An aged admiral, a washed out spook, a convicted criminal, a tainted psychologist, and a young pilot made a strange team, but no stranger than the mission itself. They were about to assault a vineyard that was, by all indications, a Starfleet black site implicated in the disappearance of a retired Rear Admiral, her husband, and two of their crew, and they were doing it within spitting distance of Starfleet Headquarters. If things went wrong, they could go very wrong very quickly.

With the surveillance feeds looped to mask their approach, Commander Lewis and Dr. Brooks returned to the perimeter of the vineyard’s grounds where Admiral Reyes, Dr. Hall and Ensign Rel awaited them. So good was the trio’s camouflage that even Commander Lewis’ hawkish eyes couldn’t spot them until they were right upon them.

“Ready to move?” Commander Lewis asked as his colleagues rose from the chaparral.

His question needed no response. Admiral Reyes had made the call. In mere minutes, they would engage seasoned operators who most likely once took the same oath as them. The Admiral had instructed them to set phasers to stun, but if the past was prologue, it was more than likely that blood would be spilled before the sun rose. They understood this reality, but they were nonetheless committed to the course. It was time for answers.

“Patrol Alpha passed to the west a few minutes ago, and Beta is a klick out on the far side of the estate,” reported Ensign Rel, who’d been studying the movement patterns of the patrols roaming the vineyard’s grounds. “We should be able to slip by them, and it will take them a few minutes to double back once we reveal ourselves.”

“That leaves only the three sentries on the roof,” Dr. Hall continued, layering in details about the three men she’d been studying who stood watch from the villa. “Their lackadaisical stance suggests they’d grown soft on this uneventful assignment.” When you had a well-concealed safehouse, it was easy to get lulled into a false sense of security.

“Then let’s get on with it,” Commander Lewis replied. He reshouldered his rifle and headed off into the sea of head-high grapevines that surrounded the estate, the team tight on his heels.

The approach went smoothly, their cover maintained until they were within a couple dozen meters of the villa’s outer walls. But then someone stepped on a dried branch that had fallen in their path. Crack. The sound of brittle wood breaking pierced the silence of the quiet night.

“Who’s there?” asked the nearest sentry as he turned in the direction of the sound. It was probably just another coyote or something, he figured. That hesitation was his downfall. Commander Lewis squeezed the trigger before he even raised his rifle.

A single shot rang out, striking the sentry dead center of the chest. His legs buckled as the low-energy polaron burst short circuited his central nervous system. He never had a chance.

The characteristic bright blue illumination of the phase pulse lancing out from the grapevines drew the attention of the other two sentries. They spun and raised their rifles, but before they could make out a target, two more shots rang out.

Admiral Reyes and Dr. Hall hit their marks. Both men fell where they stood.

“Move!” Commander Lewis shouted, and the team surged forward. They knew they’d now lost the element of surprise. The enemy would know they were here, and that meant it was now a race against the clock.

As he reached the wall, Commander Lewis drew a shaped charge from his tac vest. “Clear!” Commander Lewis shouted as slapped the charge against the stucco wall, depressing the detonator so fast that, if anyone hadn’t anticipated the move, they would have been hit with the energy of the explosion. But these were his people, either from his Hazard Team or from his past life, and they were ready for the quick action, bowing their heads so their tactical helmets would take any flying debris.

Before the dust had even settled, the team raced through the breach into the inner corridors of the villa, their rifles sweeping the long interior hallway. But for the moment, it was empty.

While Dr. Hall had profiled the sentries, and Ensign Rel had tracked the roaming patrols, Admiral Reyes had constructed a map of the villa through narrow-beam spectrographic scans. “Left,” she ordered as the team began to move down the hallway. “Past the courtyard and then down into the basement.”

Their muzzles danced past doorways and corners, covering any possible approaches, as they moved towards their target. They got as far as the courtyard before they were met by the enemy. Four men in dark camouflage had taken up position on the other side of the courtyard, and they opened fire without hesitation.

“Take cover!”

A barrage of phaser collided against the colonnade, and the team returned fire. The exchange was heated, and the two sides were at a draw. As Commander Lewis peaked out from behind a pillar and unloaded a volley before being forced to withdraw as opposing fire was hurled his way, he could not help but note that these guys were good. Very good. Their shots were dead accurate. If they kept at this for long, someone would take a hit.

“Allison,” Commander Lewis asked as debris flew off a pillar that was struck by enemy fire. “You’re sure our people are in the basement?”

“As certain as I can be.”

“How do you know?”

“Everyone else was moving around too much to be a prisoner.”

“Alright, then fuck this,” Commander Lewis replied as he yanked a large grenade off his vest, pulled the pin and hurled it across the courtyard. “Brace!”

As the team ducked back, heeding his warning, the grenade went off. He had not picked a stun grenade, nor even a small frag grenade. Instead, he’d picked a high-yield explosive that would end the fight before it got worse. Four megajoules of energy tore through the columns, walls and ceiling where their enemy had been, and then they were no more. All that was left was a giant pile of rubble covering a quarter of the courtyard.

Admiral Reyes peaked out, mouth agape. “I thought I said non-lethal,” she stated, shocked at what Commander Lewis had just done. There was no chance anyone within a couple dozen meters of the impact zone had survived the explosion. If those were Starfleet officers… that thought made her heart hurt.

“We can discuss the ethics later,” Commander Lewis replied coldly. The enemy had gone lethal, and it was only a matter of time before one of them landed a hit. “We need to move before more arrive.” Without waiting for her response, Commander Lewis began to move again.

There was no point in debating him now, knew the Admiral. After Nasera, and now this, maybe the Commander was losing it, but for now, they needed to push forward. And so she and the rest of the team began to move again.

As they neared the stairwell to the basement, a phaser shot suddenly leapt over Commander Lewis’ shoulder. Commander Lewis spun his rifle on the target, but all he saw through his sights was a large man in dark camouflage collapsing to the ground unconscious. 

He turned back around to see the shot had come from the theoretical physicist they’d sprung from New Zealand. “Nice reaction time Tom,” Commander Lewis laughed. This was not the same soft-palmed scientist he’d known back in the eighties.

“Thanks,” smiled Dr. Brooks. “A lot has changed since our time on the Enigma.”

Dr. Hall crossed the distance to where the guard had fallen. She reached down and plucked an earpiece from his ear, listening to the chatter as she rejoined the others. “Word is out,” she reported. “They know we’re here.” That was pretty self-evident given what had just transpired in the courtyard. “Patrols on the perimeter doubling back to the villa, and a call went out for reinforcements.”

“Did anyone response?”

Dr. Hall nodded.

“Who?”

“Didn’t identify except to say they’re en route from San Francisco.”

Commander Lewis signed. In this context, San Francisco was almost certainly synonymous with Starfleet. It wasn’t all that surprising though. The equipment, the access, the boldness, even the location itself, all signs pointed to this being an inside job. “Tom, is the dampening field still up?”

“Mhmmm,” confirmed Dr. Brooks.

“That means they’ll be coming by conventional transport,” Commander Lewis pointed out. At least, that was the hope. Until now, their encounters with these operators suggested that they did not have the means to cut through their own dampening field either. “Rel, you and Tom go to the roof on overwatch. Take out the patrols returning from the field and give a callout when you’ve got bogies on the horizon.”

The ensign and the convict nodded and turned to head for the roof.

“And Tom,” Commander Lewis added. “If you get a spare moment, find us the field generator. We’re going to need a way out of here after we get our people.” If they could disable it, they could call the Serenity for a beam out, and hopefully the Serenity would answer the call…

As Dr. Brooks and Ensign Rel made for the roof, Commander Lewis, Admiral Reyes and Dr. Hall headed for the basement.