Background Noises

Posted on Wed Mar 2nd, 2016 @ 2:42pm by Captain Christina Curtis & Ensign Tybald Jeune & Ensign Chloe Bishop

Mission: Begin with a Bang
Location: Discovery Bridge
Timeline: May 15th, 2155 - 1600hrs

Bridge duty wasn't always as glamorous as the stories they told of Enterprise and Columbia. It seemed as if something exciting happened to them every week. But Starfleet never talked about the hours of sitting on the bridge, monitoring subspace and radio frequencies for anything out of the ordinary. Still, after the tense period of fear of sabotage, Chloe was reassured by the hum of the deck plates as Discovery was once again at warp.

She had settled back into her station and once again took up monitoring duties, listening for any interesting transmissions. Something odd came up on her scanners. It was a low power broadcast on a non-standard bandwidth, and the message was not coming in clear. Any one of those would have attracted her attention, but all three, well, that was worth investigating. Bishop trained the ship's receivers towards the source of the transmission. "Captain, I'm picking up something odd. It's a message of some sort from an ECS freighter judging by the frequency, but the low amplitude made me almost miss it. It sounds like a distress call, but it's not a very high powered signal. What's even weirder is that this freighter was due to be at Deneva with food supplies three days ago."

Christina knew that this was no coincidence. With their mission in mind, and with a freighter that was already supposed to be at Deneva by now with supplies on an intercept course and sending out a distress call, the two could only ever be connected. "Can you open a frequency to whoever is on the line?"

Chloe nodded. "It's not the ship's main communication line, but I think I can open a channel."

"Do it," the captain ordered.

Over the bridge speakers the hushed tones of a whispering man came through in curt and well enunciated tones. A rich tenor to his voice it almost sounded comical as he spoke in deep timbre.

"...Ensign Tybald La Jeune, acting commander of the Commercial Freighter "Pasqaule" NC-45-11. I am operating under Starfleet Order 2005, regulation 46A, requesting contact with any Starfleet or trade conference delegations inbound to Deneva. Repeat...

Tal had to remember the books that were recently thrown at him, SO2005 was an order indicating the destruction of a ship through containment failure, in order to avoid its capture. 46A indicated the nature of the broadcast could be compromised... the Ensign didnt name them in his broadcast and allowed them to retain an element of surprise....

He made a point to speak before the Captain could reply, they could use this officers cunning to their advantage and get very close without raising alarm.

"Captain Curtis, recommend Tactical alert, and minimize our hull profile through refractive polarization? Mr. La Jeune has allowed us to retain autonomy and if we can further mask our energy signatures more to that of a freighter we can attempt a trilateral adjustment to our present course allowing us to come very close without raising suspicion. Replying to the message under 46A indicates enemy agents may well receive any message."

"Refractive polarisation?" Curtis asked, looking over towards the Andorian.

"We use the grid to modulate the return signal from long scans, we will respond with a somewhat unclear result of a different vessel entirely from that of an NX Cruiser. Though the modifications will diminish our defensive strength, we can pass at long range scans under guise.

She had heard of the technique in a few reports, but as far as she knew it had never been applied to the hull polarisation of an Earth ship. "If you can get it to work with our systems, do it. Take us to tactical alert; Allison, plot the course alterations. Bring us down to warp three; any faster and it doesn't matter what we look like on their sensors, our speed will give us away."

Tal was speaking to Anziano on the other line, his fingers tapping as he spoke.

"There are no modifications needed, I just need to coordinate with engineering, We can approximate a Terran Sierra-Class Hull profile most closely I feel. .... Done.

Curtis nodded to Chloe to open the return channel. "Ensign La Jeune, this is Captain Connor," she said, affecting a fake name for whoever might be eavesdropping on the conversation. "We read you. What is your situation?"

| Freighter Pasquale -21 minutes left to Self-Destruct

Tybald had run a good gauntlet, but the bitter end was upon him. Two men, two weapons, and nowhere else to run. A slug gun pointed at his chest forced a curled lip as he recalled the low class weapons on too many occasions used by scum and raider types. The freighters and haulers of the new space age still had the perils and pitfalls of the old.

This time, the man holding the gun was different, intelligent, tactical... Unlike the rank and file goons so easily dealt with before him. He had played the game well and caught Tybald off guard. Though he felt these were the last two, the rest had been dispatched with a series of tactics, but the revels were at an end.

..."Do it already.. just end it!" Tybald snarled and yelled in frustration.

Trapped as he was in a dead end corridor with a deadly foe out of reach... rage was all he had. This tall and well dressed man had not spoken in the whole time they had been engaged in this tete a tete, but now he did. His pallid complexion was revealed in the direct light of the overhead lamp, the only one for this long stretch, a demarcation of sorts. Security armor and a long coat obscured most of him, even gloved hands rested on the butt of the gun, sitting in its holster still.

"I need information first. What does Starfleet know, and who are you... really? I did not expect an agent to infiltrate so effectively but you are here..." He motioned to the other anonymous raider, armed as well and sent him to detain Tybald, never letting the gun leave its target.

Tybald raised a malfunctioning hyper-spanner that made a threatening buzzing sound as the arc failed to stabilize. It was pure ploy, but the sparks and sounds made the thug look at his boss nervously. He pressed the moment for more information, to buy time that someone would heed his call. Piecing all he had to work with together he made a few educated guesses.

"We know you're hauling explosives to Deneva, and my mission was to stop it. So I've already succeeded whether you kill me or not."

By revealing a little he hoped to inspire curiosity for the rest. It paid off nearly instantly as the mysterious mans face dropped, visible even under shadow.

"Oh, you've succeeded have you? I'd say you are twenty percent correct in that."

Tybald tried to keep an even face, and only barely managed. Five bombs all together, was that what he meant? Continuing to brandish the hyper-spanner as though it were a weapon Tybald pushed on, "at least tell me what you're trying to accomplish blowing up Starfleet HQ on Deneva."

"Oh, not so keen on the details are we? It's the conference, Terra Prime has to send a message....

Then the speaker Tybald had wired specially came to life in response to the most curious signal he had sent not moments ago.

"Ensign La Jeune, this is Captain Connor, We read you. What is your situation?"

Tybald smiled, and both men froze in place. Before any further actions could occur he replied,

"Captain Connor..."

His eyes locked with the man behind the gun. The Channel was open, all sounds were being broadcast, he had taken the moment as his own for the time being...

"We are experiencing containment failure and require immediate evacuation, estimate twenty minutes at best. I'll prepare us for evacuation in the primary shuttle-bay."

The tension was on the rise, the other brute holding the gun was uncertain which direction to go and looked to his boss. A sharp communication sent the man scurrying to a wall panel and he spoke to someone. The click of the channel closing a moment later told Tybald they had found the circuit he was using. There were more than these two left... he had missed someone and they were routing his communication.

Despite realizing the peril he was in, Tybald coolly replied, "If they arrive and I'm dead from a gun shot you have some explaining to do. I can get us off this ship but that bomb stays here. It goes when the ship goes. Everything after that..."

"Everything after that, is no concern of yours. We can handle Captain Connor. They are in an unarmed cargo hauler, so I am afraid you're ruse has only gotten a few more people killed. A shame we will lose the bomb, but beween you and me, four will send the same message as five at the scales these things are involved in."

Tybald held his steady gaze, the smirk on the Terr Prime agent's face still worn with derision. These terrorists expected to take the poor Captain Connors ship... they were expecting a soft civilian ship to be on the way.... and "Captain Connor" had taken the improvisation over the comms perfectly. He allowed himself to hope, to pray he might see his mother, live to have kids, pursue his dreams...

"Do you have a shuttlepod you can evacuate in?" the voice said over the comm. channel. "If you do, get to it and we can pick you up when we drop out of warp. If not, get to an airlock; we can dock and evacuate you that way."

The man had gathered his wits and signaled Tybald to be silent. He exchanged a brief few words with his partner in hushed whispers.

He looked to Tybald with deadly Menace, "tell her we have no shuttle and our Warp sled will not detach safely. We can dock, that's all you say."

"Captain Connor, We can't eject our load without risking immediate failure, I'm afraid I was ghosting this trip as a pilot so this is the ship I left Earth in. No shuttle either."

"We will dock with your starboard airlock, then," Curtis said over the line. "Stand by to receive us, and be prepared to evacuate quickly." She nodded to Chloe to cut the channel.

"Get Dalton and a squad of MACOs to meet me at the airlock," she said, as she made her way off the bridge.