Chapter Text
USS Gibraltar
E’Mdifarr Asteroid Belt, E’Mdifarr system
Sector 21508
Alliance Occupied Cardassian Territory
Sandhurst strode through the narrow corridor under the flickering overhead lighting as he resisted the urge with every step to open the nearest EPS access panel and assist in the ship’s repairs. His engineering teams could handle it, and he had other priorities to attend to.
As he stepped into Sickbay, Sandhurst was relieved to find only a few of his crew being attended to by the ship’s two Emergency Medical Holograms and Lt. Taiee’s efficient nursing staff. He quickly located the person who had prompted his visit to Sickbay and he approached the examination table currently occupied by Ensign Belinda Lascomb, the ship’s assistant chief engineer. The young woman’s legs and lower torso were still clad in her radiation-hardened engineering jumpsuit, though the upper half had been cut away in order to treat her injuries.
Sandhurst looked to the medical hologram and inquired briskly, “What’s her condition?”
The EMH looked up from the panel where he was directing the ensign’s treatment. “Severe radiation poisoning, sir. She absorbed close to five-hundred REMS while in the nacelle housing, despite her protective garment.”
“How soon can you have her back to duty?”
The hologram favored Sandhurst with an expression of disbelief mixed with disdain. “You can’t be serious, sir? I’ve given her the maximum dosage of hyronalin that her body can handle. That, coupled with the deionization series I’m running on her will hopefully stave off any long-term damage. There’s no way she can return to duty in less than a week, and even then she’ll have to be careful not to expose herself to any further radiation, even at low levels, for several months.”
Sandhurst marshalled his patience as he explained as calmly as possible, “Our ship is damaged and without warp capability. We can only hide out here for so long before the enemy finds us. I need to get those nacelles polarized within the next few hours so that we can escape this system, and at present only two people aboard have the requisite skills to do that… Ensign Lascomb and myself.”
The hologram met his gaze unflinchingly. “Then I’d suggest finding a Rad-Haz suit in your size, Captain, because the ensign is out of commission.”
The sudden pressure of Lascomb’s hand grasping his own startled Sandhurst. He glanced down to find the young woman retching into a pan held by a nurse who also cradled Lascomb’s head gently as the engineer evacuated her stomach. Lascomb took a few deep, shuddering breaths, and turned her head to look at Sandhurst. As she opened her mouth to speak, Sandhurst saw her teeth tinged red from her bleeding gums. “I can… do it, Captain. Just… need a few… minutes to catch… my breath.” Her eyes were focused on him like lasers, her mind and spirit willing despite the radiation-induced weakness of her flesh. The last thing Lascomb wanted to do, Sandhurst realized, was let her captain and her crewmates down.
He was momentarily overcome by a sense of self-loathing; that he had come here to force the junior officer back into the storm of hard radiation being given off by the depolarized warp coils. Sandhurst’s mind wandered back to his days at Command Officer Candidate’s training, where they had drummed into the students that a CO must be willing to order others to their deaths for the good of the majority. ‘Easier said than done,’ he thought darkly.
Sandhurst took Lascomb’s hand in his as he forced on his best supportive smile. “That’s alright, Ensign. You’ve done your duty. Your efforts and those of your team have got us more than halfway there. Time for the old man to step up.”
He nodded to the EMH as he stepped away from the exam bed towards the exit, only to find Pell standing near the entrance, arms folded across her chest. Sandhurst walked past her into the corridor and Pell fell into step beside him. “The hell you are—“ she began.
“It’s not up for discussion, Commander,” he replied brusquely, cutting her off.
“Don’t think that because Ramirez isn’t here that I’m just going to sit by and let you do something foolish,” Pell pressed. “As acting XO, it’s my responsibility to make sure this crew has the best possible chance of surviving our current circumstances. Our best chance is with you in the captain’s chair, sir, not crawling around inside the nacelles.”
The pair stepped into the turbolift and Sandhurst ordered, “Main Engineering.”
As the turbocar began its descent, Pell turned to him. “And outside the bounds of my official duty, Donald, from a purely selfish standpoint I don’t want you doing this.”
The determination set in his features softened somewhat. “I know, Ojana. I’m sorry. This is something I have to do.”
“No, this is something Lascomb has to do. It’s her job.”
Sandhurst kept his gaze fixed deliberately at the lift car’s doors. “She’s barely a year out of the academy. I can’t ask her to sacrifice her life like this. Not for something that I walked into because I wasn’t being cautious enough.”
Pell emitted an exasperated sigh. “It was an ambush! And don’t beat yourself up too badly, Ramirez didn't see it coming either. For that matter, neither did your supposedly prescient little sidekick."
He shot her a hard glare as the doors parted. “Pava’s saved my life, Ojana, you’d do well to remember that. And you said we needed lessons in diplomacy?”
She followed him through Engineering to a bank of equipment lockers. As Sandhurst opened one and removed a radiation suit, he said coolly, “I’ll send updates as to my progress every five minutes. Your place is on the bridge, Commander.” He looked over to find her still standing there defiantly. Sandhurst added, “That’s an order.”
In full view of the engineering personnel and heedless of the consequences, Pell raised up on her tiptoes and kissed Sandhurst briefly on the cheek. “Aye, Captain. Try not to get yourself killed while you’re being dramatically heroic, sir.”
*****
Tactical Outpost Theta
Hakton VII
Sector 21512, Former Demilitarized Zone
Alliance Occupied Cardassian Territory
“Laren, what the hell happened?” The former Starfleet captain’s voice was taut with barely contained anger that was not assuaged by his lightyears distance from the event.
Ro Laren sighed, “I wish we knew for certain, Ben. Something’s gone wrong in the E’Mdifarr system; that much is obvious.” She felt a headache coming on, a bad one. Months of planning had gone into this operation, and it had unraveled in mere minutes.
“Laramie’s group was staged and ready to deploy. They issued their distress call on schedule and succeeded in drawing in one of the Starfleet escorts. After taking out the escort, Laramie was supposed to signal that the Q-ships were ready, before leaving to rendezvous with your group and offload cargo from the relief convoy.”
“Only he never signaled,” Benjamin Maxwell concluded.
“Correct. That’s why I aborted the mission. There was no sense in your group jumping the convoy and assuming all the risk of dueling with the other three escort ships if we were going to have to abandon the cargo.”
She could see Maxwell nodding slightly as he absorbed the facts. “You did the right thing, Laren. I just hate to see all our work evaporate like that.”
“I’m right there with you, Ben.”
“Remind me again why the hell we let Laramie join our cell?”
Her smile was tinged with irony. “Because his family owns the shipyard that produced the Q-ships and they’ve held Maquis sympathies from the beginning.”
Maxwell rolled his eyes. “That’s right, now I remember.” His mood turned more somber and he appeared thoughtful. “What do you propose we do now?”
“Cut our losses, unfortunately.” Ro shook her head. “Those ships represent a huge investment on our part, both in personnel and materiel. But as much as I’d dearly love to send a ship or two to find out what’s gone wrong, if Laramie and his people have been captured, they know enough to threaten our entire operation. We’ll have to evacuate all our currently established bases, at least all the ones Laramie knows about.”
“As much as I hate to admit it, that’s undoubtedly the safest course of action.” The ex-captain’s features darkened. “I’m sure as hell not going back to prison over this.”
Ro frowned as she observed, “We’ve both done time in the Starfleet Stockade, Ben. Don’t flatter yourself. That place is a damned country club compared to Lazon II. After you’ve experienced Cardassian hospitality, even Rura Penthe would seem luxurious.”
Maxwell winced at his own gaffe. “I’ll have to take your word for that. I’m sorry if it seemed like I was invalidating your experiences there. I know those wounds are still fresh.” He signaled to someone off screen. “Anyway, looks like it’s time to start packing. I’ll meet you at our auxiliary rally point in say… two weeks?”
“Two weeks it is. I’ll see you then, Capt—“ she caught herself, “Mr. Maxwell.”
*****
USS Bluefin
E’Mdifarr system
Sector 21508
Alliance Occupied Cardassian Territory
Akinola waited patiently in the command chair for updates from his senior staff. He had learned long ago that constant prompting from an anxious captain did not speed matters up so much as cause sufficient angst among the bridge officers to encourage hasty assessments that invariably endangered the mission.
“Still experiencing significant communications jamming, sir,” reported T’Ser from Operations. “It’s strongest in the vicinity of the system’s asteroid field, bearing 116-mark-025. If we close any further, we’ll be out of comms range with Starfleet.”
Strauss looked up from the Tactical station. “We could drop a series of communications buoys behind us as we approach, sir.”
Akinola smiled. “A variant on the old bread-crumb trail, XO?”
“Something like that, Captain,” Strauss confirmed. “The buoys will be vulnerable to attack, of course, but if the people that ambushed Gibraltar see them, it might just be enough to draw them out to try and disable our comms relay.”
“A solid plan,” Akinola assessed. “Implement it immediately, Commander.” He turned back to look at Lieutenant Bane at the sensor station. Akinola gave the man a questioning expression.
“Nothing yet, Cap’n,” Bane announced in his Australian-accented Standard. “If someone’s out there in the asteroids, they’re keeping their heads down. No worries, though, I can detect a Cardassian vole fart at a lightyear plus, Captain.”
Akinola mock winced as he observed, “Thank you for that unnecessarily graphic descriptive, Nigel.” He called back over his shoulder to ask, “Senior Chief, what other assets do we have inbound to assist?”
“At last report, sir, the starship Trafalgar and the cutter Onodaga are en route at maximum warp. However, Trafalgar isn’t due to arrive for another twelve hours.”
Akinola mused, “Hmm. Captain Littlefoot is going to miss out on all the fun. Pity, Marcus always did like a good scrap.” To the bridge crew in general he announced, “Alright, people, let’s step up our readiness.”
“Red alert,” ordered Strauss, which initiated the crimson strobes and muted klaxon that elevated their status from yellow alert and set the crew to general quarters. “This is not a drill, all hands to battle stations!”
*****
Kriosian-flagged freighter SS
Draskaar
E’Mdifarr Asteroid Belt, E’Mdifarr system
Sector 21508
Alliance Occupied Cardassian Territory
The turbolift doors to the freighter’s bridge opened to a dazzling burst of weapons fire that scored and blacked the interior of the lift car for lack of another target.
Kyle Lightner lowered his disruptor pistol and frowned at the empty chamber. “Dolka, where the hell are they? You said the lift car didn’t make any stops between the cargo level and here.”
“It didn’t,” came the Tellarite’s gruff reply. “Sensors confirmed there were three lifeforms in the car.”
Lightner shook his head in disgust as he stepped forward to examine the battered interior of the lift. “This is ridiculous. First the Starfleeters manage to overpower our people in the cargo bay, and now they’re playing mind games with us. We’ve got to reassert control of this situation now. This is our damn ship!”
The ceiling panel on the lift car banged downward, opening unexpectedly and causing Kyle to jump back and begin to raise his weapon. A hand reached down from somewhere atop the lift car and tossed a cylindrical device onto the bridge. Lightner had just enough time to yell, “Grenade!” as he dove for the dubious cover of a cargo status console on the upper deck of the rectangular bridge.
The photon grenade, primed for stun, bounced off the top of a control panel and clattered under a work station at the back of the bridge. The force of its detonation was partially blocked by the interceding consoles which shielded most of the Maquis from more than a brief dose of the weapon’s discharge.
Ramirez dropped down into the lift car from the ceiling hatch, followed closely by Dunleavy. Both women were armed with hand phasers, and as the two pivoted smartly around either side of the lift, they were disappointed to see most of the armed bridge crew clambering to their feet, weapons still in hand. The women opened fire nearly simultaneously.
Ramirez scored two hits, sending her targets reeling and crashing to the deck. Then, someone off to the side of the lift grabbed a hold of her extended arm and pulled, throwing her off balance and sending her stumbling onto the bridge. She found herself face to face with a human male who looked suspiciously familiar, though in the heat of the moment she couldn’t quite discern why. The man wrenched her arm, forcing her to drop her phaser. Ramirez replied by driving her knee up and into the man’s thigh.
Dunleavy, meanwhile, dropped another two of the freighter crew with well-placed stun shots. Suddenly, she was knocked back by a disruptor bolt that slammed into the side of the lift door near her head and showered her with molten metal shrapnel.
The Maquis opposing Ramirez danced backwards, favoring his other leg as he tried to throw the smaller woman off balance. She brought her head forward and then up sharply to drive the back of her skull into the man’s chin. This sent him stumbling backwards and she followed the blow with another knee strike to his groin and a palm-heel jab that rocked his head back yet again. This time he tottered for a split second before falling down the short staircase into the bridge well.
As she turned to retrieve her phaser, Ramirez found a Maquis pointing an old style Starfleet pistol phaser directly at her, his finger depressing the trigger. She braced herself for the killing shot, only to blink in confusion as something whistled past her head and buried itself in the man’s chest. As the stricken Maquis sank to his knees and his phaser clattered to the deck, she realized the implement used to bring him down was a circular panel cover from inside the lift car.
Ramirez spun around just in time to see Ashok, who had finally managed to wriggle down through the small ceiling hatch, disarm yet another of the Maquis by grabbing the man’s forearm and wrenching it to the tune of cracking bone. Then the enormous Bolian picked the man up and threw him bodily across the bridge to collide with the last of the bridge crew, who was bringing his Ferengi phaser to bear. The two men collapsed in a tangle of limbs and unconscious flesh.
Dumbfounded, Ramirez looked back at the Maquis with the panel cover protruding from his chest. “Lieutenant… how… holy shit!”
Ashok picked up an unconscious crew member up in each hand and dragged them towards the back of the bridge. As he did so, the taciturn Bolian said simply, “Starfleet Academy track and field. Discus champion three years running.”
Ramirez moved to assist Dunleavy, who was huddled in the corner of the lift, clutching at her burned face with both hands. “And I thought Pava was the dangerous one…” the exec murmured.
*****