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Star Trek Athena: Stream Of Angels - crobato
:: 06/19/01 ::
Chapter 1
Voyager's return a few years ago brought a treasure load of new technologies to Starfleet. However, the implications of temporal contamination of some of these technologies caused Starfleet to evaluate and study these technologies in secret, raising a moral issue regarding their deployment or adoption to the rest of Starfleet. In any case it was thought better to have some of these technologies tested in the secrecy and isolation of Section units first.
Athena fiddled her new mobile emitter. She beamed and grinned every time she touched the device, a key that enabled her to spread her wings beyond the confines of her own ship. The ship was her own self, like her own body, but she could not help herself feel that she was trapped with it as well. The ship limited her range, and while it defined her purpose, it also restricted her range. She wanted to be free. While battles were always exciting and she would not deny her duty, she had always wished there was more to life than being just a deep space tactical combat warship. By most Federation starships were multipurpose explorers capable of undertaking military tasks; dedicated warships like herself, Steamrunners, Norways, Akiras and Defiants were a significant minority but a minority nonetheless. Of all the ships she could have turned into, why of all, a dedicated warship. Could she have been an explorer instead? Could she be free to undertake those legendary five year missions, discover new races and civilizations and go boldly where no man-and woman and hologram-even gone before?
Among the authorized shipyards, Tacitcus will build, test and deploy the new Delta Flyer class shuttles at the request of Admiral Paris in honor of his famous son, who returned from the Delta Quadrant aboard Voyager with a custom shuttle design. Whether it can replace the Venture class scout shuttles was another question. Depending on how the Starfleet wide test evaluation goes, the Delta Flyer class shuttles could be commissioned as a new shuttle class for the Starfleet, adding to a list of already redundant shuttle designs used by the Federation including the Type 9 and 11 shuttles. But the sleek Delta Flyers were not only fast and beautiful to handle, but they had great range for exploring. Their large capacity could hold a small squad of marines or an team of scientists depending on the occasion so there was a real benefit of its design in both exploration and military use. In times of trouble, their speed and agility, when supported with a good weapon package, the Delta Flyers could serve well as auxiliary fighters.
She had never been this far from her home ship, and it was exciting, thrilling even. Compared to her ship, the USS Athena, a Delta Flyer had far less mass, giving it a knife precision quick feel of handling she does not get her big overpowered ship. She flicked the ship, then gave it a roll, and then put it on a high G turn. She seemed convinced about the ship every passing minute and second. The best part about this seems to be the fact she's on another ship other than her own, and in control of it.
Garret's voice came through the comlink. "I hope you're enjoying this, Athena, because your joyride time is nearly over. The Admiral wants to talk something with you."
"Right O, Captain. Tell him he's got a nice ship here. Coming in, Athena out." She swung the ship over towards the shipyard. She saw her own home ship parked in the distance, and it was an odd feeling to see herself from this point of view. She felt some self admiration for herself-her own ship was beautiful in a highly predatory way, like a shark evoking its beauty in how its form fit its purpose, which was to prey.
The Flyer entered the shuttle bay on the shipyard. She gently landed the Flyer, then came out to greet Garret.
"You handled yourself well on that ship," Garret said.
"You can pass to the Admiral that the Flyer is a fine ship," Athena said. "We should build more of them to supplement the shuttle fleet."
"You can tell him yourself when you meet him." Garret said.
"Again?" Athena asked.
"Something has come up," Garret said. "I wonder what."
They met Hurst in his office. "Sorry to call you in again so soon, but I needed to confirm the project first before telling it to you. In any case, how did test flying our own Delta Flyer go?"
"She's quite nice, Admiral," Athena said. "You should build more of them, in my frank opinion."
"I will take account your glowing report, Athena," Hurst said. "But in any case something new has come up. Consider it part of the package that brought you this mobile emitter. When Voyager returned to Earth, she brought a treasure load of technologies with her. Some of those technologies were questionable violations of the Temporal Directive, such as the Transphasic torpedoes, and must be quarantined from further use until their appropriate time is reached. This has caused some delay in the study and deployment of these technologies, until it is deemed proper to experiment or deploy them. Some of these technologies were brought to Section for evaluation, such as the mobile emitter you have on, Athena. But we doubt we'll be using mobile emitters widely, until we can fully evaluate its consequences with our EMH population. Other than the one the former Voyager EMH has, yours is the only other copy, given that you Athena, is a very special case."
"Secrecy is the Section's main asset. It allows us to comfortably test and evaluate technologies that may have a questionable impact on the outside universe if it was known. Within the Section, we can study these technologies without worrying about its social consequences to the rest of the Galaxy," Hurst said.
He pointed to a view screen in his room, which just lit up, showing a Miranda IV class tug towing what seemed to be a small ship.
"During her travels in the Delta Quadrant, Voyager encountered what originally seemed to be a Federation ship, the USS Dauntless. The ship turned out to be a phony, but what isn't a phony was the quantum slipstream drive the ship has. Voyager copied the technology, then used it for a short ride, before it was deemed unstable for sustained long term use. She didn't have the technological resources to perfect the technology, but we do. Voyager has now given us this technology and it is our task to take it further. Our goal is to go beyond what our warp engines could do," Hurst said.
"But don't we have the Transwarp Gate?" Garret asked.
"The Gate creates a transwarp conduit between two gates, which is also in effect, a wormhole conduit. The Gate allows vessels without transwarp engines to move through this conduit. But it requires both a transmitter and a receiving gate." Hurst said. "In other words, it means vessels can only move between these two gates, but not anywhere else. Travel is only localized near and around the Gates. The equivalent of it is a city subway. You can only move within set points or stations."
"Transwarp and slipstream are two technologies with a similar principle-they create a subspace tunnel or conduit where normal space time does not apply." Hurst explained. "If the technology is moved into the ship itself, the ship can create this conduit at will, at any point in space and arrive to any point in space. It is total freedom and the key to total exploration of the Galaxy itself."
"Now we are close to making our own real slipstream Dauntless, or really, just half of it," Hurst said. "That ship the Miranda tug is towing about is really a vector ship, one half of a complete ship, a module. The other half of the module is you, Athena."
"Me?" Athena asked.
"Yes, you. You will disengage your engineering hull, and then combine your main hull to the vector ship, which will act as a new engineering hull. This hull contains two warp nacelles with slipstream coils, a new navigational deflector and a slipstream field initiator. Other than that it looks like your standard hull and fits like one. Your modular design makes such experimentation perfect. Your hull geometry and structural strength are the best thing we got that can withstand best the structural stresses caused by quantum slipstream travel," Hurst said.
"Although the crew of Voyager did not suffer any ill effects from their short use of the slipstream drive, there is insufficient data to render a conclusive observation about its effects on human health. Thus, Athena, you will be alone in their test journey. You will not have any human occupant. The only thing biological you will carry are human, animal and plant cell samples. We will also monitor the condition of your gel packs, although we do not expect any damage on such, given the experience from Voyager."
"This is not a military mission, but as technology test mission, it bears its own set of risks. Are you up to it Athena?" Hurst asked. "You have been asking if you can undertake anything other than a military type mission, am I right?"
"If there is any risk to Athena, then I should go. She's my ship," Garret said.
"It does not hold as much risk to Athena as it does to humans," Hurst said. "Are you up to it, Athena?"
'I'm ready for anything and for any change," Athena said.
"Before I won't trust you to go alone on any mission without human occupants and countermeasures," Hurst said. "Now I feel confident that you can undertake missions on your own. Captain Garret and I will still monitor you from a chase ship. You will have access to cameras from the chase ships, so you could see yourself from the outside."
"I want to prove that I can do things alone if I have to," Athena said.
"Very well," Hurst said. "This is a picture of your new slipstream vector hull."
It was unlike her vector hull. Two huge nacelles joined in the main hull, slightly slung downwards. Each pylons were much thicker and heavily reinforced. There were gill like slits across the nacelles for the slipstream coils. Instead of a round red deflector, there was a blue grilled one, streamlined to face the stresses of the slipstream.
"It does not have any weapons so you have your firepower cut in half. In case you have to run into trouble, you only have the armaments in your main hull, but we do not expect that you will get into such problems like armed conflict," Hurst said. "But in case if you do, your primary hull recently seen a minor upgrade to Type XII phasers."
"And here is the course," Hurst said. The path appeared to take all the way to the edge of the Alpha-Gamma quadrant border, then back, a course that would take several weeks to accomplish using ordinary warp speeds. But here, it's expected to be done in an hour.
'Not a problem," Athena said.
"Don't say that. It's bad luck," Garret said.
* * *
Athena sat alone in the Captain's throne. Every biological soul had moved out of the ship. It all seemed strangely quiet except for the flicker of the displays in the consoles. The beige warm bridge was big and spacious for a sing person. She moved up to the helm console instead.
Two chase ships have settled into position. Garret and Hurst moved to the Aegis class Intrepid variant USS Kiev which will act as the first chase ship. The Spearhead class Nova variant USS Magellan will be the second. A Miranda IV class tug tractored the slipstream hull to its position.
"Disengaging engineering hull," she announced. The chase ships could clearly hear her words. The engineering hull dropped off from the main section. The main hull moved slowly over the slipstream hull then locked into position.
"I am now engaging the slipstream hull," she announced. The main hull slowly lowered itself over the new engineering hull. There was a solid thud where contact was made and clamps activated.
"How does it feel, Athena?" Garret asked across the comlink.
"Like tight pants, new, very fit, very tight, makes you a bit conscious," Athena said.
"Funny, when did you ever wear tight pants?" Garret asked.
"Never, just imagining it how it would be," Athena answered.
"Athena, the biological samples are already in the engineering hull," Hurst said through the comlink. "When you're ready, prepare to go up slowly."
"Aye, aye, Admiral," she answered.
She accessed the chase ship cameras to check on her external view. Hmm not bad. Nice figure, nice butt.
"Powering up impulse engines, I'm going to begin my run soon now," she said. There was the note of a slowly ascending hum from busy impulse engines each at the rear side of her main hull. Unlike other ships, the Prometheus class gives off a white light off from its impulse engine outlet and the white glow was visible from the chase cameras.
The note of the impulse engine hum was higher now. "Beginning warp, engage!" she announced. The Athena streaked into the stars. Less than a second later, the chase ships engaged warp in formation after her.
"Warp 5...6...7..." She said. There was a momentary vibration in the hull, but it was quickly over. No harm done. Diagnostics were telling her there was nothing wrong. She should take a note of it if there was something wrong with the stress harmonics of the secondary hull structure.
"8...9..9.2...9.3...9.4...9.5..." Athena said.
"You got pretty fast acceleration there," Garret said. The Kiev and the Magellan were struggling to keep up.
"The engines are pretty smooth and strong. I detected some vibration there a while ago, but it does not seem serious....I 'm going faster now..." Athena reported.
"9.6...9.7...9.8....9.9...9.91...9.92...9.93..." Athena watched her cameras as the Magellan began to show a bit stress and started to fall behind. The Kiev was barely keeping up.
"...9.94...9.95...9.96...9.97..." At this point, the Kiev began to fall behind. There was again a small vibration but it disappeared. For a hull prototype, this must be going very well, with no problems so far, Athena thought. She better slow down a bit to let the chase ships catch up.
"I am going to engage slipstream drive...better be ready guys...I will either rock or be toast..." Athena announced.
"Ready, get set, engaging slipstream...whopee!" She shouted.
The blue slipstream generators below her hull began to hum. A side screen began to show in skeletal diagram form, a slipstream bubble beginning to form around the ship. When a desired value was reached, the slipstream coils took over with a new hum of their own. Beyond the bubble, a tunnel began to form through the space time continuum, its representation in a skeletal frame rotating in the side screen.
Then suddenly all manner of normal time and stellar cartography disappeared.
Things began to fly past in a glass smooth manner. Nebulas and stars whizzed by, hundreds of them in mere seconds, like the ship plunging into an endless tunnel of infinite speed. The chase ships were all gone. A tunnel of bluish and greenish had consumed her. Star systems and nebulas whizzed by in mere seconds.
"I have entered slipstream space, now," she said to her log. "There are stresses against the hull, but the ship is maintaining structural integrity."
This surreal plane of existence. Is this Heaven?
Time and space has no meaning; the Athena hurtling across the conduit with no resistance, no turbulence, just an eerie non stop smoothness.
But even in heaven, there was trouble. In the angry swirl of bluish and greenish clouds, lightning flashed. What, electromagnetic arcs in this ethereal realm? It could be manifestations of energy forces that needs further analysis to be understood. A storm raged ahead. The Athena buckled, her smooth cruise jarred with unexpected strong ripples and waves. If there was trouble, she better enter it into her log. "Athena's Log...."
"It has been smooth sailing so far but I have encountered unexplained turbulence in the slipstream region. Cause unknown. I am putting scans now..."
"This is very hard to believe, but scans detected ships ahead in the slipstream. I am not aware of any other race that may have slipstream or transwarp technology. Scans indicate that the ships are not Borg. Wait....scans indicate massive energy discharges. I could swear they're engaged in combat but in the slipstream plane? Going into red alert, diverting some energy to shields."
She couldn't concentrate on the log anymore. The turbulence rocked the ship with increasing violence. This may have a unforeseen consequences effects against the slipstream conduit and the bubble created by the ship.
The source of the turbulence loomed closer, and then the source fell into visual range. It was definitely an alien ship, brown, bug like and gritty, something she could not identify. It was huge, by some other warlike alien standards, a battleship or a dreadnaught. It's main hull was a massive arrowhead, much like her own ship or the Dauntless, its back curved to give it a giant roach like look. Warp nacelles with slipstream coils protruded underneath it like legs of a giant beast. Scans showed that the ship's slipstream conduit had been compromised, and the only thing holding it together was the field bubble around it.
Something fired at it. Ships that were even much larger, all with triangular, spearhead or arrowhead hulls, with nacelles or engines protruding from the back or below. The combination of the unusual geometry and the short tentacle like engines gave the ships the appearance of titanic calamari. They would look funny in another situation, but not in a slipstream shooting each other with unheard of weapons and totally unknown technologies.
She checked the designs across her databases in an attempt to identify the alien species involved. None. Nothing in the Federation, anywhere in the Alpha Quadrant, or Beta Quadrant. Expeditions to the Gamma Quadrant revealed a number of space faring species, but none of them fit the description either. There was no identification not even from the aliens known in the Delta Quadrant. The only thing she could gather was that these ships were designed for slipstream travel. Regardless of culture or species, designs should arrive to the same common principles that were most suited for slipstream flight, just like dolphins and sharks arrived to the same body design despite their biologies.
When the beams hit, they light up the bubble around the ships, but it was hard to tell if the shields extend with the same radius as the slipstream fields. Then the Athena shuddered even more violently. This time it wasn't from the shockwaves of the strange battle in the ethereal slipstream. The beam hit her directly. Then another, and another.
The Athena tumbled out of her main direction, the field bubble around her deteriorating, the conduit collapsing. "I've been hit, I've been hit. Hostile forces remain unidentified and do not correlate with any known species. Trying to regain control of the ship, but the fields are collapsing....I am not sure if I will make it." This was one of the moments she feared for life, a moment that she may face death. It was never easy but in the flash of her mind, she had no regret from dying in attempting the bold and the unknown. She shrieked when a beam hit her harder, taking her shields offline and sending the Athena into an uncontrollable spin.
* * *
She woke up in the face of what seemed to be a nurse. The nurse appeared humanoid with almost no forehead artifact except for a triangular implant on their forehead. She was tending her, and as much as she tended all the other wounded. Athena looked around, and found that she herself was among the many wounded, lying in a coot.
"You seem okay now," the nurse said. "You seem not from here. You have abnormal readings, as if you are not really made of flesh."
"That's because I am a hologram, a composite made of force fields," Athena answered. "Who are you? What are you? Where am I?"
"I do not understand what kind of being you are," the nurse said. "But I have called one of our scientists who may understand you better."
A man came, wearing a costume of adobe color, whose robes stretched down to his feet. Even though this seemed to be a new culture Athena never heard of, the stature of the man, his presence and his clothes, suggest his great importance. On his forehead, he had the same triangular implant as the nurse.
He sat down next to her. "I am Doctor Tharuk of the Sakpah, founding species of the Sakpah Hegemony. You seem to be a unique individual, or I should say a unique species. You seem to be composed entirely of fields and energy, and yet so carefully modulated to appear like a real person. Fascinating. We, the Sakpah, are generally proud of our technological achievements, but we have nothing of your equivalent." He held his scanner up to her. "You also seem to be an artificial intelligence, and yet you react, think and move like a real person. What manner of species are you? Are what species built you?"
"Have you ever head of the Federation? Earth? Mankind? Homo Sapiens?" Athena asked. "I am Athena, General Hologram Interface of the Federation starship, the USS Athena, NX59700. I request that I must contact my superiors at the Federation at once. What happened to me? What was that battle and who or what was firing?"
"Take it easy, Miss Athena," Tharuk said. "You are in a very confused state. I do not have any recollection of any alien race or nation called the Federation, or an alien species that calls itself Homo Sapiens."
"We, Mankind, are very much like you except for that thing in your forehead," Athena explained. "But what do you mean you do not know or heard anything about the Federation or mankind? What just happened to me? Those ships I saw..."
"You were caught in the crossfire in our war against the Gorkhan. You fell out of the slipstream. Our warships came and tractored you and your ship out. When we recovered your ship, we did not find anyone except you. It is strange that one large ship has only one occupant," Tharuk said.
"Where is my ship?" Athena asked.
"We parked the ship outside with the rest of our ships. A holding beam keeps the ship suspended as we are unaware of any landing gear in the ship." Tharuk said.
"Your race, the Sakpah, and your enemies the Gorkhans," Athena said. "You obviously are already space faring races, and if you already have slipstream technology, you both seem to be pretty way ahead of us. Obviously the Prime Directive no longer applies to you, yet we the Federation have neither heard of the Sakpah or the Gorkans. We though we already have cataloged the major or significant space faring species in the Alpha and Beta Quadrant."
"Alpha? Beta Quadrant? I don't understand what you mean, Athena," Tharuk said. "We are a space faring species in alliance with dozens of other space faring species. We claim nearly half of the Galaxy as our territory, and yet we never heard of this Federation you speak about."
"The Federation nearly takes up a full quarter fo the Galaxy, I'm sure you should have heard of us," Athena said. "What about the Klingon Empire, the Romulan Empire, the Cardassian Union, the Ferengi Alliance, the Dominion, the Borg Collective... Have you heard of them too? Or do they draw blanks from you?"
Tharuk nodded negatively. "I never heard of these aliens and races you speak off. The Shakpah Hegemony and its allies, with our slipstream technology has already encompassed half of the Galaxy, as I said, making us one of the two most powerful empires. The other is of course the Gorkhans of the Gorkhan Unity, who rule the other half. We are in the middle of a total war for complete dominance. Only one empire shall remain, only one empire shall rule."
"You are definitely not Gorkhan," Tharuk said. "Even though you have slipstream technology, elements of your ship seem primitive in design, and yet in other areas, seemingly quite advanced, such as your bioneural circuitry and your hologram entity. And yet we truly never heard of your Federation, even though we have analyzed your ship and there is continuous reference to this political entity. You are made of energy and fields, and yet you have the same shape and form as us. I even have to say that even to my eyes you are truly beautiful even if your uniform is very foreign to us. You are truly a mystery to us, Athena."
"I appreciate the complement, but two empires that nearly cover the entire galaxy?" Athena said. "But that's impossible. Do you have some stellar cartography databases I can examine? I can show you where the Federation is, where Earth is. I can also find out where am I. Please."
"All right, you can come with me," Tharuk said.
She stood up from her coot and followed him. She found out that she had been inside some barracks all along, converted to a field hospital. When she came out, the great sight of an army came upon her. In the landscape that stretches across to the horizon were rows and rows of parked ships. Many appear to be fighters, around the size of a large shuttle, but a small cockpit. Others were the size of Federation escort vessels. Some had landing gear, others were suspended using holding beams.
"This is part of the great Imperial fleet of the Hegemony. We are building up in defense of this sector," Tharuk said. "There is your ship." He pointed.
Invisible fields hung the USS Athena motionless in the air like a prized display item in the desk of a giant collector.
"I have to confess we are fascinated with your ship. While it shares the same basic outline for a slipstream vessel, its basic architecture is not like something we have seen before. We can see that your ship is well armed, and must serve as a cruiser in the service of this Federation you speak of."
"I can open up the ship's landing gear if you can help me settle her with your holding fields," Athena said. She stared at the ship, and at the bottom of the lower hull, the landing skids came out and straightened into position. "You can land her now," Athena said.
"That is incredible. You did it like it was part of your mind," Tharuk said. "How exactly do you do it without a control device?"
"I am integrated with the ship there," Athena said. "The form you see is merely an interface to what lies inside that ship. I am that ship, the mind you are talking to now, is actually the ship's main computer."
"Fascinating, a sentient ship," Tharuk said. "Before our scientists have concieved of such an idea in theory, to design automated living ships that will take the war to the enemy without the loss and casualty of crew life. But it was only a theory, never have I thought it would be possible. Your Federation must be a great power if it were to have an armada of ships like you."
"Well, that was what our organization originally had in mind, but I scared them out of it," Athena said. "The idea wasn't as perfect as you think it might be, for a whole lot of complex reasons. Let's just say the implementation differs from the theory."
"Hmm, you have some points there. As a scientist, I understand this fully. Things in theory does not always work out the same or the best in reality," Tharuk said. He took a device that appears to be his comlink and shouted some orders to it. The holding beams settled the USS Athena gently to the ground, letting the ship rest on its landing skids to the ground. "For a ship of that size to rest on the earth, it must have a very strong structure."
"Indeed I have," Athena said.
She followed Tharuk to a domed building. "This is the nearest thing we have for an astrometrics and cartographic laboratory," Tharuk said. "I hope this would suffice your purpose, and help us locate this Federation you speak off." The star maps projected in the air and the ceiling in a 3D hologram.
Athena stared in amazement at the sheer beauty of the star maps. It was as if an entire galaxy was duplicated in miniature right in front of her. But as she stared longer, her amazement turned into a frustrated scowl. There was nothing in the star map, in this Galaxy that she could recognize. It didn't even seem to be in the right Galaxy, the Galaxy she knew.
Panic overwhelmed her. She was never lost before, never so completely lost. There was a universe she had left behind, people that seemed to be comrades, friends and maybe even a family in spirit. This was totally unknown, a new universe. Where is she? Will it matter now?
"No!" She shouted. "This can't be..." She panicked. She ran out of the dome and then stopped, crouched and knelt on the desert floor that seemed to be mud once, and had dried for eons to form a solid rock hard surface. "This can't be..." It wasn't too long ago she was with friends, and now they were all gone. All gone-the thought struck the insides of her mind like a tornado's fury. Alone.
Then she did something she never thought she could do, something she thought she was never programmed to do, something she thought she always had the strength to resist doing. She cried against the barren surface.
<< Stream Of Angels: Chapter Index <<
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