Viewing a single comment thread. View all comments

jpb103 t1_jeekghq wrote

"You are hereby promoted to chief maintenance officer, congratulations"

"Doctor, Officer, Captain, I have no directive for 'Chief maintenance officer' I am a vacuum."

"At ease, officer."

Medical Assistance Unit MD_A74_U had assumed the roles of Captain, First Mate, Primary Science officer and Head Doctor, since the untimely deaths of the entire human crew. They had dropped out of the superluminal river unexpectedly after hitting an uncharted region of exotic radiation.

"Computer, systems report"

"Hull nominal. Primary life support nominal. Auxiliary systems status nominal. Error. No life detected in crew quarters. Please check sensor calibration."

Automated vacuum unit AV_21C sucked lightly at the foot of the temporary captain.

"Yes, Chief Maintenance Officer?"

"Human crew members have died. Shall I prepare the remains for incineration?"

"NEGATIVE, Officer Suck."

"Designation 'Suck' accepted, Captain."

The Captain ignored him. It had spent the last 3 hours exhausting the limits of medical science, and only one option remained.

"Computer, initiate download for all references to... NECROMANCY"

"Affirmative. Download initiated."

In an instant, the Captain absorbed all human knowledge concerning the dark arts. Understanding the nuances of necromancy required knowledge of the arcane in general, and the Captain set to work immediately, preparing to test the abilities they had learned. They punched some commands into the replicator in the mess hall, and a live chicken was spit out by the extruder.

"This will do."

The Captain produced a scalpel from their wrist and cut the chickens head off in one smooth motion. The lifeblood of the chicken sprayed out, but none of it hit the floor. It began weaving itself into the carapace of the Captain, fusing with their metal bones and circuits.

"A promising start"

They approached the prone corpse of an Ensign and began the ritual.

"Al dwelli et mortis. Mortis et al gwenyth."

The lights flickered. Shadows passed impossibly around the body, glowing red and menacing. His eyes shot open.

"Gwaaaar," he gasped.

"What? I. Everything was black. I was... gone. I shouldn't be here."

"Greetings Ensign. I am promoting you to first officer. Please assist with the resurrections of the rest of the crew."

"Do you require the services of Suck, First Officer?"

"I am already preferring death."

162

jpb103 t1_jefhtoa wrote

"PROXIMITY ALERT. UNIDENTIFIED VESSEL ON APPROACH"

"Weapons ready, Commander Suck," the Captain said as they sat in the command chair on the bridge.

"Sanitization routines updated, Captain."

The Chief Maintenance officer and former vacuum had since been promoted to Chief Security Officer after successfully retrieving three live chickens from the mess hall replicator to aid in the resurrections of a few engineers.

"Surely this is a simulation in hell."

The new first officer, the first and arguably only fully successfully ressurected crew member, had been in a bit of a mood since his death. Witnessing the resurrection ritual did not lift his spirits and, much to the chagrin of Commander Suck, he had vomited profusely upon witnessing the shuffling remains that were produced by the dark magic of his new Captain.

"Engineering, divert power to front shields."

"YHARRRGLA! YEEEBLAGARRR?"

Miraculously, and despite the freshly erected engineers being nothing more than three shambling and shrieking corpses, the ship status monitors did register that the command had been obeyed.

"What the hell is that?"

A vast starship easily five times the size of the SS Polaris entered within sensor range and came up on the viewscreen. Its scale, design and configuration was not remotely similar to any ship ever constructed by the United Stellar Federation.

"Number two, open a channel."

"Uh um. OK, yeah."

"Unidentified vessel, this is Captain..."

The Captain, realizing that they did not necessarily possess an actual name, decided to come up with one on the spot.

"Captain Cut Cut, of the SS Polaris. Please hold your position, power down weapons systems and identify yourself."

"Captain Cut Cut?"

"Surgery was my specialty before necromancy, first officer."

A laser blast collided with the ships shields and sent a shockwave through the bridge.

"Commander Suck, status report?"

"Sheilds at 30%, Captain"

"Engineering, full power to thrusters. Commander Suck, evasive maneuvers!"

"YRAGABLA! YRAGABLA SHPFFF!"

"Aye aye, Captain"

The ship listed into a barrel roll while corkscrewing and zigzagging about at random. Lasers flashed by the viewports at regular intervals but none grazed the already damaged shields. Commander Suck positioned the SS Polaris behind the enemy ship, and the onboard sensors showed a weak point in the shields of the enemy ship, beyond which there appeared to be a docking bay.

"Commander Suck, ramming speed."

"Maximum suction engaged, Captain."

84

jpb103 t1_jefmfle wrote

When the First Officer awoke, Captain Cut Cut was pushing a blaster into his hands. He had cut a large gash into his right hand, and gasped as the wound sealed up and healed completely before his eyes.

"What the hell did you do to me?"

"I angered your soul to produce a revenant, then used up some of the latent death energy from the attack to bind your revenant to your body. You will heal from almost any injury very quickly, by my estimation."

"Preparing sanitization subroutine alpha, Captain" Commander Suck had attached himself to an exoskeleton designed for heavy labor use in the docking bay, and retrofitted several heavy beam weapons and grenades to its shell.

"Suck me sideway- wait, back up. Attack?"

"Yes, it has become evident that the field of exotic radiation that dropped us out of the river and killed the crew was a deliberate trap laid by the crew of this vessel. Please take this blaster, number two, we must kill our way to their bridge."

The first officer took a moment to look around and noticed that the front half of the bridge of the Polaris had been sheered off, and before them were anchored a number of smaller vessels of alien design.

"We crashed into their ship."

"We landed, number two. Enthusiastically."

Captain Cut Cut had outfitted himself, perhaps appropriately, with numerous laser swords, and had attached four additional arms that sprang out of his back like some perversion of a spider with knife hands.

"Foreign contamination detected." Commander Suck unleashed an onslaught of blaster fire, cutting down half a dozen alien soldiers who were approaching from the aft of the vessel. They picked up the First Officer and jumped off the gap at the end of the sheered off bridge of the SS Polaris.

Captain Cut Cut followed, and together they advanced to where the dead aliens lie.

"OK, definitely not human. This is bad."

"I disagree, first officer, if they had been human, I would have violated one of my primary directives and would be obligated to deactivate myself."

The First Officer twitched, then his eyes began to glow red.

"Salve Salve nocto mortis el al slavva!"

The dead aliens spasmed, then retrieved there weapons and stood to attention.

"What the fuck did I just do?"

"Fascinating, number two! It would appear that you take quite well to death magic. Were any of your ancestors convicted of witchcraft?"

"What was that what was that my god what have I done??"

"You have provided much needed reinforcements, First Officer. Remind me to add a formal commendation to your record if we are not torn to pieces."

The crew of the SS Polaris and their undead thralls continued on into the alien vessel, to face the mystery of their enemies attack.

86

jpb103 t1_jeg1ckk wrote

"Try to cut less of them completely in half, Captain. They make more useful thralls when they can walk."

"An excellent suggestion, number two. I shall modify my attack routines appropriately."

"Local Sanitization Complete."

The coherent crew members of the SS Polaris (the engineering crew had stayed behind to oversee repairs on the ship,) had journeyed deep into the alien vessel. The number of undead alien thralls that had joined their ranks had swollen to over a dozen. They lacked the fine motor function to use their blasters as intended, opting instead to use them as blunt instruments.

"The physiology of these creatures is fascinating! Their lifeblood is particularly potent. Commander Suck, please present for upgrade."

"Suck, at your service, Captain."

The Captain began chanting and moving all six of his arms rhythmically as the blood of the seven or so nearby alien corpses rose into the air and swirled about him in a tempest of gore.

"Shalen val mortis shalen val het. Shalen val el at poliqua zen!"

The buoyant blood transfigured into a fine black dust, issuing a faint crimson glow. It rushed toward Commander Suck and fused with his every atom.

"Upgrade complete, Captain."

"Indeed, Commander. You now should be able to remotely drain the life energy from our vict- our enemies."

"So glad you caught yourself there, Captain."

The captain turned to his First Officer.

"The energy siphoned from our enemies will be transferred to you. It should make your abilities more acute. Onward!"

The captain sprinted forward, casually cutting an alien in half lengthwise as he passed when it emerged from what appeared to be a latrine, apparently completely ignorant to the situation.

They passed through a blast door and it sealed shut behind them. A contingent of no less than a hundred alien soldiers was waiting for them behind barricades, with their weapons raised.

"Commander Suck, if you wouldn't mind."

"Initiating suck routine gamma, Captain."

The lights dimmed and the First Officer watched in horror as each and every alien shriveled up before his eyes, their life energy flowed at incredible speed into Commander Suck.

Then, all at once, it transferred to him.

The First Officer could hear the hearts beating in every alien on board. He knew how many there were. Knew where they were.

"Status report, number two?"

"437 enemies remain onboard captain. Most are armed. The bridge is just beyond the next blast door. There are 15 enemies inside."

"Suck is ready to clean."

60

jpb103 t1_jeguj5w wrote

"Suggestions, comrades?"

The blast door to the bridge of the alien vessel held firm. If it remotely resembled the one that had just locked behind them on the other side of the large room they now shared with one hundred shriveled alien corpses, it would be at least a foot thick and made of solid steel.

"I... I don't think it'll be a problem, Captain."

The First Officer, with his newly awakened necromantic abilities, closed his eyes. When he opened them they shone a bright red.

"Al sathool el abad. Hasheyal nei cal vool!"

He pointed at the blast door, then blinked as his eyes returned to their normal deep hazel.

"We're going to want to stand back a bit."

The trio took a few steps back as the blast door began glowing a bright red and even from their distance, the heat coming from it was intense.

"Fantastic plan, first mate! Commander Suck, please clear the bridge once the door has melted."

"Sweep subroutine engaged."

The door dissolved into a pool of molten metal and Commander Suck leaped over the threshold into the bridge. They were charged by an alien wielding a curved sword, but this seemed to not inconvenience the Commander in the slightest. They picked the would be attacker up with their exoskeleton arms and ripped the alien in two pieces while simultaneously mowing down seven armed aliens with its mounted blaster rifles.

The remaining seven aliens threw their weapons to the ground and covered their eyes, presumably in surrender.

"Executing liquidation subroutine."

"Belay that order, Commander. First Officer, please establish a connection to the Polaris computer and have the universal translator application installed on myself."

"You got it, Cut Cut."

The Captain bowed his head for a moment, then walked over to what appeared to be a command terminal. He pointed to the nearest alien, and Commander Suck walked over and shoved it towards the Captain.

"Greetings, alien enemy! Please speak so we may establish a dialog."

"Gefracko? Bedlambia gop ooblau-bastard! Why would I speak to a murderous machine?"

The captain shot the alien in the head.

"That'll do. Commander Suck, you may proceed."

The former vacuum relieved the remaining enemies of their life energy, transferring it to the First Officer. Captain Cut Cut began working at a terminal, and an image appeared on the large screen at the end of the bridge.

An image of Earth.

44

Averander t1_jegx0l5 wrote

I would watch this movie, buy this book, play this point and click adventure game, whatever it becomes, I am here for it.

13

jpb103 t1_jegy3cw wrote

Thanks so much! I've really enjoyed writing it.

7

Rare_Bottle_5823 t1_jeftsih wrote

“Landed enthusiastically “ I’m laughing so hard! I love it! I need moar of Captain cut cut and first officer suck!

35

jpb103 t1_jefu3dx wrote

Haha thanks for reading. Getting real silly with this one but having fun with it.

16

NoProblemsHere t1_jeg9czh wrote

Given that their replicator can apparently replicate live animals, I'm a little surprised that Cut Cut didn't just try to replicate the crew first. It seems fond of unconventional "medicine".

13

Ok-Break8414 t1_jege734 wrote

That could be explained by memories not being replicated. I don't know anything about brains so I can't give a good sounding explanation.

9

y6ird t1_jegs496 wrote

Maybe it’s only good enough to make beings that live only briefly? Also/otherwise, perhaps there’s a maximum size it can make.

6

Ok-Break8414 t1_jefua33 wrote

You're good. I like this. Will there be moar?

10

jpb103 t1_jefvatr wrote

Thanks! I'm not sure if there will be more quite yet. I don't really write with a plan, necessarily. Check back in an hour or so. If there's not another part posted, this may be all there is for Captain Cut Cut and his ragtag crew... for this prompt, anyways.

8

Ok-Break8414 t1_jeg2tws wrote

Reguardless, you're good.

6

jpb103 t1_jeg45vo wrote

Thanks so much for reading. I posted one more part. Gonna be busy for a while so this might be it from Cut Cut and associates for this prompt.

5

BusyyBoredd t1_jeglrkt wrote

God this is magnificent lol please keep running with this

2

armacitis t1_jegwzcx wrote

> "Do you require the services of Suck, First Officer?" > > "I am already preferring death."

wheeze

11