NationStates Jolt Archive

USS Enterprise ZZB

"And a new one! Captain! I've found a new one!"

"Yes, y-"

"I shall name it the... Polytechnatron!"

"-es. Now, could you please continue witt coo-"

"Imagine it! Shiphulls made from Polytechnatronium! We could stay in the middle of a neutron star!"

"-king, cook? We're hungry."

"Yes, Captain!"

The captain, Amanda Carnage, sighed. "That was his...?"

"Fourhundred-and-seventy-fifth newly discovered particle, ma'am. To think that he majored in cooking, back at the academy..."

"Yes, yes... Oh well. How long until we're there?"

"Another... Oh, wait, we've just arrived."

"Good. Quit warpspeed, and-"

"Done."

"- Wait until I finish my orders. Anyway. What are the scanners telling us?"

"A normal system. Ten planets, one asteorid belt between the main sun and the red dwarf next to it. Relatively high levels of radiation. Apparently a pre-industrial civilisation on the fourth planet... Hrm. That's odd."

"What?"

"Said pre-industrials seem to possess technologies one would expect to find in an FTL-capable civilisation."

"WHAT?"

"Said pre-industrials seem to-"

"Oh, shut up. This is a clear violation of the prime directive!"

"Well, it wasn't us who contacted them..."

"DOESN'T MATTER! We must prevent any further contamination of this people! The Prime Directive is more important than we are!"

"The Prime Directive is more important than we are!" The rest of the bridge answered in chorus. All of them believed religiously into leaving lesser civilisations to their fate, to be snuffed out by the occasional comet on a collision course or suffering thermonuclear war when their society happened to be incapable of dealing with deterrence. Dozens of civilisations had died out prematurely because the prime directive had to be followed, preventing Starfleet capatins from saving billions of lives.

Everybody knew it, and everybody was proud of it. It was the Federations' primary gospel, to be followed without question.

"Ok. We have to find out who is responsible for this, and what kind of technology we're dealing with. I'm beaming down with you, you, and you." Amanda Carnage pointed at her first officer, her helmsman, and a random redshirt.

"Captain... Don't you think that sending the three most important officers on this ship down on a scout mission is taking a little too much risk?"

"We need skilled men down their, not sme bloody beginners. You can command the ship while we're gone, ensign."

A few minutes later, they beamed down, to explore this unknown world.

OOC: Hehehe :D. Nice work!

Somewhere in a field on the planet of Atrit, a small and unimportant world of some forty seven thousand souls, a tribal hunter was busy fitting a dart into a blowpipe. Raising it at a gazelle from the cover of some bushes at the edge of the plains, he blew hard into the pipe, letting the poisoned dart fly.

It promptly struck a gold shirted person who materialised out of thin air. The hunter looked up, and blinked. Then he realised what he’d probably done. The one important rule to remember on goa’uld words was that if anyone did something like appear out of thin air, they were either a goa’uld or one of their servants.

In either case, killing them was bad. The hunter quietly backed away, and ran off in the direction of a small village nearby, the source of some of those alien technology readings, including a massive stone ring on a pedestal dominating the village square in fear for his life. He didn’t have the presence of mind to run quietly though…

"And there we... OH MY GOD!" Amanda looked at the goldshirt, trying to remember his name, failing, and eventually hitting her communicator, hard.

"Ow! Ahem. Beam him up! Beam him up! Again! Now!"

"There is some exotic radiation, we cannot beam him up, captain..."

"You just beamed us down, how can you now fail to beam him up?!"

No answer.

"Oh, for f-"

"Wait, I've a solution. If I triple the triptularion pulse strength and reduce the attogammadiversion by 25%-"

"... Press the fucking button or die."

"- Of course, the gigatetrionium shield buffer... Errr... Yes, Captain."

Still, it took the officer in the transporter room about half a minute to finish his (Internal) monologue, but after that, the goldshirt ended up back on the ship.

It was an interesting thing with the Sterfleet Federation. Genetic enhancements were illegal, cybernetic enhancements weren't even thought of. A few edited strings of DNA could have saved the unknown crewman, a few small implants could have spread an antidote within seconds.

Alas, the purity of the Federation didn't allow for this slight changes to ones' basic properties, and as such, the crewman was already dead when arriving in the medlab, the local hologram unable to save him by pressing random buttons on even more random mobile-phone equivalents.

Back on the surface of the (Apparently hostile) world, Amanda Carnage, captain, Francis Jenning, first officer, and Jake Callisto, helmsman, started their hunt for the source of this vile and treacherous attack. Clearly, whoever had killed their fellow (If unknown) crewman had to be found, and given a stern talking to.

Following him wasn't hard, the open savannahesque environment allowing them to follow the noises, quickly, if loudly all by themselves.

"Captain! I've got a reading!"

"Hrm?"

"About a few hundred metres from here. Seems to be the alien technology we've scanned earlier."

"Ok." For some reason, Amanda didn't seem to be surprised by the transporter not transporting them there, instantly, but setting them down over a kilometre away from it, in the path of a native's poisoned dart. She had gotten used to it, over time.

A minute or two earlier, they were close enough to see the strange, alien object, the massive stone ring...

"Doesn't look very impressive."

"This guys nearby..." Amanda used her tricorder, checking, quickly. "Definitely some advanced energy source in their staffs. Now it's getting interesting... Lets get a little closer."

The death of their comrade had long been forgotten.

Beside a pedestal next to the stone ring, two of the hawk-helmeted guards were busy talking to one another. Dressed in reinforced armour made of advanced alloys, they were part of the ‘gate battalion,’ exceptional soldiers, especially by Jaffa standards.

Sitting to the left of the dialling device, one of them sat polishing the sharp metal claws attached to his gauntlets, “And so, my wife’s mother’s cousin’s brother said to him, ‘I don’t care if it’s a holy day, I want my money back…’”

The other jaffa tapped him on the arm, “Don’t look now, but see over beyond the bushes there?”

The first gate guard swivelled his hawk head, and watched the interlopers in infrared. Switching his vision back to normal, he shook his hawk head slightly and looked away, “You think they’re trying to creep up on us?”

“Apparently so,” the other jaffa said to Shektel, “As if anyone could go unnoticed in that ridiculous outfit.”

Shektel laughed, “Tell you what, I’ll go to the guardhouse, rouse the squad, send four back here, and take four with me to go and apprehend these guys.”

The other jaffa nodded, “Try to look casual…”

Shektel sauntered off towards the nearby hut that passed for a guardhouse in the village square. Slowly, one after another, the jaffa soldiers emerged, carrying non-lethal loosely pistol shaped weapons along with their blast staves, drifting off to their posts in the plan and making good efforts at seeming casual.

Jake looked forward, watching the hawk-headed entities in front of the stone ring, fascinated, smiling, almost laughing like a baby. "A fascinating culture! I'm sure we'll be able to learn alot from them!"

"Possibly." came Amanda's more or less muttered reply. The captain didn't like this situation all that much... Like essentially all female personnel, she'd been in sexually compromising situations before, usually due to the incompetence of her male subordinates, combined with the sheer level of leecherousness alien species of vastly different physiology were capable of when seeing the incompatible shape of a baseline human.

Well, perhaps she would be a little more lucky, this time. "Looks like guns to me." She pointed in the direction of the jaffa emerging from the guardhouse. "I guess we should wait a little before getting any closer."

"Nah. Well, perhaps. I'm sure it's an honorary gesture."

"You mean they've seen us?"

"Well..." The first officer, Francis, cringed. "Perhaps."

Amanda sighed, again. "This planet's people are far too rural to produce this kind of weaponry." A glance at the tricorder. Yes, definitely weaponry. "Perhaps a feudal slaver society?"

"Captain, please." Jake and Francis answered in unison. "They're hardly any more rural than our own worlds."

"Mhm... Point."

"Besides, your suspicions are... Almost racist! I'm sure this people are perfectly polite and gentle, as their head adornments suggest!"

"Their predator-birdesque helmets, you mean?" Amanda replied, slightly frustrated. The hawkmen were coming closer, by now almost encircling them. Well, they could always just beam out...

"Captain, I'm sorry to say this, but your suspicions are the reason you aren't an admiral yet."

"Oh, shut up. The fact that we're having a pre-industrial society with FTL capacities down here, suggesting a violation of the Prime-Directive by a non-federated civilisation, is the reason why we're down here to begin with. Incidentally, they're now all around us, without calling..." She ducked, assuming that the locals would open fire within the next few seconds. It was what she would do, but then, her actually taking the course in squad-level combat at the academy had always been the reason why she'd always been promoted late.

Too militaristic.

Back on board of the USS Enterprise ZZB, the ensign sighed. "Apparently the gate is interfering with our transporters..."

"No need to tell them, I'm sure they're ok."

"You're sure?"

"Yes. Want some replicated coffee?"

"Hum. Yes."

Amanda’s doubts were, oddly enough, nothing compared to those experienced by the jaffa surrounding her and her group. They thought that they’d been noticed, something that happened frequently, given their getup – even if it was less ridiculous than that of the intruders, but the intruders didn’t seem to have taken any action against them. Usually intruders shot at them if they noticed them, as was wise. It was very confusing.

Some of the gate guards hunkered down behind trees and crudea buildings. Shektel watched with great interest as one of the female intruders ducked down behind what little cover there was, and he contemplated trying to negotiate with them.

Then he decided that this was… not the way Atum would approve of the situation being handled, and gave the order for his men to open fire, though not before joining them in taking cover – advanced tactics for a jaffa warrior, but those in Atum’s Gate Guard Legion were among the most talented soldiers in his vast armed forces. From around the intruders various shots rang out, and a barrage of blasts of golden plasma seared from the blast staves of those still at the ring device, who also scattered, some crouching behind the pedestal that controlled it, and others behind the object itself, two, deprived of anywhere better to go, remained in the open, one crouching to his knees in his inflexible armoured suit, the other standing.

Now, most peoples would find this terribly unimpressive. A barrage of single shot weapons fire largely inaccurate, starting fires and blasting small rocks apart as well as creating craters in the ground and little fountains of dirt and pebbles was not what one would expect from an advanced society.

In much the same way, Shektel’s group’s fire was not too impressive, though they had a good reason. Their hand weapons were smaller, and projected thin lines of blue light that writhed and undulated like sine waves and lightning. Though one shot from these weapons was (generally) able to cause a victim enough pain to cause them to pass out, two shots tended to be lethally effective in disrupting their neural systems.

From nearby, the villagers started, many screaming, and ran away from the sounds of the sudden skirmish in their midst.

The first officer and the helmsman looked in awe as the jaffa took cover, for a moment contemplating what was going on, with Francis even going so far as to open his mouth to establish contact, shouting a 'Hel-' before the golden plasma hit.

Not them, of course, but trees, rocks, the ground all around them, with some bolts hitting nothing and just fading into the horizon.

"DAMNIT!" came the curse, followed by poorly-aimed phaser fire. Neither the first officer nor the helmsman were in any way, shape or form resembling skilled shooters.

Amanda on the other hand was. Vaguely so, anyway. "Bastards." She looked in the general direction of the village, seeing the people scream and run, thoughts forming in her mind.

Unfortunately, all of them involved ignoring the prime directive, so she forgot about them, almost instantly.

"Fire back!"

A bit late. She saw a jaffa falling as her phaser hit him, but her two companions, unable to find proper cover, encircled as they were, were already lying in spasms, hit by the blue rays of... well, whatever they were.

A few more shots were fired, two jaffa standing/ kneeing in the open on the central place at the gate fell to the ground, and eventually, Amanda decided that it would probably a good idea to use a 'lethal' setting on her phaser.

And to call for support, come to think of it. Specifically... She hit her communicator. "BEAM ME UP! Oh, and the other two idiots, too."

"Sorry, the gate interfer-"

"... I hate you."

"-s with our transporter. I've provisionally named the interference a Begalid-Sadimetrite radiation. Oh, and... You could try to destroy the gate."

More shots fired, and Amanda started to wonder why she was still standing, eventually firing back, slowly backing off... Or not. After all, she was still kinda... Encircled. "How about orbital support?"

"Hrm. I'll send a shuttle down."

"Geez, thanks."

A plasma bolt hit a tree perhaps a tenth of a metre away from her, and she stumbled, barely preventing herself from falling.

To the gate.

Eventually, she started to run, for the moment ignoring her comrades, and aiming (Or trying to aim, anyway) her phaser at the gate.

In orbit, a shuttle left the ship, almost lazily, its bulky form suggesting an in-atmosphere maneuverability about comparable to that of a blue whale.

Of course, being Starfleet, not much different from the jaffa themselves, she missed, but, in a remarkable piece of serendipity, managed to hit one of the jaffa soldiers behind the stargate in the abdomen, resulting in him disappearing in a shower of sparks. Of course, Amanda was rather unfortunate in that they were now, in part due to the fact that she was now in the open and clearly unsupported, aware of her being the only intruder left standing.

The jaffa, at a cry of “Jaffa! Kree!” executed the most effective anti-federation tactic, a tactic that had left generations of federation tacticians without any solution. They dropped their ranged weapons, and charged towards the intruder. She was actually doing rather well, having disabled three jaffa and killed another, on her own. But she’d have to be exceedingly lucky to kill the remaining six burly and armoured opponents before they reached her. Another phaser blast, square in the chest, in a show of inconsistency, turned the outer layer of the advanced composite armour a dull red. The hawk head swivelled down for a moment, then the jaffa resumed his charge.

Elsewhere on the planet, a pair of crescent shaped star fighters rose to attack the shuttles, going at what was, despite their vast potential acceleration, a truly pathetic speed. Skimming the atmosphere, they headed to intercept the shuttle when it entered the atmosphere.

Surface

"Damnit." Amanda was just about to fire again when she saw the horde of Jaffa charging against her. Not that scary a view, more an amusing one, given their costumes/ armour... Still, she'd have to get away.

Too late.

She threw her (Now useless) phaser away, and tried to resist, dealing out blows that would have worked rather well vs. an unarmoured opponent (She had some experience with this things from the past, involving Klingons and Starfleet Command nastiness), unfortunately, as clumsy and essentially pointless as Jaffa armour was...

Well, she was staring at her broken right hand, ignoring the pain as she was overwhelmed by the gang of Jaffa, forced- and held down, struggling in desperation, but it was hopeless.

On the plus side, it wasn't the first time that a bunch of male aliens jumped on her. She'd grown used to it, so this was at least something. Besides, so far, her crew had always managed to save her in the last second, and her mind was actually rather busy figuring out how long they'd take this time around.

Hr- "HEY! NO TOUCHING THERE!" Creeps. Why always me? Well at least I'm still attractive enough to attract attention. "AT LEAST NOT THAT ROUGH!" She kicked a little, but was otherwise content with the situation. Nothing out of the usual.

Air

Having already entered the atmosphere and heading downwards, the pilot of the shuttle (Varel Ke'Shak) apparently not using his supposedly superior logic in the appropriate ways, giving up vaguely acceptable maneuverability in favour of air friction.

Still, the two gliders were seen, yet not taken particularly serious. He was not here to kill, just to rescue. It would be illogical to kill an enemy he knew nothing about. Perhaps they had just insulted them, and they could negotiate afterwards? Surely showing restraint was more acceptable.

His fingers moved gracefully over the pads while his face expressed a stoic lack of emotions.

He fired, yet the beam would certainly be too weak to actually destroy the gliders. Damage, perhaps, but that was about it.

He had never been a military mind, and Pon Farr was about to commence soonish. This was just an annoyance, compared to the glorious days that were about to come.

Ground

The remaining jaffa warriors meanwhile, pinned Amanda down in just the rough manner she was expecting and used to. They might have been confounded by her effectiveness in shooting them, but she was clearly no ‘true warrior’ unlike them.

In the typically chauvinist fashion of their civilisation, the jaffa soldiers held the squirming Starfleet officer down, probing her for other weapons, and taking the opportunity to tear a gold ornament of some form from her chest. While doing so, they sent one of their number running to the guardhouse for something to hold their captives more securely. At the same time, they dragged the other two out of the undergrowth.

Now, many cultures, it has to be said, practice binding their prisoners before moving them, it is indeed, a practice often considered sensible. However, there are few who do it quite so badly as these particular jaffa chose to.

Yanking her black braid to pull her up to her knees, eliciting a short torrent of abuse, not quelled by a brief smack to the mouth, they pulled her arms back and took one of their extraordinarily cumbersome staff weapons. Pushing the, at least turned off, weapon up behind her back, they quickly pulled her wrists forwards and tied them in front of her with uncomfortable leather strips, used locally for tying beasts of burden in place.

Much the same happened, with less swearing, to the other two, and again, amused by the threats, Amanda was yanked around by the hair, this time to stand in front of the pedestal device as one of the jaffa soldiers pressed carved buttons on its surface, resulting in a glow from each in turn, and the ring nearby springing into life.

An explosion of what seemed to be water (doubtless the orbiting ship’s cook could get a slew of new particles from it) erupted from the ring, and settled back into a vertical plane. Again Amanda had the misfortune of being pulled along by her handler, after the dialler sent some sort of signal, in the same manner, and thrust into the puddle of water before he, and two more each carrying her subordinates as well as the small amounts of captured Starfleet equipment followed.

Air

Of course, shuttles rather sucked at hitting anything, or damaging it. And most Death Glider pilots thought they were good at evading enemy fire. This wonderful combination meant that as soon as Varel opened fire, both opposing pilots went into paroxysms of evasion.

Again, not quite understanding the fact that space (and indeed, atmospheres) is big, the pilots happened to be flying wingtip-to-wingtip. Spectacularly, they went towards one another, and of course, logically they hit each other, soon going down into the annals of aerial incompetence as they managed to plough into the shuttle, both of them at once.

Mnewer, Capital World of Lord Atum <insert titles here>

The receiving stargate on Atum’s home planet was, surprisingly enough, well protected. The stargate was protected by a force field (fortunately deactivated now) and then a chamber with more force fields around it, as well as two-foot thick stone walls faced with scenes of yet more jaffa in battle against, well, one another, behind which more jaffa covered their arriving comrades and the prisoners.

As the stargate shut down, a tall, surprisingly handsome man dressed in an abominably over-tailored golden outfit wandered out from behind the cover, past deactivating force fields. Amanda was promptly pushed down to her knees by the braid (which she was probably regretting now). He looked her up and down, allowing his gaze to linger far too long on her out-thrust chest, and then, with a strange phosphorescence (which most Starfleet officers would immediately start commenting on no doubt) in the whites and pupil of his eyes, “And just what are you?” he asked…

Atrit, Surface

"You fucking fucker of-" Amanda sweared as she felt the jaffa all over her. It was certainly something she'd gotten used to, yet, she would never come to like it. Still, after so many occasions including exceedingly excessive fanservice, she couldn't help it and eventually became a little cynical. "At least try to be a little less rough. Not used to women, I see... OUCH! Asshole."

The abuse (Physically from the Jaffa, verbal as far as Amanda was concerned, although she managed to hit a few jaffa with the staff she was bound to) went on, and ignoring the considerable pain she was presently in, she watched the gate 'connect'.

"So this is what it is all about?" Granted, she didn't exactly have her tricoder with her (Well, not anymore, anyway), but it really wasn't hard to guess. "Looks impract-"

Then she was pushed inside.

Atrit, Orbit

The ensign blinked, watching the screen. "Wha?"

Indeed, the catastrophic piloting skills he had just seen... His men should have been able to evade the two torpedoes. Well, it didn't matter now, as he'd just lost the lifesigns of the captain, the first officer and the helmsman. In other words, the USS Enterprise ZZB was severely weakened by lacking a significant portion of its key personnel.

Oh, and the shuttle crew had died, too, but being nameless underlings, their death was hardly an issue for the young ensign.

"What the-?"

He couldn't finish the question, as comms came to life. The voice of the cook could be heard. "FAN-TAS-TIC! Just FANTASTIC! Amazing! It's unbelievable! Seventy-five new particles! Alphatron, Betatron, Gammatron, Deltatron, Epsilontron... Damnit, there are not enough characters."

On the brindge, ice silence was the entirety of the reply.

"Oh well. Hubbartron, Marcatron, Infidelatron, Bsnatron..."

The ensign sighed, looking at the other members of the crew, as far as they were on the bridge. "And now?"

Mnewer

"OW! MY HAIR! Be careful, for the Prime Directive's sake!" Amanda made a mental note about cutting her hair shorter, next time. Possibly about a centrimetre.

She looked at the figure in front of her, having trouble not to laugh out loud. Still, she managed to suppress her urges, merely giggling at the presence in front of her, in his ludicrously overadorned outfit.

The way he was looking at her, and the parts of Amanda he was looking at, well, nothing out of the ordinary. She was used to it, even played a little with the 'Pityful Male', thrusting her chest out a little more.

"I..." The giggling stopped as she saw his eyes. Odd. "Certainly not a thing. How about usin-" Oh, right. I'm a prisoner right now. Well, damn. She forced a smile. "A Federated Starfleet Captain. With whom do I have the honour? Doubtlessly a brave warrior..." Facing me with so few of his soldiers. Only a few hundred. Why, he must feel safe. Still, she swallowed her sarcasm down. After all, she was somewhat interested in staying alive.

Atrit

The ensign had made a smart plan. To acquire information about the enemy he was facing, the enemy he needed to defeat in order to save his belowed captain (Indeed, he was already rising, just thinking of the moment when he'd free her, when she'd finally acknowledge and accept his desires), he'd have to take the planet, by all means necessary.

Of course, no message about all of this was sent to the Starfleet Command, seeing as it knowing about this disaster could seriously hurt his career chances (Granted, he had just turned fifteen and still had his chances, but still).

Nonetheless, the attack commenced, suddenly ignoring just about every rule ever made by the Starfleet Federation. The USS Enterprise ZZB spewed out deadly ortillery, capable of setting the natives' huts on fire with a single shot, barely giving the inhabitants time to save what little they possessed from their slowly collapsing homes.

At the same time, several shuttles descended. Granted, the ensign had forgotten to scan for possible anti-air or anti-orbit defences, as well as for possibly remaining crescent-shapes torpedoes, and the shuttle crews didn't think of it, either, but well... surely after a few attack waves they'd hold the planet and take the gate.

Indeed, Starfleet Command would have disapproved of such a rash and radical attack, it would have suggested the use of diplomacy, eventually sacrificing the captain (As it had done with a lot of captains in its long and varied history) but then, the ensign had lived under Captain Carnage for quite a while... And she would likely have acted the same way, given that one time when she'd eradicated those Klingons... Which had resulted in her acquiring her present surname.

Now, if the ensign had actually remembered the existence of transporters...

Atrit

“Oh for the love of Atum’s gonads!” screamed a villager as the chimney of his thatched hut exploded. Several members of his family wandered out of the door looking confused as the thatch caught fire. Some even looked frightened.

Chaos was wreaked quite effectively throughout the town square, a hay cart exploding as a photon torpedo impacted, almost yielding gunpowder level effectiveness. Natives ran, and jaffa, in a wonderfully clever move, shot their weapons into the sky.

The fine education of the mighty legions of Lord Atum clearly showed as the garrison bailed out of their barracks and formed a Napoleonic style firing line thirty-one men across and three men deep, before firing their staff-pop-guns into the air. Needless to say, this was well, just about the worst possible way to handle orbital attack, and of course, the staff weapons had nothing like the range required to hit a target in orbit.

More of the fearsome gliders would have launched from their eyrie, streaking into the sky to bring fire and death to the enemies of the great God, but they were unfortunately, stuck in place in their hangar bay due to an accident involving a drunken pilot and the rather narrow launch doors. There would, apparently, be no fire and death today.

Meanwhile, as the garrison lined up, the ortillery swept closer. Flashes kicking up dirt nearby… then phaser blasts setting light to suspicious trees that looked like they came from Vancouver… then finally, blasts coming close enough to give the disciplined jaffa light burns.

But they were dedicated to holding their ground in the name of their God! They would never retreat, for they were the servants of the One True God. Thus, with a staggering rate of accuracy, the pinpoint barrage began knocking Jaffa over with concussion, and even disintegrating a few in showers of red sparkles!

As dying jaffa shambled around, the peasants frantically pitch-forked burning hay around, setting light to several of their own, and indeed, a few jaffa survivors. Thatched roves burned slowly, crackling and sending up great wafts of smoke.

“Invaders!” someone cried, pointing at shuttles landing near the stargate. Holding burning torches which they had for no appreciable reason, it being the middle of the day, and burning pitchforks, which continued to burn mostly because of someone accidentally throwing lamp oil on the hay cart fire, a small and ragged mob of peasants charged towards the shuttles.

Mnewer

“I am,” the great noble and overdressed goa’uld proclaimed, “Venteth!”

Then he thought back on the last few moments, and her giggling, “You dare to mock my grand glorious greatness, puny human wench?”

Various jaffa wandered off, they’d seen all this sort of thing before. It usually and predictably ended up in a great deal of self-important ranting and raving about divinity (at which point Venteth would remember that he was no longer allowed to say he was a god) and power and greatness and all that other stuff that hid the fact that this particular goa’uld was basically rated as just about capable of managing a single building.

Indeed, the ridiculously costumed parasitic worm was getting ready to spew nonsensical drivel already.

Mnever

"I..." Amanda had some issues, trying to keep her face straight, but eventually, she managed it. It was odd - She knew that she was in danger, that her life was worth very, very little, right now. Yet, all she could think of was How the hell did I get caught by this people?

Well, if she thought about it, there were certain similarities...

Probably better not to think about that, though.

"I..." Keep a straight face, damnit! "No.. I'd never do that, oh grand glorious greatness, Sir." Well, after I ram a knife into your back, perhaps...

Odd. It wasn't too dissimilar from dealing with her superiors in the Federation, if on a somewhat more barbarian level. But the principles were still the same.

"So, Venteth, ummm... Why am I - And my fellow men -here? What kind of... Entity are you? You see, you have violated the Prime Directive-" She straightened up a little when she spoke this holiest-of-words, looking a little taller, "-and my superiors would like a word with you..."

The whole thing was accompanied with her eyes being downcast half of the time, while she was batting her eyelashes whenever she looked up. That the expressions didn't exactly - Read, not at all - fit her words didn't seem to disturb her.

Atrit

"Victory!" The shuttle doors opened, and out came the crews-

Just to retreat again, as they saw the masses (A few dozen) of unorganised resistance storming after them with their pitchforks.

And, as their conflicts with the Klingons had proven, nothing is more dangerous to a group of combatants with long-range weaponry than the charge of a group of barbarians armed with swords (Or in this case, pitchforks), overrunning their lines in a matter of minutes, crossing a distance of hundreds of metres with a spirit that would prove to be too strong for the defenders.

The doors closed, again, with the crews suffering only a few bruises and burns, but the constant knocking, the pitchforks hitting the hulls of their shuttles, this neolithic people climbing on top of the shuttle...

People were becoming nervous.

Atrit

“Roar!” shouted a peasant, as he smacked the pitchfork against the metallic door of the lead shuttle. It of course, didn’t occur to him that he’d have better results trying to open the door by pressing the buttons – having never had any experience with buttons before, the low-profile buttons on the door completely went over his head (though he did put the pitch fork through them at one stage, attempting to “Git the shinies out!”

Someone – with surprisingly little self-inflicted burns – manages to wheel the cartload of burning hey up against one of the shuttles.

Next to the lead shuttle, the pinned gold-shirts and other Starfleet officers could hear an ominous sound: “Hitch th’ mules!” a peasant shouted, and ropes were brought out from somewhere, and promptly tied around one of the shuttle’s engine nacelles. The butts of the peasants’ fearsome flaming torches were hammered against the beige (in the federation, everything was beige) hull of the shuttle.

The fierce clattering of angry peasants subsided, as they slid their pitchforks under the side of the shuttle, using them to leaver the shuttle about a little. Mules and donkeys were brought forth, and the ropes were put over the roof of the shuttle. Then, the peasants levered the shuttle in concert with the animals, and were soon gratified by the shuttle rolling onto its side with a thump.

Shovels, picks and for some reason, hoes, were brought out, and used to bury the doors of each shuttle under small mountains of Atrit’s soil. Sitting atop the last shuttle, after a hard fight to defeat the alien invasion of their homeworld, the inhabitants began to dole out jugs of booze, and someone produced a banjo…

Atop the shuttles, they began dancing.

Mnewer

Venteth practically preened himself, “I am a god!” he said, triumphantly as he answered the question about what kind of Entity (capitalised, of course) he was. He looked behind him as he heard the distinctive snap of a staff weapon activating behind him. Inwardly he cursed the ‘new order’ of Atum. “…like being. A godlike being! Serving the one true god Atum, right…”

The staff snapped as it was closed.

“Now, what is this Prime Directive thing,” he said, “and why should I care about it?”

Atrit

ZAPP

Lights flickered, then went out.

"There go the genepacks..." a nameless - His name had been deemed of secondary importance by the Starfleet Command, and so he was simply named #447 - ensign on board of one of the shuttles said.

Right now, they were learning that neurons and nerves were considerably vulnerable to heat. The hard way, no less.

"Now how to open the damned door..."

Of course, this was only the beginning. Soon enough - After worrying moments of ominous sounds and scratching on the hulls, and another nameless ensign (#288 according to the books, though she insisted on being called 'Maire', very much against Federation protocol - Captain Carnage hadn't minded it overly much, though) having a brief fit - everything started to move, and they tumbled over, helpless, legs and arms forming impossible knots, heads hitting consoles (Which promptly resulted in the consoles being smashed).

After this shock, it took the crews of assorted shuttles about ten minutes (During which the natives could celebrate their victory) of discussing strategies and the four most recent issues of Particles Universal until one crew, under the leadership of Lieutenant Maxwell and #153 (He had mentioned his name, but Maxwell hadn't really cared) decided to simply relaunch their shuttle.

The little earthquake wasn't noticed from the start - It was hard to get the shuttle out of its present position - but eventually, it managed it, throwing the natives from its top, and boosting into the air, carrying mules on ropes with it (Which made maneuvering a little harder, but it worked out, after a minute or so of reconfigurations).

Then the phasering began (Non-lethal, of course), while the crews in the other shuttles watched in awe.

Mnever

Amanda looked up, listening... And smiled inwardly. What a moron. Somehow, he reminded her of Starfleet Command...

And she certainly enjoyed the idea of this man in front of her being almost as much of a prisoner as she was (For now, anyway).

"The Prime Directive is the ultimate in galactic civilisation, and guides the means through which different civilisations interact with each other. Created by the Starfleet Federation, upheld and enforced by it - And you've violated it, when you actively interacted with a civilisation of lesser technological capabilities than your own."

Amanda stopped, taking a bit of breath... but before Venteth could reply (Or collapse laughing), she continued. "And you should care because non-compliance may result in all sorts of potentially negative sanctions from Starfleet, targetting you and-"

Just then, the memories returned. The bright room, the admiral, the counsellor, the questions, the answers, the patronising tones, the...

And then they were gone, again.

She straightened more, as much as she possibly could, showing her pride. "We're not coming as enemies. We're coming to aid you, to aid you in becoming a civilisation as enlightened as our own. Offering you laws. Culture. New ways. Release us, and end this dispute, for the betterment of your people."

Atrit

The population of the village of Atrit were stunned and horrified as the shuttle managed to take off, pulling their mules with it. The animals brayed and kicked as they were yanked into the air by their harnesses, kicking and panicking, their long ears twisting this way and that as they lost control of their bowels.

Numerous peasants fell from the back of the shuttle as it soared into the air, and they could only watch helplessly as the boxy ship soared around this way and that, its pilots attempting to fly it using clunky, counter-ergonomic button interfaces on smashed consoles.

Then, rays of phaser-fire shot out from the shuttle, catching – or rather, striking close enough to stun - several of the peasants, some of whom hurled their pitchforks at the shuttle, which was unfortunately flying too high for them to hit. When shot, they staggered about drunkenly or simply fell to the floor, one or two dropping their burning torches and being tragically immolated as a result.

But overall, the resulting ‘crushing’ was just as non-lethal as Starfleet’s Holy Regulations would suggest, and soon, all three shuttles were unguarded.

Mnewer

Venteth didn’t laugh at the description of the prime directive. It struck him as hilarious, in its way, but his mind didn’t have the agility to quite think how funny the idea was at the time. He was bemused by Amanda’s ranting, and as he was about to strike her for her insolence in threatening him, she seemed to have some kind of mental seizure, and then started talking in a friendly way.

Eventually, the parasite dimwittedly decided that this was some sort of insult to him, and he backhanded the Starfleet captain with his right hand, the crystal-housing on the back of its elaborate weapon cutting the skin as it hit. “You dare to mock my greatness and glory? Take this scum away! Take them all away!” he snapped, and two Jaffa dragged Amanda to her feet, and marched her away behind Venteth.

This was rather more difficult than it looked, as Amanda had to – thanks to being bound to a staff-weapon, be brought through the facility’s narrow doorways sideways. They were metallic, but rather thin, opening into curved, dangerous looking spiky doors. Worse, the corridors were only about four foot wide – with the staff being six – and so, rather than do something sensible, like remove it, they picked her up by the staff and marched her along with her feet off the floor.

There were a few quick turns, past various jaffa warriors dressed in ludicrous costumes made of chain mail and iron plates that looked exceedingly heavy. Whenever the jaffa moved they seemed to clank as though they were made of some kind of archaic clockwork mechanism. Eventually, Amanda was shoved into a small cell on the floor below, just over eight foot square. It had been designed with a certain psychological aim in mind, a metal box with nothing for the eye to really take notice of except for curved scoring in the metallic surface. Surprisingly it had a bunk.

Of course, this bunk was actually designed to be less comfortable than the floor, made of the same metal, but without anything resembling a pillow or sheets, and it had, with very non-goa’uld-like subtly, several uncomfortable bumps in it, that made actually lying on it in comfort quite impossible.

The burly, and not too bright, jaffa untied Amanda, picked her up, and pocketed – somewhere, there were pockets in jaffa armour – her communicator badge, before throwing her down at the floor. This ritual of ‘throwing to the floor’ done, they retreated outside the cell, which was sealed by both a solid door and a rippling crimson force field.

They clumped off, and slung the rest of the captives into other cells…

Atrit Orbit

"So you defeated them?" Amanda asked, smiling down at her ensign, seemingly pleased with her protegee.

"Yes, Captain." Franklin blushed, seemingly even more pleased with his captain's praise.

Very seemingly in fact, the Federation's spandex-uniforms be damned. Franklin blushed some more.

"It was very hard, but once we'd figured out how their gate worked, we had little issues following them. Locating you was of course very dangerous, and their soldiers were very strong, but after defeating several thousand of their warriors with our half-a-dozen-men team, without suffering a single loss (To no small part due to my tactical genius), we finally found you, and, well... You know the rest."

"I know indeed." They were in the Captain's quarters, alone, with the Captain having choosen to use a uniform rather more fitting to her femininity. Those last-century uniforms were sexy. "How you saved me moments before their tyrant could... Violate... But well, it's over, and you saved me. Me, and their people, by defeating the tyrant, and giving them their freedom!"

"Yes... Yes, of course..." Franklin was now outright red, and twiddling his thumbs. "But declaring me their new king was maybe a little... Exaggerated..."

"Oh, no! You deserved it! And their virgins, too, don't you think so?"

"Well..." He couldn't believe just how stupidly he was grinning. But then, Amanda seemed to like it. "But you know that there's only one woman I care about... Mistress."

Amanda was still smiling. "Well then, ensign, time to take care of some discipline... And I'm sure I'll have a special present for you, for your sixteenth' birthday..."

"Ensign? Ensign? Ensign Franklin?"

"Mhm?"

Franklin looked up, into the faces of the ground intervention team he'd sent down in the shuttles a little while ago. From the shuttle bays, the squalling of the (Confused) mules (Which had survived due to forcefields/ shields) resounded throughout the ship. "Oh, right. Well, now that the natives are stunned, we can beam down, yes?"

"Yes, Sir. Though..."

"Well then, lets do it. The science team takes care of this odd ring-shaped thing we've found, and figures out a way to follow Captain Amanda. Take the cook with you, he'll know what to do."

"Understood, Sir. Though, your right hand..."

"My..? Oh. Ummm... Uh... nevermind. Ummm... well, you've your orders, yes?"

"Yes..." The second officer (Who hadn't had protested, or even thought twice, about the fifteen-year old ensign taking over command of the ship) turned around, and left the bridge.

The ensign looked around, at the half-a-dozen people still left on the same. "I, uh, will be in the captain's quarters."

"Yes, Sir!"

"And someone send a message to Starfleet Command, about this new, hostile cont- Actually, forget it. I'll do that myself."

"Yes, Sir!"

The doors slid shut behind him, and Fanklin let out a long sigh, before throwing himself on his belowed Captain's bed (And underwear).

Annoyingly, Linkin Park was banned in the Federation.

Mnewer

Her injury and subsequent fury (Half of it because the people who had captured her were about as inept as her own crew, and taking their sweet time bringing her to... Well, some place she could rest) aside, Amanda was mostly bored, and somewhat annoyed by her capture (And the time her crew took to rescue her - they were late).

She'd gone through all of this at least a dozen times. It was, well... Getting old.

Admittedly, the entertainment factor of this particular civilisation was considerable - she had issues trying not to laugh as the fairly ridiculous, pseudo-mythological beings/ armoured warriors/ whatever walked past her, and eventually failed, anyway, spending a good part of the way chuckling quietly to herself.

Well, can't be that hard rescuing me from these guys...

And once gain, boredom. Nothing interesting inside the cell, nothing happening. Eventually, Amanda started drawing little pictures with the blood coming from the wound that had resulted from Venteth striking her, starting with a a jaffa getting his head cut off, then with another one exploding into little pieces, with guts detonating throughout the picture, and his ridiculous Hawk-head's beak piercing his own belly... But eventually, Amanda grew bored of drawing, and fell asleep (On the floor, of course).

When she awoke, it was to the rather violent method of prodding the jaffa used, with a vaguely intimately-looking figure standing in front of her, not yet clearly identifiable to her sleepy eyes.

Mnewer

Venteth frowned, “Strike her again soldier! Very roughly!” The jaffa warrior, sans helmet, stooped and smacked Amanda in the face once more, “Up!” Venteth said, and the jaffa dragged the captain to her feet once again. “Lord Atum has decided that you will be granted an audience, scum,” he said. Venteth seemed distinctly angry at this, mostly because it was well known that Atum despised his own kind. What’s worse, is that it meant he was required to actually clean Amanda up, resulting in his being degraded to actually healing the infidel peasant.

“Bring her!” he snapped, and had the guard drag her from the cell, into the corridor and up the stairs, taking, as he did so, a handheld healing device from his latest set of starched, gold-spun robes. “Hold her!” he snapped repetitively, and one of the various jaffa nearby hauled Amanda up onto her toes, pulling her head back. By the braid, as usual.

He held up a hand, covered in a three inch wide red stone in a housing of brass, which glowed brightly and began to create a feeling that Amanda was probably familiar with, that of wounded flesh and muscle being repaired, both the old wound, and the others from the back of the jaffa’s gauntlet.

“Take her and wash her face,” he snapped, when this was done, she did after all, have various scuffs and caked in blood from her injuries.

Moments later, a very wet Starfleet captain was dragged into the over decorated gate-room. The normal hawk-headed jaffa warriors looked ridiculous. Those before Amanda now contrived to do so to an even greater degree. They wore faded gilded armour, with a more compact, advanced helmet design, and their breastplates glowed with blue light from within that indicated power systems, and a nice target. They were lined up in ranks three broad and five deep.

“Behold, scum!” Venteth proclaimed, his voice distorted by ego, “the first army of Atum, the Palace Guard, of an elite battalion, too! They will soon teach your rabble our… His, might!” a circular-winged fighter descended from the ceiling, floors above, and positioned itself facing the stargate, already active. The soldiers knelt down to get out of its way, and it shot over their heads like a bullet, creating a wind in the empty room as a massive object disappeared through the portal and air rushed in to equalise pressure.

The leader of the Palace Guard detachment nodded at something only he could hear, and spoke in a processed, flat, tone. “Hostile contact far side,” he said, and the jaffa moved quickly, heavy books clanging on the floor as they formed a line before the stargate, seven wide and two deep, shouldering their weapons. The front line crouched, and both ranks began to fire, incandescent plasma blasts firing through the event horizon. Two of the jaffa from the back row, at either side, took large, metallic cricket-ball type devices from their wide, belts, which held multiple pieces of gear, and threw them through the gate, at roughly forty five degrees, crossing over just at the event horizon.

The leader, standing behind them, counted for a moment, “One, two,” he said, and then held up his staff, “Charge!”

The front rank took one hand from their weapons, and punched their chests, causing the breastplates to glow brighter, and their bodies to be surrounded by shimmering fields of golden light.

“Take prisoners!” Venteth cried.

The jaffa patrol’s leader tongued the toggle that switched to internal communications, “No prisoners,” he commanded, as his squad charged through the shimmering portal.

Atrit, Ground

The stargate opened, and a moment later, as one of the away team investigated, standing against it, waving his tricorder at it, the gate-glider barrelled through the gate, smacking into him and killing him, rather messily. The glider soared into the air, and moments later, ranks of fire, around thirty or forty bolts in all, shot out, followed by two grenades that landed on either side of the stargate, a dozen feet from the gate, each one flashed an incapacitating, stunning blast of brilliance designed to induce blindness, headaches and seizure-effects in its victims.

Then, as the glider wheeled around, the jaffa, shields flickering off whenever they moved too quickly, or fired, poured out of the stargate, some settling on either side of it in wide-legged stances on the pedestal, staff weapons out, shields flickering on and off a dozen times per second.

Mnewer

Two more of the same illuminated jaffa held Amanda in a ring on the floor of one of the side rooms of the chamber. These ones, however, were distinctly not elite. This was notable because they marched out of step, and at one point, clanged a hawk-head into a doorframe. Thick rings flashed up out of the ground, around them, and the environment changed to a high gold plated hall. They stood in a throne room attached to it, beneath a glittering banner showing the rising sun within a circle, within another mostly-complete circle roughly the shape of bulls horns, or the laurel wreath around the federation’s symbol.

The jaffa shoved her in the direction of a wide side-door, and then stepped backwards. Two hulking kull warriors in their insect-like, and rather more functional looking armour guarded the door. They stared with blue-lit eyes at Amanda. One twitched its hand over a button on its glove, and the rings flashed again behind Amanda, returning Atum’s golden throne, rather like a captain’s chair, but much more elaborate in design, and less comfortable looking.

Behind her were various courtiers who seemed to be even more ludicrously dressed than Venteth, high feathered hats, some of which were in fact model star-ships, of various designs from humble Al’kesh to battleships, as was the current fashion, and sweltering robes that compressed the waists of the wearers (both genders) down to something one could wrap a single hand around with ease – a frivolous use of the matter compression technology that powered jaffa helmets – the room was interspersed with slaves and peasants of various types, some dressed in the degrading manner Franklin aspired to be dressed in when in Amanda’s presence.

Through the door, the master of this domain stood, a short character, he was leaning against railings that looked out from the balcony on the valley below. Mountains nearby were squared off into flat topped mastabas and pyramids for landing ships on, and the city of a million people far below, beyond the palace’s ornate gardens, was surprisingly advanced looking from this great height, a Grecian/Egyptian theme dominated the valley’s architecture, and in the distance, sailing ships could be seen at the harbours at the river’s mouth. Atum had been wise enough, when he had ruled this planet only, to allow the human inhabitants to run most of their own affairs, with only intermittent tampering from him, such as the provision of transporter rings for travel, allowing the extensive prosperity whose tithes had funded his rise to pre-eminent power among the goa’uld.

Atum had no guards on the balcony itself, and his all-concealing robe was of a surprisingly humble design. He was watching pilgrims ascending the thousands of steps through the multi-tiered gardens, and seemed to only notice her presence after a few moments.

“Tell me,” he said, in an inhumanly deep, voice that was yet different from that of the lesser goa’uld, “is Venteth still a posturing fool?”

Starfleet Command, Federation Space

"... can it be said that an entity violating the first directive has been found. The entity is aggressive, and might be a slaver-society. Feudalistic traits, though not proven, may exist as well.

"Captain Amanda has been abducted by the entity in question, and measures to rescue her from her perils, bound in the dungeons of a doubtlessly amoral race, are undertaken.

"I can only stress that I believe it to be of the utmost importance to engage in a strict diplomatic dialoge to stop the entity in question from violating the first directive and Captain Amanda. I will do so myself, and hope that you'll choose to support me in my endeavours, although I believe that the USS Enterprise ZZB will be sufficient to deal with this threat.

"Ensign Franklin, out."

The room was nearly empty, with only a few men and women even older and more out of fashion than the scarce, once-modern paintings on the otherwise white walls inside it, sitting at the round desk occupying most of the room.

"Well... That's the message we received from the Enterprise. First and foremost, I must congratulate Admiral Franklin for his decision of actually adding his grandson to the Enterprise's crew - I'm sure this disciplinary measure will teach Captain Amanda to disobey direct orders."

"Thank you, Admiral Belversby. Finally something that useless prick can do."

"Indeed. In any case, with regards to this hostile entity found... I propose the deployment of several more ships near the present position of the Enterprise. Our opponent seems to operate without ships, which should grant us a decisive advantage - transporting goldshirt elites onto the surface of their worlds, should diplomatic measures fail, strikes me as the ideal method, should the worst come to worst."

"Indeed. Incidentally, given the entity's obvious lack of interstellar spacecraft, we should be able to use a rather large fraction of our interstellar assets on them - defensive needs of our worlds are taken care of by their very lack of ships."

"Very true, Admiral Johnston. I trust you to relay the orders?"

Admiral Johnston, a human - non-humans had no access to positions higher than first officer - female looking slightly dryer than Tutankhamun, nodded. "Certainly. Anyone with a differing opinion?"

The draught caused by all the shaking heads caused several batches of paper to drop from the table.

Atrit, Ground

"This is extremely interesting, you know. I mean..."

"Look! James! It has started to... To glow! It's moving!"

The two scientists near the gate looked in awe as it moved, its sophisticated structures forming the code that created pathsways between the worlds.

Somewhat unfortunately, the scientist called 'James' was notably unaware of the side effects of gate-activation, and when his partner next looked at him, all that was left of him consisted of his shoes and some burning flesh inside them.

For a moment, James' partner - Jamie, or #315, according to Starfleet protocol - was simply stunned, then she walked towards her now-deceased ex-partner. "James?"

She walked closer. "Hrm."

And finally, she was standing next to James' feet, in front of the shimmering event horizon of the Stargate, looking a little lost, but eventually pointing her tricorder at the smoking flesh. "Fascinating..."

A moment later, she heard a roaring noise, and that was it. When her guts ended up decorating the gate-glider in rather less than tasteful ways, well... She didn't really experience that, anymore. Not consciously, anyway.

Further off the gate, the three dozen or so men that formed the present 'Occupation Force' looked vaguely horrified as the events commenced, for a moment forgetting that they actually had phasers available, this regrettable - though luckily not permanent - loss of memory preventing them from shooting back through the gate.

A handful were blinded (Although they were too far off to be hit by the staff weapons' plasma bolts - well, with one exception that just happened to run into three of them), and the rest covered, now, under enemy fire, and with the jaffa already being on this side of the gate, finally remembered that they were actually armed.

Mnewer

Calling the circumstances odd would've been an understatement, and Amanda - soaked but healed - didn't hold with understatements.

Freaks.

This said, she'd seen vaguely similar scenery before... Her reaction had been the same, too, though.

She grinned briefly, peering at obviously 'Noble' females she'd presumably be able to (Literally) break with one hand, and then shuddered when she saw the more explicit costumes some of the slaves were wearing - her memory of one night, when Ensign Franklin had broken into her cabin, wearing a similar outfit, just to ask for being punished for this very deed, was still rather fresh (In fact, she feared that it'd never leave her).

She hadn't actually noticed Atum before he eventually choose to talk to her, and was rather surprised to hear the robed figure talk, but given the content of the words, it wasn't hard for her to guess who was being addressed.

The careful and cautious kind of person would probably have hesitated, wondering if the rather open question was a trap, a trick played upon them, for the party to have fun with the unfortunate, soon to suffer unbearable tortures, prisoner.

"He is indeed, although to be fair, he's pretty good at being a posturing fool. It takes quite a bit of ego for someone in such a low position to claim being a god... Incidentally, am I correct in believing that you're the 'Lord Atum' Venteth mentioned?"

No, Amanda really wasn't the careful and cautious kind of person.

Mnewer

Venteth assembled more troops, ready to charge through the stargate after the first wave, and took out a portable hourglass, letting the sand trickle through the narrow pinched ‘waist’ of the bell, so reminiscent of Atumite court fashions. When the sand passed through, he commanded his lesser minions to form a firing line, and directed them to open fire and charge.

Atrit

The Jaffa were winning! They were winning! They were through the gate and wiping out their opponents, meagre foes who couldn’t possibly stop them! They advanced down the steps, spreading out a little as they did, and began putting down heavy suppressing fire all around. A jaffa fell to the beam of a phaser, his armour plate glowing fiercely. Three more pumped plasma bolts at the firer.

And then all hell broke loose. The rear ranks of the jaffa staggered and fell as plasma bolts smashed into them from the event horizon, slaying a third of their force instantly. The remainder wheeled round, throwing themselves on the floor as the found themselves attacked from two sides, probably by their own men. The first of the next wave of Jaffa were in for a surprise, as the enraged first wave opened fire on them, staff bolts erupting in their chests and sending them tumbling back into the event horizon, scattering their molecules across space.

At the same time, the jaffa attempting to keep the Starfleet team suppressed were fighting an enemy with renewed confidence, despite its inherent ineptitude, felling jaffa.

Above, the screech of the gate-glider could be heard as it twisted about in the air, its pilots unable to see thanks to the tattered and gruesome fragments of a golden shirt over the window. Twisting and turning this way and that, it seemed to be trying to circle back around, but was doing so erratically. The jaffa on the ground could see it as it approached, clearly flying blind, headed straight for their position.

Scattering, they decided to ignore the procedure for repelling aircraft in which they had been trained. Instead of standing shoulder to shoulder, and giving it volley after volley of staff fire, they decided to behave in a sensible manner, and took to their heels.

A fireball, is how one would describe it. The death glider ploughed into the ground at full speed, and erupted into a gigantic fireball. Debris flew outwards in all directions at immense speed, scything through jaffa lethally, blasting the stargate from its moorings onto its back.

The gateway was unharmed, but as the second wave poured through, they emerged into the light of day, and then, as the force pushing them from the event horizon disappeared, they plunged back below it to the fate of total oblivion, as their molecules were distributed randomly throughout space in a line between Mnewer and Atrit.

Mnewer

“I am indeed Lord Atum, Master of all I survey, and god to billions or mortals… Claiming to be a god, is he?” Atum said, disparagingly, “that is most unfortunate for him,” he held up a black-gloved hand, and gestured to his guards, saying something in a guttural language that contained the word ‘Venteth.’ The black armoured creatures at the doorway of the balcony didn’t speak, but instead bowed stiffly, and stamped off towards the rings where Amanda had appeared, leaving her alone with the ‘god’ on the balcony overlooking the city.

A bass rumbling could be heard, and a shadow passed across the palace as a vast assemblage of gilded and weathered metal passed overhead, blocking out the sun. It was as large as a battleship, though more massive, and ascending upwards. A ha’tak class mothership. Atum had no desire to say so, but the craft was on its way to find and destroy the USS Enterprise ZZB. Detaching from a mastaba across the valley, another such craft began rising, and then another. When in orbit, the three would join with forth, larger, vessel to assemble an attack force capable of reaching the distant world of Atrit in around an hour.


The rings shot up from the floor, flashed, and dropped down into it again. Looking around the transport chamber of the stargate-base, which was distantly visible, buried deep under one of the mastabas, from Amanda’s vantage point, the Kull Warriors deemed that there was nothing of interest there. One reached out, and pushed a sun-symbol concealed in the wall’s golden hieroglyphs, causing the door to slide apart into half a dozen sections, and open.

Walking slowly, implacably, they spread out; there were two entrances to the stargate chamber, and two of them. They opened another set of doors, and stomped through them. A surprised jaffa dropped to his knees, and the Kull Warriors, revered as the reincarnated spirits of valiant jaffa in Atum’s new religion, ignored him, passing through the next set of doors instead, into the wide chamber. There were plenty of jaffa soldiers milling about there, and they shouldered their way trough them.

Standing among the warriors was the golden robed Venteth, who at last saw the Kull warriors heading towards him, their blue eyes glowing fiercely in their helms, their body language showing that they meant business. He’d heard all about Atum’s guards being sent to execute those who displeased him, and he had no doubt that’s what they’d come to do.

He did the only logical thing, and with a shriek of terror, turned and ran, shouting for the shields in the room to be turned on, in his panic forgetting that they were one-way. They snapped up, and he turned to watch a black armoured, beetle like warrior bat a hawk-headed jaffa out of the way, his beak clanging onto a wall and snapping backwards as he collapsed.

The first of the black armoured warriors ran through the ripping red shield, and Venteth frowned, “Right…” he said, remembering that the shields only blocked things one way. Although he didn’t know it, the shields would not have stopped Atum’s ‘assassins’ for long even if they’d been passing the other way. He raised his hand, jewelled weapon sending out a curtain of rippling energy which picked a pair of jaffa from their feet and hurled them back, one crashing against the shields and being savaged by red lightning and sparks.

It didn’t stop the kull warriors, though. They stood firm, being stopped for merely a moment.

Then it occurred to Venteth, the stargate was still open! He turned and sprinted for it, tripping up and falling flat onto the floor. His nose hurt. Lots.

An impossibly strong hand gripped the back of his robes and hauled him upright, and he yowled in terror, his hands reaching forwards to frantically unbutton his robe. Pulling his hands out of the sleeves, he stumbled towards the stargate, charging headlong into it as fast as he could go.

The kull warrior holding his robe looked down at it in annoyance, and tossed it over its shoulder, looked at its companion, and followed Venteth through the stargate.

Atrit

The familiar pattern of whiteness and stars whipping past the eye – Venteth had no idea how it worked – gave way with a blue-white flash to a blue vision streaked with black blurs. He couldn’t feel the ground under his feet. “Eh?” the goa’uld exclaimed.

Then he realised it was a sky. He reached out, feeling his hand catch on the rim of the ring, scrabbling with his fingers to hold on, with a scream of dread and despair, he felt his body dissolve into the freezing whiteness once more. But as the mass of the rest of his body disappeared, the hand clung on to the rim of the gate more easily, simply seeming to sit there…

The remaining Starfleet crewmen were treated to the sight of two more figures appearing and then dropping back into what now appeared to be a well of strangely opaque water, flailing as they did so.

Mnewer

Hee. Well, that worked well. Amanda smiled, happy in her knowledge that Venteth wouldn't enjoy himself for the forseeable future.

And then, she stepped a little closer, looking into the sky, and observing the Ha'tak rising into the same, rumbling and menacing and geometric – her ‘hosts’ did apparently have a soft spot for pyramids.

"Impressive ship... What's its name?"

And then, she looked down the balcony, observing the vast city deep beneath them, stretching towards the horizon.

After which she looked back into the hall were the other people - and Atum's guards - were enjoying themselves. Annoyingly, Atum's guard – the two Hawk-headed warriors she’d come with, who’d temporarily replaced Atum’s kull warriors – had apparently drawn the curtains that seperated the balcony from the main hall - she could hear people talk, distantly, but that was it.

Lord Atum didn't quite notice, though, and seemed quite content with a bit of conversation. “Ha'tak... You've naming conventions oddly similar to some of our... Client races.” She was thinking of the Klingons, who weren't really subdued per se... but it sounded better this way. That Starfleet would've disapproved of her wording... Ah well.

A giggle followed. “Oh... That must've been unfortunate. Though, I'm reminded of my own crew, there... They aren't the brightest stars in the sky, either...” A long, a very long sigh followed. “As your men are presently observing first hand, I guess.” The total lack of empathy Amanda was showing was rather inappropriate for a Starfleet captain – this said, here, it was probably standard.

“Well, I've sent the better ones, who might manage an assault without tripping over their own laces; that's happened before. Alarmingly, given that they're not actually wearing boots with laces. So, perhaps they are,” he said, leaning a little more on the balcony's edge, “But then, you'd have to be remarkably incompetent to not hold a tiny aperture like a stargate,” Lord Atum seemed embittered, there.

Amanda looked curiously at the Lord of this particular domain, suppressing a smile. “Oh, you'd be surprised... My crew has managed being imprisoned by neolithic societies before, you know. Forgot how to set their phasers on a level higher than 'Tickling' or something... And my superiors see nothing wrong with it. ‘It’s good for public relations’, they say.” Another sigh - as one might be able to guess, there's going to be a lot of sighing on this balcony. “Ever tried to get rid of the problems?”

“I've tried a programme of promoting the half-sensible ones, executing the incompetent, forming the more capable ones into elite units, I've even tried financial rewards. Nothing seems to work. I'm now busy trying to make sufficient numbers of an entirely different army to replace them. Did I mention that they're for the most part completely illiterate? It’s a hair-brained scheme thought up by my predecessor that I just can't seem to get shot of, as almost no one's learnt to write in the last five thousand years...”

“Mrm...” She was this guys - Atum's - enemy, alright. Yet, she did expereicne a sense of… Kinship – they were both suffering from similar problems. She could relate... It was an uncomfortable idea, but it was there. "Quite different from here. We require university degrees for the janitors. In three different subjects. None of which have to do with, well, warfare. Or sweeping. Do you know how frustrating it is when every crewman thinks he can out-think the captain?" She leaned over the balcony, now, looking downwards, where rather small figures - humans - appeared to do... Something. She couldn't really tell what. “And of course, this doesn't stop them from being overrun by a Klingon charge - with Bat'leths...”

“One wonders how easy those degrees must be,” Atum mused, sounding rather worried, "Bat'leths?"

Amanda was rather surprised to notice for herself that she was indeed lacking any empathy for her own crew, now dealing with Atum's 'Elite', too. Wonder if we should bet on the outcome... Atum, on the other hand, was more... amused, than anything. He'd never admit to also being delighted to have met someone who can empathise with how frustrating his existence tended to be.
Amanda looked up. "A good question... Well, they do appear to end up qualifying everyone who gets through them, so..." A brief pause followed, during which Amanda contemplated exploding consoles and the casualties she'd taken from the same. "Well, the theoretical subjects, anyway. The engineering-related ones... Eh." Hrm. I guess I'm giving secrets away... "At least you're the ruler of this domain, though. I, on the other hand... Oh, and as for the Bat'leth - you've something to draw on, perhaps?"

"If it's any consolation, I plan to soon rule your domain too," he said, fishing about in his voluminous robe for a sheet of papyrus, eventually coming up with a scroll with hieroglyphs on one side of it, “From what I've heard it should be just within the capabilities," He leaned back and looked out at his court, "of my cretins... Is it some kind of knife?"

"Oh, well..." Starfleet indoctrination kicked in, fucking with neurons, free will, and the ability of judging anything whatsoever impartially. "As many issues as we might have, we've nonetheless succeeded in creating a fairly sizeable 'Domain', as you call it." She smiled, ironically so. "It might not be as easy as you think. And knife? Mrm... no, not really. A bladed weapon, yes, but... It's hard to explain, really. One must see it."

Amanda was, incidentally, quite amused by the disregard Atum showed for his own subjects - though it did raise the worrying possibility that her own superiors might think the same way about her.

"Some sort of sword, then?" Atum asked, clearly not quite imaginative enough to figure out what a Bat'leth is, or rather, far too sensible to imagine it. "So, just where are your worlds then? And how many are there?"

Amanda looked somewhat disappointedly at Atum. "Please now. Don't you have some sensible interrogation methods? As open as I might've been..." She was, curiously enough, not really opposed to telling him – she was fairly confident that Starfleet could take him on, anyway. But still… Principles were at stake. "As for the Bat'leth... Ah, here." She eventually drew one on the papyrus. "There, like this. Yes, I'm serious. And my guys lost... Did I mention they've long-range energy weapons?"

When Atum recovered from laughter, which sounded even more clichéd than his costume looked, he eventually replied. "Oh yes. Many. Ranging from good solid beatings, to mind-downloads, and all sorts of things in between. They're actually quite creative in that department. But the latter tends to do quite a bit of brain damage."

"Mrm. That's unfortunate. But I suppose I'll have to submit, then." She pondered the whole situation for a moment, looking at some indefinable point in the sky. "No choice, then." Hesitation, again. "Incidentally... What's that?" she pointed downwards, leading over the balcony by quite a bit, cleavage pointing straight towards the ground, while her finger pointed at a... pond where a number of Atum's subjects appeared to be congregated. "If I tell you everything, I might as well ask for some details myself… If only to satisfy my curiosity."

He leaned forwards, “That’s a pond…” he said, followed by a yelp and a yowl as Amanda casually pushed him over the edge of the balcony.

She looked at the falling ‘God’ for a moment, waving after him and smiling ironically. "See you."

Atrit

"By the Prime Directive! They're just too strong! Someone, anyone, beam us up!"

It was, well... Pure chaos, and the 'Force' Ensign Franklin had deployed to the ground was in far too poor a shape to get what was actually happening.

The only thing everybody knew - or guessed from experience - was that this strange portal was somehow interfering with their transporters - for now, they had to stay in the chaos of fireballs, crossfire, and fiery eyes of demon-helmets, without really getting much of it (Except of course, that they were struck by the bolts of energy coming from their opponent's staff weapons).

Their actions were somewhat reminiscent of a panicking herd of cattle.

Mnewer

Killing their god/ overlord/ whatever... Check.

Amanda looked at her watch, somewhat annoyed with the time her subordinates took with rescuing her. Pft. Late, as usual. Time to take matters in my own hands, I suppose. How, though. Hrm. Well, the guards seemed to be docile enough...

Eventually, she stepped back into the hall, making sure to keep the balcony out of view for the people inside said hall.

Two pairs of glowing eyes looked at her, suspiciously, with staff weapons pointing more or less (Less, if one was perfectly honest – judging by the angle, they wouldn’t hit her when firing, probably courtesy of the Hawk-helmets somewhat limited vision) menacingly at Amanda.

Amanda suppressed a condescending smile, and tried her best at looking serious and important (And fighting the urge of telling the guards – and Atum’s guests in the throne room – that she'd just killed their god and was now their new lord and master - she suspected that it'd actually work, but something inside her mind told her in no uncertain terms that this course of action was unethical and unacceptable).

“He says I can go…”

The staff weapons remained pointed at her, and the eyes were still glowing.

Ah well. Next try.

“Jaffa, kree!”

There was a moment of hesitation, but eventually, the guards stepped out of her way. Amanda grinned. That’s better.

“Oh, and… Lord Atum wishes to see the two men that came with me.“

One of the creatures nodded, and trotted off in his heavy, bulky armour, his uneasy steps resounding on the floor.

Amanda followed him, towards the rings that’d transport her to the gate room. She wasn’t quite sure what she’d do once there, but, well… She was sure she’d manage it. Somehow.

It wouldn’t be her first time.

Atrit

Slowly, order resumed. And while the overpressure of the exploding deathglider threw federated ensigns and Jaffa alike off their feet, and everybody was seemingly fighting against everybody else (The affection of both sides to provide friendly fire was rather helpful when it came to this), the Feds eventually managed to hold their ground – well, what little ground they still had, anyway.

Burning ground, given that the exceedingly voluminous fire both sides had provided had set most of the trees and huts on fire… Too bad they’d missed most of each other’s men.

Mnewer

Lord Atum fell. He screamed, and writhed in midair, as he fell from the high balcony, spreading his limbs out wide, robes flapping loudly – to him at least – like unfettered sails they snapped up and down as air gathered under them and overwhelmed them.

The stairs loomed below as he fell, keeping his limbs spread to minimise his terminal velocity. He’d heard a saying somewhere, that if one was falling from a cliff, one may as well try to fly. As his robes flapped and he spread his wings, he cackled, tilting his masked head back.

Stairs hurtled closer, as though the entire world were ramming its god.

Then he hit them, a shape of blackness. There was a tremendous ‘crack’ and a flash of light. The marble steps were spiderwebbed with cracks around the body that lay on them.


Before that, he’d been quite cordial, as oppressive overlords went, “It’s a ha’tak – mothership, literally – class vessel. My underlings aren’t very creative, I’m afraid. They just refer to any ship within certain size parameters as ‘a ha’tak’ – they’ve lost a few battles because of that confusion when this class was introduced. ‘My lord, a ha’tak of chronos approaches!’” he parroted in one voice, “‘good! Send three to destroy it!’ And then of course, they discover that they’ve managed to send three ones with a combined volume less than half of the new class’s, and are promptly routed humiliatingly…”

He leaned forwards, “That’s a pond…” he said, followed by a yelp and a yowl as he was pushed over the edge of the balcony…


The guards lead Amanda through a different route than the one she’d come via. Instead of using the rings in Atum’s throne room, they lead her through the court, and its collection of magnificently poor taste costumes, and to a side alcove behind a hanging silken curtain. Or at least, it seemed to be an alcove, a heavy stone wall covered the back.

One of the jaffa pushed firmly on one of the bricks in the wall, and with a click of mechanisms working, and of counterweights moving, the rear wall began to move downwards.

This process took time. Indeed it was agonisingly slow. The wall inched and slid down so slowly that even the jaffa began tapping their feet and leaning against the walls of the alcove. Curiously, if one stepped back a little, the grinding sounds were inaudible – a technological mechanism to ensure nothing imperilled the comfort of the knobs in the court.

Slowly, the door revealed that it was in fact, a sort of lift, as there was nothing on the other side. Two yards square, it contained several benches, and a small table containing a set of triominos made of brass and engraved with various symbols – she would note, if she stuck around, that pictures were fine, letters and numerals, were not to be read save by the elite – of jaffa in various poses of martial endeavour, ha’taks and other vessels – she could even tell the relative sizes and infer strengths with a modicum of accuracy.

Vital intelligence was to be had from board games played in front of her. And there was even the opportunity to palm a few of the playing pieces when the jaffa weren’t looking – it was easy to tell, as they had their hawk-helmets fold up for some fresh air as the ‘lift’ went down.

Eventually, reading what they believed to be impatience (but was perhaps, given the situation, as the stone ‘lift’ was slowly winched downwards, anxiety over just how long the bumbling incompetents above would take to realise what was happening.

The ‘lift’ on closer analysis, was a single large piece of granite, with a vertical bar of the steel-like material trinium through it. This bar was grooved, like a screw, and the insides of the ‘lift’ were carved ornately. One of the jaffa sighed as he looked at Ms. Carnage, and reached over to a speaking tube, “Engine room… Double whippings,” he said, into it.

Far beneath, at the base of the rotating screw, a capstan wheel with a small workforce of slaves bound to it was the source of howls of dismay as the overseers began laying into the ‘motors’ of the lift with great and cruel whips while simultaneously jabbing their victims with shock-prods.

The lift’s speed increased by about half again and an foot-per-minute became more. At last, after about half an hour – and as the lift was flagging again, a crack of light that wasn’t generated by the oil-lantern around the top of the lift’s central bar slipped in.

Over the next six minutes, the lift slid into place to reveal a gilded mezzanine in a great hall, literally crammed with golden plated, blue-glowing hawk heads, some of whom swivelled to look at the lift’s occupants.

The mezannine was hanging on trinuium cords from the ceiling of the room, built like a gigantic pot, with a curved shape. Swaying bridges of rope linked it to the lift, and to two other spots on the sides of the wall, where they corkscrewed around. The guard post was lined with heavy staff cannons, pointed at the recesses in the banister-less, cover-less walls of the pot where only one man could walk abreast. One for ‘guests’ going up, and another for those going down. The reinforced platform was easy enough to hit from these positions, but to do so would likely shatter it, forcing an invader to be extremely discriminating with his fire, while allowing the guards to blaze away from their crow’s nest with impunity, attackers would find no safety from them.


Atum pushed himself up onto his knees, shocking several supplicants with the spider’s web of radiant cracks in the black mask he wore, from which an inner light of purest silver flowed, actually seeming to flow through the air, rather than shining.

“Bitch,” he muttered, then looked around him again.

He laughed. It was a good while since he’d done so, but he did so now.

It was pretty hilarious, after all.

He kept laughing, and eventually, hauled himself up to his feet, turning to face two jaffa warriors who were staring at him, not that one could tell through their helmets.

He growled at their cursed insolence, and began to clamber up the steps of the palace.


The trek through the achingly slow lift and the perilous, inclined surface of the ‘pot’ ended, at last, at a set of transporter rings. The jaffa stepped onto the ring platform, and began punching a sequence of buttons to dial to the right target.


With a flash of death and rebirth, losing a little mass to inefficiency along the way, they were back in the other facility, which was currently in a state of pandemonium. Jaffa and goa’uld clattered this way and that, some were technicians trying to determine why the system would not disengage even though they were no longer sending things through. They’d stopped trying, at last, deeming it pointless, as no one was reporting back any more.

Her jaffa and the local jaffa argued.

Actually, it was hard to tell, their language sounded like shouting even at the best of times.

“Jaffa maktal shree hel mak kree!”

Every sentence seemed to contain the word ‘kree’ at least once over.

Eventually, one of the locals moped off to get Amanada’s companions and equipment, including her comm.-badge. They even gave her, and her companions, back their guns. “You can’t go yet,” one of them added, hawk head emotionless and tinny voice likewise, shiny beak looking ready to peck, however, “There’s a battle on the other side, and we have lost contact. Our first probe didn’t return, We are preparing a larger one…”

Meanwhile, at the same time, several other jaffa were busily trying to disconnect the stargate. Amanda would probably be used to unreliable technology, of course…


Atrit

Smoke billowed over the battlefield, devoid entirely of surviving jaffa, or at least of those who weren’t playing dead, a wealth of pieces of equipment lay scattered, and Venteth’s hand, resting inertly on the side of the stargate…