A Game of Bridges
Posted on 28 Feb 2021 @ 11:22pm by Admiral Zavareh Sepandiyar & Captain Corvus DeHavilland
Edited on on 14 Mar 2021 @ 10:33pm
Mission:
M1 - Emergence
Location: USS Alexander - Main Bridge
Timeline: Immediately Following Trifecta
2224 words - 4.4 OF Standard Post Measure
”My people, they’re ok?” Captain DeHavilland asked the Theseus’s transporter Chief as she hobbled back into the transporter room, still clutching Eindorf for support.
“Yes, ma’am,” the bald man nodded, “Only one major injury,” he explained, gesturing to Eindorf, “The other Marine. He’s in surgery now,” he offered hopefully, “Ma’am, I-I’m sure you’re eager to get back to your station but Doctor Corduke very specifically ordered that you report to Sick Bay to have that leg checked out.”
“Admiral Sepandiyar’s waiting for me. I need you to send me to the Alexander,” she answered with a shake of her head. She waved for the pad and Eindorf took her over, leaving her there supported against the bulkhead as he went back for the weapon and helmets they’d ditched when they’d come aboard initially.
“With respect, ma’am,” the Chief began.
“I understand what you’re trying to do. What your Doctor’s trying to do, Chief. But I need to see the Admiral. Tell Doctor Corduke I’ll see the Alexander’s doctor as soon as is possible,” she declared, “Please don’t make me order it, Chief,” she said with a pained expression.
The man looked at her, then to the bulkhead as if he was looking to Sick Bay and then finally back down to his terminal, “Aye, ma’am,” she said. He engaged the controls that activated the transporter and looked up for confirmation. When DeHavilland nodded, he powered it up and sent the two of them to the Alexander.
If there was one thing stuck out to her as different the moment that they materialized aboard the Alexander, it was that everything seemed somehow… larger. Corvus had been on large ships before, of course. She’d served a long time on the Praetorian, a Galaxy-class ship. She was used to being aboard the best the fleet had to offer, but this ship somehow managed to put that to shame and they hadn’t even left the transporter room.
“The Admiral’s waiting for you on the bridge,” the Alexander’s Transporter Chief smiled, gesturing to the door to the Bolian woman’s left. “Straight through and up the stairs.”
“Thank you,” Corvus nodded, stepping carefully off of the transporter pad just to see if she could managed. The pain was just short of excruciating and it took everything she could muster to stay upright long enough for Eindorf to support her.
“Are you ok, ma’am?” The Bolian Lieutenant hurried around her station quickly.
“I’ll be fine,” Corvus grimaced.
“You sure? I can send for Doctor Pembroke.”
“It’s fine, Lieutenant,” Corvus waved her off. Eindorf walked them to the doorway and once more ditched their helmets and weapons before proceeding through into a corridor that arched to the left. As expected, about three feet past the doorway on the left was a set of narrow stairs that led sharply up. Any other time it wouldn’t have bothered her, but just looking at them, Corvus could feel the pain in her knee. Instinctively she reached for the railing and then the two of them ascended as carefully as they could. Both of them stopped at the top of the stairs in awe of what they were seeing.
The transporter room had ‘seemed’ to be larger, but here on the bridge there was no doubting that it truly was. They were standing at the lip of a stairwell that opened out onto the massive command bridge of the Ascension-class vessel. The stairs forked to the right near the top, leading to a raised Tactical arch where several officers were hard at work directly behind the bridges center chair and command alcove. To the left was a three-officer science station and ahead in the center was a recessed alcove for the CoNN officers, once more arranged for three. Incredibly, there was a eight foot gap before another railing where another quintet of Officer’s were working on terminals facing aft. The truly striking thing to her, and perhaps what gave it the majority of its grand presentation was that there were hardly any bulkheads anywhere. Nearly the entire bridge was one clear view of the space around it. Aft she could long spine of the ship and fore, she could see the oblong saucer.
Her first thought was that it was all holo-projections onto the bulkhead. That it really wasn’t an unhindered view of the space beyond, but at a slightly closer look the officers at the aft stations had their terminals displayed at hand and then up on the glass as well so that their eyes never had to leave the space beyond. This truly was the pinnacle of Starfleet technology and it made sense for it to be an Admiral’s flagship. But she couldn’t help but wonder how much more efficient and effective the Praetorian or the Challenger could have been with kind of tech at their disposal.
“Captain DeHavilland?” A tall, broad, dark-skinned man spoke up, standing at the edge of the Command alcove. He easily dwarfed her in both height and physical presence but despite that he exuded a kind and gentle air. The man wore a full beard that had turned silvery gray, though the hair on his head had not. He held out a hand to her, looking to Eindorf uncertainly. “Curtiss Drake, First Officer. Welcome aboard.”
Corvus delicately shrugged off Eindorf and took a shaky step towards Drake to take his hand. Her leg buckled before she got to him and the larger man shot forward with speed she would not have expected out of him and caught her before she hit the deck. Eindorf grabbed for her shoulder a full second later.
“Commander De La Fuente, get Doctor Pembroke up here, now!” Drake ordered, helping Corvus up and helping her over to the auxiliary chair in the command alcove.
“Aye, Commander,” a bald-headed man in the Science alcove replied quickly.
Sepandiyar, who had been standing behind the CoNN alcove, issuing orders had surged forward at the sight of Corvus falling over and joined the two of them as he led her to the seat.
“Admiral,” she said, drawing herself up despite Curtiss now holding her up. “Reporting as ordered, sir.”
“Sit, Captain. Please,” Sepandiyar gestured emphatically.
“That’s duty longe down those stairs,” Drake whispered to Eindorf as he pointed. The Marine nodded and excused himself.
“Thank you,” Corvus smiled, gratefully taking the seat and keeping her right leg outstretched. She wasn’t sure exactly what she’d done to it, only that it was hurting worse every second and she could tell it was swollen as she could hardly bend the leg under her EVA suit at all.
“Colonel Rutland and his Marines are preparing to board the station. You said the Marines are holding Engineering?”
“That’s correct,” Corvus nodded. “The upper utility ring. Commander Quinn was just bringing the cores online. Captain Finn, our Marine liaison, said that the fighting was heaviest in Engineering and that it was our best bet to try and either get to him in the Cargo Bay near the bottom of the station or to the Infirmary. Doctor Mazur has half a Marine medical company with her.”
“Why did you leave the CIC?” Drake asked, as if that didn’t make sense.
“There was no way we were going to defend the CIC with me, the XO and twenty some-odd Junior Officers,” Corvus shook her head. “So we suited up, took environmental controls offline, and headed for the Marine’s in the Cargo Bay. We needed to be in a place of strength, not scattered about the station. That’s what they needed. Take us by surprise and prevent us from coordinating with one another.”
“Any indication as to who your saboteur might be?” Sepandiyar pressed.
“Admiral,” a man on the tactical arch behind the alcove called out, turning everyone to look at him. “Colonel Rutland’s reporting that his teams are ready.”
“Any last details you wish to give the Colonel?” Sepandiyar asked.
“My XO’s still on the station. She was going to try and access transporter control to try and assist the Marines.”
“How? Transport the boarding party out into space?” Drake asked, his tone clearly defining his opinion of that.
“She wanted to store them in the pattern buffers, but I told her no. If she could get it to work, I told her to start picking off who she could and screening out their weapons before she put them back. Whatever she could do to disrupt the assault and give the Marines the chance to counter attack,” she explained.
Sepandiyar folded his arms over his chest, looking to his right at the forward glass. The station was looming ever closer, just off to starboard, and all around the bridge was still very much alive. The actual fighting might have been finished but the energy throughout was still running high.
“I was summoned?” A voice cut the silence that had quickly fallen between them. Just the simple statement somehow seemed to convey a level of arrogance that she couldn’t remember ever hearing before. Was the statement simply dripping with it, or was it the way his crisp RP accent made it sound. Corvus looked to her left to see a brown-haired man in a white lab coat standing at the top of the stairs holding a medical kit in his right hand, with a cocksure grin on his face.
“Doctor, this is Captain DeHavilland of Obsidian Command. She’s injured,” Sepandiyar said, cocking his head to her and stepping back, looking to Drake. The Commander sensed the silent biddance and joined the Admiral for a quiet word.
“Evening, Captain. I’m Doctor Pembroke,” the man declared, looking her over. “Let’s have a look shall we?” He said. He set his med-kit down and produced a tricorder from his coat pocket. The man jabbed the scanner node on the top of the tricorder with his thumb so that it popped out and looked like it was going to get away, but he somehow caught it on his hand, rolled it along the back of his fingers and had it in hand, pointing it at Corvus with a flourish. “Elevated adrenals, slightly increased oxygenation…” he rattled off absently as he moved the node down, “Remarkably good health otherwise, well done, Captain,” he continued, now reaching the obviously outstretched knee. “And that’ll be it…” he said, now moving the scanner in a circle about her knee.
Corvus just watched him work, glancing over at Sepandiyar and Drake hopefully. A brown-haired man in Engineering yellow joined them a moment later and the three of them had a somewhat animated conversation about something before finally Sepandiyar came over to her. “Once Rutland secures Engineering, Commander Miller here and his teams are going to deploy onto the station. You should go with them,” he tried to smile, a feature that she got the impression didn’t play often on his face.
“I’m afraid not, Admiral,” Pembroke broke in, his nose still down in his tricorder, making circles with the node. He didn’t elaborate anymore and looked up, somewhat surprised that everyone was waiting on him. He gave another cocksure grin, “Captain DeHavilland has four stress fractures to her Fibula, torn ligaments throughout the knee, a dislocated kneecap and pretty substantial meniscus tears. She needs surgery to repair it all, and now. Before she does any damage to it I can’t repair easily.”
“How long?” Sepandiyar asked.
Pembroke shrugged, “Few hours at least. Perhaps more.”
“I need to make sure my people are safe, Doc,” Corvus countered almost pleadingly.
“A dock is where a ship makes berth, Captain,” Pembroke replied cooly. “And I’m afraid I must insist. There are no less than six other Captain’s in the general area, and one Commander Drake,” he smirked, winking slyly at the XO. “Your people are in good hands, and you’ll be no use to them if you can’t even stand up. Now. Anything you’d like to finish here? We’ll be transporting to Sick Bay. I won’t risk any further damage to your leg.”
Corvus looked mutinously at the man and then to the Admiral, who just heaved a resigned sigh. “We’ll keep you posted, Captain.”
“I… Admiral…” Corvus said, trying to get out of the chair to plead her case.
Pembroke put a firm hand on her shoulder as he tapped his commbadge, “Pembroke to Sick Bay, two for direct transport. Put the patient on the bio-bed. Energize.”
“Now wai-,” Corvus started to round on the man, but she was cut off. The transporter beam took hold of the two of them and in a moment they were gone from the bridge.
“I’ll arrange for a command terminal display in her bio-suite,” Drake offered the Admiral.
“Thank you,” Zavareh nodded, turning back to the station. He heaved a slow sigh, “Something’s not right here, Curtiss. All of this… it’s too…”
“Neat,” Drake finished.
“Baleh,” Zavareh answered affirmatively in his native Farsi. “Too, neat.”
