Sol Station shook hard, and then it shook again. “Every ship of the line is firing on the station,” Commander Lewis reported as he looked out a viewport. Sol Station was as defended as any station could be, but even it could not stand forever against the barrage of a hundred ships. “It won’t be able to take much more of this.”

“Then we need to hurry,” Admiral Reyes insisted as they rushed towards the central observation deck. She hoped they weren’t too late, that the Borg drones had not beat them there.

Neither Commander Lewis nor Dr. Hall objected. They fully understood that their chances of survival fell every minute they remained aboard, but they never, even for an instant, considered fleeing for the lifepods. They both knew there was far more at stake than their own lives.

Up ahead, they spotted four officers pinned down in a corridor. One officer had retreated behind a pillar, curling up in a ball, his head in his hands, resigned to his fate as phaser fire exploded all around him. The other three had sheer terror splayed across their faces as they sprayed their phasers with reckless abandon towards the group of advancing drones.

Approaching unnoticed from the flank, Admiral Reyes, Commander Lewis and Dr. Hall opened fire without hesitation or mercy, cutting down the oncoming horde before the Borg assimilees realized what was happening.

The man with his head in his hands looked up, a stunned expression on his face. “I… I…” he stammered, trying to take in the miracle that had just saved them. “I thought we were done for.”

“Not yet, you aren’t,” Admiral Reyes said with fire in her eyes and a warrior’s spirit in her voice. She gestured for him to get up off the ground. “But you need to get up and get your head back in the game, soldier.”

“I’m not a soldier, ma’am,” the man lamented as he struggled back to his feet. “I’m just a nurse from the medical ward.”

Commander Lewis shot the man in medical teal a cold stare. Pitiful, he thought to himself. Every single one of them was a soldier today. Either that, or they woudl be dead. And they were probably all going to wind up dead anyways, but they needed to at least try.

Admiral Reyes took a more pragmatic approach. She knew they’d need every non-assimilated crewman they could rally so she chose her words carefully: “Today, we’re all soldiers. The fate of the Federation depends on us and what we do here. So form up, and let’s get moving.”

“Are we going for the lifepods?”

“No. We’re going for the main observation deck,” explained Admiral Reyes as she began to advance down the corridor one more. The others hesitated. Was she mad?

“But we need to get off this station…”

“No, we don’t,” replied Commander Lewis flatly. The Admiral had given them an order, and they were to follow it. “We are going for the observation deck.”

“But the station is going to blow…”

Admiral Reyes stopped dead in her tracks and turned to face the four officers they’d just saved. “A good chunk of the Federation’s civilian leadership is up on that observation deck,” Admiral Reyes explained, recognizing that they needed to understand why she was asking them to put their lives on the line. “Even if Sol falls, we cannot allow the Federation’s civilian leadership to go with it. It is our duty to ensure the continuity of government.”

The officers looked uneasy, but the pips on the woman’s collar made it clear that it was an order, and her call to action drew them from their panic and reminded them of their higher purpose as Starfleet officers. They drew up and began to move with renewed vigor.

Over dozens of bodies, the group of seven fought their way towards the main observation deck. Along the way, they conscripted a couple more officers, but that was it. Most of the unassimilated had already fallen. The Borg were everywhere, and they were brutally effective.

When at last the team reached the atrium outside the observation deck, they came upon the next problem.

“There’s nearly a hundred Borg drones out there,” reported Commander Lewis as he peaked around the corner. “Looks like the security team got the door sealed in time, but the Borg are just standing there… waiting.”

Admiral Reyes took a look for herself. She agreed with the Commander’s assessment. Even with the element of surprise, there were far too many Borg for them to fight their way through. “The Borg know time is on their side,” Admiral Reyes noted. “All they have to do is hold them there until the station is destroyed, and they will have accomplished their objective.”

“How efficient.”

“We’ll have to find a way around.”

“One step ahead of you,” Commander Lewis replied, already reviewing schematics on a PADD. “We’ll have to double back to a Jeffries tube junction, but we should be able to find a way in.”

The going was slow as they wound their way through a spiderweb of jefferies tubes, but at least there were no Borg in the maintenance shafts. The Borg had other priorities and so, for the first time since the shooting had begun on the promenade, they had a brief reprieve. Still, the clock was ticking down as the phasers of a hundred ships worked their way through the shields of Sol Station.

After what felt like an eternity, Commander Lewis popped the hatch of a jefferies tube to be met by the barrels of a dozen phaser rifles. But these were not the rifles of Borg converts. Instead, they were the weapons of the security detail attached to the Federation representatives that had been attending the ceremony from the observation deck of Sol Station.

“Gentlemen,” Admiral Reyes smiled as she climbed out behind Commander Lewis. “Good to see you all in such fine health.” She got to her feet and looked around. There were a good two dozen security officers here on the observation deck.

“We thought we were all that was left,” came the voice of a Captain in yellow as he stepped between his men to approach the new arrivals. “It’s good to see we’re not alone.”

“Where’s the president?”

“He and his detail were separated from us before all hell broke loose,” the Captain explained as he glanced towards the blast doors of the observation deck. “But we’ve got over a dozen councilors, cabinet officials, and ambassadors sheltered in place here with us.”

Admiral Reyes looked over at the group of civilians standing by the sweeping windows. She could see horror on their faces as they looked out at the fleet firing upon the station. It was all too clear what would follow once those phasers cut through what was left of Sol Station’s shields.

“We don’t have much time,” Admiral Reyes replied. “We need to get these guys out of here.”

“I agree, but how? Back the way you came in?”

“There isn’t time for that,” Admiral Reyes shook her head. If the Captain had thought of that from the start, their might have been time. But not now. The shields were now mere minutes from collapsing. It would take a half hour to go back the way they came in. “We’re going to have to go straight out the front.” She looked over at the blast doors.

“Respectfully Admiral,” pointed out the Captain. “There’s dozens of Borg drones waiting for us just beyond those blast doors, and there’s no cover. It would be suicide.”

“For many of us, yes,” nodded Admiral Reyes, a deep sense of gravity in her voice. “But it is the only chance we have to avoid the decapitation of our civilian government. We form a human shield in front of them, and we push our way through. As long as any of us are still alive when the last Borg drone falls, we have done our duty and ensured the continuity of government.”

The Captain looked skeptical, as did the men around him. It sounded like suicide.

“Look, I’m not going to pretend we’re all making it out of here alive,” Admiral Reyes admitted. “Hell waits for us on the other side of that door. But we are the only shot these folks have, and if we just stay holed up here, the station will blow up, and we’re all dead anyways.”

“And any chance is better than none,” came a firm voice from behind them as one of the government officials approached the group. “Put a phaser in my hand, and I’ll lead the charge myself.”

Although he wore the uniform of a Federation ambassador, the new arrival carried himself with a sense of duty borne of his days as a Starfleet officer. The Captain looked taken aback, but Admiral Reyes smiled. This was the Michael Drake that she remembered. 

“It’s good to see you Michael,” Admiral Reyes said as she drew a phaser from its holster and handed it to her old colleague. Ambassador Drake accepted the weapon without hesitation, his expression showing nothing but focus and determination as he checked its settings. The Admiral then turned back towards the Captain and his men. “The ambassador here is willing to put his life on the line for his colleagues, and if that isn’t inspiration, I don’t know what is.”

For a moment, everyone was silent.

“So let’s do our duty!”

The Captain gulped, but he knew she was right. He pushed his nerves down, and then turned to address his team. “Form up everyone! Let’s get this plan sorted!”

Over the next few minutes, Admiral Reyes and the Captain in charge of the detail, along with Ambassador Drake, Commander Lewis, Dr. Hall and the rest of the team, hashed out the details of how exactly their desparate push would proceed. It was desparate, no question of that, but they would do their duty.

Just as the team drew up in front of the door, the councilors, cabinet officials and ambassadors gathering behind them, a voice came over the intercom. It was the President.

“Do not approach Earth. A signal of unknown origin has turned out young against us. They have been assimilated by the Borg. Our fleet has been compromised, and as we speak, our planetary defenses are falling. Sol Station is defending Earth as best it can, but we’re almost out of time.”

Hearing those words, reality truly sunk in. Sol Station was going to fall, and Earth would fall shortly thereafter. It was all but inevitable. These government officials, if they could get them to the lifepods, might be all that was left at the end of it.

“We have not been able to find a way to stop this Borg signal and unassimilate our young, but I know if my father were here, he’d remind us all that hope is never lost. There are always possibilities.”

Admiral Reyes’ mind turned to the Serenity and the other ships of the line. There was still hope. Maybe Dr. Brooks, Chief Shafir and Lieutenant Morgan would succeed. Or maybe officers on another one of their ships would pull through. There was always hope, but as the station shook again, she was reminded how fleeting this hope was. Their nightmare was upon them.

“Until then, I implore you. Save yourselves. Farewell.”

The intercom cut off.

“It’s time,” Admiral Reyes said as she addressed the security forces and other officers drawn up around her. “No matter what we encounter, no matter how many of us fall, we do not slow, and we do not stop.” Contrary to their training, she’d instructed them to leave the wounded where they fell. “To our last breath, we punch a hole through the enemy so that the Federation may survive.”

The Admiral took a moment to look over at the councilors, cabinet officials and ambassadors in the rear. They looked terrified. But then, as she looked at the Starfleet officers that surrounded her, hope washed over her. Fear and doubt had mostly been supplanted in their expressions by duty and determination. Whatever fears they had, they’d set them aside.

She looked over at Commander Lewis, who stood by the control panel for the doors. “Do it!” she ordered. He keyed the controls to release the lockdown, and the blast doors opened.

Instantly, every member of the security team opened fire on the legion of Borg drones that awaited them. And then came the return fire. The barrage was intense, and there were few places to take cover, but they had no choice. They just kept firing and pressing forward.

At the vanguard, an officer fell. 

And then another.

And another.

But those still standing just kept advancing. They stayed true to their word. They stepped over the bodies of the fallen and just kept on firing, uncompromising in their mission. Their only purpose was to cut a path through so that the councilors, cabinet officials and ambassadors could get to the lifepods.

Admiral Reyes could feel the pain of loss, but more than that, she felt hope as she could see they were making progress. The Borg were falling faster than they were.

And then she was hit. It was a glancing blow to the Admiral’s lower abdomen, but it cut straight through flesh and her right hipbone, disintegrating her ambulatory function in an instant. She fell to the deck.

“Admiral!” shouted Commander Lewis.

“Go!” Admiral Reyes pleaded. She could see the hesitation on his face. Commander Lewis lived by the philosophy of leaving no man behind, but he couldn’t stop for her. Not now. He needed to keep pressing forward. They all did. “Fucking go!” 

And then Admiral Reyes lost consciousness from internal damage from the phaser blast.

She was right, Commander Lewis reminded himself as he fought his instincts. All of them, Allison included, were expendable. And so, without another glance at his oldest friend, he left her behind as he moved forward with the rest of the team.