“What in the blazes is going on?” Mayvilis looked up and over at her Executive Officer, Lieutenant Commander Benson George, as he announced his entrance with a question and tugged his uniform tunic down some. 

“Your guess is as good as mine. Take the tactical station, Commander.” Mayvilis stood herself and made her way to the helm. Two additional officers had arrived as well and assumed priority stations. She tapped several controls on the console, which brought up a tactical overlay display on the screen. 

The display showed several vessels of unknown configurations in orbit of Risa and engaged in attacks on other vessels. Aldrin had been spared for the moment as it was on the opposite side of the initial orbital angle of attack. Mayvilis figured that was likely to change very shortly. 

“Captain. Sensors are not recognizing these vessels. They’re of unknown configuration. Area reports seem to indicate they emerged from some sort of subspace aperture – there were huge spikes in gravemetric distortion scales.” A young Ensign reported from the operations station, their tone focused and confident. 

“Our grace period is ending. One of those vessels is now in pursuit of us. All hands to battle stations!” Mayvilis’ voice echoed more than usual, her bridge devoid of the normal amount of personnel at their stations. The ship was already at red alert, but her battle call reignited the alert klaxons for several pings. 

“Defense pattern Ulyesses-two engaged. Fire phasers at will and standby photon torpedoes, fire a spread  once the phaser volley has finished.” Mayvilis pulled the ship wide and engaged thrusters in an overpowered push, causing the Aldrin to almost pivot in place and face their forward section on the incoming enemy vessel, which was thankfully not much bigger than their own ship.

The Aldrin, while not a large and powerful warship, was much more capable of maneuvering its way through combat than vessels of a larger class. The incoming enemy vessel faced an immediate barrage of phaser fire, followed by a volley of photon torpedoes. 

“Direct hit – their front shields buckled and they suffered some minor structural damage,” Benson reported amidst immediately engaging in another exchange of fire. 

Despite Mayvilis’ best attempt, the enemy vessel’s own fire made contact with the Aldrin, causing those on the bridge to brace their stations as they buckled and shook. 

“Shields down to seventy-eight percent. Their weapons are spicy, Captain.” Benson called out. 

“Spicy?” Mayvilis looked back at him for a moment and raised her brow. She met his grin before she briskly turned her attention back to the helm console in front of her. Her fingers continued to glide over the panel as any experienced pilot would. She managed to maneuver the Aldrin away from the enemy’s attempts at fire several more times. 

“I was two minutes from some time on the beach… Two minutes!” Chief Engineer Hilga Stramm groaned as she entered main engineering. She braced one of the wall panels as the ship shook from initial enemy fire contact. After her own footing was stabilized, she looked at the crew population in the engineering department. 

“Great…. About half of what we need.” Hilga looked extremely out of place as she took her station at the main engineering console, centred in the work area. She adorned a flamboyant caftan and an oversized sun hat, attired appropriately to the destination that never was. 

“Hilga. Conduit stabilizers on deck five are buckling. Whoever is piloting the Aldrin is pushing the suiblight engine systems to their breaking point.” Ensign Pilar approached her superior and gave the most relevant status report she could.

“The Captain has allocated as many personnel to damage control as possible but..” Pilar continued but was cut off by Hilga.

“But we’re running on a skeletal crew. Yes. You were almost down a chief engineer, too, had it been two minutes later.” Hilga tapped some controls on her console in an attempt to remotely fix the stabilizers. Several error codes sounded in response. 

“Of course you don’t want to tango today, controls. Thank you, Ensign Pilar. Get someone to deck give to override these stabilizers manually.” Hilga ordered and tapped her comm badge, “Stramm to bridge. This is an old bird, Captain. Whoever is flying her should do so more gently…”

The Aldrin bridge shook hard once again as additional enemy fire made contact with the shields. Several consoles on the bridge erupted into a fury of angry sparks. Mayvilis picked herself up off the floor as internal communications from Hilga came through – her chief engineer’s protest to her flying felt almost satisfying.

“It’s me, Hilga, and I’ll try my best. I’m going to be pushing the stabilizers to their maximum.. Tell your crew…” Mayvilis quickly engaged another maneuver which put the enemy vessel directly in their sights. 

“That’s it!” She heard her executive officer exclaim before she took note of an aggressive firing pattern coming from the Aldrin. It made contact with the enemy, which had been as equally compromised as them so far. 

“Oh.. We’ve noticed, Captain… Try and not do the enemy’s job for them. Stramm out.” 

The enemy vessel went limp on the screen and it seemed to rotate slightly to the left, its momentum continued to carry it away from orbit. 

“They’re a drift. Direct hit to their power systems and engines.” The Ensign at Operations reported gleefully. 

“Nice shooting, Commander.” Mayvilis looked back once more and gave Benson an approving smile. 

Before he could give a witty reply, the Operations Ensign spoke up as an incoming hail was triggered. “Captain. The Britannia is haling.”

“Put it through,” Mayvilis ordered, her attention turning to the viewscreen in front of her.

The image of the grey/white haired older Captain filled the screen. She emanated a commanding and firm presence even through their current chaos. 

“Mayvilis, how good is your driving?”

“As good as you need it to be, Captain Harrison. Lead the way…“