Before The Dawning Of First Light

Posted on Wed Oct 31st, 2018 @ 1:26am by Captain Charlotte Averis & Lieutenant Commander Shaille Levine

Mission: https://wellington.pegasusfleet.site/index.php/sim/missions/id/5
Location: USS Icarus
Timeline: Right After Let The Hellfires Begin

ON:

Captain Charlotte Averis nodded slightly, "We'll transport over shortly then, Captain. Thank you again. Icarus, clear." She waited until the screen went blank and then leaned back in her chairr , glancing around the bridge. There were two officers there. Two. The rest had either been retrieved and taken to sickbay or the morgue, wait... Sickbay was gone, they'd gone... God, where had they gone? She squeezed her eyes shut and inhaled deeply, letting it out. "Sam, you have the command."

"I have command, aye, ma'am." The ever professional sensor operator confirmed.

Charlotte sat there for a few more seconds before keying the comm on her chair arm, not sure what to expect, who was alive, "Sabrina?" She asked hesitantly, the channel opening for her senior Marine.

There was a long moment of silence before Sabrina finally responded. "Dayum, Charlie, we gotta stop engaging... these sons of bitches get harder to take down every time!" There was a 'whooompf' sound as Sabrina finally exhaled every breath she had been holding since this skirmish started. "What's your status?"

There was a sigh of relief from Charlotte and she thanked God, "Alive." She said quietly, "More than I can say for most of the bridge crew... How bad did your people get hit?"

There was another very long moment of silence before Sabrina replied again. "We fought hard, they died with honor," she finally said quietly, before her voice took on a cooler tone. "It was a necessary loss, we got the recon needed." Despite the matter of fact tone to her voice, Charlotte knew her well enough to know it was just a front to cover the reality of the situation. Every loss hurt, more than she would ever admit. This late in the game it was easier to just pretend. "What's our next step?"

"I don't know how much you know about what's been going on, but we're somewhere we're not supposed to be... We went through some sort of temporal anomaly because the Wellington is here, but they've never heard of Jeremy." She referred to Captain Westerly by his first name, "I've already invoked the Cochrane Protocols, but the bugs and lizards came through behind us. With the Wellington's help, we exterminated them, but Sabrina? You and I are going to go over there to see their Captain Bartlett. She's also got a pair of Ferrets that look to be senior officers too." Referring, of course, to the Dalacari.

Sabrina sighed heavily. "Damn it, damn it all to hell!" she cursed, her words followed by a resounding thump. "Look, I gotta shower, I need to wash the bug guts off me, especially if I have to pretend to be all presentable and crap. Meet me in my quarters, we can debrief while I clean up."

"Only if I can grab a spare uniform on my way." Charlotte knew that this was helping her, she and Sabrina had made a team even back from the Janissary and knew each other like the back of their hands, "I've made a bit of a mess of this one."

"My replicator is online, just don't tell anyone," Sabrina replied with a laugh. "I'll see you soon." Without another word the communication ended. Sabrina leaned forward into the bulkhead in front of her, closing her eyes tightly, before she pushed herself away, driving her fist hard into the solid metal of the bulkhead, ignoring the pain as she spun on her heel and walked away.

A short time later, Sabrina emerged, freshly showered and dressed in a clean uniform, her 'best' boots on her feet and her hair pulled bunched messily on top of her head. "Alright, where are we at?"

Charlotte rotated her shoulder, bandaged though it was, and grimaced with pain, "In a tin can that's been peeled open like a ration?" It was a really weak attempt at humor, "We're in the same general area of space, a few light years from where we were, looks like the same basic timeframe from what I can tell, but these people have never heard of the Shalti and their pilots had obviously never gone up against them. Stands to reason we're in an alternate timeline or shit like that."

"Cheese'n'freakin rice..." Sabrina unzipped Charlotte's jacket, pulling it down firmly to take a look at her shoulder. "I've got some half assed field stitch dressings left, I can patch it up a little, but you're gonna need a real sickbay and some real sutures." Without waiting for a response, she picked up a muck covered jacket off the floor inside the door and pulled a small container out of the pocket. Opening it, she pulled out what looked like small sticky strips and trying as best she could to patch up the injuries.

"Can we trust them?" She finally asked quietly, already knowing it was something that Charlotte would have been agonizing over.

The Captain kept her shoulder still as Sabrina did her patching, also remained silent for several seconds, "I don't know. I don't see how much of a choice we have. At this point, they could probably take us apart like a chicken if they want to, yeah we'd hurt them, but Harry's gone with all of sickbay. What wounded we had I sent over to them. I don't know how bad off Renee is, but her second said she didn't look good."

Sabrina finished working in silence before stepping away. "Well, we'll take it one step at a time," she said firmly. "You know I got your back. Who knows, maybe they'll prove to be helpful."

"I don't know if you heard, but Anzio's gone." Charlotte said quietly, referring to the assault transport the small task group had had with it before the ambush that had resulted in this situation, "Sanderling as well, but I don't know about Hatsukaze or Narwhal, they tried to draw off some of that battle group and I know they got a good chunk to follow them."

Feeling the breath rush out of her body, Sabrina took two steps back, sinking down onto the arm rest of the couch. She remained quiet for a long moment. "Charlie, just throwing this out there.... but if this is some kind of alternate reality and the Shalti haven't invaded here... we have the option of not going back... destroy the anomaly, ignore these people, find a nice planet somewhere and just settle down with those of us that are left..."

The thought was tempting, but only for the barest fraction of a second, "No, we can't, I can't. You know as well as I do that if we can take that data center intact, we can find the Empress. We find her, we send the combined fleet to kill her. We kill her, then maybe we win. And Alex would never stay here, neither would Renee, God, Sabrina, their kids? They'd never abandon their kids."

Ignoring the comments, Sabrina reached into her pocket and pulled out a small isolinear data chip, holding it out to Charlotte. "The data." she said simply.

Charlotte took the chip and looked at it, such a small thing to hold such important information, "This is it? This is where it is? Exactly where it is?"

"Exactly where it is, the codes to get me past their security and the basic hex algorithm their shields and weaponry seem to operate on." Sabrina paused for a moment, contemplating, before continuing. "The hex algorithm sketchy at best and I have a feeling that there is some kind of a persistent biomatter scanner at work, at least in their ships, which would explain some of what we dealt with. I don't quite know how to counter for that yet, but I'll work it out before we go in again. Who knows, maybe this ship will have some marines worth their damned uniforms."

"We don't even know if they're going to allow us to stay to put the Icarus halfway back together or if they're going to kick us back through that thing, much less help us. And before you say anything, if they tell us to leave, we leave. You know the temporal laws as well as I do and either way we have to find a way to close this portal, I'm not going to leave it for the Shalti or Kojal to find and come through. I'm not inflicting them on these people."

Sabrina grimaced. The thought of going back as they were made her feel almost sick, despite the fact that she was usually the first to throw herself into the fray regardless of risk to life and limb. "At the very least, hopefully they will help us with some basic supplies before sending us back. It might not go a long way but it will give us a bit more hope." She paused for a moment and shook her head. "I suspect they are using some kind of biomatter scanning technology, it would explain why they detect us so easily. I know my team, we should have had more time, we should have been able to..." She stopped speaking, holding her hands behind her head, closing her eyes and sucking in a sharp breath. "A biomatter scanner would make sense, but there might be a way to get around it. Once we find out what they intend to do with us I'll find a new target ship and we can do one more run. Who knows, maybe we'll find the holy grail," she finished with forced smile.

Charlotte actually did smile, "Screw another ship, go for the mother lode and the data center. That's why we were out here, to find it and take it." She sobered, then, "That's why we had Anzio... It's going to be defended heavily by the Princess in control. Maybe we should just take the location back to the Admiral and see what she wants to do? But they might realize we're know where it is and move it... Do we have the time?"

Sabrina spun around, grabbing Charlotte by the arm. "Don't mention this to them," she warned quietly. "For now this needs to be between us. We can't risk any warning of a strike getting back to them, even more so if they're going to send us back anyway."

"I want to recruit them." The Captain said in response, "I don't know what we have left of the four task groups we brought out here, but a Sovereign-class starship, even with old technology, is still powerful enough in its own right. If we can give it some temporary upgrades and convince Captain Bartlett to intervene, we could attack the data center immediately. Admiral Orion needs the information, Sabrina, the Combined Fleet is as ready as it's going to get to assault Shal, we just need its location."

"If they aren't willing to help us, we risk exposing the entire operation," Sabrina cautioned cooly. "We need to know that they are going to help before we tell them too much."

"We may have to tell them enough to get them to help." Charlotte paused, "Even if we expose the operation on this side of that anomaly, it's not going to harm it when we return to our side of it. If they boot us back immediately, they won't be crossing over anyways. If they give us time to make repairs, then boot us back, the same thing, they won't be crossing over. Those are the rules they have to play by, in fact, convincing them to help would be difficult at best, that's for sure."

"Well I guess we'll find out shortly," Sabrina replied quietly. "Come on, we may as well get this circus under way. The sooner we get it started, the sooner it will be over and done with."

Charlotte tugged on her uniform as if to straighten it out and stood up straight, "Yeah, the sooner the better."

"Come on," Sabrina said with a vague smile, linking her arm through Charlotte's. "I promise I'll behave... or at least, I promise I'll try... maybe..." She cast a quick grin at her friend. "Really, what's the very worst that could happen?"

OFF:

Captain Charlotte Averis
Commanding Officer
USS Icarus

Sabrina Hunter
Filler Inner of Places
USS Icarus