The flotilla of gunboats had found their prey. A Seltorian frigate had taken up picket duty for the Seltorian area control ship and the Guardian's battle staff had decided that it needed to be destroyed or forced away from their line of approach. With it safely out of the way, they should have just enough time to sneak in and launch a massive strike against the carrier group before the Seltorians re-established their picket line.
     A picket's job was to screen against an enemy approach, and to warn the forces behind it of incoming strike forces. It was supposed to blunt the force of enemy thrusts if possible, and escape before being destroyed. It was not glamorous work. It was a dangerous and lonely duty that had seen the Tholians and Seltorians lose many ships and many lives in their internecine warfare. Today was no different for the Seltorian frigate. It fought bravely, but after taking heavy damage, its commander elected to leave the field of battle to the victorious Tholians, rather than suffer the inevitable loss of his ship and crew.

     The patrol boat settled into place to wait. Throughout the ship, Tholians bobbed up and down in the zero-gravity, restrained only by the web mesh of their acceleration harnesses and the instinctive use of their gravamagnetic organ. Despite their fatigue from the long mission in cramped quarters, all of them were poised for action. They knew that they were far behind enemy lines, and the slightest delay in their reaction time might have dire consequences for themselves and the fighters that they were here to support.
     Lieutenant Prime Asras Firnx checked his passive scanners for the tenth time. They still showed nothing but the nearest rocks in the asteroid field. He could see nothing of the fighters or the other patrol boats.
     He had placed himself at the bottom of the U, with several fighters spread out near him. He had placed the other Fi-Con near the top of the U close to the other set of fighters. If an overwhelming force of Klingons or Seltorians showed up, the two of them would attempt to pick up their fighters as quickly as possible before they had to leave. Of course, just about any force that shows up could be classed as overwhelming, he thought sarcastically. He was not sanguine about their chance of success.
     Firnx was still quite young by Tholian standards, but he had a promising naval career ahead of him. While the rest of the crew was mainly composed of technical officers and civilians doing their Turn service who would leave the military as soon as possible, he had already decided to build a career there. He had been assigned to Fi-Cons because he had a tendency to think outside of the box, something that was often needed in testing new systems. He was also something of a maverick and the other officers had sent him to the Fi-Con to get him out of the way until he matured.
     To Firnx, this assignment was just another stepping stone in his career progression, albeit one with a greater risk of his being killed in action than almost any other duty. The only duty he thought that might have a higher risk than flying in patrol boats would be piloting a fighter.

     All was quiet. He tried to make small talk with his Marine navigator, but the other Tholian was in no mood for conversation. Firnx gave up after a few, desultory attempts and turned his attention to his scanners. The other two Tholians, the weapons officer who guided the gunners for the ship's two phaser mounts, and the sensor technician, were busy with their tasks. He checked again to make sure that the fighters were still not showing up on his boards, and the other patrol boats were invisible also. The asteroid field was making hash of his passive scanners. If the Seltorian FCR was indeed making a supply run to the rally point, it should be having similar issues. It would have a rude awakening when they all activated their engines and electronics systems.
Even with the thought, a light began blinking on his passive scanners. We have a contact, but how many and how big are they? He twisted a few controls, and waited for the contact to get closer. The distance rapidly narrowed until he could tell that it was just one ship. It was too far away to tell how big it was, but if it continued to move to the rally point, they would soon be able to tell what class it was.
     He bobbed up and down in his harness with excitement as the ship drifted to a stop near the rally point. It was deep within their snare now! He waited long moments until the sensor technician reported that the enemy ship had launched a shuttle that was moving to the asteroid the rally point was located on. The technician also reported that he had detected transporter activity. With a high-pitched snarl, he activated ship to ship communications and ordered the trap sprung. Almost as one, the Tholian fighters and patrol boats came to life and began to accelerate toward their hapless target, weapons primed for combat, unlike the Seltorian. He was sure of that. While the bug might have his phasers charged in case he had to destroy a stray asteroid, he would not have taken any other actions that were a normal part of preparing for imminent action, such as preparing special mission shuttles.
     Firnx jammed his own throttles forward and moved to engage the Seltorian. The Seltorian commander was no coward however and the nose of the FCR swung straight at them. Evidently its commander had decided that this point in the U was the weakest and was going to attempt a breakout over the carcass of Firnx's boat. Firnx checked the range again and realized that the Seltorian was now close enough to discriminate that he was not the heavily armed patrol boat that they had hoped to portray. They have no fear of me.
     The range spun down. He considered his options. He would have to weather at least one Seltorian volley and hope the fighters could engage before the Seltorian left them hopelessly behind. But any phaser fire they expended on him would be less phaser fire directed at the fighters. He activated the intercom.
     "Brace for evasive maneuvering." He tightened his battle harness as he clicked the intercom off. He quickly programmed the battle computer to begin the random movements that would make his boat harder to hit. He knew that it was unlikely to make all of the Seltorian weapons completely miss, but it should certainly decrease the amount of damage they would take. All he needed was the damage to decrease enough to allow them to survive. As he programmed the computer, he reduced the ship's speed also. He would need the power to execute the trap. He felt the navigator beside him stir.
     "Should I save battery power to reinforce shields?"
     He considered his reply for just a second. Reinforcing shields was not part of his plan.
     "No, save it for tractor." He sensed the other Tholian's incredulity and noted the streaks of orange that flashed through the navigator's semi-translucent body. Firnx flicked the switch that told the computer to begin the erratic maneuvering he had programmed in. The boat jerked to the side. If it had not been for the webbing, he would have been slammed into the side of the cockpit. The abrupt movements continued as the battle computer interjected random movement vectors into the ship's base course. In his cockpit view window, the Seltorian FCR grew huge. Behind it, the other three patrol boats were closing fast.

     "Fire our phasers," he ordered the weapons officer. The boat's maneuvering would degrade their fire considerably, but he hoped to goad the Seltorian commander into firing before they got to point-blank range. He heard the two phasers fire, and two beams of energy rushed out from his craft to brush against the forward shield of the FCR. The shield flared as it absorbed the energy of the phasers. In response, no less than seven phasers struck back at them as the Seltorian fired everything it had.
     The forward shield flared and died as the violent energy streams crashed through them. Again, he was tossed hard against his webbing as the Fi-Con rocked from the violent impact of the phaser beams. But even as he was flung, he knew that the Seltorian had not done enough damage to destroy them or to escape the trap he had set.
     "Severe hull damage, both phasers destroyed, one fighter mech link blown off, Sir," the sensor officer reported. Firnx reached up and cut off the switch that governed the evasive maneuvers. The random movements stopped completely.
     "Activate tractor. Put half of our power into it, and if you need to, use all reserve power to maintain the link."
     "Affirmative. Activating tractor," the sensor officer replied.
     A fuzzy blue line of magnetic energy sprang into being between the two spacecraft. Firnx felt a slight shudder as the inertial dampeners managed to keep his boat from coming apart at the seams. Both his boat and the FCR slowed significantly. His eyes flared and his heart leapt. The trap is sprung! Now I must see if we can hold the beast long enough for it to be cut down. He turned the boat to face his down shield away from the FCR, simultaneously decreasing speed. He would maintain just enough headway for tactical warp maneuvering, put half of his power into reinforcing the facing shield, and use what was left to hold the tractor as long as they could before the Seltorian broke it.
     "Feeding you power. Keep the tractor link for as long we can." He tightened his web strapping some more. "I'll keep a strong shield to them, but I don't know how many more hits we can take before we lose both tractor mounts.
     I hope the fighters hurry, Firnx thought. This is going to get cold.

Lead Spider Fighter, Special Strike Force