Cloaked Motives

Posted on Sat Nov 23rd, 2024 @ 8:49pm by Captain Aisling Banerjee & Lieutenant Damian Leath & Lieutenant JG Dorian Duranik

2,183 words; about a 11 minute read

Mission: Crew Shakedown
Location: Secret Alpha Centauri station
Timeline: tbd

The shuttle departed the curious space station without hassle. The cloaking device was mounted security the deck in the rear. It seemed a simple, straightforward run back to Earth.

Only...

Call it intuition. Call it paranoia. Call it instinct or a hundred other words any other sentient species other than Vulcans would ascribe a term to. It could have even been simple cynicism borne of living in a universe that played an incautious Orion for a sucker. But something told Duke they weren't out of the woods quite yet...

Duke was used to moving things other people wanted..... He knew eyes would be looking for targets like him... He would rather be the hunter...
"Strap in." Duke told the other officer.

Duke ran the thoughts through his head. Standard SF, leave a station directly away, to a distance of..., then turn toward destination... best ambush points would be...

Duke tapped on the controls, "I sent you classic nav points scan around points two and three. My gut says we alter route and be a little unexpected. Thoughts?"

"I'm not opposed if you have a reason. Why do you want to switch routes?" says Damian while reviewing the new flight plan.


"We... " Duke looked for the words and Worth a planet in a runabout.... If anyone thought, our cargo was in this place. It is watched... And thus we are prey."

"Fair enough Duke but we are just jumping one system in the core of the Federation. Whose going to attack us this close to Sol?" Damian pauses for a moment and turns to Duke contemplatively. "Your an Orion, you'll have better instincts about this. I trust you, go ahead."

Duke started altering controls. He had failed to upload his custom controls. So many of the standard controls where for comfort. Not feeling how the ship moves. After making several quick alterations. "Hang on."

With that said the small ship, pointed nose down still moving with the lays of physics as Duke gave it 90% of impulse. The normal rocking chair ride was over.... Duke's normal race controls would make the flight feel like an old earth roller coaster. With the limited time it felt more like an old earth car.

A corkscrew followed by a sweep had the ship pointed not at Earth any longer. Pointed more toward Dukes favorite near Earth Solar Nursery ... M42 in old earth is a defuse nebula.

Mere minutes after Duke deviated from their assigned course Damian spotted something on long range sensors. It was a ship and judging by where it came from likely it had been loitering in their scheduled path. There was no transponder code and it was difficult to say what class of vessel at this rang. But Damian knew warp signatures and the vessel had to be much larger than a shuttle.

And then...it disappeared...!

"Slow to impluse" says Damian forcefully as he begins to scan for tachyons. "Something big was waiting along our original heading and it's warp signature disappeard. As far as I know only a cloaking device can do that. I need you to program a spread for me, high energy burst level six.

"Slow?" Duke said stunned, "Setting fire control . This girl does not have much firepower, but its ready."

Detecting cloaked vessels was not easy and normally to pick up tachyons in that manner required a grid, either with satellites or with a series of ships. At the moment nothing could be detected.

And because the shuttle had dropped to impulse if the other vessel was moving at warp then they were now much, much closer...

"I miscalculated, and it's going to cost us." Damian said, his voice low and focused. "Go to maximum warp and fire torpedoes in a staggered spread behind us. There is a chance, albiet a very unlikely one, we disrupt the cloak. And send out an SOS to any Starfleet vessels in range."

Without waiting for confirmation, Damian moved swiftly toward the back of the shuttle, his mind racing through the next steps. "I’m rerouting all non-essential power to the warp drive and sensors. At this point I doubt we can out run them if they're coming but I'll do my best to give us an advantage."

Duke turned the ship hard to Port, gave it a kick in the thrusters... then jumped to warp. Pushing the ship hard but not enough to blow parts off.

"If you can" Duke called "send a message to the Captain. I could use an asteroid field if you see one."

Duke would scan if the cloaked ship gave him time. Many cloaked ships had to drop deflector shields to stay cloaked. A ship without deflectors had to be careful with flying debris.

The shuttle twisted in space and took off at high warp on its new heading. Right away Duke could tell communications were being jammed; whomever was chasing them was definitely behind that.

The closest system was the three starred Alpha Centauri, where they had come from. At the moment they were much closer to Alpha Centauri than Earth. But Alpha Centauri, especially Proxima Centauri, did have an asteroid belt...

The shuttle shifted and changed course toward Proxima Centauri. "We are being jammed"

"Heading to do an asteroid run. Hoping to find a spot that our shields will let us go quickly through but a capital ship with defectors down can not."

Duke kept his eyes on the scanners looking for the best place. "Did you see how big it is?"

"It disappeared as soon as I noticed it. I'm unsure of the size beyond it being large. said Damain grimly. "Don't worry about that though, check the sensors for an echo. There should be minor subspace varience."

Duke chuckled, “If they follow us in an asteroid fields we will see the disruption. Is that field within scanner range of the station? “

"Significantly within. Their scanner range is five light years." says Damian as sits back down in the copilot seat."

Duke was doing the bob and weave flying. "Can you see if we are still jammed? And if you see any thing following us? If not we should plot a way back home."

Duke thought, then said, "Fire the Photons at you best guess. Worst the station station will take notice.... After that any chance to make our cargo work?"

Damien used the shuttle's sensors to search for the cloaked vessel. Had this been Kepler with it's powerful sensor suite perhaps they could have spotted the ship...if it was still there. But the shuttle's sensors weren't picking up anything. Either the ship was gone.

Or it was sitting very, very still and waiting for them to make a move...

"Make sure we fire at lest one to detonate and let the space station see something they can not jam a detonation." Duke added and one the torps fired he was going to do some fancy flying out of the asteroid fields, "What you think back to the station?" "

Damian fires a photon torpedo. "Stay in the asteroid field, it'll be safer there." he says before detonating it as it reaches a safe distance. "See if you can find an magnetic asteroid. If we sit on it at minimum power it will confuse their sensors."

The torpedo detonated as programmed and any passive long range sensor scan could not fail to pick it up. And within ten minutes a runabout came in from the direction of the station. A scan of the transponder showed it was assigned to the station as well. The shuttle was actively scanning, shields up, and soon it was hailing.

"-fleet vessels in this area?" the voice could be heard through a haze of static, although the static was starting to face, as if the source were moving away...

Damian begins to power up the shuttle and tries to hail. "Black Hole shuttle this is Lieutenant Damian Leath. Can you hear us? We are being jammed."

"We read you, lieutenant. Whom is jamming you?" Leath and Duke heard a voice in the background, someone speaking, it sounded like someone speaking to the Black Hole and reporting in.

"Unclear, I detected a large cloaked ship along our original route toward Sol as we were leaving the system. Shortly after detection we began to be jammed."

"Understood, lieutenant. We request that you accompany us back to the Black Hole for a debrief," from the tone it did not sound much like a 'request' at all.

Duke began working his way out of the asteroid belt and closer to the runabout. "He activated his comm and tried to broadcast to his home ship." While moving he kept an eye out for ambush... who says the black hole and the runabout are not in it...Duke knew he could boarder on paranoid that was due to the fact he knew how deep operations could run.

When he could not be overheard over the comms, "Leath, hang out and talk or jet back home?"

There was a long moment of silence, possibly that same interference as before, then, "Lieutenant, this is ensign Ferrari. What is your status? We tried hailing you and could not get through," there was a pause and the young ensign added, "Captain Banerjee is on her way to the bridge. Things have been, well, weird here."

Duke replied to the runabout, “Contact from our Captain, awaiting instructions “ Duke flew slowly toward the runabout.

"Understood," the ensign replied, "Nevertheless, our commander would like you back in the station. If a cloaked vessel had chased you, you would be safer in there than out here," a pause then the ensign added, "I would be safer in there than out here."

Damian grimaces and switches the channel back to the Kepler. "Tell Banerjee to come to Alpha Centauri immediately, something is wrong here. I know I can't give her orders but it'll take a day to get here at warp nine and I expect we don't have that kind of time so just do it Ensign."

"Understood, lieutenant," Kepler's ensign replied a bit tartly, "I will inform her right away."

"Keep flying towards the runabout but keep as much distance as you can while not being suspicious." says Damian as he scans the runabout.

Banerjee's voice cut in, "Lieutenants, under no circumstances should you follow the runabout into the station! Deviate now! Return to Earth immediately! We will meet you en route!"

"Banerjee, there is a large cloaked ship on the trajectory to earth. At minimum the size of a Defiant class. We can not win an engagement if it intercepts" says Damian emphatically.

Duke flew towards general area of Runabout while scanning. His fingers selecting a flight path. The path showing the other runabout leading back to the Starbase in an unexpected path. The plan showed Dukes vessel staying at maximum safe distance while both ships had good cover fire. Duke sent this plan to the runabout in a tight beam secure transmission. The signal ended with a lead off and we will follow.

Dukes plan was to get the runabout moving and start to follow till a good point to turn and bolt toward a midpoint of Earth. If the runabout holds and does not turn to lead Duke will alter the plan.

Duke looks to Leath, "How long would it take to plug in our cargo and make it work?"

"The runabout doesn't have enough power to use a cloaking device. Frankly, I'm not sure what to do now."

Duke turned stiff... "Moron." He tapped the controls and replayed the message from the Captain...Banerjee's voice cut in, "Lieutenants, under no circumstances should you follow the runabout into the station! Deviate now! Return to Earth immediately! We will meet you en route!"

Duke Laughed, "Moron Duke, Moron. How does she know about the runabout"

Duke activated the comms back to the Captain, "Copy Captain, have them fooled, will follow the runabout and break out when they do not expect it.... Meeting point... My girlfriend Ellie, newest tattoo. See you there."

"Follow the runabout back to the station but close the distance this time" Damian says as he ponders if he is making right call. "I find it unlikely the ship will fire upon both runabouts."

"Lieutenant," 'Banerjee' snapped, "Lieutenant! What is your status?" When it was obvious Duke was not breaking away the Captain snapped, "Do not go into that station! I am ordering you!" Even though both men barely knew their new superior it was obvious this person was far too desperate.

"I am warning you!" the woman almost screamed, "It will go badly for you! I will have your hearts and I will keep you alive long enough for me to devour them before you! You will spend hours in the agony booth and I will see you beg me for death!"

The voice cut off then, and there had been something quite...sincere and emphatic in the threats the person made. In fact, they did not seem to be threats at all.

They seemed to be...promises...

 

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