That was when he started to remember the dream, more vivid and colourful than any he had witnessed before. It had lasted for a very long time, was it possible he had been asleep for several nights and living through this?
Trying to shove the thought aside and chalking it up as a strange experience, he unpacked the graphics card with a struggle and made his way over to the computer.
Only to find that he didn't really want to install it just yet, a feeling that shocked him to his very core considering just how long he had waited to see this beauty in action.
Instead he grabbed his keys from where they lay on the desk and let out a yell as a sharp object poked into his palm. Unclenching his fist, he looked down at the intruding object in disbelief.
Instead of the Eiffel tower and the Delta Flyer there was a strange miniature vessel that he couldn't remember from any episode of Star Trek, or Stargate, or any of the other Star-related shows he watched for that matter.
Attached to the vessel was a small note, he unrolled it carefully and read out loud the two words hastily scrawled upon it.
'Be prepared.'
It hadn't been a dream, he had been aboard this very ship, blazing his way through the galaxy and protecting Earth from what he had thought was an impending Voravian invasion fleet.
His crew were still out there, somewhere, and somehow they had managed to deliver this message to him. They were waiting, and glove or not, they acknowledged him as their Captain.
Staring back down at the graphics card and the debris that surrounded it, he suddenly found that installing it didn't seem that important at all. He needed to be prepared, his crew would come for him eventually, all he had to do was wait for them.
He looked out of his window and drank in the cool air, searching the night sky and counting the stars.
Chapter 31
Jam! Swashbuckling! Ejection!
Five months later, Trigger Hawkins was suffering from the severe case of deja vu.
Okay, so he hadn't been here precisely. It had been aboard the Scavanger he had found himself in the most precarious of situations, led by a bumbling overconfident buffoon in the command seat.
Well, at least that part hadn't changed.
'Fire the torpedoes!' came the familiar bluster of Captain Darwin, who now slouched in the command chair formerly occupied by the departed Phil Jones.
'Captain,' came a deeper and more sardonic voice, 'unlike the more spacious capital ships that you are accustomed to, we are not equipped with a generous supply of torpedoes.'
'What are you trying to say, Smith?'
Agent Smith let out an audible sigh, to Trigger it sounded long-suffering but to the best of his knowledge they had only been working together a few months.
'What I am trying to inform you of Captain is that we are out of torpedoes, there is nothing left to throw at them. Unless you'd like to venture near an airlock.'
Captain Darwin seemed to ignore that last remark, slamming his fist down upon the arm of his command chair and causing a series of startled beeps to emanate from it. 'Dammit Smith, that's not good enough! Lieutenant Annika, suggestions. Now!'
The flustered-looking woman turned in her chair and attacked a series of consoles with an increasingly frantic vigour. 'I see no trajectory or calculated simulation that could end in anything but our certain death, Captain.'
There was a silence after that sentence. For all the panic creeping into her voice, the Lieutenant was fiercely scientific with her projections, but where Trigger would usually find comfort in such rock-hard statistics he now discovered terror.
He felt a hand on his shoulder then, but it wasn't the sweaty clamp of his commanding officer. It was a firm grip but a friendly one, from his co-pilot and navigator RJ.
'Take it easy, Ensign. We'll get out of this jam yet, I have me a few tricks left.' the Texan informed him in his easy southern drawl. 'Just you be ready to react to anything I throw at you, you hear?'
'Yes sir.' Trigger replied, turning back to his controls and away from the stressful arguing of his superiors. He took a steadying breath, just like RJ had shown him, focusing instead upon the console in front of him.
'Same as before Ensign, I'll do the tricky stuff, you keep our hull integrity as close to standard norms as possible.'
It wasn't the first time that RJ had shown initiative, Trigger owed his life to his mentor on several occasions already by his counting. The man seemed to chafe under the command of Captain Darwin, and his ideas were often shot down or implemented too slowly for his liking. This had only furthered the rebellious streak in the pilot that Trigger was secretly jealous of.
The ship careened through space at an increased rate as RJ took control of their trajectory. Trigger's eyes flew across various holographic dials on the console in front of him, monitoring the levels and determining whether any of them were reaching critical. So far, so good.
'Cadet! What are you doing?' Darwin bellowed at him, causing him to near-flinch out of his seat.
'I'm not doing anything, sir.' Trigger answered truthfully, there hadn't been anything to do in light of RJ's exceptional piloting.
'RJ, stand down with the spacial acrobatics, we take evasive action on my orders alone!'
The pilot offered no response, continuing to immerse himself in the controls as flashes of Voravian weaponry streaked past them.
'This is your last warning, pilot. Stand down or I shall shoot you.'
Trigger looked back in disbelief at the Captain, who had raised a previously secreted gun and levelled it at RJ's head. 'You're going to shoot him?'
'Silence Cadet!' Darwin snarled, keeping the gun trained on RJ as if expecting the man to pounce back at him. 'Now do as you're told, pilot.'
'Captain.' Smith intoned, cutting into the tense pause in the conversation smoothly. 'It would seem from my calculations that currently our pilot's efforts are the sole thing keeping us alive. In short, Captain, it would be suicide to pull that trigger.'
The slightest hint of uncertainty flickered across Darwin's features and his gun wavered slightly.
Then a very odd thing happened.
'Captain Darwin, sir.' Annika chimed in. 'We're receiving a transmission from the Voravian vessel. They have listed terms for our surrender.'
'What are they, Lieutenant?' Smith asked swiftly, before Darwin could refuse the offer.
'The Voravians request that we hand over our Captain for punishment, but not execution. In exchange for this they will let us go freely.'
After the monumental cock-up that Darwin's diplomacy had represented, it was the best offer they could possibly hope for. He didn't wish the Captain ill, on the other hand he would much like to get out of this situation alive.
'Absolutely unacceptable terms!' Darwin predictably replied. 'They're awfully thin-skinned for such a savage race, these Voravians. My swashbuckling style may have trodden on a few toes, but ultimately that's what you need to do!'
Annika stared at him in barely-contained disbelief. 'Captain, you told the ambassador that you would much like to eat his first born child, and that his wife was as beautiful as a bowl of petunias.'
Darwin waved away the complaint. 'We all make mistakes, Lieutenant. Merely an error in translation, nothing to get angry over!'
'You shot their delegate.' Smith replied.
'An accidental discharge.'
Smith glared at him. 'Twice.'
'I wasn't counting.'
'In their face.' Annika supplied.
'They weren't any uglier for the impact, I was doing them a favour!'
The Commander groaned. 'It would appear that our options are either to hand the Captain over or be blown into space dust.'
Trigger watched on in fascination as the crew gave each other strange looks. Darwin had lowered the weapon in confusion at the unspoken conference he was being left out of.
'All those in favour of relinquishing our Captain of his command.'
'Aye.' RJ replied instantly, shooting his
hand up.
'Aye.' Annika supplied.
'Nay!' this came from Darwin, whose protestations were ignored as the rest of the crew turned to Trigger.
'The vote is two to one, Ensign. Are you going to take this to deadlock or side with us?'
Ensign Trigger Hawkins found himself sweating over the situation, uncertain of what to say or do. 'I respect Captain Darwin's achievements, I really do. His list of heroic feats are well worth considering in light of this latest scandal, and I truly believe that...'
'Aye or nay, Ensign.' Smith cut him off with finality. 'Choose now.'
His heart felt like a jackhammer pulsating in his chest, he rubbed his clammy hands together and completely forgot about monitoring the ship's integrity. He knew there was only one answer though, only one way out of this without them all being killed.
'Aye.' he almost whispered, though Smith clearly caught it and turned on Darwin, disarming the man with shocking ease.
'You will now be escorted to the ejection pods, Captain. We shall try our utmost to rescue you, of course.'
Trigger couldn't help but note the lack of sincerity in Smith's voice, he even caught the beginnings of a smirk as the security chief began to drag Darwin away.
'Wait!' Darwin shouted, his voice cracking into something resembling panic for the first time. 'I have an idea!'
'Oh no.' Smith purred. 'There will be no ideas from you, Captain. Not for us anyway, feel free to bounce them off the Voravians and see if they... bite.'
'Wait.' Annika said, rising from her seat and placing a hand upon Smith's arm.
The man shivered as if he had suddenly been doused in ice water, but refused to break his grip from Darwin. 'What is it, Lieutenant?'
'The Captain deserves to be heard out. If there's another way to deal with the Voravians that doesn't involve handing him over we should at least hear it.'
'She has a point, Stiff.' RJ added, waving at the viewer to indicate the distinct lack of fire from the Voravians as they waited for a response. 'May as well think this through before handing him over.'
'What is your plan, Captain?' the security officer practically snarled, clearly unhappy about being ganged up on by the other members of the crew.
'We send them a beacon, emitting my life signature. They won't be able to tell that it isn't me until we're long gone.'
Trigger blinked. When put under pressure, Darwin had actually come up with a reasonably sensible solution. He stared out of the viewer to make sure there were no pigs floating about outside.
'That's... actually not a bad idea, sir.' Annika said, voicing Trigger's own thoughts for him. 'We can make it back to Star Command and deal with the fallout there.'
'Much as I would like to believe you, Lieutenant...' Smith started, staring down at her hand until she removed it. 'I'm afraid that the Voravians are an unknown entity to us, we cannot risk the possibility of their discovering our bait before we jump into hyperwarp.'
Even Trigger thought that seemed a bit of a flim-flam excuse, and that Smith was just hoping to deliver Darwin into the hands of a potential enemy. Then again, he wasn't going to tell him that. No sir, he had enough excitement just staying alive without the likes of that scary man breathing down his neck.
There was a palpable tension as Annika and Smith glared daggers at each other. Trigger couldn't understand why, given that Smith outranked the Lieutenant and clearly wasn't going to take no for an answer.
RJ cleared his throat and swung his chair fully back to address the crew. 'Folks, as much as I don't care for our Captain, I think we need to try this decoy. Stiff says there's no way of knowing if they can tell or not, well I say let's take that gamble and get the hell out of here while we still can.'
'Very well then.' Smith finally acquiesced, relinquishing his grip on Darwin and affording the ruffled Captain time to lower himself back into his command chair. 'In light of Hanniman no longer being with us, I shall see to the probe, if you'd care to join me Lieutenant?'
'Certainly, Commander.' Annika replied, rising from her seat and following him into the depths of the ship.
RJ continued to stare at the Captain. 'That was some mighty fine quick thinking you did there, Darwin.'
'That's Captain Darwin to you!' the Captain snarled, gripping the arms of his chair and looking decidedly threatened by everything around him. Trigger had never seen this side of the Captain either, gone was the elaborate mask of bumbling heroism and in its place was a cornered animal.
'I'm still in command of this vessel and you had better acknowledge that from here until our returning to Star Command.'
RJ merely shrugged and turned his back on the man, eyeing Trigger instead with a wry smile on his face. 'Are you ready to depart, Ensign?'
'Ready when you are, sir.'
'RJ.'
'Right you are, sir.'
'As soon as the probe is launched, I'll signal to you so that we may ready departure.' RJ replied, once again completely ignoring the Captain. 'We want this hyperwarp jump to be as clean and quick as possible. You might as well start crunching numbers for our jump now.'
'Already doing so, sir.' Trigger replied, his hands dancing across the holographic terminal and calculating distances and speeds. He was tempted to look back and see what kind of face the Captain was pulling, but judging by the burning feeling on his neck he could tell without doing so.
They sat in uncomfortable silence for a time, or at least uncomfortable for Trigger to withstand. RJ had a strange look in his eyes to match the permanent grin etched upon his face. What was his superior thinking by being so defiant to the Captain now that he was remaining on board?
After what seemed an age, the deep and resonant drawl of Agent Smith came over the intercom. 'The probe has been correctly fitted to emit Darwin's life signs, this had better work.'
RJ nodded to Trigger, who was staring at the large Voravian ship that had popped up on their view screen now. 'When I give the mark, we leap into hyperwarp. No jumping the gun and rushing things now.'
'Rushing things?' Trigger quivered, trying his best to keep his hands away from his console. 'Why would I rush things?'
The pilot smiled at him from under his broad hat. 'You seem a bit nervous, Ensign. If anything goes wrong Stiff will give the signal to keep us from being blown to pieces.'
'The probe has been launched.' came Stiff... Smith's voice. 'Contact is imminent, prepare for the worst.'
'Aye sir.' RJ replied, showing a surprising amount of deference to Smith's rank for some reason.
They were left waiting in silence once again, Darwin hadn't said more than a few words since he had unceremoniously slumped into his chair.
'They appear to be moving into position to take the bait, hit impulse engines and we shall see if their disposition has improved any.'
RJ keyed in the ignition sequence and they coasted out of range of the Voravian ship's weapons. Ordinarily this would have brought a sigh of relief from Trigger Hawkins, unfortunately he found sighing rather difficult when holding his breath.
'No sign yet that they have detected the subterfuge.' Smith continued to speak over the intercom. 'Lieutenant, have you any communiques from the Voravian vessel with regards to our depature?'
'None as of yet, shall we proceed?'
'If they get any closer we won't have enough time to make a departure that seems anything less than hasty. Did you get that, RJ?'
'Yes commander, already on it.' RJ replied, and began initiating the jump to hyperwarp while turning to Trigger. 'Nice and easy now, everyone is friends here. Don't want them folks to get all startled and think we're high-tailing it now, do we?'
Trigger nodded, not entirely understanding what the man had just said, and together they let the ship course through into the reassuringly purple-blue haze of hyperwarp.
Agent Smith and Lieutenant Annika reappeared through the door and returned to their stations, neither of them sparing a look at Darwin. It was then that Trigger finally laid eyes upon the man.
>
He was sat bolt-upright in his seat, and his gaze would have set fire ants ablaze with its intensity. His hands gripped the arms of his chair like the talons of hawk, and there was something unnerving about the rigidity of his movement as he slowly raised himself and turned to face the returning Smith.
'Agent Smith.' Darwin growled between gritted teeth. 'I demand a word with you in my private quarters.'
Smith raised an eyebrow as if the Captain was a jelly sandwich that had just started singing an overture at him. His gaze latched on to that of his superior's and there was no beating his concealing shades in a staring contest.
'I believe that anything you say to me can be said in full view of the crew... Darwin.' he finally replied.
For the briefest of moments Trigger thought that the Captain was going to launch himself at his subordinate, instead he stood shaking with barely-suppressed rage.
'Well?' Smith quipped, the right hand corner of his mouth arching up into a cat-like smile. 'What is it you wish to say to me?'
'You are completely out of line, Agent Smith!' the Captain roared, causing Trigger to jump out of his seat. 'I have led this crew through the most delicate of diplomatic missions since the departure of your previous Captain and all I have been given is cold courtesy and insubordinate behaviour!'
'Begging your pardon now, Captain sir.' RJ interrupted before Smith could reply. 'Seems to me as our last Captain was unfairly terminated and you were entirely implicit in the whole shenanigans. Methinks that may be the reason you don't have the respect of your fellow crewman. That and the complete horse's ass you made of yourself when talking to the Voravians.'
He muttered the last bit, but it was enough to set Darwin off and spinning toward him. 'How dare you accuse me of sabotaging your Captain's position!' the man screamed, levelling his weapon at RJ's placid face.
The pilot seemed to stare at the gun for a time, as if it were an interesting sculpture in an art exhibit back on Earth.
'Are you going to shoot him, Darwin?' Smith intoned ominously. 'That would be a court-martial offence irrespective of your position of command.'
Darwin stared down at his shaking hand as if noticing it for the first time. 'You're all against me, all of you!' he said, then set his eyes upon Trigger Hawkins.
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