Parting Shots

Posted on Jan 01, 2016 @ 2:56pm by Lieutenant James Barton
Edited on on Jan 01, 2016 @ 2:57pm

Mission: Promethean

“Parting Shots”
(Continued from 'If the Fates Allow')

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“A man is not finished when he's defeated. He's finished when he quits.”


-Richard Nixon

“Who won? Who's next?”


-Epic Rap Battles of History



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LOCATION: USS PHOENIX
SCENE: Brig
TIME: Just after the Neo-Essentialist Defeat


The brig was brightly lit, and stark. The walls were bare of any adornment, even the information screens and display panels common throughout most of the rest of the ship. The room hovered at the edge of cavernous, with high ceilings and smoothly polished floors. At one end were two desk workstations, behind which stood a pair of lockers. At the other end of the room were a series of portals that lead to a matched set of rooms. Each was as empty and bare as the rest of the space, with only a wall-mounted hard slab and an exposed privy. So much of the rest of the PHOENIX, though she was a warship through and through, still manifested much of the more civilized, more comfortable trappings of Federation life. The brig did not. Something about the empty space, the over-bright lights spearing down from above, the way the room itself seemed to be warily holding its breath, whispered like the ghost of malice as soon as you walked in the room.


The duty officer, Randall Patrick Herber (“RP to my buddies,”) stood in front of his workstation, fidgeting. He cracked his knuckles and rolled his neck from side to side. He was on the shorter side of average height, with a generally thin build, but powerful forearms and calloused hands that spoke of a hard life and betrayed his strength. His hair was dark, thin, and had been worked to a mighty state of unkempt by his casual habit of rubbing at his head.


The call had come down moments earlier. The boss was en route with two VIPs. He cast a forlorn glance at his coffee cup, the one he'd had to carry down with him because the brig wasn't rigged with replicators and the one growing cold even now. But he didn't want to be sitting drinking coffee when they arrived. This would actually be the first time he'd processed people into his cells since he became the PHOENIX's Brig Officer, and he wasn't exactly sure of the protocol. He also didn't know how the protocol might differ from standard procedure considering one of his visitors would be the (presumably) former President of the United Federation of Planets. Herber had never been closer to the heart of the Federation than LIMBO, but even he knew that meant this jailbird was a seriously big deal. The way he figured it, as pissed off as his new boss seemed to be perpetually, it would be a piss poor idea to screw this up and make a bad impression. He didn't want to get transferred out of the brig. This job was practically a cake walk.


The door hissed open and he stood straighter, tugging his tunic into place and running an ineffectual hand over his scattered hair. The first man to enter was blonde, with an athletic build. He walked into the room like he owned it: shoulders back, chin jutted forward, and scowling at everything around him. Immediately behind him followed an Andorian who, while only an inch or two shorter than his companion, seemed to be much smaller. He was slumped low, plodding forward with shameful steps, with both his eyes and antennae pointed at his feet. He looked like the walking definition of utter defeat. A step behind them, Herber's boss lumbered into the brig. He was keeping his gaze absolutely locked on his charges and, in his R.P. Herber's professional estimation, he looked righteously pissed. After the trio had marched a few steps into the room, he bellowed, “Stop.”

They did.


“Hey Barnes. Er, Barton.” Herber grimaced at himself. Some habits died hard, and he'd known Jacen Barnes several weeks longer than this James Barton.

Barton didn't turn to meet his gaze. “Herber,” his voice was flat.


“So this is them, huh?” Herber gave Barton a smile that, while not exactly handsome, had still been charming enough to get him laid on a half dozen worlds – one time by a gal of a species that Herber couldn't even identify.

On Barton, however, the charm seemed wasted. “Some of 'em,” he said with a faraway look that suggested he was thinking of all the prisoners' compatriots who were outside of his grasp.


“They don't look like much, now that I see 'em up close.”


For the first time, Barton turned to him.“Read your history books. People like them never do.” The neutral affectation dropped for just a second and Barton's furious venom dripped into his words. His lip began to curl into a sneer, when suddenly he forced his face back to lifeless passivity. He stepped forward, towards the prisoners. “You. There. You. There,” he said pointing at two of the cells. P'Trell moved forward immediately; Barton had to shove Heydrich forward with a meaty hand before he moved. Both men moved into their cells, and Barton keyed the force fields behind him. Herber was just preparing to breathe a sigh at seeing the hardest, most dangerous part of the job completed, when Barton turned back to him. He wasn't smiling, but he'd seemed to have corralled his face into something that vaguely resembled friendliness. “Why don't you go grab some coffee?”

Herber glanced first at the coffee mug on his desk, and then back to his superior. Something in the larger man's tone was raising his neck hairs. “I'm pretty sure I'm supposed to register the prisoners. I was reading the thing-”


The friendliness dipped, just briefly, but the Security Chief visibly forced it back into place. Barton cut him off. “Don't worry about it, Herber.”

Herber tried his smile again, shrugging his shoulders as if to say, 'What are you gonna do?' His mouth had suddenly gone dry, and all at once he had the bad feeling that there was more at stake than making a bad first impression on his first prisoner transfer. “I don't wanna get in trouble. That Irish fella's got a reputation and the Andorian first officer ain't much-”


“Herber. I'm the Chief of Security. You're covered.”


Herber was new to Starfleet, but even folks outside the military knew what pulling rank was. “Okay...” He took three quick steps toward the door, then two more uncertain ones. Then he stopped, and turned back. “You sure you don't want me to stick around?”


“No. I got this.” Barton was all but pacing in front of the cells now. Herber was quite certain that he didn't want to know what the 'this' was that Barton was referring to, but growing more despairingly sure that he did. He considered, just for an instant, pleading with Barton to not do anything crazy, anything that would jeopardize things for the new crew under him, but he abandoned the notion immediately. He'd survived enough years on LIMBO to recognize when someone had fixed their intent on doing something bad, and to learn that sometimes the best thing to do was to turn your head and walk away.


So that's what he did. He grabbed his coffee cup off of the desk and walked out of the brig, keeping his eyes locked on some imaginary point ten feet in front of him the whole way.

Barton watched him go, and was preparing to turn back to his prisoners when Heydrich spoke up behind him.


“That's what passes for discipline aboard your ship. You're what passes for a Starfleet officer.” Neither was a question. He spoke in naked judgment, sneering at Barton from behind the energy field.


Slowly, Barnes turned on him and stared into his eyes from a long moment. “Just barely.”


Heydrich smirked, taking Barton's concession as a victory. “You got that right. Only just. You're a disgrace to that uniform. You all are.”

Barton held up his hand at his sides, as if presenting himself for Heydrich's appraisal. “You're an expert in that field. I'll take your word on it. You figure if you wrote a report, Starfleet Command would censure us?”


“Go to Hell.”


“Probably,” Barton nodded. “Probably sooner before later. But you blew your shot to send me there, didn't you? When we beat you?”


“You didn't-”


Now it was the larger man's turn to smirk. “When you had us outgunned and outnumbered, but we beat you anyway?” Heydrich's smile didn't dip, but Barton saw his left foot move backwards a half inch. He pressed forward, twisting the knife. “When we snuck aboard your flagship right under your nose? When we turned the person you'd put in charge? When we humiliated you like a first-year cadet? When we won?”


Heydrich's eyes flashed. “You think you've won?”


Barton twisted at the waist, as if examining his surroundings. “I'm out here. You're in there.”


“For now. Today. Edgerton's still at the Head of Starfleet. We still have loyal men in positions of-”


“You're done. You're all done.”


Now Heydrich stepped forward, a vicious snarl on his lips. “Tell yourself that. Tell yourself that you won and that you've put us back in our box. Go back to running things on the concept of 'Everybody loves everybody,' because every time you do, we get stronger. Every time galactic war breaks out because you were too blind to prevent it and millions die, more people will realize the truth: That a Federation religiously devoted to peace is a weak Federation, and a weak Federation just gets people killed. You're all so morally bankrupt that you only count the cost of what you do, because you're too weak and you're too scared to count the cost of what you WON'T do. If you had the balls to do that, you wouldn't sleep for a week, and at the end of that week, you'd take up the Neo-Essentialist banner. But you won't. Because you're a coward.”


Jim Barton wanted more than anything to let Heydrich's words roll over him like waves over stone, impassive, but he was horrified to feel his fists shaking. There was a part of him, way deep down in the shameful place he would swear never existed but that he knew everyone saw plainly when they looked at him, that believed what Heydrich was saying. He wanted that part to die, to go away forever, but he knew it never would, so he said what people had said throughout time when faced with an idea they couldn't reconcile.


“You're insane,” he was embarrassed before the words had even crossed his lips. It was an admission, and both he and Heydrich knew it.

“I've said all I'm saying to you. We'll see what happens when we get to Federation space. I'm done.” Heydrich turned away, looking for all the world as if he was taking a victory lap, even if he couldn't walk more than four steps without walking headlong into a wall.


Barton sighed. “Yeah. You are.” He inclined his head upwards, as if speaking to the empty air around him. “Computer, seal the brig. Authorization Barton-Whiskey-Theta-Theta-Zero-Twenty.”


Heydrich turned around and stared at Barton under a cocked eyebrow. The PHOENIX's Chief of Security continued. “Y'see, I think I know what happens when we get to Federation space. Edgerton will face charges, at which point he'll either off himself or roll over on every one of you. You'll be court-martialed and tried for treason. In order to not appear overtly vindictive, the new Federation and Starfleet leadership will assign you some hotshot rainmaker out of the JAG, and they'll likely get your death sentence commuted to life in some super-fancy ultrasecure compound.” Heydrich smiled, silently signaling that he'd foreseen the same outcome. Barton tried to not let the grin get to him and continued in an even tone. “Thing is, I don't like that plan so much. So I have a different idea. I'm going to drop those force fields and I'm going to walk in there and I'm going to beat you both to death with my bare hands.”


He was so gratified to see Heydrich's cocky smile fade away as the other man swallowed hard. “What do you-”


“You. The Andorian. Both of you. I've decided that you two don't get a trial. Or due process. None of it. You gave all that up. Instead I'm gonna crack your skull open and snap your neck.” He turned towards P'Trell and enjoyed the wide-eyed look of terror on the Andorian's face. He was afraid that the former President had retreated into his own thoughts entirely. He pointed at the blue-skinned politician. “You, I'm tearing those antennae off of that dome piece, one at a time. Then I'm gonna shove one down your throat and one up your dickhole until they meet in your chest cavity. And then I'm going to kill you, too.”


P'Trell literally squeaked in terror. Heydrich spoke up, sounding satisfyingly less sure of himself. “You can't-”


“I'll bet I can. But we'll see. I mean, surely you're trained hand-to-hand. He might be a peckerwood bureaucrat, but he's still an Andorian. So, you guys might just have a snowball's chance of getting past me if you work together. Sure, you'll probably be gunned down in the hallways within five minutes, but who knows? Miracles happen. Either way, it should be fun, don't you think?” He reached for the controls.


Heydrich's eyes darted back and forth, trying to put new and unexpected pieces together. “Kane sent you here to-?”


“Nope. This bright idea is all mine. You ready?” Barton reached for the controls again.


Suddenly, P'Trell spoke, his voice a high, horrified squawk. “You can't do that! You'll get in trouble!”


Jim turned away from Heydrich. “Come again?”


P'Trell took a step backwards, trying to create a space he could think in. “You'll...you'll get kicked out of Starfleet!”


“Hmm. That might be a good point, except that's happening anyway. You see, this whole thing, THIS whole thing,” he pinched the front of his uniform tunic between his thumb and forefinger and held it out on display, “was only temporary. I wasn't joking when I said, “just barely.” Just until we got rid of all of you. Then I'm out and I'll be spending the rest of my life in the stockade. Probably not one even as nice as where they'd be sending you. So no matter what happens, my tour's just about up. This is just my going-away present to myself.”


“But it's murder!” The Andorian looked desperate, like a man who'd lived on his words and had run out of anything to say.


Barton smiled. “Not if you put up a fight. You ready?” He reached forward, and with a brief blue flash, both forcefields fell. For a long moment, no one moved and silence held terrible sway in the Brig. Barton, keeping his hands at his sides, demanded, “Well?”


P'Trell backpedaled until he had wedged himself into the corner of his cell, then he began to keen.


“Okay. You go second. You can just watch this round.” Barton thumbed the controls and resealed the former Federation president behind the force field.


He turned to Heydrich, whose posture was locked between a combat-ready stance and trying to look as casual as Barton was behaving. “What's the point of this?”


“Revenge. Vengeance. For the people who died. For my friends you tried to kill. For the people you tried to steal the Federation from. To injure you, because I want to see you injured and there's too much civilization back in the core to do it. To show you that you're not the big, bad, revolutionary force that you think you are and that a broken down nothing like me can take your legs, and your hands, and your power. To bully the bully. To break you. To leave you begging. To hurt you for my own amusement.”


“So you're no better than you think we are,” his voice was incredulous.


“Never said I was. Let's go.” Heydrich didn't move and Barton's next word were a shout. “Come on! You were itching for a fight before. You wanted to kill us all when you had a starship underneath you and an ocean of space between us. Where's your gumption now, little man?” He took a step towards the entrance of the cell. “Where's your will to win now, coward?” Another step and he was inside the cell with Heydrich. “Where's your backbone, you little punk bitch?”

Heydrich's jaw was trembling, as were his fists, but he didn't move. He was clearly trying, and failing, to work up the mettle to charge the larger man. Instead, as Barton watched, a single fat tear rolled down Heydrich's nose. Jim could see plainly how much Heydrich hated his own weakness. His chin dropped to his chest, trying to hide what had he obviously couldn't.


“Nothing,” Barton said with disgust. “For all your bullshit, you've got nothing. And you know what the worst part is? You were supposed to win, weren't you? The history books had already been written. The artifact told us that. You were destined to hold the galaxy in your hands. You had the brass ring in your hand and you weren't man enough to hold onto it.”


Heydrich whipped his head up. “That's not true!”


“The whole of the Neo-Essentialist movement brought down by one man's incompetence. Jesus, it's a fuckin' Greek tragedy.”


“No!”


Barton smiled a feral smile. “And how must Edgerton feel now? I mean he TRUSTED you to-”

Heydrich's veneer of superiority, already tattered, ripped away entirely. He began screaming like a petulant child. “It's not my fault! It wasn't me! It was Marxx! And P'Trell! Edgerton made the decision to use them! He should've known better than to trust these animals! That filth! I told him! I begged him! But he thought the aliens would give us cover! It's not my fault! I could have got the job done!”


“But I guess Edgerton didn't think so, did he? Looks to me like he measured you up against a Vegan and an Andorian and found you wanting. How does that feel? As far as Edgerton's concerned, you're less of a man than that thing.”

Heydrich reacted as if violently struck, then charged forward with a wild howl and murderous rage in his eyes. How DARE this contemptible-?!


In a blink, Barton took a flashing step backwards and jammed the force field controls. A flash of blue erupted between the two Starfleet officers, then again as Heydrich drove himself face first into it. There had been no opportunity to adjust his course or slow himself. The silence of the brig echoed with the wet crunch of the cartilage in his nose and his front teeth. All at once, he was on his knees with a crimson pool widening beneath his head. Three shards of shattered teeth were floating in it already. In his pain, his rage, and his defeated grief, he began to howl. It was a high, awful, beaten sound and he was sure it would echo within him forever.


Barton turned to P'Trell, who was staring at him in wide-eyed horror. With an accusatory glare, Barton thrust his finger towards the bleeding Neo-Essentialist. “This is what you betrayed us for. This is what they think of you. All of you. Federation First, yeah? A Federation that hates you instead of one that put you at the head of itself.”


Barton took a breath, and P'Trell whispered hesitantly,“You're...not going to...?”


“No. I'm not. You deserve it for what you tried to do, and it would feel pretty good, but you showed me something. You reminded me how much I cared about something that I used to love and that I took for granted for too long. You reminded me that it was worth fighting for, and I haven't had that in awhile so for that, I give you a pass.” P'Trell lowered his head.


Barton turned back to Heydrich's cell. “You're not even worth the effort it would take to kill you, Heydrich. You're not worth the calories. I'm gonna send a doctor in to look at your teeth, and then the brig officer is going to come back in and he's going to take away that uniform. If you don't surrender it, you will be sedated, stripped, and left unconscious, naked, and ass up in the middle of your cell. I'll take pictures and send the images to Edgerton myself. But whether the easy way or the hard way, we're taking that Starfleet uniform away from you and you will never ever wear it again.”


With a final glare of naked scorn for both conspirators, Barton turned, unsealed the doors, and strode out into the corridors of the USS PHOENIX, and towards whatever came next.


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NRPG: Short, heavy handed, and doesn't move the plot forward much, but at least I got in some cheap licks on Heydrich.

Happy New Year to each and every one of you. I'm so glad that I got to rejoin this game and get to know all of you in 2015. I'm excited for moar fantastic writing, moar harrowing adventures, moar NSFJ chat room diatribes, moar engaging characters, moar grimdark, and moar everything else in 2016.


Seriously. You guys are great. Happy New Year to you all.


Auld Lang Syne, m****f*****s!


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Dale I. Rasmussen
~writing for~
Lt. James Prophecy Barton
Sec/Tac USS PHOENIX
Who Didn't Tear Nothing Off of Nobody...This Time