Captain's log, stardate 2409.0326.
For almost 30 years, Starfleet has been studying an area in Romulan space known as the Bassen Rift. The Romulans call it the Great Bloom.
In 2379, the rift was the site of a battle between Romulan Praetor Shinzon and the U.S.S. Enterprise-E. In that battle, a large amount of thalaron radiation was released.
Shinzon's ship was destroyed when a thalaron weapon he was attempting to use was destroyed by Commander Data of the Enterprise. Since then, Starfleet has been monitoring the spread of the thalaron radiation in the area.
Thalaron radiation is extremely dangerous: it consumes organic material at the subatomic level. Should the radiation remaining in the rift drift toward inhabited worlds, the loss of life would be catastrophic.
The Rafale has been ordered to the Bassen Rift, where we are to take detailed scans of the gas formations and measure the rate of spread of the thalaron radiation.
We've been warned to stay alert. Not only is the rift in Romulan space, but it also is known to disrupt subspace communications. If we encounter difficulty out there, Starfleet may not be able to help.
"Commander, we are now entering visual range of the Bassen Rift."
Jessica looked up from the computer display at the back of the bridge, turning her head toward her Oza helmsman. "Thank you, Mr. Wirstowx. Drop out of warp, and come to a full stop on the border of the rift."
Lieutenant Wirstowx nodded his response, not even turning to see his captain. Jessica smirked a little; it seemed Wirstowx's - and really, any Oza's - motto that "talk was cheap." With a gentle rumble, Jessica felt the hum of the warp engines fade away as the stars stopped streaking past on the viewscreen. She strode to the center chair and stood behind it, putting a hand on the head rest. She was still uncomfortable sitting in the chair; it still didn't seem right that she had been promoted so quickly, and it certainly didn't feel right to her to be in command of the Rafale, not when there had been plenty of crew on board with more time in service. She glanced to her left; sitting at the ship operations station, in his support red uniform, was Lieutenant Sonia. His head turned quickly back to his console; Jess could feel the tension in the air from him. He had been on the ship longer than her, and should have been the one to take command of the ship during the Vega crisis.
But when the shit hit the fan (as the human expression so eloquently went), Seymour couldn't be found, and Jessica had stepped up among the officers, blindly giving orders regardless of who was listening or their rank. The starboard nacelle had wound up being blown off, but the Rafale held together long enough to destroy the Borg ship and be rescued by the Merveille.
Seymour was found two days later, when the ship entered dry dock, in a jeffries tube.
Since that day, he always looked longingly at the chair, and at Jessica's chest, though for different reasons than most other men - namely, her three full pips instead of the one full and one empty she had and that he still wore. Whether it was jealousy or regret, Jessica didn't know, but it never seemed to affect his work. If anything, Seymour Sonia was a better officer now than he had been before Vega.
Jessica leaned forward, tapping the console on her armrest. "Command staff to the bridge." After a quick second, she pressed the button again. "Bridge to Engineering."
"Engineering here, go ahead ma'am" came a male voice in reply a few seconds later. Jessica sighed; it was no surprise that her chief engineer wouldn't answer up.
"Yes, have Commander Seurer report to the bridge, please?"
There was muffled cursing over the channel, and then a woman answered. "Ma'am, with all respect, I think I'd be more help down here. You don't need me on the bridge."
Jessica shook her head, smirking as the rest of the bridge crew snickered and muttered sarcastically under their breaths. "Right. We'll be sure to pass the notes to you from the briefing, then."
"Thanks, Cap'n!" The channel closed, and Seymour cleared his throat, making his disgust very clear.
"I know...paranoid."
"Can you blame her" Wirstowx asked from the helm in his deep, slow voice. "The last bridge..."
"Wirst...just stop. We all know." Jessica did her best to look at the viewscreen, not wanting to look around at the faces of her officers. Everyone knew why Jessica was in command, and why she had taken command from engineering at Vega. The bridge had taken a direct hit, sweeping the entire command crew out into space or vaporizing them in the explosion. Regardless, they had all died, and the bridge had been completely destroyed. Those who now manned the consoles, despite the fact that it was a brand new bridge, were still wary of the risk. Lieutenant Commander Seurer, the chief engineer, refused to stay on the bridge for any longer than she needed to be.
The Oza tilted his head in a nod, his attention back on the piloting controls.
The turbolift doors opened with a whoosh behind her, and St. Peter turned to see her Trill science officer exit, leading her Bajoran first officer onto the bridge. Lieutenant Nizeri Sano took her place at the science station at the rear of the bridge, while Commander Obruz Dossu took his place on the other side of the command chair, standing next to Jessica. Jessica looked up at him and smiled a little, before motioning with her head toward the green cloud on the viewscreen. "We're here."
Obruz nodded. "Pretty simple, right?"
Jessica shrugged. "That's what we've been told. There should be another ship here already, the Warwick. Communications in there are probably going to be jammed, but as long as they have a visual on us they'll recognize that we're taking over the survey for them so that they can get out of the radiation and check their systems before taking the survey back from us."
Obruz turned to the conn. "Helm, ahead, full impulse. Take us into the rift. Yellow alert, shields up." He crossed the bridge and sat down at the chair near the viewscreen, as close to the helm as he could in case he needed to jump in for a battle. Jessica hoped it wouldn't be needed.
Seymour Sonia worked his console in response to the first officer's order. The display showed him what he knew would be true; nothing but static filled the subspace channels. He shook his head. "Nothing. The Rift is interfering with our communications. We're in a particularly dense part of the cloud, that might be why the Warwick isn't replying."
"Well, it was worth the try" Jessica St. Peter commented, standing up from the center chair. She crossed the small distance between her and the helmsman's station, putting her hand on the back of the chair. The massive Oza in the seat barely tilted his head to the side, so that Jessica was just in his periphery. "Wirst, take us on a path directly in front of the Warwick, before we begin our sweeps." Wirstowx turned back to his console and began inputting the commands.
"It was worth the shot." Commander Obruz Dossu shrugged, then went back to monitoring his own panel.
From the back of the bridge, Lieutenant Nizeri Sano spoke up. "Thalaron radiation levels are extremely high, ma'am. Shields are in place and holding." There was an alert chime, and Jessica turned to face the Trill as she bent over her station. "Ma'am, I'm detecting...very faint anomalies in the rift."
Jessica raised an eyebrow, walking over to the station in curiosity. "can you pinpoint where?"
Nizeri shook her head slowly, her confusion showing on her face. "The sensors are having a hard time even detecting them. It's like they're there one minute...and then gone again. Little fissures in subspace."
Obruz was behind Jessica then, and asked, "Could it be from the explosion of the Scimitar?"
The science officer shook her head. "I doubt it. It was a standard Romulan ship as far as systems and weapons, aside from the thalaron generator. I don't think even the artificial singularities they use for warp would do this; we're reading many fissures around the rift, not just one in the middle of the wreckage."
"Captain!"
The trio in the back of the bridge all turned in unison and stared at the viewscreen. Wirstowx's hands moved quickly as he input commands on his console, preparing it to act in the dual role it was designed for; helm station and tactical station. "Hirogen ships, decloaking off the bow."
The image of green clouds shifted and distorted as a Hirogen battleship appeared, it's nose pointed directly at Rafale's. There was only a second before a blue bolt of energy lanced out from the monstrous ship and raced toward the Akira-class starship.
Obruz ran to the front of the bridge, ready to relieve Wirstowx and take his role as chief tactical officer. "Red alert, shields to maximum!"
Jessica moved quickly to her chair and sat down, bringing the arm rests in over her lap. The lights turned to red, and she could just barely hear a growing hum as the weapons came online.
Then came a scream as the bolt collided with Rafale's shields. The ship rocked as an echoing boom, like a cannon, resounded through the ship. St. Peter narrowed her eyes.
"Commander," she ordered, "open fire. And keep us between them and the Warwick."
Smoke billowed from a blown console, filling the bridge. Jessica coughed, staggering forward to the tactical/helm console. Another torpedo collided with the shields, rocking the ship and causing her to lose her balance. She grabbed the back of the chair, holding on to keep herself upright. "Report!"
Obruz fired another volley of torpedoes before answering. "Shields down to 39 percent!"
Lieutenant Sonia shouted from his ops console to the side. "Hull integrity is now below 75 percent!"
"Dossu, evasive pattern five, into attack pattern beta! Fire wide spread of phasers, overcharge the damn banks, and another volley of torpedoes!"
Obruz input the commands, and Jessica felt the deck shift, matching the view on the viewscreen in front of her as the Hirogen ship flew up and out of view, followed by the stars spinning as Rafale turned onto her back and back up. The ship came back into view, this time the underside of it. Orange bolts of energy lashed out, followed by a trio of chroniton torpedoes. The phasers connected with the already weakened ventral shields of the behemoth ship. The torpedoes slammed into the ship's hull, and instantly the barrage from the enemy ship halted as main power failed.
Jessica looked over at her Trill science officer. Sano turned from her console to face her captain. "Multiple Hirogen hunting parties just beamed over to the Warwick! Her shields dropped sometime during the battle I think!"
"How in hell?"
Sonia spoke up then. "No idea, ma'am! They didn't take a single hit this whole time. We weren't watching them, so I can't tell you how long they've been defenseless."
"Dossu, get us into transporter range! Seymour! Try getting a lock on the parties to beam them o-"
"Won't work, Commander. Detecting dampening fields going up on the ship."
Jessica smacked the back of the chair, then turned and went back to the center chair. "Hail the ship."
Wirstowx took his turn to talk then. "Subspace antennae was damaged in the attack. We can't hail them."
Jessica sat down in her chair, letting our a frustrated groan. She smacked her arm rest. "Alright...how many parties did you detect over there, before the dampening fields went up?"
"Maybe five or six."
She considered this for a moment, before addressing her first officer again. "Commander, take us alongside the Warwick. We're going over there."
The Bajoran input the command, then turned his chair to face Jessica. "Don't think they can handle it?"
"I think they're going to need help. Bridge to Engineering."
"What?!"
"Ahem...Elaina, I'm leaving you in command of the ship. Keep repairs going, keep a lock on and continue to monitor us on the Warwick"
The woman cursed, and then closed the link. Jessica stood up. "Obruz, Sano, Sonia, Wirstowx. Change into subdued uniforms, meet me in transporter room 3. We're going over there to help repel the boarders." She walked into her ready room, unzipping her uniform as she went.
The away team stepped onto the transporter pad. Obruz Dossu knelt, his heavy phaser cannon at the ready; Wirstowx knelt next to him, leveling his own cannon. Lieutenant Sonia stood in the back, facing the back wall, his rifle at the ready. Jessica St. Peter and Nizeri Sano, the two science officers, stood in the middle of the group; Sano knelt, facing the same direction as Sonia, her phaser out, while Jessica stood over the two men in the front, her rifle up and ready.
The chief at the transporter control looked up, waiting for the team to set up. "I'll be transporting you into the aft cargo bay. There were no dampening fields in place there, so you shouldn't see anyone except maybe some of the crew."
Jessica nodded, then addressed her team. "Are we ready?" A few quick "aye's" were given, and she turned back to the transporter controller. Nodding, she ordered, "energize."
There was a soft, melodic sound, like wind chimes, that gradually grew louder and louder. Jessica watched as a blue light filled her vision; the transporter room faded out of sight, so that all that she could see was the blue light and a swirling of stars. Then, a new room began to take shape around her. As the blue light faded, she saw that it was dark here, except for a few panels that were flashing bright red light across the cargo bay floor. Cargo containers were toppled, and there were scorch marks on the walls from weapons fire. As the transporter effect finished, she heard a few quick clicks and then the accompanying hum as her away team powered up their weapons. She did the same, then let the rifle hang from its strap from her shoulder, trading it for her tricorder. Beside her, she heard Sano do the same, and together they did a quick sweep of the area.
“Clear.”
Jessica nodded. “Same,” she confirmed, then looked up. The ship had an eerie feel about it. “This place is already giving me the creeps…”
Obruz grunted. “The air is stale, and it’s freezing here. It feels as if a wraith were here…”
“Or a Shay’d,” Wirstowx chimed in.
Jessica nodded her agreement. “Those blast marks,” she said, motioning to the nearest wall, “check out the residue on those. Let’s find out what happened here.” Sonia and Sano moved off, tricorders out and taking readings. St. Peter and Obruz followed Wirstowx as they checked around the rest of the cargo bay.
“Main power must be offline.”
Obruz nodded. “From the looks of the mess, I’d say they were attacked.”
“Not possible, the Hirogen never got a shot –“
“He means, long before we were here.” Wirstowx bent down to examine a puddle of liquid on the floor. “They attacked the ship, killed the crew. They knew Starfleet would send another ship to investigate. They were using the Warwick as bait.”
“It was a trap all along.”
St. Peter groaned. “Those anomalies Sano picked up; they could have been the cloaked ships.”
“I doubt it, ma’am.” Lieutenants Sano and Sonia walked up to the trio, closing their tricorders. “I was still picking them up even after we had finished off the Hirogen vessels. In fact…there is one in this cargo bay.” She pointed to the far wall. “Now that we’re actually closer to it, I’m getting a somewhat better reading on it, but the computer still can’t make heads or tails of what it is.”
“What about the blast marks?”
“Commander, we picked up tetryon weapon signatures and phaser signatures. But,” Sonia paused, shaking his head. “The rate of decay isn’t matching up. The phaser signatures are at least a week or two older than the tetryon ones.”
Obruz tilted his head to the side in confusion. “Then that means the crew weren’t fighting off the Hirogen?” He looked at Sano. “Are you picking up ANY life signs on the ship?”
“Nothing, sir. Dampening fields are up all over the ship, thanks to the Hirogen, so we can’t detect them. But even then, they can’t cover the entire ship. And I’m not picking up anything.”
Jessica tapped her combadge. “Away team to Rafale. Seurer, come in.”
”Go ahead, Captain, we read you.”
“Elaina, run a quick scan of the area. We’re looking for escape pods.”
”Escape pods? Federation or Hirogen?”
“Well…” She looked up at Obruz, who shrugged. They certainly couldn’t deny help to anyone in distress, enemy or not. “Both, but I’m only interested in Federation. The Warwick crew seems to be missing.”
”Daniels, run a scan of the immediate area, look for lifeboats.” There was a brief silence, before Lieutenant Commander Seurer spoke again. ”Not picking up anything, ma’am. Besides, all the lifeboats and shuttle craft that the Warwick had are still on the ship.”
“Damn…” Seymour Sonia smacked his forehead. “The Hirogen must have either already moved the crew onto one of their ships…”
“Or they were already dead before we got here.”
”Thalaron levels on the ship are nonexistent, Jess. If they were dead, something else would have had to kill them.”
“Commander, right now, I don’t want to think about them dead.” She sighed, looking around. “Alright, keep a lock on us. Let us know if more hunting ships arrive. We’ll check in in an hour.”
”Understood, ma’am.” The channel closed.
Jessica looked around then, and asked, “where’s the door? We need to get out of here an-“ She was cut off by a terrified shriek. The away team brought their weapons up instantly, and Jess did a quick head count. “Where’s Nizeri?”
The away team fanned out, quickly going through the cargo bay trying to find the Trill.
Wirstowx shouted, “Found her!” Jessica turned toward the voice and made her way to them. The rest of the away team converged there. Wirstowx was holding a trembling Sano in his massive arms, looking up to see the team. He motioned with his head to the floor in front of them.
Jessica turned, then covered her mouth, gasping.
Lying on his back, spread out like a rag doll, was a Vulcan in a blue science uniform, his eyes wide open in fear.
Dossu pushed past Jessica, and bent down. The Bajoran put two fingers on the Vulcan’s neck, then looked up at the blue woman. “He’s dead.”
Jessica shook her head, still manipulating the sensors on the tricorder. “Right off the bat, I know what didn’t kill him, but it doesn’t make sense.” She brought her weight off her left leg, which she had been kneeling on, and moved the leg under her, then sat down on top of it. She closed the device, wiping her forehead with her free hand. “This Vulcan wasn’t killed with a phaser or tetryon weapon.” She stared down at the Vulcan’s dead eyes, showing the extreme fear he had had before dying. “All neural activity in his brain is non-existent.” She looked up at Obruz.
“He died because his brain got fried, then?”
“Something like that. I’m not detecting any neurogenic energy in his system.”
Obruz and Wirstowx exchanged confused glances. Nizeri Sano, who was still gripping tightly to Wirstowx, offered her help. “It’s energy contained in a lifeform’s nervous system. Just about every living being either has it or is made up of it.” She pulled away from the Oza’s massive form, looking up at him and nodding reassuringly to him. Wirstowx helped her to her feet before standing up himself. “Hirogen DO use neural disruptors; it’s possible he met his end that way.”
Jessica shook her head, frowning. “But that doesn’t fit what I’m seeing here. Neural distruptors disrupt neural activity, sure, but they don’t completely drain it.”
Sano took out her tricorder, performing her own scan of the body. She frowned. “He’s only been dead a few days; the energy couldn’t have dissipated that quickly.”
“Exactly.” St. Peter stood up, putting the tricorder back in its holster.
“Then the Hirogen didn’t kill him. It goes along with the decay rates of the blast marks not matching up.” Seymour Sonia swatted at the back of his neck then, looking around him anxiously.
Obruz looked around as well, then at Sonia. “Something wrong, Lieutenant?”
Sonia shook his head. “Nothing sir…just felt like something brushed against my neck.” He shivered, then looked at St. Peter. “Ma’am,” he said, “we should get going. Catching the Hirogen off guard in the corridors of the ship would be preferable to them ambushing us in a cargo bay.”
Jessica nodded her agreement. “Right. Let’s finish what we started. But,” she continued, lifting her rifle, “keep an eye out for more Warwick crew members. I don’t want to start shooting survivors if there are any.”
The away team nodded in understanding, readying their own weapons. She turned back to Sonia. “Mr. Sonia, find the door panel. Let’s get out of here.”
“Dossu, Wirst! Grenades out, now!” She fired off another shot before crouching back down behind the piece of bulkhead in the corridor, just as a jagged blue bolt of energy lashed out, going over her head.
The Bajoran and massive Oza looked at each other, then Commander Obruz gave a nod. They each lobbed photon grenades out over their cover before hunkering down again.
There were a few startled cries, and then the dual concussion as both grenades detonated. The deck shook with the blast as the away team came out of their defensive positions and fired at the Hirogen hunters. After a few more shots, the corridors were quiet again.
Nizeri bent down over the Hirogen, scanning them with her tricorder, as St. Peter looked over her shoulder, reading the tricorder scan results for herself. Obruz and Wirstowx and taken up defensive positions on either side of them, facing down the empty corridor in case of another hunting party coming to the aide of the one they had finally subdued.
“Well…this one is dead; I can’t do anything for him here. The other two are unconscious. We can beam them up to the brig, if you like.” Nizeri Sano closed her tricorder, looking back up at her captain.
Jessica nodded her reply. “Do it.” She turned around then. “Sonia, what’s the word on that door?”
Seymour Sonia held a finger up to hold her off. “Stand by…” He changed a few more isolinear chips in the open panel in front of him, then tapped a few more keys on his tricorder. He looked up, then cursed in what Jessica recognized as Spanish before going back to the open panel and changing the positions of the chips again. St. Peter crossed her arms in front of her. The air stirred a little, and she felt a tickle on the back of her neck. She quickly rubbed her hand over it, hoping to push the stray strand of hair away. Maybe it was the atmosphere, but she could have sworn it felt like someone was breathing down her neck, or maybe even grazing a finger along back there. She shuddered.
“Commander…this doesn’t make any sense.” Jessica turned back to her science officer, who was puzzling over the dead Hirogen, her tricorder back out and beeping at her. “This hunter; I’m not detecting any neural energy in his body. In fact…” She tapped another button, and then looked up in disbelief. “Captain, we didn’t kill him.”
Obruz looked over, matching the Trill’s confusion with his own. “What do you mean we didn’t kill him?”
“I mean, he was dead before we got here.”
Jessica looked to her first officer, then back at the science officer. “What is going on here?”
Sano bit on her lower lip, then shut her tricorder. “Captain, I am beginning to formulate a theory as to what happened to the Warwick's crew, but we will need to create a contained subspace field to test it.”
“A contained subspace field? What the hell is your theory?”
The Trill shook her head. “It’s a shot in the dark, but it’s the best I can come up with.” She shrugged. “The Warwick is a science vessel. Some of the crates in the cargo bay we beamed into contain highly sensitive scanners used for cataloging temporal anomalies.” She glanced over her shoulder at Seymour, still engrossed with opening the door to Engineering. “We should be able to find the components we’d need to create the field, and then, assuming we can enter Engineering, we can get the necessary power to make this work.”
“You still haven’t told me what you think happened to the crew.”
“Captain…if I’m right…and I really hope I’m not…the killers are still aboard the ship. And if we don’t act quickly, not only are we in danger, but so is the Rafale.”
Chief Engineer’s log, stardate 2409.0326. All systems are coming back online on schedule, and most of the larger sites of hull damage are repaired. The away team is due to check-in in ten minutes.
“Carlson, boost the flow, the mix still isn’t balancing out.”
“Sir, if we do that we risk rupturing-“
Lieutenant Commander Elaina Seurer pounded her hand on the console. “Don’t tell me the risk, Chief. I’m not stupid.” She glared at him before turning back to the table-like computer interface that they were bent over. “I’m manually regulating the anti-matter flow, so just boost the matter flow normally and we’ll get this worked out.”
The non-com made an annoyed sound in the back of his throat before tapping a few controls. On the display, Seurer saw the matter injectors had opened, but only fifty percent. She looked up again, catching his eyes. He shook his head, sighing, then tapped a few more controls. “Matter injectors opened to full. Your show, Commander.”
“Thank you.” Seurer watched the flow carefully, tapping her own controls at precise moments to make sure the matter/anti-matter mix that was forming ten feet to her left didn’t turn into a warp core breach. “Chief, begin rotating the crystal matrix.”
“Aye sir.” There was an alert, and the Chief looked up quickly. “Matter flow is exceeding that of the anti-matter, Commander. Loss of containment-“
“Keep rotating the matrix.” Seurer frowned, working the console quicker now. Still, she had planned on this happening; she had at least half a minute before she’d even consider shutting it all down again. “Allright, start easing off the matter flow injectors, we should be reaching stabilization in a few seconds.” She didn’t bother looking up; she could practically feel the man’s gaze on the top of her head, disbelieving. It didn’t bother her though; she knew what she was doing.
Ten seconds later, the warp core was thrumming with life again, the powerful heartbeat of the Akira-class starship. Elaina afforded herself a small smile as she looked over at the Chief. “You were saying?” Chief Carlson just shook his head and walked off to a wall console in silence.
The combadge on her chest chirped then, and the small speaker began to talk. ”Bridge to Engineering. Commander Seurer, the away team is calling in.”
Elaina tapped her badge before replying, “Understood; send it down here.”
”Yes ma’am.”
Elaina walked into her small office and tapped the control at her computer display. “Captain, everything ok over there?”
”For the most part. We’re still finding Warwick crew around, all dead. How are things over there?”
Elaina bit her bottom lip and took in a breath before she replied. She knew Jessica was only asking because she wasn’t on the Rafale and keeping up to speed with repairs. The urge to bite the other woman’s head off for doubting her abilities were contained, and Seurer responded. “Warp core is back online, and the injector assembly is running smoothly. We have shields and weapons again, so we’re good over here.”
”That’s good, but what about non-ship related incidents? Is everything ok over there?”
Commander Seurer paused, then brought up the ship status report on her monitor. “A few minor injuries in sickbay, but otherwise all is well. Why?”
”Lieutenant Sano has a working theory on what happened to the crew, and it’s not good. I want you to keep shields on standby, and start looking into creating a way to detect…well…things that are a bit out of phase with us.”
“Out of phase? What?”
”We’re about to create a subspace field that should let us see these things. Nizeri thinks the crew fell prey to parasitic beings known as Devidians. They’re…what was it again?”
Jessica’s voice was replaced by Sano’s then. ”You’ll be looking for anything out of phase by a variance of .004. Because of the phase shift, they’d be able to penetrate the shields. Before we beamed over I was detecting small subspace anomalies; chances are those are the ‘gates’ these beings used to get here. Rafale shouldn’t be near any, but do a quick search to be sure.”
”Did you copy that?”
Elaina nodded, making sure the computer was recording this. “Yes ma’am. We’ll get to work over here modifying the sensors. Be careful over there…should I send over an extra security team?”
There was a brief pause, and then St. Peter replied, almost sounding amused. ”I think we’ll be ok. Plus, the more people we have to ‘shift,’ the more power we’ll need. Just keep the ship together and make sure none of these things are over there. Away team out.”
Last edited by J. St. Peter on 06/21/10 15:22; edited 1 time in total
Jessica looked around the cramped engine room of the Warwick. A series of transporter pattern boosters had been set up around the dimly glowing core of the Shi’Kahr-class starship. Lieutenant Sonia was hunched over an open console, attempting to boost the power enough to make the generator work.
“Allright, ma’am. I think…there.” Sonia looked up at the screen in front of him, and then turned to look at the warp core. The rest of the away team followed suit, and watched as the strobing red and blue lights grew quicker as the power output increased. “We’ve got plenty of power to try this out. I’ve tied the activation controls for the field to our tricorders.” He bent down and picked up his rifle from the ground and walked over to where the rest of the team was. “The main computer will also be modulating any communications we make with the Rafale, so they’ll be able to receive our messages.”
“Ok, Nizeri. One last time.” Jessica looked to the Trill.
The other woman nodded as she holstered her phaser. “If my theory is correct and Mr. Sonia’s magic worked, the field will bring us into phase with what killed the crew; Devidians. Our readings suggest that the victim’s neural energy was siphoned away by these creatures.”
“You mean eaten.” Wirstowx folded his arms across his massive chest, frowning.
Lieutenant Sano paused before nodding slowly. “Yes, you could put it that way. These beings ate the neural energy of the crew.”
“Will our weapons be effective against them?”
Sano nodded to the first officer. “Once we’re brought into phase with them, our weapons and scanners will also be in phase. We’ll be able to see them, scan for them and, when we need to, shoot them.”
Jessica looked around the small group, preparing her rifle. “Are we ready then?” There were nods around the circle as weapons were brought up. Obruz and Wirstowx took up positions at the front and rear of the group, ready to blast anything that might attack them. She took up a position between them, and looked back to see Seymour Sonia taking position behind her, facing the opposite direction. Sano crouched in the middle, her tricorder out and waiting to input the command. Jessica nodded at the Trill science officer. “Make it so, Nizeri.”
Jessica turned back to face out, hearing the small beeps as Sano input the commands into her tricorder. The transporter enhancers glowed bright, and there was a small crackle as the room around them shifted. Blue filled her vision in short bursts before steadying out. The entire engine room was blue now, the lights from the panels glowing brightly. She glanced down, and then to her left; herself and Dossu both were glowing white, and she noticed the glow was brighter around his head.
“Nizeri? Did it work?” Jessica turned her head to see the other woman, noticing she was also glowing white, but not nearly as brightly as Dossu or, she noticed, the human Sonia, who was crouched behind her. He shone incredibly bright, and the light seemed to pulse like a white beacon in the sea of blue around them.
“Reading a phase variance of .004. Aye, ma’am; it worked.” She closed her tricorder and drew her phaser, looking around. “This is a bit unsettling.”
Jessica nodded in agreement. “You can say that again.” She pointed to her head. “What’s with the glowing? Mr. Sonia looks like he’s a regular firefly.”
Nizeri Sano turned and gasped at seeing Seymour. She did a quick glance around at the rest of the team. “It must be his neural energy. That must be how the Devidians select their prey; the ones shining brighter either have more…or it’s easier to extract from them.” She tapped her chin, in thought. “The Enterprise-D encountered these beings before, where they were going back in time to Earth and using a cholera outbreak to harvest energy from humans there. It’s possible that humans are easier to feed on, but they are able to siphon off the energy of any being, as we saw with the Hirogen and the Vulcan officer. It’s probably harder, but doable if necessary.”
Sonia shook his head, sighing. “Great. Something tells me I should have worn a yellow shirt today.”
Dossu snickered at the joke; Jessica shrugged, not understanding the meaning. “Allright, keep your eyes peeled. Nizeri, where is the first ‘gate’ these beings were using to get aboard?”
Sano pointed towards the main entrance to engineering. “The first anomaly is at the door.”
The team moved together slowly, looking around at their new surroundings. Jessica couldn’t help by smile; the idea that she wasn’t the only blue person in the room now was somewhat entertaining to her.
As they rounded a corner in the engine room, Dossu stopped and crouched low. He motioned for others to do the same, then pointed ahead of them. “Lieutenant, what are those?”
There was a tear in the air like a massive, purple wound. Floating around it were two figures. They were tall, taller even than the massive Oza standing next to Jessica. Their skin was wrinkled to the point that they looked like incredibly old raisin-people. They didn’t appear to have faces except a large orifice on their foreheads.
“Those would be Devidians, sir.”
As Nizeri said this, one of them turned its head towards the team. The hair on the back of Jessica’s neck prickled, and she lifted her weapon. “I think they see us.” The one that had turned its head followed with the rest of its body, moving quickly towards the small team, arms outstretched. Its partner followed close behind. “Open fire!”
Phasers lashed out blood red beams of energy, hitting the beings square in the chest. They tumbled backwards, dazed, before lifting up off the floor and moving forward again. Jessica let out a startled cry and fired again, as did the rest of the away team.
“I thought our weapons would be effective!” Commander Obruz shouted over at Sano.
“They are effective, or they wouldn’t be affected!” Sano fired her phaser again. “We need to find a power setting that’ll actually do more than just annoy them!”
Seymour yelled then, and Jessica turned to see the second Devidian pounce on top of the human, its hands wrapped around his neck. “Help!” He shouted, trying to kick the alien off of him. Jessica could see the glow around Sonia’s head brighten for a moment; the glow started to reach out, like a tentacle, away from his head, moving slowly toward the Devidian’s mouth. Sonia’s struggles started to falter.
“It’s killing him! Quick!” Jessica turned and lunged at the alien, kicking it square in the side and smacking it in the head with the butt of her rifle. The alien was thrown off Sonia and rolled away on the ground before lifting off again and lunging at Jessica. Its outstretched hands wrapped around her arms and it put its head close to hers; instantly Jessica felt ice cold, and her vision blurred.
There was a blood red streak then out of the corner of her eye, and the Devidian was thrown backward. Another blast flew past her, striking the alien again. This time, it fell to the ground and didn’t get back up.
“Captain?! Are you alright?” There was a strong arm around hers, lifting her up; Jessica wasn’t even aware she had fallen down. She gasped for breath and nodded.
“Sonia, are you doing ok?” The voice had turned away, Jessica could tell. Her vision was still blurred, and it was still hard to speak. “Ok, Nizeri, watch them. Wirstowx, with me.” Dossu was giving the orders; Jessica mused that she must have looked a lot worse than she probably felt. There was more phaser fire, and then a sound like fabric ripping. “Alright, the hole’s closed.”
Jessica forced herself to sit up, fighting a sudden feeling of vertigo. “What happened?”
Sano put a hand on her shoulder; she knew it was the Trill because the hand was soft and smaller than the males that were on the team. “That thing latched on and started to drain you.”
Jessica shook her head. “I figured as much. What did the boys just do?”
She could hear Dossu chuckle lightly. The Bajoran answered her now. “We closed the portal they were using to get in here with our phasers.”
“We’re…going to have to do the same thing…around the ship.” Seymour coughed, and Jessica could make him out as he also sat up, holding his head. “Either that or we destroy the whole damn ship.”
“I don’t think Starfleet would appreciate that.” Jessica tilted her head to the side, stretching her neck until it popped. “Nizeri, where’s the next portal, and what setting do we need our phasers on to get rid of these things?”
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