Above the storms of Paldor, lightning clawed upward in sheets of molten gold, turning every viewport into a furnace window. To the Secundi, it had always been the breath of the Great Gods. Tonight, it sounded like judgment.

Aboard the Mavek’du, K’Rath stood beneath that apocalyptic light and felt nothing but hunger. The storm’s song was wasted on him; it was only noise that would soon be drowned by the screams of his enemies.

On Refinery Eight, Seren Athell pressed both pale hands to the cold plazglass. The thunder that rolled through the decking was no longer the voice of her gods. It was the laughter of demons wearing Klingon armor. She prayed… to the storms… to the Gods… to any power that had the ability to protect her people.

Aboard the wounded Thunderchild, rising from the cloud layers like a half-drowned animal, Captain Rynar Jast tasted copper and burnt insulation and still managed to whisper, “Hold the line,” as he positioned his ship to protect the innocent lives on Refinery Eight.

And on the bridge of the aged cruiser T’Ong, K’trok felt the deck plates shudder beneath his boots as the scrapped together disruptors power cycled and the torpedo launchers came online; he thought, Today is a good day to die!

––––––––––––––––––––––––––

The Mavek’du’s forward disruptors glowed the color of poisoned jade, death in the form of brilliant green light.

K’Rath rested one gloved hand on the railing, chin high, savoring the moment the way a hunter savors the heartbeat before the kill.

“Weapons,” he said, voice calm, almost gentle. “Primary batteries on the T’Ong. K’vort wings, dorsal arcs on the Federation vessel.”

The hull vibrated with barely leashed fury.

K’Rath inhaled the scent of battle, the ozone of charged weapons, the sweat of his warriors, the metallic odor of engines at full power, and smiled.

“Open a channel. Let them all hear.”

The link crackled alive across every ship, every platform, every terrified Secundi ear.

“My warriors,” he declared, “above this gas giant stands an Empire that grows strong. Below us lie weaklings who believed we would be denied. And here…” he gestured lazily toward the silhouettes of the Thunderchild and T’Ong on his viewscreen, “here is Starfleet, bleeding, refusing to die quietly. Hiding behind a museum piece, led by a warrior whose father sold his own house, not even worthy of target practice.”

He lifted his hand.

“That rusting hulk couldn’t threaten a Pakled salvage tug, yet its fool captain dares bare his teeth at me.”

He dropped his hand.

“Fire.”

Green lances tore the void.

––––––––––––––––––––––––––

The first disruptor lance struck the T’Ong just forward of the neck, a green fire splashing across ancient shields that had not tasted battle in three generations.

The cruiser groaned like an old, wounded targ. Deck plates bucked, lights flickered, and the air filled with the copper stink of scorched tritanium.

K’trok did not flinch.

He stood in the center of the bridge, boots planted wide, letting the ship’s pain roll through him the way a warrior lets an enemy’s blade kiss his ribs before the counter-strike.

“Shields at sixty-two percent and falling,” Vornak reported, his biosynthetic eye glowing crimson as it drank in damage telemetry. “They are concentrating fire on our forward arc.”

Meklar’s hands were already moving. “Disruptors charged. Returning fire!”

Twin spears of verdant energy leapt from the T’Ong’s cannons, carving dark furrows across the lead K’vort’s shields. The smaller ship rolled, trying to bring its torpedo tube to bear.

K’trok’s voice cut through the smoke. “L’dren. Our Romulan surprise.”

At the auxiliary engineering console, L’dren’s blood-streaked fingers danced over cracked controls.

“Torpedoes armed, Captain. Launcher is hot. Guidance is… temperamental.”

“Just hit them,” K’trok growled.

The deck shuddered again as another disruptor bolt hammered home. Somewhere aft, a coolant line burst with a hiss like a dying serpent.

L’dren did not look up. “Targeting the lead K’vort’s port cannon pylon. If we take the wing, the bird falls.”

“Do it.”

The launcher cycled with a guttural roar that rattled teeth.

A single Romulan plasma torpedo, sleek, silver-green, slid from the tube and ignited.

On the K’vort’s bridge, warning klaxons screamed too late.

The torpedo punched through failing shields and detonated against the port wing in a blossom of white-green sunfire.

The entire pylon sheared away in a spiral of burning metal. Secondary explosions rippled down the spine; the K’vort listed hard, engines guttering, trailing plasma like blood.

Meklar let out a low, savage laugh. “The bird is grounded.”

K’trok allowed himself the ghost of a smile.

“Let the others see what happens when relics remember how to bite.”

He turned back to the viewscreen just as the Mavek’du’s main batteries began to glow.

“Brace for impact,” he said defiantly.

––––––––––––––––––––––––––

The first volley struck the Thunderchild like a god’s hammer.

Blue fire rippled across the forward shields as the green disruptor fire dissipated. The deck lurched so hard Jast tasted blood where he bit his tongue.

“Forward shields thirty-eight percent!” Vok shouted over the shriek of alarms.

“Structural stress along the dorsal ridge,” Sorel added, fighting the helm as it bucked like a wounded animal.

Smoke curled from ruptured conduits. Emergency lighting painted the bridge red.

Jast blinked back tears caused by the acrid smoke, “Return fire.”

Amber phasers shot upward, carving glowing scars across the nearest K’vort. The smaller ship staggered but held.

“Minimal effect,” Vok reported, voice tight. “They’ve adapted harmonics.”

Of course, they had. K’Rath was a butcher, not an idiot.

Another barrage. The lights died, flickered, came back at half strength.

K’Rath’s voice slid across the open channel like oil.

“Captain Jast. I almost admire your persistence.”

Jast did not answer. He simply looked at the viewscreen, at the scarred T’Ong shielding the refinery, at the Secundi lights flickering below.

––––––––––––––––––––––––––

The old bones of the T’Ong groaned under the onslaught.

Conduits burst like severed arteries. Smoke boiled across the bridge in acrid clouds. Sparks rained like dying stars.

K’trok wiped blood from his brow and stood unmoved while the deck tried to throw him to his knees.

K’Rath’s condescending face filled the viewscreen.

“Your time has passed, K’trok. Look how you cling to that derelict, guarding insects.”

K’trok’s answer was soft.

“Meklar. All channels.”

The link opened. Every Klingon ear in the system heard what came next.

K’trok stepped forward until only his face remained in the pickup, scarred, bleeding, and defiant.

“Listen to me, sons and daughters of Qo’noS,” he said, and his voice was not loud, but it carried like a war-drum across every bridge.

“Today, a coward hides behind three ships and calls it strength.

Today, he endangers the lives of unarmed workers and calls it conquest.

Today, he spits on the memory of Kahless and dares to call it glory.

I am old. My ship is older still.

But the blood in my veins remembers a time when Klingons died facing their enemy, not slaughtering the weak from orbit.

If you fire now, you fire on that memory.

If you fire now… You fire on me… K’trok, son of Morak, Lord of House Varek.

And I will still be standing when your names are forgotten. I will watch your agony in Gre’thor from the halls of Sto-vo-kor.”

Dead silence answered him.

Even the storms below seemed to pause.

––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

In the observation gallery, Secundi huddled together, translucent robes stained with soot and the sweat of fear.

A child began to sing the Zephyric Chant… thin, trembling, barely audible over the thunder of war.

One voice became ten.

Ten became a hundred.

The song rose through smoke and fear until it felt like the station itself was singing, a fragile shield of sound against the fire outside.

Seren Athell closed her eyes and let the voices carry her.

For the first time in days, she was not afraid.

––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

Captain Torval leaned forward, sweat shining under pulsing crimson lights aboard the Bird of Prey Qob’taH.

“Target the T’Ong’s reactor! Finish them!”

Dravak stood at tactical, knuckles white on the console.

K’trok’s words still rang in his skull.

Is this the Empire of Kahless… or the empire of butchers?

He looked through the viewport: the old cruiser burning but unbowed, the Starfleet ship placing her broken body between innocents and death, the refinery lights flickering like candles in wind.

Then he looked at the image of K’Rath’s smug, gleeful face being broadcast.

Torval snarled. “Dravak! Lock those disruptors!”

Dravak drew his d’k tahg in one smooth motion.

Torval reached for his own blade… too slow.

Steel flashed.

The blade slid home beneath the captain’s ribs. Hot blood spilled across Dravak’s wrist.

Torval stared at him, betrayal in dying eyes.

Dravak twisted the knife anyway.

“Someone has to remember what it means to be Klingon,” he whispered, and let the body fall.

He turned to the stunned bridge crew.

“For honor.”

They answered with a roar that shook the deck.

Dravak pivoted to tactical.

“All disruptors, target the Mavek’du.”

––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

The first traitor volley struck the Vor’cha’s starboard bow like a thunderclap. Dark green armor plates peeled away in molten curls. The forward torpedo bay vented fire into space.

K’Rath staggered, caught the railing to keep his feet.

“Who fired on us?!”

“Source is the Qob’taH, Commander. They… they have turned.”

K’Rath’s howl of rage was almost inhuman.

“TRAITORS!” K’Rath roared, “Enough! Fire until nothing remains but slag!”

A second blast carved along the dorsal spine. The bridge lights died, replaced by the red of emergency lamps and the white of venting plasma.

K’Rath slammed his fist into the armrest.

“Helm! Withdraw!”

––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

Hope arrived like cool water on burned skin.

Vok stared at his board. “The Qob’taH is firing on the flagship. Torpedo housing destroyed.”

Velar’s voice cracked with exhausted wonder. “K’trok got through to them.”

Jast rose from his chair.

“Then we make this count.”

“Tactical, all forward phasers! Helm, ventral arc on the Vor’cha, now!”

Sorel threw the dying ship into a desperate banking turn. Phaser arrays, half of them dark, flared gold anyway, carving glowing more wounds across the Mavek’du’s belly.

––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

Through smoke and blood, K’trok looked at L’dren.

She stood at auxiliary fire control, hands shaking, eyes bright with exhausted pride.

“Forward tube back online,” she said, nodding to the console display showing the plasma torpedo cradled in its launcher.

K’trok placed his walked over to Melkar’s station, scarred hand over the firing stud.

He pressed it home.

The torpedo leapt across the void, an emerald comet striking the Mavek’du just below the bridge.

The explosion rippled outward in a perfect, terrible silence.

The Vor’cha’s command deck vented into space in a brief, brilliant blossom of fire and frozen air.

K’Rath’s final snarl was cut short as the feed abruptly ended.

The mighty vessel on the viewscreen rippled as their cloak activated and was gone, as was the wounded Bird of Prey.

Vornak’s fingers flew across dying sensors.

“Cloak engaged… no residual ion trail, no gravimetric shear. He’s gone.”

K’trok stared at the empty space a moment longer, then tapped the comm panel with blood-slick fingers.

“T’Ong to Thunderchild.”

Jast’s voice came back, hoarse but steady. “Thunderchild. Go ahead.”

“He’s cloaked,” K’trok said. “Do you have him?”

A pause.

“Negative,” Jast answered. “Sensors are blind. He’s gone.”

K’trok exhaled once, slow and deep.

“Then let him run,” he said quietly. “A coward’s life is punishment enough.”

He closed the channel, looked out at the calming storms, and allowed himself the faintest of smiles.

“Secure weapons. Today we remembered who we are.”

Above the refinery lights, two scarred ships drifted in shared silence while the lightning finally began to fade, and the thunder, for the first time in days, felt almost gentle.