“This Side of Darkness” version 1.00, start date, 2015
Present earth-date April 2nd, 2018
EPH
Copyright 2018 All Rights Reserved.
Licensing for this work is pending, contingent on the good graces of Simon and Schuster, proxy for Paramount, and so, consequently, it can only be considered fan fiction at this time. The author agrees to share this edition for editing purposes with the understanding that Paramount, the official owners of Star Trek related products may revoke the sharing privilege. Comments and corrections can be directed to the author for story refinement. The author has deeply appreciated the amount of support, wishes for success, and the request for more stories! If you would like to contact Simon and Schuster to share your opinion with them, perhaps they, too, will eventually get around to considering them. If you bought this, or any of the others, you paid too much. These works are available for free at free-ebooks.net.
Author contact info:
John Erik Ege
214-907-4070 Email
solarchariot@hotmail.com
This story is the sixth in a series. Book One “A Touch of Greatness,” book two “Another Piece of the Action,” book three “Both Hands Full,” book four, “Necessary Evil,” and “The Seventh House” are available at free-ebooks.net or can be attained in PDF format from the author. (Put Trek in the subject line so the author can readily distinguish from the nonessential emails) I suspect this will be the last of the direct, Trek Fan fiction. There are others writing equal, if not better stories. “Prelude to Axanar is probably one of the most successful fan fiction, and it ended up in litigation and an attempt by Paramount to change the definition of ‘fanfiction.’ Failure to recognize sometimes the fans know something executives don’t is not a part of our paradigm. It’s even more complicated than that, as multiple entities own rights to Trek, and they don’t see eye to eye, hence the new evolution of Klingons, and the surprisingly absent Romulans. The author recognizes the issues and valid criticism from the previous books, knows there is room for improvement in his endeavors, and hopes to continue to grow as a writer and human being.
The delay in publishing this is in part due to me giving time to my bestest creation ever, the joy of my life, my son, Eston Gerik Ege; and due to being in human in general. All my love, J E E.
Prologue
An’Ko, daughter of the House of Moshe, holder of the Legacy Stone, found herself in a strange sort of hell that had no apparent relationship to anything her cultural myths offered to explain about the Universe. The lighting was different, for one. These were frequencies that were not natural. It was full spectrum, from a Sol perspective. The people she encountered lacked distinctive facial features. They didn’t even resemble the ghosts from her legends. Ghosts had ridges. They had scales. Finding a scale was proof one had fought with a paranormal and won. Further, their voices were light, the chatter they made almost musical at times. It sounded ‘happy.’ Happy for no apparent reason. They could be serious, but they lacked true expression. Anger was rare. She saw them as being disconnected from reality. This was a ship of fools.
Zara Undine, Captain of the USS New Constitution, was not human. She was at least appropriately stern. An’Ko attempted to talk to her, and she was redirected to go through the appropriate chain of command. They were disciplined in their protocols, but it was infuriating that there weren’t bypasses. She wanted to share something without telling everyone. She definitely didn’t want to write it down or alert the computer that she was aware of something.
The computer was ever present. This bothered her.
“Computer?” An’Ko asked. “How may I assist you, An’Ko,” the computer responded.
“Nothing,” An’Ko said, in Klingon, harsher than it needed to be.
“Please let me know if I might be of service.”
Life was not bad here. It was different. Grandfather Moshe’s death had resulted in her being here, and in some ways, his promise that her future would be secured had been fulfilled. There were Klingons in the crew. They seemed to be carrying the appropriate emotions. They wore armor most the time. She had been denied full armor. Ten forward offered her the perfect spot to watch the crew, and see outside. Space looked fake. Part of her wanted to return home, but she knew she could not go home until she had proven herself. The outside view revealed the ship had dropped out of warp. It was sudden. There was no obvious destination. Empty space. Between the stars. It made no sense to her. Why would they stop here?
“An’Ko,” the Computer said.
An’Ko jumped. No one else was near her. She knew it was the computer but no one seemed to realize it had called her out. In truth, the sound technology had sent the voice to her directly. No one else had heard it.
“What?” An’Ko asked. She whispered this, looking down at the table to make sure no one saw her lips move. The computer heard her. She was pretty sure it read lips. She was equally sure, it could read minds.
“You asked to be notified in the event that Admiral Garcia was on board,” the computer said.
An’Ko saw no other ship, but assumed that they had come out of warp for a space rendezvous and collected the Admiral.
“Where?” An’Ko asked.
“Admiral Garcia is presently in the shuttle bay,” the computer said.
An’Ko got up from her place and headed that way. She moved at a reasonable speed, that was not running, but not so slow crew might stop and talk to her. They had an annoying habit of trying to test her English. It also annoyed her that they would ask ‘how are you doing?’ She hated that question. She didn’t have answer to that. Did they think she was an invalid? Was she under the care of a wet-nurse? She had thought the correct response was “I’m fine,” but that phrase tended to have people asking her more detailed questions. Humans were too curious about the wrong things. They were all in her business, but not in Tama Orleans business. Was she hated, favored, or just being blocked?
A block presented itself. As far as she knew, Garcia was just on the other side of the door. A security officer intercepted her. He was human. He was tall and broad in the shoulders. If his posture was meant to be intimidating, it had failed. She saw the smile as a challenge.
“Come with me, please,” An’ko said.
“I need to see Garcia,” An’Ko said.
“I need you to come with me…”
She felled him one kick and as he went down, she shoved him to the side, and went through the door. She made her way to the airlock door, but was pulled aside. She turned to fight, and found herself suddenly on her back, looking up into the face of Captain Undine. There were several guards there. Doctor Jurak was there. Admiral Garcia was there. The guard came in, clearly hurting, and took a chair. “How difficult is it to keep a 14 year old girl out of here,” Garcia asked.
“Sorry,” he said.
Undine helped An’Ko back to her feet.
“Go to you your quarters,” Garcia said.
“No,” An’Ko said. “I wish to speak to you. It’s urgent.” “Do as you’re told,” Undine said.
“Hold on,” Counselor Rossi said. “I want to hear what she has to say.”
“This is not an impromptu counseling session,” Garcia said.
“She hasn’t spoken more than a few words to me and I want to hear what she has to say,” Rossi said.
An’Ko was clearly re-evaluating her relationship to the counselor.
“You have now established your rapport,” Garcia said. “An’Ko, return to your quarters.”
“She just assaulted an officer,” Undine said.
“You’re not putting her in the Brig,” Rossi said.
“He’ll be alright,” Jurak said, his medical assessment having been a casual glance.
“We don’t have time for this,” Garcia said.
“You never have time anything,” An’Ko snapped, reverting to Klingon. “You don’t have time for me. You don’t have time for your daughter. You will listen to me!”
The tension was high, and the stares Garcia got were uncomfortable. He seemed amused.
“Okay,” Garcia said.
An’Ko blinked. She didn’t know what to make of that.
“Time’s a ticking,” Garcia said.
“It would be easier for me to tell you in Klingon,” An’Ko said.
“Go ahead,” Garcia said.
An’Ko communicated her belief that Tamma Orleans, Garcia’s daughter, was possessed. She interpreted their faces as disbelief.
“Thank you,” Garcia said. “Return to your quarters.” “That’s it?” An’Ko asked.
“I will look into it,” Garcia assured her.
“No you won’t,” An’Ko said. “You already dismissed me before I entered the
room…”
“What makes you think Tamma is possessed?” Counselor Rossi asked. “No. We’re not discussing this” Garcia asked. “An’Ko. Return to your quarters. Forget about this. I got it.”
“You don’t have targ shit,” An’Ko said.
“Quarters, or Brig,” Garcia said.
“I will not drop this! Regardless of whether you interpret this as spirits or aliens, there is an entity trying to take over the ship…”
The power went off, emergency containment locked them in.
“That’s new,” Garcia said.
“You’re aware?!” An’Ko said.
“We’ve been monitoring the entity’s activities for a while,” Undine said.
“Entity?” Rossi said. “Tamma is really possessed?”
“No,” Garcia said. “Yes. Kelinda has created a telepathic bond with her and has been trying to access our gate so she can capture her granddaughter.” “And you didn’t tell me?” Rossi said.
“You’re her counselor,” Garcia said. “I didn’t want you to slip that you knew something… Did you confront her?” This last was to An’Ko.
“Yes,” An’Ko said. “And she tried to kill me.”
“You knew, and you’re using your daughter as bait?!” Rossi demanded.
“Yes,” Garcia said.
“That’s is severe violation of ethics, protocols, and just humanity! You’re her father!” Rossi snapped.
“I want to end this,” Garcia said.
“At all cost?!” Rossi demanded.
“One life for hundreds of billions? Yes,” Garcia said. “Do the math.”
“I am doing the math. You math sucks,” Rossi pushed back.
Outside the glass Tamma Orleans Garcia arrived on the Shuttlebay. Garcia stepped out of the shadows and presented himself to her. An’Ko was confused. Garcia was here, and in the Shuttlebay. Tamma pointed a phaser at her father. He held up his hands, showing he was unarmed. The Garcia inside the airlock dissipated like a hologram.
“Tamma,” Garcia said, softly. “Don’t do this.”
“You can’t stop me,” Tamma said. “I see through you and all your lies. Computer, reveal the Stargate.”
The Stargate that had been cloaked on the Shuttlebay was now visible. She touched the tech interwoven into her sleeve. The gateway started the dialing sequence.
“Tamma, please, don’t do this,” Garcia said.
“I am going to be with my grandmother,” Tamma said. “I am going to be with people who love me.”
“You are loved here, more than you know,” Garcia said.
“You have no clue what love is!” Tamma said. “You have impregnated half the galaxy, is that love? You have hundreds babies on the way and you can’t be with them all. You never spent time with me, and if this is how I feel, you want to bring more like me into the universe? People that will never know a father? How many stories of stepfathers molesting children they should never have had access to have to happen before parents stop bringing children into a loveless world? I hate you. I hate everything about you. I want this in the fucking history books. Everyone thinks you’re great but that’s because they don’t know you like I know you. You’re nothing. You suck as a father. You suck at maintaining relationships. And you suck as a Starfleet Officer. You’re a monster. I wish I had never met you! At least then I could have had what everyone else has, the fiction of you.”
The gate came to life. She backed towards the gate, keeping the weapon on him.
“Wait,” Garcia said. “One question.” Tamma hesitated.
“If I could go back and do it all again, never meet your mother, do you want that?” Garcia asked.
“I guess you’ll never know,” Tamma said.
Tamma stepped through the gate. She was confused. She arrived on the other side of the gate to find herself- on the other side of the gate, still in the Shuttlebay. The holographic illusion of the gate faded, and she realize the actual gate was nowhere near her. It was, however, next to her father. Her eyes grew in realization that she had just been played.
“I love you,” Garcia said.
Garcia stepped through the gate.
Tamma screamed ‘NO!’ firing her weapon at her father. She made her way to the gate, but was dropped by security firing a phaser at stun. Undine opened the door, revealing the power hadn’t actually been cut, and rushing security to the gate. Two security officers made it through. It shut off before Undine got there. Rossi came up beside her. “You were a part of this?”
“It was the fastest way to get to Kelinda,” Undine said.
Tammas Parkin Arblaster arrived at the other side of the Gateway. He didn’t take time to study the scenery. He identified an active Iconian gateway and went through. Unlike his gateway, this portal was a two dimensional image; a literal two dimensional door in the air, and only he could see it. He was gone before his security team arrived. On the other side of the dimensional gate, he could see the planet he was just on. He had traveled even further- the two security officer, phasers in hands, were looking around for Garcia, and not finding him. Tama Orleans phaser had clipped him as he was coming out of the gate, sparking his energy field to life. Triggering his emergency life belt probably saved his life. It was a curious fact in his head that he felt compelled to remember. The ‘god’ Hades was there, waiting, clearly surprised. It was not Hades. It was Kelinda. She had usurped his body, taken over his primary lair of operation, which was contained in the heart of a star. A perfect, a bubble oasis, in the center of a star, with practically unlimited, direct energy in the form of plasma, heat, electromagnetic waves, and immense pressure.
The only thing she could think of was duplicity, and she cursed Tamma even as she opened fired with energy from both her hands. Garcia’s shields took the brunt of the energy and he nearly stumbled backwards through the gateway behind him. His eyes glowed. He leaned into the energy like leaning into a storm, descending the stairs into the room proper. Three steps down. He blocked, his hands up and out and projecting energy beams of his own; he met her energy for energy. Kelinda was stunned, not understanding. Garcia’s eyes flared, intensely bright. The energy dissipated and Kelinda found herself caught up, pinned against the ceiling, five meters off the floor.
“You’ve lost, grandmother,” Garcia said. It was not Garcia’s voice. “You’re not the only player in the Universe.”
He held his right hand up. An object materialized, as if by transporter beam, leaving a geodesic shape, polyhedral- a decahedron, in his hand. He tossed it to the floor, and rolled to a stop like a die. Out of mild curiosity Garcia had written numbers on the sides. Twelve was on top. His eyes dimmed, but remained shiny.
“It always comes up twelve,” Garcia said.
Garcia could have used the Kelvin technology available to him to turn the decahedron back into Kelinda, but instead, he used the power within that had been made available to him by the gods- a power that would also be the death of him. He had access to the same information that the Kelvan tech had given him, plus a thousand times more. Most of it he couldn’t sort. His brain was evolving in complexity to handle the information, and the longer he went, the more information began to fall into place. But then, because he was also cycling in time, he would find clarity, die, return to the past saved point, and find the clarity he had gained escaped him. It was like waking from a dream and not being able to hold the content. The longer he went in cycling, the less information he brought back. His perfect, eidetic memory was gone.
He turned the decahedron back into a body. Kelinda’s body was suddenly there,the decahedron gone. Kelinda’s face was unhappy. This was not Kelinda, but Hades. He reached for the Kelvin tech on the left wrist.
“Don’t,” Garcia said, blocking with only a gesture.
Hades, in Kelinda’s body, found himself suddenly levitated, spun about, and pinned to the ceiling next to Kelinda, who was in his body. Kelinda had switched them using ancient tech, the same as used against Kirk so long ago. That tech that was actually still being studied by a branch of Fleet- a branch with very littler oversight. A branch Garcia was technically working for. Section 31. Something Losira had taken control of in his absence. The interesting thing about the tech was it gave them evidence that all their theories on consciousness was wrong. Something he wanted to explore, but in the present now, didn’t have to consider it further than what it was.
“Just hang out there, get to know each other,” Garcia said. “Maybe have some tea, sing ‘I love to laugh.’ Or, I don’t know, end this Freaky Friday shit and switch back into the right bodies already.”
Garcia went to the central control panel. Part of his brain was amused, thinking he was in the TARDIS, only better- the controls which ranged from analog to digital, complete with rows and columns of buttons and blinking lights, seemed more fitting of a device that can open gateways to any place within space-time. The instrument clusters made him think of Christmas. Every wall around him was a gateway. Five gates. The room was pentagon shaped. There was the classic symbol for a star on the floor. This was Iconian gateway tech on steroids. All those aclehmy symbols of the past: were the simply passwords for accessing future ancient tech? There were several worlds he recognized. Vulcan was one. Romulus was another. They were not temporally static. It was an accelerated time frame. There was a time loop being played out on the two worlds. The Romulus Star would explode, and take out the planet. Shortly after that event, the Vulcan world would implode. It wasn’t just video. It was real and now that he was looking, he found new information accumulating his brain. Garcia’s amplified telepathic sense felt the loss of life- on both planets. It was palpable. Even bright eyes can cry. He felt the loss, then felt the relief, and then the loss again. It was so distracting he had to turn the emotional centers of his brain off. Implants allowed him to be aware that there was an emotional signal, but exist outside of its affect.
Garcia had flashbacks to staring at a Christmas tree, fixated on ornaments that showed a g-type star going nova. He remembered the strange feeling of being disconnected. He remembered arguing with the image, thinking g-type stars don’t do that.
He remembered Guinan’s voice interrupting his thoughts, drawing him out of the trance…
“You can’t change it,” Kelinda said, laughing. Her voice drew him back. “You are it.” “I don’t know enough,” Garcia agreed, circling the panel.
Information overload. Just tracking all the streams he was taking in put a stutter in his brain that forced him to pick a consciousness stream. He heard a voice in his head, not Ilona’s, not Duana’s, not Troi. He was comforted by it. It was Lal. She said ‘Choose.” He chose the familiar. His eyes dimmed further, but stayed shiny. ‘Choice’ saved his life. Listening to Lal saved his life. Apollo arrived through one of the gates ways. Garcia eyes sparked as he and Apollo exchanged energetic rays.
“Hello, little fly,” Apollo said.
“You’re responsible for all of this!” Hades yelled. “Not alone,” Apollo said. “Venus had her hands in this.” “You’re interfering with my work!” Hades said.
“Tit for tat…”
Garcia escalated, bringing in Fleet and Kelvan tech at his disposal. Apollo stumbled backwards. Apollo laughed, even as Garcia drove him backwards towards the gate.
“You can’t win,” Apollo said.
Charlie X arrived through another gate, his eyes going bright, his forehead coming down as if he would ram Garcia. All the angry, scary faces in Garcia’s memory, no face held a candle to Charlie’s. Charlie brought his hands up and unleashed a torrent of lightening. Garcia went to his knees. His life belt flared and failed. He diverted his energies to block Charlie’s attack. He was now divided between the two. Hades and Kelinda nearly fell to the floor, but extra effort was used to push them back up.
“If I can’t have her, no one can!” Charlie said.
Apollo rushed the control panel and slammed his palm down on a single button.
Both Hades and Kelinda were protesting even as his hand was coming down. It was essentially an easy button. It turned off the protective barriers that maintained the base. It was a huge base, maybe the size of Jupiter’s biggest moon, Ganymede. An attempt of humor rose into his conscious, wondering if Buddy Holly was alive and well here. Who knew how many people Hades had ripped from time and stored in the depths of his base. The base was honeycombed with storage chambers of tech and species, many of which were no longer ‘on the playing field.’ These gods were collectors, not preservers. The Gateways snapped off, revealing the solid walls that held the gates. Walls went from dark black to white hot and then everything was gone…