“Darkness and Smoke”

[Col. C.E. Harper 0]

“Darkness and Smoke”

Harper Log 07.26.06

July 26, 2397

Unknown

 

A thick, acrid smoke danced languidly in coils above overloaded panels, fouling the air. The reprocessors were not making a dent in clearing it, now would they any time soon if life-support was at a mere thirty percent. In the meantime the sharp-bitter scent of scorched electronics clung to each breath and turned her stomach.

 

She swallowed back the nausea, four-fold though it was – smell, motion, fear, pain. If she held still enough, her body could forget the long, shuddering ride as well as the throbbing ache in her left shoulder – the same one again, blast it; it’s like a curse – but stillness only gave her mind leisure to fret over their current predicament.

 

She didn’t need to look at the status readouts to know they were in trouble. The bridge itself told the story, from the dim light and smoke to the tang of blood and burned flesh, and the groans of crewmen who hadn’t weathered the trip with as much good fortune as she’d had. Her shoulder throbbed again; she ignored it.

 

Even the viewscreen, static-clad as it was, told the tale. They had begun this trip in the middle of the Federation, a dense star zone. Now there were only a handful of pinpricks shining through the void. Outer edge of an arm? she wondered fuzzily. Reverse view should be brighter, then. That puts us… Where? Federation space reached nearly to the local arm’s edge, coreward. So did Romulan space. Rimward, the Klingons came closest, maybe the Tholians; no one knew how far their space extended… But who’s to say we’re even still in the Orion arm? Or our part of it? They could be thousands of miles anti-spinward, in the Delta Quadrant!

 

And they were alone. That was chilling. Where were the other sections? Had they survived the trip? Had Gamma section even made the trip? Why weren’t they answering hails? It could be the comm systems, she thought rationally. After a ride like that, we’re lucky to have internal comms. But somehow she didn’t think their luck extended that far.

 

Beta section continued to drift…