"Or what?" Regent Sarah countered. "You can't stop us."
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"Exactly," Krystal replied. "I can't. So why waste the energy when its a waste of time. You obviously want that guy. Every minute you waste on a random starship is one minute longer that he has to get away from you. Its a pointless show of force that won't matter in the long run. And it doesn't get you any closer to finding your target."
He snaps his fingers. Suddenly enough, Emperor Nat, Regent Sarah, the crew of the Molly, Suvel and his security team, and Krystal all find themselves in the bridge of a Cardassian Kulinor Class starship. It's plasma cannon is loaded and ready; one shot can destroy all life on the Earth. Any attempts to attack the ship fail to do any damage, any attempts to board the vessel are all redirected to ESD, and the vessel is also protected from any attacks from Q or, with Nat and Sarah's combined power, Super-Q. The ship is literally unstoppable.
"If he values this planet as much as we believe," Sarah said with a mischievous smile, "he'll come."
Risa Orbit
Systems are restored on board the Lexington and Sarai.
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Suvel looked around the Cardassian bridge. The only way he and the rest of the Starfleet personnel were getting off this ship alive was if they could out-think the Super-Qs. That would prove to be extremely hard to do.
"Don't try escaping, pal. Transporters are all blocked, and there aren't any shuttles or EVA suits either. Oh, and the ship can't be controlled via any consoles. We control the ship directly."
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The Infamous, Nel Kestral – T.I.S. Zipporah, The Grand Hall
Super-Q Amanda gloated, “Nat and an alternate version of Sarah, who is also a Super-Q, are over Earth right now, in a Cardassian ship.”
The Infamous shrugged. “Then I'll destroy the ship.”
* said, “I do not believe that is wise. It is obviously a trap.”
The Infamous narrowed his eyes at the energy cloud. “Can you, like, turn into a hot chick or something?”
The liberated Undine T'Vix said, “How can you think of that right now when Earth may be in danger?”
“The Cardassian ship does have a weapon that can destroy a planet,” Amanda Rogers said. “I discern no weaknesses to exploit.”
“It seems you do not have a choice,” the Borg Queen told The Infamous.
Rolling his eyes, The Infamous stated, “There's always a bloody choice, love.”
Suspiria cutely asked, “So what will you choose to do, Warlord?”
“Your votes?” he asked.
Everyone except for Risha the Douwd, Waraya the Cytherian, and Kes changed their colored lights to red.
The Infamous groaned, “So it's unanimous: I'm in full command of the Zipporah and the Ten K Armada. The TenKA.” He gave everyone a lazy grin.
Entering the Grand Hall, the new El-Aurian minister said, “That's not what unanimous means.”
D'ren looked over at Sai Feyt. “You must be the new girl... Anyway, I like Earth but I like me more, and I like my freedom more. Besides, Amanda here can just bring 'em all back to life...right?”
As Sai took her seat to The Infamous' right, he peered nervously at Amanda.
She shrugged. “Maybe. But remember, there are two Super Q's. I'm only one. And you're down a Q now.”
“This is true,” Sai put in. “They could just destroy it again, with their powers, and then bombard Amanda so she could do nothing except defend herself, until she lost the battle.”
Up in the stands, Nel turned to Sarah. “This is bad, Sarah. If D'ren joins Nat...everyone and everything is doomed. We need to talk to him before he makes a decision!”
Vonph Battleship 17, holding cell
Notos was found in a holding cell in the bowels of the vessel. Everyone except for the Iconian was dead. Even the Borg ships were gone. When Notos was found, he thought only of his hatred for the Iconian alliance led by Emperor Nat. For some reason, his mind was filled with images of Earth, the spacedock, and the possibility of an alliance with a powerful armada to exact vengeance upon the Iconians and the Super-Q who did this to him.
Krystal just found a chair and started spinning around a bit in it out of boredom. So far... her "plan", if it could even be qualified as one, was an absolute failure.
"An alternate, Super-Q Sarah? My god, Nat allied with her? This really is very, very bad."
Sarah turned to Nel.
"So when can we actually talk to him, and if and when we do, what can we even say? Is there any hope at all?"
T'Reth and Notos - Undine Behemoth
The 2 Undine returned to the Behemoth, and argued about where to go from there. They wanted to go to Earth, but the last time an Undine went to ESD, they were sent back to Fluidic Space without any memory of what happened.
However, they came up with a plan. Last time, the ships were sent back through an existing portal (as observed from Fluidic Space), and whatever ESD is using may be capable of opening new portals for the purposes of sending Undine ships back. The Behemoth, by nature, could employ total control over Fluidic rifts, and would be immune to the effects of the devices, just as long as both Undine stay on the Behemoth and that the vessel doesn't stray too close to ESD itself. That, and with the Cardassian ship on the other side of the Earth, they should be fine. Even if they weren't, they could come back to normal space soon enough in another system and try again.
They set course for Earth, the Cardassian ship specifically, keeping away from ESD and thus not being sent back to Fluidic Space.
The Alternate Universe
The alternate universe had been in chaos since Sarah and half of The Alliance left through that wormhole. The Federation, Klingon Empire, and Romulan Republic had all been destroyed. The Alliance had taken over the Beta Quadrant and all of Federation space in the Alpha Quadrant, but with half of their forces in the other universe, were not powerful enough to overpower the Dominion, who had taken over Cardassian space (and still control the Gamma Quadrant) and declared war on The Alliance. Making matters worse, the Borg, lead by the Borg King, had assimilated the entire known Delta Quadrant and even the Jenolan Dyson Sphere, building a massive armada of their own and locking weapons on The Alliance, and also the Dominion, themselves.
It was a 3 way war now. Who would survive? No one really knew at this point. It was doubted, that anyone ever would.
Post edited by admiralnat on
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"An alternate, Super-Q Sarah? My god, Nat allied with her? This really is very, very bad."
Sarah turned to Nel.
"So when can we actually talk to him, and if and when we do, what can we even say? Is there any hope at all?"
"I'm not sure, but we have to try," Nel answered. "According to her," she continued, gesturing to the girl sitting to her left, "We're allowed to approach the ministers after the meeting. But I've only met The Infamous once. He's very erratic. We could end up inadvertently saying something that pushes him even more into Nat's hands. We have to be careful."
"Still, we need a plan. How do we convince him to not join Admiral Nat? What in the world could possibly motivate him?"
Undine Behemoth - Sol System
The Behemoth came out of warp in orbit of Earth, opposite of ESD and thus safe from the AUDs. T'Reth could sense that Admiral Nat was on board the Cardassian ship, and that they were going to destroy the Earth.
With a thought command from T'Reth, the Behemoth fired on the Cardassian vessel with an anti-proton beam powerful enough to destroy a dreadnought. The beam had no effect.
T'Reth stood up. How is this possible. They should be been destroyed.
They fired again, and again, in futility. Eventually, they stopped.
I do not believe this.
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The Infamous, Nel Kestral - T.I.S. Zipporah, Grand Ol' Hall
"Still, we need a plan. How do we convince him to not join Admiral Nat? What in the world could possibly motivate him?"
"He lusts after power," Nel said thoughtfully, "and utterly despises the Federation, and always sought to remain free from others' influence. He also doesn't like betrayal and dishonesty. We have to make him believe that Nat is the culmination of everything he loathes...and seeks only to take D'rens power and freedom."
The Behemoth came out of warp in orbit of Earth, opposite of ESD and thus safe from the AUDs. T'Reth could sense that Admiral Nat was on board the Cardassian ship, and that they were going to destroy the Earth.
With a thought command from T'Reth, the Behemoth fired on the Cardassian vessel with an anti-proton beam powerful enough to destroy a dreadnought. The beam had no effect.
T'Reth stood up. How is this possible. They should be been destroyed.
They fired again, and again, in futility. Eventually, they stopped.
I do not believe this.
As the Assembly Ministers were bickering over whether or not they should help the Marquis, Major Ro Laren, ironically, entered the Grand Hall and whispered something to the Irish warlord. He slowly stood up.
He announced to everyone in the hall, "According to reports from reliable sources, our plan to turn the Undine Behemoth against Admiral Nat has succeeded! However, the Cardassian vessel is protected by the Super-Q, and cannot be destroyed! We are going to Earth! Assembly adjourned!"
D'ren turned to leave. Nel stood up and ran through the throngs of frightened, submissive slaves toward him, even running along the conveyer belt. Noticing the only running girl in the entire huge Grand Hall, several female bodyguards intercepted her before she got too far.
Struggling in their grasp, she shouted, "D'ren!"
The Infamous angrily spun around. "That's 'warlord' to you!" He nodded to the guards after his anger subsided.
Nel turned and gestured for Sarah to follow her. Approaching him, she said, "Sir, my lord, which side will you choose? If even the Behemoth cannot stand against Nat's ship, perhaps he is too strong, even for your mighty empire."
"Ye I know," he said. "One o' Elihu's crowd, eh?" He nodded thoughtfully as he walked down the conveyer belt. When he got closer to her, he touched her hair. Then he said, "There is no one in the universe who can stop me, my dear?" He gestured around him to the Assembly Ministers who were filing out of the Grand Hall. "Can you not see the power that backs me?"
The Infamous turned to Sarah. "An' what do you think about all this?"
"You may have your assembly to back you, but if Super-Q-Nat has Super-Q-Sarah backing him up, you're outnumbered and outgunned. From what the alternate universe Nat told me, the alternate universe Sarah's version of The Alliance managed to destroy your ship, killed your crew, and eventually, even killed you. With double the power on their side now, I don't think you'll fare much better than the alternate universe's you did."
Sarah looked down a bit, evidently worried. "To be honest, allying with them would be safer for you in the short term, but in the long run, they'll eventually come back and destroy you later on. It's simply too late to actually take any of them down."
She paused for a moment, then continued. "I'd recommend time travel, but Nat and the AU Sarah probably already have temporal shielding by now, and even then, they would just time travel to undo your time travel anyway."
Sarah gulped. Evidently, there weren't very many options, and that worried her. "You'll just have to give him a reason to want you to stay alive. Make him like you enough to keep you around, else, he'll eventually kill you, or take everything away from you for himself."
Orbit of Earth
The Behemoth fired on the Cardassian ship again, to no effect. The vessel returned fire with a conventional Spiral-Wave disruptor, but it too had no effect on the Behemoth, as it's armor was too think for any weapon to break through.
Without any resistance, Captain Nat instructed the Cardassian vessel, a Kulinor Class, to come about and fire on the Behemoth with the Kulinor's planet-killing weapon. It too had no effect.
Emperor Nat turned to Captain Nat. "See, even when I let you control the ship, you still fail."
The Kulinor instantly turned back to targeting the Earth. It was going to fire in 5 minutes. When it did, all life on Earth would be destroyed. Unless Emperor Nat or Regent Sarah stopped the weapon, there was no hope.
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The Infamous, Nel Kestral - T.I.S. Zipporah, The Grand Hall
"Well," said The Infamous with a seductively charming smirk, "I guess we'll have to come up with a plan by the time we get to Earth, now won't we?"
Ro, who walked up beside D'ren, told them, "From their point-of-view, it will take us four and a half minutes to get there. However, we will experience time differently, giving us anywhere from one month to three."
The Infamous turned to Ro. "Go back to the bridge. Dial up the time dilation device to three months. That should be enough time for me and me new gals here," he said with a smirk, turning to gesture to the two women, "to come up with...something."
With a single curt nod, Ro turned on her heels and headed for the bridge.
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Vice Admiral Nakari - U.S.S. Brock - Orbit of Earth
By now, the Cardassian Kulinor and the Behemoth had been surrounded by a Federation fleet commanded by Vice Admiral Nakari, commanding them from his flagship, the U.S.S. Brock, an Alita-Armitage hybrid vessel.
As it was now, the Behemoth was continually blasting at the Cardassian vessel with no results, while everyone on the Cardassian ship waited for the T.I.S. Zipporah to appear before they destroyed the Earth, or alternatively, the Earth's destruction. They were getting impatient.
Emperor Nat - Cardassian Vessel
Emperor Nat huffed and turned to Regent Sarah.
"I'm done waiting. They've got transwarp, do they not?"
He sent out a transmission everywhere, telling them that if the Zipporah didn't appear in the next 10 seconds, he'd destroy any and all life on Earth. The surrounding fleet were on standby for a fight, but knew that any attempts to disable the Kulinor would be futile.
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By now, as she had been left to her own devices, Krystal was messing around with a console to see if she could find some mechanical way to buy Earth more time. While she wasn't familiar with this particular class of ship, she had spent some time on DS9 and was somewhat familiar with Cardassian systems.
While she wasn't an Engineer, she was trying to see if there was some way to overload the EPS grid powering the main gun in some way.
Suvel made his way slowly over to Krystal, "I see what you are doing. I trained as an engineer during my stay at the Academy. Try realigning the EPS flow to junction T-Alpha."
"You realize we're powering the gun with our own Q power, right? That conduit does literally nothing."
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Suvel turned to look at Sarah and fixed her with a steely Vulcan gaze, "This ship was created by you two, correct? Then, if so, it is a product of your own minds. Therefore, it is linked to your consciousness. Is that correct?"
"Not really. Our Cardassian buddies back in The Alliance built it for us. We're just controlling it, and powering the planet-killing weapon, all with out powers."
Sarah glared back and gave Suvel the "I'm watching you" look, then turned back to watch for the Zipporah's arrival.
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"What else do you expect us to do? Play cards?" Krystal asked sarcastically as she tried a different tactic. If she couldn't deal with the gun itself, maybe she can cause havoc with other systems that could have an impact on the weapon in some way. "I mean... have you seen a Vulcan play poker? Its evil! Their poker face is like stone! Can't read it!"
Emperor Nat snaps his fingers, and a Poker table appears, all ready for Krystal, Suvel, and Suvel's team to play a game of Poker.
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Three days later on Zipporah; three milliseconds later in real-time...
The T.I.S. Zipporah cruised at transwarp toward a signal that was being broadcast by a certain female Romulan traitor half a dozen sectors away. Nel had broke, giving up the information that every enemy intelligence agency wanted: the knowledge of Talitha's secret, a human AI consciousness directly controlling a starship.
D'ren did not use physical torture; he rarely ever did that. Why, when he could just scare someone into submission. But he didn't really have to do much of that either. Everyone who had been part of coming up with “the plan” knew that the Zipporah - or whichever vessel that would be used to conduct the attack – required a human AI to enter the calculations and course corrections and other compensations that humans and computer cores simply could not execute. The ship did not just need Artificial Intelligence - she needed Advanced Intuition.
Once The Infamous had gained that knowledge, it was only a matter of calibrating the long-range scanners with Amanda Foster's Q senses. They detected the phase-cloaked Talitha, but when the Zipporah intercepted a Romulan transmission from the starship, D'ren was elated.
One week later on Zipporah; one second later in real-time...
D'ren was sitting at a heavy mahogany table in one of the Zipporah's lavish dining facilities. Also at the table was his female Ferasan pet, complete with collar and bell, sitting to D'ren's right. To his left, Sarah Walker sat with an elegant human meal in front of her; her favorite food actually. The only other person dining with them was Minister Feyt, the El-Aurian.
But there was something wrong with D'ren that day. He stared absently at his food, having only taken a single bite in twenty minutes. This was very unlike him.
Knowing The Infamous well, Sai eyed Sarah, luring her gaze across the table to her, gaining her attention. Sai made a subtle eye movement toward D'ren, slightly inclining her neck.
Sarah noticed Sai's signal, then looked down at her meal for a moment. Spaghetti, of all things. How in the world did they guess?
She took a bite, then turned to D'ren. "What's wrong?"
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The resident forum voice of reason (I HAZ FORUM REP! YAY!)
"If he values this planet as much as we believe," Sarah said with a mischievous smile, "he'll come."
Risa Orbit
Systems are restored on board the Lexington and Sarai.
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"Don't try escaping, pal. Transporters are all blocked, and there aren't any shuttles or EVA suits either. Oh, and the ship can't be controlled via any consoles. We control the ship directly."
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Super-Q Amanda gloated, “Nat and an alternate version of Sarah, who is also a Super-Q, are over Earth right now, in a Cardassian ship.”
The Infamous shrugged. “Then I'll destroy the ship.”
* said, “I do not believe that is wise. It is obviously a trap.”
The Infamous narrowed his eyes at the energy cloud. “Can you, like, turn into a hot chick or something?”
The liberated Undine T'Vix said, “How can you think of that right now when Earth may be in danger?”
“The Cardassian ship does have a weapon that can destroy a planet,” Amanda Rogers said. “I discern no weaknesses to exploit.”
“It seems you do not have a choice,” the Borg Queen told The Infamous.
Rolling his eyes, The Infamous stated, “There's always a bloody choice, love.”
Suspiria cutely asked, “So what will you choose to do, Warlord?”
“Your votes?” he asked.
Everyone except for Risha the Douwd, Waraya the Cytherian, and Kes changed their colored lights to red.
The Infamous groaned, “So it's unanimous: I'm in full command of the Zipporah and the Ten K Armada. The TenKA.” He gave everyone a lazy grin.
Entering the Grand Hall, the new El-Aurian minister said, “That's not what unanimous means.”
D'ren looked over at Sai Feyt. “You must be the new girl... Anyway, I like Earth but I like me more, and I like my freedom more. Besides, Amanda here can just bring 'em all back to life...right?”
As Sai took her seat to The Infamous' right, he peered nervously at Amanda.
She shrugged. “Maybe. But remember, there are two Super Q's. I'm only one. And you're down a Q now.”
“This is true,” Sai put in. “They could just destroy it again, with their powers, and then bombard Amanda so she could do nothing except defend herself, until she lost the battle.”
Up in the stands, Nel turned to Sarah. “This is bad, Sarah. If D'ren joins Nat...everyone and everything is doomed. We need to talk to him before he makes a decision!”
Vonph Battleship 17, holding cell
Notos was found in a holding cell in the bowels of the vessel. Everyone except for the Iconian was dead. Even the Borg ships were gone. When Notos was found, he thought only of his hatred for the Iconian alliance led by Emperor Nat. For some reason, his mind was filled with images of Earth, the spacedock, and the possibility of an alliance with a powerful armada to exact vengeance upon the Iconians and the Super-Q who did this to him.
The resident forum voice of reason (I HAZ FORUM REP! YAY!)
"An alternate, Super-Q Sarah? My god, Nat allied with her? This really is very, very bad."
Sarah turned to Nel.
"So when can we actually talk to him, and if and when we do, what can we even say? Is there any hope at all?"
T'Reth and Notos - Undine Behemoth
The 2 Undine returned to the Behemoth, and argued about where to go from there. They wanted to go to Earth, but the last time an Undine went to ESD, they were sent back to Fluidic Space without any memory of what happened.
However, they came up with a plan. Last time, the ships were sent back through an existing portal (as observed from Fluidic Space), and whatever ESD is using may be capable of opening new portals for the purposes of sending Undine ships back. The Behemoth, by nature, could employ total control over Fluidic rifts, and would be immune to the effects of the devices, just as long as both Undine stay on the Behemoth and that the vessel doesn't stray too close to ESD itself. That, and with the Cardassian ship on the other side of the Earth, they should be fine. Even if they weren't, they could come back to normal space soon enough in another system and try again.
They set course for Earth, the Cardassian ship specifically, keeping away from ESD and thus not being sent back to Fluidic Space.
The Alternate Universe
The alternate universe had been in chaos since Sarah and half of The Alliance left through that wormhole. The Federation, Klingon Empire, and Romulan Republic had all been destroyed. The Alliance had taken over the Beta Quadrant and all of Federation space in the Alpha Quadrant, but with half of their forces in the other universe, were not powerful enough to overpower the Dominion, who had taken over Cardassian space (and still control the Gamma Quadrant) and declared war on The Alliance. Making matters worse, the Borg, lead by the Borg King, had assimilated the entire known Delta Quadrant and even the Jenolan Dyson Sphere, building a massive armada of their own and locking weapons on The Alliance, and also the Dominion, themselves.
It was a 3 way war now. Who would survive? No one really knew at this point. It was doubted, that anyone ever would.
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"I'm not sure, but we have to try," Nel answered. "According to her," she continued, gesturing to the girl sitting to her left, "We're allowed to approach the ministers after the meeting. But I've only met The Infamous once. He's very erratic. We could end up inadvertently saying something that pushes him even more into Nat's hands. We have to be careful."
"Still, we need a plan. How do we convince him to not join Admiral Nat? What in the world could possibly motivate him?"
Undine Behemoth - Sol System
The Behemoth came out of warp in orbit of Earth, opposite of ESD and thus safe from the AUDs. T'Reth could sense that Admiral Nat was on board the Cardassian ship, and that they were going to destroy the Earth.
With a thought command from T'Reth, the Behemoth fired on the Cardassian vessel with an anti-proton beam powerful enough to destroy a dreadnought. The beam had no effect.
T'Reth stood up. How is this possible. They should be been destroyed.
They fired again, and again, in futility. Eventually, they stopped.
I do not believe this.
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"He lusts after power," Nel said thoughtfully, "and utterly despises the Federation, and always sought to remain free from others' influence. He also doesn't like betrayal and dishonesty. We have to make him believe that Nat is the culmination of everything he loathes...and seeks only to take D'rens power and freedom."
As the Assembly Ministers were bickering over whether or not they should help the Marquis, Major Ro Laren, ironically, entered the Grand Hall and whispered something to the Irish warlord. He slowly stood up.
He announced to everyone in the hall, "According to reports from reliable sources, our plan to turn the Undine Behemoth against Admiral Nat has succeeded! However, the Cardassian vessel is protected by the Super-Q, and cannot be destroyed! We are going to Earth! Assembly adjourned!"
D'ren turned to leave. Nel stood up and ran through the throngs of frightened, submissive slaves toward him, even running along the conveyer belt. Noticing the only running girl in the entire huge Grand Hall, several female bodyguards intercepted her before she got too far.
Struggling in their grasp, she shouted, "D'ren!"
The Infamous angrily spun around. "That's 'warlord' to you!" He nodded to the guards after his anger subsided.
Nel turned and gestured for Sarah to follow her. Approaching him, she said, "Sir, my lord, which side will you choose? If even the Behemoth cannot stand against Nat's ship, perhaps he is too strong, even for your mighty empire."
"Ye I know," he said. "One o' Elihu's crowd, eh?" He nodded thoughtfully as he walked down the conveyer belt. When he got closer to her, he touched her hair. Then he said, "There is no one in the universe who can stop me, my dear?" He gestured around him to the Assembly Ministers who were filing out of the Grand Hall. "Can you not see the power that backs me?"
The Infamous turned to Sarah. "An' what do you think about all this?"
"You may have your assembly to back you, but if Super-Q-Nat has Super-Q-Sarah backing him up, you're outnumbered and outgunned. From what the alternate universe Nat told me, the alternate universe Sarah's version of The Alliance managed to destroy your ship, killed your crew, and eventually, even killed you. With double the power on their side now, I don't think you'll fare much better than the alternate universe's you did."
Sarah looked down a bit, evidently worried. "To be honest, allying with them would be safer for you in the short term, but in the long run, they'll eventually come back and destroy you later on. It's simply too late to actually take any of them down."
She paused for a moment, then continued. "I'd recommend time travel, but Nat and the AU Sarah probably already have temporal shielding by now, and even then, they would just time travel to undo your time travel anyway."
Sarah gulped. Evidently, there weren't very many options, and that worried her. "You'll just have to give him a reason to want you to stay alive. Make him like you enough to keep you around, else, he'll eventually kill you, or take everything away from you for himself."
Orbit of Earth
The Behemoth fired on the Cardassian ship again, to no effect. The vessel returned fire with a conventional Spiral-Wave disruptor, but it too had no effect on the Behemoth, as it's armor was too think for any weapon to break through.
Without any resistance, Captain Nat instructed the Cardassian vessel, a Kulinor Class, to come about and fire on the Behemoth with the Kulinor's planet-killing weapon. It too had no effect.
Emperor Nat turned to Captain Nat. "See, even when I let you control the ship, you still fail."
The Kulinor instantly turned back to targeting the Earth. It was going to fire in 5 minutes. When it did, all life on Earth would be destroyed. Unless Emperor Nat or Regent Sarah stopped the weapon, there was no hope.
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"Well," said The Infamous with a seductively charming smirk, "I guess we'll have to come up with a plan by the time we get to Earth, now won't we?"
Ro, who walked up beside D'ren, told them, "From their point-of-view, it will take us four and a half minutes to get there. However, we will experience time differently, giving us anywhere from one month to three."
The Infamous turned to Ro. "Go back to the bridge. Dial up the time dilation device to three months. That should be enough time for me and me new gals here," he said with a smirk, turning to gesture to the two women, "to come up with...something."
With a single curt nod, Ro turned on her heels and headed for the bridge.
"Well, have any ideas of where to start?"
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He nodded. "Yes. Follow." The Infamous turned and headed out of the Hall.
Sarah followed The Infamous as directed.
Oh, I'm just here, buildin' my wall! Well, I recruited help. Ok, so I'm the supervisor now. Also, I recommend you not try to run through the part of the wall that isn't built; they say people never return from there, and neither have the robots I sent to patrol that place. I dunno what's going on over there, but seriously, avoid it at all costs.
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The Infamous, Nel Kestral, Sarah Walker, the Ministers - T.I.S. Zipporah, various locations
The Infamous, Nel Kestral, and Sarah Walker gather around a table in a strategy room on the dreadnought...
...They argue a lot, especially at first...
...the Assembly Ministers get involved...
...Nel throws a punch at *, but since * is a cloud of energy, she falls through the entity and hits the floor...
...Everyone is exhausted, even too exhausted to argue...
...D'ren enters the room with a PADD and slams it on the table...
...Dressed completely differently, D'ren enters the room and shows everyone a new energy weapon he designed...
...Super-Amanda shakes her head and he leaves to go find something better...
...Nel enters with Ro Laren and both are excited and start yammering, but Sai Feyt points out a flaw in their plan...
...Grilka rolls her eyes at D'ren as he, again, dressed differently, nudges her with an elbow with a wink and a grin...
...The Infamous and Nel have to pull Zyree off Gaila as they fight for some reason...
...The Infamous is using a yard stick to point something out on a white board with the drawing of a Behemoth on it...
...He flips the board over and it's a picture of a giant dinosaur for some reason...
...Everyone shakes their heads...
...T'Vix and the Borg Queen get into a heated argument...
...Nel motions for Sarah and D'ren (who is now in another outfit) to come over to the table to show them something exciting...
...Everyone agrees that the plan they finally came up with will probably work...
D'ren said, "Well, I gotta admit. I didn't expect to come up with a good plan in only 45 minutes."
Nel grumbled, "Would've been sooner if you hadn't insisted in leaving to change your clothes every ten minutes."
A few people laughed, especially the Ministers, since they could get away with it.
Sarah stood there, a little confused.
"So what's the plan, exactly?"
Vice Admiral Nakari - U.S.S. Brock - Orbit of Earth
By now, the Cardassian Kulinor and the Behemoth had been surrounded by a Federation fleet commanded by Vice Admiral Nakari, commanding them from his flagship, the U.S.S. Brock, an Alita-Armitage hybrid vessel.
As it was now, the Behemoth was continually blasting at the Cardassian vessel with no results, while everyone on the Cardassian ship waited for the T.I.S. Zipporah to appear before they destroyed the Earth, or alternatively, the Earth's destruction. They were getting impatient.
Emperor Nat - Cardassian Vessel
Emperor Nat huffed and turned to Regent Sarah.
"I'm done waiting. They've got transwarp, do they not?"
He sent out a transmission everywhere, telling them that if the Zipporah didn't appear in the next 10 seconds, he'd destroy any and all life on Earth. The surrounding fleet were on standby for a fight, but knew that any attempts to disable the Kulinor would be futile.
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While she wasn't an Engineer, she was trying to see if there was some way to overload the EPS grid powering the main gun in some way.
The resident forum voice of reason (I HAZ FORUM REP! YAY!)
The resident forum voice of reason (I HAZ FORUM REP! YAY!)
"You realize we're powering the gun with our own Q power, right? That conduit does literally nothing."
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Sarah glared back and gave Suvel the "I'm watching you" look, then turned back to watch for the Zipporah's arrival.
Oh, I'm just here, buildin' my wall! Well, I recruited help. Ok, so I'm the supervisor now. Also, I recommend you not try to run through the part of the wall that isn't built; they say people never return from there, and neither have the robots I sent to patrol that place. I dunno what's going on over there, but seriously, avoid it at all costs.
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The resident forum voice of reason (I HAZ FORUM REP! YAY!)
Oh, I'm just here, buildin' my wall! Well, I recruited help. Ok, so I'm the supervisor now. Also, I recommend you not try to run through the part of the wall that isn't built; they say people never return from there, and neither have the robots I sent to patrol that place. I dunno what's going on over there, but seriously, avoid it at all costs.
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PARADISE LOSTThree days later on Zipporah; three milliseconds later in real-time...
The T.I.S. Zipporah cruised at transwarp toward a signal that was being broadcast by a certain female Romulan traitor half a dozen sectors away. Nel had broke, giving up the information that every enemy intelligence agency wanted: the knowledge of Talitha's secret, a human AI consciousness directly controlling a starship.
D'ren did not use physical torture; he rarely ever did that. Why, when he could just scare someone into submission. But he didn't really have to do much of that either. Everyone who had been part of coming up with “the plan” knew that the Zipporah - or whichever vessel that would be used to conduct the attack – required a human AI to enter the calculations and course corrections and other compensations that humans and computer cores simply could not execute. The ship did not just need Artificial Intelligence - she needed Advanced Intuition.
Once The Infamous had gained that knowledge, it was only a matter of calibrating the long-range scanners with Amanda Foster's Q senses. They detected the phase-cloaked Talitha, but when the Zipporah intercepted a Romulan transmission from the starship, D'ren was elated.
One week later on Zipporah; one second later in real-time...
D'ren was sitting at a heavy mahogany table in one of the Zipporah's lavish dining facilities. Also at the table was his female Ferasan pet, complete with collar and bell, sitting to D'ren's right. To his left, Sarah Walker sat with an elegant human meal in front of her; her favorite food actually. The only other person dining with them was Minister Feyt, the El-Aurian.
But there was something wrong with D'ren that day. He stared absently at his food, having only taken a single bite in twenty minutes. This was very unlike him.
Knowing The Infamous well, Sai eyed Sarah, luring her gaze across the table to her, gaining her attention. Sai made a subtle eye movement toward D'ren, slightly inclining her neck.
Ask him what's wrong.
Sarah noticed Sai's signal, then looked down at her meal for a moment. Spaghetti, of all things. How in the world did they guess?
She took a bite, then turned to D'ren. "What's wrong?"
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RISA SYSTEM
Once the ship's systems had been restored, Suvel's first officer ordered the Sarai to set a course back to earth.