“Allison, you’ve hardly touched your eggs. It’s not like you to skip a meal.”

Admiral Reyes didn’t so much as look up. It was as though she hadn’t even heard him. She just poked unenthusiastically at her scramble. Her mind was elsewhere, far beyond the dining room where she and Captain Devreux sat sharing breakfast as had been their ritual nearly every Monday since August 8, 2394, when the pair first set out on a five-year mission of deep space exploration together.

“It’s the trial, isn’t it?”

“No shit, Sherlock.” The words just sort of came out before she could think about them. Of course it was the trial. It’s not like anything else was happening as they slowly meandered across core Federation territory towards the Meronia Cluster. As an aggrieved expression flashed across his face, she remembered herself. “I’m sorry Gérard. You didn’t deserve that.” He was, as always, just trying to help. She set her fork down and met his gaze. “I can’t help but wonder if I caused this whole thing?”

“These have been trying times,” Captain Devreux replied as he thought back. Over Nasera, they had almost lost their entire squadron, and nine hundred and thirty five sailors never made it home. “What was anyone to do but fight to survive?”

“That was an exceptional non-answer,” Admiral Reyes noted as she raised an eyebrow. “If I didn’t know better, I’d think you might be practicing for a deposition of your own.”

“Captain Lewis is a grown man, Allison,” Captain Devreux reminded her. “His choices, whatever they may have been, were his own.” They hadn’t even been able to communicate in real-time with him for the two weeks his team operated covertly on the Dominion-occupied world.

“Were they though? Were they really? I know who he is, and what he is capable of.” This wasn’t their first rodeo, and she’d used him knowingly. “When we received orders to retake Nasera, I knew how outgunned we were going to be. I wasn’t sure we’d succeed, but we had no choice but to try.” It was the first time she’d admitted her doubts. Throughout the battle, and even in the aftermath, she stood strong with confidence and conviction, a leader who inspired those around her to follow her into hell itself. “He was my hail mary. I sent him there knowing that, if there was any chance of success, he’d find it… no matter the lines he had to cross.” And frankly, in those desperate moments, she hadn’t given those lines a moment’s thought. It was war of the worst kind, and they had to prevail. For those on Nasera. For those across the Deneb Sector. For the Federation itself.

“I’m no Dorian Vox or Jake Lewis,” Captain Devreux offered, referring to his fellow captains who were far more war-weathered than him. “I’m just an aging explorer who was thrust into the midst of a bloody war I never wanted.” It wasn’t what he’d signed up for, but it was where he’d found himself on March 16, 2401, standing on the bridge of the Polaris as they barreled towards their end. “So Allison, believe me when I say there wasn’t another move. Not that would have seen the people of Nasera freed from the yoke of the Dominion. Not that would have seen us survive. You were moments from death when the shooting stopped, and we weren’t that far behind you.”

Suddenly, Admiral Reyes wasn’t in the room with Captain Devreux anymore. Suddenly, she was back on the streets of Nasera II with blood on her hands and fire in her eyes…

“Vox, I need aerial support,” she shouted over her combadge. An explosion went off, hitting a burned out vehicle and sending two of her officers flying. Their bodies landed among the rubble, and neither got back up. “And I need it now!” 

“Tasking Diligent Three. ETA three zero seconds.”

She rummaged through her pack, hunting for a laser illuminator. Polaron blasts and mortar fire rang out. Explosions and debris flew everywhere. She needed to find that illuminator. She needed to find it, or they would all be dead. After what seemed like an eternity, she finally had it in her hands.

“Admiral Reyes, this is Diligent Three, coming out of the west. Call it as you see it.”

She focused. Where the hell was the mortar fire coming from? Another shot went off. She saw the flash from the rooftop a block away. She didn’t flinch as the round exploded nearby and two more officers died. She needed to keep eyes on that building. She lit up the laser.

“Target marked, one eighth klick south by southeast.”

“Diligent Three proceeding, kill box four alpha. Attack direction west.”

“Confirmed Diligent Three.”

From the cockpit of the Aspara-class bomber, the pilot locked in the target. But the building was awfully close to friendlies, including the admiral that had called him in. “Be advised, danger close,” he cautioned as his ship screamed towards the target.

“Roger, danger close,” she acknowledged. “Bring the rain.” There wasn’t another option. If the Aspara didn’t clear that mortar team, they’d be dead anyway. The relentless barrage of shells had already felled a third of their squad. 

She heard the screech of the bomber tearing overhead.

“Incoming!” she screamed as she covered her head with her arms. Three projectiles lanced across the night sky. The explosion lit up the streets, and the ground shook as the building turned to rubble. The mortar threat was no more. 

As dust blanketed them, she made out the bright light of another projectile. But this one had come from the surface. She knew instantly what it was.

“Diligent Three, vampire, vampire!” she shouted, but it was too late. 

The Aspara exploded in a blaze of orange light. Her heart fell. If she hadn’t called that pilot in, he’d still be alive.

“Admiral, we’ve got another problem!”

She turned just in time to see a Dominion armored vehicle advancing down the thoroughfare towards them. She glanced back the way they’d just come, but there, another armored vehicle sat, soldiers already piling out. They were completely surrounded.

But she didn’t die on that dark and bloody night. Instead, just as the Jem’Hadar closed in around them, they suddenly stopped. They stopped, they laid down their weapons, and then they gave themselves over to death. There was simply no explanation, except that Captain Lewis and Dr. Hall had engendered the surrender from the Vorta commander they’d captured at the governor’s mansion. Captain Lewis had never elaborated though, and she didn’t ask. They both knew better.

“We owe him our lives,” she noted.

“I know.”

“You never really liked him.”

“Not really, no,” he admitted. “But I like Commander Drake even less.”

Admiral Reyes chuckled. Captain Devreux had always questioned her choice in bringing both of them aboard, but she’d been selecting for specific traits, and that meant looking past their obvious defects. Unfortunately, it had gotten away from her this time.

“And Allison,” Captain Devreux added. “If I’m being perfectly honest, I’m not the same man I was before Nasera. What the Jem’Hadar did down there, it was pure evil. Only a monster could have done what they did.” Darkness washed over his face as he recalled the doctor whose wife was killed in front of him when he refused to turn his lab into a biological weapons plant… the woman who they amputated with hacksaws and a welding torch to inspire her brothers to work harder… and little Marvolo, the nine year old who was executed for just wanting to play. “And maybe we needed a monster of our own to deal with them.”

“It won’t be the last time.”

“I wish you were wrong, but you’re probably right.”

Admiral Reyes’ thoughts drifted back to the trial that lay ahead. Commander Drake couldn’t be allowed to win. “This isn’t about loyalty to an old friend,” she finally offered as she set her fork down and rose from the table. “It’s about being ready for the next time.”

As much as he wished he didn’t, Captain Devreux agreed. Nasera had changed him. It had changed them all.