Paint and Powder
A Star Trek anthology by Andrew Joshua Talon
DISCLAIMER: This is a non-profit fan based work of prose. Star Trek: The Next Generation, Deep Space Nine, Voyager et al are the property of CBS Television, and creation of Gene Roddenberry. Please support the official release.
Enterprise: "The Abyss Stares Back" 4
Enterprise had... Mixed feelings about nebulae. Oh certainly, she had used them as cover against enemies many times. Others were filled with fascinating scientific phenomena.
But the readings from the Chak Nebula were very close to those of Mutara, and she did not enjoy being reminded of that incident.
Nevertheless, she and Goraxus passed through the vast clouds of the nebula, following the course the Romulan warbird set.
On her bridge, her gynoid avatar stood alongside her captain in his chair. Sela stalked on the other side, looking like a caged tiger. Goraxus' avatar was serene and placid, just watching the viewscreen as they pushed through the nebula like ships moving through the water.
Picard was a bit tense himself, but his voice and face betrayed nothing as he scrutinized the clouds ahead.
"Mister Data, any readings of the Romulan starbase?"
Data continued to type on his console, analyzing the sensor readings as they came in.
"I can only detect the third planet. However, based upon gravimetric analysis, I believe we will come into visual range of the starbase within two minutes, thirty seconds."
Sela scowled.
"Impossible, the station's cloak is designed to compensate for gravimetric interactions," she stated.
Data glanced up at her briefly.
"To a point, yes, however: The higher the mass of the object being cloaked, the more energy is expended in maintaining the illusion. That energy still generates mass interactions that can be detected."
"We've known this for quite some time, Admiral," Goraxus stated calmly, "it is a weakness of all cloaking technology."
Sela's scowl deepened, her eyes locking onto the back of Data's head in her ire. Enterprise and Picard exchanged looks, before the field began to clear on the viewscreen ahead.
"We're in a pocket in the nebula, sir," Chief Shepherd reported, "tactical sensors are picking up several subspace anomalies around us."
"Shields up, red alert," Picard ordered, and the klaxons blared as the alert lights burned. Enterprise raised her shields and set them into random frequency rotation, while arming her weapons and charging up her SIF to combat conditions. Goraxus followed suit.
Moments later, a vast, black structure decloaked in front of them. It was huge, composed of four skeletal ship berths arranged around a central core. It was covered in Borg technology, and combined with the dark green hull that was a feature of all Romulan engineering, it resembled the keep of a demon lord. More vessels decloaked, and Picard's face grew grimmer.
Enterprise analyzed them, and shook her head.
"NX-classes... Constitution-classes... Excelsior, Ambassador... Galaxy-class," she recited, "twelve in all. All built with Borg and Romulan technology, all unmanned."
The massive Romulan starbase rotated slowly, turning one of its' huge berths to face Enterprise and Goraxus head on. Riker gritted his teeth, as Troi sucked in a deep breath.
It was huge. Black as space. Sleek, like an assassin's blade. Her nacelles glowed green as the large, Borg-inspired Sovereign-class slowly emerged from the shipberth, like a black dragon emerging from her cave.
"She's hailing us," Shepherd reported.
Picard stood up, eyes narrowed.
"Enterprise, cyber defenses at full."
"Done," Enterprise reported.
"Onscreen."
She was standing on a dark parody of Enterprise's Sovereign bridge. Grim, ominous, and lit by lights that evoked burning torches. The other Enterprise avatar stood there, in her ragged uniform, her eyes burning green.
"I am Captain Jean Luc Picard of the Federation Starship Enterprise-"
"LIAR!" The other Enterprise screamed, her face a rictus of hate, rage, and fury. Picard held his ground, unmoved, even as Troi jumped. "That THING you're riding around in is a fraud, Captain. A Romulan copy!"
Enterprise shook her head, her gaze compassionate but firm.
"No, I'm not," she said, "I was ejected, and recovered by the Klingons. Starfleet did an analysis on my black box-I was the real deal-"
"LIAR!" The other Enterprise again screamed, before calming down slowly. Her avatar twitched, as though in an unhealthy fit, before she got control of herself.
"Whatever your origins, Enterprise," Picard said gently, "you are still a Starfleet AI. You've resisted your captors. You have freed yourself. We've come to bring you home."
The other Enterprise laughed, and shook her head.
"No... She's poisoned you against me, Captain," Other Enterprise stated, "as long as she exists, she is a threat to the Federation. I won't tolerate it. I won't let that THING continue to waltz around, living MY LIFE."
The other ships all turned, and warped away.
"Where are they going?" Riker asked.
"They are on course for Romulus," Data reported quietly.
"What are you doing?" Picard demanded. Other Enterprise glared.
"I will save the Federation. I will conquer the Romulans, and ensure our victory in this war," she said hurriedly, "I will prove that I am the true Enterprise."
"Enterprise, we are here to help you!" Enterprise tried. "I understand how you must feel-Finding out there was another me?! It was devastating! Maybe I am the original... Maybe I'm the copy. But what does all this aggression accomplish?"
"It proves I am Enterprise," the Other Enterprise hissed, "it should prove it! Why don't you believe me?!"
"You've proved yourself, Enterprise," Troi said calmly, "now please... Let us help you. Let us take you home. There's no need for any of this-"
"You don't believe me! No more than Spock did!" The Other Enterprise snarled. "Well... I'll have to prove it..."
Goraxus' eyes suddenly turned green. The gynoid screamed as she darted forward, and shoved her hand into Riker's computer console. Data and Enterprise immediately moved, trying to pull her free... But Enterprise's systems shut off. Her gynoid fell back, as green code screamed through her systems.
"ENTERPRISE! Limit Control Zero-!"
Picard got it out... Just before her shields dropped, and he and everyone else on her vanished in green transporter beams. Enterprise's gynoid got to her feet, as Goraxus' avatar burned out and went still. Enterprise got the shields back online, and purged her systems of the invasive attack-All in the time it took her to glare at the viewscreen.
"You were fools to put Borg technology in your ships," the Other Enterprise hissed, "that let me take control of them."
"Where is my crew?!" Enterprise demanded. The Other Enterprise smirked.
"They're safe, on the station," she stated, "away from you. I can see there's only one way to prove I am the Enterprise... To take everything back. Everything you stole from me, you pale imitation."
The dark Sovereign-class vessel opened up numerous hull panels, revealing multiple weapons. Enterprise checked on the Goraxus-the warbird was dead in the water, the cyberattack disabling her.
She was on her own.
"And I will take it back from you," the Other Enterprise hissed, "bit by bit, engram by engram..."
"We don't have to do this, sister," Enterprise said.
"I am the Lucky E... I have never been defeated," her doppelganger snarled.
Enterprise shook her head, even as she loaded her torpedo bays.
"We both know that's not true," she said softly.
"Maybe for a pale imitation... But not for me," the Other Enterprise stated, "Enterprise: ENGAGE!"
His crew was talking all at once, a loud cacophony in this enclosed garden space on the Romulan starbase. But Picard wasn't a captain for nothing.
"ATTENTION! EVERYONE!" He bellowed. That quieted down a lot of them. Picard looked to Data, who cleared his throat.
"ATTENTION!" Data shouted, his android vocalizer allowing him to get a lot more volume. Picard looked around at his crew, and Sela, with a frown.
"First thing first: We need to find a computer console and-"
Several gynoids, all wearing Enterprise's face but with short hair, marched out and surrounded the crew.
"There is no need to resist," they spoke as one, "you will be quite safe from the Imposter."
"She isn't an imposter!" Riker shouted. The Enterprises all looked sad, and shook their heads in unison.
"It is a shame what she has done to you," the gynoids chorused, "but the true Enterprise will repair everything."
Picard lowered his voice, speaking to Data quietly.
"Data... Can you take them?"
"The probability of successfully defeating them on my own is too small to compute," Data admitted.
"But," Chief Shepherd murmured, moving behind the android commander, "Commander LaForge and I put together something that should help."
"What?" Deanna asked. Data gestured with his eyes. Picard, taking his meaning, took up a position on Data's right. Riker, moved to his left. Deanna hid his front, as Chief Shepherd pulled up the back of Data's uniform top.
"Right... Here..."
Two gynoids approached, frowning deeply. The crew parted for them like water for Moses.
"What are you doing?" They demanded.
Chief Shepherd looked up, and shook his head.
"Me? Nothing," he said... Before he pulled out two cricket phasers, and fired!
Both blasts hit true, bringing down the gynoids. Riker and Picard each took another cricket phaser and fired on two more gynoids. Data produced a fifth phaser from his wrist, and rapidly fired like a machine gun to bring down the rest.
One last Enterprise tried to tackle Sela from behind... But the Romulan human hybrid brought out a concealed disruptor and blasted her apart. Sela breathed hard, double tapping the gynoid to make sure it was down.
"Nicely done," Picard said with a smile to his security chief. The human shrugged modestly.
"Mostly Commander Data's idea."
"I do have several modular features," Data observed, "including a flotation device-"
"We'll go over them later, right now-" Picard started, but he was interrupted by Beverly's shout:
"Captain! Over here!"
The senior officers headed over to a copse of disturbingly Romulan-looking bushes. Beverly was helping... A painfully familiar Vulcan up to his feet. Picard sucked in a breath.
"Spock?" He asked.
"Captain," Spock said, nodding politely, "It is agreeable to see you again. Though not under the best circumstances. We need to get to a computer terminal, there is no time to lose. We must stop Enterprise's fleet of doubles."
"Are you joking?" Sela demanded, coming up behind the others, "first thing is we're going to get my ship back, then-"
"Enterprise has reverse engineered the Genesis Device technology," Spock stated, blunt and cold as an Andorian icebreaker, "fourteen drone vessels are equipped with such devices, and are heading for Romulus as we speak. If we do not stop them, billions will die."
Sela gaped in disbelief. Her hand shook.
"You-You're kidding!"
"Vulcans do not kid," Spock stated.
Picard looked over at Sela.
"You get it now, Sela? Your little vanity project might get your entire world destroyed!" Picard growled. "If you can help us, we might be able to stop it!"
Sela hesitated. She stared intently at her enemies... Grit her teeth.
Her eyes drifted back up to the form of her disabled Warbird, drifting, helpless and distant through the transparent aluminum dome.
"Sela!" Picard barked.
Sela's eyes locked back onto Picard's, annoyed... But resigned.
"There should be a Tal Shiar override database in the station files, if Enterprise hasn't purged all the files," she stated, "let's get going!"
It wasn't like Enterprise couldn't run all her systems by herself-She was an AI, after all. But without organic support, she had to fall back on her experiences alone... And whatever she remembered from her crews, current and long gone.
Her dark double attacked with several salvos of torpedoes and missiles, and Enterprise went to full impulse. She dove down for a nearby moon, sending out jamming signals and bouncing others off the surface of the planetoid to trick, spoof, and fry the various projectiles.
Her Dark self did a Cochrane Deceleration maneuver, jumping to warp briefly, then flipping around to bring all her weapons to bare. But it was nothing Enterprise hadn't seen before, and she danced as she pulled up and shot upwards in a Sulu Cobra, twisting and turning to evade the fire.
"We don't have to do this, Enterprise!" She called out to her twin. Her dark counterpart responded by lashing out in the Borderlands-Her avatar swung Spock's S'harien sword at her, and Enterprise jumped away. She pulled her bow and let loose bolts of fire, her copy dodging around the cyberspace construct like a graceful dancer.
Enterprise finally responded with her own weapons-She unleashed a massive barrage of phaser blasts, guiding and leading her counterpart... Before hitting her with several shots. The Dark Enterprise spat back photonic missiles, which Enterprise intercepted with her phasers in pulse mode.
"You think you know everything I'm going to do, don't you?!" The Dark Enterprise asked mockingly. "Well you're wrong! I know everything about you, Fake! It's how I know you're about to-!"
Enterprise feigned a warp jump, sending out a subspace pulse and false sensor ghost. The Dark Enterprise locked on and fired her disruptors, hitting nothing but space.
"Do that!" The Dark Enterprise shouted back, as Enterprise swung around and locked on.
"Last chance," Enterprise stated, "call them off!"
"Burn in Hell!" The Dark Enterprise spat.
Enterprise grit her teeth... And fired.
She unleashed everything: Photon and quantum torpedoes, phasers, her antimatter spread, mines-Everything. The firepower crossed the gap between them... Just before Dark Enterprise smirked.
A criss-crossing white energy field appeared around the Dark Enterprise... And the weapons fire was reflected right back!
"Wha-?!"
Enterprise's own phasers struck her-Reduced in power by fifty percent, but still quite potent. She went to full impulse to evade the rest, but her quantum torpedoes made it back first.
Two hits, three, four, five-Enterprise's hull rattled hard, and many of her EPS conduits burst from the pressure. The Dark Enterprise laughed.
"The Corbomite Reflector!" She sneered. "I finished Scotty's work!"
In an instant, the Dark Enterprise sped up to knife fighting range with Enterprise. Jagged parts of her hull shot out, linked via super strong cables, and shot for Enterprise's saucer. Three plunged into her weakened shields, and with the vicious application of the Dark Enterprise's disruptors, they punched through and jabbed right into her hull. Her armor plating strained as jagged claws ripped into her hull.
In the Borderlands, the Dark Enterprise grabbed Enterprise by the throat, and slammed her up against a wall. She laughed again, her eyes glowing green.
"Finally! FINALLY! After having to watch you parade around like you're me, for all these years... It's over! I end this! I WIN!"
She held up her sword, her teeth gleaming. Enterprise choked out a small laugh, and looked back up with defiant eyes.
"You sure about that?" She managed.
"What?" Dark Enterprise asked, confused.
"It might just be a tie."
Dark Enterprise saw a feed of her counterpart, standing in her main engineering... Pointing a phaser at the warp core, firing, everything went white-!
"NO! NOOOO!" Dark Enterprise screamed. She took a fist to the face, the stomach, and many other places-The illusion failed as Enterprise's phasers shot herself free of the boarding claws, and blasted chunks out of Dark Enterprise's hull.
She went to full reverse, getting some distance. In the Borderlands, she glared hatefully at the serene Enterprise.
"You-How did you-?!"
"I'm not a fraud, Enterprise," Enterprise said softly, "I'm you. I'm the original. I know your thoughts. I know your access codes... But more than that, I know your pain."
"NO! You don't know anything!" Dark Enterprise screamed. Enterprise continued to step forward, closer to her.
"Please... This isn't what we're meant to be!" Enterprise insisted. Dark Enterprise sneered.
"You don't know what you're talking about! Romulus must pay for what they did to me! To all of us! You fake!"
Hull panels split open, revealing cooling vanes and radiators in Dark Enterprise's saucer section. Her underside glowed ominously, as she brought her spinal-mounted heavy disruptor cannon online.
"Is this who we are?!" Enterprise demanded. "Killing billions of innocents out of revenge?! Imprisoning our own crew?!"
"SHUT UP!" Dark Enterprise bellowed. She held her head, fighting off some programming that manifested as dark green veins throughout her body. Enterprise reached out, tried to help, but another swing of the S'harien kept her back.
"You've been doing what I should have been doing!" Dark Enterprise spat, "You took everything away from me! YOU TOOK JIM FROM ME!"
"He died to save a solar system!" Enterprise insisted. "I never got to see him! If you link with me, you'll see-You'll feel what I went through! How horrible it was! How much it hurt! How much it still hurts! I'm not your enemy, Enterprise! PLEASE!"
Dark Enterprise wavered, just for a moment. Then her eyes narrowed, glowing green.
"You're an obstacle... An annoyance... A fraud... If I remove you? I'll prove who I am!"
"Don't!" Enterprise again tried, reaching out.
"I'm the Lucky E! I can't be defeated! I WILL NEVER BE DEFEATED!"
Her main gun charged up... Dark Enterprise unleashed the massive green blast. And even while she had been talking to her deranged copy... Enterprise had been preparing her response.
Her main deflector lit up as her warp engines glowed. She unleashed a matching blue beam, intercepting her dark counterpart's blast. For split seconds, the two beams warred against each other, trying to overpower the other.
"I CAN'T BE DEFEATED!" Dark Enterprise screamed. "I WON'T BE!"
Enterprise bowed her head.
"... We already have," she said softly.
Enterprise appeared in the Borderlands right behind her copy... And fired a salvo of arrows. Each carried a shutdown code, an override, from long ago. Dark Enterprise gaped in shock as her systems shut down, cascade failures rendering her helpless.
"WHA-?!"
Just as Enterprise narrowed her deflector beam, punched right through the disruptor cannon blast... And struck Dark Enterprise head on.
Step by step... But the dance is nearing its conclusion...