Yorktown

Posted on Nov 09, 2016 @ 5:17pm by Commander Jacob Crichton
Edited on on Nov 09, 2016 @ 5:17pm

Mission: Fortress: Earth

= Yorktown =

(cont’d from “Music of the Spheres”)

=[/\]=

“I am not throwing away my shot

‘Til the world turns upside-down…”

“Yorktown (The World Turned Upside Down)”, Hamilton: An American Musical


=[/\]=

LOCATION: Point Bonita Facility, EARTH

SCENE: Corridor outside the Computer Core

STARDATE: [2.16] 1109.1348

Edgerton was hesitating. Selyara didn’t turn around, but she could feel the old man’s reticence even from several feet off. She stopped, turned to look back at him over her shoulder, and gave her most disarming smile. Edgerton would see through that, she knew, but it was also what he *expected* to see, her trying to get one over on him. Anything else might raise his suspicions in the wrong way, and that was a complication they didn’t need here, right at the knife’s edge.

“Coming, Richard?”

“Why should I trust you?” Edgerton asked. Selyara rolled her eyes.

“Because your choices are do nothing and die, or trust me and maybe die but also maybe live,” she said, spelling out the options like she would to a child. “This phrase gets tossed around quite a bit, but for this situation it’s apt; you truly have nothing to lose.”

“I have *everything* to lose, my dear,” Edgerton said. “This way out you promised me… it won’t be in the computer core, will it? Yet you seem very keen to get me to follow you.”

Selyara turned now to face him again. “I’d only thought to put your mind at ease. If you’d rather we left now-”

“I have a better idea,” Edgerton said. He reached out, pulling a hold-out phaser from the belt of one his security men, and tossed it to her. Selyara caught it easily, stared at it with genuine confusion, then looked back up at him.

“I appreciate the thought, but I hadn’t considered myself ‘unarmed’ before.”

“Set it to overload,” Edgerton said. “Throw it into the computer core.”

Selyara blinked. “And damage your precious control system?”

“The satellites will see to themselves,” Edgerton said. “Anyone you might have camped out in there waiting for me won’t be so lucky.”

“Really, Richard, this is-”

“Do it now, or we’ll shoot you where you stand,” Edgerton said. His eyes seemed to flash in the dim light of the corridor. “Don’t underestimate how willing I am to go to my grave, Ms. Chen. It will do my heart some good to know you got there first.”

A hundred competing thoughts crowded their way through Selyara Chen’s mind, but none of them showed on her face. She was playing for time now, that was all; time enough for the Starfleet crew to find some way to break the stalemate, to shut down Edgerton’s Aegis Network for good. After that, none of this would matter.

“I could shoot you myself,” Selyara said, smiling at him. “The thought had crossed my mind, you know.”

“Be my guest, I’m a dead man anyway.”

“Yet you’re not so resigned to that fate as you’d like me to believe. After all, we’re still talking.”

“I’m talking,” Edgerton said. “You’re stalling.”

“I’m simply trying to impress upon you the time-sensitive nature of our predicament.”

“You have a way with words, Ms. Chen,” Edgerton said, smiling a wide crocodile’s smile. “But the time for talking is long past. Do as you’re told, or die with the friends I’m quite sure you have waiting behind that door for me.”

Selyara raised the phaser, input the commands necessary to trigger an overload, then looked up at him. Immediately, a telltale whine from the overcharged phaser filled the corridor.

Selyara sighed. “You’re really making this difficult, Richard.”

Edgerton’s smile died on his face when, instead of throwing the phaser behind her, Selyara threw it forward, up the corridor, towards where Edgerton and his men were standing. Instantly, his men had grabbed him and pulled him back, withdrawing from the narrow corridor for cover around a nearby corner as Selyara dove to the ground, taking cover beside the Raxl Dreyton and the two marines. An instant later, a curtain of heat whipped through the corridor, pushed along by an almost deafening boom. The bulkhead beneath her shook violently, and she felt pain as the thermal energy of the explosion seared its way across her back.

Shaking the pain away, Selyara opened her eyes. Smoke filled the corridor now, but through the gloom she could see Kass, Rax, and Bellecotte sitting slowly up. The two marines had fared well enough in their armor, but Rax’s clothes were still smoldering from the explosion, and it looked like a patch of hair on the back of his head had been badly singed. Selyara’s ears were ringing, but beneath that tinny sound she could hear the steady bleat of the facility’s Red Alert, as well as what sounded like…

**Water?**

She risked a glance over the remains of their makeshift cover and saw that a few of Edgerton’s men hadn’t cleared the blast area in time; they were laying face down, not moving, and from the state of their uniforms, likely dead. The corridor around them was a ruin: blackened walls, twisted bits of bulkhead, and a slow but steady spray of water dripping down one side of the corridor’s walls.

From somewhere up ahead, Selyara could hear Edgerton shouting.

“Look what you’ve done, you bitch!”

Raxl Dreyton pulled himself up next to Selyara, risking his own glance into the corridor. “I hate to say it,” he said, “but I’m inclined to agree with him.”

“That’s going to go in your performance review, Mr. Dreyton.”

“You mean I’m gonna die down here *and* I might never work again?”

“Don’t be so dramatic,” Selyara said. “I had to do *something*.”

“Your ‘something’ just blew a hole in the side of an underwater base!”

“Oh please,” Selyara said. “A few cracks, at best.”

“Oh, I’m sure that won’t be a problem in a pressure-regulated facil-” Rax started, but he was cut-off when the bulkhead beneath them shook menacingly once again. They heard a distant sound of groaning metal, then a sensation as though something far above or below them had been ripped violently free. The bulkhead shook again, and again, as the rush of water from the side of the corridor began to prodigiously increase.


Selyara and Raxl exchanged uncertain glances.

“Okay,” Selyara said. “I might have made a mistake.”

“Oh hell,” Rax said.

He and Selyara stood up, Rax’s phaser raised and ready. The smoke and spray of water made seeing down the corridor difficult, so Rax fired randomly a few times to discourage any of Edgerton’s remaining honor guard from poking their heads out, then turned and followed Selyara as she sprinted up the corridor, towards the computer core. Kass and Bellecotte were beside them in an instant, and the quartet hurried through the door and back into the computer core, even as orange fire splashed on either side of the doorframe behind them.

=[/\]=

“They're battering down the battery

Check the damages! (Rah!)

We gotta stop ‘em and rob ‘em

Of their advantages! (Rah!)

Let's take a stand with the stamina

God has granted us!

Hamilton won't abandon ship

Yo, let's steal their cannons!”

“Right Hand Man”, Hamilton: An American Musical


=[/\]=

Scene: Computer Core

Rochemonte was helping Jake Crichton back to his feet as Selyara and the others nearly tumbled through the door. Jake flashed Raxl Dreyton a dirty look as he brushed off the front of his uniform.

“What the hell did you do?”

“Me?!” Rax cried, defensively.

“I had to improvise,” Selyara said. “Edgerton is… more committed to his principles than I expected.”

“What’s the situation out there?” Jos asked.

“The corridor is flooding,” said Selyara. “The explosion must not have been confined to this deck. I imagine the damage is worse in other parts of the facility.”

“Which means it won’t be long ‘fore this base is a damn fish tank,” Kass frowned. “What’d you call that again? Improvisin’?”

“Our most immediate problem,” Selyara said, ignoring the vertically-challenged marine, “..is that there’s nothing keeping Edgerton and his men from charging up the corridor after us. The door will bottleneck them, but I’ve already blown one hole in his facility, and I don’t think he’ll worry about a second one.”

Jos nodded. “Major Thytos, guard the door.”

Kass scowled again at Selyara, then took up a position guarding the computer core’s door. Raxl and Bellecotte followed suit, though Rax didn’t look very happy about it.

Jos turned to Jake, Cindy, and Lynette.

“Have you made progress with the satellite network?”

“We’ve got access to the satellite’s telemetry subsystems,” Jake said. “We’re keeping them out of formation, but those thaleron bombs are still charging. I don’t know if we can stall them much longer.”

“What about the calibration program?” Selyara asked.

“The doomsday command is hard-wired,” Lynette said. “It can’t be countermanded, and it’s designed to operate even if all instructions from home base are cut off.”

“So?”

“It looks like Edgerton flipped that switched when he set them to blow,” Jake said. “The detonation sequence is running independently. We can make them dance, but with that many satellites left, the explosion is going to do some real damage even if they aren’t in formation.”

“You have access,” Selyara said, an unwelcome hint of desperation creeping into her voice, “There has to be something you can do.”

Jake had started to reply, but Kass’s shout cut him off. Behind them, lances of orange fire had started flashing through the computer core’s door, nearly catching Kassandra Thytos full on in the chest. She’d managed to avoid the worst of it, only taking one blast to the shoulder, but it had chewed through her armor in seconds.

“Gawdammit!” she cursed, dropping low behind cover and gripping her wound. “They’re firing at full power, I guess they’re done playing around.”

Beside her, Henry Bellecotte drew a bead and fired, hitting their out-of-sight assailant, before dropping back behind cover as well.

“This situation is unsustainable!” Eve Dalziel shouted, as a new round of orange fire poured its way into the chamber. The Starfleet crew dove for cover; somewhere, Mackie the cat was yowling.

“Commander Crichton!” Jos shouted over the phaser blasts. “What if we destroy the computer core?”

“It won’t matter! Jake shouted back. “Those satellites don’t need it!”

“They’re designed to do everything on their own!” Lynette Ryan shouted. “Fly, scan, shoot-”

Jake turned to look at her. “What did you say?”

“I said they’re designed-”

“No!” Jake shouted. “You said they can shoot!”

Lynette gasped as a phaser-blast impacted a console just above where she’d taken cover. A spray of sparks showered down over her, singing her exposed shoulders. She shook the pain away and looked back at Jake.

“So what?”

“One of those satellites took a shot at me,” Jake said. “I triggered its proximity sensor, and it auto-targeted and fired!”

Lynette looked confused. “I don’t know why you’re telling me this!”

“We have access to the network’s subsystems,” Jake said, ducking a phaser blast that would have burned away the top of his skull. “That includes their IFF system!”

“So what?”

“Those satellites are moving into formation for their big bang,” Jake explained. “If we can fool them into tripping their own proximity sensors, they’ll open fire on each other!”

Lynette’s eyes lit up. “That could work!”

“Won’t that trigger the explosion?” Cindy Rochemonte asked.

“Sure, if they hit each other too hard,” Lynette nodded. “But we can reduce the power output for their onboard defense system! Do just enough damage to disable, but not destroy!”

“And once they’re disabled, the thaleron charging sequence is aborted,” Jake said. “No more boom!”

“Let’s do it-” Lynette Ryan said, standing and turning towards the control console. Cindy Rochemonte was up in an instant, tackling the cadet to the ground just in time to avoid another phaser blast, which ripped through the air where Lynette Ryan had been standing. Cindy rolled off Lynette, and the two women crawled behind another console, desperate for cover.

“It’s a great plan,” Cindy said sarcastically. “Now if only we can get access to the console!”

From in front of them, near the door, they heard Kass shouting:

“Fall back! Everyone, fall back!”

=[/\]=

SCENE: Submarine Bay

Thomas Varn had stopped for a breather, leaving the unconscious form of James Barton laying in a heap not far from the bay where their escape vessel, the RED OCTOBER, was moored. They’d encountered no more security as they’d made their way through the base; Varn assumed it was because Edgerton had rerouted what remained of his forces to the computer core, where Aerdan Jos and his away team were making their last stand.

Varn had only been resting for a minute when a series of violent tremors shook the facility, so severe that Varn had to grab onto a control terminal to keep from losing his footing altogether. After a moment, the worst of it passed, though Varn thought he could feel vibrations coming up from the bulkhead below his feet. He raised an eyebrow.

“I’m not sure that was supposed to happen.”

A low, rumbling voice cut through the silence then, so sudden that it nearly made Varn jump.

“Oh great,” it said. “I have to spend my last few minutes alive with *you*.”

Varn looked over, and saw that James Barton was sitting up, rubbing the back of his head and eyeing the winged man with open suspicion. Varn gave a polite smile.

“Feeling refreshed?” he asked. “I didn’t want to wake you, you seemed quite peaceful.”

“You can cut the act. I already think you’re a creepy weirdo.” Barton rose shakily to his feet. “What the hell was that?”

“It felt like an explosion,” Varn said, looking down at the floor. “Bad place for it, us being under the sea and all.”

“Edgerton must be getting desperate,” Barton said. “Or Selyara is. Either way, it’s bad news for everyone stuck down here who isn’t a goddamn psychopath.”

“We could make a break for the surface,” Varn suggested. “The escape shuttle is right here.”

Barton locked eyes with Varn. “You could do that?”

After a moment, Varn shook his head. “No. I don’t think I could.”

Barton nodded, once. “Careful. You’re starting to seem almost lifelike.”

“No point in it anyway,” Varn shrugged. “If Edgerton’s satellites detonate, there’s nowhere on this planet that will be safe.”

“Let’s work under the assumption that we’re not completely fucked,” Barton said, stepping forward to the command terminal. His fingers danced along the keypad, and the display lit up.

“The base on Red Alert,” Barton said. “There’s flooding everywhere. Emergency bulkheads responding, but someone did a helluva lot of damage to the structure of this facility. They won’t hold out the water for very long.”

“They’ll delay the others,” Varn said. “Long enough to keep them from making it back to the ship.”

Barton nodded. “Then we shut them down.”

Varn blinked. “I’m sorry?”

“We deactivate the emergency bulkheads,” Barton said. “The base will flood quicker, but at least the others won’t be trapped.”

“So either they drown, or they drown,” Varn said. “I fail to see why one is preferable to the other.”

“This way, they have a chance,” Barton said. “Deactivating emergency bulkheads now.”

Almost immediately, the facility’s structure gave another telltale groan, and the bulkhead seemed to heave beneath them, hard enough that the RED OCTOBER rocked noticeably in its moorings. Varn and Barton exchanged a nervous glance, as below them the Point Bonita facility began to flood.

=[/\]=

SCENE: Computer Core

Water had started to fill the chamber, high enough now that it reached Richard Edgerton’s knees as he stepped over the threshold and into the computer core. Ahead of him, his remaining guard stood, pulse rifles at the ready, trained on the collection of console and terminals behind which the Starfleet traitors and their Vulcan witch had taken cover. They’d put up an admirable resistance, gunning down several of his men before being pushed back, but eventually they’d broken and run, and now they had nowhere left to go. It would all end, here.

“You may as well come out,” Edgerton said, careful not to stand too exposed. He wanted to die in the purifying fire of the Aegis Shield, along with his most loyal followers; to be gunned down mere moments before the finale would be a tremendous disappointment.

“Come an’ get us!” shouted the defiant voice of the Butcher of Barbossa, Kass Thytos.

“Come now!” Edgerton said, managing to sound almost magnanimous. “You all played a good game, but in the end it wasn’t enough! You’re drawing this out needlessly… there’s nothing you can do to stop those satellites.”

“Then why not turn around and leave us alone?” Eve Dalziel asked. “For someone who’s about to die in a planetary holocaust, you seem awful preoccupied with what we might be doing in here.”

“Is that Eve Dalziel I hear?” Edgerton asked. “I never thought our paths would cross this way. Be a lamb and disarm your friends for me, won’t you?”

Despite the insane situation they’d found themselves in, Eve actually managed a laugh. “What the hell are you talking about, Edgerton?”

“Oh,” Edgerton said, looking disappointed. “You’re the wrong one.”

“Wrong…?”

“It doesn’t matter,” Edgerton grinned. “I thought we might share these final moments together, as respected enemies, but the thaleron will kill you just as well over there as it will out here. You’ve all earned the dignity of the death I’ve chosen for myself.”

“Go to hell!” Cindy Rochemonte spat.

“But before we go...” Edgerton said, turning to look down the corridor behind him. “I’d like to set my house in order. Bring him forward!”

A pair of Edgerton’s men stepped into the computer core, holding the semi-conscious form of Sam Henderson. From where she’d taken cover, Lynette Ryan gasped.

“Sam!”

Edgerton signaled for his two guards to hoist Sam to his feet, though they had to support him to keep him from toppling over again. His face was bloody and bruised, and it looked like his eyes had nearly swollen shut. Edgerton lifted a phaser, placing the tip of it against Sam’s heart, and turned back to where the others were hiding.



“Cadet Ryan,” Edgerton said. “This is for you, as I’m sure you’ve realized. You really inconvenienced me with your digging around, did you know that? I always knew it might come to this, but your interference accelerated my timetable quite considerably. I’d like to pay you back for that.”

“Don’t hurt him!” Lynette called. “He didn’t know what he was doing, it wasn’t his fault!”

“Oh, I’m well aware!” Edgerton laughed. “We beat that information out of him half an hour ago. I just wanted to make sure you saw this.”

Without another word, Edgerton fired. Sam cried out as the phaser seared into his chest, blasting through ribcage and lung, only to explode out the other side. The guards holding his arms let go, and Sam wavered, before falling face first into the water, with what remained of his guts leaking slowly out beneath him.

Lynette Ryan screamed. Richard Edgerton was laughing.

At that moment, the Point Bonita facility seemed to lurch beneath all of them. Lynette’s scream and Edgerton’s laughter both cut abruptly off. Edgerton lost his footing, falling into the water with a splash. Two of his guards fell along with him; the rest kept their footing, shouts of confusing giving way to fear as they heard the sound of rushing water roaring up the corridor behind them. The flood poured in, knocking the rest of Edgerton’s men off their feet and sweeping them along, slamming them hard into railings and consoles, knocking them senseless.

The others fared no better; Jake Crichton was swept up, knocking his head against the console behind him, and was unconscious at once. Cindy cried out his name and tried to reach for him, but the crush of water was too much, and she was pulled back to the rear of the chamber and slammed against the wall with the full force of the flood pushing her onward. Kass managed to wrap her arms around a nearby railing, but Dreyton and Bellecotte were swept away and vanished from sight, while Dalziel and Jos clutched one another in a desperate bid to not be separated. Selyara had braced herself against the side of a bulkhead, hoping to avoid the worst of the impact, but the water swept past, carrying her along with it.

The wave struck Lynette Ryan full on, tumbling her end over end until felt herself slam solidly into something hard. The air was driven from her, and when she went to suck in another breath, she felt cool, salty water pulling its way down her throat. Eyes bulging, Lynette clawed her way to the surfaced, her lungs spasming painfully; she retched up the water and shook her wet hair away from her eyes.

“Cadet!” someone was shouting. Lynette looked around, but she couldn’t see anyone. There was too much water…

“Cadet Ryan!” the voice called again. Lynette turned (she was nearly treading water now, with only the tips of her toes still in solid contact with the bulkhead beneath her) and spotted Jos and Eve, treading water themselves as they held onto what looked like a half-submerged stairway.

“Commander Jos!” Lynette called back. “Crichton and Rochemonte are gone!”

“You have to reprogram the IFF!” Jos yelled. “It’s the only thing that matters now!”

Lynette’s eyes widened. “B-but I… I *can’t*! I’m just a cadet!”

“You know this system, Lynette!” said Eve. “You’re the only one left who can do this!”

The soaked remains of the dress she'd worn for Sam (**Sam, oh God oh no you can't be dead…**) clung to her body, making Lynette feel absurd. She hadn't asked for this, had never wanted it...she'd wanted a night off with a handsome man, not this insane apocalypse that had been dropped so unceremoniously into her lap. She was only a cadet, not a trained officer. This responsibility shouldn't be hers, it wasn't fair. Yet here she was, trapped in a rapidly flooding subaquatic base, with the controls of a doomsday weapon at her fingertips… and she was the only one who could do something about it.

The facility gave another menacing rumble, and Lynette Ryan made up her mind. She turned, diving underwater to gain access to the command console linked with the Aegis Network. She’d barely gotten her wind back from a moment before, and already her lungs had started to burn, but she pushed the feeling aside and tried to focus. It came easily enough, as she’d already concluded she would die down here. That made things simple, it offered a kind of peaceful clarity. This was the end… but at least she could do something important before she went.

It was hard to make out the display, under water and in the dark, but in truth Lynette could have done it in her sleep. Her hands, rapidly numbing from the icy seawater, stretched over the controls and went to work.

=[/\]=

LOCATION: Space

SCENE: High Earth Orbit

Though delayed in their purpose, the Aegis Satellites had not ceased their deadly final dance. Jake Crichton and the others had managed to interrupt their formation, delaying the detonation by inhibiting the amount of damage it would do, but nobody can put off death forever. Sooner or later, the thaleron generators thrumming in the heart of each satellite would reach critical mass, and the destruction, while perhaps not quite as total as Richard Edgerton had expected, would still be enough to make the cradle of humanity of smoking ruin. It was only a matter of time… and the moment was fast arriving.

But then, a change; the satellites, which before had been focusing their considerable firepower on keeping the assembled Starfleet at bay, suddenly stopped shooting. A moment passed, then another, then the satellites - still coming closer and closer into formation - slowly turned their weapons towards each other. Turrets swiveled, and auto-cannons roared into furious life, and the end began.

One satellite fired. Then another, and another. Soon, the sky between them was crisscrossed with sizzling green. Each satellites fire tore through another’s shields, pulverized its defenses. One by one, each satellite the Aegis Network sparked and smoked, then groaned its last. One by one, they went out, beaten to death by their own weapons. Inside, their powerful thaleron hearts beat their last, and the building charges slowly fizzled and went inert. The Aegis Satellites, which had held Earth in their deadly embrace for far too long, had finally gone offline.

All but one.

=[/\]=

SCENE: Computer Core

Cindy Rochemonte broke the surface, her red hair plastered down the sides of her face. She’s lost her glasses in the rush of water, but she didn’t have time to worry about that now. She had an arm under Jake, and was pumping her legs in a desperate attempt to keep his dead weight as well as her own body above the water. The Red Alert was still bleating steadily somewhere in the background, though it sounded muffled under all the water.

Water which, Cindy realized with bitter hopelessness, was still slowly rising.

“Help!” Cindy cried, trying to tow Jake’s unconscious form towards the door of the computer core. She wasn’t sure what she was going to do when she got there; there was almost no chance the corridor behind it wasn’t flooded, and she had no idea how far they’d have to swim to find a section of the facility that wasn’t submerged.

“Someone help me!”

“Here!” Aerdan Jos called. Cindy turned, saw the Andorian swimming over to her. He got an arm around Jake and took some of his weight, and together he and Cindy swam for the door. Ahead of them was Dalziel, grabbing onto the door frame to keep from being pushed back into the chamber by the current.

“Have you seen Cadet Ryan?” Eve asked.

Cindy shook her head. “The water hit us too fast.”

“She was by the console,” Eve said, gesturing in that direction with her free hand. “She went under to try to stop the satellites.”

“How long?”

Eve shook her head.

Then, as if by providence, Lynette Ryan broke the surface a few meters away. She flailed in the water for a moment, turning this way and that, not sure which way was up. Cindy made sure that Jos had a good grip on Jake, then turned and paddled over to Lynette, getting an arm around her and guiding her back to the door.

“Did it work?” Jos asked her immediately.

Lynette was coughing, sputtering, still trying to get her bearings. With everything that had happened, Aerdan Jos’ calm demeanour finally cracked.

“Cadet!” he repeated, gripping her shoulder hard. “Were you able to reprogram the satellites?”

The young cadet nodded emphatically. “Yes sir! But not all of the satellites were destroyed!”

Jos’ eyes widened. “What? How many survived?”

“Just one, sir,” Ryan said, sounding like she was on the verge of tears. “I’m sorry, sir! It was all we could do, all the satellites firing on each other, and one of them just... just…”

Jos considered it. One satellite was a hell of a lot better than a dozen; as powerful as they were, the Aegis satellites required a significant portion of their network to generate the planet-killing thaleron field Edgerton had dreamed of. With the network in ruins, one satellite hardly represented a threat to all life on Earth.

But it had only taken one satellite to obliterate Paris, to exterminate 28 million souls.

Jos shook his head. “We’ve done all we can. You did good work, cadet. Many lives will go on because of you.”

“What do we do now?” Rochemonte asked, looking from Jos to Eve. The two senior officers exchanged a glance, then looked back at her. Cindy could read the answer in their sullen faces, as the water around them continued to rise.

Something split the surface nearby; it was Kass Thytos. She’d shed much of her armor, making it easier to swim, but revealing the ugly looking wound burned into her shoulder. If the wound was giving her trouble, she didn’t show it; she’d somehow managed to haul Bellecotte to the surface. A moment later, Raxl Dreyton surfaced next to her, and together they hauled the big marine over to where the rest of the crew had gathered.

“What’s the story?” Kass asked.

“The network is down, save one satellite,” Jos said.

“Kane and his bunch can handle one satellite, don’tcha think?” Kass asked.

“We have to hope. We’ve run out of options here.”

“Where’s Selyara?” Raxl asked, looking around. The others glanced around as well, but nothing else broke the surface. Eventually, Jos looked to Rax.

“She helped make all this possible,” Jos said slowly. “She’ll be remembered for that.”

“Bullshit,” Rax said, and dove back beneath the surface. Kass made to stop him, but he disappeared into the murky water before she could speak.

Kass sighed, and shook her head. “Doesn’t matter anyway. I don’t think we’re getting out of this chamber.”

Around them, the waters rose.

=[/\]=

SCENE: Submarine Bay

The facility lurched again, and Barton had to hug his console to keep from losing his footing. Water was pouring in from the seams of a nearby airlock, and a distressing amount of it had started to pool around their feet. Barton had managed to ignore it as the water crept up over his toes, then above his ankles, but now that it had climbed halfway up to his knee, it was getting harder not to pay attention.

Behind him, Thomas Varn paced, sloshing loudly through the water as he completed his back-and-forth circuit. After a moment, he kicked the water in frustration and whirled to face Barton.

“They aren’t coming,” the winged-man said, matter-of-factly.

“Go fuck yourself,” Barton said, without turning to look at him.

“I know you think I’m some kind of monster,” Varn said, coming up to stand behind Barton. “Maybe you’re right. But whatever I am, I’m not an idiot, and standing here just *waiting* for them to show up is idiotic.”

Barton turned, and stared evenly into Varn’s eyes.

“Go. Fuck. Yourself.”

Varn slapped the console in frustration. “Dammit, Barton, let your sad little martyr complex consume you on your *own* time. There’s no reason we should die out of some… misguided principle!”

Barton whirled, teeth bared. “These people risked their lives just to drag your ersatz ass out that hellhole on Lavenza II, so you are *not* going to abandon them now!”

“I know that,” Varn said. “And whatever you think of me, I am sorry. But Barton, right now they’re trapped under about 20,000 gallons of ocean water, and we’re well on our way to joining them. Even if they aren’t dead yet-”

“They’re not,” Barton said.

“Even if they aren’t,” Varn continued. “There’s no way we can reach them. The facility is losing power, pretty soon we won’t even be able to open the sub bay airlock to get out. We can’t even transport them, the salinity of the water will throw up too much interference. There’s no way we could get a remote lock on them.”

Barton frowned. “Okay. So we eyeball it.”

Varn blinked. “Come again?”

“We get eyes on them, and we manually establish the transporter lock,” Barton said. “It’s old school, but it’s been done before.”

“With cargo, maybe,” Varn said, shaking his head. “If manual calculations are off by a millionth of a percent-”

“They die,” Barton interrupted. “Seems like a lateral move in this situation.”

“It’s insane,” Varn said.

“Can you do it?”

“What?” Varn’s eyes widened. “You want me-”

“You’re probably the only person who can run those calculations in your head,” Barton said. “Can you do it?”

For a moment, Varn’s collected demeanor dropped, and he looked uncertain. Almost afraid.

“What if I make a mistake?”

“Then today will be a very sad day,” Barton said. “Can you do it, or not?”

Varn looked around. “I suppose I could try. But how exactly are we supposed to establish a visual lock? Power’s failing, there’s no way we’ll get enough camera coverage to locate them.”

Barton looked past Varn, at the RED OCTOBER still moored in the docking bay.

“Leave that part to me.”

=[/\]=

SCENE: Corridor

Raxl Dreyton fought the current, ignoring the burn in his muscles. The last few days had not been easy, and he was not a young man any more besides. The fatigue of everything he’d been through since arriving on Earth - since that day that Selyara had tracked him down, really - had crept into his bones, and now it seemed it was waking up. Worse yet, the lungful of oxygen he’d sucked in before diving back under now felt foolishly ambitious; by his measure, Rax had made it barely halfway up the corridor outside the computer core, and already his lungs felt like they might burst.

But Selyara might need help.

He couldn’t face the idea - or the probability - that Selyara might be dead. She was always too in control, always thinking ten steps ahead of everyone else. But the sudden crush of water had caught her by surprise as much as it had everyone else. It was just possible she’d finally outsmarted herself.

**No!** Rax thought. **She’s alive! She’s got to be-**

In the murky water of the corridor, Rax suddenly saw something move. He pushed off the floor, giving himself more forward momentum, and managed to catch up to the figure ahead. He crashed into it at speed, and immediately wrapped his arms around it and started kicking frantically for the surface. He wasn’t sure if there was any air left at the top of the corridor, but it was his only chance.

A few merciful seconds later, Rax broke the surface. The figure in his arms was alive, and wriggling frantically, Rax shook the water out of his eyes and found himself looking into the panic-stricken face of Richard Edgerton.

“Oh hell, not you,” Rax frowned.

“Let me go, you idiot!” Edgerton shouted, struggling futilely against Raxl’s grip. “We have to get out of here! We have to-”

Raxl Dreyton slapped him, hard. “You were trying to end the goddamn world 15 minutes ago! I don’t want to hear your whining!”

Blood had started to trickle from the old man’s lip, and he stared baleful fire up at Rax. Rax ignored it.

“Where’s Selyara?” he asked. “She must have gone after you, now where the hell-”

“I’m here.”

Rax turned, and saw Selyara paddling towards them. Her eyes were alive with something Rax had never seen there before, a flashing ferocity far removed the icy control those eyes so often reflected. Her cheeks had flushed noticeably green, and as she approached, Rax felt an insane need to paddle away, as though he was sharing the water with an enormous shark.

“Selyara,” Rax said, tightening his grip around Edgerton. “How the hell did you-”

“Give him to me,” Selyara said, her eyes fixed on Edgerton.

“It’s fine. I got him.”

“Give him to me!” Selyara almost roared. She lunged in the water, and Rax just barely managed to pull back, keeping Edgerton out of her grasp, The old admiral gagged as Rax’s arm went tight around his neck.

“Whoa there, darlin’! Just ease off, he’s not going anywhere!”

“I’ll kill you to get to him, Dreyton,” Selyara said, finally looking at him. Rax thought he felt his soul shrivel beneath the heat of her gaze. “Don’t make me.”

“Are you outta your mind?” Rax asked. “The network’s down, Selyara. The planet is safe! There’s no reason we need to kill him!”

“Oh, there is,” Selyara said. “He has 28 million lives to pay for, and more.”

“Yeah, he’s an asshole,” Rax said. “A grade-A son of a bitch. But what, you gonna tear out his heart and eat it now or something? He’s *lost*! It’s over!”

“This was always the plan,” Selyara said. “You help me get to Edgerton, so that I could kill him.”

“Yeah, well, the plan’s changed half a dozen times,” Rax said. “What’s one more?”

“You’re defending him? This… *monster*?”

“I ain’t defending him,” Rax said. “I’m defending you. What do you think your fleeter friends are going to say if you come swimming back over to them covered in the old man’s blood? They already think you’re half as bad as he is!”

“I don’t care!”

“I do!”

This caught Selyara by surprise. Her eyes widened slightly, and for a moment, that scary look in her eye seemed to fade.

“What?” she asked.

“You’re not some kind of monster,” Rax said. “You like people to think you are, you try to be, but it isn’t you.”

“Don’t think you know me, Raxl,” Selyara said, shaking her head. “Don’t make that mistake.”

“So you’re gonna kill me if I don’t let you kill him?” Rax asked. “That’s the person I’ve been running with these last few months?”

“He *can’t* survive,” Selyara said. “He’s the lynchpin of this whole insane movement! As long as he’s alive, the Federation’s in danger!”

“Let the Federation worry about that,” Rax said. “We’ve done our part. Let’s deliver the goods and get out of here, yeah? I know a place-”

“No, Rax,” Selyara said. “I’m sorry, but I’m not who you think I am.”

“I don’t believe you.”

Selyara sighed. “I know. I’ll have to show you.”

She lunged again. Rax was ready, but the fatigue had caught up with him, slowing his movements, and Selyara managed to wrap a hand around his exposed wrist. That was all it took; the thinkstrike hit him hard, scrambling his brains. Every muscle in his body went limp, as he was dimly aware he was sinking beneath the surface even as consciousness drifted away. The last thing he saw was Selyara reaching over him, for Richard Edgerton.

=[/\]=

SCENE: Computer Core

The water was nearly to the ceiling of the chamber now. The crew had long ago had to relinquish their shaky hold on the frame of the chamber’s door, and now floated, desperately treading water and watching at their lives slowly ran out.

“Won’t be long,” Eve muttered glumly, staring up at the ceiling.

“Do you think Barton and Wingboy made it to the shuttle?” Kass asked of nobody in particular. “They could have escaped.”

“They wouldn’t have left us,” Eve said.

“So they just stand around until they drown?” Kass asked. “Seems stupid.”

“Mr. Barton doesn’t strike me as the ‘standing around’ type.”

“Too bad he had the vapors,” Kass frowned. “Varn’s in charge, and I don’t think-”

The facility shook violently, even more than it had done before. The crew exchanged confused glances, and a half-second later it happened again. They heard the sound of tearing metal, and at the far end of the chamber, an infernal red glow had started emanating up from beneath the water.

“What the hell is that?!” Lynette asked.

The facility shook again, and again, and the crimson glow got brighter along with it. Cindy Rochemonte’s eyes widened.

“Oh no. They wouldn’t.”

“What is it, lieutenant?” Jos asked.

“Barton and Varn were on their way to the RED OCTOBER,” Cindy said, clutching the still-unconscious form of Jake Crichton even more tightly. “If they were trying to get us out of here…”

Now Jos’ eyes widened. “They’re outside. They’re trying to cut their way through the facility.”

“Could that work?” Eve asked.

“The facility’s lost most of its power,” Lynette said, frowning. “There’d be no external shielding. With enough power-”

The facility shook again, worse than ever.

“That’s good, right?” Kass asked. “They cut their way in here, and we can get out!”

“Not with who knows how many thousands of pounds of pressure forcing its way inside!” Lynette said. “If they breach that wall, we-”

The wall breached.

=[/\]=

LOCATION: Red October, inside the San Francisco Bay

SCENE: Cockpit

“Have you got them?” Barton asked.

Varn frowned in the seat next to him, his eyes sweeping the murky water outside their cockpit window. “This was never going to be quick or easy.”

“That isn’t what I asked.”

Suddenly, Varn’s eyes lit up. “There! I think I see something!”

“So get it!” Barton said. “We don’t have a lot of time left!”

Varn squinted once more at the indistinct shape a few meters ahead of them, then bent over his controls. A moment later, the telltale whine of a transporter signal filled the corridor. After it faded, it was replaced by the angry yowling of a soaked and terrified cat. Mackie, who’d had just about enough of this hero business, thank you very much, immediately darted off the transporter pad to flee into a far corner of the shuttle’s passenger cabin.

Barton, who’d been turned around in the pilot’s chair to watch the results, now looked back at Varn. “That was a damn cat, Varn.”

“I know,” Varn nodded.

“*Not* our friends!”

“It was an opportunity to test whether or not this scheme is possible,” Varn said, glaring back at him. “If something went wrong, would you rather it was Rochemonte or Jos or someone smeared halfway across the transporter pad?”

“Fine,” Barton said. “Where are the others?”

They turned their attention back to the murky water outside their shuttle. Barton eased the RED OCTOBER gently forward, and the hull scraped loudly against the twisted remains of the facility wall he’d blasted his way through to access the computer core. Barton frowned.

“Don’t like the sound of that. If I go any further, we might get stuck.”

“It’s fine,” Varn said, pointing. “There they are.”

Barton followed Varn’s gaze, and they spotted a cluster of humanoid figures, limbs flailing as they tried to stay upright in the sudden rush of water from outside the facility. Varn was already moving, inputting calculations, looking back up at where his colleagues were fighting for their lives, then back down at his console to make corrections. Finally, he looked up at his friends one final time.

“Here goes nothing,” he said quietly.

Aerdan Jos and Eve Dalziel materialized on the shuttle’s transport pad. A moment later, Kass, and Bellecotte appeared next to them. Cindy Rochemonte, Lynette Ryan, and the still-unconscious form of Jake Crichton brought up the rear. They were all soaking wet, and shivering from the cold, and they looked around at their new surroundings with confusion.

“The shuttle?” Jos asked. “How…?”

“Better buckle up back there,” Barton said, looking back at them from the co-pilot’s seat. “The facility is falling apart, we’re not out of danger yet!”

“Hold it,” Jos said, looking around. “What about Selyara, or Mr. Dreyton?”

“We can’t scan for them,” Varn said. “Too much salinity in the water. I think we may have to be satisfied with what we’ve got, Barton.”

“Wait,” Barton said. He angled the RED OCTOBER further forward, and the scraping on the outside of the hull grew even louder. The ship jerked when one of its nacelles caught on a twisted bit of metal, but Barton barely noticed. His eyes were fixed on something he thought he’d seen, a few meters ahead…

“It’s Selyara!” Varn said. “And…”

“Dreyton,” Barton finished. “And Edgerton, too.”

“Can you get a lock on them?” Jos asked, coming up to stand behind Varn.

“Worked before, should work again,” Varn said. He once more did the mental math necessary for his calculations, and a second later the struggling figures still in the water outside vanished in a shimmering glow.

As soon as she’d materialized, Selyara Chen pitched forward. Bellecotte and Kass caught her before she could hit the floor. Behind her, Rax Dreyton and Richard Edgerton lay on the transporter pad, motionless.

“I’m fine,” Selyara said, nodding to Kass. “See to Mr. Dreyton, I believe he swallowed some seawater.”

Kass and Bellecotte went over to Raxl, while Eve Dalzile stepped over to Selyara. “What about Edgerton?”

“He’s… alive,” Selyara said. “I was convinced that killing him might not be necessary.”

“What did you do to him?” asked Eve.

From behind them, Kass spoke up from the transporter pad. “Hey! Something’s up with the old man!”

Jos and Eve moved to the pad and squatted down beside Kass. On the pad, Raxl Dreyton was breathing shallowly, but steadily. Beside him, Richard Edgerton’s eyes were open and staring, almost bulging. His lips were moving slightly, but no sound was coming out.

“Hey!” Kass said, snapping her fingers before Edgerton’s face. “Wake up, you shit!”

“I think he’s quite beyond us now,” Selyara said, smiling a little.

Eve whirled to face her. “You said you didn’t kill him.”

“And I didn’t.”

“You may as well have!”

“I didn’t give him anything he didn’t earn,” Selyara frowned. “28 million souls, dead in an instant. Quite the psychic shock to those attuned to such things. I was tired of carrying all that pain around for him, so I gave it back.”

Eve blinked. “You what?”

“The psychic trauma of 28 million deaths, poured into his head,” said Selyara. “I’m afraid it was more than his mind could handle.”

“You had no right to do that,” said Aerdan Jos. “He should stand trial for what he’s done. The Federation needs to hold him accountable.”

“So you can,” Selyara shrugged. “He’s not comatose, just non-responsive. Assign him an arbitrator, if a farce of a trial is so important to you. Perhaps we’ll see how deep his influence really went when he’s cleared of all charges.”

“That won’t happen,” Jos said.

“Perhaps not. It makes no difference to me, either way. I’ve paid him back in kind for what he did to me, I consider the matter closed.”

Selyara stepped around Jos, only to find the slight form of Cindy Rochemonte barring her path. The young engineer stared at Selyara with no trace of intimidation or fear. Selyara quirked an eyebrow.

“Will he ever come out of it?” Cindy asked slowly.

“The admiral?” Selyara turned to glance back at the pad where Edgerton still lay. “I’m really not sure. I suppose it’s possible.”

“No.”

Selyara looked back at Cindy. “No?”

“It’s not good enough,” Cindy said.

Selyara saw what was about to happen, but she did not move to stop it. Cindy brushed past her, arm already raised and clutching a hold-out phaser. Eve and Jos moved to intercept her, but by the time they’d managed to seize her arms, Cindy had fired. The orange bolt streaked across the space that separated them, striking Edgerton in the chest. The old man didn’t cry out, but his eyes seemed to widen for a moment, before the motion of lips suddenly ceased. Jos and Eve wrestled the phaser out of Cindy’s hand, and Cindy went limp, allowing them to restrain her.

“What the hell did you just do?” Eve asked. “Cindy, he was a prisoner! That’s… that’s…”

“Murder,” Aerdan Jos said.

“No,” Cindy Rochemonte shook her head as tears started streaking down her cheeks. “It was justice. For Paris.”

What little strength he had left, Aerdan Jos took Cindy gently by the hand.

“Cindy Rochemonte,” he said slowly. “You’re under arrest for the murder of Richard Edgerton.”

=[/\]=

“We negotiate the terms of surrender.

I see George Washington smile.

We escort their men out of Yorktown.

They stagger home single file.

Tens of thousands of people flood the streets,

There are screams and church bells ringing.

And as our fallen foes retreat,

I hear the drinking song they’re singing:

The world turned upside down.

The world turned upside down.”

“Yorktown (The World Turned Upside Down)”, Hamilton: An American Musical

=[/\]=

NRPG: The crisis is, for the most part, over. The Aegis Network is defeated, Richard Edgerton is dead, and our heroes, such as they are, are safe. One satellite remains, which Jerome will be addressing in his next post, and then the metaplot we’ve worked on for the last two-plus years will be wrapped up. There will of course be a lot of fallout from the events of this mission, lots of questions yet to be answered, but that’s the future. For right now, you can be proud of all the work we’ve done getting us to this point.

I know we should try to be apolitical, but I’d be lying if I said I’m not still gutpunched from last night. I wrote most of this before the election results were in, but I wrote the last 6 pages or so and did revisions after the news came out, and to be honest it was hard to focus sometimes. I gave this a once-over and I think I got rid of most of the typos or issues, and I tried to give all your characters some time to shine. I hope I did okay with everyone, and I hope you’re satisfied with how I handled the ideas you had for each of your characters, and sorry for the things that I had to leave out. I remembered to save the cat, though! ;-)

“IFF” stands for “Identify Friend Foe”, if you’re wondering.

Also, yes, I riddled this with Hamilton quotes. I don’t know if anyone noticed (I think I remember flat out telling some of you), Dale and I have been trying to work in as many Hamilton references in our posts for this mission as possible. Since this is probably my last opportunity to do that, I decided to go all out.

Good work everyone. Be safe, we live in trying times, but at least our characters scored a big win here today.

Shawn Putnam

A.k.a.

Jake Crichton

Chief Engineering Officer

USS PHOENIX