Ad Astra :: Star Trek Fanfiction Archive ^{Beam me up, Scotty.}

Chapter Text

USS Bluefin

“Maintain pursuit. All forward weapons engage as the target presents itself,” Akinola ordered, feeling the kick of Bluefin’s powerful impulse engines as they propelled the Albacore-class cutter after the Bird-of-Prey.

Asteroids tumbled by as Fralk piloted the ship deftly through the lethal obstacle course, somehow managing to keep up with the presumably more maneuverable scout.

From Tactical, Strauss assessed, “Captain, usually the B’rel-class lacks any aft weaponry, but I’m detecting a Class-5 point defense phaser emplacement.”

“Good catch, XO.” Akinola favored Strauss with a bleak smile. “Helm, watch out for that, they’ve got a sharp tail.”

“Yes, sir.”

Strauss let fly a phaser blast as both ships were momentarily within view of one another. The beam flared against the Garth of Izar’s rear screens and seemed to encourage even more desperately dangerous evasive tactics by the Maquis helmsman.

T’Ser marveled from Ops, “At this rate, they’ll kill themselves without any help from us.”

“That’d be fine by me, “ Akinola muttered from behind clenched teeth.

*****

Maquis Bird-of-Prey Garth of Izar

Maxwell was jostled in his seat as another phaser discharge from the pursuing cutter further depleted their aft shielding.

His pilot’s course had become so erratic that Maxwell was occasionally forced to look away from the viewscreen as mountainous shards of rock flashed past.

At the weapons console, McCready whistled appreciatively. “They’re still with us, Ben. Damned if I can explain how that old bucket can keep up with Beston’s spastic maneuvers.”

“Albacore-class,” Maxwell groused, his voice tinged with reluctant admiration. “Damned things are just giant impulse engines with running lights and a registry.”

McCready frowned and pressed a comms call switch on his board. “Still no reply from the transporter room.” He flicked the toggle twice more for good measure. “Ganzi, Vraxx, what’s going on back there?” There was no answer.

A loud, metallic thud reverberated through the hull, but wasn’t accompanied by the same shaking as a weapons strike. McCready gawked at his readings. “Ben, we just launched an escape pod!” The man turned towards the bridge exit hatch.

“Mind your post, Weaps!” Maxwell snapped. “If we don’t get out of this, whatever’s happening back there won’t matter. And if those two love birds decided to jump ship, fine. Let them honeymoon in a life pod until Starfleet picks them up.” Maxwell gripped the armrests of his battered Klingon command chair tightly as he ordered, “We’re going offensive. Weaps, drop the mines while Beston slingshots us around one of those big rocks. If we can time it just right, we’ll come into firing range just as those mines detonate.”

“On it…”

*****

USS Bluefin

Lt. Bane spoke up from the Science station. “Sir, looks like they just jettisoned an escape pod. I’m reading one life form… a human.”

“Mark these coordinates, Mr. Bane. We’ll pick up that lifeboat on our way back.”

“Aye, sir.”

The two ships continued to slalom through the planetary debris, exchanging the occasional pot shot as the opportunity presented itself.

Akinola called back to Senior Chief Brin, “Solly, get a boarding party readied in transporter room one. Once we disable the Maquis ship, we’ll be beaming over to take prisoners.”

Brin stood from his console and nodded curtly. “Aye, Captain.” He headed into the turbolift, the beginnings of an eager smile tugging at his lips.

Strauss glanced up at Akinola from her post at Tactical. “Should I have someone relieve me, Captain?”

Akinola shook his head fractionally. “Negative, XO.  I’ll be leading the boarding action.”

Her eyes focused on Akinola like lasers, and in the flood of anger and disbelief that his announcement generated, she missed the two metallic objects detaching from the Bird-of-Prey ahead of them.

Fortunately, Bane had her back and called out, “Two more objects just separated from the scout, sir.”

“More escape pods?” Akinola queried suspiciously.

“Standby… no, negative… I’m reading anti-matter charges in ea—“

“Helm,” Akinola roared, “those are mines! Take evasive acti—“

The screen was suddenly awash in light, a fraction of a second before a concussive wave of explosive energy washed over Bluefin, crashing into her forward screens and sending bridge crew tumbling from their workstations as consoles sparked and died.

Akinola knew instantly what the mines presaged. While his crew was trying to pick up the pieces and get their bearings, the Bird-of-Prey was undoubtedly doubling back to finish them off. “Helm, throttle back to one-eighth impulse. Forward weapons fire!”

Strauss pulled herself back to her feet with painful slowness to call out above the din, “I… don’t have a target.”

“Just fire a blind pattern, as much energy as you can get downrange.” Akinola prayed for a clear view of their enemy but the viewscreen offered only flickering static. “Bane, find me that ship!”

*****

Maquis Bird-of-Prey Garth of Izar

The Bird-of-Prey rounded the asteroid to find the cutter slowing and disgorging an impressive field of fire that alarmed Maxwell for a fraction of a second before he realized the ship was firing blindly. “Status of their shields?”

McCready nodded to himself. “Forward shields at sixteen percent.”

“Fine,” Maxwell hissed. “Chew them up, Weaps.”

“My pleasure,” McCready replied as he pressed the torpedo launch stud on his antiquated display. Orange lights flashed on his panel. “Damn it! Ben, I’m getting an automation jam warning from the torpedo tube’s loading mechanism.”

Maxwell grimaced. “Perfect timing. Disruptors then.”

“Firing.”

*****

USS Bluefin

Bane fought his console as he desperately tried to route data feeds from the traumatized sensor suite to his board. He finally filtered out the interference and ghost images clouding the display. “Got her—“  Bane clutched the edge of his console as disruptor blasts buffeted the cutter. “Bearing 348-mark-047, range seventeen-hundred kilometers.” His hands flew across the console in a blur. “Uploading target coordinates to Tactical.”

Strauss, a dark bruise forming on one of her high cheekbones, met Bane’s expectant gaze. Her eyes transmitting gratitude and something deeper. “Got them…”

Akinola stood. “Fire a volley of Mark VI’s, followed by Mark 22’s when we’ve penetrated their shields.”

“Aye, sir. One shake n’ bake, coming up.”

Twin crimson suns flashed from Bluefin’s forward tubes, slicing through vacuum to slam into the Bird-of-Prey’s port side and collapsing the scout’s overtaxed shields. The second pair of torpedoes, set to deliver an overwhelming electromagnetic surge, followed right behind. Stringers of electrical current crackled across the vessel’s hull as even the ruggedly hardened and redundant Klingon control systems succumbed to the storm of electrons.

Bane smiled triumphantly. "We got her, sir! Target has lost all primary systems and most of her backups. Life support and gravity functioning at minimal levels.”

His battle lust far from sated, Akinola nodded curtly but refused to share in the bridge crew’s whoops and shouts of celebration. He stepped up onto the upper deck of the bridge and made for the ‘lift. Just as the doors began to close, Strauss slid into the lift car beside the captain.

“I don’t want to hear it,” he announced tersely.

“Tough,” was Strauss’ unexpected reply. “With all respect, sir, this is my job.”

“Not today, Commander. Captain’s prerogative.” Akinola’s eyes were fixed straight ahead at the lift car’s doors. “Transporter room one,” he instructed the computer.

“Hold lift,” she countered, earning a rebuking glare from Akinola. “Am I to believe you hate the Maquis so much that you just have to lead this team, or is it that you don’t trust me to get the job done?”

“I don’t owe you an explanation, XO. Drop it and resume your post.” He looked at Strauss expectantly, and when she refused to budge he growled, “Resume,” to the computer.

As the lift began its descent, Strauss spoke in a carefully modulated tone. “This is about McBride, isn’t it?”

Rather than the scathing reprimand she had expected at having brought up her predecessor’s name, Akinola closed his eyes briefly, his face going slack and giving the impression of great weariness.

“That’s precisely what this is about, Inga. I won’t see another promising command officer killed needlessly.” He opened his eyes and turned towards Strauss. “Am I reacting emotionally? Hell yes. Is this the best idea I’ve ever had? Certainly not. Do these four pips give me the right to do this my way?” The merest hint of an ironic smirk flickered across his features. “Absolutely.” He reached out a hand, clasping her shoulder. “I do trust you to do this. I just can’t sit idly by up there on the bridge while you do it… not again.”

She nodded reluctantly as the doors slid open. “I understand, sir. I don’t agree… but there’s obviously no changing your mind.”

Akinola held her gaze for a fraction of a second before he strode out into the corridor. He called back, “You have the Conn.”

*****

Maquis Bird-of-Prey Garth of Izar

Maxwell came around in response to McCready’s persistent shaking. He blinked and tried to clear the cobwebs, then found his weapons specialist within his swimming field of vision. “What… happened?”

“They must have got a weapons lock at the last moment, Ben. We’ve been disabled. They’re probably pulling alongside right now.”

He regained his feet with McCready’s help, but Maxwell groaned at the effort. “They’ll be… boarding us any minute.”

McCready drew his Cardassian phaser from its holster. “Then we’ll go down fighting.”

“Beston?” Maxwell inquired, glimpsing an unmoving form draped across the helm console. McCready shook his head in response. As the other man assisted him through the aft door into the passageway back to the body of the scout, Maxwell reflected, “Losing to Picard and the Enterprise, that I can stomach. The man may be a fool, but he commanded a worthy ship. Being shut down by an obsolete cutter, I have to admit, that stings a little.”

McCready chuckled in response. “They say pride goeth before a fall.”

The hum of a transporter field farther down the corridor spurred both men to take cover behind support struts on either side of the passageway. Maxwell pulled a Klingon disruptor pistol from a thigh holster shakily, still out of sorts. He took wavering aim and waited.

The men caught a fleeting glimpse of something moving up the corridor toward them but were unable to focus sufficiently to open fire. A discus shaped Starfleet tactical drone flashed past the two men as it fired transporter beacon tags into each with little puffs of compressed gas. Maxwell felt the sharp jab of the tag biting into flesh, then looked down in surprise. Just as he reached for it, he felt the familiar tingle of a transporter effect infusing him.

*****

"The drone’s tagged two for beaming,” Chief Deryx noted.

“Energize and hold in transit,” Akinola ordered. Two columns of light took partial shape on the transporter dais, their signals cycling through the pattern buffers.

“Registering two energy weapons,” Deryx observed.

“Deactivate them,” the captain instructed. “Beam these two to the brig as soon as security is ready for them.” Akinola slapped a power cell magazine into his phaser carbine and the weapon’s ready lights activated. “I’m glad we acquired some of those tactical drones.”

Brin gave Akinola a disapproving glance as he tightened the straps on his tactical vest, but the ruddy Orion held his tongue.

Akinola turned to face him. “You disagree, Senior Chief?”

“If I’d wanted to play it safe,” Brin replied laconically, “I’d have joined a slipshod high-g gas mining operation run by the Ferengi.”

“Everyone’s a comedian,” Akinola muttered as he closed the combat visor of his helmet. He then stepped up onto the pad after the two Maquis were banished to the brig. The rest of the boarding team joined him, Senior Chief Brin lowering his own visor as the team assumed a tactical beam-in formation, everyone facing outward with weapons raised.

“Energize.”

*****