Bridge, Orion LR Dearth of Dreams
        Kina watched with some pride as the power output on the main engines crept slowly up, then held steady at 91%. She breathed a sigh of relief, and signaled for the new power to be allocated back to the engines, pushing the damaged Raider faster through the void between the stars. She leaned back in her seat, cradling the minor burns that ran along the length of her left arm. She had only been given some painkillers, and just enough time with an epidermal spray to prevent infection.
        Feeling the quiet hum of the engines that rumbled through the ship, she looked again at the current damage report, mentally subtracting the repairs to the engines. They were out of supplies to jury-rig repairs, and could not spare the power for emergency repairs. Of course, once they reached their destination, they would have plenty of both.
On the screen in front of her, a third of which was blank, a lone bluish star slowly grew in prominence. Around it, a green diamond highlighted the small dot that was their destination. Around that dot orbited, not a manned station, but rather a supply depot, one of hundreds, if not thousands, scattered across the cartel, and beyond.
But with Jared bringing the engines to the current power levels, she had no doubt that they would make it.

Bridge, Romulan K5B Rapier
        Sub-Commander Ramelius paced back and forth across the small Bridge of his ship, every so often glancing at the view screen, with its small orange line indicating the ion trail from the damaged Raider. Although he liked the native ships of his navy, he accepted the competency of the Klingon designers.
        "Time?" he barked, not at anyone in particular, but his crew knew what he wanted.
        "Sir, we are about two hours behind the pirate. However, recent scans of the trail indicate that they have regained another fraction of their power output, although they are not at the normal rated level for the type." The woman at the science station barely turned to face her commanding officer.
        Ramelius nodded. The Orion had been repairing its engines ever since it had fled the failed raid on the convoy, and now they were engaged in a pursuit to catch the remaining ship. He gave a mental smile, and recalled the praise for, and from, his crew as they had expertly delivered the final blow to the other Light Raider, leaving it behind for the Q-ship and the Snipe-class frigate to deal with.
        "Continue pursuit. Stand down to condition one, and inform the crew to take the opportunity to rest themselves. Tell the galley to offer full hot meal service, with fresh fruit." He took another look at the view screen, with its false color ion trail. "I will take half an hour to rest myself, and then return to duty. Also tell the crew that we will be moving to condition two in one hour forty-five minutes, or upon detection of the pirate. Understood?"
        His second-in-command nodded, and moved to the center seat, although not sitting in it. "Aye, Sir. I will have the Bridge until you return."

Corridor, Dearth of Dreams
        Jared paused to let a work detail move supplies out of one compartment and into another. He waited for a clear moment, and then dodged around some stragglers to reach his own quarters.
        The door was ajar, slanted at an angle in the frame. With a groan of depression, he set his hands against the door, and jostled it back into place. The door ground into its slot, then back closed after Jared had passed through. Inside, he looked around at the mess caused by the battle, and set aside his soiled coveralls.
        He rummaged around for a clean set of dungarees, and finding them scattered across the floor, set them into a neat pile for when he awoke from his nap.
Far too soon, a persistent ringing caused him to waken, and groggily, he got dressed against the power of the sound. He slapped his palm against the door release button, and it opened halfway before stopping. Through the partially open door he said, "What?"
       The yeoman on the other side looked back at him. "Sir, the skipper requests your presence on the Bridge." Having delivered his message, the yeoman rubbed the back of his head, and left, muttering to himself, "Why haven't we got the internal comms back up?"
        "I heard that, and we don't have the parts, so live with it!" Jared poked his head out of his compartment to yell down the hall. It was his turn to mutter then, "And I wish I could fix it, but I'm no miracle worker."
        He pushed open his door a little more, then left it open, a reminder to himself to get it fixed eventually. His personal valuables were locked in the safe by his bunk. He made his way past the nearest turbolift, and went for the ladder-well adjacent to it. He climbed past a shift of workers going down to their quarters for rest, and at the top, he stopped short of the upper airlock. After giving it a quick visual inspection, he moved out onto the deck towards the Bridge.
        Entering the Bridge, Jarred looked around at the quiet room. On a Light Raider, there was only the Bridge and the Auxiliary Control to command the ship, and both had been damaged in the fight. Priority of repair went to the Bridge. "You wanted to see me?" he said.
        Kina turned to look at him, "Yes. We're a half-hour from our destination." She pointed with one arm at the star that loomed large in the view screen. "There's a supply cache in orbit around a small junk planet in the system. It has spare parts, among other things. We'll dock with it using the starboard cargo hatch and grab what we need. Be sure to get enough parts to finish fixing the engines, and give me more than a single phaser to fire. Get enough to repair all of the weapons if you can. I'll divert available power to shield repairs, and run on just what we need until we get back to base."
Jared was already mentally compiling a list of parts he would need. "All right, I'll get that started. Do you know how much is available for the taking, and do we have to pay?"
        Kina shook her head, smiling. "It's unmanned, one of those caches that the cartel maintains for situations such as these. We are expected to pay, and the parts will cost double what they will cost at the base, but we will pay later, not immediately. Money is money, so don't repair anything we can fight without, but get us ready to fight if we get caught, or find an opportunity we don't want to pass up."
        "Ok, that's good. I'll see who will be available in half an hour, and get ready. Warp, the two amidships phasers, the impulse engines, then see what comes?"
        She nodded, and turned back to the view screen. "I'll confer with you later."
        Jared moved to leave. "And you, too."







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