Story Downloaded from Open Scrolls Archive (https://www.openscrolls.net)
Title: Countdown (#4112)
Author: yuriko
Chapters: 2
Archive: Stargate
Category: Crossover
Description: What if the self-destruct mechanism had not failed when Captain Picard had initiated its countdown? What would have happened? Would things have changed or would they have stayed the same?
Published: 24 Aug 2009
Updated: 24 Aug 2009
Warnings:
Type: Action/adventure
Characters:
Chapter 1 - Part 1:
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Date : 121208, 141208, 171208
Disclaimer : All Stargate and Star Trek characters and concepts belong to respective creators and owners.
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What if the self-destruct mechanism had not failed when Captain Picard had initiated its countdown? What would have happened? Would things have changed or would they have stayed the same?
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C O U N T D O W N
Part 1:
"Computer, initiate self-destruct sequence."
"Enter self-destruct code."
"Does, the First Officer concur?"
"Yes."
"Enter self-destruct code."
"Self-destruct sequence commencing. This ship will self-destruct in five minutes."
Meanwhile onboard the Scimitar,
"Praetor, they've activated their self-destruct measure," A Reman technician manning one of the stations warned.
"Initiate full reverse and set a course for Earth. We must complete the mission. You are right, Picard. There are some things worth dying for," the dying Praetor gasped sinisterly through the nerve-wrecking pain engulfing his back.
The whole ship shook as the large sinister warbird began to pull away slowly from the smaller Federation ship.
"Computer, abort self-destruct," the captain ordered.
"Self-destruct mechanism malfunctioned. Self-destruct sequence cannot be aborted," the computer chimed.
A chill settled over the crew of the Enterprise.
"Geordi ... find a way of stopping the self-destruct sequence. The rest of us will board the Scimitar. Picard here ... All available crewmembers to transporter room. The Scimitar must not be allowed to escape," the bald-headed captain of the Enterprise ordered.
Five beams of light appeared in one of the abandoned corridors of the Scimitar. Followed by another and another. Picard and Data opened fire with their phasers, taking out the guards around them.
"Praetor, there are intruders onboard the vessel!" a Reman soldier shouted a warning.
"Picard ... he's here! Sound the alarm! All available guards to the bridge! Find and kill all intruders!" the Praetor ordered.
Corridor by corridor, room by room and deck by deck ... the battle was undoubtably intense with both sides aware of the consequences of failure. Finally, the battle came to a halt with the the badly deformed Praetor and his Reman guards lying dead on the cold metallic floors of the Scimitar.
"Data! Get us out of here, quickly! All crew members to battlestations! The Enterprise could blow up any moment now!"
"Captain ... the Scimitar is already going into warp ... " the android spoke as he stood next to the dead Reman guard lying on the floor.
"Beam Geordi out of there!"
"Done," the android answered as Geordi appeared in front of them.
The stars in front of the screen lengthened into beams of starlight and then ...
"The Enterprise has self-destruct. The wake of the explosion will hit us in five seconds. Raising shields ... "
Instinctively, all the seasoned crewmembers of the Enterprise braced themselves for impact. The structure of the Bassen Rift began to distort as the explosion from the warp core of the Enterprise began to interact with it.
"Captain, the Bassen Rift is destabilizing. I am picking up a massive surge in tachyons ... " Data warned.
"Take us out of here!" the captain ordered frantically.
Too late, the maelstrom of dimensional energies behind them swelled rapidly into a vortex before swallowing the Scimitar whole. It expanded for sometime before fading into nothingness. As the vortex disappeared from sight, the crew of the Romulan Warbird, Valdore could clearly see that the Scimitar was gone like it never existed.
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Darkness ...
In the beginning was the darkness ... and the Spirit of God hovered over the waters over the deep. Then the Lord saith, "Let there be light," and there was light.
"He's waking up," a female voice spoke.
"Captain, good to see that you're awake," a second voice that sounded familiar answered.
"What happened? Is everyone alright? Dr. Crusher?" the Captain asked.
"You were out for three days. Life support is now back online and so is most of the crew. The Scimitar has suffered some hull damage from the collision but it is still functional although the hangar is badly damaged and needs to be fixed to used it once again. All weapon systems with the exception of the thalaron matrix are offline. All healthy crew members are now attending to the repairs onboard the ship," the android replied.
"They are repairing the Scimitar? I thought that our mission was to make sure that this ship would be destroyed upon our return into Federation space," the Captain voiced out his displeasure.
"We have a problem with regards to that, Captain. According to the sensor readings that I've been taking, we are no longer anywhere near Federation space or even in the Alpha Quadrant. As a matter of fact, I'm quite sure that we are no longer even in the same universe," the android explained.
"What do you mean?" Picard asked fearing the answer.
"When the warp core of the Enterprise detonated, it further destabilised the Bassen Rift causing a tear to appear in the spacetime continuum. This tear enlarged rapidly eventually pulling the Scimitar into it. Like other tears in the spacetime fabric, it served as a transit point to another reality. Which means that we have entered another universe where things have turned out differently. For example, I have been monitoring the subspace channel since we got here and there are no subspace transmissions of any sort whatsoever like it were in the Alpha Quadrant. I was, however, able to pick up several old transmissions using the EM bandwidth from Earth. And from the sensor analysis it appears to be transmissions from Earth's 21st century in the year 2002. There's more. Perhaps it would be easier if I showed you. Computer, play back all transmissions relating to the TV series 'Star Trek'," the android ordered the ship's computer.
Captain Picard and the crew on the bridge watched the 'Star Trek' episode in a mixture of shocked silence and fascination.
"Impossible ...," Riker whispered under his breath.
"We're nothing but a bunch of characters from a TV series here?" said Geordi, the chief engineer on the bridge.
"And all our adventures are nothing but the product of someone's imagination?" echoed Worf skeptically.
"That would be the case. I have analysed all the shows and stories associated with this Star Trek series and they are all one hundred percent accurate except for one show," Data answered.
"One hundred percent accurate?" Riker looked at Data questioningly.
"I have downloaded them into the Scimitar's databanks so that we can analysed them at our leisure," the android answered.
"Data, you mentioned that all the shows were one hundred percent accurate except for one," the captain pointed out.
"That's right, sir. The show in which we fought Shinzon. In that show, the self-destruct mechanism had malfunctioned before it could be used while in our case it had malfunctioned after the Captain gave the order the first time. It is called 'Star Trek: Nemesis'. In that show, The Scimitar was destroyed. Not the Enterprise. Computer, play recording on 'Star Trek: Nemesis'," the android ordered.
The crew watched in shocked silence until they reached the part where the Enterprise collided with the Scimitar. They heard the captain gave the order for the ship to self-destruct but it failed before it could be used.
"Take note. This is where the similarities between our situation and the situation as described in the show ends. From here onwards, things are different," Data explained.
The crew continued to watch in silence until the show came to an end.
"This is unbelievable!" Riker exclaimed.
"Things are different just because of the Enterprise's self-destruct mechanism?" Geordi asked in disbelief.
"That would be true but not quite accurate. Things are different because of the difference in the timing of the malfunction in the self-destruct mechanism aboard the Enterprise," Data answered.
"And the destruction of the Enterprise is what caused us to be here?" Dr. Crusher asked.
"That looks to be the case as the explosion from the warp core nacelles of the Enterprise destabilised the Bassen Rift," the android confirmed.
"I have one other question. Why didn't the explosion from the Scimitar destabilise the Bassen Rift?" Picard asked.
"With regards to that I have one theory. It is difficult to confirm that without going through it but I believe that the Bassen Rift did not destablise from the destruction of the Scimitar because it was the thalaron generator that caused its destruction. Not the warp core," the android explained.
"Very well. In the meantime, keep me posted on the progress of the repairs onboard the Scimitar. Once it is done, we shall find a way home," the captain vowed.
"Captain, I have a suggestion to make. Once all the weapons are fully functional again, I propose we head in the direction of Mars under heavy cloak to secure enough raw materials to repair the structure of the Scimitar," the android continued with his tireless tirade.
"Mars?" the bald-headed captain of the Enterprise echoed.
"That's right since most of the raw materials that we used to construct our starships from are found there," the android explained.
"Very well. Make it so but make sure that our actions remain undetected by this Earth's inhabitants. We do not want to disrupt the timeline in anyway. In the meantime, I will be in my ready room," Picard added.
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The repairs to the Scimitar were done as quickly as possible. Unfortunately, progress was slow even with Data's android abilities and Geordi's engineering skills. This was due to three reasons. One, the Scimitar was a large ship. Thus damage was spread over a wider area. Two, the hangar that housed all the fighters and shuttlecraft was no longer structurally sound after the collision with the frontal section of the Enterprise. Therefore, shuttle travel to and fro from the hangar was very difficult if not outright impossible. Three, the engineering team was not used to working with Reman technology and equipment. Naturally, this being the first time they had ever come into contact with it.
As a result, the repairs took a painstakingly long time. Still they persisted with the repairs (necessity is the mother of invention, after all) and eventually they succeeded.
During this time, the Captain and his First Officer spent most of their time familiarizing themselves with the dark and gloomy confines of the dreaded Warbird while the rest of the crew worked steadily on the repairs of the ship. There was little doubt in their minds that it was larger on the inside than the Enterprise. They could only marvel at the resources, skill and time taken to build this ship. It was certainly no short length of time, that was for sure. When they were not familiarizing themselves with the Scimitar, they watched the 'Star Trek' episodes with a mixture of fascination and dread.
"What do you think, Number One?" Picard asked as the two men watched another Star Trek episode on the viewscreen.
"It is as Data described. The show is shockingly accurate beyond belief. Not to mention if these were all true, it would explain a lot of things that we didn't know about that was going on in the Federation," Riker replied.
The bald-headed captain simply shook his head.
"And the Alpha Quadrant."
"Or the galaxy in general."
"This whole parallel universe thing is giving me a headache."
Suddenly, the two men heard a voice from the intercom channel.
"Captain, all the repairs that could be done have been done. I'm afraid there's not much more we can do without access to the full facilities at a starbase," the chief engineer pointed out.
"Give me the status of the repairs," the bald-headed captain's order.
"All disruptors are fully functional and online. Photon torpedo bays are at ninety percent capacity and functioning. All sensors, shield generators, the cloaking device, impulse thrusters and warp engines are operating within acceptable parameters. The hangar, though, is structurally unsafe and currently unuseable until we can gain access to the facilities offered by a shipyard," came the chief engineer's reply.
"What about the self-destruct mechanism? Is it working?" Picard asked.
"Fully operational and ready to go."
"Good! Because upon our return to Federation space, we are going to destroy this ship. It must never be allowed to threaten life on any planet again," the captain vowed, "As for now, set a course for Earth."
The Scimitar chartered a course to the world that lay at the heart of the Federation. The journey was estimated to take three days. During that time, the crew busied themselves with 're-inventing' the Scimitar, that's right ... 're-inventing' is the word. The reason being, the confines of the corridor of the Scimitar were so dark and gloomy that Captain Picard gave the go-ahead to re-furbish the insides to give it a more heartening and familiar feeling. Upon receiving the go-ahead, all the crewmembers rushed at the chance to make the inside of the ship more vibrant, alive and familiar. While they were going about joyously at the task, Picard was in a room, that used to house a Reman guard, peering at its interior design.
He was disturbed from his thoughts by a call to get to the bridge. The captain did not waste any time getting there
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On the viewscreen were three pyramids and a ship floating in orbit around the Earth. The pyramids were large compared to the small ship facing them.
"Captain, those three pyramids are warships of some sort. They arrived here a minute ago in a manner similar to the use of a Borg ship's transwarp drive. Power output is high. All three ships are heavily armed with plasma weapons and deflector shields. The strength of their weapons is equivalent to that of the plasma weapons utilised by the Ferrengi in the Alpha Quadrant. Their crew appear to be a mixture of human and alien lifeforms. The other ship came from Earth and does not appear to be armed with energy weapons. Weapons involve primitive railguns. The ship's crew is strictly human."
'Came from Earth? How did Earth develop starships at this stage in time?' Picard wondered.
He was sure that all the crew of the Enterprise were wondering the same thing.
Suddenly, one of the pyramids opened fire with their plasma weapons on the ship. The plasma beams impacted against a shield that cropped into being around the ship. The ship retaliated with its weapons, barely denting the pyramid ship's shields.
"Their shields have dropped to thirty percent. One more shot would destroy the ship."
"Data, can you get a lock on the ship's occupants? Beam them out as soon as their shields fail. I would like to know more about what is going on," the captain spoke.
Small ships began to leave the large pyramid ships and headed for the planet. It was not difficult to know what their intentions were when they began to open fire on the cities.
"Hail the three vessels. I would like to speak with their commanders."
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Meanwhile onboard the Hatak Mothership,
First Prime Gara was a powerful Jaffa. In fact he was the most powerful and influential Jaffa in his Master's army. He was a veteran (some might say murderer) of countless wars and conflicts, carrying out his Master's orders without question, regardless of how cruel and despicable they might be. For his years of unparalleled devotion and unquestioned loyalty to his Divine Master, he had been rewarded by being made his Master's right hand man. A position that was held in high regard and coveted by many within the ranks of his Master's legions. Oh sure, they envied his position and elevation to success but that was all they could do. He was his Master's second-in-command after all and none dared question his orders except for a select few who were favoured by his Master. And even then, not openly.
He was not First Prime for nothing after all. He was still deep in thought when he was suddenly being roused from it by a call from his communication officer.
"First Prime Gara, we're receiving a transmission."
Without any further ado, he ordered the transmission to be put on screen. The figure of a bald-headed caucasian man in red and black uniform surrounded by darkness appeared on the viewscreen.
"Greetings, I am Captain Jean-Luc Picard of the Federation starship Enterprise. Why are you attacking this planet?" the man asked.
The First Prime studied the figure without answering for sometime. Though inwardly, he was puzzled.
'What Federation was he talking about?' he wondered.
He had never heard of such a thing before in his life! All the galactic powers that he knew about included the Nox, the Asgard, the System Lords and the Tollans. He didn't know of anyone else. Was this man trying to trick him? And if so, for what reason? Well, two could play that game.
Finally he responded with as much pride and conviction in his voice as he could, "I am First Prime Gara, servant to the System Lords and Masters of the Universe. This world is my Divine Master's to do with as He pleases."
"Your forces have already caused enough damage on this world for one day. Call of the attack," the bald-headed man implored.
'Call of the attack? Was the man out of his mind? To give an order to the chief servant of a god? Who did he think he was anyway?' First Prime Gara thought as his gaze turned icy upon the man.
"Who are you? A god? Or a fool? If you are a god, show me your great and awesome might that I might worship you," the First Prime scoffed in reply, hoping to goad the strange man into displaying his hand.
All around him his fellow Jaffa roared with laughter at the blatant insult.
"Do it," the man spoke in a less friendly tone, ignoring the rude remark upon his person before he took a step forward out of the viewscreen.
Gara's eyes widened involuntarily as the man's body passed through the display screen to appear in front of him, a completely solid man. The Jaffa crew around him who had all been laughing together at the man's expense a short while ago were no longer laughing. Their faces were set with a deadly seriousness that had not been there before. The man took another step forward to land onto the floor of the bridge further unnerving the crew in the process and causing the closest Jaffa to back away from him instinctively. For the first time, they were filled with a strong uncertainty about what had just happened.
'What was this? Some kind of sorcery?' they wondered before drawing their weapons.
"Or you will regret it." the man warned as he approached the First Prime in his command seat.
There was a sizzling burst of energy and a plasma blast passed through the man harmlessly to destroy the viewscreen. Another sizzling burst of energy followed the first only to pass through the man harmlessly like before. The man simply ignored the attacks and came closer. More and more bursts of energy followed to hit the man with no effect.
"ENOUGH FOOLS!" the First Prime roared in fury.
Heads were going to roll for this blunder as he saw the scene of destruction aboard the bridge. The consoles and viewscreen had been destroyed in the eagerness of the Jaffa present to destroy the enemy that had suddenly appeared in their midst.
"IT IS JUST A HOLOGRAM!" he shouted.
"Last warning, leave or be destroyed," the bald-headed figure warned before coming to a stop in front of the First Prime.
Unable to help himself, the First Prime made a grab at the figure only to have his hands pass through it with no visible effect.
"Find the source of the transmissions!" the First Prime shouted in anger at the Jaffa on the bridge.
"Don't bother. You have five seconds to leave before I give the order to open fire," the bald-headed figure smirked knowingly in reply at the First Prime's helplessness in locating him.
"Five."
The Jaffa crew ran frantically all over the bridge hoping to find the source of the transmissions.
"Four."
The First Prime looked on in growing anger. He would make this unknown enemy pay for his insolence and audacity in his Master's torture chambers for a thousand years when he got his hands on him.
"Three."
Unable to pinpoint the location of the transmissions, the Jaffa officers grew more frantic in their search for the hidden enemy.
"Two."
For the first time in his life, First Prime Gara began to feel doubt and a little fear growing in his heart about the coming battle with the unknown enemy. Regardless of the bravado he had shown on the bridge, the unknown enemy's ability to project a hologram onto his ship without being detected had deeply unnerved him.
"One."
He quickly prodded his communications officers and sensors officers only to confirm that it was not coming from inside his ship.
"Time's up. Good-bye, Gara."
That was the last thing First Prime Gara heard as a massive explosion engulfed the bridge.
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A few minutes before ...
"Captain, we have all three enemy ships in linear position," Data spoke.
Linear position was a position in which a ship (the Scimitar in this case) had moved to a location in which the group of ships (the Hatak Motherships) it was facing, was lined up until it was seen to be in one straight line. It was a good position to take since they needed only to face fire from one enemy ship at a time. The remaining enemy ships could not open fire on the Scimitar without hitting their own ship that was in the way. Not to mention they could not see where the enemy fire was coming from since the explosions from the first destroyed vessel would mask their position.
"All disruptors on my mark. Fire!"
More than ten disruptor beams lanced out from nowhere to hit the first Hatak Mothership, destroying its shields in the first volley and cutting through the ship to hit the second Hatak Mothership behind it.
"Fire photon torpedoes!"
The second Hatak Mothership did not even have time to respond as four photon torpedoes appeared from the wake of the fiery explosion that broke apart the first Hatak Mothership to hit the shields with tremendous force, collapsing it completely before hitting the hull beneath.
The Jaffa commander onboard the third Hatak Mothership had quickly initiated evasive maneuvers upon seeing the destruction of his fellow commanders' ships. His Jaffa officers searched frantically for the hidden enemy but they found ... nothing. Suddenly, his Jaffa officers backed off in fear from something that had appeared in their midst.
It was the figure of a bald-headed caucasian man in red and black uniform.
"I will give you one more chance. Your fellow commanders were too stubborn. Hopefully you would not be the same. Now I will ask you one more time. Recall your forces or be destroyed!" the man warned coldly.
Jaffa Commander Tarez was filled with rage at the sight of the disaster that had befallen his Divine Master's forces. He struck at the man with his plasma staff only to have the blast pass through him without effect. He struck again with similar results. The man simply watched his antics calmly as if nothing had happened. That did it!
The sheer audacity of the man! How dare he act as if he were greater than his Divine Master! To retreat right now would not only bring dishonour upon him but His Divine Master's wrath as well. Better to die in glory than to return in shame at this defeat. He gave his Jaffa officers the order to bombard the planet with everything they had. All the surviving Jaffa in Deathgliders and Alkesh bombers received the final order as well.
Death before dishonour!
They vowed before unleashing everything they had on the helpless planet below.
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Meanwhile ... onboard the Scimitar ...
"Captain, the alien vessel is opening fire with everything they have onto major population centers! So are the fighters! Some of them have gone on suicide runs!" Data warned.
"Destroy them!" Picard gave the order.
No sooner had the Hatak Mothership released its first volley of concentrated plasma beams was it struck by a volley of disruptor beams from nowhere. The disruptor beams overwhelmed the shields rapidly to cut through the pyramid-shaped ship with vengeance. It broke apart in a fiery explosion, a few pieces falling through the atmosphere to hit the Earth below.
"Captain, I'm receiving a transmission. We're being hailed by the defending vessel."
"Put it on screen."
The figure of a blonde caucasian man and woman in 20th century combat uniforms appeared on the screen.
"Captain Jean-Luc Picard of the USS Enterprise?!!" he spoke in a mixture of shock and disbelief.
"Yes Captain Picard here. To whom am I addressing?" the bald-headed captain spoke with resignation in his voice.
"This is Colonel O'Neill of the USAF Prometheus," the man spoke.
"Hello Colonel O'Neill. Do you require any assistance? I will beam over some of my crew if you do," the bald-headed captain offered.
"Yes, please. By the way, where is your ship, the Enterprise? I'm not seeing it anywhere," the Colonel asked.
"How about we meet on your ship? Say in about an hour? I'm sure we have many things to discuss," the bald-headed captain responded.
"Alright! Catch you later!" the screen blinked out.
Captain Picard simply shook his head at the oncoming meeting and the lengthy explanation he was going to have to give.
It certainly looked like it was going to be a long day.
TBC
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Chapter 2 - Part 2:
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Date : 311208
Disclaimer : All Stargate and Star Trek characters and concepts belong to respective creators and owners.
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What if the self-destruct mechanism had not failed when Captain Picard had initiated its countdown? What would have happened? Would things have changed or would they have stayed the same?
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C O U N T D O W N
Part 2:
In the last chapter, the crew of the Enterprise found themselves swept into another universe through the Bassen Rift onboard the Reman Warbird, Scimitar. Much to their surprise and consternation, the crew discovered that a great deal of their private lives (including their most intimate moments) and the universe they came from are public knowledge on this Earth. Uneasy and uncertain as to how to handle it, they made the decision to leave this alternate reality as soon as they can. Not only to preserve the Prime Directive, but to preserve their dignity. To face the specter of having every detail of their private lives being known to everyone was not something they were prepared to deal with.
Before they could leave, however, the Earth and its inhabitants came under attack from three large pyramid-shaped ships. A fourth smaller vessel appeared to defend the planet. Unfortunately, the ship was heavily outgunned and outnumbered by the three larger ships. It was quickly overwhelmed and was close to destruction when Captain Picard made the fateful decision to intervene and stop the large scale slaughter and destruction of the planet's inhabitants.
That decision alerted the occupants of the ship to their unknown savior. They quickly made contact with the Scimitar and much to their surprise, discovered the existence of the Enterprise crew. Colonel O'Neill and Captain Picard exchanged greetings before agreeing to meet them onboard the Prometheus. As of now, he was deliberating with members of his crew on what to tell this 'Colonel O'Neill'.
"So what do we tell them? The main thing being this ship. Do we tell them about it?" the bald-headed captain asked, throwing the question to the group.
"They are not yet aware of its existence. I suggest we keep it that way," Data, the positronic-brained android answered.
"Any reasons? If they discovered that we deceived them, they would not be very happy about it," Beverly pointed out.
"That is true. I get the feeling that that the man was very excited and happy to see you, captain. Deception should not be the way," the ship's cousellors folded her hands before reclining back into her seat.
"Normally, it would be a good thing to be straight about such things as honesty breeds trust and trust is essential for all relationships. However, the Scimitar is not an ordinary ship. It was designed around a thalaron generator and its emitters. Which may I remind everyone, the research was banned due to its potential use as a biogenic weapon. From what we have picked up from 'Star Trek' in their EM broadcasts and transmissions, the Scimitar's complement of weapons and its thalaron device is no secret. Make no mistake, they know everything about it here. From its primary and secondary shields to the number of fighters it carries in its hangar bay. Should the survival of the Scimitar become public knowledge, there could be problems with certain segments or leaders of their society. The last thing we need is a power-hungry group or individual with less than dubious intentions of becoming aware of the Scimitar and trying to get their hands on it, or failing that, begin research into thalaron technology," Data answered.
"Good point," the chief engineer agreed.
"But the Enterprise has been destroyed! How are we going to give them a ship that doesn't exist?" Riker asked.
"A probe could be configured to create a holographic projection of the Enterprise. We could also use the Scimitar's transmitters to fool their ship's sensors into thinking that the Enterprise they saw was real. When we bring anyone over, we could beam them into the reconfigured holodeck onboard the Scimitar for a tour through the 'Enterprise'. They would never need to know that they were just going through a simulation in the holodeck," Data continued.
The discussion continued well until it was close to the meeting time. Finally, the captain reached a decision and dismissed everyone.
"Very well. Thank you for your input everyone. This meeting is now adjourned."
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Meanwhile onboard the USAF Prometheus ...
I cannot believe how excited I am at making contact with Captain Picard and his crew from 'Star Trek'. Of all the potential candidates for saving our collective bacon from the Goa'uld, we never imagined such an illustrious group of rescuers. I cannot help but feel that things would be different now for Earth and the galaxy. For my part, I've been busy recalling what I knew about each of the individual characters from the 'Star Trek: The Next Generation' series. There was Liutenant Worf - the ship's Klingon security officer, Data - the communications officer who is an android, Deanna Troi - a ship's counsellor from Betazed, Dr. Beverly Crusher - the chief medical officer, LaForge - the chief engineer and finally Riker, the first officer onboard the Enterprise besides the captain of course.
As of now, I am waiting for the good old captain to appear.
There was a trio of shimmering lights and three figures appeared on the deck of the ship. O'Neill studied the three figures in the light. They were unmistakbly the forms of Captain Picard, Data and Deanna Troi.
And speaking of our guests, here they are. We have great hopes for this meeting. Especially a technological trade in the form of weapons and shields. From what I've seen of Star Trek, they have to be more advanced than the snakeheads although they have no hyperdrives and knowledge of naquadah. Still they have impulse thrusters and warp engines for their propulsion systems. But it is not propulsion systems or power systems that we need. It is weapons that we need. Especially the ones in the big and destructive department. Carter had mentioned it to me. Phasers and transphasic torpedoes, anybody? Even quantum torpedoes would come in handy at a time like this. Though I wonder what they would want in exchange for it?
"Greetings Captain Picard, Data and Counsellor Troi. Welcome aboard the USAF Prometheus. On behalf of SGC and Earth, we wish to thank you for your timely assistance against the Goa'uld. Your intervention helped saved countless lives. This is Major Samantha Carter, former First Prime Teal'c and our resident archaelogist, Dr. Daniel Jackson," the colonel greeted the trio.
"Greetings Colonel O'Neill. I'm sure you know all of us already so we can safely skip that part but pray tell me who are these Goa'uld?" the captain greeted in turn.
"It's a very long story but Daniel can explain it better than I can," the Colonel spoke.
At this point, the Colonel invited Daniel to relate the story surrounding the Stargate and the events leading to its discovery and what followed thereafter. The captain and his two officers listened to the tale with rapt attention and silence.
It finally ended with him saying, "So this is what SGC is for. To seek out new technology and allies in the hopes of stopping the Goa'uld from enslaving or destroying the Earth."
"And you would very much like us to contribute to Earth's defense?" the bald-headed captain asked.
"That would be deeply appreciated," the Colonel answered.
"I'm sure you are aware of the Prime Directive," Picard brought up.
"Yes but I'm also sure that you are aware that we have just been attacked by an extra-terrestrial force," O'Neill couldn't help but feel disappointed at the thought of another advanced civillisation turning down a request to help them with the defense of Earth technologically.
"Yes and that is part of the reason why we are having this conversation as opposed to having none whatsoever," the bald-headed captain answered, the expression on his face turning serious without warning.
The silence in the room became more pronounced.
"Your situation left us with a very difficult decision to make, Colonel O'Neill. The Prime Directive is very clear in regards to what we can and cannot do in this situation. At the same time, however, we do not wish to leave the people of Earth to a fate possibly worse than death when we could have done something," Deanna continued.
The SG crew listened nervously in silence. It was as if the very fate of Earth hung in the balance.
"There is another problem. The Enterprise, strong though she may be against the Goa'uld, is just one ship. She would barely make a dent in the numbers of capital ships operated by the Goa'uld. So it comes down to one of two things. We either help you all the way or none at all," the bald-headed captain added grimly.
The tension had become so thick that a knife could cut through it. The SG crew waited with bated breath to hear the decision of the Starfleet officers.
"We will help you with the defense of Earth. The schematics for state-of-the-art phaser weapons, photon torpedoes, quantum torpedoes, the cloaking device, transporters, replicators, holodecks, impulse thrusters, warp engines, the Federation Delta flyers, the Defiant-class warships, the Achilles Siege Cruisers, the construction yards and whatever else is necessary for the defense of Earth will be provided. Our engineering crews will assist with the construction. This decision is unprecedented in Federation history but than this is no ordinary situation. Had things not been so dire, we would have never have agreed to such a move. We ask only for two things in exchange. One, we would like the first Achilles Siege Cruiser constructed for our use. The second thing we ask for is the quantum mirror you mentioned. Do you still have it?" the bald-headed captain spoke.
"General Hammond ordered it to be destroyed," the Colonel answered regretfully.
"If you can find another quantum mirror for us, it would be most useful in our efforts in finding a way home," the android added.
"We will gladly do so," the Colonel answered, letting out the breath he did not know he had been holding.
"The Federation would be most grateful for any assistance rendered," the captain smiled.
With that the meeting ended. The Federation crew left the same way they came. And the ecstatic Colonel couldn't help but give a loud cheer.
"ALRIGHT! BIG HONKING SPACE GUNS!"
"I'll tell the General the good news," the blonde Major remarked happily.
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And that was the one piece of good news that SGC had.
The rest were not as good, unfortunately, as the Federation captain had made it perfectly clear that he would not interfere in what was transpiring on the Earth below unless of course it was something to do with medical aid. Which of course brought them all back to one big problem.
Although the Goa'uld Hatak Motherships that had spearheaded the invasion had been destroyed in Earth's orbit, the situation on Earth was far from settled.
Many places on Earth had been destroyed especially populated areas in developed countries. China, Japan and India, having the world's largest concentration of people suffered the most casualties and worst damage. Entire neighbourhoods and villages had been wiped out especially in the last suicidal bombing run by the Jaffa. Even the Tel'tak cargo ships were used as guided missiles after being emptied of heavily armed troops and their cargo. Europe, Russia and the United States also suffered extensive damage but they were not as bad as the ones suffered by the Asian continent.
Chaos and confusion reigned as various law enforcement bodies and the armed forces struggled to maintain law and order in those places. Some of them were still seeing massive pitched battles between the Jaffa ground troops that had landed and Earth's militaries that were now fighting back to retake back their countries. There were even places that were involved in a four-way fight between the alien invaders, the countries' local armed forces, powerful criminal organisations and the various rebel groups who had been operating in the region and had now gone out into the open to take advantage of the ruling government's weaknesses. Places such as the Middle East, Africa and South America with Israel, Lebanon, Syria, Iran, Iraq, Turkey, Algeria, Sudan, Angola, Congo, Colombia, Sri Lanka, Myanmar, Thailand, Indonesia, Somalia the worst among them.
The former countries of the Soviet Union and the Yugoslavia came a close second as entire countries and their proxies had taken advantage of the resulting anarchy and chaos to declare war on their neighbours, many of them whom they were having long-standing grudges or disputes with.
The Earth, in short, was ... one ... BIG ... CHAOTIC ... madhouse.
"There's still some fighting on the Eastern Seaboard of the US mostly in the South but it is winding down as the Army and National Guard moved in to wipe out all the remaining Jaffa. Canada and Alaska appears to have been thankfully spared of the fighting as the Jaffa seemed to avoid places with cold climates. Mexico, on the other hand still has some heavy fighting going on in the streets although it is only a matter of time before the Jaffa are defeated," the blonde Major spoke while reading the report.
"And what about the rest of the world? Do we tell them about the Stargate program?" O'Neill asked.
"The President would be meeting with the Federation captain in a one on one meeting at 0300 hours EST. If you have no further questions, this meeting is adjourned," Hammond answered.
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Disclosure.
It was not something they could do without. Not if they wanted to overhaul the entire infrastructure of the world to produce sufficient numbers of space-worthy warships capable of taking the fight to the Goa'uld. Constructing a spaceship was no lean feat especially motherships that were a combination of battleships and space carriers rolled into one, even with the necessary technology available. Moreso with shipyards that were capable of manufacturing spaceships like factories with automobiles. It was one thing to have the knowledge. Another thing to be able to put the knowledge to good use. Even with the visitors' help, they had a limited number of equipment and resources to work with.
Such was the quandry facing the defense management body of the IOA against interstellar threats. The fact that Earth had constructed the Prometheus prior to the visitor's arrival gave them a headstart but there was still a lot of work to do. Especially in the weapons, shielding and propulsion technologies. It didn't help matters that Federation technology was different from Goa'uld technology and in some cases more advanced. It was like dealing with Tollan technology all over again. Federation ships did not rely on hyperdrives to achieve faster-than-light travel. Instead, they used warp engines to accomplish the same feat.
Warp engines had its advantages and drawbacks compared to hyperdrive technology. One advantage being that it enabled their ships to travel through real space while achieving faster-than-light speeds. This enabled the ship to remain and more importantly, capable of engaging in ship to ship combat in real space should it prove necessary to do so. Something that no other civillisation in the galaxy had been able to do prior to the visitors' arrival. Impulse thrusters enabled the ship to achieve and maneuver at sublight velocity, something that would give them a necessary advantage against hostile alien vessels that did not have the same capability.
Shielding technology was also different. Unlike Goa'uld shielding which consisted of one single large solid bubble around the ship, Federation shielding differed in the sense that it was made up of several shields that covered the ships in different arcs produced by different shield projectors. This form of shielding had its advantages and disadvantages. One, any form of damage taken by one shield projection would not affect the other shield projections. Two, shield strength in any projection could be reinforced by diverting extra power from other shield projections to it. Three, it could also be regenerated in the same manner in addition to its own shield projector. Four, such a form of shielding enabled a more distributed defense as it required enemy vessels to take down all the shield projectors rather than just one single shield generator.
The disadvantages included more power as it required more energy to be diverted to the different shields to maintain them rather than just a single big solid shield. This disadvantage, however, could be offset somewhat with the use of portable naquadah generators, something that the visitors did not have. It was amazing to note that despite the fact the energy fields generated were regarded as shields, they were so different in the way they were used in different realities. The unfortunate thing was they could only implement one form of shielding system. Not both. The research and development teams were still engaged in a heated discussion over which form of shielding system to implement.
Weapons technology ... Who would ever expect the energy weapons and the way they functioned to be so different from one another? Plasma weapons technology as utilised by the Goa'uld relied on a more brute-force approach. Tearing and battering down the shields in single solid hits unlike Federation phasers which relied more on finesse and concentrated fire to penetrate enemy shielding. Not nearly as strong but then Starfleet did not pack their heavy hitters into their phasers. Rather, their heavy hitters came in the form of photon torpedoes, quantum torpedoes and most recently ... transphasic torpedoes. Phaser weapons were chosen because they had a faster rate of fire, a wider arc of fire, longer range and did not take up as much space as plasma weapons.
Also, they utilised anti-matter in all their standard torpedo weapons unlike the Goa'uld who tended to rely on naquadah. Already some of the engineering teams were salivating over the possiblities of enhancing standard anti-matter torpedoes with naquadah. Which should give out quite a big bang all things considered. Surprisingly enough, the Federation crew also had access to disruptor technology. Disruptor weapons, all things considered were real heavy hitters. They had a narrower arc of fire and lesser versatility compared to their phaser counterparts but more than made up for it with the damage they inflicted on enemy shielding and armour as they quickly cut it down to size in a matter of seconds. Just as in the shielding debate, the research and development teams were still trying to find ways of incorporating the different weapon technologies together. Failing that, the best one available.
The two technologies, the research and development crews agreed on were the implementation of anti-matter and Federation transporter technology which certainly put the Aschen and Goa'uld transporters to shame with their striking similarity to Asgard transporter technology. Anti-matter technology was a given as it produced more power than fusion technology. Enhanced with naquadah, the power output generated could easily surpass that of the power produced by Goa'uld ship reactors.
So much to do. So little time ...
'Such a thing was never a good combination if Earth was to be ready for the next Goa'uld incursion,' the general in charge of Earth's space defense agency thought.
It was ironic that at one time Earth was fighting for every little scrap of technology they could get their hands on with little to show for and now that they had it in loads, they could not field enough teams to research and put those different technological advances to good use. Lack of manpower or human resource with intellectual capital as they called it. There was no way that one country alone could ever hope to harness even a fraction of all the knowledge that the visitors had come with to good use in this lifetime even if they concentrated all their resources in doing so. Thus, the decision to involve the entire world in the technological advancement of the century. The contrast could not have been more evident.
Already, there was talk about splitting the different approaches towards implementing the available technologies to different countries to see how they worked in the field of fire. With the Russians, Indians, Chinese and Brazilians going for disruptor and multi-shielding technology and the NATO powers going for phaser and mono-shielding technology. See which combination worked best first before they adopted it as a whole, they said. Germany, Turkey and France were the notable exceptions in the sense that they chose to go with the multi-shielding approach rather than the mono-shielding system that the rest of the NATO alliance had adopted. The general seated in the command chair suspected that it was more a matter of national pride than any scientific reason for their decision.
The rest of the world were given the task of implementing and integrating the visitors' plasma technology with Goa'uld plasma weaponry like plasma cannons and plasma torpedoes. Except for Japan, Sweden, Serbia, Belarus, South Africa and Argentina that had opted to go for disruptor weaponry and Switzerland, Finland, Australia, New Zealand, Israel and Taiwan that had decided to adopt the phaser as their main weapon system, the rest of the world had gone for plasma technology. Even the pariah states of Sudan, Iran and North Korea were not excluded from the 'technological upgrade' process. Method of shielding implemented was left to each individual country's discretion. Although they would all bear similarities to each other in the form of cloaking devices, naquadah-enhanced anti-matter reactors, hyperdrives, warp engines and impulse thrusters being present onboard their vessels.
Though the danger was great, the potential of such an endeavour was just as great, if not more, in the development of the human race on Earth from being limited on one world to a galactic power on stage. The period of transition was momentous and a sign of great portent that something was about to change the face of the political landscape of the galaxy forever.
If humanity did not destroy itself first in the process.
TBC
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