Run Down Runabout pt. 1

Posted on Sat Jun 4th, 2022 @ 3:40am by Lieutenant JG Alia Fitzgerald & Captain Devin Hadenbeer & Lieutenant Commander Dorian Sheppard & Lieutenant Commander Ull Arkyn & Lieutenant Commander Klarth
Edited on on Sun Jun 12th, 2022 @ 3:20am

2,119 words; about a 11 minute read

Mission: Into The Void
Location: Lionheart and The Triangle
Tags: Hadenbeer

Toelau kept Lionheart at warp seven until the phaser arrays were recharged, then Hadenbeer ordered warp nine immediately after that. She had not kept her seat long and spent the time between now and the arrival at the site of the skirmish slowly pacing about the bridge as was her habit. Ull had been able to identify the transponder code; it was the Kwango, a runabout assigned to Gabriel station.

That did not bode well. Especially after the Klingon vessel had cloaked...and less than a minute later the Federation transponder went dark.

Lionheart dropped out of warp at the sight of the presumed battle, the ship was still under red alert.

"All right," she said quietly as she stared at the starfield on the forward viewscreen, "Everyone do your jobs..."

Junix, with hands still linked behind her back, moved from the environmental systems towards the tactical board to watch its scan results. She kept Captain Hadenbeer in her peripherals. She was having a difficult time resolving what was happening.

Klarth was ready to give advice on Klingons if needed....However, he was worried that the Captain was acting very strangely. She was clearly distracted and evasive and he didn't know why the Captain was almost hostile with Junix. Had she changed that much in 3 years? ...A possible crisis was not a good time to be having these thoughts, but he was having them all the same.

The runabout was spotted relatively quickly, Ull began scanning the Kwango for any signs of life to see who was left onboard, and to get security over to not only secure, but assist those that may be wounded. While his scan was running he was also scanning the area around the two ships for any sort of drive signature or any sort of exhaust plume. He didn't believe that the Klingon vessel had left the area.

Ull did not detect any trace of another ship in the immediate area. At the same time he did not detect the warp trail of a departing ship, implying that the Klingon vessel was still out there. He also detected three life forms on board the runabout, two human and one Gorn, all weak.

"If I was on that Klingon ship," said Klarth. "I would not run away just because a bigger ship came by. I would stick close and see if they made a mistake"

Devin made no comment to Klarth's observation, instead she stood silently as she waited to hear from her staff.

Ull set up for a metaphasic sweep as well as going through and look for any sort of electromagnetic distortions, that may let him know where the cloaked vessel was. "Captain, I have three life forms on that runabout with weak vitals. Recommend sending in Security Squads 1 and 2 to secure the runabout and provide medical assistance until we can stabilize them enough to transport them to medical."

"It would still mean dropping shields," Devin pointed out, "I am not overly fond of that idea."

Ull pondered for a moment. "Timing is crucial and it is difficult to process without substantial help from the ship's computer, but we may be able to take advantage of an EM window that is created by the shield rotating frequencies and get our teams over without dropping our shields. It is a difficult task, but not impossible."

"It is a 'task' that Starfleet Engineers have been working on for decades," Devin pointed out, "I doubt very much my staff," she glanced Alia's way with a slight smile, "no matter how talented, is going to come up with a solution before the crew over there die."

Engineering:

“Dropping out of Warp,” Dupree announces as Warp nine ceases and the impulse drives take over.

“Report,” Sheppard calls.

“We’ve got nacelle stresses at point oh one six and point oh one nine respectively,” LaBrea says.

“Copy that, LaBrea. Get to transporter room one and be ready to beam aboard any casualties,” Sheppard orders.

“Matter/antimatter fusion holding at negative six sigma plus or minus oh oh two seven,” Ensign Collins reports.

“Sir, we’ve got a faulty differential capacitor in the gravimetric manifold exhaust chamber,” Ensign T’Spall notices. “Seventeen minutes to isolate and replace.”

“You’ve got nine,” Sheppard says acknowledging the still active Red Alert, and waving the young Vulcan off while tapping his comm badge. “Captain,” he comms to Hadenbeer. “How soon will you need Warp capability?”

Devin's head glanced up at the ceiling, a wince crossed her face.

"That sounds like I am not going to have warp capability, Commander," she replied, "I would like to have it immediately. I am sending lieutenant Mell'a down to lend a hand with whatever difficulties you are experiencing to expedite matters."

Without a word Mell'a detached her grav platform and guided it to the turbolift as she tapped the communications console on her panel to join in on the conversation taking place in Engineering.

Engineering:

“Acknowledged Captain,” Sheppard replies, signing off and shouting to T’Spall, “Nevermind. We’ll replace it later. Bypassing exhaust and rerouting through ventral reservoirs.”

“Sir, that’ll disrupt keel short range sensors,” LaBrea advises.

“Alternatives?” the Chief Engineer demands.

“We can siphon plasma from the EPS conduits to directly power the nacelle injectors,” Dupree suggests.

“Or just ignore the faulty capacitor and limit Warp to six,” Mell’una comms through the engineering overhead speakers.

“Eight minutes,” T’Spall shouts from inside a Jeffries tube.

“Mell?” Shepard questions.

“Differential exhaust capacitors only kick in at Warp seven and above,” the Science Officer explains.

“Obviously,” Sheppard replies. “But the Captain needs Warp immediately.”

“So give it to her,” Mell says. “She can have up-to Warp six. Anything more and she’ll have to wait-“

“Seven minutes,” replies T’Spall.

“- seven minutes,” Mell’a replies.

Tapping his comm, Sheppard shakes his head with a grin. “Captain Hadenbeer, sorry about that. Warp is ready when you are,” he announces.

Hadenbeer's eyebrows rose fractionally as she glanced about the bridge.

"That...is good to hear," she replied. She was afraid to ask how much warp speed she was going to get and instead kept quiet on that score.

The turbolift slides open and Mell’una floats into Engineering on her hoverchair. “Sometimes the easy option is the best one,” she says. “Now, let’s figure out what caused that capacitor to blow.”

Meanwhile, back on the bridge:

"Klarth," Devin stated without turning to the doctor, "Whatever is about to happen I doubt very much we will be talking to anyone out there. Head to sickbay and prepare to receive patients."

"Of course Captain, said Klarth while he got up, "my place is in the sickbay." But he started leaving very slowly.

To the bridge in general she said, "All right, let's say we drop shields to receive survivors, what do we think is a likely outcome?"

Alia spoke up promptly. "Regulations say to stay shielded until we can determine the threat is gone, Captain." She paused, "But if we have a good guess where the cloaked ship is, we might be able to lower our shields briefly on one side and use the 'shadow' of our ship to beam survivors aboard. I suspect this will draw hostile fire, though, I cannot advise it."

Devin nodded in acknowledgment, "All right, so dropping shields is not an option at this time. Any more ideas?"

She glanced about the bridge to see if anyone had any ideas.

Klarth who hadn't quite left yet, turned around and said, "Could you release the gas from our bussard collectors? That might be enough to mask the sensors for a few seconds. With luck, by the time the Klingons could confirm we'd dropped shields, they'd already be back up"

Devin turned and regarded the Doctor, her cane made a gentle 'thump' on the deck.

"I will take that suggestion under advisement, Doctor," the Captain replied gently, "Now, Doctor, I would very much like you in Sickbay when we beam over survivors."

"Aye, aye Captain," said Klarth as he got in the turbolift and headed towards sickbay.

Transporter Room One:

LaBrea calibrates short range scanners to isolate lifeforms aboard the shuttlecraft, but the ship is still at Red Alert and the shields are disrupting the target lock algorithm. “LaBrea to Engineering,” she comms. “Sir, I have three life signs aboard the shuttle, but can’t get a lock with shields up. I have an idea. If we match a shuttlecraft shield frequency to the Lionheart’s, we can pass through ship shields and manually link up with the damaged runabout.”

“Negative, LaBrea,” Sheppard replies. “You’d be a sitting duck out there.”

“Sir, if the Klingon vessel drops its cloak, I’ll have time to re-engage the shuttle shields,” LaBrea says.

“They’ve already disabled a runabout. A shuttle can’t survive an attack even with shields,” Sheppard counters.

“But sir,” LaBrea interjects. “If the Klingons drop their cloak, the Lionheart can target their weapon systems.”

Sheppard pauses a moment, considering, then comms the bridge. “Captain, we may have a plan,” he says, and explains LaBrea’s idea.

"We will implement that plan," Devin stated, "Although I am amending it to where a runabout will be employed."

She turned to Junix, "Commander, assemble a team and take a runabout over," she glanced at Ull, "Two full squads seems like overkill and would just crowd the runabout. One should suffice."

Junix Qetzal nodded and made an indication to Lt Commander Arkyn that he should follow her, "Have one security team join us in Shuttle Bay One," she said and called Sickbay as the turbolift doors opened, "I need a doctor for an away mission - join us in Shuttle Bay One."

Ull tapped his combadge. "Security Team One meet me in Cargo Bay One, loaded and ready to assist he Kwango." One his way to Shuttle Bay One Ull stopped by a ready locker and pulled his one phaser and holster. He then grabbed an extra one in case Junix wanted it.

Meanwhile on the bridge, Alia suggested, "We could also time a wide spread of photon torpedoes near the damaged ship. It might be enough to keep them back for a crucial moment or two and interfere with their targeting computers if we time it right. We can beam survivors over if we time it carefully with the torpedoes."

"My tactical officer is proposing a technical solution and Operations desperately wants a spread of photon torpedoes," Hadenbeer noted with some amusement. Then more seriously, "You are still talking about lowering shields, lieutenant on the promises of 'ifs' and 'maybees'. We have a plan and will run with it."

"Aye aye, Ma'am!" She felt her face flush with mild embarrassment but went to her tasks with a will.
Sickbay:

When Klarth got off of the turbolift he sprinted to the sickbay. He almost ran into a careless crewman or two, but managed to avoid them. Getting hit by a Klingon at that speed would have put them in his sickbay for sure. Klarth had a flashback to a time when Captain Hadenbeer had shown Kalrth something called football. Klarth had remarked at the time that Klingons would make such good linebackers that the quarterbacker would never get to throw the ball...When Klarth got to sickbay he was barely winded, his eight chambered heart and 3 lungs were still good for something, he thought to himself. He spotted S'Lace and said "Report!"

"There is an irate Klingon in Sickbay," S'Lace noted dryly, but only loud enough so he could hear. She raised her voice a fraction and said, "Everyone is, of course, curious to know what is going on ab-"

Klarth only had time to give S'Lace a look. Before Hadenbeer chimed in, he was actually pleased that S'Lace was using humor.

Junix's voice cut in from above: "I need a doctor for an away mission - join us in Shuttle Bay One."

Go to sickbay, go to the shuttle bay. Klarth felt like a cadet getting hazed by his superior officers. But he just said "acknowledged on my way." He grabbed a med kit and was running down the corridor again. Holding onto the medkit like a football he shouted "Make way everyone....Coming through!" but he was also fantasizing that he was a linebacker that had intercepted the ball and was running down the line to glory!

Devin listened as the Kuokanjoki was reported leaving shuttle bay one, her mind was on the mystery opponent out there. And she knew they were out there. This was a trap.

The question was, had they sussed it out properly, or were there more layers to it...

 

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