Chapter Four
"We transported the whole kit and kaboodle into their engine room where there'll be no tribble at all."

USAF Prometheus
Achilles Rift
One day post transition.

"Sir, we've lost contact with the Choice and its crew," the Ship's XO said.

"Keep trying and have one of the other ships ready a Tel'Tac to go back through."

"Problem, Ronson?"

The ship's commander looked over to the newly arrived General, he pointed to the screen on his monitor knowing O'Neill would look over his shoulder anyway. "Not so much a problem General, we've lost contact with the other ships on the other side of the rift."

"And do we know why?" O'Neill asked

"No Sir. We tried a signal and there was nothing. We're sending a cargo ship through."

"Let me know if anything comes up, Ronson."

"Yes, Sir."

Warship Minos
Achilles Rift System

With a burst of light the Minos dropped from hyperspace and back into the rift system. The Centauri ship had been secreted in the other system and as thought was quite safe from prying eyes. Now they just had to get both ships out of either system or back to home base, well away from the hands of the SGC or their disgusting alien allies.

"Sir, the tugs are still online. No sign yet of the Jaffa reinforcements. We're in the clear."

"Contact the tugs…"

"Sir," the same officer interrupted him. "The lead tug is flashing an emergency call this way."

"Put it on."

"Tug Zero Seven to Minos. Code Three Black Alpha."

"Shit."

The Trust military membership had put together a number of codes that would allow them to know immediately the problems that might stop a salvage operation such as this. "Patch them through."

"Captain, the Prometheus is attempting to contact the ships that were left behind here."

"How? They should have been hundreds of light years away from the rift when we arrived. What is your status?"

"Powered down, Sir. We haven't sent a signal back but with the Jaffa ships gone they might be back."

"No, they won't. They'll send a scout first. Time for us to get out, I think."

"Yes Sir," he tug commander said. "The Minbari ship?"

"We'll pick it up. Have the tugs land immediately." He turned to the other crewmembers and said, "Rig the ship for maximum load, ready weapons as well anything comes through that rift take it out."

"Aye Sir," they chimed.

The Minos settled above the much larger hull of the Minbari ship the energy beams of the tractor system settling into place at prescribed points across the hull. Tugs in place in the belly of the Minos the ship began powering up its systems readying the ship for the much heavier drag of the massive and mostly intact ship.

As they moved to the launch point for the hyperspace window a single cargo ship broke the event horizon of the rift and sped into the system scanning the area the four ships should have been.

"Sir, contact from the rift. We have incoming."

"Identify."

"Tel'Tac cargo ship, shielded variation."

"Main cannon?"

"Dead Sir; main capacitors are dry."

"Divert power from anywhere you can and take them down NOW!"

From the rear of the ship two much smaller weapons swivelled from their position flush with the hull of the Minos. Lights dimmed throughout the ship as a dozen energy pulses spat from the guns towards the unmanned cargo ship. Three of the bolts slammed into the front shields flattening them, the rest speared the helpless craft, blowing it apart.

"Tel'Tac destroyed, Sir."

"Power status?"

"Secondary power only Sir, enough to get us and the other ship to the hiding place. We need a hell of a tune up, Sir."

"Get us out of here maximum speed."

"Aye, Sir."

The Trust starship shifted power from its weapons back into its hyperdrive systems and burst into hyperspace its prize securely attached to its tractor system. By the time the Jaffa returned, was no sign that the ship had ever been there.

Council Chambers
Minbar
Minbari Federation

"This is outrageous, the humans must have been behind this."

"Take care Coplann," said Terron. The ancient worker Satai, his tired face pinched in slight pain as he stood in the circle. "The humans have never been able to do something like this before and I doubt very much that they would have been able to create such an effective weapon so quickly."

"It caused unrest and panic within our entire people! Every single Minbari felt that attack; hundreds of thousands of our people went insane or died. Some of them killed innocents around them because of this attack. If not the humans then who?"

"That is the question we must ask both ourselves and those around us. Your belief that the humans could have done this is flawed as they would have no way to affect every Minbari in the Federation. We have heard tales that humans have also had these problems but none to the extent of our own." Delenn Responded. "The humans for once are innocent of this crime against our people, they did not perpetrate this attack on us."

"Then who Delenn?" asked Morann.

"I do not know, but until we do, cease encroachment into the Earth Alliance space. Continue probing attacks on their closest military bases, but hold the invasion fleets in our own space. Once we have determined what has happened we will proceed with the attacks. Until then, we wait."

"This is madness! The humans must have been responsible for this; they are the only race foolish enough to test us." Coplann ranted.

"Then why?" asked Delenn. "Why hurt their own people just to test a weapon that might be of harm to us? Whatever it was Coplann it was not the humans that did this."

"You are wrong Delenn, they did this somehow and they will pay! I have already dispatch two hundred of the Warrior Caste's finest vessels to destroy their colony and base at Proxima. They shall pay for their arrogance."

The council looked aghast at their brother member, his face still pale from the injuries taken by the unknown wave that had caused such damage. However, the haughty look on his face belied his belief that his ships would have no such trouble against the human forces they would be up against.

"Have you taken leave of your senses?" shouted Gemann of the workers caste. "Only the council can authorise the use of so many ships in a single engagement. what are you thinking of?"

"We need to teach them once and for all that they must not be allowed to defy us, the chosen of the Vorlons. The heirs of Valen must not be countered by them. Those two hundred ships have been ordered to destroy the human settlement and anything else that they will come up against, not one human will survive their fire. We shall cleanse the humans from the stars for their cold blooded murder of so many of our brothers."

"You are insane Coplann! Recall your ships and surrender your position with the council. You will be escorted to your clansclan's holdings until you are brought before a tribunal..." Delenn began.

"I will not. We are Minbari and we are the rightful leaders of the younger races and I refuse to stand down." He cocked his hand and a single collapsed Denn'bok extended from both sides of his closed fist, the six foot staff twirled in his hands. "We will not bow down to the terrorist actions of the Earthers or anyone else that dares to defy us. Be they Human, Narn, Centauri or even our own people. We must destroy those that would be our enemies those that would join the Shadows, those that must be destroyed to save the rest of us."

Coplann's rant was punctuated by constant sweeps of his weapon to the sides, one swinging close to the council member to his right. Unnoticed to them a slow trickle of blood was streaming from his left ear gaining speed as the rant accelerated.

"Our ships will annihilate every ship, fighter and human they meet once Proxima is gone others will follow. There is nothing that the humans will be able to put together before we destroy Earth as well. You will not shackle the warriors as you have done for so long." The blood was flowing now from his left eye spraying with every word. "We will destroy the Earthers and we will not allow any of you to stop us, the humans are to die it is our destiny and their doom!" He slammed his staff into the ground breaking the ancient rock that made up the floor the Council's meeting chamber.

The blood was now flowing freely from every orifice of his head, eyes, ears, mouth, even the capillaries that fed his head bone were bleeding. "We are the chosen ones, the first and the last, the light of the universe, the... the..."

Crashing to the ground the Minbari started to convulse, blood sprayed from his mouth as the seizures racked his body. Screams were ripped from the man's body as he thrashed around, as suddenly as it started the body ceased, its muscles seizing a last time and going limp.

Approaching him slowly one of his fellow warriors lifted Coplann's head from the floor and dropped it again. The Minbari was dead his face and head covered in his own blood which pooled around him.

"He is dead," said Morann.

"What happened?" asked Gemann.

"I do not know Satai. He is bleeding from every part of his head. Blood vessels must have ruptured through his head."

"The scream?"

"That is a distinct possibility Delenn,Delenn; the bleeding can only have started in his cranium. He showed no signs of any form of extra sensory ability but he may have been latent to an extent, it may have been why he was only affected lightly compared to many of our lost people."

"Then his orders to his ships were while he was delusional."

"We must call them back."

"They were dispatched by a warrior they may not listen to any of us, Morann can you call them back?"

"I shall try. If Coplann ordered them to run under silence then we will not be able to stop them."

"Why should we try?" Sharonn asked. "Those ships will simply destroy the Earthers most populous colony and capable shipyards, it will reduce the time that this war will continue."

"Those ships will be wiped out by the Earthers defences, even if they manage to destroy the colony we will lose those ships."

"They are crewed by warriors, they know what they do."

"Call them back Morann." Gemann said, "We do not expend the lives of our people freely, those ships will be used at the right time and for the right reason."

"Agreed," said Morann, turning to his fellow warrior. "We need to save our ships, the Earthers are getting more advanced technology and we need to train our ships and warriors to fight the humans differently."

"Very well, call them back."

Within a few minutes the chambers had been cleared and the body of the fallen Satai was interned by the Warrior's themselves, the third of their council to be lost to this war. Something that would not have been contemplated even a year ago had come to pass. The humans were fighting back and their greatest warriors were dropping like flies to the humans be it their fault or merely due to their actions.

LONAW Embassies
New York
Earth Alliance

"We're not interested Councilman," the EA Ambassador stated clearly. "Your people and those races that make up the League were protected and aided against a clearly more powerful and capable enemy. The Alliance saved a great many lives and kept your planets in your hands. We drove the Dilgar back and forced them to surrender. We gave you your freedom and assisted with your rebuilding, yet when we most needed help almost every single one of your races turned their backs."

"But the Markab…"

"The Markab have been feeding us information and supplies and limited technologies for the last few months. The other races that have approached us have been turned away as well. None of you will be getting our technologies nor will any of your races be allowed to cross into our space at any time."

"We are willing to share our technologies with the Earth Alliance as a mutual exchange of information, shielding, gravity manipulation, heavier weapons and reactor systems."

"In exchange for our own technologies and designs, you're a year too late Councilman. If you had been willing to help us out at the beginning then maybe we would have been more receptive to your requests."

"But our forces are mobilizing, many of the League members are sending their forces, thousands of ships are massing on the borders of the Earth Alliance and Minbari Federation. Without your help they will be massacred where they stand we have no way to scan them."

"Just like we didn't councilman; we could not see the Minbari and still we fought. We lost hundreds of ships, tens of thousands of men and women to this race and we kept on fighting. Now we are on equal terms for the first time and you all wish to be returned to our good graces? I think not Councilman, we will fight this war and we will continue to thrive with the few allies that we have and are willing to fight with and that does not include you, your race or most of the League."

"Then you condemn us and yourselves to die at the hands of the Minbari."

"We do nothing of the sort; we made a mistake and are paying for it beyond any sane measure. Your peoples are attempting to ride on our coattails to victory over a race that has kept everyone else in fear and awe for a millennium, every human that has died to date in the war will be remembered for making sure the rest of humanity survives and we don't need help from those who betrayed us before.

"But…"

"Good Day Councilman."

The ambassador stood up and walked out of the room, outside he leant against the wall running his temples. This had been the third of these meetings he had been forced to go through within the last week and it was more than slightly getting to him. Still the request had come from Senator Clark's offices leading to his current predicament.

"You alright David?" David Sheridan looked up at the voice and nodded to the other man.

"I'm fine Luis, thanks."

"I assume it didn't go too well."

"They are desperate now. The league have thousands of ships ready to hit the Minbari flanks and want us to distribute fleet units into their combat groups so they can see the Minbari ships. They also want the technical specs for the new scanners and a few other bits."

"What was their exchange?"

"Technical support, war with the Minbari and a lot of credits from across the league. As a goodwill gesture they are going to increase the Alliance credit's status by double."

"That puts our money situation close to what it was before the war began."

"I know, however we turned them down as requested."

"I sure as hell hope Marie knows what she's doing David. Or we could be in the crapper before this is all over."

"Yeah, I hope so too for all our sakes."

"So what now?" Santiago asked

"Now I meet with that air force Major Davis about this treaty we are putting together."

"That's why I'm here. The Achilles has been forced to deploy and Davis and his people are awaiting you downstairs."

"As in...?" he asked.

"As in, we don't want too much getting out so I came up to get you."

USAF Prometheus.

"Shit," said one of the bridge officers

"Captain?"

"Sorry Sir. The Tel'tac went through the rift and exploded as it passed through. We don't know what happened."

"Scans?"

"Negative Sir. The interference hadn't cleared before she went up. I could have been the shields collapsing."

"More problems Ronson?" O'Neill asked from the hatchway

"Yes Sir. We just lost one cargo ship we sent through. It exploded just as she transferred through."

"Same reason we lost the signal earlier?"

"I don't know, Sir. The rift was riled up so no scans got through; I'm loath to send another ship until we can figure out what's going on the other side."

"So we're still stuck here?"

"Unless you want to leave one of the Jaffa ships to continue, Sir, we are."

"We all go or none at all, Colonel. What's the status on communications?"

"That's the good news, Sir, the interference in the comm. Frequencies has dissipated we are clear to broadcast."

"Then open up a channel and send out on SGC frequencies."

Ronson nodded to the communications officer who in turn opened up the subspace transmissions.

"USAF Achilles, this is General O'Neill aboard USAF Prometheus come in please."