[Galaxy] 2159.05.19 - On the Bridge - JL - Cmd/Eng/COMMs/Med/Armory

[naschell at comcast.net]

// Challenger Bridge \\ 













"Incoming!" Samantha yelled over the noise. She was pretty sure her left ankle was broken after that last knock to the floor, but since it didn't interfere with her duties, she just hung on and did her job. She wouldn't show weakness! 

"Evading!" Bingham shouted, his hands moving over his console, his eyes flicking from the main viewscreen to the sensor outputs on his desktop. 

"Brace!" Samantha hung on as one of the shots got lucky and hit the ship on the underside of the dish, leading edge. "That hit the starboard water storage tank," she said. "We're, er, venting water." It immediately froze. A sparkling glitter of ice clouded the front of the ship, then seemed to whip backwards as Bingham flew on through it. 

"DAMMIT," Bingham was frustrated. The ship's movements were sluggish and he was taking every hit as a personal blow to his flying skills -- and thinking of the damage and casualties he was feeling partly responsible for. 

"Enemy status," T'Pren said. "How many are left and where are they, Mister Williams." She was continuing by will alone. Her heart rate was once again over 500 bpm. Blood loss had her heart trying to deliver oxygen where it needed to go with roughly half the normal volume. She no longer asked for ship's status. The response took too long and it was just as easy to say, 'we're all torn to hell'. 

"Numerous targets across the grid, ma'am ... but some of the sensors have taken damage and I'm getting holes in the readouts. Piping all information I've got down to Commander Hanley," Samantha replied. 

"McDonald to engineering, we're starting to lose power again." He turned his attention to the first officer . "Sub Commander, with the power we have left, you have a choice. Hull plating and structural integrity or propulsion." 

=/\= Cara's voice came back over the comm "Where do you want it." She asked looking at the power fluctuations all over the ship. She started coughing again. =/\= 

That was an easy one. "Propulsion," T'Pren replied. At least, being able to maneuver, they'd have a chance at avoiding attack. If she chose polarization, they'd sit there and eventually be pounded into dust when the shielding failed. "Keep us moving, Lieutenant ." 

// In Engineering \\ 

Cara heard the Sub Commander's statement "Propulsion it is." She closed the connection and began routing power to the propulsion systems. They might buckle but they would be able to move. Touching the comm panel again "Mr. McDonald you should have more power to propulsion. I've given you everything I can. We're reaching critical here." 

// Bridge \\ 

McDonald saw power readouts climb slightly, but it was a shadow of the ship's normal power output. "It will be enough to move us, but we will not be able to maneuver at the rates we were doing earlier. Helmsman , keep it under a five degree per second roll rate and we might be able to keep our port nacelle." 

"Got it!" Bingham reduced speed in favor of power to control mechanisms. They didn't need much speed if they could maneuver, so he used his allotment of power more for that than anything else. 

Liza managed to stabilize the Captain and looked around the Bridge and quietly wondered how Keaffer was doing. She notice T'Pren bleeding again and made her way over to her and without saying anything, she added another bandage to the laceration. 

T'Pren started to jerk her head away from Liza's hands, but when she realized what the doctor was doing she held still. 


Chris was standing by in a daze. Without a station to handle communications, and half deaf from the ear piece overload, there wasn't a whole lot he was good for at the moment. 

Liza went over to Chris to check on him. There wasn't much she could do for him at this point except for pain relief. She held on as the ship dove again this time she fell to the floor and felt her wrist snap. Muttering oaths under her breath, she continued to make rounds of the Bridge. 

Vic fired another round of torpedoes, mostly the regular ones. He tapped the comm button and said, "We're running low on torpedoes down here. Pretty soon we'll be all out." 

Pressing the button on the CO's chair, T'Pren replied, "I know that you will choose your targets wisely, Commander. Previous orders stand. Fire at will as long as we have weapons to use. Engineering will make sure you have power," she added, with a glance at McDonald. 

"Incoming!" Williams shouted. "Romulan vessel off the stern!" 

McDonald frantically shifted power to the rear hull plating, doubtful that it could do more than keep the pieces of the ship in a tight group. He braced himself against his console as hard as he could. 

Vic replied, "Aye ma'am." He then continued to fire the pulse cannon, with an emphasis on protecting Challenger's stern. 

"Damage to enemy ship, forward shields down to 27%," Samantha said, hanging on. "They're firing disruptors ... the Freedom is intercepting!" The Challenger shuddered a bit but not too badly. "We took that pretty well, hull polarization handled it, but we're down to 30% astern." 

"Chris," T'Pren said, her eyes finding him through the smoke and in the red emergency lighting. He looked over at her. "We have to communicate with the rest of our strike force. Is there any way you can facilitate that." She looked at the COMMs console. It was practically a melted lump of slag. 

Stingley blinked for a moment, still bracing himself against the last rumble, overwhelmed by the immense danger they were in. In light of it all he was giving in to his nervous nature and crumbling under the pressure. He was far too young to die. 


T'Pren's voice cut through the fog of war thickening in his mind. He paused for a moment as he processed the thought. Communicate? Fleet? "Yeah...um...Yes. I can......um....where's Sattal?" He turned on his heel and headed for the communications array, tapping the comm button on the science station as he walked by. "Stingley to anyone who can hear this. I need a Comm Tech to the communications array access on the double." 

=/\= "Sattal here! I'm on my way, ETA five minutes!" =/\= 

The ship was approaching the point of no return, and every readout from engineering signaled doom. "Sub Commander, we are damn close to a warp core breach. Coolant levels are extremely low, and the fractures in the reactor are approaching critical. We will not survive another hit to the stern. I recommend we withdraw from of the battle area immediately." McDonald's panel lit his face with an eerie flashing red light as he stared directly at the injured Vulcan. 

It seemed that everything and everyone on the bridge stopped. Time seemed to slow to a trickle. T'Pren felt it as everyone who could turned to look at her, awaiting her response. On her part, T'Pren looked at the Captain. He was still out, sprawled on the deck, not moving. She didn't want this decision. That was illogical, however, as it WAS her decision. As she considered the problem, they took a hit to starboard, but again it wasn't so bad. 

"Freedom again running interference, SubCommander!" Samantha shouted from the SCI console. 

That was what they needed. The Freedom must be aware of their condition. The Challenger's firepower was necessary for Alpha Group's survival. If they left the fight, the other ships would be targeted and probably be destroyed. She turned once again to Chris. "Mr. Stingley," she said, "do we have contact with our sister ships ?" 

Chris had opened up the damaged Comms console and was working on trying to jury rig a circuit bypass, siphoning off some of the less critical internal comms circuits. Sparks flew as he accidentally touched a wire that wasn't supposed to be hot. His hand jerked back reflexively. "Still working on it, T'Pren!" he shouted nervously as he shook off the pain. The fright was obvious in his voice, but he was managing to fight through it. 


"Quickly as you can, Mr. Stingley," came the calm response. 


Sattal showed up about that time. He took one look at the damage on the bridge and froze. He didn't have much of a pause, though, as Chris rushed over and tapped him on the shoulder. "Man comms. I have to crawl back in the access and rewire the circuits from there." 


"Aye," Sattal answered as the LCmdr rushed off without waiting for confirmation. He looked at the melted console. What a mess, it was practically unrecognizable. A light blinked to life on the otherwise darkened comms console. Sattal tapped a few buttons and analyzed the status. "Looks like the Commander managed to rig the communications, Sub Commander." 



"Good. Mr. Sattal, convey the following message to the rest of Alpha Group , using our emergency channel, scrambled: 'Challenger situation dire. Require regroup of Alpha ships our location.' Send it now, Lieutenant." 


Sattal repeated the message as ordered. He looked up from the station as Chris stepped back onto the bridge. "Message sent, Sub Commander. Waiting for a response." 


"It's weak, but they should hear it," Chris added. He prayed they could hear it anyway. 


"Mr. McDonald, can you hold us together, at least until we get a response?" T'Pren turned to look at him. She knew that the LAST thing anyone wanted to do was turn tail and run. The Romulans would probably chase them down anyway, but to be taken out in the act of retreating was not something she wanted to contemplate. If the rest of Alpha Group would act as their shields, they could concentrate on taking out the enemy with the rest of their weapons. 

He sighed, pressing the controls in a barrage of short sequences. "I'll do what I can. I'm barely staying ahead of a cascade of failures throughout the ship. As a precaution, I recommend we evacuate the wounded and non-essential personnel proceed to the escape pods. We may not have much time to do it later." 

// In Engineering \\ 

Cara saw on her computer what Rick was doing on the Bridge and was doing virtually the same thing in main engineering. She had ordered the main bay evacuated and told those still walking to take the wounded to the escape pods on the Engineering deck. She watched as the last of her crew left with the exception of Nelson "I'm not leaving ma'am. You need one other person." 

Cara nodded "Fine. I'm lowering life support in here again. Grab a jacket." She touched her communications panel =^=Mr. McDonald, trying to send you a bit more power. Rerouting life support from the seriously damaged areas that have breaches and main engineering. I've evacuated main engineering and sent the wounded to escape pods.=^= Cara looked around as she paused for a moment =^=You should have that power now.=^= Cara said as her hands flew across the console and tried to stop the cascades that were happening in front of her. 

// Bridge \\ 

The readout from engineering was not insignificant, but the ship was still in serious danger. "Structural integrity is hovering at 30%, with minimal power to propulsion. Moving beyond .7c could push us beyond the safety limits with this level of damage." He didn't bother to add that it would be impossible to go to warp speed in their present state if the battle was lost. Limping away at impulse would be a death sentence. 

"Thank you, Mr. McDonald," T'Pren answered. The Engineering department was second to none. 

"Ma'am! The rest of the ships are closing in on our location! Aphrodite , Neptune , and Soyuz to starboard ... Pearl Harbor , Nightingale , and Hornet to port ... Vanguard and Luddington above and below ... Freedom is aft and Pacific is at our bow!" Samantha sounded very excited as she gave her report. She grinned through the pain of her broken ankle. 

"Excellent," said T'Pren. =/\= "Mr. Hanley, friendlies will be marked on your screens. Utilize all remaining weaponry and continue firing at will." =/\= 

"Mr. Bingham, steady as she goes." 


This secondary epic post also fearlessly constructed by: 

Lt Richard McDonald 
EO 
-------------------------- 
LtCmdr Cara Nelson-Samad 
CEO 
-------------------------- 
LtCmdr Liza Rowe 
CMO 
-------------------------- 
LtCmdr Chris Stingley 
CCO 
-------------------------- 
SubCmdr T'Pren 
XO/CSO 
-------------------------- 
Cmdr Vic Hanley 
CAO 
====================== 
NX-04 Challenger, Alpha Group 
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