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A script for Star Trek, The Next Generation whic

Preface,
This work is in response to the, in my opinion, unrealistically peaceful nature
of the Star Trek Universe as depicted in Star Trek: The Next Generation. I
have taken the events in the history and have extended them in a way that i
feel is more logical, considering the political and economic circumstances as
shown us in Star Trek: The Next Generation and Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
television series. All comments on the story are welcomed at
[email protected]. And now, on with the story!

SUPER-DREADNOUGHT Part I: Chapter I
By:
Matthew A. Weed

Command Log: Stardate 56215.4: Admiral William McGinnis,
Commanding USS Ticonderoga reporting: We will be ready to launch this new ship
in less than a day. The ship is the latest in Federation design, and
unfortunately, its powers may not be sufficient to successfully prosecute our
mission. I will command this vessel in her first, and hopefully not last,
mission. If we succeed, the quadrant will be safe. If not, all of the
civilizations in the area are likely to fall to The Borg.

Admiral McGinnis shut off the recorder, and prepared to leave his quarters.
Where the old Mycenae-class ships had been powerfully armed and heavily
shielded for their times, this ship was the best- armed, best-shielded ship in
space, without exception. "Their times,", god... he thought to himself, it
was only thirteen years since he had taken command of the new defender-class
ship called Mycenae. Although the ship had been built as a warning to the
Federation's enemies, with far heavier weapons than anything of its time,
compared with this new vessel, Mycenae was a light-cruiser at best.

It had been a long thirteen-year period, highlighted by the Borg attack on the
Klingon home system, which had brought the Klingons to their decision to break
the treaty of Algeron. Their fleet had barely defeated the single Borg cube,
and had suffered staggering losses in the effort. Now, they were building up
their forces in preparation for an offensive against Borg territory.

The Romulans, not believing the Klingons' effort would end against the Borg had
also exceeded treaty limitations with their newest ships, and, fearing that it
would be left behind, the Federation had begun building a new fleet, with the
new Ticonderoga class as its centerpiece.

These ships carried phase-cloaking technology, a new hyper- accelerated
collimator ring dcapable of three times the destructive output of the old
Mycenae-class technology, rapid-fire phaser batteries with independent power
supplies, contained-plasma torpedoes, tripple shielding, and, most importantly,
a back-up forced quantum singularity generator, capable of fifteen-minute
bursts of power, sufficient to power the ships' vastly powerfful weapons and
shielding. Each of these ships could handle twenty of the old war- bird class
ships, given proper circumstances... The question, simply put, was could they
handle a single (or more likely), multiple Borg ships.

McGinnis sighed as he left his quarters, it wasn't really his job to worry
about design specs. His job was to go to the Klingon home world, in order to
meet with Gouron in order to plan allied strategy, against both Borg and
Romulans. Starfleet hoped that this brand new ship would be as powerful a sign
of commitment as the presence of Jean-luc Picard's Enterprise had been in the
first battle, four years previously. Unfortunately, Enterprise had been
destroyed in the battle, and it was rumored that some of the ship's officers
had been taken by the Borg. McGinnis sincerely hoped, for their sakes, that
they had not.

The bridge doors opened, admitting him to Ticonderoga's heavily armored command
center. "Admiral on the Bridge," said Lieutenant-commander Walter Schultz,
Tactical officer, and third-in-command.

"At ease, ... report on status of our undocking preparations?" said McGinnis as
he moved to the center seat.

"All systems have been checked, all power conduates and back-up systems show
clear, computer is on-line, weapons at standby, warp drive is available,
phase-cloak is available, and torpedoes are still being loaded sir.", said
Captain Data, who had been loaned to McGinnis' command after Starfleet realized
that there were no officers aboard Ticonderoga who had any significant
experience with the Borg. Such experience, it was thought, would be critical,
particularly in the planned meetings with the Klingon Command.

"Thank you, Captain. Operations, do you have a listing of the other ships that
will rendezvous with us at the Klingon Capitol?"

"Sir, Starfleet reports that they can not give us a complete list, but three
task forces are expected to arrive within twenty-four hours after our arrival.
They will be commanded by captains Shelby and Stromgren, and Rear-Admiral De
L'hotel. They expect a minimum total of four dreadnought-class, five
cruiser-class, and eleven support vessels. All have had the new sensor
modifications installed, and most are carrying phase-cloaking devices.
However, they will be able to provide comparatively little fire-support, and
the Klingons have allready suggested that this vessel is the only one in which
they are interested."

"I see, the smaller ships may prove a liability, but I really don't like the
Klingons' dismissal of them out-of-hand. Commander, forward the information
concerning our fleet strength to the Klingon council, and tell Gouron that I
will want to discuss the use of the smaller ships with him immediately on our
arrival." "Aye sir," replied Janet Anders as she turned back to her console.
McGinnis sat back in his chair, thinking about the tremendous change that had
come over Ms. Anders over the last few years. She had come aboard Mycenae a
young lieutenant junior-grade, who was impatient for results, believing that
things could be had if you wanted them badly enough. The last years had molded
her into a fine officer, patient, cunning, and compassionate. Assuming that
all of them survived the upcoming mission, she would make a fine ship's
commander. However, more important matters awaited them at the moment.

"Mr. Data, what is the current report on our earliest possible departure time?"

"Assuming that all of the loading is proceeding at the projected rate, we
should be able to depart the dock in thirteen hours, eight minutes fifteen
seconds." "Thank you, ms. Anders, please have dock ready to clear us in
fourteen hours. Until then, I want all of you to take added time off, because
after we leave dock, I suspect that none of us will be getting much rest for
quite some time."

At this moment, a lieutenant from engineering hastened onto the Bridge, and
reported that engineering com systems were down; that this was related to a
slight instability in the quantum core; and that Commander Macleod thought
that repairs would take about four hours. Until the repairs were complete, it
would be imposssible to generate anything more than 25% power from the
auxiliary generator.

"Lieutenant, Tell him that since we won't need the added power until after we
leave Klingon space, I suspect that he can fix the problem in transit. If he
has further concerns, have him report to me directly, and make sure that
someone finds a work-around for the comlinks, since the optical controllers
aren't up yet, we're totally dependent on our communicators."

"Aye Sir," she said as she rushed ack into the turbolift.

"Unless anyone has other concerns, I'm going to be in my quarters, you can
reach me there, ...Mr. Data, you have the bridge." said McGinnis. He rose and
left the Bridge, glancing over his shoulder to make sure that all was in order
before he left.

SUPER-DREADNOUGHT: Part I: Chapter II:

McGinnis turned over in his sleep, and then snapped wide awake. He reached
over to hit the com switch, opening a channel to the Bridge.

"McGinnis here," he said.

"Sir, you asked for notification when we were one hour from launch," replied
Data's voice.

"Thank you, I'll be up in thirty minutes, I want all senior staff on the Bridge
at that time."

"Yes sir, I will ensure that everyone is here." "McGinnis out."

After a quick shower and change of uniform, McGinnis left his quarters for a
quick snack on his way to the Bridge. Ever since the dimentional transit
several years previously, he had always been too nervous to eat full meals
during his ships' first voyages. He had been a young, inexperienced commander
then, and the physical and psychological stress of that mission had been quite
enough for an entire lifetime. Most of his crew had spent a number of weeks in
hospital, and it had been more than six months before they had been permitted
to return to duty.

***
The doors of rec-1 opened silently as he approached, and he was just as glad.
Although Alpha shift would be going on duty any minute, the room was somewhat
crowded with crew as they either relaxed or lined up to throw their dishes into
the recyclers.

McGinnis moved quickly to the bank of replicators placed near the door.

Although the bar was open, he didn't have time to chat, and he didn't want to
interrupt the other shifts' relaxation with his uniformed presence. Though he
didn't usually demand tremendous dicipline from his crew when they were
off-duty, seeing him in uniform often caused all of his crew to treat him with
what other commanders called "Captain on the Bridge" manners. Now, there was
no reason for it, and so he tried to avoid bothering them, while still gauging
their stress level as the ship's launch time approached.

After ordering a quick BLT and salad, he turned to leave, so that he could eat
in his small ready-room, located a short distance from the main bridge. Just
before he could slip out the door, a young crewmember moved to intercept him.
"Sir," she asked somewhat timidly, "I was wondering, what do you think our
chances are?" McGinnis looked at the slender young woman,whose face was lined
with stress.

"Chances of what? ensign, he asked, knowing full-well what she meant.

"Of surviving our mission against the Borg."

"Well, that isn't our mission as yet, Although the Klingons plan to attack, I
haven't received orders to help them yet, and we're still hoping to keep them
from going. I think we've got a good shot."

"I hope so, sir, I want to come back from this."

McGinnis sighed to himself, wondering for the thousandth time, why Starfleet
Command had insisted on sending mere kids on this mission, and on this ship.
Kids deserved the chance to grow up, and this ship wasn't meant to keep them
out of danger. It might be the best protection ever built once there, but it
was always best to avoid battle whenever possible. Even if that avoidance
meant threatening the other side with guaranteed destruction, a threat that
this ship was quite capable of backing up. "Ensign, we all want to come back,
and I, for one, feel that not coming back is simply unacceptable. You know
your duties well, so do them to the best of your ability, and we all will have
a better chance of getting back."

"Ay sir," she said, still somewhat unconvinced. McGinnis made a mental note to
check with Commander MacLeod to see how she was doing when they reached the
Klingon home planet.

He quickly left Rec-1, and entered the turbolift.
"Conference 1," he said and the turbolift began a sideways motion.

***
After his small meal, McGinnis rose and walked down the slightly curved
corridor that led to the main bridge entrance.

"Admiral on the Bridge," said Data as he rose from the command chair and moved
to the first officer's station located in the semi-circle of stations
surrounding the central well of the bridge. "At ease," said McGinnis as he sat
in his chair, placed at the center of the semi-circle of stations; "All
stations report." "All computer systems show green, all processors on line,
security board is green, all auxiliary systems available," said Data. "Weapons
control systems show green, main ring, rapid fire phasers, auxiliary
collimators and plasma torpedoes at standby. Phase cloak at standy, all
shields show ready for activation." said Schultz. "Helm and nav systems show
ready," said Thale, the Andorian lieutenant at helm/nav station. "Engineering
systems all show green, except for the auxiliary generator," said Commander
Anders. "All communications systems show green, save main communications in
the engineering hull, but optical links are now up." "All sensors available,
all science departments reporting ready for launch," came T 'mayek's report
from the science station.

"Good, I want to brief you all on the upcoming mission. As you know, the
Klingon fleet has been built up to levels not seen since the Klingon/Federation
hostilities ended seventy years ago. Their build-up is in direct response to
the Borg attack on their space more than four years ago. Nearly sixty vessels
were lost, and a period of political instability has ensued. Many of the
Klingons' internal political problems are still on, so be ready for surprises.
House Durass has been pressuring for a renewal of the old Klingon/Romulan
alliance, and their views are being heard, particularly due to the fact that
Federation assistance, in the Klingon view, was limited. As you know, we lost
less than ten ships in those actions, including two defender-class ships and
the flagship. This vessel, along with a large number of other ships is to
proceed to The Klingon home planet in order to show them that we will support
their offensive against the Borg should that become necessary.

"Since Captain Picard's death, there have been few officers whom the Klingons
respect. Largely because of our successful prosecution of the campaign against
the Cardassians last year, we have been ordered to head the fleet with this new
ship, in order to attempt to convince the Klingons to hold their attack. This
is my intention, but I want all of you to know that I think it unlikely that we
shall succeed, and I want all crewmembers to begin full testing of the new
armor suits that we are carrying. Should we come into contact with the Borg, I
suspect that they will be necessary. This ship is well equipped, and its
technology is different than anything that we have confronted the Borg with in
the past. However, this does not mean that you should be over-confident, or
that you should expect that we will give quarter to the Borg, should be succeed
in doing significant damage to any Borg forces that we should meet. If we can
do so, we will destroy their ships without question, and there will be no
exceptions made.

"Until further notice, all of us, plus Commander MacLeod will be on stacked
shifts duty, so that at least two command-chain officers are on duty at all
times. We are going into an unstable situation in the Klingon Empire, and I
need say nothing more about the Borg. Are there any questions?"

"Yes, Sir," replied Data, "Will we be trying to capture Borg technology?"

"Yes, my orders do provide for that possibility, and that is much of the reason
for the training in the new armor suits. We will only try to get Borg
hardware, no Borg "members", will be taken, as I don't want to risk having the
rest of the Collective tracing our location through any prisoners that we may
take." There was a pause, while all of the officers sat considering what they
had just heard. Despite that fact that most of them were from defense command,
and not exploration or science headquarters, talk of all-out war was uncommon.
Furthermore, talk of breaking every treaty and moral regulation that governed
the Federation's many civilizations was a bit hard to digest. However, the
Borg were an unusual enemy, and if they were to be defeated, unusual methods
would clearly be necessary. "Are there any further questions?" ... "Very well,
we are now less than half an hour from departure, so please double check all
systems, and notify me when you are ready. I will be in engineering. Mr.
Data, you have the conn." *** McGinnis entered the ship's great engineering
deck. The room, one of the largest pressurized contained-volume structures
ever build in space, was nearly half a kilometer long, a tenth that broad, and
twenty meters deep. The great main energizer ran much of the length of the
room, a glowing crystaline tube that split at the saucer-end of the engineering
hull into a rough Y-shape with a great ball at the apex of the three sections.
Beyond this ball, the entire hull began to narrow until it was closed off by
another ball-shaped structure, the ship's primary auxiliary power generator,
the forced quantum core.

It was toward this end of the room that McGinnis movwed, in search of Robert
MacLeod, the ship's chief engineer. Finally, after some searching, McGinnis
found him working near the main control pannel for the auxiliary power core.

"Chief, we're less than half an hour from launch, and I'd like you to be on the
bridge when we depart if possible." MacLeod turned to his commander, and one of
his closest friends. "William, you know that I'd not miss it if I could, but
these repairs are going to require my main attention for at least another two
or three hours, and with the schedule that we have to keep, I'd like to get
them done before we get to Klingon space." "If I didn't know you better, I'd
think that you were having some kind of a premonition," said McGinnis with a
small smile. "No, no premonition, just the expectation that we won't get to the
Klingon home planet without trouble. Borg, Romulans, its really all the same,
they may operate differently, but their intentions are more-or-less the same;
and as far as I'm concerned, I'm not going to let a cranky system make today my
day to die. Especially when I have the ability to fix it." "Very well, but
don't over work yourself now, I suspect that all of us will have more than our
fair share of work over the next weeks." "Agreed, and the more that I can do to
ensure that the work's in the hands of tactical, the happier I'll be." "Well,
good luck, and at least try to watch the departure on the monitors, we have
optical up, in case your staff was avoiding you." "As a matter of fact," said
MacLeod, now grinning too, "Lieutenant Furgisson did say something about that,
I'll have to make sure that she doesn't talk to me while I'm working, something
like another officer I know."

"Allright, Allright, I'm going," said McGinnis laughing. "I'll see you later,"
replied MacLeod turning back to his work.

McGinnis left engineering, satisfied that the work there was proceeding well,
and that MacLeod wasn't driving his staff too hard. With the high level of
automation, there were comparatively few jobs for the crew to carry out
directly, and so as long as the dcomputer-controlled repair systems were
functioning, the ship could be handled by as few as two crewmembers, with
little loss in efficiency. However, some engineers, MacLeod included, liked to
have their people check the computers' work, while it was progressing. This
often meant that the engineering staff was run ragged during the ship's
barely-completed construction phase. McGinnis had heard some of the younger
engineers say that they were looking forwardc to the mission, simply so that
they would have to do less work. he hoped, for everyone's sake, that they
would be proven right.

The turbolift doors opened, and McGinnis stepped in. "Weapons-control center,"
he said to the computer. The lift accelerated sideways as it travelled nearly
the entire length of the engineering hull. It then shot up at a flat angle,
passing the ship's plasma torpedo bays, through the dorsal connecting main and
engineering hulls, and then began to decellerate as it entered the main hull
through one of the struts connecting it to the mega-collimator ring surrounding
it. The doors opened, allowing access to the airlock that was one of the four
physical access points to this room, the most heavily shielded location aboard
ship.

McGinnis entered the smallish room, which was about the size of the main
bridge. Computer stations ringed the entire room, allowing interface with any
of the ship's seven-dozen weapons and defensive systems. When in battle, a
full staff was located here, in order to take over from the Bridge, should it
be compromised in any way. Between the nearly two-meter thick armor,
transporter shielding, and built-in phaser defenses, this room was considered
nearly impregnible to anything short of the Borg, and even these would need
time to break into this room.

McGinnis sat at the main status board, and requested a full computer and
weapons status check. Almost immediately the dcomputer responded with a report
far more detailed than that obtainable from the Bridge. It showed that all
primary, secondary, and distributed computer systems were fully available,
weapons were all operable at maximum efficiency, and that primary, auxiliary,
and secondary shielding was all available. All power transfer systems were
clear, and all switching hardware was available, should it become necessary.
Beyond its architectural benefits, the room's equipment was voice-controllable,
making it possible for a very small number of people to handle the task of
fighting the ship, should that become necessary. McGinnis had never fully
understood why such capabilities weren't a part of the Bridge as well, but the
"standard" explanation that such controls might loose efficiency in the higher
activity of the Bridge would have to do.

After completing the status check, he returned to the Bridge, and saw that
there were about ten minutes before launch.

"Admiral on the Bridge," said Data as he returned to his station.

"At ease," said McGinnis somewhat absently. "All stations, a brief final word
before we go. This is the newest in Federation technology, and espite the
problems that we are still having with the quantum generator, I am highly
confident in this ship's ability to handle anything thrown at her. As no other
ships are scheduled for departure, and we are loaded and ready to go, I suggest
that we get under way.... Helm, stand by thrusters, engage navigational
deflectors. ... Ops, notify dock control that we are departing early, and that
this vessel, USS Ticonderoga, NX4000, is hereby commissioned by me, as of
Stardate 56217.4" "Aye Sir," replied Thale and Anders. "Dock reports clear for
launch, and congratulations. They wish us good luck sir," said Cmdr Anders.
"Helm, ahead one quarter maneuvering power, as soon as we exit dock, come to
128.35 mark 23, and set main velocity at warp 9. ... Tactical, engage phased
cloaking device immediately." "Phased cloak is now engaged," replied Walter
Schultz. "We are now clearing dock, entering course 128.35 mark 23, our
velocity is set at warp 9." "Mr. Thale, ... You may proceed," replied McGinnis.
The ship, already invisible, accelerated to warp 9, on its way to beginning a
mission that would probably be critical to Federation history for the remainder
of the century.

SUPER-DREADNOUGHT: Part I: Chapter III

Commander's personal Log: Stardate 56229.3 Starship USS Ticonderoga:
Admiral William McGinnis recording.
We are now two days out of construction dock, and insofar as we can tell,
no ships observed our departure. As only Gouron and the three Federation
task force commanders know of this ship's existence, I am relieved by this. We
are still several hours from the Klingon home planet, and as all systems have
continued to function perfectly for the last forty hours, the tension aboard
ship seems to be decreasing by the hour. This, of course, will soon change, as
we are about to enter the most difficult part of this mission. If I succeed in
convincing Gouron to hold off in his attack, all sides will have more time to
prepare. If I do not, we may be facing the Borg before the Federation is ready
for a war on this scale.

Because we have been very fortunate over the last seventy years, we may have
become too complacent, too ready to expect that our enemies can be argued into
taking our view of things. The only exceptions to this are the Cardassians,
who are not a threat to the Federation anymore, and the Romulans, who are so
weakened by political turmoil, that they pose little threat most of the time.
The Borg, however, are another matter.

Even with the loss of the collective now under the leadership of "Hugh", and
the losses encurred at Sol, and in the Klingon war, they still pose an
overwhelming threat. Why they haven't tried a more concerted attack is beyond
me. So far, they have, apparently viewed us as "irrelevant," with only our
technology as "relevant,". What happens if they suddenly come to the
understanding that if they are to get our tech, they will have to kill us all.
Then we will become "relevant," and I do not look forward to that day. The
question, simply put, is whether the Klingons' planned offensive will make us
"relevant," or not.

***
McGinnis sat back, wondering what needed to be done. With a crew of less
than 400, many of the duties that went along with being a commander of a
Mycenae or Galaxy-class ship were unnecessary aboard this vessel. There
were two reasons for the small crew. Firstly, the ship's tremendous
automation, something that had been designed into her with the Borg in
mind. The second, put simply, was that this ship's living quarters were
not large, as the equipment that supported the weapons, computers, and
shielding of this vessel, plus extremely heavy structural members took up
tremendous amounts of space in a hull barely larger than a Galaxy-Class ship.

McGinnis rose quickly, remembering that he would have training in the new
suits of heavy-duty armor, with which this ship was equipped.

Like so many other parts of the ship, this was new equipment insofar as
"regular" starfleet personel were concerned. The suits were full-body
units, with a small back-pack nuclear reactor, mounting locks for various
beam and missile weapons, and a small shield generator. It was hoped that
these would allow the crew increased survivability and effectiveness should it
become possible to transport aboard a Borg ship.

During his ruminations, McGinnis had put his suit on, left his quarters, and
proceeded to Holo-1. His suit was all white, with a phaser rifle bracketted on
his right wrist, a head-mounted laser canon, and a grenade launcher, that for
on-board excercises, would fire simulated sonic grenades, since the real
article would wreck both holo-simulator and user, shield or not.

The holo-simulator's doors opened silently, allowing McGinnis an unrestricted
view of the combat already taking place. Several of his security crew were in
their armor, blasting a contingent of simulated borg that had apparently tried
to beam into engineering. McGinnis entered the battle, arm-mounted
phaser-rifle flaring. He quickly found that the Borg hadadapted to this weapon
already, and that heavier blasts would be required. Unfortunately, his armor
was in its default configuration, meaning that its heaviest beam weapons were
not available. He fired the head-mounted laser canon, whose raw output was
many times that of the phaser. However, because it was an inefficient energy
weapon, he could do little but rock the simulated Borg soldiers. The security
crew, meanwhile, had been firing their plasma canon, and their heavy graviton
weapons. These could punch through the shielding available on the Borg units,
but the combined firepower of all ten security suits was required to breech the
shielding on one Borg soldier.

However, it appeared, assuming that Federation intelligence was correct, that
the average units could be defeated, even at their maximum adaptive efficiency.

McGinnis smiled under his helmet, for although this was not a total victory,
and a larger team of Borg would be able to defeat his crew, it did appear that
effective offensive and defensive action would be possible against the Borg for
the first time. This was decidedly the best news that he'd had all week!

After a few minutes, his crew had defeated the remaining Borg, whose attempts
to capture McGinnis had failed due to his suit's shielding. Again, this was
fortunate, since a sufficient number of them would have been able to break
through, but, in limited action, the suits' shielding would do exactly what
Starfleet Engineering had hoped that it would do: save the wearer from
absorption.

At this point, the holosimulator shut down suddenly, the lighting went red, and
the ship-wide klaxons went off.

"Red Alert, Red alert!, this ship is now on red alert, ... Commanding officer
to the bridge." said the computer.

"McGinnisz to Bridge," said The Admiral as he struck his com badge.

"Sir, we have a cloaked ship on scan, signature suggests that its Romulan!",
replied Lt.Cmdr Anders' voice.

"On my way," replied McGinnis, not even wasting time to disguard his armor.

***
The Bridge doors opened, and McGinnis, now minus his helmet, moved quickly to
his chair. Data, who had been anticipating his arrival had already vacated the
command chair, and was sitting at his post. "Ops, tight beam transmission to
the Klingon home world," prepare a subspace buoy for immediate launch."

"Aye Sir," replied Anders, "Buoy ready, Klingon council chamber now on main
visual."

The transmission was rather scrambled as transmissions from phase-cloaked
ships were extremely difficult to keep balanced. However, Gouron's
battlehardened face could be clearly distinguished behind the snow.

"Gouron, I am William McGinnis, Admiral in command of the United Starship
Ticonderoga. We are some four hours from your planet, and have encountered a
cloaked Romulan vessel. As this ship carries the best in Federation
technology, I thought that I should offer the honor of destroying the Romulan
to you, before I took action."

"Admiral," replied Gouron, "Consider the Romulan's appearance as a test of your
vessel's capability, and your crew's honor. You are welcomed to destroy the
trespasser, I hope that your arrival is not overly delayed."

"Understood, I will contact you before our arrival at your planet," McGinnis
out.

After this communication, McGinnis turned his mind to the destruction of the
unidentified Romulan ship.

***

For Cmdr Tomaluk, it was another routine supply mission, deep within Klingon
space. His vessel and crew had made the trip at least twenty times, and it had
always gone flawlessly. This run included parts for a new disruptor array, and
some other spares that were needed by Family Durass' secret fleet. After Cmdr
Sela's failure against Picard, the Romulan high command had decided that
sending ships through singly was better than trying to send an entire fleet
across the Klingon/Romulan border at once. Tomaluk, and his fellow commanders'
recent success in delivering supplies was ample proof of the correctness of the
plan.

"Commander, I have a disturbance off our port bow, bearing 43 mark 12," said
the young female navigator.

"Scan it," snapped Tomaluk, coming out of his chair.

"It appears to be a subspace anomoly, growing in intensity as time passes,"
said the science officer.

"Cloaked ship?", demanded Tomaluk.

His answer came as a huge Federation-style ship appeared practically on top of
his own vessel. "Decloak...." he said, but the sentence never got the chance to
complete itself.

***

"Sir, decloaking in three ... two... one..." said Schultz at tactical.
"Weapons, weapons control, auxiliary and secondary energy production systems on
line, awaiting full charging cycle. We'll have to blanket the area, since we
aren't exactly sure where the Romulan ship is."

"Understood, you may clear the computer to fire when ready," said McGinnis,
hoping that the new, and largely untested, systems would work as well as
Mycenae's weapons control systems always had.

"Firing now!" said Schultz.

Phaser bolts erupted from nearly twenty rapid-fire phaser batteries, and almost
immediately thereafter, contained-plasma torpedoes flashed from the forward
tubes. These weapons brought the Romulan ship out of cloak, effectively
rendering the ship totally visible. power systems weren't affected, but this
was of little import for long. Ticonderoga's main mega-collimator ring flared
blue-white for less than a second, and then a brilliant white lance of energy
connected the two vessels, disintegrating the entire Romulan ship on impact.
Ten seconds after the firing had started, Ticonderoga was back on course for
the Klingon home world, and the phase-cloak was coming back on-line.

"Sir, the Romulan ship has been neutralized, and it got no message off before
its destruction. Because they were cloaked, they weren't able to handle our
fire. I report that all weapons and weapons-control sensors functioned ...
great!" said Schultz.

"Excellent Mr. Schultz,log your report, and stand down from red alert.
... Helm, increase velocity to warp 9.5, and give me a new eta for the
Klingon Capitol."

"Sir, at warp 9.5, we will arrive in-system in forty-seven minutes."

"Very well, Ops, get me Gouron on a double-secured channel, main viewer." A
moment passed while Commander Anders sent the transmission.Finally, the
link was established, and she turned to the Admiral.

"Sir, Gouron on main viewer." Because Ticonderoga was much closer to the
powerful receivers on the Klingon homeworld, the transmission was clearer, but
one could still see snow from time to time.

"Admiral, I did not expect that you would be contacting me so soon, how was the
battle with the Romulan invader?"

McGinnis' reply was quite concise, "Short, and quite successful."

"Excellent news, Admiral, I look forward to seeing the first Federation warship
in living memory."

"I look forward to giving you a tour of this vessel. We will arrive in your
star system in approximately forty minutes, earth time. Am I to follow any
unusual procedures once there?"

"I am told that your vessel has the ability to set down in deep water?"

"Affirmative, however we assumed that we would be ordered into orbit on
arrival."

"No, we can provide better security for your ship at the special construction
facility in the southern ocean." McGinnis had heard stories about this facility
from previous Federation officers who had visited there. It was a huge dome
built under water, and was primarily intended to facilitate the construction
of the new birds of prey. However, if what he had heard was true, it could
easily accommodate twenty full-sized Klingon battle cruisers.

"Understood, I will have to contact your trafic control computers."

"We must contact your ship."

"Unfortunately, the new cloaking device makes it nearly impossible to receive
incoming hails, so it will be necessary to contact your system."

"Very well, I like the philosophy of commitment behind your vessel, Admiral,"
said Gouron.

"Yes, our inability to receive new orders does mean that once this ship is
under cloak, Star Fleet is effectively committed to the use of this vessel.
If it is better for your controllers, we can partially decloak, and receive
transmissions, but we will be scannable on some wavelengths."

"Admiral, Too many dishonorable people now serve house Durass, and their
masters. There will be many interested eyes turned skyward over the next
few days. You are wise to remain fully invisible."

"Understood, once we are docked, I will contact you, but for now, I offer
you the hospitality of this vessel at 1800 hours, Starfleet Standard Time, for
a meal and tour of inspection."

"I accept your invitation, and look forward to meeting the man who defeated the
Cardassian fleet at Bajor."

"Gouron, the honor is mine, I shall see you at 1800."

"Understood, Gouron out." With this, the screen changed to the running tactical
view of Klingon space as Ticonderoga continued to streak toward the Klingon
Capital.

"Commander Anders, contact Klingon central traffic and tell them that we will
need a course as Gouron directed."

"Aye sir, already in progress," she said a bit distractedly as she continued to
try to contact the main traffic control center.

As much as anything else, her difficulties were directly related to the fact
that the ship was still out of communications range with the mainly in-system
traffic net.

"Sir, I can't contact them as yet, it'll be about half an hour before we can
get to them."

"Very well, keep trying and when you get through, conact me, I'll be in my
quarters, Mr. Data, you have the Bridge."

***

Even before McGinnis could get to this quarters, the ship-wide intercom had
announced in Data's voice, "Admiral to the Bridge, please." On his return to
the Bridge, McGinnis retook his chair, and turned to his first officer.

"Mr. Data, you asked for me."

"Yes, Sir. As you can see, our long-range sensors have just begun to image the
Klingon home-world. Apparently, preparations and construction are far greater
than Star Fleet had been told previously. I have at least 100 long-range
warship-class vessels on scan, including some of types not previously known."
McGinnis stared at Data in shock. If this were true, then Gouron's position
versus those in his government who didn't trust the Federation was far worse
than had been previously thought. Usually, limited information was passed back
and forth on most projects, even secret projects like Ticonderoga's
construction. However, information on new classes of ships, and build-ups of
the proportion being reported had not been passed to him before their departure
two days previously.

"Very well, scan everything, and before we get into the system, send a full
report to Defense Command HQ, and copy it to the Federation Council,
Starfleet Commander, and Admiral Gellico at Star Fleet Operations."

"Aye Sir, continuing scan. We are now four minutes from optimal reporting
range, but it'll be very hard to get a message out without shutting off the
phase-cloak."

"I know, so send it aboard a probe, we can't afford to decloak, especially as
unstable as the situation on the planet appears to be."

"Downloading and copying data as it comes in, we are three minutes, thirty
seconds from launch," said Data. "Preparing probe for launch," said Anders from
her station. "Aft firing tube is clear for launch, charging cycle beginning,"
said Schultz as he began the process of charging the torpedo launcher to send a
communications uoy back to Federation space at warp 9.9. This would mean that
Star Fleet Command would get the news in less than three hours, assuming no one
decided to destroy the probe on the way out.

A couple of minutes passed, and then Data's voice broke the silence
prevalent on the Bridge.

"Information package ready for download. I have included some side notes
on what we have received, and all is ready for launch."

"Very well, launch buoy," said McGinnis. "buoy away," replied Schultz. The
viewer shifted to an aft-directed shot of the small tubular object streaking
away from the ship. All anyone could hope for now was that it would arrive in
Federation space in time For Starfleet to analyze the data, and hopefully send
a second force of ships. There could be little question that the Klingons were
on the war path, and that they would expect their Federation allies to send a
comparable force of their own. The approximately twenty-one ships that had
been promised were simply not enough.

"Sir, we are now one minute from sub-light speed, and should be able to contact
Klingon in-system traffic control," said Thale.

"Ms. Anders, please contact Klingon control, and request a vector."

"Aye Sir."

Moments later, she turned to McGinnis. "Sir, they're telling us to lock into
their standard traffic net, and that their guide computers will bring us in."

"That's standard procedure, allow the link, ... helm, come to sub-light speed."

The great ship decellerated from high-warp, and most of the crew sat back to
enjoy the ride. It wasn't often that they could simply sweep along, not
concerned about accidents, enemies, or other things. Both Data and McGinnis
were busy admiring the view outside, both natural and artificial. The planet
was dry as compared with Earth, but there was still noticeable surface water.
Orbital space was full of activity, both military and civilian. There was a
truly staggering armada through which Ticonderoga was passing. No one was
concerned about some of the close passes, simply because while phase-cloaked,
the ship could not occupy the same space as the vessels that it was passing.
If hull contact occurred, crews on both ships would think that they had seen a
ghost image, rather than anything else.

As the journey continued, McGinnis turned his attention to the ocean
toward which Ticonderoga was proceeding. As they drew closer, it became
quite clear that there was no traffic in the entire basin, and this
confirmed the importance that the Klingons put on their underwater base.

Then the ship slowed, the computers apparently programmed to expect that damage
would occur if a ship were to hit the surface too hard. Clearly, guiding ships
in, even new Federation Starships was not considered a sufficiently honorable
task for a living Klingon to perform.

The great ship passed through the surface of the water, and then a
communication came in from the on-duty computer tech maintaining the traffic
control net.

"Federation ship, we can do no more for you, proceed to the base under your own
navigation systems. May your stay here be successful."

"Understood, our nav computer is taking over now."

With that the channel closed and Ticonderoga was on its own.

"Helm, set course for the Klingon base, thrusters at one-quarter."

"Aye Sir."

Within ten minutes, the great ship was decellerating toward the massive
under-water doors, which were as large, or larger, than those on Earth-1.
Then, the doors opened, and Ticonderoga passed through, and into open air.

"Sir, I have a message from the base commander."

"Put it on, commander."

"Federation ship, you are to proceed to the fourth bay on your right, decloak
and moor there."

"Understood, Ticonderoga out."

The ship slowed, then turned toward its docking bay. As the turn was
completed, the cloak was shut down, giving the base commander a full view
of the mighty starship as it swept into the largest docking bay in the
facility. The ship was quite impressive to say the least. As long as the
Mycenae-class defender, but twice as deep, and with a far larger collimator
ring surrounding the main hull. The multiple weapons implacements showed that
the ship was, indeed, built for action. As it moved to meet the gangway, the
great ship seemed to shudder for just a moment before coming to rest. With
this action, the waiting Klingons could come aboard.

SUPER-DREADNOUGHT: Part I: Chapter IV:

The doors at Ticonderoga's end of the gangway opened silently, admitting Kern
and his aide de campe. He had only been on one other Federation vessel, and it
was immediately clear that this ship was nothing like Picard's Enterprise. Its
corridors were narrower, there were gratings on the floor, not the carpet that
covered many of Enterprise's corridors. The structural members looked far
heavier, and the over-all air of the ship was decidedly ... military.

His attention turned to the tall human who was standing before him. "Admiral
McGinnis, I am Kern, son of Mog, Commander of this construction facility. I am
honored to meet you."

"Kern, Son of Mog, I am Admiral William McGinnis, and your presence here honors
us. ... Welcome to USS Ticonderoga. ... Would you like a brief tour of the
vessel?"

"Yes, I would."

"Very well, I am expecting Gouron within the hour, but I shall take you for a
brief tour before he arrives."

***
After his tour, Kern was even more impressed with the ship than he had when it
appeared immediately outside his window. Although the computers ran too much
of it, making it difficult for a warrior to fight an honorable battle,if the
data on the fight with the Romulan ship were true, they had proven themselves
worth it.

"Admiral, I am very impressed, I was not certain that the Federation was
capable of building a true warship, after James T. Kirk's retirement. It is
good to see that it is not as complacent as many Klingons would like to think."

"We haven't built many ships with a fully military purpose in a long time, and
despite my own successes, I would hope that this ship will be the last.
However, I believe that those like Picard had taken Star Fleet too far toward
peace and exploration, and had forgotten that we are also supposed to protect
and defend the members of the Federation. One wonders whether we would have
been able to do so had the Romulans, Cardassians, and Ferengi decided to cause
trouble at the same time."

"Personally, I doubt that you could have."

"Fortunately, we won't have the opportunity to find out. With the Cardassian
military defeated, and the Ferengi talking peaceful profitiering, those
problems should be solving themselves. However, the Romulans are beginning to
pose a serious threat to both of us, and the Borg..."

"Yes, The Borg. Is the Federation going to send a larger fleet, now that you
have seen The Klingon commitment to defending our people?"

"I haven't gotten a response to my report of your enhanced fleet strength, so I
can't say for sure. ... We had better get to the transporter room, Gouron
should be here any moment."

At this moment, Data's voice rang over mcGinnis' communicator. "Bridge to
Admiral McGinnis."

"McGinnis here."

"Sir, Gouron reports his readiness to come aboard, he also wants to know where
Kern is, as he wasn't at the base landing pad to meet him."

"What!?!," said Gouron, ..."He was to beam to this ship, not come by shuttle."

"Well, let's get to the gangway before he waits any more," replied McGinnis,
now beginning to understand how Gouron had managed to keep his somewhat
difficult seat atop the Klingon Council.

Moments later they arrived at the ship's end of the gangway. The computer
sounded honors, and Gouron stepped aboard.

"Gouron, I am Admiral William McGinnis, welcome aboard."

"It is an honor to meet you Admiral, I am pleased to have the responsibility of
thanking you for your removal of the Cardassians from space."

"I am glad that they don't pose a threat to us in the current crisis, but
their weakened state may make them easy for the Romulans to pick off, should
they choose to do so."

"Yes, that's true, and if they do,I trust that you will be able to defeat
them again."

"Yes, I believe so, assuming that Federation forces aren't weakened by our
current operations."

"It will be hard, but honor is never won by men who are afraid to take
chances."

"True, but you know that I must tell you that Star Fleet Command would rather
that the Klingon Empire wait to launch this offensive, The Federation has many
ships under construction, but the fleet construction program won't get into
full productivity until next year."

"That may be true for you, but we are ready to get ourr due revenge, and we
would not appreciate it if the Federation refused to help us in our war against
The Borg."

"I am well aware of that, and I am ordered to offer you all possible assistance
in your operations."

"I am pleased, we will be launching three days from today, so if you are able
to strengthen your forces, you hae time to contact your commanders."

"I shall do so immediately after dinner, and our tour. ... Shall we go to
the observation deck?"

"Very well..."

***
After dinner, and the usual conversation that occurs at such occasions, Gouron
called for everyone's attention.

"This has ben a fine meal. We are quite impressed by the Gach, it is difficult
to get food of this quality in the finest restaurants of the Empire. However,
our time here is not meant to be spent eating. We are here to see this mighty
new starship and to talk about the final defeat of our common enemy. Admiral,
I would like to see this ship of yours, and then to discuss our strategy,
understanding that the size of the Federation contribution to our efforts has
not been decided."

"An excellent plan, Gouron if you and your staff will follow me." The party
departed the observation bubble, located at the junction of the aft-most
support strut and the mega-collimator ring. It proceeded to the weapons
control center, which was almost too small to hold the ten Klingon and
Federation officers.

"Computer, render a three-dimentional schematic of this vessel, highlighting
weapons, defenses, power production, computer and structural items."

The computer immediately brought a hologram of the ship on line, with the
specified systems highlighted.

"As you can see, we have fifty-seven rapid-fire particle phaser batteries, each
is powered by separate fusion reactors, capable of providing all the energy
that these systems can use. The reactors can also be used as secondary power
supplies for the ship, should main or auxiliary power be knocked out. The ship
has seven contained-plasma torpedo tubes, each has fifty missiles, whose range
is twice that of the standard Federation photon torpedo. The plasma in the
warheads powers the warp sustainer coil, so at maximum range, the torpedoes
have half as much destructive potential as at launch. At launch, they have
eighty megatons standard yield. The ship has four phaser collimators located
on each face of the engineering hull, each is as powerful as a Galaxy-class
starship's main phaser collimators. The main weapon of this ship, as
with the mycenae-class defender, is the phased collimator ring that
surrounds the main hull. The ring has three times the destructive
potential of the Mycenae-class ships' main weaponry, making it nearly
twenty times as powerful as a galaxy-class ship's weapons.

"The ship has tripple shielding, which is operable in a two-layered
configuration, meaning that we can maintain shielding if the Borg should break
one layer. We can make repairs while the other layers are being worked over by
enemy weapons. The system is energy-expensive, and we have installed a new
main energizer with greater output than has been seen previously to support
this added energy demand. There is also an experimental short-duration forced
quantum core for emergency power generation, should the main systems and the
secondary fusion reactors be over-taxed. It can provide fifty percent of main
power for four hours, and with all of this power production, we can operate
every single weapons and defensive system aboard the ship at the same time.
The benefits of such a multi-redundant scheme have always been obvious, but
until recently, there has not been incentive to build such vessels. As you are
aware, we also carry the new Federation phase-cloaking technology, which
precludes use of our weapons while operational, simply because we can't hit
anything while under phase-cloak. We also carry computer-control systems,
power distribution systems, and communications relays. that are more redundant
than anything previously seen in a Federation starship."

"This is a very impressive design, how do you manage to fit so much into a hull
this size?"

"Quite simply, crew quarters are extremely tight, and we use robotic systems to
do as much work as is technically possible. This saves us nearly a thousand
crewmembers, with all of the support systems that they require. The crew is
only 400 strong."

"I assume that you have a internal defensive plan similar to that aboard the
defender-class ships?"

"Yes, if lifeforms of a type designated as "enemy" by the command staff invade
the ship, the computer has the ability to use force fields and phaser
collimators to neutralize any boarding party."

"Admiral, this is the greatest development in military technology in the last
thirty years, and I commend you on the fact that the Federation chose you to
command it in its first, and most honorable mission."

"Thank you, I was much honored by their decision to wave the rules against flag
officers commanmding single unit ships. My orders state that this vessel is to
act independently of the main fleet when I feel necessary. The remainder of
Federation forces will be under the command of your fleet, as our only other
fleet-rank officer has only recently received his admiral's commission."

"Excellent, I would like to see your other facilities."

"If you will follow me, ... Computer, end holo simulation." As they left, the
schematic of the ship disappeared. After travelling through the sick-bay,
bridge, and engineering deck the party arrived at one of the holodecks.

"We use these for training, simulation, and research, more than recreation,
although limited recreational programming is available. I believe that there
is a simulation running here that you may be interested in. ... Computer,
access holodeck thirteen, open doors." The group was met with a particle blast
from a blue-suited security member, whose bolt had just barely missed a borg
soldier attempting to access one of the slots common in the corridor walls of
their ships. The reason for the miss became obvious as another Borg soldier
slammed the security man aside. The security began using their grenade
launchers, destroying Borg soldiers right an left. The sonics couldn't be used
aboard Ticonderoga, even in self-defense, they were simply too powrful.
However, since the simulation was of a landing on a Borg ship, anything went.
The simulated grenades destroyed huge chunks of material, killing the Borg
soldiers as they approached. Finally simulated force fields came up, which
kept the grenades from doing much damage. The security party then dropped a
small "package", and called for emergency beam-out. The package was a kilogram
of antimatter, and the blast from this destroyed a huge chunk of the Borg
vessel. McGinnis watched the proceedings, thinking to himself that at this
point the ship would be moving toward the Borg ship in hopes of breaking
through the subspace field in order to come out of phase-cloak in this huge
cavity and rip the cube apart from the inside.

"An impressive battle Admiral, what was its purpose?" said Gouron, reminding
him of the presence of the Klingon observers.

"We hope to send landing parties aboard Borg vessels and then open a large
enough cavity to allow a starship to enter and blow the Borg ships apart from
the inside. The armor and shielding that the security troops wear will
hopefull allow us to survive for periods of time aboard the Borg ships. our
simulation runs suggest that the armor will also allow us to repel large
parties of Borg boarders, should they break our shielding. We will, of
coursse, destroy the ship before its capture, but if we can live to fight
another day..."

"Yes, an admirable philosophy," replied Gouron. "Can you produce suits like
these for our warriors?"

"No, but I can send the specifications to your manufacturing people so that you
can build them yourselves, should this be acceptable."

"That is fine, I shall tell them to expect the information."

"Very well, shall we adjourn for this evening, I must confer with Star Fleet
Command, and you doubtless have preparations to make."

"Very well, however, we must talk about strategy tomorrow, as soon as you know
how many ships the Federation can contribute."

"Then I shall take you back to the gangway, and we will see each other
tomorrow. I will await your transmission as to what time is convenient for
you."

The party returned to the gangway, and Gouron turned to salute the ship as he
left. His departing words to McGinnis were: "I shall contact you tomorrow, I
look forward to another meeting."

SUPER-DREADNOUGHT: Part I: Chapter V:

McGinnis walked onto the Bridge, noting the comparative quiet of third shift.
Only a young lieutenant junior-grade was there, sitting at the engineering
station, looking at the station as if she would rather be anywhere else.

"Lieutenant, raise Star Fleet Command, Admiral Jellico for me."

"Yes, Sir!," she said, her shocked look showing him that she had not seen him
enter the room. She moved to the ops station, punched a number of keys and
then turned to McGinnis.

"Sir, their response is in code, Admiral's eyes only."

"Very well, ... take fifteen minutes, I'll talk with them here, don't worry
about the duty, I'll call you when I'm ready for you to resume your duties."

"Yes, Sir," she said and quietly left through the starboard-side turbo-lift.

McGinnis moved to Ops, and worked the controls of the console for a
moment. Then the image of Defense Fleet Commander Jellico appeared on
the main viewer.

"William, its good to see that you've gotten to the Klingon Capital without
difficulty. We have your information about fleet strength, and believe that
this is simply a stronger deployment of forces than we had originally expected.
The new classes of ships are a surprise, but considering our own work, I'm not
surprised that the Klingons have some new technology, and the analysts think
that the reason for their not having told us has something to do with the
pressure being put on Gouron by those in the faction supporting house Durass.
You will have to be very careful, I think that the political situation there is
as unstable as its been in the last fifteen years."

"Thanks for the warning, Admiral, I would say that Gouron's worried about his
situation as well. However, as I'm sure you're aware, I need to know what
ships you can send me, our current commitment isn't going to be enough, from a
political standpoint, if the klingons are really going to invest this much of
their fleet in the upcomming operations."

"William, don't think that I haven't considered that already. Exploration and
science commands are determined to keep as many of their ships as possible, but
I've collected another thirty-two ships, mostly of the new victorious-class
light cruiser and Versailles-Class destroyers. Its not a lot, but these ships
do carry phase-cloaking technology, and the Victorious-Class ships do have
contained-plasma torpedoes. I'm sending the technical specs on a parallel
frequency."

McGinnis saw the data flash into the computers, and decided that he could read
it much later.

"Sir, as we both suspected, the Klingons are going ahead with the mission, and
are impatient as hell to leave. When will the new ships be here?"

"I expect, day after tomorrow. If not then, they'll be there the day after
that for sure."

"Thanks for the help, and next time you see her, tell Admiral Stephenson that
I'm eternally indebted to her for the assistance from the rest of Star Fleet."

"I'm sure that she'll be interested in your opinion, William, but face it, most
of the people around here still think tat we're back in the golden age. They
don't understand that peace comes at a price, and that the price becomes a lot
higher when those defending the rest of us aren't supported properly."

"That's for bloody certain, replied McGinnis," some of the tension surrounding
the mission boiling out of him as he spoke with his old mentor.

"Well, I suppose that I'd better let you get back to making preparations with
Gouron. Good luck, William, I wish that I could be there with you, I hate
missing out on this kind of a mission."

"I know, and I wish that you could be here too, I'd like to have a full admiral
in command of the Federation Fleet, since I'll be out on independent work most
of the time. De l'hotel is good, but he's still not fully experienced with
fleet ops, and I'm afraid that the Klingons will push us into taking
unnecessary risks."

"Don't worry, Guy's a tremendous ship commander, and the Klingon Command
respects him a great deal after the firsbattle of four years ago, I think that
he'll be fine."

"I hope so, I'll be out of touch most of the time. In any case, we'll launch
three days from now, and I'll send you reports as we progress."

"Excellent, I look forward to your news, Star Fleet out."

"Ticonderoga clear."

With this the main viewer returned to its image of the docking bay. McGinnis
struck the com unit, and called the young lieutenant back to her late-night
duties. On her return, he left the bridge to look over the specs for the
victorious and Versailles class ships.

***
By the afternoon of the next day, McGinnis felt ready to meet with Gouron. The
discussions were, as a diplomat would say, "frank,". The main issues focused
on the new lighter ships, and the diployment of Ticonderoga.

"Your new light vessels aren't properly equipped for this kind of a mission.
Their weapons are too light, and they are barely more powerful than our birds
of prey, which are much more maneuverable."

"I know that, but their shielding is much better, and in the case of the light
cruisers, they have weapons with better range than anything else in
the fleet. I wanted more firepower from the Federation too, but Fleet Admiral
Stephenson refused to force the exploration command to send the battle sections
of our galaxy class ships, and the nebulas are needed for border patrolls along
the Romulan border. As I told you yesterday, Star Fleet is not ready for this
mission, and won't be for at least a year."

"Admiral, understand that I do not blame you for this, but it does not look
good, your lack of support. I will agree to the inclusion of these ships,
despite the fact that I am certain that they will prove excellent targets for
the Borg ships. Hopefully the light cruisers can do someting, but your
destroyers, in my opinion, are useless."

"We shall have to see," said McGinnis somewhat coolly."

"Now, to the other matter. I do not like the fact that the most powerful ship
in the attack force will not be with the rest of the fleet."

"I specifically directed that it be that way. Ticonderoga isn't built to be a
fleet-line vessel. The weapons have too much range, and with all of the
technology aboard, if we're overmatched, any other ship, or group of ships,
will be outdone too."

"That is your opinion Admiral, I am not in favor of having any of the ships
away from the main body of the fleet."

"I understand your concerns, but this class of ship is built to be a
high-speed, long-range, heavily-armed, scouting and intervention vessel.
I am not stupid, I am far from certain that we will be able to handle a Borg
cube alone, but I do think that I can get more information on diployments,
communications, and distribution than any other vessel, Federation or Klingon,
simply because The Ticonderoga-class ships are better-able to survive away from
the fleet than any other vessels. I don't intend to be so far away as to be
out of range of assistance should it become necessary, but without a scouting
force, we will be flying blind."

"Yes, and that's what the bird of prey was built to do. Your ship is
one-of-a-kind, while those ships are easily replaced."

"Yes, and if they're caught against a Borg vessel, they will not be able to
outrun it, they have no chance of militarily defeating it, and their crews will
be committing suicide. My crew may actually manage to get back to fight
another battle."

"Perhaps you're right, senseless death in battle has no honor, but if you go
alone, you must agree to some form of communications schedule."

"That is dangerous, as the Borg will doubtless monitor for communication, once
they realize that a major force is in the field."

"True, so I suggest that you only contact the fleet when you are leaving a
system, and only discuss details of your movement if it seems safe to both you
and our commander."

"That should be alright, he and I will work out the details, if that is
acceptable to you."

"Yes, that will be acceptable."

***
The next two days flew by in a mad rush of arriving Federation starships,
tactical meetings, and final preparations for departure. Finally the fleet of
one hundred and fifty-seven vessels, all classes and all types was ready to
depart. Only the new, and as of yet, secret Federation ship was not in
formation.

***
"Mr. Thale, prepare to engage thrusters."

"All systems on standby, navigational computer is ready for launch."

"Very well, unlatch docking clamps."

"Docking clamps unlatched, umbilical now separated."

"Thrusters aft, 1% power."

"Thrusters, Aye."

The ship slid slowly away from its docking position, its thrusters and
anti-grav fields moving it through the open air of the great under-sea
facility. Most of the crew was looking forward to getting started, they
had not been trained to wait, and finally, the waiting was over.

"Sir, we have now cleared the docking bay, now orienting for egress."

"Very well, as soon as our plain of egress has been achieved, set thrusters to
100% forward."

"Aye, thrusters will be at 100% forward in thirty seconds, we will depart
this facility in fourty-six seconds under current course."

The ship continued to turn, its huge size was, quite simply, staggering to the
Klingon on-lookers, who were getting their first good look at the mighty new
Federation vessel. As Kern had three days earlier, all of them stared, almost
surprised that the Federation was still capable of building true warships.

"Egress in ten seconds," announced Thale.

"Ops, bring all structural support fields on line," said McGinnis.

"Fields on line,AE said Janet Anders from her station.

"We have cleared dock," came Thale's announcement.

"Very well, notify the Klingon Commander that we're on our way, navigational
deflectors on full, one quarter impulse power."

"Nav shields up, setting departure course at 113 mark 16, quarter impulse."

The mighty ship rose, sweeping out of the waters, with an enormous blast of
steam and shot skyward on the near-invisible emissions of her mighty impulse
drive. At this point, there was no reason to be cloaked, since everyone would
be getting a look at the ship over the next few weeks anyhow. Speed was far
more important on this part of the mission than stealth, and McGinnis was not
planning to waste power on unnecessary diversions until the time came. Then,
his eye, like everyone else's was caught by the picture framed by the
forward-looking main viewer.

The armada had everything imaginable, from destroyers to dreadnought-class
ships, and more Klingon battle cruisers than any of them had ever seen. The
Klingons also had some new super-heavy ships, clearly heavier than the
Mycenae-class defender, but not equal to Ticonderoga. Birds of prey, and other
small Klingon ships flitted about the larger ships, all quite beyond easy
counting for the unassisted observer.

"Wow," was Walter Schultz's only comment as he transferred the image on his
monitor on to the main viewer. "Sir, this is the fleet, I've *never* seen that
many ships in one place at one time."

"Yeah, that's what I call a fleet ..." replied Robert MacLeod as he gaped at
the view from his position, leaning on the back of McGinnis' command chair.

"I think that this is the biggest concentration of military hardware ever seen,
and I'm really quite sure that this mission isn't going to be boring," Thale
contributed.

"Yes, its big, so let's get up there before they all get bored and start firing
on *us*!," said McGinnis with a smile.

"Agreed, sir ... accelerating to one-half impulse power."

"Lieutenant, as soon as we're clear of the atmosphere, bring us to full
impulse, set course for the front of the fleet."

"Aye Sir."

"Commander Anders, get me the commander of Klingon forces."

"Aye Sir, Kalis coming up the main screen."

The viewscreen flashed to the image of a surprisingly old Klingon, his skin
looked so leathery that McGinnis thought that it must've been tanned at some
point.

"Lord Commander Kalis, I am Admiral William McGinnis, and this is the
Federation Starship Ticonderoga. We are operational, and ready to leave the
system."

"Admiral, it is good to speak with you, your vessel is quite impressive.

All Federation ships are here, according to Admiral De L'hotel, and so we are
leaving the system immediately, course 257 mark 129. Our speed will be warp
eight."

"Understood, I'll stay with the fleet until we reach the border, then I'll go
into silent running, and scout around as best I can."

"Very well, Admiral, Let us leave, and may our mission be completed by
victory."

"Sir, there is honor in our cause, and necessity as our companion, I expect
nothing less than victory, ... Ticonderoga out."

The screen darkened, returning to its view of the fleet, which now lay spread
out behind Ticonderoga and the Klingon battlecruiser that served as their
command ship. Then space flared white for a moment, as all of the ships in the
fleet accelerated into war space.

*********************************

SUPER-DREADNOUGHT: Part II: Chapter VI.

Command Log: Stardate 56318.2: Admiral William McGinnis, Commanding USS
Ticonderoga, reporting. It has been nearly two weeks since we left the
Klingon home system. The journey has been uneventful, all ships in the fleet
are functioning perfectly, and we have been taking advantage of this transit
time to continue fleet training, and setting up the command chain. This ship
continues to function perfectly, and we are now crossing the edge of explored
territory, moving toward Borg space. We will soon go to silent running, and
will be out of touch with the main fleet except in emergency, or at our
pre-determined contact times.

Morale remains high, largely due to an extremely heavy training schedule,
both of which I expect will be important in the next days as our activity
level drops sharply. I am now turning to the last open-air duties that I
can perform for the time being.

"Commander, a channel to Starfleet Command, please."

"Channel open, sir" replied Anders. "Admiral Jellico is responding."

"Admiral, I am making my last report before engaging silent running, do you
have any news or last orders that I should know about?"

"William, yes I do. The Romulans have been attacked by a single Borg cube,
demanding that they take them to sector 001. We assume that the Borg are only
partially aware of the political situation in Alpha quadrant. All planetary
defense forces are on full alert in the Federation, and I have been asked to
take command of all Star Fleet Operations. I want you to continue your
mission, The Romulans were able to defeat the Borg, and Gouron has taken
advantage of the situation. Klingon forces attacked them with about everything
left in their Home fleet. The Romulans took extremely heavy losses, so I
suspect that the Klingons will be able to defeat them, and repay them for the
help to house Durass, which has been almost completely silent during this whole
business. We're worried about that, so you should probably keep an eye on
anyone that you or Kalis doesn't trust."

"There are a few commanders, but most of them are loyal to the mission, if not
the government. I'll tell Kalis, but I'm leaving the fleet within the hour."

"Yes, that's right, I had forgotten. In any case, Federation space is secure,
although the Ferengi are trying to cross our space to supply materiel to both
sides. All scientific missions have been called off, and a combined
Starfleet-planetary forces fleet is in the triangle, should anything spill
over."

"If you need resources, now's the time to tell us."

"No, don't worry, I'll expect to hear good news from you in a few months."

"I intend to deliver, until then, I'm glad I've got my job, and not yours."

"Hell, I'm glad you've got your job and not mine, I'd take your job in a
second, risk and all."

"Well, when I get back you can have it if you want, but for now, I'm planning
to keep it for awhile."

"Good plan, and I'll hear from you as you get the chance."

"Agreed, Ticonderoga out."

The viewer changed, almost immediately, to the image of Kalis.

"Admiral, I know that you are about to leave us, I wish you honor and success."

"Thank you Kalis, I have news from Star Fleet. They say that the Romulans have
been attacked by the Borg, and that they took heavy losses. Gouron has taken
advantage of the situation, and has attacked the remainder of Romulan forces.
House Durass is surprisingly quiet on the issue, and Star Fleet is concerned
that they're planning something. Admiral Jellico, who is now Chief of Fleet
Operations, suggested that it would be prudent to keep an eye on any commanders
that you think may be disloyal."

"Thank you for the news, we are already out of range of our home transmitters.
I suspect that the few commanders that I do not trust are as unaware as I was.
We will be following our current course, unless a change becomes necessary. I
expect, from what we know of them, that we will arrive in Borg Territory within
a week at our current velocity."

"We will be travelling a similar course, but will be at something near warp
9.5, so I expect to get to their space much more quickly. I am going to see if
there are any notable civilizations along the way, and should we run across
any, I may see if I can enlist their help. Otherwise, I will notify you of any
systems that should be avoided due to limited-technology inhabitants, or Borg
outposts. We have opened some windows in the phase-cloak, so you can contact
us on the low-frequency subspace band, but only on the data-transmission
frequencies. We can't clear the high-frequency interference from the
phase-cloak, except for our scanner frequencies."

"Understood, at least we can contact you, should battle come to us before you
find honor in this war."

"Very well, is there anything else I should know?"

"No, except that all Klingons hope that your assistance will result in the end
of the Borg threat."

"I hope that we can do that, and not only for the Klingon Empire."

"Yes, your Federation will benefit as well."

"Good luck, I'll contact you within the week," said McGinnis.

"May you also have good fortune, I shall await your news," replied the Klingon
commander.

With this, the transmission ended, and Ticonderoga's viewer returned to the
view of the space in front of the ship.

"Commander Schultz, are we ready to engage phase-cloak?"

"Aye Sir, phase-cloak shows ready."

"Very well, engage cloaking device."

The bridge shimmered around them for a moment, and then everything returned to
normal.

"Phase-cloak engaged, it is functioning perfectly," announced Schultz with his
characteristic ferile smile.

"Lieutenant Thale, set course 41 mark 8, velocity warp 9.45, and engage when
ready."

"Turning to course 41 mark 8, and accelerating. ... Velocity is now warp 9.4,
and course is 41 mark 8."

"Very well, we have some time, people, I suggest that you get some relief, and
rest for a while before we start passing those systems on the long-range
scan," said McGinnis referring to the strategic view that was running in a
corner of the main viewer. "We'll have to be at our peak then, and we'll be in
scanning range of those systems in a couple of hours. Until then, Mr. Data,
you have the bridge," McGinnis said as he rose from the command chair.

SUPER-DREADNOUGHT: Part II: Chapter VII:

Command Log: STardate 56324.6: Admiral William McGinnis reporting:

We have been away from the main fleet for nearly two days, and despite some
interesting star mapping, there have been no signs of spacefaring
civilizations, and no signs of the Borg. The first I take as interesting, the
second ... only time can tell.

Our best calculations indicate that we are now in territory which has been
considered "owned", by the Borg for some time. Our systems are all functioning
perfectly, and all we can do is continue to explore the edges of their
territory until something comes up.

"Helm, change course, to 063 mark 16, continue warp 9." Said McGinnis.

"Our course is now 063 mark 16, our speed continues at warp 9," replied Thale.

"Ops, anything on sensors or communications?"

"Sir, we will pass a class G star in four minutes, our best knowledge says that
this is just outside Borg territory. Long-range scanners suggest a system of
planets surrounding the star, with two in its golden zone. Planet 5 seems to
have high-energy radio signals coming from it, but no sub-space waves
reported."

"Well, let's have a quick look, this system may be one that requires watching
in case the Borg decide to show interest in these beings. Theirs is the first
technology that we've seen since we left Klingon space. ... Helm, change course
to intercept the orgbit of the fifth planet, decellerate to maximum impulse in
two minutes, and bring us into a stellar orbit that will hold us 1 million
kilometers from the planet, its rotation will allow us a scan. I don't want to
orbit, as I want to leave quickly should any news come in from the fleet."

"Aye Sir, changing course, 314 mark 356. Our velocity is warp 9, with
decelleration in 1 minute 45 seconds."

"Excellent, ... Ops, begin scans of the system, get what information you can
despite phase-cloak interference."

"Sir, scanning is already in progress. We can't get much concerning life forms,
but it would appear, from planetary albedo, light variation and other data,
that there is a civilization on the fifth planet. Its technology is
approximately equivalent to Earth at approximately the year 2030. There appear
to be some small space stations, but nothing of major importance."

"Importance to us, maybe, but to them ... its the beginnings of exploring
their system, their neighborhood, and, given enough time, their galaxy. I hope
that we can give them that opportunity."

Nods of agreement were the crew's only response. They all turned to, working
to bring the ship into a distant position from which it could observe activity
on, and near, the planet.

"Sir, we are now in a far observatory orbit, we can only intercept limited
comunications from the planet, and as it has no moon, long-range signals are
few in number. They are transmitting the typical long-range pre-contact
signals characteristic of most civilizations at their level of development,"
said T'mayek from Science.

"Thank you Lt.Cmdr, continue to analyze the information as it comes in.

"Sir! I have powerful sub-space distortions, characteristic of Borg scouting
cubes," snapped Walter Schultz from his station.

"Tactical, red alert, bring all defensive systems on-line, ... engineering,
transfer power control to weapons-control computers, standard defense protocol.
All departments, suit your crewmembers up, and prepare for emergency defense
protocol."

"We are now at standard defense protocol, situation, red alert. All
departments report that they will be at the specified levels of preparedness
within the minute," said Schultz. A brief pause ensued, then: "The Board now
shows green," Schultz continued.

"Good, since this is a scout, we certainly can take advantage of them. Their
total ability is likely about equal to that of this ship, so we'll have to be
smart about this, but if we can knock their ship out before they can get
warning back to the collective, we may be able to get the first battle on *our*
terms. Ops, the second we come out of cloak, blanket the area with a
full-power jamming transmission. ... Helm, set course for close-in orbit of
the planet, I want to know the second that they beam their landing parties down
to the planet. Tactical, ready main ring to fire on their transmitter arrays,
I want plasma torpedoes immediately after that strike, to knock out any
secondary transmitters. We'll not get a second chance to do this, so make
every shot count. If you think that the rapid-fire weapons can do something,
use them too, but make sure that you've got enough power on line to handle the
draw."

"Sir, everything's set here, and we're in luck, because the technology is
so limited, it looks like this ship is the true scouting borg ship, like the
one that Picard met in the first "Hugh", contact. This means that its dropped
its shielding to assimilate the technology, especially since they seem to view
the planet's weapons capabilities as "irrelevant". Of course, so would I...."
reported Schultz.

"Understood, that should mean that we can get them before they're aware of our
presence. ... However, in case we're not successful, stand by all transverters,
we'll give them another surprise. ... Tactical, engineering, get together,
strip a few photon torpedoes down , so that we can beam them into the Borg
ship."

"Aye Sir," replied Schultz from his station, and MacLeod from main engineering.

McGinnis seethed. There was nothing that could be done to stop the
carnage that was occurring on the main viewscreen. The borg ship had begun
cutting the space stations apart, and after a little pittiful laser fire, and a
few nuclear missile launches, (all of which were quite effectively stopped by
Borg weapons fire), the planet seemed to be going down without a fight. Of
course, they had had no idea that beings existed outside their system, and even
if they had, they couldn't have imagined the Borg, not even in their worst
nightmares. All that the crew could do was hurry its preparations, and hope
that they could finish them in time to save something of the civilization on
the planet.

"All preparations ready sir," reported MacLeod from engineering. "We have
fourteen photon warheads ready for transversion as soon as your orders come
through."

"Good, get ready for action down there." ... "All decks, we're going in." The
ship moved, still phase-cloaked toward the small Borg scout, whose 2.5 million
tons was about a sixth Ticonderoga's mass. The great star ship moved quickly
and quietly toward its unsuspecting prey.

"Tactical, bring weapons computers on line, you may decloak and fire when
ready."

With this order, the ship's systems were all switched to command and tactical
consoles only. The rest of the crew became highly-interested bystanders in
this battle where surprise and firepower were their only advantages. The Borg
collective was as surprised as any unemotional system could get, as a huge
white vessel of a design only somewhat similar to designs reported to the
Collective appeared before their ship. They didn't have time to make note of
the fact that they hadn't been offered the chance to surrender or desist, a
step characteristic of the vessels of the mid-sized organic power calling
itself the United Federation of Planets.

What did happen, was a terrific blast of phased energy, followed, almost
immediately, by twenty high-powered explosives of a type not recorded
previously, which ripped into the already weakend super-structure. In short,
the cube was blasted into four large chunks. Each had some power left, but
these sections were quickly dealt with by the smaller phased energy weapons
surrounding the forward section of the ship before they could attempt to
recombine. ... No transmissions reached the collective about this loss. Its
conclusions would have to be drawn later.

Meanwhile, Ticonderoga now stood, victorious in its first battle against the
Borg. It orbitted the world, and McGinnis was now trying to decide whether
going down to kill the few Borg soldiers on the ground would be considered a
violation of the prime directive. ... <As if sitting in close orbit, out of
cloak, after having used newrly two gigatons of explosive to destroy an
attacking ship, wasn't violation enough.> This stark fact, alone, determined
his strategy.

"McGinnis to Lieutenant Thompson. Take all the security people that you need,
and the ground attack shuttles, and kill any borg that you see. If you need
fire support, contact tactical."

"Aye Sir, we'll launch in fifteen minutes," replied the young lieutenant from
her station in engineering.

"Thank you, move as quickly as you can, I suspect that any borg that are down
there will be seriously impared by the loss of their collective consciousness,
but they may still be able to do some damage."

"I know, we'll stop them cold."

"Good, lieutenant, that's what I want to hear," replied McGinnis.

"Ops, get me a channel to Kalis," snapped McGinnis, turning his attention
to Janet Anders' station.

"Breaking subspace silence, it'll take a bit before I can get them," she said.

"Take your time, I suspect that it'll take a bit before the Borg get too
interested in the system, it was a small ship, so they probably won't be in too
much of a hurry to find out what happened, especially if Kalis has been keeping
them as busy as I suspect."

***
Several minutes passed, and then the four small attack craft departed
Ticonderoga's landing bay, set in the aft section of the engineering hull. At
almost the same moment, Cmdr Anders turned from her station. "Sir, I have
Kalis, voice only."

"Put it through," replied McGinnis as his attention shifted from the image of
the four small ships to the other matter at hand. "Cmdr Schultz, keep tactical
control over the attack force, you have clearance to fire the rapid-fire
weapons should that become necessary, speak with me if you need any more
firepower."

With this, McGinnis waved to Anders to open the channel.

"Admiral, the fact that you are in contact would suggest that you have had
battle with The Borg. I hope that your battle went well."

"Thank you Kalis, it was utterly successful, and to the best of our knowledge,
the Borg vessel that we destroyed didn't get a communication concerning this
vessel off to their command point. The ship was small, we had surprise on our
side, and they never really had a chance. The residual Borg resistance is
being dealt with as we speak, and I believe that the planet which we are
orbiting is now, again, free of Borg influence. However, as we discussed, they
will doubtless become more interested in this planet, now that a collection
mission has been destroyed. Can you send support?"

"Yes, I can send you help, but I can not come personally, as we, too, have had
contact, and I believe that it is best to make them fight a two-front battle
for now."

"You have seen action, what happened?"

"We encountered a large cube only hours after you left the fleet. It was
moving toward Klingon home space, and after your news concerning the situation
there, it was obvious that battle was necessary. We struck from cloak, with
the Federation ships decloaking to assist. The ship was surprised, and
suffered critical damage in our first volley. However, they did get a message
off to the center of their space, the content of which is unknown. We managed
to destroy more than they could create, and to keep the field down.
Ultimately, after many Klingon and Federation crews died in honor, we were able
to completely dismantle the cube. All live Borg were destroyed, and their
technology is being taken back to allied space for study. I have only
ninety-six ships, as thirty-five were destroyed, and ten more are taking the
pieces of the Borg vessel to The Klingon Capital, where it will be studied by
Starfleet and Klingon teams."

"Well, your losses were less than ours were at Wolf 359, or at Klins'hai. Any
tactics of which I should be aware?"

"Yes, we are now using task forces, dependent on one heavy ship. The heavy
ship is used to destroy the Borg cube, while the small ships interrupt the
tractor beam, and disrupt the cutting beams and other weapons. The tactic is
expensive, and risky, but losses are justified by the victories that we have
won. We have had two other battles, each resulted in victory, using no more
than two task groups per Borg cube. Each time, we lost seven small ships to
battle, and in our most recent engagement, we also lost the dreadnought
Confederation. Admiral De L'hotel is alive, as he was in conference with me
when battle began."

"I see, I suggest that you send me the remains of the task group with the
dreadnought Confederation, and another full task group. I suggest that we
plan to meet in three weeks time, with whatever forces we have remaining. In
the mean time, I will be setting a trap for the Borg here, and hopefully
getting their interest. Anything that you can do to that will get their
attention, as far from my current position as possible, will be appreciated, as
I think that their response to the loss here, may be somewhat weakened. I
don't think that we can handle more than one full-sized cube after what you've
told me."

"I think this is a good plan, I will continue to slash at their communications
where possible. As I have told you, there have been a few messages sent by the
cubes that we have defeated, we have a general idea of the location of the
system toward which these were directed. I suggest this as a meeting point,
but it will take nearly four weeks for the main fleet to get there, if we start
out immediately. I, therefore, want to collect the fleet there at Federation
stardate ... 56490.0 with your ship scouting the area before hand. If you
haven't had contact with the Borg before you have to leave, order your ships to
meet the main fleet at these coordinates."

McGinnis glanced to Anders, who nodded, telling him that she had received
the coordinates.

"Very well, I have the coordinates, and will look forward to speaking with you
Then."

"As you humans say, good luck, Admiral, and may your battles end in victory.
Kalis out!"

" Victory to you, Kalis, Ticonderoga out." McGinnis turned to Schultz, to ask
for news aabout the attack craft. The commander anticipated the question, and
flashed a schematic of the planet up in a corner of the main viewer.

"Sir, only a few Borg soldiers beamed down before our strike, and most of
them have been neutralized. As we have seen before, they have great trouble
dealing with the loss of their connection to the collective. Lieutenant
Thompson says that she'll be back aboard within the hour," was his brief
report.

"Well, said McGinnis, good news all round. As soon as they're back aboard,
engage cloaking device, I don't want the Borg to catch us with our pants down."

Everyone on the bridge returned back to their duties, while Schultz's
schematic flashed up markers where the latest Borg soldier had been
neutralized. After some time, Schultz turned to McGinnis, to report the
completion of the mission.

"Sir, Lieutenant Thompson reports success, they're coming in, no losses, no
damage."

"Good, have her report to me in conference-1 as soon as she's able."

"Sir, I have some disturbing infformation," said T'mayek.

"Report," said McGinnnis, a look of concern on his features.

"Unfortunately, we did not cut the Borg link before they got complete
information on this planet back to their information nexus. This means that
the next Borg cube will know where the "useful" areas of the planet are."

"That is unfortunate, but not necessarily surprising. We won't be able to
respond immediately, so hopefully the next attack will show how efficient Borg
information analysis is. ... I will be in conference-1 awaiting Ms. Thompson.
Mr. Data, you have the Bridge."

With this, McGinnis rose and walked down the short corridor that led to
conference-1, where he would hear the reports concerning the level of damage
done to the planet and those living on it.

SUPER-DREADNOUGHT: Part II: Chapter VIII.

Command Log: Stardate 56331.6: William McGinnis, Commanding USS
Ticonderoga reporting:

We have haed an uneventful few days, while we await the reinforcements from the
main fleet. However, as we enter the fourth day in orbit, I must admit to
growing concern. Federation experience with the Borg scouting cubes is limited
to a brief encounter that USS Enterprise had with one nearly fifteen years ago.
The "Hugh" incident, as it is now known, only taught us that the Borg tend to
send larger ships to check on missing vessels within a few days after their
disappearance. I must, therefore, assume that we will meet a larger cube at
any time. With our reinforcements still two days away, I must admit to some
nervousness.

Despite this, I have set the crew on two/thirds duty shifts, with extra
training in the battle gear. This gives them some added rest, and provides
some variation in our routine. We have had no contact with those inhabiting
the planet below us, and I must hope that their civilization will be able to
withstand its rather rude entrance into galaxy-level politics. Of course,
should the Borg come again, as I suspect they will, they may be taken out of
galactic politics almost as suddenly as they entered it.

The crew's morale seems high, largely due to our victory and due to the active
training routine. I expect that we will maintain our routine until the fleet
arrives. After that, I would like to patroll the surrounding systems, looking
for previous activity, either on the part of the Borg, or non-borg
civilizations.

McGinnis turned the recorder off, having dispatched his duty to Command.

He had to wonder, sometimes, why they asked captains to record the damnable
things. Especially on missions like this, when the actions that the commanding
officer would be held responsible for would not occur over periods of time
lengthy enough to record logs. The bridge events recorder would be a much more
appropriate way of reconstructing ships' activities, and the decisions which
these activities depended on.

His musings were interrupted by the voice of Robert MacLeod.

"MacLeod to McGinnis."

"McGinnis here," he replied to the air.

"I have a message from Kalis, he reports that a messenger ship has come from
Klingon space, reporting that the Romulan Empire has asked for Federation
protection against the Klingons. He says that Gouron has promised to cease his
attacks, if the Romulans will allow inspections of their border bases, in order
to ensure that house durass doesn't receive covert Romulan assistance. He also
wants the Romulans to guarantee their assistance against the Borg, under a
unified Federation/Klingon central command. There are no further details."

"Thanks Robert, it looks like its rather busy back homeward, I hope that Kalis
doesn't feel the need to get back to home space, things here are going too
well."

"No, he says that he is continuing with the agreed plan, but that because some
of his commanders are loyal to house Durass, he asks us not to discuss this
with anyone at the regrouping."

"Understood, tell him that I will say nothing, and that from now on, this ship
will be operating under silent running conditions, due to the risk of Borg
attack. I will speak with him on Star date 56490, as promised."

"Understood, Ensign Smith will send that out immediately," on my return to the
Bridge."

"I don't understand, why aren't you there?"

"Kalis marked the transmission command-staff only, so I'm notifying people
directly, as Cmdrs Schultz and Anders are on holo-2 working on a new tactical
simulation.

"Right," said McGinnis.

Had any other officer, even Data, done this McGinnis would have been extremely
unhappy. However, hhis long-standing friendship with Robert MacLeod, whose
judgment he trusted implicityly, meant that he trusted the chief engineer to do
the job appropriately, even if it were in an unorthodox manner. He decided to
go down to holo-2, to see what Schultz and Anders were cooking up.

He arrived outside the holodeck, and after seeing that the simulation was not
in progress, he passed on toward rec-5. This room, in effect the ship's
gymnasium, was a popular place, nearly all of the time. While he got some
excercise clothing on, he could hear the unmistakable sound of physical
activity through the light bulkheads.

After his daily three kilometer speed walk, McGinnis moved to the swimming
pool, located in the center of the track's oval. The only other swimmer was
Kyla Moran, a long-standing friend whom he had known since he was an ensign,
and she a young child. She was also the tallest woman that McGinnis had ever
seen. Her family had chosen not to have surgery performed, once it was realized
that she would be unusually tall due to hormonal imbalances. McGinnis knew
that she had joined Star Fleet to get away from her family, to avoid
Terran architecture which she found terribly hard to deal with as it wasn't
made for people of her height, and to follow in his footsteps. He knew that
she had respected him since she had been a child. Her time in the fleet had
been important to her, allowing her to realize that people could work
side-by-side, without prejudice, despite any physical or cultural differences
that they might have.

Before he could begin his own excercise, she had come to a stop in front
of him.

"Yes, Ensign?

"Sir, I'm sorry to bring this to you now, but you had mentioned the possibility
of getting some off-shift bridge duty?"

"Yes, I had, and to be honest I'd forgotten with the current activity. I'll
check with Commander Schultz; if he says that he thinks you are ready, you will
receive tactical during third shift, I'll tell you personally if it clears. "

"Thank you sir," she said with a smile.

"You deserve the chance, Kyla, you have done good work in weapons control."

A radiant smile was her acknowledgement of this statement. After this, she
then walked to the other side of the pool, where she climbed out on her way to
change into duty uniform. With the end of the conversation, McGinnis returned
to his workout routine, and then went to find some dinner and go to bed.

No sooner had his head hit the pillow, then he was awakened by the red alert
klaxons and MacLeod's voice calling all crew to battlestations.

***
"Status," McGinnis snapped as he charged onto the Bridge.

"Heavy sub-space distortions, suggesting an incomming Borg ship. We are at
full battlestations, Weapons Control Center is manned by Lieutenant Thompson
and Ensign Moran. All weapons are on standby, and shields are up. The
phase-cloak is functioning normally, and all other sub-systems are optimal,"
said Data.

"Very well, continue close-range scanning, and wait."

They didn't have to wait long, as a full-sized Borg cube appeared only eighty
thousand kilometers off their port bow. Immediately after appearing, it began
to scan the planet very closely, obviously looking for indications of
technology capable of destroying a scouting cube. Of course, the planet didn't
have the technology, and the collective was forced to assume that an accident
or other non-controllable event had occurred. As far as McGinnis was
concerned, this was just fine. It would give him more time to plan his second
surprise attack in a week.

SUPER-DREADNOUGHT: Part II: Chapter IX

Command Log, Stardate 56332.4: William McGinnis, Comminding USS
Ticonderoga: Reporting.

The presence of the Borg vessel now in orbit near us is no surprise, however, I
had hoped that they would wait a couple more days before arriving. At this
point I have decided to consider the planet a lost cause, barring a miraculous
turn of events. Although we will strike against the Borg soon, I can not say
that I believe that we have a good chance of defeating this collective.
However, our chances are better than those of any other single starship in
history, and this will have to be enough. It is unfortunate that their
destruction of the planet has been made easier by the information that the
first scouting cube was able to send back before we could deal with it. Now,
all that we can do is watch them destroy this planet, while we finish our
preparations.

"Tactical, those photon warheads, get them set for transversion, all other
weapons under computer control, the computer may fire when ready."

"Understood, photon warheads won't be ready for a few minutes, main ring
entering charging cycle, rapid-fire weapons coming on line, plasma
torpedoes standing by, and power systems are at 100 percent."

"Very well, watch the main reactor, Commander MacLeod says that section C
is operating a little close to tollerances."

"Yes Sir, he told me about that yesterday, I have my eye on it."

Minutes dragged by while more and more of the lights on the planet's surface
went dark. Finally the preparations were all completed, and the ship could
attempt to knock out its target.

"Sir, The Borg subspace field is up, so its going to be hard to get to them.
The computer suggests transverting the torpedoes in first, to disrupt their
power systems and then hitting them with the plasma and phasers."

"You may begin when ready."

"Decloaking, shields at full power, beginning transversion."

The ship's transverters, basically a combination of the standard transporter
and the subspace inverter developed by the Rutians sent fifteen standard photon
warheads through the Borg subspace field, reintegrating them in a preset
pattern throughout the Borg ship's matrix. Their explosions ripped a huge hole
in the face of the cube now directed toward Ticonderoga, and also knocked out
primary and secondary subspace transmission nodes throughout the ship. This
was intentional, as Commander Schultz had theorized that the Borg
communications net could be crashed by using explosions with a high subspace
discharge. Unfortunately, the collective was able to get some information to
the rest of the Borg before long-range communications fell.

Almost immediately after the photon explosions, Ticonderoga's forward
contained-plasma torpedoes made their contributions. These weapons, which were
basically the Romulan plasma bolt, with a containing magnetic field, exploded
on contact with the Borg subspace field, which was just beginning to reform
after the first stage of the attack. Their power knocked it out, causing
Schultz to pump his fist in the air. At the same instant, the main ring
discharged, its white flare brighter than the hottest supernova. The bolt
crashed through the upper-left corner of the cube, knocking it off and into the
planet's atmosphere where it was consumed by the friction of atmospheric entry.

At the same instant, fifty of the ship's rapid-fire weapons struck, blasting
huge chunks out of the inner super-structure. The main ring had already
recharged, and blasted away another corner of the Borg ship. However, two
corners were left, and a green beam now flared from one of them.

***
McGinnis watched the bolt slam into the outer shields. The bridge rocked
violently, and injury reports flowed in from sick bay. He also noticed that
the subspace field was beginning to reform....

"Schultz, you'd better get that damned emitter, the field's coming back up! "

"I know, retargetting..."

Ticonderoga returned fire, its main ring now firing a blue bolt, at a much
higher frequency than before. Fortunately, the Borg defenses had only
partially reformed, so some of the beam's force broke through, temporarily
disabling the emitter. However, the other remaining corner had just become
active, grabbing the ship in a tractor beam.

"I'm on it," said Schultz, frantically working over his station. The computers
still didn't have an effective counter strategy for this, and there was nothing
to be done from outside. Schultz was trying to assist the computers, but the
intuition for which humans were famous throughout the galaxy was no more useful
than the massive processor power being directed at the problem. It became
clear that a landing party would have to go in to destroy the nexus powering
the tractor beam. More transvertable warheads couldn't be ready for at least
ten minutes.

"Sir, we'll have to send some people over there, we don't have any resources
that can handle the problem from here."

"Very well, get twenty of your best people, put them under Lieutenant Thompson,
and get them over there as soon as possible. ... Helm, stand by for reverse
warp, impulse isn't going to handle that beam. ... Computer, ..."

"Working," replied the female voice of Ticonderoga's computer systems.

"Disengage engineering control, send to the helm."

"Engineering controls are now at helm," replied the computer.

"Reverse warp, all available power, but remember we need those shields!"

"Reversing warp, shield power has unconditional priority," replied Thale.

The ship's mighty warp drive slammed into full reverse, and the tractor beam
was clearly strained, as power was diverted from the reconstruction process to
holding the Federation vessel. The Borg, even with nearly forty percent of
their ship blasted into space, still had more power, and were able to hold
Ticonderoga fast.

"Damn!" snapped Schultz, "with all of that damage, I thought that we'd be able
to get away."

"No luck," replied Thale.

The intercom chimed, and Lieutenant Thompson's voice came through, with
the characteristic distortion of a throat mike. "We're ready for transversion
sir, carrying plasma canon, phasers, particle weapons, and sonics."

"Good, lieutenant, remember to be consistent about whatever weapons you're
using, we don't want them to get a look at everything you've got in your first
attack."

"Got it sir."

"Stand by,"

"Engineering, engage transverter."

The transverter, unlike standard transporters, required immense amounts of
energy to send living beings from one place to another. The machine needed the
power to maintain the integrity of DNA, something that the old Rutian interter
could not. Because of the diversion, the ship began to slip against the Borg
tractor, something that Schultze responded to by preparing to engage main
weapons control again. He'd have to try to get through from outside, before
the Borg could drain all of the layers of shielding. They had already gotten
through primary shields, and were beginning to work on the auxiliaries.

"Sir, request permission to return engineering control to weapons systems, I
need the power to try a multifrequency assault with the rapid-fire weapons."

"Permission granted, you may fire when ready."

Schultz snapped several commands to the computer, and then turned to McGinnis.

"Sir, I've got to get down to weapons control, I don't have the access that I
need from here."

Schultz's only response was a jump to the turbolift and a disappearance through
its opening doors.

About thirty seconds later, Schultz's voice came through the bridge intercom.

"Sir, independent targetting and tracking hardware on line, frequency control
computers on-line, all weapons will fire varying frequencies, on different
algorithms. ... Firing now!"

The ship's rapid-fire weapons flared in a rainbow of color, launching a
devastating broadside of fire toward the tractor station, whose beam was still,
unfortunately, quite operational, and about to break through the auxiliary
shields. This would only leave the secondaries, plus any power that could be
channeled through the main deflectors (which were under repair), between them
and assimilation.

***
Meanwhile, Lieutenant Karen Thompson was moving with a team of ten
heavily-armed security personel toward what must be the equipment that powered
the tractor station. So far, they had been lucky, no Borg soldiers had seen
them. She knew, with great certainty, that this would soon change.

"Keep moving, the ship'll be trying anything to break through soon, so be
ready for both Borg attacks and possible phaser blasts from outside." Murmured
responses came back from her team.

Then, suddenly, a Borg soldier was before them.

"Fire, ... use phasers first, let the frequencies change with the internal
control chips!"

The ten fired, all beams hit, and the Borg soldier disappeared.

"Put your shields up, ... and be ready for anything."

Anything came in the form of a large number of approaching Borg soldiers.
Quickly the team began firing, and when the phasers stopped working, they were
ejected, and after a few moments time, they detonated, blasting huge chunks out
of the local super-structure.

Thompson's communicator chimed. "Thompson here," she said.

"Good job, lieutenant, we've got a four percent drop in power to the tractor,
we don't need much more, and we'll be able to get clear."

"Glad to hear it, sir. We're under increasing attack, and I'm not sure whether
we can help much more, ... without help from you."

"Do what you can, you're less than twenty meters from the central power feed
for that area. Doubtless its redundant, but if you can disrupt it for a few
moments, I am sure that we can break free, and destroy the tractor generator."

"Understood, we'll get there ... somehow. ... OK, everyone, we're not far
from where we need to be. use your particle weapons, set for either graviton
or quark acceleration."

"Set!" replied the team.

Before they could fire, though, a blast of energy ripped down the corridor from
a newly opened hole in the ceiling. Thompson glanced up, and saw the other
team break down in front of them.

"Lieutenant, we've got our weapons ready, if you fire at the left-side wall,
range twenty meters, we'll break through to the outside of the ship, and we can
destroy the tractor station with our sonic grenades," said ensign Moran from
her end of the corridor.

"Got it, ... fire in three....two...one!"

The particle weapons flared, smashing through the poorly defended inner hull,
blasting apart a small generator, causing it to explode, which blew open a hole
in the outer hull, giving them an unadulterated view of deep space. Some of
the younger team members stepped back nervously, but others quickly dove for
the outside, even before Borg reinforcements could arrive on the scene.

"Get out here!" yelled Thompson. "You'll be killed in there if you don't get
out here, and they aren't generally equipped to handle both repair and
offense/defense. We'll be safer out here."

With that, the entire team lept through, and fell into the microgravity of open
space. Their suits protected them from the vacuum, and the small
microfusion cells on their backs produced plenty of power for suit heating, as
well as half shielding and their grenade launchers.

The launchers were immediately primed and ready to send their explosive cargo
against the tractor station, which was only fifty meters away from them.
Before she could give the order to fire, Thompson's eyes were drawn toward
Ticonderoga, which sat only a few hundred kilometers away. At this distance,
the ship looked small, its hull gleaming a sickening purple-white in the glow
of the Borg tractor beam.

The other thing that caught her attention were the multicolored bolts of light
that were slamming into the Borg defenses, quite near to her location. These,
she knew, were the bolts from the rapid-fire weapons, a near miss from which
would be enough to kill any of her team members. The Borg ship, shrugged them
off as if they were nothing, something that she suspected these weapons shots
were, as far as the Borg were concerned.

She then turned to her teams, and gave the order to fire. The sonics slammed
into the Borg tractor nexus, seriously damaging it, and seriously weakening the
beam. At this exact moment, Ticonderoga let fly with a full-powered blast from
the main ring. Risky though the maneuver was, with secondary shielding now
nearly gone, and only limited main shields restored, there wasn't much
choice...

From Thompson's perspective, it appeared as if a gigantic white strobe had
flashed, totally overwhelming the filters in her helmet. The impact of the
shot was largely dissipated by the Borg subspace field, but because the charge
had ridden on a very high frequency wave, the Borg weren't fully ready for it,
and the tractor station was destroyed. The big ship had no choice but to take
advantage of this temporary weakness,and it fired every weapon it had at that
corner of the slowly reforming cube. The effect, both from McGinnis' and
Thompson's perspective, was terrific. With all of the ship's phasers at
maximum discharge, and the main ring firing again, plus the plasma torpedoes,
all directed at a very small part of the Borg ship, using a very wide range of
frequencies, nearly forty percent of the energy got through the defense. The
blast ripped the corner off of the Borg cube, and the back blast smashed all of
Thompson's people far away from their previous positions. Most were killed
instantly, by acceleration that overwhelmed their suits' inertial stabilizers.
Only Thompson and Moran survived.

"Scan for survivors, maintain firing rate!" said mcGinnis.

Data took over the job of searching for the members of the team, all of whom
had been far too close to the point of attack to have any chance of surviving.
Data's positronic net would not recognize a miracle, but he could conceptualize
beating the odds, and it appeared, that at least two team members had done so.
Before he could notify McGinnis, Schultz had cut in.

"Sir, we have more photon warheads ready, but they'll get used to this if
we do it too many times."

"I am well aware of that Mr. Schultz, transvert when ready, most optimal
pattern."

"Aye, transversion in four...three...two...one...Now!"

Again, fifteen warheads appeared throughout what remained of the Borg vessel.
These explosions cut the ship in half, and demolished the smaller of the two
halves. Schultz began to think of himself, not so much as a weapons officer,
but more as a diamond cutter. The larger section of the Borg vessel was still
functional, but it appeared to have very few weapons. It turned to get more
maneuvering room, but a well-placed antimatter spread stopped this tactic.

Now McGinnis had only thirty percent of the original cube to deal with, and
this meant that his ship would only need to destroy a bit more, and the rest of
the ship would have to shut down. Fortunately for him, this job was made easy,
by the need of the Borg to make repairs on what remained of their great vessel.
McGinnis' tactics were now straightforward.

"Tactical, I suggest to the computer that it fire a concentrated graviton bolt
at the center of the Borg ship. drain them from the forced quantum core."

"Computer's thinking on it, ... it says that we should have a sixty percent
chance of success. Negative is that we'll be without quantum power for two
hours."

"Do it!"

"Draining now, it'll be twenty seconds."

"Very well, maintain firing rate on rapid-fire weapons to keep them busy."

"Maintaining firing rate, ten seconds! ...
Five,...four...three...two...one...now!"

The main ring spat forth a bolt of heavy particles, which began collapsing in
on themselves the moment they left the great electromagnetic super-accelerator.
By the time the bolt could hit the Borg ship, it had become a
super-concentrated massive object, which drew a chunk of the Borg ship into
itself as it crashed through the space that it occupied. It passed out the
other side, its hole looking something like the wound from a rifle blast, small
on one side, larger on the other. This, in itself would not have been
enough,but the gravimetric forces that had held the bolt together, also could
blow it apart. They did so, resulting in a gigantic explosion, which drew on
all of the energies stored in the atoms that the temporary micro black hole had
dragged with it. The force of the blast was reflected against the remains of
the Borg ship by the dying subspace field, effectively destroying what remained
of the huge cube. With this, Ticonderoga collected its second victory in a
week, but one that had not come without tremendous cost.

"Sir, I have been tracking our team members' life signs, and we only have one
confirmed and one possible survivor, from the original twenty crew. They are
currently moving toward the atmosphere, they were sent in that direction by the
effects of our activity;" Said T'Mayek from her station. Like Data, she had
been tracking the two, and her direct access to scanners gave her the ability
to follow the progress of the two life signs with greater ease than Data, who
was rather occupied with keeping track of the battle and the ship's internal
monitors at his station.

"Are we in transporter range?"

"No, Sir, and their progress will put them in the upper atmosphere before
we can achieve transporter lock."

"How about tractors?"

"We are also outside tractor range, but tractor lock would be possible even
after atmospheric entry."

"Very well, maximum impulse toward the planet, stand by on tractor stations one
and four.

"Coming in, range 45,000 kilometers, 30,000 kilometers, 15,000 kilometers, we
have achieved tractor range, ..." said Thale . T'mayek's report came quickly
thereafter. "They are now in the upper stratosphere, I have limited telemetry,
but it would appear that lieutenant Thompson's suit's inertial dampening
systems are marginally functional given best possible circumstances. Ensign
Moran is the other survivor, her suit is still functioning within nominal
perameters."

"Very well, ... Computer, tractor control to science station."

"All ship's tractor systems are now at Science," announced the computer.

"Lt.Cmdr, do whatever appears best in your opinion."

"I now have Ensign Moran, she will be transportable in thirty-seven seconds."
Quietly, Data notified the transporter room to expect coordinates, he also
ordered medical personel to Transporter-1. "I am slowing Lieutenant Thompson's
fall, if anything disrupts our tractor, she will be difficult to retrieve. ...
I have a lock, but the thermal radiation from her entry is growing disruptive."

"Is there anything that would help you?"

"Unfortunately, there is little that we can do with other systems. The
Lieutenant's fall is too rapid to allow the ship to move in and try a
direct-line capture, which would require us to use the ship's inertial
decelleration to slow her descent sufficiently to allow transport. I believe
that the lock will hold, but the operation will be difficult." Silence reigned,
while the slender vulcan woman manipulated the tractor beam, and the fragile
life that it held. Data stood behind her, watdching to see if he could provide
assistance. He had learned that many life forms, even vulcans on occasion,
preferred to be left alone in tense situations as long as they weren't making
critical errors. In any case, he could see little else that could be done.

The com sounded on the Bridge, causing McGinnis and the rest of the crew
to sap around.

"Transporter-1 to Bridge, we have Ensign Moran, but we need you to shut down
her shield."

"On it," said Schultz from his station.

Accessing the telemetry was easy, and within seconds the personel in the
transporter room confirmed that the shield had dropped. McGinnis turned to
Data, and signalled him to come to the command chair.

"Yes, Sir?"

"I am going down to see what the Ensign's condition is, and to get a report if
possible. You have the Bridge, and total disgression to act as you see fit
until my return."

"Understood, sir."

McGinnis hastened off the Bridge, and took the turbo-lift to deck 4, where the
main transporter/transverter facilities were. He entered transport-1 at a run,
and saw the tall ensign lying on the deck, with medics around her. She was
conscious, and it appeared that she was none the worse for wear from her very
long fall.

"Ensign, how are you?"

"OK sir, but I don't ever want to go through that again. Watching a full-power
phaser blast strike less than two hundred meters from you is something to
remember," she said a slight shake in her voice. "How are the rest of the
members of the team?"

"Unfortunately, it appears that they were killed by the backblast of the phaser
impact. Their inertial dampeners failed to compensate for the acceleration
that they experienced. Lieutenant Thompson is barely alive, but we're having
trouble intercepting her, she's still in free fall. Data suggests that the
combination of heat and acceleration may have been too much for the power
distribution system. In any case, Lieutenant Thompson's telemetry seems to
support Mr. Data's theory, until we have more information."

"But, I was as close, or closer than the rest, why am I alive?"

"I don't know, maybe Commander MacLeod will be able to tell us, when they've
run a diagnostic on your suit. It does look a bit singed, though, that may
suggest that your computer overrode its power distribution programming, because
the stress tolerances were being challenged too severely. He'll have a better
idea ... I'm sure. For the moment, go with Dr. Patterson, I'll come by sick
bay later to ..."

The ship's violent stagger, not fully intercepted by the inertial dampers
cut him off.

"Bridge, what the hell's going on up there?!"

"Sir, we have lost tractor lock, Science Officer T'Mayek says that we can
reestablish if we close range to less than 100 kilometers, so I have ordered an
emergency atmospheric entry course. All temperature control systems are
available, and I felt that it was best to attempt a rescue," replied Data's
voice.

"Very well, take the helm yourself Mr. Data, your reflexes may be necessary,
since we're not entering on a standard descent plane. ... Lieutenant Thale, get
to the shuttle deck, and take the run-about fto assist should the main ship not
be able to reestablish tractor lock."

"Yes, Sir."

Moments later, the ship's single run-about streaked away, climbing up from the
shuttle bay.

"Thale, here I am now descending, range 50,000 meters and closing. I will be
in position in twom minutes."

"Understood, bridge out," replied Data.

By this point, McGinnis had returned to the Bridge, and was ready to retake the
center seat.

"Report, Mr. Data."

"We are descending at three kilometers per second, and are two hundred and
fourty-three kilometers above the surface. Ms. Thomspon has achieved
terminal velocity, just under 400 kilometers per hour. She is twenty
kilometers above the surface, and we will be able to reestablish tractor
lock in approximately fourty-five seconds."

"We will be able to stop her decent then?"

"Yes, Admiral," replied T'Mayek, "however, we will have to bring her velocity
down and simply land her on the surface, as we will be at great risk of
crashing into the planet without an immediate course change."

"Right..."

The ship continued to streak down, the shields, which were barely up to the
task, blasting all atmospheric particles out of the way. The trail that the
ship's passage made was so brilliant that it lit the darkened skies of the
planet well enough to allow survivors, had there been any, to see as well as
they did at high noon. A second, smaller trail intersected the larger one,
this being Thale's run-about.

"I am in position, I think that I can grab her from here, but you'll have
to cut the main tractor beam," he said.

"You don't have the power to do it!" said Schultz from his station.

"I think I can get her if I divert all of the power to the tractor."

"Very well, make the attempt,but I don't dare shut the main stations down.
We'll divert the beam, but if you fail, we will have to make the attempt." Came
McGinnis' decision.

"Locking on, ... I have a partial lock, but my own systems are too strained, I
hope that you can get her," came Thale's frustrated voice through the
com-line. McGinnis understood his frustration, he and the lieutenant were to
have been married at the end of the mission.

"Don't worry, lieutenan, she's not going to miss your wedding."

"Thank you, sir."

"Helm, range to minimum safe altitude?"

"We are twenty-three seconds from minimum safe altitude, with four seconds of
descent after that poin, before we will be certain of planet fall," said Data.

McGinnis turned to T'Mayek, "Its your show, Commander, you've got twenty
seconds before I call this off. Good luck."

Seconds passed while the Vulcan turned to her station, stabbed its controls,
with increasing speed, and finally said:

"Tractor lock established, ... Lieutenant Thale, she will be set down at the
coordinates coming on your screen now."

"Got them, and Thank you Commander."

T'Mayek, simply let the remark pass, like all vulcans, she did not understand
the need for thanks, for as she saw it, she was saving a trained officer so
that she could return to duty.

"Helm, hard over, full impulse, all power to anti gravity fields!" said
McGinnis.

"Sir, what about phase-cloaking, and then just working out of the planet while
in phase?" asked Schultz.

"That will not be possible, we can not use the phase-cloak, because the phase
barrier necessary to engage the device can not be formed in the extremely
ionized enviromnment which results from our rapid decent into the atmosphere."
said Data.

"Oh," replied Schultz.

Data began counting down the distance between the ship and a violent end.

"Our altitude is twenty-seven kilometers, ... twenty-five, ... twenty-three,
coming to flat trajectory, decending toward a large lake, it should give us an
added margin for error," he said.

The ship continued to fight its momentum, but there was a lot of intertial
energy built up, and although the dampers could deal with internal inertia,
they weren't built to compensate for the ship's inertia as a whole. At least
not when they also had to fight a planet's gravity. This job was handled by
the ship's anti-grav fields, and its tractor stations, which also served as
high-focus anti-grav generators when the ship was in atmosphere.

"Altitude is eight kilometers, we are slowing, I estimate risk of terminal
impact at less than ten percent."

"Lieutenant Thale reports that he has intercepted Thompson's suit, and that her
shield generator has just failed. He can't beam her to us, because we're
moving too fast, and there is too much ionization from our entry maneuver,"
said Commander Anders.

"Good, at least one thing is done, ... Overload power on tractors one and four,
we'll need the added gravimetric pressure."

"Aye, repulsor power at 140%." replied Anders.

The ship was now less than a kilometer above the lake, and although it was
slowing, McGinnnis had the uneasy feeling that they might hit the water, which
would be hard on the super-structure, considering their angle of impact, and
their extremely weakend shields.

"Direct all remaining shield power below us, If we're going to hit, I want the
water and the shields to help slow our descent. All decks, prepare for
collision..." McGinnis said.

The ship's collision alarms sounded, and all crew on the lower decks
immediately departed for higher ground, unless their stations could not
be left unmanned under any circumstances. All compartments were cealed,
and the ship's air circulation went onto distributed back-ups.

"Ten seconds to impact," said Data. ... "Now five ... four...
three...two...one... shields have struck the water, decellerating rapidly
now, eighty meters, seventy, ... sixty ... ... ... fifty .............. We have
stopped, forty-three meters above the surface." McGinnis sighed, realizing that
he'd been holding his breath for some time. All of the other bridge crew
members also sighed in relief.

"McGinnis to all decks, we have avoided collision, our condition is now
green."

SUPER-DREADNOUGHT Part II: Chapter X

Command Log, Stardate 56334.3: Admiral William McGinnis Commanding USS
Ticonderoga reporting:

We have now defeated two Borg ships, including a full-sized cube. However, our
losses have been heavy as well, with eighteen crewmembers lost in our last
action.Their service does the Federation honor, and I hereby recommend all for
postumous commendation. I further recommend Lieutenant Karen Thompson and
ensign Kyla Moran for commendations, their cool headed thinking was critical to
our success.

We are now on the surface of the planet, where I have directed that the crew to
take some open air, as it will be some time before we get the chance again.
Fortunately, our rough decent seems to have done little damage to the ship, all
of which we have now repaired. We have launched some probes to scan the
surface, and unfortunately, scanners have picked up a few Borg units, so on our
return to space, we will have to bombard the planet to ensure the units'
destruction.

After that, we will begin the process of finding the point toward which much
Borg communications seem to be directed. If we can destroy or disrupt this
nexus, we will have the Borg on the defensive, temporarily at least.

McGinnis sat back in his chair, considering the options. The ship was sitting
in a very deep lake, its systems largely shut down for minor system repairs.
Also, with only secondary power enabled, the ship would have a much better
chance of avoiding any Borg ship that might come through the system. Honestly,
McGinnis assumed that they would get a couple of days before another Borg
attempt would be made, and before that, Ticonderoga would be long-gone, and
much of the planet a burning cinder.

"Sir, why don't you get outside and take a break, as you said, it'll be a
while before we get the chance again," said Karen Thompson as she entered
the Bridge.

"Sounds like a good idea, Lieutenant but I need to get a bit more work done
first. Why don't you come back in an hour to relieve me, I think that you're
ready for a try at Bridge command."

"Thank you, sir!" she said, all smiles.

Of course, McGinnis had only been responding to a suggestion made by Dr.
Patterson that Thompson's morale would be helped by active duty. With this in
mind, he'd temporarily assigned her to data analysis, so that her mind would
remain busy during her convalescence.

***
As promised, Thompson returned an hour later to find McGinnis smiling at the
image captured by the main viewer. It was focused on a number of crew members
who were apparently trying to build a six-level living pyramid. So far, they
had gotten to five levels deep, but level six seemed to be a bit of a
problem...

"Here as ordered, Sir." Thompson said.

"Excellent, I'll be on the main hull, should you need me.

McGinnis hastened to an air lock, and was soon standing on the main hull,
in the shadow of one of the nuclear reactor-powered topside rapid-fire weapons.
A large picnic had been set out by the recreation director, and lots of crew
were sampling it as they took breaks from the various games taking place on the
hull and the near-by beach.

Since he was in "civies", McGinnis' presence went unnoticed for several
minutes, and even when the crew did see that he was watching them, they only
stopped long enough to invite him into the fun; an offer which he quickly
accepted.

Several hours later, as the planet's star was setting, everyone returned to the
ship, save a few that had decided to go exploring. McGinnis had quickly agreed
to the request, since they had their communicators and would therefore be able
to be in easy touch with the ship.

McGinnis had wanted to go as well, but he felt uncomfortable about leaving the
ship under the current circumstances. He returned to the bridge after one
final look at the various games and other activities occurring on and around
the ship's hull.

Within minutes of his return to the Bridge, the reason for his discomfiture
became clear.

Walter Schultz, currently in command of the bridge reported that: "Sir, I have
a message from Kalis, text only."

"Very well, read it."

"He says that they ahve suffered major casualties in their most recent action,
and that they will be going under total radio silence from here on in. He also
says that two of the Borg cubes that they fought departed in the middle of the
battle, and have set an approximate course for this system."

"Thank you, all stations, yellow alert."

The ship's lights went to yellow, and the computer made a brief
announcement concerning the change in status.

Within minutes, McGinnis was sitting in the command chair.

"Transporter control, notify the campers that they'll have to come back
immediately, and then beam them up. We have about an hour before the
Borg arrive, and I don't intend to waste the time."

"Aye Sir, sending notification now."

"Engineering, we need to make sure that the remaining Borg are quite dead
before we leave. I'd also like to give the Borg a mystery as to who was
responsible for the destruction. I think that they're aware of this ship
now, but the bigger the mystery the better. Of course, we'll need all the
power that we can get to get out of here, so if you've got any ideas that fit
all of that, please suggest them."

"I haven't any ideas," replied MacLeod's concerned voice over the com.

"Sir, I suggest that we just use rapid-fire weapons, knock the Borg out, and
then drop a few torpedoes into the star, near the outer edge. We could
generate a solar flare that would do extreme damage to the planet's atmosphere,
and ionize this area, making it hard to find us," suggested Schultz from his
station.

"Science officer?"

"Sir, the plan would work, but it will take too long to implement."

"What if we set a number of torpedoes in this lake, in a pattern that would
bring the waters to fusion point through pressure?" suggested Thale.

"There is a forty-six percent probability that we would not be successful,"
said Data.

"Very well, we'll just have to use the ring and then get the hell out of here,
we don't have time for magic," said McGinnis, the frustration clear in his
voice.

"Helm, set course for orbital insertion, maximum possible speed."

The ship shot out of the water, rising with improbable speed toward space. Its
arrival trail had been bright enough to see by, its departure trail was
outright blinding. Within two minutes, the ship sat in orbit its main ring at
full charge.

Within seconds huge scars opened across the planet as the few remaining Borg
soldiers were struck by power sufficient to destroy entire cities.

Within a minute the ship's work was done, and the phase-cloak was operational.
The ship broke orbit, and accelerated away, its mighty warp engines flaring at
full power.

"Let's clear the system, set course for the indicated coordinates, warp 9.7,
and any faster if the engines'll give it to us."

"Warp is now 9.7, our course is 334 mark 17."

"Mr. Data, report on ship's status?"

"Main energizers at maximum output, quantum core at 100 percent power,
secondary systems are providing ship's internal power, except the
phase-cloak and sensors," said Data.

"Sir, I am now attempting to increase speed further, subspace distortions
noted in the system." said Thale.

"Understood, the phase-cloak should provide protection too, but there's no
defense like being out of sensor range," McGinnis replied. "Push the core
beyond its maximum standard ratings if you need to, the further we're away the
better."

"Sir, we are accelerating, velocity is now warp 9.73 ... 9.75 ... warp 9.78 ...
9.80 ... We are now at warp 9.817 and holding."

"Very well, keep it here, we're rated for warp 9.975, but that'd require
shutting the phase-cloak off, and I think that would be rather bad at the
moment," said McGinnis the sarcasm dripping from every word.

"Agreed, Sir!"

Ticonderoga ran from one possible confrontation, and toward another that
would certainly be far greater than any that they had faced so far.

*****************************

SUPER-DREADNOUGHT: Part III: Chapter XI

Command Log: Stardate 56463.4: William McGinnis, Commanding USS
Ticonderoga recording:

We have been at high warp for nearly four and a half weeks, and are now coming
into the area that we believe contains some kind of Borg command nexus. This
ship has travelled far beyond any other vessels in Federation history, and
although our trip, fortunately, has been uneventful, I wish that there had been
opportunity to inspect the systems through which we have passed. The Borg have
laid waste to this area of the galaxy, and it appears that some of their work
occurred thousands of years ago. A broad diversity of technology has been
apparent, just from the wrecks and other materiel spread along our path.

We have not stopped to carefully investigate any of the wrecks or destroyed
planets along our path for two reasons. First, I believe that we have enough
information on Borg methods of assimilation from Picard's contacts to serve us
under our current mission perameters. Therefore, I have chosen to avoid study.
The other reason is far more prosaic.

I am not certain that we could continue our mission if we studies too many
destroyed planets and wrecked ships. Some, according to our scanners have had
far higher technology than is currently available to the Federation and its
allies. If this information became generally available to the crew, I don't
know that our morale could stand this reality. Therefore, I have chosen to
keep my personal evaluation of our current chances of success to myself. If it
were to be known, I believe that our mission would be certain to fail.

The fact is, that I am now not certain that we will be able to significant
damage to the Borg, even if we use some of the tactics which Kalis and I
discussed before this ship's departure from the fleet. I will investigate the
systems in the area, and at our planned rendezvous, Kalis and I will have to
decide what to do. Hopefully I can find something that will allow us to do
enough to slow the Borg down.

McGinnis finished the recording, and left his quarters. It was about half an
hour before they expected to decellerate to sub-warp, and he wanted to see
what, if anything, the long-range scanners, limited though they were while
under phase-cloak, had found.

"Admiral on the Bridge," said Data, as he released the command chair.

"At ease," McGinnis said, while looking around the room. All the senior staff
was there, including Robert MacLeod, who had replaced Janet Anders at Ops.

"Robert, where's Ms. Anders?"

"She suffered injuries in simulation on the holodeck, the Doctor wanted her to
stay in sickbay for awhile for observation. Since I was planning to be here
for the actual decelleration, I offered to take her station."

"Very well, why was I not notified?"

"Because your com badge wasn't functioning, and optical links are temporarily
down for some reconfiguration. They'll be up in about a minute."

"My com badge wasn't working? ..." McGinnis looked down to see that the small
machine wasn't attached to his uniform jacket.

"I see...." he said, and then retrieved the spare unit from his chair's
emergency storage compartment.

"McGinnis to Sick bay."

"Sick bay, Sharfelter, sir."

"Lieutenant, Ms Anders' condition?"

"She has suffered a minor concussion, which Dr. Patterson has treated, but the
Doctor wanted her to remain here for observation."

"Understood, have her file a report as soon as possible."

"Yes, Sir, I expect that she'll be sending it any moment."

"Thank you, lieutenant. McGinnis out."

"Helm, what's our status?"

"Sir, we are at warp 9.65, all systems are functioning nominally, and we are
twenty-four minutes from decelleration."

"Ops, Science, what do you see?" MacLeod studied the pannel for a moment, and
then turned to give his report.

"Indications of massive gravitational wells all throughout the area in front of
us, possibly characteristic of star systems. However, the ambient light from
the sector is somewhat less than it should be, assuming the standard
distribution of star types. Our sensors are unable to distinguish whether
there are gaps, mainly because no Federation probes or long-range mapping
programs have cataloged this area of space with sufficient detail."

"Very well, science?"

"Sir, we appear to be entering a large area of space which has had a very
high level of technology for many thousands of years. As we have closed in on
this region, the technology of the destroyed civilizations has had a slight,
but noticeable upward trend. Obviously, like the system in which we first made
contact with the Borg, there are significant exceptions to this. It may be
that we will find that there are dyson's spheres, or other system-wide
modifications that will explain the unusual distribution of gravitational
anomolies. This area may also have a large number of small dark stars, as yet
we are too distant to come to any acceptable conclusions." said T'Mayek.

"I understand, continue analysis, and report as soon as possible."

"Ops, any sign of Borg activity in the surrounding space?"

"Yes, Sir, there is a great deal of Borg traffic on long-range scanners, headed
toward what appears to be a possible type G or H system. I count at least
twenty vessels in the area."

"Great, this isn't going to be easy, but at least we've got a good candidate
for their homeworld."

"Yes sir, that would be a legitimate expectation from the available data," Data
agreed. "I am interested, though, to see whether we can get any information on
the planet itself."

"I agree, but first I want to solve the mystery of the gravitational anomolies,
they are unusual and may prove useful."

"Sir, there is a particularly powerful anomoly three degrees to starboard of
our current course, about a light-year from the system temporarily designated
as the Borg home system," said T'mayek studying her pannel.

"Very well, ... Helm, decellerate to warp 8.5 and change course as
appropriate."

"Changing course to 043 mark 351," said Thale, "Decellerating to warp 8.5."

The ship moved toward its first assignment in this area of space, the
study of a gravitational anomoly of unusual power.

"Sir, now one minute from visual, scanners have not been able to collect
increased data due to phase-cloak interference," said T'Mayek.

"What have they told us?"

"The area of space affected is extremely large, and our sensors have not been
able to penetrate the anomolous area, which is at least 500 million kilometers
in diameter. Indications of a massive gravitational object in the center of
the anomoly, but it is impossible to tell what might be responsible for these
readings."

"Understood, helm, decellerate to warp 7.5, and bring us into an orbital spiral
course that will put us at the surface of the object in fifteen minutes."

"Decellerating to warp 7.5, plotting course and laying in."

"Mr. Thale, you may proceed."

Twenty seconds later, T'mayek turned to the Admiral.

"We are now within visual range."

"Very well, ops, image on main viewer."

The viewscreen flipped from its characteristic tactical simulation of the
surrounding space into a picture of ... darkness.

"Enhance image," said McGinnis.

"Enhancement is already in progress," said T'mayek.

Slowly the darkness resolved into the image of a huge silver sphere, more
than 600 million kilometers across.

"Sir, as you can see, this is a dyson's sphere, what limited sensory
information I can collect suggests that it is made of carbon neutronium,
which is at least two kilometers thick. Neutronium of this thickness
would be sufficient to provide local gravity nearly equal to that of Sol
at its surface. I have extremely faint indications of a mass several
thousand times that of Sol inside the sphere, at its approximate center.

No indications of currently-active technology.

"Well, I suggest that we knock and see if they'll let us in," said Walter
Schultz from his station. "I don't think that we can beat the Borg alone,
maybe this civilization will help us."

"It depends on their attitude about laws similar to the Prime Directive,"
said Data.

"True, but if we don't ask them, they can't turn us down, and I can't believe
that the Borg haven't tried to assimilate them at some point, unless they were
so far ahead of the Borg in the first place that the Borg have never felt their
ability to assimilate this civilization to be sufficiently "relevant,"" replied
Schultz.

"In either case, I agree with you, Mr. Schultz, we've come here to deal with
the Borg threat, and without help, as you say, it will be difficult to handle
the Borg alone," said McGinnis, effectively ending the debate, which was one of
many that occurred recently between these officers.

"Ops, give me a full-power broadcast, all frequencies."

"You're on."

"Unidentified civilization, this is William McGinnis, in command of the
United Federation of Planets Starship Ticonderoga. We come in peace, and
hope to begin a long and fruitful relationship with your peoples. ... We
await your response."

The ship continued its slow decent, while all of the crew awaited something ...
anything ... from the great object below. Finally, a response, of a sort,
came.

"I have a brief message, running through universal translator..."

Time passed, and finally MacLeod looked up, a frown on his face.

"I have it, but its rather odd."

"Yes?"

"It just says, "If you can enter, we shall see..."

"Interesting," said T'Mayek.

"I agree," said Data.

"Very well, they've given us a challenge, can we traverse that in phase?"

"I believe, with added power to the phase-cloak, that we can pass through
without extreme risk. However, there is risk, as the quantum instability
caused by the neutronium is extremely severe, and if we lose the phase, we
shall not be able to escape immediate entrapment," said Data.

"Science officer?"

"The Captain's analysis is correct, I estimate risk of entrapment at
twenty-three percent.

"Very well, prepare the ship for event transition, we will proceed in half an
hour."

Part III: SUPER-DREADNOUGHT: Chapter 12:

Command Log: Stardate 56464.3: Admiral William McGinnis, Commanding Star
Ship Ticonderoga reporting:

We are preparing to transit the outer shell of the Dyson's sphere before us.
Carbon neutronium is so dense that it causes serious problems, even for a
phased object such as this vessel.We will therefore be operating at
emergency condition 5, with all non-essential systems shut off, and emergency
power at maximum. Our only recourse, should we encounter extreme difficulty,
is to overload the phase-cloak, which will likely throw us into an alternate
dimention. This is a prospect that I do not relish, but we must attempt entry
to this sphere, as intelligent life is quite likely to be within. Considering
the technology necessary to construct a sphere, I believe that they may be able
to help us defeat the Borg, or at least slow them down. From the long-range
scans that we took of the traffic entering and leaving their home system, I am
quite convinced that we will be defeated without outside assisance. Of course,
the final decision to attack or retreat lies with Kalis, so it is still
possible, though not likely, that we will attack no matter the odds. For
now, all we can do is investigate this sphere, and hope that it holds answers
to the problems posed by the Borg. If not, we may have to use our ultimate
weapon, a weapon whose use will probably result in the assimilation of every
member of this ship's crew.

"Helm, set course for the center of the sphere, ahead full impulse."

"Course laid in, velocity is .8 C."

The ship moved straight toward the great silver sphere lying directly in its
path. The plan, as they had ultimately made it, was that if the ship faced
overly severe quantum distortions, sufficient power would be allocated to the
phase-cloaking device to overcome the distortions, even if this meant phasing
out of real space, and into interdimentional subspace. if this happened, it
would be almost impossible to get home. Considering that McGinnis had already
gone through dimentional transit once in his life, he truly hoped that the ship
would not have to perform this desperation maneuver.

"We are now 20 million kilometers from the sphere, one minute twenty
seconds to contact," said Thale.

"Engineering, are all systems ready for emergency power allocation?"

"Yes Sir," said MacLeod who had returned to his regular station after Janet
Anders' release from sick bay.

"Now one minute to contact," said Thale.

"Tactical, keep your eyes out, I don't know what we'll find in there, although
certainly I don't want you doing anything that would be considered threatening,
as their weapons technology is unquestionably better than ours."

"Aye Sir, I have switched tactical sensors to science, with repeating signal to
this station."

"Very well, ... Science, give me all the information that you can about the
civilization as soon as its available. Mr. Data, you watch the sensors for
reports of difficulty, if you see *anything* report it, and act immediately if
there isn't time."

"Understood Sir."

"Now twenty-five seconds to contact," said Thale.

The ship continued straight toward the surface of the object, which now
appeared flat as their altitude continued its rapid decrease.

"Ten...nine...eight...seven...six...five...four...three...two...one...Contact!"

The ship bucked so violently that everyone except Data was thrown to the floor.
The emergency lighting came on, and its redness was made even more haunting by
the fog that had apparently appeared, quite literally out of nowhere. McGinnis
struggled back to his seat, now reminded why he didn't want restraining
harnesses put on the command chair. It would only slow him down when he needed
to look at his subordinates, and impacts like that would only result in
whiplash wthat would require a doctor's attention. ... He hated doctors.

The rest of the staff was also returning to their stations, or to
consciousness, depending on their constitutions.

"Mr. Schultz, take the helm!" snapped mcGinnis seeing that Thale was out cold
on the floor.

"Controlls switched," replied Schultz.

"Mr. Data, our status?"

"We have decellerated to only a few kilometers per hour, and will require
thirty-two minutes to traverse at this level of forward thrust. The quantum
gravimetric forces are nearly too strong for the impulse drive to handle, and
the density of the neutronium is preventing our passage as well."

"Are we in danger of entrapment?"

"There is a fifty-four percent probability of entrapment, if current conditions
hold."

"Engineering, emergency power to phase-cloaking device."

"Sir, we risk dimentional transit if we keep that kind of power up for too
long," said Data.

"I am well-aware of the possible consequences, but being alive in someone
else's dimention is far better than dying in here."

"Engineering here, sir....I recommend against the emergency power, the device
is already strained enough as it is."

"I understand your concerns, Mr. MacLeod, but we have no choice."

"Understood. Emergency power is now available."

The ship seemed to stagger again, its velocity improved *very*slightly, but
there was still a noticeable down-trend to their rate of forward movement.

"Sir, our risk of entrapment is now forty-seven percent."

"That's still too high!" said Schultz, and I think that there's an anomoly in
front of us that is denser than average."

"Understood, Engineering, engage warp drive, emergency acceleration."

"Sir! that'll likely cause the nacelle pylons to collapse or bend, and if
it doesn't, we'll be thrown out in an uncontrolled acceleration, and I wouldn't
want to hit the other side at high warp!"

McGinnis thought about this. The impact at high impulse had been nearly enough
to kill some crew, and an impact at warp would likely destroy the ship.
However, being trapped in the sphere's shell was clearly worse.

"Engineering, I don't see that we have much choice, keep an eye on those
support pylons, and channel emergency power to their support fields if you
think that will help."

"Aye ....... sir," said Macleod, clearly very unhappy at having to carry out
the order.

"Mr. Data, watch our forward progress, if we break free too suddenly, you
will have to reverse warp immediately, I doubt that there will be time to
order you to do so."

"Understood sir." was the android's unemotional response.

"Our power is now set for warp four travel," said Schultz. "We have
accelerated to to 108 kilometers per hour. AT this velocity, the forward
sections will pass through the inner surface in ... twenty-seven seconds."

"Good, continue monitoring, if we need more power then put it where you need
to, but remember that as soon as the center line of the saucer, and the center
of the quantum core have passed through the surface, that our acceleration will
be rapid, as the ship will present very little added forward surface."

"I've got it sir, we will hit center line in thirty seconds, quantum core
center three seconds after that. I'll begin cutting power immediately after
that.

At this moment a medical team raced onto the Bridge, grabbed Thale, and
hastened back into the turbolift.

"What's the prognosis?"

"He's got serious injuries to various central nervous system sectors, I'll
report as soon as we know more, but there are a lot of serious injuries," said
the young blonde medic leading the team.

"Very well..." McGinnis said, his acknowledgement cut off by the silent closing
of the turbolift doors.

"Now ten seconds to contact with inner surface." McGinnis quickly hit the
all-call on his chair.

"All decks, all departments, we are about fifteen seconds from breaking free of
the worst of the quantum interference from the sphere's shell. Be ready to
brace yourselves, I expect that breaking free of the effects may have results
similar to those that we suffered on contact some minutes ago."

"Sir, warp pylons are under terrible stress, there is some bending in both port
and starbord nacelle/main hull conectors." said Janet Anders from her station.

"Understood, divert more power if you can, we'll be able to shut down in about
a minute."

"Emergency power to support fields, but they're about to shut down too."

"Forward sections of main ring are in the clear!" said Schultz.

"Continue forward movement, ... enngineering, report on system stress?"

"We are at warp 4 power, main and auxiliary power systems are on-line, phase
cloak is functioning well. Warp pylons are all bending, and before we actually
drive into warp space, we'll have to reallign the pylons ourselves, it'll take
about three or four days. Power transfer systems are under stress, and will
have to be recalibrated, structural support field generators are beginning to
fail, we'll have to replace them before we try any heavy maneuvering, but
miraculously ..." and the channel closed.

"Sir! warp pylons are cukling, we'll have to shut down immediately," Anders
yelled.

"no, we're not passed center-line, we must clear that before the impulse
engines can do the rest."

"We'll lose the warp engines in a few seconds!," said Anders.

"Continue forward power!"

"Sir, we are twenty meters to center-line, ... ten ... clear! ... accelerating
rapidly, ... clear quantum core! ... engineering hull slipping free!" reported
Schultx.

"Shut down warp power. all systems to standby."

"Warp drive shut down, impulse reversed for momentum balancing, all other
systems on standby."

"Well..... We made it," said Anders.

"Yes, Science, First officer, scan around and tell me what you can find out."
Engineering, report on damage."

"Sir, damage to warp drive is severe, repairs will take at least a week.

Main power is not available, secondary power is fully available, the quantum
core will require a bit of adjustment before it can provide energy. Structural
support fields are in bad shape, they will require a week's calibration and
generator replacement. I would say that we'll be able to leave in ten days
time."

"Understood," said McGinnis. It was worse than he had expected, and would make
it impossible to get to the rendezvous with the fleet, assuming that damage on
the way out was similar. Hopefully they would be able to find an easier way
out of the sphere.

"All stations, report."

"Sir, I have life forms everywhere, and massive power generation, and a great
deal of conversion of stellar energy as well. I would estimate that the power
generated in this sphere is equal to the entire output of the Federation on a
yearly basis. There is no vessel traffic, although a large number of habitats
exist throughout the structure. The star at its center is a type H-8 star, two
class D asteroids and a class L planet are still in orbit around the star. The
habitats are marginally class-M, with a lower oxygen pressure than most
humaniform life is used to. The race appears to be humanoid, possibly more
closely related to the rigellians or Bajorans than to terran or vulcan
humaniform life," said T'mayek.

"I concur with those readings, and would add that it appears that one of the
habitats is the center of a particularly high level of subspace activity, and
may be a good place to our attempts at communication." said Data.

"Ship's systems are back on line, except for warp drive, engineering structural
support fields, and some main-hull support fields as well. Quantum core is
only rated at 10% power, estimated repair time is about a day," came Janet
Anders' report.

"Sir, weapons and defenses are available, but I suspect that they would do us
little good in here, considering the technology of the inhabitants," said
Schultz.

"Thank you, ... Ms. Anders, send a text message, ... "We were able to come in,
request face-to-face discussion, and subspace communication."

"Sent, Sir."

A number of minutes passed while the ship continued about the business of
inspecting the inside of the technological marvel whose shell it had just
passed through. Finally, Anders' head snapped up, and she reported that a
visual signal was coming through.

"Put it on screen," McGinnis said, while readying himself for contact with the
only race that might be able to help the Federation and its allies in their
desperate attempt to find an acceptable solution to the threat posed by the
Borg.

SUPER-DREADNOUGHT: Part III: Chapter 13:

"Interstellar travellers, welcome to our home. I am L'aek, leader of the
Myria. We did not expect that you would survive the transit."

"L'aek, I am Admiral William McGinnis, I command the United Federation of
Planets Star Ship Ticonderoga. I am here, on behalf of the Federation, and its
allies, to ask your assistance in our struggle for survival against the Borg."

"Admiral, I am very pleased to finally speak with a representative of a
civilization living and growing outside this sphere. In the nearly
twenty-thousand cycles that our home has existed, we have had only three
contacts. Two of them were with civilizations like yours that were trying to
defend themselves against those that you call The Borg. The other... should be
obvious, considerng our location in space. We have the technology to rid the
Galaxy of this menace, but most of the races in it, as you know, can not
coexist peacefully, or if they do so, they are unwilling to defend themselves
when the time for defense comes. We have remained in this shell for so long,
because we, too, fear the usurpers, the collectors, or as you call them, The
Borg. Our defenses are only sufficient if they always remain closed, because,
once opened, it takes nearly a full day, in your time, to reassert them.
However, working together, I believe that we can bring them down."

"I certainly hope so, nearly half of our allied strength has gone into the
current offensive, and we have destroyed no more than seven or eight of their
large vessels. As you know, their fleet must number hundreds of them. There
aren't many weapons left, and this ship carries two of them. Weapons that will
be useless if we do not leave this sphere."

"I understand your concerns, your fleet is already on our long-range scans, in
action against a Borg cube as we speak. The battle does not go well for them."

This news brought all of the crew to full attention. Their friends and allies
were fighting against an implacable enemy, and there was absolutely nothing
that they could do. Their reactions to this news varied from Data's implacable
calmness to Schultz' fist landing with a solid crack on the navigation console.
McGinnis signalled Anders to damp the audio.

"People, our mission is to get help from the people here, and we can do nothing
to help those on the outside. Kalis is an excellent commander, and the ships
that we have in the fray are all commanded by the best that the allies have to
offer. For now, our job is to open relations with these people, because we
can't perform this job on our own, and we now know that there is no way that
the Federation can survive an all-out Borg assault. Therefore, I want you to
keep tight control over yourselves, these hours will be extremely important to
whether we go home to a Federation that is whole and secure, or fragmented and
under threat of immediate absorption."

McGinnis waved to Anders who reinstated the audio pick-up.

"I appologize for the delay, we have been under enormous stress lately, and I
believe that my crew is exhausted."

"Admiral, you have been in deep space for nearly four of your months, and
have been at a nearly continuous state of military alert. It is amazing that
you and your crew have done as well as you have, considering your numerous
disadvantages."

"Yes, we have had to fight under difficult circumstances, but my crew and I
have been together for a long time, and we've learnt to work together well.
For this mission, I would have had no others in my command staff."

"High praise Admiral, we would like to send a small party to your ship to
learn more about your Federation and discuss how we can help each other survive
the Borg menace for a little while longer."

"We would be glad to have you, do you wish to come aboard via your own methods
of transport, or shall we beam your party aboard?"

"We shall use our own methods of transport, I am not certain that your regular
transporters would be able to handle the subspace activity in this environment.
I will come aboard with four assistants, if you can send us the coordinates of
your transport center?"

"They are coming through now," McGinnis said, waiting for confirmation that the
data had been sent.

"We have the coordinates, Admiral I look forward to meeting with your people
soon."

McGinnis rose, pointing to Data and Kyla Moran.

"You two are with me, Mr. Schultz, you have the Bridge."

"Aye, Sir." said Schultz, while moving to the command chair.

It did not occur to McGinnis to wonder how the Myria had known how long they
had been on their current mission until after he had entered the turbo-lift.
He made a mental note to find out how this had happened. The three officers
left The Bridge, and were whisked to transport-1. As they arrived, a quiet
crackling noise filled the roomk, and then what appeared to be a door opened
and five humanoids stepped through.

"L'aek, I am Admiral McGinnis, in command of USS Ticonderoga. I welcome you
aboard our ship. These are some of my command Staff, First Officer Data, and
Lieutenant junior-grade Kyla Moran, temporary first-shift tactical officer."

"Admiral McGinnis, we are pleased to meet you and your officers as well. Our
contact with the outside universe has, for so long, been limited to sensor
sweeps, and the occasional attempted assault by The Borg. These are my
assistants, M'laer, historian, Draen, technical specialist, and Plaik and
R'laev, civilian observers."

At this point, McGinnis began to move toward a small conference room
located at the side of the main transport deck.

"I suggest that we speak in this room, we can tell you about our culture, and
we can learn of yours."

McGinnis correctly interpreted L'aek's simple hand motion as agreement with the
suggestion.

"With reference to your point about being isolated, I am sure that most
Federation member worlds would find it difficult to live without the
benefits that our interstellar trade have conferred upon us. Of course,
if we hadn't moved out so quickly, we might not have encountered "Q" and
the Borg as early as we have."

"Your civilization, too, has encountered the beings in the "Q" continuum? I am
not surprised that they might have become interested in a group of peoples so
curious about the universe around them as your peoples obviously are. ... We
have always managed to avoid problems with them, as they feel that our enforced
isolationism and lack of explorative tendencies do not threaten them."

"Unfortunately for the Federation, we were brought into contact with the Borg
by a member of the "Q" continuum. Obviously, as soon as The Borg knew of our
existence, they launched an attack. We had a year to prepare, while their ship
travelled from the point fof first contact, toward Sol-3, our capital and an
important social, cultural, and economic center. That first attack nearly
destroyed Earth, and had it not been for Mr. Data's creative application of a
suggestion made by one of our captains who had been partially assimilated, I
suspect that Earth, and possibly the rest of the Federation would have been
lost. Their attacks have grown in strength, and I can not honestly say that we
will be able to withstand many more of them, if they aren't stopped. This is
why our fleet, and this ship, have been sent to Borg territory."

"Certainly you do not hope to destroy them alone?"

"Of course not, but we did hope to throw the collective off balance by striking
deep into their territory, and possibly to use some of our specialized weapons
to slow the Borg's activity down to a certain degree. Beyond this, I do not
believe that we can do more without added help. Your presence here was not
suspected by us, and is a stroke of great luck, should you be able and willing
to help us."

"I would like to do nothing more than help you, although we are still safe from
their assaults, the fact that civilizations have developed the ability to pass
through the matter of our home means that the Borg will likely assimilate that
technology as well. If they can break in to this sphere, we will be in serious
danger, because our offensive weapons are few, and those that we do have would
do great damage to this environment as well."

"Could one of them be mounted on a platform such as this vessel, or a construct
of your own?" asked Data, entering the conversation for the first time.

"This ship, although a miracle of technology by your standards, does not
produce energy sufficient to power any of our offensive weapons, and as I have
said, we could not send out a mission, simply because it would take too long
for our own defenses to reassert themselves, and such a mission would not have
a high enough probability of success to risk the assimilation of our
technology. It would make life for civilizations like yours even shorter than
it already may be."

"Well, we have a few things that we can still try. However, their use will
require the capture of this ship."

"What?", cried Kyla Moran. "Sir, I thought that we had orders to self-destruct
before that happened."

"Ms. Moran, all other ships do have those orders, but this ship's final mission
orders are slightly different. More than that I can not say."

"I see...."

"Admiral, you have the ability to destroy the Borg?"

"No, more render them rather busier with another problem."

"If they were rendered "occupied," for some time, we could possibly launch
enough of our special mobile constructs to ensure that they would not threaten
you for some time. By that point, your civilization may be ready for direct
technology transfer with ours, but for now, we can only help you in small
ways."

"What we need, to be honest, is an easier way out of here, than the way that
we entered. If you can help us repair our damage, using appropriate technology
of course, I'm sure that the engineers would be able to use the help."

"Admiral, that much we can do for you, if you will put me in contact with
your engineers, I will have technicians come over and help with your repairs.
The device that you used to enter can be modified to allow you to pass through
with much less difficulty. When you came through the first time, you passed
through one of our external data transfer mechanisms, and we were able to find
out much about your civilization. ... Before you become concerned, we only
read those files that weren't protected with various encription schemes. This,
primarily, is why we have chosen to speak with you and help you in your
mission. However, I know that your passage through the node nearly destroyed
your ship, and so I will provide you with an easier exit route as well."

"Thank you, any assistance that you give us will be appreciated."

"Very well, Admiral, let us get to the business of repairing your ship."

SUPER-DREADNOUGHT: Part III: Chapter XIV:

Command Log, Stardate 56488.6: Admiral William McGinnis Commanding USS
Ticonderoga reporting:

We have successfully completed repairs, and are now preparing to transit the
the shell of the Myriac sphere. These people have been greatly helpful to us,
and have been able to supply us with many replacements for our depleted stores.
As we had many full sections of superstructure to replace, I am glad that they
felt that they could replace our seriously depleted supplies of duranium and
tritanium. The ship is now at 100% operational capacity, and with the slight
modifications to the phase-cloak, and the new pathway that we have for
departure, I believe that we should have no problem in returning to the
outside. The fleet has suffered terribly, and there are barely thirty ships
now remaining, less than a fifth of what we started with. Kalis appears to be
alive, as the Myria have shown me their sensor reports which show the list of
vessels remaining. I am glad to see that the Federation ships have done well,
and now comprise a larger percentage of the remaining ships than when we
started out so many weeks ago. It is now time to see whether the very risky
plan that L'aek and I have come up with will work. If it does, the Federation
and Myria will receive a lengthy respite from Borg activity. If not, all of us
will likely become members of that unimind, and its technical prowess will
probably make it the greatest power in the galactic neighborhood, if not in the
universe.

McGinnis turned the log recorder off, and rose to walk the short distance to
the Bridge. Like all of the other members of the crew, he wore his armor in
its default mode, for he knew that there would be very little time for such
things on the other side. There was barely enough time to get to the planned
rendezvous as it was, and since Ticonderoga was to lead the assault, its people
would have little time to prepare.

With this thought, he left the small ready room, and entered the bridge,
quickly stepping to the Command chair.

"Helm, set course for rendezvous, full impulse until we get out of the shell,
then warp 9.5."

"Aye Sir, course laid in, proceeding at full impulse," said Moran, who now sat
at helm, which had allowed Schultz to move back to tactical.

The ship shuddered slightly on its intersection with the sphere's shell, and
then continued on unscathed to the other side. As soon as they had passed
through to outside space, everyone let out a great sigh of relief.

"We're through, now accelerating to warp 9.5, bringing phase-cloak back to
standard operational settings," Kyla said with a slight sigh of relief.

"Very well, time to rendezvous point?"

"We're about four minutes from the point, I have no indication that they're
there, we're still too far away to pick up the marker."

"Well, just keep scanning, they'll come up sooner or later..."

Of course, McGinnis was not certain of this, with phase-cloaking technology, it
was practically impossible for them to pick up anything until they were
practically right on top of it. Kalis had promised to wait one light year
outside any system that appeared to be the Borg home, but this still meant that
there would be a lot of space to search. They had agreed to mark the location
of the fleet with a powered-down probe, but this meant that the ship would be
looking for an object with almost no radiation emissions, ... As James T. Kirk
had said in a similar situation, looking for a needle in a haystack would be
child's play by comparison. The only hope was that Kalis had stopped along the
course that he had said that he would take into Borg territory. This point,
for the moment, was what McGinnis had designated the likeliest rendezvous
point.

"Now two minutes out, no sign as yet."

"Continue approach, something will come up, or we'll wait until star date
56490.0, and then we will travel a stacked spiral search course, maximum
possible velocity."

"That'll take a while to plot, sir."

"Exactly, lieutenant Moran, that's why I'm telling you about it now."

"Aye, sir...." she said, a frown crossing her features.

The ship came out of warp and just sat, waiting for Kalis' marker to appear.

Command Log: Stardate 56489.95: William McGinnis Comanding Starship Ticonderoga
Recording.

Kalis' time is nearly up, and I am growing concerned. The Myria told us that
the fleet was less than five light years out when we left their sphere, and yet
we can not find the buoy. To say the least, I am concerned. We can not go
active to ask the Myria, as this would give away our position to the Borg,
which have a large number of vessels in the area. If we don't find anything
soon, we will have to begin searching for them elsewhere. I hope......"

At this moment, a crash resounded throughout the ship, and the automatic
defense systems came on-line.

"What happened?"

"Sir, we've found the fleet, they launched the buoy, and it struck the hull.
No serious damage, just a lot of noise." said Schultz, still consulting his
board.

"Very well, Ops, send a message to Kalis, lowest possible power ... we are
here, awaiting news and discussion."

"Sent, Sir."

The response was immediate.

"Sir, text message, he says that he's glad that we made it, and wants to know
what we've found."

"Send him a request for visual communication, talk between ships frequencies
and power only."

"Understood, .... sending." replied Anders, bending over her station.

The viewer came on with the image of Kalis, sitting in his command bridge.

"Admiral, I am glad to see that you are still alive. We have lost most of the
fleet, and have destroyed only nine cubes. I believe that even dying in honor
will do little to dchange the balance of the military situation."

"I agree, and this is why I am glad to bring you the following news. We have
met a people called the Myria, who live in a dyson's sphere very near here.
They have been held captive in their sphere for the last fifteen or twenty
thousand Earth years due to the activities of the Borg. They have the
technology to stop them, but because their sphere is very difficult to open,
they have been unable to strike against the Borg for fear of leaving their home
practically undefended. They say that if we can divert the Borg for about one
solar day, that they can launch a fleet that will destroy the Borg home fleet
and if necessary their home system. This should give us many years of
breathing time before the Borg can recollect their strength."

"Very good, although these people are apparently quite weak, with none of the
warriior's strength,their help is exactly what we need. However, we haven't
enough ships to keep the Borg occupied for a day."

"No, we don't, but this ship carries a couple of surprises that I haven't
been able to discuss with you for fear of having knowledge of them fall into
Borg hands if you or other commanders were assimilated." Kalis' visage darkened
markedly.

"What surprises?"

"I can't be open with you, even now. Let's just say that we are going to try
another method of occupying the Borg, one that won't involve much fighting.
However, we need to stage a battle to get our weapons into a position where the
Borg will try to get them. You must know that this will require the capture of
this vessel, at least temporarily."

"What?!?"

"I repeat, this ship must be captured for our weapons to become effective. I
do not believe that we will have much trouble recapturing it from them after
they've attempted assimilation."

"Admiral, I am supreme commander of this fleet, I order you to tell me what you
are going to do."

"I refuse to accept the order, and will attempt this mission on my own if
necessary. Suffice it to say that I believe in our final weapons, and that is
all I am allowed to divulge. If you have any better ideas?"

"Unfortunately, I have nothing more to contribute, and fighting with a chance
to win is always better than fighting in a burning house." "Good, What I want
to do is to move into the home system decloak and do some collateral damage to
their home planet, and then go from there. If you feel that the fleet can do
some damage to their computing centers and communications, I would appreciate
the help. If not, just hang back and then wait. If our weapons work, you'll
know."

"How shall we know."

"Just say that the Borg will be much less active than normal, should we be
successful."

"I understand, You hope to affect their computing control in some way?"

"Yes,"

"Then I shall not ask you for further information, we all risk capture by
these honorless beings, and the less that they can learn from any of us the
better."

"True, that's why even the bridge crew on this ship doesn't know anything, a
situation that they will tell you isn't normal for my command style."

"I see... As you humans say, good hunting, Kalis out."

"Ticonderoga out."

McGinnis turned to Schultz at his tactical station.

" In twenty minutes, I want full shields, ... Helm, set course for the
Borg homeworld, maximum warp, bring us out in orbit, I'm not concerned about
in-system damage."

Moran's shocked look told McGinnis that she didn't like this at all, even
the Borg didn't deserve the massive stellar fluctuations that would result from
Ticonderoga's arrival so close to their star. However, she knew her duty and
began plotting the course.

"Tactical, when we come out of warp, decloak and open fire with all
weapons, full power, if you blow out power conduates, or even some of the
energizers, too bad. Set weapons to distributed control, leave the auxiliary
computer core clear for other activity."

"Aye, sir."

"McGinnis to all decks, all stations. We will be warping into the Borg system
in nineteen minutes, I want all crew to be in maximum armor, double check your
equipment, I expect heavy fighting and boarding from many Borg parties. Our
only duty is to survive long enough for the Borg to suffer the effects of our
ultimate weapon, whose nature I am not at liberty to divulge. As soon as we
enter the system, we will switch to fully distributed control, main computers
will be unavailable."

McGinnis rose, to make sure that he had all of his equipment, and to check on
ship-wide preparations.

Fifteen minutes later, he returned to the Bridge, fully enclosed in his
battle armor, which was loaded with all of the weapons that it could support.

"Sir, we are two minutes from system entry,and I have set the distributed
computing system to take over navigation when we arrive." said Kyla Moran.

"Sir, I have the computers ready to handle targeting on arrival, we'll do what
damage we can, before the Borg begin boarding the ship." announced Schultz.

"Very well, I want all of you to know why we're going in like this. We have
two computer viruses which I hope will cause the Borg data net to crash.
However, because we know little about their data transmission technologies,
we'll have to get them to upload the material from our system. This means that
data in the computers must be handed over to them freely. Of course, we have
the right to decide what data, so I am going to perform a system wipe shutdown
and core dump immediately. We must fight to hold the ship, as when they take
the data, we must be able to retake the parts that we have lost. This is the
only ship that can perform this mission, as other ships don't have sufficiently
redundant computers and so could not navigate close enough to the Borg
homeworld for this plan to work. Should we fail, I will destroy the ship by
overloading the forced quantum core. You must try to avoid being captured at
all costs, as all knowledge that you have can be assimilated, including what I
have just told you. I have waited until now so that there would be little risk
of other crew hearing what you now know. With that, seal your helmets, engage
your personal shielding, and wait for further action."

"Aye Sir!" all said, now realizing that McGinnis expected the upcoming battle
to be long, bloody, and ... hopefully victorious.

"Computer, erase all files, and break all main and auxiliary computer to
systems connections. ... authorization McGinnis Alpha Omega 456."

"Computer requesting confirmation of total system erasure order and of breaking
of main and auxiliary computer systems control links. " replied the computer.

"Confirmation order McGinnis, Erase all files, primary and auxiliary systems,
break all primary and auxiliary computer to systems control connections,
Authorization mcGinnis Alpha Gamma 347."

At this moment, the entire ship seemed to stagger for a moment, while the
secondary navigational systems brought it into the Borg system. Without main
computer power, the cloak became useless, and other systems crashed all
throughout the vessel. McGinnis plugged a tricorder into the port on
his seat, and downloaded the two dormant files that it contained. Once there,
the two viruses became "live," and the ship's computers awaited what was to
come.

Meanwhile, the ship had decellerated, and the secondary defense computer had
set the shields, and the independent computers in the rapid-fire phaser
batteries had begun to take shots at comparatively undefended parts of the the
Borg homeworld. Torpedoes were launched in a very helter-skelter fashion,
doing much collateral damage, but no serious damage to the Borg defenses. The
main ring could not fire because too many systems had to be integrated to allow
it to be used.

The Borg response was coordinated, and ten cubes struck against
Ticonderoga's shielding, which rapidly fell. Almost instantly, the ships
ceased fire, and hundreds of Borg transported aboard. The crew defended
themselves as best they could, but the numbers and firepower being
carried by these Borg soldiers was much more than they could handle, even
using the sonic and photon grenades. As far as McGinnis was concerned, it was
not right to expect his crew to die without a fight. Particularly when their
deaths were required in a situation in which they didn't know why they were
fighting and dying. Therefore, they were permitted to use any weapons
available to them to resist assimilation.

Fortunately for the crew, before too many could be captured, the Borg began to
become interested in the ship's computers. Of course, the files had already
been deleted, and those that were there... weren't exactly the kind of
information the the Borg were expecting.

They downloaded the files, and continued about their business.

"Sir, we're having a hard time of it down here, they've captured some of the
junior crew, and damage in engineering is growing serious." came MacLeod's
voice over McGinnis helmet com.

"I know, we're suffering damage everywhere, but just keep those force fields
around the main energizer and the quantum core connections, if we can rebuild
the structure, we can leave."

At this moment, a team of Borg arrived on the Bridge.

McGinnis pointed his phaser rifle and fired at the nearest Borg unit.

The shot had absolutely no effect.

"Damn!" he said. "Moran, fire your plasma canon, I'll use my head laser."

"Aye, Sir."

Kyla fired the heavy weapon that was too bulky for most of the crew to use
effectively, however, her far greater than average height made her one of the
three crew who could use this kind of weapon.

The blast from the weapon was bright green, and struck the Borg's defense
field. The field colapsed, and McGinnis' laser split the Borg unit in half,
spurting a combination of blood and lubricant across the Bridge.

"Secure the Bridge, its not usable without the computers anyhow, let's take
this battle to other less sensitive parts of the ship!" called McGinnis running
for the aft exit.

Data, Schultz and Moran followed him, but T'mayek and Anders hung back,
concerned over a implications of totally clearing the Bridge.

"I suggest that you two clear as well, This will soon be a rather risky
place to be," McGinnis said, waving them to follow.

"Sir, shouldn't someone remain on the Bridge? What if The Borg come here?"

"If they come, they'll find out what the layout is, they haven't any better
access to information than they have from anywhere else, now that the computers
are down. There is no reason to stay, and my orders are your reason to leave."

"Aye, Sir..." replied Anders somewhat uncertainly.

"A logical point Admiral." T'Mayek said, "where can I be best used?"

"Engineering, take command of some of the crew protecting the main energizer,
you'll have to use your thrusters, the turbolifts are out."

"Understood."

"Good luck, Commander, logical or not, you will probably need every advantage
that you can get."

"I appreciate your logic, if not the intention, sir," and with that she entered
the nearby turboshaft and began the trip to Engineering.

"The rest of you, stay with me for the moment."

During the conversation, they had traversed a large section of the main hull,
and were now closing on the aft-most sections, near where the observation deck
and shafts for the engineering hull and mega-collimator ring came together.

"Sir, let's go to the ring, since they haven't got a clear idea of the layout
of the ship, they'll have to make sweeps, and because we know the structure
better than they do, we can set some traps for them," said Schultz.

"A good idea, you and Anders take care of that, I want to check on the
security detail protecting the main computer core. Ms. Moran, Mr. Data,
you are free to do as you see fit."

"Sir, I'd like to come with you," replied Moran.

"I will accompany Mr. Schultz and Ms. Anders, it is possible that my better
reflexes and senses will be useful in the accelerator ring." said Data.

"Very well, let's split up, keep in contact via your coms or the ship's optical
net if possible.

With this, all of them went their separate ways, none sure that they would see
each other alive, and unassimilated, again.

McGinnis walked quickly down the curving corridor, headed toward the heavily
armored and shielded main computer core. It was comforting to have the
presence of Kyla Moran behind him, her intelligence and efficiency as an
officer were only matched by her loyalty as a friend.

"Kyla, I want you to know, that I am glad that I was able to prevail on you to
join Star Fleet, and take training at the Academy. You've begun to develop
into a fine officer."

"Admiral, Thank you for bringing me into the fleet. As you know, my unusual
size caused some problems on Earth, both because I stuck out in a crowd, and
because I had trouble with the buildings, most of which are still not built for
someone of my size. I feel like I've got a home, both in Star Fleet, and on
this ship in particular."

"I'm glad that I've been able to do that much for you, your parents told
Admiral Jellico about your problems, and both of us were glad to help out...."

At this moment, two Borg soldiers beamed in in front of them, and began to fire
miniaturized versions of the Borg shield weakening beams at them.

"You take the one on the Right, I've got the other," yelled Moran, swinging the
plasma canon onto her right shoulder.

Moran's shot dissintegrated the Borg unit, and also blew a large chunk out of
the near-by bulkhead. a plasma conduate broke open, and the flash from this,
combined with McGinnis' graviton blast nnocked the other unit out as well.

"Good shooting lieutenant," said McGinnis, reholstering his secondary weapon.

"Thanks Admiral."

"Keep an eye out for more, we're getting close, and I've felt a number of
shocks through the decks, so others must be seeing action."

"I've felt them too, thank goodness that these decks are so heavily
reinforced."

"Agreed!"

They turned the corner, and came upon a scene of utter devastation. Most
of the decking had been blown away, and much of the btubing and circuitry
behind the walls had been either totally destroyed, or was damaged and sparking
or burning outright. Borg units lay thick on the floor, as did a full security
detail. The mix of blood and lubricant was sickening to behold, and Moran
turned away, visibly trying to stop herself from throwing up.

"It would appear that the Borg beat us here, I'll scout ahead while you
recover, as soon as you're able, use your thrusters and catch up with me,

I'll be in the computer core room, checking damage and data loss."

"OK, sir, I'll be on in a minute, I wasn't expecting ... this."

"I know, Lieutenant, unfortunately, it seems that one just gets used to it as
one gets older, I wish that it wasn't so true, maybe we'd avoid some of our
wars if we could remember what it looks like to see our friends and comrades
dead."

McGinnis didn't give her a chance to respond, and quickly moved to the other
end of the short dcorridor. The bulkheads here seemed intact, but considering
that they were a meter or more thick, as with most of the rest of the bulkheads
in the "cylinder", which ran from top to bottom of the center of the main hull,
holding the Bridge, weapons control, primary computer core, and the main-hull
access point to the long access tube leading to the forced quantum core, this
wasn't surprising.

"Computer access, ..."

"Secondary protection computer ... on-line,"

"Computer, allow access to main computer core, McGinnis, William Admiral,
access McGinnis Alpha 456."

"Access denied,"

"Reason?"

"All security software has been compromised, ... automatic locks now in place
until main computer is back on line."

"Damn!, they got to this computer at least." said McGinnis to himself.

"McGinnis to Lieutenant Thompson."

"Thompson Here sir," came Karen Thompson's voice.

"Situation in weapons control?"

"Under control. Borg attempted access automatic defenses - have destroyed
fifty of them, they've stopped trying to get in for the moment."

"Understood, watch those that you can see, they've downloaded our files, I hope
that some of them should start having an ... effect ... soon, if I've got it
right."

"Understood, there are about ten outside now, but they've been sitting in
some kind of default mode for about the last ten minutes."

"Understood, I'll be there to inspect in a few minutes."

McGinnis turned around, to see Kyla sailing over the carniage and destruction
on her thrusters. He looked down to see that his micro sensory suite was
showing a forty degree increase in ambient temperature across the ship, with a
few "hot spots", where larger battles had apparently occurred. Moran's trace
showed up very brightly, but he was glad to see that her flight had done
comparatively little damage to the corridor.

"Lieutenant, we're going up to the weapons control center, I want to have a
look around there, especially sence Lieutenant Thompson reports that a number
of Borg are being held off by the automatic defenses."

"Aye Sir, do you want to try and get in to the computer core? I think that I
could cut through with my plasma torch."

"No, the computer says that there's been no physical security breach, and the
files have been downloaded from somewhere else in the net, so the computer's
shut down."

"Undertstood, I'll take point."

"Very well, I'm behind you."

They flew back across the mass of wrecked metal and bodies and then entered the
nearest turbo-shaft. They rose the two levels necessary, and exited through
the doors, which had already been blasted to fragments by an earlier passer-by.

"I have the Borg on my scanner, they're not reacting to us, even though there
are four or five directly in front of us," reported Moran.

"I see, take a shot at one of them, just to see if the others respond."

Moran fired her phaser rifle, not expecting it to work. However, the targetted
Borg disappeared in a flash.

"I can't believe it, my phaser hasn't worked in half an hour, but I just
destroyed one without a problem. Their shields are down, and I'm not getting
much mechanical activity at all. What is active are their bio-systems, which
are operating way above the norm for the Borg that I've scanned before.
Its like ... they're burning out somehow..."

"Let me by," said McGinnis.

As soon as he passed Moran, he took off his helmet and saw that the normally
pale Borg complexions were flushed with various forms of blood.

All were sweating heavily, and one appeared to be rithing in pain. "One of the
computer viruses has taken effect, and I suspect that its the

Iconian virus, simply by the fact that the other wasn't supposed to activate
yet, we thought that it would have the best chance of doing something to them."

"Iconian virus?"

"Oh, you don't know that mission?"

"No Sir, but the name Iconia is familiar for some reason..."

"Picard took Enterprise to investigate a distress call from USS Yamato in the
neutral zone. When he got there, Yamato sent some files over, and then blew
up, all hands were lost. The files included an extremely complex computer
program that had been written nearly a quarter million years ago on the planet
Iconia, which had technology far in advance of ours today. When they arrived
at the planet, the ship was probed a couple of times, and then an object was
launched at it. Turns out that the object carried the program, and was meant
to broadcast it into the ship's computers. They destroyed the object before it
could do any harm, but the copy in the files from Yamato nearly destroyed
Enterprise, as well as a Romulan ship that had intercepted the broadcast.
Picard destroyed the probes that carried the program, but we were able to find
a damaged probe and extract the program, which we put in a tricorder, hoping
that it would have a similar effect on the Borg. It would appear that it may
be working. .... McGinnis to all stations, report on the progress of the Borg."

The next ten minutes were a stream of reports showing that all over the ship,
Borg had begun to shut down, some restarting for a time, and then falling
either dead, or writhing in apparent biological agony. Most had been placed in
a very strong forcefield in the shuttle deck.

"McGinnis to all stations, continue collecting the functional Borg units, take
the dead ones to the air locks, and jettison them, I don't want their
mechanical parts restarting, should the collective figure a way around our
first present.

"Lieutenant Moran, I want you to find a port that will connect with the
auxiliary tranceiver, I need to talk with Kalis.

"Aye Sir."

Twenty-five minutes later, they had finally found a link to the the ship's
auxiliary tranceiver. From what they, and other crew had seen, most systems
were out, or seriously compromised, and structural damage varied from light to
severe, depending on the area of the ship that you were in. Repairing the ship
would take many weeks at a Starbase, but fortunately, the main structure, warp
drive, computers, and weapons systems all appeared fully intact, if not
operable due to power-transfer damage, control circuitry breakage, and other
comparatively easily repaired problems.

McGinnis now sat before a terminal on the forward-most section of the main
hull, awaiting Kalis' response to his message. It took time, but finally the
small viewscreen popped on, with the image of the older Klingon.

"Admiral McGinnis, I see that you are still alive, this is good news. How is
your battle proceeding?"

"We are seriously damaged, but all Borg units aboard ship have been
neutralized. I have no external scanners, so I'm wondering how things
are outside."

"The Borg are having serious difficulties, some of their ships self-destructed
of their own accord, others are apparently out of control, but there are still
many functional cubes. We are attacking and destroying those that we can, but
the in-system traffic is still too well coordinated for us to risk entry now.
Even though fighting battles against enemies that can't defend themselves well
isn't fully honorable, I do not believe that we would survive an in-system
assault. Your friends in the sphere are launching their own fleet, so we'll
let them take care of the situation nearer you when they get the chance."

"Understood, our second present should be coming on-line in about twenty
minutes, it may work, it may not. I have my doubts about the
Federation-designed viruses, they aren't nearly as complex or hardy as the
Iconian virus that we hit them with first."

"Admiral, only time can tell whether your plan will be successful, but anything
that your other tools do will help us toward an honorable peace will be of
importance."

"Agreed, ... Since this ship is damaged and barely operational, I am going to
order that we leave the system at best posible speed, we're incapable of
fighting any kind of sustained ship-to-ship action, most control systems are
either damaged or totally compromised."

"Yes, I have been scanning your ship, your damage appears wide spread and
serious, I am surprised that you can communicate with me now."

"Without the redundant systems, and the hardening of key points like the main
energizer and the computers, I'm certain that this ship would have already been
lost."

"I tend to agree. Set your course, I'll send a ship to assist you if you need
it."

"No, I suspect that the Borg will be too busy to pay us much attention, and so
we'll be all right. If you could tell the Myria that we're headed into orbit
to make repairs, I'd appreciate it, our long-range communications appear to be
out."

"Understood, I'll have Captain Stromgren contact them. ..." At this moment,
something caught his attention, and he turned away from the screen. Then Kalis
turned back, his expression one of anger.

"Admiral, I am sorry to tell you that your wife has been lost in action across
the system. Admiral De L'Hotel sends his condolences, and says that he will
notify the Myria for you. I, too, send my best wishes, and ask you to remember
that she died honorably, protecting those in your Federation who could not
fight for themselves."

McGinnis was in shock, his expression blank.

"...Thank you.... I'll be in contact later."

"Yes, contact me when your repairs are far enough along."

"Ticonderoga ... out."

McGinnis sat back, trying to assimilate the news. Unfortunately for him,
there was no time for personal grief.

"Lieutenant, I am going back to the Bridge, go to Engineering, have them begin
repairs, and tell Captain Data to get the ship under way, best possible speed,
for the Myriac system. Prioritize on the computers, and then on structural
members. Other systems can wait until we're under way for the Federation.

"Aye Sir, are you going to be OK?"

"Yes, I'll be fine, and up on the Bridge directing repairs in that area."

"Aye Sir."

Kyla left, wanting to do something, anything to help, but knowing that what she
could offer , ... what she wanted to offer ... wasn't appropriate at the
moment. Her growing attraction to this man whom she had viewed as mentor would
have to wait ... for a while.

SUPER-DREADNOUGHT: Part III Chapter XV:

Command Log, Star Date 56496.3: Admiral William McGinnis Commanding USS
Ticonderoga: Recording:

We have completed the journey back to the Myria sphere. Repairs to the
extensive damage done to this vessel continue, and will take quite some
time. However, our losses in crew can never be fully addressed. Nearly
a quarter of the crew have been killed, and forty-five others are lost,
presumed either dead or assimilated. Because of these heavy losses, we
have been working longer shifts in order to ensure that the ship is able
to make the long transit back to Federation space. The Myria have
totally destroyed the Borg in-space fleet, and have returned to their
home. This does not mean that the Borg aren't a threat. Neither we, nor
the Myria have been able to find justification for a bombardment of the Borg
homeworld, and, given time and resources, they will doubtless return
to space, posing a threat to the survival of all space faring civilizations.

However, for the moment, we have given ourselves a long respite from the fear
of assimilation. This respite has come at a heavy cost to our fleet as well.
Only twenty ships survive, and all have some losses in crew. Federation ships
now compose more than half of all our strength, and as at the battles around
the Klingon home world, I feel that the Mycenae-style designs have proven their
hardiness and their superiority over the older configurations, for military
action at least. We will continue repairs, and hope to leave this part of
space in two or three days.

Commander's personal Log, Admiral McGinnis recording:

We will be leaving thousands of dead comrades behind, and with the loss of my
wife, I often wonder if there wasn't something more that we could have done to
keep more ships and personel intact. My conclusion, hard though it is to
accept, is that there is little that could have been done, and that we made the
best decisions that could be made at the time. Obviously we could have refused
to come on the mission, letting the Klingon Empire attempt it alone.
Attractive though this is in concept, it would have never been politically
acceptable, and I don't think that most of the Federation commanders, myself
included, would have been able to let the Klingons go up against the Borg
alone. Many of us might have even disobeyed any abort order that might have
been given.

Hopefully, the work that must still be done, will be enough to keep all of us
from thinking too much about what we have lost in this campaign. Of course,
our gains have been enormous, including knowledge of a cibilization that was
exploring the possibilities of high technology while Earth was frozen at the
height of the ice age, twenty-five thousand years ago. The temporary recession
of the Borg threat is another fantastic benefit, and one that I am very
thankful for.

***
McGinnis switched the log recorder off, and looked about his still-disheveled
quarters. Although no Borg had attempted entry into the compartment, a number
of running battles had been fought in the corridor outside, and serious damage
had been caused by blast effects. With all that had been going on, he had had
little time to get around to straightening out the mess in his rooms. In fact,
if the doctor hadn't ordered him to rest for eight hours, he would have been
helping out with the repairs to the optical communications system. With the
ship immobile, his presence wasn't needed on the Bridge, and his skill as an
engineer was needed all over the ship. This fact alone, had led him to allow a
number of junior lieutenants to watch the conn and the sensors, while the
higher command staff was out and about, making repairs, or directing the repair
effort.

At this moment his door chime sounded, and he turned from the old copy of
_The Republic_ that he was putting back on its shelf.

"Come,"

The door opened to reveal Kyla Moran in a tight-fitting athletic jumper.

"Lieutenant, what can I do for you?"

"Admiral, I just wanted to check to make sure that you were OK, I know that
you've been up a lot, and you've not said much about your wife...."

"Kyla, Thank you for your concern, but I need to deal with that in my own
way, whatever that is. When I know how to deal with it, you and the doctor
will be notified. Until then, you can help me the most by keeping an eye on
the bridge for the next few hours. I expect that some of the fleet will be
coming in soon."

"If you're sure that's all..."

"Yes, I just need some rest according to the doctor, He'll be unhappy that I
even answered your page," he said a small smile curving his lips.

"I'll be on the bridge," she said, quietly withdrawing from the doorway.

After that brief conversation, McGinnis felt very tired. He turned down
the blankets on his bed and stretched out for a nap.

***
The chime of the com unit awoke him some time later.

"Sir, Moran here, The fleet has achieved rendezvous, and Kalis wants to bring
you up to speed on the news from home."

"Very well, Have all senior staff report to the Bridge immediately, tell him
that I'll be there momentarily."

"Aye Sir."

McGinnis hastened from his quarters, noting that nearly ten hours had passed
since he had last checked a chronometer. Clearly the doctor had decided that a
little extra rest wouldn't hurt him, and with the ship's repairs going very
well, he had trouble getting truly angry with him.

McGinnis entered the bridge and noticed that all of the senior staff, save
Thale who was still in critical and unstable condition were already there.
MacLeod too was missing, directing repairs on some part of the great ship's
main engineering deck.

"Ops, open channel to Kalis."

"Channel open," replied Anderws.

"Admiral, it is good to see that your repairs are going well. I must report to
you that your Federation commanders have suffered a number of important
reversals over recent days. House Durass has constructed a powerful battle
force, which has taken control over most of Klingon home territory, including
the homeworld. Gouraon is still occupied with wiping up Romulan resistance,
and some of his commanders have proven loyal to house durass. The Romulans
have broken the treaty which they signed with Gouron, and have moved to support
House Durass. Between the Romulan forces and those of house Durass, I think
that Gouron will not command imperial forces for long. Federation ships have
been dispatched to the Klingon and Romulan borders to ensure Federation
security. The the Ferengi are being denied access to those parts of Federation
space which border with either the empire or the Romulans, and they have
declared war on the Federation. So far, their attacks have not proven to be a
major nuisance to Admiral Jellico. This is all that I know."

Suddenly, before McGinnis could respond, one of the Klingon ships powered its
weapons and fired a full broadside into Ticonderoga's secondary hull. The
effect was devastating, as the shields had not been raised, as no attack could
have been expected from a supposedly friendly fleet. The aft recreation deck
was immediately vented to space killing many. More died in the sudden collapse
of the main shuttle deck's structure, and finally, and most importantly, a
photon torpedo exploded just short of the great bulkheads that protected the
engineering deck. These were blown in, and before the shocked systems could
respond, many had been blasted apart by the huge chunks of flying tritanium and
duranium from these thickly armored pannels. Others died as a result of
exposure to vacuum before the ship's systems could respond. The loss in life
on the Engineering deck was terrible, and would have been worse had the
atmospheric containment fields not come up about half way down the length of
the great chamber.

"Red Alert, shields up! ..." said McGinnis from the floor. "What was that?" he
demanded as he tried to climb into his command chair.

"Sir, we've been hit by a broadside from one of the new Klingon light
dreadnoughts. Severe damage on all engineering decks, massive loss of
atmosphere, casualties are reported as 'devastating,'", said Anders looking at
her board which had lit up like a stock exchange.

"Sir, the remainder of our fleet has destroyed the rogue, no damage to other
vessels," reported Schultz, as he shook his head to clear it.

"Very well, why didn't we know that that was coming?"

"Sir, the new Klingon ships can power their disruptors very quickly, and so
they took all of us by surprise. There was nothing that either the defense
programming or human controllers could do."

"Understood, I suggest that we try to improve both before next time....Get me
in contact with Kalis."

"He has just hailed us sir."

"Put him on."

"Admiral, I convey the regrets of myself and my people for the dishonorable
attack. I offer all assistance in your repairs and with any medical needs that
your Federation ships can not handle."

"Unfortunately, there are few cases needing attention, most crew were either
killed by exposure to disruptor ipact, torpedo blast or vacuum. If we need
assistance, I'll be sure to ask, what we need right now is time to consider our
damage and decide whether we can get the ship back to Federation space under
her own power."

"Very well, I shall speak with you in an hour's time, if that will be enough
for your damage survey."

"That will be acceptable, McGinnis out."

The screen blanked, and McGinnis turned to the job of coordinating his crew's
response to the fantastic damage that had been done. Thirty minutes later, the
entire senior staff, or at least all of those who were able to report, were in
conference-1.

"I want concise reports, we will report to Kalis, and to the rest of the
Federation fleet in less than half an hour. I need to know what our needs
are....Medical"

"Sir, we have 143 confirmed deaths, thirteen missing, and thirty-seven
requiring immediate stasus treatment, as due to their condition. I have
stabilized them so that they will make the trip back to base without
difficulty."

"Very well, that means that we have approximately sixty able-bodied crew?"

"Yes Sir," replied the doctor.

"Very well, Engineering?"

"Sir, most of the engineering crew is dead, the computers are handling most of
the repairs, the automated systems are functioning as well as can be expected
under these conditions. We need a lot more duranium and tritanium, I estimate
about thirty-thousand tons of each, and time. I think that the ship is
structurally sound, and that we can proceed at anything up to warp eight for
the moment, but higher speeds will require diversion of energy and resources
away from the structural fields and atmospheric containment systems." Said
Elane Johnson, who was now the head of the engineering department, as Robert
MacLeod was currently being maintained in a stasus field after a tritanium
shard struck him, causing massive internal injuries, which were far beyond the
ship's comparatively limited sick bay's ability to handle.

"Thank you lieutenant, you'll get all of the resources that we can spare. We
will proceed at warp seven until you clear us for higher speed, we are in no
absolute hurry to get home, and its a long trip....Weapons?"

"Sir, all weapons systems are intact, except for the engineering hull
collimators, all of which have suffered structural rupturing. We have been
able to jurry-rig the lower collimator, but port, starboard, and upper
collimators are irreparable in space. All other weapons are fully available.
Security systems are seriously compromised while we are putting so much energy
into the engineering systems, but there is little likelihood of boarding at the
moment. I have the security crew in armor, so if anything comes up, they'll
have the firepower to deal with it." said Schultz.

"Thank you, ... Mr. Data?"

"Sir, I have been inspecting the ship from the outside, and I believe that we
will be able to patch the hull within hours. After that, we will need much
time to repair the structural members and I suspect that we will not be able to
launch shuttles or other small craft without repairs to the shuttle bay's
sub-systems in a star base facility. Other than this, I believe that we are
able to proceed on your orders."

"Very well, I shall contact Kalis and the Federation commanders, tell them of
our needs, and as soon as that is done, I believe that we should go home. We
will fly a course that will allow us to avoid Klingon space, which is obviously
frought with dangers which I believe it best not to tempt under the conditions
likely to prevail aboard ship when we reach near-home space. We will therefore
circumvent Cardassian territory, and travel through an area of space which
seems to show little activity in terms of highly-developed civilizations. We
will stop for nothing, until we reach the outpost in the Bajoran system. We
all have much work to do, so let's get to it so that we can begin the trip
home.

***
Command Log: Stardate 56503.4: Admiral William McGinnis Commanding USS
Ticonderoga recording.

Kalis found the spy who was able to allow the Commander of the rogue ship
access to our communications. He has dealt with him in the traditional Klingon
way. Between the twenty remaining ships, and the Myria, we have collected
enough raw materials to make all possible repairs on the ship while in transit.

The computers are fully restored after these difficult experiences, and the
automatic repair systems are doing an incredible amount of work. Without them,
I think that it is likely that we would have had to scrap this vessel. All
energy systems are back on line, and Engineer Johnson reports that she feels
that we can safely travel at warp 9.5, if absolutely necessary. For the
moment, we will fly at warp 9, until all repairs are made. The Federation
Commanders have chosen to accompany us until we are able to travel at maximum
velocity, at which point they will move to assist Gouron. Our course will
allow us see to both crewmembers and ship's systems alike, with as little
disruption as possible. I expect that our journey home will not be quiet, and
am expecting to return to known space in approximately forty-five days time.

In the mean time, we will have much to keep us occupied.

McGinnis turned to the helm, where Kyla Moran sat awaiting orders.

"Ms Moran, warp 9 on your preprogrammed course, engage."

"Warp 9, aye."

All throughout the ship, those who remained, rejoiced at the beginning of
the homeward journey. A journey, which they all knew, was far from over.

********************************

SUPER-DREADNOUGHT: Part IV: Chapter XVI

Command Log: Stardate 56737.8, Admiral William McGinnis Commanding USS
Ticonderoga reporting.

We are less than three hours from the outer edges of Federation space, and five
hours out of Bajoran station DS9. The trip home, thanks to good fortune, has
been quiet. For some reason, I have the feeling that the events at home will
bring this peace to a sudden end.

The ship is now at 99.2 percent of optimal functionality, with the remaining
losses related to the port, starboard, and upper engineering phaser
collimators, which can not be repaired without total replacement of most of
that equipment. The ship's structure is still somewhat weakened in the
engineering sections, but in general, I feel that the ship's repair systems and
those crew that have been able to return to duty have done a truly miraculous
job, particularly under the terrible circumstances that we have faced.

The ship has not been out of warp space since we left the Myria sphere, and
less than a quarter of the original crew is capable of performing its duties.
The computers were not at full functionality until the third week of our trip
home, and without them, the repair systems and equipment is much more difficult
to control. Fortunately, we were able to get enough raw duranium and tritanium
to fill our needs before we left, and most other parts have been replicable
from ship's stores. However, we enter an extremely unstable political
situation in our home region terribly under supplied and exhausted.

I have been in continuous communication with Admiral Jellico at Starfleet
Headquarters, and the military situation is far worse than I had feared that it
might be. House Durass has taken control of the Klingon empire, with a fleet
nearly as powerful as that which the Klingons had four and a half years ago
before the military losses suffered at the battle of Borg. Gouron has been
defeated by a combined Durassite-Romulan force, which quickly dispatched the
few remaining Klingon forces. I must assume that, unfortunatley, Kalis will be
attacked as soon as he reaches Klingon home space next week. I can not warn
him, and hope that he will know to proceed with caution.

Federation forces were not able to intervene, and this has cost us dearly. The
Klingons, Romulans, and Ferengi have struck at various key points in the
Federation, including a number of military positions, and the planet Betazed.
Civilian casualties there are estimated at approximately 3 billion. War has
been declared, but the fleet construction program is still a year from full
swing, and it will require at least two years for us to reach parity with our
enemies. I have been directed to have a look at DS9, and show the flag on the
Cardassian border, so that their government does not decide to break their
treaty with us. For this reason, we are proceeding to DS9 at warp 9.6 and
expect to be there soon. Hopefully we will have a few hours to get some shore
leave in while we are there.

***
McGinnis sat in the command chair of USS ticonderoga as it swept into the
Bajoran system. Finally, after just slightly more than six months, the ship
was back in Federation space. The peace that everyone felt at the knowledge
was tempered by the fact that all of them had lost many friends in the recent
conflict with the Borg, and and that they were coming home to a Federation
whose future was in peril. A situation which had not prevailed for more than a
century.

"Ops, main scan, report on in-system traffic."

"Activity seems normal enough in all areas, we are still out of range for
direct scan of DS9, wwe will enter range in thirty seconds."

"Understood, get me a channel to DS9."

"Channel open, sir."

"This is Admiral William McGinnis, commanding the Federation Starship USS
Ticonderoga, to DS9, requesting permission for transfer of shore leave
parties."

"DS9 to Ticonderoga, you are cleared for docking on outer pylon 6, welcome
home."

"Thanks for the welcome, we'll perform docking procedure in four minutes,
Ticonderoga out."

"Sir, I am now scanning the worm hole, no activity in the area at all, in
fact, DS9 is almost devoid of docked ships. I see no designs that the computer
doesn't recognize, so there's apparently no Gamma quadrant traffic in at the
moment.", said Janet Anders.

"Very good, I want the computer to maintain scan on the wormhole while we're
docked, Although DS9 has been upgraded to some degree since we were last here,
we still have more firepower than the station, and should anything come
through, we'll be the point ship."

"Aye, I'm setting the sensors to continuous tactical scan, the computer will
notify all bridge personel should anything come through."

"Very good, ... Helm, begin to decellerate, perform docking maneuver at your
convenience."

"Aye Sir," said Moran.

"I am setting all of you loose the minute we're docked, the computer will be
set at defense protocol one, so if you want to beam back, make sure that the
computer has cleared you before you come aboard. I expect that most of us will
not get much time off after this, so take advantage of it, its been nearly four
months since we've had any rest, and all of us need a breather. Should you
need me, I'll be With Commander Cisco and then at Quark's."

Nods of acknowledgement came from all of the officers. At least two of them
made quiet plans to keep an eye on the Admiral, as General order 15 was still
on the books, and none of them wanted to be the first to have to tell Starfleet
that the hero of the Borg campaign had been lost to kidnappers or Bajoran
terrorists.

"Sir, we're thirty seconds from dock," announced Moran, as the ship
decellerated from warp to sub-light speed.

"Good, Ms. Moran, you have the conn until we dock, I'll be working with the
computer. All of you may leave your stations as you finish your closing down
cycles."

All of the crew, even data, began shutting down their stations, locking them to
restart with either voice or retina scans from at least two bridge staff
officers, or McGinnis' general restart command codes. Only tactical and helm
remained unlocked, in case the ship's weapons were needed at short call.

"Computer, recognize McGinnis William R. Code lock protocal defense-1, ... "

"Recognize, Admiral William R. McGinnis, ship protocol defense 1, ready, give
final codes for ship-wide security lockdown."

"Code Alpha 1273, condition one hour, or departure of all active crew."

"Code Alpha 1273, with time one hour recognized, give codes and conditions for
general restart."

"Restart code, recognize McGinnis, William R, Admiral, or any two first-watch
officers voice and retina scans. Codes appropriate to those officers."

"Codes loaded, conditions loaded, awaiting final code for one-hour countdown."

"Code McGinnis, William R, Alpha 3257, continuity, one hour countdown, mark !"

"Code approved, one hour to security one lockout."

Ops, put me on intership."

"You're on, sir."

"This is Admiral McGinnis, as you are all aware, we have just docked with the
station Deep Space 9. You are all encouraged to take leave while we are here,
I expectthat we will depart in about twenty-four hours. The ship is under a
code-1 lockdown until then, so you will be able to get to your quarters, but
all ship's systems are under security lockout. You will need either myself, or
two command officers to access any core systems. Have a good break, I believe
that we shall be out for some time again, so take advantage of the time,
McGinnis out."

"Sir, docking complete," said Moran.

"Very well, dismissed."

With this all of the bridge officers rose and left, leaving McGinnis alone for
a few moments. However, soon, he left as well, headed for his meeting with
Commander Cisco.

SUPER-DREADNOUGHT: Part IV: Xhapter XVII

"Admiral, it is good to see you after more than a year. I understand that
you've been busy lately." said Commadore Benjamin Cisco who had recently
returned to command the Federation detachment at Deep Space 9, after a period
of exploring in the Gamma quadrant.

"Yes, Commadore, I am glad to see you here as well. With the growing
importance of trade with the Gamma quadrant, this station, and the Bajoran
system in general, have gained tremendous strategic importance to the
Federation. Admiral Jellico tells me that you were requested by the new
Bajoran government's chief minister?"

"Yes, Minister Kira did ask me to come back, she felt that having me here while
the Federation's attention was diverted from this part of space would be
helpful to her regime's efforts to stabilize traffic and develop further
economic returns from the growing trade coming through here. As I've never
been a military commander, Command agreed to let me come back if I wished."

"Well, as I said before, I'm pleased to have you here. Can you tell me
anything about recent Cardassian activity in the area?"

"Yes, they have shown some signs of fleet reconstruction, but the Bajoran
in-system fleet is now more than sufficient to handle them for long enough to
get major starfleet assistance here, should that become necessary. Personally,
I am more concerned about the Dominion, their interest in the activities on
this side of the wormhole has grown sharply over the last few months, and since
we can't get major military units through the wormhole, and have no base rights
anywhere in the Gamma quadrant, our information about their capabilities is
limited."

"I see. As I remember, there is no way to get a cruiser or
battle-cruiser-sized ship through the passage?"

"Yes, but scout-sized ships are capable of passage, and the Dominion's
resources shouldn't be underestimated. I would think that they can
probably put firepower equal to most of Starfleet into action, if they
feel the need."

"True, but as long as they can't get large ships through, I would think that
they won't be much of a threat, as long as the Bajorans are aware of the
threat, and given Starfleet as a back-up. I will be in the area for the next
few weeks, "showing the flag," if you need further assistance, but obviously I
can't do any kind of reconnaissance on the other side with Ticonderoga."

"Thank you for the offer, I hope that we won't need that kind of help, but its
good to know that you'll be in the area for a while."

"Then, unless you have anything else that I need to pass on to Fleet
headquarters, I believe that I'm going to go down to Quark's for a bit and get
my mind off of business."

"Very well, I can send security if you need it," offered Cisco.

"No, I have my phaser with me, and there are few beings on the station that
would have had the chance to know our schedule, as Ticonderoga was only ordered
to come here twelve hours ago."

"All right,... I hope that you have a restful time."

"Thank you."

McGinnis moved through the DS9 operations center, and took the turbolift to the
promenade. Almost immediately after he stepped out of the lift, he saw Walter
Schultz and one of the ship's security officers trying to remain
unconspicuous, while still able to see him. He knew, intellectually, that this
was their duty, but he had ordered them to get some time off while they had the
chance. However, giving them a direct order to stop shadowing him would be
grounds for a fleet investigation, and he had no desire to deal with a General
order inquiry. He turned away from them, and headed toward Quark's.

Immediately on entering the place, he saw Quark moving toward him. The little
Ferengi had, to McGinnis' mind, an almost infinite capacity for scheming, and
despite early setbacks, he had made the proverbial pretty penny from Gamma
quadrant activities. The Ferengi had moved to take advantage of business
opportunities, and despite some nasty run ins with peripheral members of the
dominion, they had been quite successful in developing a thriving trade with
many races in the Gamma quadrant. However, with the recent hostilities, the
wormhole had been closed to much traffic, both Ferengi and other, and it was
clear that quark was glad to see the business, even if it was from a Starfleet
military crew.

"Admiral, it is good to see you again, its been nearly two years since you
honored my establishment with your presence," said the barkeep in his oily
voice.

"Quark, I see that you still remember me. If you remember me well, you will
know that I do not wish to be bothered with inconsequential small talk."

"I didn't mean to bother you,..." said the Ferengi backing off quickly.

"You weren't, ... yet, and you would be well not to do so at the moment.

Have your help get me my regular, and leave it at that."

"Yes, yes, Terran "BLT," with "fries," and "salad,"" said Quark, hastening away
to fill the order personally. The man, who Quark's sources told him, had just
led Federation forces to a sound defeat of the Borg, was not to be trifled
with.

***
After his meal, and a game of dabo, McGinnis left the bar, wishing to see what
had changed on the station since his last visit. Again, he noticed a trail,
this time composed of the station security chief, Odo, and Kyla Moran. He
could not order Odo off, but Kyla could be released from her self-appointed
duty. ... McGinnis turned around quickly, and tapped his communicator while
looking directly at the tall, blonde young woman.

"McGinnis to Lieutenant Moran," he said. Her surprised look was quickly
followed by the proper response:

"Moran, here."

"As Mr. Odo is likely to follow me about the station, you may consider yourself
released from the requirements of General Order 15, I don't need a security
detail, and you need your rest. ... McGinnis out."

He turned around, after seeing her confer with Odo for a moment, and then
turn toward the Klingon restaurant.

Not thirty seconds after this conversation, The feeling of impending throuble
that McGinnis had been having since Ticonderoga reached long-range scanning
range of Bajor materialized in the form of two rapid-fire events. The first
was the sounding of the red-alert klaxons on the station.

McGinnis stood, indecisive as to whether to return to the ship or go to station
ops. He quickly realized that the ship would need to get clear of the
station's firing arcs to allow it maximum effectiveness if this situation had
an external cause.

Less than a minute later, he stood at the outer gangway, as the second ceal
opened on the air lock, giving him admittance to the ship. he ran to the
nearest turbolift and got to the bridge. Ten seconds after this, he was
sitting at the Ops station, reading the mass of data coming in over the
sensors.

These showed at least nine Cardassian cruiser-class ships headed for Bajor,
and the response of the Bajoran fleet. Then, they began to detail the second,
far more serious, event.

The wormhole flared to brilliant activity, and as McGinnis watched in mute
fascination, hundreds of small warp-capable ships began pouring out of it.
These were quickly followed by twenty-three larger ships, which began, almost
immediately, to move into some form of docking maneuver. With this event,
McGinnis realized that a very serious situation had begun to develop.

"McGinnis to central computer, condition Alpha 1, emergency crew recall, all
personel, USS Ticonderoga, return to ship immediately, for immediate
departure."

"Code Alpha-1 message to all crew has been sent, all crew have responded as per
regulations," replied the computer.

McGinnis knew that many would have criticized his decision to allow all
available crew to leave the ship at once, but with the computer's security
measures, and the ability to fly the thing single-handedly if necessary, he
felt that staggered shore-leave parties would do little good for his
space-weary crew. The worst thing about this situation, in his opinion, was
the fact that his crew would not be getting any more rest, which all of them
richly deserved. His mind quicly turned from this issue to other matters.

"McGinnis to deep space 9 control, request immediate clearance for undocking.
... Request open channel to Commadore Cisco."

"Cisco here," replied The Commadore as his image replaced the main viewer's
picture of the construct now being finished just outside the wormhole.

"Commadore, you know this area, is this a Dominion force?"

"I know of no other power on the other side capable of sending through that
many ships, I would make that assumption for now."

"Understood, I am ranking officer, and will make contact with the Dominion
commander, you shall liaise between me and Bajoran military authorities. For
the moment, you should consider the Dominion forces as top priority, as their
combined firepower is far greater than that of the Cardassian squadrons.
Contact Starfleet Command for assistance, I will be too busy to do so. Also,
be aware that I may have to leave you to the dominion forces, should the
Cardassians break through the Bajoran defense fleet. Launch all of your
run-abouts, and do whatever else you feel appropriate to your command and
resources, notify me as necessary, mcGinnis out."

By this time, his crew had all come aboard, and the ship was ready for
emergency departure.

"Mr. Schultz, scan that fleet, report on capabilities. ... Ops, get me a
channel to the main vessel."

"Aye Sir," replied Schultz and Anders together.

"Helm, undock, as soon as we're clear of the station, set us on a direct
course, full impulse, to intercept those fighters."

"Aye Sir," replied Moran.

"Sir, I have scanned the fleet, their technology is comparable to ours, with
the main ship being constructed of smaller units as you have already seen. It
has phased-plasma weapons as its main offensive capability, these are more
powerful than our plasma torpedoes, but also require more energy to fire.
There are more than 200 secondary particle phasers, with single-unit output of
about 1/3 of each of our particle weapons. Over-all, I'd say that we can take
that ship with some difficulty. The fighters use particle phasers, and have
small photon-torpedo style missiles, estimated yield of about three megatons
per weapon, there are four missiles per fighter. Each fighter is easily
capable of knocking out an unshielded run-about, but the run-abouts should be
able to polish off a number of them due to superior speed and phaser output.
However, there are too many to take out that way, Bajoran close-defense forces
will have to do a lot of that work, and they'll be strained to the limit."

"Understood, Ops, that channel," said McGinnis.

"They aren't responding as yet, I'm still trying."

"I see, tell them that we will be forced to try to halt their advance, by
force if necessary, if we do not communicate."

"Aye Sir, adding the information."

Long seconds passed, while everyone waited or a response, any response.

"Sir, they're continuing to advance," said Schultz.

"Very well, change course to 153 mark 24, close on the main ship and energize
the main ring. main and auxiliary shields up, bring the ship to
red alert status."

With this, the computer announced the cnage in status with a combination
of klaxons and verbal notification.

"Sir, shields up, main ring charged, we are now within range."

"Very well, Ops, notify them that if they don't change course and stand to,
that we will open fire."

"Aye Sir,"

The construct continued to advance, its bulk now clearly visible on the
main viewer.

"No response," said Anders.

"They're still approaching," announced Moran from her station.

"Very well, Tactical, fire a full blast across their bow, duration one second."

"Firing," replied Schultz.

The bolt flared white against the blackness of space, and then the bridge
staff had to wait to gauge the effectiveness of the warning shot.

SUPER-DREADNOUGHT: Part IV: Chapter XVIII

"Sir, they have stopped advancing," announced Schultz.

"Good, Ops, get me a channel to that ship," said McGinnis.

"Aye, ... chanel open ... sir," said Anders, some surprise manifesting itself
on her face.

"Put them on screen," replied McGinnis, somewhat surprised himself.

The image that came on the main viewer was, to say the least, ugly. McGinnis
was not normally a xenophobe, but this being was quite clearly the most
distasteful thing that he had ever seen. Were it not for his starfleet
training, he suspected that he would have ordered his crew to destroy the ship
on sight, simply as a response to the purely visceral feeling that he got from
looking at the being.

"I am Taklat, commanding the Dominion forces in this area. You will agree to
cease and desist in your "exploration," of our part of space, or we shall
destroy the planet in this system, and your base."

"I am Admiral William McGinnis, commanding the United Federation of Planets
Star Ship Ticonderoga. Your demands are heard, but I do not recognize your
authority to make them on *this* side of the wormhole. You shall retreat to
your side of the phenomenon, or I will be forced to use all available resources
to incapacitate your forces."

"Your explorations, and the activities of your farengi allies have brought much
social disorder in the dominion, and I will not stop until you agree to utterly
cease all activity in our spaces."

"I have no authority to speak for the government of Bajor, in whose system your
forces are now located. I am also not empowered to speak for the Ferengi, but
on behalf of the Federation, I am willing to consider a temporary halt to all
Federation activity on your side of the phenomenon. At least until a
Federation negotiating team can be sent to your capitol in order to negotiate
other terms."

"This is not acceptable, *all* activity will stop, or we shall destroy the
planet."

"I am sorry to hear that you are unwilling to negotiate, I suspect that it will
require at least fourty-eight Federation standard hours to bring the necessary
Ferengi and Bajoran negotiators together. I shall speak with the Bajoran
government if you like, as this is their system, they can probably order all
non-bajouran ships out of the system, but I suspect that they will not be
willing to do so."

"I shall tell them directly." And with this the channel closed.

"Evaluation?"

"Sir, we can not defeat both Dominion and Cardassian forces. I would be damned
surprised if they are working together." said Schultz.

"Why?"

"Because the Cardassians want the system as an economic resource in order to
develop tolls and other imposts on wormhole traffic. Bajor has become a
wealthy planet, and after the current hostilities with the Romulan and Klingon
Empires are over, I suspect that the economic benefits of the wormhole for
Bajor will only grow. The cardassians are probably thinking the same thing,
and since our defeat of their main fleet five years ago, their economy has been
in terrible condition. Reconquest of this system would go far to help them out
of their current troubles."

"Very well..."

"Sir, we must protect the planet, the Bajorans must be the top priority," said
Anders.

"I tend to agree, but there are a number of key targets in this system, if the
Cardassians or the Dominion forces capture any of them, it will be much more
difficult to get rid of them," replied McGinnis.

"I think that we should try to contact the Federation and see if Star Fleet
Command can send help." said Moran. McGinnis stared at her for a moment. In
the mad series of events, he had forgotten that he'd ordered Cisco to do just
that.

"Ops, get Cisco on the viewer," he said.

"Commadore Cisco coming on screen," replied Anders.

"Comaadore, report on your progress."

"I've gotten to Admiral T'laz at Starfleet, she says that there are no
available resources at the moment, and she expressed her confidence in
your command and tactical abilities... I've talked with Minister Kira,
and she asked you to do what you could to defend the planet, she says
that they can't handle the Dominion and the Cardassians at the same
time. All of my ships are out, and we're shadowing the fighters on their
way to Bajor. Mr. Nog's report is that he should be able to hold them long
enough for you to get their and negotiate with them."

"Very well, this means that you're on your own versus that ship out there, I
can't stay to help. I'm going to try to help the Bajorans slow down the
Cardassian fleet, and then give the Cardassians something more important to use
their ships for. Do you think that you can handle that ship out there?"

"It'll be close, our weapons aren't the best. If you can divert the
run-abouts, I think that i can trap them between my ships and the base,
and we'll have to see after that."

"Very well, order your ships back, I'm on my way to deal with that fleet."

"Good luck, sir."

"The same to you Commadore, keep in direct contact with Admiral T'laz, I'm
turning command of this situation over to her."

"Aren't you going to tell her tat?"

"No, and since I outrank both of you, she won't have too much to stand on."

"Yes sir!", said Cisco, who was clearly not pleased at having to act as a
messenger.

"McGinnis out."

With this McGinnis turned back to Anders.

"Commander, get me a channel to minister Kira."

"Aye, .... Channel open."

"Minister, This is Admiral William McGinnis commanding the United Star Ship
Ticonderoga. Have you heard from the commander of the Dominion forces ?"

"Yes, and I won't accept his terms. For that reason, I'm making a direct
request of you and all other Federation resources in the area for assistance to
a Federation-allied government."

"Thank you, we are on our way. If you would get me a link to your commanding
officer?"

"Yes, the code is being transmitted now."

Anders nodded to show that she had it.

"Thank you, Ticonderoga out."

"Comander, get me through to the Bajoran commander."

"Aye, coming up now."

"Admiral McGinnis, I am general Tyrae, it is good to speak with you."

"General, what is your current diployment?", asked McGinnis bypassing the
courtesies as unjustifiable under the current conditions.

"We are diployed against the Cardassians, with only ground-based forces to hold
off the Dominion fleet."

"Very well, I am moving to occupy them for a bit, so push the Cardassians
back as much as you can, I'll deal with them as soon as you've engaged the
dominion forces."

"What is your plan?"

"I don't think that it would be wise to discuss it in detail, simply say that I
will make sure that the Cardassians decide that a rediployment of their forces
is ... necessary."

"All right, I'd like to know what you're planning to do, but as ranking
Federation officer, you have the right to refuse to tell me."

"General, I would do so if I felt that there was time, but there isn't, and
this channel is not fully secured."

"You are right, do as you see best."

"McGinnis out."

"Helm, set course 157 mark 36, short duration burst at warp nine to get us in
front of those ships. ... Tactical, engage all shielding, bring the secondary
weapons on line, set for rapid-fire, independent targeting.

"Aye, Sir," replied Schultz and Moran.

The ship leapt forward, and slowed just as quickly. Immediately the
computer-controlled weapons opened fire, blasting many of the small and
comparatively under-defended fighters out of space. As the toll began to rise,
the fighters began to duck and weave, trying to avoid the far bigger ship's
guns. Their maneuvers wer semi-successful, both because there was little
pattern to them, and because there were too many targets for the independent
targeting nodes to handle.

"Sir, they're avoiding our shots, we're barely ten percent effective. I
suggest that we commit the auxiliary computer core to assisting the rapid-fire
weapons targeting controllers."

"I agree, you may proceed at your earliest convenience," replied McGinnis.

"Redirecting, ... now!" said Schultz.

The act was only minimally helpful, despite the massive computing resources now
going to predicting and targeting, there were just oo many targets, acting too
randomly. Worse still, even though Ticonderoga had slowed their forward
progress, the fighters were beginning to fly around the ship at a range
sufficient to defeat the comparatively short range of the particle phasers.

"Mr. Schultz, bring the ring to full power, knock out some of those ships that
are trying to slip past us, and try not to miss, I don't want them to get an
idea as to our range on that weapon for a bit. I don't want to have to start
chasing those little ships with torpedoes."

"I agree, but despite the fact that we're running low, we may have to use
them."

"I am well aware of that, but the better your shooting, the longer we can
wait."

"Ring charged, standing by to fire."

"You may proceed."

The fighters' tactics had suddenly become ineffective.The main ring's greatly
superior range and striking power resulted in the destruction of many of the
small ships. Also, as the ring could strike over greater ranges, it's
effectiveness was even greater, as it could more easily knock out fighters that
had slipped past the ship's mid-line. The tactic forced the fighters to begin
a rapid retreat away from the great ship's new weapon. However, McGinnis
didn't want to show their entire hand, so the ring was only used out to a range
of 700,000 kilometers, slightly less than its maximum effective range.

"They're still backing off, trying to get around us."

"Good, keep them backing, fire *one* torpedo, set it to detonate at one million
kilometers range, try to take out a clump of them."

"Why ... Aye, sir." replied Schultz, realizing McGinnis' plan.

The photon torpedo flew from its bube, and detonated amongst a small cluster of
the little ships. Because space does not carry shock waves, it only destroyed
four, but the blast still forced the Dominion crews to back off very quickly.

"Good, they are probably wondering just how much they have to give before we
hit our limit, since the particle weapons stopped at half a million, and we
haven't fired the ring at more than 700,000 kilometers, they've got to be
getting tired of playing cat and mouse like this." said McGinnis, noting that
the little ships had moved out to nearly 2 million kilometers.

"Tactical, plasma torpedo, just one, shoot for any of those fighters at 1.9
million." said McGinnis.

"Contained plasma torpedo ready," replied Schultz.

"Fire!"

The longer torpedo raced through space, and a second later, blew another pair
of fighters to atoms.

"Sir, they're backing off *very quickly*. Range now 2.3 million... 2.4
million... 2.5 million... 2.7 million.... 2.85 million and holding."

"Very well, just let them think on it for awhile."

"They're just sitting there, apparently they don't want to test us again," said
Moran from her station.

"Well, we've got no better place to go, so we shall wait until they decide to
move. ... Tactical, have another torpedo ready the second that they move."

"Standing by...." replied Schultz, ordering the computer to fire at anything
that moved and was within safe range.

The wait continued for nearly half an hour. It was tedious, frustrating, and
very concerning to McGinnis. While he sat, holding down one force, the
Cardassians were taking their toll on the Bajoran home fleet. If this were
lost, the system would be in enemy hands, and retaking it would be just as
difficult, no matter whether those hands were Cardassian or Dominion-dominated
in character. Meanwhile, DS9's small ships had been destroyed by the
construct, which had broken into its constituent parts in order to handle them.
It was a contingency that McGinnis had considered, but had hoped would not
happen.

He was waiting for the Dominion to make a mistake, and they were waiting for
Cisco to let down his guard. Over all, there was much too much waiting going
on for his satisfaction. However, there was nothing to do but keep waiting...

Finally, things changed, and not for the better.

"Sir, I have an incoming transmission from Bajoran forces commander."

"... yes, yes, put it on screen."

McGinnis brought himself out of his trance, and turned to the main viewer.

"Admiral, the Cardassians are about to break our line, we need your help now!"

"I can't move, more than two thirds of the entire Dominion forces are still
sitting in front of me, and if I move, they'll level every structure on your
planet. There's no way that you can hold them off without your main fleet."

"I am well-aware of that, but you'll understand that we do not want the
Cardassians to return to power in this system," said the Bajoran
general, somewhat tensely.

"I am aware, but if you are alive, you can always be freed later. The
dominion will ensure that that is not a possibility. ... unless..."

"Ops, put that on hold!"

"done," replied Anders.

"Tactical, helm, how long would it take for us to get to Cardassia from here at
maximum possible speed?"

"About forty-five, maybe fifty seconds, at warp 9.975, but we'll have to shut
everything else off to get theree that fast."

"Fine, set a course for the Cardassian fleet, warp seven.... wait until I
tell you to engage."

"Ops, reopen that frequency."

"General, switch all of your forces to my location, I'm going to handle the
Cardassians now, but its a risky bet at best."

"What are you going to do?"

"Let them fire on us."

"What!"

"Let them fire upon us, it will let us intervene more directly, as it will be a
violation of the cease-fire that was signed five years ago."

"Very well, ... For Bajor's sake, I hope that you know what you are doing. We
are disengaging now, I hope that you can intercept the fleet."

"I'm not concerned about that."

"Very well, Tyrae out."

"Helm, set course, and engage, ... tactical, shields up, main ring to full
power, load torpedo bays, bring secondary phasers on-line, and prepare to lock
into distributed computers. Lock main ring and torpedoes into central
computer, and have the systems control the firing sequence."

"Aye Sir, standing by for range.... ten seconds...
eight...six...four...two...range achieved, awaiting your clearance to fire."

As McGinnis had hoped, the Cardassians fired at the Federation vessel, doing
only moderate damage to the outer shielding. However, it gave him the excuse
that he needed.

"You may fire at your earliest convenience," he said.

The blast of energy from the federation super-starship ripped into the
Cardassian formation, reducing the seven remaining ships to five. McGinnis was
glad to see that these ships were too seriously damaged to pose any serious
threat for at least a few minutes. It wasn't much of a window, but it was all
he had time to create. As McGinnis expected, the Cardassian vessels returned
fire, but both due to their damage, and Ticonderoga's massive shielding
advantage, they scored no damage.

"Now, accelerate to maximum possible velocity! execute!" McGinnis said, and the
great ship shot through the Cardassian formation, and accelerated to nearly
warp 9.98. Except for navigational shielding limited computing power, and
inertial dampeners, *nothing* was powered. The ship was now streaking
headlong into a very risky divertion which McGinnis hoped would get the
Cardassians to back off from Bajor, and remember the treaty limitations to
which they had agreed, not five years previously.

SUPER-DREADNOUGHT: Part IV: Chapter XIX:

Command Log: Stardate 56745.8: Admiral William McGinnis Commanding USS
Ticonderoga Recording:

We are headed to Cardassia, on what I would call a "diversionary
tactic". I hope that it works.

"Tactical, the moment we begin decellerating, engage the phase-cloak, and
stand by.

"Helm, keep our course so that we come out of warp in near-orbital space,
and set a course straight for the Cardassian capitol city, bring us to a halt
at 200 kilometers above ground level."

"Aye Sir, plotting post warp course. It may be difficult to get the kind
of acuracy you want in twenty seconds..."

"Well, if you miss, we're all going to be in trouble, so do your job as well as
you always do it."

"Aye..." replied Moran with a concerned and thankful look his way.

"Tactical, the second that we stabilize, switch off the phase-cloak, and raise
all shielding. Bring the auxiliary phasers on line, and leave them charged. I
hope that we won't need to use them."

"Aye Sir, programming..." replied Schultz hunching over his station.

"Now fifteen seconds from deceleration," announced Moran.

"Stand by.... and hold on, I suspect that we will feel this decelleration with
power shunted as it is," said Anders.

"Commander, send out a lock down warning, and hope that everyone's already at
stations."

"Aye, warning out."

"Now five seconds...four...three...two...one......"

The rest of Moran's countdown was overwhelmed by the shriek of the ship coming
down from ultra-high velocity as hard as it possibly could. Everyone was
buffeted about in their stations, but because the computer had locked them all
down, noone was thrown to the floor.

"Engineering, report!" said McGinnis into the air, as he felt the slight shift
of perspective that always came with the use of the phase-cloak.

"Engineering, Data here, sir. I believe that all of the crew here are
functional, no major injuries. The phase-cloak is operating normally,
and all other systems and structures are holding at nominal levels."

"Thank you Mr. Data," said McGinnis to his first officer, who was now in charge
of engineering, as no senior officer was left to handle the responsibilities.
The bridge could function without him, and both of them had thought that his
presence in engineering would be the most "useful," after the extent of the
casualties had become clear after the incident with the rogue Klingon ship.
Therefore, Data had been supervising the engineering repairs since that time,
and would retain his post until the ship could return to base for final
repairs.

"Sir, now passing through upper atmosphere," reported Moran.

"Hold your course, notify me when we're inserted at the proper level."

"Twenty seconds to position."

All of them watched as Cardassian defenses scrambled to deal with the invader
that had ripped into their system at speeds that the Cardassian command had
assumed were impossible. However, with the phase-cloak in operation, the
regular levels of ionic interference in Cardassia's upper atmosphere made
finding the ship absolutely impossible. Of course, McGinnis had counted on
this....

"Position achieved," announced Moran.

"Very well, ... tactical, disengage phase-cloak, shields and auxiliary phasers
to full power.... Ops, get me a channel to the Cardassian leadership."

The ship flipped into visibility, only a few hundred kilometers above the
capitol city of the Cardassian Empire. To put it mildly, this was the last
place that the Cardassian defenders would have liked to find such a powerful,
and unhappy, enemy.

"Sir, we've gota response," said Anders, with more than a bit of humor in
her voice.

"Put them on screen," replied McGinnis.

"I am Gul Meset, and I demand to know why you have invaded Cardassian
territory."

McGinnis recognized the man, he had dealt with him, both on the field of
battle, and over the negotiating table. He did not like, or trust, him in the
slightest.

"Gul Meset, It is good to see that you are still alive," said McGinnis, more
than a bit of sarcasm in his comment. "Your ships have crossed into Bajoran
space, thereby violating the treaty that you and I signed five years ago.
Quite honestly, I am surprised that you would be so lacking in respect for your
old enemies. However, that is not important now. What is important is that
you have violated the cease-fire, and this being the case, I will have to
respond in kind unless you withdraw from the Bajoran system immediately."

"Admiral, it is good to see you again," replied Meset in his typical, oily
voice. "Had I known that you were back from your recent mission, and with such
a grand new ship, I would have rethought the wisdom of trying to retake the
wormhole at this time. However, I know that things are going very badly for
the Bajorans, and that we will be able to take the planet without too many
shots fired. By the time your response is made, I will have the wormhole, and
you will have to retake it by force."

"That is as may be, but you forget that I'm sitting so close to your capitol
city that if you fire on my ship, and miss, you will do great damage to your
governing center. Of course, you'll have to turn your defensive satellietes
around to hit this ship, and by that point, they will be annihilated. In any
case, I believe that you need, ... convincing, ... of the seriousness of my
intentions. Therefore, I shall destroy a large fraction of your orbiting
defenses ...in two minutes, unless you call off your ships."

"I can not do that, Admiral." replied Meset.

"Very well, but know that I did warn you, ... Ticonderoga out."

"Tactical, lock auxiliary phasers on those orbiting platforms, knock them down
as quickly as possible. Charge the main ring, but don't use it unless you
can't shoot down anything with the smaller weapons."

"Aye, Sir!", replied Schultz, rapidly programming the computers to do something
that he thought should have been done long ago.

The phasers struck in many different directions. There were a lot of
orbiting defense satellites, and some were shielded. However, combined
fire from the auxiliary weapons was sufficient to deal with even these
platforms. However, the work went slowly, and it took nearly half an
hour to knock down all of the close-range orbiting defenses. Those that
were in far orbit would have to wait until later.

Just as the ship was finishing with the first stage of its assigned task,
a small cardassian defense shuttle streaked in, hoping to get in a lucky shot
on the upper edge of the ship's main hull, or on a warp nacelle. The auxiliary
weapons were not fully charged, so the main computer was forced to use the ring
to knock the flea out of the way. The flare of light was so bright that
anyone who was looking at the great ship was blinded.

Apparently, this event got the Gul's attention where the knocking out of
his home defenses had not.

"Sir, I have a transmission from Gul Meset," announced Anders.

"Put him on."

"Admiral, ... it is possible that we could negotiate a new agreement that
would be satisfactory to both sides, I hope?"

"No, unfortunately, you have proven your inability to stay with agreements that
you make. Here are my terms. 1. You surrender all military vessels of the
Federation classification of light-cruiser or higher to the Bajoran provisional
government. 2. You allow me to destroy all ship construction facilities on
Cardassia IV, and you release all prisoners held there. 3. You remove all of
your planetary defenses, except for the deep-space and atmospheric defenses.
4. You agree to flash inspections of all military and civilian construction
facilities by any power that desires them. and 5, you withdraw from Bajoran
space immediately."

"Those are incredibly harsh terms!" snapped meset. "You must know that they
would leave us practically defenseless, and that they would cause major
disruption to our internal political and economic structure."

"Yes, I am aware of the consequences, and believe that you and your friends in
the military would be rather too busy dealing with your internal problems to
cause Bajor, or the Federation, any trouble for quite some time.
... Meset, I have too many other problems demanding my immediate attention to
allow you the ability to come in on the side of house Durass in the action
going on with the Klingons and Romulans, and I am unwilling to trust you to
keep any lesser bargain."

"I see, then I suppose that I shall have to refuse your terms."

"As I said, I am quite busy at the moment, and would rather not have to delay
here any more than is necessary. I will, if necessary, begin a bombardment of
your planet ... which is within my rights under the treaty, considering that
you broke the cease-fire first."

"I shall contact you in a moment," said Meset, who cut the channel from his
end.

"Sir, with all due respect, I'm not sure that Command will be happy with what's
going on here," said Anders from her station.

"I think that you are very likely right, but unlike the treaty five years ago,
which we signed under conditions which approximated those of the golden age, we
can't afford kid gloves any more. Cardassia is not a major threat to the
Federation as a whole, but it can threaten allied governments like Bajor, and
with much of our military strength occupied in other areas, they pose a
reasonably serious threat to some members in the outer areas of Federation
space. This game of brinksmanship, if it works properly will allow me to
ensure that they are busy with their own concerns, and with our inspectors, for
a while. Sooner or later, a politician will cut back on my restrictions, and
it will be back to business as usual. However, for the moment, while I've got
them where I want them, it seems prudent to make sure that business as usual
will stop here and now, for a while at least."

Anders turned back to her station, shocked at the hard hand that McGinnis was
willing to use on the Cardassians. Had this been an unknown civilization, the
violations of the prime directive that he was contemplating would have been too
numerous to count. As it was, she felt that McGinnis was taking the short-term
view, and that ultimately Cardassia would have to be reformed, not forced into
an unacceptable peace. However, McGinnis was a brilliant military strategist,
and she knew that the star fleet that she had joined as an ensign fifteen years
previously was not the organization that now defended the Federation from a
newly hostile galaxy. She hoped furvently that she would not be forced to
command a ship in this "new", and retrenched organization.

Her reverie was cut short by a blinking light on her pannel. It was Meset,
calling back.

"Sir, Gul Meset on main viewer," she said.

"admiral, I have conferred with my colleagues, and we have a counter
proposal."

"I'm listening," replied McGinnis, well-aware that negotiating was not one of
his strong suits. he had been included as military representative on the
negotiating team five years ago because some of the diplomats had not been sure
that The Cardassians would listen to the Federation delegates without an
obvious sign of "commitment," to their original cease-fire terms.

"We are willing to pull out of Bajoran space, allow inspections of our
construction facilities, and disarm to the levels set in the treaty five
years ago."

"Unacceptable," replied McGinnis. ... "If you follow your terms, plus disarming
to the fleet strength of the Bajoran home forces, release all political
prisoners, and allow me to take out your construction facilities, I will accept
your offer."

"A moment, please."

"My time, and patience, are short." replied McGinnis.

The screen reverted to its view of the suddenly-empty air and ground traffic
patterns on that side of Cardassia.

McGinnis felt that he had no choice but to up the ante even further. However,
in spite of his inherent lack of respect for the Cardassian military, whose
technology was twenty years behind this new ship, he did know that if he pushed
too hard, things could slip out of control. However, a strong enough blow
against the Cardassian Empire would also force them to deal with internal
problems before they could retalliate. By that point, the war in the north
would have either been won or lost. He therefore decided to use the strongest
card in his hand.

"Computer, log general Order number 24, stardate 56745.9. The following
procedures for this bombardment schedule. All offensive and defensive systems
of this vessel shall now be under direct control of the main computer core,
with override priority to the commander and tactical officer. Should these be
incapacitated, control shall stay in the main computer, until the first officer
can assess the situation. Bombardment priorities shall be as follows: military
installations, space-based; Military installations, ground-based,
communications, transportation, and governmental control facilities; and
Civilian populations as lowest priority targets."

"Command order, general order 24, recognized. Prioritizations and computer
control procedures accepted. Awaiting time for commencement of controlled
weapons assault."

"Time is 60 minutes, mark." said McGinnis.

"60 minutes recognized and locked, bombardment shall begin in 60 minutes."

"Sir, Gul Meset back for you," said Anders.

"Put him on," replied McGinnis.

"Admiral, we will agree to all of your terms, except for the disarmament
clause. We can not hold down our military commitments with such minimal
forces."

McGinnis translated this in his mind to 'hold down our conquered territory'.
Verbally he said:

"You must disarm or I cannot accept your terms."

"I am not permitted to disarm to that level, but I am willing to allow you to
ensure that we will not build further forces."

"You will not stand in the way of a total bombardment of your construction
facilities on Cardassia IV?"

"Yes, that is quite right."

"That is a welcomed concession, but it is still insufficient. ... I would
trade you Bajor and a half forces for relief of the destruction of purely
civilian construction facilities on Cardassia IV. "

"I shall be back with you momentarily."

"Meset, tell your people that this ship's computers have been set to begin a
general order 24 bombardment of this planet in fifty-eight minutes forty-five
seconds."

"I see... Meset out."

"Sir, I respectfuly suggest that you're pushing him too hard," said Anders from
her station.

"Ms. Anders, I understand your reservations, but we do not have enough force to
take a more standard route, so I must hold the proverbial gun to Meset's head.
If you can't accept what is happening now, you are welcomed to call for relief
and stand down on your duties until we return to home port."

Anders' head turned sharply at this, the shock clear in her eyes. McGinnis had
come down on her hard in the past, but this was unprecedented.

"No Sir, that will not be necessary."

"Good!, I would hate to lose one of my best officers at a time like this."

Time passed, and the small status clock in the main viewer was showing a bit
less than ten minutes when Anders turned to McGinnis.

"Gul Meset for you sir."

"Put him up there, and let's hope that this is the last time."

"Admiral, if you will agree to forces twice the size of current Bajoran
strength, destruction of our ship-building facilities, unnanounced
inspection tours, and no releases of political prisoners, we can live
with that."

"Very well, I shall write an agreement, and we shall sign via sub-space link in
five minutes."

"Very well, I await your call."

McGinnis was glad that the original treaty had allowed him (or any other full
admiral), to sign such a reinforcement of the treaty, if Cardassia broke it.
He had been surprised that they had gone for it then, but with three-fourths of
their fleet destroyed, and the Bajorans calling for the destruction of
Cardassia, they had had little choice. He was even more surprised that the
Cardassians had tried to break the agreement so flagrantly. Admittedly, there
wasn't much in the way that the Federation could have done, had Ticonderoga not
been in the area. This single happenstance was all that stood between Bajor and
either Cardassian defeat, or destruction by the dominion fleet; McGinnis knew
that either could still happen if things didn't play out just right.

"Ms. Anders, get me Star Fleet HQ, priority one, for Admiral Jellico only."

"Aye sir, it will take a moment."

"Very well,"

McGinnis quickly wrote the terms of the new cease-fire, and loaded them into
the ship's main computers for immediate transmittal to Admiral Jellico when the
link was established.

"Sir, Admiral Jellico on the main viewer," announced Anders.

"William, what is your status?"

"Sir, while my crew was taking shore leave at Deep Space Nine, a powerful
Cardassian fleet struck at the Bajoran system. At practically the same moment,
a powerful fleet from the Dominion crossed through the worm hole, and began to
move toward Bajor. We gave them appropriate warnings, and then began to fire
upon their fleet, as their stated objective was the destruction of Bajor. The
Cardassians, meanwhile broke through the Bajoran line, so I told their
commander to deal with the Dominion forces, while I stared down the
Cardassians. before I could even come to a halt, they fired upon this ship.
I did not fire first, and therefore interpreted this as a violation of the
Federation/Cardassian treaty. As the Bajoran military asked for Federation
assistance in the matter, our alliance and economic treaties also seemed to
govern my actions since then. I am now sitting over the Cardassian capitol,
and have forced the Cardassians to agree to major force reductions, destruction
of their military construction facilities, and a pull-back from the Bajoran
system. I wanted to be sure that you'd back me on this before I make them sign
the new cease-fire."

"Yes, of course, I will back you, their actions in the last few months have
been a concern as you know, and that was why I wanted you in the area. The
council may have some problems with the preemptory nature of your action, but
they owe you a lot, after the Borg campaign's success, I wouldn't worry about
that much. Go ahead, take whatever action you feel is necessary, but keep
Cardassian casualties to a minimum."

"Thank you, Ticonderoga out. ... Ops, Get me in touch with Gul Meset."

"He's waiting on channel II."

"On the viewer if you will,"

"Meset, here are the terms of the new cease-fire, you should begin evacuating
your facilities immediately, I will be at Cardassia IV in four hours to begin
the destructions."

"Yes, I am sure that you will be, your treaty is now signed by me, representing
the Cardassian military and government."

"Good, then I look forward to reports that your forces have departed Bajoran
space."

"You shall have them. Admiral, as always, it is a pleasure doing business with
you."

"I'm glad you think so, if you and your government would take a less beligerent
stance, I believe that we could meet less frequently. Gul Meset, you must
understand that such a decrease in the frequency of our meetings would please
me as much as it would you. For now, I wish you good health and prosperity,
... McGinnis out."

The channel closed, and McGinnis sat back, letting out a deep sigh. The
"negotiations" had been easier than he had expected. He had honestly expected
to have to destroy a number of Cardassian cities before the Cardassian
government gave in. Of course, they might well be planning something, but
there was no way to know for sure. Until the ship was out of Cardassian space,
it would remain at red alert.

"Ms. Anders, keep an ear open for a call from Bajoran military or governmental
headquarters. Notify everyone that we will remain at condition 1 for the
moment, but that if crew get clearance from their departmental heads, they are
welcomed to stand down their stations for brief periods of time in order to
move about the ship."

"Aye Sir, notification is out, awaiting Bajoran signal."

Within moments, the message had come through. The Cardassians were pulling
back, and the computer had confirmed that it had been General Tyrae making the
report. With this out of the way, McGinnis could begin to think about the work
ahead.

***

Four hours later, the ship was in orbit over Cardassia IV, but as McGinnis had
expected, a major difficulty had arisen. Apparently the Cardassian military
had chosen not to evacuate their construction facilities. McGinnis saw no
reason for unnecessary casualties, but then again, he wasn't a cardassian.

"Ms. Anders, try to raise Gul Meset."

"Trying... I have another Gul, by the name of Dahrat."

"Very well, put him on the main viewer."

"Gul Dahrat, I want you to know, that I intend to destroy your construction
facilities, and I would like to keep casualties on both sides to a minimum.
That won't be possible, if your government does not remove your personel from
those bases. You and I both know that I am within my rights under the treaty
of Bajor, and the cease-fire of Cardassia to destroy those bases, inhabited or
not. However, I see no reason for unnecessary casualties. Therefore, I will
give you an hour to remove your personel."

"Admiral, many of our soldiers do not want to leave those bases. We have
removed all of the people that can be removed."

"Very well, but I want it known here that I gave those people the chance to
leave your installations. I do not want to be known as the man who heartlessly
slaughtered innocent Cardassian construction workers."

"We will not record it so, but you must know that the Cardassian people will
remember you that way."

McGinnis knew this well, and there was nothing to be done about it. He also
knew that the Cardassian government would portray him as a heartless killer,
representative of a power full of officials and military people who wanted to
kill Cardassians so that they would not rise to their appointed place in the
Galaxy. It could not be helped.

"Gul Dahrat, I will offer those people one more chance to evacuate themselves,
then I shall destroy those bases, inhabited or not."

"I understand, Admiral. Dahrat out."

"Ops, send those people a final warning, tell them that they are welcomed
to evacuate by transporter or shuttle for the next fifteen minutes, after
that, we shall open fire."

"Sent, Sir."

At this moment, the Cardassian patroll ships that had, until then, respected
the great warship's firepower, drove forward, hoping to defend their friends
and relatives on Cardassia IV. The automated systems were ready, and the small
ships, though numerous, were destroyed out of hand by torpedo and auxiliary
phaser fire. Only one ship was powerful enough to break through the defenses
to the fifty-thousand kilometer defense limit, which resulted in the discharge
of the main ring. One shot, and this small light-cruiser-class ship
disintegrated into a violent maelstrom of light and heat. By the time that
these ships were destroyed, McGinnis' time limit had passed, and the bases
awaited destruction.

It was handled, as everything else this day had been, by the computer.
Carefully targetted blasts took out power generation facilities, which either
fusion or matter/antimatter powered, supplied more than enough destructive
potential to destroy the orbiting facilities, or render them unusable for many
months to come.

The planetary facilities were taken care of by discharges from the main ring,
mostly using its particle phaser settings. Although not as destructive as the
high-energy standard settings, these were more appropriate to carefully planned
and targetted fire. The planetary facilities were often located near prison
facilities, many of which contained Cardassian political prisoners. The fire
was carefully aimed and none of these prisons suffered damage. This despite
the fact that the ship never came closer than a million kilometers from the
planet. Within an hour, the job was done.

"Tactical, shut down all weapons, save the main ring. Leave it at stand-by
status, and engage the phase-cloaking device. Also, give me your analysis of
what we have seen here."

"Sir, all weapons except main ring are now shut down. The ring is at stand-by
status, phase-cloaking device engaged. In so far as what we've seen here is
concerned, I would say that we can safely assume that the Cardassians hurried
forward construction on a number of the ships that we saw at Bajor, because
they believed that they could capture the system while Federation and other
resources were directed elsewhere. this is the main reason for the lack of
ships in progress in the docks at this time. We were very fortunate to have
been there when we were."

"Thank you, I tend to agree. ... Helm, set course for Bajor, warp 9.6, we still
have the Dominion to deal with."

"Course laid in, and warp 9.6 engaged," replied Moran.

With these words, the already invisible ship, accelerated toward Bajor,
and a situation which had not yet been fully dealt with.

SUPER-DREADNOUGHT: Part IV: Chapter XX

Command Log: Stardate 56746.2: Admiral William McGinnis, Commanding USS
Ticonderoga, recording:

We are returning to Bajor, in order to assist their dwindling defense forces
against a large fleet of craft sent there by the Dominion. It is fortunate
that we were there, because there are few resources in the area. Had the
Bajorans sent a distress call, and another federation vessel responded, it
would have taken too long for it to arrive, and any other single ship wouldn't
have had sufficient firepower to dislodge the Cardassians from Bajor, or defeat
the Dominion fleet. I can't avoid the feeling that we've been lucky.

However, while we have been ensuring that the Cardassians will not be able to
violate the cease-fire agreement for some time to come, the fleet
from The Dominion has continued to work over the Bajoran home fleet, which was
already weakend after their defensive battle against the Cardassian attack
force. We were able to whittle the Dominion ships down some, and stop the
Cardassians, but there is still a very real possibility that the Bajoran
civilization will be destroyed by the Dominion, which claims that the
influences coming from this quadrant of the galaxy are disrupting their
internal political relationships. Quite honestly, I can't say whether this is
true, and because of the size of this vessel, and the serious depletion of its
crew, I believe that direct investigation would be difficult. Hopefully we
can come up with an acceptable arrangement, as the Dominion has declared its
determination to destroy Deep space 9, and Bajor as well.

The destruction of the space station seems a reasonable goal, but it is unclear
to me why they wish to destroy the sponsoring government's planet. This is
only one of the many issues to which we now return from Cardassia.

"Helm, ETA at Deep Space 9?"

"At our current warp 9.6, we will arrive at DeS9 in two minutes twenty
seconds."

"Tactical, do we have an evaluation of the military situation yet?"

"Sir, computer's working on it now, but preliminary results suggest that the
Bajoran fleet has held against the fighter forces, and DS9 is still trading
fire with the Dominion construct. We are still too far to be able to tell what
the conditions aboard either the station or that ship are. It'll be another
half minute before I can guess, and about eighty seconds before we're close
enough for a final evaluation."

"Right, disengage phase-cloaking device, power all weapons, and stand by."

"Phase-cloak disengaged, all weapons powered and standing by," replied Schultz.

"Helm, adjust course so that we have the construct trapped between ourselves
and the space station."

"Aye, computer is handling tactical navigation, and has changed course
according to your new perameters," reported Moran.

The computers were best at making split-second changes in course, as they could
take simple perameters, and make the mathematical calculations necessary to
achieve the goal. Therefore, when in battle, the helmsman could just use a
touch-sensitive surface and tell the computer where the ship should be. This
was only useful in high-speed situations like this one, where the actual course
correction was tiny, only requiring a slight change in the ship's angle of
approach.

"Sir, we now have preliminary data on shielding and weapons," announced
Schultz.

"Report."

"DS9 is nearing shield failure, with moderate damage to many parts of the outer
areas of the station. All of its weapons are still functional, but with loss
of shield integrity, this probably won't hold long. The construct has suffered
much more structural damage, possibly due to the weaknesses which would result
from using that kind of modular design. Their shields are in better condition
than those on DS9, and they still have full estimated weapons."

"Thank you, when we get into range, have the computer target shields and
weapons, I want to be sure that they can leave if they so choose."

"Aye, setting perameters."

The great ship closed on its target, and began to slow in order to come into
the proper position. However, the commander of the Dominion ship could see
Ticonderoga closing on his vulnerable weak side, preparing to catch him in a
powerful trap. There was no choice but to back off, any other action being
likely to result in the fiery deaths of his crew, their mission not yet
complete.

"Sir, Dominion construct moving to avoid the vice," reported Schultz.

"Very well, then we take them on one-on-one. ... Helm, course 168 mark 299,
warp 8."

The ship dove down and right, nearly reversing its direction. This maneuver
took it away from the Dominion vessel, which slowed its retreat.

"Now, come around to course 16, mark 24, warp 9.6," said McGinnis tensely.

The ship swung about sharply, and was suddenly closing on the surprised
dominion commander.

"Tactical, fire all weapons, target weapons and shielding, secondary targeting
on engines."

The ship spat torpedoes and then phased energy, all of which crashed into
the shielding of the dominion vessel, nearly crumpling it on the first attack.
Ticonderoga shot past the Dominion vessel, and then began to swing around for a
second run.

However, the Dominion commander now knew that his opponent had better speed
than he did, and so depended on superior maneuverability. The ship reversed
course hard, and caught Ticonderoga with a blast from its plasma torpedoes.
The great ship staggered slightly, but remained unaffected.

Now, it was a battle of maneuverability against firepower, and despite its
over-powered impulse drive, Ticonderoga could not maneuver as quickly as the
Dominion ship did. However, it could use vastly superior firepower to deal
with the ship.

"Helm, bring us around to 196 marc 38, warp 2. Then, when we're just passing
over them, bring us straight up, full impulse."

"Course plotted, laid in."

"Tactical, ready the main ring, and load aft torpedo tube with photon
torpedoes. When we've swung up, the computer should fire the torpedoes,
and then hit them with the ring after they passs below us. If it
doesn't, do it yourself."

"Aye sir, computers are in agreement with you, locks are already set."

"Good,..."

His comment was interrupted by a hard jolt from the enemy vessel which was
trying to get a lucky shot in on the forced quantum generator. Unfortunately
for them, the auxiliary shields took the hit, where the main shields had
temporarily been overwhelmed. There was no damage from the attack.
Ticonderoga was much more lucky. Its torpedoes slammed into the weakened
shielding of the enemy vessel, breaking it totally. The blast from the main
ring smashed into the weapons section of the alien ship, utterly destroying it.
The force of the blast was so great that the construct broke up into its
constituent parts. Clearly, they could not recombine.

On the surface of the matter, this was good, meaning that the enemy had lost
their main heavy weapon. However, some of the parts careened through space,
unpowered, and uncontrolled. One of them struck DS9 a glancing blow, causing
massive structural damage to the habitat ring and the new outer docking
facility as well. The station hadd clearly been put out of commission for some
time to come.

"Sir, those ships are headed for the fighter groups, I think that they'll
try to slug it out with the Bajoran ships, and I'd bet that they'll have a
respectable shot at it. On a unit-for-unit basis, they're about a match," said
Schultz.

"Very well, we'll have to make sure that they've got fewer units. Also, since
we're nearly out of resources, tell the computer to set the torpedoes to hunt
down groups of fighters and destroy them."

"Aye, setting perameters, computer is already locking on the constrct's units.
Firing the main ring."

Pulses of fire struck at the scout-sized ships, which had no chance of
withstanding this heavy artillery. After a few moments, the combined efforts
of the Bajoran and Federation weapons had knocked out most of the construct's
subunits.

McGinnis now felt that he could push the commander of the Dominion's forces to
give him a cease fire, and a retreat from Bajoran space for some period of
time.

"Ms. Anders, get their ranking officer for me, put him/her on the main viewer
as soon as you have established contact."

"Aye Sir, it may take a moment."

"We have time."

Meanwhile, the great ship's rapid-fire weapons were knocking out more of the
fighters, which were trapped between it and the Bajoran space forces. McGinnis
knew that if they broke the Bajoran line that there were still far too many for
the Bajoran air forces to handle, and that their little photon-style missile
weapons would do critical damage to populated areas of the planet. For this
reason he was willing to take added risk, such as allowing himself to be in a
position in which he could be hit hard by these same craft. Clearly the pilots
realized this, and were maneuvering to fire at their large adversary.

The primary shielding was still down, but the auxiliary and secondary shields,
just as powerful as the primaries, were holding well, despite the hail of
three-megaton explosives hitting them. Ultimately, it came down to whether the
combined fire of Ticonderoga nad the bajouran fleet would destroy the fighters
before they could take out either of the two forces opposing them. Clearly,
the dominion's commander was willing to wait until a clear decision came before
discussion with McGinnis would occur.

The final decision came when a number of short-range patroll ships from the
Federation's Cardassian border fleet arrived in-system, in response to
Commadore Cisco's continued calls for assistance. Their added firepower began
to allow for a slow, but steady offensive that pulled the Dominion's fleet back
to the area of the wormhole.

Seeing that he was in a natural position to hold the Dominion fleet in the
system, without chance of easy escape through the wormhole, McGinnis simply
decided to sit still for a while.

"Helm, just sit here for a while, I want him to have to negotiate his way
home." said McGinnis. With this, a signal from the Dominion forces commander
came to Ticonderoga.

"Admiral McGinnis, you have bested us this day, but I do not intend to leave
the matter unfinished. The presence of you and your allies in our spaces is
dangerous to our way of life, and we are willing to fight to the death to
protect it."

"I understand your concerns, but there is little that I can do to address them.
I suggest that you speak with the head of the Bajoran government, they may be
willing to restrict traffic through the wormhole until a more satisfactory
agreement can be made. As commander of Federation forces, I can only tell you
that Federation shipping will be given direct orders not to pass through for
some period of time, until my superiors on Earth overrule me, or until they
feel that we can make Bajor safe from any attack that you may attempt."

"Very well, but I believe that you should be a part of this conversation,
as yours is the most powerful force on your side at the moment."

"Agreed, I shall set up the conference call. If you will please wait a
moment."

"Certainly."

With this McGinnis waved to Anders to begin making the necessary calls.
He then turned to Walter Schultz.

"Mr. Schultz, what is your analysis of remaining forces, both sides?"

"Sir, the Bajorans have taken heavy losses between the Cardassians and the
Dominion forces. I estimate that less than half of their fleet is
battleworthy. Two of the light patroll craft from our own fleet are destroyed,
with four left more or less undamaged. DS9 is seriously damaged, repairs will
take quite some time. We have suffered major losses in shielding, but only one
of their missiles penetrated, and it did practically no consequential damage as
it struck the upper engineering hull, just increasing the damage to the
secondary collimator there. It was too weak to do much damage to the hull
itself."

"Thank you, dominion forces status?"

"Sir, they have only two of those construct parts left, one is the command
section, the other appears to have been part of the energy production system,
and is unusually heavily shielded and lightly armed. They still have almost
half of their fighters, but I am quite certain that we can deal with those
should it be necessary."

"Good, would the Bajorans be able to handle them alone?"

"No sir, not a chance. There are too many of them and they're too mobile
for the remaining Bajoran forces to deal with without Federation assistance."

"Thank you, that is important to any hope of peace."

"Sir, Minister Kira on channel two, she is willing to confer with the
Dominion force's commander."

"Very well, put them both on screen,"

"I am Minister Kira of the Bajoran Government. You have invaded our space, and
tried to destroy The Bajoran people. Now that you are defeated, I demand your
immediate surrender to either Federation or Bajoran authority."

"Minister, your activities threaten the survival of the dominion, and we can
not permit you to continue to use the wormhole. Therefore, we demand that you
agree to stop all missions through it, something that Admiral McGinnis claims
that he can not do."

"We have the power to do so, but you are not in a position to enforce terms."

"Minister, I can see all of your forces here, and although the Federation is
very powerful, its ships here are few, and I am unwilling to believe that they
would waste such resources here on the chance that we will come back. I will
also tell you that ours was a probe force,and that larger forces can be
collected to defeat your defenses."

At this point, McGinnis cut in.

"Commander, you may be able to bring greater forces, but at the moment, you
would have difficulty getting home to inform them of what you have seen. As
long as you are on this side of the hole, I can keep you from getting back
through, by simply sitting just outside the portal and letting you try to pass.
Also, rebuilding your forces, even for another attack might take longer than it
would take for us to get enough ships here to stop you. I suggest that you
accept a temporary stop to transit through the wormhole, until such time as
better negotiations can be carried out.Otherwise I will have to keep you from
transiting the wormhole, and you can not get to Bajor, which would leave you
totally defeated and dead as well. If you were completely defeated, your
people wouldn't know what you've found out,which would leave your government in
danger for a longer period of time, while the Bajorans continued to sponsor use
of the wormhole from this end. At your end, you can always stop ships coming
out, and force them to return to this side."

"Admiral, you speak wisely, and I believe that it may be best, for the moment,
to blockade the effect on our end. However, if ships continue to pass through,
we will be back, and with a force many times the size of this one. For the
moment, I shall leave in peace, and hope that you can resolve things for your
allies here."

"I have something to say here," snapped Kira, thinking that she had been
ignored. "We have the right to use the wormhole any way that we choose, and as
allies of the Federation, we demand that you protect us."

"Ops, close the commander's channel for a moment," said McGinnis. He then
turned to Kira's image.

"Minister, please accept a temporary truce, most of these resources are needed
by actual members of the Federation, and with our ... other commitments at the
moment, keeping a force of this nature here forever is not possible. I suggest
that you follow the commander's lead and accept a truce that is less than what
you want, as anything else may prove to be far less acceptable."

Kira looked at him in shock, not fully believing that he was forcing her to
accept a peace that would threaten Bajor's economic security.

"I can't believe that you're doing this."

"Minister, their needs are as legitimate as yours are, my ship is terribly
undermanned, my crew is exhausted, I have very few torpedoes left, I have long
standing damage, and I must return to my home port soon in order to make
necessary repairs. The federation is at war against most of the powers of the
galaxy, and I only barely avoided a war with Cardassia, which would have been
rather bad for Bajor no matter what the situation with the dominion. I am not
in the mood to negotiate over this, and would be happy to leave you to the
tender mercies of the commander of the Dominion's fleet. You don't have the
resources to hold them off, and you would be in a much worse place than you are
now. If you had signed The Articles of Federation, things would be different,
but you have chosen not to, so I have little responsibility to you, and in
fact, have done more than I probably needed to."

She stared at him, unwilling to accept the fact that, again, Bajor was under
the control of a power far larger than it would ever be.

"Very well, I suppose that I must accept this agreement, but know that I shall
lodge a protest concerning how you have treated the Bajoran goverment and
people. I don't see that I have a choice, as far as the current situation is
concerned."

"No, unfortunately, I think that you don't have another legitimate option."

"Ops, put the commander back up in conference mode."

"Admiral, what is your decision?" asked the other being, understanding
well that the final decision lay in the hands of the person with the most
firepower in the area, no matter what the needs of the local governments might
be.

"The Bajoran government agrees to a cessation of hostilities, but if you come
back through, know that we will be ready for you," said Kira, not waiting for
McGinnis to begin speaking.

"It isn't my issue any more, you must leave, but I can guarantee that
Federation forces will not follow you, and the Bajorans are independent, so I
think that you have the word on their plans from The Minister." said McGinnis.
"However, I do suggest that you two find a neutral third party to negotiate
some kind of agreement between you, I am not that person, and unless you choose
to make a request to the Federation diplomatic bureau, the Federation will not
involve itself in local affairs of non-alligned worlds." "For now, plese leave
Bajoran space and let things cool off for a while."

"Very well, good luck in your travels Admiral, I have grown to respect both
your ship and your strategy over the last few hours." replied the Dominion
commander before his ship turned and disappeared through the wormhole.

Quickly enough, all of the dominion craft were back on the other side, leaving
Ticonderoga, a few small Federation ships, and the tattered remains of the
Bajoran fleet to tend to the needs of the many wounded and dead on DS9.

However, before Ticonderoga could do anything, a signal came in from Star Fleet
Head Quarters.

"Admiral, Admiral Jellico on for you."

"Put him on screen," replied McGinnis, hoping that they would get some time in
port from this call.

"William, I know of the events in the Bajoran system, and congratulate you on a
good temporary truce. You need to get back to your home port for repairs, I
don't want your crew out in space any longer than necessary, you haven't had
significant leave in more than seven months. You will therefore set a course
for your home port at maximum velocity, and not divert for any reason, unless I
order you to change your flight plan personally."

Apparenlty, Jellico had expected to get some kind of resistance from McGinnis.
He was terribly surprised when McGinnis said:

"Agreed, Sir, setting course immediately."

"Excellent, I look forward to hearing of your safe arrival at home soon.
Also, tell your crew that I share their loss, and wish that the Borg campaign
had not been so bloody. I know that you and I have talked several times in the
last few days, but I have been too busy to remember to deal with things other
than those that are very immediate."

"We all understand, and know of the situation throughout the rest of our space.
Thank you for your kind words, and unless there is anything else, I should let
you bet back to the business at hand."

"No, nothing else, travel safely and have your port commander contact me when
you arrive."

"Aye Sir, Ticonderoga out."

With that, McGinnis sighed, and turned to the helm.

"Ms Moran, set course for the Polaris system, maximum possible speed."

"Aye Sir, course laid in, velocity is warp 9.75, ETA seventy-four hours."

"Very well, if I'm needed, I'll be in my quarters. I want all of you to get
relief as quickly as possible, but until you have it, Mr. Schultz, you have the
bridge."

With these words, McGinnis left the bridge, giving himself and his crew time to
reflect on the victories won, the losses encurred, and life in general. he
knew, as he entered his quarters, that this ship still had many missions to
perform, but at least they would get some rest, relaxation, and medical care
for those who needed it, before they would see action in the widening war. For
the upcommning respite, all of them were very thankful. McGinnis could only
hope that it would last quite some time. he knew that everyone was exhausted,
and the time would do all of them good. With these thoughts, he fell asleep,
while the ship streaked toward home, and temporary peace.

 
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