Chapter 6
Location: USS Warspite
Date: February 6, 2158
Time: 1800
"Is it working?" Lieutenant Povaliy asked Dr. Watson as she stood in the brig next to their prisoner, the Orion teen girl that they'd captured aboard the permanently-disabled Orion Interceptor.
"Indeed it is, but there's simply no pheromones being detected, it's unusual, I was aware that Orion females produced them, or perhaps your scanner isn't able to detect them," Dr. Watson replied from the safety of his EV suit.
The civilian Doctor had first and foremost wanted to be sure the Orion female was physically alright. She'd taken a pretty nasty punch straight to the face from Major Odell himself, but she also had a few pieces of shrapnel imbedded into her body from the explosive breach of the ship's bridge, although none were particularly life-threatening. Lieutenant Nadia Povaliy and Lieutenant Commander Bella Frost were thus summoned to fulfill their requirement to be there for the interrogation of the teenage pirate captain when she awoke. Bella was there to translate, in case their universal translators in their ears malfunctioned. And Nadia was there to take samples of the air for the sake of finding an inoculation against the Orion pheromones that were being so carefully protected against. Two female MACO's stood in the brig, pulse rifles lowered but the female soldiers' eyes remained alert, one of them in the cell with the three senior staff. The brig was completely isolated, a back-up life support unit activated and routed for servicing this exact room and a makeshift airlock built for entering and exiting the brig likewise being present. D'Tida was brought here in a sealed canister on a gurney, and the girl now began to come to, groaning lightly and lifted a hand to her head.
"Easy…" Frost warned, drawing a phase pistol that was set to stun and pointed it at the green-skinned girl who looked at the barrel of the weapon and then up at her captors, "Name and house…"
"D'Tida, House Tendi," D'Tida growled, sitting up on her elbows.
"Tendi?" Bella gasped, blinking in surprise.
"You know the name?" Nadia asked carefully.
"Yeah, I do…I uh…spent time with them when I was sixteen as a uh…hostage," Bella replied carefully.
"A hostage?!" Dr. Watson turned to her with surprise, "Why didn't you say so before?"
"It wasn't pertinent, and…wasn't something I wanted to revisit," Bella sighed as she looked to the female MACO who held her weapon pointed at the Orion girl, allowing her to holster her own, "My parents had to pay a protection fee to pass through Orion space. But they didn't have enough of what was being asked. It was either surrender the ship, fight, or leave collateral on the route to Coridan, and they'd pay the rest when they returned. The Orions chose me."
Dr. Watson and Nadia looked at Bella in disbelief, and then at D'Tida, who understood all of this of course thanks to the translation devices they all had. D'Tida indifferently shrugged with a slight smirk.
"It's just business," the Orion replied.
"I spent a year and six days as a prisoner of House Tendi, living there amongst them, never knowing if I was going to see my family again."
"Oh, come now, the Tendi's don't mistreat our hostages, certainly not enough to be called prisoners. Especially you, I remember you, Bella Frost…" D'Tida laughed, "You were my sister's favorite hostage."
"It's funny, I don't remember you," Bella snarled.
"I spent most of my days in school and nights in the nursery, but I got out every so often to watch my sister train. You were one of the few Humans I've actually seen before today, interesting that you and I were to meet again like this," D'Tida replied as she slowly sat up, feeling the bandages on her arms, where her jacket had been removed to patch up the small wounds, "So, now I'm the hostage?"
"No, you're a prisoner, a hostage is something different. We're not pirates."
"It's too bad, your ship is well-suited for it," D'Tida shrugged.
"Commander," Lieutenant Povaliy spoke up now, "The pheromones?"
Bella nodded at that, refocusing herself and rolled her shoulders back. It was time to get back to basics. The two ladies had not detected hints of the presence of Orion pheromones, as they were not experiencing a headache and they'd been in her presence for a bit by now. It was an object of medical curiosity by this point.
"D'Tida, why is it your body isn't giving off pheromones eh?" Bella now asked.
"Pfft," the teen waved her off, "Orion females don't start giving off pheromones until we're fully sexually mature, I won't have men lapping at me like hounds for a few more years. Not that I currently have a problem with gaining their…attentions," she gave a sly glance over to Dr. Watson.
"I'm afraid I'm married, dear girl," Watson replied with classic poise, "Out of an innate sense of medical curiosity, how old are you?"
"Sixteen, in my people's years," she responded, "Not sure what that is to your people."
"That's uh…about eighteen in Earth years if I remember right," Bella responded, recalling the vague math of the Orion homeworld's orbit.
"Hmm…for such a matriarchal society I find it curious that your bodies take that long to sexually-mature," Dr. Watson.
"It is what it is," the Orion shrugged.
"Enough," the senior officer growled and laid a hand on Dr. Watson's shoulder, "Doc, I don't think we need you anymore."
"Very well, if you need me again, just give a shout," he nodded, and stepped out after packing his small case, "I'll be back in three hours to check your bandages."
"Thank you, Doctor," the girl winked.
As Dr. Watson stepped through the makeshift airlock Frost stepped in front of her, arms crossed.
"Now for something you can be use to us with," Bella waved off, "Your fleet departed from Valakis, didn't it?"
"Couldn't get into our system, could ya?" D'Tida grinned, smug at the superiority of Orion cyber security.
"We already are," Nadia replied, "We're simply decrypting it."
"That may take some time," D'Tida shrugged.
"Care to speed that up? How many other ships are at Valakis?"
"As soon as you answer one question for me," D'Tida chirped as she began to notice something, she was the only prisoner here, "Where's my crew?"
The two female Starfleet officers looked at one another, sharing a look that the young Orion didn't like. She leaned forward, a sinking feeling within her gut dragging her confidence down with it.
"They're dead?"
"You're the lone survivor of your ship, I'm sure that they were some from the freighter, but we didn't go back to check," Nadia informed her.
"Now answer our question, how many other pirates are at Valakis?" Bella demanded again.
"No idea, we left…oh…forty-five days ago, no telling how many others may or may not be there," D'Tida shrugged, "Honest," she looked up, "Don't what you expect from me."
"I suppose then we'll have to be more direct. How many ships and of what houses were at Valakis last time you were there?"
"Didn't count," D'Tida shrugged, making it clear she would not rat on her fellow Orion. To do so was tantamount to sacrilege.
"Was D'Lena there?" Bella then asked, getting an immediate look from D'Tida, "I'll take that as a yes. Let me tell you a secret that may help you help your sister avoid being stuck in this cell with you, or worse, floating around in the void. We're going to Valakis, and we're going to speak to Neram. If memory serves, there's never been a ship there that can stop us, including your sister."
"Neram? Really? Why would he even give you the time of day? You have nothing to offer him."
"Rule of Acquisition sixteen…" Bella smirked.
"Yeah…don't have those Ferengi things memorized," D'Tida deadpanned, "There's more than two hundred of them."
"Think on it, you might get what I'm on about," Bella replied as she turned around, taking Nadia with her while the female MACO sergeant backed out, weapon pointed at D'Tida who just frowned as the two officers left the room through their makeshift airlock.
Watching through a camera in the brig, listening to each and every word within the ship's command center in the back of the bridge Captain Shaw, Commander Rowley, and Major Odell had been watching the whole process with interest.
"So, our guest is a noblewoman," Shaw mumbled with intrigue as he lifted a hand to his red facial hair, "Fascinating…"
"I find it more interesting what Frost just dropped on us, that she had spent a year as a hostage of the Orion? Are we going to ignore that she's lied to us?" Rowley asked the captain.
"I don't know, seems like she might've had reason to keep that to herself," Major Odell noted.
"Explain," Shaw turned his head to the side to hear out the MACO officer.
"She was sixteen at the time, and, let's be real, Frost is a bit of a knockout in the looks department. It's not hard to imagine what she might have experienced while being their hostage in that sort of environment. Sounds like…she's got some baggage there she doesn't want to offload onto anyone else. That's just my take, sir."
"My issue is what else might she be hiding from us," Rowley replied with concern.
"You have doubts about the loyalties of our communications officer, Commander?" Captain Shaw arched an eyebrow. He knew of course, knew about this tale. Frost's father had detailed the experience to him and he knew that the story was something that the young woman didn't want to go into. If she wanted to, he was ready to discuss it, but if she didn't he'd respect her privacy. But only so much as it didn't make things dangerous for his ship.
"Her loyalties, nah…" Rowley leaned on the conference table in the center of the room, "Her motivations? Yes sir, I do. What if an opportunity arises for her to exert some form of revenge against these Orion and it puts this ship and crew at risk?"
"Hmm…" Shaw nodded at that, and took a deep breath, "I'll discuss it with her at a later time. In the meantime, we have a week before we arrive at this…'Pirate Central' which Ms. Frost described, but Starfleet has passed along orders that we need to handle up on securing the area around Deneva Colony and Cold Station 12. An Andorian freighter was attacked and seized five days ago just out of Deneva, a day later, a Vulcan research ship was attacked but managed to outpace them and got away, and the next day, a Tellarite freighter out of Coridan was attacked and seized, the perpetrators on all three occasions were Orion Interceptors with markings that seem to match so it appears to be the same squadron of three ships."
"Well, we did just handle the Orions pretty easily, what's three more?" Odell responded.
"Finding them in all that open space will be a different sort of attempt however," Shaw responded calmly, "Our best bet, I believe, is for them to come find us."
"How do we do that, captain?" Rowley inquired.
"Tell them we have something that they cannot refuse to come for, and I think we currently have it sitting in our brig," Shaw informed them.
"The girl?" Odell asked, looking between Rowley and Shaw to see if he was understanding that right.
"If the little we understand about the Orion Syndicate is to be believed the great families of the organization compete with one another just as much as they do with outsiders. We can use that I feel, perhaps inform this…Neram, that we wish him to arrange an auction of sorts to gather representatives from the various Orion families that stand in opposition to this House Tendi who might wish to take up that opportunity."
"Or, it could be a case where an outside attack on one will be construed as an attack on all," Rowley suggested.
"Well, let's make sure we're prepared for that possibility as well," Shaw nodded an acceptance of the point.
"I might recommend we do this via hailing this Neram, captain," Odell noted, "Best not to give the Orion a way to leverage against us."
"No, we'll go in person. I want those pirates to see us, and for there to be no doubt that we don't fear them. Make certain we have the runabout readied for when we do, maximum security detail, full combat loadout. No half measures, and Mr. Rowley," Shaw turned to his first officer, "If anything untoward should occur to us, you have my full support to take whatever measures needed, including authority to utilize the nuclear weapons we have aboard."
"Five of our fifty megaton warheads going off in their backyard will certainly get their attention," Rowley smirked to Captain Shaw.
"Just be sure to avert your eyes, of course."
"As another note, we will need to make some enhancements to the ship's firepower. Our phase cannons, I think I get more from them, a lot more," Rowley stated confidently.
"Are you certain? That's quite a tall order for our guns which can nearly double the output of those of the rest of the fleet," Shaw arched an eyebrow.
"Pretty sure, and something like this has been done before," the weapons officer nodded in turn.
"Well, I'm certainly listening," the Captain gave his go-ahead nod to him.
"Enterprise once patched their impulse reactor manifold directly into their phase cannon battery, it yielded an overload of the phase modulators that resulted in incredible energy output from the phase cannons but even with the excess energy recoil sent into gravity plating and structural integrity plating it Enterprise's crew still blew out plasma relays and knocked their guns offline. But the result was undeniable, they overwhelmed the shields of a ship that was merely nicked by standard phase cannons at full power. Ours are twice the size of an NX's cannons and we have the redundant feedback capacitors to absorb potential energy recoils safely back into the ship in the event of battle damage causing a cascade. I think we can recreate that effect with our own weapons."
"But…the power relays for the impulse drives are Andorian, they're incompatible with our phase cannons," Shaw retorted, curiously following the logic.
"True, but the relays are compatible with the Warp reactor's primary power distribution manifold," Rowley responded, a big grin then appearing on his face, "If I can bypass the phase cannons' generator and draw power directly from the reactor, it could increase yield from the cannons by two hundred percent before there's a danger of fusing the phase coils. I'll…need Sub-Commander T'Pmin's help with writing a new subroutine into the weapons systems for triggering that controlled overload and reinforce the plasma relays to the structural integrity systems and to polarized hull plating junctions to absorb any energy recoils that overload the feedback capacitors, but we're capable of the rest on our own, right now."
"How long would you need?" Shaw asked immediately, wanting this to happen.
"A couple days, if we put all shifts to work maybe a day."
"There is a risk though, sir, it's the reason that Starfleet didn't make this sort of thing standard," Rowley then advised, "If the Warp reactor accidentally overloads the relays into the weapons systems it could fuse the phase coils and then blow the capacitors, and that could kill the entire power grid unless the reactor is shut down."
"Can you minimize the risk of that?" Shaw demanded to know.
"A manual cut-off, physically sever the connection to the guns and redirect the energy into something else, like the deflector shield array, it's rated to withstand quite a bit because it's meant to react to weapons fire, so it'd be the go-to choice but we would need to increase insulation on the lines to keep them from jumping the gap and creating a feedback directly to the reactor manifold."
"Make it so, Commander," Shaw nodded with a stern determination, "We'll be at Deneva in two days, I expect we'll find the materials we need there amongst the colony's refineries."
Location: Deneva Colony
February 8, 2158
Time: 0745
The ship was docked now, topping up on fuel and delivering the large amount of retaken spoils, notably their crucial dilithium crystal cargo. The Warspite also managed to offload the remaining bodies of the crew of the Empire Goliath before settling in while awaiting several cargo ships that were returning from Coridan that had coalesced into a convoy for protection. Apparently the captain was of the opinion that this convoy was a potential target for pirates to try to attack, so he was keeping the Warspite hidden, almost hoping for a pirate flotilla to jump the convoy of six freighters so Warspite could emerge in turn from the thick dense asteroid field and counterattack. There were already eleven freighters in orbit of Deneva, ready to head out once the other six arrived and refueled to be ready to depart for home as one big convoy. Starfleet had a small force present over Deneva, three Daedalus-Class Frigates were stationed at the planet, and a squadron of five tiny Phobos-Class Corvettes were headed by a pair of Ganges-Class Destroyers who were guarding the assembling convoy. This force was not at all up to the job of pirate-hunting, it was too slow and undergunned and too few in number, but it could escort convoys with enough firepower that, in concert with the firepower of the freighters themselves would be able to fight them off.
This meant the crew had time on their hands. But, not all of this time belonged to them. They were still being given an amped-up training regimen on top of new upgrades to the ship's weapons systems and their own duty watches. The Captain definitely intended for each and every one of them to be a well-honed machine capable of anything that was asked of them. There was often not much time for grabbing a bite to eat in the mess, which for Monica was her favored time to actually unwind and be with her own thoughts. She was slated for her standard 0800 watch at her station on the bridge. It was actually quite the day for her, it would be the first time she'd have the bridge of the Warspite, if only for half an hour at most. The senior officers had a meeting in the Captain's Ready Room that morning and would assume their roles once finished. So, she was very quick to have her meal wolfed down and was stepping out onto the bridge.
"Ah, Miss Simms," Captain Shaw was the first to greet her, much to her surprise as he emerged from his own quarters hallway holding a coffee mug in hand, "Early to your watch I see," he stepped out as she walked behind him with hands behind her back.
"Yes sir, just…excited is all," she responded as she saw some other Ensigns of the morning watch likewise now arriving, apparently Eddie was also present.
"Well of course, having the bridge of the Warspite is quite the event," Shaw gave a smirk as he walked into the bridge and sipped at his coffee, "Status?"
"Sensors are all clear, Captain," the ensign at the science station reported.
"Communications are all clear, Captain."
"All tactical systems are green, Captain."
"Helm is ready for orders, Captain," Eddie now reported as well.
"The bridge is yours, Ensign," Shaw offered a hand to his chair.
"Aye sir," Monica eagerly went over and sat down hesitantly as Shaw stepped over to be in front of their lines of sight.
"Now," he stated quickly, "Sensors! You detect a ship approaching at high warp. You cannot identify it, what do you do?"
"Go to yellow alert and comm you, sir," Monica quickly responded.
"Ah," Shaw placed one hand behind his back, "Correct, if you were an ensign. Now I want you to think like a Captain."
"Then, we still go to yellow alert, and raise shields," Monica responded quickly.
"Justify your choice?" Shaw now began to slowly pace, "The ship is approaching, no hails, no signs of intent."
"It might be friendly, or neutral, it may be a waste of time to go to full tactical alert," Monica noted, remembering Starfleet protocol.
"This is true," Shaw nodded and then took another sip, "Now the ship is dropping out of warp. You do not recognize its configuration and scans reveal nothing affirmative about its primary systems or weapons. Your next action?"
"Hail them," Monica replied, firm in her conviction and memorized knowledge of protocol.
"Good…" Shaw continued to slowly pace before them, making Monica confused somewhat, as well as the other ensigns.
"Um…what next?" the ensign at the communications station responded.
"Nothing, the lack of an answer is time ticking away, and them closing on you."
"H-hail them again," Monica said quickly.
Shaw simply nodded his head, and it he continued his methodical walk in front of them.
"The-they aren't answering the hail?"
"Correct," Shaw replied, "They still continue to close on your ship."
"Tactical alert," Monica said with more force, "Shields to full power, polarize hull plating, power up phase cannons, impulse drives to prepare for maneuvers."
"The approaching ship locks weapons on you while continuing to close on you."
"Lock weapons," Monica states immediately.
"They fire on you. Your shields hold," Shaw dictated now.
"Return fire."
"Your weapons have not finished their arming sequence," Shaw raised a finger, "You cannot fire back, yet."
"Three more ships appear from behind the shadow of the planet, they are closing on you and have fired. Your shields are draining."
"Evasive maneuvers!" Monica said quickly.
"Calm yourself, Ensign," Shaw raised his hand, "Your crew looks to you for their foundation of assurance in this moment. Your ship is still under attack, you weapons have now armed and are ready."
"Fire on the closest ship, target the enemy weapons," she quickly said with relief, but tried to steady her voice.
"Their shields hold," Shaw noted to her.
"Continue firing, maximum output. Torpedoes to fire on the approaching three ships with stern tubes."
"Good…the fight continues, but your shields begin to fail," Shaw continued, "Your weapons do damage, the first ship's shields are failing and their weapons fail, they break off."
"Target the next nearest ship," Monica quickly replied, feeling as though she'd won something, which made Shaw stop, finally.
"Your foes' next volley breaks your shields, and a photon torpedo cracks the nacelle housing. Your warp drive is no longer operable and you are venting plasma."
Monica clutched the armrests of the chair as she realized her mistake. It would have been over, she could have jumped to warp and try to use the powerful warp drive of the ship to outrun her potential foe. Now she was stuck and being pummeled. Defeated, she lowered her head. As did the others, having vicariously been living through her in this moment. None had in their own minds come up with a different option. Captain Shaw nodded, having seen this as a sign of his little lesson for his junior officers being clear enough.
"Never surrender to defeat, ensigns, never go quietly into that long night, sometimes you might find you can beat it. But, your first responsibility is to this ship and your crew as a captain. Discretion is often the better part of valor. When in doubt, you must always, always, choose the path that safeguards your ship and crew," Shaw explained, enrapturing his young junior officers, "Another thing, I know you felt that you had the momentum there at the end. Warspite it a fantastic ship, she will do so for us if we take care of her. But your own future commands may not be a ship like Warspite. Never chase after victories. Oftentimes, you'll find that in chasing after your victory you'll stumble into a defeat. Good commanders can and will avoid stumbling into defeats, sometimes they might even catch their victories. Other times, they'll find ways to stave off those defeats and survive. But the great captains always find ways for victory to come to them, so that all they must do is to take it. If a battle is not of your wanting, or you are unprepared, your victory will be that much harder to achieve. Sometimes, you can win by simply surviving to fight another day. I know, that at times it doesn't seem that way, but it's my job as your captain to teach you these sorts of lessons, so that when, God willing, you take the chair of your own ships, you too can pass along those lessons."
At this point, Commander Rowley and Lieutenant Commander Frost stepped out from the turbolift. The Captain nodded to them, and knew that it was time. Also with them was Lieutenant Povaliy, Sub-Commander T'Pmin, and Major Odell who stepped out from the other turbolift.
"Well," Captain Shaw gave a warmer smile to Monica, "I leave the bridge to you, Ensign Simms."
"Aye, Captain," she replied dutifully, shouldering the advice, the lessons, and the responsibility endowed from him.
He gave a slight nod as he walked back to join his senior staff as they went to his ready room. The group of ensigns were relieved as the captain departed. And this left them to finally relax to an extent.
"So, you got your ship blown up," Eddie turned around with a smug look on his face.
"Oh, shut up," Monica rolled her eyes at him.
"Hey, don't worry about it, you won't get it blown up next time, maybe just crippled," Eddie smirked back.
Monica gave him a mocking sneer and stuck her tongue out at him. She'd been around Eddie for quite a while, constantly, seeing as the two sat side-by-side at the controls of the ship for about a quarter of the day and trained together either in technical proficiency courses in engineering or doing maintenance duties alongside the other ensigns to help out the much-reduced science division. It drove her nuts that despite her top-of-class scores at Starfleet Academy, that this bottom-rung scorer would be right alongside her as the helmsman of the Warspite, Starfleet's newest and biggest and baddest ship. His flirtations with her and her friends she also couldn't figure. It stuck in her head whether Eddie was being serious, and whether he was indeed interested in her and that he would flirt occasionally with her friends to make her jealous or if she because of her declining his advances he was in the process of moving on. But that didn't matter to her, why would she fret over that or really even think of it?
It was something that she, frustratingly, found herself thinking about, even as her communications operator, lifted a hand to his ear and quickly tapped at his controls.
"Hey, I'm getting a transmission, it's a distress call!" he said rapidly, eyes going wide.
"Can you identify it?" she stood up and walked over to the station.
"It's garbled, hold on," the young ensign stated quickly, "Got it, oh my God, it's the inbound convoy!"
"Plot the position, now! Eddie, prep a warp jump and navigate us out of the asteroid field."
"Got it!" Eddie snapped to it quickly tapping at the controls.
"Tactical alert!" she then knew to state, the lesson of the day already in her mind.
The tactical station's ensign snapped to his order immediately. And the red lights lit up and the alarm blared out.
"Bridge to Captain," Monica now immediately tapped the controls on the chair.
"Captain Shaw here, what's going on Ensign?" the captain demanded.
"We're receiving a distress call from the inbound freighter convoy."
"On my way."
"Got the location," the comms operator said quickly as the Warspite was brought out of the asteroid field, "Five minutes away at top speed."
"Miss Simms?" Captain Shaw asked as he and the rest of the senior officers entered.
"We have the location, Captain," Monica stepped back, and placed her hand behind her back, looking over at the comms station as Frost took the seat and the ensign stepped aside to his back-up station.
"They're a few minutes away, Captain," the more senior officer declared.
"Get us underway, maximum warp! Inform Captain Cerf on the Archon we are responding to the distress call and the rest of the ships are to remain here," Shaw declared, sensing that this may have been a trap of some sort to lure Starfleet away from Deneva as he stepped down to his chair, and then lowered his voice, "Miss Simms, well done."
"Aye sir," she smiled as she took her spot, and confirmed the right coordinates and powered up the Warp engine and then accelerated the ship into the void.
"Sensors, what're we looking at?" Shaw asked as he sat down.
"Looks like the convoy has dropped out of warp, they're under attack from four Orion Interceptors," Nadia stated as she checked her sensor scope.
"They're stating one of their ships is losing power and they're trying to defend themselves," Bella declared from her station, hand to her ear.
"Prepare to target the engines of the Orion ships, they may have transported some of the freighters' crews. Miss Povaliy, scan their ships and mark which ones may have human biosigns," Shaw ordered rapidly, "Not one of them can be allowed to escape."
"Aye sir," Lieutenant Povaliy responded.
"Want me to bring the upgrades to the weapons systems online?" Rowley inquired.
"No, not if we can help it. Let's keep our cards close to our chests unless we need to use it but have the cannon overload ready in the event something unforeseen occurs."
The ship continued its rapid acceleration, past Warp 5, into Warp 6, and the ship began its characteristic vibration as it passed Warp 6.5. The ship's crew was once more rushing to their posts, and Major Odell likewise had rushed off to his troops' mustering point. Their trip was not long, and the Warspite emerged from Warp right on top of a chaotic scene. Two larger Z-Class Freighters were withstanding the bulk of an attack while a Y-Class was trying to prevent itself from being boarded by one Orion ship while three smaller J-Class were just trying to throw potshots at the other three Orion ships that attacked their larger compatriots by circling them, firing their green-tinted particle weapons at the ships, one of the Z-Class was seemingly disabled, smoke and plasma trailing the large freighter as it continued to limp along. Red plasma bolts fired from the plasma cannons on the civilian ships, their crews refusing to surrender or give in knowing what fates awaited them if they did so.
"Shields up and power to polarized hull plating. Mr. Castello, full speed right at the Y-Class being boarded, Mr. Rowley, lock weapons and prepare photonic torpedoes once we are in range," Shaw commanded the second he took everything in.
"Aye sir, full ahead," Eddie replied as the Warspite accelerated, making it seem as though the Warspite had not even missed a beat.
"Miss Frost, begin jamming signals."
"Aye sir," Frost replied as she tapped away, beginning the use Warspite's powerful jamming capabilities to keep the Orion ships from calling for help. As of now, the Orion still didn't know about Warspite at large, he wished to keep it that way.
The ship bore down upon the isolated Orion as it had begun extending a docking port towards the disabled Y-Class, the name of which was seen to be the Trivial. Shaw leaned forward, eyes laced with predatory eagerness as the range closed and the Orion ship seemed to register the behemoth barreling towards it as he stopped extending its docking port, and then began to bank away and accelerate while turning around.
"Weapons locked, in range," Rowley declared.
"Miss Povaliy?"
"No human lifesigns aboard, Captain," she responded quickly.
"Lock onto their reactor. Maximum yield, half-spread, fire," Shaw commanded.
Three orange shimmering lights zipped out of the forward torpedo tubes and each caught the Orion ship slow enough that Warspite wouldn't have been able to miss. The first two impacts were enough to shatter the ship's shields, causing the shield projectors to explode from the strain and plasma to begin venting from the wing root on the starboard side. Then the third torpedo punched through the light structure, and the petite and graceful Orion ship was then blown in half as the stern section began to splinter with the wings wrenching themselves off in gouts of fire as the bow of the ship lazily drifted off. The Warspite passed to the disabled freighter's starboard side, having effectively saved the ship as it then continued onwards to the main action.
"Take to intercept their wheeling formation to port, Mr. Castello, Miss Povaliy, any signs of human lifesigns aboard the Orion ships," Shaw asked again.
"Affirmative Captain, I have six humans aboard one ship and eight aboard another one."
"Mr. Rowley, target their engines with phase cannons. Bridge to Engineering," Shaw nodded as he then tapped the communicator on his chair.
"Engineering," T'Pmin responded quickly.
"Prepare for transporter extraction of all humans aboard the Orion ships," he commanded quickly.
"Aye, Captain," his Vulcan chief engineer responded succinctly.
"Make it quick Sub-Commander," Shaw commanded he watched the Orion ships begin to break off and come at the Warspite at full speed, "Mr. Rowley, full power to phase cannons at the third Orion ship. Make him no more."
Rowley did so, the two forward phase cannons ripped out a high-strength volley that swatted at the Orion ship. The shields held firm but two photonic torpedoes were fired immediately afterward, one torpedo exploding against the stressed Orion ship's shield before the second one blasted them again, the explosion tearing open the ship's belly as the Orion ships' weapons likewise came into range. Multiple particle cannons fired and struck the Warspite's shields. The bridge crew felt the impacts but they continued along with their duties. The starboard and port ventral cannons fired, their port cannons targeting the engines on the nearer hostage-bearing ship and the starboard cannons fired at the damaged interceptor. Two impacts struck at the Orion ship's hull, one shot passing clean through the thin middle section of the hull while the second one nearly severed to Orion ship's port wing and the ship's impulse reactor on that side exploded at the sudden feedback loop that blew out its side and the ship began to vent atmosphere very quickly. It wasn't going to be going anywhere.
Following behind the Orion ships, the three J-Class freighters were in pursuit, aggressively trying to catch up and join the battle alongside their savior. Apparently, at least one of them had been the source of the hostages aboard the Orion ships.
"Captain, one of the freighters is hailing us," Bella said from her station.
"Tell them we're aware of the hostages aboard the Orion ships, we're working on recovering them," Shaw nodded back calmly, knowing that the boomers were probably panicking at the site of the Warspite smiting one of the Orion ships knowing that their families may have been aboard, "And tell them to stay back, we'll handle this."
"Aye sir," Frost said as the Warspite banked around without Shaw having to say so, Eddie knew what his captain wanted from him.
"Debris front," Monica said to Eddie as she watched the navigational scanners carefully, noting a sizeable few pieces of debris in their path.
"Got it," Eddie noted as the two continued to work in tandem like a well-drilled machine.
Commander Rowley's station was still a hub of activity while Lieutenant Povaliy kept careful track of the jamming frequencies alongside Lieutenant Commander Frost with the two likewise working in sync to keep the Orion ships from getting a long-range call for help out. Phase cannons fired their powerful beams into the rears of the two Orion ships as they tried to come about for another pass, knowing by now that they were doomed if they stayed in front of their foe's main battery and kept their backsides exposed. Three, then four powerful shots landed against the enemy's shields, splitting attention between them as the J-Class freighters plinked away with their plasma cannons as one of the Z-Class slowly tried to join the fight. Clearly the merchant crews were emboldened and continued their own attacks, wanting retribution and liberation of their stolen people.
"Engineering, where's my transporter lock?" Shaw demanded as the two enemy ships made another pass over the Warspite, trying to stay behind the big battleship as Rowley continued to pour accurate fire into their foes' impulse drives to break through their shields. Warspite again started to come about to fire into their rears, but was hopelessly outmaneuvered.
"The target ships have impressive electronic countermeasures, I can overcome the interference but they need to be on a stable course," T'Pmin responded promptly, "Perhaps if they jump to warp they will be stable enough for us to gain a lock."
"They're getting the idea that a jump to warp will be in their better interest by now," Shaw responded as he watched the enemy ships began to take a new path, phase cannons pounding away at their shields the whole time.
"Captain, their preparing to jump to warp now, looks like we may have our chance," Nadia declared.
"Have a pursuit course lined up quickly, Miss Simms," Shaw said in delight, knowing that he had them. The enemy ships still didn't know that they were actually safer fighting him at impulse than at warp.
The two Orion ships then powered up, and then flew off into warp. Just as they expected.
"Pursuit course laid in," Monica said eagerly, and put her hand on the throttle.
"Warp, now!" Shaw ordered the instant the last word left her mouth.
She did so, accelerating far faster than she had before. The Warspite's two quarry were seen being closed in on within mere moments. They fired their stern cannons as Warspite entered transporter range, but the polarized armor plating shrugged the blows off easily enough although the ship did feel more of a jolt from each impact as the speed reached Warp 6.3.
"The Orion ships are beginning to overheat their warp drives," Nadia called out, "They're diverting power from their jamming systems to maintain their warp fields."
"Sub-Commander?" Shaw demanded again.
"Attaining lock, ten seconds…" T'Pmin declared and then a few seconds later, stated confidently, "Beaming now."
Within the transporter room, four men and two women in civilian clothes suddenly appeared, scared, bewildered, and in a fight or flight mode within the Warspite's transporter bay. A team of MACO's was there and able to handle them for any medical needs that they might have had and ushered them off of the pad as T'Pmin quickly swapped targets.
"Transporter Bay to Bridge, I have the first ship's prisoners, locking on the second group now…" she said as the ship rocked again from a particle cannon struck them again, "Transporting second group, now."
Eight more people emerged on the pad, three men, two women, and three kids ranging from five years old to twelve. They were likewise scared and didn't know what had happened. But the MACO's ushered them off the pad just as quickly as before.
"Bridge, I have all hostages aboard," T'Pmin said into the comm system and powered down the transporter.
"Excellent," Shaw replied on the bridge and he turned to Commander Rowley, "Finish them off."
The cold-natured manner in which the Captain had made this order caught Rowley off-guard momentarily but his hand dithered for only one second before he tapped the controls again. Phase cannons poured fire from above as four of the Warspite's phase cannons opened fire, focusing first on the port-side ship, and then the starboard one after the first ship's reactor was breached and the ship cartwheeled out of Warp aflame and dying. The second ship dropped out of warp in the same manner after it was cut in half, the ship blown open like a tin can and the Warp field destabilizing ripped the ship to pieces in turn. The fight had been just as one-sided as it had been previously, and just as merciless.
Warspite had struck again.