Silence dominated the bridge of the USS Pulsar, the only sounds coming from the inputs being made to computer consoles from the various stations around the compartment as the Cadets performed their assigned tasks. Seconds had turned to minutes with agonizing sluggishness, as if being inside Underspace had caused time itself to slow to a near-stall. Every shift in the posture of his crew made Ensign Corwin Adler even more tense as he waited for what he was sure would come with the passing of each breath he took. His earlier confidence in handing out tasks had long evaporated, his shallow experience commanding others asserting its presence. Thankfully, no one who would need to rely on him in such a way had the luxury of spare seconds to take notice of him fidgeting in his seat and twitching at every other sound.

“I’m detecting movement,” Cadet Jaya Rixx announced, her voice trembling a little.

“We need more details, Cadet,” the Emergency Command Hologram remarked flatly.

“Right…” Jaya nodded several times as she tried to collect a bit of composure, “Several of the small Vaadwaur fighter craft have broken away from the armada around the structure. I’m not sure if they’re actually going to come our way yet… there’s another corridor not too far from where ours empties into the node that… whatever that big thing is… is sitting in the middle of.”

The hologram frowned a little deeper, “How many is ‘several’, Cadet?”

“Uh…” the Trill again turned to her console for a moment before answering, “Six.”

“How are the scans coming along?” Adler swiveled his chair to the left to look between the two Cadets who had been given that task.

Cadet T’Ven glanced over to the Ensign, “Initial scans are picking up a great deal of subspace interference waves coming from the structure. They match interference that was encountered by the ship prior to your arrival to the Vulcan system. I hypothesize that this is what is responsible for our interruption in communications and warp travel.”

“My scans are picking up heavy shielding and dense armor plating,” Cadet Sella Zh’Ranni followed up just a beat behind the Vulcan, “The structure… I actually think it’s some kind of station given how many ships are docked with it… is also heavily armed. And if it’s what’s been keeping us boxed in, everything I’m seeing makes sense.”

“Can you pinpoint any weaknesses?” the ECH cut in.

The Andorian shook her head in frustration, “No… not yet anyway… I’m still looking, but I don’t know that we’re going to have the time we need to find it. That place is a fortress…”

“Keep trying,” the hologram said, receiving a nod from the Cadet before she turned back to her console.

“Captain…” Rixx eked out the word, “the fighters aren’t going toward the adjacent corridor…”

“We’re being scanned,” Sella barked from her station.

“Raise shields,” Corwin said as he shot to his feet, “How long until they are within weapons range?”

“Two… maybe three minutes,” Jaya said haltingly.

“Get everything you can from your scans in two minutes,” Adler ordered, turning briefly toward the two Cadets before facing forward again. “Turn the ship about and get ready to make a run for the exit as soon as they get close enough to get a lock on us.”

All three Cadets nodded; their focus renewed on the task at hand. Corwin could feel his heart beating in his ears as the panic began to seize him. He was thankful that they’d managed to get useful intelligence, but he knew that if they couldn’t bring that knowledge back to the shipyard, it would amount to nothing. He could feel his stomach tighten just a little more as each second slipped away.

A slight lurch in the deck and a sudden shift in the view through the transparent bridge dome signaled what was the end of their investigation. Cadet Rixx hadn’t bothered to announce the start of their mad dash; she’d just done it. A warning tone sounded at the tactical station just a second afterward that was likely an alert that they’d been momentarily targeted.

“The Vaadwaur are in pursuit,” Sella reported, “We are currently outside of their firing range, but they are gaining.”

“Could we fire some torpedoes in their path to slow them down?” Adler asked.

The Andorian tapped at her console a few times, “Maybe… But with the way these corridors mess with our targeting system, once they’re launched, I won’t be able to guide them to their targets.”

“Then we fire multiple torpedoes in a tight pattern. It will force them to make course corrections to avoid them and break their momentum a bit. We may not hit them, but it will at least give us a few extra seconds before they can engage us,” the ECH said from his station.

“Do it,” Corwin ordered without even a moment’s hesitation.

Zh’Ranni nodded and inputted the required attack plan into the console, the muffled sound of multiple torpedo launches resonating through the bridge. Almost in time with the launch, the bridge lighting dimmed and the crimson warning lights of a red alert condition began to flash throughout the space.

“I took the liberty of setting Red Alert throughout the ship,” the hologram explained when Adler glanced over with a confused expression on his face.

“Oh… right… good… thank you,” the Ensign stammered as he realized he hadn’t ever mentioned it.

A tone sounded from Sella’s console, the reason for it making the young woman’s lips curve up a bit, “One of the fighters didn’t evade our net in time, direct impact to their deflector array. It has stopped pursuit.”

“Nice,” Adler said, sharing a grin with the Andorian.

The deck beneath his feet shimmied erratically, forcing Corwin to hurriedly grasp for the arm rest of his chair to keep himself from falling, “What was that?!”

“The Vaadwaur are attempting to forcibly alter our shield harmonics,” T’Ven responded, “They appear to be attempting to eject us from the Underspace corridor premature of our intended exit point.”

“Can we stop them?” the Ensign asked as another shockwave rippled through the ship.

“I am currently attempting to do just that,” the Vulcan replied as her fingers continued to dance across the console.

“Perhaps we can use their own tactics against them,” the ECH remarked, “Shall I give it a try?”

Adler forced himself back into his chair before looking over to his photonic XO, “If you think it will help, do it.”

The hologram went to work immediately, while Cadet T’Ven continued to fight with shield harmonics to prevent the Vaadwaur from ejecting the Pulsar and leaving them potentially stranded far from Vulcan and with no way to reach them and share what they’d found.

Several rough and jarring impacts rocked the ship a few seconds later, the Vaadwaur ships abandoning their earlier tactic in favor of a show of force. Bolts of polaron energy pounded the shields of the Pulsar, each subsequent hit more damaging than the last.

“Aft shields down to fifty-four percent, Captain!” Sella called out in a voice laced with panic.

The Vulcan added, “They are no longer attempting to eject us from the corridor.”

“They also seem to have better countermeasures than we do for their little trick,” the ECH grumbled from his station, “Though I suppose their response to my attempts was inevitable.”

“You tried,” Adler shrugged, “Cadet Zh’Ranni, return fire as best you can.”

“On it!” the Andorian answered back, her hands a torrent of motion. Her inexperience coupled with the strange spatial mechanics present inside the corridor made it difficult to get much more than lucky hits on their pursuers. And of those that actually connected, none of them proved to be fatal blows to knock the Vaadwaur off their tail.

“How much longer until we make it back to Vulcan?” Corwin called out to his pilot.

“Four minutes!” Jaya half-screamed, the pressure obviously impacting her greatly.

The ship bucked violently as the Vaadwaur continued their relentless assault. The unoccupied console behind Adler exploded under the withering fire, a small miracle amid the chaos unfolding around them.

“Aft shields are offline,” Zh’Ranni reported, “They’re focusing their fire on our torpedo launcher and our nacelles.”

“Can we reroute power from our forward shields to bring them back up?” Corwin asked in the middle of another bout of tremors from impacts to the hull.

“Negative, the shield generator itself was fried. Engineering reports that repairs are impossible while we’re still being hit.”

The Ensign frowned; he knew the Engineering Hologram was right, but that didn’t make the news any easier to stomach. Another violent shaking forced everyone on the bridge to bend forward, Corwin narrowly escaping the embarrassment of being dumped onto the deck yet again. As he scrambled to pull himself back upright, Sella hit him with some more bad news.

“Port nacelle has suffered catastrophic damage, Captain,” the young woman announced, with Cadet Rixx hot on her heels with, “We’re almost to the aperture!”

“Divert all power to the engines, we have to get out of here!” Adler shouted urgently.

Far removed from the danger that was threatening to end the Pulsar and her crew, the newly installed bridge of the USS Century was finally coming online. Captain Gar’rath sat in the central chair while other members of the crew sat at various positions about the compartment. Much of the senior staff was still absent, Lieutenant Khar being the sole representative of that group. Everyone else was either relief staff or departmental deputies, a stark reminder that the Century was not yet whole again.

“Is everything working as intended, Lieutenant?” Gar’rath asked his Security Chief.

“It would seem so, Captain,” the Klingon nodded as he glanced over the various readouts and information being transmitted to and from the bridge, “I believe we can operate from the bridge again without issue.”

“Excellent,” the Gorn said with a small grin tugging at the corners of his maw, “Then I suppose we can shift our focus to…”

“Captain,” Lieutenant Junior Grade Nalah t’Veris interrupted with a twinge of urgency in her voice, “I’m picking up a breach from Underspace.”

“On screen,” the Gorn said curtly. The image that sprang up showed the swirling mass of yellow-brown energy that had accompanied the attack on Vulcan. The difference, however, was that only one of them was visible. His thoughts immediately flitted to the young Ensign that he had, even if only tangentially, sent to explore the corridors and hopefully retrieve valuable intel on their enemy. When the small ship burst through the aperture looking like it was seconds away from crumbling to pieces, the Gorn shot to his feet.

“Helm, get us to that aperture, now!” he demanded, turning to Lt. Khar, “Raise our shields and power up our weapon systems. If anything else comes through that opening, I want it destroyed!”

“Aye sir,” the Klingon nodded, the alert klaxon sounding throughout the ship.

The Century’s warp engines spooled up, and the ship executed a short duration warp jump that brought them from the shipyard to the aperture in less than thirty seconds. This proved to be just enough time for the Vaadwaur ships chasing the Pulsar to breach normal space. Lieutenant Khar didn’t waste the breath it would have taken to ask permission to engage them, choosing to launch a hell storm of phaser and torpedo fire that bombarded and scuttled that small fighter craft after only two volleys.

“Contact the Pulsar,” Gar’rath demanded, facing the forward view screen fully to wait for someone aboard to answer. When Ensign Adler’s face blinked up onto the screen, the Gorn could feel the tension in his body slacken.

“Is everyone on your ship alright, Ensign?” Gar’rath asked, noticing the disheveled appearance the young man had.

“Everyone’s alive, Captain,” Adler nodded with obvious relief, “We wouldn’t have made it if you hadn’t come to our rescue.”

“I’m detecting multiple breaches in their hull, Captain,” Khar remarked behind him, “Any further damage would have likely reached their warp core and destroyed the ship.”

“Engage the tractor beam. We need to get them back to the shipyard,” Gar’rath ordered before again addressing the viewscreen, “Were you able to get anything before you were forced to flee?”

“Yes sir,” Corwin said, the tiniest of smiles bubbling through his haggard face, “I think… we found the cause of the anomaly keeping us cut off from the rest of the Federation.”

The Gorn couldn’t help but feel proud upon hearing those words, “Excellent work, Ensign. You and your crew have my sincere appreciation. Send your findings to the shipyard, and get some well-deserved rest. We’ll take it from here.”

“Thank you, Captain. I think we’ll do that…” the Ensign said with a relieved smile, “Adler out.”

The screen blinked out, the image of the now closing aperture dominating the view once more. Gar’rath turned to his Security Chief, “It would seem the ‘boy and his holograms’ have once again brought us good news.”

Khar shifted uncomfortably as the Captain threw his initial impression of the Ensign at him, “He has proved to be a capable warrior…”

“That he has,” the Gorn smirked, “And now it’s time for us to make good use of what our fledgling warrior has brought us to pay back the Vaadwaur for every transgression they have made against us.”

“SuvmeH jaghma’ vIloS!” Khar barked with a fiendish smirk.