This is my first fanfic. It's great to read everyone's stories after the final season ended so I thought I'd give it a go! Set in Season 5. If you like it let me know and I'll add another chapter …AM

The Hammersley crested up onto a wave and cascaded down again just as violently as she steamed into the oncoming storm. Word had come down from Navcom about a potential FFV spotted by Coastwatch some four hours previously and the Captain had given the order to head them off when the mother of all storms arrived in the Arafura Sea. Not wanting to risk broaching her, her Captain Mike Flynn decided to steam into it hoping to come out the other side in a few hours

Executive Officer Kate McGregor sat in the COs chair, riding with the ship as she rolled up and down, crashing through the seas like a steel leviathan, the skeleton crew on the bridge bracing themselves with every pitch and toss. She was in desperate need of a coffee as the end of the second dog watch approached, but didn't want to risk pouring it all over herself. She'd had a lot on her mind lately and had been finding it hard to sleep, worried about her impending promotion (should she get it) and where to next and where that leaves that other thing…

She'd made a stand hadn't she? She had made her decision. She called it off. She didn't want to risk his career, that was more important to him than anything else and she wasn't going to be the one to destroy the one thing that defined him. She couldn't. He had meant enough for her to at least allow him that. Had meant. She knew she was kidding herself. The ship crashed down again on a particularly large wave and sent the X careering forward, catching herself before she slammed into the radar.

"Lovely day for it X," Commander Mike Flynn at that moment stepped onto the bridge. "Who has the ship?"

"I have it sir and if you say so," Kate replied as she struggled back into the COs chair.

"Where are we on the FFV?"

"We're about 95 miles off course at this stage, steering 220. I expect we'll be out the other side of this storm in another hour sir but the FFV could be anywhere by then."

"Anything on radar?"

"Yes sir, there is one ship on screen but they've gotta be too far off course to be our guy."

"How fast is she going?"

"That's the funny thing, 6 knots, do you think they've got engine trouble?"

"If they do they'll find themselves in trouble in this storm. How far to steam Dutchy?

"At her rate sir we can be there in 30 minutes,"

"It's worth a shot. Starboard 10 Steer 020."

"Starboard 10 020 aye"

30 minutes later Hammersley came out the other side of the storm, and the sea was suddenly calm and still as if it had been like that all along. The call went out:

"Hands to boarding stations. Hands to boarding stations. Hands to boarding stations."

...

The RHIB sped across the short distance between the Hammersley and her target making quick speed to pull alongside the ageing FFV in about two minutes flat. The boarding party quickly stepped on board, weapons drawn as they cautiously made their way from aft to stern. The vessel was barely seaworthy from what Kate could gather, part of the upper deck clearly falling away to show through to the galley below.

"Watch the deck guys the boards are fairly rotten," the X had barely called out to her team when the ground she was walking on fell away and before she knew it she was falling...