With a flash that could rival a thousand suns, the USS Illustrious exploded into existence into an unknown universe, over the planet of Coruscant. The starship was badly battered in its transit through the energy distortion, and its bridge was in complete disarray. Life support on the bridge had failed momentarily, and the unfortunate Captain Pearson was gruesomely dashed against and [i]stuck[/i] against the ceiling. Their science officer lay on the floor of the bridge, unconscious and barely breathing. The rest of bridge, while not as injured, barely had time to react to the fate of their captain when hulk of a familiar ship filled the view screen. 

It was the USS Magicienne, or at least the saucer section of it. The main hull was at the corner of the screen, a little bit away missing a nacelle, but the saucer was much, much too close to the Illustrious for comfort. 

Dazed, but wits still about her, Commander Noelle Tatham Poole pulled herself up, reacting quickly to their situation. 

“Helm, evasive maneuvers. Reverse full impulse. Harper, now or never with the tractor beam. See if you can’t alter the course of the debris.” 

The maneuver was executed wonderfully. With only about a hundred meters to spare, the USS Illustrious managed to clear the wreckage of the Sovereign class ship, coming to an all stop directly above it. 

“Engineering, I want a situation report, immediately,” said the now acting-captain. “All decks, all systems, our location, status of the Magicienne. I want a full emergency beamout of the crew as soon as we can. And get a medical team to the bridge.” 

Letting herself sink down into the captain’s chair, Noelle glanced at what remained of the bridge crew. Nephenee, who seemed to not be injured, had quickly taken over the console of their science officer, and was working on a sensor sweep and getting them an accurate location. Tactical was scanning the Magicienne. 

A moment later, the turbolift door opened, revealing her colleague Yuri Khamitov, followed by a small three man medical team. His hair was a bit tossed up, and he already seemed overwhelmed. 

“Captain, there’s casualties all over the ship. This better be good-“ the medical officer stopped in his tracks as he saw the body of the captain stuck on the ceiling. 

“The captain is dead,” said Noelle, standing up from her seat. She shook her head. “Is that a good enough reason for you, Yuri? Get the late captain off of there and get lieutenant Forestall down to the medical bay, and come back. I need to coordinate a rescue of the Magicienne’s crew with you.” 

Yuri could only nod, and turned to discuss the situation with his small team. The acting captain turned back to Nephenee, who had finished her scans. Still maintaining her usual cool demeanor, she gave her report. 

“Comman… Captain. Our location is unknown. There are no identifiable star systems and the computer is throwing out errors. It’s unlikely the computer is malfunctioning,” she said. “Our sensor sweep indicates the body we are in orbit of is Class M, population one trillion. There are more than two dozen ships in orbit. I’m unfamiliar with any of their systems. However, we’ve detected a ship with a federation signature moving away from the planet at high impulse. I can’t tell who it is, some sensors are still offline.”

That was very overwhelming information to Noelle, but the presence of another Federation vessel in the vicinity was reassuring. But before she could make sense of the remaining data, tactical and engineering began to give their reports almost directly one after the other.

“Captain, there are 440 life signs aboard the Magicienne, fading quickly. That’s half of their normal crew complement, sir,” reported the officer manning the tactical station. His voice was visibly shaken.

“Engineering here,” said the chief engineering officer, over the combadge. “Situation is critical. Warp drive is offline, and so are weapons, shields, and transporters. I can get shields up within the hour, forty-five minutes, perhaps, but transporters may take over a week. If we want to mount a rescue, we’d have to go back to the ol’ fashioned way of a shuttlecraft rescue.” 

Commander Poole grimaced. The situation was getting worse and worse. With no transporters, a lot of people would die before they could get ample medical treatment, but it seemed using the shuttlecraft would be the only way. 

“Alright. Lee, I want you to coordinate a rescue effort with Lieutenant Yuri using the shuttlecraft.”

The captain turned to Nephenee, contemplating what to say. She wasn’t sure if any of the ships besides the one Federation vessel were friendly. 

“I want you to send a subspace message to the unknown Federation ship you detected earlier. Say ‘This is the USS Illustrious, NCC-2558, to the unknown Federation vessel leaving orbit. We are disabled and attempting to conduct a rescue of the USS Magicienne, NCC-70451. Only half of her crew remain and are fading fast. We are requesting any and all medical assistance you can provide.”