Escaping My Shadows

Does the Calvary Arrive in the Nick of Time?

Captain Ryan picks herself up from the deck. Just before that last maneuver she had tried to adjust the restraining belt on her chair. She was not fast enough and ended up on the ship's deck. New alarms sound, adding to the confusion already present on the bridge. A jumble of voices from the bridge crew mixes with those coming over the intercom.

"Say again, engineering!" the captain yells into the intercom on the chair. "What about the jump engines?"

"That last shot hit the hull nearth 'em, Captain," the engineer yells. "No breach, but the EMP knocked them off-line again. I'm trying to get them back but I don't know how long it will take."

"Get back to me when they are on-line." Ryan cuts the link. She has to yell to be heard over the alarms. "Tactical, weapons status."

The tactical officer forces himself to remain calm. "Weapons are back on-line. Particle cannons ready. Ion cannon charging. Emergency bulkheads are sucking up additional power, slowing the cannon's charging."

The captain cannot focus with all of the noise. "Someone turn off those damn alarms!" After a moment the alarms go silent. The jumble of voices remains.

Ryan looks at the tactical display to the side of the main screen. She uses her control console to change the perspective slightly. One of the enemy ships appears to be dropping back, thanks to a lucky shot from the T'Shara. She watches it turn around and speed away. Unfortunately, the other four enemy ships still approach. Readouts show that the enemy ships are gaining, slowly, but still gaining.

Without warning the T'Shara jerks to one side, not quite hard enough to throw the captain back onto the deck. She throws herself into the command chair and straps herself in. The captain knows that the helmsman has been keeping one eye on the lead enemy ship's energy readings. Whenever it looks like it is about to fire he quickly moves the ship to one side or the other, hopefully to avoid the ship being hit by the enemy's powerful main weapon. Most of the time he has been successful. Unfortunately, this constant side-to-side movement prevents the ship from reaching maximum speed.

"Any response to our distress call?"

The communications officer shakes her head. "I'm not picking up anything. The shadows are jamming our signals. I don't know if we were able to get anything out before the jamming started."

The captain switches to the backup rear scanner. The main screen shows the pursuing ships. The lead blacker-than-black ship, just outside of their weapons range, looks like some sort of evil crab. Three other enemy ships have formed a rough flying wedge behind the lead ship, with two on one side and one on the other. The lead ship fires again but the T'Shara evades the weapons fire. Captain Ryan has no doubt that the lead ship is just toying with them.

She remembers her shock when the T'Shara and her sister ships, Sharo and Thanos, ran into the small fleet of enemy ships in this isolated area. Six of the crab-like vessels were escorting two much larger warships. They obviously were sneaking in the back way to attack either Earth or her nearest colonies. Captain Roscoe of the Sharo barely had time to transmit a message into hyperspace before the enemy ships changed course and attacked. The three Earth ships, terribly outnumbered and outgunned, threw everything they had at the ships. Even with the full power of their weapons they could only damage one of the black ships. The bridge crew of the T'Shara was forced to watch as the Sharo and Thanos were being destroyed.

Captain Ryan had no choice but to order the T'Shara to retreat. She knew she couldn't save the other ships.  She hoped to put enough distance between them and the enemy vessels so she could jump to hyperspace. Once there, she could broadcast a warning. Once warned, Earth should have had time to put together a powerful enough force to stop the sneak attack. Unfortunately, during the fight the jump engines were damaged. Instead of jumping to hyperspace and being able to elude the enemy ships there, the T'Shara was forced into a running battle with five enemy ships.