Star Trek:
Crusade
Prologue
Beta-Hydra star system, one hundred and fifty light years from Federation territory,
Earth-calendar year 2256
Stardate 8447.2
The bridge rocked violently and the lights dimmed yet again as a fifth Klingon torpedo impacted on the already blackened hull of the U.S.S. [I]Achilles[/I].
"Report!" Yelled Captain William Fox over the growing noise of incoming damage reports and sparking, smoking consoles. His once sleek, black hair was now a shaggy mess atop his head, a side effect of being violently thrown from the command chair as the first volley of Klingon missiles hit the Achilles . And his once pristine gold captain's shirt was marred with a massive tear over the left shoulder, under which, a deep cut was still oozing thick, red blood. Fox winced in pain as the ship did a fast turn to avoid more enemy fire.
"All deflector shields down to twelve percent. Engineering reports a minor deuterium fuel pod leak, but repair teams are on the way. There is a hull breach on deck three, and microfractures are appearing on the outer hull of deck nine." Reported Commander Sonii, Achilles' science officer and resident Vulcan. His calm voice was almost eerie to Captain Fox, considering the danger the ship was in, and the horrible reports he was just ordered to read.
"Captain!" Warned young Ensign Jones from the helm. Fox looked up long enough to see the Klingon warship once again coming around to fire on the crippled ship. He could clearly see the fully charged disrupter and missile bays of the enemy warship on the viewscreen, each one glowing a dangerous, unearthly red color, each one ready to rain death down on the Federation ship once again. Fox, like everyone else on board, knew that just once more strike from the Klingon vessel would mean instant death. It would come either from the direct impact of the weapons, the shock-waves that would occur from the ship's own death throes, or, worst of all, explosive decompression from being hurtled into space through a rent in the hull.
"Signal the Klingons again," Fox ordered the communications officer, an older man named Seale, "Tell them we surrender."
The comm. officer turned toward his console and began signaling Achilles' surrender over every subspace band he could think of. After a few long seconds, Seale turned from his console, a sullen look on his face, "No response on any frequency, Captain."
Fox's shoulders slumped as far as they could without it being too painful. "It was a long shot, anyway." He muttered to himself, he knew very well that the Klingons almost never accepted surrender from their prey. Fox looked toward Lieutenant Broome manning the weapons console, "What is the status of our photon torpedo launchers?"
"The initial attack completely destroyed tube one, but two has been nominally repaired, and ready to fire."
"And phaser banks?"
"Phasers are operational at forty percent."
Fox muttered a curse under his breath. This was supposed to be a routine scanning mission of a recently discovered planet on the edge of Federation space. Achilles was only supposed to warp in, take initial readings of the planet, and warp out. The mission was supposed to be low risk, not even worthy of raising defensive shields.
Oh, but how wrong they were. Immediately after Achilles warped into the system, a Klingon battle cruiser slipped from behind a nearby asteroid and opened fire, crippling the ship beyond any ability to respond with one volley. Fortunately, the deflector screens were raised before the second volley could hit, sparing the ship for at least a little while. But now, with the shields collapsing, Fox was forced to act. The Klingons weren't responding to any of the constant hails they were sending, and now they had weapons not even capable of scratching paint. He turned toward Sonii, and got up to walk over to his console.
The sharp explosion of pain that suddenly burst forth in his shoulder nearly sent him to the floor in agony, but Fox mentally heaved it down, and resumed his course. Fox risked a quick glance over to his shoulder and stared in mute horror to see that half of his left torso was now a dull red, and it was slowly spreading. He remembered briefly a joke said by one of his teachers at the academy about the dangers of wearing a red operations shirt while in combat situations. Fortunately, Fox was in the command track, so he never had to worry about that...until now.
"Sonii" the Captain calmly, albeit weakly, said to the Vulcan, who was clearly struggling to keep his terrified feelings from surfacing, "How far away from Beta-Hydra are we?"
"Sensors show at least two hundred thousand kilometers."
Fox turned toward Jones, working furiously at the navigation console, inputting the quick commands that moved the ship just out of the weapon's range of enemy vessel that was rapidly approaching.
Achilles lurched once again as the Klingons fired off a quick disruptor shot that impacted the port warp nacelle.
"Ensign Jones, set course toward the planet, maximum impulse power."
"Aye, sir." The young officer replied, setting more commands and navigational solutions on her console.
Fox went back over to his command chair. Black soot covered the entire upholstered seat. Fox took a few precious seconds to wipe off some of the dust with his good arm, which, more than anything else, embedded it more firmly into the seat. He then slowly sat back down.
"Lieutenant Broome, shut down all weapons systems and put the power into the shield generators." Fox knew that with such low power, the boost to the shields would be only minimal, but it would hopefully give them at least a little more time. When Broome finished his work, the ship lurched forward with a boost of speed, shooting past the Klingon ship, barely missing the enemy hull by a scant few meters.
And before Fox could prepare himself, Jones complied with her order, and the ship suddenly turned a near one hundred and eighty degree turn to the right, aligning itself with the distant planet. On the viewscreen, the view became a sickening shot of a turn, stars zooming by at an impossible angle, then, finally, Beta-Hydra appeared. To the captain, it looked like a tiny blue dot among the many millions of smaller white dots. He thought with a little dismay that, if it weren't for these terrible circumstances, he'd be exploring those stars, helping to better the galaxy's knowledge of any number of subjects. That was what Starfleet was for, after all, exploration. Not battle every other week. Unfortunately, with neighbors such as the Klingons, combat was a terrible, but necessary part of any starship commander's life.
Suddenly, Achilles' comm. system activated, blaringly loud and a little grainy due to the damage to the receivers and speakers.
"Federation cowards! You would rather run from an honorable battle than face death! The guardians of Gre'thor will be pleased to torment your souls for eternity!" Fox was familiar with the "subtle" Klingon attempts at goading their victims into attempting to fight back. Even for such a warmongering, savage race, they did have a code of honor, and that code did specify against all out slaughter, claiming it an unfair tactic.
But these Klingons didn't seem to care about honor very much, fitting in perfectly with the Federation propaganda of the savage, ruthless Klingon.
"How much farther until we reach the planet?" Fox asked, staring at the rapidly expanding sphere of the planet.
"One minute, captain," Sonii responded, his calm demeanor returned once again.
Achilles shook as the Klingons fired a long-distance shot with a torpedo; fortunately, the boost to the shields protected them. The lights on the bridge dimmed to near blackness as the energy compensators struggled to keep the shields and every other system operational. Then, after a shower of sparks from an exploding console behind him, the worst news a captain could hear in the heat of battle was reported to Fox by Sonii: "All shield generators have failed, Captain, there are more casualties coming into sickbay. Doctor Farrell reports that the last concussion was enough to kill five crewmembers already seriously injured."
Fox sat dumbfounded at the news. At first he thought himself lucky that no one had been killed in this battle, but five deaths? And in one instant? Fox almost buried his head in his hands, until the pain in his shoulder reminded him of his predicament. He could already feel the dizziness associated with blood loss, but until he was dead on the floor, he would command this ship out of its mortal peril. The entire crew waited in silence over their dead shipmates for the rest of the minute. The seconds seemed to crawl by one after another, as if mocking the surviving crew, forcing them to experience the pain far longer than anyone should.
"We have arrived at high orbit over Beta-Hydra." Sonii reported, cutting the silence like a knife.
In a near daze, Fox was barely aware of his next order. "Sonii, order all nonessential personnel to evacuate the ship, take shuttles, escape pods, and transporters, whatever is necessary to get everyone off."
The Vulcan complied, sending the message over the shipwide comm. On the viewscreen, the Klingon ship was inching closer to Achilles , their engines probably struggling to recharge their weapons as well as go as fast as they could toward the planet. They were probably also relishing the sight of a completely defenseless enemy right in their sights.
"The Klingons will enter their optimum weapon's range in two minutes, thirty seconds," Sonii reported.
Fox looked out at the viewscreen at both the rapidly escaping crew and at the even more rapidly approaching Klingons. He knew that if he didn't do anything, the Klingons would simply destroy Achilles, and then beam down to the planet and slaughter the survivors. He had to give his crew a fighting chance to live. Fox sat for what seemed like an eternity, looking almost like a heroic statue of a leader pondering the fate of entire nations.
"Forty seconds until the Klingons enter weapons range." Sonii said.
Fox sighed. There was only one thing he could do to give anyone a chance at life, and he knew it would mean doom for anyone on the ship, as well as the Klingons. And then he took the most commanding pose he could considering the circumstances, and began to recite the words he memorized on his first day of command, words he hoped to never have to speak:
"Computer, initiate self destruct, authorization Fox-zero-aye-one."
Sonii realized what was happening, looked up from his console to Fox, and followed suit, "Computer, code two self destruct, authorization Sonii-one- bee-seven."
The other bridge crewmembers looked at each other for a second, daring each other to input the final code. In the end, little Ensign Suzie Jones spoke up, "Computer, code three self destruct, authorization Jones-two-alpha- six."
The pleasant feminine computer voice began a series of programmed responses, "Self-destruct mode initialized. Standing by for final code of either computer destruct or warp-core breach."
Achilles, like other starships, was equipped with two self-destruct modes, one that would destroy the ship's computer core, causing significant damage, but allowing enough of the ship to survive should Starfleet later recover the hulk for repair and analysis, but still leaving the ship unusable for any enemy boarding parties. The other mode was a warp-core breach, an uncontrolled antimatter explosion powerful enough to destroy any ship within a few hundred thousand kilometers.
Fox watched as the last shuttles and escape pods left the doomed ship, he estimated that at least three hundred of the ship's crew would survive to tell the tale of the death of Achilles , leaving one hundred brave men and women to die a fiery death. These others would eventually form a ring of dust that would circle the planet for a few centuries. It was Fox's hope the Klingons would join them in the eternal ballet.
"Computer, this is Captain William Fox, initiate a one minute warp core breach on my mark, destruct code four-one-one-beta-nine-delta-three."
The computer's pleasant voice came again, "One minute until warp core breach, all personnel aboard are highly suggested to find a means of leaving this vessel. No further warnings will be given."
Fox looked around at his brave crew one last time. The people so wrongly put into a terrible situation, so wrongly put to death for the hope that others of a different species would die. He was saddened to know that eventually, maybe in a century, their most noble of sacrifices would be nothing but statistics and footnotes in one of the many reports filed about this instance, if any reports were filed. For an instant, William Fox hated Starfleet for such injustice. Hated it for putting good people into terrible situations for negligible gain. What, a few bits of information to be scanned over, filed, and forgotten? Starfleet was nothing but a mass murder machine, and William Fox hated it.
On the viewscreen, the Klingon ship was parked just a few hundred meters away from the dying ship, probably computing their optimal targets for the best results. Fox allowed himself a small smile; these brutes had no idea what was about to happen. He hoped they would suffer.
Suffer long and terribly.
Unfortunately, Fox's smile faded when he saw something he would never had ever suspected from such bastards of aliens.
The Klingon ship slowly powered down its weapons, and fired its engines. It passed smoothly under Achilles, slowly accelerating toward an escape vector.
Sonii reported: "It appears that the Klingons have discovered our plans, and are moving away, they are caught in the planet's gravity well, and cannot jump to warp. I estimate they will be able to go to warp in forty seconds."
"Time to destruct?"
Sonii turned toward Fox, a disturbing grin marred the normally stoic Vulcan's face, "Twenty-eight seconds."
Fox regretted never getting to know his science officer better. He also noticed how many other crewmen were shocked to see the Vulcan smile. Some smiled with him, finding humor in the one scenario where humor was always nonexistent. In that short instant, Sonii was no longer a Vulcan, but a being just as human as the rest of them. Soon, others began to laugh and make some less-wholesome comments about certain alien's mothers. They were all laughing at the stupid Klingons and the one enemy they would never kill. In these last seconds, the crew was bonded in such a way that years of constant duty could never achieve. For a precious few moments, they were family. Even the captain laughed until the computer began the last verbal countdown.
"Ten."
Fox saw some of the crewmembers stop smiling and laughing, some looking around in horror, some in defiance of their fate.
"Nine."
Sonii stopped even smiling, and Fox noticed small tears running down his face.
"Eight."
Ensign Jones began crying like a child who had lost their parent in a crowded area.
"Seven."
Fox moved to touch his destroyed shoulder, his hand briefly passed over his ship's insignia on its way. His memories of his good, albeit short, Starfleet career rushed back into his thoughts. Maybe Starfleet wasn't so bad, after all. But those thought perished in his mind when he saw more and more officers, normally so cool under pressure, beginning to cry like children. Why did Starfleet do this to people?
"Six."
Fox looked at the ruins of his once beautiful bridge. He remembered how he originally ordered his own bridge officers to help the janitorial staff clean the bridge when the time came. They were good times, full of laughter and jest at those who couldn't properly handle an electro-vacuum, or those who slipped on a puddle of cleaning fluid. Fox knew those times would never happen again.
"Five."
Most of the crew was crying now. Fox couldn't help but join them.
"Four."
Fox looked at the viewscreen to see the Klingons running away as fast as possible. Cowards, he thought, abandoning their morals and dignity, the two things that made them proud, just for a chance at life.
"Three."
Some of Fox's tears hit his shoulder, causing intense flashes of pain. He hissed nearly comically loud, turning some of the crew's attention toward him.
"Two."
Fox began to feel...tired. He knew he had just doomed whoever was still on his ship and the Klingons on their vessel. He now regretted his decisions. He should have ordered his shields raised, he should have fought back, he should have ordered the entire crew off the vessel. And now they were looking at him, probably wondering why he hadn't. They probably thought him a vicious monster at this moment, worse than the Klingons. All because of damned Starfleet.
"One."
A sudden knot formed in the pit of William Fox's stomach. He didn't want to die, not here, not now. He wasn't even forty yet. There was so much to live for. Besides, the Klingons were leaving, they could survive. He could order everyone back aboard, they could effect repairs and go home. Home, and a continued mission. They could be a family. All he had to do was:
"Com..."
Captain William Fox never could complete his sentence, because, in that same instant, tons of matter and antimatter collided into each other, causing a massive explosion that instantly vaporized the ship around it, and everyone living in it. The shockwave expanded until it hit the fleeing Klingon ship, destroying its engines in an instant, and shoving the ship toward the planet's surface, to become a blazing fireball in the atmosphere of Beta-Hydra.
Just seconds after the violent bang, the cloud of interstellar dust and gas that was the U.S.S. Achilles began to coalesce into a ring around the planet Beta-Hydra, there to stay for the next five centuries or so.
The dawn broke on the surface of Beta-Hydra with an explosion in the heavens that made the sun seem like a small, flickering candle. Anyone who was looking up just as dawn broke would look down, only to realize that that one brief flash blinded him or her completely. Of the three hundred or so original survivors, only one hundred and seventy-five actually retained their sight that day.
They all knew that their only hope of going home was vaporized in that explosion, and that no message to Starfleet would ever be received or responded to in their natural lifetimes. Eventually, the mindset of the survivors changed from one of sadness, to one of anger. To them, the Federation had abandoned them, it was a cruel, murderous monster, and they would make sure to teach that to anyone and everyone they could, starting with their children, and then to the first instances of civilization that would be forged on the surface of Beta-Hydra. The people vowed that as long as their ideals survived, Starfleet and the Federation would fall in the violent end it so rightly deserved.
Crusade
Prologue
Beta-Hydra star system, one hundred and fifty light years from Federation territory,
Earth-calendar year 2256
Stardate 8447.2
The bridge rocked violently and the lights dimmed yet again as a fifth Klingon torpedo impacted on the already blackened hull of the U.S.S. [I]Achilles[/I].
"Report!" Yelled Captain William Fox over the growing noise of incoming damage reports and sparking, smoking consoles. His once sleek, black hair was now a shaggy mess atop his head, a side effect of being violently thrown from the command chair as the first volley of Klingon missiles hit the Achilles . And his once pristine gold captain's shirt was marred with a massive tear over the left shoulder, under which, a deep cut was still oozing thick, red blood. Fox winced in pain as the ship did a fast turn to avoid more enemy fire.
"All deflector shields down to twelve percent. Engineering reports a minor deuterium fuel pod leak, but repair teams are on the way. There is a hull breach on deck three, and microfractures are appearing on the outer hull of deck nine." Reported Commander Sonii, Achilles' science officer and resident Vulcan. His calm voice was almost eerie to Captain Fox, considering the danger the ship was in, and the horrible reports he was just ordered to read.
"Captain!" Warned young Ensign Jones from the helm. Fox looked up long enough to see the Klingon warship once again coming around to fire on the crippled ship. He could clearly see the fully charged disrupter and missile bays of the enemy warship on the viewscreen, each one glowing a dangerous, unearthly red color, each one ready to rain death down on the Federation ship once again. Fox, like everyone else on board, knew that just once more strike from the Klingon vessel would mean instant death. It would come either from the direct impact of the weapons, the shock-waves that would occur from the ship's own death throes, or, worst of all, explosive decompression from being hurtled into space through a rent in the hull.
"Signal the Klingons again," Fox ordered the communications officer, an older man named Seale, "Tell them we surrender."
The comm. officer turned toward his console and began signaling Achilles' surrender over every subspace band he could think of. After a few long seconds, Seale turned from his console, a sullen look on his face, "No response on any frequency, Captain."
Fox's shoulders slumped as far as they could without it being too painful. "It was a long shot, anyway." He muttered to himself, he knew very well that the Klingons almost never accepted surrender from their prey. Fox looked toward Lieutenant Broome manning the weapons console, "What is the status of our photon torpedo launchers?"
"The initial attack completely destroyed tube one, but two has been nominally repaired, and ready to fire."
"And phaser banks?"
"Phasers are operational at forty percent."
Fox muttered a curse under his breath. This was supposed to be a routine scanning mission of a recently discovered planet on the edge of Federation space. Achilles was only supposed to warp in, take initial readings of the planet, and warp out. The mission was supposed to be low risk, not even worthy of raising defensive shields.
Oh, but how wrong they were. Immediately after Achilles warped into the system, a Klingon battle cruiser slipped from behind a nearby asteroid and opened fire, crippling the ship beyond any ability to respond with one volley. Fortunately, the deflector screens were raised before the second volley could hit, sparing the ship for at least a little while. But now, with the shields collapsing, Fox was forced to act. The Klingons weren't responding to any of the constant hails they were sending, and now they had weapons not even capable of scratching paint. He turned toward Sonii, and got up to walk over to his console.
The sharp explosion of pain that suddenly burst forth in his shoulder nearly sent him to the floor in agony, but Fox mentally heaved it down, and resumed his course. Fox risked a quick glance over to his shoulder and stared in mute horror to see that half of his left torso was now a dull red, and it was slowly spreading. He remembered briefly a joke said by one of his teachers at the academy about the dangers of wearing a red operations shirt while in combat situations. Fortunately, Fox was in the command track, so he never had to worry about that...until now.
"Sonii" the Captain calmly, albeit weakly, said to the Vulcan, who was clearly struggling to keep his terrified feelings from surfacing, "How far away from Beta-Hydra are we?"
"Sensors show at least two hundred thousand kilometers."
Fox turned toward Jones, working furiously at the navigation console, inputting the quick commands that moved the ship just out of the weapon's range of enemy vessel that was rapidly approaching.
Achilles lurched once again as the Klingons fired off a quick disruptor shot that impacted the port warp nacelle.
"Ensign Jones, set course toward the planet, maximum impulse power."
"Aye, sir." The young officer replied, setting more commands and navigational solutions on her console.
Fox went back over to his command chair. Black soot covered the entire upholstered seat. Fox took a few precious seconds to wipe off some of the dust with his good arm, which, more than anything else, embedded it more firmly into the seat. He then slowly sat back down.
"Lieutenant Broome, shut down all weapons systems and put the power into the shield generators." Fox knew that with such low power, the boost to the shields would be only minimal, but it would hopefully give them at least a little more time. When Broome finished his work, the ship lurched forward with a boost of speed, shooting past the Klingon ship, barely missing the enemy hull by a scant few meters.
And before Fox could prepare himself, Jones complied with her order, and the ship suddenly turned a near one hundred and eighty degree turn to the right, aligning itself with the distant planet. On the viewscreen, the view became a sickening shot of a turn, stars zooming by at an impossible angle, then, finally, Beta-Hydra appeared. To the captain, it looked like a tiny blue dot among the many millions of smaller white dots. He thought with a little dismay that, if it weren't for these terrible circumstances, he'd be exploring those stars, helping to better the galaxy's knowledge of any number of subjects. That was what Starfleet was for, after all, exploration. Not battle every other week. Unfortunately, with neighbors such as the Klingons, combat was a terrible, but necessary part of any starship commander's life.
Suddenly, Achilles' comm. system activated, blaringly loud and a little grainy due to the damage to the receivers and speakers.
"Federation cowards! You would rather run from an honorable battle than face death! The guardians of Gre'thor will be pleased to torment your souls for eternity!" Fox was familiar with the "subtle" Klingon attempts at goading their victims into attempting to fight back. Even for such a warmongering, savage race, they did have a code of honor, and that code did specify against all out slaughter, claiming it an unfair tactic.
But these Klingons didn't seem to care about honor very much, fitting in perfectly with the Federation propaganda of the savage, ruthless Klingon.
"How much farther until we reach the planet?" Fox asked, staring at the rapidly expanding sphere of the planet.
"One minute, captain," Sonii responded, his calm demeanor returned once again.
Achilles shook as the Klingons fired a long-distance shot with a torpedo; fortunately, the boost to the shields protected them. The lights on the bridge dimmed to near blackness as the energy compensators struggled to keep the shields and every other system operational. Then, after a shower of sparks from an exploding console behind him, the worst news a captain could hear in the heat of battle was reported to Fox by Sonii: "All shield generators have failed, Captain, there are more casualties coming into sickbay. Doctor Farrell reports that the last concussion was enough to kill five crewmembers already seriously injured."
Fox sat dumbfounded at the news. At first he thought himself lucky that no one had been killed in this battle, but five deaths? And in one instant? Fox almost buried his head in his hands, until the pain in his shoulder reminded him of his predicament. He could already feel the dizziness associated with blood loss, but until he was dead on the floor, he would command this ship out of its mortal peril. The entire crew waited in silence over their dead shipmates for the rest of the minute. The seconds seemed to crawl by one after another, as if mocking the surviving crew, forcing them to experience the pain far longer than anyone should.
"We have arrived at high orbit over Beta-Hydra." Sonii reported, cutting the silence like a knife.
In a near daze, Fox was barely aware of his next order. "Sonii, order all nonessential personnel to evacuate the ship, take shuttles, escape pods, and transporters, whatever is necessary to get everyone off."
The Vulcan complied, sending the message over the shipwide comm. On the viewscreen, the Klingon ship was inching closer to Achilles , their engines probably struggling to recharge their weapons as well as go as fast as they could toward the planet. They were probably also relishing the sight of a completely defenseless enemy right in their sights.
"The Klingons will enter their optimum weapon's range in two minutes, thirty seconds," Sonii reported.
Fox looked out at the viewscreen at both the rapidly escaping crew and at the even more rapidly approaching Klingons. He knew that if he didn't do anything, the Klingons would simply destroy Achilles, and then beam down to the planet and slaughter the survivors. He had to give his crew a fighting chance to live. Fox sat for what seemed like an eternity, looking almost like a heroic statue of a leader pondering the fate of entire nations.
"Forty seconds until the Klingons enter weapons range." Sonii said.
Fox sighed. There was only one thing he could do to give anyone a chance at life, and he knew it would mean doom for anyone on the ship, as well as the Klingons. And then he took the most commanding pose he could considering the circumstances, and began to recite the words he memorized on his first day of command, words he hoped to never have to speak:
"Computer, initiate self destruct, authorization Fox-zero-aye-one."
Sonii realized what was happening, looked up from his console to Fox, and followed suit, "Computer, code two self destruct, authorization Sonii-one- bee-seven."
The other bridge crewmembers looked at each other for a second, daring each other to input the final code. In the end, little Ensign Suzie Jones spoke up, "Computer, code three self destruct, authorization Jones-two-alpha- six."
The pleasant feminine computer voice began a series of programmed responses, "Self-destruct mode initialized. Standing by for final code of either computer destruct or warp-core breach."
Achilles, like other starships, was equipped with two self-destruct modes, one that would destroy the ship's computer core, causing significant damage, but allowing enough of the ship to survive should Starfleet later recover the hulk for repair and analysis, but still leaving the ship unusable for any enemy boarding parties. The other mode was a warp-core breach, an uncontrolled antimatter explosion powerful enough to destroy any ship within a few hundred thousand kilometers.
Fox watched as the last shuttles and escape pods left the doomed ship, he estimated that at least three hundred of the ship's crew would survive to tell the tale of the death of Achilles , leaving one hundred brave men and women to die a fiery death. These others would eventually form a ring of dust that would circle the planet for a few centuries. It was Fox's hope the Klingons would join them in the eternal ballet.
"Computer, this is Captain William Fox, initiate a one minute warp core breach on my mark, destruct code four-one-one-beta-nine-delta-three."
The computer's pleasant voice came again, "One minute until warp core breach, all personnel aboard are highly suggested to find a means of leaving this vessel. No further warnings will be given."
Fox looked around at his brave crew one last time. The people so wrongly put into a terrible situation, so wrongly put to death for the hope that others of a different species would die. He was saddened to know that eventually, maybe in a century, their most noble of sacrifices would be nothing but statistics and footnotes in one of the many reports filed about this instance, if any reports were filed. For an instant, William Fox hated Starfleet for such injustice. Hated it for putting good people into terrible situations for negligible gain. What, a few bits of information to be scanned over, filed, and forgotten? Starfleet was nothing but a mass murder machine, and William Fox hated it.
On the viewscreen, the Klingon ship was parked just a few hundred meters away from the dying ship, probably computing their optimal targets for the best results. Fox allowed himself a small smile; these brutes had no idea what was about to happen. He hoped they would suffer.
Suffer long and terribly.
Unfortunately, Fox's smile faded when he saw something he would never had ever suspected from such bastards of aliens.
The Klingon ship slowly powered down its weapons, and fired its engines. It passed smoothly under Achilles, slowly accelerating toward an escape vector.
Sonii reported: "It appears that the Klingons have discovered our plans, and are moving away, they are caught in the planet's gravity well, and cannot jump to warp. I estimate they will be able to go to warp in forty seconds."
"Time to destruct?"
Sonii turned toward Fox, a disturbing grin marred the normally stoic Vulcan's face, "Twenty-eight seconds."
Fox regretted never getting to know his science officer better. He also noticed how many other crewmen were shocked to see the Vulcan smile. Some smiled with him, finding humor in the one scenario where humor was always nonexistent. In that short instant, Sonii was no longer a Vulcan, but a being just as human as the rest of them. Soon, others began to laugh and make some less-wholesome comments about certain alien's mothers. They were all laughing at the stupid Klingons and the one enemy they would never kill. In these last seconds, the crew was bonded in such a way that years of constant duty could never achieve. For a precious few moments, they were family. Even the captain laughed until the computer began the last verbal countdown.
"Ten."
Fox saw some of the crewmembers stop smiling and laughing, some looking around in horror, some in defiance of their fate.
"Nine."
Sonii stopped even smiling, and Fox noticed small tears running down his face.
"Eight."
Ensign Jones began crying like a child who had lost their parent in a crowded area.
"Seven."
Fox moved to touch his destroyed shoulder, his hand briefly passed over his ship's insignia on its way. His memories of his good, albeit short, Starfleet career rushed back into his thoughts. Maybe Starfleet wasn't so bad, after all. But those thought perished in his mind when he saw more and more officers, normally so cool under pressure, beginning to cry like children. Why did Starfleet do this to people?
"Six."
Fox looked at the ruins of his once beautiful bridge. He remembered how he originally ordered his own bridge officers to help the janitorial staff clean the bridge when the time came. They were good times, full of laughter and jest at those who couldn't properly handle an electro-vacuum, or those who slipped on a puddle of cleaning fluid. Fox knew those times would never happen again.
"Five."
Most of the crew was crying now. Fox couldn't help but join them.
"Four."
Fox looked at the viewscreen to see the Klingons running away as fast as possible. Cowards, he thought, abandoning their morals and dignity, the two things that made them proud, just for a chance at life.
"Three."
Some of Fox's tears hit his shoulder, causing intense flashes of pain. He hissed nearly comically loud, turning some of the crew's attention toward him.
"Two."
Fox began to feel...tired. He knew he had just doomed whoever was still on his ship and the Klingons on their vessel. He now regretted his decisions. He should have ordered his shields raised, he should have fought back, he should have ordered the entire crew off the vessel. And now they were looking at him, probably wondering why he hadn't. They probably thought him a vicious monster at this moment, worse than the Klingons. All because of damned Starfleet.
"One."
A sudden knot formed in the pit of William Fox's stomach. He didn't want to die, not here, not now. He wasn't even forty yet. There was so much to live for. Besides, the Klingons were leaving, they could survive. He could order everyone back aboard, they could effect repairs and go home. Home, and a continued mission. They could be a family. All he had to do was:
"Com..."
Captain William Fox never could complete his sentence, because, in that same instant, tons of matter and antimatter collided into each other, causing a massive explosion that instantly vaporized the ship around it, and everyone living in it. The shockwave expanded until it hit the fleeing Klingon ship, destroying its engines in an instant, and shoving the ship toward the planet's surface, to become a blazing fireball in the atmosphere of Beta-Hydra.
Just seconds after the violent bang, the cloud of interstellar dust and gas that was the U.S.S. Achilles began to coalesce into a ring around the planet Beta-Hydra, there to stay for the next five centuries or so.
The dawn broke on the surface of Beta-Hydra with an explosion in the heavens that made the sun seem like a small, flickering candle. Anyone who was looking up just as dawn broke would look down, only to realize that that one brief flash blinded him or her completely. Of the three hundred or so original survivors, only one hundred and seventy-five actually retained their sight that day.
They all knew that their only hope of going home was vaporized in that explosion, and that no message to Starfleet would ever be received or responded to in their natural lifetimes. Eventually, the mindset of the survivors changed from one of sadness, to one of anger. To them, the Federation had abandoned them, it was a cruel, murderous monster, and they would make sure to teach that to anyone and everyone they could, starting with their children, and then to the first instances of civilization that would be forged on the surface of Beta-Hydra. The people vowed that as long as their ideals survived, Starfleet and the Federation would fall in the violent end it so rightly deserved.