Stardate: 61113:1624
Title: Baptism By Fire
Author: Captain Khavok
Time: After "Dominion Warships"
Scene: USS Relentless Bridge


"Red alert," Alex said sinking down into his chair, "Mr. Ambassador if you'll excuse us please."

If the Deltan was perturbed or put out, he made no mention of it, instead inclining his head to the Captain and withdrawing. The red lights replaced the normal lighting on the bridge and throughout the ship as crew raced to battle stations. The horrific scene on the viewer was replaced by a tactical display as Maxine used Relly's sensors to start funnelling information to the Captain.

"Sir, it looks like a Battlecruiser, a pair of Galors, and about half dozen Dominion attack ships," Maxine said feeding the information to the main screen.

"Engage ablative armor, raise shields, helm get me above and behind the cruiser," Khavok ordered.

"Sir, incoming fighters, and the two Galors are coming about," Maxine responded.

"Steady as she goes, they can't hurt us. Mr. Tarek, get me a firing solution for the module just above and to the port of their engines, load a transphasic torpedo."

Abby wanted to interrupt the Captain, but he had such a deadly calm about him as if he'd done this before. She thought then that he probably had, successfully too. She just wondered what the effect the effect would be using the most modern weapons they had.

The incoming fighters strafed the newcomer with all their power. The ships shields light up under the impact but held steady. The Relentless was rocked under the onslaught but still closed with the battlecruiser. The Galor class vessels came about then interposing themselves between the obviously suicidal vessel and their cruiser. The heavier fire from the Galors rocked the ship and the shields less able to cope allowed fire to dissipate harmlessly on the ships ablative armor.

"Sir we are now within range of the Cruiser's main polaron cannon," Maxine stated tension in her voice.

"Helm, evasive action, continue on target."

The cruiser opened fire then, narrowly missing the smaller more manoeuvrable vessel. As the Relentless closed with her enemy the supporting fighters made desperation runs on the Relentless. Alex watched the display intently for a few seconds almost seemingly unaware of the fighters flying about. Two fighters skimmed in closely to the Relentless; meters away from where her shields ended. Khavok waited and allowed the fighters to come in close before ordering fire by the all of the Relentless' port phaser arrays. The first fighter began his strafing run, watching his shots have a much smaller effect that they had on the vessel they had just destroyed moments before. As the lead pilot pulled away, phaser fire connected with the second craft, collapsing its shields and causing catastrophic damage to it.

It was soon evident that the remaining fighters became a lot more cautious in their attack runs. Khavok ordered his gun crews to target the trailing fighters and turned his full attention back to the cruisers. The Galors continued their attempt at a screen but were no match for the agile Relentless. Finally the Relentless was in the ordered position and Alex gave the order to fire. Nothing happened.

"Mr. Tarek, why was my order not carried out? Helm! Bring us around for another pass."

Another fighter exploded as its mate scored more hits on the Relentless. Khavok looked at his display once again and realized they were moving in a straight line away from the cruiser.

"Sir," the helmsman replied panic-stricken, "controls are not responding."

"Sir, Tactical is unresponsive as well," Tarek reported calmly.

It didn't take the Captain long to figure out what was happening. It would be the first time anyone in the crew heard him raise his voice and it was certainly not pleasant.

"Relentless, you are hereby ordered to stand down and return control immediately. Failure to do so will result in your deactivation. You will follow my orders to the letter are we clear?"

A palpable unease was felt throughout the ship. The man standing giving orders on the bridge was such a radical departure from the man they'd known up to this point. The red alerts blinked and then returned to normal and helm and tac both reported control again.

"Sir, transphasic torpedo loaded, firing solution set," Tarek reported.

Continuing to ignore fire from the other ships the Relentless dove in on her target, this time not deviating from the Captain's orders. The firing of the torpedo was somewhat anticlimactic as it effortlessly penetrated the cruiser's shields. Shortly before the cruiser was destroyed the cruisers engines vented overloading the shields of one of the Galors and catching two more of the fighters in its blast radius.

As the wreckage began to separate the remaining fighters formed up on the remaining Galor. Khavok opened a channel to the Commanding officer of the Galor and demanded her immediate surrender. As he knew there would be, there was no reply and the remaining ships commenced another attack run. A few well placed quantumn torpedoes later as well as some passable phaser fire and the Relentless was drifting among the wreckage in an eerie calm.

Khavok ordered a yellow alert and set the crew to try and locate any survivors as well as the 'black box' for the destroyed Relentless. The adrenaline rush of the combat began to dissipate as the crew began to realize that they were alive and that they'd won.

"Captain," Abby said, "why the transphasic torpedo? And at a non critical location?"

Alex smiled, "ancient Chinese secret, that location holds secondary power functions that when disrupted in combat, cause catastrophic failure within the ship. Normally to pull it off, one takes severe damage to one's own ship. With our upgrades I was hoping to get the second Galor in the explosion."

The smile slid from the Captain's face, "Abby, I don't care what it takes, but find out what the hell happened with the Relentless and how we can stop it should the need arise. Her little stunt could have cost us."

"Yes Sir," Commander Winters said a bit stiffly.

The Captain turned his attention then to incoming damage reports as well as reports from the science team. Alex looked forward to the debrief - he was very interested in how his little ship and crew had fared. Khavok thought to himself with wry amusement *I hope that cruiser Captain had kittens just before that torpedo separated him from this plane*


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Captain Alexander Khavok
Commanding Officer
USS Relentless
NCC-11966
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