Unexpected Arrival, Part I
Posted on Sun Jan 1st, 2017 @ 6:43am by Captain Alistar McKeon
1,196 words; about a 6 minute read
Mission: Transitions
Alistar walked, or rather staggered rather well, out of sickbay and blinked as his eyes tried to adjust to the gloom of the dim lighting of the corridor. He had been warned that main power was out throughout the entire ship, but unlike sickbay and certain other critical areas, only the dim blue emergency lighting lit the corridors, giving off just enough light for the few remaining crew to proceed to their destinations. As for the Endeavour's captain, he had only one destination in mind. With main power out, he would have to use the turbolift shaft or the Jefferies tubes in order to get to the bridge, but either way would take time and he still had a bit of a headache. It took him a good thirty minutes of carefully picking his way through the ship before he finally arrived at deck one, where a security officer greeted him. Much to his surprise, Alistar found that the bridge was manned by two junior officers and three crewmen, all who looked about as tired as he felt. The senior officer approached and saluted.
"Sir, most of the senior officers are on other decks, trying to oversee getting other systems online. We have short range sensors, but they're only good out to roughly fifteen thousand kilometers. Communications is about the same. With main power offline, we don't have anything more than minimal thrusters and two of the RCS thrusters operational. Engineering and ops wanted to focus on life support, defenses, and propulsion in that order."
"Very well," Alistar said as he rubbed the back of his neck. He knew it had to be bad, but he was starting to get a feel for just how bad. Before he could say anything, a proximity alarm went off.
"Sir, I'm picking up on several small craft approaching. They're at the extreme range of our sensors, and I don't have a visual yet, but I can confirm that I'm reading what appears to be two medium sized craft with an additional fourteen smaller craft," the petty officer at operations reported.
Alistar's head snapped up at the report. Fourteen was the standardized number for two squadrons of fighters, and the other two craft could be boarding craft. "Scan all available frequencies," he ordered as he moved towards his command chair. Pausing, he glanced at the junior crewman on the bridge. "Find Commander Silvisi and let her know what's going on," he ordered before turning his attention to the problem at hand.
[Starbase Typhon]
An alarm sounded in Raven's office. She'd tapped into the long-ranged sensors to get warnings if anything came within range of the station. After the recent Borg incursions, she wanted to be absolutely sure she had time to do another systems lock down. While it was not technically her job, as Chief Intelligence Officer she felt it her duty to keep the station's information safe.
She ran a scan of the ship and paused. It was a Federation ship, but there were a large number of tachyon particles, which bore investigation. She would need to find out what was going on before it arrived at the station.
"Captain Mabrade, request permission to take a shuttle out to check out the incoming craft."
=^= Mabrade here. =^= The voice came over the channel. =^= We ahve it on Control Deck also, be ready to run, we are checking the Database for anything that matches. We will relay any information. =^=
"Yes, sir. Adams out." Although there were a number of things she could do that did not involve running. She didn't mention to the Captain that she was pretty sure the ship was not from this time. She wanted to be certain first.
Raven couldn't risk involving Morticia or Khiy in this, so she sent a quick message to Captain Cayne and to Lieutenant Kanzaki. Then she requisitioned a shuttle for her use and headed to the shuttle bay.
Captain Cayne sat in his chair, on the bridge, as the message came in. The XO looked over to his monitor than looked toward the Captain. "Sir, you are receiving message from the Chief Intelligence Officer of the Typhon. I hate to disappoint you, but its not to arrange your next dinner date."
Cayne looked over to his XO and shook his head slightly. "That's unfortunate. What does she say?"
"According to Commander Adams, there is a ship that appeared seemingly out of no where. She is letting us, and Typhon Security, know that she is going out there to investigate." The XO said, looking over to Darius.
Darius smirked as he stood up. "Of course she is." He said lightly as he took a step forward. "Because I would be doing the same thing. Let's try to help her out. Use our long range sensors and find that ships registration number. Let's see if there is anything its records can tell us."
The XO nodded. "Yes sir. Begin long range scans. Merlin? Once we have the number, pull up what you can from Starfleet records."
Raven was almost to the shuttle bay when her combadge chirped. "Adams," she said, tapping it.
"Hi, Sugar. This is Commander BIlly Jo Rhodes from the shipyards. I've looked over that ship coming in and it looks like it'll need some repairs."
"I need to find out why it's here first," Raven hedged. "This may be a matter for intelligence."
"Nonsense. I'm not going to risk anyone's life just because of Temporal protocol. That's why I'm going. Athena has top secret security clearance. I'm better equipped to deal with any repairs anyway. Let me jump on the Pussycat and follow you out there."
"But, Commander..." Raven had only met the COmmander a couple of times, but she definitely had a mind of her own. And, as she was not technically part of Typhon's crew, Billy Jo had the autonomy to do as she pleased. "Very well."
Billy Jo let out a whoop of pleasure. "I'll just grab my tools and be right with you."
She had a full set of tools on the Pussycat, but just to be sure, Billy Jo grabbed her diagnostic tools and headed for her pink shuttle. She'd inform Landon later. No need to get his dander up just yet.
Raven's shuttle had not gone far when it was joined by Commander Rhodes' pink one. She still didn't understand why anyone would bother painting a shuttle pink, but she guessed it was one of the foibles of engineers.
She continued to get updates from Typhon on the incoming ship, which Edgar read aloud so she could keep her eyes on the controls. When they got close enough, she activated a program to allow her computer avatar to run the prefix codes and the IFF to verify that the ship was truly what it appeared to be.
When she received confirmation that it was indeed a Starfleet ship from another time, she opened a comm channel. "Endeavour, this is the Tepes."
"Sir, we're being hailed. Comms are still somewhat limited, but I can get you visual," the operations officer reported.
"Open a channel," Alistar said, absently straightening his torn and tattered uniform jacket.
TBC....