“Situation.” Karinu stepped into Ops, and as she did T’Ren rose from the command throne, moving to the tactical station. The space was quiet, staff working at their stations.

“Four attack ships have broken away from the main force,” T’Ren said as she took her seat. “They are approaching at top speed. The remainder of the attack ships are remaining with the cruiser.”

“They will seek to move our defenses out of position,” Kron said. “To prevent us from focusing our fire on the cruiser.”

“Good strategy,” Karinu said. “The Vorta in command has memories of battle, at least. How long until they arrive?”

“Six minutes,” T’Ren said. “The orbital platforms are in place to intercept them.”

“Suggestions?” Karinu looked around the room.

“We give them what they want,” Kron said. “Let them split our defensive platforms, then cut their attack ships apart.”

“And the cruiser?”

“Harry it,” Hawke said from her place at Operations. “A massively superior force can fall against a sufficiently clever harrying attack. The Dominion will expect us to use our runabouts against their attack ships, where the matchup is closer – where two or three runabouts can possibly match one. We use them all to keep the cruiser distracted, damage its systems, keep it from focusing on the station’s shield.”

Karinu nodded. It was a good plan – anything that kept the cruiser’s fire off the planetary shield would help with their mission. “The nearest support will be thirty minutes away when the attack ships arrive, assuming they aren’t delayed.” With how widespread the Dominion attacks had already become, there was no guarantee any help would come at all, regardless of how long they held out. “We have to hold at least that long. Deploy the runabouts in sentinel positions around the platforms, where they can benefit from the platforms’ shields. In four minutes, go to red alert.”

It was the longest four minutes of her life.

Garen Epok hung in space, a rogue asteroid cast against the violet of the Valoris Nebula. Lights spotted its surface, though one by one they winked out, until the only way the station could be seen was its occlusion of the light from the Valoris and the swarm of smaller lights on its trailing side – the running lights of its complement of runabouts and the five Dominion-built orbital platforms that defended the asteroid, and the station at its core, from attack.

Suddenly, four streaks of light appeared, flashing and becoming objects. The violet scarabs immediately scattered, dodging shots from the polaron weapons on the platforms, though Platform 3 scored a hit on the starboard nacelle of the third attack ship.

T’Ren’s fingers moved quickly, and she once again appreciated the time she had spent in simulations of Roosevelt’s odd tactical setup before her assignment to the station. She sent one platform after each of the attack ships, the thrusters on the platforms sending them spinning to spread hits across their shield facings and maximize the benefits of their regenerative shields. The runabouts broke away from the platforms after the initial attack, splitting into pairs and attacking. Phaser fire from the runabouts and polaron beams from the platforms sliced at the shields of the attack ships, and the attack ships spun to retaliate.

“Targets Alpha and Delta are damaged,” T’Ren said. “Shields on the platforms holding.”

“Hold torpedoes,” Karinu said. “Stick to beams. You’re doing well.”

“Six minutes until the main Dominion force arrives,” Kron said. “Nine until Starfleet gets here.”

That meant three minutes of Roosevelt standing alone against the Dominion fleet. T’Ren let her expression slip into a frown, her focus on her console. She passed control of platforms three and four to Kron, focusing on the three she retained. The Klingon took them smoothly, and the two officers began their grim work. It was luck – an error on the part of the Jem’hadar pilot – that netted them their first kill, as Bravo shot to the side to avoid a hail of phaser fire from two runabouts and dodged directly into a shot from platform one. The ship exploded as the spinning platform shot away from it, coming in to support platform three.

There were many reasons working in Ops on Roosevelt was different from any other combat posting in Starfleet. Where battle aboard a starship or starbase was a shower of sparks and plasma fire, Roosevelt’s operations center was quiet apart from the barked words of the staff and the beeping of consoles. The floor stayed stable under Amie Hawke’s feet, the systems simply continued to function. Ops was simply so far from where any enemy fire might impact the asteroid that they were physically shielded from the battle.

That did not mean there wasn’t work to do. Keeping the station’s weapons remote had many advantages – the orbital platforms could spin and move, covering more of the station’s surface than turrets possibly could. They operated independently of one another, so damage to one would not impact the operations of the others. But there was one flaw – disruption of communication could disable the platforms. The Dominion knew this. They had built them originally, though the platforms had seen numerous upgrades since Starfleet took the station. And they were trying to exploit it.

“Charlie down! Shields on platform 3 at 78%!” Kron’s voice rose, filling the room.

The battle Hawke fought was less dramatic than that T’Ren and Kron waged. She did not fire weapons or command runabouts. But it was no less critical. With quick shifts between encryption protocols and communications frequencies, Hawke held off whatever Vorta or automated systems on the Dominion ships were attempting to block or hijack the station’s communication with the platforms.

It was ironic, she thought as she worked, that there was no one of her generation with her skill and talent at forcing technology of disparate origins and purposes to work together. For one whose home had seen the lightning rod as a cutting-edge invention to rise to her position…

She smirked. If only they could see her now.

“They are here.” Kron spoke the words, and Hawke looked up to the viewscreen in time to see the arrival of the main Dominion force. One cruiser, flanked by another eight attack ships, appeared out of warp.