The Voice of Rage and Ruin - Part 2

Posted on Wed Apr 8th, 2020 @ 7:56pm by Captain Abigail Laurens & Lieutenant Farizah Alani

Mission: Dead Moon
Location: Observation Lounge

“Out of your hands? Don’t be so foolish…” Lockwood really started to lose control as he felt the situation had certainly spiraled. His voice was raised again as his gaze turned fiery. “We're in the business of doing what we’re told Abigail. That is a responsibility of every Starfleet officer. Follow orders. Do what must be done for the greater good. Do our duty. Do you think you have some moral authority to dictate to command what is right and what is wrong? Get the hell off your soapbox. You have no moral authority here. You’re human, you are flawed, just like the rest of us. In this situation you’re blinded by your conscious, you can’t see past your own nose; but, I’m telling you, no I’m warning YOU… If you want to continue serving aboard this ship, continue to do good out there amongst the stars you need to reel this shitshow back in. Don’t ever question my orders!”

He shook his head before he continued, “I don’t know what has your back up anyway, it is a bloody Ts'usugi vessel, you have no duty to them. Starfleet has the tentative alliance with them, not you! You’re a damn CO, you don’t hold an alliance with anyone, you serve Starfleet, you don’t make this decision!! Your duty is to give the ship to Starfleet and hope they will respectfully honour the wishes of their tentative ally. I know you’re worried they will exploit the technology of a reclusive species; but, you must have faith in command. There is nothing sinister going on here! DO NOT not jump down some rabbit hole like a conspiracy theorist lunatic.” Spit flew from his lips as he pushed against the table and drilled the last few words into her ears with malice.

"Trust you?" Abigail near exploded at the thought. "Why the hell should I trust you? If you wanted me to trust you then you should have been honest with me in the first place! You lied to me and you used me to try and get your hands on a ship that you have NO RIGHT to claim! You sent me to find the damn ship! I found the damn ship! It is NOT YOUR DAMN SHIP!" Abigail's voice rose in anger, colour rising in her cheeks as she reacted. "I am a Starfleet Officer and I have an obligation to behave morally and ethically at all times. YOU might have forgotten that, Admiral, but I have not. I cannot and I will not, in good conscience, stand by and let you steal from an ally!"

“So you’re going to piss away your career just like that huh?” He huffed, “I had higher expectations for your Abigail. I thought we would both be serving Starfleet long into our Twilight years. My hair peppered more with grey…” He firmly placed both fists on the table as a calmness washed over him once again, his tone civil at least, “There is no alternative here. I am leaving here with that damn ship, your conscience be damned. Unlike you, I don’t try to find the wolf in the forest, I just do what must be done.” He shrugged now, “So, I guess the only question now is… What am I going to do with you?” He reached up to tap his COMM badge.

"If you had any intention of being honest or respecting the Ts'usugi you would have backed down immediately when I told you what that ship was," Abigail said, her voice growing colder. "The fact that you didn't tell me everything I needed to know. You lied to me, and you set me up in the process. You of ALL people would have to have known that I would not have handed it over demurely and gone on my merry little way."

As he started to speak she held up her hand and cut him off. "You want to punish me for not handing over the ship? Fine, once the ship is safely back in Ts'usugi hands, I will willingly accept my punishment. If that means I'm removed from Command and stripped of my rank, so be it. At least I'll be able to sleep at night, knowing I did the right thing. I'm not the same person I used to be James, I grew up and I grew a conscience. I also got smart. And before you respond, you should know, my Chief of Security has been monitoring and recording this entire exchange." She took a step sideways and indicated toward the console embedded in the wall panel that tied into the communication system.

Lockwood looked toward the panel and saw the deception unfold. “Do you know what a pain in the ass you are? You think rules don’t apply because you disagree with them. Well rules do apply to you and you’ll answer for your choices here today and for your insubordination.” His fingers finally tapped his COMM badge, “Lockwood to Sanguine, destroy the alien vessel!” His face turned cold, “I did misjudge you Abigail, now can I give you some advice? Do not make the same mistake I did. Tell your crewmen to get off that ship, do not have their blood on their hands. If I can’t get the ship, I’ll be damned if I’m going to let you sleep a little better at night. So what’s it going to be?” Lockwood’s vesseled readied their weapon systems. “They are under order, one minute delay… act quickly… bring your people home!”

Abigail stared at him, a disbelieving expression on her face. "Even if I wanted to help you at this point, I can't. I don't know who they are. I have no way to contact them, I have no way to force them to lower their shields."

"Bridge to Captain Laurens, Ma'am we have the Ts'usugi vessel on approach. You asked to be notified when they arrived."

There was an inaudible sigh of relief from Abigail at the sound of Rogers' voice. "Thank you Lieutenant, I'm on my way," she replied. "Please have a member of security come to the observation lounge to escort Admiral Lockwood and his people back to the transporter room. Their time here has unfortunately come to an end."

"Copy that."

Abigail turned toward Lockwood, shaking her head slightly. "I can't believe that even you would have the gall to kill innocent people in order to punish me," she said quietly. "My Chief of Security is on her way. She'll escort you back to the transporter room and give you a PaDD containing the surveillance records of this meeting. They are already being scrubbed from our databases. Now get off my damn ship."

“Are you serious? We have to do this the hard way?” He growled at the thought of his ploy not working, “I had hoped you would lower the ship’s shields so we could beam off the device. It seems we will proceed with plan C. Hopefully no one gets hurt...” He turned toward the observation window and watched his ship fire upon the alien vessel. The shaken ship took a hit but had minor damage due to a targeted fire.” He tapped his COMM badge again, “Is it done? Do you have it?”

“Aye,” a firm voice replied.

“Good! No one was hurt?” Lockwood asked.

“I don’t see how Admiral, the hit was very calculated, their shield matrix was not in a sensitive area,” the male voice replied.

The Admiral walked around the table even closer to her now, “You see… I am like a child. I wanted the whole cake; but, all I got was a piece.” He grinned now and tapped his gut, “Probably for the best… Hard on a man’s waistline…” He shrugged, “I guess that’s it now… Game over. Tell your COMM’s officer not to bother with that voice recording after all…”

The vulcan woman and male tellarite appeared in the doorway, “No… all that was recorded was a lovely version of Blue Skies… Your officer will realize the voice recording of the Admiral will corrupt and fragment in a matter of seconds…” reported the tellarite.

A song started to blast out over the ship’s COMM:

Never saw the sun shining so bright
Never saw things going so right
Noticing the days hurrying by
When you're in love…

“Well done Gral, good job,” Lockwood nodded. “You see my companions have been busy abord your ship. Gral is something of a technical wizard, and the vulcan, well, I’m sure T’Prinn didn’t have too much trouble remotely accessing your external scanning records of the alien ship. She provided us with the data, so we knew right where to target to lower the Ts'usugi ship’s shields, making the transport possible. Hell, I didn’t want anyone to get hurt you know? No…” He lowered his lips close to her ear, his hot breath crept down her neck. “We’ll hold off on that court martial for now Abigail. I don’t want to bench you yet… See you soon…” And with that the three of them vanished into a transporter beam. The USS Sanguine exited the field at high warp.

Abigail sank down in the nearest chair as they disappeared. She could feel her heart thundering in her chest, the sound of blood rushing through her body was drowning out her ears. It felt like a small eternity had passed before the doors to the Observation lounge swished open and the welcome sight of the Bolian Chief of Security made her presence known.

"Are you alright Captain?' Farizah asked quietly.

Looking up, Abigail nodded quickly. "Just tell me it worked," she said, unable to hide the slight tremble in her voice.

Walking across to the communications console, Farizah reached up and plucked a small disk from the wall, tossing it in her hand and offering a smile. "Like a charm, Captain. You were right. We have the whole thing backed up to a data PaDD. Every word, every threat, every action, right down to his staff admitting they sabotaged our ship and Admiral Lockwood himself issuing the order to fire on the ally ship."

There was a deep exhalation from Abigail as she closed her eyes for a moment, the corners of her mouth turning up in the slightest hint of a smile. "Thank you Lieutenant, I owe you one. I need to get up to the bridge... but before I go..." Abigail's smile became a grin. Admiral Lockwood was about to learn a very important lesson. If you play with fire, you get burned.

You may owe more than one after this thought the Bolian. Farizah would remember it too. "Before you go what, Captain? What's on your mind?" asked Lieutenant Farizah Alani. There truly was hardly anything that Farizah would not do, and if under the Captain's orders those few things that she would not shrank significantly.

Moments later, having relayed her request to Farizah, Abigail walked out of the observation lounge, destined for the bridge, silently hoping it wasn't too late to salvage this situation.