Episode 1.3.3: Andoria Prime

== S1, E3, Act 1: Thompson Captured ==
Lt. Ryramorl Ra’yral
USS Centaurus
Stardate 1904.06
Too much planning could be counter-productive, what with contingencies for one scenario undoing the contingencies for others and generally causing confusion, so Ryramorl passed the time by telling Daryl of his homeworld and how Ryramorl was able to actually speak Federation Standard--and why his speech was so slow.  “There is actually a human in the Military Academy who teaches Federation Standard to those who are in training to be liasons to the Federation,” Ryramorl said.  “She was specifically invited because she’s a therapist for those who have severe speech impediments.”
Daryl was puzzled.  “Why would you need you need a therapist to simply teach a language?”
Ryramorl smiled slightly, and temporarily deactivated the Universal Translator so that Daryl could hear the Carnora’s actual language.  He then recited a bit of poetry from his homeland.  It seemed that Olvern poetry relied on alliteration and rhythm rather than rhyming--and some of the vowels and consonants of that language had no place in a humanoid mouth.  Ryramorl reactivated the Universal Translator.  “Trust me, every Carnora who takes the class absolutely garbles Federation Standard at first.”
Daryl nodded. Carnora sounded like a difficult to learn language. He wondered if it was even remotely possible for a human to learn the Carnora language.
Ryramorl grinned.  “My friend Steven Conridge can speak it--sort of.  And besides..”  He made a series of gestures that apparently had meaning.  “That meant, ‘you have hands’ in Ra’yral Tribal Hunt Sign.  Olvern tribes have Hunt Sign for when they want to be silent,, The Atarans use what they call Deep Sign when they’re underwater and can’t speak at all.  The most common is the Muran trade language, which was developed because Murans and Usarin can barely hear each other.”
Commander Mayla Vree and Ensign Tiri Sh'avelith
Andoria Capital City
Stardate 1904.10
Upon the Resurrection's arrival ahead of the Centaurus with the 'admiral', Mayla and Sh'avelith beamed down to a vacant spot in the capitol late in the evening when many of the citizens had already gone to sleep for the day. The shadowed pair wandered around the city before heading to the apartment they had rented. They entered separately and after scanning the apartment for any surveillance equipment, they rested for a few hours before heading out again in the morning.
The first order of business for the day was to participate in a rally that was being held at the university in protest of the Federation's (or Starfleet) presence on Andoria Prime. This gave the Shadow operatives exposure and to gauge the mood of the crowd, and maybe even meet some of those leading the rally.
The tram ride to the university was lengthy, so the rally had already began when they finally arrived. They stood to one side and watched and listened to the unrest. The crowd was riled up by the few of those carrying signs that said in Andorian and Standard for Starfleet and the Federation to leave them alone. They pinpointed amongst the sign carriers that the others deferred to when the university campus security attempted to keep them in one area of the campus. The Andorian with a very noticeable scar on the back of his left hand and a tattoo on the palm of his right hand was the one always starting the various chants. He yelled profanities at those non-Andorians who walked in and out of the admin buildings.
The two shadow operatives remained silent, but Mayla could see an occasionally wince of disgust at how much the crowd was being riled up with fallacies of a singular perspective. When Mayla saw how much her face was beginning to have a permanent scowl, she tapped Sh'avelith's local subvocal frequency which allowed her to select the range of the communications beam. This allowed the communications to be pinpointed to her subvocal only.
"Had enough?" Mayla asked.
"I've had plenty. Let's get out of here."
The two slowly worked their way through the crowd back to the tram. "I'm going to go meet with my source. I'll meet up with you later to report in."
"Affirmative. I will surveille the target and meet you there."
"Aye. Be careful."
"You too."
Ensign Tiri Sh'avelith
Andoria Prime Capital City
Stardate 1904.10
Tiri went to her parents’ apartment, located in the Central District of the capital city. She arrived at the door and considered walking in, since this had technically been her home before she left for Starfleet Academy. But she decided perhaps it was a better idea to ring the door chime.
A moment after sounding the chime, the door slid open and there stood her mother. Vrire Sh'avelith stood slightly taller than her daughter. She was dressed in a long, gray dress and her white hair was braided behind her head, dangling down her back. Seeing Tiri was a surprise for her, at first, then she extended her arms and took her daughter into a warm embrace.
“It is so good to see you, Tiri,” she said softly. “This is quite a surprise. It has been so long since you were home.”
Tiri hugged her mother and then stepped into the apartment, the door sliding closed behind them. Vrire looked her daughter up and down and smiled. “You look good. Starfleet must be treating you well. And they must have given you shore leave?”
“I wish this was shore leave, mother,” Tiri said, taking off her jacket. She’d changed into civilian clothing before beaming down to hide her Starfleet affiliation and to maintain her cover. “I am here on a mission.”
Vrire frowned, her mood suddenly dampened, “All the trouble here on Andoria...that’s why you’re here?”
Tiri nodded. “Yes. I am undercover. Please, do not tell anyone I am here.”
Her mother immediately appeared concerned. “Tiri, these people, this ARF, they are ruthless and twisted. They have outlandish ideas and they are manipulating our youth. These are not people you should cross.”
“They need to be stopped. They are dangerous,” Tiri replied. “I need to know more about their movements. Where they congregate. Who they associate with?”
Vrire shook her head, “I don’t know. The university doesn’t let us go out without security escorts and the campus is always locked down. I have spent these past weeks simply going to and from work. I don’t go out after I come home at night.”
Tiri heard movement from across the room and turned her head slightly to see a figure appear in the doorway of the hallway that led back to the bedrooms of the apartment. It was her brother, Isavos, he stood leaning against the doorway, arms folded across his chest with a grin on his face.
“I know where they hold some of their gatherings. I know who some of their chief instigators are,” he said. “I can give you all that information, if you’re going to do something about them.”
She looked to her brother and gave a nod, “We will deal with them. Are you sure you want to do this?”
Isavos nodded as he walked across the room to hug his sister. “More than anything. Three of my friends have died since the riots began. Two of them were caught in street brawls and one was recruited into the ARF and died during one of their attacks. They are hurting all of the young people like me and my friends.”
Tiri’s mother looked from Isavos to her daughter, an expression of fear on her face. “They cannot find out you gave your sister information, Isavos. They will retaliate. Please, Tiri, he can help you but you must keep his identity a secret.”
The Andorian Shadow operative nodded, “You have my word, mother. Isavos and I will not be seen together.”
“I never liked the idea of you joining Starfleet,” Vrire said. “You showed such promise as an artist. But if you can rid this planet of these ARF troublemakers, I will never question your career pursuit again.”
Tiri smiled, “I have a witness...mom,” she motioned to her brother. “We’re holding you to that.”
Tiri and Isavos then retired to the den, where he laid out everything he knew about the ARF…
A few hours later, armed with the information Isavos had given her, Tiri went to meet with Mayla Vree.
Commander Mayla Vree and Ensign Tiri Sh'avelith
Starfleet Comm relay center, Andorian Capital City
Stardate 1904.10
Mayla rode a public tram to reconnaissance the Starfleet communications relay center and the immediate area around it. They both got on the tram together but Sh'avelith got off without a word to transfer to another tram. Mayla watched her walk away until the tram began to move again and within a second, she was out of sight. Mayla focused on her surroundings on the tram, occasionally keeping a tab on the seven other Andorians in the tram car with her. She looked out the window and as they approached the comm center, she began to take mental notes of the avenues of access, the crowds of people, the directions traffic moved, areas to be hidden, and the constant aerial presence of newsbots and maybe even remote surveillance cameras. There was a grassy area across from the station that was surrounded by various food vendors which approaching the midday meal, was beginning to fill with crowds of Starfleet uniforms.
Within minutes, the tram passed the busy area and headed towards the rest of its route. She waited a few more stops before she got off and walked purposefully away from the tram stop. Block after block she made several turns to lose the possibility of anyone following her and eventually returned to the opposite side of the tram stop where she got off from. This time, the tram that arrived was headed back in the direction of the comm center and was filled with a more diverse crowd as she stood by a window to continue her surveillance.
This time, she got off at the stop nearest to the park across from the comm center and began to peruse the different food vendors. When she bought her food from two different vendors, she sat down at a vacant bench along a path inside the grassy area, facing the comm center. With her cup of talla tea and redbat with hari bread, she pulled out a data padd and pretended to read from it while eating her meal. All at the same time, she continued a vigilant watch of the comm center and study the flow of people going in and out of the building.
She sat there for about half hour before moving back to the vendors and purchase something else to eat. This time, she ordered some seafood and walked to another part of the park that can give her a different perspective on the building. This time, she sat on the footing of a decorative fence on the west side of the building in between two shops that sold various souvenir trinkets.
Several Starfleet ensigns bantered with each other as they passed her without a glance. She sat there 'reading' her padd until Sh'avelith's voice called her over the subvocal.
"Phoenix 1, this is 6."
"I'm on the west side of the the target," Mayla responded without moving.
"On my way. I'm going to get some food."Mayla looked away from her padd and looked up as if enjoying the beams of light that was filtered in from the surface of the moon. Sh'avelith appeared from the park and sat down with her food at a bench that was 10 meters away.
"What did you find out?" Mayla asked, closing her eyes as if enjoying the filtered light.
Sh’avelith ate something she’d gotten from a vendor in the park as she sat on the nearby bench. She looked down at some rodent-like creatures called nevmok that were circling around on the ground in front of her, waiting for her to drop some of her food.
“There are two major gathering places for the ARF and their supporters,” Tiri explained, speaking in a whisper through the subvocal. “One is an abandoned warehouse in the Foshar district. They hold anti-Federation rallies there almost nightly. These usually draw between 200-600 Andorians.”
S’havelith stopped speaking as an Andorian couple walked past, their steps passing close enough to the neymok to scare them up a tree. Once they had passed Tiri resumed – just in time for the rodents to scurry back down to wait for crumbs.
“The other major gathering place is a mall in the Creshel district,” she said. “This one has been the site of some public rallies. There is also some recruiting that goes on there. They use tunnels under the mall – service access tunnels – to hide personnel and equipment during big security crackdowns.”
"Very well. We'll execute the plan tonight. We need to get it done before the admiral arrives." Mayla said with a slight edge to her voice.
Late that night, a loud explosion was heard and felt as the ground rumbled like a wave across the city. The fires lit up the night sky and the smoke billowed towards the ceiling of the underground chamber of the city. At the Starfleet communications relay center, one wing of the building had been obliterated, also damaging many of the businesses across the street. The automated fire suppression systems in the building attempted to put out fires quickly before it spread. Local and Starfleet security details were dispatched to surround the scene and cordoned off several streets around the building to contain the situation. But that didn't prevent crowds of people to assemble in the streets from the surrounding neighborhood. There was an occasional sound of cheers when the news circulated that someone had bombed the Starfleet facility. People started to automatically assume it was the ARF making another statement.
The two shadow operatives were in this crowd separately and joined an impromptu rally that started. More and more Andorians appeared holding signs of discourse and anger at Starfleet's continued presence. All through the rest of the night the protesters remained and continued to harass the security detail. As daylight filtered into the city, crowds began to form again as people were on their way to their duties and businesses. It looked like they were going to treat it as a normal work day.
Lt. Daryl Thompson / Admiral Daren Bridwell
USS Centaurus
Stardate 1904.10
Daryl had discussed possible scenarios with Ryramorl, based on the findings of Raillius which she had presented during the briefing. Now, they were waiting in silence. Then, a voice came over the comm “Admiral Bridwell, this is Commander Vesadin. We arrive within a few minutes of Andoria Prime. We already contacted the Andorian Embassy, and they are awaiting your arrival. Captain Selmak will escort you to the transporter room shortly”
“Thank you, Commander. “ Daryl/Daren replied. Then he looked at Ryramorl. “Ready?”
“Ready” grumbled the large Carnora in his native tongue. Then the door chimed. Daryl stepped up, and was greeted by Captain Selvan, accompanied by six security officers.
“Admiral” Selvan addressed Daryl. “Please follow me to the transporter room” Daryl nodded, and walked besides Selvan, followed on his heels by Ryramorl, and behind him, the security detachment.
In the transporter room, a large one, with enough room to transport larger groups of people, the security detachment positioned themselves around Daryl and Ryramorl. “Good luck, Admiral” Selvan said.
“Thank you, Captain,” Daryl / Daren replied. Then he looked at the transporter engineer.
“High security protocols in place. Ready to beam down, sir.”
USS Centaurus
Orbiting Andoria Prime
Stardate 1904.11
Ensign Ramul, a Bolian, nodded when the order to transport came. With high security protocols in place, procedure called for linking the Centaurus’ transporter with Andorian Central Command’s transporters. In this manner the two transporters were bridged together by means of a system interlock to facilitate direct transport between them.
Ramul engaged the transporter and Daryl and Rymarol disappeared in dual columns of swirling light.
Suddenly, warning lights flashed on the transporter console and alert klaxons sounded. Ramul looked frantically across the control panels and panic flashed on his face. Captain Selvan whirled around and looked to the Bolian with a raised eyebrow.
“What is it?” the Vulcan demanded.
“It’s the admiral. His signal. It’s gone!” Ramul declared. He tapped the communicator on the console. “Centaurus to Andorian Command! Do you have the admiral!”
There was a pause and then a voice came back on the open channel, “No! We thought you had it! We have the Carnora…but Bridwell…he’s just gone.”
Ramul tapped in more commands, “From here it looks like the signal was intercepted. Someone took over the transporter on your end and diverted it somewhere else.”
“Acknowledged. We’ll try to figure out where the signal was diverted to,” the Andorian transporter operator said. “We’ll find him. Command out.”
That Andorian looked up from his console and saw Rymarol standing on his transporter pad, alone. He could already tell the Carnora was not happy. “I…I don’t know what happened…someone intercepted his signal…we don’t know where he is.”
Meanwhile….
Daryl Thompson’s transporter signal was bounced around to several different locations before it was finally allowed to rematerialize. When it did, Daryl found himself standing in a dimly lit cave, presumably somewhere beneath the surface of Andoria Prime.
Thompson attempted to take several steps away from the spot where he’d been beamed to, but quickly ran into a forcefield surrounding him.
“I’m sorry admiral,” a voice came from behind Daryl. He turned to see a tall Andorian walking up behind him. “Or should I say, Lt. Daryl Thompson. I apologize for hijacking your transporter signal and bringing you here, but we couldn’t allow you to waste your time pretending to be Bridwell. Although I can only imagine how disappointed the ARF is going to be when they find out they won’t be able to kill an admiral.”
As Daryl stared back at him, the Andorian offered a faint smile, “Allow me to introduce myself, my name is Seraphim.”
[Back to top]
== S1, E3, Act 2: Growing Unrest ==
Soli Zh'iviannil (Commander Mayla Vree)
Andoria Capital City
Stardate 1904.11
A guttural growl suddenly came over the subvocal with some choice (and thankfully untranslatable) swear words Mayla recognized as the Ra’yral dialect of Olvern.
"Seven, this is One, can you calm yourself and repeat that in Standard?"
"Five has been kidnapped. His transporter beam was intercepted on our way down. Whereabouts unknown. And we can't reach him on comms."
Mayla and Sh'avelith were at the Corlan Shopping Mall in the Creshel District, on the east end of the capital city. They had been mingling separately amongst the shops to get a layout of the area before heading towards a rally when Ra'yral's outburst came.
"Someone down on the planet knew exactly where and when he was coming. Considering we just planned this a few days ago, the ARF must have moved fast once they found out the admiral was coming." There were other possibilities of course, one of which she didn't like at all-that they were compromised from the beginning. Mayla quickly opened the subvocal channel to the whole team. "Switch frequency to Theta 9-7 Backstage immediately."
"What the hell?" Beckett exclaimed.
"Two, do you have a location of his isolinear tag?"
"We are scanning for it now." Raillius responded crisply from the Resurrection. "We are also routing a download of the Centaurus' transporter and sensor logs through Andorian Command for analysis."
"Keep me posted," Mayla ordered. "Three, prepare a fully armed away team for immediate deployment as soon as we find him. Load out for either a full assault or rescue operation depending on his situation. Seven, stay on planet and coordinate with Andorian Command and the Centaurus. We need to find out who has him and where."
"It might be a safe bet the ARF has him," Preet said slowly.
"We'll know soon," Raillius said.
"Either way, we need to retrieve him. Andoria Command has to be at full alert now." Mayla looked around and didn't notice any change in the the mall. "Are they going to put out a city wide alert?"
"I have told them to keep it quiet for the moment until we decide what to do," Ra'yral said.
"Let's wait and see what we can find first," Railius said.
"Agreed. Keep me posted." Mayla switched a channel to directly to Railius. "Two, this is One, keep whatever findings to just Phoenix Team. We don't know the crew of Resurrection or the Centaurus."
"With all due respect, we don't really know each other either," her steady voice came over the subvoc.
Raillius' comment made Mayla's eyes narrow as her perspective on her new team and Admiral MacLeod changed. "If we are compromised in anyway again, then we know it's someone on the team."
"Agreed."
"And one more thing. Suspect everyone from now on until we discover otherwise. I will check in with you every 2 hours. One, out." Mayla switched frequencies to Charatetet. "Eight, where are you?"
"I am three meters to your left, behind a food vendor cart," Charatetet answered back.
"Have you taken note of who is running the rallies?"
"Yes, Comman-," the Muran stopped short and corrected himself, "One, the Andorian in the yellow tunic standing next to the one holding the sign that says 'Starfleet Stands For No One."
Mayla looked around and identified the Andorian. Off to one side was another Andorian speaking to a group of younger Andorians who have gathered around the speaker. She decided to saunter closer.
"Six, One. I'm moving in."
Lt. Ryramorl Ra’yral
Andoria Prime
Stardate 1904.12
Ryramorl growled softly as he stepped from the transporter pad.  He breathed deeply and slowly to calm himself.  “What herd of Horghenhar has the zharin hidden in?” he said aloud, but this time did not explain the term.  The Andorians were looking at him like he was about to go berserk.  How had the ARF known that they were coming?  He looked at the Andorian who manned the transporter, smelling fear and confusion.  “I wish to go to my quarters.  I am not to be disturbed,” he said bluntly.
Once inside his assigned quarters, Ryramorl set the suite to private, set up a dampening field, and went to the console there.  The first thing he thought of was if Daryl’s impersonation had been discovered.  All they needed was to find the face of the true Admiral Bridwell, just like all they needed to do was look up the real Rygaran and see that Ryramorl was using a false name as well.  He knew he could simply speak the commands but used the tactile controls instead.  Then he contacted Mayla over his subvoc.  “Seven to one.”
“One here, go ahead.”
“I had the thought that someone could have accessed information on the real Admiral Bridwell, so I tried it myself, and was successful.  Someone in the ARF could have found the same information and discover that a scent was masked.”
"Why would they kidnap someone impersonating the Admiral?" Mayla murmured as she walked closer to the throng of people at the rally.
“I don’t know. There is little sense in using a live trap over a well-aimed arrow.”
"Unless they already knew who he wasn't." Mayla's suspicions rose another level as the different possibilities began to form in her mind.
“To use a metaphor from my own race--someone is herding these wild Horghenhar.  Like the battle of Grhhnzhara 900 years ago.  My ancestors rounded up a herd and stampeded them through an enemy village.”
"Using him as bait," Mayla said, remembering the story Roar told her when she was younger. "My father's paranoia growing on you?"
“Just because a hunter is paranoid does not mean there’s a scent in the wind that should not be there,” he responded.
"Keep that in mind, and report any findings to Two," Mayla said as she stopped in front of the Andorian yelling through a handheld loudspeaker.
“Permission to contact Special Forces.  I will ask if they’ve scented anything.  If they have--the herder may know where to aim already.”
"We should keep it in the team for now, because if what is happening goes beyond just a kidnapping of a Starfleet admiral, we don't know who to trust. But coordinate with Two, and let her decide. You continue working on it with Havoc. Six, Eight and I will work on infiltrating the cell here. One, out."
Ryramorl then contacted Commander Raillius.  “Seven to Two.  I’m on Andoria in our quarters.  I’ve been able to access information on the real Admiral Bridwell, and think it is possible someone in the ARF may have done the same thing.  Permission to contact Special Forces and ask if anyone has done the same with Rygaran D’Hronaran?”
Ryramorl’s next contact was one he didn’t want anyone on Andoria to know about.  Using the controls, he opened a secure channel to a Frontier Guard outpost.  When he got a response, Ryramorl used the Trade Language--a sign language invented by two races with incompatible vocal ranges that would completely circumvent any listening device and translator.  [Link this channel to Sentinel Station,] he signed to the operator on the other end.
[At once, sir.]
The signal was bounced from Sentinel Station to Watchtower Station 680 to the office of Hroljarus Andruvar.  [I hunt, sir,] Ryramorl informed the Head of Records.  [I ask for a scent.]
[What scent do you seek?]  The use of sign language and the metaphorical phrases alerted Hroljarus to Ryramorl’s secrecy, and he responded in kind
[The scent of what hunts me.]
Hroljarus pondered this, then remembered the pings Ryramorl’s file had gotten.  [The scent is on a shifting breeze and faint,] he responded.  [Something has sniffed through your camp--and the camps of Rygaran and Oldragus, who hunted the same territory years ago.  The breeze blows from the territory of the Powerful Tribe beyond our markings, but from there, who knows whence it came?]
Ryramorl took a deep breath.  He, Rygaran D’hronaran, and the deceased Oldragus Ragoar had one and all served in Shadow Ops, and now someone from the Federation had indeed accessed his file.  [I will try to follow the scent.]
[Good hunting.]
Shortly after, Ryramorl exited his quarters to go and speak with Andorian Command.
Commander T’Aayla Raillius
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1904.13
“Interesting.”
“Thompson is kidnapped and all you say is interesting?” a crewmember next to Raillius exclaimed, perturbed at her unemotional response to the fact that they might have just lost a man.
“Yes, interesting,” she responded, this time with more ice in her voice and a raised eyebrow.  She exited the bridge, feeling the quiet hostility behind her. She’d immediately ordered Resurrection to scan for traces of the redirected transporter beam, but she suspected it would end in failure.  She had also ordered continuous monitoring for Thompson’s isolinear tag, comm badge, and life signs.  Again, she suspected that wouldn’t result in much.  He was likely in a shielded area.  She didn’t verbalize her thoughts to the crew of the Resurrection around her, but inwardly she was excited.   True, Thompson was missing, but it was highly improbable he was dead.  If whoever took him wanted him dead, they could have simply scrambled his transporter signal and allowed him to rematerialize in a puddle of misjointed goo.   No, he had been abducted.  And the manner of his abduction could tell them many things.
To start, either the abductors had an inside person in the embassy who was able to provide a link of the transporter signal to the abductors or they had extremely sophisticated hacking abilities.  Transporters, especially secure Starfleet transporters, had a large number of safety protocols and safeguards to prevent exactly what had happened.  
Their transponder codes changed by the second to prevent unlawful transports or accidental cross connections with other transporters.  An inside person could have allowed an electronic conduit into the transporter control system in the embassy.    If it was a direct hack into the transporter system from an outside entity without inside help, then this told her they were dealing with a very sophisticated adversary indeed.   
She made her way to a small conference room, several decks below the bridge.   “Computer, secure access, authorization Railius 1 Delta 1.  Computer, tie into the embassy databanks, and account for the activities of all embassy staff and Andorians embassy personnel from the time initial contact was established for the Admiral Bridwell visit.   Tie into all Federation comm badges, security swipes, computer access and logins, and surveillance equipment.   Track their physical whereabouts as well as electronic activity.  Create a summary for each person.   Identify potential personnel who had access to enable tampering with the transporter operation.  Cross index with planetary surveillance systems. Estimated time for completion?”
“1.21 hours.”
“Commence query and store the resulting file for future access.  Delete log for this request and encrypt all further access using code Gorn33.  
She also found it interesting that they only abducted the “Admiral.”  True, he was the higher value target, but they could just as easily have taken the Carnora.   A second hostage would have been useful, if for no other reason to send expendable body parts back to indicate their seriousness.   No, there was something useful about their decision to only grab Thompson.  Why only grab the Admiral or Thompson?   The answer to that question could be enlightening.  Yes, they’d lost Thompson...for now, but they had perhaps gleaned some important information.
Time would tell.
Lt. Daryl Thompson / Admiral Daren Bridwell
Somewhere on Andoria Prime
Stardate 1904.13
“Allow me to introduce myself, my name is Seraphim.” The Andorian said.
“As a high-ranked officer of Starfleet, I demand you return me to the Andorian Embassy immediately” Daryl addressed the Andorian.
Seraphim looked amused, but said nothing at first.. Then he stared at Daryl. “You can drop the charade, Thompson. We know you are not an admiral. You are a Shadow Ops operative, an organization that was disbanded several years ago. I suppose the question is why are you here, pretending to be Admiral Bridwell? I imagine it has something to do with the ARF terrorists...Starfleet wants you and your team to stop them from causing further harm on Andorian. Always the noblest of causes. You must consider yourself to be quite heroic.”
Daryl kept his straight face even though he was taken by surprise. This was bad. Real bad. His cover was blown. The ARF seemed to have enough spies to find out about Starfleet’s deepest secrets. This also meant that the whole mission was compromised already. He had to contact the Resurrection as soon as possible. But how ? For now, the odds were against him. Best thing to do was to stay calm, and find a way to get out of this cave as soon as possible.
Seraphim looked at Daryl, as if to read his mind. Daryl made a step forward until his face was only inches away from the Andorian. The soft hum of the forcefield was audible. Daryl looked the Andorian in the eyes for a few moments. Then he cracked his usual, cocky smile. “I don't know what you are talking about, Andorian.”
Seraphim nodded once and stepped away, back into the shadows “You will soon, my friend, you will soon…” Daryl watched him disappear in the dark. When it was silent, Daryl sat down on the small rocky bench, cut out from the caves’ wall. He tried to open a subvoc comm to the team, but obviously, all frequencies where blocked. He exhaled, as for now, there wasn’t much what he could do.
Ensign Reepchip Charatetet
Andoria Prime
Stardate 1904.14
Reepchip wished he’d worn something warmer as he slipped from one spot to another.  Being so tiny, the cold affected him more than most.  As the crowd grew larger, he had to find somewhere out of the way.  He glanced around for something to climb for a better vantage point and saw some out-of-the-way ductwork.  After tapping it to see if it would support his weight, he quickly climbed to a ledge, seeking Mayla and Tiri in the increasing and increasingly agitated crowd.
Colonel Jahkar
Andoria Prime
Stardate 1904.15
Jahkar beamed down to the embassy to assume command of the Marine unit there, and was greeted with the news that Admiral Bridwell was missing and presumed kidnapped by the ARF. The Romulan/Klingon cursed under his breath as he was joined in the transporter room by embassy security. Captain Duane Crowley of the embassy marine unit greeted Jahkar and then showed him the transporter logs.
“The best we can determine is someone hacked the transporter and diverted Bridwell’s signal to another location,” said the big, burly marine. “How, we’re not quite sure. It would take someone with considerable skill and knowledge of Federation technology to manage such a feat.”
Jahkar frowned, “But apparently they did accomplish just that. Can you trace where the signal was diverted?”
“They were real good,” Crowley muttered. “Signal was bounced around to several locations -- a weather control station, a freighter in orbit, a cargo facility on Andoria’s surface and then to a medical facility in the capital. After that we lost the signal.”
The colonel growled in a low voice and made a copy of the captain’s findings. Taking the padd, he left the transporter room and took a lift down to the ground level before walking out into the yard of the embassy.
Activating his comm-unit, he keyed a signal to Raillius, “Phoenix 3 to Phoenix 2.”
“Two here,” she replied.
“Security here sounds like it’s hit a dead-end,” Jahkar said. “I’ll transmit their findings to you. Meanwhile I’m at the embassy, the marine unit is here and on alert after Bridwell disappeared. What are your orders?”
Andorian Capitol
Starfleet Communications Relay
Stardate 1904.18
Fire flared from the skeletal remains of the Federation Communications Relay as firefighting crews descended on the building. Hover trucks with firefighting apparatus floated around the wrecked structure and sprayed fire suppressants to control the flames.
On the ground, security forces had formed a perimeter around the destroyed building and were busy keeping curious onlookers back. Worse, protestors who supported the ARF formed their own picket lines and jeered the security and firefighting crews as they did their jobs.
The mood on the streets was one of escalating tensions. Demonstrators were emboldened by the destruction of the building and it was quickly becoming obvious this might grow into something much larger.
Seraph watched the situation at the communications relay and turned to two of his lieutenants who stood nearby, observing the news feed.
“We didn’t direct ARF to do this?” Seraph asked.
One of the Andorians shook his head, “No. I just spoke with ARF command and they deny they ordered the attack.”
“Impressive,” Seraphim smiled thinly. “Someone impersonating the ARF, perhaps?”
“Possibly,” the lieutenant said. “If Section 31 were still operational, I’d say they did it to further incriminate the ARF to justify a powerful response.”
Seraphim raised an eyebrow inquisitively, “Or someone like Section 31.” Seraph looked again to his lieutenants. “What is the mood on the streets?”
“The ARF’s supporters are stirred up,” he replied. “Several disturbances have taken place around the communications relay and its spreading. The ARF is sending in its people to insight their supporters to become more aggressive.”
Seraph nodded, “If this can be stirred up further, we could have a full-scale uprising within a few hours.”
“Exactly what we need as a distraction,” the other lieutenant chimed in. “Should we ready the team?”
Seraphim considered the request, then gave a nod, “Yes. Have the strike force assembled and start preparations. If we can make this situation volatile enough everything should fall into place.”
One lieutenant nodded, then turned and headed off to carry out Seraph’s orders. The other Andorian waited for his instructions.
“Bring Thompson to the communications chamber,” Seraphim said. “Archangel wishes to speak with him.”
The lieutenant raised an eyebrow, “Why would he care about this man?”
“Apparently he knows something of this Daryl Thompson. I advised against it, but Archangel has decided,” Seraph said with disgust. “Have him under heavy guard. Make sure all his weapons are removed. We detected knives on transport. Secure any gear he has, bind him and bring him to the chamber. I will establish contact with Archangel.”
“As you wish,” the lieutenant said, pivoting on his heels. He then headed off to carry out his orders.
Moments later, the lieutenant arrived in the cavern where Thompson was being held. He brought four armed soldiers with him. Two were Andorian, one was human and the fourth was a Klingon. All of them wore black body armor and clothing. All carried phasers and melee weapons. Three stood back, weapons trained on Thompson. The lieutenant stood closer and directed the human to move in and secure the prisoner.
As the man approached, the forcefield dropped and the lieutenant said, “Don’t move. Hands above your head. He’s going to search you. Then we’re taking you to meet someone.”
[Back to top]
== S1, E3, Act 3: Growing Unrest 2 ==
Soli Zh'iviannil (Commander Mayla Vree)
Corlan Shopping Mall, Andoria Prime
Stardate 1904.21
"Phoenix 2, One, sitrep." Mayla asked calmly as she walked through the mall towards the main atrium at its center where several rallies of different groups were congregated.
"We're tracking every ship in orbit in case Five isn't on the planet," Raillius answered briskly. "None have left yet. We're calibrating the new sensors to detect any type of cloaked ship in orbit, or even on the planet."
"So we know he's probably somewhere on the planet," Mayla said, paying for a finger dessert at a cart vendor. "Find the spot you can't scan and that's probably where he is. Everyone knows any biosign can be scanned from orbit. They must have some sort of dampening or scattering field set up."
"We are on it. If we do locate him, do you want a full assault?"
"I want some recon done so we know what we're getting into. Stay on notice that everything we do could be broadcasted to them." Mayla said. Then her father's voice reprimanded her in her mind. "I want you to plan for a full extraction at a location that's not where Five is. But also plan in your head for a full strategic assault at his location if you do find him. Tell no one until beam out."
"That's going to be difficult, we don't have the personnel to mount two armed away teams," Raillius said, already scheming ideas in her own mind with the resources they do have.
"Phoenix Three has resources on the planet. Use them for the extraction plan and use Havoc resources for the full assault." Mayla arrived at the atrium and started observing to see which protest group seemed the most lucrative.
"Aye. Anything else?"
"That's it. I"m about to confront a possible recruiter. One, out."
Mayla finished her finger dessert and took a drink from her bottle of water. She made her way to the table with the largest sign and the same protest slogan she'd seen before at the comm relay. There were other people huddled around looking at the flyers. When some of them sauntered off, she fingered one of the flyers.
"What is the answer?" Mayla asked when the male Andorian at the table took notice of her and handed her a flyer.
"The answer to what?" He asked, antennae twitched with curiosity.
"To this," she responded as she waved towards the signs with anti-Federation propaganda. Her voice was edged in the form of borderline outrage and containment. "I'm sick of all this; the protests, the riots, walking around thinking is Starfleet going to arrest me for something. I'm sick of the unrest." She nearly slammed her fist on the table. "If the Federation leaving will end all of this, sign me up. Whether they are here or not, they haven't done me any favors lately."
The Andorian watched her performance and then his gaze averted to someone coming up beside her. Sh'avelith stood there with a dark face and crossed her arms across her chest. "Well, I'm waiting to hear your answer. I'm tired of all of this too."
"What makes you think there is an answer?"
Mayla waved to her surroundings. "So all of this is just for show?" She shook her head with disgust. "Nevermind. I'll find my own answers and solutions." She turned and walked away.
Sh'avelith watched Mayla walk away and glaredd at the sitting Andorian. "Phony." She also started to walk away when the Andorian stopped her.
"If you want to make a difference, head over to the West Starfleet Comm relay. There seems to be some action going on there." He suddenly started collecting his flyers and supplies and quickly vacated the table.
"One, Six, flyer boy just suddenly got up and left," Sh'avelith said, looking around for the Commander. "He said there's something brewing at the comm relay."
"Then let's head back there as soon as we can. We need to get into the thick of it." Mayla ordered and separately, they headed back to the communications relay they had bombed.
Ensign Tiri Sh’avelith
Andorian Capital/Federation Communication Relay
Stardate 1904.20
At dawn the mood among the crowd was beginning to mellow. Then, a steady flow of radicals began to filter into the area and they began to incite unrest among the Andorians gathered at the scene of the relay bombing.
The crowd began to chant anti-Federation slogans and there were Andorians, presumably with the ARF, who were getting up and making speeches that urged the people to rise up against their “federation overlords” and reclaim the Andorian Empire’s legacy.
By 1000 hours there were large groups of very loud, hateful Andorians hurling insults at Federation and capitol security forces. By 1100 hours the first rocks were thrown, followed not long after by fire bombs.
That’s when things became intense. Riot police moved in and set up a perimeter to drive the protestors back from the scene of the bombing. Equipped with riot shields the Andorian security forces pushed the crowd back, and the harder they pushed the worse the situation became.
Tiri scanned the crowd for Commander Vree, but she’d lost sight of her in the chaos. She keyed her comm-unit. “Phoenix Six to Phoenix One. This thing is going to boil over at any time. The sense I’m getting from the crowd is they’re going to push back against security forces. If they overrun the Andorians, they’re going to run smack dab into Starfleet reinforcements who are just itching to crack some heads.”
She looked around her again and could feel the mood turning in the crowd. It was becoming extremely volatile. “ARF has probably funnel more than 100 thugs into this crowd in just the past hour. What are you seeing, One?”
Soli Zh'iviannil (Commander Mayla Vree)
Andoria Prime, Starfleet Comm Relay
Stardate 1904.21
Mayla had been able to pick up a sign with a protest slogan on it and was chanting along with the group around her when Sh'avelith contacted her over the subvocal.
“ARF has probably funnel more than 100 thugs into this crowd in just the past hour. What are you seeing, One?”
Mayla took a quick look around while she continued her march with the group. "This crowd is different than the one we had left earlier today. From the conversations I've overhead, there was a call out to rioting. They are building up to something here. I can't make out what their final goal is."
“Eight to One, Eight to Six.  See anyone I should tag?” Reepchip's voice came over in a huff. Mayla couldn't tell where he was at.
"Don't use anything that will lead the weapon back to you. I want you to keep an eye out and follow anyone who looks to be giving orders or directions. Get his scent so we can follow him later." Someone jostled her from behind. "It's getting bad here. But we have to ID at least one principal here."
"Affirmative."
"And don't get hurt." Mayla said just as she pushed back. She needed to stay far enough away from the front of the crowd closest to security and the perimeter barrier to avoid getting hurt. All of her senses were on alert for what may happen next as the tension in the crowd escalated.
Andoria Prime
Outside the destroyed Communications Relay
Stardate 1904.21
It wasn’t long after Mayla spoke to Tiri that all Hell broke loose. A firebomb thrown by some ARF thugs struck a squad of Andorian security officers and at least two were killed and several more injured. The security forces, backed by Starfleet security and Marines struck back. They opened fire on the crowd with heavy stun settings on their phasers, dropping both innocent bystanders and ARF thugs left and right.
The ARF deployed force shields stolen from an Andorian armory. The hand-held shields were much like the one’s the security forces were using to block attacks. When the rioters were able to fend off the security forces attacks, they moved in to engage the hostiles in hand-to-hand combat, closing close enough to keep them from throwing more bombs.
At that point, the rioters produced deadly melee weapons such as knives, Andorian ushaan-tors and other blunt and bladed implements of killing. Security forces suffered immediate losses and the fighting intensified.
As the fighting in the streets grew, the ARF began to circulate phasers among their people. Pistols and rifles began to appear, passed around by individuals who seemed to appear out of nowhere -- possibly transported into the vicinity of the riot -- who had just one job, handing out guns.
Then the shooting began, and the ARF was not firing on stun…
Ensign Reepchip Charatetet
Andorian Capital/Federation Communication Relay
Stardate 1904.20
Reepchip watched the crowd with worry.  If they caught him, he’d have little chance of escape.  “Eight to One, Eight to Six.  See anyone I should tag?”  He considered slipping away altogether, but stayed where he was, holding his little blow pipe and scanning to see if he could find whoever had actually set the bomb.  
"Don't use anything that will lead the weapon back to you. I want you to keep an eye out and follow anyone who looks to be giving orders or directions. Get his scent so we can follow him later." came the reply.  Reepchip couldn’t see anyone who looked like they were directing anyone else.  He saw a group of Andorians--tough ones, by the looks of it--come towards the crowd and amping up the agitation even further.  He tried to see a leader amongst those.  Knowing Ryramorl would know what to look for, Reepchip contacted him.  “Seven to Eight,” he chittered in his own language, which he knew Ryramorl had been taught.  “I’m looking for a leader, but I don’t see one in this crowd.”
“Remember the uprising back on Carnor,” responded Ryramorl in Olvern.  “You’re looking for a herd leader, and that’s not what we want.  Look where the stampede’s coming from and find who aimed it.”
Reepchip berated himself for a fool.  Ryramorl was right; this was much like the upheaval back home, but worse.  The leaders who’d been in the crowd had truly wanted the Republic to represent all races equally.  But there’d been rumours that the real leaders had simply wanted the Republic to go down in flames, and were furious when Shor-Ghan had agreed to the protesters’ demands.  He went to where he thought they’d come from, then had to hide when he saw another group coming with more firebombs and some sort of fist-held weapons.  Once they were past, he went whence they came, and saw in an alley a group of Andorians standing around, speaking with each other.
Reepchip really wished he’d managed to learn Andorian in Starfleet; not only would knowing multiple alien languages be a real coup back home, but it would serve him very well here.  Still, when many went silent and one spoke, it wasn’t hard to guess who was Leader.  When the others had gone, he tried to follow Leader while keeping hidden.  He managed to get the Andorian’s scent and when Leader looked like he was going to disappear into a crowd, Reepchip loaded a dart into his blowpipe and took aim, even though he didn’t know whether Andoria had any native biting insects...
Lt. Daryl Thompson
Somewhere on Andoria
Stardate 1904.21
Daryl heard them before he saw them. 3 Andorians, a human and Klingon. One of the Andorian, a Lieutenant stepped close to the force field of the holding cell, then nodded to the human. The remaining 2 Andorians and the Klingon drew their sidearm and aimed at Daryl.
The Andorian lieutenant addressed Daryl, as the human thug approached the forcefield, which deactivated automatically. “Don’t move. Hands above your head. He’s going to search you. Then we’re taking you to meet someone.”
Daryl raised his hands and grinned “Oh good, I like to meet new people” The thug, who was frisking him, hit him hard in the ribs. 
“Shut the hell up, Starfleet” he hissed. “one more word, and I stab you with your own knife…” the human continued. 
Daryl looked at the human, still grinning, even though his ribs hurted, but he kept his mouth shut. Apparently the thug found that enough reason to punch again, he hit Daryl square on the nose. He staggered backwards, and the human stepped forward to give him more.
“ENOUGH” yelled the Lieutenant. He gave a short handsign and one of the Andorians stepped forward and pushed the human aside. Then, Daryl was quickly stripped from his knifes and his hands were cuffed on his back. The lieutenant whispered something to the human. The human grimaced but nodded and took out his sidearm. The Andorian who had cuffed him pushed Daryl forward, as a sign to start walking. Daryl was led through what appeared a cavern. It had lots of corridors. After a short while they stopped in front of a door. 
The Andorian lieutenant stepped closer towards the door. For a second, nothing happened, then the door opened. It revealed a dim lit room, with a large table in the middle, Daryl was pushed inside one of the chairs. The Klingon stepped forward and positioned himself so he could see Daryl from the frontside. He had his sidearm lowered, but kept a calm gaze on Daryl. The two Andorians stood behind him, just out of reach. 
The human had positioned himself at the entrance and drew a hunting knife which he started to sharpen with a whetstone. The Lieutenant tapped his commbadge and said something in Andorian. He got a reply and looked at Daryl. 
“Just to make things clear, Starfleet. I don’t care about you. Apparently our superiors think otherwise. One of them wants a chat with you. But...one wrong move….” The human grinned and pointed at Daryl and made a shooting gesture with his hand. Daryl kept a straight face. More odds against him. But even though these soldiers meant serious business, Daryl had been through worse. He just nodded, and waited for what would come.
Andoria Prime
Secret Base
Stardate 1904.24
Daryl was shown through a door into a room which was obviously set up to be a holodeck of some sort. Holo-emitters on the walls suddenly hummed to life as the door closed behind him and the room turned from a rock cavern to an office somewhere, nearby there was a desk and seated behind the desk was a man who was dimly lit so Thompson could only see his shape, no features.
“Greetings, Daryl,” the figure said, his voice definitely altered electronically. “I’m sorry we figured out your ruse, it was quite clever to have your impersonate an admiral. He was definitely a target for the ARF. As soon as they heard you were coming, they planned to assassinate you. Fortunately they have us to provide checks and balances and we determined their target was not the man he claimed to be.
“See, your plan didn’t take into account the ARF would have access to resources within Starfleet and the Federation,” the shadowman said. “Otherwise you would have baited them into that trap you were setting.”
The figure sighed, “So, here we are. I’m not really sure what to do with you. Seraphim says I should have you killed. His men are more than happy to carry out that order. I just can’t do that, because that isn’t what the Legion is all about. Certainly, to achieve some of our goals there must be bloodshed, but you really deserve a chance to know more about us and make a decision for yourself.”
Daryl frowned, “A decision about what?”
“About where your loyalties lie,” the shadowman said. “You see, Daryl, you are not unlike the my seraphim. All of them are former intelligence operatives, each abandoned, betrayed or disavowed by their governments. Much as you were when Admiral Jaegar had you replaced with a clone and dumped you in a mining operation as a slave.”
The shadow let that thought sink in a moment, before he continued. “How many years did you lose as a slave? How much time passed? Yet here you are, still serving the same masters. Why? The Legion has a plan...one that will do away with the petty bickering, squabbling and fighting the governments of the Alpha Quadrant has allowed to fester for centuries. You could be a part of that plan, Daryl. We could use someone like you.”
Daryl stared at the shadowy figure, trying to make sense of what he just had said.It was obvious that this could be Daryl’s chance to get deeper into this organization. On the other hand..he really was loyal to Starfleet. Even though he had been for so long on that forsaken planet, years passing by, waisted. But for Starfleet, Daryl never was away. That was, until the clone went rogue, was captured and jailed, and eventually killed by Jaeger, Daryl was there. Daryl held no grudge against Starfleet for that.
“Yeah, I lost quite some time as a slave on that forsaken place. Then again, Jaegar was a traitor.”
Daryl gritted his teeth by the thought of what Jaegar had gotten him into. “And, contrary to what your operatives may feel or have experienced, I don’t feel betrayed by Starfleet. It was a weird coincidence that I ended up as a slave. Yes, I wasted lots of years there. But I don’t account that to Starfleet. So, the answer is no.”  
Archangel
Secret Base
Stardate 1904.24
“Exactly,” Archangel said. “Years wasted. The actions of your clone were never investigated by anyone, it was just chalked up to a rogue agent and you were presumed dead. Sorvek failed you. Shadow Operations and Starfleet failed you.”
The shadow-figure turned his head slightly, “Seraphim, join us.”
The door opened behind Daryl and the Andorian known as Seraphim entered, “Yes.”
“Seraph, tell Lt. Thompson about what Starfleet Intelligence did to you,” Archangel told the Andorian.
Seraphim looked solemnly at Thompson and then gave a nod, “I served as an agent with Starfleet Intelligence. I was sent to steal a data file from the Breen, a few years after the war. They wanted details on a Breen warship under development so my team and I infiltrated the shipyards above the Breen homeworld. The mission was off the books, so if we were captured Starfleet Intelligence would disavow all knowledge of what we were doing.
“We got deep into the shipyard’s computer core and were uploading the data when the Breen found us. We were caught in an ambush and my entire team was killed. I was stunned and captured. The Breen imprisoned me and Starfleet did nothing. Starfleet said we were all mercenaries, no ties to the Federation...they even produced false documents to make us appear to be criminals.
“I spent eight years in a Breen prison before I escaped,” Seraphim said. “When I came back, Starfleet Intelligence still wouldn’t acknowledge me. They didn’t want me back.  Section 31 took an interest though and tried to kill me...getting rid of me so it wouldn’t look like I was accepted back into the Federation with open arms. Or so I wouldn’t talk and tell my story to the media.”
Archangel turned back to Thompson, “There are 53 more individuals in this organization with similar stories, Daryl. Not just from Starfleet Intelligence, but from the Klingon Empire, the Romulans, Cardassians -- multiple governments, all the same story.
“Don’t tell me your story is different, Daryl. Not only did they leave you, but they don’t trust you now, or value you. Aren’t you still a lieutenant, the same rank you held 20 years ago when you were replaced by the clone?” Archangel continued in his electronically-altered voice. “You’d think by now they’d have promoted you? But, I guess not.”
Lt. Daryl Thompson
Secret Base
Stardate 1904.28
Daryl listened to Seraphim’s story, then to what the man in the shadows said. Daryl exhaled softly as the words sunk in. This was propaganda on it’s best. Seraphim apparently was in some kind of secret agency as well. And apparently, he knew what the odds were. He knew upfront. The mission went south and he got arrested and thrown in a brig. Though luck for him. However, knowing the Breen, he got lucky to be thrown in jail, and not killed as well. The Breen weren’t really picky about another dead Starfleet officer. This might be a good opportunity to get deeper into this organisation and find out who was behind all this. It would be dangerous, and probably Daryl would be rigged with these explosive devices in his head. When he would refuse to join, they probably would kill him anyway. And when he played along, he would at least live a little longer, maybe long enough for his team to get him out of here alive. While he was weighing his odds in the few seconds of silence that fell, the shadowy figure spoke again. “I see your hesitation, Daryl. Join us. We can use your experience and knowledge quite well within our ranks. And here, you CAN become a leader...”
Daryl played along. “I...I need a few moments. I always thought that they didn’t fully trust me. And I always was hoping I would get rescued by Starfleet when I was in that hellish place. I trusted Starfleet and Shadow Ops Command. I realize I was wrong all that time…..” Daryl silenced, playing as if he was overthrown by the emotions from his realization of the “betrayal” of Starfleet. He exhaled again.
“All right. I will join you. Starfleet can go to hell!”
Archangel
Secret Base
Stardate 1904.24
The holographic shadow man gave a faintly visible smile. “Well, you were easily persuaded. Serpahim, see to it he’s properly indoctrinated and take him along with you.”
The Andorian frowned, “On the mission? That isn’t very practical.”
“Everything will be fine,” he said. “I have business to attend to. Welcome to the Legion, Mr. Thompson.”
The holographic image disappeared, and Seraphim looked at Thompson with obvious mistrust. “One step out of line and I’ll kill you, despite what he said.”
Two of Seraphim’s men entered the room. They approached Daryl, one of them carried a hypospray in his hand as they stepped closer…
Lt. Ryramorl Ra’yral
Andorian Capital
Stardate 1904.24
Ryramorl was meeting with the Andorian officials who would have met with Admiral Bridwell.  “Two things suggest that whoever is behind this is not a normal thug,” he said calmly, taking care to speak his own language.  “First, they managed to break into some of the most secure transporters in the Federation.  Second--if they intended to kill the Admiral, why not simply scramble the signal?  Someone is smart enough to want a high-level hostage.”
“Why wouldn’t they take you as well?” one of the Andorians asked.
“I make a poor hostage.  The Carnora Pentarchy is not a major power even in its own territory.  I would not be in Starfleet if I were not expendable even to them.  Also, it is a matter of Starfleet Academy record that Carnora can break through force fields.  So, I am more trouble than I am worth.”
Ensign Reepchip Charatetet
Andorian Capital
Stardate 1904.26
Reepchip was getting frightened.  He remembered the protests back on Carnor, but he’d never been in those where the Special Forces and protestors had done battle.  From his perch above the street, he tried to tag a few he saw handing out phasers.  Then he saw an Andorian seemingly look his way, and Reepchip scrambled to hide.
What the hell had Ryramorl gotten him into?!
Colonel Jahkar
Federation Embassy
Stardate 1904.27
Jahkar and the embassy Marine squad were assembled in the staging area in the bowels of the Federation Embassy, awaiting orders. With Thompson now missing, Jahkar was not clear what his orders would be. There was no Starfleet admiral to protect.
Gathered with the Marine force there, and being the highest ranking officer, the soldiers were all looking to him for directions as they listened to the incoming transmissions from the riot at the communications relay.
Finally, he keyed his subvocal communicator, “Phoenix 3 to Phoenix 2,” he said, opening a channel to Commander Raillius. “Permission to take the admiral’s Marine detail to the communications relay?”
He waited for Commander Raillius to respond….
Commander T’Aayla Raillius
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1904.27
“Phoenix 3, this is 2.  Hold your position and gather as many unassigned forces as you can for a potential emergency extraction of any of our team members.  Only say that you are readying an emergency response force, but do not disclose your purpose.   Leave the communications relay to the forces already assigned there- we’re not going to make a difference and 1 and 6 can use the chaos to identify an entry into the ARF.  The Commander is an experienced agent and will make the most of the opportunity.  Remember, that is what it is- an opportunity.  We’re not here to assist the Andorian police keep order in the short run.   And remember the ARF is only one component on one planet of this quadrant-wide mystery, they can’t be the ringleaders, only a possible entree to whoever is orchestrating these quadrant-wide disturbances.  I’m keeping a lock on both for immediate beam out if they get into any trouble.  Also be prepared for an operation inside the embassy.  3 out.”
She’d returned to the bridge after establishing the parameters of her security search to identify any possible people who had access to the transporter controls at the embassy and awaited the results.   She had also “suggested” actions to Captain Quentin Lazarus, regarding tracking all of the ships in orbit, establishing a hold on all ships leaving the system, and tracking into the system.   She’d also made sure that the ship’s scanners were simultaneously tracking all the members of Shadow Ops as well as searching for Lieutenant Thompson.  Unfortunately, there were so many areas on Andoria that were shielded from the ship’s scanners that it did little to help their search for the Lieutenant.   She’d even had the ship’s computers do a comparison of previously unscannable areas when the ship entered orbit to now to see if there were any new unscannable areas. Unfortunately, the ship’s scans of the planet had not been at a level deep enough to properly compare to their current efforts and large numbers of false positives and negatives existed as a result.   
She was sorely testing the patience of Captain Lazarus with her many “suggestions,” and who had tensely hissed at her through clenched teeth that, “He knew damn well knew how to run his own damn ship,” at her last suggestion for locating any cloaked ships in orbit.   She felt the man’s hostility, he didn’t like her for some reason.  It was perhaps understandable, to him she was a Romulan and Lazarus’ history did not engender trust of Romulans.   As far as she was concerned, the feeling was mutual.  Jamie Marcus had been betrayed by the Federation and hung out to dry in a kangaroo court-martial in order to protect Federation diplomacy with the Romulan Empire. She no more trusted Lazarus, or anyone, than he likely trusted her. 
If the results of her security scan identified someone as a potential saboteur of the embassy’s transporter system, she’d have a suspect.  If not, then it was highly likely that someone had inside information on their activities, enough to affect a transport steal without physical tampering at the site.  And… there was yet one more possibility that she had very quietly, and hopefully, successfully covered her inquiry into, and that was if anyone on Resurrection had access to the transporter such that they could have allowed a diversion of their transporter to transporter beam.   She’d buried the search so deep in the Resurrection’s computer that it would take an active investigation to discover it, disguising the search as a set of separate simple personnel reviews, maintenance logs, diagnostic scans, and duty roster analyses which when assembled by another query would establish any undue activity regarding Resurrection’s transporters.   
She continued monitoring the situation on the planet, and the system, while she awaited the results of her investigations, which according to her analysis should be done in several minutes.  
USS Resurrection
Orbiting Andoria Prime
Stardate 1904.29
Two avenues Raillius was following both registered a hit at the same time. The officer manning sensors on the bridge turned in his chair and looked back at both Lazarus in his chair and Marcus at the station to the aft part of the bridge.
“Sensors have found an area in the southern hemisphere, about 1200 kilometers from the capital, where there’s some sort of artificial sensor and transport jamming in effect,” Ensign Kolar said. “It’s not in any government-controlled areas…it’s in the middle of nowhere. The radius is big, a radius of 10 kilometers in diameter.”
At nearly the same time, the doors from the turbolift slid open and Lt. Commander Carmichael walked in. “Commander Raillius,” with an afterthought he looked to Lazarus, “Captain…I been looking over transporter logs from Centaurus and the Federation Embassy and I’ve found something. There’s evidence someone bypassed the transporter security protocols at the embassy and rerouted Thompson’s signal. Somebody who is a damn good hacker…it appears to have been done offsite. I’ve traced the hack to structure across the street from the embassy.”
[Back to top]
== S1, E3, Act 4: Infiltration ==
Soli Zh'iviannil (Commander Mayla Vree)
Protest at bombed Starfleet comm relay, Andoria Prime
Stardate 1905.06
Mayla shoved back hard as the crowd pushed forward against barriers. Out of the corner of her eye she saw something fly through the air and crashed at the feet of the security officers. The bottle broke and the liquid inside instantly spread a wave of flames. At that moment, the crowd burst through the barriers and ran directly towards the wall of security.
Mayla rode the wave and found herself in front of three others trying to subdue a large Bolian Starfleet security officer. Before they could seriously hurt him, she snapped her hand at his wrist and wrenched his phaser from his hand. With a fast turn while fingering the power level to stun, she fired at the struggling Bolian and stunned him. The attacking andorians fell to the ground and then ran off to look for another target.
Someone came up behind Mayla and she whirled in defense when she saw Sh'avelith. For a split second, they locked eyes when Charatetet's voice came over the subvoc in a slightly elevated voice that could have sounded like panic.
"I see phasers being passed out to the crowd. I might have been spotted."
"Find cover. If they pursue, ID them and we'll come help. Right now, we're fending for ourselves," Mayla said as she gave Sh'avelith a quick SO hand signal to disburse and find the person or persons passing out the phasers.
Both Phoenix operatives quick went their separate ways and Mayla ran towards the thick of the crowd in front of the line of security barriers. An Andorian saw her carrying a phaser and ran over to her.
"Head to the south entrance and try to get into the building. We're taking over the building." He gestured to four other Andorians that came up to him. "Follow her and secure the south wing." The four Andorians were taller than normal andorians, like her. She just gave him a nod and broke out in a run without looking to see if they were following her or not.
She dodged the largest of skirmishes and clashes as she made her way quickly to the south entrance. There, Andorians were fighting with security forces mixed with Andorian police and Starfleet security. She burst through an opening between fights and and tripped a human security officer and clocked an Andorian police who was about to stab another Andorian. Within a few seconds, she came up to the entrance taking note of the fighting that was happening there. The four following andorians came up behind her.
"What's your plan?"
Mayla just grunted. "To gain entry and take over the south wing." Without hesitation, she made a beeline for the entrance, knocking people out of the way. To her surprise, she quickly found herself at the four doored entrance where security had barricaded the doors from the inside. Three of the andorians ran up behind her and pulled out something from their pockets and threw them.
"You might want to take cover," one said, while running to one side.
Mayla leaped into an alcove situated around the entrance and hugged the back wall. The explosion erupted debris outwards and into the crowd. Still holding her phaser, she squinted her eyes and hugged the wall towards the gaping hole that was the barricaded entrance. Through the smoke and dust, she stunned anyone moving and broke through into the building. To her surprise, the four andorians were still with her. It was now plainly obvious to her that these four had special forces training. And because of that, she may be giving herself away by being their equal.
"My plan was to gain entry to the south wing, I have no idea what to do now," she said.
The shortest andorian gestured them to follow him. "I do. We clear the wing of all Starfleet personnel."
Mayla noticed all four were now armed with phasers taken from the fallen. She let them take the lead from then on as they swept through the wing on a killing spree. But she kept her phaser on stun and attempted to stun as many as she could before her 'comrades' could kill them outright.
Commander T’Aayla Raillius
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1905.06
“Awesome job Commander Carmichael!  Excellent work!” she exclaimed in an uncharacteristic upbeat and friendly voice, acknowledging the work of the Chief engineer, and further cementing her relationship with him.  ‘Excuse me while we get on this great lead right away!”     She immediately contacted Colonel Jahkar, “Three, this is two.  We have a possible location for the person who hacked the transporter signal.  It’s across the street from the embassy.”   She sent him the coordinates.    “I don’t need to tell you to cordon off the building and use a stealth infiltration to take anyone you find prisoner, or to be careful as the whole building could be boobytrapped, or to secure any evidence or leads.”    She sensed Jahkar’s wry smile that she had just done exactly that, but had also acknowledged that she probably hadn’t needed to given he was a professional.   “Use whoever you need at the embassy, but make sure it is still adequately guarded.   Two out.”    
She then walked across the bridge to Ensign Kolar, the bridge officer who had indicated that there was a possible sensor desert and looked at the readouts on his station, taking them in at a glance.  “Good work ensign, start more detailed scans to see what you can find, tie in with previous records of that area regarding geography, populations and infrastructure.    Send down a probe for a visual too.   She turned to Lazarus, “Both of these leads could have been left for us, I’d request that we have other personnel continue our investigative efforts as if we hadn’t found these leads.  They could have left something obvious to simply gain time while we followed some potential false leads.”     She saw Lazarus look at her with a look that both acknowledged that she was right, but also that he wished she wasn’t.  Next she went to the tactical officer who was scanning the system.  “Any ships attempting to leave orbit?”  
“No sir, none.  And we haven’t had any enter the system either he added.”   “Good.   Baseline the the current EM levels, comm signals, and launch sensor buoys to these coordinates.”  She punched in a series of codes.   “That will make it a bit harder for a cloaked ship to enter or leave the system.  Commence regular tachyon sweeps.”   She knew any advanced stealth ship would be able to evade a standard tachyon sweep, but she didn’t want an enemy to know she had more tricks up her sleeve than the usual Federation methods.  She walked to the back of the bridge, “Cartography?”“Um, uh yes sir,” someone sleepily said in the usually dormant section of the ship.  
“Run a max level scan of all gravimetric activity in the system, and tie into this station on the bridge please.  Alert me when you have completed a baseline run, then continue scanning at maximum resolution.  Tie into the ships main computers for enhanced analytical capabilities.“Um, Yes, I mean Aye aye mam...sir.  Sir!”  
“With your permission Captain, I’d like to have the ship’s away teams armed, prepped and ready to go, with teams in the transporter rooms and in the shuttle bay with all our shuttle prepped and ready for launch,” she formally requested.
Lazarus acknowledged the logic of the preparation.   If there was a transporter block or some sort of shielding, they might have to do this the old-fashioned way.   Again, he gave the Romulan a look like he wished she wasn’t acting quite as competent as she was.
“Any other ideas Captain?”  She asked with a slight smile designed to politely respond to his transparent look of apprehension and distrust.
Captain Quentin Lazarus
U.S.S. Resurrection
Stardate 1905.06
Lazarus looked to Raillius and considered saying something turse, or at the very least sarcastic, but he decided it would be wasted on the woman’s intensity.
“No commander,” he said. “You seem to have everything covered. Yes, prep the away teams and have them ready in the transporter room. Get the shuttle ready to launch.”
He looked at the sensor images of the sensor-blocked area on Andoria Prime and studied the viewscreen for a moment. “That appears to be a dampening field. Sensors won’t penetrate it. You can’t transport into it. It’s also below the surface, like most everything on this ice cube in space, so it won’t be easy to just blast from orbit.”
Lazarus stood up and walked toward the viewscreen, continuing to survey it as he approached, “There, on the southeast edge of the dampening field. Zoom in scans on that area.”
Ensign Kolar tapped commands into the console in front of him and the sensor scans zoomed in on the area as Lazarus had ordered. The images showed a series of subterranean tunnels extending around the black zone and Lazarus pointed toward the area.
“Those tunnels, probably natural, extend into the ‘dead zone’ but it looks like each is sealed off. Whoever is underneath that dampening field has collapsed the tunnels to prevent access into that area,” he said. The captain looked to Raillius, “You could beam into those tunnels, assuming they aren’t booby trapped, and use phasers or explosives to break through into the dampened area.”
Lazarus walked back to his chair and shrugged, “Or, you could detonate an EMP charge in those tunnels and if the blast radius were big enough, it might disrupt the field and allow you to beam in. An EMP will only lose a fraction of its power passing through rock and dirt.”
He sat down and smiled, “There’s my input for today. You deal with the situation on Andoria, I’ll watch the ship traffic in and out of the system. Carry on commander.”
Colonel Jahkar
Federation Embassy on Andoria
Stardate 1905.06
Jahkar could not hold back a slight grin as Raillius reminded him of everything she wanted him to do. He liked the half-Romulan. She was different, no nonsense and very focused. All things the Marine found appealing in a person.
She was also part-Romulan like he was...making her something of a kindred spirit. Admittedly, he knew little about his Romulan heritage and he thought Raillius could possibly help him learn more about the other culture he was a part of.
His thoughts quickly switched from Raillius to the task at hand. Take anyone with him he wanted? While he’d like to take the marines from the embassy along, he knew of two others on another level of the embassy he’ rather have fighting at his side.
“Phoenix Three to Seven and Eight,” Jahkar said into his subvocal communicator. “Meet me in the Troop Deployment Bay located in the lower level of the Embassy. We are going hunting.”
Lieutenant Ryramorl Ra’yral
Ensign Reepchip Charatetet
Andoria Capital City
Stardate 1905.06
Ryramorl acknowledged and said to the Andorians, “My superiors are summoning me.  I must go.”  Once he’d extricated himself from the discussions on what to do, he strode swiftly to where Jahkar was waiting, wishing he’d taken his battle armour with him--but also aware that would have completely blown their cover with everyone.  Before long, he was with the marines, and gave Jahkar a salute.  “Reporting, sir,” he said, unsure if he should give his real name in front of everyone, or the one he’d borrowed.
The reply from Reepchip, however, was not encouraging--the strange, squeaking bark he’d said was an alert to danger.  Fortunately for the ears of one and all, Reepchip knew he was on radio, and so barked quietly.  He tried to make his way towards the embassy, even though he certain someone had seen him fire a few darts and was waiting for him to reappear from his hiding spot..
Colonel Jahkar
Federation Embassy
Stardate 1905.06
Jahkar frowned when Reepchip proved to be unavailable. He looked to Ryramorl and gave the Carnora a stern look. “Here’s the sitrep: there is a building across the street we’ve determined the hack of the transporter came from. We’ve been ordered to hit the target with a stealth infiltration. Without Reepchip it will just be you and I. Sensor scans of the building are unable to determine life forms inside, possibly due to some form of dampening.
“We are going to transport to the rooftop and make ingress from any access points there we can find. We’ll work our way down the four floors and sweep the place. We want prisoners if possible. I’d like someone to provide some answers about what’s going on. Are you ready?”
Jahkar readied his rifle as he awaited the Carnora’s response…
Lieutenant Ryramorl Ra’yral
Federation Embassy
Stardate 1905.08
“Ready, sir,” Ryramorl.  He then pricked his ears and blinked in surprise when he heard a rapid-fire chatter over his subvoc, and responded in his own language.  Ryramorl then turned to Jahkar.  “Reepchip says he’s managed to get out from his hiding spot unseen.  Tell him which building it is, and he’ll meet us at the top.”  Seeing the unspoken question in Jahkar’s face, Ryramorl simply said, “He’ll climb.”
Ensign Reepchip Charatetet
Andoria Prime
Stardate 1905.08
Reepchip could tell the disappointment in Jahkar’s silence to the Muran’s distress.  He tried to slip away from his hiding spot, and when no-one pursued, he cursed his own cowardice.  He keyed his subvoc.  [Eight to Seven here.  Charatet managed to get away from the crowd.]
[Seven to Eight, copy that.  Three has identified a building across a street from the Embassy we must infiltrate from the roof.]  At least Ryramorl didn’t repeat the name Reepchip had called himself.
[Eight to Three, tell me the building, and I’ll meet you at the top.]  Ah, rotted branches, he forgot to say that in Standard.
Colonel Jahkar
Federation Embassy
Stardate 1905.08
Jahkar gave a nod and gave the location of the building to Reepchip. He and Ryramorl stepped up onto the transporter pad in the security bay -- a transporter designed to beam multiple security officers from the embassy to other places in the city -- and they prepared to deploy.
The half-Romulan/Klingon reached over to Ryramorl and he clipped a personal cloaking device to his armor. “We go in cloaked. Once we materialize on the rooftop, let me scan for pressure plates and motion sensors. You scan and locate any access points to the building -- doors, hatches, whatever there might be.”
At that moment, Raillius’ voice came across his subvoc asking for a sitrep. He cringed. She was impatient. “Three to two...we are deploying. I’ll update you once we are in the building. Three out.”
Jahkar then activated his cloak, as did Ryramorl, and he ordered the transporter operator to energize. The two Shadow operatives then beamed out and a moment later they stood on the rooftop of the building across the street, cloaked.
The marine began to immediately scan the roof looking for surveillance and security devices, while leaving Ryramorl to search for an access point.
Lieutenant Ryramorl Ra’yral
Across from the Federation Embassy
Stardate 1905.10
Ryramorl searched for an access point by simple scent--where scents congregated was the likeliest place of ingress, egress and thus progress.  With this simple means, it didn’t take Ryramorl long to locate a trapdoor.  Now the only question was how to open the bloody thing without setting off a zillion alarms.
Ensign Reepchip Charatetet
Across from the Federation Embassy
Stardate 1905.10
Reepchip managed to avoid notice as he made his way to the building Jahkar had pointed out.  From a back alley, he managed to get up a couple floors without being seen--and beyond that, it was unlikely anyone would see him unless they were deliberately looking up.  It was hard to avoid windows, and when he couldn’t, he used those that were dark.  It took him a while, but he made it to the roof--and found no-one.  He sniffed the air as his ears twitched.  He let out some soft, very high-pitched barks--then saluted to where he thought Jahkar was.  “Sir,” he said.
Lieutenant Daryl Thompson
Legion Base
Stardate 1905.10
The man administered the hypospray in Daryl's neck just below the jaw, then spoke. “Within moments you will feel a bit strange, some dizziness or light disorientation may occur. It will reside quickly.”
Daryl knew they had given him a dose of nanites that now would build the small device inside his head, at the base of his skull.. He felt a sting there and cringed, grimacing, then a sudden dizziness set in. He tried to get hold of something as he felt he was turned upside down. The other man grabbed him under his arms, preventing his fall.
Another sting in his head, then the dizziness subsided. As the second man put him back on his feet again, the first opened a tricorder and scanned Daryl. He nodded and while closing the tricorder, he looked at Daryl.
“Welcome to Legion, Daryl Thompson.”
Daryl nodded and mumbled a “Thank You”.
“You have arrived at an inopportune time, ” Seraphim stated. “We are moving on an important mission and time is critical. You will join us in this mission and, assuming you survive, you’ll be indoctrinated into the Legion later.”
They entered a chamber that was obviously some kind of command center. Six people -- three human, an Andorian, a Klingon and a Romulan were all manning consoles. Each was dressed in a similar black uniform and each as armed.
The Klingon looked up at Seraphim, “We’re being scanned. A starship in orbit has scanned the vicinity of this base twice in the past ten minutes.”
One of the humans chimed in, “They’ve likely detected the dampening field.”
“That will draw them in,” Seraphim muttered. “What is the situation at the relay?”
“Chaotic,” the other Andorian in the room reported. “There is an active phaser battle in the streets. More police forces are being brought in. Starfleet is also sending in its personnel.”
“Then it is time we move to the staging area,” Seraphim said. “Gather our team and prepare to transport to the staging area.”
“What's the deal?” Thompson asked.
Seraphim looked at him “All in good time, Mr. Thompson. I will fill you in once we’ve transported out of here. You’ll be coming along.”
Daryl had expected this more or less and he nodded, grinning. “Let's do this”
Seraphim looked at him sharply. “Remember, you have been implemented with a detonation device inside your head. One wrong move, and you will die. “
“I won’t fail you” Daryl replied. Seraphim nodded once, slowly, as they continued their walk.
Seraphim and his people then began to gather up their gear, they locked out all of the computer terminals set up in the command center and initiated some sort of security protocols on the computers which Daryl did not recognize. They all moved into a chamber where a transporter had been set up -- the same transporter used to bring Thompson in.
Among the gear assembled, Daryl noticed cold-weather clothing and other arctic equipment. There were also many weapons and other supplies -- all of which suggested they were going to possibly be going to the surface...
Lt. Commander Darva McGuirre
Head of USS Resurrection Security
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1905.10
Lazarus swiveled around in his chair and looked at Darva.
“Lt. Commander, get two away teams at the ready. One for the transporter, one for the shuttle. You have 10 minutes. Coordinate with Commander Raillius”
“Aye sir!’ Darva replied, and opened comms to her two senior officers to meet her
immediately in the transporter room with the away teams, while she keyed in commands to initialize shuttle preparation. For a brief moment she thought of Daryl, and hoped he was doing alright. As she looked up, she looked straight into the eyes of Commander Raillius…
Lt. Cody Beckett
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1905.10
Cody had been optimizing the routines to utilize the main deflector dish as a transporter relay when he had heard the news that Daryl had vanished.
Quickly he rerouted the deflector dish back to the original configuration to amplify the range of the Sensor arrays. Then he was hailed.
“Ensign Blo'kar to Lt. Beckett…”
Cody tapped his commbadge
“Beckett here”
“Sorry to interrupt you sir, but I need some assistance. I got some orders from Lt. Commander Raillius, but she was kind of cryptic. Also…the arrays are going haywire it seems. “ Beckett grinned.
“On my way, Beckett out”. He finished his work and headed for the deck where the small Stellar Cartography room was. He entered, and saw ensign Blo'kar fiddling on the terminal. Cody walked towards the ensign, a young Telarian, who seemed to be helplessly frustrated.
“What's going on, ensign”. Beckett addressed the young man. The ensign sighed.
“I..I just can’t seem to get things in place. And there is only so little time. The commander probably will ask me any minute if I'm done and…” Cody raised his hand, silencing the ensign, as he already saw the problem.
“You do not have the right clearances to either login to a bridge station nor into the main computer. “Cody said, as his hands danced over the console.
“And neither did you notice that the Sensor arrays were offline until a few minutes ago. Where you sleeping when they explained initialization and access routines on the Academy?” Cody lectured. Ensign Blo'kar looked at him, even more frustrated and also embarrassed. Cody tapped the last series of commands on the console, then opened a channel to Commander Raillius.
“Beckett here, gravimetric baseline run finished. Scanning interval is 10 seconds. Data is send to Tactical, ma'am....” Beckett felt how Raillius questioned the fact that Beckett had answered to the task given to the ensign, and he added
“I had reconfigured the deflector dish and the sensor arrays for hot switching between several configurations.. The ensign was not familiar with this layout so I helped him out with it.”
Raillius replied with an emotionless “thank you, Lieutenant” and the comm was cut. Cody looked at ensign Blo'kar.
“I just saved you from torture” he said, with a serious face. As he saw the petrified face of the young man he laughed and the ensign relaxed a little. Cody wiped a tear from his cheek, amused at the reaction of the ensign.
“On a serious note I did save you from disciplinary sanctions. Raillius takes her assignment very serious. I advise you get your act together, otherwise, she will find you and chew you out” Cody said  
“Thank you sir,“ the young ensign stated. Cody nodded, and walked out of SC, on his way to the bridge, to see what was next. He wondered, no, he hoped Daryl was still alive and doing well….
Commander T’Aayla Raillius
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1905.10
T’Aayla’s enigmatic stare held the Lieutenant Commander in place.   “Commander McGuire, I am aware of your… interest in Lieutenant Thompson.   This is to be by the book.   I want two away teams, each commanded by your security lieutenants with three security officers in each team.  They’ll beam down if they can, the shuttle is a last-ditch backup.   This is a recon mission, we do not know if Lieutenant Thompson is in the area we identified or not.  It could be a complete red herring.  It could be exactly where he is held.  We don’t know.   They are to investigate.   I want you ready with the main extraction team with the rest of Resurrection’s security detail ready to go if anything is found.   Lieutenant Beckett will accompany you.  Full armor and heavy weapons.  Full comms, audio and visual, and transporter transponders as well.   We’re not dealing with amateurs.  Is that clear?”
“Aye sir, and… I’ll keep it professional.”
“See to it that you do Commander, or you’ll be in charge of a Federation prison cell block for the rest of your career.”   She relented slightly at the chagrined look on McGuire’s face, “You’ll have a better chance of getting him back alive if you don’t get emotionally invested.  Remember your training, do what you normally would.”
“Aye sir...thank you.”
T’Aayla hit her commbadge, “Lieutenant Beckett, report to Comander McGuire for away team extraction duty.   Full kit.  Double time it lieutenant.  Raillius out.”
After McGuire left the bridge, Raillius turned to Lazarus.   “We don’t have the personnel for sustained combat operations.  Resurrection’s security detail is completely taken up by this small operation.  We have one shuttle.  We can’t afford to be reactive, we need to go on the offense where we can concentrate our forces, not spread out like the enemy is forcing us to do.  I don’t like it.”
“Neither do I,” Lazarus responded.  “We don’t have many leads yet.”
“We don’t have any leads, other than Lieutenant Thompson was taken.   She scowled, not liking being on the defensive. 
“Colonel Jahkar, what’s your progress?”
As she waited for the response, she met Captain Lazurus’ gaze.  He nodded.  He didn’t like how things were playing out either.   “I’ve got a bad feeling about this Commander…”    
She had to agree with him, but…  they had to cast the net and hope they picked up something.  She just hoped they didn’t lose most of their net in the process.           
Ensign Tiri Sh'avelith
Outside the Communication Relay
Stardate 1905.10
Tiri was swept up in the raging street battle surrounding the relay. Andorians were fighting other Andorians. Starfleet and local police were clashing with soldiers of the ARF. THere were many injured people scattered around the street, some were dead.
The Andorian caught her last glimpse of Vree as the disguised Trill entered the damaged relay building, armed with an ARF rifle, running with a group Andorians who were part of this misguided cause.
Tiri wanted to join her commander. Vree was apparently in with the terrorists, but she was alone and would only have their training from the trip to Andoria to fall back on. If she made one misstep, the ARF might figure out who she is. Worse, if the holoprojector disguise failed, as technology sometimes did, she’d also be discovered.
Sh'avelith ran through the crowd, trying to make it to the relay. Along the way she saw an unconscious ARF fighter laying on the street, one of the stolen phaser rifles in his hands. Tiri crouched, picked up the weapon and continued on toward the building.
As she ran, a group of Andorians fighting with Starfleet security appeared ahead of her. Amid the fight, a young Starfleet ensign in security riot gear locked eyes with Tiri and raised his weapon at the Andorian. To him, she looked like a threat. Tiri’s thumb flipped the safety setting to stun and she blasted the security officer before he would shoot her. The beam struck him and knocked him to the ground, unconscious.
The Starfleet officers were dispatched, most of them unfortunately dead, and an ARF member looked over to Tiri. “I don’t remember you at any of the rallies? Let me see that rifle!”
Tiri hesitated at first, but she handed the gun toward the Andorian. He stepped closer, looked at the weapon and reached toward the safety. He keyed it to a kill setting and pushed it back toward her.
“Apparently you didn’t come to the weapons training,” the Andorian smirked. “Come on, you’ll come with us. We’ve got to keep security forces from getting inside the building.”
The Andorian led Tiri and several more of their people back into the smoky battle and they moved to block the two street level entrances to the damaged structure.
“Phoenix Six to One,” she hissed into the subvocal after they were on the move, the sounds of the battle masking her whisper from the other ARF. “I’m with a group of ARF, but they’ve got me posted outside the building. We’re guarding the door. Will try to follow as soon as I can.”
Soli Zh'iviannil (Commander Mayla Vree)
South Wing of Starfleet comm relay, Andoria Prime
Stardate 1905.10
Mayla keyed her subvoc and responded. "Affirmative. I'm inside the south wing with four other Andorians. From what I can tell, these four has had special force training." She ducked around the corner and held position while two others pushed forward. "I'm also beginning to suspect they are not Andorian either, despite their appearances."
Sh'avelith paused. "Then they are doing the same thing you're doing, but with a different goal."
"I overheard one of them say to continue with the disruption here, and to keep the security forces focused here." Mayla left her position and followed the two Andorians.
"That might mean this is a diversion," Sh'avelith deduced.
"Yes," Mayla answered quickly. She opened a channel to the Resurrection. "Phoenix One to Havoc, the ARF might be using the comm relay rioting as a diversion for another attack somewhere else. What's your sitrep?"
As Mayla moved through each floor of the south wing, Lazarus and Raillius updated her on their progress in locating Thompson.
Lt. Commander Darva's McGuire & Lt. Cody Beckett
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1905.10
Cody got the order from Commander Raillius moments before Lt. Commander McGuire came around the corner. She didn’t look too happy. She saw him but walked past him.
“Lt. Beckett, ma'am. Reporting for extraction away team. “He said as he stepped up beside her, matching her pace. “Good. Let's get ready. We don’t want to have the Commander waiting” she said briskly, with a sarcastic undertone. Cody just grinned slightly and nodded, as they made their way to the armory to get geared up. Within minutes, they suited up. Both recon teams were heavily armed and wore additional gear and clothing against the possible arctic conditions on the surface, as were Darva and Cody and the two other security lieutenants, Stone and Jackson,  wo would lead the recon teams.
As they walked into the transporter room, Darva opened a channel to Commander Raillius. “Recon teams and extraction teams ready and stand-by in the Transporter room….
Commander T’Aayla Raillius
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1905.10
“Acknowledged.   There is an area with a ten kilometer dead zone of sensor and transporter block in the southern hemisphere.    Stone team, you are beaming to the most eastern edge of the area and Jackson team is beaming to the most western edge.   Both teams will move 2.5 kilometers toward the center of the area and then commence a counter-clockwise sweep at a radius of 2.5 km from the center.  When Stone team has reached due North and Jackson team has reached due South you will have covered the entire area with visual and local scanning with a max distance of 2.5 km, within easy eyesight.    That means you will have to travel about 6.5 kilometers for that search pattern.   You should be able to cover that at a walking pace within one hour, faster if you hustle.    If you identify anything, report it immediately.   I’ve sent  chemical communication launch vehicles to the transporter room.   Even if you are jammed, you will be able to launch a comm-rocket and it will fly out of the deadzone into the clear to be able to communicate with Resurrection.  Priority is identifying a target, secondary objective is to destroy anything preventing a direct transport into the area.   Lt. Commander Darva will command the extraction, with Lt. Beckett as second in command depending on the situation, the extraction team will go in by shuttle of transporter.   Max shuttle capacity is 10.    Commander Darva you have 12 remaining security officers, prioritize your team and assemble in the shuttle launch bay.”
“Stone team ready,”  Lieutenant Stone announced after he and his three man team had assembled on the transporter pad.  
“Energize,” Raillius ordered, knowing full well it could be a death sentence for the 4 person team.  Such was the responsibility of command.   At one time it was her being ordered into a hotspot, but as time had gone by, it became more and more sending others into harm’s way.   She found subjecting herself to danger far easier than sending others, but the service demanded it.  
“Jackson team ready.”
“Energize.”
Both teams were now on their way.   She tracked them for several minutes from the bridge and saw their dots wink out of existence as they entered the dead zone.   Within seconds, her screen was clear of blips.    Good luck, she breathed silently to herself.  
Lt. Phil Jackson
Lt. Earl Stone
Andoria Prime
Stardate 1905.11
Jackson’s team materialized in an underground passage deep inside Andoria Prime. The team activated lights attached to their armor and illuminated the caverns ahead of them. Likewise, in another location, Stone and his team beamed into a different cavern.
The two teams began their sweep of the caves, as ordered by Commander Rallius, working their way toward the center of the dampening field. In both cases, the security teams encountered sealed passages -- places in the cave network where the tunnels had been collapsed intentionally to keep intruders out.
Both lieutenants reported back to Raillius about discovering blocked passages. Both Jackson and Stone asked how they were to proceed -- phaser through it, blast it or look for other alternatives.
Meanwhile…
Members of the Legion were suited up and assembled in a makeshift transporter room, with Daryl Thompson along with them. The transporter had been assembled from portable components and were tied to a power source which also appeared to be portable.
“Team One, prepare for transport,” Seraphim said.
A group of eight Legion soldiers took to the transport pad, carrying weapons and additional equipment, including a large cylinder which took two men to carry it. Once in place on the platform, Seraphim ordered the team to be beamed out.
The transporter engaged and the eight Legion fighters disappeared in columns of sparkling light. With that, Seraphim ordered the next eight onto the platform.
“Seraphim,” the Klingon in the group said from a security station to the back of the cavern. “Sensors are detecting lifeforms in the caverns adjoining the passages,” the Klingon said.
Seraphim nodded, “As I anticipated. Are the countermeasures ready?”
“Yes, Seraphim,” the Klingon replied.
“Then proceed with the next group,” he said. He motioned to Thompson to come with him as he to stepped up on the platform. “We’ll beam out now. K’altar, you and the remaining team cover our transport.  You can follow once we’re safely away.”
The Klingon nodded, “Yes, sir.”
Seraphim and six more Legion members took to the platform and the Andorian looked to Thompson. “Daryl, come with me.”
[Back to top]
== S1, E3, Act 5: Deep Beneath Andoria ==
Ensign Reepchip Charatetet
Andorian Relay Station
Stardate 1905.15
Reepchip heard a soft growl from the roof and sniffed the air. "Watch for sensors," warned the cloaked Ryramorl from where he was.  "Help me open this hatch without setting off sensors."
Reepchip cautiously made his way over to the hatch.  His long, small fingers made quick and deft work of the sensors on it. Carefully, he and Ryramorl opened the hatch.  "What now?" he asked.
"We go in to chew bubblegum and kick ass," responded Ryramorl. "And we're all out of bubblegum."
Just then, the trio heard, "One to Eight.  Where the hell are you?!"
Reepchip winced.  "Eight to One, across from the Federation Embassy.  I was summoned by Three."
"Eight to One.  We need you here."
Jahkar looked at Reepchip.  "Go," he commanded.  Reepchip nodded and slithered his way back down the building.
The chaos on the ground was even worse now, so Reepchip tried to keep above the streets, clinging to walls and ducts as best he could.  The crowd at the relay station was even worse, and Reepchip cursed himself--he could no longer spot either Mayla or Tiri.  “Eight to One.  Where are you now?”  He squeeze up against a wall as stray phaser fire whizzed past.  He wished he were back in the building, but…
There.  He thought he recognized Mayla in the ensuing warzone, and tried to come closer.  Unfortunately, this meant he had to go to ground level, dart around the crowd and get closer, hoping he wouldn’t be noticed in the chaos.
Colonel Jahkar
Across from the Federation Embassy
Stardate 1905.15
Jahkar disarmed several pressure plates and sensor pads on the rooftop as the Carnora got the hatch opened. Once everything was clear, Jahkar moved to the hatch entrance and looked at his colleagues, whom he was able to see courtesy of the visor on his helmet.
“I’ll take point,” Jahkar told Ra’yral. “We need prisoners, so do your best to disarm and capture anyone we encounter. Stealth is necessary so try not to make too much noise...until we have no choice.”
Jahkar then went down the opening in the rooftop and climbed the rungs of the ladder down into a room on the upper floor of the building. He dropped into the room and crouched, scanning with his optics and his weapon ready in hand.
“Clear,” he announced to the Carnora. “Empty room. One doorway. I’ll cover you. Come on down.”
He then waited there for Ryramorl to arrive…
Lt. Ryramorl Ra’yral
Across from the Federation Embassy
Stardate 1905.15
Ryramorl came in after, looking around and sniffing.  “Smells like no-one has been in here for a few hours,” he said softly to Jakar.
He put his keen ear to the door, listening carefully, then he signalled to Jahkar that the hallway seemed silent.
Colonel Jahkar
Across from the Federation Embassy
Stardate 1905.15
Jahkar looked to Ryramorl, visible while cloaked due to the visor of his helmet, as the Carnora signaled that beyond the door he heard nothing. Jahkar moved to the door and reached up, tapping the opening stud on the wall. The door whooshed open and outside they saw a corridor, dimly lit, and unoccupied.
The half-Klingon/Romulan slipped into the corridor, still cloaked, and moved quietly along the hallway. There were two more doors along each side of the hall and a spiral staircase down at the end of the corridor.
Jahkar cleared the first set of doors to either side of the hallway, finding no one inside. The next two doors, however, quickly yielded a surprise. Just before Jahkar reached the next door, it slid open and two Andorians stepped out.
Standing perfectly still. Jahkar remained cloaked, his rifle aimed at the face of the nearest Andorian, as he waited to see what would happen.
Lt. Ryramorl Ra’yral
Across from the Federation Embassy
Stardate 1905.15
Ryramorl followed Jahkar out into the dimly lit hallway.  He was about to warn Jahkar about one door when it swished open, revealing two Andorians.  Like Jahkar, he froze, targeting the other Andorian.
Ryramorl firmly kept himself from growling as one Andorian glanced towards the room Jahkar and Ryramorl had just left with a quizzical “what was that?”
Colonel Jahkar
Across from the Federation Embassy
Stardate 1905.15
The Andorian who appeared to be looking in their direction reached over and placed a hand on his colleagues’ shoulder. The other Andorian turned and looked and his brow furrowed.
“Sweep those rooms,” he motioned back up the hallway. Both drew phasers and they began to walk right toward Jahkar and Ryramorl. At that point, there was nothing else they could do -- it was time to fight.
Jahkar took his rifle, held it between both hands and slammed it hard into the face of the nearest Andorian. The blow sent the tall Andorian reeling backwards and, to everyone’s surprise, a shield around the terrorist flickered and then shimmered before revealing the fallen gunman’s identity -- the Andorian was actually a human, disguised with some sort of technology that made him appear to be another species. Not quite holographic, almost like an exterior shell around his body concealing his true appearance.
The attack on the pseudo-Andorian disrupted Jahkar’s cloak, prompting the other “Andorian” to snap aim his phaser at the big half-Klingon/Romulan. Jahkar stood and swung his rifle around to take aim, but he hoped Ryramorl would be able to act before the terrorist fired on him.
Lt. Ryramorl Ra’yral
Across from the Federation Embassy
Stardate 1905.19
Ryramorl saw Jahkar’s cloak be disrupted while attacking one terrorist then he  nailed the “Andorian” in the face with his rifle butt.
With both terrorists down, Ryramorl positioned himself to cover their flank  “...Neither of them Andorian…” said Ryramorl, very softly.  “That clinches it.  This ARF is truly a herd of Horghenhar, and someone is directing the stampede.”
Away Team Jackson
Somewhere on Andoria, deep below the surface.
Stardate 1905.19
Lt Jackson moved through another corridor with his team. They had found at least half a dozen blocked entrances so far. Because of the dampening field, tricorder readouts were erratic.
Sometimes they heard faint sounds in the distance, but for now, everything was quiet. Jackson didn’t like it one bit. Since it was obvious these tunnels had been used, it would be more than obvious that they would have been detected already.  
The tunnel split in two separate corridors a little further. Phil cursed under his breath. Splitting up meant they would be even more vulnerable, but it would save time. He decided against it and after a short discussion, the team disappeared into the left tunnel.
Moments later, it was quiet again. In the ceiling, a panel, camouflaged by rocks and ice slid open, and 3 sentry drones floated out silently, For a moment, they hung in mid-air, then they started moving into the left tunnel…
Away Team Jackson
Somewhere on Andoria, deep below the surface.
Stardate 1905.19
Lt. Jackson rounded a corner in the dark tunnels and saw a long rock corridor ahead that seemed to lead into a lit area. The security officer turned to his team and gave them a move ahead sign, before he opened a channel to the Resurrection and shuttle.
“We’ve got a way in I think,” Jackson reported. “There’s a tunnel, about 100 meters long, leads into a cave that appears to have an artificial light source.”
Aboard the shuttle Jackson’s transmission was garbled, the effects of the dampening field which they were now nearly under. Jackson led the way and the team moved ahead toward the lit cavern. As they got closer, three drones appeared flying toward them and the team raised their weapons.
“Heads up!” Jackson barked, aiming his phaser. He took a shot and the drone he hit deflected the blast with a shield. The forcefield absorbed the blast and was rendered inoperative from the one hit. It gave the drone a chance to return fire, however, as it sent a full power phaser blast at the group.
The phaser beam drilled through the chest of Ensign La-Chan, a Benzite. He staggered backwards, dead before he hit the floor. The rest of the team opened fire and there was a fast exchange of phaser blasts, until all three drones were slagged, and only Jackson and Ensign Rolston remained -- their two comrades dead on the ground.
Away team Stone
Andoria, deep under the surface
Stardate 1905.19
Stone walked cautiously besides Ensign Auriak, a young Betazoid woman. Even though the dampening field scattered the readings, she kept her tricorder active. Suddenly she stopped in her tracks and raised a fist.
The others stopped as well. “What is it, ensign” Stone whispered as he kept staring into the dark shadows up ahead, his phaser ready.
“I saw something through the glitches. It looked like an alloy panel with something behind it. I thought I saw movement…”
She kept staring at the readings. Lt. Jg. Kapello grabbed a brick sized rock from the ground and tossed it further into the tunnel. The rock disappeared in the darkness and moments later they heard it clattering onto the rocky floor. As the echoes faded, it became silent again.
Kapello wanted to move forward, but Auriak grabbed his arm and hissed “find cover!!” She ducked behind a small group of ice covered stalagmites. Kapello joined her and aimed his phaser, peering in the shadows.
Stone had jumped into a small alcove on the other side, and ensign Grop, a Ferengi, had kneeled down beside the wall. Out of the dark, a phaser beam was emitted and barely missed Kapello , who timely ducked away behind the stalactites.
Stone returned fire and  missed. Phasers fired back and forth, and Lt. Stone was hit in his arm, which vaporized up to his shoulder. He slammed against the wall and fell to the ground, losing consciousness. One drone exploded in a fiery ball, taking another drone down in the explosion. “Cover me! “ Kapello yelled, and lunged forward, while Auriak and Grop fired barrages of phaser fire into the tunnel, which lit up in orange. Kapello shoulder rolled back on his knees, fired a barrage of phaser fire, and hit two drones. One exploded, and a piece of shrapnel hit Kapello in his side, tearing open his uniform and cutting a deep wound in his flesh.
The other drone rotated toward Kapello, but fire from both Auriak and Grop blasted the drone to pieces. Then it became silent again. Auriak got up and moved to Kapello, who was groaning, as he pushed on the wound. Blood gulped through his fingers. It didn’t look good.
Swiftly Auriak grabbed the first aid kit out of her backpack and started to treat the wound. Keeping focus on treating Kapello, she asked Grop how Stone was doing.
Stone's body was shaking while still unconscious.
“He is in shock. But the phaser fire cauterized the wound. I'll give him a dose painkillers and epinephrine for now.”
Grop sounded nervous. It was his first away mission and he had troubles keeping it together. But he managed, and one he administered the hypospray to Stone, the shaking almost immediately subsided.
Auriak tried to hail the other away team. “Jackson here.  Be careful, we just were attacked by drones”
“Ensign Auriak here, sir. We were attacked as well. Lt. Stone and Lt. Kapello are wounded. They need to get back to the Resurrection. “
Lt. Daryl Thompson
Andoria, Legion Base
Stardate 1905.19
As the transporter beam disappeared, Daryl looked around. Another cave, but a bigger one. In the distance, about a few hundred meters, was a mag-lev station.
The mag-lev train had just arrived and came to a full stop in front of the station. The third team beamed in, and Seraphim calmly ordered his crew here and there and they went on their way. Apparently, they would be capturing the mag-lev train for some purpose. Daryl looked at the heavily guarded device that sat on cargo loader. He had an idea what these guys were up to. For now, the only thing he could do was follow along for now. With the device in his head and trigger happy ARF soldiers around him, it was plain suicide to make a move against them now.
A large Klingon and an Andorian stayed behind with Seraphim and Daryl. The Klingon handed Daryl a phaser rifle and gestured that he and the Andorian would eyeball him in all his tracks. Daryl nodded. Then he looked at Seraph. Seraph looked at him, then at the mag-lev train in the distance, while he readied his rifle.
“Follow me. Let's see if you live up to your words…” Seraph turned around and moved swiftly between the rocks that were high enough to hide between. Daryl followed Seraph, followed on his heels by the Klingon and the Andorian. Within minutes they crossed the distance between them and the station.
The station was guarded, but not heavily. Daryl cursed inwardly as a detachment of Starfleet security showed up, patrolling the area. Seraph made some hand gestures, and several small groups of the ARF terrorists moved forward, still using the rocks and boulders to hide behind. Seraph gestured with his head to Daryl to follow him and they moved around a large stone wall to the right side of the station. The Klingon moved quickly beside Daryl.
“No tricks, human,” the Klingon growled.
Daryl ignored the Klingon and moved forward. Seraph took position and gestured to move on. Daryl quickly checked the area, and moved towards the stair that would bring them to the lower level of the station.
Two Andorians stood guard. Daryl approached them silently, and as he aimed on the first Andorian, phaser fire in the distance distracted the Andorians. Daryl reacted quickly, jumped up, and floored the first Andorian, knocking him hard to the ground, rendering him unconscious. The other guard looked back as he heard the noise, the next second Daryl hit him on the jaw with a high kick.
The Andorian flew sideways and hit his head against the stairs and sank to the floor. Daryl moved on, followed by Seraphim and the two others. Seraph pointed to a small tower, the control room, just up ahead. Around them the fights were raging on.
Then, out of nothing,.a small detachment of Andorian soldiers came running about…
Mag-Lev Station
Beneath the Surface of Andoria Prime
Stardate 1905.19
As Thompson fought alongside the group, he began to see that not all was as it seemed. In all there were 24 terrorists in the group, besides Daryl. From the beginning he knew Seraphim was something more than an ARF terrorist. He was certainly an Andorian, but he had better training than the standard ARF thug.
From what he’d seen of the group, no more than eight of the group were ARF terrorists, most likely plucked off the streets or out of their local chapter of the underground organization. They were easy to pick out. They fumbled with their weapons, they made careless mistakes, they hesitated at times to shoot to kill.
The other 16 members of the group were more like Seraphim. Their combat skills were honed. They were seasoned and they carried themselves like professional soldiers. Many of them weren’t Andorian -- they were various races including humans, Klingons, at least one Romulan and a couple of Trill.
The Starfleet team fell quickly. The five-person squad was easily taken down before they could even get off a alert to their base of command. Andorian security put up a brief fight, but their numbers were small, and they weren’t much more than police.
The Klingon with Seraph and Thompson confirmed they had successfully jammed communications as they seized the loading platform at the train. From the look of things here, Thompson could see the train was used by a mining operation. Recalling background intelligence about the planet, he knew there were a number of deep mining operations on the planet. The Andorians provided many important resources to the Federation, including duranium, dylithium and other metals and crystals used in fleet construction.
The group invaded the awaiting train and there they effortlessly took more than two dozen prisoners. The terrorists herded them into one of the five cars in the train -- the very last one -- and locked them inside. They then placed the large cylindrical device in the second car and left several men to guard it.
The rest of the team spread out between the engine car, where they took two pilots prisoner and forced them to drive at gunpoint, and the second to the last car in the train. Once they were all in place, Seraphim ordered the men in the engine to force the pilots to take off.
The anti-gravity driven train then rumbled to life and took off quickly out of the station and into the tunnel ahead of it.
Seraphim looked to Thompson and his antenna turned forward toward Daryl as a cruel smile crossed the Andorian’s face. “Now we sit back and enjoy the ride.”
Lt. Daryl Thompson
Mag-lev train, deep under the surface
Stardate 1905.23
Daryl looked at the Andorian. “This train goes deeper underground. What's with the device? Wanna blow up the planet?” Daryl asked with a wicked look in his eyes...
Seraphim
Mag-lev train, deep under the surface
Stardate 1905.23
The Andorian looked at Daryl and smiled, “Nothing so drastic, Mr. Thompson. Just follow my lead and the other Legion members. By now you’ve been able to figure out who is who, I’m sure. Say nothing to the ARF, I’ll do all the talking where they are concerned.”
He looked around at the others, then back to Daryl as the train headed deep into an underground passage. “At some point we’re going to end up on the surface. There’s cold weather gear in the cargo containers we brought to put some on. We shouldn’t be topside for long but be prepared.”
Seraphim checked a wrist chronometer and nodded, “Sit tight.”
Commander T’Aayla Raillius
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1905.23
“Understood Ensign.   We’ll beam casualties out.   Continue on mission.    She keyed another channel, “Sickbay, prepare to receive casualties.”   Turning to Captain Lazarus, “I’ll contact Andorian military defense forces and request they send in a large force to clear those tunnels and secure evidence once the dampening field is down.”
Away teams Stone and Jackson.
Andoria, under the surface
Stardate.1905.23
As soon as the casualties of both teams had been beamed up, the remaining members continued their way. Soon, team Stone reached a dimly lit cave. It was deserted. At least, there was no movement. But it had been in use until recently. But everyone, including Lt Thompson were  gone.
Team Jackson soon entered the cave from the other side. Now they had to find the field generator and disable it. Soon, they found huge power cables and started following them. They led to an adjacent cavern, where a large generator was humming. It was shielded by a forcefield at the entrance.
Lt. Jackson took off his backpack and took out a detonator. Then he grabbed the three plasma grenades from his belt.
“How many do we have?” Jackson asked the others. They all got out their explosives. In seconds, about 15 plasma grenades were gathered. “Auriak, reconfigure the grenades in remote trigger mode and link them to the detonator. “ Auriak nodded and started tapping commands on her tricorder.
Grop and Rolston where scanning the surroundings while Jackson and Auriak where creating the bomb. It only took mere minutes. Once done, Jackson ordered to move to a safe distance. Then he opened a channel to the Resurrection. “Resurrection, please stand by for transport” 
“Ready when you are, lieutenant”  Captain Lazarus replied.
Jackson nodded to Auriak, and she send the signal to the detonator. For a moment all was quiet, then a huge explosion rocked through the cavern. The lights shimmered and alarms went off.
Another explosion, even more powerful than the first. Large rocks started falling down from the ceiling of the cavern. Auriak checked her tricorder.
“Dampening generator offline. But I'm reading massive energy fluctuations. We'd better get out of here…”
“ four to beam up” Jackson said. Within second they we’re back on board the Resurrection. “Jackson to Lt. Commander McGuire. We were able to bring the dampening field offline.”
“So we noticed” McGuire’s voice sounded. “But we read massive spikes of energy down there. What did you do ?”
Jackson smiled wryly. “We blew the damn thing up.”
Abandoned Terrorist Compound
Beneath the surface of Andoria Prime
Stardate 1905.23
They certainly had blown things up. The dampening field was down, taken offline when the explosives detonated and destroyed the generator producing the interference. Resurrection could now scan the cave complex where the ARF had been hiding. It was vacant.
The destruction of the dampening field, however, had set off the planned self-destruction of the networked computer consoles ARF had been using in the cave where the command center had been. The explosions from the jury-rigged computers destroyed all the equipment and brought down much of the ceiling above the command center, filling it with rock.
Lt. Commander Darva McGuire & Lt. Cody Beckett
Resurrection shuttle
Stardate 1905.23
Darva sighed as she cut the comm with Lt. Jackson. “He should’ve been a demolisher instead of a security officer.” she said.  “Make a full spectrum scan of the area” she stated to Cody.
“Already on it, ma’am” Cody replied, while he grinned about the remark of McGuire.. “Sending all data to the Resurrection. No strange things so far….”
Abandoned Terrorist Compound
Beneath the surface of Andoria Prime
Stardate 1905.23
Beckett’s scan of the cave complex quickly yielded one thing. A cavern that had survived. Inside that cave Cody could see, via the sensor scans, that there was an intact military transporter system set up and functional -- though currently lacking a power source after destruction of the generator that not only powered the dampening field -- but all the other portable electronics the terrorists had left behind.
Captain Lazarus was on the bridge of Resurrection when the shuttle relayed the sensor scans. He looked at the incoming scans and then looked over at Raillius.
“That’s where your bad guys got away...the beamed out. There aren’t too many places they could have gone -- that transporter is deep underground and it was under a dampening field when it was used. In fact, not likely they could have gone upward...maybe transported deeper?”
He looked to Raillius to gauge her reactions…
[Back to top]
== S1, E3, Act 6: Train to Nowhere ==
Commander T’Aayla Raillius
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1905.23
If there’s a transporter, there’s a transporter log. "Raillius to McGuire. Take Beckett and a portable energy generator and beam down to that transporter. Find me the coordinates for the last beam-out. Speed is of the essence Commander.”   
Lt. Commander Darva McGuire & Lt. Cody Beckett
USS Resurrection Shuttle
Stardate 1905.25
Darva got the order, and looked at Beckett. “I’m on it” he said and jumped out of his seat.
Within a few moments he grabbed a portable energy generator, some cables and more parts that might come in handy and put them in a bag. Darva initiated the autopilot sequence and set up a link to her tricorder, so she was able to remotely command the shuttle if needed.
"Resurrection, beam Lt. Beckett and me out into the cavern where the transporter is." McGuire requested to the Resurrection, while she grabbed an extra phaser, slung the weird TR-120 subrifle on her back and strapped on some belts with extra magazines for the TR-120. That rifle had been serving her for more than 20 years. It reminded her of the time when she was in the Borg Anti-Task Force. Where she worked together with Daryl. Or at least, his clone….She sighed, and pushed away the thoughts.
Soon, the transporter engineer responded. “Stand by” she heard him, and the next moment they were transported. The small shuttle interior faded away and a cavern became visible with on one side a large transporter padd, big enough to transport groups of 15 people out at once. It was indeed intact but offline, as was the engineering console that was attached to it with a big bundle of cables. Darva scanned the room, as Beckett already made his way to the console.
He ducked under the console, removed a panel and started rummaging through the cables and within seconds, he connected the power generator and the console hummed back to life.
Cody got up and checked the transporter logs. They were there, but garbled. His hands danced over the console and he quickly connected to the Resurrection’s computer system to retrieve some nifty tools he had learned from Daryl to rebuild files to their original state. He activated the program and waited. It only took mere seconds, as he used the Resurrection’s compute power. Within a minute, he already got the message that everything had been recompiled and he opened the transporter logs to see where the last transporter beam out had taken the ARF terrorists, and, presumably, Thompson. The logs showed that indeed several large groups had been beaming deeper under the surface. All to the same set of coordinates.
Pattern matching of the people that had been beaming out learned that Thompson indeed had beamed out with a larger group, mostly human, a few Klingons and a here and there a Romulan. Only a few of them were Andorian. Investigating further showed that all that had beamed out had a unique pattern in their head. Probably the detonator device. Cody isolated the pattern and saved it for further analysis. He raised his eyebrow as he also saw this pattern at Thompson’s transporter pattern...What did that mean? It could mean a lot of things. It could mean he was forced to come with them, or it could mean that he had come with them voluntarily. He showed his findings to the Lt. Commander McGuire, and she didn’t looked too happy.
“McGuire to Resurrection. We have the coordinates and more information. Sending it over now.”
USS Resurrection
Orbiting Andoria Prime
Stardate 1905.25
Lazarus saw the incoming data from McGuire on the surface and he turned to ops, “Put those coordinates on screen.”
The officer at ops pulled up a map of the Andoria Prime underground and displayed it on the viewscreen. The coordinates put the transport into a mag-lev train station used for mining companies to move people and supplies back and forth.
“Raillius,” he said. “What do you make of this?”
Soli Zh'iviannil (Commander Mayla Vree)
South Wing of Starfleet comm relay, Andoria Prime
Stardate 1905.25
The five of them quickly swept through the south wing of the relay station and 'eliminated' any resistance easily. Mayla watched the other four 'comrades' move like a well-oiled unit as they quickly cleared each room effortlessly. They definitely were more than they seem to be. As they finished up, they returned to the ground level to see the entire first level was already occupied by a mixture of protesters and those who seemed more confident in giving orders and maintaining a defense of the Starfleet and Andorian personnel outside trying to retake the wing.
Another large Andorian glanced over to them as they emerged from a doorway. It was the same andorian who ordered the four to go with Mayla to secure the wing. He didn't acknowledge her, but one of the others.
"Status."
"The wing is cleared and secured."
He walked closer to them and spoke in a low voice. "Gather the unit and leave security to the protesters," he said, then giving Mayla a stare down. "What's your name?"
Mayla faked a flinch in her eyes as his eyes bore into hers. "Soli Zhi'iviannil."
He looked to one of the four who gave him a nearly imperceptible nod. Then looked at her and her weapon. "Why are you here?"
She narrowed her eyes and gave him a hard glare full of anger. "I'm sick of all of this. The protests, the bombings, the constant rhetoric of politics. I want all of this to end. One way or another."
One of the other men gestured to her. "She handled herself well enough. Took out several security outside and blazed a path to the entrance for us to blow our way in."
Mayla pretended to relax a bit and looked around the room. To her surprise, Sh'avelith was among the protesters standing guard inside at a blown out window.
"She has potential," one other Andorian said.
"Alright, she comes with us. Prepare to pull out." He walked away towards a few other intimidating looking Andoria on Sh'avelith's side of the room. Three of her 'comrades' dispersed leaving her alone with one.
"I'm not going with you," Mayla said in protest. Her hand prepared to move to the rifle. "I'm staying with the protesters."
"You said you wanted all this to end. Coming with us in our cause will accomplish that." The male Andorian said in a gruff impatient voice.
Mayla took a step back knowing her protest was futile. "Where are we going?"
"In due time."
"Who are you?" Mayla asked.
"Keb Th'ityqon. And we are going to meet up with another cell."
"You're not a protester. You instigated this."
The man smiled. "All in a day's work."
Mayla turned around and crossed her arms across her chest as if in silent angry protest.
The leader came back with five others in tow, Sh'avelith and the recruiter at the shopping center was among them. "Let's move out."
They proceeded to follow him up a flight of stairs and Mayla and Sh'avelith gave each other a knowing glance. They knew there was no other way out other than the front or back entrance, and they were both on the ground level. They were either going to be picked up in a shuttle or transport out.  She opened a channel to Charatetet.
"Eight, this is One, return to the Embassy. Six and I are preparing to leave the area with the instigators of this protest."
"Message received. Where are you going?"
"I don't know. One, out."
They entered an open office area on the third level. The Andorian leader took out a communicator from an inside pocket. "Falchion, 16 to beam up."
They all disappeared in a transporter beam before any of them could react and rematerialized in a large transporter bay. Mayla immediately took in her surroundings and recognized the heavily altered cargo bay of a Klingon bird of prey. She'd seen a transporter set up like this before. It was a mass deployment bay capable of transporting up to 100 personnel all at once in parallel to multiple coordinates.
Bird of Prey
Orbiting Andoria Prime
Stardate 1905.25
Upon their arrival aboard the Bird of Prey, Vree and Sh'avelith found themselves not only with the 14 Andorians they’d beamed with, but another dozen or so milling about in the bay of the ship. Everyone was armed. Among the Andorians in the bay was an Andorian female. She approached one of the Andorians who appeared to Vree to be a leader among the ARF by the name of Akoth Ch'ashaohraq.
“Welcome aboard the Falchion. I am Seraphim,” she told him.
Akoth scowled. “Seraphim...but the contact with your group down on Andoria Prime was Seraphim…”
She smiled, “Seraphim is a title bestowed upon all of the lieutenants in Legion,” she said. “If it helps, you may call me Sera?”
Akoth nodded, “Thanks for beaming us out. Was the attack the diversion you were hoping for?”
Sera nodded, “Indeed. The mission is underway. There’s no turning back now.”
“So, when my soldiers have completed their mission, you’ll beam them back here?” Akoth asked.
“That is the plan. Then we just have to wait and see if we can create the proper diversion for the Starfleet ship that’s looking for us,” Sera said.
“Starfleet ship?” he asked.
“The USS Resurrection,” Sera said. “It is sweeping the system looking for cloaked vessels. Fortunately, this vessel has an upgrade cloak that will keep us concealed...as long as we don’t attempt to leave while they’re actively searching.”
At this point during the conversation, Vree and Sh'avelith both recognized telltale signs that Seraphim might be disguised, much as Mayla was -- as they believed possibly as many as half of the Andorians beamed up were.
“Your compatriots have been most generous,” Akoth said. “The weapons. The gear. The support personnel. You have helped our cause immensely; I cannot thank you enough.”
“We believe in your cause. Both the Andorian and non-Andorian members of our organization. We want to see your revolution succeed,” Sera said with a smile.
Another Andorian came off the turbolift and looked around until his gaze fell upon Sera. He then came straight toward her carrying a data padd, his face displaying a look of concern.
Seraphim, he said. “There is a problem.”
She looked to him and frowned, “What is it?”
“We may have beamed someone aboard who does not belong here,” he said, lowering his voice and looking around nervously. He handed her the padd. “Look at this from the transporter logs.”
Sera took the padd, studied the data and her frown grew deeper. “Seal off this bay. No one in or out until we’ve had a chance to check everyone.”
Ensign Tiri Sh'avelith
Bird of Prey
Stardate 1905.25
Tiri was surprised when they ended up aboard a Klingon Bird of Prey. She assumed they must be in orbit around Andoria Prime. This was likely the ‘mothership’ of the group pulling the strings for the ARF. Modifications inside the transport bay of the ship convinced Tiri that this was indeed a surplus or captured Klingon ship. This vessel was too well lit and its technology seemed to be more black market than Klingon stock.
She was with Mayla when the female Seraphim came into the bay and began to speak with the Andorian who was apparently the leader of the ARF. Tiri recalled her research prior to the mission and recognized the ARF leader as Akoth Ch'ashaohraq.
Akoth was something of a legend on Andoria, more infamous than famous. He’d been in and out of trouble since Tiri was a child, usually working for some sort of separatist cause or another. He had learned early in his life he was descended from the last royal family to rule the Andorian Empire before it joined the Federation. Hence, he had it in his head that if Andoria was free of the Federation, he could assume his rightful place as ruler of the empire.
His name had come up in the background information as a possible high-ranking member or, more likely, the leader of the Andorian Revolutionary Front. Tiri believed Commander Vree likely knew his background as well, but she said nothing at this point to avoid being overheard.
Then, an Andorian came off the turbolift and reported something to Seraphim. There was talk of an intruder. Somehow they may have learned that she or Mayla were not who they claimed to be. Tiri patted the phaser in her waistband, tucked under her tunic, and watched to see what would happen. If they moved against Vree or herself, she had no plans of being captured.
Ensign Reepchip Charatetet
Here, there, and everywhere on Andoria Prime
Stardate 1905.25
Reepchip chittered in slight frustration--it seemed he was doing little to help.  He opened a channel to Jahkar and Ryramorl.  “Eight to Seven and Three.  One and Six have gone with the instigators of the protest, and I cannot follow.  I’ve been ordered back to the Embassy.  Shall I rejoin you if possible?”
He started to make his way to the Embassy, skirting the crowd--then gave a slight squeak of dismay when he saw an Andorian look at him and say, “what the hell is that?!”  Reepchip scrambled to get the hell out of there, hoping these Andorians ran as slowly as others he’d met.
A group of Andorians broke away from the rioting and came looking for Reepchip, all five were armed and not pleased to see a non-Andorian alone in the streets of their capital.
Reepchip saw them coming after him and dashed away on all fours in the erratic zig-zag of a fleeing prey animal, making it hard to target him, disappearing behind a building.  He knew they were armed, and they would stop at little to find him.  He scrambled partway up the wall, seeking safety in height and looked for a way to get back to the embassy, but the streets were even more full now, and the way he’d come was blocked.
Lieutenant Ryramorl Ra’yral
Andoria, Across from the Embassy
Stardate 1905.29
Ryramorl glanced at Jahkar, letting him decide whether or not to let Reepchip rejoin them.  They were still on the top floor of the building, and it wouldn’t be hard for Reepchip to rejoin them from there, especially if the Muran was teleported to the roof.
Colonel Jahkar
Andoria, Across from the Embassy
Stardate 1905.29
Jahkar and Ryramorl finished with the team on the top floor and made their way to the spiral staircase. He heard the chatter from Reepchip on the comms and he frowned. “Negative, cover the exterior of the building. Watch for anyone trying to get in or out. You’re our eyes out there. Three out.”
About the time he ended the transmission, Jahkar was halfway down to the next floor and there he was met by three more Andorians. They were aiming up at him and Ryramorl, so Jahkar skirted over the railing and landed on the trio, his booted feet knocking two down and out. Both Andorians were knocked down, the masking fields around them disrupting and showing them both to be humans.
The third Andorian pivoted and tried to shoot Jahkar, but the half-Klingon/Romulan landed in a crouch, swung his leg low, sweeping the terrorist’s legs out from under him. Again, the cloak surrounding the Andorian was disrupted and he showed his true appearance, a Cardassian.
Jahkar pounced on the Cardassian and slammed him hard in the face, twice, rendering him unconscious.
“Sweep these rooms, and fast,” Jahkar told Ryramorl. “I’ll cover the staircase. There will be more.”
The marine was trying to grasp exactly why these terrorists were disguised as Andorians, but all he could come up with is they wanted it to look like this was entirely an Andorian affair -- all of it done by the ARF.
He looked over the Cardassian and noted that his skin and clothing seemed to shimmer at times. Almost like it was moving. A strange device was attached to his belt and Jahkar noted similar devices on the other dead and subdued terrorists. Jahkar grabbed the device off the Cardassian and slipped it into a pocket on his pants.
Lieutenant Ryramorl Ra’yral
Andoria, Across from the Embassy
Stardate 1905.29
Ryramorl readied for combat and opened the door.  Or maybe the Andorian on the other side opened it, it was impossible to tell.  Ryramorl aimed a brutal kick between the Andorian’s legs, laying him flat out and exposing him as yet another human.  He’d yet to meet a humanoid that wasn’t staggered--if not incapacitated--by a low blow.  A stomp to the face knocked the human out.  He checked the room but saw no-one, so he went to the next, which proved empty.  The door to the third opened before he got there, and an Andorian came at him with a pair of ushaan-tor.  Ryramorl drove his fist at the Andorian’s throat, taking no chances.  He knew there was a possibility--even a likelihood--that this would kill the combatant, but Ryramorl knew that it was this guy or him.  It was saying something that Ryramorl was mildly surprised to find that this one, for once, was indeed an Andorian.
Colonel Jahkar
Andoria, Across from the Embassy
Stardate 1905.29
Jahkar was kept busy while Ryramorl fought the terrorists in the room to room sweep. He shot several who attempted to come up the staircase. Some were dropped no sooner than they showed their faces, others put up a fight. In the end, six terrorists ended up stunned on the staircase.
Once they seemed to stop, and he confirmed Ra’yral was holding his own. Jahkar checked the staircase and found of the six, two were actually Andorian. The rest were three humans and a Bolian. He put zip-ties on each terrorist’s wrists and left them where they’d fallen.
“Phoenix Three to Seven,” he commed Ryramorl. “Heading down to check the lower floors. Meet back here in five minutes.”
Jahkar then headed down. He swept the second floor and found no one. They had apparently left the rooms they were in and had come upstairs to engage in the fight. The Marine did find a room with several large, but portable, computer units. Someone had engaged a program that had wiped all of the computers clean -- but Jahkar determined from the way they were sliced into data conduits in the floor, they had likely used the equipment to hack into the embassy across the street. If he went down to the sub-level, he was certain he would find the group had been tapped into the communications and data grid for the city.
These people were not ARF soldiers. They were not the rag-tag rebels they had witnessed fighting in the streets. The group in this building was part of something bigger, something with diverse ranks of highly trained individuals.
Jahkar grimaced. He pulled himself away from the room full of equipment and headed down to sweep the lower floor. He did and confirmed it was empty. On his way back to meet up with Ryramorl, he opened the front door to the place and keyed his subvocal communicator, “Phoenix Three to Eight. Front door is open. Join us on the third floor. Place is clear.”
Jahkar then headed up to see what, if anything, the Carnora had found.
Ensign Reepchip Charatetet
Running For His Life Through Andoria Prime
Stardate 1905.29
Reepchip chittered in acknowledgement, wondering how he was going to ditch these Andorians.  He knew if he was caught, they were going to wipe themselves with his skin.  He needed a distraction, or something to escape these guys.  He looked around for another means of getting to the embassy before the quintet picked up his trail.
Reepchip hid in an alley not far from the embassy and was anticipating his next move as the gang of Andorians drew closer. THey were nearly on his location when suddenly he heard someone shout at the group, “Andorian Security! Drop your weapons!”
The gang responded by opening fire and the security squad returned with their own volley. Within seconds, the group of Andorian thugs were stunned and subdued. They were nothing more than ARF conscripts pulled off the streets and given weapons...no match for the trained Andorian Security forces.
The security team began to mop up the ARF gang, leaving Reepchip to slip away.
Reepchip slipped away and made a beeline for the building Jahkar and Ryramorl were in as soon as he was out of sight of the Andorians.  He actually felt safer as he slipped into the front door.  “Eight to Three.  Am inside.”  He then headed for the stairs to go to the third floor.  Knowing Ryramorl and Jahkar would be on high alert, as he approached the third floor, he made a few soft, high-pitched barks that he knew at least Ryramorl would recognize as him.
Lieutenant Ryramorl Ra’yral
Andoria, Across From The Embassy
Stardate 1906.01
Ryramorl met up with Jahkar after he’d subdued and bound the terrorists.  His muzzle was bloodied, and his teeth slightly bared in a fighting snarl.  “Good fighters.  Only one Andorian,” he said.  “They also had a stash of weapons up there.  A few top-notch ones, and a lot of cheaper ones.  I think the cheaper ones are for the Horghenhar down there.”  His ears perked towards the staircase at the sound of scratching claws, then gestured to Jahkar to relax as soon as he heard Reepchip’s soft barking.  Reepchip came into view, and Ryramorl’s snout wrinkled at the scent of the places the Muran had hidden, though he said nothing about it, instead filling Reepchip in on what they’d found.
Ensign Reepchip Charatetet
Andoria, Across From The Embassy
Stardate 1906.01
Reepchip listened as Jahkar also told Reepchip about the computers and the splicing.  “All right, let’s see how well they wiped them,” Reepchip said.  Now was the time that his history as a Madcap Engineer--and the specialized training he and his friends ended up receiving--could serve his team well.
When they arrived at the computers, Reepchip stood in one of the chairs, holding himself with his tail wrapped around the chair back and started to investigate with a well-trained eye.
Lt. Daryl Thompson
Mag-lev train, destination unknown
Stardate 1905.27
The mag-lev train moved at high speed through the dark tunnel.  Now and then a shimmer of light flashed through the few windows the train had. Daryl was pondering how this would continue, and how his team was doing with finding out where he went, as Seraphim broke the silence.
“We are almost there. The surface is a harsh environment. I advise you to take some gear from on of the crates. He gestured with his hand to the other side of the wagon they were in. Daryl nodded and got up, as was the Klingon.
Seraphim whispered something and the Klingon said down again, but he kept his sidearm in his hand, half trained at Daryl. Daryl ignored the Klingon once more and walked over to the crates. He felt that the mag-lev train was slowing down. They were almost at their destination….   
Daryl opened one of the crates and took out a set of arctic gear and put it on, along with some snowboots, which were designed to wear over normal boots. Several backpacks were neatly piled up. He opened one of them. It contained 2 ropes, icepicks, snowgoggles and more gear that would come in handy in a cold environment. He zipped it up and slung it over one shoulder. With a snowcap and a pair of gloves, he was ready.
He walked back to Seraphim and sat down again, as other terrorists started putting on their gear. Daryl looked around and wondered what next would await him….
Mag-lev Train
Andoria Prime
Stardate 1906.02
The train slowed because it had reached a section of tunnel where, ahead on the track, a second rail split off. But the second rail had not been there previously – moments earlier it had been concealed beneath a holographic projection of rock and ice.
But that all changed as the train approached. Someone among the terrorist crew that had hijacked the train triggered a remote which made the holographic projection disappear, revealing not only a secondary rail, but a hole carved through the rock leading several hundred meters over to another existing mag-lev tunnel.
The train took the diversion and slowed so it could take the reroute through the side tunnel and onto another mag-lev track which went off in a different direction. The train followed this track for several kilometers until the track emerged from beneath the surface of Andoria Prime and took the train up onto the snow-covered ice fields of the moon.
In the rear compartment, Seraphim allowed Daryl to watch a portable display which showed the view from the engine of the ultra-fast train. When they made the switch in tracks, the Andorian looked sideways at Thompson.
“We’ve prepared for this mission for months,” he said, proudly. “The secondary track, the additional tunnel – lots of planning and work.”
The train emerged onto the surface of Andoria Prime and Seraphim raeched to his communicator. He keyed a code into the device and a signal was send to all of the Legion operatives on the train.
“It’s time,” he said.
At that time, the Legion personnel scattered throughout the train all made their way toward the back. They quietly left their posts, leaving the ARF personnel behind. If asked by the ARF where they were going, they did not answer. They simply left the cars they were in and sealed the doors behind them.
In the compartment with the large, cylindrical device, a Legion soldier activated it and left it behind, moving from car to car to join the rest of Seraphim’s team. When they were all gathered in the back of the train, a Legion member slipped between the car they were in and the rest of the train. He opened a panel there and typed in a series of numbers which caused the locking mechanism between the two cars to open. The last car then began to separate from the rest of the cars in the train.
“This is Shresan Ch'virir, ARF commander,” a voice came across the Legion come units. “What’s going on? Seraphim? All of your people have left us and they’ve sealed the doors shut.”
Seraphim donned his jacket and gathered up his gear before he replied, “You will be martyrs, Shresan. You will be remembered as the soldiers of the rebellion that eventually toppled the Federation.”
“What? That wasn’t the plan!” Shresan balked. “We were going to the Starfleet base to take hostages. Reveal what they’re doing there! Not…this..this device…what is it?”
Seraphim slowly smiled, “Don’t concern yourself with that. It’ll all be over soon.”
A Legion soldier turned from his tricorder, “We are at minimum safe distance.”
The car was slowing as the rest of the train hurdled on across the frozen field of ice. Seraphim looked at one of his men who’d been a pilot who was, until a few minutes earlier, driving the train. “You locked the controls on course, didn’t you?”
The man nodded, “Done. Even if they get out of those cars the controls are slagged. They aren’t going to get control back.”
Seraphim nodded. “When the car stops, everyone out!”
He looked at Daryl and gave a nod, “Stay with me. We have a little hike ahead of us.”
[Back to top]
== S1, E3, Act 7: Saving Andoria ==
Soli Zh'iviannil (Commander Mayla Vree)
Falchion, above Andoria Prime
Stardate 1906.03
Mayla overheard lightly what the nervous Andorian said to Sera and handed her a padd. Sh'avelith caught her eye who gave her a slight nod indicating she was ready to fight if they were discovered. Her own hand, still in the grip of her rifle, tightened slightly as she casually surveyed the room again. They hadn't left the deployment bay, or cargo bay as it originally was, and the mass of people were talking amongst themselves about their whereabouts.
The exchange between Seraphim and Akoth Ch'ashaohraq enlightened Mayla, but she didn't make any indication she was listening. So this group-Legion, was assisting the ARF in their revolution. And were working behind the scenes with an ulterior motive even the ARF wasn't aware of. Their possession of a Klingon bird of prey clearly indicated their resources.
But nothing was more alarming than the fact that Sera new the Resurrection was here. There had to be a mole either on the ship or on the Fearless. Or Ops Base One. She could not risk using her subvocal to warn Havoc. Knowing that their entire mission could have already been compromised from the start, she and Sh'avelith needed to change their comm frequency as soon as possible, and refrain from using it. She and Sh'avelith were on their own until it was safe to transmit and hoped the ship wouldn't be compromised before she warned them.
Sera looked at the padd and then made a gesture in Mayla and Sh'avelith's direction. Two armed Andorians followed in her wake as she approached, they group that had beamed up from the comm relay protest. Mayla knew a close quarters phaser fight was out of the question due to the fact they were in a small ship. She readied herself to combat.
The three Andorians headed her way and stopped in front of one of the Andorian males who beamed up with them. Sera's two heavily armed henchmen took up positions behind the male.
"Your name is Irel Th'vhiathet," Sera said in the form of stating a fact.
The shorter Andorian nodded. "What's the problem?"
Sera turned her padd around and showed him a detailed profile breakdown of him. "This says you are Tarir Ch'thiller, a commander of the Andorian Imperial Guard."
The man shook his head as his antennae moved with alarm. "You are mistaken."
"The transporter doesn't lie. Take him." Sera ordered her two henchmen who were standing behind him.
"No, you have it wrong! I was recruited by-" his head whirled around and saw the recruiter from the shopping mall, "-him! He was the one who came to me during the protest."
Sera's left hand pulled out her pistol and pointed it at the recruiter. "Speaking of which," she said without a beat and fired her weapon. The blue energy beam struck the unsuspecting man who died instantly as a hole was created dead center in his chest.
Akoth Ch'ashaohraq ran over to end up staring at the barrel of her pistol. "Why did you kill one of my men?"
"That recruiter recruited a member of the Imperial Guard. That is not the type of recruiter you want who doesn't do his due diligence. A mistake like that will cost you your revolution." Sera then turned to the Andorian still being held. "And as for you, Commander Ch'thiller, should I kill you now?" She said stepping up to the man and held her pistol to the middle of his forehead.
"I have denounced the Guard by joining you!" Ch'thiller said forcefully. "I cannot go back."
Sera made a sign as if in thought. "I will give you a chance to prove your loyalty for now. A false move from you, any of my men will kill you instantly."
The Andorian bowed his head. "I subjugate myself to the Cause."
Sera nodded. "Release him and watch him."
Mayla and Sh'avelith watched the exchange and became just one amongst the crowd. With her hand still on the grip of her rifle, Mayla took the opportunity during the exchange to wiggle her fingers a shorthand signal to Sh'avelith to stay off the subvocal and to change their frequency. Sh'avelith imperceptibly gave a nod at the now standardized hand signals Starfleet Intelligence uses that Shadow Operations had originated. Both shadow operatives were of course well trained to not draw attention to themselves and disappear. But with the bay sealed, they couldn't do much except to blend in.
Mayla watched Sera as she was about to walk towards the bay doors when she slowed her pace. Mayla has seen this before, the Andorian was on comms. By the time she reached the doors, she was barking orders to her own men and they all left.
Mayla could hear the bay doors lock after them.
Ch'ashaohraq walked up to the door as if to follow them but the door wouldn't open for him. He banged on the hatch. "Why have you locked us in here?!"
Sh'avelith received a nod from Mayla. "I don't think the ARF is running the show any more."
The Andorian cell leader whirled around at the comment. "Who said that?" he demanded as several others murmured in agreement.
"I don't like this," Mayla said aloud. "They are not Federation, and it doesn't sound like they are ARF. So who are they? And why are they here?"
Ch'ashaohraq looked at all of them sternly as dissent resounded throughout the bay. "Hear this. They have given us opportunity, resources, and intelligence that has gotten us this far. This revolution would have been eliminated long ago if it were not for them."
"But where is it headed now, Ch'ashaohraq?" Another Andorian to his right stepped forward. "We are ARF, and ARF members do NOT imprison each other."
"Unless there is reason for treachery here," a female Andorian piped in-Sh'avelith. "Ch'ashaohraq, does the ARF suspect there is treachery here that has filtered down from the leadership of this cell?"
Now they had the attention of everyone in the room, staring down Ch'ashaohraq, almost demanding an answer. He brought up his weapon and pointed to the ceiling. "I am loyal to Andoria and her independence from Starfleet and the Federation! Anyone who questions that will meet the fiery end of my weapon." He glared at everyone around him.
"Then why are we locked in this bay?"
Ch'ashaohraq turned and looked at the locked door for a moment. He gestured to an Andorian to his left to come close. "Get that door opened," he whispered. "But carefully. We may be watched."
Mayla was standing just close enough to hear the soft whisper. She walked up to Ch'ashaohraq and looked at the ARF member beyond him and whispered to him. "We should try to cut the power to this bay, sir. This entire bay is a transporter pad. Once they realize we are trying to break out, they may just beam us into space."
"Agreed. Do you know how to do that? I've never seen a transporter pad this large before."
Mayla laughed as if they were having a different conversation. "I don't, but I know someone who might."
"Get on it," Ch'ashaohraq ordered, and turned away to go around the room congratulating everyone on their success with the Starfleet comm relay at the same time spreading word of his plan.
Sh'avelith came up to Mayla. "What's he doing?"
Mayla gave her a smile and put her hand on a shoulder with a squeeze, giving her a slight SO signal. "We need to disable the transporters in this bay. Ch'ashaohraq is working on a plan to break out of here."
Sh'avelith gave her a broader smile. "That sounds like fun. Did you just turn the ARF against these other 'ARF' people?"
Mayla gave a shrug and slung her rifle. "If there is another group of ARF, then they probably have a different agenda. And we need to stop them."
"So we're going to break out, then what?"
"Then we help the ARF take over this ship."
Ensign Tiri Sh'avelith
Bird of Prey
Stardate 1906.03
Tiri looked around the bay and spied a box on the far wall. She looked at Mayla and nodded toward the box. “That looks like the housing for the primary energizing coils. If I can get close to it I should be able to open it and pull the bioneural hardware from inside. That will make it impossible for the transporters to work.”
She waited to see how Commander Vree would reply…
Lieutenant Ryramorl Ra’yral
Ensign Reepchip Charatetet
Across from the Andorian Embassy
Stardate 1906.11
Ryramorl stood guard at the door as Reepchip’s long fingers tapped at the keyboard.  “One thing’s for certain--these aren’t your twig-arrow hackers.  They knew what they were doing,” he said.  “Let’s see who knows what they’re doing better…”
Ryramorl glanced back at Reepchip.  “Think you can find anything?”
“Starfleet Academy put me in their most advanced computer classes just to keep me out of mischief, and we Madcaps were trained in some serious hacking techniques.”  His ears flicked in eagerness as he worked through the computer, trying to coax what information he could from it onto his PADD.
Reepchip worked feverishly over the console, his hands flying across the keypad inputting data and running endless algorithms. He discovered a very advanced program had been initiated the moment Jahkar and Ryramorl set off the first alarm inside the building. This program systematically destroyed the data contained in the computer system, erasing nearly everything -- nearly.
The diminutive Carnora discovered some of the backups had not been erased. Those who had set up the computer hardware, all of it portable, had failed to direct the search and destroy program to clear all the back-up drives. Among the data left behind was logs of the group’s efforts to hack the embassy, even having gone so far as to physically tap into the city’s ODN conduit network running beneath the buildings.
This highly invasive hack had allowed the team in the building across the street from the embassy to reroute the transporter, making it possible to capture Thompson. Reepchip wasn’t a Federation computer specialist, but he recognized the technology and talent needed to accomplish all that the team here had done far exceeded the abilities of a group of street thugs like the ARF.
In the midst of trying to access and download data from other backups in the system, Reepchip realized he’d tripped something that initiated another security protocol. Something switched on inside the console he was working from and seized control of the system. Then it began to literally consume the computer equipment, causing it to spark and melt as if it were being subjected to intense heat.
A tricorder scan of the self-dissolving equipment revealed a true surprise -- billions of nanites had been released inside the computer equipment and every unit was being rapidly disintegrated -- destroyed from inside by these microscopic machines.
At the same time, Jahkar had been looking over the device the terrorists had been using to disguise themselves as Andorians. His tricorder scans of the device also revealed the use of nanotechnology. The little disks they’d pulled off the belts of the captured enemies were a form of this nanotech, utilizing a field of nanites projected over a person to make them look like anyone they were programmed to impersonate.
Seeing some of the computers begin to disintegrate, Reepchip first disconnected his PADD, then the cables tapping into the ODN network.  He then tried to rip open their cases and yank out some of their storage devices, hoping against hope that he would get them before the nanites did.  Yes, he’d be damaging them, but with any luck, they’d get SOMETHING from the devices.  This was nothing like he’d ever seen before.  Lastly he grabbed one of his small darts and rolled it against a crumbling processing unit before returning the dart to its casing.  “The darts Cody and I have a coating that keeps nanites more or less stuck,” he explained to his superiors.  “This is… like nothing I’ve seen before.”
Ryramorl looked at Jahkar.   “Think Reepchip should use those nanite darts he and Cody made on the operatives we took down?  They might have those embedded explosives, and I don’t want them to blow themselves up while in custody.”
Colonel Jahkar
Across from the Andorian Embassy
Stardate 1906.11
Jahkar nodded, “Do what you can. I have no idea what to do to keep those brain bombs from going off. We need to get back to the embassy with these prisoners and the data your retrieved.”
He looked over the slagged computer equipment and frowned, “Whoever these people are, they have some advanced nanotechnology.”
They gathered everyone together, dragging the prisoners into the room with them and then he opened a comm-channel to the embassy. Phoenix 3 to Base. Lock onto our signals and the lifeforms around us and beam us back.”
A moment later they were transported to the embassy and were greeted by the security team there. Jahkar looked to the commander of the security team.
“Get them into cells. Can you place them in a dampening field or something that might jam any signal sent to trigger the explosives in their heads?” Jahkar asked.
The security chief nodded, “The cells are shielded. It should protect them.”
Jahkar stepped aside and the embassy guards dragged the prisoners from the transporter bay to the building’s detention center.
“Phoenix 3 to Phoenix 2,” he said, opening a channel to Raiilius. “We have prisoners. I’m trying to have them shielded in case someone tries to detonate their head bombs. We have data Reepchip downloaded from the computers were found, including evidence that they were hacked into the embassy’s transporters -- that’s how they got Daryl.”
He then awaited orders from the commander.
Commander T’Aayla Raillius aka Jamie T. Marcus
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1906.08
Lazarus saw the incoming data from McGuire on the surface and he turned to ops, “Put those coordinates on screen.” The officer at ops pulled up a map of the Andoria Prime underground and displayed it on the viewscreen. The coordinates put the transport into a mag-lev train station used for mining companies to move people and supplies back and forth.
“Raillius,” he said. “What do you make of this?”
T’Aayla moved over to where Lazarus was viewing the data.   Whoever had beamed out of the bunker had gone to the mag-lev station.   Her eyes narrowed.   The question was, were the terrorists running or were they on mission?  
Turning her attention to the science officer on duty, “Lieutenant, tie into the planetary mag-lev central control room, through Andoria Central Net and tell me what activity has occurred on any tracks from that station near the time of beam-out.”  
After several seconds, the science officer reported, “I have it now Commander, it appears there was activity on that track two hours before time zero, and one train that left  station 5 minutes after the beam-out.”
“Track that one.  All trains should automatically be tracked as they pass track sensors for routing and safety purposes.”
“On it Commander….  Wait this is confusing.   It proceeds on a direct path toward Andoria Prime, at normal speed, ...and then it vanishes.”
“Vanishes?  Lieutenant, trains do not vanish.”
“Look for yourself Commander, the track signals trigger in the normal sequence based on train speed up to this point, then they stop.”   
“Scan for the train at that location, quickly.”
“Negative Commander, it’s gone.”
T’Aayla’s eyes narrowed.   “Debris?”
“None Commander.”
If the train wasn’t there, it had to be somewhere.  The physics of transporting an entire train were immense.  A transport was unlikely.  There were no debris, so it hadn’t exploded.   Even if it was cloaked it would still register as weight and trigger the track sensors.  Her mind ticked through options…   “Lieutenant, scan for any activity on adjacent tracks that simply starts up mid-track and not from a station.”
“Aye sir…   this is very weird.”
“If you eliminate all the probable outcomes, then whatever is left, even though improbable is the answer Lieutenant, continue scanning the records please.”
Seconds ticked by, “Sir!  I have a track that starts up out of nowhere on a track near where the mag-lev disappeared.”
“That’s it.  Track its location.”
“I have it Commander, its heading directly for the heart of Andoria Prime.”    
“Helm, bring us into geosynchronous orbit directly above that train… with your permission, Captain.”
“Make it so helm,” Lazarus responded quickly.
“Aye sir.”    The Resurrection smoothly moved to a location in orbit above the train.
“Scan that train, full sensors.”
“I detect upwards of thirty life signs.”
“Thompson?”
“No Sir, no sign of him on that train.”
“What else?”
After several seconds, “Nothing remarkable sir, however there is an object about the size of a Photon Torpedo that is encased in a lead duranium shell and has a local dampening field near it that is blocking our scans inside the device.”
She looked over at Lazarus, and asked, “What do you know of that is about the size of a Photon Torpedo and is encased in a lead duranium shell?”
“A damn metagenic weapon. Detonating out there in the wild won’t affect anything major, will it?” Lazarus asked, reviewing the incoming sensor data .    
“No,”  T’Aayla responded looking very serious indeed. “But look at what it will affect. There’s a facility directly in the path of the train. It’s a Federation research facility located on the surface. If that’s where they detonate this thing, it will destroy the base and the metagenic particles will cause some damage to the environment. It will possibly contaminate a portion of the planet’s fresh water and will create a cloud in the atmosphere that will take decades to clean up.”
Lazarus gritted his teeth, “It will look like it was an accident, at the Federation research facility. That’s one of the ARF’s claims is the Federation is conducting secret research at several facilities planetwide. This will be proof for anyone who believes their rhetoric.”
He looked over to Raillius, “Boarding party!” he exclaimed.
“All our security teams are on planet” a yeoman squeeked.
“Then it will have to be regular crew.  We’ve got to stop that device.”
“There are 35 terrorists, our odds of securing and deactivating the device before detonation are less than 20%,” T’Aayla stated, raising an eyebrow in a very vulcanlike, non-Romulan manner.
“Then what?” Lazarus fumed.
“Tractor beam.”
“We’d need to be close to it and in the atmosphere to get a lock on it,” Lazarus responded, “it would be a bitch of a maneuver to appear, grab it and…  I suppose you’re going to ask for helm control at Tactical?”
She simply smiled.   “Do it,” Lazarus ordered.  “You’d better be as damn good as MacLeod says you are.”
She keyed in several commands on the tactical board, “Raise shields to full.  Emergency and Auxiliary power to maneuvering thrusters.   Suddenly Resurrection dropped to the surface in a manner that the inertial dampeners couldn’t quite keep up with, and not unlike a hawk dropping on its prey.  Everyone experienced a bit of queasiness in their stomachs until the systems caught back up.   
The ship screamed directly toward the surface of the planet, covering the distance in mere seconds, and suddenly pulled up, engines on full reverse and maneuvering thrusters firing at maximum.  It had the effect of making Resurrection nearly weightless and in effect maintaining a stationary position above the speeding train for approximately two seconds.    T’Aayla keyed the ships tractors; tractors one and three pushing the cars surrounding the shielded device down, while tractor 2 pulled the car with the device upwards.  The magnetic locks keeping the cars connected were no match for Resurrection’s tractor beams and the car cleanly sheared away from its neighbors.  The train, destabilized, immediately slowed as its emergency systems detected an emergency, however the back cars, now unconnected to a power source, continued their trajectory into the section in front, and an instant later both sections of the train jumped the track, throwing up showers of snow as they furrowed through the deep snow surrounding the tracks on the surface of Andoria.  Meanwhile,  Resurrection had screamed spaceward, the car in tow.
“The rear shields might not take a detonation at this range.” Lazarus tersely stated.
“I know.”   She twisted Resurrection at a snap 90 degree angle and released the tractor on the train car,whipping it out into the system.
“There were people on that car,” an ensign breathed.    
“Not nearly as many as reside in Andoria Prime,” Lazarus stated harshly eyeing T’Aayla.
“Maintaining defensive posture, evasive pattern random.” She stated, eyeing her board.   If anyone was out there, they’d just gotten their attention.   She hoped the metagenic device would explode before it left the system.  She keyed some more commands into tactical rigging Resurrections scanners to track the expanding wavefront of the explosion.”  
“Alert Andoria Central Security to dispatch forces to mop up any survivors,” Lazarus ordered his comm officer.   If anyone survived the derailment, they shouldn’t be in much of a condition to put up a fight.   
Legion Group
On the Andorian Surface
Stardate 1906.10
An alarm went off on Seraphim’s tricorder, attached to his belt, and he looked down to see what it was. Stopping in the blowing snow, he turned and looked back in the direction of the tracks. Unable to see anything in the blowing snow, the group did hear the telltale sound of a sonic boom above.
“Someone has stopped the train,” he muttered. “They’ve found out what we were doing.”
The Andorian whirled on Thompson and he glared from beneath his snow goggles at the Shadow Operative, “Your friends, no doubt!”
He reached into his coat pocket and withdrew a device Daryl recognized as a detonator, “Hopefully this will make them regret interfering in our plans. A metagenic weapon detonating here or in the atmosphere, either way it’s going to cause a very big mess.”
Lt. Daryl Thompson
Legion Group, Andorian surface
Stardate 1906.10
In a split-second Daryl thought about his options. The first thought was to roundhouse kick the detonator out of Seraphim's hand, into the snowstorm...it would be lost. But it would certainly end in his death. If the Legion soldiers wouldn't kill him, Seraphim would have the nanocharge in his head detonated. Also, he had to stay, to find out where this Legion originated from, who was behind it. Seraphim pushed the one button on the detonator. Nothing happened. Then, in the distance there was a rumble, and a faint light scattered.by the storm was barely visible in the sky. Seraphim checked his tricorder once more. He nodded and grinned and evil grin. "Thanks to your friends, the metagenic agent will spread out in a bigger area. That means more casualties! Come on, let's move. We have 15 minutes before the metagenic compound reaches us. I want to be onboard of the ship by that point. So let's move!”[Back to top]
== S1, E3, Act 8: The Get Away ==
Ensign Reepchip Charatetet
Federation Embassy
Stardate 1906.13
Reepchip had made sure to tag the prisoners with the darts when they were gathered.  Once back at the embassy and he, Ryramorl, and Jahkar were alone and away from listening devices, he spoke. 
“Computer-eating nanites, and nanites that create a false image,” he said.  “The stuff us Madcaps were given access to would have made a Starfleet captain stare, but this is something I never even heard of.  So, what we need to know is who would have access to this level of nanotechnology and start a list of suspects from there.”
He worked his jaw.  “Also, in the transporter hack I looked at, it seemed they were looking for a specific signal.  I’ve seen something like that in my Advanced Transporter Security classes--authorized people go to one pad, unauthorized people go to another--if they’re let through at all.  It makes sense, if they weren’t looking for someone specific, they’d have grabbed both you AND ‘Bridwell’ and sorted it out from there.  You’re a strong warrior, but you’d have been surrounded the minute you materialized.  But if they were looking for that one, specific signal…  they weren’t interested in Admiral Bridwell.”  He looked between them, “They wanted Daryl Thompson, and no-one else.”
Lieutenant Ryramorl Ra’yral
Federation Embassy
Stardate 1906.15
Ryramorl frowned and flicked his tail as he considered what Reepchip said.  He decided to reveal his own research.  “When Thompson disappeared, I began to wonder if someone knew that Shadow Ops had been restarted and so saw through the ruse, so I contacted the Special Forces Archivist back home.” 
Seeing Jahkar’s look, he reassured the Colonel. “I used the Trade Language--it’s a sign language so listening devices can’t pick it up, and the Universal Translator doesn’t know where to begin because it’s not spoken.  I told him that I sought the scent of what was hunting me, and he said something from a strong pack nearby had sniffed through my tent--and the tents of Rygaran D’Hronarin and the late Oldragus Ragoar.” 
He turned to Reepchip.  “All three of us served in Shadow Operations in the past, and someone from the Federation had tried to access our files.  Between the nanotechnology and knowing Thompson was coming… someone knew about our plan, knew we were coming, and knows where to get very high-end technology.  The access might even have been legitimate at one time, like a former chieftain knowing more than a tribe member should.”
Colonel Jahkar
Federation Embassy
Stardate 1906.19
Jahkar listened to the Carnora and looked over the data they had acquired on the nanotechnology they’d captured in the embassy. Science was never Jahkar’s forte. It was one of the main reasons he never joined Starfleet and stuck with the grunt work in the Marine Corps.
“This nanotechnology is amazing,” he said, setting down the data padd with the information on it. “We need Lt. Commander Carmichael or Commander Vree or Raillius to look this over. I’m not sure what all this mean. Too bad Jack Dark is no longer with us, he was the expert on nanotechnology.”
Jahkar frowned. Memories of Dara, Jack and other fallen Shadow Operatives washed over him. He sighed and looked to the Carnora, “We need to take this to Resurrection, let the experts have a look at it.”
Captain Quentin Lazarus
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1906.19
Lazarus saw the sensor readings of the mag-lev train as it was tractor beamed into the upper atmosphere of Andoria Prime. He could see the familiar data scrolling across the viewscreen which revealed the nature of the train’s cargo. Metagenic weapons were a Cardassian favorite during his time in the Badlands when he fought against them many years ago. 
“That’s a metagenic weapon,” Lazarus declared as the sensors highlighted the weapon in a three dimensional display of one of the train cars. “If they detonate that before it’s out of the atmosphere…”
“It will kill millions,” said Commander Raillius.
Lazarus turned to the helmsman, “Full impulse, take us in as close as we can get then extend shields around the train cars.”
The Resurrection slipped down into the atmosphere, causing some turbulence which rocked the escort ship. When they were close enough the tactical officer extended the shields and encapsulated the train. Resurrection then sped upward, out of the atmosphere of the planet, just as Seraphim detonated the bomb.
The blast destroyed the train and slammed Resurrection with a shockwave from the explosion. The shields contained the blast and captured the metagenic compounds that would otherwise be swirling around in the atmosphere of the planet. 
“Minor damage,” tactical reported. “Shields holding.”
“Get a sample of the compounds in that weapon, then once we’re safely away from the atmosphere, lower shields and let it go.”
The captain looked to Raillius, “They wanted to engineer a biogenic weapon disaster. Their target was a Starfleet facility out in the frozen tundra. Determine what portion of the planet would have been affected by the detonation of that weapon at ground level at the coordinates of the base.”
Andoria Prime
Icefield near the Starfleet Base
Stardate 1906.19
Seraphim, Daryl and the remaining Legion team hiked across the icefield as Seraphim tracked their progress with a tricorder. The wind whipped across the gloomy horizon and snow pelted their cold weather suits and the goggles over their eyes. As they came over a nearby ridge, they saw a ship decloaking, parked in the snow ahead of them.
“It’s Romulan,” Seraphim confirmed. “Scimitar cloaking technology. I know, the Scimitar was built 15 years ago and it was destroyed with Praetor Shinzon, but the prototype cloak was one of the best every built by our Romulan friends. It is virtually undetectable.”
The Andorian turned to Daryl as they neared the Romulan scout ship, “I’m sorry Lt. Thompson, but Archangel has other plans for you. You’ll not remain with us. There is a new threat to our organization. Your colleagues in Shadow Operations.
“Your orders are to return to your people and keep an eye on them. Report back to us anything we need to know,” said Seraphim. “There’s a communicator in the left pocket of your coat. It has the frequency to contact us.”
The other Legion members gathered around, and Daryl watched as the ones who appeared as Andorians deactivated the disguise devices they wore and all of them assumed their true appearances -- leaving only one Andorian, Seraphim himself.
“Do you have questions before we part ways?” he asked.
Lt. Daryl Thompson
Legion Group, Andorian surface
Stardate 1906.21
Daryl looked at Seraphim. “Why this sudden change of plans ?”
Seraphim glared back. “In the Legion, orders are executed, not questioned.”
Seraphim looked past Daryl, pondering, then eyed him again, with that little mischievous grin. “Archangel wants to see if you are really loyal to us. So, you can show us. Since betrayal seems to be in your DNA, it shouldn’t be too hard for you for being a spy, is it”
Seraphim referred to Daryl’s clone gone rogue, a long time ago, literally in another life... Daryl clenched his teeth. They seemed to know everything about Daryl. That was disturbing. 
Seraphim continued, with a devilish grin on his face. He seemed to enjoy all this.
“If you are not, we will make sure your friends from Shadow Operations get a nice little show before you die in front of their eyes.”
Another alarm on his tricorder blared, and Seraphim glanced over it. “Time to go.” He nodded to two of the goons nearby, a Naausican and a Klingon. “Sorry, Lt. Thompson, we need you to look convincing when you get back to your friends.”
Without further notice, the Naausican grabbed Thompson by the collar of his winter jacket, and brought his other fist in position to kick Daryl in the face. Daryl reacted lightning fast, and grabbed the hand of the Naausican , twisting it around and landing the elbow of his other arm hard on the, know locked elbow of the Naausican. A crack was audible as the joint was broken by the force of Daryl’s action.
The Naausican grunted, and tried to get up but Daryl kicked the Naausican in the face, disorienting him. Daryl kicked again, and the Naausican slumped unconscious into the snow. Daryl tried to ready himself for more, but was too late, as the Klingon hit Daryl on the side of his head.
A rain of stars exploded in his view as he slumped to his knees, disoriented by the punch. He felt how he was put on his feet again, and then punched over and over again, on his face, in his ribs. The blows on the ribs pushed the air out of his lungs. He tried to pull himself together, but the flurry of blows only disoriented him more. He felt the taste of blood in his mouth as more punches hit him, and he fell into the snow, almost losing consciousness.
“Enough” he heard Seraphim yell. The beating stopped. Daryl opened his eyes and in the reddish, flurried sight, he was aware that Seraphim stood there. “Here is a backpack with some supplies. Make sure you get back. Contact us if you have any useful information. Do not disappoint me…”
Then he turned around and left. Within seconds, the only sound was the ice-cold wind. Daryl turned on his back, hoping to get some more air, as probably a rib had punctured his lung. His torso and his head hurt, and breathing was heavy. He was dizzy, probably from all the beating and low oxygen level in his blood.
He pulled himself up into a sitting position, he had to find some shelter against the cold. But the only thing he saw was fields of ice, as far as the eye could see. Not even some rock or ice formations to find at least a little protection against the wind. He grabbed the backpack and opened it. Some food ratios, a tricorder, even a handphaser was in it.
He grabbed the tricorder and activated it. He gave in some commands and reconfigured it as a comm-relay for his subvoc. As the link was established, he gave in the SO frequency and opened a channel.
“This is Phoenix 5 to Havoc. Please come in.”
A short silence followed. “This is Havoc. Standby for beaming up, Phoenix 5” came the voice of Lazarus. Daryl let out a sigh of relief. After a few moments, he felt the tingling sensation of being beamed up, and the next moment he materialized on a bed in the small sickbay of the Resurrection. 
The EMH was already activated. “Welcome back, Lt. Thompson” the doctor greeted him, while scanning him. Two nurses, also part of the EMH, helped Daryl getting out of the artic gear, and administered him a hypospray against the pain.
“Nothing severe,” the Doctor said. “Some bruises, a few bruised ribs and a light concussion. We’ll have you fixed within the hour”
The Doctor activated the medical bed, and from both sides of the bed a curved panel came up. The panels slid up, until they touched each other, forming an arch. The panels lighted up and one of the nurses activated the panel. Several small tractor-beam like beams emitted from different points on the inside of the arch. Daryl relaxed as he felt a warm sensation in his ribcage, knowing that his ribs were being fixed. He got another hypospray, and Daryl dozed off. 
As he woke up again, the EMH had disappeared, and he was lying on a bed. Darva stood beside him, and he smiled as he saw her. “It’s good to have you back, Lieutenant Thompson” she said.
She kept it professional, but her eyes were tingling. “Glad to be back, Lt. Commander” Daryl replied. He felt much better already.
Then door swooshed open, and Captain Lazarus entered, followed in his tracks by Commander Raillius. “Lt. Thompson, good to have you back on board. Are you ready for debriefing?” Lazarus asked. Friendlier as usual.
Daryl nodded. “Yes captain,“ he replied, while he carefully got off the bed. Then Daryl thought of something. “Commander McGuire, could you please raise a dampening field around this room ?”
Darva looked at Daryl, then at Lazarus. Lazarus just nodded. “Computer, raise dampening field around this room, authorization Lt. Commander Darva McGuire.”. 
“Voice recognition confirmed. Dampening field raised” affirmed the computer’s voice within seconds. “Why the dampening field?” Lazarus asked. Daryl tapped his head with his finger. “They’ve implanted me with one of the explosives. Would be nice if I can get rid of it before they decide I am no longer useful and blow my brains out of my ears.” 
“While you were transported aboard, the transporter already filtered the damn thing out. Beckett is already looking at it. It appears it emits some kind of heartbeat signal, but also receives one. If one of the signals is interrupted for a longer time, the device detonates itself automatically.”
Once more, Daryl was relieved that the explosives had been removed already.
“Now, tell us what happened” Lazarus continued. Daryl told the whole story, of how he had been ‘convinced’ to join the Legion, about Archangel, and about the mission, where they captured the train and how they ended up at the icefields on the surface. “They just let you go?” Darva asked.
Daryl nodded “They want to test my loyalty. I had to return to betray Shadow Operations and play the snitch by giving them useful information.“
Lazarus turned to Raillius. “What do you think of this , Commander ?”
Soli Zh'iviannil (Commander Mayla Vree)
Falchion, Andoria Prime
Stardate 1906.21
"Do it as stealthily as you can. We don't know who's watching or listening," Mayla said through the slit of her mouth. "I'll let Ch'ashaohraq know you'll be ready to pull the plug as soon as he gets the door open."
There was a loud clang near the door as a panel next to the door fell to the floor from a pair of clumsy Andorian hands.
"If they don't know we're up to something, they do now," Sh'aveith growled as she walked away. Mayla couldn't help but agree. She sauntered over to Ch'ashaohraq who was still standing at the door. He jabbed at a comm panel.
"Seraphim, what's the meaning of this? Why have you locked us in here?"
There was no answer as he took a deep breath and put a hand on the door. He gave a sideways glance to his comrade who was working on the door's locking mechanism.
"Sir, my friend will be able to disable the conduit supplying power to the transporter circuits momentarily." Mayla whispered to him. "On your word."
He gave her a short nod and looked at his comrade, who also gave him a nod. "Do it now."
Mayla glanced over to Sh'avelith who just looked over from across the bay to her. Receiving the word, she pulled something from the panel and the lights dimmed and came back on full. At that moment, the Andorian at the door mechanism pulled a chip and the door opened halfway. Ch'ashaohraq was the first one through with his weapon drawn. His comrade followed, along with several others as the ARF began to file through the door.
Mayla gestured to Sh'avelith to form up on her. They had their own agenda. They needed to be sure the ARF succeeded before they are able to find out who these other Andorians were.
"You secure engineering. I'm going to the Bridge." Mayla ordered without hesitation.
Ensign Tiri Sh'avelith
Bird of Prey
Stardate 1906.21
Tiri nodded and split off from Mayla. She headed aft, toward the Bird of Prey’s engineering compartment. The inside of this Klingon ship was not very Klingonish. It had been completely stripped of anything Klingon and had been renovated, corridors were brightly lit and clean, unlike the spartan interior of a typical Bird of Prey.
The layout was still the same, so Tiri followed the corridors from memory, having been trained in special operations training on the schematics of starships from other planets. Along the way, she rounded a corner and nearly ran into two humans dressed in unmarked black uniforms.
Tiri did not hesitate. She lunged at the closest of the two men, grabbed his rifle and thrust it upward into his face, smashing his nose and sending him reeling backwards.
She ducked an attempt by the other man to swing his rifle at her head. Tiri then swung a punch into the man’s gut, knocking the wind from his lungs, then she followed through with an uppercut that sent the man crashing back into the bulkhead.
The first man, the one with the smashed nose, came at Tiri and swung a fist at her head. Again, she ducked then rammed a shoulder hard into his solar plexus. Though she was smaller, she threw herself with enough force to knock the man to the ground and she landed on top of him.
The Andorian woman drew her ushaan-tor and gripped it in her right hand. The man tried to pushed her off him, but Tiri stabbed him repeatedly in the stomach, over and over, until his body slumped to the deck beneath her.
Before she could react to the man’s death, the other fighter grabbed her around the neck in an attempted chokehold. He pulled her roughly against his chest and applied a nearly neck-breaking hold on her, but Tiri worked quickly, the bloody ushaan-tor still gripped in her hand. She swung her arm upward and back, jamming the Andorian ice pick straight into the attacker’s eye. 
There was a brief squeal of pain from the terrorist and the choke hold was released. He slumped backwards and slid down the bulkhead until he came to rest on the deck. Tiri held the ushaan-tor in her hand and she scooped up a rifle with the other hand and she continued on toward engineering.
The Andorian woman arrived in engineering and oddly, she found it empty. Her suspicions were immediately heightened seeing this and she grimaced. As she moved to secure the console, her fears were confirmed. The engineering controls were locked out and an encryption code had been placed on it.
She keyed her sub-voc. “Phoenix 6 to Phoenix 1,” she said. “There’s no one in engineering. I took out two of them on the way here, that’s all I’ve seen. They have the engineering controls locked out and placed under some sort of encryption. I can’t access them. This ship should be crawling with their people. I don’t like this.”
Orbiting Andoria Prime
Bird of Prey
Stardate 1906.27
The Bird of Prey sat cloaked in orbit as Sera and her team assembled on the bridge of the refitted ship. They had left the ARF members locked in the cargo bay and were gathering to be beamed off the ship by the captured Romulan ship, which would arrive at any moment.
“Sera,” one of the Legion members reported from the ship’s security station. “Sensors show the doors into the cargo bay are open. The ARF must be free.”
The female Seraphim frowned. “Dammit. Where is Squad 2? We need to get off this ship before they come up to the bridge.”
She looked two several of her more heavily armed comrades, “Secure the doors. Open a channel to the Romulan ship. Let them know we need immediate evac.”
Another Legionnaire took the tactical station and began sending the transmission. Sera, her phaser in hand, waited as patiently as she could for transport out.
[Back to top]
== S1, E3, Act 9: The Trouble With Nanites ==
Soli Zh'iviannil (Commander Mayla Vree)
Falchion, Andoria Prime
Stardate 1906.30
Mayla had already noticed the lack of personnel in the halls as her ARF 'comrades' marched towards the bridge. Several would break off to secure other areas of the ship as Ch'ashaohraq continued his singular focus on reaching the bridge. She also noticed the ones who assaulted the Starfleet relay station with her wasn't among they group. This confirmed her suspicions that this 'other' group had infiltrated the ARF for a reason other than helping them.
"The ship is strangely deserted," someone murmured quietly. Ch'ashaohraq remained silent as several scenarios began to form in his mind. His own rifle was unwavering as it probed down each hallway they passed.
Mayla was several people behind and still heard the comment. Then Sh'avelith's voice came over her subvocal.
“Phoenix 6 to Phoenix 1,” Sh'avelith said. “There’s no one in engineering. I took out two of them on the way here, that’s all I’ve seen. They have the engineering controls locked out and placed under some sort of encryption. I can’t access them. This ship should be crawling with their people. I don’t like this.”
The Phoenix Squad leader keyed her subvocal. "We haven't encountered any of the crew either. Sounds like they are evacuating the ship. Look for any traps they may have left behind to self destruct the ship. And if they are transporting off, that means the dampening field is down. We may need to beam everyone off if they set the ship to self destruct. See if you can access the deflector array and set up a rotating harmonic dampening field around just the bridge in case there's still anyone in it. I hope they won't destroy the ship while they are still on board. We are just about there now and I don't think the ARF are interested in taking any prisoners. But I will try to dissuade them."
"That type of field will also disrupt all communications."
"Yes."
“Affirmative, I'm on it."
Mayla edged forward closer to Ch'ashaohraq. "Sir, if Sera and her people have evacuated from the ship with the intention of leaving us locked up in it…."
His face turned stern at the fact that someone else was voicing exactly what he was thinking. "They had no intention of letting us live."
"We may need to extract," Mayla said slowly as they approached the door to the bridge. "If they beamed off, we should be able to contact someone on the surface to get us off the ship if we can't access the bridge."
"I'll contact someone to get us out," he said and gestured to an ARF female who had a backpack on. "Contact the Alpha cell leader, inform them of our status, and request for transporter extraction."
"We should also try to at least take one prisoner so we can interrogate them. These people have a different agenda then we do." Mayla suggested. "It would be prudent for the ARF to find out what."
Ch'ashaohraq looked at her. "Who are you? You seem to have some military training."
Mayla scoffed and her eyes turned hard. "Soli Zh'iviannil. I was a cadet at Starfleet until they threw me out. Pride of my family until that point. They said I did not have the correct...temperament to be in Starfleet." She spat to one side. "My family fled Andoria in shame and are now living on some rock in space on the periphery. I haven't seen or heard from them in years."
"So you know Starfleet tactics?"
"I didn't get that far. I was only there for seven months." Mayla gestured forward making sure the side hallway was clear first. "I jumped onto a freighter and became a merc."
"How did you come to Andoria Prime?"
"I owe a marker to someone, and she said to come join the ARF and liberate Andoria from the Federation." She gave him a wry smile. "I'm a 'student' at the university."
"That was some marker," Ch'ashaohraq said, gesturing to the rest of his men to take up positions as they approached the door to the bridge.
"That's another long story. Right here and now, I want to take those who imprisoned us and shove them up their own phuuzh."
Someone behind them laughed at the crude language coming from an Andorian female.
Mayla didn't laugh or respond to them, but to set a determined look on her face while bringing up her rifle and stood at one side of the door. When they arrived, Ch'ashaohraq motioned with his hand to bring up the heavy ordinance. Within a second, four deflector explosive charges were attached to the door. He looked over to Mayla and held his hand up with three fingers.
"Zh'iviannil and I will storm the bridge, the rest of you stay here and fill the doorway with weapons fire. Ready." He counted down his fingers quickly. Whether those behind him were ready or not, he didn't want to give those inside any chance to react to them.
Mayla took cover as the four charges beeped, activated a forcefield on their side, and directed the explosive force into the door as if a photon torpedo fired at it. Ch'ashaohraq and Mayla leaped up and jumped through the hatch through the smoke. Mayla ducked and rolled to one side all the while taking in the status of the now smoke filled bridge.
Weapons fire exploded into the bridge through the hatch opening behind them. This gave Mayla a second for her to scan the bridge through the haze with her rifle before any of those inside could react. She quickly identified seven figures, Sera amongst them, who already had their weapons up and started firing towards the hatch. Staying out of the ARF's incoming line of fire, Mayla began firing her own rifle at the Andorians closest to her. She was able to stun two of them before the rest of them were enveloped in a transporter swirl. Mayla continued cycling her weapon at them despite them starting to disappear.
Then the swirl suddenly disappeared, leaving them still standing there to receive the bombardment of stunning phaser fire. 
Sh'avelith had successfully set up the dampening field just in time.
Ensign Tiri Sh'avelith
Bird of Prey
Stardate 1907.02
Tiri knew a little about engineering, though she was not very good at it. She’d specialized in being a medic because she was better at helping people than fixing or building things. Still, she was familiar with deflector controls so she surveyed the engineering compartment until she found a console that appeared to serve that purpose.
She looked over the console and determined they’d refitted this ship with Risan technology. She remembered some of the telltale components and the configuration of controls from a Cross-Technology class she’d take at the academy. The class taught cadets how to identify technology components aboard ships and other facilities by their place of manufacture. The entire inside of the ship she figured had been refitted in a Risan facility -- likely somewhere in the underworld on the vacation world.
Tiri surmised quickly that the deflector controls were not locked out. That was a stroke of luck indeed. Propulsion, weapons and even life support were all restricted access, but whoever had set up the encryption must not have considered deflectors to be vital. She went to work reconfiguring the array so she could erect the dampening field Mayla had requested.
It took a few minutes, but eventually Tiri got it done. When she was finished, the dampening field was in place. She gathered up her rifle and started out for the bridge when suddenly, further aft in the engineering compartment, there was an explosion. She glanced back over her shoulder to see what she was certain was the ship’s cloaking device explode in a spray of sparks and debris.
The lights flickered briefly and then resumed, but Tiri had little doubt the ship’s cloak was down. She keyed her subvocal as she headed toward the bridge. “Six to One,” she reported. “The cloaking device was just taken out by what I’m going to guess was an explosive charge of some kind. We’re visible. I’m on my way to you.”
Bird of Prey
Bridge
Stardate 1907.02
Sera and her Legion companions were shocked when the transport did not complete. They raised their weapons to counter the attacking ARF soldiers, but were gunned down in a hail of stun blasts. By the time Tiri arrived, Mayla and the ARF stood over the unconscious bodies of eight Legion members.
“Looks like the dampening field stopped them from transporting out,” said Tiri.
Ch'ashaohraq stepped away from the ops console, shaking his head. “The ship is visible, there are Starfleet ships hailing us, ordering us to surrender.”
Another ARF soldier approached the helm station and shook his head, “Everything is locked out. We’re dead in space.”
Ch'ashaohraq looked to Mayla and Tiri, “Our options are few. Surrender or fight any boarding parties. Frankly, the way we’ve been used by Sera and her colleagues, I’m not inclined to send anyone else to their deaths. They played us like the fools we are. They used us.”
He looked around at his people, “Can anyone operate this ship’s communications? I am prepared to surrender.”
A couple of his fellow ARF members protested, but the majority seemed resolved that their fight was over.
Lieutenant Ryramorl Ra’yral
UFP Embassy, Andoria
Stardate 1907.02
When Jahkar said this needed to go to the Resurrection, Ryramorl keyed his subvoc.  “Seven to Two.  We have some information and devices to take to the Resurrection for further analysis.”
Colonel Jahkar
Federation Embassy, Andoria Prime
Stardate 1907.06
Rallius responded and asked for the team’s findings. Ryramorl uploaded all the data they had, while Jahkar had the devices they’d seized transported up to Resurrection. That just left the prisoners. They had a few and unless there was some sort of way to trigger the explosive devices in the heads of their captives, as long as they were kept in shielded cells they’d be kept alive.
Once the data transfer and transport was complete, Jahkar opened a channel to Resurrection. “Phoenix Three to Two, We have about a half dozen prisoners contained in shielded cells to prevent remote detonation of their head bomb. Permission to beam back to Resurrection with our prisoners?”
Ensign Reepchip Charatetet
Federation Embassy, Andoria Prime
Stardate 1907.07
Reepchip chittered softly, and wondered if he could ask Captain Carmichael permission to “borrow” his friends from the old Madcap Engineers.  They’d be in engineering, so he’d understand if the answer was no--but it would be good to have the crew--at least those of it he could get--back together to once again study technology like this again.  And this time in earnest.
Commander T’Aayla Raillius
USS Resurrection
Stardat 1907.13
“Phoenix Three, this is Two.  We’ll beam back the prisoners one at a time directly into our brig.   Make sure they have nothing on them- do a full scan and physically search if necessary.   We’ll commence beaming once you confirm the prisoners are 100% safe for transport.”
Colonel Jahkar
Federation Embassy, Andoria Prime
Stardate 1907.15
Jahkar rolled his eyes. Of course, she was going to say that. Nothing got past this one, that was for sure. The colonel wasn’t sure if it was the Romulan in her, or the blood of James T. Kirk. But she was right, they needed to be thorough.
“Ryramorl and Reepchip,” Jahkar said curtly. “You’re with me. Let’s go check the prisoners and begin transport.”
They then started off for the detention area.
Detention Center
Federation Embassy
Stardate 1907.15
When the three Shadow operatives arrived in the detention level, located one floor up from the transport bay, everything was in absolute chaos. Guards were outside several of the cells, calling for medical support into their comm-badges. The three could see one of the prisoners sprawled on the floor of his cell, blood running from his ears, his body lifeless.
In the other holding cells, the remaining seven prisoners were all conscious once again and they were screaming for someone to help them. Jahkar and the Carnora caught bits and pieces of what they were saying.
“You fools…”
“...going to detonate!” 
“You can’t stop it!”
“We’re all dead already!”
One by one they began to drop over dead, each suffering an internal blast in their skulls -- just enough of an explosion to cause death. The only sign of the killing was a trickle of blood from each ear -- nothing more.
Medics arrived with only three prisoners remaining. They ran into the cells where the Legion prisoners were held and began to scan them, looking for the explosives in their brain. As they worked, another dropped dead. 
Jahkar looked on in disbelief. The entire cellblock was shielded. There was no way a transmission was getting through to detonate the devices. 
“They have a nanite in their brain stem. It is self-destructing!” One medic cried as he watched helplessly on his tricorder readout. The prisoner he was scanning, a Romulan, suddenly convulsed, his body jerking, then he slumped to the floor.
Looking around, one prisoner remained. He was a human and he sat quietly on the bench in his cell as a medic scanned him. The man looked at the Shadow operatives outside the cell and slowly he smiled, “The nanites are self-aware. They know when we’re compromised. There’s nothing you can do to….”
The man lurched, his eyes rolled back in his head and slowly he slid off the bench and into the arms of the medic who stood over him. The telltale trickle of blood came from his ears as the medic turned to the Shadow Ops agents and shook his head.
Ensign Reepchip Charatetet
Lieutenant Ryramorl Ra’yral
Federation Embassy
Stardate 1907.15
The nanite darts had failed.
The darts that Cody and Reepchip made--Reepchip, a Madcap Engineer, HIM!--had failed.
While the Universal Translator couldn’t follow Reepchip’s chatter, the widening of Ryramorl’s eyes and the complete flattening of his ears was enough to show that Reepchip’s language was spectacularly hideous at the moment.  When the three were out of earshot of anyone else, Ryramorl grabbed Reepchip’s shoulder and shook it to shut the furious Muran up and made a few sharp gestures.  Reepchip responded with a deep bow; evidently Ryramorl had pulled his Carnora rank.  For Jahkar’s sake, Ryramorl switched back to Federation Standard.  “Think of what he said:  ‘The nanites are self-aware.’  And most of what these pseudo-ARF goons have been using are based on nanites--The computers were eaten by nanites.  The disguises were made by nanites.  Nanites could easily reprogram a teleporter.  If they snuck Nanites on our ship, those things could track it and alert the true insurgents when we’re coming.  And we’d never know unless we looked for them.  And Starfleet has run into this before---the nanites of Kavis Alpha IV.”  He took a deep breath.  “We could be facing an enemy of nanites.”  Ryramorl keyed his subvoc.  “Phoenix Seven to Two.  We’ve lost all prisoners.  The last one told us that the nanites that killed them were self-aware, and so knew when they were compromised.  The shielding was to no avail.”
Reepchip was still furious with himself.  “I have failed, Colonel,” he said to Jahkar.  “And I am no Spirit-Speaker, or I would call their ghosts back and interrogate them.”
Ryramorl rumbled.  “First, you wouldn’t even know which afterlife to call them from, Charatetet.  And second, if you were a Spirit-Speaker, do you really think the Muran Overking would ever let Starfleet have such a powerful Shaman?”
Legion Vessel
Departing Andoria Prime under cloak
Stardate 1907.18
“The dampening field blocked our attempts to transport the last team out,” a Legion soldier reported to Seraphim on the bridge of the ship they’d escaped Andoria Prime aboard. “Sera and her people are stuck on the Bird of Prey. Should we go back for them?”
Seraphim looked annoyed, “And risk capture? No. They knew the risks. The mission is a failure and she and her team will pay the ultimate price, I’m afraid.”
The Legion soldier, a human named Renner, gave a nod, “The nanites, can they be disarmed?”
“Perhaps,” he said. “When the nanites realize their hosts are compromised, they are programmed to terminate. We’ll see what transpires.”
“Orders, Seraphim?” Renner asked.
“Lay in a course for headquarters,” he said. “Get us away from here as fast as possible. Maintain cloaking device the entire route. We don’t want to be detected.”
Renner nodded and the ship continued on its way…
[Back to top]
== S1, E3, Act 10: Sole Survivor ==
Soli Zh'iviannil (Commander Mayla Vree)
Bird of Prey Falchion, above Andoria Prime
Stardate 1907.19
Ch'ashaohraq held up his hand to silence the protests. "Our base of ops on the planet has not responded to our hails for extraction," he pointed to the andorian who carried their high powered communications package in his backpack. "Without access to the ship's controls, we have no method of getting off this ship. Fighting Starfleet now will only stop us from fighting them another day."
Mayla was among one of the protesters. But at the same time, she saw a perfect opportunity to try to apprehend Sera and her unconscious crew. Her mind had already worked out a plan to separate them from the ARF when suddenly the Andorian with the comm gear spoke up excitedly.
"Theta Cell responded!" He cocked his head as he listened and relayed the message. "They can beam us out two at a time!" He looked to Ch'ashaohraq, who gave them a smile.
"We continue to fight another day!" Ch'ashaohraq held up his weapon with conviction. Everyone cheered.
"Sir, I suggest leaving the bridge and going back down to the cargo bay. The dampening field around the bridge will prevent beam out." Mayla suggested. "A few of us will remain here to buy you time. When Starfleet boards the ship, they will attempt to take the bridge and engineering first."
Ch'ashaohraq nearly shook his head until he saw the determined look on Mayla's face. "Good luck, then. We'll see you on base." He headed off the bridge in a run followed by nearly all of the crew.
"I will stay with you," Sh'avelith said. "It would be an honor."
"Agreed." Mayla motioned to the three others who also were going to stay. "You three should go. The more of us who escape the better. Go and we will meet you on base."
To her surprise, the three gave her a short salute and left.
"Now what?" Sh'avelith whispered over the subvocal.
"Now we contact Havoc and transport everyone on the bridge. Do you have the dampening field's modulation frequency?"
"I do."
Mayla gave her a smile. "Start firing your weapon down the hallway, and be sure you only hit the walls. We need to simulate a hostile boarding party."
Sh'avelith nodded and gave her the modulation frequency.
Mayla brought up her subvoc controller and entered the dampening field's modulation so her signal could get through. "Havoc, Phoenix 1. Requesting immediate beam out for nine people at my location." She also gave them the modulation frequency.
A voice came back almost immediately. "Phoenix 1, Havoc, you are in orbit?"
"Affirmative. We have seven unconscious Andorian prisoners here pretending to be part of the ARF." Mayla walked over and collected the weapons from Sera's crew. Sh'avelith began firing her weapon down the hall to simulate a boarding action. "Better hurry before Starfleet gets here."
"You and Six are on that Bird of Prey that just decloaked?"
"Affirmative. We are on the bridge."
"Ships are converging on your location. They are preparing to beam on boarding parties. Stand by. I'm recalibrating for your modulation frequency."
While waiting for the Resurrection to beam all of them out, Mayla proceeded to search Sera and her crew for any hidden devices or weapons. But most of all, identification. They needed to find out who these people really were.
Ensign Tiri Sh'avelith
Bird of Prey
Stardate 1907.23
Tiri fired her phaser wildly down the corridor as Mayla had instructed. The blasts left score marks and sparking panels along the hallway, but did no further damage than that. She hoped they could get away with the prisoners, but she had doubts. These terrorists were good -- very good at covering their tracks. 
The Andorian continued to let off random fire, making it sound like a boarding party was aboard. She then waited to see if the ARF would buy the ruse.
Captain Quentin Lazarus
Aboard USS Resurrection, Orbiting Andoria Prime
Captain’s Log: Stardate 1909.02
“Colonel Jahkar and his team have been beamed back aboard the Resurrection, their prisoners all dead due to some kind of nanite bomb capable of artificial intelligence. I’ve asked Carmichael and Beckett to begin a review of the plethora of nanotechnology recovered during this mission to see if we can get to the bottom of what happened here,” said Captain Lazarus. “Meanwhile, we have closed with the terrorist ship in orbit and are preparing to transport Commander Vree, Ensign Sh'avelith and their prisoners aboard before they befall the same fate as the others. Hopefully, we’ll be able to get some answers once we have a living, breathing prisoner to interrogate.”
Lazarus ended his log recording and looked up, “Signal Vree that we’re in position.”
Soli Zh'iviannil (Commander Mayla Vree)
Bird of Prey Falchion, Andoria Prime
Stardate 1909.03
"Havoc to Phoenix 1, prepare for transport," the Resurrection comm officer announced over the subvoc.
Mayla acknowledged the signal. "Has Beckett come up with something to disable the nanites in the body?"
"Stand...by." She heard in an unsure voice. "Yes, we use the transporter to filter out the foreign nanites during transport."
"Then get us out of here," Mayla almost growled and walked over to knelt besides Sera. She was the high value target as the leader of this group that was clearly separate from the ARF. "Transport Phoenix 6, me, and the andorian I'm kneeling next to first."
Transporter materialization swirls appeared in the hallway just outside the bridge. Because of the dampening field around the bridge, the boarding party had to beam into whatever areas they could.
Sh'avelith began firing down the hall, making sure she didn't hit anyone. "Time to go," she said over the subvoc.
"Havoc, this is One, we are being boarded." Mayla's voice said calmly.
"Stand by for transport." 
The transporter beam took them just in time. The front of the bridge suddenly exploded outward just as the computer detected Sera was being transported off the ship. As a failsafe, the Falchion's computer had received a signal from the Legion ship as they left the area. Sera and her fellow Legionnaires will be sacrificed for their failure as soon as any of them were taken off the ship. The explosive charges set throughout the ship made sure there would be nothing left to find. The bird of prey exploded into a fireball, leaving no trace or evidence behind.
When they materialized on the pad, the ship lurched to one side as the shockwave struck the ship. The Resurrection quickly moved away from the area, avoiding any ships that were surrounding the bird of prey.
Mayla ran over to a utility cabinet and pulled out a medical kit and had a tricorder scanning Sera before anyone else could move. She scanned for any indications of the nanites to be sure of their absence before scanning her life signs. 
"Bridge to Transporter room, do you have them? The bird of prey just exploded."
"Aye, sir," Mayla responded. "Sh'avelith and I have a prisoner." With that, she took out a hypospray, entered a dosage setting and sedated Sera to keep her unconscious.
Ensign Tiri Sh'avelith 
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1909.04
Sh'avelith exhaled sharply once they were back aboard Resurrection. That had been too close for comfort. But she and Mayla had made it back, and they had managed to save the woman called Sera -- short for Seraphim. The young Andorian pondered the meaning of the name for its religious connotations in Christianity on Earth.
Soon, she hoped, they’d begin to unravel more about this group calling itself Legion. For now, they handed the unconscious woman off to security, who took her to the brig.
“Do you think Ch'ashaohraq and his people made it to the surface?” she asked Mayla after they had handed Sera off to the guards.
Lt. Commander Tommy Carmichael
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1909.04
Carmichael and Lt. Cody Beckett arrived in the engineering lab after Jahkar’s team sent up the samples of nanotechnology they’d recovered during the raid on the building across from the Federation Embassy on Andoria. They began to scan the nanites and immediately started making some interesting finds.
First, the pair confirmed that like the other nanites recovered earlier in the mission, these nanites were of Risan design. Besides being a pleasure planet known for its tropical vacation resorts, Risa was also a center for medical and technological research. Nanotechnology was one area it was well-known for, though no company on Risa had ever produced nanites like these.
Carmichael and Beckett concluded the nanites were once top-of-the-line inventory from the Risan company known as Virex. But at some point, they had been modified. They were capable of rapid reproduction and they were determined to be self-aware – gifted somehow with artificial intelligence that allowed them to think, to adapt and to make decisions on their own.
The two officers had placed the nanites in a stasis field to keep them inert after they found they were trying to destroy themselves. Once their efforts to self-destruct had been stopped, they then tried to multiply and migrate into the ship’s systems – but were again stopped by the quick thinking of Carmichael and Beckett.
They had astonishing abilities. Used in the personal cloak devices the Legion members had used, the nanites could alter anyone’s appearance, creating an almost fool-proof disguise allowing the wearer to look like anyone. The nanites also could alter voices to make them sound different – or like the subject the wearer was attempting to impersonate.
As for the nanites used to interface with the computers, they had powerful abilities that allowed them to override code and rewrite commands. They could not only seize control of a computer, they could also reduce it to slag in a matter of seconds with the nanites literally consuming the device.
Then there were the nanites used to kill those members of Legion who were unfortunate enough to be captured. Those devices were self-aware, being able to determine when a subject was taken prisoner and killing them before they could be interrogated. That was accomplished by self-destructing inside the carotid artery or at the stem of the brain, killing the subject instantly with little mess. 
When they’d finished examining the nanites and had created their report, Carmichael looked up from his work and stared at Beckett for a moment. “This is unlike anything I’ve ever seen. This nanotechnology rivals Borg tech. Whoever programmed these nanites…they must be the best in their field.”
Lt. Cody Beckett
USS Ressurection
Stardate 1909.06
Cody nodded towards Carmichael. “It’s a marvelous piece of work indeed. I’m especially intrigued with their AI. I would like to conduct some more investigations on that…” Then Cody thought of something else “...Also, we should modify both our internal and external sensor arrays to be able to pick up the nanite’s signatures. I assume this mission is far from over yet. We need to get these, and possible more countermeasures in place to prevent damage to the ship or people get killed. “ 
Commander T’Aayla Raillius
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1909.08
Risa?  She’d been on Risa when she was recruited by Admiral MacLeod.  Ironic, or perhaps not.   It looked as if she’d be going back.  It was only a matter of moments before the Captain ordered them to set course for Risa.  As far as she was aware interactive nanites had been developed on the USS Enterprise-D by Ensign Wesley Crusher in a science experiment.  The field had blossomed after that, although the nature of evolving mechanical beings had caused numerous problems in their history.   The fact that these nanites were so well behaved and advanced should certainly give them some leads.
Ensign Reepchip Charatetet
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1909.08
It had been a pleasant reunion for Reepchip Charatetet, once again meeting with his old friends from the Madcap Engineers, “Actually, you’re the only real surprise, Ratman,” said Daven Corhees.  “The rest of us think that Admiral Sorvek got us all assigned here.”
“Considering the experimental technology aboard, and that we had been a team in the academy” said Jr. Lieutenant Spargan, with typical Vulcan calmness, “it would be logical.”  When Lt. Commander Carmichael had learned about the Madcaps--and that all seven were on the ship, he had given them orders to find out everything they could about the hacking attempt and requested that Reepchip of Phoenix Team join them.
Reepchip looked around, and gave a soft squeak.  “So.  This is what we trained for.  Let’s see if we can track down who did this.”  And the seven friends went to work.
Colonel Jahkar
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1909.09
Jahkar left the Carnora and went to his quarters to change out of his commando gear. He was fuming. They’d lost all of their prisoners. They were all killed by some kind of nanites in their bodies put there, with their knowledge, specifically for the purpose of killing them if they were captured.
“Dishonorable,” he muttered after tossing his gear down on the floor of his quarters. Brooding, he stripped off his clothing and stepped into the sonic shower. Clean, he got out and dressed in a fresh Marine uniform before heading back out to see what was going on with the investigation.
[Back to top]
== S1, E3, Act 11: Investigating Clues ==
Commander Mayla Vree and Ensign Tiri Sh'avelith
USS Resurrection, Andoria Prime
Stardate 1909.09
Mayla slung her weapon as she watched Security take Sera away to the brig. Sh'avelith waited for her at the door as she approached.
“Do you think Ch'ashaohraq and his people made it to the surface?” the young andorian  asked her as they headed down the companionway to the bridge to report to Captain Lazarus.
"I'm sure some of them made it," Mayla said with confidence. She respected the passion this particular ARF team had for their cause and hoped they find a less violent way of protesting. She wondered how Sh'avelith felt about the turmoil some of her people are experiencing. "How do you feel about what you saw down there?"
Tiri shrugged, “I grew up knowing other Andorians who shared the same views as the ARF, though not as radical. There are those among my people who are opposed to membership in the Federation and those who believe Andoria should return to its old ways. What I saw down there these past days was regretful. Those people were mislead by the Legion. I don’t agree with what they wanted or what they did, but I feel bad they were used.”
"If Ch'ashaohraq or any of his group made it off the ship, I'm sure he would report what happened with Sera." Mayla's voice turned a notch towards cold. "Word probably would spread up the ARF chain of command quickly. I wonder if we could use that to our advantage some day."
As they entered the dimly lit bridge, she could see on the main viewer that the Resurrection had backed away from the cluster of Starfleet ships surrounding the debris field that was once the bird of prey. With a practiced glace at the Helm, she could see they had moved to a higher orbit around Andoria Prime. She walked over to Lazarus at the center chair.
"Where's the rest of the team?" Mayla asked as she came up behind him. "Did you find Thompson?"
Lazarus swiveled around in his chair and gave her an update. Both Mayla and Sh'avelith listened carefullly before reporting to him the events that had transpired while on the ground. He gave out a grunt as they finished their report.
Tiri frowned, her antennae shifting forward toward Lazarus as she spoke, “This Legion organization, they weren’t helping the ARF. They were using them. They set them up to be scapegoats in the communications array bombing, they also set them up to take the fall for the metagenic weapon. The weapon would have detonated in a relatively remote location, but would have made the blast appear as if it occurred at a Starfleet facility -- clearly intending to make it look like Starfleet was conducting illegal weapons experimentation."
“I concur with her. This Legion...they are conducting some kind of psyops, working to turn mass populations against their governments.” Mayla speculated further.
The young Andorian shook her head, “They appear to use tactics employed by organizations such as the Tal Shiar, the Obsidian Order and even Section 31.”
Lazarus gave them both a nod at their observations that followed the same lines Thompson had explained to him. "Get some rest. We'll update the rest of the team soon."
Mayla nodded and left the bridge. But she was surprised when Lazarus' voice came over the subvocal on her private channel. "This Legion group was highly organized, well funded, and connected. They knew we were here, and they knew Thompson was going to be here. They knew enough of our plans to snatch him during transport." She gave Sh'avelith a wave to continue on without her while she headed for her own quarters.
"We already have a mole in Shadow Operations?" Mayla said carefully. "We were just reactivated."
"A spy, probably on this ship right now." He said with growing anger. This wouldn't be the first time he had a spy on one of his ships. "Maybe even in the team."
"We need to vet everyone on the ship. Starting with the team." Mayla said entering her quarters. She stowed her weapon into a wall locker with her other weapons and started to strip out of her clothes. "We can't take it for granted that even though the Admiral recruited everyone, it doesn't mean they all could be fully trusted. Do you remember Admiral Palanar?"
Lazarus' voice turned hard at the mention of the Shadow Ops admiral Sorvek had put in command of Shadow Operations. The andorian admiral had betrayed them and nearly destroyed the organization. "I've already started a computer subroutine to scour everyone's records, Starfleet and before, starting with Phoenix Team. No one is beyond suspicion." He said pointedly.
"I understand," Mayla responded as she got into the small closet space that was the sonic shower. "My file should fully be open to you unless Starfleet Intelligence deems otherwise."
"I'm not talking about you."
That gave Mayla pause for a moment. "You mean Admiral MacLeod." There was nearly ten seconds of silence as both of their perspectives on the scope of all that's happened since SO had been reinstated broadened to something happening beyond just SO. Both of them had over the course of their careers encountered corruption and traitorous motives within Starfleet Intelligence, Shadow Operations, and also Section 31.
"Meet up with your team and compare data. We need to find out who the Legion are. Leave the internal investigation to me." Lazarus ordered.
"Aye, sir."
Lt. Daryl Thompson
USS Resurrection, Sickbay
Stardate 1909.11
As Daryl woke up again, the EMH had disappeared, and he was lying on a bed. Darva stood beside him, and he smiled as he saw her. “It’s good to have you back, Lieutenant Thompson” she said.
She kept it professional, but her eyes were tingling. “Glad to be back, Lt. Commander” Daryl replied. He felt much better already.
Then the door swooshed open, and Captain Lazarus entered, followed in his tracks by Commander Raillius. “Lt. Thompson, good to have you back on board. Are you ready for debriefing?” Lazarus asked. Friendlier as usual.
Daryl nodded. “Yes captain,“ he replied, while he carefully got off the bed. Then Daryl thought of something. “Commander McGuire, could you please raise a dampening field around this room ?”
Darva looked at Daryl, then at Lazarus. Lazarus just nodded. “Computer, raise dampening field around this room, authorization Lt. Commander Darva McGuire.”. 
“Voice recognition confirmed. Dampening field raised” affirmed the computer’s voice within seconds. “Why the dampening field?” Lazarus asked. Daryl tapped his head with his finger. “They’ve implanted me with one of the explosives. Would be nice if I can get rid of it before they decide I am no longer useful and blow my brains out of my ears.” 
“While you were transported aboard, the transporter already filtered the damn thing out. Beckett is already looking at it. It appears it emits some kind of heartbeat signal, but also receives one. If one of the signals is interrupted for a longer time, the device detonates itself automatically.”
Once more, Daryl was relieved that the explosives had been removed already. Yet, he was curious. After the debriefing he would talk to Beckett, to see if he could be of any help with investigating these nanites.
“Now, tell us what happened” Lazarus continued. Daryl told the whole story, of how he had been ‘convinced’ to join the Legion, about Archangel, and about the mission, the distrust of Seraphim against Daryl, where they captured the train and how they ended up at the icefields on the surface. “They just let you go?” Darva asked.
Daryl nodded “They want to test my loyalty. I had to return to spy on Shadow Operations and play the snitch by giving them useful information. They gave me a communicator to stay in contact. It's in the backpack I had with me. Guess we should try to tap into it, so we might be able to trace it."
Lazarus turned to Raillius. “What do you think of this , Commander ?”
Commander T’Aayla Raillius
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1909.11
“Interesting.  I find it hard to imagine that they would think we wouldn’t find the communicator, or be able to detect the nanites.  Either they are extremely arrogant and careless, or they let you go for some other reason Lieutenant. She eyed him critically.  
Lt. Daryl Thompson
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1909.11
Daryl eyed back at the Romulan Commander. "What do you mean Commander? " He asked. He was unsure what Raillius was thinking. Well, he could "guess" what she was thinking…concerning his background, with the clone leading his double life, eventually ending with the betrayal of SO, you didn't have to be a bright mind to see that Raillius didn't trust Thompson. He knew she had been accessing his files more than once upfront of the mission. but he kept his mouth shut and waited for her answer…
Ensign Reepchip Charatetet
Madcap Engineers
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1909.11
Reepchip’s group of friends had managed to extract some more data from the lone hard drive that Reepchip managed to salvage, including make, model, and even serial number.  They sifted through the hacking data, looking for tell-tale techniques. Reepchip chittered as they searched for any clue they could that would trace the hackers. “Like solving the five spheres of Aroforshaeshaeshae,” grunted Reepchip, referring to an ancient Muran philosopher who had tried--and failed--to calculate the circumference of Carnor.  “What in the Starless Sky is the value of pi?”
“Perhaps it would be logical to record all that we find, and allow those back at Ops Base One to study what we have found,” responded Spargan.  He had grown used to Reepchip’s many aphorisms and strange turns of phrase while in the academy, so knew better than to take Reepchip’s mathematical question literally.
“We do know from the hard drive that they were using very high-end equipment,” responded Daven.  “AND we have a serial number from the hard drive. That’s something that can be tracked down.”
The group transmitted the data back to Ops Base One and a member of the crew there ran it through a database. It turned out the computer’s internal parts were manufactured somewhere in the Federation and were stolen sixteen months earlier from a storage facility on Mars, near the Utopia Planitia Shipyards. Computers and other electronic equipment were taken during the theft. Stafleet security suspected a group of mercenaries to be the key suspects in the crime. They have not been located since.
The group looked over the list of equipment that Ops Base One sent back to them.  “Anything look familiar, Ratman?” asked Daven.
Reepchip’s eyes narrowed.  “A lot of it does. This exactly matches some of the equipment we found on Andoria.  The nanites were something new, though.”
“The fact that it was stolen makes it harder to track, unfortunately.” grumbled Daven
Lieutenant Ryramorl Ra’yral
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1909.11
Ryramorl was in his quarters of the Resurrection.  His prey had been snatched from his very jaws, and he was currently meditating to ease his anger.  The chant he was speaking would be heard in its native sounds by anyone who saw him; the words had no meaning.  They were simply syllables that Olvern found pleasant to hear, and thus had been used time immemorial for chants and songs meant to calm.
As he meditated, he reminded himself of the Thousand Cycles the King ruled over, all things working to His will in time.  Once Ryramorl had calmed himself, he rose to his feet and left, to see if there was any way he could help the others. 
Ensign Tiri Sh’avelith
USS Resurrection
Orbiting Andoria Prime
Stardate 1909.18
Tiri sat in front of the monitor on the desk in her quarters and looked at her mother, Vrire Sh'avelith, on the screen in front of her. 
“But we barely got to see you,” the older Andorian bemoaned. “Can’t your captain just give you a couple of hours to visit?”
Tiri smiled, “Mother, I don’t know yet. We’re in the middle of some things right now. We may be here longer, we may be leaving at any time. I really can’t say.”
Her mother nodded, “I suppose that’s how life in the military is. Can you say anything about all the violence in the streets? Is it over?”
“I don;t know, mother,” Tiri admitted. “I hope so. I can’t say much more.”
“Yes, everything is classified with you, isn't it?” Vrire said with a sigh. “Your brother seems to think things have settled down since the attack on the communications relay. He said the rallies have disappeared and there haven’t been as many gatherings.”
Tiri appeared relieved, “How is Isavos, anyway?”
“He is well,” she smiled. “This has been hard for him. Many students he goes to the university with were on one side or the other of this movement. I for one will be glad if it’s over so he can resume classes and get his education.”
The Andorian Shadow operative laughed, “I’m sure it will be nice to have one Andorian University graduate in the family!”
Her mother gave her a slight frown, “You know I’m proud of your Starfleet Academy graduation. I just would have preferred if you’d gone to the University, instead.”
Tiri shrugged, “I was never a bookworm. But I did pick up some medical knowledge, so I’m half-way to being a doctor...look at it that way.”
“Indeed,” Vrire said with a questioning tone. “Very well, if your Starfleet won’t let you come home and visit your family, I’ll let everyone know you said hello. We’ll see you again soon, daughter.”
“Goodbye mother,” Tiri said. “Until I see you again.”
The transmission ended. Tiri stood up and pulled on the jacket to her uniform before heading out the door to go to the conference room where she was to meet with the rest of the team…
Colonel Jahkar
USS Resurrection 
Stardate 1909.18
Jahkar had made several rounds of the ship, checking in at the armory no less than twice and checking on security personnel at least once (even though he was not assigned as security chief, the job going to Starfleet regulars aboard the ship) to see if anything had transpired since they’d beamed down to Andoria.
Other than the ship’s intervention in the Legion plot on the surface and the confrontation with the surplus Bird of Prey, there was nothing new to report. 
Something was nagging at Jahkar. Events from the mission were jumbled around in his head and slowly some patterns were emerging. The things that stood out most to the half-Klingon/Romulan were the presence of nanotechnology throughout much of the mission...highly advanced nanotechnology.
There were also a number of connections to Risa and the underworld there. These two factors rekindled memories in Jahkar and made him begin to wonder if there were connections between the nanotechnology, the Risan underworld and this Legion organization.
He compiled his information, storing it on several PADDs, while he waited for Commander Vree to call for the debriefing.
[Back to top]
== S1, E3, Act 12: Debriefing ==
Commander Mayla Vree
USS Resurrection, Andoria Prime
Stardate 1909.21
Mayla walked into the brig to check on Sera's status to find she was still sedated. A lone security guard stood by her cell and gave her a nod when she approached.
"Has she been searched?"
"Yes, ma'am," the guard said, a Lieutenant Joaquin Johansson, Jo-Jo as he was occasionally called. She didn't know him. Until now, he was just a name on the crew manifest.
"Scanned?"
"Sir?"
"A full body scan," Mayla clarified.
"I don't think so sir. The EMH and medical team just looked her over, we searched her, and dropped her in there."
Mayla shook her head with the slightest movement. "Computer, activate EMH."
The EMH Mark X appeared. This iteration of the Emergency Medical Hologram appeared as a middle aged woman of Indian descent from Earth. She spoke with a slight accent. "Please state the nature of the medical event."
"I want you to perform a full molecular level body scan for anything foreign or amiss for Andorian physiology. Down to her DNA." Mayla ordered without taking her eyes off Sera.
"We have already scanned her during transport to filter out the explosive nanites. We did not encounter anything...amiss, Commander Vree."
"But do you agree that a filter scan through the transporter buffer's resolution wouldn't be high enough to read her DNA? Only a full body molecular scan can do that?"
The doctor slowly nodded. "What is it you hope to find out?"
"We need to know everything there is to know about her. Do it now, and do it as fastidiously as you can and report the findings to me and Captain Lazarus. Am I clear on this, Doctor?" Mayla ordered with a cold voice. Sera was their only clue to the Legion. And they needed answers. She turned to leave the brig on her way to the Infirmary to change back into her old self before going to mission debriefing.
EMH Mark X
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1909.22
The EMH ran the scans ordered by Commander Vree and everything came back normal. During the course of the scans, the Andorian woman woke up. She tried to get up, but was restrained on the bunk in her cell.
“Please, do not move,” the older Indian woman said. “I am almost done here,”
Seraphim frowned, “Whatever you’re looking for, there’s nothing there. Assuming that you already found the nanite bomb and removed or disabled it, I have no other technology inside me.”
The Andorian then smirked, “At least that I know of.”
The EMH completed the scan and smiled at Seraphim, “All done. You appear to be fine.”
“I could have told you that,” Sera muttered. “Can I be unrestrained, please?”
“I’ll ask the captain,” the EMH said. “Until then, just stay put here.”
“Like I have another choice,” Sera said.
The EMH then transferred her program from the brig to sickbay. There, she stood before the monitor on her workstation and opened a channel to Mayla and Captain Lazarus.
“Emergency Medical Hologram to Captain Lazarus and Commander Vree,” she said. “I’ve forwarded my scans of the Andorian woman to you. I found no abnormalities in my scans. She’s a healthy Andorian female, approximately 40 years of age.”
The EMH tapped some other commands into the console and ran the DNA sample through all known databases and when the results came back, she raised an eyebrow.
“Further,” the EMH told the commander and captain. “Her DNA has been matched to one Evyshaa Zh'riakrer, Lieutenant Commander, Starfleet Intelligence. Killed in action Stardate 1004.23 during a classified mission.”
The Indian woman frowned, “I guess Starfleet doesn’t think an EMH should have clearance to find out anything else about this woman. You’re on your own from here. EMH out.”
Ensign Reepchip Charatetet
The Madcap Engineers
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1909.22
Reepchip and the others, having discovered all they could, set to work writing the final report, which included the level and styles of hacking, the fact that Thompson’s pattern was sought, so thus he, and not Admiral Bridwell, was the target of the kidnapping, a complete listing of all equipment stolen from the Mars warehouse and how it matched what they found on Andoria.
Their task complete, Reepchip and the group parted for the nonce.  As Reepchip left, Lt. Commander Carmichael stopped him.  “I noticed you struggle to speak English, but you never rely on the Universal Translator. Does it not work with your native language?”
Reepchip pondered how to answer, then explained that when he did, he was even harder to understand and people kept asking him to please slow down.  Actually speaking English slowed him down to the point where most found him understandable.  And besides, knowing an out-worldly language would make him a much more desirable mate when it came time to choose a female, so he got all the practice he could.  He hoped to learn others as well, although one cadet he knew from Starfleet--Tajel by name--warned him never to speak Klingon as members of that race were sure to be insulted by how badly he garbled it.
He said all this, however, in his native language, and Tommy Carmichael found it less of an explanation and more of a demonstration, as while the Universal Translator could handily keep up with Reepchip, the rapidity of his speech rendered the results almost incomprehensible.
Ensign Tiri Sh'avelith
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1909.22
Tiri sat down at the console in her quarters and called up the Andorian news feed. From the way everything sounded the riots were over and a number of Andorian Liberation Front members were jailed. Losses on both sides of the conflict had been substantial. 
She did not see any of the names of those she and Mayla had met in the ARF among those arrested, which told her the group they’d been with aboard the Bird of Prey had not been arrested. Of course, she still did not know if they were dead or alive.
Putting the ARF aside, she pulled up newsfeeds from across the quadrant and saw where unrest was continuing on many worlds. The young Andorian could not help but wonder how many of these incidents were related to the Legion and how many were just natural political strife?
Satisfied with the current climate on Andoria Prime, Tiri left for the team meeting….
Ensign Reepchip Charatetet
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1909.23
After Reepchip grabbed some food from the replicator, He and Daven went to the briefing room, discussing getting some actual battle armour and a rifle for the Muran, but only Reepchip actually entered.  The Muran chittered a hello to Tiri as he wrapped his tail around the PADD he was carrying before climbing into his chair, setting the PADD on the table.  Daven saw him standing in the chair and called out, “we’ll start working on a better chair right away, too, Ratman.”
“Make one for Roar too.  These things weren’t built with tails in mind.”
Commander Mayla Vree
Briefing Room, USS Resurrection
Stardate 1909.25
Mayla was standing alone by one of the windows in the empty briefing room when Lazarus walked in. He looked over to her in the dim light and stopped short all of a sudden. It wasn't until the door closed behind him that he walked over to her.
"For a moment, I thought it was your father standing here." He said, joining her on the other side of the window looking out. When Mayla didn't respond he turned to the business at hand. "We're leaving the system before we're detected. We'll debrief and I'll report in to the Admiral, see what he has for us next. How did Sh'avelith do?"
"She handled herself well; no hesitation, listened to orders, and had good input to any assignment. How did the rest of the team fair?" she asked with a slightly irritated tone. It was unfortunate she was unable to see her team in action first hand so she can gauge their abilities. She would have to rely on Raillius' reports and impressions of the team which she will ask her to compile. A holodeck sim was still just that, a holodeck sim. She wanted to see them under duress and live fire.
"As well as they could considering we seemed to be a step behind in every turn. This Legion knew more about us than we them and that doesn't sit too well with me. But not a word to the team to our suspicions of a mole. Let's see what else we can learn from the debriefing."
"Aye. Did you make mention of any of this to the Admiral yet?"
"Let's wait to see if we know anything before we take it to him. I don't want to offend our new CO since he handpicked everyone here."
"Everyone except me," Mayla said, indicating to him she knew how she came about to be leading this team.
"Touche, youngster. Sorvek knew what he was doing when he referred you." Lazarus folded his arms across his chest. "Maybe he wanted a Vree to be part of the new Shadow Ops."
"Kyril is still a Vree."
"Yes, he is, but he is probably doing something else equally as important as you." He turned and gave her a stern look. "Starfleet Intelligence kept you on; kept you where you were most needed. Even if that meant being separated from your father."
Mayla looked to the side, brooding like the way she used to when he scolded her. "He and Tylin are the only family I have."
Lazarus scoffed loudly. "You have Nielle and Zac. You have Kindred and Dezin. You have Bryce and Khymas. Do not dismiss them. I know they all consider you like family. And so do I. We are here. Your father isn't the only-"
The door swished open and ended their conversation abruptly. Mayla gave Lazarus a look and a slight bow of her head, understanding what he was trying to say. It wasn't easy for the man to say so, but old age has perhaps softened him if not just a little. Her lips turned up slightly, knowing that she had helped with breaking down that wall long ago.
But it still didn't help to quell her solitude.
USS Resurrection
Orbiting Andoria Prime
Stardate 1909.26
When the entire team was seated, Captain Lazarus took his seat and looked around the room. The Madcaps were here. He looked at Reepchip and bit the inside of his lip, refraining from saying anything because he knew there would be some outrageous, yet totally plausible reason the entire Mapcap team was in his team briefing.
“Madcaps,” he said firmly. “Whatever is discussed here today is classified. Talk about it outside this room to anyone other than one of the people here and you’ll find yourselves in the brig. Ensign Charatetet, you will act as the official spokesperson for the Madcap team in briefings from now on. No exceptions.”
Lazarus then sighed and looked over to the Commander Vree. “You each have input from the events on Andoria. Starting with Commander Vree, explain your findings from the investigation."
[Back to top]
== S1, E3, Act 13: Debriefing Wraps Up==
USS Resurrection
Phoenix Squad debriefing
Stardate 1909.25
Before Lazarus addressed the team, a holographic representation of Admiral Ian MacLeod appeared at the open chair at the opposite end of the table from the captain. MacLeod acknowledged the team, then turned to Lazarus. 
“Proceed, captain,” he said.
Lazarus nodded over to Mayla to begin.
Commander Mayla Vree and Ensign Tiri Sh'avelith
Briefing Room, USS Resurrection
Stardate 1909.25
Mayla took in the team in a few breaths, including this other team that was assembled - the Madcaps. She wondered what Lazarus had in mind for this specialized team.
"ARF recruitment kiosks seemed to be a prevalent part of the population's lives. We approached one but that particular recruiter didn't seem too well versed in BEING part of the ARF. After we set off the bomb in the Starfleet relay station, it was like a tinderbox where it suddenly took on a significant meaning of the event. The rally held there was populated by ARF and an unknown entity trying to promote violence. When the energy weapons appeared in the crowd, Sh'avelith and I knew this was much more well organized and armed than the ARF could manage on their own. Sh'avelith and I were quickly recruited and violence broke out. One Andorian seemed to be giving the orders, and I was quickly assigned to a team to enter the station and clear out all Starfleet personnel.
Mayla now leaned forward and tapped a few keys on the table's computer console. On one wall, an animated schematic she had put together appeared and she ran the program. "Only four of us was tasked to complete the job. Watch as we cleared out the first floor of the station."
Jahkar growled and spoke first. "SpecOps."
"Affirmative," Mayla responded as the animation played out. "These three were highly trained by the looks of their deployment and precision of their execution of the assignment. They were much more disciplined and trained than your usual ARF member." Next she brought up a schematic of a Klingon bird of prey. "After we cleared the station, the 'leader' selected a few Andorians who participated in the assault as new recruits to the ARF. Both Sh'avelith and I were beamed up to a cloaked bird of prey. At that moment, that's when this unknown entity revealed themselves. The leader, identified as Sera, was informed there was a mole within that ARF cell and locked all of us in the transporter bay to be captured by Starfleet.
"We broke out and deployed to commandeer the ship. Sera and her team was on the bridge preparing to beam out when Sh'avelith set up a scattering field around the bridge to prevent their beam out. We were able to stun all of them, but the cloaking device was taken offline. And Starfleet descended upon the ship. The ARF cell was able to beam off to escape while we set up a diversion for Starfleet. We were only able to bring Sera back as a prisoner before the bird of prey exploded; obviously set up by Sera's team to activate once they were off the ship. We've identified Sera as Evyshaa Zh'riakrer, a Lieutenant Commander with Starfleet Intelligence, reported KIA on stardate 1004.23." Mayla gave Lazarus a quick glance before looking at MacLeod, gauging their reaction. But she received none.
Lazarus then nodded to the Madcaps for their report…
Madcap Engineers 
USS Resurrection
 Stardate 1909.27 
The Madcap’s didn’t bat an eye.   
“Commander James Moses demanded the exact same thing when we were still Cadets,” Daven said.  As Lazarus had insisted Reepchip be their spokesperson, they slid their PADDS over to him. 
When it came Reepchip’s turn to speak, he politely bared his throat to those assembled, then began.   
“First, the facts of the physical equipment,” he said, looking at his and Daven’s PADD first.  “Most of the equipment was destroyed by nanites, but I managed to salvage a hard drive, with a serial number.  This hard drive was stolen along with a Desert Caravan of other components from a facility on Mars.”   
On the display before the rest of the team, Reepchip brought up a listing of parts.  “This is a listing of what was stolen from Mars, and it matches what I saw on Andoria.  Some of this is the exact top of the line equipment, including adapters, specialized cables, splicing kits, processors, and so on that you do not get unless you specifically order it.” 
He checked Spargan’s PADD for his next topic.  “Now, the transporter hacks.  Lt. Spargan is the expert on transporter security, and he says that the hack was done with extreme precision.  First, even I could see that the Legion was not seeking to abduct Admiral Bridwell, at all.  Instead, they were seeking to match a very specific pattern.”  His dark eyes fixed on Daryl Thompson.  “They wanted you, Lieutenant Daryl Thompson, and none other.  Not only the pattern, but also hacking into the embassy transporters suggests that whoever did it was a highly-trained specialist in transporters.” 
“Now, I shall present you with some speculations.  First, the equipment.  That it is stolen is not the dead end we first thought it was.  The mercenaries had to know it was there, but more, it had to BE there for them to steal. Could it be this equipment was requested falsely and then stolen, so as to confuse everyone as to where it was really?”  He looked around at the sceptical looks.  “As we Muran say, ‘Schemed once, done often!’  My grandmother’s nestmate is an Investigator of Merchants and I shall tell a tale he told that matches what I say.  There is a merchant named Seeva Chaivaravara… vara?”  He glanced at Ryramorl curiously. 
“Chaivaravaravara,” responded Ryramorl.  “I know of whom you speak.  Our time is short, so keep the tale shorter.” 
Reepchip bared his throat, then spoke.  “There was a merchant named Seeva Chaivaravaravara who dealt in weapons on Carnor, but he could only sell blades and projectile weapons, as he was forbidden to sell energy weapons, which were restricted by the Republic, as they are in the Pentarchy.  To get around this, he and others set up a shell company, which got the permissions, and after properly handling small orders during their probation, they ordered a large shipment, which was then stolen.  This is a common insurance fraud scheme, but the company made no such claim, even paying their client out of pocket and going out of business.  A year later, those exact weapons were used in an attempted coup against Siaka tal  Choyamvaravara, Prince of the Vara clan.  The Investigators found out Seeva had been planning the coup for many, many years, and the company and theft were simply meant to mislead.” 
Ryramorl nodded.  “To put Reepchip’s tale into context, merchants may not keep energy weapons in warehouses.  Energy weapons are transported from the manufacturer straight to their clients, and transport is kept secret.  That these thieves knew the weapons were there, that the weapons were there to be stolen at all--too many strong scents to ignore.” 
Reepchip chittered his thanks to Ryramorl.  “What I am saying is, let us look at who ordered these components.  It may lead somewhere.” 
USS Resurrection
Phoenix Squad debriefing
Stardate 1909.29
MacLeod looked to Lazarus, then shrugged. “All indications were that the equipment taken was general stock stored at Utopia Planitia. There are multiple pieces of equipment like this throughout the storage facilities, but if you feel you can find something by pursuing the lead. Be my guest,” MacLeod said.
Lazarus nodded, “Agreed.” He then looked over to Thompson. “Lieutenant. You had a unique experience on this mission. You were abducted and spent time with the Legion. They appeared to want you to act as a spy for them, but they seemed to approach it rather haphazardly. Your thoughts?”
Lt. Daryl Thompson
USS Resurrection, Briefing Room
Stardate 1909.29
Daryl nodded as he sat right up. “Well. As they didn’t trust me much, I wasn’t allowed to walk freely. I was hooked up to this Seraphim figure, an Andorian who appeared to be a former Starfleet Intelligence officer who got “betrayed” by Starfleet, as he calls it. As he said, a lot of Legion members where former Starfleet Intelligence or other Intelligence Services across the quadrant, which had been “betrayed”, left to their own during missions.  They tried to convince me in the same way, as they brought up my time in the mines…”  
Daryl looked across the room to the team. “I decided to play along, to stay alive. Seraphim didn’t trust me. However, he still gave me the encrypted comms device where he, or Archangel, could contact me with. It doesn’t make sense to me. I agree with Captain Lazarus that it was all….very odd. Furthermore, Legion appears to be a gathering of a lot of different races. Human, Klingon, Romulan, Andorian, Naausican, Tellarite, you name ‘em, and Legion has ‘em. With all the equipment and tech they have to their disposal, there have to be traces found through the black markets. I mean, it’s virtually impossible not to leave any traces, money tracks or whatsoever when I look at the size of this operation. “Another moment, he paused, pondering about Reepchip’s statement. 
“So, regarding my abduction…why would they have wanted me? And even more...why did they let me go? They knew I pose a risk to them. What would have been the purpose of that?“ 
Admiral Ian MacLeod (hologram)
USS Resurrection 
Stardate 1909.29
MacLeod listened to Daryl’s questions, then took a sharp breath. “That is a mystery, indeed. What we do know is we had records altered to create a file in which your image was used to replace Bridwell’s. It is possible, if Legion has someone at Starfleet Intelligence, they may have accessed those records and someone made you from the image alteration.”
“That would mean someone who knew Daryl saw his face on Bridwell’s file and figured out what was going on,” said Lazarus. “Either that or they used facial recognition to identify him as an imposter.”
MacLeod exhaled sharply, “The other possibility is there is a spy within this organization. Someone who knew Thompson was impersonating Bridwell and passed the information on to the Legion...who saw it as a chance to try and recruit him.”
“The attempt was reckless,” Lazarus scoffed. “By all indications from Thompson’s report, he accepted this Archangel’s offer to join Legion so easily, they had to suspect he was only going along with it to avoid being killed or glean as much information as he could about their organization.”
MacLeod gave a nod. “Any other thoughts on the Thompson abduction?”
Madcap Engineers
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1909.30
“With all respect, Captain, Admiral, I am not sure this was a kidnapping of opportunity,” said Reepchip.  “According to Spargan’s notes, they would have needed Lieutenant Thompson’s pattern to set up the transporter hack.  They must have had it from before Shadow Operations was restarted.”
“You’re forgetting something, Ratman,” said Ensign Grollan. Of course, a Tellarite would have a differing viewpoint.  “The Admiral did suggest a spy on this ship.  He may have sent that pattern to the Legion.”
“That is a large transmission, Grump,” said Reepchip.  “Could be worth looking into.  Or....” he looked at Thompson.  “Do you have an identical twin?”
Lt. Daryl Thompson
USS Ressurection
Stardate 1910.01
Daryl looked at Reepchip. “Not an identical twin. But there was a clone...maybe even more than one....” Daryl paused for a few moments, sorting his thoughts, weighing options against each other, before he continued. “Is it possible that Legion is born out of the remnants of Section 31?  Or that there are ties with Section 31 cells that went dark after Section 31 was shut down? Might that be the reason they were looking for me? After all, Section 31 threw me in that mining colony and replaced me with the clone... “
Daryl looked around the team, and his gaze kept hanging at Vree...His mind was racing…Was he seeing ghosts? Were his demons from the past troubling his judgement …Was Section 31 still after him? He forced himself to push away these thoughts and focused again on the debriefing.
Colonel Jahkar
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1910.01
Jahkar listened to the others and when his turn came around the table, the half-Romulan/half-Klingon appeared visibly troubled to his teammates. Anyone who knew Jahkar knew he was never quite this pensive.
“Our team at the embassy on Andoria Prime was deployed to the building across the street where we traced the transporter hack. As Reepchip explained, we found equipment there, we found the place where they’d hacked the city’s data grid and we neutralized a group of operators who were likely involved with Legion. Unfortunately we were not able to secure them in time before the nanite bombs were detonated. We recovered the devices that allow them to mask their appearances. Again, they utilize nanotechnology.
“Which brings me to the issues that have troubled me since the mission to Andoria. There are things in this investigation that seem to recur...frequently. The use of nanotechnology being one. “The other recurring factor is the planet Risa. The nanotech was manufactured on Risa. Not a common place to go to for such technology.”
Jahkar shifted uncomfortably in his chair, then looked up from the table and scanned around the table, “There was a former Shadow Ops officer who is also linked to both nanotech and Risa, problem is he’s dead.”
Captain Lazarus’ brow furrowed, “Dark?”
Jahkar gave a curt nod, “Captain Jack Dark. He was with Blue Squadron in training, ended up aboard the USS Repulse. He and Dara were involved before we met. When I came into the picture they were separated. Jack used his extensive resources among the Risan criminal underground to help us hide Tajel from his Cardassian father at the time he was looking for the boy.”
Lazarus appeared as if he’d had an epiphany. His surprised gaze stayed locked on Jahkar, “And he was well versed in the use of nanotechnology.”
“Indeed,” Jahkar confirmed. “He was a powerful telekinetic. He kept a...nest, if you will...of nanites inside his body. He could control and manipulate millions of them using his telekinetic abilities. I watched him form swords out of his arms or hack an enemy computer by sending nanites into their network.”
“Jack’s dead, colonel,” Lazarus reminded him. “He was killed in the mission to Kazis nearly 10 years ago.”
“Yes. The opponent Dark was up against during that mission was never identified, was it?” Jahkar asked.
“Not to my knowledge,” the captain replied. “I’d have to pull up the files.”
Jahkar produced a data padd, “I downloaded everything my clearance would allow. Enough to know the enemy Dark and his team faced was never brought to justice. They have striking similarities to this Legion group we encountered on Andoria. 
“Assorted Alpha Quadrant races. Surplus Naausican and Ferengi ships and blackmarket weapons that were upgraded inside with top of the line technology. They took political hostages -- from the Federation, Klingon Empire and the Romulans -- all meeting on Kazis IX. They made no demands. They killed many of them, but really their intentions were never known. It was almost like they just wanted to inflict as much damage as they could and kill as many politicians, and Starfleet officers who came to the rescue as they could.”
Lazarus took the PADD from Jahkar and studied the mission details, “Dark died on that mission, Jahkar. He died saving lives. He kept Repulse together long enough to beam everyone off. Hell, he even rescued President Gant, who was just a Federation councilman at the time. He died a hero. What are you suggesting?”
Jahkar shook his head, “I’m not sure. I just find the similarities to be odd. Seems like quite a coincidence.”
Madcap Engineers
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1910.01
Lieutenant Spargan pondered something.  “Colonel, as Reepchip said, ‘Schemed once, done often.’  Is it possible that Captain Jack Dark’s body was retrieved and the nanites found?  It would then be possible to track them back to Risa.”
Ensign Pui-Chor Wong also had an idea.  “Another thing we must consider is the fact that this Legion knew Lieutenant Thompson would be there, and it has been said that this Legion knew we were coming.  We need to to a complete diagnostic check of this very ship.  Perhaps the Resurrection itself betrayed us.  After all, making a tracker look like any other vital component of a ship was one thing Commander Moses taught us.”
Admiral Ian MacLeod (hologram)
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1910.01
MacLeod shook his head, "The Repulse was destroyed by a warp core breach, it was vaporized. There were no bodies recovered. The closest place anyone could have beamed to was Fearless."
"There were cloaked ships in the area," Lazarus said, recalling details of the mission. "Could he have beamed aboard one? Or could one have beamed him aboard their ship?"
"I suppose anything is possible, Quentin," MacLeod admitted. "I'll have all the details of the mission uploaded to Resurrection, all declassified."
Lieutenant Ryramorl Ra’yral
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1910.02
When it came Ryramorl’s turn to speak, he stood up.  “This group certainly had military training, They were excellent fighters in hand-to-hand combat, far better than the Andorian thugs of the ARF.  But few of those we encountered were actually Andorian; I think we encountered two that were of that actual race.”  He growled.  “Perhaps we can make this…  Evyshaa Zh'riakrer explain what’s going on.”  He paused, then looked at MacLeod.  “Zhriakrer…  her brother was my roommate at the Academy, wasn’t he?” he said.
"And that’s why we’re not letting you interrogate her, Ryramorl,” growled Lazarus.  “That debacle caused enough trouble when it happened.  We don’t need it complicating things even more after all these years.”
“Oh, you heard about that, too?” sighed Ryramorl.  He didn’t pursue the matter, though he KNEW Thompson and Beckett were bound to have questions.
“She’s not likely to be forthcoming,” warned Grollan.
“Oh, I expect the interrogation to go like clockwork,” responded Ryramorl, grinning harshly.  “We find what makes her tick.  Then we make her talk.”
Ensign Tiri Sh'avelith
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1910.03
Tiri listened to the debriefing before she decided to chime in. She had no idea who this Jack Dark was and she was a little taken back by the presence of the engineers called the Madcaps. Mostly she was worried about her homeworld and the events that had transpired these past days.
This Legion was trying to destroy her people’s society. They were trying to destroy the Federation. There was a name for people with thoughts like these -- anarchists. She never considered in her lifetime she’d see someone trying the unravel the fabric of everything she knew and loved.
Before she could be swept away by her thoughts, Tiri looked to the captain and spoke up. 
“I don’t have anything else to add to what Commander Vree said. I do know this much, whoever we’re dealing with they are bent on destroying the Federation. They are trying to create anarchy on a galactic scale,” Tiri said. “All the unrest in the quadrant, Legion is feeding it. They have to be...to what end, I don’t know.”
Commander T’Aayla Raillius
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1810.04
T’Aayla impassively watched the back and forth between the Admiral, the Captain and the crew before speaking.  There were few leads, and she was sure those leads would be explored eventually. When there was a pause in the conversation, she inserted:  “The pattern of our adversary, and I simply say adversary because we cannot ascribe motive to them as of yet, is one of extreme competence.  The handling of Lieutenant Thompson was either an abnormality or by plan.  If by plan, we need to determine the why. Why was his “defection” handled so sloppily?  What purpose does it serve?  Was it to sow suspicion amongst us, to give us a false lead, or is there something we are missing in the Lieutenant’s scans?  Perhaps different pieces of DNA altered so as to appear normal, but when combined with another substance or stimuli, they would activate like a sleeper agent?   We can’t know for sure, as our adversary’s technical abilities may outstrip our scanning and detection techniques.  Regardless, the Lieutenant is compromised, and whether we want to trust him or not, they have placed an element of doubt into our ability to function cohesively as a team.  If they are afraid of a Shadow Ops investigation, there are less subtle ways to shut us down.  Simply destroy this ship or set a trap for our away teams with overwhelming force.   Our adversary had opportunity- they knew we were coming, yet they only attacked Thompson, not the rest of us.  Certainly, that was in their abilities. Why?   If our team was destroyed, who would have known how and when to do it?   And why would our destruction not be in their best interest?   Would our outright destruction implicated them in some way?  
"As to the protests and incidents around the Galaxy, who benefits?  Who gains by setting off a metagenic weapon on Andoria?   Who gains with all the incidents amongst the different Empires?   Either some are misdirection, or there is an entity that wants all governments to fall.  Who benefits?  There is no pattern, other than disruption and anarchy, so who benefits from disruption?   If there is chaos, people demand order.  Who wants to impose that order, and why?   Authoritarianism is a natural response to anarchy and is a prerequisite condition for people giving up their freedoms.  If it is not something internal to one of our governments, then who benefits externally?   The Dominion has been quiet for some time, as have the Borg, and we know of no other outside threats at this time.  I stress no known threats.   All of this is to say, that we don’t have the data for answers yet, just enough for questions.       
She paused, “I apologize for my verbosity, it is simply a verbalization of what is going on in my head.   In the Empire one thinks like this or one dies, and sometimes one dies from being too paranoid.”  She allowed a small smile.   “Given we don’t have a lot of intel, and have been reactive to events, perhaps it is time to start being offensive and start poking some areas to see if we get any reactions.”  
Of course like any good Rihansuu, she didn’t verbalize all her thoughts, only those she wanted public.   Later she would talk to the Captain, or perhaps MacLeod about sending different pieces of information to different people to see what reaction was prompted.  For example, sending different pieces of information to everyone in the chain of command privately about the Resurrection’s activities, where it would be, what it was investigating, and what their thoughts were, and then showing up at all those locations and seeing if and where an ambush, or countermeasure would occur.  This would give them some information on who the mole or leak was in their organization.  She was pretty sure that someone with knowledge of Shadow Ops’ reactivation had a hand in what was going on.  Someone in the Federation chain of command was implicated.  Perhaps in the other empires as well, but they had access to the Federation for now.   She knew one thing, waiting and watching for something to happen was always going to keep them one step behind.  They needed to go on the offense and that meant setting some counter-intelligence traps to flush out their enemy.  
Lieutenant Cody Beckett
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1910.04
Cody listened to the debriefing of each member very closely and fed all data into the computer, where the AI, boosted with bioneural network algorithms was processing the data to form possible scenarios and leads to investigate. Since it was clear that there was a lot of clandestine and black-market operations going on, he had already tapped into the networks of his family’s company. After all, they dealt a lot with pirates, weapons dealers and other scum of the universe in their daily work, so probably the computer could at least use that information for cross reference. Then, suddenly, two images appeared on his data padd and the computer chirped softly. Cody raised an eyebrow and looked into the data. 
“Found anything lieutenant Beckett?” Lazarus addressed him “Seems like it” Cody replied, as he swiped on his datapadd from bottom to top, and the images and data appeared onto the main holoscreen hovering above the table. A Ferengi and a Cardassian were shown in the picture. The Ferengi had a large scar in his face.
Cody spoke up, “These two beauties were found by the AI I had chewing on the data. They are both arms dealers, not really big ones, but big enough to pose a serious threat. They seem to have been involved with the parts Reepchip mentioned. “
Admiral Ian MacLeod (hologram)
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1910.04
MacLeod took in all that was said. Then he typed something into the terminal in front of him, where he was aboard the USS Fearless. The file on Lt. Commander Evyshaa Zh'riakrer was unlocked on the PADDs sitting on the table aboard Resurrection. Everyone saw the classified data unlocked and the group started to read.
“Zh'riakrer was a top agent for Starfleet Intelligence,” MacLeod explained. “She was sent on a mission to the Breen homeworld, her objective was to infiltrate a Breen shipyard facility and steal classified data on a super-battleship they were developing. Long story short, she was captured. When the Breen protested, Starfleet Intelligence denied she was one of theirs. They disavowed all knowledge of her existence.
“Commander Zh’riakrer was convicted of spying and was sent to a Breen prison camp,” MacLeod continued. “That was the last anyone in the Federation heard of her. Her file lists her as killed in action during a training accident. At some point, she was apparently freed or escaped the Breen. All we can do at this time is speculate.”
MacLeod looked around the table, “For now, continue your investigation. See what you can get out of Zh’riakrer, follow the weapon merchant leads and see what more you can learn about the nanotechnology. Keep me abreast of what you learn. MacLeod out.”
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== S1, E3, Act 14: Fallout==
Commander Mayla Vree 
Briefing room, USS Resurrection
Stardate 1904.19
Admiral MacLeod's hologram rezzed out, leaving more questions than answers. Lazarus glanced over to Mayla. "How do you want to handle the interrogation?"
"Zh’riakrer was a highly trained operative of Starfleet Intelligence. It makes most sense
for me to do it, but I believe that will be to our disadvantage." Mayla
ran through the dossiers of everyone present in her head and decided who should
be the one to do it. Someone who is an unknown in Starfleet for a long time, and has no obvious history with Shadow Ops or Starfleet Intelligence.
"Then who should do it?" Lazarus asked, giving her a questioning look.
"Commander Raillius." Mayla looked to her 2IC. "Do it in the holodeck with Jahkar as your right hand. Use whatever means you deem necessary as Zh’riakrer is considered dead. I will be observing and advising you over the subvoc on the
Andorian's tactics as I come to recognize as Starfleet Intelligence training for interrogation. Sh'avelith will be with me also as an observer as she can recognize more andorian traits than we can. Ra'yral will join us for any input we may need about her brother in case there's anything there to be used against her. I also want Charatetet in the room, but hidden from view. I want him to study her posture, mood, tone, voice, and physical manifestations in her demeanor and report it live to us.
"Beckett, I want you to locate those two arms dealer in case we need to go after them. 
"And Thompson, you are sitting out on this one. Get some rest and write up your report on everything you saw, heard, everywhere you went, and everyone you saw since you were the only inside man. We need as much detail and information as you can remember about the Legion."
"Any questions?" Mayla asked. While waiting, she heard a voice in her mind.
"Leaving Thompson out on purpose?" Lazarus whispered over the subvoc private channel, but not looking at her.
Mayla kept a passive face plastered for all involved. "Just a precaution. Better he doesn't know for now what we learn from Zh’riakrer until we know more of
what we might be dealing with." She didn't like what she had to say next.
 His escape may be part of the Legion's plan."
Ryramorl Ra’yral
USS Resurrection
Stardate
1910.04
Ryramorl wasn’t sure if Mayla’s decisions were the best, but he kept silent.  He wasn’t sure if Reepchip would be able to read Andorian body language very well, having always lived amongst the Carnora except for his time at Starfleet Academy.  Before Beckett left, Ryramorl told him he wanted to talk in the
future--he thought he recognized the Ferengi.
Then he told Mayla about the debacle Lazarus had mentioned.  “There is little to tell.  Zo’ar Zh’riakrer and I were roommates at Starfleet Academy during my freshman year.  He and I disliked each other from the start, and that grew to utter hatred--perhaps it was each other’s scents.  One evening, we got into a fight and I went berserk.  It took the entire section of the dorm and every security officer in the area to pull the two of us apart.  We were seriously trying to kill each other.  It was because of the intervention of two admirals, one being Sorvek, the other can rot with his name, the fact that I was good friends with then-President Shor-Ghan, and neither side wanted a tentative alliance to end like this that I wasn’t court-martialed and booted from the Academy.  But my credits for the year were annulled, and I got an official First-Level reprimand on my record from the Carnora--that’s as high as it goes without being court-martialed.  I was very, VERY lucky.  What happened to Zo’ar I never found out until recently, when I learned he was in the ARF.  I always figured the Academy was trying to keep him and I apart.”
He sighed.  “Too bad Lazarus forbade me to interrogate her,” he said quietly.  “I have done interrogations at home.”
Commander T’Aayla Raillius
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1910.06
“Aye aye sir,” T’Aayla responded to Commander Vree.  She kept a straight face, but truth be told, Vree’s reasoning was going to be the basis for her own suggestion.  She noted the Commander’s terms “use whatever means necessary as she is considered dead.”  She read that as the Commander giving he carte blanche for any form of interrogation.
She had interrogated people before, sometimes ruthlessly, but not every interrogation called for those particular methods.  In fact, from her own experience she knew physical coercion didn’t always work, and often the answers obtained after such methods were questionable.  She recalled her own interrogation for a full
year at the hands of the Romulans after the capture of Jamie T. Marcus. It had broken her, but she hadn’t broken, at
least not in revealing anything related to Starfleet. 
“Commander, time frame for our
interrogation?  Obviously sooner is
better than later, but we have no immediate crisis currently.   The
timeline for an answer from the prisoner, will have some… bearing on the interrogation method.”
Vree
looked over to Lazarus who gave her the most faintest hint of a shrug. From
Admiral MacLeod's first briefing, Phoenix Team's formation was specifically to
investigate this unrest inside the Federation member planets. Whatever they
could find out from Zh’riakrer could have a direct bearing on their next
mission. "The Admiral hadn't assigned us a new mission yet, so we've got
some downtime. Do it now. It may determine where we go next."
Colonel Jahkar
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1910.09
Jahkar was immediately put on edge when he heard he’d be assisting Raillius in the interrogation of the Andorian woman, which Vree in the same breath sanctioned “by any means” to accomplish the objective of forcing the prisoner to talk.
The half-Klingon/Romulan had used brutal techniques in the past to obtain information from prisoners, usually off the books. Certainly never sanctioned by a commanding officer. This was the Federation -- not the Klingon or Romulan empires. Interrogations here were more -- civilized.
The
marine was uncertain about how he felt regarding this task. There was nothing
honorable about beating a confession out of a female prisoner. Perhaps that
viewpoint was a little sexist, but Jahkar did not find hitting women to be
acceptable -- unless of course the woman was hitting him...hard...with every
intention of causing him bodily harm. Then he made an exception to the rule.
He suspected Raillius would not resort to physical torture to accomplish the task they were given, but more likely something psychological. 
“Holodeck,” he muttered, suddenly aware he’d spoken aloud. “We could find some way to deceive her...using the holodeck...make her think she’s somewhere she’s not, with people she’s not with.”
Lazarus, getting up from his chair to leave the conference room, looked at Jahkar and slowly nodded, “Perhaps. But she’s trained Starfleet Intelligence and whatever training Legion might have put her through. She’d likely spot an attempt to
deceive her with a holodeck. And we don’t know enough about the Legion to
simulate what they might be like.”
“What about Thompson?” Jahkar asked. “He was with them, briefly. But he might know
enough to give us the details we’d need to pull off an effective hoax?”
Ensign Reepchip Charatetet
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1910.09
Reepchip chittered.  “With all respect, sir,” he said.  “I do not think so.  They could be like the Dead Priests back home, who have many ways to know each other that outsiders, and even those lower in the Temples do not.  Nobody has ever infiltrated them because they know each other too well.”
Seeing some confused looks, Ryramorl spoke up to explain what Reepchip was referring to.  “The Dead Priests are amongst the highest-ranking priests in our major religion.  They are called such because those who make up their ranks are Dead in Name.  Their new names are not known to outsiders and calling someone by a Dead Name is anywhere from extremely rude to a death threat amongst our people.  It is known they even have their own language, and any outsider who tries to learn it risks the death penalty.”
Commander
T’Aayla Raillius
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1910.13
“Indeed, Lieutenant Thompson may know something useful.  Even the smallest detail, like was there a nod of acknowledgement shared between members, some sort of call sign, or way for them to secretly let the others know they were legion even in a room crowded with people?   Before I go into the interrogation, I’d like to know everything Thompson saw and heard.   Following that, I’d also like to see him
locked up in the brig.”   She smiled inwardly at the reaction that produced, especially Thompson, and allowed just a glimmer of a smile to show on her face publicly.   “In a cell right next to Zh’riakrer.  I doubt she’d trust him, but it might play into a narrative, and it wouldn’t hurt for a day or
two.”    And, if he was compromised in any way without him knowing it, it’s a safe space for him to be she added
mentally.   
After hearing Thompson’s debrief, and Commander Vree closed the meeting, she moved over to Jahkar as people left the room. She’d worked with him long enough to spot the concern on his face. She knew his sense of honor might get in the way of a brutal interrogation of a female prisoner. He hadn’t worked with her much since she had “returned” from Romulus, and no doubt had all sorts of brutal Tal Shiar visions of mayhem in his head.  While she could indeed be brutal, this wasn’t the situation.  “Don’t worry, you won’t be punching her,” she started as soon as they were next to each other, I have something else in mind entirely, follow me.”       
Colonel Jahkar
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1910.14
Jahkar was slightly relieved to hear the plan was not to beat the Andorian woman into a confession. He’d been leary of the order Vree gave, finding it very
uncharacteristic of Starfleet -- even by Shadow Ops standards. But of course, Vree’s orders were open to interpretation. They didn’t condone the use of
violence, but they didn’t rule them out either.
Raillius
had a plan and it didn’t sound like it would be violent. That worked for Jahkar. His concerns about having to beat up a female Andorian had just been alleviated. He was also a little put off by Reepchip’s dismissal of his idea about deceiving the prisoner.
For the Carnora, everything related back to their gods, customs and culture. Of course, they would turn to what they know in most situations, but Jahkar had
observed they often did not consider themselves as much Starfleet as they did
Carnora.
He shrugged it off and joined Raillius. He liked working with the commander, she was unlike the rest of the team. No doubt, together, they would get to the
bottom of what the prisoner knew.
“Where
do we start, commander?” he asked.
Ensign
Reepchip Charatetet
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1910.14
Reepchip saw Jahkar’s expression and knew he had
crossed a line, so he chittered an apology and said no more.  As he was to be in there with Raillius and Jahkar, he stayed near, only slipping over to a replicator to get a quick snack.  He listened to Raillius and Jahkar
discuss how to interrogate the prisoner. 
Ensign
Tiri Sh'avelith & Commander Mayla Vree
USS Resurrection
Stardate 1910.14
Tiri
followed Commander Vree out of the conference room and fell in step with her outside in the corridor. She was a bit taken aback by Vree’s assertion that Raillius and Jahkar use any techniques available to make Zh’riakrer talk. She realized lives were on the line, but she was uneasy with the idea of torturing
a prisoner. 
There was also the lessons they’d learned in Starfleet Intelligence training that suggested inflicting pain was not always the most reliable way of obtaining information from a prisoner. Zh’riakrer had been imprisoned by the Breen, so she had likely already undergone some form of torture. And there was the fact that Starfleet Intelligence, like Shadow Operations, trained its operatives to resist most
forms of interrogation.
However
Raillius chose to go after the information, it would not be easy.
There was one more thing nagging at the young Andorian. She turned to Vree and
cleared her throat, “Commander, do you think Thompson was compromised on Andoria Prime?”
"Thompson's been out of Starfleet Intelligence for a very long time. This was his first mission and he was compromised at the very start. If this was the same Thompson I knew long ago, he had a bright future ahead of him with many possibilities. But the Thompson I had come to know who died would not hesitate betraying those who didn't have his same point of view." Mayla said with a harder edge to her voice than she wanted. 
Tiri
froze for a moment. "Was he that bad?"
"He didn't agree with his CO's command methods," Mayla started, and was about to reveal everything the clone of Thompson did. But she stopped herself. That Thompson was gone. This Thompson should have the opportunity to make of himself separate from what stigma anyone attaches to him based on the actions of his
clone. That would be wrong. The Thompson she remembered as a child saw an
enthusiastic, flamboyant man who was always willing to please and become an
accomplished officer.
Tiri
took Mayla's hesitation as her final answer. "That can't be all there was
to it. There are always officers who don't agree with all of their CO's methods
or decisions," she hinted at the interrogation boundaries given to
Raillius.
"He committed treasonous acts against his crewmates and team, attempted to kill Starfleet personnel and destroy a sovereign class ship, and deserted. I'd say any one of those is serious enough already for court martial or prison." Mayla kept her voice low, but still had a slight hard edge to it.
The andorian remained silent, seeing the depth of the anger in trill's deep lavender eyes. She was almost fearful to ask her next question. "Were you part of that team?"
Mayla continued walking. "No. It was my father's team." Tiri hurried to keep pace with her CO. "And to answer your question, we don't know exactly everything they've done to him. And I doubt even he knows. If I were leading a
group like that, I would have made him a sleeper agent with that tech combined with
 ehavioral conditioning." She said slowly. She knew first hand the extent of the Borg technology Starfleet has already deciphered and replicated in the
past 20 years. "Just because our transporters filtered out any foreign
substance from his body, doesn't mean there isn't tech that can camouflage
themselves."
Tiri's
eyes widened just a bit as her CO was speaking about her own nanotech within
her own body. "What do we do?"
"We just keep an eye on him."
Legion
Unknown Location - Somewhere in the Alpha Quadrant
Stardate 1910.16
Being a leader in Legion meant giving up some aspect of one’s individuality. There was only one Archangel, the enigmatic leader of the organization. The soldiers in the group were called Myrmidons, these were essentially grunts or foot-soldiers.
Then there were the many lieutenants – also known as Seraphim – who led the numerous Legion cells throughout the galaxy. To be a Seraphim meant to give up much of who you were prior to accepting the position. But then, if you were a part of Legion you had already lost something you could never replace – your home, your friends and family and your life as you once knew it.
Seraphim was on a turbo-lift heading up to the command center of Legion’s headquarters. His trip to HQ had been necessary after leaving Andoria Prime. He had come to be debriefed and to speak with Archangel about the events that had transpired in the days prior.
The Andorian stepped off the lift as it arrived in the command center. The command center was minimally staffed – four Myrmidon at various stations, carrying out their tasks at hand. Seraphim walked past them and went up into the communications suite where Archangel would make contact.
As he stepped into the room and the door sealed behind him, the lighting came on and there stood Archangel.
“I didn’t realize you’d already established contact, Archangel,” said Seraphim. “I’m sorry I kept you waiting.”
Archangel remained in the shadows of the room, his face obscured by darkness, as he listened to Seraphim. After the apology, Archangel gave a wave of his hand. “No need to apologize, my friend. I wasn’t waiting long. I’ve read your mission report – the failure at Andoria Prime is most unfortunate.”
Seraphim stiffened slightly. “Perhaps I should have saved the apology for that mission. Normally, I would accept full responsibility for such a failure, but with all due respect Archangel, this mess with Thompson was a major part of the mission failure. Why would you have me extend such an offer to him? It was…”
“…sloppy and improperly handled, I know and I apologize to you, Seraphim, for the handling of that aspect of the mission,” said Archangel. “I need to know, you did inject him with the hypospray I specifically asked you to use?”
Seraphim nodded, “I did. He was injected with a standard nanite used on every member of Legion. Assuming that he’s not dead, I would guess this Shadow Operation team figured out how to deactivate the nanite or how to filter it out in a transporter?”
“Possibly. I haven’t been able to gain access to any data from the Shadow Ops team since they thwarted the plot on Andoria Prime,” said Archangel. “But data from the nanite suggests it was terminated before it could detonate. The same telemetry was received from the nanite implanted in your fellow Andorian Seraphim.”
“Sera?” he asked. “She’s been taken prisoner?”
“That would be my guess,” Archangel said.
Seraphim was troubled. “A Seraphim has never been captured before.”
“I know,” said Archangel. “But, it was bound to happen eventually. “
“If Shadow Ops hadn’t of interfered with our mission,” Seraphim muttered. “If we hadn’t have risked so much trying to bring Thompson into the fold. Why was he so important to you? You should have let me kill him. He was a liability from the start.”
Archangel stepped forward, “I took a chance. I thought Thompson would turn. But when he did so with such ease, it was obvious he was doing so to get inside our organization only to gain intelligence.”
“That’s when we should have killed him!” Seraphim said, becoming slightly unhinged. “His presence is responsible for much of our failure on Andoria.”
“I could not kill him for doing his job,” Seraphim mumbled in a low voice. “Perhaps in time, he’ll see that his place is with us. Once he comes back from what happened on Andoria, he’ll be under suspicion by his colleagues. Given his past, the cloning and betrayal of that clone, his incarceration by Section 31, he will see that Starfleet is not him home. Then, he might come to his senses.”
The Andorian shook his head, “We lost a lot of good people on that mission. People who trust you as our leader. They are going to feel you’ve made a serious misstep, Archangel. And if Sera talks…”
“If Sera talks it will mean nothing,” Archangel said. “She doesn’t know much beyond the Andorian cell, most of whom are dead now. She doesn’t know who I am, she doesn’t know where our headquarters is located. She will not be able to tell them much.”
Seraphim shook his head and started to walk toward Archangel, expecting he would be able to walk through the hologram on his way to a console on the other side of the room where he planned to pick up a padd with data about Sera’s cell on Andoria. But when he reached the hologram of Archangel, the figure suddenly stepped to the side and grabbed him unexpectedly and put the Andorian in a headlock.
“Wha….y-you’re here!” Seraphim stammered as Archangel grabbed him up. “When did you..”
“I arrived shortly before you did,” Archangel said, releasing Seraphim. “I had some time to get away from my daily routine and decided to pay you a visit in person.”
“That’s a risk, is it not?” Seraphim asked. “You’re not someone who can just disappear for a few days.”
“It’s hours really, and don’t worry,” the Legion leader said. “I have everything covered. I have delivered a supply of new nanites for you to circulate among the cells. These will not be detectable in transport so they can’t be filtered out or removed.”
Seraphim nodded, “As you wish. What are your orders for me?”
“Downtime. We are about to elevate the Klingon campaign,” Archangel told him. “You are going to make sure the other cells have the new nanites and you’ll handle damage control from the Andorian mission.”
Seraphim nodded, “Consider it done. And Archangel, I am sorry for questioning your leadership. It’s just…”
“We haven’t suffered a failure prior to this,” Archangel said. “I know, trust me I know Thompson seems like a mistake, but I think with time he may come around and become an asset for us…whether he wants to or not.”
Seraphim smiled thinly as he and Archangel then went over the rest of the debriefing from the last mission…
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