Chapter 3 - The Krenim have allies…

The Sovereign had just arrived at Starbase 66. The Sovereign was met by a fleet of over 55 vessels. There were two new designs with in this fleet. The Achilles Class including the Achilles and Agamemnon; and the Excalibur Class, the newest and largest federation Starship ever built.

On board the Sovereign, the Admiral Commanding the Starbase had now been beamed on board. He was escorted by 4 security officers towards the bridge while holding a pad of information covering the Sovereign's next assignment. This was obviously something to do with this new Krenim threat against the Federation. As he approached the bridge, Admiral James Norway walked straight towards the Captain's Ready Room and pressed the door chime.

"Come" - The Captain shouted through the door, as the door opened Captain Montgomery could clearly see who had walked through the door. "Admiral, it is good to see you again, would you like a cup of tea?"

The desk that the Captain was sitting behind had one large jug and several small cups surrounding it. Captain Rebecca Montgomery reached out for a cup and started to pour tea into it, and then passed over the cup towards the Admiral.

"Thank you Rebecca, and unfortunately I have bad news, unfortunately since you were attacked by the Krenim forces near the Typhon Expanse, we have been sending in probes to seek out their numbers." The Admiral reached towards the display, pressed a few buttons and moments later a recording from one of the probes was now displayed. "As you can see the base is still intact despite the detonation of the 4 Tri - Cobalt devices, there appears to be at least 550 vessels in the area, including these two unusual vessels"

"They look a lot different to the other Krenim Vessels, for a start they look more like Pyramids" The Captain looked more carefully at the screen, noticing the size. "It looks like they are over 1 Km in length, that's bigger than most of our vessels, perhaps these are allies of the Krenim?"

The Admiral presses another button, which zooms in on the image towards one of the "pyramid" vessels. "As you can see this is what puzzles us, if you look here" as he points towards the image at some writing of some sorts on the hull of the vessel, "this appears to be similar to another language from over 4,000 years ago, that of the Ancient Egyptians"

"But that's impossible though; there has been no evidence of a space faring civilisation 4,000 years ago. Unless of course these ships come from an alternate reality or something else more disturbing"

"Well Rebecca, you will have a chance to find out who these are and how they affected the Krenim. Your Mission is to find out who this race is and why they have decided to attack the Federation with the Krenim Imperium. Starfleet wants to find out as much as possible about these new enemies, their strengths and weaknesses.

During the last few months, there have been a lot of improvements with technology including several new technologies; some of these will be installed into the Sovereign over the next few days."

The Admiral handed a pad towards Captain Rebecca Montgomery who then has a quick look over of these technologies, noticing three of them in particular, Transpasic Torpedoes, Isokinetic Cannon and the Quantum Slipstream Drive.

"Yes of Course Admiral, we should have these upgrades installed with in a couple of days at most, though I shall send you an update once I have discussed this with my chief engineer for the exact time this will take"

With that the Admiral walked out of the Ready Room, and towards the transporter room where he promptly left the vessel to inspect the rest of the fleet. As the Captain walked on the bridge the viewscreen was showing the largest vessel in the area, the Excalibur. In the background a couple of crewmen were talking about its size compared to previous ships.

Krenim Advanced Invasion Outpost 1

All around the area there were several new vessels arriving from the Delta Quadrant, there were now over 2,523 vessels including massive ships. It appears as if there new allies were attempting to help them build fleets. The bulk of the Fleet were massing around the base, defending it. While at the same time, these ships were releasing several hundred weapons platforms in the areas surrounding it and their new colony within the alpha quadrant that the base is orbiting.

On board the 10 KM Krenim Flagship, Annorax was thinking out his next plan. Although with the amount of ships he would still struggle against the federation in a war, even with Chroniton torpedoes he would still need help from his newer allies. Moments later someone was at the door, it was his second in command Obrist waiting for orders.

"Sir, what are your orders. The Fleet is ready and the Shipyards are already being set up, all of the reinforcements have finally arrived."

"Prepare a small fleet; say 150 vessels to search for a patrol of Federation Vessels to see if we can take them by surprise this time"

"What of the reports of the Federation massing a fleet at one of there starbases…"

"Obrist, we have plenty of time before there is any need to do anything. Perhaps you could persuade our allies if we can loan a couple of their vessels as support just in case, and after that begin the patrols for the Federation Vessels"

"Yes sir" Obrist responded just before he walked out of the door.

Shortly after Obrist walked out of his Superior's Quarters he sent the signal for the first patrol of the nearby sectors to go ahead, with them 151 Krenim Vessels and 6 Pyramid Vessels moved out on a direction towards Federation space. At the same time several of the other Pyramid Vessels moved off, though these ships started to move off in another direction.

New Contacts

Meanwhile on Patrol near the Romulan Border, a lone Excelsior Class Starship, the USS Dover is on its last mission before decommissioning. During the last couple of weeks it hasn't detected anything other than a couple of stray comets and a rogue planet. Despite this new peace with the Romulan Star Empire, the Federation still patrol the edge of the neutral zone.

Captain William Smith, in his late 50's, has commanded the excelsior class ship for over 10 years after being promoted from first officer. He is one of those Captains that survived against both the Borg and the Dominion forces. It had been a quiet day along the Romulan border. During the Last 12 hours the Captain was in the ready room, though every now and then he would go to the bridge. Just after he had walked on to the bridge, the tactical officer shouted out "Captain, two vessels have just come out of subspace, they are two pyramid shaped vessels, and both ships are locking weapons. These ships are launching what appear to be fighters"

Two wings of fighters were now closing down on the lone Excelsior class Starship, within a couple of seconds all of the fighters opened fire. All of the hits directly hit the shields of the Dover.

"Red Alert, All hands to Battlestations." The Captain Shouted "Lt. Collins, return fire, target as many of target as many of the fighters as you can"

"Aye Sir, though these fighters alone aren't really a match for us, those bigger vessels are the problem as we don't know who they are or why they have decided to attack us" The Tactical officer managed to respond as continuous fire from the fighters was hitting the shields.

The Excelsior class vessel suddenly started moving, although not a new ship, this ship still had some fire power as it opened fire. Several Phasers were fired from the excelsior class, several of which connected with the fighters. After several moments the fighters were dropping like flies as they exploded left, right and centre. The two larger pyramid vessels were now on top of the Excelsior class vessel.

The bridge of the Dover was completely covered in smoke just as the remaining fighters had been destroyed; however this was not the end of the attack as more weapons fire erupted from the larger unknown vessels. Several missed the ship while several more directly hit the location of the impulse engines, causing a massive hull breach. At the same time all of the consoles on the bridge exploded causing crewmen to be thrown across the bridge.

"Damage Report" The Captain picking himself off the floor of the bridge, managing to shout out, noticing that his helmsman was dead and his first officer was now at the helm.

"The Impulse engines are destroyed, warp engines are offline, and we won't be able to stand many more hits like that" Lt. Collins shouted out towards the bridge crew. Moments later several of the weapons directly hit the saucer section, causing hull breaches "There are hull breaches on decks 2 – 5, force fields are in place for the time being… Captain we're being boarded, there are troops arriving in the shuttle bays, these troops are wearing helmets shaped like snakes?"

"How many of them are there, and can we block off access to the rest of the ship?" As the Captain looked towards the science officer, knowing that he had two choices, that were either destroy his ship or allow the ship to be captured.

"There are 50 humanoids, correction they appear to be humans with a symbiont within them, they have captured everything below deck 11. They appear to have some sort of weapon that appears to be a staff, and a second weapon that is smaller that can stun. The crew are managing to hold them off at deck 9, though this will not last that long considering that more of these troops are arriving in the shuttle bays." Just after Lt. Collins finished his sentence the console behind him exploded, throwing him across the floor breaking his neck, killing him instantly. This confirmed the captain's worst fears, that he only had one choice.

"Computer Activate Self-Destruct, One Minute Countdown, authorisation – Smith - Gamma, theta, epsilon, zero, nine, one, four, alpha, zeta."

Computer – "The Self Destruct function has been disabled"

72 Hours Later…

The 3rd fleet had now arrived at Starbase 66, the ships present were now totalling over 600 vessels. While the majority were destroyers and cruisers there were a minority of larger vessels, most of these ships had been refitted with the main 4 upgrades that included, Isokinetic cannons, transphasic torpedoes, armour generators and a prototype quantum slipstream drive that could be used for short journeys.

The Sovereign's upgrades were now complete; it was ready to begin its new mission finding out about these "pyramid" ships seen by long range probes. On board the Sovereign the Captain walked out of her ready room and on to the bridge where she sat at her chair. Immediately she began giving out orders to the crew, "Lt. Hales inform the other ships that we are ready to depart. Ensign Biggs retract all moorings, release docking clamps and set course for the taskforce, one quarter impulse power. Engage.

The docking clamps and moorings that were holding the Sovereign were now slowly moving away, while the Sovereign herself was powering its impulse engines and slowly began to move towards its small taskforce of 9 other vessels. The Sovereign made its way through the third fleet to enter formation with the taskforce.

Meanwhile on the Bridge, "Captain, we are in formation and the other ships are signalling that they are ready to depart". Lt hales informed the captain.

"Ensign Biggs, activate the Quantum Slipstream drive, and set a course for the co-ordinates that were given by the starbase, Lt. Wright monitor the main deflector dish as a precaution to make sure that it doesn't overload."

The only response that followed was aye sir. Shortly after the order was given, the prototype engines originally discovered by the USS Voyager had finally been redesigned into a prototype engine, however there were some drawbacks. These were that it could only be used for 40 minutes at a time before it was needed to recharge for 48 hours, though for the first trip this would take the taskforce close to their destination instead of taking 4 – 5 days.

All 11 vessels disappeared in a blink of an eye; on board the Sovereign the crew that could see out of the windows could see a wormhole like appearance as all ships were on course. Lieutenant Samantha Wright had the duty of monitoring the slipstream drive of the Sovereign making sure that it didn't overheat. It was operating normally unlike other during the painful shakedown cruise where almost everything went wrong. Just 5 minutes after the initial activation, Lt. Wright updated the Captain on the engines "Captain, the Quantum Slipstream Drive is operating with in normal parameters the advanced sensors are working well calculating the changes in the Quantum Field"

"Very well Lieutenant, keep me informed."

35 Minutes Later – Border of Federation Space

The 11 ship federation taskforce, jumped out of slipstream leaving a bright blue flash behind them. Moments later there was a single vessel in the immediate area of the ships; it was a pyramid shaped vessel. The ship began to launch all of its fighters as many as it could.

Bridge – USS Sovereign

The Captain had just come from her ready room, immediately as she was walking towards her chair at the centre of the bridge she shouted "Report".

Lt. Christopher Hales, who was currently at the tactical station quickly looked again at his console just to be sure, "Captain, sensors show one Pyramid Vessel on approach; it is heavily armed but no match for all 10 ships. The weapons appear to be powered by an unknown energy signature; it is a material that the Federation has not seen before. Captain they are launching fighters, and they are heading towards the taskforce!"

"Red Alert, All hands to battlestations." The Captain shouted, one moment later the lights around the bridge suddenly became darker, just as the red alert lights around the bridge flashed red on and off. "Lt. Hales, lock weapons on the fighters, and prepare to fire but only if they fire first. Open a Channel to the Pyramid Vessel"

"This is Captain Rebecca Montgomery of the USS Sovereign, to Unknown vessel, you have entered Federation space, please identify yourselves and your reasons for your hostile actions towards the United Federation of Planets and her allies."

"Captain we are receiving a response, though it is not from the ship that is approaching. However it is being transferred through this ship, putting it on screen" Lt. Hales moments later pressed a couple of buttons. The main view screen changed from a view of the pyramid vessel to that of a human on a throne like seat, with two flame torches on either side of him

"You will pay for your insolence, Tau'ri. Surrender and Bow down before your GOD… Apophis." Moments later the transmission was ended.

Shortly after the transmission ended the fighters opened fire towards the lead vessel that happened to be the Sovereign. Moments after that the Federation Ships returned fire, most of the fighters were destroyed by several phaser beams that directly hit them head on. Although the fighters were being taken out like flies, several of the Fighters were still firing at the shields of various federation ships.

Bridge of USS Sovereign

"Captain the Fighters are no match for any of our ships, though the remaining 5 are difficult to destroy. These must be the elite fighters of the ship. The Pyramid Vessel is in weapons range, they are firing towards the Atlantis…direct hit, and their shields are down to 75 and dropping." Lt. Hales quickly shouted out.

"Inform the Fleet to ignore the fighters and open fire towards the Capital vessel try to disable them" The Captain looked towards the tactical display on her arm panel, showing the 11 Federation ships and the Pyramid in the Centre. "Destroy all of the turrets on that vessel"

"Perhaps if test the new weapons, maybe these would be more affective against this Pyramid Like vessel" Commander Damien Ronson Suggested towards the Captain.

"Not Yet, although I agree it is tempting to do so, using them would give them reason to call for reinforcements or possibly retreat before we can disable them." The Captain Reminded her First Officer.

The Battle Continues

The Federation Task Force started to move in formation towards the Pyramid Vessel. The Atlantis, Agamemnon, Centaur and Strood were the closest to the pyramid vessel and fired several phaser beams towards the ship. All of which directly hit the shield of the Pyramid causing the shield to glow for a few moments. A couple of seconds later the other 7 Federation Vessels opened fire using only phasers in attempt to collapse the shields, including the newer phaser arrays of the USS Excalibur the shields of the Pyramid did not hold for very long as several dozen beams penetrated its shields hitting sections of the outer hull.

The Pyramid was still firing towards random vessels, several shots managed to hit the shields of at least 5 vessels. The Centaur was firing phasers taking out several of the turrets as it passed, moments later several of the Turrets still operational managed to fire towards the Centaur. Its shields did not last very long, as several of the blasts directly hit the hull. Its port Nacelle was cleanly ripped off the hull causing a blue stream to "leak" out of the hull. The Centaur managed to move off, though it could never go to warp again with out the port Nacelle. The Nacelle drifted away from the battle still mostly intact.

After several volleys of phaser fire, all of the turrets were disabled, a couple of seconds after the turrets were disabled or destroyed several photon torpedoes directly hit the underside of the pyramid causing hull damage and at the same time damaging their hyperspace engines.

The Bridge of the Sovereign

"Captain the Pyramid Vessel has been disabled" Reported Lt. Commander Howard "The Excalibur reports that it is sending over five security teams in an attempt to secure the vessel, however there are a lot of troops on board. The Excalibur reports that they are also using heavier weapons than the standard type 3 phaser rifles."

"That was quick, perhaps we should start sending over teams before any of there reinforcements arrive" Commander Ronson was quick to reply, looking towards the Captain. "At least 20 security officers would be needed for a mission like this, since it would be difficult to take and I doubt they would surrender easily."

"Commander you can lead the Away teams" The Captain Looked towards her first officer. "Commander take Lt. Hales with you, you will need him, and also you have authorisation to use photon grenades though only if needed."

"Aye Captain" The Commander Looked around the bridge. "Lt. you heard the Captain, Ensigns Harris and Sanders you are with me". The Commander and the other officers walked off the bridge into a turbolift.

As they arrived at the armoury, Commander Ronson passed a photon grenade launcher to Lt Hales, then said "Since your record shows that your are more than qualified to use this, I'm giving you the responsibility to use this, though only under my orders."

"Aye Sir." Lt Hales responded quickly, while putting the weapon on his back.

All of the members of the Security teams were each taking a standard type II phaser, and a type IV phaser rifle. There were 3 people that also had the photon launchers other than Lt. Hales; these were the most experienced weapons officers on board the sovereign.

5 Minutes Later – Goa'uld Vessel near the Cargo Bay

Several Jaffa were around the vessel replacing equipment, while others were guarding key areas of the ship to prevent the boarding Starfleet Security officers from taking one of the key systems. The Jaffa were using their staff weapons against the federation forces at several areas of the ship, including the Cargo Bays and the Glider Bays. At this time only half of the security teams had boarded the vessel.

The Sovereigns crew had suddenly beamed in to the Cargo bay, to a location behind the Jaffa in an attempt to take them by surprise; Lt Christopher Hales used his photon grenade launcher to take out several jaffa with a massive explosion. The Sovereign's security teams quickly took control of the cargo bay and began to use it as a staging area. All of the teams used this spot for planning, moments after capturing the Cargo bay, several teams moved out to try and take the rest of the ship; these were met with heavy resistance.

Within several areas of the Pyramid ship, there were Staff weapons, Zat'nik'tel weapons, as well phaser rifles being fired in all directions. Over the whole vessel there were a lot of fire fights between the Jaffa and the Starfleet officers, though the Starfleet Officers were taking casualties from taking hits by staff weapons. These crew were quickly beamed back to their ships very quickly. After about 20 minutes several of the main areas had been captured, including the glider bay, cargo bay and the engineering equivalent of their vessel.

Commander Ronson's team had managed to find his way towards what appeared to be the bridge. There were 4 Jaffa and 1 Goa'uld sitting on what appeared to be a throne. The Security team immediately began firing as soon as they went into the room; two of the security team had been hit by staff weapons and were killed. The Jaffa were quickly dealt with as they were hit by phaser beams.

The ship was taken over quickly after that point as the Goa'uld was taken prisoner, along with several of the Jaffa that survived the surprise attack. Something unexpected happened moments later that no one else could see. One of the Jaffa that was carrying a Goa'uld Symbiont, suddenly lost it as it managed to escape and enter through the mouth of Commander Ronson taking over him almost immediately, though still acted as if he was Commander Ronson. Shortly afterwards the Security teams were beamed back on board, leaving a skeleton crew on board of the Pyramid to repair the Hyperdrive to take the ship back to Starfleet command.

Transporter room

Just after Commander Ronsons Team materialised on board, several phaser rifles were pointed straight towards him, this was mainly because the Transporter chief had detected the Goa'uld at the back of his neck. Commander Ronson realising that he had been discovered started speaking in a deeper voice after grabbing nearby Ensign Harris and using him as a shield. "Transport me back to my ship now, or he will die".

Chief Neilson behind the transporter controls quickly pressed several buttons and shortly afterwards he was transported straight towards the Brig, where he could not do any harm to any one.

"Chief Neilson to Bridge, we have a problem. It appears that Commander Ronson has been taken over by a parasite…"

"Keep him in the Brig until further notice; how many of the Jaffa were beamed to the holding area?

"About 22 of them including another human with the same parasite within his neck, I pursue that these parasites control a human as their own, while the host is tortured from within" The Transporter Chief responded.

The Captain said through the comms system. "I'm on my way"

Brig – USS Sovereign

The Captain and several security officers including Lt. Hales walked into the brig, walked towards the cell holding the man who was obviously incharge, he was a Goa'uld or a Goa'uld that had used the man as a host. Just as he saw the Captain, he immediately stood up and his eyes glowed. "You are the Captain of this ship?"

"Yes I am, who are you, and why does your race take over humans?"

"You will pay for your impudence, when Apophis finds out what you the Tau'ri have done to this ship; you will face the consequences and bow down before your god…" Shortly afterwards the Goa'uld's eyes glowed again.

"Well we shall soon see, after you have been taken out of your host, then we will find out the truth. Lt Hales take this person to the medical bay and inform the doctor of what is to be done." The Captain managed to say, just before she walked to her first officer or what another of these had parasites had taken over him had done to him. Lt Hales walked out of the brig pointing a weapon towards the Goa'uld as he walked towards sickbay.

"Commander are you, alright" The Captain asked and to her surprise he replied with his voice.

"This thing is fighting for control over me; I don't think it was yet mature enough to take a host as yet". The Commander was struggling with his words as moments later, his eyes glowed "You will bow down before your GOD…" Though just before he could mention his name the Commander collapsed.

"Medical Emergency, two to beam directly to sick bay" The Captain quickly shouted.

The Commander and the Captain were quickly transported to sickbay, to be greeted by several of medical staff. The doctor was quick to put him into the surgical area, ready to remove the parasite. Then looked towards the Captain and said, "Captain this may take some time, I will inform you when this is complete."

Main Bridge – USS Sovereign

The Captain had walked onto the bridge after her encounter with the Goa'uld. She wandered about the newly captured vessel, and if there were any more of them.

Lt. Commander Howard, who was at his usual station, immediately informed the Captain of the latest information "Captain, the Goa'uld vessel is completely under our control. The team on board have found some information about this Apophis, it appears as if he has been killed several times, and more recently has managed to survive his ship crashing into a planet along with some sort of techno bugs called replicators. However there is nothing mentioned other than they replicate to survive."

"Interesting, though what does this have to do with the Goa'uld and the Krenim" Captain Rebecca Montgomery replied quickly "Is there any mention of the word – Tau'ri?"

"Yes there is, it is their word for humans, specifically the humans from Earth. The records about earth are confusing however; they are recent but show earth as in the year 2002.

"Alternate reality?" Lt Hales who had just returned from sickbay, looking towards the Captain, noting that he had just walked into a conversation.

"Despite that these humans are of the early 21st centaury they appear to have discovered some technologies far beyond our knowledge, though this data on the Tau'ri is very limited as the ship that Apophis used to attack earth was destroyed." A shocked Lt. Commander Quinn Howard replied quickly. "Perhaps a science team could be used to look into this data further?"

That sounds like a good idea, "Lt. Wright, this is your project now, I would like you to find out as much data as you can about these Tau'ri and the history of the Goa'uld"

"Aye Sir" Lt Samantha Wright quickly replied, while moments later walked off the bridge towards the turbolift.

"Lt. Hales, report." The Captain looking towards the Chief of Security "Status of the Centaur and the Goa'uld vessel"

"The Centaur's warp engine has been successfully been reattached though cannot go faster than warp 5 and can still use its Quantum Slipstream drive. The Ha'tak hyperdrive is now fully functional and is on its way to Starbase 66…" Just before he could finish his sentence the red alert suddenly came on "Captain we have a problem, there are 50 Krenim Vessels on approach, including 3 Ha'tak class vessels we are surrounded."

"Red Alert, All hands to battlestations" The Captain Quickly shouted out loud, "Lt. Hales, Activate the hull armour, power up the Isokinetic cannons, arm the Transphasic torpedoes, lock weapons and prepare to fire.

"Aye Captain, weapons looked" Lt Hales, shocked after looking at the console again. "Captain there are now 151 Krenim vessels, 6 Ha'tak pyramids, 12 smaller ships identified as Al'Kesh mid range bombers, and several fighters that are called Death Gliders. We are being hailed, by Apophis."

Apophis appeared on the viewscreen, and began to speak in his deep voice showing that he was a goa'uld. "YOUR IMPUTENCE WILL NOT BE TOLERATED TAU'RI, BOW DOWN BEFORE YOUR GOD OR BE DESTROYED"

TO BE CONTINUED…