Prophets and Loss - Chapter 12
Chapter 12
Planet Ba’ku
Dorian Mountains
Bajora-Tavan Attack Ship Drosov
As the overloading phaser screamed, Prylar-Captain Bral readied himself to embrace the hereafter. He looked at his crew, holding their firing positions behind what cover they could find, all of them unwilling to abandon either Bral or their ship to flee the coming explosion. His chest swelled with pride at their courage and tenacity.
However, Bral’s refusal to capitulate tore at him. Could he let them die this way, sacrificed for his own conceit, simply because he was unwilling to surrender to this woman?
The Little Orb had given him access to Ensign Shanthi’s thoughts. Bral had tasted the young man’s hopes and fears, and found that despite the fact that the information contained in his mind regarding Bajor contradicted nearly everything Bral held sacrosanct, the prylar-captain could not discount it completely.
The mind of an agent sent intentionally to mislead them would have, should have contained volumes of misinformation about the supposed liberation of Bajor from the Cardassians. Instead, to Shanthi, matters of Bajoran history and politics were minor footnotes, trivia that were of little importance to the ensign. Unfortunately, that made it all the more credible to Bral.
He did not fear death. Every Bajora-Tavan was raised from birth prepared to give their lives as martyrs upon the pyre of Bajor’s freedom. However, his death and that of his crew at this time and in this place would not help his people to accomplish that goal. And if Bajor had been freed already, in defiance of prophecy, Bral had to know how and why this had come about.
Damning his own insatiable curiosity, Bral raised a hand, “I yield!” he shouted over the weapon’s piercing yowl.
Ramirez jammed the toggle down that would bleed the weapon’s excess charge into its heat-sink, stopping the overload mere seconds before it would have become irreversible. She dug the weapon’s emitter into Bral’s neck, “Your word,” she breathed savagely in his ear. “Swear on the Prophets that you’ll release my people and give them medical care.”
“I swear it. Upon the Prophets, upon Sacred Bajor, you have my oath.” There was no trace of fear or desperation in the man’s voice, only muted resignation. To his men he called, “Free the prisoners and bring them here quickly. Get their doctor her equipment and help her see to their wounded.”
*****
USS Gibraltar
Ba’ku System
The Briar Patch (Klach D'Kel Brakt)
The Ru’afo’s first salvo hammered Gibraltar’s aft shields with such force that the entire ship bucked. Sandhurst was thrown forward against his chair’s safety restraints, his surprised exhalation drown out by a chorus of gasps and grunts from others on the bridge.
“Rear screens holding at seventy-four percent,” Tark noted dourly from the Tactical console.
“Return fire, aft torpedoes and phasers,” Sandhurst commanded. He watched the aft view on the main screen as a volley of three crimson photons rifled towards the oncoming Son’a battlecruiser. The torpedoes flared ineffectually against the enemy’s shields, followed by orange phaser beams raking across Ru’afo’s forward grid an instant later that proved equally impotent.
At Ops, Juneau struggled to keep her voice even as she announced, “Negligible damage to their shields, Captain.”
“Helm, evasive maneuvers.” Sandhurst turned around to face Tark. “How long will it take to move our allotment of quantums to the aft launcher?”
Continuing to fire at the pursuing Son’a, the Tellarite referenced his board. “The warheads are too unstable for site-to-site transport and transition to the aft magazine will take upwards of five minutes through the internal transfer conduits, sir.”
“That’s too long,” Sandhurst groused, “We’ll have to come about and bring the forward launcher to bear to have any chance of hurting—“
The ship lurched again, the bridge lights flickering as EPS waveguides overloaded somewhere below decks. “Engineering to bridge, we’re in danger of losing the port/aft EPS coupling. We’re going to have to put Decks 9 through 15 on auxiliary power until we can affect repairs.”
Sandhurst frowned, acknowledging the report as he gestured for Ashok to head for Engineering. The relieved looking Bolian rushed for the lift as the captain swiveled around to address the chief petty officer manning Helm. “Chief, forty-five degree down pitch on the bow, reduce thrust by ten percent, we want to bring them in closer.”
‘Closer?’ Pell mouthed the silent question from her station as she monitored a growing number of damage reports filtering in from across the ship.
“We’re more maneuverable,” he explained. “I have to put some distance between us if we’re going to make a dent. In order to do that I have to draw them in and tuck under them.”
Pell risked leaving the relative safety of her seat to step up the command chair, bracing one hand on the safety railing and the other on Sandhurst’s armrest. In a low voice she urged, “We can’t fight them.”
Looking surprised, Sandhurst replied in an equally conspiratorial tone. “We most certainly can fight them, Ojana. We’ll lose, of course, but we’ll go down swinging.” He gave her a sharp look. “This is what you wanted, isn’t it, Commander? Better to die fighting than running?”
Before Pell could muster a reply, Sandhurst called out, “Helm, hard about, one-hundred eighty degree turn. Execute another forty-five degree down pitch as we come around.”
Another jolt sent Pell tumbling against the chair, where Sandhurst grabbed a hold of her and held tight as the nearby Engineering station sparked and crackled.
“Aft shields down to thirty-seven percent,” Tark advised. “Dorsal shields at eighty-three percent. Continuing phaser fire, all available banks.”
“Acknowledged,” Sandhurst said calmly as he released his grip on Pell. “Put a full spread of quantums in the forward tubes. Once we come around I want to give them everything we have.” Casting a glance back at Tark, he inquired, “Master Chief, what’s their forward shield strength?”
The wizened old NCO locked eyes with the captain, communicating the utter hopelessness of their situation wordlessly. “The Son’a regenerative shield strength is at ninety-four percent and climbing.”
*****
Bajora-Tavan Attack Ship Meressa
Ba’ku System
The Briar Patch (Klach D'Kel Brakt)
The Emissary watched as the Federation starship struggled to elude her attacker, laying down a flurry of desperate fire than did nothing to dissuade their pursuer. The Gibraltar pivoted sharply while pitching relative-downward, cutting back under the enormous crescent-shaped battlecruiser which was forced into a laborious loop to continue the chase. Ru’afo’s shields were peppered with photon impacts from the starship’s aft battery as she completed her protracted maneuver.
The prylar-captain of the Meressa called back to the Emissary/vadark. “Munificent One, should the Son’a vessel acquire an unhampered firing solution on the starship, there is little chance that we could retrieve the Bajoran from onboard before the ship is destroyed.”
“Then let us tell the Son’a about it. Tell our lead ships to target their weapons systems and open fire.”
“As you command, Emissary.”
*****
Alshain Battle Fleet
Mobile Assembly Station 1
The Briar Patch (Klach D'Kel Brakt)
The ancient mobile repair and refueling craft of the Exarchate had not been used in generations, so small had become the sphere of territory claimed by the Alshain. This foray into the Klach D’Kel Brakt signified the first significant acquisition by the Alshain in well over two centuries. In the space of eight weeks the Exarchate had effectively doubled the size of Alshain controlled space.
The Starforce had broken the back of the Son’a’s dwindling defenses two days earlier along the main front, and the surviving Ellora and Tarlac crewed ships had fled back into the nebula. Now the early Alshain forays into the cloud would be girded by the arrival of a full battle contingent of twenty-six vessels.
The main task force had moved ahead, leaving a handful of ships fresh from the fight behind to refuel and rearm.
The mobile base lowered its shields, allowing a damaged destroyer to slide into a repair birth next to a frigate that was being replenished after having unloaded its ordinance on a Tarlac colony only hours earlier. A swarm of automated refurbishment drones surrounded the destroyer, mending its hull and swapping out battered shield generators.
The patrol ships at the assembly station’s defense perimeter hadn’t been given a chance to report, their comms had been jammed in order to preserve the element of surprise.
Without warning, streams of photon and quantum torpedoes issued forth from the surrounding nebula, slamming into the vulnerable assembly station and many of the surrounding warships. Enterprise, Lexington, Kumari and Zhukov raced from their hidden positions, slashing through the remaining vessels in a storm of darting phaser beams and flaring torpedo strikes.
Explosions and spinning wreckage filled the viewer as Picard watched the carnage unfold. He reflected that it would be a shame to end his career this way, cashiered out of Starfleet after igniting a war with the Alshain. Nine years earlier Picard himself had removed Captain Benjamin Maxwell from command of the starship Phoenix after Maxwell had provoked hostilities with the Cardassian Union. The bitter irony that Picard now found himself in similar circumstances set like a dead weight in the center of Jean-Luc’s stomach.
A handful of surviving Alshain war-craft made a break for it, racing for the nearest gas tendrils in a desperate bid to flee the ambush. Having anticipated just such a tactic, Picard had positioned the Lakota and Progress to cut off any such escape attempt. The starships’ withering fire turned the would-be escapees into scorched hulks drifting in the constant and uncaring hand of inertia.
Data summarized the ensuing destruction with mechanical precision, “One cruiser, one destroyer, four frigates, three scout ships and one mobile logistics platform destroyed, Captain.” Refraining from looking back at the ashen-faced Picard, Data added, “Sensors indicate fourteen escape vehicles in the vicinity, sir.”
“Fourteen,” Picard echoed numbly. He cleared his throat, “Make arrangements for the Bethesda and Lexington to pick up survivors, Data.” Turning to look at Riker and Captain T’Agdi, Picard swallowed his discomfort. “Captain, Number One, let’s move to the observation lounge and select the next target package.”
*****
Ba’ku System
The Briar Patch (Klach D'Kel Brakt)
The two nearest Bajora-Tavan ships opened fire on the Son’a with a fusillade of photons, plasma canons, and phaser fire, illuminating the Ru’afo’s starboard shields with a dazzling display of aggression. The Son’a answered in kind, their dorsal weapons emplacements disgorging an onslaught that sent both corsairs reeling away, their shields overpowered by the battlecruiser’s firepower. Ru’afo then turned her attention back towards her quarry, only to find Gibraltar bearing down on them, having gone on the offensive.
*****
Son’a Battlecruiser Ru’afo
Ba’ku System
The Briar Patch (Klach D'Kel Brakt)
The Tarlac-led security team raced through the corridors towards Anij and Gallatin’s guest cabin, but as they rounded the corner to their destination their movements became inexplicably impeded. It was like struggling through solidified air, and the alarmed guards began trying to activate their comms, only to find them inoperative when their hands finally managed to reach them.
Then the lights failed.
*****
Adhar Wuuten fumed as the Ru’afo’s disruptors hiccupped and stuttered, delivering only a fraction of their rated firepower on the starship. “What’s causing that?” he screamed in frustration.
“Our targeting sensors are now being affected by the power failures, sir. It’s acting like a cascading systems collapse, but it doesn’t seem to be slowed by firewalls or anti-invasive subrout—“
“Make it stop!” Wuuten shrieked.
Like an inexorable tide, the temporal field moved ever outward, causing system after system to falter. It was as if the entire ship were being placed in stasis, and it was happening right on the cusp of Wuuten’s victory.
*****
USS Gibraltar
Ba’ku System
The Briar Patch (Klach D'Kel Brakt)
“Master Chief, fire at will,” Sandhurst said, his voice harboring an unaccustomed edge. “Indulge yourself.”
“Aye, sir,” the Tellarite said, unloading a barrage of quantum torpedoes and phaser fire at the oncoming ship.
Ru’afo answered with a salvo of her own, one of her disruptor cannons managing to punch through Gibraltar’s faltering forward screens and scorching across the top of the saucer.
“Structural damage to sections 12-Bravo through 8-Delta, saucer starboard/dorsal section. Hull breach reported on Deck—“
Tark shouted over Juneau’s damage assessment, “Their forward shields are down to fifty-eight percent, sir. I think that’s the best we’re going to do.”
“Two photons followed by our last two quantums, Master Chief.”
Gibraltar launched a final forward volley as the smaller vessel ducked under its larger adversary. As the two ships swept past each other, the battlecruiser assailed the Constitution-class with a succession of disruptor blasts that savaged her dorsal shields and sent a cloud of fractured hull plating spinning into the vacuum behind the ship like a trail of confetti.
Alarms howled on Gibraltar’s bridge, and the normal lighting scheme had been abandoned in favor of red emergency illumination. Caustic smoke began to belch from a sizzling console while other workstations flickered randomly as power systems and isolinear computer functions struggled to reroute command and control priorities.
Someone had collapsed at the base of Sandhurst’s chair, and amidst the bedlam the captain casually leaned over to check for a pulse, his mind racing with various tactical permutations. The inert form belonged to Tark, whose weak, erratic pulse and terribly burned hands and forearms announced the demise of the stand-alone Tactical station behind the captain’s chair.
Sandhurst began to retract his safety harness when he saw Pell move up out of the well and take a seat at the auxiliary Tactical console. “I’ve got it,” she said. Some detached part of Sandhurst’s mind bemoaned that he would not have the opportunity to personally throw a few last torpedoes at his killers before the end came.
*****
“Get a stabilizer clamp on that conduit now!” Lieutenant Ashok was imposing enough already given his sheer size, but in the middle of the chaotic engine room bellowing orders he was positively fearsome.
Repair crews scurried throughout the adjoining compartments, scrambling to patch up the ship’s flagging systems even as the old girl continued to absorb more damage at the hands of the Son’a juggernaut.
“We’re losing flow pressure in the main reactor!” shouted one of Ashok’s specialists, who was monitoring the matter/anti-matter reaction chamber as she struggled to don a radiation-hardened bodysuit.
“Open the injectors another fifteen percent,” he ordered tersely. “Keep the pressure at a minimum of twenty-four kilopascals.”
“Dorsal and aft shields collapsing!” This from another engineer manning the master situation board. “Shield generators are overloading in sequen—“
Feeling very much like a firefighter from ages past, Ashok sprinted across the trembling deckplates, cutting the man off mid-sentence. “Shields won’t save us now. You’re just soaking fried generators with power needed to reinforce the structural integrity grid.”
“But, sir, the captain want—“
Grabbing the young field specialist by the back of his collar, Ashok shook him to dissuade that line of reasoning. “You let the captain fight the ship, Delski. Our concern is keeping her in one piece.” He lifted the man off his feet like a kitten carried by its scruff and eyed him intently. “My point is clear?”
“V- very,” Delski stammered.
Ashok let him go as someone else cried out, “Coolant line breach, Deck 8!”
*****
Dr. Murakawa had never expected to meet her fate like this. She’d always assumed that if she died in the line of duty, it would be serving aboard her beloved Sutherland with her friends and crewmates surrounding her. Instead, she was on an outdated escort locked in combat with an alien battlewagon.
Medical technicians and nurses flooded out of Sickbay in response to the first wave of casualty reports. Murakawa remained behind with the others, preparing for a mass-casualty scenario. Fortunately, the ship had been well stocked for this relief mission, though none had known at the time that their own personnel would end up being the beneficiaries.
It wasn’t that she didn’t trust the ship’s captain, or that Gibraltar’s crew was lacking, these things happened in Starfleet after all. Starships were damaged, destroyed, or went missing with harrowing regularity, even in peacetime. Theirs was a dangerous occupation.
It was more that she’d always relied on Captain Shelby to see her crew safely through whatever danger they’d encountered. She didn’t know this captain, and it seemed perfectly reasonable to expect that the man might have gotten in over his head.
Regardless, Murakawa had a job to do. Injured crew began to filter in, either carried on gurneys by medical teams or limping in supported by their crewmates. She began to scan the presumably broken arm of a young enlisted woman when the ship jolted from another weapons impact.
“WARNING: Hull breach on Deck 6 port/aft,” the computer announced, followed by Juneau’s voice from the bridge. “Containment fields in place and holding. Damage control and medical teams report to corridor intersection 6-Y.”
Without looking up, Murakawa raised her voice, ordering, “Yoichi and Frobrim, get some pressure suits on and get down there. Expect explosive decompression injuries.”
The hum of a site-to-site transporter beam became evident at the same time as the intercom blared, “Security to Sickbay, one critical injury incoming via transporter.”
As she was buffeted by yet another shock, Murakawa mused darkly, ‘At least it’s not another boring day at the office.’
*****
Alshain Heavy Cruiser Venska
Running cloaked within the Ba’ku System
The Briar Patch (Klach D'Kel Brakt)
Sutahr R’Voss and Captain Yejokk watched the ferocious dance between the starship and the battlecruiser, noting that the phalanx of smaller ships was now coming in range of the Son’a vessel.
Looking to his Klingon counterpart, the sutahr asked, “Impressions, Captain? Why would the Bajorans be involved here?” Both of them had heard Gibraltar’s unanswered hails to the compact, lethal-looking corsairs.
Yejokk held his own counsel for a moment, finally grunting with displeasure. “I cannot say, Sutahr. I am familiar with all known variants of Bajoran spacecraft, but I do not recognize these ships.”
Inspecting the Klingon’s posture and expression, R’Voss queried, “It does not trouble you to watch your allies being torn apart by the Son’a?”
Sneering, Yejokk laughed gruffly. “They are Martok’s allies, not mine. The people who provided you this cloaking device believe, as do I, that the Federation must be tamed.”
“You wish to see them destroyed?”
“No,” Yejokk replied, “That would not serve our goals.” His pulse quickening with the battle’s approaching conclusion, Yejokk gripped the handle of his d’k tahg. “The Federation is too vast for the Empire to easily occupy and control, and its collapse would create economic and political chaos for decades. No, we seek only to see the Federation humbled and its expansion halted.”
On the screen the starship was making another turn, coming about on what the spectators guessed would be her final attack run. Glittering ribbons of leaking atmosphere and radiation trailed the wounded vessel.
The Ru’afo loosed another salvo, but it was immediately apparent that something was amiss. The bolts of energy swam free of their emitters with a sluggish torpor, the power contained in the deadly blasts dissipating before they could strike the Federation ship.
Yejokk frowned, “That is… unusual.”
“Just so,” agreed R’Voss.
“Sutahr, sensors indicate the Son’a shields are collapsing.”
*****
Bajora-Tavan Attack Ship Meressa
Ba’ku System
The Briar Patch (Klach D'Kel Brakt)
Leaning forward in his uncomfortably cramped jump-seat, the Emissary looked on with satisfaction as the shield strength on the Ru’afo began to wane.
“Split our force, Prylar-Captain. Our ship and two others will recover the Bajoran from the Federation craft. The other five will teach the Son’a some much needed humility.”
The captain made the appropriate adjustments to their attack plan, utilizing the Emissary’s command override to instantly rally the other vessels in their flotilla.
*****
USS Gibraltar
Sandhurst snugged the emergency rebreather mask to his face, his watering eyes stinging from the pungent chemical-laced smoke that filled the bridge. Most of the consoles were dead, and the few crew still uninjured were trying to configure those workstations to take the place of the inoperative ones.
Her voice distorted by her own mask, Juneau said, “Captain, the Son’a ship has ceased fire and is moving away. They appear to have come under attack from the Bajorans.” She coughed, waving her hand to disperse the drifting smoke above her terminal. “I’m also reading three Bajoran ships on approach with us.” Giving the captain a frustrated shrug, she noted with a hint of finality, “Our shields are still down.”
Plazzi looked up from where he lay beneath the Science station, attempting to bring that console back to life. “This was your plan? Fly in circles until the enemy gets so frustrated they starting shooting at each other?”
Looking down at the older scientist, Sandhurst directed a wry smile at Plazzi from behind his mask. “Innovative, no?” To Juneau he said, “Hail the Bajorans, tell them we appreciate their assistance, and we are formally reques—“
“They’re scanning the bridge, sir.” Juneau squinted at her readings, “It… it looks like they’re attempting a transporter lock.”
Sandhurst puzzled that over for the briefest of moments, before his eyes were drawn to Pell. She was kneeling over Tark, helping a med-tech apply derma-seal spray to the Tellarite’s burns.
Tapping his combadge, Sandhurst shouted, “Security team to the bridge.” He then gestured at Pell to back away from the fallen security NCO. Looking perplexed, Pell nonetheless complied.
“Computer, erect a level ten containment field around Lt. Commander Pell.”
A bluish cylinder of energy snapped into existence around Ojana, and the Bajoran woman stood, giving Sandhurst an expression equal measures concern and confusion.
There was a brief flash of ionization as a transporter beam tried to grab hold of Pell and was rebuffed by the containment field.
“Grab phasers people, we’re about to be boarded.” Sandhurst moved to the empty Helm console, reaching beneath it to procure the hand phaser stored there. Calling to Engineering, the captain urged, “Ashok, we need to get the shields back up. Nothing fancy, just enough to prevent transporter function.”
Sounding regretful, Ashok replied over the static filled comm, “We’re attempting to restore shield function right now, sir. I can’t give you even partial coverage for another half-hour… twenty minutes at the soonest.”
On the verge of castigating the engineer for something beyond his control, Sandhurst instead brought his phaser up as multiple fields of purple energy began to coalesce into Bajoran soldiers. “Nevermind,” he murmured absently, severing the comlink.
*****
) without getting lost and with out us getting lost. You're building a wonderful crescendo here!
but you pulled off an excellent effort this chapter. You've ratcheted up the tension nicely while successfully juggling all the balls you've got in play here.
But every now and then I get a flash of respect for him, like with that drawing-the-line line.
