“Sit.”

The one-word order to both MacIntyre and Velan as they entered the ready room and the flat manner in which it was given answered their most immediate question – ‘How bad is it?’

Neither of them spoke as they took a seat opposite the captain. What could they say really in light of Fremek’s declaration of a Borg attack on Earth during the Frontier Day celebration? Fremek had been tight-lipped, insisting on reaching out to Starfleet Command and refusing to say anything further. ‘It’s not my place,’ she’d stated in response. The least she could do was provide priority access to Cardassian subspace relays for Atlantis to reach out to Deep Space 47 and Commodore Aben Ch’Thobar.

And while the captain had immediately gone to her ready room to make the call, it had left MacIntyre to clean up the current mess. And keep Atlantis out of the small bit of fighting that occurred as the rest of the Breen raiders came up in pursuit, right into the waiting guns of three Cardassian Galor-class ships of relatively recent vintage. It had been like shooting fish in a barrel.

“Admiral Shelby is dead.” The captain went straight to the point. “Spacedock is a disaster and Home Fleet is either shot to shit or scattered to limit their damage should something happen again.”

“What the hell happened?” Mac found himself asking without even thinking about it. Just an automatic response to get more context, more information to make things make sense.

“The perfect fucking storm of conspiracies it sounds like,” Tikva said, managing to make every word a curse. “Command is still either putting the picture together or getting it out to the fringes, but it sounds like Changeling infiltrators, some long-con by the Borg and sheer fucking hubris.”

A padd was picked up off Tikva’s desk and tossed lightly to Velan. “Official orders to disconnect and remove all Fleet Formation hardware from my ship.”

Velan looked it over briefly, nodding and then set the padd down on his lap. “It’s mostly disconnected already. This,” he tapped the padd, “does explain why it was firing off and causing us problems.”

“We just had to be a test bed for it, didn’t we?” Tikva quipped.

“To be fair ma’am it got us to Deneb. We couldn’t have coordinated with Papakura as well as we did without it.” Velan saw the look on her face and held up his hands in defence. “Just saying. I’ll have it disconnected by the end of the shift and we’ll have it fully removed by the end of day tomorrow.”

“Dump all the hardware in security containers and seal them up tight when you’re done.” Then the captain turned on Mac. “I see the Cardassians are still hanging around.”

“Gul Fremek said she would wait to see if we needed any assistance. And to recover the crew of the Rubic as well.” He looked the captain over and what he saw wasn’t the woman he was used to seeing. “How bad is it really?”

“Thousands dead at Earth alone. But this attack apparently happened everywhere across the Federation at once.” She waited a moment to let that sink in. “Atlantis was cut off from communications and therefore the Borg activation signal didn’t get to us. Fucking circumstance spared us.”

“A Borg signal caused all the problems?” Velan asked. “How?”

Tikva leaned forward, elbows on her desk. “Somehow the Borg were able to assimilate everyone under a certain age or what have you. Whole crews suddenly found themselves either assimilated or fighting off assimilated crewmates. And either hijacked by the Borg, or by Borg drones activating Fleet Formation and taking ships right out from under ships still in Starfleet control.”

“Great Bird,” Velan cursed. “Screw end of shift ma’am, I’ll have the hardware removed by the end of the hour.” He glanced at a chrono and then offered a slight smile and correction. “Next hour maybe.”

“Sounds good to me,” Tikva said, then turned to Mac. “Our passengers all transferred over to the Cardassians?”

“Yes ma’am, including an Andorian scientist we rescued. Doctor T’Halla Shreln. Apparently working with the university team aboard the Rubic and asked to go along with them. No record of her on our computers and the Cardassian scientists vouched for her. They all beamed or shuttled over to the Galten fifteen minutes ago.”

“Good. One less thing to worry about.” She sat back once more. “We’re heading back for DS47 immediately. I’m going to ask Gul Fremek to escort us as far as she can in case something comes up. If we’re given the all-clear we’ll let her know.”

“That really necessary?” Mac asked.

“Half the bridge crew could suddenly go Borg on us at a moment’s notice. It’s necessary until I’m told it won’t happen again. Commodore Ch’Thobar said he’d pass on any information as soon as he hears it and from the state of how things went down on the station, I don’t doubt he’d tell us just to let our nerves settle.”

“The fucking Borg. Why is it always got to be the Borg?” Mac grumbled.

“Your guess is as good as mine,” Tikva responded. “Velan, get that hardware disconnected and uninstalled right now. Mac, get us ready to move. I’ll call Gul Fremek right now and arrange things with her.”

It was hours later, with Atlantis underway once more, not even stretching her legs with her Cardassian escorts, that Mac found Tikva, sitting in a half-dark Captain’s Mess. She’d opted for one of the tables by the windows, parking herself in one of the single seats. Getting himself a drink was the only delay between his entering the Mess and sitting in the seat opposite his captain, only a coffee table between them.

“Your speech to the crew was…a hell of a thing.”

“I had to tell them before we opened up communications again.” Tikva’s drink was sitting on the table in front of her, untouched. Or at least this glass was. Instead, she was playing with a model in a gloomy light, twirling it around and examining it from multiple angles. “I just got off a call with the Commodore. No more chance of the Borg uprising apparently. Turns out a geriatric ship and crew dealt with the problem.” She tossed the model at him, which he caught easily enough.

Looking at it, a small golden Galaxy-class model, he couldn’t help but frown. “What’s the oldest Galaxy-class ship currently in commission?” Then another question hit him. “Wait a minute, a Galaxy-class starship took out a Borg threat? Just one? By itself?”

“For the third time too.” Tikva glared at him, then picked up her drink, ice clinking against glass, then down then liquid in one go. “Not just in history, in its own history.”

He sighed at her, pointedly not enjoying the guessing game. “Third time, in its own history? So twice before?” He looked back at the model, studying it for a moment, trying to summon history lessons from the depths. And then it hit him. This wasn’t a model of a Galaxy-class starship, but a very particular one. “No. No fucking way.”

“Taken straight out of the Starfleet Museum according to the latest report I read. Took on some sort of Borg mega-cube over Jupiter.”

“That doesn’t make any sense. It was just a saucer last I saw it at the museum.”

Tikva scoffed. “USS Syracuse, when she was decommissioned, apparently had her stardrive donated. To make the Enterprise museum quality once more.”

“Something something they don’t make them like they used to?” he offered, a slight toast before sipping at his drink. Synthehol whiskey, fine enough for most occasions but right now was leaving an odd taste in his mouth.

“Honestly, feeling a little useless. We have one of the newest built and advanced Sovereigns in the fleet, one of the best crews as far as I’m concerned and if it had been us there instead, we’d have been fucked over by the Borg and our own starship.” The captain slumped in her seat.

“Well that’s not the Captain Theodoras I’m used to seeing. You’d have come up with something.” He set the drink and model down on the table and leaned forward. “Honestly cap, what’s up?”

“I’m allowed an off day every once and awhile right?” she countered, offering a wane smile. “Ask Lin, or hell any of the Fantastic Four. I can get a little…introspective after a disaster.”

“When you realise you could have, should have died?”

“By my own count, I’m sitting at four times now. Yet here I am.”

“One moment,” Mac said, then stood, collected both drinks and went about getting proper drinks this time. Glasses were set into a replicator for reclamation, fresh ones procured and real alcohol from the precious supplies within the Captain’s Mess used this time. Whiskey from a bottle just old enough to be considered acceptable, he returned and handed a glass over to Tikva. “Fate protects children, fools, ships named Atlantis and apparently those destined to walk her halls.”

The captain gave him a brief glare, then sipped at her drink. “Okay, you bring me real whiskey, you can get away with that tortured phrasing.”

“I’m your first officer. It’s my job to call you out when I see it and bring you a drink when you need it. Plus it gives me an excuse to drink as well.” Sitting himself back down, he put on a serious face. “The crew are going to want to see you on your A game when the news starts settling in.”

“I know,” Tikva answered. “It’s why I’m in here. And yes, I know, they’ll want to see their captain is what you’re getting at.” Another sip of her drink and she perked up a little, but even he could see the effort it took. “Port Royal is still set up for Frontier Day, isn’t it?”

“Yes, it is.”

“Good.” And then he saw the energy he normally associated with his captain return. She had something to do. “I’m not letting some cybernetic zombies steal our damn holiday. We’ve got a few days before we get back to DS47 so we’re going to celebrate. And honour the fallen.”

“Sounds like a plan,” he answered with a smile.

“Damn right it does,” Tikva confirmed. “So, here’s what I’m thinking…”