USS Alexia

Alexia class Strike Carrier

NCC-61667

Rei had entered what was called "condition black." She was lost, staring blankly at the view screen. All around Alexia, debris and shrapnel from what used to be the premier force of the Orion Space Navy was floating in pieces. Over twenty thousand lives, gone in the blink of an eye.

Kayla recognized the condition instantly, augmented reflexes aside. Marine training strongly emphasized check ins for "state of readiness" for the mental abilities of each fighting Marine. But the concept worked equally well for Starfleet.

There wasn't time for field combat counselling. Kayla needed to act.

"I'm taking command of the ship. Helm, full impulse! Get us in transporter range of Corsair. Comms, copy in Worf and tell her to keep us covered. Tactical, target her shield grids and get me a vector onboard!"

"Aye Major!" everyone responded. The ship moved forward seconds later. Alexia lashed out with all of her remaining weapons, filling the darkness of space with the light of phasers from her strips and cannons. She'd exhausted her torpedoes, but Kayla's calculations suggested that she'd have enough in the tank to get the job done.

Worf raced in from behind the ship and added her own volley of disruptors and plasma torpedoes to the fury. Green, red, orange streaks raced across and slammed into Corsair's shields, rippling the bulbous olive-coloured carrier in explosions and flames. Out of date and sluggish, Corsair's defenses were proving to be no match so far.

"Her shields are taking a beating Major. One more pass ought to do it!" Logan shouted from tactical.

Kayla looked at her console and confirmed Logan's report. She was about to order a new pass, when the entire ship rocked hard with a sudden impact.

Lights died in the bridge, while consoles shot out with sparks and debris. Artificial gravity failed momentarily, and the crew were knocked off their feet. Kayla quickly got back up and helped Rei back to her feet, hoping to snap her out of con-black.

"Rei! Wake up, we need you here!"

Rei stared blankly ahead at the view screen. In laymen's terms, the lights were on, but no one was home.

Kayla ran through the options in her mind. She couldn't hit Rei without risking both a Starfleet Cat-Six discharge and a Marine DD. Calling Kizuna up from sickbay to relieve her would take too much time, and lead to even more questions from Beaufort and San Francisco. No, there was only one move to make here.

Kayla seized Rei by her collar, hauled her face close, and kissed her a with a mix of urgency, desperation and genuine attraction. She held Rei for a long moment, wrapping her arms around her and nearly pushing her jaw in. After forever, Kayla shoved Rei back into her seat and held her face firmly.

"Hey! You here?!" she shouted at the Captain. Rei blinked several times, and then suddenly snapped back to reality.

"Wha-what?! Did you just kiss me?"

"Yeah, I did. Now wake up! The ship is crippled!"

Rei instantly snapped back to life. She pulled her Captain's console over to her seat and quickly looked over the reports. A tachyon disruption beam had hit Alexia. Such a weapon hadn't been used for over a decade. Since the battle of Vulcan.

"Logan!" she shouted, "Get our Kinshya guest up here. I think he might be able to help us!"

─•~:~•─

Viskeyra walked as quickly as he could. Walking on an Unclean ship was difficult. There was weight to the air around him that he couldn't explain. He had the Priors call it gravity, a force that the Unclean claimed was all around everywhere, except for the Darkness. It could not be seen, smelt or touched, but it weighed, and it felt upon his fur.

The force made it difficult to walk. It weighed his steps. Each movement took a great deal of effort, tiring his already injured body. Viskeyra dug deep and pushed on, led to the heart of Alexia by two of their Marines, wearing the sinful metal armour of battle. He held his tongue, though the sight made him sick to his stomach.

He entered the heart and felt the bright lights all but blind him. But the First Sword of the Unclean's Marines – Kayla was her name – approached him quickly. "Viskeyra, sorry to haul you out of bed. Your records said you'd served with the Templars, right?"

"I did, yes."

"Can you fix this?"

Viskeyra looked at the console that Kayla was pointing at. The coder was able to quickly translate the strange lettering of the Unclean, he was in turn able to make sense of the words. A tachyon disruption generator, the very same that his mentor Salatiz had used in battle only a few Cycles of the Solar March ago.

"You will need to deploy a reverse pulse. Do you have such technology?"

Kayla nodded. Her hands again went to work quickly at the science console. Viskeyra couldn't track her movements. What member of the Unclean could move with such speed?

But it still wasn't enough. "This is taking longer than I thought Rei, I'm not gonna be able to get the pulse up before Corsair locks on us again!"

But suddenly, as though in answer to Kayla's prayers, Worf charged in at her adversary.

─•~:~•─

Eyos wondered if this is what Father felt like during a glorious battle. The adrenaline rush certainly felt glorious.

For whatever reason, the tachyon disruption beam that had crippled Alexia had failed to make an impact on Worf. And now the Klingon battlecruiser was the only effective combatant in the area.

Worf dodged and weaved through a myriad of incoming fire, with Corsair pouring endless disruptors, missiles, and torpedoes through the blackness of space towards her enemy. While Worf had the armour and shield power to absorb the impact, her true strength was in his agility. Worf moved in a manner completely opposite to a Klingon, with grace and elegance.

Eyos held onto her command seat as the helmsman brought the ship fully over, rolling through a barrage of disruptor fire sent towards the ship. The gunner returned the favour, lacing the large Orion carrier with green plasma disruptor bolts. The bolts slammed into the carrier one after the other but failed to make any noticeable impact.

Worf brought himself up and over the target, preparing to make another pass, when a massive impact slammed his underside, throwing Eyos from her chair.

"What was that?!" she asked to the bridge.

The crew scrambled, but the Science Officer was able to answer back after a long few moments. "A tetryon burst, Captain. They were trying to disable as they did Alexia, but our counter measures were able to dissipate the effects."

Eyos thought for a long moment, confused by the report. Why would they try something twice that doesn't work?

Another heavy bolt rocked Worf in space. Eyos quickly looked over her status readouts. Power levels were holding steady. Impulse, weapons, sensors…

Shields!

The realization hit her stomach like a closed fist. Eyos had been looking at the wrong reports. While the tetryon disruptors were unable to affect Klingon power systems and cripple the ship like Corsair had done to Alexia, they were slowly – and almost invisibly, had Eyos not had the presence of mind to look – draining power to her shield grids.

Another bolt jerked the ship hard. Eyos watched the shield strength counter drop to just under 15%.

"Tactical, transfer all power to reserve shields and—" Eyos started to order, but too late.

A final tetryon bolt hit Worf on his underside. And Eyos watched with cold horror as the shields failed, seconds before a quantum torpedo followed the bolts.

She wasn't ready for the impact. The entire ship jolted and bucked like a Targ would buck an unwelcome rider. Eyos was thrown off her feet and slammed her head into a deck plate. The bitter taste of her blood draining from her forehead frustrated and shocked her, compelling Eyos to pick herself off the deck.

"Damage report!" she shouted to the bridge.

No one answered her. Consoles and power taps shot out in sparks all around her, wounding and killing her crew. She would have to save herself this time. Eyos walked in pain to her operations console and looked over her status board. Weapons, sensors, shields, all gone. And Corsair was seconds from generating a lock on Alexia.

"Kayla, can you hear me?!" she shouted into her comm.

"You okay sis?! Looks like your ship took a nasty hit," Kayla's voice answered.

"I won't be for long. All that's left are my engines. You'll need to beam me off exactly when I tell you to!"

"I've got it. Set your course!"

Eyos ran to the helm, threw the controls over as hard as they could go, and took a deep breath as Worf raced towards his enemy. The ships drew agonizingly close together, and a small part of Eyos worried that her adopted human sister wouldn't be fast enough to rescue her from certain death.

But just as she swore she could Father again, her body went weightless and the calming blue of a Federation transporter beam formed around Eyos. While mostly elated, a part of Eyos couldn't help but feel sad. She'd have to wait to see her father Mor again.

─•~:~•─

The bridge crew stood in silence, both out of respect and shock. Worf, on fire from stem to stern and being held together by hopes and dreams, raced across the blackness of space. A few seconds later, the smaller Klingon battlecruiser crashed through Corsair's shields and slammed into the carrier at her midsection, wreathing the larger ship in a large, violent explosion and creating a massive hole in her starboard hull.

Kayla's mind reacted even faster. Her target's shields were down, and Alexia's systems had just come back online. This would be her only chance.

"Alexia 1-9 to all call signs Alexia. Standby for flash transport. Con 1 carry, weapons free! Lets get 2-7 home!"

Kayla quickly armoured up and retrieved an XR-120 rifle from the nearby weapons locker. As she loaded her magazine into the well, a large hand on her shoulder stopped her in her tracks.

"With your permission, Abbott Kayla, might I join the effort?" Viskeyra asked.

Again, her mind went to work faster than most people could even begin to process the thought. The Kinshya Sword Abbotts were well trained, even if their tech and equipment was slightly behind the times. And Viskeyra had the motivation…

"You're in. Stay close to me for the beam in. And don't shoot any of my guys," Kayla replied quickly.

A heartbeat later, Kayla, her fifty fellow Sharkies, and Viskeyra materialized in the massive cargo bay of Corsair. Two Orion guardsmen – unarmoured – were standing casually by the door. They wouldn't live long enough to regret their mistake.

Two targets. Distance, twenty metres. Elevation .3 metres. Class 2 Combatant.

Double tap drill. Two rounds chest, one round head. Fire when ready.

Kayla raised her rifle and squeezed the trigger. The tritanium wedges slammed into each target's chest twice and head once. Both Orions fell into the deck like wet sacks of meat, blood spewing on the gold-coloured bulkheads.

"All clear!" Kayla shouted as she took a knee, "Everyone on me. Kill anything that moves and lets find Rela!"

─•~:~•─