"Last of the emergency teams away, sir." Uhura
reported.
"Sulu-" Kirk said, and even as he spoke the helmsman
sent the Enterprise into a gut-wrenching dive-and-roll
manoeuvre away and down from the Lady Grace and away
and down from the course of the Gallant. The
proximity alarms screamed as they passed the Grace so
close that the cargo hauler's struggling impulse
engines dopplered particle emissions against the
Enterprise's shields. Inertial dampners managed to
keep the crew from becoming jam on the aft bulkheads
but gravity fluctuated wildly and the ships manoeuvres
found an echo at a thousandth the force in the inner
ears of the crew.
~ Or inner whatevers,~ Kirk thought, and made a note
to raise that with Bones some time, for how exactly
*did* Sulamids maintain their balance?
"Setting up an attack run now, Captain." Sulu said.
"Pavel, I'll give you at least three seconds on her
tail."
"Promises, promises." Chekov said, grinning wolfishly
as his hands hovered over phaser controls.
"Sorry about this, Mr Scott." Sulu murmured, and then
yanked the Enterprise off her current heading and into
a new one with a novel combination of manoeuvring
thrusters and a hard pulse of the impulse engines.
Kirk could see that half his board had gone red with
computer tell-tales and the rest of it lit up an
instant later as Sulu kicked in the warp-drive for two
seconds and then dropped back into normal space with a
velocity dump that sent Kirk sliding forward to the
edge of his chair despite his white-knuckle grip on
the arm-rests.
The next minute the Enterprise's nose dropped as Sulu
flipped her end over end without cutting the engines.
"Now, Pavel!" he said.
Chekov was already firing. The high energy arrows of
phaser blasts hit the Gallant and scorched her hull
around the drives and a string of photon torpedoes
detonated near her nacelles before the Gallant's helm
changed course and brought her around on another
collision course heading.
"Three direct hits." Chekov reported. "Port impulse
engines down to thirty percent. They're on another
direct - vait, sir! The Gallant has changed course.
She's on a dead heading for the Lady Grace!"
"Sulu, pursue!" Kirk said. "Boarding parties to
transporter room. Chekov, stop that ship!"
"Aye, sir!"
"Transporter room, standby to beam boarding parties
directly to the bridge of the Gallant."
"Standing by, sir."
"The Gallant is now twenty five thousand kilometres
from the Lady Grace." Spock reported. "She is closing
at three quarters impulse."
"I can't get a clear shot at the drive, Keptain!"
Chekov said. "I'm going to take the hull out if I
keep trying!"
"At twenty three thousand kilometres." Spock said. "In
range to transport. Transporter room reports boarding
parties away."
"Uhura, pipe their comm through."
"Aye, sir." She touched her board and the bridge was
filled with a low crackle. "Interference, sir.
Filtering it now."
"- got a critical reading on the warp core."
Tomlinson's voice said. "Probably ten minutes. We've
... the bridge ... to reason with anybody, took them
down with phaser settings on stun, they're all ...
ones who ... alive anyway."
"At eighteen thousand kilometres." Spock said.
"Controls are locked, trying to ... old style command
lockout I can ... take some time." Tomlinson said.
"You have about fifteen seconds." Kirk said.
"Captain," Spock said, "sensors indicate seven hundred
and thirty two life forms aboard the Gallant. She is
now sixteen thousand five hundred and - thirty
kilometres from the Lady Grace."
"Can we evacuate the Gallant?"
"If we allow the lock on the boarding party to
dissipate, we can evacuate twenty five people -"
"No." Kirk said. "Transporter room, maintain a lock
on the boarding party. Chekov, prepare to fire on the
Gallant, target the warp core, full spread." Kirk
said. "Tomlinson, make it fast."
"Working." she replied tersely.
"Phasers locked on." Chekov said. "Photon torpedoes
armed, sair."
"Take a safe shot if you have it, Mr Chekov, and
prepare to unload everything we have on my mark."
"Fourteen thousand kilometres." Spock said.
"Captain, I can't do it." Tomlinson said. "They've
programmed a dump-and-wipe into the helm, if I -"
"Transporter room, get our boarding parties out of
there. Commence evacuation of the Gallant." Kirk
snapped, eyes fixed on the ship on the viewscreen.
"Chekov, fire on the Gallant's engines on my mark."
"Ten thousand kilometres." Spock said.
On the viewscreen the Gallant ran ahead of them at a
constant distance and now Kirk could see the Lady
Grace - a tiny metallic speck at the outer limit of
visual range, but rapidly growing larger.
"Nine thousand. Eight. Captain, may I remind you that
the Lady Grace has no shields. Explosive detonation
of the Gallant's warp drive at less than four thousand
kilometres will place dangerous stresses on the
Grace's structural integrity."
"Captain, I can put us in between them -" Sulu said.
"Do it." Kirk said, and then grabbed the arms of the
command chair as Sulu used a warp pulse to send the
Enterprise straight *through* the Gallant in the
other-where of hyperspace. As they dropped down into
normal space the proximity alarm went off again.
"Recommend we raise shields." Spock said. "Seven
thousand kilometres."
"Not yet." Kirk said. "That'll cut off our
transporter."
"Five thousand kilometres, four point five, four.
Three point five, three. Two point five -"
"Shields up! Fire!"
The lights dimmed and then went to emergency power as
the Enterprise shuddered with the recoil of every
photon torpedo tube and the shields and phasers taxed
her power systems to the limit. For half a second the
Gallant was still looming on their viewscreen,
hurtling towards them, glowing with the power
crackling through her, and then she dissolved in a
cascade of fire and debris.
The bridge crew winced and shielded their eyes as the
viewscreen blazed with light and then went dark.
"Forward viewers burnt out." Spock reported.
"Distortion wave will hit in -"
The ship rattled with the greatest impact yet, a
tremor that seemed to go on and on until Kirk thought
his teeth would come loose. "Damage report, all
decks!" he shouted.
"Hull integrity at seventy percent." Spock reported.
"Engineering reports some minor damage." Uhura said.
"Casualties all decks, no fatalities reported."
"Weapons and shields still functional." Chekov said.
"Helm fully responsive." Sulu said.
"The Lady Grace is still intact." Spock said. "Her
hull integrity is down to thirty percent but holding."
"Transporter room." Kirk said. "How many did you get
off the Gallant?"
"Our boarding party." Kyle said. "And - nine others."
"We have to commence evacuation of the Lady Grace as
soon as possible, Mr Kyle." Kirk said. "Liase with Dr
McCoy on board the Grace. Sulu, how's that tractor
beam?"
"In place, Captain, course laid in. Commander Spock
says we can move at quarter impulse without
endangering the Grace's hull integrity."
"Then do that. I'll be on the Grace. Spock, you're
with me."
The corridors of the Enterprise were already filling
with the orderly bustle of an urgent operation. Kirk
and Spock stayed close to the walls, as did most of
the crew, leaving the centre of the halls free for
those who pelted along at double time, most carrying
equipment from sickbay and engineering as the
emergency teams beamed over to the Grace reported back
on conditions aboard.
As they neared the transporter room the activity
increased to the level of controlled frenzy. The most
severely injured from the Grace had been beamed aboard
and were being hurried to sickbay on anti-grav
stretchers, shepherded through the crush by grim-faced
staff from medical and biological sciences. Two
additional crew stood with Kyle at the transporter
controls as the chief struggled to keep the flow of
people in each direction at maximum.
The air above the transporter pad shimmered and began
to coalesce in the familiar sparkle. Kirk stepped
forward to help guide the anti-grav stretchers down
from the platform, wondering what injuries lay hidden
beneath the thermal insulators tucked around each
patient. Lia Burke pushed the last stretcher to him
and then leaped down from the platform herself.
"Clear!" she called to Kyle, and at the chief's signal
four crew members in engineering uniforms lugged a
heavy field emission stabiliser up to the platform and
assumed beam-out stance beside it.
Kirk snagged Burke's arm as she headed for the door.
"Report."
"Almost all human aboard, sir. Oxygen deprivation and
hypothermia to almost everyone we saw, a number of
burn cases, crush injuries and other trauma." Burke
said. "Bulkheads down all over the ship, decks burnt
out and depressurised, life support failure. It's a
disaster area."
"Thank you." Kirk said, releasing her to attend to her
wounded.
"Get me two dozen transfusion units stat and a box of
hypos loaded with dextrnedoline." she was saying into
her comm as she went out the door at speed. "We'll
need - "
Kirk turned to look for Spock and saw that the science
officer was at the transporter console, assisting Kyle
with the calibration.
"Captain." Ingrit Tomlinson was against the wall of
the transporter room, keeping herself out of the way
while waiting to report. She was - god, she was
covered in blood, Kirk realised, and he ducked past
two science officers to get to her.
"We'll get you to sickbay." he promised her, trying to
see the source of the bleeding.
"It's not mine." Tomlinson said. "I'm not injured.
None of us were. It was the Gallant."
"What happened?" Kirk asked.
"It was the ship." Tomlinson said. "Captain - the
ship was bleeding."