Star Trek Section 7G: A Private Little Clusterfuck

"I was just hoping that you had some method of having a temporary truce with the village people. It would make it easier for us to start the process of teaching them the good magic. That is something we will have to work on."

"Will your magic still work if the people of the village do not wish to learn it?"

"It some ways it will be more powerful for you, if they don't learn it. In other ways it will be less powerful."

"What if they learn it faster than we do?"

"Then they will be slightly more powerful than you. However, the magic we are giving you both is the kind that will help your peoples, not make it easier to kill one another."

"And what if the Dark Skinned Ones return?"

"That's unlikely to happen. We have killed the ones who have been coming here, teaching the village people how to kill, and my people are busy working on a way to protect your planet, so that you never have to worry about them returning."

"I am concerned by all of this," Tyree shifted uncomfortably in his seat. Clearly, he was not relieved by Lincoln's answers to his questions. "You say you will give us great magic, which will help us to restore peace to our world, but you cannot promise that it will work. You say that you must give this magic to the village people, but you cannot promise that they will not master it faster than we do. They have killed a great many of my people, and there is much hatred between us. If they learn this magic faster than we are able and decide to use it for killing us, how will we be able to stop them?"

"Tyree, my people cannot remain here for much longer. At best, it will only be a few weeks, and we have much to teach you." Lincoln didn't mention that he was going to try and get some crew members to volunteer to stay behind for a few months until the Nixon could return to pick them up, since he didn't know if anyone would agree to it. "How long is it going to take before the village people trust us? A day? A week? Maybe never. Regardless, your people will have a head start on learning this magic. It will be up to you to keep that head start.

"And think about this: Even though Kirk gave you the same number of thundersticks that the village people have, you're still at a disadvantage because you haven't had them as long as they have. Right now, with as little magic as we have given you, you are at least equal, in terms of knowledge, to the village people. No matter what happens, your people now stand a fighting chance."

There was a sharp crack in the distance. Lincoln turned to face the noise.

"The village people are coming!" Tyree rose to his feet to begin shouting commands. "My people! We are under attack! Get the women, children, and the elders to the caves! The rest of you, we must go!"

While Tyree was giving orders and gathering his weapons, Lincoln pulled his communicator from his belt, flipped open the lid, and set it to three-way communication.

"Sybok! Hatfield! Drop whatever you're doing, grab your phasers, and meet me in the center of the camp now!" Without waiting for a reply, Lincoln closed up his communicator and replaced it on his belt, then removed his phaser, set it to stun, and waited for the others to arrive.

Hatfield was the first to arrive, Sybok took a moment or two longer. Both of them had their phasers out, looking anxious. There was the sound of more gunfire, the Hill People had all taken their positions, leaving the three Starfleet officers alone in the center of the camp.

"Set your phasers to stun," Lincoln kept a watchful eye in the direction Tyree and his men had gone. "We don't know how many of the villagers there are, but I want to try and take some of them alive. We may be able to use them as bargaining chips to open up negotiations with the villagers."

The others nodded.

"Sybok, Tyree and his men went in the direction of that big tree," Lincoln pointed as he spoke. "I want you to go about halfway between that tree and that ridge on the left. Doctor, you go to the right, about halfway between the big tree and that other tree over there. I'll follow directly behind Tyree and his men. Get ahead of them, if you can, and stun any of the village people that you see. Hopefully, Tyree's men won't attack a man when he's down, but if you have to, don't hesitate to stun his people as well. Now, go!"

The three of them headed off in their separate directions. Lincoln's mind was racing to try and figure out what to do if they got there too late, or if Tyree and his men weren't amenable to letting at least some of the villagers live. If he could stop some of the killing now, it was their best chance at restoring peace among these people.

It took Lincoln a few minutes to catch up to Tyree and the others. He nearly got himself shot in the process, because while they were creeping through the brush, in order to try and regain the upper hand on the villagers, Lincoln was racing at a breakneck pace, crashing loudly through the undergrowth. One of Tyree's men, upon hearing the noise, assumed that it was either a Mugato, or that one of the villagers had managed to slip around them, and was coming up behind them. Thankfully, the man had enough sense to hold his fire until he had a clear shot, and when he saw that it was Lincoln, he lowered his rifle, after gesturing that Lincoln should be quiet.

The two of them then crept slowly through the brush until they met up with Tyree. Tyree motioned for Lincoln to crawl beside him, and pointed to the body of a man, lying crumpled at the bottom of a cliff.

"The villagers have killed one of our sentries." His whispered faintly as he spoke. "I've sent some of my men around to try and find the villagers. We will wait here to see if the villagers come this way."

"Tyree, Sybok and Dr. Hatfield are to the far left and right of us." Hatfield pointed in both directions. "They're going to try and stop the villagers, but not kill them. Our weapons allow us to put someone to sleep if we so choose, and that's what Sybok and Hatfield are going to do. Your men, will they do anything to the villagers once they're down?"

"My men will kill the villagers, that is what they have to do, otherwise the villagers will kill us." Tyree spoke as if this was the most obvious thing in the world. "And I do not believe that you have a weapon which can make men sleep. Otherwise, Jim Kirk would have given them to us."

Lincoln adjusted his phaser to the lowest possible setting.

"See that man there," he pointed to one of Tyree's men crouching a few meters away from them. "Watch!"

Lincoln fired a short burst and the man toppled over. Tyree and the others gaped in horror at the sight. A few of them pointed their weapons at Lincoln. Tyree waved at them to keep looking for the villagers.

"Why have you killed Demang?" Tyree hissed. "I thought you were here to help us!"

"Give it a moment!" Lincoln hissed back. "I swear to you, he's only sleeping! He'll wake in a couple of minutes."

"What are minutes?"

"A short period of time. If he doesn't wake up, I'll let you kill me in retribution, and my people will continue to help you. You have my word."

They lay there, quietly, waiting. Both Tyree and Lincoln would alternate looking in the direction that the villagers were most likely to come from, and then back in the direction of the stunned man. After what seemed like an eternity, the man began to stir. Lincoln and Tyree both breathed a sigh of relief. Tyree in that the man was still alive, and Lincoln because the man had woken before Tyree had decided to kill Lincoln.

"Why haven't they shown themselves?" Tyree demanded. "Is it possible your men have found them and put them to sleep?"

"No." Lincoln shook his head. "They would have let me know if that happened."

A blank expression came over Lincoln's face, and then he suddenly got up, motioning for the others to do the same. His face was filled with panicked urgency.

"Shit!" He shouted. "It was a diversion! They're attacking the camp from some other direction!"

As if to punctuate his statement, a woman's loud scream was heard.

"The caves! They're at the caves!" Tyree's voice matched Lincoln's in tone and volume. "Hurry!"

Lincoln pulled out his communicator and informed the others as they ran towards the caves. He hoped they were in time to prevent too many of the Hill People from being killed. It would be hard to convince the Hill People to attempt to make peace with the village people if there was a mass slaughter. Tyree's influence over his people only went so far, and a pile of dead Hill People would set the survivors against the villagers, no matter what Tyree wished.

Pounding into the clearing at the center of the camp, they saw a woman Lincoln didn't recognize, screaming. She was dressed not as the Hill People, but in the manner of the villagers. Instantly, his mind put together what was going on.

"It's a trap!" He tackled Tyree to the ground as the sound of gunfire erupted from the trees on the opposite sides of the clearing.

They rolled, coming to a stop with Lincoln on top of Tyree. There was a second barrage of gunfire as Tyree's people fired wildly. Then silence.

It took Lincoln a moment to figure out what was going on. None of them had learned to stagger their fire in waves! He had maybe a minute or two before the villagers were ready to return fire, and then as long before Tyree's people were ready to fire.

Leaping to his feet, he set his phaser to wide, pulled the trigger, holding it down as he turned in a circle, hoping to knock out as many of the village people as he could before they drew a bead on him. Unconscious bodies rained down from the trees as the beam swept over them. The phaser began to grow uncomfortably warm in his hands, but he didn't care. All that mattered was he stopped the two groups from shooting at one another. To that end, he allowed his beam to play over both Hill People and villager. Even if everybody was out cold, it was still better than Tyree's people hacking away at the unconscious villagers.

The phaser's low charge alarm began beeping, but Lincoln ignored it. He repeatedly swept the area, hoping that he would catch anyone who'd been hiding behind an obstruction on a subsequent pass. When the phaser died, he tossed it aside and quickly surveyed the area. It looked like there were close to 30 villagers unconscious on the ground, which meant that this must have been a major raid on the villagers part. The fact that Lincoln was still standing after several minutes of making himself an easy target meant that he either knocked out all the villagers, or those that were still conscious had fled.

"I think it's over." He reached down to help a slightly confused Tyree to his feet. The few Hill People that had been closest to them, and thus been missed by Lincoln's phaser, began to stand up.

"Is anyone hurt?" Tyree asked of his men who were gaping in amazement at the scene around them.

The men standing indicated that they were all okay. Tyree glanced at Lincoln.

"Take your men and go see if the others are safe, but send someone back as quickly as you can with enough rope to tie the villagers up."

"What for?"

"I'm going to try and use them to bargain with the village elders."

Tyree seemed puzzled, but didn't question Lincoln's answer. He agreed to send someone with rope and joined his men in running towards the caves.

Lincoln walked over to one of the unconscious villagers when he heard Hatfield calling his name. Turning, he saw Hatfield on the edge of the clearing, leaning up against a tree, gasping.

"Henry, are you okay?" He wheezed.

"Fine, but my phaser's dead. Where's Sybok?"

"Right here!" Lincoln turned to his left to see Sybok loping into the clearing.

Before any of them could say anything, the air filled with the sound of a transporter beam materializing something. Soon, the shimmering forms of six people began to take shape behind Sybok. Lincoln's eyes darted around looking for cover. It should be crew members from the Nixon, but it was always possible that another Klingon ship had showed up and taken the Nixon by surprise. He relaxed when he saw that it was crew members of the Nixon.

"Brigman!" He called out when they fully materialized. "Is this everybody?"

"No, sir. We've got 18 more coming, plus the supplies."

"Good. I need everyone to spread out and cover the folks unconscious here. Put your phasers on stun and shoot anyone who moves, unless I say otherwise."

The group spread out as ordered, and a second group began to materialize in the same spot as the first. In between giving orders to the new arrivals, Lincoln called up to the ship and had them add some portable charge packs to items being sent down. Hatfield moved amongst the unconscious figures, checking to see if any of them needed medical attention, while Sybok ran to see how things were going at the caves where the Hill People were hiding.

As the fourth group began to materialize, Sybok, along with a couple of the children from the camp, returned to the clearing. All of them were carrying bundles of rope.

"What's it look like back there, Sybok?" Lincoln asked.

"It doesn't appear that the village people made it to the caves. Tyree and his men are scouring the area, just to be sure, but I think no one got past us."

"Good." Lincoln turned to address everyone. "Ok, folks, get some rope, and any of these folks on the ground wearing cloth needs to be tied up. Hands, feet, legs, and arms. Don't worry about the ones wearing hides, they're Tyree's people. If they try to hurt anyone tied up, stun them, but nothing more. Doctor, what're we looking like in terms of injuries?"

"Not bad." Hatfield straightened up from the man he was bending over. "So far, it looks to be nothing more than minor cuts and scratches."

"Good." Lincoln then began helping the final team to beam down as they moved the supplies out of the landing zone.

Either Sybok or Aphroodle, Lincoln didn't know which, had decided to that there needed to be four different versions of heliographs. Two were nearly identical tripod units, except of different heights, one was a large unit, designed to be mounted on a large tower, and the last one was a compact unit that could be worn on the chest of the operator. All of them were simply designed, so that they could be easily replicated by the natives and used either a candle or an oil lamp for illumination, save for the large one, which required a small fire.

Captain's Log: Stardate 4225.6 The only casualty from the raid was the lone sentry of the Hill People who was killed as part of the diversion. Despite some objections from Tyree and his people, we were able to capture all of the raiders alive. Now, the task is to see if we can open relations with the village people.

Myself, Sybok, Dr. Hatfield, and twelve of the ship's crew that beamed down to the surface, are taking half of the captured villagers, as well as some of the books, printing presses, and heliographs to the village, in hopes of opening negotiations with Apella, the leading elder of the village. The remaining twelve members who beamed down to the planet are staying behind in the Hill People's camp, not only to guard the remaining prisoners, but to begin the process of teaching the Hill People how to read and how to use the heliographs.

My hope is that by only delivering half our prisoners to the village people, they will agree to a truce with the Hill People, and this will allow us to start teaching them as well. If we should fail in our mission, I take full responsibility, and recommend that any personnel killed be given posthumous commendations.

"Why are you doing this?" The villager, Lincoln learned was named Nonac and was the leader of the raid, asked. Like the other members of the raiding party who were being returned to the village, had his arms and hands bound tightly about him. Unlike the others, he also had a large white flag on stick dangling from his bindings and was in at the head of the group walking in the direction of the village.

"Because," Lincoln was walking behind the man, with his phaser pointed at him. "You people have been corrupted by the Dark Skinned Ones, and if we don't help you to learn how to be civilized, then you'll either wipe yourselves out, or become slaves to the Dark Skinned Ones. We don't wish that to happen."

"The Dark Skinned Ones are our friends!" Nonac stumbled, but managed to recover before he fell. "They gave us the thundersticks!"

"And rewarded you for killing the Hill People, who were your friends before the Dark Skinned Ones arrived." Lincoln's tone was dour. "Its an old 'game' my people call 'divide and conquer.' To defeat an enemy, you get him to split off into two groups and then trick them into fighting one another. Then, when one of them emerges victorious, you attack him, because he is now smaller and weaker than he was before you divided his forces.

"Had you and the Hill People remained friends, the Dark Skinned Ones would have been forced to find some other place to conquer, and many of your friends and family might still be alive."

"I do not believe this. Why would they do that?"

"Because this place is a paradise and has much to offer, but they have an agreement with us that your people are to be left alone until you decide who you want to be friends with. Given your nature, if left alone, you would most likely not choose to be friends with the Dark Skinned Ones. So they give you the thundersticks, and tell you to kill your friends the Hill People. Turning paradise into a nightmare, and making it easy to conquer your people."

They reached the flat ground, which meant they were just over a kilometer away from the village. Lincoln halted the procession and motioned for Sybok to come over to him.

"Take your Tricorder and scan for the location of any sentries that might be waiting for us."

"It doesn't appear that they have seen us, yet." Sybok said as he studied the readings. "There's a lot of activity in the village, so its probably only a matter of time before someone comes this way."

"Ok," Lincoln moved so he was in front of Nonac, facing him. "We're going to remain here. You're going to walk to the village and tell Apella that we're here under a flag of truce, which means that we will do you no harm. Explain to him that he and his closest advisors are to come here, unarmed, so that we may talk. If he does this, the people we have brought with us will be set free, and we will give him gifts greater than any the Dark Skinned Ones have given him. We will discuss releasing the others being held in the Hill People's camp when he comes. If any of my people are harmed, or he does not agree to come out here unarmed, he will never see the people we have captured again. Do you understand?"

"I understand."

"Now, go!"

Nonac ran towards the village carefully, trying not to stumble and fall as he went.

"Ok, prisoners," Lincoln said once he was sure Nonac was out of earshot. "Sit down and don't say anything. The rest of you take cover as best you can. I don't know how well we can trust the villagers to honor the terms, so I want to be prepared in case they try something. Sybok, Brigman, I want the two of you to take a forward position. If the villagers head this way carrying weapons, I want you to stun them as soon as they're in range. Disarm them while they're out, then fall back to your cover, and wait for them to wake up. I don't want to kill any of these people unless we absolutely have to."

Surprisingly, the prisoners obeyed their instructions. There was some confusion amongst the crew about what to do with the sleds laden with the gear that they'd drug this far. Eventually, they decided to leave them where they were, so that the villagers could see that there were gifts, as promised. Lincoln took up position behind the prisoners in order to keep an eye on them. Then, they waited in the warm sun.

He'd been standing there for about half an hour when his communicator beeped.

"Lincoln here."

"Sybok here, captain. Just thought I'd let you know that the villagers are in sleepytown right now."

"What happened?"

"A dozen of the villagers were headed in this direction, half of them armed. Brigman and I stunned them and disarmed them, just as you ordered. They'll probably be out for another fifteen minutes."

"When they come to, Sybok, I want either you or Brigman to inform them that they will not be allowed to return to the village until they come to see me. Stun them if you have to, but I don't want them going back there until I've had a chance to talk to Apella."

"Understood, Sybok out."

"Remember this moment!" Lincoln spoke loudly so that all the prisoners could hear him. "My people could have killed your people, but we choose not to, because we wish to talk. We believe that there is more to be gained by talking, than there is by killing."

Lincoln then waited, assuming that Sybok would be calling him back in a few minutes to let him know that the villagers were on their way. Instead, the time began to drag on.

NM duplicate post.

It was two hours before Lincoln heard from Sybok, and then the news was not at all what he expected.

"Captain, this just isn't working." Sybok's frustration was evident in his voice.

"What's wrong?" Lincoln stared at the prisoners, still seated uncomfortably in the hot sun. Several of them had soiled themselves.

"Well, we stunned them, took away their weapons, and then after they woke up, explained to them that they were going to have to come and see you."

"So? What's wrong?"

"Instead of heading in your direction, they turned and tried to run back to the village, so we stunned them again. When they woke up, we told them that they were going to have to go see you, and again, they tried to make a break for it, so we stunned them again. Captain, that's all we've been doing for the past two hours."

Lincoln smacked his forehead with his communicator before speaking again.

"Ok, Sybok. Just start dragging them up here while they're out. Maybe once they see that everybody's alive, they'll hold still long enough for us to talk to them."

"Ok, and Henry, could you please not hit yourself with you communicator? Its painfully loud on this end when you do that."

"Sorry, Sybok. Lincoln out." He returned his communicator his belt and sighed heavily. "God, you people are so stupid!"

Chief Engineer's Log: Stardate 4225.6 We orbit Neural moon. Have meeting with engineering teams to plan Neural defense.

Despite most of the engineering department and nearly all of the ship's other crews being on the moon, busily dismantling the wrecked Klingon ship, the main conference room was still standing room only, with just the senior officers and the heads of the engineering teams. Aphroodle called the meeting to order once he was certain everyone was in the room.

"Shut up!" Aphroodle pounded the table to make sure he had everyone's attention. "Doz, Stamper, Terence smart. Have big idea. They talk."

"Ok," Terence was the first of the trio to speak. Slides appeared on the Visiscreen behind him that presented bullet points of his comments. "The way we see it, there are a number of issues we have to take into account in designing a defense system for this planet.

"The first is that we have no idea how long its going to need to last. Starfleet regulations prohibit us from having significant interference in a primitive society until they have developed warp drive. Of course, we're violating those regulations now, but we were kind of forced into this position by the Klingons. Still, while we'll be able to get a pass on what we're doing, because we managed to salvage considerable valuable information from the Klingon ship, there's no way we can talk Starfleet into sending routine repair ships to this system. We also don't know how long its going to take the natives to come up with warp drive.

"On Earth, it took us approximately five and a half thousand years to go from where the natives are today to the discovery of warp drive, depending upon how you want to look at things. If civilizations like Rome, ancient Greece, or the Indus Valley Civilization hadn't collapsed, we might have gotten there sooner. Those of you from planets other than Earth, don't ask me how to compare it to your world, I never took Comparative Civilizations at the Academy."

Terence paused to let the small murmur of laughter die down before he continued.

"We're also handing the Neuralians a variety of information which appeared at different times in various civilizations. In some ways, they're now equal to an Industrial Age society on Earth, in other ways, they're more advanced. Our best bet, I think, is to aim for a system that's still functional ten thousand years from now. That way, if something goes wrong, and they have several regressions, there's still a defense system protecting them.

"Which raises two big problems for us," he continued. "The first is that it has to have enough power and be reliable enough to last that long. The second is that in ten thousand years, or even a dozen, the power of the weapons won't be enough to defeat the shields of a starship. Thankfully, the limitations of Klingon technology have given us a solution to these problems.

"Since Klingons would rather be out there dying in battle, than fixing their equipment, they've made it dead simple, for greater reliability. Which means there's tons of redundancy in the parts they use. Even with taking their main computer system and data banks, combined with the fact that the bulk of the ones used in the defense system are going to be idle for most of their operational life. We can provide an incredible amount of back up systems, and our estimates are, with even the normal failure rate of a ship that often sees combat, we'll have enough functioning systems at the end of ten thousand years to ensure that Neural will be protected for a thousand more, if they need it.

"Next, because unlike us, the Klingons aren't nearly as skilled at building micro-containment vessels for anti-matter, their photon torpedoes are stored without warheads and with their containment vessels empty. The anti-matter needed for them is kept in large vessels in the weapons bay, and when they ready for combat, it is flash-pumped into the torpedoes, providing both power and the warhead.

"So, we're going to program the system to fire torpedoes at any targets which enter orbit around Neural. We're also going to adjust the storage capacity of the vessels so that they can hold millions of times more anti-matter than they do now. Once the torpedoes are gone, the defense system's computer will use that anti-matter to power the disrupter banks. It will be able to pump enough juice through those banks that the disrupters can cut through pure neutronium in pico-seconds. That should protect them against any meddlers for a long time to come."

"Where's that anti-matter going to come from?" A voice asked.

"We're going to construct solar arrays and use the Berry-Rodden Process to create it. It'll produce about a pound a day, which doesn't sound like much, but over the centuries, it'll really start to add up." Terence's reply had all the ease of someone who'd thought a problem out completely. "I'll let Stamper take it from here."

Terence stepped back and away from the screen, allowing Stamper to move forward.

"Besides the issues that Terence raised, we have a couple of other problems." Stamper began. "The first is that nobody knows what Klingon starships are going to look like in the future, and there's an almost infinite number of designs for ships that unscrupulous folks like Harry Mudd or Cyrano Jones might use when they decide to stop by and exploit the natives. There's really only one solution that's secure, and that's to program the system to fire upon any ship that doesn't come from Neural. This means, once we leave this system, nobody comes back, until the Neuralians have developed the technology to travel to their moon. Upon detecting the presence of Neuralian DNA, the system will automatically shutdown.

"Now, to prevent anyone from accidentally entering the system and getting blown to bits, we'll place warning beacons at the edges of their solar system informing anyone approaching that their ship will be destroyed if they travel to Neural. After that, if they decide to enter the system, well, they're screwed.

"Our next problem is the most critical: What happens if the containment vessels fail? The Neuralians will be left defenseless, but that's not necessarily the big worry. A few hundred years from now, if the vessels fail, they'll release enough energy to shift the moon in its orbit, which would be disastrous for Neural. In a few thousand years, it'll be enough to shatter the moon, sending massive amounts of debris raining down on Neural.

"Here is our solution," behind Stamper on the screen appeared a graphic of Neural's moon, showing a cross section of the moon, with a large hollow space where the core once was and four large tunnels extending to the surface. "We're going to construct tunnels leading to the center of the moon, which we will then hollow out. The containment vessels will be located in what used to be the core, if they blow, then the path of the explosions will be through the tunnels, which will keep the moon intact, and make minimal changes to its orbit, if any."

"How the hell are we going to get all that shit out of there?" A voice shouted. "It'll take ages to cut through that with the ship's phasers! Even if we use the Klingon's disrupters, it won't be quick!"

"We're going to use the mining technique developed by our own Chief Engineer, Mr. Aphroodle." Stamper smiled. "By using the ship's transporters, along with the ones on the Klingon ship, we'll simply beam the material out. If the tunnels seem unstable, we can seal the walls using the ship's phasers. Our estimate is that it'll take no more than a week to do this."

"What're we going to do with all the left over material? Just pile it up on the surface? That moon's got a gravity field lumpier than our moon. It'll be a bitch trying to land on there with chemical rockets. You can't expect the Neuralians to wait until they develop nuclear power to go to their own moon." Another voice asked.

"Some of the material will be distributed over the moon's surface to give it a smoother gravity field, some of it we'll scatter on the surface of Neural, and some of it we'll place in orbit around the moon."

"Why?" The first voice asked.

"For much of human history, we thought that everything revolved around the Earth because we couldn't see any moons orbiting the other planets out there. Hopefully, by having a moon orbiting their moon, the Neuralians won't make the same mistake, even if something happens and they lose all the knowledge we're giving them."

"Its a nice idea, but it won't work." Someone else said. "You can't have a stable orbit around that moon for very long unless you plan on making periodic adjustments to the orbit."

"It doesn't have to stay up there forever," Stamper replied. "We only need it to be visible for a few thousand years. That should be long enough to deeply embed it into their culture, no matter what happens. Its sudden appearance will no doubt inspire a great number of stories, and if it one day disappears, or crashes on the side of the moon visible to Neural, it'll make a huge impression. On Earth, it took centuries for Western astronomers to have the courage to defy Church beliefs about the unchanging nature of the cosmos and mention events in the skies. Even if there's an unwavering belief amongst the people that the skies do not change, having a small moon disappear, potentially in a great explosion, will be cause for comment. Doz will now explain the construction of the defense system."

Doz stepped forward, and behind him, on the screen, appeared the image of a tall, knobby looking tower on the moon's surface, with a round opening near the center of the spiked dome that capped the tower.

"Ok, I won't spend too much time describing what the tower looks like, as you can see the illustration of it there." He began. "The base of it will be ten meters in diameter, and the tower itself will be eight hundred meters tall. Located on the equator of the moon, it will be able fire upon any target entering orbit around Neural, regardless if that orbit is polar, equatorial, or some other.

"We're going to strip the armor plating from the wrecked Klingon ship and use it to re-enforce the Nixon's armor. The remaining superstructure of the ship will serve as the basis of the framework of the tower. We'll use some of the material we've mined from the moon to make thick walls for the tower, to protect it from meteor impacts.

I'm really liking this, but it's pacing is quite...varied. Right now it's going WAY to slow.

I appreciate the feedback. I honestly thought that this was something that I could just bang out in a few days, but as you can see, it's taking a bit longer than that. This is just a first draft (not that I'm planning on going on revising it ATM), and if I could afford the time to go back and look at things, I'm sure I could tighten it up a bit. I can tell you that this part is a set up for something that comes later. Hopefully, the pay off will be worth it.

"To the south of the tower will be located two large, circular solar arrays, each eighty meters in diameter. These will provide power for the Berry-Rodden process, and will be protected from impacts by the deflector screens cannibalized from the Klingon ship."

"Why don't we use them to protect the Nix'? We could just build larger solar arrays for the defense system to compensate for any damage." T'shaani, the Andorian asked.

"We don't know if they'll be compatible with our systems, and it'll save a large amount of time by not building the extra arrays. We will be bringing the auxiliary systems with us, to turn over to Starfleet, and if one of them 'just happens' to be compatible with our systems we might keep it for, um 'field testing' if you know what I mean.

"Now, if there's no further questions?" There were none. "Good, then we'll begin handing out the assignments. Each one of you will be in charge of a group of ten members of the regular crew. We've tried to break the crew up so that the more technically savvy members will be assigned to the harder operations, but there's always at least one idiot in every group, so be prepared to babysit someone. When you get your assignments, grab your gear and your assigned crew members.

"Once you're down on the moon, you're going to be there for a while, as the transporters are going to be tied up in mining operations, so if you need something, you'll have to wait for one of the shuttles to show up at your base camp to take you back to the ship, assuming it has room. My advice is pack everything you think there's a remote chance you might need, and be prepared to stay there until we're done."

The meeting broke up into groups as people got their assignments and began going off to get the things they needed.


Apella was trying to sleep, but someone kept slapping him, lightly, on the face, while calling his name. It was annoying and he wished it would stop, he was enjoying his nap. Of course, now that he thought about it, he wasn't terribly comfortable. His arms seemed to be pinned to his side, and it felt like he was standing up, not laying down. What was going on? If he wanted to find out, he was going to have to open his eyes, which would mean that his nap would be over, and he very much wanted the nap to continue. It was so enjoyable.

Still, it wasn't nearly as pleasant as it once was, what with all the face slapping and the calling of his name. Maybe if he opened his eyes and told the person to go away, he could go back to his nap in peace. Yes, that's what he would do. Hopefully, he wouldn't be awake so long that he was unable to return to sleep. He was, after all, the leader of the village, and people would obey him if he told them to leave him alone.

He opened his eyes and began screaming. Before him stood, not one of his villagers, nor even one of the Hill People, but a man unlike any he'd ever seen before. The man's skin was a dark brown, almost black, color, with tight, curly hair. He was clearly not one of the Dark Skinned Ones, like Krell. Somewhere, in the back of his mind, Apella realized that the reason why he was so uncomfortable during his nap was because he'd been tied to a tree.

Oh, I wasn't kidding when I said that I appreciated the feedback. Anyone reading this is welcome to whatever comments they want. Be as brutal as Captain X is about the new Trek movie if you want. If you don't say anything, then I just have to assume that I haven't made any mistakes, which is certainly not the case.

"Captain! He's awake!" Brigman shouted in the direction of the bushes where Lincoln had gone to relieve himself.

"I thought that might be what all the screaming was about." Lincoln responded while Apella was drawing a breath to commence screaming again. "If you can get him to shut up, ask him if the rule about leaving leaves of three be applies here as well. Never mind, I found something with four leaves. I'll wipe with that."

Lincoln emerged a few minutes later, fastening his pants. Apella was no longer screaming, not because he'd calmed down, but because Brigman had stuffed a piece of cloth in Apella's mouth. Lincoln approached Apella, hoping that his smile wouldn't seem menacing.

"I tell you what," Lincoln stood just in front of Apella. "I'll take the gag out of your mouth, if you promise to stop screaming. Do we have a deal?"

Apella mumbled something through the cloth. Lincoln took that as a "yes" and removed it.

"My apologies for all this, but I wasn't sure that you'd be willing to talk to us, and I'm here to make you an offer."

"Who are you? What do you want? Why have you tied me up?" Apella's voice trembled with fear.

"My name is Henry Lincoln, what I want is to talk to you, and the reason I've tied you up is because you kept trying to run away."

"I've nothing to say to you."

"That's too bad, because while my people will do you no harm, I'm certain that the Hill People will kill the lot of you, once we let you go, if you don't agree to talk with me."

"Untie me then, and I'll talk."

Lincoln pulled out his phaser, made sure it was still set to stun, and nodded his head at Brigman, who stepped behind the tree Apella was bound to, and began untying the ropes.

"If you run, I'll stun you, tie you back up, and we'll start all over again." Lincoln pointed his phaser at Apella. "I don't have a lot of time, and if you want your people to live, I suggest you keep your word."

"I always keep my word, Henry Lincoln." Apella, his arms free, began rubbing spots where the ropes had dug into his skin. "What is it that you have to say to me? I warn you, when Krell returns, he'll not be happy to hear what you've done."

"Were Krell to return, I think he'd be as likely to kill you for being a coward, as he would kill me for being Federation. Of course, there's no danger of that happening. Krell's dead."

"Impossible! Krell told me that his people are the greatest warriors to ever live! They've never been defeated!" Apella jutted his chin skyward.

"Did you see that fire on the moon some nights ago?" A wry smile traced itself along Lincoln's lips.

"Yes."

"That was Krell's ship. It crashed into the moon, killing everyone on board. He's not coming back."

"I don't believe you."

"Of course not. That'd be too easy." Lincoln ignored Apella's quizzical look. "Here's what I'm offering you, right now, we're teaching Tyree's people our most powerful magic, and we're giving them tools to use that magic in ways you can't even imagine. My people will teach your people that same magic, and give you the same tools, if you agree to stop killing Tyree's people. Refuse, and only Tyree's people will get it, and by the time we leave, they will be able to kill every one of your people."

"But, if you give us your magic, will Tyree's people continue to kill our people?"

"Tyree has given me his word that if you do not harm his people, he will not harm yours."

"Tell me about this magic of yours."

Lincoln explained, as best he could, about books, printing presses, heliographs, proper medical proceedures, and the various philosophies that they had given Tyree's people. He carefully chose his words, in order to not reveal that Tyree was tired of killing, and that much of the philosophies were related to non-violence. Apella was clearly a timid man at heart, and had been goaded into killing by Krell. If Lincoln could make Apella think that Tyree was a bloodthirsty warrior, eager to wipe out the village people unless they accepted what Lincoln was offering them, then there was a good chance that a truce might hold between the two groups long enough for Lincoln and his people to get some sense knocked into the natives.

For his part, Apella listened objectively to what Lincoln told him, and became excited when he saw a demonstration of the heliograph and the printing press. He was further impressed when the men who'd been captured on the raid assured him that they had been treated well, and that the others were unharmed.

"I am amazed by these things that you've shown and told me, Henry Lincoln." Apella began. "But-"

"Of course, there's a but." Lincoln muttered, dryly.

"But Krell has promised me that if I listen to him, I will be the ruler of this world. Can you promise me the same?"

"You know, for someone who grew up in a pacifist society, you're sure are a power hungry fuckstick." Lincoln spoke without thinking, and immediately regretted his words.

"A what?"

"Uh, a person who has unique passions." Lincoln hoped that would cover his previous comments.

"Thank you, but Krell promised me I'd rule this world, and that is what I want to do. So, unless you can say the same, I see no reason why I should listen to you."

"I can promise you this, if you do not listen to me, it will be Tyree who rules this world. Not you. If you listen to me, you might get to rule this world, that will be up to your people to decide. Tyree's people have taken the gifts we've offered them, and they are learning the magic as we speak. You and your people still have time to catch up to them, and can even learn faster, if you try hard enough. We will help you as much as we can, until we have to leave, but if you don't want our help, then the gifts we were going to give to you, and the help in learning how to use them will be given to Tyree.

"That means in less than a year, they will have thundersticks that will be able to kill many people with one shot. They will also know how to heal many of their people that you shoot. And they will know how to use the talking lights and that will enable them to bring their allies here, to kill you, without you knowing anything about it. It is your choice. Peace with Tyree's people, and much wisdom and magic, will be your reward. Continue your war with his people, and they will wipe you out in a year or two."

"But I want to be ruler of the world!" Apella stamped his foot, childishly. "Krell promised me I'd be the ruler of the world!"

"Listen, you primitive screwhead," Lincoln sighed. "I can promise you that if you don't accept our help, you'll all be dead. If you do accept our help, and I can promise you that there's a good chance you'll rule the world, if you're a wise and noble man."

"That sounds like work! I don't want to have to do work if I'm the ruler of the world! I want to be ruler so I can make other people do the work!"

"If that's the case, then the last thing you want to be is the ruler." Lincoln's tone turned confident. He believed he'd finally found the right hook with which to land Apella.

"What do you mean? As the ruler, if I tell someone to do something, they'll do it! Its as simple as that!"

"And, if you tell them something that doesn't work, they'll blame you. Do that enough times, and they'll kill you. What you want to be is the Advisor to the ruler."

"Advisor? What good is that? I don't want to be some useless cunt who just stands around, waiting for the ruler to ask me a question, I want to be giving orders to people!"

"Come here," A sly smile shown on Lincoln's face, and he drew Apella away from the others. "Only stupid Advisors stand around waiting to be asked questions. A smart Advisor knows to offer his ruler advice before he's asked for it. He also knows how to play the field."

"Play the field?" The phrase meant absolutely nothing to Apella.

"Oh, yeah," Lincoln made a show of looking around to see if anyone was within earshot. "You see, a good Advisor is someone people will talk to, before they talk to the ruler. If they're at all worried that the ruler will tell them something they don't want to hear, they'll ask his Advisor first, because they know that the ruler listens to his Advisor, and if they can get the Advisor on their side before they speak to the ruler, then they know the ruler is more likely to want to help them. Plus, an exceptional Advisor, and I think you might just be able to be one, will know just how popular his ruler is.

"Let's say, for example, that Tyree becomes ruler, and you're his Advisor. Now, if he fails to listen to your good advice and the people become angry with him, they'll probably want to kill him. You could explain things to him, and get him to understand the mistakes he's made, or, if its obvious to you that he'll never learn, you'll know who among the people would make a good ruler. You can approach that person, explain the situation to them, and enable them to become the ruler. Naturally, since you helped them become ruler, they'll want to reward you generously, and they'll also need your help, because you'll know more about being ruler than they do. Unlike a ruler, a good Advisor knows he has nothing to worry about, he will always have a job."

"I don't believe you."

"Tell me," Lincoln thought he smelled blood. "Was Krell a smart man?"

"Oh, very!" Apella was excited. "He knows so many things. He's the one who told me how to get my people to kill the Hill People!"

"So, what Krell was, then, was your Advisor."

A wave of realization washed over Apella's face. At that moment, Lincoln knew he'd sold Apella on the idea. He'd have to explain a few things to Tyree, but there was no question, now, that the two groups would be able to co-exist peacefully once more. Kirk may have thought that handing both sides weapons was a practical solution to the problem, but had he been willing to exert a little more thought, he'd have seen the better option. Of course, if Kirk could have seen a better option, then he wouldn't need Section 7G following him around, fixing his mistakes.

"I'll do it!" Apella's face shown radiantly. "You may tell Tyree that I agree to his terms."

"Excellent!" Lincoln turned to face where the others were, and shouted. "Brigman! Sybok! Let 'em go! Apella's agreed to our terms!"

"My people," Apella spoke as he rejoined the group. "Henry Lincoln has offered us many gifts if we cease killing the Hill People. I have agreed to this, for he is giving us much more than Krell ever promised us."

"What happens when Krell returns?" One of Apella's men shouted.

"Henry Lincoln says that Krell is dead, and is never coming back. I do not know if this is true or not, but if Krell does return, then I will demand that he give us gifts equal to those that Henry Lincoln is offering us. If he does not, I will send him away, for Henry Lincoln has demonstrated to me that he is the greater man than Krell."

Once all of Apella's men were freed, they helped the members of Lincoln's party gather up the items they'd brought and began heading towards the village. Lincoln pulled both Sybok and Hatfield to the side.

"Gentlemen, I'm leaving you two in charge, while I go talk to Tyree and get him to release the rest of Apella's people." Lincoln told them. "Until I rejoin you, I authorize you to take whatever steps you feel are necessary--"

Sybok's arched eyebrow stopped Lincoln, he sighed.

"Yes, Sybok, even that." Lincoln unsuccessfully tried to conceal his frustration with Sybok's seemingly one track mind. "Do whatever you feel is necessary to ensure the success of this mission. If you feel your lives are in danger, don't hesitate to stun anyone, but only kill as a last resort. I want check-ins from you every hour. Apella says that he's willing to work with us, but who knows the kind of things the Klingons have filled their heads with. This could still be a trap. On your way."

The three parted ways, and Lincoln began a fast jog back towards the Hill People's camp, his mind running over the possibilities of what could happen. He hated leaving his people with the villagers, with the ship now in orbit around Neural's moon, there was no way he could order the stunning of the entire village if he thought that things were going badly. There were times when Kirk's "Shoot first, and fuck asking questions" attitude made sense, but this really wasn't one of them. These people needed some kind of protection, and simply handing them weapons wasn't enough to ensure that both cultures would be able to survive. His "Just give them weapons and walk away" solution, if you could call it a "solution," was the same kind of short-sighted solution that led to the various wars of the early 21st Century. While its better to not muck about in the affairs of other people, if you're going to do it, then you'd better be prepared to do it for the long haul.

The men who rebuilt Europe after the second global war understood that, but it seemed like everyone else forgot that in the generations afterwards. They'd show up, and either hand the locals a bunch of weapons then leave, or they'd blow the shit out of a country, do a half-assed job of fixing things, and then leave. Even after this bit them on the ass repeatedly, they continued to do it, and the problems only became worse after the various major powers came to be wholly controlled entities of multi-national corporations. Only after the Resource Wars did humanity find the proper methods of restraining both governments and corporations, though the solution was far from perfect, as it so locked up certain technological innovations that even centuries later people were still suing one another over who had the rights to what. It was a wonder that humanity hadn't been outpaced by the rest of the galaxy.

Reaching the camp, Lincoln found Tyree studiously trying to follow the instructions being given by one of the Nixon's crew on how to write. Lincoln indicated to Tyree that he had something important to discuss with him, and Tyree quickly came over to where Lincoln was standing.

"How did it go?" Tyree asked.

"Mostly it went well. It took some time before I could get Apella to listen to me, but he has agreed to stop killing your people, provided you agree to a few things."

"What are those?"

"The first is that you release his people that you're holding."

"Done. I will see to it that they are returned to their people as soon as we're finished talking. What else?"

"This one's a bit more complicated." Lincoln hoped that he'd be able to explain things so that Tyree would understand that Lincoln hadn't committed Tyree to this possibility, but that there was a chance it could happen, and that Tyree had best be prepared for the worst. "Krell had promised Apella that one day Apella would be the ruler of the planet. I made no such promise to Apella, and explained to him that that could still happen if Apella was a decent man."

"And he was happy with this?"

"No." Lincoln sighed. "I tried making him think that you were willing to go on killing his people if you thought it was necessary, hoping he'd agree to peace. But it didn't work. He was insistent that he wanted to be the ruler and that he wouldn't lay down his arms until I made such a promise. I finally convinced him that being the ruler wasn't as good a job as he thought it was, and that being an Advisor to the ruler was a better job."

"So, he expects me to rule and he will be my Advisor?"

"Probably, but I never said that you would agree to the idea. I plan on letting you and the village people decide all of that. I will say, however, that if you decide to make Apella your Advisor, that you keep a close eye on him. He may serve you well, then again, he may decide that you're not listening to him enough and try to have you killed."

"This is not good. I do not want to continue the killing for any reason."

"I understand, and believe me, if I could have gotten Apella to agree to peace any other way, I certainly would have. There is a way for you to minimize any threat he might pose to you, though."

"What is that?"

"Amongst my people, we have a form of leadership known as 'democracy.' Sybok's prepared books on it, so don't feel you have to understand it fully now. The general idea is fairly simple. Every so many years, say four, for example, my people get together and pick a new leader. That leader rules for four years, then another is chosen to rule for four more. We sometimes pick the same leader more than once, but never more than twice.

"It is not a perfect solution, but it does solve a number of problems. If your people adopt such a system, then there is less of a chance that Apella, or some other Advisor would want to kill you, since you'd only be a leader for a short period of time."

"And when a person is no longer a leader, what happens to them?"

"Some of them go on to do great works, others sit around and grow fat, and others become Advisors to the new leader. Its really up to them."

"If I wanted to sit around and smoke narito and sleep with women, could I do that?"

"Yes, in fact, it'd probably be better for everyone if that's all you did."

"I like this idea!"

Captain's Log: Stardate 4255.5 We've been on this planet for over three weeks now, and outside of a few minor problems caused by Sybok's "teaching methods" we have been successful restoring the peaceful balance to this world. We've also managed to start both the Hill People and the villagers on the path of democracy, I'm pleased to say. Our efforts to teach the natives to read have gone well, but there is only so much you can teach someone in the brief amount of time we've been here. Several of the crew have volunteered to remain behind to continue the process after we leave. They know that by doing so, they will be trapped on this world for the rest of their lives, but they figure that this offers them greater opportunities than if they were to remain with Section 7G. I have granted their requests, and we have even found a way to aid them after we're gone.

It seems that unlike Federation starships, Klingons do not have a central computer which runs everything on board their ships. Instead, they have a number of individual computers, each one dedicated to running one part of the ship, or installed in each crew member's cabin, along with multiple backups. This has allowed us to transport a few of them down to the planet, where they will be used as teaching aids, to accelerate the process of advancing Neuralian society. An unexpected bonus of doing this is that the Klingon computers do not recognize Federation DRM, enabling us to provide them with even more teaching material.

Myself, and the other members of the crew who're not remaining behind on Neural, have returned to the ship, and are in orbit around Neural's moon. We're here to pick up the last of the engineering teams, before heading out to place the warning beacons at the edge of the solar system, and then on to find out what Kirk's managed to fuck up in our absence.

The Turbolift doors opened and Lincoln, Sybok, and Dr. Hatfield stepped out onto the bridge. Sybok took his place at the science station, and Aphroodle stood up from the captain's chair, turning to face Lincoln and Hatfield.

"Mr. Aphroodle," Lincoln said. "I cannot commend you enough for the excellent job you've done. Not only have you managed to accomplish an impossible task, but you've done it in record time.

"The same goes for the rest of you," Lincoln looked at the others on the bridge. "There's not a crew in Starfleet that could have done a better job. It's an honor to serve with you, and I will be recommending all of you for promotions and commendations."

There was a burst of applause. Lincoln waited a moment, and then held up his hand to indicate he had more to say.

"Of course," he continued. "Starfleet will ignore my recommendations, and you'll all still be stuck on this ship at your current ranks and pay. I will find a way to make this up to you. Perhaps if Kirk doesn't fuck things up too badly, we can sneak off and pay a visit to that shore leave planet again.

"Now, while we're waiting for word from the engineering teams that they're ready to go, I want to take a look at this defense system you've built. Could someone put it up on screen?"

Cornrows pushed a few buttons on her console, and an image of the tower appeared on the screen.

"Why does that look familiar to me?" Hatfield said softly.

"Oh, myyyy!" Chi-Chi exclaimed upon seeing the image. "I've had a few Klingon dicks in my day, but none of them were quite so big!"

"For chrissakes, Henry!" Hatfield snapped. "We've just built the galaxy's largest dildo!"

"Speaking from experience, captain." Chi-Chi was almost purring as he spoke. "There's nothing quite like the kind of fucking you get from a good, hard, Klingon cock. So I, for one, think its quite an appropriate design."

"Um, yes," Lincoln cleared his throat awkwardly. "I'll just have to make sure I don't include a full image of it my report."

"Captains," Cornrows interrupted. "I's gots a message froms the engineers. Theys says its gonna takes longer than theys thought to get everything done. Theys suggest thats if yous in a hurries, we's should proceed with deployings the beacons, and they'll catch up to us with the shuttles oncets theys got it finished and activated."

"Inform them that we'll be moving out." Lincoln sank slowly into his chair. "Have them contact us when they're ready to leave, with coordinates for a rendezvous point. Helm, lay in a course for the first deployment point, full impulse, and can someone get that giant dick off my screen?"

"Farewell, my lovely." Chi-Chi sighed as the image vanished from the screen. He punched in the necessary coordinates and engaged the impulse engines at full power.


"How's it coming, Terence?" Doz asked.

"It'd be coming a lot faster if I didn't have to wear this suit, or if it didn't have this stupid cheese grater over the faceplate. I told you we should have pressurized this thing so we could work on the insides without suits." Terence's reply was filled with frustration.

"Ok, so besides the fact that you're stuck in a spacesuit clearly designed by someone who had no idea what the hell they were doing, how's it going?" Doz rested his head on the control panel of the shuttle. He was tired, they all were tired. Weeks of working 20 hour days in spacesuits had taken their toll on everyone. All Doz wanted to do was go back to the Nixon, crawl into his bunk, and sleep for two months. Unfortunately, however, he and the crews of the other three shuttles were stuck waiting on the moon until Terence had finished up.

Most of the crew had returned to the ship, and all that were left on the moon were the engineering team members. Because they'd been pushing the shuttles pretty hard, it was decided that all of them would remain on the moon until everything was done. That way, if one of the shuttles had a critical failure, rescue would be close at hand. The defense system couldn't be activated remotely, since that offered the possibility that someone would later be able to hack it from a distance and deactivate it. So, they had installed a timer that would turn the system on after an hour had passed. That should give them not only enough time to get out of range of its weapons, but also ample cushion if something went wrong, and they had to attempt a rescue of one or more of the crews.

"I'm running the final checks now." This time, Terence's voice was heavy with fatigue. "I'm so fucking tired that I'm having trouble reading the gauges. I don't think we're having any troubles, but I need to wait a little more before I'm ready to set the timer, just to be sure."

The solar arrays were operating at maximum efficiency, the deflector screens protecting the arrays were at full strength. The containment field for the anti-matter located in the center of the moon was in no danger of collapsing, and new anti-matter was being produced at the expected rate. The disrupter banks were charged, and the automated photon torpedo filling and loading systems all reported that their systems were happy. The sensors could spot the pucker on a flea's bunghole an A.U. away, so that was essentially everything. Unless he'd misread something, but by now, he was so damned tired he didn't care.

"I'm setting the timer, get 'em warmed up." Terence was already pushing himself towards the exit as he spoke. Once outside, he bounced towards his shuttle, the Edsel, slightly drifting off to sleep on his upwards bounce, then rousting himself momentarily when he touched down, before nodding off as he rose back up. This seemed to work well, until he slammed into the side of the Edsel, because he hadn't paid attention to the distance before his last bounce.

It briefly woke him from the haze he found himself in, and he stumbled along the side of the shuttle until he found the door and tumbled through it. As soon as it had closed behind him, he ripped his helmet off and tossed it somewhere to the back of the shuttle before falling into the co-pilot's seat. A quick glance at everything told him that whomever it was that was in the pilot's seat, Terence couldn't think of her name at the moment, had the rendezvous point programmed into the nav computer.

"This is Edsel," he said as he fastened the newly added seatbelts. "We're 'GO' for flight."

"Roger," Doz's voice was almost as fatigued sounding as Terence's. "This is Pinto, we're 'GO' for flight."

"Yugo, is 'GO' for flight." A voice over the comm system said.

"Vega is 'GO' for flight." Another comm voice said.

"See you guys at the rendezvous point." Doz forced out through tired lips. "Five, four, three, two, launch!"

The four shuttles lifted off simultaneously and orientated themselves in the proper direction as they headed to where they planned to meet up with the Nixon.

"Hey," Terence couldn't tell where the voice was coming from, but it sounded like Stamper's, which meant it was coming from the Yugo. "Did anybody remember to tell the Nix' we're coming?"

"Aw, shiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit!" Did Terence say that? He didn't know, it sounded like his voice, but he didn't feel his mouth moving. "On it, now."


"Ready for final beacon deployment." Hussein said.

"Deploy beacon." Lincoln replied.

"Beacon away!"

"Captain!" There was panic in Sybok's voice. "I'm picking up three Klingon ships decloaking 10 kilometers away, off the starboard bow!"

"Shit! Helm, get us the fuck out of here, but don't leave the neighborhood!" Lincoln snapped. "Africa! Tell the shuttles to hurry it up! Aphroodle! Raise the shields and ready all weapons!"

"I canst, captain! They be jammin' us!" Cornrows informed Lincoln in response to his order to her.

"Fuck! What's the status on the Klingons, Sybok?"

"One's following us, the other two appear to be heading towards Neural."

"Damn. Tactical."

On the screen appeared a map of their section of the solar system. Two the Klingon ships were almost certainly heading for Neural, the third was sticking to their tail, despite Chi-Chi's efforts to shake them, or even put significant distance between the two ships. Lincoln began scanning the image, looking for something that they might be able to use to their advantage. They might be able to handle the Klingon in a fair fight, if the crew of the Nixon hadn't been working so many hours in the past month, but most of the crew was tired, and much of the routine maintenance on the ship had been neglected in order to speed up their work on Neural's moon. Even if they managed to beat the one ship, there were still two others to worry about. No way could the Nixon handle that many with a fully rested crew and a well maintained ship.

"Chi-Chi!" Lincoln had an idea. "That gas giant. Take us around it, and when we get the planet between us and the Klingon ship, drop us into the atmosphere."

"Captain," Chi-Chi's eyes and fingers never left the controls as he spoke. "I'm not sure I can drop our speed, and entering the atmosphere like that is going to be hard on the ship's structure."

"I don't want you to drop our speed when we hit the atmosphere. Cut all power to everything but the weapons, forward shields, and reduce the power to the inertial dampeners by a quarter. Use it to boost the forward shields and I want to you bring us out of the atmosphere when we're at the closest possible point to the projected course of that Klingon ship."

"Henry!" Sybok's voice was loud with agitation. "We could be killed! There'll be a massive plasma field around the ship, and the vacuum created in our wake will draw part of the atmosphere out with us."

"Aye, aye, captain!" Chi-Chi's fingers began an intricate dance over the controls.

"If we don't do something out of the ordinary, we will be killed. This ship's no match for three Klingon ships." Lincoln retorted as the lights went out and the Nixon plunged into the gas giant's atmosphere.

The plasma field formed almost instantly around the Nixon as it hit the thin wisps of the planet's atmosphere, and grew larger and brighter, as the ship dove deeper. There was a sharp shock on the crew as the ship transitioned out of vacuum, and a shuddering vibration set up in the ship almost immediately. The Klingon ship in pursuit, didn't see the entry of the Nixon into the gas giant's atmosphere, and the crew assumed that the Nixon was simply going to loop around the planet in a gravity assist maneuver. Since their ship was newer than the Nixon, her captain decided that they'd skip swinging around the planet and head to the point where the Nixon was most likely to reappear from behind it.

"These Federation puchpa' are such fools," Kerla chuckled. "We're almost directly behind them, and they think that they can hide behind a planet! That ship is at least fifty years old! I wouldn't send a puq out in a ship like that! Helm, hold our current position, and when those puchpa' show themselves, I want their ship crippled, not destroyed! This is the last known location of Krell's ship, they may know what happened to him."

"You don't think they had anything to do with it?" Ho'Ka asked.

"Of course not!" Kerla bellowed. "Krell might have been a fool, but even he could defeat such a ship as this."


"Captain," Chi-Chi said. "This plasma field is blocking our sensor readings. I can't tell where the Klingons are."

"Best guess, Mr. Chi-Chi," Lincoln replied. The bridge had an eerie glow, being lit solely by the image of the swirling plasma on the screen. "Ready to fire phasers and a full spread of photon torpedoes as soon as we're in space. Don't wait for the field to clear, and don't worry about getting a lock on the Klingons."


"I am picking up a strange plasma reading from the planet, captain." Ho'Ka said.

"Its a gas giant, all of them are strange, worthless things." Kerla replied.

"This one is moving too fast to be a natural phenomena, I think."

"Did our Federation 'friends' hit the atmosphere by mistake?" Kerla leaned forward in his seat, excitedly. "Take us in, closer. See if you can detect any signs of debris."

As the ship approached the planet, the mass of plasma erupted from the atmosphere and headed almost directly towards them. It quickly took on the shape of something out of Gre'Thor, to Kerla's eyes. He realized that the Federation ship hadn't been destroyed, but had deliberately flown through the upper atmosphere in order to lessen the time around the planet. It was a risky maneuver, one that nobody in their right mind would have undertaken, since it was so likely to be fatal.

"By Kahless! They're mad! Hard to port!" Kerla fell back in his seat, stunned at what he was seeing.


Chi-Chi fired the phasers, in a full sweep pattern. He had no idea where the Klingon ship might be, their sensors were still overloaded by the plasma field, and he figured that by doing the sweep, there was a chance that he'd at least wing the Klingon ship. Assuming they didn't collide into it. Seconds later, he fired the torpedoes, aiming them half a degree below the path of the phasers. This would better their odds of hitting something, if the phasers missed.

The charged nature of the plasma field was attracted to the energy of the phasers, wrapped itself around the beams and began following the course of the beams. Chi-Chi's aim had been close to where the Klingon ship was, and the beams clipped the edge of the deflector shield, which seethed with energy as it tried to dissipate the blast. This drew the plasma towards it, and the shield quickly collapsed, allowing the plasma to reach the hull. Crew members on the inside of the hull were electrocuted, and equipment which was closest to the point of impact that had been grounded to the hull had its safeties overloaded and exploded.

Alarms sounded all over the ship, and crew members raced to put out fires, or restore power to the shields. For a moment, it seemed as if they were going to gain the upper hand on the disaster, then one of the Nixon's torpedoes detonated close to the ship. The portion of the blast inside of the remaining deflector shields was reflected back upon the ship, tearing through the hull, and taking out the main power. They were dead in space and drifting.

Terence stared at the light blinking at him on the console. He knew it meant something, but his tired brain was so fogged that he couldn't remember what it might be. What had he been doing before that light came on? Let's see, they had just taken off, he'd sent a message to the Nix', telling them that they were on their way, and then the light came on. Wait! The light was tied in with the message, somehow! That was it! Still didn't tell him what it meant, though. The light was red, that usually meant something bad, so something about the message was bad. Oh, it was the "Delivery Failure" light, that's what it was. So, did he screw up the message somehow? No, everything looked okay. Well, why would they get a "Delivery Failure" light, then?

If it wasn't something he'd done, or any of the shuttle's systems, then it would have to be something wrong with the Nix's system. But text messages almost always went through, and if there was a failure, he wouldn't necessarily know about it. So, why was the light on? The only other reason it could be on, would be if they were being jammed. For that to happen, that would have to mean ---

"Fuck!" Terence shouted. "We're being jammed! There's goddamned Klingons in the system! Get us out of here!"

T'ocha, Terence remembered her name now, jabbed at the controls, activating the evasive maneuvers subroutines in the shuttle's systems. The shuttle veered up sharply in response to the program.

"Tell the others." T'ocha said.

"How?" Terence was wide awake, adrenalin having kicked in as he scanned the instruments for information as to where the Klingons might be. "We just have to hope that they've noticed we've changed course."

"How many Klingons? And what's their heading?"

"Looks like two ships, and they're heading in our direction. It might just be that they're on their way to Neural and haven't noticed us yet."

"We can't take that chance. How long 'til the defense system goes operational?"

"Maybe fifteen minutes."

"What are the other shuttles doing? Have they figured out what's going on?"

"Looks like it. They've each peeled off in a different direction."

"Good. Now, let's hope we can make it to Neural's moon before the Klingons can catch us!"



"Shit! hard to port!" Lincoln cried out as image of the drifting Klingon ship filled the viewscreen as the plasma began to dissipate.

Chi-Chi's fingers did the appropriate dance, and the crew felt themselves jerked as the ship rapidly changed direction and the underpowered dampeners failed to keep up with the demand placed on them. Lincoln's mind raced as he tried to plot their next move. He hadn't expected that they would be within collision distance of the Klingon ship when they emerged. If that ship was still operational, there was little the Nixon could do to successfully outrun it, and no chance that they could successfully repeat their surprise maneuver again.

"Sybok, status of the Klingon ship." Lincoln said.

"They might be fucked, captain. Their shields are down, and they appear to have lost main power."

"Chi-Chi, back off to a safe distance, and then blow them out of space."

"Captain?" Chi-Chi's voice was shocked, with no hint of a double entendre.

"Dat's murder!" Cornrows shouted.

"That's an order, Chi-Chi." Lincoln turned his chair to face Cornrows. "Its survival. Klingons don't believe in surrender. If they can't repair their ship, they'll try and lure us in to approaching their vessel, then self-destruct once we get close enough that they can be certain they'll take us out.

"If we leave them here, they'll do whatever they can to get their ship operational again and come after us. There's two more Klingon ships in this system that we have to deal with, and we have four shuttles with crew members out there, somewhere, just sitting ducks.

"Those Klingons," Lincoln gestured towards the screen. "Are dead already, its merely a question of who kills them. I vote that we do it, and we do it now. Fire, Chi-Chi."

"Where's the Klingons now?" T'ocha asked, her fingers still rapidly moving over the controls.

"They've split up. One's following the Yugo, and the other one's after us." Terence replied.

"Shit!" T'ocha said. "I don't know who's bright idea it was to have keyboard controls for a small ship like this, but if we make it out of this, I'm going to kill the bastard. Goddamned hard to fly this thing using just arrow keys. Fucking joysticks are good enough for airplanes for hundreds of years, but some asshole at Starfleet thinks that shuttles should be flown by keyboard! How far are we from Neural's moon?"

"About a million kilometers. While you're at it, kill whomever decided not to arm this thing. Even a gravitic mine would be handy right about now."


Chi-Chi fired a spread of torpedoes at the Klingon ship. They struck in rapid succession, ripping the ship to pieces. Most of the crew died in seconds, the rest struggled valiantly to get to spacesuits, with many failing to make it as the ship's artificial gravity disappeared. Those that successfully managed to suit up, quickly began to wonder if they hadn't chosen the more dishonorable way of dying. They had no way of knowing when, or if, they would be rescued, and there was no honor dying adrift in space.

"Sybok," Lincoln said as the glow of the exploding Klingon ship faded on the screen. "What's the status of the two other ships?"

"Both of them seem to be in pursuit of our shuttles. One of the shuttles is heading towards Neural, the rest are heading in different directions away from Neural. The shuttle heading to Neural is being pursued, as is the one headed towards Galactic North. Its not entirely clear what the other two shuttles are doing. They might be circling back around, or they could be heading out of the system."

"Are any of them outside of jamming range?"

"The Vega and the Pinto are."

"Lieutenant," Lincoln swiveled to face Cornrows. "Tell those two shuttles to head to the location of the last beacon we deployed and to wait for us there. If they don't hear from us in 30 minutes, or their long range sensors pick up Klingon vessels coming towards them, they're to get the hell out of here, and inform Starfleet command as soon as they think its safe to send a signal.

"Helm, lay in an intercept course for the Klingon ship headed towards Galactic North."


"Damned Klingons!" T'ocha snapped. "Fuckers are just toying with us! That ship's got the speed and the range that they could have taken us out by now, if they wanted to."

"They're probably just waiting to see where we go. Neural's moon is dead ahead."

"How long until the defense system's operational?"

"Any time now, if it's not already live."

"Okay, I just have to figure out how to get them in range of the defense system without getting us killed in the process."

T'ocha stabbed at the controls and the shuttle dove down to almost the surface of the moon. The terrain hugging algorithm kept them a few meters above the ground, as T'ocha kept them barely on the far side hemisphere, which was just outside the sensor range of the defense system. The Klingon ship remained several thousand kilometers behind and above the Edsel.

"Where's that opening? Where's that opening?" T'ocha muttered absentmindedly to herself as she scanned the view out the windows. The Klingons wouldn't calmly pursue them forever, and either they would have to find a way to escape the Klingons, or hope that the Nixon would come to their rescue. T'ocha wasn't about to rely on the Nix' coming to save them at the last minute. She knew that there was a better chance of the Nix' breaking down, than being useful at this moment. That meant if she couldn't find the opening, they were probably dead. No way was she going to allow the Edsel to be captured by those bastards. She'd blow up the shuttle first.

"Mr. Aphroodle," Lincoln pivoted his chair to face the Chief Engineer. "We're going to need something to take out that Klingon ship quickly. Right now, they're toying with our shuttle, but we get close, and the Klingons will use it as a bargaining chip against us. Unless we can take them out with our first shot, they'll open up on the shuttle, and her shields are no match for Klingon weapons."

"Aphroodle have idea!" He was nodding his head excitedly. "Dangerous, but will work!"

"Can you explain it to me, or is it just easier for you to do?"

"Easier me do. Need full control."

"Okay, everyone, turn over control of your stations to Mr. Aphroodle."

Aphroodle's fat fingers began a surprisingly delicate dance over the buttons at his station. He first set the ship's computer to calculating a projected course for the shuttle and her pursuer, then he began slowing the Nixon. He would need the distance between the ships to be relatively wide for his plan to work. This had the additional benefit in that it wouldn't spook the Klingons into doing something rash, like blowing up the shuttle, and then turning on the Nixon. Then he began working on some subroutines for the engines necessary for his plan to work.


"There's the opening!" T'ocha shouted. "Now, let's see if I can manage to get this bitch inside!"

The opening T'ocha was referring to was one of the tunnels they'd made. It was just barely wide enough for the shuttle to fit in, assuming that she could finagle the controls properly. It would have been so much easier to do this if she'd had a flight yoke to work with, instead of keyboard controls. The tunnel would afford them considerable safety. It was far too small for the Klingon ship to follow, and by the time the Klingons were able to angle their ship into position to fire a shot down the tunnel, the Edsel would be either out in space or hiding in the cavernous space which used to be the moon's core. T'ocha hadn't made up her mind what she was going to do, all she could think about right now, was getting the Klingon ship off her ass.

T'ocha began seemingly slapping the controls in rapid fire motion as they got closer to the opening. The Edsel arced up, and then dove bow first into the tunnel, her roof grazing the tunnel walls slightly as T'ocha and the automatic controls fought to get the shuttle into the center of the tunnel.

"So, now what?" Terence asked.

"I dunno," T'ocha replied. "Up until now, I was mainly worried about getting into the tunnel."

"Well, we can't just stay here for the rest of our lives! I'm supposed to be getting my legs waxed next week!"

T'ocha gave Terence the hairy eyeball.

"I'm kidding!" He said and T'ocha relaxed slightly. "I had my legs waxed a couple of days ago, so there's plenty of time before I have to worry about waxing them again."

T'ocha would have glared at Terence again, but they'd emerged into the center of the moon, and she wanted to move the shuttle out of the direct path of the tunnel, in case the Klingons decided they wanted to drop a torpedo or two down it. Once they were safely away from the opening, an idea began forming in her head. It was risky, but they really didn't have much choice. They had no idea what the status of the Nixon was. All they knew for certain was that there was a Klingon ship out there, somewhere, and that they had very limited rations if they wanted to stay down here in the depths of the moon before trying to escape.

Aphroodle finished entering the last of the commands into his console and turned to face Lincoln.

"Ready. Should grab before we go."

"Okay, folks," Lincoln said. "Everybody grab hold of something. Mr. Aphroodle, do your thing."

Aphroodle turned back to his console, punched a button, and the sound of the warp engines engaging filled the bridge. Lincoln was immediately concerned. One had to be very careful about how they engaged the warp drive within a system. Done wrong, and you could shift the orbit of planets or other bodies with disastrous effects. Then there was the matter of Cherenkov radiation. Go too fast, and the collisions caused by particles being moved around by the distortion of space, would emit enough radiation to kill all life within a system. Did Aphroodle really know what he was doing? Or had Lincoln made a mistake? If he had, it was certainly too late to do anything about it now. He wished that Aphroodle had installed seatbelts on the bridge, and not just the shuttles. Aphroodle promised him that they'd have the seatbelts installed soon, but didn't offer a good explanation as to why they'd done the shuttles first. Then again, Pakleds weren't known for their logic. Or much of anything at all, so the fact that Aphroodle had accomplished so much was rather remarkable in and of itself.

Almost immediately after the warp engines had engaged, they cut out. Lincoln might have wondered what the point of such a short trip was, if the collision alarms hadn't started going off.


"Okay, I've got a plan." T'ocha after they'd spent several minutes floating in the center of the moon. "If we're lucky, the Klingons are still above the North Pole's entrance."

"You do realize that being in Section 7G makes us very unlucky by default, don't you?" Terence's voice shifted upwards with nervousness as he spoke.

"Yeah," T'ocha spoke as she turned the shuttle to take them out the East tunnel. "But I figure if even you can manage to get laid every once and a while, we stand a chance of making it out of this alive."

"Hey!" Terence's tone was hurt.

"Shut it!" T'ocha snapped as they entered the East tunnel. "I need to be able to concentrate!"

The shuttle pushed towards its maximum speed as it flew through the tunnel. Upon exiting, T'ocha rolled the shuttle, and then dropped it down to within a few meters of the moon's surface, heading back towards the moon's North Pole.

"Let me know if you pick up the Klingons." She said.

"They're still over the North entrance." Terence said after a few moments.

"Good." T'ocha then ordered the shuttle into a vertical climb. "Have they spotted us?"

"Looks like it."

"Right then, down we go!" T'ocha jabbed the controls and the shuttle immediately dipped down, heading towards the moon's South Pole. There wasn't much gravity on the moon, but T'ocha wanted the boost to try and keep them just out of sight of the Klingon's sensors. "Let's hope they still want to keep at this cat and mouse game."

Flying a shuttle is technically not terribly difficult to do. The Federation generally thought of them as the 23rd Century version of pilot boats. They weren't designed to be anything more than a simple way of getting from one place to another, at modest speeds. They had minimal shielding, and were generally considered mostly useless in a society that had transporters. Starship crews often considered them excess baggage, until the transporters failed, or they needed to impress some silly diplomat or planetary leader. Much better to take a recalcitrant leader on a slow ride around a group of starships, so that he could get a good look at their imposing appearance, than to beam him directly aboard one, and hope that he comes to his senses about joining the Federation, after getting a tour through the non-secure areas of a starship.

Smart crews, like those aboard the Nixon, recognized that their lives might one day depend upon the shuttles, and enhanced their capabilities. Unfortunately, for the Nixon, they were unable to do the kinds of modifications that they really wanted. Not only could they not get the parts they needed, but unlike ships like the Enterprise, if during an admiral's inspection of the ship, it was discovered that they had significantly modified the shuttles, they got a black mark on their record. Never mind that these modifications might mean the difference between people surviving a mission or not, if it wasn't in the regs, they got blasted for it. Terrain hugging software could be easily hidden, and it was that which was allowing the Edsel to hopefully escape the Klingons.

"Klingon ship, 5 kilometers to port!" Sybok shouted. "They're headed directly for us!"

"Aphroodle!" Lincoln screamed.

"Wait. Sorry!" Aphroodle ducked his head repeatedly as he spoke.

"We've got a tractor beam lock on the shuttle!" Sybok said a second before the sound of the warp engines kicking in again was audible.

Lincoln looked at Aphroodle, concerned. Aphroodle smiled to indicate that this was all part of Aphroodle's plan. There were numerous jerks, as the Nixon dropped in and out of warp rapidly, each time they dropped out, the ship changed course, slightly.

"Tractor beam off!" Sybok said after about the fifth time they'd dropped out of warp, and then they found themselves thrown into warp again.


"South Pole entrance coming up!" Terence said.

"No shit, Greebowitcz!" T'ocha snapped. "Any sign of the Klingons?"

"Nope."

"Well, let's hope that means they're still following us just out of sensor range." T'ocha sent the shuttle into the opening. This time, instead of pausing in the core of the moon, they continued on up the tunnel to the North Pole entrance and then arced high on a course which would put them passing over Neural's northern pole by millions of kilometers. That was safely above the area covered by the defense systems on the moon. "Give me a view of the moon."

Terence switched the display to the aft view. The Klingons had failed to notice that the Edsel had gone into the southern tunnel and were heading northward up the face of the near side of Neural's moon. The defense system had detected the Klingon ship the moment it had crossed over to the hemisphere facing Neural. It soon let loose with a brace of photon torpedoes that headed directly towards the Klingon ship.

As soon as the ship detected the torpedoes, it attempted to evade them, something which was essentially pointless, since the torpedoes had been programmed with the standard Klingon evasive maneuvers and could anticipate every move of the Klingons. The torpedoes were enough to wipe out the Klingon's deflector screens, and as the screens collapsed, the defense system fired its disruptor cannon.

Onboard the Edsel, both Terence and T'ocha watched as the disruptor beam blasted the Klingon ship to pieces. Sections of debris blown towards Neural quickly became visible fireballs in the planet's atmosphere, while other portions rained down on the moon's surface.

"Okay," T'ocha said as she programmed the coordinates for the rendezvous point in the shuttle's computer. "At least we know it works. Let's hope that the Nix is still around and waiting for us."


The Nixon cycled in and out of warp in two rapid successions and then returned to sub-light speed.

"Klingons dead ahead!" Sybok shouted as the viewscreen was filled with the aft section of the Klingon ship.

"Shit!" Lincoln gasped. "Chi-Chi, all weapons fire on that ship now!"

Chi-Chi's quicksilver fingers alternated between launching torpedoes and firing the phasers. The Klingons barely had time to notice that the Nixon was behind them before the first barrage hit. While they were attempting to get a weapons lock, the second barrage overloaded their shields, the third barrage tore the nacelles off the ship. The fourth and final barrage penetrated the hull and destroyed the control system for the warp core. The liberated particles of matter and anti-matter began annihilating one another at a furious rate, and the Klingon ship quickly decomposed into high energy particles.

"Congratulations, Mr. Aphroodle," Lincoln relaxed back into his seat. "It seems your plan worked flawlessly. That's twice on a single mission. Quite impressive."

Aphroodle ducked his head bashfully.

"Now, let's see about finding that other Klingon ship." Lincoln was fairly beaming with pride as he spoke. "Sybok, any sign of it?"

"Nope." Replied Sybok. "Judging from the readings I'm picking up on the long range sensors, I'd say they got their ass fried by the defense system we installed on Neural's moon."

"Excellent. If the shuttle's are all on their way to the rendezvous point, then I suggest we go join them." Lincoln said.

"All but one, captain." Sybok replied.

"What happened to it?"

"Judging by its current course and direction, it appears to be the one we picked up and dropped off before we attacked the Klingon ship."

"Lieutenant," Lincoln turned to Cornrows. "Try contacting them."

"They ain't answering." Cornrows replied after a few minutes.

"Sybok, any signs of life inside the shuttle?"

"Nope."

"Helm, lay in an intercept course, full impulse."

"Aye, aye, captain." Chi-Chi and Hussein said simultaneously.

"Oaks, snokes, poke!" Chi-Chi quickly added as he affectionately jabbed Hussein. "You owe me a Coke!"

"May Allah send a thousand camel spiders to feast upon your testicles." Hussein replied. "That was a stupid saying when my great-great-grandmother was alive."

"Get a room, you two!" Lincoln snapped and then turned back to Sybok. "Analysis, Sybok."

"You got me, captain. I've remotely shutdown their engines, so we can safely bring it aboard when we get to it. But there's no signs of life, and I don't detect any indications of a booby trap. I tried tapping into the interior cameras, but they don't seem to be working. Until we get it onboard and have a team examine it, we've no way of knowing what happened to the crew."

"How long to intercept, Mr. Chi-Chi?"

"I'm bringing it into the shuttle bay now, captain."

"Lieutenant," Lincoln said to Cornrows. "Have the shuttle bay crew contact me as soon as the get a look inside that shuttle. Chi-Chi, as soon as you get that shuttle in the bay, head for the rendezvous point at full impulse power. Mr. Aphroodle, any ideas of what might have happened?"

"Uh, no, no, no, no, no, no!" Aphroodle shook his head rapidly, but there was a hint of a guilty expression on his face.

"Damn!" Lincoln muttered. "If they abandoned the shuttle, where could they be?"

"Heading to the rendezvous point now, captain." Chi-Chi said.

Lincoln thanked Chi-Chi and returned to his chair. His mind whirling over what might have happened to the missing crew members. They lost enough crew members as it was, what with them having substandard equipment and having to make jerry rigged repairs on everything.

"I gots the lead shuttle tech on the comm for you, Cap'n." Cornrows interrupted his thoughts.

"Talk to me," Lincoln said after punching the button on his armrest.

"Yeah, this is Bukowski," the voice spoke with a thick Brooklyn accent. "We got inside the shuttle, and it appears to be a classic case of what's known as 'liquefaction.' You see, the shuttle's inertial dampeners weren't up to handling the forces put upon it when we were jerking it around, so the crew got to experience probably several hundred gees every time we changed direction with them in tow. Frankly, I'm surprised the shuttle survived at all. We won't know if there's any internal damage to the thing until we can get a hazmat team in there to hose it all out. I think that we might be able to save it, though you'll probably want to have the carpets replaced and the seats reupholstered. Some folks like to claim you can shampoo that stuff out, but I don't know. I ain't never had much luck with that."

"Thank you, Mr. Bukowski." Lincoln buried his face in his hands.

"Hey, no problem, captain. Anything else you need? I want to get out of the bay proper before the hazmat guys start spraying things down. Stuff has a tendency to go flying all over the place, and the last thing I want is to wind up with some guy's brains all over me. I have enough trouble holding on to my own, without worrying about somebody else's. Ya know what I mean?"

"That will be all, Mr. Bukowski. Thank you." Lincoln cut the connection with his elbow and breathed heavily for several minutes.

"Mr. Aphroodle!" Lincoln rose to his feet, shouting. "You killed those people on that shuttle! If I had known that's what you were going to do, I never have allowed you to do your plan! What do you have to say for yourself?"

"Me sorry! Me sorry!" Aphroodle was bowing deeply and repeatedly as he spoke. "Me fix! Me fix!"

"How, Mr. Aphroodle?"

"Need list who died and need to be in beamer room." Aphroodle continued to bow.

"How can I trust you? Your last plan got members of my crew killed!"

"Didn't know that would happen, but can fix. If I fail, you can kill me."

Lincoln stood silently for several moments as he weighed his options.

"Okay, Mr. Aphroodle. You'll get your chance." He said finally. "Sybok, you have the conn. Doctor, Mr. Aphroodle, let's go to the transporter room. Cornrows, see if you can't figure out who was on that shuttle, and then get the information to us in the transporter room."

The three of them stepped into the Turbolift and rode in silence to the transporter room. There was a patchwork of panels laid across the hole in the floor, where the Klingons had cut their way through to get to the lower deck. Aphroodle had chosen to do only minimal repairs to the transporter room in order that they could devote most of their time to building the defense system for Neural. Now that they were underway again, Aphroodle and his crew would be working nearly as hard at doing correct repairs on everything that had been damaged during the fight. For the engineering department, it was going to be a while longer before they could relax.

"All right, Mister," Lincoln's voice was cold. "Show me how you're going to 'fix' the problem of the dead crew on that shuttle."

"I show. Follow me." Aphroodle gestured for Lincoln to join him at the controls of the transporter. Lincoln watched as Aphroodle pulled up the list of names that Cornrows had found of crew members on the shuttle. Aphroodle then cross-referenced it with the transporter logs, and pulled up the files associated with the deceased's most recent trip via the transporter. Next, Aphroodle tricked the system into thinking that it had just dematerialized those people by loading those files into the pattern buffer. He then started the process to materialize them on the transporter pad.

The crew members were confused by the site of Lincoln, Hatfield, and Aphroodle standing at the transporter controls. All of them had stepped into the transporter at different times, but none of them had done so when the captain and Hatfield were in the room. Each one of them stood silently, trying to figure out what had happened.

"Now, I understand why McCoy hates transporters so much!" Hatfield exclaimed. "An old quack like him would be quickly out of business if other people knew how to do this! There's an old saying, 'Doctors get to bury their mistakes.' Well, not any more McCoy!"

"Aphroodle," Lincoln was amazed. "These are really the crew members who died?"

"Ah uh!" Aphroodle nodded enthusiastically.

Lincoln quickly grabbed Aphroodle's face in his hands and kissed him on the forehead.

"I think I love you!" Lincoln said, and then turned to face the bewildered crew still on the transporter pad. "Good news! You're no longer dead!"

"What do you mean, sir? And why aren't you still down on the planet? What's happened to us?" One of them asked.

"Its a bit difficult to explain, but the short answer is that all of you were killed fleeing from a Klingon ship. Mr. Aphroodle, was very cleverly able to use the data from the last time you were transported to bring you back. For some of you, its weeks, or days, since you last used the transporter, so you'll need to be brought up to speed on what's happened, and how you died. Dr. Hatfield will take you to sickbay to help you get adjusted."

"Follow me," Hatfield said, stepping through the door. The puzzled crew members stepped off the transporter pad and began to follow him out.

Captain's Log: Stardate 4257.5 All is well. The crew members Aphroodle restored are adjusting to the changes that happened during the time that they were "dead." We've commenced repairs on the Nixon as we race to catch up with Kirk and the Enterprise, based on his transmissions to Starfleet, he doesn't have appeared to have screwed up too badly, so hopefully our next mission will go better. Once we've checked out Triskelion, we'll be heading to the nearest Starbase and turning over the Klingon components we pulled from the wrecked ship to Starfleet Intelligence. I recommend full commendations for everyone involved with this mission, every member of this crew has done a remarkable job, and I don't think that there's a finer crew in the fleet, even if we are in Section 7G.