STO: Back Stories – LawMarshall

[-PLASMA]

#560

“How did it come to this”?
This is what I kept repeating to myself as I paced my quarters, pondering the future, knowing that what I am heading for is a fight against all the odds. My Borg science officer has kept reminding me exactly the odds.
My newly ‘acquired’ Ferengi vessel the ‘USS Crazy Ivan II’ was making headway at warp 9 to the Romulus Sector for what most people would perceive a suicide mission.

“Captains log, Personal entry”. (Computer Bleep…)
“My real name is long forgotten, but crew and friends call me Law when not addressing me as Captain. I was born on Vulcan 122 years ago, son of a craftsman and a scientist. My mother installed in me a love of the stars and a desire to explore and I knew from an early age that’s where I’ll end up being.
I was raised by a firm hand from my father, but he taught me well about emotions and how to survive. He was at odds with the academic society and general populous over his ideology, but he enjoyed the quietness for his pursuits that being shunned afforded him for his love of sculpting. Like most Vulcan’s my parents’ marriage was arranged when they were children. They did not share the same love they had for their pursuits as with each other, but they loved me and I knew that.
At a young age I progressed through schools and training at an accelerated rate, much faster than my peers. I learned later on in life that this led to me being watched closely by the Vulcan High Command for quite a few years and at times I did feel an odd influence over a lot of my schooling assignments to push me in certain directions.
I was sent through proving ground tests and advanced combat training by the time I was 14.
With some of my results I think the High Command got scared.

It was in my late teens that I lost my parents in a surprise attack by a Romulan cell faction looking to destabilize relations and bring on war. The blast vaporized everything in a mile wide zone. 5238 people died that day, a number I’ll never forget, and the effects lasted long.
It didn’t bring war as intended, but it brought us to the point of it. I still don’t think we have gotten past it and that was nearly 100 years ago now. It did bring a major push for more defenses and it helped with our involvement with Vulcan being a founding member of the United Federation of Planets and to forge more alliances.
War was going to come at some point in the future. That was inevitable.
This more than before opened up pathways for further training and a request was sent out for more to join Starfleet.
I was 24 when I first signed up to the Starfleet Academy. The humans were still at a very early stage in there space flight, but they soon picked up the pace when they got out there amongst the stars. Even though the Academy was designed for multi races the Vulcan’s were still picked on as contentions at holding the human race back hadn’t been quite forgotten. I never held this against them but as I learnt from my father I tried to embrace and learn from other species as this is how you can use their strengths to you advantage, not just their weaknesses.
I had no problem excelling at Starfleet Academy, combat tactics for space and ground and high level of engineering gave me options, and it was here that I caught the eye of some Section 31 operatives hidden amongst some of the personnel.
After graduation I was posted to a Starship as an engineer and kept to myself. I guess I was still not really sure even at this point what drove me and what I wanted to do. I lost a lot of my direction when my parents died, but I still thought a lot about retribution.
A few years after being on the Starship and gaining the Captains respect as both an engineer and a regular on the away crew for my combat skills, I was pursued by Section 31 to be recruited into their ranks.
It was at this point in time that my whole life changed.
My disappearance happened on an away mission and then over the next year I was erased from records, had facial reconstruction and my voice altered, so for all purposes I ceased to exist and I became LawMarshall to my new colleagues.
For some years I had lived this new life, being sent on various missions to all corners of the universe. I cannot go into any detail as it is all classified, but what I can say is that over the next 50 years you can bet we were involved in any significant changes.

My life had changed; some parts for the better and some for not so the better.
My Vulcan ways had been adjusted over time to not just control my emotions, but to use my emotions if at all possible for an advantage. I guess my father was right in some of his beliefs.

I lost track of time working with Section 31 and the years were passing by quickly now.
What had started out I thought with their charter was noble and logical, but it had been changed with new leadership over the last few years to something I didn’t want to be a part of. What were grey areas of work was now being pushed to the extreme limits, so it was here that I felt conflicted and thought best to make a clean break from it. I knew that by doing so I’ll end up being a target with their new approach, but I was not a novice anymore and decided to take my chances. Besides which I had enough evidence about their actions hidden away and ‘used’ to keep my freedom unless they wanted it to go public upon my untimely death. I think they were fine to have me leave on casual terms rather than as enemy’s, we agreed to keep out of each other way.

I decided to go back to Starfleet and find my way in life again. This time round I advanced through very quickly and took the Officer Training.
After graduation with top of class marks I was posted as First Officer to Capt Conway. He was a good captain and had the respect of his crew, although he was a newly appointed captain and this was his first command. He gave respect to my ideas and sought my opinions regularly. He unfortunately died while on an away mission, just 2 years later.
I received a field promotion and took command at this point as we were in deep space on an assignment.

The 10year border war with the Romulans broke out at this point and I was thrust right into the middle of it. I was proving myself as a fierce and tactical fighter and being thrust into more and more challenging missions.
I guess my vengeance and anger towards them was coming out in me with each mission.
Starfleet decided to give me my own Dreadnought to push the fight, so I made a request of my own, and that was to assign my own crew – no questions asked.
While they didn’t like it they were getting desperate for some progression in the war.
I sent at this time invites to some old friends who I had helped and owed me from my days in Section 31. These were people that were loyal to me and were space military hardened from their own wars. I had saved them on several occasions and now was the time to call in some favors.
It must have looked strange to Starfleet and to most people as I had a Borg, a Jem Hadar, a Breen and a Gorn. For the most part we were in conflict with these races but to have them on a Starfleet vessel raised a few eyebrows. We did however get the job done and went and did things no-one else even dreamed of doing. So questions remained small. I likewise can’t go into details as this became Starfleet classified material.

After the war and after saving face for Starfleet I don’t know how many times, the Admiralty decided to cut us loose due mainly to my choice of crew. If this was the best Starfleet could do I decided to leave, but I extended an invitation to my crew to become ‘privateers’ and offered for them to stay on.
Starfleet didn’t want to lose me, but it didn’t become their choice.

It was here that I used a lot of my old skills to trade up ships and gather ‘merchandise’ for transporting. I was able to acquire through various channels my own starship that not only had a great balance of shields but could handle itself in combat when needed. This became a consistent battle as there was always someone looking to bring you down.
It was during one of these transport runs that I came across a vicious Ferengi trader named Qatar. He had a reputation of a person not to be taken lightly or you never made him feel like he is not getting a bargain. He also liked to boast about his ‘acquisitions’ and merchandise. It was in amongst his showing off that he divulged he was a slave trader. He didn’t know it but that is one thing I could not stand. In showing off his ‘merchandise’ of slaves I saw a female Trill. I could see from her eyes that she needed help and oddly enough something of an interesting emotion stirred in me I had never felt before. I knew I had to rescue her from this and the way Qatar described how he got her and the others, I could not help but to fly into a rage. If you have heard anything about Vulcan’s and what happens when they lose control of their anger, all I can say is you don’t want to be on the receiving end. Qatar didn’t see it coming and it was over quickly. It wasn’t my finest hour that’s for sure and never once before or since have I lost control of my emotions that way.
Sima was her name; she was taken from her family as payment for perceived owed debts and her family was killed as an example. So I did the logical thing and did likewise to Qatar and so we boarded and stripped Qatar of his vessel to send a message back to slave traders that there are those that will not stand for people like that. We faced little resistance and were willing to spare the crew their lives if they left peacefully. I don’t think they liked the look of our determined combat hardened ragtag bunch. Little did I know though of Qatar’s ties with the underbelly of Romulan society and they were not happy to hear of his death and seizure of the ‘goods’.

My time with Sima was short as she spent most of her time in her quarters trying to recuperate and meditate. She did this until we had brought the ‘slaves’ back to their homes. She left me a holo message when she left that deeply affected me and so I knew at that point there was something more to be pursued. I had 2 shipment deliveries to make and then I intended to go back for her. I was a new man at this point. I had a new path to follow.
It was the following week that I received in between my deliveries a communicate from a Romulan named Norek. He was a business partner of Qatar’s and it turns out Sima and some of the other slaves were meant to be for him. To cut a long story short, he was not happy and the usual cussing, threats and diatribe ensued from his mouth. I would normally just have ignored his threats and allowed him to come after me if he wanted to, but he was not just threatening me, he had a target for Sima if he couldn’t have her; neither did he explain why she was so important to him. I may never know.
His instructions were simple. Come alone, 1 ship, 2 weeks time to these co-ordinates on the outskirts of the Romulan sector. Face him, or he will give the word to assassinate her and put a large bounty on my head.
The logical thing may have been to let her go and save my own skin, take my own chances and run as I can look after myself, but I couldn’t.
It was here I gave the option to my crew, they had come to be good friends and I could not force them on this one way mission. They trusted me as captain and while I give ear to their opinions they know once my mind has been made up I have the backbone of steel. I was going, and they all decided to stand by me in my need as I had done many times before for each of them.
In the 2 weeks lead up I had 1 week to call in many a last of my favors to modify this vessel.
It is a darn sturdy ship, and full of surprises I found out, I held a few cards up my sleeves.
I knew that Norek would not bother with chatter but as soon as I came out of warp I’d be an open target. And I knew he wouldn’t be alone.
Having a borg science officer has had its benefits, especially to the modifications he can do to the ships sensors, shields, weapons and engines.
So here I am, the last few minutes before we come out of warp to face him and his 12 ships. These the modified long range sensors could pick up at warp and where they were hidden behind the nearest planet.

I had a plan; it had been whirling around my head for the past few weeks. This was my specialty. Whether it comes off or not I’ll find out soon enough, but hopefully I live long enough to tell this tale.
I’ve now decided that if I get through this it is time for me to settle down, have a family, find a group of like-minded people I could join and help people. Just slow things down a bit.
I have had an interesting life so far, but I want more; my time was not yet up I feel.
So here I am now at this time with many things in the balance. Time to stand and be counted.
Computer end entry”.

The intercom buzzed and my first officer advised we’ll be coming out of warp in 10mins. Time to head to the bridge and table my plans. Hopefully they don’t shoot me with what I have in mind.
“On my way Number One”

[-PLASMA]

#1586

Epic, you should turn this into a book!

[-PLASMA]

#1587

Woo, great back story, i’ll be posting one soon too.

[Author]

Posts