Washington DC
April 12, 2000
The new capital building had yet to be occupied--its cavernous rooms and arched hallways bare of anything but paint and, in some cases, carpeting. The process of moving the country's capital from Denver--one of the few metropolis's unharmed by the attackers--back to DC was turning out to be a longer and more involved one than anyone had thought. Not inconsiderable was the movement to keep politics out of Washington under the belief that a beautiful piece of Virginia had been corrupted by the convergence of local, state, and federal interests that had managed to turn much of the city into a concentric network of urban blight.
But those voices were shrill and pitched compared to the prevailing mood of the Nation, who, having gained a new perspective on fraternity, liberty, and life, were willing to give it all another go. After all, the world needed to be rebuilt and the old guard--the predominantly white, middle-aged males from family money--couldn't do it, and couldn't convince anyone differently.
These thoughts were close to the mind of James Whitmore, but not occupying it at the present. He moved the heavy telescope a bit and squinted through the eyepiece.
"I think it's a mistake, sir," said the General from near the elevator which led to the top of the capital dome.
"It's not a discussion," Whitmore replied, still looking through the telescope. Then he stepped away and let his daughter peek. She crumpled her features almost comically as she looked in the eyepiece. After a moment, she spun and faced her father, eyes glowing.
"What was that?" she asked.
"The Orion nebula," Whitmore answered with a smile.
"The country needs you," the General said in his say-little-elicit-much tone. "They need a man who can pull their reality back together again."
"What's a nebula?"
"It's like a big cloud, Patty," Whitmore explained. "It's a big cloud of burning-hot dust. And after a long time, the dust comes together and hardens into a star."
"Mr. President?"
Whitmore turned and faced the General. "They need a builder and a visionary. I'm neither. I'm a leader, perhaps. A hero, yes. A fighter, once. Not the kind of man who can forge a brave, new world. Besides, as a national hero, I can escape the invariable criticism that the presidency draws and raise my daughter." A tug at his windbreaker made him turn.
"Look daddy! I think I see star being made in there! Look at where I have the telescope pointed!"
Whitmore looked at a point in the nebula--a small flare of light where a star was being born. "Looks that way, honey."
"I'll have to stop referring to you as Mr. President," the General said with a wry smile.
"It'll be easy," Whitmore said. "Call me James. Jim. Jimmy. Jack, if you want to."
"That'll take some getting used to, sir."
Whitmore laughed quietly, understanding from the General's tone that this would be the end of the work talk for this evening. He pulled the telescope's view away from the nebula and back to the stars. There a flash, then a curl. Shooting star, Whitmore thought. Then prayed it was only such.
Stardate: 21772.1
Sector 16555
Federation Listening Post NCC-998255
Designation: Sentinel
The notion of a listening post was so antiquated, it was a wonder the hyper-correct Starfleet lexicon experts even allowed its use any longer. There were, after all, no sounds in space. Not quite anyway. Starships did not thunder through the void as they would an atmosphere where their impulse engines would roar in solidarity with the mid-twentieth century rockets that were the beginnings of their family tree. Phaser bolts didn't sizzle. Photon torpedoes didn't crash. Not quite.
There were sounds, though, and it took a trained ear and a karobytes of memory to discern them. Starships emitted gasses--plasma usually, but not always--as a matter of function, and those gasses carried sounds. Those sounds, in turn, defined precisely what race the ship belonged to, and what type of vessel it was. Lt. Palien, who manned the passive sensor array, was experienced enough to be able to tell from ear, the emissions of a Klingon warship against those of a Cardassian. The Sentinel's main computer was a delicately-tuned enough instrument to discern between a K'Vort-class Bird-of-Prey built ten years ago and one built thirteen years ago.
"Anything?" Commander Black asked, laconically, settling back in his chiropractically-adaptive chair amid the banks of sensor panels that ringed his work station like a neon halo. Black had put in three years in listening posts, but had had fourteen in starships prior to that, and still hadn't gotten used to the unconventional bridge design in stations. While starship bridges were geared to fore of the ship, listening posts were designed in a circle around the bridge's perimeter. The reason was simple: starships had viewers. Listening posts didn't. As difficult as it was for sounds to travel in space, it was impossible to see them. It was, however, possible to create three-dimensional holographic images of what they impacted--not unlike the sonar systems on ancient subsea vessels. The holo-viewer also served the function of a main viewer in times when there was actually something to see.
Now was one of those times. The image that hung in the center of the room was of a thin, gaseous cloud, glitter against space's dark fabric
"Readings...not recognizable, sir," said Lt. Palien, not taking her dark, intense eyes off the numerous readouts and computer models that begged her attention. "Our systems don't know what to make of the anomaly, sir." Her station was almost directly opposite Black's, and through the image suspended between them, she looked vaguely ethereal.
"Well that's not good," Black mused, checking his own set of sensor readings. "Our sensors are a lot smarter than we are. If they can't figure it out we are indeed paddling upstream." He spun in his seat and faced the comm station, off to his nine o'clock. "Mr. Cranston, send a message to Starfleet requesting a science vessel ASAP. Download some of our sensor readings and send them, too. Give them an idea what we're looking at, here."
"Aye sir," Cranston said and turned to his station.
"Request a Galaxy-class, at least. This is big." Black wondered for the hundredth time at Starfleet's decision not to equip these stations with science staff. He swiveled to face the viewer once again. "The hell is that thing?"
"Maybe nothing, sir," offered Lt. Commander S'Sskell from his position beside Palien. He was an Iguadoran--a large, reptilian race believed to be an ancient relative of the Gorn--and didn't fit a tandem work station very well. He fixed one individually-articulated eye on Black.
"Nothing," Black repeated thoughtfully.
"Yes, sir. Nothing. Simply nothing. The readings, the visuals, the sensor trips--just some huge glitch in the system." Despite the fact that his wide, sharp-toothed mouth was molded in a perpetual grin, right now he seemed to be smirking.
"That is possible," Black responded seriously.
"Or it could be something, but not something important, sir. Just an irradiated plasma-discharge or a cloud of plutonium-rich asteroid particles."
"Those would be picked up on our sensors," Palien said, missing the joke. S'Sskell fixed his other eye on her and narrowed it disapprovingly.
"And you're not picking anything up on active sensors?"
"Just the high-energy discharge."
Black nodded authoritatively, as if he had any clue whatsoever to the identity of the anomaly before them.
"Sir," Cranston reported, "Sector Command reports the USS Harmer en route to assist."
"The Harmer?" Black kicked the name over. "That's an Oberth boat isn't it?"
"I believe so, sir."
"Swell. We ask for a laboratory and we get a wet-bar."
Then the proximity alarms went crazy. Black turned to his sensors as everyone else on the bridge did the same. "What the hell just happened?"
"Our cloud's energy concentrated into a...a neutrino wash!" Palien answered, shouting above the alarms. "Radiation shielding just came up, full power!" Between them, the holo-viewer showed the cloud swirl and twist as if devouring itself, its colors growing a brilliant pink.
"I'm reading a massive energy build up." S'Sskell reported. "Reaching critical levels! It could tear this station apart!"
"Raise shields!" Black commanded. From the tactical console, Ensign Gaynes nodded.
"Now it could tear this station apart after a few seconds," S'Sskell grumped.
"Sir," Palien snapped, "check the quantum neutrino sensor readings. It looks like...it looks like a wormhole, sir!"
"A what?"
Then the room exploded in a wash of light and orange fire as the holo-viewer showed the cloud fold itself into a perfect circle with the ease of a master folding a sheet of paper into an origami swan. Space opened a gaping, glittering maw, releasing spires of light. And a large, black object.
"Sir," Gaynes reported, "reading mass some...Sir, some five-thousand kilometers in width. Tonnage equal to..."
"Red alert!" Black barked. "Energize phasers, arm photorps." Black's knee-board displayed the phaser sails unfolding and tracking the object, while the circular photon slings slid out of the hull and began spinning.
The ship's very visage was enough to unnerve Black and, judging by the tense silence in the bridge, everyone else. Not only was the beast looming in the center of the room enormous, but it was completely...completely alien. There were certain physical and sociological constants in the Galaxy--proof of the genetic seeding by some ancient race--and these constants extended all the way to starship design. Vessels tended to lay along a horizontal, rather than vertical, axis. They sported definite modular designs. Most of all, they looked like machines. The thing advancing upon them violated every one of those conventions.
It looked more like a sculpture than a vessel, a bust chiseled from flat onyx that the sculptor had broken in a fury. It had no bridge, no visible propulsion system, and most disturbingly, no scattering of running lights along its surface. Lights would have at least announced the presence of intelligent life inside. Lights were messages of welcome. We'll leave a light in the window for you...Black's thoughts rambled.
"Vessel bearing 000 mark 310 on a heading directly for us!" Gaynes reported.
"Hail them," Black said. His mouth was dry. If this thing wanted to go through them it could do so as easily as a human would trample a spider's web.
"Attempting standard greetings on all frequencies and in all language codes," Cranston reported. "No response."
"Sir," S'Sskell barked, "I'm reading a major build-up of power..."
And the image between got lost in a sapphire-green flash. The station rocked as if struck with a gigantic truncheon. The bridge suddenly lost lights and was awash in amber emergency lights which colored the smoke and sparks bleeding from the circumference of controls the color of blood.
"Damage reports coming in from all decks sir!" Cranston reported with a just a touch of hysteria.
"What was that?" Black demanded.
"Some sort of anti-proton..."
The second flash erased the left half of the bridge in a wash of flames and shrapnel which tore through Black like a swarm of metallic hornets. Smoke obscured his vision, became an orange smudge where there were fires. The holo-viewer was wrecked. He never saw the coup-de-grace, only knew it when the station turned to fire around him.
Stardate: 21772.1
Sector: 156621
Federation Starship: NCC-74207
Designation: Stark
No one had been able to solve the problem of the internal dampeners--not Starfleet Engineering, not Starfleet Design, not even the man who conceived of the turtle-shaped Defiant-class attack ships. The amount of power needed to give the small battleships the necessary speed and agility while simultaneously feeding their not-inconsiderable weapons systems--conservatively estimated at equal to two Galaxy-class starships--was simply too much for the internal stabilization units to handle during sudden acceleration or maneuvering. Every other starship--down to and including the shuttle-pods--had a greater dampening-to-acceleration ratio, making a ride in them akin to standing on terra firma. Crews of the Defiant-class ships could count on no such luxury.
Starfleet had been reticent to even commission the ships. The design was radical enough, even in the wake of the Borg's murderous assault on Wolf 359, and when the prototype had nearly shaken itself to pieces during dry runs, Starfleet decided to leave well enough alone. But Benjamin Sisko, who'd come up with the design as a form of catharsis after witnessing his wife's death at Wolf 359, had taken the prototype to Deep Space Nine and, with relatively minor overhaul efforts, had turned his ship into a force to be reckoned with. The man had used it to whup tail on both sides of the Bajoran Wormhole, fending off assaults by the Jem'Hadar, Klingons, Maquis, even--in what Starfleet would consider its most shameful hour--a renegade Excelsior-class starship.
The Defiant had returned Sisko from more bad situations than he had a right to survive, and Starfleet reversed its earlier decision and continued work of the other seven Defiant-class ships that had hung--partially assembled--in a small, secret shipyard orbiting Io. The Stark had been the second ship to impulse out of that yard. Starfleet, however, was still troubled by even having one Defiant. The existence of what could be considered a battleship indicated that there may be threats out there that couldn't be solved through diplomacy--something unheard of since the Federation's inception. It was also feared that once the power and survivability of the vessels became common knowledge, they might carry with them a certain inflammatory presence. It was for that reason that the seven ships were assigned specific duty areas and had strict limitations imposed on the types of situations they could respond to. A disaster call from a starbase, for example, would not be a situation that a Defiant-class would become involved in--if only because they lacked the space, emergency teams, and medical facilities to render any type of serviceable aid. Except if that starbase was Research Facility 1212.
"Time to station?" Captain Dwayne Kelley asked.
"Seven minutes, sir," answered his science/communications officer, Commander Prelle.
"Bring us to bearing 000 mark 000. Straight on in."
"Aye sir," responded Lt. Bojay, his navigator/helmsman. Everyone was a something-slash-something else in the damned ships, Kelley, thought with a mental scowl. The things had bridges smaller than your average tent.
"Visual," he ordered. Bojay brought the station up on the viewer. It looked normal enough. A central core with four pylons, at the end of each was a giant disk that contained science labs. No signs of phaser fire or photon blasts.
"Scan them," he ordered.
"I detect...indistinct life signs," Prelle said after a moment. "and, sir, they've initiated a gamma-rad field around the outer bulkheads of the station."
"A gamma-rad..."
"I'm sorry, sir. A gamma radiation field approximately a molecule thick, yet concentrated enough to scramble any attempt at beaming in."
"Or out," Kelley mused. "If they wanted to keep visitors out they could have raised their deflectors. What do we have on the distress signal?"
"Standard automated distress call."
Kelley stroked his neatly-clipped beard. "Will passing through the field do any damage to us?"
"Obviously anyone who came into contact with it would be affected by the radiation, but since it isn't constant exposure, I would say that the effects would be easily treatable, even with our medical facilities."
"All right, then. Mr. Bojay, plug us into their main docking port. Alert Commander Thrush that her team is on."
Miranda Thrush felt the pneumatic armor sigh closed around her chest with a squeeze a bit like that of a boa constrictor with delusions of grandeur. A moment later there came the slight prickling of the bio-monitor probes touching her flesh. The probes would keep a constant watch on her vital signs and administer the necessary medications, stimulizers, or neuro-stimulants keep her vitals stable. They would even instruct the body to cut off the blood flow to a ruptured organ or severed appendage. Behind her, the other fifteen members of her team was wriggling into their
armor and testing their weapons. They did not carry the large, gyroscopically balanced, multiple phase-capable, plug-ugly, and very awkward phaser-rifles that Starfleet issued. They had shorter, more compact compression models based loosely on Romulan designs. The weapons were less energy-efficient than the standard--firing more devastating bolts rather than extended beams--but they were more effective and easier to handle in shock situations.
A shock team of fifteen troops plus one commander was general-issue with every Defiant with the exception, ironically enough, of the actual Defiant (though from what Thrush had gleaned from Sisko's reports, he could use one). Shock forces were designed for boarding and attacking--something the Federation didn't do except in wartime--but since the Defiants were built to tend to high-risk, violence-likely situations, it made sense to have troops aboard who were equally ready for those situations.
Kelley, Thrush felt, was a fool for docking. If there was some threat aboard that station, docking gave it a clear passage into the ship. It would be better to send the troops in aboard a shuttlecraft, but to Kelley that was too much like mounting an offensive. Kelley really wasn't the right man to command a ship of this nature, Thrush, reflected. He was a scientist by nature, but the current lack of available command material had thrust him into a center seat not of his choosing. And Thrush knew that she could mind her team. The ship was his problem.
"Commander, is your team ready?" Kelley's voice filtered through the bulkhead com. Thrush punched it.
"Aye sir."
"Prepare for deployment."
Thrush turned to her team. "All right people! Let's heat them up and move them out!" The team rumbled their affirmation as they pulled on their helmets with the vision-enhancing units and 3x-sensitivity earpieces. The Stark docked with and audible thump and the clang of grapplers locking into place. The shock team assembled in a loose diamond formation at the main docking hatch. A moment later, the hatch rolled open, exposing a curtain of shimmering red. This would be the containment field, Thrush thought. She took a breath. "Okay, let's move!" They poured through the glowing curtain and into the large, main docking bay of the station, each of them covering a specific region. In an area this large, their phaser-rifles were set to wide-field.
"Thrush to Stark, are you reading this?" Her suit had a visual sensing unit built into the helmet.
"Copy that, Thrush."
"All right," she said, looking around the cavernous and empty room. "There's nothing here. We're going to move into the central hub via corridor five." The team followed her the short distance to the doorway where the doors swished open obediently. The lights were only at a third-illumination. Thrush didn't like this. No signs of a struggle, yet all the signs that the station had been under siege. Two-thirds of the way down the corridor, they found the first body. It was crumpled against the bulkhead like a broken, toy, its head a mass of blood. Thrush shined the light on her armored sleeve over the body so the bridge crew of the Stark could have a better view.
"My God...Thrush, examine the body. What happened..."
But she was distracted from Kelley's orders by the scream that echoed through her helmet. She spun, bringing her phaser to bear. The rearguard was being dragged into a jeffries tube by a single, slender tentacle. Two of her team were firing into the tube.
The ceiling caved in in a mass of thin, duranium panels and some of the most horrific creatures Thrush had ever seen. She fired blindly, hearing her troops do the same. She spun, tried to give an order, but the strobe of the constant, unrestrained phaser fire was overpowering her helmet's visual enhancers.
"Fall back!" she shouted. "Ready photon grenades and fall back!" She turned to clear the passage back to ship, and faced six of the things. They stood at least eight feet tall with spindly insectoid legs, heavy, articulated arms, and a body that was all torso, flaring and fluted in places like an Egyptian sarcophagus. They screeched and advanced. Between their ranks, Thrush could see more of them emerging from gaps in the deckplates and swarming into the docking collar of the Stark.
Kelley, you fool...Thrush thought as she brought her weapon to bear on the foremost alien's mask-like face and fired. It tumbled backward. Three more filled its place, and Thrush found herself wishing she and the team hadn't reset their weapons from wide-field when they stepped into the corridor. She fanned her blue phaser-bolts back and forth, cutting down as many of the things as she could until she saw an empty doorway.
"Back to the ship! Let's move!" She spun to lay down fire under which her team could escape. She saw only the grey-black body of one of the things. Tentacles thrashed around her.
"What the hell is happening?" Kelley demanded, trying to make some sense of the action of the viewer.
"No response, sir," Prelle answered crisply.
"All right, let's take her out of here. If there is some sort..."
"Sir, someone's coming through the docking collar!"
Kelley spun to face his tactical officer. "How? they don't our entry codes!"
"Unknown sir, but..."
"Sir," Prelle called, "we've got unknown lifeforms on decks seven, eight, and nine."
"Sound Intruder Alert, get security teams over there..." a fine sheen of perspiration rose on Kelly's forehead. The great supplement to the relatively thin security forces were the shock troops. Who were trapped on the station.
"Mr. Bojay, get us out of here!" Kelley shouted, shattering the decorum he, as a captain, was required to maintain. A moment later, the viewscreen showed the station growing smaller and small, grey bodies tumbling into space.
"Security, report!" he called into his com panel. There was no response. "Security?"
"Sir, this Ensign Ahig in Engineering! We've got intruders, sir...some kind of monster...they're My God, They're..." The young Ensign's voice rose to a scream. Kelley swung to face Bojay. "Prepare for emergency transport, all unidentified life-signs..."
But the lights went out around him, leaving the bridge illuminated only by the scattering of control-panels. Behind him, Kelley heard a turbolift door hiss open.
Stardate: 21772.1
Sector: 162177
Federation Starship: NCC-1701E
Designation: Enterprise
She was only twelve days out of Spacedock, but Picard swore he could feel the stability in the deckplates, the sound of the turbolift, flickering of the computer displays. It had taken a Starfleet team of engineers a week to remove all of the Borg equipment, nanobrobes, and subroutines to their liking, but Picard had had them put in an extra five days to sweep the ship and make sure there wasn't anything they'd missed. Only when they'd done this had they cleared the ship to his liking.
Though more than once he's entertained the notion of sweeping the Engineering bay with phaser beams, the way they searched for Changelings.
However, duty called.
The Enterprise was supposed to have remained in Starbase 44's therapeutic womb for a few more days while Picard answered any follow-up questions the brass may have had about the Second Borg attack. Except the distress signal had come in from the USS Stark, and when one of their battleships called for help, Starfleet listened. Starbase 44 had a couple of Miranda-class starships as well as some of the newly-commissioned Sabre-class ships, but they were Destroyers. Line-holders and border-maintainers. Backup at best. Whatever had caused the Stark to broadcast a distress signal would have to be more than a match for them. Not so, however, for a Sovereign-class Heavy Cruiser. Not so for the Federation's flagship.
"Sir," Ensign Strain called from the station at tactical that would ordinarily be manned by Worf, had he not shipped back to Deep Space Nine, "we're receiving the distress call from the USS Stark. Audio only."
"On speakers," Picard ordered. The ceiling-mounted speakers broadcast a crackling, panic-laden voice that cut through the lulling throb of the ship's engines.
"This is Captain Dwayne Kelley of the USS Stark transm...any ship hearing this for immediate assistance. We are under attack! Repeat, we are under...forces within the starship itself...taken engineering...Our coordinates are..." The broadcast concluded in static.
"Helm, can you triangulate their position?" Picard asked.
"Attempting..." Data responded, his cat-like eyes scanning the panel before him. "The signal originated at sector 156621. Near Starbase 1212."
"Plot a course," Picard instructed Ensign Strain, "warp nine."
"Course plotted," Strain reported.
"Engage."
Even minus Lt. Commander Worf, the familiar faces sitting along the arcing, polished-black table made him feel as if the Universe was unfolding in the proper manner, even including the crisis at hand. There was, behind him, a blurred, rainbow of a starfield that reflected in the tabletop. Picard had always found this sensation reassuring. It was as if he had a tiny bit of the galaxy he could carry with him in his pocket. Even in times such as these.
"Since we've been called off of leave early, I thought we might meet and discuss the possibilities of what awaits us, as well as our response to it." He settled back in his chair. It yielded to preceisely the same pressure as his old one. "If nothing else, it will help pass the time until we reach our destination."
"That would be in approximately four-point-six-two-one hours," Data offered.
"Thank you," Picard said tolerantly, then turned to his right, to address Commander Riker. "Number One, have you completed the background search into the USS Stark?"
Riker nodded, his blue eyes radiating a cold dread. "The Stark is a newly-commissioned Defiant-class starship. She left the Solaris shipyards three months ago and has been on passive patrol ever since. She's commanded by a Captain Dwayne Kelley, formerly of the Gallo research vessel."
"Unlikely choice for a warship," Picard mused. He'd met Captain Kelley at a conference on comparative evolution in non-humanoid races, and nothing about the man seemed appropriate to be sitting center seat in a ship whose main function was combat.
"I agree," Riker continued. "This much is for certain, though: it ups the ante. Captain Kelley said he had attackers inside the ship. If a hostile force has seized the starship, they've siezed one with the greatest capacity for destruction."
"Agreed," Picard said somberly.
"That is a possibility," Data said gingerly, telegraphing his reluctance to contradict a superior officer, "however it is not a certainty."
Picard eyed him. "Explain."
"Defiant-class starships were equipped with certain safeguards in the event of such a takeover. After the theft of the USS Defiant from Deep Space Nine by Commander Riker's brother, failsafes were built into the command and communication systems of the uncompleted starships. One of those safeguards is automatic shutdown of all command systems simply by pressing a button on the command console, as opposed to having to instruct the main computer to take that action."
"So we may be dealing with an inert starship?" Strain asked, her dark eyes narrowing slightly.
"That is correct, however, I am not certain that terrorist insurrection was necessarily what Captain Kelley was referring to. One reason is that the distress signal was not accompanied by an ultra-violet band identification--Starfleet's highest priority code--as protocol would dictate. This alone could be explained by the frantic scenario unfolding around them. However, there is one other incongruity. Why the captain was allowed to transmit his distress signal in the first place."
"Captain Kelley claimed the intruders had taken engineering," Riker picked up Data's train of thought. "So why didn't the attackers kill all power to the comm system?"
"Maybe they didn't have time," Deanna suggested.
"The garbled transmission indicates that some kind of struggle was taking place," Strain said with cold certainty. "A competent boarding party would never have allowed that. Romulans, Klingons, Breen, Cardassians..virtually every opposing race we know of would storm the bridge and engineering, wipe out everyone in those two sections, and take the rest of the ship at their leisure. These forces were less organized, efficient and, by the sounds of the losing battle Captain Kelley seemed to be waging, more brutal." The elegance and grace of Strain's features as well as the luxuriousness of her thick, dark, ringletted hair was instantly erased by the coldness of her words and the manner in which she detached herself from the prospective fate of the other ship.
Beverly Crusher brushed a wisp of strawberry-blonde hair away from her eyes and leaned forward. "Well, if we don't know for certain what to expect from the ship, perhaps we should look at the station. I, for one, have never heard of research station 1212, and when I took over as Chief of Starfleet Medical, I was responsible for budgetary and personnel allotments for all research stations in three sectors."
"Computer," Picard snapped, "identify Starbase 1212."
The computer's cool, female voice responded, "Starbase 1212 is a Monihan-class research facility located at coordinated 137 by 712 in Sector 156621."
The report ended there, leaving the room immersed in confused silence, as all senior staff members exchanged puzzled glances. "Computer, is there more?" Picard demanded.
"All other information regarding Starbase 1212 is classified required Omega-Omega-Omega clearance."
"Omega-Omega-Omega?" Geordi La Forge repeated. "I've never heard of that."
"Nor have I," Picard said dryly.
"What could be so secret?" Deanna Troi asked. No one had any answers for her.
When the Enterprise blazed out of warp in a rainbow of refracted light, the view held by the two-dimensional hologram on the main screen was not one of carnage or devastation, but of dim tedium. The Stark hung limply in space as if asleep, while Starbase 1212 rotated with the slow certainty of a solar cycle.
"No signs of phaser scoring on either the ship or the station, sir," Strain reported. "No residual photon or quantum discharge either."
"Scan them, Lieutenant," Picard ordered. "Check for life signs as well as any signs of a battle."
"Scanning...Reading no life signs. No battle damage, either sir."
"Hand-to-hand combat wouldn't leave any signs visible from here," Riker reminded him. Picard nodded. Such an unusual situation, yet his response was so...ordinary.
"Number One, take an away team aboard the Stark. Find out what happened there. Why they're not answering our hail."
Riker stood, "Mr. Data, Lt. Strain, you're with me. Permission to take Geordi, sir?"
Picard waved airily. His affirmation went without saying with Riker, but it was a formality. Starfleet was rife with them."By all means, Number One. Take the doctor as well."
"Why not investigate the station first?" Deanna asked.
"I want to secure that ship first."
Riker exited the bridge as Strain's and Data's replacements seamlessly took their stations. Picard sat forward in his chair, feeling the familiar tug of curiosity and the frustration of attaining a rank and importance that didn't allow him to indulge it.
He waited for what seemed like hours, giving menial commands to his bridge crew, running the sensor readings through his own computer-link, waiting for a report from Riker.
When it came, it was a hurried bark. "Enterprise, this is Away Team requesting immediate medical beam out!"
Picard was out of his chair and storming the viewer. "Get them out of there!" he commanded.
"Transport complete, sir," the transporter chief reported. "They're in sickbay."
"Sir," Riker's voice was heavy, "I think you'd better see this."
He turned the bridge over to Deanna and made best speed to sickbay. When he arrived, there was not the foreboding reek of phaser-burnt flesh or medical balms. He did, however, hear the whining hum of a stasis field. "Doctor, what's happened?" he asked a chalk-white Beverly. The rest of the away team stood closely in front of the stasis field. Riker turned and faced him with an aged expression.
"A survivor, sir. Not one of the crew. Not one of the researchers." Then he stepped aside and allowed Picard to see what was on the table, encased in stasis.
It was a nightmare from the past.
Beverly was in surgical garb, including the long gauntlets necessary for working through a stasis field. She scanned the creature's anatomy another time and checked the bio-reader beside the bed, to see if there was any change from the last three times she'd scanned. There wasn't.
Picard watched her work on the monster, feeling the weight in his chest shift slightly. These...it amazed him that the Federation still hadn't come up with a name for the creatures. Humankind's first encounter with alien life, the one that had brought them closer to extinction than they'd ever been in history, the incident that had forced all of humanity to recognize their fraternity within the Universe and, in many ways, planted the seeds of the United Federation of Planets. Yet the attackers were never named, never understood, never heard from again.
Until now.
"There was virtually no damage done to the Stark," Riker reported, also not taking his eyes off the medical examination Beverly was attending to. "No sign of the crew. They weren't interested in the ship, sir, nor the technology."
"Signs of a battle?" Picard asked.
"Phaser scoring attributable to the weapons issued to the crew. Nothing else. With your permission, sir, I'd like to take an engineering team and join Geordi on the ship. We should get it ready to move if we need to."
Picard nodded. "Make it so. And tell Geordi I want everything off those sensor logs as soon as possible."
Riker nodded and moved off. Picard turned back to Beverly and medical examination, then mustered up his reserve and joined her at the table. "What have you found, Doctor?"
"I 'm not sure, Jean-Luc, these creatures..." she shook her head in minor exasperation, "It's almost as if there was some sort of symbiosis at work. I'd almost compare it to a Trill, except the host organism has less sentience. It's almost a biological shell."
"What few records we have of their first assault mentions that the actual creatures were relatively small and humanoid in shape and the exterior we see is, in fact, an environmental suit. Could this be..."
Beverly shook her head. "There signs of that, but..." she changed the view on the medical moniter, "here...Look at the image." She pointed to a vague shape within the exo-skeleton. Picard stared at it, let his brain interpret the image in a number of different ways until one finally struck him.
"The creature has become...a part of the suit. The two units are merging into one being!"
Beverly nodded. "It gets worse. The exo-skeleton is composed of a mixture of tissue and synthetics similar to our polymers. The tissue, however, isn't indigenous to the life-form."
"I don't follow you, Doctor."
Beverly's brow furrowed slightly and her complexion paled. "The synthetic also serves as a support system for the organic tissue, however the tissue itself is not regenerating. It's...Jean-Luc, it's pirated. I've found seven different types of DNA in the outer shell."
Picard felt the weight move to his stomach. "Are you suggesting..."
"They're using the tissue from races they conquer," Beverly confirmed in a voice like dead leaves skittering across stones.
"Is there human DNA in that patchwork?"
Beverly's gaze met his, their horror meshed. "Yes."
"Now we know what they were after," Picard said in a soft, horrified voice. His com-badge beeped, pulling him away from the dark circles of his thoughts. He answered it, and Riker's voice filtered out clearly.
"Captain, we've downloaded the sensor-logs from the ship along with those of the station...Sir, I think we'd better assemble the senior staff for this."
"Agreed," Picard said and exchanged glances with Beverly. "Can you have a report prepared by 1400 hours?"
"I think so."
"Make it so. I want to know what these things are by the time we assemble."
The scene on the view panel did little to dispel the pall of fear that hung like a wet fog over the conference room. It showed rows and rows of creatures in stasis tubes. "A scout ship piloted by these creatures was found drifting and disabled, the pilots in stasis. They were escorted to Starbase 1212 by the Stark," Geordi said, talking over his shoulder to rest of the group. "A team of Federation xeno-biologists was assembled to study the specimens before official word of the discovery was released. This process was supposed to take a week. The ship was found two days ago."
"What happened?" Deanna asked.
Geordi shook his head. "It's not clear. It looks like one of them got loose. In any event..." he skipped forward to where the viewer showed a hazy battle scene between Starfleet shock troops and the creatures. The creatures were merciless, slashing with tentacles and clutching with bio-mechanical talons. Bodies were slammed against walls and bulkheads, or simply torn asunder in a gory spray. The mood of the room grew darker. "That was the Stark's shock team. Captain Kelley docked with station. That appears to be how the aliens stormed the ship.
"It doesn't end there, though. While the Stark's internal monitors were not operating during the struggle on the ship, the external sensors did record this..." The scene on the view panel suddenly shifted, displaying a starfield and a dark stain spreading across it. The automatic baffles on the sensors responded automatically, enhancing and clarifying until the stain became a stone wall moving through space. A small, grey blip appeared, then grew until it was a beetle-like shape which disappeared beyond the sensor range. A moment later, the beetle reappeared, shrunk to pixel, then diappeared into a green-glowing point on the wall. Then the wall became a blot on the screen.
"A ship?" Riker asked.
Data answered. "Records from the original attack record a base ship that was, by many accounts, over two-hundred kilometers in size. It is likely that what passed by the Stark was such a vessel."
"And the other craft was a launch," Beverly commented. "Picking up their lost comrades and the human bodies."
"Why would they want the bodies?" Strain asked.
Beverly explained what the specimen in sickbay had yielded.
"If that is the case," Data said, "it would seem that the intruders are no longer simply interested in natural resources, but in our corporeal forms as well."
"And they're headed toward the heart of the Federation," Picard said blackly.
"To be precise, captain," Data corrected, "an extrapolation of the vessel's trajectory coupled with recent readouts from sensor buoys would indicate that the vessel is heading toward Earth."
The room was silent as words fell like stones.
"Which would mean we're out of the frying pan..."
"Enough, Mr. Data," Picard snapped, suddenly swiveling to face his staff. "We must warns Starfleet Command and prepare for an attempted invasion on Earth."
"We've dispatched a message," Riker responded, "but they'll know the moment the first ship, listening post, or Starbase gets in the way."
"The greater danger is the defensive lines Earth will be able to muster," Strain said. "Or lack thereof. They're only about two days from Earth and fleet vessels that close to home are pretty thin from the Borg attack. The mother ship is huge."
"The Stark is in working shape," Geordi threw in, leaning over the conference table, his artificial eyes widening (and, Picard swore, brightening in intensity). "With an engineering team I could have it up and running in...seven hours."
Riker picked up on it there. "I could assemble a skeleton command staff to pilot the ship when Geordi has its systems in place."
"Two ships? Against that thing?" Deanna exclaimed incredulously. "It's almost a fourth the size of the moon."
"All we need to do is to hold it off until reinforcements arrive," Riker explained.
"What reinforcements?" Strain asked. "Respectfully speaking, the fleet's scattered. They're repairing the damage done from the Borg attack, or returning to their previous assignments. Pulling together a cohesive siege force in time to counter that thing before it begins to spit city-sized disks at the Earth might not be possible."
"Ensign Strain is correct," Data concurred. "And there is also the matter of whether or not the fleet can withstand another large-scale engagement. The state of relations between the Federation and Klingon Empire also poses a threat. A significant portion of the fleet is required to hold our positions against them."
"I am aware of the tactical difficulties we face," Picard said frostily, "however we have a Dreadnought en route to Earth. We must intercept and engage. Number One, assemble a command staff. Geordi put together your engineering team. In the meantime, we'll be searching for alternatives; diplomatic relations, any alternative to combat." Picard pushed his seat back from the table.
"Diplomatic measures didn't seem to work too well the last time we encountered them," Riker mused.
"What do we know about that initial attack?" Deanna asked. "It's been four-hundred years, we should have learned something."
"Unfortunately," Picard answered, "we haven't. We've never encountered them since, so all we have are the records from that time to work off of. And they are sadly inadequate. Earth was so devastated at that point, there were very few facilities to conduct thorough analysis. Their attack came so swiftly that there was no time to collect a great deal of data at the time of their arrival, and the carnage was so great after we'd successfully repelled them that there was very little left to study. We know they used some sort of phased-energy beam to demolish the cities they'd targeted. Knowing what we do about such weapons, it's likely they were anti-proton beams. The ships were shielded, but we have no idea of discerning by what method or to what degree. We know now that they have warp capability, but as you could see on the monitor, the mother ship had no external drive mechanisms, no warp nacelles. We do know that communicated telepathically and were able to transmit their thoughts and collective consciousness. Counsellor Troi, you will be vital in that capacity. Aside from that, we have no idea of their social structure, hierarchy, command structure or anything else. I'm afraid they are as enigmatic now as they were then."
"Except now we have the means to stand up to them," Ensign Strain said definitely.
Picard's gaze swept the table. "You have your assignments."
They left the Stark far behind, screaming at Warp 8 on an intercept course for the Mother Ship. Data now sat to Picard's right in the seat normally occupied by Will Riker, and Lt. Buckner was heading up the engineering staff. Though, they'd left less than fifty crewmen on the Stark, Picard couldn't shake the feeling of diminishment. As if the ship's complement was somehow more anemic without them.
The bridge of the Enterprise-E throbbed faintly, and her lights were dimmed to Combat Intensity to enhance the visual screens. Picard felt the humming of his ship's involuntary systems climbing his spine, spreading along his ribs, into his stomach, finally settling in the base of his skull. It was the ship reaching out to him, he knew (though he also knew on some level this was absurd). She was joining with him: he became her brain, and she became his body. Picard inhaled through his nose and felt unstoppable.
He hadn't been thrilled about the Sovereign design when he saw it--too vicious and utilitarian, he'd thought. But then he'd lost the Enterprise, and while injuries were minimal, Picard wasn't one to push luck too far. Space was not a place for waste or bloat or extravagance. It was too unforgiving. Now, in the center chair of the most sophisticated ship of the fleet, he felt an unrepentant sweep of relief that it was also the most powerful.
The Borg had learned that the hard way.
"Sir," Strain said from her position at Primary Tactical, "we're receiving a subspace reply from Starfleet Command. It's a tactical overview of the measures they're taking against the alien threat."
"On screen," Picard ordered, and a moment later, the viewscreen blurred from a starfield into a map of the Sol system. Picard looked over the massing siege force and grunted in approval. Despite the reservations Strain and Data had voiced during the briefing, Command had still managed to assemble a decent wall of starships to hold off the intruder. Three Galaxy-class starships spearheaded a collection of approximately twenty ships that would meet the threat before it entered the solar system.
"Three Galaxy-class starships, led by Captain Vaquero of the Venture," Strain rattled off the list. "Five Nebula-class ships and two Akiras comprise the primary intercept force. The supplemental force consists of two Intrepids, a Steamrunner, a Sabre, three Mirandas, and three Ambassadors."
"Admirable on short notice," Picard mused. "I'm not sure it will be enough, though."
"It'll have to be," Lieutenant Tsu commented from helm control.
"That it will, lieutenant," Picard said, then stood. There was little more to see than the empty space between the Enterprise and her quarry dwindling, and he had better ideas of how to use his time. "I'll be in Medical. Mr. Data, you have the bridge. Alert me when we're within visual distance of the intruder."
"Aye sir," Data replied automatically and slid into center seat.
Sickbay was charged with the hyperactivity that comes with the knowledge that battle is imminent. Medical personnel were hurriedly setting up triage centers, grouping equipment and supplies. In a little bit they'd be finished with preparations and relegated to waiting in the tension-choked complex for the casualties to roll in.
But Beverly was not a part of the frantic preparations--she'd left that to Nurse Ogowa--and was, instead, secluded in the lab with the bodies of the aliens. Picard entered his command code and was admitted through the self-sealing door.
"You should put a mask on, unless you want to take a trip through the transporter's bio-filters."
Picard scooped up a mask from a movable table near the entrance and slipped it over his nose and mouth. He joined Beverly at the table, standing opposite her across the monstrosity. It was, he admitted grudgingly, the singular most alien thing he'd seen in a lifetime of interacting with alien species.
"Have you learned anything further?" he asked and was answered by a flash of her green eyes above the blue of her mask.
"As in, have I found the neuro-toxin that will destroy them all? No."
"Actually, I was wondering about the various strains of DNA you've found in the exo-skeleton."
Beverly lost a bit of the stiffness in her shoulders, but still regarded him stand-offishly. "All human," she said. "Some that's unidentifiable--I think it's from their home region."
"The Beta Quadrant," Picard nodded.
"Is that where they're from?"
"We believe so, based on extrapolations of data from the late 20th century."
Beverly straightened and rolled her head. Picard heard her shoulders crackle and pop. "Jean-Luc, you are going to try to negotiate."
"Of course, why would you..."
"Your first reaction in the ready room was to assemble a fleet, arm all torpedoes, lock weapons..."
He waved her away, "I want to understand these beings as much as you--this is a historic opportunity. But as captain of the flagship, I also have to consider that the last time Earth had contact with this race, they attempted to annihilate us. And very nearly did."
"It just seems so...pointless."
"I feel the same way. But we must bear in mind these things seem to have every intention of destroying us and using our very tissue."
"Which means?"
He caught her gaze and held it. "Just because we can negotiate, doesn't necessarily mean we should."
He was interrupted by the bleeting of his comm-badge. "Captain we will be within sensor distance in seven minutes."
"Thank you, Mr. Data, begin transmitting standard hails. All linguicodes." He moved for the doors, then stopped and turned. Beverly was organizing her instruments. "You said just the two forms of DNA in that thing's armor?"
"Yes. Along with some kind of biogenic congealant that allows them to be grafted and still maintain some aspects of living tissue." Only then did she notice his intensity, "Why?"
"It may explain why they came back."
On the viewer, even set to maximum magnification, the mother ship was little more than a speck on a field of black and Picard regarded it as an explorer would a mountain or gorge that hindered his progress.
"Short-range sensors indicate some sort of warp-field--most likely generated along the centraline of the craft," Ensign Strain reported. "Hull composite appears to be base alloys. Not an organic craft."
"Weapons capability?"
"Impossible to ascertain, sir. We just don't know enough about the design to make a hypothesis."
"It appears we will have to wait until we engage them before we learn that information," Data commented.
"So it seems," Picard said tightly. While there was nothing he could do about it, that wasn't the sort of information he liked to learn in the midst of combat.
"The ship is holding at a steady warp seven, sir. And given the inefficiency of the warp field, I suspect they're at maximum speed. We should overtake them in approximately one hour."
Picard inhaled and felt the ship clutching him again. He shook it off. "What's the status of the Stark?"
"Warp engines came online approximately forty-two minutes ago," Data answered. "Commander Riker took the ship into warp immediately. Rendezvous time approximately two and a half hours."
"Excellent. Do we have a repair schedule on the Stark?"
"Commander Riker would only comment to say that they'll have the ship in fighting condition by the time we engage the alien mother ship."
Picard smiled at Riker's usual brashness. "Of that I have no doubt."
Suddenly Strain's tactical panel began bleating insistently. Onscreen, Picard saw the mother ship grow large, flare bluish-white, then dwindle into the distance again.
"Sir, mother ship has released a smaller craft on an intercept course."
"What do our sensors say?"
"It appears to be one of the siege ships used to attack cities. It's a perfect disk, sir. Approximately two kilometers in diameter."
"Intercept in seventeen minutes," Data reported. "Ship appears to have limited warp drive. It was launched in our direction like a projectile. I am reading a massive power build-up. They may be preparing to fire their main weapon."
Picard felt the ship's grip tighten around his heart. "Red alert," he said crisply. "All hands to battle stations!"
"Ready primary and secondary weapons systems," Data instructed ensign Strain. The bridge lights dimmed even further, emphasizing the red-lit runners, and the alert claxon sounded its monotonous wail.
Picard was oblivious. He was already preparing the strategies, calculating the maneuvers, anticipating the moves of an enemy he'd never before met.
"Coming into weapons range in thirty seconds," Ensign Strain reported. "Locking main phasers on target. Quantum torpedoes armed and the safeties are off."
Worf would have skipped that last part, about the safeties, Picard mused. Strain was reacting to the adrenaline of her first combat situation. "Do not fire until I give the order, Ensign Strain. We will attempt contact."
"Sir, I would be remiss in my responsibility as first officer if I did not point out the fact that the intruder's weapons were recorded as obliterating entire cities."
Picard gave Data a sidelong glance. "Your point being that the first shot may be the last shot?"
"It is my responsibility to point out the alternatives."
Picard nodded. "Understood, Mr. Data, but I will not fire on a ship first if we haven't established contact."
"Weapons range in five seconds," Strain reported. "Weapons range...now!"
The disk on the screen grew, tilted to show them its textured exterior, then vanished in a sudden blurt of light.
"Intruder has fallen out of warp!"
Picard sat forward in his chair as if to lunch forward and grab the thing with his bare hands. "Go to impulse, Lieutenant Tsu. Pursue at course...engage!"
Enterprise howled as she fell to sublight, coalesced from a blur to a sharply defined alabaster shape against the endless night. Her impulse decks glowered scarlet as Lieutenant Tsu brought her to bear at full speed on the monstrous circle that was cruising almost impassively toward an innocuous, green planet.
"Intruder is on a course for Tycho-Eleven," Ensign Strain reported. "Coordinates nine-one-two by two-two-seven."
"Our colony," Picard said quietly, imagining the terraformed agrarian city-state the Federation had established seventeen or so years earlier. How many people had settled there at last count? On screen, the disk made a perfect, black circle against the planet's green visage. It was a class theta colony, Picard remembered. That meant between seven and twenty million inhabitants. Once the intruder fired on the colony, the atmospheric processors would go. The colonists would have two hours to evacuate before the air became unbreathable.
That is, assuming anyone survived the attack.
"Power is still building in the central portion of the intruder ship," Strain reported. "I believe they are preparing to fire their main weapon. Emissions indicate that it is a disrupting anti-proton beam."
Picard mulled this. It fit with reports of the attack: a high-energy beam fired into the center of a city with a low-cohesion threshold to cause the beam to emanate outward, burning everything in its path. And it would do the same to Tycho Eleven.
"Well, Mister Data," Picard said, "it seems we won't be allowing them the first shot after all. Ensign Strain, lock weapons on the centraline of the ship. Give them one warning."
"Sir, they are approaching the planet's atmosphere," Lieutenant Tsu reported.
"No response to our warning, sir."
Picard flattened his lips against his teeth. "Open fire, ensign, with everything we have."
Enterprise became a demon. The primary phaser bands on the dorsal and ventral surfaces of the primary hull spat threads of orange fire while the multi-targeting pulse-phasers on her secondary hull laid down a background of throbbing, strobing devastation that carved and gouged the surface of the intruder ship, melting alloy into rivulets of lava or whispers of vapor. Strain followed it with the torpedoes, firing the tight clusters of iridescent blue quantum torpedoes from the weapons package on the primary hull that made a neat counterpoint to the stream of fiery red photorps launched from the tubes just beneath the scooped-out deflector dish.
Picard watched the explosions blossom on the viewer--some of the most powerful weapons ever fitted on a starship reduced to minor blotches of color against a charcoal backdrop. They were doing damage, he knew, severe damage. They could have even compromised the ship's stability, but from the sheer size of it, they seemed like little more than sparklers.
"Reading heavy damage in the centraline portion of the ship," Strain reported. "Weapon system appears unaffected."
"Intruder is changing course. Moving to intercept."
"Shields to maximum," Picard ordered, though he knew they already were.
"Weapon coming to bear," Data reported, not lifting his gold eyes from his Ops panel.
"Evasive action!"
But the jade-green ray flashed like the eyes of a devil, then slammed the ship head-on.
"Status."
"Maintaining Warp Seven-point-two. Power systems nominal. We should be able to attain warp eight-point-five in a few minutes."
Riker nodded his approval and sat back in the command chair. Around him on the small bridge, his skeleton crew was going about its duties with an easy efficiency. While he would never admit it Captain Picard, he sensed that they enjoyed the release of being on a different ship than the Enterprise. Call it a working holiday. The bridge of the Stark, small and functional, exuded a sense of closeness.
All in all, Riker thought as he surveyed his small, fully-manned bridge, he could get used to this.
"Time to intercept?"
"Approximately--" But Ensign Walker was cut off by the bleating of Riker's commboard. He keyed it.
"Go."
Geordi';s voice greeted him. "I've completed repairs on the warp engines. It'll take a little time before they reach maximum efficiency, but as long as we stay at warp, they'll make it up to factor nine-point-two."
"Very good, Geordi. What are you taking care of next?"
"There's very little actual damage to the ship's systems, Commander. Most of it's just restarting and descrambling systems. I'm going to take care of a transporter glitch, then see if we can do something about the inertial dampeners. I know on these ships the dampeners aren't supposed to be able to keep pace with the acceleration, but I'm betting I can calibrate them."
Riker grinned. "If anyone can do it, Geordi. Riker out." he killed the line and settled back in the chair.
"Sir, Enterprise has dropped out of warp!" the tactical officer exclaimed. Riker tried to remember his name...Ericksson.
"Report, Mr. Ericksson."
"She dropped out of warp in Sector seven-one-two. Communications report...they're engaging one of the intruder city-killers."
Then Riker remembered Tycho Eleven colony. "Get is there, Ensign Walker, and I want this ship up to maximum speed as soon as possible." He was reaching for his commboard to tell LaForge to get him warp nine when it bleated and Geordi's voice filtered through the speakers.
"Commander..."
"Geordi, we need full speed now. Drop whatever you're doing and get..."
"Commander, I think you should come have a look at this."
Riker tried to place the tone of Geordi's voice. He wasn't panicked--they weren't facing a breech in containment or a critical engine overload--and he wasn't perplexed by an engineering question, either.
Riker turned the bridge over to Lieutenant Commander Coleman and hustled down to the primary transporter room. He arrived in what felt like seconds--in this ship the corridors didn't seem to stretch much further than twenty meters or so--and on top of a medical team already rustling through their packs and cracking open their tricorders.
"Geordi what's going on?" he asked, but the answer was already becoming apparent to him--even with the medical staff and he and Geordi, the room seemed too crowded.
And the six or so shock troops stood out in their dark, pneumatic armor, spattered with blood. They weaved where they stood on the transporter pad, holding each other for support, and looking at the Enterprise crew with dulled, confused eyes. The only one standing unassisted was a tall, slim woman with short, jet-black hair, slicked back over her head. She held a compression phaser rifle in one hand, cradling it against her shoulder.
"My team needs medical--" she began, but was cut off by Doctor Ballard.
"We're on it!" They split up, each of them helping one of the injured troops off the pad while scanning them with the tricorder. It took a second for the room to be engulfed in the whine of scanning tricorders.
"Who are you?" Riker asked over the din.
"Commander Miranda Thrush," she lunged off the transport pad with a controlled, measured leap. "What the hell are you doing aboard my ship, Commander..."
"William Riker of the Enterprise. We were responding a distress signal this ship sent."
"What happened?" Thrush demanded. "Where's Captain Kelley?"
"Not here, Commander. It's a ghost ship." That effectively cut through her aggression, and she stopped, stared at Riker with ice-blue eyes, processing his words.
"Then they got them, too?" she asked at last.
"The aliens from the starbase. Yes. How did you..."
"I found the transporters set to a continuous diagnostic loop," Geordi pitched in. "Similar to what Captain Scott did on the Jenolin."
Thrush nodded. "We fought our way to one of the starbase's transporter pad, used their main controls to lock into the Stark's transporter controls, then beamed into the diagnostic loop. I was afraid there'd be a siege situation on the Stark and I knew we would never be able to fight our way aboard and that transporting could mean transporting into a room full of the things. I'd hoped there'd still a transporter chief around to bring us out of the loop."
"And what if there wasn't?" Riker asked. "What if those things had taken the ship?"
Thrush's eyes grew colder. "After what I saw those things do, I'd rather my pattern degrade in transport. They tore the scientists' brains out of their skulls."
Riker felt a chilled wind slash through him, he opened his mouth to speak, but Ballard cut him off.
"We need to get these people to sick bay." It was a declaration with no room for a response of criticism, a tone only a doctor could get away with.
"I'm going with my men," Thrush said, looking after Ballard's medical team.
"Not yet," Riker said, caught a lacerating stare. "You can't help them, but you can help us."
The stare turned quizzical.
"We're en route to engage the things you fought. They've got a mother ship heading straight for Earth, large enough to decimate the planet."
She went even paler. "They've got a ship?"
Riker bored into her with his own intensity. "I need to know what you know, Commander."
Enterprise tumbled, though only an objective observer could have been able to make that judgement. Onboard, the ship's artificial gravity was maintaining the illusion of stability while the lights flickered and monitors blinked, faded and flickered.
"Report!" Picard snapped.
"Damage to primary navigation and impulse systems," Strain answered. "Helm and weapons control are offline. Computer is re-routing basic command routines. We should have them back in a few minutes."
"We may not have a few minutes," Picard mused, watching the starfield tumble on the viewer. "What's our shield status?"
"Thirty percent and building."
"The initial blow diminished them," Data explained, "but when they return to full intensity they will be able to remodulate after every hit."
"Very impressive," Picard said dryly. "But with this level of energy..."
"It would be very difficult, even for our shields, to displace that amount of energy. We must avoid another impact."
"That would be advisable," Picard replied caustically.
"Intruder is adjusting its bearing," Strain reported. "I believe it is locking on to fire again."
"Helm still offline," Tsu replied.
Picard keyed his commpanel, contacted Lieutenant Fralle, the head of the damage control teams. "We need helm control now, Lieutenant!"
"Aye sir, I think we've managed to isolate..."
"Now, Lieutenant!" He closed the connection.
"Impulse systems coming online," Tsu reported.
"Intruder is targeting," Strain replied. Before them, the viewer showed the mammoth disk arc slightly and swivel until the green portal on the edge of the craft glowered at them. "Preparing to fire."
"We've got helm control!" Tsu exclaimed.
"Evasive action!"
The inertial dampeners had been damaged in the attack, but only slightly, and when the Enterprise's twin impulse decks flared, thrusting the ship out of the path of the devastating beam, the crew felt only the slightest sensation of acceleration.
"Secondary fire control is online," Strain reported. "I'm firing aft torpedoes and phasers."
The intruder's shields were no match for the Enterprise's weapons systems, but the sheer size of the thing was enough to ensure that even formidable weapons strikes did relatively little damage. Picard watched the combined photon torpedo/phaser barrage light up a section of the ship, sending up geysers of flame and vapor.
"Reading unusual energy signatures in the rim of the craft," Data said, typically calm in the midst of everything.
"Primary weapons coming back on line. Shields at ninety percent."
"Ready a full weapons barrage," Picard ordered.
"Weapons fire coming in!"
The viewer showed the enigmatic ship suddenly light up as small bolts of green lightning lashed out at them. Picard felt the tremors run through his ship. "Shield status?"
"Knocked us down to seventy-nine percent," Strain answered. "Still climbing, but under a sustained attack, I don't know how efficient out shields will be."
"Turn into it, Lieutenant Tsu. Ensign Strain, fire all weapons."
The Enterprise swivelled on an axis and bore the brunt of the fire for only a few seconds before she ambushed the dorsal side of the disk with everything she had, ripping open a gash that bled fire.
"Intruder is concentrating its fire, sir," Strain reported. "Engineering decks."
"Estimate forty seconds before they compromise shields in a one-meter square area."
Picard felt the ship shudder around him again, even though he knew she hadn't sustained any structural damage yet--that was to come. Concentrating that level of energy in that small a space meant they could carve a hole straight through engineering in less than a second. The moment the shields went, the ship would be a cloud of vapor and debris.
"Helm, hard about! Protect that section!"
"Incoming fire!"
The Enterprise shuddered again, this time protesting with alarms and burst conduits that showered them in sparks. Picard had the sudden, panicked sensation of everything slipping away.
Then the viewer lit up blue with a quantum torpedo strike.
"Enterprise, this is the Stark...could you use our help, Captain?"
Picard smiled and opened a channel. "Your timing is impeccable, Will. Standby. We'll transmit our fire-control coordinates. Concentrate all weapons in that area."
"Negative Captain. We've come into some information here. Lock onto the coordinates we transmit."
Feeling the adrenaline course through him as potent and burning as the energy pumping through his ship, Picard gave the orders, and the Enterprise combined her fire with the Stark--a dragon and a flaming angel breathing fire until their phaser beams burned out through the bottom of the intruder ship and it hung listless and dead between them.
It moved inexorably through hyperspace, its peculiar design destroying the illusion of speed or aerodynamics, the emptiness of space negating even its massive size. Until the defender came within striking distance.
"Let's transfer everything into our forward systems," Captain Salazar said. "Shield power, phasers, you name it. We're going to effect the most damage on our first pass, and our best bet is to knock her out of warp."
"Forward systems, aye."
Salazar watched as the ship loomed huge. Though nearly a century old, Excelsior-class ships were still formidably-sized, and the newest models were armed as well as ships that had just rolled off the drawing boards. The captain looked at the blinking panel on the right arm of his chair--his personal weapons display. He had those guns at his fingertips.
"Moving into weapons range, sir."
Salazar threw his shoulders back and stared down the thing on the viewscreen. "Fire all weapons. Continuous barrage until we've past the thing or knocked it out of warp."
"Aye sir," his weapons officer replied. The bridge went scarlet with battle lighting and the warning claxons sounded as the viewscreen lit up with the multiple phaser and torpedo strikes. Salazar grunted quietly. The weapons stretched out into the distance--the size of the thing made proximity illusory.
The weapons continued firing, overpowering the negligible shields and chewing up the hull of the ship. "Damage reports from intruder coming in...reporting power buildup, possible imminent explosion."
"I'll believe that when I see it," Salazar replied. "Continue firing."
"Sir, buildup appears to be concentrating into a tightly coalesced beam..."
"Take evasive act..."
And then the jade-green ray that spat from the massive obelisk's anterior erased the warship as if all that had ever been was a cloud of fine, metallic dust.
This time, the meeting in the Ready Room was charged with a different, more tangible kind of energy. It was the rawer, more directed group dynamic that came from confronted what had, until now, only been speculated upon.
Riker joined them, as did Miranda Thrush who gave them a slightly more detailed version of the debriefing she'd given Riker en route to the engagement.
"The aliens destroyed most of the computer systems on the station, but only the hardware, and not the datastorage systems. We accessed those and downloaded most of the information before those things attacked. The scientists at Starbase 1212 had gleaned a certain amount of information from the crashed ship's central computer systems, among them, a certain amount of technical data on the aliens hardware."
"That's how we knew where to hit that ship," Riker explained. "The data suggests that these craft have multiple self-destruct methods--some that kill the crew, some that blow the ship. The power relay station we took out prevented the ship from being destroyed."
"Which it most certainly would have under our combined attacks," Picard said. "This craft was a decoy, an obstacle to keep us from engaging the mother ship. To stop us in our tracks or to slow us down if it could not."
"But we now have access to it," Data observed. "And if we can extrapolate from humankind's initial encounter with these creatures, it would not be unreasonable to assume that this vessel has a centralized computer system it shares with the mother ship."
"Agreed," Picard affirmed. "Since we cannot hope to intercept the mother ship, we must leave it to the blockade and find what information we can from this ship. What do we know of it's design."
"These are the schematics we downloaded from Starbase 1212," Thrush said, standing and walking over to the display screen on the wall that now showed an object that closely resembled an old-fashioned vehicle wheel complete with central hub and spokes. "The ship is, essentially a massive generator with a rudimentary drive and weapons system. These quadrants here house small, one-man assault fighters." She pointed to the central hub. "This is the reactor--we're not sure what type. The weapon used to decimate Earth's cities four hundred years ago is essentially just a focussing element attached to the ventral side of it. The reactor kicks up, the focussing element coalesces the beam and then fires.
"These heavy conduits here can also siphon the power and focus it, though not into quite as powerful a beam. This allows it to fire at lateral targets as well as target directly below it."
"That's what they hit us with," Ensign Strain mused.
"These placements are lower power weapons systems. Anti-aircraft guns if you will."
"Now, what is important for our concerns is this area--" she pointed to a wedge-shaped segment off of the main generator. "This is their central computer system as well as main command systems. We know nothing of those, except that they are much more advanced than the ones found on the scout ship."
"We are not reading any life signs from aboard the ship," Data suggested. "We could send an away team to attempt to access their main computer system and link it with ours."
"They probably initiated one of their biological self-destruct systems," Thrush said. "They have a hive mentality and if they need to sacrifice a few hundred thousand to keep from being compromised, they'll do it."
"What's the atmospheric content of the ship?" Picard asked.
"Methane, carbon-dioxide, trace elements of helium," Riker answered. "We'll have to go in in environmental suits."
Picard nodded, "Make it so."
Miranda Thrush decided that she didn't much mind the Enterprise crew. She contemplated them as they all pulled into their environmental suits and checked their systems. She'd been given a small team of security personnel (not a siege force, but what could she do?) and told to accompany the away team while they infiltrated the enemy ship. Thrush thought it was a good position. It kept her busy.
And gave her a chance to avenge her teammates.
Her new team stood at attention before her, their planed helmets already locked to their suits, their rifles held at port-arms for inspection. She looked them over, taking each from its soldier, checking its power-level reading and then returning it. She was pleased to see that the Enterprise issued the same double-handled compression design that they'd used on the Stark. They were a relatively new design, and not every Captain had been very happy with them. Aboard the Defiant-class boats they used them because their compact size made them easier to wield in tight, confined spaces. Some Captains preferred to continue with the tried-and-true Starfleet design with the bulbous emitter section. Thrush found them second to useless.
"All right," Commander Riker's voice filtered through the mikes on the suits. "Everyone suit up and prepare for transport."
Thrush pulled her helmet on and locked the clamps. When the lights that ringed the interior of it lit up and the panel near her right cheek showed green, she nodded at Riker.
"Okay, Chief," he said, "energize."
The brightly-lit, very human room vanished from around them and was replaced by a dimly-lit, very alien one.
The corridor stretched before them for about a hundred meters, it was oval in shape and constructed of a rough, dark metal. Thrush thought it looked like the ship had been something natural that aliens had burrowed through. There were no controls, no panels, no hatches or ports or screens or anything else indicative of a culture or race of individuals.
The lighting was low, abient, with no external sources, but long strips of segmented lights set into the metal high above them. The lamps on their helmets and rifles cast long ovoids of white on the corridor and shone far enough down the corridor behind them to instill in them a sense of inconsequence. Thrush felt like a virus in the ship's bloodstream.
She only let the awe sweep her away for a moment before he motioned to her small team to take up a defensive posture around the away team--three holding up rear, three more taking point. They fell into shooting crouches shining the lights from their rifles around them, anticipating anything.
"We're almost there, just a little ways," Riker said as he consulted his tricorder.
"The ship seems almost organic," Doctor Crusher commented. "I'm getting low-level bio-emissions from all around us. Consistent with the bodies I examined. Their exo-skeletons were virtually the same."
"But the exo-skeletons were constructed from human tissue," Commander Data said. "This is very clearly a metallic alloy."
"Yes, Data, but the exo-skeletons were still acting like living organic tissue--growing, repairing itself, reacting to the environment..."
"That explains why we couldn't take them out with any setting other than dematerialize," Thrush observed. "It's like they're behind a human shield."
"Our records from the initial attack on Earth correspond with what we've seen of this ship almost exactly," Data said. "This perplexes me."
"Why haven't they advanced in four-hundred years?" Geordi asked. "I wondered that too. We cut through their shields like they were barely there."
"Come on," Riker said. "I think the answers we need will probably be in the main computer."
The walk to the end of the corridor was slow and uneventful and at the end of it was a narrow portal, barely large enough for one of them to fit through with their environmental suit. "I am not liking this," Thrush griped, as she shone her light through it. "Okay, it looks clean. I'll go through first. Jameson, Carlyle, Davies follow me, then the away team. All right?"
"Agreed," Riker said. "Let's go."
Easy for you to say, Thrush thought bemusedly as she crouched and squeezed through the accessway. Around her, the walls felt smooth and, through her protective glove, slightly spongy. Maybe this damn ship was organic or something. What would that mean? That the thing was repairing itself? Healing itself so it could lash out again?
Swell.
She scuttled forward slowly but steadily, keeping the rifle pointed dead-bead ahead of her, not letting it flutter up or down. She'd also, and without telling her team, slid the power select all the way forward. If anything came for them, it'd be running or crawling or slithering into an outpouring of truly wicked energy.
But none came, and at the end of the corridor was only a thin, translucent membrane that Thrush probed with the tip of her rifle. "Any readings?" she asked.
"It doesn't appear to be a part of a trap," Commander Data's voice came through her primary helmet speakers. "However, we are still receiving many anomolous readings."
"Great," she replied, "a definite maybe. All right, I'm going through."
"Go ahead, Commander," Riker said.
Thrush pressed the membrane hard and it bulged, stretched, then yawned open and vanished into the edges of the exit portal. "Huh," she said and stepped through. Her first sense was that it was awfully well lit for a corridor, especially compared to the two they'd just stepped out of.
Then she realized that they weren't in a corridor at all but a room. A massive room.
It only seemed like a corridor because of the massive structure in its center.
Thrush looked up and suddenly realized that it was going to be trickier than anyone had suspected to access that computer.
Because the computer was a brain.
Picard had crossed the bridge twice and scanned every panel and console. Mentally checked every calculation and equation. Waiting...waiting...waiting...
When the hail came in, he felt a youthful urge to bolt to the center chair and slam the comm panel before Ensign Strain could intercept it (as her duties dictated). "Sir," she reported, "Commander Riker says he has a visual for us."
This time, Picard did key the comm board. "Will, what's going on down there?"
"You'd have to see it sir. We've got a visual from my tricorder I'm transmitting now."
"On screen," Picard said to Lieutenant Tsu. He saw her link up to Riker's signal and then the screen flashed and showed what Riker and the rest of the away team must have been seeing. He wondered if it was giving them the same chill in the pit of the stomach as he was suffering.
The thing on the screen, enhanced and resolved by the Enterprise computer system, was a gigantic brain. Or, to be more accurate, a collection of grey matter mused into a rough oval within some kind of stasis field. And Picard suddenly understood why they'd come back. Why they'd come for Earth. Not to topple the center of the Federation.
"They came for a unique form of DNA," he breathed.
"I think so, sir." Crusher's voice jolted him out of his introspection. "Like the exo-skeleton, only two forms of DNA in this tissue, sir. One of them is human."
"They must have exhausted their supply of genetic material," Riker said.
"Meaning they wiped out an entire race," Deanna Troi said in a low, shocked voice.
"Yes," Picard said gravelly.
"I believe they've returned because human DNA is the only other compatible type," Data said.
"Wonder why they haven't simply begun, ah, cultivating it," Geordi wondered aloud.
"They're not accustomed to that type of thinking," Picard said. "They're plunderers and users. Will, can you access that thing somehow?"
"No sir. Not with any conventional equipment. Sir, we know the aliens are telepathic..."
"I'll suit up," Deanna said. Picard turned to face her.
"Are you sure? I can't imagine how stressful this could be on you, psychologically."
Deanna's deep, brown eyes held his gaze. "I can't tell, sir. But I don't feel I have a choice, either." She gestured to the screen. "We know what they intend to do when they reach Earth."
Picard tilted his head slightly. "Go."
"Fall back! Sitting Bull and LaGuardia continue the assault! We're attacking the fourth vector. Pinpoint your fire! Pinpoint your fire!"
The Venture rolled with the green fire as it tore into the lower shields, already thin from the battering they'd taken when the Lourdes exploded, and led the second charge against the intruder. They were a full thousand kilometers away from it and still seemed so close to be insects on its surface.
The Intrepid and the Istanbul slid easily into position behind the heavier, more bloated Nebula and Galaxy-class ships and began spitting torpedoes at the ship. They impacted the surface, exploded, tore holes, blew out craters, cast chunks of debris into space, and still did little more than scrape the ship's hull.
They got in a few hundred more kilometers before the green bolts tore into them, blew apart the two Intrepid-class ships, and hobbled the rest, reducing them to spinning, burning hulls in a matter of seconds.
The Marakesh, an Akira-class starship led the second wave, laying down cover fire for the lifeboats that fell, spiralling away from the crippled ships like dandelion seeds in a summer wind.
The second wave fired their phasers, launched their torpedoes, cast their mine-ribbons, and sprayed anti-matter spreads. The ship kept coming.
Riker watched the column of light become an environmental suit and then Deanna in an environmental suit. She stumbled, he reached out to her, but she regained her composure.
"God, Will," her voice was hushed and wan even over the helmet microphones. "It's like they're screaming in my mind...I hear them... I feel them so...vividly..." She began to crumple, and this time, Riker did clutch her arm.
"Deanna are you all right? Do you need to get out of here?"
"No...Will...I can...I think I've accessed their computer..." She straightened up and when she faced him, her eyes were clear despite the washed-out pallor that she sported. "What do you need to know?"
"How do we stop the mother ship?"
She shook her head, her features crumpled in exertion. "No, that's too vague...I need something more..." then her eyes went wide. "Borg!"
The Marakesh pinwheeled, bleeding energy discharge from its severed nacelle strut, its phasers still lashing out at the advancing monolith, scoring its surface. Beyond it, the remains of the secondary blockade regrouped and took up a defensive position. They were a loose collection of Sabre-, Steamrunner-, class ships headed up by the Lexington. The wings of Galaxy-, Nebula-, and Ambassador-, class ships were gone. The old Mirandas bought the blockade time and got blown out of the stars for their trouble. Single bolts of green energy flared, impacted the ships and vaporized them almost instantly.
The secondary blockade fell into position, coalesced their shields, and began to fire.
"They sent the Borg after us. They sacrificed one of their worlds to a Borg scout ship to put Transwarp technology and the transwarp triangulations for Earth in their hands!"
"That explains why the Borg only came after us with a single cube," Geordi observed. "We beat them back last time, but they came back with the same strategy. And their cube ship was even more vulnerable this time."
"They wanted...they wanted the conflict," Deanna continued haltingly. "They were planning on invading in the aftermath, knowing both sides would be vulnerable...They...knew we would have advanced in four hundred years. They couldn't just attack like they did last time. We had to be weakened...
"Will!" Her eyes grabbed him and held. "The transwarp corridor! I can access it through this mental link. If we could initiate an opening for the corridor..."
"If they're travelling transwarp," Geordi said, "they've gotta be coated with anti-tachyons. A sustained gamma-radiation pulse would activate a transwarp opening. If Deanna can calculate a course..."
"All we need to do is contact the blockade," Riker affirmed.
"If there's a blockade left," Thrush said grimly.
Riker hit his comm control and patched through to the Enterprise and quickly ran through the situation.
"Tell Counsellor Troi to link with the...computer. We'll be sending an urgent, tight-band signal to the blockade."
"Aye sir," he looked at Deanna. She was tight-lipped and pale, and he knew she was making the link.
"Sir," he heard Thrush report, "I'm getting reports of movement closing on our position."
Rifles came up. "Where are they?" Riker asked.
"All around us."
One of the Steamrunners had exploded, and another was flaring, sparkling, trying to right itself and maintain a field of fire. This left only two Sabres and an Akira-class starship standing between Earth and the intruder, and their crews knew they were not going to stop the ship. They held the line, however, striking out with their weapons charge the space between them with irradiated particles.
The ship kept coming.
They swarmed.
Bipedal, running, reaching with three-taloned fingers, lashing out with six, muscular tentacles. "Deanna! set the co-ordinates!" Riker shouted as he fired his phaser. Thrush didn't care. She and her team had formed a protective circle around the away team and were squeezing off shots as fast as the phaser rifles could cycle. Thrush had her team set theirs to wide-spread de-materialize. They ate up power, but carved great wedges out of the writhing, rippling mass of aliens closing in on them.
"Will, I'm getting you out of there!" Picard's voice filtered into Thrush's helmet. She ignored it. The decisions of the command staff weren't her concern. Taking out the monsters that were swarming like fire ants was.
Besides, she had a different team to avenge.
Thrush mentally clicked off each one's name as she pulled the trigger and vaporized a pile of the beasts.
Meyer...
Lancie...
D'G'ratok...
Vaughnn...
She enjoyed the feel of the weapon's discharge, enjoyed the shriek they made when they disintegrated, even enjoyed the pounding of blood in her ears. Thrush heard the things screaming in her mind, but also felt them being penned, kept at a distance. By Counsellor Troi, she imagined.
"Deanna!" she heard Riker shout.
"Tell them transmit!"
They advanced. Thrush exhausted her energy pack thinking Bayliss's name.
The Sabres were dead, not even lifeless hulks, but lose, rolling clouds of vapor, dust and debris that the USS Thunderchild had to nimbly pilot between to commence its suicide run at the intruder. Her phaser banks burnt out, her torpedoes exhausted, her shields overloaded and her hull ruptured in several places, Captain Kellogg had ordered the final option.
And Thunderchild was just gaining momentum.
"Plot course zero-zero-zero..."
"Sir," the tactical officer spun, her eyes frantic with hope. "We're getting a transmission from the Enterprise!"
"On speakers!" Kellogg ordered.
They listened. Then implemented.
The intruder fired, blew the Thunderchild out of its path, then continued inexorably forward. The damaged starship tumbled, then found its bearings, ignored the screams of its other systems and concentrated on one task.
She transmitted.
The intruder's hull glowed white then slid into blackness. Then vanished.
The Enterprise appeared around them, though the danger wasn't present anymore. The aliens had collapsed, the brain-matter processor went dead, the whole ship slid into a deep hibernation.
"We've received word from the Thunderchild," Picard announced as the away team stepped onto the bridge. "The intruder has gone to transwarp."
"Excellent," Riker grinned in spite of himself.
"Can't they simply...stop or leave transwarp?" Beverly asked.
"Nope," Geordi shook his head. "It's not like warp speed. It really is a corridor. You don't leave it until you reach the end. It'll be some time before they can power up and turn back on us."
"So, where did they go?" she asked. Everyone's eyes turned expectantly to Troi.
"I don't know," she confessed. "But it was some set of coordinates that was very prominent in their computer system."
"Well," Picard said, stepping over to his chair, "where ever they are, we have time to prepare for their return. Contact Starfleet Command, Ensign Strain, tell them we have one the intruder crafts. And it is very interesting."
"Aye sir."
Silent in space, Enterprise orbited the dark, motionless disk--now a relic of the second failed attack.
It exited the transwarp corridor in a blaze of light, its sensors and monitors wildly scanning the sector, trying to ascertain its position. When it did, it's engines flared sscarlet and brought its weapons systems online. But there were no match for twenty-seven Borg cubeships bearing down on it from all sides.
And after a protracted spray of jade-green and azure blue, all that was left were a few roiling dustclouds accompanying the atomizing explosion.