Chapter Text
The new Galaxy Alliance proved to be a very interesting organization. In the weeks following the announcement from Chancellor K'mpec, the Rihannsu, the Cardassians, and even the Ferengi signed the new Qo'noS Accords, forming a much more powerful military force in Starfleet. Former enemies and estranged neighbors were suddenly thrust together, serving alongside one another. Many of those who held rank in the Galae, the Klingon Defense Force, and the Cardassian Military Command received transferred commissions or ratings within Starfleet. The most surprising and impressive display of alliance and trust came in the form of the appointment of a socially and governmentally prominent Rihannsu flag officer as the Commander-in-Chief of all Starfleet forces. K'mpec, in his wisdom, put down any opposition to his selection, citing that the enemy of his enemy was his friend.
Signing the Qo'noS Accords required those signatories and the governments they represented to adhere to new rules and regulations. The Cardassian Union was ordered by the Chancellor to uphold the stipulation that any race of beings held in captivity for the express purposes of exploitation of that government were to be delivered from such treatment. Following debate and stalling, a month after the Cardassians joined the Alliance, the planet Bajor and its people were recognized by the Alliance as a sovereign power. The Bajorans enjoyed their long-fought-for freedom, forming a provisional government and establishing a military defense force to protect themselves. The Bajoran government voted two months later, to send an ambassador to Qo'noS to apply Bajor to the Alliance as a full member. Following their quick acceptance, Terok Nor, the Cardassian station in orbit of Bajor, was reallocated as an Alliance Starbase, and received technological upgrades to assist in fighting the Borg. The short-lived Bajoran Military Forces was absorbed into Starfleet.
With the Treaty of Algeron nullified by the Qo'noS Accords, all Starfleet vessels received cloaking devices as a means of defense against Borg tracking devices and sensors. Former Federation, Klingon, Rihannsu, Cardassian, and Bajoran scientists and researchers began to produce better starship hulls, more effective weapons, and shield generators able to withstand the effect of the Borg cutting beams. Starships with the highest priority for upgrades turned out to be the patrol vessels along the Borg Hot Zone (BHZ), and the Malinche was ordered to proceed to the drydocking facility at Starbase 818 in the Narendra star system for defense system upgrades.
It had been over a year since the battle at Wolf 359, and six months since the formation of the Alliance. January McKenna and the crew of the Malinche had the fortune of not encountering a single Borg vessel in all of that time spent patrolling the zone's border. The theory aboard ship was the sheer number of planets within the zone that required protection. When the Borg invaded the Alpha Quadrant, it was with a single cube and the complete knowledge of Starfleet operations and tactics belonging to the late Captain Jean-Luc Picard to assist them in their plans. Starfleet Intelligence believed that the consumption of those resources required the Borg time to, for lack of a better word, assimilate it all.
Less than five days on patrol after leaving Starbase 818, the patrol cruiser Malinche made its first contact with a Borg vessel. It was one of the vessels of a spherical design, meaning that it was less armed than a cube, but just as deadly. The shock at seeing the new design was quickly overcome as the message was sent to the Alliance. The Borg were not about to stay silent for much longer.
"Shields at eighty-five percent and holding," reported the Vulcan executive officer Lieutenant Sten, raising her voice over the battle-stations alert siren, and gripping the side of the operations console in an effort to maintain her balance. The ship took a direct hit from the sphere's tractor beam followed by the immediate presence of the cutting beam making an attempt to slice through the upgraded shields.
Captain McKenna replied, her voice tense, "Continue to shift shield nutation at per-second intervals. Unload quantum torpedoes and load uni-cobalt devices into the forward torpedo tubes." The torpedo barrage was minimally effective, causing some damage to the sphere's hull and secondary systems. However, in true Borg fashion, they adapted to the quantum torpedos within minutes, making them ineffective weapons to fight with any longer.
"Aye, sir. It'll take about forty-five seconds to load the cobalt devices up," said First Lieutenant Yamaguchi. "Shall I return fire with the phasers, Captain?"
Another hit struck the Malinche as the Borg fire a projectile at the ship. The shields visibly flickered through the sensor output on the main viewscreen. The Excelsior-class vessel rocked from side-to-side as the ship's inertial dampening systems were interrupted within that moment. McKenna's knuckles turned white as she kept herself from being thrown to the ground from the force of the impact.
Sten assisted the helmsman maintain his balance by gripping him and the console to steady him. The information flashed before her on her console, and she turned her head to tell the captain that the Borg was now employing the use of energy draining torpedos. "Shield efficiency is dropping to fifty percent, and the generators are unable to keep up with the energy drain, Captain."
"Norm?" asked McKenna.
"Twenty seconds, Captain," Yamaguchi replied. "Do I have permission to open fire with the phasers, sir?"
McKenna sighed. There had been no real advances in phaser technology as of yet, and use of the beam weaponry was nothing more than a gesture against the Borg. "Be my guest," she said to the marine officer sitting at the tactical station.
He needed no further comment following her invitation. The phasers lanced outward toward the sphere, scoring a direct hit against the hull of the Borg ship. The sustained hit lasted no more than seven seconds and did no visible damage. Sten confirmed the lack of damage with her sensor report, and McKenna just gave a shrug to Yamaguchi.
"Uni-cobalt devices have completed loading. Ready to fire at your command, sir." Yamaguchi held his hand over the firing control in anticipation.
"Target their primary power source, and then fire the devices in pairs."
"Target locked. Firing."
The blue-green cobalt devices sped on their way to their intended destination. The first pair slammed into the hull of the sphere with tremendous force, causing a shockwave to wash over the Malinche and threw nearly everyone from their stations. Energy feedback from the shields caused the science station to explode, sparking and erupting into flame. The ship's internal fire suppression grid sprung into action, suffocating the fire. It was clear to everyone that the science officer was dead, killed instantly at his port.
By the time the second pair of cobalt devices destroyed the sphere, the damage reports were flooding the bridge in a loud cacophony of voices and computer alerts. Sten reported the destruction of the sphere, and secured from battle-stations, ending the siren's wail.
Captain January McKenna coughed as her lungs rejected the smoke within the bridge. "I want a full crew casualty and ship damage report." She heard her own voice in a rasp. "Get someone from sickbay up here to tend to injuries and take Ensign Kevlin below."
Donner's voice sounded over the bridge's speakers, "Engineering to Bridge. Next time we fire those things, perhaps we should do it from a safe distance."
"Noted, Tom. Report."
"It's not good, Captain. The cloaking device is junk, the tractor beam emitters you can kiss goodbye, and the communications systems are offline until we figure out if we can remove the fused circuits to replace them. The worst part is that the port nacelle took the brunt of that shockwave and isn't responding to our inquiries. We've got a team traveling over there to give us a first-hand look at how bad the damage is."
McKenna looked over at Sten, merely inclining her head toward the turbolift. No words were exchanged, but it was clear that she was just ordered to assist Lieutenant Donner in engineering. By the time the lift doors closed behind Sten, the captain informed, "Sten is on her way down to lend you a hand, Tom. Sounds like you're going to need it."
"No kidding. If you can give me a little more time to pick up some more pieces, I'll have a better idea of how extensive the damage is," Donner said, his voice conveying the high degree of stress he was feeling.
January took a look around the bridge to stall for time before responding to Donner's request. "All right. What about the impulse engines and the sensors? Are they functioning?"
The chief engineer replied, "For the moment, Skipper, but we may have to take the lateral sensor array offline to do a full damage assessment."
"Okay. They're working, though. Right now, you realize we're less than a hundred thousand klicks from the border and just close enough to crippled to make another encounter with the Borg our last one. I'd like to be able to see them coming," she said, trying to keep a little humor in her voice to cover the worry. If the Borg were to make a capture or if the situation appeared so that the Borg would make a successful capture of the Malinche, she was under direct orders to self-destruct the ship, to prevent assimilation. It was an order she was unable to inform her senior staff about, but it was one she would see through.
"Understood, sir. I'll have a better idea in fifteen minutes. Engineering, out." The circuit closed without any further sound.
She found herself standing over the body of Ensign Kevlin, a tall young Cardassian man who had recently matriculated through the officer candidacy school on Betazed and was earned himself this assignment. His head and chest suffered the shock of the explosion at such a close distance that his oddly colored blood was forced to the surface through many lacerations across his skin. Unable to do anything for him, January removed her uniform jacket, wearing nothing but a sweat-soaked gray tank top underneath. She placed the jacket over Kevlin's face and said a few kind words on his behalf, her voice so low that she was sure that no one else heard.
Norman Yamaguchi replied with a cliché, "He died doing what he wanted to do, sir." He was standing right behind her, to try and provide the captain with a little friendly support.
"Spare me the sentiment, Lieutenant," McKenna said, suddenly angry and wondering why. She had lost officers and enlisted under her command before. In the past year of patrols, and engagements with armed smugglers and pirates trying to take their chances with the Borg, she had lost eleven people to injuries sustained in the line of duty. Why, all of a sudden, was she angry about Kevlin's death?
Kevlin was among some of the first products of the new Starfleet, the new unified Starfleet. He was the first and so far the only Cardassian she ever served with. Even though he had only been aboard for a month and a half, he was starting to fit in with the rest of the wardroom. She was looking forward to seeing him earn his junior grade lieutenant's pip in the coming months.
Though she felt remorse about that fact, the real anger lie in the simple fact that it was the backlash from their own weapon that caused his death. Whereas the other deaths were the result of enemy fire, Kevlin died by friendly fire.
The marine lieutenant stepped back, blanching at his misstep. "My apologies, Captain."
Jan turned around, with her hazel eyes staring at Yamaguchi coldly at first before softening her expression out of guilt at seeing him move back. "No, I'm sorry I snapped at you, Norm." The bridge doors opened and the medical team arrived on the bridge with their equipment, including a stretcher for the ensign's corpse. She moved out of their way, as did Yamaguchi. "Weapons status?" she asked.
Norm replied, "The torpedo systems are still functioning, but the last shockwave caused enough damage along the primary power grid to affect the phasers, sir."
"Not that the phasers were doing any good."
"No, sir. I guess not. This just means that if it comes down to another round, and we use the cobalts again..."
Captain McKenna nodded, "Right, no need to go into it." She moved to her chair, "Helm, plot us a return course for Starbase 818, and ahead full impulse. We'll limp along at sublight until Tom and Sten can get the warp engines back online."
As he slipped back into the tactical position, the proximity alarm sounded. Yamaguchi reported, "Captain, sensors indicate a second Borg sphere closing in on our position. It'll arrive in nine minutes if it maintains its present speed."
McKenna ordered, "Sound battle stations." The bridge was doused in the crimson glow once more, and she felt the tension level on the ship rise. Trying to sound nonchalant about the new enemy vessel, she said in a very causal tone, "All right, then. Load aft torpedo tubes with uni-cobalt devices and prepare to fire as soon as they get within the range of our latest and greatest."
"Loading now, sir. It'll take a minute."
"Take two, Lieutenant," January smiled. "We'll fire them as far away from the ship as possible, try to take them out."
Yamaguchi warned, "We have two tubes facing aft, sir. We had four facing forward, so I'm not positive we'll be able to destroy that sphere like we did the first one."
She nodded, "Understood. How fast can you load those things?"
"We'll have another salvo to fire in under fifteen seconds, Captain."
Let's hope they can't adapt sooner than fifteen seconds, then, Lieutenant. Redirect as much power from the forward shield generators to the aft generators," she said.
"But, Captain, after that second shot, we will be fresh out of cobalt devices."
She opened her mouth to respond to that fact, but the bridge's speakers crackled to life.
"Engineering to Bridge. Captain, we got more trouble?" Donner's voice returned to the bridge, filled with worry and concern.
McKenna nodded to the disembodied voice. "Another sphere is going to intercept us in less than eight minutes. Can you spare Sten?"
"Captain, I believe I would be of more use to Lieutenant Donner in shoring up the damaged systems at this time," Sten joined the conversation from near Donner.
"Okay, Exec. We'll just try to make do without you up here." January now fixed her gaze upon the arm of the chair, "Tom, patch up whatever you can, I'm going to try and evade, but we'll have to fire those cobalts again if it comes down to trading blows."
"I hear you, sir. I wish I could say we'll hold things together."
"Spit and bubble-gum?" the captain mused.
"Sir?"
"I said, spit and... oh, never mind. I understand what you're saying. Do what you can. Bridge, out."
Yamaguchi spoke up once more, "Borg sphere increasing speed, updated ETA of three minutes. They'll be within cruising range of the cobalt devices in thirty seconds."
"Lock on target, and then fire both tubes," McKenna said immediately.
"Target locked, aye," he worked his board quickly. "Firing tubes five and six, aye, sir. Reloading tubes."
She counted to fifteen in her head and then ordered the reloaded tubes to be fired once more. Despite Norman's warning that the devices would be out of range it didn't matter to her. The viewscreen provided the aftward perspective from the Malinche, showing the sets of twin blue-green points of light angling toward the sphere.
"Sir, we are out of cobalt devices," reported Yamaguchi.
"Call out the distance between the sphere and the devices," McKenna watched the screen intently.
He returned his attention to his board, "Calling out the distance, aye, sir. Forty klicks. Thirty-five klicks."
January calculated the distance between the first sphere and the Malinche. The shockwave was powerful, powerful enough to cause serious damage to an Excelsior-class, then perhaps it would do the same to a sphere. Once the distance was within her calculated distance, she ordered, "Detonate the first set of devices."
"Aye, sir."
The first set of devices erupted on the screen, causing a large shockwave to appear and slamming into the sphere. The Borg vessel took the hit in stride, with visible damage appearing under magnification along the surface of the hemisphere facing the detonation. The second set of devices slammed into the sphere, punching clear through the hull and out the other side, continuing on course. Damage done by the shockwave was already being repaired.
"What the hell just happened?" she asked angrily.
"I'm not sure, sir," Yamaguchi reported in a confused tone.
"Detonate the second set, hurry!"
"Detonating, aye."
The operations officer filling in for Sten reported, "Only minor damage to the sphere, sir."
McKenna's eyes widened. "Oh, hell." She turned her chair around to ask, "Status of the aft shield generators."
Norm said aloud, "We can hold our own for a while, but obviously not indefinitely, Captain."
"Incoming fire from the sphere, Captain," said the operations officer.
The ship rocked once more under the fire of the Borg weapons. This time, however, there was a higher degree of pitch as the weapons attacking the Malinche were of a higher degree of power.
"Aft shields down to sixty percent, falling fast!"
McKenna ordered, "Set quantum torpedoes for overloaded charges and then load them into the aft torpedo tubes."
"Sir..." began Yamaguchi.
"Do it!" January's tone indicated that she was not in any mood to hold a debate.
"Resetting quantum torpedoes for overload status, aye, sir." Norman said it as quickly as possible as he issued the orders down to the torpedo deck. Overloading the charges on the torpedoes was the quickest way to get the largest bang as possible for that class of warhead; however, it also had a high percentage chance of doing damage to the tubes themselves. It was a risky move, considering that the quantum torpedoes were proven ineffective earlier.
Meanwhile, the ship continued to endure the sphere's attacks on the shields. Soon, the shield generators would overload and cause another feedback spike in the power grid; failing outright and allowing the Borg to carve the Malinche up like a turkey at Thanksgiving dinner.
Damage reports began to fill the bridge once more. Donner reported that there had been a superstructure collapse in the stardrive section, trapping a few crewmembers on two decks.
"Hold on a moment, Captain. I'm getting some strange readings, here," Yamaguchi said.
"Confirmed, sir," said operations. "I'm showing two subspace anomalies moving at warp nine on our position. Pretty big, too."
The captain lifted out of her seat to peer over the shoulder of the operations officer at the information being displayed on his console. "Those look like cloaked ships."
"Whatever they are, sir, they'll be here in forty seconds," Norman said. "Torpedoes loading now, sir."
The captain barely got a nod in to acknowledge Lieutenant Yamaguchi before the operations officer screamed out loud, "Sir! I hold two ships decloaking off our forward bow. Range is twenty klicks."
"Can you identify them?" she asked.
When the viewscreen was shifted to show the two ships in a state of decloaking, there was no need to identify them. January made out the silhouette of a Cardassian Galor-class battlecruiser alongside a Rihannsu-built d'Deridex-class heavy cruiser. As soon as the cloaking field no longer prevented them from using their weapons, both ships presented tremendous opposition to the Borg sphere with a fierce volley of compressor beams, disruptors, and cobalt devices.
The sphere was torn away, piece by piece, until the two ships struck the central power core of their common foe. Watching the display made McKenna's heart leap within her chest, and with a closed fist, she cheered the destruction of the sphere with the rest of the bridge crew.
"Not that I'm not glad to see them, sir, but where the hell did they come from?" Yamaguchi commented, once he was sure he could be heard.
January admitted, "Without communications, we're not going to find out much. I'm sure they'll run scans on us and figure out why we're not responding to their hails right now. We're not even sure they're sending hails."
"It looks as though the d'Deridex is moving into position for towing, sir."
The ship shuddered slightly at that moment as the hypothesis was proven correct. The Rihannsu warbird was aiding them, and McKenna folded her arms across her chest and said out loud.
"You know, I never thought I would live to see the day when a Federation starship, a Cardassian battlecruiser, and Romulan warbird would fight side-by-side. If I were Klingon, I think I would vomit," she said with a wide smile.