Planet Killler Stardate 2259.309

Captain’s Log Stardate 2259.309

The Enterprise has arrived at Druilliar system only to discover Druilliar IV, like Foltar VII had been destroyed. There are dangerous amounts of anti-protons nearby what is left of the planets. This was now a shipwide mystery and I’ve diverted the Enterprise to investigate this event.

The viewscreen was showing rubble left from the planet and a husk of what was left. Kirk signed the Yeoman's PADD then turned toward Spock and Scarlett who were scanning the rubble.

“Anything?” Kirk asked. “Yes and no Captain,” Spock said as Scarlett shifted back so Spock could look through her scanner. “There is an obvious trail of Anti-protons leading to and away from the planet,” Spock said. Kirk looked at the viewscreen and pursed his lips.

“Do we know which direction the originator of these Anti-protons went?” he asked. “What could destroy a planet?” Kal asked. “Something extremely large and powerful Kal,” Kirk replied. “We have something Captain,” Scarlett said. “Feed it to Navigation and set a course,” Kirk said. Fiona turned her head toward him. “I Sir,” she said then began to work with Scarletts telemetry.

After Jim had been informed that she had passed, Elyse had spoken to him privately and reassured him that she had no intention of leaving the Enterprise while their mission was still ongoing. He had seemed rather relieved by that news and had congratulated her on passing the exam. 

Word had quickly spread through the ship that Scotty and Sofia had broken up. Things in Engineering were rather...tense to say the least. They continued to work together, but they either worked in complete silence, or in an environment where the cute, old married couple type of banter had been replaced by not so cute, heated arguments. Amara had never imagined that Scotty would ever break up with Sofia. He had seemed so happy with her and now he was clearly very much not happy. 

However, they had bigger problems to deal with right now after discovering that two planetary systems had been completely destroyed. No one had ever seen anything like it and Scarlett and Spock were trying to figure out what could have done something like this. Scarlett managed to figure out which way the originator of the anti-protons had gone and after feeding the telemetry to Fiona's station, Fiona entered in the coordinates and they began to head that way.

“Amara, I need to speak to you,” Kirk said as he gestured toward the ready room. As she nodded and moved that way Kirk stood. “Warp 5 Kal and keep long range sensors going. I don’t want to run into this...thing, whatever it is,” Kirk said. As soon as the door closed behind him he reached up and hit the door lock. Before she even turned around he pushed her forward and bent her over the table. She felt him undo her skirt and then that and her panties were pulled down below her bottom to her thighs. She felt him jostle his own pants behind her and then he was inside of her a moment later.

Kirk was surprised at how wet she had gotten and he held her upper body flat against the table as he moved against her bottom. There was nothing gentle or loving about what was happening. This was desire and lust and the need for him to get off in her. It didn’t last very long, a few minutes of hard, quick thrusts and then he came in her. After he was done he did up his pants and let her up. Her right cheek was still red where it had been pressed onto the table top. Kirk was breathing fairly hard and his cheeks were pink from the effort. He plopped himself down onto his chair and leaned back and watched her straighten herself out after the manhandling and aggressive sex.

“So what’s going on with Scotty? Do you think we have a problem in Engineering/” he asked. When she looked at him his face took on a defensive look. “I...hear things too,” Kirk said.

Amara had been rather surprised when James had pressed her down against the table in the ready room and began to undo her skirt. Amara knew though that had she protested or told him no that he would have stopped. She let him do what he needed to do though. Due to various circumstances, they had not had sex the past few days. Clearly, that had affected him. Amara knew that she wasn't going to get off herself, but it didn't matter to her. She knew James well enough to know that he would make it up to her later.

Once he was finished, he backed off and let her up. The right side of her face had been pressed against the table and was red, but that would fade fairly quickly. She straightened up and began to adjust her uniform as she listened to James' question about Scotty. 

"I don't know. I think for some reason the thought that Sofia wants to get married, which I don't even think is true, freaked him out. I think Scotty's going to come to realize though that he doesn't want to be apart from her."

Kirk thought about that a moment. “So you think this is all a misunderstanding between them? How can we fix this? I have a mind to just sit them both down and have them hash it out but I doubt they’d appreciate that. This is part of the reason I was worried about the fraternization among the crew. I mean, what I just did is not part of that...or what I’m talking about. I needed you...that...sex with you,” he clarifiied.

“I know where I stand with you and I don’t worry about you screwing around on me. But that may not be the case for other couples. And we can’t say for certain Sofia ‘doesn’t’ want him to ask her to marry him. Maybe she does and has been throwing out signals. Scotty is a fairly intuitive sort. I think he’d know her better than anyone,” he said then thought about something.

“What about that Ensign...Davis in Security. I thought Sofia was would end up with him initially, not Scotty. I saw them together alot at first,” Kirk said.

Amara finished fixing herself up and looked over at James when he clarified that what had just happened between them had been 'needed'. She just smiled a little at his attempt at justification and sat on the table in front of him. She blinked when James then mentioned Ensign Davis from Security. 

"Are you suggesting setting Sofia up with a guy you know Scotty despises in order to make him jealous? Why Captain James Tiberius Kirk that is...diabolical," she said with an approving grin.

Kirk grinned. “Why thank you, I am learning,” He said, regarding her far superior skills in scheming. “Do you think you can set that up?” Kirk asked as he saw her sit down in front of him. “I can handle Scotty but Sofia might be in rebound mode,” he said. His body was still coming down off of that high of what just happened. Or, what he did to her.

Amara nodded. "Yeah, I can set up that. I'll just give both Davis and Sofia a little nudge towards one another. We just have to make sure that word gets back to Scotty about what's going on." She thought about it a moment. "He is going to be so pissed when he finds out. I mean he's mad enough at Davis that he kept sniffing around Sofia while they were together." She then became quiet a moment and looked at James and grinned a little. "Are you feeling better now?"

“I do feel better, thank you,” Kirk replied sweetly. “You think that we’ve been married and I don’t just want you sometimes. You just look incredible in that uniform,” He said with a smile. “And I like keeping you on your toes,” he said. “That and there is something very sexy about you having to wear wet panties for a while, and why they are wet,” he said.

“I’ll make certain Scotty knows whats going on after it starts,” Kirk said. “That way, they won’t compare notes and think it was all you or all me,” he said. Those 2 were not stupid, far from it. They had to act casually.

Amara grinned and rolled her eyes at what James said. In many ways, though she was sad that they wouldn't be able to have children of their own, not being able to become pregnant was quite freeing sexually. She and James didn't have to worry about birth control in the same way they had before. She leaned down and kissed him. The kiss lasted for a moment before she pulled back and grinned at him. "You owe me one for later," she whispered.

Kirk came out first then Amara did after. Spock stood up from the con then moved back to his XO chair. Amara took her place again and Kirk came and sat down. “Captain, we’ve arrived at Beta Reicher. We’re receiving a distress signal and it appears to be coming from the USS Constitution,” Spock said. The USS Constitution was one of the few Dreadnaughts Starfleet has built. Kirk turned to him in surprise. “Commodore Henley’s ship? What are they doing here?” Kirk asked. They were far beyond Federation Space. He didn’t even need to look at Amara for her to try and contact the ship.

“Scarlett, what’s their status?” Kirk asked.

Amara went back over to her seat and sat down. When she heard that they had picked up a distress signal from the USS Constitution she immediately tried to contact them. Scarlett looked over at Kirk when he asked for a status update.

"She's drifting and appears to have been wrecked. Damage reports show that all power plants are dead and reserve energy banks operative at a very low power level Sir. The entire bridge appears to be damaged and uninhabitable and life support systems are operative at a low level."

Amara looked at James. "There's no answer Captain. All I'm picking up is the ship's disaster beacon. There's heavy subspace interference. It's almost blocking the signal."

Kirk pursed the corner of his mouth as he thought about what to do. He leaned to his right and hit his intercom button. “Scotty, I need you to assemble two damage control teams and beam them to the Constitution,” Kirk said. “We’ll need to reroute all ship controls to Engineering, Kirk out,” he said then turned it off. “I’m going over there,” Kirk said and Spock stepped up to him. “Captain, my I remind you that we’ve failed to make contact with the ship. If something happens to the Enterprise, she will need her Captain,” He said. “Not this time Spock, Kirk said and stood up and looked at Amara. When she told him, without needing to be asked that McCoy was off duty he sighed.

“Inform Lagasho that she’s in the party,” he said. “You too Elyse,” he said. He intended to include her as much as possible with Away teams now that nothing was in her way of Captaining her own ship soon. They would need jackets as the ship’s life support was minimal. In the transporter room crewmen were there to help them get into the jackets. Kirk tossed Elyse a phaser. Lagasho, the very sexy, voluptuous Orion doctor came into the room. The one crewman that was about to help Elyse into her jacket moved away from her to help Lagasho into one. The other one that looked disappointed moved up to Elyse and helped her into one.

Amara had worked with James long enough at this point to know what he was going to say or ask her before the words even came out of his mouth. She nodded when he told her to contact Dr. Lagasho to inform her that she was going to be apart of the away team. Amara was a very intelligent and observant woman. She knew that Lagasho had a crush on James. However, she trusted James completely and knew there was nothing to worry about on his part. She contacted Lagasho and told her to meet the away team in the Transporter Room.

Elyse stood and walked with Kirk off the bridge. They headed to the Transporter Room as well and Elyse caught the phaser Kirk tossed to her. She saw a crewman move to help her put on her jacket, but before he did Lagasho entered the room and she blinked as he left her to go help her instead. She sighed a little and another crewman came over to help her.

Sofia looked at Scotty after he informed the team what was going on. Despite what was going on personally between them, they took situations like this seriously. "What do you need me to do?"

Kirk and the others assembled on the transporter pad. “Energize,” Kirk said.

Scotty and Sofia went into work mode once it was clear they had real work to do. Their personal problems took a step back in situations like these.

“Take command of team 2 and try and get the Warp Drive up and Running. “My team will work on weapons and shields and structural integrity. Once we get that we can work together to bring all ship, command functions to engineering...the bridge is gone,” he said then looked at Keenser.

“Get down! That’s not a climbin frame!” He said in a scolding tone. Keenser just shook his head. He was always there when they spoke for some reason.

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Lagasho managed to pull her eyes from Kirk but it wasn’t easy. Not only was he the Captain but he had that confident way about him that drove her crazy when she was around him for any length of time. She devised ways of tripping him into her bed though the consequences of that...of having Amara angry with her was really the only reason it hasn’t happened yet. She sighed and looked at her tricorder.

“I’m getting one lifesign Captain,” she said. “A human,” she said then shifted the tricorder down the hall. Kirk gestured silently to Elyse to shift to the other side of the hall. They were on deck 11, where there was still atmosphere and life support. Kirk set his phaser to stun. “Phasers on stun,” Kirk said as he stalked forward. “Where is the crew, over 800 people…” Kirk said as they walked down the hall. Even here there was rubble and damage. They had to maneuver around a fallen support beam and the smell of soot and burned metal was thick in the air.

Elyse set her phaser to stun and shifted to the other side of the hall when she saw Kirk's gesture. She was getting a really bad feeling about whatever happened here. This ship's crew was double the size of the Enterprise. Where the hell was everyone?

Sofia nodded and took her team and they headed to the Transporter Room. They were beamed onto the ship and they immediately headed towards the Warp Drive. "Captain, Vasquez here. My team is onboard. We're heading for the Warp Drive. I'll see what I can do to get it running."

Amara turned and spoke to Spock, who had the Con. "Captain, the interference is disrupting our abilities to contact Starfleet. We're on our own."

“Yes, this concentration of Anti-protons...keep in contact with the away teams Amara, we need to learn what happened to the crew,” Spock said.

Kirk and Elyse moved up to what appeared to be the bar. The door was jammed and kirk tried to force it open. Elyse moved right to the door control panel and tried it but nothing worked. Finally she looked around her and found a small, metal shard. She picked it up and wedged it into the side of the panel until it popped open. She pulled the panel back from the wall and disconnected the locking mechanism. The door shifted slightly then Kirk was able to force it open. Lagasho was very worried that everyone on board was dead. She had never seen so many and she hoped it wasn’t now.

Kirk switched on his wrist lamp as did the others as they stepped inside. It was dark but there wasn’t any bodies. Nothing, no one but then Kirk thought he saw someone’s arm. They approached cautiously. He looked at Lagasho and she nodded silently. Elyse shifted to the side to get a clear shot if she needed to shoot and not hit Kirk. Kirk spun the chair around. The man in it flung up his hand with a phaser in it but Kirk caught it by his wrist. The man was of middling years with a little gray in his hair. He had blue eyes and a light complexion. He was tall and thin though not particularly muscular. His blue eyes had a desperate, crazed look in them. Kirk was able to disarm him and the man held his hurt wrist against his chest.

“Commodore Henley?” Kirk asked. The man looked at Kirk. Elyse’s light shined on them both so the man saw Kirk’s face. “James...Kirk...I...remember you,” he said. His voice was dry and cracked when he spoke. Kirk pocketed the man’s phaser and holstered his. Henley smiled. “Kirk...you should leave...the Captain goes down with his ship!” Henley said crazily. Kirk frowned then lifted the man up by his shoulders. He shook him. “Commodore...Tom...where is the crew!?” Kirk asked in an urgent, worried tone.

Amara nodded to Spock. "Aye, Captain." She turned back around to her station. 

Elyse couldn't help but notice as she poked her head into various rooms along the hallway that everything seemed to be in order. It didn't look like the crew was abducted. It looked like the crew just...left. The tricorder led them to what appeared to be the bar. The door was jammed and Elyse was able to force the door control panel open and then disconnect the locking mechanism, allowing Jim to force it open. They moved in cautiously. It was dark, but they were able to use their wrist lamps to illuminate small areas. She and Jim both spotted what looked like a man in a chair. She moved off to one side with her phaser at the ready to get a good shot if she needed to. Jim was able to disarm the man and it was then that they realized it was Commodore Henley. Elyse relaxed and holstered her phaser. 

Lagasho stepped up to Henley and gave him a hypospray injection. She then looked at Kirk when he shook him. "Captain, give him a minute. The man is in shock," she said. She placed her hand on top of one of Kirk's to stop him. Elyse noticed this and knew what game this woman was playing. She didn't like it one bit. 

"Captain, I've checked the engines," Vasquez said. "The warp drive is a hopeless pile of junk. The impulse engines are not too badly off. We should be able to do something with them. The phaser banks are completely exhausted. Whatever happened, they didn't give up without a fight. The computer system is still in tact. We can playback the duplicate Captain's log from the auxiliary control room."

Kirk let the man sit back down. “We...encountered a vast...machine of some kind. Miles long. When we came toward it we noticed that it was using some kind of anti-proton beams toward a planet...Reicher VI. The planet just...came apart Jim,” Tom said. Kirk glanced at Elyse. “Yes, we...saw other planets like this one,” Kirk said. “We tried to stop it Jim, we did everything we could! There are populated planets not far from here. If that...thing gets to them...You see it uses the rubble and asteroids it creates as some kind of fuel for itself. When we attacked...we took...heavy damage. Warp drive and weapons went offline, life support was failing. I...evacuated the crew to Reicher VII,” he said as he began to weep. Kirk closed his eyes at hearing that and paused a moment to collect himself. He knew some of those people. So many...gone.

“So you see, I evacuated them just to send them to their deaths Jim...I decided to just come here and die along with my ship,” Tom said wearily.

‘So not a living life form, but a machine, built by...something and let loose to devour entire star systems. Some kind of ‘Doomsday Machine’ Kirk thought. ‘If we don’t stop it, it might come across populated worlds’.

Kirk flipped out his communicator. “Spock, lock onto this ship with a tractor beam, then continue to follow the anti-proton trail at our best speed,” Kirk said. “Yes Captain,” Spock said.

Kirk stepped up to Lagasho. Had she fluffed up her hair? “Take the Commodore to sickbay and give him a full physical,” Kirk said softly and didn’t notice how she was looking at him. “Have security posted outside sickbay,” Kirk said under his breath.

Lagasho heard Kirk's orders and she nodded. She let her eyes meet his for a moment before she gently pulled Commodore Henley to his feet. She pulled out her communicator and flipped it open. "Two to beam up. Put us directly in sickbay," she requested. A moment later they were gone. Elyse waited until she was gone before speaking to Jim. She considered Jim and Amara very good friends and felt she could talk to him honestly.

"You do realize Dr. Lagasho is trying to get your attention, right?"

Once they were gone Kirk appeared to relax a little. He turned to Elyse. “She’s an Orion, it’s what they do,” Kirk said as if he knew full well what she was doing and he did. He actually kind of liked it too. He smiled at Elyse. “It’s alright Elyse,” he said as he shifted and put his hand on her shoulder. “Besides, it’s nothing like what Kal feels for you. I suspect he genuinely loves you, and not in the way you think,” Kirk said as he looked around the room. Kirk was a man and he knew when other men had feelings for women. Kal might love Fiona but he also loved Elyse. Elyse was unavailable but it didn’t change how he felt about her. He only tried to hide it and keep it bottled up inside him.

“Let's head to Engineering,” Kirk said then looked at her as she hadn’t moved yet. He nodded and they began walking. “Its jefferies tubes down to engineering. That’ll be fun,” Kirk said sarcastically.

Elyse blushed a little when Jim pointed out that Kal was in love with her. She had hoped that perhaps his feelings would begin to fade now that he was involved with Fiona, but, at least according to Jim, that wasn't the case. She sighed, but decided not to speak further about Dr. Lagasho. She just hoped the woman wouldn't push things too far. Amara would not put up with something like that.

They headed out of the bar and towards Engineering. Elyse knew the Enterprise backwards and forwards at this point and had spent time in jefferies tubes before, although she didn't necessarily like it. Elyse could get claustrophobic. She much preferred the wide openness of the bridge. However, it was the only way down. They headed down and she forced herself to breathe and keep going. Jim, Spock, Amara and McCoy were the only ones who knew about her fear.

The ship suddenly lurched as the Enterprise began to tow it. Kirk looked up and saw Elyse clutch onto the ladder. The jeffries tube vibrated and groaned as the ship’s hull was forced to follow the Enterprise. “Elyse, take a slow, deep breath. Hold it for a few seconds then take another one,” Kirk said. He didn’t move until she was ready to move. Once she was they continued down. They had to open several hatches and head down several sets of ladders until they opened the hatch that led right onto the deck in the Engine room. Sofia was there as well as the other Engineers. Her face was filthy like her uniform and jacket. Two knuckles on her left hand were stained with blood as if she had banged them or cut them. “Report,” Kirk said as he brushed off his jacket.

“Main Impulse drives will be fixed in a couple of hours Captain but as I said before, The Warp Drive is another matter. If I had the ship in drydock I could have it running in 3 weeks,” she said. “Well, we’ll have to call for a tug, I’m not going to lose this ship,” Kirk said. “What about rerouting the controls?” he asked. “Silas has been working on that sir, also a few hours,” she said. “Alright, have you seen Scotty?” He asked. For a moment her eyes went soft and then hardened right up again.

“No sir,” she said.

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Spock looked at Scarlett. “How long Scarlett, before you think we’ll run into that thing. I presume it must stop to ‘destroy’ the planets it chooses to consume,” he said.

Elyse had been moving down pretty quickly through the jefferies tubes until the Enterprise locked onto the Constitution with a tractor beam and began to tug it along. The Constitution lurched and the sudden movement startled Elyse and she desperately clutched to the ladder for a few moments. She heard Jim's calm, soothing voice and she listened to him and did as he instructed. She was thankful for Jim's presence and he waited until she was ready. She began to move again and they soon made it down to Engineering. Sofia was filthy and she had some blood smeared on her left hand. 

"His team was supposed to be working on weapons, shields, and structural integrity," Sofia finally said. 

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Scarlett looked over at Spock. "It's difficult to tell, but I would say a couple of hours. I've been able to study it using the long range sensors and it appears to be essentially a robot...an automated weapon of immense size and power. It's apparent function is to smash planets to rubble and then digest the debris for fuel, therefore making it essentially self-sustaining as long as there are planetary bodies for it to feed on. I've also projected it's path back on our star charts and have found that it came from another galaxy."

"Supposedly? Are you not in constant communication?" Kirk asked when she looked at him Jim's bottom lip tightened and he motioned for her to come over to the side away from the others. Elyse had come with them.

"Look, you two can pummel one another all you want on your own time but when you're in that uniform, I expect you to do your job. Yours was to lead your team and keep in touch with the other team leader. By the looks of it you were crawling all over the floor and doing all the repairs yourself. How commendable but you have people to take your direction and do that. If you're incapable of explaining to them what you need done and have such little faith in them to get it done, I can find someone else to do your job Sofia! Find out if they are falling behind and give them help if they are!" He commanded. "Go," he said in an urgent tone then stepped over to the control console that would eventually be switched over to Pilot the ship. Kirk pressed a few buttons. There was power to the console but nothing was working yet.

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"Do you think it's possible that someone or something directed this weapon? I do not understand it's purpose to randomly destroy worlds," Spock said.