— USS Andromeda, Conference Room 1 —

Erei’Riov Jarval has only been the ship’s third officer for a little over six months in Terran months. The time had sped past, and he had enjoyed working under an experienced captain. The D’deridex-class warbird had been tasked with fighting Klingon incursions into Romulan space and he had savoured the good work of standing up to those savages. Then all of a sudden they’d been cut off from communication with others and had found themselves unable to travel beyond warp three.

If Klingons were smarter they might have been behind it, but it had seemed more like a Federation ploy. It was the kind of all too clever trick the humans would have done. But it had turned out to be this species nobody onboard the warbird had heard of, and they had attacked in force. The ship had put up a fight, but Jarval had been reconciled with dying along with the ship after both of his senior officers had died. Romulans did not have songs of glorious death, but they were not cowards.

The arrival of the Federation had surprised them, and given the warbird a second chance. Now after limping to relative safety he was aboard the Starfleet ship, as their engineers helped to fix the warbird. Him and a Tal Shiar agent sat in the other ship’s conference room across from its captain a brown skinned woman who did not look much older than himself though telling human ages was hard.

“So we’re heavily outgunned,” Captain Carrillo said as she gestured at the screen on the wall which had readouts of all the scans from the attacking forces. Two large ships, four medium sized ones and a number of fighters. One of the large ships would have been hard to handle, two were impossible for the combined power of this Starfleet ship and his own.

“We had been hopeful of launching the orbital weapons platform,” Jarval said.

“Erei’Rov,” the Tal Shiar agent said warningly. He glared at the younger officer who was now in charge.

Carrillo paused, “Orbital weapons?”

“To defend against Klingons attacks across the border a number of our world’s have automated weapons platforms,” Javal said.

“This is unacceptable,” the agent huffed.

“The weapons are clearly not operational,”  Javal said, ignoring the agent. Likely they would all die anyway, so listening to the Tal Shiar seemed like a waste of time.

“How long would you need to get them operational?” A tall broad Andorrian man who was the Starfleet ship’s first officer asked.

“There is resistance on the ground, but ideally we could have it working in an hour,” Javal said. The orbital defences had nearly been completed when the invasion had happened. The only reason the warbird had been in the region was to try to get it going before the invasion happened.

The idea of being able to put a team on the ground, have them fight their way to the complex where the orbital defence controls were and then being able to activate it all while the Starfleet and Romulan ships fought with the attackers was daunting. 

As if doing the math in his head the Andorian looked at the statistics of the enemy forces and then at his captain and nodded, “If the platform is working we have a shot.”

Carrillo nodded, “I agree. The trouble is the Andromeda can’t last against that force on its own. We’d need like five more warbirds.”

Javal sighed, “If you an create a distration we can insert a command team.”

“Okay, we get in, drop the team and get out. Return when things are ready?” Carrillo said.

There was a lot more to work out, but the basic idea was sound if risky. The main question seemed to be what would the Andromeda be doing for the time it would take to bring the defenses online. The Vaadwaur were already placing teams on the planet, and the longer they were allowed to do so the harder it was going to be to fight their way to the planetary system.

The plan was going to require the D’deridex-class warbird to sneak in while the Andromeda engaged their foes. The issue was the estimates for how long the Andromeda could hold out against superior firepower was significantly less than the amount of time insertion of a ground based assault team and the activation of the defense system was estimated to take. While Javal had no issues sacrificing a Starfleet vessel in defense of a Romulan world, he did not want to seem too eager to see the Federation sacrificing itself.

With the meeting over the two Romulans returned to their ship, which currently had teams of Starfleet engineers assisting the repairs to make the ship combat ready. In what was now his office the Tal Shiar agent that had accompanied him to the Federation ship confronted Javal.

“You are betraying the Romulans, you are betraying your post,” the older man accused gesturing towards Javal. Normally over years of service you were meant to build up your relationship with the Tal Shiar, a mutual understanding that while imperfect helped smooth over some of the edges. Being elevated by the deaths of his superiors Javal had never had to concern himself with the Tal Shiar before, and he could focus on naval matters. 

“I am doing what I can to free a colony,” Javal snapped as he wanted to fall into a chair and nap for the rest of the day. He had not slept since their first encounter with the Vaadwaur. 

“You are in love with that Starfleet woman,” the agent accused.

Javal was not a man to roll his eyes, but nor was he a man given to anger. He simply adjusted his tunic and eyed the agent. He had not yet gotten down the aspect of being threatening, or of handling outrageous claims. So unwisely he said something explicit about the Tal Shiar agent’s romantic abilities.

“Humans are frail and weak,” Javal added, “but I will use them as needed to accomplish our tasks.”

“I hope you have more to contribute to the defense of our territory than innuendo,” Javal said gesturing to the door, “now leave and be glad I do not execute you.”

It was a hollow threat, but Javal felt close enough to the end of his rope to actually try to see if he could pull it off. In normal times he would not be able to but now, well who knew. Having made the threat however Javal realized he was going to maybe actually have to carry it out. When normal life did return the agent would not stand for the defiance that Javal had shown.

— USS Andromeda, Ten Forward —

“I don’t actually know enough about your relationship to the intelligence services to understand why this is a problem,” Captain Olivia Carrillo said upon hearing Javal’s tale.

He had distracted is Tal Shiar handler with keeping tabs on the Starfleet engineering teams aboard the Romulan warbird, and went to speak with his counterpart. They were now in a large lounge with great windows looking out onto the starfield that surrounded their ships.

“A Tal Shiar officer ensures loyalty, they report on your behaviour and watch for signs that you will betray the Romulan cause. But their word is worth more than action, get on the wrong side of one and even if you are loyal you will be punished for calling into question their authority. Command of a vessel usually means enough prestige to mitigate some of this, but having risen quickly…” Javal trailed off.

“You don’t have the juice to tell him to shove it up his ass,” Carrillo said.

“An interesting metaphor, but yes,” Javal said, “So I request that an accident befall our Tal Shiar friend, in the chaos of everything.”

Carrillo shook her head, “Sorry but I’m not going to arrange the death of a foreign agent. He might be a dirt bag but if there is an after this I don’t want to start a war.”

“Then I request asylum,” Javal said.

Carrillo exhaled, “Shit, okay. Here I thought we’d just take on an overwhelmingly dominant military force and liberate a planet, but I guess you want to make this tricky.”

Javal understood that this was something. Sarcasm maybe. Carrillo rose, draining her glass of synthahol and said, “Follow me. We’ve got someone to talk to.”