Anabasis

[Pablo Sanchez]

Anabasis
Chapter One
Across the Distance



The bridge of the USS Jutland was cramped, as on most of the Akira-class vessels operated by Starfleet. Akiras were tough little ships, small but with shields and firepower disproportionate to their size.

Captain Putzkammer would almost have preferred to have remained the first officer of a larger ship. He had been on the Tercio, a Galaxy Class, and everything was much more spacious, and luxurious. For the purposes of the sort of long patrol the Jutland was taking, all the way along the borders with the Klingons and Romulans, things got cramped. The poor Tercio didn't even have a holodeck.

For all the military utility and necessity of his mission, Putzkammer was not a military officer. He was an astronaut, explorer, and adventurer, and he resented to the turn that Starfleet had been taking after the Dominion War. San Francisco was beginning to see space as a frontier, not to be explored but to be defended. So there he was a little pocket cruiser patrolling a border, instead of explored the unknown fringes of space in a long-endurance Galaxy Class.

Now he was feeling his oats and had the sense of a little bit of superiority over those admirals back in 'Frisco. Even if he couldn't go work the unknown fringes, they would come to him. He leaned close to the sensor station, squinting at the faint contacts.

Ensign Pauley tapped at one of them, "The others are just static. I had the gain all the way up to see this one. Notice how the others go in and out and move a bit--"

"--while that one stays still," Putzkammer finished for her, "that's got to be the contact that the border sensors detected. Any idea what it is?"

Pauley shrugged. "From the looks of it, a starship of some kind. It isn't Romulan. If they were trying to sneak across the border they'd just use their cloaking devices. This ship isn't behaving like anything I've ever seen or heard of. I'm not getting a lot of energy or transmission scatter. It's mostly infrared. That ship has a lot of heat to bleed off, otherwise I don't think we would have ever spotted it."

"Hm," the Captain grunted, stepping back from the station and straightening to his full two meters of height. If he wasn't at station in the center of the bridge, Putzkammer had to bend low. Doorways were a bother as well. He missed the Tercio and her high cielings dearly.

"Helm, close the range to 10,000 kilometers, but slowly. I want a better look at this flying saucer," Putzkammer ordered.


----


Lieutenant Hitotsugi oversaw his station with intensity, interpretting the multicolored holographic sphere that floated weightlessly just in front of his face.

"Contact is moving toward the Maikaze, acceleration one-five-zero meters per second. Range 70,000 kilometers and closing," Hitotsugi said, glancing at his other displays.

Captain Saegusa frowned, "They've seen her."

"Unavoidable. She had a great deal of heat to bleed away and we could not risk further damage to her systems," Admiral Yamashita replied, "at any rate it does not appear that they have seen the rest of the task force. We will cover the Maikaze from attack, if they intend to attack."

"If they are even capable of attack," Saegusa pointed out.

Yamashita glanced at the holo-display and the single bright point of red light moving slowly towards the destroyer Maikaze. At least he now knew for certain that these unknown aliens had some method of masking acceleration stress, unless they were somehow accustomed to living under fifteen gravities of acceleration.

The question was whether the contact was actually a warship or not. It was giving off an amount of heat and light that Hitotsugi had likened to the New Year's celebration in Kyoto when he had first spotted it, tearing at faster-than-light speeds on some kind of modified Cochrane drive and dropping out of warp only 70,000 kilometers away. If it was a warship, it felt no need to be stealthy.

The picture from the telescopic cameras was even more confusing. The unidentified vessel was disc-shaped, with two cylinders joined to the main hull with spars. From the copious emmissions it was easy to guess that the cylinders were engines of some sort. It was obvious in any case that it would be impossible for the designers of that vessel to have armored the outriggers in any adequate fashion. This ship looked like no warship Admiral Yamashita had ever seen, but it did behave according to tactics with which he was familiar.

Yamashita stroked the right side of his mustache, then the left. Not even the least pretension of stealth, inadequate sensor searches, and unimaginative direct maneuvers. Yes, he knew those characteristics well. He had not been appointed Admiral merely because he came from an important family.

The unknown vessel had locked onto the Maikaze, because the Maikaze had suffered a minor containment loss of her starboard reactor just a few minutes before the anomaly had interrupted Yamashita's set piece engagement. The emergency fields had snapped on and most of the imperiled antimatter had been safely spaced, but there had been a few seconds of runaway reaction before the safeties cut in. The Maikaze had had to get rid of that excess heat somehow, and after the anomaly it had seemed safe enough. The German and American fleets had disappeared and task force Hiei had found itself deep within the safety of Imperial Territory. There was no guessing what had triggered the wormhole, at least not in any sane terms, so the immediate concern was keeping the destroyer from burning out any delicate electronics or other systems. She had already lost her subspace transceiver, and there was no sense in risking her sensors as well.

But then this new contact had just sprung on them from nowhere, right in the middle of Imperial territory. It was damned peculiar, so peculiar that Yamashita's first and most obvious order of a hail demanding that the vessel identify itself had died in his throat. Something was wrong.

"I want a continuous firing solution on the spar on which their starboard engine is attached," the Admiral ordered.


----


"Image is resolving," Lieutenant Commander Stanley called from the tactical station.

"On screen," Putzkammer ordered.

The tactical screen zoomed from a wide-angle shot showing a tiny point of light to show a closer image of the vessel that had been detected. It was a boxy arrangement two hundred-fifty meters in length, and it's cross-section was eighty by eighty. It wasn't Klingon or Romulan, or any other nation that the Federation had contact with.

"What's that charring on the side there?" the captain asked. "Can you get a better shot of that?"

Stanley pressed a few images on his touchscreen panel, and the screen snapped to a closeup of the area Putzkammer had asked about. There was a crater on one side of the object, surrounded by black scoring on the grey hull.

"Battle damage," he said, a touch nervously.

Putzkammer frowned and said sternly, "Or an asteroid impact. Get me that shot of the whole ship again."

Stanley tapped the appropriate sections of his console, and the whole length of the ship filled the screen again. The captain bit his lower lip and considered the image. There were various lumps and protrusions projecting from the hull of the vessel, and there were no windows that he could see. The little irregularities almost reminded him of a Borg cube, though it was much less extreme.

"Any activity, Ensign Pauley?"

She shook her head. "No sir. I'll need to do an active scan to see anything."

"Well, if it's crewed they must have seen us by now. Lieutenant French, standard hail for identification," Putzkammer ordered, then he raised a hand, "Wait, cancel that. I want you to make it a tight beam transmission. We don't need to tell everyone in the neighborhood that we're in the midst of a first contact situation."

The communications officer got on the subspace transmitter and sent the message as ordered. Then the bridge crew waited.

After a full two minutes, the lieutenant looked up with a shake of his head, "No response, Captain."

Putzkammer bit his lip again. "Ensign Pauley, let's try that active scan."


----


Hitotsugi's eyes shot up from his viewer, "Admiral, they are painting the Maikaze with targetting sensors."

Yamashita nodded with decision to Lieutenant Kawashima at the weapons station.


----


Pauley turned in her seat, suddenly. She had just enough time to blurt out, "Captain!"

Then Putzkammer felt the deck lurch under his feet and his head hit the ceiling above to the sensor station, hard. Then there was a sickening moment of blackness behind his eyes. He heard muffled sounds of chaos that slowly increased in volume until it was back to normal, or as normal as shrieking klaxons could be. He opened his eyes and wiped the blood out of them. He was on his back on the deck. Judging from the bedlam still raging it had only been a second or two. He sat up and ignored the pounding pain coming from his forehead. He looked at the viewscreen and almost fell again.

The starfield was turning crazily as the Jutland engaged in a dizzying spin to starboard. Putzkammer understood in an instant what had happened. He pressed one hand to his head to stop his bleeding and staggered into his seat. He keyed for engineering. The chief engineer was speaking before Putzkammer could even begin, his speech coming rapid and uncontrolled in a Gujarati accent highlighted by alarms. The captain didn't even bother trying to interpret it. He gripped the arms of his chair tightly and bellowed, "Eject the warp core!"

"As ordered!" was the reply.

Half a second later every light on the bridge went out and the klaxons died. Another half second later, the entire ship rocked violently once again. The blackness was chased away for an instant as the helm console exploded in a shower of plasma and liquid metal, and the pilot screamed in th deeper darkness that followed. Then everything was quiet. Putzkammer took a deep breath to calm himself and licked his lips nervously.

"Emergency power," he ordered quietly.

The dim emergency lights came on, together with the flashers for red alert. The spinning starfield reappeared as well.

"Lieutenant Commander Stanley, patch emergency thrusters to your station and stabilize that spin."

Stanley stared at the captain, wild-eyed and with sweat running down his face. "Captain, what about shields--and weapons?"

Putzkammer blinked away the blood that was again threatening to blind his left eye. "I haven't got the damage report yet, but I'm certain that that ship knocked our starboard nacelle clean away. We've ejected the warp core as well, and furthermore it's vapor. We're dead in space."

"It wasn't that ship, sir," Ensign Pauley correct him, "something to starboard hit us, but I can't see what it could have been."

The captain nodded, which set his head to throbbing even more painfully, "Understood. It doesn't seem as though they're looking to finish us off." He keyed for engineering, "Mister Patel, I want a damage report as soon as possible."

"The Chief Engineer fell and broke his arm, sir. This is Chief Petty Officer Graham."

"Mister Graham, you are promoted to Chief Engineer for the duration of Patel's convalescence. Damage report. ASAP." Without waiting for confirmation, Putzkammer clicked over to sickbay. "Two medical officers to the bridge, we've got one man needs treatment for plasma burns and some minor--."

"Sir?" Lieutenant French interrupted him.

The captain looked over.

"We're getting a subspace transmission," French explained.

"Origin?" Putzkammer barked.

Pauley checked her console. "18,000 kilometers to starboard. And closing."

"Put the transmission on screen," the captain ordered, turning his chair to face the main viewscreen.

French hesitated. "Sir."

"What is it?" Putzkammer growled impatiently.

"The transmission. It's in Japanese." French coughed nervously. "And... ah... audio only."

Putzkammer licked his lips. "Let's hear it, then."

The speakers cracked with a burst of static, causing everyone to jump. The subspace receiver had probably been damaged when the warp core let go. But the voice came through in plain English, the universal translator retaining the authority of the deep voice that rumbled through the static.

It said: "Unknown vessel, this is Admiral Ichiro Yamashita of the Imperial Japanese Navy. You are in violation of imperial space. Surrender immediately or be destroyed."

The captain glanced around the bridge as if making sure that he had heard the same message as everyone else. The two medical corpsmen entered through the doors at the far left of the bridge and moved to treat the helmsman's burns.

"Admiral Yamashita, this--this is Captain Leopold Putzkammer of the USS Jutland, United Federation of Planets. We surrender."

Stanley's whirled around and fixed Putzkammer with a glare, "Captain--"

Putzkammer gestured sharply for silence. The comm channel was still open.

The voice came back, sounding slightly different this time, "Acknowledged, Jutland. Stand to and prepare to be boarded."

The comm squawked off, and Stanley spoke instantly. "Captain, we cannot surrender this ship so lightly!"

"Do you suggest we fight them?" the captain asked, "An enemy who sheared the starboard nacelle clean away from the ship with one shot from 18,000 kilometers downrange, without us even having a glimmer of a sensor contact with them? And the Jutland crippled?"

Stanley set his jaw but did not reply.

"French, that last transmission sounded different," Putzkammer said.

The lieutenant nodded, "It didn't go through the UT, the enemy replied in English."

Putzkammer nodded. Why not?


----


"An English speaking German, in command of a 'United States Ship' named after a British battle," Captain Saegusa said suspiciously, "claiming to be from a non-existent nation."

Yamashita stroked his mustache idly, "Nothing seems impossible. The task force fell into a wormhole, did it not?"

"We can't say definitively that it was a wormhole," the captain replied.

Yamashita nodded, "But there is nothing else to explain what happened. Perhaps the same wormhole transported these people here. A lost colony? Order the marines to prepare a prize crew and bring the Hiei to within one thousand kilometers."

[Crazedwraith]

Curious, Good and Intriguing but niot as good as La Mort De Homme.(Hint hint )

[Pablo Sanchez]

Curious, Good and Intriguing but niot as good as La Mort De Homme.(Hint hint )

"The Dead of Man?"

I've basically suspended Le Mort Homme as I'm having difficulty continuing the story. I'll probably continue it later.

[Crazedwraith]

Curious, Good and Intriguing but niot as good as La Mort De Homme.(Hint hint )

"The Dead of Man?"

Oops. Three little letters make all that difference?

I've basically suspended Le Mort Homme as I'm having difficulty continuing the story. I'll probably continue it later.

Well that sucks. This new one does look could though. Should i know the people the fed. are facing now? or are they original.

[MKSheppard]

I've basically suspended Le Mort Homme as I'm having difficulty continuing the story. I'll probably continue it later.

I demand more WWI style combat damn you!

[darthdavid]

Good, but may I ask where this Imperial Japanese Space Navy you have is coming from? Is it a creation of your own or is it from a show/book/movie. If so, what's it from?

[Pablo Sanchez]

Good, but may I ask where this Imperial Japanese Space Navy you have is coming from? Is it a creation of your own or is it from a show/book/movie. If so, what's it from?

My own creation. Since only the very worst writing uses the "as you know, Bob" technique to inform the reader, it will be explained bit by bit.

I demand more WWI style combat damn you!

I've actually figured out how the next chapter is going to go, finally, so the ETA is middle of next week, depending on the breaks. No time this weekend, though.

[darthdavid]

Good, but may I ask where this Imperial Japanese Space Navy you have is coming from? Is it a creation of your own or is it from a show/book/movie. If so, what's it from?

My own creation. Since only the very worst writing uses the "as you know, Bob" technique to inform the reader, it will be explained bit by bit.

I demand more WWI style combat damn you!

I've actually figured out how the next chapter is going to go, finally, so the ETA is middle of next week, depending on the breaks. No time this weekend, though.

W00tage. There's some great writers here but it's not very often that some one creates a universe of their own (even if it does end up being used in conjunction with an established franchise).

[phongn]

Iiiinteresting. Do continue, Pablo.

[Pablo Sanchez]

Anabasis
Chapter Two
Prize Crew


"The computer is finished evaluating our sensor data, Captain," Ensign Pauley announced, "but you aren't going to like this."

Putzkammer smiled sadly, "It's been that kind of day. Run it down for me."

A picture of the first vessel sighted appeared on the viewscreen. "There are twenty-four ships, not counting the initial vessel sighted. Thirteen of them match our first example in all characteristics apparent to passive sensors, minus the battle damage and thermal radiation. Those would be the smallest ships in their little armada. I believe those bumps and protrusions on the hull to be clumsy weaponry mountings, shield emitters, and sensor packages. The next ships in order of size look like these--"

Another image of a ship replaced the first, this one similar in shape but with the front end rounded off instead of squared, and the sides featuring a set of what looked like giant-size stair steps on the four sides, with quite large lumps affixed to each step. "--which is 400 meters long, and about 125 meters in the other two dimensions. They've got five of those."

Another image, this one almost identical to the last but more slender. "Three of these. 600 by 150 meters."

The next image reassumed the boxlike shape of the very first vessel, but was apparently much larger, "There are two of these fellows, about six hundred meters long and two hundred wide. They don't have as many protrusions and surface variation as the other ship classes. If my hunch is correct about those protrusions these ships might be transports of some sort."

"Now the last one," Pauley said, bringing up the final image in her slideshow. It was a final repeat of the rounded box with steps. "This must be the flagship. It's a full kilometer in length by 250 meters across."

Captain Putzkammer gently fingered the bandage on his forehead. "Rather impressive. Their combined tonnage is probably better than any three task forces in all of Starfleet. I don't know how to weigh them pound for pound, but I'm not optimistic. Any idea on the yield of the weapons in those... turrets?"

Pauley threw up her hands. "What hit us was a beam of coherent x-rays with enough power to tear the starboard nacelle away in one shot as easily as slicing bread. Its exact gigawattage, I just can't say for certain."

"Guesstimate, then."

Pauley shrugged, "A lot more than anything they told us about at the academy."

"Still want to fight them, Stanley?" Putzkammer asked ironically.

"No sir," Stanley said with a scowl.

Putzkammer considered the image of the massive battlewagon and scowled himself. "Strange design philosophy. It almost looks like old images of ancient surface warships, like the ones that fought at the actual _battle_ of Jutland."

"They look primitive," Stanley interjected.

The captain shook his head, "Looks are deceiving. I think they must be using turret mounts for their weapons because of all that power behind them. I don't think an omnidirectional array could handle that much output. And those steps--they must be designed to prevent the forward turrets from obstructing the rear. The heavier ships can fire all their guns forward, and probably three quarters of them to port, starboard, dorsal, and ventral. Not much on the rear arc. A design oversight?"

Lieutenant Commander Stanley smirked, "They probably just aren't used to running away."

The enemy ships to which the Jutland had surrendered were within a thousand kilometers now, and decelerating relative to her.

Lieutenant French signalled with a wave of his hand. "Another message, sir."

"On screen," Putzkammer ordered.

French coughed, "Audio only, sir."

"You know what I meant, Lieutenant," the captain replied with a hint of pique.

The voice from before came back over the bridge speakers, "USS Jutland, this is Admiral Yamashita. We will be sending a boarding craft with marines to secure your vessel, under the command of Major Uchida; he will enter at your docking bay. Assemble all crew and officers except for bridge staff in your ship's mess; you and your bridge crew are to remain at your stations. Follow any commands issued by Major Ushida precisely and promptly and violence will not be necessary. Do you understand?"

"Ah--I understand, but the Jutland does not possess a mess hall."

"What?" Yamashita asked.

"We don't have a mess hall. There's a cafè where we can eat in groups, but most everyone takes meals in his or her cabin," Putzkammer explained.

There was a pause of several seconds, as if the Japanese admiral was weighing his response. "Then assemble them in your 'cafe.' Yamashita out."

The comm clicked as the connection was severed once again.


----


"Have we attacked some sort of cruise liner?" Captain Saegusa asked the admiral, checking over the sensor data with renewed interest, "everyone has his own personal cabin and there is no mess but there is a cafè."

"His or _her_ own cabin," Yamashita emphasized, "evidently they have female crewers. And it definitely possesses weapon emplacements and has stardrives far in excess of what any passenger vessel should legitimately require."

"The yacht of some baron, then?"

"He would have to be spectacularly wealthy," Yamashita said after consideration, "and it would not have identified itself as it did. The captain would have said that he was a yachtsman, rather than risking misintepretation. I would say it was a merchant tender, except that it lacks cargo space. It is like nothing I have ever seen." He turned to Hitotsugi. "Do you have any thoughts, Lieutenant?"

As a sensor operator Hitotsugi had been trained to recognize many different types of vessels. He mulled it over carefully, "It appears similar in some respects to the old Romulan and Klingon starships of the twenty-second and twenty-third centuries; there are also the vessels which were reported to have been destroyed by the United States Navy at the Bajoran Wormhole, though our information on those ships is incomplete. I could also detect some characteristics which are often found in Borg ships."

Yamashita nodded. "I was reminded of that myself. The lack of sensor stealthing and the simple straight-line approach to contact are classic Borg, though their greeting message was absent and the crew is apparently human."

Captain Saegusa scratched at the back of his head. "Major Uchida is reporting that he has docked with the Jutland. We'll find out what they are presently, sir."


----


Lieutenant Commander Stanley had been delegated to greet the boarding party at the docking bay, and he stood with some apprehension. Much more than Captain Putzkammer he was a military-minded man, and he had come face to face with an enemy who had bested his ship as easily as one breaks a child's toy. Of course, there was the small consolation that the Jutland had been taken by surprise. Perhaps things might have gone differently if they had been better prepared.

The enemy shuttle was quite large. It dominated the whole of a docking bay which had been designed to hold multiple Federation shuttles and runabouts. Stanley stood bolt upright as the ramp descended with a hiss of pressurized air. Five men immediately stomped down it and the commander's jaw became very slightly slackened. The men were shorter than him by 10 or 15 centimeters on average, and they were covered from head to toe in black uniforms--Stanley guessed that they were combat pressure suits. They featured what looked like plates of composite armor in key areas, sturdy-looking boots and vests festooned with all manner of objects totally foreign to Stanley--even more odd was the rectangular patch that rode their right upper arms: a yellow flower on a red field. The ensemble was topped by a helmet that hugged the head tightly and hid the eyes behind two large, dark lenses, the jawline sprouting an air-filtering snout that reminded the lieutenant commander of illustrations from his history classes. They looked, in short, even more inhuman and mechanical then Borg drones. Their weapons were harsh amalgams of blocky mechanical parts, chunky, black, and threatening; utterly unlike phasers.

The first five men stomped past Stanley as if he wasn't even there. As did the next. He watched nervously as they methodically cleared the entire docking, sweeping their weapons this way and that, until finally they stopped and apparently gave the all-clear signal to their shuttle. Then a full fifty men turned out in a clatter of boots striking deck to organize into groups with antlike efficiency. Some of them had extra symbols on their arms; as to the provenance of these, Stanley had no idea whatsoever. Finally one of them, not carrying a weapon in his hands, walked directly to the lieutenant commander and stopped in front of him.

The voice came out from the snout of the helmet, harshly filtered through the external speaker. "I am Major Uchida. Your name and rank, immediately."

"Lieutenant Commander Stanley. I'm here to lead you through the ship," he replied.

"You will take us to the galley. If any member of the crew resists, they will be killed without mercy and you will follow them. Do you understood?"

Stanley gulped as he looked down at the squat, cyborg-looking man. "Yes."

He led them quickly out of the docking bay and into the corridors until they reached the turbolift.

"The cafè--the galley--is a few decks above us. We'll need to take the turbolift," Stanley explained, looking back down the corridor at the sixty-some men filling the hall. Some of them were entering rooms along the way in the same systematic manner that they had used to clear the docking bay. It seemed as though they were very concerned about the possibility of ambush.

Uchida spoke again, drawing the lieutenant commander's attention back down to him. "Stairs."

Stanley started to explain. "There aren't any stairs, there's just--"

Major Uchida struck him hard across the jaw with the back of one gloved fist. Stanley reeled and caught himself against one of the bulkheads, barely avoiding an ignominous spill to the carpet. A little rivulet of blood mixed with saliva spilled out of the right corner of his mouth.

"Don't tell stupid lies. This lift cannot be the only access between decks," Uchida growled.

Stanley wiped the blood away with one hand. "I'm not lying. There's only the lift and some access ladders through that door." He pointed. For a moment he thought the little man would hit him again, but he didn't.

"Summon the lift," he ordered, then he turned back towards the other men and uttered a rapid stream of Japanese. The soldiers began to pour through the door that Stanley had indicated, taking the ladder to the other decks of the ship.

The lift car arrived momentarily, because no one was using it. When it arrived, Stanley was shoved roughly through the doors. Uchida and six others crowded in with him, fairly crushing him against the wall. He took the opportunity to examine their uniforms more closely. There were precisely sixteen petals to the flower that the soldiers wore on their right shoulders.

"Take us to the galley," Uchida demanded.

Stanley looked up and said, "Deck ten."

The turbolift hummed as it rose, only taking a few moments to reach the destination, and easily beating the men that had been sent by the ladder. Stanley led them out and down the corridor to the cafè, or Ten-Forward as it was called on most Starfleet vessels. When the doors opened, he saw that it was greatly overcrowed. All the furniture had been pushed to the walls but still there was scarcely room to sit.

Uchida slowly examined the room and turned back to Stanley. His face was completely hidden and his voiced modulated by the speaker system, but his shock carried through in the movements of his head and body.

He asked, "Why are there women and children on your ship?"

"It's the families of the crew," Stanley replied matter-of-factly.

"What? Is this not a warship?" Uchida asked.

Stanley drew himself up proudly, "The Jutland is an Akira-class heavy cruiser; she was at Chin'Toka and Cardassia. She is most definitely a warship."

In sequence the Japanese officer looked at Stanley, back at the terrified non-combatants, the cafè tables and bar, the soft red carpet, and finally back at Stanley.

"Is there another room of size where the women and children can be placed to relieve their crowding?" Uchida asked.

Stanley pointed down the corridor, "The nursery is the third door on the right."

Uchida issued a rapid burst of commands to the six soldiers, then turned back to the crowd. "All non-combatants and children will go to the nursery immediately."

He stood back away from the door to let them pass, but grabbed one of the women by the arm. She quaked with terror despite her height advantage. Uchida said, "Give the children treats and have them sing songs or something."

The woman nodded quickly and all but ran away when Uchida released her. Stanley ran his tongue over loosened teeth and looked ironically at Major Uchida. They waited until the crowd had moved into the nursery, by which time soldiers had begun emerging from the access ladder to clear this deck as well. Stanley trooped into the elevator ahead of the the major, and again the honor guard ate up the space.

"Bridge," Major Uchida said.

The turbolift obediently began to move.


----


Major Kazuo Uchida walked onto the apparent bridge of the Jutland behind Lieutenant Commander Stanley, quickly assessing the room. It looked like some kind of ergonomically designed entertainment center, built around a single large flatscreen at the front of the room. The floor was red carpet, the console a calm beige, and everywhere was a pronounced lack of any hard angles. It was also quite spacious. Aboard the Hiei the bridge crew was packed into a small room near the center of the ship, just barely large enough to be comfortable. This ship struck him as incredibly wasteful of space from the moment he exited the docking bay, corridors with a meter of headspace and room to walk three men abreast, deck after deck of personal cabins.

One of the consoles had apparently exploded. Odd.

He examined the personnel last. There was at least one woman off against the wall, dressed in their strange uniforms, like a cross between pajamas and a bellhop's outfit. The most standout figure was definitely the man in red who stood at the center of the bridge, fully two meters tall with a crisply cut head of blond hair just slightly marred by a bandage on his forehead. Thanks to his starving youth as a cadet the Imperial Marines academy, Kazuo was only 165 centimeters tall. Of course, this man looked soft, and it would be hard to say whose adolescent diet had better served him.

"I'm Captain Putzkammer, and you must be Major Uchida. Ah... welcome aboard," the man said, extending a massive hand towards Uchida.

Uchida had been given to understand that occidentals shook hands in preference to bowing; because the Jutland and her crew had surrendered ignominiously Putzkammer was scarcely worthy of such a greeting. The major turned away from the man without responding.

"Inform Admiral Yamashita that we have secured the vessel," he ordered his second-in-command, Captain Aida. Then he reached up to the place near his jawline where the helmet's seal met the neck of the pressure suit and trigger the release. The heads-up-display in the lenses winked off and the helmet hissed with pressure release, and then he was holding it lightly in one hand. It felt good to have a little space around one's head.

Putzkammer looked down warily at the major. With the helmet off he was at least assured of the other man's humanity, which had most definitely been unclear before. Of course, humanity had it's degrees. Uchida had the typical features of the Asian man with the addition of an age-faded scar running from his earlobe all the way along his left jawline. As for his age, if their geriatrics were anything like the Federation's, he would have been somewhere between thirty-five and forty-five. There was a leanness to his features, in the way one thought of a wolf as being lean.

And then there the darkening bruise on Lieutenant Commander Stanley's jaw, and the hint of blood at the corner of his mouth. Someone had struck him, and Captain Putzkammer could guess who. If that was the way their officers behaved, this was going to be a difficult process.

Uchida looked at the helm console for a long time, then spoke, "You have suffered damage here?"

"Yes," Putzkammer replied tonelessly, "when you fired on us, the plasma conduits in the helm console were damaged. My pilot was burned rather badly."

"Plasma conduits in the console?" Kazuo asked, "surely you joke."

Putzkammer shook his head with slight confusion, "No. How else would we power them?"

Major Uchida looked at him a long time, then snorted and allowed his eyes to continue roving the bridge.

Captain Aida said in Japanese, "Major Uchida, Admiral Yamashita replies that he will be coming aboard this ship presently."

"Confirmed. I await him on the bridge," Kazuo replied.

"The Admiral is coming aboard?" Putzkammer asked.

Uchida narrowed his eyes at the other man. "Yes. You speak Japanese?"

"Ah, no. We have universal translators incorporated into our communicator badges," Putzkammer expounded, "which interface with the ship's computer in order to make use of its exhaustive catalogue of human and alien languages. In case of a true first contact situation the computer can interpret and translate a wholly undiscovered language in a matter of minutes using its advanced--"

Kazuo interrupted him. "Are you trying to explain yourself, or to compell me to purchase your device?"

Putzkammer gave a confused little cough. "To explain it."

"Then be silent. You had finished explaining it with your first eight words, the remainder of your speech was dross. Give me your communicator." Kazuo extended one hand.

Putzkammer hesitated. "But--"

"Now."

The captain reluctantly took his comm badge and dropped it into Major Uchida's hand. The Japanese officer formed a fist around it, and without any warning aimed a strong uppercut into the pit of Putzkammer's stomach. The big man doubled over and dropped to his knees, gasping for breath.

"As a prisoner of war you must comply immediately to orders in the same obedient and unquestioning manner as a dog, or you will be punished in the same manner as an unruly cur. Do you understand?" Kazuo growled. Putzkammer did not--could not--respond immediately.

Uchida took a step closer to the prostrate captain. "I will strike you again if you do not answer me."

Putzkammer nodded and wheezed, "I understand. I understand."

"Good." Uchida opened his hand and looked down at the communicator badge. It would be something good for the technicians aboard the Hiei to examine, though he did not hold out much hope for it's usefulness.

Nearer the door Stanley rubbed at the corner of his mouth where his flesh had been torn earlier. Observing it this time from outside the violence, he could not help but note the dispassionate manner with which Uchida had delivered the punch. There was no emotion in it, just a precise movement to create the desired effect. Putzkammer might as well have not even been there, for all it affected Uchida to have knocked the captain breathless to the deck in front of his crew. Lieutenant Commander Stanley had never really liked his commanding officer, but it still rankled to have a Starfleet officer humiliated like that.

[GeneralTacticus]

Nice One question: was this bit supposed to cut off like that?

The ensemble was topped by a helmet that hugged the head tightly and hid the eyes behind two large, dark lenses, the jawline sprouting an air-filtering snout that reminded the lieutenant commander of illustrations from his history classes. They looked, in short, even more inhuman and mechanical then Borg drones. Their weapons were harsh amalgams of blocky mechanical parts

[Pablo Sanchez]

Nice One question: was this bit supposed to cut off like that?

Curses. I was in the process of writing that bit down when I copied and pasted it in. It should be fixed now.

[GeneralTacticus]

Nice One question: was this bit supposed to cut off like that?

Curses. I was in the process of writing that bit down when I copied and pasted it in. It should be fixed now.

Thanks, now that bit makes slightly more sense.

[Col. Crackpot]

Well, you've got my attention!

one nitpick though, i don't think even the most docile of Fed Captains would give up his ship that easily. But hey, I wan't to see where you are going with this.

[Crazedwraith]

Slight nit pick in this bit...

"Ah, no. We have universal translators incorporated into our communicator badges," Putzkammer expounded,

"Then be silent. You had finished explaining it with your first eight words,

I bolded the first eight words and personally i dont think they explain that much.

Otherwise very good.

[Pablo Sanchez]

I bolded the first eight words and personally i dont think they explain that much.

My main concern in writing dialogue is making it realistic, and part of that is imprecision. Do you think that Uchida, as a character, would have actually counted out exactly how many words Putzkammer said? I don't. He just said it.

[Crazedwraith]

I bolded the first eight words and personally i dont think they explain that much.

My main concern in writing dialogue is making it realistic, and part of that is imprecision. Do you think that Uchida, as a character, would have actually counted out exactly how many words Putzkammer said? I don't.

Neither do I but I wouldn't then use an excat number, I would say "in your first sentence" or "with your first half-doozen words." Not a precise figure.

[Pablo Sanchez]

Neither do I but I wouldn't then use an excat number, I would say "in your first sentence" or "with your first half-doozen words." Not a precise figure.

"First sentence" would be even more semantically incorrect (his statement had three sentences, the first sentence being "Ah, no." and the rest being everything else) and moreover you're not thinking of it as you should, as a conversation. When you're hearing a person talk, it's a little difficult to divide stuff up into clear sentences. And "half-dozen" is a precise figure, exactly six; furthermore it is idiomatic to English and a non-native speaker would probably not be familiar with it; and it is clumsier than using a number. I used eight because it was approximately correct, and I don't see why you're getting so worked up over something so totally irrelevent.

To be honest, I didn't expect anyone to actually go back and count out the words in the sentence, I just thought it was about eight words and would be good enough. But I guess one can never account for the consumer; after all, don't we put instruction labels on boxes of toothpicks?

[Crazedwraith]

I'm not getting worked up about it I'm just nitpicking endless. And alsoo a sentence has to include a verb so "ahh no" wouldn't count.

[darthdavid]

Great. Write more at the first opportunity.

[Kuja]

Me likes, Pablo.

[Pablo Sanchez]

Anabasis
Chapter Three
Mistaken Identity


Admiral Yamashita retired to his cabin while his shuttle was prepared for the trip over to the Jutland. It was standard naval practice to drain the Hiei's small craft of fuel before battle to prevent sympathetic explosions, and it was also standard naval practice never to launch a shuttle without a full load of fuel; it would be a good few minutes before everything was ready. For Yamashita to be impatient at this minor delay would be hypocritical, as he had been a member of the board which the admiralty had charged with updating the naval regulations. Anyway, he wasn't the sort to get impatient and couldn't actually recall a time when he had been. His philosophy was that time could only be wasted if one allowed it to be so; he decided to have a bit of a wash in the few moments that he had.

He wrapped a towel around his neck to shield his uniform and bent over the sink, splashing cascades of cold water onto his face. He rubbed synthetic naval soap, with its reeking disinfectant, between his hands until it had worked up a fine lather, and he put that on his face and rinsed it off as well. And with that, he felt like a new man. Yamashita sometimes marvelled at the ability of simple hygeine to refresh one after even the greatest exertions. Until this brief break, he had been on the bridge for about fifteen hours straight, had not slept in thirty-one hours. Before the mysterious event that had transported his task force across hundreds of light years he had supervised a raid on the Neues München naval yards and commanded the subsequent pursuit battle against the US-German fleet that had tried to defend the yards, but had been put the flight instead.

He would have run them down, as well, if he had had the time, but he had been interrupted by a wormhole or some other spatial anomaly. Known space was full of such things, but he had never heard of one with such proportions as to transport an entire battlegroup.

Yamashita stood at the mirror above the sink, pulling the towel from his throat and drying his face and hair. Then he hummed a tune to himself as he brushed the stray hairs of his mustache back into place.

A voice with a light American accent came from the other room, "What tuneless warbling Japanese song might that be?"

The admiral straightened and stopped humming. "A song my wife taught me, years ago. It's about fish," he said.

"You are an exceedingly strange man," the voice said, "I don't know why I bother with you."

Yamashita ran one hand over his close cropped hair and scratched at the back of his head before stepping into his cabin proper. "Neither do I," he replied, "but I should have known, Q."

The man was reclining on Yamashita's bed, one eyebrow raised at him. He was wearing a queer sort of uniform, black pants and a shirt that was also black but for the top quarter of it, which was red. There was some sort of lavender turtleneck under that. It looked almost like a suit of pajamas converted into a naval uniform, but Yamashita supposed it meshed well with Q's general style, which was odd. The tall being with his curly hair and round occidental eyes was always playing dressup. The first time he had mocked Yamashita with his presence, he had been wearing a full set of ancient samurai regalia.

"Indeed, you should have, Ichiro-chan. And I think you did," Q said, sitting up and turning to let his legs hang over the edge of the bed, "but I wonder you didn't just tell your crew precisely what--or rather who--had happened."

Yamashita ignored the being's insulting use of the diminutive form in addressing him. "I should tell my crew that they had been snatched into another dimension by a nearly omnipotent being?"

Q's eyebrows shot up, "Only 'nearly onmipotent?' I'm hurt by your lack of confidence. Anyway, your men have great faith in you, no doubt they would believe whatever you told them. You _are_ Admiral Ichiro Yamashita, the victor of a hundred battles, after all."

"The ability to do something without repercussion is not reason to do that thing," Ichiro said.

"Ah, an unsubtle barb. Need I remind you that you are a cockroach compared to me, and I could easily make you into one simply for the purpose of stomping on you?" Q asked.

Yamashita shook his head, "No, I recall the many times that you have said that, I need not be reminded. But of course you have a continued interest in my activities, else you would not be harassing me and transporting my fleet about as you have, so I doubt that you will carry through your threat at this juncture. Now, what is it you want?"

"Hmph," the being grunted, "you're being very rude today. You haven't even asked me about my new clothes."

There was a long pause before Yamashita took a deep breath and spoke, deadpan, "There is no doubt a story associated with your current ensemble. Would you please regale me with it?"

Q smirked. "Have I told you that you're an exceedingly strange man? All the things you've done, and still you putter about your bathroom humming children's songs, and then you mock a godlike being repeatedly out of mere petulence. You're right, I simply couldn't turn you into a cockroach and stamp you out. You're too interesting to destroy."

Yamashita said, "I have tried in previous meetings to persuade you to convert to Zen--"

Q rolled his eyes.

Yamashita continued, "--and you have proven resistant, even though it is that very philosophy which gives me the power you find so interesting, that of finding perfection no matter where I find myself. But no matter. The story of your clothing, please."

"Ah, yes. You said earlier that I was harassing you, but it's an unwarranted assumption to say that it's all about you this time. No, I'm testing a larger group this time," Q explained, "and this happens to be the uniform of those poor fellows whose ship you largely destroyed. Your guess was good, you are in a parallel dimension. I've been cultivating you and these people both, for a long time, and I'm taking the opportunity to throw you into collision and see what happens."

"When you've seen it, please be so good as to tell me what happened."

"Don't you want to ask me how you're going to get home?" Q asked with another smirk.

Yamashita picked up his cap from his desk. He said, "No. For all your vast intelligence, or perhaps because of it, you are a predictable creature. You are teasing me. Now I must go to the shuttle. Poof, disappear, and return to mock me later."

"Hmph," Q grunted again, "you silly insect. Look at me, brain the size of a planet and I'm wasting time on a mean-spirited cicada."

"If I am so beastly and you are so omnipotent, then create yourself another diversion." Yamashita put his cap on.

The Q disappeared in a flash of white light, and Ichiro walked out his door, bound for his shuttle.


----


The woman from the side console had risen to offer Captain Putzkammer aid and consolation after his brief beating, and now the two of them were standing against the wall near her console, murmuring softly in English. Perhaps that was her purpose, Major Uchida thought, a sort of camp follower offering comfort to the crew. Putzkammer himself appeared to be in some stage of shock, as if he hadn't expected to be struck. How odd. When one dishonored himself by surrendering, he could expect punishment. The Germans had always understood that, the Americans to a lesser extent. Perhaps these people came from a nation of soft-skinned cowards. Uchida frowned at the thought. The essence of the warrior was his ability to annihilate himself, to erase all that was extraneous leaving only his spirit of battle, so that he could make the right decision instantly and without hesitation, even if the right decision was death.

If Uchida was to fight these whelps, the battles would probably be far too easy and he would be unable to achieve that level of commitment. Like most samurai, he never felt himself except in the depths of a pitched battle. He ran his thumb along the line of his facial scar. Years ago, when he had been nothing but a twenty year old raw second lieutenant learning the trade as a supernumerary to a marine platoon, he had participated in an assault against a German moonbase. The 112th and 204th Imperial Marine divisions against the 25th SS, a battle in perfect vacuum, silent but for the chatter over the helmet radios. That had been a battle. His platoon pouring through the cracked hull, watching as the cracked hull of the base poured oxygen into open space.

One of those hulking genetically engineered ubermenschen had slammed the butt of a rifle into the side of Uchida's face, cracking the helmet and driving a sharp edge of metal into his jaw as his rifle tumbled away. Uchida had ignored the hiss of escaping oxygen and fought through the yawning blackness of the concussion and drawn his combat knife, reaching up to the tall German's throat and stabbing through the armored synthetic fiber at the SS man's throat just before he lost consciousness, almost certainly to die of hypoxia as his helmet leaked out. But he had been lucky, his own blood had flash frozen on contact with the vacuum and formed a primitive but airtight seal around the breach, and he made it out alive. Unlike his enemy.

That had been a high point. He had felt immortality in the realization of his own imminent death and his own cool acceptance of it; the sensation of everything he had ever been being reduced to one stab of his knife. But these people were unlikely to supply him with such a catharsis.

He watched the lieutenant commander that had welcomed him aboard the ship walk over to speak with Putzkammer. No. They were not sufficient to his pride.


----


"He's been staring at me for an uncomfortably long time," Ensign Pauley whispered, glancing up at Major Uchida as Stanley stopped next to them.

Stanley shrugged, "Just don't make eye contact. And stop whispering, it attracts attention. Just talk quietly, sotto voice."

"What are you, playing the spy now?" Pauley asked sarcastically, though still following his instruction.

"Maybe," Stanley said, "but in any case it's a good idea to be cautious. That Major is not a man to trifle with."

Putzkammer, stooping next to the wall, licked his lips nervously. "That Admiral will be coming over soon. I think he'll be easier to deal with."

"We can only hope," Stanley said, "but you're doing alright?"

"Yes, I'm fine," Putzkammer said, "but... you were right, Commander. When you said we shouldn't have surrendered."

"I'm not sure we had much other choice," Stanley said tonelessly.

The captain shook his head, "I misread the situation. I should have done _something_ instead of just rolling over for them. But..."

He trailed off. Ensign Pauley asked, "But what?"

"When French said that they were communicating in Japanese, that they were humans, I thought... maybe it had just been a misunderstanding. I've always believed in the the human race as a team, I guess. I mean, there hasn't been a war between humans for centuries. I guess I couldn't believe they had actually meant to attack us," Putzkammer said lamely.

"It's alright, sir, you had no way of knowing," Pauley comforted him.

Idiot, Stanley thought. It was people like him that had dragged the Federation down for centuries. Humans were pack predators by nature, it was just that they had found external threats grave enough to force them to redefine the dimensions of their pack. These new enemies had come from no place anyone had ever heard of, and it was unsafe and stupid to assume that an unknown quantity would behave the way one wanted them to.

"The naval command is going to take notice when we don't make rendezvous at Wertham V tomorrow," Stanley murmured.

"That's good," Pauley replied. When neither man replied, she asked, "Isn't it?"

"Not exactly," Captain Putzkammer explained, "they'd have no idea what they were up against. Standard procedure is to investigate incidents like this with one Galaxy class or equivalent, and after that maybe a task force of five to ten ships at most. This so-called Imperial Japanese Navy would eat them alive. If they knew that there was a battle fleet sitting here, they might be able to round up fifty ships by stripping the surrounding sectors. But they don't know, so we're on a time limit. If my guess is right we've got less than thirty hours to either send a warning out or convince these people to do this peacefully."

Pauley paled, "I had no idea we were spread so thin."

"Believe it," Lieutenant Commander Stanley said, "we're still recovering from the Dominion War, and we will be for a good decade. Too many ships, too many men lost. If these people aren't limited to just the twenty ships we've seen, the Federation might be in serious trouble. We need a quick response or--"

The Japanese soldier nearest the door shouted something in his own language, and all of the soldiers straightened, followed by the bridge crew. Putzkammer followed suit, looking around nervously. His translator had been confiscated.

"What happened?" he whispered.

Stanley leaned over and whispered back, "'Admiral on deck.'"

A group of Japanese men in dark blue uniforms much like those seen in historical documentaries of surface navies walked through the main doors, one of them carrying some sort of suitcase. Four of them surrounded one with a substantially more impressive set of decorations on his uniform, probably the Admiral that Putzkammer had spoken with over the comm. The naval officers were a few centimeters taller than the soldiers on average, and the apparent Admiral himself was a slim man of about 175 centimeters. His hair was close cropped and just beginning to go to gray, and he wore a well-groomed mustache on his upper lip.


----


"Your report, Major Uchida," Admiral Yamashita demanded.

Uchida snapped a salute at full attention. "Sir. The ship is secured. The remainder of the prisoners are under guard in the mess and nursery, and the bridge crew is here."

"Nursery?" Yamashita asked.

Uchida nodded sharply, "There are a number of civilians among the prisoners taken, including children. They are evidently the families of the crew."

"How odd," the admiral replied, then he spoke in English to the crew of the Jutland, "Which of you is the navigator?"

Captain Putzkammer spoke up, "Our pilot was injured when you fired on us."

"Ah. You are Captain Putzkammer, yes?" Yamashita looked over at him, "Lieutenant Takashi will need to retrieve information from your computers. Star maps, especially. We would prefer it if you made this process easy by offering your assistance."

Putzkammer straightened, "We're under no obligation to do that. We've surrendered, not agreed to become your allies."

Major Uchida took a step forward and growled, "Didn't I teach you earlier? You cannot speak to the Admiral like that!"

"Please, Major Uchida," Yamashita said, laying a hand on the marine's shoulder to calm him, "he has refused to help willingly. No doubt he believes he would be doing his nation a disservice by revealing his maps to us."

The admiral stared directly into Putzkammer's eyes and continued, "But there will be opportunity to convince him otherwise. Lieutenant Takashi will make do on his own for the moment. Do you have a ready room adjoining this bridge, Captain Putzkammer?"

"Yes," the captain replied, "it's just a bit down the hall."

"We will go there, then. Major Uchida, you will remain here." Yamashita turned on his heel and marched out the door, followed by two of the other naval officers. The officer with the briefcase opened it, revealing that it was actually a large portable computer, and seated himself at the science station.

A pair of soldiers seized Putzkammer by the arms and pulled him towards the door as well. It looked somewhat comic, the tall captain being led around by men who came up only to the region around his armpits. But Putzkammer felt their iron grip, and whatever there size he was sure these men were far more dangerous than he. He allowed himself to be dragged along to the ready room.

When he entered, Yamashita had already seated himself in the chair at the head of the table that Putzkammer had normally occupied as captain, flanked on right and left by his two officers. The soldiers pushed him into the seat at the foot of the table, and took up similar positions around him. Two more marines stood immediately behind him. Yamashita took off his cap and set it on the table in front of him.

"You said in your transmission that your name is Leopold Putzkammer," the admiral asked, "this is a German name?"

"Yes, my name is Leopold Joseph Putzkammer, but I'm actually Austrian, from Innsbruck in the Tirol," Putzkammer replied.

"Innsbruck? That city was destroyed by nuclear attack in 2190."

"That would have been news to me. I grew up there, and it's 2380 right now," Leopold replied.

"Indeed, this is most strange," Yamashita said. "I would suppose that Berlin, Munich, Hamburg, Frankfurt... those cities are also intact? And there remain German people living on Earth?"

Putzkammer nodded, "Yes, of course."

"Not 'of course,'" the admiral replied, "not in this case. Evidently your version of the Earth does not coincide with mine. Germany-on-Earth was entirely destroyed by nuclear weapons and ethnic revolt in the War of 2190, all that remains are their space colonies."

"That... that never happened," Putzkammer said.

"Not to you. I believe that our task force fell into a wormhole, and that it has transported us into an entirely different dimension from our home," Yamashita said.

The other men in the room, Putzkammer thought, seemed remarkably calm at this announcement.

Ichiro continued, "Please. Explain to me the status of Earth as you know it."

Leopold leaned back. "Well--" he said, then he proceeded into a brief description of human history since first contact with the Vulcans. Through the entire truncated lesson, Yamashita stroked his mustache thoughtfully. When Putzkammer had finally run down and finished, the admiral considered it silently for a few moments.

"So, you are saying that the entire human race is under a single unified government?" Yamashita asked.

Putzkammer considered going into an explanation of independent former colonies and the Maquis, but he decided against it. "More or less."

Ichiro grunted thoughtfully, "And how did you achieve the agreement of the Third Reich and the Empire of Japan to this scheme?"

"Well, there wasn't any Third Reich or Empire of Japan. Not after 1945, anyway."

"You no doubt have a history in your ship's library, Lieutenant Takashi will be instructed to retrieve it. But there are more pressing matters than ancient history. Am I to understand that the Romulan and Klingon Empires are still extant?"

"Why, yes. Don't you have them in your, ah... _universe_?"

The admiral shook his head, "Effectively, the whole of the Beta Quadrant is under the rule of his Majesty the Emperor and has been so since 2230."

"You conquered the Romulans and Klingons?" Putzkammer asked incredulously.

"More or less. In fact, it was my ancestor Montaro Yamashita who commanded the invasion of Qo'Nos," Yamashita replied, "but we are now on your border with the Romulans and Klingons?"

"Uh, yes."

"It would then be reasonable to infer that you were patrolling this border." The admiral frowned in disapproval. "When are you expected to next report in?"

Putzkammer said nothing.

"A pity. You had been most talkative," Ichiro said with a sigh. "I find torture distasteful, but it is sometimes necessary. Sergeant Kanagashi, on your right, is most experienced, and given time he could use artful measures to force your tongue. But we may be short of time, and finesse is a luxury."

Yamashita said something in Japanese, in the very same tone of voice in which he had carried the entire previous conversation. The two marines behind Putzkammer grabbed his arms and pinned them to the table.

Yamashita continued calmly, "If you refuse to answer my question, Sergeant Kanagashi will cut off your small finger. A second refusal will cost you your thumb."

"What?" the other asked incredulously. Putzkammer's eyes widened as he looked down at his hand.

The sergeant still seated at his right drew a wicked-looking knife from a sheath on his vest webbing, and he took hold of Leopold's right hand. He carefully separated the pinkie finger from the others and laid the blade at the first knuckle. Leopold felt himself breaking out in a cold sweat, and he looked up at the sergeant. Aside from Major Uchida, none of the soldiers had removed their helmets, so the captain found himself looking into inhuman lenses instead of eyes, his own dim reflection staring back at him in fear.

"Wait!" he tried to jerk his arms free, but he might as well have been trying to break through steel manacles. Even if the marines were thirty centimeters shorter than him, they were more than strong enough to hold him down. All he succeeded in doing was jerking his arms a few centimeters in either direction, and the combat knife slid slightly against his finger. It cut a few millimeters into his flesh and drew a tiny drop of blood. It was evidently razor sharp.

Yamashita said, "Do not struggle. I have no wish to mutilate you needlessly. Only answer my questions truthfully, and you will not be harmed. Now, when are you expected to report?"

Putzkammer took a few gasping breaths and stared at the knife.

"You refuse? Sergeant Kanagashi, you may--"

"About thirty hours from now," Putzkammer interrupted quickly.

"'About'?" Ichiro asked doubtfully, "I would have preferred an exact answer. But that will do well enough."

He said something further in Japanese, and the soldiers released him and reassumed their former positions. Leopold wiped sweat from his forehead.

"I'm glad that we understand eachother," Admiral Yamashita said.

Putzkammer gulped and exhaled a quavering breath.

[frigidmagi]

That Captain is a complete jackass. If Starfleet was a half way decent military group, he'll be court marshaled.

[phongn]

Hrm. Does the USA own the Alpha Quadrant, then?

[frigidmagi]

Sounds like we might be sharing it with the Nazis.