“Shields up. Hailing again, Captain,” said the tactical officer. Unlike Vale, he still wore one of the black stealth suits the away team had been issued for the prison rescue operation. His suit was torn, bloodied, and caked with dust: he had obviously spent as little time as was permissible getting patched up in sickbay following the rescue raid.
“We started hailing them right after the sensor web detected their launch from Remus,” Vale reported. “Their only response has been to drop their cloaks.”
Which means either that they know there’s no longer any point to maintaining their cloaks,Riker thought. Or that they’re about to attack Romulus.
Or both.
Riker leaned forward as he studied the image on the bridge’s panoramic central viewscreen. The cloud-streaked blue-brown orb of Romulus stood out in sharp detail, the curving shadow of its terminator temporarily consigning half of the planet—including Ki Baratan—to darkness. Two of the planet’s four airless, rocky moons were visible as well, each of them in half phase, poised on the twilight boundary between day and night.
Beyond lay the pockmarked orange hellworld of Remus, which appeared to be only a quarter the size of Romulus because of its relative distance from Titan.Though it was co-orbital with Romulus, Remus had an eternally broiling day side as well as a perpetually frozen night side. Less than half the planet’s bright side was visible, dominated presently by its ever dark and frozen hemisphere.
Harsh white sunlight glinted off the gray-green hulls of what appeared to be dozens of vessels, which were flying in formation and dropping in a long graceful arc from un-inviting Remus toward the cool blue world that Titanorbited. The incoming fleet’s trajectory confirmed that it had just crossed the shallow gulf of cisplanetary space—a span scarcely larger than the distance between Earth and Luna—that separated Remus and the fleet’s obvious target, the surface of Romulus itself.
Vale quickly consulted one of the consoles built into the arm of her chair. “None of these ships are on the cutting edge of Romulan design, Captain. Most of them are Amarcan-class warbirds. Some appear to be Klingon cast-offs that might be K’t’inga-class or even old D-7s. There are even a few horseshoe-crab–shaped birds-of-prey that have to be at least a hundred years old.”
“They must be decommissioned ships, then,” Riker said, nodding his understanding. “Mothballed long enough ago that the Romulan military wasn’t keeping a close enough eye on them during the last few sudden management changes in Ki Baratan.”
Vale shrugged. “Maybe so, Captain. But wherever the Reman crews got these ships, they’re relatively well armed—and they outnumber us nearly six to one. They’re more than a match for us, maybe even with our Klingon escorts.”
“They’re charging their weapons systems, sir,” Keru said, his voice steady, though pitched a bit higher than his customary baritone. “And their shields are going up.”
“Alert the rest of the convoy,” Vale said to Keru.
“And tell the commanders of the Phoebus, T’rin’saz,and the Der Sonnenaufgangto get their ships into a higher orbit,” Riker added. “They’re not equipped for combat, and I want them out of the line of fire.”
“Aye, sir,” Keru said, already working the companel.
Riker turned toward Vale and noticed then that her gaze had drifted, just for a second, toward a conspicuously blank space on the bulkhead beside the main turbolift. It was the spot they had reserved for Titan’s dedication plaque, once the captain and first officer finally agreed on exactly what they wanted to have engraved on it.
“How could the Romulan military lose track of so many warships?” Deanna asked, shaking her head incredulously.
“This kind of thing has happened before,” Riker said. “After the Cold War of Earth’s twentieth century, a lot of questions were asked about the whereabouts of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet, as well as its stockpiles of weapons-grade nuclear material.”
“Mr. Keru, any sign of Romulan planetary defenses?” Vale asked, turning toward the aft tactical console.
The large Trill shook his head. “I’m picking up a gabble of planetside communications, Commander. The local defenses are trying to respond, but they seem to be in disarray.”
“Just as they probably have been ever since Shinzon’s attack on the Senate,” Riker said.
Glancing aftward, the captain saw that Akaar was standing silently beside the turbolift, making his stolid presence as unobtrusive as a man his size possibly could. Ambassador Spock and Commander Tuvok, still clad in the Romulan civilian garb they had been wearing at the time of their rescue, stood flanking him. All three men seemed to be taking conspicuous care not to get in anyone’s way. Riker momentarily considered ordering the malnourished-looking Tuvok to report to sickbay, but decided to leave that for later; like Akaar, Spock, and everyone else on the bridge, Tuvok’s attention was riveted to the drama that was unfolding on the bridge’s central viewscreen.
“The sensor nets are picking up intermittent tachyon emissions,” said Jaza, turning from the science console. “They may indicate the presence of other nearby cloaked vessels. And they don’t match the tachyon profile of General Khegh’s warships.”
“So whose ships are they?” asked Vale, who was still standing before her chair as she studied the main viewscreen.
“They’re apparently Romulan,” Keru said.
“More Remans?” Deanna said.
Riker shook his head. “I’d bet real money that they have Romulan crews.” He felt certain that Commanders Donatra and Suran wouldn’t have left the Romulan capital so utterly open to a Reman sneak attack, which they surely must have suspected was coming. But they might not have been able to post a large force—either because of dissension within their own military hierarchy, or out of fear of provoking Tal’Aura, Durjik’s hard-liners, or even the Tal Shiar.
Ambassador Spock stepped down into the center of the bridge, simultaneously facing Riker, Vale, and Deanna. “Captain, you see before you an eloquent argument in favor of returning me to the Reman leadership. Immediately.”
Riker sighed. “You may be right, Mr. Ambassador. Unfortunately, I’m afraid the opportunity to do that may already have passed.” Spock treated him to a withering glare as the captain moved up to the upper portion of the bridge, passing Akaar and Tuvok as he crossed to the tactical station.
“Any response yet from the Remans?” Riker asked Keru.
“No, sir. I’m continuing to hail.”
“And there’s still no definitive evidence that the Romulan military is intact enough to mount an effective defense,” Vale pointed out. “The Remans have a lot of ships, and there are a hell of a lot of soft targets down there.” She was still standing, bouncing slightly on the balls of her feet. Once again, Riker noticed that her gaze lit fleetingly on the missing dedication plaque.
Looking toward the screen that displayed the approaching Reman fleet, Riker said, “Mr. Keru, get me General Khegh.”
A moment later, the image of Romulus and the Reman-operated flotilla that threatened it shrank and withdrew to the upper left quadrant of the screen. The rest of the image area was now dominated by the ruddy illumination of the Vaj’s crowded bridge; in the foreground was the grinning, jagged-toothed face of the commander of the local Klingon forces.
“This is an exhilarating spectacle, Captain Riker, is it not?”Khegh said, punctuating his observation with a coarse guffaw.
“That wouldn’t quite be how I’d describe it, General,” Riker said, standing before his command chair. “You’ve received my tactical officer’s alert. You know that the Remans are in control of those incoming vessels, and that the Romulans might not be able to defend themselves from them. We can’t just sit by while Romulus is decimated.”