View source for Federation News Service/Hours from disaster, USS Darwin saves USS Dunbar

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===Hours from disaster, USS Darwin saves USS Dunbar===
''Stardate 239204.28''
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[[File:USSDarwinA.jpg|thumb|300px|The {{USS|Darwin|A}} has rescued the crew of a freighter caught in an anomaly.]]
ZETA GELIS REGION — The USS Darwin freed a freighter from an anomaly just in the nick of time after facing communications issues, gravimetric spikes, hull breaches, and crew disappearances.

The USS Darwin (NCC-99312-A) found the USS Dunbar lying prone in space, trapped by a powerful anomaly, which had opened suddenly in the region. Captain Renos quickly assessed the situation and sent an away team led by Lt. Cmdr. Jorey and comprised of Lt. JGs Yael and Peters, Ensigns Lexicon, Malon and Dragumov as well as Petty Officer Jellico, via shuttle to support repair efforts and help find the missing crew. The bridge crew’s calculations revealed that there were only a few hours left before the Dunbar was irretrievably caught in the thrall of the rift.

Aboard the Dunbar, Jorey and his team made contact with Captain Dreyfus but almost immediately, powerful gravity spikes and subspace eddies were detected in the vicinity. The group barely managed to escape the cargo bay before a massive discharge blew out a section of the cargo bay’s hull, taking the shuttle with it.

Due to Zalkonian sightings in the area and the threat of a weapon called an Anoxia field, communications proved to be risky and difficult. The bridge crew, led by Commander Renos and consisting of Lt. Cmdr. Thomas, Lt. JGs Traenor and Shedet, Ensigns Valdivia sought to find a way around such difficulties.

On the Dunbar, Peters, Jellico and Lexicon helped with repairs, while Malon and Yael headed to sickbay. On both ships more people vanished, with Peters and Lt. Cmdr. Icavoc finding themselves in an incorporeal state, unable to interact with their surroundings or people nearby.

Valdivia posited a theory about the location and status of missing crew on the Dunbar, while Traenor discovered the gravimetric spikes were being exacerbated by their own sensor use, which was subsequently stopped, leading to a temporary reprieve from the outbursts. Minutes later the largest spike detected left the bridge dumbfounded.

Valdivia spotted and attempted to rescue the phased Dokkaran, only to become trapped himself. In his phased state, he noticed a Zalkonian ship on the viewscreen he hadn’t seen prior to phasing. No one on the bridge knew it was there, so finding a way to warm them was critical.

The situation seemed to continually decline until success came finally in a method to start pulling the Dunbar out of the rift, without tearing the weakened freighter apart. Valdivia and Icavoc found a way to attract the attention of the bridge crew, resulting in Valdivia leading Shedet off the bridge in an attempt to get to engineering where he might find a phased engineer to help him with his plans. Icavoc remained on the bridge trying to find a way to warn the bridge crew about the Zalkonian presence.

Renos, Thomas and Traenor went back to the idea posited by Valdivia earlier about using anyon sweeps to de-phase the missing officers. Using this method they successfully retrieved Icavoc, who warned them about the Zalokonians, bringing the fear of the Anoxia field back into play. A plan was devised to use the phasers to transmit a visual morse code message to the Dunbar alerting them of the immediate threat.

Pulled free, the Dunbar had barely begun to head back to Deep Space 6 under impulse power when the Zalkonian vessel decloaked and launched something into the anomaly before warping back towards their own territory. The anomaly closed and the two ships departed for Deep Space 6.

“Captain Renos and his crew despite the odds managed to save my crew and I from meeting a certain end,” remarked Captain Dreyfus of the Dunbar. “We owe the crew of the Darwin a great deal.”
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