Star Trek: The Canine Voyage

Star Trek: The Canine Voyage

part four

 

Space... the final frontier. These are the voyages of the starship Iditarod. It's continuing mission, to explore strange new worlds. To seek out new life, and new civilizations. To boldly go where no dog has gone before!

 

Cast: Balto Mandrell-Captain

Boris Goosinoff-Commander

Kaltag Roberts-1st lieutenant

Star Henderson-Helmsman

Nikki Richardson-Security Chief

Jenna Alba-Counselor

Doc-Doctor

Stella Rahssi-Nurse

Dusty Franks-Chief engineer

Kodiak, Muk, and Luk-Security personnel

Mel, Sylvia, and Dixie-Engineers

 

two years after Star Trek: First Contact

It had been a peaceful day for Balto. He got up at 0730, grabbed his drumsticks, and went down to the holodeck. There he had the computer create a large drum set, and he set about practicing. It wasn't a peaceful day for anyone who walked past though. When he was all finished, all good and sweaty, he walked to his quarters to change into his uniform. When finished with that, he headed for the bridge. As usual, Boris was in his seat.

“Boris! If you want me to request you as a captain, quit sitting in my chair!”

“Oh! Balto! You usually call before you come up!”

“I quit doing that once I found out you sit in my chair while I'm gone!”

Nikki spoke up. “I'm sorry to interrupt your... wonderful little chat, but we're being hailed.”

Balto sat down. “On screen.”

It was Admiral Matthew Dougherty. “Hello, crew of the Iditarod. Are you on a current assignment?”

“Um, no sir,” said Balto. “Why do you ask?”

“We have need of your services. In case you didn't know, a minefield has been placed in front of the Bajoran wormhole, preventing further Dominion forces from entering the Alpha quadrant. But, however, there is still the question of what to do about the Cardassians, and the Dominion forces already in the quadrant. That's where you come in. We have located a small Jem'Hadar outpost on one of Bajor's moons, a Class-M planetoid named Jeraddo. It was believed to be uninhabitable, but the Jem'Hadar have found a spot capable of habitation. Normally, we wouldn't view this as a priority, but we've been getting several distress calls recently about ships being attacked by Jem'Hadar vessels. We think that it's the handiwork of those very Jem'Hadar. Your mission is to get rid of them. Understood?”

“Yes, but I have one question. Why can't your ship do it? You have a Sovereign class Starship, and we have a Galaxy-class. You're much more suited.”

“Yes but I'm, Er, occupied at the moment. I'm at the Ba'ku planet, conducting some research. Dougherty out.”

As soon as the connection was broken, Balto said “I really don't like that guy. He's always hanging around those Son'a guys. They freak me out, with the skin on their faces stretched back. Blleeech! Mister Henderson, set a course for Jeraddo, warp 8.”

By the time they had arrived, they had developed a strategy. Boris would beam down on the moon with a team of around two dozen officers, most of them security, while the Iditarod, after beaming them down, would back off and lay siege, and if the Jem'Hadar had enough guts to send of their ships out, the Iditarod would go after them. In the transporter room, Boris was going over the plan one last time.

“The Jem'Hadar have a mere three small buildings on the moon. One is an armory, another is a control room for... well, I don't know what. The last is a launch pad/docking bay for their ships. Nikki, you take eight men and tackle the armory. You'll be team one. Kodiak, even though you're a cadet, I'm putting you in charge of another eight to handle the control room. You'll be team two. I'll take the remaining eight and take the docking bay. We'll be command team. Now, prepare to beam down!” The strike teams got in the transporters, first team one, then team two, then (obviously) command team. Boris' team was beamed down two hundred feet from the docking bay. The area was excellent for hiding in, dozens of acres of tall grass. At first Boris was worried that the grass would waver when they walked through, thus giving away their position. But fortunately for them, wind was blowing. The team moved in quickly, and when they were near the edge of the field, Boris ordered them to stop.

“Before we go,” he whispered “Count how many guards there are outside.”

“Weren't we supposed to know that already?”

“I think it was supposed to be... two outside? I don't know. Anyway, there's more than that.”

“Hmm. Five.”

“Alright, here's the plan. All nine of us line up to fire, and we fire at the same time, that way if any of us miss there will be four other shots also going. As soon as we do that, we charge. When we charge, five run ahead, then stop at the first safe spot. The other four run ahead, and the safe five cover them. Repeat until we're clear.”

 

Nikki was preparing to enter the armory with his team of eight. His only disadvantage was he didn't have a wheat field to cover him. As soon as they beamed down, the Jem'Hadar saw them. They quickly ducked behind the only source of protection they had. A rock, about the size of an old wagon wheel. A large rock, but not when you have nine men behind it.

“Great, what do we do now?” asked one of Nikki's men.

“I'm thinking! I'm thinking!” said Nikki. “Alright, how about this? Two men lean around to the right side and fire at the guards. If that draws their attention, two more quickly lean to the left side and fire. Hopefully we'll catch them off guard. Remember, phasers on stun. We want as many prisoners as possible!”

 

Kodiak was off much better than Boris or Nikki. No guards outside the control room! He did note with dismay that the control room was more like a control tower. He counted seven stories, at least. He also noticed with a sinking feeling that he had no idea what his mission was. Boris said 'Kodiak, you take the control tower.' So what the heck was he supposed to do?! He finally decided he was going to weed out the Jem'Hadar, then help Boris or Nikki, then get clear instructions as to what to do. He then gave the order to enter the tower.

 

Orbiting Jeraddo, the Iditarod had nothing to do.

 

Boris' plan for entering the docking bay was a success. When they got inside, he realized his plan for covering each other wouldn't work though. It was a hangar! Several Jem'Hadar fighters were hanging from the ceiling, and Jem'Hadar were hiding on various ones, so the command team had no idea where the next shot was coming from. They huddled in various spots, teamed into two or three, and could do nothing but take occasional potshots at the fighters, constantly under heavy barrage from the Jem'Hadar. One thing puzzled Boris though. Where were their starships? These one or two man fighters couldn't have done the damage described to them.

 

Nikki's plan also worked. Only three guards were outside, so that made things easier. And, fortunately for them, no guards inside either. So all Nikki's team had to do was plant a grenade in the armory and run.

 

Kodiak began having some trouble. Inside the control tower looked like a skyscraper! Not only was there a staircase to the top floor, there was a lobby! This was no ordinary control tower! But, no Jem'Hadar, at least that he could see. He then realized they were cloaked with their personal devices, and soon dozens of them were decloaking all over the place! Before his team could even make a run for cover six of them were out. All that was left was himself, Luk and Muk. They made a quick dash for the staircase and went up. When they had some partial cover, they began firing down.

Meanwhile in space, the Iditarod still had nothing to do.

 

Boris decided to make a risky move. He ordered his team to continue the charge, stop, cover, etc. plan. As far as he could tell, that was the only way to figure out which fighters had a Jem'Hadar on top of them. Doing that, they could make some progress! As soon as the first four charged, the five began covering. Anytime they saw a shot emit from on top of a fighter, the fired on that spot. And Boris' gamble paid off! Soon they had cleared half the hangar with no losses for themselves.

 

Nikki wondered what his team was to do now that the armory was gone. Then he looked towards the control tower and realized his team might be of use there.

 

Kodiak was freaking out. The staircase him and the polar bears were on barely provided enough cover. And to make it worse, every single Jem'Hadar in the room was focused on them. And, to make it even worse, some more were coming down the stairs! Just as the new Jem'Hadar were about to fire, the entrance doors swung open, and Kodiak saw Nikki and his team lay a large wave of fire over the room. It surprised the new Jem'Hadar enough that they paused for a moment, allowing Kodiak to stun them.

 

Meanwhile, the Iditarod still sat patiently in the bored stupor. Balto drew out a deck of cards and began playing solitaire.

 

Finally, Boris and his team cleared the hangar of Jem'Hadar. The question about the Jem'Hadar's starships still puzzled him. Where could you put a starship except... The answer hit him like a blast from the Death Star (Oops, wrong universe!)

 

With Nikki's help, Kodiak and the polar bears were saved. They advanced up the final floor without any disturbance. When they reached the top, they found a team of Jem'Hadar. Nikki quizzed them as to their duties. He soon learned that they were the strategists for the hit-and-run attacks they had been making. Then Nikki took all them prisoner, and prepared to beam back aboard. But if he knew where the ships were, like

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