"Reign of Terror" Revisited

[Robo Jesus]

Why do I get the feeling that sooner or later a major plot point is going to occur when the droid repeats that "Only enlisted crew members with proper clearance can shut off security" and one of the Maquis mouths off "Well where do we enlist?"

[Sea Skimmer]

Great stuff, complete chapter 10 at once!

As a note though, hardwired phones aren’t immune to interference and detection. In the world wars, it was common to listen in on enemy field telephones by simply setting up your own field telephone, which could then pick up enemy transmissions through the ground wires at a distance of up to several miles, especially if the ground was very wet. Usually you just listened, but sometimes you could get a good enough signal to send out interference. I’m not sure if this would work with a digital phone system like the Maquis could be using, but I would assume they use a very simple and reliable sound powered analog system.

It is also possible for electronic warfare aircraft and even satellites to pick up scatter off telephone lines and interpret it at significant ranges. The US used this as a means of spying on the Soviet Union among other things but it was never all that reliable.

[lukexcom]

Would a digital phone transmitting over fiber optics be a good solution in this case?

[Darth Wong]

Would a digital phone transmitting over fiber optics be a good solution in this case?

Yes (and Sea Skimmer makes an interesting point; I suppose the phone lines act as a sort of impromptu transmitter). However, you have to keep in mind that these guys are basically farmers and miners, and as we've seen many times in Trek, farmers and miners have very little in the way of modern equipment to work with. Especially when they're cut off from their infrastructural base due to embargoes, as the Maquis are. Old-fashioned hand-cranked phones on copper wires are so primitive that they could easily make them themselves, whereas a more sophisticated device requires more skill and equipment on their part. The fact that they have advanced weapons and small spacecraft should not be taken as an indicator of their general abilities; they would have begged, borrowed, and bartered to get those from black-market vendors.

Of course, they might be able to barter for high-tech communications gear too, but that would all be subspace-based, because that's what everyone uses.

[Darth Wong]

Chapter Ten

Alien Ship, Lower Decks

Sheppard could barely conceal his glee as he put on the stormtrooper armour. The suit had far better mobility than any EV suit he'd ever seen, although it only carried a few minutes worth of air without the bulky extra tanks. Still, they wouldn't need more than that for this short space jump.

"You will need ammunition for that E-11 model blaster." the android explained, pointing at a large storage case. "The ammunition cartridges are always stored separately."

"No wonder I couldn't make the guns work." Sheppard grumbled, feeling foolish. Moments later, he retrieved a cartridge from the storage case, slapping it into the weapon. "Hey Tin Man, just how powerful is this thing?"

"Well sir, on maximum yield, it is capable of blasting through a bulkhead, if that's what you need to know." the android replied.

"All right, let's try it." Sheppard said, pointing the gun at the door of the armoury and pulling the trigger. The gun had a moderate kick, and a brilliant red bolt lanced across the room, striking the door and bouncing off. To his surprise and alarm, it ricocheted and hit the wall, which burst into a shower of sparks and acrid smoke.

Everyone immediately hit the deck, while chunks of wall fell to the floor around them.

"Anyone hurt?" Dalton shouted.

"We're OK sir." Wilson reported, scrambling to his feet and dusting himself off.

"No thanks to Billy The Kid here." Dalton replied from between clenched teeth.

"Sorry, sir." Sheppard said, clearly chastened. "Won't happen again, sir."

"Sir, the shot ricocheted because the door to this armoury is magnetically sealed." the android volunteered helpfully.

"Thanks for the heads-up." Sheppard grumbled.

"Heads up?" the droid replied quizzically.

"Never mind. Can I take out one of those big gunbots with this thing?"

"No, sir. The E-11 blaster is not powerful enough to penetrate the armour on a heavy war droid, and the higher-end models have shielding. In order to destroy heavy war droids, you will need a much heavier weapon, such as an E-Web." the droid replied, pointing at a stack of very large boxes.

Sheppard immediately rushed over to the boxes and tried to haul one onto the floor, only to discover that it was much heavier than he expected. "Hey Wilson, can you give me a hand?"

"Forget it." Dalton ordered. "We can't haul around anything that big, and we're on a clock."

"But sir, we might need it!" Sheppard protested.

"What we need is to get the hell off this ship before a hundred more of those war machines come to life and start hunting us down like dogs." Dalton retorted. "Now seal up that armour. We need to do a systems check and make sure we're good to go. It's bad enough we're going outside, but we're going outside in EV suits we've never used before. If we screw this up, we're done."

________________________________________


Maquis Colony HR51

Marina ran through the tunnels in a panic, hoping to get away from the pounding. She had never experienced real military firepower before, and her elation over killing that handful of enemy soldiers felt like a distant memory now. The tunnel seemed to shake, as if a giant were pounding his fist on the ground above.

In the air, the small Jem'Hadar attack ships hovered in place, pounding the surface with concussion charges. They had seen the last of Ota'Klan's men fall as they approached, and they were in a foul mood. The bombardment had to be carefully judged so that it did not collapse the mines, but they wanted to ensure that all booby traps outside the entrances were destroyed, and that any defenders had been driven back into the tunnel network. Charge after charge after charge slammed into the mountain side, sending great clods of earth flying into the air.

Marina kept running until she finally saw her friends ahead. They were set up behind a stout barricade, guns at the ready.

"Marina!" her friend Amy called out, infinitely relieved. "What's going on out there?"

"They're pounding the place pretty hard." Marina replied, just as the bombardment stopped. They all looked at each other and the same thought was on their minds. Either the Jem'Hadar were taking a break to consider their next move, or they were about to come in.

Marina became silent just like the others, waiting for the other shoe to drop. The sound of one person nervously flipping the display panel up and down on his phaser rifle was starting to seriously irritate her, and she fought the impulse to knock the rifle out of his hands.

Should she go back to the entrance, or would the bombardment start again when she got there? She only narrowly escaped the last time, and she was not at all keen to go anywhere now. The fact was that Marina was not military or ex-military; neither were the vast majority of the Maquis militia. She was a civilian who had learned to shoot a gun, and this was an entirely alien experience for her. Worse yet, most of the people on this colony who did have military experience were off scouting around somewhere, looking for Ando and Nitram.

A series of sharp cracking sounds echoed down the tunnels and made her decision for her; the Jem'Hadar had already entered the tunnels and had set off a booby trap. She could hear shouting sounds approaching, and she knew that it hadn't slowed them down at all.

"OK guys, there's something you should know. When they take casualties, they get more aggressive, not less."

"Great." Amy grumbled, peering down the tunnel over the barricade. She had never seen a Jem'Hadar in person before, but she knew what to expect: large, fierce warriors, with lizard-skin complexions and ridges.

What she did not expect was a weapon firing from thin air. The beam struck the barricade right next to her head and the flash temporarily blinded her, sending her falling to the ground and clutching her eyes with a cry.

"They're cloaked!" Marina shouted, heaving a grenade down the tunnel. She wanted to carry Amy away, but they needed every gun. "Use your HUD panels!" The grenade explosion sent the Jem'Hadar tumbling down like bowling pins, but more were coming.

________________________________________


In orbit on the Jem'Hadar battlecruiser, Kalan'Adar turned to his Vorta overseer. "Why are we here? Should we not be taking the alien vessel?"

"It is the Will of the Founders." Belath replied emphatically. "We do not need that alien ship to establish a presence in this quadrant, but we do need dilithium. I contacted them for guidance, and in their infinite wisdom, they changed our orders. The Cardassians will take that ship."

Of course, if the Founders themselves had ordered this change, then there could be no debate. Their wisdom was absolute, their decisions beyond challenge. But one question remained.

"The Founders are wise. But why do we have this Cardassian here?"

"I am here," Lucet interjected, "because I managed to get off that alien ship alive, and your ship picked me up."

"No." Kalan'Adar said menacingly, moving closer to Lucet. "I know we picked up your escape pod. I wanted to know why you have been allowed onto this bridge."

"Kalan'Adar," Belath purred. "The Cardassians are our allies. They are to be treated as honoured guests on this ship. Lucet here is a Gul, and he has asked for the opportunity to see our troops in action."

"Well there's not much to see." Kalan'Adar replied gruffly. "All of the fighting is going on underground. Our men have reported heavy resistance as they try to advance into the tunnels. The enemy is determined to resist. We have already lost more than fifty warriors."

"Tunnel fighting is nasty, costly work." Lucet said quietly.

"I know about tunnel fighting!" Kalan'Adar said sharply. "But we will be victorious. This is a small civilian colony. We will grind them down and take those mines intact, even if it costs us a thousand warriors."

"That's not very logical, is it? At this rate, it just might well cost you a thousand warriors." Lucet allowed a bit of characteristically Cardassian smugness to creep into his voice. "Shouldn't you consider simply collapsing that mine, and everyone in it? At the rate you're going, it would be cheaper to build a new mine."

"But it would take longer." Belath replied calmly, in her infuriatingly calm voice. "And this operation is not just about capturing an objective. It is about making an example of these people, for others."

"What kind of example does it set when you lose more than a thousand men trying to take a single mine?"

"It sets the ultimate example." Belath said with a smile. "Do you think the Jem'Hadar are feared because they are invincible? No, they are feared because the Jem'Hadar never stop coming. If you kill a thousand Jem'Hadar, they will come with a thousand more. And a thousand more. And a thousand more. They do not fear death. They will come until you are overrun. They do not grieve over fallen comrades, or weep over destroyed colonies and dead civilians. That is why they are strong, and you are weak."

Lucet stared at the Vorta and could not think of any words to say.

________________________________________


Alien Ship, Lower Decks

Renako glanced at the corridor maps his men had brought back from their brief survey. The logical thing to do was to leave, but he knew Tain would never accept it. His plan was clear: he would humour Tain by staying here as long as possible, and then leave before the deadline was up. All he had to do was make a token effort to hack the ship's systems from here on the docking bay, and then fortify the doors in case of attack.

No sooner had he arranged his defenses than the sound of phaser fire erupted in the hallway. Unbelievably, the humans were mounting a direct assault!

He sprinted to the source of the noise, where his men had piled up storage crates to form a barricade in the hallway. At the other end of the hallway, the humans were firing blindly around corners, hoping in vain to hit something. For an instant, he thought he saw a white helmet peek around the corner. Phaser blasts flew back and forth across the hallway, as eight of his men threw up a spirited hail of return fire.

"Sir, the humans are attacking us!" one of the men shouted.

"I can see that!" Renako shouted back. But why would they do something so futile? His men had strength in numbers and a good defensive position; this attack could not possibly succeed. He tried to imagine what the human commander must be thinking. Was he so desperate to get off the ship that he would risk such a foolhardy attack? Or did he have something else up his sleeve? Could this be a diversion?

"I don't like this!" he shouted. He turned around and pointed at the rest of his men, who were waiting for his orders: "Break out the heavy weapons!"

His men immediately began boarding their ships to get the heavy weapons, and he turned back to the battle. His small defensive force was stalemated against the humans, but they wouldn't be for long. Once the rest of his men brought out the heavy weapons, they would crush this small attacker force and then-

He was startled by the sound of phaser fire. Impossibly, the sound was coming from behind him! But how could the humans have gotten behind him? He spun around in a panic, already knowing that something had gone terribly wrong.

________________________________________


"Three, two, one, go!" Dalton barked into his helmet microphone, and his men sprinted along the docking bay floor, leaping up and out into the great space on the underside of the ship. According to the protocol droid, these suits were modified for boarding spacecraft, hence the small jet packs. Unrecognizable symbols flashed across his helmet display, and he reflected that it would be nice to understand the alien language from whence they came. No doubt there was a lot of useful information here, but he couldn't understand any of it.

Ten metres to his right, Ando tightened his grip on his blaster and tried to steady himself. He could feel his pulse pounding in his head as they floated across the empty space to the other docking bay. He looked to his left and right; everyone else seemed so calm. It was maddening that he couldn't control his own fear the way they seemed to. Or were they just as afraid as he was? He looked ahead again, the brightly lit docking bay getting closer and closer. Strangely, he couldn't see any activity.

Sheppard and Wilson flew on Dalton's left, the younger man goosing his jets and eagerly surging ahead while the older man remained precisely in line. Wilson scanned the docking bay for targets, but found none. Something was wrong; there should be three dozen Cardassians in the docking bay. And if they were leaving, why weren't their shuttles powering up?

"Sir, I'm not picking up any targets."

"Me neither, Wilson." came the tinny reply from Dalton through his helmet speakers. "No phaser fire either. There should be phaser fire from the diversionary attack at the aft door."

"Sir, do you think they took out Coyote and Frank?"

"We'll know soon enough, boys." Dalton replied. They were almost there now, and all of the men fired a burst from their retro-rockets to slow down. He braced for the shock of re-entering into an artificial gravity field.

He hit the atmospheric forcefield and felt the jolt as the artificial gravity field seized him in its grip. It pulled him down toward the deckplate, and he brought up his knees to his chest to tuck and roll. He grunted with the impact as he slammed into the deck plate and rolled several times before scrambling to his feet. He felt white-hot pain in his knee, but tried to ignore it. Apparently, Stravo had not entirely fixed his knee after the crash landing.

He brought up his weapon to the ready position and whipped around, scanning for enemies. But none appeared. No phaser fire, no grenades, nothing. No reaction to their presence at all. He looked at the other men, all of whom were reacting the same way he was.

Sheppard was the first to speak. "Sir, what the fuck is going on here? Where are all the Cardies?"

"I don't know." Dalton replied, suspiciously eyeing the shuttles. Smoke curled ominously upwards from both of them. He triggered his built-in communicator again. "Coyote, Frank, report. Coyote, Frank, do you read me?" There was no response.

"Shep, Wilson, check out the aft door." he ordered. "See if you can find Coyote and Frank. Typho, Wilkens, Mackey, check out the first shuttle. Eleas and Ando, with me." Dalton ordered, moving cautiously toward the second shuttle.

Ando followed Dalton toward the second shuttle and his hands were shaking again. He tried to quell his nervousness and silently cursed himself for his lack of self-control. As they got closer, Dalton stopped abruptly. He took off his helmet and sniffed the air, and he knew what it was: the all-too-familiar smell of death and burnt flesh. He moved closer, and waved Ando and Eleas forward. They took up position on both sides of the open door, and then burst inside.

The scene inside was gruesome. Bodies were strewn about the inside of the shuttle, some laying on top of others. They had been killed by phaser wounds, knife wounds, even blunt-force trauma to the head. Thick, acrid smoke filled the cockpit, and the bridge instrumentation was almost completely destroyed.

"Hot damn ..." Eleas muttered. "They're all dead, sir."

"I count fourteen of 'em, sir." Ando added, crinkling his nose at the stench. "And the computer core is ... melted. Somebody phasered it to hell."

"What happened here?" Dalton asked in a near-whisper. He triggered his communicator again. "Wilkie, we got a shuttle full of dead Cardies. What did you find in the other one?"

"Sir, we got the same situation over here." reported Wilkens. "Twelve Cardies, all dead. Computer core melted down. This shuttle ain't flyin' any time soon, sir. Without the computer, we'll never even get the impulse reactor on-line."

Wilson's urgent voice came over the communicator. "Sir, we found a live one! Aft door!" The entire group sprinted to the aft door on cue.

When Dalton got there, he found Sheppard pointing his weapon at a Cardassian who was sobbing and cowering in the corner next to a dead comrade. He looked like an officer, but he wasn't acting like one. He had a small bloody knife in his hand and waved it uselessly at Sheppard.

Dalton leaned in close. "What's your name, son?"

"R - R - Renako" the young man replied between sobs. "My men ..." he said, dissolving into tears again.

"What happened here?"

Renako stared up at him. "Human ... you don't understand. It's here! You can't kill ... Hunger ... My men ..." he said unevenly, in a voice that alternated bizarrely between choking sobs and cackling laughter. Then he shuddered, and before anyone could react, he suddenly turned the knife on himself, thrusting it into the side of his own neck. He crumpled lifelessly to the deck, blood pouring from the wound.

Ando stared down at him, h is eyes widening in fear.

"Ando? Talk to me ..." Dalton said quietly. "What the hell is he talking about?

"I don't know, sir. But he sounds just like the captain."

"The captain?"

"The captain of this ship, sir. I thought he was crazy. Before he killed himself, he said the same thing. There's something on this ship. You can't kill it. It's here." Ando replied slowly. He looked down at his hands, and he couldn't stop them from shaking.

[Sea Skimmer]

Yes (and Sea Skimmer makes an interesting point; I suppose the phone lines act as a sort of impromptu transmitter).

Pretty much; a small amount of electricity leaks out of the line and into the air as the pulses travel along. Fraction of a milliwatt, but this is still strong enough to be detected from space in the right circumstances. This also works in reserve; the much overrated EMP of nuclear device set off at high altitude can induce voltage back into phone lines and disrupt them.

However, you have to keep in mind that these guys are basically farmers and miners, and as we've seen many times in Trek, farmers and miners have very little in the way of modern equipment to work with. Especially when they're cut off from their infrastructural base due to embargoes, as the Maquis are. Old-fashioned hand-cranked phones on copper wires are so primitive that they could easily make them themselves, whereas a more sophisticated device requires more skill and equipment on their part. The fact that they have advanced weapons and small spacecraft should not be taken as an indicator of their general abilities; they would have begged, borrowed, and bartered to get those from black-market vendors.

I don’t see a problem with the phone at all; I just think it should be ‘near immune’ instead of ‘immune’. I’ve been thinking, and if you used a sound powered phone, a phone which directly converts sound into electrical pulses with no boosting, something that is common for military field telephones anyway, the power output in the lines would probably be so low that whatever leakage occurred would not be reasonably detectable. As I recall most of the spying on the Soviets was directed at very long and high powered phone lines stretching across Siberia.

Also, Jem Hadar attack ships probably have shitty sensors and electronic warfare gear given that the things are mass produced expendables to be manned by expendable personal. Or at least, the sensors may not be bad, but they probably are very focused in capabilities, unlike Federation ships which are flying science stations. Something this basic might just escape them or be lost in the background. I just felt the need to comment, since this vulnerability is not very well known. Mastering it was one of those little things that added up to making the US by far the world electronic warfare superpower.

[Darth Raptor]

And the other shoe drops. You've got a good knack for revealing things without actually revealing anything.

As I understand it, a Star Trek phaser is a more conventional directed energy weapon than a Star Wars blaster. IOW, they wouldn't leave the same effects. But what about a lightsaber? Might they be mistaking phaser burns for saber wounds? Scary.

[Edward Yee]

Hmm... that actually leaves me curious as to the knife wounds. If we take "mistaken for phaser burns" to be the case, and assume that the blunt Force trauma (pun intended), then whence would Cardassians be struck by knives from...

... oh boy.

[Alan Bolte]

Perhaps the Cardassians killed each other with their own phasers and knives. I don't remember them carrying knives into battle like Klingons, but surely they are practical enough (unlike the Federation) to carry survival knives.

[Themightytom]

wow they are gonna ahve their hands full taking on a Sith Ghost especailly sicne they ahve no idea what it is or how to deal with it. You probably can't blow it up with a torpedo or drive it away by making everyone laugh, perhaps they can reverse its polarity?

[The Duchess of Zeon]

*smokes a kretek in a lull in the fighting and listens to a Dimotika.* "Everyone dies someday."

For some reason, I always imagined myself standing on the parapet, smoking--because it doesn't matter anymore--and ignoring the flick of the occasional bullet from the tribes outside, waiting, calculating, knowing that the end is coming soon--how much food is left, how much ammo--how unlikely it is for relief to arrive before then. And when I imagine it, it's usually with this strumming greek folk song in the background, with the sun setting. I'd upload it if I could, but it's not allowed since it's an mp3, even though folk music is public domain, oh well.

But there's a link to a version on youtube.

Good work, Mike.

[fusion]

This is getting a bit scary... A ghost that is there and can possess anyone.
But anyways a very good fan fiction.

[Darth Wong]

I don't like the word "ghost". It sounds far too Scooby-Doo.

[tim31]

You're all on the wrong track. This is a Wars/Trek/Predator crossover.

[Darth Wong]

You're all on the wrong track. This is a Wars/Trek/Predator crossover.

If someone were to ever do a Wars/Trek/Predator crossover, I would hope that the Preds get killed off right away. They've become totally lame without Arnold.

[Darth Raptor]

The way to do a Wars/Predator crossover is to make them just another kind of alien like they did in IMPS.

"Here's your Frisbee back."

[Darth Wong]

I just realized that I haven't yet established whether any of the characters is black. If I had, then we would know who will die next, as per genre standards

[Singular Quartet]

I just realized that I haven't yet established whether any of the characters is black. If I had, then we would know who will die next, as per genre standards

YOU BASTARD!!!

Hum, we don't have any stupid fat people, and we don't have anybody who's going to have sex "on camera", so that rules those two cliches out... nobody named Kenny, either. Yep, you have a clear ability to slaughter at will.

[tim31]

Now there's something I want to see: Mike write a classy sex scene. He's already done a rape scene, so let's have some passionate but realistic sex.

[Darth Wong]

Now there's something I want to see: Mike write a classy sex scene. He's already done a rape scene, so let's have some passionate but realistic sex.

I feel I need to point out that to me, good sex is not classy. It's dirty, and crude, and fucking awesome.

In any case, the humans on HR51 are fighting a desperate battle for survival against an enemy who intends to relentlessly push men into the meat grinder until they overrun the defenders. Not much time for sex. And the humans on the ISD are all men ... not the kind of sex scene I would want to write.

[JointStrikeFighter]

Now there's something I want to see: Mike write a classy sex scene. He's already done a rape scene, so let's have some passionate but realistic sex.

I feel I need to point out that to me, good sex is not classy. It's dirty, and crude, and fucking awesome.

In any case, the humans on HR51 are fighting a desperate battle for survival against an enemy who intends to relentlessly push men into the meat grinder until they overrun the defenders. Not much time for sex. And the humans on the ISD are all men ... not the kind of sex scene I would want to write.

You never know Mike, they could find a hot Imperial hiding out on the ship...or something.

[Themightytom]

I just realized that I haven't yet established whether any of the characters is black. If I had, then we would know who will die next, as per genre standards

YOU BASTARD!!!

Hum, we don't have any stupid fat people, and we don't have anybody who's going to have sex "on camera", so that rules those two cliches out... nobody named Kenny, either. Yep, you have a clear ability to slaughter at will.

Well, as per ST standards, the redshirt, ie: the newest least developed character goes first, anyone who demonstrates a disrespectful or hateful atitude towards anyone else ESPECIALLY a main cahracter goes second and clones trasporter twins synthetic organ factories etc tend to ahve a 70/30 chance at survival.

In Star wars if anyone dies they have to make that canned screaming noise that Lucas used for the death of everything from storm troopers to arabs

[Ekiqa]

You never know Mike, they could find a hot Imperial hiding out on the ship...or something.

Or a sex droid.

Hey, you gotta keep a crew entertained. There has to be some sort of "recreation centre" on the ship.

[CmdrWilkens]

Let me just say that if I die I just want to go out a la BoH hacking evil down all around me Since we're all probably gonna die (except probably Shep and Dalton) I just want a fun death with limbs hacked apart and all that.

[fusion]

I don't like the word "ghost". It sounds far too Scooby-Doo.

But... But... I like Scooby-Doo
Anyways, there is two possible outcome. Either Shep is really evil and sides with the thing or everyone dies...

Wait a minute that doesn't sound right...

Darth Wong you aren't going to kill everyone off right?