Riders of the Storm

Posted on Thu Mar 23rd, 2017 @ 9:43pm by Lieutenant Commander Ziyal Tajor

Mission: All the Kings Men: Wargames
Location: USS Cosmos
Timeline: concurrent to "The Fifth Horsemen"

Previously, on the USS Victory:

Rogers stopped as his module flashed. He now had eight minutes to finish his orders.

"Rogers to Victory, we're a go for security, you should see the shields are now down, weapons should be offline - if you're pummeling of the ship didn't already take them out."

He sighed, as he glanced around at the two teams with him, not full teams because...there were dead and wounded. The weight of that pressed down on him, but he had to shunt it aside for the moment.

"You're good to go for part two, send Security over," Rogers said. "Engineering should still be secured, but uknown intel made things a bit more difficult than we expected. Tell them to watch their six and..." Rogers swallowed hard, still seeing Thane's body tumble down the shaft in front of him. "And tell them to be safe. We're in position to take the Bridge." He was sure that Cuprum read the short mission brief he's written and sent to him regarding his plans, so Cuprum should be aware their actual target was the battle bridge, not the main bridge.

Rogers felt that little bit of subterfuge and surprise would help them gain control of the ship much quicker and with less fighting.

"Roger that, Rogers. Proceed to capture points Charlie and Delta."

"Wilco, Captain," Rogers said as he saw five more biometrics go suddenly in the red at the same time that his wrist module flashed. Rogers looked at it and grinned. "Good, good," he said, realizing they must have created some kind of connection with Kawolski's wrist module. Fortunately, he sighed, Kawolski wasn't dead, but the readings indicated he wasn't conscious either.

Ziyal listened to the conversation intently, frowning slightly. They were nowhere near the bridge... That is when it hit her, they were going for the battle bridge, not the main bridge. She swore silently to herself, asking how she could have missed this. She had never visited the battle bridge, except on a tour when she first got on the ship.

Her hands sped over the PADD she held in her hands. She remembered some commtraffic she had intercepted early in the battle about the battle bridge. She had disregarded it at the time, assuming that it was the usual battle preparations. However, as she read over the terse messages. Reading them, she realized that they had switched the battle bridge from backup to duplex. It meant that Captain Reinhelt could be commanding from either and make it look like he was on the main bridge. However, with someone like Captain Reinhelt, it meant he was commanding from the Battle Bridge.

"Hold up Captain, now that I know we are going after the Bridge, I've looked over some of the transmission data. I think that Captain Reinhelt is on it." She said quickly. Working a plan in her mind.

"That means he is going to have it as protected as the main bridge would be. We're likely to lose some Marines going in. However, unlike the main bridge, the battle bridge is surrounded by other compartments. If we assault through a wall rather than the doors, we'll probably take fewer casualties." She said as she pulled up some schematics, highlighted what she meant, and showed them to Rogers.

"Wait, is he or isn't he on the main bridge?" Rogers asked as he glanced over the schematics she was showing him. She was right, there were some other ways in, if..."Anybody bring any explosives?" he asked. He sure as hell hadn't. "You, find out where the hell Reinhelt is. If he's there, on the battle bridge, then..." Rogers trailed off. Cuprum's response came back to him. Rogers was joking when he asked about casualties, of course, but...he said he could have as many casualties as Marines he lost. He's lost more than one and that's all the casualities he wanted right now. Not just for justice for the Marines that died on this op, but Reinhelt was a man that threatened to kill his own, as well as civilians, just to get the Marines to stand down. He didn't deserve to draw another breath in this galaxy when he'd kill so many to save his own ass.

"Tell me where he's at," Rogers said to Tajor as Sangar and T'pan were digging some shape charges out of their packs.

Ziyal worked through the data on her PADD, it was painfully lacking. If she was still in the computer core, she might have been able to tell. A moment later, she shook her head, "I can't be certain, he's got commbadges in both places and there are the right number of warm bodies in both places. However, Captain Reinhelt is a devious one, so I think he's here." She regretted for a moment she had not been able to fully win the Captain's confidence. There was a lot that she had still not been told about, like the phaser cannons in the turbolift shafts. It worried her that she was still missing something.

"We're going through the back wall here," Rogers said as he took the PaDD with the schematic, holding it so that others could see it as they crowded around. Most of them not even aware that they were crushing Tajor in the process. "Sangar, T'pan, you're on demo. You," Rogers said, grabbing Tajor and pulling her from the crush. "I don't know your name, but your ass is in the back, behind this wall of Marines. You're a priority package and the first opportunity you're getting back to home base for delivery to the Victory, with the memory modules. You try any more heroics that get my men killed and you'll regret it. I've got killing credits and I'm not afraid to spend them. Clear?"

Ziyal nodded, he blamed her for Thane's death. She could feel a sense of despair starting to well up inside her. She pushed it aside, there was a battle to be won. She kinda wanted to be in the back, she did not have any powered armor or a weapon. She could feel Modesitt, who had become her defecto minder now, moving with her.

Ziyal straightened up to her full five-foot height and looked Rogers in the eye. "I'm Liutentant Tajor, Captain. You do your job, I'll do mine." Being a Cardassian around and in Starfleet had never been easy. However, it had also instilled in her a sense of who she was and a steel to never show how intimidated she was by others. While he could feel that he intimidated her, he could also feel that steel and pride that would hold her up regardless.

"I don't care what your name is," Rogers said turning away and looking for the jeffries tube junction that was supposed to be at his feet. It was true, at the moment, he didn't care. Giving a person a name made them an actual person. There were too many dying already and he knew much more about them than just their names. They were his brothers, part of the only family he had and they were dying because...

He ripped off the cover plate and tossed it aside, much harsher than he intended. Then, crouching next to it, he ordered Sangar and T'Pan inside, waiting for them to indicate that things were ready. In the meantime he prepared two sonic grenades to pop through whatever hole they blasted into the battle bridge.

It didn't take long, just long enough for Rogers to go through his wrist module and check the status of several different items, before T'pan came back out of the hole. Sangar quickly followed, allowing three other to duck into it and make the slow crawl. The rest of the Marines followed suit, Sangar and T'pan going back in at the end.

Modesitt held Tajor back. "When the others are in, we can go," he said, watching his teammates disappear down that particular rabbit hole. "He's going to be sorry later, when things calm down. He's just...sometimes he gets intense. He gets to be so...Marine."

Ziyal nodded, understanding, but still feeling hurt by him brushing her off. "I've worked on a lot of plans, but few have had lives riding on them. Even then, I could count on others to catch my mistakes. Now, I'm close to the execution of one of them, and it feels wrong somehow that if I've miscalculated, that I probably won't be the one to pay for it."

Modesitt was enlisted, however, he had seen this before in other officers, usually Marines. So he said to her what he had heard said to them, "Maxim 70: Failure is not an option. It is mandatory. The option is whether or not to let failure be the last thing you do."

Waiting around the junction where they placed the charges, Roger, Dawsyn and the two others stood on either side, stacked up. Dawsyn had two shock grenades ready to pop. He nodded to Rogers, all of the Marines trying to be as quiet as they could be. It wouldn't do to ruin their element of surprise by being heard behind the thick bulkhead separating them from the battle bridge.

Rogers hesitated for only a moment. The rest of the Marines were fulfilling their goals, but it wasn't going without a cost. He received the reports from Delta and Beta that they breached the torpedo storage and placed the transporter discs. "Delta" was now heading back to Engineering, those wounded who were able carrying the Marines they lost in taking that section. Those who were still able reformed into "Beta" and were headed to the main bridge. Rogers wanted this over and the remainder of this ship's command team in custody before they got there. Hopefully that would put an end to it, but he was sure there would still be pockets of resistance. Essentially, then, it would be the 'mop up' operation at that point.

They had less than six minutes, at the minimum, to get all this done before they had warp core issues.

Finally, he nodded. Sangar hit the detonator and the deafening blast of the explosion resounded down the jeffries tube, the noise and shockwave physically painful. Shunting that aside, Rogers tossed his grenades into the room as Dawsyn did the same with his.

Four pops and a second later, two large Marines were kicking their way through the hole in the wall. They were screaming orders as they went. Rogers was right behind them.

--Battle Bridge--

Several shots were going off at once. Through the dust and smoke caused by the explosives and grenades, Rogers thought he saw a figure slip out the side and a door whoosh closed. But, being shot at grabbed his attention. He quickly fired back, stunning the attacker. Except there was...

Like a knife stuck into both temples at once. He could swear there was a low pitched whine and then...his head exploded. At least that what it felt like. A figure was rising from the captain's chair in the center.

"Reinhelt?" Rogers asked, wincing, his eyes tearing up from the pain in his head. He dropped his rifle to grab at his temples, vainly hoping to keep his head together. He'd felt something like this before, when he had to do psispike training but this was worse. Infinitely worse.

There were...voices. He heard them, that was the whine. They were growing louder and with it the pain.

"Afraid not, Rogers," the figure said. Between the pain, the tearing and the smoke, Rogers couldn't make him out. "Did you really think you'd outsmart us? Are you really so arrogant?" He pushed a button and Rogers screamed. It sounded as if it echoed, but then he realized it wasn't just him. As he dropped to his knees, Dawsyn was there next to him.

"You didn't think we had other tricks up our sleeve? For a Betazoid betraying the Federation to the Jennari?" He stepped aside. A half sphere glowed pink behind him. "It's amazing what can be done when a Ferengi thought maker is combined with a Romulan doctor's thought collector."

"Stop this," Rogers whined falling forward and to the floor.

"Stop it!" Sanger screamed as he fired at the pink sphere. His phaser blast was stopped by a force field.

"Yes, the collected thoughts of everyone who has died on this ship are now yours to enjoy," the man said. "But not for long. You see, Rogers and the rest of you apes, you talk about the glory of dying for the Corps, but I'm dying for the Federation."

He held up another button and managed to press it just before Sangar's pistol blew his hand apart. The bullet shattered the viewscreen behind them. "It's too bad," he said as an energy began circling the room, decreasing in circumference. T'pan, the closest to the wall screamed as the field caught him, tearing him apart. Another two followed, their screams drowning out even that of Roger's and Dawsyn.

--Corridor--
Modesitt looked down at Tajor. "Okay, we can start making the way there. I'm not happy being exposed out here. Stay behind me."

He almost froze, however, when the screams started. High pitched, horrible wails of pain and terror. Which seemed to come from more than one person.

Ziyal wanted to go to them. However, Modesitt stopped her with a hand. The screams were like nothing that she had heard before. Screams that told somewhere deep inside of her to run. Screams to haunt one's nightmares.

She forced herself into analysis mode. To detach herself from the situation and think. The screams were probably coming from the marines who had gone in. There had been a little weapon's fire. However, this was not the screams of wounded men, this sounded like the screams of the damned. It seemed unlikely that it was some normal kind of weapon that was causing this. She guessed that it was something inside of the room, but she couldn't guess what.

"Toss this into the room." She said, handing the tricorder linked to her PADD to Modesitt. He complied, tossing it like a grenade. Scanning the room, Ziyal saw what was causing the screaming, a baryon sweeper. It was a model designed to clean rooms, however, here it was killing the Marines with invisible beams of radiation. More slowly than a sweep that would be used to clean a ship, but killing them none the less. She sent the image to Rodgers, "Shoot this." She told him.

--Battle Bridge--

"Captain!" Sangar screamed, horrified not only that they were going to die as the sweep violently tore them apart, reducing their carbon substance to vaporized ash. But that he was watching another of his captain's dying in the same day. He turned to raise his pistol toward the thought maker. He heard them as well, the thoughts of those dying as they died. The horror of dying, the acceptance, the supreme confusion - not so many, but they were there, repeatedly in his head.

How much worse was this for the two telepaths with him?

The figure tried to step in the way of the thought maker. "Rogers won't even know he's dead, but he'll know about each one of you as you die," he said.

"And you, shithead," Sangar said. Three quick pops and two dark spots stained the man's uniform before the back of his head splattered brains, blood and bone against the shattered viewscreen. Sangar fired three more times, each one hitting the thought maker. The shield couldn't protect it as it exploded.

Rogers felt his head return. Not to normal, no, there was too much there. But the pressure was gone. The feeling like it exploded in glacial motion. But they were there. So many thoughts...stabbing into his memories. He rolled to his back, what he thought were tears leaking from his eyes. They were, but tinged with blood as well.

"Captain!" Sangar said, trying to pull him up and smacking him across the face at the same time. The Marines were crowding around, trying to stay away from the beam. The others, the ones they stunned on the battle bridge, were lucky in that when the beam tore them apart they weren't aware of it.

The Marines - warriors hardened to the idea of war and death and often the cause of both - were sickened as they watched their fate drawing closer to them.

--Corridor--

Ziyal saw that the emitter was not destoryed. Through the tricorder, she watched in horror as marines were swollowed by it. send it...a...gain... a tired, pained, worn out voice barely audible whispered directly into Tajor's mind. send...again... Ziyal's telepathic training told her when a telepath was trying to insert something into her mind. Even something as weak as what she heard. Most might dismiss it as being a weird thought, but she knew better. She sent the message again, this time to any Marine nearby. "Destroy this!" She shouted, She shoved the PADD at Modesitt, "Get in there and destroy it now!" She said urgently.

"You're with me, I ain't having Lieutenant rise from the grave to kick my ass cause I left you in the corridor to get killed," Modesitt said as he grabbed her arm and pulled her to the entrance to the jeffries tube. He all but shoved her down and into the crawlspace, following behind her to the large hole in the wall.

Dawsyn was trying to direct others were to fire, the image clearer in his mind and he being able to see the spot now. But, whatever that device did, with the echoes of the dead still ringing through his 'ears', he was finding it hard to concentrate enough. He knew what he needed to do, but it was also going to get his ass kicked later because of it.

"Captain," he said, without the strength to crawl, he reached out, through the Marines scrunched about all of them, and grabbed Roger's hand.

As bad as he felt, that contact let him know the device must have been aligned specifically for Betazoids. If they had as much information as they were bragging about having, it could have been programmed for Rogers specifically. Dawsyn wasn't sure what he was about to do would affect him, but he did it anyway.

He took away Roger's pain - all the echoes of the dead he was hearing still - took it all away and replaced it with a clear image. And the command shoot.

Without any further warning, Rogers sat bolt upright, raised the rifle to his shoulder and fired at the thing he was told to fire at. Though a shield crackled around it, he continued firing. Even as the beam came closer. Half of the man from the captain's chair was already gone, being eaten slowly away by the baryon sweep. The shield continued to crackle.

Rogers didn't even question it - at the moment he couldn't queston it - as a second beam joined his. Then others as the Marines in the room, desperately wanting to live, hit the same mark. The shield emitter burnt out and the baryon emitter exploded under the sudden energy beam onslaught.

Dawsyn's hand fell away and Rogers let out another scream, one not as painful as before, but it was still there.

"Alright," Modesitt said as he entered the room, holding his breath as he believed he would encounter the field - expecting to encounter it in fact. But, as he made his way to his brothers in arms, he gave a sigh of relieve that he was still alive and so were most of them. It pained him, though, to hear three of his brothers wouldn't ever go home and there wasn't even anything to send on the Last Patrol.

"Where's...where's the Carddie spook?" Rogers croaked as he tried to climb to his feet. It was a mark of how bad he was that he didn't even try to shove off the help he was given. His eyes fixed on Dawsyn, unconscious and bleeding from eyes, ears and nose. If Dawsyn were dead...Rogers didn't want to think about it. Couldn't...because there were too many other voices in his head to do it.

Ziyal stepped out from behind Modesitt, "I'm not a spook." She protested mildly. Her eyes taking in the scene that she had only glimpsed through the tricorder. She closed her mind completely to him, to anyone trying to feel her or even her emotions. She did not want him to taste her fear of Roger's wrath. If he wanted to kill her for this cluster, she would not give him the satisfaction of her fear.

"I don't care," Rogers said, a half scream. He winced hearing his own voice so out of control like that.

"Captain," Sangar said, trying to lead him to the captain's chair to sit.

Rogers wiped his face, wiped away the bloody tears, only to have more falling as fast as he wiped them away. He stabbed at the wrist module, the way a drunk man suffering dementia and some debiliting physical disorder might. "You're an officer, on this ship?" he said, his voice cracking on every other syllable. "Get control of this ship. They died," he said, and would have fallen if others were right next to him and grabbed him to prevent it from happening. "Don't let them die for nothing. We have to finish this mission. 'Fleet must know!"

Ziyal nodded, moving over to one of the few consoles that were not burnt out. "Plug the cores into those ports." She said, motioning to the console.

"Just...speak...your command codes," Rogers said as he stabbed at the wrist module again. "They've already given us backdoor access. Kawolski...he..." Rogers winced and shook his head, he couldn't say it. "It'll put you in charge. I could do it...but easier if you're already an officer on the ship."

"Just do it, Lieutenant," Modesitt said, standing next to her still. He had the look of someone trying not to look at a horrible sight, in this case it was Rogers still trying to hold his head together.

Ziyal looked over the console at what they were trying. She nodded silently as she understood the plan. "Lieutenant Ziyal Tajor, Command authorization code Omicron-Omicron-Alpha-Yellow-Daystar-Two-Seven."

"Command Succession Authorized." A computer voice said. "Lieutenant Tajor is now acting Captain of the Cosmos."

Ziyal thought for a moment, she was probably going to be acting captain for all of five minutes before she got orders from quite literally almost anyone. However, she had things to do. She checked something, then spoke clearly, "This is Lieutenant Tajor of the USS Cosmos to all nearby Starfleet ships. We are beginning a core dump of data stored on this ship by Captain Reinhelt and Admiral Gates. The information being transmitted will prove their traitorous intentions against the Federation. It also contains information about their current and future plans as well as potential conspirators still remaining within Starfleet. They attempted to wipe this information, but we had already retried the memory sections where it was stored. Core dump follows." Then she transmitted the message and the attached core dump.

She slumped ever so slightly, the information was away. It was too late, if something happened to her, then it didn't really matter as Starfleet had all of the information they needed, and probably more. She had accomplished what she had set out to do.

"Computer, recognize Rogers, Christian, Marine Company USS Victory. Give command access." Rogers leaned against the tactical station, trying not to wince as anybody spoke...or even thought too loudly.

"Captain Christian Rogers, Marine Company, USS Victory recognized. Command access authorized."

"Computer, locate Reinhelt."

"Commander Reinhelt is currently on the Captain's Yacht," the computer said.

"What the hell?" Rogers asked. "Computer, lock down that ship! Transport Reinhelt back to the battle bridge immediately!" Rogers stood, fury blocking out the after effects of whatever it was that thoughtmaker was doing to him. It also revived his lagging phsyical strength.

"Unable to comply with command, Captain's Yacht departing. Unable to comply with commnand, transporters offline."

"Lock phasers on the Yacht and fire," Rogers said, his anger growing.

"Unable to comply, ship weapons offline."

"Working on it," Sangar said at a control panel.

"Sir," Maximoff said, "the torpedoes?"

"What about them?" Rogers asked, smacking the tactical station as if that would restore weapons functionality that he took away!

"We have transporter discs on the torpedoes, we can transport them to where you'd like."

Rogers looked up, quickly calculating. Yes, yes! He didn't even have to precise, there were enough of them. He stabbed at the wrist module bringing up the transporter disc controls. "Give me coordinates on that yacht!" he ordered, knowing they'd take a few more seconds before going to warp.

Sangar yelled them out. Rogers inputted them, making sure to get it right the first time. There was no way in hell he was going to let Reinhelt get away, not after all this.

"Prepare for incoming," Maximoff yelled out, having edged Rogers away from the station. The ship rocked violently as the torpedoes transported into the near space around it began exploding. While it wasn't enough to cause major damage, the ship still was in the blast zone for many of them. System alerts began appearing.

"Sensors indicate the yacht took three direct hits," Maximoff said, stepping away from the tactical station. "It's been destroyed, Captain." Maximoff smiled as his gaze took in Tajor. "Sorry, Captain Rogers."

Rogers nodded as he turned and leaned against the counter, covering his face with one hand while rubbing his temple with the other. It felt like maybe the effects were slowly bleeding away, but it still left him with too much.

"Order the ship into lockdown," he said. "Inform the crew anyone not in their quarters will be dealt with as an enemy combatant. Revoke computer access to everyone except for Tajor and Victory crew." Rogers said, the main thrust was over, it was mop up now.

"I'm going to bet that Cuprum will want to talk to you at once. We'll get you to Engineering for processing, then over to the Victory."

Rogers winced again, a whole body shudder as a single thoughtform swum to the forefront of his consciousness. He didn't want to hear it right now, but it was because of the Cardassian officer. Thane's last thoughts just before he died. "Maximoff, your team take her and...make sure she gets off the ship safely."