The Convicts

Posted on Wed Oct 20th, 2010 @ 2:13pm by Captain Liarra Von & Lieutenant Commander Melissa Daniels M.D. & Chief Warrant Officer Daniel Maddux & Lieutenant Commander Morgan Kelly & Senior Chief Petty Officer Gilbert Bones [PNPC]

Mission: Ten Little Diplomats
Location: Starbase 332 - Perimeter Space
Timeline: MD01 1540

[ON]

The grip of the phaser rifle felt sticky and warm in his hand. He wanted to put it down and take a break but these people were dangerous and all that stood between them and having control of a prison ship was himself and a few other good men. Good, heavily armed men.

The pilot looked in the surveillance screen nervously. He was still as green as sun-kissed grass and was petrified that something might go wrong on what was only his second flight. He was making everyone else nervous too, and he knew it. He flicked the long-range sensors on to make sure their flight-path was clear. This region was notorious for bandits as well as treacherous anomalies. He breathed deeply and set the auto-pilot for the Harliin Penal Colony.

The warp engines came to life, accelerating the prison vessel to 214 times the speed of light at a respectable warp five. Sitting back in his chair and letting out a low sigh, the pilot started daydreaming about being on a faster ship, wishing that he could make these prison runs as short as possible. He received far less than that wish. Warning alarms brought his attention back with a start as the ship started shaking.

"What's the problem, Rookie?" the armed guard asked worriedly. "Don't tell me you broke it."

"I'm not sure what's wrong. Everything seemed to check out." The pilot checked displays in a panic. He seemed to have done everything right, but there was still a problem. "Bridge to Engineering. We seem to be experiencing problems."

"You don't say," was the reply on the other side of the comm channel. "It's good of you to keep us apprised of these things, Rookie. It looks like a plasma manifold is malfunctioning. We'll have to get it replaced. For now, reduce speed to warp two."

The pilot sighed another long sigh. "Copy that, engineering. Reducing speed now." Motioning over his controls, the transport reduced it's speed to only 10 times the speed of light, making this trip over twenty times longer than it should have been. At least the shaking stopped and the alarms switched off. "Any word on how long it will take to get the manifold repaired?"

The gruff engineer on the other end of the line was audibly not in a good mood. "I said replaced, not repaired. This one's shot. We better head in for the nearest outpost. Let me know if anything else breaks."

The pilot could feel the glares coming from the guards, but he swore under his breath that it wasn't his fault. Still, he had to find a place to take them in. It looked like they were close to a starbase in the Archaan system. He adjusted their heading, and leaned back in his chair, hoping that nothing else would go wrong.

As the ship dropped out of warp in the middle of the system an alert flitted across the tactical station aboard the USS Jackal. She had just finished tractoring in a freighter that was a day too early and now here she was faced with another erroneous vessel.

Morgan Kelly, the tactical officer on duty, looked through the the tactical scan which was coming in on the ship. He spoke, "Ma'am we have a prisoner transport vessel just warped into the system. Its ID tag shows that it is from the Harliin colony."

A prison ship? Liarra thought to herself. "Does the ship appear to be damaged?"

"They're showing no fluctuations in any vital systems and their codec doesn't show them as due to dock with the starbase at all in the next month."

"They're an awfully long way from Harliin. Hail them, Mr. Kelly."

"Aye, Commander. Hailing frequencies open."

Liarra stood from the command chair. "Harliin transport vessel, this is Lt. Commander Liarra Von, Chief of Strategic Operations for this sector. Please identify your business here."

"This is Prison Transport four-five. We request permission to dock with Starbase three-three-two for repairs."

"Understood, Prison Transport four-five. Stand by." Liarra turns and gestures to mute the transmission. "Any thing abnormal on sensors, Mr. Kelly?"

"No, sir. Everything checks out."

"Good. Resume transmission and notify docking command." She turned back to the viewscreen. "We will be assigning you a berth shortly, Transport four-five." She pressed several commands on her console after taking a seat in the command chair. "The fighters will escort you in."

"Copy that, Jackal." The voice of the pilot came over loud and clear. "Setting guidance systems to auto. Thank you, Jackal. Prison Transport four-five, out."

Maddux looked over at Kelly as the transmission ended, his voice all business. "I want that ship's ID. I need to check something."

"You got it." Kelly replied. "Transmitting to your station, Chief. Identification niner-five-zero-alpha-epsilon-kappa. What's on your mind?"

The chief turned back to his station and focused his attention on the screen in front of him, inputting his Intelligence clearance. "If I told you I'm looking at the ship's manifest, I'd have to kill you," he said with a sardonic smile as he brought up the information he wanted on his display. He whistled as he read the names popping up on his screen.

"In that case, I'll lock down the phasers on this deck." Morgan retorted quickly before feeling a piercing glare from the Commanding Officer in his back. He flicked a command switch and returned to his wide-band sensor sweeps.

Liarra removed her piercing gaze from Kelly's back and turned towards Maddux. "If you have something useful, Chief, I suggest you let me know."

[Starbase 332 - Observation Deck]

A man watched from the Base's observation deck, he was unassuming, and from the looks, an average Federation Citizen. 'Yes... Theyare dangerous criminals. Untrustworthy and uncivilized. I would be a pity if some of them were to escape. And perish the thought of them disrupting the oncoming peace conference.' He thought. 'I am going to have Starfleet Security chasing its own tail by the time the Federation's diplomat pigs are dead. Epsilon Idris will be avenged.

[OFF]

Lieutenant Commander Liarra Von
Acting Commanding Officer

Lieutenant Melissa Daniels M.D.
Chief Medical Officer

Chief Warrant Officer Daniel Maddux
Chief Intelligence Officer

Lieutenant (JG) Morgan Kelly [NPC]
Acting Chief Tactical Officer

Ensign Y'Laais [NPC]
Chief Flight Control Officer
USS Jackal