“Do not be afraid, Commander Troi,” said the voice. “We are aware you have had undesirable encounters with nanite technologies in the past, during your time aboard the Starship Enterprise. Please know that our systems are wholly benign.”
She wanted to believe that, more than anything, if it meant getting her son back in one piece. “This is… how you heal your own people?”
“When reparation is required,” it replied. “The incidence is rare. Jazari are long-lived and we are cautious.”
Troi’s unanswered questions came to her once more. “Exactly how old are you, Mister Zade?” She vaguely recalled that Zade’s Starfleet record put him somewhere at the low end of his thirties in standard years.
“We do not measure time on the same scale as humans.” The reply was a deflection, and he knew it.
Inside the tube, the light shifted again, and she felt her son’s aura change and soften. His fear was waning. He felt safe.
Please let that be true. Troi offered the thought to whatever benevolent powers or fates might be watching over them at this moment. As an empath, she had always possessed some measure of belief in the numinous and the spiritual, and as her son lay on the edge of survival, she desperately wanted every element of the universe to be looking out for him.
“What are his chances?” It took a moment before Troi realized that she had said the words aloud.
“Thaddeus’s chances are good,” said Zade. “He will endure today.” Then a shadow passed over the Jazari’s reptilian face. “Beyond that, he will face the same challenges as all of us—”
Zade suddenly stiffened, falling silent. In the same moment, a low booming sound like a tolling bell echoed through the reparation chamber, and the floating drones reacted like frightened birds, darting away to the corners of the space.
“What’s wrong?” Troi cast around, her heart racing. “What is it?”
“Danger, Deanna Troi,” said Friend. “A weapons discharge has been detected in close proximity. The Romulan starship escorting us has launched an unprovoked attack.”
“Will…” She slapped at the combadge on her chest, but the device remained silent.
A heartbeat later, the walls of the chamber trembled as something powerful impacted the great ship’s hull with punishing force, and Troi fell against the side of the glowing capsule.
* * *
“Get me a tactical approach!” demanded Riker, jabbing a finger at the viewscreen. “We have to stop this!”
“The warbird has completed a sweep over the generation ship,” said Vale, reading the monitor at her side. “Reading multiple disruptor hits. They’ve already lost a dozen shield emitters.”
“Why aren’t they firing back?” said Keru.
“The Jazari are pacifists, their ship is unarmed,” explained Livnah. “They believe in using force only in the most extreme of cases.”
“I’d say this is pretty bloody extreme,” retorted the Trill. “Captain, photon torpedo launchers are still cycling up to active state but I can give you phasers now.”
Riker’s hand tightened into a fist, and it took all of his self-control not to give in to an aggressive reaction. “Hold your fire.” He bit out the words. “And someone get me communications with that ship!”
“Warbird is extending away and turning,” said Westerguard.
Riker saw the Othrys on the main viewer as a distant green-gray falcon, describing a lazy turn away from the damaged shape of the bigger Jazari vessel. Mass for mass, the Romulan battle cruiser was nowhere near the equal of the generation ship, but its weapons were still powerful enough to reduce the other craft to irradiated wreckage.
“Coming around,” continued the navigator. “Heading back toward us.”
“Good.” Riker drew himself up. “The longer they keep their attention on the Titan, the better it is for the Jazari.” And all our people still over there, he added silently.
The captain pushed away his own anger and fear, knowing that the next few moments could mean life or death. Glancing around, he saw his command crew follow his example. They were good people, every one of them, and Riker knew he wasn’t the only person on the bridge fearing for the life of someone they cared for over on the Jazari ship. Both Ranul Keru’s partner and Hal Westerguard’s daughter were down in the Ochre Dome, and the tactical officer and the navigator had to be feeling every iota of the same dread coursing through Will Riker’s mind.
“We won’t let them down,” said Riker.
“Captain,” Cantua called out from across the bridge, “the Othrys has reopened hailing frequencies.” She nodded to him. “You’re on, sir.”
Riker stepped up to the midbridge and set his jaw in a firm line. “Commander Medaka, this is Captain Riker. What you are doing is an act of war! Stand down immediately and explain yourself!”
The main viewer blinked from the image of the Romulan ship to the interior of its bridge, and Riker’s explanation sat there in front of him, gazing out of the screen with a haughty, dismissive expression on her face.
“The commander is indisposed,” said Major Helek, her pale lips twisted in a sneer. “This vessel is now operating under my orders, Riker.”
“I want to speak to Medaka,” he insisted.
“You are in no position to make demands,” Helek snapped. “We are no longer in Federation space and you have no authority here. I gave you the courtesy of a warning shot. If you value the lives of your crew, turn away now.”
Riker stood his ground. “We’re going nowhere.”
Helek rose to her feet. “Do not interfere, Terran! You may be too blind to see it, but we know the Jazari are an existential threat to all organic life! Their continued existence cannot be permitted!”
“What the hell are you talking about?” Riker’s snarl sliced through the air like a blade. “They are no threat to anyone! My people, my family, are on board that ship! I won’t let you endanger them.”
Helek’s mercurial mood shifted, her fury becoming scorn. “Unfortunate. But then, these are the losses incurred when one makes pacts with destroyers.” She put hard emphasis on the last word. “Unless you wish to lose more, Riker. Unless you wish to lose everything. You will take your wounded ship and flee.” Helek made a vague wave at the air and settled back into the command chair. “Consider that my one and only grant of mercy. It’s far more than you deserve.”
Once more, Riker bit down on his instinctive reaction and tried, one final time, to find a way through this that did not lead to violence. “What are you trying to achieve here, Major? You know I can’t leave. And you’re firing on a ship full of defenseless civilians. Since when is this the Romulan way? It’s the act of a coward! Make me understand why you have done this.” As long as he kept her talking, the Othrys’s cannons were silent, and every second that passed kept people alive.
Helek hesitated, and for a moment she seemed to be considering his words. But then she pressed on. “If you understood, Riker. If you were actually capable of it. Then you would join me in annihilating these things. But your kind are too weak. You will never have the burden of the clarity I bear.” She glanced toward her weapons officer. “And for that, I think you must perish along with them.” Helek signaled to her subordinate and the link was severed.
“She’s insane,” breathed Vale. “And if that crew blindly follow someone so irrational—”
“She’ll make good on her threat.” Riker threw a glance at Lieutenant Cantua. “Can we raise the Jazari?”
The Denobulan’s face creased in a scowl. “Negative, sir. The Romulans are putting out a broad-spectrum jamming field; it’s interfering with long-range comms. But I read increased power output in the generation ship’s engines. They’re trying to get away.”
“New aspect change on the Othrys,” called Keru. “They’re turning back toward the other ship.”
“Helm, intercept course, full impulse.” Riker looked back at Keru. “I need those torpedoes, mister.”
“Working on it, sir.”<
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Vale leaned closer, her voice low and urgent. “Sir, what’s our play here? That warbird’s a match for us; we need an edge if we’re going to neutralize it.”
“I know,” agreed Riker. “First thing we do, get their attention off the Jazari and keep it on the Titan,” he replied. “We’ve got to hope Zade and his people can put some distance between us.”
Ahead, the Romulan warship pivoted on one wing and entered a swooping arc that would end with its weapons centered on the huge mass of the generation ship. At this range, it would be impossible for the Romulan gunners to miss the bigger vessel.
Its impulse drive surging, Titan dove after the Othrys, gaining momentum and bringing its own weapons to bear.
“All phaser banks charging. Ready!” called McCreedy.
“Target their weapons and engines,” said Vale.
“Manual targeting active,” noted Keru. “Ready to fire.”
“Make it count,” Riker told him. “Take your shot when you have it.”
“Steady,” muttered the Trill as a spread of beam fire from an aft disruptor stuttered across the rear arc of the Othrys. “Steady.”
Emerald lightning slammed into the Titan’s shields and crawled away as it dissipated. Ahead of them, the warbird began its next bombardment of the slow-moving Jazari vessel, raining down green death on the lumbering giant.
“Firing!” Keru held his nerve until the optimal moment came, and when it did he gave full release to Titan’s weapons. Lances of searing orange-yellow energy stabbed out across the distance and raked over the wings and warp nacelles of the Romulan ship.
The Othrys trembled, and it veered off sharply before it could complete its second attack run, ignoring its primary target to shoot back toward its pursuer.
“Another power surge on the Romulan ship!” said Livnah.
“The plasma weapon?” Vale’s voice held a note of fear.
“No, Commander,” said the science officer. “I’m detecting a focused neutrino surge…”
“They’re cloaking.” Riker saw a shimmering aura move over the warbird. The vessel became glassy, insubstantial—and it vanished.
“Active sensors, sweep all sectors,” ordered Vale. “Find them!”
Keru gave a nod and Riker heard him mutter something under his breath. “Well, now we’ve got ourselves a game.”
* * *
For a moment, Troi felt disconnected from the events around her, briefly dizzy, her thoughts a muddle.
She picked herself up, wincing at the echoing hum of the tolling bell as the sound resonated around the reparation chamber. She placed both her hands flat upon the side of the capsule. Thaddeus. I am here. You will be all right.
If her son could pick up on her intentions, she hoped it would calm him. Troi found Zade nearby, the Jazari staring blankly into space. “Can we open this? Get him out?”
The reply came from one of the floating orbs. “Not yet. The reparation cycle cannot be interrupted. It would be extremely bad for the boy.”
Zade snapped back to awareness, as if a switch had been tripped. “Our systems are calibrated for Jazari, not humans. It takes longer to process the… the healing.”
“What is going on?” Troi tapped her communicator again, but it was still inactive. “I need to raise the Titan.”
“Your ship is currently engaged in combat,” Friend said matter-of-factly. “Observe.” The closest of the orbs emitted a flickering bubble of holographic light and it became a three-dimensional viewer, showing images captured from sensors along the outer hull of the Jazari generation ship.
Troi caught a gasp in her throat as she saw the low-slung, fast-moving shape of the Titan trading fire with their Romulan companion. “They… They attacked? Why would the Romulans suddenly turn on us?”
The image jumped to a view of the Tal Shiar officer Troi had glimpsed a day or so earlier, in what appeared to be a fragment from an intercepted transmission. “This vessel is now operating under my orders,” said the woman, then the image changed again. “The Jazari are an existential threat to all organic life! Their continued existence cannot be permitted!”
“Major Helek is attempting to destroy this vessel,” said Zade. “We are working to evade her, but the great ship is large and it presents an easy target.”
“Why is she doing this…?” Troi trailed off. She knew the byzantine thought processes of the Tal Shiar about as well as any non-Romulan could, but even this sudden, unprovoked violence was unlike them. “She must have a reason, no matter how twisted it may be.”
“I warned you this would happen!” Behind them, a hatchway had hissed open to reveal the Jazari councilor Qaylan, and the technician Keret. Qaylan pointed at Zade, as if this entire situation was his fault. “Now see what you have brought to us! Ruin and destruction!”
“I tried to stop him,” said Keret, “but he would not relent.”
“Leave me!” Qaylan shouted at the technician, and then his angry glare found Troi. “You should not be here! This place is not for—”
“I permitted it.” Friend spoke over him. “We are saving a life.”
“The life of one human child, valued over the privacy and safety of our entire civilization?” Qaylan’s response was incredulous, and he glared at the nearest of the floating orbs. “You have allowed your imprudent fascination for these outsiders to cloud your judgment! You put us at terrible risk! We have no weapons, we cannot possibly fight a Romulan warbird.”
“We will help,” insisted Troi. “Whatever the reasoning behind this attack, the Titan will fight to defend you. We know the Romulans and the Tal Shiar, we’ve dealt with them many times before.”
Qaylan rounded on her. “We want no part in your endless wars, Betazoid! We do not wish to be dragged into the tangle of your petty disputes!” He gestured at the orb. “Our only course of action is clear, we must escape this madness at once.”
“You can’t run from someone like Helek,” said Troi. “She’ll keep coming. The Tal Shiar are relentless.” But the Jazari were barely registering her words. Qaylan, Keret, and Zade each exhibited that same, blank-eyed stare, as if their minds were momentarily far away.
“The transit is not yet ready for deployment,” said Zade, after a long moment.
“Transit?” Troi echoed the word, wondering. Was he referring to some sort of drive system?
“We cannot activate it,” agreed Keret. “The situation is too fluid. Too many hazardous variables are present.”
Qaylan’s manner shifted, and once again he turned to Troi. Now the expression on his scaled face was steely and uncompromising. “I want you and all your kind off this vessel.” He pointed at the reparation capsule. “The cycle is almost over. When it ends, take your progeny and go!”
“You cannot ask them to leave in the middle of an attack,” said Zade. “Remember our code!”
“The code is in error!” retorted Qaylan. As the words left his mouth, the deck shuddered again as another series of impacts slammed into the hull of the generation ship.
“The Romulan warbird has reappeared,” reported Friend. “They are targeting the environment domes.”
* * *
Adrenaline spiked hard through Christine Vale, and the first officer’s hands gripped the armrests on her seat, her fingers digging into the material. Every battle she had fought pivoted on a moment like this, when the second-by-second choices of the command crew set the path toward survival or destruction.
Part of Vale hated this. In a hand-to-hand fight, when she was sparring with a holographic opponent in a training program or against a real, live antagonist, she could call on muscle memory, ingrained reflexes, and her own senses to predict an attacker’s moves. Plant your foot there; block with this arm; strike with that hand.
It was so much simpler, so much clearer. In this kind of fight, she could only ride her chair and call out the commands, hoping that those around her could act in unison and make the right play.
“The Romulans have decloaked
!” Keru called out from tactical. “Target at one-five-one, mark six. Firing on the Jazari.”
At her side, the captain took that in. “Intercept course.”
“Intercept, aye.” Cantua repeated the order and pivoted the ship back toward the other vessel. On the main viewscreen, Vale saw the green flare of disruptors.
“Multiple structural hits on the Jazari craft,” said Livnah. “Hull breaches…” She swallowed hard. “Catastrophic depressurization events in several of the ecodomes.”
Vale was horrified as the screen at her side showed her the same sensor readings. She saw the disruptor cannons blast open a series of glassy hemispheres on the generation ship’s dorsal hull. As the domes were punctured by a beam of fire, the environments within were blown out into the unforgiving vacuum. Around one, she saw the shredded remnants of great treelike structures tumbling in the dark. About another, the waters of an ocean-like enclosure became a torrent of flash-frozen ice crystals.
This was not an attack meant to hobble or wound. Helek’s intention was mass murder.
“Photon torpedo launchers are answering commands,” said Keru. “Ready on your word, Captain.”
Riker nodded, shooting Vale a sideways glance. Neither of them spoke. They had no need. They both knew what the stakes were.
“Launch torpedoes, full spread,” said Riker. “Set for proximity detonation, and fire.”
“Photons away,” said the Trill.
Four coruscating balls of light leaped from beneath the Titan’s saucer section and raced forward, tracking the warbird.
Whoever was at the helm of the Othrys saw the incoming torpedoes and broke into a high-g impulse turn, hoping to veer off and avoid the lethal antimatter warheads, but Ranul Keru’s targeting was on the mark. The first torpedo detonated in a brilliant flash of fire and the warbird bucked in the shockwave. In quick order, the other torpedoes exploded in a halo of light and Vale saw the Romulan ship take damage. Splinters of hull metal tumbled into its impulse wake, shed like lost feathers from its metallic wings—but the Othrys was still in the fight, and she couldn’t help but curse when the vessel became a ghost and recloaked.
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