kalokagathia - a Star Trek Story [on hiatus]

Chapter 13: You Can't Be Serious

The Enterprise shuddered as she came out of hyperspace, the world around them returning to normal time. Well, if you call having seven ships turned into spare parts floating around normal. Cass's eyes flew open, so wide they seemed to take up most of her face, her mouth gaping slightly.

All those people that were on those ships, gone, just like that. She didn't have much time to ponder their demise however, as Sulu swerved the ship to the right, throwing her off balance and forcing her to have to grab onto the console for support. Jim reached out for her, steadying her, and to his surprise he wasn't immediately shrugged off. Cass thanked him with her eyes, which surprised him. After what had just happened he'd expected to be shoved to the floor, not for her to be grateful. The universe moves in mysterious ways indeed.

"Take us under them, Sulu," said captain Pike, his hands gripping the arms of his command chair, his demeanour still one of unshakable confidence. Cass's jaw was tense in concentration, her eyes wide as she watched as the Enterprise slide carefully under the wreckage, the hull screeching as it scraped past it.

"Shields are holding," Cass shouted over the sirens that were blaring through the bridge. She cast a look at Jim, more out of habit than anything else, almost to reassure herself. He seemed to be as shaken up as she felt as he looked up to her at the exact same time, nodding to her, a small nod, the sort that can say whole sentences between best friends. A nod that told her not to worry, with eyes that told her 'you got this'.

Cass gritted her teeth, nodding back to him less than confidently. This was what she signed up for, right? It never felt this scary in the simulations. In the simulations, if you screw up you can try again, realise your mistakes, but with this . . . any one of them messes up and that's it. Game over. Just like all the other crews whose ships created an excellent graveyard. Cass's eyes widened as she looked at the viewscreen again, and the image that filled it.

One enormous ship, well the Klingons were right about that part, but Cass didn't think enormous quite covered it. The ship was so huge it filled most of the viewscreen, and they were still thousands of kilometres away from it. A great long tendril reached down into the atmosphere, through the light cloud cover, spluttering plasma reaching down and boring into the surface. This was not normal.

Without even waiting for an order, Cass began powering up the weapons. They were definitely going to need them. Her eyes flickered to the schematic of the ship that had appeared on her consol, the energy readings increasing.

"Sir, they're firing torpedos." She said, not a touch of the anxiety she was feeling edging into her voice.

"Divert power to shields. Arm photons." Replied captain Pike, his voice calm, collected.

"I already did," Cass said, her voice strained in comparison, the weight of everything beginning to take its toll. The ship lurched to one side as a torpedo ripped through the hull, everyone on the bridge struggling to stay upright. Cass tried not to think about it, to think about all the people that had just died with that torpedo blast, just like her mother had done.

"Shields?" Pike asked as soon as everyone got their breath back, shouting over the overwhelming noise of the red-alert siren and knocking Cass out of her thoughts.

"The shields are at 32 percent," said Cass, her blue eyes quickly scanning her consol, "their weapons are extremely powerful sir, we can't take another hit like that,"

"Get me Starfleet command," Captain Pike said. He was so in control, swallowing his fear, but Cass could see how white his knuckled were from gripping the arms of his command chair, she could tell he was worried.

"Captain," said Spock, "the Romulan ship has lowered some kind of high energy pulse device into the Vulcan atmosphere. Its signal appears to be blocking our communications and transporter abilities."