Note: Ye-es! Finally a return to this story after…jeez, how many years? Anyhow I hope a few of you out there are still tuning in, and perhaps a few newcomers as well ^_^ A short chapter, but does it ever get the plot moving again. Make it so, Incanto out!


Acting Captain's Log, Miss Sakaki, Stardate XX-OO

To…whomever it may concern, this is…well, it may be the final log entry of the J.F.S. Ryouma. In a matter of several minutes, I have resolved to open fire on a vessel of vastly superior firepower. Nothing in my training prepared me for captaincy…but with both our first and second officers in captivity, I am a commander, and…technically ranking officer. Escape seems impossible, but leaving three fine officers for whom I'm developed a…deep admiration, is just as unthinkable. I wish to apologize to any member of this crew, their friends and family who…might have been reluctant to lay down their lives; but if we fail here, we all would likely fall in any case. I will terminate this entry with the words of ancient Terran statesman Winston Churchill: "Humanity will not be cast down."


"Miss Osaka, please target the Tojo. Fire all weapons and c-continue to do so…until you can't anymore."

Osaka, standing at the tactical console in place of Kagura, looked unfazed as usual as she tapped at the buttons. The same could not be said of every other hand on bridge. Chiyo, in the left navigational seat, bubbled with tears; although her eyes lit up every time Sakaki spoke, Kaorin shuddered copiously.

"Miss…Commander Sakaki!" Chiyo let out, in a terrified chirp. "Are you…are you really certain about this?"

With an eerie calm, although her voice shook, Sakaki answered-her eyes fixed on the ship in the viewscreen ahead: "All we really must do…is disable their shields. After that, we can…we can ram them."

"R-ram them!"

"It will disable them at least…destroy them, most likely."

"But what about us…!"

Sakaki shut her eyes.

"The Tojo is returning fire!" yelped Kaorin.

"Evasive maneuvers-"

It did no good. A spread of phaser shots like a fan cut across black space, along with a literal stream of photon torpedoes that, while lagging behind the Ryouma as she turned, followed her with a horrifying accuracy. Bursts of energy and two torpedoes collided with the shields; the bridge shook, Chiyo and Kaorin both tumbled out of their seats, and red warning lights throbbed bloodily while klaxons sang.

Osaka kept her balance, and reported calmly: "Shields at sixty percent and holding."

"Sixty percent!" Chiyo was clinging to the edge of her console, wide-eyed. "Then, one more hit…!"

"Captain, if I may," Osaka went on just as calmly. "Your decision reminds me of the actions of certain historical airplane pilots of Terra."

"I-I'm sure that's very intriguing, Miss Osaka,"-Chiyo, as she wrestled over her console.

But Sakaki's eyes went wider. Wider, if it could have been imagined, than before.

Over the inoffensive beep-beep (WHAM a torpedo peeled off starboard shields) Osaka's implacable voice: "The sacrifice of a living being, believing their nation did right, in the service of that nation, has a value that cannot be diminished in any way. However to be sure one is in the right…"

"Chemical fires on Deck J!" shouted an ensign.

"Divert 3…4% to localized suppression matrix," Sakaki immediately shot back before leaning her ear:

"Well," said Osaka, "supposing there were just a 4 or a 3, or a lil ol' zero-point-zero-point-zero-point-zero-point…well, y'all get the idea…chance that you were wrong. Or supposing there were only one good living being on target, one that did not deserve to be eliminated no matter what. All I am saying is. Do you not believe Captain Takino would want you to exhaust every nonviolent avenue of solution first…and I do mean every one?"

Almost never in Starfleet History-not even in the days of Captain James T. K.-had a such a profound command decision been overturned, so abruptly, on the sudden recommendation of an inferior officer.

Sakaki whanged the console. "Belay all that. Oh-belay all that, climb, climb!"


Although their biology was not identical to that of Terran reptiles, Cardassians were known, in times of duress, not to sweat. Instead their skin grew cool and gray in anticipation of faking death. The young proud face of the Engineering Lieutenant known as Ha'fzz was very cool and gray indeed, big flakes of dead skin trembling off it, as he watched the underbelly of the J.F.S. Ryouma arc up in front of them, even as their phaser fire raked it, gorgeous and glistening, playful like a whale in a tank, so absurd, so funny yet terrifying, that it changed the entire character of everything they had been seeing; and it produced a start back of fear, even of reverence, that was impossible to mistake. Impossible to mistake for one officer in particular.

The end of Kagura's bat'leth glistened by his ear.

"Do you know," growled the giant, "how the Klingon Hero Mor'rech'chk dealt with those who declined the honor to march in his vanguard?"

"I don't," grumbled Ha'fzz, gristle in his throat, "but I'll bet I'm going to find out."

Rising to her full terrifying height, throwing out her twin bat'leth: "He made their bodies the totem-poles of his warship! So, they became his vanguard after all. Hah, hah, hah!"

A deathwish impulse brought Ha'fzz-a calm, thorough, officer who nursed a secret love of poetry (after today who might know?): "Miss Kagura! That was millions of years ago, this is the 24th century! These people are not cowed savages…"

"Muteness before me, scale-thing."

"…are not cowed savages, but have clearly lost their minds in the face of our overwhelming superiority of arms…a-and are trying to surrender in some insane gesture, like a dog showing its belly!"

Thoughtful gestures all around. The Ryouma continued to glide before them, turning its loop in vast space.

A stern-mouthed human gunner observed: "We have our orders."

An unusually bright-eyed Romulan broke in on Ha'fzz's side: "But we haven't heard from the Captain recently, she may be compromised…M-Miss Kagura, please try and raise her….!"

"Fagh." It was clear that Kagura had been drinking. The rancid, worm-like, red-black clots that heavy bloodwine consumption left in the mouth and around the corners of the mouth were impossible to disguise. She spat one near Ha'fzz's' brightly-tooled boots. He cringed, but stood his ground.

"I have served alongside Sakaki…a very…very…long time," she said, and her crusted eyes remembered. "She is my sister in the hunt. Men! Women! Keep casting your spears…." regressing almost to some atavistic time, "SLAY THAT THING! As for you, Cardassian," and she took another slug of bloodwine from a synth-clay jar on her hip, "stand with your spine straight."

Even before carrying out the other orders, almost everyone on the bridge shut their eyes.

However, while Cardassians, like any race, have their characteristic virtues as well as their vices, an obsessive devotion to bravery, violence, and the spectacle thereof, was not one of Ha'fzz's.

In the moment before the bat'leths swung he dropped on his knees.

Both long thin blades sliced into the console like knives in butter and an eruption, a summer's fireworks of sparks belched out in every direction, shooting, swerving, gaily dancing, singeing the uniform trousers of the dumbfounded onlookers all the way across the bridge. Kagura howled as her skin cooked, unable to pull away; stinking smoke peeled off her arms and chest. Immediately klaxons rang. Although technically not the highest-ranking present, Ha'fzz wheeled his arms beseeching his comrades in a clear, personal tone of voice Cardassians are rarely heard to use with outsiders: "Evacuate, please, evacuate right now!"