A triumphant Vincent Kelly had Commander Lee Carter at gunpoint. "My new employer has a winning track record against your Banshees!" he cried. "Just ask your precious Commander Phoenix. What's that? You can't because she's dead? That's right! And you're next!" He jabbed the disruptor pistol he held deeper into Carter's back. "Move towards that door."
Carter's blood froze in her veins at the mention of Jazz Phoenix. The horror of the events leading to the former Banshee Squadron Wing Commander's death were still agonizingly fresh in her mind: the Mulluran War, the dilithium mines on Rostella IV, the undead corpses of slain soldiers mindless pursuing them through the black tunnels, their rending claws always just barely out of reach... But worst of all was what they had found in the lowest pit of the mines -- the only thing that had ever bested the Banshees. Jazz had sacrificed her own life to save the rest of them from its gruesome clutches.
The Jelly Brain.
At another impatient jab from Kelly, Carter was forced to start forward towards the door. Was Kelly's 'employer' another Jelly Brain?!? Madness! But then, Vincent Kelly was a madman. And it neatly explained his obsession with collecting stolen neural energy in his life crystals. If her guess was correct, she was pretty sure what chilling fate awaited her on the other side of that door. The Jelly Brain would extract her neural energy too, feasting on its living force, leaving her body an empty husk. Carter failed to suppress a violent shudder.
She had to break away from Kelly, but how? The villain held a gun at her back with his finger on the trigger. On the other hand, she had nothing to lose. She tensed her muscles, preparing for her desperation move, but never got the chance.
A deafening explosion rocked the control room as a gaping hole suddenly appeared in the high, domed ceiling. Billowing clouds of smoke filled the air and debris and sharp metal hailed down on their heads. Brilliant sunlight filtered through the new opening momentarily blinding Carter and Kelly, followed by streams of fresh sea air, dispelling the air of death permeating the chamber. Carter had no idea what was going on, but the distraction was all she needed.
She mercilessly rammed her elbow into Kelly's stomach, doubling him over, and ran towards the jagged wound in the ceiling. Three ropes snaked down from the blue sky above and three forms rappelled deckwards with military precision and swiftness. Phaser beams flashed from the figures, illuminating the smoke cloud from within, sweeping the room seeking a target, and amplified voices shouted orders. "Nobody move! We've got the place surrounded! Drop all weapons!"
A gust of wind swept through the blasted tear in the roof dispersing the acrid smoke, and Carter beheld her rescuers. Max Vasser was at the head of Jo Schmidt and Alex Dalton! Vince Kelly saw them as well.
"No! Not you! Damn you!" His voice bordered on the hysterical. Raising his disruptor, he fired several wild shots, and then fled for the far door in the control room, disappearing through it.
"Not so fast, dirtbag!" shouted Max, and immediately set off in pursuit, with Jo and Alex right on her heels.
"No, wait!" cried Carter, wanting to warn them about what she suspected lay on the other side of the door, but in their zeal none of the others heeded, leaving her no option but to run after.
The Banshees burst through the door, but none were prepared for the scene that slammed into their senses, not even Carter. Their momentum faltered and drained away, the very life sucked out of their limbs by the horrific manifestation lurking in the center of the new chamber beyond the control room. There, hovering above a noxious tank of bilious green slime was a thing out of their most primeval nightmares. The Jelly Brain.
"Oh dear God," whispered Max, horror-struck. "Not another one!" Jo just stood agape, while Alex took several staggering steps backwards, her lips trembling.
A wide pool sunk into the floor at the center of the circular, domed chamber was the nesting place of a Smelly Jelly. Glabrous tentacles extruded, whipped through the thick air, and were reabsorbed back into its mass in a never-ending cycle. A hellish radiance emanating from the Jelly bathed the chamber and all within in a sick, moldy shade of green, lending an aura of death and decay. Above it all though, levitated the object of the women's gaping stares -- a huge, misshapen, disembodied BRAIN, sickly gray in color and dripping with green ooze. It pulsed and thrummed rhythmically and exuded an evil presence almost palpable in intensity, grabbing their eyes and refusing to let go.
On the far side of the suspended Brain, Carter spotted Vincent Kelly, face awash in the eerie green light, wringing his hands in unholy anticipation and cackling insanely, but she immediately felt her gaze forcefully ripped back to the Jelly Brain. She tried raising her disruptor, but discovered to her dismay that her arm no longer obeyed her will. The monstrous Brain in the center of the room filled her thoughts, crowding out all other considerations. Seductive suggestions whispered softly in her mind. Come closer. There is no need to fear.
She tried pressing her eyes shut, but to no avail. Even through closed lids, she could still see the throbbing form of the Brain, felt sinuous tendrils reaching out for her and caressing her consciousness with their chilling touch. Come to me. Embrace me, whispered the unspoken words. Carter found it increasingly difficult to resist their temptation. She felt her feet shuffle forward. Try as she might, she couldn't stop herself. To her right and left, the other three women also jerked forwards like puppets on strings, glazed eyes staring unseeing ahead, arms hanging limply at their sides, phasers forgotten, helpless under the thrall of the powerful intellect.
Come to me. We will be one.
Carter was more than halfway to the Jelly Brain. Tentacles stretched and yearned for her like a lover reaching out for his long-lost paramour, ready to enfold her in their smothering embrace. Though utterly repulsed, she felt her arms rising to meet the questing limbs. One more step. Do not deny your destiny. Carter's fingers were inches away. She turned her head away and clenched her eyes and teeth in a titanic effort to fight the waking nightmare, but could feel the irresistible control of the Jelly Brain dragging her inexorably forward.
She heard and felt the sharp sizzle of a phaser beam set on its highest setting lance by her head, and moments later, the iron grip of the Jelly Brain released its hold on her will. Snapping her eyes open, she saw a charred hole blasted in the Brain's side. A second phaser beam burned another gash in the creature. The Jelly Brain faltered and sank onto the surface of the Jelly pool beneath it, its throbbing visibly diminishing, its wounds oozing viscous, black fluid in time with the pulsing. A keening wail issued from the mortally wounded monster as it sank, and was echoed suddenly by a more human shriek from the far side of the tank.
Vince Kelly screeched incoherently and clutched his head in obvious agony, then dropped to the floor, writhing spasmodically.
At the same time, Max felt herself released from the creature's bondage. But even more significant than that. The black veil that had shrouded her mind ever since her encounter with the mysterious corvette out in the system's Oort Cloud lifted, and it was like drawing back the curtains and letting in the morning sunlight after a night a thousand years long. She knew she once again had her esper prescience back! She could feel it; that sense of almost being able to glimpse a few seconds into the future. The Jelly Brain must have been clouding her mind all this time, preventing her from using her mental ability to discover its plans too soon.
She instantly brought up her phaser and began firing into the gelatinous mass of wrinkled tissue. Jo and Alex, similarly freed, followed her lead, sending two more death-dealing energy beams licking across the fallen monster.
Carter flashed a look behind her to see where the phaser shots had come from that had crippled the Jelly Brain, and was astonished to see West propped up against the door frame with a phaser in his hand. His face was covered in blood from a jagged gash on his forehead, but smiled weakly and gave her the thumbs-up. Feeling suddenly rejuvenated and revitalized, Carter turned back to the Jelly Brain, and grinning fiercely, took aim with her own weapon and joined the others in blasting it.
The terrible alien keening rose in pitch as gray, folded tissue began sloughing off the stricken creature where the phasers hit. The Jelly Brain shuddered, its tentacles whipping about feebly, its viscous life-blood spreading across the deck, but it could do nothing to defend itself now that all its puppets were fled, incapacitated, or killed. It shuddered one last time, then the tentacles dropped to the floor and lay still, and the whole thing slouched momentarily before exploding in a grisly spray of fleshy chunks and globs of goo, splattering the chamber walls with slimy guts.
And then it was all over. Carter could hardly believe it. She let her phaser drop back to her side and took a couple of steps towards the crumpled Jelly Brain. It was clearly dead, and the Smelly Jelly in the vat had turned a dull, lifeless brown as well. The only motion in the room was the feebly-twitching form of Vincent Kelly lying on the floor and the slimy brain chunks slowly dribbling down the walls onto the deck. She looked across at her teammates and saw her own disbelieving relief mirrored on all three faces.
A groan from the far side of the room caught Carter's attention. "Max, go take care of Kelly." She herself hurried back to the door where West was slumped. Wrapping an arm around his shoulder, she gently propped him up and said, "Thanks, West. You saved the day."
West managed a weak smile. "Now that's what I call a 'mind blowing' experience!"
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