Commander Mira Novak leaned back in her chair after her eyes had begun to lose focus as she read another status report. She let out a slow, tired sigh as she considered the situation for what felt like the hundredth time. By station reckoning, they had recently passed the two-week threshold of being displaced in a universe that was either actively trying to expel them or exterminate them. Four days had gone by since their captors turned protectors had examined their sensor logs. After what seemed to be some breakthrough on their part, according to Lieutenant Grant’s report, the being departed and not a soul had reported a sighting since.

Mira had thought to consult the Watcher regarding their silence, only to discover that he had returned to the Infirmary and had been placed in a medically induced sleep to assist in his very slow recovery. Doctor Vreen had stated rather bluntly that she was amazed he’d managed to stay conscious to render what assistance he had, given how slow his body was healing. She had mentioned that the pain he was likely experiencing eclipsed by an order of magnitude what his species likely could tolerate under normal circumstances.

With no way to contact their supposedly allies, the crew had been forced to accept the silence and carry on the business of keeping the station operating. This had created a need to distribute a good deal more information to the residents than they had originally planned. Rumors regarding their situation had grown to a point just below the point of no return, driving the command team to finally outline the situation. While the populace did not panic or riot, everyone could feel the tension in the air after they released the information. Trust in the Starfleet crew hadn’t been destroyed, but it would likely be strained for some time even after their return to their own universe.

Logistically speaking, the station was still capable of supporting most of the daily necessities for the population they boasted. Facilities were still running, services were being provided, and only those shops that relied on through traffic had shut down so far. Novak had been forced to make a few concessions to those shopkeepers, but wouldn’t have to make good on them until after their return. As her mother used to say when she was younger, it was a problem for a future version of herself to worry about.

Mira’s eyes drifted toward the large windows that rested against the back wall of her office, the dark and unfamiliar array of stars hanging steady and silent in her field of view. She lamented, for a brief moment, that the M-11 colony hadn’t been there instead. Despite the challenges of having to navigate colonial politics, Novak would have sincerely preferred to do so rather than having to deal with multiversal incursions and beings that hunted paradoxes into extinction.

As Mira continued to stare outside of her window, her thoughts moving away from the moment toward flights of fancy, a glint near the corner of her eye drew her attention. A search of the sparsely dotted space in the window didn’t yield an answer right away, the scene remaining unchanged for a long moment while she scrutinized it. When her mind had almost settled on having imagined it, another ripple of light appeared not far from where she’d been looking. Her eyes tried to latch on to the fragment of motion but it was just fleeting enough that she couldn’t resolve whatever was causing the strange flickering.

A frown formed on Novak’s lips after she caught another hint of movement, a fragment she actually could resolve. It looked like a small, amorphous shape tumbling through space in an erratic pattern. The shape itself reminded her of the strange vessel that was parked inside of the barrier with them. She stood and leaned against the waist high cabinet that stood between her and the window itself to see if she could catch sight of the craft. The station’s slow rotation had brought her office just outside of the view of the strange craft, prompting her to push herself away from the window so that she could tap her commbadge without falling forward awkwardly.

“Novak to Ops, are you detecting any movement from the unknown vessel?” Mira inquired, a frown still pulling at her lips.

Lieutenant Commander Holv’s voice replied through the speakers, “We haven’t seen any…”

The pause confirmed her suspicions before the Bolian actually said anything further. Her feet were already in motion when Jakrin’s voice returned. “I just saw filaments moving away from the craft, but I can’t track where they’re heading.”

“I’m on my way,” Novak informed him. “Have Commander Reid report to Ops if he isn’t already there.”

“I’ll let him know. Ops out.”

Mira’s pace quickened as soon as she cleared the small platform her desk rested on and moved out into the corridor beyond. Once through the nearby door into the Operations Center, Mira’s eyes moved toward the center of the compartment where a large holographic screen was hanging in mid-air. The image of the craft, from the back of the room, looked static. The closer she moved toward it, the more dynamic the image became. Small pieces of polished material were drifting away from the large vessel, some swiftly and others lazily. While it was obvious that they were moving, the purpose of the movement and where they might be going remained a mystery.

“Have we picked up any transmissions or energy signatures?” Novak asked.

“Visual sensors are all we have working,” Holv remarked, frustrated. “Had you not mentioned you’d seen something, it might have taken us a bit longer to realize something was happening.”

Mira folded her arms in front of her. “Then they’re still jamming our sensors.”

“Every system they’ve crippled is still… well… crippled,” Jak said with a small shrug. “Engineering has been working on trying to bypass whatever they’ve done, but nothing they’ve tried seems to make a difference.”

Novak looked back up at the screen hanging above their heads. “It would have been nice for them to tell us something beforehand…”

The sound of footfalls behind her drew Mira’s attention. Commander Reid was approaching with a similar hurried pace she had adopted not long ago, his face openly displaying his concern. He was looking up at the scene playing out, eyes darting from place to place as more of the craft broke away.

“Did something happen to them?” Vernon asked after watching in silence for a few moments.

“Couldn’t say. They’ve got everything but visual sensors still locked out. I haven’t seen anything that looks like an explosion, so I assume this is intentional,” Holv answered his friend’s question.

“Why would they intentionally break their own ship apart?” Reid asked, his face contorting in confusion.

“Perhaps,” Mira said after a short pause. “It was never a ship to begin with.”

Both men looked toward Novak, their expressions silently urging her to continue. Mira let the silence hang for a few moments while she deliberated on how far she was willing to allow her own speculations to go before voicing them.

“I’ve been thinking about how they’ve appeared on the station the few times they’ve actually made their presence known. Unlike how we use transporters, they seem to walk through a rift in space. Who’s to say that rift can only connect them to places in the same range as our transporters? There were several ancient civilizations, like the Iconians, that could walk through portals that connected opposite sides of the galaxy. Can we say for sure that they don’t also possess something like that?” Novak postulated.

“I hadn’t witnessed their arrival before, so that’s news to me,” Reid admitted before sinking into thought.

“I was here when they showed up and I didn’t catch that little detail. I thought the rift moved around them somehow,” Jak remarked with a small chuckle of self-derision.

“I might not have noticed it myself if I hadn’t been staring them down when they left abruptly on our first meeting,” Mira said, her eyes shifting back to the screen.

While the bulk of the object was still intact, an obvious cloud had formed around it, moving slowly toward the visual sensor’s point of view. Several of the officers around them began to whisper to one another about what was happening, each theory just as wild but not immediately dismissible as the next.

“I’m reading movement at what is assumed to be the edge of the barrier, Commander,” one of the officers at a tactical console announced.

“Is it another object?” Reid asked.

“Negative. It appears to be a lifeform of some kind,” the man responded.

“Put it on screen,” Novak ordered. The view shifted to another point in space, dominated by the same form that had devoured the shuttle several days before. Mira felt a tremor move up her spine as she looked at the creature hanging in the dead of space.

“What is that thing doing here?” Novak asked before she could stop herself.

Reid reeled back a bit as he asked, “What the hell is that thing?”

“That’s one of those Loom things we told you about,” Holv answered.

“That’s the thing that made me forget that shuttle you mentioned we supposedly launched?”

The Bolian nodded. “The very same.”

“Now I understand why you said I was lucky I didn’t see it…” Reid said, his voice doing a poor job of masking his disdain.

The officer at the tactical station cut into the ongoing commentary. “Three more have been sighted.” The screen shifted to reveal the additional Loom floating in what appeared to be a loose array just beyond the edge of their protective barrier.

“Has the barrier keeping them out failed?” Reid asked, looking down at Holv.

Jak shrugged apologetically. “I really wish I knew. Even when sensors were working, we couldn’t detect the barrier. We wouldn’t even know what to look for to say if it was failing.”

“That’s a fair point,” Reid said with a wry smile.

“Commander…” the tactical officer spoke up again.

“How many more?” Novak said as she turned toward the man.

“I’m counting thirty, with more popping up out of nowhere by the second,” the officer responded.

Mira took in a steadying breath as she considered the information for a brief moment. “Issue a station wide red alert. Have all civilians and non-essential personnel move to the innermost part of the station.”

“Why core ward?” Reid asked.

Mira turned toward her Executive Officer. “When the last one was… erasing the shuttle, it did so piece by piece. Even with a swarm of them out there, it will take time for them to… eat through the station. I’m not sure if our supposed protectors are trying to help us, but it looks like whatever they are doing isn’t going to happen immediately. If we buy enough time, even if some of the station is removed, this will save as many people from being removed from existence as possible.”

“I see,” Reid said, a ripple of quiet disgust forming on his face. “Do you want me to head down and coordinate efforts personally?”

Novak understood that there was a layer of personal interest in his request. He was, after all, living on the station with his family. In any other situation, Mira might have admonished him for what could have been seen as prioritizing his personal feelings over his duty. With the Loom waiting just a thousand kilometers away, Novak saw no point in denying him what might be very precious last moments with his loved ones should their efforts be in vain.

“Do it,” Mira said firmly, giving him a brief nod.

“On my way,” Vernon said, returning the nod. He spared a momentary glance toward his friend, who gave him a similar nod of understanding before he hurried out of Ops toward the turbolifts. The compartment dimmed just as Reid departed, crimson lights replacing the usual warm lighting.

Novak leaned heavily onto the central console and glared at the screen as she waited for whatever was going to happen next to occur. Time seemed to slow to a crawl as she watched the Loom seem to multiply before her eyes while the filaments from the object nearby continued to drift in their direction. Even the pulsing red lights seemed slower than usual, as if the station itself was hesitating in the face of its potential doom.

What bothered Mira the most as she stared down what might simply be inevitable was the uncertainty. Not knowing whether they were moments away from salvation or seconds away from death rankled at her. Though she wasn’t one to make grand displays, not knowing whether to even attempt to encourage her crew or guide their thoughts toward something pleasant before the inevitable made her feel like she had in some way fallen short as a leader. Her own mentor might have pretended, at the very least, to know which direction was best and commit to a course. Novak, however, couldn’t settle for either because neither seemed right in that moment. So she opted for the only thing that did, quiet observation and strength in that silence.

A small tremor pulled Mira from her thoughts, her eyes moving from the screen to the surface she was leaning against. As it became more pronounced, Novak turned to look at her Operations Officer to see if he noticed it too. The puzzled look on the Bolian’s face made it obvious that she hadn’t imagined it, and his quick response showed that he was already anticipating her question before she’d voiced it.

“Internal sensors are picking up a resonance throughout the entire superstructure,” Holv said after a moment of quiet investigation.

“Suspected cause?”

“I’m not sure,” Jak said as he continued to enter commands into his console. “The vibrations look to be affecting the entire station simultaneously… either the station itself decided to have a full body convulsion, or something outside that we can’t pick up with visual sensors is making it shake.”

Mira frowned at the response but couldn’t deny that after everything they’d experienced, the station quivering on its own could have genuinely been the answer. She pushed the somewhat nonsensical thought aside and looked back up at the screen.

“Give me a view of the vessel,” Novak requested.

Holv entered the request and the holographic display shifted from the sea of Loom to the object that had been, until recently, far from the station. What they saw on the screen was enough to give everyone in Ops pause. Gone was the slightly misaligned pyramidal shape, a vast blue-white maw of swirling energy in its place. The massive torrent of energy seemed to be moving toward them at increasing speed, which seemed a logical reason for the station to suddenly start to vibrate.

“What do you think that is?” Jak asked in a voice barely above a whisper.

“I don’t know,” Mira confessed. “But I hope that’s our way home.”

The Bolian’s lips twitched upward briefly before he returned his attention to his console. The once subtle tremor shifted toward a more noticeable shake as the display was subsumed by the blue-white glare of the energy vortex. When they could no longer see any hint of space in the feed, Mira reached over and cut off the feed, casting the room in the gentle darkness of the alert status. The movement of the station forced Novak to her knees as many of the officers around the room scrambled to cling to their stations. Several lurching motions rocked the station before it all just… stopped.

For several seconds, no one in Ops moved. Mira had, at some point, stopped breathing and finally took in a lung full of air. The sound seemed to break whatever spell had gripped the rest of the crew, everyone pushing themselves back upright from their braced position.

“Report,” Novak said as she slowly rose to her feet.

Holv spent the next few moments trying to assess their condition before he let out a breath of relief that felt so sweet to him in that moment that he almost forgot he’d been asked a question.

“Our sensors are back online,” he reported as he looked up at Mira. “M-11 is right where it should be, subspace relays are transmitting data to us… we’re home.”

It only took the crew a moment for the realization to register. Several rose from their seats and embraced one another in unbridled relief and unrestrained celebration. Novak looked around the room at her crew reacting in their various ways to the news that they had, despite being powerless to influence the outcome, made it through their ordeal. Jak leaped out of his chair when the enthusiasm in the room finally got to his head. He scooped Mira up by her waist and lifted her up into a bear hug, laughter rolling from deep within his chest.

Novak allowed him to spin her around like that exactly one full turn before she said flatly, “Put me down, Mister Holv.” While he did comply and set her back onto the deck, the hug did not abate for another seven full and extremely uncomfortable seconds for Mira. When she was finally released, Novak graced the excited man with a withering glare that did exactly nothing to dampen his spirits.

“Sorry about that… got caught up in the moment,” the Bolian said with a mischievous grin.

“I’ll be sure to note that in my log…” Mira said with an edge in her voice that wasn’t quite hostile but couldn’t be considered friendly either.