Kirk walked over to Sylar, "Do you know where the security office is?" He nodded, "Good. Why don't you take her there and keep her contained. I'll head down and meet you." Sylar nodded as he disappeared.

Kirk turned to Spock, "Do we have a fix on the Andorian ship?"

"Yes. It is 10 light years away. They've set a course bearing 593 mark 263." he paused and said, "It appears they have set a course for the Klingon Neutral Zone."

Uhura looked apprehensive, "The Klingons don't know the situation. If they cross the border…"

Kirk nodded worried, "Then the Federation could be pulled into war." He headed for the lift, "We have to stop that from happening. Mr. Sulu, set a course to intercept that ship. Mr. Spock, you have the bridge."

****

Kirk and Uhura walked into the brig where Sylar stood over Claire watchfully. He looked over and looked anxious, "I can't hear her at all. It's just a jumble of voices."

Uhura commented, "She said they were all one mind trying to enslave us."

His eyes darkened, "Well, that is unacceptable."

Kirk added, "It gets worse. The ship is heading into Klingon space. If they cross the border, the Klingons will view it as a treaty violation. It'll plunge the Alpha Quadrant into war."

Sylar sighs, "Is there something I can do to help?"

Kirk indicates Claire, "Find a way to cut her off from them. If they can't hear her they won't know we're coming."

He looks unsure, "I honestly don't know what that would to her. For all I know, it could kill her."

He looked surprised, "I thought the two of you couldn't die."

"This is more than pulling a knife from her heart. From what I can tell, the technology has fused with or even replaced some of her organs. She could heal from it; she might not."

He thought briefly and Uhura suddenly commented, "Could you rewire the communication pathway for single wave transmissions?"

Sylar looked unsure, "I don't know what you mean."

She inhaled and clarified, "Can you make it so they can't hear her but she can still hear them? Then we would have a tactical advantage."

Sylar smirked at her, "No wonder Claire likes you." He turns to Claire, "I hate to sound pushy, but I would like some privacy. I will have your officer back to you in a short time."

Kirk nods and heads out, "Lt, lets leave him for now."

Uhura says firmly, "Please bring her back."

Sylar nods and waits for the door to close. He comments proudly, "Let's take a look under the hood, shall we?" He looks her over for several moments before giving a conceited smirk. "There you are." Claire opens her eyes slowly and she looks at him disoriented.

******

Kirk walks onto the bridge and asks sternly, "What's the location of the Andorian ship?"

Sulu reports, "It's three light years from the Neutral Zone, captain. We have picked up several warning messages from the Klingons, but the vessel is ignoring them. There is a Klingon fleet moving to intercept the ship."

Spock speaks up, "Judging by the modifications to the Andorians technology, even their fleet would suffer heavy causalities in the ensuing battle."

Sulu comments sincerely, "They need to be warned."

Kirk sighs and shakes his head, "They'd disregard any warnings we would give. After all, we're only humans."

Everyone turns when a distorted voice speaks up, "Then we'll just have to convince them we are ready to stand with them to a glorious death."

Kirk and the crew looked shocked as Claire and Sylar walk onto the bridge and she walks up to Kirk, "Lt. Bennett reporting for duty."

He asked, "What happened to your voice?"

Claire looked irritated, "I believe Sylar identified it as a subvocal processor." She rubbed her throat, "I can't stand it; it's grating on my nerves."

He smirks, "Well, why don't we try offering our help?"

She shakes her head, "They'll never agree to that. Lt, hail the lead Klingon ship." She glances at Kirk, "Let me talk to them, and be prepared to play along."

Uhura announces, "Channel is open."

Claire glances at Kirk who opens, "This is Captain Kirk of the USS Enterprise. As you're probably aware, an Andorian cruiser is approaching the Neutral Zone."

An angry Klingon voice bellows the speakers, "And we will send any invaders to Grethor!"

Claire walks forward and says firmly, "My name is Claire Bennett of the House of Bi'Lok! I have vanquished countless enemies of the Empire and felt no fear…"

She stopped when a quiet beep sounded. Uhura looked disappointed, "They closed the channel."

Claire sighed and bit her lip, "Captain, we need to do something!"

He looked understanding, "Sulu, how long until we reach the Andorian ship?"

"We'll be in weapons range in six minutes." he paused and finished worried, "The ship will cross the border in two."

Claire looked sick as she mumbled, "May Kah'Less help them." She turned to Uhura, "Lt, look for a subspace transmission in the low beta range. Frequency is 719.820."

The crew looked around attentively as several voices began talking in quick succession, "The vessel has crossed the Neutral Zone."

"All ships commence attack!"

"The ship's defenses are impressive; our weapons are having no effect at all."

As realization comes to her as Claire commented in shame, "I knew every system on dozens of Klingon warships and now the crew does too."

Kirk looked sympathetic, "It's not your fault, Bennett."

She begins crying freely, "Yeah, sure."

Claire grabs at Sylar for support as a voice announces, "The Jah'Ting is taking heavy fire. It's core is going critical. It has been destroyed."

Claire looks at Sylar desperately, "Tell me she wasn't on board! Please?!"

He closes his eyes momentarily. He opens them and looks relieved, "She's on Qo'Nos." He pauses briefly, "Koral was on board." She crosses her arms and closes her eyes tightly.

Kirk orders, "End transmission."

Sulu reports, "The remaining Klingon ships are retreating. The Andorian vessel is changing course; it's going deeper in Klingon space."

Spock asked, "What is it's course?"

He replied, "It's trajectory indicates it is heading for a small moon."

Kirk orders, ""Open a channel. This is Captain Kirk of the Enterprise. We know your ships are damaged. We are willing to provide assistance."

Uhura waited for a minute and inhaled as the console beeped, "They're responding."

"On screen."

Kirk starts to respond when Ko'Lal shouts angrily, "Where is the female that has betrayed the Empire?"

Claire seems to forgot her pain and glances over at him as she counters back coldly, "Brave accusation for the commander who abandoned his ship like a gutless targ. Did you even tell your crew you left or were you roused from your bed?!"

His anger increased, "I will not stand for such slander…" Claire turned to Uhura and signaled to cut the transmission.

She did so and Kirk smirked, "Remind me never to cross you on a bad day."

Uhura commented with a smirk, "We're being hailed, captain."

He forced a serious expression and nodded, "On screen."

Ko'Lal came back on the screen and despite the livid expression he wore, spoke evenly, "Captain, we do require assistance. As I am under High Council orders to capture or destroy the intruding ship, I allow your ship to enter our space."

Kirk nods and orders, "Mr. Sulu, bring us to within transporter range of the Klingon Fleet."

Ko'Lal glances over at Claire and fully takes in her condition. His voice is full of disrespect, "I see you are not as indestructible as you once thought."

Kirk swallows nervously expecting another outburst or insult. Instead, he heard Claire reply, "Yes. I was shown there are things even I am unable to fight." She walked forward, "But I am not the first they've claimed, nor will I be the last."

He looked confident, "The Klingons will prevail over them where you have not."

Claire sighed, "Ko'Lal, look at me! Despite your dislike of me as an outsider, even you respect me as a warrior. You and I have fought and you know my skill." She paused, "You were partially correct in your accusation. I am to blame for the defeat here today." He inhaled with anger but allowed her to continue. "I was absorbed into a group consciousness. My skills and knowledge were stolen from me. I was reduced to being someone's puppet!" She raised her voice in anger, "And if we don't work together, your people and eventually the quadrant will be doomed to the same fate."

He sighed, "What do you propose to prevent this?"

She sighed, "While they know everything I do, I have an advantage of my own. I can hear them even now." she paused and informed him, "Hail the colony on Mortaur 2. Tell them to dismantle their subspace relays and deflectors. I know it will leave them blind to their surroundings, but a brief inconvenience is tolerable compared to the outcome should that ship arrive and be able to gain access to the technology. Make sure they are thorough; destroy the equipment completely if they need to."

He looked at her, "What will happen if they get it?"

She replied, "The Alpha quadrant will be over run with an invasion force that not even the Federation and Klingon Empire could repel even if we stood together."

He looked accepting, "We will inform them immediately." The screen returned to the view of the Klingon fleet.

Kirk looked to Claire, "Lt. Bennett, man your station. The ship's defensive offensive systems need to be revised. Work with Mr. Scott and update them."

She nodded and held up her arm, "Should I modify them with the technology on the Andorian vessel?"

He glanced at her nervously, "No. Despite the advantage it might give us, I won't risk losing the ship to it."

She nodded, "Understood. I will then beam to the Andorian ship…"

Kirk objects, "No one is setting foot on that ship again."

She continues, "I can go in and undermine their neural link from there. That way we can slow them down."

He replies, "It's too dangerous."

She asks calmly, "Do you have a better idea?"

He sighs, "No."

She tells him, "I'm also trying to rescue as many Andorians as we can. In a weird way, they are victims here."

He exhales, "fine. But I want you to maintain open communication. If you run into problems, I'm going to pull out."

She nods, "I'll hold you to that." she glances at Sylar, "Can I get a lift over?"

Sylar takes her hand and teleports them to the ship. She moves to leave but she stops when he doesn't let her go. She glances back confused, "Sylar, I have work to do."

He seems worried about something and she comments, "Sylar, it's me. We both know…" She is cut off when he leans forward suddenly and kisses her. She briefly stiffens but slowly returns the kiss. He moves away and she scoffs is amusement, "It takes you almost three centuries to admit it?"

He looks confused before glaring, "You knew I loved you?! Then why did you marry him?"

She rolled her good eye, "I was in love with him. You loved someone else too remember? Don't put this all on me, Mr. Gray!" She looked at him, "I know we have to talk about this. But right now, I need to stop this ship." He nods and moves to leave. She stops him and says smugly, "Just so you know, you're not the only one who wasn't admitting it."

He smirks at her before disappearing. She grows sad, "That's why I can't say goodbye to you."

She heads for the engine room and looks on curiously as dozens of Andorians are working feverishly on a large sphere. She tunes in to their voices. Construction of Interplexing Relay at 93% complete. Transmission will commence when we retrieve the colony power grid."

She flipped open the communicator, "Bennett to Enterprise." she was met with static and repeated, "Kirk, do you read?" She sighed and closed the communicator. "I knew I wouldn't be coming back."

She walked to an alcove and stepped inside. She tilted her head, "Accessing helm controls. Reroute course trajectory: bearing 138 mark 523." she steeled herself, "Maximum warp. Engage." Claire squeezed her eyes closed as they was a bright flash.

She opened her eyes after a minute and realized everything was white. She looked around curiously, "Where am I?"

A voice answered, "You're here." she turned to see a young girl in a blue summer dress standing in front of her.

Claire chuckled, "Where is here?"

The girl replied, "Where do you think it is?"

Claire looked at the girl, "Look, I don't mean to sound rude, but I don't have time for games."

The girl looked humorously at her, "Really? I think you have plenty of time for games."

Claire paused when she realized the girl seemed to know more than she let on. "Who are you?"

"My name doesn't matter, Claire. But the current situation does. It's happening too soon in the course of things. Luckily, you kept us from needing to step in. You stopped them from receiving the signal before it was supposed to. Now it can happen in it's own due time. We have another assigned for that event."

Claire asked curiously, "You're assigned to watch me?"

The girl sighed exasperated, "Please, you think you're that important that I supervise you personally?"

Claire chuckled, "I'm sorry for assuming that."

"I hope so. You'll still wet behind the ears, but in a few hundred years, you might need supervision." she looked thoughtful, "Probably even before Sylar does. Right now, he's content just to tinker around. Very much like a child."

Claire surmised, "I guess I should be flattered that I was approached."

The girl eyed her cautiously, "Be careful, Claire. You're attempting to step outside what you find comfortable. If you do it too quickly, you might be biting off more than you can chew."

"So you just came to tell to be careful?"

"I cam to stop them from coming too soon. I have done that, so it's time to return you to Enterprise."

Claire asked, "Am I going to remember this conversation?"

The girl looked impressed, "You are so impressive. You are as smart as he thought."

Claire saw a bright flash before she question that.

*******

Claire jolted awake and bolted up. She glanced around at McCoy and Kirk, "What happened?" she looked at herself and asked, "where are the implants?"

Kirk answered, "We barely managed to beam you off the ship. That was a risky move; the ship was destroyed in the gas planet. As for the implants, you we completely free of them when we beamed you back. As for the Klingons, Ko'Lal threatened to destroy once they realized the threat was taken care of."

She looked disgusted, "He'll probably boast how he defeated the vessel with a damaged flagship."

He commented, "Probably, but he did say we will remember that you offered to sacrifice yourself to defend his people."

She looked skeptical, "Really? He said that?"

Kirk gave a crooked smile, "that's how I'm spinning it."

She glanced past them as Sylar walked into sickbay. She asked, "Could I have a minute?" Kirk glanced back and scoffed. He and McCoy nodded and they left. She smirked as Sylar walked up to her, "So I seem to remember you kissed me. Were you toying with me or did you just think I wouldn't be coming back?"

He shrugged, "Maybe it was both. You'll probably never know."

She wrapped her arms around his neck and playfully kissed him on the nose. "I don't know. I think we have a long time to find out."