Chapter One
One Year Prior to Prologue
Stardate 2389.5
In Orbit, Mars
"Approaching Utopia Planitia, sir."
"Drop to one-eighth impulse, Mr. Jacobs, let the tractor beams take us in."
As he spoke to his young helmsman, Captain Michael Harris was not a happy man. In fact, he was downright irritated.
His starship, the Carrollton, had been surveying star systems in an isolated section of the Beta Quadrant, space where the Federation hadn't truly ventured since the heady days of Starfleet exploration before the Cardassian War in the 2340s. It had been far from an exciting cruise. With the exception of a few scattered Nyberrite Alliance freighters, there had hardly been any contact with other starships, and stellar anomalies requiring investigation were few and far between.
As much as the crew murmured about the boredom - and he joined in with them, silently of course - they all knew the reason why they were in the outreaches of Federation space.
With the turmoil of the last decade, the reach of Starfleet's arm had dangerously shrunk. Far-reaching sections of the Federation were theirs in name only. Many hadn't seen the presence of a starship in ages.
Starfleet Command had trusted he and his ship to travel out and "show the flag" - to appropriate an old phrase. And that's what they had done. Explore, visit outer colonies, and deal with bureaucratic minutiae. For an agonizing three years.
By the time that she began to make her way back to Earth, the Carrollton was possessed with five hundred officers and crew that were restless and well-prepared for a good month or two of R&R, himself included. Except over subspace, the crew hadn't seen their families for the entirety of the cruise. They were looking forward to seeing their loved ones in person.
He was an exception; the only relatives he still had were aboard his ship. Although he would protest, of course, that he cared for all of his crew like family, he was closest with his second officer.
Lieutenant-Commander T'Vau had joined his crew eighteen years ago as a relief ensign, and the two of them had eventually formed something like a father and daughter bond. In her time under his command, she'd risen in the ranks - on her own merit, Michael despised nepotism - to her current position as his second and tactical officer.
They'd been planning to spend part of their leave on a tour of old Terran scientific landmarks. He had the programs stored within the holodeck, but there was something different, almost sacred, about being in physical contact with the locations where history had been made. T'Vau labelled his feelings "illogical," but he knew she silently agreed with him. Her Vulcan pride just wouldn't let her admit it.
They were to kick it off by traveling to the old CERN Particle Collider in Europe. The herculean work of old Earth physicists to discover the mysteries of the universe in "such primitive conditions" had always fascinated the Vulcan, as it had him, and he'd decided to begin their tour there. It would certainly put the last three years of trying to "discover" things themselves into perspective.
All those plans were now moot; hence his irritation.
Yesterday, as they had drawn closer to the Sol System, he'd received a Priority One message from Starfleet Command. He reviewed the text-only order in his mind,
On arrival in Sector 001, U.S.S. Carrollton NCC-68749 is to report for repair and refitting at the Utopia Planitia Fleet Yards. All shore leave is to be halted. Commanding Officer will report immediately to Starfleet Command in San Francisco for a personal debriefing on the refit.
He didn't like it. It pissed him off, as immature as that was. To arrive home after three years of almost no contact with Starfleet Command, and then be tossed a set of short, impersonal orders that offered no explanation and brokered no delay. Fleet politics, how he had missed them.
He sighed softly. "Bridge to Shuttlebay Three, prep Shuttlecraft Hunley for a trip to Earth."
Michael stood and turned to his first officer, Commander Odessa Kallos, who was seated at her usual position by the Flight Operations console to the rear of the bridge. "Odessa, you have the conn," he said as he strode to the turbolift.
The commander made the move over to his chair. "I'll keep her in one piece until you get back," she quipped. It was an old joke.
He smirked as the turbolift opened and he stepped inside, "You always do."
"And find out when we're getting our leave back would ya?"
"I'll do my best," he replied as the lift doors closed. "Shuttlebay Three."
Ensign Janson was his assigned pilot, and the trip to Earth passed fairly quietly, but quickly.
He made a mental note to keep an eye on Janson in the future. He was young, this tour of the Beta Quadrant had been his first as a commissioned officer.
The young man usually flew in one of the Carrollton's Peregrine-D fighters, but he handled the shuttle exceptionally well.
As they touched down, he had a thought and smiled. Aloud, he said, "I imagine I'll be awhile for this debriefing Ensign. If you can do it quietly, feel free to transport and see some of your family while we're here."
The young man started, but grinned. "Aye sir! Thank you!"
He felt the delicate thump of their landing, and the rear door opened, lowered, and he made his way out.
He turned his head, "I'll let you know if anything changes, Mr. Janson. But at least one member of the crew should be able to enjoy some R&R."
He gave himself a mental thump as he strode across the courtyard. That was more openly critical of Command's orders than he should have been.
A warm breeze wafted past him, and he relaxed. It had been a while since he had been planetside, the Carrollton hadn't had the opportunity to send out away missions very often in the Beta Quadrant, and regulations didn't permit the captain to embark on them without good reason.
The humidity of California was a pleasant change from the monotony of a climate-controlled starship, and he enjoyed the feel of a few beads of sweat forming on his forehead as he made his way towards the Daystrom Administration Building.
"Mike!"
A familiar voice rang out behind him and Michael spun around with a grin as he saw the hispanic woman, "Rosa! How the hell are you?"
She grinned up at him, "Good Lord, when did you grow that soup catcher?"
His grin broadened as his fingers brushed brushed the salt-and-pepper goatee.
"About two years ago," he replied. "If old Will Riker could pull it off for this long, I figured I'd give it a shot."
His old captain laughed, "Well, it's very nautical, I'll give you that. It's been too long Mike. What, almost ten years now?"
"More or less. Are you still commanding the Madison?"
"More or less," she shot back, reaching out to give his hand a firm shake. "I'm here at Command the majority of the time now, the paperwork is deep enough to drown in."
The sun emerged from behind a bank of clouds, enough for the glint of her rank insignia to catch his eye. Michael whistled sharply, "Vice-Admiral? That's a few more pips than you wore the last time that I saw you."
Her hand went to her collar and grazed them softly, "I took over for Admiral Patterson when he retired two years ago; I'm commanding the Eleventh Fleet now." She frowned slightly, "I thought you would have gotten the quarterly fleet communique on that."
He shook his head and smiled wanly, "Not out in the Beta Quadrant, they only copied us on priority-level communications, so we've been fairly out-of-touch. What else have I missed?"
Her warm brown eyes hardened, "Trouble. You'll get filled in at the briefing. And I'm sorry to have to do this to you after a long deployment, but as soon as we're done refitting her, I'll need you and the Carrollton ready to ship back out within three weeks."
He was quiet on the turbolift ride, as he let Rosa describe the upgrades that Utopia Planitia would be making to his ship.
"New nacelles?" he asked surprised.
She nodded, "All the Akiras from the Carrollton's production run are being retrofitted with the new Zephyr-type nacelle. They're better armored and more efficient, about a ten-percent power reduction for the warp field."
"My chief engineer would love to see the research on that, he's been working on improving the field efficiency for a few months now. Something to pass the time on our way back."
Rosa smiled, "I'm sure Commander Rollins would enjoy the reading, I'll send the reports his way."
They emerged from another turbolift into an old conference room on the top levels of the Daystrom Building. There was a veritable sea of command red in the room.
Rosa murmured a brief apology and moved away, heading towards a huddle of other flag officers that included Admiral Akaar, the C-in-C of Starfleet. The old man always looked stern, but his expression was even more severe than usual. It unnerved Michael a bit.
The briefing - and it looked to be a hell of a big one - hadn't begun yet, and he meandered around the room, searching out any familiar faces. One deep voice carried over the others, and he moved towards it.
"-seems to have any idea what in the blazes is going on," the voice, belonging to an older Bolian, said. "There are captains here from at least four different sectors. If this isn't some exercise, we've got the makings of a major fleet movement." Another captain, a Tellarite, grunted in agreement, his eyes moving over the crowd. They fixed on him. "You, Harris, isn't it? What have you heard?"
Michael didn't recognize either of them, but he answered regardless. "Little to nothing. The Carrollton's been stationed out in the Beta Quadrant for the last three years. We only arrived back in system a little under three hours ago."
The Bolian snorted in disdain, "So they've kept you in the dark while you've been gone?"
He nodded, his earlier irritation returning. He understood the reasoning, subspace transmissions broadcast over such long distances could be easily intercepted, but it still seemed like a mistake to keep Starfleet's exploration arm out of the loop.
He nodded his head towards the huddle of flag officers, "I spoke to Admiral Gutiérrez on the way in. No formal orders yet, but they're refitting my ship in a hell of hurry. She told me we need to be prepared to redeploy in the next three weeks."
A single tone echoed through the room, and Rosa's group of flag officers exited, and the assembled captains moved to follow.
'Guess we'll all know why in a minute,' thought Michael as he entered and took a seat around a massive conference table.
As the captains and assorted admirals sat down, the silver-haired Admiral Akaar eschewed a chair and stood at a separate dais. The speculations and talk quieted quickly.
Akaar stood stiffly, hands clenched behind his back, "Captains, good morning. On stardate 2388.83, several of our deep-cover agents within the Typhon Pact began hearing whispers about a covert military initiative. One of them were able to infiltrate a portion of it. Earlier this week, they went silent."
Michael leaned forward, covert operations within the old Romulan Star Empire rarely boded well.
The admiral continued, "In the last databurst, our agent delivered confirmation of what we were dealing with. The Romulans and the Gorn have been retrofitting a large number of vessels - our agent estimated at least five hundred - from the various Orion Syndicates. They're being provided with some of the best power systems, weaponry, shielding, and cloaking devices that the Typhon Pact has to offer."
Michael's gut hardened. That kind of rearmament program meant war. His fellow captains obviously thought the same, going by the murmurs that broke out among them. Akaar paused until they quieted, but every one of them knew what he was going to say.
"We've lost all communications from two starbases and five starships in the area near the Tholian border. We suspect that they've been destroyed."
He paused here, as voices rang out. They quieted again. People could argue against some of the decisions which Admiral Leonard James Akaar had made, but no one could contest the man's command presence.
"The Federation Council is convening to," he grimaced, "examine the evidence of Orion involvement. However, Starfleet is making our move now because I, for one, am tired of innocents dying while the bureaucrats debate. Officially, you captains gathered here today are part of a heavy task force engaged in fleet exercises. Unofficially, you'll be engaged in surveillance and defense of our outlying colonies. Admiral Gutiérrez will be in command, and I'll leave the details of the mission to her. Admiral?"
Rosa joined Akaar on the dais and began to speak.
Her words were a faint buzz in his ears as he leaned back in his seat. He looked up, and met the eyes of the Bolian that he'd spoken to a few moments ago. The captain nodded at him grimly. They both knew what this would lead to, what it would become. The cold war was about to become blazing hot. Another full-out war.
Stardate 2390.5
Location Unknown
The bridge of the U.S.S Carrollton was in chaos, an overhanging cloud of smoke drifted over everything as sparks danced from overloaded consoles.
They'd been out alone, engaged in a discreet scouting mission. Cruising at Warp 6, a sudden flux of neutrino emissions had flashed into existence, and Lieutenant Harcrow, the science officer, had barely had been able to shout a short warning before a brutal impact had sent the bridge crew flying from their stations, flinging them into consoles and bulkheads.
Michael winced as the aforementioned officer pulled him to his feet. "Red Alert," he barked as he stumbled over to his chair. As he collapsed into it, he hit its comm control, "Medical team to the bridge."
'I'm getting too old for this,' he thought wearily, gingerly probing the area of his chest where he'd been flung into the navigation console and grimaced. 'Probably a couple of broken ribs.'
"T'Vau, I need a damage report. O'Mealy, what the hell did we hit?"
O'Mealy responded first, "I've got nothing on sensors, sir, I'm running a high-intensity tachyon sweep to try and smoke out any cloaked ships."
At the science station, Lt. Jon Harcrow shook his head, "We'd know if it was a cloak. A collision like that one would have knocked out any shipboard device. Could it be a new minefield? It would fit their pattern since the Battle of Inverness."
Hand still on his injured chest, Michael nodded in agreement, "I agree, but run the scan regardless, I don't want to be caught flatfooted by any Orions patrolling in the area. Commander T'Vau, that damage report?"
She didn't respond, and he turned to the right with a twinge of dread to gaze at his silent second officer. He jumped to his feet, pain forgotten, as he saw her slumped over her console, forehead glistening with green blood. "Jensen, take her station. T'Vau, can you hear me?"
The lift doors opened and a medical team emerged, moving to the wounded. One of them, a Tellarite, hurried over as fast as his species' short legs would carry him. Pulling out his tricorder, he scanned her, his snort flaring briefly. "Her skull has several hairline fractures and she has a severe concussion, but there doesn't appear to be any serious damage to the brain, I'll get her to sickbay for treatment there."
Harris nodded and the nurse - Ensign Grallin, he remembered absently - tapped his commbadge and spoke a few short words. A second later, the two had disappeared in the tell-tale sparkle of a intraship transporter beam.
Another member of the medical team was running a regenerator over his chest, reducing the pain from sharp to dull, before it faded completely.
"Go easy for a few days," the medical officer whispered with a smile, before moving to treat Ensign Jacobs at the helm, whose left arm was bent at an unusual angle.
Jensen O'Mealy had filled T'Vau's post at tactical, and Michael turned his attention back to him, "Mister O'Mealy, that damage report?"
The middle-aged Lieutenant responded with alacrity, his eyes running over the LCARS interface. "There's some minor buckling on the struts for the port nacelle," he began. "Engineering reports power fluctuations all over the ship, as well as a ruptured EPS conduit on Deck Seven. Damage control teams have it successfully contained. Minor problems with our long-range sensors as well, the plasma fires from the rupture damaged some of the bio-neural circuitry. Engineer Rollins estimates two hours repair time before they can get them replaced and fully operational again."
An alert sounded from the station and Jensen O'Mealy's face tightened briefly, then relaxed as he read the new report out loud, "Doctor R'Glus reports several casualties, mostly blunt force trauma like Commander T'Vau, no fatalities."
Mike released a breath that he hadn't realized he's been holding, "Good."
They'd had enough of those in the last few months. The Typhon Pact and the Orions hadn't been fooled by their 'maneuvers' - who would be? - and pitched battles had broken out fairly quickly, and as a auxillary carrier, the Carrolton had been involved in many of them.
On a ship that had been involved in long-ranged exploration as long as his, the crew gained a sense of family that you didn't find everywhere in Starfleet. And the losses cut deep. Michael hated dictating the solemn messages. Telling a parent, a spouse, or a child that a loved one wasn't coming back.
He'd known that duty enough in the Dominion and Borg Wars. And repeating it so often these last few months had brought back those and other, more painful, memories that he'd rather not recall.
The sound of the turbolift doors pulled him out of his thoughts. As his first officer stepped onto the bridge he gave himself a mental shake, now wasn't the time to reminisce.
"What happened sir?" she asked. Going off her disheveled appearance, he guessed she'd been asleep during the impact.
"We're not sure," he replied. "But get Deadbolt Squadron launched, I want them running a CAP until we've completed repairs." He turned to Lt. Harcrow at the science station, "Jon, get an encrypted subspace message to Admiral Gutiérrez, send our position, situation, and request support."
His science officer had been hunched over his station since he'd given the order for the tachyon scan, pouring over sensor logs and readouts. Michael had heard snatches of a quiet but rapid conversation with stellar cartography. About what, he had no idea.
For a few seconds, no reply came, then the blond man straightened in his chair and looked at Harris with a strange glint in his eye. It twisted his gut in a way he didn't like.
"Lieutenant?"
The answer hit like a thunderbolt, "Captain, I can't get a fix on our position...I think that we hit a wormhole."
Activity on the bridge stopped instantly.
Michael allowed himself a brief second of shock as well before Starfleet training and years of wartime experience took hold.
"Have repair teams prioritize the sensors, I want them back up yesterday. I don't want a repeat of what happened to the Odyssey."
Commander Kallos moved to Flight Ops in the aft section of the bridge. "Launch our Venture scouts with Deadbolt Squadron. Have them fill any holes in our sensors. Prep Ivory and Nazgul Squadrons as well, heavy weapons loadou-"
As the crew rushed about him, Michael back in his chair and thought back on the last major wormhole discovery twenty years before. And the great interstellar war that resulted in almost the complete devastation of the Alpha Quadrant. The Orions, the Typhon Pact, and now this. He only prayed that this wasn't going to turn out as bad as his gut was telling him.