By William Lindsay and Keiran O’Sullivan
100227.23
Immediately after Part One
-=The Headquarters of Temporal Investigations: Earth=-
100227.23
Immediately after Part One
-=The Headquarters of Temporal Investigations: Earth=-
All across TI people were being transported away, but it was not by the Serendipity. William Lindsay only became aware of this phenomenon as Denise too shimmered and beamed out of reach.
He had no chance to contemplate it though as a high pitched screech, so painfully loud that it made his head feel like it would explode, rang throughout the halls of the Temporal Investigations and into the ears of everyone who remained there.
-=Bridge, USS Serendipity=-
The same screeching sound rang out across Serendipity through Liis’ active combadge; seeming to drill into the brains of everyone within earshot.
Groans of pain were heard from all around the bridge as different people reacted with different levels of severity depending on their personal resistance.
“Close the channel!” TC ordered from the command chair to Steele at communications.
She shut it off immediately and the bridge was rendered silent again, but TC was nowhere naive enough to believe that that was all they had to deal with.
“That was coming from TI and it was probably a hell of a lot worse on site,” he concluded, quickly deciding that with the effect it’d had up here they didn’t have time to waste on a full analysis. He activated his combadge. “Blane to Parrish! Get our people out of there now.”
[I can’t, sir.] Parrish answered grimly as he checked and rechecked his readings. [They’re not showing up on any of my scans.]
“Find them, Crewman,” Blane insisted sharply but before he could offer another word Cristiane cut in from tactical.
“We’ve got a vessel decloaking to port!” He warned, though it was only when he recognised this ship that he truly became alarmed. “It’s…”
Now Steele pointedly cut him off. “It’s an unknown configuration.”
TC didn’t miss that Dane hadn’t been allowed to finish and decided quickly that whoever these people were, he wasn’t going to take any chances.
“Shields up!” he ordered, as the ominous black vessel which was at least the size of the Serendipity herself suddenly started adjusting its position to face their direction.
-=Bridge of the opposing vessel=-
“Why have we decloaked?” Denise asked rapidly with confusion, fighting to conceal her fear. She had taken the command chair/operations console of this compact but well designed bridge where she, Brody and several other major players had been beamed immediately while others were simply transported onto random locations on this vessel.
“If we didn’t then someone on the Serendipity might have followed the transporter beam of their officers and found us with our shields down,” Brody snarled, as he ran back and forth the few steps between the tactical and navigation consoles, tapping in commands.
“No one on board could have the knowledge or the technology for that,” Mitchell protested shakily, not understanding why Brody would want to make this situation any more complicated than it already was.
“We don’t know that!” Brody snapped, wanting to strike the man who was supposed to be managing tactical but had quickly proven himself to be quite useless according to Brody’s perception of things.
“I still don’t see why we had to beam them up,” Mitchell added, just wishing again for this all to be over as he stood up against the back wall watching events playing out before him.
“Because we need bargaining chips!” Brody shouted, as if it should be obvious to anyone with half a brain. He muttered to himself as he began to activate a device that was not to be found on any other vessel.
It truth, revenge was much more on his mind than the need of hostages. “Anyway, the sonic pulse rendered them and everyone else at TI unconscious,” he then added without even looking up from what he was doing. “They pose no risk to us now.”
-=Bridge, USS Serendipity=-
“I think they’re charging weapons,” Cristiane warned from tactical, hating not have been able to be more certain about what he was seeing as an energy field began forming, focusing at the front of the enemy ship.
“You think?” TC asked, giving Cristiane an incredulous glance over his shoulder.
“I’ve never seen readings like these before,” Lara reported from Science. “But I’d bet a bottle of Romulan Ale they were hostile.”
“Agreed,” TC nodded, jumping up out of the command chair and rapidly issuing orders. “Red Alert. Shields to maximum. Move us away at maximum impulse!”
At navigation, Ensign Delia Swift quickly began inputting the commands to move them away, but before she’d even finished the energy field had focused down into a single point and seemed to leap rapidly towards the Serendipity.
“All hands brace for impact,” TC announced to the entire ship, as the energy point impacted upon them and shook it so violently that it almost threw him to the deck.
“Damage reports are coming in from all over,” Mellice Cem reported, using an unmanned station to help Dane sort through the myriad of sensor readings pouring in across the Security grid.
“Shields and phasers are down.” Dane added.
“So is navigation,” Swift concluded.
TC marched over to Dane’s station and grumbled as he reached over Cristiane’s shoulder and scrolled through the incoming data. “We’re getting reports of systems offline all over the ship!”
-=Bridge of the opposing vessel=-
“We’ve crippled them,” Brody announced with barely contained pride, finally settling down at the tactical station as an Ensign took over at navigation.
Denise however was not so proud of what they’d accomplished.
“Something’s wrong,” she observed with confusion as she studied the readings before her. “According to these reports only fifteen of our people are either here or on board the Serendipity.”
“The Serendipity couldn’t fit that many people in their brig. They must have beamed some of them back to Earth,” Brody realised, pausing only for a second before continuing. “Doesn’t matter. We’re leaving without them.”
“What? We can’t! Don’t you understand?” Denise snapped, in this moment quite aware Brody would gladly have abandoned any of them- herself included- given the chance. “We barely have enough people to run the ship. We certainly don’t have enough to get it operational for a jump before someone shows up!”
Brody’s face would have been unreadable if not for the rage that broke through his features, twisting them fiercely until finally a flash of inspiration struck him again.
“Yes, we do,” he murmured, with an entirely unsettling smile before turning to navigation. “Ensign, am I correct that this ship capable of transwarp travel by skimming the timeline?”
“Aye, sir.” The young man responded, thinking he saw where he was going, and indeed he just may have.
“It doesn’t matter how fast we go,” Mitchell loudly objected before he could anything more, having had enough and then far too much of all this. “TI will come after us and they’ll catch us.”
“They can’t.” Brody corrected harshly, disgusted by the man’s stupidity and what he now saw as his cowardice. “The Department’s in lockdown. We’ll be long gone by the time they even know what’s happened.”
Brody’s certainty did little to calm Mitchell’s nerves.
-=Bridge, USS Serendipity=-
With the ship in disarray around him as people rapidly tried to affect repairs and regain some sort of control, TC couldn’t help but wonder what sort of weapon had so easily cut straight through their shields. That raised another question and he didn’t doubt he knew the man who had the answer.
“Cristiane,” TC turned and demanded in a tone and with those icy blue eyes that told the Ensign this was not the time to lie to him. “You recognised that ship, didn’t you?”
Dane swallowed hard, as a look from Landry told him that he wasn’t the only one who knew and that she also knew that he really shouldn’t be sharing this information outside of very small circles; circles that did not currently or explicitly include TC Blane.
However, he had to ask himself what Keiran O’Sullivan would do in this situation and knowing the answer, he quickly reached a conclusion.
“It’s the USS Poseidon, Sir,” Dane said quietly, relieved as he felt these lessons he’d had about loyalty were really sinking in. “It’s an outdated prototype…from Temporal Investigations.”
-=Bridge, USS Poseidon=-
“You can not seriously be suggesting this,” Denise said, rising from her chair as Brody strolled arrogantly over to look her in the eye.
“It’s the only way,” he insisted, standing far too close to her for comfort, clearly challenging the woman more than only for her decision.
A moment passed as Denise considered this, but she then quickly made up her mind about it and tried her best to be firm.
“No, I’m…I’m in charge here and I insist that we do not involve them.” She spoke with confidence but without certainty.
With her remark the temperature in the room seemed to drop thirty degrees as all eyes began to flicker between Moreno and Brody as they stared each other down. Clearly Brody wasn’t happy to be spoken to like this, or to be refused anything he wanted or felt entitled to.
“Well, then, Captain,” he said sharply, making the respectful title sound through his intonation more like the most despicable insult he could imagine. “Congratulations, you’ve just prevented us from ever being able to make a jump back and to stop this from ever happening. We’ll just hang around here, at this point in history until the Department tracks us down and destroys us, shall we?”
Denise couldn’t answer; the last thing she needed was more innocent people being hurt because of her especially when she knew as well as anyone else and better than most that a jump couldn’t always fix it. However she also knew she had no other option.
“There is no other way,” Brody spat the words, and it was clear that Denise couldn’t argue.
“Fine,” she relented at last, quietly giving into Tucker this once but with a look in her eyes that said she wouldn’t always before turning to the Ensign at navigation and speaking much more boldly. “Bring us to within twenty metres of the Serendipity. Then activate the temporal drive components.”
Brody was clearly pleased with his victory, and it was enough for now to let him overlook the fact that Denise was still technically in charge here, so he moved back towards tactical as Denise took her command chair again.
“Heading, sir?” The Ensign as navigation asked shakily.
“It doesn’t matter,” Denise said softly. “Just get us out of here.”
With the tension still thick enough to choke all in this room, the Ensign didn’t wish to be the person it was unleashed upon and so quickly complied with the order. Soon the Poseidon was positioned directly beside the lifeless Serendipity.
A large sphere of energy slowly began to form, much thicker than a warp bubble, and began to expand outward from the Poseidon until it encapsulated both ships. Then the instant it was done and though it felt like they were still they were moving. It was not through normal space or even at warp, but with a remarkably beautiful effect visible outside the windows of both vessels that looked like a billion blinking lights swirling all around them.
Brody was less than amazed by this site personally and much more amused by what would happen now. In fact the only thing impressive he found about this mode of travel was that since it prevented transporters working, he and Peterson would be trapped on different ships for the immediate future.
“Someone’s going to need to tell them what their part is going to be in all of this,” Brody decided, without as much as looking to the viewscreen before sarcastically asking Denise a question. “So, Captain, do you want to do the honours or shall I?”
Denise simply gestured that he should go ahead and Brody opened a channel from his station, pumping the message over the Serendipity’s internal communications system to everyone rather than speaking directly to the current commanding officer.
“Attention crew of the USS Serendipity,” Brody said, deeply satisfied that he now had everyone’s rapt attention. “You are now defenseless. All weapons on board your vessel, including handheld, have been disabled using frequency jamming. We have your Captain, your Security Liaison, and the illustrious Director Lindsay.
For the first three attempts at resistance, or any refusal to offer assistance we may require, one of them will be killed. At the fourth your ship will be destroyed. Any attempt to repair your vessel beyond basic operations, or if any harm comes to our officers on board who are to be promptly released from your brig, and you will be destroyed. In short, you are now under our control.”
-=USS Serendipity=-
TC Blane’s eyes flashed fury. “Who the hell is that?”
Dane and Landry exchanged an expression that showed how sickened they felt at the sound of that voice, a voice they had both heard before. “That,” Landry replied not just nervously but truly fearfully, “is Tucker Brody.”
----------------------
Captain William Lindsay
Interim Director
The Department of Temporal Investigations
and
-=/\=- Keiran O’Sullivan
Security Liaison
The Alchemy Project
Captain William Lindsay
Interim Director
The Department of Temporal Investigations
and
-=/\=- Keiran O’Sullivan
Security Liaison
The Alchemy Project