“What do we have, Zemess?” Aylen asked as Jerok watched her slowly pace the center of the bridge in front of him, her eyes locked to the view screen. A dead planetoid moon blocked half the view screen, but beyond it was a small, blue sphere; the D’Ghor ship’s warp trail led the Yorktown directly back to that planet.

“Standard Class-M planet. Oxygen, nitrogen, plenty of water, no signs of intelligent life. The surface seems pretty unremarkable, but I am picking up underground structures. It looks like a small area of one of the continents contains some sort of network of underground… factories?” was the tactical officer’s guess.

Jerok raised an eyebrow and asked, “Anything more than that?”

Zemess clicked his tongue in the typical Saurian fashion before elaborating, “Sensors are picking up large amounts of duranium alloy and antimatter. It would appear there are a great many number of torpedoes on this planet.”

“Is it a stockpile or a factory?” Ensign Thomas wondered out loud, but Jerok had been wondering the same thing.

The captain stood from his command chair and walked next to Commander Branson, “Could this be where D’Ghor is getting their munitions from?”

“That would appear to be a safe bet, captain. I’ve confirmed that the structures underground are more than just for storage. I believe this is a munitions factory,” the Saurian voice came from behind the captain.

“Any defenses?” Branson asked.

“Not that I can detect,” Zemess quickly shot back.

Jerok sighed, “There could be cloaked Klingon ships as a defense. But this is also so far out of the way that D’Ghor probably never suspected anyone would find it. Let alone a ship that actually has the sensor capabilities to figure out what they’re doing. What are the chances?”

“I could prepare a salvo of photon torpedoes which should be able to collapse and then destroy the entirety of the facilities, even underground,” Zemess offered.

“Do it. Helm, get us out from behind this moon and take us to within range of the planet. Tactical… whenever you’re ready,” the captain ordered as both he and Commander Branson returned to their respective command chairs.

“Red alert!” Branson ordered as the bridge dimmed towards darkness.

The Yorktown came out from behind the dead moon and quickly made haste to the planet as the blue orb grew in the view screen. After a few tense moments, Zemess finally confirmed, “Firing!” In a flurry, almost a dozen photon torpedoes launched from the underbelly of the Yorktown and made their way to do the planet’s surface. So far, Jerok thought, no defenses or other ships was a luck of the draw. The entire bridge crew watched as the precision hits from the torpedoes began throwing dust into the atmosphere and creating craters where the underground structures once were. A few secondary detonations could even be seen from space. The job was done.

“Get us out of here before we get some unexpected guests,” the captain ordered.

“Aye sir,” Ensign Thomas responded as the ship whipped around and entered warp.

Turning to his first officer, Jerok asked, “And send a subspace message to Admiral Beckett. Let him know we believe we’ve just eliminated a main munitions supply line for D’Ghor. Hopefully, that will help with the problems back home.”

____________________________________________________________

In this release:

• The Yorktown followed the D’Ghor ships warp trail back to a Class-M planet
• Sensor readings indicated that the planet had underground factories which were developing photon torpedoes for D’Ghor
• The Yorktown was able to successfully destroy the facility, and because it was so far out of the way and hidden, there was no resistance or defenses
• A victory that will trickle back home to Archanis!
• This concludes the Yorktown’s story in the Archanis Campaign, as small and out of the way as it was!