The Archanis Campaign: USS Ahwahnee
Woozamagoo
Member
Since taking command of the USS Ahwahnee over a year ago, Captain Felrak Vordenna has been tasked with fostering alliances and maintaining diplomatic ties with the different inhabitants of the Briar Patch region. A pacifist at heart, commanding an older ship on such a mission has come naturally to him. He serves alongside a proud crew, many of whom are greatly attached to the ship and its legacy. Although they can hardly describe themselves as being on the cutting edge of fleet operations, they do their best with what they have. What follows is the story of a ship and crew of modest means, thrust into the centre of events that will change the lives of millions.
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On the Move
The Eternity Hall was vast. Archways, carved from a material unrecognisable to Felrak, sprung up from the ground. A semi-circular series of steps climbed to form an amphitheatre facing the speakers’ platform. High above, a balcony ran around the circumference of the ceiling dome, lined by stone balustrades and dotted with spectators. Specks of dust danced in the light of the midday sun as they drifted slowly to the ground, as if suspended in the wash of light that streamed in through the large, diamond-shaped windows.
As a Federation delegate to the Conference on the Regulation and Control of Subspace Weaponry, Felrak was bored out of his mind. Despite Ambassador Serrell’s assurances, Felrak was well aware that this, along with every other talk hosted by the Son’a, was merely a formality. He doubted if the Ambassador really was naïve enough to think the Son’a were serious about decommissioning their subspace arsenal this time. Making agreements with the Son’a was like negotiating with a Craawn viper. More than likely, Felrak thought, the Vulcan diplomat was trying to encourage the Federation delegation to humour their hosts’ outright lies in the name of neighbourly good will. Felrak would have to behave himself. He had literally been ordered to. Carrying out this duty with enthusiasm, though, was out of the question. He leaned back on his step, arms folded, and sighed as another politician began a far longer than necessary speech about the importance of Federation-Son’a co-prosperity.
“Probably just want the Federation to look the other way while they make another grab for Ba’ku…” Felrak muttered.
Serrell, seated next to him, raised an eyebrow, “I’m sorry Captain, I did not quite hear you.”
“Nothing, Ambassador.” Felrak coughed, shifting uncomfortably.
Two stultifying hours later, he had never been happier to hear his comm. badge chirp. Ambassador Serrell glared at him as he got to his feet and made for the exit.
Cloaked figures, delegates and officials came and went as Felrak walked through the grounds of the complex. He scanned for a less trafficked area to answer the call from the Ahwahnee, in orbit high above them. Lavish, well-manicured lawns extended before him, sectioned off by neatly trimmed hedgerows. By the outer wall, the gardens gave way to the city skyline. Ulaan’athul’s sandy, worn buildings cut a stark contrast to the greens and garden flowers that sprung from where Felrak stood. The Son’a had spared no expense on impressing their galactic neighbours. It seemed the ordinary citizens of Ulaan’athul could have found a better use for the funding.
Felrak stopped under a thorny tree and tapped his badge.
“Vordenna.”
“Sir,” Came the gruff voice of Commander Tursk, “I hate to interrupt the conference, but there’s a priority one message coming in from Devron. It’s on a Task Force 93 frequency, Captain.”
“Must be Captain Dex.” Felrak thought out loud. It had been years since they had last spoken, and longer still since Felrak had been required to act in his capacity as Task Group Commanding Officer. A message from Dex could only mean that the Task Force was being mobilised. “Order all crew back to the ship by 1400 hours. One to beam up immediately.”
A bird sang in the branch above Felrak’s head as he took a last look at Ulaan’athul. He wouldn’t miss it. He did, however, feel a distinct need to be more careful about what he wished for, as the humans might have said. Whatever happened now, it would most likely make the last three days of diplomatic babysitting seem like a walk in the park.
***
The USS Ahwahnee was neither new, nor powerful. She came from a time before Federation ideals had truly been stretched. Some might have said she was born out of a sense of optimism for a peaceful galactic future; from a vision that some were beginning to feel might slowly be slipping away. Felrak, middle-aged for an Argosian at 163, remembered those times better than most. In his own stubborn way, he was determined to continue living in them. This made the ageing Cheyenne class light cruiser perfect for him, and for the crew he sought out. Together, without need for fanfare, they would further the ideals of Starfleet as a beacon of rationality in a hot headed galaxy. That was the plan, at least.
Felrak still wore his white dress uniform as he stepped onto the bridge. Commander Tursk rose from the centre chair.
“Good to have you back, sir.” The Tellarite was uncharacteristically tall for his species, and when he spoke a deep growl reverberated around the room.
“It’s good to be back, Commander. The Son’a are really dragging this one out. It’s… Testing…” Reaching the limits of his diplomatic speaking abilities, Felrak got down to business. “Route the transmission from Task Force 93 to my ready room. Inform the consulate planetside that we’ll be leaving Ambassador Serrell to conclude conference proceedings.”
“I’m sure he’ll be happy to hear that, sir.” Tursk said with a sarcastic glint in his eye.
“Absolutely,” Felrak ran with it, “a negotiator of his calibre would surely jump at the chance to work without Starfleet looking over his shoulder.”
“Aye, sir.”
Seating himself behind his desk in the ready room, Felrak watched the UFP insignia on the viewer blink off to reveal the faces of Captain Dex, Captain Adams, and Commander Tarvos. As the discussion progressed, Felrak’s expression became more and more grave. The D’Ghor Hunters had been a wildcard in the Klingon Empire for some time, but this kind of outright attack was beyond anything Starfleet could have reasonably expected. Combined with the fungal blight in the Meronia Cluster, it had all the ingredients of a humanitarian disaster of cataclysmic proportions. By the time Captain Dex had cut the transmission, any hint of levity in Felrak’s demeanour was long extinguished.
He marched back onto the bridge. It didn’t take much for those on duty to sense that something was very, very wrong. “Lieutenant Delfino, take us out of orbit as soon as all remaining crew are aboard. Set a course for Starbase 27 at warp eight.”
Comm. chatter burbled in the background as personnel coordinated last minute beam outs. The young ship’s pilot plotted the course, inputting and double checking coordinates on the navigation console with lightning efficiency.
“What the hell is going on?” Lieutenant Commander Lupulo’s face of abject dismay was directed straight at the captain as he appeared from a turbolift to the rear of the bridge. The grizzled officer cut a wide path around his usual station at tactical, coming face to face with Felrak and Tursk who had just seated themselves. “Our whole security detail? What about the consulate staff at the conference? You’re just going to leave them to it with the Son’a?”
“Not now, Lup.” Tursk snapped, “Just get your people off the planet.”
“Commander Lupulo,” Felrak appreciated his first officer’s attempt to give him time to think, but he wasn’t above explaining his orders, “I highly doubt the Son’a would be stupid enough to endanger Federation diplomatic staff at a conference designed to sweet talk us into dropping sanctions on their subspace weapons programme.”
“I don’t trust them.”
“Neither do I. Though let’s not forget that the Klingons and Romulans are here too. Their interests align with ours in this sector, and their security teams have been all over the conference since before it begun.”
“I don’t trust them either.”
“Let it go, Lup.” Tursk growled.
“Like it or not, Commander, we’re leaving. And where we’re going, we’re going to need our whole security detachment. Clear?”
“Understood.” Lupulo’s thin jaw clenched as he grumbled through gritted teeth. He ran a hand through his greying hair, as if formulating a reply, then thought better of it. His spindly legs carried him away as he turned and left.
“He’s done it this time, Captain.” Tursk leaned over, “That kind of backchat is way out of line.”
“He cares about the mission.” Felrak raised a hand, palm facing down, signalling an end to the issue. “He’ll forget about it soon enough, especially when he sees what’s at stake.”
“What is at stake, sir? It’s not every day we get orders straight from Task Force Command.”
“Everyone and everything in the Archanis Sector, Tursk.” Felrak locked eyes with his first officer, “It’s the Hunters of D’Ghor. No one saw them coming, and they’re on the move again.”
The USS Ahwahnee tore through subspace. Deuterium and antideuterium writhed and pulsed through its dilithium crystal matrix. As they met, their annihilation into a stream of pure electro-plasma was enough to change the very geometry of spacetime itself. The Ahwahnee carried four such streams, each highly concentrated and focused along the length of her four warp nacelles. The resulting displacement field created an extremely stable warp bubble around the ship. Of course, two nacelles achieved similar stability with much less need for maintenance, and the debate over which configuration was superior had raged for most of the 24th Century. There was something to be said, however, for the comforting feeling of going to warp knowing it was going to be 200% harder to knock you back down to sub-light speeds.
Commander Tursk watched from his seat in the conference room as stars streaked past the viewport. He scratched absent-mindedly at his beard and leaned into the tall-backed chair. He held a padd that detailed the Ahwahnee’s deployment into the Archanis Sector. On skimming through the short, bullet pointed list, a perplexed expression furrowed his brow and wrinkled his upturned Tellarite nose. Tursk looked up from the padd towards Captain Vordenna, who sat at the head of the table.
“So, convoy duty it is.”
Felrak sighed, “Those are the orders.”
Tursk shifted in his seat, sitting upright, “Captain I have to say, with respect to the ship’s capabilities, we’re hardly outfitted for a tactical engagement. I know the Hunters of D’Ghor don’t exactly have top of the line equipment out there but still, this intel is patchy. These attacks, they’re on Meronia and then they’re all over the sector. Multiple ships, single ships… There’s no pattern here.”
“I’ve raised some concerns with Command. They’re letting us requisition a pair of Arrow class runabouts from Starbase 27. We’ll be moving out ahead of the convoy and casting a wide sensor net for early threat detection.”
The answer appeared to satisfy Tursk as he leaned back again. He emitted one of the wide range of muffled grunts he kept in his repertoire; a way of signalling his approval without going to the bother of actually vocalising it. A long time had passed for him since last giving input on a tactical matter. In fact, were it not for the words “Tactical Report” in bold print at the top of the padd, he would hardly have believed it.
“This is crazy,” Lupulo piped up, bluntly echoing Tursk’s thoughts in the way only Lupulo could. The New Yorker spoke in the hurried, matter-of-fact cadence that had been characteristic of the city for centuries. “Starfleet’s got some hefty ships operating in the area. You’ve got the Bellerophon, the Odyssey, the Vesta… Why the hell are we taking point?”
“Command is diverting every available ship in the Fourth Fleet. My guess is they want the big guns up front, clearing a path. Especially with Meronia, we can’t send a medical convoy straight into an area crawling with D’Ghor. They… We’d be cut to shreds.”
“Let’s hope they clear the way then. I personally prefer the unshredded option.”
“They’ll get it done.” Tursk grumbled.
“Which brings us to our next order of business.” Felrak moved swiftly on, “The medical ships assigned to the convoy are... “ He read the names from the padd, “USS Tranquility, USS Fleming and USS Galen. We’ll also be joining several support ships on reaching Starbase 27, although Command has yet to enlighten us on how many. Lup, I’ll relay the information to you as soon as we know numbers and specs, then you and Delfino can start working on tactical formations.”
Lupulo barely kept his skepticism in check, “I should probably run a few tests on the phaser banks too. I bet they’ve got a few cobwebs growing on them.”
Felrak ignored him, “Our ETA at Starbase 27 is 0700 hours. I suggest we all get some sleep. Dismissed.”
“Happy to oblige, sir.” Tursk grinned.
Lupulo was first to leave, a flash of grey as he disappeared out into the deck one corridor. The deep green leaves of the large potted plant by the door fluttered slightly in his wake. He wondered to himself how the captain could be talking about sleep at a time like this. Granted, the ship had survived the Borg, but that had been 33 years ago. Even with support, the upgrades and overhauls, she wasn’t coming out well from a fight with the Klingons.
***
Aside from the odd crewman pottering about, Main Engineering was deserted. The warp core radiated a rhythmic pulse, filling the room with a gentle blue light as each wave of superheated plasma passed through its coils. Shadows faded then appeared again, pitching along the sides of bulkheads against the dimmed, late-shift glow. Lupulo approached the central pool table console, highlighting the ship’s phaser arrays on the master systems display.
“Computer, state the current safety parameters for power input to the phaser arrays.”
The computer chirped in acknowledgement before answering, “Current safety parameters allow for power input of two terrajoules to the phaser array EPS grid.”
“Calculate the carrying capacity of the phaser array EPS grid, accounting for possible power flow degradation since the system’s last maintenance check.”
“The carrying capacity of the phaser array EPS grid is approximately 2.4 terrajoules.”
“Calculate phaser discharge output given an increase of 0.3 terra-”
“That does not give us much margin if we get a system overload.” Lieutenant Commander Sreyler Theb called out from across the room. The Chief Engineer was small and slight, with a braid of long, silvery hair that tumbled down the front of her uniform. Her Efrosian eyes gleamed a crisp blue, and it was as if her pupils shrank a little as Lupulo came into focus. She marched towards him.
“Shouldn’t you be in your quarters? I believe the Captain ordered us all to get some rest.”
Lupulo, a little startled, fired back, “I could say the same to you.”
“Ha.” She tossed her hair back behind her, “Like I need it. Why do humans need so much sleep anyway? It’s like you all get fuzzy even if you get five hours.”
He paused, looking down at the Engineer who barely reached up to his chest. He held back several derisive comments relating to sleep and childhood growth. “Good question.” He managed.
“So you can go ahead and get out of here. I sure as hell don’t want our Tactical Officer walking round like a zombie when we’re supposed to be meeting the convoy tomorrow.”
“But-”
“I know you, Lup. I’ve seen you like this before. It’s how you get before a big mission. Changing the phaser output now is not going to change anything. And if you were just modelling it, you can do that any time. Now you need to get out of here.” She smiled, sweet but with a sharpness that was not to be crossed.
He knew she was right, and as he skulked out of Engineering, she shook her head. As the heavy doors closed, she grabbed a tricorder clipped to a utility band around her waist. She threw it high up in an arc above her. It spun, making three full rotations as she turned back to face the warp core. She completed the turn just in time to catch it on the way down. Jauntily, she walked towards the dilithium crystal chamber, aiming the tricorder in its direction as it ran a level three diagnostic. She whistled a tune her brother had taught her on the Icefields of Ell.
Tursk splashed his face with water from the small basin in the First Officer’s quarters. His wide, paw-like hands dragged over his wrinkled skin as he rubbed his eyes. He looked into the mirror, observing the creased corners of his eyes. Dark patches, like graphite smudges, hung beneath the bunched up skin of his lower eyelids. His hand sunk to his tangled beard, smoothing it down against his barrel chest. His morning routine hadn’t changed in years, but he certainly had. Every now and then he’d catch a glimpse of a new mark or blemish. A burst blood vessel or liver spot perhaps; nothing that couldn’t be fixed by the skim of a dermal regenerator, not that Tursk would go to those lengths. For many Tellarites, stubborn as they were, such imperfections were a sign of wisdom. Age bestowed perspective, and an indication that one could deal with all the ups, downs, scratches and bumps that life could throw at you.
There was still a part of him that looked back from that mirror and wondered who another Tursk might have been. The part of him that yearned to climb the fourteen peaks of Miracht, building campfires as he set out along the trails on the Cheschen prairies, and watching the thick rain dripping from the canvas shelter that was all that stood between him and the biting wind. Vordenna was a man of nature too, he mused. In conversation with the captain, he had learned of the extended time the Argosian had spent in the forests of his home planet. Perhaps there was a part of Tursk that envied the kind of lifespan that permitted one to spend a decade in the wilderness, only to pick up a career again from where it was left off.
Then again, age bestowed perspective, and that included a perspective of time. Vordenna had plenty of time. Time to grow attached, time to forget, and time to feel the pain of lost friends. It was a curious life he chose then, among Federation races like Tellarites, Andorians and Humans. Life among them must have seemed like a nonstop rush. Tursk suspected the captain enjoyed it, choosing to value the moments he was given more than any other Argosian he had come across. That, to Tursk, was admirable. He therefore reflected that a life spent among people like Vordenna was a life well lived. What’s more, it was a life in service of the institutions that had allowed the cooperation and mingling of different perspectives. They truly had found a strength in diversity, and all the philosophies, cultural observations, attitudes and expression that held the Federation together had stood the test of time. As he dried his face with a towel, Tursk resolved that perhaps there could be no better use of his time than to help it all stand for a little longer.
“Bridge.” His voice rumbled as, raktajino in hand, he stepped into the turbolift. He briefly wondered if the Hunters of D’Ghor availed themselves of this fine beverage before a hard day of pillaging Federation colonies. He gazed uncomfortably into the mug, frowning slightly, then thought of all the considerably more honourable Klingons who had also enjoyed a drink or two of Kahless’ cupped lightning.
Another sip banished all introspection from Tursk’s mind just as the turbolift doors opened and the bridge came into view.
“Good morning, Commander.” Delfino craned her head, expecting him. The Tellarite ran like clockwork. “We’re about two parsecs out from Starbase 27, one from the Tir Kapov system. All systems operating within normal parameters. Plain sailing, sir.”
Tursk reached out to grab the padd offered to him as he replaced Delfino in the centre chair. The olive skinned Lieutenant stood aside as he skimmed over her shift details. Folding her arms, she patiently waited for Tursk to finish. Her eyes drifted slightly to the space above his head as he took his time. In a tired monotone she added, “Our ETA is 0800 hours. Fleet command reports aid ships have already made the rendezvous, with support vessels still a few hours out.”
“Very good, Lieutenant.” Tursk replied, oblivious until he looked up. “Uh, better get some rack time.”
Delfino said nothing, leaving Tursk to it as she proceeded to collapse in her quarters.
***
THWOCK, the Ahwahnee dropped out of warp. Approaching the Starbase 27 defence perimeter, the extent of Starfleet’s efforts in the region became starkly apparent. A small squadron of Volga class runabouts curved in through the base’s identification zone. Freighters, support vessels, cruisers and a smattering of capital ships lit up the Ahwahnee’s sensors. Ahead, faint but recognisable onscreen from the bridge, the spinning top of the station glowed like a beacon surrounded by a hundred buzzing, blueish fireflies.
“Ahwahnee this is Starbase 27 port control, approach vector theta six is yours. Bearing six-four mark twelve.”
“Acknowledged, 27.”
“Welcome to the fray.”
Tursk raised an eyebrow to no one in particular, “Take us in helm.”
Impulse thrusters fired, propelling the ship into the milieu. The starbase grew bigger onscreen, and before long the vast, cylindrical citadel dominated the starscape. The sheer size of the structures was always an eye opener for Tursk after returning from a long deployment. To him, they also signified a kind of relief. Shore leave or down time was never normally far away once the ship had docked. Now, he felt only apprehension as the Ahwahnee drew closer.
“I see we’ve made good time.” The Captain strode down the bridge, pausing to admire the view.
“Only a little late to the party.” Tursk said. He was briefly distracted by an incoming communication alert. “Command is hailing us, sir.”
“I’ll take it in my ready room.”
“Aye, routing it through.”
Felrak seated himself, activating the viewer to reveal the face of Commodore L’Eral. Her luxurious golden fur framed her face, falling away behind her to highlight her gleaming, feline eyes.
She spoke with a slight lisp, her Caitian fangs protruding past her bottom lip, “Captain Vordenna, Fourth Fleet Command sends its regards.”
“Appreciated, ma’am.” Pleasant enough, he thought before adding, “I see Admiral Beckett has decided not to grace us with his presence.”
L’Eral purred, “The Admiral has… Bigger fish to fry, Captain. Tactical concerns in the sector have demanded his full attention. The Ahwahnee has been assigned to logistics and support operations-”
“Ah yes, escort duty.”
“As senior captain, the convoy is under your immediate command. I’m transferring the details of the ships assigned now. Most are from Task Group 27.”
Felrak eyed the feed that appeared in the corner of the screen, “Ma’am, I’m seeing two frigates and a couple of runabouts. The Ahwahnee isn’t exactly outfitted for extended tactical operations. Is this everything?”
The Caitian lowered her gaze for a moment, “It’s all we have, Captain. Forces are spread thin throughout the sector. We’ve got a lot of firepower deployed closer to the Klingon border with orders to intercept and drive the Hunters out of Federation space. They’re doing the heavy lifting. Simulations indicate your convoy has a low probability of attack.”
Somewhat reassured, Felrak relaxed his shoulders a little, “Very well.”
“We can’t waste time,” She continued, “I want the convoy en route to Meronia by 2000 hours. The longer we wait, the more lives we lose out there. If we’ve got any hope of stabilising this situation we have to get those supplies planetside and into peoples hands fast. We do not need people turning to the Orions for supplies that we haven’t distributed in time.”
“Understood. I’d like to brief the convoy COs, Commodore.”
“Be my guest. I’ll patch you through.” She looked about ready to end the conversation before hesitating, “Oh, and Vordenna?”
“Yes, ma’am?”
“Task Group 27 have already had significant contact with D’Ghor. They’ve been through the wringer, and I understand there have been casualties. Morale is in short supply.”
Felrak well understood the shorthand for ‘vastly overworked’, and it stoked his apprehension, “How bad are we talking?”
“I think it’s better for you to assess the situation yourself. I’ll patch you through to them right away.”
“Time is of the essence.” Felrak said, mainly to himself as the Commodore disappeared from the viewer. She was replaced by two captains; one sat in her ready room much like himself, the other appeared to be coordinating repairs on his bridge. Crew scrambled about as he issued orders, clearing away the remains of shattered components and optic cable strewn about as if a typhoon had ripped across the deck.
Felrak overheard background chatter rising above the clanking and scraping of debris, “2000 hours? They want us out of here by 2000 hours? They must be out of their goddamn minds if they think we’re getting-”
“Stow it, Haines!”
Felrak cleared his throat, “Captain Felrak Vordenna, USS Ahwahnee. I’ve orders to assume command of the convoy heading for Meronia.”
“Well Captain Vordenna, you’re not assuming command of much right now.” The seated woman on the right half of the screen seemed a picture of calm, “Commander Kate De Vries, USS Stavanger.”
Through the cacophony of the partially destroyed bridge, a gigantic Bolian lumbered into view. His uniform was frayed around the left shoulder, and a deep blue bruise darkened the cheekbone above it. “Speak for yourself, De Vries.” He boomed, “The Tulwar’s gonna be shipshape and ready to go.”
De Vries eyes rolled far, far back, “I very much doubt that, Commander Thrix.”
“Doubt all you want, every second we’re out of action is more time those animals are flying around out there unchallenged.”
“Captain Vordenna, we know what we have to do.” De Vries was stern, “I would strongly recommend we allow the Tulwar more time for repairs. If we set out at warp six they would have plenty of time to catch up with the rest of the convoy.”
Felrak stepped in, “Commander Thrix, I admire your tenacity. However you are mistaken if you think the Tulwar is going anywhere without all key systems operational. I’m sure Starbase 27 has already got people over there, and I’m willing to send a team over to assist.”
“That would be appreciated, Captain.” Thrix dialled back the bravado.
“We will not be leaving the Starbase 27 defence perimeter without all ships in the convoy present. Command won’t be happy if we push much past 2000 hours, but late supplies are better than no supplies at all. Objections?”
Silence.
“Very well. Let’s get to it. Regular updates on the hour, Commanders.”
The comm link terminated and Felrak took a moment to collect his thoughts. Small thorstup trees lined the left bulkhead, casting a scattered shadow on the terracotta paneling behind. He gazed into the swirling pattern of their leaves, kaleidoscopic greens and yellows interweaving, reminding him of home. He slowed his breathing. The thick canopies and jungle branches of the Southen Craawn flooded his mind. The birdsong and the humid loamy vapours rolled gently over the leafwork lattice of the forest floor. The door chimed.
“Enter.”
“All good, Captain?” Tursk approached Felrak’s desk almost sheepishly.
“Tursk,” The Argosian’s mottled hands rested, steepled on his stomach, “I fear we are between a rock and a hard place.”
“What?”
“Something I read on Earth. An ancient story, of a man named Odysseus.” Felrak leaned forward, “On his sea voyage he needed to sail between the rock of Scylla the flesh eating monster, and the giant Charybdis whirlpool.”
“I don’t follow…”
“Our voyage is full of risks, Tursk. There is no avoiding them. Our only way through is to sail between adeptly.”
Honour Among Targ
Blackened grime lay languid, smeared in a greasy sheen across the green tinged alloy. Clanking machinery and the hiss of steam filled the recycled air that hung heavy, pouring forth mingled with the dank and fetid odours from long neglected carbon scrubbers. There was an ascetic sharpness to the stench, surely detectable to the olfactory organs of any more sensitive species unfortunate enough to be walking those same corridors. Dark, forgotten pits of rotting remains filled forgotten corners, unfit to be cleaned by any other than the lowest of menial p’taq; beasts of burden for whom a warrior’s death was no longer an ambition, unworthy even of a place to sit on the Barge of the Dead.
They were all unworthy, in a way. The souls of those who occupied that metallic tomb, careening through space. A lost house of savage practices, cast adrift with precious few opportunities to reclaim their honour. With the respect of the Empire denied to them, their self respect waned in turn. Prestige and service to Klingon honour eroded, Kahless’ teachings forgotten, the wretched house fell to backbiting and petty cruelties. As a return to honour slipped further and further from their sights, a new urge took hold. Driven by a sense of injustice, manifested as pure malice, a twisted rationality entered into the minds of an entire house condemned to the torment of Gre’thor and Fek’lhr’s whims. It was not they who were responsible for D’Ghor’s ousting. Many had pledged their loyalty to that d’blok as a way to further their own standing in the Empire. Now, exiled for five generations, their prospects disintegrated and scattered into the wind. A tempestuous boiling of resentment and rage built within them, spinning and all consuming like the maelstrom infernos of Bresh’Vaq.
G’Vir knew the story all too well. A cook in the D’Ghor militia while the house still served the Empire, he had roasted meats and prepared gagh in the galley of the IKS Jat’lh, as it was then known. He was proud of his position in the ranks. His family still farmed the low plains of Mekro’vak. For him, with not a drop of noble blood, the thought of a life of subsisting on his family’s crops left him disgusted. They were snivelling indolents who thought nothing of the glories of battle. No, he would not continue this path. G’Vir would carve a piece of his own honour from the flanks of the Empire, glorious that it was. He would drink its blood, replacing his own, and he would endure any abuse that came along with his low station, weather any insults, and absorb degradations one after another to earn his place in Sto’vo-kor.
He remembered Bekk Chorr, a towering warrior with a broad back who once sat down in the Jat’lh’s mess to feast on a whole leg of targ. G’Vir had killed the beast that very morning, leading it up from the dark holding pen and onto the sluice grate of the slaughter hole. It whimpered, dipping its short tusks, perhaps aware that these were now its final moments. It looked G’Vir in the eye, proving once again to him that the targ was an animal of immaculate honour. Something changed in those eyes. They hardened, meeting G’Vir’s with what looked to him like determination. Such an animal would not simply face death quivering and whimpering in fear. Its final moments would be glorious. Head down, it charged towards G’Vir, who had released the chain around its neck. The targ would have an excellent death.
“Nob vam Ha’Qaj, Hegh!” G’Vir brought the tajtlq up in both hands, level with his head. As the targ ran he waited until the grunting, squealing boar was in the throes of fury. It focused on nothing but blood rage, on eviscerating its captor. G’Vir could feel the heat of its anger radiating, almost lighting up the death chamber with its ferocity. He stood poised. His dark, muscular arms held steady, both hands overlapping each other on the dagger’s grip. The targ, oblivious, sped up and G’Vir brought the blade down. Its head was driven into the ground, impaled through the apex of its skull by the sheer force of the blow. A high pitched screech rang out and then silence. It twitched once, twice, neural impulses firing for the last time before it lay still. It’s breathing ceased. G’Vir heaved the beast up, its body hooked onto the dagger, then hung the heavy carcass on a metal hook jutting out from the room’s central pillar. He slit its throat. Warm blood drained through the grill with the full vigour of a running stream.
Boots clomped in a chaotic rhythm on their march into the ship’s mess. Bowls, utensils, and metal tumblers all scattered across the long bench tables as hungry Klingons piled into their usual places. It didn’t take long for the loud, expectant babble to erupt into ill-tempered roaring. They slammed their fists into the table, shoving and jostling, and an enormous cheer reverberated around the hall when the cauldron of bone stew was carried out by the kitchen hands. Rich, coils of spiced vapour wafted towards their hungered mouths and the pounding grew louder. Rendered targ fat from the boiled carcass formed a glistening film on the cauldron’s surface. A giant ladle plunged through it to collect the pieces of brot root suspended in the salty, aromatic broth. The chaos subsided as, one by one, they collected their ration.
Higher ranked individuals were entitled to the roast meat. Crisped up skin crackled as G’Vir sliced through it into the flesh below. Turned for three hours over an open flame, the cuts were tender, tearing off easily as the warriors’ pointed teeth bit into them. The leg, reserved for Chorr, was the envy of all others in the mess. He had fought for it, and he had earned the privilege in blood. His hulking frame strained the bench on which he sat, making even the stocky fighting Klingons who sat around him seem scrawny, even underfed in comparison.
“G’Vir!” He slammed a heavy fist onto the table, causing everything and everyone around it to jump up and rattle, “This is truly a fine targ!” He held up the leg in one hand, inspecting it as he chewed. “You cook with a warrior’s finesse.” The giant took a large swig of his bahgol.
G’Vir beamed a toothy grin, breaking into a baritone chuckle, “You eat with less grace than that targ did!”
Chorr flew out of his seat, sending cutlery skittering across the deck. In a single step he was standing over G’Vir, who stood his ground. G’Vir snarled. Outwardly, he was steadfast. Inwardly, he prepared for a quick death. Silence. A moment passed, then a moment more. Chorr’s laugh was quiet at first, under his breath, then it grew louder. As the chortle grew into a belly laugh, the others in the mess joined. Soon the whole room was howling with laughter, and Chorr slapped G’Vir so hard on the back that he could almost feel his teeth loosening.
“G’Vir, you are a fine cook. But I can smell your fear.” Chorr bore his teeth with a low growl.
It was a voice of authority that cut above the crowd, “Perhaps, if he had less to fear, then you would all get a bit more of that targ meat!”
Chorr’s head jerked around, pinpointing the source of the remark. The challenger stood head on, right before his eyes. His glare pierced Chorr, shining out dazzling against the full bodied black hair that dropped to his shoulders. That look was unmistakable. This was a challenge, and only one of them would leave the mess hall uncarried this day.
“You challenge me, Captain Ler’Keth?” Chorr looked unsettled only for a second on recognising his commander.
“Yes I do, Chorr. Your greed is greater than a starving qu’vatlh! If I allow you to live, these fine warriors will surely shrivel and disappear.” He swept his arm around the room, punctuated by a series of jeers and whoops, “All because of you, Chorr, you empty headed oaf. How can we serve the glory of the Empire with a great weight like you tied about our necks? You have brought shame on this vessel, and to our great house.”
Chorr unsheathed his d’k tahg, flicking open the secondary blades in one smooth motion. He brandished it towards the captain, dropping into a low stance and moving his weight between each foot, prowling. The others in the mess drew back, instinctively forming a circle in which the two hulking Klingons stalked each other. Insults flew along with flecks of spittle from the incensed crowd that was now at fever pitch. Some raised their arms, pumping the air, while others crammed forward for a better view.
Ler’Keth’s blade whistled through the air as he stepped forward with a quick flick of his knife. Chorr, the ogre surprisingly light on his feet, pulled out of the way just in time. Ler’Keth came in again, seeking a quick end to the matter. Reacting aggressively this time, Chorr swung his knife hand directly into Ler’Keth’s. The two hilts clanked as they knocked against each other at speed, to the tremendous uproar of the crowd. Chorr then came in close, barging into Ler’Keth with his right shoulder and knocking him off balance. Ler’Keth spun around, on the back foot, but Chorr had been allowed time to centre his own weight. With a heave, Chorr aimed a kick towards the captain, winding him. Bent over double, Ler’Keth staggered back into the crowd who fanned out in respect, growing the arena so the warrior may do battle unhindered. Chorr gnashed his teeth, sensing his moment. He leapt forward, feet leaving the deck, reaching his knife arm as far as it could stretch. He drove the blade straight into Ler’Keth’s still bent back, sending the captain crashing down. Chorr fell on top of him, scrambling up again as Ler’Keth howled in pain. The blade had found its mark, and blood gushed out from under the downed Klingon’s splayed out body. Chorr reached down, taking hold of the knife grip. He twisted it in a single, wrenching motion that further tore into Ler’Keth’s chest cavity. The blood loss began to set in. With organs displaced, even the redundant ones, Ler’Keth merely gasped as a stream of crimson ran from his lips.
“Stabbed in the back!” A cry went up, “Coward!” Chorr stood back, “Traitor to the Empire!”
Ripping the d’k tahg from Ler’Keth’s corpse, he pointed it towards them. Eyes wild, droplets of blood flew from the wet metal as he faced off with the mob, thrusting towards any outliers who looked themselves ready to strike.
“I have bested our captain in combat. You worms know the protocol!”
As if in answer to him, the mess halls doors whirred open with a hiss. An older officer stepped forward, a ceremonial cloak draped over his arms. He approached Chorr, facing him in front of the disgruntled onlookers. Murmuring a few words of ceremony, seemingly to himself, the white haired old Klingon draped the cloak over Chorr’s shoulders. Instantly, Chorr felt the power vested in him assert itself.
“GET BACK TO YOUR POSTS.” He bellowed, scattering them all like vultures faced with competition from a true hunter. It felt good.
“YOU!” He whirled around, locking G’Vir in his line of sight. “You will go back to your pen, you mangy k’pekt! Even Ler’Keth could not defend your honour. Now you will lie in the filth of your fellow targ.”
So it was that G’Vir’s fortunes changed. No longer filled with the smells and tastes of hearty Klingon feasts, the life of the galley was soon drained. Grumbles and mutinous intent were quickly silenced by the new captain’s informants, nipped in the bud at the first sign of insubordination. Of course, before long the declining quality of rations would be the least of the rabble’s concerns. If the fall of House D’Ghor was low, the fall of the IKS Jat’lh was precipitous. Now simply the Jat’lh, she marauded, a once proud crew on the margins of Klingon society doling out violence in return for scraps.
As the crew looked up from their thin soup bowls, a quietly told story would occasionally distract them from their despondency and tarnished honour. Only when sure they were speaking with a trustworthy warrior, they would whisper in hushed tones of the targ chef from Mekro’vak. They would recount the smells, the tastes, and the feeling of being served food fit for a Klingon. On an especially weary day, one might hear a loose comment here and there describing the delicious aroma of that roast targ. Similar, it was suggested, to the smell that regularly emanated from the captain’s private suite.
As for G’Vir, he spent his days mucking out the targ. Reduced to the lowest of the low, he scrubbed the sluice gates clean and swabbed the blood strained slaughter chamber until it gleamed. It was in his best interests to do so, lest the entrail stench overpower him as night after night he laid his head down on the metal to rest.
Tailed
Sreyler Theb had the jitters. It wasn’t just that fact that the Ahwahnee was hurtling, in convoy at warp 8, into space infested with merciless rogue Klingons. It also had something to do with the fact that, from what she’d seen, she was the most experienced engineer in the whole ragtag assembly of ships. She’d already spent half a day on the Tulwar making sure their warp core stayed in one piece for the duration of the trip to Meronia. Whether they could make it back to Starbase 27 or not was another problem for another time.
She swung back on her chair in Engineering, feet resting on the edge of the diagnostic panel. Letting her arms dangle down by her sides, she let out a long sigh. She blew a wisp of long, silver hair out of her eyes that had come loose from its braid. The warp core pulsed at a steady pace, blue waves coursing through at pleasingly regular intervals. Sreyler lost herself for a moment as she stared through the booth’s transparent aluminium panels. Each engine had a character; the beating heart of the ship. This particular one was hers to look after, and she knew it well. She knew that the particle dynamic inducers tended to deviate about three microns every month, she knew that the ion inhibitors occasionally misfired, and that the magnetic intermix field needed slightly more than the recommended EPS flow to operate within normal safety parameters. It was all finely balanced, sometimes a little too finely for her liking. The Cheyenne class warp drive was famous for being finicky. Despite being a highly strung ship, given the right inputs and oversight once she was on the move there wasn’t much that was going to stop her. The upkeep was a challenge, but she’d spent enough years on Starfleet’s older ships to know more than a thing or two about what needed to be done.
A loud knocking on the panel in front of her shook her from her introspection. She jumped up, startled, and nearly fell out of her chair.
“Damn it, Lup, ya scared me!”
Lupulo grinned, creasing the well worn skin around his eyes and dimpling his grey stubbled cheeks. “Ha, I cracked it.”
“You what?”
“The power flow to the phaser array, I got it stabilised.” His wide smile bordered on maniacal.
Sreyler huffed, scowling, launching up and around the edge of the booth to meet him face to face, “Have you even been to sleep? Wait, don’t answer that. I don’t want to know.”
“Come here, I’ll show you.” He started over to the pool table.
Sreyler could feel smugness radiating from every jaunty step he took. They both hunched over the systems display as Lupulo highlighted power allocation and phaser systems. “As you can see,” he was making a meal out of it, “it turns out the power couplings that make up link 73-J have much greater stress-energy tensor strength, so we can simply reroute through there to the-”
She stopped him dead in his tracks, “That’s a lot of words to describe the fact that you modeled every power coupling and this was the one that worked.”
“Well, uh, I’m no engineer,” she watched the wind leave his sails, “it took me a while to…”
“Aha, Lup, you silly!” Her stony expression cracked, and giggling a little she slapped him on the shoulder for good measure, “Looks great to me! Wanna give it a try?”
He composed himself, “Sure.”
Sreyler move around to the opposite side of the console, “Keep an eye on the flux in that coupling as I complete the reroute.” She didn’t look up as she worked to divert power.
“Acknowledged. Power stable.”
“Hey, Lup?” She said, continuing to input commands.
“Yeah?” His eyes remained fixed on the display.
“How long do you think until the D’Ghor get a fix on us?”
A pause, “Hard to say… The reports have been inconsistent. They’ve been striking all over the sector.”
“Yeah, but, you’re the Tactical Officer. Give me some details. Like, they’re flying around in janky old B’rel’s right? How bad can it be?”
Lupulo raised an eyebrow, “That’s not all, Sreyler. We’ve had intel of at least one Vor’cha floating around out there. Hell knows what else they’ve got. You know the Odyssey?”
“What, the USS Odyssey? First in her class? Captain McCallister?”
“The very same.” He lowered his voice, “Last we heard they took a suicide run from a D-12 bird of prey.”
“No!” Sreyler hissed.
His face was grim, “And the Endeavour’s catching heat in the Elgatis system.”
“Those are big ships.” Sreyler was incredulous, “The ice path is cruel.”
“The ice path? That an Efrosian thing?”
“Yup,” Sreyler nodded, “means I hope to hell we don’t end up trading blows with D’Ghor.”
“Ha.” Lupulo pursed his lips, “Well, the Ahwahnee’s survived worse.”
“Don’t talk about that.” She snipped, “Not now.”
He rolled his eyes. An LCARs beep signalled an end to the conversation, “And the diversion is complete.” The triumphant grin returned to his face.
Sreyler looked up, breaking into her own smile, “Alright, thanks for the help, Lup. We’ll make an engineer out of you yet.”
“Not bad for a sleepless night and a mere four cups of coffee.” Resting a hand on the pool table, he made a show of being overly tired. Then the lights dimmed.
“Captain Vordenna to all hands and all ships.” A familiar voice came over the intercom as emergency lighting flashed red. Simultaneously, the klaxon blared. “USS Stavanger has detected three Klingon birds of prey on a course identical to our own. Time to intercept; approximately four hours.”
Their targets fixed, three abreast they swooped past star systems. Anomalies, phenomena, the knowledge and teachings of the universe were of no interest; all distractions, unwelcome and cast aside like congealed gristle from a slaughter blade. For a slaughter it would be. The honourless blHnuch could surely detect them now, and still they ran like dogs. They barely deserved the chance to redeem themselves in battle that, as warriors, the Hunters of D’Ghor were bound to offer them. They would be run down and before their throats were cut, they would learn to be proud of such a death. They would welcome it. Fek’lhr could only smile upon such an act, and when the members of the excommunicated house made their blazing descent to Gre’thor perhaps he might allow them victory in the sacred battle.
Coolant steam vented from a bulkhead grate, filling the Jat’lh’s bridge with the noxious vapour. “Why are we still out of RANGE?” Chorr roared, smashing his fist against the arm of the command chair.
“The Federation ships are at warp 8.5, sir.” The pilot ignored Chorr’s outrage, concentrating on the distance readout in front of him. “Seven million qelI'qam and closing.”
Chorr’s growl was low and guttural, “Not fast enough.” He gripped the chair, eyes narrowed, “Fek’lhr must have his sacrifice in blood, today.”
A metallic whir sounded as the periscope lowered from the bridge ceiling. Chorr brought it close to his face, magnifying to being the stern of the USS Stavanger into view. He cycled to the next target and the USS Tulwar’s curved profile filled his field of vision. His breathing quickened and he pushed back the scope. His voice erupted in a gravelly snarl, “I can smell glory!” Shouts of enthusiasm accompanied him, swelling raucously until Chorr’s barked orders cut through the unruly din. “Signal the Su’ghar and Maveq. MORE SPEED!”
The Jat’lh had seen better days, but she rose to the occasion. What remained of the ship’s inertial dampeners struggled to compensate for the surge of raw power that forced itself through its propulsion systems. The deck rattled. Cries of anticipation echoed through the Jat’lh’s corridors as the bird of prey accelerated to warp 8.8, warp 9, warp 9.5, until finally, “Warp 9.8, sir.”
Chorr could feel the rush of battle course through him. He stood and the ship rattled beneath his feet. Even if she was torn apart by the speed, it would be a glorious death. He punched the intercom across all vessels, “Today, we are warriors again. TO BATTLE!”
Across the com link, and throughout the three ships, 36 Klingon voices called out across the void. They hammered their feet in a deadly rhythm,
“Qoy qeylIs puqloD.
Qoy puqbe'pu'.
yoHbogh matlhbogh je SuvwI'”
***
The USS Ahwahnee’s tactical station sounded like an angry insect as the alert flashed up in front of Alex Lupulo. “Captain,” He spoke up from behind where Felrak and Tursk sat reviewing the most recent hourly reports, “The Stavanger is reporting Klingon ships increasing speed. Sir… They’ve reached wap 9.8.”
“Get me Thrix and De Vries.” Felrak fired back at Lupulo, and the images of both commanders quickly appeared on the main viewer.
“They’ve got the juice and they’re getting close, sir.” The Bolian looked relaxed as his bridge bustled around him.
The red glow of the alert lighting splashed against De Vries’ pale features, her eyes emotionless, “We estimate they’ll be on top of us in thirty minutes.”
Felrak cut straight to it, “We’re not going to avoid a fight here. If they’re tailing us at warp we’ve got the range advantage. Hit them with all the torpedoes you can, when you can.”
“Alright, Captain, we’ll let ‘em have it.” Thrix stretched back his broad shoulders as if limbering up.
“Get as much speed up as you can and draw them into the Ahwahnee’s weapons range. With all three ships throwing torpedoes we can knock them out of warp and be on our way.”
De Vries looked skeptical, “Here’s hoping it goes that smoothly.” Her auburn hair was tied back in a utilitarian ponytail that bobbed as she looked down towards her tactical data display. “Torpedo range in five minutes.”
“You have your orders, Commanders. Whatever happens, stay with the group.” The comm link was cut, the Captains replaced by the spherical hull of an Olympic class medical ship on the main viewer. Two more flew close, and Felrak pictured the command crews on each ship in their state of high alert. He looked down towards his own tactical display, at the runabouts in formation at the head of the convoy. Silently he thanked the forests that the Orwell and Bonaventure had arrived when they did. The strategic edge was his, for now.
***
Thrix watched intently as the lead bird of prey closed in, “Photon torpedoes, standby…” His elbow rested nonchalantly on the armrest. The Tulwar’s bridge crew moved with a singular focus. Only the ambient input tones and warp engine hum could be heard as they drew upon their training. They exuded a cool professionalism, refusing to acknowledge the mental exhaustion that accompanied the latest in a string of engagements with the House of D’Ghor.
“Ten seconds until the lead Klingon vessel is within range.” Announced the Lieutenant in the tactical booth.
“Fire when ready. Full spread.” Thrix responded.
Three red flashes screamed across the shrinking gap between the USS Tulwar and the Jat’lh. The first found its mark, detonating on impact with the bird of prey’s forward shields. For a moment a green shimmer was visible against the antimatter explosion shockwave, channeling the kinetic energy away and around the ship. The next two torpedoes sailed past their target into the abyss behind.
“They’re running countermeasures… It looks like a high density polaron field interfering with our targeting sensors.” The frustration could be heard in the tactical officer’s voice.
With no time for emotion, Thrix was matter-of-fact, “Compensate. Fast.”
Three more torpedoes, this time from the Stavanger, blazed across space. The Jat’lh’s shield absorbed another hit, but again two of the projectiles flew past harmlessly.
“Lead ship’s shields down to 25%.”
Thrix straightened up. Visible furrows ran across his brow, wrinkling the facial bifurcation that cut across his darkening blue skin at a perpendicular, “Not fast enough, we’ll be within range of their torpedoes if we don’t knock them out of warp soon. Fire at will.”
The Tulwar’s rear launcher lit up, propelling yet more destructive antimatter out from the apex of the Saber Class’ boomerang curve. The Jat’lh took another hit, collapsing its forward shields. Flames from the explosive annihilation ripped across the forward hull, polarised armour plating dissipating the full brunt of the explosion. Despite now being fully exposed to the next torpedo volley, the bird of prey pressed doggedly forward.
“They’re coming up on us.” Thrix stated to no one in particular, “We need another volley NOW.”
A two tone alert sounded, alerting him to what could clearly be seen on his display. This was confirmed by a harangued call from tactical, “Sir, we’re within their weapons range.”
Thrix whirled around to face the officer, “Full power to aft sh-”
Molten electroplasma from conduit 116A streaked flames across the rear section of the Tulwar’s bridge. Torpedoes fired simultaneously from each bird of prey impacted and punched through the ships rear shielding. Catastrophic levels of electromagnetic energy fed back through the ship’s EPS grid and antimatter containment systems. The warp core stuttered, struggling to maintain power like a wounded animal that knew it had to keep running. It clung to life, as if aware of the consequences of being separated from the herd. Klaxons blared, coolant vented, a tremendous shuddering sigh ran through engineering. Then the warp field collapsed.
The USS Tulwar spun awkwardly on a vertical axis as it fell out of warp. With propulsion systems offline, sheer momentum carried it forward. It floated, blown like a leaf in the eye of a storm. Its pursuers had themselves dropped to sublight speed, and were already making their approach. Their prey, fallen, alone, was ready for the taking.
***
A stunned silence fell across the bridge of the Ahwahnee. The blip on sensors that had been the Tulwar was gone. There was no comm chatter, no reports, only the silence of the ever growing void of space between the drifting ship and the convoy that charged ahead.
“So they’re just gonna pick us off…” Lupulo was the first to speak up, “No strategy, no objectives, just take us down one by one.”
Tursk’s face twitched with irritation, “Is that your tactical analysis, Lup?”
“We’ve all read the reports, Commander. We know what these… D’Ghor are doing to the people they ‘hunt’. If we let them at us, just like that? Feels a lot like we’re just leaving those people on the Tulwar to it. And we’re inviting D’Ghor back for the next round, sir.”
“You’re saying that as though we’re not under orders to keep going.” Tursk’s face reddened, “And next time I hear you question those orders, Lieutenant, it’s going to be a long time before you’re back on this bridge.”
“Oh so that’s how it’s gonna be? You’re hiding behind orders while the Tulwar crew get slaughtered? Always knew you liked the rules, Tursk but never had you down for a-”
Felrak cut him off, saving the incensed New Yorker from a night in the brig, “Enough. Mr. Lupulo, go and analyse that tactical data. I want to know about that polaron interference, and I want to know why those torpedoes were not hitting their targets. Tursk, hail the runabout squadron immediately. Let them know I have a proposal for them.”
From the Jaws of Fek’lhr
They called them Birds of Prey, but they appeared more like vultures as they circled their quarry. Plasma billowed, venting green from the USS Tulwar’s dorsal reactor housing. The vessel crawled at fractional impulse, every spare joule of energy engaged, putting as much distance as she could between her maimed spaceframe and the swooping ghouls that circled close.
Another disruptor burst pulsed. Vile and luminous, it raked across the Tulwar’s shields to the rear of her bridge module. There was a short fizz as what remained of the shield emitters struggled to repel the effects of the superheated particles, then flames. Ignited oxygen from the environmental systems spewed the ship’s firey lifeblood out in a wide arc above. Viewport lights flickered and the red bussard collector glow stuttered, gasping one last time for particulate energy before giving out.
“Their shields are down.” Chorr clenched his fist at the announcement from tactical.
A guttural growl seeped from his throat, “No…” He held himself back from giving the order to fire, observing the crippled Federation vessel positioned neatly within the Jat’lh’s targeting reticles. He stood in the centre of the dingy bridge, his eyes sweeping around like a lighthouse beam from the top of his massive frame. “Today we look into the eyes of these SPINELESS ghuy’cha’! We will watch the life drain from their faces as we IMPALE them on our blades. They will experience the pain of Gre’Thor in the living world, and we will drain their blood for Fek’lhr’s sacrifice.” His pointed teeth gnashed as he snarled, whipping the damned war party into their blood frenzy. He unsheathed his d’k tahg, brandishing it upwards. The bridge crew followed suit, unholstering their disruptor pistols, their long black hair whipped around as they tossed back their heads. Discordant noise found a rhythm in a few at first, but through the chaos a chant emerged.
“Chorr… Chorr… CHORR!”
His voice soared above them, “WARRIORS! PREPARE FOR BOARDING.”
***
Lieutenant Althaia Delfino’s pulse raced. The USS Orwell was close enough to see the macabre scene unfolding on long range sensors, but still too far to do anything about it. The Orion class runabout hurtled at warp 8, as fast as its engines would allow, but not fast enough. She tapped her finger nervously on the side of the runabout’s flight controls. Her thoughts escaped under her breath, “Come on… Come on…”
She was certain Lieutenant Nihl could hear her, and she was certain he could feel the exquisite sense of tension mixed with hopelessness that pervaded the Orwell’s cockpit every bit as acutely as she. Each second that elapsed between now and contact was further opportunity for the Tulwar’s brutalisation by the hands of D’Ghor, and more time for the convoy with only minimal protection. She flicked a strand of straight, black hair out of her eyes. The proximity alert sounded, and her ears pulled back. Her jaw clenched with apprehension, “Dropping out of warp in five… Four… Three… Two… One…”
***
Captain Thrix lay slumped over the arm of the USS Tulwar’s command chair. The low blare of the ship’s red alert klaxon was muffled by the hissing blast of the bridge’s fire suppression system. Carbon dioxide clouds mingled with the toxic smoke and vapours exuded from smouldering bio-neural circuitry. The air was thick, and his breathing was laboured. The fire burned hot against his face despite the choking gas. A blue hand flexed, open, closed, scrabbling for a grip on something. It found the corner of the chair and, latching on, Thrix heaved his body into a seated position. Blood streamed down the left side of his face and his vision was blurred. His eardrums, perforated by the blast, dulled the roar of the fire behind him. He spat out the blood that had pooled in his mouth, flecks of deep blue mingling with shards of debris that lay strewn about the deck. A deep, staggered breath, and he could taste more; a pulmonary haemorrhage from the shockwave convulsed his chest in searing pain.
He forced his eyes up, surveying what was left of the bridge. His bridge. The bodies of his crew lay where they had fallen. His First Officer lay partially buried under a sheet of duranium bulkhead, torn from the ship’s structure, twisted into a grotesque metallic contortion. What remained of Ensign Haines began to be consumed by the blaze that now occupied the bridge’s entire rear section. The fire had blackened the Ensign's skin, and his gold uniform collar erupted in red as the insatiable flames continued to consume.
Why wasn’t he dead? A cough wracked him, and the smoke bit into his dried out throat. It was his damned orders that had got them into this. Why was he still breathing? Through the pain that bubbled up in his chest, he let out a groan. It grew into a choked growl, “Computer, damage report.”
“All propulsion systems offline. Deflector shields offline. Hull breaches on decks 2, 3, 5, 6…”
Thrix hauled himself up with a gargantuan effort just as the red glow of a Klingon transporter beam shimmered into view. Chorr’s hulking figure stepped forward, looking first at the ruined bridge, then down at Thrix with disdain. The Klingon towered over Thrix’s already tall build. Looking into his eyes and seeing nothing but rage, Chorr grinned. He exposed his jagged sharpened teeth and laughed, “A Bolian.” Contemptuously, he stressed the first syllable with widened eyes, “Run from us like a dog, die like a dog.”
Thrix staggered forward towards Chorr with another groan, “Have my life!” He swung at the Klingon, who easily blocked his effort, “You’ve killed my crew,” he swung again, “destroyed my ship,” Chorr was bemused, “only thing you- gahhh..." Thrix strained against Chorr's blocking arm, "...worthless thugs are good for!” The Bolian panted and more blood ran from his mouth. Chorr shoved him back, and he nearly collapsed back into the chair, “We were saving lives. Cleaning up your Klingon mess again!”
Chorr paused, observing for a moment as Thrix caught his breath. He still smiled, deeply amused by the Bolian’s protestations, and laughed again in a deep boom, “You… You have some honour. Fight me, Bolian.” He flipped a d’k tahg out from its sheath on his upper thigh and the secondary blades flicked open. He threw it at Thrix’s feet, who strained as he bent down, grasping the thick handle of the blade built for Klingon hands. Chorr brought out a second, grinning at the deliciousness of a knife duel with a Starfleet captain. He tossed the knife back and forth between each hand, goading Thrix, crouching down, circling him.
It was Thrix’s turn to smile. Deliriously, he looked through the hulking Klingon to the bodies of his crew. The two captains circled each other for one full rotation. The fire burned with an ever more furious heat. Behind Thrix what remained of an EPS conduit, overloaded for a final time, shot a million tiny sparks across the Tulwar’s disfigured bridge. They danced like stars, bouncing through the flames and across matte grey duranium smeared with combusted soot. Chorr was instantly dazzled by their acetylene intensity. Thrix felt the quick searing sting of electroplasma on the back of his neck as he launched forwards, d’k tahg thrust out. Chorr moved in close, Thrix’s blade nicking the shoulder of his knife arm before being deflected up. With his own thrust, Chorr sunk the d’k tahg deep into Thrix’s side. The Bolian’s ribs gave way as it slid between them and he sank to the deck.
Without pause, Chorr sheathed his dagger, unclipping the bat’leth slung on his back. He twirled it with an elaborate motion before bringing the scythe-like end to Thrix’s throat. The dying Bolian could only moan as Chorr leaned in close, eyes inches from his face, “Today, you die with honour.” The bat’leth whipped through the carbon smoke and clanged down on the deck. It severed Thrix’s head from his body in a single blow.
***
“Why aren’t they finishing her off?” Althaia squinted as Tulwar came into view, “Unless…” She thought for a moment then, “I think I can get us in closer.” Ice ran down her spine as the USS Orwell banked right in a flash, avoiding another pulse of disruptor fire, “There’s too much distortion, they're using that damn polaron field again, I can’t make anything out.” The runabout rocked as the inertial dampeners absorbed a direct hit.
“Returning fire.” Chief Olren stated robotically. Three neon orange streaks blasted towards the bird of prey that was now rounding on the Orwell, “Klingons got smart, huh?” He added.
“Don’t underestimate them.” Althaia scolded through gritted teeth, “They’re butchering that ship’s crew right now.” Eyes still forward, she called out to the rear compartment, “How’s he doing?”
“Concussion,” came the reply from Crewman Jalt, medical tricorder in hand, “won’t be the worst of it if we take another hit like that.”
Althaia’s eyes flicked down briefly, a pang of guilt shot through her for a second before the stricken Saber Class starship came into view. “Signal the Bonaventure, see if they can cover us. If we can’t scan them, we’re gonna have to go and take a look around.” More disruptor fire streaked past the Orwell as it darted about, shrinking the distance between it and the Tulwar. “OK, we’re in transporter range. The Tulwar’s shields are down. Valera, Dol’ak, you stay here with Nihl and keep those birds of prey busy. Jalt, Olren, you’re with me.”
She input a code into the arms locker, which slid open to reveal a row of neatly racked type-III phaser rifles. Jalt and Olren grabbed their own as Althaia adjusted the settings on her weapon’s small LCARS display. In a few quick steps, they were on the transporter pad. She set coordinates, “I’m going to drop the shields for transport. Dol’ak, evasive pattern delta six. Make sure there’s somewhere left for us to transport back to.”
“Aye.” Dol’ak grunted. Eyes forward, the emotionless pilot guided the Orwell in a smooth barrel roll as it passed below the Tulwar’s burning spaceframe.
Althaia inhaled, “Energise.”
The runabout’s crew compartment dissolved away, replaced by a section of corridor barely lit by the Tulwar’s slowly failing emergency power. The deck heaved beneath them, “Warning. Structural integrity compromised,” the computer, polite as ever, informed the three newcomers, “all personnel to emergency escape pods.” No time to adjust their eyes to the gloom, they flicked on their barrel-mounted flashlights. A groan rose up from the scorched duranium wall in front of them. They angled their beams down, provoking another strangled croak as the wretched figure before them struggled to shield his eyes.
Jalt crouched down, reaching out to the slumped man, “Damn.” He set his rifle down and swung the field medic’s kit off his back. In an instant the medical tricorder was once again in his hand as he moved the scanner over the gaping wound. A huge laceration ran down the officers front from his left collarbone, winding under his arm to finish at the top of his hip. His uniform had a single long gore where the blade had ripped through. The black material hung loose, sliced into two flaps which hung, soaked in blood and parted to reveal the cleaved flesh beneath. Jalt rummaged briefly for a hypospray, and a quiet hiss sounded as he pressed it against the side of the man’s neck. “They cut him up good. If I can control the bleeding I can stabilise him. Pressure there.” Jalt directed Althaia to a point above the hip, “More.” He unclipped a dermal regenerator, ripped the shredded uniform apart further and hovered it inches from the exposed skin down the length of the wound. Blood seeped through Althaia’s fingers, and she could feel the rise and fall of the downed officer’s laboured breathing. He was an Ensign, human, in his twenties. His face was ghostly white and his blonde hair was matted with sweat across his forehead. Jalt’s black, Tiburonian eyes narrowed as, head bowed, he concentrated on his medical tricorder’s ECG readout. The dermal regenerator continued along its path, and the Ensign’s heart rate began to stabilise.
A disruptor bolt slammed into the bulkhead above Althaia and Jalt, sending hot fragments raining down. “Company!” Olren yelled, loosing three shots of his own in quick succession.
“Go.” Jalt looked up to Althaia, furrowed brow dragging down his cranial ridge, “I’ve stopped the worst of the bleeding.”
Hands still damp with blood, Althaia brought her rifle to bear. Olren’s phaser bolts had not found their target, and vapourised metallic smoke began to diffuse back along the corridor. Both crouched, lights extinguished, Althaia gave a hand signal and they both inched forward. In a flash of red alert light, she caught the unmistakable silhouette against a glossy wall panel metres ahead. She knew it was too late. Olren, positioned on the outer edge of the corridor’s curve, disappeared in a green shimmer. He could barely utter a scream before his body was disassembled at the atomic level. Molecular bonds were severed and cells homogenised into invisible vapour. His rifle flew back, clattering along the corridor from the force of the blast.
“Soj Qunpu'!” Althaia heard a triumphant shout from up ahead. She pressed herself back against the inner wall, training her rifle dead ahead, ready. She froze. Her heart thumped in her chest like the boots of the approaching Klingons, pounding out the same rhythm. She stared ahead, unable to blink even if she had wanted to. Summoning all her willpower, she refused even the quickest of glances towards where Olren had stood, his presence now marked only by a small scorch mark on the deckplate.
The first Klingon came into view, charging through the gloom. One shot from Althaia and he was down, sprawled lifeless on the deck. The second shouldered his disruptor too late, and her two pale yellow phaser bursts threw him back off his feet. He tumbled into the extremely tall Klingon behind, who pushed the corpse angrily out of his way before howling in rage. Althaia shot again and missed, firing wide and above the Klingon’s left shoulder. The flash of the impact behind him obscured the glint of the d’k tahg that spun towards her.
The blade had twisted horizontally in midair and sank deep into the muscle beneath her clavicle. Thrown with incredible strength, it severed tendons and connective tissue, lodging itself so deep in her shoulder that the knife’s two flared hilt blades grazed against her skin. The subtlety of the knife's design was lost on Althaia as she gasped, winded, hands instinctively grabbing at the hilt of the embedded weapon still warm from its owner’s grasp. Lightning fire exploded through her torso. Her arm seized up, severed nerves sending it into a clenching spasm. In a few quick steps, he was upon her, and the phaser rifle was wrenched from her good hand. He tossed it aside like a targ bone stripped of meat. Looming above her, his cleft lip curled upwards into a sneer.
“You fought well.” His baritone dripped with condescension.
She grimaced, deep brown eyes locked defiantly on his, “D’Ghor p’taq.” She took a swipe towards him, then doubled over from the full force of a punch to her stomach. The Klingon followed up, crashing his reinforced boot heel into the side of her face. More pain clawed its way into the side of her head as it thudded down on metal. Her jaw rattled. Three of her teeth lay in front of her as she wretched in a collapsed heap.
He looked down. A deep, resounding laugh swelled up within him, “You have spirit, sending two of my warriors to Gre’thor. Perhaps now we have slaughtered enough Starfleet cattle to appease Fek’lhr. A worthy soul like yours would please him greatly.” He paused. At that moment Jalt rounded the corridor, phaser rifle at the ready. There was a split second as, eyes wide, the Tiburonian medic absorbed the scene in front of him. It was all the Klingon needed to unholster his disruptor pistol, discharging a quick green flash straight into Jalt’s chest.
The nonchalant giant turned his attention back to Althaia. She writhed on her back, one hand scrabbling around in vain for grip. Calmly, he stepped on it. The bones made a sickening crunch as they were crushed, “Yet still you struggle in defeat. You choose to fight to the end.” Nodding slowly, he smiled with a grudging respect. It was almost as if a sense of relief had crept into his voice “At last, here on this pathetic ship, I have found a warrior.” He considered his next words, “Yes, you are worthy of Sto’vo’kor.”
“No honour in slaughter, coward.” She hissed.
He leaned in, reaching down and placing his hand on the dagger that jutted out from her. He pressed down, drawing his face close to hers. She screamed in agony. The veins in his neck throbbed. She could smell his pungent breath.
“When you find yourself before the great gates, you will tell them of the one who has sent you.” Althaia could see the whites of his imploring eyes, “You will tell them of me, Chorr, son of Miq’vegh. I will have deliverance from Gre’thor and from the jaws of Fek’lhr.”
Chorr looked down, puzzled. He brought a hand up to his face. Rubbing his thumb and forefinger together, he found the slippery blood that coated them curious. It seemed strange to him that the bat’leth blade protruding from his stomach pointed up towards his face. He gazed at the razor edge for a second, growing even more perplexed as it moved higher, towards him. The Klingon behind him, who held the blade, heaved with all his strength. Chorr’s legs gave way, bringing his full weight to bear on the upward cutting edge that ran him through. He slid down further, shuddering once, then again, until the bat’leth wielder was satisfied.
“Warning. Structural integrity compromised.” The computer continued its regular updates, “Hull failure imminent. All personnel to emergency escape pods.”
“D’blok.” The second Klingon grunted. He stood shorter than Chorr and more portly of build. His hair was a lighter tone than the vanquished captain’s thick, black mane. He kicked Chorr’s corpse in the small of the back, pushing him off the bat’leth. Silently, he crouched down over Althaia. His fingers felt rough and calloused against her neck as he checked her pulse. Placing his arm under her unwounded shoulder, he began to drag her along the corridor. She drifted in and out of mental presence, aware only of the excruciation brought on by the Klingon’s irregular movements. He laid her down. She saw another body from the corner of her eye. The wounded Ensign she had first seen after beaming in was propped up against the corridor wall. Jalt’s field medic kit lay wide open beside him.
A red hot lance of fire tore through her upper body as her muscles closed around where the blade had been. She couldn’t tear her eyes away, willing the Klingon to move faster; further damage to her mangled rotator cuff be damned. He fumbled with the dermal regenerator, aware that time was ticking. The blade had been millimetres from her subclavian artery. When he was confident she wasn’t going to bleed out, he heaved her up onto his shoulder. The Ensign was next, offering up no resistance, merely staring ahead with a blank expression. The Klingon muttered an order and a beam of red light descended on the trio. Their forms briefly shimmered in the dark before fading from sight in the soft, wavering energy stream.
The overwhelming explosive decompression began in the ship’s engineering section. Exposed to the vacuum of space, the matter/antimatter reaction assembly was immediately torn from its housing. Breaching their containment, the highly volatile materials combined, unlimited and uncontrolled. The disintegration was violent. Chunks of duranium alloy, roughly matching the shape of the components painstakingly pieced together at the Calder Prime Shipyard, were blown apart. Secondary explosions fragmented the pieces further and dazzling tongues of flame leapt from the spinning wreck. Soon all that remained of the USS Tulwar were scraps of this twisted metal, destined to forever drift and scatter across the distant, unplumbed depths of space.
***
The Klingon biobed was a crude, blocky thing. Barely used, it was of course preferable to leave wounded warriors to their deaths. On the cusp of the 25th Century, Klingon medicine still left much to be desired. Those deemed too weak to make it through the painful, needlessly damaging surgeries were simply written off. Those with disabilities were simply ignored, ostracised and condemned as weak for having chosen such a life over a glorious death in battle. Having no interest in death or glory, Althaia Delfino was at first confused when she awoke in the Jat’lh’s infirmary, then relieved, then horrified. Her uniform jacket had been replaced by a Klingon military undershirt. The material was thick and several sizes too big, hanging down off her narrow shoulders in a shapeless blob. Coarse fibres scratched her skin when she rolled the sleeves up past her elbows, and her chest ached as she swung her legs off the bed. She looked around for a blade, a hypospray, anything she could use as a weapon. That was when the infirmary doors whirred and the blonde haired Ensign walked in.
“Lieutenant, you’re awake.” He stopped still as her eyes continued darting around the room, trying to make sense of the situation, “We’re on the Jat’lh. It was Chorr’s ship. Before G’Vir killed him, that is.”
“What?” Her head was spinning. She recognised the Ensign from the Tulwar. Right now he was her only anchor to the vaguely familiar. The strange machinery clicked and hummed. She steadied herself on the side of the bed, gripping it, running a hand through her hair. It felt real. She looked again at the Ensign, still unsure if this was all some strange hallucination.
“G’Vir said that huge Klingon nearly killed you. He was the captain of this ship,” he continued, slowly. He took a step forward. Althaia froze. He tried to reassure her, “It’s OK.”
“Jalt? Olren?”
His green eyes looked down in remorse. Deep lines formed in his brow despite the officer’s youth. The grey shoulders of his uniform were frayed and tattered, and his soul was in no better shape. His voice trembled, “The crewmen you were with? Gone.” He raised his hands, “Wait!”
Althaia’s memory broke over her in a crashing wave. She heaved, pushing past him, stumbling out of the infirmary door. A Klingon corpse lay face down on the deck. More death. She stopped in her tracks, wretched twice and vomited. The Ensign approached slowly as she leant over, wanting to help but afraid, “It’s probably the Klingon meds,” he attempted to reassure her. “They’re pretty strong. Double the organs and all that…”
“What… Happened here?” Althaia spoke between heavy breaths.
“G’Vir killed them all. Well, not exactly.” His voice dropped low, “He said Chorr was dishonourable. Waited til they beamed over to the Tulwar then overrode the lock on his cell. This guy,” he pointed to the dead Klingon on the floor, “was one of the guys they left on the ship.” He began shaking his head slowly, “He was stalking Chorr the whole time. You were the one that finally gave him his opportunity. Said he owed you for that and figured I was with you, so he brought us back here.”
She stared at the floor for a while longer, absorbing what had been said before pulling herself upright. She looked towards the Ensign. He was skinny and a little red faced. It looked like he’d spent more time in science labs than anywhere else. His exhaustion was clear from the deep dark patches under his eyes, smudging in contrast to his pale complexion. For the first time in 48 hours, Althaia smiled.
“What’s your name?”
“Ensign Edward Steldon. Yourself?”
“Lieutenant Athaia Delfino.” The protocol was stuffy, but for both officers it signalled the smallest of steps towards normality, “OK Ensign Steldon, how do I meet this G’Vir?”
“Uhhh, follow me, sir.” He fumbled awkwardly, stepping around the dead Klingon and what remained of Althaia’s breakfast. Steldon led the way along the grimy central walkway that connected the bird of prey’s bridge to the rest of the ship.
Flanked by a small group of Starfleet runabouts, the Jat’lh soared at warp on the galactic winds. It altered course, increasing speed, matching the heading of another group of vessels lightyears away. Althaia Delfino was going home.
***
After resting as well as he might have expected, Captain Felrak Vordenna walked onto the bridge. Argosians did not undergo what humans would generally recognise as ‘sleep’. Instead, the organisms that grew on their bodies required contact with the vines of an orbosh tree. Fortunately, the trees were hardy, able to grow well under artificial ultraviolet light. Felrak kept one in his quarters among a host of other plants, flowers and leaves of all shapes and sizes. It grew up and along the curved corner of the room, stooping over at the top where it could reach no further. The vines hung down like a thick curtain. Microfibrils lining their surface would cling to his skin when he stepped under them. Psychotropic phosphate compounds crossed over, through the lichens and mosses, into his bloodstream. The result was a deep and usually restful period of cell regeneration and memory processing. These were not usual circumstances, however, and Felrak had awoken with a prickly, irritable mood.
“What’s our ETA at Legera?” He barked as he strode around the tactical station. It was mounted on a faux wooden beam that rose from the deck not unlike those found on larger Galaxy class vessels.
Tursk knew that tone of voice well and did not beat about the bush with his response, “Two hours, sir.”
“Any news from the runabouts?” Felrak knew full well he would have been informed already, had there been any.
“No, sir.”
“Keep me posted, Commander.” He grumbled. The previous evening had seen reports fly in about an inbound D’Ghor assault across multiple systems. Now they were down one ship and three runabouts, the last thing they needed was to get caught up in a pitched battle. “Continue monitoring coms,” he added, declining to sit, “if anything comes in from Legera I want to know about it. Who’s going where, alert levels, what they’re having for breakfast. Understood?”
“Aye, sir.” Tursk had seen Felrak like this a few times before. The lack of empathy in his eyes. The short, snappy sentences. It was never the precursor of anything good.
Felrak paced away, “Send it all through to my ready room.” He continued pacing once inside. He activated the wall display, a screen large enough to show a tactical overlay of the Archanis sector. Current fleet positions based on the the most recent updates from command were overlaid on the star systems that peppered the chart. He brought a hand up to touch the Legera system, enlarging it and the surrounding area on the screen. Starfleet had ships deployed to each populated world in the system. The ships were mainly from Task Group 27, previous home of the Tulwar and Stavanger. Felrak couldn’t help but wonder if those ships would have been better off simply staying put. He controlled his regrets, expunging them from his mind. He couldn’t afford them. Not now.
The ready room door chimed. “Enter.” The word came out tinged with consternation. His interrupted thoughts left him baffled by the unexpected intrusion. His face softened when the solemn form of Sreyler Theb stepped quietly in. “Commander Theb, is there anything I can do for you?”
Her ice blue eyes looked up at him. Facing him was difficult. She held her head at a slight angle, as if contemplating whether to walk straight back out the way she had come. She stood still. Her thick silver hair was hastily knotted in a bun, rather than tied back in its usual, neat plait. Strands of it poked in every which way, and Felrak could tell that whatever she had to say had struck her in the moment. He knew his Chief Engineer, the impulsive, brilliant mind introduced to him by his dear old friend Xin Ra-Havreii back when Felrak had himself run the engineering department on the USS Luna. She had been just fifteen years old then, growing up on the harsh frozen plains of Efrosia.
“A nimble mind, this one.” Xin had enthused, showing Felrak the teen’s miniaturised Heisenburg compensator. Each part had been separately replicated, the model constructed with specially programmed nanobots for the annual Zhaman’ti Engineering Festival in the domed Efrosian capital. Felrak’s friend had encouraged her to apply to Starfleet Academy when she came of age, and would no doubt have poached her for his own command if Felrak had not got there first. It was still a bone of contention whenever they met.
The face that had smiled bashfully when Felrak had complimented her designs now appeared stony and sombre. She attempted to speak and her bottom lip quivered. She drew in a short, sharp breath before, almost involuntarily, she whispered, “They’re not coming back, are they?”
“They still have time.” Felrak spoke and realised it wasn’t only Sreyler he was trying to convince.
Her eyes widened and her fists clenched, “What time? I know we’re getting closer to Legera. If they made it they would have caught up with us by now.”
“That’s not for you to say,” Felrak cautioned, “and in any case, we must be prepared for all eventualities.”
Sreyler’s gaze fell to the floor on hearing him admit the unthinkable. Her voice dropped to a murmur, “I should have never OK’d those repairs. They went down too quick. It can only have been the EPS flux control,” her speech quickened, “I could have said something. The quality... It was all such a rush…”
Felrak took a step towards the forlorn officer in front of him, “You know I’m the one who ordered the departure. I made the decision.”
“I was supposed to help them get the ship back online. I didn’t do a good enough job. Now they’re all dead, or worse.”
She had conjured gruesome imagery that flashed through Felrak’s mind. He looked up to the ceiling, suddenly envious of Vulcan emotional detachment, “Let it go, Sreyler. I have final responsibility and I need you in engineering.”
“No need to humour me, sir. I know what I’ve done.” She looked up again, “You chose the wrong person for the job way back then.”
Felrak’s stoic facade caved in, “LISTEN to me, Sreyler. This is NOT your fault. It’s not anybody’s fault. Those things that call themselves Klingons come streaming over our border and we react! That’s all we’re doing here. We make our choices and we live with them. You must live with them.” He composed himself, immediately regretting the outburst. Sreyler snapped upright as if she was on a parade ground. It pained him to see her like this, the child he had once known confronting the dark realities of conflict, “There’s a good chance we’re not getting through to Legera without another fight. If that happens, I need someone in engineering who can move this ship. There aren’t many people out there who can do that. You’ve always been one of them.” He let his words sink in for a fleeting moment, “Is that still the case?”
Sreyler relaxed after a barely perceptible nod, “Yes, sir.” She bit her lip.
Tursk’s voice came over the intercom, “Bridge to Captain Vordenna.”
“Go ahead.”
“Sir, we’re reading significant Klingon movement approaching the Legera system. Task Group 27 has identified them as D’Ghor and is moving to intercept.”
“On my way.” Red alert sounded throughout the ship. Felrak looked to Sreyler, whose expression now reflected a steely determination. There was no need for words, and he followed her out of the ready room. Before entering the bridge turbolift, she glanced over to Alex Lupulo. He stood manning the tactical station, behind the centre chair the Captain now made for. Catching her eye with a deadpan look, he gave her a stealthy thumbs up. She smiled, and as the turbolift doors swung shut, he could just about make out the beginnings of a little grin. It was all he needed.
Tursk’s voice announced again, “We’re in communications range.”
“Let’s hear it. Starfleet frequency one eight three eight," Felrak ordered.
Tursk punched it into his arm controls. The voices were garbled at first, simultaneous transmissions overlapping each other as ship to ship messages were also broadcast on the common frequency. It took a while for Felrak’s ears to attune, and as the Ahwahnee closed in the subspace interference lessened.
“Arcadia, Ephyra, Oppenheimer returning from subspace picket line form up with-"
“We have them in visual range on course three three zero, mark one.”
“Acknowledged, command.”
“Persephone reports ready at grid C-12-”
“-ships, B’rel class, approaching on vector tango. Two K’t’inga class inbound-”
“All ships open fire.”
“-shields down to 35%-”
“-hold them back, more ships incoming, hold!”
“USS Sturek reports 53 wounded, requesting reinforcements-”
“-report, Captain!”
“Ventral shields failing, security teams repel boarding parties, decks three through eight.”
Felrak’s grip tightened on the arm rest as the damage reports, casualties and tactical updates from the Task Group spewed in. It was almost as if the energy had been sucked out of the bridge. They grew cold with anticipation as the Ahwahnee hurtled towards the Federation lines at Legera.
“Sir!” Lupulo’s called out above the subspace chatter, “We’ve got a Klingon ship coming in, matching our course.” Felrak’s heart skipped a beat, “They’ve got runabouts flanking them sir, transponders identify them as...” the relief was evident in his voice as he reeled off the names, “USS Orwell, USS Locksley, USS Bonaventure, USS Arrow...”
“Tulwar?” Felrak now felt a pit forming in his stomach.
“Negative, sir. The Klingon ship is using an invalid identifier, no longer used by the Imperial Fleet. It’s showing as IKS Jat’lh. They’re hailing us now.”
Felrak had no time to waste, “On screen.”
A stocky Klingon filled the command chair on the Jat’lh’s bridge. He lacked the warrior’s poise that Felrak had come to expect from his dealings with Klingon captains. Slouching in the chair, he beamed a wide and toothy smile as soon as the comlink was established. In his hand, bits of meat still dangling from the gnawed on bone, was a roasted leg of targ.
“Captain Felrak Vordenna,” He chortled heartily, “I am G’Vir, son of K’metch, ship’s cook of the Jat’lh!” He emphasised his title with a twinkle in his eye.
“Forgive me, G’Vir, but it looks to me like you’re in command.” Felrak replied quizzically.
“No,” G’Vir shook his head slowly, growing serious, “I am no commander. Our captain was an honourless, mangy P’taQ! I merely took from him what he did not deserve, and gave him the death he most certainly did. I will gladly return this vessel once we reach port.”
Felrak raised an eyebrow, another human expression he had picked up over the years, “Understood. Then how is it that a ship’s cook, commandeering a bird of prey, has come to know my name?”
“Ha ha haaa,” a drawn out belly laugh was followed by G’Vir beckoning behind him. The bedraggled form of Lieutenant Althaia Delfino stepped forward into view. The sight of her bruised, purpled cheek and torn uniform made the lichen on Felrak’s skin crawl with alarm. She braced herself against the back of G’Vir’s chair.
Felrak stared in disbelief, “Althaia? You’re..." He launched to her defence, “G’Vir, know that mistreatment of prisoners is expressly forbidden under article-”
Althaia winced in pain as she inhaled, “-It’s OK, Captain, I’m not his prisoner.”
“Indeed, she has fought with considerable honour.” G’Vir added.
“So you helped G’Vir take the ship?” Felrak grew more incredulous.
“I hardly helped, sir. The D’Ghor were interfering with our sensors. We beamed over to the Tulwar to look for survivors. The Klingons had already boarded, but they left G’Vir behind. He took the opportunity to take control of the Jat’lh, then beamed over himself to settle his grudge with the captain.” Althaia looked sideways at G’Vir, “Our team got taken out by the D’Ghor. We would have been too if it wasn’t for him.”
Felrak paused, reassessing the Klingon who still lounged in his chair, “It seems I have been too quick to judge. You have my gratitude for rescuing my officer.” He had one further question, “Lieutenant Delfino referred to the D’Ghor as if you are not one of them. It seems strange to me that one would be serving on a D'Ghor ship, without also being a member of that house. Where exactly do your loyalties lie, G’Vir?”
Angered, the Klingon rose to his feet, “Loyalties?” he spat, “I have no loyalties now, Captain! I was cast out with the rest of those pathetic Ql’YaH, and now they want my blood. They are vicious fools who know nothing of honourable battle. They have lost their way, exacting pain and suffering on weaker enemies, inflicting torture worse than any Romulan or a Cardassian would. Gre’thor is where they claim to be welcomed, but in their hearts they yearn for Sto’vo’kor.” He threw the targ bone aside, jabbing his finger towards Felrak before clenching into a fist, “Do you understand, Captain? They do not face death, they cower. They are afraid. These are not warriors! They are not Klingons! They are insects, barely even slime, and they will be exterminated.”
The bridge fell silent, then a series of warnings rang out from the tactical station.
“Captain,” Lupulo spoke up, “A bird of prey squadron has broken away from the main D’Ghor fleet. Five ships heading our way. Ten minutes to intercept.”
Tursk whirled around, “How long until we reach Task Group 27 lines?”
“At our present speed and heading, approximately thirty minutes.” Lupulo could not hold back his grim undertone.
“G’Vir,” Felrak stood, facing the Klingon through subspace, “I disagree with your imagery. Nevertheless, if you want to exterminate D’Ghor, now’s the time. Lieutenant Delfino, you are to assist. Signal the convoy.”
“Aye, sir.” Tursk opened a channel.
“Vordenna to all ships, we are about to face an assault from D’Ghor approaching roughly on heading zero seven four, mark three five. All runabouts will deploy to the convoy’s starboard flank. USS Ahwahnee, USS Stavanger and the Jat’lh will position immediately behind. Keep yourselves between the D’Ghor and the medical ships, and protect them at all costs. We have fifteen minutes before we reach Task Group 27, until then it’s just us and the D’Ghor. We’ve made it this far, just a little further and it’s only a matter of time until we get that aid planetside. It’s the only thing standing between those colonists and shelter, freedom from disease, and feeding their children. We have to give them a fighting chance. Hold them off, and let’s see this through.”
Commander De Vries responded, “USS Stavanger reports ready. Runabouts are formed up, standing by to engage.”
To Felrak’s surprise, G’Vir also took advantage of the open com link, “Well met, Captain! Your warriors do not pursue glory, and yet they rally to their cause with honour. Today, most certainly, will be a good day to die!”
“I still want my pilot back, G’Vir.” Felrak sounded stern, but not without appreciation for the Klingon's rallying cry.
“There is no cause for alarm, Captain. We will have victory. Jat’lh, out!”
Felrak, wishing he could share G’Vir’s sense of assuredness, returned to the centre seat, “Mr. Lupulo, tell me you’ve found the solution to our targeting issues.”
“Yes, sir,” Alex confirmed, “If we alter our sensor resonance frequency to isolate the polaron dispersal pattern-”
Felrak cut him off, “-Just make sure all ships are aware of the new configurations.”
“Already done, sir.” There was a hint of smugness, but he didn’t push it.
“Good.”
Tursk eyed his controls, “One minute til contact.”
***
Torpedoes fell in a rain of deadly, flared green. Briefly, they formed ripples of sparkling force before exploding against strained deflector shields. At warp, the ships had only limited manoeuvrability and their positions were key. Absorbing most of the Klingon barrage, they returned fire with their own lethal swarm of light. Runabouts launched micro-torpedoes that splashed against the strafing predators with little discernible impact. The Ahwahnee spat red that shook through the Klingon spaceframes bearing down upon them. A quick stream of blue shot from the Stavanger at far greater speed, smashing through the Klingon shields into the wounded hawk. A finishing blow came in green, the Jat’lh turning Klingon firepower back upon the House of D’Ghor with vengeance. The bird of prey erupted in flame, disintegrating along with its collapsing warp bubble. Parts of its structure instantly disappeared into the invisible depths behind as they exited the bubble, decelerating below the speed of light. The dismantling continued for a few seconds before the speeding wreck imploded in a violent fireball. It too fell away into a destruction stretched across spacetime.
Tursk held on as the ship rocked, “Damage report.”
“Shields holding.” said Alex, “Minor EPS failures on deck eleven.” He eyed the tactical display, “They’re coming around for another pass.”
Torpedoes flew again. This time, more sporadic. A runabout, already venting plasma, took two direct hits. She flew apart, swept back out of warp, remains of her hull ricocheting off the Stavanger’s shields.
“We’ve lost the Locksley.” Tursk yelled over the impact rumbles, punctuated by the electrical sizzle of overloading conduits.
Another bird of prey went down as two quantum torpedoes from the Stavanger slammed straight into its ventral hull. Klingon torpedoes slipped through the cracks, antimatter igniting against the USS Galen’s shields. The Olympic class starship trembled, pressing on.
“Shields at 35%, casualties on decks six and eight.” The notifications from across the ship appearing as fast as Alex could read them.
“How long ‘till we reach the line?” Felrak asked, holding on tighter.
“Five minutes, sir!” Replied flight control.
“Steady...”
“Damn, De Vries is doing fine work.” Tursk marvelled as another bird of prey vanished from sensors.
“One more group of D’Ghor, two B’rel class, one K’t’inga.” Lupulo fired off more photons, “Arrow’s gone!”
Another tremor rattled through the Ahwahnee, knocking the personnel at the rear auxiliary stations across the bridge in a shower of sparks. Alex checked their vitals, “Emergency medical teams to the bridge.”
“That last hit knocked out our aft and ventral shields. We’re sitting ducks, sir.” Tursk’s voice rose above the building chaos.
“Eyes on that K’t’inga!” Felrak ordered.
The Jat’lh exchanged fire with the two remaining birds of prey from the original attack squadron. It was soon a one on one firefight, with more miniature torpedoes whizzing in from the remaining runabouts. The Stavanger altered trajectory, banking towards the three fresh D’Ghor ships that rapidly closed. Another electric blue volley from the Norway class ship incinerated a bird of prey. One more remained, flying alongside the K’t’inga on a charging run.
“They’re coming straight for us…” Tursk croaked.
“They think this will take them to Sto’vo’kor.” Felrak said with acceptance, “We may meet them there. All hands, brace for impact.”
The two D’Ghor ships disappeared in a cloud of blue, then flames, then nothing.
Two white streaks shot past at high warp in the opposite direction.
Collective confusion followed as some bridge crew still held onto their stations for dear life. Others simply breathed sighs of relief, having resigned themselves to their fate.
“We’re being hailed sir.” Alex said, shakily.
After a good few seconds, Felrak finally exhaled, “On screen.”
“Ahwahnee, this is captain B’resh Thronn, USS Byxx. We’ll keep them off your back until you’re through to Legera.”
Felrak took some time to collect himself, “Thank you, Captain.” was all he could muster. He realised that he was perched at the very end of his seat, “Thank you.”
Sea Haven
His moss itched with intensity, but it couldn’t distract Felrak from the waves. One by one they crashed, softly down below the cliff edge, onto a beach littered with pebbles and translucent crystals that from a distance reminded him of quartz. Gusting winds flurried along in line towards Legera II’s magnetic north pole. They carried a chill breeze with them, which flattened the sparse, fuzzy coverage of hair across the top of the Argosian’s scalp. Gulls, of a species unrecognisable to Felrak, battled against the prevailing direction of the bluster. Some, with heads angled down, charged against it and made only a little headway before being knocked back. Others gave up entirely, gliding down and circling towards the sea where they plunged on the hunt for food. White clouds drifted across the temperate sky. It was late in the afternoon and the light had just begun to dim. The gulls yelled and squawked; unaware, hungry.
Tursk’s black boots slipped a little in the mud. He climbed up the slope, away from Terithys Point which now bustled with Starfleet personnel. It was a small track. The soil had been worn away, exposing clay that had grown damp in precipitation pushed from the sea. His powerful legs carried him forward against the wind that whipped around the rocky outcroppings between him and the sheer drop. As he neared the summit, he caught sight of Felrak. Standing, eyes fixed on the horizon, the Argosian’s overcoat flapped out behind him in each pulsing breath of the wind.
“How long have you been up here?” Tursk drew up alongside, his bushy beard pressed back against his chest.
Felrak smiled, eyes still locked ahead, “Oh, about an hour, perhaps?”
“Heh,” Tursk chuckled, “didn’t think Argosians were much for the cold.”
“We’re not.” Felrak shifted the cloak-like service jacket over his shoulders, closing it up around him. He turned towards Tursk, “You forget that I spent rather a long time on Earth. In Manitoba. The climate here is quite similar.”
“Hmmm, the cold here's not so different from Tellar.” Tursk scraped the mud from his left boot with the side of his right one, “But this place is too damp for a dried up old hairball like me.”
“Old?” Felrak turned to face Tursk. A few teeth poked through a wry, lopsided grin.
“Sure feels that way. Making it up a hill like that ain’t as easy as it used to be.”
Felrak rolled up his sleeve, displaying the cloudy greens and mottled turquoise that grew up his arm, “You should try some of this. Does wonders for your health.”
Tursk’s nose wrinkled, “Uhh, hard pass on that one. I’ll stick to the gym on the Ahwahnee. Thanks for the offer though. Next time I feel like inviting a fungus to integrate with my cardiovascular system, I’ll let you know.”
For a while, they laughed and forgot. The salt-air, abrasive against the tumbling waves sprayed droplets of foam up from their collisions with the rocks, their fading laughter gradually subsumed in the rolling tide.
“We’re about ready to hand off aid distribution to civilian control.” Tursk informed the captain as the sun dropped towards the ocean.
“Good. I hear the Tranquility will remain for another week to finalise the soil purification initiative.”
“They’ve got their work cut out for them. D’Ghor managed to chemically salt a good portion of agricultural land before they left.” Tursk grumbled.
Felrak sighed, “These colonies will be affected for years. Not just those who’ve lost their families, loved ones… The future will be precarious as long as they’re dependent on aid.”
“We did what we could, sir.” Tursk tried to reassure him.
Felrak thought of Sreyler, “Have the crew been able to rest?”
The tellarite scoffed, “I’ve tried convincing them to take some downtime, but they’re having none of it. Lupulo and Theb are up there now, they’ve done a damn good job of patching up the ship for the run back to starbase. Delfino’s taken some time planetside, but not as much as I’d like. She’s been talking to Ensign Steldon a lot.”
“Ah, the last surviving officer of the Tulwar...” Felrak trailed off, “A heavy burden to carry.”
“I’ve arranged them both with regular counselling. They’ll get a full debrief when we reach starbase 86.” Tursk added.
“Tell me, Tursk, what of G’Vir?”
“Last I heard he was headed towards The Triangle. Said something about finding a crew, some delicious targ, then hunting some D’Ghor. In that order.” Tursk couldn’t help but smile when he thought of the plucky Klingon.
“He’s wasting no time,” Felrak said with mock indignance, “and neither should we. Are we ready to depart?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Then we will. Tomorrow. I’m rather enjoying the view.”
The two figures stood braced against the wind. By now the sky was a patchwork of purple and violet hues, splashed orange in a waning sunlight that spilled upward where it met the churning sea. Long grass that grew along the cliff edge rustled gently. It stood amongst the sweeping gusts. The gulls had long since returned to their nests and the ocean’s dull roar was constant. Their evening shadows stretched out long behind them.
End.