“We’ve Got Hostiles”
Posted on Sun Mar 9th, 2025 @ 5:34am by Captain Calypso Skyie & Lieutenant JG Jenna Jade & Lieutenant Commander Alexander Espersen & Lieutenant Mark Valleroy & Lieutenant Rebecca McMillen & Lieutenant JG Raven Windancer & Lieutenant JG Rala & Lieutenant JG Kally Kellerman & Senior Chief Petty Officer Jadizon Enor & Lieutenant JG Katie Kellerman & Lieutenant JG T'Pinga & Petty Officer 1st Class Kael Draven & Crewman Liam Peterson
Mission: Doing What We Do Best
ON
Alexander Espersen sat in the command chair, having watch over the bridge in these final minutes before they reached their destination. He had done his rounds earlier. He knew the Chimera and her crew were ready for this engagement. Marines were ready to give these pirates a good ass-kicking while security officers were prepared to defend the Dashians. Chimera herself was already at Condition Red: armed, shielded, and ready to play.
"We're approaching the freighter, Commander," Raven said, swallowing as her...not exactly 'blood lust' but on that spectrum...started to rise along with her adrenaline.
“Understood. Take us out of warp,” Alexander ordered. “Captain Skyie to the bridge.”
"Aye, Commander. Bringing her out of warp," Raven eased the ship out of warp.
Right, pirate hunting, Rala thought as she shifted her position in the Ops chair, trying to find a more comfortable position for her tail. Only finding moderate success, she settled down, re-checked her prepared commands, and resisted the urge to pull the jekka root twig out of her pocket. A slight smirk played across her lips. Run up the colors.
Calypso stepped in from the ready room as she readjusted the uniform that she wore. It was the 'standard' uniform rather than the flight suit style that she preferred and she shooed Alex out of the command chair as she approached, settling herself in as if she were a queen ascending the throne.
As the ship reverted from faster-than-light travel, the blur of warp resolved into a single ship sitting there, running lights blinking as if nothing was wrong in the world, but it wasn't moving in any direction. The few windows that were in evidence were all dark, no sign of light or life from a glance.
"Where are the pirates?" Cally asked accusingly at Rala, then over at Raven, "They're not here! Someone open a hailing frequency!"
Rala cocked her head to one side in confusion, fingers playing across her console. “No other ships in the area, Captain. She’s alone.” Her second right hand poked a button. “Hailing frequencies open.”
"Ooookay...this ain't good," Raven growled, the hacks on her neck coming to full attention.
"This is Captain Calypso Skyie of the Federation Starship Chimera. We received your distress call and have come to assist, how might we aide you?" She gave a cutting off signal and gave Alexander a look. "Have Mark get his boarding party ready, something feels fishy about this. Rala, anything from your scans on that ship?"
Rala killed the outgoing comm signal and pulled up focused scans of the other ship. “Minimal damage, nothing that...” She trailed off, her ears and tail twitching nervously. “Captain...” she said, looking over her shoulder at Calypso, “...I’m not reading any life signs.”
"No life signs?" Cally stood from the chair and walked over to the Operations station, leaning over the officer to look at the results of the scans, tapping her toe as she did, "No life signs." She agreed, patting the Draakri on her shoulder, "Cosmetic damage only."
The Captain took a couple steps away, "It's a trap." She said as a conclusion, an off-hand conclusion that apparently seemed to bother her not one bit, "An obvious trap, at least to us. Dashian ships would come running in, launch shuttles to board the freighter and be focused on finding the raiders that attacked the ship, but their formations are well-known to the pirates that operate out here, but with one rub: No pirates around, means they're hiding."
She pondered for half a moment, then tapped her commbadge, "Major, crash the freighter, get your demolitions teams taking a look in the right places." She then started back towards her chair, "But where are the pirates? Where?" She looked around the bridge, an idea in her own head already, but wanting opinions.
Rala poked at her console. Studied it for a few seconds. Poked at it again. “I’m reading a comet nearby—well, nearby on a stellar scale, not so much on a ship-to-ship scale.” She glanced at the Captain again. “If they’re hiding, they could be there, but that’s a bit far for an ambush.”
"Anybody got any carrots? Maybe we can lure them back out?" Raven joked.
Engineering
Katie rushed out of the computer room and into Main Engineering, skidding to a halt by the MSD. "Damage control teams are standing by and Lieutenant Rala is ready on the bridge." She swallowed, biting her lip. "I guess it's game time, huh," she said, looking at Jenna.
"But is it?" Jenna asked, keeping her eyes on the central holographic display. Nothing was happening. Shield strength was steady, no weapons energy, no nothing. "We're not under attack. Let's be ready though, Ah wanna make sure that nothin' is missed."
Katie nodded, accessing the sensor logs. "Nothing reported nearby. We may be chasing them down. I'll make sure we've got a monitoring team ready in case we need maximum warp."
"Right, good idea." Jenna brought up the display of the engine readiness, "Ah'll keep monitorin' the arrays."
Sickbay
Kally killed the red alert klaxon from blaring through Sickbay, but left the lights flashing for the time being. She left her office and stepped out into the main sickbay. "All right, everybody, the curtain goes up any second now! Dance shoes on and take your positions!" She grabbed a box of supplies, helping an orderly carry them over to the surgical bay and then returned to inspect the instrument trays as they prepped for the onslaught.
Deck 4, Transporter Room 1
"No pirates?" Mark asked, almost in awe at the report he was receiving. "And no life signs on the freighter?"
"That is what the bridge is reporting," T'Pinga reported, standing at the transporter controls along with the transporter chief. "My own scans would seem to confirm this. Bridge warns that this may be a trap intended for someone like us."
"But then where would the pirates be?" Mark asked. "Are they hiding somewhere?"
"That would be the logical assessment, at least initially," T'Pinga replied. "However, the question then arises as to where they would be hiding. Stellar Cartography has noted that, outside of small rogue comet of insufficient size for hiding a vessel of any size worth noting, we are several light years from the nearest star, even farther from the nearest star with a planetary system, and even farther from any other notable spatial phenomenon such as a nebula that could be used for hiding. Any ships hiding there would take sufficient time to arrive at these coordinates that we would be quite aware of them well prior to their arrival at these coordinates, and would certainly have ample time to either prepare ourselves for their arrival or to be able to make our escape. In order to spring an effective trap of that nature entails that those springing the trap being in the immediate area."
Mark thought for a moment. "Cloaking devices?" he then asked.
"It is possible," T'Pinga said. "We do not know much of the area, and that includes both the indigenous technological capabilities of local species or what other technologies they may have acquired from elsewhere." T'Pinga thought for a moment, then added, "Lieutenant, we must also consider the possibility that the freighter itself is the trap. Trick unsuspecting rescuers into boarding, then automated systems would activate and take the ship at high warp to preprogrammed coordinates where those behind it are waiting."
Mark nodded. "Something to consider. Pass that information onto the bridge."
Cally listened to Rala relating the information from T'Pinga and nodded, snapping her fingers once and tapping her forearm, "That's gotta be it! That comet may have one behind it, but it's too far away or at least marginal.. Becca!" She spun on her heel to where the diminutive science officer, "I'd like a 360 tachyon pulse, then if that doesn't show us anything, whatever else may reveal something that's out there that doesn't want to be seen!"
Rebecca giggled from her station, "Maybe not a carrot, but if we get a few spare commbadges to spoof bio signs, and then see about remote activation of certain systems, like we were exploring the ship on foot, we can possibly trigger whatever response they have waiting. And then we can track the badges." she offered.
"I mean, that's what I would do." she smirked, a bit of sass with that smile. "One wide sweep queued. I'll start it focused on the craft, and then sweep outwards in a 'what else is out there' approach." she started the scan, knowing full well it would return nothing in the first few sweeps. It wasn't supposed to see anything while looking at the bait.
"I'll also queue up a kinetic dispersal analysis. Even if it's cloaked whatever might be there is still physically there, and a presence in the tail of a comet would disrupt the intended trajectory of debris and comet melt." she proposed, her own mounted diminutive PaDD mirroring the larger terminal she all but stood upon. "I'll have both of those momentarily."
Nothing had come of the check of the comet's tail and seventeen minutes had passed between the time they had entered the system and when the Marines had gone over, that should be enough time for them to have found any critical explosives and disarmed them. It was one of those things that any communications between the two ships would have sounded an alarm, but that time was coming soon anyways. "Becca, start the tachyon sweep, turn the ship as we sweep, let's give our friends a tempting target."
"One sweep coming up." Rebecca started, beginning the tachyon sweep. "Scanning. Scanning. Scanning. Nothing so f.. wait."
"What have you found?" Alexander asked, coming up alongside the science station.
Despite the thought that an initial sweep would turn nothing up, as the tachyon pulse sweep began to traverse around the area, one area flashed what appeared to be a muted explosion, then another and finally one more before there was a flicker of something and suddenly a ship became visible, surrounded by a network of satellites as if it were a framework around them. While it was clear that this ship wasn't of a known design, it was also apparent that it wasn't a civilian design.
Rala let out a soft hiss, and focused the Chimera’s sensors on the alien ship and its array of satellites as much as she could without interfering with the tachyon sweep.
Calypso allowed herself to drop back into the Captain's chair as she gave a grim smile, "Ops, open a channel."
Rala tapped the comm controls again, eliciting the expected chirp from the computer. “Channel open.”
"Unknown ship, this is Captain Skyie of the Starship Chimera, heave to and lower your shields and power down your weapons. You are hereby being detained pending investigation of a distress signal received."
There was no response from the ship aside from a surge of power that began to drive it forward, only a hesitation as if it were expecting something. Points of light began to glow on the hull, a clear indication that it was powering the weapons systems.
"Evasion pattern Echo Three, Miss Windancer." Cally said calmly, "Weapons prepare to counterfire, let's make it clear they're shooting first. Becca, complete the sweep at your pleasure."
"Ah, Captain. Ewboy...that got their attention!" Raven whistled incredulously as she made the adjustments.
"Yes ma'am, running the scan to completion!" the diminutive officer called over the excitement.
Even while the unknown ship opened fire, the beams dissipating against the shields, another ship was un-cloaked from another array of satellites, but the third ship was already poking it's nose out of their own array before it too went down, the third being clearly the largest of the three, though still only two-thirds the size of Chimera.
The initial counterfire from Chimera was stopped by a set of shields that appeared different than the ones the Federation utilized. As the energy hit them, a rectangular form showed not only where it were hit, but as if it were activated from it. The phaser fire traced along the length of the ship, additional overlapping rectangular shields were revealed. "Analysis of their shields." Calypso snapped, "Looks like they're scales of some sort, see if there are any weak spots."
"Running up a shield analysis on the enemy craft. Keep hitting it so I can track dissipation patterns." came the voice of Rebecca from her science console.
"SHOOT A BRICK!" Raven swore, playing a 'symphony' on the holo keys to keep the ship dancing around the phaser fire.
"As much as rolling down a window and throwing a rock at them might help..." Rebecca commented as the analysis came back. "Hmmm, the flat plane of the shield projection deflects away most of the incoming phaser fire, angle the shot to come at the target area from directly above. Zero degree angle of incidence." she suggested.
"Helm, give me some vertical separation from these guys." Calypso took Rebecca's advise, "Tactical, fire a spread of torpedoes at target two, let's see what they do."
"Aye yie yie! While I USUALLY enjoy this kinda horseplay, this is straight up REDICULOUS!" Raven hissed through clenched teeth, almost loosing her seat as she tried to keep with the rhythm of the bucking ship.
"Captain, the freighter is moving, collision course with target two, impact in twenty seconds." The call came out from someone.
"Abort attack on target two, engage target three with torpedoes." Cally snapped, relieved to know that the projectiles hadn't gone out yet. If the freighter was going to ram that other target, it meant that Nat had a plan.
Torpedoes flashed between Chimera and the third of the alien ships, the first impacting one of the shields, the energy pane flashing before imploding, the second torpedo digging into the hull before exploding. The other pair of torpedoes repeated the effect further back. Cally watched even as the ships continued to fire upon her own ship, "Cease fire on target three, I don't want to kill them if I don't have to. Mark, take your security teams and beam over to target three, see if you can make a capture."
"Captain, request permission to beam over one of those satellites," Alexander asked. "If we can access its systems up close, maybe we can turn their systems further to our advantage."
"Granted, Mister Esperson." Calypso kept her eyes on the first target, the one that had been targeted only with phasers, "Let's even the odds. Full volley on Target One. Shoot to disable, or destroy if necessary."
“Ops,” Alexander said, “lock transporters onto the nearest intact satellite. When it’s safe to do so, beam it to Cargo Bay Eight.” On his way to the turbolift, he tapped his commbadge. “Katie Kellerman and Sakura Tanikawa to Cargo Bay Eight.”
Engineering
Katie looked up in surprise at the summons, but with a nod from Jade, grabbed her tool kit and diagnostic tablet, and went running for the turbolift. "Oh my way!" she said.
Sickbay
Kally huffed and looked around the room. They thankfully hadn't had any casualties from the attack, but she was not a fan of waiting around wondering what was going on. She didn't want to bother the bridge, but she wanted to know what was going on.
"All right, contact me if anything happens; I'm going to the bridge," Kally said, having come to a decision. She left Sickbay and walked quickly to a turbo lift, stepping inside as the doors opened. "Bridge," she said.
Bridge
A few moments later, Kally stepped onto the bridge, looking around to get the lay of the land as she walked up to the bridge rail, leaning on it, watching the view screen. "I take it we haven't found any survivors," she said.
"No Dashians were on the freighter, Kally," Calypso said with a smile. "We've got reports of resistance on two of the three ships we're boarding, but non-Dashians. We don't have a profile on the species yet, bipedal, facial tentacles and aggressive."
"Facial tentacles? Ewboy, that doesn't sound good. Anyone watch that Ancient Earth series 'Pirates Of The Caribbean'?" Raven asked.
"Don't knock it till you try it, Lieutenant," Kally said, coming around the bridge rail, giving a smile to Rebecca and sitting in the empty XO's seat, crossing her legs.
"Eh, no. If they don't come off, I am NOT trying them," Raven shivered, having run into some VERY unsavory characters in the racing circuit.
Rebecca offered a wave wave to Kally as she entered, before returning her attention to her vastly more spacious console. "I'll keep the sensors running. Don't want a reactor spike or an energy signature to slip by."
(To Be Continued...)
