Engineering Under Fire

Posted on Sun Mar 31st, 2019 @ 10:32am by Captain Gary Taylor & Lieutenant JG Gallia Norris & Lieutenant Commander Turak & Petty Officer 1st Class Kaywin-Li Fray & Senior Chief Petty Officer Fernando De La Rosa [Taylor]
Edited on on Sun Apr 28th, 2019 @ 10:46am

Mission: Season 2: Episode 3: Determination is not always a good thing
Location: Cortic VI: Dunphy's Hideaway
Timeline: after Fight's On
5864 words - 11.7 OF Standard Post Measure

The team was assembled, they'd even been spared an extra engineer, now all that remained was to figure out how to get there and do what needed to be done. Liorga paced nervously, hoping the senior officers would come to a decision on what to do; time was of the essence: Syren was, most likely, already dead, the others were running out of time, somebody needed to make a decision. Do something, she thought, even if it's wrong.

Sami Justice could feel her mentor's nerves were on edge from the other side of the planet if she'd been there, but up close it was even more noticeable. She walked over and placed a hand softly on Liorga's shoulder, "It'll be okay, Chief." She swore, "We'll take this thing down and get your people freed."

"I'm sure you're right, Sami." Liorga nodded, even if she wasn't. But, if there was one thing you learned as a senior NCO it was never let the lower ranks know you're not one hundred percent confident in the plan ahead; she made a note to remember to teach Sami that later.

Mona was nervous. She had agreed to the plan because she was the logical choice. She had thought they'd need to figure out a way in without attracting attention. Now that wasn't going to work any more. The camera and microphone she was wearing wasn't needed, it was purely ornamental now. Mona just hoped they'd talk to her long enough, under the guise of wanting to spread the cure, that they could be overpowered. Just, with Liorga already gone, and her escape certainly having been noticed, she wondered whether they wouldn't just shoot her on sight. That was something she'd rather not experienced. But someone had to go, and now it was her. "Park close to the door, just not right in front of it, okay?" That way, Fernando could take the shot, if needed.

As he was pulling up, Turak made note of where Fernando was in relation of the building and made sure he would be able to take his shot if it became necessary. Turak also made sure to pull his medical uniform that he had borrowed over the pistol that he had tucked into his pants. "Here we go, ready?"

Anje, by rank becoming the de facto second in command of this suicide mission, stood alongside Taylor, helping decide exactly how they should go in to this situation, "Honestly, Sir, I think subtlety is going to be pretty much out." Anje began, "I mean, by this point these loons know Liorga is out, so they're out looking for her and probably also expect us anyway. We may just have to beam in and come out shooting." It wasn't an idea that appealed to her, but nothing else flew to mind.

Gary was thinking as Anje spoke, when she finished he answered. "You may be right but I hate to beam in, the transporter whine will give us away....unless." He paused as an idea came to mind. "We use the transporter as a diversion? We beam in cargo supplies first, and while these loons as you called them are looking at them, the assault teams beam in."

Mona tried her best not to let it show she was worried. As Turak pulled up near the entrance, she waited two seconds before opening the door of the vehicle. At least they hadn't opened fire immediately, so there was hope. "Good afternoon!" she called out to the guards in what she hoped was a tone reasonably cheerful enough not to seem suspicious. "I'm Mona Lott from Starfleet. I've come to distribute the cure to the infection that's been making the rounds. How many doses do you need? One per person." She hoped the others were getting the video feed.

"What's this then?" The guard, a hulking man with green hair and two different colored eyes said, "I better call the boss..."

As he exited the vehicle, Turak added, "Sir, this cure is a matter of life and death for anyone who is sick. It is important that it is distributed to those in need as soon as possible."

Gary looked at the others. He judged Mona and Turak to be at the Windchime. "Alright, It's time." He looked over to Fernando and Anya, "You know your jobs. Fernando, you watch Mona and Turak. Keep them safe. Anya you'll give covering fire to the Home Guard and the hostages. Anje, Gallia and I will take out the Windchime. Lets do this. Everyone comes back." He stressed.

Gallia checked the Webley tucked into her belt; the old revolver might not be modern like the TR-110 pistol, but it had an almost five century history of getting Norrises back in one piece and was, thus far, undefeated in that enterprise. That and she wasn't good enough with a 110 to feel comfortable with it in combat, but she wasn't going to tell anyone else that; Just imagine that, she thought, this lot of jokers findin' out an engineer struggles with a machine as simple as an autoloadin' pistol...

Liorga took her place alongside Gallia, a TR-116 slung over her back as she fought off a flashback to the Dominion War; I'll be dreaming about that again tonight, no doubt. She thought, sighing as she realized she now had a whole new set of nightmares. Beside her tool kit on her belt, she placed a long bladed fighting knife, having decided from the second they were cleared to go to plunge it into the belly of on Quinton Dunphy at the first opportunity.

Gary had a Heckler and Koch G36 slung over his shoulder and a combat knife inside his boot. He loved the ancient automatic weapon. It was short on a few of the more modern touches but it made up for it in reliability and precision firing.

Anje looked over the XO's weapon approvingly, "That's nice." She said, adding, "I, too, like to keep it old school. And Russian." She turned her back to show him the AK-47 she'd chosen, "Automatika Kalishnakov, Russia's best battle implement since Cossack swords."

He nodded with approval. "Thanks Anje. I like yours as well. Something to be said about reliability."

"A weapon's like a parachute," Anje began quoting her Aunt, "if it fails you once, it'll be the only time."

"Amen." He agreed. "I see you're familiar with the Admiral. That is one of her favorite sayings."

"Well, we do share a name." Anje laughed, she knew that Taylor and her aunt knew each other, though she didn't know how or how well, "Lot to live up to, that name." If he knows her well, he knows how large a shadow she casts, maybe he'll understand me better than most.

Walking over to the group, Kaylee had a hard shell backpack full of supplies including her equipment and was carrying a type III phaser rifle with a hand phaser on her belt. All she had been told was that she was assigned to a team on the surface and that she would be briefed on arrival. Feeling nervous as she saw the outdated weaponry most of the group were carrying, she gave a sigh and turned to her companion, a modified Exocomp, floating just behind her. “Well this looks interesting EX” she commented before putting on a brave face and stepping up to them. “Hi, I’m your friendly neighbourhood engineer Kaylee” she said, giving a friendly smile.

Anje looked her over, only taking her a second to realize that Kaylee didn't know about the countermeasures, "Welcome, Kaylee." She began, "You'll want to turn in those energy weapons though, get yourself a TR-116 if you don't have anything else. The defensive countermeasures on that cannon will disable energy weapons."

"Though, hopefully, you willnae need any of 'em." Gallia offered hope, "Hopin' we can get there, take it down, and bugger off as fast as we came in."

"Yes. I know you do." Gary said with a smile. His attention going to Kaylee as she walked over. "Get yourself some grenades as well." He told her as he looked over to Anje. "Grenades are always good."

Kaylee’s expression went from surprised, to confused, to thoughtful and finally back to a smile, “Ok sure, I think I’ve got just the thing” she said, turning to EX and opening an interface panel on the side of the Exocomp. After a moment, she removed the phaser from her belt and held both of the energy weapons in front of EX.

EX quickly scanned the weapons in front of it before dematerialising them using the micro replication unit it had installed. After a moment, the replicator reactivated and deposited a F88 Austeyr and an F1911 pistol with holster into her hands.

Strapping the pistol to her hip, Kaylee conducted a quick check over her new weapon before looking up at the others, “Is this more appropriate?”

"Much better." Gary answered, "Get some grenades as well." He gently reminded Kaylee.

Kaylee turned to Gary with an expression of confusion before turning to the Exocomp, “EX, can you create three non leathal grenades for me?”

EX made a series of beeps before replicating three flashbang grenades and dropping them into Kaylee’s hands, who put them into her backpack, “Anything else you think I need?” Kaylee asked.

"Do you feel comfortable with a knife?" Gary asked.

Kaylee though for a moment, “Oh wait, I’ve got something that may work” she said, rummaging through her backpack before pulling out a heavily modified knife with no hand guard but there was a small display mounted on the pommel, “it’s a tool I put together to access alien computer systems that aren’t compatible with Federation technology. If I insert the bladed end into the right place, it will bypass any security and create a link to my tricorder” she said, pulling out what was a standard tricorder but had been fitted with a multi reader designed to read various types of computer chips and data rods. “In case it’s not obvious enough, I like to tinker.”

"As long as it works." Gary observed.

"Stay out of the line of fire as much as you can", Anya told Kaylee. She wasn't impressed with all the toys the woman carried, or that she had come down with no clue as to what she was getting into either. Anya wasn't sure who to blame for that but it didn't look like she was dealing with a combat veteran there. For her own part, she held a knife, a pistol and a rifle with a bayonet mounted, though only a short one. Their technology was as simple as it was ingenious. Solid metal bullets were accelerated using magnetic coils in the barrel, in two separate settings. One was a subsonic, and thus quiet launch, and another was supersonic, for more power but also more noise. The TR-series, developed a little further.

Kaylee looked confused, "i'm not going to be in your way, I can actually fight."

"That's good, it might be needed", Anya said. "Just remember there are interference and dampening fields in place, your fancy toys might not work."

Anje stepped over and gave EX the once over, "Your little friend here is cute." She complimented, "When we get back can I get some details on him?"

“Um, yea sure thing. He’s nothing special, I’ve just made some improvements to the original model” Kaylee said, looking at EX, “hopefully I won’t need to repair him after this mission.”

"Just watch your ass and worry about your teammates, Fray." Liorga instructed, "And if we have to do emergency surgery on your buddy we'll all get our hands dirty helping you, okay?"

Kaylee smiled, “that would be great”

"Sir, I think it's as good a time as we can hope for." Anje informed Cdr. Taylor, "I think we should make our move now."

"Agreed." Gary answered firmly. "Alright everyone, you know your jobs. Lets get those hostages back and take down a big gun."

[Orbit of Cortic VI]

A positively ancient Merchantman vessel dropped out of warp over the planet, the Captain running a quick scan and motioning for the, for lack of a better word, owner to come to the console, "Mother Harila, it's every bit as bad as we've heard." Capt. Bob Fergie said, "I'm afraid beaming down supplies isn't the best idea. I'm sorry."

"It's alright, Captain." The Mother said comfortingly, "I know you're just looking out for the crew and the sisters. What can we do for those poor people?"

"We can safely and comfortably evac twenty-eight." Fergie answered, "Forty if we forego comfort for the passengers. A dozen more if we forego comfort for ourselves..."

"Will our food supplies hold up to that capacity until we reach a safe place for them?" The Mother asked; she wanted to help as many people as she could, but understood that logistics and supply were a thing.

"I've got a populated planet half a day out at maximum warp." Fergie stated, pointing to a dot on the console, "You'll have to negotiate getting them accepted by the natives. Failing that, we're less than a week from DS9. I think our supplies can hold up that long..."

"Very well, Captain." She nodded, "Please inform the Cortic authorities that we'll offer ourselves for evacuations."

"Yes, Ma'am." He nodded, turning to his comms officer to execute the command.

"Attention Home Guard and Allied vessels, this is the Sisters of Mercy charity vessel, SS Nightingale." Stacy Salmon, the comms officer, began, "We are ready to receive refugees. Please relay beam out coordinates..."

[Dunphy's Hideaway]

What they didn't know, they couldn't have known, was that Quinton Dunphy knew Starfleet was coming. Book learning wasn't an interest of his, but he knew enough to know how his equipment worked, and he had enough street smarts to expect a retaliatory attack once the bald bitch escaped. He'd expected all of this, well, all save for Syren's betrayal, but he'd put this bitch back in her place, same way he'd had to with Nancy before her.

"Whatcha want us to do, Quin?" Bull asked, he'd avoided capture along with the others when a Home Guard patrol, led by a Private Pike, got lost, taking a left when a right was in order. Stupid boy, he laughed to himself.

"Get the guys up in that big gun, mate." Quin ordered, "Blow that damn rescue ship outta the sky. That'll make 'em piss off for sure."

"Right." Bull obeyed, motioning the three man gun crew to their posts, "And the rest of us?"

"Get ready to defend the house, brother." He smiled, he was looking forward to this fight.

[Orbit]

The first refugees were now safe aboard the Nightingale, carrying what little they could save of their previous lives, and the sisters were helping them to the cargo hold, which was being busily converted into temporary living quarters. Mother Harila left the bridge, though she kept in contact with Capt. Fergie, waiting for news of the next beam out.

The bridge was buzzing, the crew of the Nightingale, some former Starfleet officers, but mostly untested civilian recruits, had not expected to be doing an evacuation from a disaster area today. Fergie, a decorated former Captain of a Defiant class ship, couldn't help but be a little proud of his crew at that moment, "How are we doing timewise?" He asked Salmon.

"Looks like we'll be at emergency capacity and able to break orbit in around thirty minutes, Captain." She replied. Stacy Salmon was eighteen, volunteering on the Nightingale out of high school while she figured out what she wanted to do with her life, and thought that this was the best day of it so far...

"Captain, we've got a huge energy reading, bearing..." T'Jal, the Romulan who served as Fergie's flight officer began, before an explosion of the console in front of him killed both he and the navigator, Erich Hamrin instantly.

Fergie looked on in horror as the explosion fed into a cascade of further explosions, engulfing the bridge in flames. Opening his comm channel, he instructed, "All hands, prepare to abandon ship..." before realizing nobody had heard him, the system was down, all the systems were down. The next explosion breached the hull, sucking poor Stacy Salmon into the void. Bob Fergie didn't have time to mourn her, or even to scream, as the next cascade of explosions took the ship out completely.

[Staging Area]

First there was a melodic sound, heard for miles, then there was fire in the sky, causing the assembled rescuers to turn their eyes to the Heavens, where a normally beautiful sky had become a picture of carnage, "Bloody Hell..." Gallia Norris muttered, not believing what she'd just seen.

"Oh, shit." Anje Brett lowered her head, turning to Cdr. Taylor, "Sir, they know what they've got..."

Gary turned and looked at her, fire in his eyes though his voice was colder than an arctic winter. "How did this happen? I thought all ships were warned away. Make sure they get the message this time."

Anje transmitted the message to all ships in the area on a repeating frequency, she had no clue why the unfortunate vessel hadn't gotten the original message though. She'd figure it out after they came home, she didn't have time now as she felt herself being beamed away.

[Front Door]

Mona ducked out of the way when the cannon was fired. She expected the guards to start shooting any second now, and didn't want to offer too tempting a target. "What was that?!" she exclaimed, looking at the guard. Maybe asking the question helped maintain her cover a bit longer?

"Don't you worry about that, love." The guard replied, standing aside to admit her. He hadn't bothered to see Dunphy at all, he didn't know if he had time. The fact was, he was sick. About six of them were, "Get in here, hey."

Mona called to Turak. "I'm going in to see how many need help." Then, looking at the guard, she asked, "How many humans are in here? Or human hybrids, for that matter? They'll each need a dose of this."

Walking in, Mona immediately noticed the crates of weapons stacked up on either side of the corridor, which hadn't been moved into secure storage for some reason. She played the role of not knowing what was what, even though she was familiar with most of these pieces from her training, and others from manuals. At any rate, her camera recorded all the evidence, so it would still be available if they should end up having to blow up the entire building. "You're preparing for a zombie outbreak or something?"

"You just keep your voice down and mind your business, Pretty Miss." He instructed, "The ones what you need ta see is down the 'all. Least five, mebbe more by now."

"You don't understand", Mona said. "This is highly contagious. Even if some of you don't show symptoms yet, they'll need to take this or they will get sick, too. We're coming out here to distribute it to everybody so we can keep mortality down to under five per cent. So there's no maybe. Every human in this building needs to get this, or you'll just get re-infected after this first round is done."

"Right." He nodded, whispering, "Look, them that's in there need ya worse. I'll need it, too..." His fever had been increasing steadily over the last few hours and he was starting to worry...

Mona nodded. She took one of the hyposprays that Estelle had given her, and approached the people he had indicated. She injected the medication like she was taught a nurse would. "They'll sleep it off, when they wake up tomorrow, they'll need a lot of fluid, and they'll be hungry soon after." That way, Mona figured, she might get to inject several more, and thus put them to sleep for a few hours. Each one who took it, one fewer enemy to fight, and she figured it wouldn't be too suspicious.

"Right." He said, ready to obey any command this lovely nurse issued. He pointed to a young boy in the corner, "Get 'im next. It's my son. He's real sick, ma'am."

Mona handed him one of the hyposprays. "I'll get everybody. Distribute this to anyone else in the building, okay? Let's get it done quickly." She injected his son.

The guard didn't even reply, he simply took the hypos and moved out, he knew exactly how important this was. He'd take care of himself when it was all over, but for right now he was just happy that his son was going to be okay. The boy was only nine, and he wasn't about to let Quinton Dunphy sacrifice his only child for the sins of the father.

[Assault]

"Careful about hitting the targ enclosure", Anya reminded everyone. Targs could be aggressive, and dangerous, if provoked or frightened. "The pen is mightier than the targs, if it stays intact."

"Right." Gallia nodded, more than a little disturbed at the sight of that many monstrous pigs, "They all look hungry..."

"It's okay, Lieutenant." Liorga reassured her, "Let's just focus on our work. We'll hit it and forget it, okay?"

"Right." Gallia repeated, Liorga had really taken charge here and she was grateful, this was intense.

Anje shared her friends trepidation regarding the targs, deciding if that pen did give way she was going to focus her fire on them, ~Can't take this damn thing down if we're all targ chow.~

Looking over at the targ pit, Kaylee sighed, “how can they treat animals like this?”

"Think this is bad, you should see how they treat people." Liorga informed her, though she was beginning to wonder about this one's thought process. I'm sure she means well, Liorga reminded herself, "We'll take care of the pigs when we're done, okay?"

Kaylee shivered uncomfortably. She didn’t like the idea of Klingons killing these animals for food, especially when replicator technology could produce realistic meats without any killing. “Come on EX, we can’t do anything now” she said to her companion who had floated closer to the targ pit.

EX gave a few beeps of confirmation before returning to float just above Kaylee’s shoulder.

"Enough talk about the targs." Gary said sharply. "We have a cannon to take out and people to rescue. Anya you and Fernando get in position. Gallia, you and Anje come with me. Chief you and Kaylee pick a spot, get out of sight and cover us. Wait for the Home Guard to make their move then we'll make ours."

Anya nodded and took position with Liorga and Sami, who she had been assigned to guard.

Kaylee gave a nervous nod before looking over to the Chief for some kind of lead.

Liorga simply nodded to Kaylee, motioning her to a position on the right side where she could give Gallia and the others support.

Something few people knew about Vulcans, or maybe didn't want to admit they knew or even thought because it was very politically incorrect, but their ears were super sensitive, that's how Anje could hear people coming up the ladder on the left side, "Liorga, help Gallia and Taylor!" She yelled, taking a position where she could see them, "We're about to have company!"

"What?" Liorga said; what company was she talking about?

"Trust me." Anje replied, getting to her knees and rolling one of her grenades on a five second timer. The stun blast went off just as the first thug reached the top of the ladder, sending him back down into the three below him, "That'll slow them down."

Gallia pried open the access panel, "All right, if I remember correct the computer that controls the defensive mechanisms is.... here!" She began to tap on the panel, looking for a menu screen but instead receiving one hell of a shock, sending her to the deck.

"Oh, shit, Gallia!" Liorga yelled, pulling the unconscious engineer to a safe place, "Sir, they've got this thing boobytrapped, Gallia's out."

The thugs were on their way up again, Anje made them think twice with a quick burst of 7.62 fire, dropping back towards Taylor and whispering, "There's a retinal scanner, all of your scans are registered, it was my aunt's backup in case you ever needed to shut one of these down. Identify for the scan, any of the Wolf Pack can do it, you can take down the internal defenses."

Gary nodded at the information. "God bless your aunt." He whispered as he moved to the retinal scanner. "Grey Wolf." He whispered, "Run authorization scan to disengage internal defenses." There was an answering beep followed by. "Grey Wolf identified. Internal defenses are now offline." He looked back at Anje, "Lets get this done."

"Right." Anje replied, she could hear them coming up again, firing off another quick burst to keep them down, "Heads on a swivel, everybody, they're probably going to try an end run."

"Ahh... sonofabitch..." Gallia muttered, managing to sit up just as one of Dunphy's men managed to make it top side. She was seeing three of him at that moment, but she drew the Webley anyway, firing at the one in the middle and screaming, "PISS OFF, WANKER!"

Tommy Lister, one of Dunphy's hired guns, had drawn a bead on the guy who seemed to be in charge, he was wearing red anyway, when some redheaded bitch fired a round at him from an ancient gun, missing in front of him. Well, he thought she had missed until something hit him in his head and knocked him off the ladder.

As her vision returned to normal Gallia saw that she'd hit not the gunman himself, but the ladder in front of him, which broke away and hit him in his forehead, knocking him cold, "Whatever, it worked." She muttered, rising to her feet and addressing the weapon, "Now for you, ya bastard. You didnae think you'd get away with shockin' a Scot, did ya?"

The kid was up and pissed off, that gave Liorga a level of joy, they'd have that thing down in no time.

"Alright, I got that menu now." Gallia smiled as she found herself one step away from taking down the big gun, when it suddenly rotated, nearly hitting the others and sending them to the ground below. Barely hanging on, she managed to input the shutdown command, dropping to the level below where she found herself in the hands of Bull, "Shit..."

"Shit's right, princess." Bull sneered, taking her up by her throat and dangling her over the edge, "Think I'll just toss you inta them trees, bitch."

The lights were about to go out on Gallia as she kicked futilely at the behemoth, though she'd accepted she was about to die. Then she heard a shot...

There was a shot, and the thug Liorga remembered as Bull fell dead off the edge onto the ground below, dropping Gallia to the ground beside him. Liorga slung her rifle, drawing her pistol as she busted down the door to the fire control room, snapping off multiple shots at the gun crew as they tried to draw a bead on her. In seconds all three were dead, "It's clear, Sir!"

[Home Guard Rescue Operation]

Captain Anderson and his chosen platoon rolled up by the front door, in undisguised vehicles that proudly proclaimed who they were. But the guards by the front door were already asleep, Mona's 'cure' had made sure of that. Anderson charged ahead, followed by the others. One of them kept reminding the others not to panic, and while they were a bit slower than younger soldiers, they were experienced enough to know how to move. The hard part was finding the room where the hostages were being kept, and they started searching the building room by room.

Emmy was the first one they saw, carrying a bloody and dying Syren draped over her right shoulder, "Help us, please...."

"We're here to take you all to safety", Anderson said. "Where are the others?"

He waved over an elderly man who was there to provide first aid. He looked at Syren, but shook his head. "Nothing I can do for her. She needs surgery, and fast."

"We need to get everyone out of here", Anderson said. "The building will blow in five minutes." It would take a bit longer than that, but he figured it couldn't hurt to exaggerate the urgency of the situation to this woman.

Things were going to Hell on Dunphy in a hurry; half of his guys were out and the gun was down, he could tell by the sound, and one of the new guys, Marcus, had just told him Bull was dead; now there was nothing left for him to do but make a break for it. He ran by the hall where Emmy was selling out to the HG, tossing a fragmentation grenade into their midst, slashing Emmy's throat with his knife as soon as he got into grabbing range, now there was nothing between him and the door.

Fernando along with Anya had taken positions where they could cover the compound and those entering (namely Mona, Turak and the Home Guard) He adjusted the sights on his rifle and checked it again, satisfied he settled into a prone position to cover the entrance.

Anya saw how one of the brutes sneaked up on Sami. She'd have left the shot to Fernando, who she had to concede was much better at range, but there was a wall in the way from his point of view. She took careful aim, and seconds later Sami could hear a projectile go past her head and into the sneaky bastard who was getting ready to split her skull in half, changing his plans permanently.

Fernando glanced at her and nodded, "I like to watch a professional work." He quipped as he swung his gaze back and saw two thugs Moving toward the assault team's position. He swung the rifle in a controlled arc and fired two quick shots from his Remington 700 and an instant later two thugs had all their worries permanently erased.

Dunphy's breakout was almost complete, just a half a klick to the hidden tunnels that would take him to his escape vehicle. Unfortunately, he found himself in the midst of what looked to be a hundred fleeters, including the bald bitch who caused all of this. He raised his rifle to fire a couple rounds at her, not hitting her but sending her to the deck.

As soon as Dunphy fired his two, Liorga sent three back, missing to the right twice before hitting his left knee. She drew a bead on his head, determined to pop it like an overripe melon, "Watch the birdie, you bastard..." She snarled as she began to squeeze the trigger, then released it before firing again, "No, there's questions only he can answer..."

Liorga walked back to Taylor and Brett, "Commanders, Dunphy's on ground level, he's shot, we can take him into custody now."

Gary looked at her, his eyes full of scorn for the leader of the thugs. "Take him, don't be gentle and don't rush getting him to the hospital. Let him suffer. Let him feel a little something his victims felt."

Sami had followed the sound of the grenade into the building, finding two women on the floor, bleeding to death. Dragging them outside, she tapped her commbadge and vanished with them to the field hospital, Doc Hertz would take care of them.

Gallia, standing on a sprained ankle, managed to get to her feet where one of the thugs, the one just firing at Liorga, was trying to get to his feet and back into the fight. Pulling the hammer back on the Webley she brandished it at him, "You're my prisoner." She informed him, "Least I think that's how this works..."

A short while later, Anderson tapped his wrist communicator that was tied into the Starfleet channel. "Anderson to Taylor, everyone we care about is off the premises", he reported. "You can blow it at your leisure." The rescue had been a lot easier than expected, so many of the enemy had already been asleep. Anderson's team hadn't bothers with taking prisoners, as that would have endangered the hostages.

"Taylor to Anderson, acknowledged, get your people and the hostages out now." He looked over at Anje, "Time for you to leave as well Anje. This is my job now. You and the others did magnificently. I'm very proud of you and I know your aunt would be as well."

"Right." Anje nodded, "I'll go down and get Norris, looks like she's got a busted ankle, and we'll be on our way."

"I'll be along shortly." Gary answered as input the self destruct code and set the timer for 6 minutes. He then wiped the computers hard drive clean just to make sure nothing could in the unlikely event be traced back to the admiral.

Fernando glanced at Anya, "Do you see Mona?"

Anya pointed to the front door. "She's making her way back to Turak, carrying someone." It was the boy the guard had wanted Mona to save above all else. Mona had no idea whether the guard was even still alive but she wasn't going to leave a child behind.

A relieved sigh escaped Fernando's lips at Anya's announcement. Mona was safe, the team was safe, most of the hostages were safe. The cannon would soon be no more. A job well done all around.

Anje had made her way back to the ground where Gallia had her gun drawn on one Quinton Dunphy, "Good job, Gallia, you got the bad guy." She smiled, tucking herself under Gallia's left arm to support her and take the weight off of her injured ankle, "Ready to go home to the family?"

"Aye." Gallia nodded, grabbing Dunphy by his collar as they beamed back to the ops center; Almost home, she smiled.

Liorga nodded to Taylor as the self destruct was set on the cannon, from the schematic on the PADD Anje had left with her she knew the self destruct was an implosion, so it wouldn't leave the mass destruction that orbital bombardment or an explosion would, "We good to go?" She asked.

Gary looked over his shoulder at Liorga, "Yes Chief, we're good to go. Lets get the hell out of here. In a few minutes this is just going to be a big hole in the ground." He gave a last look around and motioned for Liorga to head out, he was right behind her. He wanted to get out of here. He had once again been in Death's company and come out unscathed. He didn't know how much longer is luck would continue to hold but for at least this mission it was still working.