Aaron awoke sharply to the harsh red glare of flashing warning lights and a rising and falling siren. Sitting up in his bed and rubbing his eyes he surveyed the room. The half‐eaten meal he had been nursing before he had gone to bed, steak and chips, lay strewn across the floor and the sword, given to him by his grandfather that usually hung on the wall, lay beside it.
A harsh jolt brought Aaron to his senses in an instant.
‘Asulaz to Leto. Get your ass into sick bay NOW!’ Still slightly groggy, Aaron stumbled out his bed and began grabbing random bits of uniform off the floor.
‘Omniway!’ Aaron mumbled hitting his combadge. Another jolt sent Aaron skidding across the room and into a bulkhead. Today was going to be a difficult day. Finally managing to get himself into something that resembled a uniform, Aaron crashed out his quarters and began charging his way through the corridors towards the turbolift. People were running everywhere. Consoles on the walls were sparking or not operational at all, and officers in red and yellowshouldered uniforms were hopping about the corridors with boxes and equipment. Every face had a steeled determination and there was not an ounce of panic or fear in any one of their eyes. Definitely not an easy day. Aaron reached the turbolift and hit the console on the left hand side to summon it. It appeared almost instantly. Another jolt, this time harsher, sent Aaron flying into the back wall of the turbolift. Bracing himself against the wall to lift himself off the ground, he stood up.
‘Deck Nine!’ he snapped as the computer made its usual beeping sound of acknowledgement. A few seconds later he arrived at Deck Nine. The sight that lay before him was nothing short of remarkable. To his right were the greyscale corridor walls with console inlays all red flashing ‘Red Alert!’ To his left was simply… nothing. The vastness of space pressed in upon the ship, stars blinking in the distance. Aaron looked carefully out for a few seconds longer before deciding to risk entering the corridor. It seemed that the force fields had held in place and nothing and nobody was flying out into space. Just to be safe, he sprinted the full length of the corridor and got to where there were walls on both sides. When he reached the other side he turned around. Looking out past the force fields and the remains of whatever rooms where there, bits of bulkheads were still poking out everywhere, a ship, much smaller than the one he was on, flew past the hole in the ship. It moved incredibly fast, too fast for Aaron to catch it’s name or symbol. Just as that one passed, another whizzed by, this time in the opposite direction from the one that had came before. Now he knew it was more than one ship. Aaron continued to recover from jolts that threw him about the corridors while he ran, in an orderly manner, as was the Starfleet way, to sickbay. Eventually reaching the large blue doors with ‘sickbay’ written all over them, he composed himself and entered swiftly into the room. As expected, it was sheer pandemonium. Nurses in blue uniforms and hygiene masks were running from bed to bed, loading hyposprays or using tricorders to measure certain things. Aaron grabbed a medical tricorder from the supply table next to the door and moved to the first unattended bio-bed.
A young tactical officer, a Trill, occupied the bed. She was unconscious. Aaron pulled out the body scanner and got to work, monitoring the beeping and flashing on his screen. Deciding what was wrong he crossed the medical bay to the hypospray counter and loaded one full of blue‐ish green liquid. Moving quickly, as time was everything in medicine, he returned to the Trill officer. Her eyes were beginning to flicker open and shut. She was going into shock. Cold as ice, Aaron plunged the hypospray deep into the cavity of her neck just below her chin. He heard the satisfying swish of the tool emptying and watched as the blue liquid disappeared. He again pulled out the tricorder and began measuring the squiggly lines on it. This patient seemed stable. Aaron moved on to the next bed. This one was filled with a male Bolian science officer. Aaron did a quick visual inspection. He didn’t appear to be breathing. Aaron used his fingers to feel for a pulse. He couldn’t find one, then remembering that Bolian hearts were on the right side of their body he tried again. Steady pulse and his tricorder seemed to show nothing more than a few broken bones. This one could wait. Aaron continued like this for several hours, bracing himself against jolts as the ship rocked and was hit. More and more crew were streaming in, injured and suffering and it got to the stage for a while, that there were more officers coming in than were going out.
‘Intruder alert!’ The harsh female voice of the computer sounded out into the already noisy sickbay. It continued for a short time then was silenced midsentence. During this time Aaron had continued working, treating the injured but when he heard phaser fire someways down the hall he stopped. He dropped his hand down to his waist where he could feel the familiar touch of his phaser pistol. He drew it and along with several other, less senior officers began approaching the sickbay doors. The higher ranking officers continued to treat the wounded as Aaron and a few other medical officers reached the door. The sound of the fighting continued, becoming louder with every second. They were getting closer. Aaron nodded to one of the other officers, a Klingon. She nodded back. Aaron hit the console beside the door to open it and threw himself out into the corridor. Some other officers followed.
Beams of purple light streamed down the corridor, bouncing off walls. One made contact with an officer in blue. Aaron glanced round to see the Bolian officer he had treated earlier, fall heavily to the ground. Aaron reached out a hand to him. He began to reach back. Another jet of purple light and he lay still. Aaron peeked around the corner of the corridor walls. The Klingon, had taken up a defensive position beside him along with a young engineering officer Aaron recognised but couldn’t remember his name. Some men, if you could call them that, were walking smartly down the corridor rifles raised.
‘On the count of three.’ Aaron whispered. ‘One… Two… Three!’ Aaron launched himself around the corner, phaser in hand, firing madly. One man fell, then another, and another. By this point, the rest had rallied from the surprise and had began firing back. More jets of purple light. Aaron ducked down behind an exposed bulkhead that lay damaged across the corridor floor, but too late. A searing pain drilled into his left shoulder. He dropped his phaser to instinctively grasp at it. A firm hand grabbed him by the arm and dragged him forcefully into cover. It was the young engineering officer. Aaron looked up to him. He was covered with dirt and sweat but he still had the disposition to smile, and wink? He pulled out of his pocket a small device with a button on it and pressing it down firmly, the world collapsed away from Aaron. The sounds of exploding consoles and screaming could be heard from just down the corridor and Aaron could feel the heat from the flames licking the top of his head. That was one way to win a battle.
Aaron fumbled with his good arm down to his belt and pulled out another hypospray. Anethazine, it would help keep the pain down till he could treat it properly. Raising to his neck, he injected.
‘Come on,’ The Engineering officer snapped, in a southern drawl, ‘We’ve got to get out of here and make it to the escape pods. We’re evacuating.’ He reached out a hand and hauled Aaron to his feet. Recovering his phaser, Aaron and the other officers proceeded down the corridor towards the escape pods but met no resistance. It seemed this section of the ship was clear. Aaron glanced back towards the sickbay doors as he rounded the corner and saw some senior officers evacuating the injured but they were going in the opposite direction. Everything after that was a blur. Fire and bodies were everywhere. Aaron never really got a good look at whoever it was they were being attacked by. They were moving so quickly. One cover to another. Dodging patrols here and there. The last thing Aaron remembered was being in the escape pod as it launched and watching as the ship he had come to know so well, disappear in a bright golden light. Aaron watched out the window to see if he could see his attackers, but there was nothing, only the escape pods, drifting helplessly in space. Aaron reached up to his shoulder. He felt something warm and wet trickle down his hands. He looked down to see himself covered in a thick red liquid. What was this? Aaron began to feel dizzy. The engineering officer who had halfcarried, half‐dragged Aaron to the escape pod turned round to see him slowly close his eyes and fall back onto the seat, covered in red. Aaron began to giggle uncontrollably. His head was spinning and everything around him was turning into a gooey mush. He decided to keep his eyes closed. Opening them was too hard anyway. Too much effort… too much…
‘Coffee. Black.’ Aaron reached for his head and stroked it, trying to ease out the pain that had been there since he woke up. That dream again. It always surfaced now when he entered this part of space. The replicator finished making the coffee and beeped with it’s usual vigour, which was never very much and Aaron reached out and picked up the cup. Wandering over to his desk, datapad in one hand, coffee in the other, he looked down to the screen and typed in a few commands on the console.
‘Patch me through to Admiral Varren.’
‘Connecting.’ The Starfleet logo appeared briefly on the screen.
‘Captain. To what do I owe this pleasure?’
‘Hello Mikhail. You were right. The Ferengi were siphoning credits off into the Orion Syndicate in the Be Tau sector.’
‘What can I say Aaron? I had a hunch.’
‘Well I thought I would just give you a call to let you know.’ Aaron smiled and looked over his desk to a wooden framed picture of himself and a younger Mikhail Varren. They were standing in front of a canoe holding what could have been the most pathetic fisherman’s catch of all time. ‘I guess I’ll see you next at space dock?’
‘Sure will. Thanks for letting me know. Talk soon. Don’t leave it so long next time, eh?’ Mikhail smiled, ‘Varren out.’
The screen flashed the Starfleet logo again, then went black. Smiling, Aaron went back to his datapad. Engineering report, security report, crew report, report, report, report. All a captain’s life was, was looking over reports. Aaron gave up and threw the datapad down onto the table and sat drinking his coffee whilst staring out into the vast blackness of space. He was sick of the Ferengi. Always out to make another buck, no matter the cost. He had been dealing with their bargaining, insults, threats, sharp teeth, deep pockets and all together lack of hygiene for the last three months and he was more than happy to me moving on to another assignment. What it was however, Aaron didn’t quite know. He had been ordered to return to Starbase 47 and rendezvous with a contact who would have more information for him when he got there. They were several days out even at high warp so Aaron had time to relax and do nothing. Well, as far as his reports would allow.
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