Star Trek: DS9, Nexus Crossings

Star Trek: DS9, Nexus Crossings

Colonel Kira’s log:
Supplemental,

It’s been four months since the Dominion War ended and the treaty signed. For the most part, life has returned to the mundane normalcy with a few exceptions. With Odo still in the Gamma quadrant, Quark seems to be running his bar honestly. I haven’t even heard any complaints of him watering down his drinks. There’s still some shadows, a few Federation ships still patrol the space around the wormhole at random intervals. In accordance with the treaty, we are no longer ‘allowed’ to colonize planets in the Gamma quadrant. The Dominion Founders have permitted the people of the Alpha quadrant to continue scientific expeditions provided there aren’t any permanent ones. However...

Kira was interrupted by a chime on her desk.“Computer, pause log entry.” She reached over to tap the comm. switch on her desk, “Yes?”

A small diminutive voice responded, “Colonel? There’s a visitor waiting for you outside your office. Shall I send her in?”
Kira Stood up from her chair and took a moment to straighten her uniform before exhaling sharply, “Send her in.”

Kira’s mildly annoyed ‘business’ face was instantly changed to a warm smile when the doors opened for her visitor to walk through.“Kasidy!” Kira seemed to smile more so as she rounded the desk to greet her properly.

“Hello Nerys. I was in the neighborhood and thought it would be time to introduce Benny to you.” Kasidy gently handed the sleeping baby over to Kira. Staring at the child cradled in her arms she looked up, “Wait Benny?” The baby gurgled and Kira handed him back to his mother.

“After his father,” she replied rocking him back to sleep.

Before Kira could ask more, she was interrupted by another chime. “I don’t believe this. What?” she asked tapping her commbage.

“Colonel, you’d better come to Ops. The wormhole is opening.”

Kira’s previously cheerful attitude was replaced by one of concern.

“What’s wrong” Kasidy inquired, concern creeping into her own voice.

“We’re not expecting another ship to come through for another week,” she responded before walking past her. “Report!” Kira commanded stepping into the ‘pit’.

“Sensors are detecting a ship coming through,” an ensign replied.

“On screen” Kira stated.

A second later the screen winked on to show the wormhole fully open. A moment later, a ship exited and the wormhole closed behind it. It wasn’t Dominion, but it wasn’t Federation either.

“What kind of ship is that?” she asked out loud.

“It doesn’t match anything in our database ma'am,” a lieutenant answered.

Collecting her wits, Kira shook her head, “Life signs?”

“I’m picking up over one hundred and twelve biosigns, however there’s something in the hull preventing a more detailed scan. The best I can tell you is that they’re humanoid ma’am” the lieutenant replied, tapping commands into his station.

Kira nodded, before she could request a hail, the ensign spoke up, “Colonel, the ship is hailing us.”

Kira again straightened her uniform and swallowed the lump in her throat. “Alright, put it up,” she told the ensign.

The screen changed from a view of the ship, to that of its bridge where a man and a woman stood in the center of the screen. English lettering dominated the wall behind them, but was unreadable with the two people standing between the screen and the wall.The man then spoke, “I am captain Ryan Avries of the D.E.S. science vessel Hathaway 2. To whom am I addressing?”

Kira blinked before responding, “I’m Colonel Kira, commander of Deep Space Nine.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Two months prior to the Hathaway 2's arrival at Deep Space Nine...

Captain Avries was in the conference room aboard the Hathaway 2. He stood in front of the holo-window in annoyance. He had set it for the normal exterior view and wished he was out in the stars instead of zero-space where nothing existed. Minutes ago, he watched the Carrier-class vessel that brought him and the ship here, depart. He was entranced with how the eerie glow of its running lights made it seem more like a ghost than a ship, and watched it till it transit back to normal space.

The only other thing to see outside was the station to which the Hathaway docked with ten minutes ago. Avries sighed and switched the holo-window to a recorded view of Earths night sky, and sat down at the conference table to again review the information of his transfer off his ship.

He set the holographic display to book mode. 'Flipping' through the pages, he saw a list of his achievements and ship postings including when he was a helmsman on the Hathaway 2 years ago.

"Crap, has it really been fourteen years?" he asked himself out loud. He flipped back and forth, but couldn't find any reason for being transferred off.

"I believe it's been thirteen years and eleven months since you were posted here," said a voice opposite of the table to Avries.

Startled, Avries looked up before jumping to attention, "Admiral Sir. I'm sorry; I didn't hear you come in."

"That's alright. I may be a bit weighty, but I can move with the best of them," He then laughed at his joke.

"That's an understatement," Avries thought to himself, the admirals stomach bulged over his belt. He may have an admiral’s uniform but, clearly spent much of his career behind a desk.

"Yes admiral sir. I was just reviewing my transfer papers and was wondering where it states I'll be transferred to," Avries said.

The Admiral walked over to the holo-window and seemed to consider the night sky of earth before changing it to the real-time view of the station, which he smiled at before turning to Avries. "That's because your transfer hasn't been finalized yet." Avries turned his head slightly in a questioning manner. The admiral continued, "Basically, you're being given' a choice between two commands. You can either take command of an Achilles-class frigate and continue your previous mission. Or you can take command of the ship you’re standing on."

Avries thought a moment, "Sir, there is nothing wrong with the Ajax.."

"I'm not saying there is captain. To the contrary, the Ajax is the finest ship of her class I've seen. Including her crew," The admiral said cutting him off.

"Then why sir, I don't understand."

"As you know, for the last two years, since the war ended, we've been slowly phasing out the Attack-class frigate for the newer Achilles design. Simply put, it's your turn. Frankly, I don't understand what the fuss is about. Sure the Achilles-class is smaller, but it's practically the same profile to the Attack-class," he stated bluntly.

Swallowing his creeping anger, Avries calmly replied, "Admiral Sir, with all due respect, the Achilles-class has barely half the armaments let alone not having the capabilities of an Attack-class."

"None of which is truly needed in peace time," the admiral retorted hotly.

Rather than continue the argument, one Avries felt he already lost; he again forced himself to calm down. "So what would I be doing if I choose this ship?" he asked gesturing around him.

The admirals red face instantly brightened as he smiled, "Why you’re going to go exploring." He said simply.

Avries was even more confused, "Sir? Surely there are other more qualified personnel for space exploration."

"Sure if this were a typical mission. However, since the invention of the zero-space drive, it's only been a matter of time before command decides to see if we can enter other universes."

Avries turned to the holo-window and called up information on the Hathaway 2, "Then why the Hathaway, sir? It's over fifteen years old, in fact it's older than the Ajax," Avries said staring at the rotating image of the ship.

The admiral changed the image back to the view of the station. "Because there is a chance, however slim, that you'll run into someone out there. Don't you think it will be better diplomatically if a first encounter was with a science vessel instead of a warship? And the reason I've pick this ship instead of a more advanced one is because I have considered the possibility that if they were aggressive then all they will have is an old ship that would've been decommissioned otherwise. And since it's a rather famous ship, it should be good for the crews moral. The fact you used to serve on her only further proves my point." Finished the admiral turned and sat at the conference table expectantly.

Avries reluctantly sat down beside him, "Very well admiral sir, I'll take command of the Hathaway 2."

The admiral smiled, "Wonderful, I knew you would make the right decision." He activated the comm unit on the table, "You can come in now."

The door to the conference slid open and a woman walked in and sat at the table opposite of Avries.

The admiral shook her hand, "Sorry to have kept you waiting. It took longer than I thought to get the captain to accept the mission. Oh, pardon me, allow me to introduce you. This is Captain Ryan Avries." the admiral said gesturing towards Avries.

Avries stood up to reach over and shake her hand. As he did so, he took note of the robes she wore and the orangey yellow tips to her dark hair before finally noticing the slitted pupils of her eyes. "You're.."

"Of the Phoenix Clan? Yes I am," she finished for him with a smile.

"She will be your communications expert in case of unforeseen difficulties," the admiral told Avries.

"It will be a pleasure and an honor to have you aboard," Avries told her. She nodded with another smile.

"Well, now that the formalities are taken care of," the admiral continued. "We can begin with the mission outline. We will send your ship through first captain. Your initial job is to establish a safe area of operations, and deal with negotiations of any local politics as needed. Then once you send the go ahead, we'll send a fleet consisting mostly of cargo, support, merchant, and other science ships. For the interest of not spooking the locals, you'll only have ten or twelve military escorts," the admiral listed. "All the ship will be warp powered for security reasons."

"Of course," Avries retorted as he looked over the information displayed on the holopad being displayed from the table. "So, admiral sir. When do we start the mission?"

"As soon as we fill the ship and personnel roster," he answered. "It'll take time to ferry the needed ships into zero-space and train each crew on the mission parameters."

As the admiral moved to stand, Avries moved to meet him. "It's time I got back to the station, and Avries?"

"Yes sir?"

"Welcome aboard. Now use the time you have to refamiliarize yourself with the ship. You two have a lot of catching up to do."

"Yes sir"

Before he left, the admiral gave Avries a knowing look. Avries returned his look with one of puzzlement until the door to the room slid closed leaving Avries alone with the Phoenix Clan woman. Avries sat back in the chair and stared at the holopad in front of him with a sigh.

The Phoenix Clan woman got up from her chair and walked over beside Avries and placed her hand on his shoulder, "I don't suppose you would honor me by giving me a tour of your ship captain," she asked. He looked up at her warm smile and returned it with one of his own.

"Of course!" he said and escorted her out of the conference room.

------

Later after showing her half the ship, he began telling her about its history as they walked down the corridor. "The ship was built two years before the war and even now, it's still quite versatile ship I have to admit. It's because of the compartments attached along the hull between the command section and engineering, giving the ship a total of twenty compartments. The compartments can be removed and replaced with a more advantageous one to help it with whatever scientific needs it may have. The large communication dishes on the ships back were intended for deep space use, which was later removed on the updated versions of the Discovery-class. Most of the turrets are placed along the mid-section leaving most of the rear and fore of the ship exposed to attack. Its only other armaments are 'drifter' torpedoes that were originally modified probes that launched from the planetary sensor array."

The Phoenix Clan woman just nodded and made the odd remark on the ships outer colour scheme compared to the other ships in the D.E.S. fleet. "The Admiral told me you used to serve on this ship."

Avries looked at her and saw only an honest smile, "Just barely over a year. My last few months were spent assisting in evacuating colonies and delaying the Jikoran fleets for the evacuations. I made it all the way up to captain on the Hathaway. It was only for a short time till I was offered the Ajax, which I've been in command of up till now. I've come full circle, it seems." Avries said with a sigh.

"Just like the Phoenix Clan,” she replied.

"I'm sorry?"

"My people start as children, grow old, then become children again," she said with her ever present smile.

Avries chuckles slightly, "You sure do seem to smile a lot."

"Well, when you can live as long as my people, I would rather be smiling for most of it than frown all the time," she said plainly.

Avries was going to say something but noticed that they arrived at the doors to the bridge. "And so our tour ends with the bridge," he held his hand to the now open door.

She walked in, keeping her smiling face towards him till she was inside. He stood at the archway for a moment, taking a deep breath and adjusting his armguards, he stepped onto the bridge. It had been remodeled since he was last here. Before, the stations had been arranged around the oval shaped walls. Now, they were clustered in the front half in a lowered section. The ships name was proudly displayed in large block letters along the back wall. The captains’ chair sat on the ramp before the lowered section as if to overlook the stations in front.

The bridge crew worked silently till one turned and noticed him, "Captain on the bridge!" he said at a heightened volume. Instantly everyone stopped working and stood at attention, facing Avries.

"As you were," the crew returned to their stations to resume work. The one who issued the command walked up to meet him; Avries noticed from the bars on his shoulders that he held the rank of Commander.

"Welcome aboard captain. I'm Commander Arthur Noel, I'll be your XO," he said shaking his hand.

"Thank you Commander. So tell me, what's the ships status?"

"Ship systems are all green sir. And I'm happy to note, the ship doesn't even have any growing pains. Almost as if she rolled out of dry-dock. Kind of surprising really, considering what she's been' through."

"Well, let’s hope she continues to surprise us like this then. We have quite an unusual mission ahead of us. I'd hate for her to fail us at a critical moment."

"Couldn't agree with you more sirs. So, do you have any orders? We're currently in the middle of running a ship wide diagnostic to make sure everything checks out."

"After the diagnostics are completed, and if everything checks out, start issuing random drills. It'll be awhile before our mission starts, but I’d like the crew to be ready for whatever is thrown at us."

"Aye sir," Commander Noel responded, and then turned to talk to the lieutenant at the tactical station.

Avries sat in the captains’ chair and looked around the bridge again. From his vantage point, he could clearly see the main display of each station. He noticed that the Phoenix Clan woman was talking to the communications officer.

"This is going to be a long mission," Avries thought with a sigh.

------

The weeks passed by quickly and the drills seemed to pull the crew closer together, and soon the mission date arrived. They were still short a few ships, but weren't really essential till the home base was established. Avries stepped out of his office onto the bridge. When he first arrived the bridge's atmosphere was calm and easy. Now it had the feeling of subdued controlled chaos. This made Avries smile as he slipped into his chair.

"Status report."

"All sections report ready sir," his XO responded beside him.

"Alright. Helm, undock us from the station and bring us about."

"Aye sir," the helmsman replied.

Several thumps could be heard through the front of the ship as the docking ports unlocked and moved away. A low vibration could be felt through the deck plates as the ship four engines came to life. Slowly, the ship backed away from the station and turned around.

"Helm, set course for the jump point. Half thrust please."

"Aye sir. Course set, half thrust," the helmsman responded tapping in commands on his panel.

The ship moved off towards four waiting Carrier-class ships that were in a circle formation. Ordinarily when a ship enters or leaves zero-space, a field large enough to envelope the ship is erected allowing the ship to transit to and from. The Carrier-class is the only ship capable of extending its field to encompass another vessel.

The theory behind using the zero-space drive for traveling to an alternate universe was that the four ships would extend their fields to overlap the other. A warp vessel would fly through the middle at warp speeds and hopefully end up in another universe safely.

"We're at the specified coordinate’s sir," the helmsman informed Avries.

"Very well helm, stand by. Communications, inform the Carrier ships that we are in position and waiting."

"Aye captain," he relayed the message. A moment later four beeps flashed on his display. "Sir, the ships have acknowledged and are now extending their fields."

"Confirmed, I'm reading a full overlap between them and its reading stable," the XO said reading over the science officer’s shoulder.

"Very well. Helm, take us through at warp one" said Avries.

"Warp one, aye."

The crew felt a subtle change of the vibrations in the deck plating as the warp coils accelerated the ship towards and through the field at warp.

On passing through, the ships velocity suddenly increased and lurched back to a stop, throwing everyone forward.

"Report!" Avries shouted climbing back into his chair.

The Operations officer staggered back to his seat and took a second to look over the information pouring in on his screen, "Compartments nine through twelve have lost power, and weapons by those sections are also offline. There's some buckling in the warp coils. No injuries reported."

Avries rubbed his jaw from the fall, "Helm, what's our position?" when she didn't answer, Avries repeated his question.

"...I'm not sure sir. We're not in zero-space but, we aren't in normal space either," she finally said.

"On screen," Avries told her.

The screen flickered on to show a large tunnel with various shades of blue, random snake-like energy strings were moving along the outer edges. A large sun-like light source could be seen presumably at the tunnels end.

The whole thing reminded Avries of a hyperspace corridor used by the Archaic species for FTL travel. However what he saw here looked almost organic. Space life forms were only theorized to exist, "Science, can you determine if we are in some sort of life form?"

"I don't have sufficient data to make any guess' sir. I'm not picking up any organic materials, carbon based or silicon. This whole area is flooded with tachyon particles. I'm sorry sir."

"No need to apologize. I don't think anyone really knew what was going to happen. Helm, set a course for the end of this tunnel. Make your speed one quarter thrust. I don't want to run into anything by accident in here."

"Yes sir, one quarter thrust," the helmsman answered.

As the ship moved forward, the crew was able to restore primary power to three of the damaged compartments. Avries was in his office talking to commander Noel about the repairs.

"So, how long till weapons are restored? Avries asked his XO.

"I've been told it will take approximately ten hours for complete repairs of the turrets. We can probably get them up and firing in five. Just as long as we don't rely on them exclusively," Noel answered.

Avries only grunted in reply as he looked over the damage reports of the warp coils. Two weeks of repairs to return then to specs, four days if he wanted warp seven. Till repairs were completed, the ship will only make warp five. His armguard beeped, "Yes?"

"Sir? Sensors have detected an aperture opening ahead. It could be a way out."

"On my way."

Avries and Noel exchanged a look before moving to the bridge. The helmsman brought the ship to a halt just before the opening.

Avries looked around the bridge, then at the screen, "Science, is there any chance the ship may be damaged if we pass through it?"

"None that I can detect sir," he responded. His uncertainty was clearly shown in his voice.

"Well hell, it beats sitting here waiting for something to happen. Helm, take us in."

"Yes Captain," she replied.

Slowly, the ship moved forward. It was as if the ship was emerging from a fog as the stars came into view.

"Contact! There's a large structure ahead of us," the tactical officer warned. Everyone looked to the screen and saw what looked to be a large spindle wheel with six large fingers jutting above and below as if it were ready to grab something.

Avries got up from his chair and walked to the upper section of the bridge behind his chair, "Communications, open a hailing frequency."

"Aye sir," he responded.

The Phoenix Clan Woman moved to Avries side. When he gave her a questioning look, she responded with, "Just in case the translation software isn't up to the job," she smiled.

"They're responding," the Comm. officer said.

A second later, the screen changed. At first, Avries thought the woman was human until he noticed the ridges on her nose. After a slight hesitation, Avries spoke.

"I am Captain Ryan Avries of the D.E.S. science vessel Hathaway 2. To whom am I addressing?"

The woman seemed surprised to see him. Avries wondered if it was because she's never seen a human before or if it was how they arrived here. The woman quickly regained her composure though.

"I'm Colonel Kira, commander of Deep Space Nine."



Authors note:
This story's far from complete, as I'm just getting the introductory out of the way, but I promise the action will pick up soon.