Nowhere to Run: The Hunt For Jake Grey Part Thirteen

A purple wormhole opens in STU16, and the Archangel exits from it.
Ok... Sir, the bridge is yours again. Like I said, we have a recording of the memorial service, in case you want to look at it.

Gryemoran sniffs, and coughs slightly. "Yes, yes, later. Um, Carrie, do you have a fix on our position?" Carrie's face vanishes from the screen, and the computer makes a few noises. "Looks like we missed the battle. According to long range sensors the Natives have pushed the few forces Grye left behind all the way to Vulcan. At maximum warp we should readch them in about an hou-wait, what the hell? An XDCA satellite is linking up with our location, but this one is on the destroyed list. Why-" Before Carrie can finish hundreds of purple portals open all around the tiny warship, and a massive fleet of ships from various universes, most likely the survivng ships from Macedonia 1, as well as the STU16 ships Grey had pulled out. The Archangel was now surrounded by over 200 ships varying in size from smaller than even the Archangel, to massive battleships, from scout vessels to what were essentially movile weapon platforms. There were even several Defiant-class vessels, identical to the Archangel in design. Rita, back at the helm in her hoverchair, gulped. "Not good." Greymoran closed his mouth which had dropped open in shock. "Rita, get us out of here!"

Hudzen quickly raises the shields as the surrounding ships targeted the Archangel. One volley from the 200 ships would probably be able destroy the ship. They had to leave. Now.

Rita pushes the ship into warp, dangerously forgetting to set a course. Through sheer luck, the Archangel passes between a pair of Excelsior class cruisers without ramming into either of them. The smaller ships in Grey's fleet quickly tunred to pursue, a total of 17 scout ships, Defiant-class vessels, and a pair of Miranda-class frigates. The larger ships turn slowly, and wait. The Defiant-class ships in Grey's fleet take the point. Greymoran, now able to focus entirely on the situation at hand goes over the study Hudzen's console. "Clever. They're keeping the weaker of the small ships in back of the pursuing lfeet, becuase our rear-firing torpedo tube won't hurt the Defiants up front. I'd bet you real money that Grey is on one of those. Do you agree Jackson?"

Knowing Grey? I wouldn't be suprised.
Of course, he could fool us, and be on one of the weaker ships and then beam to one of the Defiants, just to keep us on our toes.
You know, we could program a couple torpedoes so that they go for the weaker ships...
Do we have an EMP generator on board, and would it be effective in this situation?

Gryemoran sighed and shook his head. "The weaker ships are out of range, and their sheilds can block any EMP we could generate. It'd take a supernova to generate the kind of pulse needed to knock out those ships, and no, we don't have anything that could blow up a sun and even if we did I wouldn't wnat to."

Of course, since we serve on a Defiant-class ship we know all the weak points of Defiant-class ships and they should not be as hard to destroy or cripple as the other ships. However, the people on the other Defiant-class ships will conversely know our weaknesses.

Good point, Sorik. Of course, that doesn't stop Grey from building up and strengthening those weak points.

Greymoran nodded. "Correct. If Grey is chasing us it's for one of two reasons. Either he's confident he has us outgunned which means we can assume those ships are heavily modified, or two, he's simply beocme frustrated. The latter is a lot more likely considering he's lost three flagships now, but the former is still the most obvious choice. Rita, prepare for an abrupt course change. All hands, brace yourselves. We're goign to do a high energy turn. Even though this ship is small enough to pull it off, the fact that we'll be doing it at maximum warp means we're going to be thrown against the walls unless we're securely strapped in." He sits down and pulls the arms of his chair inward until they lock together. "I always said these ships neede restraints," he mutters under his breath. "I'm glad someone listend. Rita, this course is going to take us right through the persuing fleet. Set a course for Vulcan. Doubtless Grey's larger ships are no more than few minutes behind them, but they can't fire any heavy wepaons at maximum warp. I just hope we don't crash into them." Rita takes in a deep breath. "OK. Here goes nothing. Jackson, focus all sensors forward. We won't be able to keep track of our followers when they turn around unless they get withing weapons range, but we'll have fair warning before a collision."

Aye, sir.
Jackson does the same thing to his chair that Greymoran does and changes the sensor field.
Ready, sir!

Rita lets out a heavy, nervous sigh. "OK, here goes nothing." With the push a few buttons the view of the speeding stars on the screen alters drastically. Jackson makes the mistkae of looking at it directly and gets dizzy. The shoip creaks, and the crew feels as though they were being curshed under gallons and gallons of some thick liquid. Suddenly, large dull dots were seen covering some of the tiny white lines. They grew and grew and in a matter of seconds the outline of ships became apparent, several seemed to be dropping out of warp. Jackson looked as his panel. The ships they'd just passed were gone from his depleted rear sensors in less than second, but he got the impression that two of the small scout vessels collided, although he had no way of proving it. He checked the forward sensors again. The larger battlefleet was coming up. Several had already dropped out of warp and were attempting a blockade. "Rita!" He shouted, alter course by, point 8 degrees, down!" Rita didn't respond but the ship shudder and creaked again for a second as she performed the maneuver. A few seconds later, Jackson looked at his panel again. "YES! We are no way ahead of Grey's fleet. We could slow to Warp 8, maybe even 7 and still be far enough ahead to get to-" Jackson and the rest of the bridge crew are hurled forward as the ship abruptly exits warp, without any slow down procedures. Rita's chair protects her, but the others aren't so lucky. Keith and Greymoran's lower ribs are cracked and nearly broken as they slam into the chair restrainsts. Jackson's armor dents as he hit's his. Hudzen's magnetic foot locks fail and the robot gets slammed into the bulkhead, smashing the edge of Rita's console, and putting a tear in the lower right-hand part of the viewscreen. Coughing, and having trouble breathing, Gryemoran asks, "What the hell just happened?" His question is soon answered. The viewscreen is filled by a massive array of silver globes, no larger than a phaser rifle in circumfrence. Greymoran wipes blood from his lip and painfully realizes what happened. "Warp dissipator mines. They alter the fabric of subspace in a 100 kilometer wide area each, making warp travel over warp 1 impossible. There are enough of these out there to interdict the entire Earth sector if they wanted to. Carrie, *cough* can you get a fix on our location?" Carrie's face superimposes over the mines. "Rigel sector. But I'm not detecting any life signs. Rigel is the most densely populated system in the Federation, in the Alpha quadrant. Grey must've done somethign awful." Rita finally gets control of her breath. "Thank God for this chair. I'm restoring sensors. Grey's fleet should get here fairly soon, assumign these are his mines." Jackson checks his panel as well. Both he and Rita reach the same conclusion. "The bulk of his fleet should be here in 10, maybe 12 minutes," Jackson reports. "Rita, Keith and I are going to Sickbay." He coughs, and this time blood comes up. He gets out of his chair, and, wincing the whole time, he grabs Keith's arm and the two head towards the turbolift. "Jack-Jackson, take the, take command. Sorik! Report to the bridge immediately. You can access Engineering computers from Jackson's console. We're going to need you." Rita watches with concenr as Keith enters the turbolift. "Hang in there baby," she mutters. She shakes her head and focuses back on her console. "Allright, Warp 1 is still possible. The mines are small enough that our deflector sheilds can deflect them at that speed. I'm going to try and buy us some time."

Now I know what Ludicrous Speed is like.
Rita, try and find us a safe spot to hide from the bad guys. Maybe the inhibiters will inhibit their warp, too.
Carrie, would our Hyperspace engines work in this situation, and if they did, how long to get to Vulcan?

I wonder what the Vulcans are like in this dimension.

Rita shurgged. "Unless Grey shuts them down, but that would give us an escpae route too, so I doubt he'll try. The one advantage we have is the navigation hazard the mines provide. Even if they were deactivated if we tried going faster than our current speed they would tear through this ship like a hot knife through butter, and that's WITH the sheilds up. As for hyperspace, I really don't know. With all this debirs and all these mines in the way we might not have a clear shot to get out of here. This field is pretty thick. Even at our current speed, it'll take well over six hours to get out of it, and Grey's fleet is going to be here in, less than 6 minutes."

Could we blow a few up behind us?
If we can't...Rita, just do what you do best, flying!

Perhaps I could provide a distraction.

Ryo-O appeared behind the Archangel, and then vanished again.

I'll give anyone comming up behind us a little supprise. And if Grey is with them, well... Do I have to hold back?

No Ahz, if you can destroy Grey, do it.

He turns back to Rita and Jackson.

It would take at least three seconds of concentrated phaser fire from our pulse cannons to destroy one of those mines. Even with quantum and photon torpedoes we would quickly run out. Blasting through the field is not a practical option.

Rita nods. "OK, look I know the captain left Jackson in charge but I do have some ideas. It's a little risky, but-" An alarm goes off on the bridge, adn the viewscreen switches to port view to reveal a massive wave of starships dropping out of wapr just outisde the mine field. "Sonofabitch knew just where to drop out," Rita muttered. "Forget my plan. No time."

Ryo-o: "Grey's fleet has arrived"

Ahz: "Let's see it."

A window opened up, revealing a massive formation of ship. With the distance to the fleet and the sheer numbers, it was impossible to pick out individual ships in the formation.

Ahz: "This can't be good."

Ryo-O: "They are converging on the Archangel."

Ahz: "Very well. Open fire when the fleet is within range. All batteries, full power. I will search for Grey."

The space near the Archangel exploded into a dazzling display of firepower. Sheets of energy poured out of seemingly empty space, cutting the closest enemy ships to ribbons.

Ryo-O: "I have detected Jake Grey's lifesigns on several ships. I am attempting to determine which set of signals is the real thing."

Ahz: "Good, I'll... AH!!"

A Galaxy Class ship preformed a warp ram on Ryo-O's side, knocking her out of position. Inside, Ryo-O screamed, and Ahz felt something hit him hard in the ribs right before he was tossed out of the control ring.

Ryo-O appeared next to Ahz, holding her side, in the exact same place that Ahz felt the blow.

Ahz: "Are you all right?!?"

Ryo-O: "I'll be fine."

Ahz: "Show me where the ships are that have Grey's lifesigns. You focus on keeping those ramming ships away."

A 3D map showing all the ships in the local patch of space appeared. A number of them were glowing green. Ahz put on a glove and made a fist. A long spike extended from the glove. When Ahz relaxed his hand, the spike retracted. After that quick test, Ahz vanished.

Jackson watches the approaching fleet
I very much doubt that we're safe here in the mine field.
The mines aren't magnetic, so we can't drag them along and throw them at the fleet...
We could possibly set the Archangel on self destruct, aim it towards the fleet, and we escape to Ryo-O... We wouldn't have a ship, but we would have taken out much of the fleet...
Hmm.. I wonder if Ryo-O has room enough for the Archangel itself... then Ryo-O could take us out of the mine field...

Aboard his ship, Grey notices Ryo-O. "HER! TorGal, order all ships within range to begin suicide strikes against her! With that thing out of the way Archangel will be easy pickings." Grey grins evily. TorGal's face contorts until it looks even uglier then before. To a troll this is a sign of concern. "But my Lord, with the Archangel in our sights! We can destroy her easily, but if we attack Ryo-O now-" "DO IT!"

Jackson stands up out of his chair
Look... several of the ships are going after Ryo-O!
Maybe this is our chance to go after them!
Ok...Let's go after the ships that aren't going after Ryo-O!

Rita smiles, and cheers. "I hear that!"

Ahz appears on the bridge of one of the attacking Defiant class vessels. He takes a quick look around and realises that Grey is not on the bridge, where the lifesigns indicate he is. Ahz extends the spike, inserts it into the nearest control pannel, and then teleports off of the ship.

The affected ship stops as the entire computer system goes haywire. Every console and computer screen now displays Ahz, singing Klingon Opera over, and over, and over. Ahz appears onboard Ryo-O and checks out the map. One of the green ships has vanished.

One down. Only about 20 or so to go.

And then, Ahz vanishes again.

Jackson notices one of the Defiant class ships stopping and says
What's going on with that ship?
Hudzen: Sensors show that somehow their computers contracted a virus of some sort. They also show that just before the ship stopped, Ahz's lifesigns were on that ship.
Jackson: Just the break we needed! Rita, set a course for that ship. Hudzen, ready all weapons and fire on that ship when we're in range!

Sweat forms on Rita's brow as she swerves and dives, and perfrom all sorts of tight maneuvers as the number of Grey's ships firing on them increases. She fires at a sicence vessel that passes in front to them, trying to ram them, and blows it apart. The explosion and the debirs weaken the Archangel's sheilds. "Easier said than done! We've got about a dozen ships, including 5 Definats riding our ass. the other one is, what the, she's firing on the crippled one!"

-

Grey's Defiant was the one shooting at the disabled craft. "TorGal, order ALL cruisers to launch an all out asault on Ryo-O! We shall join them! I want that thing destroyed!"

-

Frustrated Rita begins firing blindy, not bothering to target or let Hudzen call his shots. Several ships are hurt but not seriously by the attack, but the berserker style causes several ships to break off their course in a panic, and several small craft collide.

You're doing good, Rita.
Ok.. Can we release warp plasma behind us and then ignite it? And if we did that, could we outrun it, and how much damage would it do?
Jackson Dupree to Ahz and Ryo-O, I don't know what you did to that one ship, but keep doing it! Ahz, if you're going to be dealing with more ships, perhaps you could cause their warp cores to breach.

Another thing... put all avaliable energy we're not using into the shields and weapons!

Carrie, any way you can project external holoimages? Say, of multiple copies of ourselves, or other ships? That might cause some confusion for our friends out there, causing collisions and friendly fire. Then we could take advantage of the confusion by firing at ships ourselves.

Jake Grey suddenly found Ahz standing before him holding what looked like a lightsabre blade in his left hand. The rest of the bridge crew had similar blades floating in front of their throats. The glove on Ahz's right hand clicked, and Ahz inserted the spike into the nearest console. Immediatly, all the shipboard systems shut down, and three messages appeared... Doors locked, transporter inhibitor enabled, and retreat command sent.

Out in space, the attacking fleet immediatly disengaged and began to retreat.

Hello, Mr Grey. I sugguest that you sit very still. And if anyone else around here wants to be a hero, I promice that Your Mr Grey will not live to reward you for your efforts.

Jackson watches as the ships begin retreating.
Carrie, what's going on out there?

Carrie's face appears on screen. "They're going after Ryo-O and ignoring us! As for your holoimage idea, wouldn't work. We don't have any external holo-emitters on this ship. We're not in your universe remember?" Rita turns her chair around. "Shouldn't we do soemthing to help Ryo-O? Even as advanced as she is, she's still seriously outnumbered out there!"

-

Grey merely smiled, and closed his eyes. "So, you are the mighty Ahz. Good. I hoped we would meet face to face." Grey put a surprising emphasis on the words face to face. Ahz wonders a bit why, then starts to move forward, and is bounced back by a force field. Grey stands up smiling. "I, um, borrowed this nifty little magicians trap from Gryemoran's teacher, before I gave him an incurable virus that will painfully destroy his inards over the next few years. And now that the mighty wizard has made inter-dimensional travel to his unvierse impossible by design, he can never be helped. Anyway, I would explain it to you, but I've seen enough Bond movies to know you never reveal all of your plan, no matter how close you are to winning. Suffice it to say, unless you happen to have a certain type of gem with you, you aren't going anywhere. TorGal! Gather up the remainging Defiants, and head for Avalon. Our shipyards should be up by now. Also, order any ships that survive the massacre of Ryo-O to go there. Send out a general call to all contested universes as well. We'll let the resistors to my new order have them, for now." He turns back to face Ahz. "In the meantime my friend, you are going to provide me with information that I have no doubt you have available. Greymoran's brain wave pattern." He starts to walk away as the power to his ship is restored. "Oh, by the way, in case you're worried that I might kill you, worry not. Your death would only bring the wrath of the Wanderers on me, and as is, they currently tend to leave me alone. As soon as you give what I desire you can not only leave, I'll even give you a warship to repalce your precious Ryo-O, as she will doubtless be destroyed. TorGal, I almost forgot, rescind the retreat orders sent to all the other ships."

Right, Rita. Set a course to protect Ryo-O.
Hudzen, fire at any enemy ship you see.
Jackson to Greymoran, how are you doing?

Greymoran was in the turbolift when Jackson called. "I'm on the way up. Keith had some internal injuries. He'll live but he's out for the battle. Give me a status report."

TorGal, I wouldn't do that if I were you.

Nevertheless, TorGal activated the communication equipment, and the bridge seemed to explode. Every panel and conduit overloaded, throwing sparks, smoke, and sometimes crew into the air. The lights overloaded and went out all over the ship, and then the emergency lights overloaded and went out, plunging the ship darkness, lit only by burning equipment.

I warned you. Every circuit onboard has unfortunatly overloaded and melted. Even if you did have power to play with, you wouldn't be able to use it, since all the controls are gone. I can't begin to imagine what your computer core looks like right now. I figure that we have about an hour, maybe two before our air runs out. That's only if the anti-matter containment doesn't give out before then. I suppose I could sing to pass the time. Do you like Klingon Opera?

Grey growls, and pulls a small dagger out of his robe. He hurls it, and it slows briefly as it passes through the magical force field, and flies right into Ahz's left arm, embedding itself in the bone. "TorGal, activate emergency self-destruct. Have Defiant-7 come and beam us out. You me, and the wounded Wanderer over here. Did you really think you could beat me with a COMPUTER virus? Remember what I said about Bond films. The self-destruct system is set-up to be entirly independnet of all other systems. The downside being you have to activate manually from a certain location, but thems the breaks as New York Earthers say." He starts to walk away, but turns around. "You know, it's sad you killed all that power. Now you won't get to watch your precious ship die."

-

Ryo-O was weakening from the intense fighting. The Archangel was helping as best it could, but the two were seriosuly outnumbered. Suddenly, Jackson's sensor panel covering the edge of the mine field went balistic. A fleet of ships, half again the size of Grey's was brought abruptly out of warp just inside the field. The lead ship was clearly a Klingon battlecruiser. It fired on one of Grey's ships that wandered too close, then hailed the Archangel. "Redding to Greymoran! Exactly what the hell are these things? Our sensors detected a null area in subspace and we figured Grey was behind it!" Greymoran exited the birdge just before the call came in, and he clenched his fist and smiled excitedly when he heard that familiar voice. "Greymoran to Revanche, Grey's up to this all right. Go ship to ship. We got the upper hand now."

Yes! Finally some help! Hey Redding, this is Jackson. Welcome to the party!
Now, as for what's been going on, sir...
We've gone after some ships, some ships have gone after Ryo-O, we've been trying to protect Ryo-O without being blown to bits ourselves.

Redding doesn't reply, but the fleet under his command starts to break off into segments. "I'm not exactly sure what you said, but I get the gist of it. Hang on. Captain Lee, take your fleet and protect Ryo-O. Captains Mewes and Damon, move in on the ships attacking the Archnagel. We'll bat clean up for ya."

The Archangel shudders as a stary torpedo tears a chunk of their armor off. "Dammit!" Greymoran grunts in frustration. So far, despite having Grey's forces outnumbered, Gryemoran and Redding were barley holding on. The only bright spot was that Ryo-O had returned to Ahz's lab, minus Ahz himself. Greymoran had a pang of concern put decidedto put it aside until the battle was over. Besides, he thought to himself, Ahz is more than capable of taking care of himself. "Jackson, damaage report!" "Communication systems are dead. I don;t mean damaged, I mean gone. We can't communicate with engineering or medlab, or anywhere else on the ship. We can't communciate with Redding or the rest of the fleet, and we lost our link-up to the Spidership. We can't contact them or vice-versa." Greymoran hit the arm of his chair. "By the Gods this is a disaster," he murmered. Rita yelped as a barrage of torpedoes slammed into and destroyed the command section of an Ambassador-class cruisers whose engines had been removed by way of the Revanche's disruptors. The ship was now on fire, exploding, and drifitng downward. Without sheilds, the mines were puncturing the unprotected hull, carving the large ship to pieces. "Sir, our shields are all but gone. One more hit we'll lose them and we'll be at high risk for seriosu damage from the debris or the mines. Might I suggest we get the fuck out of Dodge?"

-

Grey laughed at the Wanderer Ahz. He was now wrapped in a pink magical coocoon, his arms pressed suffocatingly tight against his chest, his mouth covered so he cannot speak. "This must be humiliating for you. Trapped in an escape pod with the sworn enemy of the XDCA, and his smelly Troll companion." TorGal grunted in displeasure at the remark, but otherwise kept himself curled up like a kitten in the back of the pod. The tight space of the Captain's Pod wasn't comfortable for him either. "I'd bet you'd prefer death to what I have planned for you. Too bad. I never kill someone who isn't afraid of death. It just isn't fun. Once I'm through with you, once I havce what I desire, you will be kicked off my new ship, which you'll get a friendly look at the outside of, and after that, it's really up to you. You could go back to pick up the peices of your beloved tree ship, or face your shame in front of the Conclave if you so desire. But you WILL give me what I need."

A window, similar to Ahz's computer appeared next to Ahz. Ahz's voice came out of the window.

You talk far too much. You should learn to just be quiet for a few minutes, and listen to the singing stars. But if Greymoran's brainwaves are all you want, then I would happily give you that information.

A second window opened next to the first, and a number of lines appeared on it. Grey gleefully began recording the waves until he realised that they were spelling something out: "Bite me, you irritating imbecile!"

Sir, I don't ususally say things like this, but truely we are in deep shit....or should I say doo-doo?
I agree with Rita. Our warp engines still work, as well as the Hyperdrive. Now would be a good time to make a stratigic withdrawral.

Gryemoran nods. "I only wish we could tell Redding and the others. Get us out of here Rita." Rita nods and without saying a word brings the ship around for a retreat. Suddenly, another Defiant comes right at them, and begins firing. The ship shudders, and panles explode as the forward armor is quickly pounded away. Greymoran's neck hairs stand on end as he fears that they're thread is ending, but a barrage of torpedoes and phasers tear into the enemy vessel. A Galaxy-class cruiser flies sideways in front of the Archangel, and through the debris of the enemy vessel. Greymoran sees the name of the ship. U.S.S. Challenger. "Remind me to thank them as soon as the communicators are working again. Rita?" "I've already got a course plotted, and Redding's poeple have got our back clear. We're leaving."

-

TorGal moved faster than Ahz expected. His massive fist collided with Ahz's exposed head, leaving the Wanderer dizzy, but otherwise unharmed. "We don't have the proper torture facilities on this pod. Has that ship picked us up yet?" Grey shouts. As if on cue, the pod shudders as a tractor beam is locked onto them. Grey checks a panbel. "Ah, one of ours. An Excelsior-class I see, and in good shape too." He turns back to face. The Wanderer looks unconcerned. "You're friends will come for you, I don't doubt that. They may even bring whatever survives that battle out there with them. But it won't matter. I'll have what I want by then." He laughs, evily, a laugh that would've sent chills down Ahz's spine, if he weren't still too dizzy to fully understand what he said.

TO BE CONTINUED...