Concatenation

Mission : CONCATENATION

Art by David Jones 1991

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Prologue

From the Ship’s Log of USS EXCALIBUR (NCC-2005), March, 2305

Starfleet Command had decided to give the crew of the EXCALIBUR a working vacation to relax them after the death of their third officer, Commander Bob Urich. The assignment was a simple cargo run from Aldebaran to Newport News Ship Building, Virginia, Earth with some extra time for shore leave on both planets. A shuttle crash and the resulting explosions at the Naval Yards in Virginia decimated their inventory of on-board navigational computers, which brought their ship production to a grinding halt. Although there are other naval facilities on Earth capable of manufacturing the computer systems, Aldebaran has them stockpiled and it's only a matter of transporting them back to Terra. The manufacturing process would exceed five months, while the journey from Aldebaran would take approximately six weeks. Repairs to the Newport News facility are expected to take nine months. The New Aberdeen Naval Yards on Aldebaran III has agreed to supply enough computers to keep them operational, significantly slowing their own production of heavy cruisers. At Starfleet's request, the Aldebarans have agreed to suspend work on private contracts until the Newport News facility is fully operational.

Two days before the EXCALIBUR's arrival, the spacedock orbiting Aldebaran was destroyed along with Starfleet's supply center on the surface. The Naval Yards sustained moderate damage overall, with the major damage being limited to the supply sections.

Admira Ken Brannon ordered the EXCALIBUR to investigate and have a preliminary report ready for the official Federation investigative team when they arrive in eight days.

Early clues are scarce. Of all the private ship yards on Aldebaran, only the New Aberdeen Naval Yard was attacked. It is also the only yard under contract with Starfleet. A few of the private yards could have profited from just the Naval Yard attack, but all of them will suffer because the spacedock was destroyed.

The New Aberdeen Yard had three additional contracts at the time of the attack. The first was with Mephiithoia Baaje, an Andorian trader with lots of money and few morals, for large cargo ships. Baaje left Andor twelve years ago after swindling the government out of billions of credits in a shuttle craft building scheme. He has been banned from Andor for life and is very resentful of that ruling.

The second contract was with the Vulcan Science Academy for two transport ships. The Academy had planned to expand its study of the Neutral Zone by using their new deep space transport ships to bring artifacts back to Vulcan from the Federation's distant colonies that border the zone. There has been heightened interest in the Neutral Zone since fragments of what appear to be an advanced Romulan weapon began drifting into Federation space.

The third contract with the Andorian government was signed only weeks before the attack. Production of the twenty-five heavy cruisers had not begun and it is likely the Andorians will have to wait over a year to find suitable replacements.