The constant pulsing alarm echoing off the walls in the room was more than enough to wake up the individual that the alarm was intended for. Hell, if louder, it could wake up the whole section of the ship. Whoever designed these alarms were clearly insane, or just a prank for those who operate and fly the ship from those who spent months, years, building the ship. A hand shot out from under the blanket and smacked the button that would silence the alarm but it kept blaring in its tormenting pulses. So the hand smacked the button again, clearly it missed for the second time before it balled up into a fist and hit the button home, silencing the alarm.

Top half of the man was uncovered by shoving the blanket off of him with the use of his hands and arms. He exhaled heavily in a deep loud sigh, whether it be of annoyance of having to wake up at five o’clock in the morning every day, or because he had to leave the bed when he alone was not the only one who occupied it. To prove that, a slender, more feminine arm slid out from the blanket from the otherside of the bed and laid across his chest, the hand grabbed his side and began to pull. In this movement, a head and top half of a woman’s back slipped out from underneath the blanket, her face grew close to his, her lips locked onto their target and made contact.

The two individuals wrestled for what seemed like ten minutes when the alarm went off once again, a loud groan of frustration and a slam of the fist silence that alarm one final time. After about thirty minutes, the two individuals were dressed in their uniforms and were half way through their breakfast when a conversation finally began. “So what do you and your team think that you can get from analyzing the…what was it?” Man asked.

“A subspace rift.” She answered as she ate her bacon, her eyes watched him closely.

“Have we not encountered these things before? I mean, other vessels?” He asked her.

She shrugged her shoulders.

He raised a brow. “Is that a professional scientific response there, Major?”

She smiled, “Please, Colonel. Every time I explain something scientifically, you start to doze off.”

“That’s because every time you do, it’s later in the day when I’m ready to get off duty. Plus I need to know why it is so damn important that we had to rush out of drydock without our entire crew.” He grinned at her.

She rolled her eyes, “All right then, I’ll explain it simply. For one, we can operate and get the job done with a skeleton crew. Two, we can’t risk this opportunity or the rift may disappear. And three, unfortunately all other ships are either busy dealing with rogue elements or other missions that they can’t be diverted. So, every rift we encountered has been different in several ways. Now, for you flyboys, appearance is a few of those. Size, shape, color and intensity, whether it be gravity waves or electrical and magnetic storms, like lightning bolts and sounds of thunder in space. Which is spectacular alone. But that’s what you see and hear through your eyes and ears. What we don’t see, is what our instruments see. Gravitational forces, radiation, no radiation, temporal displacement, fluidic space, sensor anomalies and so much more. The data we gather helps us understand the universe even more and possibly discover new technologies.”

He finished his coffee and set the mug down. “You lost me at ‘intensity’.” He joked, at which she took a muffin and tossed it at his head, where he quickly deflected it with his hands. While they were laughing and giggling, the intercom on the wall by the door chirped.

“Bridge to the Colonel.”

He sighed, “Duty calls.” He said as he stood up from the table and went over to the intercom to press the button. “Go ahead, Bridge.”

“We are five minutes from the coordinates. Should I contact the Major?”

“Negative, I’ll inform her of the news. Out.” He then looked at her. “Well, Major. Your project awaits.”

As the two individuals left his quarters, they made their way to the lift. Both their uniforms were more like jumpsuits, which had a planet with two leaves around it as a flag on the end of the shoulder, the American flag on the end of the other shoulder, a tag that said U.S. Air Force over one breast, and a tag over their other breast with their last names. Her’s said Maddison and his said Ryker.

“I’m so glad the Alliance finally approved on board relationships.” Said Maddison while the lift reached its destination and they stepped off to make their way to the Bridge.

“Yeah but the guidelines are pretty strict. If the two couples cannot maintain professionalism and their duty performance declines, then one of them ends up reassigned.” He explained to her as they approached the Bridge.

“Good thing we know how to maintain professionalism.” She joked.

He chuckled before he made it to the center chair and sat down. “All right Lieutenants, where is my report from the third shift?”

“All systems are nominal, sir.” Said Lieutenant Hayes who operated the pilot and weapons station.

“Still on course and soon to drop out of hyperspace in ninety seconds.” Said Captain Marks who operated the navigation station.

“So, really no change from last night?” Colonel Ryker asked.

“No, sir.” They both said in unison.

“Well damn.” He looked at Maddison with a smirk.

“Dropping out in five…” Marks counted down to one and then the ship returned to normal space, the subspace rift in plain sight in front of them and they weren’t even ten kilometers from it. “Holding at one hundred kilometers.”

“My god, it’s huge.” Said Maddison.

“If the Jaffa vessel had not reported this into the Alliance, some one sure would have. Damn.” Said Ryker. “How close do we need to be to run your scans?”

“Ten kilometers, maybe five.” Said Maddison as she went to her station.

“Are there any disturbances that we need to worry about?” He asked.

“From a visual point of view,” Said Hayes, seeing electrical bolts flying out from random points every five minutes, “Probably those.”

“Major?” Ryker asked.

“Bring us to twenty kilometers and I’ll have an answer on those energy surges.” She answered.

“You heard the lady, but just in case, shields up.”

“Aye, sir. Shields up, thrusters engaged, approaching the anomaly.” Said Hayes as they monitor the distance reader. She brought the ship right up to twenty kilometers from the rift.

“All right. From the readings here, the energy surges from the rift don’t appear to be too powerful. The shields should be able to take any hit we receive with no issue. You may bring us closer to five kilometers.” Said Maddison.

“Sir?” Hayes asked the Colonel.

“You heard the lady. Five kilometers.” Ryker ordered and Hayes followed, only to stop the ship right at five kilometers away from the edge of the rift. “All right, Doc. Get started on your scans, I don’t feel comfortable being this close.”

She smiled at him and started tapping away at her station. This would last for like an hour with what felt like no progress to everyone but to her, a lot of data was being recorded.

Ryker got tired of just sitting there and went over to her station, “So, what have we learned so far?” He asked.

She looked at him, her smile even bigger than before. “The most amazing thing and yet the most mind boggling.”

He raised a brow, “How so?”

He didn’t think her smile would get any bigger but it did. “Look at these numbers right here. This set of numbers is something we in the Alliance have finally been accepting as the proper way of figuring out the difference between realities. See, when Command had another…unfortunate malfunction that caused a number of individuals from alternate realities to come through that they had to find a better way of sending them back home and quantum signatures was the best way of doing it. So this set of numbers here, is the quantum signature on the other side of the rift.”

Ryker blinked at the numbers then at her. “Okay.”

She smiled, “Bare with me. Let me start here,” She pointed at some data. “This here tells me that on the other side of the rift, is in the future. By almost four hundred years.”

Ryker whistled.

“Good, you can follow.” She teased. Then she pointed back at the numbers earlier. “This here would make the reality on the other side of the rift different from ours. Basically we have our own unique quantum signature, like a security code. But here is what gets interesting. This quantum signature of that reality in that rift, is almost identical to ours, down to the last digit. Which is insane! At first I thought it was impossible because no reality would have identical signatures, but then.” She pointed at a new set of numbers, just a couple digits really. “What we discovered two years ago is that this number never changes among other realities. Which means this number is a universal signature.”

Ryker shrugged his shoulders.

She grinned at him, “Let me put it this way. This set of numbers is like our universe’s operating system and the quantum signatures are the hardware and we are the software. You, me, this ship, our hyperdrive, power cores, everything. This number should never be different, at least we believed it to be impossible for it to be different.”

Ryker raised his brows, “Because…if that universe is a different operating system…if we crossed over, some things won’t work?”

She smiled at him, “Yes! You got it! Well, most of our software will work. We know each computer uses the same hardware, but certain software does not work for certain operating systems. Of course, you and I will be fine. The system that I believe that will be affected the most, would be the hyperdrive. If for some reason we crossed over, and we tried to use our hyperdrive, the math would fail because the system is incompatible with that operating system. It would basically have to be rewritten, adjust some properties and other settings…only would know what exactly if we were to be on the other side of the rift…in order to make the hyperdrive work.”

Ryker stood up straight with a hmph. “So, if we went through, we would be stranded. No faster than light capabilities.”

“Either not for a while or never. It really depends. But this is what is intriguing the most, is these two sets of numbers. Because the universe on that side of the rift is a completely different universe, which we all thought to be impossible, would explain why these numbers, the quantum signatures, would be practically identical, which is also impossible. This rift breaks the laws of physics that we know of! It’s going to blow the minds at the science institute at the Alliance Headquarters. And what is more intriguing is that it is three hundred and seventy-eight years into the future!!”

Ryker rubbed his chin, “So let me get this straight. Different quantum signatures define…different events in one’s reality?”

She could not make her smile go away even if she wanted to. “Yes! Our humanity has encountered alternate realities before, ones where Command has fallen due to the unsuspecting attack and unable to repel it. Or due to different choices having been made.”

“So then, this signature, being identical to our own, would mean certain events have played out exactly as ours have?” He asked.

“Almost identical, there is a minor variance down to the point. But yes! I think the only thing that could potentially be identical is right down to our home planet. Events on Earth must have happened perfectly the same as ours did, except for maybe what happened back in Egypt long ago.” She explained.

“Forming of Command, the missions that saved our planet countless times, then the galaxy and other galaxies.” He added.

“Yes!!” She relaxed into her seat and let out a huge sigh of relief, trying to calm herself from this discovery. “Even though these numbers are almost identical, its the two numbers behind the decimal point that are different. We’ve never had that before. Ever!”

“Sounds like your project is going to be the storm of the century back home.” He smiled.

She laughed, “Oh you bet. There are going to be scientists arguing for years about this.”

Unfortunately, what little did they know is, while they were focused on scanning the rift, they did not detect the incoming three Wraith Cruisers and their combined Dart Squadron until the first Cruiser fired and the blue bolt hit the aft shields.

When the deck lurched a bit, Ryker grew concerned. “Was that the rift?”

Hayes checked her sensors and then her eyes widened. “No, sir! We got three Wraith cruisers behind us and a squadron of Darts closing in fast!”

“Shit! Battlestations!” The main lights dimmed and then the Bridge was illuminated by low level blue lights. “Bring us about and prepare to open fire!” He ordered as he sat back down into his chair.

Hayes began to enter commands but when one of the blue bolts from the Wraith cruisers that were wildly firing at the vessel went and hit the rift, it began to become unstable. “I can’t get the thrusters to respond. In fact, we’re being pulled in!” She said as the ship lurched again from enemy fire.

Ryker pushed himself up out of his chair. “Thrusters to full reverse.”

“Already done, they’re only slowing our forward motion.” Reported Hayes.

“At least those three cruisers confirmed Alliance Commands suspicions.” Said Marks, as the ship lurched again.

“I can’t believe that a hive took the risk of a long journey between galaxies to set up base in this galaxy!” Said Maddison.

“Yeah and we need to tell Command about it. Lieutenant Patterson, can you contact Command?” Ryker asked the one manning the comm station.

“Negative, sir. I think the rift is interfering with our communications.” Patterson reported.

The ship continued to lurch from each hit it took. Ryker was given no other option. “Engage the point defense system for the fighters and divert auxiliary power to the aft shields. We don’t have the manpower to launch fighters to deal with the Darts. But I’m going to the chair, I’ll deal with the cruisers.” He was about to leave when he remembered something and turned to face Maddison. “You have the conn.” And then he was gone, bolting down the corridor to the lift to take it down to the chair. It took a matter of minutes and several more deck lurching under his feet from weapons fire before he made it to the chair, where he sat down and activated the drone system.

Outside of the ship, just behind the missile bays, a circular door opened up and dozens of large ancient drones came flying out and headed straight for the cruisers. The Darts that were still closing the distance to their ship tried to intercept the drones via kamikaze, taking some of the drones out in the process but plenty of them made it across the gap of space between them and began piercing through the hulls of the cruisers, striking the most critical sections, their power cores. This took several drones to each cruiser to eliminate them but once they were gone, he launched more drones to try to assist the point defense system in taking out the Darts.

“Colonel! We’re going to cross through the rift!”

“Is there no way of stopping our forward motion?”

“Negative!”

Ryker then saw three Darts making a run for their port hangar bay. “Shit!” He cursed loudly as he tried to intercept them with the drones. Drones were exceptionally faster but the Darts had a head start. One of them collided into the door, creating a large hole, while two of them got through and landed. He used up the remaining drones to finish the rest of the Darts to keep them from following the two that got in before shoving himself out of the chair. “Security detail, prepare to repel enemy intruders. Number is unknown! Rest of you, get to the emergency rooms or to the starboard hangar and hide in a jumper. Now!”

“Harry!” Maddison called over the intercom.

“Just do as I say, Janet.” He went to the closest weapons locker, entered his code and grabbed the energy rifle. He powered it up and switched the mode to burst fire and to kill. The Alliance had also switched their projectile weapons, like MP5s and P90s to energy based weapons for the purpose of proper self defense and to be set on stun at all times. Kill was for only extreme measures. Unfortunately with a rogue wraith group like these, it calls for extreme measures. Stunning them would be pointless, especially when their hive has refused to come to the negotiating table for years. Though they still keep their MP5s and P90s, among others, in case of one of those rare cases of replicator attacks but there hasn’t been a case for at least a decade or so.

“You can’t do this alone, Harry!” She said over the intercom.

“I won’t be alone, Janet. Now follow my orders! Please.” He raised the rifle up, butt to shoulder, ready to fire as he proceeded to head for the port hangar bay. Meanwhile, the ship proceeded through the rift and right on the otherside was a ship that no one knows about, as no one was on the Bridge to see, so they would be completely unaware of a strange looking vessel before them that attempts to make contact. The name did appear on scanners on the science station, that no one manned at this time as everyone evacuated to emergency rooms to secure themselves from the wraith soldiers or the starboard hangar to hide in a jumper. The name that appeared on the scanner display read USS Centaur.

“Wait, what?” Vakai proclaimed, slightly annoyed by the sudden information that was given to him.

Commander Maxwell crossed his arms over his chest. “Captain Carter will be taking half of the crew and taking temporary command of one of the other small vessels. While the Centaur works on closing that rift, Captain Carter and other vessels will be working on evacuating the colony that is a couple light years away from said rift. Because of that rift, it is causing storms to become more volatile. So you, Commander Vakai, will officially be in command of the Centaur during this operation.”

Vakai sighed, “Nice surprise when we were just about to depart, sir.” He said as he stared at the man’s face on the holo display in the office slash quarters that is apparently his now for the time being.

“It came as a surprise to me as well, Commander. Just relaying the message. Also you will be taking on a few new officers who shall assist you with the mission. They should help make your job go more smoothly.” Said Maxwell.

Vakai nodded his head in acceptance to this sudden change and new officers. “Copy that. Centaur will depart the second they are on board.”

“Good. We need you to get over there as soon as possible, Commander. Maxwell out.” And with that, the image blinked away and the holo display disappeared.

Vakai stood up from the chair and made his way to the Bridge as he tapped his badge. “Vakai to Ryker. Check the duty roster for three new officers. Find out if they have checked in and if they have, get us out of this dry dock and set a course for that subspace rift, maximum warp.”

“They’re already here sir. I am requesting permission for departure now.”

“Good man. I’ll be there in a minute. Vakai out.” He then stepped into the turbolift and let out yet another sigh as he started to rub the palm and the back of his right hand. He wasn’t hallucinating or feeling the pain of the trauma from his interrogation, but what the Counselor has mentioned was that he may also be suffering from what she called ‘phantom pains’. Although it was not like it was hurting, it was just tingling and a lot. He’s had it addressed with Doctor Pearce several times but she could find nothing on her medical scans. What Vakai has discovered though, is that any time he is a little bit stressed, his right hand would start to tingle. He knew about Captain Carter being put on the sidelines and that he was going to be in Command of the Centaur, but having half the crew taken away and three new officers just out of the blue was what bothered him. But of course, he is not the First Officer anymore, Ryker is Acting First Officer of the ship, who has most likely heard of the new officers but likely not been given the chance to review their records. This was just adding some bit of stress and now his right hand won’t stop tingling.

The second the doors split open to reveal the Bridge to him, he let go of his right hand, closed and opened it a few times before pushing the tingling sensation out of his mind and walked to his chair. But instead of sitting in it, he placed his hand on the top of it and watched on the main viewer, as the ship had left the dry dock it had been sitting in for over a month before the stars shifted as the ship turned and in a couple of minutes, the ship’s warp engines propelled it into warp velocity and began its adventure to the subspace rift, one of several or more that they been tasked to close.

“How long until we arrive, Commander Ryker?” He looked at the back of the man’s head who sat at the helm station.

Ryker turned in his seat to look back at Vakai. “At maximum warp, about a day’s journey. The rift that we are after is not too deep in the Paulson Nebula, but reports indicate that it is causing some disruption in warp travel, so I will do my best to get as close as we can but it will take an additional sixteen hours to arrive at the rift at full impulse.”

“Very good.” Said Vakai before he looked around on the Bridge and saw a couple officers that he did not recognize. A Trill and a Saurian. “Excuse me, Lieutenants?” Vakai said after he stepped closer to them.

Both of which turned to face him before introducing themselves, “Commander! My name is Bazial, I am your new Chief Science Officer.” Said the Trill with a warm smile.

The Saurian however, not much of a smile but a slight tilt of their head. “Lieutenant Gatia, Commander. Your Chief of Operations. Well, temporary of course.” She said as she looked at Bazial, which showed that Gatia made the proper correction that the Trill forgot.

Bazial cleared her throat. “Yes, of course. Captain Carter has the other half of his senior staff on board the Saber vessel that they’re using to assist in the evacuation of the colony.”

Vakai nodded his head a bit, as he understood what they had said. “Of course. Then I am going to need you two to monitor and scan that subspace rift as much as possible when we arrive, so that way we know exactly what we need to do to close it.”

“I will work with the Chief Engineer in making the necessary modifications to the secondary deflector dish in order to close the rift, but we will need the sensor data from Lieutenant Bazial.” Said Gatia.

“Which you will get and much more.” She said with excitement in her tone of voice.

“We will only need what is necessary to close the rift, Bazial.” Said Gatia.

“Of course but…nevermind.” She cleared her throat and began to turn away.

Vakai raised his hand up in the air as a halt command to her actions. “Hold on now. Explain, Lieutenant.” He directed at her.

She cleared her throat. “Not all subspace rifts are the same. Some may cause temporal effects, some may be gateways to alternate realities, some could be potentially dangerous and lethal to the ship and crew and some we’ve yet to come across that are hypothesized.”

Ryker, having overheard, turned in his seat. “Dangerous and lethal?”

She smiled apologetically, “This one apparently is not. It was detected via long range from Starbase Bravo and there were no properties detected that would consider it to be dangerous. Which is why we are on our way to close it and not some other vessel with far better defenses.”

Gomez, who had been sitting at the Engineering Station with her arms crossed against her chest, had been listening and decided to chip in. “No subspace rift is safe, regardless of what sensors detect.”

Bazial blushed and nodded her head. “Of course, Chief. But to simply put, we just do not know what this rift is and we won’t know until we get a closer look.”

Vakai shrugged a shoulder before he made his way back to his chair. “Well, Lieutenant, we are all going to find out once we get there. Because I doubt we will get that rift closed right away, right Chief?” Vakai turned to face Gomez with his question.

She nodded her head. “Of course, Commander. Depending on what modifications we have to do to the warp engines and the secondary deflector, it could take a while before we can even begin to close it but once we begin, it could take several minutes.”

“There, you see. Plenty of time.” Vakai smiled at Bazial.

She smiled even more, “Of course, Commander!” She cleared her throat lightly and sat back down at her station.

“If you do not mind, Chief. I would like to get the secondary deflector prepared with the necessary modifications. There are some things that we can at least get started with.” Said Gatia.

“Of course, Lieutenant. I’ll come with you.” Gomez pushed herself out of her chair and the two stepped into the turbolift.

Ryker then slipped out of his chair and stood beside Vakai to whisper. “Well you met two of the three new officers and I suspect you won’t like the third.”

Vakai frowned, “Why is that?”

“She’s a Counselor.” Ryker told him.

Vakai’s frown deepened. “This ship is too small for a ship’s counselor.”

“Exactly.” Ryker said before he went right back to his station.

Vakai sat there in thought for a moment before he pushed himself out of his chair, “Ryker, you have the conn.” And with that he went to the turbolift, waited for the next car to arrive before he stepped in to locate this Counselor.

To which the Counselor was in Sickbay, getting her ‘standard procedure’ medical examination. “Is this really necessary?”

Sivol closed her medical tricorder before looking at the Lieutenant Commander. “Of course it is. You of all people should know that, Commander Sucil.”

Sucil sighed and closed her eyes, only to open a second later and looked at Sivol “You’re doing this because of your feelings for Commander Vakai.”

Sivol paused in her movement to return the medical tricorder to its drawer, only to turn around and gave Sucil a harsh glare. “I think you know that regulations are fairly strict on Betazed Officers using their telepathic abilities to read another Officer’s mind without permission. Correct?”

“Of course.” She smiled.

“Then if you read my mind one more time, I will file a complaint and an immediate removal of your service from this ship to Starfleet Command. Do I make myself clear?” Sivol ordered.

“Of course, Doctor.” Sucil said with a smile still on her face. Then she turned her head when she heard the door to Sickbay open and saw the one man she was tasked to watch over carefully. “Commander! I was planning on reporting to you, but I got held up.”

“Cut the chit chat, Commander. I know exactly why you are here.” Vakai told her as he crossed his arms over his chest.

“Didn’t think you were a Betazoid, Commander.”

“Lieutenant Commander Nuri Sucil. You will stand at attention and address me as ‘sir’!” Vakai’s voice became louder and more stern.

She slipped off of the biobed and stood at attention as she was instructed. “Sir, yes sir!” Though she had a problem in removing that smile.

Vakai frowned, “I do not care if Commander Maxwell assigned you to this ship to monitor me. But you will adhere to Starfleet Regulations and you will not read my mind or anyone else’s mind on this ship for as long as I am in Command, do I make myself clear?”

“Yes, sir. Unfortunately, the Task Force Executive’s orders supersedes yours, sir.” She told him.

“Really now? Am I not officially in command of the Centaur, Commander Sucil?” He asked her.

“You are, sir.”

“Then while I am in Command, you will follow my orders and I am ordering you to keep your telepathic mind reading abilities to yourself or I will have you sent back to Devron Fleet Yards in a shuttle. Do I make myself clear?”

“Crystal, sir. But if you do that sir, you will never Command a Starship again.” She explained to him.

“Excuse me?” Vakai asked.

“Assuming this is a permission to speak freely, sir. But I am not just here on Commander Maxwell’s orders. I am also here under Commander Vax’s orders as well. The Counselor that you were seeing, remember? Not only does Commander Maxwell have the authority to give and take away your Command, but so does the Counselor. If I see that your trauma affects your command decisions on this mission and puts everyone at risk, I will have no choice but to report it to Commander Vax and she will make the decision on whether you are allowed to remain in Command or not.” She explained to him. “Of course, I am not supposed to be telling you that, but you’re not really giving me much of a choice, sir, considering how angry you are.”

“What did I tell you about-”

“Pardon my interruption, sir. But I was not reading your mind. I can read facial expressions as well, and your face gave it away.” She mused.

“Are you done examining her, Sivol?” Vakai asked.

“Of course, Commander.”

“Good. Report to the Bridge, Commander Sucil. Dismissed.”

“Sir, yes, sir!” She acknowledged before leaving sickbay, that smile still stuck on her face.

Vakai turned around to face Sivol and leaned back against the end of the biobed. He began to rub the bridge of his nose. “Should have expected this.” He told himself, but out loud of course as he wanted Sivol’s opinion.

She moved in between biobeds and leaned back against the edge of one before she folded her arms across her chest. “It was indeed to be expected. But her smug attitude may be a problem.”

Vakai shook his head, “I would have accepted any counselor but a Betazoid? That only screams problems. Especially with that smug attitude.” He shook his head before he moved in between the biobeds and leaned against one across from her. He looked into her eyes, “This is only going to stress me out more than I need.” He told her as he held out his right hand, which he began to close and open a few times.

Sivol reached out to take his right hand in both of hers and began to massage it gently. “It’s tingling right now?” Vakai nodded his head. She was tempted to go get her medical tricorder but knew from Doctor Pearce’s logs, the tricorder won’t pick up anything. “Is any of this helping?”

Vakai stared at her face, “Just you alone is always helpful.”

She smiled at him, “Shut up charmer, or she’s going to sense it all the way from the Bridge.”

Vakai shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t care. The tingling is going away, and that’s because of you and to me, that is all that matters.” And when the tingling did stop, he did not pull his hand away from her massaging hands.

“So what are you going to do with our ship’s counselor?” She asked.

He sighed with yet another shrug of his shoulders. “I don’t know. Only thing I can really do is just be myself and hope this mission succeeds.”

“Just try not to let her stress you out too much. Less chances you have of an episode, the better your chances of remaining in Command.” She told him before she leaned in, pressed her lips against his, which would be locked together for what seemed like a minute before Vakai pulled away.

“I will do my best. But I should return to the Bridge. Got Command Duties to perform, so that the Counselor’s report back looks spotless.”

Sivol smiled, “Of course. Tonight?”

Vakai smiled right back, “Absolutely.” And with that, he departed Sickbay to head right back for the Bridge.

—

The Centaur made the long trek via warp and full impulse to the subspace rift. The crew themselves had spent their time in being prepared for what was to come and what they would need to do to close it. As the ship closed in for the twenty kilometer stopping point from the rift, the scientific fun began.

“All right, Lieutenant. Run your scans. Engineering and Operations need everything they can to make the proper modifications so that we can close this rift before it makes the storm more dangerous to the colony than it needs to be.” Vakai ordered as he leaned forward a bit in his chair, stared at what looked like a tear in space with bright light that emanated from the very center, bolts of electricity that spewed out randoming from its edges.

“Running every scan I can think of, sir.” Said Bazial. There was a moment of silence for a few minutes, until the Lieutenant gasped loudly for all to hear. “Amazing!”

“What is it?” Ryker asked, still at the Helm.

“This rift is absolutely much different from any other rift Starfleet has encountered. I don’t even know how it is possible.” She exclaimed while her eyes were locked onto her displays, reading the information as it came to her console.

“Explain.” Vakai ordered.

There was a pause for what seemed like a few minutes that Vakai was about to make another order when the Lieutenant turned in her seat to look at everyone else, her eyes still open wide in, her face filled with shock, surprise and excitement. She licked her lips as her eyes began to dart around the Bridge, looking at each and every person one at a time and they kept doing so as she began to explain. “We all know about the differences in Alternate Realities, correct? Like, quantum signatures?”

“Of course.” Said Sucil, who stood there beside Vakai with her hands clasped together behind her back. Her way of keeping a close eye on him.

“The rift is absolutely, one hundred percent, a gateway to an alternate reality but the quantum signature is almost identical except for the last two digits after the decimal point. Which has never happened before in Starfleet history!” Her excitement grew. “I mean, this rift is basically showing a nearly identical reality to our very own.”

Gomo turned in his seat, his tactical station now adjacent with the helm. He had a frown on his face from all this new information. “But how is that possible? No reality has a quantum signature that is nearly identical to our own.”

“Exactly. I mean, it’s almost perfectly identical, but the numbers after the decimal point are clearly different, which still signifies that the reality is different from ours. But that’s not the only thing that is incredibly remarkable here.” Bazial turned in her seat and looked at the data before she turned once again to look at everyone. “There is one significant number that we’ve never seen change until now. It’s like, the quantum signature would be like us as beings, unique to each individual, which is what alternate realities are, unique to each one. These sets of numbers, that are usually always the same, are like a race. Prime example, humans.”

“Is that really the best way to describe that in terminology?” Ryker asked.

She sighed and tapped her chin, “Okay. Let me try it this way. It is like a class of ship. The number is like, for example, the Centaur and the quantum signatures is the equipment on the Centaur. We can easily swap most of this equipment with any other Centaur class vessel out there.”

Gomez shook her head, “Except a lot of our equipment could fit on any other class vessel out there.”

Bazial groaned and tapped her chin some more. “Okay! I got it. Starfleet has its own unique operating system. Quantum signatures are like the software to the operating system. These sets of numbers are basically telling me that whatever is on the other side of that rift, is a completely different operating system. A completely different universe from our own.”

Gatia tilted her head in curiosity. “So what you are saying is…some events in that universe never happened?”

Bazial looked at the Saurian then at everyone else. “It means that that universe has very different species, and a very different outcome to everything, except…for Earth. That is why the quantum signature is almost perfectly identical to ours right now. Events on Earth happened exactly on the other side of that rift, as they did on Earth in our universe, in our reality. Exactly.”

Ryker whistled. “So what would happen if we were to cross through that rift then?”

“Well, for one, we shouldn’t. Because there is one last thing that I need to address. But first, let me explain what would happen if we did. Because that universe is on a completely separate operating system, which by the way, was completely theoretical up until this point. We are not even sure if our method of faster than light travel will work or not. It could take days, weeks or months to reconfigure the warp engines to establish a stable warp field bubble around the ship in order to travel at warp speeds. See, hardwares will work on a different operating system but some softwares will not. We are basically the hardware, we will survive perfectly fine because of the basics that we need. You know, air, food, water, etcetera. All the equipment on board the Centaur is software, and a lot of it will work but the more critical softwares like the warp engines, may need a patch update in order for it to work properly.” Bazial explained.

Ryker nodded his head, “So we would be stranded.”

“Until we can reconfigure the warp engines, as she explained, yup.” Gomez told him with a smirk.

Ryker returned the smirk before he looked back at Bazial. “So what’s the last thing you mentioned?”

She smiled. “The rift also goes into the past. Three hundred and seventy eight years into the past, exactly. The year would basically be Twenty Twenty-Two, instead of Twenty-Four Hundred.”

Vakai shook his head, “Then we would be advised to not cross through that rift. Even if it is an alternate reality or a completely different universe, we would risk contaminating the past of that reality and we can’t risk that.”

“Well…” Bazial shrugged her shoulders with her hands up above them. “That’s where it becomes complicated. If by some strange unfortunate circumstances that we did cross over, there would be nothing to say in their reality that we never did. I mean, we could be playing out a role that was meant to happen. But on the other hand, if the Earth’s events are identical to each other, then we would have to avoid mentioning anything past Twenty Twenty-Two. But that would literally be the only consequence that we would have to avoid.”

Vakai shook his head, he needed more time than they have to process this. “Nevertheless, we are going to remain here, twenty kilometers away from the rift. Gomez. Gatia. Do you have all the data you need to make the necessary modifications to close this rift?”

The two looked at each other, then their consoles to review the data that was sent to them before they turned to look back at Vakai. “Yes, sir.” They said in unison.

Vakai smiled. “Good. Then if you two would mind getting those modifications done to the warp core and to the secondary deflector dish, that would be swell. Sooner we get this rift closed, the less damage the storm could cause to the colony and to the ships that are evacuating the population.”

But before they could acknowledge his orders, warning alarms went off and the rift before them began to react violently. The bolts of electricity became more frequent and bright light in the center began to dim. Something was happening and their instruments did not like it. Not one bit.

“We’re holding steady at twenty kilometers from the rift, Commander. But my console is displaying some sort of gravitational pull coming from the rift.” Ryker reported.

“I don’t understand. The rift was perfectly fine. We didn’t do anything yet!” Said Bazial.

“Then what is going on, Lieutenant? Is this sudden change to the rift going to affect the storm in the region?” Vakai asked.

“Scanning now but I am not seeing any changes to the storm’s intensity. The Storm is not being affected, sir. But…the hell?” Bazial frowned at the sensor data that her console was receiving and displayed to her.

“What, Lieutenant?” Vakai started to grow annoyed with the sudden cease of information from the Science officer.

“I think something is emerging from the rift!” She said as she turned in her seat to look at the view screen, much as everyone else did on the Bridge.

In a matter of seconds, a large object that at first seemed like to be only a pillar but gew in width as the entirety of the vessel slowly emerged from the rift. It was about the same size compared to the Centaur and it was still coming towards them. At least, that was until it slowly came to a stop before it slowly started to head back towards the rift.

“Ryker, turn us around, full one eighty. Lieutenant Gatia, get the aft tractor beam locked onto that ship.”

“Aye, sir.” They said in unison, watching on the main viewer as the image shifted.

“Full one eighty turn complete, Commander.” Said Ryker.

“Aft tractor beam locked on but fluctuating. The rift is causing some interference. Compensating.” Said Gatia.

“Ryker, give us speed that would help pull that ship away from the rift but don’t lose that tractor beam.” Vakai ordered.

“On it.” Ryker’s fingers tapped several commands, slowly the Centaur began to pull the unknown vessel away from the rift.

“Commander, I got the tractor beam stabilized, we can increase speed.” Gatia said to Ryker.

“Copy that. Thanks, Lieutenant!” Ryker complimented and did just that before he brought both ships to a stop. “We are holding at thirty kilometers from the rift, which seems to be right outside of the gravitational pull of the rift.” Ryker informed Vakai after he turned in his seat to face him.

Vakai nodded his head in acknowledgement. “Thank you, Ryker. I want a full sensor scan of that vessel. Lifesigns. Damage. Offensive and defensive capabilities. Everything.”

“Sensors are detecting shield generators, of what kind is unknown. Beam emitters, point defense systems and…missile launchers? There is also another weapon system, I think it’s a weapon system, but I am uncertain of its function.” Said Gomo. “But there appears to be some cylinder-like tube just behind the row of missile launchers and it leads to a bay full of…small dormant objects.”

“Torpedoes maybe?” Ryker asked.

Gomo turned his head to look at Ryker. “Nothing like any torpedo launch system I’ve ever seen.”

“It has maneuvering thrusters, some sort of sublight drive system that sensors can’t tell what they are nor are the sensors capable of determining what kind of faster than light drive they have and the power plant…again, sensors can’t figure it out.” Said Gomez as she turned in her eyes with confusion on her face. “It is nothing Starfleet has ever encountered before.”

“It’s hull is composed of elements that the computer doesn’t even recognize. Its sensor array is also unknown to the computer and has transportation systems that are not recognized either. Hell, sensors are even picking up smaller crafts that look like fighters. A couple that look like standard shuttles but the shape is more…cylindrical.” Said Gatia.

Bazial frowned before she turned in her seat to look at Vakai. “While most of the sensors are operating efficiently, the sensor pallets for the lifesign scanners are running into some sort of interference. I can’t tell if it is from the rift or from something else on that ship.”

“So we have no way of knowing if there are people on board, alive or dead?” Vakai asked.

She shook her head. “No sir.”

“Sir, there is one more thing that I just noticed.” Gatia spoke up, who then tapped in a few commands to adjust the main view screen to bring the ship up and zoom in on the port hangar bay. There, they can clearly see a large hole in what was supposed to be a door, as well as a shimmer of some type of forcefield. “Looks like they have been attacked. Not only that, sensors have detected two crafts that do not match any of the other small crafts in that hangar. Even the material that those two crafts are made of, don’t match. It’s possible that, if there are people on board-”

Vakai stood up from his chair, “Then they’ve been boarded and are in trouble. Transporters?”

Gatia faced her console, entered some commands then faced Vakai with a shake of her head. “Negative. The rift is causing some sort of interference with the transporters as well as with the lifesign scanners. But I have scanned the forcefield, I believe that I can modify the shields of a small craft to allow it to pass through the forcefield to enter that hangar bay.”

“All right then. Inform Lieutenants Koyda and Maya to prepare two teams. We’re going to board that vessel and see what kind of assistance we can give them.” Vakai said as he began to head for the turbolift.

“Excuse me, Commander. But where do you think you are going?” Sucil’s voice filled the Bridge.

Vakai halted in his tracks, not to what she said but how she said it, and turned around to face her. “I beg your pardon, Lieutenant Commander?”

“I meant no disrespect, sir. But you are the Commanding Officer of this vessel and per regulations, you cannot lead the away team.” She told him. “And we did quote regulations earlier, did we not, sir?”

Vakai frowned at her with a harsh glare before he took a deep breath and sighed with a long exhale. He then returned to his seat and looked at Ryker. “Commander. Lead the away team and report back your findings.”

“That’s going to be a problem, sir.” Said Bazial as Ryker stood up from his seat.

“Why is that?” Ryker and Vakai asked at the same time, both looked at each other. Ryker shrugged a shoulder and Vakai smirked.

“The rift seems to be also causing interference with the comm systems.” She explained.

Gatia tilted her head then looked back at her console, with a few commands tapped, she let out a sigh of annoyance. “She is correct, sir. I will attempt to compensate for the interference, but we will have no communication with the away team once they are on board.”

“Terrific.” Said Vakai before he looked back at Ryker. “Be careful over there. Got it?”

Ryker laughed. “You know me. We’ll be fine.” He then made his way to the turbolift.

“I mean it, James.” Vakai said as he turned his seat to face the man who stepped into the lift.

“You have my word, Vakai.” Ryker winked with a smile before the door closed.

Vakai clenched his right hand, the tingling sensation having returned. Great.

While Ryker had hoped that the entire crew had made it to their shelter areas on the ship and the critical staff made it to the jumper in the starboard hangar to hide, he had Lieutenant Hayes with him along with other security personnel to complete the four member team of scouring the decks of the invaders. There were other security forces doing the same, but they had only about a hundred crew on board, half of the complement the ship was supposed to have.

The Alliance are in the process of switching over to energy based weapons over projectile weapons, but considering that they were dealing with the Wraith and the risk of encountering them after they have fed is too high. So Ryker gave the authorization to use projectile weapons against the enemy, his personal favorite is the Desert Tech MDRx assault rifle with a drum mag. His setup however, allows him to load and chamber .308 Win. The rifle can use seven different types of rounds, as long as it is set up properly to fire those rounds. The Lieutenant chose a P90 while the two airmen chose MP5’s. To each their own, he had thought.

While he had his rifle at the ready, he had the Lantean Hand Scanner in his free hand while the barrel of his rifle rested on his forearm just an inch away from his wrist. He naturally had the gene, where those who didn’t required the treatment and that is if it worked. So he was able to use the devices from the Ancients that they had on board, devices that unfortunately, they have yet to reverse engineer. The display on the scanner was showing him that they were getting close to a small group of Wraith, three of them to be precise.

First Ryker put the scanner away in his back pocket and signaled his team that there were three hostiles around the corner. The four of them stacked up and silently counted with his fingers until he reached zero. Second his hand made a zero, they quickly moved into the small room junction where the three wraith were. At that moment, as time felt like it had slowed down, Ryker saw four crew members on the deck, their skin clinging tightly to their bones, hair white as snow…their life force completely drained from their bodies. This made him furious. Was it to be expected? Yes. Did he like seeing it? No. Did he like losing anyone under his command? No. Furthermore, this was wraith of a hive that refused to accept peace. So with that, they opened fire on them and with all four of them with the knowledge of how versatile wraith are after they had fed, they did not release their fingers from the triggers until all three dropped.

To Ryker, it felt easy. Too easy, as he walked over to one of the downed wraiths as the other team members checked on the other wraiths, as well as the downed crewmembers. It appeared as they had tried to regenerate most of the shots that they had taken but there were many fresh bullet wounds that looked as though their bodies had failed to heal. That was good enough for him as he looked at his team. “Come on. We still have wraith to deal with.” He told them.

Hayes frowned, “Something doesn’t make sense, sir.”

“What?” Ryker asked.

“There are four dead crewmen and three wraith.”

“None of it needs to make sense, Lieutenant.” He nearly barked at her. “We should have found these wraith before they got to these crewmembers, but we didn’t.”

“I meant no disrespect, sir. It’s just, we know that one person is enough for one wraith.” She explained.

Ryker frowned as what she was saying had started to make sense. Suddenly one of the airmen screamed, which made everyone turn towards them to find a wraith had them pinned up against the wall, vest and jacket torn open, a patch of shirt ripped down and the wraith’s hand pressed right against the center of their chest. Right before their very eyes they saw the airman begin to age.

Ryker saw the others lift up their weapons but he held his hand up. “Don’t shoot!” He told them.

“We have to do something!” Said the other airman.

Just as Ryker was reaching for his combat knife, five more wraith came around the corner. “Fall back!” Ryker ordered. “Fall back now!”

Ryker and Hayes were able to go back the way they came but the other airman got hit by the wraith stun weapons and fell to the deck. Ryker took cover around the corner and opened fire on the ones he could without risking a bullet to stray and hit one of his own people. But the return fire and nearly being hit by one of their stun weapons forced him to retreat.

“What are we going to do, sir?” Hayes called back to him as Ryker caught up to her.

“We need to get to the auxiliary control room and find out how many of these things we have on board.” He told her as he slung his weapon the moment he reached a ladder and took it down to the next deck below.

Even though it was just the two of them, they were able to make it to the auxiliary control room without any confrontations. From there, Ryker and Hayes were able to determine the number of wraith lifesigns on board the ship with their internal sensors. Ryker cursed under his breath at the results he saw on the monitor. “Damnit.”

“Those six wraith back there were the only ones left on the ship?” Hayes asked as she too saw the numbers.

“Yeah. And we just left them there to feed on two of our crew members, to regenerate any damage that was done to them.” He said as he sat down in one of the chairs and pulled out the drum mag to see how many rounds were left in it. While he did that, he noticed Hayes was accessing the external sensors.

“Colonel. I don’t know where we are at but there is a ship of an unknown design. Trying to get its IFF but the system is having a hard time. We seem to be in some storm and the rift is right behind us.” Hayes told him.

Ryker frowned, “A space storm?”

Hayes smirked. “Yeah, those do happen. It’s-”

Ryker waved his hand. “Tell me about it later. Right now, what is that ship doing?” He pointed at the blip, especially when a smaller blip came from it.

Hayes began a scan on the smaller target and the system brought up the visual of what the sensors interpreted it. “Interesting. Looks about the same size as our puddle jumpers. It’s close enough to get life readings and I’m picking up ten life signs on board. Looks like they are heading for the port hangar.”

“That forcefield will stop them from getting in, won’t it?” He asked.

They watched as the blip disappeared, no explosion or anything. Hayes switched to internal sensors and accessed the port hangar video feed and there they watched as the craft did a full one-eighty inside the hangar and then landed. “Apparently not. Only way that would have worked is if they configured their shields frequency to match our forcefield. Makes them par to our level of technology, you think?”

Ryker shrugged his shoulders. “I just command. I leave this technobable to the engineers. But no, I get it. Guess we will get to see if those ten lifesigns are reinforcements or hostiles.”

Vakai stood there in front of his chair on the Bridge of the Centaur as he stared at the strange vessel on the view screen. His thoughts wandered back to when he was just an Ensign, who had led a Hazard Team into the territories of the Hunters of D’Ghor during the Archanis Campaign. Now, here he was, a Commander who was assigned Command of the Centaur in some ‘trial run’. The one thing he had not prepared himself for, was the idea of having to wait for the results of the mission from the Away Teams. They tried to maintain an open comm channel but the Subspace Rift was causing too much interference. The moment the shuttle got half way between the Centaur and the unknown vessel, was the moment the comm link started to go and just as the shuttle made it to the large opening to the port hangar of the vessel, the comm link was lost.

“Commander.”

Vakai’s complete focus was trained on that very object in the view screen. The object with so many unknowns on board right now, it was driving a nail right through him. A nail of worry, anxiety and anticipation. He was afraid that he was sending his friends to their deaths, as there was no way to determine if anything on board that ship was friendly or hostile. Communications, sensors, everything that they needed to get any shred of information about that ship, was being affected by the Subspace Rift.

“Commander Vakai.”

The thing that bothered him most was that he had known that some day this would happen, that once he was in Command of a Starship, he would have to sit on the sidelines during situations like this. He just had not expected nor prepared himself for it to happen so soon, regardless of all the exams and training he’s taken to get himself this far so quickly, which the record would show of how quickly he and his friends have risen. Maybe it was a mistake. Maybe he should have just avoided the whole training courses period and gone through the ranks like any other officer. Then he would have been able to enjoy being in charge of an Away Team more often, get used to it, then ween into the idea of staying behind and ordering others to go in his place.

“Commander Vakai.”

Vakai blinked a couple of times when he realized he was being called and when he turned on his heels to see who it was, he saw that it was the ship’s counselor, Lieutenant Commander Nuri Sucil. The Betazoid.

Sucil raised a brow. “I can hear you doubting me. And no, I am not involuntarily reading your mind. It’s actually coming out quite loud and clear. Look, I will get to the point. Aside from your thoughts that were also quite loud and clear for me to hear, so have been your emotions. I understand. I deal with plenty of officers who go through this a few times when they have only been in Command for a few weeks. It is perfectly normal. But in this case, I highly recommend that you take a deep breath and focus on the positives, or on some activities. The more stress you accumulate, the higher the chance you may trigger an episode.” She said the last part more quietly for only him to hear.

Vakai closed his eyes, took a deep breath, held it for a few seconds then slowly exhaled before he opened his eyes and looked directly at her. “I appreciate your concern and your observation, Commander.” He spoke quietly before he began to scan around the Bridge, looked to see who all was left. They were essentially the only Officers that remained, him, Sucil and the three Lieutenants, Gomo, Bazial and Gatia. Rest are crewmembers, half actually, doing routine work. Doing exactly what she recommended him to do, keep busy. “Lieutenant Gatia, Bazial. Need you two to work together in clearing up this interference. I want comms with my people over there. Gomo, you and I are going to see about getting our sensors around this interference. I want detailed scans of that ship.”

—

Mizu followed right behind Ruby and alongside a security crew member. Beside Ruby was Sivol and the one who had the lead was James Ryker. They slowly and carefully treaded through the corridors of the ship, their destination is where they hope to be the Bridge. When James had piloted the shuttle close enough to the vessel, they not only got scans of the ship, which included a deck layout and a rough scan of what appeared to be the Bridge, but they also had noticed a name etched on the side of the ship. That name was Hercules.

As she followed those in front and beside her, she allowed herself to be observant of her surroundings. A lot of what she could see looked like something that they would have seen on one of the old United Earth vessels. But there were other things that stood out, that she believed were obsolete. It was difficult to extrapolate with just looking at it and not being able to examine it with a tricorder. No. Right now, the most important thing is reaching their destination and figuring out what the hell is going on.

“Commander. My tricorder is picking up life signs ahead. The tricorder can’t figure out what they are, the species is not in our database.” Sivol reported.

James pulled his pistol out of his holster. “Be prepared everyone.” He told them before eyeing back at Sivol. “How many?”

“Three.” She told him.

James sighed as he halted the team’s movement to think. “We have the advantage in numbers, but we are at a disadvantage because we don’t know what they are and if our weapons will work. So be on your guard.” He told them before he led them right into a junction.

Mizu and the crewman beside her were the last two in, but right in that moment, three pale blue skinned, white long haired aliens walked in from the other side and saw the team. Everyone was now paused, the team on one end, and the three aliens on the other. Both sides had their weapons lowered by their sides, or rifles lowered against their chest and stomach with the barrel aimed downward. No one seemed to move at all as the seconds went by. Mizu looked at each and every one of them. They were humanoid, two of them had some sort of masks on, and wore sleeveless vests. The middle one, had no mask, had the face of a human but looked like it had an extra pair of nostrils, one on each cheek. She wasn’t certain, as she doubted she would be allowed to get a closer look. Not that she would want to, as the middle one certainly looked mean. Curious. But angry nonetheless. The two with the masks had long white hair, whereas the middle one had long braided white hair and a braided goatee.

“Who or what are they?” Ruby asked.

“About to find out.” Said James. “I am Commander James Ryker of the Starship Centaur. Identify yourself.”

In that instant, all three of them raised their weapons and fired. Somehow, no one but the crewman beside Mizu got hit. Those who did not get hit, like her, raised their weapons and fired on the weird aliens. But even with their weapons set to medium stun, the enemy was not going down. The junction they were in provided practically no cover, so all they could really do was close the distance and resort to hand to hand combat. This is where Mizu ended up standing there with her rifle, raising and lowering it whenever she thought she had a shot but did not.

Mizu looked to Ruby, who had slammed the butt of his rifle into one of the masked aliens, right into their stomach which seemed to have stunned it for only a moment. When Ruby got hit in the head with the butt of it’s rifle and Ruby had bent over to try and recover from the pain, Mizu raised her weapon and fired multiple shots into the target to try and distract it from doing anything else to Ruby. This tactic worked well in keeping it off balance, because as soon as Ruby recovered, he grabbed the butt of his rifle with both hands and used it as a blunt weapon to smack right against the side of it’s head. One hit. Two hits. Three hits. Until finally the beastly thing fell to the deck after the fourth hit. Was a good thing too, because Ruby had completely broken his rifle in half after the fourth hit.

Mizu then looked at Sivol and watched as the Vulcan used one of many skills and techniques that she must have learned back home. These moves were no match for the other masked villain. From Mizu’s view point, each strike Sivol connected to the masked creature, it stumbled back and held the spot where she had hit. Mizu learned that Vulcans could double, if not triple, the power in their attacks when necessary and here, Mizu was witnessing it for the first time. There was absolutely no need for Mizu to intervene or assist when the Doctor clearly could defend herself without an issue. In moments, the second masked creature fell to the deck, unconscious.

Now, when Mizu looked at the Commander, she had realized that he had his pistol holstered. He was trying to fight the unmasked creature in hand to hand combat much like Sivol was. Unfortunately, the unmasked creature seemed to be more nimble, flexible and much faster than the two masked brutes. The creature even ended the battle much faster than anyone had expected by the spin kick it performed to drop James to the deck. At which point, Mizu raised her rifle at it but before she could fire her weapon, the creature pulled its pistol out and shot Ruby. Mizu cursed at herself for being slow and fired on the creature, which once again did practically nothing as it stumbled back for a brief moment then raised its arm with pistol in hand and aimed it at her.

But before either of them could get a shot off, Sivol came in with a technique that with her hands, she was able to knock the pistol out of its hand and then send the creature back a couple feet with a swift kick into its chest. Mizu then sighed in relief, knowing that this woman would certainly defeat the last creature with ease. That is until Mizu watched as the creature had immediately recovered and was swift on its feet that not even Sivol could have anticipated it grabbing her by the throat and pinning her against the wall. Mizu raised her rifle and fired on him and this time she noticed the stun setting had started to take effect as the creature started to droop. But Mizu also noticed the look on its face, the look of it being surprised and alarmed by this.

Without hesitation, the creature tore open a hole big enough in Sivol’s jacket and shirt to press its free hand against her skin. Mizu had zero clue as to what it was doing but Sivol crying out in pain was clear enough that something horrible was happening. Although as seconds went by, nothing in appearance could be seen on what it was that the creature was doing to Sivol, likely because she was a Vulcan. In fact, they both saw the look on the creature’s face that it was extremely excited at what it was doing, as if it was…tasting a rare treat.

“Ensign! Get it off me!” Sivol ordered.

Mizu cranked the setting to maximum stun and then fired on the creature but now, it hardly phased it at all. Somehow, whatever it is that the creature was doing, was making it stronger. She fired several more shots and still nothing happened. “I can’t!”

“Get it off me!!” Sivol screamed in pain.

Mizu stared in horror and the cries of help, she panicked and acted without considering the consequences. She switched her rifle from stun to kill and adjusted it to a high setting before she took aim. With the squeeze of the trigger, a beam lanced out and Mizu lowered the rifle where it sliced through both the creature’s forearms, just next to its elbows. With those arms free from the creature, Sivol fell to the floor and the creature screamed in agony. Mizu had chosen to end its suffering by cranking the setting to max and vaporizing it with one single shot to the chest.

“Ensign!” James shouted at her as he started to slowly push himself to his feet, grunting in the process.

Mizu could not stop staring at where the creature had stood, what it was doing to Sivol, the cries it made when she severed its arms and how it just vanished when she ended its life. Her heart was still pounding in her chest when James had reached her and grabbed the rifle out of her hands. That motion alone woke her from her trance, her eyes moved to look at the Commander and then at everyone else. “I-I-I was…it had Sivol…I couldn’t stop it…the stun wasn’t working…and it was doing something to her…I” She felt a hand on her shoulder and jumped to look at who that hand belonged to and saw it was Ruby. In an instant she threw her arms around him and squeezed tightly as she closed her eyes, trying so hard to clear her mind of what she had done.

“We’ll discuss it later.” James told her before he looked at Ruby with a simple nod to him before he made his way to Sivol. “Are you all right?” He asked her. He watched as Sivol peeled the hand off of her throat and tossed the forearm away before grabbing the other hand that was stuck to her chest and peeled it off of her before tossing it as well. He could see the indentations of each digit and claw mark in her skin on her chest but the worst part was the wound where he could see her bleeding from. James went to grab her medkit when Sivol took it from him and handed him her medical tricorder. “I need to treat your wound.”

“I know but I need you to figure out what the hell that thing did to me.” Sivol told him.

James nodded his head, but before he could begin to scan they were suddenly surrounded by a group of soldiers with weapons pointed at them. One of them shouted, “Nobody move!” Then the man saw what James was holding. “Put it down! Put it down now!”

James frowned at them. “This is a medical tricorder! I am trying to help my friend here!”

“Not until you explain what the hell you are doing on this ship and who the hell are you!” said the man.

Sivol placed a hand on his and patted, her way of telling him that she will be fine for a moment longer. James placed the tricorder down beside her and stood up with his hands in the air. “Not until you explain to me who you are and that you put those weapons down!”

“I am Captain Jeffrey Marks and we will lower our weapons after you tell us who you are and that you disarm yourselves.” Marks pointed at the holstered weapon on James’ hip.

“Captain?” James asked only to look at Ruby and Mizu.

Ruby saw the bars that the stranger had and looked at James, only to shake his head. “Military, sir. Not Starfleet or Naval.”

“So…?”

Mizu pulled away from Ruby with a deep breath and slowly exhaled before she explained. “His rank is equivalent to a Lieutenant, sir. If I am correct, their rank structure is Second Lieutenant, then First Lieutenant, Captain, Major, Lieutenant Colonel and Colonel. The first rank I mentioned is similar to Ensign and then so on and so forth.”

“Ah.” James then looked at the man. “My name is Commander James Ryker, I’m the First Officer on board the ship out there, called the USS Centaur.”

Marks blinked for a moment then lowered his weapon, his security forces doing the same. “Ryker?”

James frowned and tilted his head a little. “Yeah?”

Marks then looked down at Sivol and saw the marks on her chest. “We need to take her to the infirmary. It’s not too far from where and it’s one of our emergency shelters. The medical staff there will be able to treat her wound.”

“Do you know what happened to her? And what the hell are they? ” James asked.

“They’re the Wraith. And she’s been fed on.” Marks explained before he gestured two of his men to help Sivol to her feat and to carry her. “Come. I’ll explain on the way.” Just as he said that, the crewman who had been the first one stunned, finally got up onto his feet. “Did I miss anything?” They asked.

—

K’Roll had his rifle up at the ready as he followed right beside Elidia and behind Gomez. Koyda was beside her and Maya was leading the way as she intended when she took the role of Hazard Team Commanding Officer for the Centaur. Even though it wasn’t completely official yet. Nevertheless, it was the Command Staff’s intention of placing a permanent Hazard Force on the ship and placing her in charge. And K’Roll intends to sign up. They were on their way to where they think to be the Engineering section of the ship, at least what Gomez speculated from the shuttle’s scans.

“I mean, Bridge is somewhere here, in the front-mid section of the ship, right? No reason for the Engineering section to not be near the rear of the ship.” Gomez had explained earlier when they were in the shuttle, when the discussion of their course of action took place.

Nevertheless, the team moved in unison. Those with rifles had them up at the ready, as those with pistols were less than ready but were not completely necessary. They could easily fire from the hip if needed and it really took no effort to raise one’s arm to shoot either. Sure there is a chance of the pistol being knocked out of their hand before they could raise their arm to fire but the point is, three of them had rifles and the other two had pistols. K’Roll was in full confidence that they were perfectly fine.

“Um. Lieutenants.” Elidia’s voice interrupted his thoughts. Everyone stopped when Maya stopped, all having turned on their feet to look at Elidia who blushed a bit as she had not expected their full attention. “Sorry but I think we’re nearing the spot where we think it is the Engineering section.”

“Okay?” Gomez said in question, more as to why they stopped with this.

“Well, my tricorder is detecting life signs in there. Three of them. Species that Starfleet has never encountered before.” She explained.

Maya smiled lightly, “Nothing to be sorry about, Ensign. Thank you for the information. So now we know that when we go into that room, we have to be prepared for the unexpected. These life signs could be the crew of the ship. Or they could be the hostiles that has left this ship incapacitated. Nevertheless, I want you all to be on your guard. Understood?” They all nodded and acknowledged in unison. Maya smiled, “Good. Elidia, Gomez. I want you both to stay behind.”

“But!-”

“Our odds are better if we stick together.” Gomez interrupted the Ensign.

Maya shook her head. “Elidia is our combat medic. If it goes south and we need medical assistance, we need her unharmed. And you are our Chief Engineer. Again if the situation goes south, I rather you don’t get harmed either. Plus I suspect that the three of us can handle whatever it is that’s in there. And if by some chance we are having trouble, you two would be back up. A surprise that they surely would not expect. Understood?”

“Yes, ma’am.” Said Elidia.

“Your team.” Said Gomez.

“All right. Koyda. K’roll. On me.” She ordered and then took the lead with Koyda behind her on her left, and K’Roll behind her on her right.

K’Roll followed them right into the room where they saw the three strange looking aliens who were trying to do something at the terminals. But when those creatures saw the three come in, weapons raised and aimed, they immediately reacted. They lifted up their weapons and opened fire on them. Luckily the three of them knew when to duck and anticipate when they saw the three creatures had lifted up their weapons. Unlucky though, is that Koyda was the one to get a full blast in the face, falling onto his back on the deck, completely unconscious. K’Roll and Maya covered behind one of the consoles, only to rise up and open fire on two of the creatures to see that their weapons had no effect. They quickly returned to cover to avoid being hit, and K’Roll looked at Maya with concern. “Stuns not working, ma’am!”

“I know!” She told him as she maxed out the stun setting. “Just keep trying!” She said as she stood up and fired several shots before she dropped back down.

K’Roll maxed out his stun setting and then did the same, only that when he came back down, he saw Elidia and Gomez were trying to pull Koyda out of the room. When K’Roll took a look, he saw that two of the creatures were aiming their weapons at them. “Damnit!” He growled. He dropped his rifle to the floor, rose up, opened up his hands to extend his claws and hissed at them. This got their attention immediately, where K’Roll was able to get a good look at them. Two of them were masked, and one was not. But all three looked hideous to him now that they had become his enemy. K’Roll noticed that two of them had raised their weapons at him but just before they could fire, the masked one was struck in the face with a beam before the unmasked one got a rifle butt in the face. K’Roll saw that Maya was taking on the unmasked creature, leaving him with the two masked ones to deal with.

First the one to the right charged at him and wrapped its arms around K’Rolls abdomen while the one to his left came swinging. K’Roll took a full punch to the face but he did it on purpose so that once the arm was in front of him and vulnerable, he would open his maw and bite into the arm, sinking his teeth, puncturing the odd and distasteful skin. While he clamped his jaw down on the arm, hearing the creature roaring in pain, he tried his best to claw through the back of the other one’s vest only to realize that he needed to get to the flesh that’s already exposed. He decided to focus all his attention on the one that he has sunk his teeth into, grab the arm with his hands and dug his claws into it just to pull it closer so he can grab its throw and sink his claws into it. Meanwhile he was trying to knee the masked creature that still had its arms around his abdomen, trying so hard to throw K’Roll down onto the deck but he managed to hold his ground.

The one that been bitten and had been clawed managed to break free from K’Roll’s grip and jaws…only to stumble backwards as it heaved loudly. With it distracted, K’Roll refocused his attention on the one still hugging him and began to smash his elbow into the back of its head until it finally let go and stumbled back. K’Roll drove a kick into its stomach before slugging it hard in the head, only to watch it crash into the deck unconscious. What he did not prepare himself for, was the other masked creature to grab K’Roll by the throat and pin him down against the terminal. K’Roll then felt pieces of his jacket and shirt being torn off and away from his upper torso just before the creature’s free hand slammed down onto his bare chest. K’Roll gasped and coughed at having the air knocked out of his lungs but that was immediately pushed aside when he suddenly felt intense pain from his chest. He had no idea what the thing was doing but he saw with his very eyes of the holes of where his claws had dug in in its throat began to seal up as if it never happened.

“K’Roll!” He heard Elidia’s voice. He didn’t understand what was going on but he felt himself getting weaker by the second. He needed to think fast. He let go of the arm that belonged to the hand on his chest, grabbed the creature’s mask and shoved his thumbs right where he believed to be its eye sockets behind the mask. His claws tore through the material and from there, the creature let go of K’Roll entirely and stumbled backward as it roared in agony. But being that it recently fed, the pain it felt soon left and K’Roll saw those eyes were normal, as if digging his claws into them had no effect. K’Roll was prepared for the worst to happen, until he heard a very loud ‘pop pop pop’ sound and watched as the creature’s blood spurt out from three newly formed holes in its skull before it tumbled onto the deck.

“What the hell?!” K’Roll heard Maya’s voice but did not check to see that she had defeated her opponent with less trouble than he had.

K’Roll slid down off the terminal and landed on his ass onto the deck, where he sat as he panted heavily. At first there were just the two bodies of the creatures on the deck before him and then when he closed his eyes for just a second, he opened them just to see Elidia knelt before him with her medical tricorder.

“Well I can easily tell that you’re not my enemy.” A voice that K’Roll did not recognize.

“Depends. If you don’t lower your weapons, we might just become your enemy.” Said Maya.

“Lieutenant Maya, not the best choice of words.” Said Gomez.

“No. What she said is fair.” Said the man. Had to be from how the voice sounded to him.

“Care to explain why you just killed that thing?” Maya asked.

“I will, after you all tell me who you are and why you’re on my ship.”

“She’s Lieutenant Maya.” Said Gomez, “And I am Lieutenant Ashley Gomez.” She then pointed at Koyda who was slowly rising to his feet. “That’s Lieutenant Koyda, those two there are Ensign Elidia and Ensign K’Roll. K’Roll’s the cat looking one.”

“Caitian.” K’Roll wheezed.

“Shhh, K’Roll. Save your strength.” Said Elidia. “What happened to him? Do you know?” She looked at the man when she asked.

“The Wraith, those you were fighting, they tried to feed off him.” He told them.

“What?” Elidia’s eyes widened.

“You didn’t answer my question!” Said Maya.

“Technically I did. They feed off of people’s life energy. I killed it because that bastard fed off of some of my crew. They all did.” He told them.

“Colonel Ryker.” A voice was heard coming from speakers on devices that were on the soldier’s vests.

Everyone on the away team started to look at each other when they recognized the name. Ryker sighed and grabbed his radio. “Go ahead, Marks.”

“I found one of the groups, sir. One of their own has been injured by the Wraith. We’re taking her to the infirmary.” said Marks.

“Copy that. We found the other group. One of their own was injured by the Wraith as well. We’ll meet you there. Also, we got three Wraith bodies here in Engineering.” Said Ryker.

“Good. These guys took out three Wraith too. Well we found two bodies but one of them explained the third was disintegrated. Pretty much what the Zats do after three shots.” Marks explained. “Also, you coming to the infirmary saves me the trouble of asking you to. We got someone with the same last name as you. Spelled the same too.”

Ryker frowned and looked at the away team. “Who the hell are you people?”

Gomez stepped forward, “I think it is best we all got together. Then we will explain.”

Colonel Ryker watched as the medical staff attended to the two individuals from the ship named the USS Centaur. So he was told. One of them looked more human than the other, except for the way the eyebrows slanted and the ears. Oh and let’s not forget the blood that he saw. As for the other patient, they were definitely as alien as the Wraith are. Except this one is covered in fur and looks like a cat. They should really keep their animals at home, Harry thought.

“This is incredible.” Said Maddison, who stood beside him, who also stared at the newcomers. “I knew we were going to end up crossing through the subspace rift when we were attacked but actually meeting people from this universe was not at all expected.”

Harry raised his brows after he looked at her. “Really?”

“What?”

“Alliance was just as curious as you were about analyzing the subspace rift. Telling me about how each rift is unique and that there are endless possibilities. What makes you think there be no one investigating the same rift on this side?” He asked her.

“Good point.” She smirked and looked back at him. “So you do listen to me.”

He shrugged a shoulder. “I try not to.”

She slugged him in the arm. “Turd.”

“That really appropriate from a Major, Major?” He chuckled.

“Oh shut up.” She then looked at the other Ryker. “Are you going to talk to him?”

“The hell am I supposed to say? Hello Ryker, my name is Ryker.” He shook his head. “What is there to say? We’re probably not even related. Well. Of course we ain’t. We can’t be.”

She laughed and shook her head. “Of course you’re not. But you might learn a little bit. Come on, we should get to know them better. Get some idea of who we have here on board. I mean, they did help you take care of the remaining Wraith, right?”

He sighed with a nod of his head. “That they did. Come on.” He led the way to the other Ryker’s group. “James, correct?”

James had his back turned, talking to his people, when Harry approached them. So he turned around completely and smiled. “That’s correct. I hear we have the same last name.”

Harry nodded. “Colonel Harry Ryker. Commanding Officer of the Hercules.”

James raised his brows. “Wait a minute. Harry Jameson Ryker?”

Harry was next to raise his brows. “That’s correct. Do we know each other?”

James laughed and shook his head. “I wish. Harry Jameson Ryker is my great great grandfather. He commanded one of the Virginia Class Submarines.”

Harry tilted his head. “Huh. Navy man. Definitely not the same.”

James nodded. “Clearly. I was told by one of my Ensigns that your rank is military, not naval?”

“United States Air Force. We do have the United States Space Force on some of our ships, but it’s really a joint kind of thing.” He explained.

“We are also slowly incorporating officers and warriors from the Alliance.” Said Maddison. “Like, Jaffa and Langaria. Even Wraith.”

Gomez’s eyes widened. “You mean those freaky things that tried to feed on our two friends there? What?!”

Maddison shook her head. “The Wraith that you saw are part of a Hive group that has refused to come to negotiations like the other Hives have. So we do have those who support the Alliance.”

“What about the four Wraith that are still alive?” Maya asked.

“They have been placed in a holding cell. We have a mix of Asgard and Ancient force fields in place around the cells to keep them from trying to escape. But in case they do, we have security personnel armed to take them down. To be honest though, I rather jettison them out the airlock.”

Maddison nudged him with her elbow. “What he means is, he does not want them on board for too long.”

Harry sighed. “Your two friends are fine. Your pointy eared one lost maybe twenty years. The cat, five, maybe ten. But these bastards fed and killed over fifteen of my crew, and we are running on half of our crew complement, or we were. Now we have less than a hundred personnel. And when these Wraiths have recently fed, they are extremely difficult to put down.”

Maddison stepped in to explain. “All of their abilities are heightened by a lot. Their healing, regenerative capabilities, their speed, their strength, everything. Your pointy eared friend-”

“Sivol.” Gomez corrected.

“My apologies. When Sivol fought the bulkier ones at hand to hand combat, she had the advantage then. But when she fought one of their Lieutenants, the less bulky, more agile one, that is when she was at a disadvantage.”

“But the stun setting was starting to work on it.” Mizu spoke up. Where James began to glare at her.

“The spike in their heightened abilities lasts only for a while after they are recently fed but they are still strong and fast when they are not hungry or starving. So when it got a hold of Sivol and began to feed off of her, your advantage in taking it down with the stun setting, was lost in an instant. Its body was able to heal and restore itself, remove all effects of the stun, because it was feeding at that time.” Maddison explained.

“That still does not excuse what you did, Ensign.” James told Mizu.

Harry eyed the man before he looked at the others. “So now that you are here and our Wraith problem has been resolved. What do you plan to do?”

“When we got close to your ship with our shuttle, we noticed that your ship suffered damage after it came through. Were your shields offline?” Gomez asked.

Harry nodded his head. “We were caught off guard by three Wraith Cruisers when we were trying to do a scienctific mission with the Subspace Rift on our side. They damaged the shield generators in their first assault so I was forced to use the one weapon that guaranteed our victory. And thanks to the Asgard Core, we are able to replenish the drones we used up against them.”

Maya smirked. “Kind of makes you guys a bit overpowered, doesn’t it?”

Harry shook his head. “We had an encounter with a group called the Ori. They were incredibly advanced and the drones we had weren’t working. Well, at the time we didn’t have a way to replenish them, nor did we have them installed on our ships. But when the Asgard race decided to commit suicide because they could no longer continue their cloning process…they had no other way of reproducing…we ended up with their technology. They literally handed it to us. Ever since then we have been a major galactic power. But there are a group called the Human Replicators and a group of Asgard that splintered from their homeworld, rogues I suppose you could call them. So we still have those that we are standing toe to toe with.”

Maya shrugged her shoulders. “Perfectly good explanation wasted but it’s okay. You get all that, husband?” She looked at Koyda who shook his head.

“Right.” Harry looked at the others. “So are you saying that you are willing to help us make repairs?”

“If we can. I mean, a lot of this looks extremely old to us.” Said Gomez.

“Hold on. We are forgetting the most important question of all here!” Said Maddison. “What year is it?”

“Early twenty-four hundred.” Said James.

Both Harry and Maddison looked at each other, while Marks, Patterson and Hayes came up in time to hear that.

“We went three hundred and seventy-eight years into the future?” Hayes asked.

“I knew it! Then our analysis about the Subspace Rift was spot on!” Maddison gleamed with joy.

“What’s the year on your side of the rift?” Ruby asked.

“Early twenty twenty-two.” Harry answered.

Ruby, Koyda and Maya’s eyes went wide, where Gomez and Mizu covered their mouths in surprise. James just shook his head, as he couldn’t believe it. “Guess our science officer was also right.” Said James as he still shook his head. “Unbelievable. I can imagine a subspace rift connecting our universe with a different, alternate universe. But also is time distorted?”

“A massive time distortion to be precise.” Said Maddison. “We have not had much experience in encountering subspace rifts because we’ve been busy with expansion and getting ourselves figured out when our governments decided to create the Alliance. It’s basically some of the NATO forces that had been introduced to the Stargate Program back in two thousand and three, along with the Jaffa Free Nation, the Langarians and other groups in the Milky Way and Pegasus Galaxies that are around our technological level.”

Everyone looked at her as if they were waiting for her to get to the point.

She smiled apologetically. “Just trying to not leave anyone confused here. Anyway, the point is, we have encountered some subspace rifts and we even had some time traveling incidents as well, both Stargate Command and Atlantis. Well…” She paused for a moment as she made several gestures, as if she was counting. “We actually had a lot of instances of traveling through time, but most have been done through the Stargate or through a time machine and… there were times that-”

“Major.” Harry interrupted.

She again smiled apologetically. “Sorry. Point is, we have not encountered a subspace rift that traveled more than several years, past or future. This is the first rift we’ve encountered that sent us almost four hundred years into the future. Which, to our people in our universe…not at all surprising I suppose. Or crazy.”

James shrugged his shoulders, “I can’t say the same for us. I mean, if anyone has, it’s usually classified or we don’t remember for certain reasons.”

“Causality effect. Like going back in time and offing your grandfather would result in you never being born. Or stepping on a bug and you changed the entire course of history.” Maddison explained.

“Stepping on a bug would alter our future?” Ruby asked Mizu who swatted him and said ‘Shush.’ to him.

“Well, maybe not but we would never truly know.” Maddison told him, who overheard. Then she looked at the others. “Point is, now that we know that we are in the future, or in our future…I guess you could say that…it would be best that we did not know of any event that happened on Earth.”

James frowned, “But we’re an alternate universe. To you anyway. So why would it matter?”

“Your science officer. Did they explain just how similar our universes are?” Maddison explained. “Like operating system to-”

James snapped his fingers. “She did, yes.”

Maddison smiled, “Basically, even though our universes took very two separate paths, whereas the other path didn’t even exist to the other. Like for us, we discovered the Stargate, a large ring with symbols on it, back in Egypt in nineteen twenty-eight. Which I am assuming never happened to you guys?”

Everyone shook their heads. “No, it didn’t.” James told her.

“Precisely. That is a path that never appeared to you. Whereas…” She paused to wait to see if someone caught on.

“Whereas a physicist named Zefram Cochrane who invented the warp-drive in twenty sixty-three, ten years after world war three ended.” Said Gomez.

Maddison sighed. “That path may not come to us, the path of…warp-drive you said?” Gomez nodded. “Right. But…”

Harry stepped in. “Before we departed for this mission, we were receiving news that the situation between Russia and Ukraine was getting worse.”

Gomez looked to James, who looked to Harry. “Not going to lie, it does get worse but that’s not what started world war three for us. In twenty twenty-six, it began because of genetic manipulation and enhancing the human genome.”

Maddison sighed again, “We’re not experimenting with any of that. At least, I hope we’re not. But I am afraid that you are right. Our Earth’s histories are so intertwined, despite the different paths that were given to us, it is just important that we don’t know beyond our current year. I mean, we knew it would happen.” She looked at Harry.

Harry nodded. “When the Stargate Program began to get more involved, more attention from an enemy that is practically non-existent now, we started negotiations and trading technology that we’ve obtained or invented thanks to the Stargate Program with Russia. At this moment, some of our NATO allies, including Russia, have ships similar to the Hercules.”

“And you fear that the conflict between Russia and Ukraine would spark a world war that would be far more devastating?” James asked.

Harry nodded again. “We have naquadria enhanced nuclear weapons. Hell we even have the Horizon weapon, with ten mark IX tactical warheads with the naquadria power source, and four dummies.”

Koyda frowned. “Naquadria?”

“Element in our universe that if you have never heard of it, likely does not exist in yours. It’s an element created from a source called Naquadah.” Maddison explained.

All of them shook their heads as they didn’t know what that was either.

“Point is, we may not be in the year twenty-four hundred, but our technological level puts us nearly equivalent to your own.” Harry explained.

James shook his head as he rubbed his chin. “If we had these kinds of weapons back then…”

“Earth wouldn’t stand a chance.” Said Maddison.

Harry sighed, “I can only hope that the Russians aren’t stupid enough to use any of these powerful weapons on Earth. But one thing that is on our side, is that we have more ships than they do. But the other fear that we have is, if Russians do try to use any of their ships in this conflict, we will be forced to reveal the entire program to the entire world. I still don’t think the world is ready for it. There would be a world-wide panic.”

There was a long pause, everyone essentially thinking about what would happen to Earth if such weapons existed, or to those who do have such weapons. After a long period of silence, one of the medical personnel came over to the group. “Your two friends are free to leave. We’ve treated their wounds and given them enough fluids to return to duty but we recommend light duty for at least forty-eight hours.”

“I suggest you listen. Wraith bites and the effects of being fed upon don’t disappear right away.” Harry told James.

James nodded his head, “Are your communication systems working?” He then turned to Gomez. “Was that one of the systems that our shuttle sensors detected to be damaged or no?”

Gomez shook her head. “I think we are just too close to the subspace rift that the interference is preventing communication.”

“We can consult with the Asgard Core. It’s a very advanced system, if we give it a question or a problem, it can solve it in a matter of seconds. I’m sure there we can figure out how to modify our comms array so we can make contact with your ship.” Said Maddison.

“I would love to see that.” Said Gomez.

“Come on. I’ll show you.” Maddison led the way, Gomez, Ruby and Mizu following right behind.

“Care to see the Bridge?” Harry asked James.

James threw up his arms. “Why not. I got nothing else better to do. Our job was to make contact with you, find out what was going on and neutralize whatever threat you may have and well. That job is done.”

Harry smiled. “Come, we’ll give you the grand tour.” Harry then led the way, Marks, Patterson and Hayes right behind him. To follow were James, Koyda and Maya.

Elidia stood there beside K’Roll as she was prepared to help him while he slowly got out of the medical bed. “Are you all right, K’Roll?” She asked.

He smiled at her. “I will be fine. They did a pretty good job. Though I wouldn’t mind being under our own biobeds back on the ship.” He then looked at the medical staff. “No offense.”

Sivol made her way to them slowly. “Do not worry about offending anyone. It is something that we are used to because that is what we grew up with. Besides, I feel the same way. Despite their advancements in other areas, medicine is still a bit primitive.”

“Well excuse us.” Said one of the nurses.

Sivol cleared her throat. “My apologies.”

K’Roll chuckled. “Look who’s worried about offending them now.”

Elidia grinned as she examined the two of them. “You both seem to have some mild changes. I see some white in your fur and there is a bit of a white strand of hair. Like a single stripe.” She told Sivol.

As K’Roll started to check his arms for the white fur, Sivol went to a mirror to see that long strand of white hair. Essentially a similar look to what Rogue had from one of the X-Men movies when she touched Magneto with her bare hands and absorbed some of his powers. Something that they got stuck watching with James the other day. “Interesting. Wonder how Vakai will feel when he finds out that I am twenty years older than I was before…”

Elidia looked up at the ceiling as she tried to do the math and tried to remember Sivol’s age when she last saw Sivol’s personnel file. “So then, you’re seventy-four years old now?”

Sivol glared at her. “Not that age matters.”

Elidia smiled apologetically. “Yeah well…umm…by Vulcan years, you’re still young! And healthy! And nimble! And I’m going to shut up now.”

Meanwhile, as James walked beside Harry on their way to the Bridge, he was busy thinking about what to do with Ensign Mizu. And Harry could tell just by looking at him. “You’re thinking about punishing that Ensign of yours, aren’t you?”

James blinked and looked at Harry. “She changed the settings on her rifle without permission. Let alone violated regulations. Our weapons must remain on stun, never switch to kill and never set to maximum setting to vaporize someone.”

Harry sighed and looked behind him at those following them before he looked at James. “I don’t know about you but I have no issue telling you this in front of my people. What your Ensign did was react in the best way that she can in the worst situation that she was in. You heard her, the stun setting stopped working when the Wraith started feeding off of your friend, Sivol. If that Ensign had not done what she did, your friend would have been dead.”

James shook his head. “She severed the arms from the thing. That alone was enough.”

Harry stopped in his tracks, everyone else doing the same. “Except that is not true. We haven’t really seen Wraith regenerate or regrow limbs before but you have to remind yourself. We never had…what was her race? Vulcans?” James nodded his head. “We never had them in our universe and I can’t say that we do, as much as you don’t have Goa’uld or Asgard or Wraith in your universe. Point is, as Maddison explained, the moment they feed, they get a spike in their abilities, including regeneration. That Wraith, after having fed on your friend, could have regenerated its arms right back. What your Ensign did was made sure that it could not get that chance, otherwise your Ensign and your friend could have very well been dead if she had not eliminated the threat.”

Harry sighed heavily, “Look. Just take some time to think about it, all right? You said you are the First Officer of your ship, correct? Discuss it with your Commanding Officer then, get some feedback on it. Anything. These bastards took the lives of my people and surprisingly none of yours. That makes you damn lucky, whereas mine were not. But these things have taken more lives than this, especially this Hive that refuses to talk peace with us. Granted, our Alliance would rather use more stun weapons than our current projectile weapons, lethal weapons. But I chose lethal, because none of these Wraith on board, none of them were willing to negotiate and none of them had any intention of taking anyone alive. They wanted my ship because of its technology and weapons and they were going to kill every single personnel on board. For that, your Ensign did me and my crew a huge favor, because now we only have four Wraith in our hold and not six. Believe me, having too many screams trouble. Especially when they’re still full from feeding.”

James raised his hands. “All right, all right. I won’t do anything until I speak to my Commanding Officer.”

Harry nodded his head. “All I ask. Come.” He resumed on their way to the Bridge, only to meet Maddison, Gomez and the rest there. “Good news I hope?”

Maddison smiled, “The Asgard Core was able to make the adjustments on its own. Very quickly too.”

“Not only that, apparently the Centaur was busy modifying their comms as well. We now have a direct link to our ship.” Said Gomez, who too had a smile on her face.

James looked to Harry who gestured to him to proceed. James stepped over and was a bit confused at first but Maddison then pointed to the three screens just above their heads. Kind of small really but James could make out the bridge of the Centaur. Couldn’t really see Vakai’s face very well though. “Commander!”

“Commander Ryker. Good to finally hear from you. What’s the status over there?” Vakai’s voice rang on the Bridge from the speakers.

James smiled. “Boy. Where do I even begin?”

Vakai stood there in front of his chair as he watched the shuttle craft leave the port hangar bay of the Hercules and made its way towards the Centaur. Most of the team were on their way back to the ship since the crisis on board the other vessel had been taken care of. The surviving four Wraith, as they were called, are in separate holding cells and guarded. His First Officer, James Ryker, decided to remain on board the strange vessel to continue to speak with its Commanding Officer, Colonel Harry Ryker, who Vakai just found out, happens to be a perfect resemblance of James’ ancestor.

Those who are on the shuttle craft are the four ensigns, Chief of Security Koyda, Hazard Commander Maya and of course, Sivol. Who will be going to Sickbay, along with one of the Ensigns, for a final check up before they are sent to their quarters to rest. The one other officer who remained is Ashley Gomez, who’s curiosity had grown the best of her and wanted to remain on board to assist with the repairs.

From Vakai’s understanding in the damage that the Hercules has sustained, is that her shields system are offline, along with her sublight engines, beam transporters, weapons and lastly their sensors. Gomez believes that the sensors are just being affected by the nebula but there was some indications of damage. Some of this were caused by weapons fire, others by crossing through the subspace rift. Gomez made it perfectly clear that they need to get the shields back online before they cross back over to their side of the rift, or they could suffer further damage and if there are hostile vessels on their side of the rift, they would be put in grave danger. And James Ryker was not at all too thrilled on letting them return to their universe without at least getting their shields and weapons back online.

Not like Vakai would refuse to assist another space vessel in need, but he has begun to grow concerned in regards to the storm affecting the colony that is close by. The very colony in which their Captain, Captain Carter, is temporarily in command of a vessel while in charge of the evacuation of said colony. And from the frowning brow on Lieutenant Bazial’s face, he can only assume that the sensors were showing uncomfortable readings on her display. “Got something Lieutenant?” Vakai decided to get the bad news done and over with.

The trill turned in her chair so that she could look directly at him. “Our readings are indicating that the storm is getting worse. Most likely from the effects of the subspace rift behind the other vessel. If we don’t close it soon, we could be looking at severe lightning strikes.”

Vakai sighed. “Of course.”

James stood there on the bridge of the Hercules while he stared out at the Centaur from the forward view port. But he did not stare at it for too long, as his eyes were attracted to all the instruments around him, his curiosity peaked once again. He simply just could not help himself. He was like a child in a candy shop. “What does this do?” He asked as he started to reach for a button, only to get a smack on the back of his hand by one of the officers.

“That would activate the point defense system, our rail guns. Fortunately, if you had pressed it, they probably would not even work since our weapon control system is down.” Said Harry.

James chuckled. “Not sure why I even did that. But this is a bit nostalgic for me.”

Harry raised his brows. “You had ships like this?”

James turned to face Harry and shrugged his shoulders. “Well to be fair, no not really, at least nothing like this. We do have a few very old vessels in the museum that our ancestors used back before the United Federation of Planets was chartered. I’ve visited them all whenever I had the chance and just seeing all these push buttons reminded me of them.”

Harry smirked. “Well we are working on touch screens, as our ships are so advanced as they are, no one is truly safe from an EMP attack. If we tried to make all of this analogue, it wouldn’t be too fun.”

“I’ve been curious. What made you join the Air Force instead of the Navy?” James asked.

“What makes you think I had my eyes on the Navy?” Harry asked.

James shrugged his shoulders again. “Not that I am trying to compare you to my ancestor, just really curious. Have you ever thought about joining the Navy?”

Harry smiled. “I did when I was a kid. Heck for a while that was something that I had planned on doing even when I went through High School. But for some reason, my father and mother encouraged me to join the Air Force instead. They told me that I would have a much different experience than I would in the Navy. So I went through college, joined the Academy and became a Second Lieutenant. Not even a day goes by when my mother and father, oh I forgot to mention they were in the Air Force too, took me straight to Stargate Command. Well first I had to sign quite a bit of paperwork along the way but the second I was done, they did not hesitate to show me my future.”

James nodded his head. “I think my grandfather told me that, and this was passed down of course, when he showed me the pictures of our family, the Harry Ryker in my family had chosen to join the Navy. Probably for the same reasons you had in the beginning. But considering that we didn’t have anything like a ‘Stargate Program’ or whatever it was, I doubt his parents did anything to stop him. In fact, my grandfather said that Harry’s parents encouraged him to go where his heart wanted to go.”

Harry laughed. “To be fair, that is exactly what my parents told me to do, except they were incredibly persistent that I joined the Air Force. For a while my heart leaned towards the Navy but once I got a peak at the Stargate in Stargate Command, my heart began leaning towards it. I knew my parents knew what was best for me, so I never doubted them and to be frank, I am glad that they did.”

James smirked. “Strange how such differences in our universes would influence people in different ways.”

Harry nodded as he folded his arms against his chest. “I still think back on what it would be like to be in the Navy but to be honest, I don’t think I would ever switch branches. I prefer where I am right now.”

James laughed. “I don’t blame you. This is a beautiful ship, regardless how old it looks-”

“Watch yourself.”

James grinned. “But it certainly is up to date on certain technologies. I mean you got shields, beam weapons, energy drones that I could compare to being photon torpedoes in our case and transporters. Of course sensors, communications, stuff like that. But the one thing that separates us apart, is your way of traveling faster than light.”

Harry sighed with a nod. “Unfortunately it doesn’t work here. The hyperdrive anyway.”

James raised a brow. “Why not?”

Harry shook his head. “I don’t know, you would have to ask the egg heads behind it. Major Maddison told me that it has something to do with this universe. It doesn’t make sense to me, to be honest, but I already asked Captain Marks to plot a course and for Lieutenant Hayes to open a Hyer window but upon doing so, the window was completely unstable. Our safety protocols engaged and stopped us from completing the window as well as shut the hyperdrive down. If we had engaged our hyperdrive engines and flown into that window, as unstable as it were, we would have been torn apart. For some reason, this universe is just not allowing us to do it.”

“Huh. Maybe it just needs some adjustments.” Said James.

Harry nodded. “That’s what Maddison said too but she said it could take her weeks, maybe months, to figure out the proper adjustments needed in order to make sure it is stable and safe.”

James gave a single nod. “Ah. Suppose then that would make me wonder if our roles were reversed, would we be able to create a stable warp field around our ship. Oh well.” He shrugged at that.

“Well it’s going to be a bit before we get all our systems back online. I feel like talking to one of them Wraith’s in our holding cells. The one with more brains than brawn.” Said Harry.

James rose a brow. “You really think they are willing to talk?”

Harry smirked. “They don’t have much of a choice right now. Once we go back to our universe and report to Command, we will likely end up either heading straight for the Pegasus Galaxy to meet up with one of the Wraith Hives that we are friends with and hand them over. Or transfer them over to another ship to do that job for us. OR return them to their Hive in a gesture of good will. Just never know what Command will decide. Come on, I’m really curious to see if I can find out what kind of excuse they have for continued hostilities towards us.” Harry gestured to James to follow as he led the way.

It took only a matter of moments but they were now standing there face to face with one of the more agile, mask less, Wraiths. Of course behind a generated force field in the doorway of the cell to keep the Wraith from leaving. With his arms folded against his chest once more, Harry stared into the eyes of his enemy for what seemed like several moments until finally…someone blinked. “Is anyone going to say anything?” Of course it was James that was the one that blinked.

Harry glanced at him for a moment before he looked back at the Wraith. “Look. I know the whole spiel and nonsense that your kind spews whenever we capture you so let’s cut the crap and get to the point. Why is your Hive so insistent on sticking with the old ways?”

The Wraith stood there in silence for a solid minute before he decided to speak. “You would not understand.”

Harry sighed and started to rub the bridge of his brow. “Here we go. I told you to cut the crap…I’m just going to call you Bob, is that okay, Bob? Okay, Bob. What is it you think I would not understand? Just explain it.”

“We must remain who we are if we are to survive.” Said the Wraith.

Harry shook his head. “I guess Bob’s right. I don’t understand. Because your Hive was there when our people laid down the legitimate proof that your kind can survive without feeding on people. We made that discovery…for your people…so that your people no longer need to survive but to live…to live life to the fullest. Is that not good enough for you?”

“All the other Hives know nothing of what we know. They know nothing of the horrors that still awaits us. We must remain who we are if we are to survive against a foe that has nearly wiped our species out.” Said the Wraith (Bob).

James raised his brows and looked at Harry, who too looked at James with his brows raised. They were definitely getting somewhere. Harry looked back at Bob and licked his lips. “So you’re telling me that there is a race out there, that we have yet to encounter, that has nearly wiped your kind out?”

Bob nodded his head. “We call them the Remnants.”

Harry shook his head. “Lovely. A name that your kind has chosen but most likely not what they are actually called.”

“We don’t know the name of their species, just what we know of them. They are incredibly powerful.” Said Bob.

Harry nodded his head. “I know. That’s what I just said. All right, Bob. I’m going to get back to you on this subject. Because I assure you, if we all unite together as allies, we can do anything. But your Hive resisting and causing so much trouble is making everything that much more difficult. So I’ll see you soon, Bob.” Harry then gestured to James to follow as he began to walk away, the guard closing the door afterwards.

“At least you’re getting somewhere…right?” James asked.

“Yeah but I swear to god…we are always finding out that there are some other…more powerful species out there. Like if it weren’t for the Asgard and their weapons and upgrades, we would have lost the war with the Ori. Well. Maybe. SG One had a lot to do with stopping them. But the fact remains is, we really stood no chance against the Ori. And now we got some other unknown, powerful race to deal with? This is going to make heads spin back at Command.” Harry explained.

James laughed. “Tell me about it.”

Bazial turned her head away from her station to look at Vakai. “Sir, the storm is getting worse.” And as if right on cue, the ship’s shields were suddenly struck by lightning. The deck lurched a little bit but enough to raise concerns.

Vakai sighed, “Get me Ryker.”

Comms Officer looked to Vakai. “Channel open, sir.”

—

“Colonel, we’re getting another communication from the Centaur.”

Harry nodded his head. “Send it.”

Then they see Vakai’s face on the forward monitors. “Commander Ryker. I’m sure you are aware but the storm is getting worse. What’s your status?”

James looked to Harry who looked back before Harry turned his attention back to the monitors. “Commander Vakai, this is Colonel Harry Ryker. Almost all of the damaged systems are back online, including our shields but our sublight engines are giving us some trouble.”

Vakai turned his head, someone in the background was speaking to him. Vakai then looked back at the main viewer. “Lieutenant Gatia just informed me that we could use the tractor beam to push your ship, or repel it, give it some momentum.”

James shook his head. “Gomez thought of that already. The moment this ship hits the Subspace Rift, it will cause friction and slow the ship down, eventually to a halt. They need those engines.”

Vakai nodded his head. “Understood. Tell Gomez to speed it up.”

Gomez then came right out of the right corner, now stepped onto the bridge, Maddison right behind her. “Won’t have to, Commander! Sublight engines are back online.” Suddenly the deck beneath them lurched a bit as a bolt of lightning struck the shields.

“We’re going to have a problem getting back to the Centaur though. I don’t think our transporters are going to work in this storm.” Said James.

Maddison grinned, “Lucky for us, a storm like this does not affect our transporter systems. At least our diagnostics indicated that it is functioning properly. All we need is your ship’s shield frequency and we can beam you right over without having to lower shields on either ship.”

Gomez and James looked at each other before they looked back at Maddison. “Seriously?” Gomez asked.

Maddison laughed. “Yeah, this is not really our technology but we’ve had a decade or so to study it and conduct safe experiments with certain test containers with organics and such.”

Gomez nodded her head. “Oh yeah, we use test containers like that too.”

Maddison smiled. “Yeah, and I’m not saying Asgard technology is superior or you know, perfect, but their tech really does have its perks.”

“Makes you wish they were still around?” James asked.

Maddison shrugged her shoulders. “Maybe. I mean, I have a lot of respect for them. But if they were still around, there is some technology that we wouldn’t have that certainly has saved us in a lot of situations. Nevertheless, it is a shame what happened to them. Cloning has a lot of pros to it but also some dangerous cons too and unfortunately they were unable to prevent degradation, the very fatal con of cloning.”

Gomez nodded her head, “I know Starfleet has experimented with cloning before, as well as other empires we’ve dealt with but not to an incredible extent. Well…except for the Dominion but that is a subject and a story that is too long in this current situation.”

The ship lurched once more and then they saw the Centaur get struck by a bolt as well, the shields absorbing it. Harry looked at them, “Ladies. James. I think it is time we get you two back home.”

Gomez made a gesture to question as to where she can input the Centaur’s shield frequency and Maddison pointed to a station. They both went over to it, Maddison guiding Gomez to the right menu before Gomez entered the frequency. Maddison then looked at them and smiled. “All right, I think we are set.”

Harry looked up at the monitors, and he can see that Vakai has been very patient. “Sorry for the wait Commander. Major, if you would please.”

“Yes, sir. Ashley, James. It was a pleasure working with you two and getting a glimpse of our future, even if it is a completely different future.” Maddison said as she gestured towards the front of the bridge where there was a more open space for them.

“It was an absolute thrill to work on your systems. It made me feel like I was working on an NX Class. Almost.” Said Gomez, a ship she had explained in detail to Maddison some time ago.

James looked to Harry after he stopped in the open space beside Gomez. “It was a pleasure to get to know and see how my ancestor has turned out.”

Harry laughed, “Good to know where my future is going. Say, do you know who your Harry Ryker married?”

James threw up his arms. “I have no idea and even if I did, who’s to say you’d marry her in your universe?”

Harry grinned. “Very true. I personally want to thank you both for helping us take care of our Wraith problem and for assisting us in our repairs. I assure you, my superiors are going to have a field day once they read my report.”

James smiled, “I can’t say the same for my superiors but this interaction will certainly raise some eyebrows.”

Harry nodded his head. “Stay safe out there, James. And will you hurry up and marry that woman already?”

James and Ashley looked at each other, smiling before they looked back at Harry. “Technically we already are married. Officially…well, suppose we can get that settled real quick.”

Harry laughed and shook his head. “All right then. Major, beam them over.”

Maddison started typing away at the station and within moments, Gomez and James Ryker were whisked away in a beam of light. In a matter of seconds, Vakai’s face lit up for a split second. “All right then Hercules, I got my people back. I wish you the best of luck on your endeavors.”

Harry smiled at the monitors. “You too, Commander. Hercules out.” With that, the transmission was terminated, and monitors returned to their normal display.

Harry then looked over to Hayes. “All right then, Lieutenant. Bring us around, full one eighty and take us through the subspace rift. Bring our shields to maximum.” Harry then pressed the button on his arm rest. “All hands, brace for turbulence.”

—

Vakai stood there at the center of the Bridge and watched the strange vessel go through the subspace rift. In seconds, the vessel was gone. Vakai sighed, content and relieved that they finally got this over with and can now begin to close the rift. “Have they gone completely through?”

Bazial looked from her station. “Sensors are having trouble with the increased storm activity but I believe that they have cleared.”

Vakai nodded his head. “All right folks. Let’s get this thing closed. Gatia, is the secondary deflector dish ready to go?”

“Yes, sir. All the adjustments have been made.” Said Gatia.

“You may proceed.” Said Vakai.

Gatia entered a few commands and when she was ready she announced, “Firing now.” With a single press of the button, they witnessed a beam of blue light coming out from beneath the view screen, and it made contact with the subspace rift.

“Sensors are showing a change. Reading a ninety five percent in closure. Ninety. Eight five percent.” Bazial continued until Gomez interrupted over the intercom at fifty percent.

“Captain, we’re reading a massive drain in main power. We’re going to have to shut down the beam in a few minutes.” Said Gomez.

“But we don’t have the subspace rift closed yet. If we stop, it could restore to its previous state. We cannot interrupt the process.” As Bazial said that, the ship lurched a bit as the shields were struck once again by a bolt of lightning.

“I’ll see what I can do. Think I will remodulate the shields to absorb the lightning strikes, perhaps even attract them but we will have to be careful and do this quickly or we risk shorting out the deflector dish.” Said Gomez.

Ryker smiled, “We still have our primary. What does it matter if we lose the secondary?”

Vakai glanced at Ryker for a moment before he looked up at the ceiling. “Do what you can, Lieutenant. We need that rift closed.”

“Re-modulating the shields now!” Moments after Gomez said that, the ship began to lurch more as more bolts of lightning made contact with the shields. As each bolt that struck the shields, the lights emanating from the windows and other light sources began to glow more brightly and the beam from the secondary deflector grew more intense with each strike.

“Subspace rift at twenty-five percent and closing!” Said Bazial. “The extra power is giving us the boost we need to shut it, Commander!”

“I’m getting warnings across the board. Sustaining this beam with this extra power is going to overload the deflector.” Reported Gomez.

“Try to level it out, Gomez. We can’t lose it just yet.” Said Vakai as he watched the rift before them get smaller and smaller by the second.

“Ten percent!” Reported Bazial.

“I’m getting warnings on my board too. The deflector is going to overload!” Reported Gatia.

“Five percent!”

“We’re going to lose the deflector before we close it but I have an idea. Everyone hang on!” Soon after Gomez said it, Vakai barely got his rear end into his seat when the ship lurched harder than before and those who were paying attention to the view screen would see a massive ball at the tail end of the beam. Moment that tail end of the beam made contact with what was left of the rift, it completely vanished from space.

Bazial tapped on her screens before she looked over to Vakai. “All sensor readings have been confirmed. The rift is closed. The storm is beginning to dissipate in this area.”

Vakai sighed and sat up straight in his seat, not wanting to look unprofessional while being slouched. “Damage report.”

“As expected. The secondary dish has overloaded. It’s completely destroyed.” Reported Gatia.

“Maybe not completely but it certainly is out of commission. Sure the boys at the yards are going to love us. They just installed it.” Said Gomez over the intercom.

“Sir, incoming transmission from Captain Carter.” Said the Comms.

“Let’s hear it.” Vakai ordered.

“Centaur. I don’t know what you did, closed the rift I hope, because the storm over here is beginning to lighten up finally. We nearly lost a transport, an empty one at that, but otherwise everyone else is doing just fine. We are still detecting a large storm heading this way but we will have the colony completely evacuated and relocated before it arrives. Good work, crew! We’re done here. Hang around a while longer until Command says otherwise. Carter out.”

“Lieutenant, start analyzing your data. Closing that rift shouldn’t have been that difficult. I can bet other vessels are having no issues like ours in closing their rifts.” Said Ryker.

“On it, sir.” Bazial acknowledged and went to work.

Vakai looked at the man. “What are you thinking?”

Ryker shrugged his shoulders. “Probably nothing. But maybe the extent of what the rift was connected to. You know…almost four hundred years into the past…to a completely different universe from our own…perhaps being a doorway made it more difficult to close than others. Or perhaps it was a stubborn, spoiled brat that just didn’t want to go into time out.”

Vakai chuckled. “Suppose we shall see.”

The Centaur is on its way back to the Devron Fleet Yards at cruising speed. The life on board the vessel with merely fifty crew members, was pretty bleak. While most of the crew were going about performing routine maintenance, the four Ensigns were in the mess hall, Ruby and Mizu competing on who can chug the most synthahol. Seemed like a pointless competition where no one will get drunk, but suppose it is about who can hold the most liquid in their stomach.

Gomez and Gatia were down in the torpedo pod section, checking in on the secondary deflector dish. Analyzing the damage and marking the parts that were either completely gone or ones that could be easily repaired.

Maya and Koyda were in the security section, where they were debriefing the rest of their security staff about their encounters on board that strange vessel and the strange creatures that they had fought.

Ryker was on the bridge, sitting in the ‘Captain’s Chair’ while going on and on about his ancestry. Gomo sat at tactical trying to ignore him and Bazial sitting at her station with fingers in her ears.

Sucil was in her quarters trying to speak to Captain Maxwell about reassigning her to someplace else. Explaining that her mission here to keep an eye on Vakai was completed but the Captain does not yet think so and this was making her more frustrated than ever. On a ship this size, she had no office, no staff, she felt not only limited here but also unwanted.

As for Vakai and Sivol, they remained in their quarters together for the duration of the voyage back.

Meanwhile in the ‘other’ universe…

The Hercules just dropped out of hyperspace in the very star system where the Alpha Site was located. When they had finished crossing through the subspace rift, for some reason their communication systems had gone on the fritz and had been unable to contact Command or anyone else. With that being said, with their critical system inoperable, Colonel Ryker chose to head straight for the Alpha Site for repairs. But as soon as the ship had landed in the designated landing pad that had been constructed years ago at the Alpha Site, they were in for a surprise.

“Colonel, multiple beam-ins throughout the ship. Armed soldiers are seizing control!” Maddison reported. She then looked up from her station when three individuals were beamed in right at the front of the bridge, two armed soldiers with their weapons up and trained on Ryker’s crew.

Ryker stood up from his seat and looked directly at the base commander. “The hell is going on, Colonel Matthews?”

“In due time. Authentication code, now.” Matthews ordered.

“Delta-Zulu-Sierra-Niner.” Said Ryker.

Matthews exhaled heavily in relief then gestured his men to stand down before he grabbed his radio. “All teams. Stand down. I repeat, stand down.”

“Sir, we got Wraith prisoners in the holding cells.”

“Colonel?” Matthews looked at Ryker.

“Long story. The hell is going on?” Ryker asked once more.

“Long story.” Matthews looked about before he returned his gaze to Ryker. “We have been trying to contact you since you entered the system.”

“Comm systems are down.” Ryker reported.

“Thought as much but can never be too careful.” Said Matthews.

“Colonel, with all due respect. What the hell is all of this?” Maddison spoke up.

Matthews glared at her for a moment before returning his gaze back to Ryker. “The Russians declared war on Ukraine. They’ve been invading the country since you have been gone. But that’s not the worst of it. The Russians are targeting civilians. All Ukraine civilian offworld research sites have also been hit. No survivors.”

As Maddison covered her mouth, Ryker balled up his hands into fists before relaxing them. “Then what are our orders?”

“So far, NATO and the US have only been throwing heavy sanctions at them. But I’m not going to lie. It’s getting worse. Putin won’t talk to anyone, and anyone who establishes a ‘No Fly Zone’ are effectively combatants in their war. China has also joined them as allies. We have some Ukrainian survivors here from offworld sites that were hit, those that were able to escape through the Stargate. For a second there, when you entered the system and did not respond, we had feared that you were taken over by the Russians or the Chinese.” Said Matthews.

“Sir! A BC-304 just entered the system. Its IFF is Russian!” A Voice came from the radio.

“Damnit. Aside from Communications, is anything else damaged?” Matthews asked.

“No, Colonel.” Ryker told him.

Matthews then pulled out a communication device that was used by the Tok’ra and handed it to Ryker. “That will have to do for now. We need the Hercules ready to act as a deterrent to the Russian ship. They don’t have the same armaments as we do, not all of them anyway. So your ship will be superior to theirs. I can only hope that they will be smart enough not to engage.”

“And if they do engage?” Ryker asked.

“Then the Russians would have effectively brought the United States into this war. Then the President and our NATO allies will have no choice but to inform the world about the Stargate Program. Worse, our current space faring allies are threatening to dissolve the Alliance due to our internal conflict.” Said Matthews.

“Colonel, there’s something else.” Ryker stepped closer to the man. “I had a talk with one of the Wraiths in our holding cell. They finally divulged as to why their hive has refused to come to the negotiation table. They believe that there is a race out there that is far worse than the Wraith. Worse than the Ori. If they do come-”

“If they do come and we’re busy fighting amongst ourselves, then we’ll be nothing but easy pickings for whatever it is. Yeah. Terrific news, Colonel. Earth has been in worse situations before but this time…If what you say is true, I’m not even sure if we can pull a miracle out of this one.” Matthews sighed as he shook his head then brought up his radio. “All teams, depart.” He looked at Ryker. “Get the Hercules in orbit, Colonel. Evacuation to Earth should already be under way but if they choose to attack now…”

“Then we will have no choice but to defend the Alpha Site. Understood.” Said Ryker.

“Godspeed, Colonel.” Matthews told him before he spoke into his radio. Then he and his two guards were beamed off.

“Starting to wish we stayed in that universe.” Said Maddison.

Ryker looked at her, “You and me both.” He looked at his Pilot and Navigator. “Get us back in orbit. And prepare to defend the Alpha Site.”