Not leaving it till later to track the freighter Pt 3

Posted on Tuesday August 23rd, 2022 @ 12:16pm by

Mission: New Worlds
Location: Desert region, Southern continent of Halacha, Vein II
Timeline: Current.

Meanwhile, back in the lab of the freighter, Karadis was wondering where Branna was as he hadn't followed her inside. She edged towards the door, making sure the geneticists knew in no uncertain terms that if the moved, she stun them. She disabled the internal locking system, opened then closed the door behind her and locked it from the outside so no-one could get out. Slowly she made her way back up the tunnel, still no sign of Branna. As she got near the entrance, she saw him and was just about to call to him when she heard the firing. Rushing forward, she saw Elliot and Maxx fall, Branna pull something out his bag, the drones appearing then falling to the ground and being destroyed.

She heard the conversation about Elliot and Maxx being taken inside and what Branna said about her. She had to think fast as she moved back down the tunnel. As she did, a plan formed but it would need the help of the geneticists for it to work. When she arrived back at the lab door, she opened it and went inside "Right, listen up the three of you. If you want to live, you'll do as I say otherwise we're all dead. Others are going to be here in a minute or so, when they ask you where I am, tell them you told me the research part of your work was in the main computer and that's where I've gone. The two unconscious people who will be brought in are other members of the Federation ship I'm from. You help me free them, we can all get out of this together, ok?"

The three geneticists all nodded their heads in agreement.

Jason tasted metal in his mouth, he knew he'd been stunned with a phaser. He judged by the movements he was being dragged too. Jason decided that enough was enough shortly he would do what needed to be done, then he was going too put Karadis in handcuffs, but first he had to deal with these thugs. Jason started a mental count, then planted his feet his right arm came free first he swung impacting hopefully impacting his kidney or something, he let out a moan as he dropped too the ground. The other thug dropped Jason's arm freeing them both, Jason lunged tackling the man then delivered a closed fist punch to the other man stunning him, Jason looked seeing his phaser Jason jumped snagging it he rolled hitting the second man square in the chest, the first man stood long enough to feel the effects of the of a stun setting hitting him to.

Jason turned his attention too the other two, who had barely had time to react both were dropped in quick succession, Jason scrambled over too Maxx, "Time to rise and fight, looks like we're doing this the hard way."

Jason found his pack, opening it he found what he needed, a second phaser and six sets of handcuffs. He stood up holding out the other phaser, "Don't go above setting three."

Maxx was groggy as he was woken up by Jason. It was not a pleasant moment since Maxx was dreaming about the last one night stand he had before his reassignment. She was beautiful and fun. Sadly he could not remember her name since they only had a fleeting moment together before their departure. So in his dream he was about to kiss the mystery girl and then saw Jason's face so it scared him and sent shivers down his spine. Maxx was in a panic state for a moment till he realize a funny after taste in his mouth of metal. It was then that he realized he was stunned and was feeling like crap. He ached as he moved his body and rubbed his head to ease the pain. He never liked being phased since it was hard to recover from. He then collected his armband and put it back on as he took the phaser from Jason and nodded. Setting the phaser to 3 before he checked on his drones. He grunted as he saw two of them were offline after being destroyed. He was not in a good mood since it took a long time to make them and program them. However the one in the lab was still cloaked and working as it was downloading the data from the computers while everyone else was unaware. Sadly Maxx could not use it to fight with since he didn't want to break the data stream, so he sent a message that they were attacked by an unknown group and barely managed to escape. Maybe they would sent back up if they could. Maxx then whispered to Jason, "So I lost two drones when we got attacked. My guess that Branna person was involved since my drones were hacked from inside this freighter and I doubt Karadis would sabotage her own mission. So what's the game plan?"

Jason pulled out another cylinder from his pack, "Stun grenades, just zap everyone and sort it out after." reaching back into his pack he pulled out a flat metal case he opened it "Put these in your ears, or you get hit by the grenades stun effect."

He stood up and looked at Maxx "Before we go," Kicking one of the downed thugs "Lets cuff these guys."

"I'm afraid not" a voice behind Elliot and Maxx said "and please don't be stupid enough to turn round, if you so much as move a muscle or try to use the stun grenades, I will kill you" Branna said.

My group has been waiting for many time units to try and gain access to this facility, we knew the ones responsible for the changes to our genetic make up were down here, we just didn't have the technology to get in and the patrols were to well armed for us to attack. How fortunate for us you came when you did."

Four of the six soldiers were now up on their feet again and were looking murderously at Elliot and Maxx.

"Leave them" Branna said "You" he said, pointing to one of them "Get to the control deck and disable the forcefield so we can beam out."

The soldier, as he passed Elliot, punched him took the stun grenades off him, threw them over to Branna, turned back to Elliot and punched him hard in the stomach and them chopped him behind the head "That's for kicking me when I was down, I'll finish the job off later" and he walked off.

Branna looked at Maxx, pointed to another of the soldiers and said "On his arm, the control armband, take it off him and smash it."

The soldier took great delight in taking the control armband off of Maxx arm, throwing it to the ground, stomping on it several times and grinding it into the deck plating under his heel. Standing back, he kicked the remnants of the armband off to the side.

"Oh, I think you'll find that the drone I heard you talking to your companion about will have stopped downloading, in fact, stopped working altogether" Branna said.

The soldier returned from the control deck and said "The forcefields down, we can join Tor and the others anytime."

"Very good, Second get all your people together, we'll beam out shortly" Branna said.

He watched as the soldiers picked up their still unconscious friends and waited for him to give the word.

"We can't afford to leave any witnesses now, can we?" he asked rhetorically.

He raised his phaser and took aim at Elliot and Maxx "Say goodb..."

"NOOOOOOOOO!!!!!" Karadis called from the doorway to the lab, firing at Branna and hitting him full in the chest and watching him drop like a stone.

Before the other soldiers could react, she ran at the nearest one and fired at him, watching to as he went down to. The one next to him had time to draw his phaser, but Karadis threw herself on the deck and slid along the plating, taking the soldiers feet out from under him. She was up and at him before he could get up, punching him twice in the face and once in his midriff, then head butted him and he was out cold.

Maxx was impressed by Karadis's skills in combat despite her abrasive personality. Then one of the injured soldiers on the floor began to reach for his phaser so Maxx kicked him in the head to knock him out and picked up his phaser and began stunning all the soldiers on the ground to make sure they stayed out cold as he began cuffing them behind their backs.

By now the other two had almost got their wits about them and had drawn their phasers, but Karadis fired and hit one in the leg and the other in the shoulder. She watched as the two of them screamed in pain and went down. She picked herself up, and as one reached for his phaser, she kicked him across the face knocking him out, then she turned to the last one. Unfortunately for her, he did have his phaser in his hand.

"JASH!" he said in his native tongue and attempted to fire, but nothing happened. He tried again, still nothing, so he threw the phaser at Karadis and tried to get to something in his belt. Karadis was on him in no time "That's a pity for you it jammed, isn't it?" she said as she pinned him down and head butted him twice, knocking him out.

She turned to see if anyone else was attacking and saw it was done, they were all out cold.

Looking at Maxx, she slumped onto the deck and pointed towards the lab door, saying "In there...the geneticists...there's three of them,"

Maxx then cuffed and stunned the last of the soldiers and disarmed them before giving Karadis first aid from his bag.

Jason walked down the corridor a blood soaked machete dripping "We're leaving with the scientists, you can come quietly or in a tiny bag, your choice." saying as he walked in to the room, the splatters of blood on his face becoming visible.

Karadis suddenly sat forward and looked up "No!" she said to no-one in particular around her.

Tapping her COMM badge, she winced in pain as her side began to ache again "Karadis to Oberon, emergency beam out of Away Team, three geneticists and one Akaru soldier immediately."

"Oberon here Sir, we'll lower the shields and beam you up now" a voice replied.

"Very good, quick as you can, there's not much time, out" Karadis relied, rather quietly for her.

"Lieutenant Elliot, the Oberon will be lowering their shields momentarily and we can all beam out Sir" she called out to Elliot, then sat back. Placing her hand on her side, she brought it out and saw it was bloody. Not anywhere near as much as before, none the less, the bleeding had started again.

"No, not much time at all" she sighed to herself.

Jason bulled out a rectangular box "Lock on too the emergency beacon, we have about twelve or so indigenous predators that were attracted too Ensign Kardis' blood." Jason looked at Karadis "Next time I tell you to get medical attention do it."

Maxx Looked at Jason and Karadis as he was giving her first aid. He remained quiet since this mission was already FUBARed already and tempers were already high. He used medi foam to seal the leaks on Karadis but she was still in need of treatment. Granted he could wing it if they got stuck but he was not a medical doctor and thanks to Branna his drones were out of commission. So after he was done with his treating Karadis he said, "Its only temporary but it should hold you till we beam out." Then Maxx stood up and walked to Branna who lay face down with his hands cuffed behind himself. Maxx took a deep breath and then harshly kicked Branna in crotch a few times before saying, "That was for breaking my drones and controller." Then Maxx kicked him a few more times in the crotch as he said, "And that is for trying to kill us when we were helping you.....you psycho nut job!" Maxx then stomped Branna in the back of the head to break his nose before as he cooled his emotions and then found the guy who stomped on his armband and kicked him in the crotch a few times as he mumbled about scrambling eggs till he looked at Jason and asked, "Wait......why haven't we beamed out yet?"

"Thank you" Karadis said to Talerian after he'd patched her." She could breath a little easier, but she also knew something was up."

"The ships shields are still up" Karadis said, then tapped her COMM badge "Karadis to Oberon, are yo able to drop shields so we can beam back?"

"Yes Sir, shields have been dropped, we'll beam you out now" the reply came back.

The blue hue of the transporter beam surrounded them all and moments later they disappeared from the freighter and appeared in transporter room 2."

Karadis knew she wasn't needed anymore, Security or the Officers would take care of the prisoners and geneticists, she she slowly made her way out of the transporter room.

Jason realizing he was whole exited the transporter room, "Computer upload mission files to server number....." was all that was intelligible as he went out ear shot.

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Lieutenant Commander Finchley Kerr
Temporary Commanding Officer
USS Oberon

&

Lieutenant Jason Elliot
Chief Intelligence Officer
USS Oberon

&

Lieutenant JG Talerian Maxx
Chief Science Officer
USS Oberon