From jeffj@baudelaire.princeton.edu Fri May 1 09:07:47 1998 Date: Tue, 21 Apr 1998 06:50:30 -0600 From: "Jeffrey J. Jenkins" To: INDIGO FLEET List Serve Subject: [INDIGO] Attack on Tabillin ---OFFICIAL INDIGO FLEET TRANSMISSION--- FMD : 3.0001 Scene : Tabili Nebula Timeframe: 36 hours after the destruction of the LEXINGTON by Dalriadan forces The Tabili Nebula was nothing more than a huge gaseous cloud in space to the casual astronomer a number of light years away. The elliptical shape of the cloud had long enchanted inhabitants of many nearby worlds in the night sky, but they thought nothing more of it than any other big, prominent celestial body. But to certain people, it was much more than something pretty to look at. For those civilizations advanced enough to venture inside the Tabili Nebula knew it was more than mere eye candy. If one were to enter the relatively small corridor which allowed merchant vessels to pass in and out of the gaseous shell which surrounded a star called Tabili, one would encounter an entire solar system and associated spacefaring traffic... an entire civilization once isolated from the rest of the region by the enveloping nebula. A civilization yanked from the dark ages by the arrival of the Dalriada, the Federation, and all of their commercial interests. For a single planet captured the attention of even the most amateur trader... the planet of Tabilin. Tabilin was home to the native Cabbali as well as the source of nearly one-third of INDIGO Fleet's dilithium supply. Concerned about smugglers and pirate activity attracted to the heavy merchant traffic in the system, the Federation had set up a commerce inspection outpost on the planet several years ago. In the capital city of Helak, Tabilin... where many Federation merchants set up shop, providing equipment, supplies, housing, and other services to the large amount of traders which passed in and out of the system on a routine basis... stood the only Star Fleet presence on the planet. Attached to the outpost were a small fleet of runabouts, and after the investigation performed by the USS HOOD 21 months ago, two frigates had also been assigned to patrol duty -- the USS WODEN and the USS AMALTHEA. After Commander Sheila Dalton was removed as CO of the inspection post by the crew of the HOOD, who found her guilty of accepting bribes from the Dalriada, the outpost personnel were placed under the command of one of the fleet's top-performing officers, Commander Harold T. Hawkins. Hawkins had turned the command around from a corrupt bunch of slackers to the finest inspection task force in Tabilin history. He knew every square kilometer of the system, and had shut down several smuggling rings and apprehended seven known pirates since his arrival. The Tabili Nebula was completely under his control, and everything was now running in accordance with Star Fleet directives for the system. He had worked long and hard to train his personnel, and he was confident that there was nothing they couldn't handle. Knock on wood... ______________________________________________________________________________ Scene: Operations Center, Federation Outpost at Helak, Tabilin Commander Hawkins arrived for Alpha Watch in the OPS Center with his morning cup of coffee. After performing a short turnover, he relieved his previous watch officer and took a seat in the center of the room. Around him, communications personnel sat at their consoles, coordinating the efforts of the entire inspection fleet through the whole system. On the previous watch, they had been tracking a vessel suspected of smuggling illegal substances which had emerged from the nebula wall. All traders were required to use the corridor through the nebula and submit to a inspection before continuing into or out of the system, so passing through the nebula wall was always a bit suspicious. On the walls, screens displayed the status of each vessel in the fleet... shield and damage indicators, weapons readiness gauges, and other important data. At the front of the room, a large viewscreen showed a sanner image of the system and its associated symbols for targets, friendlies, and unknowns. "Sir, I'm detecting a spatial anomaly at the edge of the system, just inside the nebula wall. Bearing 234 mark 45," called out the sensor operator. "Thank you, Mr. Higgins," replied the commander. "Send the nearest unit to investigate." "Runabout Three, this is Helak. We've just picked up a spatial anomaly in your area... transmitting the coordinates now. Proceed to the anomaly and investigate." [[Runabout Three here... order acknowledged. Proceeding to waypoint. Three out.]] "What do you think it is, sir?" Higgins asked, turning to face CDR Hawkins. "Probably just a sensor malfunction. Let's see what Three comes up with," he replied. _____________________________________________________________________________ Scene: Spatial Anomaly, Tabili Nebula Cosmic gases swirled around the hole in the fabric of space as light began to stab through the opening. Slowly, but steadily, the hole became a tear... then a rip... then a gash... increasing in size at an exponential rate. Before long, the opening was large enough to swallow a small shuttlecraft. The gases continued to swirl as arcs of energy sizzled across the opening, stretching it as it became wider. If one could look directly through the expanding perforation in the fabric of space and perform a spectral analysis on the star that was at the other end, one could determine the system from which it originated. It was a system that was many light-years away right now... a gateway from it appearing inside the Tabili Nebula because the artificial forces which were causing space to fold brought the two locations closer together than they could ever naturally be. Runabout Three reached the mysterious spatial anomaly just as it became large enough to engulf a GALAXY-class starship. The pilot strained to look into the anomaly, only to be temporarily blinded by the starlight shining through until the computerized light filters built into the window of the craft could compensate. Suddenly, without warning, the hole stretched to its final size. Just as Runabout Three began taking sensor readings of the anomaly, several vessels were detected by the craft's scanners. "We've got incoming objects from the other side of that wormhole!" the pilot shouted to the Runabout commander, a junior lieutenant recently assigned to the inspection force. "Helak, this is Runabout Three. We're staring at what appears to be some sort of wormhole. A number of vessels appear to be travelling through the anomaly... I'm getting too much interference to determine the exact number or size. It's almost as if the interference is specifically pinpointing our sensing systems," the lieutenant reported. [[Three, your communication is breaking up. We can barely hear you... are you being scrambled?]] Hawkins asked. "Unknown, sir..." the Runabout commander replied. The pilot brought some new information to his attention, which made him almost speechless. "Commander... power readings from the emerging vessels are a 90 percent match for the wave pattern recorded by LEXINGTON," he announced. After a moment of hesistation, he added, "But they read as much more powerful, sir." At that precise moment, three Dalriadan battlecruisers emerged from the event horizon in perfect formation. Although they matched Federation light cruisers in displacement, each could probably survive a sustained engagement with a ZEUS-class battleship. The lead ship locked onto the Star Fleet runabout with only a fraction of its array of forward-mounted plasma bolt projectors and vaporized her instantly... before any more communication could take place. ______________________________________________________________________________ Scene: Operations Center, Federation Outpost at Helak, Tabilin Commander Hawkins watched as the indicators for Runabout Three shot all the way up to red and then disappeared from the display screen. "We just lost Runabout Three, sir!" someone reported, pointing out the obvious. "What the hell...?" was the commander's response, as he stared in awe at the three huge blips emerging from the anomaly symbol on the tactical map of the system. Suddenly, the three huge blips scattered out and turned into dozens of smaller blips. Seconds later, they formed into one gigantic blip. The target pattern kept changing. "Countermeasures, sir. They're interfering with our sensors... tricking us into seeing an incorrect number of vessels of inaccurate displacement information," a technician explained. "They appear to be heading towards Tabilin." "Send the nearest frigate to intercept, and order the other units to defend the planet. Transmit an evacuation notice to all merchant vessels," Commander Hawkins directed. "Go to GQ." In instantaneous response, red alert klaxons were sounded throughout the outpost, in addition to the announcement: [[General quarters, general quarters... this is not a drill. All hands, man your battle stations. General quarters.]] "Acknowledged, sir. The AMALTHEA is moving to intercept." "Hail the hostile vessels." "No response, sir." "Open all communications frequencies..." "Wide-band transmission channel open, sir." "This is Commander Harold T. Hawkins of the Federation Commerce Inspection Task Force. Identify yourselves and your intent." [[This is His Majesty's Battlecruiser WORMWOOD, Royal Dalriadan Navy. The Dalriadan Alliance grows tiresome of your presence in this region. Prepare for battle, Star Fleet.]] The fleetwide alerts had been correct... the Dalriada wanted war. And because they had one of INDIGO Fleet's highest officials on their payroll, they knew just where to strike. To Hawkins' right, the shield indicators on one of the frigates disappeared and the damage indicators flooded with the color of blood. The representation of the frigate then disappeared from the display before the USS AMALTHEA could transmit vital tactical data on the invasion force obtained from her ORACLE IIr sensor system. "We just lost the AMALTHEA!" "Lord Almighty!" Hawkins cried out. "What the hell are they using? How many of them are there?" "Sir, they just tore up a CHARON-class frigate like it was nothing... we've got to get out of here! We don't stand a chance!" "Commander, the USS WODEN and the remaining runabouts are requesting permission to intercept and attack," his XO announced. "Denied... they stay and defend the planet," Hawkins decided. "Contact OMEGA... tell them we're under attack by the Dalriada... size of force unknown, at least one battlecruiser." Unfortunately, the Dalriada were outputting massive directed communications interference that the outpost could not cut through. "At their current velocity, the attacking fleet will arrive in approximately 10 minutes, sir." Alarms and klaxons still rang in the distance, adding to the tension and mass hysteria in the operations center and all throughout the outpost. "Cut off those alarms!" Hawkins shouted. _____________________________________________________________________________ Scene: Bridge, USS WODEN The WODEN was a VALHALLA-class frigate assigned to regional patrol in the Tabilin system after Captain Steven Kawahara of the USS HOOD recommended a greater Star Fleet presence in the area to combat pirate and smuggling activities. Although she was much less powerful and versatile than her GALAXY-class cousins, the WODEN could hold her own against the typical pirate vessel or rouge merchantman when necessary. However, watching the AMALTHEA's indicator drop from the tactical display nearly immediately upon contact with the invading forces gave the crew of the WODEN enough reason to doubt her capabilities. The WODEN and the remaining runabouts had maneuvered themselves into a extended wedge formation between the incoming Dalriadan warships and the planet, preparing for a battle they knew they had very little chance of winning. Commander Gregory Erwin, skipper of the USS WODEN, shifted uncomfortably in the center seat as he waited for the Dalriada to come into weapons range. On his command, the wedge of ships would advance, with the runabouts on the ends of the wedge wrapping around to flank the attacking forces. They had already seen what would happen in an one-on-one engagement, so their only hope would be to overwhelm the Dalriada with a large amount of small, maneuverable targets. Unfortunately, the Dalriada had a similar idea. "Sir, the Dalriada have launched dozens of projectiles at us. Impact in two minutes," reported the tactical officer. If these were the seeker drones Erwin had read about in Fleet Intelligence Report, soon the fire control systems of the Federation ships would be overloaded with the small and agile agents of destruction. ECM equipment or phaser emitters could be installed on each... a healthy mix of both types of drones would produce a virtual cloud of devastation which would be near impossible to target and destroy. "Arm torpedoes... set to detonate on remote operation. Target the incoming projectiles," Erwin ordered. He knew the WODEN's phasers would be useless against so many targets... even if the pulse phasers were switched to local operation by the gunner's mates, but if he could destroy enough of them with a few well-placed photon torpedoes... they might stand a chance. A pair of quantum flux torpedoes blasted out of the forward tubes every three seconds and streaked across the dark void of space, leaving short, glowing trails behind them as they raced toward the incoming cloud of Dalriadan seeker drones. Just as the pair or torpedoes entered the swarm of rapidly approaching computer-controlled projectiles, Erwin gave the command to detonate. The resulting explosion instantly vaporized the drones which were located closest to the center of the blast. However, they were spaced out distantly enough such that 75% of the drones still remained. Another pair of torpedoes entered the mass of seekers less than three seconds later, once again producing a huge fireball which consumed another fraction of the offensive devices which would soon reach the small defense fleet. The crew of the WODEN hoped that their ECM systems would be enough to drive the surviving drones away after failure to achieve a target lock. "Sir, the Dalriada have launched projectiles with a different set of energy signatures than the first wave. They appear to be Pulverizer missiles," announced the stoic Vulcan TAC officer. The Dalriadan Pulverizer missiles were deadly indeed... they typically carried bomb-pumped phase modulated x-ray laser warheads. When the one-megaton fusion bomb exploded some distance away from its intended target, the energy created was enough to pump a large, coherent, powerful x-ray beam which melted right through shields and vaporized anything in its path. This included ablative armor, officers' quarters, computer systems, and the worst of all scenarios... warp cores. As subsequent torpedo detonations reduced the incoming fleet of seeker drones down to around a dozen, they passed inside torpedo range and began to swarm towards the multiple Federation targets. Amidst sufficient interference from the Dalriadan signal-jamming, but mostly comprehensible due to the relatively short range, the following transmission from the outpost was heard: [[USS WODEN, this is Helak. Engage and destroy targets at will. Good luck.]] "Set shields to full power... let's give them something to think about," Commander Erwin instructed. "All ships, execute maneuver Erwin-Delta-8!" he transmitted to the runabouts as the WODEN lurched forward, steadily increasing velocity and heading right for the incoming battlecruisers. The runabouts on the ends of the wedge began to spread out in order to envelop the Dalriadan vessels in a flanking movement at the appropriate time. As the ships passed through the remaining wave of seeker drones, they momentarily got caught up in a crisscrossing web of phaser fire as the devices managed to achieve lock-on through the ECM interference. Phaser blasts struck the shields of a few of the ships. The drones swivelled around and began to chase after the Star Fleet vessels almost as soon as they passed. Another pair of torpedoes spat out from the WODEN, trying to catch as many of the Pulverizer missiles in the resulting detonation as possible. As the explosion cleared, several remaining missiles emerged from the cloud of destruction and headed towards the frigate. From behind, the seeker drones began to catch up with the defense fleet and began striking at their aft shields with their phaser bursts. Suddenly, huge fusion explosions shattered area in front of the USS WODEN as the Pulverizer missiles began to pump out their deadly stream of phase modulated x-ray energy. Cutting directly through the shields, klaxons began to screech as the hull was breached on several decks. One lucky beam sliced right through the warp core, instantly destroying the WODEN before her crew could even figure out what had happened. As the flanking runabouts came into position, they began to close the wedge around the Dalriadan warships and closed in for their futile attack. The battlecruisers on either side of the lead vessel suddenly turned on their sides, exposing their undersides to the flanking runabouts as they started raking the Dalriada with phaser fire. However, no damage occured to the Dalriadan vessels for the gravity wave fields which covered their dorsal and ventral sides were able to harmlessly dissipate the phased energy which struck them. Before the runabouts could determine the next angle of attack, the battlecruisers returned to their normal configuration and opened fire with a tiny fraction of their broadside armaments. Gatling phaser bursts and particle cannon discharges arced across outer space, finishing off the rest of the Star Fleet vessels in the system. _______________________________________________________________________________ Scene: Operations Center, Federation Outpost at Helak, Tabilin Commander Harold Hawkins stared blankly at the completely darkened display screens which indicated the status of the vessels under his operational and administrative command. None of the indicators for any of the ships remained lit. All of the communications frequencies were dead silent. The usual low-level chatter over the commlinks was gone, producing an eerie quietness Ops had never experienced before. One of the battlecruisers had entered orbit and was now interfering with communications to Starbase OMEGA. A plasma bolt or a Pulverizer missile from orbit would be enough to destroy the outpost... and Hawkins was half-expecting to be instantly fried at any moment. But the Dalriada apparently didn't want to destroy the outpost... <> announced the computer. "Sir, they're beaming in personnel!" "Send out security teams and prepare to neutralize computer systems!" Hawkins shouted back as he reached for a Type II hand phaser. Off in the distance, small explosions and weapons discharge could be heard. Screams of pain and agony echoed through the corridors. As the outpost was merely an administration and communications headquarters for the inspection task force, they were not outfitted with Marines or any sort of missile systems with which to attack orbiting vessels. "Security Team Alpha reports contact in Sector Two, sir." "On screen," he commanded. The viewscreen switched from the tactical display to a view from a audio/visual sensor in Sector Two just in time to see a large squad of Dalriadan shock troops, clad in their characteristic metallic-gray ablative armor and carrying particle beam carbines, systematically cut down the rest of Security Team Alpha. The last man dropped to the ground, clutching at several sizzling holes in his chest. "Do we have the computers neutralized yet?!" Hawkins demanded. Standard procedure for an impending takeover of the outpost was to clear all information from the computers, which contained large quantities of tactical and strategic data which could become very dangerous if it fell into the wrong hands. "I'm trying, sir!" exclaimed a technician as he fed the command into the computer. Just then, the doors to the operations center burst open and neural blast rifle pulses, which did not damage non-living material, shot across the room. Shock troops rushed in through the hatch and blasted the technician trying to clear the computer. Almost instantly, his nervous system was flooded with intense, agonizing pain as his neurons fired simultaneously. He dropped to the deck, convulsing violently as the burning sensations tore through his nerves. The Star Fleet personnel fired back with their hand phasers, but they were grossly outnumbered and wouldn't be able to hold out for long. Commander Hawkins weighed the consequences of the Dalriada gaining access to the outpost computer system against the lives of his subordinates, and then made the command decision to destroy the computer core itself, located just underneath the main viewscreen, with his phaser. The next thing everyone in the operations center saw was a blinding, intense white light... and then complete nothingness. While the Dalriada had not gained access to Star Fleet computer files due to the heroic actions of Commander Harold T. Hawkins and the brave men and women of the Tabilin Commerce Inspection Task Force, they now controlled the Tabilin system... the primary source of dilithium in the region. Respectfully submitted, Jeffery D. Trock aka Rear Admiral James Phaser, Executive Officer, INDIGO Fleet --- FMD 3.001 Dalriadan forces invade Tabillin System destroying all opposing forces and capturing the base within 5 hours. Jamming prevents a distress signal from warning INDIGO Fleet Command. +------------------------------------------------------------------------+ | Midshipman Jeffery D. Trock, USNR Cornell University NROTC | | Web Page URL: http://www.people.cornell.edu/pages/jdt7/index.html | +------------------------------------------------------------------------+ ***This message sent by an official member of Indigo Fleet*** Are you also posting your message to the newsgroup?!!! ---END TRANSMISSION---