Meanwhile, over the starbase assailant, someone is hacking the LCARS computer at Stellar Cartography room 3

Prologue

Starbase Assailant

Stellar Cartography

Room 3

The door slid open and light from the bright hallway spilled into the darkened and empty room. A figure dressed in a dark hooded robe strode swiftly and silently to the nearest computer console. Moving his fingers swiftly over the display area, the computer suddenly sprang to life.

“LCARS online,” the computer’s female voice said.

“Load starbase mission logs,” came a kind of hiss from the figure.

The computer made some quiet chirps and beeps. “Accessing logs,” came the reply. Then a discouraging tone emanated from it. “Access denied. Level 4 clearance required.”

The figure, expecting this, didn’t miss a beat. “Subsystem command code ID two-four-six-seven-alpha-tango-five-seven-seven.”

Again the computer chirped and beeped. “Section 31 access code. Initiating security link. Deleting accessed logs. Creating false logs. System override. Level 6 clearance granted.

Underneath his robe the figure smiled. “Now, again. Load starbase mission logs.

“Database loaded,” came the computer’s emotionless reply.

“Locate ship. Registry seven-five-zero-zero-three-two.”

He waited a few seconds and then the computer had it. “Ship located.”

“Download coordinates to PADD. ID four-five-six-one-two-three.”

“Link established. Transmitting coordinates.” After a few seconds of whirring from the computer the figure got a verbal and visible confirmation. “Transmission complete.” Suddenly a small alarm went off inside the room. “Warning!” the computer stated simply. “Trace attempt from Deck 1, main security console!”

The figure didn’t seem to be worried. “Disable security console, Deck 1. Code ID two-four-six-seven-alpha-tango-five-seven-seven.

“Console disabled. System failure simulated.”

“Log off system,” the figure said and turned to walk out of the room.

“Log off initiated. Deleting logs. Inserting false logs. LCARS offline.”

As the screen went blank and the sinister person left, the security officer, Lieutenant Klang, who was in the starbase’s Ops Center—also called Ops—on the Command Deck, went into a rage trying to figure out what had happened. “What the hell?” he roared. “What happened?”

The phrase was heard across the deck and everyone looked over at the lieutenant. He was a bright officer who had proven himself in the security department on several occasions, but not many had seen him this mad or bewildered.

Commander Tszill, who was in charge of the night-watch said in a surprised voice, “What is it Lieutenant?”

“Sir, I was investigating a strange computer access from a stellar cartography room, but right when I was about to find out something, the console simply went blank.”

“Have you tried reinitiating the system?” Commander Tszill asked him, underestimating the situation.

“That’s the really strange part. After I reinitiated the system, the computer told me that no access had been made from any console in any of the stellar cartography rooms in the base. It doesn’t even have a record of my investigation!” reported the surprised lieutenant, scratching his head while still trying to contemplate the whole situation.

The starbase’s Chief Engineering Officer, Lieutenant Commander Hughes, walked up behind them. “Sir, if I may, a friend of mine from the U.S.S. Magician, Commander Sp1ke77, is on the starbase waiting to board the U.S.S. Lone Wolf. He has extensive knowledge of these matters and he might be able to help Klang with this.”

The commander nodded. “Bridge to Commander Sp1ke77, please report to the Ops Center, ASAP.”

“On my way, sir,” replied Sp1ke77 through the comm

“Mr. Klang, check that console inside and out. Mr. Hughes, help him if you please,” ordered Tszill, concerned that something very wrong was happening here.

“Aye, sir,” the CEO and security officer said simultaneously.

Commander Sp1ke77 was surprised with the request to be on the Command Deck and he quickly left his unfinished drink in the base’s lounge and rushed to the nearest turbolift.

While hustling down the corridor, he noticed a mysterious character slowly walking in the opposite direction. Something told him that he knew the person, but quickly dismissed it. He had to be in Ops.

“Computer, Command Deck!” ordered Sp1ke77, as the turbolift doors closed.

While en route, the shady person, completely dressed in a long, black, hooded robe that concealed his face, kept reappearing in his mind.

Who was that? The commander thought, as the turbolift door opened onto his destination.

“Ah! Sp1ke77. Nice to see you again,” exclaimed Hughes in a very British accent, with a smile on his face.

“My dear Hughes. How are Loretta and the kids?” asked Sp1ke77.

“Fine Sp1ke77, just fine. She’s expecting a boy!” responded Hughes, with a proud and happy look in his face.

“Jesus Hughes! That’s your sixth son!” said the commander with an extremely surprised look. “You’re a hell of a machine,” joked Sp1ke77.

“Come friend. Commander Tszill and I have something to ask you,” said Hughes indicating the way with his arm.

The two approached Tszill. “Commander, this is Commander Sp1ke77,” informed Hughes to the night watch CO.

“Ah, welcome Commander, it is a pleasure!” exclaimed Tszill. “Please, let’s talk in the ready room,” Before they got there, Tszill turned and said gently, “Klang. Join us please.”

“Yes, sir,” replied the Klingon lieutenant.

After a short coffee break and chat, Sp1ke77 leaned forward and rested his elbows on his knees. “Sir, if I may, why did you called me here?”

“Klang, tell him what happened,” said Tszill.

Chapter 1

U.S.S. Lone Wolf NCC-750032

En route to Starbase Assailant

Commander Rynn Natala walked into sickbay onboard the U.S.S. Lone Wolf, now speeding through space towards home, Starbase Assailant, at a multiple factor of light speed. She went over to her friend, Lieutenant Commander Robert Melhall’s bed and sat down next to him. She wondered what was going on in his mind after all that had happened to him in the past few days. Though she had recovered quickly, she could only imagine the demons he had to face in who knew how long. She hoped her friend would wake soon and pull through. She didn’t want to have to go through counseling alone.

Captain T’Shael was standing by the window of her ready room and watched the starlines passing by. She saw the reflection of herself in the glass and she felt that her face looked worn out.

The last mission had demanded a lot of strength and there were moments in which she had wished she were a full Vulcan and therefore able to pass through such stressful events without any negative influence on her physical appearance. But now that the mission was fulfilled, her human part could not ignore the fact that she would need some rest.

On the other hand she was fully satisfied with how her first mission in command had developed. Not at all how she had thought it would be, but definitely very interesting and at the very end also rewarding. Finally, there was some stability in a small corner of the galaxy.

They would arrive at Starbase Assailant within a few hours and T’Shael thoroughly hoped that they would be able to spend a shore leave of several days as the crew needed some time off, time to relax. Especially Robert and Tala, who both had to get over the horrible actions that had been done to them back on the planet. Yet, the talks with Caring seemed to help and the last time T’Shael had seen her first officer, she had been in not that bad of a mood.

Although foresight definitely wasn’t one of the special abilities of a Vulcan mind, something seemed to tell her that they would not get the needed time to rest. It was a mere intuition, an uneasy feeling that they would be in a new adventure sooner than she thought.

Looking at her chronometer she noticed that it was almost time for one of the more pleasant duties of a captain. A brief smile crossed her face as she saw the three half-golden pips on her table; it was time to attach them to the collars where they belonged.

Robert blinked his eyes a few times and then opened them fully. He was in sickbay, but in which sickbay, he didn’t know. The last thing he remembered was the increasing pain as he watched the monitors on Paran. He sat up and immediately Nurse Tanner was at his side.

“Commander,” she said, “Please lie down. I need to run some tests on you, now that you’re awake.”

Robert lied back down hesitantly and asked her, “Where am I? What happened to me?”

The nurse looked at him with sympathy in her eyes. “Sir, you’re on the Lone Wolf. We beamed you and the away team to the ship almost four days ago. You were unconscious, so the doctor, the counselor and Commander Rynn helped bring your life signs back to normal.”

“I don’t remember any of that,” said Robert uncertainly.

“It all happened, Commander. As soon as I release you, you’re to report to Commander Rynn and Counselor Sorrow for some therapy sessions.”

After more tests than Robert cared to have done on him, he was allowed to leave sickbay. He walked out of the doors and was unsure of where to go next. Then he remembered what Tanner had said.

“Computer. Please locate Commander Rynn.”

“Commander Rynn is in Counselor Sorrow’s quarters,” said the familiar voice.

Robert went to the turbolift and proceeded to the counselor’s quarters. He pressed the door chime and didn’t have to wait long before he heard the counselor’s response.

“Come,” she said.

Robert entered and found Tala sitting in a comfortable lounge chair, with tears streaming down her face.

“Commander. Good to see you. I suppose you are here for your counseling sessions.”

“That’s what I’ve been told, Caring,” Robert said not knowing what exactly to expect.

“Well, let’s get started then. Tell me Robert, what’s the last thing you remember?”

Robert began to tell his story and for the next few hours he and Tala talked through the huge emotional stress they had gone through.

Finally, Sorrow decided the two of them had been through enough. “Ok you two. Now I want you to come with me to Ten Forward. It will be good for both of you to mix with the rest of the crew.”

Half an hour later the senior crew had gathered on Deck 10, Forward. Captain T’Shael stepped forward and when everyone had quieted down she began to speak. “It is an honor for me to announce some well-deserved promotions. Lieutenant Shaw, please step forward.”

The security officer stepped forward, grinning happily.

“Lieutenant Shaw, because of excellent fulfillment of your duty I hereby promote you to Lieutenant Commander.” T’Shael took the pin and attached it to Shaw’s collar. Under applause he stepped back.

“Lieutenant Sorrow, please step forward.” The counselor was also smiling contentedly while coming forward.

“Lieutenant Sorrow, you have done excellent work and have been an irreplaceable help onboard this ship. I therefore, hereby promote you to Lieutenant Commander.” Another round of applause ran through the Lounge and T’Shael then looked to the third person to be promoted, her first officer. Rynn looked calm and at the moment it didn’t seem as though her mind had been violated only a few days ago.

“Commander Rynn, please step forward,” T’Shael said, and the bajoran woman did so, keeping her face in an almost Vulcan-like neutral expression.

“Commander Rynn, you have proven great strength and courage while fulfilling your duties and it is my pleasure to hereby promote you to Commander 1st Class.” As soon as the applause was over the champagne was passed around and the glasses were filled.

Hours later T’Shael was sitting on the bridge and saw Starbase Assailant growing bigger on the screen. Finally, she stood up. “Commander Citon, please hail the starbase.”

“Aye, sir,” Citon replied and opened a connection.

“Starbase Assailant, this is the U.S.S. Lone Wolf, requesting permission to dock.”

“Permission granted,” the current officer on duty replied. “Welcome home,” he added.

Carefully and expertly, Lieutenant Commander Melhall steered the ship into the docking area and soon the big starship lay still, docked at the huge starbase.

T’Shael signaled Citon to open a ship wide channel so she could announce the happy news. “This is Captain T’Shael. Alpha and Beta shift are now free for shore leave on the starbase. Enjoy it; it might not be too long.”

Then she looked around. “Would anyone like to come for a drink in the starbase bar? It is supposed to be one of the best in the Alpha quadrant. And I assume that is where we will find our new science officer.”

Caring was in her quarters, finishing a report on both Commander Rynn and Lieutenant Commander Melhall. After being in both their minds, she was feeling a bit nostalgic, so she headed for the holodeck.

It was July 4th, 2002. A family of four was spending the day in their backyard, having a barbeque, playing in the pool and swinging. Suddenly the sky darkened. Dad was gathering the kids to run inside and Mom was running back for Bucky, their family dog, when something appeared that resembled a man. He poked Mom with a needle that protruded from his hand and disappears. The sky lightens just as suddenly, but Dad and the kids are stunned by the disappearance of Mom. Luckily, the security camera had gotten the abduction on tape. Even so, Dad can’t understand what his eyes see. He shows the authorities the tape but no one knows what it is. In the end, they declare his wife dead.

This was where the program ended and Caring spoke to the image of the mother, “Sorry, Great-great-great-great Grandma. I still have not found you! I enjoy being in Starfleet and I hope to someday come upon you on a Borg ship. With your telepathic ability, you must be quite an asset to the Borg. It was always said that your telepathy had been handed down to all the women born in our family.

Recently, I have had an experience far beyond my abilities and I have to admit, it was exhilarating. I have decided to examine my abilities and maybe increase them even more.

Thank you for listening to me Great-great-great-great Grandma, you have always been there for me, even if it is in this capacity. It always helps. I think if the crew knew about my counseling sessions with a holographic program, I don’t think they would seek my counsel.”

Unknown to Caring, the Captain had entered the holodeck intending to hear a report on the sessions with Tala and Robert, but she was stopped short by the image she saw. I can’t believe what I am seeing, T’Shael thought. Is it really her?

T’Shael stood there silently and thought about what she had just seen. When she had learned her new counselor’s name was Caring Grace Sorrow she had not imagined her middle name could have anything to do with the Nevada’s counselor and T’Shael’s good friend Grace Mitchell. But now that she saw the hologram of Grace, looking a few years younger, it was evident that Caring was a descendant of Grace. T’Shael could hardly believe it. She had spent many hours talking to her friend on the Nevada about her mysterious past. Grace had been found in some Borg wreckage, not assimilated, but with no memory of her past at all. And now T’Shael had unknowingly been serving with this woman who was the key to Grace’s past; who didn’t know her Great-great-great-great Grandma was alive, here in the present.

At that moment Caring started to feel T’Shael’s presence and turned around. When she saw the Captain staring at the hologram she looked puzzled. “What is it Captain?” she asked.

“Grace...” T’Shael replied. “This is intriguing,” she continued, in her cool, calm Vulcaness.

“What Captain? How did you know her name was Grace?”

“Would you believe me if I told you that I know your ancestor?” T’Shael replied.

“What? That is impossible. She disappeared and was never found,” Caring said, totally confused by what she had just heard.

“Why don’t you join me for a cup for coffee counselor? I think we have a lot to discuss...”

Most of the senior crew had gathered in the bar of the star base. There was laughter and cheerfulness all around, a mixture of Starfleet officers and civilian members of various species. After the tense mission, it felt good to be in such a relaxed atmosphere. Although they were technically off duty, they were all still in uniform. T’Shael was eager to find her new science officer, but she couldn’t see him anywhere. An ex-Borg sure should have caught her eye, she thought, so he probably was off in some other part of the starbase. She therefore decided to enjoy the time off herself as well and she sat down with her crewmembers.

Caring was struck with the irony that the Captain could know her Great-great-great-great Grandmother and call her a friend as well. When they had joined the rest of the crew at the starbase’s bar, T’Shael had proceed to tell the events of how she had served with and known Caring’s Great-great-great-great Grandmother, Commander Grace Mitchell, Counselor of the U.S.S. Nevada. T’Shael had also told Caring that Commander Mitchell did not remember her past life. Now, Caring was torn between her need to know her ancestor and her professional duty of Counselor/Psychologist. What the impact of her relationship to Commander Mitchell could do to the two of them.

Chapter 2

Starbase Assailant

Command Deck

Ops Center

After a long briefing with Klang, Sp1ke77 looked concerned.

“…And that’s what happened Commander,” finished Klang with a worried look. “I’m a disgrace to my house.”

“No, Lieutenant, you’re not. Any other officer would never even have noticed that something was wrong,” replied Sp1ke77. “Well, Commander Tszill, I’ll check that console in Stellar C. and I’ll see what I can do.”

“Very well, keep me informed, and—,” Tszill was cutoff as his comm badge beeped. “Tszill here!”

“Commander the Lone Wolf has arrived and docked. Captain T’Shael and her crew are in the Deck 12 bar,” informed an officer on the bridge.

“Well Commander, I won’t take anymore of your time, you have a crew to meet,” exclaimed Tszill, smiling at Sp1ke77

“Thank you Commander, I will talk to you later. Commander, Gentleman,” said Sp1ke77 as he left the room.

While en route to the bar, Sp1ke77 was worried. He clearly remembered those types of “malfunctions” from Section 31. He had spent five years there at the research center and all his previous training told him that an agent of S31 was now on the starbase. What is an agent doing here? He thought, worried, but yet eager to meet his new crew and an old friend like Melhall.

The turbolift doors opened and the commander stepped towards the doors to the bar and on the way he bumped into someone. When he turned to see who it was, there was no one there, and he shook his head in surprise. “I must be nuts! Damn implants,” Sp1ke77 tried to explain to himself. But he clearly understood that he had really bumped into someone when he took a very small PADD from his pocket. He activated it and it displayed a message. Shuttlebay 5 - 0500 – don’t be late.

Sp1ke77 was even more worried, as he entered the lounge.

T’Shael looked to the door of the bar as it opened and saw a person entering who looked partially Borg, and she assumed it had to be her new science officer, Sp1ke77. He looked around and when he saw the gathered Starfleet officers at a table, he approached them.

“Commander Sp1ke77, reporting for duty, sir,” he said to T’Shael, when he noticed the four pips on the collar of the half-Vulcan woman.

“Welcome to our crew Mr. Sp1ke77,” T’Shael said. “We are not officially on duty at the moment, but I hereby give you permission to come aboard the Lone Wolf.”

“Thank you, sir,” Sp1ke77 replied. “It will be an honor to serve on your ship.”

“Why don’t you sit down with us for now? Let me introduce you to the senior crew. I believe you already know Mr. Melhall,” the Captain said when she saw Robert grinning at Sp1ke77 and then she introduced the rest of her senior staff.

After Sp1ke77 had gotten comfortable and ordered a drink, his facial expression became serious and it seemed as though he wanted to say something to the Captain, but then suddenly hesitated and remained silent.

Later that day, after her “session” with Robbie and Caring, Rynn headed to the Ten Forward Lounge on the Lone Wolf. She had an armload of PADDs, a plate of hasperat, and spiced plum tea, which both had grown cold. Rynn had made up her mind that work and lots of it would be the only thing to help her through this. She looked like she was swamped but in reality, she was trying to cover up the hurt.

That was when a tall man walked up to her table. “Congratulations on your promotion Commander First Class Rynn.”

She smiled and looked up at the person speaking, actually somewhat surprised that it was Dexter. She placed her PADD down and said, “Oh please, call me Commander or Rynn, or when I am off duty like now, Tala will suffice.” Her brows furrowed at her words. She didn’t let too many people call her by her given name. She motioned for him to have a seat. He nodded and accepted.

“Ok Tala, if you’re off duty, why are you working on...” and he picked up one of her PADDs and read it. “…Crew arrangements.”

She smiled and shook her head, then looked at him again. He had short brown hair and tanned skin. He was only a bit taller than her since she stood 5’10”. His build was that of a man you might find standing outside of one of those popular bars in the early 21st century on Earth. What were they called? Oh yes, a bouncer. She thought to herself. Tala leaned forward and smiled. “This is a duty that is never done. Listen, I am going to the holodeck later for therapeutic reasons. Care to join me?” She smiled and raised a brow to see if he would take the bait. She hated to fight against the holograms. Real flesh and blood was so much more fun.

He sat back and said, “Of course. Name the time.”

“Docking bay two, docking bay two,” Richards said to himself reading the section signs as he walked down the corridor. The computer had said it was somewhere near here. Spotting a maintenance officer in the corner, the young doctor approached him. “Excuse me. I’m looking for docking bay two, the U.S.S. Lone Wolf is docked there,” he said, raising his PADD containing his new orders to illustrate

“Keep going down this corridor then take a turn at junction 2B.”

“Thank you,” he said quickly as he hurried down the corridor.

Approaching the docking bay he pressed the comm button “Doctor Max Richards requesting permission to come aboard.”

A male voice replied through the intercom. “Granted. Welcome aboard Doctor. The Captain is in a meeting at the moment, feel free to dump your gear and take a look around sickbay. We will inform you when she returns.”

Walking along the corridors, Max had to take a step and admire the craftsmanship of the design. Although he was an experienced doctor, he had only served on older classes of starships assigned to medical use, never a ship of the line. He was going to enjoy this. Finding the turbolift easily, he soon found himself on Deck 8 where, according to the deck plan at least, sickbay should be. “Computer display route to sickbay,” he requested. Responding at once, colorful arrows appeared on the screen displays, indicating the way. Now sure of where he was going, Max found sickbay easily. Walking into the room, he let out a sigh of amazement; the sickbay was huge and equipped with the latest in medical care. It was a far cry from the small sickbay he was used to.

Standing in the center of the room was a fellow doctor holding a small suitcase. Recognizing him at once, Richards greeted him. “Dr. Jones, a pleasure to see you again.”

“Dr. Richards, I hear you are here to take over my sickbay,” Jones joked with him.

“Well with you going off to Starfleet Medical someone needs to keep the front line crews healthy.”

Jones nodded his head. “And we all know how hard that is. This crew is as stubborn as any other when it comes to check-ups.” The two laughed at the small doctor joke before turning serious again. “I have prepared updated reports on the crew’s medical files for you, and left some notes on methods I have found useful—now if you’ll excuse me I have a transport to catch.”

“Of course,” Richards said, stepping aside to allow the man past.

Walking into his new office Richards sat quietly for a few moments as he took in the size of his new sickbay. “This will certainly be an interesting experience,” he said to himself.

“Commander Tszill. We have Starfleet on a channel. They require that you, Captain T’Shael and Commander Sp1ke77 be present in Briefing Room One in five minutes,” informed an ensign standing at the communications console in Ops.

“Thank you Ensign. Please notify the Captain and the Commander,” replied Tszill.

After the three officers of the Lone Wolf were informed, they gathered in the briefing room and milled around, waiting impatiently.

“Well, does anyone know why we are here?” asked T’Shael kind of bored. “We’ve just met each other.”

“And he’s awfully late.” said Sp1ke77, scratching his Borg implant. “We’ve been waiting here for the last half hour.”

“Careful Commander, you could get an infection if you keep doing that,” warned Tszill.

As the Commander ended the sentence the room doors opened and two security officers entered the room carrying some tricorders and scanning the walls. Behind them entered a sinister person, all dressed in a black robe, the face hidden by shadows. The same character that had been “haunting” Commander Sp1ke77.

Sp1ke77 stood up and looked at him. He knew this person from somewhere, but his mind was full of holes since he was retrieved from that moon, almost dead. And as a Starfleet officer, he couldn’t trust his impressions, only facts; facts that he did not have.

“The room is secure, sir,” said one of the security officers to the odd person.

The sinister character moved his head and both security officers left the room. As he moved to the empty chair, he said, “You may be seated.”

All three officers in the room sat.

“You can call me Maximus,” revealed the character at last. “Thank you for being here.”

He sat and silence ruled in the room. T’Shael remained firm as Vulcans always do; Sp1ke77 got suspicious and tried to remember anything that might help him; Tszill was getting nervous, because he was new at this stuff. Finally, the briefing started.

“May I remind you that this is a classified meeting, any leaks will be explained in court-martial under Federation laws,” informed Maximus.

Silence insistently remained in the room.

“Captain, you will provide me transit to the Wolf 359 battle ground to retrieve a damaged device from some Borg debris. This is vital for the survival of the Federation. If any of the Federation’s enemies obtain this device before we do, it will be the beginning of our end,” explained Maximus with a calm, yet sincere voice.

“Sir, why us?” asked T’Shael, trying to see the logic in all this.

“I have studied the personnel files on the senior crew, and you are the best ship in the area suited to this mission. You have a Vulcan in command that provides good leadership under stressful situations, a superb engineer—Commander Sp1ke77 is the only former-Borg specimen in the surrounding sectors with enough knowledge and clearance level to go on the mission, and an excellent pilot which we will need. You will see the reason for that soon enough. As for the rest of the crew, they are as loyal as they come. That’s what we need,” replied Maximus.

“Seems logical,” said T’Shael, looking pleased but not completely satisfied.

“Commander Tszill, you will give full cover on this. This is a black-ops mission; details on your tasks here are on this PADD. All information for your officers is on a need-to-know basis. I’ve already informed the Admiral,” instructed Maximus

“Yes, sir,” agreed Tszill, as he received the PADD from Maximus, trembling as though his hands were centuries older than they were.

“Commander Sp1ke77, I’m counting on your full cooperation with this,” said Maximus looking to the stars that could be seen through the room’s window.

“Sir, I’m a Starfleet officer, I will follow the orders of a superior officer!” exclaimed the commander doubting Maximus’s authority on this.

Maximus laughed. “I assure you commander, I have all the authority I need on this. You can check your PADDs,” said Maximus, as he returned to the table. “I will personally oversee this mission.”

Captain T’Shael remained still with the same serious look on her face.

“Captain, you will have full command of the mission,” affirmed Maximus. “ Also, I want the ship refitted with anti-Borg weapons and defenses, and get some plasma probes to be fitted on a few torpedoes. We might find someone cloaked in there.”

“Yes sir,” agreed T’Shael. “Oh, by the way sir, what shall we call you?” asked T’Shael.

“Sir or Mr. Maximus will do,” replied Maximus. “Get your ship ready for departure in eighteen hours, Captain.”

“We’ll do our best, sir,” replied T’Shael.

“We never had this meeting. You have never seen me. Is that understood?” asked Maximus. “This meeting is over.”

“Yes, sir,” they all responded.

Chapter 3 U.S.S. Lone Wolf

Docked at Starbase Assailant

T’Shael and Sp1ke77 returned to the Lone Wolf. The Captain was deep in thought about what she had just learned. She personally did not trust this mysterious person and she knew she wasn’t going to like having him on her ship. More than that, she didn’t like to have such a vague mission coming up. But the orders seemed clear and Starfleet had verified that they should fly to Wolf 359 the next day and for the most part be silent about their mission. Whatever this device was, it seemed to be something of extreme importance for the Federation. T’Shael gazed at her new science officer and sighed mentally. Although she did not have any problems working with an ex-Borg, the thought of any upcoming encounters with the real Borg did not make her feel comfortable at all. Somehow she doubted that they could just get this device and bring it back to the Federation. It was going to be more complicated than that.

“Well, Commander,” she finally said to her science officer. “It looks like you are going to work closely with this Maximus. See what you can find out from him, and whatever it is inform me. All the information we can get might be vital for the success of this mission.”

“Aye aye, sir,” Sp1ke77 said and then went to the science lab for preparations.

T’Shael decided to stop by sickbay to welcome her new doctor. She had gotten word of the change only a few hours before the meeting and had already said good-bye to Dr. Jones. Hopefully he would be satisfied with his new job at Starfleet Medical. She entered sickbay and found a young good-looking lieutenant in a teal uniform and it didn’t take much of her Vulcan logic to see that he was the new doctor. He smiled at her briefly, “Captain T’Shael, I presume. Dr. Max Richards reporting for duty, ma’am.”

“Welcome aboard Doctor. I see you have already made yourself comfortable in sickbay.”

“Indeed. I hear you were at a meeting. Do we have an interesting mission coming up?”

T’Shael liked the friendly curiosity of her new doctor, but this time she would have to disappoint him.

“I don’t doubt it will be interesting, but for the moment I’m afraid I can’t give you any information about it.”

“I understand, sir. I will just be prepared for...everything,” Richards replied.

“Very good,” T’Shael nodded. “We will be leaving the starbase tomorrow. Until then, be sure to get to know the crew. You can find me on the bridge if you need anything.”

The last place she needed to go before she could get back to her place on the bridge was engineering. T’Shael was a bit worried about the new technology that was supposed to be built into her ship’s systems.

“Commander Q. I have work for you,” she said when she saw her Chief Engineer working at a console. She handed him a PADD. “You have eighteen hours to complete everything.”

He looked at the PADD and frowned. “Borg?” he simply asked.

“I’m afraid so,” she replied. “I cannot give you more information. I will send Commander Melhall to assist you. Only you and he are supposed to know the full details. The rest of your crew is on a need-to-know basis. Only tell them what they need to know to get their job done.”

“Understood, Captain,” he said, although she could hear in his voice that he didn’t like it. She didn’t either, but unfortunately that was the way it was.

Tala had been sitting in the Captain’s chair on the bridge. She had just come from her “bout” with Dexter. She had a shower and changed, but she did have a few bruises on her back and side from the holodeck. She mentally chastised herself for being out of shape and letting a younger officer “beat” her. She was reading over the new transfers on the ship and saw that they had just received a new CMO. She couldn’t believe this. Her lips pursed in a thin line. She felt like she wanted to hit something. She just got through all this mental torture with their last mission and now they got a new doctor? She could almost bet a whole bar of latinum that he would want her to go in for a “check up.” God, she despised doctors. She sighed loudly and then looked up at the PADD again. Oh just great, a Lieutenant Junior grade too, by the prophets. What was happening in the universe today? Soon the whole fleet would be over run by the untrained beings. She mentally shivered and then laid the PADD down as T’Shael came on to the bridge.

Upon returning to the bridge, she saw Lieutenant Commander Melhall at the conn position. “Commander, why don’t you report to Engineering? Not much work to do for you here as long as we’re parked.”

“Agreed, Captain,” he said, clearly glad that he’d get something better to do and left the bridge.

“Lieutenant Commander Shaw,” she said, turning to tactical.

“Yes, ma’am?”

“We have a new guest on board. He is supervising the upcoming mission, but I want you to keep an eye on him. Be discreet, but see if you can find out anything about him. You might find some basic info in this PADD,” she said, handing it to him.

Then T’Shael turned to Tala. Although she wasn’t supposed to talk about it, she couldn’t leave her FO in the dark about the meeting. “We need to talk,” she said, pointing to the ready room. “Commander Citon, you have the bridge.”

Commander Q had just finished reading through the information on the PADD when Commander Melhall walked in.

The look on Q’s face was enough to tell Robert that Q had read the briefing.

“Any ideas what’s going on?”

“Not a clue. Let’s talk.”

Q headed for his office where they could have some privacy to discuss the briefing. On the way, conscious that he didn’t have much time to complete the alterations, he gave a few orders, trying not to give too much of the mission away.

His deputy did look at him rather oddly, however, when he was asked to ready a team for fitting plasma probes to torpedoes.

Once in the engineer’s office, the two commanders discussed the rather unusual mission ahead of them.

“But, Wolf 359, that’s a ship graveyard. They sealed that off; no ship is allowed near there.”

“I know,” Melhall replied, “and Starfleet wouldn’t compromise that for anything.”

“Unless...”

“Unless what?”

“I hate to say this,” Q answered slowly, and then double-checked to make sure no one was even near the office, “but if Section 31 was involved.”

“You’re right. They have no morals at all. But it’s just a theory, and we need some evidence before we say anything.”

Q knew the conn officer was right, but he needed to know if Section 31 was involved—as it would greatly influence what happened during the mission.

He grabbed his tricorder and started to scan the room, indicating that Robert should do the same.

They both drew blanks. Nothing unusual.

After several seconds of looking at each other, both were wondering exactly what was going on here.

Suddenly Q had an idea. “Wait here; I’ll only be a second.”

Q left his office and strode over to a console, where he began to work furiously, working his tricorder at the same time. In under a minute he strode back to the office, ignoring his deputy, who he could see was ready to ask plenty of awkward questions about the arrival of plasma probes.

Once back in the office he began scanning again.

“A little trick I learned at McKinley.”

After a few minutes of scanning, adjusting and rescanning, Q turned to Robert, who was wearing a strange expression.

“Absolutely nothing,” he said, but his face and hands said different. Robert could see that Q was indicating that there was a micro-surveillance device of some kind behind him; the evidence they were looking for. Most likely, Robert thought, it had been under a tiny cloak, a device rumored to exist—if you knew where to get your rumors.

A few minutes later, with the knowledge that the entire engineering department was wired with these devices, Q and Robert began to work on the alterations for the mission. Both were highly confused and rather suspicious of this Maximus character.

Rynn followed after her captain like a diligent child. She sighed and smiled as she sat down. T’Shael went to the replicator.

“Vulcan spiced tea, hot.”

A few milliseconds later, the familiar whirring of the replicator sounded and the tea was produced.

“Care for anything, Commander?”

Oh, this is bad. Tala thought. She doesn’t call me that unless something wrong. Rynn raised one Bajoran brow and reached a hand up to her ear scratching it gently. She then touched the earring hanging there. “Thank you, Captain, no,” she said, wondering what was wrong.

T’Shael nodded and walked back over to her shiny black onyx desk and sat in her chair, turning to look out the window. Rynn wondered what was going through her mind. She grew antsy and raised one knee up and rested her foot on the edge of the chair, wrapping her arms around it, waiting patiently to hear what she wanted to tell her. Rynn sat there for a few good minutes. That was when T’Shael turned around and told her what was going on.

Rynn’s mouth dropped, as did her foot. Her violet eyes narrowed and just stared, too stunned to think.

“You have got to be kidding me! Have you checked everything?”

She tilted her head to the side as T’Shael nodded and said, “Yes. Commander Sp1ke77 is verifying everything. He will let us know.”

Rynn sat back in the chair and thought for a moment. She reached up and pushed her hair out of her eyes. What could she say? “Well Captain, all I can suggest at this moment is do what you have already done.” She knew that sounded corny, but Rynn had no suggestions. She looked down at the gray carpet and bit her lower lip in thought, then looked up. “Does the rest of the senior staff know?”

T’Shael shook her head in the negative position. “No, they don’t.”

Rynn could tell she wasn’t even supposed to tell her. “I understand Captain,” she said and nodded.

“On another note, we have a new addition to our senior staff.”

T’Shael went on to say something else on that note and Rynn stood up quickly, hoping she wouldn’t ask her to get checked up.

She began to scratch her arm nervously. “I read that in the new transfer list,” she smiled weakly. “I’ll go see what I can dig up on our new friend.” She shook her head for a moment thinking she was going to keep away from that Lieutenant Little Nobody if it was the last thing she’d do. Then, she smiled at her Captain again.

“Ok Rynn, just remember this is on the QT, and please go see Caring.”

Rynn grimaced but nodded as she walked out of the ready room. She turned around looking at the bridge and bit her lip. “Astrometrics, yep,” she said to herself and headed there.

Lieutenant Little Nobody sat at his desk studying the crew’s medical logs. As he checked through the senior staff he noticed the ship’s FO, Commander Rynn, had recently been kidnapped during the last mission. Dr. Jones had left notes recommending regular check-ups for a while. No time like the present, Richards thought to himself, raising his hand to tap his comm badge.

“Sickbay to Commander Rynn.”

He thought he heard a slight sigh as a rather begrudged voice replied, “Rynn here.” The Doctor smiled cheerfully, replying in an almost too happy voice, “Commander Rynn, this your new Doctor. I was wondering if you wouldn’t mind popping down to visit me at your nearest convenience.” This time he knew he heard her say something under her breath, something about Lieutenant Little Nobody.

“Understood,” Rynn simply replied, cutting the channel.

Richards stared blankly for a few moments, not used to being cut off so abruptly. Nodding his head slightly, he returned to reviewing the crew’s medical logs. That will be an interesting check up, he thought to himself.

Chapter 4

U.S.S. Lone Wolf

Docked at Starbase Assailant

Main Bridge

The chime rang musically to Captain T’Shael’s ready room.

“Come in,” the woman sitting in her chair behind her desk called out. The door opened and Commander Melhall entered the room.

“Commander Q and I have finished the work you gave us,” he said. “Engineering is ready to go.”

“Very good. All the new installations are working properly?” T’Shael asked.

“More or less,” he replied smiling. “They need a little fine-tuning, but we should be fine. There is quite a bit of power in those systems,” he added.

“Oh yes, and I fear that we may need it,” the Captain said. “Anything else?” she asked, when Melhall remained standing in silence.

“Um, yes, actually,” he replied and handed her a PADD she hadn’t noticed in his hands before.

T’Shael took it, read the words on it, handed it back and nodded. “Very good, Commander. You and Commander Q proceed by your own judgment.” She checked the chronometer and then added, “Set course for Wolf 359 in half an hour.”

“Aye, Captain,” Melhall replied and left the room.

T’Shael kept sitting for a while thinking about the words that had been on the PADD. We are being observed, Melhall had only written. T’Shael had imagined that something like that would have been done. Whatever secret part of Starfleet Maximus belonged to, they didn’t leave anything up to chance. She sighed. Admiral T’Plet had confirmed the mission and there wasn’t anything she could do about it at the moment, except to stay watchful herself.

A few minutes later she stood up and entered the bridge. “Computer, locate Commander Rynn,” she said, when she didn’t find her FO on the bridge.

“Commander Rynn is in Astrometrics,” the computer voice replied.

T’Shael entered the turbolift and ordered it to move to Deck 10. When she left the turbolift, she almost ran into an ensign who seemed to be in quite a hurry.

“Oh, excuse me,” he said, and when he finally saw who he had ran into added, “Captain.”

“Proceed, ensign,” T’Shael replied, without thinking about it much and then finally stopped, puzzled when she noticed she didn’t know that ensign. Usually she kept track of all her crewmembers. It must have been the stress of that last mission that made me forget to check the files of the new crewmembers, she thought. “Wait,” she finally said out loud, before the turbolift doors closed in front of the ensign. “What is your name?”

“Ensign Miller, sir. Security officer.”

Then the doors closed before T’Shael could ask anything else. She reminded herself to ask Lieutenant Shaw about him. Then she headed to Astrometrics where she found Commander Rynn, Sp1ke77 and Maximus.

“We are setting out for Wolf 359 right on time,” she told the strange man who only nodded in response. “Anything to report Commanders?” she then asked her two officers.

After the Captain’s question, Sp1ke77 reported. “Well Captain, I’ve studied the Wolf 359 system, and navigation will be hard. Shields will have to be up almost the entire mission, as well as deflectors. I recommend that we reinforce the power supplies. Also, there is a lot of debris. Detection of ships can be hard. I’m working on a way to bypass all debris interference.”

“Very well Commander,” replied the Captain. “You have Q and Melhall. They can help you.”

Maximus turned to T’Shael. “Captain, how fast can a ship like this shutdown all systems except life-support?” asked Maximus. His mind was thinking some wild things.

T’Shael looked surprised. “Excuse me?”

“You’ve listened well,” said Maximus, sarcastically. “How fast?”

Q arrived from engineering just in time to hear Maximus’s question. Being the engineer, it was his job to know such things, so, seeing the look on the Captain’s face, answered for her.

“34 seconds to shutdown beyond sensor detection. A complete shutdown will take 52.”

“Hmmm…that is fairly slow. Is there anyway you can reduce it?” Maximus replied.

Q felt rather annoyed, as a Sovereign vessel could shut down as fast as any ship, and it was stats like that that made engineers proud of their ships.

“Have you seen our warp core? That takes a little time to shut down. If you really want we can shut it down as soon as we get there. That’ll reduce total shutdown to 39 seconds, but we won’t have warp drive if we need it. It’s takes 22 minutes to reinitialize.”

The Captain turned now to Q and inquired as to his purpose in Astrometrics.

He replied that he would like to meet with her, Commander Rynn and Lieutenant Commander Shaw in his office as soon as possible. He then turned and left, thinking more and more that the Captain’s puzzled expression did not mean she didn’t know the answer to Maximus’ question, but more likely wondering why he had asked.

In the security briefing room, the daily briefing was ending. Yellow-collard security officers were piling out of the single doorway. As they were doing so, Shaw and Dexter were standing at the front of the room, having been heading up the briefing.

Shaw began to talk to Dexter, “I don’t like this Maximus. He reeks like burning chicken nuggets.”

Dexter smiled and laughed slightly. “Why didn’t you mention him to the crew?” Dexter gestured toward the final few officers leaving the room as he wrote up a briefing report on a PADD.

Shaw flared his eyebrows mildly. “Well he’s obviously above investigation, although the Captain’s asked me to keep an eye on him. God knows what poking around will get us into at that, besides isn’t the atmosphere usually created by a “supervisor?”

Shaw handed Dexter a PADD, it was the same one T’Shael had handed Shaw on the bridge with the basic information about Maximus and the mission. The details were indeed basic. No information about Maximus or his position, qualifications or even a second name. The mission plans were also sketchy basically stating a “high priority retrieval of device.”

Shaw looked at Dexter as he read the PADD Shaw had handed him. “What do you think?”

Dexter finished reading and offered the PADD back to Shaw as he commented. “I think there’s nothing on here. No names, no dates, hell not even a flight plan, this is Maximus’s mission. The Wolf’s just along for the ride, and probably to take a few hits for him with where we’re going.”

Shaw looked at the PADD. “Yeah, and not many nameless strangers have the authority to stroll aboard a starship, effectively seize command, and order it to a starship graveyard to do the job of an unmanned droid. This man’s high up, and he’s got Starfleet covering his tracks for him.”

Dexter looked back at Shaw, pausing for a moment. “You’re right…he reeks.”

Shaw’s comm. badge chirped to life.

“Commander Q to Lieutenant Commander Shaw, would you please report to my office immediately.”

Lieutenant Shaw replied, “On my way Commander, Shaw out.”

Shaw looked toward Dexter. “See if there is anything you can dig up about Maximus. Anything. Maybe like where the cover name comes from. Maybe we can find out at least whom he’s working for. I don’t like strangers.”

Dexter nodded, and began working on a console at the front of the briefing room. Shaw left the briefing room and headed for engineering to meet with Q.

Simon Shaw walked into Q’s office to find Q, T’Shael and Rynn all waiting for him.

As he sat down, Q stood up and placed a device on the desk.

“I’ve come up with this little device. It’s portable, and I think it can disrupt the adaptability of the Borg. In personal combat, it could give us a few more shots.”

“Excellent, Q,” Rynn commented.

“We’ll need the security personnel briefed on its use, and we’ll probably need a few more, if possible,” Shaw added.

“Yes, but it still has some fine tuning. Because of some components I had to use, there are some side effects. You activate it here, look.” Q pointed to a small console on the little pyramid-shaped device. He tapped a few buttons, and the device activated.

They sat in silence for several seconds waiting for the device to charge up. Once it was fully working, Q broke the silence.

“Right. Okay, first of all, this device is fairly useless against the Borg. But that’s not the reason I brought you here.”

All three other officers looked confused.

Q turned and began scanning the room, whilst continuing.

“Captain, you remember we told you we are being observed?”

As he turned back to his seat he could see the Captain’s nod.

“There are tiny observation devices all over the ship, each attached to an incredibly sophisticated micro-cloak. They are undetectable with a normal tricorder, but I modified this one to detect them.”

“Can we have some more of those made, Commander?” Shaw enquired.

“Of course, I’ll get on that as soon as I can. Meanwhile, this device can deactivate any of these surveillance devices within fifty feet,” he said, indicating the little pyramid on his desk.

“If you think it appropriate, I can install this technology all over the ship, and we can disable surveillance in any specific part of the ship at any time, and simulate a power failure, or a random dampening field, or anything. Otherwise, just watch what you say and do, because Maximus will be watching it, too.”

Shaw entered the security briefing room. Dexter was still there, working at the same console. Shaw stood in front of him, behind the console.

“Q’s come up with a device that should be useful.” Shaw produced one of the small pyramid devices and placed it on the console.

“It disrupts the Borg collective link for around fifty feet, but apparently it can cause interference with communications. But we haven’t noticed anything yet. Activate it by pressing here.”

Shaw pressed the side of the device, and it was immediately activated.

Dexter smiled sarcastically. “Great, another impractical gizmo to defend ourselves from the Borg.”

Shaw smiled. “Well, actually, it’s not that at all.”

Dexter, continuing his sarcastic mannerisms replied, “Excuse me?”

Shaw’s face suddenly became foreboding. “We’ve found MX-12s littering the ship, hundreds of them, almost every room.”

Dexter’s face dropped. “Section 31.”

Shaw nodded. “Yeah, looks like it.”

Dexter pointed to the device. “And what is this then?”

Shaw picked up the device and held it in front of his face while leaning on the console.

“This is the jamming device we thought wasn’t possible; it disables the MX-12s, for about a fifty foot range. Clever chap.”

Dexter laughed slightly. “Yeah, those MX-12s were the biggest achievement of Pete’s career! Shame he’s not here to meet the guy who ruined it in under an hour!”

Shaw put the device back down on the console and responded, “Yeah, Mason spent years making those things. Well, just shows that even the best can be beaten.” Shaw moved to leave, but stopped, “Oh, did you get anything on Maximus?”

Dexter looked to the console, “A little. The name comes from Roman mythology. Translates to ‘the great.’ And this guy seems like the self-absorbed type. There’s something in here though: Pontifex Maximus, the Great Bridge Builder, led a religions movement, organized around the prevention of…”

Shaw responded, “Of?”

Dexter lifted his head to look back up at Shaw from his chair. “Prevention of a war that could wipe out the Roman Empire. But hey, I don’t know if that has any relevance.”

Shaw raised an eyebrow and passed Dexter a tricorder. He examined it, realizing it had been rigged to detect the MX-12s, and laughed under his breath slightly as he looked into a supposedly empty corner. Shaw deactivated the device and moved to leave again, then stopped.

“Oh, did you get anything on Maximus?”

Dexter closed the tricorder. “Nope. Came up empty.”

Shaw shrugged. “Ah well. Anyway, get a few men together, about four or five, and show them how to use those devices in case we should need them. You never know, the Borg could turn up.”

Dexter nodded, realizing what Shaw meant. Shaw exited the briefing room.

Later that evening, Shaw was in his quarters, looking over an old photo. It was one of those old military photos: young soldiers grouped together, smiling in a photo to send back to their families. The photos hadn’t changed in centuries. Not since the first ones in the twentieth century. Only the faces changed, new generations of soldiers, and new wars, but the same message was hidden behind the smiling faces, and the messages of patriotism along with that kill them before they kill you adage. This photo was of a group of soldiers, two of them were recognizable as Shaw and Dexter, although much younger. At the center of the photo was a man who appeared to be their commander. It was a man by the name of Pete Mason. At the bottom of the small plaque, was a quote: “Even the best can be beaten” – Pete Mason, CO, 6th division.

Chapter 5

U.S.S. Lone Wolf

En route to Wolf 359

The next morning, T’Shael walked from her quarters to the bridge in lost in thought. She had a modified tricorder in her pocket. She much like the fact that her whole ship had been bugged with those surveillance devices. She wondered how Maximus had achieved getting them on board and installing them everywhere without being noticed. He had been in Astrometrics most of the time since coming on board, together with Sp1ke77 and Natala. He couldn’t have impossibly done that since then. Either he had intruded on the ship when it was docked at the base or he had an accomplice somewhere. And mostly she wondered what he needed them for. He had Starfleet’s authority behind him. He was in charge of the mission, and the crew would not do anything against him unless command changed their orders. She feared there was more to this than what Starfleet knew, and that Maximus was somehow preparing for the case that he could not trust the crew anymore, because he suddenly had different plans. She did not like that thought. Or maybe there was a totally different factor she hadn’t considered yet.

T’Shael was not aware that Commander Rynn was walking beside her for a moment. Only when they reached the turbolift did she notice the presence of her first officer.

“Commander,” T’Shael said. “How are the preparations in Astrometrics coming along?”

“Sp1ke77 and Maximus are almost done. We should be ready to start the scans immediately upon reaching the debris field,” Natala replied.

“Very good! I hope to get out of there again as quickly as possible.”

“You don’t believe the stories they tell about the Wolf 359 ship graveyard behind haunted, do you?” Tala teased her captain.

“Of course not,” the half-Vulcan replied with a twitch of her eyebrow. “But I fear some very real dangers will expect us, or Maximus would not have insisted on all the weapon upgrading and shutting down of the ship. I doubt Q had one quiet minute last night. I want you to return to Astrometrics to oversee the scanning work and constantly report to the bridge.” Pushing a button on her tricorder she then added, “I don’t want Maximus to be alone with only one officer. Make sure someone is always with him.”

Rynn nodded and T’Shael switched her tricorder back off. Then she entered the turbolift to head for the bridge while Rynn turned back in the opposite direction.

“ETA Mr. Melhall?" Captain T’Shael asked when she stepped on the bridge.

“One hour, ma’am. We will soon be passing into the prohibited zone. I will have to go to impulse to maneuver through all the scattered debris.”

“Alright. Now you will be able to prove your piloting skills! Coordinate your course with Sp1ke77 and Maximus in Astrometrics, they will want some sort of search pattern I am sure.”

Melhall nodded. “Aye aye, Captain.”

“Lieutenant Commander Citon, please keep long range scans continuous. I would prefer not to be surprised by anyone here!”

Then she signaled Lieutenant Commander Shaw, who was behind tactical, to come with her for a moment. Making sure that all bugs around them were deactivated, she started to tell him about her fear of an accomplice.

“I’ve come to the same conclusion,” Shaw replied. “Maximus is clever, but he was not here long enough to install all the devices himself.”

“I want you to work with Dr. Richards. Since he is new it should not be too suspicious for him going through the crew files. See if you can find anyone who could have had contact with Maximus. I ran into an Ensign Miller yesterday whose file I haven’t had the chance to read yet. We left the starbase too quickly for my taste; I did not have time to look into our new crew. It’s very well possible that one of them is working for Maximus.”

“Ok Captain,” Shaw replied and made his way towards sickbay to work with the Doc. The thought occurred to him that he might become a suspect of working for Maximus himself.

Having learned the location of Commander Shaw from the ever-helpful computer, Q headed for sickbay. He had already guessed why Shaw was paying the doctor a visit. On the way, he contacted the bridge.

“Q to Robert, you probably know we plan to shut down the core as soon as possible. I want to transfer to the bridge after we do, but I’ll need a wall panel to operate out of. Can you free one up for me?”

“Can do, Q. When you’ve shut the core down, contact me and I’ll have engineering control up and running by the time you get up here.”

“Excellent, Mr. Melhall, tell me as soon as you go to impulse, please.”

“Sure,” came the response and with that Q ended communication and reached sickbay, simultaneously.

“Q, feeling alright?” the doctor greeted him.

“Yes thanks. I’m just here to alert you that we are experiencing some technical difficulties,” Q said, walking into the office towards Dr. Richards’s desk. “The new systems are causing it, but I don’t think these devices are helping at all either.” Q indicated the pyramid sitting on the doctor’s desk, and reached out to it. “I’ve made some modifications which I think may help.”

The other two officers looked on, knowing what this was really about, and Q activated the pyramid.

“So,” said Max, “don’t want Maximus knowing you have a headache, or is there some other reason for your actions?”

“I’ve noticed a few unfamiliar crewmen around recently. I reviewed the new crew before we left the starbase, but there are some I’m sure weren’t there.”

“Yes,” replied Shaw, “several senior staff have reported that same thing recently. Max was going to check it out now.”

Moving to his desk, Max turned the small computer console round to face the other two officers, “Lets see what we can find,” he said, as he entered commands into the computer.

The other two moved closer to look, “25 crewmembers came aboard at the starbase. All of them reported to sickbay for routine checkups.”

Q thought for a moment. “Did you notice anything unusual about any of them?” calling up his reports.

The Doc shook his head. “No.”

“Could you describe the crewmembers who you think should not be here?” Max asked Q and Shaw.

“One was a human male, about thirty,” Q replied.

“We have a few of those onboard,” Shaw joked.

Q ignored his joke, trying to think up any more details. “He was only an ensign, I remember thinking he looked too seasoned for his rank.”

Max keyed in the data.

“Searching,” the soft tone of the computer replied. “Two matches found.”

“Display visual image,” Q ordered the computer and the faces of two human males appeared on the small screen one with blonde hair, one with brown.

“Any of them him?” Max asked Q.

The Chief Engineer peered at the images carefully “Nope. He had ginger hair.”

“In that case gentlemen I believe we may have a stowaway,” Max stated, folding his arms.

Caring entered sickbay at that moment. “Hello, gentlemen. Is there anything I can help you with? By the way, Dr.Richards, I am Caring Sorrow, the ship’s counselor. I’m afraid I have been detained in greeting you; hope you are settling in fine with the crew.”

Max replied, “It’s good to meet you, Counselor, and yes the crew is treating me well, but a few aren’t so happy to see a doctor.”

“I am pretty sure I know who you mean. A couple of them aren’t too happy to see me either. Now, who is this mystery person you are all talking about? I know every crewmember. Why don’t you describe him to me and maybe I could tell you if have seen him around?”

Maximus was working with Sp1ke77 on a navigation route.

While the commander was analyzing charts, Maximus was holding a strange device. It looked like a cross between a tricorder and a portable engineering computer used for repairs. This one was black, though and there was a number seven in roman letters etched in the side of it.

The ship was about to enter into the Wolf 359 sector, known to many Starfleet officers as hell itself and the Lone Wolf stood at its very gates. Bitter memories came to all. Many had lost family and friends in the bloodiest and fastest single battle in all of Starfleet’s history. One Borg ship had slaughtered an entire fleet of Federation starships.

Suddenly, a beep was heard from Maximus’s “computer.”

“Commander, we need a full stop in about ninety seconds,” said Maximus.

“Sir?” said Sp1ke77, totally confused.

“85 seconds, Commander,” continued Maximus.

“All hands, battle stations,” shouted Sp1ke77, touching a comm button on the console. “Engineering, emergency shutdown in eighty seconds and counting. This is not a drill,” warned Sp1ke77 ending the communication and looking at Maximus, who stood still looking at the screen of his computer.

In the corridors, everyone was running through the decks as the condition lights turned bloody red. Wolf 359. Red lights. Klaxon Warnings. This was not a pretty combination. It could be a prelude to death. Hope and fear mixed in everyone’s heart.

If anyone missed the eighty seconds, the turbolifts would be offline, and the only way to get to their posts would be through the Jeffries tubes. And that could mean that if an emergency appeared, he or she would miss his or her task to help the crew and perhaps save the ship.

When the message from Sp1ke77 came from astrometrics, T’Shael immediately jumped out of her chair on the bridge. So, in eighty seconds, things would start. Like they didn’t have enough around their ears already. She wondered what Maximus needed the shutdown for. Borg already? But no, Citon would have noticed them also. It had to be something different, but whatever it was, she didn’t like it.

Looking around on the bridge she saw Dexter on tactical, knowing that Shaw would not make it here in time she was glad about having at least the 2nd best officer. With Melhall at the conn it was the best pilot they had, he was very skilled at navigating only with thrusters, without the computer calculations of the impulse and warp drive. In this debris field they might need that a lot.

“T’Shael to sickbay,” the Captain contacted the team working in sickbay at the moment.

“Doc Richards here,” came the reply.

“We are shutting down everything except life-support and communications in little over a minute. Q had better hurry to engineering!”

“He’s already on his way, sir,” Richards replied.

Then Shaw tapped his communicator. “We have determined that there is a stowaway with ginger hair; a man around thirty, who disguised himself as an ensign. How are we supposed to proceed if everything is shut down?” he asked.

“Ginger hair and thirty you say? That must be the supposed Ensign Miller I ran into myself. I didn’t think I had seen him in the crew files, but I put it down to the stress we’ve had. Do what you can to find him. With everything shut down, he can’t move around well. Maybe you can trap him somehow, or find another way to locate him. This is yours, the counselor’s and the doctor’s priority work now. I don’t like having a possible saboteur running around on the ship when we enter the debris field,” T’Shael replied and then closed the connection. The eighty seconds were almost up.

Opening a connection to both astrometrics and engineering she then said, “Sp1ke77, Q, everything should be ready for shutdown now.”

“Five, four, three, two, one. Initiate shutdown, Commander,” informed Sp1ke77, immediately after the Captain’s report,

Everyone on the ship watched the lights fade out; the consoles go offline and the turbolift stop between floors.

Maximus stood still; watching his screen very closely while the ship was shutting down.

“The ship has shutdown, all systems are offline except life support,” reported the Commander awaiting a reaction from the “ice” that Maximus looked like in that moment.

“Stand by, Commander. Prepare to reactivate in-ship communications on my mark,” instructed Maximus.

Suddenly a large drone de-cloaked right in front of the ship and stopped beside her. Sp1ke77 looked at it on the astrometrics viewscreen. The design was familiar to him, but he couldn’t recall from where. He didn’t like having that “thing” so close to the defenseless ship. A single quantum torpedo could blast the ship to pieces, and if he had to die, he would like to die in battle, not like this.

“Relax Commander, you’re not going to die today,” said Maximus smiling a bit, as Sp1ke77 turned is head towards him.

“You can read my mind?” questioned Sp1ke77.

“No, Commander, but I can feel what you are feeling,” explained Maximus. “I know that I’m not welcome on this ship, but without me, you would already be dead.”

Sp1ke77 looked at the thing, it was black, hard to see, but he noticed painted in red, the same kind of symbols like on Maximus’s computer: the number VII.

Could Maximus be responsible for that thing? Was he in control? Sp1ke77 thought.

Suddenly, the drone started moving and cloaked again, silently, like a death messenger.

“Communications,” said Maximus.

“Activating in-ship communications,” replied Sp1ke77

“Maximus to Captain T’Shael, are you able to come to astrometrics ASAP?” asked Maximus.

“It might take a while to get there, turbolifts are offline,” replied T’Shael.

“I’m not going anywhere Captain, meanwhile please tell your helmsman to set course heading zero-six-three. Come to bearing zero-one-two, mark zero-zero-zero with thrusters only and very, very slowly,” said Maximus.

“Of course, T’Shael out,” ended the Captain.

“Oh, and Captain? Come alone,” added Maximus.

With internal communications back online, Q was able to signal the bridge.

“Q to the bridge. As soon as we reactivate ship’s power, I’ll transfer up there.”

“We’ll have a console ready for you,” replied the science deputy.

As he broke off, Q noticed something odd. A wall panel in a far corner of engineering was still on. On his way over, he grabbed a PADD and checked who was supposed to be manning that station. He had recognized already that it was a low-level sensory systems panel.

Having drawn up the crew assignments on the PADD, he spun 360 degrees, still on his way to the active panel. The crewman was not there. Stuck in a turbolift, or halfway here in a Jeffries tube no doubt.

Having reached the panel, Q was about to switch it off when he noticed what was on it. It had recorded the drone that had appeared, and had a lot of data on it. He didn’t think these sensory systems had that kind of power, but he presumed it had to do with Maximus’s upgrades.

Q quickly scanned the data on the drone, saved it and deactivated the panel. This data could be extremely useful, as he doubted Maximus was about to tell them the whole truth. For now, though, he preferred to keep this information to himself. Fortunately and surprisingly, due to the ship wide shutdown still in operation, just about the entire engineering staff was busy with something or another, and Q didn’t think anyone had seen what he was doing.

With that, Q resolved to check the data as soon as he got to the bridge, and started prowling around engineering, waiting for the startup order.

Caring looked at Dr. Richards and Shaw. “Where do we go from here?”

Sickbay fell into darkness as all the consoles shut down, and just life support kept the backup lights running. Moving to his desk, Richards pulled out a medical tricorder. “We can use this to begin searching for the saboteur,” Max replied to Caring. “There should be some more in the compartment to your left.”

As the counselor hurried to retrieve the devices, Shaw turned to Max. “No offense Doc, but that is a medical tricorder. We need a standard duty one.”

Accessing a few controls, the Doctor shook his head. “One thing they teach you at med school is how to modify your med tricorder to act as a standard duty one,” he said handing Shaw the now modified tricorder.

Caring arrived back into the office with the med tricorders. Like the Doctor, she had been trained in how to modify med tricorders. She thought briefly that it was something Starfleet should start training everyone to do, and not just medical and engineering personnel.

“All we need to do now is work out where to start,” Max stated.

As Richards and Caring were making their way out of sickbay, they realized Shaw was not following. They turned to see him still sitting at the office’s desk. After a brief silence, Shaw placed his modified medical tricorder down on the desk and spoke.

“Don’t get too excited. Something they teach you in TacSec,” Shaw said, as he smiled slightly at Richards and continued. “Exactly what do you intend to do with him once you find him?”

Shaw received no answer; they all realized this had not been considered.

Shaw carried on. “If this guy’s working for Maximus, then we’re not going to do the mission any favors by putting him in a cell. Believe it or not, Section 31 is on our side. If Maximus were some Cardassian hijacker, then I’d be all too willing to go screw things up for him. But that’s one thing I don’t think he is. We need to find out who this guy is before we go after him, who he’s working for. We need identification.”

Caring could sense that Richards didn’t like the way Shaw was putting down their plan, and broke the silence.

“What’s your plan?” asked the counselor.

Shaw picked up the tricorder. “Set these to do a constant scan of everyone in range and carry them as you go about your business. It’ll take longer, but you won’t be waving them in people’s faces and raising suspicions. Between us, we should be able to cover most of the ship, and Richards, can you ask Q to do the same, or get one of his crew to do so. They’ll have an excuse to go looking around the depths of the ship where someone like this could be hiding. When you’ve detected something, we’ll all meet back up and investigate who the guy is from Starfleet’s medical records. You have access to those right?” Shaw asked Richards, who nodded in response.

Shaw concluded, “Okay, just keep it all quiet, and contact each other when you have something and we’ll meet back in my quarters for a…um…a quiet poker game,” Shaw said sarcastically as he lifted the MX-12 disabling pyramid device, implying to the others to be wary of the surveillance,

“Any questions?” Shaw asked, receiving no response he deactivated the pyramid and the three officers left sickbay.

Shaw stopped, turned to Richards, “Oh, by the way, I’m Simon Shaw, CTSO!” Shaw realized he had not introduced himself amid the action. Richards shook Shaw’s extended hand.

“Doctor Max Richards,” he replied

“Welcome aboard,” Shaw continued, “have fun!”

Then the group split up and began the search for whoever it was they were looking for.

Chapter 6

U.S.S. Lone Wolf

Wolf 359

Outer Perimeter

Main Bridge

“Commander Melhall, you have your orders,” T’Shael told the conn officer. “Better do exactly what he says, I have a bad feeling about this place.”

“All right Captain, I promise I won’t get off the course by an inch,” Robert replied.

“Commander Citon, you have the bridge for now. I will be in Astrometrics.”

“Understood, sir,” Citon said.

With those words she turned and headed to the Jeffries tube entrance that led away from the bridge. This was one of the times she was very thankful for the nearly photographic memory she had inherited from her Vulcan mother. In the dark, with only the little light of a portable lamp she still found the right Jeffries tube to get to Astrometrics immediately, even though the way would have seemed like a maze to an outsider. But it took much more time than it would have with the turbolift and T’Shael did not like the delay that was caused by the shutdown. She would have preferred to be on the bridge in such a situation rather than crawling around in the dark. If anything happened she would not be able to do anything against it, and this was something she did not like. She preferred to be in control of a situation, but now Maximus had the control, although she knew, or at least very much hoped, that he had only the best intentions for Starfleet and her ship. Hopefully, in Astrometrics she would get some answers finally.

After about fifteen minutes of tedious crawling, she reached the deck where Astrometrics was located. Nothing seemed to have happened and she wondered if they had reached the coordinates Maximus had ordered already, at the very slow speed they were going. She missed the faint vibrations of the warp and impulse engines. It felt like they were standing still completely, although of course they were still moving at, for humans, fairly quick speed, but in galactic measures it was slower than a snail. The corridor was dark and no one was wandering around, everyone had been ordered to be either at their stations or stay in their quarters. Only Shaw’s teams were moving through the ship, trying to locate that stowaway. But T’Shael didn’t run into any of them. Finally she entered the Astrometrics lab where Maximus, Commander Sp1ke77 and Commander Rynn were waiting for her.

“I see you’ve made it Captain,” Maximus said.

“Yes I have. And I want some answers now! What is happening? What are you shutting down my ship for? And how fast can we pick up that device and get out of here?”

Maximus stood and walked to the window.

“Well?” said the Captain.

He remained in silence, facing the void and debris mix.

“Mr. Rynn and Mr. Sp1ke77, could you please leave me and the Captain alone? We need to have a little chat,” asked Maximus gently.

Rynn simply arched a brow as she watched the other man with her captain. She didn’t trust him for as far as she could throw him, and her being bajoran, well. She stepped up to the Captain and said, “Sir, I don’t think it would be a good idea if we left you alone.” She was looking at T’Shael, not giving the man a reason to say anything to her, but of course he did.

“Mr. Rynn,” he said, grating on her nerves. “I will take care of your captain.”

Rynn’s gaze turned from her captain’s over to the man, and then she seemed to look him over as if sizing him up. He simply stood there of course, not giving her a reason to go nuts on him.

T’Shael stepped in front of Rynn and said to her, “I want you to take some people and shut down these extra systems. And Sp1ke77, I want you to take a team and do the same.”

Rynn was just about ready to speak up and say something about leaving the Captain here, but T’Shael didn’t give her a chance. “Dismissed!” she ordered, curtly.

Rynn had to stop. She grabbed her shirt, tugging it down, and then nodded. “Lets go Sp1ke77,” she said, then turned around and left Astrometrics.

Sp1ke77 went one way and she headed down to the supply locker. Then, she tapped her comm badge. “Dexter and Sanchez, report down to weapons locker three. Rynn out,” not giving them a chance to even respond. She was thankful for the communications systems being brought back online.

On her way down she’d been thinking about what had happened only moments before. Assessing things in her mind, various simulations were running through her mind. Her reprieve was broken when she saw both Dexter and Sanchez standing there. On any other occasion, seeing Dexter, the woman in her would have been elated but now was clearly not the time. She keyed in her codes and then said as the locker slid open, “We’ve got a visitor gentlemen, and the way I see it, he’s making some energy spikes. I also think,” she grabbed herself a phaser rifle and strapped it on, “that if we find the means he’s using, we might find him.” She pulled out two rifles and handed them to Dexter and Sanchez and she actually smiled to Dexter.

Then she pulled out some tricorders and gave one to them and herself, she closed the locker and then they headed off. Rynn was smiling to herself grateful she didn’t have to see the nosey doctor.

T’Shael sat in a chair right behind Maximus; the silence in the room was creepy. It was almost as if they were in a ghost ship, little noises were heard sometimes but from outside the ship.

“My dear Captain,” started Maximus “I know very well that I’m not welcome here. No captain likes to be on a ship having a stranger giving the orders.”

“Damn right about that,” mumbled T’Shael.

“I’ll get to the point,” continued Maximus. “I’m here to save the Federation. If an enemy race gets that device we’re all as good as dead, because they would become a Borg-like super-powerful race.”

“Well, we don’t want that to happen, do we?” said T’Shael showing that Vulcan cold expression. “You still haven’t answered my questions.”

“All right, I shutdown the ship, because there are several energy seeking drones capable of destroying a ship in the first shot, and we need to run on minimal energy, so that we don’t get caught,” explained Maximus.

“What?” exclaimed the concerned Captain. “You’ve brought us into a death-trap!”

The robed figure turned and walked towards the Captain, and sat down next to her.

“Those drones aren’t dangerous if we keep these levels, but…” Maximus hesitated.

T’Shael looked at him. “Yes?”

“The ship has high energy spikes all over the ship,” said Maximus

“What do you mean?” asked the Captain.

“I don’t understand it. In my simulations this ship should have a low readings on every deck. Instead of that, we appear like a Christmas tree to the drone sensors. I managed to trick one by telling it that we were an energy charged particle cloud about to explode, but we will not be that lucky the next time,” explained the supposed S31 agent to a curious Captain T’Shael. “I need you to find out what is lighting us up, our lives depends on it.”

“I’ll try, I’ll try. And about how fast we can get out of here?” T’Shael said.

“I don’t know Captain. I really don’t know,” Maximus said quietly.

Suddenly his computer started to beep. He looked at the display. “Captain, another drone!” he warned. “We need to cut some more power off this ship, or we will be history.”

“Energy spikes, eh?” Q thought out loud.

He was in his office, listening to every word being said in Astrometrics. In the shutdown, there was little to do, so he had used a tricorder to work on the MX-12s. With the dampening device in place, he had learned an awful lot about these little surveillance devices. He was now fairly confident that he couldn’t be detected whilst using the network to his own advantage.

He listened for a little longer, getting more and more concerned, and certain that his captain would be as well. So, he wants permanent shutdown. He thought. Lovely. And these drones, new toys for me to get to work on, hopefully!

The conversation in Astrometrics was ending. Q grabbed a PADD, typed a note to the Captain and walked out of his office. As he handed the PADD to the nearest crewman, with instructions to take it to Captain T’Shael, a Jeffries tube opened and Shaw climbed out.

“Excellent, just the man I wanted to see,” Q greeted him. He led the way into his office. “So what brings you here?”

Shaw glanced at the pyramid sitting on Q’s desk and, noticing it was on, carried on.

“Looking for our intruder. Wondered if he was about?”

“Haven’t seen him, sorry. Anyway, I’ve just recorded this conversation.” He played back the Astrometrics conversation, and explained how he had gained access to the MX-12 network.

“This is all very unsettling,” Shaw concluded.

“You’re telling me, Simon. I’ve told the Captain I think there are energy spikes occurring across the ship, and I can level them off with a general dampener. The reason for these spikes is guess what,” he said, waving his finger around, indicating the bugs all around them. “The dampening field will shut them down and no-one is any the wiser we even know they exist.”

As he said this, in Astrometrics, Captain T’Shael was reading the PADD she had just been given by a crewman from engineering. She relayed parts to Maximus, informing him of the dampening field plan. He looked uncomfortable, she thought, but he agreed to it, allowing the bugs to be shut down rather than let T’Shael know they were there. He didn’t know, of course, that she already knew they were there.

The Captain typed a response to Q, and then sent it back with the crewman.

Back in engineering, Shaw was taking a look at Q’s latest work on the MX-12s. “You know, once this is all over, you should work on a surveillance device of your own, after everything you’ve done with these.”

“No,” he replied, “I don’t make brilliant devices, I just ruin other people’s! I’m going to be based on the bridge soon, so if you need me that’s where I’ll be in the future.”

“Alright then, I’ll be off to keep looking for out little stowaway.” Shaw headed for the door, but before he got there, Q stopped him.

“Look Simon, a panel was left on somehow. Operator stuck in the tubes. Anyway, it recorded quite a bit on the drones, and I’d like you to help me analyze the data the next chance you get. When we bring power back on line, how long will it be before you can get away an accurate torpedo volley?”

Max walked slowly along the ship’s corridors. The small tricorder he had in his belt hoister was scanning everyone, and probably everything in range, making sure to keep to the side of the walls where it was darkest. He did not fancy trying to explain to someone what he was doing wondering the ship when all the power was out. Hearing foot steps approach, he ducked behind a bend in the corridor and watched as the First Officer walked past with two officers he had not met, all of them carrying phaser rifles. At the sight of the powerful side arms, the Doctor went a bit giddy, tactical situations had never been his strong point.

Somewhere in the back of his mind he remembered the First Officer had yet to report to sickbay for her checkup. An idea came into his mind: wherever the First Officer was heading, there was a good chance it would be where the action was, and probably a good chance some clues as to the whereabouts of the intruder. Walking out of the shadows, he ran up to the team.

“Excuse me Commander,” he called out. He noticed the cold stare Rynn gave him when she saw it was he.

“Doctor why are you not in sickbay?” she demanded, hoping to make him go away.

The Doctor smiled awkwardly. “I was finding my way around the ship when the power went,” laughing slightly he continued his story “And it appears I am lost. Do you mind if I join your team?”

Rynn muttered something under her breath, something to do with Doctors and a Klingon Targ. “Very well,” she said giving him permission to join her small team “But keep out of my way”.

The Doctor nodded his head in agreement. He felt guilty about lying to Rynn, but he thought it was probably best the fewer people who knew what he, Shaw and Caring were up to the better.

Caring was walking the corridors near some crew quarters on Deck 13. She didn’t know why she chose this area except that it was far enough away from that Maximus character. She didn’t trust him and she got mixed feelings from him, sometimes they were feelings of trust and sometimes not.

Caring looked at her modified tricorder but was trusting her intuition more then it. While walking, she picked up a thought from someone: it was Rynn. Hmm, so Rynn is still avoiding the doctor, again.

Sometimes Caring picked up on Rynn’s and Robert’s thoughts because of the mind meld, but not often enough to warrant telling them, especially since they both avoided Caring right now. “Those two and their doctor phobias. Maybe I should have a counseling session with them about it,” she muttered to herself.

What was that? Caring thought, as a movement caught her eye, she quickly looked at her tricorder to make sure it was registering and followed the movement.

In Astrometrics, T’Shael and Maximus were observing the energy spikes all over the ship. Q was almost ready to activate the dampening field in engineering and T’Shael hoped that this would finally bring some security to the ship.

“We are ready Captain,” came the voice of the engineer through the intercom.

“Very well, Commander,” T’Shael replied. “Please proceed.”

Q acknowledged and then hit the buttons on his panel to finalize the build up of his field. T’Shael and Maximus watched how the spikes on their screen started to decrease, first in engineering and then spreading throughout the ship. They became lower and lower and finally vanished completely.

“Good work Commander,” T’Shael said. “The energy spikes are gone.”

“My pleasure Captain,” Q replied with a grin, feeling proud he was better than the intruder. Then he started preparing the restart of the rest of the ship’s systems.

“We are not getting anything out of those MX-12s anymore,” an angry voice said to a shadowy figure. “They must have found a way to neutralize them. They must know we are here.”

The darkness of the ship coincided with the two figures and the rest of their plans.

“They know nothing,” the dark figure hissed back. “The MX-12s can’t be detected. They are my brilliant work. They shut down everything and put up a dampening field to make sure there is absolutely no energy left that will endanger the ship. The shutting down of our network is only a pleasant side-effect for them they know nothing of.”

“I wouldn’t be so sure, sir” came the reply of the first man. “They have a brilliant engineer, and remember, Shaw is the tactical officer. He knows the MX-12s.”

“Shaw, he’s a nobody. He was not worthy of us. He will never find out. But now we can’t rely on the MX-12s anymore. You have to find another way to find out when they have found it.”

“But I can’t just walk through the ship like I’m some ensign anymore. The crew is restricted to their quarters or their stations. It’s too dangerous.”

“Too dangerous? That’s something new. You’re clever enough and that’s why I hired you. Now go. Don’t come back unless you have good news.”

Finally, the ginger haired man just nodded, turned and stepped back into the dark corridor.

Chapter 7

U.S.S. Lone Wolf

Wolf 359

Outer Perimeter

Astrometrics Lab 1

“We should be able to get past those next drones now,” Maximus said.

“Should be?” T’Shael asked. “I don’t like the sound of that.”

“Don’t worry Captain, we’ll make it,” Maximus tried to calm her down. “And after we are through those and inside the debris field, things will be easier.”

“I hope so,” the Captain said. “If we only make a hundred meters every few minutes, it will take a decade to find what we’re looking for.”

“I promise you it won’t take more than a few days,” the agent said. “The outside of the field is so heavily guarded, that there is no need to crawl through the whole thing. No one except those who are supposed to know can get in anyway.” He made some adjustments to his “tricorder” and then hit the comm button on the console. “Maximus to the bridge. Commander Melhall, I am transferring you the next coordinates to fly to. Same speed as last time.”

Slowly the ship started to move, and T’Shael held her breath as she watched them pass by two drones that remained sleeping. Relieved, she sighed quietly.

Suddenly something on Maximus’ console flashed. He quickly did a brief scan and then shook his head, not believing what he saw.

“What is it?” T’Shael asked, worried because she had never seen such an expression on Maximus’s usually very calm face.

“A ship...” he said. “Appears to be Ferengi. They are inside. This is not possible.”

“I thought no one could get past those drones,” T’Shael said as sarcastically as a Vulcan could.

“No one can get past them,” Maximus confirmed, although it was quite clear what the sensors had picked up.

“Commander Sp1ke77, please report back to Astrometrics,” T’Shael said hitting her comm badge. “There are enough people out there chasing our friend. We seem to have another problem here now.”

Next, she let Q in engineering know the latest situation, in case she needed a quick power up of the ship’s systems.

“Ferengi, eh? Ingenious little oiks, I half expected them to have a regular ship out here.”

“Well clearly Mr. Maximus didn’t, Q.”

“Yes Captain, which does surprise me. He should know a small thing like impossibilities won’t get in the way of profit for a Ferengi.”

“Quite right. Anyway, the problem is not how they got here, rather what to do now that they are here.”

“Well, no doubt they will have to be on limited power too, which helps in a battle situation. But you would probably rather try diplomacy.”

“The only problem with that is we’re not supposed to be here either. I’ll see what Sp1ke77 and the local Roman Emperor have to say, and we’ll have a staff meeting.”

“OK then, I have something to be getting on with too. Just so you know, as an option, I’m ninety-five percent certain we can go from sensor invisibility, to destroying them, back to sensor invisibility inside two minutes.”

“Understood Commander. Astrometrics out.”

Walking next to the FO, Max felt small vibrations coming from his tricorder, indicating that the bio signature of the person they were looking for was nearby. Thinking quickly, he turned to face Rynn. “Excuse me, Commander; I just remembered the Captain requested that I assist Counselor Sorrow in monitoring crew reactions to the mission.”

Rynn turned slowly to face the Doctor; the man was really getting on her nerves. First, he had tried to perform a medical on her. Then, he had invited himself to join her team and now he wanted off. She had just about had it. “Fine Lieutenant Commander,” she said, used his rank deliberately. “You are dismissed, go and find the Counselor.”

Only nodding his head, Max hurried down the next turning. When he was a safe distance from the small team he had just left, he tapped his comm badge “Richards to Sorrow. Meet me on Deck 5, Corridor 6, Sub-junction 2.”

Sorrow replied, “Acknowledged.”

Ducking behind the next bend in the corridor, the Doctor pulled out his tricorder and scanned the area, whoever or whatever the tricorder was picking up was around the next curve.

Caring met with the Doctor at the specified coordinates. Caring whispered to Max, “What’s up Doc? I always wanted to say that.”

Max made a face at Caring. “Very funny. My tricorder has picked up bio readings on our intruder. He’s nearby.”

“I’m picking up the readings on my tricorder as well. Plus, I can sense his presence.” Caring replied all business like.

“What are your senses telling you?” Max asked.

Caring looked deadpan at the doctor and said. “To be careful. Seriously though, he is feeling afraid. He is afraid of being caught but also something else as well.”

“Okay, let’s follow these readings and see what we can find,” Richards answered.

Max and Caring headed down the corridor, neither knowing what they would find.

The two medical officers stifled down the corridor, both had their tricorders out, keeping a constant lock on the location of the intruder. With power still inoperative, the deck was a misty darkness; the only real light source was there palm touches.

“Doctor,” Sorrow whispered as they drew nearer the intruder. “Maybe we should deactivate these,” indicating to her palm touch. “We don’t want him to see us coming.”

Max nodded his head in complete agreement. Both officers pressed the control to deactivate the devices.

Something else occurred to Max before they entered the next section where the intruder was. “Counselor, I don’t suppose you have a phaser?” In the heat of the action, the Doctor had forgotten to take a phaser from storage.

“I was hoping you had one,” Sorrow replied. The two stopped for a moment, the actual seriousness of the situation they were in hitting them.

“Maybe we should call security?” Richards suggested taking his eyes off the tricorder to look at the Counselor.

“Sounds good to me,” she replied also briefly looking away from her readings.

It was then the sound of a phaser blast filled the air. Both officers jumped in fright, neither expecting it, running to the bend they had just passed.

Sorrow pulled out her tricorder. “It’s him, he’s closing fast.”

The two again shared a look; there was only one thing to do. “Richards to Security,” the Doctor pressed the small device on his chest, hoping communication was restored. “Myself and the Counselor could use a little help.”

“I need to go to the bridge,” Captain T’Shael said after they had identified the Ferengi ship. “Q stand-by with your plan,” she said over the intercom to the engineer. Even though the Ferengi were in this area of space quite illegally, she did not want to destroy them before having talked to them. She could not justify the destruction of a ship only because it was at a place where it should not be. First she would have to listen to their explanation.

“Sp1ke77, you stay here with Maximus to coordinate the search for the device. I will take care of the Ferengi ship.”

“Aye aye, sir,” Sp1ke77 replied, but Maximus insisted that the Ferengi ship had to be taken care of first.

“Captain, if we find the device, the Ferengi will do everything to get it! We can’t let that happen and have to avoid it at whatever cost,” he said.

“But we don’t have it yet,” T’Shael replied. “Therefore we have time to deal with the ship, just like the Federation is supposed to,” she added with a tone in her voice making clear she did not approve of how Section 31 tended to handle some matters.

“Alright Captain. For now I will let you do it your way,” he said. “But if it should be necessary for the sake of the Federation, I will not hesitate to go over your head.”

“Let’s hope it won’t get to that,” T’Shael said, grimly and then left Astrometrics.

The turbolifts were still not running and she therefore had to do the long walk through the corridors and Jeffries tubes again. She did not meet a soul; everyone except the search party was still restricted to his or her stations or quarters. But suddenly there was a shadow moving behind her. Before she could even turn around, something knocked her down and she lost consciousness.

“Q to Shaw. Sorry to interrupt you Simon, but I need your help down here.”

“Okay Q, I’ve been monitoring the Ferengi situation and I’m on my way. Shaw out.

“Q to T’Shael. Come in Captain.” As the Captain did not respond, Q became slightly concerned. “Captain. Do you hear me?”

Q jogged to a panel and, checking to see that no one was watching, activated a small part. He gave it an order to find the Captain.

According to the readout, she was standing still, alone in a corridor not too far from engineering. Q found this strange and so, grabbing a tricorder and a phaser, sprinted out of engineering, hoping to be back before Shaw made it.

Several seconds later, he sprinted around the corner, his tricorder telling him he should be running into Captain T’Shael right about now.

However, the corridor was empty. Following his tricorder, he walked to where she should be, and found her comm badge lying on the floor. This concerned him even more. With a stowaway on board, a complete shutdown in operation and a Ferengi ship nearby, this was a very worrying find.

As he ran back to engineering, he worked his tricorder furiously. By the time he was back he had performed a ship-wide scan for Vulcan bio signs. Knowing how many were aboard, he noticed there was one missing.

Just as he headed for his office, Shaw walked into engineering.

Shaw saw the expression on Q’s face as he entered engineering. The next few moments were not going to hold good news.

Shaw walked over to Q. “What’s up?” he asked in a concerned tone.

“The Captain. She’s missing,” Q replied, while showing Shaw the Captain’s comm badge. While Shaw looked at the comm badge, Q continued. “What do you think?”

Simon looked back at him. “I think maybe I’m not doing my job right!” He turned and walked to the middle of the room. Tapping his comm badge, he spoke, “Shaw to Lieutenant Commander Richards, I’m going to need to find our intruder. He may have kidnapped—”

Shaw was cut off by the sound of phaser fire. It seemed that Richards was under attack.

Q, overhearing the conversation, grew even more concerned. It appeared things were moving faster than expected. Shaw turned to leave engineering. As he walked down the corridor towards a Jeffries tube entrance, he tapped his comm badge. “Shaw to Dexter. Richards is under attack, send a—”

Dexter cut him off. “Got a call from him a few moments ago. I’m sending a team down now.”

As Shaw entered the Jeffries tube and began crawling towards the location of Richards and Caring, he said, “I’m heading down there now. I don’t know how many there are. Sensors are out. Send as many men as you can.”

Dexter acknowledged, “Right.” He then made a call to Lieutenant Hale, who was working the TacSec station on the bridge in his absence. He told her to make sure to keep an eye on when the sensors came back online.

Rynn snapped her head around, looked over to Dexter and arched one brow. Then, she tapped her comm badge. “Rynn to Shaw. What’s going on?” She waited a few moments, as she and the other two security officers were almost right up to where Max and Caring were.

“Sir...the Captain is missing. It’s safe to assume she’s no longer aboard the ship.”

Rynn’s eyes narrowed. She visibly let out a sigh of dismay as she turned around. “Damn,” she said. Then, she nodded to Sanchez and Dexter to go help Max and Caring.

“Shaw I’m on my way to the bridge. I want you to see what you can do about finding a way to locate the Captain. I know we need to keep scans and other electrical signatures to a minimum, but I want it done. Rynn out.”

That was when she ducked into a Jeffries tube and climbed her way up to Deck 1, kicked the panel out and crawled into the bridge because the turbolifts were still out. Everyone looked like they just had been scared to death.

She frowned, thinking right about now she’d rather have Max tailing her than anything else.

“Alright,” she said as she walked over to the captain’s chair. She looked at it and dreaded sitting in it. But it was a part of her job.

When everyone was done with the tasks they were assigned, she would call an emergency staff meeting. This was a time to work together and drop petty differences. “Rynn to Richards,” she said.

She heard a barrage of phaser fire and then a loud thud.

“Richards here sir,” he said breathing heavily. “We just got the guy.”

A smile grew on her lips, but quickly died. She was starting to like that ‘doc’.

Then she heard Richards give Sanchez and Samuelson orders to take him to the brig.

“Alright Richards, get up to the bridge. I want a staff meeting in 45 minutes. She tapped the ship wide intercom button. “This is Commander 1^st Class Rynn. All senior officers to the observation lounge in 45 minutes. I want full reports. She closed the channel and spoke to Robert. “Keep your eyes open…for anything.”

“Aye aye…Tala,” he said her name under his breath, smiling to himself.

She leaned forward, smiling herself. “What was that Commander?”

“Oh nothing,” he said innocently, turning his chair to face her.

“I’m sure,” she said sarcastically.

She pondered going to the captain’s ready room, then thought she might be needed here just in case, so she stayed.

Slowly the blackness faded and a bright light hit her eyes when she opened them. Either Q had reactivated all systems or she was not on the Lone Wolf anymore. She slowly started to look around. Her head still hurt and made her very aware of what had happened in the fraction of a second back in the dark corridor. Suddenly, she was staring into the face of a man who was about fifty years old. And beside him was a Ferengi.

“Welcome Captain,” the man said with a grin. “I’m glad we finally get to meet. I have heard so much about you during my little stay on your ship.”

For a second T’Shael was confused. They had been searching for a man around thirty with ginger hair. This definitely did not apply to this man. Which meant that there had been two stowaways. And one was still on her ship.

“Who are you, and what do you want?” she finally managed to ask.

“Pete Mason at your service. I just happen to be looking for the same thing you are. Maximus and I are old friends, but unfortunately we have slightly different opinions on what to do once it is found. The Ferengi here have proved to be much more on my wavelength. And luckily your ship will be as friendly to directly lead us to what we want...”

Chapter 8

U.S.S. Lone Wolf

Wolf 359

Inner Perimeter

Deck 5, Corridor 6, Sub-Junction 2

Max reached down and helped Caring to her feet. She had been knocked down by phaser fire, but was conscious. Her leg had been grazed by a blast from the intruder’s phaser. “Are you alright, Caring?” Max asked as he looked at her leg “Can you walk on it?”

Caring took a step to test the leg. “I think so. Maybe I should go find a doctor to look at it. Oh wait, he’s right here!”

“Counselor, are you ever serious?” Max looked exasperated.

“Yes, most of the time. Did I hear Commander Rynn call a staff meeting? Where is the Captain?” Caring said more seriously.

“It would seem the Captain is not aboard the ship at this time, Commander,” Dexter said. Caring got a funny feeling from him and the way he had said that; he seemed too calm about it. She shrugged it off and attempted to look for T’Shael. “Damn! You’re right, I can’t sense her presence anywhere on the ship.” She looked to Richards. “Well, you’d better fix my leg, Doc. We have a staff meeting to attend.”

As Sorrow sat against the bulkhead holding her leg, Richards opened the small med-kit he was carrying with him. Opening his tricorder, he began scanning Caring’s leg “You have a pulled muscle,” he told her. “I’m giving you some acinolyathin.” Programming his hypospray, he administered the drug. “It will relieve the pain,” he explained.

Caring gave him a smile. “Feels better already,”

Finally, Richards waved a tissue mitigator over the affected area. “It will be sore for a few hours but you should be fine.” Helping Caring to her feet, the two headed for the briefing room.

The two of them walked in to find most of the senior staff already gathered. Shaw appeared to be giving Rynn details of the Captain’s disappearance.

Noticing the two medical officers taking their seats, Rynn began the meeting. “OK people. Captain T’Shael has been abducted by an unknown force and we have a stowaway in our brig.” Looking each of the officers in the eye, she continued her orders. “I want to know how this happened and how much this prisoner is involved.”

Sp1ke77 broke the silence that had befallen the room. “Basically, here’s what we’ve got. The Captain is missing; we have no record of what happened in the corridor. We have a stowaway captured and in the brig. Meanwhile, there’s a Ferengi ship out there, we don’t know why. But the Captain favors diplomacy, that’s the Federation way.”

“Yes,” agreed Shaw, “But sneaking around an off-limits ship graveyard looking for a device that could change the balance of power significantly isn’t the Federation way.”

Q glanced around at the crew. They were mostly deep in thought.

Now-Acting-Captain Rynn spoke. “The current priority though is the Captain. We have to get her back, and we have to know what happened in that corridor. Then, we deal with the Ferengi. They might even be linked, you never know.”

Robert rose from his seat. “Excuse me one moment, Captain.” He looked tired as he walked over to the replicator. Everyone else was too deep in thought to remember that replicator wasn’t entirely working.

“Black coffee, hot,” the helmsman ordered.

The replicator churned out his order and he took a sip. He then spat it back quickly and turned on the replicator. “Hot! I said hot!”

“Sorry,” Q chipped in. “I have to get that fixed.”

“Soon as you get a moment, Commander,” said Rynn.

Q looked around again. “We’re not really getting anywhere here. I could do it now. It’s just a simple job.”

“Yes, why not, if it’s just a simple job, won’t take long. And you can still interact. Go for it,” ordered Captain Rynn.

“Aye Com—er, Captain. Sorry.” Q grabbed the engineering kit he had become accustomed to carrying around recently and walked over to the replicator, wondering why it was still active through the general shutdown.

He removed a panel and crawled in on his back. “Yes...right here,” he mumbled to himself. “Simple problem...just the thermal...Thermal! Arrgh!” Q sat up quickly with his exclamation and cracked his head on the top of the hole left by the panel.

“Would you like to elaborate, Q?”

“Yes, um, sorry Counselor, yes,” Q touched his hand to the wound on the back of his head as he stood and replaced the panel.

Max walked over, opening the med-kit he still had with him. “Hold still,” he told the engineer as he cleaned the wound and applied an auto suture.

“Thanks doc,” said Q, making his way to the large panel behind the acting captain. “Fortunately, with the MX-12s offline fully, we can activate a few panels for a while without worrying about being spotted.”

“Glad to hear it,” said Max. That means I get a fully operational biobed, right? Anyway, thermal?”

“I don’t see why not, if you come to need one,” Q replied, looking at Captain Rynn in an inquiring way.

She simply nodded.

“Thermal sensors,” Q continued. “Throughout the entire ship, wouldn’t have been deactivated with the general shutdown. They run on a separate system. Not many people actually know they are there.”

“Of course,” Shaw interrupted. “That’s a Starfleet regulation, but it’s normally left forgotten and it has really become more of a recommendation than an enforced regulation. There have to be some kind of sensors monitoring every part of a ship at all times, and generally the thermals are there to do that.”

“Exactly. And they’re on a separate system so they won’t be turned off with the other internal sensors.” As he said this, Q worked the panel. “Here, this is what the thermals picked up. From the time we last had any kind of contact with the Captain, until she was noticed missing.” With that, Q started the sensor sequence, and watched intently along with the rest of the senior staff.

The senior crew watched as Q pieced together the data from the thermal sensors. The display was less that perfect, and quite vague. Q guided the officers through the footage.

“This is the Captain leaving Astrometrics,” Q pointed toward what appeared to be little more than a blob on the display. Q knew what he was looking for much more easily then that the rest of the crew, except for maybe Robert. He tried to alter a few settings on the display. After a few moments, the “blob” took a more humanoid form, and the surroundings appeared a bit more familiar as one of the Lone Wolf’s corridors. Although it was still quite difficult to follow, T’Shael was just a colorful shape, made up of various heat readings. Q continued. “Computer, move forward to timeframe 03:24:12. ”

The footage moved forward to the specified point. T’Shael was still walking the corridors, the officers were watching for nearly a minute when Melhall broke the silence.

“Are you sure this is when she went missing?”

Q looked over to Melhall. “I think so, her comm badge was found just a few moments from—” Q was cut off by Shaw.

“Q.”

Q looked at Simon, and then back at the display. T’Shael was gone.

Shaw continued, “Go back to timeframe 03:25:01.”

Q input the commands and the footage returned to T’Shael walking the corridors. After a few seconds, her shape appeared distorted.

“Pause,” Shaw said quickly.

The display paused, but T’Shael had already disappeared.

Robert piped up now. “Move back two seconds.” T’Shael was again in the corridor, although the image was currently paused “Move forward, one-quarter speed. ”

The footage slowly moved forward. After a few moments, the Captain’s figure again became distorted.

“Pause,” Melhall said, recognizing what was happening.

Shaw moved closer to the display and pointed towards a small heat reading on the floor of the corridor. “That’s the Captain’s badge.” His finger moved to the bright spot on the top and bottom of the corridor directly above and below T’Shael.

Q saw what he was indicating to, and offered an explanation. “Those readings are consistent with a transporter beam.”

“So she was transported off the ship,” Robert said.

Simon looked at the display again and frowned. “How did they get a lock when she wasn’t wearing her comm badge?”

Q and Shaw appeared to have the same suspicion and Q began to alter some more settings. The display improved some more: T’Shael’s body now appeared much clearer.

Robert frowned at Q. “Set it to display lower end data.”

Gradually, from top to bottom, the display altered. T’Shael’s sensor reading was now appearing fainter, and the corridor, which had little heat itself no longer appeared. T’Shael herself was represented in only light blue colors, but Shaw, Q and Robert had found what they were looking for and the senior crew looked shocked at what they saw.

Behind T’Shael was an even fainter figure, but noticeably humanoid. Replaying the footage, the figure could be seen following T’Shael for at least two minutes prior to her abduction. And after she disappeared, so did the other figure.

Shaw looked at Q.

“Cloaks,” Melhall commented.

“The intruder had already been captured by then. That can’t be the same man,” Shaw acknowledged.

“So he’s not alone,” Dexter said as he entered the room.

Q finished looking through the thermal data from the time of the abduction. “Well there’s no more thermal evidence of transporter activity on the ship at that point, so wherever she was taken to was not anywhere on the Lone Wolf.”

“I want to meet this intruder of ours,” Shaw said rather irritated.

Dexter interrupted. “I’m sure you do.” He looked at Shaw knowingly. Simon looked back, with a curious expression. As the meeting broke up, Commander Rynn again reiterated that the top priority was recovering the Captain, and warned everyone to be on guard. There seemed to be little about this situation that could be trusted. The officers returned to their business; Shaw and Dexter left for the brig.

As the Senior Staff all returned to their duty stations, Max and Caring pulled back the Jeffrey tube panel. With the power still down, the turbolifts were not working, which meant the only way to move between decks, was the long, hard way.

“I’m not sure I like the idea of little cloaked men running round the ship,” Caring whispered as they began the climb to sickbay.

Max nodded his head in agreement. “Who knows what they could do, maybe even take over the ship.”

The two officers continued this discussion of what if scenarios until they reached sickbay.

The large room was still in darkness; some of the wall panels gave limited light, but not nearly enough to be able to see clearly. Pulling out his torch, Max lit the room. As he waved the light around to inspect his sickbay, the torch moved over his computer console.

“I wonder,” he said to himself.

“Doc?” Caring asked, not too sure if Max was speaking to himself or not.

“Q said we should be able to access some computer functions without drawing attention. I wonder if we could check the Federation database, try and discover a bit more about our intruder.”

“Doc, how many members of the Federation do you think are going to match the basic description we have of him?”

Max nodded his head in agreement before continuing to explain his idea. “Probably thousands, but do you remember when we were searching the crew records? We obtained an image of the man. If we scan that through the system, we may get something, even if it’s only a name.”

“I guess so,” Caring agreed as the two medical officers got to work.

Shaw and Dexter had a long crawl through the Jeffries tubes before they got to the brig. On the way, they discussed the mysterious cloaked man from the thermal footage.

“You think he’s the only one?” Dexter questioned.

Shaw replied. “It’s possible.” Shaw began to crank open a hatch within the Jeffries tube. “If there are any more, we don’t want them running amuck on our ship. We’ve got to be ready for whatever’s going to happen on the rest of this mission, and that could be anything.”

The two continued down the now open hatch, and were soon at the appropriate exit. After a short walk down the corridors, they were outside the brig, Shaw entered first, followed by Dexter.

Shaw raised his torch to look around the dark, powerless brig. On the far side, one of the cells had been rigged with bars. With power down, force fields were impossible. In this cell was the intruder. As Shaw walked over to the cell, he shone his torch upon the prisoner, who turned towards him. This was the first time Shaw had a chance to see the mysterious ginger haired intruder, and to Shaw’s surprise the face was familiar. From behind the bars, this man was the same man who over ten years earlier had stood side by side with Shaw and Dexter, in a photograph. A photograph that Shaw kept in his quarters, from a time when they had all been part of a six-man Special Service team: division of Section 31.

“I wondered what you’d amount to in life. So what have you been up to? Sneak around a lot of ships do you?”

The prisoner let out a tired laugh, “Simon, what do you really think you’re going to accomplish with sarcasm? Besides, we both know I could find a way out of this room in under a minute!”

Simon looked at him with contempt. “Well, for one thing, Ryan, I doubt that. Don’t forget you’re not the pro you like to think you are.”

The prisoner, Ryan, looked back over to Shaw. “Well I’m the one who’s had ten years in this game, while this is, what, your first commission in ten years. Mason trained us to be great men and you’re just another security officer, on just another starship. What do you think Pete would think if he saw what you’ve done with your life?” Ryan had a hint of a sarcastic smile on his face.

“Yeah well, Mason’s dead,” Shaw replied.

Ryan responded quickly. “And whose fault is that?”

This angered the CTSO. “What are you doing on this ship?”

Ryan remained silent.

Shaw continued, “There are two options. Either you’re working for Section 31 and Maximus, which is impossible because all of us,” Simon indicated to the three of them, “were banned from future duty in Special Service after the rest of the team was killed on Cardassia. So that leaves you with mercenary work. Who are you working for Ryan? Our Ferengi friends out there?”

Ryan was getting frustrated. “You know you can’t make me talk.”

Shaw continued his questioning. “Who are you working with?”

Ryan again remained silent.

“What about the cloaked man? And the MX-12s?”

Now Shaw could see he had cracked the armor. Ryan was trying to cover up his surprise that Shaw knew about these, but his surprise was still apparent. Simon smiled slightly. He had an angle on Ryan to start an interrogation; he sat on a chair just outside the cell.

Q walked on to the bridge, and turned to the temporary captain.

“My intention was to transfer engineering control to the bridge to allow quicker reaction times once the shutdown was over.”

“Yes, I see where you’re going there, Q,” Rynn replied, “It looks like the shutdown will be in place throughout the mission. The quicker reaction times will be highly useful in this situation.”

Sp1ke77 cut in and indicated a wall panel. “You can transfer to that one, Q.”

“Right then,” he said, walking over to it. “I’ll start right away.”

Q brought the panel online and worked quickly to transfer engineering control to the bridge.

“Q to engineering. I’ll be operating from the bridge from now on.”

“Understood, sir,” came the reply.

Q then turned back to the panel and pulled up everything he could on the Jem’Hadar shrouds, with the thermal sensor images running to one side. He then set about taking down these cloaks in the same way he’d taken down the MX-12s.

As he thought about it, he suddenly realized. The MX-12s. He quickly dug up everything they had found out about the mini-cloaks on the surveillance devices. There was a good chance they could be using the same technology.

T’Shael was held to a chair by a force field, but she was not isolated in a cell as she had expected she would be. She was right on the bridge of the Ferengi ship and although not able to move, she could at least follow what was going on. It seemed like Mason wanted to have her right by him. Whatever he had planned, he wanted her to be able to observe everything. Well, everything meant, at the moment, mostly waiting. Not much was happening on the Ferengi ship, as Mason had said they had to wait for the Lone Wolf to find the Borg device first, before they could do anything. T’Shael assumed that he had kidnapped her in order to use her to blackmail the crew: an exchange of the Captain for the device.

But Maximus would not let that happen. The crew was probably already working on a way to rescue her, but if that should fail Starfleet did not negotiate with terrorists.

T’Shael gazed at Mason for a while. He was in thought over his panel, probably going over the scans of the debris field. Although he seemed to be slightly mad, he was no fool. He must know a Starfleet captain would rather die than let a very important device fall into the wrong hands. So maybe there was another reason yet why he had kidnapped her.

For a while she was observing the Ferengi. Curiosity stirred in her. How had they managed to get into the debris field? Even the Lone Wolf, with the aid of Maximus, had had a very difficult time getting passed the drones. It was a sheer impossible thing to do. And yet they were here. When she saw one of the Ferengi not far away from her chair staring at her, she thought she would simply ask them. Her clear voice almost echoed through the mostly quiet bridge where usually only the beeping of consoles and occasional whispered conversations between crewmembers were to be heard.

“How did you get passed the drones?” she simply asked. Within an instant all eyes turned to her. The Ferengi she had addressed was startled and looked uncertainly to his superiors.

The first officer replied with a sharp tone. “That is none of your business Starfleet,”

The DaiMon then spoke up after a quick look to Mason. “It won’t bring her any profit if she knows, so it won’t hurt to tell. If she should return and tell the story it will make us famous.” he said with a toothy grin. “And that is good for profit.”

Mason didn’t seem to mind him telling the story. Besides, it would shorten the waiting time a bit and he was tired of waiting.

“Actually we did not get passed the drones,” the DaiMon said. “We were here before the drones were installed.”

T’Shael couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “But that was over twenty years ago! They must have been placed the drones shortly after the battle to prevent people like you from robbing Starfleet property.”

“21 to be exact. And we were here already,” he said proudly. “I’ve always had good ears to let me know where there was profit. We were in the field only a very short time after the battle to collect all that precious technology that was still usable. But then they placed the drones...”

“And you couldn’t get back out, so you’re still here after all those years. A miracle you could survive for so long.” T’Shael said.

“The debris field proved to be very profitable,” the DaiMon said. “There is enough dilithium and deuterium to get energy for years. And there are so many other things we’ve found that we will make profit of very soon. We will be richer than the Nagus.”

“If those drones don’t blow you up when you try to get out.”

“Oh they won’t,” Mason now interrupted. “I have enough data on the drones now that I can lead my desperate friends out of here. Once I have what I want.”

T’Shael reflected for a while about what she had heard. It was quite impressive that the Ferengi had been able to survive here for such a long time, plundering the huge debris field, without going insane from being isolated for years. The longing for the profit must really be very high. And for Mason, they were perfect to use for his plans. She guessed that he had somehow known the Ferengi were here and he would be able to use them for his purpose. No, there wouldn’t be a way to get the Ferengi on her side. She would have to wait to find another weakness in Mason’s plan.

Pulling up information on the wall panel, Q was developing a slight headache. He had pulled up everything they had gathered on the MX-12s, along with all Starfleet data on Jem’Hadar shrouds.

“Sp1ke77, could you give me a hand here? I could use another brain.”

“Sure, be right there,” he replied, walking over. “Give me something to do.”

He joined Q at the panel and looked over what was displayed. He saved a few items and started pulling up some other information. The two of them talked in general mumbles, points and agreements.

For quite some time they continued in this manner, looking for a way around the cloaks, when Sp1ke77 saw something out of the corner of his eye.

He fell silent mid-sentence and looked up at the corner of the panel, where the thermal imaging of the corridor where the Captain went missing was running.

“What is it?” Q asked, following his stare and looking up at the thermal imaging.

Without answering, Sp1ke77 ran some commands into the panel and changed the scan to a different area of the ship. The next section from the one they had been concentrating on.

Q realized what he was looking for and grabbed his tricorder, working it quickly with information from the panel. Soon, Sp1ke77 found what he was looking for, as a thermal image moved across the screen, though fainter than it should be, signifying a cloaked man.

“Let’s go,” Q said, grabbing a phaser from a weapons locker on his way to the Jeffries tube.

Sp1ke77 was right behind him. “Captain, you might want to have a look at this,” he said, indicating the panel, and Rynn rose to have a look as the engineer and science officer left the bridge.

After a short while of going through some dark and sinister J-tubes, they both arrived to the area where they detected the cloaked man.

“Q,” called Sp1ke77, “cover me.”

Q said nodded and Sp1ke77 moved on.

A few corridors down, Sp1ke77 fell to his knees, grabbing his head with both hands, in deep pain. Q ran over, and tried to calm the commander down. But as he turned to Sp1ke77, he saw blood stream down from his eyes and from the implants he had.

“Sp1ke77! What’s happening to you?” Q asked, a little frightened.

The commander, blinded by the blood in his eyes grabbed Q’s uniform with one hand and said, “Warn Maximus…implants…activated…they are…here…” He fell to the floor. “They are here!” screamed Sp1ke77 before past out in pain.

“Q to Dr. Richards!” called Q through the comm badge. “Officer down!”

Chapter 9

U.S.S. Lone Wolf

Wolf 359

Inner Perimeter

Astrometrics Lab 1

Shaw made his way to Astrometrics, via the now standard routes through Jeffries tubes and dark as death corridors. He paused for a moment at the door to Astrometrics. He didn’t like the man who had nested in here, controlling the mission with no official authority to do so. Shaw entered Astrometrics. In the shadows, Maximus briskly turned his head from a panel, towards Shaw, his eyes almost looked right through him. For a single, old, man, his stare was quite terrifying. Made ever more abstract by the only source of illumination being the green hue given off by the panel in front of Maximus. After a moment of silence, which seemed like minutes, Shaw delivered the message he was carrying from Sp1ke77.

“Commander Sp1ke77 believes there may be a Borg presence in the sector. His implants have become active, he’s partially sedated in sickbay right now.” He didn’t waste any time breaking the news. He didn’t like the fact that after the Captain’s abduction, Maximus had gotten an even stronger foothold on command of the Lone Wolf.

Maximus turned back to his panel and continued working, “That’s…disappointing.”

The conversation appeared to have ended there. Even this managed to anger Shaw. The way he seemed to be running the whole situation himself, with no regard for the crew of the ship.

“What would you like me to do about it…sir?” Shaw said this last part with an added, sarcastic emphasis.

Maximus appeared not to break his concentration from the panel.

Shaw waited for a response. He didn’t get one.

“Well?”

The agent stopped tapping his panel. “I’ll inform you should your services be required.”

Shaw’s dislike of Maximus had just reached an entirely new level. “You’ll inform—,” Shaw cut his own sentence off, his eyes nearly bugging out of his head. “You might not give a damn about this ship or its crew. Your mission is to find whatever in hell’s out there. And you know what? I’m not even going to pretend to know what the hell that is, because you don’t seem to want us to know. But my job is to ensure the safety of this crew, so if Borg or any other surprises turn up, I don’t care about your mission, I will defend this ship. So if Sp1ke77 says there’s Borg out there, I’m inclined to act upon that, even if you’re not.”

After a pause, Maximus still seemed indifferent to Shaw’s display of frustration. He went on, “I’m going to distribute weapons amongst the crew. Whatever you’re not telling us about, we’re going to be ready for it.” Simon’s tone was a calm aggression now, telling Maximus his intentions was merely a formality. Shaw didn’t recognize Maximus’ authority to object should he do so. Maximus realized this, and allowed Shaw to make his intended preparations.

A few minutes later, Shaw was in the armory, using a card to unlock weapons cabinets. As he removed the weapons, he distributed them amongst a few crew who were present, mostly security officers, but a few were from other departments.

“These type-2 hand phasers have been upgraded with I-mod technology. This should give them an endless remodulation with every fire, so the Borg can’t adapt to them. But they haven’t been field-tested. ”

A few uninformed officers were disturbed to hear the Borg mentioned. After decades of confrontations, they still struck fear in most Starfleet officers. Shaw pulled out another piece of equipment from the cabinets.

“These are Multi-Phasic hand-grenades. Don’t worry about the name. Just know that they’ll blow the crap outta any Borg within a few meters.”

The adapted phasers and grenades were distributed amongst those present, then, some security officers took crates of weapons to be distributed throughout the rest of the ship.

Shaw was making his way out when he saw Caring in the crowd. She didn’t need to be an empath to see he was angry with the situation this stranger had put them in. Simon arrived in the brig. Even before he got through the doors, he could tell something was very wrong. Looking at the cell the prisoner was supposed to be in confirmed it. Dexter was gone, the cell door was wide open and their prisoner, Ryan, was gone.

While most of the crew was preoccupied with getting prepared for a Borg attack, no one noticed that Maximus had left Astrometrics doors. And he had locked the doors. One of the reasons no one noticed he’d gone was because of the odd means he had left by: a site-to-site transport.

In sickbay, Dr. Richards was keeping an ever-watchful eye over his newest patient. “Poor guy,” said the Doctor looking at Sp1ke77 “He’s in pain.”

Suddenly, he got a call to an emergency three decks down. The good doctor looked at the biobed to check Sp1ke77’s latest stats, grabbed a portable med-kit and left the room in a hurry.

Immediately after he left, Maximus materialized next to Sp1ke77’s bed.

“Hang on, my old friend. I’ll take care of you,” says Maximus, passing his hands through the Commander’s hair as if he were his own son.

He opened a small box and grabbed a strange-looking hypospray from inside. It held a dark, green liquid. He injected Sp1ke77 with the drug. Nothing happened in the few seconds after, but suddenly, Sp1ke77 started convulsing and twisting his body in pain. Then, it stops, as if he were dead.

Maximus approached the now still man and remove his comm badge, replacing it with a different comm badge similar to the roman-like symbol he has on his “tricorder.”

Suddenly, the door opened and Dr. Richards entered, mad as hell. The supposed emergency was a fake. He looked at the biobed and his mouth nearly hit the floor. It was empty!

“Max to Shaw,” called Max tapping on his badge. “Commander Sp1ke77 has disappeared. I have his comm badge, but there is no sign of him.”

Shaw heard the message. “Acknowledged, Doctor.” He was starting to go crazy. Now he had a cloaked intruder, and three missing crewmembers. Sweet Jesus. What else was going to happen?

He climbed out of a Jeffries tube onto the bridge to deliver the news of Sp1ke77’s disappearance to the rest of the senior crew in person. He was slightly distracted though when he put his hand to his hip and found his tricorder missing.

He whirled around to look back towards the tube hatch he had just emerged from, seeing instead Q standing there in deep concentration, holding a tool in one hand and working on what was unmistakably the CTSO’s tricorder.

“How the...” he trailed off.

“Hmm?” Q said, looking up. “Oh, this. Sorry, no time for explanations,” he said. Then, quickly checked the tricorder over before handing it back. He then walked over to the panel which engineering was now operating out of and input his newly acquired data.

Shaw watched him do this with a look of curiosity on his face, before suddenly remembering why he was here.

“Captain,” he said, turning to Commander Rynn. “I have some bad news. I’m afraid Sp1ke77 and Dexter are both missing. Sp1ke77 is without his comm badge.”

“Contact Maximus immediately,” she ordered, but before Shaw could carry out this order Q interrupted.

“Don’t bother. He’s not on board.”

“Commander?” Simon enquired.

“I checked as soon as you said told us the news and neither Maximus’s or Sp1ke77’s biosigns are on board. Can’t look further into the field with the power available I’m afraid. Dexter, unfortunately, is less obvious. I could search for Sp1ke77’s implants and for Maximus by age, but Dexter blends in too much to distinguish if he’s here or not, not without more power.”

“I don’t know what happened in the brig. Both Dexter and the prisoner are gone, and the cell is open. But from the doc’s report, Sp1ke77 must have been transported off.”

He strode quickly to a panel from where he accessed transporter records. They showed the most recent transports as: Captain T’Shael and one unidentified. Endpoint unknown. Maximus. Endpoint sickbay. Maximus and Commander Sp1ke77. Endpoint unknown. As he read this, the bridge was silent. The remaining senior crew was frozen in various poses across the bridge.

Eventually, Q moved and quietly said, “Enough.” He worked the panel once more, before saying, again quietly, “Transport inhibitors are active throughout the ship. Locked out to the personal security codes of Simon, Captain Rynn and myself.”

“Right, umm, what were you working on earlier, Q?” Shaw said, once again breaking the uneasy silence.

“Ah, yes,” the engineer said, being brought back to the task at hand. “Tachyon particles. I used the data from your tricorder to determine exactly what I needed to know. Tachyon particles will disrupt the cloaks. Unfortunately, they don’t work the same way as the MX-12 cloaks. Seems they didn’t underestimate us as much as we thought.”

“So,” said Robert. “We just need to flood the ship with tachyon particles?”

“Theoretically yes, as long as they don’t have any damaging physiological effects. I’ll have to check with the doctor,” Q answered. “The other thing,” he continued, “ is that I’ve studied the spatial effects of the battle on the surrounding area. Due to the heavy fire, the area works like a nebula for tachyon sweeps.”

“You mean we could sweep the area and reveal any cloaked ships?”

“Exactly, Captain. But it would need more power.”

“If we took the comm system offline, we could redirect power and it’d be back up in about twenty seconds,” said Robert.

“Sounds good, people,” concluded Rynn. “Go for it.”

After the Ferengi’s explanation on how they got into the debris field, things turned quiet again. It didn’t seem as though they would give any more information that T’Shael might use to her advantage. But as long as she was tied to her chair with the invisible force field, she could not have done anything anyway. All she could do was observe, and wait for a chance to change the current situation, or for a security team from the Lone Wolf. She hated to sit there, not being able to do anything. She liked to have control over the situation and right now she had no control at all. In her mind, she cursed Mason for his treacherous action, although on the outside she remained calm and didn’t show any emotions. She couldn’t quite fit him into a common criminal group. He was a specialist, that was obvious, not a common thief who looked for something valuable to sell. No, he was a man looking for revenge; she could see that in his eyes. Most likely, he knew Maximus, had been in Section 31 himself but had left for whatever reason. And also, she had learned that he knew Lieutenant Commander Shaw. She was not sure what connection there had been between the two, but she had overheard Mason talking to the Ferengi about him, and it wasn’t just because Shaw was the security chief on board. It seemed Mason had known Shaw for quite a while. Her security officer would have to do a lot of explaining.

Suddenly, there was anxiety stirring on the bridge.

“DaiMon,” a young Ferengi said, his voice was filled with fear. “There’s a transwarp conduit opening just outside the field. The Borg...”

His last words almost created chaos on the bridge. The Ferengi were running around, screaming. There had been nothing they had feared more than the Borg showing up.

It was Mason who finally got everyone back to order. “Will you all shut up,” he yelled furiously. “It will take the Borg a while to get in here. They have to get passed the drones as well. Maybe they won’t even make it. But Starfleet over there must have noticed them too, and now they are forced to act. Keep a constant scan of their ship, and tell me of even the slightest action!” he ordered the scared Ferengi.

Two minutes later the Ferengi watching the sensors, found something. “Sir, there’s a shuttle leaving the Lone Wolf,” he reported.

“Any life signs?” Mason asked.

“No, sir. It appears to be remote controlled.”

“Strange,” Mason said. “Where is it heading to?”

“To the debris of the ship formerly known as U.S.S. Saratoga. Sir, two life signs just appeared in one of the preserved decks of the Saratoga that still has minimal life support.”

“Maximus,” Mason hissed. “And probably some Starfleet officer. Time for action! I will take your small shuttle that I have fitted out with one of my clever cloaks. As soon as I have the device I will come back and get all of us out of here. Then you will get thirty percent of the profit.”

“We had agreed on fifty,” the DaiMon said.

“I’m quite sure it was thirty percent. Of course, I can just take the shuttle and leave without you after I have what I want,” Mason threatened. “A bit more difficult to escape but it might be worth the profit.”

“No you can’t,” the DaiMon replied, grinning. “We have made sure that the shuttle doesn’t have warp capability. You need us to get out of here just as we need you. And we get fifty percent of the profit.”

“Sneaky little Ferengi,” Mason said, furiously but then decided he had no time to argue and left for the shuttle.

A few minutes later T’Shael saw on the screen how the little shuttle left the ship and then cloaked, leaving only the billions of debris pieces out there visible.

Rynn sat in the captain’s chair. “Begin the tachyon sweep.”

Q nodded, “Aye, Captain.” He pressed a button on his panel and there was a slight flutter in the dim, backup lighting. The tachyon sweep was underway.

Shaw stood at the tactical console. “Captain, there’s a cloaked shuttle, Ferengi, headed away from the Ferengi vessel.”

Rynn pondered. “Where is it going?”

Shaw continued. “I’m not sure yet. But there is one life sign on board…human!”

Everyone present was frowning by this point.

Within moments, the scan was over and Q began to analyze the data, to try and plot the shuttle’s course.

Shaw was about to speak to Rynn, when something very alarming occurred. The familiar darkness, their shroud against the drones, lifted, the lights, panels and familiar background noises returned. Both Q and Shaw scrambled at their control panels, squinting in the light that had lived without for days.

T’Shael waited through another half an hour of the silence on the Ferengi bridge, when the DaiMon approached her, with a typical Ferengi menacing expression. “Captain, I do hope your, ‘accommodations’ have been satisfactory,” the little man’s face grinned as though he were actually funny. “However, now, you must pay for our hospitality.” The Ferengi’s grin grew wider. “We want one thing from you…transponder codes.”

T’Shael was stunned by this ridiculous request, she responded quickly. “Starfleet captains are not in the habit of exchanging transponder codes for their own personal freedom.”

The DaiMon leaned into her and smiled. “What about in exchange for your life?” He pulled out a Ferengi disruptor weapon.

T’Shael looked at the weapon which was being displayed directly in front of her face. “...Nor, in exchange for their lives.” T’Shael’s cold, Vulcan, emotionless side was showing through. She felt this was the best way to deal with hostilities.

The DaiMon moved away, still carrying his disruptor. “What about…his life?”

At this point, Ryan escorted Dexter onto the bridge. T’Shael recognized him as the ginger-haired intruder. Dexter’s hands were bound behind his back and he was forced to kneel about one meter in front of T’Shael. The DaiMon placed his disruptor directly against his head and began a countdown. “Three.”

“Starfleet captains are given strict guidelines on dealing with terrorists and hostage takers, the greater good must always be satisfied.”

“Two.”

T’Shael continued to try and reason with the man. Even though she would die before telling them anything, she’d just as soon live if she could. “Killing a Starfleet officer isn’t going to gain you anything. You’ll loose a hostage, and the Lone Wolf would never let you get out of this system alive.”

The DaiMon paused and looked at her. “What about the preservation of life?”

T’Shael looked right into the Ferengi. She had her opening. “I’m talking about preserving life. What you could do with those transponder codes could endanger every person on that ship.”

“What if I was to tell you Maximus was a rogue Section 31 agent, working for the Breen Empire? That would change your understanding wouldn’t it?”

T’Shael was disturbed about this prospect. But handing over transponder codes was still ludicrous. “I will not give you those codes.”

Dexter looked right into T’Shael’s eyes. He wasn’t saying a word, but his eyes were pleading with her.

“One,” the DaiMon finished. “Too bad. We could have worked well as a team.” He pulled the trigger.

And nothing happened. Dexter remained kneeling and the DaiMon began laughing, cackling in a very Ferengi way. Dexter stopped him.

“I told you she wouldn’t give us the codes. This has just been a waste of time.”

T’Shael was confused as to what Dexter was talking about. She wasn’t for long, though. He was going to finish his thought.

Dexter continued. “You’re just another stupid Ferengi aren’t you?” His tone was sinister. He stood up and surprisingly freed himself from his restraints. “We’ll have to go with my plan.”

T’Shael didn’t like what she was hearing.

Dexter pointed at her. “Does she still have to be here?”

The Vulcan responded, “Why? Your conscience bothering you?”

Dexter smiled at the Captain. It was a sinister smile. “No, Captain, it isn’t. I have no need for a conscience, because by this time tomorrow, I will be richer than God!” Dexter turned to the DaiMon, while he pushed a Ferengi officer away from a panel. “I can get you access to the Lone Wolf’s TacSec main-frame. It’s on the backbone of the computer network. It’ll take longer, and they’d be able to track it back to this ship.”

The DaiMon was outraged. “That’s absurd. Just let a Federation battleship know we’re here, accessing their systems?”

Dexter had little patience for the Ferengi. “What exactly do you think they can do about it? By the time they get a plan together, the Borg will be all over them. In a few minutes, they’ll just be another one of Wolf 359’s floating hunks of debris.”

Dexter finished tapping away at the panel. “There…it’s done. Captain, you should have given him the codes. I promise you it would have been a much prettier end than this.”

Shaw shouted out. “Our computers have been accessed remotely, through one of the sub-matrixes.”

Q continued the report. “The security sub-matrix. Lieutenant Dexter’s clearance.” Shaw froze, not believing what he’d just heard Q say amongst the confusion of the bridge

With a final tap, Q reinitiated the shutdown, and lights and panels once again disappeared.

Shaw spoke softly, “The…the remote access was traced back to the Ferengi vessel.” Although he didn’t want to believe Dexter had switched sides, it explained a lot of things, like the escape from the brig for one. “If that’s where he is, it’s most likely where the Captain is too.”

Rynn could not believe this news either, but continued with business. “Did any of the drones detect us?”

Shaw replied. “There’s no way to tell. But sir, I believe I may have seen another vessel. A Borg cube. Looks like Sp1ke77 was right.”

At the outskirts of the sector, the Borg ship suddenly came to life; its sinister character showing itself as it slowly set on a new course, directly for the U.S.S. Lone Wolf.

“Mr. Shaw, I think deleting Dexter’s security codes may work.”

“Aye, Captain,” the CTSO replied. “Already halfway there.”

“I’m transmitting the new prefix code to your consoles now. I’ve just changed it but Dexter’s gonna know it,” Q said, while working the panel.

The bridge officers all looked down at their consoles and memorized the new prefix code. As they did this, Q grabbed his tricorder and phaser and headed for a tube hatch.

“Captain,” he said, “can you manage without me for a few minutes?”

“Umm, yes I suppose. Where are you going?” she replied.

“The brig, then sensor control,” Q said. He then crawled into the tube. He crawled quickly, coming out at a corridor near the brig.

He spent several minutes going over the area before finding what he was looking for. A few minutes ago this would have been a shock, now it was exactly what he expected: the door had been opened with Dexter’s security card.

Having discovered this, he left and headed for the main sensor control. Here he worked panels, opened hatches, and switched keys. Eventually, he had completed his task here and left. This time, he headed for Astrometrics.

But when he got there, he found the door locked. Nothing he tried could open it. So, needing to get in there, he returned to the old-fashioned methods and blew the door apart with his phaser. Once inside, he contacted the bridge, asking them to switch the main screen to the Astrometrics display. Once done, he operated the controls to perform a high-speed total sensor sweep, knowing it would be over before the drones noticed them.

The results were displayed on the screen. Now they knew so much more. Sp1ke77 and Maximus were on the wreck of the Saratoga, Ryan, Dexter and the Captain were on the Ferengi ship. An automated shuttle, from their own bay, and a cloaked Ferengi shuttle were both headed for the Saratoga. And the Borg cube was heading for the Lone Wolf.

But, he thought, that wouldn’t affect them for a while. The cube was some time away, and besides even if they got past the drones, those five Romulan Warbirds were moving to intercept it.

He had just climbed back into the Jeffries tube when he stopped, realizing he hadn’t investigated why the door was locked. He resolved to check it out later, and continued crawling through the tube. About thirty seconds later he stopped dead again, and said aloud. “Wait a minute, Romulan Warbirds!?”

Chapter 10

Remains of U.S.S. Saratoga

Wolf 359

Inner Perimeter

Sp1ke77 slowly awakened from a troubled dream.

He looked around, still stunned, and saw Maximus standing still on a bench, looking at that damn strange “tricorder.”

“Where am I?” asked the Commander, holding his head in pain.

Maximus looked at him, and then returned his attention back to what he was doing. “Relax my friend. The pain will soon be gone.”

“What happened?” asked Sp1ke77.

“When the Borg arrived, they activated all sleeping Borg technology around here. They have a special device that activates all their technology for retrieval purposes, including you. I gave you a serum that was used when we found you in that moon. You gave me a lot of headaches trying to develop that miraculous serum. But it saved your life,” explained Maximus. He was doing something that he had never done: some explaining.

“Huh?” replied Sp1ke77. “Could you translate that?”

Maximus looked at him. “The garbage men. They came to pick up their garbage.” Maximus told the science officer. “You. But the serum I gave you put those implants back to sleep again. It will take a while for the Borg to be able to revive them again.”

Sp1ke77 fell back asleep.

Some hours passed by. When the Commander awoke, the pain was gone and he watched Maximus give him another shot.

“What is that?” asked Sp1ke77, frightened with the memories of the deep pain.

“Relax my friend. It’s only adrenaline. My serum is miraculous, but not perfect. So you need this, or you’ll have muscular collapse,” said Maximus, with his irritating whisper. “Now, get up and start working on the shuttle on Deck 4. I need it ready in fifteen minutes. You have all the tools you need in there.”

Sp1ke77 stood up and walked to the door, heading to the deck where the shuttle was docked.

He was still scratching his head and thinking about how the hell he had put himself into that situation. A bright, young engineer, working for Section 31, developing highly secret weapons and warp engines and testing some crazy theories on transwarp drives. But ambition was stronger. And the desire to get his butt in a starship, and fly across the galaxy was strong. Not even situations like this made him regret the decision of leaving Section 31’s Xenotech Research & Development Lab in exchange for a starship.

When Sp1ke77 looked up, he found himself near the warp core. So many years studying starships had paid off. He could walk through any of them with his eyes closed.

The commander smiled. He had an idea. A rigged warp core is always a good last-resort weapon. So he rigged the core as quickly as possible and headed to the shuttle.

Meanwhile, Maximus had located the device and was locking his coordinates in his “tricorder.” What he didn’t know about was that, his archenemy was cloaked near the Saratoga, waiting for a chance to steal the device before Maximus could get it.

Great! Just great! Section 31 renegade spies, rogue crewmembers, Ferengi, the Borg perimeter drones... Just the kind of things Sp1ke77 would put in a blender when making a milkshake. This commander was getting tired of having his butt kicked every time his cousins (the Borg) showed up. He was getting a trigger-happy feeling. And fitting that shuttle was giving him a lot of joy. Some of that technology he had developed himself. So Sp1ke77 was feeling a little bit more at home. Ah, home sweet home. He removed the safety precautions, boosted the power on the weapons. Replacing another power pack in one area and the shuttle was becoming ten times more powerful than Admiral Janeway’s shuttle when she faced the Borg back in the Delta Quadrant. Someone was going to have a big surprise.

“Sp1ke77…is it ready?” asked Maximus.

“Almost…I need you here now, Maximus,” replied Sp1ke77.

Maximus closed his “tricorder” and took it on his way to the shuttle.

A few minutes later, and after some instructions and planning by both, the shuttle left the Saratoga and was on its way to retrieve the device. Unbeknownst to them, a cloaked shuttle followed them to their new destination.

Getting back to the bridge, Q reported his findings in the brig, and then how he had modified the sensor arrays to a full burst scan.

He then returned to his station, but before he got there, Captain Rynn turned to him and said, “Why was that workstation on in Astrometrics?”

This confused Q. He wasn’t aware that there was a panel on in Astrometrics, but Rynn had clearly seen something from the camera view of Astrometrics that he hadn’t seen in his rush.

Pulling up the camera view again, he spotted the console. He remotely accessed and took a look around what was on it. It didn’t take long to see why there was a high level lockout on the door. Which reminded him.

“Maintenance team to Astrometrics. Uh, small, umm, problem with the door.”

“Aye, sir,”

Back on the console, Q had found a few alterations to the sensor array. Maximus must have made them, just to make them more worried, apparently. This man confused Q. He didn’t underestimate them entirely, prepared for them to make a scan to reveal all, cloaked or not, but did not expect them to break down a door, or make the discovery that he had altered the sensors to show a Romulan fleet that did not exist...strange.

Dexter’s face turned from grin to complete anger as he was working on intruding into the Lone Wolf’s systems. Getting in hadn’t been a problem, and he had been able to activate the systems. But the crew had discovered it quickly. He secretly had to congratulate them; they were working very efficiently under these circumstances. They had changed the prefix code as well; there was no way now he could intrude again. But it wouldn’t be necessary. Although the drones hadn’t detected the ship, the Borg had. Now there would be no escape for them. He briefly felt sorry for his former friend Shaw. They had been a good team. But now he had other priorities, being rich sounded so much better than being dead. Shaw could have changed sides as well, they could have been the old team reunited. But of course he would not do that. Too bad for him.

T’Shael was watching Dexter and could sense what was going on in his mind. It was a pity that the thought of quick money corrupted even a Starfleet officer. A very good officer he was, too. But now there was no hope left. Her crew, the Borg, or Maximus, maybe even Mason, who probably wouldn’t want to share his profit, one of them would see to it that he didn’t get away with what he was doing. He would end up dead or spending a lifetime in prison. As a former Section 31 agent, that much she now knew about him, Shaw, Ryan and Mason, he should know that there was no way to get away. But the money blinded him too much. She was glad Shaw hadn’t been as foolish as the other three.

The Borg cube started to make its way into the debris field. It got to the first drone, unprepared, and it fired at the cube immediately. It didn’t have the capability of destroying it, but it did quite a bit of damage. The Borg moved on, immediately starting with regeneration and adapting their systems to the new threat so they could get passed the next drone more quickly, taking much less damage. And so they went on, passing through the lines of drones, although being damaged they could not be stopped, and so they were getting closer to the one Starfleet ship that was not debris like all the others...

Captain Rynn had gathered what was left of her senior staff to decide on further actions. She began by briefly summarizing what they knew. “We have three problems to face. One of them is that bloody device that we still don’t know anything about. We will leave that to Maximus and Sp1ke77. I doubt that we can do anything there. That leaves us with the Borg out there, and our Ferengi friends and dear Mr. Dexter who is holding the Captain hostage.” She now turned towards Simon. “Commander Shaw, you know Dexter and Ryan well. Therefore, I want you to work on a plan to get the Captain out of their hands. Max will help you. Just get the Captain out of there alive, with whatever means necessary. Dexter and Ryan are traitors, do what you want with them,” she said with a lot of anger in her voice. On Bajor she had learned to despise traitors above anything else. “Q, Caring, we need to keep the Borg away from us. We can’t get involved in a fight in here, so we have to find a way to get rid of them before they have a chance to get rid of us. The drones don’t seem able to stop them, although they’ve weakened them. Maybe we could reprogram one of the drones to destroy the cube. Or we find another way, anything but a direct fight. Any suggestions are welcome.”

As most of the officers rose to get about their tasks, Q remained seated, deep in thought. A few seconds later, he came to his conclusion and stopped everyone from leaving. “Wait a minute everyone. What if we could get the Captain back and take care of both the Borg and the Ferengi all at once?”

Everyone returned to the table and stood leaning on chairs, looking at Q.

“We’re listening, Commander,” said Rynn.

“Well, ma’am,” the engineer said, “we could use the same technique that Maximus used to create those Romulan ships in order to make the Ferengi look like us.”

“Look like us?” Most of the officers looked slightly confused and Q realized his explanation had been less than brilliant.

“What I mean is,” he tried again, “we fly over, right next to the Ferengi ship, then shut down beyond sensor pickup. At the same time planting a sensor image of us on top of the Ferengi ship. The Borg will then attack the Ferengi and the second their shields are down, we shut down life support for thirty seconds and beam over the Captain.”

“Can you make that work? How safe is it?” Rynn questioned in the thorough way a captain should.

“I’ll need...probably two other good engineers. With those I would say a ninety percent success probability.”

From Rynn’s expression Q could tell she was worried about the other ten percent, but there was nothing much he could do about that.

“What do you want done with Dexter and Ryan? We could run parallel transports if you want and capture the pair of them.”

Rynn thought about the option. Q thought he saw a somewhat wicked look flash across her face as she said, “No, don’t waste the energy. Let them be assimilated. Now, what can we do with the cube after that?”

Q thought once more, but Shaw beat him to a solution.

“We can’t modify the drones with better weapons or shields or anything. But what if we modified them to use tactics and group against the cube as it leaves the debris field? We could get them all to congregate in one place and attack the cube.”

“Meanwhile we would be running off in the opposite direction!” Q finished.

“Sounds like a plan to me, ” Rynn said, “Let’s get to work.”

Caring was assigned to work with Shaw on modifying the drones, but before she left the briefing room she approached Rynn “Rynn, I know you are not fond of traitors but are you sure about letting Dexter and Ryan being assimilated. Maybe Section 31 would want them for information they may have about other traitors?”

“You may be right, Counselor. I just feel our top priority should be getting the Captain and the Lone Wolf out of this debris field, intact,” Rynn replied.

“That should be our first priority. But my name isn’t Caring for nothing. When you think about it, if I acted like my name all the time, then I’d be crying a lot as well.”

Rynn looked at Caring with a thoughtful look on her face. Then, she smiled and chuckled. “Leave it to you, Caring, to make me smile, even in the worst of times. Thanks. Now you’d better go help Shaw and I will think about the fate of our two traitors.”

“Aye, Captain,” Caring said as she left Rynn.

The ship was a flurry of activity, with officers everywhere working on different aspects of the plan. They were soon ready and Rynn gave the order to execute it.

Robert at the helm flew them over to the Ferengi ship, a silent shape moving through space. The Ferengi undoubtedly saw them move, but wouldn’t dare take action, as that would reveal their position.

As soon as they were in place, Q and two deputies began working the wall panels at the back of the bridge. The ship shutdown and planted an image of themselves on the Ferengi ship. With limited sensors, they would not see this sensor image on themselves.

The Borg obviously did though, and changed course appropriately. Everything was going well, until, the drones began moving into the debris field. An ill-informed junior officer must have sent the reprogramming too early, and now they were closing in on the cube.

The plan might still work though, Rynn thought to herself, as the cube had a decent head start.

The bridge officers could only watch as the cube began attacking the D’Kora-class starship. Soon after, the drones came into weapons range and began their assault. The Ferengi were forced to give up hiding and started joining in with the drones, but the cube managed to destroy most of the drones and take out the shield generators on the D’Kora before it was itself destroyed. The drones then turned and moved silently back to their stations.

Snapping back to life, Q turned back to the panel and attempted transport.

“Sir, I can’t get the Captain back, there’s a force field around her.”

“Options,” Rynn almost shouted.

“Assault teams. We storm the Ferengi, rescue the Captain and capture the traitors.” Shaw said this with a slight glint in his eye.

“Or we could contact the Ferengi government and get their version of a prefix code, but that would take some time and we have no guarantee that they will cooperate. I think assault teams would work better.” Q knew Simon had been looking forward to assaulting the D’Kora-class vessel.

“Mr. Shaw, prepare your assault,” the Captain ordered.

“Aye, Captain,” he said, with a wicked a grin.

“In the meantime, I recommend another full sensor sweep to keep us up to date on Sp1ke77 and the device,” Q suggested.

“Very well Q, you work on that.”

“Look, here they come,” Ryan said grinning at T’Shael. “A few more minutes and your ship will be history. I told you it would’ve been better to cooperate with us.”

T’Shael didn’t react, but simply watched the screen. She appeared absolutely calm on the outside, but on the inside she was not calm at all. She was trapped in a chair, a force field around her, while her ship was in mortal danger. Although she was confident that her crew had found a way out of this without her, there was still doubt. And even her Vulcan side hadn’t managed to push that away.

“The Federation ship is moving,” one of the Ferengi yelled, and everyone’s head turned to the screen.

“Running away won’t help them either,” Ryan said, still grinning.

“They aren’t running away,” the Ferengi replied. “They’re coming towards us!”

“What?” Dexter called out. “They must be up to something. We should get away from them.”

“Why?” Ryan replied. “The Borg will destroy them, while they still won’t see us.”

“The Borg are getting closer. The drones are attacking them, but I think they’ll make it through,” the Ferengi reported. “Sir, they are turning and moving towards us now!” he suddenly yelled in fear.

“What??” Dexter and Ryan yelled simultaneously. They stared at each other hatefully for a moment. “I said they were up to something,” Dexter hissed. “Activate weapons, fire at the cube.”

“No,” Ryan intervened. “Let’s get out of here, the Borg will attack the Federation ship instead.”

The Ferengi looked uncertainly from one to the other, not knowing what to do.

“Running away won’t help us either,” Dexter quoted Ryan. “Now attack, you fool of a Ferengi, if you don’t want to die.”

When the first salvo from the Borg ship hit the shield generator, the Ferengi finally decided he did not want to die and opened fire. Thanks to the damage the drones had already done the cube exploded in a great ball of fire.

Everyone sighed in relief. Only Ryan and Dexter quickly realized that their plan had failed and things now looked much worse for them. T’Shael was glad her crew had managed the situation, although she was not quite sure how they had done it. But she was sure it would make an interesting story.

“Now what are we going to do?” Ryan said. “The Starfleet ship’s still there, Mason’s out there somewhere and we have nothing, only that Captain. We should just kill her, before they come and get her and kill us. Without shields what are we to do?” He pulled out his phaser and aimed it at T’Shael.

“No you idiot,” Dexter yelled, and jumped at Ryan, taking his phaser down. “If you kill her, we are certainly dead. They’ll just blow up the whole ship. With her on board we still have a chance. They will try to get her out, but they can’t beam her out because of the force field. So we must assume they will send an assault team to get her. I’m quite sure Shaw will come. We better be prepared, with a plan that works this time,” he added furiously.

Chapter 11

U.S.S. Lone Wolf

Wolf 359

Inner Perimeter

Bridge

Rynn didn’t know what to think. It seemed that they were running out of options and the Captain was still missing. To top that off, Dexter and Spike77 had been captured or… Her eyes narrowed. Something was wrong here. And Caring had pointed it out. She reached up and rubbed her nose then shook her head. She was getting tired of sitting around. This was not good and she’d be damned if it was going to go on her record as losing a commanding officer. No, this was not good at all. She got up and started pacing the bridge. That gleam in Shaw’s eye almost made her want to jump up and do something violent. Everything on the ship was at the minimum operating power that they could muster and the darkness was getting on Rynn’s nerves. She reached up and rubbed her temples for a moment, then looked up at the rest of her bridge crew, sparse as it was. All her training and yet they were at an impasse. And why were things still running in Astrometrics?

She stopped, turned around and looked at the blank viewer and crossed her arms, placing one hand up and resting her chin on it in an askance stance. Who was it? she kept asking herself. Spike77 was the newest member of the crew. Everything started happening when he came on board. But Dexter, it seemed as though hardly anyone knew anything about him. Just Shaw and her. She lowered her hands and looked down to the gray slandered issue carpeting on the bridge. Then it hit her. A smile formed on her face. She was fed up with this. She turned around and said, “Lieutenant Melhall, you have the bridge.”

She went to her chair, grabbed her phaser, and picked up something else quickly before anyone else could say anything. Then she quickly left the bridge via the Jeffries tube.

After about fifteen minutes, she emerged from the Jeffries tube and stood up. Her hair was sticking to her face. She stood straight up and tugged on her black tunic, which seemed to be darker in this awful, dim lighting.

A beeping noise caught her attention and she raised her head, eyes locking on the door to the Astrometrics lab. It was partially open. She quietly walked over to the side of the door and carefully slid her head to the side and peered in. There was nothing there but one single comm panel on. Her brows furrowed and she pushed the doors open wide enough for her to get through. Looking around, she and made sure no one was hiding inside, then put away her phaser and tapped the console on the panel. What Rynn saw next surprised her to say the least.

That was when she turned around and climbed back into the Jeffries tube and went as fast as she could back to the bridge. When she got out she almost fell onto the floor. She quickly tumbled and did a half roll and landed on knee while propping the other foot up.

“Q,” she said as she stood up. “I think it’s time we took things into our own hands. I have the coordinates and I want you to use the information in this tricorder to beam it to the ship. Place it under lock and a force field.” Rynn turned around and then sat down in the Captain’s chair, then instantly got up again. “Oh, and find a way to send a signal to the beings that have the Captain after we get the…Borg equipment”

Q stood there, looking at her like she like she had a screw loose or something.

Rynn raised her head and looked at him since he hadn’t moved. “Portable transwarp conduit,” was all she said to him.

Q was stunned. A portable transwarp conduit. Now that would be an interesting piece of technology to have. No wonder Maximus as well as Mason were after it. It would have an enormous worth, and it could do a whole lot of damage if it fell into the wrong hands. The Borg transwarp net could be accessed from anywhere with this, meaning a ship could very easily vanish. It would be a very handy tool for thieves and pirates, or secret services.

“I’m scanning the coordinates you gave me,” Q told Rynn. “Must be where Maximus located the device. He probably left it for us in case something unexpected would have happened. But somehow I think if it could simply be beamed, Maximus or Mason would have gotten it already.”

“Probably,” Rynn nodded. “But it can’t hurt to try.”

Q nodded and proceeded with the order. “Sorry, sir. There’s a strong field around it. Not sure what it is, Borg technology obviously. But there’s no chance we can get through with our transporters.”

“Damn,” Rynn said. “Would have been interesting to see what this would have been worth to the Ferengi.”

“You didn’t mean to trade this against the Captain’s life, did you?” Q asked in disbelief.

“Of course not,” Rynn replied. “But I could have made them believe I would,” she added grinning. “Unfortunately we can’t wait until Maximus brings it back. Mr. Shaw, I’m afraid you will have to get the Captain out of there the conventional way.”

“You mean…by force?” Shaw asked grinning.

“You got it in one,” Rynn replied. “Q, I want you to work with Mr. Shaw. Getting the device is now up to Maximus, so the Captain is our priority. Get to work. Caring, Commander Melhall, and I will monitor from here and if necessary provide some help with the ship’s firing capabilities.”

Q and Shaw were looking over some schematics for the D’Kora-class vessels. Shaw pointed towards the display of the vessel on his panel.

“So we know she’s being held on the bridge.”

Q responded quickly. “Yes. It seems strange, though. The ship has a perfectly good brig. I suppose they don’t want to let her out of their site. The force field keeping her there, and stopping us from using transporters to retrieve her it seems, can only be deactivated onsite.”

Shaw put the plan in the simplest terms he could think of. “So we beam over, deactivate the shield, and beam back.”

Q smiled slightly. “Sounds about right.”

Shaw continued tapping at his console, after a few moments, he had selected four officers from the roster to join the assault team

“Q, I need an engineer, I have a feeling that shield might not be as straight forward as an on/off switch. You got anyone free?”

Q looked through his own engineering roster, after a few seconds, he came up with a name. “Lieutenant Foster. Some experience in munitions, I believe he’s a veteran from the Dominion War. Damn good engineer too. Does that sound about like what you’re looking for?”

Shaw nodded “Should do just fine. Have him report to the armory.”

Q nodded back, and tapped away at his own console.

Shaw finished at his. “That does it. We’re ready.” He tapped his comm badge. “Captain, Q and I have made the arrangements we need.”

Rynn replied over the channel, “Well, go get our Captain.”

As Shaw picked up the phaser rifle which had been propped up against the side of his panel, Rynn continued “Shaw, Bring back the Captain. All other objectives are secondary.”

She didn’t want any personal vendetta to jeopardize the safe return of the Captain, and she made this clear.

Shaw acknowledged with a “Yes, ma’am” and headed for the Jeffries tube entrance, almost immediately, he had gone.

Soon after, Shaw walked into the armory. There were five officers already there. Four of them were from the security department, and Foster the engineer, who was being instructed on the use of some of the more specialized equipment by the others. As Shaw entered, their speculative mumbles quickly quieted. They were all wondering what they were doing here. Shaw ended their confusion. “As you know, the Captain is over on the Ferengi ship. To cut a long story short, we’re getting her back. She’s being held on the bridge, inside a force field. That’s where you come in Mr. Foster.”

Foster seemed to show little reaction

“We’re beaming over to this corridor here,” Shaw brought up a display of the D’Kora-class on a panel. “A simple storm of the bridge should do it. Subdue any resistance as quickly as possible, teams of two. Jones and Peterson. Chavez and myself. Johnson, you’re to assist Mr. Foster with the force field.”

Each of the officers nodded as their names were called.

“We’re leaving ASAP, so suit up.”

All six began to dress in a kind of “assault uniform” made up of black armor, very similar to the current EV suits, but in darker tones. Blacks and deep grays with small panels on the thigh and forearm like its EV counterpart.

After a few moments, Q came over the comm system. “Q to Commander Shaw. A dampening field just went up over the entire Ferengi vessel. No transports in or out.”

Shaw sighed, and responded, “Prepare a shuttle to depart, Shuttlebay 1. We can dock with one of its cargo ports?” Shaw looked for confirmation from Foster, who nodded

Q replied, “Shuttle ready in five minutes.” then the channel closed.

When all the men were finished getting into the suits, Shaw picked up his phaser rifle, as did the other officers.

“Okay, let’s go.” Shaw led the officers out of the armory and through the corridors to the shuttlebay.

After a few minutes they arrived in the shuttlebay. It was as dimly lit as the rest of the ship. A shuttle was waiting for them as promised. The six men boarded it in the passenger area; a pilot had already been assigned. As the door closed slowly, the officers inside could be seen fitting helmets completing their uniform, and as they did so, momentarily. Shielding could be seen activating around their whole body, similar to the eerie green personal shielding of a Borg drone. The reflective visors of the helmets made the six men indistinguishable from each other, and as the doors of the shuttle closed, the door of the shuttlebay opened. The shuttle took off and out of the bay doors, through space towards the Ferengi ship in the distance.

“You have no chance,” T’Shael said. “The Borg are destroyed. Maximus will get the device before Mason does, and my crew will rescue me. You have no shields, they will be here in no time.”

“No they won’t,” Dexter said. “I put up a dampening field around the whole ship.”

“That will never last. You don’t have energy for more than a few hours like this.”

“But a few hours will be good enough. By then we will be out of here. Mason will be back soon. He has just transmitted that he got the device. He’s on his way back. Maximus can’t stop him anymore now.”

T’Shael remained silent for a short while. If Mason indeed had the device, that was bad news. She hoped that Dexter was just bluffing, but there was a spark in his eye she did not like.

“My crew will never let you go,” she finally said. “They would rather destroy this whole ship including me than letting you go.”

“They won’t, as long as they see a chance of rescuing you. And when they notice they can’t, it will be too late.”

“A shuttle is approaching,” Ryan said. “Must be Shaw.”

“Too bad our weapons are out, or we could have just blown him away. Everyone arm yourself,” Dexter yelled at the Ferengi. Ryan and he pulled out their phasers.

“Looks like your last hope is here, Captain,” Dexter said. “Too bad he will fail. I know Shaw. I’ve worked with him for so long. He won’t have any chance.”

“You are forgetting something,” T’Shael stated. “He’s worked with you for just as long. And he always has a few surprises up his sleeve.”

“The shuttle is docking,” Ryan said. “There’re on their way.”

The shuttle was gliding through the debris parts, away from the Saratoga into a field of concentrated Borg debris. Their invisible shadow was following them, still unnoticed and waiting for his chance to grab the prey.

“We are approaching,” Maximus told Sp1ke77. “It must be in the center of all this debris here. This must be part of the former main core of the Borg cube. Can you get a closer scan already?”

“No,” Sp1ke77 replied. “Too much junk disturbing the read. Maybe we should just blast away some of this stuff.”

“No,” Maximus said. “We could damage the device by mistake and it would take years again till it regenerates, if it does again at all. Use the tractor beam to move it out of our way. If we head straight now, we should arrive just in front of it.”

After a few minutes of very slow approaching, moving every single piece of debris out of their way they finally reached the center.

“There it is,” Maximus said, enlarging an area of a big piece of debris on the screen.

Sp1ke77 stared at the screen and now understood what it was they were looking for. Although he had never seen one personally the memory of the hive mind was still present. “I don’t believe it,” he said. “This is the most fragile part of the ship, and it survived so many years. Usually it is destroyed in the explosion. The Borg even make sure that it is if their destruction is inevitable, so no one else can steal it!”

“But you forget the circumstances on this Borg cube just before it was destroyed,” Maximus said. “Picard put them to sleep. They could not destroy the transwarp conduit themselves. So it survived the explosion and regenerated unnoticed, until it was fully functional again and called the Borg to pick it up. Only we got here faster. Now, all I need you to do is cut through the protection field.”

“Me?” Sp1ke77 asked.

“Yes you. Why do you think I needed your ship? Why do you think I took you with me? Only one with the memory of the hive mind can know how to cut through the field without blowing the whole thing up.”

Sp1ke77 looked at the small device that was shown enlarged on screen; the pulsating field around it. It was a device close to perfection. One of the best pieces of technology the Borg had. But was it right to get it now for Maximus?

Maximus noticed his hesitation. “The Federation needs this Sp1ke77,” he said. “The Borg will get stronger again, and there are so many other threats. This will give us a crucial advantage. Do it for the Federation.”

At this, Sp1ke77 acted without thinking much, putting up an energy beam with the frequency that was stored in his memory. The field collapsed immediately. And at the same time the device vanished.

Maximus put his head down, saying, “We must retrieve that device, or we are all doomed.”

Sp1ke77 didn’t reply. He was too busy tracing the device. “Maximus, I got it. The device is going towards the Ferengi ship. It must be in a cloaked ship,” informed Sp1ke77.

“Initiate intercept course,” ordered Maximus “Full speed!”

“Hmm. He’s going to pass very close to Saratoga’s remains...” said the Commander, smiling.

Maximus looked at him and asked in a surprised voice, “What are you planning you little devil?”

“Just watch the fireworks, and enjoy,” replied Sp1ke77.

The commander established a link to the Saratoga’s engineering computer and activated the already rigged warp core.

A sound echoed inside the empty ship. “Warning. Warp core overload complete in Three…two…one…zero. Warning. Warp core is now in critical condition. Explosion Imminent. Warning.”

In that instant the cloaked ship slid through the Saratoga’s hull, avoiding the debris nearby.

“See ya in hell, asshole!” said the Commander, touching the screen on a little button that said, “Detonate.”

Suddenly the ship blew away. Debris was scattered around even more, and between the “flying” debris, a small ship sat dead in space. It was visibly evident that her cloaking device was damaged and starting to fail.

“Excellent, excellent. You would give an excellent Section 31 agent,” said Maximus.

Sp1ke77 looked at him and said, “You never know. But we have more important things to do now. I’ve detected a damaged shuttle and it’s heading slowly towards the Ferengi. There’s no way that he can get there.”

“Let’s go get him!” exclaimed Maximus.

In this instant, another shuttle carrying the rescue team initiated a scrambling of the Ferengi’s sensors, confusing them, so they can get closer to the ship.

Mason was lucky. This shuttle had strong shielding. But there was no way he could make it to the ship by himself.

“Mason to Dexter. I need emergency transport,” said the dark agent to the ship

“Sir, we might have a Federation shuttle nearby. I’ll have to lower the shields to get you over,” replied Dexter.

“It’s either that or a quantum torpedo from Maximus. My ship is a total mess. It won’t last much longer. Do it. That’s an order,” Mason said forcefully.

Dexter acknowledged reluctantly, “Aye, sir.”

The ship was just approaching transporter range at the same time a torpedo was fired from Maximus and Sp1ke77’s shuttle.

Chapter 12

U.S.S. Lone Wolf

Wolf 359

Inner Perimeter

Bridge

For the first time in ages, Q had very little to do on the Lone Wolf. He was keeping the main viewer up to date with everything that was going on: their shuttle, the D’Kora, the Saratoga, and Mason’s shuttle.

Unfortunately, he was not able to have a visual of Mason’s shuttle. But he did know exactly what it was doing. He had been forced to compensate for the lack of visual by putting in a rather hasty and distinctly iffy doodle of a Ferengi shuttle, which followed Mason’s progress through the debris.

Q turned to the PADD he used to call up personnel for Shaw. He glanced over Foster’s record again. Q noticed a blip and investigated further. Foster was an excellent engineer, so to find a mar on an otherwise good record was strange.

Looking closer, Foster had only just scraped through the final academy exam, completely failing the section on force fields. Finding this, Q came to the sudden realization that he probably wouldn’t have a chance with the force field the Ferengi would have up. He turned and strode quickly to a weapons locker at the side of the bridge, wearing a worried expression.

Q knew Simon had taken all the newly modified assault suits, and there would be no time to make another. He opened the locker and removed two phaser rifles, then returned to his wall panel and propped them against the side. He also called engineering and told them to get his little ship ready.

He then returned to monitoring the situation, knowing that there was absolutely nothing else he could do.

The Ferengi lowered their shields and made the transport. A second later, Mason’s shuttle was obliterated from the direct hit of the torpedo from Maximus’s shuttle.

The Lone Wolf’s shuttle speeded across the hull of the comparatively massive Ferengi D’kora, slowing and rotating as necessary to dock with one of the ship’s cargo holds.

On the bridge of the D’Kora, Dexter and Ryan were awaiting the arrival of Mason after they had transported him from his shuttle. From what she had observed, T’Shael had to accept that Mason had the device.

Ryan stood over one of the freestanding consoles. “Their shuttle has docked.”

Dexter barely responded. The Ferengi captain immediately spoke up. “I’ll send a security detail to the docking port.”

Dexter and Ryan’s response was to simply laugh at the idea.

Dexter didn’t even give the man an answer. He simply turned to the other human on the bridge. “Ryan, head down there. Eliminate any intruders.”

As Ryan picked up a simple type-2 hand phaser, the Ferengi captain looked at Dexter blankly.

Dexter responded to his look. “Don’t worry, he can handle twenty marines...and a hundred Ferengi.”

The Ferengi was as disconcerted by the comment as Dexter had hoped.

Ryan slowly made his way through the masses of crates in the cargo hold, making his way to the docking port. He noticed it was still closed. When he got to the port, he stood with his back to the wall at the side of the door and started planting a small explosive device by it. As Ryan was hurriedly planting the device, a figure moved in the shadows of the cargo hold, unnoticed by Ryan, who was intent on planting the device. Within moments the figure emerged from the shadows: one of the assault team. Ryan, shocked at having assumed the team was still in the shuttle, had no time to react before the figure threw a grenade to Ryan’s side. Ryan grabbed the grenade to throw it back. Too late. As the grenade exploded, crates and panels for around ten meters were completely destroyed, leaving behind black scorch marks and a few small flames.

The members of the assault team emerged from between crates across the room, and made their way out of the hold.

Back on the D’Kora’s bridge, Dexter was inexpressively speaking into a panel, “...Ryan?”

T’Shael interrupted her former officer’s attention from the static he was receiving from Ryan’s comm channel. “I warned you about him.”

Dexter was infuriated by this comment and briskly walked across the room to where she was sitting and hit her squarely and powerfully across the face. A silence followed. T’Shael had some of her green Vulcan blood at the corner of her mouth following Dexter’s punch, but was otherwise unaffected.

The assault team made their way through the ship, stunning any Ferengi officers they came across. At one junction, two of the men split away from the group, their destination was the engineering room. The other four continued on their way to the bridge.

On the bustling bridge, Dexter was shouting out orders to the disorganized Ferengi officers, telling them to prepare for the assault team.

The team was running through corridors. At roughly similar times, the two-man team arrived in engineering, bursting in and shouting for all Ferengi present to get down on the floor. After restraining the Ferengi with handcuffs, they set about deactivating the ship’s power, something they achieved quickly. They seemed to know exactly what to do.

The four-man team ran towards the bridge. Inside, the Ferengi crouched behind consoles and pillars in a desperate attempt to gain cover. They all waited silently for the assault. T’Shael waited as well, as anxious as a Vulcan could be.

The four men arrived outside the locked bridge doors, just as the power went down, and backup lighting initiated, but only dimly. The team took it that the two men had successfully deactivated the power and this was confirmed over their intercom, one of the men gave a typical military announcement, “Objective Two completed without deviation. Proceed.”

One of the men at the bridge door gave a hand signal.

Shaw’s voice was heard over the intercom, quietly saying. “Okay, get this door down. Get ready.”

Foster, opened a panel by the door and began altering settings and wiring, while the other three adjusted their positions and weapons. Moments later the door flew open.

Inside, the Ferengi, still distracted by the recent outage of power, proved Dexter’s lack of faith in them. The assault team almost instantly repressed them. In the brief firefight, two assault team members pushed onward towards the Captain, occasionally Ferengi disruptor shots would be deflected by the team’s personal shielding.

Once the Ferengi had been restrained, the team gathered around the Captain, still alert, but raising their visors. Now, they could be distinguished from each other.

Foster squatted to the side of her restraints, struggling to deactivate the shield surrounding her.

Shaw was standing by the open door, tapping at a panel to close it again, and the two other officers were standing over the Captain and Foster.

He was having obvious difficulty deactivating the shield. But more prominent in Shaw’s concerns, was the absence of Dexter. He’d expected to see him at the command center, with their hostage.

Outside the doors, Ferengi officers could be heard trying to get in. Two of the assault team took up positions by the door, while Shaw and Foster stayed with the Captain.

Q was standing at his station on the bridge when he got the comm message he’d been expecting, but dreading.

“Shaw to Q. We’ve got a problem here. Foster is having trouble with the force field.”

Q took a couple of deep breaths, before replying. “On my way. Q out.” He turned to the acting captain and asked permission to leave, which Rynn gave immediately, knowing the importance of getting the Captain back. He quickly tapped a message onto a PADD and left it face down on the console, before grabbing the two rifles he had ready and leaving the bridge via a Jeffries tube.

In just three minutes he had crawled most of the length of the ship, to the main shuttlebay. There, he sprinted to his little ship, the Impervious, and took off immediately. Q zipped towards the Marauder, meantime checking the feed from the camera hack he had on the Ferengi bridge.

He had just docked the ship as he saw the recorded footage of Dexter hitting the Captain. This made him burn with rage, and as he grabbed his mek’leth from the weapons cabinet and clipped it to his leg, he felt the battle hunger he had not felt since the rebellion on Xenex.

Quickly scanning, he found multiple Ferengi in the cargo bay. Jarring one rifle against each elbow, allowing one-handed operation, he tapped the panel with the tip of one. As soon as the door opened, Q walked forward determinedly, cris-crossing his rifles in a strafing motion, holding the triggers. The Ferengi were caught by surprise and quickly removed from their existence.

The enraged engineer then marched through the corridors, shooting the occasional security guard without breaking stride, until he reached the bridge. Rounding the corner, he found several Ferengi facing the door. He shot four or five rounds before ducking back around the corner. The Ferengi didn’t follow him.

This gave him time to rip off an access panel, and tear out enough circuitry. He soon made a makeshift grenade, balled it up and threw it around the corner. Following it shortly after, Q found the door gone, and Ferengi all over the place. Q strode onto the bridge and over to the Captain. Releasing the Captain in a few minutes he turned to the other officers.

“Good job guys, lets move—” Shaw started to say, but was interrupted by the swoosh of a door.

In the door to the ready room stood Dexter, wearing a heavy assault suit. He fired at Shaw, sending him flying backwards, and then turned to Captain T’Shael.

As Dexter fired, Q leapt across the bridge, goalkeeper style, firing both rifles simultaneously. Dexter was hit repeatedly and jerked with each hit, but he had got his shot away. Q flew over the console splitting the bridge levels, and took Dexter’s disruptor blast in the upper torso, intercepting it just ten centimeters in front of Captain T’Shael.

As Q fell, Dexter staggered backwards and the door shut in front of him. Shaw stood up nearby. He was fine, but his suit was not. Dexter was probably in similar shape. All the officers present ran to the fallen engineer and surrounded him.

Q managed to utter the words; “No greater love…has a man…than this…that he…give his life…for his…friends.”

Then, he lay down his head, and died.

Shaw stood and immediately gave a yell, before turning and ordering his security men to escort the Captain back to the shuttle and on to the Lone Wolf. As they left the bridge, Simon unclipped the mek’leth from the leg of the fallen officer, and tossed his phaser rifle aside, striding towards the ready room.

He walked towards Dexter, only now standing up, and knocked his disrupter aside. Dexter stepped back, and grabbed an ornamental blade weapon the Ferengi captain kept on a shelf.

Shaw charged at him and initiated a bout of furious fighting that lasted several minutes, before forcing Dexter’s blade up, and delivering a fatal blow to his chest. Running back onto the bridge, voices in the corridor told him he’d never escape that way.

He ran to Q’s body and used his comm badge to initiate a transport to the Impervious, taking the CEO’s corpse with him. He then undocked, and noticed the shuttle was doing exactly the same thing.

The two ships flew back to the Lone Wolf in unison and parked in the shuttle bay. They were back, but…

One man down.

Chapter 13

Ferengi D’Kora-class Marauder

Wolf 359

Inner Perimeter

After the assault team had left with the Captain and Q’s body, there was sheer confusion on the Ferengi ship. Dexter and Ryan were dead, so were several Ferengi, and the few who remained seemed too much in shock to react to the situation.

The only one who kept a cool head was Mason. After he had beamed over from his shuttle he hid the device and himself well, staying out of the way of the assault team. He knew how to survive, unlike the fools Dexter and Ryan. He had what he wanted. Secretly, he grinned because he wouldn’t have to share it with anyone. All he had to do now was get out of there.

After he was sure that all Starfleet officers were gone, he headed for the bridge. The Ferengi were not in a state for handling the ship, therefore he took the navigations seat himself. He quickly copied all the information about the drones he had secretly gotten on the Lone Wolf into the Ferengi computer and then programmed the autopilot to get him out of the debris field.

Slowly, the ship started to move towards the drones, making sure they stayed asleep, and maneuvered skillfully through the debris past the drones.

Captain T’Shael and Commander Shaw reached the bridge, fully aware that the game wasn’t over yet. Commander Rynn stood up from the Captain’s chair when she saw them and seemed relieved. “Welcome back Captain,” she said. “You are injured,” she added when she saw the blood around T’Shael’s lips.

“It’s nothing,” T’Shael replied. “Q...” she finally said, “he is dead.”

The terrible news spread on the bridge and everyone remained in a shocked silence. “He died saving my life. Saving all of us,” she added. “He was a great officer. But we will have to mourn later. Mason has the device, we have to stop him.”

Quickly Shaw took over the tactical station and gave a report. “He’s moving towards the drones, trying to escape.”

“Follow him,” T’Shael ordered.

“He will never get past,” Rynn stated. “Captain we can’t risk another confrontation with a drone. Without Maximus, we will be destroyed immediately. The ship is too damaged already.”

“Commander Shaw, can you target him?”

“He’s too far out already, he just passed the first line of drones. To get into phaser range, we’d have to move too close to the drones. And there’s too much debris in the way for photon torpedoes.”

“Damn,” T’Shael said, and the crew knew it was the first time they had heard their captain swear. “There must be a way to destroy that ship. We can’t let him escape.” She sounded quite desperate. Very un-Vulcan like in this instant. She needed all her self-control to push the emotions about Q’s death away. She felt responsible for it; he had died when she should have. Mason had started this whole catastrophe, and if she killed him now at least she had some revenge for her engineer’s death.

“Captain, it’s no use,” Rynn said. It was a rather ironic situation, the usually hot-tempered Bajoran who tried to calm down the usually emotionless half-Vulcan.

“Maximus and Sp1ke77 are still out there,” Shaw reminded her. “They will take care of Mason.”

“The shuttle doesn’t have enough firepower to destroy the Ferengi ship,” T’Shael replied.

“I’m sure Maximus has another idea up his sleeve. An S31 agent always does,” Shaw said, and T’Shael briefly thought she’d have to have a long talk with him about certain former S31 agents.

Maximus and Sp1ke77 were following Mason on their shuttle. They had seen the two Federation shuttles leaving and knew that all the Starfleet officers were back on the Lone Wolf.

“It is now time for you to go back as well,” Maximus told Sp1ke77. “I will have to handle Mason alone.”

“But Maximus,” Sp1ke77 objected, “if you want to get the transwarp conduit from Mason you will need all the help you can get.”

“It is too late. Mason has outwitted me, and I won’t let that happen again.”

“What are you planning to do then?” Sp1ke77 asked confused, not believing this man would give up that easily.

“The only thing left that I can do. And you can’t be of any help there. Maximus to Lone Wolf, beam Commander Sp1ke77 back to the ship,” he said, opening a comm channel.

A few seconds later, the ex-Borg dematerialized, before he could ask more questions.

They were all watching as Mason passed the last line of drones, moving out of the debris field. Maximus followed close behind him. He did not fire at all, but simply started to speed up, heading straight for the Ferengi ship. A few seconds before Mason could go to warp, the shuttle crashed into the Ferengi ship, and an S31 agent, a former S31 agent, a precious portable warp-conduit and a few Ferengi blew up in shower of spectacular fireworks.

“Commander Melhall, please get us out of here,” T’Shael said calmly, “back the way we came, the info about the locations of the drones should still be in the computer.”

Melhall only nodded to acknowledge and slowly started to turn the ship.

Gracefully, the U.S.S. Lone Wolf moved past the sleeping drones, leaving behind the debris of several Federation ships, two Borg cubes and a Ferengi freighter.

Epilogue

U.S.S. Lone Wolf

En Route to Starbase Assailant

“Captain’s log. Stardate 88.1011. We will arrive at Starbase Assailant in two hours. It has been a quiet flight back from the debris field, and I’ve spent most of the time writing my report for Starfleet command about the recent events. I am sure that they will have a lot of questions, though I can’t help thinking that in the end, this mission will be filed somewhere in a classified folder and be forgotten. Although we prevented the device from falling into the wrong hands, we did not succeed in obtaining it for Starfleet. For that, I’ve lost two great officers: Lieutenant Dexter to the corruption of money and Commander Q by fulfilling his duty in protecting this crew. The price was too high.

I have been informed of several crew changes. Dr. Richards and Lieutenant Commander Citon are leaving us for teaching positions at the Starfleet Academy. We already have a new doctor and a COO waiting for us at the starbase. I have asked Lieutenant Commander Melhall to take over engineering as he has some background and expertise in the area. I am sure he will be able to get the ship back into shape, even though I don’t think anyone can fully replace Commander Q.

In his last will, Q asked me to gather the senior crew on the holodeck, for he has prepared a final farewell in case he should die in action. We will have a memorial service later on. I do not know Xenexian burial customs, but maybe Q will tell us how he would like it to be. He was a fine officer and will not be forgotten.”

A few minutes later, T’Shael entered the holodeck, and she saw that all of Q’s friends and colleagues were already waiting. Everyone was quiet; it was a sad, but also solemn atmosphere. “Computer. Start program Q-alpha,” T’Shael said calmly.

A scene appeared around the officers: Xenex, during the late stages of the rebellion. A holographic image of Q appeared, wearing full engineering dress uniform, with his back to them.

“I spent some time field training on the Enterprise, during my Academy days. While I was there, I heard of a security chief who had died. Yar her name was. She had recorded a holographic farewell. Seemed like a good idea to me.

“First of all, I want my body…you have no idea how weird recording this is…my body placed with most of my possessions in the Impervious, and set adrift with shields raised. She will last a lot longer than you’d expect.”

The holo-image of the former CEO turned and took a couple of steps towards the group.

“There are a few things I want you all to know. You are an incredible crew, a great asset to Starfleet. This is one of the best, if not the best crew in the Section. My time aboard the Lone Wolf has been the best of my career. Thank you all for being such a great crew, for being so welcoming.

I also want to say a couple of things to two people in particular. First, to you, Captain. You are the finest captain I have ever had the privilege of serving under. I’m sure you’ve heard the advice Captain Kirk once gave to Captain Picard, a few years ago, during the nexus incident. ‘Don’t let them do anything that will take you off the bridge of that ship, because while you’re there, you can make a difference.’ I’m sure before long they’ll want you in the top brass. You’re an excellent officer, but whatever you do, don’t leave the bridge of your ship.

Finally, Simon. I feel you have been the best friend I’ve had on board. You are the bravest man I have served with, or met for that matter. I hope I died in action, but if I did I’m sorry. You will have joined the list of officers who haven’t managed to contain me.

One thing I expect none of you knew about me is my musical taste. I like music from several centuries back, and the engineering staff will tell you rarely am I not found humming away as I work. Music has become how I express myself, and I have a song for most situations.”

Q sat on a rock and looked up at where the group was standing. He leaned forwards and rested his arms on his knees.

“This seemed very fitting for now. It’s called Everything I Do by Bryan Adams.”

The engineer quietly began to sing, as the computer played a soft musical accompaniment.

“Look into my eyes, you will see

Just how much you mean to me.

Search your heart,

Search your soul

When you find me there you’ll search no more

Don’t tell me it’s not worth trying for

You can’t tell me it’s not worth dying for.

You know it’s true,

Everything I do,

I do it for you.”