The Mantle of Leadership

Posted on Sun 22nd Feb, 2026 @ 12:25am by Lieutenant Damion Ildaran & Commander Geraldine "Geri" Severide

2,102 words; about a 11 minute read

Mission: [MAIN] From The Ashes
Location: IBEX- White Room
Timeline: After "Through the eyes of the crew"

-Start-

Space and Time came to a near total halt in the White Room. For most people its a sensation akin to holding breath, or a staring contest gone too long. Your own heart plays the metronome which allows you to comprehend linear existence, to keep your sanity in a place no Human mind was meant to stay for long. Alex had made his choices, and so confronted with the consequences had opted to offset their applications. The TaBB was connected to their HOME network, and his orders to surrender were held up by one thing. Alex was to transfer the captaincy and train his replacement, and then submit to isolation from the timeline.

Alex knew time and life passed by in the real world, but to his recollections, barely a day had passed since he stepped in. In that day he had seen Captain Francis accept the local node role, albeit reluctantly, and now the program would survive. One last conversation before his isolation period was imposed and the adventure was over. To say it wasn't fair was to deny the mistakes which had brought him to this low point. Mistakes he needed to impress upon his successor.

When the four Starfleet officers walked into the docking bay, Alex almost felt sad. It was finally time to go. Putting on his award winning "face" Alex announced he was taking liberties and needed to talk to Damion.

"Darling..." He had a kinship to the IBEX main computer, and darling was his personal activation phrase, "Transport Damion directly to me, please."

"...We will talk to you soon!--" was the last thing Damion heard before he suddenly found himself in a place that was not the IBEX's loading bay. He was standing on a square patch of grass. A cabin and a tree stood close by. He saw patio furniture--but what struck him the most was the eerie, pure, cloudy whiteness that stretched beyond the patch of grass in all directions into limitless...space? He wasn't sure, as there was no horizon and no sensation of walls. Having grown up in an underground city of concrete and steel tunnels, the whiteness and endless fog seemed entirely alien.

He half-turned and saw a dark-skinned man who must be Alex Richardson standing to his left. The guy was tall--seven feet if he was an inch, with a weight that was proportionate to his height. He had short-cropped black hair that was beginning to turn gray in scattered places, and a well-trimmed moustache.

Damion blinked and darted his gaze around the grassy area. "You have a subtle transporter," he said after a moment. "Captain Richardson?"

The man confirmed, with a gentle sadness. "Yes. And Welcome. I'm here to ease the transition, answer any questions. You've made an exciting choice to come here."

Damion sighed and moved toward Richardson. "I half-disbelieved they were serious," he said. "I was sure it must be a joke. I didn't join Starfleet dreaming of commanding a starship--but when one is offered, only a fool doesn't choose to stretch himself. So here I am. I'm just baffled by the selection method. You don't know me; we've never met before. I don't even recall taking the personality test I apparently took. The closest I've ever come to command was serving as CIO on the Hermes. It was a Defiant-class ship, and I had six direct reports. Are you sure you want me to command the IBEX?"

Alex smiled with a mysterious lilt, "We aren't Starfleet, it's not your usual command structure, and I didn't choose you either, though I'm in awe of the process that clearly works. I can explain, it's a lot to go over, so let's take a seat."

The patio furniture on stark green grass flew in the face of the ethereal gasps nipping away at the edges of reality. Alex knew the previous captain Nguyen had loved to grill, making food in here as often this room prompted long sessions of reading and poring over intelligence. Where she had gone off to was for only her family to know. Retirement was possible, but Alex had been recruited to a ship with two people serving and rebuilt the program to... Alex stopped himself; he needed to focus on the matter at hand. Tragedy was patient and could be expected to pounce later.

He gestured broadly to the surrounding luminescent void as Damion took a seat across from him. "Let's start with where are we... This is a tear in space/time, a gift from a scientific discovery god knows where, god knows when. It's a feature of our ships, and we all have one. That tree was brought here, all of this was brought here, and exists in its own time frame unless you interact with it. That time frame is slow, microseconds. You are slow too, but things like breathing and heartbeat keep you moving forward enough to function biologically. Don't go to sleep here, but if you need time to plan, need to consult the TaBB and HOME... oh yeah that's next up on the list; I'm skipping ahead..."

Alex rubbed his nose, "You've been selected because you've passed invisible scrutiny by very attentive people. We don't have an HQ, we just have this."

On the table, an ancient relic sat. Before "Personal Access Display Device", was the "Tablet BookBoard," a commercial product adopted into early Starfleet usage. TaBB were essentially a small mobile linking device designed to share and display data.

Damion's eyes widened as he looked at it. "Amazing. I've read about these."

"Right? They nailed it with this one. These were all programmed way back in the early days of Starfleet. When this hidden deck was installed on the Piper... what this ship was called before her rebranding, it was a patrol cutter on frontier duty in the 22nd century. We can't make it anymore; that ability was lost to us, hence the rebuilding a centuries-old starship. We are compartmentalized cells, all linked via those TaBB's. It stays here in the white space, unhackable, and under your exact control. That's the HOME network. But they aren't your boss, just your ideological brethren. For our work, you must always remain separate; do not interact directly. Intelligence loaded into HOME is seen by all, for anyone to act on. If you get close to one of ours, the onboard regulation AI will notify you."

Alex stopped, "There's a training program, I'll go ahead and tell you it's a Ferengi Thought Maker. We made an Academy-like experience for how to command the ship and it takes about fifteen seconds real time. You'll experience a lot longer in a vision of your own making. Mine was three years, but yours may vary. I had demons to exorcise, let's just say. I also have a letter from previous captains for you once you're done. This is a lot, we can pause for a moment if you need?"

Captain Bose of the Fine Investment wouldn't have been happy to hear of him having anything to do with a Thought Maker, Damion mused. "I'm not keen on the Thought Maker, but since it seems to be a great time saver, and Captain Francis trusts you, all right."

Damion mulled over the rest of what Richardson told him. "So this is the 'pocket void' Cmdr. Severide mentioned to me," he said. "Let me recap so I'll remember. TaBBs are meant for information sharing only and aren't chatrooms. The HOME network is the TaBB system as a whole, if I'm understanding it correctly--a way to share information with all the other ships in this fleet. Cmdr. Severide did say there's an insane amount of OPSEC related to these ships, so it's good that you have a secure place like here to store the TaBB." Damion flicked a glance back at Alex. "It's a lot to take in. An hour ago, I was happily eating pizza in a pub. Now I'm here and committed to this. What sort of missions do you perform, if I may ask?"

Alex nodded along, "Yes, Perfect, you got it." As for the rest of what was asked Alex prepared himself for the hard part.

The question was expected, so he gave a "What you feel compelled to fix when you see it's gone wrong. Grazia is in process of countering market manipulation for instance, there's a world with Barzan government influencers breaking legs, she is a market wizard and doing the good work to rob Peter to pay Paul. Every once in a while Kolor picks up on an old trail from the Dominion War, stolen tech, people posing as gods to minor races, fairly boilerplate. We don't operate too far out from the Federation scope, but if say an agent finds themselves in irons on Tzenketh, a ship like ours would be sent that information. Whether you engage with it or not, that's the job more than anything else. If you wanted a traditional command I apologize, but this is intelligence work."

Alex hesitated, clearly having more to say. "I made the mistake of thinking we could go in and take something from the Chalnoth by force. They almost killed us. This ship isn't for battle. But you use it well, and it will never be in one. Merrick, one of my former crew, used a planetary ring to create a resonance feedback that split a Borg sphere in half when the Tik Bol, and USS Fracas engaged over Pelias Fen. We've aided in evacuations, evened odds, tipped scales, and all of it without bodies in our wake or angry politicians."

"Would I be here if I were interested in a traditional command?" Damion said with a light chuckle. "As for the Chalnoth--" He whistled and shook his head. "Ballsy. I think I'd just about rather fight a wet Kzin--But I get the point you're making. We're to go in, do the jobs, finish the jobs and leave without being noticed, always." He looked back at Alex. "I'm sorry it ended the way it did. It must have been horrible for you and your crew."

Alex looked genuinely miserable, "The end of a really good dream."

Alex pulled up the TaBB, "Here's the notes page, a journal running back to our first commander. Mission logs are also playable in the Holo-Dome. The training module will be on your quarters here on the ship, all the tech data and regulation exist in Reggie. Don't write anything down..."

Damion's eyes widened as he regarded the TaBB. "The first commander--from 200 some-odd years ago?" he asked with a tone of reverence in his voice. "My people barely even know their own history. To have something like this, with so much history in it--I will spend a lot of time reading this," he said. "I hope it's more than just a logbook. I hope I'll get a feel for the commanders' personalities, too."

Alex looked to the strands of rope or cable running off of the tree into the void. "You will, it's a good read if I say so myself." He pointed to the tree with near a dozen strands taut along the perceived ground until they hit ephemera dn began to float. "If you want to follow those strands, all I know to say is do not stop thinking, stay aware. Your ownheartbeat will help you keep time... this place saps you."

Damion glanced out at what looked to him like ropes leading into endless, featureless fog. He stifled a shudder. "Is that why we're advised not to fall asleep in here?"

Alex nodded emphatically, "The reason we have to hold onto this space... one day many centuries from now, there will be more than grass and a log cabin. We get to use the space, but our descendants will be the ones who see it for what it can be. For now, we are a single egg in a large frying pan, don't let yourself spread too thin. We once had another captain come in off of the "LARK" line she was definitely worse for wear, explained very little. Her ship was doomed, and the beacon was lost on the other side. She was trapped here... Reggie whisked them away to transporter buffer brig and we turned them over in digital to Starfleet Intelligence. If it ever happens again, keep them in here, and disable Reggie. Honestly getting around that smarmy holo-regulations manual given eyes is a quarter of the task most of the time."

-TBC-

 

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