On the bridge of the Iconian Battle Cruiser the captain had a large smile on his face. There was a party about to start, and who could blame the crew for being excited. He turned to the watch commander and signaled that he had control, and then promptly left the bridge.
On the large hanger deck the support craft had been moved to one side and stacked on top of each other. Over half of the crew had congregated here for the banquet. Music, food, and friends had come to celebrate their fortune. The captain’s daughter stood by him as they entered. The large doors leading to the exterior of the ship opened, as was customary to view the stars at such an event. Then, for reasons that the crew only had moments to contemplate, the force shield around the opening dropped. The crew was blown out the opening, as the captain tried desperately to hold on to a bulkhead with one hand, and pull his daughter up with the other. Suddenly his grip slipped and both fell, tumbling towards open space. The force field reactivated, slamming the girl into the energy barrier, but cutting her father in two. As she watched his lower half drift away, she screamed.
"Malory, you've got about fifteen minutes to find that problem or we're cutting her loose."
The voice echoed in her helmet as she glided across the electro magnetic tether from one ship to the other. '15 minutes' she thought to her self, 'no problem.'
It was these kinds of time frames that made her enjoy every job they picked up. Like salvaging a Menthe battle cruiser from the accretion disk of a black hole. If she could do that, then this was simple.
When she reached the derelict ship, she climbed through an access hatch next to where the tether was locked in place. It was standard for warp tugs to have tractor beams, but the captain felt the tether was more appropriate. Something about the proper way to do things, and keeping with the traditions of the sea fearing salvage crews of Earth centuries before. In this case, it was a blessing.
Malory made her way to engineering and brought the diagnostic consul online. The problem was obvious immediately.
"Phipps, the subspace array is drawing power from the tether. We must have locked it right on top of umbilical port."
"And the ship?" asked Phipps.
"Without the warp drive to push her out, the ship appears to be sinking into subspace."
"Alright, get back to the tether, we're unhooking her."
"No way, it took us 6 months to find her in the middle of that split pea soup you call a nebula." she replied rebelliously, "I am not about to let her go now."
She began to work out the problem in her head, trying to find a solution. Cut power to the array maybe? No... the damage had already been done. Shunt power through to the deflector array? Not a chance, it would be more likely to blow the ancient hulk to pieces. Then it hit her. You couldn't pull her out of subspace; it would be like dragging a boat through the sand. But she could push herself. If only she could get the core back online. She had the fuel for the fire; she just needed to spark it.
"Phipps, have Franklin shunt more power through the tether, I'm going to try to cold start the core."
"What?" he responded quickly, "That thing hasn't been hot for thousands of years. Malory, we know your good but you can't fix everything. Now get back to the tether so we can get you out of there."
"It will work, just trust me." and with that she closed the comm line. She waited a minute to see that the power levels began to rise, and set to work to pull a miracle out of her ass. She would have to do this manually, and the timing had to be precise. First she opened the matter flow regulators, then crossed to the other side of the core to the antimatter flow regulators and watched the power levels. They climbed slowly, 25%, 26%. At 30% the containment chamber would kick in, but not for long. The computer would read that the core was dead and shut down the field to conserve power. A split second chance and that was it. 28%, she thought about her family back home on Earth. 29%, she thought about her crew, who would be caught in the blast if this didn't work. 30%, she released the antimatter, closed her eyes and prayed.
She opened her eyes and saw the core. It was still intact. She looked around as consoles came online, systems started working. The warp field created by the core stabilized the ship where it was, and began to push it back out into normal space. She opened the comm line with a big grin on her face.
"Oh Phipps..."
"Yeah yeah, you're a god damned genius. Now get your ass back here so I can congratulate you then kick it."
The trip back to the Outpost 7 took far less time then they had thought. Although it helped that the derelict now had its own warp field, so they weren't towing dead weight. The retired Starfleet tug still had a lot of power, and gruelingly pulled their prize into orbit two weeks after pulling her out of the Men'karian Nebula. Mallory was looking over her engines, it had been far too long since they had a proper overhaul, but she made due with what was available.
She knew when she returned to the Sonoma, she would get chewed out by Phipps. She was used to it, but it still annoyed her a bit.
"When I tell you to return to the ship, you do it Mallory." he said, raising his voice. "You're too valuable to risk your neck like that. And that stunt you pulled, if you were off by just a few milliseconds you could have killed us all."
"But I didn't, did I?" she replied, looking over engine diagnostics. "And that’s why I'm part of this crew, because I can do exactly that."
Phipps' eyes narrowed on her, knowing she was right, but still wanting to strangle her for it. And he'd be the one to do it. He was human of course, but had grown up on a denser planet then earth. This made him somewhat stockier then the average human, but also much stronger. He was also an ex-Starfleet marine, and was a Master Gunnery Sergeant before he resigned. He still donned the Marine Corps crew cut, and his 'uniform' as it were, was always neatly pressed. 'Some habits die hard I guess' thought Mallory. She, on the other hand, was tall, slender, and agile. She was about a head and a half taller then Phipps, and moved around with a grace and elegance that was reserved for the elven kind in the stories from her childhood. She had long, dark hair, with blond streaks through it, and eyes that made people wonder if she was more then human.
"And besides," she continued, "No one got hurt, and that hulk is worth a couple hundred bricks of latinum. That’s 20 bricks a piece. Worth it I'd say."
"Alright fine, anything in the way of technology or information useful for us?"
"It's hard to tell," she said, handing him a PADD. "The systems are still mostly inert. It looks like something knocked out most of the processing systems, making them useless. We did manage to do a core dump that was fairly well protected."
"Anything good?"
"The twins are still looking over it, trying to translate it. But they found one thing of interest." she replied, looking towards the PADD.
Phipps read what was on the small screen, and nearly fainted. "An Iconian fleet?"
"We believe so. It seems they were locked in some sort of temporal trap just outside the galactic barrier. The reason no one has come across them before is that we can't cross the barrier."
"Is it even safe to go near it anymore? I mean what with that entity the Enterprise-D crew came in contact with?"
"As far as the history books say, that crew destroyed the being known as O. So although the barrier still stands, it should be safer to cross it now."
"Alright, get all the information you can. I'll arrange to use one of the rec-centers on the outpost to brief everyone while the engineers go over the ship."
"Yes sir," she said as she started typing commands into the computer. An Iconian fleet... what a prize.
Two hours later, the 20 people that made up the crew of the Sonoma had gathered in Rec-Center 4. It was an odd assortment of people, only 6 of which were Human. There were, of course the twins, a pair of Bynars who served as their computer experts, which seemed only fitting considering they were almost computers themselves. The rest of the crew was surprisingly comprised of 4 Klingons, 3 Romulans, 4 Cardassians, and a Ferangi who always told them when he felt the cost of the job was getting to high. Mallory stood in front of the crew next to Phipps and looked each one in the eyes. They were tired, that was readily apparent. They had been on that ship for almost a year and a half, jumping from one job to the next, and the prospect of another year was enough to cause even Mallory to shudder.
"Alright," Phipps called their attention. "First of all I'd like to say good job on the last run. You all deserve a break with how long we've been out here. However, something has been brought to my attention."
The screen behind him came on and showed a map of the galactic edge. As it moved closer, you could see 5 points just outside the barrier.
"This was taken from the computer core of the derelict we just brought in. Turns out she's a Hur'q ship and she was spying on the Iconians." Phipps paused a moment to let the name sink into their minds. Even the Klingons became obviously agitated, but probably more because of the Hur'q then the Iconians.
"These coordinates, according to the Hur'q database, is a fleet of 5 Iconian battle cruisers. They were trapped outside the barrier during the last great Daemon war while the Egyptians were only dreaming of the pyramids." Again, he paused, as if deciding to say next. "Now, like I said, you all deserve a break. To ask you to go on this run wouldn't be right, and we don't know for sure if the fleet is still there or not."
"Where else would it go?" asked Daimon Grund, practically drooling at the possibilities.
"That’s where the hard part comes in. The same barrier that is separating us from our prize could have easily destroyed it thousands of years ago. So here's my offer. Even split, straight across the board. Anyone who doesn't want to go will wait here for us to get back. And you'll have my 20 bricks of the last haul to split and live off of. So think about it, and we'll vote."
As they all talked amongst themselves as Mallory walked among them. Salvage crew's had a tendency to be more superstitious then most crews, and what she overheard showed just how much. "Daemons I tell you, that’s all they are." said one Cardassian. "And what about that insane Q out there?" "Calls himself O from what I've heard."
Then Mallory heard it, that little spark that usually got the whole crew excited. "With all we've been through, I'd like to see a daemon try and take us."
The vote was unanimous, the whole crew was going.
On the large hanger deck the support craft had been moved to one side and stacked on top of each other. Over half of the crew had congregated here for the banquet. Music, food, and friends had come to celebrate their fortune. The captain’s daughter stood by him as they entered. The large doors leading to the exterior of the ship opened, as was customary to view the stars at such an event. Then, for reasons that the crew only had moments to contemplate, the force shield around the opening dropped. The crew was blown out the opening, as the captain tried desperately to hold on to a bulkhead with one hand, and pull his daughter up with the other. Suddenly his grip slipped and both fell, tumbling towards open space. The force field reactivated, slamming the girl into the energy barrier, but cutting her father in two. As she watched his lower half drift away, she screamed.
"Malory, you've got about fifteen minutes to find that problem or we're cutting her loose."
The voice echoed in her helmet as she glided across the electro magnetic tether from one ship to the other. '15 minutes' she thought to her self, 'no problem.'
It was these kinds of time frames that made her enjoy every job they picked up. Like salvaging a Menthe battle cruiser from the accretion disk of a black hole. If she could do that, then this was simple.
When she reached the derelict ship, she climbed through an access hatch next to where the tether was locked in place. It was standard for warp tugs to have tractor beams, but the captain felt the tether was more appropriate. Something about the proper way to do things, and keeping with the traditions of the sea fearing salvage crews of Earth centuries before. In this case, it was a blessing.
Malory made her way to engineering and brought the diagnostic consul online. The problem was obvious immediately.
"Phipps, the subspace array is drawing power from the tether. We must have locked it right on top of umbilical port."
"And the ship?" asked Phipps.
"Without the warp drive to push her out, the ship appears to be sinking into subspace."
"Alright, get back to the tether, we're unhooking her."
"No way, it took us 6 months to find her in the middle of that split pea soup you call a nebula." she replied rebelliously, "I am not about to let her go now."
She began to work out the problem in her head, trying to find a solution. Cut power to the array maybe? No... the damage had already been done. Shunt power through to the deflector array? Not a chance, it would be more likely to blow the ancient hulk to pieces. Then it hit her. You couldn't pull her out of subspace; it would be like dragging a boat through the sand. But she could push herself. If only she could get the core back online. She had the fuel for the fire; she just needed to spark it.
"Phipps, have Franklin shunt more power through the tether, I'm going to try to cold start the core."
"What?" he responded quickly, "That thing hasn't been hot for thousands of years. Malory, we know your good but you can't fix everything. Now get back to the tether so we can get you out of there."
"It will work, just trust me." and with that she closed the comm line. She waited a minute to see that the power levels began to rise, and set to work to pull a miracle out of her ass. She would have to do this manually, and the timing had to be precise. First she opened the matter flow regulators, then crossed to the other side of the core to the antimatter flow regulators and watched the power levels. They climbed slowly, 25%, 26%. At 30% the containment chamber would kick in, but not for long. The computer would read that the core was dead and shut down the field to conserve power. A split second chance and that was it. 28%, she thought about her family back home on Earth. 29%, she thought about her crew, who would be caught in the blast if this didn't work. 30%, she released the antimatter, closed her eyes and prayed.
She opened her eyes and saw the core. It was still intact. She looked around as consoles came online, systems started working. The warp field created by the core stabilized the ship where it was, and began to push it back out into normal space. She opened the comm line with a big grin on her face.
"Oh Phipps..."
"Yeah yeah, you're a god damned genius. Now get your ass back here so I can congratulate you then kick it."
The trip back to the Outpost 7 took far less time then they had thought. Although it helped that the derelict now had its own warp field, so they weren't towing dead weight. The retired Starfleet tug still had a lot of power, and gruelingly pulled their prize into orbit two weeks after pulling her out of the Men'karian Nebula. Mallory was looking over her engines, it had been far too long since they had a proper overhaul, but she made due with what was available.
She knew when she returned to the Sonoma, she would get chewed out by Phipps. She was used to it, but it still annoyed her a bit.
"When I tell you to return to the ship, you do it Mallory." he said, raising his voice. "You're too valuable to risk your neck like that. And that stunt you pulled, if you were off by just a few milliseconds you could have killed us all."
"But I didn't, did I?" she replied, looking over engine diagnostics. "And that’s why I'm part of this crew, because I can do exactly that."
Phipps' eyes narrowed on her, knowing she was right, but still wanting to strangle her for it. And he'd be the one to do it. He was human of course, but had grown up on a denser planet then earth. This made him somewhat stockier then the average human, but also much stronger. He was also an ex-Starfleet marine, and was a Master Gunnery Sergeant before he resigned. He still donned the Marine Corps crew cut, and his 'uniform' as it were, was always neatly pressed. 'Some habits die hard I guess' thought Mallory. She, on the other hand, was tall, slender, and agile. She was about a head and a half taller then Phipps, and moved around with a grace and elegance that was reserved for the elven kind in the stories from her childhood. She had long, dark hair, with blond streaks through it, and eyes that made people wonder if she was more then human.
"And besides," she continued, "No one got hurt, and that hulk is worth a couple hundred bricks of latinum. That’s 20 bricks a piece. Worth it I'd say."
"Alright fine, anything in the way of technology or information useful for us?"
"It's hard to tell," she said, handing him a PADD. "The systems are still mostly inert. It looks like something knocked out most of the processing systems, making them useless. We did manage to do a core dump that was fairly well protected."
"Anything good?"
"The twins are still looking over it, trying to translate it. But they found one thing of interest." she replied, looking towards the PADD.
Phipps read what was on the small screen, and nearly fainted. "An Iconian fleet?"
"We believe so. It seems they were locked in some sort of temporal trap just outside the galactic barrier. The reason no one has come across them before is that we can't cross the barrier."
"Is it even safe to go near it anymore? I mean what with that entity the Enterprise-D crew came in contact with?"
"As far as the history books say, that crew destroyed the being known as O. So although the barrier still stands, it should be safer to cross it now."
"Alright, get all the information you can. I'll arrange to use one of the rec-centers on the outpost to brief everyone while the engineers go over the ship."
"Yes sir," she said as she started typing commands into the computer. An Iconian fleet... what a prize.
Two hours later, the 20 people that made up the crew of the Sonoma had gathered in Rec-Center 4. It was an odd assortment of people, only 6 of which were Human. There were, of course the twins, a pair of Bynars who served as their computer experts, which seemed only fitting considering they were almost computers themselves. The rest of the crew was surprisingly comprised of 4 Klingons, 3 Romulans, 4 Cardassians, and a Ferangi who always told them when he felt the cost of the job was getting to high. Mallory stood in front of the crew next to Phipps and looked each one in the eyes. They were tired, that was readily apparent. They had been on that ship for almost a year and a half, jumping from one job to the next, and the prospect of another year was enough to cause even Mallory to shudder.
"Alright," Phipps called their attention. "First of all I'd like to say good job on the last run. You all deserve a break with how long we've been out here. However, something has been brought to my attention."
The screen behind him came on and showed a map of the galactic edge. As it moved closer, you could see 5 points just outside the barrier.
"This was taken from the computer core of the derelict we just brought in. Turns out she's a Hur'q ship and she was spying on the Iconians." Phipps paused a moment to let the name sink into their minds. Even the Klingons became obviously agitated, but probably more because of the Hur'q then the Iconians.
"These coordinates, according to the Hur'q database, is a fleet of 5 Iconian battle cruisers. They were trapped outside the barrier during the last great Daemon war while the Egyptians were only dreaming of the pyramids." Again, he paused, as if deciding to say next. "Now, like I said, you all deserve a break. To ask you to go on this run wouldn't be right, and we don't know for sure if the fleet is still there or not."
"Where else would it go?" asked Daimon Grund, practically drooling at the possibilities.
"That’s where the hard part comes in. The same barrier that is separating us from our prize could have easily destroyed it thousands of years ago. So here's my offer. Even split, straight across the board. Anyone who doesn't want to go will wait here for us to get back. And you'll have my 20 bricks of the last haul to split and live off of. So think about it, and we'll vote."
As they all talked amongst themselves as Mallory walked among them. Salvage crew's had a tendency to be more superstitious then most crews, and what she overheard showed just how much. "Daemons I tell you, that’s all they are." said one Cardassian. "And what about that insane Q out there?" "Calls himself O from what I've heard."
Then Mallory heard it, that little spark that usually got the whole crew excited. "With all we've been through, I'd like to see a daemon try and take us."
The vote was unanimous, the whole crew was going.
