Allegiances 4 – Close Quarters
by Soghla' Jared

Post Details

Title		Close Quarters
Mission		Allegiances 4
Author(s)		Soghla' Jared
Posted		Tue Sep 06, 2011 @ 6:17am
Location		A cloaked vessle near the Nausican fight
Timeline		Moments after Jared vanished off the F'Hew bridge

The gloomy transporter chamber was illuminated by the glow of a transporter, briefly bathing the waiting warriors in orange light. After a moment, the glow faded, leaving behind the diminutive figure of the F'Hew's science officer.

"...it might be some kind of ambush, Captain. They appear to be... oh."

The last comment was addressed to the assembled group of Klingon and Nausican who he now suddenly found himself surrounded by. He scanned his surroundings with a look of mild surprise.

"TiQ!" a burly Klingon said. "You're coming with us."

Jared raised his eyebrows, and gave a slightly bemused smile.

"Really? You don't say!"

One of the Nausicans gave a grunt, and there was a muffled "Ploof" sound. Jared flinched as a dart hit him in the arm. He gave the Nausican a look.

"OW!" he said, reproachfully. He plucked the dart out and examined it.

Hypodermic dart. Loaded with Dioxymethal Tholenine. You could tell by the purple tinge.

He shook his head, and looked at the warriors.

"Now... you lads weren't very well briefed, were you?"

The group looked at each other in confusion. Jared could see an edge of alarm in the faces of some of the Klingons. They probably knew just a little about the TiQ. Some old stories. Someone had told them that taking a lone unarmed one prisoner wouldn't be a problem, but some of them were starting to doubt.

A massive Nausican stepped forward. They clearly didn't know the stories. One of a number of areas of knowledge they were weak on. Like reading. Or personal hygiene.

"You come with us, little rat man. In one piece or many. It matter not."

Jared looked at the Nausican with a searching gaze, taking a subtle step back as he did so.

"No," he said after a thoughtful pause. "No, I don't think so."

The Nausican gave a quizzical grunt. He was not a small creature, and Jared clearly was. He was obviously used to his threats working better than this.

"You see," Jared explained, "I probably would have gone with the Klingons, if they'd asked very politely. Klingons have a reputation for honour, which is sometimes deserved. I respect Klingons. But you're quite clearly an idiot, who probably couldn't tell the difference between my head and..."

Jared's insult was cut short by the Nausican, who gave and angry growl and charged forward, swinging a sledgehammer punch at Jared's face. The TiQ didn't move or react - not until the very last second, when he leaned back and sideways. The Nausican's blow carried past him and straight into a metal box on the wall behind him, which gave and angry crackling noise as the Nausican's fist crushed it. The Nausican was hurled back across the room and into several other warriors - convulsing with the power that had arced through his body, but nevertheless out cold.

"...and a power distributor junction," Jared finished, the air around him now filled with smoke and the smell of burned Nausican.

Two other Nausicans gave angry bellowing noises and charged out of the pack. Jared deftly manoeuvred between them and as the two creatures drew weapons - one holding a brutal looking serrated sword, and the other a short barbed spear. As they drew in he leapt toward the sword wielder, who's weapon was drawn back for a blow. He kicked against the creature - not attacking it, but rather kicking off against it to leap up and grab a roof support beam.

The sword warrior's slow reflexes brought it's sword around to block Jared's "attack", as the spear warrior raised it's spear to impale him. A moment before they reached his dangling form, Jared flicked his legs and body upwards, hooking his legs onto the roof beam.

The two warriors collided at full charge, the swordsman taking a spear to the shoulder, and the spear-wielder taking a serrated sword to the guts. Both went down, temporarily out of action.

Jared released the beam and landed deftly on the deck a few feet away, skipping back a little to make sure he was out of reach of the groaning warriors.

Nausicans! It wasn't that they were all short sighted brutes with almost no situational awareness. Just... most of them.

Jared leaped back and onto a ledge on the wall - coolant mechanism housing, his mind for machinery told him at a glimpse - as three more Nausicans and two of the bolder Klingons advanced with weapons ready. They were halted, however, by a loud, commanding Klingon voice.

"Ancient, if you please!"

Heads in the room turned. One Klingon stood holding a Klingon disruptor rifle, pointing it at Jared. The advancing warriors stopped in their tracks, and stepped back to watch what happened next.

"Your back is against the wall, Ancient. There's no-one to trick into shooting me from the other side."

Jared regarded the Klingon thoughtfully. He had Sogh markings on - probably the ranking officer here, and clearly brighter than most of them. He was youthful - probably someone who'd advanced through the ranks by doing what no-one else would, and by being smarter than the average BeQ.

"Do you know for sure that stun setting works on my kind?" Jared asked, thoughtfully.

The Warrior didn't answer. He simply flicked the power setting with his thumb. Everyone heard the power cell in the rifle kick up a notch to high power.

"In which case," Jared replied, "I can think of two things that would make you not want to fire that thing. The first is if you know anything about my kind."

"I know the stories," the Sogh replied levelly. "You're all thousands of years old. You've travelled the width of the galaxy, and you know all it's secrets. You drink poison and eat fire, and death owes you some great debt. And now he shuns you lest you call in the favour."

"I don't believe any of it," he added coldly. "I think this rifle will kill you just as it would any other."

Jared nodded thoughtfully. "No... no, you don't strike me as the mythology type. Barely half that stuff is true at any rate. But you seem to be more the... hands on people focused type."

"So that just leaves this one question to ask before you pull that trigger. Tell me Sogh... you're a battle hardened veteran who's seen more than his share of enemies. You're standing with a rifle in your hands, and eleven armed warriors still at your command. And all you're facing is one tiny little unarmed humanoid. So I'd like you to do something before you fire. I'd like you to look me in the eyes, and tell me... am I afraid of you?"

There was a long, slow moment, as the TiQ and the Klingon regarded each other carefully.

The Klingon Sogh swallowed.

Then he pulled the trigger.

Jared had an incredibly good grasp of physiology. He also knew Klingons exceptionally well, and had watched them fight hundreds of times. There was a sort of poetry to their movement. Jared watched the slight tensing around the eyes that signalled the intention to fire. Saw the minute shift in stance as the warrior braced against the coming force of the disruptor shot, and followed the movement of the tendon along his forearm as it tensed up on the trigger.

It wasn't that the Vetus were fast enough to dodge disruptors as people sometimes thought. Jared was moving well before the trigger clicked home.

He jerked his feet out from under him and dropped straight down onto his back, the high-power disruptor bolt sizzling through the space he'd just vacated and passing within a few inches of his face. As he landed - slightly uncomfortably - he heard the sound of the coolant pipe behind him bursting as the disruptor shot ruptured it.

Within seconds, the chamber was flooded with thick steam venting out of the cooling system. Visibility dropped to almost nothing.

After that, things got a little... chaotic.