Miriya Sterling sat on her chair, feeling down on herself again. Around her the usual hustle and bustle were going on, those actions that allowed her command to function at peak efficiency whenever it was called upon, even though the occasions that it would be were rare as hen's teeth. Those going about their business would sometimes look at her, and at the object she held in her hand, before starting back to work again. Everyone was avoiding her, it seemed.

She sighed, a bit more wistfully than she probably should have considering she was the officer on deck, but it was a glum day, one she would have liked to beg off on, but events were spiraling towards a climax, and she wouldn't miss them for the world. For him, she would have, but not the world. Thinking those thoughts, she gently ran her fingers down the side of the thing in her hand, a small locket, which popped open easily, revealing two worn out pictures inside.

"Oh Max," was all she said, and this in a whisper that didn't carry. Not that it needed to. The bridge crew knew her well enough to remember the date. On this day, over two hundred years ago, Miriya, Zentraedi ace pilot and one of their greatest warriors, had become Miriya Sterling, the first, and not the last, of her people to find their home among the humans. So few of them had been of her breed though, so few had had the extra genes to live like her, practically forever. Only five others, and all of them loners, none who ever gave their hearts away to those who would pass on.

To those of the Terran race, she was considered their mother, the first woman to bare a Terran child, mixing both homo sapien and Zen DNA together to create a new way of living. None of those on her bridge thought of her like that though. To them, she was the great warrior, a soldier and commander on the level of the great Henry Gloval himself, and able to lead them to victory against any foe that might decide to stand in their way. They knew why she was there today, when she should have taken a day off, so they gave her all the space they could, at least until an alert sounded, and a small display on her chair sprung to life.

"This Amanda Hayes, Representative of the Senate on the Conclave. By my authority, I order this command to Shanxi to defend the colony. All steps to preserve the life of the invaders are to be taken, but they are not to set foot on the surface of the world, understood?" said the display, the voice normal though slowed down a bit by a scrambler code on the transmission.

"This is Southern Cross. Please state command code," said Miriya into her station, instantly awake and alert, ready for this to be either real or a trick.

"Code is X3A, fly true, strike hard," said Hayes voice, and then the channel automatically closed, the order given.

"All hands, battlestations, I repeat, all hands, battlestations!" shouted Miriya, and instantly the milling about several troops had been doing became very deliberate runs, hopping into their chairs and putting on head sets. Orders were shouted into those sets, and all along the length of her ship, lights began to turn on, engines were spun up, and the fold drive deep within, that had been kept on stand by, was given the go ahead. Before a minute had passed, the great ship she served on was surrounded by a glowing sheen of light, and then it vanished.

OoOoO

Sparatus had just given the order for some of his ships to land on the planet. A few frigates only, not cruisers. They knew the Terrans were larger than your average sentient, by an order of magnitude. That information had been included with the mission that had brought him here. Acting on that, he wanted any ships sent down to be able to remain active for as long as possible, with guns and weapons ready should any of the Terrans get any big ideas.

As the final course was charted, as the first frigate began to move, it happened. There was a bright flash of light outside his view port, and he had to cover his eyes with his hand, trying to peer out into the depths of space to find what the heck had caused it. All around him, the sounds of officers trying to adapt, a few screaming, as they'd been blinded by the bright light, possibly some kind of attack from below, a new weapon they hadn't been told about.

When his vision cleared enough that he could see, leaving only a few spots, he got a good look at what had happened, and his heart nearly stopped. In front of his ship was a new space station. He couldn't really gauge the size, but with the various cruisers and frigates in his view, he knew the thing had to be quite distant to be seen, and so massive that it dwarfed the Citadel itself. It now hung there in space before him, as if daring him to try something.

OoOoO

The Council Chamber hung silent as the new shape appeared. There was no flash of light for them, just one minute, the sky was filled with only turian vessel, the next, it just popped into existence, and you could hear the shocked gasps of politicians, the muttered obscenities of the military minds, and even a few prayers to gods or ancestors the speaker probably hadn't even really believed in until that moment.

The shape was too scale, or so they assumed as the turian fleet was displayed that way in the hologram. That meant that the thing was miles and miles long, at least as large as the Citadel, if not larger. The design was dirt simple too. It was a single long shaft, seemingly smooth like a jewel, and in the shape of a square prism. Near the back part, just from the end of the thing, jutted several smaller prisms at ninety degree angles to each other, before a piece of the longer one, the same length as the pieces jutting out, stretched behind.

To a human, the shape was simple, a sword of blocks. The hilt, a star guard, or so Hayes had had it described to her once, with two sets of arms instead of a single, allowing it to be held at different angles. The shape have given the unit its name, The Sword of the Southern Cross, otherwise called the SDF-4. It was eighty miles in total length, eight miles wide at every end, and the rear protrusions and the arms both stuck out an additional eight miles from the body.

Simple design, on a massive scale. It was also the most powerful mobile weapon Terrans had ever designed. The main gun, which ran the entire length of the ship, was powerful enough that it could punch a hole in a planet, and most of that length was still covered with small bumps that couldn't be seen in the holo, each one a reflex turret, with enough firepower behind the individual shots to level large sections of a city from orbit. To the Terrans, the view of this had become a major point of triumph, that they had built something so powerful.

"Governor Williams, would you try and patch us through to Sparatus again? I think he might want to talk a little more now," said Hayes to the still floating image of the older man, who just nodded as he worked on getting the connection established again. The Councilors, looking at the sight before them, unable to look away, were numb to those words. Each one thinking thoughts of how badly this could go, if Sparatus refused to listen to reason.

OoOoO

"General, there's a transmission from the planet. Should I put it through?" asked a captain Sparatus barely heard as he continued to just stare out of the port at the thing in front of him. Sensors were confirming its existence, somehow popping into being, despite being almost twice as long as the Citadel, and an estimated mass of not much lower. This thing was a beast, a feat of engineering he had never even considered possible, and now it hung there, silent.

"Sir?" asked the captain again, this time his hand going to Sparatus' shoulder, the touch of another instantly snapping him out of his thoughts, as he focused on what he was being told, motioning for the officers to put the governor's image back in front of him. That was then replaced a moment later by the three Councilors all of whom looked at him like he was scum of some sort, something to be wiped away to make them all feel clean again.

"General, I believe the Terrans have made their point quite clear. You will not be allowed to land, and are hereby ordered to return to Citadel Space as soon as possible. Is that clear?" asked the salarian, her tone suggesting that he had better fall into line right now, or face the consequences. Looking dully at her, and then back out the window, the turian's face seemed frozen in shock, and the Councilor was just about to order the second in command to take over, when the General raised a single hand.

"Captain, have all ships prepare weapons to fire on my mark," he said, and that order seemed to snap a few of his subordinates out of their own daze. With a command at last to be followed, they leapt to their stations and began signaling the other ships in the fleet.

"General, I do believe you just gave an order counter to the will of this Council. You are ordered, ordered! To stand down, right this instant," said the salarian, and General Sparatus turned to face her, his gaze fixing on the image of her in front of him, and then turning slightly to the side to the turian Councilor, who stood there, impassive, almost like he was ignoring the whole situation and hoping it blew over.

"Councilor, as the officer in the field, my command is absolute under the Citadel Conventions. That authority trumps even yours in a combat situation, which this has now become due to the Terrans' refusal to submit to a simple search. I feel that deserves a response in kind. All guns, fire in ten seconds," this order was relayed to the ships in his fleet, and even as the politicians impotently shouted at him, trying to keep him from protecting them from these upstart Terrans, he felt the dull thunk of a launch beneath his feet.

OoOoO

"Incoming fire!" shouted a voice on the bridge, the SDF-4 having been hanging there, waiting for some response to their arrival. Honestly, looking at the fleet before her, less than a thousand ships all total, Miriya had expected them to surrender. That was not to say that fire had not been counted on, and as the projectiles closed, solid state things of metal and speed rather than energy and heat, she heard the hum of the barrier system starting up. Within a heartbeat, an oval of green energy came into being around her ship, protecting it.

The impacts were still felt, however, as hundreds of the things slammed home hard. Stations began to shout numbers at her, engine levels, protoculture drain, and a dozen other things besides. She heard it all, taking in every detail of the battle. When the fire had passed, she watched with everyone else for a few moments, wondering if the enemy would continue to waste their time. Kinetic projectiles had no chance of penetrating a full omnidirectional barrier.

When no second wave of shots came, Mirirya considered her options. The enemy weapons were useless against her defenses, but they couldn't fire with them up either. The barrier was a two way street. She could just plow through them, of course, but she'd been told their ships were faster, and if they started maneuvering around she'd never catch them. Looking at her targeting displays, she decided, and pressed a button on her console so her voice would echo through the ship.

"All stations, prepare to return fire. Our information is that reflex weapons, and the enemy's own barriers down mix, so every gunner pick your target. Barrier drop in ten seconds. Point defense operators, prepare to intercept any incoming fire," the order was given, and she was satisfied with her crew as everyone quickly dropped into position, the bridge stations showing power drain of the various systems, before, at her count, the barrier fell, and streams of blue light shot between the massive SDF-4 and the turian fleet.

OoOoO

The image hanging above the Council showed the absolutely ridiculous amount of firepower pouring onto the ship, enough that even the best ship in the fleet would have been smashed into its component atoms. Then a glowing barrier appeared around the Terran ship, and suddenly that firepower looked woefully inadequate next to the power of this ultimate weapon, the shield blocking everything with ease, leaving the ship floating there serene, almost like a bomb before it exploded.

Every eye in the room knew that they were witnessing history, and so no one spoke as the barrier withdrew, leaving the ship once more exposed to the turians. Before another salvo could be fired, lances of light shot from the hull of the Terran vessel, streaking their way across space. The shots, faster than the turians, struck in seconds, and each vessel shuddered under the impact, the small frigates all having their barriers blown away, before going dead, in space, and at the Terrans' mercy.

To the larger ships, cruisers and dreadnaughts both, those shots might as well have been so much water, for all the impact they had. The light of each blast broke like waves upon the rocks, leaving the ships unharmed. Still, the fight seemed over, with so much of the fleet gone, and Hayes looked confidently at the images floating in front of her. Another salvo was fired from the turian ships, and this time many dots of light bloomed on the surface of the large vessel, each intercepting as much of the incoming fire as they could.

Not every shot was blocked, however. The points of light simply couldn't move fast enough to cover every projectile, and so many of them struck home. Where they did, the hull crumpled, and in one case, a hole seemed to be torn through several decks, causing Hayes to gasp. The armor of the SDF-4 wasn't the best, as the ship was designed more as a first strike weapon, but still, it was armored the same as any other warship. To see that hull simply punched through like that was a shock.

OoOoO

"Report!" shouted Miriya, holding onto her chair as violent shudders tore through the ship.

"Impact, D-sector. Seals are holding, no casualties to report ma'am," said one of the AIs from a monitor nearby, and she would have breathed a sigh of relief at that, if she could have allowed herself that moment. She was a soldier, however, and instead powered through.

"What happened?" she asked simply.

"The Point Directional Barrier is used to larger strikes over a wide area. Too many small hits incoming strained the systems ability to respond. Compensating," as she spoke, the large points of light suddenly broke apart into many smaller ones, and as a third wave of shots came in, every single one was intercepted this time, giving them all that moment of respite to collect themselves.

"Did our shots have any affect on their shields?" she asked, and saw at least a few stations running sims of the first strike, even as more fire from the enemies continued to rain down.

"Affirmative. There was a slight power decrease in them when struck. It will take approximately twenty two hundred hits to drain their systems fully at that rate," confirmed one of the Terrans sitting in a seat nearby.

"Unacceptable. Attempt a concert fire," she ordered.

"Target?" asked one of the nearby AIs.

"One of the smaller ships, we have to decrease the amount of incoming fire," she said, and was given an acknowledging beep, before she looked on her main monitor to watch as more and more fire was propelled her way. The turians were getting smarter too, sending fire in alternating patterns, and dividing up where their shots would hit, trying to overwhelm the point barriers. They weren't succeeding yet, but a single miss could tear the ship apart, if that first impact was any indication.

"Concert fire, locked," said one of the stations.

"Fire!" she ordered, and then watched in pride as her ship shot at her foes again. This time instead of hundreds of small columns of light, there was first one, then another, and then another, each turret firing in a pattern so that each shot would land at the exact same moment, showing a level of coordination that was surprising, even if some of those gunners were AIs.

When the shot finally passed the bow of her ship, fully sixty shots were part of it, and the slammed hard into the enemy ship before it could do more than notice the incoming fire. These shots landed hard, and as before, the impacts seemed to scatter on the barriers. However, instead of spreading out in all directions, lines like those that had appeared on the frigates ran over the cruisers barriers, and after a few seconds, that barrier popped, leaving the cruiser adrift, and getting a triumphant shout from the crew on the bridge.

"Concert fire again, begin binary test. Let's find out just how many of our shots they can take," she ordered, and a few crew members got rather wicked grins on their faces as a second volley of three sets of thirty slammed home, and once again, the targets were disabled, everyone aboard thinking the battle was won save the enemy surrendering or, as one of the dreadnaughts appeared to be doing, turning tail and running. Then she noticed something. The dreadnaught stopped turning before going completely the other way, and her eyes followed the ship's bow, before slamming her fist on her station, her voice ringing out over the bridge.

"I need the main reflex cannon to power, now!" she shouted.

"Ma'am, the main gun was damaged by the hit from earlier," said one of the bridge officers, an image of the ship flashing on her monitor with red lights in the damaged section.

"Then start charging the secondary, I want to fire as soon as possible!" she ordered, and then watched as another image of her vessel appeared on the monitor before her, hoping she was wrong, hoping the ship wasn't doing what she thought it was doing. Near the rear of her vessel, arcs of lightning began to play between one set of 'arms'. The energy moved up, and then hung in the space between those sections of the ship, soon joined by more arcs, as at the center of the lightning, a small ball began to grow, getting larger and more powerful as the seconds ticked on, but no where near fast enough.

OoOoO

"Yes!" shouted Jonathan Archer as he watched the monitor before him. His ship, along with a dozen other frigates, had been sitting here in space, floating a bit away from the relay that would take them to the Citadel, for almost a week now. He'd been concerned the whole time with what his home would do if trouble came, but seeing the SDF-4 defending it, he was satisfied that it would still be there when he got back. The battle seemed all but over now, and he almost wanted to open a bottle of champagne he'd been saving.

Then he noticed something. Something worrying, as one of the vessels in the rear, the big dreadnaughts, began to turn. After first, he thought it was trying to retreat, but then it stopped before it was facing fully away from the battle. Without saying anything, he fiddled with his controls to see what it was facing, and then his eyes went wide.

"T'Pol! Calculate Fold maneuver!" he cried out.

OoOoO

"This is going very badly," whispered the salarian Dalatress to her companions. The two Councilors could do little but nod at the comment. The battle, whichever way it went, was going to seriously hamper negotiations, and they would be forced to make at least some token reparations to the Terrans to make up for it. Luckily, it seemed for the moment that neither side had taken many, if any, fatalities. Still, in battle, that was only a matter of time.

"We should have cleared the chamber the instant this began," griped the turian beside her, and the Dalatress could only nod. It was far too late now, of course, and none of them could have known this would happen, but still, she hoped to be able to nip any problems like this in the bud next time. Looking up, she found the battle seemed nearly over. A back and forth had turned almost completely one sided now, despite the damage to the Terran ship.

"We might even be able to get some concessions out of Hayes for this," commented the Dalatress as the battle began to wrap up. A few ships to haul their fleet back, with an appropriate admonishment to the General, and probably a demotion. With that fleet down and out though, they could possibly convince Hayes to assist with border patrols, and allow Council agents onto the Terran ships. That could give them a lot of information, and a Specter or two in the midst of that fleet might even be able to get away with swiping some of that protoculture stuff.

"Wait, what is...?" the question trailed off, as the image of Sparatus' personal dreadnaught began to turn, looking at first like it might be about to flee the battle. Then everyone present realized what was really happening, and all of them just stared, shocked at this turn of events.

OoOoO

"What is that ship doing?" asked Shepard as stared at the monitor before her. It showed the battle hologram the Council was watching. Then she realized what it was she was seeing, and her heart leapt, as her eyes went wide.

OoOoO

"Hmm, well, that appears to be game," said Governor Williams to the empty conference room in his home. The display of the ships battling overhead had focused on one in particular, a huge arrowhead, now aimed straight for his colony. He knew what was coming. He knew how this was going to end, and could only feel cold resignation, wishing that he'd decided to keep Ashley at his side, as the future began to bear itself down upon him.

OoOoO

"This is impossible!" shouted the general as the information began to pour in. The enemy's first volley had somehow disabled his ships, hundreds of frigates rendered in operable. At first he had thought they were destroyed, as they vanished from his tactical displays, but then someone had actually decided to look for them, rather than just register their connections were dead, and found that the ships were intact, but dead in space.

Ordering another salvo from the remaining ships of his fleet, which seemed to be immune to this enemy weapon, he was satisfied when one of the shots not only got through the defenses, but literally tore a hole in the side of the enemy vessel. The ship was huge, powerful, but it wasn't invincible. It might take a while, but he could win this, and then he'd drag this thing's wreck back to Citadel Space. If they complained about it, well, they'd been the ones to attack his ships, the legitimate authority here.

Then it struck back again, in an impossible way. He saw it, the fire as it passed over the hull of that monster, each shot followed by another, and then another. It would have taken more than a computer or a gunner to do that. Even the AIs he knew of could not have calculated so well. Still, however they did it, the Terrans were able to fire off all their guns in sequence, so that a huge mass of blue light smashed into the barrier of one of the remaining cruisers, popping it like a bubble, and leaving the cruiser dead in space.

"Turn us!" he shouted to the crew in front of him, many of whom had been calculating firing vectors and the like, to make sure they didn't hit any of their own ships, which floated dead in front of them.

"General?" asked the captain, and Sparatus, rather than giving the order again, walked around his display and towards a piloting station ahead of him. Pushing the pilot out of his seat, he programed in the course he wanted, and felt the slight bit of motion as the engines began to turn the ship to the side. The massive weapon ahead slid out of view, to be replaced by the planet below.

"Fire control, give me a targeting solution on the colony," he said simply, coldly. The crew, unable to do anything other than what their training dictated, gave the general his request, and he felt that lovely hum as shots from the main cannon began to spin up to speed.

OoOoO

Across the galaxy, in a half a dozen locations, there were hundreds of eyes looking at the battle over Shanxi. All of them, as one, turned to the ship at the rear of the turian formation. All of them knew what was going to happen, and none of them could stop it. They could only watch in horror, as the turian dreadnaught charged up its main cannon, spinning a large hunk of metal up until it was going at near light speed, and then fired out of the cannon that housed it, streaking down into the atmosphere of the planet on a screaming trajectory towards the world below.

"No!" cried out the voices of many of the watchers, a final cry at the unfairness of it all, impotently begging the universe for some miracle to stop this.