Lieutenant Commander LeCroy stood nervously in Engineering, preparing for his enemies to approach him. They were close. He immediately thought ahead and initiated several steps to protect the warp core. There would really only be one reason why the Annecta humanoids would want to go to Engineering at all. Clearly, with a complex matter/antimatter system in place, it was easily the most sensitive part of the ship. LeCroy surmised that that had to be the intended target of the initial assault on the Excelsior.
They’re coming…he thought. Fear began to strike into his heart. The six security guards that Lieutenant Commander Thorn assigned to protect Engineering stood ready with their phaser rifles, but even they were nervous. What would everyone think if I just took off? LeCroy quietly considered. Can’t…I run the place. What the hell do they expect? I’m an Engineer!
The humanoids made their appearance. Their first target appeared to directly be the security guards. They were fast and they were strong. LeCroy could see a humanoid being taken down by some effective moves by a security officer, but just when he was about to make a final shot to the head with his phaser rifle, the humanoid disintegrated on the floor, only to immediately re-materialize behind him. LeCroy couldn’t look to see what happened next, but he could hear the officer scream.
One of the humanoids was down, but he had lost the other two. That can’t be good. He looked around. He was in a fairly skinny corridor that led to the warp core; it made sense that they would head down here. Then one materialized in front of him.
The humanoid looked squarely at LeCroy. There was nowhere to run, LeCroy thought, and there is no one here to protect me. LeCroy thought quickly. “Computer, invert the direction of the artificial gravity!” LeCroy said. The humanoid, along with everything else, immediately collapsed on the ceiling, but LeCroy more gracefully flipped to land on all four, and stood up again on his two feet, upside down. But almost immediately before the alien could recover, LeCroy yelled again, “COMPUTER, INVERT THE DIRECTION OF THE GRAVITY AGAIN!!”
The humanoid immediately again collapsed on the floor, banging his head loudly as he did so. He became disorientated from the constant inversion of gravity. LeCroy, on the other hand, stood perfectly normal. He was surprisingly nimble for someone with such unusual posture. He was surprisingly nimble for an engineer, for that matter.
LeCroy quickly grabbed a handy tool from his belt and plunged it into the back of the alien’s skull, before the humanoid had a chance to recover. He stared at the dead alien. “On all of our new ships, gravity plating has been installed in all of our walls and ceilings,” he explained to it. “Just thought you might like to know.”
But before LeCroy could even turn the corner, another humanoid came from out of nowhere and pounded him the abdomen. LeCroy immediately hit the wall and collapsed to the ground; the wind was completely knocked out of him. He gasped and gasped for air, but found that he was completely unable to breathe. Wow, it’s been a long time since I felt that kind of pain, he moaned. But something even worse was bothering him. The Annecta humanoid had also slapped something on his chest on his way down, and that something felt increasingly warm with each passing second. He looked down to see what it was, and whispered a French curse.
Merd.
