The Last Flight of the Ning'tao
A "missing scene" in the final act of the episode Once More Unto The Breach.
The motes of the transporter beam spun away, revealing the cramped angles and grimy hull plating of another ship's transporter room. Kor allowed himself a generous smile.
"Sir!?" The young officer behind the control desk, absurdly young, straightened his posture, and then confusion creased his features. "We had heard-?"
"You heard what I wanted you to hear," Kor answered, stomping down from the pad, and marching directly for the hatch, all pretence of imbecility and alcoholic stupor dropped like a cloak. He allowed his smile to grow. "And I wanted a ship."
The young officer hurried to keep pace. "I am... the captain here," he faltered. Like many Klingons of his generation, he had not made the change to his name which traditionally marked the passage to adulthood, but he came from a good line, and he evidently felt self-conscious.
Kor nodded. "Your earned you name in the fight at Trelka Five, Scout Captain Kurkan," he remarked, as if it was a casual thing. Then he turned to him, and smiled in delight. "You also passed my little test. Why do you think I chose your ship, heh?"
The boy's eyes went wide, but he paused a moment to recover his poise before he followed onto the bridge.
That gave Kor a moment to himself - a moment to savour. He took a breath as he walked through the hatch, savouring the taint in the dry air, the edge that spoke of engines run too hot for their shielding, and battle recently fought.
It had been a long time. Too long.
The bridge crew were little more than childen - a tall girl at Tactical, a clean-shaven boy without an officer's sash on the Helm, broad-shouldered young men glancing round from the rear consoles, but to Kor's veteran glance, they all looked competent enough. He strode forward to the Chair without allowing himself to hesitate, reaching inside his tunic, and pulling out the old sash, its texture soft between his fingers.
"Time is short," he said, in battle language. "Any who wish to leave with Martok can report to the transporter room." And I'll have the transporteer scatter your atoms into space on maximum dispersal. "I will take this ship to fight the Jem'Hadar alone if necessary."
No-one moved. A couple of them might have even, almost, grinned.
Kor's smile brightened considerably.
"Good," he said, slipping the sash over his shoulder, and letting it sit at the hip. He sat down in the commander's place. "Tactical, drop the cloak. Helm, out of warp, and break evasive starboard. I want the scum to see us."
On the screen, the starlines were replaced by naked stars, and Kor smiled to see them. Hello, old friends.
It wasn't just about announcing their intentions, though. The seemingly random manoeuvre had a second purpose, putting distance between the Ning'tao and the rest of the Klingon squadron before Martok could discover that he had taken the ship. "Now give me an intercept course for the Jem'Hadar squadron and go to warp."
"Acting," answered Kurkan, now standing at the helm, as the starlines streaked past on the main display, and the formation of Jem'Hadar fighters appeared as a group of distant blips, too far away to make out individual details.
"Warp power to the deflector. Tactical, recalibrate the launch cycle. I want three torpedoes running, timed to intercept their formation exactly when we activate the deflector weapon."
"To make them break formation as we bring them out of warp," she noted - impressed, double-checking that she could time the move correctly.
"Just so." The Jem'Hadar vessels began to grow beyond blips on screen, the starlines rushing past. "Show tactical."
The screen switched to a tactical grid, a game-board of triangular spaces, with the Bird-of-Prey and the swarm of enemy ships as the pieces in play.
"Hold," he hissed, fist raised. The timing had to be perfect. "Fire!"
Three torpedoes seared out from the launcher, the high-pitched war-cry of the energizer and the shake of deck beneath his boots accompanied by a trio of blips on the display. The distances made them appear slow.
Kor watched as the torpedo blips closed towards the figures representing the attack ships. The Jem'Hadar would hold formation for as long as possible to maintain maximum speed in their pursuit of Martok. Whether or not they broke formation at the last moment hardly mattered.
"Now! The deflector, if you want to live!"
The pulse caught the Jem'Hadar just as the torpedo salvo arrived, throwing them out of warp and leaving their formation in total disarray. Two collided while trying to avoid the torpedoes and the other ships beside them, and as Kor watched, a torpedo found a third attack ship which had held its course towards the Ning'tao, leaving seven, scattered across a gratifyingly wide expanse of space.
"Two of them are closing."
"Evasive!"
The tactical dipslay showed torpedoes incoming, and the ship shook as the salvo clipped the shields. Kor allowed the incident to pass without complaint. The glancing blow was a good way to make Martok and his sensor officers think that the Ning'tao was taking damage. And to make the Jem'Hadar over-confident.
"Cloak us. Helm, take us to their right!"
The two attacking Jem'Hadar ships slowed, allowing a third to regroup with them from the rear, probably a command vessel for a Vorta squadron leader, seeking safety behind his janissaries. The move would allow the sensors of three ships to work together in the hunt for their cloaked opponent, but Kurkan did not need to be told to put an evasive swoop into the Bird of Prey's oblique attack-run.
Kor smiled in approval, and studied his opponents.
As he had anticipated, they had deployed into standard formation, flank guards supporting the forward ship, with the one on the left hanging back slightly. Had he misjudged which ship carried the Vorta?
"Place us behind them," he snapped. "Stand by torpedoes and disruptors."
The gunner missed with her first shot. She didn't make the same mistake the second time. The central ship of the Jem'Hadar formation flew apart, and the guns switched to the ship on the right, with equal effect. The one on the left had turned to flee, but two torpedoes took care of that.
Long live the Vorta, Kor thought, ironically.
A lazy predator would have taken the weakest target first, but attacking the most powerful formation had prevented them from manoeuvring to regroup with the others, leaving the survivors scattered and vulnerable.
"The Jem'Hadar are going to warp," Kurkan reported. The two ships which had been furthest from the focus of the graviton pulse were now racing off in pursuit of Martok, followed by a third ship on a high-speed intercept vector. A fourth straggler was still on impulse.
Kor nodded. This time, the straggler was the immediate target. "Take that one."
They overtook their own torpedo before seeing the result, but Kor knew the girl would find her mark.
"Flank speed!" he ordered. The three remaining Jem'Hadar ships were in formation now, racing towards the rest of Martok's squadron with the usual, predictable lack of skill. Kor was quietly pleased that he had read them so correctly.
They were unlikely to break from their fixed course, hoping that they could outpace a damaged Bird-of-Prey, and knowing that they would face less dishonour against Martok's ships. Perhaps it was a little cruel to imagine that they were running away from him.
"Fire!" he snapped. "Fire! Fire!"
Three torpedoes raced ahead, targeting the fleeing Jem'Hadar.
The girl was good. She had targeted the flanking Jem'Hadar ships first, and the explosions or the debris must have caught the lead ship too - it had winked off the display before the final torpedo plunged into the maelstrom, completing the destruction of the Dominion force.
"Cloak us," he rapped. They were almost up on Martok's sensor range again. "Warp six."
Martok was a skilled warrior in his way, but he played the game like a Marine sergeant, focused on his own survival, viewing ships and subordinates as expendable pawns to secure his position and achieve his personal targets, and showing little consideration for the wider progress of the empire. Kor was a more old-fashioned commander, a Klingon who believed that being Klingon meant more than mere personal survival. But such complexities were best taught by showing proper leadership to a ship's crew.
"Visual screen. As much magnification on the flagship as you can give me."
The girl answered with a clipped affirmative, and the tactical schematic was replaced with an image of the Ch'tang, fleeing towards the Federation at high warp.
"There!" Kor exclaimed, gesturing at the screen. "There is the General. You see him, fleeing from a threat that eight Klingons disposed of in less time than it takes to finish a cup of ale. You see how easily the vaunted Jem'Hadar were bested with a single ship." A pause, letting the implications of that impress themsleves on the crew. "There will be no more flight from our enemies. Not aboard this ship." Kor glanced at the helm. "If, that is, Kurkan wants to continue as first officer under my command."
"The Chair is yours." The young officer was trying to suppress a grin. "Thought Admiral."
"Thank you," Kor smiled. "Now, take us back around towards the enemy, and set a course for Trelka Five. There are still a lot of Jem'Hadar to kill, and I'd imagine that they will have filled that system with easy targets." He paused, and smiled again. "And this ship needs a new name..."