MSNPC Ergaholz: No Turning Back

[Quinn Friedl]

((Subdeck 8, Sheliak Vessel Ascended Codex)) 

 

Ergaholz sat. This was true on most days, considering his deeply supine biology. The irony of silicon-based life was that there was very little the sentient variety could do to enjoy their physically differential structure. Yes, they could inhabit planets that would otherwise kill or liquify other carbon based life, and yes they were more an amalgamated mass of grudgingly cooperative slime than a coherent form, but this granted them very little in terms of mobility, or in status across the universe. 

 

What they lacked- he lacked- in structure, he made up for in structure. Almost as if to keep their slovenly, tar-imitating bodies at bay, the society of the Sheliak was one of paramount rigidity. Their language was sharper and more precise than most species’ edged weapons, and that was to say nothing of their social structures and goals within that most aligned and predetermined civilization of theirs. 

The pursuit of science was pursued with a relentless, infatuated respect that bordered on invasive. Ergaholz’ species had suffered more than their fair share of scientific mishaps and horrors- indeed, their current condition demanded a more exploitive approach to surrounding space than was, perhaps, wise. And thus, this situation was born, brewed from the intolerance of the present, and the foolishness of the past. 

 

Ergaholz would, under normal circumstances, stay well away from such a hotly contested area of space as this. It was not the place of a Sheliak learner, and he was being missed on Shelia, he knew. And yet, the stakes were so high- too high. 

 

And thus, he sat, because the hard work had already been done. 

 

He watched the window of his laboratory as the tortured, streaking stars coalesced into their composite pinpricks, and the light of a different sun, and the refracted glow of a carbon-haven planetoid flashed before his light receptors. 

 

It had begun. 

 

Before the alarms even began to ring out, the beam had fired. First, the emitters had activated in quick succession, and then, an ice blue web of floundering, raging energy blasted toward the planet. All at once, the whirring of the shipboard generators whined down, and the lights that usually shone brightly upon his leathery, silicon skin faded almost to nothingness. 

 

There were others with him by design, and they clicked and communicated with one another, sharing similar thoughts as Ergaholz would in their place. But they didn’t know. They couldn’t. 

As the Ascended Codex began conserve power it never had in the first place, most of the defensive systems that would have ordinarily snapped on failed to do so. Amidst the panic of a thousand Sheliak administrators sitting idly, only Ergaholz, perched upon his podium in the now darkened lab, had the wherewithal to watch out the window, as their only hope, their only salvation skewed around the planet like a startled parent, and brought itself to a directly combative and protective position before the Ascended Codex. A small Federation ship, perhaps a tenth of the overall size of the Codex, and yet she was fierce. That was apparent in her actions as much as her scarred hull. 

On any other day, Ergaholz would have enjoyed blowing this pittance out of the water, would have delighted in their carbon bodies being returned to more useful, elemental forms. But they were salvation, for them all, and those around him could not be allowed to ruin that. 

 

It would take time, time for heads to cool and for answers to be presented, and in that time, Ergaholz would have the data he needed- the data that would tell him if his math and his theories about this pitiful little world were correct. If they weren’t, he would return to Shelia with a lifted heart and a slightly bruised ego. But if he was right… than sabotaging a corporate vessel to fire on an inhabited world would be the least of his problems. 

 

He busied himself with finding out the truth, as those below him, in the core of the ship, worked to understand and untangle the situation Ergaholz had just plunged them in. 

For the good of the Corporate.

Scientist First Circle Ergaholz
Chief Science Officer 
Sheliak Vessel Ascended Codex

As simmed by

Commander Randal Shayne
Commanding Officer
USS Arrow
NCC 69829
G239202RS0