Chapter IX
The USS Spirit reached Starbase 629 after five days of travel.
As the Nebula-class starship slid into orbit of the space station, Leanne Sturgess briefed the thirty-man security team on what they would expect.
'Have any of you met Admiral Nechayev?' she asked. Two of the officers present, both Lieutenants, held up their hands for a moment. Leanne nodded. 'Admiral Nechayev will not be anything like you have ever seen before, count on it. When and if you come face to face with her, you will be required to shoot her down instantly. Any hesitation, and you will die. Count on that as well.'
Sturgess had the satisfaction of seeing a few of the team grow pale. 'You will have phaser rifles set to stun. At any moment, I may give the order to activate the kill setting on your weapons. Do not do so before you are ordered. Of course, with the computer locked down, we cannot do so. Team three's first objective is to disable the lock-outs and give us that setting on our phasers.' Sturgess paused. The Admiral will almost certainly have set a number of traps – be careful. She used phaser sentries aboard the Enterprise – expect worse here.
'If you encounter any survivors, any at all, check the back of their necks. If there is a small protrusion above the skin, stun them immediately, and take them back to the beam-out site. Do not lose sight of your partners, and keep in cover at all times. The Admiral does not have our compunction about killing.
'Check each body you find, but don't take any unnecessary risks – don't shout, call or give away your position at any time. If you see Admiral Nechayev, then contact everybody using commbadges on secure frequency – you'll receive that later.'
Leanne gave everybody a slightly softer look. 'Nechayev's good, but if we're careful, we'll take her down. Good luck. Beam-out in ten minutes.'
Ten glittering beams of energy formed in the darkness of the Promenade of Starbase 629, and vanished, leaving ten security guards, led by Sturgess, in their place. Immediately, they split up and vanished into the shadows, awaiting the next group.
The first thing Sturgess noted were the bodies laid on the deck. Some were in various states of decomposition, while others were so blackened and burned that it was difficult to tell if that had happened before or after death. Even after what she had already seen inflicted by Nechayev, she was sickened.
As the second team beamed in, Sturgess motioned for two of her team to stay and provide cover, while she and the others advanced silently, weapons raised, alert for any danger. As they passed a body, they would check futilely for signs of life.
They had beamed in fairly close to the security office, and Sturgess decided to head for it. She covered her partner, who dashed forward and dropped behind a tall pillar, and then Sturgess herself moved quickly, past the pillar, and into cover of the arch of the security door that marked the entrance to the office.
She stood, phaser pressed against her body, and counted to three. Then, she ducked in, weapon ready.
Admiral Nechayev sat, staring at her, from within the confines of the security cell. Sturgess stopped, stunned by her appearance, and nearly raised the rifle and fired on her.
No forcefield shimmered between her and the Admiral, who watched Sturgess intently, with no change of emotion. Sturgess tapped her commbadge. 'Sturgess to team one. I've found her. Report to the security office immediately.'
There was an answering acknowledgement, and a moment later, the others came through the door. Sturgess motioned for them to keep their weapons ready, trained on Nechayev, who had still not moved. However, Sturgess was filled with greater concern for Michael Regitz.
The security office, unlike many others, was laid out so that the main office itself had to be reached by going through the cell areas first. Sturgess headed through the door that led to the main office now – and stopped dead, her grim determination fading into despair at the tragic sight before her.
Regitz lay in the position that he had been left in nearly a week before. His head lolled ungracefully to the side; evidence, if Sturgess needed anymore, that his neck was broken and he was very dead. Near him, another body, someone that Sturgess did not know but also wore security gold on his collar.
Sturgess fought back the tears that flowed from her eyes, feeling her heart harden as she turned away from the body of the man she had loved.
As she did so, a shimmer of golden light in the security cell area caught her eye as it died away. She stared for a brief second, and then hurried through the door again.
She was staggered by the sight that greeted her, and for a moment, she could not believe that it had actually happened. Nechayev had disappeared, and the nine security officers that had guarded the former admiral had also vanished.
Sturgess let her rifle down, stunned amazement filling her mind, unable to believe. She tapped her commbadge after a second. 'Sturgess to Spirit. Have you beamed anyone onboard?'
'No, Lieutenant,' answered Corl's voice immediately. 'Why?'
'I'll get back to you on that, Spirit,' said Sturgess. 'Stand by.'
Sturgess tapped her badge again. 'Sturgess to team two. Any sightings of the Admiral?'
'None, sir,' replied her number two, Lieutenant Strell. 'How about yourself?'
'We had her penned up in the security office.' Sturgess took a deep breath. 'She's escaped, and I think she's killed my security team.'
There was an intake of breath on Strell's end of the link. 'Damn.'
'I want you to keep your eyes open. Keep weapons on stun.'
'Will do. What about your side?'
'I'll meet you at the Promenade turbolift in five minutes. Sturgess out.'
Sturgess took one glance around the office, noting the small play of light in the corner of the room -
She threw herself to the floor as a beam of golden energy flashed over her head and exploded in sparks against the door behind her. She rolled, brought her rifle up and fired.
The small black shape that had suddenly materialised on the wall exploded, and fell, clattering to the deck. Sturgess did not move for a moment as she checked the rest of the room for more hidden booby traps.
When no more appeared, she got to her feet, and stepped over to where the small blob of melted metal lay. As she had suspected, it was an automatic phaser sentry. She picked it up from the floor.
She stepped out of the security office, scanning the Promenade. Ducking into cover, she swiftly made her way to the turbolift to her left. Stood at the door was Strell's team, all looking around warily, as Strell stepped towards her, looking slightly worried. Despite the fact that the expression was one that Strell always seemed to wear anyway, Sturgess appreciated the fact that Strell had been shaken by her news.
'What happened?' asked the other. Sturgess proceeded to tell him exactly what had transpired. As she drew to the end of her short story, she displayed the phaser sentry that Nechayev had used, and Strell took it, examining it professionally. As an expert in firearms, she knew he would be instantly able to identify it.
'Klingon phaser sentry,' said Strell immediately. 'Standard model. However, it's been modified.' He drew Sturgess' attention to a series of tiny controls on the side that had been left undamaged by phaser fire. 'This is a micro-cloaking device, designed to render the unit invisible until it fires.'
'I wondered why my team never saw it.'
'That's only a little part of the ingenuity,' said Strell, sounding almost excited. 'This section –' He indicated a part of the control panel '- this is a holo-imager and projector. Designed to project a false holographic image up to ten metres in order to confuse the enemy. Also, this little beauty is connected to the main computer.'
'What? How? The computer's still locked down –' Sturgess broke off as a horrified thought occurred to her. She hit her commbadge. 'Sturgess to Lieutenant Carstairs!'
The leader of team three answered immediately. 'Carstairs here.'
'Have you unlocked the computer yet?'
'Not quite, Lieutenant. We're in the infirmary –'
'Don't touch the computer! Don't reactivate it! Get your team into the Promenade and await further orders!' The barked commands from Sturgess surprised Strell.
'Understood,' replied Carstairs, his voice a little stunned. 'We'll assemble outside the security office.'
'Keep in cover. Sturgess out.' The lieutenant turned to Strell, who favoured her with a quizzical stare. 'The phaser sentries are connected to the main computer, but the computer is locked out.'
Strell nodded. 'It effectively renders the sentries useless. They can't be activated until the computer... becomes... active....' His voice trailed away as he realised what he was saying. Sturgess nodded grimly.
'I'm willing to bet that those sentries were programmed to fire as soon as the computer went online again. Not only that, they were probably positioned so that they could cover the entire Promenade with a single wide-angle burst of fire. They might have wiped us all out with a single shot.'
Strell blinked slightly as the security team behind him muttered to each other as they took in the dreadful implications of the plan. 'Brilliant,' murmured Strell.
'That's one word for it,' remarked Sturgess. 'She's obviously watching us, though.'
'How do you know?'
'She must be. The sentry in the security office was also connected to the computer, but it fired prematurely. She must have triggered it manually – and the only way she knew if she had a clear target was if she was watching us.'
Strell nodded. 'What are your plans?'
Sturgess glanced at the security office. 'We'll meet up with team three, and I'll explain my idea there –'
'Open fire!' Ten phaser blasts sizzled almost simultaneously into the bulkheads on the upper tier of the Promenade, aimed from the direction of the security office. An explosion billowed out, but failed to punch through one of the portholes dotted along that section of the outer hull.
'Cease fire!' screamed Sturgess over the sudden noise. 'Hold your fire!'
She charged to the security office, hoping that Nechayev wasn't watching at that moment. She reached the cover of the door, faced by Carstairs and his team. The young lieutenant turned to face Sturgess, his face perturbed.
'Sir, we had a clear shot at the Admiral,' said Carstairs. 'I decided –'
'Where the hell is she?' said Sturgess, her face flushed with anger. Carstairs looked up at the upper tier of the Promenade, and his face became stunned. He faced Sturgess again.
'She was there, Lieutenant! I swear –'
'Don't worry,' said Sturgess, calming herself, angry at herself for losing her cool. 'You made the wrong decision, but you're not the first.' She glanced up at the scarred bulkhead, and suddenly realised how close they had been to breaching the hull of the Starbase. Almost certainly part of Nechayev's plan.
Sturgess turned and motioned for Strell and team two to join them. When they did so, always wary, looking out for attack, Sturgess addressed them all quietly.
'I want to split us up into groups again, but we're going to go about this a little differently. At the moment, Admiral Nechayev holds home advantage – she's got cloaked phaser sentries all over the place, all equipped with mini holo-imagers. That's why we've been chasing shadows – she's projecting images of herself and hoping we'll fire on them. She's also watching us from a high position, which makes it likely that she can track all of our movements with a good field of fire.'
'So what's the plan?' asked Carstairs.
'We have to hunt down and eliminate each one of those phaser sentries. After we finish that, we can begin looking for Nechayev. The Promenade isn't a huge place, so we ought to be able to cover the entire area and knock out each one. You're looking for a small shimmer of yellow light, a little like a transporter beam. The second you see one, fire a single shot into it. That will be enough to destroy it. Don't just look on the walls – they could be everywhere; on the ceiling, floors and even in the middle of a porthole. If that's the case, get into cover and alert us all to its presence – I don't want to risk depressurising the Promenade.'
'What if we see Admiral Nechayev?' asked one of the ensigns from group three.
'Admiral Nechayev will almost certainly not expose herself unless she is either in danger of being uncovered, or unless we find all of the sentries. If she projects an image, fire a single shot into it – that will disperse the holomatrix. If she is really there, then you will only get one shot – make it count. Understood?'
One by one, her team nodded. Sturgess smiled slightly, trying to encourage them, knowing that some of them might die because of what she asked them to do. 'One last thing,' she said. 'Set phasers to kill. Program in override alpha-9-epsilon-Sturgess as the code to unlock the setting, and set for maximum.'
They all did so, rewarded by a small hum of extra power as the phaser rifles funnelled extra energy to the power cells. Sturgess lifted her rifle. 'Strell, Carstairs, divide each team into three teams of three people. Then, you come with me.'
The other two group commanders swiftly created six groups, and then formed a seventh with Sturgess. Then, quietly, professionally, they moved out.
Three groups filed slowly and carefully up the staircases to the upper levels of the Promenade, while three others searched the rooms and corridors leading from the lower of level. Sturgess' group worked along the main section of the Promenade.
Almost immediately, the first burst of phaser fire was heard. A small explosion billowed out from the wall as a member of Carstairs' team vaporised a sentry. A moment later, a series of phaser volleys rang out as a short-lived firefight broke out between a pair of sentries and Strell's group. One of the guards fell, but the sentries were destroyed.
The clearing out operation continued apace, but Sturgess herself was more concerned with finding Nechayev. She had a score to settle.
She kept her eyes open for phaser sentries as well, of course, but also for movement in the girders above the main deck –
The beam, when it came, was from a totally unexpected angle. A green line of energy flashed across the Promenade from the lower sections, and vaporised a young guard who didn't even scream. Before Sturgess and her teams could take cover, another blast killed Carstairs.
With a shout, Sturgess fired a return blast into the darkness, motioning for her teams to take cover. No more energy blasts flashed towards them and Sturgess managed to get herself into cover. She peered into the inky blackness that covered one of the main doors into the airless areas of the station. 'What is she doing?' she muttered to herself.
Another volley of shots rang out, followed by a crack. Sturgess' commbadge bleeped. She tapped it. 'Sturgess here.'
'Lieutenant, we've cleared the upper deck of phaser sentries.'
'Any casualties?'
'Ensign Torres was killed, and we've had a couple of near misses.'
Sturgess nodded. 'Good work. Assist in clearing the lower deck.'
'Yes, sir.'
Sturgess turned her attention to the darkness before. 'Did you hear that, Admiral? We're clearing your phaser traps. Come out and surrender.'
There was, as she expected, no answer. Sturgess peered further into the shadows before her. There was no movement. Taking a calculated risk, she shone a light beam into the darkness. There was no-one there, but she could see a small black shape on the floor. Sturgess sighed, stood and stepped over to it, picking it up.
As she had suspected it was another phaser sentry. She had obviously caught it with the shot she had fired at random. She threw it to the floor in momentary anger. Tapping her commbadge, she said, 'Sturgess to Strell.'
'Strell here.'
'How many phaser sentries are you confident that you've destroyed?'
'My team has cleared the entire upper section and most of the ones hidden underneath arches and overhangs. I would suspect that we have cleared ninety percent of them.'
'All right,' said Sturgess. 'Have the full force assemble on the upper deck. I'll meet you there.'
Slowly, Sturgess made her way to the stairs and up them to the deck above. She kept her eyes out for Nechayev, who could spring at any moment.
Strell approached her from the other side of the Promenade. 'What is it, Lieutenant?'
'We've cleared most of the sentries, but she still hasn't come out of hiding. At the moment, we're completely in the dark. I'm going to get the Spirit to do a full scan and flush her out.'
Strell nodded. 'A wise choice.'
Sturgess shrugged. 'Not really. I should have done it the moment we beamed onboard, but my thoughts were so wrapped up in what had happened to my friends that I failed to see the right choice.' She tapped her badge. 'Sturgess to Spirit.'
'Spirit here,' said Captain Corl.
'Captain, can you run a full scan of the station? Scan for mixed lifesigns.'
'Stand by,' said Corl. A minute later, his voice came back. 'There's no sign of any life readings of the type that you describe on the station, Lieutenant.'
'What?' said Sturgess, stunned. A second later, she realised. 'Captain, scan the Spirit!'
Corl nodded at the ops officer. A moment later, the ops officer gave him a horrified look. 'Sir, she's in Engineering!'
Nechayev stepped over the dead body of the small Engineering crew and stared for a moment at the warp core. She rested the unusual weapon she had used for her escape and also her phaser rifle on the console before her.
'Sir, she's re-routing bridge controls to Engineering!'
'Lock her out,' ordered Corl calmly.
'I can't, sir,' said the Ops officer despairingly. 'She locked out all the overrides!'
'Security to Engineering.'
Strell levered the crate open and sighed. 'You're right, Lieutenant. Yridian transporter guns.'
Sturgess stared at them. 'How did she manage to use it to get to the Spirit? Their shields are up.'
'Transporter guns operate on a different energy carrier wave to normal transporters. Because of the high energy output of a phaser beam combined with a transporter beam, plus the additional fact that it is still deadly if you shoot someone at close range with it, it is not used for that purpose. There is no annular confinement beam, none of the usual refinements of a passenger transport beam.'
'Nechayev would have taken the risk,' said Sturgess. 'We already know that parasite has made her stronger and more intelligent – I wouldn't be surprised if it made her resilient to phaser blasts.'
Lieutenant McNeill stared for a moment at the glimmering forcefield which blocked his entrance to Engineering. He tapped his commbadge. 'McNeill to bridge.'
'Bridge here.'
'Sir, she's erected a level ten forcefield all around Engineering. It'll take some time to break through.'
'Do what you have to, Lieutenant,' said Corl's voice. 'Just take her down.'
'Aye, sir.' McNeill backed off, and then looked around as one of the officers emitted an audible moan. 'Ensign?'
'Sir, I don't feel too well,' gasped the young officer. He collapsed a second later. McNeill glanced at the others, and suddenly realised that they were all pale and ill.
'What the –' A sudden rush of nausea passed through him, and he retched. Abruptly, he realised. He tapped his commbadge, but even as he did so, he collapsed to his knees. 'McNeill to bridge,' he managed.
Corl looked worried at the sound of the officer's voice. 'Bridge here.'
'Sir, my entire team's feeling ill, and they've collapsed. I –' There was a gasp, a thud and the channel cut out. Corl looked at the ops officer.
'What's going on?'
Suddenly, the tactical officer swayed and fell at his post. The ops officer paled, and turned to Corl. 'Sir, she's flooded the ship with theta radiation! We've all had exposure long enough for fatal doses!' At that moment, he proved himself right by gasping and pitching forward.
Corl suddenly felt sick himself, and he moved forward and hit the comm button.
'Corl to Sturgess!'
'Sturgess here,' said the lieutenant, concerned at the sound of his voice.
'Lieutenant, Nechayev's killed the entire crew with lethal doses of theta radiation. I don't know how –' The channel cut out. Sturgess tried for a moment to get it back, and then stared up at the shape of the Spirit, now threatening them under the command of Nechayev.
Nechayev nodded, pleased at her success. The humans were paying a heavy price for their hunt. She engaged the engines of the starship and set course for Emeralle II.
The Nebula-class starship swung up and over the Starbase, casting a brief shadow over it. It passed over, and went to warp speed.
Sturgess shuddered with relief when she realised Nechayev had not fired, but then remembered the heavy price the Spirit's crew had paid for her misjudgement. Sighing deeply, she put her phaser down and sat on one of the crates in the cargo bay.
Strell looked at her. 'What do we do now, Lieutenant?'
'Now,' said Sturgess, 'we wait to be rescued.'