MSNPC Eru Ghant - The Black Dance: Accelerando

[Justin Partridge]

((Interior. U.S.S. Arrow, Cargo Bay 1.))

The Fed's eyes narrowed, focusing on Ghant's posture and stance quicker than the corsair had expected. The solid looking officer then further surprised her. By smiling. Or at least it looked like a smile from the distance between them. If Ghant was being perfectly honest with herself, most mammalian races tended to blend together for her. It was not a failing of her mind nor memory, but simply a failing in their dispositions. Most purely humanoid races (barring the scant exception of a select, equally as rare elite) just tended to look plain boring to her.

But this one now, here, stood out simply because she had provided a branching control group away from the usual terror and trepidation that usually came with her arrival. Bless. Some people were simply just informed.

And now, fueled by rage and a burning desire to see the ship she currently occupied decimated, she would teach her plainly. After a few more heavy moments, she spoke, in a clipped, but controlled patter.

Alvarez: Ensign Maria Alvarez, decidedly not at yours.  Unless you're an interphasic being, or intending on starting a new fashion trend based on copious quantities of freshly-obtained ensign giblets, I can't say I'd recommend going "through" me...  However, you'd be correct that I have no intention of allowing a criminal's departure if I can help it.

It was then Starfleet's Ensign Maria Alvarez surprised her once again. By quickly closing the gap between them in a quick sprint, spinning Eru's aiming gun-arm upward, and connecting flatly with the underside of her arm, whipping the phaser from her hand before she could draw a bead on her. Had Eru not been so brimming with anger, she would have laughed, but instead she quickly took advantage of what Maria's speed had cost her; an opening of her midsection

Sliding back her left foot and then springing forth in her own way, she corrected Maria's speeding disarmament with a sharp knee to her stomach, sending her skidding right back across the smallish space she had just covered and bending her slightly, surely with the effort and pain it now took to breathe. Ghant heard a slight wheeze and groan from the officer, now backtracking slightly to regain her stance. 

Now it was Ghant's turn to smile and stalk forward like the predator she was

Ghant: You are faster than the others. It is...commendable.

Alvarez: Yeah, well, sometimes I surprise myself too.  :: She smirked yet again, now a proven action on her part. ::  I can't say I expected to find myself facing down an interstellar terrorist after everything else today.  One of the many charms of Starfleet, I suppose. :: She shrugged. ::

Ghant: I suppose if one only knows control and compliance, it would look like charm. You can only see what is in front of you. You cannot imagine what else is out here. You experience only what your masters deem worthy of contact. never understanding the splendor of the cosmos just standing outside of your blinders. I pity you more than anything, truth be said.

Ghant continued her forward advance and Maria, to her credit, kept a respective distance away from her now, but she could see she was preparing herself for the coming action. Her gait started to arc and her limbs started to shake out, limbering for movement and contact. Though the pain was still surely there, there was an intention behind the movements. A pointedness. Eru wondered if she might have been a dancer in a former, better life. One free from the jackboots of the Federation and their stunted view of progress.

Garnering her further respect from the captain was her keeping her eyes locked onto hers. It was an admirable quality Ghant found of prey.

Alvarez: Man, with the way you talk, you really should have considered opening up a shady timeshare business on Risa swindling gullibles out of their hard-earned latinum.  Probably could have made more money off of that than this ill-advised little heist... or whatever this is.

Ghant: You talk far too much, Ensign Maria Alvarez.

Ghant snarled as she leapt forward, lashing out with heavy, but coordinated blows. This Alvarez was a decent size, but it still would not take much to put her down. Ghant did not want to spend any more time on this ship than she had to. 

Again, Maria Alvarez proved harder to hit than she had first expected, feinting, blocking, and then spinning out of the combination's path, keeping the buffer of space between them. With the followthrough of her spin, Eru's theory was confirmed. Absolutely a dancer's training and discipline. Fragile, pretty things as they were, they usually proved to be far more agile than their build's would suggest. It always frustrated Ghant, which just compounded her rage, turning her positively murderous. Had she still had her stiletto, this farce would have not been allowed to go on as long as it had already.

Alvarez gained a defensive stance again, relocking her eyes into Ghant's own as she continued to attempt to bridge the distance between them.

Alvarez: I'm curious... what exactly was there to be gained in a risky assault on this ship?  You're locked out of my ship, and your ship is in smolders.  Just what was the plan... Eru?

She capped off the stunning show of impertinence with a dazzling display of footwork, stretching and pivoting her impressive legs upward and outward, causing Ghant to bring her arms up suddenly and precisely keeping the impeccably pointed feet from dashing about her head and ears. But while the blows were precise and deliberately delivered to keep her precious spacing away from Ghant, there was no real drive behind them. No deadly intention. Ghant knew that was the opening she would need. The Fed, though clearly trained and brave, would not do what would need to be done to keep her here. 

Whereas Eru Ghant knew, through a life lived away from comfort and coddling, exactly what she needed to do to continue off this spit of a ship. She wondered when the moment would come for this Ensign? After the first hard blow she was able to deliver? When her fingers found her dainty throat and would not relent? It mattered little when. But the important thing was that it was coming.

Ghant: The same as it always is. "Take what you can, give nothing back". Old words, but steady you will find. Beyond that, I did not like much the idea of this patch having law skulking around. Or at least someone parading as law. The Sheliak are not the only predators out here, but heavy space fills all hold. Pirating is always so much easier when there is a bigger threat operating alongside.

Alvarez: Well, don't you have an interesting personality.  I never realized there could be so much depth and complexity and genuine empathy in a pirate!  I almost bet we'd be friends if you weren't trying to kill me...  Please, tell me all about your "tragic" backstory before you bore me to death with talk about how you're going to grind me to a pulp.

This Maria was officially trying too hard.

Ghant: You Starfleet are all the same. You think your training, your "mission" gives you something over the rest of the universe. A disgusting piety that underscores your profound arrogance. I MADE myself. FOUGHT to become something more than just another bought and traded courtesan of cruel royalty. As my chains broke, I broke others, gaining respect and riches by the end of a blade and deeds in battle. Not with words and naked expansionism. You and I are actually the same, my petal. I just have the clarity to see the work for what it really is. Bloody and driven by self-interest.

As she finished speaking, Maria Alvarez suddenly pitched and yawed her body, lashing out with a more directed but unpowerful volley, almost herding her into the access corridor of the Bay. It was then that Ghant started to realize what she was REALLY doing. She was not trying to keep distance between the two of them. She was trying to KEEP her from something. Or get to something deeper into the Bay.  

Again their eyes found one another.

Alvarez: Even if I did believe any of your story, I'm still going to take you down and evict your motley crew off my ship.  Almost everyone comes through adversity and hardship, that's no excuse to become a gleefully violent thug.

Ghant: You say "violent". I say I have "perspective".

Ghant grew tired of this game. Of the pantomime of it all. Maria Alvarez bent to try and spring upward again, but as she did, Ghant caught her with a vicious backfist, meeting her cheek and chin at the point of her arc. A sudden, pained shout belched from her lips. With any luck, it would stop her nattering, but Ghant was not about to count on that. She tried to follow up with a few quick jabs and mid-kicks, but again her defense stance impressed (but was noticeably slower at this point). The blow had stifled her spark and now was the moment to snuff it out

She could see now that effort it was taking from her to try and stay between her and whatever her quarry in the Bay was. Maybe the still discarded phaser or some kind of control panel access? Ghant could not say, as she did not have eyes in the back of her head quite yet. But she did know that she was tired of this Maria's game and tired evermore still at the oppressive and falsely superior air of the Starfleet tub. Before she had thought it to be her next trophy and now she only wanted to see it turned to dust to float among the dead black stars.

oO Such a difference a few hours can make...Oo 

Alvarez: Yeah?  And what makes you think that?

Ghant: You think this a dance. But I know it for what it is. Life and death. 

To accentuate the point, she jumped suddenly, crashing both feet hard into her chest sending Ghant falling to her back and the Ensign spilling back into the Bay with an audible crash. As quickly as she fell, Ghant kipped back up, displaying her OWN dancer's grace and effortless movement. Her eyes instantly found the Ensign, spilled into a puddle of elbows and knees on the flooring. 

She knew she needed to be off the ship. She knew she needed to get back to the Edge to try and salvage something from this failed "sure-thing". But she also knew...that she wanted to take her time with this one. She took a step forward, but a newly familiar voice cracked the Bay's soundscape.

Wilde: ::theatrically.:: Well, well, well. If it isn’t Captain Hook?

She craned her neck hard toward the sound's owner and was given her latest surprise. It was The Pretty One! Now turned...Slightly Pummeled One. But still his beauty (for a humanoid/mammalian) shone through the fresh pops and shots. Her rage seemed to...temper at the sight of him. Brighten into something far more pronounced than it was before then. She could not articulate it. Nor would she ever truly understand it. But it was there all the same.

And was more than ready to be poured into these fragile birds of Starfleet. Her teeth bared into a hideously ravenous smile.

Ghant: AH! My Pretty! Have you come to see your admirer off, Pretty?

Wilde: You know, I asked myself when you first came aboard what fitting human pirate name you'd have if you lived hundreds of years ago. We had Blackbeard. I rather fancied Greenscalp, for you. But I like Captain Hook better. How's the wrist?

She sucked her teeth slightly, turning now to approach The Pretty One, pointing her still stinging and now slightly scabbed initial wound in his direction as she stepped lightly in a slight arc toward round the side of him.

Ghant: It still ever so hurts, Pretty. Perhaps I should make you kiss it better.

The Pretty One swept their arms and bowed mockingly. At least he was taking ownership of the damage he had caused. It was more than she could say for any of the others. But even that would not stay her hand once she got to the end of her arc.

Wilde: You’ve hurt a lot of people today, Hook. I underestimated you in the transporter room, and in the briefing room. That was my mistake. Your mistake was to take your eyes off the prize. Captain Hook famously hated and chased the boy Peter Pan - the boy who never grew up - in revenge for taking his hand. Well Pan's right here, Captain. Take me!

She growled mightily as she lurched, granting his request. In seconds she had scads of his signed and now well worn uniform in her hands, pulling him closer to her, mere hair lengths from his ear.

Ghant: This. Is. Not. A fairy tale.

Hammering home the lesson was a savage headbutt, crashing her foreskull into the bridge of the Pretty One's nose. She would normally have hated destroying something so beautiful but when it's very existence ran counter to you, it tended to color one's experience and appreciation. She started forward but was keened to a nearby hissing sound. She darted her eyes wildly around the Bay, but was too late.

As quickly as she had clocked it, the sound had suddenly intensified and then resolved with a heavy POP. A nearby bulkhead cover junction had been blown, flinging the heavy cap metal from its housing and sending it flying drunkenly through the air, pitching hard off of Ghant's midsection and left flank. The sudden blow hit bone deep and sent her sprawling just like Maria Alvarez had previously.

She was raising to try and work feeling back into her arm.

Ghant: Blowing bulkheads now? Your spineless Captain must be panicking now, eh?

Wilde/Alvarez: RESPONSE

Ghant: It matters little. I do not need that much time to kill you.

Wilde/Alvarez: RESPONSE

To Be Continued...

MSNPC Captain Eru Ghant

Corsair Captain of the Razor's Edge

Privateer-at-Large and In Exodus 

As Simmed By

LIEUTENANT COMMANDER 

QUENTIN COLLINS III

FIRST OFFICER

[[CO-FORUM OPERATOR 

(SB118 Forums) 

F.N.S. CONTRIBUTOR]]

U.S.S. ARROW NCC-69829

ID: E239512QC0