The Border Banshee

[TheLoneRedshirt]

Wow! When Koth gets in a funk, he doesn't mess around. Good thing he has a Dr. McCoy around to repair the damage (a nice touch, that).

Guilt aside, Koth obviously has in mind to have his pound of flesh from someone on Kilo. I'm still in the dark about his relationship to Gunderson or SI but it seems he's on some kind of mission for somebody, mental state aside.

Looking forward to more!

 

[BrotherBenny]

Hey guys, I didn't realize it had been SIX WEEKS since I last posted on this story. Things have been really difficult for me recently and I will admit that I have been having a crisis of confidence. I'm not completely sure that's been taken care of, but I am still writing.

Without further ado, here is the next chapter...

__________________________________________________

Chapter Two

Star Station Kilo
Gethsemane System
Stardate 55871.6 (November 15, 2378)

Lord Byrn of the Akishi Confederation slammed his fist onto the table to punctuate his point, which he had been hammering into the assembled politicians and Border Service personnel for the better part of a duty shift. His opposite number, the alluring and venomous Premier Nunien of the Deronian Primacy, hissed in response and bared her arachnoid fangs. Admiral Gunderson wanted nothing more than to put them both in cages but her political brain forbade that, but a mischievous smirk made its way to her face and the warring planetary glanced at her quizzically.

'Is there something amusing?' Lord Byrn asked as he returned to his full standing height.

'Actually, yes. I was wondering if you would consent to being placed in cages and paraded around a zoo?'

'You call us animals?' the Deronian Premier took a menacing step closer, ignoring the security officers who raised their weapons in her direction.

'You're acting like animals,' Gunderson replied, looking at both of them, 'and I am only too willing to treat you as such. We have been in this room for almost seven hours and you have yet to provide me with any concrete proof of Akishi involvement in the massacre on your homeworld. All you have done is throw accusations around and I for one am tired of listening to it. If you have no intention of doing so, please leave and allow me to return to my regular duties.'

The two world leaders looked at her for a long moment before Nunien stepped back, took something from one of her aides, then inserted it into an interface on the table in the conference room. 'Here is your proof.'

All eyes turned to the screen which dominated the far wall and watched as three vessels suddenly appeared out of nowhere and began a strafing run on the planet's surface. As soon as the run was complete, the vessels disappeared as quickly as they had appeared, returning to their previous location, wherever that was.

'Those are not Akishi vessels. I have not seen that design before,' Lord Byrn said in a quiet voice that made even the loud Deronian Premier take notice.

She was about to counter his comment but Gunderson spoke first. 'I have.'

'They are yours?' Nunien accused.

'Allow me to clarify, Premier. I have seen designs which are very similar to this, but I can assure you that the ships this design is based on belong to a people which is not hostile to the Federation or yourselves. Will you allow the Federation access to Deronian territory in order to discover the truth behind these attacks?'

Nunien considered the offer and then nodded. 'Very well, but I warn you to beware of the mid system, where these ships appeared from, many ships have gone missing and not returned.'

'The ship will be careful, I assure you. If you will excuse me, I have an order to give.'

Gunderson left the politicians to be escorted back to their ships and quarters, and headed for a secluded area of the star station on the same level as the conference. After placing her hand on a panel set into the bulkhead, a hidden door slid open and she went inside. The room resembled an astrometrics laboratory and in essence it was exactly that, but the occupants of the room kept tabs on everything that occurred in the Kursican sector, including the political situation as it changed (which seemed to be daily). In addition, it allowed her to keep track of the spatial anomalies as they formed in the sector, in addition to the voids in space which accompanied them. A lot of the hard work had been done by Captain Archer and the crew of the pre-Federation Enterprise over two hundred years ago, to the point where she knew what to look for.

'Admiral, what can I do for you?' asked the Starfleet operative who ran the tactical array.

'Bring the Deronian system up please,' she answered and stared at the logo on the screen. 'What does that mean?'

The operative looked up and smiled. 'It is a reference to an intelligence-gathering outfit from the twenty-first century. It stands for Long-range Threat Assessment Command, usually shortened by Starfleet Tactical to LTAC.'

'So this is the LTAC Operations Center?'

'Yes ma'am.'

'Good to know,' she replied as the Deronian system appeared on the screen.

'Zoom in on the mid system. Premier Nunien mentioned a dangerous region of space where ships went missing.'

The operative, a former security officer of the Enterprise-D, entered a series of commands and brought up the relevant area. Nothing appeared amiss and she said as much.

'Have the computer track straight lines in all directions from the centre of that area and check to see if there are any spatial anomalies along them. I think we might have found another one of those spheres.'

'The computer is tracking now,' the woman said. 'It will take a few minutes.'

'Thank you, Commander...Sorry, what was your name?'

'Sandra Rhodes, ma'am.'

Gunderson nodded and looked up as the computer repositioned the view on the screen to a point almost a light year from the Deron system.

'There's your sphere, Admiral,' Lieutenant Commander Rhodes stated. 'I'll enter the rough coordinates for this one until our friends can give us a definitive answer.'

'How long before they get there?'

Rhodes consulted the computer. 'Another day or so, but I wouldn't recommend contacting them again so soon. Someone is bound to be monitoring all of our communications.'

'I didn't think anyone here had the ability to monitor our communications,'Gunderson replied.

'The Ynelavii Alliance is far more technologically advanced than we have given them credit for. One of the moons in this system has a spy satellite aimed in our direction. We have avoided making too much noise thus far, but accidents do happen and we might get caught with an errant transmission.'

'Why are they spying on us?'

'Probably the same reason we're spying on them,' Rhodes answered.

 

[TheLoneRedshirt]

Nothing wrong with your writing here! Gotta love Marge Gunderson. She's not one to mince words.

I like the spy-tech stuff. It makes sense that a station such as Kilo would have long-range observation capabilities.

An intriguing story!

 

[CeJay]

Gunderson is a no-nonsense kinda woman who doesn't put up with foolish politicking.

Looks like another mystery is waiting to be unraveled. Curious to see how this ties in with the Banshee.

 

[Mistral]

Whatever you're building-its helluva interesting. Still trying to sort the players out...

 

[BrotherBenny]

I know, I know, I've been remiss in posting anything on this. But rest assured that I will be doing so this year. I hope to have something up in the next week or so, depending on how my original writing goes.

 

[BrotherBenny]

Chapter Three

Star Station Kilo
Gethsemane System
Stardate 55886.1 (November 20, 2378)

The five starships were a beautiful sight to Admiral Gunderson. The Pytheas had stopped by the day before to drop off personnel and supplies and Captain Cheer had transferred command of the fleet to her in an official ceremony aboard the station. Star Station Kilo was now a fully manned and operational station. The Finback, Redhawk, Bonsai and Panama City would be undertaking exploratory and maintenance missions throughout the sector and the Brunel would be fixing anything that needed to be fixed. A Border Service Corps of Engineers vessel, the Brunel was the last of the Saber-class vessels built before the Dominion war and had been allocated to the Border Service instead of being scrapped.

While the Banshee was on its covert missions, the other ships would be making colony runs, assisting the Ynelavii Alliance where possible and patrolling the new Federation border for pirates and Cha’lav vessels, though according to Starfleet Tactical they were not likely to return to this area. The ward room was currently empty as she waited for the commanding officer of the Bonsai to arrive. The small Sequoia-class vessel, smaller than Starfleet’s Defiant-class starships, was to be her fast attack scout and backup to the covert operations of the Banshee.

Captain Andrew Banks entered the wardroom and Gunderson’s eyes widened in surprise. ‘Admiral, you wanted to see me?’

‘I thought you were regular fleet?’ Gunderson asked.

‘I was and so is my crew, but six escape pods carrying a total of nineteen people from the Weisskopf didn’t make it. They didn’t land anywhere and there is no evidence of debris. Starfleet Command approved my command of the Bonsai with as many crew as I could fit on board so we could find the missing people. After that, who knows.’

Gunderson smiled. ‘Well, I will help where I can but we have more immediate concerns at the moment. As you’re no doubt aware, we supposedly have a rogue Border dog on the loose.’

‘I heard about the Banshee’s actions. Do you want me to catch them?’

‘Heavens, no,’ Gunderson countered. ‘The Banshee is about as rogue as Captain Picard. What I am about to say will not leave this room, understood?’

‘Yes ma’am.’

‘The Banshee is working with Starfleet Tactical to counter a threat that Captain Archer stopped two hundred years ago.’

‘I’m going to need a little more than that, Admiral.’

‘The Xindi attack on Earth was orchestrated by a race known to them as the Guardians, a race we know as the Sphere Builders. They created an area of space called the Delphic Expanse to transform our space into theirs and it failed because of Captain Archer and his crew. The Expanse is now home to the Ferengi, Cardassians, Breen and Tzenkethi among others.

‘The Sphere Builders are back but the anomalies are not sufficiently widespread enough to cause too much trouble. It will only take a few more spheres for the thermobaric clouds to form and cut off the sector from the rest of the quadrant. We’re here to stop that happening. As of right now, the Banshee is in the Deron system looking for the sphere and trying to get the memory core inside it. I need you to go to the Deron system and pretend to be doing the same thing.’

‘May I ask why?’

‘I told Lord Byrne that I would send a ship to investigate and I haven’t officially done so yet because the Banshee is operating off the grid. You’ll be on station if the Banshee needs help, and you’ll keep the Deronians off my back for a while. The Ynelavii Alliance is fractious at best and I need to try and keep them together.’

‘Have you notified them of the Sphere Builders’ efforts?’

‘Not as yet, though it will be unavoidable if the thermobaric clouds begin to form.’

‘When do you expect that to happen?’

‘If the number of spheres increases by just three, it will be enough for the clouds to form. We haven’t found all of the spheres yet, but we know where the anomalies are for the most part. You’ll have access to everything we currently know as soon as your ship leaves the Gethsemane system.’

Banks nodded. ‘What do I tell my crew?’

‘Leave them in the dark about the specifics, but tell them that the Deronians are threatening to secede from the Alliance unless something is done about the massacre on their homeworld. You’re investigating where those ships came from.’

‘Which is true?’

‘Exactly,’ Gunderson replied. ‘The ships came from a void within the system and vanished as quickly as they appeared. I said I had seen the ships before to take the blame off the Akishi but I have no clue whose they were. I’m hoping that either you or the Banshee’s crew can give me that answer. Starfleet Tactical need something and so do the Alliance, they just don’t know it yet.’

‘Giving them another enemy to fight won’t do it?’

‘Not a faceless one. The Sphere Builders never really showed themselves and I need to know who is orchestrating this latest attack, whether it is the Sphere Builders themselves, a rogue faction, a race who stole their technology, anything will be helpful.’

‘We’ll find something.’

‘I hope you do, dismissed, Captain.’

Banks nodded and left the ward room, leaving Gunderson to wonder if any clue to the aliens’ identities would be found and if knowing it would do any good. Capturing one of the aliens or one of their ships would provide knowledge but the Deronian leadership were likely to want blood. The attack had killed thousands of people, destroyed an agricultural farming region and destroyed a shipyard. Other Alliance nations were already providing aid where they could and the Ynelavii were doing their best while still trying to understand the return of their savior.

The Ynelavii savior was not helping matters when he insisted that the Alliance be disbanded or that the Ynelavii use force to dominate the Alliance. The Federation Council had asked that she make every effort to cement the Alliance and have them join the Federation.

It was not an easy task.

 

[CeJay]

The Sphere Builders are back? That's not good.

Not sure yet how the Banshee going 'rogue' is fitting into all this.

 

[Mistral]

A swirling cloud of intrigue. Brother Benny doing what he does best. I love it.

 

[Kyhrk]

I had wondered what happened to the sphere builders. Good to see someone decided to continue on with them. Keep it up.