Shinzon’s lifeless body collapsed to the deck and Sisko wiped the blood from his knife and sheeted it. “Get rid of that,” he said, turning to face the forward section of the bridge. “Attack pattern Sisko Gamma. Destroy the Romulan fleet and cripple the Enterprise. Picard will meet the same fate as this worm.”
“Emperor!” shouted Bashir. He had pulled a medical scanner from his waist and was sweeping Shinzon’s body. “I’m detecting a massive amount of thalaron radiation!”
Sisko snapped his attention to the Jem’Hadar first. “Quickly, beam the body into space!”
The transporter field encompassed Shinzon’s body and head and beamed faded to ten thousand kilometers off the ship’s starboard bow.
Bashir exhaled a sigh of relief. “I need to get all of us treated. We took in far too much. Thalaron radiation can destroy organic material at the cellular level.”
“He was a booby trap,” Sisko said. Suddenly a pain shot through his head. He grimaced and touched his forehead. A piece of skin came away, caked in blood and muscle tissue. “There IS a cure, right?”
Bashir ran to the replicator and punched in several commands. “I think I can stabilize us without too much trouble.” Several hypos materialized and Bashir began administering the medication.
The cool kiss of the hypo instantly relieved Sisko’s pain. “He was got in the lower section of this ship, he no doubt spread the radiation throughout the entire vessel.”
Garak pushed away from a tactical console. “Jem’Hadar all board the ship are falling at their posts. We’ve lost two thirds of the crew.”
“Abandon ship,” Sisko ordered. “Transfer the flag to that cruiser.” He pointed to an identical Jem’Hadar battleship that was flanked by the Imperial ships Archer and Sentinel. “Set the transporters for maximum decon. Pilot,” he added, “set this ship on a collision course with the enemy fleet.”
* * *
“Sir, I am no longer detecting life-signs aboard the lead Jem’Hadar cruiser,” O’Brien reported from ops.
“Praetor Shinzon must have succeeded,” Worf said. He had returned to tactical and the blood fury was still raging through the proud warrior.
Picard, still haggard and beaten from the loss of so many aboard Terok Nor, stood between the helm and ops. He turned to the center of the bridge, where Data, now acting first officer, occupied Riker’s former chair. “So it seems,” he said quietly. If Sisko was finally dead, killed by Shinzon’s thalaron radiation pulse, this war might finally be over.
“Captain,” said Worf, “the Jem’Hadar ship’s engines have gone to full impulse. It is on a direct course for the center of our fleet.”
“Helm, hard to port, get us out of here.”
He returned toh is chair and sat down. Throwing a glance at Data he said, “I don’t think this is over yet.”
“Agreed,” Data replied. “Data to engineering. Mister Barclay, prepare the warp engines for maximum speed. We may have to make a rapid departure.”
“All systems ready to go,” came the stuttered reply.
They watched on the main viewscreen as the Jem’Hadar cruiser tore through the Romulan-Reman fleet and detonated it’s warp core.
The antimatter shockwave expanded in every direction, ripping at Enterprise’s shields.
“Deflectors at thirty percent,” O’Brien said, “we just caught the edge of it.”
“The entire Romulan-Reman armada has been destroyed,” Worf said. Quietly he added, “they fought with honor.”
“The alien ships are reconfiguring into an attack posture,” said the chief.
“We are being hailed by one of the battle ships,” Worf said.
Picard looked back to the viewer and stood. “On screen.”
“Hello Jean-Luc,” said Emperor Sisko. “Surrender.”
“Never,” Picard said defiantly. “Close the channel. Mister Paris, maximum warp, engage.”
Before Tom could acknowledge the order, a brace of white torpedoes emerged from the alien vessel and sped towards the Enterprise. Before anyone could react, the weapons tore through what remained of the Enterprise’s deflector shields. Her warp nacelles were sheared from the pylons, her main engineering section breeched to space.
It was in that instant that the first alien soldiers, clad in black, with white tubes of liquid pouring into their necks, began beaming aboard the once proud flagship of the United Federation of Planets. An organization that had once been the dream of humanity was now nothing BUT a dream of a now doomed civilization.
The aliens opened fire. Spock was the first to be vaporized, great man of peace and contribution to the galaxy, gone in a nanosecond. The next were Paris and O’Brien, stabbed with bayonets at their posts.
Data, who had rushed the first wave of troops was immobilized by a neural charge, the torn apart limb from limb.
Finally, Worf, who had launched himself over the tactical console to defend his captain was struck several times across the back of his skull. His bloodlust still boiling, he killed three soldiers with his bare hands, before he too was stabbed in his spinal cord, killing him immediately.
Jean-Luc Picard, held in the iron grip of the alien troops, watched in sickening horror as his crew was slaughtered. “Computer!” he shouted. “Initiate self destruct seq…” he was struck across the mouth with the butt of a rifle, breaking several teeth off at the gums.
“You will remain SILENT,” said one of the soldiers.
Picard spit blood onto the deck and remained quiet.
The turbolift doors opened at the rear of the bridge. Sisko, followed by two soldiers, emerged, dragging Crusher and Troi by their hair. “Ah, Jean-Luc,” he said. “I knew you’d still be alive. I brought the females for you.” He threw both women to the deck. He pulled a large knife from the holster on his hip and grabbed Crusher by the back of the neck. “Poor Beverly, she’ll die never knowing how much you cared for her.” He slice the blade across her throat, blood squiring over his hands. She fell to the deck, her eyes wide in horror. Troi screamed. The emotional overload to the Betazoid senses were crippling her.
Sisko snapped out with this foot, catching Troi in the face. “And the half-breed telepath. I killed her lover myself. So it’s only fitting…” he took the same knife and plunged it into Troi’s head. He twisted the knife, ripped away Troi’s face and through the knife to the deck.
Picard’s stomach churned, bile racing up his esophagus, and gurgling out of his mouth and onto the deck. “Finish it,” he said to Sisko.
“Oh no, Jean-Luc, I’ve been waiting YEARS for this, you’re going to remain in agony for quite some time.” He nodded to the lead soldier. “Take the good captain back to the ship and confine him. Then get this ship’s computers decoded. I want all of their secrets.”
* * *
Chapter.
“All the data has been confirmed, sir. Borg elements in the known galaxy are GONE. No space stations, planets, vessels. EVERYTHING. Something cut a swath nearly fifteen thousand light-years across, eliminating every Borg it came in contact with.”
“What about neighboring species?” Ben Zoma asked.
In the conference lounge of the Starship Sutherland, Captain Robin Lefler shook her head. ”We made contact with dozens of species. Every one of them told us of a fleet of bio-engineered vessels coming out of quantum singularities and obliterating the Borg. They made no contact with any of the humanoids we met. They just destroyed the Borg and returned back through the singularities.”
Ben Zoma stood and moved to the viewport. The Caretaker array was only a few kilometers away from the Nebula-Class starship. “We need to speak with the Alliance Council. If the Borg are gone and Picard fails in his mission with the Romulans, we’re done for.”
Lefler stood as well. “It’s not good, I give you that, but there has to be something we can do.”
The doors to the lounge hissed open. An ensign ran in, out of breath, his face stricken with horror. “Captain! We just got word from our sentry probes. Enterprise has been captured, the Romulans destroyed and the Empire has begun obliterating our colonies in the Badlands!”
Chapter:
At the edge of explored space lie a planet. Beta Triangulae. A temperate, barren world, claimed by no one. Until the day Emperor Sisko had descended through the clouds of Earth and took command.
The Federation Council members, those who had escaped the purge, fled to the outlying systems of the Federation. They had cowered in fear while images of Federation President Amitra had been beamed across known space, as she had been publically disemboweled by Sisko himself.
The former leaders of the Federation had come together when Jean-Luc Picard had formed the Alliance, and created the Alliance Council, a vane effort to regulate activities against the Empire. They had no real power; that power lie with the remnants of Starfleet, and the officers who had followed the banner Picard had raised.
Word now filtered to them from their spies and probes near Bajor. The utter victory of the Empire was at hand. Project Caretaker was falling apart around them. Sisko, with his new Gamma Quadrant allies, and their more powerful ships and sensors, had exterminated the last vestige of the Federation from the Badlands. More than three million refugees were now dead. The people who had escaped to the Delta Quadrant were now the lucky ones, and plans were in effect to order Captain Ben Zoma to destroy the Caretaker Array and try to begin anew with what they had.
It was order that Ben Zoma would most likely disobey.
So it was, that public figure head, and quasi-leader of the Alliance, Sarek of Vulcan stood on a high railing peering across the vast desert plains not unlike the sands of home.
He was two hundred and eight standard years old. He had helped shape what took form as the modern day Federation. It was he who had led the charge for peace. Be it with the Klingons, the Romulans or the Legarans. He had been born in a time when human starships were not capable of warp speeds greater than seven, when phasers and photon torpedoes were not instruments of destruction, but dreams of scientists who had not yet been born to create them.
Sarek had struggled with much in his life. From the death of his wife Amanda, to the loss of his son Sybok. Only a few short years ago, Sarek had considered his own life at an end when the onset of Bendii syndrome had overtaken him. When Vulcan had been occupied by the Empire, Sarek had been in bed, screaming at the world in his emotional instability.
He had been evacuated with his wife Perin, by the Enterprise, who had been defending the system in a retreating battle that had begun at Earth several weeks earlier. It wasn’t until the Enterprise made it to the safety of the plasma fields of the Badlands, and then into the far reaches of the Delta Quadrant, that they had discovered the Caretaker array, which contained the technology that cured him. It had practically rejuvenated him.
After his recovery, the former councilors who had fled Earth, begged for his leadership, to show the refugees fleeing the Empire, that the principles and ideals of the Federation were still alive with them.
Sarek had grudgingly accepted the responsibility and in the past few years had tried to set forth a path that would once again restore the peace that the Federation had created.
He had no official title, but everyone called him ambassador, his last official rank. But on this day, he wished only to be alone. Word had spread widely, even in this remote sector of the Beta Quadrant. The Empire had a new ally, new soldiers and had finally turned the tide of the stalemate. Picard was captured, along with his ship, millons were dead. It was not logical to continue to resist.
Resistance under these circumstances was hopeless.
As hopeless as the call that had come in minutes ago.
An armada of Jem’Hadar warships had been detected approaching the planet. To avoid detection by the Empire, Beta Triangulae had very little in the way of defenses. Two old Constellation-Class starships in orbit, along with three planet based verteron disruptors, was their only defense. The enemy force consisted of hundreds of vessels.
They would reach orbit in less than one hour.
“Sarek,” came his wife’s pleasant voice.
He turned to see Perin approaching. They both extended two fingers, in the traditional Vulcan greeting between mates. “The council has ended it’s final session. Everyone has returned home. Admiral Ross has ordered the orbiting ships away. All of the children and as many as the civilians as they could carry have been beamed to the Vanguard and the Okinawa. They’re going to try to make contact with Caretaker Nine. If they can make it to the Delta Quadrant, they’ll be safe, if not…” she paused and took a breath, “they’re going to aim for unknown space and get as far away from this catastrophe as possible.”
Sarek heard the sadness in her voice and shared it. Although his repression shoved it aside. “It is regrettable that so many were left behind. From all reports the Jem’Hadar do not recognize the rules of war.”
“Which is probably why Sisko recruited them,” Perin spat.
“Yes, he is a most barbarous man,” Sarek said. “He maims his victims at a whim. I do not want you to suffer at his hands because of your ties to me.”
“Sarek, what are you saying?”
“I want your life to end with dignity and happiness. Not at the blunt end of an Imperial blade.”
“You’re talking about the al-ta-kon aren’t you!”
“The ritual suicide is normally reserved for Vulcan’s when they reach an age of infirmity and existence no longer remains productive. Perin, My Wife, we will do this together. We will be spared the horrors that the emperor will inflict upon us. We will spend our last moments together, they way we have lived. Come. Our time is at an end.”
