This is an alternate Star Trek timeline. As Star Trek likes to play with those a lot, I figured
that I would invent one of my own, with the Klingons and the Romulans still bitter Federation
enemies. Only difference is that their alliance lasted a lot longer than in The Original
Series. Oh, Kirk and his pals are definately in this universe.
I, in no way, shape, or form own Star Trek or any related material.
(Fire, noise, explosions)
Helmsman and First officer Ephraim Tinson steadied himself at his console. As he tried to make sense of what happened he heard a raspy order from his captain, Kytin O'Reilly.
"...Take command...ship...get ship out."
As his friend gave this order he pitched forward, into unconsiousness.
Imnediatelly Tinson got out of his seat, took the conn, and ordered sickbay to come and get the captain. After he finished, he assesed the situation. The U.S.S. Chauntel was patrolling the neutral zone between the Federation and the Klingon Empire. Without warning three K'Tinga class battlecruisers had decloaked around the hapless Miranda-class starship and began firing. With the Chauntel caught unprepared and its shields down, the Klingon's first target had been the powerful, yet, extremely vulnerable photon topedo launchers. With all ability to launch photon torpedoes gone, the Chauntel was limited to her phaser banks, which, compared to the K'tinga class's heavy disrupters, were like firing a .22 automatic at someone who had a couple of a .50 machine guns.
"Return fire on all phaser banks," Tinson ordered.
As the Chauntel sat in space, all 16 of its phaser arrays locked onto various of the Klingon cruisers and fired.
"Direct hits on all Klingon vessels, but no damage," reported the Tactical officer, Jonas McPherson.
"SIR!, decks eight through thirteen have been breached," screamed the damage control officer.
"Get us out of here, MAXIMUM WARP!"
Without warning, the Chauntel accelerated to and past Warp 1. As she ran for dear life, the Klingon cruisers went into a frenzy to catch her. The Chauntel was a heavily modified Miranda. Most of the light Miranda-class cruisers could do nothing more than Warp 8, but the Chauntel was forseen as a Heavy Escort and as such, was modified with the same type of engines carried on the Constitution-class starships. In addition to better engines, her armor and shielding was that of a Constitution-class. As she accelerated to Warp 9, most of the Klingon cruisers fell back. However, when Chauntel went to warp, she was on a course that took her slightly into the neutral zone. As such, an additional Klingon patrol of 3 B'rel-class Birds-of-Prey came into the chase. As the BOPs were much faster than the K'tinga-class cruisers, the K'tingas left the chase to the Birds of Prey.
"Sir, we have an additional 3 ships chasing us. They're Birds of Prey," the science officer, Lieutenant Suren, reported.
"Speed and distance," Tinson snapped.
"Speed: Warp 7 and increasing. Distance: 5,300,000 km and closing," replied Suren.
"Give me a readout of all natural phenomena of the region. I don't care what it is, black holes, asteroid belts, nebulae, even a gas giant would work," Tinson said.
"Sir, I've got a gas giant at twenty-seven mark two," the navigator, M'rel, reported.
"Set a course at maximum warp."
As the Chauntel hurtled towards the gas giant, the Klingon ships increased their speed and decreased the distance between them and the Chauntel. As the Chauntel neared the planet, Tinson ordered a reduction in speed to Warp 1, then to full impulse power. The Chauntel broke from warp at the edges of the outer atmosphere of the planet. What Tinson was hoping to do was dive into the gas giant's atmosphere deep enough to evade orbital scans. Since there was an atmosphere, the Birds of Prey would not be as manuverable as they were in space. If the Klingon ships came into the atmosphere after them, they would have more leverage and be better able to hit the nimble ships. As the Chauntel dove, the Klingon ships hovered in orbit, as if the move puzzled them. Then, without warning, one of the ships dove down into the atmosphere.
The Klingons sent down one of the ships to harry the Chauntel and when the Chauntel attempted to escape, the other two Klingon ships would be able to pounce.
The Chauntel had barely survived its fiery descent at full impulse power, and that had been with as much power as possible pumped into the shields. With the Klingon diving at full power, by the time it got close enough to attck the Chauntel it would have virtually no shielding, provided the Klingon ship survived the descent at all. As the Chauntel hovered, waiting to see if thier ruse worked, they picked the Klingon up on theur sensors, however, the fiery descent had disabled the majority of the systems of the Klingon fighter. Seeing the damage of the Klingon ship, Tinson decided a risky plan.
The Romulans had initiated a shooting war with the Federation and had been rumored to have a secret alliance with the Klingons. That was the whole reason that Chauntel was patrolling the neutral zone. In case a Klingon fleet emerged, the Chauntel would warp out at maximum speed and get a message to Starfleet. With most of the other ships tied up fighting the Romulans, Chauntel had been the only ship available for the task. Since the Romulans initiated the war, all treaties between them and the Federation had been voided, including the one that restricted the use of cloaking devices. Tinson decided to risk sending a heavily armed boarding party to the Klingon fighter and capture the valuable cloaking device.
"Prepare a twelve man assualt team and have them report to transporter room 2," Tinson ordered the security chief on the bridge.
"Aye, sir."
Five minutes later, the team was assembled in the transporter room and Tinson came to give them their orders.
"Your orders are simple. The only way we will be able to get out of here is by stealing this fighter's cloaking device and using it on our ship. The Klingon ship only has about 12 men onboard, unfortuantely, and we expect resistance to be extremely high. The Chauntel will fire on the bridge, when they get close enough, to disorient the rest of the crew. You people will be in a hazardous environment, so I want you using full environmental suits. Set your phasers to disrupt. Shoot first and ask questions later. Its a common practice that the Klingons don't take prisoners, so when they get wind of you boarding they will be doing their utmost to kill you. The cloaking device is in engineering so we will beam you into the engineering access coridor. You have your orders. Good luck.
As Captain Tinson strode back to the Bridge an alarm klaxon sounded.
"Klingon cruisers approaching! All hands man battle stations! Repeat, all hands man battle stations!"
Tinson broke into a run and arrived on the bridge in time to hear McPherson report that the Klingon ship was at the outskirts of phaser range, now severaly decreased due to the atmosphere.
"Very good. Let them close a few more thousand km and then lock onto their bridge and fire.
As the Klingon ship approached without warning the red beams of the phasers slammed into the bridge of the fighter. Immediately it was opened to vacuum and all in that compartment of the ship were killed.
"No life signs on the bridge sir," Suren reported.
"Energize!"
Suddenly 12 Starfleet personnel materialized in the Engineering access corridor of the Klingon ship. When they were able to see their surroundings they saw two klingons aiming disruters at them. The Klingons fired, killng two of the party. However the other members of the team returned fire, killing the Klingons.
"Alright, lets ge that cloaking device. It should be right through these doors," Lieutenant Michael Murphy said.
As the boarding party moved into engineering, the Klingons in there tried to get their disrupters up, however the Starfleet personnel were faster, killing all of the Klingons.
"Scan for any more hostiles, Thames. Tucker, start preparing their cloaking device for transport."
"Aye, sir," they answered in unison.
"Sir, the boarding party reports all hostiles are neutralized and they have the cloaking device ready for transport," McPherson reported.
"Alright. Beam them back and get the cloaking device to engineering as quickly as possible. I want it set up and operational before any more of those ships come down after us.
"Before you come back, Murph, I want you to set up a link between our ship and theirs. Have their ship locked on a collision course with one of the other vessels. Hopefully, when they don't answer to ails they will think that their comm system is down. I want us to be able to initiate the collision course after the cloaking device is ready."
"We're on it," Murphy reported.
As the cloaking device was finished being set up in engineering, Murphy reported back to command.
"Sir, the uplink is ready and, as best as we can tell from your sensors, we have a course locked in on the lead vessel."
"Good. The cloak is almost ready, according to engineering. Stand by for transport."
In the transporter room the familier whine sounded as Murphy and his team members materialized. Murphy's position had been in the main weapons control room. However, that had been destroyed when the torpedo bay blew. He reported to the captain to see what his orders were.
"Murph, I want you to supplement McPherson at tactical. We have lost computer control of the starboard and port phaser banks, so I want you to tie in....
"Sir!," Suren reported, "via the Klingon cruiser I've managed to get a sensor feed from the other ships. On long range sensors there is another ship approaching, a Constitution class."
"Good we can use all the help we can get. Murph, I want you to tie in to the axiliary weapons panel and take control of starboard and port weapons. Suren, do you have any idea who that ship is?"
"I can't tell from this distance. However, from the lack of sensor data on the ship from the Klingons, I would assertain that this is one of newest Constitutions."
"What new Connies have been launched lately?"
"The USS Vincent, the USS Palomino, the USS Endeavour, and the USS David G. Farragut."
"Hmmm...the Endevour. I had a good friend of mine comm me a few months ago. He said that they were giving him a brand new ship, the Endeavour. he didn't say the class, but I can guess he's..."
"Sir, report from sickbay. The captain's dead."
At that news, Tinson and Murphy turned pale. They and O'reilly had known each other for years. When Tinson, Murph, as he was called, and Mumaw, another friend of the captain's, were new to the Academy, O'Reilly had been one of the first people to befriend them. Tinson, O'Reilly, Mumaw, and Murphy had been pals at Starfleet. The Quandary Quartet, as they were called, were always coming up with schemes that perplexed everyone as to how they could pull them off so flawlessly.
"Aye. Engineering report!"
"Sir, the cloaking device is hooked up and ready to go. Just say the word."
"The word is given."
In the midst of the gas giant's atmosphere the Chauntel faded from view. As they prepared to implement their plan, things were bustling on the fast approaching Constitution-class heavy cruiser.
On the Endeavour:
"What in the heck are those Klingon cruisers doing in Federation space? Red Alert. All power to the weapon systems. Let's show these guys how we play," Mumaw yelled.
As the Endeavour closed in on the Klingons, the Birds of Prey sent out a call for support. The K'Tingas that had given off the chase renewed it. Only, this time, their attention was focused on the Endeavour alone.
"Sir, I have three vessels moving to intercept us. They're K'tinga-class battlecruisers," the science officer reported.
"Hmmm...start scanning the nearby region for anything out of the ordinary. What reason would they have to send five ships against us? Stand by aft weapons. If the Klingons close to weapons range, target their bridges and forward weapons."
"Aye,sir," the tactical officer replied.
On the Chauntel:
"Sir, I've got three K'tinga-class cruisers closing in on the Endeavour," Suren reported.
"Open a channel with the Endeavour."
"Aye, sir," the comm officer replied.
On the Endeavour:
"Sir, we are being hailed by...The USS Chauntel," Ensign Oreander said.
"The Chauntel...put it through," Captain Mumaw replied.
"USS Endeavour, this is the USS Chauntel requesting assitance...repeat, this is the USS Chauntel requesting assistance."
"We read you Chauntel. We detect two ships in orbit and we are close to being intercepted by three battlecruisers..."
On the IKS Q'tek the science officer yelled to his captain.
"Sir, I'm picking up a transmission coming from inside the ionosphere of that planet, directed at the closing Federation starship."
"Target weapons on the source and open fire."
As the Chauntel gained altitude, dsrupter shots from the Klingon fighters began raining down. Suddenly, several shots hit the Chauntel's engineering area. As the cloaking device lost power the Chauntel became visible.
"Sir, we are detecing a ship coming up through the atmosphere, the USS Chauntel," the Klingon tactical officer on the Q'tek reported.
"Target that ship and fire," the captain replied.
On the Chauntel:
"Sir, the cloak is offline and both Klingon ships have targeted us and have begun to fire," Suren reported.
"M'rel, pilot the Klingon fighter into the nearest enemy vesssel. Jonas, Murph, start firing on the other ship. Hopefully we can disable it."
On the Endeavour:
"Sir, I'm detecting a ship, no two ships, inside the atmosphere of that planet. One is Federation and the other is Klingon. The Klingon ship appears....whoa!...it just slammed at full power into one of the other ships. The Chauntel is the other ship in the atmosphere. It's targeting the remaining ship," the science officer siad.
"What is the distance of the nearest battlecruiser?"
"12,498,527 km, sir," Lieutenant George Scott, the helmsman replied.
"What is our time to intercept the Klingon fighter?"
"We won't get to it before the Klingon cruisers intercept us," the scinece officer replied.
"Well...continue course, but let me known when the Klingons are 10 secounds out. Also, reload the aft tubes with our photonic mines," the captain said.
On the Chauntel:
"Sir, the explosion of the Klingon fighter knocked our shields down to 32%, but the other ship's shields are down," Murphy reported.
"Good, target their bridge and engineering. I'd love to get a good 'ol fashioned warp core breach going. Get to work on recharging those shields. If you have to, take power from the sensor arrays and the warp engines. Endeavour will have to handle those cruisers for now," Tinson said.
"Aye, sir," McPherson replied.
On the Endeavour:
"Sir, the Klingon ships are 10 seconds out," the tactical officer reported.
"Deploy photonic mines."
As the lead Klingon ship approached the Endeavour, its forward shield flared with the impact of 10 photonic mines. As the other ships closed, the Endeavour began firing all aft weapons at the ship. She then began rotating, bringing the starboard and finally, forward weapons to bear on the lead ship.
On the lead Klingon vessel:
"Sir, forward shields are failing. If we take another hit the bridge and forward weapons will be exposed!" the tacital officer screamed.
Before the Klingon ship could begin any manuver the Endeavvour's phasers and torpedoes pierced the weakened forward shields and slammed into the bridge and forward torpedo launcher. Any battle capability that the Klingon ship had was lost at that moment.
"Sir, the Klingon ship's brdge has been destroyed and their forward torpedo launcher severly damaged," the tactical officer reported.
"Good. Shift our fire onto the next ship. Begin evasive manuvers. If possible, keep the ships in torpedo firing arcs. Target their shield generators, weapons, and bridge," Mumaw ordered.
As the Endeavour began its attack on the second ship, the Chauntel finished off the remaining Bird of Prey. She then raced to join her sister ship in the fight.
On the Endeavour:
"Sir, the Chauntel has destroyed the other Bird of Prey and is closing on our position," the tactical officer said.
"Ok, establish me a hailing frequency, highly scrambled, between our ships."
"Ephraim, where is Kytin?" Mumaw asked.
"He's dead Basil. The first salvo hit near our bridge and he died a while after we got him to sickbay."
Captain Mumaw didn't say anything for a few moment. Kytin adn he had been dear freidns. He didn't keep many grudges, but this was something he itended to avenge.
"I understand. I could use some assistance."
"Well, Basil, we've started taking fire from that other Klingon ship. However, I have a risky idea. I've got a lot of casualties and my starboard shields are down. How about you swing around, lower your aft shields and we beam the survivors onboard. I will pilot the ship on a collision course with the other klingon ship and at the last possible moment escape in a shuttle. If you can keep the aft shields down I'll come in the shuttle bay and we'll finsih off the rest of these guys," Tinson said.
"Kytin would put the safety of his crew before anything else. I agree. We're coming about now."
The Endeavour rotated in space as the Chauntel closed. When they were 5km from each other, a mere hair in space, the Endeavour lowered her aft shields and the Chauntel rotated on her starboard. Within seconds all of the Chauntel survivvors except for Tinson were safely aboard the Endeavour.
After the trasport was complete the Chauntel backed off and headed right for the farthest Klingon cruiser. As she got only 10km from the cruiser a small shuttlecraft left launch bay 2. The Klingon ship made an attempt to evade, but by them it was too late. The Chauntel slammed into the Klingon ship at her maximum capable speed, overloading the Klingon's shields and, with the resulting antimatter explosion, gutting her. However, the wake of the explosion left the Endeavour and the Klingon ship nearly shieldless. It would be a race against who could knock the others shields down first. Unfortuantely for Tinson, the strongest shields were the aft ones, which were down at the time of the blast.
"Sir, we've lost the forward shields and the port and starboard shields are down to 12%," the tactical officer said.
"Rotate the ship and pull the aft shields up. Drop whichever other shields you have to and beam Tinson aboard," Mumaw ordered.
When Tinson materialized in the transporter room of the Endeavour, he immediately headed to the bridge.
Tinson stepped out of the turbolift and onto the brdige. Immediately he saw what the effects of the explosion had on Endeavour, power realys and innumerable circuits had been blown out all over the bridge.
Captain Mumaw turned around and looked at Tinson, "Eppy, we're running out of time..."
that I would invent one of my own, with the Klingons and the Romulans still bitter Federation
enemies. Only difference is that their alliance lasted a lot longer than in The Original
Series. Oh, Kirk and his pals are definately in this universe.
I, in no way, shape, or form own Star Trek or any related material.
(Fire, noise, explosions)
Helmsman and First officer Ephraim Tinson steadied himself at his console. As he tried to make sense of what happened he heard a raspy order from his captain, Kytin O'Reilly.
"...Take command...ship...get ship out."
As his friend gave this order he pitched forward, into unconsiousness.
Imnediatelly Tinson got out of his seat, took the conn, and ordered sickbay to come and get the captain. After he finished, he assesed the situation. The U.S.S. Chauntel was patrolling the neutral zone between the Federation and the Klingon Empire. Without warning three K'Tinga class battlecruisers had decloaked around the hapless Miranda-class starship and began firing. With the Chauntel caught unprepared and its shields down, the Klingon's first target had been the powerful, yet, extremely vulnerable photon topedo launchers. With all ability to launch photon torpedoes gone, the Chauntel was limited to her phaser banks, which, compared to the K'tinga class's heavy disrupters, were like firing a .22 automatic at someone who had a couple of a .50 machine guns.
"Return fire on all phaser banks," Tinson ordered.
As the Chauntel sat in space, all 16 of its phaser arrays locked onto various of the Klingon cruisers and fired.
"Direct hits on all Klingon vessels, but no damage," reported the Tactical officer, Jonas McPherson.
"SIR!, decks eight through thirteen have been breached," screamed the damage control officer.
"Get us out of here, MAXIMUM WARP!"
Without warning, the Chauntel accelerated to and past Warp 1. As she ran for dear life, the Klingon cruisers went into a frenzy to catch her. The Chauntel was a heavily modified Miranda. Most of the light Miranda-class cruisers could do nothing more than Warp 8, but the Chauntel was forseen as a Heavy Escort and as such, was modified with the same type of engines carried on the Constitution-class starships. In addition to better engines, her armor and shielding was that of a Constitution-class. As she accelerated to Warp 9, most of the Klingon cruisers fell back. However, when Chauntel went to warp, she was on a course that took her slightly into the neutral zone. As such, an additional Klingon patrol of 3 B'rel-class Birds-of-Prey came into the chase. As the BOPs were much faster than the K'tinga-class cruisers, the K'tingas left the chase to the Birds of Prey.
"Sir, we have an additional 3 ships chasing us. They're Birds of Prey," the science officer, Lieutenant Suren, reported.
"Speed and distance," Tinson snapped.
"Speed: Warp 7 and increasing. Distance: 5,300,000 km and closing," replied Suren.
"Give me a readout of all natural phenomena of the region. I don't care what it is, black holes, asteroid belts, nebulae, even a gas giant would work," Tinson said.
"Sir, I've got a gas giant at twenty-seven mark two," the navigator, M'rel, reported.
"Set a course at maximum warp."
As the Chauntel hurtled towards the gas giant, the Klingon ships increased their speed and decreased the distance between them and the Chauntel. As the Chauntel neared the planet, Tinson ordered a reduction in speed to Warp 1, then to full impulse power. The Chauntel broke from warp at the edges of the outer atmosphere of the planet. What Tinson was hoping to do was dive into the gas giant's atmosphere deep enough to evade orbital scans. Since there was an atmosphere, the Birds of Prey would not be as manuverable as they were in space. If the Klingon ships came into the atmosphere after them, they would have more leverage and be better able to hit the nimble ships. As the Chauntel dove, the Klingon ships hovered in orbit, as if the move puzzled them. Then, without warning, one of the ships dove down into the atmosphere.
The Klingons sent down one of the ships to harry the Chauntel and when the Chauntel attempted to escape, the other two Klingon ships would be able to pounce.
The Chauntel had barely survived its fiery descent at full impulse power, and that had been with as much power as possible pumped into the shields. With the Klingon diving at full power, by the time it got close enough to attck the Chauntel it would have virtually no shielding, provided the Klingon ship survived the descent at all. As the Chauntel hovered, waiting to see if thier ruse worked, they picked the Klingon up on theur sensors, however, the fiery descent had disabled the majority of the systems of the Klingon fighter. Seeing the damage of the Klingon ship, Tinson decided a risky plan.
The Romulans had initiated a shooting war with the Federation and had been rumored to have a secret alliance with the Klingons. That was the whole reason that Chauntel was patrolling the neutral zone. In case a Klingon fleet emerged, the Chauntel would warp out at maximum speed and get a message to Starfleet. With most of the other ships tied up fighting the Romulans, Chauntel had been the only ship available for the task. Since the Romulans initiated the war, all treaties between them and the Federation had been voided, including the one that restricted the use of cloaking devices. Tinson decided to risk sending a heavily armed boarding party to the Klingon fighter and capture the valuable cloaking device.
"Prepare a twelve man assualt team and have them report to transporter room 2," Tinson ordered the security chief on the bridge.
"Aye, sir."
Five minutes later, the team was assembled in the transporter room and Tinson came to give them their orders.
"Your orders are simple. The only way we will be able to get out of here is by stealing this fighter's cloaking device and using it on our ship. The Klingon ship only has about 12 men onboard, unfortuantely, and we expect resistance to be extremely high. The Chauntel will fire on the bridge, when they get close enough, to disorient the rest of the crew. You people will be in a hazardous environment, so I want you using full environmental suits. Set your phasers to disrupt. Shoot first and ask questions later. Its a common practice that the Klingons don't take prisoners, so when they get wind of you boarding they will be doing their utmost to kill you. The cloaking device is in engineering so we will beam you into the engineering access coridor. You have your orders. Good luck.
As Captain Tinson strode back to the Bridge an alarm klaxon sounded.
"Klingon cruisers approaching! All hands man battle stations! Repeat, all hands man battle stations!"
Tinson broke into a run and arrived on the bridge in time to hear McPherson report that the Klingon ship was at the outskirts of phaser range, now severaly decreased due to the atmosphere.
"Very good. Let them close a few more thousand km and then lock onto their bridge and fire.
As the Klingon ship approached without warning the red beams of the phasers slammed into the bridge of the fighter. Immediately it was opened to vacuum and all in that compartment of the ship were killed.
"No life signs on the bridge sir," Suren reported.
"Energize!"
Suddenly 12 Starfleet personnel materialized in the Engineering access corridor of the Klingon ship. When they were able to see their surroundings they saw two klingons aiming disruters at them. The Klingons fired, killng two of the party. However the other members of the team returned fire, killing the Klingons.
"Alright, lets ge that cloaking device. It should be right through these doors," Lieutenant Michael Murphy said.
As the boarding party moved into engineering, the Klingons in there tried to get their disrupters up, however the Starfleet personnel were faster, killing all of the Klingons.
"Scan for any more hostiles, Thames. Tucker, start preparing their cloaking device for transport."
"Aye, sir," they answered in unison.
"Sir, the boarding party reports all hostiles are neutralized and they have the cloaking device ready for transport," McPherson reported.
"Alright. Beam them back and get the cloaking device to engineering as quickly as possible. I want it set up and operational before any more of those ships come down after us.
"Before you come back, Murph, I want you to set up a link between our ship and theirs. Have their ship locked on a collision course with one of the other vessels. Hopefully, when they don't answer to ails they will think that their comm system is down. I want us to be able to initiate the collision course after the cloaking device is ready."
"We're on it," Murphy reported.
As the cloaking device was finished being set up in engineering, Murphy reported back to command.
"Sir, the uplink is ready and, as best as we can tell from your sensors, we have a course locked in on the lead vessel."
"Good. The cloak is almost ready, according to engineering. Stand by for transport."
In the transporter room the familier whine sounded as Murphy and his team members materialized. Murphy's position had been in the main weapons control room. However, that had been destroyed when the torpedo bay blew. He reported to the captain to see what his orders were.
"Murph, I want you to supplement McPherson at tactical. We have lost computer control of the starboard and port phaser banks, so I want you to tie in....
"Sir!," Suren reported, "via the Klingon cruiser I've managed to get a sensor feed from the other ships. On long range sensors there is another ship approaching, a Constitution class."
"Good we can use all the help we can get. Murph, I want you to tie in to the axiliary weapons panel and take control of starboard and port weapons. Suren, do you have any idea who that ship is?"
"I can't tell from this distance. However, from the lack of sensor data on the ship from the Klingons, I would assertain that this is one of newest Constitutions."
"What new Connies have been launched lately?"
"The USS Vincent, the USS Palomino, the USS Endeavour, and the USS David G. Farragut."
"Hmmm...the Endevour. I had a good friend of mine comm me a few months ago. He said that they were giving him a brand new ship, the Endeavour. he didn't say the class, but I can guess he's..."
"Sir, report from sickbay. The captain's dead."
At that news, Tinson and Murphy turned pale. They and O'reilly had known each other for years. When Tinson, Murph, as he was called, and Mumaw, another friend of the captain's, were new to the Academy, O'Reilly had been one of the first people to befriend them. Tinson, O'Reilly, Mumaw, and Murphy had been pals at Starfleet. The Quandary Quartet, as they were called, were always coming up with schemes that perplexed everyone as to how they could pull them off so flawlessly.
"Aye. Engineering report!"
"Sir, the cloaking device is hooked up and ready to go. Just say the word."
"The word is given."
In the midst of the gas giant's atmosphere the Chauntel faded from view. As they prepared to implement their plan, things were bustling on the fast approaching Constitution-class heavy cruiser.
On the Endeavour:
"What in the heck are those Klingon cruisers doing in Federation space? Red Alert. All power to the weapon systems. Let's show these guys how we play," Mumaw yelled.
As the Endeavour closed in on the Klingons, the Birds of Prey sent out a call for support. The K'Tingas that had given off the chase renewed it. Only, this time, their attention was focused on the Endeavour alone.
"Sir, I have three vessels moving to intercept us. They're K'tinga-class battlecruisers," the science officer reported.
"Hmmm...start scanning the nearby region for anything out of the ordinary. What reason would they have to send five ships against us? Stand by aft weapons. If the Klingons close to weapons range, target their bridges and forward weapons."
"Aye,sir," the tactical officer replied.
On the Chauntel:
"Sir, I've got three K'tinga-class cruisers closing in on the Endeavour," Suren reported.
"Open a channel with the Endeavour."
"Aye, sir," the comm officer replied.
On the Endeavour:
"Sir, we are being hailed by...The USS Chauntel," Ensign Oreander said.
"The Chauntel...put it through," Captain Mumaw replied.
"USS Endeavour, this is the USS Chauntel requesting assitance...repeat, this is the USS Chauntel requesting assistance."
"We read you Chauntel. We detect two ships in orbit and we are close to being intercepted by three battlecruisers..."
On the IKS Q'tek the science officer yelled to his captain.
"Sir, I'm picking up a transmission coming from inside the ionosphere of that planet, directed at the closing Federation starship."
"Target weapons on the source and open fire."
As the Chauntel gained altitude, dsrupter shots from the Klingon fighters began raining down. Suddenly, several shots hit the Chauntel's engineering area. As the cloaking device lost power the Chauntel became visible.
"Sir, we are detecing a ship coming up through the atmosphere, the USS Chauntel," the Klingon tactical officer on the Q'tek reported.
"Target that ship and fire," the captain replied.
On the Chauntel:
"Sir, the cloak is offline and both Klingon ships have targeted us and have begun to fire," Suren reported.
"M'rel, pilot the Klingon fighter into the nearest enemy vesssel. Jonas, Murph, start firing on the other ship. Hopefully we can disable it."
On the Endeavour:
"Sir, I'm detecting a ship, no two ships, inside the atmosphere of that planet. One is Federation and the other is Klingon. The Klingon ship appears....whoa!...it just slammed at full power into one of the other ships. The Chauntel is the other ship in the atmosphere. It's targeting the remaining ship," the science officer siad.
"What is the distance of the nearest battlecruiser?"
"12,498,527 km, sir," Lieutenant George Scott, the helmsman replied.
"What is our time to intercept the Klingon fighter?"
"We won't get to it before the Klingon cruisers intercept us," the scinece officer replied.
"Well...continue course, but let me known when the Klingons are 10 secounds out. Also, reload the aft tubes with our photonic mines," the captain said.
On the Chauntel:
"Sir, the explosion of the Klingon fighter knocked our shields down to 32%, but the other ship's shields are down," Murphy reported.
"Good, target their bridge and engineering. I'd love to get a good 'ol fashioned warp core breach going. Get to work on recharging those shields. If you have to, take power from the sensor arrays and the warp engines. Endeavour will have to handle those cruisers for now," Tinson said.
"Aye, sir," McPherson replied.
On the Endeavour:
"Sir, the Klingon ships are 10 seconds out," the tactical officer reported.
"Deploy photonic mines."
As the lead Klingon ship approached the Endeavour, its forward shield flared with the impact of 10 photonic mines. As the other ships closed, the Endeavour began firing all aft weapons at the ship. She then began rotating, bringing the starboard and finally, forward weapons to bear on the lead ship.
On the lead Klingon vessel:
"Sir, forward shields are failing. If we take another hit the bridge and forward weapons will be exposed!" the tacital officer screamed.
Before the Klingon ship could begin any manuver the Endeavvour's phasers and torpedoes pierced the weakened forward shields and slammed into the bridge and forward torpedo launcher. Any battle capability that the Klingon ship had was lost at that moment.
"Sir, the Klingon ship's brdge has been destroyed and their forward torpedo launcher severly damaged," the tactical officer reported.
"Good. Shift our fire onto the next ship. Begin evasive manuvers. If possible, keep the ships in torpedo firing arcs. Target their shield generators, weapons, and bridge," Mumaw ordered.
As the Endeavour began its attack on the second ship, the Chauntel finished off the remaining Bird of Prey. She then raced to join her sister ship in the fight.
On the Endeavour:
"Sir, the Chauntel has destroyed the other Bird of Prey and is closing on our position," the tactical officer said.
"Ok, establish me a hailing frequency, highly scrambled, between our ships."
"Ephraim, where is Kytin?" Mumaw asked.
"He's dead Basil. The first salvo hit near our bridge and he died a while after we got him to sickbay."
Captain Mumaw didn't say anything for a few moment. Kytin adn he had been dear freidns. He didn't keep many grudges, but this was something he itended to avenge.
"I understand. I could use some assistance."
"Well, Basil, we've started taking fire from that other Klingon ship. However, I have a risky idea. I've got a lot of casualties and my starboard shields are down. How about you swing around, lower your aft shields and we beam the survivors onboard. I will pilot the ship on a collision course with the other klingon ship and at the last possible moment escape in a shuttle. If you can keep the aft shields down I'll come in the shuttle bay and we'll finsih off the rest of these guys," Tinson said.
"Kytin would put the safety of his crew before anything else. I agree. We're coming about now."
The Endeavour rotated in space as the Chauntel closed. When they were 5km from each other, a mere hair in space, the Endeavour lowered her aft shields and the Chauntel rotated on her starboard. Within seconds all of the Chauntel survivvors except for Tinson were safely aboard the Endeavour.
After the trasport was complete the Chauntel backed off and headed right for the farthest Klingon cruiser. As she got only 10km from the cruiser a small shuttlecraft left launch bay 2. The Klingon ship made an attempt to evade, but by them it was too late. The Chauntel slammed into the Klingon ship at her maximum capable speed, overloading the Klingon's shields and, with the resulting antimatter explosion, gutting her. However, the wake of the explosion left the Endeavour and the Klingon ship nearly shieldless. It would be a race against who could knock the others shields down first. Unfortuantely for Tinson, the strongest shields were the aft ones, which were down at the time of the blast.
"Sir, we've lost the forward shields and the port and starboard shields are down to 12%," the tactical officer said.
"Rotate the ship and pull the aft shields up. Drop whichever other shields you have to and beam Tinson aboard," Mumaw ordered.
When Tinson materialized in the transporter room of the Endeavour, he immediately headed to the bridge.
Tinson stepped out of the turbolift and onto the brdige. Immediately he saw what the effects of the explosion had on Endeavour, power realys and innumerable circuits had been blown out all over the bridge.
Captain Mumaw turned around and looked at Tinson, "Eppy, we're running out of time..."