Captain's log, stardate 85055.1.
A Bolian freighter, the S.S. Azura, was scheduled to arrive at spacedock this morning, carrying a load of deuterium pods. It did not show, and attempts to contact the ship over subspace had gone unanswered. I was to travel to their last known coordinates and assist in rescue operations if needed.
When we got there, there was no sign of the Azura. I ordered a concentric search pattern with the long-range scanners. We picked up no sign of their engine signatures, but we did find what might be a vessel in a nearby asteroid field. Anne had no problem flying the ship through asteroids, especially considering the power of today's navigational deflectors. We arrived at the deepest point in the field and found the Azura, with its power out — and two Orion raiders circling it. The ship had been attacked by pirates.
The Orion commander hailed me, at least long enough to spit threats at me. Then the two ships powered up their weapons. The two raiders were slow enough to hit with our phasers — but they were big enough to absorb several hits, and powerful enough to make Zarva call up to the bridge regarding our shield emitters. However, I wanted to take the Orion pirates alive so they I could remand them to Earth for trial; completely destroying their vessels was out of the question.
But I had an outstanding tactical officer and an amazing pilot. I instructed them to attack the Orion ships' weapons and engines only; I wanted them dead in space. Elise and Anna worked together beautifully. I was able to successfully disable one of the Orion vessels; the other fled.
I decided to deal with the crippled Orion vessel later; first priority was the situation aboard the Azura. I called for Zarva to send an engineering detail to the transporter room; I was to join them. Or, at least, I wanted to join them. A good captain trusts in her crew to lead missions like this independently. So I sat back and watched, while keeping an eye out for that second Orion ship if it decides to make a surprise return. Then I decided that it would be better if I was to do two things at once, and I ordered a security team to the transporter room to secure the disabled Orion ship.
Let me tell you something: Orions are cowards. There were twelve Orions aboard the disabled vessel, and all of them had surrendered when they realized that they were dealing with highly trained Starfleet security officers. Our brig could only hold up to ten people, so I went and sealed off Cargo Bay Two with its computer inputs disabled, then ordered the Orions beamed there. Now that that was done, I could only sit back and wait for a status update from the Azura.
Zarva told me once they returned what had happened over there. It was not pretty.
The ship was devastated. Its transporter was inoperative, its warp core was critical, there were plasma leaks on every deck — and there were four Orions on board, who ambushed us. The Orions had weapons; we did not. The Orions had most of the engineering crew tied up; they would sell us as slaves later. Like that would ever work. Zarva and one other crewman were able to escape into the depths of Engineering. But Zarva had full control over the ship's systems to aid in repairs, and she decided to make life hell for the Orion hijackers.
The Orions had killed three of the five crew members aboard. The Azura's master, a Bolian named Brott, was still alive, as was his first officer. They were tied up and dumped a small room near the bridge. The plan was for the Orions to use them as hostages, but they found no need to do so. Zarva programmed the ship's computer to play suspicious noises coming from the room where Brott was being held. The Orions ran back to check on their hostages, who they believed were escaping — only to find nothing there. Then the Orion would go away, and Zarva would play the suspicious noises again. After doing this three more times, the Orions had decided to ignore the noises coming from the hostage room. The Orion pirates were rather thick, and they decided that they were hearing things due to the high personal stress level involved in committing interstellar piracy. Their mistake.
The Orions didn't know that their two pirate vessels were no longer there to assist them. As such, they kept pacing around the ship, waiting to be picked up, snarling as they got more and more bored. There were several plasma leaks on board, which restricted the number of hallways the Orions could travel through. Zarva programmed the computer to spray water on the floor in several places, then had the temperature lowered so that the water flash-froze. Sure enough, the Orions were not looking where they were going, and two of them slipped and fell. One had landed on his head and was unconscious; the other had a broken leg. No serious injuries to either, but both were immobilized. They called for one of their crewmates to come down there and help them; Zarva had the frozen area extended so that the Orion would trip and fall again, thinking that the icy area was still the same size as it was before. The third Orion landed on his face and broke his nose. He apparently had a very low personal pain tolerance, as he started wailing and wailing about how much it hurt.
That left the fourth Orion. This one was simple. He had still not conclusively determined the source of these strange occurrences, but was was getting suspicious that someone was still loose on board. He jumped in the turbolift to go to Main Engineering — but Zarva reprogrammed the turbolift to conveniently fail, automatically divert itself to turbolift maintenance, and have the door open but get stuck immediately, leaving the final pirate trapped in the turbolift car.
With that done, Zarva and her crewmate emerged from hiding and went and untied the rest of the engineering team. One of them used a plasma cutter as an impromptu weapon to relieve the one still mobile Orion of his disruptor, then stunned him with it.
By this point they realized how much time had passed, and they have not checked in with me. Zarva therefore did so. I was alarmed when she explained what happened, but not completely shocked; I had since realized that there probably would be Orions on board and I sent the team over there without armed escort. I was glad to hear that the Orions had been overpowered, and laughed mightily when Zarva explained how she did it; she always had a love of practical jokes.
I had the unconscious Orion, the one with the broken nose, and the one trapped in the turbolift beamed to Cargo Bay Two with the rest; whatever damage was done to the first two could easily be fixed later. I had the one with the broken leg beamed to Sickbay under restraint. Morek said he cursed heavily at him while being treated; Morek simply disabled his universal translator and ignored the hissing that composes the Orion language while treating him. When fixed he was also beamed into Cargo Bay Two.
When Captain Brott and her first officer beamed on board, I went down to the transporter room to speak with them. I was disheartened when I learned that all the other members of her crew were dead. I wanted to take everyone back to Earth, but I didn't want leave her ship here for anyone to salvage. I did a bit of math; the deuterium tanks that she carried would fit into Cargo Bay One, but it took a lot of rearrangement to make them all fit. With that, I destroyed the hulk of the Azura at Captain Brott's request, and set course for home.
The Earth public prosecutor's office thanked me for returning all the Orions alive. The individual I spoke with said that they don't get a case this open-and-shut very often. I transferred custody of the pirates to Earth Security. Then I went back to my quarters and read for a time. The mission was over.
Computer, end recording.