By this point, Helvetica had obtained quite the collection of firearms from the various Borg drone’s in the corridors. Her armament now consisted of a multitude of pistols and rifles–entirely disruptors and phasers. She’d taken to keeping a phaser pistol in one hand and a disruptor rifle in the other.
The Borg apparently had not learned their lesson and continued to deliver weapons and snacks to Helvetica as she stormed through the hallways. Good thing too for those catfish sandwiches; killing Borg was hungry work.
She had just polished off another cluster of drones (and drank the Saurian Brandy she found on them) when she heard the strangest caterwauling vibrating through the nearest door.
For the most part, the Oxford had extremely boring corridors. Grey carpet, white paneling on the slightly curved sides, and black screens lining the walls that would alternately display bright crimson RED ALERT or a cross-section of the ship. The doors were almost all resolute brown with silver trim.
This door, however, was covered with blue cat pawprints.
The panel next to the door read: Ensign Rocky-Road.
From the sound, Helvetica presumed that the ensign needed help. So she levelled her rifle, and keyed the sequence that would open the door.
In the same instant the door opened, something large, furry, and wearing a blue uniform blurred past Helvetica and into the corridor. Expecting resistance–and possibly someone to rescue–she triggered the rifle on full auto and sprayed down the room with green bolts of disruptor fire. The rifle whined as it blazed with withering fury into the small quarters. Carpet singed, a table erupted into flames, the windows shimmered as structural integrity fields deflected the blasts–but through all the fury and firepower, Helvetica saw no Borg drones.
After she let her finger off the trigger, the room seemed very quiet.
She poked her head inside. A few leafs of burning paper fluttered slowly through the air, leaving trails of ash. The smell of ozone and burnt fibers filled the room with a pall–and some sort of environmental system put out the fire on the table. So far, the only occupant of the room she could see appeared to be a potted plant–which remained miraculously untouched.
“Are they dead?” a voice asked at her shoulder. “Can I go back in my room yet?”
Helvetica turned her head very slowly. There, at her side, a half-head shorter than she stood a slight woman wearing a blue uniform, whose feline features formed a particularly cat-like visage, white ears, sleek black hair, and tortoiseshell-patterned fur all over her face and shoulders. The woman’s huge, green eyes reminded Helvetica of her own cat, Tumbles.
“Er,” Helvetica said. “I don’t think there were any Borg in there.”
“Borg!?” With a start, the woman–Ensign Rocky-Road perhaps?–fumbled at her belt for a tricorder, which she opened deftly, and began tapping away at buttons. “This is not good. Not good. I am detecting Borg drones all over the ship… They seem to have infiltrated most decks and are… mostly dead.”
Helvetica shrugged. “Well, I have killed almost eighty of them so far.”
“I see,” the cat-woman said and closed her tricorder. “May I accompany you, then? I am not good with guns and do not want to be assimilated today. Or any day for that matter.”
“Sure, I’m Helvetica.”
“Rocky-Road. Ensign science officer.”
“Isn’t Rocky Road the name of an icecream?” Helvetica asked.
“Oh yes,” Ensign Rocky-Road nodded vigorously. “When humans first contacted my people, catians, many in my culture found your icecream particularly interesting. So we tend to name our kits after the various flavors.”
“Do you like icecream? I think I have two sundaes in my backpack.”
“I would love some,” Rocky-Road said. “Do you have a plan to deal with the Borg?”
Helvetica smirked and blew smoke from the tip of her rifle. “I’m going to blast the rest of them and get to the bridge.”
The author Helvetica writes the Helvetica Voyage, Helvetica Venture, and Hellvetica Chronicles for Vox Ex Machina and proudly supports the works of Kyt Dotson, whose writing includes Mill Avenue Vexations (a gothic webserial featuring cab driver Vex Harrow), Black Hat Magick, and Helljammer and invites you to check out the novel, The Specter in the Spectacles by Kyt Dotson.
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