((Exeter, Flight Deck)).

Chief Mezze: *On the comms with pilots of the Sparrows. As they had all just seen the Romulan BoP disappear infront of them, everyone was suprised.* Hunter, can you confirm that sighting, we are running checks on our end?

As he began checking his panel to confirm that their was no combat Sims scheduled he glanced over to the Cadet manning the Training Coordination Console to his right. The red flashing light in the corner of the centre display was a dead giveaway. The cadet must have inadvertantly set the system to activate random combat scenarios at random intervals. The sensor and visual representation that the cadets in the fighters, and everyone on the bridge had just saw were mere ghosts, a training sim.

Contrary to what Mezze had just told the fighter’s moments before, this was actually training. But the runabout being prepared for launch to intercept the runabout the sensors had detected was ‘real world’ and not training at all. It was a mistake by the cadet manning the console next to him, but not a catastrophic one yet.

Hunter: There’s nothing there now chief.

Mezze: We copy that on our end aswell, it was a snap training sim, we are canceling that to respond to real world tasking. I say again ‘Real World’ tasking. Charge Shields, and reset weapons to standard configuration. Standby to recieve rendezvous coordinates.

Hunter: “Confirm: Sparrows 1 and 2 breaking to intercept second target – we are condition yellow.”

The Sparrows disengage from the strange sensor ghost that they were investigating, to pursue this new potential threat/target at full impulse.

((Exeter Bridge))

A mere 6 minutes after detecting the direlect run about, and 3 minutes after discovering that the Romulan BoP was a errant unscheduled training sim after all, the frenetic pace had somewhat subsided. The bridge crew, still under LCdr Aloran, as the ships CO was presumably already en route to the bridge were responding by; Reporting the situation back to SBB,  requesting orders on how to proceed, finishing preparations to launch their own Danube class Runabout to rescue any survivors and tow it back to SBB, going to yellow alert, and canceling all training aboard the vessel.

All staff and officers were ordered to report to their duty stations over the intercom. All cadets not on duty, we’re to report to muster stations. For a simple training cruise on a training vessel in the heart of the HQ system of the Federations 4th Fleet, the famed Bravo fleet, the atmosphere had changed tone dramatically. They were now performing a possible rescue and ship recovery operation.

Traan: *Speaking to Aloran* Crew for the USS Oxus are mustering now, the runabout should be ready to launch in the next few minutes, sir. Starbase Bravo has responded to our comms, they report they can put together a rescue package with 1 tug and 3 Peregrines, it could be made available to us in 25 minutes, they want to know if they should scramble it, or if we can handle this sir.

Aloran: *To the navigator* Conn,  how long until our Runabout can intercept the target at warp 6?

Cadet Abaroa had been manning the Helm station for the past several hours, and responded ‘After they launch, 17 minutes sir.’

Abaroa had been on several other training missions, being a 4th year cadet who would be graduating soon. It was a task he was mostly familiar with at this point, so most of the ride so far had been simple and routine for him. And he liked machines a lot more than people, so he wasn’t planning on command training. But a Romulan bird of prey? This was shaping up to be a lot more interesting than other training cruises he’d been on.

Aloran: *To Traan* Inform SBB we will handle it, but that they should standby for updates.

Traan: Aye sir. *Just then the flight deck reported that the Runabout Oxus was performing pre-flight, and would be ready to launch in 2 minutes.*

((USS Exeter, Flight Deck))

Since the ship was on a training  cruise and their was only about 48 non-cadet crew aboard, including a large Flight Wing, the decision was made to send Lt. Raskal, and a cadet crew of 3 on the runabout USS Oxus to proceed at their max cruising speed of warp 6 to intercept the inbound direlect vessel. Raskall had the ship prepped and ready as the 3 cadets who would make up his ‘crew’ boarded the vessel. As soon as the hatch had closed, he requested and recieved clearance to launch.

Raskal: *The veteran grazerite pilot, assigned each of the Cadets to stations. Among them were 2 security majors, and a 4th year medical student.*

“Cadet Darwin, can you monitor sensors and navigational deflectors. Cadet Davidson, you take over communications, and monitor the engineering console there” *pointing without averting his gaze on the primary nav console infront of him.*

“If you don’t know something, dont try to fake it,  just ask me. You’re our medic?” *To the 3rd cadet, who nodded affirmatively.* “Get ready to beam any survivors aboard and render aid. And you give them blood test before anything else, make sure they aren’t changelings.”

((USS Exeter Bridge))

Traan spoke to Aloran “The Runabout should be making contact with the target in about 2 minutes sir. They are reporting 4 lifesigns onboard, 3 Humans and 1 Vulcan sir.”

He started cross referencing the list of reports of missing or stranded vessels that Starfleet had compiled in the aftermath of the recent Vaadwaur attacks. He had quickly narrowed down the identity of the vessel their fighter crews were now intercepting as likely being the USS Fraser, which had been on a scientific survey mission in the Beltras system about 22 light years away when the Blackout had occurred.

The vessel had been reported as missing only 19 days ago, after it had failed to report back to Starbase 420.

((USS Oxus, cockpit))

The runabout shifted to impulse and approached its sister ship slowly. Raskall had ordered the cadets in the sparrows to fly a patrol perimeter 150km’s from the 2 runabouts. Raskall had maneuvered to parallel the course of the other Runabout. They were preparing to beam the crew over to their vessel and take the runabout under tow. They would then make their way back, and rendezvous with the Exeter, and presumably continue with their training.

Raskal spoke to the cadet manning the console to his left. “Lock on to those lifesigns and beam them aboard.” He then looked to his right and told Cadet Davidson to prepare to lock on to the Fraser with their tractor beam before opening a channel to the cadets in the Sparrows.

Raskal spoke into the comm “Sparrows, nice work watching our backs. We are taking the runabout under tow now and heading back to Starbase Bravo. Form up on our wing, and as we approach the USS Exeter you can break formation and return to the barn. I will be sure to log you each for additional hours of Operational Flight in addition to the training hours you have accrued.”

Davidson’s fingers hovered above the comms panel of the runabout, the glow of the LCARS interface lighting his increasingly furrowed brow. He’d been quiet, observing, absorbing what was happening. The rush of real-world action sobering the usual excitement of flight training. Adrenaline was pulsing.

He pushed a button to open a channel with the stranded ship and began speaking. “Crew of the Fraser, our transporters are locking onto your life signs. Prepare for transport.” Only static answered.

He turned to Raskal. “Sir, we’re seeing elevated CO2 levels, it could be life support degradation. I believe we should prepare to take medical action.” The captain of the Oxus nodded in response.

After tapping a few buttons, the transport was ready to initiate. With a shimmer of light, the four figures materialized, all visibly disoriented and dazed.

In the void, the tractor beam activated and latched onto the Fraser. With a steady force applied through the tractor, the inert vessel began its slow, obedient drift behind them.

Raskal turned to face the 4 new faces they had just recovered from the Fraser. The medic had informed Raskal that were all who they were appearing to be with a ‘initial tests are all negative sir, they’re clear.’

The there was 3 males and 1 female in the group. 2 blueshirted human males, 1 yellowshirted vulcan male Lt JG, and a female redshirted Ensign. After taking them back to the rear cabin with the medic, Raskal interviewed them for a few minutes as they started making their way towards the inner Mellstoxx System.

He learned that they were indeed, the crew of the Fraser, and they had been stranded on the farside of a Blackout region. Instead of trying to return to their home base at SB 420, they decided to attempt to make it to SBB. The route to SBB was shorter then the now winding and circuitous route back to 420. Initially they had enough power and supplies in the runabout to easily make the trip to Bravo, but 8 days prior, they had struck a localized quantum filament that had knocked out main power, comms and the loss of their warp capability due to the filament destabilizing and damaging  the matter antimatter reaction chamber beyond repair.

Luckily, the Yellowshirted Vulcan engineer had jury rigged a shunt to feed a burst of full impulse to the drives manually with the majority of their remaining auxiliary power. Saving just enough power to maintain life support for the, what would then be, 17 day sublight speed trip to SBB. Aside from some slight malnurishment, all 4 of them were in good health, and would likely be cleared to return to duty once being cleared by the Medical Staff back on SBB.

Raskal heard from Davidson that the Exeter had responded , and given them orders to tow the Fraser directly back to the base, as he had suspected they would. At max tractor tow speed of warp 3, it would take them about 4.5 hours. He told Davidson and the Medic to take the controls for the next few hours. Cadet Darwin and he would rest and take over for the last few hours of the trip. As he stood, before heading to the rear cabin again, he said to the 3 cadets “Excellent work so far Cadets. I will be sure to note that fact in my mission report.”

And with that, they speedily made their way back to SBB. Dropping the sparrows off as they rendevoused with the Exeter who then carried on, uneventfully, with the rest of the Cadet cruise.