As the Starfleet vessel banked hard and accelerated back toward the convoy of human ships, its weapons now focused on alternate targets, Major Talok let himself relax. Alarms were still sounding throughout the IRW Belak and the stench of smoke was heavy in the air. Small electrical fires were burning from where overloaded panels had exploded and two crewmen were hard at work trying to extinguish them. Ten more seconds and the shields would have completely collapsed under the force of Starfleet firepower.
With a groan, Commander Xerius climbed back to his feet, all but collapsing into the command chair. Blood trickled down his face and he winced with pain as he touched the leaking scalp wound. Sensing Talok's eyes on him, the commander gave the major a dark look before barking a command.
"Damage report!" he bellowed, unnecessarily loud, and Talok struggled to keep his expression even. He loathed Xerius, and hated serving aboard this ship, but he had no choice.
Valdore had seen to that.
"Shields at eight percent," Talok responded calmly, his attention seemingly focused on the damage control console before him. "Minor structural damage along the aft quarter." He gave Xerius a cold look. "Maneuvering thrusters are out." For a long moment, the commander glared at Talok, seething fury and hatred in his eyes.
To Talok, such expressions from his crewmates had become almost routine and expected. His position as a disgraced Infiltrator in the Tal Shiar was common knowledge among the crew of the Belak, and his appointment as executive officer at the direct command of Admiral Valdore had displaced a popular officer. Commander Xerius had never concealed his disdain for Talok, and the ex-Infilitrator suspected it was he who had revealed the major's links to the Tal Shiar; how Xerius had found out was another matter entirely. In the month since his appointment to the Belak, Talok had survived three separate assassination attempts and, although he had no proof, he knew all three had been orchestrated by the commander.
"Get them back online!" Xerius snarled, swinging his attention to his communications officer. "I want a status report at once!" he demanded, wiping the blood from his face as he spoke. His eyes on the sensor feed, Talok pushed back his disgust at the man's overreaction.
Already, the Starfleet vessel was hot in pursuit of the Koderex and the Dividices, and Talok had to salute the humans for their ingenuity thus far. The mine that damaged the IRW Makar had been surprise enough, but the sudden attack by what appeared to be an Orion Syndicate gunboat had been completely unexpected. Even now, the gunboat dueled with the Genorex and the Haakona; the damage it was inflicting was negligible, but it was proving to be enough of a harassment that Talok fully expected one of those ships to focus on eliminating it.
Destruction of the Makar had confirmed one thing, however; the human transporting device, which Tal Shiar scientists were even now attempting to reverse-engineer, gave them an incredible tactical advantage, one which they had been able to exploit nearly at once. From his board, Talok had detected the transmission stream from the Starfleet vessel mere seconds before the explosion and had been stunned at how dangerous such a weapon could be. Shields seemed to defeat the matter transporter, but the major kept a cautious eye on the sensors just in case.
The Starfleet vessel - Endeavour by its markings - dove toward the convoy, weapons flashing. Dividices absorbed the brunt of the assault and Talok winced with remembered sympathy. Photonic torpedoes exploded against the Dividices' protective force screen, and the power of those detonations rocked the smaller craft. Wheeling into a spinning climb, Dividices darted into the panicked convoy of human ships, no doubt hoping to gain some sort of cover from the relentless assault, even as the Koderex and the Haakona retaliated against the Starfleet ship. Disruptor beams lanced out, splashing across the nearly invisible defensive shield, and a pair of torpedoes flashed forward.
Incredibly, Endeavour's shields held under their attack.
A dozen of the human ships, all clearly modified, suddenly pounced on the Haakona as she attacked the maneuvering Starfleet vessel. Disruptor beams, plasma bolts and pulsed lasers flashed through the void, outlining a brilliant image of the Haakona's shields; the Orion gunboat twisted into view, spitting a pair of low-powered torpedoes at the larger ship. Its shields suddenly stressed under the unexpected assault from multiple quarters, Haakona responded with a brutal barrage of firepower that hammered into the human ships, destroying four and crippling a fifth in a matter of seconds.
Too late, the Haakona's captain remembered Endeavour.
A salvo of high-yield photonic torpedoes raced from the Starfleet vessel, exploding against the Haakona's shields with devastating force that overloaded the field generators almost at once. Streams of phase cannon fire punched through the collapsing shields, stitching angry gashes across the smaller craft's hull. Hull plating melted under the attack and an explosion of molten metal rained out from the ship; a second salvo of torpedoes pounded into the Haakona, detonating against the hull with horrific results. Leaking atmosphere and bodies, the Haakona went into a steep dive, twisting and spinning in a vain effort to evade Endeavour's assaults. More phase fire lanced out, slicing into the port nacelle with the casual ease of a laser through bread. An explosion of plasma and warp coolant erupted forth.
Talok's console beeped and he swept his eyes over the incoming data. Glancing back at Xerius, he found the commander pressing a stained cloth to his scalp wound and frowning at the data display of the battle.
"Maneuvering thrusters are online," Talok announced, his lack of honorific a calculated insult that Xerius noted at once.
"Get us back into the fight," the commander ordered his helmsman. On the main sensor display, Endeavour was relentless, pounding Haakona with attack after attack; under the withering assault the smaller craft began to disintegrate, breaking apart into great chunks of burning debris.
"Incoming transmission from the D'ridthau," the communications officer abruptly announced, and Talok frowned. The D'ridthau was Admiral Vrax's command ship and had been lurking at the edge of the battle, ostensibly to better direct the assault; but Talok knew better.
Vrax was afraid.
Ejected from the Senate for his role in the droneship fiasco, Vrax had entered the military in an attempt to redeem himself. Despite the disgrace, he was given the rank of Admiral and offered command of a strike group. Made up of older ships originally slated for decommission, this squadron was clearly meant to be Vrax's death, but his own influence and wealth had allowed him to arrange for considerable upgrades. Without these upgrades, they would hardly stand a chance against a ship like Endeavour.
For six months, Vrax's strike group had been terrorizing human shipping lanes throughout this entire sector, destroying dozens of ships in the process and nearly single-handedly bringing interstellar commerce to a standstill; it was patently obvious that Vrax was trying to reclaim the respect he had lost by burying his previous failure in glory. Having somehow escaped blame for his role in the droneship failure, Admiral Valdore had noted Vrax's efforts with some concern.
That was where Talok came in.
As an Infiltrator, the major had the skills necessary to penetrate Vrax's command structure to monitor the admiral and, if necessary, eliminate him. At the time Valdore contacted him, Talok's failure with the Vulcan V'Las was hardly common knowledge, but somehow the admiral had known and had offered him an opportunity for redemption. The plan that Talok devised had been a simple one: establish himself as an efficient military adviser in order to get close to the admiral. His assignment as the executive officer for the Belak had complicated matters slightly, but he had been confident that it was a minor setback at best; the moment he stepped aboard the warship, however, Talok knew that his position had been compromised. Only fear of the Tal Shiar kept most of the crew from assaulting him.
"D'ridthau orders Belak to move against the station," the communications officer said after deciphering the encrypted transmission. Neutrino tightbeams were still the preferred means of communication, but in situations such as these it was necessary to encrypt the actual message.
"Send: acknowledge and comply," Xerius commanded. He suddenly smiled, a cold and terrible expression that held no remorse or pity. "Major Talok," he said, the emphasis on Talok's Tal Shiar rank loud, "prepare an assault team." Icy tendrils of fear crept up the major's spine as Xerius continued. "I will grant you the glory of taking the station." Giving his superior officer a tight nod, Talok turned back to his duties, recognizing that assassination attempt number four was beginning.
He had hoped to avoid this sort of situation.