At the Jaws of Fenrir:
Chapter 1: The Builder
By tremor3258
A Retelling of the 'Ragnarok' mission, with some of my characters. Forgive the indulgence.
1523 AD
It was festival day on Grimak, greatest of the colonies of Fifth Great Expansion of the Gorn. The celebration of the founding wasn't the largest festival; that honor was reserved for the hatching of the Hegemony, celebrated across all the worlds. The warrior caste had promised a flyby of the newest air-defense units, and Sliss was eager to reach home. Her apartment was in the foreign district; and the usual problem of its distance from the university meant less build up and a better view.
And it was cheap, and the landlord was only genially corrupt. Her neighbor across the hall had gotten some decent imported liquor – clear but with a heavy punch. They would have a good seat on the rooftop as a result. For a non-Gorn, her neighbor wasn't bad, even if her name was nearly impossible to pronounce with a soft palate, and she had hair.
She shuddered, even on a linguistics grant, she hadn't had too much exposure to aliens yet. The Hegemony had preferred to keep to themselves, but the need to expand their population had forced them to spend more time around people, though most were mammals. The hair – the bizarre keratin structures – looks like diseased scales, falling in rivulets.
But Sliss's caste was merchant, and they were more open as a result, seeing the angles. The mammals saw the Gorn as plodding, unemotional, and slow. Her knack for acoustics was better than most, and so she had been selected to learn their languages, and then their secrets.
It would be useful, but the government hadn't deemed it worth a very large grant, so she had to live closer to aliens than she wanted on a regular basis. Going to school with them was bad enough. She looked at the sky, it was rapidly darkening, the red dwarf sinking below the horizon. She heard something rustle on the streets around her. The city transit network hadn't been extended all the way to her apartment, and she'd had to walk ten blocks.
The city lights would be on soon, and she feared missing the fly-by. Fortunately, there was always her backup route. An access point to the city's power distribution network – if one breathed in a little, one could shuffle through it. She'd used it the other way, making the morning train. True, it was dark, but this was a Gorn world. The military caste dare not risk the humiliation of one of their people being injured.
She slipped into the alley, squeezing past the transformer stack, humming to itself. Then it was a short walk down a delivery driveway, and she'd saved herself a block. Unfortunately, in the dim light, she missed the trash bins had been shoved out of the way – someone had been hasty. She tripped over them in a clatter in the shadows.
When she finally managed to stand up, cursing and brushing herself off, the light suddenly dropped. She turned, confused. A shadow was blocking the end of the street, far too short to be a Gorn, but she thought she recognized the stance and hair against the silhouette. "Student Revka?" Sliss asked, confused. She hissed, then. The figure was pulling up a hand with the sort of deliberate slowness that screamed 'weapon' from a hundred bad dramas.
She couldn't move in time – inertia fighting against her. But instead of a loud 'bang' there was a trill like a camera flash being discharged. A bright flash filled her vision, and she heard a gasp as something small and heavy ran into her, sending her back to the ground. Her vision finally cleared, seeing her neighbor standing over her, hand on her chest, pushing hard enough to make sure she felt it though not truly pinning her.
The alien's other hand was waving around something she didn't recognize. Her eyes were strained, but they appear to have tumbled behind some blocks of glass or the like, aglow in the city's haze. And beyond… there was another figure, grunting, hand held to his chest. Reddish eyes glared at them, and a rifle was held somewhat listlessly. Student Revka did something with her other hand, she heard a faint hum, and the pressure on her chest ceased.
"Stay here behind the er, wall, Sliss," Revka said gently, patting her, getting the sibilants all wrong as usual. Her other hand came into view, and was holding some sort of plastic contraption that hummed. The other spat something, and Student Revka winced briefly – apparently she understood it.
"No, none of that," Revka said sharply as the other creature struggled to raise the rifle. There was a screech, and his movements slowed and stiffened. The small, pink alien smiled with clear satisfaction and put the box away, pulling something else plastic and small. She rolled out from the glass, and manipulated it somehow. Sliss struggled to sit up in shock. It was a ray gun- a beam of light caressed. Fire sparkled and strobed around the other, warding off the light, and Revka rolled back.
Her eyes widened and she tapped something on her chest, a parabola insignia she had described as a religious symbol. "Get down!" she barked, with all the insistence of the ruling caste, and Sliss found herself dropping in surprise reflex – the pronunciation had been perfect. The stranger managed to get his rifle out, and instead of bullets – or even light, some sort of fog came out. But it hit the glass, and then Sliss realized, it was light, not glass. The fog cleared, and the trash bins scattered from her fall were slumped, corroded.
But she was intact, whatever the barrier was, it held. The shadowy figured snarled, a harsh figure, looking almost melted by Gorn standards. It shimmered with empyrean fires again, and duplicated, creating an even shadier version of itself. They were linked by fire. Student Revka tapped her strange tool again, a sparkle of light bringing an ally, a small halo, glowing orange, floating on no wings. Something burning launched at Revka, but a clean blue shimmer held it off.
She fired again, a cone of orange light – not even fire as the halo added its own otherworldly fury. The shadow vanished, leaving only the lead devil, the fires dying down around it. The figured stepped backward, but slipped against the partially melted garbage, slumping. With a defiant snarl, he pulled a small cylinder from a pocket. Revka started to run, but the devil jammed the cylinder into himself. There was a shudder and a gasp, and then stillness, with a dreadful finality to it.
The light-wall, the ray gun, the small floating halo suddenly vanished in more clear blue light. "Are you all right?" Revka asked. Sliss gaped at the angel, and, to her later shame, it took time to find her voice.
"I thought you were an engineering student, not an angel!" Sliss said at last, to her later regret. Of all the stupid things…
"One never stops learning!" Revka said brightly. "But, yes – I am an engineer." She reached down a hand to help Sliss stand. Amazingly, it worked, and Sliss didn't bring the tiny alien down. Though her ears did detect a slight whirring of gears – a clockwork engineering angel, apparently.
She held her box up again. "Are you hurt at all?" Revka asked, "I'm sorry to knock you down." Sliss brushed her off lightly, and adjusted her tunic back out of askew, unhurt but confused.
"Who was that? What are you?" Sliss said. "Why are you here? What about the roof?" Sliss babbled. She looked at the corpse briefly. It didn't look familiar – years later, she mapped it to a slave species towards Galactic core, past the Azure Nebula.
"Um – we should still have the spot, actually," Revka said weakly. "But I'm sorry he got so close – he was… an operative. He didn't like the sort of future you represent, and the growing Hegemony." That made her straighten a little. Angelic recognition. "I came here last week because we heard he was here, but I was hoping to catch him before this. I'm sorry you were nearly hurt."
"I'm fine," Sliss assured her savior. Sliss spat on the corpse. "Shadowy scum." Revka nodded, and then seemed to catch herself.
"He had his reasons," Revka said. "They're terrible, but they're there." She looked at the fight area. "I'll get the body taken care of – you shouldn't have to deal with any of the questions."
Sliss held her claws up. "I may not be laborer, but I can help with trash." Revka hesitated, eyes lidded, then nodded. Sliss worked to arrange the cans. It took longer than it should, her hands seemed to be shaking. Revka waved some sort of wand over the body and the area. Then she summoned the disc again, which played light over specific spots. With Sliss's sensitive eyes, the spots were slightly discolored. Sliss nodded. Demon blood was supposed to be corruptive.
Sliss had more or less gotten the cans back together, and Revka seemed to be finishing her preparations with the corpse when she heard the booms. "Oh, the flyover! I'd be home by now" Sliss said, another subject of later castigation. Still feeling unsteady – that was where she should be, after all, if things were normal.
Revka seemed to be listening to something, and then spoke quietly. Then she looked up and smiled. "You're right – we should get you back where you should be. It was a pleasure to meet you, Sliss. Your people are courageous and brave, and I'm sorry someone would try to damage that, but glad I got to meet you and see your world."
Sliss nodded. Revka drew her up to her full insignificant height. "But," she said with finality, "I'm afraid we probably won't see each other again. Fuso, execute plan Charlie-Five." The world dissolved to light, then the scattered pieces seemed to reform back to the rooftop. Her stomach suddenly lurched, and dizzy, she found herself in a prepositioned sunbed.
Overhead, the newest air-fighters of her people went through acrobatics, launching flares and amid fireworks across the whole spectrum. Caught in the spectacle, the other residents of the low-cost housing had missed it. Turning a little as she gasped, she saw another barrel there of the distilled spirits Revka had been handing out. With a shaky note on it, "For a good neighbor and a better future."
Overhead, the lights shone across the spectrum, the Hegemony bright.
Captain Antonine Revka, U.S.S. Fuso, beamed back aboard her ship. Her science officer was waiting with her operations chief. Even for a Reman, he was looking grim, at the bundle that had beamed up beside her. Figuring the exact time origination point of the body would help lock down the Na'kuhl 'insertion' technique. And, given the Republic's torturous recent past, history was not the favorite subject of Subcommander Manas.
"Ambassador S'tass's ancestor has avoided an untimely death in an alleyway," she said happily. "Status report up here?"
She stepped down from the transporter room – carefully, it was built to a century-old style, like much of the ship. All bright colors and thick, well-shielded conduits. But beneath the surface, the hexagonal facets had the sparkling high-resolution of a current transporter, the thick power conduits were really modern electro-plasma instead, carrying loads undreamed of to those dead engineers.
Those in fact, those engineers were yet to be born. Manas looked at the dead operative. "Our credentials continue to hold. Intelligence gear has successfully pulled the databases from the planetary surface, and we are monitoring all possible surface transmissions. There will be a great deal of information about the Fifth Expansion to add to the Federation Library."
"And our other issues?" Antonine asked, moving behind a screen to change back to uniform from civilian wear.
"The temporal and chroniton scanners obviously failed to show any improvement with our additions," Manas said mournfully. "Distortion was only evident at close range and very near the point of temporal impact. Their incursion method still refuses to be remotely identified. Science teams are finally starting to show some improvement at data gathering," Manas said with some schadenfreude.
Temporal Defense was staffed with the timelost, not the best of the best, and grinding people in the Starfleet tradition; from two centuries and alternate timelines of different Starfleet traditions, was proving difficult.
"We have successfully offloaded our 'cargo'," the operations officer, Lieutenant (probationary, as Donaldson often reminded) Feric said, leaning on the transporter console. He shot a look at Manas. "And we've managed to keep a heavy drill schedule going without the Gorn knowing." The Ferengi had the lobes for logistics. "The replicated fabrics will resist any obvious identification as manufactured through that method; and will decay before appropriate methods are discovered. The hardwoods should, given what happens in the next century, fit pretty well into making the Gorn trade deficit that much worse."
Antonine popped her head up at that feeling glum. "Those poor people," she said, and sighed. "Even the Na'kuhl couldn't make that chaos worse, and I wasn't able to even capture him. Going to kill an innocent young woman in a dark alley…"
Manas said, "Still, we detected the deviation enough to be in position. Was there any issues with the target?"
"No, one good thing about a week's stay – she seemed pretty certain I was on the side of angels." Antonine laughed, but shook her head at their questioning looks. "She really misidentified me."
"But it sounds like we made progress up here – what was Donaldson talking about an anomaly? I would have stayed longer otherwise." Antonine said, getting more serious as she finished putting on her uniform. The captain approach to uniform regulations was a blessing – she could use the Sierra model she was used to from her timeline. The Odyssey just felt odd on the shoulders.
The two officers looked at each other uneasily.
Feric offered, "We had a very minor blip in our carrier wave for temporal communications. We sent a query but got back a standard status report to continue mission while in another temporal zone."
"That transmitter is set in our future," Antonine said, now also uneasy. "When was the glitch?"
"Fifteen minutes before the attack on Sliss," Manas said. "Our understanding of temporal theory is the probability of the event at that point should not have caused effects – given the mechanisms of travel used by the Na'kuhl and ourselves."
"All right, something's up then. We need to confirm who we're working for – Donaldson's attention to detail paid off again," Antonine said. "Are we cleared for departure from the ground yet?"
Feric nodded, "Yes, everything is set – we have all scanner points logged to be able to maintain our hologram, and that little probe you suggested is ready with our warp signature. I'm sorry I didn't think of it."
"Well, it's easy to forget how slow speeds are back now," Antonine said. "An endurance of two minutes at warp 9.5 goes a lot longer at these blistering modern speeds of Warp 1.3." She tapped her commbadge. "All hands, this is the captain: prep departure stations." She tapped it again and turned to the others. "Run final checks we didn't leave anything behind when I checked out of the apartment – what, wow, all of six standard hours ago? I'll be on the bridge."
Yama was lingering outside the transporter room to where Antonine nearly tripped over her. She scooped the ship's cat up, and, reflexively scratching it. "And detail someone to lock up poor Yama. We really don't want a repeat of what happened when we arrived." The other two nodded, and Antonine delegated the cat to Feric before heading into the turbolift.
Donaldson had harbor watch, standing to attention as Antonine came in and moving from the center console. A few seconds behind, the other turbolift opened, disgorging auxiliaries to man the ship's secondary console, unnecessary in a quiet orbit. "Orbit stable, captain. Traffic control has given our exit vector. Sensor sources marked. Holoemitter disguise active with no anomalies, impulse baffles holding."
"How long until our departure?" Antonine asked, settling into standing at her post. Posts were certainly right. The bridge controls were all scattered on various columns across the structure. No hint of old-school ergonomics here. Or 25th century ergonomics. Or any, it seemed at times.
She wasn't sure why the ship, originating a century in the future, seemed to pay little to ergonomics, but they weren't able to access the time travel settings without the original bridge. She'd been forced to set up four-hour watches to avoid physical exhaustion.
"Groundside traffic control has us set for whenever we're ready within the next hour – departure vector logged to helm," Donaldson reported. "Mission go well with Foch pulled away?" He waited a beat, "And did you get my aquavit back?"
"Not sure yet, we'll have to see what the future's like. We didn't get a live capture but I doubt Captain Foch would've made a difference given our last couple missions," Antonine said, pulling up their vector. "Main Engineering: Bridge – I need power now to the temporal core," she ordered.
"Commander Tela here – warp power available," the Tiburonian said over audio cheerfully. "Unhooking the safeties on temporal core. When are we going? Can I plug in the still? Donaldson's been hovering over it." The human officer grimaced and turned away. Antonine hid her smile.
"Tell everyone to stand by and not start the mash yet, I'll let you know when we end up," Antonine advised. "Computer – contact Temporal Relay; Temporal Defense mission contact under one-time code seven-delta."
"Working," responded the computer. "Standby," it said after several seconds.
"We're time travelling – why does it always seem we have to wait for this?" Donaldson said, composure recovering.
"There's about fifteen competing theories I've read-" Antonine began, but stopped. The contact appearing in hologram was not Daniels. Some other human, graying at the temples, someone heavyset.
"Captain Revka – my name is Pavel Chekov. Timeline integration check is three-seven-alpha-four-seven," the man said, with some accent she couldn't place. Donaldson stepped to another control column and nodded.
"It seems we're in the same history, Mister Chekov," Antonine said. "Transferring automated mission report – would you like a summary?"
"No time," the man said with no trace of humor. "Daniels has fallen in the line of duty. The Temporal Liberation Front has joined with Terran Empire forces and nearly overwrote the existence of the Array at New Khitomer. We have a limited window remaining, but it appears all pieces are on the board for Procyon V, and we are seeing massive flux in the timeline. Additional post-Procyon Nexus forces are unavailable."
That caused some muttering on the bridge. Antonine looked around, silencing the mutters. "Do we proceed to the battle?"
"Negative – your previous experience with the Tox Uhat is valuable, and we have time to organize. Proceed to your originating point and then proceed to New Khitomer at the attached timespace coordinates within one hour after arriving, your personal perspective. You are authorized to recruit one ship and crew for the temporal emergency. We have no for using your ship to shuttle multiple ships and removing too many pieces from history at this point could tip the balance," Chekov said.
"Is it alright to alert my normal chain of command?" Antonine said.
"Yes, though we are also alerting through other channels," Chekov said, then looked off screen. "I'm sorry – we're reaching other ships for emergency recall. You have your orders captain." The screen winked out.
"That was fast," Antonine muttered, and winced. Not the best move for morale. "Lock down temporal core onto axis for return and begin charging capacitors for time travel. Communications, contact traffic control – say we got loading expedited and are ready for departure. Lieutenant Feric's probe is ready so plot for temporal event immediately after entering warp. Senior staff meeting in fifteen minutes. Commander Donaldson-"
"Aye, ma'am," Donaldson said, standing up stiffly again. "Going to go check Feric's probe to make sure he didn't get inventive."
"Absolutely," Antonine said. "And I *am* sorry, but I did have to use the last of your aquavit. We did have those recordings from the archive Sliss saw the airshow, so I needed to make sure she had a seat."
"The last of the Freya batch, and most of our first Fuso batch," Donaldson said mournfully, "You'd think even in an isolationist, corrupt society, throwing one extra alien into an empty apartment wouldn't be so expensive."
"Corruption is the theme of the Fifth Expansion, if memory serves," Antonine said, a tad mournfully. There would be mass riots at best on the planet below in several decades, as a variety of cascading mistakes brought down this version of the Hegemony. She could guess what it would be like. Her own home was far closer to the chaos of scarcity economies than most Federation worlds. The history books had made sure the pictures were vivid.
Donaldson saluted. "A well-lubricated society, then, if not well-ordered. Can't believe how usefl a still has been. Who would think distilled spirits would be the best weapon in non-lethal temporal warfare" Antonine shrugged, at that. Replicators were wonderful, but weren't the best at volatile compounds like alcohol, if you liked the people you served it too. And, what had been more important, brewing was brewing – it was much easier to 'obscure' and tweak the origin for whatever world they were at this wekk."
"Fifteen minutes Donaldson, I'm going to check with Tela," she announced.
The conference room was a weird mishmash of late 26th century and 23rd again. An old-school communication tri-screen in the center of a table, but with a holoprojector mounted on it. Tela was waiting already, even though Antoine had called for her while just in the turbolift. Someday, Antonine would figure out how her chief engineer anticipated her so well.
"How'd it go?" Tela said, direct, though only looking abstracted – she was looking over a sensor module from their latest attempt to crack the temporal core blackboxes. From the blackened condition, it had gone as well as the last ten attempts. At least it wasn't vaporizing their sensors, any more.
Antonine sat heavily. "I held my own- I don't know. All the kit worked, and I have had melee combat before. But he just killed himself without hesitation, or a qualm. How could someone believe so fiercely in something so… monstrously dangerous and stupid?"
Tela sighed, not looking over. "But that's not the real issue?" she prompted. "We have fanatics in this timeline too."
Antonine stopped, looking at the table. Tela tapped it after a minute. The two had worked together closely during the fitting out of the temporal ships, and Antonine was happy to have a good engineer while she got her head around the other departments on the ship, even if Tela was probably headed back to Utopia Planitia in a year or so to lay the groundwork to build these future ships.
"All right," Antonine said, "It was… really close. No, I've never seen someone die that closely. And certainly never so… deliberately. A few long-distant firefights, and those were slower paced. Not sort of throwing stuff down so quickly, and then… just, quiet when it happened."
Tela nodded sympathetically. "They prepped us a lot for combat at the Academy, but we knew it was a certainty going in, not just a likely possibility of our risky business."
"I'll talk to the counselor when… whatever is happening, gets over," Antonine promised. She nodded at the hunk of blackened junk on the table. "Did it get anything?"
"Well, it caught sixteen simultaneous predicted end of life failures," Tela said. "The joke is on the core, though. It didn't get the sensors watching the sensors, this time. I think I caught enough of what it did to enhance local entropy to create small replicas for ground gear, so we can use some of those fancy techniques on away missions."
"And?" Antonine asked, from short, but rich, experience. For Tela, this was terse – there must be a part 2.
"We were able to run a lot of tactical drills with those temporal tricks this week. The computer core on Fuso is a little behind modern except for that M6 standalone – we get any time to a dockyard, I can fix some of the clustering for speed, but if you can authorize freeing up, oh, say, eighty or two hundred cubic meters in the hull, the Romulans have some new quantum relays to coordinate their cloaked ships with those new command ships. Then we could really set some gunnery records now that the crew has figured out which end is the emitter on an antiproton bank," Tela said eagerly.
Antonine calculated mentally. "I'm assuming in the continued hunt for more energy on target, you don't want to drop the redundant particle emitters to the shields or the capacitors." Tela nodded briefly. "That leaves… the holodecks, half the crew quarters, a third of the impulse engines, or most of the life support." Antonine started punching notes on into the console.
"True," Tela allowed. "If the lab space wasn't so distributed it would be an option as well. I suppose we can trundle along with the weapon boosters we have, but you figure a ship from the future would be able to set some records, and quantum shield interpretation would help."
"About that," Antonine asked, casual, "I'm trying to pull up the computer you mentioned but I keep hitting a security seal – it seems the Republic still has the specs classified. How did you know enough of its specs to give a size estimate?"
"Well, Captain, I'd love to tell you, but we have a meeting to prep for," Tela said sweetly.
The meeting took place on schedule with her departmental chiefs and bridge officers. Manas looked glum. "Despite our attempts to understand the engineering of the temporal technology, we were unable to improve on either the timeline scanners or understand the temporal shift devices the ship uses during the mission," he reported. "Though the rest of the science sections' data from orbit will be very valuable to historians, once it has been sanitized of originating in another time period."
"I didn't see the Na'kuhl commando transport in, and it doesn't sound like Sliss did either – she was distracted by the trashbins and then myself," Antonine reported. "No technological differences from the combat reports we had used for training, though, so it still appears the Na'kuhl got one 'shift' through history. Or at least this history." That caused some nervous chuckles.
"We didn't have any issues with chroniton buildup, temporal diffractions, or gravimetric shifts," Tela reported. "We've run level one diagnostics on all systems over the week. Dilithium matrix is stable – none of the previous disruptions associated with long-range time travel for an object of this mass have been reported." They had done some personal time travelling for missions, or through Daniels' intercession, but this was Fuso's longest trip under its own power, alone without any experienced hands.
"Extend my thanks to the crew, please, and my apologies they aren't going to get the break we were hoping. Do you feel comfortable we can pull the temporal wake trick Chekov authorized?" Antonine asked. They'd dragged some extra firepower on missions, but, again, had Daniels, who time travelled better than he lied and almost as well as he breathed.
Manas and Hela shared a glance, and the Reman gestured, letting Hela speak. "We ran several simulations since we had some free computer space and time. It's hard to tell with the core; it's usually oriented backwards on our own temporal axis. We've got some simulations I want you to look at later." Antonine nodded.
Manas cleared his throat and Hela got back on subject. "Right. Based on our measurements and observed temporal transits by Alliance craft, we can guarantee at least one cruiser sized ship can transit on the same trajectory." She shrugged, "Maybe several small escorts, but that many warp fields, even on standby, have plenty of odd interactions with the technology we do completely understand."
"It sounded like this isn't a mission for subtlety," Feric observed. "Could we cram a dreadnought in behind us? It sounded like they were hunting for people. I'd love to have the Enterprise backing us up."
Donaldson said stiffly, "The Enterprise's movements aren't precisely known while on missions – I'm not sure we have time to track it down."
Hela said, "Hypothetically, the mass shouldn't be an issue, though the feedback as energy cascades into normal space would be hard on its surface systems. Assuming no time to refit, if Captain Shon didn't mind having someone else be his eyes, it could work." She shrugged
"Actually, I wasn't planning to look for Captain Shon," Antonine said, abstractly, then looked around at everyone in surprise. "Admiral Chekov mentioned the Mirror Universe was an x-factor they were trying to eliminate. The best trained group for that is the Badlands patrol fleets; with time a factor, the best chance to find someone cleared for time travel and battle capable is at Deep Space Nine, given our short time window."
"Admiral Chekov?" Hela asked.
"I did a quick check on the name against the database; apparently Temporal Defense recruiting is even more dramatic than we thought: he served on Kirk's Enterprise," Antonine said. "Facial recognition puts the approximate age in the early 24th century, though." Hela whistled.
"That's actually alarming," Manas said. "If the best candidate still aligned with the peaceful administration of the timeline is from in the past, then the future could have been twisted to something we would all find very grave. Personal freedom is one of the corner stones of all parts of the Alliance – given the power of time travel-"
"That's not the future yet," Antonine vowed. "If New Khitomer is still under our control, then there's still a good chance, but it's clear they need the best help we can find." She stood up, and turned to look.
"Donaldson, you're in charge of Feric's noisemaker. Make sure the flight path's a match for what we should be, and I want contingency plans if we can't wait around to go to warp – get a shuttle loaded with the flight plan too and tweak it to match our current signature. Don't worry about sparing the coils, and rig it to self-destruct after it can reach a point where it can go to work and drop the probe off," she ordered. The big human grimaced at Feric, and nodded. Feric grinned back.
"Feric, don't look so pleased, you've got the rougher duty – we're inserting back at our relative point at the continuum, so I want you to go over all the operations plans Starfleet had for the week to estimate what's at Deep Space Nine, or within a half-hour at maximum warp. I want experienced captains or flag officers over big ships if we have to pick. Someone having a nervous breakdown over how they may accidentally erase their grandchildren is not someone we have time to quibble with," Antonine said. The Ferengi nodded.
"Manas, look over the temporal scanners if there's any obvious deviation before Procyon, and if the situation 'somehow' unlocked some records about the battle, finally. I know we don't have any information on where we're headed after Khitomer, and they may not know, but I doubt we'll have time for a full briefing." The Reman nodded.
"Tela, run a check on the tactical systems and make sure we've got all the counter-programming for Starfleet ships loaded – get a probe loaded with all out logs for the mission in case we don't have time, and detail some people to make sure all the crew who wants to have personal logs loaded get some time in the," Antonine stopped, checking the clock. "Thirty-five minutes we have left."
She stopped pacing, and leaned against the table – not very dramatic given her height, but one worked with what one had. "I know none of us wanted to go into another mission immediately afterward, but it sounds like this is the big one. Over the last month and a half, I've gotten to know you, and the rest of the crew. I know all of us, no matter what the future brings, will hold to Starfleet's finest tradition so our children have a galaxy worth growing up in." Antonine stood back up and straightened her tunic, not letting her shoulders flex. "Dismissed." Her subordinated nodded back in determination as they stood.
2711 AD
Thirty-five minutes later, to their eyes, they made transit. With a flash of light and a hole into an endless field of stars, the soundless protests of the laws of physics torn beyond any rational measure, Fuso slid back into its proper place in the spacetime continuum. Everyone on the bridge let out a breath as one. They'd made some eleven transits through time as a group, and no one liked relying on a blackbox technology.
"Confirm location, and start the clock," Antonine ordered, and the corner of the viewscreen lit up with an hour countdown. They'd hopefully dropped into space far enough from DS9 that an average observer would miss them as part of the warp traffic to one of the Federation's busies stations.
Feric looked up from his pillar, "Local star matches Bajor's primary. Message traffic still matches Alliance protocols. No alert is being raised on the station by our presence, and standard traffic protocol query was met by automated buoys."
Manas added with a rumble. "All long-range quasars current signal frequency indicates desired time and space positioning has been achieved."
Donaldson said, "Engineering reports temporal core powering down, all readings in the green."
"Excellent, transmit all mission logs by normal routing to Temporal Defense. Feric, get me that ship list. Proceed to station at full impulse. Secure from yellow alert – Donaldson – get me Deep Space Nine operations," Antonine ordered, and then gave something she'd been dreaded. "Use priority sector alert code."
She always admired the big officer's professionalism – his hands darting over the console didn't even slow down given she had just done one of those few actions that carried an automatic Starfleet review board.
"Kurland here," came back the captain of Deep Space Nine almost instantly, though the background was the replimat. "Captain Revka – when's the emergency?" Kurland was serious, despite the joke – with the responsibilities of the wormhole, the Commander of DS9 carried more security clearance than some vice admirals. "I think I know what your problem is, for once."
"Captain," Feric said, "Most of Task Force 102 is here, but I don't see the Trafalgar." He squinted, peg teeth working, "Lot of Romulans too." She nodded in acknowledgement – that was her quantum duplicate's command, though if the Guardian-class cruiser wasn't here, the Admiral was probably joy-riding on some mission.
Which was an absolute shame – a temporal mission they'd been able to do some planning on had her and Foch recruiting Revka for securing an artifact with cosmic implications. Having along the version of her from this time had been … comforting. Still, there should be some senior officers available able to swing above their weight.
"First – Captain, is Ambassador S'tass on board?" she asked.
Kurland showed no surprise at the name – a good sign. "No, the Empire's Embassy is currently under the deputy, the Ambassador is still on New Romulus." The station commander looked worried. "Is that wrong?"
"No, Captain – that's one mission down," she said. "But another came up – I need the sector operational download, and I have a departure of under an hour, maximum, and whatever is the best ship you can spare."
"Ooh – I'd say the Defiant," Kurland said, "But Commander Sarish is on a strike mission against a True Way pirate base with half the ready fleet, and I'm not sure how much else I can spare. A Republic strike group showed up yesterday, they're on tactical alert around the wormhole, and they're not saying why, exactly. Maybe you can ask them?"
Antonine checked tactical. There was more Republic ships than normal, scattered around the station, but the posture didn't look unusual.
Kurland saw her confusion. "Hang on – ops, this is Kurland – tie the Fuso into our tactical net."
The systems gave a brief beep, and then the picture made sense. The Republic had three times as many ships present as they were letting on – sitting cloaked, and, when combined with the seeming indolence of their visible ships, they formed a cone stretching out from the wormhole to the station. Anything emerging would face a tremendous concentration of power.
"They're still feeding tactical data, so it's not an invasion," Antonine said, stating the obvious as her mind worked. "Our mission didn't take us anywhere near their space, so I can't imagine that's a factor. Did their commanding officer say anything?"
"No, Admiral seh'Virinat showed up, used our transmitter to the Gamma Quadrant for a while – then got navigation permission and sent her ship through," Kurland said, sounding exasperated. "As soon as she did, her whole attack group set up for interdiction and just cites operational security when we ask. Whatever it is, Starfleet Command is backing them up on it."
"I suspect our missions may actually be identical," Revka allowed, given the Admiral's track record for being in the right place at the right time. "What shape is 102 in?"
Kurland shook his head, "Operational – Admiral Revka is in seclusion in the temple, one reason I'm down here instead of ops."
"She let the Trafalgar go?" Antonine asked, surprised.
"She was going to take it on a terraforming support run, but the request from the temple suddenly came up. She kept her flag on Nagato and it's actually fully repaired for once," Kurland offered.
"That sounds… actually, suspiciously ideal," Revka said, and glanced in what she thought was the direction of the wormhole. "I'm going to beam down, to see if they let me in to see me, then." Kurland nodded. "Revka out – we're sending a full briefing, but with the security chain, it may be a little bit before it hits your desk." Kurland nodded, and cut the connection.
"Manas, tactical scan of the Nagato," Antonine ordered. The big Yamato was in spacedock, of course. Given the nature of the dreadnought as an assault platform – it was either being held back for combat, in combat, or repairing from combat. However, it looked like all the nacelles were attached and the status monitors agreed.
And, unlike most of Starfleet, its crew had a lot of experience – and the ship's systems were tweaked to a much higher performance level, with what looked like some sort of exotic reactive shielding. "Feric, anything else seem as useful for throwing into a battle?"
"Maybe some of the escort squadrons – there's a Mercury group," the Ferengi said, "But I checked – the captains are all newly promoted and the power levels are showing class base." Antonine nodded, a bit disappointed – even she was getting the Fuso pushed up technology-wise even as the crew was still shaping up, though she didn't quite have an Admiral's knack for part acquisition.
"Manas, you have the conn," she said. "I'm beaming to the station. If I'm not back in time, take us through on the given coordinates." The Reman nodded, and moved to the center of the bridge as she headed off.
Once the Captain was safely off the bridge, Feric added. "You think there's any possibility she's not coming back with the other of her over anyone else?"
"That's not the best to say," Donaldson chided.
"The Admiral's a hero. Having her along saved our butts when we got sent against the Breen," Feric said. "If I had a self that had three extra years of combat experience I didn't have to waste a lot of time explaining a crazy mission to save the Federation, I'd go for it."
That got some nods. "True – who better to trust than one's own reflection?" Manas said.
"That… may not quite be accurate, Commander," Donaldson said. "I've fought the Terran Empire; your reflection is usually the last thing you want to see."
Antonine materialized directly in front of one of the airlocks linking the promenade with the outer 'rings' of DS9. Captain Kurland was at the replimat, gazing at the temple location with some worry – though that could be his normal expression after the last few years commanding the galaxy's crossroads. The hallways of the promenade were living up to the title, with a dozen familiar species and a hundred she couldn't name offhand.
She started to walk over, but found her path suddenly blocked – a Bajoran, in the robes of one of the low-ranking pryars. The Bajoran was carrying a small box and looked frazzled. "Admiral Revka," he said, with a nervous formality. "I was told to return this to you after your meeting with the Prophets." He looked her over and then blurted. "Twice in one lifetime – the honor, I can't – excuse me. May I survey your pagh?"
"What? Yes?" Antonine said, not sure why the Translator had dropped out. "But I think you have the wrong-" She stopped as the pryar reached up and grabbed her ear briefly, before his face fell. He could not have looked more destroyed if she had taken her phaser to him, silhouetted against the wall like – she blinked, and forced her hands to unclench.
Bowing slightly, the pryar mumbled apologies as he moved away. "Are you all right?" Kurland asked, having come up to her.
"What the hell was that?" Antonine asked, and moved over to the shade of the replimat to avoid being quite a distraction.
"It's a Bajoran ritual on the pagh– somewhere between life force and a soul in more general terms, if the UT is carrying that over. Religion always makes the translator temperamental," Kurland commented. "Have you not seen it before?"
"No, I was never posted to Deep Space Nine or Bajor itself – we were able to build a lot more outposts along the Cardassian frontier and Boudicca was usually there," she said, and made sure a chair was behind her to sit. "I've been to member world celebrations and lit the temple offerings two years back home before Q; that was surprisingly personal."
"I've often had new personnel react that way – the Bajoran religion is very tied up to their political system; even given a person's history, the shape and strength of the pagh is an important and objective guide," Kurland said. "Unfortunately, the Prophets seem to be interceding – Admiral Revka's commbadge and Bioscan are not within forty thousand kilometers of the station right now."
"Perfect," Antonine said bitterly, considering other options. If the Celestial Temple wanted her other self out of action, there wasn't anything they could do in an hour, unprepared. "Did she get exchanged for a gift? What did my counterpart donate, I wonder?" Antonine said. "When you had the Jem'hadar attack I'm pretty sure I was wrestling something like a half-sized Rigelian tiger to recover samples on a survey mission, if I've got the time dilations matched." Kurland glanced at her oddly. She shrugged.
"Just because it was peaceful didn't mean stagnant," she said defensively. She pointed towards the pryar, who was still pacing back and forth nervously, fluttering hands. "The temple seems to be looking for the Admiral as well – do you have that list of alternates then?" She sighed. Having a battle-hardened version of yourself was reassuring.
"Well – we've been cycling through the fleet lately and most ships are on patrol – I think we've got six with the security clearances necessary in range, four with up to date psychological profiles – the other two are probably fine, but their last evaluation was before they got bumped to command," Kurland said. "We'll have to go to my office to check the crew lists; your people may be survivors of this sort of thing, but it's hard to tell in advance."
Antonine held up her hand, and said, "That's frankly immaterial – if they have nervous breakdowns later, at least they'll still exist to have them; we don't have time to pick the best or even best available. My counterpart was a useful shortcut"
Kurland swallowed at that, and then looked at the pryar again, who apparently threw up his hands in frustration and went into the temple. "Okay – maybe Captain Tervan will work – he has some experience – if both of you max out your coils, you can probably get to him in time if nothing disrupted his patrol. He's not the easiest to work with, but he has a good rep from the Iconian War."
"All right, though I wish it wasn't so close – I'll tell the Fuso to prep for quantum slipstream," Antonine said. So much for the omniscience of non-linear beings; she could easily imagine what, say, the Cardassian Union without Federation influence would do the wormhole.
Kurland nodded, and then stopped as a commotion came on the temple steps. The pryar was stumbling backwards, into people who were crossing the promenade, and ignoring all of it, even as he fell. Out from the temple, blinking at the light change, was Admiral Revka; slipping something into a pouch on her uniform belt. Revka saw the two of them and waved briefly. Antonine signaled to her counterpart, whose gaze hardened, but she did another cheery wave and moved to join them, ignoring the pryar.
Antonine looked at her other self, the native of this timeline, and veteran of wars that had not occurred in her timeline. It was an odd thing to look at one's self and see what one would look like in a few years. Stress and death, the workload of fleet staffing, and dozens of battles had aged her other self prematurely, a darkly blood-stained timeline Antoine herself had no relation to. But that history had helped the Federation establish diplomatic ties across the quadrant, encounter new species, and push back the boundaries of possibilities.
"Is it solipsistic to say that I see two of my favorite people are together?" Revka joked briefly. The two exchanged a quick hug.
"It's good to see you, and I wish this was a social call," Antonine said.
"Bad?' Revka asked, quietly.
"From the way it was described; a possible criticality in a major temporal nexus point," Antonine said, "Bad enough they're looking for extra hands from the past."
Revka tapped her communicator. "Nagato, move from yellow to Red Alert status, prepare to clear mooring." After acknowledgement, she asked, "Wouldn't that make the odds worse? Our crews won't be there for the timeline," Revka said. "I know depending on the temporal event the pattern is odd."
Antonine nodded agreement, "When you have time travel, the future can precede the past. But it sounds like the Mirror Universe from our time is involved; probably for a share of the loot."
Revka patted her pocket, "Okay – then I'm glad I was around even if I wish I didn't get how the Terrans think– the Romulans around meant I was going to fake moving the flag to keep an eye on whatever had them worried. Not good enough for the Prophets it seems."
"What did they say?" Kurland asked, "If they're worried, it could be important."
"Where space burns, you must quench the fire," Revka said. The two waited expectantly, and she shrugged. "That's it. I looked into an Orb, got that spoken by Admiral T'Nae, and then was back. Nothing else – subjectively, it took maybe fifteen seconds."
"That was exceptionally non-helpful," Antonine commented.
"Yes, nice of them to take two hours to make sure I was around, apparently," Revka said with a snarl. "We don't have much time – is there a briefing on the other end or are we being dropped into a homeworld assault."
"Sounds like forces are being gathered – no idea how many, but as many as it can, it seems – and it is bad enough Daniels isn't going to be there," Antonine said. She pressed a few buttons and transferred some information. "And so this is going to be a rougher transition than last time; but my engineers think we can take you - I'm sending the probable effects."
Revka looked over the results for a few seconds, scrolling down past the science to the summary of the effects, "Doable, especially with other Starfleet ships in the area– Captain Kurland," and Antonine recognized Revka's 'command voice' – she used it as well. "I'm putting in a formal requisition for all your lateral sensor pallets; standard issue – and anything in spares for ships below ready condition – with luck, we'll bring back enough you can service so the parts depot isn't dry." Kurland nodded.
"All right – let's get our navigation and engineering teams talking – it looks like we have a half-hour left to leave, maybe we can smooth the ride a little," Revka said. She stood, and Antonine followed towards the better beam-out point.
As they left Kurland's earshot, Revka said quietly, "I see you put some work into figuring out how to force a Galaxy through."
"They're the largest ships in terms of cross-section," Antonine said, "And the Nagato's the biggest gun I could expect to find in the Bajor Sector." She sighed, "And I'm scared," she admitted. "You've faced these odds, I'd rather have someone there who knew them. After the Academy, there's no match for our lives. I don't want to face this alone."
Revka patted her shoulder, "Trust me, that just means you're sensible. Stacking the deck is the best form of luck, even when you aren't sure which game."
"So I take it the Prophets handed you an ace?" Antonine asked.
"It's certainly a wild card," Revka said. "If we can figure out how to play it. I'm happier having a pair."
Antonine stood on her bridge again, and waited for the ship in front of her to light up, thinking again on what her counterpart's ship represented. The clock was counting down, six minutes to null point.
Take an interstellar polity, huge, expanding via diplomacy, and the massive conflicts against an equal power generations removed. Give it technological superiority in its few recent wars, and a certain arrogance. Build massive ships, mobile starbases, capable of anchoring the exploration efforts of entire sectors, full of everything to keep a crew happy on a multi-year mission, with massive advancements almost everywhere but weapons. Leave even more space in the future for more plans to expand, just because you can. Name it, in an act of hubris, the Galaxy.
Then run into an enemy, that didn't want planets, that didn't have anger, or fear, or pride driving them – just a hunger for your very superiority and distinctiveness. Lose, badly, fighting – learn how much more there is in dangers, and how far there is to go. Take a look at that extra space – reinforce shield generators, and structural integrity, add more weapon capacitors and nadion generators. Cram even more short-range sensors in for tactical work.
Rebuild your fleet, but face a different enemy, more relatable but equally dangerous. Have a designer point out you don't need all those labs and science sensors and range when you're in a massive fleet. Start some design studies about what to do with that space instead. Win the war, but keep the design studies going. Eventually, reach the point where you can put a starbase weapon on a mobile hull, if you don't mind ripping out everything you designed the Galaxy for. Sure, the mass made it nearly unmaneuverable; but giant gun. And also, it even slowed down construction, since they took half again as many warp coils; a real pain at that size.
That's where it ended in Antonine's timeline. There were a dozen such design concepts – one, she recalled, was designed to detach its saucer permanently to serve as a colony hub for mass-settlement. Here, though, further wars had led to the plans becoming a reality. The gun was certainly big, and technology improvements made the Yamato version, using some of the technology from advances that led to the Odyssey, made the Nagato more maneuverable, and even shrunk the giant gun enough to fit in carrier construction facilities, for more guns.
On the other hand, the Odyssey was massively powerful and a strong exploration vessel. And the Odyssey was still years away in her timeline. And there were normal Galaxies too, upgraded as well, in more than just guns. And her own ship, originating in the future, was clearly built in Starfleet's traditional quad-nacelle, long-range explorer vein.
But sometimes you needed a giant gun. She, Foch, and Revka had torn apart an entire wing of the Breen invasion forces during a temporal jaunt to Earth (it was classified, and complicated) and that was only a few decades different. The time travelers Starfleet had faced were civilian terrorists and pirates. This was a historic battle; whatever amazing capabilities in the future would be matched. If they were to be meatshields, the Nagato would at least help them sell themselves dearly.
"Nagato reports warp injector start – bringing up running lights and cutting from shore power," Manas reported. The ship lit up, running lights touching the registries and the old required red/green to indicate direction if all else failed. The usual grey and blue warp grills, though, were replaced by the high-energy emitters of Iconian-boosted technology. A touch of thruster drifted Nagato clear of the skeletal gantry.
"Move us into position, Donaldson," Revka said, pacing between the control pillars. The burly security officer nodded, and she felt through her boots the infinitesimal quiver in the inertial damping as the Sagittarius's maneuvering thrusters skewed them around before the Nagato. Antonine was too much a product of the 25th century to go for a combined weapons/helm position normally, but Donaldson had the best pilot certifications of anyone on board from his old career in the Federation Marshals, before an encounter with an alien singularity projector cost him fifteen years.
"We have linked navigation to Nagato's main bridge; they have unlocked security and slaved their helm controls to ours," Feric said, working the ops pillar. "Remember Sjerd, they've got twice our mass and the flag's a friend of the captain – don't ding their paint, dive into any unnecessary black holes."
"You really want to go into this now, Probationary Lieutenant?" Donaldson asked, "Maybe you should double check your bandwidth – it's pretty clear your first checks aren't up to why a planet would be called Shiva."
Antonine and the other bridge officers didn't bother hiding smiles as Feric made indignant noises. It was an old routine at this point – Feric had been making a dramatic sales presentation of some new technology… and while it had saved Feric, Donaldson (and the investors) the anti-gravity fields the Ferengi had created hadn't saved them fifteen years from the mysterious singularity generators of the cordoned planet.
Fortunately, work-release was working well. She'd wanted Feric, but Donaldson had come to make sure the Ferengi wouldn't kill them all. While he hadn't qualified for starship duty fifteen years ago, attrition meant Lieutenant Commander Donaldson was now the ship's second officer.
"Indulge him, Lieutenant," Antonine directed, "Run pre-transit diagnostic on the temporal core. Commander Donaldson, let's get the Nagato clear, and align us on temporal vector – Commander Manas, confirm the clock."
"Aye, Captain," the Reman said, "Five minutes remaining on Temporal Defense's estimate. Setting course for the 28th century, New Khitomer system. Locking in the core on given coordinates."
"Captain – the pre-ignition routine isn't building power at the rate we've seen on previous transits," Feric said. "No problems showed in the earlier diagnostic with any of the shielding. There's some odd entropy resonances skewing around too."
"Replicate to science's station, Lieutenant," Antonine ordered as she walked beside Manas. At the heart of the display, the repeated signal from New Khitomer's temporal scanner beat – but thready and wide.
"I'm more familiar with subspace, but that looks more like an interference pattern than power loss," she commented. Though unless New Khitomer took more damage than she thought, why have so many signals? What could be blipping so badly? On that thought, her eyes narrowed.
Manas started briefly as he looked up, "Power loss would be my first thought, given the circumstances with the nexus existing before New Khitomer," the Reman admitted. "But my field is more exotic particles, and we're seeing a definite drop in them – that could be due to some scattering, but we have little ability to adjust or read the signal beyond the equipment presets."
"We need maximum aperture," Antonine said, "Try something fast – can you set five minutes farther ahead than the rendezvous?" Manas compiled – much of the pattern suddenly dropped away. The Reman turned to stare at his captain.
"Power gain rate climbing! Chroniton particle now fitting previous patterns," Feric crowed.
"Leave your ear cleaner off next time," Donaldson grumbled.
Antonine shrugged at the liaison officer, "We have someone from our time running the controls on their side– not Daniels. Every time we travel, it leaves a blip on the timeline – there's dozens of ships in Temporal Defense; if they're all hitting the very same spacetime point."
"Then all those ships are technically changing time," Manas rumbled. "A good theory."
"One I'm sure they'll never confirm for us," Antonine said in a very low voice. She stepped back to center. "Ready vortex for maximum aperture – helm, we updated our vector slightly, make sure the Nagato's prepped."
"Aye," Donaldson said, and the deck gave another tiny thump.
Tela's voice came over the intercom. "Engineering here – warp core stable – bringing systems to full power for transit. All capacitors now in series and charging."
"Subspace fields matching," Feric reported. "Nagato's warp signature now matches Fuso – they are raising shields."
"Start the final countdown," Antonine said. Before them, the faint Cherenkov glow of the vortex started to build before them. She signaled all hands. "All hands! Brace for temporal transit."
"Four minutes until null point, fifteen seconds until transfer," Manas said.
"Ten seconds until capacitor dump to core, all systems stable, mark! Nine, eight," Feric continued the countdown.
"Nagato going to full impulse. Estimated clearance after transit at fifty meters," Donaldson said.
"Three, two – mark!" Feric said. Before them, the vortex opened – into 'other', as far as their science could still tell. The eye refused to recognize it. Hopefully, New Khitomer would be there still on the other side.
28th century
"Transit – three, two – mark!" Donaldson said – and there was the brief period between heartbeats that seemed to go forever and take no time at all. She was almost use to it, but the period after transit still got her. She staggered and nearly fell, her inner ear not quite making the trip. Most of the rest were similarly flummoxed. Even the viewscreen was wracked by static as their sensors recovered.
"Mass readings indicate probable correct location of New Khitomer megastructure. Astrometrics is trying to confirm. Multiple contacts," Manas said, refusing a little think like the violation of spacetime to crack his façade. "IFF beacons indicating Temporal Defense ships. Seeing other Federation ships – two with the Republic; a KDF beaconed ship. Trying to confirm classes."
"Nagato status?" Antonine croaked.
"Short-range sensors clearing, bringing on screen," Manas said. The viewscreen blinked, the sensor artifacts slowly clearing from it. Nagato was behind them, in the grip of eldritch lighting, its shields flickering – but the light from its warp grilles was steady, and the pattern of window lights seemed to be steadying from a frantic Morse.
"Hail coming in Captain," Feric said. "Looks like Temporal Command."
Antonine took a moment to try and straighten her uniform – it still didn't pull right, and the headache was starting. "On screen, then. Fuso responding, Admiral."
"Ah, not yet, my lady!" came back from the viewscreen. Captain Dean Foch, Antonine's oft-partner in time travel was standing there, looking more composed than she liked, and he even gave a jaunty wave. Behind him was some blue-lit conference room, like a museum display of Starfleet uniforms brought to life.
"Admiral Chekov is busy," Foch said, and leaned away to show the maroon-uniformed figure arguing with what looked like representatives of all three powers. "And between us, he may be for some time, but at least you bothered to finally arrive."
"Do we have time?" Antonine interrupted. If Foch was complaining about five minutes, they were either way off or he had screwed up.
"Our estimate, in the heart of power here, is we have four hours before time tries to rebalance. Still, at least you finally showed up, and I see you managed to find some real weight to add to the scales. Once everyone is through shouting, we should have time to cut everyone formal orders for this circus."
"And informal orders?" Antonine asked.
"Get your ships secured from transit and bring yourself and you down as fast as you can," Foch said much more seriously. "This force was never intended to operate as a fleet, half the crews are literally from different decades and aren't worked up, and it shows. Maybe we can at least shake everyone into pointing the right direction at the enemy." Foch looked behind him – the yelling was getting louder. "Foch out."
The viewscreen cut, and Antonine started issuing orders. Time it seemed, was in more supply in the future.
Four hours (estimated) until Ragnarok
End chapter 1