Episode 1 - 30 Days of Flight

--August 8th, 2376. Mission Time: 29 Days.-----

“This headache is never going to go away…”

Captain Bren Chell winced as he leaned up against the armrest of his command chair. His head was pounding as the pulsing sound coming from a breached power conduit behind one of aft bridge terminals continued to pierce a shrill tone that seemed to stab the Bolian starship captain right in the frontal lobe.


It had been twenty-nine days, since the Europa, and her companion vessel the USS Galaxy had found themselves relocated… stranded in a completely uncharted area of the universe. His head pulsed as he thought about the events that got them into this mess.

***

Four years ago, Starfleet had been able to get in touch with the Federation Starship Voyager, who had been reporting lost in action. Using one of the Federation’s deep space communication arrays, the starship had been located in the Delta Quadrant, one of the farthest reaches of known space. Voyager had reported that they were heading back toward the Alpha Quadrant. However, they were so far away from Federation territory, it would take them nearly seventy years to make it home.

Starfleet had decided that seventy years was too long to wait, They tasked two starships, the Europa and the Galaxy to venture into deep space and intercept Voyager. The two ships were tasked with plotting stellar phenomenon that would help Voyager find her way home faster, while also moving to go meet her at least midway.  


The USS Galaxy, commanded by Captain Joseph Branston, would the brawn of the duo. As an uprated Galaxy class explorer, the Galaxy had some of the latest tactical weaponry that Starfleet had ever developed for a long-range exploratory starship. She was designed to be a powerhouse, specifically made to operate in situations where it was important to shoot first, and ask questions later.


The USS Europa on the other hand, was designed to be the ‘brains’ of the two. A modified Nebula class explorer, the majority of the ship’s weapons and tactical systems had been replaced with an advanced multi-spectral sensor array, and an AWACS system. Inside, the ship was massively redesigned from the standard Nebula-class setup. With a reduced crew compliment of only four hundred, compared to the regular seven hundred, the extra space onboard the Europa had been reconfigured to hold industrial sized replicators, advanced medical facilities and storage space for additional shuttlecraft.

The majority of the Europa’s crew had been re-assigned from the Starfleet Core of Engineers or from Starfleet medical. She was more of a workhorse than anything else, designed to support the Galaxy whenever possible. Captain Chell was one of the few officers in Starfleet that had reached the rank of Captain, while being under the engineering career path. His ship was basically full of what humans would call "grease monkeys".

Both ships had been only days into their assignment, having just left the borders of the Alpha Quadrant when they discovered a massive stellar artifact, what Federation scientists had called an Iconian Super-Gate.  The massive technological structure which had only spoken to be rumor, but designed by the ancient Iconian race in order to transport fleets of ships massive distances across the Galaxy. The existence of what had been deemed to be rumor, until the two Federation vessels discovered it. It was a once in a lifetime discovery. Something that had been rumored to exist for tens of thousands of years.


Captain Branston had wanted to leave a sensor buoy, and let a Federation research team come out and properly investigate the Super Gate.  However, Captain Chell had been able to convince his counter-part that they were the Federation research team, and that they had a duty to gather as much information as they could before moving on.

When the two ships had approached the Super-Gate to begin running scans, the massive structure began to power up. Opening the center of the gate with an immense iris. It grabbed both ships with powerful tractor beams, and hurled them through the center. Both ships traveled across space at speeds faster than had ever been recorded.  When they arrived, they were heavily damaged. Galaxy in particular had suffered core structural damage, taking her primary sensor array offline. Europa had served to be the ‘eyes’ for both ships, ever since they arrived here.

Bren still had no idea what caused the gate to activate. All he knew was that his ship was too far away to send any subspace distress signal to Starfleet, no matter how advanced of a communication system they could come up with. They had no stellar reference points to tell them where they were, or to give them a heading they could use to start to head back home.

The Captain didn’t want to tell the crew, but there was a pretty good chance that the twelve hundred men and women between the two ships were never going to see Earth ever again.

Bren felt responsible for that. If they had listened to Captain Branson, and just left the sensor log at the Super-Gate, they wouldn’t have been stranded here. The guilt he felt over that was overwhelming, and he silent paid for it every night in his quarters, when he poured his feelings into his personal log.

***

That had been nearly a month ago, and both the Europa and Galaxy had run into more immediate problems since then. From the moment they had arrived in this new area of space, they had found themselves under attack by an unknown enemy. The alien ships were large and powerful, bristling with particle weapons with configurations that Captain Chell had never seen before.


They never hailed them. The only form of communication from the alien vessels were them trying to punch through the Europa’s shields every time the two Federation vessels dropped from warp speed.

It seemed that moving at warp was the only security that Captain Chell could find for his crew. Whoever those aliens were, it didn’t seem like they were able to pursue them at faster than light speeds. Yet, whenever either ship dropped from warp, they were immediately attacked.  Playing warp hopscotch was an expensive strategy to their deuterium fuel stores, made worse by they had no idea where they were going.

Any one of Captain Chell’s crew could see the azure blood vessels raising from the top of his skull, as they delivered him wave after wave of amended damage or inventory reports. The Captain basically skimmed before handing them over to his first officer. He didn’t need to read them to know that the situation was bad. Chell chuckled to himself in a painful irony, which made his head ache again. The situation they were in was beyond bad. It was catastrophic.

The stress of their current situation was starting to get to him. It was starting to get to them all. Every duty shift had been running a triple stint from the moment they arrived here.

He was tired...exhausted.  He wasn’t the only one.  The rest of his crew felt like they were stuck in warp purgatory in an unknown area of space. They had to find a way out of this situation, if they could take a moment to pause in open space without being attacked.

Europa and Galaxy had both taken refuge in a Class 9 nebula. The idea had been for both ships to replenish their deuterium stores, by taking in materials from the nebula and converting them. Europa was much better equipped to this work, as she had industrial Class 11 high-matter converters designed specifically for the task. However, she also had to be the eyes for both ships, as her sensor array was the only thing keeping watch in case they were attacked again.

“Captain, are you sure that you don’t want to take a visit to Sickbay? With all due respect sir, you look awful,” NPC Helmsman Lieutenant Johnson said to her captain. Bren laughed slightly at the junior officer’s remark, before his face twisted again in a slight pain. With both ships stuck in such dire straights, the Captain found it ironic that anyone would want to treat him with due respect.

After all, in the grand scheme of things, it was his fault that they were stuck here...

(Tag all)

--^-- Communication from USS Galaxy --^--

Through the intricacies of subspace communication came a real time link with Captain Branston of the starship Galaxy, the only other friendly ship in this entire galaxy it seemed.

As much as Branston was loathe to admit it, he needed the Europa badly. They were the only ship that had working sensors. Being on stims this long made that thought come out in much more colourful mental language though.

"Hello Captain Chell, for the millionth time," Branston spoke with the slight slur of a man who had not slept in days, "Any sign of them yet?"

Where was the point? He thought. They all knew how long it took for these alien jerkoffs to show up. The number was burned into their brains - ten minutes, fourty seconds exactly.

Still. It was good to talk, right?

{Chell}

Bren rested with his head in his hands, as he leaned back into his command chair. His headache seemed to be getting worse. Every ping and chirp from the bridge threatening to crack his skull open from the sound. The Bolian Captain wasn't one to rely on stimulants, as the chemicals reacted poorly to his physiology. So he seemed to hold onto every ache and pain that he had developed since they had arrived here.

Sucking a sharp intake a breath through his teeth, Captain Chell decided that he had enough and was going to take his helmsman's advice and go down to sickbay. Maybe one of the doctor might have something that would at least clear his head. Bracing himself against the armrests of his chair, Bren focused all of his willpower to try and rise himself out of his command chair and head towards the turbolift.

That was until another shrill beeping sound seem assault his ears from the Operations console. NPC Lieutenant Melar cleared her throat slightly as the Trill spoke up to her Captain. "Captain, we're receiving a transmission from the Galaxy. It's Captain Branston."

Chell let himself slump back into his seat, as he let out another long breath. He knew what the Captain was going to ask. Every time he hailed Europa, it was basically to ask the same question. Still, maybe Branston would surprise him.

"Alright, punch it up on the main viewer." Chell said as the viewscreen changed from the nebulous star background, to the bridge of their sister Galaxy-class ship. The crew of the Galaxy seemed just as ragged as Europa's. Crewmen seemed bearly awake at their stations, eyes botched red and black as they all stared at their own viewscreen with a dazed look of desperation.

***

=/\="Hello Captain Chell, for the millionth time," Branston spoke with the slight slur of a man who had not slept in days, "Any sign of them yet?" =/\=

Bren let a small smile rise on his face, pretending that the sound of Branston's voice over the speakers wasn't like a punch in the face. He took a moment to pause, as if he was considering what the proper answer was for a reply. He looked up at the bridge lighting, then down at his feet as if he was admiring the carpet, before returning his eye contact to his fellow captain.

=/\= "Nothing on our scanners, Captain. At least nothing that we can see well. The interference from the nebula is still playing games with our main sensor array. Though, my team has figure out how to clear up most of it from the background radiation, the occasional echo still gets through from time to time."=/\=

Bren knew that he was telling the Galaxy's captain more information than he probably wanted to know, but any conversation that wasn't discussing a casualty report was a nice change. Captain Branston didn't seem that impressed, or that interested. Normally Bren would chalk that up to exhaustion. However, Branston and Chell hadn't really gotten along from the first day that this crisis had begun.

<Branston>

Chell let out a small sigh at the Captain's flippant response. =/\= It's nothing that serious. Most of the time it's just a sensor echo that's bouncing our own scans back at us. If I thought there was something out there, I would go investigate=/\=

<Branston>

Chell bit his lower lip slightly, and decided not to reply back to Branston's last comment. In Branston's eyes, Chell was 'just an engineer that held the rank of Captain', not a command officer. Bren noticed every once in a while when the two had conversations. If there was a decision that needed to be made between the two ships, Branston seemed to confer more with his own first officer about the proper course of action, rather than with him. If was almost if mentioning things to Captain Chell was more of an after-thought, rather than rank protocol.

Chell thought that Branston was a blow-hard. A pillow-talker that came from Federation admiralty in his family. He wore his command red like a badge of honor, which uniformed officers who wore the lesser colors 'wouldn't understand.'

Long story short, if Chell didn't need Branston help to stay alive during this nightmare, he'd be happy to never talk to this human again. But he did, so the two kept talking.

<Branston>

=/\="Hello Captain Chell, for the millionth time," Branston spoke with the slight slur of a man who had not slept in days, "Any sign of them yet?" =/\=

Bren let a small smile rise on his face, pretending that the sound of Branston's voice over the speakers wasn't like a punch in the face. He took a moment to pause, as if he was considering what the proper answer was for a reply. He looked up at the bridge lighting, then down at his feet as if he was admiring the carpet, before returning his eye contact to his fellow captain.

=/\= "Nothing on our scanners, Captain. At least nothing that we can see well. The interference from the nebula is still playing games with our main sensor array. Though, my team has figure out how to clear up most of it from the background radiation, the occasional echo still gets through from time to time."=/\=

Bren knew that he was telling the Galaxy's captain more information than he probably wanted to know, but any conversation that wasn't discussing a casualty report was a nice change. Captain Branston didn't seem that impressed, or that interested. Normally Bren would chalk that up to exhaustion. However, Branston and Chell hadn't really gotten along from the first day that this crisis had begun.

=^="Yeah, great. Why not talk about what we really need to worry about? Is this echo them?"=^= Branston snorted.

Chell let out a small sigh at the Captain's flippant response. =/\= It's nothing that serious. Most of the time it's just a sensor echo that's bouncing our own scans back at us. If I thought there was something out there, I would go investigate=/\=

=^="Stop thinking like a grease monkey," Branston huffed impatiently, "We can't afford to split up right now. All it would take is for the aliens to show up and they could rip us both apart before anyone was the wiser."=^=

Chell bit his lower lip slightly, and decided not to reply back to Branston's last comment. In Branston's eyes, Chell was 'just an engineer that held the rank of Captain', not a command officer. Bren noticed every once in a while when the two had conversations. If there was a decision that needed to be made between the two ships, Branston seemed to confer more with his own first officer about the proper course of action, rather than with him. If was almost if mentioning things to Captain Chell was more of an after-thought, rather than rank protocol.

Chell thought that Branston was a blow-hard. A pillow-talker that came from Federation admiralty in his family. He wore his command red like a badge of honor, which uniformed officers who wore the lesser colors 'wouldn't understand.'

Long story short, if Chell didn't need Branston help to stay alive during this nightmare, he'd be happy to never talk to this human again. But he did, so the two kept talking.

=^="Look," Branston took a moment to check his cranky attitude, "Maybe we're looking at this the wrong way. We've been running on fumes for days and desperately need a break. If we could fix the deuterium storage facilities on Galaxy we'd be able to stay at warp for longer - maybe find out how these jerks are able to track us wherever we go."=^=

{Chell}

Long story short, if Chell didn't need Branston help to stay alive during this nightmare, he'd be happy to never talk to this human again. But he did, so the two kept talking.

=^="Look," Branston took a moment to check his cranky attitude, "Maybe we're looking at this the wrong way. We've been running on fumes for days and desperately need a break. If we could fix the deuterium storage facilities on Galaxy we'd be able to stay at warp for longer - maybe find out how these jerks are able to track us wherever we go."=^=

Bren let out a frustrated sigh, as Captain Branston reminded him of yet another issue they were facing. Captain Chell wasn't making eye contact with his colleague, as it was clear that his engineering brain was at work.

The Galaxy had been suffering from micro-fractures in her deuterium storage tanks since the first attack. It basically meant that she was basically burning fuel...running rich as they would say. That also had a knock-on affect of overheating the warp plasma manifolds, causing the ship to run hot whenever she was at warp speed.

The only way for deuterium storage tanks could be serviced is when they were cold, the deuterium reactions inert and material isolated in a secondary storage tank. The only way to do that meant taking the warp drive offline and disabling several of the primary propulsion power management systems for several hours.  

It wasn’t a matter of manpower. Chell could send several engineering teams over to the Galaxy, and have them work on repairing their sister ship at any moment. It was a matter of timing. Since they arrived here, whenever either ship wasn’t moving at warp, they found themselves under attack by the aliens cruisers that patrolled this space. Leaving the Galaxy stranded at sublight speed for several hours was just asking to paint a target on their hull.

In fact, Chell found himself surprised that they had been able to stay hidden in this nebula for as long as they had. He had gotten so used to playing hit and run, that Europa had bearly an opportunity to gain some astrometric data about the region of space that they were in. They were still lost as lost could be.

“How much deuterium does your ship have left?”, Chell asked, clearly trying to come up with a stop gap.

<Branson>

“What progress have you made trying to take in the nebula material in the Bussard Collectors?” he asked, hoping for a better answer.

<Branson>

The Bolian captain made no effort to hide his frustration at the answers he was getting. His eyes fell to the carpet of his own bridge deck, as he was clearly in some thought. Branston was speaking still, but Chell hadn’t heard a word that he said. Galaxy needed repairs, and both crews needed rest.

His eyes perked up when he heard one of Branston's bridge officers at tactical giving a suggestion about cold-stopping the Galaxy in intervals in order to gather more nebular material. Branston seemed to be looking back to give his subordinate a response, but her suggestion had started to make Captain Chell think a bit deeper about the situation.

Suddenly, Bren interrupted Captain Branston as an idea came to mind.

“You know? That's actually not a bad idea. However, maybe we can add onto it. Maybe the issue we’re having isn’t a matter of how fast we can travel, but how far we can go without stopping. For whatever reason, these bastards never seem to try and attack us when we’re traveling at warp,” Chell started, noticing Branson slight confusion at his collegues approach.

Chell ignored the expression of Branston’s face and continued.

“Rather than trying to move at our maximum speed, what if we kept our speed barely above the speed of light. Warp 1.1. That would extend the range that we could go, before we had to drop out of warp to refuel and extend some of the range that we could travel before we had to stop, right?” he asked, rhetorically. "Then at the very least, when your ship had to cold-stop, you'd be more likely to do it less often."

<Branston>

The look on Captain Chell’s face read, ‘If you’ve got a better idea, I’d like to hear it.’, as he shrugged his shoulders slightly. “Look, I have no idea why we’re seemingly safe at warp. We all know that for ninety-nine percent of the species we’ve encountered, they would be able to track us and intercept us. However, for the moment, I’d count it as a blessing, because at least we have some time to start thinking about how to get out of this situation, “Chell commented, as he just continued to talk.

“Look, I know we keep talking about this, and I know you don’t want to hear it, but I’m telling you. These aliens must have a border of space that they control. Maybe if we can figure out where that is, we can try and leave so we can try and find a safe haven. Your ship needs repairs that it needs to be in a spacedock for…wherever the closest one might be.”  Chell suggested as he looked back to his colleague.

<Branson>

Long story short, if Chell didn't need Branston help to stay alive during this nightmare, he'd be happy to never talk to this human again. But he did, so the two kept talking.

=^="Look," Branston took a moment to check his cranky attitude, "Maybe we're looking at this the wrong way. We've been running on fumes for days and desperately need a break. If we could fix the deuterium storage facilities on Galaxy we'd be able to stay at warp for longer - maybe find out how these jerks are able to track us wherever we go."=^=

Bren let out a frustrated sigh, as Captain Branston reminded him of yet another issue they were facing. Captain Chell wasn't making eye contact with his colleague, as it was clear that his engineering brain was at work.

The Galaxy had been suffering from micro-fractures in her deuterium storage tanks since the first attack. It basically meant that she was basically burning fuel...running rich as they would say. That also had a knock-on affect of overheating the warp plasma manifolds, causing the ship to run hot whenever she was at warp speed.

The only way for deuterium storage tanks could be serviced is when they were cold, the deuterium reactions inert and material isolated in a secondary storage tank. The only way to do that meant taking the warp drive offline and disabling several of the primary propulsion power management systems for several hours.

It wasn’t a matter of manpower. Chell could send several engineering teams over to the Galaxy, and have them work on repairing their sister ship at any moment. It was a matter of timing. Since they arrived here, whenever either ship wasn’t moving at warp, they found themselves under attack by the aliens cruisers that patrolled this space. Leaving the Galaxy stranded at sublight speed for several hours was just asking to paint a target on their hull.

In fact, Chell found himself surprised that they had been able to stay hidden in this nebula for as long as they had. He had gotten so used to playing hit and run, that Europa had bearly an opportunity to gain some astrometric data about the region of space that they were in. They were still lost as lost could be.

“How much deuterium does your ship have left?”, Chell asked, clearly trying to come up with a stop gap.

Branston shook his head, trying to remember the figures he'd only seen a moment before. Damn this exhaustion, "Um. Not much. Maybe enough to get us a light year or two at most."

“What progress have you made trying to take in the nebula material in the Bussard Collectors?” he asked, hoping for a better answer.

"Well that's where things brighten - but not by much." Branston shrugged, "The manifolds overheating has damaged the collectors a bit. They're running at about 45%..."

The Bolian captain made no effort to hide his frustration at the answers he was getting. His eyes fell to the carpet of his own bridge deck, as he was clearly in some thought. Branston was speaking still, but Chell hadn’t heard a word that he said. Galaxy needed repairs, and both crews needed rest.

His eyes perked up when he heard one of Branston's bridge officers at tactical giving a suggestion about cold-stopping the Galaxy in intervals in order to gather more nebular material. Branston seemed to be looking back to give his subordinate a response, but her suggestion had started to make Captain Chell think a bit deeper about the situation.

Suddenly, Bren interrupted Captain Branston as an idea came to mind.

“You know? That's actually not a bad idea. However, maybe we can add onto it. Maybe the issue we’re having isn’t a matter of how fast we can travel, but how far we can go without stopping. For whatever reason, these bastards never seem to try and attack us when we’re traveling at warp,” Chell started, noticing Branson slight confusion at his collegues approach.

Chell ignored the expression of Branston’s face and continued.

“Rather than trying to move at our maximum speed, what if we kept our speed barely above the speed of light. Warp 1.1. That would extend the range that we could go, before we had to drop out of warp to refuel and extend some of the range that we could travel before we had to stop, right?” he asked, rhetorically. "Then at the very least, when your ship had to cold-stop, you'd be more likely to do it less often."

Branston didn't say anything. He was trying too hard to clear his fuzzy mind to consider Chell's proposal. Maybe he needed another stim...

The look on Captain Chell’s face read, ‘If you’ve got a better idea, I’d like to hear it.’, as he shrugged his shoulders slightly. “Look, I have no idea why we’re seemingly safe at warp. We all know that for ninety-nine percent of the species we’ve encountered, they would be able to track us and intercept us. However, for the moment, I’d count it as a blessing, because at least we have some time to start thinking about how to get out of this situation, “Chell commented, as he just continued to talk.

“Look, I know we keep talking about this, and I know you don’t want to hear it, but I’m telling you. These aliens must have a border of space that they control. Maybe if we can figure out where that is, we can try and leave so we can try and find a safe haven. Your ship needs repairs that it needs to be in a spacedock for…wherever the closest one might be.” Chell suggested as he looked back to his colleague.

"Granted. They must have some kind of sensor grid or something in their space. But short of capturing the data, I don't know how we're going to be able to find out where their borders are. Don't active sensors give off an energy reading or something? Something we can track down if we knew where to look? If we figure out how they work maybe we can hide from them or something...I...make any sense to you?"

{Chell}

"Granted. They must have some kind of sensor grid or something in their space. But short of capturing the data, I don't know how we're going to be able to find out where their borders are. Don't active sensors give off an energy reading or something? Something we can track down if we knew where to look? If we figure out how they work maybe we can hide from them or something...I...make any sense to you?"

***
Captain Chell thought about Branson's idea. Although his fellow captain's thoughts were fairly lucid, conceptually it made sense. Unless they could find a way to determine where the boundaries of their pursuers' space were, the Europa and Galaxy would just be running blind hoping that the attacks would eventually stop.

The problem was that the Galaxy was in no condition for a sustained search, fight or pursuit. She desperately needed repairs, and if Europa was chained to her by acting as her main sensor platform, their range of movement would be extremely limited. That's how it had been for the last month while they had played an deadly game of interstellar hide and seek. They needed a different strategy, before both ships were too badly damaged to be of much use.

"Captain, how long do you think that Galaxy can stay in this nebula?" he asked, somewhat hypothetically

<Branson>

Chell shrugged his shoulders. "We need to start mapping this regional of space, just that we know more about what we're getting into. I can transferred a few engineering crews over to Galaxy, via shuttlecraft. Then the Europa will exit the nebula and go out for four-or five lightyears. Our sensor suites are much more advanced than your ship...and they work right now. We'll return to the nebula after a run, transfer the data to Galaxy, and head out again."

Chell waited for Branson's reply, which he assumed would probably be a negative one.

<Branson>

If Chell had been supposed to take offense, the Captain just gave another dismissive shrug, before he started talking again. "Look, by having a better idea of the stellar cartography, we'll have a much greater tactical advantage by knowing the area." he said simply, hoping that the words 'tactical advantage' would strike a cord with "By the book-Branson"

<Branson>