Disclaimer: None of us own Star Trek. None of us own Star Trek Online, though Ron, Titanic, Jorn, and Takeshi have Accounts there, and Takeshi Yamato and Ron the True Fan have Lifetime Subscriptions. We only own our OCs and OC-Specific Plotlines. Anything else you may recognize is the property of its respective owner.

Chapter 4: R&R

Risa System

Captain's Log, Stardate 86057. After that mess with the Guardian of Forever, finally dealing with B'Vat, and recovering Lieutenant Miral Paris (whose DNA was apparently what was needed to finally begin undoing the damage the Augment Virus had done to them back in the 22nd Century [Who knew?]), we're now finally at Risa, where we can enjoy some well-deserved shore leave.

I have to admit, I always enjoy any chance I can get to see Linda in a swimsuit - and after hearing about what happened between Jaden and T'Vrell earlier, I wouldn't be surprised if he's looking forward to seeing her in one, too…

Risa was a rain-soaked, earthquake-ridden planet. At least, it would be without the weather control system and the seismic stabilizers. With them, it was paradise. A paradise that the Ptolemaeus crew… were not taking part of. When asked, Sonja simply said 'ask Ron about it'. And with him locking himself in his quarters, that was nigh-impossible.

"FINALLY," Jaden cheered out, as the respective bridge crews of the Yorktown, Tempest and Liberator had taken a shuttle down to the planet, and were now standing before one of the more private beaches, with few other people around. "It's been forever since I've been here!"

"I can't believe your parents rented out the whole beach…" T'Vrell muttered.

"My family's got a LOT of pull here," Jaden said grinning, "They just want to make sure our vacation goes on without any incidents… so while we are here: NO. TEMPTING. MURPHY. Are we clear?"

"Very," Jessica said. "Though we're still missing your grandfather."

"Ron's basically banned EVERYONE from his ship from coming down here," Jaden said. "And as no one wants to talk about it… I personally think it has something to do with that one planet the Exeter and Enterprise visited back in the 23rd Century Ishmael told me about."

"Shirou-ojii-san mentioned that in his journals," Takeshi remarked. "Something about a planet where anyone's fantasies could come to life… and something happened to cause Ron to swear off Vacation Planets."

"I think Ron's overreacted a bit," Jaden said. "It's not like every vacation planet's like that one… but enough of that: once we get our stuff to our rooms, we're having some fun! It's been forever since I've surfed without a holodeck!"

A Class-1 shuttlecraft landed close by, bearing the registry NCC-1672/1 Ra-Horakhty. "That's an old one." Jaden said blinking, "Sixteen-Seventy-Two? That means it's from the Exeter. The OLD Exeter." The side doors opened, and out came Riza, wearing her standard brick-red uniform, only instead of pants she had a skirt.

"Riza?" Jaden asked blinking. "What are you doing here? I thought Ron locked down the Ptolemaeus."

"Well, she had some help," Ishmael said as he stepped out of the shuttle after Riza. "Me and Riza managed to… sneak out without Ron knowing. As far as he's concerned… we're still on the Ptolemaeus."

"Sneaky…" Jaden said with a smirk. "Well either way, glad both of you were here!"

"In about fifteen minutes, I expect my brother to call," Riza said. "He might be busy with his tribbles, but he'll find out soon enough."

"Tribbles?" T'Vrell asked. "He has tribbles?"

"A fuckton of them," Ish said with a chuckle. "He's genetically altering them to… explode."

Jaden and the others all blinked at that. "That… is either the most messed up thing I've heard… or the most awesome," he said.

"It'd certainly make the Klingons hate Tribbles even more," Takeshi remarked. "I mean, I remember hearing the Klingons drove Tribbles to almost extinction back in the 2270's, though they obviously missed some if Ron has a supply. And then if I remember correctly, DS9's security chief, Odo, brought a Tribble back from when they had an incident with someone using the Orb of Time to bring them back to the time Kirk was at K7, and I think the Klingons went into an uproar that the Tribble population started a resurgence."

"You'd be wrong: they were wiped out in 2292," Ish said. "Ron's tribbles were the last ones in the known universe. Well, at least until now. Besides, he'll probably come down here to test his new tribble grenades. Think of it: grenades that resupply themselves given enough time."

"I still think it's kinda mean…" T'Vrell muttered. "They're not that bad… especially if you get them genetically modified so they don't, ah… go at it like bunnies…"

"Oh? Like you and Jaden a few days ago?" Elisa said with a smirk, causing both the Captain and the Vulcan to blush bright red.

"E-Elisa!" T'Vrell shouted, just causing the tactical officer to laugh.

"That reminds me," Takeshi said, looking at T'Vrell. "Did you get checked out by your doctor after that, in case of any… unforeseen consequences?"

"I…" T'Vrell began to say before she paused for a minute. "Oh Crap, I didn't think about that…"

"Huh?" Jaden asked, "You… oh boy… we're… gonna have to check that soon…"

"Worry about it later. My brother gave you all strict orders to relax. So do it."

"Excuse me?" A man in a suit approached the Starfleet officers. "I'm Garfield Paxton of the New Essentialists. I saw you come down and wanted to invite you all to a meeting we're holding later today."

"Thanks… we'll consider it, but really we just want to relax…" Jaden said. "You have NO idea what kind of month we've been having lately…"

Takeshi sighed. "Jaden, I remember hearing about these guys - they're a group of extremists who think that the Federation's gotten too soft because of places like Risa… how did you get here anyway, Mister Paxton? This is supposed to be a private beach."

"No forcefields preventing me from walking onto it." He had a point.

"Don't worry about it," Jaden said before turning back to Garfield. "Mr. Paxton, thank you for the offer, but really… we need a good vacation. If you've seen the shit we've been through the last few weeks… well, you'd see the Federation is anything but Soft."

Paxton shook his head, leaving the group alone as he walked away. "Unfortunately, my brother might actually listen to those morons." Riza said. "He's a bit overzealous about defending the Federation."

"We've noticed: the man's a fleet killer." Jessica mused.

Riza shook her head. "No. He's more of an advocate of simpler pleasures: theaters, plays, books and such." She said. "This place isn't his thing, and if it was a danger to anyone, he'd General Order 25 it."

"Okay, can we please drop this subject, and get to the resort?" Jaden asked. "We only have a week of shoreleave, and I refuse to allow anyone tempting Murphy while we're here that will cut it short. Let's get going now, alright?"

"Forgotten. Come on: I need to get a horga'hn to prank Ron with once we get back to the ship."

"He's going to kill you for it, Ish."

"It'll be worth it."

Riza smiled. "I never said it wouldn't be."

USS Ptolemaeus - Captain's 'private laboratory'

"And they called me crazy before." He had FINALLY done it. He had created his tribble grenades. They had the explosive force of an RGD-5 from the 20th Century, and all you had to do to 'prime' it was pet the tribble. 10 seconds later, BOOM. "And now to breed them like rabbits. Actually, tribbles breed WORSE than rabbits."

A device on his belt beeped before he pulled it out. Someone from S31 handed it to him before he left ESD in 2293, and he never figured out what it was. At least until he heard a voice coming from it. JADEN'S voice. "What the hell do you want, kid?"

"I'm going to be paying you a visit in a few hours," Jaden said, sounding… different. "Get… him up on the ship as well."

"You know I hate mobius loops."

Meanwhile - Risa Surface

"I know this is cliche, but I gotta say it: COWABUNGA!" Jaden shouted as he rode a sizable wave down on a surfboard.

Riza and Ishmael chuckled as they hovered above the water using their newly acquired AG thruster packs (called 'Floaters' by the Risians). His grandson was enjoying himself, but he was more focused on Riza. She was a VERY pretty lady, and if Ron wasn't so overprotective, Riza might've been Jaden's grandmother. Then again, the last time someone tried to ask Riza out, (and attempted kidnapping two days later) Ron broke most of the bones in the fool's body.

"Something wrong, Ish? You're staring."

"Oh, uhh, nothing," Ish said. "Just, uh… I think this is the first time I've seen you in, ah, in a swimsuit."

Riza, much like her brother, was rather conservative. She didn't like exposing skin unless it was necessary. A gold one-piece suit with enough missing parts to indulge the imagination while leaving plenty to it was her most provocative outfit. And in Ishmael's highly biased opinion, she was fucking sexy in it.

"Oh, uh, yeah… I rarely ever get the chance to use it…" Riza said, turning her head slightly to hide her blush. "What with us being on missions and all… it… doesn't look bad, does it?"

"Oh, ah, No! Not at all!" Ishmael said. "You look great - err, I mean you look perfect!"

There could have been a new shade of red for Riza's blush. Ishmael privately coined it 'Riza scarlet'. "Well… I was considering asking you out before you left, but…" she said. "We had to leave so quickly, and after you came back and I knew you were married…" Ishmael winced. Riza's betrayed feelings went beyond him leaving. He married someone that WASN'T her. Loved someone that wasn't her.

"Riza…" Ish said, as the two landed their floaters on the beach. "I… can't excuse what I did, I know… I thought you, Ron and the others were all dead… everyone was telling me to move on… I admit, I loved Peg… which made it all the more harder when she died during the Dominion War, it felt like I failed the people I loved twice…"

"You failed no one," Riza said, surprising Ishmael. "It was beyond your control. Section 31 kept you from us, and you had nothing to do with the death of your wife during the war. Stop carrying around the guilt. It's time to move on." She then smiled a bit as she held his hand. "And I've forgiven you."

"Riza…" Ish said, as the two looked deep into one another's eyes. Ish moved closer to Riza, and she in turn moved closer, until finally their lips met into a kiss.

"I was wondering why you two were having such a hard time dealing with one another." Both froze before they looked shoreward, spotting their commanding officer in full uniform carrying a basket full of tribbles. "I was going to ask if you would finally just kiss and get it over with, as my sister's had a crush on you for the past decade and you're the only one I approve of to date her. Of course, you know what will happen to you should you hurt her in any way, correct?"

"HOW THE HELL DID YOU GET DOWN HERE?!" Both of them shouted.

"There's a transporter unit on the Ra-Horakhty." Ron said. "Where's your grandson? I need him."

Riza and Ish blinked, as they pointed over to where Jaden was still surfboarding. "YES!" Jaden shouted as he rode up the current wave he was on, as he launched himself into the air for a few moments before landing back on the wave. "If Only this was Hawaii! I REALLY need to do the next surfing contest there!"

"Your surfing's going to have to wait." Jaden froze as he looked at Ron, pulling out his communicator before handing the tribbles to Ish and Riza. "Pet one, throw it into the water and watch the fireworks. Literally. I need you on the Ptolemaeus, Jaden: it's important."

"CAN IT FUCKING WAIT!" Jaden shouted in the communicator, causing the others to wince. "Can't the Goddamned Federation handle ANYTHING without us FOR ONE GODDAMNED WEEK!"

"This is personal, Jaden. I wouldn't ask if it weren't. Let's just say the person asking for you… is you." The two Ptolemaeus officers facepalmed. Time travel. DTI was going to have their asses by the end of the week.

"…son of a-" the next verse of curses Jaden sputtered out needed to be censored, lest this fic be altered into an M-rated story.

"And I thought I had a mouth," Ron said. "Get onto the Ra-Horakhty after you get changed into something more presentable. We don't want to embarrass the Admiral by you showing up in a swimsuit."

"If it's really me - I'd understand." Jaden said.

Later - Ra-Cailum

"He's right, I could've cared less."

Sitting before Ron and Jaden was a man who looked to be an older version of Jaden, now wearing what looked like the flag officer version of the Odyssey Uniform.

"Alright, you better have had a damn good reason for pulling this shit off," Jaden said, still in his swimsuit. "You know the kind of week I've had."

"I didn't want to do this, but I had to preserve the timeline, even if I piss myself off in the process." Admiral Jaden said with a sigh. "And I remember doing this at this time, at this date. And Ron wasn't going to take no for an answer."

"What, Captain Pinkerton's still ordering you around?" Jaden asked, but future Jaden shook his head.

"No, ADMIRAL Pinkerton is ordering me around, and he's the unofficial head of Starfleet Tactical now," he said.

"Wow - Ron getting promoted… what did he do to earn that punishment?" Jaden asked, knowing full and well Ron did NOT look forward to being promoted to an Admiral. If anything, he'd consider it a punishment more than anything.

"He kept doing what he did best," Admiral Jaden said. "And kept trying to make us look good instead. Don't bother trying not to, Ron: it'll happen whether you want it to or not."

Ron crossed his arms. "What's this about?" he asked. "The last time I saw you was in 2293, just before the Ptolemaeus left spacedock. You gave me this thing." Ron held up the temporal communicator.

"Yeah, there's a reason for that," Future Jaden said. "It's about the Iconians."

"Oh goddamnit…" both Jaden and Ron muttered at the same time.

"I know," Admiral Jaden said. "For Ron, the Iconians are a dead race, a historical myth. For you… and once upon a time me, they're a fact that seems to be gone. They aren't. Everything from Romulus' destruction to the war with the Klingons to all the shit with the Undine… it's their doing."

"So the Iconians are still alive… fan-tucking-fastic," Jaden muttered, as the Admiral nodded.

"They made the Undine think we're invading their realm when we're leaving them alone. They also convinced Taris to… well, you know what happened to Romulus."

"So why aren't the Iconians trying to, well, kill you right now?" Jaden asked.

"Because they can't travel back in time," Future Jaden said. "Their brains use chronoton-based transmissions. Allows them to use those gateways of theirs."

"Buh?"

"What your future self means, Jaden, is that their minds can't withstand going back in time." Ron simplified. "It's like using an EM pulse to fry a 21st century computer to them."

"Ah," Jaden said nodding. "So… what do we need to know now? About the Iconians?"

"You'll be going up against a Cardassian and Klingon attack force in about 6 days," Future Jaden said. "Five other captains will be joining your motley task force: three Klingons, two Romulan Republicans. You'll be working together for the rest of the war. Ron knows who to blame."

Ron slammed his head against his desk. "KUBAN FUCKING SANJUICHI!"

"Yeah, them, Klingon Intelligence, and Republic Intelligence," he said. "After that, you'll go back in time on Drozana station. Ron'll meet you there for the first time."

"Anything critical that I should tell Ron then?" Jaden asked. "Aside from giving him the communicator?"

"No, you're not giving him the communicator," Future Jaden informed.

"The first time we met wasn't in 2293," Ron said. "It was 28 years earlier. Just as I was starting out my career on the Reliant. I was with Shirou and Rin that day. You had a Vulcan with you - T'Vrell - mentioned a doctor that might be able to help."

Jaden blinked. "Help with what?" he asked, as the future Jaden chuckled.

"You'll find out very soon," he said. "But anyways, when you go back you're basically going to make sure that no one dies because the Davidians are trying to phase shift the entire sector using a triolic wave-charged comet. You'll plant a recording device in the computer center for information gathering on the Iconians."

"Guess that explains all the weird shit we were experiencing that week."

"Just do what you need to do, and remember, he CAN break the laws of physics," Admiral Jaden said with a smirk. "It's how he survived 75 years in a buffer."

He then pulled out another tesseract communicator. He froze for a second before looking at his past self. "One last thing," he said with a brief smile. "You should see about looking for a ring for T'Vrell sometime in the next nine months - preferably sooner. I will mention there's a couple decent jewelers down on Risa's surface you could go to."

"...why?" Jaden asked warily, as Admiral Jaden laughed.

"Oh man, it really is funny seeing my reaction," he said. "You'll see very soon."

He disappeared in a vortex of light, returning to his time. "Iconians. What does one of their gate things look like?" Jaden pushed a button on Ron's monitor, pulling up an image of an arch-type gateway. "I've blown up one of those. 2288, just after I got the Ptolemaeus. Long story: it involves the Tholians."

"Well, at least I get the rest of my shore leave until the Klings show up," Jaden said with a sigh. "If you need me, please: HESITATE to ask." And with that, he tapped his commbadge. "One to beam back to the beach please." And a few moments later, Jaden vanished.

"And so continues my life. Note to self: kill the next Section 31 agent I see."

Risa surface

BOOM!

"Holy shit, he wasn't kidding. These things DO explode." Riza and Ishmael, doubters of the exploding tribble, had been testing the tribbles as Ron asked. And every one of them exploded as Ron stated they would.

"Wow, Ron did some serious work with those exploding Tribbles," Takeshi remarked, having come over with Linda, who was clad in a two-piece deep red bikini that put her slender figure and decently-sized assets on full display, to see just what was going on with the explosions.

Jessica came up as well, clad in a sleeveless wetsuit with half the leg missing. She looked back at the explosion marks on the sand before looking up at the pair of impromptu testers. "Okay. I gotta admit, that's kind of… interesting… or creative or insane. I don't know which, but… those could come in handy some day," she said, folding her arms.

"Yeah… it's… it's something…" T'Vrell said, as she approached the group - wearing her own dark blue two-piece bikini which left little to the imagination.

"You alright, T'Vrell?" Ishmael asked. "You look a bit… pale… "

"Uhh… anyone know when Jaden's coming back?" she asked, scratching the back of her head a bit sheepishly. "I, uhh… I've got something I need to… tell him…"

"Apparently Ron needed to talk to him about something, from what Ish and Riza said," Takeshi remarked. "I think he'll be back soon enough."

At that moment, a transporter beam of light appeared nearby, as coming out of it was Jaden who sighed. "Alright, back to relaxing…" he muttered, before he saw the others. "Sup, guys! Whacha doing?"

Riza pet a tribble before throwing it into the water. Jaden wondered what it was prior to a large explosion going off. "My brother gave us his first batch of exploding tribbles," she said. "He calls them polygeminus grex praemium."

Jaden blinked. "That's a… mouthful for a name," he said.

"Not really, when all it amounts to is 'exploding tribble'," Riza said. "Polygeminus grex is the species name for the tribble. Praemium means 'explode' in latin."

A VERY meaningful name. "So it's cute AND it's lethal," he said.

"That's what he was going for," Riza said, shrugging.

Jaden then glanced at T'Vrell, blushing slightly at her choice of attire for the vacation. "Oh, ah, T'Vrell…" he said. "You look, ahh… you look great!"

"T-thanks, Jaden…" T'Vrell said, before she sighed. "I, uhh… I've got something I… need to tell you…"

"What?"

T'Vrell gulped a bit. "Well, I… while you were gone, I was feeling a bit… woozy, so I checked with the local doctor, and… well…" She scratched the back of her head. "You're… gonna be a daddy..."

All were speechless. At least until Riza spoke up. "Well, at least I'm going to be a step-grandmother."

"Wait, WHAT?!"

"My brother gave his blessing. I'm basically dating Ishmael now." The double shock caused Jaden to fall back on his back, unable to process anything.

"I think we broke him," Ish said.

"Likely," Takeshi remarked. "Still, congratulations, T'Vrell."

Riza pet another tribble before tossing it seaward, but it exploded long before it hit the water. "I think we should stop before the tribbles dye the sand red."

USS Escalvantine

An AI had many things to do, and C.C was trying her hand at hacking into the Ptolemaeus' so-called 'Exeter Records' in an attempt to get more information on the unofficial commander of their task force.

'Hmm… Lantaru? Isn't that the system listed in the background for those Omega files Lelouch has under high-security clearance?' she wondered. She'd managed to crack the security on those files out of curiosity soon after she'd been integrated into the ship's systems, but had agreed to be sworn into secrecy - that 'Omega Particle' had a lot of potential, but was just too unstable. Still, the Lantaru files on the Ptolemaeus' systems weren't connected to the Omega directory - what was in there, she wondered.

"Omega-level authorization required."

The ancient AI narrowed her digital eyes. Omega-level clearance was meant for Grand Admirals: the Chiefs of Staff. She began working her way around the clearance level, before finding a log entry. "Captain's Log, USS Exeter, Stardate 7492.1: 15 years ago, we let that bitch go. T'Uerell escaped from our clutches, but NOT this time. Sanjuichi's going to pay for not telling us about those cybernetic fucks, but at the moment, I'm more worried about that Vulcan whore and what she has planned."

'He doesn't like Section 31, does he?' she asked herself mentally. Still, she'd heard some stories regarding the rogue Vulcan T'Uerell - it looked like Pinkerton had been part of the chase at one point. And apparently she'd had access to Borg back then, as well.

Another image appeared, this time of a starship she knew: Odyssey-class. But the stardate was off: 8915. It was a blurred image, but clearly Ron had a record with DTI almost as large as Kirk's. And one of the last files she saw was the Exeter… facing off against itself.

'What the hell?' she thought, as she fully examined the images.

One ship had USS Exeter, NCC-1672, with standard Starfleet markings. The other was marked ISS Exeter NCC-1672, but had yellow markings on the saucer section and hull.

She then recalled the various stories she'd found detailing the 'Mirror Universe' - how the Terran Empire in that universe was essentially a descendant of the Nazis who won WWII in that timeline, and was an expansionist group that conquered whatever they came across, before the Kirk from her timeline was transposed with their Kirk, and apparently got their Spock to start thinking of doing things Starfleet's way. He started turning the Empire into a republic, only for the Klingons and Cardassians to conquer them. And then the DS9 crew had several encounters with them, as well, sparking the Terrans to rise up against their conquerors. It seemed Ron had his own encounter with this Mirror Universe.

And apparently recruited someone from it. The crew manifest showed no Sonja Henderson prior to Stardate 7249 on the Exeter. The moment they got BACK, her name first appeared on the crew lists. Henderson wasn't an Academy graduate, but someone from the dark side of the mirror, and assigned to the Exeter simply because S31 thought she was Ron's problem.

This was getting more and more intriguing the further she looked. It seemed like Ron seemed to get all the weird assignments the Enterprise missed - and any ships he worked with apparently picked up the same luck.

"Trying to learn more about us, hmm?" A circular screen appeared before her, showing off the woman she just learned was from an alternate universe. "You know, I was HOPING one of you would try this."

"Wh- How?" C.C asked. She thought she'd been discreet enough not to draw attention-

"I set up a special tap in the system files the moment they were set up on the Ptolemaeus. ANY access that doesn't have the big man's authorization gives me an alert. Picked up the trick from some assholes in the Romulan Tal Shiar."

That was rather clever, C.C had to admit. "Well, you can't fault me for being curious," she said. "All of the official files on Ron, your ship, and the rest of you are so heavily redacted it isn't funny - and part of my purpose is to collect and analyze data on both allies and enemies, determining behavioral patterns which I then use to help formulate battle strategies. It's why the Preservers made me so many millennia ago - I was stuck monitoring an abandoned outpost for who knows how long before Lelouch found me less than a year ago."

"I remember those assholes. And don't access my ship's computers ever again."

"Or what?"

"We picked something up in 88. It took me MONTHS to isolate it in a tricorder, but now, I've sorta weaponized it. Enjoy." Sonja pressed a button before the Escalvantine's computers were flooded with a virus. No, not a virus. A computer program. An Iconian computer program.

Luckily, C.C was built around or before the time the Iconians came around, so she was able to resist it. Still, she was not looking forward to cleansing it from the ship, which didn't have that resistance, and she also wasn't looking forward to informing Lelouch about this…

Sonja smiled. About a month of work went into isolating that program, and nearly four YEARS of work to get it to do what SHE wanted. She had no idea who originally made it, nor did she care: a weapon was a weapon. And it was EFFECTIVE. "Commander, there's a ship entering orbit. IDed as USS Independence."

"Cobb decided to bring his people to this shithole? Open a channel, Corpie." The Andorian paused to glare at Sonja. "Don't call me that."

The bridge of the Independence appeared on the engineering station's monitor, complete with the ship's new commanding officer. "Commander Cobb, welcome to the earthquake-plagued and rain-soaked shithole known far and wide as Risa. Anything I can do for you?"

"Well, the Admiral sent us here as part of our shore leave, after the crew managed to get in touch with their families," said the now Captain of the Ambassador-Class cruiser. "Oh, by the way, it's Captain Cobb, now. Since I was the only higher ranking officer on the Independence, who hadn't lost their mind and killed themselves, because of… you-know-who, the Admiral choose me,"

Sonja shrugged. "Meh. None of us can keep heads or tails of the new rank system nowadays." Unlike the rest of the task force, which used Antares or early-release versions of the Odyssey uniform, the Ptolemaeus crew STILL wore their vintage 2293 uniforms with rank pins on the uniform flap fastener. "Enjoy your vacation. Ptolemaeus out." The image faded from the screen.

USS Yorktown - Stardate 86072

"The Cardassian movement known as the True Way is making some kind of push into the Donatu system." Sonja said. "Right in the middle of an offensive made by the Klingons. Our job…" The Ptolemaeus' chief engineer pointed at the monitor screen with a long metal rod. "…is to make those fleets go away. The context is up to them."

"At least we have one more day of leave…" Jaden said, cracking his neck a bit. "I'm just glad we're going back into the fray after some good old relaxation."

Sonja scoffed. Like most members of the Ptolemaeus crew, she wasn't one for vacation planets. Ishmael was one of the few exceptions to the rule. "The boss told me about your little visitor from the future," she said. "I think we're going to have a bit of an issue if we're getting intel from one of those ships on a people who are long since dead."

"Correction: thought to be long since dead," Jaden said. "Future me said that a lot of the events today are being set up by the Iconians. They never went extinct… they just found a new home somewhere else in the cosmos."

"Well, if they show up, I have a nasty surprise for them: I dug up a computer program from some planet back in 88. Nearly destroyed the ship. It took me months to isolate and almost five years to rewrite it to do what I wanted, but it works now."

Lelouch was not pleased by that. "Oh, I know: you used it on MY ship. You nearly destroyed it, and we're STILL cleaning up the mess that Iconian virus made!"

"Technically it's not a virus - it's just a computer program," Jaden said. "It's like trying to run a modern day computer system on something made during the 21st century - they're not just incompatible, it just… overrides everything. "

"And causes shit to explode!" Sonja shouted with a grin. "I fucking LOVE it! I used it on a Klingon battleship back in 88 before I began rewriting it: less than five minutes later, BOOM!"

"That trick won't always work you know," Jaden said. "After what happened to the Yamato back in 2365, and what almost happened to the Enterprise, people have been figuring out how to prevent that from happening again. We have a much superior understanding of Iconian technology and such now than we did back in the 24th century."

"Meh. I can correct that."

"Moving on, children." All glared at the head of the table, where Ron was tapping his finger on the surface. "STIG, which we all know now as Section 31, wants to know why the hell the True Way's in the Neutral Zone. They're so far from their native space, it's not funny. We're going to find out WHY they're here after beating the fuck out of them. As such, the Ptolemaeus will be focusing its' attention on the Klingons. I trust you can handle these… Cardassians. Of course, you're Starfleet officers: you can handle it. Otherwise, you wouldn't be wearing the uniform."

"Of course," Jaden said nodding. "Cardassians are easy… but we just need to treat this assignment just as we would any other."

"Then you're dismissed. you've got time to get a souvenir from Risa, but I want you back on your ships within the next 3 hours. There are asses that need kicking. And we're the only ones with the right boots for the job."

USS Escalvantine

Lelouch sighed as he looked over the bridge of his ship, still in a bit of chaos from the aftereffects of the Iconian program. "C.C, how's the removal process going?" he asked.

"I've scrubbed the program from most of the computer systems, but this program is INSIDIOUS. It's WORSE then the program encountered by the Yamato, and that's not due to Iconian programming. Commander Henderson is highly skilled at her job. We may not be able to enter the battle, as tactical coordination is nigh-impossible, and this program is like a weed."

Lelouch sighed again. "Do what you can, C.C," he said. "As soon as Lloyd gets the physical systems figured out, I'll have him give you what help he can."

The lights blacked out for the most part once more. "ARGH. This is like pulling Borg regenerative technology out without disabling them first. How the hell did she do this? We barely understand Iconian programming, yet a woman from the 23rd Century made it WORSE!"

"I have no idea, sir," Jeremiah said from the Captain's Chair. "We'll just have to hope C.C and Lloyd can properly deal with it… or if worse comes to worst, that we can call in Commander Chawla from the SCE."

"I hope it doesn't come to that," Lelouch remarked. Rakshata Chawla and Lloyd Asplund had been rivals at the academy - and upon graduation, that rivalry had grown. If they needed to call Rakshata in, she'd be insufferable and Lloyd would never let anyone on the crew hear the end of it.

The lights came back on, but the gravity plating deactivated. Sonja didn't just make it difficult to remove: she made it AGGRAVATING, as well. "C.C?"

"Yes?"

"The next time you want information from the Ptolemaeus computers… ask. This is the second time that ship has screwed us. I do not want the third to be our end. Am I clear?"

"Yes, Lelouch," C.C replied. "Also, if I might be blunt… we might need Commander Chawla's help with this, no matter what the consequences."

"I think I have no choice. Open a channel to Starfleet Command. And… try to get a link to the Ptolemaeus. If Henderson caused this, she can fix it."

"Understood," C.C said as she got to work on the messages.

Nigh-psychotic laughter was heard from Sonja's post on the Ptolemaeus bridge. "You want my help fixing this? Please. I re-wrote the program to some degree, but even I can't erase it. The last time, I had to use an nadion-saturated EM pulse just to wipe the cores clean."

On the screen, Lelouch was livid. "But that only works on duotronic computers!"

"Exactly. Your AI was too stupid to just call and ask. Even if the bossman said no, the result would not've been you trying to scrub your computers clean."

Lelouch sighed yet again. "Fine, I guess I'll need to see if my chief engineer and his Academy rival will be enough to help C.C get rid of the thing."

"Good luck with that. It took me months to isolate the program just to purge it. And I've had time to enhance this one. Guess you won't be joining us on the Donatu op."

"Likely not," Lelouch agreed. "I guess my crew will get to spend more time on Risa as we fix this - I don't want this spreading to shipyards or, heaven forbid, ESD."

Sonja tapped a few keys before something transported over. "Remove the computer cores and fit that in one of them, that way you can get back to ESD. The boys at Intelligence can toy with that thing, see if they can make a countermeasure to Iconian programming that doesn't involve a full shutdown and wiping. Have fun, kiddo."

Lelouch glared at her, before unceremoniously closing the channel.

The engineer smirked, proud at putting the brat in his place once again. The first time, the fleet killer humbled him. This time, the engineer made his AI think twice about getting information from their computers without asking. Next time… well, only time would tell.

One day later - USS Yorktown

Jaden sighed as he sat down in the bridge chair of the Yorktown once more. "That…. was a vacation I think we ALL needed..." he said with a smile. "Now we can go back to kicking Cardassian, Klingon, and Iconian ass once more."

"The Escalvantine won't be joining us: the Ptolemaeus' Iconian 'weapon' basically fried their computers," T'Vrell said. "Well, I guess that's one way to stick it to the Admiral: screwing up his ship."

"Ah, Karma's a bitch," Jaden said with a smirk. "We may not understand Iconian tech and computers, but we can sure as hell exploit it, at least."

"ETA to Donatu, 30 minutes. Captain Pinkerton is requesting that the Raging Tempest spearhead the attack, with us following suit."

"And look at the fleet killer planning out an attack before hand," Jaden said. "Let him know we acknowledge, and we'll be right behind them."

USS Raging Tempest

"You know, generally, I imagined Ron just going in guns blazing, screaming at the top of his lungs for this, sir," Rina remarked. "I guess even he can be unpredictable."

"Agreed," Takeshi replied. "Still, I'm glad he's letting us get a chance to unload on them first."

Linda hmmed as she read through a PADD containing a few diary entries from Shirou Yamato. "Huh. Thought he just charged in. Guess I was wrong."

"Yeah, according to Shirou-jiji, Ron did plan things out sometimes," Takeshi remarked. "Most of the planning was by the seat of his pants, though."

"In your grandfather's words, he did not look for trouble, trouble looked for HIM."

"And it paid the price."

Donatu system

The True Way were operating in Donatu, reasons as yet unknown to the Klingons and Starfleet. As such, the KDF were preparing to engage the interlopers, not expecting interference from Starfleet.

As such, when the Raging Tempest warped in and unleashed a hail of Pulse Cannon fire, it surprised both the KDF and the True Way.

"Where did that ship come from?! No matter, destroy it!" The tiny escort was followed through by a larger ship: Constitution-Class, which fired her phasers at the lead Negh'var, getting the battleship's attention, and distracting it from another Starfleet vessel.

The Liberator took the chance to blast past, speeding by and releasing three quantum torps at the ship, hitting its shields full on before speeding after the Tempest.

"Destroy those Starfleet interlopers!"

"I THINK you're forgetting someone, Klinky boy."

The jaws of most of the Klingon fleet's personnel hit their respective ships' decks at the sound of THAT voice. "NO!"

"Fuck yes! Power trio of 2270 is BACK, assholes!"

The Ptolemaeus sped forward, unleashing a hail of phaser fire, as flanking on either side of it was the Yorktown and Raging Tempest, letting out their own volleys of weapons fire as they carved a path through the enemy defenses.

"Sorry, assholes! Time for me to do what we do best!" Pinpoint phaser attacks and careful uses of tractor beams, photonic shockwaves and psychological warfare (Ron WAS terrifying at work) reduced the Klingons to screaming messes of themselves. The Cardassians, however, knew little of the Windstorm. They did not fear him.

Jaden was about to become the Cardassians' worst nightmare, with a little help from the Ptolemaeus. "Drop some lead on these guys!" Jaden ordered, as the Yorktown went full impulse, charging towards the Cardassian Galor-class Cruisers ahead. They opened fire on the Yorktown, only hitting against its shields before the Yorktown returned the favor. Her already enhanced weaponry made quick work of the Cardassians as after a short burst of phasers and two photon torpedoes, two enemy ships were reduced to burning scrap.

The Axon, the True Way's Keldon-Class flagship, attempted to fire on the Yorktown, but the Escalvatine introduced a viral matrix into the ship's computers, knocking it out of the fight. A Jem'Hadar attack ship then made a kamikaze run on the Yorktown, only to be cut down… by disruptor fire.

A Mogh-Class Battle Cruiser rippled out of cloak, before proceeding to pulverize more True Way and Jem'Hadar ships with its weapons.

"Where the fuck did that thing come from?"

Another Klingon ship decloaked, this one being Vor'cha-Class, supporting the Starfleet ships. It didn't make sense: they were at war. Why HELP them?

"That's new," Jaden said.

"Sir, we're being hailed by the Vor'cha attack cruiser," T'Vrell reported.

"Patch them through," Jaden said, as T'Vrell opened a channel from the Vor'cha.

A Klingon appeared on the screen. "Greetings, Captain Takeo." He said. "I am Guinlong, captain of the Ha'bakt. My apologies for our sudden appearance, but we had to avoid the fools that only wish for war within the KDF."

"Not a problem, Captain Guinlong," Jaden said. "Happy to have your assistance."

"I have transmitted a retreat signal to the rest of the fleet. Fools they may be, they are still KDF. And the Windstorm is not someone to… be around."

"Sir, I'm picking up three more ships decloaking!" A massive shimmer of light signalled the arrival of one of the largest ships in the galaxy: a romulan D'Deridex-Class warbird. An evolution of the hated V'malek-Class warbird (hated because of Narendra III and a certain starship that four of them destroyed) the D'Deridex outgunned everything there.

From the second shimmer, another vessel emerged with the oh-so familiar bird-like design of Romulan vessels - a Norexan-Class Heavy Warbird, while not as heavily armed as the D'Deridex, it still possessed decent turn-rate, speed, and hull. Jaden looked at the vessel, and noticed however it didn't have the usual full dark green color most Romulan vessels possessed - for it had a lot of red trimming across the hull in a series of patterns.

The third shimmer revealed an Ar'Kala-Class Tactical Warbird, which looked to be a bit of a cross between the D'Deridex and Norexan. It also appeared to be a Carrier variant, with its lower shuttlebay having been expanded into a much larger hangar. And its appearance, again, was a mixture of the two other ships, primarily green, but with red trimming along the hull.

"That's a new one."

"We're being hailed by the mogai," T'Vrell said. "It's identifying itself as the Romulan Republic Warbird Vengeance."

Elisa put the call through, and an alien woman, more or less unknown to them, appeared beside Guinlong's image. She had deep red skin, and had a pair of long pointed ears, and had dark green eyes, and had bright pinkish/purple hair tied into a pair of pigtails. "Greetings, Captain," the woman said. "I am Commander Zaheena Kalix Tokarnika, commanding officer of the Republic Warbird Vengeance. I presume you are here for the same reason we are?"

"Seems so, Commander." Jaden said nodding, "Either way, glad to have you and your friends help here - the more the merrier after all."

"This is Ptolemaeus Actual: we'll begin patrolling the area. Get the intel and get out. No unnecessary risks: once that ship comes back online, we're going to have a problem."

"Got it Ron," Jaden said. "The Axon is disabled, we'll beam over and get what we need."

Later - Axon

Jaden beamed onboard the Axon alongside T'Vrell, Razkii, and Zarva. "Sir, Cardassian security teams will probably already be heading our way," T'Vrell said. "We should expect heavy resistance."

"That's always how it is..." Jaden muttered as he prepped his Full-Auto Phaser Rifle. "Form up and stick close."

The ruined interior of the ship (Jaden felt a slight bit of pride that his ship, not the Ptolemaeus, caused this) was full of wounded and dead Cardassians, the living not being able to hinder the Starfleeters. "I'm picking up an odd energy signature. My tricorder can't ID it."

"Where?"

"Mess Hall, up ahead."

The away team breached the door to the Mess hall, which seemed to be surrounded by a strange blueish glow, before they spotted several strange figures leave through the door, before the room returned to normal. "Sir, were those-"

"Devidians…" Jaden muttered. "Well, we're on the right track."

They didn't bother with the dead bodies (they already knew that their neural energy had been drained, which ultimately caused their painful deaths) before moving out of the mess hall. Before they could move on, though, the sounds of transporters were heard behind them, and not Federation ones. Klingon and Romulan ones. As Captain Guinlong and Commander Zahena appeared from them, along with their respective away teams.

"Captain, Commander," Jaden said nodding. "Glad to have you with us."

"We were informed you would say that." Guinlong held up a device that looked familiar. Jaden would have sighed if the situation weren't so serious, as it was a Klingon version of the same one Ron had on him. "Our version of your… DTI, I believe it is called, has granted us a reprieve from any visitations due to these things."

"God damned time travel…" Jaden muttered, "Why is it always us who deals with this bullshit?!"

Zaheena giggled slightly. "Eh, I kinda got used to it after a while," she said, "But anyways, we have Devidians to deal with. After you, Captain."

The Klingons moved forward, some of them looking at the Romulan and Starfleet personnel with little more than contempt. Not their captain, though: he seemed more 'I don't care who my allies are so long as the job gets done'.

"Here's the bridge," Jaden said as they arrived at the door which would lead to the bridge. "Odds are there are a fuckton of Devidians inside… so, who wants to knock?"

"Today is a good day to die!" The Klingons rushed into the bridge, screaming at the tops of their lungs. "I guess the door's been knocked on."

Jaden and Zaheena's own teams were right behind the Klingons, as they were once again confronted by the bluish glow, and well over dozens of the ghost-like Dividians within the room, whos attention was immdediatly drawn on the newcomers. "Chew on this!" Jaden shouted as he and the other teams opened fire with their Phasers, Plasma guns and Disruptors upon the Devidians.

They were only of marginal effectiveness, as they were still partly out of phase, meaning only protons and antiprotons could do the most damage. "Yorktown, we're having problems over here!"

"I can see it, sir: Commander Henderson's got me doing something to the deflector to make things easier for you."

"Hurry it up then!" Jaden shouted as he ducked under a Devidians psionic attack behind the consoles. "These things are damn annoying to kill!"

The Devidians suddenly shifted to solid masses, and one or two of the weaker ones began to actually erupt in flames. "What in the hell?"

"That's what you get when you fuck with Starfleet, assholes! Phase-shifted storm of protons and antiprotons!" The two must've be out of phase sync, as if those two made contact, the result was the same as a warp core breach, only more… destructive.

"I'll take what I can get… FIRE!" Jaden shouted as they opened fire once again on the Devidians, only this time their weapons had far more effect as they burned and blasted the creatures into dust, soon clearing the bridge.

"Starfleet's engineering abilities continue to impress," Zaheena said. "And terrify."

They didn't even know the half of it.

"Strip their computers of any information!" Quinlong ordered. "We must put an end to this threat quickly!" The Klingons saluted before they got to work. "It is an honor to meet you in person, Captain Takeo. I only wish the collective stupidity that is our governments did not cause this war. There is no honor in fighting what is supposed to be one's ally."

"I agree," Jaden said, nodding. "We have far more dangerous enemies than each other. Case in point? The Borg and Iconians."

"Agreed," Guinlong said, nodding. "Perhaps that is why Imperial Intelligence leaked the Windstorm's existence to your people."

Jaden blinked. "Wait, you KNEW he was alive and didn't do anything about it?" he asked.

Guinlong scoffed. "Only a fool would dare waste a resource like that cursed man and his crew. And there is a reason the Klingon Defense Force is running out of fools."

"Huh… Charles Darwin at its finest." Jaden said shrugging, "Brutal, maybe. Effective? Very much so."

"We will take our leave of you. We will meet again." He grabbed his arm-communicator, the KDF's commbadge, for lack of a better term. "jol yIchu'!" The Klingons disappeared in showers of red light, leaving them with the Romulan team.

"Guinlong's a very straightforward Klingon," Zaheena said. "And Practical as well."

"I can see that," Jaden said, glancing at her. "So… I don't think I've ever seen your species before…"

Zaheena smiled a bit. "I am a Kalenian," she said. "We only made contact with the Romulans a few months ago. Specifically, our fleet met with the Romulan flotilla, and eventually joined the Republic once New Romulus was colonized. It's a new homeworld not just for the Romulans, but for my people as well… it's better than being on the run from the Borg constantly, or having to work with the Tal Shiar," She growled a bit as she spat out the names of the two groups.

"I'm guessing you have some history with them?" Jaden asked.

"The Borg destroyed and assimilated my people's homeworld centuries ago, forcing our people into exile," Zaheena said. "We've been wandering the galaxy since until we met the Romulans… as for the Tal Shiar... " She seemed to hesitate for a moment. "... for now, let's just say there is a reason I named my ship the Vengeance. And if I ever see Empress Sela again… I'm going to Kill her."

"Ptolemaeus Actual to landing parties." Ron said. "I just received a hail from K7: we're to report there for debriefing and for our next assignment, so get your butts back to your ships."

"So, I take it that was the so-called Reaper of the Federation?" Zaheena asked. "Or Windstorm as the Klingons call him?"

"Yup." Jaden said nodding. "He's an oddball… but he's a bloody awesome oddball." He sighed, "Well… I must return to my ship now Miss Tokarnika, I look forward to working with you in the future."

"As do I, Captain." Zaheena said, before Jaden tapped his combadge as he was transported back to the ship.

Deep Space station K-7

One of the oldest operating stations in the Federation, K-7 had changed little externally. On the inside, she was one of the most advanced stations used by Starfleet. And the nickname the Ptolemaeus crew had for the place was making people giggle. "Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to Starbase Tribble!"

Jessica blinked, a smirk crossing her face. "Heh. Nice name," she said. A small chuckle escaped her as she grinned.

"Commanders for USS Yorktown, Raging Tempest, Escalvantine, Ptolemaeus, and Liberator, please report to the Commandant's office. Repeat..."

"Not even five minutes here, and the guy in charge wants to lynch us."

"Doubt he wants to lynch us," Takeshi replied. "Could be he just wants to brief us on some new development in the region."

Jessica pursed her lips. "I don't know," she said. "We'll have to see."

"Well, the layout hasn't changed. Follow me." Ron led them through the station to the only lift leading to the commandant's office, shaking his head. "The last time I was here, I was commanding the Exeter. Actually, it was about five months before the Bullshit Incident where I lost my ship. At least I saved part of her."

"What part of her?" Jaden asked.

"The ship's computer cores," he said. "They were eventually refitted; in fact, they're still in use."

"Where?"

"What ship do I command, Jaden?" The lift doors opened before the five stepped inside.

"So, basically the Ptolemaeus has the same computer core as the Exeter?" Jaden asked, "Wouldn't that cause compatibility issues? Using a Connie computer on an Excelsior?"

"Not really," Ron said. "Duotronic computers are easy to upgrade. When I took command of the Ex in '70, she used a Mk 4A duotronic computer core. When she went kablewy in '85, those cores were Mk 5Cs. Other than a few exchanged parts, they were the same thing. Hell, Sonja spent two years getting those things up to Mk 6B standard. It's like upgrading a B-52 from a B-52D to a B-52H: just a matter of part exchange."

"Hm, makes sense I suppose." Jaden said shrugging, "The designs between the Connie and Excelsior aren't that different to begin with I suppose…"

"One was literally developed from the other," The doors opened when the lift came to a stop, exposing them to a darkened office. "Oh, great. If this is Sanjuichi at work, I'm NOT going to be happy."

"It isn't Sanjuichi, Captain." The commandant's chair spun around before the lights came back on, revealing… Ron. Another one, wearing a different uniform, with two gold pipes and a four-sided star replacing the captain's bars on the fastener.

"OH GOD! THERE'S TWO OF THEM!" Jaden shouted. "EVERY MAN FOR THEMSELVES! WOMEN AND CHILDREN LAST!"

"Fucking great! DTI's going to have my ass for this!"

The other Ron stood up, walking towards the group, using his sheathed kilij as a walking stick. "Relax. DTI's not going to do a thing: I was supposed to come back now. Now, she should be here any minute."

"Who?"

"Oh, Jaden met her yesterday. Fucking transwarp transporters never work properly with me."

The younger Ron looked closely at his older counterpart's uniform. "Fleet Admiral?! Who the hell kicked me up the ladder?!"

"Don't know, but they had to have a lot of pull," Takeshi remarked. "You're a bit like me - the thought of being ranked any higher than Captain is anathema to us."

"Officially, I'm commander-in-chief of the Alpha Quadrant Alliance's joint operations. Unofficially, I gave all the work to Lelouch so I could command my ship, and there ain't a damn thing he can do about it, because I fuckin' outrank him!"

Lelouch groaned at that. "Gee, thanks," he said sarcastically.

Both Pinkertons looked at Lelouch. "Go fuck yourself. That's an order." And the older one WASN'T joking. "Now, where the hell-"

A Starfleet transporter beam appeared in the middle of the room. "Finally. I thought it was faster the first time." Out of the beam came Zaheena, who pulled out her weapon when surrounded by an unfamiliar room.

"WHOA WAIT WHAT THE FUCK!?" The Kalenian shouted, as she spun around. "Where the Hell- how did I get here?!"

"That would be my doing, Admiral - sorry, Commander. WAY too used to mine."

She looked at the seeming twins. "Who the hell-"

"Fleet Admiral Ronald Pinkerton, from 2425. A pleasure to see you again."

Jessica blinked, unsure of what to make of this. "Okay. It's kind of weird to see two of the same person, but… what the hell is going on?" she asked, holding up her hands.

"Easy. Just giving you a bit of a warning." Future Ron said. "It's about a certain bitch we will all grow to loathe. Empress Sela, Head of State for the Romulan Star empire."

At the name of the woman, Zaheena's eyes narrowed immediately as her hands balled into fists. "Where?" She growled out.

"Oh, you're wondering where she is right now? Rator III. And no, you can't kill her." THAT was the wrong thing to say. Of course, saying that was like saying detonating a nuclear warhead in the middle of a daycare was a generally stupid thing to do.

"And why the HELL not!" Zaheena shouted, her hand on her plasma pistol ready to draw out, while she set her wrist-badge to immediately send her back to the Vengeance to plot a course to Raptor III. "Give me one godamned good reason why I shouldn't head right over there, and TORCH THAT ROMULAN BITCH-WHORE AT THE STAKE!?"

"Clearly, Commander… This will get as annoying for you as it is for me."

The Captain raised an eyebrow. "No shit. You're ME."

"Ok, Rator III's the throne world, for one." Future Ron counted, "Two, the bulk of the Imperial Navy is there, plus that unholy Sword of hers, and three... kill her, you doom your own species, if not the entire Milky Way Galaxy."

Zaheena narrowed her eyes. "I can deal with the first two… but how could that bitch be important enough to 'save the galaxy'? If anything, that whore and Tal Shiar would condemn this galaxy!"

"I always hated that about you," Future Ron muttered. "Never saw the bigger picture until someone else spelled it out." A snort came from the older man's nose. "Alright then. If you kill her now, Sela will never make contact with the Dominion. Without the Dominion's forces to assist the Alliance, the Republic will die. Quickly. Oh, most of the people will survive… but none of them would be yours, not enough to sustain a population. Just enough to witness your own extinction. Can you live with that? A brief moment of vengeance, just to fuck yourself later on? If so, you do not deserve to wear that uniform, or command that ship."

Zaheena still had a mad-as-hell look on her face, growling slighting, before she shouted out as she punched the nearest wall. "GODDAMNIT! FUCK!" she shouted, as she proceeded to vent her rage out into the wall.

"I don't think I've ever met anyone with that big of a grudge against Sela…" Jaden muttered.

"She has her reasons," Future Ron replied. "Ask her why yourself once she cools off."

"I think I know," Ron said. "They might've tried it with me."

"You could say that," Future Ron said. "Now, I'll be leaving soon. Just remember, Commander…" He made a T in the air. "Which outweighs the other? Vengeance? Or survival?" The Admiral disappeared in a purple transporter beam.

"Damn, I'm a dick," Ron said. "Then again, you DID kinda deserve that."

Zaheena had finally vented out most of her rage, though now her hands were bruised and bleeding a bit - that's what anyone would get for punching a Tritanium wall, after all. She was breathing heavily before she sighed. "Where… where is the medbay…" she said, as she rubbed her bleeding hands. "And then… where's the ten-forward of this place?"

"Five decks down, Arm three for the former," Ron said. "Seven for the bar. Don't get too drunk, and avoid anything green."

"I could care less right now… " The Kalenian said, as she walked out of the room, the door closing behind her.

Jessica looked back at the others. "So now that we know where that… bitch is, what's the plan?" she asked, narrowing her eyes. "Because something tells me we'll need to be ready for if she tries anything."

"We do nothing. She's the Romulan head of state. My GOD, the standards at the Academy went down!"

Jessica narrowed her eyes a bit more, but said nothing. Even she knew better than to mouth off with Ron. "Okay. So we do nothing. I get it. Still, I don't like it."

"Deal with it."

At Club K7, Sonja was attempting to drown her sorrows. For the past month, she had been trying to make the 25th century technology work with the duotronic computers on the Ptolemaeus. Her attempts were...innovative, but pointless. Duotronics were reliable and tough, but not as fast as the new isolinear ones. Once this shit was dealt with, she'd put in for an isolinear core to supplement the duotronics. She would NOT abandon the Exeter's old computers. They were the only things left of the ship's collective past, and no one wanted to lose that.

"What… what is… this any-*hick*-anyway?"

"It's, ahh… it's… well… *sniff* well… it's Green."

"…fuck it, bottom's up."

Sonja glanced to the other side of the bar, as she saw a red-skinned woman in a Romulan republic uniform accept the bottle of Green… well, green, and proceeded to down her first shot, before pouring down another one. Sonja vaguely recalled her as the captain of one of the Romulan ships that helped them against the Cardassians and Devidians. And she was already looking a bit on the tipsy side.

'Oh, NO. Not that crap.' She'd gone drinking with God (well, A god) a few years back and that shit (as well as Romulan ale and Klingon bloodwine) put her under the table. She approached the Republican officer, and attempted to arrest the bottle from her. Only one man could DARE drink that shit and not be terribly affected.

Unfortunately, the moment she tried to grab it, the red skinned woman yanked it out of her reach. "H-hey-*hick*… get… get your own…" she muttered. "I… I called dibs… on *hick* on this one…"

"Trust me, little girl, you don't want to drink that. You need to be a Scotsman in order to survive that stuff." Aldeberan whiskey was not for the faint of heart. Or anyone that didn't have the word 'Scott' in their name. "Come on, give me the bottle, and I'll get you something a little better."

"I… I like this one…" the woman muttered. "I *hick* I dunno what a Scotsman is… but I-*hick*-I can handle this…"

"Trust me, girly, you can't." Sonja tried to reason, "I've seen Klingons go under the table in four glasses, and they've got livers of tritanium." Only race with tougher livers were Romulans. And that was because their ale was INSANELY alcoholic. And the only one with a liver tougher than a Romulan's was Montgomery Scott.

"I… I got this-*hick*-this... " She said, shaking her head. "It helps… better… it helps keep… the memories away… others don't… *hick* don't work… "

"Getting stone drunk isn't the way to solve your problems. Come on." The engineer sat beside the drunken officer. "Talk to me. It'll help. I might know a few things about… whatever the hell you're trying to forget."

Normally, Zaheena would never talk about this subject… but at the moment, she was drunk enough to start talking. "You… you know the Tal Shiar, righ-*hick* Right?" She asked. "Heard of what… what they do to people?"

"Yeah." Sonja said nodding. "It was before my time, but it happened to my captain."

The drunken officer looked at the Mars-born human. "R-*hic*-really?"

"Yeah," she said. "During a trip to a station at the Neutral Zone, he got kidnapped by the Romulans. Had a Reman poking inside his head and a LOT of chemical agents pumped into him for two months before he got pissed off enough to escape. Stole a ship, made his way back to the Exeter."

"I know… I know the feeling…" Zaheena said. "Few… few months ago… me and my crew went to… went to the Hobus system… investigate some… station… that's when we found out… some Tal Shiar scientist… Taris… blew up Hobus… caused the supernova, blew up Romulus and Remus…" she shook her head. "They say… Tal Shiar's was to… to protect the Star Empire… then they blew up a star, and killed billions of their own people... "

"Fuck," Sonja muttered. "I sorta know how that feels. I... my parents were very bad people, claimed to be 'doing what needed to be done', but they killed thousands for shits and giggles. All in the name of 'perfecting humanity'. If I wanted to be 'perfect', I'd've beamed over to one of those ships at Lantaru."

"That's not… the worst of it…" Zaheena said. "I was… on the station… my team beamed out… I set the place to blow… had to escape through the… the gateway they were testing…" she then chortled a laugh. "And guess where the fuck I ended up? Smack dab in the middle of a Tal Shiar Warbird."

"In the serpent's nest, in a matter of speaking," Sonja said. "They must've been pissed. What'd they do, try to brainwash you into working for them?" Zaheena's silence was the only answer she needed. "Oh fuck…"

"…She was there… Sela." She growled out, her grip on her glass tightening. "Though every step… first it was just talking… then the damn pain… I can still hear the ringing in my ears… when I woke up… I could barely control my own body… I tried fighting it, again and again… I kept hearing her voice… over and over… and my friends voice… first they… they put me in a holodeck simulation… made me… made me think I… I killed my best friend… then they… they made me build… and test, a Thalron weapon… I tried to sabotage it, but… every piece I picked up just…" she swallowed the lump in her throat. "Then… the woman… oh god… they… they had me… graft Borg… borg Implants on that… human woman… I wanted to stop it… fuck I even tried to put her out of her misery, but… I couldn't control my own body… I can still hear her screams… pleading… begging me to stop… but I… I couldn't… "

"Well, I'd kill the bitch," Sonja said. "Tempted to do just that if I run into the bitch." Sonja patted her twin ushaan-tor ice-mining tools as a form of comfort. "But what brought this about?"

"That… Windstorm guy… Pinkerton... " Zaheena said, "Some… future version of him… told me where she was… but said… I kill her… I doom the Republic… I doom my species… and I might even doom the whole goddamned galaxy…" She bared her teeth as her grip tightened. "I want… I want to kill her so bad… make her pay… for everything… but I can't knowing… knowing I'd… I'd… GAH!" Her grip was so tight, that she actually broke the glass in her hands, shattering it.

"So, bitch saves the galaxy eventually. What's stopping you from doing it AFTER?" The Republican officer looked at Sonja, honestly not considering that. "War's over and there's no reason for her to live any longer. It's just a matter of time." She withdrew one of her ice-picks from hell. "A simple matter of time before you shove something like this into her skull."

Zaheena chuckled slightly, "Yeah… if I can I'd like to shove that sword we found at Dimorus down her throat," she said. "Assuming the eggheads will let me… borrow it long enough… "

"If the bitch dies, who cares how?" Sonja asked, as she put the ice mining tool back into her holster on her hip. "I need to get back to my ship: she needs a bit of work before she's ready to go back out into the field."

"Yeah, yeah… " Zaheena said, shrugging as she poured down another glass. "I'll… be here for a while… "

USS Yorktown - conference room

"Driffen's Comet is the source of this bullshit, and it'll pass by Drozana Station in 96 hours." A diagram showed the comet passing by the former Federation station. "The Devidians have charged it with enough trolic energy that it's generating a temporal field. Once it crosses pathes with Drozana, the fuckers'll be able to phase shift an entire sector."

"Om nom nom." Sonja glared at Ron, who just shrugged. "So, we need to get a team onto the station and destroy their little nest."

"Might not be that simple," Takeshi replied. "I mean, we know the Devidians have used time-travel before. Who's to say they're not doing it at Drozana?"

"They did." Ron spun his chair around to face his fellows. "I remember seeing some of you on Drozana, as well as some bullshit with the lights."

Takeshi nodded grimly. "Which means we need to go back to the past, and find a way to stop them there - including potentially destroying that comet, if we have to."

"I hate time travel…" Jaden muttered. "So much I'd want to change, yet so much I can't…"

"Oh? What would you change if you had the chance?" T'Vrell asked.

"First - go back to the age of Dinosaurs and rescue some, and put them all on a habitable planet so their species could survive," Jaden said, raising one finger. "Next: kill whoever invented the Borg, and finally… prevent the birth of Justin Bieber. If I hear that 'baby' song one more goddamned time, I'm gonna saw my own arm off!"

The Ptolemaeus officers blanched at that. Clearly, they had first-hand experience. "Regardless, we know who to send. Jaden, T'Vrell, Takeshi, Linda, you're going to Drozana Station."

Takeshi nodded. "Right," he said. "What about you guys, what'll you be doing?"

"I'll be working on the Ptolemaeus' retrofit."

"We weren't involved with the time travel thing. I would remember, yes? while we're dealing with that, I'll deal with the fucktards in Sanjuichi: find a way to get one of our ships back to Drozana in 2265."

"Well, let us do as the Big E's do," Jaden said, shrugging. "If the Enterprise can do it, so can the Yorktown… I mean hell, a freaking B'Rel was able to pull it off!"

"We need confirmation, first," Ron said. "You guys were TERRIBLY vague when you were there: we're not sure if the Devidians caused this or not. So you're going back to make damn sure this was caused by them, and not an accident. TPD applies. Try not to cause too much chaos."

"I can make no promises," Jaden said. "We'll get things set up."

"Dismissed, then."

Drozana Station - 6 hours later

The former Federation starbase was in VERY poor shape. And it showed: one of the arms was nearly falling off, and it sickened the Starfleeters. "I think Captain Pinkerton is going to be VERY angry when he hears about this."

"Understatement of the century," Takeshi replied. "K7's an important frontline base. DS9's the Crossroads to the Gamma Quadrant. Drozana? It's just a dive, now, and he would NOT be happy about that."

"He's gonna find out eventually…" Jaden said, as they entered the station's bar. "So, where is that Ferengi we gotta meet?"

"By the bar."

There was, indeed, a Ferengi at the bar, no doubt watering down the drinks to make a profit. Oh, was HE in for a surprise, as the four Starfleet officers approached the Ferengi.

"Welcome to Drozana station. I'm Balen, the humble administrator of this place. How can I help you? Might I interest you in the comet cocktail? It's out of this world!"

"Maybe later." Jaden said, "For now, I'm looking for someone. Ze'Mara, know her?"

"Hmm... I might. I could be persuaded to remember…" At this point, the capitalistic mentality of the Ferengi had driven Jaden to the brink. Humanity outgrew that stupidity three centuries ago. So he was going to use his 'secret weapon'.

Jaden let out a small, chilling laugh, causing the Ferengi to feel a shiver down his spine. "Belan… if there is one thing I hate about Ferengi… it's that stupid capitalistic mentality nearly your entire damn species has… " he said, as he picked up his communicator. "I don't want to - nor do I have the time - to deal with this shit, so… I'm gonna just go ahead and call in the motherfucking artillery."

He then pressed the comm. "Hey Ron!" Jaden said in an overly cheerful tone. "Wanna stop by Drozana Station or a sec? I got something I gotta show ya!"

"I'll be there in a few hours: I have to hijack a shuttle."

Balen paled slightly. "Uh… who was that?" he asked, before Jaden began grinning like a madman.

"Oh, that was Ronald Pinkerton," Jaden said. "You know, the only man to make the Klingons SHIT THEIR PANTS just HEARING his name?"

"Uh...why did you call him?"

"Easy… he's from the 23rd Century… you know… back when this very station was in pristine condition? Federation-controlled… " He said, before he looked at the Ferengi dead in the eye with a sick grin. "How do you think he's gonna react when he sees this once great Federation frontline starbase… reduced to this?"

Balen's skin turned bone-white. "Uh… she's by the dabo table." He said, pointing in the general direction. "Please don't call him in! I don't want to die!"

Jaden shook his head, making a 'tisk, tisk, tisk' sound. "Oh, trust me." He said, "He will do WORSE then kill you. But if you promise to fix this place up, I'll put in a good word for you."

"Do you know how much a full refit to this place will cut into my profits?!" The Ferengi shouted.

Hole. Dug. Deeper.

Jaden's eye twiched slightly as he stood up, and proceeded to walk towards the dabo table. "W-wait! Aren't you gonna-"

"I just asked you where she was, and you told me," Jaden said, glancing back with an evil gleam in his eye. "I never said I was gonna stop him… he's your problem now, ya big-eared capitalist bastard."

"Oh, shit. Blessed Chequer, help me!"

"Pray to whatever god you worship, because your god is coming. And he will NOT show mercy." Balen screamed before running from the bar, waving his arms in terror. T'vrell gave Jaden a smile as she looked toward him. "You enjoyed that," she said.

"Damn right I did," he said, as he proceeded to set his clock. "Alright… should take him about 2-3 hours to get here… make sure we have cameras recording when he shows up. It's gonna be glorious."

He approached the dabo table, where a woman, looking awfully paranoid, was standing. "Who are you?"

"Jaden Takeo, Starfleet Intelligence. We're here to get you out of here."

"It's not safe, not with the ghosts around here!"

"Look, the Windstorm, Ronald Pinkerton, is going to be here soon," he said. "Once he gets here, you'll be the safest person in the quadrant."

Ze'Mara looked at Jaden, almost like a pilgrim onto God. "Y… you're sure? But he's dead: been gone for over a century!"

Jaden smirked, as he tapped his Combadge again. "Ron? ETA?" He asked.

"Just got a shuttle, leaving now." Came Ron's voice through the Commbadge. "How soon do you need me?"

"As soon as possible, preferably," Jaden said. "You're gonna have a… surprise waiting for you."

"I look forward to seeing my old station again. Deal with those Devidians. Pinkerton out."

Jaden tapped the badge, smiling like a loon.

"You didn't tell him," T'Vrell said.

"Do you KNOW what sort of rage he'll be in once he gets here?" Linda asked.

"Grandpa Shirou wrote in his journals that pissing Ron off is a generally BAD idea." Takeshi said. "The Tholians did it once, and they weren't heard from until he vanished."

"I'm just milking this for all its worth," Jaden said, smirking. "That, and I want to instill as much fear as I can into that Ferengi asshole… as if basting a turkey, which I shall proceed to have sex with." This got an odd look from the others. "That's right - I'm going to FUCK THE FEAR TURKEY! … you can follow me on Star Twitter at the TheCrimsonFucker!"

"This will not end well."

"Definitely not," Takeshi replied, even as he facepalmed. He liked old earth media as much as Jaden obviously did, but there were some things that were just overkill in situations like this - and the 'Crimson Fucker' joke was one of them.

Class-1 shuttlecraft Ra-Horakhty

Ron expected Drozana to be in MUCH better shape. Instead, the station was falling apart at the seams. He twitched as the shuttle docked with the station, picking up the proton rifle that was given to him by Drake to deal with the Devidians, if any were on the station and opened the side hatch, looking beyond livid. "JADEN! WHERE THE FUCK ARE YOU?!"

"Hey! You're here," Jaden said on the comm. "At the Bar. Oh and you'll find the Ferengi that owns this station here too… probably cowering under a table or something."

"Thank. You." The snarling captain marched through the halls of the station, walking through the central core that would eventually take him back to the entertainment zone.

"Bonnie-kin, bonnie-kin… I see you!"

Ron groaned in annoyance at the 'disembodied' voice. "I am NOT in the mood for this BULLSHIT." He activated the rifle before discharging it into a panel, then began rewiring the controls. "I have PLENTY of experience with you assholes."

The lights dimmed and shut down for a minute or two before they came back on. "Heeee's heeeere," Jaden said with a smirk. "Everything's set to record… once that's done, we deal with the Devi's."

A lift door opened, and in came a VERY pissed off Ron, carrying an assault weapon of some kind. "Here!" He tossed it onto the table. "I have had to deal with spiders and a malfunctioning hologram using some kind of mobile emitter!" He tossed the emitter in question on the table. "I might not be up to date on some things, but I KNOW Starfleet when I SEE it. The fucker running this place and I are going to have a VERY long conversation."

Takeshi sighed. "Jeez, you have to admire Ferengi for their resourcefulness, even if you hate their lack of business ethics," he said.

"I. Do. Not. CARE." Ron pulled out his kilij, stalking over to the bar before one of the Ferengi (Balen) screamed and ran. "GET BACK HERE SO I CAN KILL YOU, YOU CAPITALIST FUCKER!"

"Well, while he's dealing with him, we'll head down below and hunt some Devidians," Jaden said, pulling out his Phasers. "Let's see what lies beneath, shall we?"

Corpses of spiders were all over the place, caused, most likely, by a very angry Captain. "Ok, maybe not telling Ron about Drozana's status was a mistake."

"That's an understatement."

They weren't under attack by the Devidians, either. Intimidation was clearly Ron's stock in trade.

"Just stay alert, and keep your eyes peeled," Jaden said as they walked forward. "We may not have to worry 'bout spiders, but I'm sure we've got some Devidians down here somewhere…" At that moment, he checked his tricorder, which began to detect triolic energy patterns. "Speak of the devil."

Takeshi drew the MACO Pulsewave he always carried as a ranged weapon. He'd upgraded from the family heirloom sword to a Monomolecular Tritanium Katana, courtesy of Ron, but even that wasn't going to be as good against Devidians as it could have been. Linda grabbed an Antiproton Sniper Rifle she'd gotten at K-7 - Matt was busily crafting her new Sniper Rifle back on the Raging Tempest, but against Devidians, again, energy beat projectiles.

Jaden opened one of the doors, finding a body on the deck, wearing a Starfleet uniform. But it wasn't an Antares or even an older version from the past 30 years. It was a uniform from 2265-2271, in brick-red with a braid on each cuff, making him a Lieutenant.

Takeshi sighed. "Well, that confirms they're using time travel again," he said. "We'll need to find whatever portal they're using, analyze it, and figure out how to go through ourselves."

"That's one way, or we could close whatever portal they're using, and go back in time via warp 9 around a star," Jaden said, shrugging. "Either way works though."

The station core was in horrible shape, as electricity sparked from one exposed conduct to the opposite bulkhead. And as none of the damage seemed to be recent (lack of sooty carbon scoring from nadion-based weapons fire) it wasn't caused by Ron. It was sheer negligence that caused this, and Balen was likely suffering for it at the hands of the only man who once served on the station that was still alive.

"I'm gonna ask Starfleet if we can fix this old station up," Jaden said as they walked into the core. "She deserves better than this… alright, we all know what to do, right?"

"Take down the Devidians, find their portal, and see where it leads," Takeshi replied. "And I think we'll end up going through it, too."

At that point, they got their first sign of the semi-malevolent beings as the air tinted blue and they appeared. "Jaden, the proton rifle!" Jaden pressed the firing key, sending out a stream of proton energy, reminding Jaden of… something. It suddenly hit him as he smirked, prepping the rifle once more.

"When there's something strange… and it don't look good," He sung to himself, nodding his head to the rhythm. "Who ya gonna Call?" He then pulled the trigger as he hit a Devidian square in the chest. "GHOSTBUSTERS!"

The beam bounced from phase-shifted 'ghost' to 'ghost, making them more vulnerable to conventional energy weapons. "What in the name of Surak are you SINGING?!" T'Vrell asked. "I've never heard that before!"

"Ghostbuster's theme! 20th century movie, one of the best!" Jaden shouted, as he continued to light the Devidians up. "I ain't afraid of no ghost! Da-na, da-na, da-na, da-na, dadadadada, "

This more or less continued until they reached the computer core, which was STILL the same as it was in 2265, only… well, the same state as the rest of the station. "I think I can understand Captain Pinkerton's rage, now. This could have been the Ptolemaeus."

"Well we're just gonna have to fix this place up then," Jaden said. "T'Vrell, get working on the computer - see what you can find and do for it."

"I'm on it." T'Vrell pulled out a tricorder, then began working on the only operational console when she picked up an isolinear signature. The station was practically abandoned before 2320: Starfleet never upgraded the station's computers to isolinear. "Sir, there's something here." She reached into an opening, pulling out a recording device. It was old, but clearly modern. And on the surface were labels indicating that it came from the Yorktown.

Takeshi looked at the device. "Oh boy," he said with a sigh. "Well, that settles it: We're going through that portal. That's about the only way we're getting to that terminal in the past in order to place that thing."

"I REALLY hope we don't have to do Time Travel too often," Jaden said with a sigh, "Can you tell what's in the device?"

"About 150 years of information on everything the station detected." T'Vrell said as she checked the encoding mechanism. "Oh, shit. Jaden, YOU'RE the one that planted this thing. On Stardate… 2715.6. Anno Domini 2265."

"Figures…" Jaden muttered. "Well, we'll have to go through the info on that thing, hopefully it recorded something useful… just make sure someone reminds me that when we do go to the past, we plant that damn thing here."

"Gotcha," Takeshi replied. "We should probably pass this on to Ron while we grab the blank version to plant in the past…" He sighed. "And is everyone's head hurting from that, or is it just me?"

The air tinted bright blue before a Devidian passed into the portal. One of them even gave the four what appeared to be the finger. And as soon as they recovered from THAT audacious act, their general response to the taunt was not pretty.

"…Oh HELL No!" Jaden shouted, as he and the others all drew out their weapons. "EAT PHASERS ASSHOLE!" And the group proceeded to light the Devidian up, before it was nothing more than a spray of ashes against the wall.

"Sir, if we have to go into the past, we're going to need the right clothing to pass as Starfleet officers. Our uniforms just won't… pass."

A ping was heard before they heard Ron's voice on the internal PA. "Is this thing on? Hello? Jaden, talk to me, damn it! It's on vox!"

"Ron?" Takeshi asked. "I take it you managed to get control of the PA system?"

"More than that. I've got access to what's left of the internal sensors. Balen was more then cooperative." The sound of the Ferengi monotonously greeting people coming to his bar was heard in the background. "I think I can tie the internal sensors to the transporters and use a site-to-site. Need anything?"

"We're good for now, but it looks like we're gonna be time-traveling, just as we thought." Jaden said. "Also, I'm going to put up a request to have Starfleet fix this station back up… "

"Oh, that's LONG overdue. Hang on." Blue light shone as a pair of boxes appeared before them. "I had the quartermasters on the Yorktown get those ready for you." Jaden opened the box, revealing a uniform and a pair of boots. The uniform itself was a 2265-2270 variant, in gold with Lieutenant's braids on the cuffs.

"Ah, old 23rd century uniforms…" Jaden said nostalgically. "I liked the older versions, but this works. "

Takeshi slapped a locator tag on the recording device they'd picked up. "Ron, we found a recording device down here, too - one we apparently are going to place when we go into the past. I've slapped a tag on it so you can use the transporter to get it - might want to get its data analyzed ASAP. We'll also need a fresh version to place when we get there…"

"Ok, locking on… God I MISSED these old duotronic controls." The device disappeared, followed by one materializing in its' place, directly from the Yorktown. In a way, it was the same one. "Get those uniforms on and get back into the past! You've got an appointment with history, damn it!"

Takeshi nodded, getting into a gold uniform as Linda slipped into a red one. Takeshi then whistled as he saw what his wife was wearing. "Looking good there, Linda," he said.

Linda smiled. "Thank you, Takeshi," she replied.

"So weird wearing these things... " Jaden muttered, adjusting the collar of his uniform, before glancing at Linda. "Though, ahhh… you sure you don't want a blue one?"

Linda blinked, "Why would I want blue?" She asked in confusion.

"My… grandfather said anyone in Starfleet wearing a Red uniform… especially during the Big E's 5 year mission… well… didn't last long." Jaden said.

Linda rolled her eyes. "Oh you don't know-" she began to say, before Jaden raised a finger.

"Nomad - 2267, killed several Starfleet officers - all Redshirts," he listed. "Stardate 3715.3, Crewman Hendorff and Lieutenants Kaplan and Mallory are killed on Gamma Trianguli VI, one by poison dart plants, another from exploding rocks, and other by a freaking bolt of lightning, with Lieutenant Marple going MIA, presumed KIA. Later, the dikironium cloud creature kills three of the Big E's guards - guess what color they were wearing? RED! Need. I. Go. On?"

Linda blinked for a moment, before sighing. "Alright, alright…" she said, switching from red to blue. "But when Jadzia Dax needed to blend in during the Orb of Time Incident, she wore red and had no problems."

"She got lucky - just like Scotty during his career," Jaden said. "But aside from them, there is a 90% mortality rating for ANYONE wearing a redshirt in the 23rd century. It's a FACT."

"Are you done?! I wore a fucking red shirt back then, and I'M STILL HERE!" All four paused at the reminder of Ron's use of the PA. And the shock that he didn't wear command gold, yet was still alive.

"Well, you're one of the lucky 10% then, Ron," Jaden said. "And you can't deny that, out of ALL the people in starfleet back then, anyone wearing a Red shirt died far more than anyone in any different colored shirt. It didn't end until Starfleet made ALL of their uniforms red in the late 23rd century… then it started up again when they started color-coding them again in the 24th."

"I changed divisions when I transferred to the Reliant; now get going! you have a timeline to save!" All four of them picked up 2265-era Type-2 phasers from the crates before arming them. "I'll see you when you get back."

"Thanks, Ron," Takeshi said. He turned to T'Vrell. "OK, do we know how to… work this thing, I guess?"

T'Vrell adjusted the settings on her phaser. "Yes. The Enterprise-D's records on the Devidian incident were quite complete."

"Isn't that where Captain data lost his head?"

The Vulcan nodded in amusement. "Yes. Surviving five centuries under what would eventually become Starfleet Academy proves how durable a Soong-type android is."

"Anyways, we got the data we need, now… who's ready for some time travel?" Jaden said, as he prepared his rifle.

"Let's get this over with," Takeshi replied, checking his phaser and making sure his katana was attached to the appropriate point on his borrowed uniform.

Drozana station was a proud place. More heavily armed than Deep Space station K-7 a few lightyears away and even more than Starbase 47-Vanguard, people would kill for this assignment. At least, if it were legal.

"I hate this place."

"Yes, Ron, you've said that for the past WEEK, now."

Lt. Commander Ronald Pinkerton glanced at his Academy classmates in annoyance. "Not my fault that this place is so difficult to police, Rin."

"Look, Ron, we know how difficult this place is to navigate," Shirou Yamato said. "That doesn't mean you have to bring it up every half-" A blue glow seemed to suffuse everything for a few seconds, before the lighting returned to normal. "Oh, come on, problems with the lights again?"

The higher-ranking of the three groaned. "Come on. Let's get to the computer core: we can trace the problems there. At least Rin can: we'll just make sure no one can disturb her."

"Thanks for the vote of confidence," Rin Higurashi replied. "I'll find out what's going on."

"So… 2265 Drozana Station. Sure as hell looks a lot better than the present day." Everything looked brand new, practically sparkling: no traces of rust in sight.

"That's for sure," Takeshi replied. "Kinda miss LCARS display panels, but they weren't invented until we went Isolinear." He then noticed a familiar terminal. "Jaden, don't forget planting that recording device for us to pick up about 15 minutes ago."

"Done." Jaden said, as he planted the device, "Thanks for the reminder - now… where the hell is everyone? You'd think there would be a technician or two down here in the computer room…"

Yelling was heard outside the door to the core. "Come on, is there ANYTHING on this station working?!"

"Duotronics are known to malfunction, Rin, especially when they're subjected to enough radiation to cook a whole cow, like this entire station has been since that damn comet entered the system."

"That's not the point!"

A shrill sound was heard as a phaser beam cut through the door lock, and the door opened. "There, problem solved."

Before the four from the future could hide, three people walked in - one they recognized (Ron, even if he was a bit younger than they remembered), but the other two only Takeshi recognized, from seeing them in photo albums.

"Shirou-ojiisan? Rin-obaa-san?" he whispered.

All three pointed their phasers at the four, before Ron gestured them to lower the weapons. "Christ, you people spooked me. I thought all you E transfers were up above, in the main complex."

"Uh… E?" T'Vrell asked.

Ron the younger pointed at the emblem on their uniforms. "Delta arrow. That means you're assigned to the Enterprise, NCC-1701."

"Ah, right," Jaden said, as he quite simply 'made shit up' as they went along. "Sorry, we're pretty new here. We came down here to access the computers, then the doors locked up on us. We were about to override the controls to unlock the door before you showed up."

"There isn't supposed to BE anyone down here. Come on, let's get you up to the higher levels. That comet's brought all kinds of trouble: the lights are fucky, people are getting sick, and we have a bunch of Klingons on leave here. NONE of that is coincidence."

Rin gave Ron an amused smirk. "What, playing detective now?"

"YOU try to make sense of this shit!"

Shirou smiled a bit. "Those two never change," he said. "They're good friends from before the Academy, but nowhere near compatible enough for a romance - honestly, it's like watching siblings argue."

"We… can tell."

Ron never seemed like the romantic type to begin with, although he supported it: he married Shirou and Rin, and let them continue their relationship while under his command. And they were always a packaged deal, as wherever Ron was, Rin and Shirou were, and after Ishmael joined the Exeter's crew, so was he.

"You kids better come with us before the forcefields kick in."

"Uh… Commander, right?" T'Vrell said. "We actually need to do something with the station's sensors."

"We have an idea on what's going on here… but we need to use the sensors to see if our theory is correct," Jaden said. "We don't think it's the Klingons that are causing this,"

"Ok, you aren't personnel assigned to the Big E. Who the hell do you work for?" They had to think quickly: Ron didn't put up with bullshit in their time, and he was likely more ill-tempered when he was younger-

"The Starfleet Technical Intelligence Group."

All eyes were on Takeshi. "The Starfleet what?"

"Not surprised you haven't heard of it," Takeshi said with a perfectly straight face. "It's a branch of Starfleet Intelligence classified so top-secret only the President is fully aware of its existence."

"Yes." Linda's poker face could probably be used as starship hull plating at this. Bullshitting the three living lie detectors was going to be STRESSFUL. "We're authorized to do whatever we have to without being noticed or bringing heat on the UFP as per-"

All three interrupted the sniper. In Japanese, no less. "Jō Juyon, Kuban Sanjuichi."

"Oh… you know the regs well!"

Rin and Shirou hooked thumbs at Ron. "Blame Mr. 'Memorize the damned regulations so well he can quote them in his sleep'!"

"Screw you, Rin! At least I know enough loopholes to let your boyfriend carry that damned letter opener on him!"

"Hey, don't diss Akatsuki no Ken!" Shirou snapped. "It's more than capable of combat, and has drawn blood since the days of feudal Japan!"

Takeshi didn't comment, though he agreed with his grandfather - heirloom blades were not to be belittled, even though he'd placed his time's Akatsuki no Ken in storage after Ron gave him the monomolecular blade, until the time came to pass the heirloom on to Larcei.

"And I kicked your ass for carrying it back at the Academy until we were forced into the same room during second year. And you STILL had to find the correct reg to carry it, with my help!"

"Uh... are they like this all the time?"

"Concerning Shirou's katana?" Rin remarked. "Yeah: they've been like this since they met. Though he's mellowed. Ish."

THIS was mellowed?

"I… see…" Takeshi replied.

It would be five years before those two would come close to a normalized relationship, then another full decade of bonding to become almost family, according to the journals.

"Well, fuck, if you're with Sanjuichi, we'll get you past the security teams. Come on."

"What, you're just… trusting us?"

"No. Try anything that endangers this station without due cause, and you die. Now get moving."

"Won't be a problem, then," Jaden said, as they started moving. "Let's get to the sensors ASAP."

Pre-Exeter Ron, Shirou and Rin were interesting people. 'Badasses before they became baddasses' was what came to mind. But they WERE the trio that defeated the undefeatable Kobayashi Maru: Ron's commands and attack patterns, Shirou's flying, Rin's sensor operations. They would only get better once Ishmael's tactical abilities, Riza's ungodly flying hands and Sonja's engineering expertise became available.

"So, who the fuck is screwing with the lights? Bones is yelling all over the place for whatever's causing it."

"None of the usual 'suspects', if that's what you're wondering," Takeshi replied. "The current thoughts by our superiors are that it's beings from outside our normal plane of existence, and the 'blue light' is the two planes coming into phase with each other."

"Oh, THAT'S lovely." The tint became a constant blue as a trio of Devidians entered a solid state, tapping the neural energy of everything in range. "WHAT THE HELL IS THAT FUCKING THING?!"

"That… is the creature we were just talking about," Jaden said as he pulled out his proton rifle. "We know these guys are vulnerable to Proton weaponry… T'Vrell, music please?"

T'Vrell sighed "Really, Jaden?"

"It's necessary - hit it," he retorted, as T'Vrell sighed as she hit her PADD… and then music began to play.

BGM: Ghostbuster Theme Song

The music started out creepy and eerie… but then the music suddenly kicked up, and just as it did Jaden pulled the trigger as a beam of blueish energy spat out of the weapon, hitting the first Devidian in the head. "When there's something strange… in your neighborhood," Jaden sung as he attacked the next Devidian, "Who ya gonna call? Ghostbusters!"

Ron began nodding along, much to Rin's chagrin. "Oh, dear God, not again."

"When it fits!" He opened fire with the phaser, adding the classic weapon's fire to Jaden's antiproton/proton streams. It wasn't MUCH, but it DID hurt. "Come on, I ain't afraid of no ghost!"

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah!" Jaden sung out, before they focused their fire on the last Devidian before them. "And, scratch three freaks. Now - where were we?"

"Getting to the triage bay. Bones could use the help." Ron led the through the halls, as they wondered who the hell was 'Bones'. Then they entered a large cargo area, they got the answer. Lanky, black hair, Southern accent and medical genius. It was the god of medicine of the 23rd Century. Lt. Commander Leonard H. McCoy, future Chief Medical Officer of the USS Enterprise NCC-1701 and NCC-1701-A, as well as the future head of Starfleet Medical. "You there! Don't just stand around there, come over here and give me a hand!" McCoy shouted. "People are dropping like flies on this station, and it's all I can do to keep up!"

"Fuck, man! What the hell are they doing?!"

Bones looked at Ron with the gravest face possible. "It's like their brains are getting sucked out!" He said.

"…Thank you, Leonard, for giving me THAT colorful image," Ron said. "Uh, Vulcan lady with the belly, a little help!"

T'Vrell blinked at the comment Ron said. "E-excuse me?" she asked, feeling somewhat insulted.

"Hate to say it, but you're not exactly hiding your pregnancy well." The complete BLUNTNESS of the comment sent her mind reeling. She'd only been pregnant for less than five weeks: how the hell did he notice?! "I've dealt with pregnant Vulcans before: I spent a year and a half on your homeworld. Now snap out of it: we've got work to do."

"R-right," T'Vrell said, stepping forward, "What do you need me to do?"

"Take scans, figure out what the hell happened! I need to keep this from getting worse!"

"Goldy, do what you need to do: we'll help McCoy keep these guys from getting worse." Ron said.

Jaden's eye twitched at the 'goldy' remark, but nodded. "Right, I'll work on the sensors," he said. "Takeshi, you come with me - might need your help. T'Vrell, you and Linda should stay here and help. You're better in this field that we probably are."

"Right," Takeshi said.

"And if nothing else, I can cover this area," Linda added.

With that, they left the trio behind, heading for the Station's sesnor array. In most cases, they would've had to scavenge parts, but they DID bring modern equipment with them. With a bit of hotwiring, they got it to work, and the results were as expected. Driffen's Comet was the source of their problems.

"OK, so we'll need to get back to our time, get our ships, take them back to this time period, and blast that thing to dust," Takeshi remarked.

"Sounds like a plan to me," Jaden said. "Let's get T'Vrell and Linda and get back to our time, so we can bring in the cavalry on that comet. If I understand the Devidians well enough, it won't be enough to blast it in the present - they'd still be able to access it back here in the 23rd."

"Right," Takeshi replied. "Though we'll likely need some supplies - going through that portal gave us enough of a Triolic Radiation dose that if we come back as is, we'll get lethal levels. Our own med supplies are likely affected, too, so we'll likely need to ask Dr. McCoy for some local stuff."

"Good work. I should be able to get these people back on their feet. Pinkerton, get your ass over here and get these people to sickbay!"

"Yatta, yatta, Bones."

"And stop with that Japanese crap! I can barely understand you on a good day!"

Linda shook her head. Five years from then, those three would be on the Exeter. "So, Commander, what's your plan?"

The younger man paused as he carried a security officer in his arms. "Huh?"

"Well, you couldn't have just joined for the sake of joining," Linda said. "What were your career plans?"

"Never thought about it. Tactical sped the fuck out of my rating, making a big fucking deal over that test at the Academy."

"Huh," Linda replied.

At that moment though, Jaden and Takeshi returned to the room. "Linda, T'Vrell, time to go." Jaden said.

"Hold it. You were exposed to enough radiation to fry an egg. You're going to need medical attention." All four paused as they looked at the resident medical officer. "Look, I don't care where you folks are from, and I ain't looking a gift horse in the mouth. I'll get you your shots before you go galavanting: I don't want you people dying on me."

"Thanks, Doc," Takeshi replied.

"Right, right," Jaden said sighing. "Just make it quick - we need to get moving ASAP."

McCoy pulled out a set of hypos, all filled with hyronalin. "Come here." None of them moved, as those things looked like old-style syringes. "Commander?"

"Yeah, Bones?"

"Can you make sure they get their shots?"

"Oh, with PLEASURE."

Back to the future (117Jorn: HA!), Ron stood a few meters from the portal, using a knife to clean under his nails before four screams were heard as Jaden, Takeshi, T'Vrell, and Linda landed on the deck, on their faces. "Have fun?"

"Fuck you Ron."

"Come on, it was just a prick-"

"YOU CALL STABBING US WITH A NEEDLE A PRICK?!" T'Vrell shouted.

"Alright, calm down," Takeshi said. "We have the information we need, now we need to get to our ships, take them back to the past, and blow that comet to smithereens."

"Goody." Ron said, before pointing at T'Vrell, "Also, Lieutenant, as of now, you're on maternity leave. Get your ass to K7 for a full medical workup: I have no idea how triolic exposure like that will affect that baby of yours. And I ain't keen on finding out!"

T'Vrell looked like she was about to protest, but Jaden put a hand on her shoulder. "T'Vrell…" he said. "Just go with it, it's always best to play safe now." The Vulcan glanced at Jaden, before she sighed.

"Alright, alright," she said, shaking her head. "I'll head to K7… just don't do anything stupid while I'm gone."

"I can make no promises on that, you know."

"He'll be fine. Now, I have repair crews to organize. Balen was… generous enough to request assistance in fixing this place up." More like he scared the unholy shit out of the Ferengi, but the Starfleeters weren't complaining. "Just try not to ruin my ship when you get there."

"Sure thing," Jaden said, as he and the others walked away.

"Jaden, why did you have your fingers crossed when you said that?" T'Vrell whispered.

"I'm gonna bring out some pre-emptive payback for what the Reliant does to the Enterprise - that's why."

"What does that have to do with-"

"Before he took command of the Exeter, Ron was the Reliant's XO. And Drozana was the last posting he had before he had that job." That meant the Reliant was going to be at Drozana. And that ship had a blemish on its' name that lasted for almost 50 years after she was lost at Mutara: so much so that she didn't get a successor until late into the 2220s. And even THEN, no one wanted to serve on that ship! If only they could kill Khan, but the TPD was in full effect.

"Just don't kick their asses too much, Jaden."

"25th Century starship vs early 23rd Century starships, T'Vrell," Jaden said. "It's not gonna end well for them, one way or another."

Bepi system

The Constitution-Class heavy cruiser hung in orbit near the star, ready to jump to warp and begin the slingshot maneuver that would take them back to 2265. Once they were there, the mission was simple: deal with the Devidians once and for all. And get revenge for the Enterprise. "All stations report ready." Jaden said. "The Raging Tempest is 30000 kilometers behind us, and will arrive 15 seconds after we do."

"Sir, what will happen once we cross into the past?" Anne Potter asked. "Our ships look far more advanced-"

"We equipped a holo-emitter on the ship, which will make our ship look like a Klingon D7 from the time period - a 'gift' from our favorite group of spooks. Take's ship will appear looking like a B'Rel. While we may look like Klingons though, we'll keep our 25th era firepower."

"So, we're taking out a comet." Anne confirmed.

"Not just a comet," Elisa said, smirking slightly. "It's time to get some payback for the Enterprise. We're going up against the ship that killed her."

"Wasn't the Enterprise technically killed by her Captain over the Genesis planet?" Anne asked. "And even then, that was because Klingons forced him too?"

"Eh, details - Khan put the Big E in that position, and the ship Khan used was the Reliant," Jaden said, shrugging. While Kirk DID auto-destruct the Enterprise, she was badly damaged to begin with. And ONE ship caused that damage: Miranda-Class, NCC-1864, USS Reliant. And they were going to beat the shit out of that thing. "Yorktown to Tempest, you ready Take?"

"All set," Takeshi replied. "Can't believe S31 gave us Klingon Holoemitters, though - something tells me that'll cause trouble."

"We may look like Klingon ships for now, but we're still Federation starships," Jaden said. "We should be able to handle whatever should be thrown our way. We just need to focus on the Comet, but if the Devidians are trying anything on the station itself we'll help kick them out."

"Gotcha," Takeshi replied. "Well, ready to go when you are."

"Anne, you know what to do." Jaden said nodding. "Time to go back to the past."

The Yorktown began moving at full impulse, then engaged her warp drive, going straight to Warp 9. The gravitational forces were extreme, and circling the star at warp speed was not easy. "Sir, this is not going to be fun!"

"Since when did I imply that it would?!" Jaden shouted, as the Yorktown began shaking as they began the slingshot around the sun.

The ship seemed to snap as their vision blurred before the ship came to a complete stop. "I... think we did it, sir. Braking thrusters have fired. And according to the sensors, the stars are out of position, indicating we are where we are supposed to be."

"Alright, set course to Drozana Station - time to kill a Comet, and get a little bit of payback." Jaden said with a smirk.

Drozana system

There were two ships orbiting the station: the Constitution-Class Reuben James, NCC-1634... and the Reliant. The Reliant was the only one that they were going to beat the crap out of.

Suddenly however, appearing from warp was a pair of Klingon vessels - one was a D7 K'tinga, while the second was a B'Rel. "We've arrived at Drozana," Anne reported.

"Sir, we've got eyes on the comet," Elisa said. "Also, we're being hailed by the Reuben James."

"Put it on screen - don't show our faces though." Jaden said.

A human face appeared on the screen, wearing a Starfleet uniform with Commodore's braids. "This is Commodore Ross of the USS Reuben James. Your vessel is IDed as one of the two that attacked a Federation colony. If this is a case of mistaken identity, please respond, or we will consider you hostile."

"Oh, crap."

"Take, deal with the Reuben," Jaden said smirking. "Reliant is MINE."

"On it," Takeshi replied. "We'll keep damage to a minimum." The disguised Raging Tempest began moving, vectoring around to be able to hit key spots on the Reuben James to disable it.

The Miranda-Class light cruiser fired on the Yorktown, the blue phaser beams impacting the shields, causing light flare ups. The Reliant's captain was an idiot if he thought he could take on a Connie from the 25th Century or a D7 from its' own time.

"Time to tease," Jaden said, "Anne, Attack Pattern Takeo Bravo, keep running circles around him. Elisa, target weapons and engines, and non-vital areas of the ship. Show 'em how much firepower we're pack'n."

The superior Starfleet vessel's phasers hacked through the weak shields, hitting the impulse control manifold, killing the Miranda's engines before the beams cut through the hull on the warp nacelles, causing the ship to begin venting drive plasma. A Mk IIA photon torpedo left the Reliant's rear launcher, but didn't even make a dent in the Yorktown's shields before Jaden had that particular launcher... well, it didn't exist after he gave the order.

"Aaaaaand cut!" Jaden said, clapping his hands. "I think it's safe to say she's effectively neutered now. Alright, let's blast this comet to smithereens and then get the fuck out."

"Sir, I'm picking up triolic energy signatures on the station, and I think some of those are Devidian lifesigns."

"Oh, you have got to be KIDDING ME!" Elisa shouted. "Why can't we just blow up the comet and leave?!"

Jaden groaned. "Alright… Elisa, you stay in command here - I'll take Zarva and Morek, and board the station to kick the Devi's out. Once we take care of the situation there, we're blasting that comet."

Drozana station

"Who the hell put the redneck music on?!" The ENTIRE deck was engaged in a bar brawl, and some jackass decided to make it horribly, horribly fitting by playing some redneck song that started with a cowboy whoop. For the three Japanese officers, it was VERY annoying.

"We'll worry about it later," Takeshi replied. "Jaden, you deal with the Devidians with that rifle of yours - we'll handle the brawlers."

Phaser fire was heard from the central area before they heard a familiar voice. "WHAT THE FUCK ARE THOSE?!"

"I DON'T KNOW, RON, JUST SHOOT THEM!"

"KILL IT WITH FIRE! KILL IT WITH FIRE! PLASMA FIRE!"

Jaden grinned as he headed for the juke box, before he downloaded a different song. "Perfect timing." He said, before the country music ended… before once more, an all-too familiar tune began to play as Jaden pulled out his anti-proton rifle. The moment the music picked up, Jaden fired out a stream of anti-proton energy into the closest Devidian, reducing the creature into little more than a stain on the wall.

"Fucking A, this is more… fitting…" The semi-familiar figure of the younger Ron entered Jaden's view, looking slightly annoyed. "Are you going to show up every time this happens? If so, I'm transferring out of the Operations division and into Command."

"Don't worry, this shouldn't happen too much." Jaden said, prepping his rifle once more. "After today, we shouldn't have to deal with anymore of these ghost fucks for a while."

"Yeah, thank God for that. SCOTTY! Where the hell are you, you Scottish bastard?!" Jaden blinked. Did he just say Scotty? As in THE Scotty? Ron pulled out his communicator, then activated it with its' soon to be iconic chirp. "Commander Scott, where the hell are you?"

"I'm locked in the lounge, you daft Japanese fool! Get me out of here!" He looked at the slightly bewildered Jaden. "Can you help me get that drunk out of the lounge? God of engineering he might be, but the doors are fucked up."

"R-right," Jaden said as he headed for the door. "Zarva, you got this?"

"One sec…" Zarva said, as she worked on the door controls. "Working… working… there we go!"

The doors finally parted ways… and standing before them all, wearing the 'cursed' Red shirt, was the, younger, immortal engineer, Montgomery Scott in the flesh.

"Finally! door controls were fried on this side: couldn't get them to work."

"Worry about that later. STIG guy, this is Montgomery Scott, soon to be chief engineer of the enterprise. Scotty, this is… I don't know his name. Don't really care to know right now. Could you-"

"Aye, lad, I'll get the shields back online."

"Zarva, go with him and give him a hand." Jaden said, "We need to start hunting those ghost assholes down, and the sooner the better."

"I'll go hunting. Shirou, Rin, we've got ghosts to bust!"

"Oh, god, he's doing it again!"

Once Ron was out of earshot, Jaden grabbed Scotty's shoulder. "Is there something I can do for you, lad?"

"Yeah, uh... Have you ever thought of using a transporter as a really long term stasis device?"

The legend looked upwards at the ceiling. "Hmm. It'd take a bit of juryrigging," he said. "Might work. Why?"

"Some… friends of mine in Starfleet have been wanting to see if such a thing was possible," Jaden said. "In the event a Starship crashes, and the likelihood of rescue was unlikely at the time. Mentioned something about feeding power to the transporter through auxiliary systems, disable dematerialization routines, and connect the phase inducers into the emitter array, and lock the pattern buffers into a diagnostic cycle."

"That seems a little crazy, but it might work, lad," Scotty said nodding. "Though you'd probably have to worry about signal degradation or one of the boosters to fail depending on how long your in there. If the pattern goes below 50%, well… there won't be much to materialize back if ya are rescued."

"Thanks," Jaden said nodding, "I'll be sure to let my friend know."

"Yorktown to Captain: we've got a number of Klingon D7-Class battlecruisers on an intercept course. And you aren't going to like this. The lead ship is commanded by B'vat."

Jaden facepalmed. He just got DONE with that bastard! "Goddamn son of a bitch…" he muttered. "What the hell is HE doing here?!"

"Unknown, sir. we're locking onto you now. Energizing."

Jaden disappeared in a shower of light just as Ron returned.

"Where the hell did HE go? I've never seen a transporter beam like that!"

Scotty simply shrugged. "I don't know, lad. But I don't think that's the end of it."

USS Raging Tempest

This day JUST wasn't going well. First, they had to disable the the Reuben James, although everyone was VERY pleased to see the Reliant turned into a drifting hulk. Now they had a bunch of Klingons incoming, and led by the biggest pain in their asses since the task force was formed: B'vat. No matter WHAT time he was in, he just didn't stop getting in the way!

Takeshi, now back on his ship, looked at a map of the system on the viewscreen. The Comet was getting closer, too - they'd have to disable the Klingons, destroy the conduit, and then get out of there. "Jaden, you handle B'vat," he said. "Your ship's better suited for that. We've got more firepower, so we'll deal with the comet."

"Got it," Jaden said, as he cracked his neck. "Well on the bright side I get to kick the everloving shit out of both the Reliant and the Quv. Anne, full impulse!"

As the Yorktown moved to disable the Klingons, Takeshi angled his ship to face the comet. "Kevin, set cannons to Rapid Fire and cue up a volley of High Yield Quantum Torpedoes. Let's turn this comet to space debris."

"On it, Boss," Kevin replied. "Ready when you are."

Takeshi pulled the trigger, sending out a volley of fire into the comet.

The ball of ice began to degrade, but a wing of Klingon D7s moved on the Tempest, firing their disruptors at the disguised Sao Paulo-Class escort. Normally, this wouldn't do anything, but SIX D7s were firing at them. That equalled the same amount of firepower that came from a modern Vor'cha attack cruiser's forward disruptor cannon. In short, not good.

Takeshi barrel-rolled to avoid the incoming fire, before coming around and firing precision bursts at the D7s, disabling their engines and weapons before he focused his fire back on the comet.

"Duras dogs! You will not escape my wrath forever-" Blue beams impacted another D7, crippling its' engines before a Constitution-Class ship entered the fight. The deflector was slightly different, and there were extra sensor spikes on the Bussard collectors, but there was no mistaking her once the ship rolled over, banking. "This is Captain Christopher Pike of the Federation Starship Enterprise to all Klingon vessels. I demand to know what is going on here!"

"Oh yeah… forgot the Big E would show up…" Jaden said, "One second... " The Yorktown fired a flurry of Photon Torpedoes and Phaser fire at the comet's remaining bits, quickly reducing whatever was left of the comment into harmless bits and pieces. "Okay - Time to Go! I ain't testing my luck against the Big E!"

"Gentlemen, I know you can hear this. This is Franklin Drake. I had a few pieces of equipment installed on your ships: borg temporal nodes. See you when you get back."

"There's a temporal field forming inside the ship!"

"You could've told us when we first crossed over," Jaden said, rolling his eyes. "If you weren't a recording I'd kick your ass… Takeshi! Get ready, we're going home!"

Drozana system

Two flashes signalled the arrival of the Yorktown and Raging Tempest in front of another Federation starship. It appeared to be a variant of the Excelsior-Class, with upgraded warp nacelles and hull configuration. It was a Resolute-Class heavy cruiser, one of the first in service.

And it worked, to some degree, for Section 31. "Ah, Captain Takeo, welcome back."

"Drake," Jaden growled. "Alright, we fixed the Devidian problem, and without altering the timeline. We're done."

"Yes, for now, Captain. We'll call on you again. You should know by now from Captain Pinkerton: you're NEVER done with us. A pleasure to be working with you." The image faded, and the Resolute jumped to warp. "I think I can safely say that I hate that son of a bitch, Jaden."

"I'm gonna find a way to kill that bastard…" Jaden muttered. "One way or another… "

"Setting course back to K7," Takeshi said. "I think dealing with Captain Miller and Admiral Lamperouge is better than dealing with Section 31."

"True…" Jaden said with a sigh. "Anna, set a course for K7. Let's cross our fingers and hope the next assignment isn't nearly as insane as this one was…"

Both ships jumped to warp, but the universe just wasn't going to cooperate with Jaden's wishes.

117Jorn: And there you go! One more chapter done!

Ron the True Fan: And things are about to get MUCH more interesting. Expect more updates: we have a list. And this is on it.

Takeshi Yamato: Yeah - a few others are, too, but this will be one of our primary focuses.

117Jorn: So until next time…

Everyone: Ja Ne!