CSS Starburst

Posted on Tue Oct 19th, 2010 @ 6:37pm by Samanthia Akiashiro & Lieutenant JG Jonathan Royce & Captain Liarra Von & Lieutenant Commander Melissa Daniels M.D.

Mission: Ten Little Diplomats
Location: SB332 Perimeter Space
Timeline: MD01 - 1730

CSS Starburst exited out of warp drive. The kilometer long freighter sporadically sending out it's transponder code, was showing repairs from battle damage and ship marker lights not working and leaking plasma from one of it warp nacelle. It was showing the company and merchant fleet it belonged to the Akiashiro Merchant Fleet. It's planned trajectory showed it would miss the Starbase 332. CSS Starburst was scheduled to arrive a day later, yet it showed up 24 hours earlier. Commanded by Civilian Captain Marko Devenport, 50 year veteran of the spaceways.

"Flight Control to Python One."

Anvil, sitting in the RIO's seat directly behind Hammer, hit the comm panel. "Python One here, go ahead."

"Python One, alter course to intercept incoming freighter bearing 278 Mark 12 off your point. Inspect and report."

"Aye, 278 Mark 12." Anvil answered.

"Mongoose, you copy that?" Royce checked his wing-man to port and aft of his own craft.

"Roger that, Hammer."

The two sleek craft altered course and accelerated to intercept the monstrous freighter.

"Anvil, call up info on that ship. What're we lookin' at?"

"She's a day early. IFF intermittent, no running lights, running on one-quarter impulse, venting plasma."

"Life signs?"

"Six."

"Open a channel."

A light came on Royce's control panel indicating he had an open frequency. "CSS Starburst, this is Lieutenant Royce, United Federation of Planets. Please respond."

The comm channel sounded out with broken static. "This is . . . . enport. We . . . support failure . . . arp . . . off line . . . assist."

Hammer took his Viper into a long, spiraling barrel roll from aft to fore, visually inspecting the freighter and getting sensor readings.

"Copy that Starburst. Do you have any injured?"

"Fo . . . ed . . . even injured . . . ee criti . . "

"Got that, Starburst. Heave-to and stand-by for docking protocols." Royce said, then muted the channel.

"Hey, Hammer. I'm trying to get a sensor reading on that ship's cargo hold. Most of it's routine equipment and supplies."

"And?" Royce said, prompting him to continue.

"There's a section I can't get a reading on. Scans are just bouncing off."

"See if you can access their manifest."

Anvil called accessed the ships computers, easily over-riding it security lockouts, and read off a long list of items and where they were stowed.

"That accounts for everything, with a few empty holds, except for the hold I can't scan."

The Starburst came to a stop and the two fighters continued to orbit it.

"Hammer to Jackal. I got the CSS Starburst stopped. Looks like she's been through a battle, has suffered a few casualties and has some wounded, possibly three in critical condition. She's also got some engineering problems. They could use a little help. Suggest you send a security detail as well. There's a cargo hold we can't scan and there's nothing on the manifest showing what's in there. My take is someone wanted what's on that ship. I don't know if they got it or not, but either way it doesn't look right. If they didn't get what they were after, we might have more company coming."

From the bridge of the small warship, Lt. Commander Von answers the hail. "Understood, Hammer. We are receiving your coordinates. Hold the Starburst at your current position. We'll be there in a moment. Jackal out."

From the command chair, she directs her attention to the various stations. "Helm, lay in a course, full impulse. Notify patrols to adjust for our absence." She taps her combadge before continuing. "We will be boarding the CSS Starburst. Casualties are expected. Security teams and medical teams, report to the transporter room. Engineering teams, stand by." She taps her combadge again to close the channel.

The Jackal's impulse engines increase power to adjust the course. The slim ship slices through space, accelerating towards the edge of the Threshold sector. The tiny Defiant-class ship was just a speck against the massive freighter. Despite the superior sensor pallets, the Jackal had no success penetrating the mysterious cargo hold. Liarra knew that any suspicious cargo could be dangerous to the station, or the coming conference. It would have to be inspected manually before she would authorize a docking berth.

Von opened a comm frequency from the panel flanking the command chair. "Jackal to Hammer, this is Commander Von. I'm taking security and medical teams down to the Starburst. Continue to monitor the surrounding area."

"Roger that, Jackal."

"Mongoose this is Jackal, change heading, 075 mark 0. Let's keep an eye on the area where this thing came out of warp in case we have company coming."

"Aye, Hammer."

Liarra stood up from her chair and addressed her helm officer. "Lieutenant, you have the bridge. I'm beaming down with the away team. See if you can penetrate that cargo hold. Notify me if you find anything."

"Aye, Commander," the officer replied.

Leaving the bridge, it only took Liarra a moment to reach the transporter room on the little ship. Checking her side arm, she turned to the security team leader. "I'm going down with you. We need to figure out what is in that hold. Keep your phasers on stun. The medical team will follow us down. Understood?"

Petty Officer Jennings nodded his head. "Understood, Commander."

"Let's go." The trill officer stepped up on the transporter pad, along with the security team. Nodding to the transporter chief she uttered one word, "Energize."

*** Bridge of the CSS Starburst ***

"Baric, the Starfleet officers have just beamed aboard!" Jason said, sounding very nervous.

"Fool, use the crew names!"

"I'm sorry, Captain Devenport."

"And calm down." He added. "Now, go and meet them. Show them were the infirmary and engine room are, then bring them to me."

"Yes, Captain."

*** Corridor 50' away from the bridge doors ***

"Oh, thank goodness you're here." The man greets the Starfleet officers. "I hope we'll be safe now. I'm Derik Jacobo, second mate. You the doctor? C'mon, I'll show you the infirmary, we got some badly wounded."

Liarra nodded to the medical team to follow the officer. "Mr. Jacobo, if you don't mind, I'd like to speak with your captain. I am Lt. Commander Liarra Von, Chief of Strategic Operations for the sector. We have some things to discuss. I'd like to give you a docking berth where we can facilitate your repairs more efficiently, but I have to inspect your cargo first. Nothing personal, just procedure."

"Ah, sure, of course." Jacobo sees one of his fellow crewmates. "Hey, Halpin, show the doctor where the infirmary is, will ya." He turns to the doctor. "Just follow Halpin there."

"Commander, the bridge is just over here." He said as he turned and walked back the way he came.

Once inside the bridge Jacobo begins the introductions. Captain Davenport, this is Lieutenant Commander Von."

Devenport extends his hand. "Please to meet you, Commander Von. Thanks for responding to us so quickly. We've run into a bit of trouble. If them come chasing after us they'll have one hell of a surprise waiting for them."

Von smiled and shook the captain's hand. "The pleasure is mine, Captain. Don't worry, no one will try anything here. Archa IV is probably the most fortified area in the galactic south, and it's my job to keep it that way. Do you know who attacked you?"

"Pirates." Devenport shrugged. "That's the only way to describe them. They had a couple of fighters that disabled us, then beamed aboard and tried to take us over. We've been there before, so we were ready for them." He looked down and shook his head. "I lost some crew, and friends, defending this ship and her cargo, but we managed to kill or round them up. My engineer performed some miracle and got us warp capability. We must have surprised them. They're secured in an empty cargo hold."

Liarra nodded. "Our sensors didn't detect them, however, one of your holds was masked. We couldn't penetrate it with our sensors. Do you have some sort of dampening field in place, Captain?"

"Yeah, we, ah, sometimes transport, shall we say, 'sensitive cargo' that our clients, including Starfleet, would rather keep under wraps. We put them in there so that they wouldn't have any way of communicating with their friends or having them get beamed out. We'd gladly turn them over to you and them them off our hands. Put em in jail so that they don't hijack any more ships."

CSS Starburst : Cargo hold 2057

Real Crew of the CSS Starburst, secured in the cargohold, quietly conferring with each other as the newest crewmember just out of Terra IV Tech Academy, shook his head to Captain Devenport, "They welded the doors shuts and the Access Hatch to the maintenance tunnel is under lockdown due to hull damage we received in the encounter with those pirates. Boss."

"Damn!" Marko swore a colorful streak, as he paced, looking over two of his crewmembers seriously wounded and had patched them up just to stabilizes them. But one had died to inadequate medical treatment. "Twenty crew and we're down to a mere handful. Why did they attack? All we're carrying is the usual specialized parts for the Starbase that no ship could ever use." He muttered.

"Captain! We've came to a stop," The Big Caitain "Tom" Caitlin, Leaning against the bulkhead, as he sat there, The Ship's Master at Arms, Cuffed both at the wrists and ankles. He was very upset. He called out when the ship's vibrations and harmonics lessened to that of a ship at a full stop.

CSS Starburst : Corridor Outside Cargo hold 2057

"They're in here, Captain." Devenport said. They tried prying the doors open, so we had to weld em shut. That phaser you have should break the weld on a low setting." He said, motioning to the sidearm. "But be careful, they've had time to plan and try to spring a trap, they're a tricky lot."

CSS Starburst : Inside Cargo hold 2057

Chief Engineer Caitlin softly "meowed", alerting the crew trapped within the cargo hold when is hearing heards noises outside of the hold in the corridor. Marko motioned the crew and moved to the wall farthest from the door, bringing "Tom" with them. They all got comfortable and resumed playing cards as this was a, abiet, "forced vacation" on them. Not much you could do against a superior armed crew of determined pirates.

"Keedran to Devenport." The voice came over the comm panel in the wall near the cargo hold.

'Devenport' walked over to the unit and hit the switch. "Devenport here, what do you have?"

"Thanks to out Federation friends, we've got the leaks plugged and the impulse engines back on-line."

"Good work." Devenport then turned to Von. "With your permission, I'd like to set course for the Starbase, maybe we can complete our repairs before we get underway and you can take these guys off our hands." He said, thumbing towards the door. "And if it isn't too much to ask, perhaps some of my crew could take advantage of the Starbase facilities, we've been in deep space for a long time and I think some shore-leave will do them some good, raise moral a bit, especially after our latest ordeal."

Von nodded her head. "I can't see any reason to deny that request, Captain. I'd like to keep my security team posted outside this cargo hold until we arrive. We'll take these pirates off your hands and move them into custody on the station. The Jackal will escort you in, and alert you of your docking assignment. We'll make sure repairs get started so that we can get underway quickly. Most of the facilities will be available to your crew, but make sure you stay in the civilian areas. Starbase 332 will be hosting a conference, so accidental security breaches will probably still be handled pretty seriously. I just ask that you be careful. If you don't have any more questions for me, I'll be returning to my ship."

"Thank you Commander, any help you can give us would be greatly appreciated."

Devenport returned to the bridge. "Follow that Federation ship to the starbasel." He ordered. "They're gonna escort us in and even fix us up."

"I still think it was a mistake to let the crew live." Orlin said. "Eventually they're going to figure out what happened."

Devenport turned angrily on the man sitting at the helm. "No unnecessary killing! These people aren't our enemies, they were just at he wrong place at the wrong time. The men who died defending this ship have families."

"But the ones you let live can identify us. We should evacuate the atmosphere from the hold." The more militant Orlin said.

Even with the Maquis, as fast and loose as they may play with the rules, there was still some structure. "I'm in charge of this mission, Orlin, and if you don't like it, you can just walk out the nearest airlock." He said, giving the man a whithering look. Orlin turned back to his console and made the necessary course adjustments to follow the Jackal.

"A Federation officer assassinating one of their top diplomats should be enough to fire up the Cardassians into starting a war. Then Starfleet can finish those snake-heads off once and for all." Devenport said. "The commander's given us free reign of the Starbase's public areas, and I don't need to remind you that security is going to be tight in the restricted areas. As soon as we dock, spread out and gather as much info as you can on the conference schedule and who's gong to be where, and when. We need to plan this on the fly and move quickly."

Devenport paced the bridge. "By the time they figure this out, if all goes well, we'll be long gone."

As much as he wanted to make sure that his insurnace policy was paid up, he didn't dare trying to contact the antiquated Bird of Prey that Velkar was supposed to aquire from the Ferengi. He was certain any outgoing transmissions would be monitored. He'd just have to trust that he'd be where he was supposed to be, when he was supposed to be there to beam them off the starbase. They had less than two days to accomplish their mission, and there was no telling if the best opportunity would come as soon as the next few hours, of if they'd have to bide their time and be patient.

Cargo Hold 2057

Caitain Engineer spoke up again, "Ship's impulse is online. This ought to be interesting to say the least." The rest of the crew nodded as the real Devenport just nodded, keeping the remaining crew calm and slowly picking the cuff's locks to free his Engineer/Security officer and Best friend as they been together for a long time.

"Just glad you're okay, Tom. Once we're free, we can drop the "security shield" on this cargo hold." Marko spoke quietly as he worked to free the Caitain Officer.

"Just roughed up abit, hating to be tasered is all... Who would think they would be carrying one of those things..." Tom spoke softly back, assisting when he could.

"Why would they want to take over our ship? We hauling nothing that would be useful. Why risk taking our cargo ship?" Marko spoke thoughtfuly as he worked.

"Maybe it's not the cargo they want. It could be us. Why keep us alive? They may be holding us hostage for something of value." Tom suggested.

"There's no telling right now where we are." Marko added. "Maybe they need the ship to move some cargo, or use as a decoy."

CSS Starburst : Bridge

"We're on approach to the starbase, Captain." Orlin said.

"Smoothe and steady." Devenport ordered. "Their tractor beam should take hold soon and dock us up."

Akiashiro Control Center .Deck 1404

Raphiel Akiashiro watched the CSS Starburst dock at another docking port instead of the usual pre arrange and reserved fleet docking port. He was puzzled and moved over to his contreol center comm unit and tried to contact the CSS Starburst.=A= "Devenport! This is Akiashiro, Raphiel! What is the meaning of this?" =A=

The imposter Devenport and Orlin looked at each other. They hadn't anticipated that anyone here would know Devenport, much less his voice.

"Orlin, can you do something with the comm's, a little distortion and static?"

"Sure, just give me a minute." Orlin said. He punched some commands into the computer that would break up the transmission, add a little warbling, and skew the tone. "Good to go captain, they'll never know it's not the real Devenport."

Devenport hit the comm switch. "Aki . . hiro, . . ered dama . . . Jackal's Cap. . . dir . .ed . . . . here for . . . epairs."

He cut the channel.

"Spread the word. As soon as we're docked and off this junk pile, spread out and blend in. Become invisible. I'll contact everyone in two hours."

Within minutes the Starburst was berthed in a maintenance and repair dock. Once the umbilicals were attached and the ship was on station power, "Devenport" and the rest turned the ship and prisoners over to Starfleet personnel and headed into the station carrying their traveling packs. They each went their separate ways and were quickly lost in the crowd.

-----------------------------------
Lieutenant Liarra Von
Chief Strategic Operations Officer
Starbase 332

Lieutenant JG Jonathan Royce
Squadron Leader - V/F-26 "Pythons"
Starbase 332

Samanthia Akiashiro
Owner - "Warp 12"
Starbase 332