Lt. (jg) Hyper Nor was at her post when Lt. Cmdr. Maxine Taggert came up behind her, startling her, "Nor, where is McKay? she inquired, "The computer said she was in here, but I don't see her anywhere!"

Hyper couldn't find Audra either. She knew Audra wanted to go planetside to that estate sale, but surely she wouldn't have . . . "I haven't seen her Commander, "answered Nor.

"Taggert to McKay," said Taggert, slapping her comm badge. No answer. "What's wrong with the comm channel?" she shouted. "Can't anything work around here in an emergency!?" "Nor, if McKay comes back this way, send her to me immediately! Understand?!"

"Yes, sir, right away."

The Endeavour was on its way to Federation Starbase 98 after it had picked up an emergency signal indicating that the starbase was under attack by unknown forces.

Hyper's internal 'Audra Alert' went off. She knew Audra would be at her post during an emergency and would most certainly answer Taggert's call, had she been able to. And the fact that her comm channel wasn't working properly was just too convenient.

Surely, thought Hyper, Audra didn't beam down to Trilan 2. No, she thought shaking her head, she wouldn't. "Of course she would! She's Audra McKay!" Suddenly it all came together for her. Audra was stuck on Trilan 2 and for some reason wasn't able to make it back to the ship when the emergency happened!

Hyper had a hunch and wanted to check something out."Computer, where is the location of Lt. (jg) Audra McKay?"

"Lt. Audra McKay is in Transporter Room 2."

Ok, now let's see if . . . "Computer, location of Lt. Audra McKay".

"Lt. Audra McKay is on deck 36, corridor 4".

Ah, ha! Just as I thought! Audra fixed the computer to make it look as though she were still aboard the ship. Now, what do I do? thought Hyper.

*****************

Terry and Audra stepped from the Government Building and Terry promptly plopped herself down on the curb, hugging her knees to her body. Her head dropped down and she was near to tears. She was afraid she was going to loose what little rank she had and would probably get thrown into the brig for this! Why did she let Audra talk her into coming here!? she wondered.

Audra sat down beside her and put her arm around her little friend's shoulder, "Aw, come on, Ter, it isn't all that bad, " she lied. She was beginning to feel a little bit guilty about dragging Terry into this misadventure of hers. But how was she to know that the Endeavour would get called off on some emergency mission! And besides, Terry had wanted to come along. At least, that was what she was telling herself at the moment.

Suddenly Terry jumped to her feet. Her hands were in fists by her side and she had such an angry look on her face that Audra was a bit unsettled by it. She had never seen her friend look so angry before and felt she was in for it!

"Terry, I'm really sorry! she began, "if I had known the Endeavour was going to get called away I . . . "

Terry cut her off short, "I'm not mad at you Audra. I wanted to come her too. I'm mad at those punks! They had no right or cause to attack us and steal our stuff!"

Audra sighed a sigh of relief. "I know, Terry,"she replied as she got to her feet, "But there's nothing we can do about that now. And besides, it was just stuff. Nothing really important."

"Oh? Aren't you forgetting about our comm badges? How are we going to explain to Taggert that we let some creeps steal our badges? That's Starfleet property and we're Starfleet Officers and I'm not gonna let those punks get away with this!"

"But, Ter, what can we do? They outnumbered us 12 to one!" Audra knew Terry was right about getting the comm badges back, but she wasn't all that happy about getting into a fight with those guys again.

"It was more like 4 to 1, Audra. We can take 'em!"

Audra couldn't believe that Terry was serious about fighting those men again, but then, she didn't know Terry all that well. Terry had been assigned to the Endeavour at the same time as Audra, but they really didn't get to know each other until the past few months.

"Terry, we don't even know where they went. How are we gonna find them? And even if we do find them, how are the two of us gonna take on all those guys?"

"I'm used to being outnumbered, Audra. I come from a large family, remember? My brothers always outnumbered me, but I fought 'em anyway."

"How many times did you win?" asked Audra with a smirk.

"More times than I lost." replied Terry as she headed out toward the park where they had been attacked. "Let's go!"

"But Ter, " shouted Audra, "I'm not used to being outnumbered!"

Terry stopped suddenly and swung around to face Audra. "Look Audra, if you don't want to some with me, fine. You just stay here and wait until the Endeavour comes back and then you can explain to Taggert how we came to be stranded on this planet without our comm badges! I'm going to find those punks and get our stuff back!"

Audra thought about what Terry had said and even though they were outnumbered, on an alien planet with no way to reach their ship, she still thought she would rather face those men than Taggert! "Hold on Terry, I'm coming!"

*********

"Nor!" shouted Taggert. "Did you see McKay yet?"

"No, sir. The computer stated that she was in Transporter Room 2. Probably making some repairs."

"I was just in Transporter Room 2 and she's not there! What is going on around here? It's a good thing this wasn't an actual emergency! If it had been, and we'd had to transport hundreds of people off of that starbase . . . " she let the last words fade as she turned and stomped out of main engineering.

Hyper was relieved that the Endeavour was not needed after all at Starbase 98. It seems that an experiment in one of their science labs had gone bad and exploded, setting off an alarm. Someone was too quick to assume they were being attacked and had sent out the wrong message.

Now that the emergency was over, the Endeavour was heading back to Trilan 2. That was good. The bad thing was that now, Taggert had the time to figure out what was going on with Audra! She knew that Taggert had already contacted Ensign Brock about repairing the malfunctioning comm channel. It wouldn't take Brock long to figure out that it had been tampered with along with the computer. This is not looking good for Audra, she thought. I sure hope she's having fun! thought Hyper.

*****************

Terry and Audra walked to the park and Terry pointed in the direction of some buildings which were across from them. "I think those slime pits went in that direction." She stood for a minute and thought out loud, "We need some weapons, Audra. See if you can find some rocks or something."

"We're gonna throw rocks at them!" "If we have to! I see some branches we can use too. Over here." Terry ran over to a large tree which had many fallen branches around it. "Here, Audra, these will do fine," she said, handing Audra a large branch about 1 and half meters long. She picked up another one about the same length.

"Here, Ter,"said Audra, handing Terry several rocks she had found on the ground. "I' don't' see what good these rocks are going to do against those men."

"Remember the first rule when engaging an enemy that outnumbers you, Audra?"

"Wait for reinforcements?" answered Audra meekly.

"Be serious, Audra! Terry shouted.

"What?!" asked Audra, who really thought that was the correct answer.

" No! Divide and conquer!" said Terry triumphantly.

"Oh, that rule."

Suddenly Terry grabbed Audra's arm. "Look! I think that's them," she whispered. Terry was pointing to a group of men who were about 200 meters away and slowly walking towards them. Audra pulled Terry into the safety of the bushes.

"Do you think they say us, Audra?"

"Naw. It's getting pretty dark and we're a good ways away. Look, Ter, I have an idea about how to divide and conquer," she said as she began whispering her plan to Terry.

As the gang of thugs slowly made their way to the park, laughing and joking with each other, they failed to notice two small shadows slipping into the alleyways of the buildings in front of where they were walking.

The gang consisted of eight members with the strongest, and largest one at the front of the pack. He apparently was the leader. There were two other members walking along beside him followed by three more directly behind them. The two smallest and slowest members of the pack were taking up the rear.

As the gang crossed the alleyway where Audra was concealed, she waited until all but the last two had passed then she threw one of her rocks at them. It hit one of the punks in the back. He stopped and turned around. "Hey! What was that?"

"What was what?" asked the other one.

"Something just hit me." He looked around but could see no one. He looked toward the alley where he saw a hand motioning for him to come. The rest of the gang members didn't notice when the last two slowly and cautiously made their way into the alley where Audra and Terry were waiting for them. They quickly grabbed each one around the neck, exerting enough pressure to render them unconscious, while at the same time making sure they did not yell out.

"Two down, six to go," stated Terry as she and Audra dragged the youths into the alleyway.

"We'll have to be fast about it, Ter. These guys won't remain unconscious for long! Check their pockets for our comm badges."

"Nothing!

"I didn't think so," replied Audra. "I bet the leader has them. They're too good to give to these little peons. Now for part two."

Audra and Terry figured that they would need to take out at least two more guys to have a fighting chance. Four to two was still being outnumbered, but Terry and Audra were Starfleet trained officers and they figured they could handle those odds.

As the gang passed the next alleyway, Terry waited until the leaders had passed, then quickly jumped out and hit two of the youths over the head with her stick, knocking them to the ground, unconscious. As soon as the other gang members heard this, they turned around and the leader stepped forward.

"Ah, our little Starfleet officer!" he said smiling. "I thought we'd seen the last of you. Where's your friend? Run home to the Captain, did she? He was laughing at her. "Oooo, I'm shaking, I'm so scared!" he laughed.

"Laugh all you want," said Terry, "but we Starfleet Officers have just taken out six of your guys!"

The leader stopped smiling and look around."Where are Nino and Paylor?" he asked the others.

"Don't know, Dunson, they were right behind us," one of them answered.

Terry noticed Dunson was wearing both comm badges on his jacket. "Look, just give us our comm badges back and we won't cause you any more trouble. Even if you did steal our packages," said Terry, holding her stick high and ready to swing at them.

"Your packages were all a bunch of junk! Not worth what little effort it took to get them! But these," he said, pointing to the comm badges, "are worth a lot of currency on the free market. And I think I know just the Ferengi who would pay nicely for these. So you are not getting them back, little officer," he laughed.

"You know, " began Terry, "I'm really getting sick of you referring to me as 'little'. So why don't you come closer so I can shut both of you up!" said Terry, waving her stick back and forth.

"You are challenging me!" he laughed, looking around at his men, "Hey fellahs, not only is she stupid, she can't even count to four!"

They all started laughing at that comment when Terry yelled, "ONE, TWO!" When she did, Audra came up from behind the gang, swinging her stick hard.

"THREE, FOUR!" Audra yelled as she caught one youth on the side of his head and another one in the back between his shoulders.

When this happened, the leader rushed at Terry. "I'm gonna KILL you!" he screamed.

When he rushed her, Terry simply stepped to one side, swinging her stick down across his back. He went down but didn't stay down for long. He came up at her, this time pulling a large knife from his belt.

"Now let's see what you can do about this!" he yelled, swinging his knife back and forth in front of her. Terry remained calm. She knew that his anger would work against him. He jabbed his knife at her and she backed up, swinging her stick. He managed to stay out of the reach of it.

"I bet you aren't even the leader of this stinking group of babies!" she yelled at him. "You can't even beat a little girl!"

"You Argelian slime pit!" he yelled and came at her again with the knife.

Terry managed to hit his wrist with her stick which caused him to drop the knife. He yelled and dove for the knife. Terry rushed him planning on hitting him on his back but he was quicker than she thought and stuck out his leg, tripping her in the process. Terry went down hard on her right elbow which caused her to lose her grip on the stick.

Dunson managed to pick up his knife and came at her again. Terry quickly brought both legs up and managed to kick him in the stomach knocking him back and causing him to bend over in pain. She got up fast, reaching for her stick, grabbed it and spun around just as he was coming at her with his knife.

She caught him in the ribs this time, causing him to grabbed at them which gave her enough time to wield the stick a second time catching him on the side of his neck, knocking him to the ground, his knife flying out of his hands. She stood beside him waiting to give him another whack if he tried to get up, but he was at last, unconscious.

Meanwhile Audra had her hands full with the last gang member. When the leader charged for Terry, this one had turned and grabbed Audra's weapon. When she realized that she couldn't wrench it from his hands she fell backwards to the ground still holding on to her end of the limb. This caused her opponent to be pulled forward. As he was off balance, Audra kicked his feet out from under him and he went down, still holding onto the branch. Audra released her grip and he fell onto his back, disoriented. Before he could get up, Audra came over and kicked the branch out of his hand. He grabbed her legs and she went tumbling down, landing with both hands out flat to catch herself.

The punk then got up quickly and kicked at her. She managed to roll out of the way just in time and get to her feet. He came at her swinging his fists. She kept backing up when she hit the wall of a building. He took one large swing at her with his fist but she quickly ducked out of the way and his fist went smashing into the concrete wall.

"Ah! You've broken my wrist!" he screamed in pain. Audra didn't wait for him to recover as she brought her hand up, palm opened smashing into his nose. She followed this with a well placed kick to his mid section. This sent the youth sprawling to the ground, holding his now bleeding nose with his good hand.

Audra went to him and was about to deliver another kick, when he got up and ran away. She turned to see how Terry was doing and noticed her bending over the gang leader, pulling their comm badges off his jacket. She ran over to where her friend was standing.

"Let's get out of here, Terry! Those two we knocked out will be showing up here soon!" suggested Audra.

"Are you all right?" asked Terry holding her elbow with her left hand.

"Yea, are you?"

"My elbow's hurt, but I don't think it's broken. Let's get back to that government building. Maybe we can stay there until the Endeavour comes back to get us."

"Okay. I think I'll carry our sticks along. . .just in case," said Audra, picking up the weapons she and Terry had so valiantly fought with. "These things aren't' half bad!"

"Yea, they did come in handy, didn't they? But I don't think those creeps will be after us again. I think they will probably want to forget that they got beat up by a couple of girls!" remarked Terry.

*****

Hyper Nor raced towards Transporter Room Three where she knew Crewman Anthony Sutton was on duty. "Crewman Sutton," she began, "I need you to do something which could save your boss's career. Will you do it?"

Crewman Sutton was puzzled. "What's going on, Lieutenant? I have no idea what you are talking about."

"Just answer one question, do you want to help save Lt. McKay's career?" Hyper waited anxiously, not really knowing if this crewman would put his own career in jeopardy to save Audra's.

"If Lt. McKay is in trouble, then I want to help." he responded. "She has saved me on numerous occasions from the wrath of Taggert. So, what do you need for me to do?"

**********

Terry and Audra finally managed to get back to the government building with no more trouble. It was already late and they didn't know when or if the Endeavour would be returning. "What do we do now, Audra," asked an exhausted Terry. Except for her elbow hurting, she had come away from the fight with just minor abrasions and minor clothes damage.

Audra had fared even better than Terry. Although her clothes were torn and dirty, she had no injuries except for a few bruises. "I guess we just wait here, Ter. If the Endeavour does return, I'm hoping that Hyper will have guessed that we were left behind, lock onto our comm badges and beam us up." They both sat down on the curb, their sticks still in their hands.

They had been waiting for over an hour when Audra's comm badge came to life. "Nor to McKay, respond."

"Audra jumped up, "Hyper! It's good to hear your voice! Is everything ok with the Endeavour?"

"Yes, but I don't have time to explain now. Are you alone?"

"No, Terry is with me."

"Okay, listen carefully,. . .

*****

"Computer, what is the location of Lt. Audra McKay?" grumbled Taggert. She had been having a devil of a time finding McKay and she was getting a little bit tired of it.

"Lt. McKay is in Transporter Room Three".

"Commander Taggert to Lt. McKay, respond!"

"McKay here, sir."

"Finally! Where have you been, McKay? I have been trying to find you for hours!"

"Er, sorry sir, but I have been having a time with the . . .er . . transporters. I have been very busy, and it seems that my comm badge was out of commission for a while there."

"Yes, I am very aware of that Lieutenant! Report to my office at once. I have an assignment for you. The transporter in shuttle craft 5 is malfunctioning."

"Yes, sir, on my way."

"Whew!" exclaimed Audra, "That was close!" She was standing in transporter room 3 with Hyper, Terry and Crewman Sutton. They had just been beamed aboard. Hyper handed Audra a uniform.

"Here, you won't have time to go to your quarters and change. I would have told Sutton to beam you to your quarters but if Taggert had asked the computer where you were and it said you were in your quarters, you would have been toast!"

"Ensign Brock must have found the problem with the comm channel and the computer, huh?"asked Audra.

"Yes, just a few minutes ago. Luckily you did a good job and it looked like a normal malfunction, or else you would be in big time trouble!"

Audra went over to Crewman Sutton, "Thanks Anthony. You saved my life!"

"Sutton smiled, "Anytime Lieutenant."

"Terry, you'd better get to your quarters and change before Taggert comes looking for you. And, what are you doing two doing with those sticks, anyway?"

"Souvenirs," said Terry as she started to leave, "Thanks Hyper, I owe you one, a big one!"

"That's okay Terry. I have the feeling that the three of us will be pulling each other out of more trouble in the future!"

"Taggert to McKay!" screamed Taggert.

Audra and Hyper looked at each other and shrugged. "McKay here. I'm on my way, sir."

"What's the problem, McKay? You should have been here an hour ago!"

"Looks like things are back to normal!" said Audra, as she motioned Sutton to turn around so she could get into her uniform.

As Hyper walked out of the transporter room she thought, Nothing on board the Endeavour is ever normal!