Saeihr-hveith Mission 04: "Underground"
The Shadowhawk crew, minus the injured V'Tana, are sent to rescue a Senator believed kidnapped by Reman terrorists. Tracking the Senator to an abandoned dilithium mine on Remus, they encounter more than they bargained for when they met up with a group of Underground operatives led by Imina Sevala, who reveal that they are searching for a telepath who is part of a program developed by Enriov Tei to help him solidify control over the Empire.
Mission Summary
Act One
With erei'Riov V'Tana critically injured and the Shadowhawk severely damaged from its fight at Outpost 12, the crew, under the command of Arrain I'Dartha, returned to Romulus for repairs and shore leave. Upon arrival at Hdrael 1, however, I'Dartha was summoned to the Base Commander's Office and given the assignment to lead a small team of his choosing to rescue Senator Khev, who was presumed kidnapped by Reman dissidents. Taking along key members of the Shadowhawk crew, he assumed command of the RIS Emael Ranasailho, an Aeh'lla Class Scout ship, and set off for Remus, where intelligence reports had placed Khev and his captors in the abandoned Ih'uwe Tahherh dilithium mine.
Unknown to I'Dartha and his team, another group was also interested in finding Khev. On the opposite side of the Empire, the Federation battle cruiser USS Gettysburg had fought a battle with two Romulan warbirds. Badly damaged and drifting, it was hopelessly drawn towards a nearby black nebula. As the ship fell into the anomaly, which sent it to an alternate universe, Romulan exile and former Imperial Fleet officer Imina Sevala, now serving as a Commander in Star Fleet, was caught in a transporter glitch which, unbeknownst to her, created a duplicate, leaving one copy in this universe, trapped alone on a damaged shuttle, while the other traveled with the Gettysburg into the unknown. Picked up by the Tal'Shiar and tortured, the Sevala who had remained in this universe was en route to Romulus, where she was to be executed as a traitor, when she was rescued by members of the Ana'eri Nuar, a faction of the Romulan Underground led by Eveh Lern, for whom she had had worked as a spy in the Federation.
Act Two
Taken to the Neutral Zone and the planet Nevas IV, Sevala was reunited with Lern and offered the chance to stay in the Empire and fight against the Tei regime. The Underground had discovered that Tei, along with Khev and another senator, had successfully developed a telepathic program and planned to use it as an instrument of war. Fear that Tei would turn his telepaths on his own people had prompted the Anna'eri Nuar to set into motion their plans to overthrow the government. Sevala accepted the offer, and along with Lern and an operative from the Democratic Romulan Republic, Terrh S'Ten, she set off for Remus to search for one of of the telepaths, who was in hiding, waiting to be activated.
On Remus, Sevala, Lern and S'Ten teamed up with two Reman guides and a Reman telepath, Nhaav, and headed for the Ih'uwe Tahherh mine, where the telepath, Odirne Radaik, was known to be present. Not long after they had entered the mine and begun their search, I'Dartha and his team arrived and entered the mine from a different entrance. As both pushed forward with their search for Radaik and Khev, Radaik used her powers to deceive them, making them see walls where they were none, holes in the floor which weren't real, and not allowing them to see the Reman soldiers protecting the mine. Sevala and her group were aided by Nhaav, who was able to neutralize many of Radiak's telepathic suggestions, though I'Dartha's team was not so lucky.
Act Three
Drawing closer to the location of the two targets, the two teams eventually encountered each other, and after a few tense moments they agreed to trust each other and work together once Sevala had explained about Khev and the telepath. Radaik, attempting one final stand, sent all her troops in an assault on the combined group. Unable to see their attackers, the two teams did their best to defend themselves. Sevala, with the help of Nhaav, was finally able to track down Radaik's location, and using an experimental personal transporter that the Anna'eri Nuar had developed, located her and killed her. With the telepath's powers broken, a second team from the Emael Ranasailho was able to come to the aide of the beleaguered group deeper in the mine and help them escape before the tunnels collapsed in a final act of desperation by Khev to eliminate them.
While the two teams were fighting in the mines, civil war broke out in the Empire as Senator Jisit Hrienteh staged a coup and removed Tei's supporters from power. Tei escaped arrest and rallied members of the Imperial Fleet who were loyal to him and activated his telepaths. A bloody battle raged over Remus for control of the planet, catching the Emael Ranasailho in the middle. Unwilling to disobey I'Dartha's orders, the crew managed to narrowly escape destruction and land the ship near the main mine entrance, where they picked up the two teams after they emerged from the tunnels. The teams tragically lost one member of I'Dartha's team, Tafv S'Ten, the estranged brother of Terrh, who had remained behind to shore up a fallen crossbeam while the others escaped.
Act Four
Once on the ship, Lern was informed about the coup and explained who he was to the crew of the Emael Ranasailho. As the battle had raged on, Hrienteh's ships had suffered serious loses to Tei due to his use of telepaths. She struck a deal with the Anna'eri Nuar, who had the ability to defend against the telepaths, and together they formed a coalition to stand against Tei's tyranny. I'Dartha and his crew agreed to join the Anna'eri Nuar and the government in their battle against Tei. Since the scout ship wasn't a viable option to take into the fight, they two sides decided to steal the Shadowhawk from the Reman Imperial Shipyards orbiting above them, which were controlled by Tei. They used the personal transporters to beam directly onto the ship and take the Bridge and Engineering.
Sealing off the rest of the ship, Sevala ordered them to break away from space dock to join the battle, which was now turning in favor of the new coalition. Tei's telepaths attempted to force the crew to abandon their stations, but Nhaav was able to block their influence. He was also able to locate the cloaked warbird which Tei was using as a command platform, and the Shadowhawk attacked the ship. Facing certain defeat if he remained, Tei ordered retreat, and his remaining forces, 13 ships in all, warped out of the Eisn system, leaving the new government to solidify its control over the Empire. The coalition soon declared a cease fire with the Federation and recalled its warships to Romulus, all except for the Shadowhawk, which took off in pursuit of Tei.
