Nico left the rest of the teams and made his way to the closest jeffries tube, he preferred to remain unknown. His intelligence mark said it was the third cargo bay located on the lower part of the commercial ring. Inside the Cargo bay was outside of the communication range that Nico had set up with the two Runabouts, outside was in communications range.

Turning off his light and going off the light that was peering through the window, he watched the floor and hallway, he had his phaser drawn. He could hear the muffled voices in the foreground. They were not friendly that’s for sure. They were speaking Kzinti!

He stopped dead in his tracks, their acute senses were no match for Nico.

“You don’t smell it? There are people on here.” said one.

“No, I don’t. I hear something in the hallway, it could be a rat.” said the other.

Nico continued to listen to the back and forth while looking somewhere to take cover. Moving ever so slightly, he missed his step and tripped over a bulkhead.

“The hallways, we have an intruder!” the pair said in the slithering voice. Moments later Nico was surrounded.

‘How did they get here so fast?’ he thought to himself.

“We’re auggies.” the male adolescent said.

“Auggies?” Nico questioned.

“Augments.” came a stronger female voice.

“Who are you?” he asked the woman standing in the shadows.

“You will find out…” Moments later a phaser shot came from the shadowy woman.

As the room darkened even more, he could hear the shuffling of footsteps and phaser fire, and then transporters.

((Elsewhere on the station))

Traan said to Anderson in a whisper, “Rally back at the ship? Get a head count and do a proper sweep?” Standard procedure when comms was lost was to rally at the muster point, which on this mission was the 2 parked runabouts.

Anderson nodded.  “Fall back; we’re too exposed here.”

He cautiously retreated from the main lounge, heading back towards the docking bay in which they’d landed.  As he reached one intersection between two corridors, though, Anderson stopped suddenly, holding up a fist to signal for a stop before dropping into a crouch.  He then touched his ear, and pointed down the branch labeled “Cargo Bay”.  Straining their ears, both Anderson and Traan could hear unfamiliar voices echo down the corridor.  Moving even more cautiously now, the human began creeping down the new corridor, switching on red filters for his lamps given the low light.

As he neared the door at the end of the hall, Anderson suddenly signaled another stop; more sound, this time from behind himself and Traan.  He spun around, rifle raised and spotting a group of four Kzinti who had been attempting – unsuccessfully – to sneak up behind the two Starfleet officers.  The security officer was quicker on the draw, opening fire; he hit the lead in the side with a bolt of phaser fire, causing the others to grab their wounded companion and fall back with a few wild return shots that all missed.  “Cargo bay!  Move!”  Anderson hissed to Traan, placing himself between the Andorian and the Kzinti and firing several more shots down the corridor, to keep the Kzinti’s heads down.

((Cargo Bay))

The phaser fire Nico had heard as he was passing out was actually Anderson and Traan who had come looking for him and heard the unfamiliar voices. Anderson had been able to wound one of the Kzinti before they had beamed out.

“Bastards…ahhh no Nico, what were you thinking bud…” Traan said aloud as he rushed up to Nico and started assessing his injuries. Within a few seconds he came to, with a sharp inhale.

“We have to retreat back to Bravo. We are dealing with Kzinti Augments.”  Nico finally caught his breath.

Anderson kept the two covered while Traan tended to Nico.  “Agreed.  We need a proper security team to clear this place,” he said, then tapped his combadge.  “Anderson to engineering team.  Fall back.  Repeat, fall back on the runabouts.”  If truth be told, he wasn’t confident that the message had been transmitted, but he had to try anyway; Anderson then addressed Nico once more.  “Why’d you come here, instead of the command center?”

“I was asked to do this mission for Intelligence, I’ve been moonlighting because of my language skills. Anyway, it’s not like anyone died.”  Nico said with some hope in his voice.

As they made their way through the corridors there was a chirp… “Comms are back, which means transporters are too. So should be our tricorders.” Nico said.

Traan then tapped his comm badge, realizing that it whatever was jamming their tricorders and comms had been lifted.

“I’ll do you one better commander. Traan to New Langley  scan the area for any ships that might be making a quick getaway. A bunch Kzinti just beamed off the station so scan for transporter signals too.” Traan knew the second request might be tough because there was dozens of ships in orbit of Pyrithia at any given time, but it was worth a shot.

“We’re already back at the runabout sir, Tarsin hasn’t come back though.” Kip replied over the comm.

“Then go find him and get him out,” Anderson replied.  “And stay together; we’ve had contact here.”  After Traan closed that channel, he addressed him again.  “Bring Nico; I’ll cover you.”  And true to his word, as Traan helped Nico back to the docking bay, Anderson kept the two covered, though fortunately no other threats revealed themselves.

((Command Deck))

Anderson had sent Alonzo and Kip to the command deck to look for Tarsin. They found him. Eyes wolide frozen in a look of shock, with a hole in his chest.

Kip, being no stranger to death in his 20 plus years in Starfleet, was able to process it a bit better in the moment than Alonzo.

“Shit…” the old chief said and slowly shook is head before realizing he should clear the rest of the deck and moved to check every corner.

Alonzo on the other hand broke down and wept. He and Tarsin had become close friends, and had worked on the same crew for most of the last 8 months. It had been a part of the reason Traan had decided to bring the 2 on the mission.

About 15 minutes after bringing Tarsin’s body back to the New Langley the Pyrithian crews that were scheduled to meet and join them on the repairs arrived.

They also found a warp trace of a ship that left the system right after the Kzinti beamed out. Nico was keen on coping this info and presumably forwarded it to his handlers.

With the added personnel, the Starfleeters decided to stay and complete the mission after all. Tarsins body was was given to the Pyrithians government for immediate cremation in accordance with his will and ‘in case of my death’ Starfleet forms he had filled out when joining.

EPILOGUE 

After hearing about the Kzinti Augments attack the leader of the Pyrithian crew mentioned that things like that were the exact reason they had requested Federation assistance. The Pyrithians held a moment of silence in empathy for deceased and to their credit the Pyrithian government would unofficoally rename the place ‘Tarsin Station’ a few weeks later.

A subsequent sweep of the station, Anderson leading the Pyrithian security team that came with the work crew, found that whatever Kzinti or anyone else who had been aboard the station when the Starfleet detail had arrived had disappeared; for the duration of the mission, Anderson drilled the Pyrithian team on sweeping and clearing techniques, to try to it set them up for success after the Starfleet crew left; they took to the training well, and by the time the runabouts departed Anderson could confidently report that the Pyrithians were, in his opinion, ready to control the station on their own.

Traan, being the nominal leader of the impromptu team and the Head of Repair Docks on SBB, sent his first ever next of kin “death letter” a day after returning from the ultimately successful mission. A thoroughly miserable experience that he hadn’t ever had to go through having been a noncom up until three and a half months ago. After sending the letter, Traan downed a half a bottle of illicit Romulan Ale and passed out in a fit of despondent drunkenness, alone in his quarters. This prompted him to schedule another appointment with Minh the next morning. Apparently he had identified another trigger that caused him to drink.

The mission itself was a moderately success, and the station was brought back online officially by the Pyrithians mere days after the Starfleet team had left. The trip home in the New Langley was a mostly quiet and sullen affair. Though, since Tarsin had brought up the idea to play poker on the outbound trip, Kip had organized a game after dinner the day before they arrived back at SBB, which brightened spirits and allowed for some healing to begin.