The Black Kris

[Crash Calestorm 0]

Current Plot Note: The following log takes place sometime during the Two Week time between Sims.

 

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I ain’t as good as I once was, but I’m good once, as I ever was. ~ As Good As I Once Was by Toby Keith

 

Overall, considering that Captain Calestorm and Commander Wesley had had to launch their crew into tactical scramble mode concerning the new developments to the search mission that had occurred with regard to the Mos Eisen planetary system, the preparations and actual launch of the teams had gone comparatively well.

 

The away teams had all inserted via the Comanche shuttles, fighters, and short range hoppers, and the transport craft themselves had been stripped and patched up with hasty paint jobs and miscellaneous equipment in order for the Fleet issue transport vehicles to appear more civilian (read: shady) in class and usage. Once all the undercover officers, including Cale and Wesley, had cleared the orbital space port security systems and officers -- such as it and they were -- and achieved planet fall on Eisen, all of them had spread out in a standard search and Intel gathering pattern over the last few days in order to get the lay of the land so to speak. Some of Cale’s line crew were working with a partner or partners while other officers were working on their own recognizance, yet these ‘lone rangers’ were required to check in regularly with another crew member that had been inserted and assigned as a solo operative as well.

 

This mission to Mos Eisen was to be considered a working shore leave vacation, as the shared cover story for the Comanche away teams was that the whole lot of them worked on a civilian merchant freighter that had come to Eisen for some time off. All of them had adopted civilian clothing and found lodging at the available planetary based motels and the like.

 

And, on a completely random side note, Ashton didn’t even want to dwell on the size of the cockroach that she had spotted (actually, she had yelped in a rather un-Captain like freaked out manner) in her seedy motel room last night…she wasn’t entirely sure, but it may have actually made a pass at her.

 

Very creepy. Moving on now…

 

The USS Comanche Creek herself was hidden within the Eisen system along the outer sector. If the rescue operation came down to the wire, then Calestorm’s direct order to the senior Lieutenant manning ships operations while the command team and senior line officers were away was to literally saddle up, break cover, and ride to the rescue, beaming all away teams currently planet side out of harm’s way ASAP.

 

And hopefully, beam up any surviving Vulcan colonists along for the ride as well. Calestorm held no optimistic presumptions that all of the kidnapped Vulcan’s were still alive. Not when they were dealing with this sort of low life mercenary group that would traffic in flesh and use Mos Eisen as a possible base of operations or at the very least a transport changeover site. The planet and port had quite the reputation of being a rough place to live and work, and with no Starfleet or Federation influence, was a prime spot for the illegal activities.

 

Currently, there had been no tangible sightings of the Orion slaver ship Audacious, yet the Orion slaver trail had gone cold here at the Eisen planet. That meant that the missing Vulcan’s had to be hidden somewhere among the city districts and were being prepped for transport out of system.

 

Captain Ashton ‘Crash’ Calestorm had opted -- command prerogative -- to be one of the solo planetary operatives, though per procedure she was checking in regularly with Commander Wesley. The captain of the Comanche Creek was currently engaging in a routine tracking maneuver, shadowing four local thugs for the better part of the afternoon.

 

Ashton had also picked up her own literal shadow a few hours ago; at first, she had been concerned that a local cartel or gang organization had made her in some way. But, when said shadow had started employing SOPs that paralleled her own movements, the situation had taken on the familiar feel of past missions, and Cale’s nerves had settled down. She had a pretty good idea of who the shadow was.

 

Rear Admiral Shauna ‘Skipper’ Coyote hadn’t taken on a full field mission like this in about five years or so. But, she was taking the kidnapping of the Vulcan colonists personally. Very personally: the massacre that had occurred at the Comanche Creek* colony those years ago had taken quite a few of her relatives out. The shared family sadness and loss would probably ripple through the surviving Coyote relatives for years to come, and in the Admirals case, she was determined to not have the same sort of disaster befall the Vulcans that had been snatched by the slavers. An endangered species needed all the genetic help that it could get, and the missing colonists equaled a chance for more numbers at the colony and a way for the species to procreate and survive into the future centuries.

 

Coyote had followed her own orders to Calestorm and the 'Creek crew and had gone mobile K.L.E.P.T.O* as well, and Ashton was pretty sure that Skipper had set herself up as her long range backup. Despite Skipper always holding the position of senior officer above whatever Crash’s rank designation had been at any given time, the two women always seemed to work in a way that reversed the rank positions: Cale taking the point lead, Coyote bringing up the rear with needed support. Ashton had to admit that Coyote had always been an aggressive officer when it came to furthering her career, yet Shauna had always been the hands on type when a situation or incident called for it.

 

This was one of those incidents.

 

The captain had also tried to talk her out of taking on this particular field mission. Shauna had then promptly told her in what orifice exactly that she could stick that suggestion. Ash gave her props for the graphic description as well as a few new Klingon cuss words that had been successfully integrated into the description.

 

Ashton gave a sweeping glance around her immediate vicinity, and then leaned a shoulder against a storefront, acting as if she was responding to a message on her communicator device. The current targets that she was observing were four of the local gang members. These thugs were young, male, and of mixed species. Two of them were Humans, one was a half Orion of average height and build, and one other male who undoubtedly had some Vulcan or Romulan genetics somewhere in his lineage. The local thugs and street gangs were ‘low rent’ enforcers that could be hired to provide the muscle for the whims and day to day operations of whatever criminal cartel or faction that controlled a particular section of neighborhood or district. To the gang members, aligning with a faction was a way to break into an established criminal syndicate.

 

Crash had been watching as the older teens operated and went about their daily criminal activities, and really, it was a bit heart sickening that the young men were showing this dark a side to their personalities before they even had a chance to try and make something of themselves.

 

She muttered to herself. “Wonderful. Extortion, shake downs, a drug buy, and now I get to see them do business with Captain Pimp of the USS Streetwalker…”

 

Ashton had left her rented hover flitter a few blocks back and gone to foot, continuing to track her Intel targets after the immediate district area had turned from business commercial to the more questionable warehouse, and apartment districts that she found herself now traversing. It was easier to move about on foot while trying to not attract undue attention, although, what Crash gained in foot mobility and blending into the shadows she lost in the event that she needed a quick getaway as provided by a mobile hover car.

 

The two Human thugs were speaking with a Vulcan (and a logical and endangered species didn’t necessarily mean that they didn’t have their own reprobates such as this pimp), who wore a well cut dark suit that was out of place in the slightly dilapidated district. A green skinned prostitute of mixed Orion extract hung on the pimps right arm, wearing nothing more then a short skirt, a halter top, high heeled shoes, and the endowments that the gods had given her.

 

It was then that Crash realized that a fourth member of the thug crew was nowhere to be seen…and karma being karma, heard the footsteps behind her a fraction of a second before the cold point of a weapon was pressed against her neck. She heard the distinctive sound of a hammer action revolver. Ballistics weapon.

 

Well, this presented a bit of a complication. The last time she found herself in this compromised a position, the aftermath had left her with a projectile bullet wound in the back right thigh. She was not looking to repeat that particular incident again, definitely not.

 

“Drop the communicator on the pavement, no alert message. Who are you and what do you want?” The language was Federation standard. The tone was young and matched her earlier visual profile of the gang. The wording suggested a basic education.

 

“I represent Mary t’Kay Cosmetic Supply Sales. I think I took a wrong turn. Can you tell me how to get to North Street?”

 

The Orion kid snarled and grabbed her in a choke hold with his free arm under her chin and pressing painfully in on the front of her throat, the weapon now pointing at her temple. It was an awkward grapple on his part, but Cale would end up just as dead, and her bad knee locked up under the strain of the scuffle. Her vision started to go tunnel as the blood flow supply started to get cut from her brain. The Orion started to drag her over towards his buddies up the street.

 

A single phaser beam shot out, the distinctive pew pew sound carrying across the area; the orange hued beam, which indicated a civilian issue weapon, lanced out from somewhere up the street and impacted with one of the two Humans still in the distance. A few of the local civilians went for cover to avoid getting stuck in the middle of what they assumed to be a gang based firefight.

 

The distraction had the desired effect on the captain’s precarious position when her captor panicked, let go, and turned towards the general direction where the beam had appeared from. Onward to plan B: get the hell away from twitchy by any means necessary.

 

Calestorm threw herself away from the male Orion and crouched behind an abandoned hover car, her bad knee protesting the quick movement but still managing to get her where she wanted to go. The Orion male that had had her cornered was drilled with the stun beam in the same manner as his one buddy before he could get himself out of the line of fire sight. The remaining two thugs who were still standing took off running, not knowing where the fire was being directed from while the pimp and his lady retreated back into the shabby looking apartment building that they had originally emerged from.

 

The entire incident had taken less then five seconds, and after those civilians who had been walking on the street had re-emerged from wherever they had taken cover or dove behind a stationary object as Cale had, the entire neighborhood district was back to business as usual. A mere gunfight that took out a few thugs was considered a small disturbance and business as usual, sad to say.

 

The master of the Comanche Creek stayed where she was, dropping down on her butt and leaning the back of her head wearily against the rear bumper of the hover vehicle. After a couple minutes had passed, a figure sporting civilian clothing and wearing a dark hooded jacket walked to the car that Ash had taken refuge behind, casually leaning on the rear hover jet casing to peer down at her line captain.

 

Calestorm both saluted and acknowledged Coyote by touching two fingertips to her forehead and then flicking them back outward. “When you’d get here?”

 

“Three days ago. I started tracking your signal when you first lit out,” her slight grin turned into a leer, “and figured you’d need me eventually.”

 

The rear admiral then offered her line captain a hand up.

 

* * * *

 

An hour had passed since the minor dust up out on the streets, and Calestorm and Coyote had retired to a little run down (though clean) eating establishment set just on the outskirts of the Bad Lands neighborhood sector. A simple point of fact was that these dives always had the best food and coffee. And, more importantly, certain off the record conversations between a line admiral and her lead field captain could take place without fear of eavesdroppers. The two older women occupied a table booth that had been patched with gray duct tape stretching at various intervals across the black vinyl material; the planets twin suns were just beginning to set, casting the outside sky in oranges and reds.

 

Admiral Coyote, who for the duration of her stay on Mos Eisen would simply be known as her call sign of Skipper just as Calestorm was using her own call sign to maintain the undercover work, took a sip of her coffee from a plain white mug. “What has your crew found out so far Crash?”

 

“We’ve all been blanketing the main city as well as the outskirt districts for the past week, and between the local Intel from the police chief and my people following up on the information, we’re getting closer to whoever is holding the Vulcan colonists. The local law enforcement is underpaid, understaffed, and trying valiantly to keep certain city sections safe.”

 

Calestorm paused in her assessment briefly before continuing, taking a sip of her coffee. “But…it’s an ongoing battle, and they are not winning. These local cartels and factions, both Orion run as well as represented by other species, are constantly jockeying for position.”

 

“And who are we most interested in?”

 

“No real proof yet, but my teams seem to have a pretty good lead on an Orion cartel faction that calls themselves the Black Kris. This group seems to be the most powerful among the criminal groups vying for power here on Eisen. Faction leader is a woman by the name of Litasha. A senior lieutenant that she employs is Morohtar, the master of the Audacious.” Here Cale paused and took another sip of her warm coffee before continuing, “…Morohtar is Scooter’s elder brother. I’ve already worked it out with my second that she’ll handle him herself when the time comes, and no, I will not go into any more detail on that. It’s my call and command team privilege as mission ops lead.”

 

Shauna raised her mug in silent agreement. “Fair enough. It’s a blood matter. Move in as soon as you get full confirmation on this Kris group, but not before. If we screw this up, we’ll never see the colonists alive again.”

 

“I’ll send the word out to Scooter and the other teams to start reverting their search patterns to concentrate on gathering more info and any leads on the Kris factions that may be operating across the city.”

 

“I’m going to head back to the ship then. Don’t mind if I take over from that Lieutenant of yours for a little bit on the mission monitoring end of things?”

 

“Hell no. Good kid, but he’s likely to regulation himself into a coma, he worries so much about being in bridge operations command. He’ll be a good senior line Lieutenant once Scooter and I knock that newbie officer spit and polish shine off ‘im.”

 

The two older women sat in silence after the semi-final logistics of the Eisen tag and grab mission had been laid out. Then, with no acknowledgment, Coyote leaned to the side of the booth table that the two of them sat at, pointedly gazing at Cale’s leg where it was stretched straight out across the booth cushion so as to try and minimize the knee pain. Her blue eyes then snapped to hazel eyes, speaking loud and clear to her longtime friend and subordinate officer.

 

When you had served with one another and been friends as long as the two of them had…you didn’t really need to say a whole lot when a simple look would more then do. The Nero attacks had been devastating, and despite the lack of experienced living officers still serving in the Fleet, Coyote really would not hesitate to pull her line captain temporarily off ship command if she needed too because of an ongoing injury that was starting to present an everyday problem.

 

Again, Rear Admiral Coyote was very aggressive when it came to her managerial and administrative methods, an old friendship aside.

 

Crash conceded the unspoken and so called threat/suggestion verbally, but kept her voice low enough so that only Skipper could hear her. “I know, I know, Skipper. It’s starting to compromise my fighting and defensive forms. I’m working on the issue. Got my word. Thanks for your help today.”

 

“If you and your teams need the Comanche and an immediate pull out, She and I will be there with bells on before the echo dies across the parsecs.”

 

“Sounds like a plan. Let’s kick the tires and light the fires Big Skipper.”

 

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*Note:

 

- See K.L.E.P.T.O Maniacs log on Comanche Briefings and Logs Boards for reference material on the mobile KLEPTO program.

- See RAdm Shauna Coyote Biography on Comanche Bio Boards for reference material on the Comanche Creek colony.