STAR TREK: WHERE NO ONE HAS GONE BEFORE
"The Tides of Time and War"
by Michael D. Garcia

Interlude One

NCC-1701-C (USS Enterprise)
Narendra System
Combat Date 43625.2
Main Bridge

With only the faint crimson glow from the bridge's emergency lighting system providing illumination, the smoke generated by a small fire was difficult to see, but he could smell it as it wafted through the air. Coughing to try and expel the smoke from his lungs, he brought his left fist up to mouth out of reflex, and in doing so realized that his face was wet from tears and sweat. The glow from the lights did not reach far enough for him to see, His right shoulder made him wince with pain as he tried to pull himself up from the deck and stand up. With deep heaving breaths, he finally placed his left foot flat against the deck near the bridge's damage control station, and drew himself up against the bulkhead, leaning on it for support.

Trying to get his bearings, he lifted his left arm to feel his way around the bridge. When he touched the turbolift doors, he realized then that he had thrown clear across the bridge from the operations console near the viewscreen. The doors did not open in response to his presence, and in his mind, he counted off another system that had been severely damaged. Stumbling from the bulkhead toward the center of the bridge, he made it to the railing around the command area, using it to support his weight as he leaned over to see if anyone stirred.

"Is anyone there?" he managed to croak out, but his voice was rewarded by a fit of coughing. The ship's emergency systems were offline and the fire continued to burn unabated. He could make out the outline of the captain in the center seat. He wanted to press his search for other survivors, but the pain in his shoulder cried out every time he moved. Tears continued to run down his cheeks as he fought through the pain, moving just behind the captain's chair to see if she could be awakened from her sleep.

With his voice barely above a whisper, he called to her. "Captain Garrett?" He peered at her, shaking the chair in an attempt to bring her around. "Captain Garrett, can you hear me, sir?" he asked her, but it was no use. Spreading his feet to widen his stance, he stood upright and reached up to her neck. It was wet and warm, but he could feel a very faint pulse beneath his fingers.

He sighed a sigh of relief, but realized that she needed medical attention. Staggering for the operations console, he reached out with his hand ahead of him and felt nothing but collapsed bulkhead. The console was crushed beneath it, chair and all. He nearly lost his footing as he moved toward the helm, slipping upon the drenched carpet beneath him. Pin wheeling his good arm outward to steady himself, he felt for the bulkhead and failed, falling to his knees. His head dove forward and he stopped, pulling himself inches away from the lifeless form of the helmsman.

"Oh, my God," he said to himself. His eyes had adjusted to the level of lighting and he could see that she had been disfigured by the impact of the support crashing down upon her. Her once beautiful face half-ripped away from the bone coupled with the smell of exposed innards turned his stomach. He gagged and choked back the bile building up from within and coughed to keep from smelling it, breathing with his mouth instead of his nose.

Pushing himself back, he scooted away from the corpse as quick as he could before it overwhelmed him. He welcomed the smell of burning metal to mask the corpse, but then wondered how many others of the bridge crew were dead. Rather than explore the grisly scene, he turned himself over gently and crawled his way back to the captain's chair.

At the end of the armrests of the chair were two small displays that the captain could use to monitor the ship's systems. Flickering with only a small amount of power, he touched his finger to control pad and tried to activate the ship-wide intercom. He was rewarded with a negative response from the console; the system was offline.

Entering in another command, he tried to signal the sickbay compartment. It worked, but there was no response from anyone in sickbay. As he slumped back down to the deck, his heart sank as he realized that he and the captain might be the only two survivors of whatever it was they survived, and with the captain's injuries possibly being severe, there was a real possibility that he would be the only one left. Mustering the strength to pull himself up once more, he decided that the best course of action would be to transmit a general distress call.

He accessed the command menu once more, trying to issue commands to the ship's subspace transceiver array. Breathing a sigh of thanks, it responded, though barely functional. He activated the bridge's audio pickups and began to speak, while placing the message on a looping transmission:

"To anyone within the sound of my voice, this is the Federation starship Enterprise..."