Captain Morgan

by Khartoum

Star Trek 50 years before Kirk & Co.

2. Others

Captain Morgan: Others

Captain Morgan watched the stars fly by the main screen, as they cruised to the next planet. Sherrizin 12 was the fourth planet out from the secondary star in a binary star system. It was the most habitable planet in the system, but that was not saying much. The planet's atmosphere was over forty percent oxygen, and fifty percent nitrogen. The colony lived in a sealed dome, and extracted argon to mix with the atmosphere to allow the colonists to breathe without worrying about sparks.

The source of all the oxygen was the massive plant life present. Virtually every square meter of the planet's surface was covered with a plant that turned sunlight and carbon dioxide into oxygen. The colonists had to go outside every few days to clear off the plants from the exhaust vents, as the plants were all but ravenous in their search for carbon dioxide. A few small oxygen-breathing herbivores had developed, but the charged particle waves that the sun spewed out every few years kept their population down, while the plants simply out-reproduced them, with seedpods hardened against the effects. In fact, a few plants had been using the flares to trigger their seedpods to open, waiting for the rich soil to be ready for them to live in.

As a result, there was no need to worry about the plants choking each other out, as the solar flares and charged particles would kill off all plant life, and the seeds in the ground would be able to use the raw material from the decomposing plants to grow. The decomposition effect was caused by hardy xenobacteria that lived inside the plants, taking a little of the plant mass to sustain them, in effect a type of parasite. While the plant was alive, the plant could grow fast enough that there was no problem with the bacteria, but when the plant died as a result of the flares, the bacteria would rapidly destroy the plant that it lived in. The colonists had not found out yet how the bacteria got inside the plants yet, but they were still looking into it.

There was no need for breathing equipment if you went outside the base, and the colonists there were in the habit of keeping a small, slow-growing plant in their room, to keep it smelling fresh, and providing plenty of oxygen. The plants worked better than any filter the Federation could produce so far, and at a far lower cost. The net result was that their plants were sent all over the Federation, as a cheap method of air filtration. The colonists had had some small success crossbreeding various plants with the local variety, and several variants had been produced. Some had a pleasant odor, others glowed in the dark via bioluminescence, and still others would have sealed bulbs where the flower developed inside, but would only open when carbon dioxide was exhaled on them. However, there was a strict quarantine system working, to prevent anyone from crossbreeding those plants with any of the toxic kinds, or fast growing kinds. One person had been a prankster, and had managed to crossbreed the plants with a native earth plant called the "Rotting corpse flower". The plant lived up to its name, and had forced the evacuation of an entire building when the massive flower opened during a speech.

According to the messages sent so far, the colony was having trouble with its fusion reactor. Without its reactor, the colony would not be able to communicate with the rest of the Federation; and even more importantly, there would be no way for the colony to survive the next solar flare. The colony also served as a center for biological research into plants, and exported various food crops to the Federation. By using small shuttles to extract the necessary biological materials from the local comet bodies and similar sites, the scientists would deposit the materials on the planet in pre-selected areas. The areas pre-selected were those that had hybrids that been bred to produce fruit and other similar crops.

The biological materials would land on those plants, serving the two tasks of clearing a field, and fertilizing the area. The seedpods in the area would use the raw organic material, and grow to titanic proportions. The old Earth records of defining bumper crops, and record sizes were considered barely acceptable amounts here. Each acre on this planet yielded over ten times the amount of crops as an acre on Earth, and that was per planting. Since each field could handle four plantings per year, this one planet was one of the most vital planets of the Federation.

Briefly Captain Morgan wondered why the Federation was shipping hyper growth seed stock to this sector, instead of having Sherrizin 12 export its crop to the local systems. But that was the way the Federation operated; all proceeds are to go to the local Starbase according to what the colony was able to produce, and the Starbase would disperse the items to each colony as to their needs. Anything left over would go up the chain of command for the starbases, until a use was found for it. If a colony needed something that was not produced locally, it would send the request to their starbase, and the request would be passed up the chain until somebody was found that had it, and then that item would be sent down to the colony that needed it. Most colonies kept a hidden supply depot, to use in case the items ordered weren't available for a few months, or years.

But that was idle daydreaming, and Captain Morgan knew that if any independent operators tried substituting themselves in here, they would be used by the Federation for more efficient distribution purposes. While on the way there another general quarters drill was held, to keep the crew in the right frame of mind.

When they arrived at Sherrizin 12, the communication section could get no answer to their hails. Investigating further with their scanners, they were only able to detect low-level battery power running, and extremely high levels of oxygen present in the base, indicating that the base's argon filters were no longer running. Sending down a shuttle to investigate, a standard complement away team was to investigate the base and report back what was going on.

The standard away team was composed of six security personnel, two medics, two engineers, an officer in charge, and a pilot and communications person. The security team would assign one member to each other person, and the engineering team would be responsible for finding out what was going on and get basic services running again. The medical team would be responsible for taking care of any injured personnel, while the officer would be in charge of the whole team, and any communication with the remaining colony personnel. Finally, the pilot would use the shuttle's communications to keep the team in contact with the Excellon, while using the shuttle's sensors to scan the area for anything interesting. The shuttle could also request help from the Excellon's sensors in case anything unusual was found, and additional power was needed to identify.

Arriving at the colony, the shuttle team saw that the main landing areas were full of plants, and the pilot began using the shuttle's laser to slowly clear an area to land. The security team got out first, and began using their weapons to clear a path to the main colony buildings. Getting halfway there, they heard voices.

"Over here, this way, thank goodness you've arrived."

It turned out that the colony's main fusion reactor had failed due to proper maintenance, and had lost containment. With no gravitational field to pressurize the deuterium for fusion, the reaction had stopped immediately, and the batteries had been brought on-line to keep the colony going. Solar power had been useless, as the plants covered any solar panels within a few days. The local shuttles used more complex power storage, but still depended on the colony's reactor for recharging their power cells. The net result was that the colony was running out of power, and as the date for the solar flare approached, the people were getting more and more concerned.

To save power, the colony had decided to set all of the doors open, and run on minimal lighting. The bioluminescent plants had been planted, and were currently providing plenty of light inside the colony, though they needed to be brought out of the colony every few days to receive sunlight to recharge their chemical supplies.

The colony was doing quite well for food, as the food plants had gotten loose inside the station, and were thriving in the high carbon dioxide environment. The colony had been doing quite well, except for not having any communications with the rest of the Federation. However, with all the doors open, when the solar flare arrived, the colony would be incinerated, and that had been a definite damper on people's spirits.

The spare components had been among the supplies the Excellon was transporting, and soon the colony's main reactor was back on-line, and the respective leaders were talking to one another. Captain Morgan was talking to the colony's administrator, and their conversation went like this:

"Mrs. Prokelon, I'm glad to see your colony is getting better, but I have to admit I am curious about why you didn't notify starbase 121 about your situation."

"Simple Captain. We did. We sent four different communications attempts to them, and then stopped after it became clear that nothing was headed our way, even though Starbase 121 said that something would be sent. Also, the subspace communicators required a heck of a jolt to send a message, and we needed the power to run basic life support here. Recycling materials, running the genetics lab to breed the plants we needed here, and running the defoliants seemed more important at the time.

"I was curious myself, as Starfleet didn't send out any ships to pick up the food crops we had. We were wondering about it, as it seemed rather odd. Do you know why they haven't sent any ships out?"

"Yes I do. It seems as though one of the colonies out here is intercepting ships and shuttles. We are trying to find out who it is, and would appreciate any information you might have on that."

"I'll see what we can do, though without main power, all our sensors were unplugged, as we were trying to keep enough power to survive the solar flare. We kept the subspace receiver on a little longer, as it required less power, but we were forced to turn that off as well. But I will get together with my staff, and give you a complete copy of all our sensor records if you wish."

"That would be wonderful. I'll have my computer people standing by for your data."

The data was transferred, and the sensor people sat down, trying to find out anything useful out of the data given to them. But no matter how long they stared at it, there was nothing useful in there. There were the usual, nebulae, drifting hunks of rocks, and basic readouts on nearby systems. The data was filtered, and nothing that they could identify was there. Finding no new evidence to suggest the missing shuttles and ships were in the Sherrizin system, the Excellon continued its route.

*

The same procedure repeated itself as the Excellon continued its tour of the various colonies. Verrin five, Gollar one, Detrin outpost, Eilar three, Fendrin eight, and other colonies were visited. Each one showed signs of being out of contact with the Federation, and all reported that they had been out of contact with the starbase as far as supplies went, and no sign was found of any missing shuttles or ships in their systems.

Captain Morgan finally called his senior staff into the main meeting room, as the Excellon went towards Starbase 121. Everybody was looking a little tired, and the fact that they had found nothing to show for their efforts gnawed at them. They knew that the shuttles and ships had disappeared, but there had been no trace of them anywhere. They were getting their message ready to send to starbase 121, and were deciding how to word it appropriately-

The Ops officer suddenly jerked upright, as his communicator buzzed. He was startled as he had given orders not to be disturbed, and was curious as to what this was about. He held the communicator up to his ear for a moment, and then looked at the others in the room, the color draining from his face.

"Captain, we just got a message from starbase 121. They say that the colony on Ritzak five is complaining that the module freighter never arrived. They've been waiting for the past two months, and there still hasn't been any sign. Commander Wilson is asking if we know anything about this."

The rest of the staff was looking at him as though he was crazy. The weapons officer spoke up first. "But that's impossible! We went over that route, and there was nothing there that would harm a freighter."

The rest of the staff started babbling in complete agreement, and the Captain silenced all of them. "All right. We think that it is impossible, but it happened. Deal with it. We will alter our route, to come back along the course the Amemnon would have taken on the way to Ritzak five from starbase 121, and we will go over it with a fine-toothed comb. If there are any anomalies, and I mean any, I want you to analyze it until you have identified the reason for it. If you can't find a reason, then we will investigate it until we find a reason. Do I make myself clear?"

There was a chorus of "Yes, sir??s, and the officers went to do their jobs. The Excellon altered heading to go past Ritzak five, on their way to starbase 121, and the sensor operators dug out the data from the previous run, and began comparing each section of their passage, with the corresponding part from their initial travel.

Day after day crawled by, as the sensor logs were examined down to the square meter, which in space is very high resolution indeed. There were the same accumulation of space debris as before, a few comets, an asteroid, but one of the nebulas showed a slight change. The change was as though a lot of energy had been applied in one direction, in one area, similar to that of an impulse drive in operation. Unfortunately, it appeared as though the energy had been directed away from the Amemnon's path, so the Amemnon could not have gone that way.

The tactical officer presented his findings to the Captain, and the Captain looked over it as well.

"So whatever this is, it could not be the Amemnon?"

"No Captain. The energy pattern is all wrong. If it was the Amemnon, the dispersion would be in a much smaller area. All of this nebula change means that the impulse drive was from a larger source, speaking in terms of area of the exhaust. Also, given the speed of the retreating particles, I would say that the engine is just as good as ours, if not better."

"So it would be as though someone hid behind the nebula, waited for the Amemnon to come by, and popped out in time to attack her?"

"That looks like, my gosh, that fits the data perfectly! The nebula would screen against most sensors, and a high thrust engine would allow the unknown to get right on top of Amemnon. But how did they manage to surprise Amemnon without the Amemnon sending out a message?"

"Is there anything in the volume that would have prevented the Amemnon from sending out a message?"

"Nothing at all Captain."

"Then the only possibility is that a Federation ship managed to get in close to the Amemnon, and communicate with her to keep quiet. When they were close enough, they would have either boarded and taken over the engine room and comm center, or simply fired at them from the outside and crippled the engine room and communications center that way.

"In either case, we are looking at traitors to the Federation, and we know what have to do."

"Yes Captain. Do you also want me to load the vertical launch cells with variable-yield nuclear missiles?

"Yes. We'll give them a chance to surrender, but if they want a fight, it's a fight they'll get.

So the Excellon cruised through space, heading towards Starbase 121. Captain Morgan wanted to get this information out to the other colonies, and the Starbase had the necessary communications hook-ups. He also wanted to get fresh supplies for the Excellon, especially related to weapons and other ordnance.

*

Arriving at Starbase 121, Captain Morgan ordered the weapons crews to begin loading the vertical launch bays with variable yield nuclear missiles. This would allow him to determine the size of the warhead to be used against the Federation ship doing the attacks.

The base's crew was also busy, loading up the Excellon with combat supplies, ranging from weapons, to several pallets of spare parts for weapons systems. A local asteroid miner had come back, so there were several more rounds prepared for the Gauss cannon, bringing a full load of Gauss slugs on board. Various exotic chemicals were loaded, designed to allow the Excellon to replace the lasing rods of the lasers in case they were cracked.

The Excellon's main lasers were only ten centimeters wide, but being over one hundred meters long, carrying spares of that size was not feasible. What had been done was to design a laser system with two-meter long sections, and whenever a section cracked, that section would be removed, and the sections further towards the tail would be moved up to keep the beam ready. At the end, there were systems for mounting additional sections. So as the sections got used and cracked during combat, extras would be loaded in at the rear, and attached to the main chain as combat permitted.

To properly focus the lasers, two gas lenses were used at the forward point, and the air inside was not subjected to the normal gravity. The first chamber was spun, and the resulting change in air density was enough to slightly alter the focal point of the particles making up the laser stream. The second was also spun, but at a constant rate, and was used to aim the laser beam at targets slightly off-axis.

A similar system of sections was used for the laser turrets, but only three sections were used for each. The sections were buried within the ship, and mirrors were used to channel the laser to the target. A gas rotation was also used, but the gas rotation was used before the laser energy struck the mirrors, to prevent that systemry from being outside the hull when combat occurred. Since all the lasers used the same sections, it was a simple matter for one set of replacements to serve any laser on board the ship.

Since there was more room for cooling equipment, the turret lasers could be run for longer periods than the main lasers, and as such were used to keep a steady beam on the target. The main lasers though, heated up so quickly that they could only be used for twenty seconds at a time. Those twenty seconds though, usually meant life for the ship firing, and death for the ship being fired upon.

The Gauss system was designed along similar lines, with various numbers of acceleration rings used to fire a projectile. If one set of acceleration rings was damaged, they were simply removed, even while combat was occurring, and replaced with new ones. After combat was over, the engineering staff could go over the rings and figure out if they could be repaired or not. If not, the parts were used to repair other rings that were damaged.

The final result of this segmentation was that even under stress, the main weapons could keep firing, and the shipboard personnel could restore them to combat capability. The key detail with the lasers was to keep the rear mirror in the appropriate place, and as a result the Excellon carried three for each laser. The normal configuration was one in use, one to place after the replacement laser rods, and a spare. When the new rods were installed, a new mirror was set up at the rear, and when the bridge okayed the crew to reset the laser; the original mirror was pulled out, allowing the laser to access the new sections.

The vertical launch systems were designed with similar functionality in mind, so that even if there was a gaping crater where one cell used to be, the computer could easily switch to another cell, and keep firing missiles from it. The easiest way to reload a missile cell was to use the shuttles to pull out the old canisters, and transfer a new one in. By landing a shuttle on the ship's hull, and cutting off gravity in that region, the shuttle could start the transfer process. The crystal armor was designed to be on panels there, so the panels would flip up, and the magnetic clamps on the shuttles would attach to those as it removed the old cell, and put in a new one. As there was no gravity to worry about, the only problem was that of the mass of the missile cell itself.

The variable yield missiles were designed to allow any size warhead from one to ten megatons to be selected, in half-megaton increments. It was not as powerful as a properly designed warhead, which was capable of fifteen megatons, but that was a hammer, while this missile was a scalpel. By tailoring the missile yield, the EMP effects could be adjusted for maximum effect, without obliterating the target vessel when the warhead exploded.

The starbase commander looked at the Captain, and said, "You know, this is the only trouble I've had in this sector, and you look like you're about to go to war."

"I am figuring that whoever did this was powerful to keep the other ships from even getting a message away, and I want to have a polite reply ready for when I meet them. I also want to make sure they listen."

"Well, I know I'd listen, seeing what you're loading up there."

"Let's hope they do too."

The two of them then went back to their respective tasks, one hoping the problem could be cleared up rapidly, the other knowing what could happen in combat, and dreading how many might be lost.

*

The Excellon then went out again, but received another transmission from the starbase. One of the warp-capable shuttle pilots was scheduled to go out, and he wanted to go with them. Although it would hold them down to the shuttle's speed, Captain Morgan immediately agreed. This way, the only way for the renegades to get to the shuttle was through him and his ship.

The two ships then set off, with the Excellon leading the shuttle by a quarter light second, intending to get the cargo through, and find out who was raiding the ships. They wound their course by Ritzak five, observing the same nebulae and other phenomena, and getting especially tense as they passed the nebula with the slight change in its edge.

But nothing happened. The entire trip there was boring, save for only a General Quarters drill during the passage past the nebula, but nobody appeared to attack the shuttle. Captain Morgan was curious about what had happened, but was willing to slightly relax as his ship and the shuttle arrived at their destination, the Detrin outpost.

The Detrin outpost was a mining colony, extracting various lighter ores containing phosphorus, aluminum, and similar metals from the asteroid belt. There were heavier metals deeper in the planets, but Starfleet figured that by the time the other ores were starting to get low, the necessary technology would have been developed to get to the deeper ores. In the meantime, the colony ran a small fleet of mining vessels, whose sole job was to use the laser spectroscope and small charges to analyze an asteroid, and to break it up to store the useful pieces on board the small shuttles.

The laser spectroscope was merely used to vaporize parts of asteroids, while the main colony would analyze the emissions from the vaporized material. Standard procedure was to arrange a sector to be scanned before launching, fire several shots with the laser to get vapor samples, and home in on the ones selected by the main base. The charges would be placed in critical junctures on an asteroid, and then detonated; to make the rock fracture and the pieces could then be loaded onto the shuttle.

One person had tried to simply tie a wire from the rear of the shuttle to larger rocks, but had run into trouble with the warp field and towing the rock. If the line was too short, the impulse drives would vaporize the wire attached around the rock during its trip, while if the wire was too long, the warp field was strained. The second idea proposed by him was to use a smaller version of the module freighter, with a simple shuttle front that would attach to the asteroid, and the impulse engines would be mounted to thrust around the rock. However, the same problem arose, in that the asteroid could only be a certain size to fit between the impulse exhaust. Since the shuttles had a large rear hatch, it was easy for a shuttle to simply back up to the processing facility, unload the asteroid(s) quickly, and go back out. He was still working on new ideas, but the colony administrator generally filed them in the circular filing cabinet.

The colony relied on imports for food, and the people there were glad to see the shuttle. They had gotten down to three weeks of food, and since there was generally a two-week lag time between requests and arrival, they had been getting worried. With the shuttle there though, they had just received another four months of food supplies.

The base had a large supply of processed ore available, and the colony started getting the processed ore on board the shuttle. As the large ingots were loaded on board, the Excellon's crew took the opportunity to look around the colony. The people there seemed sad, as though they did not enjoy their life there of hard work and mining. The shuttle crews were a different sort though, as they seemed very independent, and only associated with other shuttle crews. They seemed to look down upon the other colony members, which was odd as everybody knew that nobody was superior to another.

The planet leave lasted for a day, and then it was time to head out. The shuttle was going back to Starbase 121, and Captain Morgan decided to join it. This had been the first shuttle run with no incidents, and he wanted to make sure that nothing happened on the way back. The same route was followed, with the Excellon in front, and the shuttle behind. Again nothing happened, and when the shuttle arrived at Starbase 121, the people there welcomed the pilot and the crew of the Excellon back with lots of hearty thanks.

Two days after they arrived however, another shuttle was reported missing. This shuttle had been on Ventar four getting repairs to its power distribution system, and was carrying a load of electronic components to Starbase 121. The shuttle was declared missing, because its route should have brought it to the base the day before, and it had not arrived yet. This latest loss dampened everyone's spirits, and the mood at the base got worse.

Captain Morgan and Commander Wilson met later on that day, to discuss the latest event. They were at a local pub, and were enjoying their drinks, discussing how to prevent any other losses.

"Captain, I don't see what we can do. We are losing shuttles at a horrible rate, and my superiors are threatening to cut off my support unless we can stop the traitors. I want to try to do something, but everything I send out goes missing."

"Commander, the problem that I can see is that the colonies are spread out, and their sensors cannot cover the routes to get from one colony to another. All any raider has to do is wait outside the colonies' detection radius, and wait for a shuttle to come by. There are several dozen star systems in this sector that aren't colonized, and any one of them could hide the base. I could search every system, but it would take too much time."

"You're right Captain, but even if I had better sensors here to distribute, I wouldn't be able to send them to the colonies, as these traitors would simply pick up the shuttle, and grab the sensors for themselves. Then we'll have raiders with top-line sensors, instead of what we have now."

"The only way to get to those raiders is to make them come into our sensor range, but nothing we've seen so far indicates they'd be that foolish. What I'd have to do is look enough like a freighter that they'd come close, but as soon as they saw my ship they'd realize I was no freighter, and run."

"Too bad. I suppose that asking you to use your ship as a freighter in the meantime is asking a little too much?"

"You'd be right. I thought about that, but I don't have enough room to be really useful. The best way that I can think of is to make a single route, and have a single ship fully loaded with the supplies. From there, I simply go around to each system, escorting the ship, while the ship drops off the supplies and picks up the products from each colony."

"I know. Hey, there's another module freighter coming in next week. I can get my teams to work, and build a cargo module in orbit. Using its additional cargo storage, that module freighter could handle most of the supply shipments. Not all of them though."

"You've got a good idea though, Commander. I can simply set up two or more trips for the module freighter to make, and it can drop off the supplies here each time it finishes. Also, I was reading a story about the World War that took place on Earth, in the early and mid twentieth century. One nation faced a similar problem, in which it had to get needed supplies from one continent to another, with stealthy raiders trying to intercept those shipments. I think the method they used was called a "convoy" system. Instead of having lots of freighters all over the ocean, the convoy system would have all the freighters in one solid group, far more easily protected by the escorting vessels.

"Of course, if a raider got in among the freighters, it was guaranteed an easy selection of targets, but getting there was extremely difficult. I could do the same with my ship. Use the module freighter as the convoy, and my ship as the escort. If the renegades want to prey on a ship, they will have to get by me. I'll broadcast my status every day, so you will know roughly when we engage them."

"Captain that's a great idea. Unfortunately, the module freighter isn't supposed to go through the sector. It is supposed to just come here, drop off its supplies, pick up the supplies, and return to main Federation space. Starfleet headquarters won't approve of the freighter being used in this fashion."

"Commander, if the freighter comes here, it will return empty. If Starfleet asks about the freighter, tell them it was a choice of sending it back empty, or borrowing it for a few months and sending it back full."

"Captain, they won't like it one bit. It'll mess up their schedules, ruin their maintenance schedule for the freighter, and will put their noses out of joint. Let's do it."

Both of them left the pub that night, feeling much better about their chances of catching whoever was responsible for the thefts.

*

The next few days saw a flurry of activity. The shuttles at the Starbase were pressed into action, ferrying parts and workers up to a single structure in orbit. The structure was the skeleton of a cargo module, as the information to build was available in any Federation database, and easily constructed by any starbase in the Federation. The Excellon's crew was being trained in escort drills, with sensor crews being worked to identify everything they saw, and tactical drills so that weapons fire would not come near the freighter, even during extreme situations.

The security details were being drilled also, on how to take over another ship, by using shuttles to deliver them to their target, and how to retake a freighter in case a pirate shuttle gets onto the freighter and the raiders storm out. Lieutenant (jg) Mallory was designing a few systems to aid in defending the Excellon, in case she was boarded.

One time she was at a workstation, designing a new gadget, when Captain Morgan walked up behind her and looked at her schematic. The display on her screen showed what looked like a net, but with slight differences.

"Lieutenant, what is that you are working on?" Captain Morgan called her Lieutenant, as adding the words junior grade or the letters 'JG after the rank every time it was said was very slow.

"Um, Captain, what a surprise, um, I had a few ideas about how to keep any boarding parties entertained if they come on board. This is a spring-activated net system. In normal use, it simply lies on the floor, or attached to the walls or ceiling. If a local alert sounds, the net is triggered, and springs out of the wall, and attaches to the opposite side. The strings in it are diamond filament, and are very hard to break. By using thin filaments, and adding a dulling spray, the strings often won't be seen in time, and whoever is attacking will be caught in the net. Some other ideas I have thought of are using lights to create a strobe effect, a display system, using similar ideas as the main viewer, to create the image of a long hallway when it is actually a solid wall, and force fields, similar to the energy shields we use."

"Good job Lieutenant. When you get finished with those ideas, set them into a report, and submit them, along with proposed locations for using them. Carry on."

As Captain Morgan walked away, he admitted to himself, 'She is very clever. I'm glad she's on my ship.'

*

When the module freighter arrived, the captain was not very cooperative concerning the plan.

"Look Commander, I am not allowed to deviate from my flight plan, no matter what. If I don't go to the next starbase after this one, they won't be able to deliver their cargo on time. Speaking of which, where's the cargo that's supposed to go in my ship?"

"Not here. Look Captain, there have been a total of four ships and over twenty shuttles that have disappeared in the past six months, and you can guess what the result of that is. In short, I don't have the cargo here, except for one shipment, which will only occupy a corner of one of your holds."

"Then what am I supposed to do? If I don't show up with the cargo, they'll assume I'm hiding it out somewhere, and they'll haul me in for questioning, and keep me there until they find out."

"Well then, the only option left is to go around to the colonies and pick up the supplies yourself."

"Well, uh, wait a minute Commander! You said that there have been all those ships and shuttles disappearing! What's there to prevent the same thing from happening to me?"

"If you go along with this route, the Excellon will be able to escort you over your route. Also, the second cargo module in orbit will help to hold the required materials, so you can get to your next destination with a double-sized load. Does that make you a little bit happier?"

"Well, I suppose so. But I don't like it. I'll do it, but I won't like it."

The discussion was ended, and Commander Wilson sent a message off to Captain Morgan, telling him that the freighter captain would cooperate.

The next day, the two ships left orbit, and accelerated onto the route laid out. The Excellon was in the lead, and the module freighter was trailing by one quarter of a light second, to keep the two ships close enough so that if anything happened, the Excellon would be in range to assist. The two ships traveled the route, the freighter captain sweating the entire time, the Excellon and her crew waiting, and even hoping something would show up.

But nothing happened, as they went from colony to colony, and the freighter captain began to grow more and more abrasive to Captain Morgan. Captain Morgan in the meantime grew more and more concerned that whoever had done the attacks had left, and was even now striking other shuttles and ships in the Federation.

But as they emerged from warp near the colony of Fendrin eight, a new sight greeted their eyes.

"Captain, I have a ship in orbit, it's the Amemnon!"

"What the? Communications, raise her!"

"Attempting to do so now sir."

Several minutes pass, far longer than it normally takes to contact a ship using subspace or radio. During this time, Captain Morgan tells the module freighter with them to hide in the outer system, in case something goes wrong. Also, Excellon is closing on the Amemnon, attempting to find out what is going on.

"Communications, any response to our hail?"

"None yet Captain."

"Very well then. XO, bring this ship to General Quarters."

The atonal siren rang throughout the Excellon, rousing crewmen, and telling them that they were needed. Within three minutes, the Excellon was ready for battle, and Commander Verrin reported the condition.

"All systems manned and ready Captain. Shields are up, and weapons are ready."

"Sensors, can you tell me anything about what is going on around here?"

"Not much yet sir. We'll know more as we get closer though. We might lose our track of our module freighter though."

"Hm, tell the captain of our freighter to proceed to the next planet in, so we can keep watch his ship too."

"Doing it now Captain."

"In the meantime, keep trying to raise the Amemnon."

The Excellon proceeded further in-system, each time keeping the module freighter that had followed them moving in with the Excellon, so that if something happened, the Excellon could respond quickly.

"Captain, we're getting better reads on the Amemnon and the colony. The colony seems to have lost main power, and some of the Amemnon's power reads are different. Not just modified as though by raiders, but totally different. It's as though a totally new technology was used in them, and the difference is enough to show up. I'm reading the differences in their warp field, and a couple of unusual power reads in the module attached to the ship."

"Any idea what could cause the loss of main power at the colony?"

"No idea Captain."

"Very well then. We will proceed under the assumption that the Amemnon is operating under the command of an unknown force. XO, keep on the sensors to find out all you can about the colony. Most importantly, is the Amemnon rendering aid, or is it the cause of the colony's loss of power?"

"Yes sir."

More minutes passed, and suddenly, the XO called out, "Captain, there appear to be shuttles leaving the planet, and heading towards the Amemnon. Looks like they're getting ready to leave."

"Can't let that happen; tactical, I want a missile solution on the Amemnon. Set three warheads for half a megaton, I want to get the Amemnon's attention. Have the missiles detonate beyond the Amemnon, and fire when I give the word."

The tactical officer pressed the button, and the command raced through the ship's systems. Automatic systems tested the first missiles selected, and reported that one missile wasn't responding properly. Another missile was selected, and the three missiles were set to half a megaton, and readied for firing. The whole process had taken less than one hundredth of a second, and all the tactical crew knew was that three missiles were set properly.

"Missiles are ready Captain, and are awaiting your orders."

"Thank you. If the Amemnon tries to get away from us, I will use the missiles to discourage her. Communications, keep trying to raise her."

"Captain, the Amemnon is heading towards us. We're also reading several unusual power sites on her hull. Looks like an additional power nexus has been set up on top and below the main hull. The module in the rear looks slightly different too. Since there are five shuttles currently in operation, they could have converted the module into a boat bay to hold the three additional shuttles."

"Comm, any response yet?"

"None yet Captain."

"Fire a single missile, from the ones that are at a half-megaton, halfway between us and the Amemnon."

The tactical officer pressed a button, and one of the missiles already set to half a megaton in yield was blown out of its launching tube by gas pressure, and the missile drive ignited in less than a hundredth of a second after that. Receiving the feed from the Excellon's sensors, the missile arched over towards the Amemnon in a fifteen G turn, and blasted towards the detonation point. In the span of a few seconds, the missile reached the point, and detonated.

Five hundred kilotons of explosive fury vented itself on the space between the two ships, and the EMP effect raced out almost immediately behind the light from the explosion. The main screen in the Excellon automatically dimmed to protect the sight of the humans on board, but the Amemnon was not protected against the EMP as the Excellon was. Relays blew out in several sections, and lights flickered. But those apparently were the secondary systems, for the Amemnon charged through where the missile had detonated, and the five shuttles swerved towards the Amemnon.

"Captain, they're heading right for us."

"Very well then. If more than one shuttle approaches to within one kilometer, fire a turret laser to warn, then fire a second shot to cripple it. I want answers, and sifting debris won't give me enough of them."

But not only were the five shuttles approaching, the Amemnon was too. Even worse, the Amemnon began firing on the Excellon!

"Sir, incoming fire!"

"Return fire with the main lasers! Turrets, cripple those shuttles!"

Sensors told the weapons how far their targets were, and where they were heading. Computers calculated where the target would be, and minor adjustments were made. Lasers fired, pumping massive amounts of energy into thin lines that reached out to prevent those who would harm the Excellon from doing so. Gouts of vaporized metal flew from the sides of the shuttles attacking, and two holes were punched deep into the hull of the Amemnon. But the Amemnon and her shuttles were no less accurate, and twelve of their shots hit the Excellon?s shields.

"Multiple hits Captain. They're savaging our shields. Forward shield down to seventy one percent and the Amemnon is still closing."

"Target five missiles at the Amemnon, set for three megaton yield. Detonation range is one hundred meters. Fire when ready."

More missiles received their orders, and the deadly sequence repeated. The missiles launched, and homed in on the vessel they were ordered to kill. Five explosions dotted the space near the Amemnon, yet she still came on. She was venting atmosphere, and looked like a cripple, yet her weapons still had power, and they fired again.

"More hits Captain. Forward shields are down to forty nine percent, and two of the shuttles are still moving. I don't know what their weapons are, but they are nasty."

"Helm, ninety degrees down, and Turrets fire on the Amemnon. If any shuttles get into a spot where they can fire on the forward shields, they have first priority."

"Sensors, you said there were two points of unusual power nexii on the Amemnon. Have the weapons fire been coming from them?"

"Um, yes captain."

"Feed those coordinates to the dorsal turret. Dorsal turret, fire on that location."

The turret on the top of the Excellon received the location, and fired both of its beams at the location. From the outside, the beams were invisible, but the effects on the Amemnon were noticeable. Sparks flew in the vacuum of space, as the weapons mounted there were subjected to torrents of particles burning away at their connections. A surge of sparks occurred as the beings controlling the Amemnon tried to fire the weapons, and the mount was silent.

"Nailed it sir. Incoming!"

More shots poured in from the Amemnon, but only from the second turret, and the impact knocked the dorsal shields down by fifteen percent. Damage Control crews labored on the units that had overloaded in the bow, feverishly trying to get them reset and re-energized before anybody else targeted there.

"Sensors, feed the location of the other power nexus to the dorsal turret. Dorsal, can you hit around that spot, to try to cut those weapons off?"

"Will try Captain."

The gunner for that turret saw the site highlighted by sensors, on the bottom of the Amemnon's hull, and began tracking that point. Picking a spot one meter above and one meter to the left, the gunner began firing the laser, and guiding the beam to the right. The weapon mounted on the Amemnon was primarily outside the hull, and without its supporting skeleton and power feeds, now needed only a minor twitch to be snapped off.

The sensor department gave out a small cheer as the power source disappeared from their screens, and Captain Morgan knew that the weapon was no longer a threat to his ship. While all this had been going on, the other turrets had managed to cripple the remaining shuttles, and there were a total of six weaponless craft floating near the Excellon. But the Amemnon still had its power plant, and the sensor department began to read a steady build-up of power from the reactor.

"Captain, there seems to be a massive build-up in the Amemnon's main reactor." The sensor operator was sounding puzzled as the data was reported, and the confusion showed in his voice. "What the- lifeboat launching from the Amemnon!"

But that wasn't the only thing to startle the sensor team, as the main reactor aboard the Amemnon had its containment pulled, and the plasma within was allowed to vent through the entire ship. The plasma raced through the passageways, vaporizing organic components and reducing the living and dead bodies on board to so much burnt organic material in the process.

The shuttles began to drift at the same time, though whether that was due to seeing what had happened to their ship or due to the damage inflicted on them by the Excellon's lasers was difficult to tell. Since there was no more action being taken by any of the six hostile vessels, Captain Morgan began issuing orders to begin a salvage and investigation operation.

"XO, connect me to the security team."

"Here Captain."

"Security? I want you to put together four teams. The first is to go down to the colony and find out what happened, the second is to go around to the shuttles and investigate them, the third to go out to the lifeboat and find out all you can from it, and the fourth is to go on board the Amemnon and find out what was going on there. Report back when your teams are complete and you are ready to go."

"Yes sir."

"Helm, get us closer to the planet, I want to get some more information for the security team to have for when they go down there."

"Yes sir."

*

The minutes passed as the Excellon approached the planet. The Amemnon was kept in sensor range the entire time, and the data kept piling up. The colony's power plant had several scars on the outside that appeared to be similar to lightning strikes, and the main communication center had similar scars.

The security teams reported they were ready, and Captain Morgan gave them permission to use the four shuttles to complete their missions. The first team sped towards the planet's surface, intending to find out what was going on. The second team began going to the closest shuttle, while the third team headed towards the life pod and the fourth team went towards the Amemnon.

The module freighter during this time was also heading towards the colony, and her captain sent a message to the Excellon, for Captain Morgan. It was a private message, intended for Captain Morgan only, so he took it in his chambers.

"Captain Morgan, I would like to apologize for my comments earlier."

"Captain, is there any particular reason for that?"

"Essentially, I saw what you did to the Amemnon, and I'm guessing you wee holding back. It's starting to sink in among me and my crew just how much firepower you're packing there. I don't think a Falcon class cruiser could have taken care of the Amemnon as quickly or as effectively as you did."

A Falcon class cruiser was a survey ship, designed to look for new systems, and survey them for useful materials and/or minerals. It had barely half the armament of the Excellon, so Captain Morgan knew the freighter captain was just trying to impress him.

In the meantime Captain, I would like to start transferring cargo to the colony. Do you mind if I start?"

"Actually Captain, I do. My security teams haven't even gotten to the planet yet to tell me what happened, and you want to start transferring cargo immediately? If your shuttles aren't loaded yet, you may load and launch them, but don't send them to the colony until I say so. After all, there may be more surprises down there."

"Um, ah, yes Captain. I'll send them down when you say so."

Captain Morgan broke the connection, and went back to the Bridge.

"Captain, the third team has reached the life pod, and reports three people on board. They are bringing them and the life pod back, but report that the environmental system aboard the life pod seemed to be missing, sir. If they hadn't been using a reserve air supply, they would've only lasted half an hour in there.

"They also wish to give a full report, but only one of them is fit enough to do so. The other two look like they've been, well, whipped. All three are showing lots of bruises, and one person seems to have several broken bones. They are in bad shape, and the boarding commander has already asked for medical assistance to meet them at the boat bay."

"Very well then. I'm heading there too, and will want to talk to the team leader. Commander Verrin, you have the bridge."

Captain Morgan walked out of the bridge into the passageway, his mind full of questions. 'Why would someone remove the environmental systems from a life pod? Who would whip someone resulting in such bad injuries?' But no answers presented themselves, and he had to content himself with knowing that the boarding commander would have a few answers.

He arrived in the boat bay, but got to one side as he heard, "Medical emergency! Clear the way!" The ship's doctor was coming through with three gurneys, and one person was barely visible through all the hardware being used. The boarding commander had already gotten the life pod removed from the shuttle, and an engineering team was going over it, to find out everything they could.

From where he was standing, Captain Morgan could see that it was a one-person life-pod, and that no maintenance had been done on it. In fact, several components had been removed from it, and those were critical components as well. The team leader was standing nearby though, and Captain Morgan went over to talk to him.

"Lieutenant, can you give me a brief summary?"

"Yes Captain. Off-hand, I'd say this life pod has been without maintenance for several weeks, almost the same amount of time since the Amemnon went missing. This is a one-person life pod, so I am wondering why they crammed three people in it. All three of them were wearing remnants of their uniforms, and I'd say those remnants were worn by them even as they were whipped. All three people had bruises, and there was blood on several parts of their uniforms as well. I'd have to get a lab to confirm, but I think it was their blood. They also appeared malnourished, and when one of my members offered them some survival rations, they ate them like crazy."

"These people were in a bad place Captain. I don't know who did this to them, but I'd like to meet them one day."

"Very well then. Where's the remaining person from the life pod?"

"He's on the gurney over there being questioned by Chief Barrow. He's telling us whatever we want to know, and we've had a recorder running the entire time. We'll go over it later to get the complete story, but he seems to be saying that whoever was doing this wore suits the entire time, to hide their identities."

"Thank you."

"Yes sir." The team leader went back to his men, and continued the set-up. He would detail his men to watch the current crewman talking, and station his men to watch sickbay as well, in case these three people were faking. Of course, if they were faking, they were doing a good job, but a security leader doesn't trust anyone easily.

"Bridge, any news from the other teams?"

"Captain, team two has reached the first of the shuttles, and reports that it seems to be remote operated. They have found no sign of any pilot, and the cargo hold is empty. She's setting the shuttle up so it will be in a stable orbit, in case we want to salvage it. After that, she will proceed to each shuttle, and set them up in close orbits, to prevent them from crashing into the colony."

"Good thinking. How are the other teams?"

"Team one is two minutes out from the colony, and team four is one minute from the Amemnon. Team two is three minutes from finishing up the orbit, and then they'll move on to the next shuttle."

"Very well then."

The minutes now seemed to drag by, as Captain Morgan waited to hear the results from the two teams heading into unknown areas. He listened to the reports from each team, trying to find out anything that would help. He listened to team four as they reached the Amemnon, and began moving through the ship to certify it cleared. He listened as team one reached the colony, and began heading towards the buildings to clear them out as well.

"In here, in here! We're Federation!"

Captain Morgan heard the communications, and was startled as the communication was from the Amemnon! He listened further, and found out that the people speaking were from the colony, and had apparently been brought up there by the shuttles. But the other shuttles had also been coming from the planet? Were there people aboard them as well?

The team exploring the colony had similar luck, finding all the colony personnel crowded into a warehouse, and the people there were overjoyed to see the Federation troops. As the troops explored further, they found what appeared to be large explosion sites on the colony, and the colonists reported that those locations had been where the raiders had self-destructed their suits.

When all the teams had reported in, and the reports put together, the basic sequence had been like this; the Amemnon had come into orbit, and had broadcast the old transponder codes. The colony had been concerned, but had not notified Starbase 121 because the Amemnon was a Federation ship. When the Amemnon had gotten close enough, it used its weapons to cripple the communications array first, then the power plant. Without power, the colonists were helpless when the raiders arrived.

The raiders killed the colony administrator, and herded everyone into the warehouse, killing everyone who was too slow. They had then sent the shuttles down, transferring people up twenty at a time to the freighter, where they were shoved in the back. The final group of people who were being ferried up when the Excellon arrived was not on board the Amemnon though. They had been jettisoned out the back of the shuttles to reduce their mass in the space combat that had occurred. The shuttles had been over twenty thousand feet from ground when that had occurred.

The report from the survivor from the life pod wasn't that much better. He had been an engineer on the Amemnon, so was not mixed up with whoever had been on sensor duty. He hadn't been asleep when the attack had occurred, and everybody who had been on duty was dead. The raiders had caused the Amemnon to drop out of warp somehow, and had crippled her electronics, then boarded the ship. Anyone who had resisted was killed, and the intruders dealt harshly with anyone who didn't do as they gestured. They seemed to have a form of translator with them, and made their demands known through that. He had been part of the twelve remaining people who had been near an escape pod during the Amemnon's attack, and he and the two others had been chosen to get into the escape pod, as the other nine would keep the raiders away from them for as long as they could. His last sight of the nine had been the raiders butchering them in an attempt to get to the life pod he was in.

The engineering team reported that several of the control components and all of the environmental components of the life pod had been removed. Apparently, whoever did this didn't want anyone getting away even with a useless life pod to warn anyone of what was going on. A further report of the weapons used had also been done, and the basic idea of the weapons was ridiculously simple.

The weapons created a "sphere" of charged particles, and fired the "sphere" at the target. The charged particles would overload electrical connections, resulting in massive confusion on board as computer sections were lost. Since they were charged particles, the Excellon's shields would stop them, but shuttles and ships were helpless against them. Already the engineering team was working on modifications to the shield generators, to make them far more resistant to the attacks. It was little more than a system to use a "thicker" shield, to stop a charged particle penetration in one small area, instead of lots of particles over a large area. The shield could be controlled from the bridge, allowing the engineering officer to select the type of shields as the Captain demanded. But more research into the weapons was needed, and the Chief Engineer requested that they leave one of their shuttles behind in exchange for one of the armed shuttles used by the raiders.

The shuttles had used a small weapon, and the turrets on the Amemnon were little more than a collection of five of those weapons set up to fire in the same direction. The Chief Engineer commented that it seemed fairly easy to build a larger weapon, and wondered why they hadn't done so. The general technology style of some of the components was radically different from normal federation components. These parts seemed to be designed for function, instead of a pleasing form like most Federation components. Also, several of the parts that were lying around seemed to have blood on them, as though they had been used to hit a crewmember when the holder felt like it.

In the meantime, one of the officers asked what they should do about the Amemnon. Should they leave it here, destroy it, or return it to Starbase 121? The debate on that was short. Since the local area needed the shipping, the Amemnon would be returned to Starbase 121, where it would be refitted to Federation standards. The technology on board would be studied at the starbase, and the ship would be returned to cargo duty.

Unfortunately, the Amemnon was not currently capable of warp travel. Since nobody wanted to let the Amemnon proceed along at sub-light to the Starbase, it was decided to dismantle the ship, and store it in the second cargo pod of the module freighter. The five shuttles were the final concern, and the colony administrator was afraid of letting go of all their firepower.

"But surely Captain, you aren't planning on leaving us defenseless against whoever did this? We need those shuttles to protect ourselves in case their friends come here again."

"I appreciate your concern Mr. Androsa, but none of those shuttles will be able to fly for several weeks, given the amount of damage they have received. In short, it will take three to four months for both yours and our facilities working together to repair those shuttles for service. And I have to move on to the next colony. If whoever did this struck at your colony, they might also be striking at other colonies as well."

There was a general sense of shock that went around the table as the meaning of his statement sunk in. The Amemnon had been captured by another vessel, and that other vessel was somewhere out there. Even more worrisome, was that the other three ships that had disappeared might have also been converted like the Amemnon, meaning that there could be around four other vessels roaming out there.

"But Mr. Androsa, your colony size says that you are allowed to have a warp-capable shuttle here, is that correct?"

"Well, um, yes, but what are you going to do?"

"Simple. We have four warp-capable shuttles on board, and a good team of engineers. Cheng (short for Chief Engineer), how long would it take you to attach one of these ion weapons to one of our shuttles and rig it so it can be fired from the cockpit?"

"A couple of hours sir, if I start now. But sir, won't that cut our shuttle amount?"

"I want you to do it. And it won't cut down on our complement, because one of those shuttles out there is the same type that we normally carry. The armed shuttle out there will take the place of ours, and your repair crews are going to be busy for a few weeks.

"Administrator, does that make you a little happier?"

"Well, yes. But what about when we have to use that shuttle for regular trips and supply runs? We'll be defenseless while it's gone then."

"No. I am using the module freighter with us to do all the cargo runs, and am escorting it myself. Your shuttle will be used strictly for local work. All inter-system traffic will be handled by us. We are also going to have an engineering team on the module freighter carrying the Amemnon. They will be responsible for getting its warp system ready for operation. Once we're done fixing it, the Amemnon will take over cargo shipments between planets."

"Um, very well then, thank you."

The meeting was concluded shortly after that, and the Chief engineer went down to begin breaking the news to his teams. He had already picked out the enlisted team to refit the shuttle, and was working on the other two teams as he left.

Since merely refitting the shuttle didn't require a lot of work, he pulled in a petty officer and four enlisted to get the job done quickly. The warp realignment could be done during the trip back to Starbase 121, so the same team could be used for that also. The remaining job of repairing the shuttle would take a while, and he selected a chief, three petty officers, and ten enlisted to get to work on it.

*

In a couple of hours, the job of refitting the Excellon's shuttle was done, and the replacement crew from the colony arrived to take possession of it. In the meantime, a second shuttle was returning with one of the crippled shuttles, and the engineering team assembled looked at the deep gashes in its sides and whistled. The team that was assigned to look after the Amemnon also took the opportunity to have the other four shuttles moved into the same cargo hold as the Amemnon, in case they had any free time. The module on the rear of the Amemnon was attached to the rear of the current module chain, and the two ships turned to head back to Starbase 121.

The repairs to the shuttle took a long time, and many of the parts had to be literally rebuilt from supplies on board. One of the enlisted working on the shuttle had managed to snag the assignment of figuring out how the interface worked between the computer, and the targeting system for the energy weapon. Another team managed to get to the life-support system, and was working on it, trying to find the normal operating environment of whoever had controlled the shuttle.

When they Excellon and the module freighter finally reached Starbase 121, the Amemnon was fully patched, and ready to conduct warp tests. The armed shuttle on the Excellon was put on board the Amemnon, and another shuttle from the Excellon was sent to the Amemnon to make up its full complement. Another armed shuttle was transferred to the Excellon, and supplies to replace what was used and other repair parts were transferred from the Starbase. The shuttle transfer resulted in the Amemnon having one armed and one unarmed shuttle, and the Excellon having two unarmed and two armed but damaged shuttles. The remaining damaged armed shuttle was carefully flown to the Starbase, to be fully analyzed by the experts there.

The module freighter's captain that had accompanied the Excellon said that it was time for them to head on to the next system, and that the Starbase shouldn't worry about the missing load. In the meantime, the cargo module holding the Amemnon had been left behind, and the Amemnon was about to undergo warp testing.

The module freighter was brought to the edge of the system under its on power, and readied its warp core for action. The engineering crew from the Starbase brought the warp core on line, and did a one and a half second jump. The warp core performed properly and everybody was satisfied that they had taken an important step to reclaiming this area for the Federation.

Returning to the Starbase, the Excellon and the Amemnon reviewed their communications links, and set out to complete their runs. A team of people had been "borrowed" from the Starbase, and there had been several local "volunteers" as well. Captain Morgan wasn't that keen to trust them, so a security team from the Starbase had also been assigned to the Amemnon, in case anyone had second ideas about wanting to work. Since the security team was skilled in areas besides fighting, they fit into the crew with no disruption.

The Excellon had all the parts they needed for another trip, and with fresh missiles from the Starbase, they were ready to head out again. The two ships headed out of the gravity well of the star, and continued on their route. Several General Quarters drills were held, and with the fresh combat on their minds, everyone on board the Excellon concentrated on their job. They knew that someone had attacked the Amemnon, and was probably still out there.

But the trip to the remaining colonies was uneventful, and the Excellon and the Amemnon got on their way to Starbase 121. They had found nothing unusual, but every colony out there was now demanding protection from whoever had done the attacks. After all, if Fendrin eight could be attacked, then so could any of them. Captain Morgan wound up leaving each colony with a headache due to the arguments that occurred. Each colony had demanded an armed shuttles or weapons to arm themselves with, and Captain Morgan had told them that Federation charter had stated that colonies were not allowed weapons.

That excuse had not sat well with the Administrators, and Captain Morgan had liked it even less. He knew that the charter had been written that way to prevent any colony from trying to rebel, but he also knew that all the people here were scared. He briefly considered disobeying the rules, but dismissed the thought at once. He was out here as a representative of the Federation, and he was determined to keep the image of the Federation clean.

*

While the Excellon was returning to Starbase 121, Commander Verrin was on the bridge when the sensor department reported something unusual. There had been a faint warp trail ahead of them, but it had disappeared within a couple seconds of spotting. Given the current state of ship disappearances, any unusual signals were to be investigated immediately.

"Tactical, can you get any better resolution on the warp trail?"

"Not yet Commander. We're running it through all our scanners, but it matches nothing that we know of. We'll tell you if we can get anything better on it."

"Good." Commander Verrin then called the Captain's quarters, and told him about the signal. "Captain, we've picked up a faint signal, and it disappeared a couple seconds after we spotted it. We're trying to get a better resolution right now, and I'm going to warm up the shields and weapons."

"Very well then. Warm up the shields and weapons, and call me if anything changes."

As the Excellon approached the location of where the warp signature had disappeared, everyone's tension grew. They had not managed to get any new information from the warp signature, and were nervous about what might be waiting for them. Since they were escorting the Amemnon, they couldn't just head of in one direction, so the entire crew had nothing to do but wait as they approached.

But even as they reached the closest approach to the signature, nothing happened. Commander Verrin modified the cruising formation to keep the Excellon between the last location of the warp signature and the Amemnon, in case anything happened.

But the return to Starbase 121 was boring, and the Excellon arrived in orbit with the Amemnon. The full cargo module was dropped off, being simply detached to allow an empty one to be attached. There was also a message for Captain Morgan from Starfleet command, complaining about his taking over a Federation freighter and throwing all of their schedules off.

There was an empty cargo module there, as the Starbase teams had managed to construct a second module. Before talking to Commander Wilson though, Captain Morgan had talked with his senior staff, and the Chief Engineer had figured that a conductive net would help to reduce the damage from the ion attacks. A simple mesh over the outside of a ship would channel the power from the hull to a storage battery, or other power system.

The only problems would occur with the power of the energy weapons. Although the mesh as currently designed would be able to handle one shot from the small craft weapons every two seconds, faster firing would cause the mesh to melt from the resistance, while the simple kinetic impact would cause the mesh to degrade over time. If larger weapons were used, the mesh would be pretty much useless, but against smaller weapons, the mesh would work.

A battery system was designed to hold the excess charge, but the simple size of the batteries required, for the power being delivered, was going to be a limiting factor. The Chief Engineer figured that they could install batteries on board the Amemnon, but those batteries would only be able to handle fifty shots before being in risk of exploding from having a full charge. This gave the Amemnon only one and a half minutes before being in danger from the battery exploding.

Captain Morgan communicated with Commander Wilson, sending him the designs for the conductive mesh and the batteries. The Commander looked over the designs, and got his engineering teams working on the ideas. While talking, Commander Wilson reported that he had been hiring new engineers to help out with the building projects that were going on. The local population had grumbled at first, but when the new jobs began funneling Federation credits into the town, the grumbling stopped.

After the Excellon arrived at Starbase 121, several people were down on shore leave. While down there, a junior officer had noticed the construction going on, and had found out about the mesh. Returning to the Excellon, that officer had started to design a similar mesh, but this one was designed to be wrapped around a cargo module. It would be removable, so that other starbases would not find out about it, and the batteries inside could be twice as large as the ones in the main ship. Submitting his design to his superior, the design caught the eye of the Chief Engineer, who then submitted it to the Captain.

The construction work proceeded slowly though, as the mesh had to be assembled on the ground, then transported up to the Amemnon in orbit. The batteries also had to be built on the ground and shuttled up as well, and that was taking more time. Captain Morgan looked at the schedule required for the completion, and grumbled. It would take four weeks to complete the initial mesh system, and that would only be fore the crew portion of the Amemnon. The cargo section would still be vulnerable, and any hits on the modules would be simply conducted into the Amemnon.

Suddenly, an idea came to him. Turning to his communications console, he sent a call to Commander Wilson. "Commander, do you have any shield generators down there?"

"Yes we do Captain. Do you need any extras?"

"Not me. I was thinking more along the lines of putting them on the Amemnon instead. Our shields were able to handle the ion blasts fairly well, and with some minor modifications, we should be able to handle them easily next time."

"Captain, Federation law states that freighters are not allowed to have shields. I mean, they would be nice to have on board, but we have to obey the law that says civilian freighters are not allowed to have shields."

"Since Starfleet personnel are mainly crewing the Amemnon, is it still a civilian vessel?" Asked Captain Morgan, with a smile on his face

"Well, I suppose if you put it that way, it isn't completely a civilian ship." Commander Wilson was looking off to one side now, obviously hesitant about continuing along this thread.

"So if a ship is crewed by Federation personnel, it becomes part of Starfleet, and thus is allowed to have shields. Correct?"

"I suppose so Captain. But what about the programming job to redo the shields to the proper shape of the Amemnon's hull? I mean, you would have to configure the shields for having no modules, one module, two modules, and for three modules."

"We can attach one module to it now, and configure the shields for just the one. During the trip, we can get the groundwork made up for the other configurations as well. In this case, it is merely a change to the shield equation concerning its shape. We would have to redo a few emitters and attach them to the generator. In fact, the forward half of the shields could stay the same, and the rear part would require the four different emitters.

"So Commander, can you release those shield generators?"

"I believe I can now Captain. But remember, those generators were normally supposed to replace ones that get damaged on your ship. If you lose a generator, it will be three months before we can get new ones."

"Can you order new ones now?"

"Well, I suppose I could. After all, I haven't submitted the full report of what happened during your engagement, so merely adding a few generators to the list would be easy. In fact, I could even say that the Amemnon required almost full rebuilding in order to get more spare parts here."

"Good. I'm glad we understand each other. Excellon out." Turning from his screen, Captain Morgan almost paled at the thought of someone being able to lie so easily to superiors to get spare parts. But then again, he had done nearly that in order to get the Amemnon equipped with shields. 'Where is the dividing line? How will I know when I've gone too far?' But those questions were dismissed for now, as he got the shields crew together to get the new generators rigged up on board the Amemnon.

*

Two days later, the Excellon and the Amemnon were ready to go out again. The Amemnon had tested out with its shield generators, and all had worked well. Starbase 121 was assembling the mesh covering for when they returned, and it would be ready to install. The key problem with the shields was that they would draw a lot of power. As a result, the only thing that the Amemnon could do while the shields were up was maneuver and uses its basic sensors. Warp travel was impossible, as was any subspace communications.

The standard orders that had been set up was that if the Excellon was out of communications with the Amemnon for more than a minute, the Excellon would head towards the Amemnon's last position on communications at maximum warp. To keep the constant communications open, several games were set up, with players on both ships. This way, the games would keep the crews entertained, and the communications required would allow the two ships to stay in contact.

While traveling though, they were forced to slow to impulse to avoid a subspace disruption. It was similar to the one they had seen before, and they knew that it would dissipate in four minutes. While they traveled through it on impulse, a scanner technician suddenly called out, "Incoming ship! Coming in at two-thirds impulse."

Of course, the impulse rating was relative to the ships originally designed. As a result, most ships these days could go full impulse at normal operation. Impulse speed had been selected as the maximum acceleration one of the original impulse powered vessels could go. The name had caught on, and was now widely used as a meter stick. Since this vessel was coming in at two-thirds impulse that meant it was coming in at two-thirds the top acceleration of one of the old impulse driven ships. Since no normal cargo vessel was designed to go that fast, this was a problem.

"Shields up, and get the lasers and missiles ready." He then called the Captain, "Captain, we've got an unidentified ship closing at two-thirds impulse. Recommend we go to General Quarters."

"Do it. I'll be there in two minutes."

The atonal alarm rang through out the ship, and crewmen stopped their games and reported to their battle stations. The lasers were brought on-line, and missiles awoke to do their deadly missions. As the unknown ship approached, Commander Verrin continued to send communications signals to it, hoping for a reply. After all, the Amemnon had not been able to move at that rate, meaning that this ship, if hostile, was probably in better shape than what the Amemnon had been.

Captain Morgan arrived on the bridge, and looked at the tactical map. He gasped in surprise, as the Amemnon was currently between and slightly above a line between the Excellon and the unknown.

"Sir, I have a rough ID on the ship. It's the Potenton, a module freighter that went missing here two months before we arrived. Its power signature is changed even more than the Amemnon's had been though."

"Keep on scanning."

Turning to Commander Verrin, Captain Morgan said, "Commander, we're behind the Amemnon. You do realize that if this ship opens fire on us, they will hit the Amemnon first?"

"Oh my gosh. I never thought of-"

"But on the other hand, the other ship might not be able to see us. So far all they might know is that the Amemnon is there. And since the Amemnon was originally used by the raiders in this sector, they might think the Amemnon is friendly."

"Comm, raise the Amemnon. Low power systems only."

"Hello, Lieutenant Gordon? Are there any signals being sent towards you?"

"Captain, thank goodness you called. We've been getting lots of communications from the unknown ship, but we've been unable to translate them. It's a totally new language, and we're working on it. Do you want us to relay it to you?"

"Yes. We'll have fun working on it as well. Relay it on this frequency, and use a second frequency to give us the data on frequency use and any scrambling. This way we can try to translate their language, and if they are hostile, we can try to break their codes."

The communications setup was one, and the Excellon's computers began working on the task of deciphering the language. A second program was running to look for patterns in the signals, trying to find how the pattern repeated. A copy was kept of all the original data, so that heavier computers could try to crack it later on as well, looking for patterns between solar activity, and other such phenomena.

After two minutes though, the communications stopped, and the unknown ship began to close in. Both crews began to tense up, and the tracking crews began plotting missile solutions to engage the unknown ship with. The shield crews on the Amemnon were beside their generators, making sure that the generators would work the first time. Since the shields were all being powered by one generator in the front half, if that generator went down, there would be no protection there.

As the crew watched, the unknown ship began closing to the theoretical range of the energy weapons. At that point, Captain Morgan ordered them, "Helm, bring us down thirty meters, and then full impulse towards that ship. Tactical, lock lasers and missile on that ship."

The sensor crew was boring holes in their screens, watching for the Potenton's reaction as the Excellon suddenly became visible to its sensors. As a result, they were able to call out in time, "Captain, incoming fire. Same type of ion weapon as before, and it's firing in five shot bursts."

"Execute Fire plan Charlie." Fire Plan Charlie had been set up as a coordinated effort between sensors and the turrets to cut off sections of an enemy ship. In effect, the sensor team did what they had done before; feed the data from the sensors to the turrets, and the turrets would attempt to cut through the enemy ship to cripple those weapons. The main lasers weren't used because they would cut straight through the Potenton, and Captain Morgan wanted that ship back.

But even as the words came out of his mouth, the ion bolts streaked in from the Potenton's weapons. Ion bolts slammed into the Excellon's shields, but the improvements worked, and there was only a five percent reduction in shield strength. The lasers bored in though, and seared through power connectors and structural supports, cutting off the ion cannons as they had done before.

But those five ion cannons weren't the only ones the Potenton was armed with. A larger cannon had been mounted on top of the hull, and with the Excellon's maneuver, it finally had a target for its main weapon. A single ion bolt was fired, but it was more powerful than the smaller guns had been. It crossed the distance between the two ships, and crashed into the Excellon's forward shields like a hammer.

"Impact, forward shields down to seventy five percent." called out a report, and Captain Morgan paled as the damage was shown on his console. "Fire Plans Charlie and Nova, execute." Again the lasers reached out to cripple the horrible gun, while Nova was a simultaneous launch of four missiles set to five megatons each and ordered to detonate within one hundred meters of their target.

The lasers began carving their way through the Potenton's hull, but this gun had more structural support, and the turret lasers were taking a little time to cut through. But the missiles arced over and around the Amemnon, and detonated their loads near the Potenton, searing her hull with nuclear fire and her electronics with effects that were not to be denied.

The Potenton's acceleration stopped as the final waves of EMP washed over her, and the hull began to cool down. It was still drifting towards the Excellon and the Amemnon, but it was without any sort of control now. The two ships simply moved out of its way, and watched as the Potenton made no attempts to change its course.

Captain Morgan turned to Commander Verrin and said, "Commander, let's bring another ship back. Set up the security details, and find out what happened." Turning back to his console, he watched as the damage control teams reported no significant casualties from the major hit. A couple people had gotten burned when their shield generator had thrown out a spark, and one person's hair was still sticking out, but those were the only casualties. The shield generator was even now being repaired to full service, and would be completed in two minutes. Since it was a simple matter of swapping out the necessary parts, the repairs were far easier than if the generator had burned completely out.

The security teams went over to the Potenton, and Lieutenant Mallory reported in, "Commander, whoever was on this ship didn't get a chance to use the fusion plant to wipe themselves out. There are several beings here who wish to thank us for rescuing them, including the scanner crew of the Amemnon. The main computer core is wrecked though, but we are currently putting together a retrieval of the spare. If the Amemnon can help us, we can get the main computer back up and running enough to keep us in decent shape until we get to the next colony."

"Are there any other survivors?"

"Several Commander. There are three races we've never seen before, and a fourth being who is there simply to serve as a translator. At least, that's what it has been doing for us."

"Very well then. I'll pass your recommendation along to the Captain about salvaging the ship. In the meantime, try to find as many survivors as you can, and give them medical help. Anything else?"

"Nothing yet Commander. When we find anything new, we'll call you."

"Commander Verrin out."

She then turned back to the communications console, and opened a communications link to Captain Morgan. "Captain, the security reports that we can salvage the Potenton with several spares from the Amemnon. Also, there are at least three new races aboard that ship, apparently not counting the ones who controlled it."

"Very well Commander. Let's salvage the ship, and mark another one up for the home team. Have the Amemnon distribute the necessary spares, and get the Potenton underway. I will need a crew to guide the ship, and do you have anyone in mind that you think would do a good job?" Captain Morgan said the last with a slight smile on his face, and Commander Verrin gasped slightly as she realized what he was asking.

"I respectfully volunteer for the job sir."

"Good. I expect you'll enjoy the thrill of commanding your own ship. Have the races present transferred to the Amemnon and the Excellon as necessary, and proceed over to your new command. It will be temporary of course, as I'll need you back here, but I think that the time you are in command will be memorable. Is there anything else?"

"Nothing yet. I'll call you when we are ready to go to warp."

"Captain out."

*

It took the Engineering crew three hours to get the warp core back on-line, and the impulse engines were only capable of making gross maneuvers, but the Potenton was finally able to go. Several beings on board had even volunteered to help the engineers, once the translator had told them about the key difference between the old controllers and the Federation. Commander Verrin had kept it on board as they cruised along with the Excellon, as the crew quarters were set up for the different species, and changing them would have required several days of work.

"So, how did you get into this situation?" Commander Verrin was talking with the translator creature, trying to find out more. A recorder was running, for the benefit of anyone who wanted to review the conversation.

"Was born into this life, was. Have been doing translating for many years. Know many languages, and learn new ones quickly. The slavers used me to translate between the races on board their ships. Was not able to get much of their language, as they did not talk much around me. But other races were talked around, and listened to other races I did. But still not much of their language known."

"You said other ships. How many other ships?"

"Ved not know. Ved not my name, is name used by slavers. Possibly their word for translator, as others named similarly. But Ved best name to use, as have forgotten real name.

"Ships look the same on end of whip. Not recommended looking around. Slavers also hungry for fresh meat. Not good to look around."

"You mean the 'slavers' would kill one of you and eat you?"

"Not kill me, as was too good with languages. But others, yes, when they feel nice, they kill. Else they cook alive one that disobeyed."

"But each ship has sense of different crew. I count have been on ten ships. One ship no go anywhere, maybe stopped ship, you word is station? That was ship on before this one."

Commander Verrin reeled at the thought. 'Somewhere out there is a base that these slavers operate from. We need to find it and take it out.' "So, how did the other races get captured?"

"Many like you, open world, no guns, slavers come in and take beings. They shove beings into cargo hold, and go away with beings in ship. Or they take ships and smaller ships. Your word, shuttles?"

"What were some of the other ships like? Did they have many on board?"

"This ship, not many. Station, many many. Ship on before that, many. Most were of slaver race, but a few were of other races. Station, lots of slavers, with a few from your race. Very big place, big cargo hold. This ship in the cargo hold, fit it did."

Commander Verrin was thinking quickly now. Although Ved was not capable of giving the exact numbers, there were probably others who could. "Ved, would you be willing to help me talk to others on board?"

"No problem. Is what Ved did before. Ved no do much, but Ved translate. Whenever translator needed, Ved there."

"Good." With that, Commander Verrin began calling in the members of the crew, and discussing with them the different sights that they had seen, and also their histories and their culture. The portable recorder had filled up its memory during one interview, and Commander Verrin had simply gotten another one out. She had figured that there would be a lot of information, and she didn't want to lose any because a recorder ran out of memory.

After ten hours of interviews, Commander Verrin was tired, but she made herself go back over the recorders, searching for anything she had not heard originally, or had missed.

'There is a large base out there, with the other two freighters acting as roving pirates. The crafts that started the station though, are fairly strong, and mount at least two of the larger energy cannon that hurt us so bad the last time. There are several freighters that seem similar in design to the original pirate ships; I'd better give the original pirate ships a designation. Pirate Alpha is simple, and works. The freighters used by the pirates, call them Supply Alphas, and for the converted captured freighters, Traitor Alpha for the one with the small weapons, and Traitor beta for the one with the large weapon. Figure Traitor Charlie for one that has two of the large weapon. The shuttles that were captured, call those Turncoat Alphas.

'So what we are looking at here is at least two Pirate Alphas, each with three of those large ion weapons, at worst case two Traitor Charlies, unknown Supply Alphas and ten Turncoat Alphas. Thank goodness we found five more in the hold of this ship. They are in mint condition, so we've got a small armada of them. The food supplies on here for the ex-slaves are okay, but we're checking with them to see if they can also eat Federation food. If not, we'll see if we can get a special job running on Sherrizin 12.' Turning back to her computer, Commander Verrin began composing her report to Captain Morgan, and attaching the data from the interviews so he could look over it himself.

The next day, Commander Verrin began her interviews with the human crew, with a request to the engine room to do something about the temperature. The temperature was fluctuating wildly, rising to one hundred and ten degrees Fahrenheit, and dropping to forty degrees Fahrenheit. The engineering team replied that they were working on it, but not to hope for anything. As a result, Commander Verrin was thoroughly uncomfortable during all the interviews, and it was good for her that the recorder was on, as it caught key information that she would have missed.

Thanks to the humans that she had interviewed, she had learned much about the slavers. The main base that was used could fit several ships inside its cargo holds, and enclose them. They were not able to see the outside, but any space station would be easy to spot. There were some defenses there too, but according to all the reports she had received, they were only more ion guns, with nothing resembling any sort of shield or armor? They weren't even using point defense! But that made sense, from the slaver's point of view, as they were designed to deal with weapons they knew about, and armor and point defense weren't much good against ion weapons, but without shields, the station would be getting clobbered with micrometeorites.

But she figured that they would have something for that, and assumed that it would be some sort of low-level shield. That way, she was covering her bets on what might be waiting there.

She laughed out loud at that. Here she was, second in command of a single warship, and already thinking about how to take out a space station! Turning back to her work, she continued looking over the technology, and attempting to figure out how many of the slavers lived on the station and the Pirate Alphas. Judging from the reports, there were roughly one hundred of the slavers on a Pirate Alpha, and several thousand on a station. There also appeared to be fresh meat on the station, though the people were not sure if that was from other slaves being killed or from a planet that they hunted on. It was not pre-packaged, as the meat was fresh, and often bloody.

*

Captain Morgan was also going through similar activities, as he was getting reports from the computer team assigned to crack the enemy's computers. They were attempting to use similar sensors and other interfaces as the Potenton did, in an attempt to figure out how the computer stored and retrieved data. They were having a little luck, and were slowly working on the specific component that encrypted everything between the memory core and the input and output devices.

The rest of the crew was feeling better too, as they had rescued half the ships, but more importantly, they had rescued some of the people that had been held captive as well. The entire crew was in good spirits, and even during the three general quarters drills, they kept their confident attitudes going. Captain Morgan was even feeling the mood slightly, even with the reports from engineering about the power of the weapon they had picked up.

For the larger weapon mounted on the Potenton was far more than it seemed. The Potenton had fired it at a slow rate, but that rate it seemed had been dictated by the need to power it up between shots, not the actual cooling and firing time. If more power was provided, the weapon could be fired every three seconds, or even higher if it was allowed to overheat. The weapon also was not a scratch-built one similar to the smaller ones placed on the shuttles. It had been a full-capability weapon, with every part designed for its location, and no scratch-built parts on it.

In short, there was someone out there building these weapons, for some purpose that only they knew.