Chapter 66:
[On the planet near Gorn space with a Klingon colony, 2088]
The Klingons who had recently arrived on the planet, assembled a dome and started planting crops and raising livestock animals. They used magic and technology to automate most of the work needed.
28 Klingons, most young adults gathered around a campfire, eating fresh grilled meat and being fairly loud.
A group of lizards rushed them, killing two and spraying some sort of slime on two others.
Instantly, all of the surviving Klingons had their Mek'leths out. These were traditional Klingon twin pronged daggers. The 4 Klingons with magic had an equivalent to a wand embedded in the dagger. All of them had a disruptor attached to it. They were all well practiced in using all capabilities of these modified Mek'leths.
One yelled, "Scanners did not detect them! Look for movement."
They killed many of the lizards, but 10 more Klingons were down. The remaining 16 found their way into a small shelter and sealed the entrance. They called for a rescue ship. Before it arrived at the planet baby lizards hatched from the two Klingons who were hit with slime, killing them in the process.
Video and audio was live-streamed over subspace. The Klingon rescue ship approached the star system and said, "Colonists. We have identified your attackers as Gorn.
Those infected with the slime host baby Gorn who eat the host and try to disperse upon hatching. All survivors will be put into stasis fields and placed in secure cargo until later study. Your advance directives will be followed for treatment protocols.
When we arrive in approximately .0005 stardates [a little over 4 hours, we will apply suppressing fire when in range and transport survivors when in transport range."
The ship sent out drones to try to detect any stealth Gorn ships and approached the planet carefully. When the ship arrived there were no survivors. The larger lizards broke through the shelter's wall.
The treatment protocols mentioned by the rescue ship is the Alliance modification of Klingon custom. Encoded in their Alliance ID or Starfleet badge are their advance treatment decisions. Some Klingons do not want to be treated at all. Others did not want to survive lack of full ability. The Alliance ensured that Klingons were not treated the same way just for being Klingon. Each would secretly make their wishes known.
[Alliance 2088]
There were rallies everywhere showing pictures of the 28 Klingon victims of the Gorn. Signs said, "Blood must be answered for."
[Alliance meeting 2088]
President Balram Singh said, "Our response will be far different than the Federation in the Strange New Worlds Episode Hegemony.
In Canon when a Gorn massacre was still underway on a Federation colony Captain Pike spoke to a Starfleet superior, who said, "The Federation is at a dangerous point in our relationship with the Gorn Hegemony.
Right now whatever this is, it's technically happening outside the Federation. This incident could spark a war between us and Gorn. Starfleet would like to avoid that."
Balram looked like he couldn't believe what he quoted and continued, "That is not what we will do. I will lead the fleet that goes to war against the Gorn. Anyone have any comments?"
A Denobulan said, "First I agree. Anything other than war against the Gorn would split the Alliance. Second, I wonder about the wisdom in risking the President in this war."
Balram said, "It is close to the time for me to retire from the Presidency anyway. My son Karampreet will be the acting President for all other matters while I focus on the war. This might help him establish his future role.
It is also the time for me to renew my families legacy as a warrior. My grandfather was the last one who put himself at risk and that was almost a century ago.
If you have never been to the Hapsburg museum in Vienna on Earth, I would recommend visiting it when you get the chance. There is a section displaying the armor of the Hapsburg rulers. The early ones show armor that might have been worn in combat. The later ones were highly decorated and clearly costumes, not tools for fighting. By stardate 1918 the Hapsburg monarchy ended after a long period of poor decisions."
[Briefing to Starfleet crews and Marines heading toward the war zone, 2088]
"You have all seen the Canon that shows the Gorn. You understand that the Original series episode Arena depiction is not a true view of Gorn, but does show their tactics.
The ability to easily infect our species with their eggs results in the following tactics. One, protective environmental suits whenever close combat is possible. Two, avoid close combat when possible.
Use drones and long distance tactics. We note their ability to travel through small spaces such as ventilation ducts. We also note their ability to use long distance tactics, as seen in the Original Series
Goals include rescuing non-Gorns when possible. All should be considered infected until cleared. We magically freeze them until that can be determined. As far as we know none are combatants on the side of the Gorn, but freezing them will preclude that possibility before being investigated.
We note that Gorn are not easily seen by scanners or by magic. Alertness is critical. We can scan for air movement. Gorn will stay still as part of stealth and are cold blooded. We are working on a temperature sweep, looking for responses that might indicate hidden still Gorn, which should be ready before the first operations.
It goes without saying that no attempts should be made to capture Gorn prisoners if there is any risk of being infected. Freezing a Gorn will probably work and we can gain some information if we have prisoners. We only want prisoners that are useful."
[Near a Gorn planet]
Two Enterprise-A class ships were searching through a system for hidden Gorn. They passed through an asteroid field. Shielding is effective against asteroid strikes which could occur despite the deflectors pushing away any debris. Some raw materials are added to the ship's storage when they exist in space, such as hydrogen atoms, but the access is far too narrow for Gorn to get aboard that way.
A few hours later both ships had intruder alarms go off. All crew instantly had on full environmental suits and drones throughout the ships hunted for intruders. The Gorn however were not detectable, so shields did not prevent their movement. One crew group was attacked, two killed and one sprayed with eggs, and then the Gorn disappeared into the ventilation system.
The Captain ordered, "All sections isolated now. Lockdown on movement between sections except with double airlocks with mass detection or transporters."
Each section of each deck could be completely sealed off from the others and had enough energy storage to run all essential systems for quite a while, including food replicators, air recycling, gravity, water recycling, etc.
A thorough drone search was made sector by sector looking for any anomalies, in dimensions of spaces, temperature, mass, air movement, and several others. Magical sensors were included, and eventually dispersed the equivalent to notice-me-not charms.
When the ships were cleared a full analysis was made on how to counter the Gorn and how they got aboard the ship. The conclusion was magic was used, and magic must be used to counter some of their tactics.
[Communication from the Gorn, 2088]
"The Gorn would consider an agreement affirming areas of space claimed by the Gorn and the Alliance and ceasing hostilities."
The reply from the Alliance was, "The Alliance will accept unconditional surrender from the Gorn. The only assurance we will give is no mass killings of Gorn, except those guilty of war crimes."
[Alliance meeting with Orions 2088]
Pontax a Klingon started, "The Gorn have magic. Did you supply them with magic?"
The Orion Ambassador Jommal answered, "Yes, and I'll explain. Texts and information on magic is freely available in the Alliance. The same applies to genetic engineering. Neither subject could be considered to be a military secret."
Pontax appeared angry and said, "Why should the Alliance tolerate the existence of Orions helping our enemies?"
Jommal answered, "First, due to honor. When the Alliance was weak the Orions allowed it to grow. There was an agreement that foresaw the Orion role at a time when the Alliance would grow considerably. We have kept to those agreements.
Second, we provide a valuable service of safely facilitating those who find Alliance rules overbearing. We look out for true dangers and channel antisocial impulses.
Third we provide a channel of communication with hostile entities. We helped the Klingons and the Alliance first peacefully coexist which then enabled them to get together without grudges. We continue to do that with the Romulans and Tholians."
Karampreet Singh, acting President of the Alliance said, "Yes, we acknowledge and appreciate Orions keeping to the agreements. We have no grudge against the Orions even if we are now fighting against magic that the Orions facilitated the Gorn acquiring.
We do consider that it is time to reexamine our agreements to fine tune it in ways still agreeable to the Alliance and to the Orions. The Alliance expects more intelligence about other species. I would agree that it would not have been realistic to expect information taught at Alliance universities to not be discovered by non-Alliance members. We should have been more aware of the progress made by the Gorn."
Jommal answered, "Of course. These are agreed to. In addition we have kept secret those technologies shared by the Alliance with us that are not publicly available in the Alliance. We suggest increasing this sharing."
Karampreet answered, "We can agree to that. Just note that the public opinion of the Alliance could turn sharply against Orions. We suggest you find something you can do for us that we can publicize."
Jommal answered, "Understood. We will work quickly on that."
[Gorn war 2089]
The war against the Gorn proceeded slowly. In massed ship battles the Alliance over-matched the Gorn. The Gorn caused steady causalities of ships and crews with ambushes.
Alliance production went into overdrive to build drones, both tiny and large to flood entire areas of space. Magical charms were built into many to identify and counter Gorn magic.
Despite drones, close quarter fighting happened frequently when the Gorn got past drone sweeps, wards, shields, and physical barriers. Rescuing non-Gorn was difficult with traps and ambushes frequently encountered.
The Gorn could travel at sub-light speeds with almost undetectable stealth. They couldn't hide warp signatures when traveling faster than light. They could not only reduce their mass to tiny amounts, but also shrink their size. The Alliance couldn't do that with live crew, but the Gorn could do so with the crew in stasis while shrunk.
Rescued non-Gorn were brought to Cestus 3. This was the planet that Kirk and crew fought against the Gorn using artillery, in the Original Series episode Arena. It was well defended against Gorn attacks.
As the war continued the overwhelming advantage in resources by the Alliance took effect and the more of Gorn space was cleared. Hidden traps in cleared areas frequently caused causalities. The Alliance learned from each of these and adapted tactics.
In 2090 the remaining Gorn surrendered. They were confined to a small part of their original territory, mostly those systems that they were originally from or which they colonized without their being other native sentient life.
Part of the surrender agreement was that they would provide all information that might help disarm remaining traps.
[Former Gorn area 2090]
Alliance development specialists tried to reestablish civilizations destroyed by the Gorn from survivors. Alliance colonists were encouraged to settle available places in the former Gorn empire to make it more difficult for them to build up again.
[Alliance 2090]
A large number of Gorn war veterans had been infected by Gorn eggs and were treated, generally without any lasting effect. Some regarded those survivors with caution, worried that Gorn will someday emerge from them.
Alliance President Balram Singh led a huge ceremony to give awards to the veterans. At the end of the ceremony, his son Karampreet Singh was sworn in as the new Alliance President. His first act was to give an award to Balram for his actions during the war. His speech described how Balram's command ship was attacked and how Balram fought with his kirpan sword which also holds his wand.