Embedded Files
Chapter Sixteen
Doctor McCoy was excited. Today was the day they would reach Excalbia. They would reach the planet in .3 hours and then they would perform the necessary scans and hopefully find them. Scott had all the environmental suits ready, after giving them a thorough going over. Suddenly the ship went into red alert. He grabbed his shirt and ran out of his quarters while putting it on. He slid into the lift and jabbed the button for the bridge. He walked out onto the bridge as on the screen came the view of a Romulan destroyer and a Klingon warbird. Oh shit. He walked over and stood next to Scotty as it was not even halfway through his shift. “Report,” he snapped.
“We have two vessels approaching on low speed, there are no weapons showing as armed. They do have their shields up.” Sulu continued working at his console as he gave his report.
“Uhura, try to hail them. I wanna kno’ wha’ they want.”
“Yes, sir,” she said and turned around to send out the hail. “Sir, we are being hailed by both ships.”
“On screen,”
The image of two men lite up the screen. Their scowling visage aimed at both each other and at the bridge crew.
“Ha'DIbaH 'ejyo', HoD Sogh divork jIvang.” the sharp tones of the Klingon coming through.
“And I am acting Riov Centurion Lovok, we are heading to planet Excalbia. Why are you in here, Enterprise?” Lovok snapped.
“I am Lieutenant Commander Montgomery Scott, acting Capt’n for the USS Enterprise. We ha’ business on the planet.”
“We have business there as well.”
“So do we,” Divork growled out.
“So, I take it ya are missing your Commanding officers as well,” Scotty said to them.
“What makes you say this, Lieutenant Commander Scott,” asked Lovok.
“Ye said acting infront of ya titles. We too are heading there to retrieve wha’ was stolen.”
“Perhaps we can come to an accord, Lieutenant Commander.”
“I’ma listenin’.”
“We agree for the duration of the landing and once back aboard ship, we go our separate ways peacefully and in future we can continue on as enemies,” he proposed.
“Agreed,” Scotty said.
“We agree as well,” Divork added.
“So from now until we are done and gone from the planet, we will work together.” Lovok added.
“Aye, we should all be there in less than .3 hours.”
“Very well, until then.” And with that, they cancelled the call.
“You do realize that we are going to have to tell Admiral Pike and the Ambassador's party.”
“Aye,” he answered morosely.
**********
Twenty minutes later, everyone was assembled in the Captain’s ready room. “What is going in Lieutenant Commander Scott?” Pike asked.
“We ran inta two ships, Romulan and Klingon. Apparently our Captain and First Officer weren’t the only ones that were absconded,” he told them.
“Indeed, you can to this conclusion how? I do not believe this is information that they would give willingly,” Selek said.
“They said they ha’ business on tha planet and they intraduced themselves as acting Captains,” he told them. “The acting Captain, Centurion Lovok proposed that we work tagether and go back ta being enemies next time we meet.”
“And you agreed,” Pike stated more than asked.
“Aye, would make things go better. It would be easier ta work with them then hav’ to watch our backs for them.”
“Your logic is sound, Lieutenant Commander Scott,” Sarek said to him. “This will give us more manpower in case the Excalbians are not working alone. From what you have told us, someone would have needed to get them off planet in order to take the Captain and Commander Spock.”
“Yes, we just need to figure out who,” Pike mused. “If they do have our men, we can get more information once we get them.”
“Indeed, Admiral.”
“Lieutenant Commander Scott, we have reached orbit for Excalbia.” Uhura’s voice echoed over the comm.
“Well, it looks like we are about to find out.” And with that Admiral Pike disconnected his call and everyone exited the ready room.
**********
“Planet on screen,” McCoy said as they exited the ready room.
“Aye, sir,” Sulu said as he brought up the planet’s image on the screen.
“Run that scan,” Scotty said as he sat back down in the chair that Sulu had just moments ago vacated.
“Running scan, sir. Looks like there is a heavily shielded area approximately 27,432 meters in size.”
“Why would they need to shield something that big?” McCoy asked.
“Nay idea, but we might hav’ just found our missing Captain and Commander,” Scotty told him.
“We will definitely need to go down and check. Very suspicious to have a shielded area that big, especially as the natives don’t need to be shielded from the planet's radiation.”
“Indeed, Doctor. We should go down and investigate.”
“We are being hailed, sir.”
“Put them on forward screen, Uhura.”
“Yes, sir.”
The image of Lovok came up onto the screen. “Greetings, Lieutenant Commander Scott. From our scans, and yours I presume, it looks like we have found what we are looking for. We will be beaming down in .5 hours. We will send you the coordinates.” The screen abruptly went blank as he cut transmission.
“Sir, we’ve received the coordinates.”
“Send them down ta the transporter room.”
“Aye, sir.”
“Well now gentlemen and ladies, it seems we best go get ready ta beam down.”
**********
Point five hours later found the crew and the New Vulcan party in the transporter room. They had just finished suiting up and were ready to beam down to the planet. McCoy did a double check that he had everything he would need for a medical emergency, especially as there were five people from security going with them. The security team beamed down first, once they had the all clear, the remaining members of the rescue team beamed down. When they arrived, they found the parties from the Romulan and Klingon ships.
“Everyone ready ta go?” Scotty asked.
“The area that would more than likely being housing them is 0.09144 kilometers to the North. We did not read any weapon energy signatures.,” Lovok told them in lieu of a greeting.
“That might not matter. From what we know of them, they could possibly manipulate matter to suit them,” Selek told him.
“It will not matter. They can be killed like everything else. We can kill them if they get in our way,” Divork said.
“That may be a problem as they are essentially living rock. It would take an extremely high phaser charge to do them harm let alone kill them. They usually are peaceful, they just are fascinated by concepts and like to experiment. We must be prepared for anything in that regards.”
Divork and his fellow Klingons grunted at what Sarek said to him. They slowly made their way to where the shielding was located on the last scan and found a 3 story building. “Fascinating, they created a very large complex. They must have been in contact with another race to get the information needed to build this.”
“Agreed, the question now stands, who.”
They walked 0.9144 meters and located a door in the southern corner of the building. There seemed to be no security on the door or around it. One of the security team went up to the door and opened it. McCoy held his breath hoping not to have to deal with a dead or badly injured idiot. When nothing happened, he breathed a sigh and they all moved cautiously into the building. They took out tricorders that were set to the missing Captains and First Officers, after going about 0.09144 kilometers further into the building they were able to get a reading.
“They are further down this way. It seems that they are all being housed in the same area,” Lovok told them.
“Aye, so it would seem. But why? Why did they take the two from each of our ships? It doesna back sense.”
“Once we have the missing crew back, we should be able to ascertain what has happened,” Sarek said.
They kept going down the corridor until they finally came across a door. They scanned and could tell from the life signs, it was where they needed to go. “Well it seems that this door has a lock. Most peculiar. Why lock one door and not the outside door.”
“Probably to keep them from going somewhere. Probably didn’t think someone would come and get them.”
“How long have your Captains and First Officers been missing?”
“Commander Merrok and Sub Commander Suran have been missing for 3.5 months now.”
“Why have you kept looking for them for so long? Would they have not been declared dead by now?”
“If you must know, Merrok is the nephew to our Empress. We have been ordered to continue looking for him.”
“We too have been looking for 3.5 months. Captain Kor and Colonel Korath and the son’s to one of our Council Members. We have been charged to bring their bodies home and give them an honorable burial.”
“Well, according to my scans, they are all alive and well. So if we can get in there and get everyone out, we will know what has been going on with them.” McCoy stepped back and motioned to one of the security officers. He raised a phaser and melted off the lock. The door swung open and they all filed in, weapons and tricorders at the ready. There was another door and that to had a lock in it. Once that was dealt with they entered into what to them looked like a common room. There at the table sat all six missing men eating what looked like a evening meal.
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