Sometimes I hate this job
Lt. Karyn Dallas, Chief Counselor
USS Galaxy

It seemed all Karyn had been doing lately was dealing with personnel problems. Her own personnel...people she depended on to follow regs and generally work to help the rest of the crew and the ship run smoothly. It seemed like every time she turned around, people were getting drunk, knocking the daylights out of people or just generally going postal. *I swear, sometimes I feel like I'm the director of "As the Planet Turns."

As she cruised down to Elaine's quarters, she caught a brief glimpse of the Excelsior and the Enterprise-C. *Look at the pretty ships, wonder what they're here fo-? Oh, yeah, our mission. I think I remember our mission...something about a rift? the past? I don't know, the images get blurred with those of me playing BABYSITTER to a bunch of hostile children!!

When she reached O'Hare's quarters, she rang the chime, expecting to catch Elaine before Alpha Shift.

"Lt...Karyn, what brings you here?" asked Elaine with surprise.

Karyn answered without preamble, "Thought you could use these, she answers, tossing a pair of black sunglasses her way, "you look like hell."

The door close as Karyn enters. Elaine glances down at the floor, not quite sure what to say. "I guess you heard about last night."

"Ah...yes, last night. A little bird named Tim O'Connell told me he helped you to your quarters last night after he found you in a drunken stupor. You remember Tim...one of the security officers who unjustly brought you to the brig, the one who could justfiably throw you in there now?"

"Karyn...I don't know what to say. I was angry. It was late."

"Why did you get drunk? What did you intend to do?"

"I guess I intended to hurt Lt. Shtik, not seriously, I just wanted him to feel what it was like. I couldn't let him get away with it."

"I see. Well, it appears today is your lucky day. Had you hurt him, you would have found yourself without a counselling license and on the next transport home. SFC doesn't kid with these matters and neither does Capt. Price. I need to be able to depend on you to keep your cool. See that it doesn't happen again, or I'm afraid we won't be so lenient. Take a few days and recover. I'm here if you feel like talking about it. Don't come back until you're sure you're ready, I need you at 100%. Is that clear?"

"Crystal. If I may ask, what's going to happen with Lt. Shtik?"

"I'm on my way to speak to him now and to read the latest report. I'm also going to meet with Cat to see if we can come up with a physiological cause. Are you sure you don't want to press charges?"

"I'm sure. Whatever caused him to attack me was not normal. He needs help and I'm not sure his incarceration will make me feel any better. Just seeing the look on Bolitho's face when you chewed him out and then demanded my release was worth it to me. No one will underestimate you again."

Completely deadpan Karyn answered, "They better not." Elaine laughed. Her CO could be difficult when challenged, but genuinely cared about the crew and would do anything to help them.

***Security***

Was it her imagination or did everyone scatter when she entered Security? Nah...they're probably really busy, thought Karyn with a smirk.

"I'd like to see the latest report on Lt. Shtik, please. She recognized the young man behind the counter as the Ensign she had been short with the day before.

"Here you go ma'am, he said carefully, "anything else?"

Karyn quickly scanned the report and stopped when a particular part caught her attention. "Ensign, are you sure this is accurate?"

"Y...yyes ma'am. Lt(jg) Bolitho and O'Connell just filed it this morning."

"I see, thanks Ensign." she thought she caught a glimpse of relief in the young man's eyes as she turned to leave. She did her best to hide a grin before hitting her combadge.

[Dallas to Khatroweena.]

[Khatroweena here. What can I do for you Karyn?]

[Please meet me in Main Security. I think we may have found our culprit with Lt. Shtik.]

[I'm on my way. Cat out.]

While Karyn waited, she tried to smile at passing security officers as they cast nervous glances her way, before hurrying off to chat in hushed tones.

“Love Klingon style”
by LtCmdr. Hunter McKenzie
Chief Tactical Officer, USS Galaxy

LtCmdr. K’Eytyanna Samara
Engineer, USS Galaxy

Stepping into the turbolift after her shift, K'Eyt waited before the doors closed before asking,

"Computer, location of Hunter McKenzie."

[Lt Cmdr McKenzie is in the Briefing Room.]

"Is there a senior officer's meeting at the moment?"

[The last meeting finished 10 minutes ago.]

Grinning, K'Eyt ran to the nearest lift, hoping she could talk to Hunter.

******************

Stepping into the room, she stopped suddenly. Sitting in one of the chairs right next to Hunter was a thin lithe young blond female. From the look of the uniform, K'Eyt realized the woman was from the Enterprise-C.

The woman had her hand on Hunter's shoulder, and was sitting too close in K'Eytyanna's opinion. Neither of them had realized K’Eyt had walked in, as the woman leaned closer and hugged Hunter.

Gasping, K’Eyt stepped backwards, catching herself on a chair. Swearing loudly in Klingon, she spun around as she raced out, trying to keep her emotions in check.

As she left, her fist drove its way into the door panel in anger.

******************

Hunter spun around suddenly when he heard a very familiar sound - K'Eytyanna's very colorful Klingon swearing.

Stepping from Tasha’s embrace Mac hurried after K’Eyt without any glance back at his former lovers counterpart

*******************

K’Eyt raced down the passage, trying not to show how bad she felt at the moment.

Behind her, she could hear Hunter calling out as he ran after her, but she didn't care and just ignored him.

Reaching the end of the corridor, she swore angrily when she realized she would have to wait for a turbolift.

Quickly, she ran back to the nearest intersection, hoping Hunter wouldn't catch her. As she was turning, a strong hand grabbed her arm tightly and spun her around.

"I said wait. K’Eyt, I can explain everything."

Growling angrily, she spat out,

"Let go of me, you p'takh."

He grabbed her other arm and shook her slightly,

"Listen. What you saw wasn’t what you think. There is nothing between me and Tasha."

Snarling, K’Eyt struggled a bit before quickly smashing her head forward, reasoning that her harder head would be less affected then Hunter. To her relief, he let go of her and stepped back in surprise, shaking his head.

Sprinting away, she headed off towards a Jefferies Tube she knew she could hide in.

About five metres down the corridor, she felt a heavy weight slam into her legs, knocking her to the ground.

She spat out some choice curses in various languages as she hit the deck hard.

Hunter landed on top of her and she quickly turned her upper body, smashing her fist outwards to catch him in the eye.

Trying to slide out, K’Eyt struggled as hard as she could.

“Dammit, Stop it!!” Mac barely had time to adjust as she flipped him over her head. Tossing him on his back. As both of them rolled to their feet. As Mac turned he heard the familiar ‘snickt’ of her blade as she drew it from its scabbard Mac watched as the pain she was feeling mixed with the feral anger that simmered in her dark eyes.

“Go back to your whore, P’takh” she spat, waving the blade menacingly.

“Tasha doesn’t mean anything. She helped me get over something that I had kept hidden a long time ago. Something that happened with her counterpart way before we met…”

K’Eyt snarled feinting toward Mac. “I saw what she was ‘helping’ you with…I should bury my blade in that bitch too.

“Ok..That’s about enough...I don’t have time for this…” spat Mac stepping into her reach. K’Eyt reacted just as Mac thought she would, feinting, then lunging at Mac’s unprotected throat. Mac though had learned well form his lover and bobbed left as the blade tore through his uniform slicing his shoulder underneath. Ignoring the pain, Mac swung his cleansed fist catching the Bajoran-Klingon-Human female flush on her left jaw knocking her back into the wall and causing her blade to fly across the corridor.

K’Eyt lay there stunned by the blow that had taken many a Klingon warrior out as the SF Academy boxing champ. Mac glanced at the prone form of his lover as his hand touched the freely bleeding wound on his shoulder. He winced as he stopped to pick up the Klingon blade.

A moan from behind caused him to turn around as K’Eyt began to return to consciousness. Mac walked to where she lay and knelt before her. Placing the blade firmly against her smooth throat, firmly enough to cause a small bead of blood to form at the blade’s edge. As she stirred at the blades coolness against her throat, Mac leaned in to his voice low and hard as he spoke the Klingon.

“I hold your blade. I am the victor. Your blood is mine to do with what I wish…” Mac’s eyes were hard as he stared into hers. He could see her hurt as it mixed with the fiery sprit of her Klingon side as she struggled to not accept defeat. Only the pressure of the d’ktahg kept her prone. After a tense moment , Mac stood and reversed the blade offering the handle to K’Eyt. “But I am also your Lover…and as such any harm to you is returned to me tenfold. If my path is to die for any dishonor than may Kahless receive me now.”

As Mac completed the ancient Klingon apology, K’Eyt took the blade and Mac raised his arms out to his sides exposing his torso to attack….

Lt. Commander Hunter McKenzie, Chief Tactical Officer, USS Galaxy
ICQ 6758283

"The Missing Element"
By Ensign Elaine O'Hare

Elaine stepped back from the door and slipped out from her uniform. She walked over to the replicator and requested some aspirin for her headache, which was worse now. Elaine swallowed the aspirin with the rest of the orange juice that was room temperature and headed back to bed.

Upset at Tim for rating her out to Karyn, she let it slide.

*There's your favor, repaid in full, lt.* Elaine thought.

She nestled down in her bed with the covers almost up to her nose. Elaine closed her eyes and drifted off.

**********7 hours later************

O'Hare turned over a few times and stretched out. Feeling much better, she decided to practice for a while in the holodeck.

Unlocking her trunk, she raised an outfit up from the bottom of the pile. Elaine smiled for a second, remembering that the outfit had been a gift from a dear Klingon friend of her mothers. O'Hare pulled the matching six inch spiked heeled boots out from the trunk and placed everything on the neatly made bed.

The outfit was a carmel colored leather studded one. Elaine slipped on the pants and then the vest. Adding the boots boosted Elaine's height and she liked to look her enemy in the eye before she took their holographic life from them.

Pulling her hair up in a cream colored ribbon, she examined herself in the mirror.

*Good enough, hopefully this will help* Elaine sighed

Lifting the top of her jewelry box, Elaine grabbed an amulet of many jewels out of the intricately carved wooden box. O'Hare clasped the heavy necklace around her neck. She ran her fingers across the amulet, recalling the purpose of the Klingon ritual in which Elaine was given it.

She was fifteen when her father gave it to her. It's purpose, as a symbol, permitting others to know that she was available for a mate. O'Hare wore it on special occasions, but now made a note of wearing it all the time.

Not that the ensign was looking for a mate, she just wanted something to remind her of duty, honor, and respect. Qualities, to which of late, Elaine had thrown to the wayside.

She walked over to her wall and gently lifted the bat'leth off of it's supports. Swinging the weapon from side to side, she felt some of the tension release from the muscles in her arms and shoulders.

*Yes, this is what I've been missing.*

O'Hare sheafed the sharp blade to her back and exhaled a long breath.

Turning out of the corridor, Elaine proceeded to the holodeck. Something about her one boot did not feel correct, Elaine bent over to tighten the laces.

Tim and Neil were turning the corner just when Elaine stood back up. Neil was busy talking about something. Tim was the first of the three to notice each other. His eyebrows raised as the ensign stood up.

"Neil!"

"What?"

"Look......"

"Look at what?" Neil said defensively.

Just then, Elaine's eyes spotted Tim and Neil and her face flushed with embarrassment, not anger for once.

Neil met her eyes with a flash of fake anger.

"Lts." Elaine said with a forced smile

"Ensign." Tim replied politely

Neil merely grunted under his breath.

Elaine continued past the two officers and proceeded to the holodeck.

"That......was deliberate." Neil stated with a sigh.

"So, it worked then?" Tim smiled.

"Yes, unfortunately."

Tim smacked his buddy on the back and laughed.

**********Holodeck***********

Elaine took her weapon from it's resting place on her back. Her heart was beating wildly and sweat had started to form in dropplets on her forehead.

Dimly lit and musty smelling, the rooms Elaine chose had many places for Klingons to hide.

The first opponent was behind O'Hare. Elaine swung around, lifted the blade high into the stale air.

The Klingon charged at Elaine, but had no time to bury the steel into the ensign's side. Leaning back on one leg, O'Hare lifted the other leg with force and knocked the enemy down to the ground. Placing her spiked boot on the body, Elaine brought the blade down and a flash of blue appeared.

As O'Hare stood still, she heard two pairs of footsteps behind her. Elaine could feel the hot breath of one opponent on her neck. Dropping immediately to the floor, she spun around and hit him right above the knees. Dropping her weapon and arching her back, she back flipped over to the other enemy to the point of performing a head stand with her arms out stretch. She wrapped her legs around the opponents neck and proceeded to flip his body over hers, ending up sitting on his torso with her legs still wrapped around his neck. Determination filled O'Hare's face as she smiled and moved her legs swiftly to the left and then back to the right. Once more, the blue hazed appeared.

Quickly picking her blade up from the ground, Elaine proceeded to fight for the next hour.

Drenched in sweat and exhausted, the ensign smiled, feeling more like herself than she had in quite a while. Walking back to her quarters, Elaine had a spring in her step and the hard exterior seemed to disappear.

"Reporting For Duty"
Ensign Tam Li
TacOps, USS Galaxy

With a barely audible hiss, the turbolift doors parted and Tam Li stepped from the enclosed confines of the lift onto the bridge of the USS Galaxy. *Another day, another time. Literally.*

*Space Time Anomolies.* The thought raced through Tam's mind as she approached the tactical arch and assumed her position at one of the secondary consoles. Her fingers flashed across the console as she keyed in the commands to run a detailed diagnostic of the Galaxy's weapons systems and the power drain Lieutenant Commander Mercury's "cloaking device" would demand. Once the diagnostic was under way, she looked up toward the view screen at the mysterious wonder of "The Rift".

*Will we get home?* A question unanswered.

The petite Asian Tac Officer pushed the cascading thoughts from her head as she returned her attention to her console and the diagnostic readouts. Just as she surmised. The power demanded by the "cloaking device" would drain much needed power from several primary systems including the weapons systems. Not good. But, power allocation was Operations department. Surly they were already aware of the situation. Yet, to be absolutely sure, Tam sent the results of her diagnostics to the Ops console.

Tam clenched her lips together. *Will we have the power to return home?* She turned to the Vulcan Tac Officer standing near her and smiled weakly. "Looks like Ops will have a time juggling power allocation on this trip."

Kamin turned his head slightly in response to Tam's statement. "Indeed they will. In the mean time I suggest you turn your attentions to cross indexing the energy readings immolating from the rift through our tactical database with all known energy signatures"

*Vulcans.* "Thank you!" quipped Tam a little harshly. "I am familiar with Lieutenant Commander McKenzie's orders."

"Indeed." came Kamin's emotionless reply.

*Vulcans!*

"Meeting some legends"
By Lieutenant JG Jordan Arisa
Helmsman
USS Galaxy

**Excelsior, Bridge**

"This bag contains any spare components you should need and here is a padd just in case you're not quite up to speed on the Enterprise-C and here systems." Lieutenant Dimitri Valtane said as he hung the bag over Jordan's shoulder. He smiled his Russian smile at her as she began to examine the padd.

"Thank you so much for all of this. I'm sure it will come in very useful, I'm not the best engineer. But...I do know the helm like the back of my hand." she smiled as she turned away from Valtane's console, as she did so she looked over at the dark skinned Vulcan. His black eyes seemed to bore into the console. "Hey Dimitri." she said over her shoulder.

He looked up at the Lieutenant from the future, he had to admit that he liked the new uniforms. "What is it?" Dimitri asked as he looked in Tuvok's direction. "You talking about Tuvok?"

"Yes..." suddenly she was cut off by the rich voice of Captain Hikaru Sulu.

"Lieutenant Arisa, Lieutenant Castillo needs you on the Enterprise. I hope that Lieutenant Valtane has given you everything you need." he said waving Valtane off. Then indicating that she should follow him into the turbolift.

"Yes, Mr. Valtane has been most helpful." Jordan said as the doors closed behind her. She couldn't help feeling a little bit more than slightly intimidated by the legendary Captain standing beside her.

"May I ask Lieutenant, how far along are you?" he asked gesturing towards her very slight bump.

"Nine weeks." she replied, her voice over flowing with joy. "Do you have any children sir?" she asked, not remembering when the legendary helmsman of the Enterprise-B had been born.

"Yes, a daughter, Demora. She's now at the Academy, just a little younger than yourself in fact...well here we are." he said as the doors swished open.

Jordan turned around at smiled at the Captain, "It's been a pleasure to meet you sir." she shook the Asian Captain's hand and almost regretted that she wouldn't be able to meet him in the future...or rather her present.

"Likewise Lieutenant, and tell your baby when it's born that Captain Hikaru Sulu gives it his blessing." Jordan smiled as the doors closed in front of her face. 'Here that guys, Captain Sulu gives you his blessing'.

--
Camilla Claudia Pretlove

"Trying to Stay out of Trouble"
LtJg Lexana Ral
Security- USS Galaxy
Reviewed by Captain Price

Normally LtJg Ral would not be doing any type of engineering activities, however, everyone was helping out and so she found herself on the Enterprise -C welding some panelling back into a bulkhead. It was rather monotonous and Lex hummed quietly as she watched the sparks fall to the floor. She felt rather sick, patching up a ship which was shortly going to be destroyed, sensing the thoughts of those who knew they were going to die. She'd 'turned off' her sensing abilities, something she'd learned to do over time.

She'd seen Heratta and Jii earlier, hefting pieces of metal back into place. The Nausicaan she noted with grim pleasure, had been looking rather sore. They'd had to stop their holodeck challenge due to lack of time, but they'd each given each other a fair beat down in the process. She'd gotten two broken ribs, a lot of bruises and a sprained wrist. She didn't know about Rotan, and was unfamiliar with Nausicaan physiology. But she knew, as they'd stood there and dropped their weapons in mutual agreement, that she'd gotten some good blows in. If they'd had time, who knew what the outcome would have been.

A voice rang out in her head "Lt Ral?"

She was about to open her mouth to respond, when another did so before her.

"Yes Ensign?" It said in a musical betazoid accent

"I need you to look at these readouts, do these numbers look correct?"

Lex stared firmly at the wall, welding the same spot for several minutes. She couldn't turn around, couldn't look. Captain Price had issued strict instructions that they were not to interfere with family members or do anything which may affect the timeline. She knew the 'other' Lt Ral was looking at her, she could feel her eyes on her back.

"I think that's pretty much welded Lt" The accented voice said appearing at Lex's shoulder.

"Yes sir." She turned off the device and stared at the floor

"What is your name?"

"Lexana.. " she said, staring fixedly at a spot on the carpeting

"I thought so.."

This caused the half romulan to look up rather sharply, into the dark eyes of a women not much shorter than herself, with dark eyes and the same auburn locks which she had. Her face was softer than Lex's, without the starker features brought on by the romulan blood.

"I.. shouldn't be talking to you." Lex said

"I know." The other woman said "I just wanted to hear your voice. I've been watching you work. You're very like her you know."

"Who?"

"My sister. Her name is Miinae, she's working towards going on a colony expedition."

"That's my mother's name or.." She bit her tongue to stop herself from saying more "How did you know mine?"

"She promised me if she ever had a daughter she'd name her after me." the woman in an engineering uniform said "I'm glad I got to see you, even if it was just like this." She reached up and very gently brushed Lex's cheek with her hand, Lex felt a slight tingle in her spine, she closed her eyes and felt the other woman leave, not opening them till she knew she was gone.

She finished up her work and beamed back to the Galaxy, a bundle of mixed emotions just waiting to explode.

Bugout
by Lt Commander Endris Gakor
with Lt Commander Matthew Albrecht
(reviewed by Captain Price)

*** Enterprise NCC-1701-C, Main Transporter Room ***

The orders were clear. "Bugout". It was a command once used in the old Mobile Army Surgical Hospital units on ancient Earth. In this case, it meant that the Galaxy officers who were visiting the Enterprise should return to their home assignments.

As the senior officer of the detail currently on the Enterprise, Gakor was responsible to muster all the troops from the Galaxy and see that they returned. Given the historic mission the Enterprise was destined to complete, no stragglers would be permitted. Every single visitor must be off the Enterprise before she entered the chroniton rift.

90% of the crew had been checked off the list, when Ensign Angela Dana walked in. The bald Deltan was covered with a layer of grease and sweat. It was evident that she had been in the detail correcting the engine problem Gakor had managed to identify during her medical exam of Ensign Ston.

"Lt Commander, I respectfully request immediate transfer to this vessel.", the young female officer asked unexpectedly snapping to attention at the same moment.

The orders were quite explicit. Every single crew member must return to their ship of origin, (with the exception of Ensign Shoak, who Captain Price had dealt with), in order to prevent temporal paradox. Still, the Tellarite doctor knew it was not best to summarily dismiss requests, for two reasons. One, there might be a logical reason behind the request, and second, if requests were rejected without being heard, resentments would build up and cause problems later.

Endris shifted her hooved feet in her regulation boots. Since she had adopted the uniform of someone 30 years earlier for the convenience of the 'natives', the doctor was a tad uncomfortable in the unfamiliar garments.

That aside, she answered the request with a question. "Why do you want to remain, Ensign?"

"The repairs I have made to the Enterprise's engines are very delicate, since the engineering crew did not have a great deal of time to complete precision labor under the conditions we face. The crew shortage here will make monitoring the repairs a critical task. I have personal knowledge of how and what was fixed, so I am the logical person to complete that work.

"That is interesting, but my orders are explicit. Everyone of our officers is to return to the Galaxy. However, your hard work and determination deserve to be rewarded. As senior officer supervising the labor detail here, I am going to recommend you for promotion. If Captain Price agrees, you will soon be a Jay Gee.", Endris said with an encouraging smile.

The Ensign walked over to the transporter pad without further protest, thinking a promotion was an adequite inticement to return to her station on the Galaxy.

A few minutes later, the rotund Doctor's significant other walked in to the transporter room, sneaking up on his lover and planting a wrap-around hug from behind the woman. The surprise made Gakor's temperature jump, until her sensitive nose caught the familiar human scent and identified her 'assailant'.

"Matthew Albrecht! What have you done with Dumpling while you are out galloping around like an irresponsible teenager? I seem to remember leaving Adam in your care......"

"Ah, my most delectable Pumpky. Adam Delorbius is in no danger, he is being watched at this moment by a very responsible cat. Oh yes, Kalln is helping, too. Don't worry, if a seven foot lizard with giant razor sharp claws can't protect our son, then what can?" Matthew inquired with a grin.

The Tellarite Doctor hurumpt in mock protest, then allowed a sinister smile to be pasted on her mouth as if she had just eaten an unexpectedly tart snack. "In that case, you had best return to the Galaxy and scoop Adam up, Mister.", she said playfully poking him in the chest for emphasis. "As you can see, I am occupied here to make sure no one is left behind by mistake."

Slumping his shoulders in theatrical submission, the security officer wandered into the transporter beam and disappeared in a column of sparkling energy.

Gakor lingered until the rest of the crew had returned to the Galaxy. Although this took time, there were no more surprises. An hour later, she was the only member of the Galaxy's crew still on the Enterprise. After reporting this to Captain Castillo, she herself beamed back to her home vessel.

The Lt Commander was tired, but slacking it off, she made her way to the bridge to give the work detail report to the Duty Operations Officer. Once requirements were satisfied, Endris returned to the family quarters to see her son and husband to be. The reunion proved nourishing, as Matthew had prepaired a a Welcome Home Oinkus for Gakor, Adam, and himself.

"Let Down"

"Computer, In Search of Angels by Windham Hill."

The soft, gentle music calmed Elaine down after her victory in the holodeck. Lighting the proverbial candles, the scent of strawberries filled the room. O'Hare had quite a collection of candles, she lit them, watching the flame burn which gave her an inward peace.

The door chimed, still in her leather sparring hear, drenched in sweat, she sighed.

*Never and peace* Elaine thought to herself.

"Come in"

The door hissed open and there Hudson stood. Time stood still for Door as he saw Elaine. Totally drenched, the ensign still had the beauty of a female warrior, victorious from the battle that had ensued a while earlier. Her blade still grasped in her hand, the tired ensign spoke.

"Well there Door, long time no see."

"Not really ensign, this big Cardassian dog saw you last night."

"Yeah, I know, I'm trying to forget."

"Well, dinner in ten forward might help you put the past behind you." Door cracked a huge smile and waited for a response.

Elaine thought about it for a second.

"Okay, your on. Let me shower and change and I'll meet you in ten forward in an hour."

"See you then"

Door was seen doing, as some would call it, the happy dance outside O'Hare's quarters after the door fully shut closed.

O'Hare took the next hour to transform from warrior to princess. Picking out the little black dress Elaine loved to wear, she slipped into. It was black velvet with two thin straps leading from the heart shaped bustline. the two straps in the front broke off into three a piece, cascading loosely down her back and stopped right above the curve in her back. She un-hooked the amulet and replaced it with a black velvet chocker that displayed a tiny diamond embedded in the center. Choosing her shoes took a while, since the ensign had quite a lot to choose from. Finally, she chose a simple black heel that had straps for around the ankles that led up to Elaine's lower calf.

Inwardly hoping Neil and Tim were off somewhere and not walking around anywhere close, she left her quarters.

"Music off and dim lights."

As she left her quarters, the cuckoo clock on the wall chirped the hour. Elaine proceeded down the corridor, thinking about Cat.

*I'll have to go and have a visit with her soon*

O'Hare wondered if Cat was upset that she had not stopped by and said hello.

**********Ten Forward**********

Door grabbed a table close to the window. He was anxious because usually, he was not the person seen out on a date. Door a chosen a nice outfit, tailored, so it fit him well. Tonight was the night Hudson planned on telling the ensign his true feelings towards her.

O'Hare stepped into ten-forward cautiously, first looking around for the presence of the boisterous Electra. Breathing a sigh of relief, she continued to scan the room for her date for the evening.

Door spotted Elaine and stood up. Hudson had fallen hard for the attractive counselor and looking the way she did tonight, did not make the situation any easier on him. Elaine saw Door and waved.

*No cologne. Please please, don't be wearing any cologne* Elaine thought.

O'Hare had a weakness when it came to cologne on men. Even if she did not know the man, something about smelling it released an excitement in her head. O'Hare hated this fact about her and she never revealed this, even to her closest friends. Even though the ensign loved scents, some of them made her eyes water and her nose run.

Unfortunately, O'Hare could smell Door's cologne even before she reached the table.

The two sat down and chatted all throughout dinner.

Elaine grimaced as she started to feel her sinus's fill and her eyes begin to water.

*Why me?*

Hudson started to notice that the ensign's eyes were red, puffy, and filling up with saline.

"Allergies?" Hudson asked.

"No, your cologne." Elaine sniffled

"God, I'm sorry Elaine. Why don't I get a shower and meed you in the holodeck in 30 minutes."

"Okay, why the holodeck?"

"I need to talk to you."

"That's fine, I'll head back and change."

The two stood up and Door leaned over, gently kissing Elaine on the cheek.

Taken back by the gesture, O'Hare smiled.

"Thank you" She said softly.

Cat came walking in as the ensign was walking out.

"Cat! I've been meaning to talk to you."

"Oh sure lady." Cat smiled

"What's wrong with you?" Concern expressed itself on Cat. Elaine could never seem to get a break the last few weeks.

Elaine rolled her eyes and giggled. "Door's cologne"

"Elaine, I swear!"

"I know, I know."

The women looked at each other and exchanged a smile, promising to get together and chat soon.

*****O'Hare's Quarters*******

Elaine changed into jeans and a peach colored shirt. having sometime left, she grabbed a cup of tea from the replicator.

**********Holodeck********

Door had gotten there ten minutes earlier and made up a country like setting with a hill overlooking a serene lake. On top of the hill was a large oak tree and a blanket lying underneath the shade of the leaves.

Hudson laid down on his stomach on the blanket watching the ducks guide effortlessly over the crystal clear lake.

Elaine arrived and smiled when she saw the setting before her.

Trudging up the hill and finding Door, she snuck up on him and plopped on the blanket laying on her stomach beside him.

Rolling to his side, Hudson looked at Elaine.

"Hello there."

"Hi." Elaine chuckled

"What's up Door?"

Door sat up Indian style and Elaine sat up across from him. He took both her hands and gently held them.

"Elaine, I would like to tell you that I really am starting to care for you. You are the most lovely, kindest person I've eve met. I was wondering if I could see you on a regular basis."

O'Hare looked a tad uncomfortable.

"I believe what I need right now is just a close friend Hudson. With the assault still fresh in my mind, I really need to find closure to it. Whether if the issue will find closure with counselling or on my own, I'm frightened about getting close to anyone right now. I'm sorry."

Hudson tried to hid the disappointed look from Elaine, although she saw right through him. Unlocking her hand from Door's grasp, O'Hare gently ran her hand down his cheek.

"I'm sorry." Elaine whispered as her face softened. A tear ran down her face and Hudson wiped it away with his finger.

"It's alright" Door said quietly.

***************Next morning, Counselor O'Hare's office***********

Elaine sat in her office waiting for the security officer to show up for his first appointment.

*What is it with me and security officers?* Elaine thought sourly.

Ensign Mark Mulich had just recently lost his parents in a shuttle accident on Earth. Sunder brought it to Elaine's attention by a note on her console. Sunder informed her that the ensign had been depressed and bitter, along with a lacking job performance.

Elaine took a few sips of coffee, trying to dismiss the thoughts of hurting Hudson's feelings the night before last. She felt terrible, but thought it was the right decision to make. The last thing on the ensign's mind was romance and affection after considering how she's been treated by some of the males here.

The ensign showed up with a look of disgust on his face. Elaine went to open her mouth, but the ensign cut her off.

"I'm only here because I have to be." Mike spouted.

"Please have a seat ensign. My name is Elaine. You were referred here by your commanding officer because he was concerned about you and your performance in the security department."

The ensign rolled his eyes.

"You shrinks are all the same. Sit behind your desks, dishing out advice hand over foot, not really getting to our level."

Elaine proceeded to stand up and move her chair from behind the desk to across from the ensign. Stooping down to his eye level, she spoke:

"Look ensign Mulich, I know that you don't want to be here. If I was in your shoes, I wouldn't either. Much opposite to your thinking, we counsellors have feelings also, unless we're Vulcans."

Mark chuckled at the statement the ensign just made. He had been on duty in the brig when Elaine had been detained and released by the Chief Counselor. Elaine had impressed the ensign by not being the stereotypical, holier than tho counselor. She appeared to be down to earth and he like that. Mark felt himself relax and was feeling more at ease with O'Hare's presence.

"I'd like to see you twice a week till we've both agreed that you're feeling better. You will never fully get over the deaths of your parents and I don't want you to. What we need to do is get you to open up and release some of the pent up hostility and grief. You had no control over the deaths of your parents and I don't want you to feel guilty. What were their names, Mark?" Elaine asked softly.

"Tom and Darlene." Mark sighed as he said their names.

"I bet you miss them? I've been missing mine also since I've been stationed here. One thing I've learned in my short time here is that life is never dull. You should live it with out feeling guilty over things you can't change."

Elaine jotted down the names of Mark's parents and some other side notes.

"The one thing I'll ask you to do for me is to think about why you are feeling angry and possibly jot them down for me so we can start there on our next meeting."

"Okay."

"All right Ensign, I'll see you in two days, same time, same place. Deal?"

"It's a date counsellor." Mark said with a forced smile.

"Good, I'll see you then."

Elaine moved the chair back around to her desk. O'Hare wrote down some more notes in his file. Overall, he's a nice guy, just having some difficulty seeing his emotions clearly and separating personal issue from work related issues. Set up sessions q. 2/week until we feel he has a better grasp on the death of his parents. EOH.

Elaine shut the file and opened the next one up to read it.

"Show time"
by Captain Robert Edward Lee Price

It was time.

All of the preparations over the last couple of days had been completed. The Enterprise was as repaired as it was going to be. The Excelsior was back up to operational status. Even better actually, thanks to Ensign Shoak's assistance on that older vessel. And both the Galaxy and Excelsior had been fitted with Lieutenant Commander David "the Boot" Mercury's crude cloaking devices. It appeared that all things were ready to reenter the spatial rift and try returning the Enterprise back to 2344 and Narendra III.

"Captain, the Excelsior is hailing us." Lieutenant jg Richeson explained from the Tactical station on the Bridge.

"On screen 'mate." Lee responded from the Command chair.

The image of Captain Sulu appeared larger than life. ["Greetings Captain Price. The Excelsior is standing by and ready to begin on your order."]

Lee nodded. He felt funny having the legendary Captain Hikaru Sulu waiting on his order to begin, but being Fleet Captain, that made Price the officer in command. If this worked or if it failed, it would be Captain Price who would be responsible. "Fair dinkum 'mate. Let me contact the Enterprise and establish a tractor beam and then we can follow you in."

["We will be waiting for your signal Captain. Excelsior out."]

"Hail the Enterprise 'Commander." Lee called out.

Lieutenant Commander Thomas opened a channel to the Enterprise-C. "Hailing frequencies open Captain."

The screen changed to show the young Lieutenant Richard Castillio sitting apprehensively in the command chair of the Federation's flag ship. ["Enterprise here Galaxy. Go ahead Captain Price."]

"It's time 'mate. The Excelsior is standing by ready to get the show under way." Captain Price explained.

["We are ready Captain. Let's go show those Romulans what it means to be Starfleet."] Castillio responded bravely. Behind him at the tactical station, Tasha Yar stood just as proudly, readying the Enterprise arsenal for the battle.

Lee nodded. "Lieutenant' Richeson, activate tractor beams."

"Tractor beams are engaged Captain. We have a strong hold on the Enterprise sir." Tim replied.

"'Commander Thomas, adjust the Galaxy's shields to extend around the Enterprise 'mate." Lee ordered evenly.

Chris tapped the proper controls and soon the Galaxy's shields surrounded both starships. "Shields extended sir and holding steady."

"Bonzer." Lee declared. Send to the Excelsior, we are ready to begin."

After a moment, Lieutenant' Richeson responded, "Message sent and received Captain. The Excelsior is moving out."

Everyone on the bridge glanced up at the elegant starship Excelsior as she maneuvered in front of the Galaxy and Enterprise and gracefully entered the spatial rift.

"Lieutenant Commander Bancroft," Lee paused with a slight grin and a pointed finger, "follow that ship."

Teb snapped her gum and gave a nod, "Aye sir. I'll keep us right on the Excelsior's tail."

Within a few seconds all three ships had entered the swirling rift.

"Minor turbulence Captain." 'Commander Bancroft called back as the Galaxy buckled, "Nothing to worry about."

Captain Price nodded as the starship seemed to smooth out considerably just after that one jolt. The Excelsior was holding a steady course down the throat of the phenomenon. Teb was keeping the Galaxy and the towed Enterprise-C right behind the lead starship. Other than a few rickety bumps and cross currents, the three starships proceeded smoothly for the next fifteen minutes.

"Sir, detecting the exit point of the rift, just ahead." Lieutenant Commander Erikson reported from science station one.

"Long range sensors are detecting several power signatures. They could possibly be Romulan ships." Lieutenant jg Richeson reported from Tactical.

"Signal the Excelsior to activate their cloaking device to mask our exit from the rift Lieutenant." Captain Price ordered.

Lieutenant' Richeson complied. "Signal sent sir."

Before them, the USS Excelsior's image began to waver and disappear as Captain Sulu activated the ship's make shift cloaking device. It was a crude cloak, cobbled together from bits and pieces of technology that 'The Boot' was able to remember from his experience installing a secret Starfleet Intelligence cloaking device on board the Galaxy some time ago. But the device was effective at fooling the sensors of the 2344 era Romulan vessels and creating a cloaking field so large that the Galaxy and Enterprise was successfully masked in her wake. All three ships exited the rift and could see the dozens of Romulan attack ships devastating the Klingon outpost station at Narendra III. Over subspace, a general distress signal was received, obviously in Klingoneese, though translated into English by the universal translator. It was easy for one to tell.

["Emergency! Help us! The Romulan's attack without provocation. This is Narendra III to any vessel. We are under attack by the Romulans. In Kahless name, help us defend this outpost from such cowardly enemies."]

As the bridge crew of the Galaxy listened to the static filled message, a hail came in from the Enterprise-C.

"Captain, the Enterprise is hailing us sir." Lieutenant' Richeson informed.

"On screen 'mate."

Lieutenant Castillio's image replaced the main view screen, larger than life. ["Thank you for the ride Galaxy. If you'd be so kind to turn us loose now, there is an outpost station that needs the help of the Enterprise."]

Captain Price stood from his command chair and took a couple of steps forward to stand before the main view screen at the front of the bridge. Behind the Captain, the rest of the Galaxy bridge crew likewise stood to attention in a show of respect. "Our hopes, our dreams and our prayers go with you Captain Castillio." Lee stated as he snapped an old fashioned naval salute.

Castillio nodded, speechless. He looked pale and focused on the job at hand. Without saying another word, he simply deactivated the view screen.

Lee turned around and started making his way back to the command chair. "Commander Casey, please coordinate the deactivation of the Galaxy's shields and tractor beams with the activation of our own cloaking device."

Deiran glanced at Thomas and gave him a nod. "Okay gentlemen, on my mark, deactivate shields and tractor beams and divert power to Cloaking device on five, four, three, two, one, mark."

With flawless precision, Lieutenant' Richeson deactivated the Galaxy's tractor beam and extended shields while at the same time, Lieutenant Commander Thomas activated the make shift cloaking device to render the Galaxy invisible to the Romulan sensors. There was a brief moment of tension as it wasn't known if the cloaking device would activate having traveled through the turbulent rift, but that was soon put to rest with Deiran's smile. "Lieutenant Commander Mercury reports the cloaking device has activated and is working as designed."

"Bonzer job 'mates. It looks like our job is done."

The Captain had barely said the words before everyone's attentions went to the view screen as several Romulan warships broke off their attack of the Klingon outpost station and started for the now visible Enterprise. It didn't look like the Starship was going to even get to survive the first volley of fire at this rate. Though the Enterprise-C struck out boldly under Lieutenant Tasha Yar's tactical guidance, firing photon torpedos and the one remaining phaser bank at the incoming ships.

"She's never going to survive long enough to earn any respect from the Klingon's at this rate." Lieutenant' Richeson commented while staring at his sensors at Tactical. Then he looked up and declared, "The Romulan's are firing..."

Everyone on the Galaxy knew that the Enterprise had minimal shields. All it would take would be one medium powered attack to render the ship useless and a few more to destroy her after that. Everyone watched as the incoming disrupter blasts appeared to become absorbed just before striking the Enterprise-C.

"What happened there?" Erikson asked from Science station one, "That shot should have rendered the Enterprise's shields inoperable."

"It didn't strike the Enterprise 'mate." Lee declared flatly while plopping down into the command chair. "I believe our Captain Sulu of the Excelsior has decided on a little more cowboy antics."

"You don't think?..." Deiran asked in a stunned tone.

"Aye. It's the only explanation." Lee stated.

"Captain, if the Excelsior is destroyed in the battle, or even if it's damaged and looses it's cloak, it will seriously affect our own history." Thomas pointed out from the Operations Station.

"I know that 'mate. That's why Lieutenant Commander Bancroft is going to take us in and make sure the Excelsior doesn't get itself into trouble. Do it 'mate."

Teb activated the controls, "Doing it luv."

"We can't risk trying to raise the Excelsior Captain, the Romulans would be able to detect the transmissions." Commander Casey explained.

"Aye. Unlike the Enterprise, the Excelsior doesn't have the newer secured communications systems that we have." Turning, Captain Price glanced at Lieutenant Commander Erikson, "'Commander, can we use the Galaxy's sensors to locate the Excelsior while she's cloaked?"

Greer nodded, "Yes sir. The cloaking device David created are very crude by our present day standards. They are adequate to fool the Romulan sensors at the time, and probably even the Excelsior's, but ours are much more sophisticated. We should be able to get a fix on them easily."

"Do it 'Commander. If we can locate the Excelsior, at least we can try and keep her out of trouble."

"Incoming Romulan warships on attack vector Captain." Lieutenant' Richeson declared.

Lee sighed. "It's going to be a long day I see. Evasive maneuvers. Try and protect the Enterprise and the Excelsior if possible."

"The Beginning of the Dance"
by Lt. Cmdr. Ronni Morris
Assistant Chief Science Officer, USS Galaxy

"Greasy son-of-a-Targ!!!" the Delphinian spat as she covered her eyes. The sparks seared small holes in her uniform which she quickly put out.

Ronni put the Har'dil Spanner up to the console again and activated it. This time, the pathway flared to life. As she closed the panel, she said, "It's about time."

The Battle Bridge was silent except for her. She sat at the Operations Console and started her program. Boosted by the terciary power supplies, she would be able to make ghost images of the USS Excelsior, the USS Enterprise, and the USS Galaxy. It wouldn't make of the ships invulnerable, but it would play havoc with the Romulan sensors.

She sent the schematics to Greer. As Chief Science Officer, it was his job to forward the idea to the Captain. It was Ronni's job to help the ship and to make Greer look good.

With a smile, she sent the plans to Greer, and took a sip of coffee as she looked over the "To Do" list that she had been given.

Done and done

Lt(jg) Tim O'Connell
security
USS Galaxy

Tim settled back in to his chair and finished the paperwork needed for this incident. Elaine O'Hare then he had to carry her drunken self back to her quarters. She was going to have problems with this. He puncehd a command and sent a small message to Dallas informing her that he had to scrape her off the corridors and basically told her to check in on her tomorrow. Completing the final touches on his forms, he spent his entire shift on this one complaint and this Tzaq then lectures them on Ponn farr, Tim sighed.

11PM Tim was exhausted, he got up and walked out and back to the turbo lift. As the lift whirred up to his deck he rubbed his neck and stared straight ahead. Getting off the lift he walked in to his quarters. Changing out of his uniform he was now dressed for bed in a pair of shorts and a t shirt. He walked in and crawled under the sheets. His arm reached out and felt the familiar warm presance Eshar. He put his arm around her and she stirred and moved in, still asleep. Tim drifted off to sleep.

==next morning==

Tim stirred and his eyes opened, he looked up and saw her staring at him, he looked at her, "what's up?" She looked at him, "nothing much you got in late last night, any fun..."

He laughed and told her the whole story, SHitak and O'Hare and all this insanity.. she was laughing at that and he told her all about how Dallas chewed out Neil, she noticed his eyes harden a bit as he remembered the look on Neil's face afterwords. She looked at him and knew that he had something in mind, "Tim relax, Neil can handle it.." Tim smiled at her and replied, " I know but Neil took care of me it's my turn. I promise not to get arrested." She smiled and kissed him, "I hope not, Sunder does have a no conjucal visit policy in his brig." Tim laughed and began to get up. She pushed him down in bed, "you have 3 hours till work Neil interrupted us last time so... this time no excuses Mr O'Connell..." she kissed him and the two fell back on the bed....

"Of balance"
by Ensign Michael McDowell
Engineer - USS Galaxy

The doors swished open and Michael almost had to drag himself into his quarters. *Thank heavens...i thought i never get here*, thought Michael. His last shift ended some thirty minutes ago and Michael's intention was to go straight to his quarters and get some sleep.

But instead of doing that he found himself wandering on the wrong deck twice simply because he was so tyred he could'nt think straight. The last several days were exhausting.

The seemingly infinite stream of work had drained all the energy from him, like the imaginary dracula sucking every drop of blood out of his victim.

Without thinking he walked towards his bed. It was as if his mind was set on automatic pilot. One step,...only one step before he could drop his exhausted body onto the nice soft bed. Again, an error. Suddenly he lost his balance and before he knew what had happened he lay on the ground reaching for his his left ankle. Michael screamed while pain, originating from his ankle, shot through his leg.

"Damn! Computer, lights!" Within a fraction of a second the request was analysed and executed causing darkness to switch places with the light. This sudden change caused Michael to close his eyes until they adapted to the intensity of the light. Now he could see what caused his fall. His personal PADD lay a few meters from the bed. No doubt, that must have been it. Of course it was his own fault. Last night, before going to sleep, he used it to refresh his knowlegde about temporal mechanics. He must have fallen asleep while reading it and eventualy the PADD slipped through his fingers and fell on the ground.

With some difficulty Micheal got up, turned, and took the first step in the direction of his PADD. A flash of pain run through his leg when he took the other. This time he could contain himself. No need to scream twice.

"Great...now i've done it." Michael mumbled to himself "I injured myself at the worst possible time. Should be great seeing me crawl through a Jeffries tube right now." He limped further got the PADD and noticed he did'nt even got past the first chapter although he had tried hard to finish reading the first two chapters before going to sleep.

By now Michael was fully awake and it was no use trying to sleep now. Surely the pain would keep him out of his sleep. Should he go to sickbay? No, he could'nt go to sickbay just because he had a sore ankle. It just sounded ridiculus. Right now the best he could do was to take care of his ankle himself...and take a good shower.

***20 minutes later***

Nothing beats a good shower. That was something Michael could agree on. *Now, to find something for my ankle...i think some ice will do the trick.* He limped to the the replicator at the other end of the room and requested some ice. The response was logical from a computers point of view. ["Please specify shape and amount of ice to be replicated."] Michael sighed. He wished that in some cases the computer would be a little bit smarter. "Cube shape, amount 15."

This time Michael's request was executed without further delay. He used his towel to keep the icecubes together.

A few moments moments later Michael sat on his bed thinking about last weeks event's while pressing the towell against ankle. Strange, how quickly things could change. One day you are living a ordinary life in 2375, by Starfleet standards of course, the next you find yourself in the year 2295 repairing two antique ships. But no one worried about that since they all knew that these things, although rare, could happen if you served on a starship. No, the problem was to restore the timeline...or timelines if you took Quantum mechanics into account. To do that they had to sent each ship back to his own time in a particular order. That was basically the plan as far as Michael knew. And at this very moment it was put into practice.

Only one thing kept bothering Michael. They managed to repair the Excelsior in time but the Enterprise-C was still a wreck. She would not stand a change in batlle when returned to Narendra II in 2344. And that's precisely what they were doing now. It's like leading them to the slaughtering-table. Even thinking about that made him feel sick.

*I need a cold glass of water right now.* Michael thought and walked as quickly as he could towards the replicator.

"Computer, a glass of water."

["Please specify the temperture."] The computers response was formal and without emotion.

What!? Unbelievable.

"Why not take a certain temperture as a default value for crying out loud!" Micheal said with a loud voice.

["Insufficient data. Please restate specification."]

USS Galaxy "Oh What Now!"
Written By Lt Commander Kahn Nilani
Chief Medical Officer, USS Galaxy

Nilani was sitting in the holodeck practicing on her clarinet when Red Alert sounded and the computers voice came into life.

"Red Alert, all hands to battle stations. All Crew report to your assigned stations."

Nilani put her clarinet down and stood up, she placed her clarinet in the box and sighed. "Computer end program and transfer design setting to my office!"

The holodeck turned back to it's yellow and black pattern, the doors opened and Nilani left. She walked as fast as she could to the sickbay and when she entered she moved to a chair that she had the Engineering team develop so that she didn't have to stand up all the time.

She moved to a central station and entered her access code, the computer displayed all medical station terminals and diagnostic systems, Nilani's staff were working hard when she stood up.

"Can I have your attention for the moment!" Nilani shouted.

The medical staff stopped and looked forward and faced her.

"Ok I've been doing some thinking about what is about to happen, I want full triage stations setup. Endris... goto the medical suiet 3 doors down and set up first level triage facilities. Take three nurses and if you need any further assistance don't hesitate to call for help!" Nilani turned to Cat "Cat take the Pediatric doctor and another 3 nurses, convert the auditorium into a level two triage facility. Take as many medkits as you need and any other help you may require!" Nilani looked back over everyone "Eveyone else you know your duties and you know where you have to be, so everyone lets hope that the prophets bless us all. Dismissed!"

Nilani moved her chair over to storage rack and pulled open the protective covering. She turned around and spoke to the remianing staff. "Everyone else, I want this area preped for emergancy surgery. The EMH is on he will handle most situations, and we have the rest of you who know how to do basic surgery. All we need to do is stabalise the patient, once that is accomplished sedate the patient and then add his or her name to the padd on the wall. The EMH or I will then check the surgery and fix the patient fully, Ok people lets move!"

"Violent Cases"
Starring Elaine O'Hare, Gordall Kalln and a cast of thousands

***Counsellor O'Hare's office***

O'Hare sighed and turned to the next file.

Oh, THIS was interesting.

Gordall Trichiolachnen Kalln. Gnalish Elt. There was a photo... euchh! What the hell is that? Oh, that must be it - him.

What's it say then?

Gordall Kalln - hmmhnhnnhmmhmh - in alien fleet - hmmmhnhmnmnh - ship destroyed by Cardassians - hnhnnhnhn - mercenary for ten years - hmmmhnh- joined Starfleet - mhhmhmmhh - court martial - hmhmmhh - ended up on the Galaxy.

_How_ long ago? Fifty years? He's been in Starfleet fifty years? Ninety-eight years old? He doesn't look a day over... over... well, whatever age he looks like.

Psych profile... Gnalish Elt are depressed by nature - hmmhnhhn - Jem'Hadar similarities, lack of a creator race which they used to serve - mhmhmhnmh - Gordall Kalln suffered loss of shipful of crew - hmnhmnmnh - caused occasional behavioural problems but attitude more of the issue - hmnmhmn - generally liked - hmmhmnmnh - cultural practices demand he be addressed as 'Kalln' not 'Gordall' - hmhnmhnmh - scheduled for regular sessions with Counsellor Dallas Walker.

Dallas Walker? Hadn't she left ages ago? Had Kalln had a counselling session since? This sounded foreboding...

Recent additions (updated by Karyn Dallas): hmmhnmnh - begun a relationship with security officer Anna Gartner (crossref Gartner) - hmmhmmhh - Anna's stability in question - hmhmmhmh - Kalln to attend joint sessions with Anna - hmhhnnmnh - not sure as to long-term effect - hmmhnmh - Kalln has close contact with security department in general, frequent personal meetings with Neil Bolitho, Tim O'Connell, Lexana Ral, Ursa Sunder, often on holodecks.

Not _them_ again, though O'Hare, they popped up everywhere.

She closed the file and sighed again. This was going to be an uphill struggle...

* * *

Tim Fletcher for:
LJG Gordall Kalln, Science Officer, USS Galaxy

"It's going to be a cold day in Hell"
Lt. Jg. Lexana Ral
Ensign Elaine O'Hare

*This happened the day after Elaine got out of the brig.*

Elaine had gotten up from her desk and decided to take a small break in Ten_Forward. Grabbing some files to look at, she headed out the door and towards Ten_Forward.

The doors hissed open and Elaine looked around for an available table. Every one was taken and almost full. O'Hare spotted one near the window with a woman sitting there audibly grumbling to herself. She noted the color of the collar of her uniform and sighed. Security.....again.

*Oh well, at least she's a female.*

Elaine made her way over to the table and asked if she could take a seat.

Lex, seeing the ensign guessed who she was from Neils description of her.

*That's strange* Lex thought to herself, *She doesn't have any warts or is carrying a broom.*

"Ensign O'Hare?"

"Yes, how did you know? May I sit here for a minute? It's the only table I see available." Elaine asked

"Sure, go ahead." Lex gestured Elaine to one of the seats.

Elaine took the seat and smiled. *Maybe not all security personal are spawns of the devil*

"How did you know my name? Wait, let me guess, Neil Blothio?" Elaine smirked as deep down she knew the answer before Lex even replied.

"Yes, unfortunately."

The two women both shared a very big grimace.

"What did he do to you? It's Lex, right?

"Yea, see these?" Lex held up a huge number of files.

Elaine frowned.

"Sorry, part of that is my fault. The Shtik incident."

"From what I heard, nothing is your fault. Neil is just playing the big bully. I wish I could get back at him for all this...."

"Yeah, I know how you feel. I'm out of ideas for my 'psychological assault' on the Lt. I've gotten myself in enough trouble already. If I could just think of something small, yet funny to irritate the hell out of him." Elaine said scratching her head.

"The leather outfit didn't work?" Lex said laughing.

"I don't think so. I could hardly breathe in that outfit anyway, and those boots, geez, try killing Klingons in those and not loosing your balance. Good thing I had the holodeck safety's on or Cat would have been carrying me out in separate body bags." Elaine giggled.

"The things we do.....Ohhhhhh, hey, I got an idea......."

Lex leaned in close and divulged the plan to Elaine. O'Hare had tears in her eyes from laughing so hard and the two set a time to get under way. The plan was a very intricate one and needed to be planned out carefully so no one would suspect these two little angels were up to no good.

Elaine and Lex waited until they were both officially off of duty before they started planning. They knew that Neil would be out of the quarters late this evening. Elaine and Lex snuck down the corridor from Elaine's quarters, carrying with them a black duffel bag full of only the essential ingredients to make someone's quarters very uncomfortable.

Lex, being Security, knew the way to get into someone's quarters without being noticed. Once inside Neil abode, they knew they only had a little bit of time to pull this off before Neil got back. Elaine walked over to the climate control panel and turned down the temperature and turned up the humidity.

The two waited.........

and waited........

Soon, little white flakes began to fall from the ceiling. The two girls immediately broke out in a fit a giggling as they watch the accumulation get larger and larger. When there was a good blanket of the white stuff on the floor, Elaine and Lex proceeded to build an anotomically correct male snowman and dressed it in one of Neil's spare uniforms.

Around the neck of the snowman, the two left a sign that read.......

"Neil has no balls"

The two looked at each other and broke into another fit of laughter. It was just what Elaine needed to relieve some of the stress and Lex looked better too. They gathered up the tools and snuck back to Elaine's quarters to wait the oncoming tropical storm named Hurricane Neil.

In Elaine's quarters, the two looked at each other and said at the same time "Payback's a bitch." The two colapsed on the floor laughing hysterically.

“History In the Making… All Over Again”
USS GALAXY
Commander Deiran Casey
W/ excerpts from Capt. Price’s “Show Time”

It was times like these that Deiran loved being on the Bridge. The adrenaline rush, the exhilaration of the moment, this was what Deiran Casey lived for. How many times do you get a chance like this? Going through a temporal rift, fighting side-by-side with Captain Sulu and being a witness to one of the most important battles in federation history in the last 50 years. This was exciting.

But, the moment was tempered with cold, hard reality because if history remained true the Enterprise-C and all on board, except for a few survivors, would be dead. But, their sacrifice would save millions more. They were heroes in the making.

The journey through the rift was a bumpy ride. The rift seemed to be getting more unstable which didn’t bode well for the Excelsior and the Galaxy.

As they went through the rift, Deiran monitored the Galaxy’s power readings on his chair’s display. He watched with a trained eye for any fluctuations or certain systems for overloading. He was looking for anything that might cause some problems, something that could get overlooked in all the excitement. You never know when something could blow up in your face.

The Galaxy pulled the Enterprise through the rift. Deiran could have sworn he heard a collective sigh throughout the bridge.

“Great job everyone,” Casey said to the Bridge officers. The Main viewer showed the white and blue hurricane shaped tunnel that was the rift. A few nebulae clouds hid the exit of the rift. If things weren’t so deadly serious it would actually be a pretty sight.

Once the Galaxy was clear of the temporal anomaly, the Captain began to put the plan into action. "Commander Casey, please coordinate the deactivation of the Galaxy's shields and tractor beams with the activation of our own cloaking device."

Deiran glanced at Thomas and gave him a nod. "Okay gentlemen, on my mark, deactivate shields and tractor beams and divert all available power to the Cloaking device on five… four… three… two… one… mark!"

In perfect unison, the shields and tractor beams deactivated and milliseconds later the Galaxy’s makeshift cloak was activated.

The tension was heavy, cloudy almost if tension could be seen. It could certainly be felt. ‘Does Lee have a back-up plan if the Cloak doesn’t work?’ Deiran thought as he waited for the word on the Cloak. Twenty seconds later he saw that the cloak was operational as he stared at his XO’s monitor. Deiran was beaming with pride, "Lieutenant Commander Mercury reports the cloaking device has activated and is working as designed, Captain."

"Bonzer job 'mates. It looks like our job is done," replied Captain Price.

Deiran turned to Lee, attained his attention and showed Lee his crossed fingers and a smile. “Here’s hoping sir,” he said to Lee. Price smiled back.

The battle then began to unfold before them and all eyes shifted to the view screen ahead of them. The Enterprise was on a direct course for the Narenda III outpost when the Romulan warbirds broke off their attack and changed course to intercept the Enterprise-C. A lost cause for the Enterprise, if there ever was one.

It ate at Casey’s inside’s to sit there, cloaked and not able to help. He wanted to jump out of the chair and start a cheering section for the Enterprise and her crew and then start a prayer group of different religions right next to the cheering section.

Deiran made a fist and whispered, “Come on C, give ‘em hell!”

The Captain heard Casey’s spirit coming through even in a whisper. Both Casey and Price looked up at the main viewer when they heard Erikson ask…

"What happened there?" Erikson asked from Science station one, "That shot should have rendered the Enterprise's shields inoperable."

"It didn't strike the Enterprise 'mate." Lee declared flatly as he sat back in the command chair. "I believe our Captain Sulu of the Excelsior has decided on some more cowboy antics."

"You don't think...?" Casey asked in a stunned tone. That was Sulu. The man did exactly what Casey felt like doing just a few seconds earlier.

"Aye. It's the only explanation." Lee stated.

"Captain, if the Excelsior is destroyed in the battle, or even if it's damaged and loses it's cloak, it will seriously affect our own history," Thomas pointed out from the Operations Station.

"I know that 'mate. That's why Lieutenant Commander Bancroft is going to take us in and make sure the Excelsior doesn't get itself into trouble. Do it 'mate."

Teb activated the controls, "Doing it luv."

"We can't risk trying to raise the Excelsior Captain, the Romulans would be able to detect the transmissions." Casey reminded Lee.

"Aye. Unlike the Enterprise, the Excelsior doesn't have the newer secured communications systems that we have." Turning, Captain Price glanced at Lieutenant Commander Erikson, "'Commander, can we use the Galaxy's sensors to locate the Excelsior while she's cloaked?"

Greer nodded, "Yes sir. The cloaking devices David created are very crude by our present day standards. They are adequate to fool the Romulan sensors of this time, and probably even the Excelsior's, but ours are much more sophisticated. We should be able to get a fix on them easily."

"Do it 'Commander. If we can locate the Excelsior, at least we can try and keep her out of trouble."

"Incoming Romulan warships on attack vector Captain." Lieutenant' Richeson declared.

Lee sighed. "It's going to be a long day I see. Evasive maneuvers. Try and protect the Enterprise and the Excelsior if possible."

Casey watched as the Galaxy swiftly moved into position and blocked a few torpedo’s that were aiming right at the Enterprise. The Excelsior was protecting the Enterprise and in a strange twist the Excelsior was being protected by the Galaxy.

The whole Bridge shook as the torpedo’s slammed into the port side of the Saucer section. Casey and the Captain were thrown from side to side in their seats and the Bridge crew held onto their stations to steady themselves as the ship rocked like a toy sail boat in a bathtub.

Casey laughed out loud, “I’d love to see the faces of those Romulans right now. They’ve got be in total shock that their torpedo’s and phasers are impacting so far away from the Enterprise’s shields.”

“Aye ‘mate, if situations were reversed it would be quite a sight to see,” Price replied with a smile. Both men were inwardly hoping and praying that the cloaks held steady.

“Power levels to the cloak are at 91% Captain,” Casey informed, as he watched his XO console to his right. Casey was in direct contact with the Boot down in Engineering.

Two more Romulan warbirds let out a volley of phaser fire. One catching the Excelsior and the other slamming into the shields of the Galaxy. The ship shook like a rope bridge over a long deep ravine.

“Cloak down to 84% sir,” Casey informed again. “We need to do something quick or a few more shots like that and our cloak will fail Captain.”

“Suggestion Commander?” the Captain asked.

“Yes sir, if we change course and keep the Galaxy in front of or below the Enterprise maybe we can fire some quick volley’s to give the Excelsior and the Enterprise some breathing room. We can fire when the Romulans have fired and have their backs away from us sir. Maybe we can set our torpedo’s to register the same frequency as the Enterprise’s so that it looks like the torpedo’s we fire are coming from the C, sir?”

"Visions.”

Lt. Benedict T'Kal
Tactical Officer
USS Galaxy

The holodeck re-creation of the Jen’ Tavere Temple of The Prophets was silent. Benedict was motionless – even his breathing was slowed to almost imperceptible levels. He was far away. The void was enveloping his conscious mind – and that mind was being driven by a part of Benedict that had not risen in a long time.

His was the past. Ironic that Benedict was here – in the past with the Galaxy and the Enterprise and the Excelsior.. and the ghost of his own past – Tikaru. He had been a killer once - an assassin. He still was that man – although the last years had submerged that part of him so that it lay dormant. Now it was awake – a self defense mechanism by a mind that was reeling from an assault upon its’ very foundations.

Benedict was caught between honor and suffering – and the changes made to his memories were overlapped, done with no real skill – only brutal force. His memories were erased, changed, played with and juggled, until they no longer made sense.. like a computer that no longer knew where it stored it’s data. Sooner or later the system crashed. Benedict’s system had crashed after he had told Tebrianne that it was all over between them. It was as if he’d simply had enough – and switched off.

Now it was something else that moved him. Tikaru had always been Benedict’s respite from a cruel war. His mask when hunting. The man with no remorse and no conscience when he took life. There was no quarter in those eyes – the flat violet gaze that betrayed nothing and heralded death. Tikaru had been truly feared by the Cardassians.

He sat still – dressed in black – the tailored jacket and black silk shirt – his hair the same color but with a single flash of silver over the left brow – pulled tightly into a ponytail and held fast by a silver snake in a coil. He knelt on the stone floor – both hands resting on his thighs, his eyes closed.

Before him on the stone, lay a black sheathed dagger – a traditional blade of Human Japanese origin. The tanto was crafted by a Klingon – the Head of House T’Kal on Q’onoS – the Klingon Homeworld. It was a warriors blade – and tradition held that a warrior was never without it – because there may come a time when he would have to use it for it’s intended purpose. Seppuku – ritual suicide was the only recourse for an honorable man in such circumstances in which Benedict found himself.

It was time.

He moved slowly – removing the jacket and folding it neatly by his side. The shirt followed. His muscular body glistened with the light from the flames in the bowl – and the golden tiger danced as if alive. He watched the flames for a while – tightly in control of his body – using his meditative technique to remove all outward sensation – concentration centered inside himself. Preparing for the ritual.

The soft scraping of claws and a deep growling sounded to his left. He remained motionless – aware yet removed. The sounds approached and the cat stood next to his shoulder, it’s hot breath at a level with his ear. It nuzzled against his shoulder and let out a soft purring. He turned slightly to see it more clearly – this was his spirit animal – a Kami by his father’s standards. His spiritual guide that had come to him more than once over the years. The last time had been shortly before his attempted rescue of Nilani’s sister Illiyana.

It was a blessing upon his endeavors and when it arrived he felt sure that the Prophets watched over him. The animal was present – he could feel it’s pagh. It stared at him and walked around him – sinuous and graceful, it sat directly before him.

It’s golden eyes held his – and he felt it’s raw power hiding there. The eyes drew him in – and held him as if they were twin tractor beams. The whole scene suddenly shifted to a golden haze and Benedict felt detached totally.

A voice from his left was startling in its’ quiet intensity. His father stepped into view – Martin Tikaru was dressed in a Bajoran Militia uniform. His dark features and black eyes held him in thrall. He was stern faced and scowling. “The Tikaru has not finished!” He said and moved around to Benedicts’ right.

Another voice just as intense came from behind. “The Tikaru has tasks to perform.” The lithe form of Alayessa stepped before him – moving from right to left. She was as he’d last seen her – and her eyes were a startling blue – her face blood red. Her hair was braided and held back over her shoulders, and the Klingon armour shined golden.

“He has a task set before him.” Tebrianne said as she followed Alayessa. She reached out and touched his face and smiled. “It is not time for his linear existence to end.” She moved past and he followed her with his eyes. Benedict’s mind responded to the images being given him – and he despaired that he could not end his life, as he should.

“The Tikaru must do his duty!” His father said stepping once again into view. “There are no excuses for failure!”

“Tikaru.” A new voice sounded behind him and he felt a slight touch on his bare shoulder. His mother moved close to him and regarded him with her steady violet gaze. She was as beautiful as he’d always remembered. “You are of three minds. Seek the One mind that holds truth – for it is hidden within you.” She moved by.

Alayessa glared at him. “A new name is yours.” She spat.

“Bonded.” Said Tebrianne as she crossed in front of Alayessa.

“You will find duty.” His father said. “You will seek honor.” He walked past and behind.

Benedict’s mind had been focussed solely on the act of seppuku – now it was uncoiling – releasing slowly from the determination to end his life. He felt sensation begin to flood through his body – he’d been so close to the edge. It was denied him. He could not disobey the Prophets. For he knew the vision was their Way.

He had to find duty and honor – and he had tasks to perform. Whatever they were Tikaru would find them. Once that duty was done – he would find release. The single-minded purpose was fixed. Benedict was no longer in control of things. Tikaru had a duty. Until that duty was done – all other considerations were non-existent.

The vision faded and Benedict’s sight returned to the Temple in the holodeck. He looked longingly at the sheathed tanto and picked it up. He placed it back in his belt and scooped up his clothing. He stood and surveyed his surroundings.

“Computer. End program.” He said. The Temple vanished to be replaced by the yellow grid on grey. Carrying his clothing Tikaru left the holodeck.

*********************************************************************
Simon Griffin:
simong@wantree.com.au
ICQ: 19514425 Benedict

*********************************************************************

Of Stones and Sling Shots.
by Lt Commander Endris Gakor

*** Medical Suite ***

Endris didn't understand the point of the massive triage. The Galaxy could not risk transporting crew from the past abord for treatment; to do so would jeapordise history. Never the less, Endris followed orders and set up the triage facility. There was a chance by the sheer number of Rhomulans, a stray shot would damage the Galaxy.

Nurse Kenan had just hooked up the last of the biobeds, and the plasma infuser units stood ready to deliver blood suppliements if required. It was frustraiting! All this firepower, and it could not be used in the historic battle. If the Klingons scored a decisive victory, history would be changed. Endris balled up a fist and punched the wall, taking out some of her frustraition. The reenforced bulkhead recieved a minor dent, and her hand started to throb.

*Snacks! That was a dammed stupid thing to do!*, she thought healing the injury with a portable neturalizer.

This was a classic underdog situation. Gakor thought of some of the good-verses-evil legends in classic literature. Kirk vs Kor. The Galaxy's own battle with the Jem' Hadar in the Argonii system. David and Golith. A stone to kill a Giant. Perhaps this concept applied here. The problem was not taking the Galaxy into the fracias, the problem was it couldn't move close enough to the Enterprise to make it look like attacks were taking place from the single visible Starfleet vessel. Neither could the Excelisor, it was to large to position itself so that it could do more than offer 'extra sheilding'.

However, Runabouts were smaller and more manueverable. And there weapons output, due to their smaller size, was comperable to 2344 level technology. If the Galaxy approached the Enterprise at a range to cloak the runabouts, they could go under the belly of the other ship and appear to "fix" the broken Enterprise weapons. The onboard computers could be set to match the older ship's energy signature. With some work, the illusion of the Enterprise fixing their auxillary weapon banks would appear transparent to the Rhomulans. With additional firepower, the Enterprise would survive long enough to gain the Klingon's respect, securing the timeline the Galaxy knew Of course, that depended on the actions of the Excelisor to become more cooperative. Extending their shields around the Enterprise-C had bought some time, but not much.

The Rhomulans were known for their treatury and cunning after all. And if a stray shot damaged one of the Federation ship's cloaks, she didn;t want to think of the consequences of the Rhomulans ending the treaty of Algeron, or .... the changing of history. Endris keyed in her suggestion to the remote bridge officers log, so the option could be considered. Then the doctor noticed one of the biobeds failed its diagnostic cycle, and went to recalibrate it....

"Damage (out of) control"

By Lt.Jg. Kelt
Flight Control Officer
USS Galaxy

-- USS Galaxy, deck seven --

Red lights flashed around them, and the red alert siren sounded from every direction. They were leaving the section that was relatively quiet, and entering clouds of smoke. From the direction they were heading to, shouts and screams were heard. This was what it was like to be in a damage control team. To the men and women in the team of chief petty officer Burke this was almost routine, but to lieutenant Kelt, obsolete flight control officer, the situation was something to get used to.

With both the primary and backup helm positions on the bridge AND the battle bridge occupied with excellent helm officers, Kelt decided to make himself useful in these difficult hours by re-joining the damage control team of officer Burke. The cooperation had been efficient on the previous occasions, and while Kelt was not very skilled at the repairs themselves, he was useful for the team to have around them because of the odd jobs he could do other than repairing. Especially answering to the extremely curious Enterprise C crew was something left well in the patient hands of Kelt.

They rounded another corner, and to officer Burke it was immediately obvious the situation was beyond their team to control. He dashed for a computer panel to check on the force fields of the deck. Kelt lunged forward to catch one of two wounded people staggering around the other corner, their faces and uniforms badly burned. Around the same corner, more people came running. One of the officers was in communication with someone else further up. Kelt overheard part of the garbled transmission:

-/\- Slashed away. I don't know how long the force fields will hold. We've lost sections 32 and 33. Hull breaches in section 34 through 38. Divert your teams...-/\-

The communication was cut short, and the officer cursed. He approached Burke: "A torpedo slammed into the hull in section 32. We lost two sections completely, and we've sustained heavy damage in multiple others. Tell the bridge that if they don't want a massacre, they raise the shields on this baby!"

"I will take care of that," replied Kelt. As an officer, he should be the one contacting the bridge. He raised his hand to tap his comm-badge, when a roar like close-range thunder almost deafened him. He was slammed into the wall at the far end of the corridor, and he lay motionless on the floor for a few moments.

To his own surprise, he didn't lose consciousness then and there. He fought the pain and disorientation and forced himself up. In a daze of heightened concentration he noticed the red lights were out, and the siren had stopped. In fact, all the lights were out. Despite that, the place was lit up like a ceremonial hall, and when Kelt finally had struggled to his feet, he saw why. Just about the entire section was on fire.

Kelt got up, and saw several people spread over the corridor. Events seemed to go in super-slow motion, as he noticed the flames around him twist and turn, the structure of the corridor walls bending, and the void of space at the far end of the corridor sucking up the rubble ahead of him. Only moments before the piece of the section before him was ripped off, Kelt noticed a flicker of a force field in front of him. Just then, he felt himself transported out.

-- Sickbay --

Kelt materialized in the familiar surroundings of sickbay. To his relief, this section was not on fire, but organized chaos was ruling here nevertheless. Kelt noticed others materializing around him. All the others were lying on biobeds the instant they materialized, but Kelt was standing. He tried to say something to the two medical officers who almost jumped at him, but he found that his tongue couldn't move. It was as if his tongue was plastered to the rest of his mouth.

One of the officers pressed a hypospray to his neck, the other one grabbed him and pushed him down onto the biobed. From the corner of his eye, Kelt noticed officer Burke, and from his point of view, Burke did not seem to be doing very well. Again, Kelt tried to speak up and order the medical officers to attend to officer Burke first, but again he was unable to speak.

"Third degree burns to the face, fourth degree burns to the chest and arms. Eight fractured ribs, perforated lungs, heart rythem entering critical stage. Sedate, and prepare for emergency surgery."

Apparently, the medical officers were referring to him. Strangely enough, he didn't feel any pain normally associated with the amount of injuries he heard the officers just mention. Then the sedation hit, and unconsciousness finally swept over his Vulcan head.

Bas Veerman

"Officer down"
by Captain Robert Edward Lee Price

The red alert klaxons were wailing away in the back ground as the USS Galaxy buckled under the Romulan fire.

Even cloaked, the impact of the lethal weapons originally targeted at the Starship Enterprise caused a great deal of damage to the Galaxy. With the taxing drain of Lieutenant Commander Mercury's crude cloaking device, that left reduced power available for the shields. Lee cursed as he pulled himself up off of the floor. "Damn you Sulu!" he hissed. "'Commander Erikson, have you located the Excelsior yet?" the Captain called out.

Over the warble of the red alert, signaling senior officers to report to their stations, Greer responded, "I have a fix on her now sir. They are shadowing the Enterprise off of her starboard bow."

Deiran was also knocked out of his chair, and was no longer cheering for the Enterprise-C to come through this skirmish but was now thinking of his own ship, his own crew and his family. Glancing back at the tactical station, the first officer looked on in horror. "By the Profits!" Deiran moved quickly to the Galaxy's tactical station where Lieutenant jg Richeson had been knocked off his feet in the last blast and slammed against the near by bulkhead. Blood was gushing from the base of his skull where it had struck the shiny metal surface.

Tapping his comm badge, Casey ordered, "Sickbay, medical emergency on the bridge. Lieutenant Richeson has been injured and is unconscious with a head injury."

Captain Price glanced at the fallen crew member and nodded to his executive officer as he covered the Tactical station until McKenzie or another Tac officer could arrive on the bridge to cover the position.

"'Commander Bancroft, bring us around to the starboard side of the Enterprise near the Excelsior's position. Lieutenant Commander Erikson can feed you the coordinates." Captain Price ordered quickly.

"Aye sir." Teb replied quickly, while piloting the Galaxy to the proper spot through the chaos of the battle.

"That will leave the port side of the Enterprise exposed Captain." Deiran pointed out. "Have you thought about what I suggested? using the Galaxy's weapons from underneath the Enterprise?"

Lee shook his head. "That wouldn't work 'mate. We have to drop our cloak when we fire, which would let the Romulans see the Galaxy. One look at a Federation Starship of the Galaxy's size and they are likely to break off the attack and run for Romulan space. That would change history forever."

"The Excelsior Captain." Lieutenant Commander Thomas suggested.

"'Mate?"

"We could use the Excelsior to hide us the same way we did entering from the rift. By navigating in her immediate wake and using her cloaking field to mask us." Chris explained from Ops.

"Excellent idea Chris!" Deiran agreed from Tactical. "If we move between the Excelsior and Enterprise, our phasers will appear to be coming from the C."

"Can you remodulate them to fool the Romulans into believing they are coming from the Enterprise weapons systems and not our modern designed phasers?" Lee asked Thomas.

"I believe so. As long as Commander Casey only fires with one bank at a time in short bursts, I don't think the Romulans will ever be able to detect the difference." Chris explained.

"Do it 'mate. Make the adjustments to the weapons. 'Commander Bancroft, bring us into position between the Enterprise and the Excelsior so we can hide in the cloaking wake of Captain Sulu's ship."

"Making adjustments now Captain." Lieutenant Commander Bancroft replied from the helm, glad she was an expert at flying by instruments alone, since essentially the Captain had just ordered her to fly between the Enterprise and an invisible starship.

The Galaxy moved into position even as the Romulan ships banked for another attack on the apparently lone Enterprise.

Lt. Shtik
Science Officer

The red alert signal blared through the security center. The sudden noise sent Shtik bolting from his bunk only to stop short in front of the force field separating him from the security officer on duty. He had to grab the wall for support in order to remain standing as the ship bucked and thrashed around him.

"Relax, Lieutenant," the female ensign remained calm but alert behind her console, "your duty station is right there for now."

"I assure you ensign, that the most appropriate utilization of my energies would be to allow me to my battle station." Shtik did his best to remain at an erect pose of attention. The guard punched up some new information from the console in front of her. A lot of battle statistics were beginning to roll in.

"According to this, your battle station consists of securing an astrophysics lab on deck 31." She looked up at Shtik, "I think they can live without you." Shtik sighed and returned to sit on his bunk. He began to interpret each bounce and jolt that the ship was going through in an attempt to understand what was going on around him.

"If events have progressed as planned, the Galaxy has now traveled to the battle of Narendra III in the year 2344." Shtik said.

"That looks like the way things are going."

"Since I was incarcerated in the year 2295, by any standard federation sentence for the crimes in which I'm accused, I should logically be eligible for parole at this time." The security guard turned back to look at Shtik with a smirk.

"With a sense of humor like that, It's no wonder they locked you up."

Lt. Shtik sat back down on the bunk and ran a mental analysis of the line of logic he had attempted to use in order to determine it's humorous interpretation.

Battle Stations
by Ensign Philip Grasso
Operations Officer

Phil was in his barley light quarters when the Red Alert Kazons went off. After putting on his Operations Uniform he runs out of his quarters and into the Turbolift. " Computer, Bridge". The turbo lift takes off to the bridge, about half way there the lift sudders under the fire of the Romulans. Stepping out of the lift he Silently moves to the Misson Ops console and looks to the Operations officer currently assigned to it.

" If you dont mind Ill take over here, you can report to the battle bridge" he tells the Yeoman officer

" Aye Aye sir" The Yeoman scurries off the bridge. Phil taps a few buttons on the Misson Ops screen and the current staus display pops up. It displays all the damage and power allocations onboard and out side off the ship. As the ship shudders under the more fire Phil is almost nocked off his feet. Once again he looks at the screen and then gets to work

"The Forgotten Heroes"
By Lieutenant Jr. Anna Gartner, Security Officer

USS Enterprise-C - Engineering
(Before re-entering the rift)

Anna slowly sat up against a bulkhead on the floor in engineering, exhausted after spending several hours crawling around what felt like miles of Jefferies tubes.

The junior lieutenant reached and rub her sore knees, she was amazed that the knees to her pants didn't worn through. Regardless, her ripped uniform was a write off, being caked with dirt, grime.

"Life in engineering is fun, fun and more fun." Anna murmured before remembering that she was to meet Kalln's former 'girlfriend.'

Looking at herself, Anna wasn't in any appearance to meet anyone but, oh well. 'They'll have to take her as is!'

At that moment several Enterprise-C personnel walked by and she watched as they pass her. One of them noticed Anna and politely nodded to the young security officer. Anna managed to smile back.

'They all know that they're about to die.' She thought. 'But they act like they're just taking a trip... Which is actually a one when journey .'

Gartner continued to watch the Enterprise crew walking on by, still thinking. 'I wasn't even born when the Enterprise-C met it's fate at Narendra III but here I am to witness them giving their lives to save all of us and to preserve our timeline. When they first tried to return to their own timeline after they supposedly encountered the Enterprise-D, any trace or knowledge of the future they saved us from would had been forgotten. In the history books (which still has to be completed), the lost of the Enterprise-C at Narendra III had no real importance than just another tragic lost of ship and crew for the Federation in the defense of a Klingon colony. But that act brought the Klingons and the Federation closer together, instead of being at each others throats and no knew what they accomplished.'

'No parties, no fanfare or monuments built to honor their memory for what they're about to do. However we will know now and we will take this information back with us so their sacrifice will be remembered and not to be forgotten.'

***** Triage 2 *****
By Dr. Felicia Khatroweena, Lieutenant Commander
(Assistant Chief Medical Officer), USS Galaxy NCC-70637

***** Triage 2 *****

Cat and Gr'Iss, the other Caitian on the Medical Staff with a number of nurses and some of the crew trained to help on first aid were getting everything set up in the triage.

Gr'Iss and Cat were busy going over details of the third triage. Both had fallen into speaking Cait. Mews and growls interspersed with what could be vaguely recognized as words came from the two of them.

Suddenly the whole ship shook as the first of the Romulan disrupters hit against the Galaxy. Against the smoothing effect of the IDF, crew were pushed around, loosing balance and falling against equipment and walls. To Cat, the hit felt the worst she could remember, for it was against the unprotected hull. The cloak didn't allow for shields and weapon systems to be active. But the Galaxy had to let the Ent-C have some chance for it to survive at least for a short time and the only way to do this was to use the Galaxy itself to stop the shots.

Suddenly there was a quick double shudder as the Galaxy intercepted a quick volley aimed at the Ent-C. Cat quickly got up from the deck, calling out orders to the rest of the medical crew in triage. She scrabbled for the earpiece she wore to always be able to hear the computerized damage control reports. Reports had already started coming in. Lower decks had taken the first blast with hull breaches and the ever-present EPS leaks filling the corridors with super-heated plasma. Almost immediately after came the calls for emergency transport.

Blue sparkle columns appeared within the room, as the injured were being transported in. Triage began! Those who could live with out attending to, were put aside, most that was done was a hypo to soothe any pain. Other critically injured went under fast 'meatball' surgery. Just enough for them to survive until they could be transferred to the Sickbay for the main surgery. With 24th century medical technology, only a small number of the crew had to be transferred to Sickbay for 'major' surgery.

Soon, Cat began to move around to attend to the less critically wounded. Cat recognized Elaine O'Hare. Punching up Elaine's chart on her tricorder, Cat quickly read the notes made by the triage nurse when Elaine came in.

She looked down at Elaine's comatose body. The leg wound was a simple fracture that could be dealt with easily. But of concern was the head wound. She had concussion and a bleeder within the brain. It wasn't immediately life threatening, but if something wasn't done within a day or so, it could cause complications.

"Umpph? What? Where am..." Elaine mumbled as she started to come out of her unconsciousness condition.

"Lie down and stay still Elaine. You've taken a bad hit." Cat moved over placing a hand on Elaine chest to keep her from getting up. "Its best that you try to sleep."

"I don't feel good," groaned Elaine.

"I'm not surprised," Cat soothed as she applied a hypo. "Try to sleep."

"Ok, I'll go to slee..." Elaine slowly and groggily feel back asleep.

Happy that Elaine would be ok for a few hours, Cat moved on to the other patients in her care.

--
Trevor Ayliffe
tayliffe@nexus.edu.au
ICQ: 3722239
IM : VampyreCat

"That's gotta hurt"
By none other than the tart Ensign O'Hare

Looking down the corridor, Elaine felt uncomfortable. Not just because of the counseling talk with Lt. Dallas, or the fact that the Galaxy was in a fire fight, it was because of being so vicicous towards Lt. Bolitho. After all, Neil did apologize. Maybe Elaine did need to stay in the brig, for her protection.

O'Hare had taken Neil's feelings for granted. He wasn't really that awful looking.........

The blast caught O'Hare and threw the ensign's body like a rag doll across the corridor, slamming her violently against the wall. All Elaine saw was a flash of white light. A small stream of blood quickly trickled out from under her head and leg. Her body was still, almost lifeless, but Elaine was still there.

"Historical Conflicts"
by Lt. Commander Thomas
W/ excerpts from Capt. Price’s “Show Time” & "Officer down"

** Bridge USS Galaxy **

"It didn't strike the Enterprise 'mate." Lee declared flatly as he sat back in the command chair. "I believe our Captain Sulu of the Excelsior has decided on some more cowboy antics."

Lt. Commander Thomas executed the orders on key, as Commander Casey ordered. He was wondering how they'd avoid geeting involved in the battle, appearnatly that was no longer a question. They were now involved in the battle, because the Execlsoirs captain had become involved.

Things were certainly going to be very lively today, unfortantely Thomas could think of a lot more enjoyable things to be doing then this stunt. They were tinkering with the past, the idea of course was preserve their past and present. This was going to be a really tough job to do as they needed to protect the Enterprise - C, the Execelsior and themselves. Not an easy task to say the least, the real problem would be trying to achieve their goal. Which of course was to make sure the Klingons remembered the day the Enterprise - C risked it all for one of their colonies.

Chris sat at his station on the bridge, thinking about what kind of future they'd likely come back to when they finally finished depositing the other two ships in their rightful timeline. This was going to be a full time job, more work then fighting a wing of Dominion ships, which of course they might find no longer in the Federation.

** Moments later **

The whole Bridge shook as the torpedo’s slammed into the port side of the Saucer section. Casey and the Captain were thrown from side to side in their seats and the Bridge crew held onto their stations to steady themselves as the ship rocked like a toy sail boat in a bathtub.

Chris was starting to reroute addational power to the shields, but the cloak was drawing a lot of the ships power. He was begining to become frustared about the power situation, maintaining the power flow was becoming a problem. He didn't know how much longer he could continue to route power to the systems that were authorized to be running at this moment in time. He'd already shutdown non-esential systems and had to reduce power to other systems that weren't critical at the moment.

He was completely focues on maintaing a power and resource balance, but it was working fighting to keep things in balance. Chris was barely aware of what was happening on the bridge, unless it happened to catch his attention. He was focusing on his job when he heard the captain and first officer talking about a plan to return fire against the Romulan's, but that would require some sort of trick.

Chris focused his attention to hear what they had in mind, since it would most likely call upon his talents to balance the power output and usage even more closely. He was going to have take control of the situation and start shutting down systems throughout the ship, expect those that were classified as critical or essential to ship operation.

“Suggestion Commander?” the Captain asked.

“Yes sir, if we change course and keep the Galaxy in front of or below the Enterprise maybe we can fire some quick volley’s to give the Excelsior and the Enterprise some breathing room. We can fire when the Romulans have fired and have their backs away from us sir. Maybe we can set our torpedo’s to register the same frequency as the Enterprise’s so that it looks like the torpedo’s we fire are coming from the C, sir?”

Interesing thought on how to start balancing out this battle, Chris like most on the bridge were quickly getting tired of taking a beating in this fight and not being able to even return a single blow back. This wasn't very much fun, but then he guessed war wasn't suppose to be fun, nah. He remembered his battles with Klingon fighters, both real and training those where fun. Yes there was a very real threat of getting injuried or even killed, but such was the life of a Klingon warrior. He missed those days at times, they were after all so much fun and lively.

"Have you thought about what I suggested? using the Galaxy's weapons from underneath the Enterprise?" Deiran asked.

Lee shook his head. "That wouldn't work 'mate. We have to drop our cloak when we fire, which would let the Romulans see the Galaxy. One look at a Federation Starship of the Galaxy's size and they are likely to break off the attack and run for Romulan space. That would change history forever."

Chris had been paying attention to the conversation despite, working his station and letting his mind wonder for a moment. He knew what his limit was and at the moment he'd balanced the output and input, but that wasn't going to last for long.

"The Excelsior Captain." Lieutenant Commander Thomas suggested.

"'Mate?"

"We could use the Excelsior to hide us the same way we did entering from the rift. By navigating in her immediate wake and using her cloaking field to mask us." Chris explained from Ops.

The Galaxy moved into position even as the Romulan ships banked for another attack on the apparently lone Enterprise.

Christopher Patton
ICQ # 11497863

***** A Bridge almost too far *****
By Dr. Felicia Khatroweena, Lieutenant Commander
(Assistant Chief Medical Officer), USS Galaxy NCC-70637

***** Triage 2 *****

[Sickbay, medical emergency on the bridge. Lieutenant Richeson has been injured and is unconscious with a head injury.] Casey’s calm voice came over the comm.

Cat listening in on the damage control reports considered the other medical areas dealing with enough problems already. Injuries to triage 2 had slowed down, now it a trickled down to the walking wounded, those who could make it under there own steam. Cat considered a beam out to the bridge, but only life threatening medical emergencies warranted beaming. Cat collected a medi-kit and rushed out into the corridor grabbing a nurse with a grav stretcher.

As they rushed out towards the turbolift, Cat tapped her commbadge, “Khatroweena to rest of Medical: I’ve got the bridge covered. It’s slow down here.” She called out to the computer, “Bridge” as she rushed in. As she spun to face the door, the turbolift began its smooth acceleration.

Cat waited impatiently, listening to the thrum of the lift as it raised through the floors. Suddenly the ship shook again; Cat and the Nurse Opel were flung against the walls of the lift. The lights in the lift dimmed and Cat could feel that the lift wasn’t moving. She called out, “Bridge,” waiting for the lift to continue on its way. The lift failed to move.

“Computer: Get this lift moving to the bridge.” Cat ordered.

[Unable to comply. Debris within the shaft.]

Cat looked at Kristen, exasperation on her face. Luckily they were on one of the horizontal arteries for the turbolift system on deck eight. Cat sat on the floor of the lift and kicked at the egress hatch near the floor. She kicked a couple of times before the hatch stubbornly cracked open. A secondary clunk in the corridor explained the reluctance of the hatch. Some of the debris had fallen against it.

“Let’s hope the access hatch to the jefferies tube is not too far,” commented Kristen.

Cat nodded as she crawled through the hatch, into the ‘shaft.’ Cat had to flatten against the deck, more debris of structural beams had effectively blocked the ‘shaft.’ Stretching herself and dragging herself through. She grabbed at a heavy truss, sure that it was stable. Suddenly some light debris fell on her. “Yeow”, her arms covered her head from the falling debris.

“Cat! You ok?” Kristen called out from just behind, concern in her voice.

Cat uncovered her head, “Yeah, I’m fine.” She continued forward, the pieces falling to the side as Cat moved on.

Cat had to contort her body, stretch it out to get through the last of the collapsed structure. She sighed at the relief of getting out from under the collapsed tunnel. She turned around to see Kristen coming out as well. Just as Kristen was about to finally get out, the whole thing shifted. Kirsten screamed as Cat grabbed her arms to get her out before she was crushed.

Luckily the whole thing was just settling, it wasn’t going to collapse farther. Relief on her face, she wasn’t going to be crushed, Kristen moved to crawl out. But to no avail. She was pinned down. “Cat, I’m stuck.”

Cat and Kristen grabbed each other’s arms. Cat used all her strength to pull Kirsten out. A look of grim determination and pain appeared on Kirsten.

Cat stopped, “What’s wrong?”

“I’m fine. Don’t stop. I can feel myself moving. Just keep going.” Kristen urged Cat.

Cat tugged on Kristen as she stifled a groan. Suddenly Kristen called out, “That’s it!” Kristen moved slowly through and finally was out. “Don’t you dare say anything about me needing to lose weight!” The smile on her face belied the harshness of her words.

Cat smiled, but she flung open her tricorder and quickly checked over Kristen. There was only bruising, along her side and a little on her leg. In general, she was fine. “Com’On, lets get moving!”

The two jogged along the horizontal shaft, until they came to the access hatch. Cat tapped the controls and the hatch slid aside. Climbing through into one of the ladders between floors, they climbed up to Deck Seven.

They moved through the tube and came out into the corridor on Deck Seven. Cat looked up the corridor to see the turbolift doors at the end open. A couple of engineering officers rushing out to fix something important near by.

Cat and Kristen rushed for the lift returning to their interrupted trip to the bridge.

***** Bridge *****

The doors slid aside, to show the bridge. Cat and Kristen rushed over to the fallen officer. Cat quickly checked for any reason not to move the man and with Kristen moved him onto the stretcher and away from the tactical arch.

Cat noticed the clear fluid, mixed with blood coming from the ears, “Got a bad skull fracture.” Scanning him closely, the tricorder reported a buildup of pressure in the brain. As Cat gave orders to Kristen for what needed to be done, movement caught her eye. She turned to see the some Romulan ships slowly move off to the right of the huge main screen as the Ent-C slowly reappeared on the left side. Cat saw the stars begin to move even quicker to the side and Cat felt her balance shift. Teb had made a tight turn with the Galaxy.

Cat returned her concentration to her patient. She applied a hypo against the base of the skull. The medication was used to relieve the pressure within the skull. Cat did what she could to attend to the tactical officer. They had a few minute wait until the medication would have made it safe to move him to Sickbay. Right now all she could do was watch and wait.

--
Trevor Ayliffe
tayliffe@nexus.edu.au
ICQ: 3722239
IM : VampyreCat

"Tacticas Of Mistake."

Lt. Benedict T'Kal
Tactical Officer
USS Galaxy

The first of the shudders rippled through the Galaxy as she entered combat with the Romulans. Benedict braced himself against the wall in the corridor and felt the vibrations through the palm of his hand.

'Combat?' His mind raced. 'What the hell?' He tapped his commbadge. "T'Kal to TacOps Centre." His voice was calm. he saw three crew run across the corridor in front of him. They were security and they carried phasers.

"TacOps." Came the reply. "Kamin here."

"SitRep?" Benedict commanded. A medical officer walked past him at a quick pace carrying a field kit.

"Galaxy has joined Enterprise in the fight." Kamin replied. "We are using our ship as a barrier between the Romulan barrage and the Enterprise."

Benedict's eyes widened in surprise. For a moment he was dumbfounded. They were cloaked - they had to remain cloaked! A ships weapons systems, defensive shields and sensors were useless under cloak! It wasn't the immense power drain that caused the lack of defence - it was the nature of the Romulan cloak.

The cloaking device was like a double shield around the ships' hull that projected it. It allowed light to pass around it - as a distortion and thus gave an illusion of empty space. The actual shield would reflect any weapons discharge back against it's own hull - and so weapons were useless. The ships sensors were totally useless also - so they wouldn't be able to gain any kind of lock on another ship while they were under cloak - the shield of the cloak bounced the subspace waves back against the projecting ship.

To enter combat under cloak as a shield was pure tactical stupidity! The Romulan tactical strategems for warfare with cloaks dictated a ship would hit and run - hit and run, each time coming out of cloak at a different quarter - maneuvering fast enough to get under cloak before the enemy could lock on.

They used cloaking devices to pre-position their ships - ready to strike from surprise and kill their enemies while unaware - not to enter a stand-still encounter and remain cloaked!

Benedict shook his head. He'd studied every text he could get his hands on about Romulan Tactical strategy - what kind of ludicrous Tactics of Mistake were being employed by the Galaxy now? He almost knew the answer before the question finished forming - it had to be Casey! Gung-Ho Casey! Hero to the Last!

He'd done it in his patented Jaw-Breaker - risking the lives of everyone on the ship for a snatch and grab at glory! Well - he was doing it now too!

"Where's MacKenzie?" Benedict snapped.

"I don't know." Replied Kamin. "I think he's in the Battle Bridge. Richeson is down on the Bridge - Casey is running Tactical." Kamins' voice carried the all-too familiar sarcasm of neutrality. Benedict knew that Kamin viewed the XO as a man ruled by his emotive states - and thus was illogical in his methods of duty. "What is your location?" He asked.

Benedict replied. "Deck Three." He moved away as he spoke - moving toward the nearest turbo lift. "On route to the Bridge." He stepped into the next lift and ordered it to get him to where he would be able to see what the hell was happening.

The ship shuddered and groaned. Benedict was flung against the lift wall and barely avoided injury. The dorrs snapped open on the Bridge and he stepped out as the Main viewer showed a Romulan torpedo closing the distance.

It slammed into the exposed Galaxy's hull and the ship rocked once more. He looked at the Tactical Arch and saw Casey looking at the read-outs. Richeson was laying on the deck and being attended to by Medical Officers.

The whole scene was cast red in emergency lighting - and he could see as he moved to Casey's side that damage reports were begining to shade the major systems in outlines of dark red on the displays.

"He tapped the comm system to TacOps and said, "T'Kal on the Bridge assuming Tactical Station." He glanced at Casey. "Thank you Commander." He glanced once at the Main Viewer and back at the read-out of several incoming Romulan vessels. He gritted his teeth and looked back at Deiran Casey. "Sir - I would respectfully suggest we get the hell out of here. Before the Galaxy's bones get picked clean. It's the Enterprise that's supposed to die here - not the Galaxy!"

Casey just glared at him and moved away without comment. The situation was a tactical nightmare - they were defending a ship that is - or was supposed to die gloriously against overwhelming odds! Who was to say that the Klingons of this age did not view a few seconds of valiant effort as a feat of valor and thus as time passed did not let the account of the Enterprises' few seconds grow in stature as some of the old battle songs of Klingon Heroes did? Stories grew taller with age - it was a Klingon Tradition - and here they were trying to impress a people who would be impressed no matter what happened!

Just being here and throwing a bloody stone against the hull of a Romulan ship would impress them!

Benedict cast his mind back to his duty. The Prophets had said he had a duty - and wasn't here - not in this time! They had to move aside - there was no way they would survive a direct Plasma Torpedo hit. They had no defences!

*********************************************************************
Simon Griffin:
simong@wantree.com.au
ICQ: 19514425 Benedict

*********************************************************************

=/\= "Red Means Go" =/\=
by Lt Cmdr Matthew Albrecht
Asst Chief Meat Truck

Heidi Mason slipped in through the doors to Main Security on deck 38 only moments after the Red Alert klaxon started wailing. Matthew was standing at her station, reviewing the status of all security personell and to which stations they should be reporting. When he saw her arrive, he moved away from the panel, and let her slip into the seat. "Hello, 'commander," she said, trying to conceal her excitement. Matthew understood, she had a very important job. "Good to have you here, Heidi," he replied.

Communication traffic was already getting heavy. "...Bartok to security..." "...Smith here, where's my post?" "...I'm in section 17..." "...In position, sir..." She handled all the calls efficiently. Her drills had paid off, and she managed the large number of security crewmen with ease.

Matthew watched the situation monitors. He was surprised when reports started coming in of massive torpedo damage to the ship. Engineering would coordinate their people, and damage control crews in general. But, since Security officers were stationed all over the ship, they often reported their findings to Heidi. Albrecht compiled a quick report of his peoples' damage assessments, and forwarded them over to Engineering. They probably knew anyway, but every little bit helps. You can't have too much information, his father always said.

He stepped away from the station for a minute, to think about the situation. The Galaxy was cloaked. The Enterprise was soon going to be destroyed. The Excelsior was also lurking about. What dangers were there to the security of the starship? There were, as Matthew finally determined, plenty of reasons to have officers all around the ship. But, he doubted very much that any kind of boarding action were going to occur. But then again, he hadn't thought they would be getting shot at by the Romulan ships, either. Just to be on the safe side, the ASEC went to a nearby viewer, and started perusing the database on Romulan transporter technology...

"Under the full moon!"
By Counsellor Elaine O'Hare and Lt(jg) Neil Bolitho
Approved By Lt,(jg) Gordall Kalln

Saying goodbye to Lex, O'Hare stepped back into her quarters. Being full of energy, she decided to go to the holodeck to get some practice. She felt playful and wide awake. Part of Elaine was cringing when she though of the snow in Neil's quarters, it was cruel, but O'Hare was true to her word.

Picking out a black leather outfit that fit a little loosely than the last one did, she got quickly dressed. Ritualistically, she dabbed her vanilla perfume on her wrists. Pulling her long hair up in a loose bun, she smiled.

"Computer, Athetha Franklin's RESPECT"

Elaine started to bob her head and up and down to the rhythm of the music as she finished getting ready. She absolutely loved Jazz and Blues, anything that had a good beat to it.

Grabbing her Bat'leth of the wall, Elaine grinned wickedly, running her finger down the cool smooth surface of the blade. O'Hare did enjoy being mean and nasty when she felt like it. It was a little brash, but it was ingrained in her character and spirit.

Strapping the weapon on to her back, she headed to the holodeck.

Sashaying down the hall, she choked back the laughter when she saw Lt. Bolitho walking down the corridor towards her.

Stop it Lainey. Control yourself.

She evilly smiled at the Lt. "Evening Lt."

Neil noticed Counsellor O'Hare in the corridor, and was half tempted to flee in the opposite direction, considering the "chewing outs" he had received from the counselling staff of the Galaxy lately. But Elaine's choice of clothing, and the way she walked made him pause, freeze in actual fact...... WOW!

The Counsellor's greeting snapped him out of his little daydream, forcing Neil to return to the real world." Umm Hi Counsellor!" Replied Neil red in the face, suddenly feeling just a little uncomfortable. Neil shifted his weight from foot to foot as he stood there staring at the counsellor O'Hare, finally Neil's spotted the Bat'leth strapped to her back, grateful for something to take his attention off the Counsellor, as well as something to say.

"The Bat'leth?" Neil gestured to the weapon strapped to her back. " May I?"

Unsheathing with lighting speed, Elaine offered the weapon to Neil.

"It was a gift from a friend who taught me the ways of the warrior." Elaine's eyes narrowed as Neil took the Bat'leth from her hands. Watching him handle her blade was interesting to say the least. The flush of red drained from his cheeks as she waited for him to hand it back to her.

"You will have to come see how well I fight sometime Lt. I bet I'm better than you think I am." Elaine said softly, challenging Neil with the tone of her voice.

Neil gently handed the Bat'leth to her saying nothing. Putting her weapon back in it's holder, Elaine continued to speak.

"Well, Lt, I'm off. Like I said, feel free to come and watch me fight"

O'Hare turned and continued down the hall.

Neil totally tongue tied watched O'Hare depart, before letting out a deep sigh and shaking his head slightly, headed back towards his own quarters.

Elaine arrived at the holodeck, proceeding to program the computer to the specifications that she desired.

Stepping inside, mist blocked her view. The room was dimly lit by huge torches that outlined a large circle. The floor was dirt and the full moon shone above her. The temperature was hot and Elaine started to sweat, her hair getting damp from the humidity in the room. Unsheathing her weapon once more, she swung it from side to side, waiting for the first opponent to show his cowardly self.

Neil Bolitho opened his quarters and the first thing that struck him as odd, was the blast of bitterly cold air that escaped past him into the corridor. Neil's eyes widened as he made out a shadowy shape waiting for him in the darkness of his room.

" Computer lights!" Growled Neil reaching for his phaser at his waist' He didn't know who was waiting in his quarters but............'The lights to Neil's quarters came on and Neil never finished that thought as the scene in his quarters unfolded before him.

Neil his jaw dropped and his tongue unfolded, as stared in absolute astonishment into his quarters there must have been at least a foot's worth of snow covering the floor, his bed, locker......everything! Neil turned his open mouthed gaze onto the figure who he at first thought was an intruder.

Staring back at him was a snowman dressed in one of his uniforms,with a sign draped over it Neil shuffled forward into the snow and lifted the sign that was hanging obscurely on the one side of the snowman.

Neil read the sign and let it drop down as he stared around his quarters. Slowly the corners of his mouth lifted and a smile appeared on his face, the smile grew wider followed by the first fit of giggles and finally Neil began to laugh. Still laughing Neil reached out for the sign again and this time slipped on the wet surface. With a undignified plop, Neil landed on his backside in the wet..... cold.... snow.

That was the final straw for Neil as he fell backwards, he could no longer control himself, not for another minute, he laughed so hard, tears streamed out of his eye's, and down his face, he had trouble breathing he was laughing so much!

Neil finally crawled out into the passage way, choking on his laughter. There stood an off duty Kalln, as usual wandering around the ship that found Neil outside his quarters, immediately recognising what was wrong with Neil, Kalln pounded Neil on his back, until Neil wheezed "enough" in between his fits of giggles.

"Neil are you alright ? You need something?" Asked the worried Lizard

Neil turned his tear ridden face up to Kalln and managed to whisper "My Bat'leth!"

" Your Bat'leth?" exclaimed the crouched lizard. "You want your Bat'leth?"

Neil nodded numbly back. Kalln stared down at Neil, for a few seconds before shaking his head in amazement. Stepping in to Neil's quarters was even more sillier. Especially as he was greeted by a snowperson in the entrance. Kalln turned round in the small room, before spotting Neil's treasured weapon sitting on the wall, covered in a layer of snow. Kalln picked up the weapon off the wall and carefully made his way back out to the corridor.

Neil burst out laughing as kalln literally tiptoed his way out his quarters. and the tears began running afresh down his face. Neil held up his hand and was pulled up strongly by Kalln to his feet. Still giggling Neil held out his hand and Kalln solemnly placed the Klingon weapon in his hand.

Neil tried to give his thanks in between fits of laughter, but finally gave up. Waving his goodbye's he headed off back down the corridor in his soaking uniform.

Neil had put two and two together, the moment he saw the Snowman, he thought of one person. "Lexana Ral", only she would......Neil's thought process had trailed off as another person smiling evilly at him popped into his minds eye "Elaine O'Hare."

'Perhaps she needed some instruction in the Bat'leth!' Grinned Neil to himself as he neared the holodeck 'Or a swift kick up the backside?" laughed Neil to himself.

Arriving at the holodeck he checked with the computer and was gratified to know that prank playing Counsellor was still playing at killing holographic enemies. Neil gave himself a moment to compose himself and entered the holodeck.

Elaine was battling a Klingon warrior in between a circle of torch's Neil shouted out "Computer freeze program" The Klingon immediately stopped moving, Neil had to fight down the urge to start snickering especially since he had said the word...."Freeze!"

" Counsellor!" Smiled Neil stepping into the circle. " I thought you could do with some instruction?"

Spinning around angrily for someone interrupting her, Elaine spat out, "Excuse me? I said you could watch, not play along. Besides, I doubt you could keep up with me." Elaine smirked, her hair out of the loose bun.

"C'mon Pigtails!" Grinned Neil slyly remembering what he used to call Elaine back on Qo'Nos " This won't hurt a bit, or take very long for that matter.

Elaine growled " Remember my name ...you'll be screaming it later!"

Landing from a perfect backflip, Elaine took the Bat'leth and raised it in the air, readying herself to bring it upon Neil's square head.

The Lt. ducked out to the left as Elaine brought down the blade. Still giggling, Neil replied to the even angrier counsellor.

" Now that was not very counsellor like?" cracked Neil

"You..........." Flabbergasted that Neil moved out of the way so quickly she challenged him with her voice."Let's see what you got, Lt. You ready to be snow blowed?" Elaine looked at Neil with a sparkle in her eye, waiting for his reaction.

A rye smile rose on Neil's face, as he readied his Bat'leth, giving Elaine a curt nod he sprang into motion, diving forward and coming out of the roll and spun his Bat'leth sweeping the blade forcing Elaine to jump backwards, halfway through the sweep, Neil reversed direction and thrust the blade forward. Neil's sudden manoeuvre caught Elaine totally off guard, and Elaine found her self backpeddling totally off balance as Neil attacked quickly and quite viciously form every conceivable angle.

Neil was impressed he had her off balance and she was still managing to deflect his attacks, although she was unable to initiate any attacks of her own. Neil paused in his flurry of attacks and began to open his mouth to compliment her, when Elaine yelled and cut down at Neil's head in lightning strike.

Neil raised his Bat'leth and blocked the attack, and stepped forward to push Elaine back, Elaine at the same time steeped forwards and the two combatants met in the middle of the ring of torches, Elaine's scent wafted across to Neil, while not powerful it was certainly most distracting!

Elaine taking the most from the distraction, took one hand of her Bat'leth and smashed her open palm into Neil's face aiming for his nose. Neil at the last moment managed to turn his face aside and took the blow on his cheek, even so Elaine had put her whole shoulder into the punch, Neil staggered back, Elaine followed up quickly by ramming her knee up, aiming for Neil's groin. Neil twisted at the last second, taking the hit on his leg. He dropped suddenly, releasing his Bat'leth as he did. He wrapped his arms around Elaine's legs and jerked up quickly, flinging Elaine onto her back.

Neil rolled away from Elaine and scooped up his Bat'leth as he came to his feet, gingerly he put his hand to his cheek and the rubbed his leg where he had averted her strike at his groin. " Your really trying to prove that theory aren't you?" Smiled Neil.

Elaine smiled and came forward immediately. Neil moved forward as well eager now to end it with a swift lesson on humility to Elaine that he hoped she wouldn't forget for a very long time to come! Neil rolled underneath the high attack. Elaine threw at him. He came up behind the Elaine and punched at the back of her head, Elaine whirled and walked straight into the punch, and her head snapped back!

Neil starred horrified at what he had done, he had ment to pull the punch,not have Elaine walk in to it, started "Elaine....I.." He never got to finish it as, Elaine's elbow landed squarely in Neil's bread basket, forcing the air out of his lungs, Elaine followed up with a vicious right landing flush on Neil's jaw. Neil staggered back, Elaine grinned as she launched her self into a high spinning back kick which connected solidly on the side of Neil's head.

Neil crumpled to the floor, the room was spinning as he tried desperately to rise to his feet but only ended flopping over onto his back.

Finally the room and the whining noise in his ear stopped and Neil's vision cleared enough to see the counsellor standing over him, grinning, leaning on her Bat'leth, damn right gloating in victory.

" Are you alright?" she asked with a winning smile.

Neil slowly and gently moved his jaw from side to side before answering. " I think I may just live!" Quipped Neil staring up at the counsellor with some new found respect. God his head felt like it had been caught between a rock and a hard place.

Elaine offered her hand to help Neil stand, Neil took the offered hand and was pulled to his feet. Neil could know see the bruising around Elaine's eye, and the puffy swelling that was starting to come out. "Are you ok, I'm really sorry I didn't mean to hit you?"

Elaine barked out a laugh" I put you down Bolitho and your concerned about me!" Elaine stepped forward and leaned close to Neil's ear. Whispering in a seductive tone, Elaine stated,

"Well, Lt. looks as if I have you, doesn't it?" O'Hare took her index finger and ran it along the side of Neil's face, down his cheekbone.

Elaine backed up, flicking her blade side to side, she curtly left the holosuite.

Neil gazed at the departing counsellor waiting for her to leave the holodeck before replying to the closed doors.

" I guess you do Counsellor!"

"Things could only get worse"
By Lt. (jg) Timothy O'Connell
The very sore Ensign Elaine O'Hare

O'Hare just stepped into her quarters after her altercation with the Lt. in the Holodeck. Drenched in sweat and nursing the black eye Neil had given her, she hung her weapon up on the wall with her other prized things.

Picking up the picture that Lex and her had taken of the snowman in Lt. Bolitho's quarters, she chucked it across the room. Still upset that Neil thought it was funny, she sighed. "All that work, and HE LAUGHED."

Elaine had crawled up on her bed to relax for a moment. Something in the back of her mind told O'hare that she was going to Be dreading waking up in the morning. Neil had managed to pull about every muscle of hers in the matter of an hour.

Wincing as she laid down, O'hare spoke:

"Computer, light jazz please."

The door chimed and Elaine rolled her eyes crawling off the bed.

"Come in"

Tim O'connell walked in to Elaine's quarters. "Hey Counselor, I brought a little welcome aboard gift, One fellow child of the emerald Isle to another." Tim stated as he held up a large bottle of whiskey; "care for a drink.... or 2?" He grinned....

Elaine shook her head and smiled.

"Lt., trying to get me in trouble again?"

Tim grinned, "Of course not. Besides, we're off duty now you can call me Tim."

"Well Tim, I need that after what your fellow security officer did to me. Hopefully, he's still cleaning up his quarters and will be for quite a while.

Tim raised an eyebrow, "I take it by the picture that this has something to do with Neil right?" He then looked at the picture of the Snowman and broke out laughing, "Let me guess you met Lex Ral right?"

"Yeah. .....and we really get along well together, so to speak." Elaine walked over to the replicator and requested some ice for her eye.

Grabbing the bag of ice, she lightly applied it to her eye. Wincing, she looked back over at Tim.

"Pour yourself a drink Lt., and then one for me please." Elaine sighed wondering what Neil was up to at the moment.

Taking the drink, she turned to the Lt, gesturing for him to take a seat.

"Tim, give me a few minutes, I need to peal this off and get a shower. K?"

"Sure, take your time. You look like you need it."

Elaine glanced back over her shoulder, smirking, "Gee, Tim, thanks for the compliment."

"Anytime Elaine, anytime." Tim grinned. While the counselor showered Tim began to sip his beverage and sat back waiting.....

O'Hare looked at herself in the mirror, she did look like she had gotten run over by a bunch of angry Klingons. Unfortunately, it was just one security officer in a holodeck. Elaine had gained new respect for Neil, not to the point of likely him much more mind you, it was reassuring to know that someone could post a challenge to her fighting skills.

Slowly dressing, checking for more bruises that were likely going to start to color during the night, Elaine grimaced. Since she arrived in her quarters, there had been only one person on her mind, Neil Bolitho.

Coming out to where Tim was sitting, she grabbed her drink. Holding her glass up to Tim's, the two clinked their glasses together.

Tim took a large drink and spoke, "So,why the hell did you two decide to beat the snot out of each other on the holodeck? Was this some damned Klingon honor thing or what?"

"No, I offered to Neil that he could come and 'watch' me destroy some Klingons in the holodeck. Halfway through my program, he walks in, has the nerve to freeze the program and asks if I would like some instruction. Before you know it, we're beating the snot out of each other. Don't even think about asking if it's a Klingon mating ritual........" Elaine began rubbing her neck and took a drink.

Tim bit off his next question, "Ah Neil, Mr Klingon. The first time I met him he tried to teach me Klingon martial arts, I just put him on the ground with a street classic, wrist lock and pull straight down.... I got stories about that boy I can't even begin to tell you.. but give me a few more and I might just tell you how he managed to get shot down on Risa..." he trailed off knowing Neil would kill him for that one.

"Sure....have a few more." Elaine cracked Tim a brilliant smile.

"So, is this all I have to do to get the dirt on Neil? You know what your'e doing? Your adding more bullets to the gun Tim. I'll have to remember that move the next time I'm in the holodeck with him." Elaine lowered her eyes a bit from Tim's gaze.

"Don't laugh, but I did have a crush on him when we were young. He still is quite handsome............" Elaine bushed, revealing the information to Tim. She looked up to Tim, appearing as if she just divulged a little too much information.

*The guys his friend, what the hell am I telling him this for?*

Tim raised an eyebrow and took a larger drink, *she thinks he's handsome.. she wants him* "Well I remember one time when we were cadets he was practicing the Bat'leth in our quarters and my brother came in and almost got his head sliced off. I had to prevent my brother from shoving Neil's sword down his throat."

As they drank Tim began to tell stories about Neil and his adventures in the academy, Tim felt the effects of the alcohol begin to kick in and he asked Elaine, "So, what was Neil like as a kid?"

Elaine grimaced as she spoke.

"He was a little shit. Getting into all sorts of trouble from his dad, but, I did get him back every now and then. I suppose he told you about when he and his supposed friends dumped me in a dish of worms?"

Tim chuckled. He remembered when Neil had told him about the story just after they met Elaine in her quarters. He nodded and O'Hare continued.

"Well, soon after that incident, I paid the same Klingon kids to beat the snot out of Neil." Elaine giggled "They did a pretty good job of it too."

"Half of my personality comes from chasing him around back then. I received my gift of practical jokes from trying them out on him." Looking like she was reliving the past, Elaine smiled. Now feeling the slight effect of the whiskey, she continued.

"Still to this day, I'm chasing him around. Or is it the other way around Tim? Tell me, what does Neil think about the counselor? Have I found a place in his head yet?" Elaine looked intently at Tim, waiting for his response.

Tim looked at Elaine, "Neil thinks about you... I have known that knuckle head for a few years, he's got some feelings I think, hell I haven't seen him this messed up since Gartner....." Tim trailed off *you said too much knucklehead*

Elaine chuckled. "I prefer to call him a lunk head. So, what's the story behind Gartner, did she used to be his partner? She's seeing that lizard, right? What's he been doing that makes you think he's messed up?"

Tim looked at her, "Well,Anna Gartner is still his partner technically but you know more then I would since you are a counselor person. Neil had the hots for her big time, he wanted to ask her out and when he worked up the courage to do something she had already...." Tim shifted and drank more.."kinda started dating the lizard... he took it hard, we got massively trashed that night. He spent the entire damned shoreleave moping like a little kid, and then this lunkhead was too klingon to sabotage it, however he moped and grumped the entire bloody time about it. And Ms O'Hare if you repeat any of this to Neil I will kick your butt whether or not you wear the tight leather outfit." Tim grinned and replied to her.

O'Hare bust out laughing at this point,

"Problem is Neil aaaahhhhh, I mean Tim, I likely won't remember this conversation in the morning."

Elaine stifled a big yawn and Tim looked at her with a grin. Letting out a giggle, he replied, "You are tired aren't you? Now, should I take you to bed or are we gonna just pass out on the couch?" Tim asked he drank more, stopping only to pour more whiskey for himself and the counselor.

Elaine looked amazed at what he just said to her. "TIM! You are more then welcome to stay here, just on the couch. I'm going back to my bed and you are going to stay right there mister. I don't think that this ship needs any thing more to talk about and I have to grow up a little bit. Besides, I trust you......."

Before she could finish the sentence, O'Hare was out, curled up in the corner of the couch. Tim looked at her for a second and thought, "Hell, I'm not staying here. I wouldn't do a thing anyway, but it would look bad and this ship gossips about everything.. " However, his body had other ideas and he slumped over the couch his head hit Elaine's hip and he was snoring like a buzz saw.

The two looked comfortable and were out like burned out bulbs. Unfortunately for Elaine, her new room mate had just coming walking in.

Ensign Angelica Garcia stepped into Elaine's quarters and said a boisterous "HHHEEEELLLOOOOOOOOOOOOOO..........." Her mouth stopped cold as she noticed the security officer and the counselor snuggled up together on the couch.

"Well, one of those room mates" She said giggling.

"This is going to be fun." Grabbing the camera that was sitting on the bed, the ensign leaned in close and snapped a picture of the two. The Lt. and the Ensign had no idea that the flash even went off.

Off in their own separate dream worlds, Tim was dreaming of Eshar and Elaine.....of beating the shit out of Neil again. Little did they know, that tongues were going to wag as Angelica, holding the picture in her hands, made her way down to ten-forward with a huge smile on her face.

USS Galaxy "A Bloody Mess Pt 1"
Written by Lt Commander Kahn Nilani
Chief Medical Officer, USS Galaxy

The first volly weapons fire hit the Galaxy, the ship shuddered under the firepower of the Romulan attackers. Nilani was lucky to be sitting down otherwise she would have been thrown half way across sickbay. Nilani moved quickly over to the pannel and opened her up, activating the emergancy power systems. The Sickbay couldn't afford loosing power in a situation like this.

A second weapons hit and a pannel on a far wall exploded into a shower of sparks, the door to sickbay opened and a number of crewmen were brought in by some first aid officers. Nilani moved quickly over to a biobed!

"Ok place him on here, what's his condition?" Nilani spoke to the officer who brought him in.

"His condition is critical! 3rd degree burns to more than 40% of his body, internal bleeding, 3 broken ribs, punctured kidney and if you thought that wasn't enough he also has a deflated left lung!"

"I'm surprised he's alive!" Nilani commented quickly, while grabbing a Medical tricorder to find the exact extent of the damage. Nilani looked at the results and looked at a sickbay nurse.

"Get the surgical unit over here NOW!" she turned back to the first aid officer "Ok an minor injuries and even bad ones take them to the other facilities. I only want surgery cases here, anyone that can live longer than 1 hour without surgery let the other doctor's handle it!"

The First aid officer nodded and quickly left the sickbay, the nurse placed the surgical unit over the near dead crewman and activated it. Nilani moved to the display and started working on the lung, the creman was badly injured and she was going to do her best to save him.

**** 21 min later ****

The sickbay got really busy really quickly, it seemed more than half the ship had rolled into sickbay or the surrounding areas, Nilani's staff was doing a great job in handling the influx of patients. They had not fallen behind and the surgical teams had worked perfectly, Nilani thought that she made the right judgement when she heard what the captain was going to do. And she knew she had made the right choice!

She looked down to the injured crewman and worked on another injury he had suffered, during the first wave of attacks. Nilani finished and allowed one of the other doctors to finish up, she went over to another bio bed and ran a quick scan. She noticed a punture wound on the right part of the ensigns neck, she removed the bandage to get a better look and a bit of blood splurted out and onto her face, just then the lights flickered.

"Nurse get me a dermal regenerator and fix up this wound, he is also suffering from cranial bleeding and I want him ready for the EMH!" Nilani then tapped on her comm badge. "Sickbay to Engineering, I need more power dammit!"

She moved over to another biobed and started to operate once more

**** Unknown Time later ****

Nilani finished working on another patient, she had jsut worked on 10 in what seemed the last 3 hours, but she knew it hadn't been that long.

"All Secure"
Lt. jg Numa Taurean
SO USS Galaxy

Numa jumped out of her warm and cozy bed. The red alert had been sounded, and she was acting purely from instinct. She was dressed in her uniform before she realized that she was moving towards the medical labs.

Her strides were long and graceful as she rounded a corner and entered a turbo lift. She was on her way to the Botonical labs. She had to make sure that they were locked down and secured.

Whish. The door to the turbo lift slid open. The young benzite picked up her pace again. She rounded another corner and ran into a young ensign who was anxiously moving to her 'battle' post.

"I'm sorry." Her voice quavered a little.

"It's okay, Ensign...." There was a pause as Numa waited for the young asian officer to fill it in with her name.

"Oh, Ensign Tam Li." She was gaining her composure by now.

"Ensign Tam Li," Numa repeated. "I'm sorry, but we haven't the time to chat now." Numa nodded her head in the direction of one of the flashing red lights and smiled. "We both have positions to get to. Later we'll meet and continue our introductions."

With that, Numa returned her attention to her mission.

The shipped rocked. Numa braced herself in the door frame of the lab. She took a quick survey of the current occupants. Ensign Manden was in the process of locking up some of the fragile containers and equipment. Also present were Petty Officer Elik and Ensign Whitlock.

Within minutes the Botanical Labs were secure.

"Lt jg Taurean to Lt. Commander Erikson. Botanical Labs all secure."

The ship rocked once again.

"No Rest for the Weary"
By Lt(jg) Yazron Beq
Tactical Officer
USS Galaxy

***Beq's quarters***

The Red Alert Klaxon sounded once again and the couple were awkened from their cosy dreams.

"Well so much for rest." Lorraine said, smiling. "I suppose we'd better get to it!"

"I suppose your right," Yaz replied. "But remind me that we still need to go for your check-up when this is over." He remembered that Lorraine was due for a check up on their child soon.

"I will." Lorraine said and then kissed Yaz.

The couple got out of bed and slipped on their uniforms. Lorraine was ready first. "Slow coach!" She said as she left their quarters.

Yaz tapped his comm as he slipped on his boots. =/\= "Beq to Kamin, status report."

The Vulcan replied imediately over the comm. =/\= We have escorted the Enterprise-C back to Nerada in her own time. We are currently engaged in.......=/\= the ship shook and he paused for a moment before continuing. =/\= ....battle with the Romulans of that time. Captain Sulu has decided to intervene also. =/\=

Yaz left his quarters. He should have guest "Cowboy" Sulu would have had something to do with this. "I'm on my way." Yaz cut the comm link. =\/=

***Tactical Operations, 2 minutes later***

Yaz entered Tactical Ops and immediately took a seat at the main console. Kamin gave a nod of acknowledgement as he entered. Yaz called up the ship status, things weren't looking to good at this moment in time, the cloak wouldn't be able to hold for much longer with this sort of damage. The ship shook again in warning. Yaz was flung to the ground and Kamin barely kept his place. As Yaz got up he rubbed his eyes, he was too tired for this.

=/\= T'Kal on the Bridge assuming Tactical Station. =/\= Ben's voice cut through the comm.

Well at least someone had relieved Casey, Yaz wasn't sure why but he didn't feel comfortable with him at the main tactical console, though, unlike many others, he didn't mind the man personnally.

He sat back in his chair in Tac Ops. They had managed to pick up the Excelsior, he fed the data up to T'Kal just incase he hadn't noticed and then suggested:

"Grab them and get the hell out of here!"

He knew his suggestion wasn't very helpful, but his mind couldn't work very well, having had only 30 minutes sleep in the past 28 hours. Oh well, he couldn't help it, he got back to work seeing what he could come up with.

Lt(jg) Yazron Beq, Tactical Officer, USS Galaxy

"I Know You"
by LJG Kalln and Ensign Michael McDowell

***USS Galaxy, Ten-Forward, just before battle of Narenda III***

Kalln strolled into Ten-Forward, pretty worn out from the trials of counselling, dealing with multiple lady friends, getting lost in the Jeffries' Tubes, and other worries that face your average four- armed lizard.

Then he spotted a face he thought was familiar. Walking over to the table near the window, he found an Engineering Ensign he could have sworn he recognised.

"Hey," he said in greeting, "Weren't you at the Antwerp Physics Institute back in '72?"

The sudden voice startled Michael. He had been thinking about his home, his father, mother. Just letting his mind wander, not wanting to think about anything that had to do the with the upcomming battle of the Enterprice-C. He could not think about that. Every time he did that he got cold as ice and saw numerous death body's before his eyes floating trough space.

First it seemed the voice came out of nowhere but when he look around he noticed the giant lizard standing next to him wearing the insignia of an Lieutenant jg. Michael just stared at him for a moment before he realized that the question was meant for him.

"Oh...i'm sorry sir, but i was somewhere else with my mind. You were asking?"

"You're Michael McDowell aren't you?"

*How does he know my name?* thought Michael, while scrutinizing the Lieutenant in a discrete way...as if that would give him the answer. *I've only been here for a few weeks. That's too short for anyone outside Engineering to know my name.* Still, the four armed lizard triggerd something. Some distant memories. But those were too vague to understand. When he failt to find an explanation Michael decided to continue the conversation as if they were still on duty, just to be on the safe site.

"Yes sir. I'm Ensign McDowell from Engineering."

"I know you. You were on Earth, at the Antwerp Institute. I was a visitor there, with Yatoh Derch on his special lecture. Don't you remember me?"

"Yato Derch? Wait I minute, I remember a lecture about some new insights in warp field geometry given by him. Is that the same man?"

"That's the one!' said Kalln enthusiastically, helping himself to a seat, 'Dearold Derch. He's my oldest academy chum, you know. Him and Raleigh and Kravatz. But you don't want to know about them. So how have you been? Got posted to the Galaxy, huh? I seem to remember you being one of the bright ones back at the Institute. Never thought you'd end up in Starfleet."

Michael, still amazed that he was talking to someone who knew Yatoh Derch, smiled. And then it all came back. His year at the Institute, the lecture, and of course the excitement about the consequences of Derch his lecture. After that Michael saw no need in formalities anymore. After all, this was someone he knew!

"Well i always wanted to serve in Starfleet. But tell me, If i'm right then you must be Kalln. Back at the Institute you were the giant among dwarfs, sitting on the front row in the conference hall."

"That's me,' said Kalln, 'I'm quite an intimidating sight when I'm sat down. I was there for moral support. Do you know how long he spent preparing that lecture?"

"No, how long?"

"Two months! I mean he knew it all anyway, but he was humming and hahhing about it - that was back when he was the Captain of the Jumanji. I was on DS9 at the time - they gave me special leave to go see it."

Strange. Yatoh Derch was a Vulcan. Vulcans are almost walking computers. So why had it taken so long to prepare himself? True, he knew all there was to know about warp field geometry. Michael had learned a lot from his lecture. Some of those things were a major break- through and proved also to be very useful when used in the theory Micheal was working on that time.

"Captain of the Jumanji? I didn't know that. But tell me, why did it take so long for Derch to prepare himself for his lecture. Vulcans are practically living computers."

"Yeah, well Derch is a pretty unusual Vulcan. We spent six years at the Academy - he was thirty, I was fifty - on an extended course, and spent a good proportion of that time tipping buckets of things onto people."

"Buckets of things?"

"Yes, small fluffy toys, water, silly string, Tribbles, that kind of thing. All good fun. Derch can never keep a straight face."

Michael laughed. A vulcan with a bit of humor, who thought that could be? He had a hard time even to imagine it!

"What? A vulcan with humor?? No way!!" Michael said laughing "What a pitty I wasn't there."

"It was a bit before your time,' said Kalln, 'You probably weren't even born then. We've been knocking around for a bit, the four of us. That reminds me, I must get in touch with Raleigh and Kravatz some time. I hear Raleigh got put on the USS Casablanca, with the weirdest-ass Science department in the fleet. Still, that's us all over."

"When were you at the academy? If it was before 2350 then you're right, it was before my time."

"Class of 2335, it was. We served our Cadet cruise on a Soyuz-class. You may not even remember them."

"I see. Well, that's way before my time." Micheal replied "And what did you say about-"

Micheal was cut short when all hell broke loose.

"Red Alert, all hands to battle stations. All Crew report to your assigned stations."

People starting leaping up from tables and heading for the door. Evidently they were going back through the rift.

Kalln stood, somewhat more leisurely than anyone else "Time to mess with history a little, I guess. See you after the fight? If we're both still around, that is."

"Sounds good to me. And Kalln...." Michael pauzed for a few seconds and looked him straight in the eye. "...good luck. I think that's something we all need now."

The conversation over, the old lizard and the young human headed for the door and their stations.

"It's got to be the morning after"
By somewhat disheveled Ensign O'Hare

Ensign Garcia sat in the chair, waiting patiently for the Lt. and the Ensign to stir. She was going to enjoy meeting them and finding out what the situation was.

O'Hare was the first to move. Groaning loudly, she awoke Tim, who was still laying on the ensigns hip.

Here we go! Thought Angelica.

"Elaine?" Tim was shocked to see himself laying on the ensign's hip. Bolting up, he expressed a look of utter amazement when Elaine lifted her head.

"Tim, what the hell are you doing here?" Elaine asked.

The Lt. was still starring at Elaine's face, which boasted a nice shiner. Looking down at her neck and arms, Tim whistled when he saw the array of bruises Neil had inflicted on the Counselor.

"What? What are you looking at? " Looking around, the ensign had a look of utter dishevelment. Finally remembering last night, she sighed.

"Now I remember" Grimacing. The two finally looked over at Angelica who was snickering rather loudly.

Elaine shook her head and said, "And just who the hell are you?"

Taken back by O'Hare's apparent rudeness at her sitting at the table, Garcia replied, sneering:

"I'm your new room mate Ensign. Who the hell are you two?"

Tim motioning at Elaine replied with protectiveness in his voice. "This is Counselor O'Hare. You better treat her with a little more respect. She's one of a kind. I'm LT. Tim O'Connell, security."

"She doesn't look very tough. In fact, she looks a little weak at the moment to me. Especially with all those bruises." Garcia sneered once more.

Tim automatically put his arm out in front of Elaine, who was growling at the ensign, restraining her from grabbing Garcia by the neck and strangling the life force right out of her.

O'Connell forced Elaine to look him in the eye. "Ignore her. We better hurry up, Alpha shift starts in 30 minutes."

Elaine curtly nodded to Tim and returned the evil stare right back at Garcia. Wincing as she stood up, she looked at Tim.

"Tim, thanks for last night…..I had a good time, despite the little wench over there that I had to wake up to."

"Grab some coffee and some aspirin. You'll feel better."

Kissing Elaine on the cheek, he leaned back and grinned.

"Better watch yourself Ensign. I think your falling for a certain Lt., and it's not me." Tim turned to leave, walking out of the counselor's quarters looking still very disheveled.

Elaine cocked her head to the side with a quizzical look.

Turning back on her heel, Elaine glowered at Angelica.

Garcia side stepped her gaze and very quietly asked, "Your involved with someone else? That was all innocent?"

"I'm not involved with anyone at the moment, why? Did you do something Ensign?" Elaine face flushed white.

"Well, I actually came in last night and saw you guys knocked out on the couch and I took the camera…………."

"What did you do ensign?" Elaine's face was whiter now, just imagining what was being said across the ship this morning.

"Took a picture." Garcia said, wincing, waiting for Elaine's response.

"Where is this picture, ENSIGN???" O'Hare's face was not white anymore, but a brilliant shade of crimson.

"Ummmmm, I don't know at the moment. Likely floating around the ship somewhere."

"WHAT????? Why you little bitch!" Elaine screamed.

"I didn't mean to……"

"Get out! Before I inflict on you some major bruises of your own." Elaine hissed, with that same poisonous voice she used in the Brig when addressing Neil.

Angelica got up and basically backed out of the quarters. After the doors hissed, Elaine plopped back down on the couch, and covered her head with her hands. Jumping up, she proceeded to dress in her uniform, silently swearing under her breath the whole time. Looking in the mirror, she panicked. What was once some red swelling had turned into a major, nasty purple and black bruise where she had ran into Neil's fist. * Wonderful, Karyn's going to have my butt in a slingshot when she sees me this morning.* Elaine thought, grimacing.

Retrieving two aspirin from the replicator, along with her coffee, she proceeded out of the corridor. Planning on finding Tim later in the day and telling him about the picture, if he did not already know about it by now.

Elaine stepped out in the corridor, she was greeted by snickering and odd looks from the shiner on her face. Ignoring everyone that said hi to her, she marched right to her office, longing for the seclusion that it may bring.

Not getting that seclusion long, Lt. Dallas stepped into Elaine's office. O'Hare quickly looked down, so Karyn could not see the bruise.

"Morning Elaine. We have a lot of work to do to…….." Karyn stopped in mid sentence noticing Elaine had not looked up to return the Lt.'s gaze.

Cocking her head to the side, Karyn asked, "Elaine? Look at me please."

"Um, I can't Maam. Not for at least a week!"

"Ensign, look at me!" Karyn had a little irritated scratchiness to her voice.

"Okay, but……" Elaine lifted her head slightly so Lt. Dallas could get a peak at the bruise.

Karyn looked back in shock. "What the hell happened? Did you go confront that Vulcan?"

"Um, no. Lt. Neil Bolitho and I had it out in the holodeck last night. He went to punch me in the head and I swung around, catching his fist, well, you know where." Elaine sunk down in her chair, waiting for her superior's reaction.

"Damn it Ensign. What do I have to do to get through to you? Rescuing you in the brig didn't work, getting drunk didn't work….."

Elaine was practically under her desk at this point. Not wanting to divulge that she drank an incredible amount of whiskey the night before, O'Hare waited to speak until the wrath of the boss was aired. Karyn continued,

"Having an officer practically drag you back to your quarters didn't work, fighting another officer in the holodeck…."

"But maam, it was consensual….."

"Sex is consensual, beating the living shit out of each other is just plain stupid." Leaning over the desk looking at O'Hare, Lt. Dallas spoke:

"Geez, you are a wreck. Did you at least smack him around a bit?"

Elaine eased up back in her seat and smiled. "Did more than that." Elaine proceeded to tell Karyn everything that went on in the holodeck.

Karyn leaned back and suppressed a snicker. "So, you're not the only one walking around a little dizzy this morning?"

"I hope not. Inwardly, I hope he's really hurting now. Cause I am!" Elaine took a sip of her coffee, wincing in pain.

"Okay, now that that's dealt with, what about a certain picture I saw this morning in ten forward of you and a Lt. O'Connell?"

"Oh God, YOU saw it? Neil's just likely hitting the roof right about now!" Elaine let out an audible groan. Looking to each side she thought ,Now, why in the hell did I say that?

"I hope he hasn't done anything to Tim yet!"

"Red Alert, all hands to battle stations"

"Ensign, we will defiantly discuss this later. Right now, I need you to go down the corridor and get these files back where they belong. After your done, meet me in my office…..we are not done talking yet."

Elaine stood up and took the files from the Lt.s hand and walked out of her office into the corridor.

Lt. Dallas looked upward and stated loudly, "Why me God? Why me?"

***Deck 31, Astrophysics Lab***

BANG!!

Kalln rushed into the room as LCARS consoles started to blow. Where the hell was the officer assigned to this station? He checked on the PADD he carried. Lt Shtik. He was in the brig. Going through Pon Farr, Kalln had heard. He had served with a Vulcan for eighteen years at least. He knew all there was to know about Pon Farr. Must have been fun for the poor sod.

Entering the room he saw that some kind of feedback from the local power conduits was frizzing the panels. They had been fired on without shields, and even the primitive Romulan weapons of the time period (ah yes - he remembered them well) could rip the hell out of unshielded hull.

Who's great idea was this anyway?

Still, the point about predestination paradoxes was that they were like prophecy - you couldn't break or avoid them. If you'd done anything to alter the timeline, you'd know about it - or rather you wouldn't, because it woud already have changed.

Kalln was intimately familiar with both predestination paradoxes and prophecy, having been a prominent feature in varieties of both over the years, and he couldn't see quite what all these people were worried about it; they couldn't get it wrong - if they did happen to get it wrong then no one but the El-Aurians would notice anyway, and they were a bunch of scroidy buggers if ever there was one.

Still, that was no reason not to fix things. He rushed up to the console and made a quick damage assessment.

'Kalln to Engineering,' he said, 'Astrophysics lab, Deck 31. Low prioroty power overload.'

Doing what he could to jury-rig the thing into not totally disintegrating, he left the room. This pass he still had five more rooms to check. Better get on with it.

Tim Fletcher for:
LJG Gordall Kalln, Science Officer, USS Galaxy

Confrontations
Lt(Jg) Tim O'Connell
Lt(jg) Neil Bolitho

Security
USS Galaxy

The klaxon sounds for red alert right in the middle of...... well whatever the two were doing... however the two do not break stride and continued with their activities.

They are now resting comfortably when Tim hears the door to his quarters open. He sits up and looks out, "shit, Neil.... I forgot to leave the boot outside..

***A few minutes earlier***

Neil left ten-forward just as the red alert klaxon blazed followed by the "Battle stations" ringing throughout the ship. Bolitho paused briefly

" Computer location of Lt O'Connell"

[Lt. O'Connell is currently in his quarters]

Neil nodded and ran down to O'Connells quarters barging in, just as Tim yelled his warning, their was a flash of spots, before Neil averted his eyes, and retreated out of Tim O'Connells quarters at warp speed. Neil leaned back against the corridor wall and shouted into the quarters,

" Sorry Eshar!"

Neil was fuming, the rat he spent the night with Elaine and now he's back with Eshar. Neil took a deep breath before continuing. " O'Connell you moron! We're at red alert! and you ........ " Neil trailed off not wanting to vocalise what it was they were been doing.

"Eshar, your just as bad as he is!" Growled Neil angry with her as well

Eshar was giggeling, and Tim was trying valiantly to control laughter. She kissed Tim again and replied, "I got to go shower now, we should go to work now anyway" She moved in to the lavatory with a clean change of clothes. The second the door closed to the restroom Tim called out to Neil, "Neil get in here dammit." Neil entered Tim's quarters now nervous and looking around, "Eshar?" Tim replied, "She's cleaning up... " Tim had taken the time to be dressed in a large part of his uniform and was getting the uniform jacket on when she made another appearance this time in proper uniform.

Neil glared at O'Connell angrily. " Your a real piece of work you know that?"

Tim raised his eyebrow, "What the hell are you talking about Neil, I admit this wasn't the best timing on the planet, but piece of work? what is going on with you?"

" Neil what are you talking about?" Frowned Eshar.

" Speak to your boyfriend over here Eshar about where he spent last night?" Spat out Neil lividly.

Eshar looked at Tim totally confused " Tim what is Neil talking about?"

Tim turned to Eshar, "I got a little drunk with the new counselor, I don't remember much but Neil's a bit upset."

Neil scoffed, "Yeah a likely story, unfortunately for you O'Connell their is a little picture floating around Ten-forward that says otherwise!"

Neil gave Tim a sad look, before turning to Eshar and taking her arm. "C'mon Eshar, you've got better things to do then to hang around with this loser!"

Tim was very confused, "What picture...dammit Bolitho you jackass get back her and tell me what the fuck is going on.." He grabbed Neil by the shoulder and tried to spin him around *no wonder he's pissed he thinks Elaine and I ....* Neil whirled around with Tim's arm pulling on his shoulder and let go with a punch that knocked Tim O'Connell back into the opposite wall. Neil glared at O'Connell's who looked back with a one of total surprise.

" You want some more?" Spat out Neil, his face enraged starting to advance on his one time friend.

"C'mon Neil" Said Eshar quitely, pulling on his sleeve. Neil turned to look at Eshar and his face softned, nodding he turned his back on his former friend, whirling as he reached the door.

"O'Connell, you stay away from Eshar, ...do you understand? And you bloody well stay away from me!"

***

Tim was still shocked, Neil was pissed that;s for sure. *I can't believe that stubborn bastard won't let me expalin a damned thing.. too klingon for his own good* Tim rubbed his face, *yep gonna have a shiner for sure.... great* He got up and left his quarters. *Elaine you got some explaining to do for damned sure* "computer location of ensign O;Hare"

[ensign O'Hare is in sickbay]

Tim walked out of his quarters and headed to sickbay...

Reports were coming in from all decks as the Galaxy endeavoured to protect its charges in the swirling maelstrom. From the outside perspective, a starship in battle can be both a thing of beauty and a terrible sight to behold. It is a silent ballet of destruction; crimson and blue fire explode from one ship, lancing destruction into another. Explosions silently appear, as engines and fuel components are raked and pierced by the deadly energies.

But it is eerily silent. With all the motion and activity, the absence of sound in the dark vacuum is an oddity that even the most battle-hardened veteran of space combat can not adjust to. The humanoid ear naturally searches for sound in dangerous situations, and the while the brain can acknowledge the danger, the body can not. External space combat is the most unbalancing and dangerous thing in space anyone - regardless of racial courage and heroic exploits - can ever attempt.

So why was he doing this?

Sunder checked the equipment roster trying to retain his balance as the ships around them were locked in deadly combat. He had developed this plan for emergency contingencies only because of the great risk it carried to its attempters. In this situation though, Sunder figured that the cost was worht it if they could right both the past and the future of the Federation.

He looked out of the external hatchway at the Romulans. The pressure suit he had on was specially configured for the mission. A low energy current ran through it to mask his presence from enemy sensors. Of course, the less sophisticated sensors of the older vessels had even less of a chance of spotting him. He gave silent thanks for the Romulans' preference for better guns over sensing equipment.

He went through a last-minute checklist of the equipment around him. Motivator sled, the twelve packs of nitronium explosive, the phase inhibitor unit, and an array of various weapons and sundries necessary for the mission ahead. Everything was ready; he just hoped he was.

He had code-named the operation " Thundercloud " after the nickname some of the security staff had foisted upon him. It seemed strangely appropriate. It was supposed to be a secret nickname that Sunder had adopted for a secret operation that only the captain and he knew about. The captain wasn't too keen on the idea - thinking it to be a heavy amount of sacrifice focused upon the shoulders of a few crewmen. But Sunder had managed to conivnce him that was the strength of the operation. Rather than having to run a high-risk stunt that endangered the entire ship, only a few would have to put themselves in a very dangerous situation. If all succeeded then the ship was out of danger and able to reclaim the away party. If it failed... then it wouldn't make any difference anyway.

The captain had forced him to shelve the plan and cover it in a veil of secrecy. No-one could ever know that Sunder had created little better than a "suicide squad" on board a flagship of Federation ideals! Preposterous! Price prayed that it would never be used.

Sunder had no such compunctions however. Raised by orion privateers whose devotion to ship and crew bordered upon savage ferocity, Sunder knew the value of necessity when he saw it. He was no kamikaze or gung-ho klingon gloryhound. This was something that simply had to be done and he was the man to do it - alone, preferably.

While Sunder had his own choice to make, he didn't have the right to make others for them. Star Fleet didn't believe in needlessly sending troops to their deaths and Sunder would not start a precedent now. What Captain Price didnt' know was that this was a plan that could be adapted for one. The motivator sled was just as well-hidden as his suit, designed not to be picked up by close-range sensors. The phase inhibitor in the sled would allow him and the unit to pass through and enemy's shields and land on the hull of the vessel.

He would carry out this operation himself. The Galaxy was within range of the enemy ships, but couldn't allow itself to be seen. That limited its tactical capbility. If it was to strike back, it also had to be in secrecy and the only way the Galaxy could fight was to drop its cloak and reveal its futuristic presence to all. Maybe a ship from the future couldn't help, but perhaps one man in the right place could...

He got ready to pop the hatch. He would have to be quick about it. His access codes would allow him egress but only for a few seconds before the Bridge would see the opening and seek to shut the hatch off with an emergency forcefield. By that time though, Sunder would be out the hatch and piloting his way to the nearest Romulan ship. The motivator unit was powered with a tiny impulse engine. Certainly not capable of a comfortable ride for any sort of duration, but it would get him where he needed it to go fairly quickly. Besides, the Romulans were all crowding around the Galaxy's location anyway.

Moving from one ship to the other, Sunder would, as quickly and as carefully as he could, attach the explosives he was carrying to whatever sensitive locations of the enemy ships as he could. Being small and undetectable, and with all the commotion going on, it was his theory that this would be the very last thing an enemy ship commander would expect his foe to pull off. Of course, Sunder couldn't account for all the variables in the plan - a stray phaser blast, a large ship plowing into him at the last minute, equipment malfunction - and there was the fact that no-one would know he was out there until he gave the signal that he had worked out with the captain those months before.

He took a deep breath. Everything was ready to go. The operation would move a lot faster if he had others on similar motivator units, but this was his choice alone. One final check and he was ready to jump into the great expanse of the combat-filled space.

Busy as Beavers
by Lt Commander Endris Gakor

*** Medical Suite ***

"By the Towers of Cuisine!", Endris exclaimed as the ship rocked. At the fringe of Narendra III, the Rhomulan assult on the Klingons did not seem all that hazardous. Gakor was glad Doctor Kahn had the forsight to order the Tellarite to set up the triage area, which was filling up to rapidly for her tastes.

A call from the bridge came in, that Lt jg Richerson was down, but Endris was too busy working in the medical bay to respond. Knowing the triage area was a ways down the hall from main Sickbay, Endris had a pair of nurses test the emergancy communication equipment. The large screen on the bulkhead was not as large as the main viewscreeen on the bridge, but it served a similar purpose. It communicated what was going on in the medical suite to main Sickbay, without the hinderance of needing to tap a comm badge.

Looking into the screen, Endris reported to Nilani that the triage area was nearly 60% full, and wounded were staggering in from all over the ship. It was like a manic hive of bees, buzzing, buzzing. The religious Bajoran nearly gasped as she noticed the discoraged tone Gakor used to report she already needed additional assistance to help with the arrivals. The CMO had expected casualties, but not in the numbers that were coming in.

Out in the corridors of the ship, the Red Alert sirens repeated, but here, where Doctors and Nurses had to have freedom to communicate without distractions in order to save lives, klaxons were muted. The plazma units, which minutes before had been full, were swiftly being depleated.

Endris wiped a layer of persperation off her brow. Ensign Hitchcock staggered in, dragging a mangled leg behind him. The yeoman had a crude bandage staunching the wound, but the sterile white cloth was saturated with the gravy brown color of Tellarite blood. Nurse Illiyanna looked dismayed as she examined the Ensign's wound. It was surrounded by 3rd degree burns, but worse, shards of metal had punctured the femeral artery. She called Doctor Lemur over to help, but the damage was too extensive. The leg would be lost.

The Immunologist was herself occupied with a difficult lung trama surgery. *At least in this battle I have modern supplies*, Gakor mused. She remembered a time during the battle with the Jem' Hadar when thepower had been off. It had been a struggle to keep people healthy with limited supplies. Fortunately, the engineers of the Galaxy had rectified the problem in short order.

Things were proceding at a frantic pace. While mending Soleri's lungs, Endris noticed a pair of orderlies bringing a statis chamber into the room. The sonic sutcher was stiching a vital area to close, so there wasn't time for Gakor to pause to see who the new occupant was. Federation technology wasn't extensive enough to replace the lungs if the orignal organs were damaged beyond repair. It was a battle against time for the doctor to save the patient before time ran out. Elsewhere in the Galaxy, the skills to transplant a lung might exist, but not so here.

Doctor Bellen walked over, although the room was crowding with trama cases. Her eyebrows were raised in a Vulcan manner of concern. "This is a most difficult procedure, do you need a hand, Commander?", she asked. Bellen had already gowned up for surgery, and looked a bit errie in the opera length surgery gloves. Sometimes a retorical question was helpful to restore an emotional species sense of humor and spur them on to their best work. The Trill symboint knew this, even if her Vulcan form could not quite embrace the concept.

"Snacks!", Endris swore!" Clear liquid (probably water, which composed most humanoid bodies), was filling the cavity and interfering with the procedure. A nurse tried to increase suction, but the pump was clogged. Her hands free, D'Tara Bellen saw the problem and corrected it before it could become fatal.

This operation was going to take time. Endris worked at breakneck speed, sealing the Andorian science officer's lungs. But the wounds were extensive. The doctor didn't even allow the distraction of seeing who was in the statis chamber....

"Worrying" By Lt(jg) Neil Bolitho- security officer

Neil was storming down the passage way, the corridor lights tinged in red as the klaxon blared, Neil wringed out his aching hand....." God damn Irishmen! and their heads of cobalt!" Growled Neil."

Neil was already regretting, having punched his best friend. Eshar wasn't so quick to judge Tim as Neil had, saying she wanted to see the picture and speak to the counsellor before drawing any conclusions. Neil had nodded his agreement as she had departed him heading for her own battle station.

The Galaxy suddenly shook and battled to right it self as she shook in the fury of the enemy attack, smoke began filling corridor as the electrical conduits burst into flames sputtering sparks and with it came the sharp arid smell of burning electrical wiring.

Neil balanced himself out and wondered 'Just what in the hell was going on?' the brief had said they would be escorting the Enterprise -C through the rift to her date with destiny, and ultimately her destruction. The Galaxy was supposed to remain cloaked, and not get attacked by the Romulans. The way these impacts were tearing into the Galaxy he was guessing they had no shields.

"Better report in to Heidi back in the security office, maybe she can tell me whats going on?" * Bolitho to Mason*

" Mason here, go ahead Neil!"

" Heidi...." Neil paused to lean against the wall as the Galaxy rumbled from the latest impacts" Just what in hell is going on?"

" Not sure Neil, just know that the Galaxy has moved into position above the Enterprise -C, and were taking hits......I will let you know when I have more Mason out!"

Neil shook his head as the Galaxy rocked again. "Surely were not going to change the time line and get involved in this fight?"

The Galaxy was more that a match for a couple of 30 year old Romulan warbirds! but what effect would that have on the future? Neil shook his head glad to be a simple security officer and not have to worry at all about the space time continuum!

Lt. Shtik
Science Officer

"With a sense of humor like that, It's no wonder they locked you up." The ship was suddenly rocked with an especially loud explosion. The lights flickered. The creak of metal on metal sounded from nearby. The temperature began to drop slowly.

Shtik, feeling the change in atmosphere in front of him, reached forward with one finger to where the force field was. His finger passed effortlessly through the field's former location. This caught the attention of the security guard, who immediately scrambled with the communications console.

"Security backup to brig for prisoner esc…" She never finished the sentence as the board in front of her exploded. Her body was flung into the air. Shtik leapt across the room to catch her limp form before it hit the floor. He eased it down to the carpet as he checked her pulse. He tried to recall her name… Smits… Saint… Salt?

"Shtik to sickbay!" he had to try the communicator on her chest, since his had been taken away. She appeared to have a concussion at least, probably more extensive damage internally. No matter what, she needed immediate medical attention. Unfortunately his suspicions had been confirmed; her communicator was damaged beyond use. As was the console she had been sitting at.

The brig had only one exit and Shtik quickly crossed to it and placed his hand on the door. It was cold; that meant there wasn't a fire in the corridor that would swoop in when the door was opened. However, the door was very cold. That was a problem even more feared by space travelers than fire, vacuum.

Shtik raced through his recollections of the ship's layout. He hadn't spent much time in the security section before, and since his return to the Galaxy he had been distracted by his pon farr fever. He had no choice but to trust his memory.

Shtik crossed back to the security ensign and picked her up in a fireman's carry. He made his way back to the door as the ship continued to violent shake and bounce. He was trying to do the mathematical figures in his head. He knew that as a vulcan, he would be able to tolerate a vacuum environment for a relatively substantial amount of time. But he was unsure how well the human female would survive with the injuries she had already accumulated. But there were no more options. Taking breaths as deep as he could, he clamped his lips shut and opened the door.

His vulcan inner eyelids slammed shut as the air from the brig sucked them both into the corridor. Flying quickly down the corridor with the rush of air, Shtik counted to four before reaching out with his right hand and grabbing the emergency ladder rung that he hoped would be there. It was.

What he didn't count on was his weakened grip on his unconscious charge. She slipped off his shoulders and began to fly toward the gaping hole in the hull. Shtiks left hand shot out to catch her wrist as he clung to the ladder with his right.

With both hands now full, Shtik had no way of activating the manual force field controls, which were right in front of his face. Feeling the pull of deep space weakening his hold, he quickly wrapped his legs around the lower rungs of the ladder, freed his right hand and activated the force field that would block off the hole at the end of the hallway. Shtik then gave a violent tug on his left hand just in time to pull the ensigns feet out of the way of the activating force field. Of course this action had a powerful reaction in the gravity free environment of the corridor. Shtik let go of the ladder and wrapped his body around hers to protect it as they bounced toward the interior of the ship.

After several decks of dead ends, rubble and gravity fluctuations, they finally stumbled into sickbay. Shtik toppled over as soon as he handed the limp body to the first doctor he saw.

"My God," Ensign O'Hare mumbled from her cot, "he's gotten another girl?"

Shtik took several minutes to catch his breath before he stood up, brushed himself off and turned back toward the door.

"Excuse me, where do you think you're going!" it was not a question the doctor expected to have answered. Shtik mustered up as much dignity as his bruised, tattered and smudged body would allow.

"I have not yet been released from custody, at this time I am still considered a dangerous criminal." He stated, "I will be returning to the security confinement cell. Would you please inform security and request a replacement sentry as soon an I have established the integrity of the life support systems in that area."

"What the hell is going on here?"
Lt. (jg) Timothy O'Connell
Ensign Elaine O'Hare

Floating in and out of consciousness, O'Hare lay still in the bio bed. Coming back into consciousness, Elaine stirred, trying to lift her head. A sharp, jagged edged pain ripped through the ensign's body, stopping her from trying to lift it any further. O'Hare winced as she lay her head back on the pillow. Slowly opening her eyes, Elaine blinked several times, attempting to clear the fog out of her head and focus on the things surrounding her.

O'Hare stayed still, knowing she could not change the course of events that was happening around her. Not knowing, on the other hand, how one ensign, one little picture, and an overly pissed off security officer, would change her future as Elaine perceived it.

Elaine came to this time....for a little longer than before.

The ensign sat up in the bio bed wondering where everyone went that she knew. No one had stopped by to say hello, least of all Neil and Tim. She worried that Neil had found out about the picture of Tim and herself, but, then, what would he care? The two were just sleeping, nothing more.

Lt. O'Connell gingerly stepped into the med unit where the ensign sat waiting for something to happen.

"Elaine? How are you feeling? You look like hell."

Turning sharply towards the voice, her jaw dropped open.

There stood Tim, sporty a shiner worse than Elaine's.

"What the hell happened to you?" Elaine replied worried.

Tim looked at Elaine, "officially I was injured in the action, but unofficially Neil hit me...and if you tell anyone that I'll deny it. " Tim fixed her with a glare, "now what picture of us is floating through this ship and who is going to die by my hand for taking it." he asked.

"My little shitty room mate, that's who. Now, if you excuse me Lt., I have a certain security officer to knock out. By the time I'm done with him, he won't know what day of the week it is." Anger flashed across her face, mixed with pain. O'Hare glared at Tim's eye and proceeded to slide off the bio bed.

Tim grabbed her arm to steady her, "you do know I am going to have to throw your roommate out an airlock ... where does she work please?" Tim asked with a gentle voice which belied his rage at this point

"Don't you dare. She and the lunkhead are both my responsibility. God, I can't believe he hit you!! Anyway, I scared the living crap out of her this morning, so if she's smart, she'll leave us alone. Now, like I said, excuse me Lt.!" Determination engrained in O'Hare's face as she continued to slide off the bed. Wobbling, she used Tim as support.

Tim knew in his mind this was a bad idea but she had already had started her way out the door. Tim spoke to her worry evident in his face, "Elaine, when you are done get back up here..... you still need medical attention."

Elaine turned softly, still wincing from the pain.

"Thanks for caring Tim....at least someone does around here." Contempt and sadness mixed in her voice and she leaned against the corridor for support.

O'Hare was still wobbly, worrying Tim all the more.

"Tim..........."

Tim picked the counselor up in his arms and carried her back in to sickbay right past a startled Rotan Heretta. "don't ask, Irish and Klingon stubborn as a mules" Tim commented as he walked back in to sickbay.

After placing the counselor on a bio bed Tim walked out of the room he saw a few knowing glances from medical staff which he cut off with a glare.

Elaine, weak from getting angry and weaker from knowing that there was nothing she could do about it, drifted off again into unconsciousness.

Subject : " Break date. "
by Lt. (jg) Mike Marc
Tactical Officer

Mike and Ulya were in Mike's room where they enjoyed their free time. They didn't remember when they quite ate diner last time and today they decide to have it.

"Ulya, I have bad feeling about it. You know when starship travel through the time it is always trouble. Do you remember how it began?" - said Mike looking at Ulya's face.

"Yep, I remember but don't worry. This evening is our only Romulans could break it. " - said Ulya and kissed Mike. Immediately after it both Mike and Ulya heard The Red Alert Klaxon.

" 'Blin ' I knew , I knew I had feeling that something would happen. " - scream Mike and tapped his comm.

=/\= "Marc to Kamin, status report." Mike immediately heard answer over the comm. =/\= We have escorted the Enterprise-C back to Nerada in her own time. We are currently engaged in.......=/\= the ship shook and he paused for a moment before continuing. =/\= ....battle with the Romulans of that time. We now protect Entr-C and we seeking for Captain Sulu vessel. =/\= =/\= I'm on my way =/\= - said Mike and cut comm link.

"Ulya you heard Romulans, you was right I think we both need to go. So see you after the battle. And I'm really sorry . " - said Mike kissed Ulya and then both left Mike's quarter.

"Ok Ok I know " - said Ulya , but Mike didn't hear her voice because he already was in turbo-lift he moved to bridge.

When he enter to bridge he saw that Casey was operating main tactical console but after a sec Benedict T'Kal enter to Bridge and replace him." Now we safe " - thought Mike because he like when everybody do their job.

Mike sat to chair in Tac Ops. Before he begin to work Mike looked over the bridge and thought that their ship have a great crew.

SHUT UP
Lt(jg) Tim O'Connell
Security officer and very angry person
Galaxy

Tim stalked out of sickbay his mind a wash in rage. Every impulse in his mind is not thinking of his duty at hand and he was trying to calm down. That was bad... just then a familar face bumped in to him in the corridor, Angellica Garcia, A/k/a the shitty roomate.... Tim's eyes narrowed as he saw her, his voice grew cold, "ensign" She started a bit and asked him, "what did I do to you?"

Tim stopped in his tracks and faced the young woman, "excuse me what did you do to me? You do not want to have this conversation now.... trust me... you don't want to." She faced him, "I'm a counselor it's not good to hide feelings confrontation is good." Tim's face clouded over with rage and he took a breath or 2 to calm down, however he did vent, "Your a counselor, you can't keep a secret anyway. you bitch, what the hell were you thinking. You should have asked before taking that picture and passing it around like it was some Damned joke!!!"

She was majorly shocked and began to protest, Tim cut her off with a glare, "SHUT UP, you don't get to be angry that's not your right. You don't get to protest... I DO you used my life as a fucking joke, because of your complete lack of brains that were given a paramecium my best friend is not speaking to me, I may have lost the one woman I care about, and the whole ship thinks I'm screwing someone I haven't even seen naked. so next time you feel like fucking up my life for some goddamned gossip show please let me know in advance so I can plan for this." she again tried to say something but

Tim was on a roll and he was not to be stopped. He got nose to nose with the young woman , "You better pray long and hard that everything turns out ok because if it does not I will personally make it my mission in life to see to it that your life is a living hell for the rest of your days on this ship and in Starfleet... I have powerful family one word and you will be a custodian on a Bolian Sewage treatement ship.. try me."

Tim stalked off already regretting his last words to the young counselor. He would never do anything that petty but he figured maybe she would think twice before gossiping again.

Raging Romulans
LtJg Lexana Ral
Junior Meat Truck
USS Galaxy, Security

The bristling rage Lex was currently feeling was not being helped by the fact that she was being somewhat bounced around as the ship danced around in her sets of manouevres. She had one hand on her phaser belt, and the other most firmly on the desk. Her realisation that one of her family members- even though she'd never known them- was shortly going to be space dust was something which hung rather heavily on her mind. She wasn't entirely sure how she felt about it. She was half Romulan- but didn't consider her Romulan heritage at all. Well now it was attacking them.

She looked at Albrecht who was going over some strategic plans should they be boarded. Yeah... right.. Like that was gonna happen. There were a few noticeable absences from the room. LtCdr Sunder was not there, she figured he must have some good reason and shrugged it off. LtJg's O'Connell and Bolitho were noticeably absent and had STILL not reported in to get their post assignments. She'd had just about enough of the two of them. The'yd given her more headaches over the past week than anybody else upon the entire ship.

"Sir.. ?" She asked Albrecht who was poring over a PADD

"Lt?"

"I would like to make a complaint."

"A complaint?"

"Yes. I am filing a formal complaint with you in regards to LtJg's Bolitho and O'Connell. "

"May I ask why?"

"Yes. They are constantly LATE- such as now when we are clearly at red alert and supposed to be at our stations. They are, to put it bluntly, screwing around. Ever since that new counselor came aboard LtJg Bolitho has been lax in his work, essentially daydreaming half the day. His mind is clearly NOT on his work."

Lt Chen, overhearing the conversation stepped in "Lex.. don't you think you're overreacting?"

"I am NOT overreacting." she snapped "As for LtJg O'Connell, I got a computer readout of his wearabouts 9 minutes after the Red Alert alarm went off. He was in his quarters. May I also add that Ensign Jaron was also there.She also has NOT reported in. He's guilty of a major dereliction of duty and so is she. This is one of the finest ships in starfleet- and half the damned security staff are fucking around whilst they're supposed to be on duty. Sir" she added, almost as an afterthought.

Albrecht regarded the scowling officer for a moment "Understood Lt. Their behaviour is not fitting and they will be disciplined accordingly."

She seemed to cool off a little at this "Thank you." She said in a softer tone

"Are you alright?" Lt Chen asked her a moment later

"I don't know." She replied, taking the PADD which held her deck assignement for the anti-boarding party patrols. She gave him a faint smile "Sorry if I snapped at you. I'm.. not feeling myself. See you later" And with that she stalked out of Main Security and headed to her post. Fully intent on yelling at those two no good excuses for meat rucks the minute she could.

“Time’s Mistake”
by LtCmdr. Hunter McKenzie
Chief Tactical Officer, USS Galaxy

Mac sped onto the bridge as the Galaxy rocked again from the unexpended energy of a plasma torpedo directed at the Enterprise-C. Mac’s shoulder was still raw from K’Eyt’s blade and the trip to sickbay had been cut short when the Red alert Klaxon sounded. As he stepped onto the bridge he watched as medics attended to Richeson on the floor behind the Tactical arch and the ever solemn T’Kal manned the vacated post diligently. Mac had accessed the info from TacOps and knew that the situation was dire. He was glad, though, that Casey had been relived from Tactical. He knew that for all of his bravado and glamorous tactics, he still knew very little about Tactics and someday his unnessacary risks would get people killed and when that happened tha "vaunted" Casey name would'nt count for anything. He didn’t want to be around to pick up the pieces of that fiasco.

Mac stepped behind T’Kal and placed his hand on the Bajoran-Human's shoulder to acknowledge his presence. He didn’t need to relieve Benedict as he had the situation well under control…unfortunately there was one problem that seemed to be overlooked.

“Captain, I believe that we are overlooking two minor points.” Interjected Mac.

“Yes Commander?” replied Price as he spun to face the rear of the bridge. His eyes narrowing at the bloody tear in the shoulder of his uniform.

“Sir, We have no idea which Romulan vessel took out the Enterprise. The honor that that captain would receive for firing that deathblow would be enormous both in political and martial circles. With every blow that the Excelsior deflects we run the risk of changing that part of history. From the amount of attacks already, we may have already changed it . That, and the fact that there is no way that the galaxy can withstand even a minor hit from a plasma torpedo. With the cloak n place, we are essentially shieldless.” Our best option is to grab the Excelsior and hi tail out of here and head to the rift. We are on dangerous ground here, Captain"

Captain Price turned back to the screen and glanced at Casey. Mac watched as another barrage was released at Nerenda III. The Romulans using the hit and run tactics that’s they had perfected over centuries of warfare. Mac waited for the Captains reply while his fingers initiated the “cloaked defense” program that he and Mercury had designed. Like always he was a good little soldier and if eth Captain said blast the Romulans from the sky...so be it…he would.

Lt. Commander Hunter McKenzie, Chief Tactical Officer, USS Galaxy
ICQ 6758283

"The Incredible Flying Vulcan"
By the incredibly drugged Ensign O'Hare
Line or two by the Flying Vulcan, Lt.Shtik
and an unbearable appearance by the holier than thou counselor Ensign Garcia

As the hours passed, O'Hare felt stronger. Still a little mixed up from the lovely assortment of pain killers, antibiotics, and co-agulents Cat and the various medical staff had hyposprayed into her, she wasn't sure if what the ensign had just seen was a figment of her drugged out imagination, or a nasty bit of reality that Elaine would personally take care of herself when she felt strong enough.

Lying on her bed, Elaine swore to God above, the peckish Vulcan, Lt.Shtik, was flying beside her, carrying another woman in his arms.

O'Hare faintly muttered,

"My God, he's gotten another girl." before passing out AGAIN!

Waking up for the fourth time, O'Hare adjusted her vision

"Hi." A female voice said.

Finally being able to see who it was, Elaine grimaced.

"Come to kick me when I'm down Ensign Garcia?"

"No, ensign, I came to apologize."

Realizing that this was definitely a figment of her somewhat drug inforced, warped imagination, Elaine laughed. The ripping pain brought her sadly back into the gross reality, responsible in part, by the woman beside her.

"Why the hell are you here?"

"I thought I should apologize. I met the Lt. that you were with last night and he wasn't exactly that kind. I rethought what I did, and realized that it was totally illogical."

"Please don't say illogical around me. I hate that word." Elaine winced, thinking of the flying Vulcan thing again.

Elaine smile came naturally. O'Hare tried to imagine Tim ripping into the ass of the counselor.

"Geez, at this rate, asses are just going to start falling on the floor."

"Pardon me?"

Contempt once again filled O'Hare's eyes.

"Shut the hell up! If I was strong enough, I'd kick what you have left of your ass all the way back to Earth, present day that is. Not any of this in the past crap."

"Ya know, ensign, your kind of rude for a counselor." Garcia smarted off.

"And your kind of an insensitive bitch!!" Elaine roared, with all the strength she could muster.

"Now, get the hell out of here before I hit you with a used bedpan!" O'Hare snapped.

Turning angerly on her heel, the other counselor left.

Sighing, Elaine fell back into the covers..........

"Guard Duty"
By: Lieutenant Jg. Rotan Heratta
Security Officer - USS Galaxy
(excerpt from "A Bloody Mess - Part 1")

Rotan Heratta held his position outside of the doors to sickbay, where he had been stationed since the red alert began. Above him, the red alert klaxons blared there sirens warning as the ship was hammered again by a fierce barrage of Romulan weapons fire.

As he watched, another group was being rushed into sickbay. Injuries throughout the ship had been severe. Rotan, for his part had done the best he could to be of help, without getting in the way.

"Get that door open!" Yelled a Lieutenant who was bringing in a group of wounded on two floating hover-stretchers.

"Yes Sir." Rotan replied as he keyed open the doors and helped the Lieutenant with one of the stretchers. The Sickbay was full to capacity, almost every bio-bed was occupied. As Rotan took the Stretcher inside, he passed Lt(jg) Tim O'Connell on his way out. The doors to sickbay closed as O'Connell stopped to confront someone in the hall beyond.

As Rotan watched, Dr. Nilani approached the Lieutenant who had brought in the wounded.

"Ok place him on here, what's his condition?" Nilani spoke to the officer who brought him in.

"His condition is critical! 3rd degree burns to more than 40% of his body, internal bleeding, 3 broken ribs, punctured kidney and if you thought that wasn't enough he also has a deflated left lung!"

"I'm surprised he's alive!" Nilani commented quickly, while grabbing a Medical tricorder to find the exact extent of the damage. Nilani looked at the results and looked at a sickbay nurse.

"Get the surgical unit over here NOW!" she turned back to the first aid officer "Ok an minor injuries and even bad ones take them to the other facilities. I only want surgery cases here, anyone that can live longer than 1 hour without surgery let the other doctor's handle it!"

The First aid officer nodded and quickly left the sickbay, the nurse placed the surgical unit over the near dead crewman and activated it. Nilani moved to the display and started working on the lung, the crewman was badly injured and she was going to do her best to save him.

It was always an honor to watch a true professional at work. Rotan knew that warriors were not the only caste of people needed in order for the Federation to function as a whole.

"I will return to my duty station." Rotan offered to the Lieutenant.

"Great,..and thanks for the help." He replied as the Nausicaan moved back though the doors to sickbay.

As he watched, Lieutenant Jg. O'Connell turned the corner of the corridor enroute to the turbolift. A very confused and upset Ensign Garcia was left standing there as he approached.

"Is everything all right Councilor?" Rotan asked her.

"I'll be all right." She replied, wiping a tear from her face as she looked up at him. "Its just..its..Tim." She offered, her voice laced with confusion.

"He upset you? What did he say?" Rotans voice got deeper as he became more concerned.

"He,..he threatened me. Said he would make my life a living hell on the ship if I crossed him again." To Rotan, the young girl seemed terrified.

"I see. Well..you have my word of honor no harm will come to you. If he tries anything, he will answer to me!" Rotan boomed, his voice louder than the surrounding klaxons.

"Thank you..Sir." I better get to my station." She smiled at him hopefully as she moved off down the corridor.

*You and I are going to have a talk, Mr. O'Connell!* Rotan thought to himself as he watched the next group of wounded approach...

"Back to the Future"
by Lt. Commander Tebrianne Bancroft

***

Maneuvering the Galaxy was never an easy task. The large starship didn't respond like a smaller ship. Add to that the drain brought on by a cloaking device, and flying in such close proximity to another starship.

The Galaxy was taking a pounding. Teb wondered if the captain knew the risk he was running with what they were doing. One good shot could take out the cloaking device. One good shot and the Romulans and Klingons would all see the USS Galaxy. One good shot and history would be irrevocably changed forever.

The ship shuddered under the impact of another disruptor blast from one of the warbirds.

Voices sang out across the bridge as orders were barked and met with "Aye, sirs" and other such responses. Teb tried to block out most of it to concentrate on her duty--to not be wherever they were firing.

"We could use the Excelsior to hide us the same way we did entering from the rift. By navigating in her immediate wake and using her cloaking field to mask us."

What? Chris Thomas was the last person Teb would have ever thought of to make such a daft suggestion. The Galaxy was far larger than an Excelsior-class starship. How did anyone expect a makeshift cloaking device to mask the Excelsior and the Galaxy? Teb wasn't a tactical genius, but the maneuver sounded like suicide. It might have had a chance of working if there was only one warbird--but there wasn't only one warbird. Let the bloody Enterprise die like it was supposed to.

And, it's wasn't like everyone was going to die. Hell, where did everyone think bloody Sela came from?

"Excellent idea Chris!" Excellent? Tebrianne didn't need to turn to know it was Deiran. "If we move between the Excelsior and Enterprise, our phasers will appear to be coming from the C."

"Can you remodulate them to fool the Romulans into believing they are coming from the Enterprise weapons systems and not our modern designed phasers?"

Et tu, Captain Price? They were all trying to get her killed. She banked the Galaxy across the port sheering plane. It was bad enough that there were a bunch of Romulans out there trying to kill her--even though they couldn't even see her. To think that her own mates were trying to do her in as well was enough to make her want to switch sides. She was part Romulan. She'd always been fascinated by the Romulans. And, the whole situation with Ben was a royal cock-up. Perhaps the Romulans would like a new pilot.

Thomas continued to explain how they would be able to fool the Romulans into thinking the Enterprise was shooting at them. She just wished he sounded more convinced. "I believe..." and "I don't think..." weren't very confidence boosting statements.

"Do it 'mate," Captain Price said. "Make the adjustments to the weapons. 'Commander Bancroft, bring us into position between the Enterprise and the Excelsior so we can hide in the cloaking wake of Captain Sulu's ship."

"Making adjustments now Captain." Tebrianne felt a lump forming in her throat. It wasn't until she tried to blow a bubble that she realized it was her gum. With a gulp, she plotted the course the captain called for and hoped that there was some higher power out there that might smile on the foolish actions of the Galaxy crew.

Teb moved the Galaxy into position between the Excelsior and the Enterprise. She wanted to turn around and see Q flash into existence and proclaim it had all been a little game. Another test. She hazarded a quick glance. Nothing. The oppressive realization that there wouldn't be any cavalry on this one.

******************************************************
Lt. Tebrianne, USS Galaxy, Chief Helmsman
tebrianne@elsinore.net UIN# 2172851

The Tebrianne Bancroft Archive. Now Online!
http:/www.elsinore.net/tebrianne/
******************************************************

"Reply"
by Lt Cmdr K'Eytyanna Samara,
Assistant Chief, Engineering - USS Galaxy

Crashing back from the punch, K'Ey felt her head hit the wall hard, seeing black.

A few seconds later, she moaned and stirred. Suddenly, she felt the coldness of her d'k tagh against her throat and froze.

"I hold your blade. I am the victor. Your blood is mine to do with what I wish."

Looking at him, she tried to hide how badly she was feeling, and how angry she felt. Wisely, her human side held her back due to the weapon at her throat.

After a tense moment, Mac stood and reversed the blade offering the handle to K'Ey.

"But I am also your Lover, and as such any harm to you is returned to me tenfold. If my path is to die for any dishonor than may Kahless receive me now."

Taking the d'k tagh from him as he stood and raised his arms, she waited a few seconds before quickly sliding her weapon back into its sheath.

Springing up, she knocked Hunter onto his back as she straddled him, kissing him passionatly on the lips.

After a few seconds, she broke the kiss and said breathlessly,

"Apology accepted."

Helping Hunter up, she led him to Sickbay to get fixed.

As they were about to reach the turbolift, the Red Alert sirens started and they quickly split up, heading to their respective posts.

"Purple Heart"
With a parts of Captain Prices posts.
Lt. (jg) Richeson
A hurting Tactical officer...

***Bridge**

Lee nodded. "Lieutenant' Richeson, activate tractor beams."

"Tractor beams are engaged Captain. We have a strong hold on the Enterprise sir." Tim replied. This was only his 2nd time in battle. The first did not go to well. And Tim was hoping for a better turn around this time.

"'Commander Thomas, adjust the Galaxy's shields to extend around the Enterprise 'mate." Lee ordered evenly.

Chris tapped the proper controls and soon the Galaxy's shields surrounded both starships. "Shields extended sir and holding steady."

"Bonzer." Lee declared. Send to the Excelsior, we are ready to begin."

He tapped a few buttons, after less then a few seconds, "Message sent and received Captain. Excelsior is moving out." Now it was going to begin. Mac was on the battle bridge. And Tim had to laugh to himself, He and Mac had switched spots. And it was his turn to have fun...

"Follow that ship!"

Tim grinned. No reason, but he found that comment amusing. The ship shook slightly..

"Minor turbulence Captain." 'Commander Bancroft called back as the Galaxy buckled, "Nothing to worry about."

The Galaxy shook a bit more before emerging... "Long range sensors are detecting several power signatures. They could possibly be Romulan ships."

After Price wanted a signal to the Excelsior, Richeson began to scan of targets. Only to find a incoming message from the outpost. With out thinking he immediately put it on speakers.

["Emergency! Help us! The Romulan's attack without provocation. This is Narendra III to any vessel. We are under attack by the Romulans. In Kahless name, help us defend this outpost from such cowardly enemies."]

The Klingons asking for help. Tim had never heard that before. They must have been hit real bad.

"Captain, the Enterprise is hailing us sir." Lieutenant' Richeson informed.

"On screen 'mate."

Richeson took a long look at Captain Castillio. More then likely he and his ship would be dead in minutes. But Castillio was steadfast, acting like he was in a iron eagle, impenetrable. Closing the com channel after a few inspiring words from Lee, he began to shut down the tractor beam holding the Enterprise.

Less then a minute later Captain Price was yelling at the top of his Ausy lungs.. "Evasive Maneuvers...." The Klaxons were blaring.. and even a bit of fear came across Tim. Before he could even get a target lock, Lt Richeson was thrown by a volley of Romulan fire. He could feel the blood on his face. He could see Deiran over him, then move to the arch.

Tapping his comm badge, Casey ordered, "Sickbay, medical emergency on the bridge. Lieutenant Richeson has been injured and is unconscious with a head injury."

"I..... " Tim tried to say he was still conscious, but found he couldn't speak. Before he knew it, Cat had come to his rescue for the 2nd time. 'Damn he thought, Dosnt she have any other patients? This is the 2nd time ive gotten hurt here too... I better get a Purple Heart for this!' Then he felt his body go num. The last thing he saw was the hypo spray coming towards his neck....

"Identity"
by Lieutenant James Chen
Security Officer

Chen looked after Lex as she walked out of the planning room. He hoped she was okay. He'd have to talk with her later. She was half-Romulan, after all, and here they were shooting at the Romulans. He knew that must be disconcerting. Chen turned away and looked back at the planning table to help Albrecht work out a plan of action should the Galaxy be boarded. Both knew the possibility was a longshot. If the Galaxy ever became visible, the Romulans would know how badly outclassed they were and run. They weren't Klingons, after all. Still, it gave them something to do during a time when they were otherwise not needed. This one was in the hands of Command and Tactical and even Engineering and Science. All that there was for them to do was wait. Watch and wait. Chen was never any good at waiting, especially with something like this. He just wished there was some way he could help. Finally, the planning was over and the officers dismissed to their separate posts. Chen moved towards a porthole and looked out, watching one of the most legendary battles in Federation history unfold. Since the Galaxy was involved, personnel were all supposed to be at the ready to aid with casualties and damage control in the middle of an emergency. Chen himself stood in one of the security hubs, waiting for the possibility of being called into action. He smiled mirthlessly. Here they were in a battle decades from the time they knew. It felt strange. The Battle of Narenda III. Cheung would be a baby at this time. A child. So far from where he remembered the man.

***Six Months Ago***

Cheung looked at the stars. The smell of the flowers in his garden lent the air a fragrant odor that reminded Chen of Master Kwan's training garden. Chen liked the crisp night air as he looked at the stars with the older man. "It must have been difficult," the older man finally said.

Chen looked at him. Cheung was dressed nicely. Definitely upper-class, which he was. He was groomed immaculately, a man who took care of his appearance. A light difference from Chen's style of dress. His hair was longer than normal and a three-day growth of beard covered his face. His clothes were rough and not in very good condition. Chen also knew the man was in great shape. "What?" Chen asked.

Cheung motioned at the sky. "Giving that up. The stars were your home. It must have been amazing."

Chen shrugged. "You get used to it."

Cheung looked at his companion. "Well, aren't you cosmopolitan. 'You get used to it'. I could never get used to it. Why did you resign?"

Chen took a deep breath. "I didn't get along too well with a superior officer. So I decked him. It was either a lengthy court-martial or resign. So I quit."

"And what of the woman you told me about? Lexana?"

Chen smiled. "Didn't want to give her career up. She put a lot of time into it."

Cheung smiled. The two walked on in the garden. "Isn't that always the way? I have been married twice. One left me for another man. The other left me for another woman. That was a blow to the ego, as you could imagine." Chen chuckled. Cheung smiled at Chen. "Oh? Is that funny?"

Chen nodded. "Yes."

Cheung shrugged. "I think so, too. Well, not at the time, but as you get older you realize how important it is to laugh." The two laughed. Cheung sighed and scratched his chin. "Do you know why I asked to see you?"

Chen shook his head. "No, sir."

Cheung smiled. "Always so polite, James. Just like your father."

Chen stopped and looked at Cheung. "What?"

"Your father. I knew him."

"How?"

Cheung started walking again. Chen followed alongside. "When I was in high school, I took a job delivering flowers for your father. Your mother was pregnant at the time. I worked for him four years. I saw you as a baby and raised. Until the explosion, that is."

Chen looked at the ground as the memory of his mother's face before the explosion surfaced. He pushed it quickly away. "What were they like?"

Cheung looked at Chen. "You never met anybody who knew them?"

Chen shook his head. "I kind of disappeared after they died. My next memory is of meeting Master Kwan shortly after that. I don't recall a thing about them."

Cheung nodded. "That's too bad. My mother passed away just five years ago. I couldn't imagine losing one's parents so early on. You must be strong."

Chen shrugged. "Just too young to remember it, that's all."

Cheung nodded. "They were very kind. Your mother was one of the most beautiful women I'd ever known. Your father was gentle and giving. He was a wonderful person. Very honorable. Honor is very important, you know."

"Really."

"Absolutely. Honesty is something that men in our profession cannot afford to have. We lie to survive. But honor is completely different. A man doing what we do can be honorable. He can be true to his employees and he can follow his own code."

"What? Like Robin Hood."

Cheung laughed. "No. Robin Hood stole for the poor. I steal to become rich. I try to spread it around to those who truly need it, though if given a choice between giving all of my money to charity or keeping it, I would keep it. I'm no saint."

Chen smiled. "And my father?"

Cheung looked up at the stars, as if he could see back in time. "He WAS a saint. He would always extend a helping hand to those who needed it. You remind me of him."

"How?"

"You'll understand some day. But, onto business. There will be much more time to discuss your parents in the future. I wished to speak to you because there has been some concerns."

"What about?"

"Your loyalties. Wong in particular. He feels that you could be a danger."

"Why?"

Cheung shrugged. "He has difficulty believing that a former Starfleet officer would wish to join our outfit not weeks after he quit. I must say, the question has come into my mind as well."

"Do you want me to go?"

Cheung shook his head. "No. You are too powerful and too well-trained. You could be of use. If you can prove yourself."

Chen looked at Cheung. "With what?"

"A certain rival faction has come into possession for the plans of a very...powerful weapon which has been developed by the Romulans. These plans when sold to the right bidder, could be a very good means of finance. It would earn us a lot of money."

"You want the plans?"

Cheung nodded. "And I believe you are just the man who can get it for us."

Chen scratched his chin. He furrowed his brow in thought, then nodded. "No problem."

Cheung smiled. "Just like your father."

"Concurring Suggestions."

Lt. Benedict T'Kal
Tactical Officer
USS Galaxy

Benedict felt a hand come to rest on his shoulder and spared a split second to see who it was. Hunter MacKenzie stood there - he nodded once - telling Benedict he should carry on and and he stepped to the other side of the arch - giving his CO some room to assist.

“Captain, I believe that we are overlooking two minor points.” Hunters' voice was loud enough to capture the Captains attention. Benedict looked up just as the Galaxy banked and he couldn't help himself taking in the raven dark hair and lithe figure of Tebrianne sitting in her customary helm seat. It made him feel better that he was here - with her - during all of this.

If the Galaxy died here - he'd die with her. No matter what had happened to him - he knew that he loved her still - and as he thought of her he was again filled with the eerie calm of Tikaru. That mind-set seemed to come to his rescue when his mind wandered into that territory that threatened to shatter him. The thought of losing her was like that. He had to - yet he couldn't bear to at the same time. A major conflict that raged within him.

“Yes Commander?” replied Price as he spun to face the rear of the Bridge.

Mackenzie leaned forward on the Tactical rail and met his Captains eyes. “Sir, We have no idea which Romulan vessel took out the Enterprise. The honor that that captain would receive for firing that deathblow would be enormous both in political and martial circles. With every blow that the Excelsior deflects we run the risk of changing that part of history." Hunter shook his head and pointed at the view screen.

"From the amount of attacks already, we may have already changed it." He said. "That, and the fact that there is no way that the Galaxy can withstand even a minor hit from a plasma torpedo. With the cloak in place, we are essentially shieldless. Our best option is to grab the Excelsior and high-tail out of here and head to the rift. We are on dangerous ground here, Captain."

Benedict looked at Price to see the reaction of Hunters words. At last the voice of reason - Benedict prayed that the Captain would heed the CTO's advice. His fingers called up the tactical withdrawal patterns on a secondary screen before the Captain had a chance to speak - all he had to do was touch a key...

"I concur with the Commanders assessment sir." Benedict said simply. He waited with his finger above the key..

*********************************************************************
Simon Griffin:
simong@wantree.com.au
ICQ: 19514425 Benedict

*********************************************************************

"Under Guard"
by Lieutenant JG Elaiithin Jii & Lieutenant JG Tim O'Connell

Elaiithin watch as Lexana stormed out of Security. Prophets, he thought, I certainly wouldn't care to be Neil or Tim at the moment. He was still waiting for Albrecht to send him somewhere when Rotan's voice came on over the comm.

["Heratta to Security"]

"Albrecht here, Lieutenant, Go ahead." Matthew responded.

["Lieutenant Shtik just carried Ensign Salt into sickbay, and informed us he would need a new guard,"] the Nausicaan stated, sounding a bit befuddled, likely by the Vulcan's behavior.

"Informed you ?" Matthew asked with a raised eyebrow.

["Aye, Commander. I believe he was headed back down there."]

"Thanks, Lieutenant. Security Out."

Elaiithin checked his board. "Engineering says they have the breach repaired. You want me to go?" Jii asked his superior.

"Sounds like a plan, Jii. As soon as O'Connell reports in, I'll send him down there with you," the assistant chief said.

"Aye sir," the Bajoran responded, and headed out of Security.

He got to the rear half of Deck 38, where the Brig was located, and entered the room with Lieutenant Shtik's cell. The Vulcan officer was calmly seated on the bunk. Elaiithin walked over to the force field, fixed the small power flow problem which had shut it off, and reengaged the field. He sat down behind the desk, and gave the Vulcan an odd look.

"For what it's worth, Lieutenant, I'm not certain you should have been arrested." Elaiithin stated.

"That would make two of us, Lieutenant" The Vulcan replied impassively.

"Don't worry," Elaiithin said with a haphazard grin. "You're not the only officer on this ship who's seen the inside of a brig cell."

Tim was not looking forward to this as he walked in to deck 38 and ended up getting called on the carpet by Albrecht, after a hurried explanation and pretty much just saying, "yes sir" a lot. Finally he was just ordered to stand guard on Shtik, Ironic isn't it?

Elaiithin looked as though he was going to say more to Shtik, but at that point, Lieutenant O'Connell walked in, sporting a bruised eye.

"What the hell happened to you?" the Bajoran asked of his friend.

Tim looked at Jii, "I fell" he responded coldly. Beginning to work the console he looked at the Vulcan in the brig, "and Shtik thanks for coming back ... and for taking Astrid to sickbay. I was probably wrong about you."

Shtik raised an eyebrow, "Indeed thank you Lt." Tim gave a wry grin to Jii. "Not a bad way to spend a war huh?"

"It is a little odd. The Battle of Narendra Three was one of the more noted in Starfleet History. Of course, the fact that it resulted in the destruction of an Enterprise was one of the few noteworthy things about it. Everything I've read on Starfleet History indicates those ships and her crews are notoriously hard to kill." Elaiithin said, pausing for second before commenting again. "And a fall wouldn't give you a bruise like that, Tim. answer the question."

"What makes you think anything happened?" O'Connell asked.

"The fact that you're avoiding the question pretty much confirms it Tim. Now, are you going to tell me, or am I going to have to shot you?" the Bajoran officer quipped.

"It was nothing." Tim responded, a bit annoyedly.

"What, did you and Eshar have a fight or something?" Elaiithin guessed, prodding his friend to talk.

Tim glared at Jii but eventually crumbled, "You're going to hear it anyway through the grapevine so here goes... Eshar and I did have a fight, but I got this from Neil ... you know that new counselor O'Hare, red head Irish, I kinda got a bit drunk with her and we passed out on the couch, after that I went back to spend a little time with Eshar, and we got that red alert ... then Neil shows up starts accusing me of doing something I'd never do to him or Eshar in million years and decks me. In case you are wondering nothing could have happened or would have ... and now Neil won't talk to me."

Elaiithin looked at O'Connell, not saying anything, for about two minutes.

Then he laughed. Very long, hard, and loud. Tim gave him a "it's not funny" look, and then thought about it, and his friends laughter became infectious, and he too started laughing.

Meanwhile, Shtik just eyed his two unusual guards, and shook his head.

"I'm sorry." Elaiithin said. "I really shouldn't laugh."

"It's allright." Tim replied.

"It's just so damn funny. When one being likes another, it can cause so many problems. Everyone makes assumptions, and no one is right. Neil and Eshar think you slept with O'Hare, who, from what you tell me, and what Neil told me yesterday, clearly likes Neil. And Neil clearly likes her. Meanwhile, you being a friend, simply get tired, fall asleep on the couch, and get photographed by an idiot roommate. Which, being gossip material, flows on this ship faster than warp speed. It seems like one of those old human forms of entertainment - what were they called? Oh yeah, Soap operas."said the Bajoran.

"That pretty much sums all of it up." O'Connell said, having finally stopped chuckling.

"Look, do you want me to talk to Neil for you? Smooth things over a bit?" Jii offered.

Tim looked at the Bajoran, "Sure. Talk to him. But be warned I have a bit of a past as a one night stand type of person. Eshar might believe me, but Neil still hasn't totally gotten over that bar girl I dragged back to the academy she stole his tricorder and commbadge ... we had to track her down to avoid any extra details or punishment for loss of Starfleet property. But let him know I've done nothing wrong but I do want to explain."

Jii let out a low chuckle. "Sounds fine, Tim. I'll search Neil out after the Red Alert's over." Elaiithin had no doubt that those on the Bridge would get them out of this, just fine.

"Goo gali mugalie"
Lt. jg. Jonathan Lucas Brandis
Assistant Chief Operations Officer

Red alert. Siren's blaring through out the Galaxy and flashing red lights all over the ship. It was exciting, blood pumping action. Lt. Brandis couldn't wait. He'd been sitting in his quarters reading up on the latest news from Betazed, which was still being occupied by the Dominion.

Rushing out of his lavish quarters the junior officer ran down the hall into a waiting turbo lift. "Bridge" He called out.

If he knew anything, he knew the Brigde would have all the senior officers assembled. His place during this type of situation was a Mission Ops at the rear of the Bridge. The ship shook under apparent phaser or disrupter fire. He thought they'd only be sending the Enterprise back, he never even guessed that they might be involved in the battle.

The lift doors opened and Lucas noticed the Captain and Lt. Cmdr. McKenzie were discussing the temporal repercussions of the situation. He knew that the Grandfather paradox was not going to be the least of their problems, but took a definate second to keeping the Galaxy running and the Enterprise safe.

Making his way towards Mission Ops and relieving the relieved ensign from the chore, Lt. Brandis sat a quick analysis of the situation. Out look not so good, he thought as he screened out a power junction that had been damaged by the Romulan fire.

Noticing the power read out on the shield didn't do much to lift his spirits either.

'Great Goo gali mugalie.' He thought, seeing another volley of Romulan fire erupt against the Galaxy for a monitor no his display. There was nothing he could do about it. The Security section's Brigs would definately need some R&R repaired and refit.

"Sir, hull breech along deck 38 section 42. Structural containment fields in place and holding."

The Galaxy was a strong ship, but, even it couldn't keep taking too much of this.