A Ship for Heroes - 20801.01

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Star date 20709.14, September 14. Leonid Sergeievich Krilenko enjoyed the last week of his summer holidays in his family house in Crimea. It was a large wind-swept stone house on the crest at the final edge of a narrow foreland in the sheer coast of Novyï-Svet of Eastern Crimea. It was a rainy and windy morning of September. Leonid Sergeievich had just come back from his one hour long ramble in the country and walked directly to the eastern balcony to sit and gaze at the distant view of the Genoese fortress of Sudak, the best preserved castle on the northern shore of the Black Sea, as he used to do every morning. He closed his gray eyes for a while to feel the cool salted wind on his sweaty face and listen the sound of the waves blowing over the rocks down to the precipice, several tens of meters below his feet.

Leonid Sergeievich was a Russian giant of 6ft4” with broad shoulders, strong hands viselike, and rich fire-blond whisker. Despite his awe-inspiring look of barbarous medieval warrior with “wooden shield and axe” he was a very calm, gentle and cultivated man. The fortune smiled on him as he had a very cheerful childhood with his both parents and many friends of various species in Cyprus. After his graduation from the college he studied astronautics engineering in Moscow Academy of Aerospace Engineering. Then he applied to Star-Fleet Academy. During his Star-Fleet career he rose to prominence as a tactical officer of daring solutions to difficult situations. However this very attitude was the reason of his decorations and disgrace.

During the Borg Invasion he took part in the battle of the Kupier Belt as the First Officer of the Frigate USS San Diego. With the Captain killed, Leonid assumed the command and burst the ship in the middle of the Borg armada in high speed and with abrupt and seemingly random maneuvers, creating confusion and friendly kills among the enemy vessels, though he sustained heavy damage. This unforeseeable and random tactics put a spoke in Borg’s adaptation capabilities and apparently played an important role in the Borg’s defeat.

After almost one hour of crazy riding in the middle of the enemy fleet, Borg drones started to board and assimilated the crippled USS San Diego and her crew. Then, in order to avoid to be captured, Leonid drove the ship to collision course with a Borg sphere and teleported himself and the remaining two bridge officers onboard of a shuttle craft and escaped.

After the battle, Leonid Sergeievich had been accused of insubordination because he broke the fleet formation, for abandoning comrades in enemy hands, for deliberately loosing ship and for defection; and had been court martialled for his acts. Despite the accusations by many of his rivals within Star Fleet, his Fleet Commander Commodore

Amanda Hamilton came to his rescue. Substantiating that Leonid’s non orthodox tactics, played a major role in the victory of the Federation forces, and seeing that there was no hope to rescue the remaining crew and the ship, the most appropriate and the only remaining option was indeed a suicide attack on a Borg ship, the Commodore saved Leonid’s career. Leonid always recalls, with wet eyes, the closing speech of Commodore Hamilton’s testimony:

“…he had to choose between two options, to have a conventional career within Star Fleet and seek for promotions, or instead, to put his very existence at high risk and became a hero. He chose the second one. Our dilemma is this: do we have to condemn him for demonstrating in practice the value of the main principle of our ancestors the Spartans, no surrender – no retreat, or instead, should we decorate him for honor and heroic acts?”

The military jury’s verdict of not guilty granted him promotion to the rank of Captain and decoration, and a transfer to an office position instead of commanding a star ship, a bitter moral victory indeed.

The Gathering

The communicator’s warning beep dissipated his thoughts:

“Incoming communication” announced the computer’s soft feminine voice

“Computer, identify the caller” Leonid asked to the computer with a sour face; he was never in the mood to be disturbed, for no reason at all, during his relaxing holidays.

“Rear Admiral Amanda Hamilton, private and secure channel” replied the computer.

“Put it through, password Papa Charlie seven three dash Teal” commanded Leonid with a sigh of relief. It was always a pleasure for him to hear the voice of his only prop within the Admiralty.

“Acknowledged” responded the machine and the smiley face of Admiral Hamilton appeared on the display.

“Good morning Captain” greeted Admiral Hamilton. It was not possible to augur anything from her neutral look, but nevertheless something important should have happened as social calls were not among Admiral Hamilton’s style.

“Spokoinoi nochi (good night) Admiral, it is late in San Francisco now, glad to see you”. Leonid tried instinctively to interpret the body language of his friend.

“Listen to me very carefully Captain, I’ll be brief. I formally inform you that you have been assigned as the Captain of USS Alexander the Great to be effective by now…”

The last sentence echoed in his head as the gigantic bell of the Kremlin’s garden. This was the most unbelievable event. So far it was unheard of for a disgraced officer of

office duty to be given the command of the most modern attack destroyer of the Star Fleet.

“… I understand that you should probably prefer to be assigned as the Captain of USS Alexander Nevsky, but she will be ready in a couple of months, and we need you aboard right now…” continued Admiral blinking an eye and wearing a large smile.

USS Alexander the Great and USS Alexander Nevsky were the first of the new Alexander class star ships. These ships were designed to respond to the need of relatively small, very agile ships with high endurance, capable of incarnating the all package of maneuver warfare doctrines and to fight successfully under all foreseeable dissimilar combat situations.

The ellipsoid dish shaped ship of 160x120x45m of size with 10 decks and two compact warp nacelles incorporated in her aft-port and aft-starboard sides, was buried with the state of the art force multipliers. Her power generation technology was probably among the most innovative: the distributed power core, known as Narlis generator array. Leonora Narlis, one of the senior engineers of Theoretical Propulsion Group patented the invention of the Dynamic Power Combiner Interlock DPCI or “DipSee” five years ago. This devise, capable of fully autonomous operation, was designed in order to regulate the power transfer from a number of remote located and parallel connected antimatter reactors to the ship’s various systems. Thus, generators and systems could operate safely even under conditions of abrupt power fluctuations or even worst, with reactors shut down. Therefore a ship with many smaller and parallel connected reactors can safely operate while over-powered, and continue to fight with her shields, weapons and propulsion unaffected, even when some of her reactors were damaged or somehow came off-line.

“With great pleasure Admiral, besides, Alexander the Great was the teacher of all future military leaders…” replied Leonid, “… you will not be disappointed”

“You and your new ship have matched tempers Captain, and I believe that once more you will honor the name of Leonidas…” continued the Admiral insinuating the Spartan king who sacrificed himself in Thermopylae. “…but you must be vigilant my friend, as you have many well-wishers in Star-Fleet watching you for any possible mistake you will probably make. You are authorized to select key members of your crew. Now you should start packing. I’m waiting you in my office in the next twelve hours for the briefing; after that you will fly to Mars to take the command of your ship from Utopia Planitia Yards. Bye my friend” ended Admiral Hamilton.

“Dasvidanie (good bye in Russian meaning we will meet again), have a nice night Admiral” said Leonid and ended the communication. Shortly after, while trying to understand the meaning of this change in his life, he contacted Lieutenant Commander Nadia Rodogoon and Lieutenant Patrick O’Hara in conference. Both Nadia, a smart girl with black eyes and long curly black hair of Iranian origin, and Patrick O’Hara, a young man with a freckled face and short cut blond hair from Cork, Ireland, were fine pilots and excellent tacticians. Both were loyal to him to the death, as all three were the only survivors from the USS San Diego. Then, he made another call and contacted his classmate in the Moscow Academy; Kostas Baldoukas, aerospace engineer working with the Advanced Star Ship Design Bureau. Kostas was

an excellent engineer, and being discontent with the office routine and lack of passionate activity, he did not let be begged twice; he jumped to the opportunity at once and requested his official transfer to Star Fleet personnel.

The Mission

Star date 20709.17, September 17. Four friends, Leonid, Nadia, Patrick and Kostas materialized in the transporter room of USS Alexander the Great. The transporter officer greeted them, and all went through the corridor to the bridge. The decks have been designed to have less height then usual, in an attempt to economize more space for the ship’s distributed and redundant systems. Once on the bridge, they noticed the most apparent differences: the chairs were all fixed to the floor and had been equipped with seat belts and shoulder harnesses. Furthermore, all stations were sitting stations; both being indications that the ship was designed for possible violent combats. There was a free space of 5 meters between the helm – ops station, and Captain and First Officer’s seats. This free space was surrounded by an arch like structure which was equipped with holographic projectors.

All four officers took their respective seats, Nadia the First Officer’s seat, Patrick the security console just behind the Captain and First Officer’s seats, and Kostas sat at the engineering station which was built in a niche inn the wall on the left side of the security station.

Captain Krilenko tapped to some menus on his seat’s touch sensitive display activating the broadcast mode of intercom:

“Ladies and gentlemen, this is your Captain…” Captain’s throaty and firm voice echoed all over the ship. “…My name is Leonid Sergueievich. Welcome to USS Alexander the Great. I expect all of you to honor the name of your ship. We will head for Altair to conduct test runs”. Then turned to the helmsman and ordered. “Lieutenant, get us out of here and warp 8 asap to Altair”.

“Yes Captain…” replied the young officer, a Bajoran Lieutenant Junior Grade, who started at once to go through the pre-departure check list.

Captain Krilenko tried to hide his boredom, while fifteen minutes after the departure order was given the young helmsman’s shy and trembling voice was heard to say:

“Clear for departure, docking clamps released and checked. Impulse 1/8 up to shipyard’s safe distance…”

“At last…” thought the Captain “…we are out of here, this guy must be rookie, but at least he knows what he is doing…”

“Full impulse to Kupier Belt Captain” announced shyly again the Bajoran officer, and then suddenly, the Captain realized the oddity on the ship which he had sensed since he came aboard: the crew was very young and certainly inexperienced. Admiral Hamilton’s warning made perfect sense in this context; his well-wishers in the

admiralty had to man the ship with young and totally inexperienced crew in order to make his mission fail.

“I can trust no one but my friends in this very moment…” Leonid thought, then something more obscure tormented his mind. “At full impulse we will make 22 hours to reach the Kupier Belt... lets make good use of this…”; then suddenly he addressed the Chief Engineer and the Chief Security Officer:

“Mr. Baldoukas, Mr. O’Hara, I want you to run a full diagnostic as much exhaustive as possible all over the ship and ship’s accessory systems. Check also the provisions and the spare parts, and confirm your findings against the official inventory documents. Take your time gentlemen, but report to me in the next 12 hours. Miss Rodogoon you have the bridge”. Then, Captain Krilenko walked towards the door opening to his ready room.

Once in his office, he tried to organize his thoughts and to anticipate possible displeasing situations which may occur:

“Computer, ship’s manifest and crew files, password Charlie – Charlie zero two zero dash Green”

“Acknowledged, 105 officers…” replied the computer’s feminine voice.

Four hours later and despite his most exhaustive analysis on the crew’s personal files and biographies, he found nothing unusual but the lack of experience. The highest ranked officers besides the Captain’s three friends were the Bajoran helmsman, the doctor and the Vulcan counsellor, all Lieutenants Junior Grade; the rest were ensigns petty officers and crewmen. Very few officers had some limited star ship experience, and some others had been assigned to different star bases for very short periods, but nothing more; the rest of the crew was totally rookie: The Bajoran helmsman had flight experience in shuttlecrafts in the Jupiter Base, while the Vulcan counsellor and the doctor had worked in Star Base Alpha before their assignment to the ship. “Despite their high marks in the academy they will not stand in a high sea situation…” thought Krilenko.

“Mr. O’Hara to my office at once” called the Captain; disgust nauseated him for awhile. He tried to calm his testiness looking at the stars and listening to the buzz of the ship’s engines, as they flew away from Mars at the quarter of the speed of light.

“I’m on my way Captain” replied Patrick “There must be something wrong, he sounds concerned…” Patrick thought.

Once in the Captain’s ready room, both men appraised each-other silently; the shadow of imminent death in USS San-Diego bond both men and Nadia with unbreakable ties of comradeship.

“Irish coffee - standard” ordered Patrick to the replicator, then turned his face to the Captain: “What’s wrong Leo?” he asked with apparent uneasiness…

“Pat… all the crew are rookie, some people want to see us fail…” replied the Captain more concerned than before, trying to dissolve a node in his gorge.

“I already noticed that… I have already checked the inventory list, it is correct and standard; nothing more, nothing less, I also cross-checked the provisions with the inventory list, they match. Lieutenant Baldoukas is still checking ship’s systems. When he finishes he will start checking the quality of the provisions and spare parts. Now I have started examining the crew’s personal files…” reported Patrick O’Hara to his Captain.

“If everything is correct, and since apparently the only discrepancy is the crew’s lack of ship experience, then this means that they want us to fail, and blame us once more for incompetence, while they save their face! No one will accuse them of malice and premeditation. Pat, I want you to check, drill in the files, in order to find any odd ties between crew members or crew members and cycles within the Admiralty; anything that could appear odd. Filter any detail; we should possibly need to isolate some people, but I want to avoid any witch-hunting. You have six more hours for this” explained the Captain.

“I fully understand Leo…” replied Patrick and added “…I’ll talk to Nadia to have her eyes open too!”

“But no word to Kostas for the moment, he is an excellent engineer and I trust him, but maybe he is not been accustomed to such manipulations, and I do not want him to be distracted from his duties” commented the Captain just before his security officer left the office.

………………………………………………………..

Twelve hours have already passed without an incident.

Both lieutenants Baldoukas and O’Hara approached the Captain:

“We are ready to report Captain” said Kostas.

“In my office… Miss Rodogoon you have the bridge” commanded the Captain in a neutral tone. Then, the two officers followed their Captain. Three men sat in the Captain’s ready room around the conference table. “Kostas…?” asked the Captain.

“All ship’s systems are green and nominal Captain. I have configured Engine Room 1 to be the master and Engine Room 3 to be the auxiliary one. All four reactors are in nominal power and operate at 25% average; this means that we are slightly overpowered. Weapons are working fine…” continued Kostas with his somehow detailed executive summary. “May I speak off the record Captain…?” he asked at last, and without waiting for the Captain’s response he continued: “With all due respect Captain, I’m wondering if your decision to assign me as Chief Engineer is wise. As you know I have no ship experience and while I worked on many of this ship’s systems, still, to be a ship’s Chief Engineer is quite different from working in labs, I’m saying this because all the engineering crew are rookie; their hands are trembling when they have to do an adjustment, they always consult the handbooks

and the checklists, even for minor things… as if they are being examined in the academy… I’m not a fan of conspiracy theories, but it seems to me…”

“Ok it’s done, even Kostas noticed…” thought Leonid anxiously, and said: “Ok guys no more hiding… Miss Rodogoon, to my office at once please…”

Just when the door slid open, they heard Nadia command “Lieutenant Olay you have the bridge”. She confided the bridge to the rookie helmsman as the most senior officer in duty on the bridge at that moment; however none of them could see the astonished look on the pale face of the young Bajoran officer.

Nadia Rodogoon sat on the empty chair facing the Chief Engineer. Their eyes crossed each other. Kostas smiled to her and Nadia responded with a smile, while instinctively shuffling her long curls for awhile... The four friends engaged in a discussion for more than four hours to find the way as to how to deal with this unprecedented situation: a war ship with only three experienced senior officers and an inexperienced crew… They finished their meeting by ordering food from the replicator and dining together at the conference table. Having lunch with his friends was O’Hara’s among the favourite amusements.

………………………………………………………..

Almost 23 hours after their departure they entered the Kupier Belt. This is a region of the Solar System beyond the planets extending from the orbit of Neptune to approximately 55AUs from the Sun. This region consists mainly of small bodies, remnants of the Solar System's formation, largely of frozen volatiles, such as methane, ammonia and water, fragments from the original proto-planetary disc around the Sun that failed to fully coalesce into planets and instead formed into smaller bodies.

“Kupier Belt Captain, we are passing to Warp as you ordered sir… accelerating… Warp 2, 4, 6, Warp 8 and stable Captain; estimate time enroute to Altair 5 days 16 hours Captain” announced the helmsman now in a more assured tone. While the ship passed to warp, Leonid, Nadia and Patrick stared at each other silently, Leonid instinctively clenched his fists. All three recalled the terrible fight against the Borg armada 4 years ago.

………………………………………………………..

Five days after USS Alexander the Great had left Mars, they still had to travel for almost one and a half days before they reached Altair. These last four days, the Captain, the First Officer, the Security Officer and the Chief Engineer managed to simulate any possible unexpected events to raise the expertise level of the crew: from system failures, to manoeuvring, from battle damage repairs to security breaches, anything that they could devise under the circumstances. The positive results of these drills became shortly apparent; at least the crew began to work with more self-confidence and team work.

The Captain and the First Officer had retired to their rooms to rest. Lieutenant O’Hara had assumed the command of the bridge…

“Captain, I think something is following us sir…” noticed the Arcturian ensign operating the tactical station, with a more or less concerned tone, “…it is stealthy but definitively there…” but before finishing his sentence, the proximity warning beep sounded on the bridge.

Patrick pressing the intercom menu in broadcast mode shouted with a firm voice:

“Shields up, yellow alert, seat belts, Captain and First Officer to the bridge at once…”

“Captain, multiple unidentified signatures dropped out of trans-warp conduits, definitely not Borg…” the tactical officer continued to report with a more unfaltering tone.

“Reactors are set to security margin of 50%, all systems are 100% over powered…” heard the voice of Kostas from the master Engine Room who had anticipated that a skirmish was going to break out.

“One life sign per ship sir…” announced the tactical ensign reporting.

Captain Krilenko and Lieutenant Commander Rodogoon rushed onto the bridge and assumed their duty… Patrick O’Hara manned the tactical station at once, while the Arcturian ensign sat at the ops seat.

“Captain, they are surrounding us, definitively hostile, 8 large ships and 16 of heavy fighter size…” continued to report Lieutenant O’Hara.

“Red alert...” shouted the Captain followed by his First Officer’s command: “Tactical display…” and a holographic sphere of 3m diameter appeared from nowhere on the empty space between the commanding officers seats and the ops-helm station. The glowing gray sphere displayed the federation destroyer in blue colour in the centre of the sphere and the enemy vessels encircling the destroyer, in 3D space, in red colours. “…All hands battle stations, helm set course 020 mark 10 full impulse, we will break the claw… helm, manoeuvre Sierra-3 full impulse now!” ordered the Captain, in an attempt to break the enemy circle…

The enemy vessels had the shape of a black spider viewed from below. The legs or tentacles, or whatever else they could be, they were connected to a conical central body. On the base of the cone, which seemed to be their bow, there was a cruciform opening like a mouth. Suddenly the large spider-shaped enemy vessels started firing from many directions with continuous pink ray beams ejected from their “mouths”, while the smaller ones began to harass the federation ship with pulsed weapons. USS Alexander the Great shook violently and her shields glowed while dissipating the deadly energy. The inertial dampers tried to compensate the vibration but the shock was too strong.

“Both main phasers concentrate fire on the large bandit at eleven o’clock” commanded Captain Krilenko. “Pulsed phaser turrets fire at will… keep clear the smallers!” Nadia Rodogoon shouted. Their long lasted cooperation and their ship experience appeared clearly, since both played in concert in this very stressful

situation. The First Officer gave orders that normally were given by the Captain, but in a manner that both officers complemented each-other raising the command effectiveness.

Nadia, despite her very attractive appearance and her feminine everyday attitude and behaviour, was very systematic and calculative in her duty. She had developed the skill of always predicting the adversary’s next move, to think like the adversary and to act accordingly. She was never loosing her sang-froid under no circumstances at all. In this aspect, she was completely the opposite of the daring character of her Captain, who was capable of planning intuitively unanticipated moves. Leonid was always appreciating Nadia’s modus operandi (course of action) and trying to take advantage of these skills of hers. Thus, Leonid and Nadia were working instinctively as an unbeatable pair: The daring and the calculative…

“Damage report…” shouted the First Officer…

“No damage… no casualties…” reported the Arcturian ops ensign with more assured voice.

“Bow and port shields at 50% stern shields at 70% but recovering fast…, shifting firing arc…” reported back O’Hara who manned the tactical station, with nerve in his tone. The joy of fight was embedded in O’Hara’s Irish temper. The ship yawed to port side to expose the less touched starboard side of the shields to the enemy, while both the upper and the lower main phaser beams kept on firing to the center of one of the large enemy ships in front of them. “The phasers have no effect sir… wow sir she is bleeding sir…” shouted Patrick O’Hara joyfully.

The ship they had targeted appeared to have a cut like a breach in the base of what seemed to be one of her tentacles; some gaseous liquid leaked out… and then:

“weeeeiiiirkhhh…” a horrific scream heard from the ships communicators… and the enemy ships tentacles crinkled…

“Captain she is dead… no life sign, these ships are alive and telepathic…” noticed O’Hara.

“Target the second big boogie, fire the pulsed phaser batteries to keep clear the smaller ones, launch the aft quantum torpedoes…” ordered the Captain. “…Counselor to the bridge!” commanded the First Officer and continued: “Ops try to hail them, what they want?”

The ship shook more violently than before. “Captain, stern shields at 30%, bow shields at 70% port and starboard shield at 60%... and recovering, stern shield can fail Captain…” reported again O’Hara.

“They do not respond; the com channels receive nothing” added, the ops ensign, now in a professional tone.

In the Engine Room 1 the personnel was working fast to respond to the power requirements of the ship’s different redundant systems accordingly. The ship’s

“DipSees” had been working perfectly so far, but apparently, the power network of the ship needed some supplementary human assistance to reach his optimum performance under these circumstances… The last shock was more violent than the previous ones; apparently the ship was hit by multiple weapons… A console exploded and hurt the petty officer working on it. The young black man got down covering his bloody face with his burned hands, while fumes of burning chemicals filled the room… At this very moment the Captain’s voice was heard in the Engine Room 1:

“Engineering, ops, transfer more power to stern shields, she must recover faster!”

The Chief Engineer responded coughing with a more concerned voice than ever: “Sir, reactor 3 is fluctuating; emergency shutdown is imminent… Sick bay we have a wounded man in Engine Room 1…” Kostas rushed to the central control console and pushed away the young Bolian ensign who apparently was frozen from panic. He quickly tapped some menus in the touch sensitive display and added: “…Diverting power to stern, port and starboard shields directly from reactor 2, reactor 1 is powering weapons and reactor 4 to bow shields, reactor 3 is relaxing, repairs are ongoing…”

Then, grasping a plasma torch and a magnetic probe he ordered the Bolian ensign “Get a hyperspanner and come with me to Engine Room 3, quickly!”

On the bridge; the Vulcan counselor entered wearing an impassible look and he addressed the Captain: “Your orders Captain…”

“Mr. Sevak, could you advise anything, the ships seem to be alive and telepathic…” said the Captain to the Vulcan Counselor more perplexed than some moments ago.

“Intriguing Captain, I get nothing, as nothing should be out there” commented the Vulcan calmly.

“Quantum torpedoes missed, they are jamming the seekers Captain…” yelled O’Hara, “…shifting to programmed guidance, firing sequence for spread pattern, 8 torpedoes away…”

Another violent shock and: “Breach in shuttle bay, force field online, 4 light casualties…” yelled the ops ensign. Sparks flashed behind a service hatch. The smell of burned organic material filled the Bridge. “Obviously we lost some gel packs. With all the damage we are incurring, I want to see your skills Kostas…” thought Nadia smiling slyly. She was a Persian girl, on a ship named “Alexander the Great” with a Greek engineer aboard, after all…

“Mr. O’Hara, leave the torpedoes to me and concentrate yourself on the phasers!” shouted the First Officer.

“weeeeiiiirkhhh…” and “weeeeiiiirkhhh…” two more horrific screams through the communicators, and two more enemy ships were put out of combat.

“Captain, we have problem… we have to keep the main phasers in continuous firing for almost 5 seconds on a single boogie to mark a kill, and the quantums are practically useless…” noticed O’Hara and suddenly:

“Yeah we broke the claw, we are cleared…” announced the Bajoran Lieutenant Olay joyfully. “We’ve done it but we are not yet finished boy…” replied Krilenko; “…helm, heading 340 mark 350; ops, engineering, all power to stern, port and starboard shields, bow shield minimal, continue to fire all beam weapons, engineering what about reactor 3?”

“Captain, they do not have shields but their structure must be incredibly strong to resist to the phasers for so long…” continued reporting Lieutenant Patrick O’Hara.

“Reactor “3 is still fluctuating but recovering, it supplies the life support…” answered the engineering.

Another violent shock and: “Captain, port shields at 70% and recovering…” the voice of O’Hara was heard too concerned. “Damage in port nacelle and we loose plasma…, casualties at deck 2, burns…” added the ops ensign in a panicky tone but without a sign of loosing his sang-froid.

“weeeeiiiirkhhh…” and “Captain, the remaining 4 large ships and 11 small boogies are retreating sir!” O’Hara announced in a more relaxed tone. “Ops, open a secure channel to the headquarters at…” tried to order Krilenko but the ops ensign intervened “Captain incoming communication, Admiral Hamilton, secure channel…”

“Transfer to my office, and Miss Rodogoon, you have the bridge. Collect wreckage samples and try to get away from here at maximum possible warp…” then, he walked to his ready room. Once there, Captain Krilenko stared at the smiley face of his friend. Before starting to report, the admiral talked: “Well done Captain, nice performance for this drill, I will remember to congratulate Lieutenant Baldoukas on the realism of this design…”

Captain Krilenko watched her with astonishment: “You mean that…”

“Yes…” replied the admiral, “…I have seen the manifest, they were all rookies, then I ordered your friend accordingly; and please do not blame him, he followed direct orders from me; but I must admit, he was more than happy to play this to you. I think he has not forgotten some jokes you have done to him in the university… Bye now and good hunt my friend”. She terminated the link. Krilenko tapped onto his communicator: “Lieutenant Baldoukas to my office immediately” commanded “Son of a bitch” he thought.

In the Sick Bay Doctor Harutunyan and two nurses tried to manage the situation with the wounded personnel. “Thank God, I can work now that the ship stopped trembling and shocking… apparently it’s over, oowfff…” he murmured. Then, he prepared himself to remove the splinters from the face of the engineering petty officer. “You are lucky, your eyes are not hurt my friend…” said with compassion to the wounded

man; then he ordered the nurses “…nurses, get dermal generators and heal the burned fellows while I will be working with Mr. Bekele.”

The doctor disinfected his hands with a surgical scrubber and placed a somnetic inducer on his patient’s forehead to make him sleep. Then with the aid of an exoscalpel he removed the splinters, some of which were deep in the underlying tissue. Once he had finished, with his hypospray he injected a mixture of antibiotics and antalgic drug to his patient. Finally, he turned off the somnetic inducer. As soon as the patient opened his eyes, the doctor spoke: “Welcome back Mr. Bekele, one of the nurses will treat your hands, then you will be free to go. Remember, you are in sick leave for one day… By the way, where are you from?” “From Axum, Ethiopia, Sir” replied the Petty Officer.”

The door of the Captain’s ready room’s door opened and a sweaty Chief Engineer showed himself…

“You bastard…” shouted the Captain hitting his fist on the table, but Baldoukas stopped him wearing a broad smile of innocence: “If I had warned you it would have never been like a real one. The casualties and some damages are real, the breach in the shuttle bay, the fluctuating core and many damages are simulated… I tried to get the maximum in training and working under stress from this drill, I exploited this opportunity to train even myself as well as the medic and the counselor, both of whom are a little more experienced than the others”.

“I must admit, I thought we wouldn’t have done it, it was a good drill, even for myself as well, now lets continue at warp 8…” said the Captain, but again Baldoukas stopped him: “No Leo, I said some damages are real, they have to work through battle damage repairs, to maneuver the work bee and to walk in space in order to repair the plasma leak at the nacelle; the ship can not go faster than warp two… The drill must run to an end, and we must tell nothing about this drill to the crew, at least for the time being”.

………………………………………………………..

“Captain’s Log: Star date 20709.27. USS Alexander the Great left the Altair sector two hours ago, heading for her assigned patrol area, the Typhoon Expanse, close to the Romulan Border. The repairs have been concluded. We have calculated to reach DS5 in two months; meanwhile we will try to get the maximum during this idle period of cruising, as we have scheduled extensive drills in order to have our crew well trained for any circumstances which may occur”.

………………………………………………………..

“Captain’s Log: Star date 20711.25. We have reached our mission area and we have set to DS5 to allow our crew some days of relaxation…”

“Captain, you are required to the bridge sir”, heard the voice of the First Officer Nadia Rodogoon, “I’m on my way…” responded the Captain.

Once on the bridge, Leonid Krilenko looked at his First Officer with obvious mystification.

“Captain, a ship in high warp is closing on intercept course.” Nadia Rodogoon reported.

“Yellow alert, shields up, seat belts and harnesses, drop out of warp” commanded the Captain

“Reactors are set to security margin of 50%, all systems are 100% over powered…” responded the engineering “It starts again…” thought Captain Krilenko.

“Captain, a trans warp conduit is opening at 2 o’clock… Oh God it is huge…” exclaimed the ops ensign.

It was a huge dark green-gray colored triangular ship of approximately 6000 meters long 4000 meters large and some 2000 meters high.

“Captain, their weapons and shields are off line. I’m reading multiple live forms, some tens of thousands…” reported the tactical ensign in duty. “They are hailing us Captain…” added the ops ensign.

“Main screen…” commanded Krilenko, and the faces of two reptilian humanoids appeared on the bridge’s holographic display.

“Greetings Captain, I’m Tova Veer and this is Frola Gegen: we are Voth. We need to meet…” spoke the male.

Captain Krilenko looked at his Vulcan counselor: “Mr. Sevak?”

“They are sincere and afraid to death Captain” replied the Vulcan officer raising his left eyebrow…