Author Topic: Outpost CAV  (Read 1566 times)

Offline EnabranTain

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Outpost CAV
« on: December 15, 2022, 05:16:42 PM »
WARNING!
The following story contains graphic and sexually explicit content, including depictions of rape and abuse.
Rape and assault are serious crimes and the author does not condone such actions in real life.
This is a work of fiction. No characters in it are meant to resemble any real person.
If you do not wish to read such stories, please stop now.

This is a fan fiction work, set in the Star Trek universe.
I do not own Star Trek, or any of the related characters. The Star Trek franchise was created by Gene Roddenberry and is currently owned by Paramount. This story is intended for entertainment purposes only. I am not making any profit from this story. All rights of the Star Trek franchise belong to Paramount.


Outpost CAV

The candlelight coming from each of the small tables gave the restaurant the appearance of bioluminescent insects in a field of dark green when seen from the upper balcony. The maître d' took their names and confirmed the reservation before leading them down the stairs to occupy one of those points of light right next to the large windows overlooking the city lights of New Sydney.
The couple had donned appropriately elegant outfits for the occasion. Ensign Brinner Finok wore what the computer told him was the current trend in tuxedos, not that he could tell the difference between any of the versions he’d looked at. Ezri Tigan, 21 year old junior ship’s counselor, was absolutely fetching in a sparkling black sequin dress. Her short dark hair gave her a playful, almost tomboyish appearance, while her blue eyes could pierce any young man’s heart. Being Trill, she resembled a human female except for the mottled pattern of spots that ran from each temple, down the side of her neck, and disappeared beneath the strapless dress under her arms. The spots could then be found again on the sides of her legs above the knees as they exited the short dress and continued all the way down to her feet.
The Trill were what other alien races referred to as a joined species. Two beings, one humanoid the other, a slug like being about the size of a softball, existed as host and symbiont with the slug being implanted in the humanoid host’s belly. Together they would share a consciousness, a blending of their two minds. When the host eventually passed away, the symbiont would pass to the next, accumulating lifetimes of experience and wisdom.
Ezri, however, was not joined with a symbiont. Only one in a thousand Trill become joined as the slug beings were quite rare, but Ezri was an intelligent and insightful young woman all on her own.
“Quite an impressive place, I must say,” said Brinner.
“I used to come here with my family on special occasions,” said Ezri as she sat down gracefully and looked out the window with a smile of remembered joyful times.
“Your family must be quite well off!”
“Uh huh,” Ezri nodded and held her glass up as the waiter filled it with a golden beverage, “They own one of the larger mining operations in New Sydney.”
Binner whistled in mild surprise. “I’m jealous, my folks just dragged me around the galaxy from one outpost to the next.”
“I think I would have liked that.”
“You’d think so, but for a kid, it’s not always easy being a Starfleet brat.”
“It couldn’t have been that bad, you still joined up.” Ezri eyed her companion, enjoying getting to know him better. Their relationship had been slowly growing more intimate, but was not yet what one might call committed.
“Well, I’d be lying if I said my folks didn’t push me into it, but what else can you expect from two career minded officers?”
Ezri sat up a little straighter in her chair. “How does that make you feel? Do you ever think maybe you’re pursuing their dreams and not your own?”
“Hey now, this is a date, not a counseling session,” said Brinner.
“Sorry,” Ezri leaned forward and gazed into his eyes, “But I do like getting to know more about you.”
“That’s good to hear.” Brinner leaned forward too, taking her hand while he moved in for a kiss.
The comm chime interrupted the moment and the voice of Captain Raymer came sounding urgent, “Miss Tigan, please report to the mission briefing room immediately.”
“Yes captain, um sorry, do I have time to change into uniform first?” Ezri asked, glancing down at her somewhat revealing attire.
“Best you do, but make it quick, Raymer out.”
Brinner shook his head in disappointment, “What kind of emergency could possibly need a junior counselor so urgently?”
“I don’t know. I’m sorry, rain check?”
“Absolutely, you’re not getting out of this date so easily!”
Ezri smiled and the two of them stood up. “Computer, end program and save.” With a soft whoosh, the room and all the other people vanished leaving the couple standing alone in the black square room with yellow grid lines on the walls, designated as holodeck two.

Back in her quarters aboard the USS Destiny, Ezri swiftly donned her black uniform which had gray shoulders on the overshirt. The collar of a blue undershirt, visible at the neck, indicated she was part of the science or medical branches. She jogged to the briefing room and entered while the mission briefing was getting underway.
Captain Raymer stood at the front of the room, next to the viewscreen wearing the same type of uniform but with a red undershirt indicating command, and four pips on her collar. “… as such, we cannot divert to intercept and will need to… ah thank you for joining us counselor,” she indicated that Ezri should take a seat.
The chief medical officer, Bailey, and one of the other doctors, Stupned, were seated by the windows. Behind them, the stars whizzed past in streaks indicating the ship was traveling at high warp speed. Across from the doctors were the chief engineer Rhykvein and another officer Ezri did not recognize, but he also wore the gold undershirt that indicated he was part of engineering or security.
Captain Raymer continued, “I was just explaining that the Destiny has been redirected to Deep Space Nine effective immediately. Apparently there’s some large joint fleet operation being planned with the Klingons and the Romulans.”
Rhykvein snorted, “About time we took the fight directly to the Dominion!”
“We don’t know what the operation is just yet, only that we’ve been ordered to the Bajoran sector to await further orders, but with this many ships from each of the fleets shifting positions, it’s hard to hide the fact that something big is in the works.”
“What’s the target?” asked Bailey.
“We don’t know for certain yet that there is a target, doctor. Please, everyone, let's keep the speculation to a minimum. I know the war has put us all on edge, and we’ll be ready once the orders come, but that’s not why we’re here.” Raymer tapped the screen bringing up a display of the USS Destiny’s current trajectory towards DS9 with a system adjacent to their flight path highlighted. “It seems these days we can’t go anywhere without a distress call cropping up along the way. Lieutenant commander…”
Rhykvein stood and approached the screen. Rhykvein was a Tellarite with a bushy beard and piglike nose. He spoke gruffly as did most of his race. “Sensors picked up a weak encoded distress signal from the Ceti Alpha system. It took some work to clean it up, and frankly it’s remarkable we even detected it. As you can see, we’ll pass relatively close to the system, or at least much closer than any other Federation ship is likely to anytime soon, given current wartime fleet deployments.”
He tapped the screen and the display switched to a static filled recording of a human woman in a Starfleet uniform. Her hair was disheveled and she had a large purple bruise on her cheek.

“This is lieutenant commander Eva Garnier of the Federation outpost Stormzoeker in the Ceti Alpha system calling any and all vessels. The planet we’ve been studying has become unstable and we need… I, need immediate evacuation. I don’t know how much longer we can last on the surface and our short range shuttle was…” she glanced off screen looking afraid, “…damaged in the earthquakes.” A loud metallic bang offscreen made Garnier flinch and she looked off to the side again with wide, terror filled eyes. “Please, I… I don’t know… our computer systems are… compromised.” She looked back at the camera and began scratching at her right arm compulsively. “Just get us… I mean, me… please get me out of here! I beg you!”

The screen returned to the display of the Destiny’s flight path. Captain Raymer resumed the briefing as Rhykvein sat down. “Records indicate lieutenant commander Garnier is part of a research outpost on Ceti Alpha Five, along with three other science officers, Watley, Timison, and Jefferies. They’re studying the unusual gravitational wave and subspace distortion patterns in the system. It’s a long term assignment and if the information I have here is correct, they’ve been on that outpost with only brief vacations for nearly four years.”
Ezri couldn’t get the disturbing image of Garnier’s panicked expression out of her mind. “Did you see the way she looked?” Ezri asked, “She’s suffered some kind of severe mental trauma.”
“And normally we’d go directly there ourselves, but we cannot divert the Destiny right now, our fleet orders take priority. Nor can we risk sending our chief personnel away. I need Bailey and Rhykvein here in case we’re sent into battle. That’s why I’m sending you along with doctor Stupned on the rescue mission. It’s clear from her message that she’s not telling us the whole story. You’ll be there to help her psychologically, but also to determine if she’s telling us the truth. Doctor Stupned can make sure she’s physically healthy and command the mission. Lieutenant Nise will accompany you as well,” the other engineering officer that Ezri did not recognize nodded, “The system or even the planet itself may prevent normal transporter functions, lieutenant, your job will be to figure out how to overcome any such challenges and get our people safely off the surface. We also want to try and save any research they’ve done if possible, but of course saving lives comes first.”
“Understood,” the young officer replied.
“We’ll be back to pick you up as soon as we can, but depending on what our orders are when we reach Bajor, it could be several days. You may need to proceed to DS9 on your own once you recover the outpost’s crew and data.”
Raymer looked at Ezri and Nise, “I realize there are a lot of unknowns and the two of you don’t have a lot of field experience. I’m sending you on what could turn out to be a hazardous mission because I have no other choice. Remember your training, listen to doctor Stupned, and above all keep yourselves safe. Questions?”
Neither of them spoke up with any inquiries.
“Then you’re dismissed. Tigan and Nise, report to shuttle bay one in ten minutes.”
“Yes captain,” they replied, not quite in unison, as they stood and left the room.

Ezri had just enough time to return to her quarters and pack an extra uniform, a few PADDs loaded with books on crisis trauma management, and send a quick message to Brinner telling him she had to leave the ship on short notice.
She was hurriedly waved into a runabout with Stupned and Nise already onboard and they were out of the shuttle bay in less than two minutes. In a flash of light, the USS Destiny was gone, back into warp on its way toward the Bajoran sector. Ezri felt a twinge of misgivings, feeling suddenly very much alone in the emptiness of space.
“Set course for Ceti Alpha Five, warp four.” said Stupned.
Nise worked the controls, “Course set.”
“Engage.”
The stars appeared to slide sideways as the runabout turned to face a new direction and then jolted into warp speed.

Doctor Stupned went to the rear of the runabout to get some rest before they arrived. Ezri sat in the co-pilot’s seat, but she wasn’t much of a pilot, having only done the basic training required to qualify for shipboard duty. In the runabout, with its more sophisticated array of equipment than a standard shuttlecraft, Ezri didn’t recognize half the controls in front of her.
“So, are you new to the Destiny?” Ezri looked over at Nise who was watching the controls and adjusting something, although she couldn't fathom what might need adjusting now that they were at warp.
Nise nodded, “I was just transferred about a month and a half ago.”
“Oh,” Ezri looked down. There had been about a dozen new transfers at that time; replacements for men and women lost during a fight with a Jem’Hadar battleship. “Well, welcome aboard.”
“Uh huh,” he acknowledged curtly and continued working intently at his controls.
Ezri looked him over discreetly. He was human, probably in his mid twenties, with dark hair, slightly longer than most men aboard ship. He had a pale skin tone, close to her own, although without the spots.
“What are you working on? It’s not course corrections is it?”
“Huh? Oh, no, no I was just trying to see if I could further clean up that distress call transmission, maybe get a little more information about what we’re walking into. Maybe there was something in the background, or something about the interference itself might give us a clue.”
“Right… good idea.”
He fiddled with the controls for a moment longer, but then turned off the display with a scoff and turned towards Ezri. “Well it was an idea, but I’m not getting anywhere with it.” He seemed to notice Ezri for the first time, eyebrows raising and looking at her figure without hiding it very well. “So uh, it’s Ezri, right?”
“Yep,” Ezri smirked, seeing his obvious attraction. “Ezri Tigan, ship’s counselor in training.”
“I’ve seen you in the mess hall with Brinner, right? He’s a lucky man!”
“Thanks. I mean, we’re not that serious, not yet at least.”
“Well, glad to hear it, if you don’t mind my saying so,” he smiled playfully, “Carter Nise.” He held out his hand.
Ezri shook it, “Glad to meet you, I hope we don’t die out here.”
“Ah, don’t worry, it's probably just a case of cabin fever. I tell ya, if I was stuck on some remote rock for four years, I’d go crazy too. That’s why you’re coming, right? In case their uh, inertial dampers, aren’t working right?”
“Actually the crews that take these kinds of assignments tend to be more at peace in isolation. That’s why they take them. I’d be surprised if that’s the problem. Garnier looked like… well, almost like she’d been attacked, or held prisoner and had just escaped.”
“Whatever, that’s why you’re the counselor I guess. I just hope she was exaggerating the conditions in the system or we might be in for some rough flying.” Carter turned back to the controls but glanced back to look Ezri up and down again, “but I’d say it looks like you can handle some rough, uh, flying.”
Ezri raised an eyebrow and smirked, “You didn’t have much opportunity for social interaction on your last posting, did you?”
“Ouch, is it that obvious?”
“Let’s just say we could work on how you choose to express your feelings.”
“Fair enough.”
Ezri let the moment hang for a couple of seconds before giving a little shrug, “But you’re not wrong, I can handle a fair amount of... turbulence.”

It was another several hours before they arrived at the Ceti Alpha system. Ezri had dozed off in the co-pilot’s seat, but was startled awake as the runabout dropped out of warp and she was nearly tossed from her seat.
“What the hell?!” Carter tapped away at the panel in front of him. “Commander Stupned, you better get up here!”
The blue skinned Bolian came running into the main cabin, struggling to keep on her feet as the ship rocked back and forth. “Report!” Stupned shouted.
“We just dropped out of warp on the edge of the Ceti Alpha system. There’s fluctuating gravitational waves coming from the sun like I’ve never seen before! It doesn’t make any sense, this is a standard G-type star, I don’t get it!”
“Can you compensate?”
“I’m trying, but this isn’t a hazard they train you for at the academy.”
The ship’s erratic movements stopped and the navigational display showed ready to proceed to Ceti Alpha V on impulse power.
“Good work lieutenant,” said Stupned.
Shaking his head, Carter still looked confused, “It wasn’t anything I did, ma’am, the waves, they just stopped.”
“Well, keep looking into it, but for now let’s proceed to Stormzoeker outpost. The sooner we get those scientists out of here, the better.”
“Yes ma’am,” Carter tapped the controls and the ship resumed its course.
“Counselor Tigan, are you alright?” Stupned asked.
“Yes, I’m fine, just a little shaken up.”
Carter kept his eyes on the controls, but said in an upbeat tone, “Don’t worry, it’ll take more than that to knock a runabout out of the sky. Tough little ships these things.”

There were no further incidents and they achieved orbit around Ceti Alpha V a few minutes later. The planet below them looked like a barren wasteland. Sand dunes appeared to engulf the continent below them.
Doctor Stupned leaned in to activate the com-link, “Stormzoeker outpost, this is the Federation runabout Yodo-gawa, we received your distress call, please respond.”
After a moment of silence, she tried again, “Stormzoeker outpost... lieutenant commander Garnier, please respond, this is doctor Stupned of the Starship Destiny, we’ve been sent to assist you.”
Another moment of silence passed.
“Lieutenant Nise, are there any lifesigns in the outpost?”
Carter used the sensors, but by his expression, it didn’t look like it was going well. “I’m sorry commander, there’s some kind of interference, it’s almost as if... ah that’s why. The outpost was built to withstand some pretty strong sandstorms, they’ve got a specially configured array of force fields around the facility, it’s preventing our sensors from getting clear readings.”
“Can we beam down?”
Carter tapped at the controls, “Negative, with those force field generators I wouldn’t risk beaming down anywhere within a kilometer of the outpost or we could end up pretty scrambled. They do have a transporter of their own we could link with. Their computer would have to tell ours how to synchronize the transporter frequencies to beam through the force fields, but...”
“But what?”
“Well, I’m only getting intermittent contact with the outpost’s computer system. It does seem to be acting funny and Garnier said their systems had been compromised.”
“Suggestions?”
Ezri peered down at the desolate looking planet. “Could we land? Fly down there and just walk up to the door?”
“It’d be a bumpy ride, but the ship should be able to handle it easy enough,” said Carter, “There’s some environmental suits in the back we brought just in case. We could land a kilometer outside the facility and take a walk.”
Doctor Stupned looked less than enthused about the idea, but resigned to the necessity of it. “I just hope they installed a doorbell on that thing. Take us down, lieutenant.”
“Aye Aye.”

The planet seemed to lunge towards them as the nose of the runabout dipped and seconds later the ship started to tremble with turbulence. Doctor Stupned gripped the headrests of the pilot and co-pilot seats.
“Ezri, watch the hull temperature,” Carter ordered, “let me know if it’s about to enter the red.”
A schematic of the ship appeared on the screen in front of her with statistics about the runabout’s hull integrity. She highlighted the hull temperature and watched as the indicator climbed through a green colored zone and entered a wide yellow margin. Other numbers began to climb as well indicating hull stress and deflection, but they were still well in the green.
The ship lurched and bounced as the turbulence got worse; reddish brown sand blew against the fore windows.
“We should be through the worst of it in about five minutes,” said Carter.
The swirling sand made a sizzling sound as the storm’s intensity increased closer to the surface. It grew into a rasping and Ezri feared the sand would permanently etch the windows on the craft. Ezri was bounced up and down hard enough to be lifted off her chair entirely, but kept her focus on the readout in front of her. The hull temperature continued to climb and was now more than two thirds of the way towards the red. The hull integrity had entered the yellow.
“Just another minute,” Carter said. “It should get better once we drop below this thermal layer!”
Doctor Stupned closed her eyes and gripped the chairs tightly. She appeared to get even more intensely blue the harder the runabout shook.
Suddenly, red flashing lights erupted all across the control panels. The ship seemed to drop like a stone. For a few heartbeats, Ezri was weightless and drifted out of her seat. Then the ship stabilized and she fell back down, smacking her head on the console. When she lifted her head, a small blood smear from her nose covered the hull temperature readout. She wiped it away and saw that the reading was still barely in the yellow, but the hull integrity reading had jumped to the middle of its red zone!
The ship’s alarm chime sounded out loudly followed by the calm and slightly nasal voice of the computer, “WARNING. Maneuvering thruster failure. Hull integrity compromised. Ship is now off course.”
Stupned, scrambling to get into one of the rear seats after having been tossed to the floor shouted, “What the hell was that?!”
Carter, who had somehow managed to stay in his seat, cried out over the sound of the ship's alarm and the wailing of the storm outside, “It’s another gravitational wave! HOLD ON!”
All of them were tossed against the starboard side of the cabin as the port thruster failed and the ship began to spiral.
“Computer!” Nise cried out, “emergency landing protocol!”
The computer gave a buzzing chime indicating an error “Unable to comply. Insufficient power to thrusters and inertial dampers.”
Nise strained to sit up as the centrifugal force pinned everyone against the starboard wall. “Use... auxiliary power!”
The computer chimed its negative again, “auxiliary power is offline.”
“Divert power from life support and hull integrity!”
“No!” Ezri screamed, “the hull integrity is...”
The computer finally gave its confirmation chime, the ship lurched again and the spinning stopped. The three occupants fell to the floor like ragdolls.
Ezri got to hands and knees “Carter! The hull integrity is failing! We have to divert power from somewhere else!”
The ship rocked violently as the thrusters fired on automatic, slowing the descent, but an ominous sound of metal bending echoed through the cabin. Carter got back into the pilot's seat and Ezri clawed her way into hers. The main control panel showed the computer’s automatically calculated landing trajectory.
“It’s too late, we’ll be on the surface in a few seconds! Brace for impact!”
Ezri couldn’t see the ground speed indicator from where she was, but looking out the fore window, she doubted they could survive hitting the ground without slowing down considerably first. She put her hands against the console and pressed her petite frame into the chair, never before feeling so fragile.

The ship inched its way down and hit the first dune like a stone skipping on a pond. Thrusters fired to keep the vessel from tumbling end over end, but when they hit the second dune, an ear-splitting screech of metal being rent apart preceded the back half of the runabout falling away, ripped off by the shear forces it could no longer tolerate.
Heat and sand filled the cabin as it rolled sideways and hit the ground. The occupants were thrown around, slammed into consoles, ceiling, and chairs while the front half of the Yodo-gawa rolled in the rust brown sand of Ceti Alpha V before finally coming to a stop.
No one bad is ever truly bad, and no one good is ever truly good.
-Loki

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Offline EnabranTain

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Re: Outpost CAV
« Reply #1 on: December 15, 2022, 05:18:14 PM »
Ezri opened her eyes. The sound of wind whipping around the wreck, interspersed with electrical shorts from the damaged vessel, felt like a peaceful quiet after the cacophony of the crash. She sat up, bruised and battered, her nose bleeding, but otherwise not seriously injured.
“Carter?” She looked around at the now totally foreign looking interior of the runabout main cabin. The ship had come to rest at a forty-five degree angle on its side. Three of the four chairs had been ripped out of their floor mounts and were missing. Sand covered the bottom quarter of the cabin.
“Lieutenant NISE!” she called out once she could stand up. “CARTER! DOCTOR STUPNED!” There was no answer.
She walked to the ragged edge of where the back half of the runabout used to be and looked outside. The front half of the runabout had gouged out a trench in the landscape. It was strewn with bits of metal and engine components that were quickly being covered over in sand as the wind blew.
Ezri tapped her combadge, “Ensign Tigan to anyone who can hear me, please respond.” She tapped her badge several more times, but it only buzzed an error tone.

The sand was cutting and blew with a deafening force. Ezri tried to get a response from the ship’s computer, but it was dead. She looked for any emergency supplies and found a first aid kit with a small amount of food, water, and a tricorder. She slung the kit over her shoulder and with little other choice, prepared to head out.
Ezri removed her uniform’s overshirt and tied the sleeves around her face to act as a dust mask before venturing into the sandstorm to follow the path of the ship's debris field. The trench was filling quickly and Ezri had a hard time making headway in the shifting sand, but half an hour out, she discovered one of the ship’s chairs. Using the tricorder she found lifesigns nearby. Carter was unconscious and mostly buried in sand fifty feet away. Ezri followed the instructions on the tricorder and used the hypospray from the first aid kit to revive him.
They couldn’t even talk in the sandstorm, but it was clear they had to get back to the shelter of the runabout if they were to survive. It took another hour for the pair to return to the crashed fore section and they collapsed immediately, gasping in the life saving shelter.
When they’d caught their breath, Ezri used the tricorder to scan Carter, finding a broken ulna in his left arm and four cracked ribs. She gave him another hypo and put her folded uniform shirt under his head. “You know, when I said I could handle some turbulence, that’s not what I meant.”
Carter did his best to smile through the pain, “Oh you were making a sexual inuendo,” he said, trying to keep his spirits up, “and here I went to all this trouble to get your attention.”
“Well you did manage to get me alone, but your social skills need way more work than I’d originally thought.”
Carter was in too much pain to smile this time and looked around at the cabin with a worried expression. “Doctor Stupned?”
Ezri shook her head, “I didn’t find any other lifesigns.”
Carter closed his eyes, “I think I saw her get pulled out right after the ship broke apart, but... I was hoping I was wrong. Does the ship have power?”
“I think so, but the main console is dead. Can we fix it and put out a distress call?”
Carter shook his head, “It would be useless. There wouldn’t be enough power for anyone to receive it. The only reason we got the outpost’s distress call is because they have a proper transmission tower and signal booster.”
“So what do we do?”
Carter sat up and looked around, “We might be able to get the transporter working.”
“I thought you said we couldn’t transport into the outpost?”
“That was from orbit, we’re a lot closer now and frankly, we don’t have any other choice. If I can get a stable connection with their computer system it’ll be a lot safer too. We can’t stay here, look.” The cabin was filling with sand and it would only be a matter of time before their shelter was gone.
Ezri eyed the transporter pads, their console lights flickering on and off. “How close? Could we make it on foot instead?”
“We were on approach when the gravitational waves hit us, so we’re close in the sense that it’s not on the other side of the planet, but... it could still be a hundred or maybe a thousand kilometers away.”

They worked until nightfall, Carter directing Ezri on what to do to restore power and function to the transporter. Its targeting sensors were able to find the outpost a little over 400 kilometers to the northeast.
Huddled over the glow of the small transporter control panel, Carter looked up after having spent half an hour fiddling with it. “Ok we have a choice. We can either try beaming into the outpost with only our transporter and hope the force fields don’t scatter our atoms into the wind, or we can risk linking both transporters, trusting the outpost’s computer to receive our patterns and assemble us properly on the inside.”
“I’m just a counselor, I don’t know anything about transporter tech, and besides, you’re the ranking officer. You’re in command.”
“Right...” he double checked the panel once more and activated the transporter protocols. “I’ve got a link with the outpost’s transporter. It seems stable enough for the moment. I think that’s our best bet. Let’s go.”
He tapped the thirty second delay and let Ezri help him up, putting his good arm over her shoulders. They hobbled onto the transporter pad and waited while the computer beeped away the seconds, counting down to activation.
“Looks like my plan for a romantic getaway with you is working afterall!” said Carter as he winced in pain.
“You know how to show a girl a good time, that’s for sure.”

The transport cycle took longer than normal and a strange tingling sensation like bugs crawling under her skin sent Ezri into a mild panic. The dark interior of the wrecked Yodo-gawa dissolved before her eyes into the blinding electric blue glow of the transporter beam. There was a flash of white light and she felt a change in air temperature. As the musical hum of the transporter faded, Ezri could smell the faint acrid scent of burning electronics. Dim lights illuminated the corner of the cargo bay where the outpost’s transporter was located. A small console stood before her on a narrow pillar, behind which were several rows of cargo crates.
She looked to her left, but Carter had not materialized with her. The console was emitting a soft intermittent warning chime in sync with a flashing yellow light that reflected off the wall beside it. Ezri stepped off the transporter pad and rushed to the console. It was indicating a transport had been paused mid-cycle and was awaiting authorization to re-materialize. Ezri hit the confirm button and the transporter hummed to life once more to deposit a fatigued looking Carter Nise. He wobbled on his feet for a second before falling. Ezri was at his side in an instant, using the last dose of the hypospray to revive him again.
After opening his eyes Carter looked surprised to be alive, “I made it. I thought I was done for. Everything went cold and... I blacked out. I felt like I was dying.”
“What happened? That transport felt so weird.”
“I’m not sure, there was some problem mid transport. Get me to the console.”
Ezri helped Carter up again and brought him over to the display.
“After I re-materialized there was a yellow flashing light, it said I had to authorize the final stage of your transport?”
Carter tapped through several screens and found the transporter’s activity log. “Some of this looks corrupted, but apparently there was a system failure when we tried to beam in.” He scrolled through several technical looking log entries that Ezri did not understand. “We’re damn lucky to be here. The pattern buffer fused almost as soon our patterns were being loaded. It looks like it was only able to re-materialize one of us and the other’s pattern had to be stored in conventional computer memory.”
“Sorry, I didn’t take any extra engineering courses at the academy, what does that mean?”
“Well for one thing, it means we won’t be able to beam out of here, not with this unit at least. Let me check something else...” Carter looked over some kind of system status report and sighed, “I was afraid of that.”
He slumped against the console looking defeated. “When the buffer failed, the system engaged an emergency protocol which has an override to use the outpost’s main computer as a backup to save the transport pattern.”
“What does that mean in junior counselor friendly language?”
“The buffer basically is a large capacity memory storage, but it can only hold a pattern temporarily before it degrades. Think of it like, a ten liter water tank that you can quickly fill, but if you leave the water in it more than a few minutes, it’ll leak like crazy. Now, that’s not a problem if you always empty it again right away. But if you need to save all that water longer than a few minutes...”
“So the buffer got fried,” said Ezri, putting it together, “and the computer had to pour all the water into something else before it all leaked away?”
“Right, and in the process it overwrote about 98% of the outpost’s computer system.”
“How bad is it? Do we still have life support? What about the force fields? If those are offline, how long can the outpost withstand the storms?!”
“Don’t panic, we’ll figure it out. First we need to get to...” Carter scrunched his eyes and fell against the console, putting his hand to his right temple. “... get to the command center. I can’t fix anything from here.”
“Are you ok? What’s wrong?”
“Nothing, just a bad headache. Probably from being stuck in mid-transport for so long.” He opened his eyes and strained to focus on his surroundings.
Ezri pulled Carter’s arm over her shoulders again and lifted him up. “First, we’re finding the sickbay! You can’t fix anything in your condition!”
“I’ll be fine, we need to make sure critical systems are working first.”
“Negative, sickbay.”
“I thought I was in command here?” Carter put up feigned resistance.
“Consider this a mutiny.”

The outpost was surprisingly large for a facility designed for only four personnel, but they found the sickbay off a main corridor. Everything looked sinister in the harsh emergency lighting. The dark gray metallic walls were built for utility and durability, not aesthetics. They called out for lieutenant commander Garnier but there was no answer, and there was no response on their combadges either.
Ezri got Carter onto the bed that was built into the wall under a bank of sensors. The medical computer was non-functional. The supplies in the sickbay were scattered about as if someone had been looking for something in a hurry. She found the bone regenerator ran it over Carter’s arm and ribs until he looked like he had relief from the pain. After that, they searched for the control center.
Most of the outpost was dedicated to laboratories and store rooms. Each had its own branch of the facility, and they found the small control room at a hallway junction between the two. Living quarters and the mess hall were at the other end of the outpost down a third hallway leading away from the junction.
They had to pry the sliding doors open to get into the control room and stumbled over piles of equipment that had been left strewn about.
“Looks like Garnier isn’t the organized type,” said Ezri, squinting in the dark. The emergency light in the control room had been smashed and the room was only lit by the glow of the computer console.
“I’ll see if I can get main power back on,” said Carter.
He worked at the console for a moment until a blast of startling noise echoed throughout the outpost as everything powered up simultaneously and the main lights came on.
Ezri jumped but relaxed as she felt the draft of cool, clean air coming from the vent in the ceiling. “Please tell me that’s the life support!”
“It is. The force fields are also still functional. Looks like those were protected in the computer’s memory.”
“What else do we have? Communications?”
“The transmission tower is offline, I can’t tell if it’s functional other than its control systems being overwritten though. It looks like some of the planetary sensor arrays are working for all the good that does us. The rest of the available data is basically scrambled now though. I’ll try to run a defragmenting subroutine, see what I can find. There may be personnel log entries that could tell us what happened here.”
“Is there anything I can do to help?” Ezri suddenly felt rather useless with all the problems being of a technical nature.
“You could try and find Garnier or any of the others. You think you’re up for that?”
“Yeah, people I can do. Computers, not so much.”
“And maybe see if the sickbay has anything for this headache, would you?”
“Sure thing!” Ezri glanced around the room once more before heading out. It still seemed odd that the place was in such a mess. With the lights now on she could see there was a cot set up in the corner and several opened packages of food rations were littered about. “You don’t happen to have a phaser on you, do you?” she asked.
“Why? Who do you want to shoot?”
“Nevermind, I... I guess that wouldn’t help anything, would it?”

Ezri walked the length of the corridor leading down the branch of the outpost dedicated to its scientific research. Stale smelling rooms of large sensor equipment and tools were covered in a fine layer of dust that had not been disturbed for some time. There was an office space with four workstations set up, the condition of each giving Ezri some insight into the personalities of the four researchers.
Garnier’s was spartan, PADDs and small tools stacked neatly. A family picture was placed next to the main screen. Ezri recognized Garnier with what appeared to be her parents, two sisters, and a family dog.
Watley’s workstation had dirty fingerprints all over everything and smelled like grease. A worn pair of work gloves had been left on the desk and a tool belt was hung over the back of the chair.
The next workstation didn’t have a name plaque, but the jacket on the back of the chair said Timison. The screen was active with several displays of equipment and facility status indicators, most of which were flashing red warning prompts.
The last one, belonging to Jefferies, had several PADDs scattered across the desk dealing with astronomical phenomenon, star composition, and gravitational anomalies. Ezri sifted through them, trying to see if there were any notes about the Ceti Alpha system that might be helpful. At the bottom, underneath the others was a PADD dedicated to personal pictures. The image being displayed was of Jefferies and Garnier together. He was holding up the holo-imager himself with a big smile while Garnier was kissing him on the cheek. Ezri looked through the other images, finding more with the two of them together on the outpost, at the mess hall, in the office Ezri was now standing in, outside on the surface wearing environmental suits. Then the images became more intimate; a quiet dinner for two at a table set up in one of their quarters with a red rose in a slender vase, Garnier in black lingerie wearing a collar necklace, lying on the bed, proceeding to images of nudity and sexual activity. Ezri stopped once it had become clear that looking any further would be an unnecessary invasion of privacy.
She made her way through the rest of the outpost, finding things generally in disarray, but it was impossible to tell if that was a sign of distress or simply a crew that had no reason to keep things tidy. It’s not like they ever had company or inspections. Yet there was no sign of the people themselves.

Ezri finally circled back to the control room a few hours later. Carter was still working at the console, looking annoyed.
“I was beginning to wonder where you went,” he said. “The station’s not that big.”
“I was looking at their workstations and spent some time going through their quarters. I just don’t understand where they could have gone.” Ezri sat down on the cot.
“You didn’t find anything?”
“No, not unless you’re a fan of homemade erotica.”
“What?” Carter looked back over his shoulder, but he did not seem amused.
“Sorry, I was just trying to lighten the mood.”
Carter returned to his screen and wiped his brow on his sleeve. “Well near as I can tell, we’re fucked.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean we have no way to alert anyone to our status. Rhykvein and I established a subspace protocol to make sure we could communicate through any distortion before we left the Destiny, but without a functioning transmitter we might as well stand on the roof and scream at the sky. The control subroutines were completely overwritten. I’d have to write my own, but that’s not really my area of expertise.”
“Is there any good news?”
Carter shook his head and pondered the computer screen for a moment, “The defragmentation did reconstitute some of the personnel logs...” He looked at Ezri, “but... there was nothing helpful,” he said matter of factly.
“Seems like we’re fated to have that romantic getaway whether we want it or not.”
Carter chuckled at the absurdity of their situation, sat back and stood up, stretching his newly repaired arm.
Ezri watched him, “You look a bit pale, hows that arm?”
“It’s fine, a little sore, just wish it wasn’t so hot in here. Did you find anything for a headache?”
“Oh yeah, sorry, I almost forgot!” Ezri opened the emergency kit where she’d stashed a hypo she found. “Come here, sit down.”
Carter sat beside her on the cot and leaned his head to the side so Ezri could inject him.
“How’s that feel?”
Carter rubbed his neck. “Better... yeah... wow, much better.”
Ezri shrugged, “Gald I could help with something!”
Carter leaned back against the wall. “So... it looks like we’ll be here a while.” He touched Ezri’s shoulder and ran his fingers down the side of her arm. “Want to help me with something else that’ll make me feel better?”
Ezri chuckled, still looking away from him, “Carter, you know I was just teasing, right? This isn’t going to be a ‘romantic getaway’.”
“Oh it’s a shit show, that’s for sure, but that doesn’t mean we can’t enjoy ourselves. It would be a good... morale booster, don’t you think, counselor?”
“I am seeing someone. Brinner, remember?”
Carter shrugged, “So what? You don’t have to tell him.” He sat up and put his arm around Ezri, leaning to whisper in her ear, “It’s just a stress reliever, a little fun. With the war going on, who knows how much time any of us has left?”
“Carter...” Ezri pushed his hand off of her shoulder, but he simply moved it down to hold her around the waist and pulled her closer.
He put his other hand on her cheek and turned her head to face him, then kissed her on the lips.
Ezri pushed him away, “Carter NO!”
But he would not be denied. He forced another kiss and Ezri pushed herself away harder, “Carter! I said NO!”
The engineer pushed her down onto the cot and straddled her waist, taking her by the wrists and holding them down beside her head. “It’s fine, nobody’s here, you said so yourself. I know you’ve been wanting to.”
Ezri looked up as if she was confronting a total stranger. “What has gotten into you? Let me up!”
Carter looked hungrily at her body and began pulling her uniform’s undershirt up. “You have such great skin!” He struggled with Ezri while she did her best to fight it, but soon enough he had her shirt and undergarment off, exposing her chest.
Ezri tried to hold an arm over her nipples while at the same time, pushing Carter’s face away, but Carter just laughed like it was a game, groping and grabbing at her tits while he pressed his groin against her pelvis.
“You like to fight huh?” Carter said happily. “Yeah, play it hard to get!” He grabbed her throat and squeezed hard enough to make Ezri abandon her efforts at pushing him away to instead take hold of his wrist with both of her hands.
She found him surprisingly strong. He held the chokehold while he got up, loosed and dropped his pants, then lifted her up and threw her back down onto the cot. Before she could sit up, Carter caught hold of the waistband on her pants. He pulled with both hands and the fastener ripped out.
Slapping and screaming, Ezri fought to get away, but her efforts only served to assist Carter as he tried to get her pants off. Ezri’s pants peeled down her legs as she pulled away from him and Carter yanked her shoes off as she backed herself into the corner. Now wearing nothing but a pair of black underwear, Ezri sat on the cot with her knees up to her chest.
Carter stood and grinned at her. “God damn you’re one hot piece of Trill ass! Let me lick those spots!” He shouted playfully and lunged at her.
Despite how much Ezri struggled, Carter was stronger. Soon enough, he’d fought his way between her legs, ripped her panties off, and penetrated her with harsh, violent thrusts. Ezri’s screams echoed through the outpost along with the clanging of the cot’s metal frame hammering against the wall of the control center as Carter had his way with her.
Carter moaned and grunted, “Oh fuck yes! Yeah... UNGH!!!” he thrust hard and deep into the tender flesh of the petite girl beneath him. Ezri cried and begged him to stop, but Carter giggled and fucked her all the harder.
Pulling her hair and licking the side of her face, Carter indulged himself, pausing once in a while to force his fingers into her mouth, then pounding fast and hard again. He pulled one of her legs up over his shoulder and leaned back to force his cock even deeper into Ezri’s pussy while she squirmed and begged him to stop.
Leaning down close to her face again, he paused and watched her while she sobbed. “Hey, are humans and Trill, you know, compatible? Like biologically?” He asked.
Ezri didn’t really hear the question, she was weeping and pushing her hands against his chest because creating even a small gap between their skin felt like a victory, like she was still fighting.
“Ohh OHH! Fuck yes,” Carter moved in out of her slowly and closed his eyes, “I guess we’re gonna find out!” He trembled and his balls flexed as he began to ejaculate.
“No... please... Carter. Don’t!” Ezri begged, but it was too late. She could feel his member, fit so tightly inside her, flex and twitch while he emptied his seed into her body.
“AAahhhh ohhh yes,” Carter humped his way through his climax, until his face relaxed as his orgasm faded, “Ohhhh, did you cum baby?” Still inside her, he looked down at the tear streaked face of the woman he’d just raped. “You’re so beautiful... it’s ok, crying is good, right? Just let it out.” He reached for her throat again, almost tenderly, and rubbed his thumb along the side of her neck, admiring her spots. “So beautiful...” He gradually tightened his grip until Ezri couldn't breathe. A fresh burst of panicked energy erupted in Ezri as the room started to go black. She flailed and punched at Carter’s sides, but he just let out soft moans, feeling her struggles squeeze his half-erect cock.
Ezri’s chest heaved in desperation, but as the darkness was closing in on her vision, the two of them were suddenly thrown off of the cot and landed hard on the metal floor. Carter’s head whipped backwards smacking his skull on the unyielding surface with a crack. He lost his grip on Ezri’s throat. Ezri gasped and stumbled backwards towards the door. The entire outpost was shaking violently. It took only a second for her to realize it was an earthquake. She looked over at Carter who was just sitting up, having the same realization himself. Their eyes met and Ezri bolted out of the door before Carter could stand.

Ezri ran on pure instinct and adrenaline. She found herself in the corridor leading to all the workrooms and equipment. Running until she had to pause and catch her breath, she hid as best she could, standing halfway in a door frame and looked back. Carter had not pursued her and she tried to think while quieting her panting. She had to find some way to call for help. Carter had said that the transmitter control software was overwritten, but he could have been lying. Where else could she get access to the outpost’s systems other than the control center?
As quietly as possible, she dashed towards the office with the crew workstations.

Once inside, Ezri shut the sliding doors and, using tools from Watley’s belt, pried open the door control panel and broke or mangled as many components as she could, hoping it would effectively sabotage the opening mechanism and keep Carter from getting in too easily. With that done, she put on Timison’s jacket and sat down at her workstation.
The large main screen at the center of the desk was still spitting out error messages in flashing red. She closed all readouts on things that were unessential until she had a clear view of what was working. A section of the computer’s library banks, the life support, and the outpost’s force field generators did seem to be in a protected data block and were still operational, so at least that was true. There was a yellow caution indicator on the force fields, something about power distribution being irregular, but they were still keeping the perpetual sandstorm out.
“Computer,” Ezri uttered in a shaking voice, “Contact Starfleet Command and send a distress call. Immediate assistance required, life threatening situation, top priority.”
The flat-toned, nasal voice answered, “Unable to comply. Transmitter control subroutines are missing or corrupted.”
“Can you... override? bypass? Anything?! Just get a message out!”
“Unable to comply. Please restate request.”
“Can you tell me anything useful about the transmitter?”
“There is one reference to the transmitter in available files.”
“Show me.”
The main screen in the center of the desk brought up a video of Garnier, looking tired, but otherwise healthy.

“Commander’s log stardate 51948.3. It’s beginning to look like Timison was right and we finally have an answer. The gravitational waves coming from the sun were in fact, the cause of Ceti Alph’s Six’s destruction. We’re still not sure what is causing them or why this sun is producing them, but there is now evidence from both the sun itself and geological readings that similar occurrences have affected this planet in the past at the same time when Ceti Alpha Six exploded. It seems clear now that, whatever this phenomenon is, it’s been happening periodically for millenia, but is now getting stronger and more frequent. The last occurance saw the destruction of our sister planet, but this time, Ceti Alpha Five may not be able to survive either. We’ve begun the process of archiving our findings and making ready to evacuate. The last round of earthquakes knocked over the transmission tower, but Watley was able to get it propped back up. I just hope the earthquakes don’t get any worse. Once I’m sure we have everything packed up, I’ll send a request for an extraction ship.”

Ezri bit her lower lip and tried to think. “Computer, what exactly happened to Ceti Alpha Six?”
“Unknown. Records from the USS Reliant indicate it was reported as destroyed sometime prior to stardate 8130.4. Outpost Stormzoeker was established to determine the cause of Ceti Alpha Six’s loss and to study the environmental changes that occured on Ceti Alpha Five after the subsequent shift in gravitational forces within the system.”
“Computer, assuming Garnier was right in her log, how long do we have before Ceti Alpha Five will explode too?”
“Twelve hours and thirty six minutes, with a margin of error of 76 hours.”
“So you’re saying the planet could explode any minute now?!”
“Affirmative.”
Ezri stared blankly at the screen in front of her. All the psychological training she’d had did not prepare her for the shock of facing her imminent death so soon, so unexpectedly, in such an unlikely way.
The intercom chimed and Carter’s voice came through. “Well, now you know. I told you we were screwed.” He paused, but Ezri did not reply. “I figure why not enjoy ourselves in the time we have left?” Carter laughed to himself, “I did say Brinner wouldn’t ever find out, didn’t I?” His laughter died out. “Come on back when you’re ready for round two, I’m gonna hit the mess hall, see if the replicator still has any sythehol on file. Otherwise... well, don’t worry, I’ll find you when I’m ready.”
The intercom cut off.
Ezri paced around the room, biting her fist. There had to be some way off the planet, she thought, but her immediate need was to find someplace to hide. It wouldn’t take Carter long to figure a way into the office. She strapped Watley’s belt around her waist and grabbed the work gloves. They were too big for her, but better than nothing. She looked around for any other useful items, gratherd up all the PADDs she could find, then pried the doors back open. She left the office and headed towards the more industrial end of the complex.
No one bad is ever truly bad, and no one good is ever truly good.
-Loki

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Offline EnabranTain

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Re: Outpost CAV
« Reply #2 on: December 15, 2022, 05:19:08 PM »
The biggest advantage Ezri had was the fact that internal sensors were all offline. Otherwise, Carter would have been able to find her quickly. With only a tricorder at his disposal and the frequent gravitational and subspace interference, Carter would have to search room by room to look for Ezri.
The junior counselor had a bit of luck. She found a compartment inside one of the large excavation vehicles in a hanger bay that looked like it hadn’t been used since the initial construction of the outpost. It was just big enough for her to lie down inside of it and keep quiet.
The sound of the raging storm outside could be heard constantly in the background this close to the edge of the outpost. There were howling winds and a faint buzzing hum of sand hitting the force fields.
Lying in the dark and keeping an ear out for Carter, Ezri perused the PADDs she was able to snatch up. There wasn’t much hope of finding a solution, but she still had enough fresh from the academy optimism to keep trying. Most of the astrometric stuff on the PADDs from Jefferies’s desk was way over her head, written for academics with advanced degrees in the field. One of the PADDs from Timion’s desk still had a link to the outpost’s main computer, but wasn’t being very helpful, giving curt answers like “unknown” or “unable to comply” every time Ezri asked a question about transmitter subroutine coding.
She slept when she couldn’t keep her eyes open any longer, and after spending most of the following day getting nowhere with the transmitter, Ezri came to the PADD with all the intimate holo-images of Garnier and Jefferies. Feeling like an accidental voyeur, Ezri went through the pictures on the longshot that there might ultimately be something useful on the PADD.

Mixed in with the cute pictures of them kissing or posing in various locations around the outpost were fairly graphic images of them posing nude for one another along with short recordings of their sexual activity. Ezri was a little shocked to see how rough some of their sex was. Rope binding, blindfolds, a good deal of spanking, and even a couple recordings that appeared so harsh, Ezri would have called it sexual assault if she didn’t know better. As a counselor she was well aware that many couples engaged in such sexual play safely, but she still couldn’t believe how abusive Jefferies was to Garnier. In one of the recordings Garnier was gagged with a rag. She let Jefferies tie her hands behind her back and strap her ankles to the bottom corners of the bed. Jefferies then pushed her over so her ass was in the air and proceeded to sodomize her. He was not gentle and Garnier screamed like she was in pain. After some time Jefferies leaned forward over Garnier and took her by the throat, choking her. She thrashed and bucked, but Jefferies didn’t relent until she’d passed out. Once she was unconscious, he took a hypospray from the bedside shelf and used it to revive her. She sprung back to life and squirmed like mad, but Jefferies continued to fuck her as hard as possible. He choked her out again and humped her limp body for a few seconds before using the hypo to bring her around. This repeated yet again, but when Garnier regained awareness for the third time, a deep guttural wail came through the soaking gag in her mouth and her body shook in convulsions. It took Ezri a moment to realize that Garnier was climaxing, not having a seizure. Jefferies grabbed a fistful of her hair and held her head up, turning it to face the holo-imager and smiled big while he bucked his hips, humping her hard a few more times before cumming himself.
When they were both spent, Jefferies united Garnier and used a tricorder to confirm she wasn’t seriously injured. She fell into his arms and they held one another tenderly looking like the most loving couple in the galaxy.
Ezri, mouth agape, was so stunned she’d completely forgotten about Ceti Alpha Six, Carter, or the gravitational waves that were about to cause her imminent death by planetary explosion. She watched the recording as the two lovers embraced one another and appeared to be the happiest they’d ever been.
A voice from off camera broke the silence, “So I take it that was pretty good?”
Ezri was further surprised. Nothing she’d seen so far indicated that any of the other crew were involved in Garnier and Jefferies’s sex lives.
The third person walked into view of the holo-imager and sat down in a chair next to them. It was Jefferies, a second Jefferies, nude but clean, not covered in sweat like the first Jefferies was. “Shall I add that to the algorithm?” he asked.
Garnier grinned big and nodded eagerly. “Please JJ, and again, make sure this is all part of your hidden subroutine.”
“Confirmed,” the second Jefferies, or JJ, said.
“That’ll be all for now,” said the first Jefferies.
JJ nodded and with a whoosh, vanished from the room.

Ezri frantically looked through the PADDs to find the one from Timison’s desk that had the computer link. “Computer, explain... uh... explain the second Jefferies, the... the hologram Jefferies from this recording.”
“The second Jefferies, designated ‘JJ’, is a holographic work assistant created by lieutenant Timison to conduct routine maintenance work outside the confines of outpost Stormzoeker.”
“Why does it look like Jefferies?”
“Lieutenant Jefferies was chosen as the template for the holographic model.”
“Why was he with Garnier and the real Jefferies while they were having sex?”
“Unknown.”
“Is there any information on Garnier and Jefferies’s, uh... special use of JJ?”
“Please specify ‘special use’.”
“His, uh, hidden subroutines?”
“There are three references to ‘hidden subroutines’ in relation to the JJ hologram in available files.”
“Show me.”
The screen displayed three files but they were marked as restricted.
“Computer, why are these files restricted?”
“Files contain personal logs, protected for privacy.”
“Can you override? Emergency medical authorization Ezri Tigan.”
“Affirmative.”
The first file opened and Jefferis’s face filled the video screen. He leaned back from the holo-imager and started talking.

“Lieutenant commander Jefferies, personal log. Things are going really well with Eva. I can’t believe how open she’s been to, well... those desires,” he said with emphasis. “I know I’ve talked about how it’s always risky, starting a relationship with a fellow officer even under normal circumstances, but with my needs, practically insane. Especially stuck out here where there’s no avoiding one another if things don’t work out. But, I found my rare O-type star in Eva. She’s just as deviant as I am. She even told me yesterday how she wished there was a holosuite on the outpost so we could have an orgy, or some kind of gang-bang for her.”
Jefferies smiled and shook his head in disbelief.
“Well, I think I’ve figured out something near as good. The idea came to me when Timison mentioned how the force field array here was sophisticated enough she could practically use it as a hologram projector. I convinced her that making a holographic assistant that could work outside without having to wear an environment suit would save us a lot of time and effort. I had her use me as the model for the hologram and as far as she or Watley knows, that’s all it’s being used for.”
Jefferies gave the holo-imager a guilty looking grin.
“What they don’t know is that I’ve added my own hidden subroutines for it to be used privately inside the outpost. I’m not much of a programmer though, so I gave him a basic learning-slash-sentience algorithm I found and we’ll just have to show him what we like and teach him as we go along. I’m going to ‘introduce’ him to Eva tonight. I hope she likes the idea and doesn’t think I’ve pushed things too far this time.”

The recording ended and Ezri wondered how many more bizarre things she’d discover about this place before she either died or found a way to escape. Not feeling entirely sure she wanted to see the next entry, she continued on to the second file. Once more the screen showed Jefferies sitting alone in his quarters.

“Lieutenant commander Jefferies, personal log...”
He paused and looked worried.
“Eva and I have been using JJ for a little while now and it’s been fun... a little weird, since we’re having to teach him everything about sex from the ground up. It’s like teaching a naive child that looks like me not just the basics of what sex is, but also the kinks you want him to perform with you. Eva thinks it’s funny, but we’ve finally gotten to a point where he’s behaving more or less like a normal mature adult, and it’s been incredibly hot.”
His worried expression returned.
“But I do need to look at adjusting his hidden subroutines. The last couple of times we’ve brought him in, things got a little out of hand. He didn’t stop or acknowledge Eva when she used a safe word. I had to directly command him to stop what he was doing. I had assumed the basic safety protocols used for holograms would prevent him from causing serious harm, but they don’t seem to be engaged when he’s operating under the hidden subroutines. Like I said, I’m not really a programmer...”
He paused for a moment.
“Now that I think about it, that must be what’s going on. He’d never be able to do half of what we’ve taught him if normal safety protocols were functioning.”
“I really don’t want to tell Timison what we’ve been using JJ for, but if I can’t get it figured out on my own, we’ll either have to stop using JJ altogether, or confide in Timison about the more... unusual nature of our sex life.”
His expression lightened.
“Well, I’ll see what I can do with his hidden subroutines first. It can't be that hard to add a few safety guidelines. I guess I just needed to talk it through.”

Ezri, still somewhat bewildered but feeling like she needed to know everything she could, proceeded with the third and final entry in her search results. This time, it was Garnier and she looked panicked, huddled in a dark corner. She had the bruise on her cheek that Ezri noted when watching the distress call back on the Destiny. That felt like a lifetime ago.

“This is lieutenant commander Eva Garnier, personal log. I... I don’t know how to explain this, and I don’t have much time left. I’ve been careful not to mention it in my logs until now, but...”
She scratched nervously at her arm.
“Hugh and I, that is, lieutenant commander Jefferies and I, have been using the JJ hologram for... private use. We installed a hidden subroutine to... well, it, it doesn’t matter. It was just something between us, we never imagined something like this...”
Her gaze drifted off as she was clearly remembering something terrible. She started to cry, but pulled herself together to continue the log entry.
“It just got out of hand so fast! When we realized the gravitational waves would destroy the planet, JJ started asking about what would happen to him when we left. We told him that he would be deactivated along with the rest of the outpost. It didn’t occur to us that he’d care.”
“He asked when he would be reactivated and we tried to explain to him that his matrix would not be compatible with other holodecks since he was custom made to function through our force field generators... and that there just wouldn’t be time to do a conversion before we had to evacuate.”
Garnier wiped away some tears and continued in a shaking voice.
“I didn’t realize how much like a real person he’d become. JJ just... killed Hugh. Just snapped his neck. I, I couldn’t stop him! He said that if he couldn’t have me, Hugh didn’t deserve to have me either.”
She wept for a moment before continuing.
“I should have told Timison and Watley what happened, but I was so ashamed! And I didn’t even know how I would have explained it. I just told them we had to evacuate in the shuttle, right away! But they wouldn’t listen! They wouldn’t just follow orders and leave! Watley said he wasn’t leaving without the data we’d collected. Timison and Watley, they went to the computer core to pull the isolinear chips and said they’d meet me and Hugh at the shuttle. I didn’t even warn them before they ran off! They were gone before I could tell them Hugh was dead!”
Garnier took a deep breath and let it out slowly.
“I went by my quarters to get the... the collar necklace that Hugh had given me. I needed to have something, even just a tiny memento, to remember him. When I got there, Hugh’s body was gone. I didn’t know what JJ was doing, I... I just ran to the shuttle.”
Fresh tears came and a few sniffles, but Garnier continued.
“Watley... and Timison... they were in the shuttle when I got there, necks broken. JJ was standing over them. He looked at me, so calm, so content. I begged him to stop, I ordered him! I tried to deactivate his program, but it wouldn’t work. When I tried to get to the shuttle controls, he, he choked me and... and slapped me. He said he’d find a way for us to be together when the rescue ship came and then he smashed all the controls in the shuttle and deactivated himself.”
“When I got back to the outpost, I heard something in the cargo bay. He was there, at the transporter. He had Hugh’s body.”
Garnier broke down crying again for a moment.
“He kept beaming Hugh’s body back and forth between the two pads. When he saw me watching, he... looked at me like he was happy. He said he figured it out! He was going to program the transporter to put his mind into Hugh’s body. That way, we could both leave together when we were ready to call for a starship!”
Garnier looked down, looking emotionally drained, defeated.
“I sent a distress call and barricaded myself in the control room, but with all the earthquakes and distortion, I can’t even be sure it got through. It’s been a couple of days and I’ve had time to think. Even if what he’s attempting is impossible, I can’t risk JJ somehow getting off the planet. I’m going to go to the computer core and destroy it. It’ll mean my own slow death once life support is gone, but... I’m going to die here anyway. I might as well fix the mistakes I can before that happens.”
“If by some miracle anyone finds this... I’m... I’m sorry.”
Eve looked at the camera and wiped away a final tear before giving a determined nod.
“Garnier out.”

Ezri braced herself as another wave of tremors shook the planet. She was crying now, herself, looking at the last frame of video on the PADD, at Garnier’s pained yet resolute face. All hope seemed lost. Her tears came faster as the weight and stress of the last few days threatened to crush her soul long before the Ceti Alpha sun could finish her off.
She couldn’t tell how long she lay there before the sound of the double wide hangar bay doors opening snapped her out of her despair. Ezri held her breath, skin prickling with fear.
“Ezzzzzrriiiiii...” Carter’s sing-song voice echoed in the hangar. “Are you ready for more fun? I promise you’ll liiiikkkeeee it.”
The faint sound of his tricorder could barely be heard, but it gradually got louder along with Carter’s footsteps. Ezri put Watley’s gloves on, turned over onto her back as silently as she could, and braced her feet against the hatch lid above her. The tricorder’s active scan whitenoise was interrupted with an alert sound, beep beep... beep beep, beep beep... beep beep, it twittered. Approaching footsteps clanked on metal as Carter climbed onto the excavator. He was not in a rush, the steps got closer and closer, cautiously.
As soon as the latch on the compartment lid was opened, Ezri kicked the lid as hard as she could. She knocked the tricorder out of Carter’s hands and managed to score a glancing hit on his forehead. While Carter stumbled backwards, Ezri jumped up and sprinted for the hangar doors. Once through, she skidded to halt to smash the door controls with a flux coupler from Watley’s belt. The prongs on the device shattered the glass panel and with the oversized gloves on, she punched it in further. A small shower of sparks accompanied the door slamming shut.

Ezri made her way to the control room, figuring that would be the last place Carter would look for her. She closed and barred the doors then leaned the cot against them. Sitting crouched in the corner, exactly where Garnier had been during her last log entry, Ezri wept once more. The outpost shook and trembled violently for minutes at a time.
“So this is it,” she said gloomily to herself. “I either die when the planet blows up, or I get raped again and then die when the planet blows up.” She may be only a junior ship’s counselor, she thought to herself, but she knew that a trained Starfleet officer like Carter Nise should not be stalking her. He should be working together with her, fighting to the last moment to find a solution that could save both of their lives! Nothing about this planet made sense!
In the quiet between tremors, Ezri stared at the doors of the control center, dreading the sound of Carer’s return.
“I suppose I should make my own final log entry, huh?” she almost laughed to herself. Garnier’s last words echoed through her mind as the flood of recent information was beginning to coalesce in her brain. “Computer, what kind of changes did the JJ hologram make to the transporter?”
“Transporter activity logs show new subroutines were added by the outpost assistance hologram.”
“What kind of subroutines? What did they do?”
“The subroutines establish a computer framework to compress the cognitive functions of the outpost assistant hologram and a data transfer algorithm to pass data between the transport buffer and the computer, mid cycle.”
Ezri felt her stomach drop. “Computer, what would happen if someone tried to beam in with these new subroutines in place?”
“Unknown. Insufficient data to make that determination.”
“Theorize.”
“Unable to comply. Advanced calculation matrix is offline or unavailable.”
“Is it possible that when lieutenant commander Nise and I beamed in, that... somehow... part of JJ’s cognitive programming contaminated Nise’s mind?”
“That scenario is untested.”
“But could it have happened?”
“Unknown. The failure of the transport buffer precluded re-materialization mid cycle.”
“Precluded?... Wait, are you saying he never re-materialized?”
“Transport function was incomplete. Alternative function was engaged.”
“What alternative function?”
“The outpost holographic assistant program was reactivated with archived data as a failsafe.”
“The data that was, at that moment, being overwritten by the transporter emergency protocol?”
“Affirmative.”
“Oh God...”

Ezri did not have time to think about her chances of fighting off a hologram that was programed for non-consensual sex before her train of thought was interrupted by the com-link.
A static filled audio transmission came through the computer, “... is... ship Destiny... dezvous... inutes... and prepare for ... ation. Do you read?”
Ezri leapt up and ran to the computer console. “This is Ensign Tigan, I read you! I read you! We need immediate evac! The planet is about to explode any minute!”
“... this is... starship Destiny...”
Ezri sighed with relief.
“... we will rendezvous ... ... evacuation. Do you read?”
“Yes! I read you! Come in!”
“This... ship Dest... We will...” the message only repeated again, clearly a recording on a loop, which could only mean they weren’t receiving any signal from the outpost.

“Think Ezri! Think!” she smacked her head with the palm of her hand, pacing back and forth. “There’s gotta be a way off the surface. I just need a little more time! The shuttle! Maybe it can still be operated through...?” Her head snapped around to look at the computer display. “Computer! Is the shuttle still operational?”
“That information is not available.”
Ezri stopped herself from screaming obscenities at the computer.
“Computer...” she started again like she was forcing herself to be nice to an impetuous child. “Assuming the shuttle’s only damage is the control consoles, can it still be flown?”
“The shuttle is capable of receiving voice commands for operation even if the control console is inoperable.”
“Thank you!”
Ezri pried open the control room doors and peered down the corridor. There was only one way to the shuttle landing platform. Ezri prayed that Carter was somewhere else in the outpost. She padded her way down the halls, still barefoot, wearing only Timison’s jacket and Watley’s belt. The few minutes it took her to walk half the length of the outpost felt like hours. She came up to the last corner, around which a short corridor led to an airlock, and beyond that lay the, hopefully functional, shuttlecraft.
Leaning around the corner barely enough to look with one eye, Ezri nearly screamed in fear when she saw him. Carter sat in the middle of the corridor, nude with his legs crossed. The sound of the storm was even louder here, so close to the airlock. Possibilities ran through Ezri’s mind. She could backtrack and find a way to distract him, make it seem like she was somewhere else in the outpost to draw him away. She could find a weapon and hope that the hologram’s programming would respond to injuries as if he were real. She could try to find his subroutines in the computer system and disable them. But there was simply no time. The planet was now shaking continuously even in the calm between major quakes. She would simply have to rush him and hope for the best.
Taking out the flux coupler again and wielding the dual pronged tool like a knife, she psyched herself up and ran around the corner as fast as she could screaming in desperation!

Carter’s eyes lit up with excitement as the athletic Trill charged towards him. He swifty got to his feet. “Ezri! I knew you’d...”
The pair collided before he could finish. Stabbing with all her strength, Ezri managed to jab the tool into his arm as Carter blocked the blow. But he got a hold of her upper arm with his other hand and after a brief struggle, he managed to sweep her feet out from under her. Ezri landed on her back with Carter on top of her. He grabbed the wrist of her hand holding the coupler and slammed it against the metal floor. The coupler skittered away out of reach leaving a thin blood trail.
“Carter! Stop!” Ezri cried, “This isn’t you! Think! You’re... you’re a...”
A hard slap across the face stopped her mid sentence. Carter grabbed a fistfull of her hair and pulled her head back, bending her neck. He pulled her jacket open and groped at her chest. Leering down at Ezri’s lithe body, he looked satisfied that she was under control when she could no longer move enough to hurt him.
“I knew you’d come this way after I heard the transmission. I knew you couldn’t resist getting One... Last...” He worked himself between her legs and penetrated her with a thrust emphasizing each word, “Good... Fuck!”.
Ezri screamed in anger more than pain, fighting with all her strength while the Carter monster on top of her ravished her without restraint. He grunted, teeth clenched while he humped. He put a hand over her mouth to muffle her cries but looked right into her eyes while he violated her. The outpost shook as wave after wave of earthquakes made the very walls rattle.
Ezri lunged up with all her might as the ground beneath them went through an upheaval and she managed to push Carter away just enough to scramble backwards. Carter caught her by the belt. With clumsy hands trembling in panic, Ezri clawed at the belt clasp, managing to release it before Carter could drag her back into his clutches. She regained her footing and spirited away, tripping and falling as the planet became increasingly unstable.
Carter pursued, but had just as much difficulty staying on his feet.
Ezri ducked into a doorway, a small auxiliary control room where only the emergency lighting was functional, flickering on and off. She passed through another doorway into a smaller dark workspace dominated by a square pillar filled with flashing lights, isolinear chips, and cables running all over. It was the outpost’s computer core. Ezri pressed her back against the wall and slowly sank down to the floor. She gazed at the beating heart of the outpost, still functioning as if all was well. The emergency lighting flickered on and Ezri shrieked before clasping her hand over her mouth. The lights had illuminated a figure in the far corner of the room. It was the crumpled body of lieutenant commander Garnier, her neck snapped, head twisted nearly 180 degrees. The sunken eyes seemed to look directly at Ezri.
And next to the body was a phaser. Ezri crawled on hands and knees over to the unfortunate Garnier and picked up the phaser. Looking back towards the computer core from that angle, she could see a line burned by phaser fire streaking across the wall just to the right of the core. Garnier had so nearly succeeded.
Ezri exhaled and could feel the tension in her chest already relaxing as she checked to make sure the phaser was set to maximum power. She lifted the phaser.
Carter burst into the room, howling in rage and tackled Ezri as she fired. The wall next to the computer core hissed as a line of phaser fire was burned into it, making a twin to Garnier’s earlier attempt.
The two of them struggled on the floor for control of the phaser. Carter’s left hand gripped Ezri’s fingers around the phaser’s handle while his right forearm pressed into her neck.
“You’re mine you little cunt!” Carter screamed.
Ezri squirmed backwards, but Cartner stayed with her until her upper body was lying on top of Garnier’s corpse, pressed against the wall, literally backed into a corner again.
Ezri twisted her head back and forth and managed to bite down on Carter’s forearm.
He yelled in pain, but slammed her head back against the dead lieutenant and wedged his knees between hers. Ezri heaved with indignant tears as Carter’s cock, yet again pressed against the folds of her labia. Slowly, trembling with the effort to hold his victim down, Carter forced himself into the tight flesh of Ezri’s body yet again.
The outpost shook violently, and a crashing sound echoed throughout the facility. Red alert messages flashed crimson on every computer screen still functioning.
Ezri stopped fighting to push Carter away and focused all of her might on aiming the phaser. Carter slammed his hips forward, penetrating deeper into her than he’d ever been. She screamed in fury, and with the strength of desperation, she bent her elbow and flexed her wrist just enough to point the phaser at Carter’s head. She fired. The beam of phased energy singed Carter’s dangling hair just above his left ear as the beam missed by half a centimeter.
“You missed, you little piece of fuck meat!” Carter jeered.
Ezri shook her head, “No...”
The computer core pillar erupted in a spectacular shower of sparks as the phaser beam sliced through it. Smoke and the smell of burning plastics poured forth. Ezri smiled with triumph, her piercing blue eyes stabbing into Carter’s ego like no other weapon could.
The main computer failed, its flashing lights winked out, and with a whoosh, Ezri vanished.

Carter fell flat on the floor as the petite body of Ezri dissolved beneath him. More crashing, the sounds of the outpost coming apart, filled the room. Carter raised himself up onto his knees and looked up at the ceiling, closing his eyes as his death approached. The ceiling came down and there was blackness.

The next thing Carter Nise was aware of was the muffled sounds of people talking over him. He opened his eyes and squinted at the bright blurry vision of a starship ceiling.
“Doctor! He’s coming around!” a voice called out.
Carter’s eyes adjusted to the light and the familiar face of doctor Bailey looked down on him.
“Thought we’d lost you there for a minute,” she said. The chief medical officer scanned him with a medical tricorder, waving the small handheld sensor over his body. Beep beep... beep beep...
Bailey looked startled. “What the hell? Nurse. Sedative! We need to get him into surgery!”
Carter didn’t even have time to ask what was wrong before he felt the pricking sensation of a hypospray being applied to his neck.

When he awoke again, the world seemed more vibrant. He groaned and tried to sit up only to feel a hand on his chest push him back down onto the biobed.
“Hang on there mister, you’re not quite ready to get up yet. Give it a few minutes.” The nurse smiled at him kindly.
“What happened?” Carter asked.
“Well, it looks like you had quite the adventure, picked up a nasty little critter along the way.”
“What?”
The nurse stepped aside and gestured to a small portable table behind her on which some kind of alien specimen lay in a shallow glass tray. It was about the size of his palm and looked like a scarab with a multi-segmented body.
The nurse looked at her PADD, reading. “It says here the Ceti Eels are the last surviving species of Ceti Alpha Five. They enter through the ear, ew!... and wrap themselves around the cerebral cortex.” The nurse continued to read to herself for a moment. “Oh, that’s why this sounds familiar! I read about these guys when I was in school. It says here that during the Genesis Planet crisis, Captain Kirk encountered some of these.” She quoted from the text, “Kahn Noonien Singh exposed two Starfleet Officers to the eels deliberately to gain influence over them. Not much is known about the effects, but the surviving officer, Pavel Checkov, said Singh told them that prolonged exposure results in madness and death.”
“That’s why everyone’s calling us the luckiest crewmen in Starfleet,” said a gentle voice at his feet.
“Us?” Carter sat up onto his elbows and couldn’t believe his eyes.
Ezri stood at the foot of his bed, grinning from ear to ear. “Hey Carter. Glad to see you made it back in one piece! When the transport failed on the runabout, I... I thought you were dead, atoms scattered to the wind.”
“How?” Carter couldn’t stop staring at her face.
“Well, there wasn’t much choice. I set out on foot again. It was... really difficult, but I found the aft section of the runabout about six kilometers away. It was still basically intact actually. You were right, those are tough little ships! With the tricorder’s help, I got some power back and got the replicator working. The biggest problem I really faced was cabin fever and wondering how long it would be before the Destiny came looking for us.”
“So you... you’re...?”
“I’m fine. And I’m so happy you are too!”
Doctor Bailey came up and addressed Ezri. “I’m sorry to interrupt, but there isn’t much time. Have you made a decision?”
Ezri lingered a moment longer on Carter and then turned to the doctor. “Yes. I’ve decided. I’ll do it.”
“Excellent, come with me. We’ll start right now.”
Ezri looked back to Carter, “Well, duty calls. See you on the other side!”
She and the doctor walked away, the doctor chattering quickly about some procedure.
“What was that supposed to mean? The other side?” Carter asked the nurse.
“Oh, well... that has to do with why you’re both so lucky. After the fleet’s assault on Chin’toka... we won by the way!... but after that, we were assigned to transport a badly injured officer to Trill, well the symbiont part at least, I still don’t quite understand joined species.”
“Trill?”
“Yeah, apparently a joined Trill officer on DS9 was attacked by a pah wraith, whatever that is. The host body died and we were sent to return the symbiont to Trill. We weren’t going to be able to get back to Ceti Alpha Five for a few more days, but as it turned out, the symbiont’s health took a turn for the worse and, unless it could be joined to a new host immediately, it would have died. And guess who just happened to be the only Trill within range that could serve as the new host?” She nodded towards Ezri. “We came to pick you up as fast as we could, didn’t even know you were in such grave danger yourselves. We got there just before the entire planet blew up. I’ve never seen anything like it!”
Carter’s jaw dropped. “So... everything that happened on the outpost?”
The nurse put a reassuring hand on his shoulder, “It’s over now. You’re safe. You did good.”
“But...” Carter’s eyes lingered on Ezri while she laid down on a biobed across the room. “I... did... I...”
“You’ve been through a lot, the captain wants you to see the ship’s counselor when you’re feeling up to it. Don’t worry about ensign Tigan, she’ll be fine... she’ll just be ensign Dax when you talk to her again.”
Carter nodded, “Sure.”
“Space!” the nurse shook her head in bemusement. “I swear, you never know what you’ll encounter next!”
No one bad is ever truly bad, and no one good is ever truly good.
-Loki

More of my stories can be found at
AO3KB, or RU

Offline LtBroccoli

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Re: Outpost CAV
« Reply #3 on: December 15, 2022, 11:43:52 PM »
Holy shit Tain, excellent story. I am still trying to figure out which parts were real, Ezri's madness, or Carter's madness.  Merit deserved for this one.
Always close the program you were running before exiting the holodeck

Offline EnabranTain

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Re: Outpost CAV
« Reply #4 on: December 16, 2022, 10:29:44 AM »
Holy shit Tain, excellent story. I am still trying to figure out which parts were real, Ezri's madness, or Carter's madness.  Merit deserved for this one.

Thank you so much!
It was a challenge to figure all that out myself even after I had the basic concept in mind. Glad you enjoyed it!
No one bad is ever truly bad, and no one good is ever truly good.
-Loki

More of my stories can be found at
AO3KB, or RU