A/N: Huzzah! A new chapter of Yield Point, just for you, my readers!* I'm so glad to be getting back into this story, and thanks again to my good friends Kretolus and DrZevil, who offer their help, advice, and support!** Enjoy!
*- both of you.
**- Most of the time, when they aren't being a pair of unhelpful idiots. (love you really, guys!)
Given the journey to Starbase 82 would take several hours, and that Azhasca was emotionally and physically drained, the new captain had opted to get some rest - with some much-needed coercion from Bobbi, of course. The concept of sleep still scared her, perhaps even more so now, but she recognised the need to try.
Once again, she awoke screaming, her body drenched in terrified sweat.
She swung her legs out of her bunk, running her hands through her soaking hair, and tried to fight the urge to cry. The tears were already flowing when she realised she'd failed, and she gave full vent to her emotions as she sobbed into her hands.
She thought she'd been making progress. Recovering from the trauma of a Borg attack was a long process for most, but she felt she was making strides, and between her dearest friend, a crew she knew she could count on, and a job she'd proven to be damned good at, Azhasca felt she had made huge advances in her treatment.
But now that she was back in command of a ship again, going back to the front lines, it was all coming back to her worse than ever - now, current friends and crew were among the faces of the dead and assimilated in her dreams, her new ship the one attacked.
She fought back a fresh cry of anguish as one such image flashed in her mind, an image of Womers being injected in the neck by a Borg Drone, the nanoprobes already at work in his body as he reached out to her, begging her to end him. She knew she'd been too harsh on Womers, and while she had meant what she said to him while working on the Hades, she knew she'd been too harsh. Azh knew that she cared for Elliot, but she refused to subject him to a relationship with a broken woman...a woman who was now likely to never recover fully.
Eventually, she scrubbed her eyes and moved over to the replicator, sniffing and trying not to cry yet again.
"Romulan ale," she told the machine, resting her head against the wall of her quarters. The replicator emitted an error tone, and she slapped the display panel as she snarled the request again. The same error tone sounded, and this time she punched the machine, doing more damage to her hand than the replicator.
"Fine, you fucking...A glass of Chateau Picard," she ordered, nursing her bruised knuckles, and when the error tone sounded yet again she threw one of her boots at it and slumped into a chair, fumbling around for her commbadge.
"Pezhal to Commander Lehar," she said, her voice still shaking. After a lengthy pause, Bobbi answered, sounding half asleep herself.
"Azh? Wha' the' fu- Honey, iss fucking three in the morning!"
"Were asleep too?" Azh snapped. "Who was on bridge duty?!"
"Lt. Commander Pekeez," Bobbi answered wearily. "You know, the Second Officer you chose?"
"Just come here will you," Azh snarled, then calmed herself. "Please?"
There was something about the plea in Azh's tone that Bobbi couldn't help but answer, and she sighed heavily.
"Give me a couple minutes to get dressed, I'll be there shortly."
The commbadge chirped as Bobbi closed the link, and Azh spent the next few minutes trying to ignore the cruel images flashing through her mind.
Eventually the door chime sounded, and Azh merely shouted at the door to open.
"I came as soon as I could," Bobbi said as the door closed behind her, plunging the room back into darkness. "What's wrong?"
"The fucking replicator won't give me a drink."
Bobbi stared at her in annoyed silence for several moments.
"That's why you woke me in the middle of the fucking night? I thought you'd been crying or something!"
"I have," Azh answered, sniffing again wiping her eyes with the sleeve of her uniform that was draped over the back of her chair.
"Oh, honey, I'm so sorry," Bobbi said, hurrying to her side and giving her friend a tight hug. "I'm so sorry I yelled. The dreams again?"
Azh nodded.
"But they're worse now, like...like coming back has re-opened old wounds. I just..I just wanted a drink, but the fucking…"
Azh broke down into sobs again, not because of the replicator but because of the safety she felt with Bobbi, and the Commander got up and went to check the offending device.
"Two large Raktajinos, hot."
The replicator beeped and promptly complied, and two steaming mugs of Raktajino appeared in the receptacle.
"Seems to work fine to me," Bobbi said, passing one of the mugs to Azhasca. "What were you asking for? No, wait, let me guess - Romulan ale."
Azh glared at her silently, sipping the raktajino as she did.
"What did you do to my replicator?"
"I made sure that you, a newly-minted Captain of Starfleet, can't sabotage yourself on the job by crawling into a bottle."
"Why?!" Azh almost shouted. "You know that is all I have to keep the nightmares from tearing me up at night!"
"You have me, Azh."
"No I don't!" Azh slammed her glass down so hard it almost cracked, and Bobbi looked wounded by the implication. "How can I 'have you', Bobbi? Hm? I can't bring you into my quarters at night, even when we both have the same off-duty hours, because how the fuck would that look to the crew? And I can't just cry into your shoulder either, because again, the crew." Tears began to trail down Azh's cheeks once more, and for the first time she realised how much more she had lost over the years. "You've always been there for me, Bobbi, always been my rock, and now...now by virtue of rank I can't even have that, at the time I feel most afraid."
Bobbi pulled her close as Azh broke down again, softly stroking her hair until the latest round of sobs died down, then gently pulled away and rested her hands on her friend's shoulders.
"Listen, Azh. I'm your First Officer, your right-hand man - woman - and I will always be here for you. I may be your ex-girlfriend, but I'm still your friend, and I will always make time for you. I love you dearly, Azh, always have, always will. I'd move heaven and Earth for you if that's what it took..but I will also kick your ass when you need it, and believe me when I say the drink. Isn't. Helping. We need you sharp and clear, you understand?"
Azh nodded, kissing Bobbi on the cheek and wiping her eyes again.
"Yeah, alright, I get it." She chuckled weakly, and began walking back to her bunk. "Stop staring at my ass as well, and fuck off back to your own quarters."
"What can I say? I miss that ass," Bobbi answered with a laugh. "You know, I still remember that time we-"
"Out, you vile harlot," Azh shouted through her pillow, chuckling. Trust Bobbi to make her laugh right after crying her eyes out…
"Alright Captain, see you in the morning, bright and early," Bobbi called into the dark, as the door opened at her approach. "Love you loads, Azh."
"Love you too, now fuck off back to bed!"
Bobbi giggled to herself and left at last, and as Azh's door hissed closed once more the young captain heaved a content sigh.
"Thanks, Bobbi," she said into the darkness. "I owe you more than you know."
With that she turned over, and attempted to get a few extra hours of sleep before she was back on duty.
She was still afraid, but now she felt able to function again.
Another four hours later, Azh stepped onto the bridge again, her back straight, exuding a confidence she didn't feel as she walked to her chair. Bobbi was already on the bridge, sipping another raktajino as she went over the night's reports.
"How are we looking, Bobbi?" Azh asked, mentally willing herself to stop gripping her armrests so tight.
"Well you look like shit, but the ship and crew are on top form," the red-head answered with a laugh, earning her a scowl from her friend.
"Thanks for the vote of confidence, " Azh told her, although there was no real malice in her tone. She'd known Bobbi for long enough to know when she was playing and when she was sincere, and eventually her resolve cracked as she laughed at the banter.
"Thanks, Bobbi," she said at last, "I couldn't make it through this without you."
"Yeah, you could," Bobbi answered. "I'm just here to be your counselor more than anything."
Azh smirked, but declined to respond this time, instead, checking the readouts on her terminal.
"Miss Viirtali, how long until we reach Starbase 82?"
The dark-skinned officer checked her own panel with a glance.
"Another five minutes, ma'am."
Azh nodded and thanked her, then turned to her First Officer.
"Bobbi, take us to red alert. Tactical, charge weapons and load torpedoes, and raise shields. I want to be ready for anything that might be loitering around the base."
Toski gave a confident "yes, ma'am," and proceeded to comply, still wary of what was going on with the admiralty that dared to throw his captain into the position.
"Pezhal to Engineering," Azh stated, trying to find anything to talk about with any department in order to stave off her rising panic.
"Engineering here, uh, ma'am. Womers...uh...here."
Azh rolled her eyes.
"We'll be dropping out of warp in approximately four minutes," she said, hoping her voice still sounded confident. "We don't know what to expect here, so...just keep us together on your end, and I'll do what I can on mine."
There was a momentary pause, as Womers tried to figure out what to say.
"Yes ma'am," he said eventually, "you can count on us."
"I know, Elliot. Pezhal out." She focused her attention on her helm officer once again. "Viirtali?"
"Aye ma'am, four minutes until we drop out of warp."
"Good. I want us moving as soon as we drop to impulse, in case we need to evade."
"Aye ma'am."
Azh nodded, content that all was as ready as it could be.
Now she just had to wait for four minutes.
Precisely four minutes later, the Phoenix slammed back into existence, her impulse engines flaring as Viirtali did as she was ordered.
Azh was already staring at the viewscreen, fighting the rising sense of terror as she saw the space around Starbase 82 tinged a sickly green.
"What...is that?" she asked, her hand shaking as she pointed to a small, dark object near the base.
The ops officer entered a command into his console and the viewscreen flickered, suddenly showing the object in full size.
Azh let out a strangled sob as she stared at the dark, metallic surface of the very herald of all her nightmares, the immense Borg Cube dwarfing even the Phoenix.
As if on cue, the comm channel crackled and whined with static before a voice spoke, freezing Azh to her seat with utter horror.
"We are Borg. Lower your shields and surrender your ships. We will add your biological and technological distinctiveness to our own. Your culture will adapt to service us. Resistance is futile."
"I'm reading multiple Borg vessels on an intercept course, multiple vectors!" Toski called out, but still Azh was frozen. Her every nightmare was coming true at once, her eyes wide in terror, beads of sweat forming on her forehead, tears already trailing down her cheeks.
"Viirtali, evasive manoeuvers!" Bobbi yelled. "Toski, open fire the minute they're in range!"
The ship groaned as Viirtali threw the ship into an evasive pattern, but there was a limit to how effective such manoeuvres would be - the Phoenix was a huge ship, and as such was far from agile.
"Borg vessels entering attack range," Toski announced, his own anger spiking. "Firing!"
A volley of crimson beams lanced out at the nearest Borg vessel, a smaller, longer class known as a Probe. Almost all of the shots hit, doing little structural damage but clawing at the vessel's shields...but it wasn't the only volley.
As soon as Toski was sure of a target lock, he went to continuous fire with the beam arrays, hammering the Probe relentlessly, until at last its shields broke and the beams began carving deep into the Borg ship's hull. A short moment later it exploded, and Toski targeted the next ship...but the Borg were in range for their own weapons, as well.
The Phoenix shuddered and lurched as beams lanced into her from several directions, and Azh threw herself to the floor as she began to scream.
