Doomsday, part 1

Posted on Sat Oct 9th, 2010 @ 12:31pm by Commodore Samantha York & Colonel Damon Raine

1,316 words; about a 7 minute read

Mission: Peace, or Something Like It
Location: Turkana IV
Timeline: Current

ON

The room was dark, and bare. The only illumination came from a small device, that was manufacturing both oxygen, and a small pool of water. It had just three green LED lights, to illuminate the roughly 70 square foot room.

The door was in the ceiling. The captor nodded, content that the captives were clearly not going anywhere.

Climbing the rope ladder that had been hitched to the door, he looked down into the abyss, spat, and pulled the cord, drawing the rope ladder well out of reach.

"They'll be around in a minute. We won't stick around." A voice said in Orion. "Don't want to give them any idea who is really behind this.

Another figure in the 'guard room', which was nothing more than a small home's pantry, that had had a portion of it's floor carved out, with a phaser.

"Watch the door." He added, in the native language of the planet. "The Federation woman is known for resourcefulness, we can't have her running about."

Then the door to the pantry was closed, leaving the Grand Marshall, and Commander York in the dark...

-----------------------------------

Sam woke up several minutes later with a throbbing headache. She sat up and looked around. The room was unfamiliar, but it appeared to be a room on the planet.

She walked over to the three LED lights and checked out the device. Oxygen? Why did they need to have oxygen? That was a puzzle.

She found the wall and walked around the room, feeling carefully for any door or opening. There was none. She then used her telepathy. One person was in the room with her. Several more were above her. She couldn't make out their thoughts, though.

Walking back around the wall, she found the other occupant and knelt down. The Grand Marshal? Why him? For that matter, why her? She sat back to wait for him to wake up. And to think. There had to be something she could do...

From the corner of the room, Teenan's eyes suddenly flashed open to reveal darkness. He blinked several times trying to adjust his eyes to what little light was given and he slowly sat himself up against the wall.

His body ached almost as much as his head as he had been summarily dumped in a corner of the room without regard for comfort. He stretched out his arms and legs as he flexed so that blood flow would be increase to the cold extremities of his body.

A hand reached up and gently prodded his bloody scalp where he had been hit. Unlike the rest, Teenan wasn't gassed to sleep in the assault as he had left moments before hand. He had the misfortune of actually running into the assailants as they merged on the assembly hall. Unfortunately for him, he had to be physically accosted in order to be taken.

Teenan needed not to wonder where he was, it was clearly a cell, the only question left to him was whose prison this was.

Thinking he was alone in his cell, the Grand Marshal went into a tirade of expletives to voice his displeasure at the situation.

"Feel better?" Sam asked wryly when his tirade slowed. "The entrance into the room is in the ceiling. There's a device providing oxygen and water. Other than that, the room is empty," she said quietly. "And, before you ask, I have no idea who took us or why."

She knew the Grand Marshal would be even more upset to find himself stuck with her, so she wanted to get it out of the way first. They would need to work together if they hoped to get out of here. Or survive until they were found. Sam had no doubt they'd be found. Damon would find her and she would do all she could to help him. Their kidnappers would make a mistake sooner or later.

"Wonderful." Teenan growled. Being imprisoned suddenly became less appetising to him.

"Oh, you know we're going to come out of this being best friends," she said, unwilling to miss this chance to poke at him a little.

"I can't wait." said with a rumbling sarcasm. "Being better friends with Starfleet was at the top of my list when I woke up this morning."

"I know," she said lightly. "Dreams do come true." Then she grew serious. "I can't read their minds -- yet. I'll keep working on it. In the meantime, what ideas do you have for getting out of here?"

"Well I don't know, appeal to their better sense perhaps?" He shook his head derisively. "I don't even know who I'm dealing with, let alone how to get out of here. Probably it's that fool Xon."

"No idea. It could be anyone, including those mercenaries who attacked my ship." She wasn't going to jump to any conclusions. She would take the time she needed to find out what was going on. With a sigh she made herself as comfortable as she could.

"Whoever it is, we can be sure that we are being held in a very heavily shielded facility." He said looking down to the attachment on his arm.

"Why do you say that?" Sam asked him.

He stretched out his arm so that she could see his arm implant and pointed to one seemingly insignificant orange light in an otherwise long sequence.

"This one monitors my communication device. This piece of technology is the crown jewel of the Coalition because of its signal strength. It was built specifically to pierce otherwise powerful jamming technology."

He pulled the sleeve back over his forearm. "It's supposed to glow blue to signify an active link. The shield generator here must be massive in order to block it."

"So, what happens when the connection is severed?" she asked.

"It means that I cannot contact my people." He let the words hang in the air as if they had more significance. He looked at his chronometer and after a moment continued speaking "It also means that we have less than 20 hours to either be rescued or get a signal through to the Coalition."

"20 hours? And then what?" She had a sinking feeling she already knew the answer, but she wanted to hear it from him.

"Then, peace talks on Turkana will no longer be necessary. It's my safety insurance; should something happen to me while a guest of the Alliance or Union leaders."

"Every missile under my control is to be launched at key locations all around the planet. All major cities will be instantly leveled along with anyone that happens to be on the surface at the time. The Alliance will have no choice but to respond in kind, launching their own weapons. The resulting explosions will poison the surface of the planet for hundreds of years, extinguishing all life."

"Strangely enough, that isn't the bad part. The Coalition and Alliance have spent decades warring with each other and we have gotten pretty efficient at it. The latest series of weapons on both sides have subsonic properties which destabilise rock mass. When these weapons go off, they will collapse the underground caverns as well...most of them, anyways."

"So, you want to make sure that if anything happens to you, you want all life on Turkana IV to be destroyed out of, what? Arrogance? Self-aggrandizement? A need to play God?" She glared at him. "What gives you the right to decide who lives and dies? You claim to want what is best for your people, but you want to make sure every single one of them dies if you leave the planet? No wonder you can't be bothered with peace. You'd rather destroy everyone and be cone with it."


(To be continued...)

Commander Samantha York
Commanding Officer
USS Calypso

Grand Marshal Teenan Varik (NPC)
Leader of the Coalition
Turkana IV

 

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