The Emperor’s Clothes
Up Murder Most Foul The Emperor’s Clothes Third Time’s A Charm

 

Table Of Contents

Mission : The Emperor’s Clothes
By: Captain Sir G. Dorsai Grahame, IV (a.k.a. Wolfbayne Stryker)


Art by Jennifer Stuart 1993

The contents of the Ship Logs are considered to be a "compilation" under the provisions of Title 17, U.S. Code (known as the Copyright Act): that is, "A work formed by the collection and assembling of preexisting materials or of data that is selected, coordinated or arranged in such a way that the resulting work as a whole constitutes an original work of authorship." As such, it is the property of the ship’s Captain; however, automatic transfer of ownership to STARSHIPS OF THE THIRD FLEET is effected upon publication of this mission by the ship’s Captain ipso facto.

As outlined in Circular 1 (Copyrighted Basics, Library of Congress, Washington DC, USGPO 1989-262-309/12), "copyrighted in each separate contribution to a periodical or other collective work is distinct from the copyright in the collective work as a whole and vests initially with the author of the contribution."

This mission may not be reproduced in any form without the express, written authorization of STARSHIPS OF THE THIRD FLEET.

Prologue

From the Ship’s Log of USS GALILEO (NCC-8888), November, 2307

USS GALILEO GALILEI had been on station just outside the Delta Triangle for more than 12 hours. During this time both Science Stations on the Bridge had been manned, accumulating data on the strange cloud. Originally detected by a passing Third fleet tug, investigation of this anomalous energy reading had been assigned to the GALILEO. As CDR Edwards, GALILEO's Science Officer, had remarked when notified of the mission, "This is right down our alley."

He wasn't so flippant now, standing in front of Captain Clayton. "No, sir," he repeated. "Our sensors are giving us no data we didn't already get from USS IBN BAUD (NCC-3806). It appears that the anomalous energy is still there, but we just can't get any better answers than that." The failure of his Science Department to come up with anything concrete made Terry Edwards a bit defensive.

Captain Clayton frowned. He looked at the viewscreen. It showed a nebulous cloud with filaments of pink, blue, and purple doing a stately dance within the ill-defined boundaries of the mystery. It is beautiful, Clayton thought to himself. But what in Hell is it? He turned back to the discomforted officer in front of him.

"Well, Commander. What do you recommend?"

Edwards hesitated, not positive that he wanted to make the recommendation he had formulated after several heated discussions with members of his department. "Well, sir," uncharacteristically, he fidgeted. "My only recommendation at this point is to move into the cloud and see what we can discover when we're in actual contact. I'd also like to send out a shuttle to get a sample. Maybe that will tell us something."

LT Judith Rick, Chief of Life Sciences, spoke up. "Captain, I must register my objection to that course of action." CDR Edwards fixed her with a penetrating gaze. She shrank from it, unaccustomed to disagreeing so openly with her department head.

Clayton noticed Edwards' look. "Now, Commander," he said in a placating voice. "I wouldn't actually call that mutiny. I'd like to hear the lieutenant's objections." Edwards shot her one last look which had "we'll talk later" written all over it, and nodded. "Continue, Lieutenant Rick."

I'm up to my, you-know-what in it now, LT Rick thought. She tried not to let her nervousness show. "Well, Captain, Commander, we know from past experience that the Delta Triangle doesn't seem to always follow the same laws of physics that the rest of us do. It also seems to be a favorite hangout for Orion Pirates. What if this is nothing more than fly paper?"

The Chief Security Officer, LCDR Boulay, who had begun to nod his head in agreement, started. "Fly paper?" he asked.

"Yes, sir. Fly paper. It was used hundreds of years ago on Earth to trap a certain kind of scavenger insect on a sticky sheet of paper impregnated with a sweet-smelling substance as bait."

Boulay was thoughtful for a moment. "I agree with the lieutenant. We don't know enough about this energy cloud to rule out the fact it might be a trap. I would not like to get 'fly papered'." Rick shot him a grateful smile, glad to have someone on her side.

"Commander?" Captain Clayton looked back at Edwards.

"At this point, Captain, the energy cloud could be anything from a trap to a simple anomaly. Until we have more data, there's no way to tell. However, I would be surprised if it had anything to do with the Orions."

Clayton turned to LCDR Renfrew, the Operations Officer, who gave him a noncommittal shrug. "I should think that Orion Pirates would be the least of our worries. We've got more firepower aboard this ship than the law allows. I'd like to know more about this pretty cloud."

Captain Clayton turned over alternatives in his mind for a moment, and then made his decision. "We'll do it your way, Commander. But," he held up a warning hand, "I want someone's finger on the button at all times, just in case discretion becomes the better part of valor. Have your shuttle ready in 30 minutes-we'll move in then. Commander Elvenfriend, would you stay behind for a moment?"

Disappointed her warnings were ignored, LT Judith Rick followed the other officers out of the Briefing Room. She rubbed her chin. "I've got a bad feeling about this," she announced to no one in particular.

"Lieutenant Rick, would you join me?" CDR Edwards' voice did not promise a picnic for the two of them. She moved quickly to catch up with her department head.

Clayton looked at his Chief Logistics Officer, then at Kirtland Burke and induced his head. MCPO Burke smiled, went to a table just behind the Captain, retrieved a box, and moved to stand just to Clayton's right.

CDR Minute Elvenfriend was confused, but it barely showed through her usual effervescent demeanor. She stood and moved to a spot just in front of Captain Clayton in response to his hand signal.

"There are two tasks a Commanding Officer is called upon to complete which are joyous, and at least one that often is not. I have the pleasure and the regret to have to do two of them today."

The smile on Min's face began to fade. This was a strange and confusing preamble. Her blue eyes became apprehensive.

Clayton reached for the box Kirtland was holding.

"It is my great pleasure to give you my first set of captain's insignia. They brought me luck, and I hope, Captain Elvenfriend, they do the same for you."

The color drained from Minuet's face. She opened her mouth several times, but nothing came out. As Clayton removed her commander's insignia and replaced it with that of a captain's, her eyes got wider and wider.

She sputtered as Clayton handed her the pins he had removed.

Clayton stepped back and gave her a precise salute, something Min had not seen since her Academy days. Numbly, she returned the gesture of respect. "Congratulations, Captain Elvenfriend."

Still dumbfounded, Minuet couldn't even react as Kirtland hugged her. "Congratulations, Captain," Kirtland repeated.

"There must be some mistake!"

Kirtland's musical laughter broke the spell. "That's the exact same thing Grahame said when he was promoted."

Clayton, too, hugged Minuet and handed her the certificate. She stared at it in disbelief. It must be true! There's the signature of the President of the United Federation of Planets and the signature of Fleet Admiral Ken Brannon, She checked the name on the certificate: "Minute Elvenfriend." That's me!

"There's one other thing," Clayton sat down, a small cloud passing across his face. Still in shock, Min looked at Clayton.

"Your orders." The words were like a thunderclap. Minuet began shaking her head.

Clayton sighed. "I don't want to lose you, Min, any more than you want to leave. But don't you even want to know what your orders are?" A small smile returned.

"I'll tell you one damned thing, Captain," Minuet had finally found her voice. "They'd better be good. Otherwise you can have these back," she motioned at the shoulder strap, "and I'll just go back to my office and pretend this never happened."

"I don't think so, Min." He took the isochip Kirtland handed him, inserted it into the computer terminal, and spun the screen around for Minuet to see. As she read, her mouth dropped open.

"But-but -"

"You're to attend Command School and then report as Commanding Officer of the United Nations-class support ship USS MOGADISHU (NCC-8327) upon its acceptance by Starfleet following final testing. It's the lead ship in a new class of combat replenishment ships, Min! It'll be all yours!"

Minuet stood there, looking first at Clayton then Kirtland. Finally she spoke. "IF you will excuse me, Captain, I have some important decisions to make."

Clayton sighed. "Of course, Captain, I understand."

As Captain Minuet Elvenfriend left the Briefing Room, Clayton sighed again. "She's the only person I know who would have to think about a promotion and her own ship."

Kirtland put her hands on Clayton's shoulders, and rested her cheek alongside his. "She really loves the GALILEO, you know. She doesn't want to leave her friends or her Captain."

"I know, Kirtland, I know." His voice was soft. He stared silently al the closed door.


The Main Lounge had a larger-than-average crowd today, but it wasn't unusual. The number of people in the Lounge at any one time varied from just one or two, all the way to the 70 or 80 who were crowded around the tables and the bar at the moment.

A group of unusually noisy crewmembers were gathered around a gaming table off to one side of the room. LCDR Mike Stevens, the Chief Helmsman, and ENS Natasha Kuznetsova, Helmsman on Gamma Shift, were engaged in a spirited game of "Starships at War." The two officers were intently maneuvering their holographic ships in an attempt to get a phaser shot off at their opponent. Shouts of encouragement, laughter, and ribald comments came from the on-lookers.

Finally, Stevens pulled a complicated Rubrics Maneuver and fired, sending Kuznetsova's ship into a flaming spiral. The act was greeted with an equal number of expressions of joy and disappointment.

"But, you can't do that!" Natasha stammered, tom between outrage at losing and fear of antagonizing her boss. "The G-forces would have torn your ship apart!"

"Not so! I simply dropped all life-support systems off line and channeled the extra power into the artificial gravity dampeners, which held the ship together just long enough for me to line you up in my sights; and then-Bingo!" Stevens emphasized his explanation with his right hand shaped like a pistol pointed at Natasha's head. He pulled the "trigger' at the appropriate moment.

"You can do that?" the ensign's face was a study in disbelief.

"Whadd'ya say, Mac, can it be done, or not?" Mike looked to LCDR MacDonald for validation.

"Aye, it can be done. But you'd better not do it with my engines." MacDonald affixed Stevens with an icy stare.

His pronouncement was met with renewed laughter. Like most engineers, especially Scots, LCDR MacDonald's feelings toward "his engines" were legerdemain. Lance Corporal Wayne Slaughter was sitting a couple of tables away watching the scene and carefully, intensely, staring at the tall, magnificent figure of Kirtland Burke. A student of Earth mythology and legends, Slaughter compared the imagined nude body of MCPO Burke to that of Venus. He had just positively, absolutely, and without reservation, decided that there was no contest whatsoever-Kirtland would win. In fact, he decided, Kirtland would put a certain Deltan I know to shame. Yes, he concluded, and also that Orion slave girl-what was her name? Oh, yes, Shamir-in that backwater bar on Leviathan. He shook his head. What I wouldn’t give to take Captain Clayton's place for just one night. Of course, he had no proof that anything had ever happened between the Captain and his Chief Yeoman, but it was something to contemplate. He took another sip of his drink, sat it down, and looked back at Kirtland.

The color drained from his face. He shook his head, closed his eyes for a second, and opened them again, hoping against hope. It was true! As he watched, Kirtland's uniform began to dissolve. Not just part of it, but every single stitch! His mouth hung open foolishly. She stood there, apparently unconcerned, completely naked. For once, real life was far better than his vivid imagination. His concentration was broken by a scream from the bar, "My clothes!"

Realization began to run rampant through the Lounge. Uniform after uniform had dissolved, leaving a majority of the crew without clothing. Some of the women ran from the Lounge, trying with too few hands to cover too many places.

A consummate voyeur, Slaughter was enjoying himself immensely. It was funny, though. Those people who were wearing civilian clothing were still fully covered. He reached for his drink and grasped air. He could see a hairy forearm out of the corner of his eye. It dawned on him that he, too, was wearing a uniform. The operative word here seemed to be "was." He turned beet red and looked up to find Kirtland Burke standing in front of him, still apparently totally unconcerned over her sudden lack of clothing.

"Well, Corporal, how does it feel to have your greatest wish come true?" she had a wicked, almost evil, grin on her face.

He fed the room, running awkwardly, both hands held in front of him.

Kirtland laughed at the look on his face. Well, she said to herself. I don’t mind going swimming in the nude, most people on the GALILEO don’t bother with swim suits in the pool, but it's just not proper in the Lounge. She headed out the Lounge door toward her quarters, her head held high and proud. At least I'm not alone!


On the Main Bridge, Captain Clayton was torn between laughter and concern. Here, too, uniforms had disappeared. He suddenly put two and two together. "Helmsman, get us out of here! Full impulse!"

"Sorry, sir. Impulse engines are down!" LT Brewer-O'Brian was trying, unsuccessfully, to man her station using only one hand.

"Warp One, then!" Everyone on the Bridge was exercising a great deal of restraint, looking straight at their consoles, not at each other.

The Helmsman shook her head, "No warp engines either, Captain!"

Clayton resumed his seat in the center chair and punched the Engineering comm. button. "Mac! What's going on down there? I need power, and I need it now!"

"Excuse me, Captain," came the confused voice of ENS Jocelyn MacKenzie. "Commander MacDonald isn't here right now."

"Then you tell me what's happening. Why are impulse and warp engines both down?" Clayton's voice had a hard edge to it.

"I don't know, Captain," her voice had a hysterical timber to it. "Everything that has been replicated has disappeared!" Her voice wavered, "Including clothes!"

The humor of the situation finally struck Clayton. His voice softened. "It would seem that engineers aren't the only ones who've been caught with their pants down. Clayton out."

He looked around the Bridge. "Well, people. Who feels the need to get civilian clothes on first?"

Kirsten Brewer-O'Brian timidly raised her hand.

"Go on, Lieutenant. I promise none of us will look. Terry, take her place. We don't seem to need a child to tell us about the Emperor's clothes."

MISSION UPDATE Captain Sir G. Dorsal Clayton, IV

"Commander, your first job is to collect every emergency ration from every lifeboat and place them under armed guard." Clayton, self-consciously dressed in a Sherwood green jump suit which had been a present from Kirtland Burke on his last birthday, was addressing LCDR Peter Boulay, the ship's Chief Security Officer. Clayton felt uncomfortable sitting in the Command Chair without a uniform, but there was no alternative. Well, there was an alternative, but it's not one I would choose.

Boulay nodded. "Luckily, the majority of the phasers in the Armory are operable. Only the one's we've repaired lately don't work. I'll put my men on it immediately. I suggest we use Cargo Bay Two as a staging area-there's only one way in or out, and it'll be easier to defend."

"I certainly hope it won't come to that, Peter, but, of course, you're right. See to it..."

Boulay, dressed in a white silk shirt and baggy brown pants, turned and left the Bridge, his bare feet making no sound. For the hundredth time, Clayton frowned at the blank Main Viewscreen.

Angus MacDonald broke the Captain's train of thought when he cleared his throat. Clayton turned to the Acting Chief Engineer and smiled. MacDonald was one of the few people who were unaffected by the loss of uniforms. He looked perfectly at home in his kilt, sporran, and the ceremonial knife strapped to his leg. "Yes, Angus?"

"Well, sair, it's like this," Angus paused, trying to decide on which bad news to deliver first. He sighed and plunged in. "The parts of the impulse engines and the warp engines which have gone away are not ones we keep spares of. We'll have to manufacture them by hand and hope they can be aligned well enough to work. There seems to be no major structural damage to the ship, but we have had to seal off a couple of areas where hull plates are either gone or weakened."

"How long will it take to get the engines back on line?" Clayton almost didn't want to hear the answer.

Angus shook his head. "I've no way of giving ye an estimate, Captain. We can't access the part of the main computer which has the blueprints for the missing parts. We'll have to use the backup paper copies." He looked embarrassed. "And we're not sure where they are. The computer inventory listing is gone too."

"Battery power?"

"At the rate we're using it, about two weeks." Clayton's face fell.

"With your permission, sair," Angus pointedly ignored the Captain's reaction, "I'm going to shut down every energy-consuming device on the ship that we don't have to have, and reduce the energy supply to those we do need. I'll be able to give you a better estimate of our reserves in an hour or two." Angus turned to leave.

Clayton nodded, "Keep me abreast of developments, Angus." He stared blankly at a bulkhead. I'm beginning to not like this, he thought. Billy Deveraux, her new Lieutenant Commander devices bright on her uniform, was next.

Clayton looked pointedly at her uniform. The Chief Medical Officer smoothed her tunic nervously and answered the unspoken question. "I had a dress uniform made on Earth when I found out I was getting promoted."

Clayton shook his head. "Don't worry about it, Billy. It's just that you're the only person who looks like they belong on the Bridge."

LCDR Deveraux gave a lopsided smile and hurriedly began her report. "There are no injuries, Captain. However, I would like to pull in all the medical supplies from the shuttles and the lifeboats, just in case."

"Tell Commander Boulay to add that to his list. He's pulling out all the emergency rations."

Deveraux's eyes suddenly got bigger. "I hadn't thought of that!" She looked considerably more worried than when she stepped onto the Bridge.

"It'll be alright, Billy," Clayton said, and then added to himself, I hope. "Identify what power requirements you absolutely have to have and let Angus know. He'll be shutting down everything non-essential."

She nodded and left, a thoughtful look on her face.


The Bridge was quiet again. The only real activity was a steady stream of senior officers making status reports. Clayton reviewed the condition of his ship. It was not a pretty picture.

Warp and impulse engines inoperative. Food replicators out of commission. Sensors not working. No communications outside the ship and interior communications spotty at best. He turned suddenly to the Communications Watch Officer.

"T'Kilyle, have your technicians cannibalize non-essential circuits for whatever pieces they need to make the critical ones work. I need to have communications with Medical, Engineering, and Security as soon as possible."

"I've already started that job, Captain. All of my people, no matter what shift they're on, are working on it right now. We should have your circuits for you in a couple of hours."

"Excellent!" Clayton replied, cheered a bit by the proof that his crew once again was proving their mettle. He turned back to his list.

No visibility outside the ship. He understood much better now the old saying "blind as a bat." No shields, no phasers and no photon torpedoes. And what had happened to the shuttle they launched just before entering the cloud?

At least there were a couple of non-problems: morale foremost. Clayton smiled to himself as he remembered Kirtland's report of the scene in the Main Lounge. I wished I could have been there! He wondered if she had managed to acquire civilian clothing. The only non-replicated clothing Kirtland had in her quarters were some extremely flimsy nightclothes, which certainly left nothing to the imagination, and a string bikini she had bought on New Britain; that was little better. It would be difficult for her to find someone with extra clothes which would fit her. Clayton shrugged. She's resourceful. She'll come up with something.

The turbolift doors opened as though on cue and MCPO Kirtland Burke stepped onto the Bridge. She was wearing the same gown she had worn at the Greystoke reception during the Christmas stand down. Somehow she had managed to secure the sides of the gown so that it was no longer open to the waist. It did make the gown more appropriate, but Clayton noticed there were some gaps. She stood next to his chair and whispered.

"It's the best I could do. Unfortunately, there's no way to fix the neckline."

Involuntarily, Clayton looked to see what she meant. A single raised eyebrow was his only comment as he forced himself to look away.

Kirtland laughed, a silvery sound that seemed to break the dark mood of the Bridge. She rested her hand on his shoulder and squeezed.

"I met Corporal Slaughter on the way here." She laughed again. "He wouldn't even look at me. I wonder why?"

Clayton smiled for the first time since the ship had gone into the cloud. He could think of several answers to that question. He thought of the missing shuttle again and his smile faded.

"Kirtland, I can't get hold of the Shuttlebay, and I haven't seen Commander Renfrew."

Kirtland became serious immediately. "I'll go and try to track her down. I’ll also go by the Shuttlebay and see what I can find out."

Clayton watched Kirtland walk across the Bridge to the turbolift, his mind not entirely on the problems he faced. It lasted only a moment, though. I suspect things may get worse before they get better, he thought, unaware of how prophetic his statement would prove to be.