"An Experience Best Shared Part 2"

Captain Daren M'Kantu, Commanding Officer
Lieutenant Commander James Corgan, Chief of Security
Lieutenant Saul Bental, Acting Tactical Officer
Lieutenant Dhanishta Eshe, Chief Engineer
Lieutenant Michael Jamson, Chief Operations Officer
Lieutenant T'Pol (8-Ball) Hunter, Chief Science Officer
SCPO. Renora Loret, Tactical
Crewman Kallor, Security
Lt. Raven Darkstar, Navigation Chief

****

USS Galaxy
Stardrive Deck 8
Battle Bridge

***

"Eyes forward, people," Daren spoke up as the ten-second countdown to saucer release started. "It's our turn to share."

=/\= Three =/\=

=/\= Two =/\=

=/\= One =/\=

"Now."

The saucer section separated from the Galaxy gracefully, its new shields activating just moments later allowing the usually slow section of the flag ship to maneuver quickly to its destination and its mission: to rescue the crew and civilians on Deep Space 5. It was a heavy undertaking which relied upon the hasty upgrades and integrity of the crew. But this was no time for nerves, nor torn loyalties, they would either succeed or they wouldn't, those on the Stardrive had bigger worries, like the fleet of advancing Hydran ships that had taken the bait offered, and were now targeting the Drive section of the USS Galaxy.

"Saucer separation complete." Darkstar rumbled from the helm, looking even more uncomfortable wedged into the cramped battle bridge flight chair.

"The new shield variant has been activated," Dhanishta informed the Captain, her singing having come to an abrupt halt, "the saucer section is heading in, inertia mass has been decreased, impulse speed has been doubled, everything is going according to plan." As the words fell out of her mouth she knew she would regret it later, though they hadn't exactly planned the next leg of their journey into battle, perhaps she wouldn't have to go hunting for a piece of wood so soon, though with the previous look from Saul she may not escape being beaten with one none the less!

"Helm," Daren said, staring at the plot, "bring us around. Ms. Hunter, I want to know if Light of Vindication is still disabled. Tactical, as soon as we know that and reach optimum firing distance for whichever carrier is out primary target, give them everything we have. All fighters in defensive formations; try and screen what you can. No mistakes, people - there isn't room in this plan for them."

"Helm, coming around." Darkstar replied. He had trained under Admiral Bhrode and had been involved in more then his fair share of ship to ship combat with the surly flag officer. Repeating an order in combat was an old tradition that the admiral had instilled in all those who served under him until it had became a reflex.

His massive hands seemed to chop across the flight control pad somewhat clumsily, however the star drive's over 2.7 million metric tons moved as gracefully as a feather in a summer breeze and within seconds, the ship was perfectly positioned.

The comm buzzed and Renora's urgent voice came over the bridge. =/\=We've got a problem...it looks like the IFF codes in the torpedo launch control are corrupted. We must have some latent systems damage from our first pass. The codes must have been mapped to some unstable memory.=/\=

"It's not a trip to the veldt without a few lions," Daren sighed. "What kind of problem, Chief? We're going to need those torpedoes in..." He looked at the plot. "Let's just say we'll need them now."

=/\=Every time we try and acquire a lock, the computer tells us it's a friendly target. Phasers and fighter weapons appear unaffected. We're going to re-sync the torpedo's systems but until then we're going to have to target and fire manually.=/\=

8-Ball slumped forward and banged her head on the console twice, wishing she'd taken that new arrival in Flight Control up on his offer that morning. No one should have to die without having just had sex. Or being in the middle of sex. Actually, now that she thought of it, everyone ought to just be having sex and not dying.

"It must have been the recalibration we did according to the transmission from DS5." Saul spat out. If these transmissions were a fake, the enemy would know precisely where the Galaxy will come from. "I suggest we alter our approach vector."

"No," Daren shook his head. "This gives us our best shot on Hammer of Progress. If we're going to make this work, she has to be knocked out at the start of the fight. We have to disable their ability to resupply and support their fighters, or the saucer section is going to be destroyed." He sighed and made a decision, which was the reason he was here, after all, to make them.

"Make adjustments, Mr. Bental," Daren directed. "We'll launch them on manual if we have to, but, one way or another, those torpedoes are going to a new home." He glanced back at the plot. "Rush that re-sync Chief, computer targeting is about the only advantage we have going for us right now besides the Hydrans not believing that we'd be stupid enough to do this in the first place."

=/\= Aye, Captain. Re-sync underway. Generating shooting solution for manual targeting. =/\=

Jamson couldn't believe it, the bloody transmissions from DS5 were no good! If you're going into battle, you must ready or suffer the consequences. Were they going to die because they were unprepared? What a shame! A black dot in his long and boring resume. "This is definitely not a glorious moment to die..." he sighed quietly. Without the proper IFF codes, even though the targeting scanners would get a lock, they wouldn't allow firing, so visual scanners and manual firing were an unfortunate alternative. Each and every tactical officer would state he'd rather risk computer calculations than manual firing.

Michael had a solution. It wasn't 100% effective nor pretty, but it was the only thing he could think of. He'd have to reset and reprogram the computer to allow firing on 'anything' except friendly vessels. And how would he accomplish that? Without pondering too much, this was a situation of 'all or nothing'. Accessing the Starfleet Registry codes database, he'd tell the computer to accept all the friendly Federation registry codes as 'Friendly' while treating anything else unknown, as unfriendly and foe. Thus, they'll be able to target anything that is not Starfleet or Federation, to the discretion of the tactical officer.

Letting his hands perform the magic, it took Jamson only a few moments to do so. It was a simple yet not impressive solution to the matter at hand. Creating a standard rule of allow and don't was easy enough. He wished he had more time to customize it a bit more, but time was a predator in this case, as in many others. "There we go...." he said and pressed the last couple of buttons.

Saul's comm badge chimed again with the news Renora hoped he wanted to hear. =/\= Computer targeting re-enabled. IFF codes green. All forward torpedoes locked on Hammer Of Progress. =/\=

"Good; IFF solution ready," said Saul. "It looks like the mistake was not in the transmissions themselves but in the manual recalibration." "Sir!" 8-Ball called out from her station as she looked up and saw the status of her scans displayed inches from her eyes. "Scans of Light of Vindication show her warp core and reactors still active." She adjusted the scan. "I make her at 65% capacity."

War, like love, was all about the things you never expected, Daren reflected as he digested his science Officer's news. Was a Heavy Carrier damaged to 1/3 its normal levels more dangerous than a Light Carrier at full power? Was diverting their attack plan in mid-launch to further disable the Light of Vindication a better plan than attempting to cripple Hammer of Progress? How many of his crew would die because of the decision? "Make your adjustments, Mr. Bental," he said quietly. "Our new target is Light of Vindication. Helm, bring us around...."

The Dutchman was already at it; on his display, red markers closed on both targets. He lifted his eyes to look at the viewscreen momentarily. The carriers were there. His single healthy hand hovered over the launch controls.

"...and up on her on her port side from zenith, Helm," Daren corrected smoothly. "That puts her between us and Hammer of Progress for the initial pass."

Darkstar's massive hands barely seemed to move on the controls, but the ungainly Stardrive Section danced like a leaf on the wind, dipping, turning, and rising up in position. "Bring her up on target portside, zenith," he rumbled.

Daren took one last look at the plot, closed his eyes and offered up the short prayer to Allah that he'd said before every engagement that he'd ever fought in, and nodded. "Commence firing."

"Full spread!" Saul proclaimed. A barrage of torpedoes rushed from the Galaxy, streaking toward their inevitable targets.

Saul's eyes darted from the tactical arch to the viewscreen, but both told the same story. Their attack wasn't countered. The enemy was caught off-guard, possibly the fruit of the information passed in the transmission.

Well, he wasn't going to give the Hydrans a chance to get their bearings.

The two Hydran carriers began gathering speed, commencing evasive maneuvers, but not fast enough for the torpedoes to miss; they impacted magnificently upon both starships.

The Stardrive Section was within effective phasers range now, and Galaxy spat beams at the Light of Vindication. The Hydran carrier visibly recoiled as the beams hit her, but then, through the debris breaking from its port section, came the Hellbore beams.

"Looks like the Hammer of Progress are taking their chances with friendly fire!"

As the Hellbores sizzled along the Stardrive Section's shields, Daren had to reflect that in all his years in Starfleet, despite all the battles he'd participated in, he'd never once considered any incoming fire 'friendly.'

~The High Shepard~

Cutter Kara'nin

The annular confinement beam formed, and within approximately five seconds, the matter stream was transmitted and reassembled, forming six scared and worried individuals. There were over a thousand such individuals on DS5 that required rescue. While it may have taken only five seconds to transport these six, the next six would not be able to come for another ninety seconds. This was the time it took for the pattern buffer, the device that stored the matter stream, to cool down and resent.

This was, theoretically, a nuisance, because it slowed the rate of evacuation. However, even if they had the ability to transport more often, they would be limited by the rate of recently transported people to move off the pad and clear the transporter room. No matter how many drills one had run, this seemed to average out to about ninety seconds.

Of course, left on their own, this rate of refugee departure from the pad would increase exponentially. Thus, whenever a starship, such as the Galaxy, performed a mass evacuation, many crewmen were assigned to help, guide, lead, or otherwise strong arm the refugees out of the transporter room and into the designated evacuation areas as quickly as possible.

Cutter Kara'nin, in his great misfortune, had been assigned as one of these crewmen.

More specifically, he was in charge of shepherding the evacuated down the fifty meters of corridor between transporter room three and crewmens' Jones and Porter's position, who in turn were in charge of the fifty meters after that, and so on, and so forth, until the evacuated eventually reached cargo bay four.

Humans, he rediscovered approximately every ninety seconds, were incredibly annoying. "This way," he would command, upon the arrival of each new group of six, in the most comforting and soothing voice he could muster (which, in fact, was neither very soothing nor comforting, but rather harsh and annoyed). As was instinctual for him, he would raise his right wing, letting his dark blue contour feathers point the direction of their intended travel. Almost without fail, at least one of these six refugees would stop in the transporter room door frame, shocked by his alien appearance (by his wings most likely, but possibly his midnight blue hair or his wider than average chest or some combination of these features), and prevent anyone behind them from moving. After the third such person, he began grabbing them, either around the arm or on the shoulder, and pulling them into the corridor, and then pushing them along their way.

Approximately fifty percent of the time, another of the six evacuees would yell at him for pushing their compatriot. Such hostility "wasn't necessary," for example, or an excuse, like, "We're moving as fast as we can," or, more commonly, "You're an ass!"

He would, of course, ignore their hostility towards him, as he was trained. He would instead reply back, in the most apologetic tone he could muster, "Do please hurry, so you don't hold up the people transporting in behind you, and those behind them, and so on, for so long, such that the Hydrans break through our diversion and attack us directly and we all die. Do, please, hurry."

Of course, this never sounded very apologetic, but rather sarcastic. And, of course, his tone was not improved by the addition, "Groundwalkers," which he spat out at the end of his request.

And compounding annoyances further, the possibilities of the Hydrans breaking through their diversion and attacking the saucer section directly were becoming more and more likely the longer they took to evacuate the station. As it was, they were already suffering pot shots from Hydran fighters, and the occasional lucky strike from DS5 itself.

Another group of six beamed in and were directed by the crewmen in the transporter room out into the hall. Once more, Cutter stood and pointed down the hall, "This way." And, once more, one of the six froze in the door frame, staring at him.

This time, it was an old woman, at least seventy years old. The wrinkled skin around her gray eyes spread and flattened as her eyes widened in shock and awe, showing thin patches that hadn't seen light for the past ten years. Fortunately, for the sake of efficiency, she was the last of the six. She was not holding anyone else up.

Cutter sighed and rolled his eyes. "This way," he repeated more urgently, and, more delicately than others before her, took her by the arm and began to escort her down the hallway. But, she was not really cooperating. She wasn't resisting, but she was so stunned that her feet refused to work properly. All her mental energies were focused on him, and her repetitions of "Un ange," a phrase in a language he did not speak.

Suddenly, the saucer rocked from an explosion on its hull, pushing the ship into a sudden tilt. A cascade of energy overload raced down through its EPS circuits and burnt out one of the corridor lights above Cutter and the elder woman's head in a shower of sparks. On reflex, he ducked, and through up his wings as a shield, covering both of their heads.

"Un ange. Vous ?tes un ange. Vous m'avez sauv?," the woman cried, clutching Cutter's arm tightly and attempting to kiss his hand.

"Let go of me," he said, repulsed, he shook her off violently, and she stumbled back into the arms of crewman Jones.

"That wasn't necessary," Jones said, "She was trying to thank you." Cutter looked at him. For a moment, a look of embarrassment and realization washed across his face, but then it vanished into an annoyed grunt.

As Cutter walked off, back to the transporter room to await the next batch, crewman Jones looked to his colleague Porter and said, "That guy's an ass." And Porter nodded.

"Lost and Found"

Lt. JG Ophelia Zamora
JAG

Marine Captain Man'darr Maivia
4th Platoon CO

-----------------------

"Eragon......this is where we have to part." Ophelia knelt down to the little red head and met his eyes square on spot. The look of fear and utter confusion worn a path on his young features.

His head turned slightly, however the tight grip he had on her hand with his intensified as his gaze fell upon the escape craft. Saying nothing, his line of vision changed to take in Ophelia.

The surroundings were ones of disparity in a sense. The aroma of uncertainty littered the air apparent in the faces and slight murmurings of the people around them. It was as if a great wave of emotion swept across the crowd, hushing them with the reality of what was set before them. It was almost too much for a six year old to mentally take in. That compounded with the loss of his f ather and the disappearance of his mother made the little one's face fall as he sniffed. "Don't go." He whispered as liquid started to pool in his eyes. "Please...."

Zamora felt her heart breaking as she placed one hand on his shallow shoulder with her other hand gently cupping his smooth face on the left side. "Honey...I have to. I have to get others like you to safety...it's my job."

Ophelia felt that he had the bluest, clearest eyes she had ever seen. They drew her in, forcing her protective nature to burst through the surface. "Here....." Unzipping her jacket, she reached in and extraced a worn silver circular coin with a figure stamped on one end and words engraved in the other.

"What's that?" He asked, his instinctual curiousity floated to the surface of his eyes, erasing a shred of the fear and doubt he felt.

"This....well. This is very special. It's my go od luck item." Taking her hand, she opened his small fingers. Her heart retched back in pain as she viewed his father's dried blood underneath his fingernails. Swallowing her fear that she felt now, she pressed the coin into the palm of his hand. "You keep it. It's Saint Christopher. And they say, that anyone that views Saint Christopher's image will be protected on their journey."

"Where am I going?"

Her face softened. "You...are going to my ship...."

"Is it big?"

"Oh yes, it's very big...and strong too."

"Your comments of me are very kind," Man'darr said, approaching the group down the corridor, carrying his Type-4 Pulse Rifle, as he looked down at the female lieutenant and the small child. "However, these corridors are not safe."

Ophelia's mouth opened slightly, not possitive how to respond to the man that stood in front of her.

Eragon responded in a quiet, protective voice as much as a little man could muster as he held her hand. "She wasn't talking about your rifle."

Surpressing a giggle, Ophelia blushed then smiled at Man'darr. "I'm sorry, we were just saying our goodbye's......."

"It is alright," Man'darr grinned back. "Where is this child's parents?" he asked the lieutenant.

"Dead." He responded coldly.

"He's right....I found him."

Man'darr knelt down next to Ophelia. "I am saddened by your loss and know your pain as I, too, have lost my family."

The child looked at him with largened eyes, then turned to hide behind Ophelia. The woman tilted her head and glanced at him with a soft expression on his face. "If you'll excuse us...I need to get him back to the ship."

Man'darr nodded. "That is a wise choice. This area is still dangerous."

Despite the unusuall sarcastic remark she felt forming into words in her mind, Ophelia bowed her head slightly wondering if the man had viewed the phaser rifle strapped to her back. "Adios......"

As the woman began to take off, Man'darr spoke. "I am glad that you survived the Hydrans." Though the woman did not seem that interested in speaking with him, Man'darr knew the current location was not the best time to ask how she had survived and more about the child.

"Crackin Jewels" Part 6

Lieutenant Dhanishta Eshe - Chief Engineer
Lieutenant Michael Jamson - Chief of Operations
Ensign Sota - Systems Engineer (Written by Robert S)
Lieutenant (Jg) Naranda Sol Roswell - Engineering Officer
Ambassador Turan Trelar - Civilian Engineering Trainee
Mr. Michael McDowell - Civilian Engineering Specialist

(Set before the battle and before 'Equilibrium'. Sorry for delay and backwards posting.)

***USS Galaxy, Deck 21, Engineering Laboratory, En rout to DS5***

Leaving the table Dhani looked up across the room to the other team, they appeared to be looking quite smug from where she was standing.

"Jamson," Dhani called out, "what have you got for me?"

With a big smile on his face, Jamson stared at Eshe and the other team before speaking. Exchanging looks with Lieutenant Roswell and Mr. McDowell, he finally spit it out, "We believe to have found a way to 'open' this organizer. By using some creative thinking, we have taken a similar device and used computer schematics and analyzing applications to find the 'weak' spots of the padd."

"Interesting." Dhani stated raising an eyebrow intrigued.

"Since the electronic notebook is locked locally, by using sophisticated encryption, we have determined that taking advantage of the back up transceivers, which are available on almost any terminal, console, desktop, padd, tricorders, by using an outside source, is the best course of action. We'll force the device to communicate by depleting its batteries' power source."

Dhanishta nodded, "Okay," she said thinking, "sounds like a plan. Ensign Sota had several workable ideas, if you please Ensign." Dhani asked gesturing for Sota to inform the team of his ideas.

"Ma'am," the Ensign acknowledged as he stood. "The two proposals I have put forward to Lieutenant Eshe are as follows. One, we can attempt to infiltrate the device using a set of tailored nanites. The nanites should enable us to bypass the security lockouts and directly access the memory core of the organizer. However, if the device has sufficient security the nanites may not be able to penetrate and give us an accurate readout. The process is worth an attempt though as the nanites can be tailored easily. This will allow us direct access to the data and allow us to attempt a clear decryption without the data packet scrambling I suspect is part of the security being employed."

Still stood impassively before the team Sota continued, allowing no time for questions, "The second proposal is somewhat more complex and will take several days to set up but as I explained previously this procedure has been used successfully to defeat active scan blocks. The process employs quantum tunneling and ghost imaging arrays. Using the Lorentz time dilation effect and coherent pairs of entangled photons as part of the scan process we should be able to obtain a high resolution quantum level scan of the organizer without actually interacting with the device. Since the scan data will arrive before the scan beam is emitted we will be able to bypass any active scan blocks present on the device."

"Both investigative approaches have the benefit of also ensuring there is no damage to the organizer. It is after all personal property of a crewmember, and if it is nothing more that it appears then we will not have damaged her? PADD." He finished, with a suspect look at the pink device in question.

Dhanishta looked up at her crew expectantly. "So?" she enquired, "What's the general consensus?" she asked.

Nara furrowed her brows. It seemed much too complicated, "We can take it apart in a manner we can put it back together good as new. We're engineers. That's our job. I suggest we try that first before getting into the fancy stuff."

Dhanishta looked round at the gathered faces for a moment before a smile of satisfaction erupted, slapping Nara on the shoulder she nodded, "I concur." she announced. "Let's get to it."

Nara didn't hold back anymore. She was the first to move to the little pink bugger and proceeded scanning it for places of opening or just places of weakness. She carefully scanned with a scanner and with her eyes and fingers to be sure she could get it apart without too much damage. After a bit of time, she took some tools and started to carefully pry it apart.

"I'm no engineer?but I recommend caution" Michael said, knowing he'd be able to take that little irritating thing apart quite easily. As for putting it back together, he had an extensive experience with personal access data displays, Federation and non Federation. But this pink planner, was something else. "As much as I want to crack this baby open, I believe we should be careful," Opening the device just like that, could result in damage to the data inside. Intentional damage could occur if the device was protected, and contained sensitive data, it would then corrupt, erase and wipe itself out, or even burn crucial electronic microprocessors and junction. "We don't know what we're facing; we need to take it slow."

Nara looked at him a little irritated. She had it opened slightly, but needed another slight nudge, but she was worried it would crack. "Engineers have caution. Don't you think I've thought of the precautions?" and after a moment she remembered, "Sir," she added meekly. She tried to have a respectful air about her, but for goodness sake, she knew what she was doing!

Dhanishtas eyes trailed from the incredibly eager Naranda to Michael and then back again. "What do you suggest?" she asked unable to hide a fleeting smile at Nara's efforts.

"Maybe using gas cooling such as nitrogen or carbon dioxide with steam, liquid coolant, for example, deionized water or antifreeze to slow the device down so it couldn't detect our actions and react, while we take it apart would assist us in our task." Jamson suggested.

Nara paused as she was trying it at another angle. Defeated, she set the device down and gave Jamson a look letting him know she knew he won. "Then let's get some."

Dhanishta turned slightly from the group, lowering her head to hide her amusement. Nara was an experienced engineer, but when she set her focus on something she got awfully irritable. It was going to take time for that fiery temperament to lull into smooth dealings with others. Recalling a chat, on that very topic, with the Lieutenant just a few months ago she chewed absently on her bottom lip as the exchange continued around her. For a moment she just reflected on the situation, occasionally glancing up at Nara as she worked with Jamson to implement his suggestions. Feeling somewhat dissociated from the group as they milled around her, chatting to each other as they went, she let herself regard each one of them; how they went about their work, interacted with each other, feeling the vibes and the atmosphere develop. That was something she rarely got to do; just watch and drink everything in. It was something she should do more often, she decided.

With the delivery of the liquid nitrogen cooling apparatus the team got to work with vigor. Donning appropriate protective gear the PADD was soon encased in a billowing cloud of vapor that was captured by a portable forcefield. After the cloud had dissipated the frost covered device was swiftly removed to a work surface and its case subjected to a careful application of force at several weak points to pop the cover from the case.

With a satisfying click the cover popped off and the guts of the now frozen pink horror was revealed, fortunately 'not' coated in pink glitter. With swift precision the main power cells of the device were hooked up to external devices and the power rapidly depleted, at the same time the broadcast power receiver was disconnected to prevent the cells from charging.

As the power levels dropped the backup transceivers were accessed and data connectivity tested, then, as the power level on the main source reached five percent the device switched automatically to its backup supply, then unexpectedly entered a secure 'power safe' mode, deactivating all internal functions to preserve power and system integrity.

"Well," Dhanishta said with an aggravated sigh, "that was a waste of time!" Sitting heavily she rubbed her aching shoulders and shook her head.

"With all due respect, Lt, I wouldn't say a waste of?" Nara was cut off by a comm. coming in.

-^-"Baile to Dhanishta Eshe."-^- an unwelcome voice chimed in unexpectedly.

Rubbing her forehead Dhani tapped her comm. badge, "Eshe here." she answered surprised.

-^-"I had a visitor in the brig. Your sister. She tried to get information about what happened on Romulus by threatening to report a broken nose to the captain."-^-

Dhanishta was silent for a time, feeling all eyes on her. She couldn't look at Michael, though she could hear his thoughts clear as crystal, that and the hostility he held for the owner of the disembodied voice. Turning away from them slightly she tried to conceal the conversation, "Lieutenant I don't know what you're..." she paused, there was no point in trying to hide anything. A slight exasperated sigh escaped her lips, "Is there something you would like to discuss Lieutenant? I'm quite busy right now; I could meet you in a few hours if you want to talk?"

-^-"I'll be in my quarters."-^-

"I'll be there," Dhanishta paused and looked about the Lab, "In three hours." she concluded, "Eshe out."

Nara heard the familiar voice and tried to not seem like she was actively listening. She eyed the gutted device and what she did hear sounded like nothing more than a little squabble between crewmates. That one of them was Baile was interesting, but that was irrelevant now. Nara ran some further scans and got nothing new. She sighed frustrated.

Returning to her similarly dissatisfied companions, Dhanishta smiled meekly. "Right..." she said thinking, "that got us nowhere," don't fixate on the negative an inner voice chided, "I want to try the ghost imaging next." she informed them, "but we don't have time, Naranda I need you to get down to Engineering and start the preparations for the battle. McDowell, Trelar you two are dismissed, you can continue with your duties. Sota I want a full report on the requirements of the ghost imaging, once this ordeal is over we can try again." nodding she turned to Jamson, "We have a meeting to get to." she reminded him briskly as she made her way to the exit.

Nara nodded to Dhani, "Aye." she made her way calmly but briskly to her destination. She made a quick Comm. call to check on Saia, but after that she got in command/battle mode. She wouldn't be in charge, but she did have rank over some people and if they were slacking off, she'd let them know. ~Kindly. Be nice about it.~ She reminded herself. ~Damned Starfleet politeness.~ She cursed as she walked into Engineering and got to work on preparations, delegating as necessary.

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