“Report ship status, First Officer,” Captain Frederick Wilshire ordered as he began his sign-off on the 20-hour post-launch checkpoint document.
“We have green across the board,” the first officer replied. “Fuel capacity and consumption at optimum levels, and we are 10-squared to reach the O.R.C. within the intended timeframe.” Allowing himself the slightest hint of a smile, First Officer Brendan Kirkpatrick could not help but feel pleased as he surveyed the readouts and information screens at his station onboard the Galactic Alliance Special Transport Ship Franconia. Every system was functioning to perfection and the bridge of the ship was a beehive of intense but highly controlled activity. Accompanying them on the bridge was Navigation Officer Nigel Sebastian, tactical and executive officer Mariah Henderson and on one of her first excursions to the farther reaches of the known galaxy, a young Science Officer named Alanna Kosari. There were also seven other crewmembers scattered around various areas of the ship, such as Engineering, Medical and Security.
The S.T.S. Franconia noiselessly and smoothly departed from the Galactic Alliance Detention Facility on Three-Prime Cordova nearly a Terran day ago and had just cleared the dust boundary demarcating the limits of the Alliance and entered into free space. It was headed to the Justice headquarters of the Outer Rim Complex, a large array of interconnected space stations, vehicles and pods the comprised the largest and most secure penitentiary in that quadrant of the galaxy. The Outer Rim Complex, or O.R.C. as it is known, was the destination for the most incorrigible and dangerous criminals in the Galactic Alliance. It was also the most tightly guarded and regulated – in its entire 75-year existence, there had been many attempts by inmates to break out, but none have succeeded. It is known everywhere as a place for the worst of the worst, the most evil and dangerous beings the worlds of the Galactic Alliance could produce. The Franconia was transporting a cargo of nine individuals, each guilty of horrific, heinous crimes, for final judicial processing at the Complex and eventual incarceration far beyond the boundaries of the Galactic Alliance. So violent and unpredictable were these criminals that they were kept isolated from the crew of the Franconia and from each other in the detention area of the ship by a honeycomb maze of interlocking, intersecting force fields and near-zero gravity conditions.
“What do the tactical screens look like, Ms. Henderson?” the captain queried. The tactical officer looked over her workstation and replied, “All long-range and short-range scans show nothing out there, sir,” she said with calm reassurance. “No other vessels within 15 parsecs and not much of anything between us and the Complex. E.T.A. for us at Athena Station is 42 hours, sixteen minutes.”
“Just what I like to hear,” the captain answered. “Science officer, do you have anything to add?” He glanced over to his new, relatively inexperienced science officer and gave her the slightest little wink with his eye.
Alanna Kosari could not suppress a smile as she noticed her captain’s gesture of reassurance. “Nothing to report, sir,” she said. Looking up at him with her wide set brown eyes, she added, “Everything appears to be quite normal.” Having passed the checkpoint with everything running as smoothly as possible, the crew of the bridge resumed their monitoring duties and looked forward to a quiet, uneventful journey.
So it came as a total shock to everyone when several different alarms and alerts went off on the bridge nearly simultaneously a little over five hours later. Spinning around in his chair, the captain instinctively looked at the view screen in front of them for some indication of danger, but could only see the panorama of stars, clusters and distant galaxies on the black velvet backdrop of interstellar space.
“First officer, report,” the captain ordered. Frantically looking over his status console, Brendan Kirkpatrick was trying to make sense of what the ship’s sensors were telling him. “Wild energy fluctuations from 60 degrees portside, sir,” he said. “Source unknown, composition unknown.”
“Port side?” the captain asked. “Give me a visual from the side cameras,” he said. The image on the view screen switched from one starscape to a slightly different one. Nothing looked particularly out of ordinary, except for down in the lower left corner of the field, where the images of the background stars appeared to be blurring or wavering, as if they were underwater.
“Science officer, analysis on that disturbance at eight o’clock,” the captain barked out, becoming increasingly agitated as more and more scientific and computer alerts were issued.
Her fingers flashing expertly and swiftly over her sensor panels, Alanna tried to pull in as much information as she possibly could given the suddenness of the appearance of the blurry, wavering object that appeared to be rushing toward them. “It reads as some sort of energy shockwave,” she said, as the first data scans began to come in. “Very extensive, many thousands of dectons in size, roughly spherical in shape.”
“Can you get a reading of the level of energy in that thing,” the captain asked. “Just how much energy are we dealing with?”
“That’s the difficult part, sir,” Alanna said, a tinge of fear and apprehension creeping into her voice. “Energy levels are extremely low, not much more than ambient space,” she said, “but that can’t be.” Seeing the kind of visual distortion the wavefront produced in the background stars, it was clear to everyone on the bridge that a tremendous amount of energy was involved.
Alanna suddenly had a thought and switched the calibration algorithms of her scanning equipment. The readings on her screens jumped suddenly. Some additional fine-tuning made her also drop her jaw in disbelief.
“The scans are showing an energy wavefront, sir,” Alanna added, genuinely alarmed. “But it appears to be negative energy!”
“Negative energy?” Brendan asked. “How can that be?”
“We’ll speculate about that another time,” the captain shouted. “Navigator, hard to starboard! Emergency velocity!”
The Franconia jerked strongly to the right and veered off in another direction. Everyone on the bridge was strongly pulled to the left as the internal gravity systems fought against the massive G-forces the maneuver caused.
“We can’t outrun it, sir,” the tactical officer said. “It’s far too big and it’s catching up to us at nearly lightspeed.”
“Time to contact?” the captain asked urgently. “Three seconds,” Alanna replied. “Defensive shields at maximum,” the captain ordered. He barely got those words out of his mouth when the massive, invisible pulse of mysterious energy caught up with them and enveloped them.
There was an enormous concussion which nearly ripped the ship in two and the lighting on the bridge went out immediately. The bridge personnel were thrown from their chairs, catapulted through the air and slammed against one of the walls. Although it was only seconds, it seemed like an eternity in the pitch blackness of the darkened bridge, punctuated only by the staccato strobe flashing of short-circuiting electronic equipment, until the orange emergency lights came on. Battery power automatically kicked in but it was only enough to provide half the normal gravitation.
Stunned and breathless from the unbelievable force of the impact, Alanna shakily stood up and looked around. Through the rusty smoke and haze she could see several other people trying to stand up and get back to their consoles. The air still crackled with the sharp smell of ozone from the electrical discharges and damaged equipment and there were red warning lights and alert sirens going off continually. “Captain Wilshire,” she called out. “Where are you, Captain?”
Waving away clouds of acrid gray smoke, she noticed the captain in his blue uniform laying face down on the floor against a bulkhead. Rushing over to him, she shook his shoulder. “Captain Wilshire, can you hear me? Captain?” She tried to move him a little bit and turn him over, but she noticed with great alarm how his neck and head was tilted at a very unnatural angle from the rest of his body. As she leaned over to him, she looked into his glazed, unblinking eyes and knew immediately that the captain’s neck had been broken and he had died instantly. She knelt there in complete disbelief as she cradled the lifeless body of her role model and mentor.
She didn’t have time to even begin to mourn the loss of her friend when she heard someone calling from the other side of the damaged, broken bridge. “I need help over here,” someone shouted out. “I need help with Mr. Kirkpatrick!” Alanna jumped up and tried to move across the smoky bridge as quickly as possible without tripping over the chairs and uprooted banks of equipment. She made her way over to Tactical Officer Henderson who was holding the unconscious form of First Officer Kirkpatrick.
“How is he?” Alanna asked anxiously. “He is still alive,” Mariah answered, “but …” She moved her hand from the side of Brendan’s head and it was drenched with blood. “He has a very severe head injury,” she said. Alanna knew immediately his head wound was life-threatening and if he was experiencing bleeding on the brain, he might not live another couple of minutes. “What are we going to do?” Mariah asked desperately.
Alanna jumped up and ran to one of the computer consoles that still appeared to have some functionality. Working the damaged controls, she quickly tried to ascertain which systems on board the ship were still working and which were totally offline.
“Main engines are offline,” she announced. “Computers are down, life support at 25%, communications are out, the reactor is online but at barely above minimal capacity.” Her mind raced as she tried to ascertain the condition of the ship. She saw something which attracted her attention and set off a spark of hope in her mind. “Matter transporter still online, but with reduced capacity,” she said. She thought for a second and knew immediately what she had to do to save the First Officer. Swiftly her fingers began to enter commands into the console. “Mariah! Stand away from Kirkpatrick”
“What?” the shocked officer replied. “What do you mean, stand away? He needs our help” she protested.
“I know he needs help,” Alanna cried out, “but we can’t do anything for him without medical personnel. Stand back, Mariah, please!”
The tactical officer gently lowered the first officer’s head to the floor and stood back as Alanna punched some final buttons on the console. A second later the first officer’s body was enveloped by a brilliant flare of violet light which lit up the entire smashed bridge in a lurid, unnatural color. A huge cloud of silver sparks appeared out of nowhere and swarmed over the prostrate figure of the first officer. They congealed all over his body and for a second he looked like he was made of brilliant silvery light before the sparks and the violet glare surrounding him vanished.
“Where did you transport him to?” Mariah asked in shock and surprise. “We don’t even know if we have a medical center to transport him to!”
“Quite true,” Alanna said as she adjusted some final controls on her console. “That’s why I interrupted the transport halfway through. All the molecular information about his body is in the memory repositories of the transporter. At least there he will be in statis, and his head wound won’t get any worse. When we’ve determined that we have an operational medical center, then we can complete his matter transportation, and materialize him again!”
Mariah seemed stunned that this had happened so suddenly, but realized it was the only way the first officer had any chance of survival. “What about the captain?” Mariah asked. Alanna looked at her with a painful look on her face. She didn’t have to tell Mariah about him, it was obvious from her facial expression. “What we need to do now is determined the extent of casualties and damage to the rest of the ship, and figure out what we are going to do.”
Over the next several minutes, the bridge crew put aside their shock and terror and worked to ascertain the condition of their vessel. “Report when you have anything, Mariah,” Alanna said as she cleared some of the debris from her science station. “Medical facilities have been damaged but are operational,” she said, listening to some information coming over her headset. Doctor Chandra thinks his arm is broken but is otherwise okay. Lieutenant Talbott in Engineering reports one crewman dead and another crewman missing.” Alanna looked over the sensor screen as she scanned the ship for biosigns. “Out of our crew of twelve, it would seem there are seven of us left,” she said ominously.
Mariah suddenly had a thought and her eyes opened wide. “The prisoners!” she said. “What about the prisoners.”
Alanna continued to receive and interpret data from the sensor arrays at lightning speed. “The prisoners are all accounted for and are still in the detention area,” she said. “I don’t know what physical condition they are in but chances are the force fields kept them safe and cushioned from the main brunt of the collision.” She thought for a second and then started punching some controls on the communications console. “I’m calling all able-bodied crewmembers to the bridge,” she said. “We need to have everyone’s input to get out of this awful situation.”
Ten minutes later the seven surviving crewmembers of the stricken Franconia were huddled together in one corner of the battered, wreckage-strewn bridge. “What was it that hit us?” Lieutenant Talbott asked, still stunned and shaken from the experience, as was everyone else.
“I managed to switch on all the automatic sensor arrays just seconds before the first major impact,” Alanna said. She activated one of the science station monitors and a great deal of scientific information and measurements started pouring out. She pointed to a large, vaguely circular blob in the center of the read-out.
“It would appear we encountered a huge bow shock from a massive energy discharge,” she said as everyone craned their necks to see the monitor. “It actually seems to be an energy ‘movement’ as opposed to a discharge, because there was never any indication of the source of the energy. No space-time disturbance, cosmic filament, supernova, hypernova, black hole explosion, gamma ray burst – nothing that would even suggest an origin.”
“So it just appeared out of nowhere with no warning at all,” Dr. Chandra said as he nursed his injured arm in a makeshift sling.
“That seems to be the case,” Mariah Henderson added. “All of a sudden, it was just there.”
“There seems to have been a gigantic amount of energy involved,” the Navigator said, not understanding completely how this could have happened. “How could our sensors not have picked up something that enormous a lot sooner?”
“Because it was comprised of negative energy,” Alanna said, pointing to a graph on the computer screen. “Our sensors are routinely calibrated for positive energy, since that is what was most often come in contact with. Negative energy is most likely associated with dark energy and dark matter, none of which have ever been detected in this region of the galaxy.” In fact, the S.T.S. Franconia would become known as the first vessel to ever come in contact with a brand new phenomenon, an enormous dark energy sphere propagating its way through space and time, which would be called a “Franconian Bubble”. These bubbles would later be found to number in the millions, orbiting the galactic center in wide-ranging, irregular paths just as some comets orbit a star.
“Who is going to be in charge?” Mariah asked. “Captain Wilshire is dead and the first officer is in matter stasis due to a severe head wound. Who’s going to be giving the orders here?” Everyone turned to Lieutenant Talbott. “Max, you’re the highest ranking officer here, aren’t you?” Mariah asked.
“I am the highest ranking military officer,” the lieutenant replied. “But according to the standard protocols, if the captain and first officer of a vessel are disabled, the command duties of the ship will fall first to whomever the captain has designated in his Delegate Signatory, as long as they are able-bodied.” He looked over to another crewmember who was working on the main computer console, trying to get it restored. “Sarah, is the administrative computer still operational?”
“I think so,” the crewmember said. “Power is kind of spotty at best, but I think I can redirect the functionality to the monitor station next to the ship’s status control.” She activated some controls and a small monitor screen above an input keypad flickered to life, next to a status readout of the vessel, which had many red lights and areas flashing atop an outline of the vessel.
“Mariah, enter in your command prefix,” Lieutenant Talbott said. The tactical officer came over and punched in some numbers on the keypad. “I’ll enter mine now,” he said, doing the same. “Alanna, your command prefix is next.” Alanna came over to the keypad and entered in her information. When she did, several dozen lines of information were displayed on the small monitor screen, along with an image of their deceased captain taken the day he assumed command of the now-beleaguered transport ship.
“Let’s see, here’s the signatory section,” Lieutenant Talbott said as he quickly scanned down the information. His eyes stopped suddenly and he looked up. “Delegate Signatory – Kosari, Alanna M.”
“Me?!” Alanna asked incredulously. “He made me his signatory? There must be some mistake!” Alanna quickly rushed over and looked at the data on the screen. Sure enough, her name was the one designated by the captain to take over command function of the ship in the case of his disablement or death in the line of duty.
“I … I can’t be captain,” Alanna said in complete confusion. “I have no knowledge or experience in command.”
“There’s no mistake,” Lieutenant Talbott said, “Captain Wilshire clearly chose you to take over for him, Alanna. We have no choice but to follow his wishes.” The remaining crewmembers looked up at Alanna at the same time, who still could not believe this was happening to her. “What are your orders, sir?” he asked of a still-thunderstruck Alanna.
Before Alanna even had time to consider any sort of answer, the ship was rattled by a deep clanging kind of noise and a jarring shudder. Some of the red blinking areas on the ship’s status console shifted and increased in size. Somewhat started out of her shock, Alanna said, “Ship’s status, report.”
Another crewmember turned to look at the ship’s status display. “The whole port side of the ship has suffered severe structural damage and the bulkheads are starting to collapse under the strain,” he said with great trepidation. “The areas most in danger of structural failure are C and D decks between Area 14 and Area 33.” Everyone looked at the ship’s display. “The prisoner isolation area is in imminent danger of a hull breach.”
Alanna’s face turned pale at that news. “A hull breach in the prisoner area?” she asked. “That would kill them instantly.”
“What about reinforcing force fields in that area, to take the strain off the bulkheads?” Mariah asked.
“Structural integrity fields are down over most of the ship,” another crewmember answered. “The projectors have been damaged and we would never have enough power for them without the main engines.” The news was just going from bad to worse for the crew of the Franconia.
“We need to get into the isolation area and reinforce the bulkheads here and here,” the crewman said, looking over some status readings from the computer console. “If we can do that then the criminals can remain in the isolation area until we can repair the ship enough to return to Three-Prime. But how are we going to get in while the prisoners are there?”
“How soon can we get the main engines regenerated and back online?” Alanna asked desperately. Lieutenant Talbott looked at her with genuine fear in his eyes. “It will be at least eight hours before I even know if the engines can be salvaged at all,” he said grimly. “We’ll be lucky if we have twenty minutes before those C-deck bulkheads give way!”
“We can’t let them just die in there,” Alanna said with great anxiety. “Well, why not?” Mariah asked, surprising everyone. “They’re only prisoners; they’re going to die anyway at the Outer Rim.” Everyone was shocked and horrified at what the tactical officer was suggesting.
“It doesn’t matter that they are ‘only prisoners’, Mariah,” Dr. Chandra interjected. “We can’t just abrogate our duties and do nothing. It’s not their fault they are in grave danger. It is our job to transport the prisoners safely to the O.R.C. and not our job to pass judgment on them. We don’t know what is going to happen to them when they get there.” He looked around at all the crewmembers. “We must do whatever we can to save their lives. To do otherwise would make us worse criminals than they are!”
Everyone stood in silence for a few seconds as the words of the doctor sunk in. Alanna was first to turn to look at a map of the internal structure of the ship. “It looks like the nearest area large enough to hold the prisoners would be the aft crew lounge, right down corridor 15 from the isolation area,” she said. “It has only one entry and exit, and it wouldn’t be easy but at least we would be able to guard them and monitor their actions.”
“That is anything but a secure area,” Lieutenant Talbott objected. “They would have access to a wide variety of objects they could use as weapons, and also access to communications and command functions. And those doors are pretty thin and not meant to withstand a lot of force.”
“It’s definitely not secure,” Mariah said, “but it looks like our only option. We can clear out the most obvious possible weapons. We can also reroute command and control circuits away from this part of C-deck,” she said, pointing to various places around the perimeter of the crew lounge. “Nothing we can do about the communications functions, though,” she said.”
“We can’t put nine of the most dangerous criminals in the Alliance together in the same area!” objected another crewmember. “They could easily band together and come up with some way to take control of the ship. We are all going to be extremely busy trying to put this ship back in one piece, there’s no way we’ll be able to watch them closely.”
The crewmembers looked around at each other; they all knew what the crewmember said was the truth. “We need to get them out the isolation area,” the doctor said. “Once they are in the crew lounge, we can figure out a way to incapacitate or immobilize them without causing any gross physical injury. That way they will be much easier to monitor and control.”
“And just how do you propose we ‘incapacitate’ them, doctor?” Lieutenant Talbott asked.
“Well, I don’t know,” the doctor said, searching for answers and grasping at straws. “Medical injections are not the answer; there is no time to figure out the type of drug and the appropriate dosages.” He thought as hard as he could. “Maybe we can induce unconsciousness in them through a controlled EMP!” he said.
“An electromagnetic pulse?” the tactical officer asked in disbelief. “Are you crazy, doctor?”
“Wait a minute, Mariah,” Lieutenant Talbott said, “the doc might be on to something here. It’s been known for centuries that EMPs can cause various physiological reactions, everything from mild dizziness to complete loss of consciousness and motor control. This is something that works across all known humanoid species with very little residual side effects.”
“I suppose we can attach small emitters and modify the communication equipment in the lounge area to transmit the pulse,” a crewmember said.
“Well how do we know how strong to make the pulse, and how long they will be incapacitated?” Alanna asked.
“That’s a big unknown,” the lieutenant admitted. “It looks like we have to go for broke and hit them really hard, so that there’s no chance they can wake up before we’re ready for them and cause trouble for us. And hopefully when they wake up again they’ll be groggy and docile enough for us to get them back in the repaired isolation area.”
Alanna thought as hard as she could about the information and options presented to her. She knew anything could go wrong in a million different ways. She also knew time was quickly running out on them.
“There does appear to be no other viable course of action,” Alanna said quietly. She looked at the ship’s diagram for another couple of seconds and looked up at her colleagues. “Mariah, get somebody and go down to the aft lounge. Move out everything and anything that could be used as a weapon. Max, you and Sarah attach portable emitters to the communicators in the crew lounge. I will make preparations for a focused electromagnetic pulse generator. And Dr. Chandra, to monitor the prisoners you will need to tie directly into the sensors in this immediate area – the ship-wide sensor arrays are offline.” She looked around to the crew in the utmost seriousness. “Everyone is to arm themselves with a weapon,” she said firmly, “and meet in front of the prisoner isolation area in five minutes!”
A very short time later all seven remaining crewmembers were crouched down in front of the prisoner isolation area with their laser weapons pointed at the door. Pale and glum, Alanna looked down at her weapon and made an adjustment. “Laser rifles on setting 9,” she said in a lifeless monotone. Each crewmember checked the power setting on their weapon, knowing that the setting they were using was one click under the maximum ‘kill’ setting. They were taking no chances at all with these dangerous beings that were soon to be removed from their isolation area.
Alanna motioned to a crewmember who touched some controls on a side wall panel and opened the doors to the isolation area. A sharp hissing noise startled everyone, as the air pressure equalized inside and outside the isolation area, another indication that precious oxygen was leaking out of the damaged bulkheads into space. The prisoners were clustered at the doors and nearly fell out when they opened.
“Hold your positions,” Lieutenant Talbott barked loudly. “Do not move any further.” All weapons were trained on the isolation area doors and the members of the Franconia were at their highest alert level, ready for even the slightest of suspicious movements from the prisoners.
“It’s about time you idiots woke up and got us out of there,” angrily shouted one of the prisoners. “We could barely breathe in there!” Claude Wendigo was the only Terran prisoner in the group. A rogue scientist from the Beta Centauri colonies, his specialty was delivery systems for weapons of mass destruction. The remaining prisoners included a Perseid, with snake-like, scaly skin; a blue-skinned Orionid; a Callidean whose crusty, dark brown skin looked like it was permanently burned; a symbiotic pair of fish-like Sporeans from a Fomalhaut star system; a Denebian, a Xandran, and a Symian.
“Prisoners will clasp their hands behind their heads, turn to the left and proceed down the corridor to the open area directly in front,” Lieutenant Talbott shouted. “Do not talk to each other or make ANY sound at all!” Still not knowing what was going on, the prisoners looked at each other in confusion. “I said MOVE!” bellowed the lieutenant. “And move NOW!” Motivated by all the weapons’ barrels pointed directly at them, the prisoners placed their hands behind their heads, grudgingly got in single file and trudged out of the isolation area down the corridor.
“What the hell are you doing with us?” snarled the Terran prisoner. “I said SHUT UP, Wendigo!” exploded Lieutenant Talbott. “One more sound out of you and you will be introduced to the nearest airlock!” Wendigo angrily looked down at the floor and said nothing. It seemed like it took a very long time, but the line of prisoners slowly made its way to the aft crew lounge. The tension in the atmosphere was unbelievably thick, and everyone knew that it would only take the slightest misstep on anyone’s part to unleash a firestorm of death.
The last prisoner finally crossed over the threshold of the crew lounge and they all got a look at their new surroundings. Claude Wendigo was the first to notice the energy emitters jury-rigged into the communications devices and his scientific training immediately told him something was up.
“Seal the doors,” Alanna ordered from the outside corridor. Instantly the doors to the crew lounge slammed shut behind the prisoners. “Rig for EMP in five seconds”, she shouted into a handheld communication device. Inside, Claude Wendigo had only to hear ‘EMP’ and knew what was going to happen and began to look around desperately. He noticed a metallic blanket which had been left on the floor in the crew lounged and dived on it, wrapping it quickly around his head and holding it in place, hoping that the metal in the blanket would shield him from the worst effects of the coming EMP.
“Everyone, take cover,” Alanna called out, and all the crewmembers out in the corridor took shelter, ducking behind a wall or an internal bulkhead. Seconds later there was a strange sizzling sound and what sounded like a small explosion as the doors to the crew lounge vibrated. An intense blue-green flash of light shown out around the edges of the doors and poured out through the gap at floor level.
“EMP completed. Doctor Chandra, report,” Alanna shouted into her communicator. In the medical facility, Dr. Chandra was looking intently at a monitor of the sensor images of the inside of the crew lounge. He could see the biosigns of the nine prisoners. All biosigns appeared normal but were not moving around at all.
“It looks like the pulse worked,” Dr. Chandra stated hesitantly. “The prisoners’ biosigns appear normal but greatly reduced and showing no activity. No one is moving around.”
Alanna and the rest of the crew breathed a little easier and relaxed from their excruciating experience. “All right,” she said. “We’re going to assume that everything worked and the prisoners are unconscious and immobilized,” she said. “We have a lot of work still to do and very little time. We may have to initiate another pulse if the prisoners awake. Engineering, get into the isolation area and reinforce those bulkheads. Everyone else, report to your repair stations and resume your work. Long-range communications are still out so help will not be coming to us. We need to get this ship flying again and return to Three-Prime as quickly as possible. Dr. Chandra, continue to monitor the prisoners closely and report any changes in their condition to me immediately.”
The crewmembers dispersed from the corridor and returned to their critical business of repairing their ship. An eerie, stifling quiet descended on the ship. But not more than thirty seconds later another crisis was dropped into their laps.
“Doctor Chandra to the captain,” came the urgent message. “Kosari here,” Alanna replied into her communicator at the science station. “What is it?”
“We have a big problem,” he said ominously. “It seems the electromagnetic pulse has caused some unforeseen problems with some of the equipment. I am seeing some wild and dangerous fluctuations in the matter transporter. The internal matrix is breaking down and the repositories are starting to lose integrity!”
Alanna froze in her tracks and looked over to Mariah, horror crossing her face at the news. “The first officer is in matter statis,” she said. “If the repositories become corrupted we will never be able to recover Brendan.”
“I’m confirming what the doctor has observed,” Mariah said urgently, looking at a computer readout. “A runaway degradation is starting to sweep through the memory coils. We need to get Brendan re-materialized immediately!”
Alanna looked around in utmost desperation. “Doctor, do you have the facilities to begin treatment of Brendan’s head injury if we materialize him in your facility?”
“The medical center is in shambles,” replied the doctor. “The best that I can do would be to stabilize him and keep his injuries from getting worse.”
“Then that’s what we will do,” Alanna said, resigning herself to a very much less-than-ideal option. “I’m beginning the rematerialization sequence now.” She hurried over to another console and rapidly entered a number of commands into the matter transporter. The medical center of the ship was flooded with a flare of purple light and the silver fireflies congealed on the form of a male human prostrate on the floor. Dr. Chandra was standing above him with some medical equipment to sustain and stabilize First Officer Kirkpatrick. With Dr. Chandra’s full attention now focused on keeping the first officer alive, he did not notice a slight movement in one of the prisoner biosigns on his sensor monitor. Inside the aft crew lounge, the unconscious bodies of eight prisoners lay motionless on the floor, but Claude Wendigo opened his eyes.
Each of the seven Franconia crew members worked feverishly on their tasks, repairing the internal systems which were not too badly damaged and bringing the computer systems back online. Dr. Chandra worked intently on the first officer, staunching the flow of blood from his head and administering fluids and medication intravenously. No one noticed when Claude Wendigo used one of the smaller prisoners as a battering ram, repeatedly slamming the unconscious alien into the doors of the crew lounge until they finally broke open. He squeezed his way through the doors and ran down the corridor in the direction from which they came. He took an abrupt right turn down a corridor which led to the shuttlecraft.
Glancing up from his treatment of the first officer, Dr. Chandra took one look at his sensor monitor and felt his blood run cold inside him. “Prisoner escape!” he cried into his communicator. “One of the prisoners has regained consciousness and has broken out of the crew lounge.”
“Oh for God’s sake!” Alanna said despairingly. “Mariah, can we get a sensor fix on him?”
The tactical officer looked at her screens. “Not possible,” came the frantic reply. “All the sensor arrays are offline; the only ones that are working are the ones in the crew lounge that Chandra is directly connected to.”
Alanna felt the cold fingers of fear move up her spine. “A dangerous criminal loose on this ship and we are essentially blind,” she said quietly. “Can we seal off any of those decks?” she asked desperately. “At least try to restrict him to a certain area?”
“All the command and control functions had been terminated for that area in preparation for the prisoner move and were never reinstated,” Mariah said. “We can’t control a single thing.” Alanna thought for a moment. “Max,” she called into her communicator, “we have a prisoner escape; can you get to the crew lounge?”
“I’m in the middle of an antimatter regeneration in the main engines,” came the crackling, static-filled reply. “If I don’t monitor this process carefully the engines can explode. I can’t possibly leave, nor can I send the one remaining engineer who’s helping me!”
Dejectedly, Alanna knew what he was saying was true. Completely out of options and having no idea at all of what to do next, Alanna felt as if the only reasonable thing she could do was give up. A part of her almost envied her dead friend, Captain Wilshire.
Mariah was swiftly glancing from one computer monitor to the other, not believing what she was seeing. “Computers indicate the shuttlecraft is powering up!” she cried out. Alanna’s jaw dropped. “He’s stealing the shuttlecraft?” she asked, disbelieving. “It would appear so,” Mariah said. “It looks like he’s running through all the startup steps manually, but the computers are still taking checkpoints.”
“Can’t we shut the manual processes down?” Alanna asked anxiously. “Again, all command and control processes for that area have been shut down. We can’t do a single thing to stop him,” Marian replied in evident frustration.
Alanna just stood there feeling more helpless than she ever had in her entire life. Solemnly, Mariah announced, “The shuttlecraft has powered up and detached itself from the bay.” She looked at the rough radar scans of the outside of the Franconia. “It is moving away from us.”
Suddenly she jumped over to another console. “I have limited weaponry!” she shouted out excitedly. “And the targeting sensors are working! I can see him on my screen!” Alanna rushed behind her and peered over her shoulder. Sure enough, the targeting sensors showed a clear picture of the shuttlecraft pointing itself away from the Franconia and ready to cut in its main engines.
“I have a strong targeting lock on the shuttlecraft,” Mariah said, frantically operating some controls on the console. “There is a single battery of laser cannons completely charged and ready to go.” She turned to look at Alanna. “We have him in our sights,” she said urgently. “We can blast him and shuttle into a cloud of debris. Just give the order, captain.”
Alanna froze in place and felt the blood rush out of her face. She could stop the escape of a dangerous, convicted criminal by destroying the shuttlecraft but it would take the prisoner’s life. She just had to give the word and bring this misbegotten escape to an end, but deliberately taking the life of another living being was so repugnant to her that she felt inside that she could not do it.
“Captain, you must give the order,” Mariah insisted. “The shuttle is picking up speed rapidly and will be out of weapons range in seconds!” Alanna felt the walls of the bridge starting to close in on her. Breathing became extremely difficult for her as she felt her chest tighten and her heart pound like a trip hammer.
“SIR! YOUR ORDERS!” Mariah fairly shouted at her. Alanna felt as if she were paralyzed, looking at the targeting monitor and back to Mariah, unable to speak. Several critical seconds slipped by and finally Mariah let out an audible sigh and quietly said, “Shuttlecraft has moved out of weapons range, sir.” They watched the image of the shuttlecraft shrink as it pulled away from the Franconia at great speed and disappeared into the blackness of space.
Mariah looked into Alanna’s face and touched her hand, saying softly, “I’m sorry Alanna. It was an extremely difficult, almost impossible decision. I know you made the only choice you could.”
“What have I done, Mariah?” Alanna said sadly, gazing at the featureless black expanse on the targeting monitor. “What have I done?”
