10-20-2026, 01:37 AM
Morad’s boots planted wide against the deck plates as Krandall whipped the Zephyr into the sudden, bone-jarring figure-eight, the inertial dampers whining in protest against the violent lateral G-forces. Through the tactical plot on the center console, he watched Powl seize the fleeting split-second openings, unloading two blistering salvos from the aft burst-fire launcher and rear phaser arrays straight into the teeth of the pursuing Hidekis before Krandall snapped them back onto their high-speed escape vector.
"Good shooting, Powl! Way to thread the needle, Tom, keep that throttle buried!" Morad called out, his grip tight on the command chair's armrest as the twin impulse engines roared back to full linear thrust.
Before the vibration of the aft torpedoes had fully cleared the deck, Commander O'Fee's voice cut through the bridge clamor with her proposal to launch the shuttles as close-in disruptors, followed immediately by Amila speaking up from the Science station.
"Captain," she called out, turning from her panel to suggest using Ensign Singer’s drone algorithms to pilot the craft remotely.
For a fraction of a second, the word hung in Morad’s ear. Even in the middle of a firefight, hearing Captain come from Amila’s lips sent a brief, warm jolt through his chest. He didn't let it break his command mask, nor would he ever give her flack for it, though the briefest, knowing glint flickered in his dark eyes as he met her gaze.
"It's clever thinking from both of you," Morad replied, addressing Ava and Amila together with decisive clarity. "And using Singer’s drone subroutines to fly the Aura and the Boreas instead of risking pilots in a suicide run is smart adaptation. But right now, those three Hidekis are glued to our six and pouring disruptor fire directly into our rear arcs. Dropping our aft shields and depressurizing the hangar bays to launch at full impulse would hand them an unshielded target right into our belly, and I can't pull Singer off the warp core coolant repairs while our main drive needs his attention."
He gave Amila and Ava a firm nod, refusing to let a good tactical ace go to waste.
"Hold the shuttles in their bays for now, but don't scrap the play. Amila, have Ava coordinate with Singer when Engineering has a breathing room to pre-stage that remote drone interface with the shuttlebay flight computers. If they manage to box us in before we cross Starbase 214’s perimeter, having two unmanned Type-14s ready to sprint out as close-range decoys could buy us the seconds we need."
Shifting his attention toward Operations and the auxiliary science displays, Morad read the fresh internal diagnostics flashing across his armrest monitor.
"Cortez, your environmental zoning just bought us breathing room, and the simulation on your optical telemetry link is solid; implement it, but cap your polling rate to low-bandwidth bursts so you don't crowd Keti's probe feeds on the Deck Three multiplexers, and manually lock out those fire-suppression overrides first. Baldwin, take that power margin Cortez just freed up and dump it straight into the Deck Four aft weapons cooling loops and our port-aft shield relays. Keep Powl's rear guns cold and that port quadrant standing!"
== Tag Bridge ==
"Good shooting, Powl! Way to thread the needle, Tom, keep that throttle buried!" Morad called out, his grip tight on the command chair's armrest as the twin impulse engines roared back to full linear thrust.
Before the vibration of the aft torpedoes had fully cleared the deck, Commander O'Fee's voice cut through the bridge clamor with her proposal to launch the shuttles as close-in disruptors, followed immediately by Amila speaking up from the Science station.
"Captain," she called out, turning from her panel to suggest using Ensign Singer’s drone algorithms to pilot the craft remotely.
For a fraction of a second, the word hung in Morad’s ear. Even in the middle of a firefight, hearing Captain come from Amila’s lips sent a brief, warm jolt through his chest. He didn't let it break his command mask, nor would he ever give her flack for it, though the briefest, knowing glint flickered in his dark eyes as he met her gaze.
"It's clever thinking from both of you," Morad replied, addressing Ava and Amila together with decisive clarity. "And using Singer’s drone subroutines to fly the Aura and the Boreas instead of risking pilots in a suicide run is smart adaptation. But right now, those three Hidekis are glued to our six and pouring disruptor fire directly into our rear arcs. Dropping our aft shields and depressurizing the hangar bays to launch at full impulse would hand them an unshielded target right into our belly, and I can't pull Singer off the warp core coolant repairs while our main drive needs his attention."
He gave Amila and Ava a firm nod, refusing to let a good tactical ace go to waste.
"Hold the shuttles in their bays for now, but don't scrap the play. Amila, have Ava coordinate with Singer when Engineering has a breathing room to pre-stage that remote drone interface with the shuttlebay flight computers. If they manage to box us in before we cross Starbase 214’s perimeter, having two unmanned Type-14s ready to sprint out as close-range decoys could buy us the seconds we need."
Shifting his attention toward Operations and the auxiliary science displays, Morad read the fresh internal diagnostics flashing across his armrest monitor.
"Cortez, your environmental zoning just bought us breathing room, and the simulation on your optical telemetry link is solid; implement it, but cap your polling rate to low-bandwidth bursts so you don't crowd Keti's probe feeds on the Deck Three multiplexers, and manually lock out those fire-suppression overrides first. Baldwin, take that power margin Cortez just freed up and dump it straight into the Deck Four aft weapons cooling loops and our port-aft shield relays. Keep Powl's rear guns cold and that port quadrant standing!"
== Tag Bridge ==