IKC FHew 7C6110
Lest we forget... – Salvage
by Soghla' Marie St. Helene & Sogh Marla Varquis
Post Details
Marie felt stupid as she walked out onto the planet’s surface. Not only that, she felt very uncomfortable and awkward. There was nothing for it, she knew; she wouldn’t last a second in Miletus’ -40C temperature. That didn’t make the envirosuit she was wearing any more bearable.
She walked over to Marla. “OK, lets get this over with so we can get back into the warmth. I’ll point out what’s salvageable, you get to stow it away. Jared says we can’t take those Nephilim things apart so I’ll look around and see if there’s anything smaller that’s of value.”
Marla nodded. She knew that out of the two she was the higher rank, but she was better at following than she was at leading. That is why she was glad Tell was still Chief Engineer, and she was able to stay as just the Cloak Specialist. If she was in charge she would be afraid that no one would listen to the half-breed. She followed closely behind Marie looking for anything they might want to save, and staying alert just in case there was something alive here.
Good, the puppy dog’s tagging along, Marie thought. She actually quite liked Marla but couldn’t keep still the thought that the woman felt all too sorry for herself. If only she’d shed the self-pity at only being half-Klingon (or half-human) she could actually make something of herself. Not that I’m one to talk, I suppose, I’ve got a big enough chip on my shoulder but Marla wanders around like the world’s just waiting for a chance to jump up and bite her.
She spotted one of those sled things that looked to be in reasonable condition. “Let’s start with this one. They used things like this in medieval times on Earth. Called them ‘cats’. They wheeled them up to a town’s walls then the sappers mined under the walls to bring them down. The roof protected them from rocks and arrows. It must have been awful underneath. They nailed the skins of freshly slaughtered animals on the roof so that fire arrows couldn’t take hold. The stench must have been appalling.
Marla grabbed the sled, and followed behind Marie waiting to see what she could find next.
“Take it over there,” Marie ordered. “I’ll get that one,” she said, pointing to her right. “We’ll get as many of them as we can in one place then look them over. We don’t have the room to take them all but we might be able to get bits of some that we can put together later.”
Marla did as she was told. She knew that a true Klingon would never act like this, and it started to make her a bit more upset, but she did not show it. She did know how to hide her true feelings.
Marie pushed at a sled. It wouldn’t budge despite looking like being made of lightweight materials. Thing must weigh a ton! she thought. “You keep going with the sleds,” she called out to Marla. “I’ll have a look at the bikes.”
Bad move. The spikes were still damn sharp. She grabbed a discarded uniform and wrapped it around one of them. That was better! The uniform material was tough – she gave it that much. Suppose it would have to be to survive two thousand years or more exposure to the elements. Now, these are more my weight. If I’m careful.... Yes, she could manipulate it. It would take a while to get it to....
Wait a minute! What was that Matlh said. She hadn’t been particularly listening; she never particularly listened to anything Matlh said. No, it was Jared. That’s probably why I caught it. Something about...anti-grav plates. She cast a hungry eye over the controls. The layout looked basic and fairly straightforward. One thing about bi-pedal humanoids, they tended to set out controls in a similar fashion no matter where they came from. There was just a matter of whether this race was predominantly....
‘,’St. Helene to Jared. This race that built these bike things.... Were they mainly left or right handed?’,’
‘,’Much the same ratio as humans,’,’ Jared’s voice said over the comm link. ‘,’So mostly right-handed.’,’
Yeah, that’s what I thought. So, essential controls will be on the right-hand side of the panel and things you switch on and forget will be on the left. That means.... She pushed and poked and was gratified to hear the whir of a motor. Sluggishly the bike lifted off and hovered a half a metre above the ground. Marie clambered on. While she did so the bike remained stable, the anti-grav mechanism keeping it level. Now for a bit of enjoyment.
The first button she pressed sent a shiver through the bike. Looking down she saw the spikes begin to spin. No, not that one. While it’d be fun sending it against Matlh, he might not see the humour in it.. She pressed the button next to it and the blades sped up. That was unexpected. Then she thought about it. There are probably multiple settings to be chosen depending on the situation. So.... Let’s try the end one on this row.
The blades dutifully stopped spinning. Good. Now for the next row down.
The bike bucked and kicked, nearly throwing Marie off. There was a button all by itself on the left hand side. She pressed that and tried again. Sure enough, the bike behaved itself. Now, if I remember correctly, you have to get some power into it before you let out the clutch. Wonder why they designed it that way? Maybe it gave better power delivery in tight turns or under rapid acceleration or deceleration. If you’re in the midst of enemy soldiers and you’re trying to get the blades to do their lethal work, I imagine you’d have to twist and turn a lot. So..... She found a sliding control on the right. Gingerly letting go of the clutch she pushed the slider down.
The bike edged forward.
She pushed the slider a bit further down and the bike gathered speed. She pushed it back up and the bike slowed. She almost forgot the clutch, only pressing in just before the bike protested again.
Better learn how to steer it before I go much further. That presented a problem. She’d run out of buttons to press. She looked around but couldn’t see any way to turn the thing. She was about to give up in disgust when she noticed a different looking material just in front of her knees. I wonder..... She edged forward and got herself comfortable. She started up the bike again and, when it was moving forward, she pressed her left knee in. The bike turned to the left. She let off the pressure and the bike went straight ahead. Cute! She took her finger off the slider but the bike didn’t slow down. In fact, it kept going at the same speed. Thought so. It was built to operate without hands. Ingenious...a mixture of manual and automatic. It’ll keep on going smoothly once you’ve set it but you can take over control if you need quick bursts of power. So you’ve both hands free to wield weapons as well as those razor sharp blades. This must have been some weapon! Once in amongst the enemy’s ranks it would be slaughter. There’s no protection while you’re speeding across open ground but I’ll bet this thing really flew.
She got off and walked around the still hovering machine, admiring its sleek lines. Beautifully aerodynamic. Yeah, it’d have flown in more ways than one. Then she noticed what looked like handles towards the front. She climbed back on and re-positioned herself with her knees on the steering controls. Then she leaned forward. If they were handles they were just out of reach. Then again, I’m not particularly tall. Another one would quite possibly suit better. I wouldn’t mind betting these things were tailor built. Hunkered down in that position you’d present a very small target. Mind you, if the bike was blown out from under you, your chances of survival would probably be slim but, even so.... Even so, you’d be a hard target to hit once at full speed..
She wriggled further forward and got her hands around the handles. On the inside of each, she found more buttons. She guessed what they’d be but, in the spirit of experimentation, decided to try them out. Before she did so, she craned her neck up. Good, no-one in front of me. She pressed and a searing beam of light burst from the front of the bike. Not totally defenceless then. Phasers or something similar while charging then blades and what...? Hand held phasers probably but I wouldn’t mind betting they had something like a bat’leth too. That probably explains the slots I saw in the back – holsters. So you use the phasers on the handle to take out those Nephilim things.
Marla watched as Marie tried to figure out everything. She was anxious to get going again. "So, are you done playing with it yet?"
“Yeah, yeah,” Marie replied. “Matlh’s going to want to know what these things do when we bring them on board.” Don’t get your knickers in a twist, she added to herself. That is, if Klingons actually wear knickers. Probably smacks too much of luxury for them. Would have liked to try these other buttons but one's probably some sort of torpedo and the other...? Well, I'll find out later. For now...I don’t even care to think about the carnage you could wreak with a line of these things!
She quickly investigated other bikes. As she moved from one to another, she increasingly felt like Goldilocks: one was too big; one, surprisingly, was too small. Eventually she found one which was just right but its control panel was configured for a left handed person. She decided she could live with that.
She smirked. Now to show the puppy dog how to do this properly.
She fired up the engine and pointed the machine towards where Varquis was pushing a sled. She’d gone no more than twenty metres when the bike started to splutter and cough. With a final grunt it fell to the ground. She kicked it in frustration but achieved nothing more than sore toes.
That wiped the smirk off her face. And it was all looking so good for once! she thought disgustedly.
She inspected the bike but could not see any sort of power pack though she found a small socket which might have been some sort of input. It was probably solar powered. This red giant wouldn’t give off light of the right frequency to keep the power supply charged. Damn! Now there’s nothing for it but some manual labour. I suppose it might warm me up. That final thought did nothing to cheer her.
"So, now what?" Marla said with a slight smirk on her face.
“Now, you push!” Marie replied caustically.
Marla sneered, and did as she was asked.
by Soghla' Marie St. Helene & Sogh Marla Varquis
Post Details
| Title | Salvage | |
| Mission | Lest we forget... | |
| Author(s) | Soghla' Marie St. Helene & Sogh Marla Varquis | |
| Posted | Tue Aug 24, 2010 @ 11:48am | |
| Location | Miletus' surface |
She walked over to Marla. “OK, lets get this over with so we can get back into the warmth. I’ll point out what’s salvageable, you get to stow it away. Jared says we can’t take those Nephilim things apart so I’ll look around and see if there’s anything smaller that’s of value.”
Marla nodded. She knew that out of the two she was the higher rank, but she was better at following than she was at leading. That is why she was glad Tell was still Chief Engineer, and she was able to stay as just the Cloak Specialist. If she was in charge she would be afraid that no one would listen to the half-breed. She followed closely behind Marie looking for anything they might want to save, and staying alert just in case there was something alive here.
Good, the puppy dog’s tagging along, Marie thought. She actually quite liked Marla but couldn’t keep still the thought that the woman felt all too sorry for herself. If only she’d shed the self-pity at only being half-Klingon (or half-human) she could actually make something of herself. Not that I’m one to talk, I suppose, I’ve got a big enough chip on my shoulder but Marla wanders around like the world’s just waiting for a chance to jump up and bite her.
She spotted one of those sled things that looked to be in reasonable condition. “Let’s start with this one. They used things like this in medieval times on Earth. Called them ‘cats’. They wheeled them up to a town’s walls then the sappers mined under the walls to bring them down. The roof protected them from rocks and arrows. It must have been awful underneath. They nailed the skins of freshly slaughtered animals on the roof so that fire arrows couldn’t take hold. The stench must have been appalling.
Marla grabbed the sled, and followed behind Marie waiting to see what she could find next.
“Take it over there,” Marie ordered. “I’ll get that one,” she said, pointing to her right. “We’ll get as many of them as we can in one place then look them over. We don’t have the room to take them all but we might be able to get bits of some that we can put together later.”
Marla did as she was told. She knew that a true Klingon would never act like this, and it started to make her a bit more upset, but she did not show it. She did know how to hide her true feelings.
Marie pushed at a sled. It wouldn’t budge despite looking like being made of lightweight materials. Thing must weigh a ton! she thought. “You keep going with the sleds,” she called out to Marla. “I’ll have a look at the bikes.”
Bad move. The spikes were still damn sharp. She grabbed a discarded uniform and wrapped it around one of them. That was better! The uniform material was tough – she gave it that much. Suppose it would have to be to survive two thousand years or more exposure to the elements. Now, these are more my weight. If I’m careful.... Yes, she could manipulate it. It would take a while to get it to....
Wait a minute! What was that Matlh said. She hadn’t been particularly listening; she never particularly listened to anything Matlh said. No, it was Jared. That’s probably why I caught it. Something about...anti-grav plates. She cast a hungry eye over the controls. The layout looked basic and fairly straightforward. One thing about bi-pedal humanoids, they tended to set out controls in a similar fashion no matter where they came from. There was just a matter of whether this race was predominantly....
‘,’St. Helene to Jared. This race that built these bike things.... Were they mainly left or right handed?’,’
‘,’Much the same ratio as humans,’,’ Jared’s voice said over the comm link. ‘,’So mostly right-handed.’,’
Yeah, that’s what I thought. So, essential controls will be on the right-hand side of the panel and things you switch on and forget will be on the left. That means.... She pushed and poked and was gratified to hear the whir of a motor. Sluggishly the bike lifted off and hovered a half a metre above the ground. Marie clambered on. While she did so the bike remained stable, the anti-grav mechanism keeping it level. Now for a bit of enjoyment.
The first button she pressed sent a shiver through the bike. Looking down she saw the spikes begin to spin. No, not that one. While it’d be fun sending it against Matlh, he might not see the humour in it.. She pressed the button next to it and the blades sped up. That was unexpected. Then she thought about it. There are probably multiple settings to be chosen depending on the situation. So.... Let’s try the end one on this row.
The blades dutifully stopped spinning. Good. Now for the next row down.
The bike bucked and kicked, nearly throwing Marie off.
The bike edged forward.
She pushed the slider a bit further down and the bike gathered speed. She pushed it back up and the bike slowed. She almost forgot the clutch, only pressing in just before the bike protested again.
Better learn how to steer it before I go much further. That presented a problem. She’d run out of buttons to press. She looked around but couldn’t see any way to turn the thing. She was about to give up in disgust when she noticed a different looking material just in front of her knees. I wonder..... She edged forward and got herself comfortable. She started up the bike again and, when it was moving forward, she pressed her left knee in. The bike turned to the left. She let off the pressure and the bike went straight ahead. Cute! She took her finger off the slider but the bike didn’t slow down. In fact, it kept going at the same speed. Thought so. It was built to operate without hands. Ingenious...a mixture of manual and automatic. It’ll keep on going smoothly once you’ve set it but you can take over control if you need quick bursts of power. So you’ve both hands free to wield weapons as well as those razor sharp blades. This must have been some weapon! Once in amongst the enemy’s ranks it would be slaughter. There’s no protection while you’re speeding across open ground but I’ll bet this thing really flew.
She got off and walked around the still hovering machine, admiring its sleek lines. Beautifully aerodynamic. Yeah, it’d have flown in more ways than one. Then she noticed what looked like handles towards the front. She climbed back on and re-positioned herself with her knees on the steering controls. Then she leaned forward. If they were handles they were just out of reach. Then again, I’m not particularly tall. Another one would quite possibly suit better. I wouldn’t mind betting these things were tailor built. Hunkered down in that position you’d present a very small target. Mind you, if the bike was blown out from under you, your chances of survival would probably be slim but, even so.... Even so, you’d be a hard target to hit once at full speed..
She wriggled further forward and got her hands around the handles. On the inside of each, she found more buttons. She guessed what they’d be but, in the spirit of experimentation, decided to try them out. Before she did so, she craned her neck up. Good, no-one in front of me. She pressed and a searing beam of light burst from the front of the bike. Not totally defenceless then. Phasers or something similar while charging then blades and what...? Hand held phasers probably but I wouldn’t mind betting they had something like a bat’leth too. That probably explains the slots I saw in the back – holsters. So you use the phasers on the handle to take out those Nephilim things.
Marla watched as Marie tried to figure out everything. She was anxious to get going again. "So, are you done playing with it yet?"
“Yeah, yeah,” Marie replied. “Matlh’s going to want to know what these things do when we bring them on board.” Don’t get your knickers in a twist, she added to herself. That is, if Klingons actually wear knickers. Probably smacks too much of luxury for them. Would have liked to try these other buttons but one's probably some sort of torpedo and the other...? Well, I'll find out later. For now...I don’t even care to think about the carnage you could wreak with a line of these things!
She quickly investigated other bikes. As she moved from one to another, she increasingly felt like Goldilocks: one was too big; one, surprisingly, was too small. Eventually she found one which was just right but its control panel was configured for a left handed person. She decided she could live with that.
She smirked. Now to show the puppy dog how to do this properly.
She fired up the engine and pointed the machine towards where Varquis was pushing a sled. She’d gone no more than twenty metres when the bike started to splutter and cough. With a final grunt it fell to the ground. She kicked it in frustration but achieved nothing more than sore toes.
That wiped the smirk off her face. And it was all looking so good for once! she thought disgustedly.
She inspected the bike but could not see any sort of power pack though she found a small socket which might have been some sort of input. It was probably solar powered. This red giant wouldn’t give off light of the right frequency to keep the power supply charged. Damn! Now there’s nothing for it but some manual labour. I suppose it might warm me up. That final thought did nothing to cheer her.
"So, now what?" Marla said with a slight smirk on her face.
“Now, you push!” Marie replied caustically.
Marla sneered, and did as she was asked.