Hide, Seek & Shoot!

Posted on Thu Dec 14th, 2023 @ 3:10am by Captain Mikoto Misaka & Lieutenant Commander Sonak & Commander Eila Juutilainen 'Illu' & Lieutenant James Henderson & Lieutenant Felicie Giehl

1,660 words; about a 8 minute read

Mission: The Search
Location: Main Bridge

"Captain's Log. It's been four days since we started our search for the Starship Bismarck. The Cardassians weren't kidding when they said that the Maquis were good at hiding. So far we've not seen a single trace of them or their activities.

It's becoming frustrating, I know they're out here!"

Mikoto drummed her fingers on the arm of her chair as she sat staring at the forward viewscreen. There seemed to be no sign of Maquis activity anywhere in their sensor range. She was starting to get annoyed, they had to be somewhere and they had to find them.

"Anything at all?" She asked outloud hoping someone would give her something to go off.

While Felicie had found herself at the back of the bridge at this moment, she kept quiet. She had no idea why they hadn't come across the Bismark. Sickbay was still stocked up and all of her officers were still on high alert ready for any casualties they may come across when they found the ship.

Eila sat in the first officer's chair next to Mikoto. Her attention was fixed to a PADD displaying real time sensor readings to her.

"So far, there's been no sign of the Bismarck or any other Maquis activity even on our long range sensors." She reported.

'Commander Sonak continued to monitor the sensor readouts, however it was his supposition that the sensor readings were being significantly affected by the spatial distortions common in this area of space.

"Trying to remain positive here," the doctor stated, clearing her throat lightly, "we haven't found anything yet, which while that means both good and bad news at the same time. Should lead to some credence they weren't just destroyed."

"For all we know they could be hiding right under our noses..." Mikoto replied. "The anomalies in this area of space have been known to interfere with starship sensors."

Suddenly the proximity sensor sounded loudly on the tactical console, quickly followed by the Ermiana taking phaser hits on her ventral shields. The ship automatically switched to Red Alert, darkening the bridge and causing the console lighting to change.

"We've got three maquis ships coming from under us. They're at point blank range Captain," The lieutenant at the tactical station reported. At the moment Commander Lurath was elsewhere, but there was no doubt he would be on his way to the bridge.

"How did we not see them?!" Mikoto exclaimed as the ship took more hits. "Hail them!"

The operations officer ran his finger across the ops console before looking back. "No response Captain."

"Ok then, we'll let's get their attention another way. Target their weapons and engines." She ordered. "Fire phasers to disable."

"Firing Phasers," The tactical officer reported. The bright orange beams of energy erupted from the phaser banks. Several of their shots missed only one hit on the third Maquis vessel.

"Sorry Captain, they're much faster than us. Only minimal damage to their shields..." The Ermiana shook again as the Maquis raiders turned and fired simultaneously whilst forming a V-shaped formation.

"Helm, evasive maneuvers!" Eila ordered.

"Executing evasive manoeuvre Lambda-2-Alpha," James responded to the command quickly loading the pattern into the console. As soon as he hit execute, the ship pitched up and did a quarter roll so that both ventral and dorsal phasers could target both sides of the Maquis V formation and then dived down between the arms of the V.

He felt a slight lurch in his stomach as the inertial dampeners kicked in a split second after the Ermiana started her dive between the raiders

"Targeting phasers," Tactical said. Once again several beams of orange erupted from the phaser arrays on the hull, striking the Maquis vessels.

After the ship had passed through the fighters and made them scatter out of their formation, James programmed the next set of moves

"Defensive pattern Beta-4", he announced. The ship suddenly rolled back to a normal position and then climbed above the raiders. It also started a slow arc as it climbed so that this time, the fore and aft phasers could target the raiders.

The main phaser arrays opened fire, striking down the Maquis ships.
"All three ships have been disabled Captain." The Lieutenant at tactical reported. "They're drifting."

Mikoto stood up and tool a step forward. "Right, now let's see if they'll talk..."

The Ops officer opened up a channel.

"This is Captain Mikoto Misaka of the Federation Starship Ermiana. Your ships are disabled, surrender and prepare to be boarded." She said simply. She then waited for a response. However only got silence in return.

"Right, well let's take them into custody." Mikoto said. "Helm, take us in close. Once we're in range we'll transport their crews aboard." She said

"Aye Captain," James responded and moved the ship closer to the disabled raider. As soon as the ship was inside of 40,000km James turned around

"Inside transporter range Captain."

"I'll head to sickbay. Either send them to Sickbay under escort, or I'll find them in the Brig," Felicie commented as she excused herself from the Bridge to tend to the injured.

"Lowering shields for transport," the tactical officer said. It was at that moment that the Ermiana shook violently as she was struck by a volley of photon torpedoes striking the nacelles and upper saucer section. The tactical console exploded, throwing the young officer away from his station.

Several of the aft consoles showered their occupants in sparks, the mission Ops console also exploded outwards. The crew were taken completely by surprise as the viewscreen showed the USS Bismarck zooming right over their head and now turning to face them.

Mikoto coughed on smoke from the explosions. "So, it was all an ambush!" She coughed. "Damage report?"

------------------------------
Scene: Turbolift
------------------------------

Felicie had been in the turbolift when the ship was struck. She was thrown against the bulkhead, smacking her head in the process. Pain coursed through her body as she righted herself. Her nimble fingers palpitated the area and realized that there was a gash and a contusion forming. All capable of being dealt with once she got to Sickbay. The turbolift power though flickered and the turbolift sputtered to a stop. She tapped her badge. "Bridge, Giehl here, we've lost power in the turbolift. Can you reroute power or should I continue on my own?" she asked.

[Bridge]

"Critical hits to port Nacelle, minor damage to Starboard Nacelle, weapons array took a direct hit. We've lost phaser, shields, long range communications and warp drive." The officer at Operations reported. "Injurues are being reported on all decks, they really did a number on us there...."

Mikoto sighed. The Ermiana was now a sitting duck at the mercy of the Maquis.

"The Bismarck is hailing us..."

Mikoto looked around her bridge, it had taken damage just like the rest of the ship. "On screen, get those shields back up!"

The viewer switched from the image of the Bismarck bearing down on them to that of a man who seemed to be in his early thirties.

"Why hello Captain Misaka. You didn't see that coming did you?" He smirked. He seemed to be very satisfied with his accomplishment. "And I thought that a Galaxy Class would be harder to take down. Such a shame really."

"And what gives you the right to attack us?!" Mikoto demanded.

"Right? RIGHTS!" He exclaimed angrily. "Don't lecture me on rights Captain! What gave the Federation the rights to give our homes to the Cardassians! What gives them the right to displace our families from their homes?!"

"Look," Mikoto started. "I'm not here to debate the treaty with you. I'm here to take back that Starship you stole." She narrowed her eyes at the man.

"You think I'm going to give it back?" He laughed.

"No, I didn't expect you to willingly. But do tell me this, where is the crew? Did you kill them? A Starfleet crew would defend their ship to the very end!" Mikoto asked.

"Captain, captain. We may be outlaws, but we're not cold blooded murderers. The Bismarck crew are back at our base. They are our... guests... well apart from their Captain. I keep her here, someone needed to provide me with the codes to operate the ship!" He snarled. "Speaking of which. That's a pretty ship you have there. I think I'll take it..."

"You're not taking anything!" Mikoto said clenching her fist.

"You don't have a choice. Surrender and prepare to be boarded!". The viewscreen changed back to show the Bismarck. One by one behind her more and more Maquis raiders started to drop out of warp.

Mikoto clenched her fists, digging her fingernails into her palms. She walked slowly back to her chair and opened a shipwide communication.

"All hands. This is the Captain. Initiate internal defence protocols. Set weapons to heavy stun and lockdown all systems. Prepare for incoming intruders. Do NOT let them take control of this ship!" She ordered. She then turned to the rest of her bridge crew. "Lock out your consoles, lock out all command and control systems a d arm yourselves!"

Eila rose from the first officer's chair.

"Captain, if I might suggest performing a master system lockout." She suggested. "It will require us to head to main engineering just as if we were to arm the auto-destruct sequence. From there, we'd need to scatter; so if one of us gets captured, they can't unlock the ship's systems without the other."

"Computer." Mikoto said outloud. "Lock out all command functions, Authorisation Misaka-Red-Alpha-Tango."

She looked at Eila. "Luckily these days we can do that from the bridge too," she said.

"Command and Control functions locked." The computers voice replied. Mikoto made her way over to the phaser lockers and pulled out a hand phaser, she tossed them out to the bridge crew.

"Incoming transporter signals! All decks!" The officer at tactical announced.

"Stand ready!" Mikoto ordered.

To be continued...

RSS Feed