On Approach

Posted on 25 May 2024 @ 9:28am by Story Teller & Commander John Reynolds & Lieutenant Commander Camila Di Pasquale & Lieutenant JG Shay Mitchell

3,174 words; about a 16 minute read

Mission: Return to Razmena
Location: USS Gaittithe
Timeline: June 17, 2390 || 0900 hours

As the shuttles filled with Security personnel approached the flight deck with some holding off in formation in case it was a trap, Ensign Karn opened a hailing frequency to the others in command of various parts of the operation to rescue those aboard the Gaittithe's. The pirates had fled for the most part, but he was very aware of their ability to cloak ships and wished that the Commander were here to guide the operation.

When the codes were given and responded to, Karn brought the first shuttle onto the Flight Deck and began to deploy the Security personnel to various areas of the ship to look for survivors and remaining pirates.

The Flight Deck was far from empty. In fact, two pirate ships remained landed there with people trying frantically to load the final crates of supplies into their ships. They were so desperate, in fact, that six pirates immediately broke off, pulled out their disruptors, and opened fire on the incoming shuttle.

Karn couldn't believe that they were firing at the shuttle with disruptors. He powered the shields up more and pushed into the shuttle bay slowly, letting it push the pirates back.

And that worked, to some extent, as the pirates slowly backed away from the approaching shuttles. They did not give up firing, however, as they needed to provide cover in hopes that their own ships could escape.

Shay just barely managed to get away from the group of people she was with, hoping like hell that they wouldn't notice she was missing and go looking for her. She crouched behind some crates and took in the sight before her. This was total chaos, and now was the time to act. Her phaser was strapped to her leg, and being hidden allowed her the time to remove it, but the pirates couldn't be allowed the opportunity to get away with the supplies.

She knew she would soon be giving up her position, but desperate times called for desperate measures. The young woman brought her phaser out before her, adjusted her setting to a wider beam and stun, then fired toward the six pirates using the disruptors. If nothing else, it would provide a good distraction.

Two of the pirates fell instantly. The others were blocked by the stunned bodies and other items throughout the flight deck. The ensign's blast had a slightly unexpected result as three other pirates stopped what they were doing and began firing on Shay and each other. Just like that, a crossfire was now underway in the flight deck.

Karn knew that firing the shuttle's phasers in the flight deck would incinerate the pirates and the new woman on the scene. He had no idea who she was, either and had other matters on his mind. He directed several of the shuttles off to search for survivors in escape pods, but only if there was life signs on them. He couldn't waste time and as the shuttle he was on touched down, he ordered the pilot to lower the shields as he went to the hatch and opened it, his phaser in hand.

When the hatch opened and the force fields of the shuttle came down, he ducked around the edge of the shuttle and fired a level three stun beam from left to right in a quick sweep along the last position he had seen the pirates in.

The pirates continued to put up a fight, including all of those who were loading before. Most of the pirates fell rather quickly, but a couple under well-protected cover, including the foreman, laid down heavy suppressing fire in hopes that at least one of their ships could escape.

Shay continued to fire, pausing long enough to move to the other side of the crate she was crouched behind. She was going to do her very best to make sure that the pirates didn't get away, but she was only one person, and more pirates were showing up to the fight it seemed.

Karn ducked back in the hatch and opened the external speakers. "You are surrounded and your ships are currently being boarded, If you surrender now, you will not be harmed." He turned the shields back on and began to extend them forward.

The foreman rolled her eyes, wondering when Starfleet would realize that they were only using heavy stun beams. "Let us leave peacefully and you can have your ship. What's on board our ships is our property under maritime law!"

"Anything taken from the Gaittithe is property of Starfleet," Karn responded. He cut the intercom and looked at the pilot. "Go to the transporter and get a lock on them. We don't have time for this."

The pilot got up and headed back to the transporter, even though it could only do two at a time. "Yes, Sir," he said as he scanned the flight deck and locked onto two at random, setting it to immobilize them for a moment after transport and remove their weapons.

"Energize!"

"Energizing," the pilot said as he got a lock and hit transport, then drew his phaser and aimed it at the platform.

His shot rang true, catching two pirates running across the bay. Instantly, they were surrounded by a transporter beam and disappeared. The foreman watched this, cursed, and ducked back under her cover. She looked at her disruptor, and then her surroundings. A glance out from behind her cover revealed an opportunity.

The foreman pulled out her backup disruptor and quickly set it for overload. She only had one shot at this, and she knew there was little chance she'd make it out with the last transport. She had to give them just a few more seconds. The foreman quickly revealed herself and threw her disruptor in the direction of two barrels near the Starfleet shuttle. With a clatter, the disruptor bounced to a stop in front of the towering yellow cylinders.

Almost instantly, the disruptor sparked. Both containers melted away in a burst of light as their flammable contents ignited.

Karn threw his hand up over his eyes as the blinding flash and explosion caught him by surprise. The pilot, however, had his back turned and his phaser on the two matrerializing pirates. "Your cooperation would be greatly appreciated," he said.

The pirates on the transporter pad slowly raised their hands, realizing that they'd been beaten. One of them glanced out the forward window where the pirate ship had closed its hatch and was starting to take off.

"Bravo Team," Karn called out over the comms unit as he got his shuttle under control. "Close in on the flight deck."

Bravo Team, being a Type II shuttle and bigger than most appeared and locked it phasers on the pirate ship that was just starting to take off, firing a burst at the nacelle with the intent to disable it only.

The nacelle shorted out and the ship began to lose altitude. A second later, and the power cascaded out across the craft, and it fell to the floor in a loud clank. Its forward momentum still caused it to screech forward, knocking a workbee out of the bay and into the vacuum of space.

Shay stepped out from behind the crate with her phaser pointed toward the pirates as a precautionary measure. "Don't try anything stupid, either. It's over."

The foreman paused, finding herself at gunpoint at the human she allowed aboard earlier. "Should have figured you humans were plants. It's people like you that make it hard to trust the Alpha Quadrant.

With the pirates on the flight deck under control. Karn lowered the force fields and opened the hatch, then began calling orders over his combadge to begin Search and Rescue efforts and find all survivors immediately. He set Bravo Team to look for evacuees that used the escape pods and the others to scan for survivors throughout the ship, entering where they were able and looking for the crew.

He looked at the human woman with the phaser for a moment before he recognized her. "Ensign Mitchell! Thank you!

"And you think you're better? You're not," Shay snapped at the foreman before looking to Karn. "It's good to see you, too. The ship is full of wounded, and sadly..." Her gaze moved back to the pirates she held at phaser point so they could be detained. "some of whom didn't make it. They're in various locations. Sickbay has quite a few. I saw them first hand."

"We didn't hurt anyone," protested the foreman. "We may not appreciate Starfleet, but that doesn't mean that we're here to kill anyone. We just have need for what you're no longer providing."

Shay arched a brow. "Did they hurt themselves, then? I somehow doubt that."

Karn directed more shuttles into the flight deck and organized the round up of the pirates, but his priority was finding survivors. He stood in the hatch of the shuttle with a tricorder and PADD in his hand, giving orders and telling SAR teams where they needed to go.

The foreman looked at Shay, then at Karn. "We still have some of ours spread out with the survivors. In fact, I'll tell you were they all are. Just let us leave. And keep the cargo in our holds."

"How about you tell us and maybe you'll get a little leniency?" Shay countered.

The purple haired woman scoffed. "Leniency, the word the Federation uses when it's about to throw a temper tantrum. No. Either you let us and our cargo go, or you'll be spending hours more here locating all of the survivors. We all know that you won't leave a soul behind."

Karn looked back at the woman who had been doing all the talking. While he had been placed in charge of the Search and Rescue efforts, this woman could easily hinder them. He looked at Ensign Mitchell and lowered his phaser. "Let them have them. She's right." He would take the fall if it came to it from the Chief or Captain. He looked back at the purpled haired woman. "Tell us where they are and don't hinder us in their rescue or I swear, I will hunt you all down myself."

The woman looked at Shay, then Karn. "All right," she said, pulling her pad out from its pouch. She tapped a few buttons on the screen to transfer what files she had back to her ship, and then called up a schematic of the Gaittithe. "Your people are scattered all throughout the ship," she said, gesturing both of them to come and look. "Maybe 170 or 180 in total. About 30 in sickbay. 80 scattered on the fifth level. 20 holed up here in the port lounge," she pointed to one of the catamarans. "The rest are spread out throughout the ship."

Karn began issuing orders to the SAR teams on the locations of the survivors, hoping this waste management show hadn't cost more lives. "Thank you, now get out of here," he told the purple haired woman. "Now."

The woman activated her communicator and spoke into it. Moments later, the cargo door opened, allowing four pirates to disembark. They quickly gathered their stunned shipmates and carried them back aboard. The foreman, however, waited until everyone was aboard, including the two beamed aboard the Starfleet shuttle, before she boarded the ship. Its lone working nacelle whined as the craft practically limped out of the flight deck.

Shay watched them leave before she looked to Karn. He was right about one thing. He would definitely take the fall. Without another word to him, she returned her phaser to its holster, then left the flight deck to go to the fifth level since she knew about sickbay already.


====

When the sudden chaos hit the ship, pirates started running in all directions. Some to the nearest exits. Some to arm themselves. Some to wherever. John took the opportunity in the ensuing commotion to take the chimp from the cage and yell something about finding a weapon on a dead Fleeter. He turned down a corridor and ducked into an open room.

It took a few minutes of waiting for the noise outside to die down. But when it did, John made a beeline for the forward sections of the ship. That was where he remembered the pirate leader saying they kept the surviving officers. His plan was to free them, get some communicators and phasers, and split up. One team to head to the Bridge, releasing other along the way, and the other team to create more confusion on the way to the cargo bay.

When he found the captives and convinced them of who he was, he learned that the now cognizant chimp belonged to one of the senior staff. Everyone seemed confused on who exactly since he sort of bounced around from department head to department head every few months. John was told that his name was Mojo. And Mojo would probably stick to John since he was the ranking officer in the immediate. John smirked. Looks like he now had a pet chimp. Geisler would be furious. Or maybe not. He didn't really know the man that well.

John's small strike team, which consisted of only one security officer, made a stop by the armory for some stun grenades along with phasers. They were all running down the corridor to the cargo bay with a plan to breach and join the chaos. But this was Starfleet.

"Starfleet!" shouted a deep voice from down the corridor. Two different disruptors opened fire in John's direction, the heat from the beams radiating awfully close to flesh.

"Aww hell," said John as he hit the floor. It took a second to realize he'd only had some degree of a burn instead of full disruptor hit. One of the team that was with him laid down some cover fire while another team member ran to to the opposite wall. He activated a stun grenade and tossed it around the corner hard enough to bounce it off the opposing wall. "Eight ball, corner pocket."

The grenade landed and detonated. Instantly, the weapons fire ceased. What replaced it was the sound of someone moaning and groaning.

"Perfect," said John. "Someone to question. Let's go, but be wary." He slowly advanced with his phaser at the ready. His shooting arm still burned and, as a result, hurt as he held it extended and sweeping the forward area. He would have to get that looked at...eventually. "Well, well, what do we have here?" he said, rounding the corner.

Two pirates, one T'lani woman and one large Dosi male, laid in crumpled positions. The Dosi had taken the brunt of the blast and fallen on top of the T'lani, who was now trapped and unable to move. She'd dropped her disruptor, which she frantically tried to reach for when she saw John approach. Behind both of them was an antigrav cart filled with Starfleet branded supplies.

John ran over and picked up the disruptor. "Interesting piece of weapons tech you have here." He handed it to one of the officers with instructions not to lose it. He then squatted near the T'lani woman's head, but stayed far enough away be safe. "Back in the old days on Earth, pirates - whether sea, land, or air - were always dealt with harshly. I'm a fan of those old days."

He got up and walked around the two bodies, giving indication to the rest of the group to scout ahead. Except the officer to whom he'd handed the disruptor. "So why don't you tell me," he continued with the pinned pirate, "why exactly you attacked a Starfleet ship and what you want with a bunch of supplies." While he'd gotten some information earlier while undercover, John had a reason for asking a different person.

"We didn't attack you, Starfleet," grunted the T'lani, heaving in her attempt to free herself. "We just got a tip that there was a cache of resources out here. We didn't know it was a Starfleet ship until we got here and saw it adrift."

"Okay, so let's say you didn't attack us," said John. "Do you know who did? And who tells you about these caches of resources?" He nodded his head back to the officer who was holding the disruptor. "Do you scavenge from groups other than the Federation?"

"We scavenge from whatever we find. And we have a lot of friends that tell us about ships like this one," grunted the woman. "Please... help me up. This Dosi's too heavy."

"Give me something specific," he said. "Give me a name, a ship registry, a course...something, and we'll roll him off of you." Right now, the pirate was in a place where she would hopefully provide an answer. And less of a chance of her attacking him. If she were up...who knew.

The T'lani fired a stern look at the human. "Dosi. Karemma. Some human named Voseh. People who can afford to have people like me do the grunt work." And, on cue, she grunted, trying to move her Dosi person-weight once more.

"There we go," said John. "Now that wasn't too hard, was it? Dosi, Karemma, and the human Voseh...it's a good start." He took the disruptor from the officer. "Roll the Dosi off," he ordered. The chimp that John rescued - and took responsibility for - started screeching and pointing the woman underneath.

"Shhh!" exclaimed John. "She won't get away," he said. He pointed both the phaser and disruptor at their captive. "See, she runs, she dies." And now he was talking to Mojo like he would anyone else.

"Typical Starfleet," she muttered, still struggling with the stunned body as two uniformed Starfleeters approached to help. "Threatening death when you'd be court martialed for firing your phaser at the wrong setting. "When this is all done, I hope you go to hell."

"I'll save you a seat," John answered with a smirk. He watched as the Dosi was rolled off and then took a few steps back himself. "Now that you can breathe a little better, what else do you have to say?"

The T'lani looked at Reynolds, then at the ragtag group of Starfleeters around him. "You know what? Fine. You Federation types think you're so high and mighty. But you're not. You help worlds out here only when it's convenient for you. You call us pirates. We call ourselves freelancers. A lot of us are tired of surviving. Some of us aim to thrive, no matter who gets in the way."

As John listened, he thought he heard passion in her voice. Determination in her beliefs. People simply surviving and not thriving. He kept that in the back of his mind for a report later. "Good enough then. Off to the cargo bay." He gestured for a couple of the others to escort their new acquaintance along the way.

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