Ming the Merciless

Posted on Wed Nov 15th, 2023 @ 10:23am by Lieutenant Shinobu Miyake & Captain Tristan Faust & Commander Lucy Heartfilia & Lieutenant T'kara & Lieutenant Azrel Vox & Lieutenant Commander Darrod Hanous & Chief Petty Officer Meredith Corden
Edited on on Thu Nov 23rd, 2023 @ 9:01pm

1,508 words; about a 8 minute read

Mission: Mission 4: Through a Glass, Darkly
Location: Deck 1: Bridge
Timeline: M4 MD03 (2268.07.12) 1800

The Midway quickly approached the space battle unfolding in front of them. The distinctive light grey hull of the majestic Constitution-class was dead ahead surrounded by several NX class starships, other Earth Starfleet support vessels, several Vulcan and Andorian ships. The battle was a complete free for all. Each ship was firing at each other almost indiscriminately and the Defiant was caught in the middle. It was clear they were walking into a Civil War.

"Give me a read out on those ships," Tristan said as he glanced over at Lucy. "Helm and Navigation, ignore the 22nd century ships, they can't do much damange to us," he said, "Focus fire on the Defiant if needed... Focus on their power system."

The helmsman acknowledged the order.

Lucy looked into the scanner scope. "Well, The Defiant has sustained some damage. The others are more heavily damaged" she reported. "The Defiant seems to be focusing on the Andorian vessels."

"It looks as if we've got the high ground, Captain," Shinobu assessed. "Of course, we may just be counting our chickens before they've even hatched, so I wouldn't necessarily bank on this being a one-sided victory."

"Captain, we are being hailed by the Defiant. On screen sir? " she asked.

"Call up the Defiant's pre-fix code..." the Captain responded, "Then put them on screen."

T’kara’s fingers flew from control to control, rapidly doing her part to set the ship up on a firing solution to the Defiant. She hesitated for a split second; she couldn’t believe she was face-to-face with 22nd-century ships! She’d seen holos of the types now in front of her…but to be facing them down, not staring at them in a museum…

She swallowed her hesitation and went back to her duties. She was just as surprised as anyone else when she learned that they were being hailed.

The viewscreen clicked on, revealing a bridge exactly the same as the Midway's except for one distinct change... The sleek Starfleet Captain’s chair had been replaced by a gaudy golden throne in a imitated Japanese design, something like the Showa Emperor might have sat on prior to World War II... No, Ming the Merciless. A young Japanese woman lounged on the throne and staring them with a bored expression.

"This is Captain Tristan Faust of the USS Midway," the Captain announced.

“I knew someone from the other side would come for the Defiant,” the young woman announced.

"Who am I speaking with?" Tristan asked.

"You are speaking with... Empress Hoshi Sato of the Terran Empire," she responded, "You have violated our territory and breaking... What I believe you call the Prime Directive, according to the Defiant's computer."

"We are willing to be reasonable...," Tristan responded, "We have picked up two survivors of the ISS Enterprise and would be willing to return them to you. Return our property to us."

"Two offers are meaningless to me... And what's the old saying, possession is 9/10ths of the law?" Empress Sato asked.

"Now listen here," Tristan said, "I will give you one chance to hand over the Defiant.... Otherwise we will resort to offensive means."

"Then that is what it shall be," the Empress responded.

"Now, Lieutenant!" the Captain ordered to the Communications officer.

Vox nodded to Faust and tapped into her console sending the code as per the captain's orders. Her console gave an error tone a few seconds after the console confirmed the code had been forwarded. She looked over at the captain and shook her head with a worried look.

That complicated things...

"Their shields are still raised." Lucy reported. "And they're turning to being their fore weapons to bear." She looked over at Tristan. "They have the same phasers as us, they can seriously hurt us."

Darrod looked at Lucy and shook his head, gesturing for Georgette to switch urgently to Engineering 2. "With all my respect, sir, like hell they can hurt us. We know this ship, they do not know the Defiant. Defiant is a sister of Enterprise in the first production run, so was the Hood. Realigning shield pattern and phase to counter phaser energy patterns."

Tristan nodded, "Lt. T'Kara, photon torpedoes..." He said looking at the young woman at the CONN." He then said, "Lt. Vox, warn the other ships to back off... The last thing we need are more people killed by our 23rd century weapons." He was betting by now the Defiant was running low on torpedoes and was limited to phasers. The last thing he wanted was a full on firefight.

"Yes sir. " Vox put her ear piece back in. She sent a warning message to other ships in the vacinity to stay clear as their issue was not with them.

"I tried sir but whether they listened is debatable. " Vox advised

“Firing now, sir,” T’kara responded as she stabbed out at the firing controls. The ship shook slightly as the forward banks discharged the torpedoes. On the main viewer, the torpedoes’ exhaust trails lanced out toward the Defiant.

Lucy shook her head. "We've weakened their shields, but that's about it." She explained as she turned to Tristan.

"Full power to shields... Mr. Knowles, take us for a diesel strafing run, point blank phaser fire to their warp nacelles. Once clear emergency warp," the Captain ordered the helmsman as a phaser barrage impacted against the Midway's shields causing a shower of sparks from several consoles.

As soon as the sparks started flying, Darrod was glad he'd taken the main Engineering station up here - if he was going to be anywhere but his engine room, let it be somewhere he could be effective. Damage reports were coming in, but it was nothing they couldn't handle. That was just a little discharge when the shields went out of phase and some of the capacitor-diode units opened backwards. "Damage reports coming in from a few places, sir. Control teams are deployed, repairs starting. Shields at ninety-five percent and holding."

The Captain nodded, "Mr. Hanous, I want all non essential systems deactivated and do all you can to reduce our mass," he added, "I want the ship rigged for silent running and want us to be as small of a sensor target as possible. Although we can easily fool the sensors of a century ago, the same cannot be said of the Defiant 's."

Darrod's nod was tight, the expression of an engineer wholly focused on his work. "Aye, Captain. Rigging for silent running. Shield plane adjustments in progress, non-essential systems being deactivated, team reports that the warp core is being shielded as we speak. Suggest we also deactivate our main FoF and deploy a wild weasel shuttle rigged to explode on proximity matching Midway's command codes and FoF." It was a costly move, and a sleazy one. In fact, it was an Orion move, one Darrod had learned from the people he'd grown up with; and grown to hate - but against people who thought like them and fought like them, he considered it fair play. If the shuttle didn't manage to get anyone's attention, it would mean hours of delicate work for an Engineering team to undo a five-minute crosswiring of the proximity sensors to the plasma chamber; if it did, the Midway would be down a shuttle - but the enemy would be severely injured and they would be able to capitalize on it with full volleys. It was part of how Orion ships often appeared to be in two places at once, and what they did to ambush unsuspecting ships. The green man never once looked off his board as he sent his orders through, knowing he should be down there, rather than up here; and at the same time trusting his team to follow his orders. If they encountered a snag, they would tell him; and if they didn't trust his direction, they would signal that, too, in their work. Neither was happening. So far, Engineering was in lockstep with the plans from the Captain. His maverick suggestion was the only thing that would raise eyebrows, especially so soon after so many of the crew had barely begun to accept that he was a Starfleet officer first and an Orion native second. But seeing the way the battle was flowing made him uneasy, watching the tactics of the smaller ships around the Defiant. He knew them too well; and believed that whoever was commanding their elder sister-ship would too, but wouldn't recognize the wide array of tools at their disposal until it was too late. They needed to commandeer the ship, and resolve any concerns later. This was a prize-taking mission; he was resolved, for the first time in his life, to act like it.

The Midway flew dangerously close to the Defiant and fired all phasers point blank at the Defiant 's sensor dome which flickered and went dim. Sparks flew aboard the Midway as the Defiant fired erratically after them as the ship went to warp.

 

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