Captain Sulu and commander Gars crossed the bridge and headed for the communications-station and the lieutenant manning it. The lieutenant, wearing an orange department-shirt indicating him as a Specialist, was quite eager to report his findings.

"Mister Wu" Sulu said as he and Gars joined the communications-lieutenant, "what do you have for us?"

"A message, sir" lieutenant Wu said and pointed at his screens. "A couple of minutes ago, we spotted a tight burst of photons aimed directly at our ship. It was first ignored as a random event caused by Korvat City. But, I noticed a pattern and couldn't help studying it closer."

"A pattern?" Sulu inquired.

"Yes, sir" the lieutenant said, almost pleased with himself. "I finally realized what I was looking at" he said and then pointed at his graphs depicting the signal in question. "Ancient Morse code. Someone was transmitting a message intended for us."

Gars looked at her captain, and then at the lieutenant. "What was in the message?"

Lieutenant Wu hit a few keys and the message, in text-form, appeared on a screen. As Sulu and Gars read it, they could hardly believe it.

"I have double-checked her identity-number" Wu explained. "It checks out."

"She's alive?" Sulu whispered. "Where did she transmit from?"

"Somewhere in this region of the system" Wu said and had the relevant part of space appear on another screen. "There is nothing there now, but we have a large form of mass about twenty light-seconds away, heading for Korvat Five. Its trajectory should have taken it straight through the region of interest."

Gars turned to her captain. "The message indicates that lieutenant Marcus-Kirk was attacked. My guess is that whoever is heading for Korvat Five are either responsible, or witnessed the attack with their sensors."

"Who ever it was that attacked her" Sulu said, "did so to silence her. She had proof of the romulans actions in this system. That ship" he then said and pointed at the mass moving towards the fifth planet in the system, "either is an ally of the romulans, or is manned by agents of the Tal Shiar. And with a little luck, Emelie is still alive and onboard that ship as their captive."

"Captain!"

Shravs voice caught everyones attention as the blue-skinned andorian came hurrying across the bridge from the main entrance.

"Captain" Shrav repeated as he joined Sulu and Gars, "I know how to gain an advantage over the klingons."

Sulu gave the andorian his fullest attention. "Well, out with it!"

"The datafiles" Shrav said with a grin. "We have their datafiles. All of them! That includes the schematics of their ships, their weapons and their equipment. Everything! Let me go through the klingon data and I can guarantee you that I will find information we need to get out of this situation alive."

Sulu smiled and nodded. "Excellent, lieutenant commander. Get to work immediately."

"Yes, sir" Shrav said with a salute and left the bridge.

"Commander" Sulu then said and started walking towards his chair, located in the middle of the bridge, followed by his first officer. "If we gain an advantage over the klingons, should we try and locate lieutenant Marcus-Kirk?"

Gars sighed at the question and shook her head out of uncertainty. "Hard to say, captain. To be honest, it's impossible to answer that question right now."

Sulu nodded, he knew she was right, and sat down in the captains chair. "The problem is that she is the only thing, at the moment, that can prove to the klingons that the Federation is not the enemy. Lieutenant Emelie Marcus-Kirk is right now our only hope in order to save our crew and stop a war with the Klingon Empire. If she can prove that the romulans are behind all of this, then we need to find her."

"If she is alive" Gars added.

Sulu turned grim. "Yes… If she is alive."

XXX XXX

Emelie was appearing quite irrational where she sat constrained to a chair; her eyes unable to focus, her lips trembling ever so slightly, her face covered in beads of sweat. Around her, four figures stood, all bald with pointy ears and features covered in tattoos.

"Our mission has changed" D'jalel told her fellow romulans. They were alone in the chamber with no cardassians present. "A klingon Bird-of-Prey is heading for this system and will arrive in a matter of hours. We must secure it for the Empire."

"More klingons?" Toldol said, a bit unsecure of the situation. "Three klingon warships? Why do we need to secure this vessel?"

"It contains a torpedo" D'jalel explained and, with a smile, placed a hand on Emelie's shoulder. "A torpedo that could potentially alter history." The smile faded as she turned to face her colleagues once more, "We can not allow it to remain in enemy hands. Securing this weapon has now highest priority."

"What's so special about it?" Toldol wondered.

D'jalel gently stroked Emelies head as she spoke. "Its specifications are based on technology from a hundred years into the future… With it, the empire can change the course of history."

XXX XXX

Kang entered the bridge of the IKS Gr'oth and found several of the highest ranking officers of the vessel gathered around a tactical-station that provided an overview of the situation, depicting not only the Gr'oth, but also the rings around Korvat Six and the Excelsior hiding within the rings.

"Kang!" Koloth barked and waved his fellow lord over. "Come and see!"

Kang did and joined Koloth and studied the screens; a flight-pattern had been calculated, showing the Gr'oth flying in low above the rings, dropping an item and then pulling away from the rings at high speed as the item landed on top of the USS Excelsior.

"What is this?" Kang wondered.

Koloth pointed at the calculated approach the Gr'oth would take as it neared the Excelsior and later veer off. "This is how Hikaru of Akira dies, and the stolen datafiles are destroyed. We fly in at maximum impulse, perform a manual ejection of our warpcore and let it drop like a bomb down upon the Excelsior. The anti-matter detonation will utterly rip the Excelsior apart."

"Hikaru will not die by your hands?" Kang sounded a bit surprised.

Koloth snarled and headed for his own chair on the bridge. "We have no way of shooting him and no way of boarding him" he growled as he sat down. "Honor demands that Hikaru dies and that his ship is destroyed. This will ensure that honor is satisfied."

"It will satisfy honor" Kang admitted, "but will leave glory cheated in the moment of victory."

"Victory is always glorious" Koloth countered. "I will not leave this kill to you, Kang. I already made that clear. I, Koloth, son of Lasshar, of House Lasshar, will se Hikaru, son of Akira, dead! Koloth! Not Kang!"

Kang studied the plan as it was shown on the screen and then turned to the klingon warlord in command of the Gr'oth. "The day is yours, Koloth of Lasshar. I shall take my ship out of harms way and witness your victory from afar. You carry a guest on your ship, a friend of house Ryna. To avoid tension between house Lasshar and Ryna, I offer to ensure the safety of Curzon of Dax and return him to Kor on your behalf."

Koloth eyed Kang for a brief moment, his eyes revealing his suspicions towards his fellow lord and noble. "Very well" he said in the end. "Take the trill and keep Kors pet safe."

Kang headed to leave the bridge, but before stepping through the automated doors, he turned and looked straight at Koloth.

"Qapla'!"

And with that single word, Kang left the bridge and allowed the doors to slide shut behind him.

XXX XXX

Moments later, Kang and Dax entered the bridge of the IKS HaH'vat where Kangs second in command, Mogh was waiting.

"Moving away from Korvat Six, my lord" Mogh said. "Heading for a distance of one light-minute."

"Excellent" Kang said and sat down in his chair on the bridge. "The Gr'oth?"

"Moving to prepare their bombing-run" Mogh explained as the ship in question came up on the main viewer.

Dax felt a bit anxious. "Will they be able to escape the blast-radius?"

"Not likely" Mogh said.

"This is why you could never persuade Koloth to walk away from killing Hikaru" Kang told Dax. "Koloth missed the opportunity to kill Kirk, to destroy the Enterprise; his nemesis. A shame he could never wash from his name. Now, with honor demanding of him to kill Hikaru and destroy the Excelsior, the most famous captain in Starfleet and his ship, Koloth will not let this opportunity slip through his fingers. Kor was right when he said that Curzon of Dax is one of few aliens to truly understand klingons… Unfortunately for you, Dax, Koloth is immune to reason at the moment."

Curzon turned away from Kang and looked at the viewer depicting the Gr'oth and the planet in the background with its rings. There was nothing he could do but look on as the klingons positioned themselves for an attack-run that would see the Excelsior, and all of its crew, annihilated.

XXX XXX

Gars entered the captains ready-room and found Sulu looking out a viewport, drink in hand.

"Saurian brandy?" Sulu wondered.

"Why not" Gars said and went to pour herself a drink.

"Anything new to report?"

Gars, as she poured herself a glass of brandy, nodded. "Yes, captain. Repairs are underway and we will be able to restore shields, up to ten percent at least, in two hours."

"Good" Sulu said and drank some of the alcohol in his hand.

"Shrav, Karalga and Tuvok are working on going through the datafiles" the commander then said and placed the bottle to the side and sipped the strong drink. "So far, they have discovered that an aimed ionic pulse, at the klingon vessel, will cause their plasma-coils to falter which in turn will activate their cloaking-device."

Sulu turned around at the new. "Deactivating their shields?" he said and realized the potential. "Giving us a window of two to three seconds to fire at the ship while it is unprotected."

Gars nodded and drank some more of the strong liquor and then found a seat to rest in. "And… a high concentration of neutrinos will be capable of triggering the detonators used by the klingon tretryon-devices."

"This is good news" Sulu said and sat down in his chair behind his desk. "How do we deliver the neutrinos?"

"Four probes" Gars explained. "Shrav is right now looking into re-configuring four probes to release high amounts of neutrinos. Tuvok has calculated that if we launch them and manage to box in the Gr'oth, so to speak, the levels of neutrinos should be enough to detonate all tetryon-devices on the Gr'oth."

"That is it!" Sulu said with a smile and hit the desk. "By god, that is it!" The captain got up on his feet, unable to sit still. "We use an ionic pulse to activate Koloths cloak, lowering his shields in the process. Unshielded, he will be vulnerable, allowing our probes to blast his ship with neutrinos and detonate the tetryon-devices. Cloaked, and armed with only photon-torpedoes, Koloth will be unable to prevent our escape." Sulu was feeling hopefull, so much so that he could not help himself from planning ahead. "We will head for Korvat Five and Koloth will follow. We will bait the klingons and take them directly to Emelie and the romulans."

"And what of the second ship?" Gars wondered, glass in hand. "It is most likely another D7 battlecruiser."

"Koloth is intent on our destruction" Sulu said, nodding as he though upon the klingon warlords state of mind. "He will not let anyone else claim victory this day. It would dishonor him. We have a plan" Sulu then said and turned to his commander. "We have a plan, Nathalie. We need to prepare."

"At once, captain."

XXX XXX

D'jalel and Toldol entered the cardassian bridge and joined Director Rukat on the elevated platform that allowed him to look down on all officers and crew manning the various stations of the bridge. On the main screen, two position of the two klingon vessels were clearly indicated.

"The IKS HaH'vat is moving away at three quarters impulse" Rukat said. "And the Gr'oth is circling around and is heading straight for the Excelsior."

D'jalel eyed the information provided by the cardassian ships sensors. "An attack-run?"

Rukat turned to watch events unfold as well. "Will accomplish nothing" he said, arms casually folded over his back. "They could possibly intend to ram the Excelsior."

"Even klingons use that as a last resort" Toldol pointed out, him too studying what was taking place with some confusion.

The cardassian captain of the vessel turned from a station and addressed Rukat directly. "The IKS Gr'oth appears to have released a portion of their ventral hull-plating."

The piece of thick, reinforced hull-plating was soon visible up on the screen as it floated off into space on its own.

"Radiation-emotions from the Gr'oth is drastically increasing" the captain then informed.

"The warpcore is exposed" Toldol said as he realized what had happened.

D'jalel turned into an image of intense rage. "Toldol… detonate the Federation torpedo. Now!"