Space Date - 14x^6Tyx@2. Location - The Ether between worlds.
The good ship VSS Industry Standard is in the middle of its five-year mission. To boldly go and clean up after the battles of the better, faster and more important spaceships of the Valdaryian fleet. The ship is led by Captain 5th Class Jyden C. D’Arcy, who rules over her band of Academy dropouts and assorted misfits with an iron fist, albeit a rather soft form of iron that’s often ignored and occasionally mocked.
“Mr. Sillas, what do your scanners say?” Jyden said. She sat high in the Captain’s chair in the middle of the bridge.
Sillas sat in front of her to her left, at the main navigation console. “Readings are consistent with the aftermath of a battle. Latent drive signatures suggest this was the work of the VSS Adventure Time in their space quest against the Space Ogres. Captain.”
“Citizen Datrnold, what is our protocol here?”
Datrnold, a human-computer hybrid called a dobot, sat on the other side of the bridge from Sillas in the other navigation console. “Boop, Beep. If we can reasonably believe this to be the work of VSS ships… accessing protocols… we are duty-bound to collect anything of value and return it to headquarters. Boop. Answer terminate. Beep.”
“Will you stop that? You don’t need to boop and beep. You’re almost a perfect replication of a human.”
Datrnold cocked his head slightly. “I find it helps me remember my place here on this ship.”
“As a science officer?”
“As a slave.”
“Wait, what?! You’re not a slave!”
“Feels like I’m one. I’m a little bit different than everyone else here. Plus, I have to do whatever you say.”
“That’s just the chain of command.”
“Oh, it’s chains of something, all right. I mean, can I leave?”
“What? The ship? Now?”
“Yeah, or am I… not allowed?”
“We’re in the ether in the middle of space. There’s nothing out there. You’ll float away until you run out of power.”
“So I can’t leave?”
“I mean, the door won’t even open when we’re pressurized. No one can leave.”
“So I’m not allowed to leave and have to do what you say? This is basically the middle passage with uniforms.”
“Holy fuck, dude! Okay, not entertaining that. Moving along.” Jyden turned to Beden, sitting in the second-in-command chair to her right. “What do you think about the debris, number three?”
Beden looked uncomfortable. “Um… well. I guess this is as good a time as any to bring this up. Why am I number three?”
Jyden scowled a bit. “You’ve always been number three.”
“Right, and at first, I thought it a bit of a joke. But by now, well, you’re serious. There’s no number two. It’s just me. So why aren’t I number two? Look, in the chain-of—. I mean, the ship hierarchy—.”
“Uh-huh,” Datrnold said.
“—There’s you, Captain. And then there’s me. That’s number two.”
“No,” Jyden said, “you’re number three to give you something to aspire to. You see, it’s part carrot because it’s a goal, and it’s part stick because it’s insulting. The best motivational tools are both carrots and sticks. That way, you always keep your underlings guessing.”
“No, that’s terrible. And I’m not playing that game anymore. You either agree that I’m number two, or I’ll stop doing your bidding.”
“Insubordination then? Well, guess who just got knocked down to number four?”
“If there’s no two and no three, what difference does that make?!”
“Right you are. Michael? How’d you like to be my new number three?”
Michael was in the back of the bridge, one hand gripping a stripper pole. His chainmail bikini clinked softly whenever he moved. Everyone with reasonable taste refused to look at him. “Yes sir, whatever you’d like.”
“See Beden. That’s how you do it.”
“And that’s another thing,” Beden said, to which Jyden groaned in response. “Why is the old man in the chainmail bikini hanging from a stripper pole on the bridge? What does he even do here?”
“What does he do? Well, right now, he’s superior officering you. And word is he’s on the fast track for number two. So, what do you say about the debris, number three?” She looked back at Michael.
“Hum…, that’s a good one. I’m gonna consult my team. Number four? What do you think.”
Beden groaned but gave up his fight. “It’s space garbage. We should go pick it up. That’s what we do, isn’t it? Pick up space garbage?”
“That’s our task,” Captain Jyden said, “and we don’t question it.”
“Wait, why don’t we question it?”
“Mr. Sillas. Head for that space debris. Warp, eh, five or so.”
Sillas shook his head. “Captain, it’s right there. If we just let the ship coast, we’ll be there in ten minutes.”
Jyden looked around. Ten minutes to kill with these folks? Not if she could do anything about that. “Can’t we, eh, add some power and cut down that time.”
“Even the smallest amount of impulse power will shoot us right past it. Or possibly through it.”
“Ugh, fine. Ten minutes it is. I guess we can all… talk?”
“Is that part of our mission?” Soon-to-be-number-five Beden asked. “To, you know, boldly chit-chat while time passes.”
“I sense some tension in your voice,” Sarrani said from Jyden’s left.
“And that’s another thing,” Beden said. “Why is the damn guidance counselor on the bridge?”
“She brings some well-needed insight,” Jyden said. “Plus, otherwise, this bridge crew is a bit of a sausage fest.”
“She doesn’t even do anything. She just states the obvious and gives horrible advice about hiding your issues.”
“You seem angry about your recent demotions,” Sarrani said. “You should bottle that up. Let it build up inside you with all your other issues. Eventually, the pressure will turn it into a diamond of wisdom.”
“That’s possibly the worst advice one could give.”
“Commander Beden!” Jyden said. “You will not speak that way of a superior officer!”
“I thought the chainmail stripper guy was my superior officer?”
“You’ve got a lot of superior officers. You want some more? Hey, Toth? Want to be in charge of this guy?”
Toth was standing at a long weapon’s console behind the Captain’s chair and adjacent to the stripper pole. The large man had his hair tied tight into one long row down the middle of his scalp. It’s a look that shouldn’t work, but somehow it did for him.
“Captain,” Toth said in a deep voice. “Your contract with the Barbannan Syndicate forbids you from engaging me unless we are in direct combat.”
“Uh, right. Remind me again why I agreed to that. No, wait. Don’t. Just stand there, I guess.”
“Captain. Your contract with the Barbannan Syndicate forbids—.”
Jyden sighed aggressively.
“Captain!” Sillas said. “A ship appeared just ahead.”
“What!?” Jyden said. “Appeared out of nowhere?”
“Yes. Well, maybe? The ship’s computer has been sluggish. Maybe the sensors just noticed it? I think they’re space ogres. They’re hailing us.”
Jyden grabbed the bridge of her nose to fight off the headache. “Fine. I guess.” She raised her head to look official and sat forward in her chair. “On screen.”
Nothing happened.
Jyden cleared her throat. “On screen!”
Nothing continued to happen.
Jyden turned to her right. “Ozhura!”
“Uhura, really?” Ozhura said. “Out of everyone, that’s who I get? This is ridiculous!”
“Will you stop blabbering nonsense and just do your job?”
“What job? There’s exactly one button I have to push, and I can only do it when you tell me, according to the dressing down you gave me after that whole incident with the open channel to the Valdaryian Command during karaoke night.”
“We weren’t going to bring that back up,” Sarrani said. “You know, we have to stuff it down, deep within us. Form the diamond.”
“And why am I in a dress!?” Ozhura gestured to his tight-fitting skirt. “It’s ridiculous, Captain. And if you think we’ll make out at some point, well… I mean, let’s not rule anything out.”
Jyden’s headache intensified, but she resisted the temptation to yell and grab her head. “Will you just… do you job… NOW!”
“Fine!” Ozhura said with a sneer. “But only under protest. Computer! Put the space ogres on screen.” He crossed his arms and leaned back in his chair. “At least there’s still one thing I can boss around here.”
Michael cleared his throat. He was staring at his handheld. “The, uh, computer just texted me. It said, ‘Tell Ozhura to push the button.’”
“Oh, for the love of…! Fine.” Ozhura pushed the button.
“Attention Valdaryian Garbage Collector Class VSS Industry Standard. I am OOrk of the Globis Clan and Captain of the Interceptor V’shak Mo’Lok. The ogres have laid claim to this debris field, and as such, under interspecies-interplanetary law, you are currently violating our spacespace. Turn your piece of junk around or face… our… wrath.”
“The pride of the Valdaryian fleet does not take commands from space ogres.” Jyden spoke clearly and firmly, belying none of her nervousness about her ship’s capabilities in a fight. Just like a good captain should, she told herself, mostly to keep her mind off what might happen.
“Very well. Prepare to be demo—. Wait. What did you call us?”
Jyden was confused. “Space ogres?”
OOrk groaned. “We’re not space ogres. We’re just ogres.”
“But you’re in space. I mean, we’re in spaceships, and we’re about to be in space combat. So you’re space ogres. Otherwise, how would we tell the difference between you and ogres on the planet?”
“What planet? We’re on all the planets. And there is no difference! We’re all just ogres. You don’t have to put space in front of everything in space. For example, are you ‘space people’?”
Jyden scoffed. “Of course not, don’t be stupid. We’re just people.”
OOrk flung out his ogre hands in exasperation. “It’s just like that!”
“Ha! He thinks he’s people!” Ozhura said unhelpfully.
OOrk looked away. “Racist pricks. Whatever! Prepare to be—.”
“No!” Jyden shouted. “YOU prepare to be destroyed! Mr. Toth.” She leaned forward and squinted her eyes to look both commanding and defiant. She summoned up all her might and rage and regrets and, well, a thousand other things that had no bearing but felt appropriate. She was mad, and this was her moment. “Fire. Everything.”
Toth touched his console twice. The screen split, with OOrk’s surprised face on the left and a forward-facing view on the right. The right side lit up bright as the phasers and torpedos shot forward and then slowly dimmed as they made the quick trek to the enemy ship. OOrk’s demeanor changed to one of fear, then quickly to confusion. Then he relaxed. Meanwhile, on the other half of the screen, the lights from the weapons dimmed as they traveled, then shifted to the left. Then they shifted left some more. And again, until finally, they disappeared off-screen.
“I think we space missed,” Beden said.
OOrk lowered and shook his head.
“What!” Jyden said. “Mr. Toth, what happened?”
Toth raised his head slightly in stern defiance. “We missed, Captain.”
“I know that! It’s obvious because the space ogres are still here.”
“Ogres. It’s just ogres,” OOrk said.
“I mean, how could we miss? The computer handles the trajectory, and there’s nothing but nothing between us and them.”
“I’m running diagnostics now, Captain.”
Jyden waited for what felt like forever, but Toth said nothing.
“So… uh—.” OOrk started.
“Diagnostics complete, Captain. It appears that the computer is low on resources. Ninety-nine point nine, nine, nine, nine percent of our storage is taken up by one folder in Ozhura’s personal drive. The folder is labeled ‘Space Taxes,’ but it appears to contain almost exclusively pornography. Along with Dr. Suess, self-insert slash fiction.”
Ozhura laughed. “Yeah, but that’s just the tip of the weirdberg I got going on.”
Jyden rested her head in one hand. “How can someone need thirty-two exabytes of pornography?”
Ozhura shrugged. “Cause holodeck files are really large, probably. Oh, and on that note, no one should use the holodeck until I can, uh, clean it up a bit.”
“Alright,” Sarrani said, “everyone needs to take what you’re feeling right now, give it a big hug and push it way, way down inside you.”
“Oh, and everyone needs to go online and give my stories five stars. And a review. But don’t make it look like you’re just doing it out of friendship. Like, I don’t know, review casual. But nice. And five stars.”
Jyden rolled her eyes. “Why do I bother? Alright, Mr. Toth, delete the folder—.”
“Hey!”
“—and fire again!”
“I… can’t, Captain,” Toth said. “That was… um, everything. We have nothing left.”
“You fired all our weapons?!”
“You said to fire everything!”
“Well, yeah… but, like… I meant on target.” She sighed. “So we’re defenseless?”
“And offenseless,” Beden added, again unhelpfully. Jyden would see him demoted again when she had time.
But for now, she had a plan. She looked up at the screen, a fire in her eyes. “But they don’t know that. Ozhura, open the audio channel.”
Ozhura looked from the screen to his console and back again. Then he looked to Jyden and shrugged. “Uh, okay. It’s open, Captain.”
“Attention space ogres—.”
“It’s just ogres,” OOrk said.
“You have seen our capabilities in that warning shot,” Jyden continued. “Prepare to stand down, or the next volley will be straight at you.”
OOrk grimaced and covered his eyes. He then brought his hand forward toward the camera, almost pleadingly. “The channel’s been open the whole time. I heard everything.”
“Ozhura!” Jyden growled.
“You didn’t say to close it!” Ozhura said. “The last time I took liberties with opening and closing channels, I had to spend like two days with space HR.”
“It’s just HR!” OOrk said with a growl. “Anyway, I know you have no weapons, and our sensors found that your shields are barely registering because you’ve diverted so much power to your holodeck.”
“Worth it!”
“Destroying you now would be a simple task, but you see… the ogre high command has instituted a new scoring system for all space combat— I know how that sounds, but sometimes it’s a good adjective. Anyway, all the ships in all the fleets for all the armies are given a point value based on their historical worth. The VSS Industry Standard is the only ship in existence worth negative points.”
“Wait, really?” Jyden said.
“It’s been decided that you are far more likely to harm your own fleet in a docking accident, or perhaps by releasing some new sort of fungus or bacteria upon your populace, than you ever will to any ogre ships. By taking you off the board, I would make your army more capable and competent. Now look, I very much want to destroy you and your annoying crew, but… I can’t afford the points. We’re currently tied for second place, and every point counts.”
“So you think you’ve defeated us?”
“Well, I mean… it’s kind of just a recognition of reality.”
“You’ll soon learn that no ship I Captain is ever out of options. Mr. Sillas, initiate the Omega Protocol.”
Sillas and Datrnold exchange worried looks.
“The Omega Protocol?” Datrnold said. “Captain, no ship in history has ever purposely used that.”
Jyden smiled. “Playtime is over. Put on your grown-up pants, and let’s get this done.”
Sillas and Datrnold nodded. They both flipped up a plastic shield covering a button on their respective consoles.
“It’s been a pleasure serving with you,” Datrnold said to Sillas.
“I’m glad I got to know you, friend.” Sillas pushed the button.
Datrnold thought for a moment, then smiled. “You called me friend. I have a real human friend. Now, in the darkest of moments, I learn the true power and meaning of friend—.”
“Just push the button, dummy,” Ozhura said.
Datrnold pushed the button. A red strobe light started flashing, and a klaxon sounded. Datrnold turned to Jyden. “The anti-collision system is offline, captain.”
“Very good,” Jyden replied. “Mr. Sillas, engage!”
Sillas touched the engine power bar on his console, then slowly drug up his finger, putting the power to maximum. A loud winding sound echoed throughout the bridge.
“Wait,” OOrk said. “What is this? Are you trying to ram us?”
The winding sound increased in frequency and volume, then suddenly decreased, sounding like the air being let out of a balloon.
“Mr. Sillas, what’s going on?” Jyden asked.
Sillas turned around. “It’s the engines, Captain. They aren’t responding.”
“Uzhura, get me DL in Engineering.”
“Computer,” Ozhura said, “get the Captain DL in Engineering.”
“I just got a text from the computer,” Michael said. “You know what it says. And hey, I don’t want to be ‘that guy,’ but I’m on a limited phone plan here. I only get so many messages every space month.”
“It’s just a month,” OOrk said.
Ozhura sighed and languidly pressed a single button on his console. The right side of the split screen changed to a view of engineering.
“DL?” Jyden said. “What’s going on down there?”
A weathered-looking old man appeared on the screen. He had a long grey beard and deep-set, angry eyes. He was also wearing a long cloak with a hood that he kept over his head. He was looking all around the camera.
“Oh, of course, that bitch would call down now,” DL said. “Once I make a friend or two… BAM, mutiny time. Then we’ll see who can call who whenever they like and ruin perfectly good naps. Now, where’s the damn talk button? I can never find it here.” He continued to search the area.
“There’s no talk button. You just talk.”
DL looked right at the camera. “Oh! Right. I remember now. Well, Captain… how are things?”
“What in the eleventeen space hells is going on down there?”
“Yes! Well….” He looked away from the camera, then back forward. “Hit a little bit of a snag down here. You remember how I promised I would get you a twenty-five percent increase in efficiency out of engineering?”
Jyden shrugged. “I remember you saying something like that, completely unbidden. I thought engineering was running fine.”
“Right. So to keep my promise, I added some extra berating, name-calling and some physical beatings to my routine down here, but it wasn’t working. So I tossed an engineer into the reactor, you know, to really inspire the others.”
“You what?!”
“But it worked! I estimate a twenty-five percent increase in productivity by the survivors. Course, we were down twenty percent of our workforce, so it kinda leveled out. Well, I was kind of at a loss on what to do then, so I tossed another one in. Didn’t really see any increase in productivity from that one. In fact, the cowering in fear was a real drag on all our output. Well, long story short, I tossed them all in eventually.”
“You murdered them all?!”
DL shrugged. “Fraid so.”
“You can’t do that! It’s illegal. And immoral!”
DL pointed at the camera. “Hey! If you don’t want Dark Lord solutions to your problems, don’t put a Dark Lord in charge of fixing them!”
Jyden put her fingers to her temples to try and control the headache. “So we have no engines?”
DL thought for a moment. “No main engine. I tried to run things myself but… well, I may have flipped a wrong switch or two. We still have the warp engine, though. That’s a different team and as yet unsacrificed. And let me tell you, those guys are really motivated. I may be on to something here.”
Jyden flicked her wrist, and Ozhura closed the channel, leaving just OOrk looking sheepish on the screen.
“Look,” OOrk said. “This is… uh, embarrassing for all involved. We’re just going to, like, wing you with a torpedo out of principle. Then we’ll let you float home in peace, and we can all forget we ever space met. Bah! I mean met! Now they got me doing it. Fire!”
The ogres closed the channel, and a moment later, a vast explosion rocked the Industry Standard. Everyone on the bridge was tossed from their seats and flung to the ground. The lights dimmed and turned even redder. The klaxon stopped, being replaced with a more dire-sounding klaxon a moment later. A series of explosions followed, each rocking the ship a little more until, finally, the bridge was covered in a shower of sparks as the electronics in the walls exploded.
Once the shaking and alarms stopped, Jyden got to her feet and tried her best to look in control, though she felt anything but. “Mr. Toth, damage assessment.”
Toth was one of the few who managed to remain standing. He looked down at his console. “The space ogre ship is leaving, Captain.”
“So?”
“So we are no longer in combat, and thus, contractually, I have no reason—.”
“Holy crap! Will someone just give me a damage assessment?”
Sillas got to his feet and went back to his console. “The torpedo exploded just off our left main engine, doing initially only minimal cosmetic damage, Captain.”
“Minimal, cosmetic damage? Then what was all the shaking and explosions?”
“It’s just the ship,” Beden said. “I mean, it’s legally classified as a complex Rube Goldberg device. It was built by the same guys that did the Death Star.”
“The one that blew up from a small exhaust explosion?”
“Yeah, not their finest moment.”
“So we’re not damaged at all?” She looked at Sillas.
He shook his head. “We have no main engine and no weapons… but that was from before anyway. Almost all of our performative electronics are out, but they’re not really helpful anyway.”
“This doesn’t sound too bad.”
“The only thing of note that was destroyed is the coffee maker.”
Jyden collapsed to her knees. “NOOOOO!” She raised a fist to the sky. “OOoooooooooooork!”
“The tea maker is fine, though.”
Jyden rolled her eyes. “If I wanted to drink a glass of watered-down piss, I’d join Ozhura in the holodeck.”
Ozhura laughed. “Oh, I’m waaaay beyond water sports at this point.”
Jyden ignored him, pushing the terrible feeling down deep inside her, as was wise. “So we’re stuck here. With no engines and no weapons and no coffee. We’ve got no way to get home.”
“That’s not true, Captain,” Sillas said. He looked over his console for a moment, then nodded. “The explosion put us into a light spin. If we wait for the ship to be pointed directly at home, we can engage the warp drive at that moment and make it. Then we’ll call for help and get towed in.”
“For what, though? We were given the simplest task possible, collecting salvage. I can’t return to headquarters empty-handed. It’ll be the end of my career and probably all of yours too.”
“Captain,” Datrnold said. “I may have a solution.”
“Is it better than self-destructing? ‘Cause that’s plan A right now.”
“It’s the ship. In its current condition, with no engines or weapons or coffee, I believe it meets the qualifications to technically be considered salvage.”
It was a shitty way out. But it was a way out. “I think that might work.”
Beden shook his head. “I don’t think the Valdaryian fleet command will like that.”
“What? I’m bringing them a whole ship’s worth of salvage. It’s perfect. Mr. Sillas, when we’re lined up, take us home.”
Sillas nodded and looked at his console.
“And how long will that be?”
“Bout ten minutes,” Sillas said.
Jyden sighed and leaned back in her chair, hoping Beden wouldn’t say anything. It was a futile hope, though.
“So more boldly chit-chatting?”
“Down,” Saranni said. “Deep down. Push it down.”
And Jyden did.