A/N - I'm really trying to do better with the timings, I swear! Thanks so much to everyone who reads this, and thanks for all the reviews - any advice you have is greatly appreciated as this is my first fanfic and I do get a bit lost!

Disclaimer - I do not own anything NCIS. The Stars universe is, however, my own. It is inspired by Doctor Who and various other sci-fi shows but I take nothing from them except that inspiration.

Also, anything medical and anything about war and battle is just stuff I make up. I'm no expert.

The next few days were a blur of exhausting and pointless activity, leaving everyone onboard the Orbiter drained but no closer to an answer. Timothy slept when he could but only for a few hours at a time, not because he wasn't tired but because of the turmoil in his head. A million questions without answers span in his mind, making sleep all but impossible as he searched every bit of knowledge he'd accumulated over his many years of fighting - more than sixty, in total, though most of those 'lost years' were not ones he cared to look back on - for some small clue into what they were facing.

His head ached all day as a result, making him snappish and irritable. His temper served to increase the general atmosphere of fearful respect that followed him through the corridors; people were wary, afraid to anger him further, and worked even harder if he was whispered to be near. It wasn't all-out fear, exactly, and certainly not the kind that engenders ill feeling or mutiny. Everyone was all too aware that they were not providing any answers in this time of crisis.

In truth, the Orbiter had all but forgotten what it was like to have a military general stalking the corridors, for Kinoan had ruled alone these ten years of peace. Timothy's reappearance was a rather sudden injection of severity and discipline back into daily order and the Orbiter worked all the better for it.

Despite everything, though, there were still no answers. The tech teams in both the Control and the Radio rooms had failed to trace the origin of the teleportation beam. They were no closer to identifying the missiles, either. It wasn't spoken of but there was an uncomfortable undercurrent of tension onboard the Orbiter; every solider and every staff member felt strangely vulnerable. It was an unfamiliar sensation, here on a station that was more home than command centre.

There was, however, a spark of hope in what seemed an impossible situation. Gibbs' test results had come back and, like Timothy and Gorcheva had expected, the blood work and scans were clean. Of course, that left them no nearer an answer and Timothy readily agreed to Gorcheva's suggestion of monitoring Gibbs' neurological activity over a period of several hours.

This final test proved illuminating. The neurologist - a short, balding, dark man from Scotland who was, Gorcheva assured Timothy, renowned in his field - identified a pattern of strange 'bursts' of activity, short-lived and always in areas that shouldn't be registering such levels. Gibbs had another 'episode' the day after he was quarantined, while Timothy was prowling the Control Room and thoroughly spooking the staff there, which coincided with an even more bizarre pattern of brain activity.

Mere moments after returning to his normal self, Gibbs fell unconscious abruptly and could not be woken. Timothy and the rest of the NCIS team had spent the next three hours pacing the corridor outside his room, badgering Gorcheva until she snapped and told Timothy, in no uncertain terms, to shut up and let her do her job or leave.

He hadn't argued and hadn't gotten angry, though he would not normally tolerate that level of familiarity even from Gorcheva.

Then, just as suddenly as he had fallen into it, Gibbs awoke from his coma. His brain activity had returned to normal and stayed that way.

None of the rest of the team displayed irregular neurological activity, when they too were testing, but the worry remained. At some point, however, worry had to give way to practicality and life had to go on. Things couldn't freeze because Timothy was anxious about a small group of people, no matter how close he was to them. He was a General, first and foremost.

Gibbs was released from quarantine but all plans to put him into service were abandoned, despite the agent's insistence that he was fine. Timothy couldn't be his babysitter, though. It was Harriet who suggested asking Captain Cleve to show him around. With no further missiles incoming but the threat still heavy in the air, the Captain's unit was on standby. Cleve, a Marine himself before Stars came headhunting, seemed perfectly happy to take the agent on. It wasn't the ideal solution, though, and the relationship between Timothy and Gibbs was becoming strained. Gibbs thought he could do more and did not like being told no.

Ducky, Palmer and Abby were sent to their respective stations on the second day after Gibbs' quarantine. The two medical examiners found themselves thrown straight into action when the crew from a starship wreck was brought in, in critical condition all. They did little but watch the high-speed efficiency of the emergency response team but it was an educational experience, to say the least. Fortunately, their particular service was not needed.

Abby's introduction to the radio room was less dramatic but no less overwhelming. The forensic scientist was good with computers but, like Timothy before her, she had no concept of the technology Stars used. Leah and Varigandi were more than happy to have a 'student', though, and Abby seemed happy enough when Timothy came in to check on her.

He'd sworn he wouldn't be babysitting them anymore, but found he couldn't quite help himself.

Ziva and Tony were due to start basic training, shipping out to Horrovanda the day after Gibbs was released from quarantine. If they were annoyed that their boss would not be joining them, they were hiding it better than the man himself. A strange kind of acceptance had settled over the pair; they had made their choice freely and wanted to do this, no matter how intimidating the prospect of combat training on an alien planet seemed.

Timothy was no less worried about sending them off, but was at least secure in the knowledge that no one ever died in basic training. The Peace Force had had millennia to perfect its training programmes. Tony and Ziva would emerge, in four months time, as ready to battle the unbeatable as any new recruit - as ready as Timothy had been, jumping straight from training to all-out warfare.

Timothy was afraid for his team but most of the frustration - the root of his foul temper - came from the tech team's inability to trace the teleportation beam that had brought the team to the Orbiter. It did not seem to have emanated from anywhere in particular, which made Timothy more certain than ever that the point had been to get them on board to station rather than outright abduction. It was not a comforting idea.

Another worry was Harriet. She had disappeared, which wasn't particularly unusual and wouldn't be a cause for concern on any other occasion. Harriet came and went and she pleased and no force or authority in the Peace Force could stop her; nor wanted to. But she had been acting strangely since the NCIS team arrived; since Gibbs' had his first 'episode'. Harriet's behaviour had always been strange, Timothy thought to himself, but something had changed recently and it set off alarm bells in his head. He would talk to her when she returned, as she would. He could not afford to have his best soldier, his best warrior, following her own lead in this.

Timothy had his pride, yes, but he was not above admitting that to have any chance of winning this thing, he needed both Harriet and Kinoan. The three of them had fought and won many hard battles, leading the Peace Force to victory even when it seemed impossible. They may not know what they were facing now but Timothy still felt sure they could defeat their enemy if the Peace Force pulled together.

Everything was running peacefully. Ziva and Tony departed for basic training an hour ago and now Timothy lay on his bunk, staring obliviously up at the ceiling, not even attempting to sleep as Kinoan had urged him. There was a tightness in his stomach, a leaden feeling that would not let him rest. Perhaps he had been fighting for too long, perhaps he had lived too long; this felt like something approaching.

He already had his weapon out when Harriet burst through the door.

Always Harriet, the bringer of bloody war. There were worlds out there whose legends spoke of her as the harbinger of death.

"Isgul is attacked." This time there was no note of panic or fear in the Captain's voice. There was fire and determination, a rage all her own. This was Harriet preparing for war; a war she could actually fight.

"Facing?" Timothy barked, slipping off the bed and following her in the direction of the hangars. They had fought side-by-side for so long they had developed a kind of shorthand and needed few words.

"No idea. Ships, idle; foot soldiers not so."

"Us?"

"Elite unit heads up, plus you. Infantry back-up if needed."

The blood thumped in Timothy's brain, adrenaline swirling. It felt ... familiar. Good. Ships and soldiers - that was something they could fight. Timothy knew ships and soldiers. Knew the field of battle, knew war.

It was starting.

And maybe, just maybe, they could stop it before it got too out of hand. Maybe they could prevent the grand prediction.

A battle which will encompass not just our galaxy but the galaxies beyond and which will tear our universe apart. This is the end of all things.