interrupted. "What happens if you want to toss a lightning bolt to a target 200 m away?"

"Impossible," Both Anezka and Razia replied simultaneously. Razia continued,"it will wander off way before it reaches that far."

"So how do you precisely hit a target from orbit with a charged particle beam not unlike a lightning bolt? Or hit a target 200 m away with your pistol? You cheat with that laser component as Stephen would say." Sara drew her phaser. "Remember this collimator?" Sara mentioned while pointing at it.

"Yes," Anezka replied while Razia stated, "Of course."

"It fires a UV laser to ionize the atmosphere, and the charged particles follow it in a straight line. That's why it's a collimator." Sara concluded. Now she had a peculiar look on her face.

Razia cocked her head to one side. "Ghostbusters?" She asked.

"The original," Sara replied. Anezka looked totally puzzled by the exchange. "You need to borrow Stephen s old movie collection."

"So what is the status before we start blasting away?" I broke in with.

"Nobody is going to be shooting anytime soon.' Anezka replied, relieved to be back to normal bridge talk. "That device has a Nutronium hull. Not even trans-phasic torpedoes will scratch it."

"The only way to kill a planet killer is to get it to eat a massive explosive device. And detonate it directly in front of the energy converter. It's called the Kirk Defense".

Sara was looking that up in the database. "Captain Kirk detonated the impulse engines on a damaged Constitution class cruiser. The 100 megaton blast nicely breached the antimatter containment, and vaporized everything except the neutronium hull. There have been a few sightings of these machines in the years since the first one was destroyed."

"Who would build such a thing?" Anezka had to ask.

"The El-Aurians built them. They were in a fight for their very survival with the Borg, and built them as a last ditch effort to not get assimilated." I replied.

"So what happened to the El-Aurians?" Razia asked this time.

"The Borg assimilated them, I answered. A few refugees made it to Federation Space starting around Stardate 9700. Their planet killers have been roaming around on automatic ever since."

"So why do they consume planets indiscriminately anyway?" Anezka asked. "Would the El-Aurian planets be at risk too?"

"It's a dead-man's switch. If a planet was El-Aurian, it had an IFF subspace relay to tell the machine the system was off limits. If the El-Aurians fell, as they did, they expected all the habitable planets of the galaxy to have Borg on them. Turn your enemy into the machines fuel supply. They didn't count on others to be able to beat back the Borg, and never thought to put in a fail-safe."

"So Ectair III is firmly in its sights", Anezka stated. "Is a Daedalus class big enough for a Kirk Defense?"

"We can always pack it full of anti-matter, if we can convince all these ships to donate an anti-matter container each," Razia interjected. "Everybody here except us have skin in the game, as it is their planet which could be next."

This was going to be long shift, as the arguments between the various ship captains echoed up from K'Tee's console.

"You are brooding," Razia insisted. "I watched you for a good 5 minutes now." Razia was standing in the entryway to the bridge. I actually didn't notice her there. "That machine over there shouldn't be bothering you that much.

"It isn't the thing bothering me, the Borg are." I mused. "You mentioned that the sphere ran over an entrance to a transwarp conduit. If the transwarp network still extends this far, why hasn't this quadrant been assimilated? There aren't that many planet killers roaming around, you know."

"I don t know, but I'm sure we can find that out. Obviously something or someone is keeping them in check. But for now..." Razia took my hand, yanked me out of the captain s chair, and dragged me back to our quarters.

It was late in the morning when we returned to the bridge. Neither Razia nor I was scheduled a watch today, but with a smooth running ship, Sara nursing an expanding midriff, and boredom setting in, we decided to give someone a break. It turned out Nergat was on watch, and he didn't need a break after all. I m not sure he sleeps, regardless of the universe he is in.

At noon, K Tee joined us on the bridge. It wasn't long before she had something. "Although each faction out here dogging the Doomsday Machine, is eventually in its sights, no one is willing to step onboard another's ship to talk." K'Tee announced. "It might be this new faction," she continued.

"What new faction?" Razia asked while entering the bridge with yours truly.

"We don t know," Nergat answered. "They are running cloaked, but not doing a very good job. I'd put the cloak at generation five, at best."

"I'll bet the other factions haven't noticed yet," I stated. "Our sensors are the best out here. Prepare a standard photon with a blank warhead. We may want to paint a cloaked ship without any damage." The impact of an empty photon casing on a cloaked hull may cause a dent, but the splash will make it visible to everyone who isn't asleep at the wheel as it were.

"Torpedo prepared. Looks like it won't be necessary though. Look." Two ships decloaked, revealing a pair of K'T'Inga class battlecruisers. They sported Romulan emblems.

After a while, K'Tee had an announcement. "The Romulan commander is no other than Relar himself. He was using narrow beams to talk with the captain of each faction present. So what was he up to?"

Another hour and we finally had a hail from Relar.

"Believe it or not but that Romulan is actually hailing us," K'Tee stated.

"Seriously?"

"Yes, I will patch him through." K Tee pressed buttons on her console and Relar s face appeared on the main viewscreen.

"Greetings from the Romulan Star Republic! Relar exclaimed. We don't usually see eye to eye, but I have a request from you."

"And your request is?" I asked sceptically.

"I need to borrow your ship," Relar deadpanned. "Seriously. All of the various ship captains have finally agreed to meet, but on neutral ground. As you don't have what is it 'called skin in the game', your ship is as close to neutral ground as it gets around here."

"And the Romulans have skin in the game?" I asked. "The last squadron commander didn't seem to think so."

"She didn't know that the listening post on Celestia II evolved into a full fledged colony. The planet's climate was just too good. So how about it? Are you willing to play host?"

"Sure, why not? So who will beam over first?"

"I have to. The other captains basically said you first . One last request. Could Razia be present in the transporter room?" Relar ended with.

"I don t see why not," I signed off with.

We waited in our compact transporter room for Relar to arrive. His companion was totally unexpected.

I did not see this coming.

Relars companion had her arms wrapped around him. He was holding her wings in, aware of the compact pad's limitations. She was wearing a hybrid uniform, but so was Relar. The best way to describe his was a Romulan uniform T-shirt. Her tunic revealed her past: Guardian of the Gateless.

Razia was holding my hand. The squeeze told me she had some trepidation about meeting with Sabriel. My squeeze back would hopefully be supportive.

"Uhmm, greetings holiest," Sabriel stated. To Relar she said "You really knew Razia still lived?"

"That's what I was trying to tell you all along. Stephen here, was her rescuer. Way before we met. I was, rather, an ass, used by some factions that I thought would advance the Romulan cause. I was mistaken. Then you came along. Now I don't regret our first meeting. When Stephen got the best of me, it was just business as usual between our spy networks. I didn t know Stephen kicked section 31 to the curb, and really had a love on for your mom. It took some time to beat it into this old Romulan, but I did send our info on transphasics, as a peace token."

"Peace token accepted," Razia answered. "Sabriel, I understand you defected from Aurelia's overbearing reincarnation and joined the gateless movement. I do not approve, but I do understand. You are my daughter, and will forever be my daughter." Razia steped forward and gave Sabriel a long hug.

That left just Relar and myself. "We were helping out in Ravnica in a building collapse, I found her, somewhat crushed by the debris. So I took a page from your book and said life link with me. She did. Ouch, I didn't know that it would hurt that much. I bet that if you set me on fire it would not hurt so much."

"When I rescued Sara I got a sedative and missed most of the pain," I replied.

"My doctor was quick and I got KO ed as well. We survived and now I fully understand you. You are apparently one of the angel squad and I hope you can allow me to join your ranks."

I looked at Razia still in a hug with Sabriel. "It looks like the answer is ... welcome to the club."

"If I had captured you two at the beginning I would not had to have a problem if I knew your true purpose, you know. It was the section 31 order which tainted my view. I really thought you were an enemy of the state and would cross me at every chance you got. The capturing of my whitewind just reinforced my viewpoint. Until Sabriel came along," Relar paused. "I really didn't know, until she slapped me silly." Relars grin told me was still keeping tabs on me.

"Get used to it. It only takes a slapping ... or an empty bed to finish the punishment!"

"Once you go angel you never go back!" Relar winked.

Our lounge was packed full of ship captains and some first officers, but it seems that everybody wants to sacrifice someone else s ship. I was a spectator of this argument, but so was Relar it seemed. I leaned over and mentioned, "You know, you re the one captain here with two ships."

"Yeah, but I plan on keeping both of them. Besides, how about we just wait for the Avens to get here with their spare ship? They are due here tomorrow," Relar mentioned.

"And how would you know that?" I was incredulous.
"I placed the call," Relar replied. "There was an Aven fleet on patrol near the Triangle and had Sabriel back me up on a request after namedropping you. They had a resupply and an empty freighter was handy."

"Be careful on how much of Sabriel's cred you use up on any particular request. Even Razia doesn t carry weight in certain areas."

"Noted. Sabriel has already stated how much she can or can t do. And yes, they wouldn't give me the time of day without her. Relar shrugged. He placed a hand on my shoulder. It took all this time to finally get you but I think I finally do. I think we can even... become friends."

"Then maybe we can become friends after all but your alliance with the dimir does leave a stain ... that Sabriel may remove..."

Sabriel came up from behind and hugged Relar. "What must I remove?"

"My Dimir stain."

"You allied with those scum?" Sabriel asked.

"Yes I did. I thought that it would be the best ladder to the planet that would be the first extra-dimensional one that we would have relations with. My rivalry with Stephen blinded me to who look to here, and I must admit that Szadeck was a slick operator."

"That vampire ghost was still around?" Sabriel was astonished.

"Yes he was, until the mending when agarem got flipped out of this dimension. Then the rest of the Dimir wouldn't give me the time of the day. Then I found you and everything changed," Relar gave Sabriel a hug. One of those hugs.

I was back on the bridge. We had to get clear of the subspace interference to make contact with the Avens. All of the other captains could communicate with their ships due to the short range. The Avens were a still a day out and we needed to get clear of the machine s distortion to make communications. Many of those captains had called their ships so the 'fleet' that broke out of the existing fleet to find the Avens was less than ten. Once out of the interference we did contact the Avens, they were about 30 hours out, had a spare ship packed with antimatter, and were happy to see my face. It was the same admiral that leaded the Aven faction in Ravnica. I had to present and vouch for Relar as the new 'good guy' (with angel backup). Our basic statement to them is "If an angel is there to vouch, and it has the S. Michael approvement, then we will be there That's what brought us here. Is that Relar fellow with you?"

"Yes he is here with his angel." I had given their view to the avens, angels and all. All five of us were in the view screen view.

"So all of you need our freighter soon."

"Yes we do. There is a planet killer that needs to be deactivated. It will destroy Ectair 3 in about 3 days. I will send you the Kirk Defense files so you know what will happen.."

After revewing our information we got a call from the avens; "We know what we need to do. Let's rescue Ectair III. It ll take about 14 hours to get there. Grab a nap and wait till the calvary gets there!"

Relar then said, "do you have spare quarters that Sabriel and I can use?"

"What, no orgies?"

"What is an orgy?" Sabriel talked quickly in his ear. He turned an interesting shade of green. "Uh no. I think we just want to be alone."

"Talk to Anezka, she will set you up on deck 2..." Relar was issued a standard set of quarters on deck 2 so he and Sabriel can be alone. Somebody who is a few thousand years old has seen, basically everything that humans have done...

A good night's sleep later with both my angels . . . but does Sara now sport a baby bump? She seems to.

"Um, what are you looking at?" Sara asked.

She looked over my shoulder. I looked up sleeping with a pregnant woman . She gave me a hug and said that she already looked that up. "I have a body pillow and will have to hug you remotely at night soon. It's only a couple of months until birth. "

That s awfully soon," I mentioned.

"An angel takes only about 7 months of gestation. According to Toki at least."

If Toki has been involved then he is the expert, I'm sure. But it was time for the Avens to get here so a quick breakfast and then to the bridge.

It was anticlimatical. The Kirk Defence went perfect, and the planet killer was sitting inert adrift.

Now it was time to return to Ravnica. We were going to rendezvous with our fleet on the way back. We were accompanied by a pair of Romulan D-7 s but with Relar staying on board of the Sister and his crews just following along. I suspect that he was giving Sabriel some angel time with Razia and her sisters. Sara's baby bump was getting bigger by the day and I hoped to be back on Ravnica to celebrate the birth of our daughter.

The trip back to Ravnica was uneventful with Relar and Sabriel returning to their ship and us taking up the flag back on the Helion3. When we arived back home all there was . . . was mayhem.