To Scratch or Rend pt.2

Posted on Mon 24th Mar, 2025 @ 2:03pm by Commander Heriah Rex & Commodore H'tek

2,263 words; about a 11 minute read

Mission: The Phoenix Gamble
Location: Suv'Wi (H'tek's Flagship)
Timeline: Previously https://sb109.sim-station.net/index.php/sim/viewpost/2431

-Start-

{Suv'Wi Cargo Bay}

Anslo had been beaten to within the last half inch of life. Every breath was hard. The fear the crew once had him had gone, and all of his work was in flames with H'teks betrayal. Bound, gagged, bleeding on the dirty floor had brought him to a calm place, accepting of death. In many ways there was a sweet relief to the moment he had looked over his shoulder for a decade trying to avoid finally arriving. his life had ended when Tol needed a host, he was the unlucky Trill called to purpose and abandoned by Starfleet. This was never a choice, but the outcome was the same.

"Sire!" one of the retinue present manned a console near the cargo transporter, "The Trill have sent authorizations for transport, they require a feedback loop to maintain signal lock."

H'tek laughed, "Partha is waiting, let them think I am the thing to fear but accede to their request Puro."

The Klingon loved to play act, it was truly a loss to the galaxy for his absence amongst the stage players of a generation. "You can keep your signal lock Trill. We need no tricks to deal with you. Make haste or we will target your engines and board your vessel!"

H'tek gave a thumbs up in approval, Anslo groaned. This was a foolish play. He had given his life to a madman and fool hoping it was enough to keep the Trill at bay. Now it was time to face the music.

Two forms appeared in monastic robes, each evidently a Trill male, One with svelte on mahogany spotting, another with fearsome knives and a fearsome face. And that fearsome face took on an appearance or clear disgust at the sight of a beaten Anslo Tol. If his eyes were canons, he would have shot his hate upon whoever was responsible.

The smaller one spoke first, "I am Rizhkyn, authorized to deal on behalf of Trill. We are prepared to take Anslo with us, without delay."

"Rautha," Rautha spoke up in Rizhkyn's immediate wake. "T'Iril Monk, Apostle of the Way," he said in a voice as though that was supposed to mean something. It did mean something, however, just too few ever survived meeting such a monk to speak on the encounter.

H'tek snarled, "I will accept payment first. Make a transfer, grab this worm, and be on your way."

Rizhkyn nodded, wordlessly communicating a ton, with tensions rising each second. Rautha made no move but kept his eyes stuck on H'Tek.

Anslo tried his last hope of a plan, drawing a painful full lung of air and yelling, "He has a second ship, he will kill you!"

One of H'Tek's minions rushed up and hurriedly placed a weighty boot right into Anslo's gut making the rest of his announcement come out as a painful and bloody cough.

Rautha had not looked around to take stock of H'Tek and his cronies. He and Rizhkyn had already scoped the place out with scanners before beaming over. They knew exactly where H'Tek had his men and knew exactly where to go once a fight erupted. Rautha was burning holes in H'Tek with his eyes. "You dare," but his words were for Anslo's attacker, "to strike Tol! And you," Rautha turned his words to H'Tek. He kept his hands in his tunic, fingers ready on the hilts of his daggers. "What could you possibly gain from our deaths? Why even accept our arrival?"

Anslo had cut to the chase for all of them, no banter, no parlay, just time to make decisions. H'tek was nimble for his age, and twisted deftly to half cover behind a console shouting, "Transfer the payment, or you die now. Ten seconds, I don't see the transfer you die! Tol dies, and I add your spots to my leather straps. Ten, Nine, Eight..."

The soldiers who only thought they were hidden emerged, startling nobody at all.

At the pulling of the plug, everything went to hell.

Rautha gave an irritating and nasal sigh. He took a step forward, toward Anslo and in front of Rizhkyn. The microcosm of his consciousness in the immense vastness of the universe helped him center himself and ready himself for what was next. H'Tek's countdown slowed to a crawl. The others spread about were slowly raising their weapons. Rizhkyn was slowly preparing himself. All the while, Rautha's inner thoughts were working at warp 10.

Rautha was fingering at a device stuck to the inside of his tunic. It was a personal body shield; about the size of a coin but able to encompass any individual up to 8 feet tall. It would stop any blade, shrapnel or phaser fire for up to five minutes depending on the load it took. If all of H'Tek's soldiers fired upon him all at once, this body shield might last 30 seconds before burning out. With no load at all, it would last no more than 10 minutes. With his right hand, Rautha was gripping his dagger hidden beneath his runic. The stage was set, with all the pieces right where he wanted them, to include himself. Except for one, Rizhkyn was not where he needed to be.

After playing the scene out in his head, Rautha acted. H'Tek was only getting to "...Six..." when Rautha pulled the personal body shield out from his tunic. He backhanded Rizhkyn in the chest to send him back beneath a balcony and out of view of about half of H'Tek's soldiers. Simultaneously, Rautha withdrew his right hand, dagger gripped therein and sent it to his right in the direction of one of H'Tek's poor bastard soldiers, and he activated the personal body shield while throwing it at Anslo and it finding a home on Anslo's chest. Darting toward Poor Bastard as the Klingon was getting a dagger in the neck, Anslo was being protected by a body shield, Rautha was pulling his other dagger free and aiming it at Poor Bastard's eye socket, intending on sending them both toppling over a set of crates to be used as shielding.

Rizhkyn was out of view of most of H'Tek's soldiers, Poor Bastard was dead or dying, Rautha was taking position behind the crates whilst also claiming Poor Bastard's phaser, Anslo was protected from all attacks for a few minutes, all before H'Tek could get to "...Five..."

Rizhkyn was only surprised by how fast it had all happened. Anslo had clearly wanted a disruption, but the professional and calm aspects had seen this all as a possibility. In addition to their transport signal, a simple packet of specially prepared atmospheric nanites had come with them. Only requiring a minute to scatter far and wide, he hoped this suddenness wasn't going to affect their efficacy. By now all of these p'taq had breathed it in, but only Anslo, Rizhkyn and Rautha had the DNA to avoid what came next.

The phaser fire fight was short-lived. It was a grand display to be true. Anslo lit up like a Christmas tree, as the humans like to say, but was protected the whole time as he was fired upon. A phaser to the face resulted in only temporary blindness. Anslo felt only a deal, not too great, of heat seep through. With adrenaline flooding his blood, he recalled, through symbiontic memory, how to move under fire and rolled to the side. It hurt, dreadfully to do so, but he sprung up and leapt over a storage crate, turning it over with him. Rautha got off a few shots and took down at least two additional soldiers. A third became the unfortunate recipient of the dagger Rautha reclaimed from Poor Bastard's neck.

Finding a break in the fighting, H'tek staggered, grabbing the console, two of his men fell completely. H'tek staggered a second time, in the throes of a painful chest heaving rictus. Trill DNA was spared, but Klingon DNA was tasty to the voracious nano-swarm.

"Hold your fire, Klingons, or you'll surely die," Rizhkyn called out.

H'tek was fumbling to retrieve his disruptor, dropping it and also to one knee, "Partha..." he uttered but the man swayed and fell.

Rautha stepped upon him and kicked H'Tek over with a foot.

"I'll stop the curse, when we are away," Rizhkyn continued. "I know of your sister ship, and can easily escape them. You are in my grasp, my talons can either scratch or rend, but we will not be fools for you."

Anslo was crawling to the transport pad, presumably to use it to get to the Trill ship or some other means of escape. Rizhkyn moved to the console and set it to his command, ordering Rautha, "We will leave now, secure Anslo."

"For allowing Tol to become injured," Rautha said through gritting teeth, "perhaps even torturing him yourself, you deserve a fate worse than death." He had Poor Bastard's phaser in hand as well as H'Tek's custom disruptor in the other. Each pointed at each of H'Tek's eyes. "How many failures have you racked up over the past several days H'Tek. You are hereby sentenced...to live...with that. You can expect this news to be broadcast across the quadrant." Rautha withdrew the phasers. "I am keeping these." He went and reclaimed his daggers, cleaned them on a dead Klingon's clothing and resheathed them. He let Anslo keep the personal body shield for the moment in the event H'Tek or one of his cronies wanted to take a shot.

H'tek coughed into a laugh, "If I die, my brothers will avenge me. Be gone, end your curse."

Rizhkyn didn't need to be told twice, outside of the bay a dozen armed Klingons were about to breach in. "You won't die, but it will be a long time before you can take a full breath. And if these doors open, any Klingon on the other side will end up like you, debilitated inside five minutes. Follow us and we can amplify their effect. Remain here and the signal loss will end their rampage. Call your dogs on us and it's all the same."

He hit the panel control and the three of them began to feel the swirl of the transporter beam in motion.

Rizhkyn felt like he had missed something. Motion in the corner of his eyes aligned with an earlier moment he had not had time to unpack. Anslo had crawled to this transporter pad, but had no weapons in his hand. He did have the personal shield, and too late Rizhkyn saw Anslo had acquired a the power cell of a disruptor and hidden that quite successfully.

{Trill Seeker Ship}

The beams confinement ring prevented him from reacting, and he only had time to warn Rautha, "Cover your eyes!" before Anslo shoved the power cell out of the containment zone. Charged batteries have to be transported carefully, or they release their energies once the dissolution of the materials occur. His personal shield was still active though, and Rizhkyn and Rautha suffered the explosion at point blank. The lack of shrapnel would reduce the injuries, but the concussive forces popped their eardrums and rattled their bodies to the bone as they were ejected from the transporter panel.

Rizhkyn lost track of Rautha, in vain he tried to recover his sense but the smoke obscured vision, his ears hurt beyond agony. A solid blow to the temple dropped the Trill to his knees again, Anslo had escaped their control so he only barely had the time to say, "Ship.. is locked."

Anslo couldnt fly it out of here, and H'tek was just as much of a death sentence. What's more the automatic security system engaged and Anslo clung to life behind a containment field.

"Try anything like that again, I'll amputate your limbs and cut out your tongue. Tol will live."

Anslo had nowhere to go, despite this ploy he was trapped as ever, despair over being caught overtook him and he slumped finally. Before losing consciousness himself, motion caught Rizhkyn's eye.

Rautha stood, while Rizhkyn fell into the black.

Picking at his ears needlessly, Rautha gave up restoring his own hearing. He was bleeded from a gash above his right eye. He ignored it. Rautha was sore and bruised; ignored it all. His hearing would return on its own in time. He retrieved the deactivated personal body shield from Anslo and repocketed it. It was useless and needed a full recharge.

Both men were insensate, Rizhkyn was not bleeding, and though Anslo was quite injured, it was in no way that threatened Tol. Their manxome foe was secured behind the containment field, but in no shape to fight. Without a need for it, he turned it off to survey the damage.

Rautha scooped up Anslo and placed him in his bunk; covered him up and tucked him in. He did the same for Rizhkyn then scanned them both for serious injuries. Neither had anything that required immediate attention. He turned to surveying their ship. There was damage yes, and nothing he could fix on his own. There was a cascading failure to Life Support. It was active but seemed to only have hours left before it failed utterly. Sitting in the pilot's seat, Rautha sought out places to land and possibly perform repairs. He also had to get them away from H'Tek's ragtag fleet.

Rautha found only one location where they could go for repairs.

Two hours away would leave them with a small margin for error, so they moved fast, setting course to Starbase 109.

-TBC-

 

RSS Feed