SEASON 2: EPISODE 02

Q, TIME AND AGAIN: Part Two

  The Swiftfire moved closer to the edge of the nebula and increased its speed.  The ship manoeuvred around pockets of turbulence that its sensors could detect, but because of the unstable nature of the area of space there were pockets that moved or just suddenly appeared and the ship could not avoid all of them.

  Ensign Cole struggled to keep the ship on course as it was buffeted from the turbulence.  But despite the difficulty he managed to minimise major course corrections.  The Ensign couldn’t avoid all the turbulence, so it was a bumpy ride, but also the Ensign’s last minute manoeuvres to avoid turbulence he didn’t see or just appeared didn’t help make it a smooth ride.

  The Swiftfire neared the end of its trips around the nebula. 

  “We’re just about away, Captain,” reported Cole.

  Suddenly the ship lurched forward, throwing the crew around.  Ensign Cole came out of his seat and smacked into the flight control console.  The ship then dropped down and to port.  The Ensign fell out of his seat and onto the deck.  The Ensign tried to break his fall with his hand, but his middle finger hit the ground first and under the full weight of his body it snapped backwards, the Ensign let out a cry of pain.  The rest of Cole’s hand then made contact with the ground and he felt his wrist break.  Cole’s arm went limp and he landed hard on the ground.  The Ensign rolled off his broken wrist and cried out in pain.  The Ensign clenched his eyes closed and rived around the floor in agony.

  The Ensign felt a hand land on his shoulder to hold him still.  The person spoke to the Ensign and he recognised it as the Captain.  “Ensign, just hold still help is on the way.”  The Captain then addressed someone else.  “Do you have the ship back under control?  Good.  Put us back on course for the task force.  Ah, Doctor the Ensign appears to have broken his finger and possibly his wrist and arm.”

  The Doctor put a hypospray to Cole’s neck and applied a pain killer.  Cole settled down as the pain left and opened his eyes.  The Captain, First Officer and the Doctor were over him.

  “I’m going to help you up, Ensign.  Then we’re going down to Sickbay to check out your arm.”

  With the help of the Doctor, Cole stood up cradling his arm.

  “What happened?” he asked.

  “We got hit by a subspace discharge from the nebula,” explained the Captain.  “It was strong enough to knock us around.  After you went down Lieutenant Karak managed to take control of and fix us up.  You did well guiding us through the edge of the nebula, Ensign.  Let the doc see to your injuries and have a bit of a break before reporting back.”

  “Thank you, Captain,” he said, thankfully for the praise from his CO.

  The Doctor led Cole into the turbolift.  “Sickbay,” ordered the Doctor.

  Cole left the bridge pleased that it was all over.

  Once Masters made sure the ensign was off getting his injures seen to he went back to seeing if the ship was alright.

  “Damage report, Lieutenant Letac.”

  “Minor damage, sir.  We’re getting reports of injuries from all over the ship but no fatalities.”

  He let out a sigh of relief.  The blast had been a complete surprise and extremely violent and the fact no one was killed was a minor miracle.  Masters returned to the Captain’s chair and sat down.  The Lieutenant had transferred a more detailed report to his console on the chair’s armrest.  As he quickly scanned it he was again relieved that the damage was just as the Lieutenant said, minor.

  “Karak, can we jump to Warp?”

  The Vulcan officer swivelled his chair around to face the Captain.  He was manning the flight control station with Ensign Cole out of commission.  While the lieutenant was the Operations manager he had served as a flight controller before moving to operations and Masters was confident that Karak could handle the ship until Cole returned to duty.  “We can go to warp at your command, Captain.

  “Excellent.  Go to maximum warp on a course for the rendezvous with the task force; we need to make up some time, so the faster then better, lieutenant.”

  “As ordered, Captain.”

  Karak swivelled back around and started work on the console.  Masters felt the slight vibration through the hull as the ship made the jump to warp.  He returned to viewing the damage report.  The damage had been minor but plentiful.

  “Captain to Engineering.”

  “Celcho here, Captain.”

  “Lt. Commander, I want you to get to work on the damage we sustained from the nebula incident.”

  “Already on it, Captain.  We have a dozen teams out repairing and replacing damage.  Good thing the damage is more in quantity then quality.  The ship should be back to peak performance in two hours.”

  “That’s good news.  Masters, out.”

  Commander Core sat down next to Masters.  She let out a sigh and ran her hand through her hair in a sign of fatigue.

  “Are you alright, Susan?”

  Core titled her head towards Masters with a disparaging look on her face.  “Just peachy, Jonathan.”

  Masters chuckled.  “Now, now, Susan, be nice.  That was a surprise; do you know what caused the discharge?”

  “The nature of the nebula has an extreme effect on subspace in and around it.  Normally turbulence is the only effect you’d come in contact with outside the nebula, the discharges are mostly contained inside the nebula.  Our warp core and its influence on subspace attracted the discharge towards our ship.  I guess we came too close to the nebula at the wrong spot at the wrong time.”  Core let out a nervous laugh.  “Just our luck!”

  Masters raised his eyebrows in agreement.  The Swiftfire seemed to have the Enterprise’s luck, if anything was going to go wrong it would happen in eye shot of the ship.  It did make things exciting, but you can have too much excitement.

  Once he was sure the situation was under control he decided to retire back to his ready room.  This would also be a good time for him to brief the Commander on their mission when they joined the task force.  “Commander Core, will you join me in my ready room.  Lt. Commander Whitechapel, you have the bridge.”