From: Rob Dalton Newsgroups: alt.startrek.vs.starwars Subject: [Fanfic] LT.Hit-Man Takes a Vacation Date: Thu, 16 Mar 2000 01:05:19 -0500 “LT.Hit-Man Takes a Vacation” by Rob Dalton (daltonator@hotmail.com) Grunting, a weary LT.Hit-Man rubbed his temples as he sat back down in the pilot's seat, the assault shuttle making it's way back to the ISD _Cerberus_ on autopilot. He had just completed yet another ground- pound cleaning mission, and the dreary repetitiveness of another typical slaughter was getting to him. The shuttle shook slightly as it came within range of the mighty ship's tractor beams, and he keyed the comm. "Assault Shuttle _Meat Grinder_ to ISD _Cerberus_; mission complete." The precise voice of Captain Nathan "Enforcer" Yates crackled back over. "Acknowledged, el tee. Casualties?" "Ahh, my entire squad was wiped out, as usual." He looked at the mound of dead stormtroopers in the passenger compartment. "Squads Delta, Gamma, and Rho sustained minor injuries, and the garrison base is set up and rearing to go." LT.Hit-Man thought he could hear a faint sigh come over the comm before Yates spoke up again. "Acknowledged. Standby while we bring your shuttle in. Debriefing is at 1700 hours. Get some rest. _Cerberus_ out." LT.Hit-Man cut off the channel, then leaned back and waited for the invisible line of the behemoth to reel him in. Without realizing it, he was soon fast asleep. *** Darkness... Nothing but darkness... And suddenly, light. The darkness coalesced into sudden, frightening clarity; a swirling maelstrom of angry reds, venomous blues...LT.Hit-Man felt dizzy as he rushed past the hallucinogenic tunnel. Twists, turns, vertigo...his stomach churned. Navigation was impossible in this impossible realm; the tide carried him wherever it wanted it to go, and the current suddenly rounded a sharp bend, throwing LT.Hit-Man through the 'wall', and with an intensely bright flash of light, he found himself dropped right into a nightmare. He heard various whirring noises, then suddenly a bone-chilling voice - no, a chorus of voices, many speaking as one. "We are the Borg. You will be assimilated. Your biological and technological distinctiveness will be added to our own. Resistance is futile." An army of freakish cyborgs began to swarm him...all around him...he tried to back away and ran into more of them. Them...somehow, 'them' didn't feel right. More like... More like 'him.' The feeling of the hive mind's affect on the Force was one of the most frightening experiences he had ever had...thousands, billions - no, _trillions_ of minds worked as _one_. It was a feeling akin to that of the depression a marble made on a featherbed as opposed to that of a bowling ball. The existence of the collective mind sent LT.Hit-Man's senses into confusion...and he felt a taste of something not felt much before. A taste of fear... He screamed in rage, trying to upset or perhaps make the bionics pause for a second, but they - no, it - was relentless. He whipped out his lightsaber, igniting the dark blade, carving through their ranks...they fell before him, one after another, but they were too many...though they could not adapt, there were more than enough to overrun his defenses...and with a loud, metallic _clang_, four drones in succession injected nanoprobes into him... *** LT.Hit-Man awoke suddenly, sweating from the intense experience his own mind had been kind enough to put him through. Through the viewport, he saw the familiar sight of a standard Imperial hangar bay, bobbing slightly as the shuttle settled on the landing pad, the mag locks gripping the deck metal tightly. A team of medics came pouring in, carrying stretchers; more than they should have been normally hauling, but they had foregone the standard medpacks and bacta injections, counting them out as useless. After all, it _was_ Hit-Man's turn to train the rookie squad. With a clang and the sound of many pairs of booted feet, the medics boarded and started to haul away the stinking dead, calling in a cleaning crew to scrape off the rest. LT.Hit-Man stretched, yawning as he threaded through the busy men and down the ramp, both mentally and physically ready for a nerfburger and forty winks, when a young Ensign came up to him nervously with a datapad. "Uhh...uhh..." he began to stammer. "Spit it out, chuckles." "Captain Yates has requested to see you immediately, sir," the Ensign replied. "He has a new mission for you." He held out the padd with trepidation, and the LT. snatched it suddenly, nearly taking out the poor man's arm. He skimmed over it with a grimace, then slapped it back into the Ensign's abdomen, knocking the wind out of him. "Tell him I'll be up as soon as I drain the lizard," he grunted. [30 minutes later...] "I thought you were just going to relieve yourself, Hit-Man," inquired Captain Yates. "I was," LT.Hit-Man replied. "Missions like that don't leave a lot of room for personal needs." Yates simply nodded, not wanting to know the gory details. "Have a seat, Lieutenant. We have a bit of a problem." "What problem? I thought we were doin' a good job of fuckin' up the Alpha Quadrant." Yates grimaced, not used to hearing salty language on his ship. "Seems that the rearguard is encountering some problems from an unknown force. Here's the sensor logs." He slid over another datapad, which almost fell before Hit-Man yanked it into his outstretched palm with a thought. He glanced over it. "Real kriffin' imaginative, aren't they?" he asked. "Straightline trajectories, pattern tactics..." He trailed off, reading the lengthy post-battle data, before turning his attention to the small device that Yates placed before him. He pressed the button on it. "Ye Gods, these folks are as creative as burnt toast," Hit-Man snorted, leering at the cubical vessel. "What do ya want me to do with them?" Yates smiled. "Enslave them." "You can't be serious." "Well, not really. See, we're going to need a few more of them for study, as well as intact computer cores and communication arrays. All we know about them is that they are the Borg, their collective goal is assimilation, and their enemy...is individuality." Hit-Man nodded. "Break one mind..." "...and you break them all." "Just like so many marionettes on one string." "Precisely. If we manage to hack into their communications, codes, and encrypts..." "...then the Borg Collective..." "...is ours," the finished in tandem. [Two days later] LT.Hit-Man swung his arms around as he headed down the corridor, relishing his last few moments of off-time before heading out on yet another mission, inadvertently decking an oblivious tech. He glanced down, then continued on, leaving the poor man to be found by his duty officer. He swung by the mess and picked up his pre-ordered cooler full of fresh nerf steaks and burgers to be charred over the open flames of burning Borg, along with several bottles of a fine vintage of Corellian ale. After that, the armory, where he picked up a hand truck and several heavy cases full of shiny new Imperial toys, each one fully loaded and charged, along with a spare set of stormtrooper armor. His errands complete, he then made way for his baby. LT.Hit-Man hitched a ride in one of the larger turbolift cars to the forward, or auxiliary, hangar bay where his baby waited...his personal TIE Defender. It's name, "The Fearmeister", was emblazoned on it's side next to dozens of silhouettes in the shape of various Rebel starfighters and Federation Peregrines. Majestic in all it's splendor, it gleamed under the interior lighting of the bay, the armor over the extended neck giving off a lovely sparkle. Taking a piece of felt cloth, LT.Hit-Man rubbed gently at a small spot on one of the three wings, then hopped into the special-made hatch on it's side. He dropped his gear, then went forward and flipped on the preflights. The engines started with a satisfying hum. Switching on the comm, he called for clearance, then went to bolt down everything in the back. By the time LT.Hit-Man returned to the cockpit, his lights were green and the control tower gave him the go. He activated the repulsorlifts, and gently shoved the throttle forward, and winced as the scream of metal contacting metal came to his ears. He glanced at his display and saw that he had almost sheared his wing off on an overhang. He glanced over at where his ship was normally parked, and saw sitting there an odd-looking spherical craft. He passed it off and rocketed out of the hangar bay. Entering coordinates provided to him by the _Cerberus_, he pushed the hyperdrive levers forward and shot into Hyperspace. [An hour later] [Borg space] *Drone 15 of 197 online *Drone 16 of 197 online... *Interrupt assimilation *Assess new energy signatures *Energy signature not found in database *Investigate energy signature *Signature artificial *Target for assimilation *Engage audio contact "We are the Borg. You will be assimilated. Your biological and technological distinctiveness will be added to our own. Resistance is futile." *Target velocity decreasing *Target is opening fire *Direct hit *Direct hit *Damage to 3% of hull *Engage repair systems *Assimilation priority 57% *Target is increasing velocity *Tractor beams locked on *Target has been captured *Engage matter/energy transport *Target has been transported *Vessel is now berthed *Continue assimilation *** [Hyperspace] He screamed in rage, trying to upset or perhaps make the bionics pause for a second, but they - no, it - was relentless. He whipped out his lightsaber, igniting the dark blade, carving through their ranks...they fell before him, one after another, but they were too many...though they could not adapt, there were more than enough to overrun his defenses...and with a loud pinging sound, four drones in succession injected nanoprobes into him... LT.Hit-Man jerked awake, his body glove damp with sweat. He wiped his forehead and glanced over at the pinging navicomp, signalling the ship’s proximity to the termination point. Fifteen seconds. He took a dep breath, trying to clear his mind of the impending sense of doom, and got ready to break out. “The Fearmeister” coasted through the endless expanses of hyperspace, suddenly jumping again across the barrier that was lightspeed to the realm of realspace as the clock reached zero, and almost ran straight into a Borg cube. LT.Hit-Man hoped that they didn’t notice him, counting on the element of surprise in order to carry out his mission, but no such luck. Soon, over his speakers, he heard the voice that had haunted his dreams so much in the past few days... "We are the Borg. You will be assimilated. Your biological and technological distinctiveness will be added to our own. Resistance is futile." He reacted suddenly, and violently. Twisting the control stick, he threw his ship into a jinking barrel roll to his left, cutting his speed and firing a pair of concussion missiles. They impacted, but had little effect on the hull. Suddenly, with only a flicker of warning from the force, the cube snared him in a tractor beam, which he almost avoided, throttling up to full acceleration. A split second too late; he was locked in. And then he was gone. It looked like a psychedelic tunnel, but it only lasted a second. A second before which he was inside his ship, and after which he was suddenly inside the cube at a junction with Borg closing in on all sides. “What the fuck?!?” he yelled. “Give me my ship. NOW, whores!” They ignored him. As the nearest reached him, it extended an arm menacingly. LT.Hit-Man whipped out his lightsabre, igniting it and taking the arm off, decapitating the drone with one smooth stroke. He spun a full 360 degrees, creating a circle of death that unfortunately left him slightly disoriented, but still dangerous. He began to slice and dice some more, but there were far too many for him to handle, and soon, he missed one. Not with his ‘sabre, but with his senses...and he felt a sharp object plunge into his back. He staggered and turned around, ready to face his attacker...but he was again pierced in the back, then from both sides...and then, darkness. He dimly managed to call on the Force for some sort of defense before he lost consciousness... *** He awoke in fits and starts, dimly feeling the bonds around both his human and cybernetic limbs, and a low buzz going through his mind that coalesced into voices...voices of the Borg. With a low hum, his artificial eye rebooted, casting a red glow into the darkness. He shut his eyes again as lights came on. It took a few minutes before he could open them again, and when he did, he wished he didn’t. As he watched, a floating torso with a wriggling spine floated down from the ceiling into a waiting...”body”, he thought, but wasn’t sure exactly what it was. It settled in, sharp clamps grabbing hold of wrinkled, distorted skin. “You are unique.” It was a statement, not a question. “What’s it to you?!” “So crude, yet so much like us.” “I’ll show you crude, you robotic bitch...” “You would make a fine addition to the Collective...” “Yeah, so? What now?” “Our attempt to assimilate you has failed.” He wondered about that, then thought back to what his last conscious action had been. Turning around, feeling the pierces in his back, calling on the Force...there. The Force...must have had prevented his assimilation. Or the creatures that allowed him to communicate with the Force. Could nanoprobes assimilate midiclorians? “We have encountered others that we have not been able to assimilate. We have been unable to ascertain the cause. You will tell us what it is.” “Even if I did know, do ya think I’d tell some freak bitch like you?” He shook his head, trying to clear the buzzing voices. “Even now your mind is part of the collective, although not completely so. We will find out anyway.” Suddenly, there was a great pressure inside his head, and LT.Hit-Man could feel something, or someone, trying to force their way into his thoughts. Calling on the Dark Side, he erected a powerful mental block, and the bitch frowned. She dismissed the failure as irrelevant, then tried herself with similar result. “Your mind is closed to us.” “Boo hoo, too kriffing bad.” “Open it.” “Piss off.” LT.Hit-Man bit his lip as he headed off another, then yet another attempt at a mental break-in, while simultaneously trying to find a route back to the host. The invasion tried another route, but LT.Hit-Man quickly blocked it; it tried to access his personal computer inside of his cybernetics, but was foiled by the encryption... Encryption. With an inward, malicious grin, LT.Hit-Man put into place a mind scrambler that the Emperor had taught him so long ago. Designed to let the user think clearly but also to block any outside invasion of privacy, it was just the thing he needed. He set the pattern into his subconscious, and it seemed to hold, so he focused his full concentration onto the mind of the woman...no, the Queen. She was the Queen...of the collective, unlikely, but surely of a subnet of the whole. He probed deeper...and she didn’t seem to notice, all her concentration focused on the task at hand. He stroked the motor control for her arms with a tendril of thought, and her arms started to flap. The Queen’s frown deepened, but disappeared as it stopped, and it was dismissed as irrelevant. LT.Hit-Man laughed as he inserted a command and instructions into her brain... As Lt.Hit-Man watched, the Borg Queen began to dance the Funky Chicken. It was funny trying to see her stop, but he had put the thought command into a permanent loop. He probed again, this time towards her linkup with the Collective. His thoughts ran over the folds and crevices, mapping out her thought patterns, or what was left of them, eventually coming to a dead halt as he reached the point where the brain stopped and the Borg began. LT.Hit-Man, using his own experience with his cybernetic components, began to decipher the electrical impulses being sent out to the rest of the cube. However, as he “watched”, he felt the barrier he began to set up fall, and he desperately thought of something to stall them... Concentrating, he managed to slip a single command into the transmissions. _Boogie!_ The intrusion stopped...and the lights dimmed. Suddenly, above him, a light turned on and off rapidly, creating a sort of strobe effect, and disco music cached from the systems of assimilated Federation ships began to blare. The Queen and any other Borg in sight began to dance furiously. LT.Hit- Man cackled like a mad scientist about to complete a great, evil experiment, then set to work. [A few hours later] [ISD _Cerberus_] Captain Yates wrung his hands, then asked for the third time, “Any word from LT.Hit-Man?” “No, sir,” came the reply. Yates mulled, wondering if the el tee had managed to pull it off, or if he had been assimilated, when suddenly alarms began to blare. “What is it?!” Yates demanded. “Sir! One of the vessels that attacked our ships...” he trailed off. Yates watched as a cube slowed down, coming to a halt off the starboard bow. “They’re hailing us...” “Put it on.” “HEY, HEY, HEY, BITCH!” came the voice of LT.Hit-Man, seemingly in tandem with many others. “LT.?” Yates asked, astounded. “Did you get the components we need to take over the Collective?” “Shit, man, I _am_ the Collective!”