Star Trek Hunter Episode 25: I Dream of Shiva
- Thread starter Robert Bruce Scott
- Start date
I just posted the short story that is also part of the STH universe - in which both the ferengi lawyer, Brack, and the tellerite Tribunal Justice Cisl Mreek put in an appearance.
I put it on the new Ad Astra archive at this link:
Star Trek Hunter: Rock of Ages
Star Trek Hunter
Episode 25: I Dream of Shiva
Scene 7: Waterfront
25.7
Waterfront
Waterfront
Pehisa and her young partner, Heben, grimly inspected this morning’s harvest. Even here in Safagreer the streets were not entirely safe for either romulan or hemra. An elderly romulan bureaucrat and his young hemra slave had been murdered and their bodies splayed out in a ritual pattern. Heben had to turn his head and take several deep breaths before returning his gaze to the grisly scene.
“Why do they do that…” Heben gestured vaguely at part of the savage display, “…that thing with their fingers and toes… and their mouths?”
Pehisa had been hardened by her years as an assessor with the Safagreer Code Enforcement Agency. But she had to admit that in her nearly 60 years in the violent crimes unit, she had not seen so much effort put into killings. Passion, there was always passion in murder, but this was more like hedonistic indulgence – these murders suggested an almost sexual carnality.
“They cut off the fingers and toes and splay skin from them to create wings,” said Senior Assessor Pehisa. “The wings of the mogu mogo larvae - and they lay out the dismembered digits in a pattern suggestive of mogu mogo larvae flying out of the mouths of their victims, just like fresh larvae…”
Heben had to overcome his gag reflex again. This was his first assignment with the violent crimes unit and with less than an hour on the job, it was turning out to be a grim day. “And the…” he vaguely described a circle around the bodies, “…entrails…”
“A new development. It represents the wheel in the sky that will come down to devour believer and non-believer alike. Notice that the slave is hairless?” asked Pehisa.
“An ascetic,” Heben observed.
“Which is almost certainly why she and her master were targeted. The self-described ‘Devout’ think of the ascetics as a perversion of the proper worship of Shiva. This is a blood sacrifice.”
“Why kill her master?” asked Heben.
“For traveling with an ascetic. He might have tried to protect her,” Pehisa answered. She shrugged, scratched her head, squatted down and looked more closely at the carnage. “All this carving and gutting wasn’t done here. Too clean. And too exposed. This was done somewhere else, probably nearby, and then transported here.” She pulled out a particle analyzer, got close to the remains and ran the analyzer over them. “Cargo transporter, I’m sending the signature in now for verification. We should head toward the piers. I’m betting we’re looking for a warehouse on the waterfront. The Devout believe fervently in blood sacrifice. This was a major kill for them. They probably sacrificed one of their own in celebration. We will find that body where these two were killed. I want this little band of savages. I want them under my lash.” Pehisa stood up and patted the whip coiled on her hip.
By this time other Code Enforcement units had arrived, bringing tools and slaves to clean up the remains.
The two romulan detectives mounted a pair of machines that looked somewhat like motorcycles without wheels. They donned simple, visored helmets that had been attached to the sides of these machines, then each lifted off and took to the road along the waterfront, flying approximately a half-meter above the road.
“The Devout,” said Heben. The communicator in his helmet carried his voice to his partner. “Aren’t they pretty much savages from the farms? How did they gain access to a warehouse? Or a transporter? And how did they get into this city?”
“This is it,” Pehisa replied. She pointed at a warehouse. The romulan detectives landed their machines silently in front of the warehouse and removed their helmets.
Pehisa gestured at the warehouse. “Central Information Processing identified the signature of the cargo transporter. That unit was installed in this building.” She and her partner both removed disruptor rifles from compartments on the sides of their hovermounts. They approached the building, moving quickly, close and crouched low, covering each other with their rifles in a pattern that any police officer in any city on any planet would immediately recognize from their own training.
After a thorough search, they found no living persons in the building. They convened near the large cargo transporter unit. Nearby was a dead hemra, laid out the same as the victims they had looked at minutes previously.
“Farmhand,” said Heben, looking at the body. “How did these savages get into this city?”
“Central, this is Senior Assessor Pehisa. Who is the owner of the building we are currently standing in?”
The voice on the communicator was a male with an accent commonly heard among the more educated hemra slaves: “Rotan, Roku and Gamble, Enrolled Collective.”
“Those are our first suspects, Heben,” mused Pehisa. “The field hemra are getting into the city because they have made some converts among our fellow romulans.”
“I can understand the savage hemra falling for this nonsense religion,” said Heben. “But how could a sophisticated, educated romulan fall for this… mind destroying garbage?”
“There are always people who will believe what they want to believe, even if they are scientifically literate enough to know better. Especially if they’re frightened. And our people are very, very frightened these days, Heben.” The female detective keyed her communicator badge: “Central, mark our location and get a clean-up crew down here. We have another body. And I’m going to want to have a close look at these bodies once you get them into cold storage…”
25.7 (of 19)
I've read a couple of Sci fi murder mysteries, but they are rare. It's too bad. The mystery is a great genre.
-Will
-Will
Including the first few episodes of this series... At this point I'm really broadening the picture. The lens will go more and more wide angle until just near the end of the series.
Thanks!! rbs
Star Trek Hunter
Episode 25: I Dream of Shiva
Scene 8: Johnny Be Good
25.8
Johnny Be Good
Johnny Be Good
“Hello Johnny. I’ve been waiting for you.” Chief Justice Julian Bashir’s voice retained a suave quality enhanced by his posh British accent. He emerged from the darkness. Despite the gauntness of his face, the careworn look around his eyes – an almost haunted look – he was still a remarkably handsome man. Part of this came from perfect posture.
“I didn’t see any evidence of another ship…” started Johnny Canada, only to be startled nearly out of his skin when Bashir stepped forward and placed an almost emaciated hand on Canada’s shoulder. Canada was aware that Bashir was only a decade older than him, but the Chief Justice looked as if he had aged 50 years during that time.
“Yes, I’m actually here. In the flesh. Don’t be so astounded!” Bashir smiled and some of the careworn lines on his face smoothed out and didn’t return. “And no, this isn’t dream comm stuff. Sometimes you really need to meet people face to face and make yourself vulnerable to them. It’s a human thing. Come on in, I’ve put on some tea.” Bashir turned and opened a door into a lighted room.
“This looks familiar,” Canada said as he followed Bashir into a room with black walls, a black floor and ceiling and lighting focused on two overstuffed leather armchairs with a table between them. The chairs were facing a standing desk that contained a trio of monitors and two cameras on individual, automated stands.
“It should,” Bashir responded. He served Canada a tea that smelled strongly of raspberry along with some sort of heavy seed cake. “This is the actual studio that then Governor Ivonovic used to start Subspace Radio Ivonovic. I had it moved out here. Can you believe he had this built in the same star system as the Colony of New Hope? He really wasn’t trying all that hard to not be found.”
“That’s quite a move,” Canada commented. He sipped his tea appreciatively, raising his eyebrows at the taste, then tried the seed cake and made an approving noise. “We’re on the other side of the Alpha Quadrant from New Hope – almost to the edge of the galactic disc…”
“You thought you would find the Dream Weaver out here, didn’t you?” Bashir asked around a mouthful of seed cake.
“I take it I haven’t?”
“I deliberately misled you into this meeting. I’m afraid if you want to disable the Dream Weaver, you have a bit of a journey ahead of you. It is located almost exactly on the opposite side of the galaxy from here – in the Delta Quadrant, near the galactic rim,” Bashir said. He took a seat in one of the overstuffed armchairs. “If you’re still thinking of taking a journey to the Delta Quadrant to shut down the Dream Weaver, you should plan on taking an army with you. Best an army of betazoids and vulcans - telepaths. It’s ocompan technology and the ocompans aren’t finished using it. They rely on it, actually. They won’t take kindly to any attempt on our part to disable it or even modify it.”
Johnny Canada sat back in his chair, eyes opened wide, just letting the repercussions of this information roll about in his mind. After nearly two full minutes, he drained his tea, then said, “But I thought this was something we invented…”
“Bit of a kick in the knickers, isn’t it?” Bashir smiled grimly. “Pathetically easy to get to and use, freely available to anyone who is capable of self-directed dreaming, and you can use it to give people nightmares so bad they literally die of fright in their sleep. You can see why Section 31 is quite keen on keeping it secret and providing misleading information to anyone who stumbles into it.”
“Do the ocompans know we are able to access it?” Canada asked.
“They know. They just don’t care. We’re just vermin to them, so if we use the thing to make our lives miserable or kill people off by the billions…” Bashir shrugged, made an amused noise… “Good riddance as far as they’re concerned.”
“How… how does the thing work? It’s like, instantaneous communication back and forth across 100,000 light years…”
Bashir shrugged again. “Not a clue. Did you hear the bit about it being ocompan technology? They are quantum telekinetic, so when they bother to build a machine, they build it from the subatomic particle up. I should point out to you, since you are so concerned about the existence of Section 31, that this is precisely the sort of threat Section 31 was created to protect the Federation against.”
“How did you…” Canada started.
“How did I find it?” Bashir asked. “I reviewed all of Admiral Janeway’s reports from the Delta Quadrant. A number of them didn’t make sense unless something like this thing existed, so I immediately classified the reports in question and went looking for the thing. I found it and I created a doorway into it. Until recently, everyone from the Alpha Quadrant who has been using the Dream Weaver has been using my doorway – But Shiva has created her own doorway now. You will need to monitor that – it’s getting to be a bit much for me to manage along with all the other threats to the quadrant that I am monitoring…”
“You are giving me an assignment?” Canada was genuinely surprised.
“Johnny, who else can I give it to?” Bashir asked. “Scrivax has descended into madness. Kenny Dolphin doesn’t sufficiently comprehend the threat to even seek me out about it. Minerva has transformed herself into some sort of god of destruction. There’s no one else in the organization who is even aware this technology exists. President Ivonovic knows about it, but he doesn’t know about Section 31 – yet…”
“And you trust me to do this?”
“Johnny, if you aren’t morally conflicted to the very core of your being by what we have to do, the kinds of decisions we have to make, you cannot be trusted to even know about Section 31, much less serve as an agent.”
Julian Bashir slowly sipped his tea and watched the young police executive from Trantor as he mulled over what he had been hearing. Bashir took a deep breath. “Johnny, I’m the one who told Minerva Irons that she would need to become the Monster of Saketh. The romulans will bicker and delay and miss their chance to save Saketh unless they are driven to do it in desperation.”
Bashir sipped his tea, took a breath. “But Minerva is Shiva now and she seems to have buried herself in the part. I’m not certain how her new religion is going to convince the locals to pick up their entire biosphere from the ocean beds to the ozone layer and move to a whole new planet that is, at the moment, nothing but barren rock. Shiva has the mythology right – devouring one world to build a new one – but the practicality escapes me.”
“So you want me to try to make her religion… practical?” Canada squinted at Bashir.
“No,” Bashir replied. “That’s being worked out on two fronts – behind the scenes with Former President Rodriguez and Sela’s top advisor, Admiral Ekot, and on Saketh by Shiva and her religious maniacs. No, Johnny, my concern is that in her fervor to drive the romulans to transplant Saketh, Shiva has opened Pandora’s Box – in a big way. One of your jobs is going to be stuffing all the demons back into it.”
“And what makes you think I’ll even consider doing this – taking on this assignment from you?” Canada asked.
“Because there is no one else to do it,” Bashir replied. “Saketh seems so far away – all the way on the other side of the Romulan Star Empire. But wait… Saketh will be coming to a location near you... Conveniently located in the Al Donovos and Al Jenova star systems, only a few weeks’ journey to your beloved Trantor at warp 5. Just imagine the sweet religion of Shiva set loose in a city of three billion people living literally right on top of one another.”
Bashir smiled grimly. “Mr. Canada, you agreed to join Section 31 because of our unique ability to help you to identify threats to Trantor. Can you think of a greater threat than a fractious, charismatic, evangelic, apocalyptic religion already responsible for the death of thousands in the scant few months it has been in existence?”
25.8 (of 19)
Star Trek Hunter
Episode 25: I Dream of Shiva
Scene 9: Bad Moon on the Rise
25.9
Bad Moon on the Rise
Bad Moon on the Rise
Camp Brunun, located deep inside the Chicolo forest, was a unique community on Saketh. There was no slavery and romulans and hemra lived in mingled families. There were no hybrid children because that would have required genetic engineering, which was prohibited by law and custom. But in Camp Brunun, a few hundred romulans and hemra lived as equals. While trade in Chicolo nuts, acrans, wospern powder and other forest products provided a basic economy, the mingled population lived very close to nature with few possessions and little contact with the rest of Saketh or the Romulan Star Empire beyond their economically insignificant trade in local nuts, berries and medicinals.
The relative peace of this community had recently become disturbed by sightings of increasing numbers of hairy ascetics in the nearby woods – a few romulan, but mostly hemra, who were indistinguishable from humans to all appearances.
Davoga was more or less charged with keeping the peace in Camp Brunun. She was the only representative of the empire anyone there knew – a forest manager who had Camp Brunun in her administrative district. She lived outside of town and her office was on the edge of town, near the ravine where villagers would daily go to pump water up from the river into the only water tower for miles around. There had been a solar-powered pump to get the water up, but it had been broken for nearly 30 years. All that needed to be done was for someone to vigorously pump for about 45 minutes, then the laws of siphonage would take over until the tower was full again.
“Di’ig, how is the forest this morning?” Davoga respected Di’ig as much as any romulan and more than any other hemra - largely because this hemra was as much a creature of the forest as the jakdar and the eargan they hunted. Di’ig was like the barkmoss - ever-present, witness to all and casually ignored, which allowed him to observe more.
“Now we have eight of them,” Di’ig replied. “The hairy ones, not the shavers. But every bit as skinny.”
“Eight?” asked Davoga, “Where are they holing up?”
“Looks like they’re building some sort of temple on the big stump,” said Di’ig. “There are some shallow caves near there, but that’s rough living. They seem like a rough sort. Not the type to fit in around here.”
Davoga sighed heavily. “Get everyone together, Di’ig. We can’t leave them sleeping in the mud. If nothing else, we’ll build them a hut.”
“There’s going to be more of them,” said Di’ig. “More of them then there are of us. The fourth moon will be out tonight by itself. The bad moon. They’re going to make trouble.”
“We’ll worry about that when it happens, Di’ig,” said Davoga. “Let’s just worry about the ones who are here for now.”
A few hours later there were nearly 20 of the hairy ascetics gathered in the center of Camp Brunun. Davoga arrived too late to stop someone from building a bonfire. To add to the misfortune, they had drums and they were all drumming. Badly.
“PUT THAT FIRE OUT!” Davoga shouted.
“You try,” one of the town elders retorted. The hairy drummers were dancing and whirling close to the fire. Dangerously close.
“They’ve been munching on eldergrass. They’re hallucinating…” said Di’ig. “And there’s more of them…” He gestured toward another dozen or so drummers emerging from the trees from all directions and heading toward the fire. “The fire and the drumming have them coming out of the woods. And this lot look crazier than the ones who are already here.”
Davoga looked around at the insanity and realized it was just going to get worse. Much worse. She drew Di’ig aside. “Get the word out. Have everyone draw water and keep buckets on their porches.”
“You think they’re going to try to set fire to the woods?” asked Di’ig.
“I think they’re coming here to set fire to themselves.” Davoga put her hand on Di’ig’s shoulder and turned him away from the spinning, dancing drummers. She drew her disrupter pistol and handed it to him - dialed the highest setting. “Any of them get into the fire - vaporize them. Be ready to order people around to put out fires. They’ll listen to you.”
“What if they don’t? Come down to it, I’m just a hemra,” said Di’ig.
Davoga removed the forest manager’s badge from her tunic and pinned it to Di’ig’s shirt. “Now you’re a hemra with a badge and a gun. Make them listen to you. I’m going to try to stop this from getting any worse.”
“Without your disruptor?”
“I have another disruptor, Di’ig. Look after these people. Unless I’m mistaken, it’s going to be a very bad night.
Davoga retrieved her disruptor rifle and another disruptor pistol from her cabin, then disappeared into the woods. Di’ig managed to get a few of the villagers organized around fire control, but many of the others seemed either too frightened to remain outdoors or offended that a hemra was wearing a badge and barking orders at them. As many hemra as romulans were offended and as many romulans as hemra responded to Di’ig’s authority without question.
It was less than a half-hour before the first of the whirling drummers threw herself into the fire, then came out, howling, clothes, hair and drum on fire and ran screaming for the woods. She only made it a few steps before Di’ig vaporized her with the disruptor.
The biggest disadvantage to vaporizing a target, instead of just using deadly force, was that it required Di’ig to keep a bead on the target for several seconds. The drummers were soon setting themselves on fire too fast for that and soon fires were spreading into the woods. Villagers were responding, but buckets of water were not particularly effective for fire control. By the time ten whirling drummers had thrown themselves into the fire, it became evident to Di’ig that all the dancing drummers were intent on self-immolation and equally determined to ignite the forest with their burning bodies. He switched the disruptor from vaporize to deadly force and began shooting at all the drummers.
The drummers realized quickly that Di’ig was interrupting their religious ceremony and charged him as a group. Disruptor fire came out the woods – Davoga emerged using her disrupter rifle with one hand and pistol with the other. It still took her and Di’ig several minutes to put down the last of the dancers.
Putting out the small fires took hours, but without a wind they did not spread quickly and eventually they were all snuffed out. Di’ig and Davoga kept an eye to the woods, shooting down a few more hairy ascetics who straggled in from the tree line.
“Looks like we had about 50 of them,” said Di’ig as the first light of dawn exposed more and more of the carnage.
“I must have put down at least another 30 in the woods,” said Davoga.
“You didn’t just stun them?” asked Di’ig.
“And go through this again?” Davoga rolled her head and stretched. “We have four major fires these Chicolonutheads started in other parts of the forest. I’m going to have to leave it to you to clean up the mess here. I’ll be working fire management to make sure none of those other fires jump the river...”
25.9 (of 19)
Mind boggling. Great ideas and plot addition. To kill the people who, other wise, were going to kill themselves anyway.
Is there a trial coming for Davoga?
-Will
Is there a trial coming for Davoga?
-Will
For killing hemra who did not immediately obey her orders? Considering her authority as a forest ranger, she would have to kill a fairly important romulan to warrant a trial. Although she might face a reprimand if her superiors ever found out that she gave a badge and a gun to a hemra.
The concept of using a religion to goad a planetary population into ecological action comes straight out of Dune.
Davoga and Di'ig will return in Episode 27...
Thanks!! rbs
I had a conceit of naming most of the scenes of Ep 25 after pop songs...
CCR was one of those bands that had more than "one" of people's favorite songs. I can think of three immediately that rank in my personal top 40. Give me just a few minutes and more will probably spring to mind.
Oh yeah, I almost forgot about... Have you Ever Seen the Rain, Fortunate Son, Who'll Stop the Rain, Lookin' out my Back Door, Down on the Corner, Born on the Bayou, ...
Let's not forget the incredible jobs they did on their covers: I Heard it Through the Grapevine, Suzy-Q, Good Golly Miss Molly,..."
-Will
The Episode 25 playlist:
RUSH - Armor and Sword (title song to the Snakes and Arrows album)
FRANK SINATRA - Come Fly With Me
JOURNEY - Wheel In The Sky
THE BEATLES - Get Back
GARY WRIGHT - Dream Weaver
MAHLIA - Terms and Conditions
SIMPLE MINDS - Waterfront
CHUCK BERRY - Johnny B Goode
CREDENCE CLEARWATER REVIVAL - Bad Moon A-Rising
CHRISTOPHER CROSS - Sailing
THE POLICE - Murder By Numbers
BBC RADIOPHONIC WORKSHOP - Dr. Who Theme
JUAN LUIS GUERRA - Medicine For My Soul
It's a really eclectic list, but every song, every performance kicks ass...
There are additional chapters that came in from Episode 26 that were not named after pop songs, but this is enough of a song list anyway.
RUSH - Armor and Sword (title song to the Snakes and Arrows album)
FRANK SINATRA - Come Fly With Me
JOURNEY - Wheel In The Sky
THE BEATLES - Get Back
GARY WRIGHT - Dream Weaver
MAHLIA - Terms and Conditions
SIMPLE MINDS - Waterfront
CHUCK BERRY - Johnny B Goode
CREDENCE CLEARWATER REVIVAL - Bad Moon A-Rising
CHRISTOPHER CROSS - Sailing
THE POLICE - Murder By Numbers
BBC RADIOPHONIC WORKSHOP - Dr. Who Theme
JUAN LUIS GUERRA - Medicine For My Soul
It's a really eclectic list, but every song, every performance kicks ass...
There are additional chapters that came in from Episode 26 that were not named after pop songs, but this is enough of a song list anyway.
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So far, referenced in my own series:
Another, more subtle reference is The Music of the Spheres. A concept from Pythagoras about the relative orbital harmonics of the planets. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Music_of_the_Spheres_(Langgaard)
This is a small spoiler, because it's what I imagine the music on the scroll sounds like.
-Will
Another, more subtle reference is The Music of the Spheres. A concept from Pythagoras about the relative orbital harmonics of the planets. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Music_of_the_Spheres_(Langgaard)
This is a small spoiler, because it's what I imagine the music on the scroll sounds like.
-Will
Star Trek Hunter
Episode 25: I Dream of Shiva
Scene 10: Sailing
25.10
Sailing
Sailing
“It IS a b’ath rayl!” Vuk Smith called out.
“Shields up!” called Captain Icu Coho. She began moving the rudder control lever quickly from side to side, causing the small bajoran sailing vessel to rock back and forth in the water.
“We have shields, Coho!” her husband and first mate, Icu Yoy called back.
The yacht started shuddering as the deflector shields created a positive pressure of about an inch between the boat’s hull and the water, lifting the boat slightly.
“So you actually enjoy this?” asked Captain Kenneth Dolphin. He was standing near the ship’s prow, an arm woven around the rail above the gunwale. “Seems a little dangerous to me…”
“Says Captain Kirk Dolphin!” River Dolphin teased. Starlight Dolphin, standing on the deck near her sister, started laughing.
Dr. Moon Sun Salek, the U.S.S. Hunter’s Director of Engineering put her hands over her mouth, trying mute her high-pitched giggle. Dr. Jazz Sam Sinder, Hunter’s Medical Director and Dr. Kunto Wekesa, one of the Hunter’s two new forensic specialists, made no effort to conceal their laughter. Lieutenant T’Lon, Hunter’s Director of Ground Operations, raised an eyebrow.
Captain Dolphin and these few members of his crew had joined his daughters and the half-vulcan Smith brothers on a biological expedition, sailing on one of the oceans of Bajor.
“Port side if you want to see it!” Vuk called.
The ship leaned slightly to port as everyone on deck crowded to the port rail with the exception of Icu Yoy, who was operating the sailboat’s deflector shields. He adjusted the shields on the port side of the Pagh Kez’bal* to keep the ship righted.
“She’s going to spit!” shouted Surrol Smith. “Do you have the shields up over the top of the mast?”
“They’re coming up now!” Yoy shouted. The ocean was a little harder to focus on seen through the sailboat’s deflector shields and the noise from the waves was muted. As the deflector screens came up, the main sail, which had been billowed out, grew slack. The ship slowed slightly as the deflector screens took the wind out of its sails.
A number of bajoran lungfish were leaping out of the ocean, coming closer and closer to the sailboat. Then a large animal that looked oddly like a cross between a large jellyfish and some sort of toothless shark with enormous twin backfins emerged from the water. A white, gelatinous mass ejected from the animal’s mouth and for a split second pasted several dozen lungfish to the side of the Pagh Kez’bal. A large amount of this expectorant splattered against the shields that extended above the gunwales, causing the spectators to jump back, their startle reactions fully engaged. Both the whitish goo and the lungfish hung for a moment, caught against the deflector screen, then slid neatly off the sailing vessel’s deflectors back into the ocean.
Surrol Smith and Dr. Jazz moved quickly to a panel just ahead of the pilot’s wheel. Vuk Smith was watching the creature with what appeared to be a large pair of binoculars, which he made constant adjustments to as the b’ath rayl slowly slipped back beneath the waves.
“I’m bringing the shields down,” said Yoy, “You should be able to beam samples aboard now…” The main sail filled once again with wind as the deflectors came down.
“Energizing,” said Surrol.
“Gently,” said Dr. Jazz. “Just a tiny amount. We don’t want to harm the creature.”
“Each sample is about 4 cubic microns,” Surrol replied. “I’m bringing up a sample of her expectorant now - there’s almost a half kiloton down there, predigesting her meal for her.”
“She’s feeding now,” Vuk shouted. With the boat’s shields down, the sound of the ocean was once again loud enough that everyone had to raise their voices to be heard.
Dr. Kunto Wekesa was watching readings in a tri-corder: “No traces of bleeding. All biometric readings nominal. Looks like she’s unharmed.”
“We have samples of her organs and about a liter of her expectorant in storage,” said Surrol. “Who knew the b’ath rayl were back in the Sea of Valor?”
“There are reports of little ones in the Inland Sea,” said Captain Icu. “We should cross through the straits of Bar’trilla into the Inland Sea day after tomorrow. Hopefully you can get some samples there as well.”
A few hours later, everyone aboard the Pagh Kez’bal was seated around the captain’s table, inside the poop deck, which afforded views forward of the main deck and off the sides and the stern of the ship about two meters above water level. The captain and her mate both had control stations and monitors next to their seats at the table. The Pagh Kez’bal was traveling on autopilot. Large servo motors occasionally made fine adjustments to the positions of the sails.
“Mmmmm, lungfish hasperat…” said Dr. Moon, trying unsuccessfully to conceal her lack of enthusiasm.
Lt. T’Lon, seated next to the Hunter’s Director of Engineering, lingered over her food. “Very… flavorful,” she said to Icu Yoy, who, as first mate, was also the Pagh Kez’bal’s cook.
“Superb,” said Dr. Jazz. “Better than my mother’s hasperat. And so much better than replicated. Just the correct aroma.”
“I think I’m in love,” said Captain Kenneth Dolphin.
“With that red chick T’Lon was telling us about?” asked River. Vuk, seated next to her, turned and raised an eyebrow.
“Bajoran springwine,” the captain replied. “I’ve never had it fresh before. Never understood what everybody was going on about.” He drained his glass.
“More?” asked Captain Icu Coho.
“Oh please yes!” enthused Dolphin.
“So I don’t get it, Dad,” said Starlight Dolphin. “They exonerate you at the inquest and then turn around and force you to take 30 days leave?”
“Standard procedure. I fired on a friendly. No matter how well justified that action was, the inquest needs to go through all the evidence and I might be called on to testify again.” Dolphin took another drink of the springwine. “That said, they didn’t really have to twist the screws all that hard to get me to take shore leave,” he remarked.
“I don’t think I’ve ever seen you happier than when they gave you that order,” said Dr. Moon.
“I was happier when they allowed me to put the ship on Emergency Reserve status,” said Dolphin. “The entire crew needed the break.”
“I think Counselor Brack was the happy one,” remarked T’Lon.
“He seemed about as emotional as a brick throughout the entire inquest,” said Dolphin. “I found myself wondering if he was all ferengi or if he might be part vulcan…”
“You didn’t see him out in the hall,” T’Lon rejoined. “He was… I think the best word to describe it is… snickering. It was really quite amusing. Especially during breaks in your testimony. He really seemed to enjoy your reasoning.”
“I thought he was unhappy about the whole thing,” said Dolphin. “Something about his tombstone?”
“I was there when he made that remark,” T’Lon replied. “He was snickering the entire time. He said, ‘I just helped transform Star Fleet into a police force. Just what the founders of the Federation never wanted. That will probably be my epitaph’.”
Dr. Wekesa made an amused noise. “I also heard him say, ‘But I’m ferengi, so what do I care?’…”
*Pagh Kez’bal (Bajoran – Medicine for the Soul)
25.10 (of 19)
First, a militarized science corp., then a police force, next an army, last Imperial invasion force.
Nice boat scenes. Look up Flettner rotors and the magnus effect. Sort of a Sci-fi wind drive. Sails heel boats, the magnus effect, much less so.
-Will
One of the things I wanted to do in the series (kind of a counterpoint to all the philosophy) was to put people on the water - surfing, sailing, motor boating and flying in every sort of contraption I could think of. I also wanted to show lots of alien critters. I felt both those things provided some visual and visceral interest to the series - ways of opening up the reader's mind's eye to those alien environments.
Thanks!! rbs
Star Trek Hunter
Episode 25: I Dream of Shiva
Scene 11: Murder By Numbers
25.11
Murder by Numbers
Murder by Numbers
Sela, the half romulan / half human Supreme Commander of the Romulan Star Navy, found herself seated in an overstuffed leather armchair, still wearing her nightgown. Lights blared down on her, but behind the lights she could just make out the face of the traitor Remma. She turned her head quickly to her right and saw Shiva – the person that had evolved from Justice Minerva Irons – sitting in an identical overstuffed leather chair.
Shiva’s looks had changed – her skin was so pale it was almost translucent. The careworn wrinkles that had characterized Irons’ face in her last few months were gone, but so was something about her eyes. The warmth was gone. Shiva’s eyes were hard, bright, staring, pitiless. The eyes of a predator. But the most striking transformation was her hair.
Raven black or later iron gray, Justice Irons had always kept her hair shaved on the left side of her head to reveal the subtle spots of her trill ancestry and the hair on her right side had always fallen straight and fine. Now most of her hair was platinum blonde with an increasing number of black stripes and it radiated out from her head in all directions, framing her face like a sparking, electric halo.
Sela was already tired of this. She had no idea how she had gotten here, and no idea when she could expect help to arrive, but it was time to make her intense displeasure known. She opened her mouth and uttered her complaint firmly, succinctly, eloquently and most of all, definitively:
SQUAWK!!!
Sela shook her beak and hopped around on the overstuffed armchair in frustration, doing some damage to the leather upholstery with her considerable and rather sharp talons. She saw Remma waving “goodbye” to her and then she began to plummet, nose first through the clouds. The ground rushed up at her.
“You need to spread your wings and your tail feathers,” said Shiva, who had also now taken the form of a large bird with mottled grey and black feathers. The only other thing, aside from this coloration, that distinguished the two women from terrestrial crows was their size – easily four times the size of a crow, making them far larger than any flight-capable terrestrial bird – almost the size of ostriches.
Suddenly, the air kicked up under Sela’s wings, carrying her skyward. In spite of her confusion, astonishment and anger about being kidnapped and somehow transformed into a large bird, she found herself reveling in the feeling of flight under her own power. To FLY!!!!
“Listen,” she heard Shiva squawking to her nearby.
Hundreds of voices – a babel of conversations – thousands of voices. Sela could make out bits of gossip about who was courting whom, whether or not a certain clutch belonged to a certain male (who seemed overly proud of them…), when the auditions for the upcoming drama would be, a freewheeling discussion about when to manure a freshly planted field…
“What is this?” Sela squawked.
“I knew there was an undiscovered, intelligent race deep inside the Romulan Star Empire,” squawked Shiva, flying nearby. “In your language, you could call them the Nikamsitiri*. A race who could never develop space travel, much less faster than light travel. A people doomed to die on their own planet from the approaching gamma wavefront. And I know for the survival of your people that you must rescue these people and bring them into your service. Not as slaves, but as partners. Fellow warriors. Police."
“You must save these people, Sela. Save them and teach them your language. The survival of your people depends on it. There are almost 11 billion of them. It will take a massive effort on your part, but your people will need every one of them.”
“Aren’t you violating your Prime Directive by telling me to do this?” Sela asked.
“In so many ways,” Shiva reflected. “But I am whole. I am no longer prey to the doubts of a dithering old woman. I see with eyes unclouded and mind unshackled. I am no longer a creature of the Federation. The Prime Directive – to even think of it being relevant under this sentence of mass death – the gamma wavefront…” Shiva made an amused squawk. “The Prime Directive is for those who fear to be gods. I have evolved far beyond that fear.”
“So you think yourself a god, now?” Sela squawked.
“There, just below us, see them now? How can you think that I am not a god, Sela? Behold the gift I give beyond the dreams of power and avarice! See these magnificent people I give to you.”
Just below Sela and Shiva was a massive flock – hundreds of thousands of birds – mottled gray and black birds - most about twice the size of a crow - some as large as an ostrich - weaving in and out of the treetops of a great forest in an incomprehensible formation of close flight just above the tops of trees that themselves grew out of the waters of a freshwater ocean to tower hundreds of feet above the waves. Some birds were fishing. Some were gathering nuts. Others were planting seeds in sections of open ground further up the shoreline.
And all of them were talking… squawking… communicating… a vast city of enormous crows…
“You have 14 years,” squawked Shiva. “Then the gamma wavefront will reach this planet and all of this will die. You have to find a way to save 11 billion flying people and make them part of your own civilization. You are going to need every single one of them. They are the only ones who can save you.”
“Save me from what?” squawked Sela. She turned to see that Shiva had swollen to nearly a hundred times Sela’s size.
“FROM ME!!!” the monstrous Shiva bellowed, then she opened her beak wide and swallowed Sela into darkness.
Sela sat bolt upright in her bed. Her nightgown was soaked with sweat.
And maybe a little pee…
In her mind was a set of spatial coordinates. Coordinates for a solar system located 14 light years above the coming gamma wavefront…
* Nikamsitiri - (Romulan: Giant Flying Genius)
25.11 (of 19)
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