Failing Bechdel

Posted on Sep 20, 2015 @ 3:35pm by Captain Michael Turlogh Kane

Mission: Civil War

"FAILING BECHDEL"

(Continued from "The Infamous Beer Bottle Battle of Elandipole IV")

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Location: Elandipole IV, surface
Stardate: [2.15]0920.1935
Scene: Makshift classroom


Jane Hakeswill checked the wall chronometer again. One of the children had managed to splash water on it this morning, but the internal circuitry had been undamaged and the chronometer was still keeping good time. It wasn't the only thing that was wet - there were sand particles and child-sized water footprints everywhere inside the pre-fabricated schoolroom. Aboard the Phoenix, with its automated self-cleaning systems, she had forgotten how utterly filthy children could be.

Today she had been trying to teach the children about ocean planets. It seemed fitting given that E-4 was to be their new home for the time being. "Even though this planet is smaller than Terra, the oceans are very deep, hundreds of kilometers deeper than Terra. The immense pressure at the bottom of Elandipole's world-ocean means that there are many strange ice formations on the ocean floor, and although we all live on the warm surfaces of shallow tectonic plates, far out into the world-ocean the waves are as high as mountains! Isn't that amazing!"

The chronometer hit fifteen hundred hours and buzzed. The children let out a collective whoop, got up from their desks and started to gleefully pack their satchels. Jane moved among them, calling out homework reminders. "Remember to finish reading the chapters on ocean planets in your textpads! Tomorrow we'll be talking a little more about the differences between E-4 and Earth, and don't forget to bring suits for your swimming practice!"

It was no use; they were gone, running away through the streets back to their pre-fab dwellings. One of them - little Jody Hamilton - had even asked earlier "Where is Earth and is it pretty?" Like Jane herself, none of the children had ever seen the homeworld of the Human race. To them, it was like a fable, a story of some distant land across the galaxy. All they had ever known were the grimy back-alleys and the cut-throat life on Limbo, descendants of stupidly idealistic Earther colonists, the last of whom had died generations ago and left their progeny to suffer amongst uncaring stars.

She gave the schoolroom a quick tidy-up and stepped out into the sunshine. The temperature on E-4 was constantly balmy, warm but never too hot, and always tempered by cool breezes wafting in from the ocean. The clouds floated high in the sky, wispy white things that stretched out lazily like streamers. It was a beautiful world, there was no denying that, but it was a culture shock to move from Limbo to this. Secretly, Jane worried that some of the colonists wouldn't be able to take it, that as soon as the novelty of being on vacation wore off, their bad old habits would return.

She walked down towards the beach, enjoying the feel of the breeze on her face, tasting the tang of sea-salt on her tongue. Several people were on the water, paddle-boarding between the small islands. Already, a town was forming between the little land masses, an as-yet bridgeless town constructed by the never-ending gifts of the Phoenix's industrial replicators. The Starfleet crew were working closely with the colonists to make sure any settlement was set up as carefully and as fairly as possible. Efficient and orderly grid-like streets, with important amenities equidistant from everywhere else. No prime real estate, nobody feeling like they were losing out. Equality was the key, and amazingly, it was working. The Limbo colonists seemed to be pulling together, at least for now. With everyone occupied in building homes, there was less time for all those little Limbo enmities to spite the collective mood.

Jane herself was living in a small one-room apartment near the medical centre. It was one of four in the building, the others also occupied by people with no families. The more kids a colonist had, the bigger their space, and that was just fine with Jane. She didn't have much to her name, just replicated clothes and a bunch of PADDs downloaded from the memory banks of the Phoenix.

On the beach, one of the gold-uniformed Starfleet engineers was standing facing the town. She was holding a pair of rangefinders up to her eyes and cross-referencing her findings with a tricorder on her hip. Short, red-haired and pretty, she was getting several lecherous glances from the nearby male colonists, but seemed completely oblivious to their inanity.

Jane walked up to her. "It's Lieutenant Rochemonte, isn't it?" she said with a smile.

The engineer deactivated the rangefinder. "Right," she nodded. "It's Cindy to civilians, though. Do I know you?"

"My name's Jane. You were the one that oversaw the construction of my apartment building," said Jane awkwardly, wondering why she had bothered the woman while she was obviously working on something. "The town is coming along well. Thank you for everything you've done."

"It's short-to-mid-term only," said Cindy, stuffing the rangefinder back into a hip pouch. "We hope that eventually Starfleet will dispatch a fully-equipped colony ship to convert the buildings to more permanent structures. But you've got a good start here. The weather is always calm and warm, and oceanic wave action can generate power for the replicators so you'll never run out of food. Your colony's got a bright future ahead of it, Jane."

Jane tried not to think about what would happen if the rougher of Limbo's residents decided to get up to their old tricks in a new place, once the firepower of the orbiting starships were gone. "I hope so." She paused for a moment. "Do you, uh, do you think Captain Kane will beam down to inspect the colony at some stage?"

Cindy shrugged. "I don't know. I suppose so. He's always busy, though. Right now he's in orbit aboard the Pendragon in some sort of conference."

"Right," said Jane quickly. "Always busy in meetings. I understand. Starship captains must have important work to do." She frowned."When did he last have a holiday, do you think?"

Cindy was fiddling with her hip pouch, trying to get the tricorder into it, but the device had snagged itself on the side of her belt and she was trying to extricate it. "Hmm? I don't know. I don't know anything about him."

"Nothing?"

"No," Cindy said absently. "I doubt anyone does." She pulled the tricorder free and snapped it shut. "Hah."

"How come?" asked Jane. She was curious now. "You'd imagine that a ship's captain might have some sort of reputation preceding him."

Cindy stopped suddenly and looked sidelong at Jane. "Why are you asking?"

"Oh, just curious." Jane felt the heat in her cheeks, thankful that Cindy wouldn't be able to see it. "Have you ever seen his service record?"

Cindy shrugged. "No. I'm sure he has one, it's just that I've never bothered to read it."

"His reputation, then? What do his crew think of him?"

Cindy seemed about to say something, then thought better of it and shut up. She pursed her lips and thought a moment. "It's not for me to say. I find Captain Kane to be a highly professional officer who maintains a proper distance from the crew at all times. He gives me an order, I obey it. I don't have a problem with him as my commander. That's all I'm going to say."

"You might not want to say more, Lieutenant, but it sounds like there's some more to tell." Jane's curiosity was well and truly piqued now. She tried a different tack. "Who else might know more about him?"

"What do you mean?"

"I don't know. Someone who's served with him a while, perhaps? You tell me."

Cindy frowned. "I suppose there'd be no harm in that." She thought for a moment before answering. "Our assistant chief science officer is Stephanie Trimble. She was on the Discovery with him when they were exploring the Beta Quadrant ten years ago. Maybe check with her?" Cindy pointed to an atoll in the middle distance, at the other end of a calm blue lagoon. "She's off duty right now. That's Science Island or something over there. Watch out though, the marines and engineers have their own shore leave islands nearby. I hear there have been high-jinks."

Jane nodded. "I'll be careful. Thank you, Lieutenant."

Cindy nodded. "Have a good day." She turned on her heel and walked off across the white sand.

Jane looked around for a free paddle board. There was a mystery to solve and a trail to follow.

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Scene: Science Island


The paddle over to Science Island took less than ten minutes. The water was a beautiful crystal green, and almost transparent all the way to sandy seabed. Schools of colourful little alien fish, no bigger than goldfish in a tank, ebbed and flowed with the current, darting in an out amongst the kelps and seaweeds that grew out of the seabed.

The water was all shallow, too, less than thirty feet at its deepest point. That went for most of the waters around the atolls and lagoons. It wasn't until you fell off the continental shelf that the ocean got deep, terrifyingly deep, dropping down into a dark world of cold underwater canyons and trenches where no sunlight could penetrate. Those were the depths where the giants lived - enormous ocean monsters like the caridea, shoals of frilled sharks, and god-knows-what.

Jane had hitched up the legs of her pants, and now she stepped off her board onto the beach. Several of the Starfleet crew were using this small island as their own personal shore leave port. They were littered around the beach like empty shells, sunbathing, lounging around in groups, or playing beach sports. The sun shone down on them, and bare arms and legs soaked up the light like thirsty sponges.

A sunbathing young Human woman gave her directions to where Stephanie Trimble was likewise lying on the beach, dozing on top of a huge towel. Trimble was tall and long-limbed, somewhere in her mid-thirties, with a wavy length of brown hair that was spread out around her head like a thought bubble.

Jane stepped into her sunlight, casting a shadow over Trimble's sun-visored face. After a few moments she stirred and looked up. "Hello?" she said expectantly.

"Stephanie Trimble?"

"Yes." Stephanie sat up.

"I'm Jane Hakeswill, one of the Limbo colonists. I'm sorry for interrupting your shore leave, but I was wondering if I could ask you a few questions."

"Oh. Is that all," Stephanie chuckled. "I thought you were going to order me to report back to the ship. Here, sit down." She scooched over on the towel, giving Jane space to sit down. "What sort of questions?"

"About Captain Kane," said Jane, sitting down cross-legged opposite Stephanie. Immediately she noticed Stephanie bristling. "Is something wrong?"

"You want me to talk about the Captain?" asked Stephanie. She sounded somewhat suspicious. "Why?"

"I'm told that you've served in Starfleet with him for a long time. How long, if you don't mind me asking?"

"I guess not." Stephanie rubbed her chin and pulled her sun-visor down over her eyes, rubbing her chin thoughtfully like a witness in a courtroom. "Let me see. Five-and-a-half years on the Discovery back in the day, and then ever since we got reactivated last year. Seven years, all told."

"Seven years!" Jane exclaimed. "I had no idea it was so long! You must be close friends, then?"

Stephanie laughed, but not in mirth. She shook her head, spilling her hair everywhere. "No, Jane. Captain Kane and I aren't friends."

"No?"

"No," Stephanie chuckled. "We're colleagues. We have a working relationship, not a personal one."

"I don't understand. After seven years, I would have assumed - "

"You'd think so, right?" Stephanie traced lines in the sand absent-mindedly. "He's not that kind of man. Never has been, as long as I've known him. We first met when he was assigned as the Discovery's first officer. She'd just been refitted and reactivated by Starfleet after years in mothballs. A voyage of exploration into the Beta Quadrant. We were supposed to be gone a couple of years, as I recall."

"When was this?"

Stephanie paused to consider it. "We're talking about thirteen years ago, I guess. We were all a hell of a lot younger than we are now. But the Discovery was beautiful ship, with a superb crew. The Captain was just a lieutenant commander then."

"What was he like?"

"I don't know," shrugged Stephanie, somewhat helplessly. "Much like he is now? Professional, courteous, somewhat distant, occasionally temperamental. He was highly-regarded by his old CO on the Century, I remember that much. Had a successful career as a SecTac for a number of years prior to being promoted to command."

"Did he have any romantic relationships?"

Stephanie looked up sharply. "That's kind of personal, don't you think?"

Jane nodded blithely. "Yep. So, did he?"

Stephanie sighed. "I don't think so. There were rumours only. He and Commander Brennan, the CO, were close. Then later, when Captain Kane had been promoted to CO, there were rumours of him and his ExO, Selyara. I don't know if he was actually involved with either of them, though."

"Selyara?" Jane frowned. "That Vulcan woman that came aboard with us from Limbo?"

"Apparently so." Stephanie smiled slyly at her. "Maybe you have a rival. Maybe you don't. Like I said, I don't know. I only know the man professionally."

Jane digested that for a moment. "Is there anyone else you think I should talk to?"

"Yes, but I don't recommend it," said Stephanie. "The Captain keeps his distance from the crew for a reason. I wouldn't go poking around in his business. You're liable to call down some sort of Irish curse."

"I'll take my chances. Who is it?"

"On your head be it," said Stephanie gravely. "John Doe, the proprietor of the Vulgar Tribble on the Phoenix, has known him for years, ever since the then-Ensign Kane was a junior officer aboard the USS Century."

"Then the Phoenix is where I'm bound next," said Jane, getting to her feet.

"Take my advice and leave it alone," said Stephanie, lying back down on the beach towel. "You're liable to find out something you don't want to know."

"Like I said, I'll take my chances. Thank you, Stephanie." Jane turned on her heel and made for her paddle board, ruminating on the science officer's words. She was probably right - delving too deeply into someone's private life was not only downright nosey, it wasn't what a potential mate did until much farther into the relationship. But Kane was different - the man these people were describing bore no resemblance to the man she knew. In the scant hours they had spent together, he had come across as... well, not that. Not temperamental. Not cold. Not distant.

Starfleet was a life Jane could hardly imagine. In the dangerous, grasping world of Limbo, there was no stability, no rules except that might was right. The social hierarchy was fluid and tidal like the waves she was paddling on, but Starfleet was different. It couldn't work without order, without stability, without a clearly defined power structure. In Starfleet, some people gave the orders and more people obeyed them. Those whose job it was to obey did so professionally, even if it meant they would be put in harm's way.

A life of command would be lonely, she thought. You were the one that everyone blamed if something went wrong, the one that ended up in front of a court-martial for turning everyone left when you should have gone right. You might give an order that got someone killed. You might give an order that got a hell of a lot of people killed.

Was that what was hiding behind Michael's mismatched stare? There was a story behind his prosthetic golden eye, another story behind the several metres of polymer in place of his small intestine, another story about all the scar-borders on his skin where numerous grafts had been placed. The tales of his star trek were visual, sculpted on to living flesh. Maybe that's why nobody seemed to know him much - after all, nobody liked looking at ugly things. Superficially, he was four gold rank pips, but when you looked past all that, and saw fifteen years of physical mutilation, you might shy away from the web of scars and the creature that lived at the centre of the web.

They were dark thoughts for a sunlit ocean, but Jane Hakeswill was not deterred. She would look. Though she might be turned to stone by what she saw, she would look.

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Location: USS Phoenix, orbiting high above
Scene: The Vulgar Tribble


Arranging to be beamed up to the Phoenix was not difficult. She had worried that there was some sort of Starfleet code about not permitting civilians aboard the ship, but under the white lie of a colonist beaming up to fetch the last of her personal belongings, someone had helped her by making contact with the ship and arranging the transport. There was a central square area where the Phoenix's crew were always coming and going, shimmering cobalt pillars of light alternately depositing them down or whisking them up and away. Teleportation, like in the old fairy-tales, was now real.

When beaming down from the ship to Elandipole, she had been worried that the machine was killing her. The science of it was scary. She had closed her eyes, and had not seen anything. One moment she was aboard the Phoenix, listening to the beeps of the transporter control console, then she was on Elandipole, with the heat on her face and the cawing of the brightwings in her ears. She had opened her eyes to a new world.

Not this time. This time she kept her eyes open. It was a bizarre experience. Her vision had blurred, dissolving the sky, the ocean and the pre-fab apartments, bleeding all their colours into one haze of white-blue light. She had tried to move her hands, to lift one of them to her face to see what it looked like, but she found she couldn't move a muscle. She had tried to take a deep breath, to reassure herself that she was still alive by the simple act of breathing, but couldn't do that either. Just as fear had begun to seep into her mind, the light had begun to change again, coalescing into a muddy rainbow of colours and shapes until a picture became clear. Sound asserted itself - the background beeping of the transporter console again - and then it all came together as she rushed up back to full awareness. The gunmetal deck plating, the blinking coloured lights, the smiling face of Stiles Orion looking at her from behind the transporter console. This was reality, and she was back in it again.

The ship was deserted. Most of the decks were empty. A quick check with the computer revealed that only eleven Starfleet crew were still aboard, being commanded from the bridge by the android operations officer. She had taken a turbolift down four decks, past crew quarters and the gymnasium to reach the Vulgar Tribble.

The doors to the Vulgar Tribble opened with a smooth hiss. The very first thing she saw were the stars and the planet below, seen through the enormous bay window directly opposite the entrance door. Elandipole was rolling by, tumbling over and over in its endless Newtonian spiral, a verdant jewel in the long night. Millions of stars were her backdrop, pin-pricks of light in the velvet black.

Scattered around the floor were tables and chairs of all sizes. There was a bar over on the right, a long counter-top that blocked off the upper right quadrant of the room. There was a doorway behind the bar, leading to another room.

Sudden movement caught her eye. Peeking over the top of the bar was the orange head and oversized ears of a very ugly Ferengi. His misshapen bodkin teeth poked out from his mouth at odd angles, and he regarded her suspiciously.

Attention dragged from the starfield, Jane stepped forward.

"Go away, Hewmon!" snapped the Ferengi. "We're closed!"

Jane raised en eyebrow. "I'm looking for - "

"Closed! Closed!" screeched the Ferengi. He moved to Jane's right - she watched his orange head bob up and down behind the bar as he moved to the entrance. When he hefted up the hinged access section and stepped out, she had to stifle a laugh. The Ferengi was only around four feet tall, and was tottering toward her on boots with six-inch soles built into them. "I'm warning you! I am a master of Pek, and I kill at will!"

Jane folded her arms and leaned against the wall. "What's Pek?"

The four-foot tall Ferengi snapped into a karate killer stance with a squawk, his platform boots thumping on the replicated wooden floor, arms outstretched at dangerous angles, fingers bent into claws. "This is Pek, Hewmon!" he screamed, bodkin teeth scraping against each other, ears and nostrils flared. "Fear me!"

The door behind the bar hissed open and a second figure emerged. Where the Ferengi was diminutive, this new figure was huge. He was over seven feet tall, heavily muscular, meaty hands ending in knobbled short claws, with skin as red as blood and two tusks jutting up from his lower jaw. Two ivory horns thrust upward from his skull above his eyes, and when he came out from behind the bar, Jane could see that his legs tapered to two cloven hooves. Bizarrely, he was wearing a fashionable multi-coloured suit that consisted of a separate jacket and pants.

It was a devil. A real live Devil, come up from Hell.

The Devil crossed the room towards her. Then its face split into a smile. "Hello," it said in a deep, rich voice.

"Hello," said Jane dumbly.

"Fear me!" screeched the Ferengi from somewhere below them both.

Jane ingnored the troll's wailing. "I'm looking for someone called John Doe," she said.

"That's me," said the Devil incarnate. The shaggy head looked downward at its familiar. "Take an hour off, Sneekum. Go and find Roger or something."

The Ferengi tottered out through the door, cursing. John Doe reached out and took Jane's hand in a gentle grip. "Sneekum was right when he said we're closed at the moment. Still, I'm sure I could fix you something to eat if you like. How about some woodlouse soup?"

Jane shook her head, the craziness suddenly overwhelming her. "You're John Doe?" she said.

"I am."

"But... but..." said Jane, and blurted it out. "What are you?"

"Oh. This question again." John picked up a chair like it was a piece of paper and put it underneath her. As she sat down, he said "I do not know what I am, nor where I am from, nor what my true name is. I was found by a Starfleet exploratory vessel as an infant alone on the hellworld of Infernus. I was named John Doe. Because I look like a creature from Human religious mythology, they named my species Daemon. I am alone in the galaxy, the only one of my kind. I grew up in an orphanage on Earth. When I came of age, I learned how to cook. I am a civilian licensed by Starfleet to operate mess halls aboard active starships." John Doe leaned forward in a courtly bow. "I am John Doe, the Daemon, and I am pleased to meet you."

"My name is Jane. Jane Hakeswill. I'm pleased to meet you too." Jane jerked a thumb at the door. "And him?"

"That was Sneekum. He's the bartender. He is angry at the galaxy because he wishes he was a few inches taller. I have a maitre'd somewhere on the ship too, by the name of Roger Van Horne. They look after the guests. I cook." John Doe looked around. "But I have no customers because everyone is on the planet below, which you'd know that if you were a member of this crew. Who are you, Miss Hakeswill?"

"I'm one of the people who came aboard from Limbo. I came to find you because I heard that, of everyone aboard the Phoenix, you've known Captain Kane the longest."

The enormous Daemon pulled up a chair and straddled it. "That's true. I've known Captain Kane off and on for about fifteen years. We haven't always been on the same ship, but every time he's been in space, I've been somewhere in the background." He paused. "Why do you ask?"

"I'm trying to find out more about him," said Jane, choosing her words carefully. "I've not had any luck with other members of the crew, so you're kind of my last hope."

"More about him?" John said, raising a bushy black eyebrow. "Are you not satisfied with what he presents to you when you see him?"

"No. There's more, more he's not telling me. I think learning a bit about his background might help me colour in the sketch I have of him in my head."

"Why not just ask him?"

"Because he'll likely evade. I'm not asking you to reveal anything private, Mister Doe. Just tell me what he was like back then. Back in his younger days, when you knew him."

"Ah." John smiled and picked at a tusk with his right index finger. "That I can do, I suppose." He swivelled his head and looked out at the stars, as if calling up old ghosts in his memory.

"I'm all ears," Jane prompted.

John Doe spoke slowly, like he was picking his words carefully. "When I first met him,sixteen years ago, he was a junior tactical officer aboard the USS Century. He was very different back then - brash, cocky, fun-loving. A real drinker, too. The junior officers of that ship were a bunch of hellraisers, and Kane was one of their leaders. His life was such a pastiche you'd have thought it was being written by a teenage boy on a computer somewhere."

"Really? I can't imagine him behaving like that."

"Oh, it's true, I promise. I was there, I saw the whole thing. Him, Daxton Young, Aren Keel, Jon MacLean. Up and comers. Throwing themselves into harm's way, heedless of risk. All very heroic, if you like that sort of thing."

"Is that where he lost the eye?"

John Doe shook his head. "No. But it's when he got his guts hacked out. A Klingon pirate did that. And it's also when he almost got incinerated, when his shuttle's shields failed while he was working in the corona of some star. Broken noses, hangovers."

"Was there a girl?"

John looked up in surprise. "Yes, actually. He was in a relationship with the ship's doctor for a long time. It was a bad breakup, or so I heard. She was pregnant. The baby might even have been his, but there was a miscarriage."

"Oh." Jane swallowed that, but it didn't go down easily. "Was that when he began to change?"

John shrugged his massive shoulders. "You might call it change. I call it growing up. He did sterling work as the ship's security chief, really made that department his own. Fast and accurate at all times on the bridge too. Eventually it paid off. They gave him a third rank pip, assigned him as the Discovery's first officer."

"You went with him into the Beta Quadrant?"

"It wasn't exactly like that. Like I said earlier, I've always just tended to be in background. The Century was being refitted, and I thought some consistency might be good for me, so I took the license for the Discovery's bar. Off into the black we went." John smiled wistfully at the thought.

"Something happened out there, didn't it?"

"Yes," said John. "We made first contact with a violently xenophobic people called the Calnarians. There was a battle. We lost the Discovery. Many people were killed. Everyone was captured, and the Calnarians began to exterminate their captives after learning what they could from them." He looked out into the stars. "We were close to going out like a light, all of us."

"But you made it back."

"Captain Kane managed to rescue some of the crew and led a rescue attempt. We got away aboard the ship, but he got left behind."

"These Calnarian aliens captured him, but didn't kill him?"

"Something to do with their notion of honour regarding enemy leaders. Their underlings were deserving of death, but they liked humiliating the enemy leaders," said John sombrely. "They put him to work in the mines on a planet called Byss. From what I hear, it was an horrific experience. Murder, cannibalism, rape - need I go on?"

Jane shook her head. "What happened?"

"Starfleet organised a task force and struck back at them. The Discovery was part of that task force.We rescued Captain Kane from Byss just as a peace treaty was being signed, but I don't think he was ready to go quietly. The mines were all powered by nuclear reactors, you see. Byss was being stripped of its minerals, and the Calnarians didn't much care about preserving the local ecology." John took a breath. "Captain Kane detonated all the nuclear reactors around the planet. Byss was turned from a slag heap into an irradiated wasteland."

Jane gasped. "How many died?"

"Twenty thousand Calnarians. Several tens of thousands more, prisoners in the mines."

Jane was dumbstruck. "But... why did he... why did he do it? Killing these Calnarians was one thing, but the prisoners too?"

"Nobody knows," said John. "But when the time came to decide what to do, he killed everyone with one button push."

Jane couldn't say anything for a moment. They sat there in silence, only the background rumble of the Phoenix's engines to keep them company. Finally Jane said, "Did he go to jail?"

"When the Discovery got back to Earth, he underwent a psych evaluation. Apparently, people thought he was unhinged."

"And?"

John looked at her sidelong. "It was shut down. Someone higher up in Starfleet quietly gave him back his rank and his commission and set him loose amongst the stars in his own ship."

Jane looked John dead in the eye. "Do you think he'd ever hurt anyone? I mean, deliberately hurt someone?"

John raised an eyebrow. "They say he nuked twenty thousand people on Byss. They say he murdered the Discovery survivors rather than allow the Neo-Essentialists to escape system K-60. He came back alone and covered in blood after meeting Rawyvin Seth on Limbo. What do you think he's capable of?"

Jane shook her head. "No. He's not like that."

"You know him that well, do you?" John said. "A haunted hero, brooding and bloody, who stands apart from the people who want to love him because he's been through hell and come out the other side." His huge face split into a laconic smile, and he chuckled. "Still a pastiche after all these years."

Jane got up from her seat. "Thank you for your time, Mister Doe."

The demon sat there and watched her leave. Crossing the threshold of the Vulgar Tribble, Jane shivered and put her arms around herself as she headed for the turbolift that would take her to the transporter room. The ship seemed colder, like it had lost all its lustre. She thought that she could feels his presence on it, even now, a shadow that loomed over everything, that might reach out to touch her with a cold hand if she got too close, and she quickened her pace, anxious to be off this damned ship, thinking about the bright sunshine and calm waters of Elandipole.

One thing was for sure. She didn't want to see Michael Turlogh Kane anytime soon.

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NRPG: Self-indulgence takes like cheese.


Jerome McKee
the Soul of Michael Turlogh Kane
Commanding Officer
USS PHOENIX


"He speaks an infinite deal of nothing!"
- Shakespeare's "The Merchant of Venice", Act 1, Scene 1.117

"Futile is resistance. Assimilated you will be."
- Yoda of Borg

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