Star Trek: Schism

by AjaxTorbin

A unique ship, a unique crew and a mission to protect other ships exploring the Gamma Quadrant. (((NOTE, divided story into readable parts rather than the publication format I usually use))) Rated M for violent themes that will be added later.

14. Chapter 14

Star Trek][Schism

Part One

The Crew

Space warped, time bent and a small ship warped in from subspace.

"Katana to Earth control." intoned a gravel like voice from the tactical station in a corner of the cramped bridge.

"This is earth control, go ahead Katana,"

"USS Katana NCC-76034, requesting orbit permission and a repair dock queue status."

A voice responded after a moment, "Katana, orbit permission granted. But all repair docks are shut down for the ceremony tonight."

"Understood. Katana out."

The Katana was different from most saber class ships, different from most ships in Starfleet for that matter, it had an integrated bridge, no turbo lift was needed to leave it.

Touching a control to shut down the subspace channel the owner of the gravel voice turned from his station, strode to the rear of the room and exited into a long corridor, walking until reaching a specific door. Pressing the admittance key he entered when the door opened and stood at loose attention.

The man inside looked amused at the lieutenant's entrance. No matter how many times I see that it still brings a smile to my face. The first thing one would notice about lieutenant Orrourak was his size, he was an imposing 2.15 meters tall and while his size would grab your attention it was the rest of him that kept it. He, well, he looked like an oversized koala with shaggy fur, a seven foot tall, thick haired, harness wearing, robust, koala. Black nose, beady little brown eyes, fluffy ears, yea, a huge koala. If koala's had somehow cross-bred with brown bears.

Anyone that spent any time with him though could tell you he was anything but a koala. His strength was disproportionate to his size, he could probably punch a hole in the deck if wanted to and then there was that fur, that thick, dense, wiry, cream colored fur. Fur that could take the punch out of a phaser blast.

But the captain said nothing, just smiled as the seven foot furball called Orourack stooped slightly and sidestepped to enter his room.

Flipping a large oversize drafting PADD toward him he asked, "What do 'ya think Commander?"

After studying the diagram a moment, that concrete scraping concrete voice that was heard reciting poetry as often as tactical reports responded, "It looks like an Acadian slug."

The captain sighed, "Everyone's a critic. So what's up? Are we there yet?"

"We entered the Sol system a few minutes ago and we have been cleared for orbit."

"I'm sensing a 'but' there."

"But, all the repair slips are shut down, some kind of ceremony, whatever it is the whole system is at yellow alert."

Reaching across his deck the captain retrieved a more normal sized PADD and handed it to Orourack, "Read this. It's why we're here instead of our normal haunts at Starbase 24 ."

After reading the message on the device he set the thing down and composed his thoughts on the contents, Orourack snorted his reply, "No wonder the whole system is under high alert." he paused but went on when the captain made a little 'go on' motion with his hand, "and the rest, is cryptic."

The captain slid back further into his chair and nodded, "Yes, that was my impression also."

"Will it affect us again?"

"No. I think not. Well, no more than it taking longer for our repairs."

"Ah, angling for shore leave." Orourack guessed.

"Exactly." he smiled back

Orourack's reply was cut off by the chirping of the captains' combadge.

"Bridge to captain Kayetan."

"Kayetan here, go ahead Chief."

"Sir, the USS Ajax is hailing. Mastermind wants to see you." said chief Inuzaki, the helmsman, with more than a note of glee in his voice. Mastermind referred to Captain Alexander Tanton, an old friend of Kayetan's and something of a legend among the crew as Kayetan liked to tell stories about their days at the academy. The Mastermind was a nickname, referring to a joke they'd played on an instructor.

"I'll take it on the bridge, chief."

"Alright sir, I'll tell him you'll be a moment. Bridge out."

Upon reaching the bridge Kayetan saw the blue green orb that was Earth filling the view screen, its myriad of satellites, man-made and otherwise orbiting like a pack of angry bees.

Well, thought captain Kristopher Ingram Kayetan, commanding officer, USS Katana, I'm back for what that's worth, but instead he said, "Put him on."

By the time they got everything squared away and got to the 'party' it was in full force. But they were still there before everything was set, other groups were still arriving and a work crew was putting the final touches on the decorations. The whole crew was here, somewhere. Only Orourack, Commander Hiss'toor Sharr Lallal, Lieutenant Tarna Radia, their Bajoran operations officer and Kayetan stayed in a group.

It was a large outdoor area, a courtyard in the middle of starfleet command, right on the shore stretching out over the water on a jetty. That part had struck Kayetan as odd, not the jetty itself but the dais was on it, a large platform had been erected and seating for about a hundred people set on top. I would have put it front of the headquarters emblem. He thought, referring to the twenty meter Starfleet delta that covered the front of the main building.

There were over a thousand sentient's here already, mingling, talking, eating, drinking. News crews from all corners of the Federation had people here, even some from outside the Federation he amended as he noticed a group of Breen in their armored environmental suits.

Their little group had snagged some drinks off a passing waiter's tray but they otherwise hadn't mingled. No surprise there. Their numbers included Orourack, who's massive bear-like bulk was enough to make anyone think twice about approaching. And then there was Commander Hiss'toor, he was not even a meter and a half tall but it wasn't his height that was imposing. It was just hard for some people to get used to a being that looked more like an over-sized, armored Terran gecko than anything else.

But it wasn't that unique physiology that so amused Lieutenant Tarna right now. It was watching her three superiors interact with each other and the crowd. At some point after the three had met they decided that it was their sacred duty to comment on the action of the universe around them, often with an undertone of the wry humor they all shared. And for that end they had for the last few minutes watched, and commented on the Tellarite delegation as they slowly chased the Andorian delegation around the square.

"Red alert." said Kayetan. "Andorians moving again."

"Hmmm. Yess. The hunt beginss again." replied Hiss'toor as the Tellarites moved to intercept.

"The prey moves confidently as they are stalked across the arena of diplomacy." Orourack stated as if announcing a sporting event, "They must have something up their planned." he finished narrowing his gaze as the blue skinned aliens 'drifted' deeper into the crowd.

"I think you're right," responded Kayetan, "they're moving towards the Klingons."

"Hmm. Like one of thosse wolveriness you told me about taking refuge with a bear." summed up Hiss'toor turning to the captain.

"Exactly." affirmed Kayetan.

The Klingons had arrived not long after the officers of the Katana had and immediately started to drink, slugging down everything from blood wine to saurian brandy. It went without saying that most of the partygoers were giving them a wide berth.

"What would drive an Andorian to take refuge with Klingons?" mused Orourack.

"When that Andorian is trying to avoid finalizing giving away the rights to a large portion of a wealthy asteroid belt." Cut in a smooth voice from behind them.

Turning around the four of them saw a green skinned woman near them standing near two other women who were obviously related to her. Actually, the three of them together looked rather like a time elapsed photograph of one woman growing taller and greener as she aged.

They were Tala, Zillianna, and Cartia; Alex's Grandmother, mother and sister, respectively.

Kayetan smiled back, "I was beginning to wonder if you three would show"

"Of course we would, you boys are like family." said Tala smiling all the wider. She looked toward Tarna and raised an eyebrow, "and who is this lovely woman?"

"Tala Dionisio, may I present Lieutenant Tarna Radia, my operations officer." Kayetan started holding an indicating hand toward Tarna. "Tarna Radia, ambassador Tala Dionisio, to her left is Zillianna Tanton her daughter and to her left is Lieutenant Commander Carita Tanton, Alex's sister."

"It's a pleasure." said the Bajoran woman shaking hands with each in turn and taking her chance to smile.

Kayetan noticed that Tarna seemed immediately at ease with the three women, they'd always had the ability to do that and it had always fascinated him. He supposed it was because he had never been very outgoing, oh he kept a close circle of friends, mostly those who had been able look past his rather plain, bookish, and uninteresting outward appearance to find a loyal friend who would stay by your side and try to keep things interesting.

But these women were just the opposite, they made friends easily, and often. They, the two older ones that is, had often poked fun at Alex's rather old-fashioned take on love and romance, they would flirt with most any thing that came near, even a rather shy engineer named Kristopher that Alex had brought home with him one summer vacation at Starfleet Academy. Alex had nearly died from the perceived embarrassment.

Kayetan though had noted one thing about their 'philandering', as much as mother and daughter had gone on about what they would do to their 'conquests' they had never actually seemed to do what they'd been threatening even after their husbands had died in the Dominion war. It seemed to Kayetan that after Alex's father and grandfather, they had never really wanted anyone else but just liked to tease. Stir the pot of the upper social crust events they often attended as it were.

Tala had been one of the finest Orion ambassadors ever seen, she had overseen the final stages of Orion integration into the Federation. She was also the first Orion woman to openly practice a profession without the screen of pretending her husband was the power but she had still been married, as is the custom. After the death of her first husband she decided to end her career and marry a human man by the name of Alejandro Dionisio, a warp-propulsion specialist. This was a bold move as highly intelligent men were still considered taboo by most Orion women.

Tala had one child with Dionisio, a girl named Zillianna who in later years met and married a human named Connor Tanton. Connor and Zillianna then had two children, Alexander and Cartia, both of whom serve in Starfleet; Cartia was chief engineer on the Cobalt until recently and Alexander had been CO of the Ajax, which had the dubious honor of being the last Apollo Class starship built.

Kayetan knew the elder women through both Cartia and Alex; Alex from the academy and their first posting on Starbase 12, and Cartia from the Proxima fleet yards, where they had both been engineers and had dated briefly. For some parents that might have been a problem, seeing their girl and then breaking up but the Tanton women were not as 'stuffy' as some and Kayetan had stayed friends with all three of them.

Kayetan though suddenly noticed something, looking around he asked, "So where's Alex?"

"He's 'helping' with the festivities." responded Cartia.

"He'll be on stage." added Zillianna.

"Ass part of the sscenery?" interjected Hiss'toor, at which Tarna snorted into her drink, a laugh stifled by the champagne in her mouth. She had only met Alex once when the Katana made a rendezvous with the Ajax six months ago. She had been impressed at his size. Alex Tanton was huge but with not an ounce of fat on him, so much so she had even wondered how he sat in his command chair. He was short, barely a meter and a half tall, very thickly muscled with squared features, more like a large block that had some how achieved sentience. All this was topped off by a thick mane of bluish-black hair and layer of greenish-tinged tan skin.

"My brother has a small part, I suppose you could say he's part of the scenery." Was Cartia's reply as she looked over Tarna out of the corner of her eye.

Kayetan shook his head, "Fine, keep it your secret then." he shared a smile with Cartia, her gleaming white teeth shining over her greenish skin in that winning fashion that she had been known for, much nicer than his softer closed lipped one.

It was as they stared at each other, words on her lips unspoken as she sized him up. You a lot better than the last time I saw you. Every time their paths crossed after their first meeting it seemed as if he aged past his years somehow, but now he looked right, a little grey in his very closely cropped brown hair and the slight wrinkles around his face had become full fledged laugh lines. He had aged further yes, but now it was a cultured, well worn look, not a result of hard living and stress. Still, it was a far cry from the naive young bright eyed engineer that summered at her home when he was at the academy.

"Kristopher," said Tala interrupting Cartia's musing, "A moment please, I need to bend you ear, as you humans say."

Nodding, he spoke to Hiss'toor, "Commander, the party is yours, keep it together while I'm gone." the commander's response was to stick out his tongue, no small gesture, as it was a little over a quarter meter long.

Winding their way through the crowd she led him to a bar covered by an awning and immediately ordered drinks, "Two Tahitian sunrises."

"You'll like it, I promise." she finished handing him one after it had been mixed.

Fruity, he thought sipping the drink but aloud he said, "So what has you sounding so serious?"

"You." was her concise reply before going on, "I have learned recently that your name has been moved to the top of a very short list. Kayetan started to speak but she held up a hand and continued, "don't worry, this is not necessarily a bad thing."

Kayetan narrowed a questioning brow, he had never been good at subterfuge and insinuation, in fact, he was down right horrible at it, any attempt at subtly or distraction in the social arena tended to go right over his head.

Tala on the other hand was a successful diplomat with a long record of expertly out-maneuvering her opponents. She could infer a world of meaning from one word and lie with the best of them, both good qualities in a politician. At first it might seem strange that she would like the younger man and originally she had been suspicious of him when her grandson had brought him home from the academy. It was because of a quality she had seen in him after a few weeks, the reason for his seeming naivete; he was a truly honest person. So much so that he had been nearly incapable of seeing the dishonesty in others. Some had just thought he was dense or socially retarded but she declared that it was a breath of fresh air to her. In her line of work one had to sift through thousands of terra-quads of information to arrive at one truth and even then it was to be doubted. But with Kayetan, 'Kick' as he had been called by everyone but her, what you saw was what you got, to use the human phrase.

"I know you're having a meeting with admiral Janeway after the announcement here. I don't know what exactly it is she wants from you, but I do know she needs you and for whatever reason that gives you an edge."

Kayetan thought for a moment, this was dragging up things he'd rather not have drug up. "So what do think I should do?" he said after a moment.

Tala laughed softly, "I'm not trying to tell you what to do. I actually have no advise on that. Only you can know what you want from this. I just want it to be clear to you that you have an opportunity to gain something for yourself here."

Something for myself?, he repeated in his mind as more memories surfaced in the dark pool of his mind.

But before he could respond there was loud sound, a bosuns pipe electronically enhanced to sound over the whole crowd. There was a loud call of 'admiral on deck' and every starfleet officer turned to the podium where a group was advancing toward the seats set there. And behind that, what in the world? It was a line of starfleet officers, five in all and each wearing a different uniform. The first was a human, probably, he couldn't see details at his distance and he was wearing a United Earth Starfleet uniform, the four pips of a captain gleaming on his right breast. Right behind him was a Vulcan in a later starfleet uniform, a kind of pasty-gold shirt with black pants that were flared at the bottom, the same uniform James Kirk wore during his famous five year mission. Next was another human, female this time, who wore one of the so called 'pajama top' uniforms. And there, his width causing a slight disruption in the uniformity of the line was Alex Tanton, just behind the two officers modeling more modern uniforms. The five anachronistic officers came to attention on a raised platform just behind where Admiral Janeway finally made it to the lectern.

Setting a PADD down she spoke, "Thank you all for coming tonight. As some of you may know I'm not one to beat around the bush so I will get right to the point. To day, as most of you know, is the two-hundred and thirty-second anniversary of the signing of the Federations' initial charter." she paused looking around at the crowd, "But that's not why were here. We are here because that day also marked the start of a new age of exploration, an age of knowledge when people like, Archer, April, Kirk, Spock, and many others blazed a path to the unknown." the admiral paused here, scanning the crowd, "It is in their memory that I ask Admiral Picard to give the order to start the nights events." she nodded to the older man sitting near her.

Rising, looking upward and touching his commbadge he said in a crisp accent, "Commanders, you may begin your landing."

There was a moment, many looked upward to see where Picard was looking and then there was a collective gasp. It was a large shape as it came in low, most likely had been skimming the surface till called for. All the starfleet officers almost immediately knew exactly what it was, the engineers a little bit sooner because the warp core of that ship was required study.

"Gathered sentient's, I give you, The Enterprise, as flown by Commander Geordi LaForge." proclaimed Janeway.

The ship did a lap around the gathering and then landed on a platform that had rose from the water nearby, grappling arms rising from the barge to cradle the three hundred year old ship onto its bulk.

But it wasn't over yet, there was a droning sound and a low booming and an even larger shape came towards the crowd. It took the same route the smaller ship did, all though not as elegantly, it was an explorer, its massive bulk not made for planetary maneuvering in any circumstance. Kayetan's eye was sharp enough to spot the antigravs attached to the hull to make the landing possible.

Janeway spoke again, "USS Enterprise-A, as piloted by reserve Admiral Montgomery Scott and Captain Steve Whorl, Starfleet core of engineers."

The ship landed in its own platform that was rigged with struts to hold the saucer section in place in the gravity.

Then there was the loudest rumbling yet and huge form blocked the sun from view and a great silver beast settled into the bay without a platform and began to move slowly toward the jetty where the podium was.

"And, of course, the U.S.S. Enterprise-E, piloted by Captain William Riker." finished Janeway as the massive bulk actually docked with the jetty and a cargo hatch hissed open revealing a cargo bay set up with more tables and party supplies.

"These ships are a testament to the Federation and all it stands for, they represent the quest for knowledge and understanding we have undertaken across the universe. Some of you may note that ships from this historic line are missing; NCC-1701, NCC-1701-B, 1701-C and D, these four were destroyed in the line of duty, doing as their designers envisioned, and stand as a testament to the cost of exploration. Some would say that that cost is too high, that we should move slowly through space and the uncharted. Were April and Kirk moving slowly as they moved through the beta quadrant? When people look back on the past the usually see the 'greatest eras' as the eras we pushed outwards just to see what was there. And so after much deliberation, advise from the Federation council, I and the other Starfleet chiefs of staff have decided to reintroduce the five year mission exploration plan."

At that point one could hear pin drop from a thousand meters and then, one of the starfleet officers stated clapping and another, and one more and then the whole crowd was involved. There had been talk of something like this, it had been floating around the starfleet net for weeks, but no one thought it was this serious. Kayetan was wary of it, he had seen every empire building admiral who wanted to make a name for himself start some half-assed 'exploration' plan; they would call in a few favors, gather some ships and send them off to chart some distant nebula somewhere. These plans usually sounded good but the admiral in charge always seemed to end up micro-managing them into the ground with weekly reports, constant supervision, all these 'starfleet revitalization' plans had ended with the hand picked crews falling apart and having a huge lapse of judgment. But his line of thought trailed off as the applause died down and Janeway continued her speech.

"This will not be the long-range scouts we have been performing for the last few years nor will it be a 'wave the flag' exercise; volunteer crews will head out into the Gamma quadrant for independent mapping and exploration duties lasting no shorter than five years or events force a return, they will be the First Exploration Fleet." she looked over the crowd scanning the faces there and finished, "All in all it is going to be a very interesting next few years and I look forward to sharing it with you."

Kayetan stared at the podium as the admiral left, not really seeing the next speaker come forward, 'may we live in interesting times', I wonder if she knows about that curse. He thought as he swirled the remains of his drink.

Janeway sat at her desk and sipped coffee from her old mug before setting it down with a sigh. There is too much to do and not enough time to do it in, she thought bitterly. It had started several years after their return from the Delta quadrant and now Starfleet wasn't all it seemed.

Actually, for her it started about ten months after they made it home when Voyager was destroyed. Not by enemy weapons, or a spatial phenomenon; seven years in the Delta quadrant and it was a massive spread of quantum torpedoes fired from sister ships that did her in. After returning home the Voyager had been impounded because of the advanced future technology brought by her own future self. Starfleet brass had debated what to do with it, they allowed scans taken to be used by an engineering design team, but the ship herself floundered in a secure dry dock until further scans indicated the ship was beginning to phase through time, 'temporal de-cohesion' they were calling it.

When the effects started to spread the decision had been made to destroy the ship totally. Voyager had been towed out beyond Pluto orbit and with the newly promoted Admiral Janeway standing on the bridge of the USS Intrepid had given the order to three of Voyager's sister ships to open fire. The only piece that remained was the dedication plaque that now hung above her office door and a coffee mug that someone, Harry and/or Tom probably, had saved and left on her desk, everything else was atomized.

But it was not the loss of her old ship that furrowed her brow in consternation now, it was the list of names sitting in front of her all of which but one had been crossed off. All the names had characteristics linking them, they were all starfleet captains, all with an excellent academy rating and all had earned reputations for thinking outside the box. She would be meeting with the owner of that last name momentarily and if he to was wrong for what she had in mind, she really didn't know what she would do. The subject of her ire was at present one Captian Kayetan, Kristopher I. He was senior for his position as captain of a small Saber class scout vessel and reading into his records revealed why; the man couldn't make a senior ranking friend to save his life. At least not one that played by the rules. From the academy on the only officers he got good evaluations from were few and far between and even then they added a lot of qualifications to their recommendations, mostly along the lines of 'he's a good engineer, but not senior staff material'. And even then if it hadn't been for his superb marks in engineering he'd never have made it past First Lieutenant. But then something had brought him to the eye of the wildcard Admiral Wainwright who'd taken the Commander off of the Utopia Planetia Shipyards and added him to his staff as an aide, giving the younger Kayeten very high marks with only the caveat; "-he is very goal oriented, an order is given and this officer will act on it far above the call of duty. However, he is inexperienced, even retarded in the niceties of command etiquette." But despite all this the late admiral went on; "However, I am sure commander Kayetan will make an excellent addition to the senior ranks with some seasoning and a firm example to follow."

However, any potential advancement was interrupted when Seventh Fleet was ambushed in the Tyra system and torn apart by a much larger Dominion force. But that was also where Kayetan's record changed, it seemed that after the Admiral's flagship the Hammer took a bridge hit Kayetan, by now the chief engineer, was left in command and ordered the remaining ships to leave the system, technically an illegal order coming from a mere Commander to the other ships' captains. But he didn't stop there, he further ordered all ships who couldn't warp out to remain and cover the escape at all costs, including the Hammer. The Hammer then led a guerrilla operation against the Dominion fleet for three days, long enough for two more ships to repair their warp drives and escape with dozens of life pods they'd picked up. Kayeten only then surrendered his remaining ship while rigging it to explode only after they'd been taken back to a Dominion base. He and the seventy survivors of the Hammer had then been intered ina POW camp until near the end of the war when theyd staged a massive breakout that removed a major Dominion material base from the war. It was those actions that earned his Federation Cross as well as several other awards.

Quite an interesting read, and that first half was only slightly more interesting then the second half, she thought touching a panel on her desk and said, "Commander, bring him in please."

Commander Tuvok, now her chief of staff, came in preceded by a human man of medium height and build wearing the red collared uniform of command over which was a close cropped head of hair. A steady gaze that swept over her office gave her the impression that he could give a precise inventory of everything in her office without looking around again. He came to attention in front of her desk and waited until she waived a hand and offered a seat.

"Thank you ma'am." he said crisply as he sat.

Impeccable. Not a motion was over-done or wasted. He didn't even look down when he sat. "Thank you commander, that is all." she said and Tuvok left the room to them.

"Alright Captain, I'm going to cut the bull. I have your complete record here and read every bit of it. You see, I was completely serious with what I said earlier, we are restarting the five year mission plan, just as it was, only the technology and procedures have changed. What are your thoughts on that Captain? And speak freely, I want your honest opinion."

Taking a breath to compose his thoughts he responded, "It won't work." he said bluntly.

Janeway did have some idea about Kayetan's mannerisms from his record, his old CO's reports indicated such, but she was still rather taken aback at that simple declaration. "Care to elaborate on that statement?" she said.

"Of course admiral. First, assuming you truly mean to let captains go on five year missions unsupervised, you still have other factors; ships to start with, even here almost sixteen years after the complete end of the dominion war we are still in heavy rebuilding, too many planets were far too devastated and most of Starfleet is till tied up in missions helping member worlds. And then the ships left are tied up in every project that any admiral, councilmen or planetary governor can think up thanks to the war rebuilding special measure."

Janeway nodded with that last statement, the war rebuild special measure was supposed to be temporary measure that was enacted by the Federation council to aid member worlds in their recovery by allowing them to use starfleet resources. In effect though, it had opened the door to every planetary leader who wanted to keep a few starships around as their personal go-fers. At first it had been fine, after the war a huge number of personal who had signed up during the war had decided to stay in active service and with all the light hulls in production near the end it meant they actually had the ships to spare. But now, as the rebuild projects started to wind down more and more ships were spending time as errand runners for every back-water planet that had a mission.

And there was another problem, the ships themselves. They had been built during a war with no end in sight, small ships built with quick build time rather than durability in mind and they were beginning to show their wear. Some senior officers wanted to start refurbishing them but there were too many and their basic frames were just too old to handle any real upgrades. This all meant that starfleet was caught in a crossfire, on one hand they had a huge fleet so couldn't get the resources to build more of the newer ships but she couldn't decommission the old ones until she had replacements in the docks, at least she couldn't if she wanted to maintain the work load the council demanded. In the past her predecessors would just tell the federation president what they needed but lately the processes in the council had taken a change for the red taped and even the president had his hands tied.

It's amazing, we withstood the Dominion only to tear ourselves apart with our own legal processes. The Founders should have tried sending lawyers, not troops, she thought wryly. But she shook off that train of thought and finished listening to Kayetan speak.

"The second is us, starfleet officers, this has the potential to be a historic turning point for starfleet and every captain and admiral who wants to make a name for himself is going to want in on the planing phase and each will want to add his own touch to the mission statement until there's just a glob of unidentifiable orders that no one can follow in a Euclidean universe." Taking a deep breath he finished, "And the last is related, those same admirals who want 'in' will demand constant status reports and critique every mission report that comes in. The explorer captains will be afraid to act, to take the initiative that is needed out in the unknown. If you actually mange to assemble a fleet and get it to the gamma quadrant, I give it a year at the most before most of the crews try to opt out or something happens to call them all home."

Well, I see why everyone thinks he's abrasive, but Janeway let the silence continue for a moment after he finished then returned, "Well captain, you stated several of the more powerful arguments against the five year plan. The arguments almost everyone on my staff tender-footed around with for months. Your abruptness was quite rude coming from someone I've never met." she smiled here, noting that Kayetan's face didn't even twitch with that pronouncement, so he's the real thing she thought, "I rather like it." she finished. "Half my staff is too enamored with my career and the other half is afraid to upset the 'old lady'. In truth the only one I seem to be able to count on is my Vulcan aid, Tuvok." she paused taking a breath, "And so in the same spirit I'll be up-front with you, you were not my first choice. Nor even my second, no, you were last on my list. Not because I don't know you, I knew none of the captains on my list, I put you on the bottom because you're still listed as an engineer and engineers aren't usually the type of person I'm looking for." She stopped again, a sudden question occurring to her, "Out of curiosity captain, why did you change to a command track?"

Kayetan looked puzzled for a moment and she felt she could almost see a mental shrug as he started, "It was admiral Wainwright, he submitted my name to the advanced tactical command school, he said it would be foolish to deny starfleet access to my full potential." he paused a moment, "His words, not mine." he added.

Hmm. She herself had never met the admiral, the CO of seventh fleet had earned a bulldog reputation during the opening months of the Dominion war, that is up until seventh fleet was decimated outside the Tyra system but the admiral was killed in action, seventh fleet lost ninety-eight ships and Kayetan ended up in a Dominion POW camp awarded the Federation Cross and the Starfleet Medal of Honor for his actions. It had been that award that brought Janeway's eye to Kayetan in the first place.

The first battle of Tyra seems to be a turning point for him. But aloud she said, "Well, getting back on track what you said is true, all of it. Which is why I've taken measures to avoid those scenarios. First there will be only one admiral overseeing the First Exploration Fleet, Picard, I trust you have heard of him?" after getting an affirmative response she continued, "And he will be stationed on Orbit One, right here in Earth orbit. Second, while we will be laying subspace transmitters and relays so we can keep in touch I have made the First Exploratory its own fleet, only Picard will be authorized to give orders to his captains, who by the way, have been given very specific orders; they are to cruise an area of space between Dominion occupied territory and the border of the alpha quadrant. These orders are given directly from my office and cannot be countered by any other than my office. But that's not why you're here. You see there will be lot of science vessels out there, barely armed and vulnerable, cut off from most aid and direction. And as much as I would like to just throw them out there I have to appease the by-the-book officers and according to 'the book' there must be a flag officer or at least a senior officer in charge so there is a clear chain of command. It's a stupid bit of rarely used procedure but the junior admirals have been grousing about it to the Federation council so I have to have someone 'in charge' out there." she stopped again here, looking at Kayetan who seemed interested and was staring intently at her.

"So what I want to do with you is simple, you will be starfleet command in the Gamma quadrant. You will have the authority to step in and assist the explorer captains if they need, their safety net if you will. This will mean added responsibilities for you and your crew, so you will get your pick of new ships and officers, whatever you think you need. The hard part will be that you need to be in place before the fleet gets there, hopefully in nine months which would give you six to have a ship and crew ready. Also, in order to void any seniority issues you will receive a promotion to Fleet Captain."

The room was silent for few seconds as kayetan thought, "So, in essence I would act as back up for any problems the fleet might encounter and resolve any internal differences the personnel might have. I would be in effect an internal affairs department and a tactical response unit."

"Yes. That would sum up your duties perfectly."

"What if I said I like my scout ship and my current duties?"

"This is not an order captain. It is a, request. And only that. If you wish to remain captain of a ship far below your grade I will not begrudge that. And you could go back to your anti-pirate patrols."

"Well admiral," he said standing suddenly, "I will have to think on your offer, this is rather sudden for me. May I sleep on it?"

She nodded, "Of course. But I need your answer by tomorrow, I don't have time to waste if you decline."

"Then by your leave." Kayetan came to brief attention before moving smartly out of her office.

After he had gone she called out, "So, what do you think Tuvok?"

"An intriguing individual." intoned the vulcan as he stepped from the corner where he had been listening. "Did you see he was an exchange student with the Vulcan science academy?"

"Yes. I saw that. Top marks from there if I recall."

"Yes. But it is not his scholastic record I am intrigued with. According to an instructor I spoke with, after his incarceration in the POW camp he returned to Vulcan and learned a number of more advanced meditation techniques before being summoned back to the Advanced Starship Design Bureau. But one of the masters I spoke with was almost, impressed, with his achievements while he stayed with him. He said that if Kayetan had wished it he would have recommended that he start the Kolinar ritual. A most unique offer." He added, "For an non-vulcan at least."

Kathryn thought on that for a moment, interesting, very interesting.

Janeway moved through the late night fog that had rolled in just after the sun set. Many off-worlders who came to earth were surprised at the barely controlled weather on the Federation's capital planet but the planetary governing body didn't like to interfere with the natural cycles more then they had to. But it meant that the uniform 'trench-coat' she liked to wear was quite suitable and kept her warm enough.

She moved slowly through the fog, she was still unfamiliar with this side of old San Francisco, Alameda, she believed it was called. Spotting her destination, the only thing separating it from all the other plain buildings here by the wharf was a sign, The Core, which was lit in bright blue and had a stylized warp core as the background.

Sounds like the place an engineer would want to meet, she thought slightlytestily, although it doesn't look it.

Stepping through the old fashioned wooden door, complete with brass door knob, she immediately saw how it got its name, for there, behind the large horseshoe shaped bar, was a warp core. From one of the old J class cargo haulers, if she didn't miss her guess. Slipping off her knee length uniform coat she off she draped it over her arm and slid up to the bar, eyeing the name plate hammered onto the dilithium matrix chamber; ECS Fargo, Luna Ship Yards, Earth, commissioned this day, November 12, 2105.

"Hello admiral." broke in a soft voice from behind her.

Turning, Janeway saw a short woman in the uniform of a starfleet engineering commander. She had soft blue eyes and greenish skin under a head of long black hair.

"Interesting place commander. Is it new?"

Cartia smiled at that, "No, admiral. The Core has been around as long as there's been a Starfleet core of engineers."

"Why haven't I head of it?"

Smiling even wider she responded, "Well, you're not an engineer are you?." Sobering suddenly she finished walking toward the end of the warp core, near the wall, "When Kick, Kristopher that is, first told me about your offer, I must admit, I was angry."

Janeway's eyes widened at that, "How so?"

Stopping near where the plasma conduits normally would have come out the back of the warp core Cartia responded softly, "Kick called me right after your meeting with him. He might not see the trouble you're getting him involved in, but I see it." Raising a wooden bar panel on its hinges she stepped into the serving area and turned toward Janeway. "I was mad, at first because I thought he was being set up, just like what happened with the Argo. But then you called and asked about him, asked me about him and then I knew, and was no longer angry." Reaching under the bar Cartia pulled out a bottle of a greenish liquid.

"Orion brandy Admiral?" she said pouring some into a tumbler.

The Admiral eyed the drink, she didn't normally indulge, but she decided it wasn't a bad idea after a long day. She placed her coat on the counter and after the other woman had filled her glass they drank.

"Why did that change your mind commander?' Janeway quizzed after setting the throat scorching liquid down.

Raising an eyebrow the Orion woman replied, "Why would you care to know more about him if you were just setting him up? Oh there are other reasons to know, but you, personally, the commander in chief of starfleet operations, calling a mere Commander of engineers to talk about the rather shy captain of a small scout ship? No." Cartia looked the admiral in the eye now, smiling thinly, "Unlikely that you would follow up on this unless something was biting at you. I can read a news biography as well as the next person, and you, admiral, are not the type to grouse about 'expendable parts'." She smiled wider, "Actually, I know exactly what happened. Somehow in the few minutes you spent with Kick you started to like him." she paused a moment, "Well, maybe not like him, but he seemed 'interesting'."

Cartia started to pour another drink but Janeway put a hand over the top of her glass, stopping the other woman from pouring. "Commander,-" she started but was cut off.

"The first rule of The Core is no rank, call me Cartia."

Nodding Janeway shot back, "Alright, Cartia. If we are to be informal than call me Kathryn." she said in an infrequent show of generosity. "So, where is the proprietor of this establishment?"

"The owner had some business in Dublen," something about getting some more 'proper' brandy. He asked me to watch the place for him." putting the stopper back in the bottle of brandy she replaced it under the counter and turned toward the warp core reaching under a curved panel that shielded the main housing and circuitry.

"Now, Kathryn, I'll show you why I wanted to meet here rather then some where more formal." pressing a hidden catch she lifted the whole panel away.

That has to weigh at least thirty-five kilos , thought the admiral.

But Cartia started before her, "In order to tell you about Kick I need to tell you about his past."

Setting the heavy panel aside Cartia twisted the handle on a meter long inspection hatch letting it open, falling downwards on gimbal hinges.

Inside there were scratch marks carved into the diatainum panel. Pointing at one Cartia went on, "Can you read that one ma'am? The light isn't quite right. cocking her head she said raising her voice, "Computer, raise lights by thirty percent."

Eyes adjusting quickly to the brighter illumination Janeway saw that the 'scratches' weren't just that. They were signatures. And the one she was pointing to started with a large 'Z' and then a 'e'- by the stars

"Is that, is it real?" she stammered out.

"Yes ma'am. That is the signature of Zefram Cochrane." moving her hand a few dozen centimeters to the left she stopped over another signature, this one had a simple style, rather plain and blocky but was clearly spelled, Kristopher Ingram Kayetan. "This warp core was originally installed in the cargo ship Fargo, one of the last 'J' type cargo haulers built. And the last ship that Cochrane personally oversaw the construction of. After the ship was mothballed its core passed through various hands until it was found powering an old sensor station in Neptune orbit, nobody knew how it had got there. The original owner of this tavern bought it and placed it here, fully operational, as a decoration. Every year the engineering student at the top of the class is allowed to perform the basic maintenance on it, realign the injectors and what not. If a student is the top engineer for all three of his main academy years he is allowed to carve his name on this inspection port, right with Cochrane's."

She paused here to see that she still held the admiral's attention before going on. "This is where the Kayetan I know starts. The first time I saw him, thin and lanky with a head of unkempt hair, I wondered what had gotten into my brother bringing him to our house for the summer break at the academy. You see, I didn't like him at first, I was young, jealous at his natural engineering ability and the way my whole family seemed to take an instant liking to him. And so in my teenaged way I tried to get him angry, to get him 'riled up' and show everyone that I was better then him. But the more things I did to him the less he seemed to care; nothing I did got under his skin. I thought at first he was baiting me, trying to draw me out or something by staying calm. But it wasn't that."

Taking a breath she finished. "It was something my mother said about him one day, that it was pleasant to meet someone with his honesty. And then it hit me, he didn't know he should be angry at me. He didn't know I was jealous, he didn't know the daggers I was glaring at him when his back was turned. He had no plan to compete with me. You see, Kick is one of the best engineers I've known, one of the most organized, logical, intelligent people I've known. You give him a warp flux problem, a subspace fractal algorithm; in any situation with known quantities he'll figure it out, or find the one who can, but if you put him in a social situation with any sort of hidden meaning or insinuation he can't deal with it. He just can not understand the layers of lies, half truths, insinuation, two-faced actions, and any number of the things that normally occur whenever more than one sentient being gathers in one place."

Cartia took a sip of her drink before going on, "And that is why he's gotten in trouble so many times. Nothing that really shows clearly on his record, but he's really pissed some people off, which is why he's been happy with his small ship running around chasing pirates on the borders. There he's with a crew who know and return the trust he freely gives and he can face every problem on his terms, one step at a time, just the way he likes."

As the engineer sitting across from her trailed off, a question from earlier came back to her, "Does this attitude have something to do with the first battle of Tyra?"

"Yes and no. Kick has always been lost in his own head or whatever problem he's working on at the time. He was always like that. When he first met admiral Wainwright it was right after one those incidents of trouble I spoke of, someone took something from him out of spite and he was still reeling from it when somehow the admiral saw through his depression to his potential. With some convincing Kick joined the admiral's staff as an aid. Well, as you may know admiral Wainwright believed in leading from the front lines and so he commanded his own flagship, the Hammer, and Kick's 'aid' job quickly turned into being head of engineering and then first officer. I think that was the first time he really formed a lot of extended friendships. Before, Kick had just a few very close friends, but on the Hammer he was well-liked and accepted among the characters Wainwright liked to have on staff. Then there was Tyra and Kick had to hold a Dominion fleet off so the remainder of seventh fleet could escape. He had opened up to the crew of the Hammer, really opened up for the first time, and all but sixty of the original crew of five-hundred were killed and most of those sent off with the last escaping ship." Cartia thought for a moment, "Did you know that the ones that stayed top cover the escape are still with him, Lieutenant Coda and Commander Lallal included? I understand those three were inseparable during their incarceration. And that, admiral, is the real story. One that I don't have. He doesn't talk about the camp. Not with anyone. Not even the councilors he had to see after the camp was liberated. I was able to find out that at some point he did something there that scared some of the other prisoners, something even Coda and Lallal will avoid talking about. But whatever it was; there were more than two-hundred prisoners when camp fourteen was at capacity, barely more than a hundred survived it and fifty of those are in his current crew, some bond has kept them together all this time."

Janeway mulled over what Cartia was saying, it was nothing she hadn't read in Kayetan's file, but Cartia put it all together nicely. But there was one thing she still needed to ask, "Do you think Kayetan can handle what I've offered?"

"Well, I don't know the details of whatever you have him doing but I can tell you this, he is loyal, loyal to anything he see as his responsibility to protect. And he will always do what he sees as the right, no matter what. He will find the best solution and he has learned to act with no hesitation and by no half measures. Don't get me wrong, he's not a loose cannon, it takes a lot for him to declare war but once he does he can and will do anything and he has the brains and will-power to back that up. A scary thing for anyone on the wrong side."

"Well commander, lets hope he stays on our side then."

Chapter 2

Kayetan hadn't slept. He just laid on his bunk and thought on his current situation. Getting nowhere even after he talked to Cartia he had started a meditation technique to focus his thoughts. But the only one that kept repeating was your 'new ship, new crew'. I like my ship and crew. Was the only response he could think of. And he sat there until finally his mind wandered back to the party and he thought about what kind of specs those barges needed to land those ships, then he thought of Cartia again and wondered how her mother was doing and-'Only you can know what you want from this. I just want it to be clear to you that you have an opportunity to regain some of what you lost.'- it was like a lightning bolt as he remembered what Tala had said and then what Janeway had said- 'your pick of new ships and officers, whatever you think you need' .

He shot out of bead like a Thasken Razor boar and went to his wall panel pulling up a set of schematics from his personal files. I do have a chance here don't I? More slowly and deliberately he pressed a button near his bed and spoke, "Computer, activate EMH, my location."

A hologram of a youngish looking human woman with a slight gymnast's frame and fiery red hair appeared a few meters from his position. She looked around and narrowed her gaze as she caught eye of the captain, "So, midnight house call? I'm not that kind of hologram." she said coyly.

Kayetan stepped back, putting him off balance because he was still next to his bed and it blocked his path, "No, I, that's, you're, we don't . . ." He trailed off has he felt his face flush and bumped into the bed behind him.

"Well, it's nice to know that after all these years I can still make you blush when I want." she laughed merrily.

"Miranda, please, seriousness for a moment."

"Fine." she stated has she sat in a chair near the end of the captains bunk. "Does this have something to do with your visit to San Francisco?"

"Yes. Access the files I have on my work station."

Miranda sighed, she ran through a few dozen scenarios in her cognitive cortex attempting some insight into what the captain was thinking and from past example she deduced that the captain was making some important decision; and from her presence in the matter it had personal implications for the captain. In all matters relating to duty the captain's decision process was fast, taking an average of 4.758 seconds to make up his mind, usually without any outside help. On the other hand, personal choices, especially those that would indirectly effect others took the captain an average of 3.2 standard days. And he usually needed help with them. Miranda accessed the message net log and, yes there it was, he had called Cartia, one of the ones he liked to get an 'unbiased' view from. But here the captain broke form, Miranda was his friend, they shared a love of strategy games and music, he usually went to Orruorak or Lallal for personal advice, so what was she . . . her thought processes stopped, or rather she devoted a full three-quarters of her processing powers to the situation. While she had considered the captain's mood she had accessed his work station and, it was the Storm.

She stared at him; Miranda was an advanced holographic matrix comprised of forty-two hundred (squared) Tera-quads of information in a bilateral positronic core. To one who knew their computers that meant she was a combination of two fields, her hardware was based off the work of Dr. Noonian Soong the creator of the late Commander Data. But beyond the basic idea she differed with that famous officer because none of the scientists working on Soong's notes and ideas had been able to make a stable positronic core capable of self-growth. One team who had once worked with Lewis Zimmerman, the creator of the EMH and father of modern holography, theorized that by using a positronic matrix to generate a holographic field, they would be able to simulate Soong's work and then be able to see how a properly constructed positron matrix formed. It was hoped that this would allow them to discover the secret of positron matrices that had died with Soong. But what they got was the most adaptive, expansive program ever designed, from the time they activated the first version to the time it grew too large for its memory and 'died' from a recursive error was measured in nanoseconds. They had told it to learn and it had, everything in less then a second, the entire federation database, something it took days to load into a starships main computer core even if you had the right equipment.

For some time now they had the knowledge to create sentient holograms, but they needed constant maintenance and as a holographic matrix very complicated algorithm and conflict errors started to form. Sometimes they could be fixed, as in the well known example of Voyagers EMH, but any good programing expert would tell you that he was a very unique case and just as much luck as skill went in to saving him. Those like her though had been allowed to 'grow' naturally, overcoming most programming conflicts before they could cascade into a single massive failure.

Miranda herself had come into being thirteen years beforehand, she was one of six to go online within a year. She spent six months downloading information and 'growing' into a fully formed personality matrix. Unlike most holograms generated for entertainment her form and personality were the result of 'growing up', albeit in a highly accelerated time frame, rather than being preprogramed. She and two others had volunteered for a program called Intelligent Computer Interface, this group was experimenting with using intelligent holograms to maintain the onboard computers of starships. In theory this method would increase reaction speeds, computer lifetimes, and allow a ships computer to 'predict' a crews needs. It was at this point that an engineer researching technologies for a new ship class came across the program and decided it was something that would be perfect for his needs.

For more than a year Miranda worked with the crew designing the Storm class, she helped design the computer core itself and made ready to integrate herself with its systems, as her positronic matrix would provide the 'personality', rather than the standard one used in most starfleet ships. That was not all, her core processor, the actual hardware itself would be installed in the ship where she would provide maintenance and act as a 'firewall' for the main computer core. This was to be the first time a computer program designed by a computer generated hologram would then be managed and inhabited by that program. Then the Storm project was canceled. It was decided that the ship was far too warlike, unneeded, and too resource intensive to justify its continuation. The Storm and most of the systems developed for her use, including the Intelligent Computer Interface were classified and canceled.

Miranda herself was set to be deactivated but Kayetan had used his engineering contacts to instead have her installed as a maintenance computer in a secure facility. He had in effect saved her life but it had been at great personal cost to him, particularly his career. It didn't end there though. Half a year later, after Kayetan had taken leave, he had requested ship command and as some form of back-handed slap they had offered him the Katana, normally a lieutenant commanders slot, as a full captain he should have gotten a much bigger and newer ship. Kick though was happy, the Katana had been the last ship he had overseen the construction of before the Storm had been canceled. Then Kayetan had retrieved her matrix core from exile and installed it in the Katana as an EMH.

It was kind of ironic actually, Kayetan had been one the silent proponents behind the Emergent Lifeform Emancipation Act, a law that would protect artificial, 'generated' life, he had helped organize like-minded engineers to gather and write an article entitled simply: Emerging intelligent life, studies in case. The article had circulated among the engineers of the fleet for months gathering momentum and favor until at a yearly engineering symposium held on earth every engineer refused to submit their work in protest, instead signing their name to the article. It was this incident and resulting debates that forced the federation council to make a decision one way or the other, something they had been avoiding due to the strong feelings on either side.

The result was the Emergent Lifeform Emancipation Act, which simply said that life created through artificial means including, Positronic, Holographic, and any Techno-organic was to be considered a sentient life form with all the rights, privileges, and responsibilities thereof; end of discussion. This had led to the placing of inhibitors on all holodecks, no self-learning programs with over twelve tera-quads of programing would be allowed. If that had been the end of the story it might have been fine, but Miranda had been put online several years before the act and at the time starfleet preferred to just deactivate unused holograms rather than add fuel to the growing holographic rights movement. The other part of that was when Kayetan had gotten his command he had gotten Miranda out from her exile, but it had been through a very shady 'mix-up' in orders. At the time Miranda had been ecstatic at the thought at finally going into ship board duty, it was later that she realized what the captain had done to get her out of hock. It was a classic rock and hard place, on one hand he had broken the law by basically stealing starfleet hardware, then he did it again to let her join his crew without authorization. Then the act was ratified and now if it was revealed what he had done, if she was recognized under the act, everything he had done would come out and he had lost too much already, she hadn't wanted to cause him more grief and what was done was done.

And that brought her back to the current problem. She wasn't just another hologram she was a holographic interface. In order for her to move from one ship to the other they would need some very specialized equipment, the type of equipment that would raise some flags in the oversight committee that enforced the Emancipation Act. Kayetan had gotten away with it the first time under special circumstances, she had been kept in Proxima orbit and moving her to a ship under refit there hadn't been a noticeable task with all the construction. And she had covered his tracks in the computer databases herself when he had come for her. She had gone willingly, but if her true nature was revealed, one wrong word in the wrong place and they could get into a lot of trouble. The committee had already proved that it was willing to hand out some of the hardest sentences in the Federation for those found guilty of what was for all intents and purposes slavery. She pulled up part of her sub matrix and looked in the Federation legal database: forty-seven. They could charge him with forty-seven crimes. If they wanted to push it. Yes some of them would be legal over-extensions but by the time he was cleared he would be in disgrace. And, she calculated that, as fractured as the officer core was at present, some party would take advantage of the situation for their benefit.

But I've not seen him so energetic in a long time. Well, whether or not he knew it, she had a debt to him, he had saved her life, that she was sure of, she would have been deactivated if not for him. If he had found a hope to get the ship he'd spent most of his career designing she would back him up all the way. But now she was bonded with the Katana's computers and if he attempted to remove her, there would be questions, more questions and lots of jail time.

"Anyway Miranda," Kayetan was going happily on in true form, "so, I was thinking that this is an opportunity, Janeway's basically said she would give open-ended orders for equipment and personal, I'd be able to pull the Storm out of storage and transfer everyone to her. It would be great, a bigger ship, new space to explore . . ."

Mirdanda assigned fifteen percent of her cognitive abilities to listening to the captain, the rest she used to run scenarios and calculate the odds of a favorable scenario. Yup, in eighty percent of cases we'll need some outside help for a favorable outcome, we'll need someone on the council and who would be willing to listen to the whole story. She listened to the captain go on about the ship and what would be needed to be done and went through her files of oversight committee members. Professor Roch, Reginald Moore, Dr Hans Grubber-she stopped there; doctor. In only a few milliseconds she accessed a file and added a person to the scenarios running through her mind. Yes, with his help, we achieve a ninety-three percent success rate. Those were as good as they got for a machine.

The fifteen percent of her mind that was listening to the captain noted that he had paused for two point six seconds and was staring at her. She moved another sixty percent of her functions to focus on him.

"Kristopher?" she said.

"Are you OK?" he asked.

And there it was again. She had never changed her features, nodded at all the right places, she checked her visual memory just to be sure and as always it was. No one else had ever noticed, they couldn't really, when she was distracted but the captain did. She had never been able to classify it. She smiled. She had never been able figure it out and she doubted she would tonight. But there was a saying that starfleet engineers had a magic touch, especially when it came to the impossible. She filed it yet again under that one percent 'human element' factor that was part of all her calculations and asked the captain to go on.

"Just a second, I minus well start the ball rolling before I get started again." He hit a comm button, calling the bridge.

"Sir?" was the response from Nancy, the night bridge officer

"Put me through to the head of starfleet operations, Janeway's office."

"Sir, its four a.m. local."

"I know. Just put it through lieutenant."

Kayetan stood there tapping the wall panel staring at the schematics displayed there until Janeway appeared on screen. Miranda slid back out of screen angle and waited.

"Admiral, I know its early, but do you think I can have those orders in writing?" Janeway smiled, "I guess this means you're on board?"

Smiling back he said, "Yes, yes it does. Can you send those orders?"

"In the morning, farther into the morning Captain, after my coffee. You'll get them."

"Thank you ma'am. Sorry to disturb you. Good day." He finished, ending the call.

Miranda smiled again, there are constants in the universe and Kristopher Ingram Kayetan's habit for bulling forward was one of them, thought part of her complex mind as he continued on with his plans as if he called the head of starfleet operations every night.

Kayetan looked at his crew, all eighty-two of them gathered in the Katana's main cargo bay. It was times like these he was glad for a small crew. Stepping up onto a crate he waved at the crowd to get their attention and not really succeeding until Orruorak called out, 'captain on deck!' then they really started to pay attention. More from not hearing that phrase very often than any actual hard discipline.

"Well," Kayetan started, "I see we're in fine military form. I'd say 'at ease' but if you were any more at ease you'd still be in bed." to which he got a chorus of snickering. "Anyway, unless the grapevine has died a sudden and unlikely death, you all know I had a meeting with the head of starfleet operations yesterday. Admiral Janeway gave me an offer that I couldn't refuse. I know it is rather sudden but she didn't give me enough time to consult many people and I had to give her an answer early this morning." Looking around at his crew, his friends, he could see confusion. "You all know me, I won't try to justify my decision, or explain myself; we've been together for too long for that to work anyway. So I'll just read my new orders to you and offer you all a similar choice." Kayetan pulled out a PADD and began reading, his clear precise voice echoing through the bay, "To, Captain Kristoffer Ingram Kayetan, CO USS Katana, from the office of the director of starfleet operations; you are hereby requested and required to relinquish command of USS Katana, NCC-76034, to the first available caretaker crew and remove yourself and any staff you may require to Starbase 001 in earth orbit. There you will await further orders. Failure to comply with this order may result in court marshal or censure." Kayetan paused here and scrolled down on his PADD continuing, "To, Captain Kristoffer Ingram Kayetan, unattached duty, earth orbit; you are hereby promoted to the rank of Fleet Captain and are to uphold the responsibilities and requirements your station requires. Failure to comply with this order may result in court marshal or censure." he touched the PADD again and went on, "To, Fleet Captain Kristoffer Ingram Kayetan, unattached duty, earth orbit; you are hereby given authorization to inspect or requisition any facility or ship that you or your staff deem necessary until which time you take command of your next duty station. This order signed this day, Admiral Kathryn Janeway." he paused again, noting that everyone seemed interested, "To, Fleet Captain Kristoffer Ingram Kayetan, unattached duty, earth orbit; you are hereby authorized to transfer any Starfleet personal you or your staff deem necessary to your duties and responsibilities as long as the procurement of such personal does not directly threaten or impair the safety of starfleet personal or equipment. This order signed this day, Admiral Kathryn Janeway."

There was a second of silence in the bay as the ramifications of those orders sunk into the crew. Then Kayetan finished, "This is quite a sudden change and I didn't make my decision lightly and, I hope you will all come with me. My orders let me write my own ticket and I will transfer any of you who wish to come onto my 'staff' until we pick-up our ship. However, you should all know that our duties will involve the new First Fleet and we will be on extended patrol in the Gamma quadrant so I will not, can not, order any of you to come-you must decide for yourself. The only thing is that I need a decision within the day."

As Kayetan trailed off the bay came alive as the crew started to mummer and discuss until Orrourak shouted for quiet and turned to the captain.

"Sir. I must let you know, that, there was a breach in protocol. Your orders were, known to us, before your announcement." Orrourak looked over the crew and the back at the captain, "We have already discussed the, implications, and have divided according to our wish to remain here or go with you."

It was then that Kayetan saw Lieutenant Tarna and Chief Redgruve standing with a few of the junior enlisted personnel, a few feet away.

"Sir," she started, looking at the other personal near her, "we, we have decided not to join the five year missions and will remain here. And-" she trailed off. While she had not been with the captain as long as Lallal or Orrourak she felt the weight of leaving. When she thought on it, she hadn't really been part of any of the adventures described to her by the senior officers. But there was the root of it, she had family, lots of them scattered around half the quadrant and while she enjoyed listening to their tales and hunting pirates on the edges of Federation space, she couldn't just leave and be out of direct contact with her family. Unlike those three, her life was not all starfleet, yes she enjoyed it, but she used her leave as it came. Commander Coda once stated he had ten months accumulated, the captain probably had far more.

Kayetan looked for a moment, distant, unsure, then he smiled, "I understand Lieutenant, I don't know what to say." He finished speaking as he swept his gaze around the whole group she was with. "I will miss you-all of you." Fourteen, fourteen will be left behind. There was a small part of Kayetan's mind that reeled from this, losing more of his friends, no loosing family,but this small portion was overshadowed by the part that was happy a new set problems was about to start and if it was one thing he liked, it was a nice direct challenge.

"It's fine sir, I wouldn't know what to do if you did say something." and she started to turn back towards the bay, smiling slightly before Kayetan went on addressing the crew.

His leaving crew members hanging on his mind Kayetan continued, "We have twelve weeks to pick up our ship, refit it, man it, and get to the Gamma quadrant. So while I have you all here, first, promotions all around, from this point on consider everyone here one rank higher that you were before, I'm just waiting for the paperwork to be pushed through;" then, "Millar, Tobias, Rezgat, take the third shift engineers and start setting the Katana for refit, pull all the personnel lockers and what not, you know the drill. Orrourak, take the security department to the Mars ship yards and get us some space, a full refit dock and the equipment to go with it." Kayetan barely paused for the 'aye, sir' from Orrouak before going on, "Chief Talos, choose ten people and start collecting inventory for a heavy dreadnaught weight ship, I want scanners, shields, every new upgrade you can get your hands on then take it all to Orrouak at Mars." Kayetan smiled here, "The rest of us will go pick up our new ship."

It was there that he paused long enough for someone to speak, Hiss'toor actually, "You speak of a sship again, and what sship would that be sir?"

Smiling all the wider, something his crew was accustomed to seeing, he responded, "You'll see commander. You'll see."

The ship was huge. And black. Well, it looked black with the storage coverings in place. Combined with its arrowhead shaped superstructure they gave it a dark menacing look. On the two hour flight to Proxima Centauri the captain had filled him in on the USS Storm, the ship they were 'retrieving'. It had gone smoothly actually, the twenty plus crew from the Katana had barely raised an eye at the shuttle launch bay as it was a common flight for starfleet personnel to take. Then the disembarkation went fine, even when they 'borrowed' a shuttle from the Proxima yards no one said anything, it was all 'down hill' as the humans say, that is, until now, where a middle aged Tellarite commander stood behind a desk pointing a meaty finger at the captain.

"Look, you cant just stroll in here and take whatever you want! I don't care who signed what orders, only the yard commander himself can release anything on the restricted listings!"

"You kept us waiting four hours just to find out the dock commander is on leave and now two more hours and you haven't found his XO, we don't have the time to waste sitting around while you find your superiors."

"Well that's the way it's going to be. Unless you suddenly found your requisition orders and security pass."

"That's what these are for." said Kayetan sliding the data rod with his orders closer to the officious man. "If you want, I can call someone and verify them for you." he finished with a devilish grin.

Lieutenant Raishida Sorne was having a bad year. First she gets dumped on the Utopia Planetia shipyards in Mars orbit, yes it was a far cry from her home of Trillus Prime, but still she was not visiting exotic places like the starfleet recruiter had said she would. And now she had some overgrown fur-ball running roughshod over her carefully laid construction que. Yes she was only in charge of part of the massive shipyards but it was the part that had the main heavy docks, the huge lattice works, the so-called 'dry-docks' (human phrases didn't make sense to her, everything was 'dry' in space) were in huge demand with captains of lager ships because they were the only thing big enough to handle them. Never mind the advanced fabrication plants they came with and the industrial grade transporters and replicators. They made any ship repair faster so they were always full, so when one ship bumped another off the list, every captain from here to Alpha Centauri would be screaming bloody hell and wanting to know why they had been pushed back on the schedule. And now for the last ten hours barges and transport shuttles had been arriving bound for repair dock twelve loaded down with all sorts of supplies, deflector dish upgrades, transporters, the latest shield generators; someone was planning a major upgrade and was planning to use her dock to do it in, all without telling her.

So that was why she was stalking quickly toward this 'commander Or-rack' that had waived some orders around, intimidated her subordinates and caused her delicate schedule to become a nightmare. Turning an intersection in the corridor she launched herself into the observation bay on dock twelve.

"Alright, whichever one of you is commander Or-Rack, listen up; I don't care under who's authority you're here this is my observation room on my dock in my shipyard and you will tell me what you're doing and cease whatever it is until I can verify those orders or I will clap you in iron so fast your brain will think your body just jumped to warp."

Two things happened to Raishidda right then, first she took a breath, then her brain caught up with her eyes and she really saw for the first time what, or who, she had just dressed down. It was more than two meters tall and instead of a normal uniform, understandable because they probably didn't have uniforms big enough for that, bear thing. The only indication she had that it was sentient was that it had a combadge on the left strap of its harness and the rank pips of a full commander on its right strap along with a standard type two phaser. To her credit her first thought after the initial mind trip was, why does something that, huge need a phaser? Staring at it, he, (she?) Raishidda answered her own question as she noticed the mustard yellow shoulder pauldrons mounted on the harness, oh, he's in security. But even after the long silence she refused to be intimidated by the, admittedly, imposing bulk in front of her

Looking up at the mountain in front of her she said, "Well?"

"Great One once said, 'hot head starts many fires'." rumbled back the mountain, "It was not our intention to challenge your authority in this, your domain."

Raishidda was taken aback, this was a very well spoken mountain.

"You haven't answered my question, commander Or-rak, right?" she tried the name as she heard her subordinate say it.

"OrOURrack. And we are docking a ship for refit." He corrected and pointed out the observation port. "That ship."

Looking out the viewport where a huge black leviathan was moving slowly toward the docks, the small shuttles, work bees and yard tugs scattering in front of it like schools of fish.

"Coda to Kayetan." intoned the commander touching his commbadge.

"Kayetan here, go ahead Orrourak." was the prompt reply.

"Sir, you may want to blow the storage shield panels from the hull before you enter the dock."

There was slight pause, "I knew we forgot something. There was a very annoying yard foreman who made things difficult. I guess we forgot in all the fuss he made."

"I trust you handled the situation with grace and diplomacy?"

Raishidda could hear movement across the comlink and then, "Well, I called Janeway and she convinced him to release the ship to me. After she told me never to call after oh-two-hundred hours again."

The mountain sighed audibly and responded, "Great One says, 'it is hard to walk down trail of broken branches, one should tread lightly.'" Then, "May I remind you sir, the storage panels?"

"Right." There was a soft beep of a comm panel from over the link and, "Now hear this, this is Captain Kayetan of the USS Storm to all work crews near repair dock twelve, I am blowing outer hull panels so I suggest all craft move at least a thousand meters from my location. You have ten seconds."

From her vantage point it looked like someone had just yelled 'fire' in a gas filled room as all the support vehicles within a kilometer scattered outwards in a mad rush to escape the black leviathan shedding. Then a pause and a shudder that they could feel even through the space between them the ship as the black hull plates shot from the ship and she got a look at its true form. A good five hundred meters long it was unlike any starfleet ship she had ever seen. From her angle she could see that it was shaped like an arrowhead, more than half its length taken up by a large triangular 'saucer section'; like someone had taken one of the Prometheus class destroyers, enlarged it to epic proportions and sharpened the edges. But there its similarity to common starfleet ships ended. The first noticeable difference was the warp nacelles, there were two, but they were integrated into the rear of the hull and angled outward so they formed a mirror angle to the front of the ship. Then there was something on the front of the ship, where the arrow point narrowed, a massive plate of armor covered the front quarter of the hull, there were no markings, windows or surface divots of any kind on it. Why would you need that much armor on the front of a ship? She wondered to herself as her gaze wandered down the rest of its length. One, two three, holy- she stopped counting phaser banks because there were too many of them, the ship bristled with weapons and as it pulled closer she got a look at its underside where a massive engineering section was the only protrusion from the, at least, fifteen deck thick 'saucer' section. Now she could see even more phaser banks plastered over every inch of the hull and on the engineering hull at least six torpedo tubes that she could see. By the spirits, if I didn't know better I'd say that was a warship! But there was no way starfleet ever made a warship that big. Was there?

Chapter 3

"You may go in now Captain." intoned the slight woman sitting behind a plain but functional desk.

Smoothing the lines of her uniform as she rose from where she had been sitting in a well appointed waiting room, Captain Samantha Doyal nodded understanding to Admiral Carson's secretary and strode to the door leading to his inner office.

"Ah! Captain!" The middle aged human man inside seated behind a wide desk was a familiar sight to her, he and her father, Admiral Michael Doyal, now retired, were old friends and the Carson's and Doyal's were oft seen at each others homes.

"How are you?"

"I'm fine. Father sends his regards and wants to know if you'll make it to the game on Saturday."

"Ha. I haven't missed a game of golf in ten years, I'm not about to start."

"Well he asked me to say something anyway."

"Good, good." He motioned with his fingers to one of the chairs opposite him, "Have a seat, I'm afraid we don't have much time and I need to get right to the point."

Sitting she questioned, "Sir?"

"That still seems strange, you calling me sir." He dismissed the thought with a waive of his hand and went on. "Anyway captain, I understand you are due to take command of the Tripoli in a few months time."

"Yes, sir. I haven't actually assumed the station yet, but my orders have been cut. I'm still picking a command staff."

"Yes, you father has been speaking of nothing else lately, and," He stopped mid sentence and looked straight at her.

"Sir?" she questioned again.

"Its, well. I have something of a quandary here. And no matter what I do I keep coming back to you." He rose suddenly and turned to the large transparent wall behind him. "What do you know about Janeway's new mission plan?"

Samantha sat back moment thinking, what does that have to do with me? Finding no immediate connection she answered, "Well, only what I've heard over the news, that she's assembling a large fleet to send into the Gamma quadrant. From what I understand its still a few months from any action actually being taken."

"Hmm. Well there's more." He turned to her meeting her gaze, "And, Samantha, you didn't hear it from me."

The use of her first name caught her attention, it was true that he had been known in her house as 'uncle jack' but while in uniform he had always followed protocol.

"Orders have already been cut, straight from Janeway's desk. The first ship is due to arrive there in six months."

Sam was taken aback, "Six months? To form an entirely new fleet and command structure?"

Carson nodded his agreement, "Yes, that's what myself and several other department heads thought, but Janeway has already found a captain and seems to be quite serious about all this." He sat back down in his chair and leaned back continuing, "You see, she is ignoring the so called 'traditional' command structure; after it's organized Picard and his cronies will have direct control of the fleet, and they don't seen to be wasting any time either. This is a guess, but I think that she's been working with him on this for months, if not years. But while he will have operational control she has been throwing her weight around getting the ball rolling." Humph, he scoffed, "There's a reason he have 'traditional' methods, so going off half cocked like this doesn't happen!" Here he paused for breath and went on, "But that's not why I called you Samantha, you see Janeway has so totally bypassed what she considers 'obstacles' that there will not be, and has not been time to properly prepare, document, and debate the issues. She's even been able to bypass the Federation Council on most issues, the important ones at least." He got up again, coming partway around the desk, "But there was one bit of procedure Janeway was unable to simply bypass, all flag officers must attempt at all times to provide a clear chain of command to a sector fleet and her wish to just throw ships into the void with no back-up was a clear abridgment, if not outright violation of that. Well, she went and thought up a way around that also," He reached down and tapped a PADD sitting on his desk, "These are a copy of the orders Janeway gave to a Captain Kayetan, you may recall the name from the Argus incident a few years ago. You see, he is to be the 'clear line of authority' for the whole Gamma quadrant. I need you to help me with this, you see, I need someone I trust out there, someone who can bypass this Kayetan fellow and give clear reports as to the goings on of First Fleet. But for now, his full personnel file is here so you may further understand what my fears are about this whole mess. "

"You want me to spy, on a starfleet captain?" Carson said nothing in reply as she pulled the PADD closer and began to skim the contents.

Kristopher Ingram Kayetan. His personnel file cover page was definitely one of the more colorful Samantha had ever seen. Order of Merit first class, Decoration for Gallantry, Starfleet Medal of Honor Christopher Pike Medal of Valor; some of the highest honors a serving officer could receive but there were more citations and warnings then there were medals.

She scrolled past the fluff and started on the real background of the man. He had joined starfleet at the bare minimum age of 16 years and spent his first year in San Francisco at the starfleet Central Basic Training Compound. According to all his instructors, even at that time he showed an almost supernatural ability with engineering problems. And despite several near failures with certain physical activities he passed and started his specialty training at the Star Fleet Technical Services Academy where he learned antimatter reactor repair, maintenance and theory, basic astro-sciences, and made it through his officer training all while taking the gold at several interstellar fencing and blade fighting competitions as his required extracurricular. Here there were some more instructors notes about his 'lack of stamina' while doing certain strenuous activities is mentioned again. Also, an incident with a upperclassman, according to a report he refused to take part in a 'traditional' ritual, the upperclassman filed a report that Kayetan disobeyed orders and then in Kayetan's statement he said the orders were illegal. Reading between the lines, someone tried to haze him and he didn't play along. Then there was a note attached to the end of that file year: Psychiatric evaluation,

From, Captain Jilanna Oreage, Starfleet academy counselor. RE: cadet Kayeten

'In a past report I stated a worry about this cadet, his tendency to throw himself into his work at the expense of most social activity. Having finally received the rest of his medical history, I now understand why. It pertains to his genetic linage, he is descended from colonists who established Deneva. Among them were several groups who were all that remained of the products of several Earth eugenics programs. Upon further study of his genome, I now theorize that several of his ancestors were so-called 'super soldiers'. His reflexes, thought patterns(which are indicative of a three dimensional thinking process) and corrective surgery for a cortical chemical imbalance also support this. After searching the historic database, I found that certain types of soldiers on earth were 'bred' and while most focused on tactical decision making and strength, his ancestors I believe, were of a 'special operations' type. Problem solving, agility, and awareness were their enhanced traits. This officer though is too far removed from this ancestor for this to have more than the effects already listed on his medical record.

Summery: although he has internal emotional conflicts, Kayeten has found to my delight, certain meditative exercises that help him maintain his emotional balance, much like most Vulcans do and I believe him to be quite capable of handling the responsibilities of a Starfleet officer.'

She had stopped right there, staring at the screen for several minutes before she thought to check the medical reports the counselor mentioned. A few commands later and she had them:

Medical records, service number: 654017D, Kayetan, Kristoffer I.

Species: human, genetic mutation: Beta 412_66_DDAAN. This officer has a higher than normal tolerance for radiation than normal humans, as is associated with decedents of colonists who had to travel through interstellar clouds at low warp speeds to reach their destination.

Also, please note that the files of the parents, see attached, verify eugenics in the family history. Factors of this include, high pain tolerance, enhanced agility, sensory input and strength, hyperactive immune system, a high kinesthetic score and increased mental faculties. These factors also mean the subject needs a higher caloric intake than average, at least 2800 calories a twenty-four hour day. High activity levels or heated environment may increase this. It is recommended this is kept in mind when assigning duties.

Note: subject is also more susceptible to auto-immune disorders and any pathogen that directly attacks DNA, please see attached DNA study, sector 5q-r through 7r-y.

Note: patient has had corrective genetic surgery to repair a cholinergic imbalance in his occipital lobe.

Note: Nanite-based treatments have been known to cause the following in this patent: flaring in the parietal lobe, dephasia in sensory functions, and extrapyramidal dyskinesia.

Note: the patient is sensitive to ocular stimuli. Eye-wear to adjust visible spectrum is recommended if subject will be exposed to bright lights for long periods.

Note: subjects is resistant to most basic medications and requires higher doses.

End file overview, 654017D, Kayetan, Kristopher I.

Samantha stared at the screen for several minutes, utter disbelief hanging on her mind. He's an augment! She thought using a common slang term for the so called 'supermen' that caused the Eugenics wars in the late twentieth century. Her mental stun was interrupted by the admiral.

"Samantha, you're the daughter of my closest friend, you're family, and I wouldn't ask you to put your career on hold and do something of this magnitude unless I really needed you."

Questions bubbled up in her mind and she asked first, "So how would this work? If Kayetan was hand-picked by Janeway wont he just choose his own command crew?"

"Well, it seems for whatever reason he hasn't been using his orders to acquire crew, just equipment so far. But he has asked for a full captain to be his second in command and I want to oblige him, with you if could." He sat on the desk near where she was sitting and put a hand on her shoulder, "Now let me be clear, this is a choice for you, it will delay your career some. You are supposed to take over as captain of the Tripoli yes?"

"Yes, after her refit is done in a week. I've been working up a crew on Orbit One for three weeks now." she said referring to the massive dock station in close earth orbit.

"Yes, your father has kept me appraised. Well, what if I said there is a hull being laid now, the Monaco, Corsica class. She'll be done in about a year. You do this for me and I'm sure you can be moved to the top of the list for her captain."

Samantha was slightly taken aback, there were much more senior captains waiting for new ship hulls, and- no, she had paid her dues in the junior ranks, stuck with backwater duties and captaincy of ships barely bigger than a runabout. Sure she would be stuck out in the gamma quadrant for a year, but it was a small price to pay for career move as good as a new top of the line ship. She didn't hesitate.

"I'll do it. Just make sure you don't leave me out there alright?"

Carson laughed, "If I did your father would never let me hear the end of it. No, I'll get you back to Federation space after the year if I have steal a runabout and do it myself. Alright?"

"Thank you, sir. I appreciate the sentiment."

The admiral got up and moved towards the door, "Well, I feel as if a load has been lifted, care to join me in a jilrilan tea? And fill me in on how your brothers are doing in the academy?"

"Of course." She said getting up and following him out.

Kayetan was having fun. Now that, to most captains, was things going smoothly and their way, Kayetan though was not normal captains.

"But sir, we'll never get a full biosciences lab in here."

"Pull these, condense all this into one mark four to make room for the new equipment. And, if we take this bulkhead out, that will make enough room for a science lab. We're pulling three sets of phasers from this side of the hull anyway, so we wont need a fourth redundant control room." Kayetan was standing in a cramped power transfer trunk, little more than a closet off one of the phaser control rooms. Turning he saw Lallal and Orruorak poking their heads in from the door several meters down.

"Jarvis," he said to the Lieutenant who was taking notes on a PADD, "You got all that?"

"Yes, sir. That all?"

"Shoo." retorted Kayetan making a scatting motion with his fingers. "Take that to the bridge and pump it into the remodel list."

After the room was vacated the two officers joined their captain inside and waited while he extricated himself from the cramped alcove and leaned on a wall facing them.

"So, how are we doing?"

Lallal stepped back into a corner, his short tail rising and bracing against the wall. It looked awkward, but it was his version of 'leaning'. "The final parcelss of equipment are arriving and the industrial transporters are programed and ready too remove the proper partss of the ship." he folded his arms behind him and took a hissing breath, "All in all we are almosst done with the preliminariess. But we'll need more personnel to continue at this pace." he swivelled an eye over to Orourack, indicating that we was done.

"Which brings us to this." he motioned with a PADD that was dwarfed in his massive paw, "I agree, we've moved beyond the part we can handle with just a skeleton crew, even one as fluid as ours. On the plus side thirty new personnel have already reported aboard, but most of them are junior grade and don't have much engineering experience."

Kayetan nodded, "Good, just put them to work pulling the new hardware out of its casings." He paused a moment the went on, "I considered the matter and when I requested a first officer, this is what I got." he reached down to the overlarge pocket in his coverall and pulled out a PADD of his own. "Captain Samantha Doyal. Started off in operations aboard the Nimitz, promoted to Lieutenant in field after a skirmish with Jem Hadar fighters. Then it was tactical on the Corsair where she made Lt. Commander and the Fleet Cross in a bit of mess called the first Battle of Betazed. Was transferred to Deep Space Six where she piled up several years worth of Very Good rating reports. From there she had several runs as a first officer before giving up a position as captain of the Tripoli to join our merry family here." he flipped the PADD around and tossed it to Lallal who caught it adroitly and started skimming its contents.

"Sseems like a fine officer." he said handing the device to Orourack. "It will be nice when we have someone to dedicate to coordinating operations."

Orourack rumbled again, "I do have two other recommendations. The last few days I have been impressed by the abilities of the dock master, a lieutenant commander Sorne. She has smoothly integrated us into the traffic flow of the yard and consistently kept up with the demands of our schedule. I think she would perform excellently as operations officer."

Kayetan smiled, "That's the Trill dock master right?" He thought about it a moment. He had only spoken to the overworked harbor master once, and from his own time spent in the same position he knew a sudden change scheduling like the one he had made was taxing on the dock workers. He noticed she had taken everything in stride. "Very well, if she's impressed you she's in, if she wants." Shifting around he folded his arms and went on, "I'll talk to Sorne and anyone else you two or any one else can think of. And the other?" he finished.

"Do you remember Mrilla?"

How could he forget, she had at one time or the other set half his bones, "Yea. How is she?"

"She is well. But she is now doctor Mrilla, she just graduated from medical school and has entered the starfleet officer exchange program. And while we made do with Miranda as a medic, we will need an actual chief medial officer."

Kayetan thought a moment, "Yea, that's perfect, I wanted to contact her brother anyway, see if he wanted to get involved with our little adventure."

"The general, Sir?" queried Orruoak.

"Yea." he confirmed, "We'll need more than one ship to really be effective as a backup and our allies will get involved at some point anyway, I'll just include them from the start." Kayetan looked thoughtful for a moment, "Besides, this will take care of that so-called 'debt' he owes me."

Orruoak considered that, it was the type of direct tactical thinking the captain was known for, there would be a can of worms opened though, but nothing he could see as a problem. The general's ships would be handy as a reserve, their speed and response power would be useful for scouting, but not much else. And more importantly, he was trustworthy, the type of trust that could only be gained though surviving together. Orruoak looked at Lallal who swiveled an eye his direction and bobbed it up and down, signifying his agreement.

"Alright sir, I will contact them."

"Do it, but for now just compile any others in a list, the rest will be for our new first officer.

Chapter 4

Captain Samantha Doyal had, like many others, gotten caught in the whirlwind of activity that was repair dock twelve. She found herself almost wishing she hadn't said yes to the admiral, she'd known this Kayetan fellow was moving quickly, but this! It had been only a day since her meeting and already she had orders to report aboard. There was no time for her to do more than let her father know and then retrieve her things from orbit one and transfer them to Mars. From there she had tracked down Kayetan and his cronies, not hard what with them leaving a wake of chaos behind them.

By the time she got there dock twelve had grown so full of waiting parts and supplies that transport had been impossible so she had to acquire an inspection pod to move her things over to the ship. And that had been chore too. First she had to fly a very slow and unresponsive pod through the maze of panels, wiring, even a warp core that was just floating there! What a mess! That will be the first thing to change. This slovenly attitude must go. But, she had to admit, they had gotten a lot done, and in only four days according to the harbor master.

As she had tooled past the work site in her pod she saw most of the attention of the fifty some-odd work crew focusing on a pair of torpedo launchers, whether they were replacing or removing them she couldn't tell. But she would settle her things and report to the captain before introducing herself to the crew.

And that is what she had been trying to do for that last twenty minutes. She had left her things in a room near the shuttle bay after attempting to hail a crewman and failing. Everything on the ship seemed to be running on automatic. That and someone had opened all the doors. Every internal door on this five-hundred meter ship was open, it was quite strange walking along the corridors, no one in sight with all the doors open, like some surrealistic nightmare.

Finding a turbolift had been easy, finding a working one, that had been a different matter. She queried the computer and found out that all the lifts were locked out for repairs. So in the end she gritted her teeth and climbed in a lift shaft to deck one, where the doors were open to reveal; a hallway.

Samantha had always prided herself on her composure, but this entire day seemed to be working to counter her every move and after she pulled herself from the shaft she hit the wall panel closest to her causing a schematic of the ship to appear.

Regaining her composure, she calmly asked aloud, "Computer, highlight the bridge on this display." And there it was, in the center of the ship on deck ten. She hit the wall again turning off the display, the bridge had been only one deck below the main shuttle bay where she had boarded the ship.

Stepping back into the shaft she snapped out, "Deck ten! Who puts the bridge on deck ten!".

Another ten minutes later she stepped out and looked around, it was a short hall with a heavy blast door that was open, leading to a 'Y' branch where each side had a more normal set of sliding doors which were actually closed, for once. Quickening her pace she sped through the right side doors to find, the bridge! She stopped a moment to survey the surroundings. To her left there was a raised platform with two wide steps leading to a huge master display and raised workstation with room for several crew to work, the engineering station. To the right there was another raised station, mirroring an identical station to the far left, not quite as commanding as the view from the engineering station, but raised higher nonetheless. A single armless chair on coasters was set in each circular station, probably OPS and tactical. Taking a step farther in she saw that there was a panel set into the front of the engineering station so the officer using it would face to the rear of the bridge, it was lit with environmental readouts. In front of that station a few paces away was an island console that had been disassembled, ODN relays and optronics were poking out of where the touch panel would be mounted. And there, right in front of this mess of wires, was the captains chair, flanked by two other chairs set half a meter further towards the front, one for the first officer she guessed, and a guest chair.

Two meters in front of them was the Con, the deck sloped downward aggressively after the captains chair so by the time it reached the Con station it had the effect of being on a far lower plain than the rest of the bridge. A pilots dream station if ever there was. True, it would be hard for whoever sat there to see the rest of the bridge crew behind him, but shear accessibility to the controls more than made up for that.

Moving in further she saw four more stations forming an 'W' shape with the captain/first officer/guest chairs as the middle and the main elevated stations on either side as the tops. These stations were situated so they could easily swivel to view the fore or the aft of the bridge.

Other than the blinking lights and hum of circuitry she was alone and perhaps that's why the urge overcame her, she approached the command chair and sat in it's well padded depths.

"Hey." said a soft voice from above her. "Can you had me that spanner?" it went on calmly even as she shot up, banging her ankle on a tool box that had been set under the chair.

Looking up she saw a gaping hole with optronic relays spilling out allover, and in the middle of them was a face, it was shadowy but she could tell it was looking far too amused at his new XO's discomfort.

"Get down here crewman." she stated with an edge that said 'don't play with me'.

"Yes ma'am." he said promptly. Then without waiting for her to move he vaulted from the ceiling head first spinning in midair to land crouched, his back to her. Getting up and spinning to face her she saw his face clearly for the first time. He wore a gray jumpsuit of the type favored by engineers instead of the normal black uniform and her eyes drifted back to his face as he turned and she saw a pair of twinkling green eyes. The slight grey in his almost shaved off hair and lines around his face showed his middle age but it gave an air of maturity rather than age, all in all he could be considered handsome but there was something else. It was the eyes that did it, they laughed and softened the hard edges giving him a more playful look.

"Well captain, shall I show you around?" said the owner of those eyes has he turned to fully face her.

She started to come down on him hard, in no way should a crewman address his senior that way but her retort was cut short as she caught sight of the small pips on his collar and her mind reminded her where she'd seen that face before . . .

Rank pips had been in use by Starfleet for almost a hundred years, its ease of use and simple system was easy for every race in the Federation to remember. The more pips one had the higher ones rank. Enlisted personal had one, an oval that was marked with darkened bars, the more bars the higher the rank. Then there were officers, one round pip indicated an ensign. One pip and a 'hollow' pip, a ring instead of the solid circle, that indicated lieutenant, junior grade. It went up like that until the rank captain, like she herself wore; four gold solid pips. After captain they simply started over with one solid pip inside of a box. But this man wore five rank pips. It was a rare rank, usually given to some officer too junior for an admirals slot but given the duties of one. Or more often it was a posthumous award given to those who earned some other high award like the Metal of Valor.

She stopped suddenly unsure, then she saw the smile under those laughing green eyes and in that moment she couldn't help but smile in return, it was infectious.

"There you go captain, that's the spirit, co'mon, le'me show you the Storm."

She didn't know what to say, it was strange, she had been angry, annoyed then embarrassed, but, but he had just ignored it all and this sudden shift in the way he talked, it reminded her of her twelve year old nephew when he found something new to play with and was showing it off.

Putting a lifetime of showing the right emotion at the right time to use she smiled demurely and followed the captain as he showed the ship to her.

"Well ssir, I am surprised how little we actually have to do." Commander Lallal was saying as they walked down a corridor toward the Storm's shuttle bay.

"Don't be." responded Kayetan as he fiddled with the shiny fifth pip that indicated him as a Fleet Captain. "When we designed the Storm it was supposed to be a test bed for all the newest toys." he shrugged, finally setting the pip in place again. "Most of the methods and systems we used on her were later used on most of the Sovereign updates and most of the subsequent classes. I just glad they didn't tear her apart when they decided to discontinue the build line."

"Hmm." Lallal hummed back "What I sstill don't get is why starfleet hid the two that were built. While this ship is rather warlike, just parking it in the back of a sstarship boneyard seems a waste."

"I made that same argument to my superiors at the time, but they said the war was over and we didn't need more warships." Kayetan stopped, looking around at the corridor, "I made this ship Hiss'toor, this started out on my drafting board. I oversaw the design, the production, I chose the systems that would be installed; I even helped name the class, it was just the Fleet Tactical Response Project before that. And then they shunted her to the graveyard for almost ten years. And not just that, they classified her so high that I would be committing treason just talking about it to anyone."

"Well, that's why you never ssaid anything about thiss to me." shot back Lallal with a feigned hurt tone.

Kayetan smiled and started walking again, "Well now she's mine again and no-one's going to take her."

Lallal looked intently at his captain, he hadn't heard him so intense about something, not in a long while at least. "Well, ass long as you leave the engine room to me, you are the captain now, not the caretaker."

Kayetan smiled again, "Storm couldn't be in more capable hands."

There wasn't time for a response because they had reached their destination and the massive doors to the shuttle bay opened and they saw that their new personnel were already gathered waiting for orders.

"Sir." started Samantha, "Eighty-seven personnel, fifty five junior officers and thirty-two enlisted."

Kayetan nodded and stepped up onto a transporter platform near the edge of the cavernous five story bay bay and called for attention.

"All right listen up! I know this isn't standard procedure but the transporters are being upgraded and this was easier because I don't have time to meet with every one individually. I am Captain Kayetan," he pointed at Hiss'toor and Samantha, who stepped in behind him. "and this is Captain Samantha Doyal your Xo and commander Hiss'toor Shar Lallal your chief engineer. If there are any problems you will go to them, is that clear?"

After a chorus of confused 'aye-sirs' he went on, "I don't beat around the bush, I don't hold your hand and I expect to work you all into the ground over the next few weeks." Kayetan saw that he had everyone's attention now, "We have exactly twelve weeks to refit this entire ship, work it up and become an experienced crew before we are due in the Gamma quadrant. We will get it done. Toward this end there will be some unusual methods employed in the chain of command. First, you are all assigned to engineering unless told by one of the senior officers. There you will be divided and commanded by your engineering capabilities, NOT your actual rank."

This was a shock, everyone was looking around like they were trying to figure out where they were. But Kayetan plowed ahead as if unaware, "This is not up for negotiation. Second, we have to refit the whole ship at once, so you will be moving your bunks around a lot. Keep your bags packed for quick moving, and no, you may NOT sleep on the dockyard station, we don't have time for you to shuttle back and forth every day. Third, everyone will be working double shifts until further notice. Fourth, if for any reason you cannot handle the workload or methods used here, I have placed a signed transfer order in your personnel files, please do not waste our time trying to 'make it work' here, just use your transfer. I'm sure you will get a later posting in First Fleet as soon as they become available."

Kayetan stopped so anyone could speak up, none did.

"That is all. Dismissed."

The assembled personnel vacated the bay in record time and soon only Orrourak, Hiss'toor and Samantha were left with Kayetan.

"The Great One once said, 'even a dream hunt may score a kill'." Intoned Orrourak.

"Yess, captain, I hope you know what you are doing here."

"I hope I do too, Lallal, I hope so too." he replied softly. "All right, Samantha, I know we haven't had a chance to talk much, but I need to pop down to Earth and pick up a special piece of hardware and finalize some of our other crew transfers so I'll be gone a few days. In any other circumstance you would be here supervising, but I think this will be an excellent time for us to get to know one another.

"A few dayss for one piece of hardware?" wondered Hiss'toor, "What do you have to do, ssteal it?"

"Only if I have to." he responded dryly.

Captain Doyal thought she was final getting the hang of this, roughshod command style, even if the rest of the crew was starting to resent it. Right now she had the inside of the ship mostly to herself, the crew had been given twelve hours leave before they started the emplacement of the new hardware.

The crew. All two hundred of them. Half of what they needed. She thumbed through the list again the faces and records flying through quickly. Her new captain had giver her a list of personnel that had applied to first fleet and asked her to recommend some for department heads. But she couldn't focus.

It was all too amazing, this whole ship was against the nature of starfleet, it was designed as a warship. And no matter how many phasers Kayetan pulled out it was still an engine of destruction. She closed the crew list and put a schematic up.

The USS Storm was four-hundred and ninety-two meters, putting her more than one hundred meters shorter than the Sovereign class but with twenty-four decks and a more compact design she had almost the same internal volume but her crew was two-thirds the size, the difference being made up through far more numerous backup and weapon systems.

Those weapons. It was almost scary. There were twenty-two phaser banks, a number which seemed high, but they were ten-deltas, a less powerful but more rapidly firing version of standard ships phasers. And that was how many were left after they had pulled four banks from each side of the ship. Then there were the torpedo launchers, originally they could only fire the more powerful quantum torpedoes, but Kayetan had acquired a set of multi-launchers that could fire both photon and quantum torpedoes. So all eight that remained, six on the front of the engineering hull and two on the rear had been replaced with them.

But the real teeth of this predator were the four remaining sustained burst phasers mounted in the forward superstructure. They were insane. First, they could not be fired while in warp, as ninety-eight percent of warp power was used to fire the damn things. They couldn't be aimed anywhere but forward, but they could overload almost any known shield type with only a three second burst. However, their power-up phase took two hundred and seven seconds, almost three and a half minutes and no other weapon system could be used while they were firing. There were other drawbacks, like the interference they put out practically blinding the sensors and alerting every ship in the sector of their presence.

This whole ship was contrary to the tenants of starfleet. It wasn't an explorer, or science vessel, even with the captains modifications, adding more long range survey equipment, pulling some of the phasers for science labs adding more shuttle storage and equipment fabrication facilities. Yes these changes would make it easier for the ship on long range patrols, but it still didn't change the fact that anyone or anything that scanned the Storm would know it was a warship, not a peaceful explorer.

And then there was 'the piece' of equipment the captain had picked up. It had taken a few days but in the end he, with several gleeful minions and one Captain Doyal in tow had acquired a Slipstream Overdrive.

The slipstream overdrive is one of the breakthroughs that came when the USS Voyager came back from her sojourn in the delta quadrant. Particularly, with the designs for the quantum slipstream drive. At first starfleet engineers were ecstatic when they got access to the data on the quantum slipstream, however, when they attempted to apply the data in a prototype ship even with their improvements on B'elanna Torres's original schematics, the prototype still failed. After picking up the pieces of the prototype scattered halfway around the alpha quadrant, the design team declared that with current technology it was technically infeasible to make the slipstream work. But one of the team members wasn't quite ready to give up and requested permission to keep working on the drive with a small team because he felt that it was the future of transportation technology. He was half right. While the slipstream core itself was impractical with the current levels, many of the subsystems involved in generating a slipstream corridor were quite feasible.

Many new power supply methods came from this derivative work but it wasn't until it was thought upon to apply the quantum drive deflector modifications to a vessel but instead of using it to open a slipstream corridor they would use it to enhance the 'normal' warp field of the ship. It was because of one of these modifications that the research vessel USS T'plana Hath, NAR-14922, became the first vessel to reach warp 9.999 under its own power and hold it for two minutes before the warp field destabilized and the ship was thrown clear.

To better understand this achievement one needs to understand how the quantum slipstream works, instead of folding space around the ship (as a normal warp drive) the slipstream uses the deflector to generate a 'tunnel' in front of the ship, something like the trans-warp conduits the borg use. In fact, some theories suggest that the slipstream drive is just a low powered version of the trans-warp conduit. Now, during normal warp flight your actual speeds will vary depending on the amount of subspace turbulence, gravity wells and anything that has an effect on subspace. This same interference is what causes the 'warp ten' barrier; the amount of power needed to overcome these effects is too great to actually generate and so the tenth 'warp threshold' is impossible.

The quantum slipstream overcomes this basic flaw in the 'normal' drive by, instead of generating a field around the ship to propel it, a much stronger 'curved' subspace field is generated in front of the ship allowing it to 'slide' through at incredible speeds. Despite this amazing increase in speed, there are two main inerrant flaws in the slipstream; the amount of power it takes, while not nearly the 'infinite' amounts needed for warp ten, is still phenomenal and can cause the power systems of the ship to overload; and the speed of the slipstream is so great that sensors can't 'see' where the ship is headed. This 'quantum resonance effect' is similar to the Einstein effect seen on normal faster than light travel. Sensors of the current type, including astrometric sensors, just aren't capable of seeing fast enough to steer the ship. Even the use of 'pilot' vessels, like a shuttle, don't make up for this. Perhaps future breakthroughs will enable us to create a working slipstream drive but until then the Quantum Slipstream is too unstable for practical use.

Until that time though, we have the Overdrive. The Overdrive is a kind of 'cross' of what is known of the quantum slipstream and normal warp drive. A ship equipped with the modified Overdrive deflector starts warp flight as normal until reaching the ninth warp threshold, IE: warp nine-pont-oh. At this point the deflector is engaged generating a 'subspace plow' in front of the ship. The warp plow 'smooths' space in front of the ship, allowing the main warp field to work at vastly improved rate much like the Slipstream Drive. It is this that allows a ship to engage a maximum of four more warp thresholds. These warp thresholds are not as strong as the ones generated by the main warp coils, they can't be or they would destabilize the main warp field. The theory behind the devices use was explained in the annual Starfleet engineers log as, 'imagine if the warp drive were like running uphill through a narrow ravine dodging boulders constantly falling toward you. When you add the Overdrive its now like running downhill, on a clear open plain.' While this turn of phrase gets the point across it makes the drive sound like it will replace the standard warp drive quickly. This is untrue. While the Overdrive will make extreme long distance quicker the inherent faults it has will limit it to just that.

First, the Overdrive is extremely delicate, even a micron out of alignment, a particle in the wrong space, and BOOM, no more ship. Like hitting a brick wall at full impulse. Second, the transition period. The additional warp fields generated by it must be engaged slowly, about thirty minutes for each, compounded. So the first one takes thirty minutes, the next, one hour, and next an hour and a half, etc. etc. Therefore, if you wanted to go to warp 11, (which is warp 9.0+Overdrive 2) it would take a total of an hour and a half to get there. So to get to the maximum of warp 13, it would take 6 ½ hrs to get there. And the same time to disengage the drive. No sudden stops there. Third is power requirements. Using the overdrive takes 2 KiloCochranes of power usage. Nearly the maximum that a standard Galaxy class ship warp core produces.

These and other drawbacks mean the Warp Overdrive will not see wide-spread service other then long rage transportation and exploration. And then only in larger ships like the Sovereign, Excalibur, Corsica and Galaxy refit classes. Although there is now a dedicated passenger service running from Q'noS stopping by Earth and then to Bajor, a cross Federation route.

Now as to the Storm, there was a an additional complication, two warp cores. Yup. The ship had twin warp cores. It had been attempted before but was discarded as impractical as well as unfeasible; one couldn't align the matter anti-matter feeds so the two cores would just interfere with each other, sometimes to catastrophic results. Well, it seemed that an engineering team, led by no less than her current superior, had found how to do it; just have them feed from the same injector assemblies. It had meant inventing a whole new method for the process, but they did it. They ended up with a system that had a massive power curve. Indeed, when she was reading the specs of the core one of the initial designers had indicated a problem with dumping power, they just had too much and the warp field only took so much, the rest had to be sent to subsystems. And usually there were enough to suck the excess, and then some. But the old runabout they had tested the twin core in didn't, so they just ran a plasma conduit to the rear of the ship and dumped the excess energy there. It was odd actually, normally one designed a ship, worked out what you wanted it to do then designed a core for it, one tailored to its power needs. In the Storm's case it the other way around, they had a core and wanted a hull to use it. According to the reports they tried again with small ship, no larger than a Defiant, the Scarab class project. Even with that the twin core design was over powered, its power curve was just too extreme. They added huge plasma impulse engines, massive shields and weapons banks, by then they were ready to try anything. A few years later they tried bigger. Enter the Storm class. Some flag officer had decided Sterfleet needed a response to the Romulan warbirds, Cardissian galors and Dominion battleships and so commissioned a design team. Interesting really, how the various teams came together, a weapons design team working on a new phaser system, the original Twin-core team and metaphasic shield teams, all brought under Kayetan and let loose. The Storm and two sisters were laid down less than then a year later. It was an impressive testament to the engineers designing such an impressive ship in so short a time, the Galaxy class had taken more than fifteen years to design and it wasn't half as complicated as the Storm.

Sam sighed. It was kind of sad but just because she understood what it had taken to build the Storm didn't mean she agreed with its philosophy. It was the right thing, to cancel the class build, the war had been won and over and starfleet didn't need a fleet of battleships running around while they rebuilt. Especially such resource intensive ones. No, it had been best to put them in deep storage and forget what depths the war had brought them to.

But now she would be serving on that ship. For a year. Well, she had her pride, spy or not she would learn the ins and outs of her ship and be as good a first officer as she could, even with the crew of misfits and castoffs Kayetan seemed to be drawing. She just wouldn't like it.

So, if she didn't have a say in which ship, she did have one on who crewed her. Security Chief and Head of Engineering were taken by Orrourak and Lallal respectively and they seemed to have people in mind for Operations and Medical. So that left only the Conning Officer and the multitude of junior officers and crewmen that would be needed to crew the ship. Her choices were limited to those who had volunteered for the five year missions and that in and of itself drew some strange types. Conning would be the important one a ships senior pilot was traditionally part of the ships core command, so she wanted someone stable, someone who would not add to the volatile mix . . . someone like THAT. She was young, but had top marks in flight school, she had been shunted to a test-pilot program but her request for exploration duty was flagged.

Well, one out of several hundred down; It was going to be a long night.

Chapter 5

The Doctor looked up, a shadow had fallen across the light streaming in from outside and his grumpiness faded has he saw the figure that shadow was attached to. She was thin, lithe and had a head of intense red hair that flashed in the light of Sol filtering through the skylights to form an almost halo around her smiling face.

"Sorry Doctor, but I tried to talk to you earlier but your assistant said you were booked until next session." her smile dropped slightly and she leaned closer her tone becoming serious, "I couldn't wait that long."

Finding himself liking the young woman despite his mood, he smiled back, "Well if Sharon is turning away beautiful young women I'll have to have a talk with her." he indicated the seat opposite him across the table and she sat. Removing herself from the sun faded the halo effect but allowed him to see more of her, her slightly pale skin and her uniform. Starfleet, it indicated sciences officer with its blue stripe across the inky blackness of the jacket and the blue under shirt, the turtle-neck collar visible around the low cut collar of the jacket.

Hmm. He thought. Call me a purist, but I like the utility of the old jumpsuits. It had been several years since starfleet had switched to the pants-shirt-jacket configuration for its officer core. Yes this did look more professional, and he did like the versatility of the jacket system, it meant that it was easy to just adjust that outer layer for environment, or even remove it entirely. Or, he smiled, wear that damn overcoat like Kathryn.

"Have a seat, Miss?" he queried.

"Miranda." she said returning his smile far more brightly that he could have. "I hope I haven't caught you at a bad time Doctor but I only have a few hours before I need to get back."

"So what can I do for you then?"

"I need your help." she looked in his eyes, "You see, I need you to exempt someone from prosecution."

The Doctor's face fell and he responded angrily. "I wont cover up for any one who breaks-"

She cut him off, slapping her hand on the table. The doctor didn't even look away even as people from other tables started to stare. "Look, I don't have the time to debate with you but a good man might loose his career if you don't." she said that last as she held her had out where he could see it. It was fractalizing, the fields that created the semblance of human flesh having a hard time keeping up with the violence of the movement. The Doctor recognized it because the same thing happened to him here. It was the mobile emitters Starfleet had made. It had been inevitable really, the emitter from the future had been taken, like the rest of the equipment on Voyager. But unlike Voyager herself it still existed, held in some lab. But the results of just knowing that such a thing was possible had the Starfleet engineers working hard and in the end they had, well, not copied, but imitated rather well its effects. Right now the doctor had downloaded himself into a half-meter cylinder supported by several anti-grav pulse emitters. The outside of the cylinder was covered in holo-emitters and generated his form. Yes it was limited by its battery, but it was a small price to pay for mobility.

But that was nothing compared to what her hand fractalizing meant. Yes it revealed she was a hologram, but it also meant something else. The Doctor had overseen personally every case that was covered by the Emancipation Act and she was not covered, she was an unknown.

"Come with me. We'll talk in private." He said rising, ignoring all the stares from people around him. It was only a simple turbo lift ride to his apartment, and they spent it silence. And when they had reseated themselves on his couches he went on.

"So tell me the story.' He said simply. It was some time before she was through.

"So." he started when she was done. "You covered up for this man, without his knowledge." he got up and turned to the window, "Normally there is a process, for this, the being in question is removed from its environment and a investigation is launched. But I do wonder, why did you, do you, trust this man?"

"Because he's in the wrong time." He turned with a questioning eye and motioned to go on, "If I can see it from out on a small ship patrolling the edges of Federation space surely you can see it? The changes." she got up and joined him at the window, facing him as he stared out. "The Federation is changing. It happens to every government, its amazing that its taken this long, really. But eventually the bureaucrats and self-interested would have their time at power." she scoffed slightly. "It was that damn war. I missed most of it, but those two bloody years of fighting, they have had more effect on the Federation than the hundred years before."

She turned to the window, "Kayetan though, he's out of place. Maybe in a previous era, earlier in Federation history he would be fine, he has the skill. Even the willpower, but right now with people making their own plans for the way things should be with little or no regard for the Federation as a whole, well, he'll just get ground up. Or rather he should have gotten. But he didn't. And I've spent many processing hours deciphering the reason; he found friends. He has the ability to get people to open up, to truly relax. There is a twenty-seven percent drop in stress indicators when he gets involved in a problem, and-" she trailed off for a moment. "And there's something else. I haven't been able to factor it. I don't think I can. He may not even know it himself, but he just knows things, like he has an innate understanding of what a problem needs. Not what the problem is, just what, or who needs to be there." she knew she was giving far more than what was needed for her goal, but well, she had been gathering information about Kick for years, and if this failed she might not see him for while, so she'd 'lay all her cards on the table' as the humans said.

"Its made me think in circles, I even asked him about it once, in a roundabout manor, I asked him about measuring unknown factors and he said to just listen to my gut. He didn't even consider who he said it to. My nature made no difference to him. And that is why I trust him. My time with him has helped me grow in ways I never thought possible, literally. I knew what I was and before I met him, but to keep up with him I expanded my processes and found a world of unknown. And I liked it. If I ever quantify everything, the universe will be somehow, lessened. So in a way he is proof that I will never understand everything and, and that makes me strangely comfortable."

The Doctor was smiling slightly now, but she went on before he could say anything, "But truly, I trust him because before I met him I was known as 'four-six-eight'. But as I first tried to catagorize him I happened upon an epic tale, 'The Tempest' and he reminded me of the character Prospero, in that he was a man out of place with his magic. Kick truly is lost on his own island and he's the closest thing to a father have."

The Doctor was truly impressed now, and quoted, " 'O wonder, how many goodly creatures are there here? How beautiful can mankind be? O brave new world that has such people in it!' " He gave a small chuckle and faced her. "So, Miranda is it then? I've never seen you before and might not again, but I know this feeling you speak of. You are a convincing speaker and I wish you had been around when I was fighting for the Emergent Lifeform Emancipation Act."

"All right." he continued, "You don't mince words and I will not either, I'll do what I can, you'll get whatever you need. But this is it. No more free passes. We've fought for to much to risk on one man. But it sounds to me like he won't need my help again." his smile went to his eyes, "At least not with you backing him up."

Admiral Kira Nerys was quite pleased. Her internal smile widened as she arrived in the massive OPS center, normal for a Spacedock Class Starbase, but after spending half her life on DS9 having twenty personal standing watch in one room, even if they all had plenty of space seemed like over-kill to her, but then again, DS9 had one-twentieth the mass and personal Bajor Station had. And there was the fact that all the materials making up the station had been mined in the Bajor System, something her people had never thought they'd be able to do after the Cardassians had plundered most of the natural resources from Bajor. Then there was the OPS center itself, the materials and architecture had been taken from her home world. The ruling council had insisted on it. It was nice she had to admit, going from the rather stark greys and crisp edges of Starfleet norms to the more rounded and earth toned calm of her command station. And not that Bajor Station was in any other way normal, they'd insisted on keeping with tradition and the Promenade had been more or less been re-created, if on a much more grand scale, right down to Quark's, now owned and managed by Morn. She had looked up just as she neared the lift to Ops and the memory made a rakish grin steal across her face, if a mere five stories of the sectors' finest shopping couldn't be called grand, nothing could.

But now it was to the business of the morning as Captian Nog called out a 'good morning' from the master systems display. He had spent most of the years since the war working his way up to command one the starfleet core of engineers fleet repair ships, the Edison, but when it was decommissioned he'd decided that station life was more to his liking. So he'd come back to DS9 and then to Bajor Station when it was built in orbit. And she was glad he did, he was the one who'd come up with the idea to not totally scrap DS9 like Starfleet had wanted. Instead they had turned it into a massive sensor and weapons platform and left it where it was near the mouth of the wormhole. It was loaded with a caretaker crew and enough of Rom's eighth generation self-replicating mines to totally block off twelve wormholes and the sensors to scan half the quadrant.

Approaching the massive holographic Master Systems Display she noted a systems failure reading from dock twelve, which as the spiritual successor to upper pylon three was always suffering from some problem or the other and made a mental note to have chief Engineer Kel just take the damn thing off-line. Seeing that nothing else was highlighted she held up a hand to Nog, who knew better to say anything yet anyway, and retrieved a raktajino from a nearby replicator.

Patently waiting for his CO to get some stimulants in her system Nog scanned his reports (for the third time) and sat down across from her waiting until she did so as well.

"Admiral, We have thirteen ships scheduled to come in today, the first batch of ships for the up-coming sector wargames. However Admiral Kag'el's Monarch will be here later this afternoon, which, if I may remind you, is preceding task group three-thirty-seven who will be here the day after tomorrow according to Captain Wright."

Kira nodded, task group three-thirty-seven was supposed to be working up in the nearby Badlands Exercise Zone, a popular area for wargames with many officers, and the upcoming purview for a fleet exercise. But this particular task group had been formed to patrol the old Cardassian/Orion border, a haven for freebooters and pirates and so had a reputation to maintain. Admittedly their record was good, but that was due more to the prowess of the flotilla captains in spite of their commanding officer, an Admiral who was punctilious and precise in the extreme and for some reason thought that he was some brilliant tactician and so 'lead from the front', just like during the war. The war where he had been a supply officer in the Vulcan system. Though no-one said that to his face.

"Have you told him that we don't have an opposition force available for them?"

"Yes, but he says they'll divide if necessary." Nog hesitated before going on, "Although Admiral Kag'el said he wants you find an op force if you have drag one out here."

Kira nodded. Normally there was a unit of some sort hanging around the sector even it was just the old Bajoran self defense force, still maintained as a tradition and was filled with the old and the young who liked to play soldier in their spare time. It was a silly thing to most starfleet officers, but the BSDF impulse fleet maintained a good record, even against a couple of Klingon wings that came though a few times a year to play around. But currently the bulk of the force was off escorting the High Minister on a state visit to Cardassia Prime. And the rest was tending to some much needed maintenance on their impulse fighters and carriers. Kira smiled at the memory; as a former member of the force during wartime she'd received an honorary rank of Full General and she'd just spent some free time inspecting the troops. Little more than youths who'd never seen battle; something she'd never thought she'd see in her life time, thank the Prophets she had been wrong. But they idolized the old guard like her who'd actually used ships like theirs in combat against the occupation forces.

Kira sighed, but that was last week, now she was again a Starfleet Vice Admiral and had to pay attention to what her peers wanted.

"Is there anyone available to play the bad guy?"

Nog again looked down at his PADD, scrolling down though the names and ship classifications, mumbling softly to himself, "No, no, no a . . . no," he paused a moment; expanded an entry and read further. Taking long enough for Kira to get impatient and start tapping the side of the holotable.

"Well?" she interjected.

Whatever Nog was reading held his gaze for a heartbeat longer and he pried his eyes away, "Well, Admiral, the comm center just dumped this mornings traffic and according to this,-" he indicated the PADD, "-the first ship tasked to the First Exploratory is coming though in a couple of days to rendezvous with a wing of Klingon birds of prey and a pair of fleet transports. That got Kira's attention, "Already?" She hadn't been expecting any movement on that for at least another couple of months. "Which ship? Agamemnon?" she asked referring to the new Corsica class ship being worked up especially to head into the Gamma quadrant.

"No ma'am." He responded, "That's what's weird, the ship class listing is different. And I can't seem to pull more than basic data on its type from the computer."

"Show me." she commanded and he slid the PADD over to her, and she read aloud, " 'USS Storm, NCC-81018; classification: Heavy Tactical Response'." That was a new one, she tapped the corner of the device to expand a section of its capability, "tactical power rating: Heavy Dreadnaught"

"Computer, define ship class storm." she called aloud.

"Level four clearance needed." the computers artificial feminine voice responded.

"Authorize, Kira, delta, one-one, sigma, epsilon." she intoned.

"Storm class dreadnaught, designed to fill heavy tactical response role and counter proliferation of large warships found in other space based forces. Storm class build authorized stardate 73146.8. First ship hull USS Storm NCC-81018 laid down stardate 74148.9, followed by USS Tempest NCC-81818,-"

"Computer, stop." she interrupted, "Display statistics of Storm class, this station."

And then the computer complied with a hologram and scrolling list. One second in and Kira was impressed, three seconds in and she could hardly believe a vessel like this had actually been built, by eight seconds she was wondering where the damn things had been during the Dominion war, and then nearly ten full seconds in she was smiling as the thought of this ship pitted against Admiral Kag'el's flotilla of punctual pirate hunters . . .

"Computer, cancel display." To which the normal projection of the mushroom like Bajor Station MSD came back online.

"Commander Sovell," she called over her shoulder, "contact the USS Storm, extend my complements and ask if her captain can spare a moment."

She turned back to Nog, "You did say they were meeting a wing of Birds of Prey right?"

Nog nodded, a pointy toothed smile forming on his narrow face, "Yea. For working up."

"Well, you may be able to tell captain Wright that his Admiral will have an opposition force after all."

"Sir! Target found, bearing one-two-nine, mark-three!"

"Helm, reciprocating course! Full torpedo spread! Attack pattern Alpha, fire all banks as they bear!" was the response Storm's master and commander barked out.

Twisting through three dimensions of space like a dervish the USS Storm fired two quantum torpedoes from each of its six forward tubes and began a complicated corkscrew pattern that allowed each of its twenty-two phaser banks to gain a clear shot at its foe. Each bank was made up of nearly a hundred energy coils and coherent energy could stab out from any three locations along each of their twenty-five meter length in as little as a tenth of a second; normally this should have bothered the Storm's foe, but the captain of that vessel had been lacking in an important piece of information: those phaser banks were not the mark tens most starfleet ships mounted, they were mark ten-deltas, slightly less powerful but faster firing. So it only took three seconds of maneuvering to allow each of those twenty-two weapons to each stab three beams out from their length. What should have been a minor, ineffectual, quickly passing opening exchange; a showing of teeth as it were, was not. And indeed, instead of allowing the opposing captain to use her masterful (in her opinion) ship-handling skills to acquire advantage, it was the end for her as the referee computer compared the five percent power shots against the effectiveness of the likewise lamed shields and calculated the results of the furious barrage; USS Storm NCC-81018: shields reduced 15%; USS Monarch NCC-79091: total shield failure, offensive power reduced to two torpedo tubes, deck fifteen through five exposed to vacuum, warp power down and impulse reduced to one quarter. In obedient compliance to its programming the referee computer sent the information to the Monarch's computer and it in turn shut down the effected systems quite effectively by taking them totally offline.

Now, if the Monarch command staff, including Task Force 337's commanding officer had been as quick of the mark as Storm had been, and if one of them had realized that a point blank engagement was exactly what Storm's captain had wanted, or that the Monarch still had working torpedo launchers and both of her escorts were still unbloodied, well the result might have been vastly different. But instead they had chosen to rant at the view screen and query the exercise judge to complain of tampering. And so they were stabbed by more phased energy (turned down so they wouldn't even scratch paint) and quickly pronounced 'dead' by the game computers.

Early on this response was because at that time none of the involved captains (and admiral) had any real clue what Storm was capable of. And even when they did catch on to how she was armed and armored, they still couldn't quite win decisively in any of the games where the Storm showed up as an aggressor force. Which so far had been all but two of them. Granted, she wasn't alone, a full wing of ten Klingon Birds of Prey had joined forces with her, and yes they were all of the newer Ka'vagh class, slightly faster, larger and more maneuverable than the last generation. But still, they shouldn't have so totally dominated the exercise like they did. And it got worse, even the few times they had managed to remove the Storm herself from the fight, somehow they usually succeeded in their 'missions' anyway. One of those times someone had even 'modified' the scenario to give the twenty-three ships of task group three-thirty-seven an extreme advantage and still the Storm and her opforce had won the day. Granted, the Storm had been reduced to a hypothetically sundered hulk by her own computer, but three of the damn Birds of Prey had swung out of the Storm's sensor shadow just as they got the damn thing and finished the 'randomly generated' mission to destroy the very small asteroid 'outpost'.

Now in this final mission given them by the referee computers the role had been reversed, Storm and General Grekt's Birds of Prey were 'defending' a large planetoid from invasion, a mission that favored the more numerous and capable task force 337. The Monarch followed closely by four smaller ships had waited until the rest of the task force had engaged the Kingons in the nearby asteroid field and then swooped in to surround the Storm. A simple strategy that had depended on the fact that the Op Force had divided their ships. Or rather the assumption that their divided force was much less capable than the Task Force's divisions. Again though the force's commander hadn't known that Storm's fighter wing and small craft had finally arrived and been loaded in her bays. Twelve Valkyrie fighters, two Alpha class runabouts and a heavy scout shuttle of all things, had suddenly shot from the flank and gotten in close enough that the Monarch had been forced to leave two of her support ships behind, which is when the Storm finally came out from behind the gravity shadow of the planetoid driving right for Monarch. Now that the weight of fire favored Admiral Kag'el's flagship he ordered the confidant Captain Wright in for the kill.

Which was when the Storm gutted the Monarch. Captain Holly of the Constant was quick to note the loss of communication from the flagship and, being next in command, immediately ordered he sister ship, the Forward, to sweep around and take Storm out with their combined firepower. Which was a good plan, as the two Akira class vessels between them had twenty torpedo launchers. The two ships began to spiral around the rear of Storm, unleashing a fusillade of 'torpedoes' (really just harmless ionic blasts in this case) into their foe. The Storm's shields flared under the furious attack; unlike captain Wright, Holly had done her research, and more importantly, actually knew Storm's CO, well, met him a few times. He had been relying on the fact that no-one had come up against a ship quite like his, granted it seemed he'd powered down a lot of his non-standard systems so that when he did use them it came as even more of a surprise, but he was not the tactical monster everyone seemed to be making him out to be. In fact his tactics tended to be very simple and direct. So when he'd split his forces keeping only the Storm to protect the target it was likely simply no more than that. Now those fighters and light craft had come as a surprise but the Reliable and Corso were taking care of them easily.

Holly watched the Storm try to slip away from their salvos by sliding back around the planetoid without success. "Open a channel to the Forward, have them break off and land their troops on the 'target', and inform Captain Jaxe that we'll try to keep Storm off of her."

Turning back before the aye-aye she smirked at her tactical display as the Forward suddenly turned and spilled a flight of her own shuttles who then dived right for the surface on an 'attack run' against the facility it was their job to capture. Now here her research would pay off, she'd been able to get into part of the Storm's original specifications and she knew that while the ship was horribly over-powered it became worse when the ship, according to the original demands of Starfleet Engineering, separated. And now with the objective contested, Kayetan would do the best thing; divide his forces further.

Which will put you exactly where we want you. she thought with a playful sense of satisfaction.

Kayeten, standing near his command chair instead of sitting on it was thinking of doing exactly what Holly wanted and a part of his mind, the one that was always active, exploring the current scenario and devising ways to fix it knew he was in a bind. He could win the engagement easily, but loose the scenario entirely if he did.

I shouldn't have let Grekt take his wing so far out. He thought. Oh well.

"Captain Doyal take Inuzaki off helm and to the dorsal section, keep after the Constant!" he suddenly yelled out, "Captain to all hands, prepare for ship separation, fifteen seconds, MARK!"

Doyal, having moved behind Raishidda at the Ops station paused a heartbeat while her mind caught up with that absurd sounding order, but then it caught up with reality and she darted into the tubolift with Commander Sorne, Chief Inuzaki and an ensign who'd been at an auxiliary station aiding with the targeting. Hawk she thought his name was.

The ride to the secondary bridge, an exact scaled down copy of the main bridge, was quick because it was literally one deck up. They could have walked there. But it was still a couple of seconds for the backup crew to power up their stations, and couple of more for her to hit the separation warnings so by the time she sat down and was ready there was a smooth but definite shudder as the ship suddenly split in two while moving at full impulse and performing high gee maneuvers. Sorne though had adapted quickly, Doyal made a mental note to make her performance as 'excellent', and had already brought up a tactical display on the main monitor and marked several key targets along the Constant's hull.

Doyal couldn't help but be exasperated, annoyed with, and caught-up in the moment all at once. She got over it quickly though.

The Storm was designed to be fully warp capable when divided into its respective halves; and halves they were, there was no neck and there for there was no saucer section to split so a more symmetrical separation like that of the Prometheus class was the result. However unlike Prometheus Storm was not designed with multi-vector attack in mind, not that multi-vector attack had been a good idea in the first place. It seemed like a good idea, if one had no idea how power systems and weapons worked on a modern starship. Tactically a force multiplier still sounded good, until it was quickly realized that instead of splitting an already smallish ship in three under-powered sections, one should just build three small ships and get better results. The Storm could pull off the separation trick because one, there was still been some proponents of the idea when it was designed, and two, because its had a full working warp core and actual nacelles rather than the retracting nacelles and micro cores (little more than over-powered shuttle engines) that Prometheus had. Normally Storm's secondary nacelles were tucked in behind several layers of armor and her primary ones where they could be powered up in case something happened to the larger primaries. Now though the Ventral section had them and Doyal would have to make do with the smaller ones.

Oh well, she thought again, this time with an almost predatory glint in her eye. I have those damn over sized impulse engines and less bulk to lug around.

Storm's Dorsal section gyrated and corkscrewed under the handling of Chief Inuzaki who'd started life as a smallcraft pilot and (privately) hated the way the Storm handled. But now he had to change his mind, he hated the way it behaved with twice the mass. Now though he was flying a torpedo, an Inuzaki guided, phaser armed porcupine of a ship.

Constant was trying to pull away but the massive dart behind her just wouldn't give any space, even closing the gap to a mere two kilometers.

Doyal called to Inuzaki, "Can you get under her?"

"Aye, ma'am!" the small helmsman called back without turning away from the display.

Turning to face Raishidda, Doyal barked more orders, "Commander, when the Chief gets us a clear shot I want continuous rapid fire into Constant's engineering section, let's see if we can knock a few things loose."

Meanwhile, on board Constant, Captain Holly glared at her tactical display, Come on, why don't they fire? She wondered as her helmsman took them through yet another maneuver the inertial dampers had difficulty with.

But they didn't for several long seconds and then suddenly the arrow shaped forward section of the Storm twisted inside of Constant's turn and rotated on her long axis to bring her phaser banks to bear. The powered down weapons stabbed out dozens of times in a few seconds lashing at their similarly powered down shields causing them to flare and then as the same few meters were hit again and again to fail entirely.

Holly yelled for a report as the computer shut down systems to simulate battle damage.

"Shields at ten percent, warp power off-line, impulse down to half, engineering reports weapons down to forward phasers only." Came the shout from the engineering station.

Already turning to the tactical station before the report finished Holly called out, "Re-route all power to engines and forward phaser arrays. Tactical, prepare to target their engines; helm give me a high speed impulse turn, one-eight-zero, mark, one-eight-zero! Give us a U-turn Lieutenant Markos!

Chapter 6

The fleet exercises had been going quite well, the 337th had arrived on schedule and started off on a series verses Fleet Captain Kayetan's Storm and General Grakt's Birds of Prey led by the IKS Ko'Vaght. Well, gone well for the Kingons and the Storm, in fact if not for the last scenario going to the 337th at the last second it might have been a total shutout in terms of points. But in the end the task group had won out, if only just, thanks to some rather cutthroat knife fighting from the group's fourth ranking captain, Jessica Holly.

But that had been almost four days ago and now the station was now preparing for the actual wargames that would have twice as many ships on all sides. A Klingon wargroup had arrived headed by the IKS Azetbur and a wing of Klingon cruisers. For the first time in several years the Romulans had showed up with a trio of their Valdor-types and an aging Cardassian Galor was even showing the flag.

For now though it was mostly quiet on Bajor Station . . . except for the Storm's crew, thought Admiral Kira as there was sudden commotion from Quark's (owned by Morn) and a pair of station security officers ducking inside as if they'd been waiting for it. Which they likely had been, as per her orders. It was bad enough when the twice-damned crew of the Storm would come back to Bajor Station to gloat, drink copious amounts of blood wine with their Klingon allies and rub it in to the 'losers'; now they'd been joined by the crews of the Constant and Forward, the two ships that had almost single-handedly pulled out the win in the last exercise. It seemed the Storm's crew could take a thrashing as well as give one and the fights that had broken out had tapered off into mutual bingeing until Captains Holly and Jaxe had recalled their crews. But still, never had so many complaints been issued in so short a time in all the three years Bajor Station had come online to replace Deep Space Nine, they were loud, they hogged up all the restaurant space and the gaming rooms in the back and they were made all the worse by the ten Klingon crews who seemed to have moved on the station.

But, as Rear Admiral Kira Nerys thought, the complaints were probably only there because the crews of the other ships wanted to do the same things the Storm's were doing. Oh well. If the Storm's captain would rather release his crew onto the station that was his prerogative. So long as they don't break anything, she thought as the security officers pulled two Klingons and a short wiry human with a Master Chief's ranking badge on his sleeve out of the bar.

Speaking of which.

"Kira to Nog." she started tapping the badge on her left breast.

"Nog here Admiral, go ahead." responded Captain Nog.

"Captain," she started, "Let captain Kayetan know I'm on my way up now and I'm sorry about his wait."

"He heard you Admiral, he's still in my office, you can join us here if you want."

"I'll be there shortly, Kira out."

Hmm. Still in Nog's office? What was that about? Oh well, she'd see in a moment.

After a short turbo lift ride she arrived in the massive OPS center, nodded at the watch officer and strolled across the dais, down to an open lift that would take her back down three levels to where her chief of operations office was on the docking observation level. There was far too much space in-between stations for her tastes, but she couldn't disparage Nog for wanting a view of his primary domain, especially when it was so spectacular; the open lift gave her a view through the transparent steel which rimmed the whole level. Out there a space large enough to fit several Galaxy class starships were half a dozen ships, from a pair of small Novas, an Akira and all the way up to the now familiar dagger silhouette of the Storm presently docked at one of the main loading tubes, an army of engineers crawling around her outer hull and a fleet fast supply ship umbilicaled to the other side offloading who-knows what.

The doors to Nog's office were open and she simply walked in just as Nog was finishing some story.

"So there was the Chief, a look on his face like he was going to fall down and in walks Sisko, his desk just the way he left it. Exactly as I had promised."

Kayetan, reclining on one of the overstuffed Bajoran chairs that Nog had somehow acquired laughed and leaned forward. "Oh I would have given anything to see that." But he straightened lightly when he saw her out if the corner of his eye.

"Relax captains, I think you've both earned some informalities." before sitting down herself.

Kayetan's smile only faded a bit as he nodded, "Actually Admiral, that's part of why I came aboard, I wanted to thank you for your help in getting our final systems check out of the way so quickly and for letting some of my crews exuberance off lightly."

Kira returned a smile at that, "Our pleasure Captain. And I should thank you for volunteering as OpForce in the wargames and for the taskforce, we were having a difficult time finding anyone and Admiral Kag'el didn't want to reschedule." she paused before adding, "However I will have to ask you to please keep a handle on your crew, they've been causing disruptions on the Promenade."

"Yes Ma'am." he quickly replied his grin fading.

"And the other reason you wanted to see me?"

"I wanted to let you know that there will be a final set of ships arriving tomorrow a subspace buoy layer, a passenger transport and pair of Klingon supply ships."

Kira nodded for him to go on.

"Our final personnel and supplies will be arriving on them and then I wanted to head out after three more weeks of working up." he paused again before continuing, "I also have an update directly from Admiral Janeway, the first elements of First Fleet will be arriving on station in one month, Admiral Picard's adjunct and staff will be taking up residence on Bajor Station in preparation for the fleet elements. And the Admiral wanted me assure you that they wont interfere with normal station operations."

Kira nodded, "It shouldn't be an issue, we have plenty of office space." she looked at Kayeten trying to size him up and couldn't quite do it again. So far he'd been skillful at manipulating peoples expectations, but there was something else, something that she almost recognized in the younger man. Something that kept her from fully trusting him. "Was that all captain?"

"No ma'am," he said respectfully, "I also wanted to let you know that we'll be testing the Pulse Phasers and Cannons and they might cause some, disruptions in your comm array."

Kira looked at him expectantly, but got nothing, "Ok, captain, I give, what are those?"

"The pulse phasers are our primary weapon system and they use most of our warp power. The cannons are just a bank of standard mark elevens."

"And you want to do this near the station?"

"Yes ma'am, if they overload our systems it would be a catastrophic cascade failure of our EPS grid, and we'd need a tow anyway, so I'd like to do in near the station, just past one of Bajor's moons should do the trick."

Kira thought on that a moment, "No warp breaches?"

"Of course not admiral, there are safeguards and cutouts to prevent such things but we've done a lot of work to the Storm's main power systems and there is a chance of some feedback, a small one, but it is there, which is why I want the added safety of station rescue personal in the mix. I'm already having all but a skeleton crew take a few hours leave for it."

"Alright captain, as long as you have them keep out of trouble while they're on station."

"Of course ma'am."

The transport shuttle Vagabond had left the Vulcan system right on time, loaded down with passengers for Bajor. And newly promoted Lieutenant (Junior Grade) S'ara found herself among several other starfleet officers including a young Commander who'd boarded on the Sol system layover. S'ara made use of that time to check on the status of her new posting, which had moved from Alpha Centauri, to Mars and then on to Bajor Station inside of the two weeks that had passed after she'd gotten her orders. S'ara was both at once slightly confused by and impressed with whomever her new commanding officer was. Impressed in that they'd managed to work up a ship so fast and efficiently, and confused because she wasn't quite sure who her CO was. The orders had come through her former post on Starbase twenty-four and from a Captain Doyal whom she assumed, not a great leap in logic, was the CO in question. But as a Vulcan S'ara tended to notice things, things like her orders not actually specifically saying one Samantha Doyal was her commander.

In fact her orders had been very sparse in any detail; on her two previous postings the specific time, place and duties of the station had been very clearly defined in her first dispatch. This time only a rather vague set of timetables and an order to report aboard was to be found no matter how many times she queried the database. And then when she'd tried to determine exactly what the USS Storm was she'd been blocked by a level four security block, far above her meager level one access. But she could logically deduce what they wanted her for; she'd graduated at the near top of her class in astrometrics, mathematics and spacial dynamics. But she was at the top of her academy flight school, an ace of the official flight team, which still had no name after the Nova and Red Squad debacles, had full rating in everything from Vulcan long range shuttles, the type nine shuttles currently in service, three runabout classes, four fighter variants and everything from scouts and escorts to the brand new nearly thousand meter long Excalibur class. As an ensign she'd spent nearly a year on Intri Base in a joint Starfleet/Vulcan Science Academy experimental light craft design facility as what the humans called a 'test-pilot'. But then just after her confirmation as a Lieutenant the announcement went out that volunteers would be needed for the new five year mission plan and, after some careful consideration, decided that her skills would be far more useful on that than as yet another pilot waiting to test some designer's project of the month. So she'd applied and after only two days and gotten the warning that there would likely be at least six months before any transfer came though. And then in classic human fashion they'd been completely wrong as two days later she got orders to report aboard this 'Storm' ship.

But, she was Vulcan and it would have take far more than that to throw her off stride, so she'd packed her belongings, (which took no more than an hour), alerted her watch officer, a civilian who simply waived her goodby (making friends was not a Vulcan priority) and, while waiting for her shuttle she attempted to comm her mother, T'karra, captain of the science vessel Cherenkov. However the Cherenkov was currently deep inside a darkmatter nebula and communication was degraded she S'ara simply left a message telling her of the new posting. She then attempted to reach Mars before the Storm left, but missed it by three days, as the Slipstream shuttle was reserved for senior officers and emergencies she then spent nearly a week working her way to Bajor on a personal transport and, in her mind admitted, finally, to Bajor Station. Or just outside of it at least. Her co-passengers had initially expressed some joy at having reached the massive spacedock facility, but then a lot of annoyance when the captain announced that Station Control had asked them to hold off on the edge of planetary orbit until further notice.

"Hey Georgie!" called out Lieutenant Michaels to the passenger ship's bartender, "What's up with this, some exercise?"

Georgie barely looked up, "What do I look like, the captain 'o this tug?"

"Naw, mon, we know you gota line to dat redhead in engineering." responded one Lieutenant Commander Benjimon LaScorsesi esq. until recently of Jamaica, Earth. "Not dat everyone wouldn't mind dose lines." he finished to which a low chuckle flowed through the rest of the dozen or so passengers waiting in the lounge. Everyone except her of course. LaScorsesi, it seemed, came from a preserve of some kind where people lived as they had for more than five hundred years. It seemed it was quite popular with visitors to the federation capital, especially an attraction called 'pirate bay' that according to 'Benji' as he insisted everyone call him, still had a small fleet of real honest-to-Ja wind powered vessels. He then had gone on at great length about his six brothers and sisters and how disappointed they'd been when he'd went to law school and then Starfleet Academy instead of helping to maintain the family business running one the Caribbean League's many resorts and attractions.

Among the loudest laughing at the dark skinned humans joke was one J'ust Wert, Colonel Wert actually who had been pulled from leave on Andoria to rejoin his Mobile Assault Corps company (a division of the Federation's Military Assault & Command Operations) whom he was meeting on Bajor station. S'ara had only joined in the in-flight discussions as necessary and stayed in her cabin most of the time. But she did wish to see the approach to Bajor so had left the meditative darkness of her cabin and braved the lounge, which was why she was currently listening to the 'banter', she thought it was called, between her fellow officers.

Georgie had quietly called his woman friend in engineering and was now explaining the delay; "Well," he looked pointedly at the Colonel, "what ship did you say you'd all been ordered to?"

"The Storm." He responded "Like I said before I think it's a new subspace buoy layer, something starfleet security wants to keep hush-hush for the push into the Gamma quadrant."

"It makes sense." agreed Benji, "Or else why would they be wantin a lawyer on board?"

"Well," started Georgie, "this Storm of yours is testing some system or the other and they don't want any ships docking while they keep the station emergency personal on standby." Georgie looked skeptical at that and finished, "Or so that's what Lira says anyway."

"Hey mon, can you patch us in to the station channel so we can hear what dis is all about? It'll be tha first ting we all get to hear about dis new ship of ours."

"Are you kidding, I can patch you in to the Romulan Senate chambers with this setup back here." the bartender responded as he fiddled with his console again.

There was moment as he adjusted and then, "-again, I've got a que of ships forming out here, how long until you're ready Commander?"

There was slight pause and then an voice responded with an accent that somehow made it through the universal translator, "Thirty ssecondss Admiral. The captain iss looking over the last detailss now." the voice from Storm hissed.

"Well, move it along Lallal, with the arrival of the Marcos you're actually holding up your own personal now."

"Twenty ssecondss admiral." was the simple reply. Followed by a count down, "Ten ssecondss. Eight. Sseven, ssix, five, four, three, two, one, Firing!"

Even S'ara had become curious about what was happening and found herself angling for a better position to hear. Not that it was hard for her, with everyone gathered near the bar she simply approached the observation windows where the acoustics were very good as well as providing an excellent view of the station.

Which is exactly why she saw it as it happened. Bajor station was hanging right on the planet's terminator half of its lights sparkling in the dark half of the world and silhouetted against Bajor's second moon; then there was a bright flash as a massive line of red energy suddenly carved its way out from near that moon and just stayed like that, cutting into the space beyond it's narrow orbit a continuous red beam that pulsed with orange energy every half second.

From back at the bar a fuzzy squelching sound came from the subspace audio channel before it was turned down. But before anyone could wounder what happened S'ara decided to alert her future co-workers, "Perhaps you would enjoy the visual of the event rather than the audio."

The other officers and various sentients making their way to Bajor for whatever reasons turned almost as one to see that massive display of raw power and it was quiet for a moment until a young lieutenant named Imbassa, as she recalled, spoke up, "Well, at least now I know why they wanted me."

Several people turned to the human quizzically, and he continued, "Up until four weeks ago I was on the maintenance staff for one of Earth's planetary defense installations, and that, is bank of type twelve sustained burst phasers."

There were a few questioning looks from the non-starfleet personal, but Banji and Colonel Wert sobered quickly even before Imbassa explained, "Also known as planetary defense phasers and normally mounted on stations."

It was a slightly more sober group of officers who turned back to the sight of one of the most destructive energy weapons in starfleet's arsenal being dumped into space by a five-hundred meter long starship.

S'ara and another officer (with the rank pips of a lieutenant commander who introduced herself as Jenkens) had been guided to their rooms by a petite redheaded woman who was wearing a starfleet uniform without any rank after they'd beamed aboard. But before she'd been able to make further inquiries they'd arrived at a turbolift and, waiting for the other two to precede her inside the lift allowed the blond commander to ask;

"So, um, Miranda was it?"

"Yes. That's my name, don't wear it out." she replied in with a tone of voice often called 'bubbly'. Then quickly, "Deck ten."

"Well, are you in starfleet . . . or?" the commander paused grasping for words.

The moment was drawn out and S'ara thought that it might be logical, as she would be with these people for quite some time, to foster some inter-personal relations so she came to the conversational rescue of her superior.

"I think the commander is curious as to why your uniform has no rank insignia."

Miranda looked down at herself, "I knew this was bad idea. But the captain thought it would raise less questions if I at least wore a uniform." she tugged on the hem of the jacket pulling it back down over her mustard yellow undershirt of the science and engineering divisions. "Well, it's not a secret or anything. I'm technically head of the computer sciences department, all five of us. But what I actually am is just Miranda, your friendly shipboard Intelligent Computer Interface. But ICI is a terrible acronym, I mean, 'icky?!' who would want to be called that?"

Jenkens started again, "I, what." she paused her eyes narrowing, "So, then, what do you do on the ship?"

"Oh," Miranda replied "Basically I am a physical manifestation of the Storm's computer. Well, rather more like an extension there-of." She paused again, looking thoughtful this time, "Well, Stormy and I are different entities, but my subsystems maintain hers and her memory banks now house my primary matrix."

Jenkins looked only slightly less confused. S'ara briefly wondered how she'd made full commander if a simple explanation like that went completely over her head.

"I think commander, that you will find that Miranda is a holographic entity who will be maintaining the ships computers."

"Oh!" she suddenly sparked, "Then you should know The Doctor!"

"Yes, actually, we have been acquainted."

"Oh good, I didn't have time to say hi when we stopped by earth on the way out here. How is he doing?"

Miranda looked oddly for moment then went on, "He was well a few weeks ago when we left. You know him?"

"Yes, I was an ensign on Voyager." the older woman practically beamed now, "And here I was worried that it might take a while to find friends on board."

And now Miranda's smile returned, wider than ever. S'ara was unsure what to do at this point but the shear delight exuding from the two women, even the holographic one, was disconcerting.

Wait. She said, 'friends', plural. S'ara had gotten in last and so was facing the doors when they closed and she had not seen a reason to turn fully around, meaning she was facing mostly away from the other two passengers. Something she remedied quickly as she saw the expectant looks on the faces of her fellows.

"Yes." she started carefully, "I am sure we will get to know each other quite well during our tour of duty."

Working a couple of corridors down engineer Jarvis was performing last minute checks on a turbolift with the doors open to the deck. He paused as a strange 'squeeeeeee' sound drifted up the corridor from the other lift tube and poked his head out half expecting to see a thraskin razor bat come hurtling up the corridor. But there was only Miranda and a couple of the new officers walking the other way.

Maybe I should take a break, he thought as he leaned back in and looked at the exposed relays of the console he was working on.

Kayetan looked up from the engineering trench in the forward power distribution node when he and engineer Sims were correcting a few slight imbalances that had shown up on their weapons test. The sound that had alerted him was Orourack and Sam Doyal with a PADD tucked under an arm approaching from the corridor and he quickly finished his adjustment before tapping Sims on the shoulder and climbing out of the meter deep optronic filled trench after the young engineer nodded.

Making for the pile of tools they'd left near the door he grabbed a towel and started wiping the grime that always accumulated in engineering spaces no matter how clean the environment was from his hands as Doyal raised an eyebrow and Ororrack just stared.

"What? It was quicker to just do in myself."

Orourack's stare and Doyal's eyebrow remained the same.

Kayetan sighed, "It won't become a habit, I swear." he pleaded.

The other two officers shared a look, but it was Orourack who responded, "Then we shall take your word." and then almost as a pointed afterthought, "Sir." the big Tactical Officer finished.

"So what brings you to junction three-forward?"

"Our new officers are reporting aboard in a few minutes and we thought we'd walk you to the shuttle bay." Sam informed him.

"Excellent. This means we can start the briefings and integrate them into the shipboard functions." he responded as he unzipped his engineering jumpsuit and slung it over his shoulder.

"About that sir," Sam started, "I know it's a bit late but do we really want a bunch of MAC's making up nearly a quarter of the crew?"

The Mobile Assault Corps, or 'Mac's' were a small and highly specialized division of the Fedaration's Military Assault & Command Operations, a small (compared to Starfleet at least) organization which had been maintained as a traditional holdover from Earth's more militant days. They had eventually attracted members from the Andorian Imperial Guard, the Bolian Gladitori and several other traditional military organizations still maintained by various cultures who had since joined the federation. For most of the Federation's early years MACO hadn't really been needed and it filled an honor guard function at many federation functions up until the second Romulan War when many captains asked for MACO detachments to be posted on their ships. But even that tradition fell by the wayside in the relative century of peace that followed. And then the Dominion War started eating troops by the millions and a group of MAC's trapped on Betazed when it fell aided in a brutal guerrilla campaign against the occupying forces. Their kill ratio had proven unacceptable to the Vorta in charge of the campaign and his attempt to fortify against the attacks allowed the Betazed resistance to unleash an ancient psychic weapon system on the now nicely gathered Jem Hadar. That, and the sheer usefulness of having a unit of trained soldiers around had caused a new swelling in the popularity of MACO and their foremost unit, the Mobile Assault Corps.

But in keeping with long tradition there was constant rivalry between Starfleet and the Corps, a pointless one as the two organizations were vastly different in scope and primary function and admittedly it was a more or less friendly one, but the sides were both unwilling to publicly admit to the usefulness of the other. Several command level councilors had either attempted to ban the rivalry where it then immediately went underground, or work though it by trying to find its origins. It was actually a tactical officer who explained the whole thing;

"No matter how peaceful or advanced we say we are the majority of federation races have a militant background and minority who still feel more comfortable with a militant life. It is a fact and will not change no matter how many counseling sessions we force them into. In fact three of the four founding members of the Federation have extensive and historically recent military histories."

All this ran though Kayetan's mind and he still came to the same conclusion;

"Yes captain, I would rather have them and not need them than wish even once that I had them." he said repeating the argument he'd given when she first brought it up. "Besides, the Storm was laid out to have separate living areas for just such a reason." he tapped a wall panel as they waked by, a schematic of the ship lighting up beneath his touch as they stopped, "Its clearly marked on the plan," he went on point to a highlighted section, "Green Country, right there. Anyone who wanders in there knows that they are leaving a starfleet ship and entering a wild game preserve."

That got a snort from Ororrack, "Great one says; 'those who live in a cave with beasts should not throw stones''. Also," he went on, "I doubt your sister would agree with that statement."

"Right, in fairness she'd probably make a remark about how a 'fleeter couldn't find the right end of a pulse rifle with both hands, a full ground team and approach control systems."

"But then again," finished Kayetan as they neared the turbolift "she is a merely a Major of MAC's."

Doyal thought she would ask about the captains sister but as they were boarding the lift decided against it, instead deciding to fill him in on the arriving personnel as Ororrack rumbled "Main shuttle bay." to the lift.

Looking down at her PADD she started in, "As to our new personnel, Colonel Wert and his company have arrived with all their equipment which I have Chief Inuzaki arranging in the heavy storage on deck five. Miranda was showing our Wing Commander and Conning officer to their quarters and Commander Mrilla has settled in with her medical staff." Doyal looked up at Kayetan who had allowed a slight snort of amusement to escape with that last announcement.

"Settling in?" he said over a puckish smirk, "I think its more of our medical staff 'settling in' with Mrilla."

"She is rather brusque as I recall." interjected Ororrack

"Calling a Klingon 'brusque', commander, is like calling space 'a bit chilly'. And to be fair she's, um, less 'brusque' than her brother."

"To be sure."

Doyal was now sure her face would freeze into a half-glare before this tour was over, "As I was saying, gentlemen," she paused to see if there were anymore comments and was rewarded with a look of angelic attentiveness from Kayetan and the normal black-eyed stare from Ororrack. Ignoring it she went on, "Our medical staff is getting along nicely. And with our helm officer and wing commander now on board all departments will now be at full, including legal, fighter operations, and requisition." she paused for a breath, and, thankfully, was not interrupted this time.

"I formed a liaison office which will be reporting to legal unless that proves too cumbersome and have worked in a rotation of auxiliary bridge personal so there should be at least a three-man crew in there at all times. Engineering reports that all systems will be at full by tomorrow so long as, and I quote commander Lallal, 'the captain keeps his head out of our way'." she scrolled back up to the details on the MAC's, "Also Major Von Resile has asked for extra vehicle storage for a pair of gunboats and dedicated room on the flight deck. I told him we're letting them have control over the dorsal shuttle bay but that he'd have to clear extra smallcraft storage with Wing Commander Jenkins." she finished referring to Colonel Wert's XO and the Lieutenant Commander who was in charge of Storm's fighter squad. The commander of a ship's fighter detachment was always referred to as 'wing commander' whatever the actual number of craft she commanded, and as it had become tradition on ships with large fighter complements, was in charge of all smallcraft storage space.

Looking up at the lift location indicator, which was rapidly moving in on the main bay, she quicly added, "And we have to talk about Chief Inuzaki moving to flight operations, it is what he's trained for."

Kayeten nodded at that last, the Chief and Sam had been after him about that detail, he'd just gotten so used to seeing the little Honshu native at the helm. Oh well, things change and we have an actual helm Officer now, his train of thought derailed for a moment as he realized he didn't know what the new helm officer was called but was interrupted by the lift arriving before he could rectify that omission.

Oh well, he thought as he preceded the other two officers into the cavernous three-tiered main shuttle bay.

Inside three stories up the fourteen Hornet mkII fighters of their compliment were locked in their cradles and along each side of the main bay were alcoves holding the other smallcraft, including two Alpha Class runabouts, a design based off of Voyager's Delta Flyer, and eight type nine personal shuttles. The rest of them were currently one deck down in the deep storage area to make room for the eighty-seven members of the thirty-eighth Mobile Assault company who were all standing at ease in a precise parade formation on the port side of the bay where the lift had deposited them.

And then almost as if to underscore the difference between them and the people taking up the other half of the bay a loud shout of, "Atten-hup." came from Major Von Resile and each of the identically armed troopers came to attention and the with the order of, "Port-arms!" they shouldered their pulse rifles as one. In contrast to Ororrack's cry of "Attention of Deck." that shocked the Starfleet officers into attention the fleet officers crisp stance seemed lax and slovenly. And as they had no weapons to port they simply stopped at that.

Kayetan, knowing something of the ways of the MAC trooper, did not declare an immediate 'at-ease' and instead walked down the ranks to where Colonel Wert was standing with his command unit. Approaching the crisply appointed Andorian Officer he gave his uniform a quick once over; his sister once said the state of MACO trooper's uniform was very revealing. Colonel Wert was in his dark blue 'basics' a two part uniform similar to starfleet's current type. But the MACO uniform's jacket section was slightly longer and had a pair of angled pockets near the hips. And instead of having rank pips on the undershirt collar, they used a 'box' system. One broken line was 2nd Lieutenant, one unbroken was 1st Lieutenant, two box halves were Captain, three lines was Major, a diagonally bisected line was Lt. Colonel, a twice diagonally bisected line was full Colonel, an 'X' through the square was Brigadier and it progressed though the flag ranks to the four diamonds and four triangles (which formed a box) of the General-Marshal of the MACO's.

Wert's rank in insignia was worn, very worn and had discolorations on it; it had likely been transplanted from a uniform heavily damaged to where it was on Wert's left collarbone along with the placard with his name and unit on it. This one was a combat veteran, still had a very firm grasp of military etiquette but didn't go too far with it. Kayetan suppressed the urge to smile, he'd had the inside track on him anyway; Wert had been one of the young troopers on Betazed during the Dominion invasion and, according to his sister, had gotten his rank insignia the hard way when his own colonel was wounded while fighting Gorn Mercenaries and passed command to Wert just before he died. He was also a full colonel of the Andorian Imperial Guard and holder of some of that world's highest honors as well as the only other holder of the Federation Cross on board.

Satisfied (but not showing it of course) he moved on to Major Werner Von Resile who was also a dual commission holder having an appointment as an honor guard Captain of Hussars in the Imperial Prussian army; a group of reenactors from Earth's European sector who, with their various sibling groups launched forth in mock battles using ancient systems and tactics. An odd pastime to be sure, but their members spawned a lot of MACO troopers so there was some point to it he supposed. The Major was as crisply appointed as his colonel but in stark contrast to the blue skinned and white haired Wert, Von Resile was pale and black haired with a neat goatee and mustache under an aquiline nose.

Next up was the company Sergeant Major, which used slash mark system identical to starfleet's enlisted ranks, in this case three forward slashes, and three backward slashes on his rank placard above the name Sakalar. The Tellarite was bit short and stubby, average for his species with a closely trimmed beard and short hair, which was unusual. Kayetan remembered his Tellarite etiquette and glared at the shorter man flicking an invisible bit of lint from the immaculate uniform shoulder.

He then strolled back along the front rank of troops and finding nothing amiss, switched back to Wert and stated, "You may put your troops at ease Colonel." to which he simply nodded sharply at Sakalar who barked out an order to go to parade rest and as one the company 'relaxed' and set their weapons butt-first on the deck while still holing onto the end of emitter array, or 'barrel' in the parlance of the unit.

Extending a hand out to the Andorian officer he offered, "Care to join me Colonel?"

"Of course sir." Was the response had he shook his hand and then moved to fall in behind the Storm command group.

Kayetan, now followed closely by Ororrack, Doyal and Wert, moved across to where Miranda was standing with Llal and Sorne on the starfleet side of the shuttle bay.

"Having fun sir?" she said with no hint of military formality but still at attention despite her lack of rank.

"Yes Miranda, I do take some pleasure in sometimes being reminded that there is a command structure and some military tradition in our glorious starfleet."

Miranda's smile never faded as she about-faced and turned to the senior starfleet officer at the head of the forty or so gathered in the bay. And Kayeten called out an at-ease as he surveyed the group of young officers at the head of the lines and-stopped. Well, a relative stop, his pause was far longer than it should have been according to previous examples.

Orourack was there and simply adjusted his final step to stay at the captains six o'clock position. Doyal, not overly familiar with the habits of her peers noticed the stop and scanned the line before likely assuming it was just the nature of the captain.

But the captain had adjusted himself mid-thought and that as subtle as it was was had happened at the same time he would have caught sight of Lt. S'ara who was two places down from the right of the line next to Lt. Commander Jenkens. Miranda looked her over again . . . Her hair was dark as per the Vulcan norm and cut at a severe angle which left her ears and neck clear of obstruction but it was a common style for Vulcans and there was nothing strange about her uniform. For her mere presence to throw the captain off like that though . . .

Miranda was the first one to figure it out of course. But there was nothing surprising about that. Once she knew there was a connection between Lieutenant S'ara and the captain she delved into the records and compared the two officers; they had never served together, there was nothing that . . . wait, there was overlap. The Haka province on Vulkan was home to several major research stations and S'ara's mother. No father listed . . . then she found the overlap. Or rather lack there-of. T'karra of Haka province was S'ara's mother and she did have overlap with the captain; from a Dominion POW camp . . . Miranda double checked and re-checked a dozen times in half-a-second before arriving at the inescapable conclusion: Lieutenant (jg) S'ara was the Captain's daughter. Well, this is going to an interesting deployment.

The captain's inspection was moving along nicely, and after his close examination of the MACs he had paused to survey the Starfleet officers before speaking, "Captain, if you will."

"Sir," started Doyal, "This is Lieutenant Commander Benjimon LaScorsesi from the Judge Advocate General's office."

"Nice to meet cha'." said the dark skinned human indicating two Lieutenants to his rear "These here Lieutenants Harrison and Yantora are my staff and we will be providin any legal services you may be needin." the mans smile, as well as his record was impeccable, but it had not been just his legal record Doyal had wanted. He was well known as a font of case law and a stickler for maintaining proper procedure. She thought that he would be a welcome counter to the motley collection they'd acquired to fill the other senior posts.

After nodding Kayetan pointed, "I have a few last minute things I need to discuss with you Commander, I'd like to see you on the bridge when we're done here."

"Yes sir." crisply responded the Jamaican native before the inspection line moved down.

Kayetan backed away from the formation before turning and calling out to all gathered, "Alright, first, welcome aboard, I am Fleet Captain Keyetan, and I hope to get to know you all over the next few years. But until then we are on a tight schedule so we need to get cracking. You should all know where your quarters are so everyone will have the rest of the day to get settled in. There will be a general meeting of all department heads starting tomorrow at oh-six-thirty and continuing until everything is hammered out however long that takes, so until then consider yourself dismissed."

Kayeten turned to the officers following him, "As for us I want all senior officers," he looked at Colonel Wert, "consider yourself among them Colonel, to report to the main briefing room on deck ten at 0500 hours to go over our schedule and requirements for tomorrow."

"Anything else?" he finished glancing at each one of them in turn, getting no reply and so again said "Dismissed."

Chapter 7

Lieutenant Raishida Sorne was worried, what with the dulled pain of the plasma burn on her arm constantly reminding her she had to go to sickbay. At first she'd not had the time to get to know the other senior staff, she was quite busy as OPS Officer, which had been the only other department besides Engineering who'd had a (mostly) complete staff early on. And that was only because as often as OPS was put upon or outright ignored it really was quite important. Oh OPS officers would admit that maintaining scheduling and logistics was not as glamorous as something like, well security or medicine, but actually managing a ship this large took an entire department, and while her own staff was shaping up, everyone else seemed to be doing better.

Her thoughts trailed off as she thought she heard yelling from down the hall towards sickbay, but when she stopped and as her footfalls faded into the general thrum of the ships operation there was nothing.

Huh. Weird. But she stared walking again and fell back into her thoughts.

She'd spent all her time getting her department running smoothly, and so (she feared) was becoming known as a workaholic and while (in private) she admitted she'd rather spend more time getting to know her new co-workers even at the expense of her department efficiency her sense of duty and dedication had won over. Until the urge to wander the ship kicked in that was. It was always getting her into trouble. Like when she cleared the Symbiosis Commission training and tests and found herself literally in-line for a symbiont; a waist deep soothing muck line, but in the actual line with a couple other initiates and a few keepers. She was supposed to receive the Itran symbiont and be its third host, but a rare thing happened and while she was still grateful for the honor and would not change it for anything, she was rushed by a young symbiont and, well . . . instead of three lifetimes of memories she just had hers, and a vague recollection of floating in a pool and seeing a spark, a spark that awoke something, a desire and then. Well, Raishida Wrent became Raishida, first host of the Sorne symbiont. So really that first bout of impulsiveness was Sorne's, not her's exactly . . . but that was splitting hairs at this point.

The commission declared that there was nothing they could do and it was a great honor to be a first host anyway, so stop complaining; but they had been more concerned with their implantation schedule being disrupted then anything else. It was hard though, with no previous hosts to draw off of she could not quite tell where Raishida started and Sorne began. Well, except the impulsiveness. Raishida Wrent was not an impulsive woman, or girl for that matter. She'd decided early on that she would be a host and then done everything to ensure it. Everything had gone exactly to her schedule, until Sorne rushed into her inflamed symbiont pouch and melded before anything could be done. It was a childish and immoral maneuver to the older symbionts, but; one, the younger ones with no lives yet outside the pool tended not to get that (or why) and they were also sessile until they aged a few decades. And, two, there was usually more warning that a symbiont was coming of age, but, there again Sorne was not like most. Or so she was firmly coming to believe.

And so now she was the elder in a personality partnership where she'd been expecting to be the junior. She abandoned her plans to attend a tertiary university, and (on impulse) hopped a shuttle to Risa to spend some time not thinking about how this had upset her plans. While there she'd been convinced by some locals to check out the glimmering ice falls of Andoria while they were in thaw, which only happened once a hundred years or so. And while there she'd encountered a starfleet recruiter who'd sold her on enlisting. Her dual degrees in computer sciences and applied quantum dynamics (with a dozen minors in various tech related fields) earned her a posting to the academy and even let her skip a year. Not that she wasn't one of the oldest in her graduating class. But all that was the start of what was now a long running pattern of impulsive behavior in most everything but her day-to-day duties. Her family still didn't know what to think and the Symbiosis Commission (and the joined Trill counselors they'd sent) were somewhat sympathetic, but always arrived at the same basic answer; young symbionts were unpredictable.

But anyway, the most resent bit of impulsiveness to inconvenience her was suddenly deciding to go to engineering and see what they were up to. They were always up to something, out of every department on the ship they were the most chaotic, switching shifts, hogging computer and replicator time for wherever system they were tweaking. It was finally tapering off now that they were in the Bajor system with only a couple weeks to be in the gamma quadrant. Arriving in main engineering a few hours after the start of third watch it was more lightly manned then normal but was still active, not surprising. But there was no-one near the main engineering console and she had gone up to where it sat in front of the two massive warp cores which were slowly pulsing. Which was when Hiss'toor had suddenly dropped from the ceiling two stories up. She'd been warned that Lallal used his natural abilities quite a lot but she hadn't expected that. Thankfully he let her laugh it off without making any great deal of it. But then she'd got to talking with him which led to one thing and then another and she'd ended up helping him put the finishing touches on a plasma manifold that had been converted into a three burner cook stove. Lallal wouldn't say exactly what it was for, but it was fun passing the time and getting to know the Sphankonidae engineer. She'd gotten a little too focused on listening to Lallal go on about pirate chasing around the Tykon Rift and accidentally engaged the purge on the plasma canister. Nothing was harmed, except her hand and forearm which was now covered in burns. One of Lallal's engineers had come over with a med kit, but the burns were deep enough that he'd ordered her to sickbay for proper treatment after administering a local anesthetic.

So she was walking to the sick bay to see Medical Officer Mrilla in her official capacity for the first time. And while there had been no actual horrors committed, and because she was OPS officer and knew there was no way that their chief medical officer had smuggled a targ on board there was still a touch of apprehension, mostly because she did know that Officer Mrilla had made some rather abnormal equipment requests. But it was made worse for her personally because she never really liked hospitals, or doctors, having grown up with four of them in her immediate family and every second family friend being one. She'd been lucky she was the third of four children, it meant that when she'd opted to focus on more technological aspects with her degrees her father (MD), mother (MD), and two elder siblings (both MD's) had not been too disappointed.

But it also meant that she had not yet interacted with the doctor on anything more than an interdepartmental level. Quite frankly she found the tall athletic Klingon woman quite intimidating, besides not enjoying her choice of profession. It didn't help that she still wore her Klingon armor as a uniform, granted it was lacking the wide shoulder pads and thick pointy boots that normally went with it; and granted she did wear her medical blue lab coat over it, but it was still rather, intimidating taken with the doctors general look of being able to break you before putting you back together.

Entering sickbay just little apprehensively she found herself suddenly more confused at what was going on than fearful. A human orderly, a Deltan nurse and doctor Mrilla herself with her back to the door were standing next to a tank filled with what appeared to be green fuzz and their arms sunk as deep as they could get into the open top of the tank. Additionally there was a light green mist in the air and some on the walls, like something had exploded out of the tank at some point. And while that would have been enough to make her stop and wonder what was going on, there was also a distinct atmosphere of annoyance radiating off of the doctor.

Braving the odd sight and moving closer, she started, "Um, doctor?"

Mrilla snapped her head as far around as it would go without removing her arms from the tank. "Is it life threatening?" she snapped out.

"Um, what?"

The glare intensified, "You have come to sickbay, and the wound you'd better have or I swear I'll make one, IS . . . IT . . . LIFETHREATENIENG?"

"No, ma'am." She heard herself say.

"Well what is it then?"

Before she could respond the orderly who had a clearer view of the door responded, "Looks like second degree plasma burns. On her arm." he added almost hopefully.

Mrilla let loose a growl and shot back to the orderly, "Don't think a lucky break will get you out of cleaning this stuff up when we're done. And you'd better save the spoor capsule as well or I will have you on targ scaling detail for a month."

To which the nurse responded, "We don't have any targs."

"Anything can be found to fit the punishment to the deed." she barked back hard enough to knock some of her hair, weaved into complex warriors knot, loose and over her forehead. Straining a little more she tried to twist farther while barking again, "Well burned patient, get over here where I can see this so-called injury."

Raishida approached and held out her burned left arm where the doctor could see it.

The Klingon's eyes narrowed in practiced inspection and she gave a snort of approval. "Made it all the way here with that did you Lieutenant?" Mrilla looked pointedly at the orderly, "See Hobart? It is quite possible."

"Yes ma'am, but we generate our own anesthetic, its not a waste it's, it's . . ." the orderly trailed off. "Unless you want to change starfleet medical's standing orders then it's standard procedure to apply a painkiller before any other efforts are made."

Mrilla looked for a moment like she could glare holes in the deck, but consented, "No, no changes. I just think It is a waste of valuable time."

There was a pause and the gentle pulsing of the ship's engines filled the gap before Raishida held her arm closer, "Um, not to interrupt, but could someone maybe get a regenerator? "

"Can't help right now." responded Mrilla. "But there's enough dead skin on that arm to fix our problem much more quickly, so take your jacket off and join us in the mold."

"Um, what is this stuff?'

"Something with a long and time consuming name, so everyone calls it Exploding Moss." replied the nurse. "It will eat all the dead tissue off your burn and sate it's hunger long enough for it go into remission."

Well, Raishida thought, it can't be that bad, pealed her jacket off and smoothly slid her arms down into the . . . green stuff.

"It tingles." she found herself exclaiming out-loud.

"That's the mold working, exposing the nerves of the new skin, you'll be fine, just be patient." Responded Mrilla.

After another moment of silence Raishida had to ask, "So, what makes exploding moss explode?"

"Food. When it senses food it will actually explode, covering the target in this digestive mold. And it will keep exploding towards food until it finds some, which is why we're feeding it before it runs off though the ventilation system." Answered the nurse. "I'm Shaelana by the way."

"And its a good thing this batch was modified to eat only dead cells or it would be eating far more than just the outer layer of skin." growled in Mrilla.

Hobart looked progressively more nervous as the doctor spoke, but he was granted reprieve as the doctor looked into the green fuzz. "A few more minutes and we can pull ourselves out."

Yet another space of silence passed and Raishida started to feel the last bit of nervousness fade away as she realized her predicament. And then the absurdity of the whole events of the last hour occurred to her and she did the only thing any sane person could do in such happenstance: she laughed.

"Whats so funny?" barked Mrilla.

"Its just, I ended my shift worrying uselessly, wandering to engineering for no reason, ended up getting burned while helping someone make a stove for what I have no idea, and and now I'm shoulder deep in green mold from who-knows-where."

"Sounds like a full day." responded Shaelana cheerfully.

Humph snorted Mrilla, "Better than my day; I had to deal with 'paperwork' which is done on optronic data slates, contend with supply storage, battle the head of the bio-chemical lab for the use of the only medical replicator that's not being worked on by engineers-whom I must refrain from kicking when they suddenly appear from access tubes and block my path-and climbed the tower of authority all the way to the captain to get my other samples authorized. However invigorated as I was by the climb I returned to my domain only to find doctor Orrt had yet again changed the arrangement of sickbay without my authorization and, unable to simply slap some respect into the Bolian, made do with verbal abuse. I then finished my accursed 'paper' work where I exited my office too late to stop a certain (glare at Hobart here) orderly opening a container clearly marked 'do not open'."

"It was marked in Klingon!" defended Hobart.

"It's a universal sign." came back Mrilla.

"It . . . no, It's not! I thought it was more of your hundreds of tissue samples, not ballistic fungi."

Raishida thought she might help the beleaguered Hobart now and cut in with, "Why did you have so many tissue samples?"

"I collect a sample from anything I kill." she responded proudly. "I use them to grow the various microbes native to each creature, part of a long term comparison of ship sterile VS. natural bacterial growth." Mrilla smiled, "Do you have some interest in such topics?"

"Well, my parents are both doctors who run a clinic on Trillus but-" and she was cut off by Mrilla's response.

"Good, someone who would appreciate the battle against disease and the constant vigilance we must maintain!"

"I've never heard it put quite like that, but I-"

"Well, many federation doctors take silly oaths and speak only of making things better; things do not get better, they change, there is always a new disease to fight, it is a never ending battle for the lives of everyone who a doctor has placed under their care. Only constant vigilance can even hope to hold the onslaught at bay."

She'd never heard it put quite that way. But it actually made medicine sound exciting again. Still not her favored field, but at least not taboo.

"You know doctor, I think I would like to hear about your samples, perhaps you can show them to me after we get free from mold feeding duty."

"Yes! Very good. Until then we have some time so I will tell you how I killed my first sample . . ."

If the doctor heard the groan from Hobart, or saw the smirk on Shaelana's face, she made no indication of it while she told them about her first Razorboar kill.

"Eeh, lets not be getting all worked up mon. we are here to be providing legal council no to be provoking the ill will of Ja. Or worse da XO."

"But sir, how do they expect us to fit fifteen people in to these offices?" responded Lieutenant Commander LaScorsesi's senior adjunct, Lieutenant Harrison opening his arms to indicate the offices they had been appointed. Twenty meters from one end to the other and more than ten wide from door to outer hull windows, it was a dozen partitioned office places divided with low walls and transparent aluminum. Wide spaces between the cubicles allowed for freedom of movement and visibility. Along one wall three offices and a meeting room fully enclosed by transparent aluminum that could be polarized for privacy. At either end of the office was a large office space left open to the main area allowing the senior officers to see their domain as it were. A set of double doors on the same wall on either end finished the whole thing. It was more than most starships had ever seen outside of the legal division on the Galaxy or Excalibur classes and on the tightly packed triple redundant hull of the Storm it was downright spacious compared to what some other departments had been assigned. The Ops department had more than five times the personnel and half the space, granted they were also spread over half the ship but still. Benji knew half his department was used to dirt-side offices with twice the working space but they'd also volunteered for this. He himself though, it was exactly what he wanted. Benji knew better than to expect frontier lawyering, if such a thing existed, but he was also a starfleet officer and just being as close as he could would be enough. Or so he hoped.

"What did you expect mon? Dis is not a Galaxy Class cruise liner with wall to wall and private suites for every one aboard." Benji looked up from the pile of reports over the half-wall that divided his office space from the rest of the legal & liaison department. "And it be sixteen, we waitin on one more more for the liaison side of tings."

"Sir that's even worse . . . how . . . how can the captain expect us to provide legal services for dozens of ships, thousands of personnel and now they want us to liaise . . ."

Benji rose suddenly and slapped his fingers together in a loud attention getting motion that he had picked up from his father, "And which captain you be blamin now mon? Captain Doyal asked us to take on the extra duties and I accepted. What you tink we be arguing cases and providin council for high court justice? Dis is not the law firm of Boldly, Go & How, da case load on the frontier is much lighter." he sat down, letting one the smiles people said were disarming cross his features, "Which is part of why I volunteered, now I got more time to work on my backhand serve."

"That would be part of the 'tennis' game you spoke of?" asked Yantora his other adjunt in the slightly nasal voice all Mantellans had. Likely the nasal crest they possessed instead of nose as their secondary breathing apertures were near outside edge of the eyes.

"Ya mon, after we get our routine figured out I show you some basics."

A moment passed allowing the near tension of the past to fade and for Harrison's mind to catch up to the conversation, "Wait, sixteen, I've only gotten orders and files for fifteen including yourself sir."

"Ya, I would tink so. Dis last officer is not on the normal chain of command and will be reporting only to me or the first officer, but you should not be havin trouble rememberin that, I tink. We will see soon, our new co-worker should be here any moment."

The pronouncement could not have been any better timed as one of the two main office doors opened and in walked an officious looking man, his head of white hair, precise bearing and legal sized attache case would have let him fit in in any courtroom in the federation, if it weren't for the fact that he was very distinctly NOT a Federation member. The ears were slightly larger than a Vulcan's and he had the pronounced brow ridges of a Romulan. But that in and of itself, as there were a number of vulcanoid races was not enough to be sure. It was the Romulan Eagle on the case, and the Commander's sash that any retired senior officer was allowed to wear that had yet more Romulan iconography affixed that, if Benji recalled correctly, indicated that he was also a Praetorian Guard at one point. The Guard was the elite unit of the Imperial Forces and required a commitment of fifty years, or death, whichever came first. That, combined with the white hair and age lines places this particular Romulan somewhere beyond his first century of life.

Benji rose to meet the new addition extending a simple Romulan salute as he approched , "Ah Commander Joruk, exactly on time, I had just informed my staff that we were expecting one more."

With that pronouncement the other two remembered their courtesy and stood to offer their respects and benji went on, "Commander Joruk dis is Lieutenant Harrison my senior adjunct, and Lieutenant Yontora who will be our office manager.

After accepting handshakes from the two men Joruk spoke, "Please, I have not held military command for some years, for now I am just Joruk, or Speaker if a title is to be used."

"Well then Speaker Joruk allow me to show you around our offices and introduce you to the other staff, then we can go familiarize ourselves with the ship; the captain did give us the evening off after all."

"I would like that, thank you commander. Is there a place I may leave my documents?" he asked.

Benji pointed to a desk directly across from his and protected by a similar half wall. "We reserved a space for you to work, but were unsure as to your preference of working station, so it is the basic desktop for now. If you have something more personal in mind feel free to have someone in operations whip something up for you."

Joruk sized up the space with what appeared to be a well trained eye, "It will do nicely for now Commander. I shall take up the offer for improving the facilities though, personal spaces should should be organic and the templates found in most databases are rarely to my tastes."

"Oh please, we are to be colleagues, I am Benji to my friends to which I hope I may add you." he stated as he walked Joruk across the office.

"Ah yes, " responded Joruk with the same more-friendly-then-thou-art tone. "The human 'nick-name'. I have one as well, Ren after a small but vicious predator found in the northern deserts on Romulus." he finished setting his case on the desk and joining Benji at the door of the offices.

"You see when I was a young and very foolish centurion . . ." he started as the four legal officers wandered into the main corridors.

Some might have found it out of the ordinary to be summoned to the private quarters of their most senior officer, and perhaps odder still to find that officer in the middle of what appeared to be a basic Vulcan meditation technique. S'ara though was rapidly coming to learn that this duty station was going to be anything but ordinary.

Entering the cabin she was a little surprised at its sparseness; the common area, often called a living room by humans, was appointed with standard furniture from the replicator inventory. The only non-standard major addition seemed to be an oversized drafting board and desk complete with holographic interface. Decorations were minimal, being made up of mostly official plaques and awards; a holo of a graduating academy class (his presumably) a personal recording of a social event involving a dark haired woman in a MAC uniform (likely his sister) and the rest, well, S'ara could only identify a few. A Bolian Gladus and small shield, Andorian icesaber, several human sabers, foils and epès, a Klingon mek'leth and numerous daggers and blades of all shapes were carefully arranged on hooks, stands and sheathes. Next to this rather exotic collection was transparent case with two old style type-2 phasers, of the design often referred to as phaser pistols.

Kayetan came from the sleeping area without bothering to put his uniform jacket back on to find the Lieutenant standing at loose attention in his living room. He approached the younger officer and started.

"Well, we have both had a few hours to contemplate the situation and there is really only one question that need logically be asked." he placed his hands behind his back, "Is there need for a transfer at this time?"

"No sir, unless you think there is." was her precise reply. This was not what she had expected.

"Good." he went on, "However it is not a good idea to leave our personal connection totally undressed so, please Lieutenant, at ease." he moved toward the couch and seating area. "Have you eaten yet?"

"No sir, not since morning."

"Well then we can eat and handle anything that may come to mind." he said approaching the replicator. "What is your preference, I prefer light fair this late, salad perhaps?"

"That is acceptable sir." she said moving toward the table.

This was still not what she'd expected. The captain seemed to be quick witted but this direct handling of the situation as well as the apparent detachment he was exhibiting displayed an almost Vulcan logic.

While still in her younger years she had asked her mother about her parentage when it became obvious to her that the death date of Sokarn, her mother's late husband, meant that he could not possibly have been her father. S'ara liked to think that she'd always had a closer and more open relationship with her mother than most, but the subject of her real father was something that T'karra did not discuss without need. T'karra had eventually, and with much asking, outlined the unique events and necessity that had culminated in her daughters birth, from her capture and imprisonment to the escape nearer the end of the war but the details had been left to a minimum. Even knowing only the basics had been a lot for a twelve year old to take in, even a Vulcan one but she'd learned to take things as they came and 'roll with it' as she'd heard a human say.

Growing up in the northern provinces of Vulcan with only her mother and grandparents around had also given her an oddly mature perspective. Vulcan's polar regions were normally considered second rate real estate to a people evolved for desert life but her family had maintained the polar station since the time of Suarak. The station had been used by the followers of Suarak as a shelter against the the still waring factions, the cold and rough landscape providing defense against most direct attacks. Her grandparents had taken their retirement to the station, away from the old family holdings near one the few seas. Her grandfather Selaalk was a mathematician and was working on a theorem, while her grandmother was tending a hundred-year survey of Vulcan polar geological expansion.

All this meant she'd been able to explore the tundra and generally take advantage of the disinterest of her extended family in reigning in the wilds of youth to focus on maintaining the shrine and science facilities. Well, disinterest of all but her mother. Average Vulcan thought on child rearing was to have the child learn as many things as possible as soon as possible, but her mother had been more lenient so she'd been able to focus on things at her own pace. Eventually that freedom had grown into a goals and she'd started taking classes to ready herself for entrance into starfleet. But up until then S'ara had assumed she would focus on the sciences like most Vulcans in starfleet but then upon encountering others of her own age range she'd realized how divergent from the Vulcan norm she really was, and how much of it was do to her human lineage.

Which was why the captains simple logic in handling the situation was surprising and quite welcome.

After retrieving two large servings of mixed vegetables and pot of green tea from the replicator he motioned for her sit and followed suit.

After a moment of companionable silence he indicated the meal and said, "It's not too much is it?"

"No, I take portions larger than average as well."

"Ah," he started, "that would be from my side." He paused again, Are you familiar with our particular genetic variation?"

"No, mother spoke of a unique mutation but medicine is not her favored subject."

"Without getting into details we have an increased metabolism and lowered heat tolerance in exchange for an increase in peripheral and kinisthetic awareness, reaction speed and problem solving."

"Yes, I have always scored above the average in those areas."

"There are also some other genetic adjustments, they've likely been noted in your medical file but knowing where one gets their quirks can help in knowing which are affectations of the body and which the mind."

"Indeed." she replied. "Is that reference to Master K'ta's treatise on meditative control of the body?"

"Yes."

They ate in companionable silence until the food was cleared and tea mostly gone. Something that was also oddly Vulcan.

After removing the dishes Kayetan sat back down, a jumble of thoughts running through his head, but none of them were worth bringing up. He looked at her; really looked at her closely for the first time and saw bits of himself. Something about the eyes, her stance and the ease she had in even unfamiliar surroundings. This had not happened in the way he thought it would, or wanted it to and there were just to many things she brought up for him. Not all bad, just, complicated and hard to decipher.

Making a decision he broke the silence, "There are things I want to say; things I want to explain, but all that is meaningless and likely the result of the high emotional state I've been in for the last few weeks."

Kayetan abruptly stood and faced the window, letting the familiar starscape filter though his mind.

"Master Thikan would chastise me for giving in to my emotions." and then he smiled, "But your mother would note my discomfort and likely make some comment about being too direct and emotionally out of touch for a human. But its done and they aren't here." He turned back to her, a set of rather familiar green eyes staring back from under the sharply angled features of a Vulcan. "That's all I have for now, was there something you wanted to say?"

S'ara listened to him intently, the emotional origins of what he was saying and his sudden move from the chair to the window did not correspond to the steady, even tone he used to deliver those words. It was again, in its delivery, very Vulcan. She found herself not quite sure what a proper response was until he turned and she saw his eyes. They were familiar, the same shade of green she looked at in the mirror and she realized without quite knowing how what the right response was, the thing that would let them both leave this meeting without having second thoughts or regrets.

"Just that I am looking forward to working with you sir." she said simply and extended a hand for him to shake.

His head angled slightly to the left and there was a moment before he smiled and took the offered hand.

Skin-to-skin contact was socially taboo for Vulcans and the handshake was still regraded as very distinctly human so her experience in the maneuver was basically non existent, his hand though larger than her own was surprisingly warm and gentle.

"So am I lieutenant, so am I."

O500 was set to 'early' for ships clocks by default, so the lights were kept at around seventy percent and slowly transferred to full power over the next hour. Colonal Wert had woken up two hours before though and marshaled his section leaders, hashing out exactly what they'd be needing from the vacuum-heads who manned this oversized shuttle. Although he did have to admit (privately) that this particular shuttle was actually quite well set up for troop billeting, a so-called MAC country had already formed on the upper decks, they had their own officers quarters, storage spaces and armory. Most importantly though, they didn't have to fight for shuttle bay space to stow their landing shuttles. It had always been an issue anytime MAC's where stationed on starfleet ships, starfleeters didn't like the oversized things taking up room better used for runabouts or 'real' shuttles. But the secondary shuttlebay which was located where most ships had their bridge had been completely seconded to his flight officer Lieutenant Vasto and held their pair of Ender assault shuttles quite nicely with room left for a pair of type nine shuttles, three work bees and space to maintain them all. Technically the work bee's were under the control of the engineering department, but the chief engineer had said he'd give reasonable warning before sending anyone to retrieve the little tractor craft. He also said that if Wert's small craft crew maintained them, he'd have his engineers convert one of the storage bays in MAC country into a holodeck. That had been an easy yes. It was a nice change from the normal disregard most starfleet officers had for having to make allowances for his troops. All in all though, Captain Kayetan and his staff sis seem to know how to work with MAC's better than most, likely from the Captain having a close relative in uniform.

Actually, Major Mikaela Kayetan was something of a legend in the Corps, she'd started as enlisted earned her warrant and then a full commission the hard way in the Dominion war by being one of the survivors of the Olgbolt raid, an ill considered venture to destroy the Jem'hadar's ketracel white production facility deep in Cardassian ships, and more importantly to Mobile

Assault Command Operations, nearly a thousand MACs had been sent in; one ship and barley a hundred MAC's made it out having discovered the facility was a hoax. But they'd made the Dominion troops pay dearly for each loss, it had been there the Major had earned her reputation as a brutal tactician by launching a guerrilla campaign to distract the Dominion forces while the starfleet engineers repaired the warp drive of their remaining ship. Warrant Officer Kayetan had been promoted directly to Captain during the initial action and again to Major almost as soon as they got back. She now headed the MAC main training facility on Centauri B III for advanced combat tactics and was tagged for a Colonel's slot as soon as one became open.

Turing the corridor and entering the bridge he saw several ships officers still milling about the open door to the conference room, likely some last minute co-ordination. Captain Doyal, Chief engineer Lallal and OPS officer Sorne were going over something on a PADD and all three looked up upon his entrance.

"Ah, Colonel, good morning." said Doyal.

"And to you ma'am. Am I early?" was his crisp response.

"No Colonel, just on time, we were just going over subjects for the departmental meeting later."

Nodding, he moved for the conference room and surveyed for a suitable place to sit and decided on a free chair in the middle of the table opposite the door and next to Orourack who's girth was causing a slight disruption in the spacing of the seats.

It was not long before Doyal came in followed by the missing officers, including Captain Kayetan himself.

"At ease." he said before he was even fully in the room.

Striding quickly to the seat at the head of the table right in front of a master systems display imbedded in the wall at the front of the room, instead of sitting though he just pulled the char away from the table, giving him a clear view.

"Well, I hope you have come to expect me getting to the point, because that's not going to change."

"This meeting is to iron out how we are going to be working together, in other words, the boring part of running a starship and the stuff I've been ignoring for the last few weeks. Miranda if you will." leaning back to allow view of the monitor behind him, the MSD was replaced by a departmental seniority chart. And he went on, "You may have noted that our chain of command and even our department composition is not average for ship of this size." pointing at the chart, it zoomed in to the top, where the captains name was right over the senior staff, all of whom were present. "For clarity, I will start with the basics, even if we all know them. I will be retaining direct command of the ship, though Captain Doyal will be responsible for all non-emergency ship operations. Seniority of department heads are as follows:

Commander Hiss'toor Sharr Lallal, Chief Engineer.

Colonel J'ust Wert, MAC Commander and Head of Security.

Commader Orourack Coda, Tactical Officer.

Lieutenant Commander Benjimon LaScorsesi, JAG and liaison officer.

Lieutenant Commander Laura Jenkins, Wing Commander.

Medical Officer Mrilla daughter of Grella, Chief Medical officer.

Lieutenant Raishida Sorne, Operations Officer.

Lieutenant S'ara., Conning Officer.

"All department heads who have passed the bridge officers course will be watch officers in a standard rotation not yet determined. Which brings me to the first item of business; ships clock and-." with that Kayetan nodded to Lieutenant Raishida.

"Thank you sir. As most of you know two default settings are available to startfleet ships, a traditional terran twenty-four hour clock, or a thirty hour one. I have submitted a recommendation to Captain Kayetan to switch to the thirty hour clock as it will be more efficient for our particular crew mix and mission statement." finishing she turned to the captain, "Sir."

"XO Doyal and I have read the report and agreed with the assessment; unless there are some objections?"

None were raised.

"Allright, the thirty hour clock it is, please note it Miranda." he said and there was small pause as the holograhic woman at the captains immediate left eyes glazed over, and she responded.

"Done sir, we can switch when ready."

Kayetan smiled and pulling his chair closer he finally sat, "Well that was easy. Hopefully the next thirty issues we have to hammer out before the general meeting will be as easy."

"Next up, non startfleet personal. We have three areas of special note and consideration. First up are the MAC troopers, they will be incorporated into damage control and maintenance staff as well as maintaining their own equipment and providing shipboard security. Colonel Wert here has undergone cross training and passed the Advanced Tactical Course on Earth as well as passing the bridge officers course and will be taking a watch in a rotation to be determined."

Now that was a surprise, Wert had only taken the course because MACO liked anyone over the rank of Captain to have some understanding of ship command, not because they expected a starfleet ship caption to actually use a Corps commander as a watch officer. Wert made a mental note to review his startfleet protocol as the Captain went on.

"We also have Medical Officer Mrilla, she does hold the honorary rank of Lieutenant Commander. However as she has not passed the bridge officers course she will not be a watch officer, but still in the chain of command as normal for chief medical officer."

The indicated Klingon officer, her medial blue coat, like the colonel's own dark blue uniform and Ororack's girth causing a slight disruption in the uniformity of those present. That and the Klingon armor poking out from the gap in the coat.

"And I do think you have all come to know Miranda, she is nominally in charge of computer sciences. In actuality she will be working close alongside the operations department and taking over many of the technical functions of that section as well being available to consult as needed."

Then it was Orourack who interjected when the captain paused, "Fair warning to all, Miranda loves to consult even if not asked." to which everyone except Lieutenant S'ara laughed. Miranda's eagerness, energy and friendly attitude had gotten her a lot of friends with the new crew members, but she had also gained a reputation for showing up where she wasn't exactly needed. Not that she got in the way, she just seemed to be everywhere.

"Well, then, the last major non-starfleet addition, who is on board at my invitation, Commander Joruk will be aiding the legal division, officially."

The way he said 'officially' got everyone's attention, "Unofficially, he is our direct contact with the Romulan Star Empire and here to watch over some equipment and starcharts they've given us. Also, he's an old friend so I hope you all will make sure he is given the respect and allowance his rank and position deserve."

Wert was sure there was some story there, but half the people in the room were Dominion war veterans so having Romulan friends was not that odd, having one who according to scuttlebutt was a Praetorian Guard, now that was interesting.

Chapter 8

Bajor Station was packed. And so was Deep Space Nine for that matter. Although it was more properly known as the wormhole observation post now. Not that anyone but some starfleet desk jockeys three sectors away actually called it that. Sometimes Kira wondered if it had been a good idea, joining the Federation so close to the end of the war. Some part of her that wanted the old freedom the resistance and then the Bajorian Defense Forces had, their traditions had only been social and religious, starfleet had all sorts of baggage in their day to day operations.

On the other hand, she thought as she looked out the Ops windows, there was no way Bajor could have hosted all this without the aid of the federation. At least not for many, many more decades.

In close orbit of the massive station were a hundred or so ships, Task Group 337 had been joined by several others and flotillas of allied nations as well as Kayetan's First Exploration Fleet support vessels. Kira went though the silhouettes she could see out of habit. Two Galaxy class explorers re-converted from the war era dreadnaughts, half a dozen Akira's in loose formation, the Monarch, second ship of the Sovereign class with several Saber and Norway class cruisers buzzing protectively in close proximity. But amidst the new designs were some older ones, twenty or so Miranda types in several configurations, a couple of Excelsior light explorers an old friend to the station the Centaur hovering rather close but still outside the door lanes. She smiled at that one, the Centaur was not here for the wargames or the Gamma quadrant push, but was actually the only ship out there actually assigned to this sector. Captain Dretth had been the OPS officer on the Centaur during the war and eventually inherited the center seat, as well as being an old friend. And then lastly there were the three Defiant class escorts hovering in close to her, half of those remaining in service.

But all those ships were not the most impressive thing in visual range; the USS Durandal, its massive bulk eclipsing even the Monarch. Forty decks and more than nine-hundred meters long it was the only major new ship class launched since the war and it was impressive. Supposedly it was the culmination of concepts that had gone into the Galaxy, Sovereign, Nebula and Corsica classes, in reality it was a huge resource magnet and waste. Or that's what Kira and a lot of the officer core thought. Despite that she did have to admit that it was damn impressive up close. And it had been in the works for the better part of twenty-five years and starfleet did need some big ships for long term independent operations. And they are limiting the build run to three, the Excalibur, Mjolnir and Durandal. The Excalibur had been in space for more than two years now, the Mjolnir was still in the docks and the Durandal was working up to head out to the Gamma quadrant.

Bur for now it was a free-for-all out there and getting worse by the minute. The Imperial Klingon Ship Nedj'Mur had shown up finally, the last ship of Fleet Captain Kayetan's advance flotilla. It was as impressive as the Durandal and just as big. During the war the Klingons had encountered difficulty in supporting their Bird of Prey squadrons, at first they had simply taken advantage of federation supplies, but when those started getting spread thin they had to adapt some of their superheavy freighters to act as fast supply ships. Then someone somewhere in the empire had thought it was great idea and could be even better if a dedicated bird of prey tender was devised, and so enter what startfleet had labeled the Eyrie combat supply ship. The Klingon word for the ship type was Jught Tokeduj which translated as 'roost of predators' and was impressive as it was the largest dedicated fleet support vessel ever launched by any known alpha or beta quadrant race. It had hard docking space for an entire wing of the smaller B'rel scouts or the newer Ka'vagh attack ships. More importantly it had matter re-sequencers, heavy transporters, antimatter generation facilities, weapons manufacturing, a massive weapons battery and overpowered shields to protect them all.

It's dark green bulk was slowly scattering the smaller ships as it closed with the station to dock with the heavy support umbilicals on the edge of the docking ring at the edge of so-called 'mushroom' part of the upper station. The bulk of the thing was enough that not only could it not enter the cavernous internal docking bay, it actually was about cause . . . and there it was, the station-keeping thrusters fired to counter the push from the Klingon ship docking and a pair heavy tractors caught the ship to remove the last vestiges of momentum.

"Signal General Krwan his ship is received and and extend my compliments." Kira called to the docking officer.

Two more weeks, Kira thought, only two more weeks and all these ships would be leaving for the games, some would come back for repairs and post game layovers but this mass of ships was not going to be around for long. It's going to be boring around here without them. She added as she watched her domain bustle.

General Krwan had his weapons officer and second acknowledge the message from the federation admiral and stood. "I shall be going aboard to meet with General Grekt; inform me when they are finished transfering supplies."

"Yes general." came the barked reply as he exited the command deck and headed for the transporters.

A feeling of pride came to him as he walked the decks of his domain, lesser officers and troops moving aside to let him pass. One of the most powerful ships in Imperial service was his to command, given to him as reward for a lifetime of honorable service to his house and his emperor. The house of Stregd had come far and gained much and as the blood brother of the house leader it was his responsibility to see that the house was served in all things, even if one of those things was reigning in the son of his brother.

Grekt had fought well during both the last war with the federation and when the cause of that war had been found to be Dominion spies, against the Founders and their slave troops and proxies. Grekt's capture had been a black mark on the honor of the house but the fact that he had returned triumphantly with many other prisoners having slaughtered their way though an entire garrison of Cardassian and Jem'hadar soldiers starting from nothing more than bare hands and sharpened rocks, all was made right. But now the younger general was starting overstep and it was his responsibility to make sure it did not lead to the dishonor of the house.

Arriving at the transport room he looked at the transport technician, "Beam me to the Ko'Vaght." and a moment later he was looking at a much smaller transport room and greeted by the Ko'Vaght's second and his nephews mate, Jokora who was also known as The Baakonite Fist in some circles. She too was a veteran of the Dominion war and quite the catch considering she was also one the top masters of Mok'bara and twice champion of the VO'dun unarmed fighting tournament held every five years on Qo'nos.

"Uncle." she chose simply to say.

"As good as it is to see you again Jokora, take me to Grekt, there is much we have to discuss."

"Of course uncle." she said moving from the room.

Following her though the more narrow corridors of the Ko'Vaght was much the same as the crew scattered out their way, the sight of their second and a senior member of the house they served was more than enough to get them quickly to the feasting hall that all Klingon ships traditionally had. Upon entry the hall's occupants looked up and seeing who was in their midst stood to offer respect. All except one, who only stood as he approached.

"Uncle! I thought we would meet later." Grekt greeted.

"We have matters of the house to discuss."

Grekt turned to the other warriors in the hall and shouted an order to clear out. In moments only he, Grekt and Jokora were left amidst the smell of gagh, blood wine and targ meat.

The silence hung in the room like over smoked targ until Grekt asked, "So what uncle? Only family now remains, speak your worry."

"You have taken your ships and your troops as is your right, but you have promised the support of the entire house to this 'exploration'-" he spat the word out like curse, "-of space so far away as to be useless to the Empire. And you have committed us without seeking the permission of your father, who still leads this house."

"We have more and newer ships than the closest ten of our rivals, two wings and their support can be spared."

"That does not excuse the act!" Krwan said slamming his hand down onto the table with enough force to shake gagh from its bowl and spill a flagon of wine.

Grekt eyed the older warrior without blinking or wavering, "I took only what was mine to take, I asked you to join us as family, not as a servant, so change your tone." he got even closer as he spoke so by now Grekt was inches from his face, "And there was not time, if I had waited and asked for permission like child on his first hunt the chance might have slid from our firm grasp and been taken by another house."

Krwan continued to stare the younger but larger man down. "So you claim to have the future of the house in mind when you take some our best warriors and newest ships and hand them over to the Federation!?"

"Every time startfleet wanders off into the unknown they come back with new and more powerful tactics and technology, this time we will be there as well, taking what we can from the cosmos and demonstrating the power of the Empire and its warriors without the filter of the federation between us." his volume lowered a little, but not so much as to be disrespectful, "And it was the first chance I have had to repay a debt owed."

Something in Grekt's voice told him that there was something else, "And what else? Tell me everything before I decide to take my ships and leave."

A spark of pride and defiance appeared in Grekt's eye, "I owe a debt to the human Kayetan. It was he who made possible the chance to escape while taking so many enemies with us, but what more he is a warrior despite his humanness and his starfleet training, he is a warrior and I call him comrade to me and all my line."

The Klingon language was not a subtle one. Quite the opposite in fact. But one exception was in the various words they had for warrior. The one Grekt had just used was reserved for fellow warriors who had saved each others life and become brothers in battle. It was translated most often as 'comrade' by the humans, but that did not capture the full emotion behind the word; battle-brother was closer but still not exact. However that particular variation of the word and the addition of 'to me and all my line' indicated that a far as Grekt was concerned the human was his brother.

"So your mother was right, far more happened at that camp than is known."

Grekt looked a bit surprised at that sudden pronouncement. "What? Of course, there is always more than songs or prose can take down."

"Then what? What has been kept from even your own family?"

It was then Grekt and Jokora shared a look. "Not all family." said Jokora after a moment.

Krwan sighed, the sound more like growl coming from the aged warrior.

"Then bring me a bottle of good wine and tell me the story, tell me why we should except this human as more than one of our house's allies; tell me why this starfleeter should be called family by the son of my brother."

Part Two

The facility

Chapter 9

Sound bent, spaceframes' shuddered and the waveform broke as they hit atmosphere; a sonic boom it was commonly called. Kayeten shook in his restraints along with the other seventy or so survivors packed in the cramped Cardiassian shuttle. It was a variant of a Cardiassian long-range light transport, similar in function to a runabout but this one had been equipped with an extra large troop compartment. And he'd been able to catch a glimpse of a dozen more like it back at the station where they'd been held after their capture at the Tyra system. Kayetan figured out what they were really for after a moments consideration and had silenced a junior ensign who had wondered out-loud as to their function. No sense getting everyone worried in mid transit with a bunch of trigger happy Jem'hadar and a Vorta who had a cruel streak watching over them. Besides, even if they had escaped right then, and found a transmitter right then, it was unlikely they could halt the invasion these landing craft had been designed for.

'War' indeed. Until Tyra the war had been a game of stalling, the Dominion forces taking world after world, only slowed down by technological tricks thrown in front of them like speed bumps. All the tricks were buying time until the fleet yards could get into full production and it was working. Until Tyra. Fifty ships gone in few minutes. The warp core detonations had made retreat all but impossible and the remaining ships fought had held out for three days while trying to find way out of trap the system had become. But there was none and by the end of the third day twenty ships out of 114 were left. And most of those where nearly husks with less than skeleton crews and no flag officers. It had been quirk of timing that put him in command of the 'fleet', he'd been a full commander for longer than the other remaining officers because he had been with the Starfleet Advanced Starship Design Bureau for most of his career and one didn't join them for the swift advancement to flag rank. In fact if it hadn't been for Admiral Wainwright dragging him off of his design bench he would probably still be in the shipyards.

With the thought of the Admiral a burst of emotion threatened to come forth, but he stifled it, held it, contained it and transformed it into something more useful; warp four for four days, depending on intervening terrain, they had to be within one sector of the Tyra system. He made a mental note to ask one of the surviving astrometics personnel if there were any major subspace phenomenon near the Tyra sector. But as to their new home, Jem'hadar were not talkative and taking amongst the prisoners had been frowned upon so he'd have to go on the sound of re-entry. Atmospheric buffeting had started a full minute before the sonic boom had gone off, and they were landing less then a minute later. So a thin atmosphere. No special equipment had been issued to the either the Cardiassian or the Jem'Hadar, so class M.

And that was all he had time for as the ramp opened and phaser armed Cardassian guards yelled for them to exit. Running from the hold with the others he nearly tripped as he reflexively turned his head from the sudden light, but only stumbled on the ramp.

Outside was not all he was expecting. Squinting from the light he scanned the camp, and camp it indeed was. A hundred meter square compound had been fenced off, with a double layer ten meter tall fence. A fence that was humming with power and for good measure spaced with guard towers every twenty meters with what looked like an auto-turret on each corner. Dead center in the double layered fence was a massive gate over which a guard tower larger than the others and fully enclosed with a sensor tower on the roof.

Lining up along the pad three deep the seventy crewmen and ten officers who remained from seventh fleet stood at attention facing the main section of the fence in front of the. As the senior officer remaining, and still reeling from the light Kayetan moved in front of the lines and stood as still as the flashing in his eyes and the thrust from the departing shuttles would let him. His eyes were as adjusted as they would get but he still couldn't see very clearly, but from the silhouettes only the guards in the tower were Jem'hadar, the rest moving up and down the line were Cardassian. As was the woman who exited the main tower. Kayetan tried to angle his head to get details of who he presumed was their senior captor but the sun was low and shining right into the camp giving his already light sensitive eyes and extra ache.

"Greetings gathered sentients." her voice was clear and carried well despite being thirty some-odd yards away.

Well, at least I can hear just fine. Kayetan thought wryly to himself.

"I am Gul Grata and I am your host. You will tempted to make escape plans, and despite what I say next you might actually complete those plans. I don't care. Spend all your time trying to get out, get out even, because beyond these walls is nothing but an endless forest of moss, lichen and fungus. You have been landed on the surface because transport into the compound is difficult, em fields tend to scramble more complicated patterns. There are no power sources in the compound and if you somehow get one," the blurry silhouette pointed to one the fence corners, "those turrets will automatically target and fire on any power source that is inside of the wide yellow line we have marked out for you." the form moved along what he presumed to be a walkway set along the outermost of the two fences. "This is not to say you will not be cared for, food will be provided once a week, blankets and sleeping cots have already been provided, you will work out amongst yourselves how they are distributed. Other rules have been made known to the prisoners already interred here, so I will just tell you the only penalty for breaking them: death. How long the death takes is up to the guard who catches you, so I recommend you stay on their good side."

The guards finished their inspection and removal of the shackles and filtered around to the the door leading out of the place; which looked to be made from solid duranium and lifted as one mass on a pair of hydraulic screws. Efficient, he thought, nothing much to go wrong and can be physically locked in any position.

Guards on the walkways covered their companions' retreat and held phaser rifles on the Federation personnel until the gate was shut and locked with a rather final (and loud) THUNK.

"And before I forget, some of you were not very co-operative, she spoke into a commbadge, 'beam them down now'." the the harmonics of a Cardassian transporter whined though the area and a dozen klingons started to materialize thirty meters to the federation prisoners immediate left. Well, twelve klingons and three small piles of organic matter that might have been klingons at some point. "I'll let you get acquainted on your own." she finished as she went back into the tower.

Kayetan dared prolonged look at the klingons, some of whom were still bound with cargo ties. A couple of the free ones looked to be in bad shape and three others, suddenly finding themselves free ran for the fence. Crap, he thought, no sense letting perfectly good allies die for no reason and he called out,

"The fence is electrified!".

One Klingon slowed his run, two others didn't. No one was close enough to stop them and the (presumably) faster of the two hit the fence with an impressive leap catching one of the heavy wire sections a good three meters up . . . and instantly fried as at least a million volts raced though his body. The non metallic body armor dissipated some of the charge in an impressive display of lightning. Lightning that caught the second Klingon square in the chest and probably saved his life by launching him away from the fence.

"Get back to my side you fools!" shouted a voice raspy from age above the smell of burnt flesh.

The Klingon who shouted was one of the ones still in restraints and was missing half his face and most of an arm. But the authority in the shout stopped the other warriors and the one still near the fence picked up his toasty friend and came back to his general who turned to survey the federation prisoners.

But it was a new voice that broke the silence, "Welcome gentlemen, to Dominion Prison Camp Fourteen." it came from a short human of Oriental decent in the uniform of a Captain who was crossing the empty expanse of the landing pad.

"I am not gentle." was the growled response from the general. But the twinkle in his eye suggested that he appreciated the oddity of the situation. "I am General Krugh." he glowered at the unconscious and still smoking warrior, "And these are my warriors. Or whats left of them anyway."

Kayetan move closer to the the other officer and interjected, "Commander Kristopher Kayetan, Chief engineer of the Hammer."

"Good for you." rumbled the general.

The startfleet officer was more polite, "Captain Harold Jii, CO starbase one-twelve."

None of the three made a motion, or a sound until Jii spoke, "Well we're going to be together for while but how about some real news, most of us have been here for almost eight weeks now and have no idea what's been going on. Unless our Vorta was not lying when he said Vulcan was under Dominion rule and earth was next."

Kayetan looked at the general, who's stoic icy glare said he wasn't the news giving type. "Vulcan and Earth are fine sir, but Seventh fleet is gone."

Jii looked like he's been struck. "What do you mean gone?"

Kayetan started to reply but a couple of his subordinates caught his eye and he was suddenly reminded that he had more responsibilities than imparting news.

"Sir, if I could get my people situated first, we've been shuffled from holding cell to holding cell for more than a week and locked in a cramped bay for the last four days."

Jii nodded, "All right, the Gul was not fooling, she does 'care' for us; she beams in a weeks worth of raw foodstuffs and lets us worry about cooking. But we've got more than enough room for all of you in the caves." Jii looked over his shoulder at a cliff face which made up the back wall of the prison where indeed, there was a thirty meter wide cave opening and about fifty or so more startfleet personnel standing around inside. "They ordered us the say inside while the shuttles were in sight." he explained.

The general looked at his men and barked an order to follow him inside. "We'll find our own way."

Jii watched the Klingons move toward the caves, "Introduce me to your senior officers and well start getting beds ready for everyone."

Kayetan nodded and waved them them over. "Captain Jii, this is Commander T'karra first officer of the Corinth." the Vulcan officer nodded in acknowledgment, Kayetan noted that she was holding her arms clasped together, a Vulcan response to cold.

"Commander Hiss'toor Sharr Lallal, chief engineer of the Mako." the lizard-like officer nodded as well, the movement looking far more dynamic on him than the Vulcan. Kaytean indicated the next officer who'd been put in charge of a batch of survivors, "And this is Lieutenant Commander Orourack Coda, Hammer's chief of security." he finished.

Jii nodded at each one in turn, only pausing on the extensive scorch marks that crisscrossed Orourack's thick wiry fur. Or more likely his sheer bulk. In testimony to the flag officer's flexibility he treated the whole thing like tired, weary and heavily bedraggled startfleet officers introduced each other on Cardassian landing pads in the middle of Dominion POW camps all the time. "Well then lets get you all settled and fed, looks like some of you can use it. We keep a fire burning in the main cave so it's nice and warm. I hope you like re-sequenced protein stew with some badly replicated Cardassian leeks."

As it turned out that Kayeten didn't like protein stew or Cardassian leeks. Well, the broth was not bad but the protein had the flavor of bad liver and the 'leeks' were like . . . he wasn't sure what they were similar to, but not an onion-like herb.

Getting to the food had allowed him to get a view of their new home; it was a cave. Series of caves really. A major cavern half open to the fenced in area with half a dozen side rooms and a 'back door' corridor that wrapped around to empty out in the enclosed compound.

But while the stew was bad tasting, it was filling, and warm. He had made the rounds and checked in with his section leaders and after making sure everyone was still okay., they had kept them separated into four smaller units since capture and talking had been discouraged. Not that he was worried about everyone, if something had happened one of his officers would have found a way to notify him despite the guards. He was concerned about individuals; Orourack had not been taken in lightly, with the comm systems down Kayetan had no way to formally surrender the whole ship, so when the two-meter tall Masturian security officer had hold up in one of the remaining cargo bays, well, the Jem'hadar had discovered the hard way that Masturian fur could take the punch out of everything but combined heavy stun fire. Kayetan knew Orourack would not show weakness, but he also knew that he was moving slower than normal from some unhealed close-range stun bursts (and their matching bruises). It had been deemed safer to keep stunning the bear-like Lieutenant Commander while they moved them into holding cells.

But as bad as he was doing, Kayetan was more worried about how his other two senior officers were doing. Hiss'toor Sharr Lallal was even more sensitive to cold than the vulcan commander T'karra was, and going from the heat the Cardassians preferred to this chill would have had struck the Sphankonidae engineer like a hammer. Kayetan hadn't known the chief engineer of the Mako all that well before the ambush, but the Mako had been severely hulled and used as cover for an ambush of a Jem'hadar attack wing after they'd pulled the surviving crew off of her. Lallal had been helpful in fixing the ships they had left and restoring enough of the Hammer's systems to make her somewhat combat effective. He'd also personally led the teams that had cut the useless warp nacelles free and put all their remaining power into the impulse engines and turned out to be a great field engineer.

And then there was Commander T'karra, his most immediate junior. She had been XO of the Corinth before that ship had been forced to eject its warp core. The bulk of her crew and all the other senior staff had been killed when the core exploded too close to the ship. She was Vulcan and so didn't seem effected, and she'd likely be fine but he had a background that had given him a rare ability to read Vulcan moods and she was not doing as well as everyone else thought.

Not that their stories or condition were odd; Seventh fleet's only remaining flag officers had been among the severely injured and sent off on the only ship they'd been able to restore warp capability of inside of three days.

His own ship, he Hammer had gotten off relatively lightly, only her bridge was a total loss, if you ignored the fact that both of her warp nacelles had been overloaded and rendered into useless weight. And the fact the warp core was only capable of 1/8 power. But none of that mattered, every one of these seventy-eight people still with him had been among the ninety that had volunteered to cover the escape of the other survivors of the battle of Tyra. A little over eight hundred out of the twenty thousand officers and crew that had been on a hundred and twelve ships of Seventh Fleet. The math was a staggering example of how badly the war was going.

Kayetan hadn't had any time to really think about it though, at first the Jem'Hadar and their Vorta had been quite sociable, if insisting that they keep discussions to a minimum. Kayetan had spent this time trying to ignore the heat the Cardassians preferred and focus on what the guards were saying. So far it had been enlightening, he learned that the transports they were on were supposed to pick up a lot of troops after they off-loaded their prisoners. And he'd learned why they were using actual bars and guards, seems they'd had some bad experiences with some starfleet engineers overloading force-fields from inside the cells. Which was also the reason they'd scanned them all pretty thoroughly and then beaten anyone who was hiding things on their person, which turned out to be more than half his people. It had been bad enough that he'd been 'allowed' to address them all and order them to co-operate with their captors.

But that wasn't what Captain Jii was interested in.

"So Commander, why are you here then?" the shorter human asked in-between Kayetan's spoonfuls of 'stew'.

"We held out as long as we could, but there just wasn't enough room for everyone on an Miranda class hull with half its environmental systems gone."

Jii laughed at that explanation. "You really are an engineer aren't you Commander."

"Sir?" he asked.

Jii sat down on an outcropping of rock that was just seating height, "I mean what are you doing here at this camp Commander Kayetan? This is not just any camp, it was specifically set up for the people they pulled form starbase one-twelve and anyone else who has been making a nuisance of themselves." Jii pointed at his two senior officers who were still organizing the new arrivals. "Captain Shanlao Annon was unlucky enough to have docked at our station for computer maintenance, her ship was caught without power to anything other than secondary systems."

Kayetan looked at the Bolian officer, she was organizing some crewmen into sections and helping assign sleeping areas, such as they were in a cave.

"And that, is commander Donaldson, who was passing though on another matter."

This time the indicated officer was less involved and simply watching from an alcove in the cave wall.

"The rest have been added over the last five weeks or so, everyone who who's been identified as being a problem or proven security risk." Jii leaned back in his, um, bench, and gave him an odd look, "I know what my crime was, and all hundred people we have here already, the Klingons are a bit obvious, but then there's you. Our gracious host was kind enough to let us all know that the 'only remaining members of seventh fleet' were on their way." he paused as Kayetan set the bowl down, "So I suppose the question is, what did seventy people do before they were captured to get put on the high risk list?"

Kayetan was a little surprised at that direct question. It was almost like something he would ask. "The Tyra system was a trap. A binary system with a blue dwarf, the whole place was a sensor nightmare. We thought it was just a staging area for the fleet that had been probing . . ." He trailed off when he realized that he was starting to ramble, "In less than a day we were down to four ships and we had to detonate the core of one of those to hide the fact that we were still alive. They left a small force behind to search for and pick up the stragglers." this was the first time Kayetan had spoken of these events since they'd happened and he suddenly had to sit down. "We, uh, used parts from one ship to repair the Hammer and the Ramujan and kept our power signature low so they couldn't find us. We focused on weapons and sublight on the Hammer, and warp drive on the Ramujan. The idea was to use the Hammer to distract the Dominion while the Ramujan got out. But then they started firing into the debris field, we didn't know why at first until we found out that a couple other ships had been playing dead as well." Kayetan found it harder to speak about it all then he'd expected, but went on, "We launched early with a volunteer crew and surprised them. And I suppose launching our remaining smallcraft on autopilot with timers on their warp cores may have helped. They both got away, warped out, but we still had to cover the Ramujan and she needed another day for repairs so . . . we stayed out there all day, we used the debris field and the system itself for cover as long as we could, performing hit and runs for thirty-six hours, even after the Ramujan got away clean." he felt the cool rock under him and took a breath before finishing. "We only surrendered after we expended our remaining torpedoes and they destroyed our last phaser array and power transfer systems."

Jii was silent for a while, "You held of a Dominion fleet with a broken ship and let three other ships get away from what sounds like a trap that someone spent a long time setting up."

Kayetan nodded and then to his confusion, Jii laughed. And not a chuckle either, a full line of rippling laughter.

After Jii recovered his facilities he extended a hand to Kayetan, "Well Commander, welcome to Dominion Prisoner of War camp number 14, or so we've been told. We have enough to eat and nothing to do but entertain our host who is a Obsidian Order dropout with a grudge against the federation." still smiling he finished, "I think you'll fit in nicely."

Orourack drifted awake slowly, his kind had several types of rest, they could hibernate to an extent that most of their extraneous biologic functions shut down; descend onto a basic muscular torpor which let their bodies rest and digest whatever feast they'd eaten, or like he just completed, spend a couple hours every four months or so effectively dead to the world. They were a defense mechanism from evolving on a world with a mean average temperature of about four degrees and possessing such an abundance of predatory creatures that one Betazoid biologist once said it was 'the ultimate in survival of the fittest'. Orourack could not help but agree once he'd actually interacted with other races, they all seemed downright tiny and frail. Also warm. Far too warm. His eyes were actually slightly sensitive to heat and his fur was an extremely effective thermal insulator. Luckily his people had also evolved a fat layer and down coat which could be shed in the rare and short summer months. His first year at the academy had not been pleasant, for anyone or anything within breathing range. But, as the great one once said, 'every shedding has a lining of silver'. That was actually referring to the thaws and the massive fish migration that happened at the same time. The fish were so thick that the seas looked to be made of silver. Great, and now he was hungry.

Good thing it hadn't been warm enough to start a hibernation cycle. That would have been bad, Masturians could eat a lot without trying to prepare for hibernation, let alone when it was warm enough to gain a few hundred pounds without worrying about predators.

Regardless, the nap had helped his mood and his healing. He'd only once been beaten as badly and that had taken three of his peers and a Dregodath, which to his amusement had once been compared to a 'saber-toothed tiger crossed with a great white shark'. It was amusing that someone thought either of those puny things could compare to an eight meter semi-amphibious predator that would either stalk, out-run or ambush depending on time of the year and mood. But that was neither here nor now and he decided to open an eye before his mind wandered again.

It was not exactly what he was expecting. He'd dropped off in an alcove after Commander Kayetan had relieved him and said to get some rack time. As this was a cave he'd simply chosen an alcove off of one of the side rooms that was out of the way and drooped off. Now he was not alone. Fifteen some-odd junior crewmen were milling about in the room nearby talking quietly and several dozen more were standing at the head of his chosen cave with what looked like blankets and cots. What more, they were talking about him.

"Um, is he hibernating? Should we wake him?"

"Hey," said another crewman, "he came with you guys, we've never met him till today."

"Guys," interrupted a junior grade lieutenant, "Standing around is not going to get the bunks in place."

"Then you wake up the snoring bear and kick him out of his cave!" shot back the first crewman.

"I . . . are you sure you yelled loud enough Inuzaki?" the lieutenant asked plaintively.

"You didn't hear that?!" said a third short dark haired crewman who remembered his protocol late and added a , "sir." after moment.

"You served with him, right chief?" asked the first one.

"Yes, but he never passed out while standing at tactical." he paused, "You know, I don't recall him sleeping the whole time were in the Tyra system now that I think about it."

Orourack had heard enough, and as much as it might be amusing to let them go on, it seemed that he was actually holding something up; and as the great one once said 'a general must never become part of the baggage'.

He rolled into a sitting position and spoke, "Worry not, I have already awoken and have no need of another deep sleep for several more months."

"Uh, sir." started the lieutenant as Orourack rose to his full height.

"What have I missed, lieutenant . . .?" he asked.

"Reiza, sir. Reiza Ashian." she said answering quickly and without hesitation, "They've decided to billet all the non-commissioned personnel in this set of caves as they're the largest of the side caverns."

He sized up the smaller officer, not that size meant anything, everyone was smaller than him, but she was a species he'd not encountered before. She was of the average height around one point eight meters, but she diverged from the average 'humanoid' template in that her skin faded between violet and indigo; becoming brighter in the light and darkening depending on how it caught the light. Her hair matched and was ever so slightly translucent so again it caught the light from outside in a distinctive way.

"Well, I am Orourack. I shall move so the chief can billet his fellows and I would appreciate it if you would show me to the senior officers."

"Of course sir. Right this way." she said turning and walking briskly toward the opposite side of the main cave.

Following her he got his first good look at the cave network and he was a bit impressed with its size. The main cave was fifty meters across but narrowed to about forty wide. The dome rose some twenty meters in the center and a few stalactites hung from various points indicating the presence of water. The floor center sloped upwards and was capped in a raised flat-topped mound on-which a fire had been built and was being tended. Makeshift tables had been formed out of plasticine crates and various bits were being pealed, flayed, chopped and diced ready for preparation in the fire. A set of large pots had been supplied and they were releasing a steady steam of warming vapor, four Vulcan crewmen attended the area along with a Xindi reptilian and a couple others from species whom he presumed didn't take well to cold. Reiza led him into a side cave that widened and curved back from the side of the main cavern to empty out again into the courtyard where they'd first landed.

Orourack knew his caves and was impressed; reminds me of the clan home. In this area was set a great pile of goods, stores of food and the neatly stacked remains of the crates they came in. There was also a steady flow of crewmen who were taking folding cots from a pile and moving back to where his napping spot had been. Just beyond the storeroom though was a smaller cove with a long ledge where several senior officers had set up a command area.

"My thanks, lieutenant," he started as Reiza turned around, "Do not let me keep you from previous duties." to which she nodded and strode back the way they'd come.

He kept to the edge of the 'command area' where the other senior officers as well as a few senior Lieutenants were gathered around and simply waited for an order; he knew he was visible enough; if his superiors wanted him for something they'd tell him. And true to form after moment Commander Kayetan motioned him over to his side as captain Jii was filling them in about the camp.

"What have I missed sir?" he said quietly.

"Nothing much really, I filled in the captain on recent events and we figured out where to put everybody. He's just telling us what we can expect from our hosts now."

Orourack took the chance to see inspect how the others were doing, he'd been unable to get a clear view of anyone from the Hammer survivors for weeks.

Lieutenant Commander Lallal he'd only met few times before and only come to know the engineer right at the end. He had been very central to the actual work that had allowed them to hold out for so long and was similar to Kayetan in that they both led from the very front. But when he'd first come on board the Hammer he'd been a deep green and a just a touch glistening with moisture. Now he had faded a bit to a dull green and his mucus was dried out. Orourack was no expert in saurian physiology but the way he was staying close to the small fire that was built nearby and his normally twitching eyes staying focused on a single target seemed to indicate he was not doing well in the cold.

Commander T'karra on the other claw was a still bit more of a mystery, she'd been the only remaining senior officer that had actual command experience of note and had been the only one doing all the things a good CO normally needed to do; such as co-ordinate between departments and look beyond the immediate problems. She'd been the one who ordered every crewmen to keep a survival kit on their person at all times and had made sure everyone had a moment to compose a message to send along with the wounded. For a dozen of their skeleton crew it was now the last message they would send and it would be of some comfort to the ones they had left behind. Other than her odd awareness of the emotional needs of her crewmen she had mostly worked as coordinator, taking on the roles of OPS officer and XO while they'd prepared their ships. But she was one of only thirteen survivors of the Corinth and loosing seven hundred fellow officers and crew had to have some effect despite the Vulcan stereotype of emotionlessness. She looked better then Lallal, but she was still holding her arms close and, he noted, had set herself up in a place that was just where sweep of the cave wall was reflecting the heat of the fire.

But honestly he was no better off then they were; he'd not been on the bridge when the ship had finally been taken, he'd been trying to organize a repair team to see if they could get a phaser bank back online because Lallal had been stuck in impulse control trying to keep the engines form exploding. A stray blast had removed most of their comm array from the land of the functioning and so he and the four crewmen in the forward phaser control room had not known that there had been a surrender. So when a Jem'Hdar strike team had stepped in on them they'd fired and retreated into a cargo bay to make a made a last stand. He was still a bit fuzzy about the details, all he recalled was Ensign Davies taking a hit and going down, then it was a blur of claws and blood and a lot of pain. Judging from the looks the Vorta had shot his way, and the extreme care the Jem'Hadar took had then the way the Cardassians been treating him he must have taken quite a few of them out before they dropped him.

But however they were now, the four of them had actually worked quite well together; T'karra provided clear data to work off of, Lallal had been able to adjust the resources to the goals, Orourack himself had been able to provide direct tactical goals while Kayetan just worked hard and assumed that everyone would keep up. Everyone on the Hammer had known that the Admiral had been like a father to him so the thought was that if he could work that hard despite it all, they could as well.

Kayetan he knew as a very capable problem solver and engineer who hadn't taken to command very well. His plans were good as the successful escape of three ships and at least a thousand people attested, but he was no leader of hunters. Right now though the wiry human actually looked thinner than he had been before, his normally shaved head-fur was longer and dirty, his eyes had the dark of sleep about them and he leaned on the rock for support while he listened. The commander had been continually awake almost as long has he had been and he knew that was harder on a human than his kind.

Orourack still wasn't sure what the Admiral had seen in the scrawny engineer, he was a poor leader with no finesse in his interpersonal style at all. Kayetan's social capability was about that of a Dregodath in a feeding frenzy; whatever happened would be painful for someone. Don't get him wrong, he was one the best, if not the best engineer in seventh fleet but when the Admiral had asked him to look out for the engineer after he'd found him in between assignments on Orbit One in earth orbit Orourack had not been impressed with Wainwrights choice of staff aid. Still, he did have to admit, Kayetan was a loyal friend, but it was like being with a child who only saw the untouched snows and not the signs that lurked beneath.

Admiral Wainwright had been a capable leader not because of any masterful skill, though he had possessed a sound tactical mind, but because he could see who needed to be where. He could see the good teams and the bad, where the strengths of one would cover the weaknesses of another. Orourack had seen many winters himself and in the cold he'd seen hunters who took to the snow before they were ready; or even hunters who had much experience with one prey and thought they could easily hunt another. Warriors who faced too big a battle before they were ready; the great one said even the strongest warrior may have his fill of battle and turn aside; while the weakest gatherer may yearn for blood and stand his ground. There was no way to know until the time came if Kayetan would be the Blood Filled Gatherer, or the Warrior Turned Aside. And truthfully, he didn't know which he prayed for. They both had their curse. And though he trusted the Admiral, he had not been infallible and Orourack was glad that there were now two officers more senior then Kayetan; there was too much to risk in following only the lead of the untested engineer.

Now though Captain Jii was speaking to Kayetan and the other Hammer officers.

"Aside from that obvious stuff though you should know some things that are not on the tour guide. First, I've mentioned that our host is an Obsidian Order wash-out, what I didn't say at the time is that she was one of the ones responsible for taking down the order on behalf of the Detapa Council. For her service she was promptly placed in jail where she rotted until Gul Dukat released all political prisoners as pert of his new-order regime. And we all know where that ended up. For her continuing services she has been placed in command of a major transhipment base, all forces stationed in system, and our beloved little camp here."

Jii paused and rose from his rock bench and clasped his hands together, "But before I get too far, I need you all to provide some proof of who you are; Doctor Sotonaka here is a Betazoid, and while we've been talking he's been subtly probing your surface thoughts." Jii held up a finger, "This was done under protest and by my direct order, so don't go blaming him if you have problem, but we know so little about founders and the final test is needed if just to put my mind at ease." he waved the doctor closer, "We're also short of hypo's and we have to use the Klingon method." with that slightly cryptic message he nodded at Doctor Sontonaka who produced a small shard of shining black rock, "We found a small deposit of obsidian in the back of the cave and managed to fashion a few implements. Please hold out your hands so the doctor can get a sample."

There was slight pause but all the Hammer officers held out their hands, Kayetan had been closest so he was the first to have his palm pricked by a thin shard, then T'karra, himself and Lallal. Jii held out his hand as well and said,

"Lets go, everyone gets poked."

The doctor had another piece of that plasticine casing and each drip of blood fell into it own space on the length, most of it was red, but his own more greyish-brown blood, the blue blood of the Bolian captain and green of Vulcan blood were clear against the light grey-green of the Cardassian material.

The last one was the doctor himself who then nodded to Jii.

"Well, no shapeshifting Founders in our midst it seems. Sorry about that, blame my background in intelligence; but for now I think it's time for you to settle in and me to consider what our options are. It won't take too long, if the past few weeks are any indication Gul Grata won't give us too much breathing room. So get some rest, all of you. Dismissed."

Chapter 10

T'karra had, like her fellow Vulcans quickly acquired the habit of staying in the caves near the main fire. The main fire had become a source of pride as well as need, all the side caverns had small personal fires for light and warmth, and they were all lit from the constantly list main fire. It was fed from the cellulose packing materials that came surrounding the food inside plasticine crates. The packing material burned slowly with almost no fumes; she did have to admit that whomever had planned this prison had done so very well. The courtyard was too large to overwhelm or cross easily, the banning of any powered technology, a deep bedrock cave with not exits not enclosed by a fence that was energized with enough energy to kill most known humanoids. It was nearly perfect. Thinking of the logistics of breaking out made her head spin, which admittedly had been happening far more often and with greater and greater intensity.

Honesty with the self is on the path to logic. She thought. It is not the logistics of escape that bother me now. It was a thing of depths was the Vulcan soul; layers upon layer, and at the core was the fury that had once rendered low and sundered a people in two. It was that core that was carefully covered in a faceted wall which was only ever pierced by those closest to that individual. She had only ever known her own extended family for many years as she pursued a course of stellar dynamics and an interest in post-industrial sociological development. Her family had a long history of pursuing such low impact and leisurely sciences. But then as she read histories of various races she finally began to read her own in great depth and discovered a great divergence, Vulcan had stagnated for hundreds of years the relative growth of knowledge remained the same. Then the humans showed up and change began again, they shook the alpha quadrant and exposed the fugue of stagnation that had settled on the quadrant. Change, they introduced change into Vulcan again and the more she studied the change the more it inspired her to action and awoke the desire to be near that change, if only to document it. Vulcans in starfleet were not a rare thing, they were in-fact the second most numerous members when counted racially, but it was still a low percentage of Vulcans that actually joined when taken with the total of Vulcan population. And then most Vulcans in starfleet chose science career paths, next most common were Vulcans in the engineering and security paths. She had quite to own surprise found she wanted to command a ship and so entered service with a focus on operations, the traditional path to command. Her career was going along quite as expected until the Dominion initiated an aggressive and quickly accelerating response to federation presence in the delta quadrant. Then with the sudden alliance with Cardassia who had never been happy with the federation, war had quickly come. For her it meant experienced command officers were in short supply and she was given a promotion far in advance of the normal time frame and assigned as first officer of the Corinth. The ship was newer Nebula class explorer which had been out fitted with a sensor heavy upper pod. For months they had been used as a forward scout by the CO of seventh fleet, escaping from the Dominion forces many times while operating with a crew shortage.

Her crew. Captain Smith's crew actually, she was the dry realist to her human joviality. Smith had often joked that a captain only commanded at the leisure of their first officer. Captain smith had been almost irritatingly jovial. And Ensign Mokatan had only joined because of the war and kept wondering when it would over so he could get back to his oceanographic survey of cambradial worlds.

All the ships she'd served on had been filled with annoyances and things done for illogical reasons, but the one she kept finding herself missing was the one that she would never serve on again. Some thought Vulcans were emotionless; and sometimes, deep in the back of her mind, sometimes wished it were so.

Even Vulcans felt the pressure, even we have to be able to stop and take a break from the tide of things the universe was intent to throw at a person. Inside of a week she'd heard that the man she'd been betrothed to, mentally bonded at a a young age was dead, lost her ship and now forced into a camp that was determined to make her perpetually frost bitten, and now, now her olfactory suppressor was wearing off. Inside she was straining to hold the Vulcan fury down and it was getting harder with each moment.

But I'm not the only one, I am not unique; I am still upon the ocean; I am the ocean. I am within and without, and so all things pass though and over and beyond leaving only me.

The traditional mantra was enough this time, but- and there it was again. Her head spinning. No, wait; it is not equilibrium, it was not a symptom of the olfactory suppressor wearing off. It was something else, it was coming from somewhere else, some place she was not familiar with. But it was gone before she could further track its nature and so she focused on her surroundings.

The caves were freed of fumes and stale air periodically due to the heavy wind that washed from over the cliff face every evening and the small spring that bubbled slowly up from one of the side caverns. In an accession to necessity, but still keeping with the no technology rule, the Cardassians had provided an activated charcoal water filter and a container for the purified water. The removal of dank air was not entirely perfect though and being in a cavern all day, as large as it was, that was still filled with two hundred POWs along with the detritus and smells that amount of people generate was not something someone with sensitive sense of smell could do for long.

Commander Lallal though had been effected by the temperature even more than herself and fellow Vulcans and could be found on the massive landing pad as soon at it heated up in the morning and stayed out there until it cooled. But the reptilian commander was not the only person who had gained that habit, the doctor had ordered all the cold sensitive personnel to spend time outside on the landing pad. It was a practical and logical order and the pad heated up nicely in the morning so by midday it was wavering with radiated heat, though it did cool quickly once the evening winds picked up.

Other habits had quickly cropped up as well, such as naming things, the initial occupants of the camp had stayed mostly in the main cavern but as the place filled up in true fashion the residents had named all the caverns. The big one had been termed the 'Kitchen' and indeed the central fire in the center had grown to bonfire proportions and the size of the of food preparation area had increased right along side. It was tended mostly by the Vulcan personnel who needed out of the average ten degrees Celsius of the planetoid and also let the Vulcans and their superior hearing listen for guard patrols as sparse as they were. The kitchen was partially open to the courtyard by a twenty meter break in the cliff face, which had gained the name 'Front Door'.

To the right of the 'front door', and moving counter-clockwise the smaller side caverns were now known as; Merrimack Caverns which was connected to Risa by a narrow secondary crevasse and which housed most of the residents. Then the Staterooms which was actually more of long corridor with several jagged alcoves and nooks. It was ill suited for arranging rows of cots and so had been taken over by the far less numerous officers who had each claimed a personal alcove. It narrowed to point and ended in a very small and easily insulated room, the only problem being it was a tight squeeze getting into. Someone had suggested using it for storage, but it too out of the way and hard to gain access too.

Continuing her visual scan of their prison at one O'clock was a room accessed though a narrow switch-back that had proven a useful place to put the chemical based biological waste disposal unit. Someone had called it an 'out house' and the name stuck. She thought it was master chief warrant officer Sterling who named Merrimack Caverns who was responsible for the name as well as the plasticine food crate lid that had a crescent moon cut into it hanging over the entrance.

That man's pride at his Ozark heritage was by far the most aggressive textbook case of cultural pride that she'd ever encountered. But it was also one of the small rebellions against the general mood of depression that seemed to be infusing the place and the chief was likeable to the point that he had rapidly become known as 'bosun', a traditional term used for the senior enlisted person. Added to that he was also responsible for the alcohol that was being distilled from the lichens that constantly regrew on the walls and some of the leftover starch heavy tubers (which had quickly been labeled 'potatoes' despite a gross difference in their visual appearance) that were part of the weekly supply beam in.

Anyway, after Out House, there was the Spare Room, which had not been earmarked for anything as yet but was where the water from the underground pooled. And then there was Klingon Country at the ten O'clock position. Also known as 'party place', as they had donated their entire ration of the 'potatoes' to the alcohol production and were its only real consumers as the rest was being stockpiled for medicinal use.

Lastly, in the nine O'clock place was The Storeroom, where they piled all their supplies for storage which was also connected to 'The Bridge' which was also open to the fenced in court yard by (naturally) the Back Door. It was here most of the officers spent their time discussing the occasional escape plan and making sure the problems that any community of people faced were taken care of. The bridge also had a fairly large, easily accessible and sheltered alcove which had been taken over by the medical staff, and so termed Sickbay.

It was actually psychologically fascinating how quickly everyone seemed to be settling into a routine, keeping themselves busy with the day to day operations. It might have even been ideal if not for the enforced conditions.

Gul Grata took a personal interest in her prisoners and every day, twice a day for the last thirteen days she would leave the warmth of her command post to observe as a pair of Jem'Hadar or Cardassian guards walked the compound, they would walk down one of the two towers closest to the cliff face and stroll though the cavern entering though the front door along the edge of the Kitchen, though the Storeroom and then out the Bridge and the Back Door. The guards were careful to keep to where they could quickly escape and never carried energy weapons.

T'karra watched as an extra duo of guards walked along the scaffolding that lead from emplacement to emplacement; but there was something else this time, another set of guards was coming along the other side and then the sound of the pneumatic screws that drove the main door indicated that it was being raised.

This is new. She thought as Lieutenant Sren ceased his stirring of the evening meal and looked up in question, she indicated a negative and responded.

"I shall alert the senior officers, inform chief Sterling and have him to keep everyone within the cave."

Striding quickly as her cold numbed feet would let her she moved past the storeroom into 'The Bridge' to alert captain Jii.

"Sir, something out of the ordinary is happening, we should assemble."

Jii who had been playing some game carved onto a crate piece rose and slid into his uniform jacket which he'd placed nearby. Commander Donaldson sitting opposite him did the same and stood to follow.

While closing the clasp on his uniform Jii asked, "Anything else going on, things I shouldn't know about?"

"Nothing that I am familiar with is currently ongoing." she responded more or less truthfully.

'things the captain shouldn't know about' had become camp slang for projects that would likely get people in trouble, after the first close inspection and reading of the rules a few days after the seventh fleet survivors had been dropped off. It had been a combination role-call, security inspection and informing of the rules. Gul Grata had taken a personal pleasure in addressing all two-hundred and thirteen prisoners, of informing them that their stay was for the good of the quadrant and that if they reformed from their previous acts against the Dominion they might be paroled once the war was won. Then she went on at great lengths about the various rules; no one was to approach a guard unless ordered, when the supply transport alarm went off everyone had 100 seconds to clear the courtyard, no one was to approach the fence for any reason, if the gate was opening no one was to approach within twenty meters of a fence. After listing all seventy rules, she said that after some time to go though their records certain prisoners would be undergoing close interrogation and that those remaining should not worry for their fellows.

That last had confused her slightly at first, until it became known that Captain Jii had once been with starfleet intelligence and that it was highly likely that most of the camp inhabitants had been placed here because of the likelihood they would have useful intelligence.

She'd also learned why the Klingons were were, they were all that remained of a scout force that had been destroyed poking around the Cardassian sector and gotten as far as Golmora III, a Cardassian colony world only a few light years from Cardassia prime. Their situation was out of the average because most Klingons died before capture, but General Krugh was proving to be an odd sort of Klingon indeed. While he had tried to blow up his ship and take a Cardassian boarding party with them, something had been done to the charges by another strike team. Having listened to the general's story several times now, it seemed likely that they'd been ordered to take Klingon Generals when they could and had been ready for the self-destruct attempt. But since then he had only lost a few warriors to escape attempts and he had quite firmly ordered his remaining ones to 'stop behaving like wild targ and spending their lives easily'. In addition to the abnormal amount of loyalty (even for Klingons) that his men held for him, they were also oddities; Grekt, his second was distinctly thoughtful and well-spoken (for a klingon). Grekt's sister, Grella who had been the flagship communications officer was quite an accomplished medic, a field of study that Klingons felt was ignoble. Then Gokahn who by all accounts possessed a perfect memory. The rest were more or less average Klingons with less notable quirks but were strangely willing to keep their Klingon ways to their own part of the cave. Admittedly, the fermented tuber juice had helped keep them more or less willing to keep to themselves but she got the impression that they would have anyway. The General himself was missing the lower half of his left hand and possessed extensive scaring from there all the way to his cranial ridges, but it was his relatively calm demeanor that marked his uniqueness among his fellows. He had also readily acceded to Captain Jii's seniority. That has been a fuzzy issue, the Klingon rank of general was a catch-all for any rank above that of unit leader or ship captain, klingons handled seniority issues between identically racked officers by fighting for it. General Krugh though had only demanded to know what Jii's previous three postings had been before accepting his right to lead the camp and then retreating with his men to their cave. Where they stayed most of the time.

Removing her mind from casual retrospection she stepped back into the Kitchen as the results of their early warning system started to appear from the side caverns; Orourack was standing with Kayetan and some of the engineering personnel near the entrance to Risa and captain Annon was appearing from the Suites. Lallal had already been outside sunning himself and was making his way slowly towards the cave mouth with Commander Donaldson and the forty or so crewmen who had been outside when the gate started opening. Grekt and another warrior who's name escaped her at the moment came out to the edge of Klingon Country but made no other moves. None of the officers made any move to join the command party except Kayetan who as third ranking starfleet officer and was expected to come along. Everyone else as per Captain Jii's orders only nodded to indicate that they had informed their sections. Captain Jii had ordered everyone to take their time in responding to guard movements so as to no give away how close an eye they were keeping on them.

As they neared the cave opening Kayetan joined them and Jii looked at her.
"I think you can take over here commander. Keep everyone back unless they order otherwise."

"Yes sir." she responded.

Standing near the cave opening she watched as her three superiors walked slowly across the open plaza and stopped just on the far edge of the landing pad. It was out of range of even Vulcan hearing and she had nothing to do but wait so she held her arms tighter to her torso and did so.

Kayetan was feeling slightly better. He was still not quite feeling like himself, but he didn't feel like he was about to drop dead at any time like he had just after Tyra. In fact, his morning couldn't be going any better under the circumstances. The crappy protein stew had been lightly better tasting, he'd finally found a position to put his cot in that was actually level (he'd never been able to sleep on a surface tilted more than a couple degrees) and while making sure everyone was settled in the enlisted crew areas he had discovered a small vein of phosphorous. It wasn't much, and the obsidian the first prisoners had found was likely to continue to be far more useful, but it was something and he had been working out a rotation of people to scrape it from the crevice in the far back of Risa. He'd been a little worried about keeping busy after captain Jii had told them all that he'd better not find out about any suspicious activities, but Lallal had quickly pointed out that all they had to do was keep the project between themselves and not bother to mention it to to the captain. Kayetan had been unsure at first but then Orourack had taken a section of personnel and was slowly going over the caves to get an exact measure of their size, and so he'd caught on to the 'don't ask/don't tell' policy captain Jii had implemented. He wasn't sure why he'd made that his policy but was willing to go along if everyone else was.

But whatever machinations his superiors were contemplating he was not the one everyone was looking at for leadership; granted there was no warp core for him work on either, but concessions had to made, and being able to run off and scrape minerals from rock faces with his crewmen let him deal with something that he knew the issues therein.

He knew he was avoiding the real problem, that he was hiding, but things had been happening too quickly and he just needed some time to think, or not think as it were.

One thing at a time, he thought to himself. First, this whatever this is and then back to the caves.

As they walled the captain suddenly spoke lowly out of the corner of his mouth without turning around,

"Whatever happens, do not interfere, you hear me, do nothing."

Kayetan was still wondering at what that meant when he and Annon stopped a meter form the edge of the landing platform just behind captain Jii and waited as a formation of Cardassian guards arranged protectively around Gul Grata to make the distance and wondered what this was all about. Five Cardasisans with phasers, two Jem'Hadar and Chenjop, the vorta who had originally overseen the Hammer survivors.

The Gul was mostly typical of Cardassian females but slightly taller than average so she was able to sweep her eyes across the three officers with ease before stopping and starring at him. Uh-oh. He thought breaking the eye contact as she focused on Jii.

"Well, you can follow orders quite well captain Jii, I expected nothing less. But I think you will need to do to some more training with regards to respect. Well, not you personally." she finished with a bit a sneer.

"I'm sorry ma'am." Jii said simply. Not breaking eye contact with her.

She looked at the short human and the stepped closer, "Well, we don't have all day so I'll get to purpose behind my visit here." she paused a moment to bring out a Cardassian data slate; they must have the sensors turned off-noted part of Kayetan's mind.

"I have been preparing a list of names for you captain, you will see to it that everyone on that list is arranged near the main gate in the morning and ready for their debriefing." she said handing him the slate. "But first, there is another matter." she clasped her hands together, "I have learned that it is tradition for our allies the Jem'Hadar to use captured enemies to familiarize themselves with their combat capabilities by arranging sparring matches." she started to move, looking over the three of them like one would inspect cargo.

"As such, and out of respect for the ways of our honored allies, you will choose five of your people, ones not on the list, to compete against some of my guards as well as some of Chenjop's Jem'Hadar."

Jii stared at her and was silent for so long that he thought for sure she would get angry, but both of them just glared softly at the other.

"Of course Gul. May I take this list back now or was there something else?"

"Oh, no, I almost forgot, you have to keep that slate out in the open, it you take it past the landing pad the auto turrets will engage."
"Of course, Gul, things slip from us all from time to time." he said evenly.

Turning back for the gate her guards started with her and she called over her shoulder, "Chenjop will fill you in on how he wants to do the matches."

After a second of watching her retreat the vorta started in that characteristic smooth way of speaking they all seemed to have.

"The rules are quite simple captain; my soldiers will set up a ring on the landing pad and they and your volunteers will fight until they've had their fill." he said. "Other prisoners may watch, but any attempts to interfere will be dealt with quite severely."

"Meaning they'll be killed." Jii shot back.

"Yes. Please don't mistake us, this is not the normal way such things are done, but this is a Cardassian prison and as our trusted allies they have our complete faith in how they choose to deal with their prisoners."

"You both call each other trusted ally." Jii said thoughtfully.

"What of it, it's true." responded the vorta.

"Well, it's just that in my experience people who really trust each other don't have to remind everyone of it."

Chenjop pointed sharply at the captain and the Jem'Hadar on his right swung his weapon butt into Jii's ribs with enough force to double him over.

Kayetan saw the movement and started to reach out to catch the smaller man but recalled the order 'do nothing' and killed the movement in it's infancy. Captain Annon was not as resistant to to the temptation and caught Jii as he fell, and she caught the side of the Jem'Hadar's back-swing for her trouble. There was a moment where he though that it might grow from there, something in the look in the eye of the Vorta, the stance of the Jem'Hadar, and the part of his mind that was always watching pulled back to take inventory; two allies, one on the ground and one in a highly unstable position unable to help, three targets one in the middle of a movement, one raising his weapon and one who was fully exposed. Target with weapon clear is most dangerous, target swinging weapon second, third target can be taken at leisure.

The process had been so automatic and it happened so quickly that Kayeten suddenly frightened himself; his sudden recoiling in response and conscious suppression of the movement must have looked like him backing off because the Vorta raised a halting hand and laughed.

"Leave them, Taran'tarar, there is no test in beating cringing prisoners."

Both Jem'Hadar pulled back, but the one who has swung kept his weapon trained even as his Chenjop strolled casually back to the gate.

Kayetan looked down as Annon helped Jii from the ground and saw his hand shaking, the light of the systems sun shadowing every wrinkle and muscle spasm like the surface of some broken canyon. He took a deep breath and closed his eyes feeling for each muscle that was trying to act and called for each of them to slow and expand in his minds eye; willing them back into stillness.

"-eytan? Commander, are you alright?" Captain Jii was saying.

He breathed out and realized that it must have taken far longer then he thought, there was no sign of the Vorta or his guard, Captain Jii was on his feet, and Annon was looking concerned at both of them as she held the cut on her cheak closed with a hand.

"I . . ." he started but interrupted himself with his own thought, Am I alright?

"I, sir . . ." he started again looking down.

Jii moved closer and spoke in a clear tone of command, "Commander, look at me."

Before he could even think his head snapped up and he met the captains gaze.

The captain has brown eyes, he could only think.

"Commander, that wasn't cowardice was it?" he asked rhetorically after a moment.

For second there was something, something working in the captains eye; Kayetan was not good at reading people, he never had been, but it was a look that he'd gotten before, one that was usually followed by bad news. Or something worse, like a private talk.

Captain Jii on the other hand looked quickly away and spoke to Annon.

"Go back and get everyone out here for parade, I'll cal the names directly from the list. As for you commander, let's have a quick talk in private."

Kayetan's heart fell with that announcement. It was nearly the same words that his superior at the Advanced Starship Design Bureau had used when he'd removed him from the project he'd been working for more than three years; and not just from the project, from the ASDB entirely. What should have been one the high points of his career was smashed down into the not-quite black mark of 'removed from station by request of CO'.

But as Annon walked to the caves Jii tuned to face him and said something that he didn't quite know how to take.

"So Commander, you know I'm from the Shanghai area, yes?"

He'd heard that from one the other prisoners, "Yes sir, Lieutenant P'elan said something to that effect."

Jii stopped a moment and looked thoughtful, "Out of curiosity, do you recall when you heard that?"

"Four days ago just as dinner was being served, she was talking to Ensign Bates near the Suites."

"Remarkable." he said. "I thought you had a good memory. But my home town is actually deep in Hennan Province. I only moved to Shanghai for my starfleet preparation classes. Hennan is not known for its many transporters. But where I'm from has greatly influenced my outlook and skills. A lot of the rest is the result of my grandfather who did most of the work raising me. He taught me a great many things including knowing the look of a man who is capable of anything." he looked more intently at him, "Where are you from Commander Kristopher Kayetan? What have you learned?"

"I'm from Novastradjk, Alpha Centauri system."

"Ah." was all Jii said before a great pause as he no doubt remembered his spacial geography and history.

The Alpha Centauri system is a collection of three stars all within four light years of each other the closest of which is less than five light years from the Sol system. Centauri A, B and Centauri C known as Proxima. The Proxima Fleet Yards, one of starfleet's most important construction bases takes up most of Centauri C while the fourth planet of Centauri A is humankind's second oldest colony world and home to some half a billion.

Novastradjk was the second largest city on the smallest of three continents on Centauri A IV. The two main continents are called Alpha and Beta, while the third is known as Aumri. And Amuri was almost totally settled by Augments who were left over from the Eugenics wars; the ones who had helped win the wars for the 'regulars'.

The post war era had not been kind to the reaming augments despite the fact that they'd followed all their orders and showed none of the extreme megalomania that had overcome the rest. Despite this the augments had been rounded up and relocated to Chatham, a small south pacific island off the coast of New Zealand. Later as Zefram Cochren's warp flight forged a new world, the forgotten augments were rediscovered living peaceably with their former captors. But there had still been too much distrust for anyone genetically altered even with the new era of peace and the 'augment question' went unanswered until the inhabitants of the the Chatham islands asked for a colony ship. It was quickly given to them and they settled on what had been named Delta Continent by the original settlers who were not at all happy with the new arrivals.

It took nearly a hundred years for things to settle down enough for Alpha Centauri to become able to be one of the founding Federation worlds. Though technically Federation members, Aumri has not officially recognized many Federation laws and has on occasion claimed protection under the Prime Directive and non-interference acts which so-far have not been disputed.

Quite frankly the whole origin and existence of the the 'augment colony' is not something many humans are comfortable with talking about, even hundreds of years later; the taboo surrounding any genetically altered human has only faded, not been lost.

And then Captain Harold Jii did something that surprised Kayetan who was already confused about this line of questioning.

Harold Jii ignored it. "Well, you have a sharp memory Commander, and I think you should find someone to confide in, no one goes though what you did, keeps people focused under the conditions that you did and not come out without a few problems. Talk to someone Kristopher, talk and get a handle on yourself because this is only just starting and I may need someone who can stay focused on the task at hand, someone who can hide their fears and keep a level head while smiling all the while."

"I know you're an engineer Commander, I know you'd rather be working on a raw hull fresh from the fusion welders, but you're not, you're here, in this shit-hole in this damn war under this damn Cardassian Gul who I think we have only seen the start of, and I can't have you acting like a new Ensign on his first posting. I'd rather be up to my neck in intelligence reports, or running that damn station they stuck me in even; but I'm not. I'm here." he paused and lowered his tone from the level he'd been at and held up the data slate, "And I'm on this list along with Captain Annon. So you take some time, pull someone aside and have it out but you take the night and work though this so you can act like the officer you are because I do not have time for you to become the officer others want you to be." Jii leaned around Kayetan to indicate the the growing formation of starfleet personnel in the distance, "Not for me, not for you, for them."

Another pause came over them as he considered, What had the Admiral said when they'd met? 'You come with me boy, I'll put you where you'll be of better use than moping around. Lemmi show you what those ships you've been making can really do.'

But there was no time to dwell as the Captain spoke again, "Later, commander, later; Take the night, talk to someone, but in the morning you're in command again, so have yourself squared away by then." he pointed this time, "For them, commander, for them is why we lead."

Kayetan turned and saw the two-hundred people of the camp spilling out in orderly fashion and lining up by section and he heard all the instructors at the academy coaching about leadership and he felt the same fear he had then; how was he to lead them all? They were too many, he was only one and not even the most capable. People like admiral Wainwright and Captain Jii made leading so easy, they made friends so quickly and were respected, while he just had his engines.

But there was no time to think now, he had to act like the officer they needed and not the engineer they had no use for.

Chapter 11

Standing in formation was one of the most difficult things he'd ever done. But he did it, his pride would not let him otherwise. And if there was anything that Hiss'toor Sharr Lallal was it was prideful of his status. He was not the first of his kind in starfleet, nor was he especially well placed or rewarded. He just had an overabundance of pride. But it was getting harder and accessions to necessity had come about.

He hated being on the edge of torpor and for the first time envied his mammalian peers their endothermic biology. At least they weren't locked in their own mind as their body refused to move properly.

Bah! He thought, the first major inconvenience I have faced in starfleet and I whine like a hatching.

Sharr had always taken some pride in his divergence from the norm; even that of the norm for his own people. Most of his people disliked leaving the worlds they had made habitable for themselves, they disdained using anything they had not made or designed themselves. And they disliked moving quickly, but when your average lifetime was much longer than most other known species one could afford to take their time.

And for the most part Sharr had taken his time. He lived for quite some time as an artist, shaping, heating and compressing the sands of his home into glass and crystalline sculptures. From there he'd taken an interest on geology, and then the nature of exotic minerals such as dilithium and crystalline lattice-form solid oxygen. Soon he found himself dropping his other pursuits to focus on impulse systems and Fusion reactors and all such high energy reactor systems. And then he wanted more, he wanted to see what other methods there were and so made the leap to join starfleet, one of a vast few of his kind who did. He'd been a respectable ninety years of age as the humans measured, he'd added his offspring to the vast genetic pool and contributed to the wonder of his culture; so he'd been a little annoyed when his brood mate and some of his friends had thought him selfish. Even if it was selfish he'd earned some. And he'd enjoyed his abbreviated time in the accelerated classes at starfleet academy and quite found it to his liking. He'd always been going against the grain and when he was in class his very presence was against he grain. He liked being the only one who could cling to the rafters, and see in two directions, and hang by his tail. Oh, and swim faster and father than any his graduating class.

Oh bother, and rubbish. He thought. So what if his body was fighting to move and he felt as if his scales were turning to stone, he'd chosen his path and he loved his co workers and all the problems of maintaining an interstellar craft. Which was why he was missing his crew. The Mako had been home for more than a year and its aging spaceframe had been as familiar to him as his own hand.

A pox upon all Dominion forces. His battered Excelsior class engines would never have their intermix skewed again, impulse two would never develop that damn feedback and the forward power distribution node would never overload again no matter how many regulators they crammed into it. It was an old ship with so many quirks she had been destined for the scrapyard, but looming war had saved her for Captain Fona and a crew that was forever at half strength. But by god they had gotten her worked into fine vessel, they'd been second in record only to the Forestall in fleet battler honors. Some thought they'd been cheating, the two top ships in the fleet both being more than seventy years old, but what they lacked in new cutting edge systems they made up for with shear determination. And if there was one thing that a Sphankonidae could endorse it was shear determination.

It was ingrained into their culture, it was bone deep. Nothing you did not gain by self reliance was truly worth anything. That was probably the real reason joining starfleet was not popular with his people, even though they were federation members. And why they'd insisted on keeping to themselves. Granted there was starfleet station in the sphere of space claimed by his people, they were close to Gorn space and they were always ones to watch. But the starfleeters kept to themselves and the Sphankonidae did the same. Joining the federation had been a carefully considered move, needed because of the Gorn aggressiveness, but the wording of the alliance had been even more carefully thought out. It had ended the Long Vigil. For many generations they had been watching the Gorn, for the they had sworn to eradicate the Sphankonidae and had made several attempts. The scars of the few wars still marked the home system, but then at just as the hour was dark these new people showed up in their sector of the galaxy; humans. They came screaming into the sector like a plague; their war with the Romulans has been recent and they had so many ships left over that they just threw them into the void. The Gorn had not liked that, not liked it at all, this upstart race staking claims to the area they had wanted expand into and so his people gained some breathing room. The thing that really frightened the Gorn though had been only short time later the human entered into an alliance with the Vulcans Andorians and Tellarites, three races that had not agreed upon anything and even fought several wars for a hundreds of years. That these humans could arrange such an unprecedented formation, and by all reports without coercion, had shook the quadrant. The Orions who had profited from the state of things were shocked, the Klingons responded by forging an alliance with the Romulans and the Gorn retreated into their well-defended boarders. But then this Federation grew and hundreds of worlds joined over the next few decades, soon such fearsome races as the Tholians, Orions and Gorn were a thing of the past. Yes they were threat to some lone starships but the Federation had been building ships by the hundreds, patrol craft, sector ships and the huge exploration cruisers. By this time they fought another war with the Romulans and again with the Klingons, winning both times. The Klingon and Romulan neutral zones formed and the Gorn and Tholians were left by the wayside of history, small empires by the new comparison of the quadrant. The once mighty Gorn fleet was left to harass their neighbors like the Sphankonidae and so his people had decided to abandon the Great and Long Vigil and joined the Federation. Starfleet got their Deep Space 2 station and we deactivated our military defense grid for the first time in a thousand years.

What followed was called a 'Renaissance era' by the humans, a lifestyle that had formed to defend against the Gorn was no longer needed, soldiers found that they could peruse more artistic endeavors. The great leader of the time, Iss'a'ssissiotr Garall Rasal had put it best: We lay down our weapons, we take the power destined for our defense and we we place it back in the hands of the artist, the builder and the thinker. But we must remember all those who who were the eye watching our back, those few to whom so many owe so much. For if we forget the Long Vigil they have kept, then we forget ourselves. Many forgot the rest of the speech where he want on to thank the Federation.

But that was not here nor now, that was now nearly two generations behind, it was now time to live in the stars and not cringe from them. Change was a slow thing for his kind and wars like this were not helping but they had still embraced peace a little too hard he was coming to think.

Sadly his nice warm home and villa in the edge of the Scalassaa desert was several hundreds, if not thousands of lightyears away right now. I shall never take the temperature controls for granted again. He swore to himself for the hundredth time since arriving on this rock.

Enough mental contortions, everyone else seemed to be keeping their thoughts in order, he'd be damned again if he'd be the weak link and forced his left eye to focus. The right eye had earned a respite so it closed to keep what heat he did have remaining in.

Besides, their commanding officer was ending the reading of names.

"And Ensign Davies. All these personnel will report to the section near the main gate, while remembering to keep at least twenty meters away. Myself and Captain Annon will with with you so no slacking and I'm sure you will each to your own council look for how to deal with your questioners."

"All this means that Commander Kayetan with be in charge until we're done with our debrief and I have been assured that the standard routine we have gotten use to will continue." he paused moment before continuing, looking at the section leaders at the head of each group.

"Quiet down." Jii barked. "I shall be available for last minute instructions the rest of the day, so come right to me or Captain Annon on the Bridge."

Jii stopped then, just as a cool breeze washed over the compound. It was just long enough for some to remember what Cardiassian interrogation techniques were like before Jii went on.

"Be careful all of you, you know the penalty for disobedience as well as I, and I hope you all make the right choice in the next few days. As for the rest of the day, do as you will and take what time you have. All those listed I expect in formation at dawn. That is all."

Lallal couldn't be sure, he didn't know the black haired human captain well, but he could have sworn there was an air of finality in his words, like he expected that these would be his last orders. He'd known that there was something greater at work in this camp, but he was now almost positive that Captain Jii had some idea and was protecting his juniors from something, but what? He asked himself as he hurried to the Kitchen and the fire therein.

T'karra had born the chill of the formation well she thought but there was something else wrong, she kept getting odd stray thoughts unrelated to the situation. She'd suddenly thought of her family home in Ba'karra highlands for which she'd been named and then of her first mind-meld and training. There was an emotion at its base, but she couldn't identify it and that troubled her even more. And then as Captain Jii was speaking she'd felt the sudden urge to wander. It was easily suppressed, but there it was, she was restless and felt an almost migratory need. It was somehow familiar as well, but in her distracted state she couldn't remember from where the familiarity came. Captain Jii had taken on all the responsibilities for the afternoon and dismissed all the officers except Captain Annon and Commander Donaldson. For that she'd been thankful, she wasn't sure how useful she could be in her present state of mind and needed some quiet space and time to meditate.

So that was why after the formation she took some of the embers from the fire on a hardened plate of steel and went to the back of the so-called officers suites cave and to the small formation of granite that formed a room. The entrance was narrow and curved upwards but she squeezed in and was glad she had because as soon as she squeezed in the sound that constantly echoed in the caverns and even the smell was gone. Respite from that was enough to relax her more quickly then she'd have though possible. And she placed her makeshift brazier down in one 'corner' of the roughly one and a half meter cracked sphere stone that had likely been a lava bubble in the ancient past of this planetoid.

The small plate of glowing packing material was enough to warm the room somewhat but the rock itself felt like ice as she sat. It was taking time for her body heat to warm the cloth of her uniform. Starfleet really should consider using a material that was more readily kept to the body temperature of the one wearing it, she thought. But it would do for now and she stilled the stray thoughts in her mind and stared at the embers, letting their wavering heat take the place of all doubt and confusion. Which is why she had no idea how long it had been when the sound of someone scrabbling down the passageway shocked her back to the cold of the cave; and indeed it had gotten colder despite the closeness and the embers.

The movement from outside was not as loud as she first thought, only a trick of the cave; the shape kept noises from far away out but those closer were still easily heard. But before she could inquire as to the identity, someone called out softly.

"Commander? Are you there?"

It was the soft accent of Commander Kayetan, and she suddenly wondered how long she'd been away.

"I am here Commnader Kayetan." she called back starting to rise.

"Wait, I'll come in, we need to talk." he responded.

She knelt back down and moved farther back to allow more room and by the time she could see the other officer he had rather athletically entered while dragging a fairly large bundle in behind him.

"Cozy." he said "Someone said you came this way with a pile of embers, I thought some blankets would help as well." he presented the bundle to her.

Though oddly outgoing for him she simply accepted the offering and said, "What was it you wanted to discuss?"

"Well," he started as he sat across from her, "I'm not sure it's . . ." he stopped and a strange look came over him. "I just don't know . . . I . ."

Now he stared at her and she could see in the dim light of the embers that his eyes were glassy. He started again in a moment. His voice wavering, something that she had not heard from him before even as they had been desperately holding the attention of a system full of Dominion ships.

"How do you do it? How do you remain so calm, so in-control? How do Vulcans eliminate the rage?"

She could see that this was not a subject he wanted to broach, or likely had ever broached, but he was doing it anyway; she admired the subtle strength it took to do so. And again she was surprised at how quickly her emotions were bubbling, causing such unbidden thoughts. He was a peer, senior by a few months which placed him in command but right now he looked like a child, like one of the others at her basic school when she was still young and for some reason that made her wary of him. A strange unbidden feeling of distrust.

She took a deep breath, the cool air giving her jolt and actually letting the words flow freely. "We don't." she stated simply. This was not something that Vulcans talked about to outsiders, it was one of the things best left alone but she gave it exposition in an impulsive moment.

"We don't." she repeated, "We have it always in our core, rage and hate and all the things best shed and cast out."

Kayetan looked physically weakened at that statement. "I thought . . ."

But he trailed off and there was silence for a moment, the slow wheeze of the cave picked up and sucked some of the warm air of the room to be replaced by cool air drifting in from some place deeper in narrow crevasse of the cave.

"What did you think, we have sought for the answers that you seek for longer than your race has known spaceflight and you think that you can just learn them in a moment in this dark and cold cave where I cannot even escape my own trouble let alone take on yours?!"

She'd hadn't realized that she had raised her voice until she noticed that Kayetan was staring at her with a look of shock. And she looked down at herself and saw she was shivering. Vulcans didn't shiver from cold, sometimes the did so from anger. Suddenly she couldn't hold herself together anymore as the embarrassment washed over her, she started to get up but the cold had numbed her balance and she started to fall towards the twenty centimeter gap on the back of the room near where she had sat. The gap with its wheeze of cold air and sharp edges.

Then he moved, he moved forward and grabbed her by the arm she'd extended looking for a handhold and the shock of the touch was sudden and slammed though her mind like lightning.

She hadn't realized that her mental defenses were so compromised; it was not a meld, but emotions not her own warped over her; loss and sadness and anger and . . . at the core was loneliness and regret. Regret that more could not be done, regret that he'd been unable to save even one more. No, regret that she'd been unable to save one more.

Then it was over and the jumble was gone, the spark was released but the touch remained and he pulled her upright with ease.

His hand is so warm. Was her first thought as she found herself again in the sea of emotions. Kayetan though looked sobered and she knew that he must have felt the exchange as well.

'I'm sorry, I, didn't mean to intrude. I'll leave you alone." he said quietly turning toward the exit.

"Wait." she said before he could leave. "Why did you look for me? Why did you think that I could help you?"

Resting hand on an out cropping near the exit he spoke, "Because there have been four people in my life to whom I always felt I could speak freely and you remind me of two of them."

"Who are they?" she asked.

"Were. " he started turning back around, "My sister and the Admiral."

Some how she knew there was bad news there, "What happened?"

"She was a MAC trooper and her company was reported missing in action a month ago." he considered a moment, "More than a month now I suppose."

About he same time as Sokarn she thought. The thought of him sharpened her thoughts for a moment; the clear warm morning as they had been bonded.

And then she suddenly realized what was happening. The feeling of journey. A wish to sojourn . . .

She had been no more than a teenager when she practiced mind-melds with her mother who was practiced with the technique to the point of mastery, but during the meld the call of Pon Far had once bubbled to the surface. It was something that many Vulcan mothers had tried to share with their daughters, but it was different for each one and so hard to convey even with the meld. The signs males experienced were far more explicit and violent, and it was usually they who began the mating cycle every seven years of their adult life. But females would undergo a similar, less precise and irregular cycle if unbonded, but she had been bonded. So why-then suddenly she knew, she knew why she felt so strongly the need to leave, Sokarn had started to feel the blood boil, he had been entering Pon Far and she was his mate and so felt the call no matter the distance.

This was bad, the mating call was not as bad for females but it was just as dangerous. She had a little more time then a male would but if she didn't find a way to suppress it soon she would likely die. Kolinar masters had a way to suppress the call but that skill took years of Kolinar training and even they could not eliminate it fully.

Kayetan was still unsure that he'd made the right choice in seeking out commander T'karra, but that doubt was fading as it looked like she needed someone to talk to as well. Perhaps they'd be able to support each other through whatever they were going though. But her silence after he told her about his sister was bring the doubt back.

"Commander are you alright?" he asked.

Her breathing had slowed again but was shallow making her voice a bit breathless as she responded. "I am fine for now sir."

He looked at her closer in the fading light from the embers, she was holding herself very tightly against the cold and the tips of her ears exposed to the cool air were just a bit yellow/green. She's freezing! He looked for the bundle of blankets he'd brought and pulled the top one out as he moved closer to her.

"No you're not, you're freezing." He said quickly.

He d been so damn concerned with himself and what Captain Jii had been saying that he'd almost forgotten that the temperature was near that which vulcans could get frostbite. They had evolved with a very high core temperature and efficient cooling system for surviving on a dry desert world. A cold damp world like this was the the exact opposite and the only way it could be worse is if it were actually snowing.

Taking the oversized and coarse blanket he gave it a snap to unfold and flipped it around her. Not stopping there he did the same to the other one but flung it around both of them. Not that he was cold, he was actually quite comfortable but he knew that he also tended to generate a lot of excess body heat. From under the blanket he started rubbing her extremities as he remembered his survival training. Her skin was clammy and cold not a good sign.

He moved so quickly again. Anytime he saw a clear goal he moved so quickly. But she said nothing, she hadn't realized how cold she had gotten until he touched her again but she was having trouble feeling her fingers and her ears had a sharp tingle, a sign of too much cold. It suddenly struck her as odd that he was so warm and now that her attention was drawn to it he had never once voiced an issue with the temperature even when it fell to where even the humans complained about it. She was sure not all humans were as inured to the cold as he was and was struck by curiosity, so while he was rubbing life back into her hands she asked,

"Commander, why are you so resistant to the cold?"

He slowed for only a second and didn't answer until he'd finished and adjusted the blankets around them.

"I think first, I'd like you to call me Kick. All my oldest friends do and I don't think I want to be an officer right now."

"Kick?" she asked.

"From my initials. Kristopher Ingram Kayetan. Silly I know. If it's to much Kayetan is fine."

"Humans and their need to shorten things." she stated looking directly at him. "Was that an avoidance of my question?"

He stared back, unblinking, "Yes."

"I have not known you to do such a thing in the time I have known you, in fact you are usually surprisingly direct and nonvocal with your emotions."

"You're one to talk." he said evenly.

"I have the excuse of being Vulcan." but she acceded, "If it is something you wish not to talk about then I withdraw the question."

He was quiet for a moment, but then "No, it's just that it is related to the question I asked when I first came in."

He took a deep breath and just plowed on, "I have a high body temperature because I have an extremely fast metabolism."

"I fail to see the correlation."

"Most of my ancestors have the same genetic quirk. It was the price we paid for the work of the geneticists who designed us."

"I thought earth had outlawed such engineering centuries ago."

"They did, and we're the reason for it."

That was a cryptic reference that she did not completely understand.

"What do you mean Kayetan?"

"I am a genetic mutation type Beta 412/66/DDAAN. My whole family is, all the way back to the geneticists who first decided to try and make a better human. All my ancestors were designed in a lab because they wanted better soldiers. But they were careful with us, the first two generations had 'not turned out as expected'. Their way of saying they'd killed two million people by then. But I've always known, I've seen the same capability for destruction in myself and many of my family. We've shunted it, turned it to focus on other things but it's there and always trying to find a gap, find a legitimate sounding reason to be unleashed. Our own minds are trying to turn us into monsters and normally it's something we can control."

And she listened she thought that there was something else going on here, something that had been going on far longer to cause this out pouring.

"Is that all? Fighting a war can do that to a person."

"No." he said after a moment. "I can hurt people. Most of the early super-soldiers had been conditioned for strength but we were bred for speed, agility and the awareness to use it. I've always known it's there, incidents at home and a few times at the academy, but it's getting worse, ever since the admiral transferred me to his ship. But at Tyra I saw everything and knew where to apply the pressure to break them; it was all a calculation and I could solve it."

He was breathing slowly with a ragged edge and T'karra was unsure what that signified.

"I . . . I'm afraid. I'm afraid of what I can do. I'm afraid that if I let it slip even once I might turn into the monster my ancestors were created to fight." his voice faltered but he went on, "I'm afraid that I might not be able to be an engineer anymore if I let go. And I don't want to be a soldier, I don't want to hurt or destroy, I just to build starships."

They had been sitting next to each other against the wall and now the heat under the blanket was even removing the chill of the stone wall. The embers had faded and she could still feel the blanket shift under the occasional breath of air from the cave. It was enough of a respite though for her get a handle on her wildly shifting thoughts and consider his words. Thinking on his fears gave new light to her own.

"Then perhaps we do have more in common than I thought." she readjusted herself on the hard surface, "I have never been one to make friends, even in the way Vulcans do. I have labeled myself outsider and remained on the edge of relationships. The only things that I have even been sure of is that I would marry Sokarn of the lowlands provinces and that I would command a starship. But Sokarn is dead and I am no longer sure that I ever will command a ship."

"But the worst part is that I do not know if I shall ever get out of this prison to avenge the crew that I had never even considered as friends."

He was quiet for some time, "Vengeance is not logical." he said simply. "But then so is fear of ones own self."

Another silence passed. And even though she was getting a handle on her emotions again, for however long that would last, an odd thought cropped up, a turn of phrase that amused her so much she had to share it.

"I suppose illogical people should band together against the logic around them."

It was silent for a moment, then Kayetan snorted, then chuckled, then was convulsed in laughter that shook the outer blanket from around them. making her tense against the sudden cold.

After he'd regained control of himself and adjusted the blanket he apologized and said, "Why T'karra, I didn't know that comedy was among your talents."

"It is not." she said dryly.

"Please, I think you could have career as a comic."

"I could not." she responded.

He paused and shifted, "I can't see but you're glaring at me aren't you?"

"No."

"Ok then I'll take your word for it."

There was another extended time of companionable silence until she decided there was one more thing to say.

"Kayetan."

"Yea."

"Thank-you."

"Me? For what?"

"Giving me a chance to think."

"Oh. Your-welcome I guess. Thank-you for listening."

"You are welcome as well."

It was quiet again for a while. Then he spoke.

"Dinner time I think."

"You're hungry?"

"Famished." he answered.

"Then let us go."

This camp is a mess thought Jii. He had acquired a steaming bowl of the usual stew which had tasted better than normal all day and he'd found a corner of the storeroom and a private moment. Sitting cross-legged in a shadow cast from the smaller fire kept in the Bridge he watched the goings on in the Kitchen. Four lines were formed and crewmen were slowly getting heaping spoons of the stew and full mugs of juice pressed from some fruit that was being compared to a green mango. Like most things in this camp the comparison was only skin deep.

Time, dammit, time. There was never enough time. His commands had been changing radically the last year. From the tower annex of Starfleet intelligence on Mars with a view of the Olympus Mons reserve to his sudden post to Starbase 112 near the cardassian sector to a cave on some no name planetoid. They'd wanted an intelligence operative in charge of the station so someone with an experience eye could keep a watch on the cardassians and their new friends in the Dominion. Deep Space Nine was too close and too under defended to be an observation station so 112 was chosen. It was thought it was far enough from the front and small enough to be ignored if there there was an attack. His peers, and himself if truth be known, in starfleet intelligence had been so sure that the Dominion would keep things to a cold war state for at least two more years, if not longer. Their previous tactic from what they'd learned would be to take over by absorption, the sheer size and composition of the Dominion making it possible. And they'd been fooled, all of them, only with the clarity of hindsight he could see it now. The Dominion had never come up against something as large as the Federation; nor it seemed something as obstinate as its member races and were so convinced of it they went for the killing blow instead.

Complacency was the answer, the federation had been enamored of their early successes in discovering the plants and machinations of the founders. So what if their ships had censors more sensitive then they'd ever come across. So what if they had a warrior slave race that would fight and die at single command and be glad for the chance. So what if they had a puppet government and beachhead in the Alpha quadrant?

A lifetime spent in intelligence work and too much time to think now gave him the clear view; the founders were master statesmen, they had overseen the fall of countless governments and once they were sure the Federation would give them trouble they started the ball rolling. Benjamin Sisko, damn him! The commander of Deep Space Nine quickly become the starfleet expert on the Dominion with good reason but he'd been so successful in countering all their attempts to destabilized the quadrant that they decided to go for the jugular. Damn him, it was more useful to have a known agent in place than to out him publicly. If only Sisko had been more subtle, cautious, not shooting phasers at everything and scaring the only founders they'd found outside Dominion controlled space into retreating.

I shouldn't blame Sisko for doing exactly what we'd drug him back to earth to do, he repented. But dammit I want to blame someone and it was always his name on the Dominion reports.

But that was all done. Gone. Starbase 112 had been loaded with all the most advanced sensor devices the federation had to offer and so had the USS Tetsuo; they were to be the eyes and ears of starfleet intelligence and it was filled with the best technicians and analysts they had. They even installed one of their own as station commander so they would have a good hold on the data from detection to dissemination. He had to give it to them, they'd done it deftly, gotten all starfleet intelligence's best and brightest in one place. Then with the opening move they'd swarmed across the territorial line and right for his station and the half gutted ship they'd been so proud of. Quantum relays, triphase astrometric sensors, graviton detectors sensitive enough to pick up the shift in orbit of anything bigger than a dozen meters from fifty lightyears and it had all been sitting in the docks half installed. It had been only luck that they'd been able to destroy the docks, luck and an couple of fusion reactors that had been handy. All those Jem'Hadar attack ships had been so careful to avoid damage to the powered down ship and the docks; its destruction was a small victory paid at the expense of the rest of the station and most of its three thousand starflest personnel and civilian workers. Two hundred and eighty survived. A testament to how efficient the Jem'Hadar were at destruction. Less than ten percent; a number that had become the average survival ratio in combat with the Dominion and their Cardassian puppets. He'd not known them very well, but still he'd been their leader for nearly a year and now, who knows where the bulk of them were. The Dominion's Vorta representative had only wanted to know which of his prisoners had been in key positions and now they were all here.

Jii looked from his shadow out at his 'command'; thirty-seven people from starbase 112 were sent along with him, only ten from the Tetsuo survived and were all here. There were eleven klingons, eighty survivors from Seventh Fleet and the Hammer, and then seventy-seven various personal along with a couple of civilians who had proven to be troublemakers in other camps. Meaning he had a grand total of two-hundred & fifteen under his charge and all of them were in a lot of trouble.

They had to have one by now, they'd taken and destroyed enough ships and starbases, they had to have at least one federation database. The damn things. An intelligence officer's worst nightmare. Every starship and starbase of note had one, a massive store of everything that the federation had learned, and if it was taken from a starfleet ship or base then it also had personnel records and detailed accounts of starfleet orders and methods. Oh, they were encoded but the Dominion had proven very adept at decoding and electronic data retrieval so there was no reason to assume they hadn't broken a database. It was not of strategic use but knowing everything about the target of interrogation made breaking a target much easier. This whole camp was an engine designed to break a target; some would think it odd to first drive your targets together, make them work hard and become close to survive and made comrades against the evil captors. But friends and companions were merely tools to the truly devious interrogator and Gul Grata had gotten her start breaking former Obsidian Order agents. A skill like that required a deviousness and total lack of empathy for one's targets.

The problem was he had know idea how to get out of it. He could delay, the best way was to just talk about everything, to go on and on and on, but she would tire of that quickly.

Dammit, dammit, dammit! Maybe if he'd had time to shape this rabble of awkward trouble makers into a force they'd been able to take advantage of some opportunity, but there wasn't time!

Captain Shanloo was good at following orders, which was why she'd been chosen as captain of the Tetsuo. Commander Kayetan was a mess self-doubt and regret. Commander T'karra was cold, cold and unapproachable even for a vulcan. Commander Lallal was too cold to move properly and far to patient a sort to take any dramatic initiative. Lieutenant Commander Orourack was a slightly better officer, he'd quickly made friends with his juniors, but he also was still recovering from injuries and from all accounts had berserk tendencies as well as being the one every guard watched as they patrolled the cave. And lastly was Lieutenant Commander Jeremy Donaldson.

The thought of that shark made him chortle under his breath. Donaldson was nothing of the sort. It was a cover identity issued by the Federation Security Bureau; they were the real spies to Starfleet Intelligence's information analysts. Jii only knew what Donaldson was because FSB had been in on the starbase 112 and Tetsuo project. Total co-operation biting them soundly on the ass.

Jii didn't need a thousand reports and a legion of followers to tell him that it was going badly. FSB and Starfleet had both been on edge, and then they were blinded in the opening move. Followed up with a little old fashioned planet by planet conquering to remove the morale and then cinch the noose tight by totally destroying the one offensive fleet starfleet had been able to put together.

Mix well, add a dash of hopelessness with a sprinkle of overwhelming odds, season lightly and bake until browned. That was how you made a federation pie with klingon empire on the side.

But there was a more important dish now being cooked. He and Donaldson had been at the heart of the intelligence operations against the Dominion for as long as there had been intelligence operations against the Dominion. Their codes would have been changed, their knowledge was outdated, but someone was going though a lot of trouble to get something from them. But there was no way they could know what intelligence he really had. If they knew they'd already have rectified the situation and prepping him for interrogation was useless, and despite everything the Dominion would net let even their most honored allies waste time on breaking a man who didn't need breaking.

I suppose I can't rule out pure hate and a free hand to do what she wants, but that was unlikely, he thought. The Dominion was as a rule highly efficient and one did not have one of the best interrogators in the quadrant sit around do what she wants. Something else was at work. Something else and whatever it was did not bode well. If he could just hold out long enough to find out what it was and if he could figure out a way to get this lot of rebels and characters to become an elite force . . . well, best not to dwell on it.

But, that was well enough out of his control, for now he would act within his role as camp senior officer, and that meant finding volunteers for this sparing they wanted.

Jii smiled to himself, sometimes its just too easy, he thought as he wandered over to where he thought he'd find his 'sparing volunteers'.

Chapter 12

Morning comes abruptly on a planetoid; its low radius made for quick and surprisingly fantastic sunrises though. The large yellow giant that warmed the thin atmosphere was just close enough to be blinding, especially if one was working off a hangover.

The 'hooch' one of the humans was proficient at making burned like deturium tank cleaner and hit harder than any targ that ever roamed the foothills of Qo'noS.

Master chief Sterling could retire and make a fortune off of it in the Empire, thought Grakt as he refused to wince from the sharp glare of the sun.

He was as usual the second to awake from the nights drink and telling of stories and wondered yet again what was going on.

Two camps had evolved, the big one was filed with starfleeters and their constant roaming and mapping of their cell. The second, smaller one was located at the back and had quickly become known as Mach Gre'thor, 'the small hell' when translated to the human tongue though the humans called it 'klingon country'. All eleven reaming kingons were loyal to their general, he had never led them astray in two wars and many campaigns but the old man's patience was going to be his undoing. If not Greckt, then Malakor or Tor would challenge him. The only reason no one had yet was because they all saw the look in the reaming eye of the old warrior; he sensed a battle.

And when General Krugh, of the house of Krugh, Lord of the N'ostrian Straights, winner of the Emperors Own Combat, winner of the Order of the Bat'leth, Master of the Fell-blade Mek'leth style . . . and Grekt's father's sworn brother. The house of Skorn and the house of Krugh had been allies for more than five generations and it would bode ill if he was forced to kill the old man.

But that was unlikely. Krugh had the sight. All kingons could see the killing intent in the eyes of another but Krugh's vision was especially clear when seeing into the soul of warriors. He had never been wrong. Except when he'd lead his heavy wing of the larger K'vort birds of prey into an battle that proved to be an ambush. True they had been able to warn the allied fleet of the massing invasion force, and true they had taken twice their number with them but Krugh's insistence that they, they, they . . . he could barely even think the word in his own head!

Surrender! After their ship was cut in two and oxygen running out they'd been boarded, still they beat the enemy back. And second time, it had been glorious and was worthy of song and prose, yet after the defeat of the second wave the general had told them 'stand down, if you cannot, do as your heart commands.'. The paltry twenty remaining crew had not done so easily, five died in last minute attacks against the Jen'hadar, three over the next few days as some found existence as a prisoner too much to bear and one more as soon as they had been beamed down to this rock they now called home. Yet all throughout that time the General just said kept saying 'stand down, if you cannot, do as your heart commands.'

Now only a few senior bridge offers were left, the most loyal core who had seen firsthand the look of battle in their commanders eye; but after nearly eighteen days of imprisonment there was no sign of an attack. What more, any successful action had become impossible! Even he, Greckt, son of Tagh was becoming impatient with the inaction and relative silence of his general.

Or at least he would be as soon as his head stopped pounding for a moment.

Damn and fire of hell this 'hooch' has a kick! Perhaps he could wrest the method of its creation from the brewer. If it was possible, and if he survived this place and made it back to his family seat on the colony of T'anigor he could present the recipe to his mother and hope its was enough to lessen the shame of capture. Maybe. Probably not. Even among the living legends among the matrons of the great klingon houses his mother B'cjan was feared. She was iron willed and proud, from an honored line extending far back into the histories of his people. And she didn't even have to remind everyone of it like some, she merely entered a chamber and one knew they were lesser beings while reducing even the most prideful warrior to a quivering pool. Grekt risked a skyward glance, half expecting to see his mother falling unaided though the sky to wonder where her son had gotten too.

No, the hooch would have not effect. Still, the challenge of wresting it from the owners mind would be a distraction. Everyone in their cave now knew everyone else's stories as well as they knew their own and they were running out of memorized opera.

It would have grown dull in Klingon Country this night if not for the prospect of hand-to-hand combat. They'd stayed awake half the night competing to see which would volunteer for the duty but in the end it had been decided, Malakor, Tor, Chung, Gerrak and himself would be fighting these Cardassian scum and their Dominion puppet masters.

Hopefully as soon as his ridges stopped pulsing in time with the pain in his head. By sto-vo-kor even the aftereffects are a battle. A true warriors drink.

But, it was time to apply the old remedy for hangovers so he moved though a crowd of still waking starfleeters he approached a flat looking section of the wall and slammed his head against it, the sudden and sharp jarring tingled down his neck and the dull throbbing of his head faded.

Ah. Better, he thought as many of the starfleeters stared at him.

"What?!" he asked his audience, "Have you not seen a warrior cure a hangover?"

"Probably not." said a voice from behind him.

Turning Grekt saw the small human captain, he had not yet spent any great time with the human leader but he was known now to have been a intelligence officer, a spy. Honorable spies were a rare breed and this one had not shown his true motives yet.

"You are awake early." Grekt simply stated.

"So are you." shot back Jii.

"I awake when necessary!"

"As do I."

This is getting nowhere, he thought. "Fine. Why do you approach, have you a message?"

"You are going to fight later, yes?"

Grekt stared at the human who was barely a third his mass, Grekt was taller than average and the human was shorter, the disparity in their builds was comical; yet there was no fear or hesitation in the stance or tone. In fact, his tone commanding; this one might be a spy, but he makes his authority known with his every movement.

But that was not all it took to lead; Grekt turned to leave, "Who fights is not your concern."

To his surprise the human did not ask his question again, nor did he order him to stop, Jii grabbed his arm by the pet'natch fur of his lower armor and held it tightly.

"I don't have time for klingon attempts to challenge authority, just answer the question."

"Remove your hand little human, before you loose it."

They stood like that for several seconds until Grekt had enough and reached for the offending arm, which is when it happened.

Those nearby had stopped their morning activities with sudden aura of violence coming from the captain and the klingon and a few more quick witted started to move to aid their over-matched CO, but even they slowed when the captain suddenly moved.

Jii reached out with his free hand just as Grekt was moving, finding purchase on the klingon's armor he pulled himself closer so quickly that Grekt was taken off balance. Not stopping there Jii used the movement to gain leverage and pulled the klingon forward using his own body as a fulcrum. His larger opponent was slammed into the hard rock wall with enough force to get though even the re-enforced skeleton of a klingon and the wind was knocked out of him. Not stopping with just that Jii used the moment to swivel around and look Grekt in the eye.

"You listen well, because there will not be second time; your general agreed that I am in charge, you have a problem with that take up with him but you do not disrespect me in front of my people? You understand me?"

Grekt thought about resisting further, and even knew it likely that he could do some great harm to the human despite this hidden skill in hand-to-hand, but the anger that had been bubbling cut cut off at the mention of Krugh. He looked quickly toward the entrance to the little hell and saw his general standing there, watching, measuring, judging the actions of his senior renaming warrior. But the half burned face of the old warrior was a mask, and no indication of what he wanted done was to be found.

The moment dragged on and Grekt recalled the words of the ancestor who founded his house; 'A warrior is measured by the honor of his deeds, but he is remembered for honor he shows to others.' Those words had been carved into the feasting hall of his family estate with a bat'leth and were the words his family lived by.

The laugh carried throughout the cavern and Grekt moved back from the wall brushing the lichen from his armor.

"Worry not captain, I shall not lose." he leaned in close to finish in a softer tone, "Worry more for yourself and your people; at least those outside will have some control over their fate."

The little human's eyes narrowed and then softened but he didn't miss more than a second before he spoke. "

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words with no home yet

The call of attention rang out, and like many things on this ship it was an oddity, but in this case the oddity was that it actually came from their own commanding officer. But what really got their attention was the tone, it a tone often called the 'voice of command' and only those who had been with the captain for a while knew he could do it, the rest were as surprised as they were wondering what was going on.

"At ease." he said quickly as he noted everyone was paying attention. The lounge had quickly spilled out into the shuttlebay it was connected to by a pair of wide airlock doors when opened had the effect of more than tripling the size of the lounge. The bay had been conceded as MAC territory, but the assault shuttles had been moved to the main bay and only a few type nine craft were found, their own doors open and a few crewmembers sitting on their entry steps. A little more than four hundred people, his entire crew was here, minus some volunteers who were watching on the bridge and a couple of key sections and adding a dozen klingons who had brought a barrel of bloodwine and were downing it with great efficiency.

"Thank you. I'm quite sure you've been wondering what's been going on, your senior officers cooking food and hanging around in the lounge; it is something of a habit we picked up and has become a tradition. Don't worry, it's not a thing that happens often, only when the mood strikes us. But it's one of the things that has kept us together. A thing that is ours. I know those who have been together a long time are now outnumbered by those who have not and this may seem a strange tradition but it's not the food or the even the companionship that we seek by doing this." he nodded to Inuzaki, who had drifted closer to where he was standing on the podium near the windows.

The chief was the most senior non-officer on the ship and with that distinction came the honorific title of Bosun. He and a few preselected others began passing around translucent carafes filled with a clear liquid. Those who received the containers poured a small amount in their glasses and passed them on as the captain went on.

"I should warn you all, this is real alcohol and strong stuff at that. Those of you apposed or incapable of imbibing such should refrain from drinking, but I hope you join us if able." he paused, a moment of thought before going on.

"A ship or any successful command is a family. That is what we are now. You have all met and even surpassed my expectations and I thank you. I thank you all for coming with me, for choosing to stay; for becoming my family. You are the reason I have remained in starfleet, the reason I continue to do what I do and I think you for allowing me this responsibility. But all of us have come from somewhere else, we are built upon what has come before and it is that which I ask you now to join me in remembering."

Kayetan raised his glass in front of him, the tumbler catching the sconce lighting framing the starry windows behind him, "Fellow sentients, my crew, my family,' he paused as the veterans of his command raised their glasses and the newcomers followed suit, "That which we leave behind."

Those who could drank, the liquid was vile and caustic, some even retched, but they held their own as the entire crew drank with their captain.

But as glasses upturned and throats burned, the captain spoke again.

"But the past is only the foundation, only the starting point. So for all of you, I propose a new toast, a new thing to remember."

At this point even the old hands didn't know what was going on this was new, this was more that what they had done when gathered for the last decade.

"Those that know me know I am loathe to change my habits, but we have grown, we have become stronger that we were and I hope worthy of something better, something that I have not looked to in a long time which is my own failing."

Something was different about him. Kayetan was an even individual, well in control of his own emotions but his voice wavered, his eyes glistened with moisture.

"My crew, my family; a new toast, a new honor is upon us." he took a breath and raised his glass higher, "I now put forth; places not yet known. Beings not yet met. Battles not yet fought and alliances not yet forged. Charts not yet laid down, knowledge not yet understood and friends not yet made family. I set before you; That not yet discovered."

There was another pause. It was still, even the klingons were silent and unmoving. Then a cry. A roar of agreement, the klingons beat their armor in unison; even a single romulan silently raised his glass higher and drank as the entire ship's crew agreed with vigor.

There was no way anyone could know. There was no indication of it, no marks in his file, no sign given to the starfleet councilors of its existence, but it had formed nonetheless. She saw it now, she saw the change as very long shift, and every slight and hurt and frustration at the captain's methods and manor simply washed away. It was gone in an instant and she felt alone. A cult of personality had now formed, those who came with him were now sure of their alliance and those new to him were now in his camp. Doyal knew this because she looked out across the sea of starfleet and mobile assault commandos and saw that no one looked at her, she was safe in her position as a spy because now one was paying the slightest attention to her. No one saw the danger to starfleet and the federation because they were all staring at him. There might have been some allies amongst the crew before in case of something going truly wrong, but now even they would hesitate, they would give the captain the benefit of the doubt. For how could this man have have their ill will in his heart. How could he knowingly subvert starfleet?

Captain Samantha Eileen Doyal looked at the sea of faces and knew that if the worst came to pass, if this ship and crew should abandon their oath to the federation and its ideals for whatever reason, she would be alone. Admiral Carson had feared that Janeway was subverting the federation council and going against the good of starfleet, but now she was not sure if that possibility was even a real concern against the idea of a crew loyal to their captain over all else. A crew that was in all effects now a sovereign nation in space with a ship that was half again as powerful as its mightiest kindred.

There was a time coming that the commander of starfleet, arguably the most powerful person in the federation, would have to be asked to step down for the good of the federation and that she might not do it because of her own pride. And if a ship like this was a factor in that, no matter how small a percentage against the bulk of the starfleet, if it had to be accounted for then it was an unknown proposition for any who compensated the future. And unknowns could turn the tide with ease.

But worst of it was that she found she had raised her glass alongside the captain's crew, for they were now his crew for better or worse. For the first time in her life Captain Sam Doyal was unsure of herself and that scared her like nothing else.

as one, not as individual interactions he had to get though to get to the real problem, but as one being he was part of and he saw there were too many.

and had to protect.

These were his people. All of them from the klingons to the andorians to the vulcans; from all across the alpha and beta quadrants it didn't matter how each acted alone, it only mattered how they acted together.

And then for the first time in what felt like a long time he didn't feel as though he was in over his head.

He knew what was coming, he'd seen first hand the results of Cardassian interrogation techniques. He would break of that there was no doubt, the question was how long.

"Sir? What are you doing?"

Kayeten looked up from the corner where he'd ensconced himself and looked a touch embarrassed as he suddenly seemed to realize that he was crouching against a wall with a pile of burnt sticks of plasticine and surrounded by strange marks on the wall.

Commander T'karra gave him a moment she looked closer, they seemed to be warp equations of some sort, and of a type she was not familiar with.

"Um." he started, "It's, well-" he pointed to one end, "That's the equation for a Galaxy class warp field." he moved his pointing hand down along the section of more or less smooth stone he'd found, "And this is something better." rubbing his thickening facial growth with thoughtful strokes he finished. "I think."

"Better?" she wondered.

"Well, different. More efficient. You see the design of the Galaxy class came from looking for more efficient hull shapes, ones that could be wrapped in a warp field more easily. The oval primary hull or to use the vernacular, the 'saucer section' was found to be more officiant for large hulls such as the galaxy." he took a step back from the wall of marks and pointed at another section, "But more powerful warp fields changed that. The oval is still efficient, like that on the Sovereign class, but was what is really the best approach is s more fully integrated hull. By keeping everything close to the center of the field you could pack more warp layers around you ship for less threshold disruption. That and the need to generate warp fields that wouldn't damage space was the reason a triangular hull became the new standard. Having the warp field be more angular and tighter to the hull was not only efficient but safer and not harmful to the fabric of reality."

She now had a better idea of what he was doing, but not the details and somehow her loss was detected by Kayetan.

"Well, think of it as streamlining, but not for atmospheric resistance, the arrow shape lets a warp field slide into subspace and keeping the warp bubble close to the hull make the transition smoother which means less energy is spent getting into warp. That's why you see less blocky and segmented hull designs in the latest generation of ships."

He pointed again to the section of wall where he had been working, "But it hasn't gone as far as you can take it. If you make a smooth hull and project a vary small warp field in an oblong shape around your vessel it would be even more efficient. The trick is, I think, to mirror the rear of the ship and keep things even more compact then what we've been doing."

She looked at the math, and saw some of what he was saying, but debating warp dynamics was not the reason she came over here but it was also not a good idea to let him work out warp theory in full view of the guards.

"Commander, I am sure this is all very useful, but we are in an enemy camp and-"

"None of it's classified." he interrupted. "At least the parts that have already been worked out aren't."

She just looked at him.

"It's all theoretical, very theoretical." he responded.