Lieutenant Commander Morro Caras - The cake is a lie (it's holographic)

[Morro Caras]

((Simulated War Room of the PSS T'Kuvma, Holosuite 3, Deck 5, USS Thor))

Lieutenant Commander Morro Caras was out of options. Caras and his crew had been captured by their Opposition. An organization that called themselves “The Conservatory”, that masqueraded like a peace keeping outfit, but were closer to pirates or intergalactic gangsters. They were now at their mercy and while Nera had palmed a laser scalpel. Caras had instead grabbed an experimental piece of technology. He didn’t know why he had it on him, that had been decided by the version of him that had been running in his place while the holodeck had malfunctioned and skipped ahead, but Caras was sure it was in his back pocket for a reason. Caras wasn’t sure if they’d buy it, or even understand it, and at this point, he wasn’t sure what the device would do. It had never been used in a test scenario due to the nature of how it affected subspace.

Caras: They are in a compartment safely in subspace. All you need is my transponder and you should be able to transport it in. Once you do, the specimens are yours.

What she didn’t know was that the moment she used it. She’d kick off their homing beacon to all of the torpedoes, and then the kill switch.

Herrick: Captain, don’t do it.

Nera: We’ve spent all this time trying to keep the specimens out of their hands. We can’t just give in now.

Caras hoped they could get out of there before they activated it. He was hoping they could get through on this one. That it would be better, if this was real it would have been even worse than his mission with the OEB on the Trillian. Those people might never be saved, and there was nothing they could do for them, but one thing was for sure. They couldn’t let these guys have what they wanted. It wasn’t worth the price. Those people would die. He had made the call dooming them if they destroyed the T'Kuvma. You couldn’t win them all, you couldn’t save them all, sometimes the price was too great. Putting a bioweapon in the hands of well armed, and even possibly good intentioned people that only understood power, was a recipe for more death and destruction. 

Geera: You talk too much

Caras decided in that moment, that he didn’t really like Geera

Herrick: Wouldn’t it be better if we helped secure more of them for you? A handful will only get so far.

Caras was pretty sure Geera wasn’t going to bite at all. They had tried everything.

Nera: ::nodding:: I’m a scientist, I can help your team preserve the samples and cultivate more.

Caras knew that there were pirates that ruled with an iron fist, and Pirates that were smarter, that worked through cat paws, used leverage, blackmail, and other tactics in order to reach their goals. Not only was Geera a bad person, she was a bad pirate.

Caras: I’m not sure the conservatory knows the value of everything they have here. Starfleet officers, a fully intact ship. Instead you’d rather dig your own grave by killing people, destroying samples, and picking apart a perfectly good ship.

Geera: Enough! I’m tired of your delays and misdirection. I’m not interested in any of your offers or badly concealed attempts to play me. How stupid do you think I am?

Caras wanted to speak up to answer that question, but kept his mouth shut.

Ral: Captain, I think it’s the only option now.  We have no cards left to play.

Geera’s hand moved like lightning as something jutted out of her sleeve and then her hand swept across Josh’s face. With the same movement she snatched up the transponder from Morro Caras. It took a second but then finally a small leaking of blood painted Josh’s face. Caras didn’t really think that it was necessary for her to go that far.

Geera: :: sarcastically:: Thank you

Josh seemed to share a similar sentiment.

Herrick: Short-sighted and short-tempered, a winning combination.

Nera: You’re every bit as bad as the people you’re trying to defend against ::beat:: And I’ve seen better ships in a scrapyard.

Ral: If my abilities worked here I would burst that pea sized brain in your skull.

Caras: Let’s just take things as they come.

Geera was gloating now, if not with her words, but her actions as well.

Geera: Once my specimens are safely aboard, I’m going to enjoy a glass of Maratekkan brandy while you’re evicted from my vessel. My crew will take you to the airlock. I’m sure you can get by without EV suits. I hear plasma exposure is all the rage.

She used the transponder she had taken from Morro. And entered a few commands on the console. Caras wasn’t sure they’d be able to get to a transporter at this rate. It was possible that they might be able to use it through the gap made in subspace, but that would be risky. It would be the hole inside their shields though. When she opened a way to subspace, Caras hoped that it would create a tunnel. But that had yet to happen. Instead the torpedoes that had been jettisoned early and seemingly were inert, were now active.

Alarms went off everywhere on the T’Kuvma. Geera worked faster at the controls. Ay dug something down, and Tars let out a yelp. The ship rocked and then fell.  Caras landed on his face without having his arms to catch him.

They were either going to be destroyed in the T’Kuvma or they were going to get last second transported…

But as Caras turned his head to look, he realized it was neither.

Herrick: (opening his eyes) Are these… cake sprinkles?

There were indeed cake sprinkles

Nera: ::nodding:: Definitely cake sprinkles ::starting to sing:: It’s Raining Cake! Hallelujah! It’s Raining Cake!

It was cake, everything was cake. Was the ship cake? Space cake? What had happened. They were still injured, beaten, some of them shirtless. Nera celebrated.

Caras looked over to the Holodeck doors with Ral, and there they were.

Ral:::brushing a sprinkle from his shoulder::  Well. That’s… one way to terminate a scenario.

It was over, but had they won?

Caras: … Were we ever in any danger? Certainly we were right? Or was this all part of the scenario?

Caras didn’t know if this was pass or fail at this point. His enemies being turned into cake didn’t seem like it was the most likely scenario, particularly with no intervention from himself. He felt like it was a failure at that point.

Speaking of failures.

Ral: It appears the program hit a cascade failure. Conflicting objectives. Too many unstable variables 

layered on top of each other. ::beat:: It couldn’t reconcile an outcome.

Ral carefully examined the sprinkles and other cake toppings left from the holodeck malfunction. Seemingly trying to glean some kind of meaning.

Ral: ::looking at Morro:: Your transponder solution forced the break. For what it’s worth, you ended it without giving them what they wanted.

Caras didn’t really see that as a win, but he did appreciate Ral’s confidence in him.

Caras: To be fair, I don’t know if that device fully works. It’s still in the prototype stage and we haven’t done any real testing on it. I’m going to be mad if my Holo-double figured it out during one of those skips. We should really take a look at the logs, as well as determine ::looking at the controls:: What caused this in multiple suites?

Ral: I’ll get a team to review the instability with the program, Captain.

Caras: the scenario is over, Commander, is appropriate again. I hope to not have to wear that title for a very long time.

Caras saw to it that the more injured of the crew, Nera and Herrick left first and He escorted them to sick bay, pulling up a PADD and seeing the massive amount of work this was going to cost them.

[[End Mission for Morro Caras]]

—

Lieutenant Commander Morro Caras

Chief of Engineering

USS Thor

O240106MC1

he/him/his (player/character)