Ambush
Posted on Fri Sep 2nd, 2022 @ 12:49am by Captain Alex Shepard & Lieutenant Robyn Cole & Senior Chief Petty Officer Samuel Russell & Commander Yadira Tristan House Kilrah & Lieutenant Commander Savsa Parsala & Lieutenant Nerex & Lieutenant JG Hank Solomon & Master Chief Petty Officer Skargarr
Mission:
Dark Star Trilogy - M1: Star Fall
Location: USS Eminence, Dantari Three Orbit
Timeline: Current
The USS Eminence was at cruising warp speed in formation with the SS Falling Star. They were just minutes away from the future colony. Alex was leaned back in the center chair looking through through the updated orders for the crew of the Eminence. After they arrived in orbit, they would provide any assistance to the Falling Star setting up the colony. After that, they'd remain in orbit awaiting the USS Horizon to pick up Lieutenant Ryal and other crew members who were transferring off the ship, who had already been off-duty to get prepared.
Normally a ship like the Horizon would be occupied with something far greater since she was a capital ship and exploration vessel, but the ship was in the sector and Captain Phoenix, a long time friend of Alex, was happy to provide the help. But right now, the crew's focus was helping the colony.
She leaned forward in her chair and turned her attention to the helm. "Mister Nerex, how far are we from our destination?"
“Two minutes from orbit,” Nerex quickly responded.
Savsa sat back in her chair and sipped her orange juice and thought about her meeting with Captain Shepard. One tough cookie as the Terrans would say. She wondered why Starfleet had reassigned her during the middle of a mission, even one that was as relatively benign as this one would appear, escorting a colony ship. Then again, why transfer her also during the mission? She sighed and realized the answers where not going to be coming forth with anytime soon. She opened up her PaDD and again reviewed the mission briefing she had been provided looking for a clue as to why such changes had occurred.
Just then the Eminence's resident Chief Medical Officer entered the bridge. "Have I missed our arrival?" she questioned while being out of breath.
"Not at all doc. You're right on time" Alex smiled at Doctor Cole.
“I’m really curious to see how this new planet looks like” the Science Officer said “from the data we had been fed looked like a sort of Earth” he concluded excited.
Alex smiled. "It's always amazing to see similar planets to our own. What atmosphere does the planet have?"
Hank punched a couple of buttons "The atmosphere is basically the Earth one. Nitrogen, Oxygen and other gases such as argon, carbon dioxide, neon, helium, and hydrogen." he answered the captain "but its percentages are slightly different than the ones we are used to. At least...Oxygen is less concentrated, as if you were at 3000m from sea level in our planet. Will take some time to get used to it if you are not used to mountaineering. People might suffer of some light headache initially but they will acclimatize to it soon." he concluded.
As the next two minutes had come and gone it was time to drop out of warp.
The Bolian at operations spoke up. "The Falling Star is ready to drop out of warp in formation on your command sir."
The Captain rose up out of her chair and looked at operations and then at the helm. "Very well, Mister Nerex, drop us out of warp and bring us to a standard orbit around Dantari Three."
"Yes, Captain," Nerex responded as he complied.
“All sensors readings seems clear, Sir” reported Hank from the science console.
Savsa stretched and down her PaDD the mystery of why she and Captain Shepard where transferred like they were. She put her empty glass of orange juice back in the recycler unit and decided to make her way to the bridge; after all they should soon be arriving at a new planet. She left her office with her PaDD because she still needed to review the crews psychological evals. She entered the turbolift “Bridge” she stated and the lift took off. The doors slide open and she stepped onto the bridge just as she heard the captain say "Very well, Mister Nerex, drop us out of warp and bring us to a standard orbit around Dantari Three."
Nerex heard the doors open and glanced over his shoulder out of curiousity. He made eye contact with Lieutenant Commander Parsala and nodded respectfully.
Alex too nodded to the counselor and then turned to the officer at ops. "Please inform the Falling Star that we are ready to help wherever they need us."
"Yes ma'am" the Bolian answered as he tapped at his console. "Message sent."
Suddenly, a spatial anomaly opened not terribly far from the two ships.
The ops officer looked up from his console "Uhh Captain, a spatial anomaly has opened out of nowhere, approximately 10,000 kilometers away on the same side of the planet as us?"
"Mister Solomon, analysis."
The Science Officer started a deep scan of the anomaly and reported the results to the CO "It's a sort of wormhole...a portal of some sort." he kept reading the sensors' results and went through it twice before continuing "the other side is not regular space but...fluidic space, ma'am" he concluded turning towards the Captain's chair.
Nerex turned in his seat, “Fluidic space? What’s that?”
Alex's face quickly turned to pure fear. "Nothing good. And if we didn't open that portal, someone on the other side did" she turned to Skar. "Mister Skar, raise shields and take us directly to red alert."
Skar merely hissed at the prospect of combat as he pushed a few buttons and brought the phaser array online and made sure the torpedo tubes were locked and loaded. 'Where are those nanite warheads when we need em?' he thought to himself.
"Ops tell the Falling Star to get to a safe distance away from the portal."
"Yes ma'am sending the message now."
Skar made no comment as he listened to all around him. He understand maybe half of what anyone was really discussing or saying. He was more inclined to fire ship weapons then to deal with the inclinations of magical talk the science officer was saying amongst the rest of the bridge crew.
Before Alex could say or order anything else two vessels approached exited from the anomaly, weapons hot and on a direct intercept course for the Eminence and the Falling Star.
Savsa nudged the large Gorn and whispered “Hey big guy the Captain gave an order that falls in your area of expertise. Raise the shields and put us on red alert.” The contact with the Gorn brought a brief glimpse into his alien mind, he was confused by much of the technical aspects that science was producing but seemed more than willing to act on the defense and offense of the ship.
"I already did, get to medical to get your eyes and ears checked, I think the red color the bridge is in and the Klaxon sounds of the red alert alarm are giving clear indications that I carried out the orders given." Skar said in a hushed hiss at Savsa.
Savsa chuckled internally, she was told that the Gorn species was by far worse than Klingons or even Jem’Hadar when it came to humor.
"Captain, the computer is identifying them as Species 8472 according to there bio-organic hull composition. I suggest we either run and give them what they want. Of course we have time to rescue those onboard the Falling Star before using the ship as a distraction. Or we find some nanites, slap them into the warheads and we fight our way out as our phasers will be useless against those ships. Unless they have somehow eradicated the nanites since the last time Starfleet tangled with this threat. We would not want another 'Purge' attempt of all organic life to happen, sir." Skar said, he knew he wasnt one for alot of words but a grunt was not going to be enough this time.
"Mister Solomon, do we have any nanites onboard?"
"uhm" the Science Officer, with a worried face, ran an internal scan of the Eminence trying to come up with a result while listening to Skar's suggestions "I don't think we have...wait...yes, ma'am." he returned "We have them but in a limited quantity, I'm not sure they will be enough to enact Mr. Skar's plan. And..." he continued "..the Falling Star is just a transport ship. I'm not sure they would handle much beating." he concluded giving his opinion.
"We wont need that much. We drop shields and in the same time frame, we transport the falling stars crew onboard, Operations will initiate another transport beam along the same carrier wave transporting a nanite warhead torpedo to the transport ship. We then use the transport ship as a trojan horse for the torpedo and the transport signals should match up so it will look like we are rescuing the crew without giving away the second transport beam." Skar said hoping they get what he was suggesting before continuing.
"If we do it right, they will either destroy the ship spreading nanites through out space flying right threw them infecting themselves, or we wait until they get close and we destroy the transport ship. Either way they get infected and it will give us a better chance. Unless there is more then one then we use the torpedoes and not use the falling star as a giant land mine." Skar said covering his bases.
Before she could answer, the Undine vessels entered weapons range and opened fire on the Eminence first and ignoring the colony ship. They had targeted the upper decks of the Eminence and fired their energy weapons on the ship, which caused everyone to be thrown from their stations.
Doctor Cole and Lieutenant Nerex were both thrown pretty hard and thus hit the ground hard, rendering them unconscious.
Skar merely hissed as he regained his composure and manned tactical once more, noticing his uniform was slightly burned from the console sparking with the impact.
Hank suddenly found himself laying on the floor of the bridge. His head hurting probably from bumping it against one of the consoles there and his left arm with a visible and bloody wound. He shook his head to clear his mind and stood up again heading for the science station. Once manned his position, he took a piece of fabric and wrapped it hard on his left arm to stop the bleeding from the wound.
"Medical team to the bridge!" Shepard bellowed from the floor. "Skar, get those damn nanite weapons ready!" she barked as she crawled to the helm which was unmanned for a few seconds. "What's our damage?"
"They are loading them now. I guess the trojan horse wont work now. We either fight or we run." Skar said as he re-modulated the ships shields wishing about now they were outfitted with a better shield system. "Shields down to 75%, micro fractures have formed along the hull. We might be able to survive two more direct hits before the bridge shields fully collapse and we are ejected into space." Skar said as he planned in his head to the best of his ability of what to do should this happen.
Once she slid into the helm seat she tapped at the helm. "I'm gonna take some evasive action. Hopefully that buys you some time Chief" she said to Skar without looking back. "It also seems they are avoiding the Falling Star. It appears they want us for some reason."
"Maybe they find us better looking." Skar joked as the light appeared on his console. "Torpedo launchers are loaded. We only have six shots before we are out of nano torpedos. Once they are gone..." Skar allowed himself to trail off into silence to give it a moment to sink in.
"Sensors are still online and somewhat working, ma'am. We lost the data link with the Falling Star though, they are no longer receiving our sensors' data. I'll get one of our people to work on it but might take some time, depending on what was damaged". Having said that, Lt. Solomon communicated to one of the scientists to identify the issue and take care of it.
Savsa grab one of the emergency medical kits and went to Dr. Cole first, taking a medical tricorder she scanned him and was relieved to see he was only unconscious from the sudden attack. She braced herself and gently touched Dr. Cole’s face in the Vulcan mind meld technique. She dreaded doing this as it often left her drained but she needed to get the doctor back up on her feet. Mentally she gently began to nudge Dr. Coles mind “Dr. Cole, we need you to come around now, allow me to ease the burden of your pain, provide all your pain to me so that you may awaken and take care of the crew.” Savsa repeated this phrase mentally to Dr. Cole until she felt both Dr. Coles pain ease and felt her stir under her touch. Savsa immediately released her contact as Dr. Cole came around and sat up. Smiling Savsa said “I apologize doctor, but time is of the essence. I will attended to the other wounded her on the bridge and report to the sick bay once the medical team arrives here. You should report to sick bay as I believe we are about to have multiple casualties.” With that Savsa turned to Lieutenant Nerax and ran the tricorder over him. He had small electrical burns up his arms and it appeared the electrical burns allowed an overload of his nervous system. She quickly gave him a hypo of Synaptizine to help with the neuroleptic shock from the med kit, she then performed the same Vulcan mind meld technique on him. She gently brushed against his mind and repeated softly over and over mentally to him “Lieutenant Nerax, we need you to come around now, allow me to ease the burden of your pain, provide all your pain to me so that you may awaken and take care of the flight controls of the ship.” She could feel his grogginess and pain as he slowly came around, again she broke contact when she felt his conscious mind come around. Savsa was drained emotionally and physically but she pushed on knowing that the danger was not over and the ships crew would need her skills today as a medical doctor and in the future as a counselor. She was getting up from assisting Lieutenant Nerax when she heard the doors slide open to the bridge as the medical technician team arrived.
Nerex stirred, a bit shocked from the mental contact from Savsa. He winced at the pain from his burns, but forced himself to his feet. One of the medical technicians began running a medical tricorder over him, and he glared at them until they readjusted to stay out of his way while he attempted to regain control at his console.
Alex quickly turned to Nerex. "Go with Senior Chief Russell to sickbay. That's an order" she turned to Russell. "Get Doctor Cole to sickbay as well."
Nerex knew better than to argue with a Starfleet Captain, and immediately complied, although he would rather have stayed.
Chief Russell quickly moved to Nerex while the other tech moved to Cole and helped her to her feet. The two technicians helped the two officers out of the bridge and into the turbolift.
Alex quickly engaged the evasive maneuvers to fly the Eminence into a better position to fire the nanite-modified torpedoes. The Undine ships fired another barrage of weapons fire on the Eminence. This time a few missed, but the rest of the weapons that did hit, hit the lower decks of the Eminence.
The bridge shook a little, but the Eminence could still fly. "Report!" she yelled as she flew the Eminence about into an attack formation.
"We have a hull breach on Deck Three!" yelled the ops officer from the steaming console. "Emergency forcefield is in place and holding for now."
"Mister Skar prepare to fire those torpedoes on the Undine ships on my command" Alex ordered as she flew closer to the position she intended to fire on the ships at.
"Im already prepared, sir. Just waiting to press this lovely blinking button to see what happens when it explodes on impact!" Skar said point at the button with a since of mad scientist glee that crossed into a sneer but was intended as a smile, as the idea of death and the exhilaration of combat was evident on the Gorn as he began to tense up slightly.
Hank's eyes widened hearing of the hull breach in deck three but he tried to suppress the feeling to focus on the tasks at hand and ran an in depth scan to see if the enemy ship had any weak spots to aim at.
Savsa heard the damage report and took that as her cue to leave and report to the sick bay to assist with the wounded. She new that there was a very good chance that they had lost crew members but that would have to wait for later. She stepped into the turbolift and made her way to sick bay.
The Captain continued to pilot the Eminence into position. She began to count down in her head. 5. 4. 3. 2. 1.
The Eminence was flown into a quick flank position above the Undine vessels. "Mister Skar, Fire."
That quick turn, with the IDF badly compromised, caused the damaged bulkhead to give way and land hard taking Yadira with it. Pain and anger surged through her body but it was not enough to help her stay conscious. She was beamed quickly to sickbay for medical attention.
Finally the word came and he smashed down what little force but sadly it was too much as it caused the console to cause sparks as the console panel was smashed but the command was sent and the torpedo were fired from the torpedo tubes, they watched on the view screen as the torpedoes flew out of the torpedo tubes, and impacted the front runner of the Unidine ships, causing it to explode.
However, as it exploded the second torpedo merely grazed it and exploded in the face of the rear Unidine ship. Causing it to be slightly blinded as it returned fire and its energy beam directly hit the Sabre class ship. "Direct hit, we are losing power on all decks, gravity plating is going, shields down. Weapons non functional, Life support is failing." Skar reported as he went to an auxiliary console nearby to transfer tactical readings too as his strength made the primary station useless.
Alex tapped at the helm. The controls weren't responding. "Helm unresponsive. It may be too late, but send a distress call. All frequencies." she would have sent one out sooner if it weren't for the rapid damage to the ship. "Ops, tell the Falling Star to get the hell out of dodge."
She tapped comm button on the console. =^=Engineering, can we get power to the engines or weapons?=^=
=^=Yes, but it would take hours at least=^=
And right now we don't have that, Alex said to herself. The last hostile ship came about in full attack formation. This time ready to attack both ships as the Falling Star hadn't left yet.
"Enough power to send only one. Then we have nothing left." Skar said as he sent out a general distress signal on all frequencies.
[Sickbay, USS Eminence]
Lieutenant Commander Savsa stumbled into the sickbay with the second hit the Eminence took. She looked around the sickbay and the chaos that was happening. She immediately looked at one of the nurses, "Who is in charge?" she queried. Just then the power flucuated.
"Normally it would be the Doc" Chief Russell explained, "but we don't have an acmo yet, so it's me I think," he said running a medical tricorder over Nerex as he helped the pilot to a biobed. Nerex winced as the Chief helped him shift positions onto the biobed, but he didn't say anything.
Savsa smiled at Chief Russel and replied “Well Chief you're in luck. I happen to be a Doctor, Vulcan trained, as well as a counselor. You're more familiar with the sickbay so allow me to assist you till we can get Doctor Cole back on his feet.”
"Thank you sir. We could use all the help we can get" he took a dermal regenerator that was next to him and began to hover it over Nerex's burns. "Commander, can you begin to examine the Doctor?" he asked the Counselor
Savsa nodded and went over to Doctor Cole, she seemed to still be concussed. She sighed and gentle touched her head again with her hands, expertly finding the neural telepathic pathways to establish contact with another mind. She was exhausted from doing this, but she pushed through the exhaustion. The ship was badly damaged and there were injured crew that needed attending to. She reached into the doctors mind yet again, Release your pain to me Doctor Cole, come back to the surface, the crew needs their doctor she continued repeating this mantra over and over until she again could feel the doctor starting to rise to the surface of her conscious mind. That is it, come back to the conscious world, people are hurt and need your attention. with that Savsa released her hold on Doctor Coles mind. “Forgive my intrusion doctor but you are needed.” She said as she scanned the doctor with a medical tricorder looking for more than a concussion.
She wasn't fully awake yet. But with the help of Savsa, Robyn began to become conscious again. Even if it was little by little.
Savsa looked at a nurse "I need 0.4ccs of Trianoline, the doctor has suffered a concussion and is starting to come round. We need Doctor Cole back sooner than later." Savsa waited patiently as the nurse drew up the requested hypo and handed it to her. Savsa gave the doctor the shot and waited. She hoped the drug would help the doctor recover without her needing to provide the mental intrusion yet again.
Robyn finally awoke and was for the most part conscious. "What happened?" she asked beginning to recollect herself and her thoughts.
Savsa looked at Dr. Cole, “The ship came under attack, you were thrown to the deck and lost consciousness. I have used a Vulcan mind technique to revive you and also gave you 0.4ccs of Trianoline. We have a hull breach on deck three and multiple casualties. Unfortunately doctor it appears you and I are going to be very busy for a while, that is if the captain can keep us alive against Species 8472. Do you feel up to handling patients?”
The CMO sat up and set her feet on the ground and regained herself. "I've got to. I got no other choice Counselor" she began to get up off of the biobed carefully.
Savsa nodded at Dr. Cole and provided a steadying hand. "I'll assist you, nice thing about having a counselor who is also medically trained." she replied. "Are you ready to move on your own?"
"Yeah" she said as she accepted the Counselor's helping hand and began to carefully rise up. "Thank you."
Once she was sure that doctor Cole was steady and able Savsa stated, “I say we divide and conquer. I will help those with a triage category of yellow and you handle the red categories. Once we finish taking care of them we can both focus on the green category patients that chief Russell has not taken care of.”
"Sounds good Counselor" she nodded as she picked up a medical tricorder and began scanning an injured crewman for the proper triage.
Savsa had just grabbed a medical tricorder when Lieutenant Nerax came up to her and Dr. Cole, requesting to be released back to duty.
Nerex hurriedly interrupted Savsa and Doctor Cole, "Excuse me, I was ordered here by the captain for these burns on my arm, but Chief Russell already used a dermal regenerator. Can I be released back to the Bridge to assist there?"
"Considering your burns weren't worse then they seem to be, I think you should be alright. But when we get out of this situation, and we WILL, I want you to pop by sickbay so we can double check those burns. Do you concur counselor?" she asked. She technically didn't need a second opinion from anyone, but she wanted to be safe since she was in and out of consciousness moments prior.
Savsa took a quick scan and confirmed Dr. Coles opinion, “Yes I say he should be fine for duty and able to return after the current crisis is over.” With that Savsa went over to the next patient and began working on them.
As Savsa spoke with word "over", Nerex was already to his feet and practically running out of Sickbay, calling out "Thank you!" as he hurried to get to the bridge.
[Main Bridge, USS Eminence]
She looked back at the rest of the bridge crew. "I may not have served with you long, but it was an honor and a privilege."
The Chief Science Officer thightened the jaw at the Captain's comment. His mind racing through many thoughts but still trying to deliver his best making his part for the Eminence and its crew.
The Undine ship grew closer and opened fire draining the structural integrity.
"Whatever that Undine ship fired at us is draining our power. We lost comms, our ability to send a distress signal outside of what I just sent and our hull integrity is down to 20%. If it drops anymore we are officially dead." Skar reported, he knew he could survive in space for a long period but he was not about to boast about it at this time as death is imminent.
But then, just a few moments away was the USS Horizon coming in hot at high slipstream with weapons hot.
[Main Bridge, USS Horizon]
Captain James Phoenix sat sternly in the main command chair of the Horizon, holding on tightly to the armrests. If they went any faster at slipstream velocities, they would tear the ship to shreds. But anything to save two starships. Let alone from the Undine.
Phoenix and his crew had detected weapons fire in the Dantari system while they were enroute there. When they realized that the Eminence and Falling Star were being attacked, Phoenix ordered the fastest possible speed with slipstream velocities. The Eminence's distress signal had come moments prior to their arrival.
"We are approaching the Dantari system" called out ops.
"All hands brace for impact! Helm, drop us to warp 5 and then to impulse with a course to cover the friendly vessels. Tac, ready the nanite weapons and fire on the Undine vessel when in weapons range. Do not wait for my order."
"Yes sir" the tactical officer said with a smirk.
"Dropping us to warp five" there was a massive shake on the bridge.
[Main Bridge, USS Eminence]
"Captain Shepard, we have a ship coming in hot. It's the Horizon!"
The Century Class starship jumped out of warp and flew directly between the Eminence and Falling Star taking the next attack from the Undine ship. It was harsh against the ship, but the Horizon was very strong. It unleashed a volley of nanite-laced quantum torpedoes against the Undine.
A few seconds went by and the torpedoes destroyed the enemy in a mighty blast.
With a relieved face Hank held onto his science console and started breathing deeply once again, as if he had been in apnea for too much time.
"Report?" the CO asked, stunned in the miracle she just witnessed.
"Sensors are clean, only friendly vessels in the area. The fluidic space anomaly is still open tho" Hank duly reported to his CO.
Before she could say anything the ops console beeped. The officer at the station spoke up. "Ma'am, the Horizon is hailing us"
"Mister Skar, do we have at least short range communication?"
"Maybe, I cant make heads or tails of this. Im a tactical officer not operations, sir. They would have a better idea of what is what, sir." Skar sneered out in frustration.
"Noted. Ops, any thoughts?"
The ops officer quickly tapped at his console. "We still don't have long range comms. But we may be able to allocate power from the little power we have at the engines to communications. We will at least be able to communicate with the Falling Star and Horizon. As for the engines we can restore those later."
"Understood. Let's do it" she opened a comm channel to engineering. =^=Yadira, can you transfer power from the engines to external communications?=^=
=^=Sir this is Ensign Johnson. Commander Tristan has been beamed directly to sickbay in serious condition. But I can give comms power=^=
Three of her senior officers were injured. One of them in serious condition. Not only that but there were other crew unaccounted for. She didn't like the outcome of the battle even if they one the battle. Alex felt responsible. =^=Thank you Ensign. Make it so. Bridge out.=^=
"Captain, the power transfer worked. I can respond to the Horizon's hail" ops called out.
"Answer it" she ordered.
In a few seconds a man who appeared to be a similar age to Alex appeared on the viewscreen. "Captain Shepard. It seems we arrived in the nick of time."
"It sure was" Alex smiled. "Though I wasn't expecting the Horizon to come as soon as we sent the distress call."
"As you know we were already en-route. Plus we detected the Undine as they came out of the portal on long range scanners. We hauled it as soon as we detected the weapons fire."
"Clearly" she chuckled. "But we have a more serious issue right now still. Any ideas on how to close the portal?" she looked back at Solomon and then at Phoenix again indicating the question was for both crews.
The Eminence CSO gently passed a hand over his well shaved jaw while recalling a few information from Starfleet Database.
“Well, ma’am, sir” addressing both his CO and the one of the USS Horizon “what we have in front of us is basically an organic gravitational well that should close itself in a given timespan. But the real issue here is that we do not know how long it would take to close on its own and, in the meantime, more Undine vessels could pop out from it”.
He breathed deeply trying to find a solution to the issue and to report it in an understandable manner.
“This singularity can either open naturally or artificially. If it was indeed opened from the other side, as I suspect being the Undine ship right there to assault us, they probably used a set of well triggered and phased graviton beams” he explained.
“Now…” he punched a few buttons on the science console while continuing “we might do the same to try and close it but would probably require both of our ships to concentrate a specific set of resonant graviton beams towards that area of space to try and close it.” He wet his lips before concluding his speech. “Such an emission can be created by modulating the ship’s deflector’s dish…but I guess we would need to have both ships’ deflectors in perfect shape to attempt such a solution” he finally concluded while shooting a look towards the Chief Engineer standing on the bridge at the moment.
Yadira looked like hell, uniform somewhat ragged considering she had just come from sickbay. Bruised broken, but mended enough to work. Cuts still evident, but not bleeding, and with tears in her eyes, "Engineering is a disaster!! 4 dead, 9 injured, and we are going to need a tow home with 3 weeks in drydock," she said, looking at the captain. Yadira was emotionally tied to the ship so much so that it hurt her very core.
She saw the emotion in the Chief Engineer's eyes. Alex felt in a way guilty. Like in a way she could have prevented the battle. The death. But no person should dwell like that. It wasn't healthy. She sighed sadly and then looked at the CEO. "Can we get the deflector in good enough condition to carry out Solomon's idea?"
"With luck yes. I can get the deflector dish to work but for how long do you need? It's going to be tricky," Yadira said sadly. "Captain I know it's not your fault. It happens and I wish I was better prepared for what happened. I should have felt something," she added.
"The process shouldn't theoretically take too long because we are closing it. Plus with the added help of the Horizon."
"It should not take long to align both dishes and close the bloody thing," Yadira said walking to the almost destroyed engineering console. "When ever you are ready Mr. Solomon," she added.
Alex then looked back at the screen. "You can help us, right Captain?"
Captain Phoenix stood up out of his chair on his end of the viewscreen. "Are you kidding?" he said in a light tone. "Of course we can" he smiled. "I'll have my Chief Science Officer and Chief Engineer coordinate efforts with yours."
"Understood" she looked back at Yadira. "You couldn't have known. They ambushed us. But right now we need to focus on closing the portal" she said, but that last part was more or less to herself. She needed to focus on ensuring the safety of the three crews in the moment. Saying no more, she realised that they just needed to get the portal closed however they did it.
Alex looked around the bridge. "Alright people let's get this portal closed" she gave a nod to Captain Phoenix to begin his side of the process.
At the captain’s order Hank worked closely with the engineering team and the officers of the USS Horizon’s team to get the portal closed.
While the engineers patched up the deflector and modified it for the purpose, he and the Horizon CSO crunched numbers to define the correct frequency needed for the job. Once all was ready he notified the commanding officer.
Alex nodded and turned to the CEO. "Are you ready Commander?"
Yadira looked at the captain, "Ready on your mark," sir.
She turned to Solomon and back at the viewer. "On my mark folks, close the portal."
Hank nodded at his CO without adding much more.
"We're ready on our end Alex" Captain Phoenix called from his end his Chief Science Officer notified him that she was ready.
She closed her eyes and mentally prepared herself for whatever could occur when closing that portal. She took a deep breath and opened her eyes again. "Mister Solomon, Captain Phoenix, mark."
As soon as the Captain gave the order, Hank modulated the deflector frequency as per the calculated one and shot an impulse towards the portal.
Soon a large beam emitted from both vessels towards the portal and struck it. The entrance to Fluidic Space began to dissolve slowly.
"Sir, the anomaly is collapsing" the CSO reported while reading the data stream coming from the far away source. "It is closing" he concluded.
"Very good. I'm keeping her steady" the Captain called out from the front of the bridge.
"So are we Captain" Captain Phoenix said.
Both ships began to shake a little. But despite that and the attack, the view of the beams was a beautiful sight. Even though space was very dangerous, especially with the Undine threat, this was why many joined Starfleet. For cosmic situations like this.
Alex gruffed. "Keeping her steady. Hang on people!"
The anomaly finally sealed. For now, the Undine entrance was neutralized. But it was alarming. This close to Federation territory.
"Mister Solomon, is the portal completely gone?" she asked her CSO.
"Yes, ma'am" the CSO double checked "It's closed" he confirmed finally taking the time to breathe again and notiving once again the wound in his left arm.
"Captain, permission to get to the sickbay to have this wound treated?" he asks
"Granted Mister Solomon" she stated as she heard the turbolift doors open to reveal Nerex.
With a not of his head Hank thanked the CO and moved towards the exit of the bridge.
Nerex rushed onto the bridge, expecting chaos but surprised to find it calm. "Captain, I got sickbay to release me temporarily to assist on the bridge...but it looks like I missed the rest of the fun?"
"Unfortunately that seems to be the case for now" she began to smile as she got up from the helm. "But Lieutenant, if the Doctor has cleared you and you are feeling up to it, would you like to re-take the helm?"
“I mean, I’m supposed to go back to sickbay as soon as the crisis is over. But maybe I can squeeze some extra time out of that,” he smiled, moving to take the helm. “It looks like you took good care of my seat for me, Captain.”
"As good as I could in the heat of the battle" she chuckled. "I'm afraid that we won't be moving under our own power anytime soon however."
"I'll be ready for when we can, Captain," Nerex answered pleasantly.
"How is the Falling Star?" she looked back for a report.
"The Falling Star made it to a safe distance before they could get hit. It is odd since they were more vulnerable to the Undine" the ops officer said.
"Agreed, but we need to focus on repairs" she looked to the screen right in front of her. "Captain, once we get as fixed up as we can here, can you give us a tow, my Engineering Chief says that we are in need of dry-dock repairs and we are sitting ducks."
Phoenix nodded. "We'd be happy too. My Chief Engineer will send over some aid as well. Once you are ready we also have your crew transfers."
"Thank you Captain. I almost forgot the original reason you were going to be here for" Alex let out a quick laugh.
"Your welcome Alex" The other Captain smiled. "I'll begin our end of the repairs shortly. "Phoenix out."
The viewscreen cut back to the original view of Dantari Three orbit. It was unfortunate that they couldn't take part in helping the colony form like they were supposed to. But at least Alex and the rest of the crew were alive. The same went for the colony. Starfleet would for sure want a detailed report from both Captains.
She looked to Yadira. "Please direct the Horizon's engineering away team to where they are needed the most once they arrive. I'd also like you to begin the repairs on our side."
"Repairs have already begun on the most critical systems," said a very grateful, to be alive and still have her lady Eminence still in one piece, a very exhausted Yadira said to her captain.
Alex then looked around the bridge. "You did good today people. We took some losses. We will mourn them" she sighed sadly. "But the important thing is we got saved the ship and the rest of the crew. We're alive. Honestly right now in this moment that is all that matters. Good work. I have been here for a short time but I'm proud of you all."
OFF:
Captain Alex Shepard
Commanding Officer
Commander Yadira Tristan House Kilrah
Chief Engineering Officer
Lieutenant Commander Savsa Parsala
Chief Counselor
Lieutenant Nerex
Chief Helm Officer
Lieutenant JG Hank Solomon
Chief Science Officer
Master Chief Petty Officer Skargarr
Chief Security/Tactical Officer
Master Chief Petty Officer Henry Reagan
Chief of Boat
Lieutenant Robyn Cole (NPC)
Chief Medical Officer
Captain James Phoenix (NPC)
Commanding Officer, USS Horizon
