Star Trek: Fortitude
Episode Three: “First Impressions”
By Jack D. Elmlinger
PROLOGUE
Everybody was ready.
Sitting comfortably in his command chair, Ewan Llewellyn shared an expression of eager anticipation with his first officer, Valerie Archer. In front of them sat Lieutenant Arden Vuro who was, perhaps, the most prepared of them all. His blue digits were hovering over the controls that he was anxious to touch. Standing at the back of the Bridge at the operations station, Ensign Jason Armstrong couldn’t remember the last time that he had been this excited, no matter how hard he tried.
“Bridge to Transporter Room One,” Ewan called out. “Is that it?”
“Bridge, this is Doctor T’Verra,” came a reply. “The final supplies had been beamed aboard and transferred to Cargo Bay Two.”
A smile across Jason’s face. As the youngest member of the Senior Staff, he was the most excitable. Were it not for the sheer embarrassment of it, he would have been jumping up and down at his station. The main viewscreen showed empty space, a blanket of twinkling stars that made up the unexplored half of the Beta Quadrant. Quite literally, it was where nobody had been before.
An incoming message diverted the operations officer’s attention, but only for a brief second. “Captain, Rear Admiral Blackmore sends his regards,” he reported. “He wishes us a safe journey and that he;ll see us in a month.”
“Send a reply. Tell him to keep my seat at the poker table open.”
“Aye, sir.”
“Engineering to Bridge. Sollik here, Captain.”
“Go ahead, Sollik.”
“We’re ready whenever you are, sir.”
Subconsciously, Llewellyn edged forward in his chair, perching himself as close to the viewscreen and Vuro’s helm station as it was possible without falling flat on his face and looking like a fool.
This was it.
The moment that he had prepared for, all of his life. The moment that had, years ago, inspired him to join Starfleet Academy. The moment that he could remember dreaming about since childhood and he had dreamed about, every night since then. With as much drama as his Welsh accent could muster, he issued the order that he would never forget for the rest of his days.
“Helm, prepare for warp speed on my command.”
“Heading, sir?”
“Anywhere that we’ve never been before.”
“Aye, sir.”
Upon his order to engage the warp drive, seconds later, the USS Fortitude, NCC-76240, folded her warp nacelles upwards and in a brilliant blue flash of light, jumped ahead to the speed of light, leaving Santrag II and Starbase 499 far behind them.
ACT ONE
Captain’s Log, Stardate 48994.2;
Three hours have passed by since we left the Santrag system and began our mission of exploration in the uncharted regions of the Beta Quadrant. Cruising at Warp Five, we’re running extensive sensor sweeps to search for new life and new civilizations.
I do have to say that the novelty of finally getting underway hasn’t diminished one tiny bit. I don’t expect it will for a long time to come, either. Judging from the reactions of my Bridge officers, I believe that this first foray into the unknown can be run on the excitement of one hundred and fifty souls under my command.
Jason Armstrong was determined to focus on his duties. Many of the scans that he was running weren’t even required by Starfleet Standard Operating Procedures, but in just under a few hours, he would be presenting his first operations report to the captain. He wanted it to read like Shakespeare. It was his inexperience and immature nature that meant he was about to place his foot firmly in his mouth. The alert wasn’t even of a high priority, but nevertheless…
“Captain to the Bridge!,” he barked, tapping his combadge.
A second later, and the Ready Room doors opened to reveal Ewan Llewellyn, wearing a very unflattering frown. Marching to the center of the Bridge, he gave the young ensign an expression that could best be summed up by the phrase, ‘What the hell?’
“I’m sorry, Captain,” Armstrong stammered, blushing. “I didn’t mean to order…”
“Are you after my job, Ensign?” Ewan finally smiled. As today was the first day of their mission, thankfully, he could see the funny side. “Just a little tip, though. Don’t make a habit of issuing orders to your senior officers. Understood?”
“Yes, sir. Sorry, sir.”
The turbolift doors slid open and Commander Archer, obviously in a hurry, rushed out onto the Bridge. Like Ewan's, her expression was one of concern and slight panic.
“Are we under attack?”
“I wish I knew,” Llewellyn shrugged, turning back to Ops. “Report, Ensign.”
“Sensors are detecting an unusually large debris field in orbit of a nearby Class-J gas giant, approximately one lightyear from our current position,” Jason finally revealed to them. “I’m reading, at least, five different hull fragments from clearly separate sources. It looks like a fleet of starships got wiped out there. Some of the weapons signatures on the debris are recent.”
“A fresh carcass,” Valerie mused,” ripped apart.”
“Run a full sector scan,” Ewan ordered after doing a little musing of his own. “Let’s hope that the lions have satisfied their hunger.”
“No other vessels detected, sir,” came the results of Armstrong’s scan.
“Mister Vuro, set a course and engage at Warp Four.”
Taking his seat beside his First Officer and watching as the main viewer showed the change in their course, the captain arched his fingers and let out a deep sigh. Turning, he noted the stare that he was getting from Archer and leaned over to reply.
“The first bit of exploring that we get to do,” he muttered,” and it’s the site of a massacre in space. However, protocol is protocol, I suppose. We investigate.”
* * * *
It didn’t take long before Fortitude was lowering her warp nacelles and dropping to impulse power, swooping majestically towards the swirling orange sphere of gas that dominated the main viewer. Between the starship and the planet, there was a large cloud of small hull fragments, green in color. Vuro immediately slowed the ship further, taking them to maneuvering thrusters in order to drift carefully alongside the obliterated fleet of alien vessels.
“Full scan, Mister Armstrong,” commanded Captain Llewellyn.
“Can you get a match on those weapons signatures, Jason?,” Commander Archer inquired, more concerned about the cause of the destruction, rather than the cataloguing of the victims. After all, they were dead. They wouldn’t be causing anyone any problems anymore.
“Affirmative,” Jason replied, his face suddenly falling.
The silence betrayed his shock.
“Ensign?”
Both Ewan and Valerie stood from their seats, turning to face Ops.
“The weapons signatures match those of the ships that attacked Starbase 499 upon our arrival in the Santrag system,” came his grave answer. “These ships were destroyed by the same unidentified aliens.”
“Red Alert!,” Llewellyn barked immediately. “Shields up!”
“Are you sure?,” Vuro called out, his Bolian nervousness showing through his otherwise brave exterior as the lights on the Bridge dimmed and they were replaced with an eerie crimson glow.
“Readings confirmed. It was them!,” Jason exclaimed, his own nervous disposition much more obviously on display. “The firepower must have been ten times what we encountered during that battle, Captain!”
“They’re obviously a large presence in this part of the Galaxy.”
“Intergalactic bullies, by the look of things,” Valerie offered, staring at the debris still on the viewscreen.
“Sir, I have one biosign coming from the debris,” was the next shocking revelation from Armstrong’s sensor readings. “It looks like an escape pod of some kind.”
“Can you tell if it’s a friend or a foe?”
“Negative, Captain. We never got clear bio-readings on our attackers during the battle. They could be the aggressor or the victim.”
It only took a moment to weigh the consequences for Ewan Llewellyn and he came up with a course of action. At the end of the day, he was a Starfleet officer and there was somebody drifting helplessly out there in the space wreckage. Fortitude was their only hope of rescue right now. Besides, if the bio-readings did belong to a member of the aggressive unidentified alien species, this might present them with an opportunity to make a proper First Contact and get some answers about their violent tendencies.
“Beam them directly to Sickbay and erect a Level-Ten force field,” he ordered. “Tell Doctor T’Verra that she has incoming and to warn her to use extreme caution.”
“We have them,” came the confirmation, a moment later.
“I’ll be in Sickbay. Commander, you have the Bridge.”
* * * *
Ewan was hardly Sickbay’s biggest fan. He hated hospitals.
That hatred was the furthest thing from his mind as he walked into Fortitude’s Sickbay and headed immediately towards Doctor T’Verra, the Vulcan Chief Medical Officer. She was leaning over the recovered alien who was occupying the central biobed. Nurse Boswell was in attendance, her youthful face showing concern that was beyond her years.
“Massive internal bleeding,” observed T’Verra. “Four CCs of inaprovaline.”
“What’s the diagnosis, Doctor?,” Llewellyn asked her.
“Please, Captain, allow me to perform my duty before distracting me with a status report request,” came her cold, logical reply.
Llewellyn took a step back, realizing that his impatience wasn’t welcome and decided, instead, to process the new arrival. He gazed as the alien body. It appeared to be male and looked humanoid enough, but its skin was a horrible yellow, and almost decayed by Human standards.
The uniform appeared to be militaristic with dark colors, and some kind of rank insignia that Ewan couldn’t even begin to fathom. All of the alien’s hair was missing and he wasn’t sure if that was unique to this individual or a common trait of its species.
This was the first person encountered by the USS Fortitude on her mission of peaceful exploration and it would hardly do morale any good if he died on their biobed. Despite the collective will of the Sickbay vowing to keep him alive, T’Verra finally folded up her medical tricorder and stepped back.
“You asked for my diagnosis, Captain,” she finally said with no emotions on display. “I regretfully have to inform you that his injuries were too severe. There was nothing more that I could achieve.”
Ewan knew what was coming, but he still had to hear it from the Doctor.
“He is dead.”
ACT TWO
They were just moving out of sensor range when they picked it up. A vessel was investigating the site of the battle.
The pilot turned, sending the data that he had collected back to his carrier ship before he switched his focus back to flying his fighter. High above him and streaking through warp, the larger carrier received the message and began to process the image. When they found a result, they instantly initiated an emergency signal back to their homeworld. The commander of the carrier was alerted and he processed the data much like a computer would. When he had finished processing the data, he turned to his subordinate.
“Recent?”
“As you say.”
“Did we leave soldiers behind?”
“I am checking.”
“Check faster!”
It was their standard battle practice to leave those who abandoned ship behind at the site of the engagement. The soldiers were trained from childhood that their relationships with their vessels were stronger than any marriage or offspring that they could ever hope for. If one lost his fighter, he was left to die. He wouldn’t want to live and society wouldn’t want him to return from the battle.
Despite the importance of custom, the commander of the carrier also realized that the retrieval of a corpse or, worse, a living soldier could give the enemy a tactical advantage. Their initial attack on this particular enemy had failed but it would succeed the next time. Providing that they didn’t gain knowledge from one of their soldiers.
“Result: one soldier.”
Well, that was that, wasn’t it? There was only one course of action remaining.
“Signal FS-Six. Order them to reverse course, intercept and destroy the target before they can return to the Santrag System.”
On that order, Fighter Squadron Six banked hard, dropped to impulse before turning to port and jumped back to warp speed. There were thirty fighters included in the squadron, and despite having been defeated once before, they were battle-hardened and experienced now. No more ionic shockwaves would stop them.
The USS Fortitude would be destroyed.
* * * *
The Briefing Room was full. At the head of the table, Captain Llewellyn listened to the reports pour in from their most recent scans. Jason Armstrong was certainly proving his worth as an operations officer on this first mission. The only person standing in the room, he was using the LCARS display to present his findings.
“There’s no doubt, Captain,” he concluded. “The escape pod that we found with the alien inside is not composed of the same alloy that we found in the debris.”
“That means he belongs to the species that won the battle,” Valerie added,” and the species that won the battle are the same species that attacked Starbase 499. It’s confirmed, sir. The dead man in Sickbay is the enemy.”
“He’s still a dead man, whether he’s an enemy or not,” Ewan sighed, his usually optimistic demeanor downtrodden by the recent events. “Doctor T’Verra, it’s only because we don;t know of their burial rituals that I’m ordering you to conduct an autopsy. I want to know what makes them tick, what they eat… everything. Understood?”
“Understood, Captain,” the Vulcan nodded in agreement.
“I’m going to transmit everything that we’ve found back to Rear Admiral Blackmore for further analysis. In the meantime, keep sorting through this information. Let me know when you all think that we’ve squeezed this particular sponge dry, and we’ll get underway again. Hopefully, our next point of interest will be somewhat more uplifting. Dismissed.”
* * * *
Fortitude’s main shuttlebay had a new occupant. Llewellyn had decided to bring the escape pod aboard to see what made it tick, and after a few minutes with the universal translator and Ensign Armstrong’s help, he was finally getting some results.
“We’ve got data here on the procedure for abandoning ship,” he observed, transferring some of the information from the alien computer terminal to a PADD and directly translating it to Federation Standard. “That’s odd.”
“What’s that, sir?”
“It says here that the loss of a vessel is the ultimate dishonor for these people, therefore, you would think that escape pods are irreverent.”
“Perhaps, they deliberately leave them floating for the disgraced pilot to die a slow death,” offered Jason, his words finding grim truth. “Perhaps it gives them time to think about their mistake.”
“Hmm… It says here that the escape pod systems are automated. The pilot has no say. That would fit your theory, Ensign. Good deductive reasoning… You’d make a fine Vulcan.”
“No need to insult me, sir, surely?”
They shared a laugh, the first in what had felt like days. In actual fact, it had only been five hours since they had found the debris field and brought the hostile alien pilot and his small coffin aboard. Then a thought occurred to Ewan. a thought that Jason soon had himself. Slowly, they stopped laughing and both saw it in each other’s eyes that they were approaching the same conclusion. The ensign let the captain voice it.
“If it’s some kind of ritual… then they might be returning to collect him.”
“Permission to get the hell out of here, sir?”
Surprisingly and seemingly out of place, the smile returned to Llewellyn’s lips. “You know what, Ensign?,” he grinned. “I think we’re going to stay right where we are.”
ACT THREE
The squadron leader activated his long-range scanner and smiled, his horrible yellow skin crackling across his face like a layer of dried mud. With his movement restricted by his flight suit and complex sensory-input helmet, it was all that could manage in reaction to the pleasing image on his screen.
There she was.
The target hadn’t moved.
Her hull markings read USS Fortitude.
She had destroyed three of his soldiers and humiliated his fleet back in the Santrag system.. Revenge would be sweet.
“Squadron,” he growled into his communicator,” this is your First. Prepare for attack!”
A bank of lights flashed. His men were signalling their readiness.
This was it.
Riding the huge distortion in subspace that FS-Six was creating, he led his people out of warp and, with the speed and certainty of a hawk, descended towards the Class-J gas giant. He could see them now without sensors. The grey and blue starship, hovering peacefully, running tests on the wreckage around them, just sitting there. They were even facing away from his incoming attack.
It was excellent.
“Squadron, this is your First,” he repeated once more. “Target their primary reactor core and concentrate your fire on their engines. I want them to suffer!”
One by one, each fighter peeled away from the main formation and performed striking runs along the hull of the Fortitude. There were registered hits which the squadron leader recognized with satisfaction. More of his pilots made their attack runs, and small plumes of flame erupted from the saucer section and the warp nacelles.
Without even returning fire, suddenly, those very same warp nacelles folded up and, in a flash, Fortitude jumped to beyond the speed of light.
“Gah, they’re running! The fools! Pursuit course!,” screamed the squadron leader, hammering his controls. “Form up! Get after them!”
In the blink of an eye, FS-Six had all jumped to warp.
* * * *
“Ready or not,” joked Valerie Archer,” here we come!”
On Captain Llewellyn’s order, the Fortitude ignited her impulse engines and gracefully emerged from the dense orange thermo-clouds that made up the Class-J gas giant. With immense gratification that his plan had worked, he watched as Vuro deftly moved the Intrepid-class starship back to her original position. The combination of holographic projection and false sensor readings had worked wonders. They had just watched the alien attack force leave the system, chasing after a ghost.
“Bridge to Engineering,” Llewellyn called out. “Nice holo-work, Sollik. You can take the main deflector offline now and restore it to its original function.”
“Thank you, Captain. It should buy us the time that we need to escape.”
“That it will, my friend. Well done.”
Rather than call out across the Bridge, Ewan walked over to Jason’s station and patted the ensign on his yellow-clad shoulder. For the second time that day, they shared a laugh.
“I take it that you got the scans?”
“Yes, Captain,” Armstrong nodded, showing him on his console. “They were so busy attacking… well, ‘us’ that they didn’t detect anything. I’ve got full schematics, specs, and even the number of bolts holding their bulkheads together, including…”
“Weapons and defense!,” the Welshman saw.
“Everything on the list, checked off.”
“I think you’ve more than earned your place on my Bridge,” Ewan concluded, moving back to his command chair. “All of you have. I don’t know about the rest of you but I didn’t fancy charging phasers today. Now, let’s get out of here before they realize what’s actually happened. Arden, heading 151, mark 330, and engage!”
* * * *
Captain’s log, supplemental;
After traveling at Warp Nine for the last hour, we’ve detected no sign of hostile alien pursuit. It seems that our little magic trick gave us the window that we needed to escape their territory. Although from what I’m learning about this new species, I doubt it’s the last time that Starfleet or my crew in particular will be hearing about them.
“Okay, give me the main headlines,” Llewellyn sighed.
The Senior Staff were collected together again in the Briefing room. Standing beside the presentation screen, Lieutenant Commander Sollik had just finished translating and decoding the alien database that they had intercepted and downloaded. T’Verra, Archer, Armstrong, and Vuro were also present. All of the senior staff needed to know what they were up against, or so the captain thought.
“Their ships are tough, durable, and fast,” Sollik began. “I’m very impressed by what I see here, sir. Their culture is entirely built around space travel. Everything is geared towards the production of a better, stronger attack fleet. We’ve already encountered the fighter classes, which are divided into thirty-strong squadron wings. They report to carrier vessels that roam in fleets of anywhere up to a hundred.”
“Great Scott,” Ewan breathed, giving a voice to the looks of shock and amazement scattered around the table. Even T’Verra raised an eyebrow.
“In searching through their database,” Jason said, standing up and taking over the report from his Suliban colleague,” I found no references to art, music, literature… nothing. The only history that they record is military. It seems that they own planets and systems right up to the edge of the Galaxy. Starbase 499 in the Santrag System is the limit of the Federation’s expansionism for a reason, Captain. Going any further would spark a war.”
“It’s lucky we stopped there, then,” muttered Valerie.
“The only thing that I can’t explain,” Armstrong wrapped up,” is a reference to some kind of soldier growth facility.”
“I believe that I have the answer to that, Ensign,” Doctor T’Verra interrupted, turning towards the captain and clasping her hands together on the table. “My autopsy of the alien pilot that we recovered had revealed that this is a species grown, not born.”
“Excuse me?,” frowned Ewan.
“I am uncertain whether it is true of their entire race,” answered the Vulcan woman,” but insofar as their soldier class, they are the product of some highly-advanced genetic growth programs. The DNA is harvested from an unknown source, probably from their homeworld, and the tissue is artificially stimulated. They experience a lifespan that is roughly equivalent to that of a Human, but they contain no reproductive system.”
“An entire navy,” whispered Vuro, shaking his head in disbelief,” grown in a facility for the sole purpose of galactic domination.”
“It would appear so,” agreed T’Verra.
At that moment, Llewellyn stood from his chair, holding his hands behind his back as he turned to gaze out of the briefing room window. The stars were a blue outside, whipped past Fortitude as she desperately ran from this new aggressor.
He had been a lucky man, hadn’t he?
Their first encounter at Starbase 499, and a neat little torpedo trick with thanks to the quick tactical mind of his First Officer…
Their second encounter and a cheeky holographic reproduction of his starship had fooled them in their blind rage, and it made him remember an old saying that his father used to quote: Third time lucky, son.”
The thing was, he had been the lucky one on the first two counts. Would it be third time lucky for them, next time?
“There is one other thing, Captain,” Ensign Armstrong called out, breaking into his thoughts and returning him to the briefing. “I found a name in their database. After running it through the Universal Translator, I was certain that I had made a mistake but, well, sir, it’s definitely unique.”
“Spit it out, Ensign,” the captain ordered. “What are our new friends called?”
“The closest definition that the computer could get was ‘conclusion’, resolution’, or indeed simply the word ‘end’.”
“The End?,” Archer repeated with emphasis.
“Yes, ma’am.”
Ewan spun on his heel, returning to the view of the starscape. “How fitting.”
EPILOGUE
The shipwide mood from Deck One to Deck Fifteen of the USS Fortitude had certainly improved, thanks to their successful evasion of the End squadron, after the downbeat beginning to their month away from Starbase 499 and finding the corpse of a hostile alien species in a debris field, Ewan had been pleased to discover two interesting new spacial phenomenon along their flight path. They were hardly remarkable but it focused the attention of his crew elsewhere, and it made them realize that they had done a brave thing by hiding inside the Class-J gas giant. They had risked detection in order to gain intelligence on a possible new threat.
Heading for bed himself, Ewan rubbed his eyes and finished his coffee when his desktop monitor started making noises at him. He did a double-take, first deciding that whatever it was could wait until the morning, but then on second thought, he padded over to the monitor and tagged the activation panel.
“TO: Llewellyn, Captain Ewan: USS Fortitude, NCC-76240
FROM: Blackmore, Rear Admiral Edward: Starbase 499, Santrag II
Ewan, I got your data regarding the End. Erica and I sat up all night, cataloguing it and going over the fine details. I can safely say that my initial character assessment about you was spot on. You’re ballsy.
I’ve transmitted the whole thing to Starfleet Commander via subspace relay. I guess I own you a beer when you get back. Club 499, my private table? Deal? Just watch your backsides out there, and remember, regardless of whatever happens, in this corner of space, we’re all in this together. See you in three weeks. Boxer.”
Somehow, with those words from his superior officer, Ewan Llewellyn managed to sleep peacefully that night.
The End…