Attacked from within! Part 4

Posted on Tue Sep 2, 2014 @ 8:19pm by Fleet Captain Rhea Kennit & Lieutenant Nicole Anderson

2,639 words; about a 13 minute read

Mission: A Whole New World, Part 2 - Durbatuluk
Location: USS Victory

[Main Engineering]

It had been a long crawl and decent in some cases, as well as leaving some bodies of fellow crewmen laid out. The normally peaceful Chief Engineer seemed to be letting out a great deal of frustration on those that tried to stop him from getting to his goal, and though he made sure not to cause permanent injury to anyone they were going to know they were in a fight when they finally woke up. If Miguel had stopped long enough to think he might have deduced that he was being effected some what by what was causing the temporary insanity of his fellow crewmates, only not to the same degree. His focus was on getting to engineering and fixing whatever was broke. And in the back of his mind he hoped that he would also have the assistance of Lt. Raylen. Along with Barnes help they might be able to accomplish the task ahead of them. However he was unsure of her current situation or if she had even received his last communication.

Tom stuck close to the Commander, phaser still held close. Since teaming up with the officer, the phaser had to be used twice. Tom hoped the next time he was forced to discharge it, it was against whoever let loose this chaos aboard the Victory. As they approached the Engineering door, Thomas motioned to his companion to slow down. Glancing around the corner, he saw that the Engineering doors were wide open with several of the Raeru inside. Anyone in a Starfleet uniform was laid out on the floor or otherwise disabled.

"We have our work cut out for us," he commented, seeing what the Raeru were armed with. Tom could fire off a shot or two before the Raeru could prepare to rout the duo. Then he remembered that he was a non-com, and that the lead belonged to the Commander. "What do you think, sir?"

"Let's do this." Torres said after taking a deep breath to center himself and then began firing at the first Raeru he was able to see.

Tom nodded, eager to get this over with. He aimed and fired at one of the Raeru, hitting the alien in the shoulder. He then fired a couple extra shots in the direction of the others to provide covering fire for the Chief Engineer.

Torres leaped into main engineering and did a roll as he hit the floor so he could end up behind some cover. He looked around and towards the upper deck when he saw someone at one of the other terminals, only this wasn't a Raeru it was someone in a starfleet uniform.

Inside Main Engineering, Lt. Raylen was working to fight the attempts by the Raeru forces to access the computer core. The task was daunting, whoever it was that was on the other end of the computerized battle she was fighting was good.. damn good!

He motioned at Barnes to bring the enlisted man's attention to the figure who seemed distracted by something.

Sam wasn't paying attention to much of anything other than the program currently locking the ship's crew out of all primary command functions. Everytime she broke through one section of the lockout program, another one came up. She was starting to think the Raeru had someone on their end, fighting her attempts to regain control...

Tom, still in his position outside engineering, looked up at the upper deck to see someone at the controls. Tom took aim and prepared to fire when he noticed a Raeru arrive at the upper deck and also aim at the figure. As he was about to press the trigger, Tom quickly adjusted and fired at the Raeru. He dropped quickly. Before Tom could identify whoever was up there, a few lances of weapons fire flew past him. Tom ducked for cover and waited for an opportunity to fire again.


[Inside the Jeffries Tube:]

Alone in the 'tubes, worried about Blackburn, worried about the Doctor.. furious that she'd lost control of her ship to a small group of bad dressing aliens.. even though she didn't expect it to work - before she started climbing the Captain struck her comm badge and spoke, "Kennit to Hunter... do you read?"

On the bridge, trying to gauge and keep a handle on the current situation. Hunter thought he heard something, it was low and tinny sounding. He concentrated again and yes! He heard Rhea's voice coming through. "I hear you Rhea!" Hunter replied happily. Relieved to know Rhea was alright. He could again breathe again. "You're coming through low and slightly hollow. Where are you?"

"Jeffries tubes," came the answer. "What is your status?" Kennit asked.

"The bridge is secure and hopefully you're making your way to it." He added, perhaps a bit more forcefully then he should but he wanted her safe. Miguel, is in Engineering working to stop the cascade system failures we've been experiencing."

"I want locations on the enemy. There's only a few of them this ends now!" She answered.

"I couldn't agree more and we're working on that now Captain." Alec's voice came back to her, filtered by the combadge. "With the cascade effect going on it's slowing down the whole process."

Clinging to a ladder inside the narrow, somewhat dark (and rather dusty she noted with a little distaste and a mental note to have engineering send a cleaning crew through.. assuming they survived this mess..), the Captain made a decision and changed course, heading down into the ship's hull rather than continuing up towards the Bridge. "I've had it...this shit ends and it ends now..." she told Hunter over the comm. "Keep working to restore control from your location. I'm going to go find Imlad and see if I can't put an end to this personally."

"Will do Captain." Hunter said to the first part of her message then his whole tone changed, Rhea! Captain!" Hunter shouted into the combadge. "Damn!" He tapped his combadge' "Mr. Yarin, the Captain is headed for Imlad's quarters, go and assist her. Keep her safe."

Yarin massaged his jaw muscles, blew air out of his nasal slits in frustration and sent out two telepathic messages. On my way Commander. Captain Kennit I will meet you at the designated coordinates, Yarin out.

She didn't answer, it seemed rather pointless as she worked her way towards the exit hatch from the jefferies tube where she hoped she'd be able to make her way towards where Imlad was located. She wasn't even certain where to find him.. but she was fairly certain he wasn't in the quarters assigned to him and his entourage since she'd been there and they were long gone.. they'd have had to move their device and their group to a centralized location on the ship, somewhere with ready access to the computer systems to allow them to have knocked out so many systems.. There weren't too many points that fit that bill aboard.. and she had an idea where she'd find them ..

On the bridge, Alec silently fumed, he had received Yarin's telepathic message and he assumed Rhea has as well. He was partly mad at Rhea and her hardheadedness to go after the Imlad but even more so at himself and his inability to help her. At least Yarin was on his way to offer his assistance. "What's the status of the internal sensors? Can we locate the intruders?" He asked looking around the bridge.

"We have restored internal sensors to approximately 46 percent of the ship's interior.." the Ensign at the console reported. "At the moment.. I can only definitively tell you were they aren't..."

Alec nodded irritably at the news. "That's better than nothing." He looked over at the Ensign. "Well? Where aren't they?" He paused and asked a follow up question," Can you tell where the Captain and our people are?"

[Sickbay]

"Interspace, interspace, interspace..." Nicole said as she paced around Sickbay. Her pacing was somewhat slowed by the prone forms of her staff, knocked out on the floor. Whether they did it to themselves, or each other she wasn't sure. She checked them quickly for concussions and when nothing life-threatening appeared, she put her mind to work. An interspace beam sounded familiar but she couldn't place why.

Her temples were throbbing and she was constantly hearing what sounded like a hiss in the back of her mind. It sounded like one of her former crewmember's swearing at her. Her last ship's helmsman was what was known collectively as a Fury; beings who had once lived in the Alpha Quadrant, dominating most of the current species before being banished across the galaxy. Only a few had made it back to their side and remained thanks to the efforts of the Enterprise--

"That's it!" She jumped up as her eyes snapped open and immediately ran to one of the science stations, shoving the body of one of her medtechs away so she could sit down. The Furies had used an Interspace beam when they'd attacked to destabilize the minds of the Enterprise crew. She'd read a paper on it from the ship's CMO. A combination of shield harmonics and on-board tranquilizers were used to combat the effects. Since this beam was inside the ship she doubted shields would help, but she could work with the environmental systems.

She pulled up Dr. Crusher's report and ran through the list of ingredients. The Doctor had used chemicals found in a Bajoran medicinal tea that had acted as a mild sedative and added them to the air supply. Nicole immediately began inputting the formulas but turned up the amounts a bit. It wouldn't cure the problem, but it would slow it down and make everyone a bit calmer--hopefully including her. She could feel her mind succumbing again and she didn't want anyone else hurt.

She input the last of the commands into the system and immediately noticed the new scent in the air. Hopefully the crew would feel the effects sooner rather than later.

She let out a growl and immediately pinched herself for a distraction. She ran out of Sickbay as fast as she could and headed for her lab. She'd designed it with several seals, shields and lock-downs, not to keep everyone out, but to keep things in. Namely, her.

[Imlad's quarters]

Yarin made his way to the Captain's position. What is our plan of attack Captain? he asked.

"Take back control of my ship!" she answered. Phaser in hand, the Captain exited the jefferies tubes and immediately headed down the passageway towards where she hoped to find Imlad. The doors were sealed, however a quick shot with the phaser dealt with that and let her force the doors open. Imlad's quarters were empty..

The profanity which issued forth from the Captain's lips was quite.. inventive.. Slapping at her comm badge, she said "Kennit to Hunter! Find that son of a bitch! His quarters are empty!"

Yarin closed all six of his eyes and wiped his brow with one of his upper arms; he was sweating. He looked at his raised hand: the color was shifting slowly against his control. The strain of constant telepathic communication was getting to him. Captain, i am scanning the ship deck by deck I believe i have found Imlad he is in his shuttle, he said.

"His shuttle?" Alec's voice came through the comm line. "Go and get him Mr. Yarin. He has a lot to answer for. If he doesn't come peacefully. Stun his ass into next week."

"Then that's where we're going.." Kennit answered. With a jerk of her head, she indicated that Yarin should follow as she turned and headed towards the shuttle bay.


[Sickbay]

Groans and shuffling was heard as two of the sickbay crew came to their senses. The groans were from the extreme bruising they suffered and the shuffling was their slow, methodical checking to see if anything was broken.

Nurse Rhodes rubbed his head and shook the cobwebs, then immediately regretted it, groaning again. He pulled himself to his feet and tapped his combadge. "Rhodes to Anderson," he said, groggily. When no reply came, he tried again, but was again met with silence.

"Computer," he said, "locate Doctor Anderson."

"Doctor Anderson is in Med Lab 1," the computer said.

*Her high security lab,* he thought. He hoped that meant she was working on a solution to why everyone went crazy. He took a breath to clear his head and coughed slightly, then sniffed the air. *What the hell is that?* he thought. Despite being slightly concussed, he had enough sense to realize something abnormal was in the air, and he wondered if that was it.

He sat down quickly at a terminal and pulled up the environmental controls. An herbal mixture had been added to the air supply. *It's sedating us,* he realized.

He pulled a medtech off the floor and slapped a hypospray into his hand. "We need everyone on their feet asap," he said. "We have to secure Sickbay and begin funneling wounded in."

A muttering of "aye, Sir," came back from the rest of her staff as half of them began putting each other on biobeds, and the others went to seal the doors and access hatches.

Rhodes looked over and saw Doctor Anderson's little black bag lying on a console. He suddenly got concerned; she never went anywhere without it.

He picked up the bag and was surprised to find how light it was. He gripped the handle tightly and left Sickbay, heading for the medlab.



[Shuttlebay]

Reaching the shuttlebay, the pair found that the access hatch and standard doors were sealed. Clearly, someone didn't want them getting inside.

Captain if I may. Yarin said as he grabbed the inner edge of both sides of the door and attempted to pull them apart they opened about eight inches than would move no further.

She looked at the narrow gap for a moment, then with a short nod said "Keep them busy.. give me 60 seconds then start firing into the hanger bay.. take out the lights overhead and then start taking shots at their ship from here.. I'm going to breech the hanger deck from below.. there's an access way for the neural gel pack systems under the deck. I can crawl through, come up through the hatch while they're distracted by you and get to that ship.."

"Kennit to Hunter. I want security teams at the shuttle bay; block off the exits and be ready to breech the bay on my signal," she told him.

On the bridge Alec answered the hail. "Already on it, Captain," Alec replied over the com. As he sent an order to security to block all exits, in and out of the shuttle bay as well as to be ready to breech the bay on the Captain's signal. He tapped his combadge again, "Security's moving into place Captain, and they know their instructions."

Yarin waited the appropriate number of seconds then took his phaser and shot out the lights, he then walked quietly into the room, and ran around the ship, shooting with wild abandon.

The shuttle bay rapidly filled with smoke from fires set off by the indiscriminate phaser fire.. making it hard to see who was who..

The piercing wail of the ship's fire alarm drowned out the shouts and sounds of fighting, and in moments the fight was over. Imlad and his surviving guards were in custody and being escorted under close guard to the brig, while the strange device which had set the ship's crew against one another had been deactivated and was now being taken into a secure holding area for analysis by the Victory's Chief Engineer and Chief Medical officer.

 

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