Lieutenant Commander Thorn and his two accompanying officers moved down to the main area where the terrorists were mostly congregating. All of the security guards that were assigned to guard the hospital were disabled and tied down. It would only be Thorn and his team. He could tell from his tricorder that all of the entrances to the hospital were now guarded by them, so they were trapped inside the hospital. The remaining men looked like they were ready to go after whatever they were looking for. About twenty men were moving towards the room where Jenovia and the others were.
Fifteen of them were moving towards a large room where Thorn and his team already were. It was quite spacious, with pillars and large desks to hide behind. The ceiling was very high. One end of the room had two curved staircases that led to an upstairs floor. Thorn decided that this was the best place to make their stand. Having thought that there were only fifteen men, he only brought two flash-bombs. He had only one left. This was going to be tricky.
Thorn knew that they probably had Federation tricorders and would likely detect their presence. So Thorn and his team probably just couldn’t hide behind a wall. But he didn’t have much time; if the terrorists were headed towards them, their life signatures would soon be within range of detection. Thorn’s tricorder may have much more range than the old-generation ones, but that advantage was soon about to close.
The terrorists soon rushed into the large room, armed and ready to fire. One of them held out his tricorder, scanning the room. “I’m detecting two life signs, human,” he said. “Over there.” He was pointing to a large desk that Thorn’s team had hidden behind.
Suddenly, a stun grenade flew from the desk and rolled to the center of the group. They could tell immediately what it was. “Everybody turn away!” Morie yelled. They all followed his command, but when the stun grenade stopped rolling, it didn’t do anything. Was it OK to look back? Phaser fire then ripped from the team behind the desk and struck Morie in the chest. He flew back, and lay on the ground completely knocked out. The other terrorists immediately dispersed for cover behind the pillars in the room and returned fire with their phaser rifles, but they didn’t even know who they were firing at. Thorn specifically had his team target the lead terrorist first; without him, the rest of the team was lost.
The other officers of Thorn’s team hid upstairs behind the railing where the two staircases connected. They employed typical cowboy tactics of take cover and fire, but that was only to concentrate the terrorists’ attention to one location. Little did they know that Lieutenant Commander Thorn was behind them, hidden from view. He was clinging to one of the pillars, faced down. Thorn knew that in the time that he had before the terrorists arrived, there was no way that he could hide the human life signatures of his team. But his own physiology allowed him to escape undetected, because the old-generation tricorders couldn’t properly detect Breen life signatures. With a little control, he could appear ‘dead’ to the tricorder, at least by human standards.
Thorn targeted the outermost terrorist trying to fire at the team, and quickly put him in a choke hold from behind. Unable to breathe, he fell unconscious, but the others were still too distracted with phaser fire to notice. One terrorist hid behind one of the large pillars. He immediately jumped out, ready to fire, but before he could even raise his weapon, Thorn had intercepted him on the other side and struck a blow to his face, striking his nose. He fell backwards, his face bloody. But Thorn paid a price for that move: it made him visible, if only for a moment. One of the terrorists on the other side turned his phaser toward him and began firing. “Over there!” he yelled. Thorn immediately pulled out his shielding from his left arm, but still hid for cover. The other terrorists were firing at him as well.
The advantage of surprise was over. Thorn had already taken out three out of the fifteen, including the lead terrorist, so that wasn’t a bad turnout. But he needed another advantage, because he couldn’t win in a phaser fight being outnumbered four-to-one. He did have one more surprise for them.
The terrorists saw Thorn come out of hiding and throw a glass vial in the middle of the room. They could hear the glass shatter as it landed, and they were immediately afraid of what would come out of the vial. But only a clear liquid spilled from the vial, no more than a few milliliters. But even that few milliliters had a noticeable effect on everyone in the room, including Thorn’s team. Everyone, with perhaps the exception of Thorn, could no longer stand properly or aim their rifle properly. They stumbled in a drunken stupor, unable to even differentiate each other.
Thorn immediately stepped in and began picking them off, one at a time. His first order of business before any attack was to separate the terrorist from his weapon. One terrorist made a weak attempt at a punch, but Thorn was easily able to grab the arm, and flip him to the ground. He quickly turned and made a sharp karate chop to the throat of another nearby terrorist, who keeled over and collapsed with his hands cradling his neck. He was about to engage a third, but his target was shot down by one of his own, also in a confused state. Thorn blasted him with his own phaser.
It didn’t take long before everyone was disabled and unconscious. But it left the problem of Thorn’s own team also being in a confused stupor. “Keep calm,” he tried to assure them. “I used a volatile chemical that momentarily disrupts the cerebellum. Your sense of coordination has been shut down. But the effects should only last a few minutes.”
Thorn kneeled and took one of the communicators of one of the fallen terrorists. He could overhear a conversation that was happening remotely. “Damnit, our men have been taken out again. Frank to base. Look, we need all of you to come.”
“You want everybody? But Frank, there are like, a hundred of us. We need people to protect our base here.”
“Forget the base. This is much more important. There is this damn Federation officer that’s taking everybody out, do you copy? We can’t stop until we get what we need.”
“Yes, sir.”
“God damnit…this must be Jerad’s doing. He’ll be the death of us all.”
“Do you want us to bring more of those Type III phaser rifles?”
“Absolutely. Bring everything. Stun grenades, too. Everything. Get here in five minutes.”
***
Lieutenant Commander Thorn was becoming increasingly concerned that the terrorists were not giving in. Not that he was afraid that he couldn’t handle them, in fact, he eagerly welcomed the challenge. But had he known that he was going to tackle nearly a hundred men, he would have been more prepared. What was bothering Thorn was that their motive was coming into question. Why attack a hospital so persistently? There must have been something specific that they wanted to devote so much manpower. Either that or they were the worst terrorist organization in the Alpha Quadrant.
Thorn grabbed one of the unconscious terrorists and started dragging him by the collar. “Fall back,” he ordered to his only two officers. “There is no way we’ll be able to take a hundred men. It’s time to change our tactics.”
The team made it back to the room, with one unconscious terrorist in one hand. Jenovia rushed to help him. “Bring up the force fields,” he quickly instructed. “We need to secure the area.” Jenovia could sense the urgency in his voice, as mechanical as it sounded.
“This doesn’t make any sense,” Thorn said. He turned to the medical administrator, “They would not commit so many men ‘just for a few medical supplies.’ There is something that you’re not telling us.” Jenovia translated for him.
“There is nothing! I swear it! They attack us all of the time!” he pleaded.
“They’re coming.”
“Get the physicians and nurses out!”
Thorn turned back around in disgust. He awoke the terrorist that he dragged in. “I want to talk to you. I want to ask you a few questions.” Thorn was losing patience. He grabbed him by the hair and started dragging him across the floor. The terrorist began screaming at the sudden pain.
Thorn slammed him against the wall, with a force that would put a Klingon to shame. “Why are you attacking the hospital? What is it you want?” The terrorist looked up in confusion, unable to understand him, and still very much afraid. He could sense that Thorn was demanding something of him and could feel the intensity of his grip, but he didn’t have a universal translator to help him translate the Breen language.
“Here, allow me,” said Jenovia, gently placing her hand on Thorn’s shoulder. She bent down and glared at the terrorist. “We want to know why you are so persistent in attacking this hospital. What is it that you want here?”
“We…we need medical supplies…” he whispered.
“We heard that already. You need more than just hyposprays and tissue regenerators.”
“…We….”
Jenovia grabbed him by the collar, and boiled with an intensity that even surprised Thorn. “You have almost a hundred more men wanting to break into this room,” she yelled. “You need to tell us why, or more people are going to get hurt!”
His face was silent. He didn’t want to talk about it. He just wanted to get the damn thing, and go home. Why is the Federation interfering, of all days to interfere?
“TELL US!!”
“…We need…” he began reluctantly, “…a vaccine. Everyone on this planet is in danger.”
