Ad Astra :: Star Trek Fanfiction Archive ^{Beam me up, Scotty.}

Chapter Text

XX. Sleight of Hand

Jameson McCall watches with anger as Harriman and Styles leave the conference room, the triumph in their walks sending him into despair—something he doesn’t feel usually, but now seems appropriate. That they had managed to at least get OPSTAR to agree to refrain from sending the Task Force in had been something to put a spring in their steps.

He looks over at Chekov, who appears to be calm, along with C.

“What are you two cooking up?” he asks, suspicion in his voice.

Castellan enters the room, removing the captain’s jacket that she wears, along with the faux white turtleneck ascot from over her service dress black undershirt. C’s eyes widen; apparently someone in his shop can still surprise the Federation’s spymaster.

“We’ve got a way to get Chandra’s full group involved,” C says. “To get them into the disputed zone. The President has signed off on it, as has the FSA. The rub seems to be coming from the Secretary of State for Intergalactic Affairs’ Department, who are being extremely cautious.”

“So what is this secret evil plan?” Jameson asks.

He looks up as another being comes into the room. Admiral Gavek, the Eastern Hemisphere Tellarite walks in, followed by a Commander wearing operations gold and a staff officer’s aiguillette that he doesn’t immediately recognize.

“It’s in motion,” Gavek rumbles, his thick red beard—a shade that doesn’t occur in Earth’s nature, at least—twitching. “Commander Grayson here has confirmed. Rear Admiral Decker is enroute, if not already there.”

Jameson stares at him. “Gav,” he says, “how is this possible?” He looks at C. “Again, what the fuck have you got going, woman?”

“Just calm your bowels, old man,” she says, with what he detects might actually be fondness. “BUPERs has signed off on it. The 17th has been temporarily transferred to Starfleet Engineering Command.”

Jameson looks at Gavek, who, from the time that they were cadets, then Midshipmen, then Ensigns together, had never looked this self-satisfied.

That’s saying a lot, he thinks.

“And Decker? This is fairly recent.”

“She had requested family leave. She’s entitled to it.”

“Why do I think this might’ve been Mary’s idea?”

No one says anything.

Jameson shakes his head. Okay, then why do I think I’ve been playing three-dimensional chess, when I’m looking at a checkers board? he thinks.

Might be time to retire.

XXI. The Briefing

Jamie looks at the assembled faces on the O’Bannon’s small hangar deck. He focuses on Declan Starros, the major commanding the reinforced independent company of the Rapid Deployment Force, the closest thing to marines Starfleet has. The marine looks back at him, contempt on his rugged features at Jamie’s uniform.

He turns back to Agon, who is watching the byplay between them both with great amusement. Rear Admiral Decker stares at all three of them with her teeth gritted and her hazel-blue eyes hard.

“Continue, Mr. Zh'qithiq,” she says.

“The pods should each give off their own signal. They’re harder to find out here, with all of the interference from this particular gas giant, but with the combined power behind them, if Captain Sinclair had kept with what her mother had told her about my little party, then we should find the pod assembly when we’re in there.”

Jamie nods. “We’re also banking on the fact that it caused that ejection of the gas that revealed the KFS ships to the pirates,” he says.

“I prefer the term privateer, in this case,” Targsbane says, a smirk on her face.

“So what are we supposed to do when the KFS or whoever comes calling?” This from Assisi, the representative apparently from the Institute. “A modified Goddess, a jarhead ship that will be attending to the gas giant, and a, what did you call it, ‘privateer’ that used to be a Romulan dart-mother, ain’t exactly building confidence, Croft.”

Jamie looks at Ava Fonseca, one of two possible adults on the Starlight. “Don’t worry about it, Francis,” he says. “We have a Starfleet officer on board. She’ll make up for your shortcomings.”

“Asshole,” Francis mutters. D’Shaya, the Romulan member of the crew, sticks out her tongue at Jamie.

Okay, he thinks, one adult on the Starlight.

Starros looks at Jamie. “So what are you going to be doing, Crofty?” he asks in his thick Cockney accent. He looks at the gunnery sergeant, another tall, thin Englishman with a melodious voice and a lugubrious countenance, who will lead the recon team into the soup, as if he knows the answer.

And doesn’t like it.

“I’ll be going in with the recon team,” Jamie replies evenly.

“Oh, no hell you won’t,” Starros says.

Jamie feels his feet fix to the deck, immovable. His arms cross over his chest, matching Starros’ stance. Starros pushes his green beret on the back of his head, before returning to his own recalcitrant stance.

“I’ve got the same training in zero-g combat as your troops,” he says. “I didn’t just get handed this uniform and the Beret.”

A smile quirks Starros’ lip up, made nasty by the scar through the right side of his mouth. “But I’m not putting an unknown quantity in with my team. They’ve worked together and trained together for years.” He looks at Mary.

Jamie can tell that Mary Decker is torn. She had served with him before; she probably trusted him more than the marines.

She exhales. “I want you up above. You’ve got more experience running a standup fight in space than anyone here.” She grins. “Me, included.”

After a moment, Jamie nods. He turns back to Starros. To his credit, his expression is even.

“Let’s bring our friends home,” he says.

He switches from ‘Jamie’ to ‘Croft’ in his thoughts. He feels T'Varilyn’s smile.

Amazingly, he also feels Chandra’s through the mists of the Link.

She is close.

XXII. The Klingon Machiavelli

The woman known even in her own thoughts as C sits on a park bench. It had been light for a hour or two; none of them had slept during the night and morning as they waited for word. She had been drafted to meet the mysterious Klingon envoy.

She senses a shape coming out of the mist of the morning. She feels her eyes widen as she realizes that the shape doesn’t appear to be as massive as she would’ve thought. The shape also doesn’t appear to be clad as she would’ve thought either.

She—it is definitely feminine in shape—is wearing what looks like a Terran business suit. Dark black eyes gaze at her over a scarf that hides the woman’s features.

C stands, facing the woman. She sees the woman’s hands move up to the scarf. She wears no gloves; C observes a mass of triangular shaped tattoos on the bronze skin.

C is further surprised when the woman’s face is revealed. The eyes stare out of the same bronze-skinned face. Her hair is shaved close on the sides and flops down over one side of a very slightly ridged forehead. The shaved body of the dark hair, which is only marginally longer than the sides reveal delicately pointed ears.

“So who do you represent?” C asks. “The Klingon or the Romulan side?”

A smile quirks her lips, giving her a softer appearance. It also reveals a mouthful of sharpened teeth.

“Right now, the Klingon, though I have connections with the Roms,” she says. Her voice is lightly accented; C can’t place it.

“So you mentioned something you could add to an issue? Plus, I’d like to know something I can call you. You can call me Clarisse,” C adds.

The woman nods. “Of course, C, if that makes you feel better. I am Senior Force Leader K’hrella, of the True House of Klinzhai and the House of Kor. I think that we can do business.”

C is suddenly glad that she had come alone. She isn’t sure whether McCall or Chandra would continue with the interaction, with that House Name. Or the fact that K’hrella had identified herself as a relatively junior marine rank.

“And what do you want?”

“Just a connection, Kh’larisse,” she replies. Even C can hear the distinction in pronunciation.“You can give Chandra a message for me. I’m looking to punish those who caused her so much pain on Vostus.”

“In return, you can solve an issue for the Empire in the space that your ‘engineering task force’ is working in.” The softer, but still dangerous smile returns. “And it won’t cost you anything. My agent has already paid the cost for you. By a blood voyage to Sto-Vo-Kor.”

XXIII. Gas Diving

Gunnery Sergeant Daniel Hagan makes sure that his helmet seal is tight, before checking the uniform seals on his Field Combat Assault Uniform. He looks at the other nine sergeants he had picked from his recon platoon of twenty-eight—the very best, in his judgement of EVA operators in Company A (Reinforced), 45 Commando, Rapid Deployment Force

He turns and looks at Major Starros and First Sergeant Forsten, both standing near the troop transporter pad.

“You ready, Songbird?” Evie Forsten asks, her ice-blue eyes gazing at him.

“Ready, Viking,” he replies.

She nods, then turns to Starros, saluting him. She reaches down and taps her ear. “We’re ready, Admiral,” she says.

“Execute,” comes Admiral Decker’s voice from the bridge.

“Escorts deploying to the rose,” Blackthorne’s voice says over the speakers. The three other ships, joined by a Lancer-class, the San Sebastián, form at four points around the O’Bannon.

Hagan looks over the other nine, then nods at the transporter operator.

Starros’ face dissolves in front of him, as does everything else around him.

Chaos reassembles. He at first sees nothing but darkness, then there is a cacophony of light and color. He tries to orient himself, but realizes that he seems to be spinning some. The spinning stops as one of the sergeants pulls up on his tether.

When his stomach and brain calms, he touches a control on his gauntlet. He hears a tone as the receiver starts, then silence.

He can almost feel the other recon marines holding their breath, hoping that they can find the missing crew. Before they run out of time.

While waiting for the receiver to find the pod assembly, Daniel thinks about what he has to do. They won’t be able to use the tractor beams, until they clear the gas giant, because of the interference.

They’ll have to do it the old-fashioned way. With grapplers fired, based on their own signals.

He comes alert, shoving thoughts of their tactics away as four clear signals start to beep in his earpiece.

Daniel keys his mike. “Mother, we’ve got the signals. Homing in on them,” he says.

The point man triggers his jetpack, pulling the other nine with him. They increase speed as all of them activate the ‘packs.

It only takes about five minutes for a dark shape to show up against the backdrop of the bright, shifting colors.

There are another two minutes for them to clamp onto the assembly. Sergeant Backus comes up to hull of the assembly. There is a tiny bit of an escape of compressed air.

The first pod slides out of the assembly, enough for a port to show, while still connected to the others. Daniel and Backus move up to the port. Both marines smile at each other as they see three figures in this pod.

A large Andorian male holds a skinny young redhaired woman, while another young man, a technician, tends to her.

“Mother, this is Songbird. We’ve found them!” He sees the young woman’s dark eyes flutter.

“Tell the Admiral that Captain Sinclair is alive.”

He hears nothing but static.