Fire!

“Jon…”  She dropped her lab coat on the floor and reached with both hands for his face, holding it in her hands to bring him back to her lips.

He spun her around and lifted her off the floor. Laughing, she wrapped her legs around Jon and hung on. They both started to laugh and managed to kiss the other without stumbling; two more steps and Jon put one knee on the bed, then laid her down with an agility he didn’t even expect of himself.

“You are the only thing I can think about,” he whispered, and all but fell on top of her, pinning her down in another deep enduring kiss. She tasted like sweet cream and coffee, and he breathed the fragrance of her skin and the familiar herbs of the soap used on board.

Panting Jon pulled away from Riaan a few centimeters to catch his breath, and then pressed his full body against her, the strength of his entire body clasping her in hunger.

“Uh, Jon-“ but he didn’t hear her.

            Abruptly Endeavour leapt up and sharply to one side, knocking Jon and Riaan apart and off the bed to the floor. The ship listed and rolled to one side, wobbling yaw. Jonathan was flat on his back, Riaan just a meter to his left on her side.

            “What the hell is going on!” he shouted, trying to climb to his feet but it was hard to stand up. He crawled for his intercom. “Archer to the bridge! What in hell is going on?!”

            Another explosion sent them reeling in the opposite direction. They saw a blast of white and orange fill the window from the outside.

            “Are you alright?” the admiral shouted at Riaan. He stumbled to his feet finally, grateful to redirect his adrenaline on something else.

            “I think so,” she stammered. “I better find Branni and get to sick bay.”

            “Come on!” Admiral Archer grabbed Riaan by the hand. He took an uncomfortable step and stopped.

            “Are you okay?” she asked him gingerly. He nodded and looked up.

            “I’m fine. Let’s go.”

            They ran from his quarters to the turbo lift. It wouldn’t respond.

            “Lifts down, come on!” Archer sprinted a few meters to the ladder in the Jeffries tube and pushed Riaan in ahead of him. “Go, go!” he shouted, helping her go faster by pushing her behind with his shoulder.

            “I’m going!”

            Another explosion rocked the ship; they hung on tight until the pitch and yaw stabilized.

            “Those aren’t asteroids! That’s weapons fire!” Archer shouted. “Here, that door, pull it down, that’s the hatch to D deck,” he told her. “Sick bay is starboard – to the right. Go!” He gave her a helping push out the hatch and kept climbing. Before he could get to the bridge another explosion shook the entire ship, knocking him down three rungs before he regained his footing and made his way to A deck. He pushed at the door to get it open.

            Smoke had filled the bridge, an acrid electrical blue fog obscuring Archer’s view, but an NX bridge was an NX bridge. The alarm blared and the only sounds were shouts from people and sparks flying as small explosions erupted at the comm and the helm. He rushed in and grabbed the railing to steady himself against another blast! Particles of black insulation, fiber optic strands, and conduits rained down on the controls and the crew’s heads.

            “Captain!” he shouted.

            “Take weapons, Admiral, and load forward torpedo bays!”

            “Who in hell is firing on us?!”

            “Orions!”

Archer wasn’t sure he heard Captain Mitchell right. They had just left Orions on Akal, and prior to that it had been years since they’d had trouble at their hands.

            “What do they want?!”

            “Target their weapons and fire torpedoes!” Archer wasn’t terribly familiar with the weapons station, but he managed to hit the target. It wasn’t enough. Some kind of bomb hit the dome of the bridge and pieces of the ceiling splintered off and down on the crew. The bridge went dark, then lit up with orange flames. The view screen went black and the ship listed to one side as the stabilizers went off line.

            “Keep firing! Hit ‘em with everything we got!”

            Archer wasn’t accustomed to taking orders, but running a ship took teamwork, sometimes just doing whatever needed to be done  regardless of rank.

            “Targeting engines,” he shouted, and with phasers charged, he shot in the dark with instruments that barely functioned at this point.

            “Helm, get us out of here,” Archer shouted.

            “Driver coil assembly is fused; impulse engines are down, sir!”

            “Engineering – we need warp engines now!” Archer shouted.

            “Admiral, some of us are pinned down here, including Brannigaan. Engines are going to need an hour before they’re back online!” came a voice over the intercom. Archer panicked. His lion’s personality was both playful and protective. There was no choice but to get down to Engineering.

            GO!” the captain shouted to Archer. Whether he’d said it or not wouldn’t have mattered to Archer, but the acknowledgment that he was about to abandon the bridge was appreciated. It was, after all Mitchell’s ship, Endeavor, not Enterprise. 

Archer sprinted to the Jeffries tube and half climbed half dropped down to the Engineering Room, landing just outside where flames lapped at the walls and blocked the door. The heat was almost unbearable, certainly dangerous. The smoke here was different – smoke from plasma and anti-matter fusion that was deadly even before it scorched the lungs. The corridor was otherwise empty. He ripped the closest extinguisher from the wall and sprayed at the base of the fire blocking the door.

            “Jamison!” he shouted as soon as the door was open. Sparks of red, gold, orange, white, and yellow shot in every direction from the top of the reactor. Archer covered most of his face with his forearm, trying to keep asphyxiation at bay. “Commander!”