Reflection

Another day, another salvage run. The Troll had been contracted to help with the dismantling of a Genesis-class research station that had had one too many close encounters with asteroids. Our capacious cargo bay was full to the brim with valuable salvage, and we were off to Starbase XI to turn it in for some hard-earned credits. Captain Ryan was behind me in his command chair, snoring lightly. First Officer Smith was next to me at our shared console, poking at her screen. Probably playing Tetris or something. I was screening the Tom Cruise classic film Labyrinth. The Troll was cruising along at Warp 3, which was pretty close to our top speed and definitely the maximum speed our new engineer, Bob, was comfortable with.

“You know there’s a big ion storm ahead,” Smith said. Not Tetris, then. She generally handled the helm while I handled navigation, although we could swap anytime we wanted.

“Um, sure,” I said. “Right here,” I said, tapping my screen and flipping Labyrinth into the background. “I saw it.”

She sighed. “Just plot a course around it.”

“It’s not all that severe,” I said. “And we’re in warp. It’s big, though. At this range I’m probably going to still skim the edge of it.” I was already poking the controls to modify the ship’s course. “Go ahead and execute.”

She reviewed the new course. “Should be fine,” she said, engaging the new heading. “Engineering,” she said, opening a channel to Bob back in the Engineering hull, “might want to lock it down for a few minutes. We’re going to skim the edge of a fairly big cloud of ionized particles in a few minutes.”

“Copy,” same the terse reply. Bob, thank the heavens, wasn’t much of a conversationalist.

The minutes ticked down until we entered the edge of the particle field. The ship shuddered slightly as our warp field interacted with the charged particles. It was all basically smooth sailing until we hit a more densely packed section, causing the ship to buck hard.

“What the hell?” Ryan said, coming out of his light nap.

“Ions,” I said. “Not bad, though. We’re clear of the field. Should be fine.”

“Yeah, let’s run a long-range scan just to make sure we don’t hit any more unexpected pockets like that one,” Smith said.

“Scanning,” I replied. “Um, there’s a ship ahead, but it looks like we’re otherwise clear.”

“A ship?” Ryan asked.

“Yeah, she’s in warp, moving just a tick slower than us. Looks like a Starfleet cruiser from the basic signature.”

“Huh. Any idea which one?”

“No,” I said slowly. “It’s vaguely Miranda class, but… thing is, it’s not an exact match for the computer’s records. The basic configuration is right, but we don’t have a profile that matches the specific details. And… Captain, I think they’re pulling alongside.”

“What?” Ryan asked, leaning forward in his chair.

“Don’s right,” Smith confirmed, staring at her console. “They’re deliberately allowing us to catch up, and they’re maneuvering as if they’re trying to pull alongside.”

“You can’t pull alongside in warp,” Ryan said. “I thought the warp fields would bounce off each other or something.”

“Hardly,” I said. “There’d be some bad interactions, but they can keep pace with us so long as they keep their distance.”

“They’re not,” Shandra said, alarmed. She slapped the ship wide emergency channel into life. “Brace yourselves!”

The Starfleet ship had dropped back rapidly, pulling to what must have been within a hair’s breadth of our own warp field. The Troll shuddered mightily, and alarms were blaring from every console on the bridge. I reached over to drop us out of warp – a maneuver that wasn’t completely safe, in that situation, but that would at least get us down to relativistic speeds. I never had the chance. The other ship did something, and we both dropped out of warp immediately. More than out of warp: we essentially came a complete standstill in a single second. Troll’s inertial dampers overloaded with the unexpected shift, and we were all thrown forward. Ryan, who rarely fastened the seatbelt on his jury-rigged command chair, flew into the back of my chair. I was too busy trying to regain my breath after my own restraint dug into my diaphragm.

“Jesus,” Ryan moaned from the deck. At least he was alive. “You guys okay?”

“Yeah,” Smith groaned. “Engineering?” she said. The ship wide comm must have still been open, but there was no reply. “Bob?” Nothing. “Shit.”

“He may just have had the wind knocked out of him,” Ryan said. I nodded, still dealing with that same sensation.

“Unidentified vessel!” The speakers on the bridge blasted out a hail that I hadn’t even keyed to accept. “This is the ISS Reliant. Identify yourselves and prepare to be boarded for inspection.”

I turned and glanced at Shandra. We’d both caught the ISS. Starfleet ships were USS.

“This is the salvage ship SS Icelandic Troll,” Ryan called out. “Captain Buzz Ryan. What the hell did you do to us? Who’s your captain?”

Our forward viewscreen activated, delivering a video feed from the Reliant. Her captain was in standard Starfleet command gold, but it was… well, a custom shirt design, I suppose you’d call it. It sported a deep V-neck, a sash around the waist, and lacked sleeves. At his left hip was a Type-II phaser, and at his right was a dagger. Neither were customary accouterments for a Starfleet captain on the bridge of his own ship. “Silence!” he barked. “You will answer questions, not ask them. Prepare to be boarded.”

No sooner had the words left his mouth than the distinctive sound of a transporter chimed across our bridge. No fewer than four security officers beamed aboard. They wore normal-looking Starfleet shirts, in red of course, but sported gold waist sashes. They had Type-II phasers raised and pointed at us. Their insignia were unusual: I was accustomed to Starfleet crew wearing insignia distinct to their ship, but this one was an Earth-like globe pierced vertically by a long sword. It was a little more… military than I’d seen before.

“Do not move!” one of them ordered. “You are being taken into custody. Surrender all weapons immediately.”

“We’re not armed,” Ryan said. “We’re civilians. And we may have an injured–”

“Your fourth crew member is dead,” he said. He glanced at one of his compatriots. “How is it that you are not armed?” he asked. All four were eyeing us up, but our utilitarian coveralls didn’t leave a lot of places to hide weapons.

“As I said,” Ryan repeated, raising his hands slightly, “we’re civilians.”

“Impossible,” the man retorted. “There are no civilian ships in the Empire.” The other three men were moving toward us, each one positioning themselves next to one of us. “Reliant! Six to beam over!”

“Empire?” I started to ask, before I was swept up in the tingling, there-yet-not-there sensation of the transporter beam.

Several minutes later, we were aboard Reliant. We’d been “escorted” to their brig facility, and were each in our own individual, uncomfortably cozy niches behind force fields. The ship’s captain stood before us, accompanied by two security officers and a blue-garbed medical officer holding a tricorder. “Our records match your ship with the ISS Icelandic Troll,” the captain said, emphasizing the I, “an Imperial salvage ship under the command of one Jonathan Ryan of Earth.”

“That’s me!” Buzz said. I groaned internally. The medical officer stepped forward and gave Ryan a once-over with his tricorder. He showed the device’s screen to the captain.

“Yes, a genetic scan confirms your identity,” the captain said. “But our scans of your ship show its markings as SS Icelandic Troll, and show an installation of unauthorized military-grade equipment including heavy shields. Do you deny these facts?”

Buzz caught on and said nothing.

“I see. So you have renounced the Terran Empire, stolen Imperial property, and are conducting yourself as a rebel, no doubt in league with the so-called Reformist movement led by former Imperial Commander Spock.” He paused. “Take him to the agony booth.”

The two security officers stepped toward Buzz’ cell.

Several hours passed. Shandra and I weren’t left alone, but we at least weren’t hauled off to ‘agony booths,’ whatever those were. We were instead subjected to a simple interrogation by one of the ship’s security officers. They confirmed our names, and confirmed Shandra’s identity by means of a genetic scan. Turns out that their Smith–because we were very obviously in some kind of screwed-up alternate universe–was serving on the ISS Powhatan under the command of her mother. Like I said, screwed up. My own genetic scan… well.

“Your records match nothing in the Terran Empire’s fleet or citizen databases,” I was informed by the medical officer.

“I get that a lot,” I replied.

“You are demonstrably human,” he said, “and there have been no reports of rebel outposts in any timeframe corresponding with your age. The only possible conclusion is that you have tampered with Imperial databases, which is high treason and punishable by death.”

“Whoa!” I said, raising my hands. “Slow down. No, there’s a perfectly good explanation, and it has absolutely nothing to do with high treason.”

“And that is?” he prompted.

“Um. Genetic experiments modified my genome,” I said. “And it’s not in your database because it’s all classified way above your pay grade.” One of those things was definitely true, at least back in my own universe, and I hoped it’d help sell the other one.

The medic raised an eyebrow and stared at his tricorder. “Hmm,” was all he said. He glanced at the security officer. They looked at each other for a moment, and then turned and left the room. Shandra and I were alone in our separate cells.

“Genetic experiments?” she said.

“I just told you it’s classified,” I said. No way was this room not being monitored right now. “And besides, I–” I stopped as the doors swished open, and Buzz came back in. He was between two security officers, who each had hold of one of his arms. As they drug him, obviously, because he was passed out. They tossed him back in a cell, activated its force field, and walked back out without saying a word.

“Do you still know how to operate a transporter?” I asked Shandra.

“Yeah, why?”

“I feel that they’re probably already transmitting a message to the Powhatan, and they’re going to realize that you’re not the you they think you are.”

“You’re probably right.”

“Then they’re probably going to track down the ISS Troll and figure out that Buzz isn’t who they think he is.”

“Yeah.”

“So we should probably leave before then and the transporter seems like the easiest way.”

“You’re forgetting,” she said, “that we’re stuck inside force field detention cells.”

“I didn’t,” I said, “but I absolutely do not want to discuss this, not even later. Not ever.”

“Discuss what?” she asked.

I stuck my arm into my cell’s force field, which promptly stuttered and died. “That,” I said. I walked out and stuck my arm into hers, and then Buzz’, and they both promptly shut down.

“How the hell–”

“No. No discussions. Help me carry him, he weighs a ton.”

He had very little time, but fortunately their detention room was a short ways away from their transporter room. We paused outside the door, and I muttered, “you owe me a tooth, too.”

“What?”

There was no time to answer as the door swished open. There were two crewmembers in the room: a red-shirt security officer and a duty officer behind the transporter console. I’d suspected as much. The security officer started to draw his phaser, but I ground down on a molar and spat in the man’s face; he went down immediately. Shandra threw some of her mad judo moves on the duty officer, and he crumped into a wall and slid to the floor, unconscious.

We hauled Buzz into the roomWe drug Buzz onto a transporter pad, and beamed ourselves back to the Troll’s bridge.

“There’s no way they didn’t notice all that,” I said. I quickly opened the Troll’s salvage bay doors and deactivated the tractor/pressor net that held our salvage in place.

“Then what the hell are you doing?” she asked, slipping into her seat and leaving Buzz lying on the deck.

“Just warm up the warp drive and plot us a course back to that ion field,” I said. “Backwards.” The ship’s inertial dampers could be deactivated within the salvage bay, and I did so. I then goosed us backwards slightly on impulse, causing the salvage to spread out in front of us. The Reliant was already pivoting slightly, probably to bring her phasers to bear on us.

“I’ve got a plot,” Shandra said. “We’re not supposed to do this with the bay doors open,” she noted. Whatever. That’s why we carried insurance.

“Stand by on the shields,” I said. She moved back into Buzz’ command chair, which was within reach of the jury-rigged shield controls he’d bolted to the wall years ago.

I was busy pivoting the Troll. We didn’t have proper weapons-grade phasers, but we had something better, in this case: a powerful short-range phaser array designed to help carve up debris so it could fit into the salvage bay. “When I say ‘now,’” I said, “hit the shields, then hit the warp drives. Whatever you think they’ll tolerate.” The leading edge of Reliant’s warp nacelles were right at the range of our phaser array, but it close enough was good enough. I fired. “Now!”

Reliant obviously didn’t consider us to be enough of a threat to raise shields, and so we inflicted a good bit of damage on both nacelles. Hopefully enough to keep them from following us too quickly. We leapt into warp. “We need to make sure we hit that same rough patch at the edge of the ion field,” I said.

“Yeah, I figured that’s what you meant. I got it,” she said.

“Ow,” came a ragged voice from the deck.

“Stay down, Buzz,” Shandra ordered. I could feel the Troll shimmying; she’d run us up to the old warp engines’ maximum. “Approaching the ion field.” We fastened our restraints.

I had a moment to worry that we weren’t duplicating our prior circumstances very well, since we were at a much higher velocity, when we hit the denser patch of ionized gas. The ship lurched, and Buzz came off the deck and then slammed right back into it. “Ow,” he repeated.

“Are we home?” Shandra asked.

“I’ve no idea,” I said, poring over my console’s readings. “Wait–yes. Yes, I’m getting Starfleet background traffic. I’m yelling for help. Wait a couple more light-years and drop us out of warp.”

Our extremely urgent and profanity-laden distress call was, ironically, answered by the USS Powhatan. I have never used the zoom function on the viewer more aggressively to verify that U on her hull. We’d been debriefed quite thoroughly by the ship’s captain, who shared nothing but gave us the distinct impression that the alternate Terran Empire universe wasn’t completely unknown to Starfleet.

“We’ll get warning buoys by that ion storm immediately,” the captain assured us. “And I don’t have to remind you again, do I, that this is all highly classified? You’re not to speak of it to anyone?”

“No, Mom,” Shandra said, “you don’t have to.”

“All right. You kids take care, then.” She closed the channel.

“Ow,” Buzz groaned under his breath. He’d been sitting in his command chair rubbing his head the entire time. Our automated medi-bay had declared him fit for service, but warned that he’d likely be in some pain for a few days. He’d declined its offer of analgesics and was instead nursing an enormous mug of hot tea.

“You okay?” Shandra asked.

“No,” he said. “Yes. I will be. That agony booth thing was well-named. How did you guys bust out of those cells, though?” I’d delicately avoided specifics with the Powhatan’s captain, kind of implying we’d been the beneficiaries of careless guards.

“We don’t discuss that,” I said. “Not ever. And you owe me a tooth.” I rubbed my tongue over the gap in my molars.

“I don’t think we can buy SFMC tooth capsules,” Shandra said.

I sighed. “I know a guy. Frankly, he could also get us some proper phasers, and I’m starting to think it’d be worth it.”

“Oh good,” Buzz said. “We can bolt those controls to the other wall,” he added, gesturing to the side of the bridge opposite his jury-rigged shield controls. “The lack of symmetry in here has always bothered me.”

Labyrinth hadn’t turned out to be as good as I’d remembered. I cued up Endless Love, which was definitely worse.