“Yellow alert. Admiral Reyes to the bridge.”

The room was dark, darker than it should have been. Admiral Reyes sat up in bed and glanced around. Where was the Vesparan sun and its partner, the Underspace-rooted singularity? The Ingenuity was supposed to be holding steady in the violent ergosphere, flooding the aberrant aperture with negative energy density exotic particles to belay its gravitational effects, but now, the deck was calm, and as she looked out the window at the starscape, she could see only the blackness of space. She reached over to the side table and tapped her combadge.

“Reyes to bridge. Report?” 

Out of the corner of her eye, she spied the clock: 1100 hours. That fucking physicist. Dr. Brooks was supposed to call her as soon as Dr. al-Qadir finished recalibrating the warp assembly, which should have been three or four hours ago. Had the modifications taken longer than forecast, or was this just Dr. Brooks thinking he knew better than her? If it was the latter, she’d have a bone to pick with him.

“You should get up here, ma’am. Brooks out.”

Why couldn’t he just give her an update? But she could hear an uncharacteristic urgency in his voice. Maybe he was preoccupied. Swinging herself out of the bed, Allison Reyes shed the soft silk robe and pulled on her duty uniform as she rushed for the door. Jogging down the corridor, she finished zipping it up, and a moment later, she stepped into a waiting turbolift.

“Bridge.”

Admiral Reyes straightened her collar and tapped her foot against the deck while she waited for the turbolift to make its short trip up a couple decks. While Dr. Brooks might have let her sleep out of his own volition, he wouldn’t have turned them away from the singularity without purpose. That much, she was certain of. He knew the stakes. And that meant something had happened.

At last, the door slid open, and Admiral Reyes blazed onto the bridge: “Status report?”

“Well, we took a poll,” Dr. Brooks replied, leaning up against a pillar with a bemused expression on his face as he gestured at the bridge crew around them. “And we all agreed that our dear leader could use a few extra hours of sleep.”

That was not an acceptable answer. The Admiral looked at Ensign Rel, who nodded meekly from the conn, and then at Ensign Seltzer, who cast his eyes away sheepishly. Regardless of if he’d co-opted them into his scheme, this was on him, and she met his gaze with a furious glare. When she’d ceded the bridge to him, she’d been crystal clear.

“But on the positive side,” Dr. Brooks continued, almost seeming humored by her frustration. “A few hours ago, Akil increased reactivity from six percent to twenty two percent.”

“And on the negative side, we’re no longer in the ergosphere of the singularity at all,” Admiral Reyes countered. She didn’t mean to diminish the news. Twenty two percent was a damn fine number, and it would buy the Vespara Prime days, if not a week, of additional life… but only if they were still sitting over the ergosphere injecting exotic particles into the aperture. Their success did them no good if they were racing away from the singularity. “I also can’t help but notice we’re at yellow alert,” Admiral Reyes pushed, noting the dimmed lights and the alert condition. “So again, what the hell is going on?” She was in no mood for his antics.

“Ah yes, that…” Dr. Brooks frowned. “We’ve got company.” He turned towards the operations officer. “Kellan, increase viewscreen magnification.”

“Aye sir,” came the affirmative from Ensign Seltzer.

Admiral Reyes turned towards the main viewscreen as it zoomed in on the ships of Polaris Squadron, which hovered in geostationary orbit over the equatorial belt of Vespara Prime. 

“What the hell?!” Admiral Reyes asked as she took in the view. Polaris Squadron was right where they’d left it, but now it was surrounded on all sides by B’rel warbirds, and a Neg’Vhar battlecruiser sat nose-to-nose with the Polaris, almost as if staring it down. “Where’d they come from? And when?”

“They decloaked maybe a minute before I called you,” Dr. Brooks reported.

“Any reason to presume hostile intent?” Admiral Reyes asked. The Klingon Empire was a declared ally of the Federation, and had been for decades, but by the way the borderland houses often behaved, it certainly didn’t always feel that way – and right now, it certainly didn’t look that way. The Klingon ships looked almost like a pack of coyotes ringing their meal.

“Oh no, none at all,” Dr. Brooks chuckled. “Except that they’re Klingons and they brought a small armada of warships to say hello.” He’d lived through many eras, but one thing consistent among them all was that a Klingon battlegroup decloaking on all sides of you was never good.

“I can’t say I disagree,” Admiral Reyes concurred. She’d followed intelligence reports coming out of the Empire. Ever since Martok had gone missing and Toral had assumed the throne, tensions had risen significantly. Still, while some border houses had certainly been thumping their chests towards the Romulans, they’d not made any moves against the Federation. Not yet, at least, but memories of D’Ghor still hung in her mind. “Have we made contact?”

“No ma’am,” reported Ensign Seltzer from operations. “We alerted Polaris to our intentions, and Captain Devreux elected to wait for you.”

Of course he did, thought Admiral Reyes. Fleet Captain Gérard Devreux, while a phenomenal first officer, was an explorer first, and his natural instinct was to shy away from conflict. “Alright, hail them.”

A moment later, a burly Klingon in traditional battle garb appeared on screen.

“I am…” Admiral Reyes began to say.

“Fleet Admiral Allison Reyes. Yes, yes, we know…” the Klingon on the other end of the viewscreen interrupted, grinning widely with pointy teeth. “Director of the Advanced Science, Technology and Research Activity, a bastion of illustrious scientific research, and Commander of Polaris Squadron, a squadron of warships with victories known even to the Empire.”

“And you are?” Admiral Reyes asked firmly. His tone was gregarious and grandiose, more like a jovial drinking buddy than an avaricious adversary, but he knew far more about her than she knew of him, and his disruptors outnumbered her phasers by more than two to one. That made her more than a bit wary.

“Oh yes, how very impolite of me,” the Klingon laughed. “I am General Golroth, and we come in peace.” The inflection in the way he flared his nostrils as he spoke that final word made her skeptical. “We received your mayday – a planet falling towards oblivion – and we are here to assist.” Again, there was something off in the way he said it.

“We welcome the assistance of our honorable friends from the Empire,” Admiral Reyes smiled warmly, her doubts to the General’s motives well concealed beneath her practiced demeanor. “At the moment, we are building out…”

“Environmental shelters to shield the colonists from the sun as the planet’s orbit continues to decay,” General Golroth interrupted again, the intimation clear that he’d been observing them before revealing himself. “Me and my men, we can dig better than anyone, and my ships, they have space to carry colonists aplenty away from this dying world.” He paused for a moment as his eyes narrowed on her and his expression grew serious. “But you and I, we both know that won’t be enough. Eventually, this world will still fall into the sun. But aboard my flagship, I have scientists too, the honorable and esteemed of Mempa V, and they too are in your service.”

The offer caught Admiral Reyes completely off guard in more ways than one, but she was not going to look a gift horse in the face. “We would be forever grateful,” she offered. It wasn’t like they had a lot of other options. Starfleet was preoccupied, and the clock was ticking down.

“Gratefulness is not necessary,” General Golroth chortled. “Together, we shall achieve glory and prevail over the grand forces of the universe itself. My brigadier will coordinate with your people, and I will beam over with my colleagues from Mempa V shortly.”

And with that, the Klingon hung up.

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Dr. Brooks shook his head incredulously. “A Klingon assault wing shows up, and they just happen to have a team from the Institute aboard? Are you really going to accept their offer?” That was far too much of a coincidence for him.

“What else would you have us do, Tom?” Admiral Reyes asked. “It would be a dishonor to reject them, and besides, we could use their help.”

“Are you sure you’re not letting desperation cloud your judgment?”

“Possibly,” Admiral Reyes admitted. “And we will proceed carefully, but frankly, if Golroth is good to his word, it could save hundreds of thousands, or a million even.” Although Commander Lee and Commodore Agarwal had bought them time, and Dr. al-Qadir had extended it further with their latest findings, Polaris Squadron still did not have the capacity or capability to evacuate everyone on Vespara Prime before it collapsed into the rapidly expanding gravity well. “It seems worth the risk to me.”

“Lockwood’s gonna have a conniption if you let those beasts loose in his lab,” Dr. Brooks laughed. “I’d love to be there to see it, but I gather you’re going to go back to the Polaris to receive them yourself?”

“Seems only natural,” Admiral Reyes nodded. “I don’t think Gérard would ever forgive me if I stuck him with that.” And besides, she wanted to keep a close eye on their new friends. Golroth might have presented like a benevolent humanitarian, but something didn’t feel quite right.

“Well, while you have all the fun over on the Polaris,” Dr. Brooks offered. “I’ll take the Ingenuity back to the singularity and continue our work. Akil said he’s probably got the reaction near its max, but who knows… maybe he’ll find a few more percent somewhere.”

“You sure?”

“Yep, it’s the one assured way to buy time,” Dr. Brooks nodded. If they maintained the new, increased level, they’d slow the orbital decay to such an extent as to buy the planet another eight days of life. “And besides, I’ve gotten all the bridge time I need to be qualified as an OOD now, haven’t I?”

“You’ll do just fine, for now,” Admiral Reyes chuckled. “Godspeed, Tom.” The ex-con most certainly wasn’t a traditional officer of the deck, but she wasn’t going to pull Commander Lee back from the surface, not when her engineering prowess was needed down there, nor would she put the Ingenuity’s vital mission in the hands of the risk-averse Lieutenant Commander Allen. She then tapped her combadge. “Polaris, one to beam over.”