Saratoga NX-3842
Supreme Overlord of the Universe
THis story is a bit of therapy, where fiction is taking a page from home life. Will post more as it's available:it's available:
Brice Kellin stole one last glance in the holographic mirror, ran his fingers through his rapidly thinning hair and headed into the corridor.
“Bridge to Captain Kellin.”
“Yes, Captain,” he asked of Walter Schumacher, commander of the USS Thunderchild, the Akira-Class vessel he was currently traveling aboard.
“We’re through the Bajoran security checkpoints, we’ll be docking at Deep Space Nine in seven minutes.”
“Excellent timing,” Kellin replied, “I’m on my way up to the bridge as we speak.”
He tapped his combade, terminating the link and continued his march towards the nearest turbolift alcove. A lot had changed in his life over the past ten years and here he was, returning to that one point in the galaxy that seemed ooze destiny from it stars. Bajor. He’d served under Benjamin Sisko for a number of years and new full well the god-like status the Bajorans had bestowed him with, naming him their emissary. Kellin, while not quite a god, had so far experienced one of the strangest careers in Starfleet history. He was now taking a new step, back into the fleet that had cashiered him out nearly three years ago. After the incident with the Efobi in the distant corners of the Beta Quadrant, Starfleet had been forced to court-martial him for the loss of the USS Saratoga, the first ship he’d ever commanded.
Kellin recalled the days after the ship’s loss. Only himself and Commander Vanick, his trusted right hand had been spared, when the xenophobic Efobi, had passed their judgment and declared the Saratoga and her crew to be trespassers and obliterated the ship with a single burst from their neutronium cannon. They had spared Kellin and Vanick, allowing them to return to the Federation to tell their own people to stay away from that particular corner of the galaxy.
The problem was the Saratoga should never have been anywhere near that sector. They had been on a routine mapping mission in the Dakoran Cluster when they’d picked up what had appeared to be a distress signal. It turned out to be faint radiation but Kellin had been sure it was the sign of a temporal transponder. Starfleet had decided given his temporal incursions that he posed to great a threat to Federation security to remain on active duty. They’d trumped up charges against him and threw him out.
He still remembered the look in Admiral Cerjak’s eyes when he’d removed the pip’s from Kellins collar and denounced him with a dishonorable discharged. It’d hurt like hell and for many years, Kellin wandered. His wife and daughter were living in San Francisco at the time and were crushed. They knew what his career had meant to him. He’d wandered for a while. He worked for a Ferengi company, doing tech work, he’d spent some time on Farius Prime helping root out bad debtors and the filth of the Orion Syndicate for Farius Security. But nothing had fulfilled him.
Until six weeks ago when Admiral Cerjak had beamed to his front lawn in Buffalo, New York and pleaded Starfleet’s case. Captain Kira Nerys of Deep Space Nine was stepping down. She’d married and was retiring to the farms of Dakhur on Bajor. After ten years as commander of the station, she was losing her edge she said and wanted a change. It presented Starfleet with a huge problem. For the past six years the Bajoran system had been the spot of increasing terrorism by Cardassians, still reeling from their defeat twelve years earlier in the Dominion War. Bajor had essentially been locked down. It was feared Cardassian operations were trying to reach the Gamma Quadrant to reestablish their old ties with the Dominion. With the Great Link gone, and only the Vorta and the Jem’Hadar left to run most of the quadrant, protecting the wormholme had once again become Starfleet’s number one objective.
“And let’s face it, Brice,” Cerjak had said. “You’ve been out there, you know the players involved and you know what it takes to fight them back if it does come to war. You’ll be fully reinstated; rank of captain, and the station and the Defiant will be yours,”
Kellin had waited no time at all in accepting. He was once again going to make a difference.
The turbolift doors hissed open to reveal the spacious bridge. He took a few steps in, and remained on the aft quarter deck near the tactical station. On the main viewer, he saw his former and future home growing ever larger against the sparkling eddies of the Denorias Belt.
Welcome Back they seemed to say.
Chapter:
The cog-shaped airlock rolled into the bulkhead and the familiar scents of old permeated Kellin’s nostrils. He dropped down the two short steps and smiled at Captain Kira Nerys, waiting for him a few steps away.
“Welcome to Deep Space Nine,” she said with a polite bow.
“It’s good to be back,” he replied, taking her hand firmly. She’d aged since he’d last scene. Her once robust red hair and darkened, and there were definite lines around her eyes. The fire was still there though. The Resistance fighter who’d driven the Cardassians of the plenty was ever present in her.
She gestured down the stretch of corridor. “If you’ll come with me, I’ve set up a few things in my office we can over and try to get you settled. My chief of security has set up quarters for you on Level 22, Section 41 Delta. They’re actually Captain Siko’s old quarters.”
Kellin matched her stride as the neared the turbolift. “How is the captain?”
“Well,” Kira said. “Enjoying retirement. He’d been on an extended leave of absence, but he grew to love the Bajoran countryside too much. He, Kasidy and little Rebecca, who’s now eight by the way, are still living in the house the captain designed.”
The entered the lift and rose through the docking ring and up the central core towards ops. They emerged in the command center and made their way to Kira’s office. The doors closed with a click and KIra stopped short. “I believe this is your desk now,” she said.
Kellin rounded the rectangular, polished table and dropped into the Cardassian eelphin leather chair. “Lot of history in this chair. Not all of it good.”
Kira shot him a quizzical look.
“Unless I’m mistaken, this was once Gul Dukat’s chair.”
“Actually,” Kira said with a smile, “Captain Sisko had Dukat’s chair removed the day he took command. He didn’t want to sit in the chair of a man who’d ordered the deaths of five million Bajorans.”
“I never knew that,” Kellin said. “But still, this chair has seen the Alpha Quadrant through the Dominion War and the current problems with the Cardassians. I’m surprised this old station is still up to the task.”
“It’s the Prophet’s will,” Kira said, taking a seat across the desk. She picked up several data pads. “Here are the crew rosters. Let’s see.. since you were here last, Commander Vaughn has finally retired, Ezri Dax is now captain of the Aventine, taking Sam Bowers with her. Dr. Bashir and Lieutenant Commander Nog are still here and loving it. And of course the Ferengi embassy is thriving under the care of Ambassador Quark.”
Kellin leaned forward and felt the weight of the world press firmly on his shoulders. “Looks like I’ve got a lot to learn. Let’s get started.”
The door chime sounded. Kellin peered out through the glass to see the lithe form of a female Starfleet officer. “Come,” he said.
The doors parted and Kellin’s life changed forever.
“Captain,” Kira said, turning around, “this is my.. I’m sorry… you’re first officer, Commander Danella Valtane.”
* * *
“I’m in trouble,” Kellin said.
On the desktop monitor the smiling face of Captain Kelso Vanick glowed. Commander of the USS Yorktown, Vanick had been at Kellin’s side since their academy days. After Kellin had been court-martialed, Vanick had been given command of a Sovereign-Class ship, quite a feather in his cap. But now he was out near the edge of the quadrant, and Kellin needed him here, now, on Deep Space Nine.
“Come on, Brice, it can’t be that bad.”
“Damn it,” Kellin spat. “this woman walked into my office today and I fell in love. We spent three hours going over crew rosters, cargo manifests, boring day to day operations of running a starbase and I couldn’t take my eyes off her. I was infatuated with everything she said and did.”
“Maybe that’s all it is,” Vanick said. “An infatuation that’ll pass.”
“Pass by working closely together every single day? Hardly. Makes me want to send the Defiant out to rendevouse with you, to see what your response is.”
“Come on, Brice, what’s her name? I’ll see for myself.”
“Danella Valtane.”
Vanick turned to another computer screen on the bulkhead and asked the compouter to display Valtane’s file. Her image appeared. Kellin felt his heart skip a beat. There she was again. The image he couldn’t get out ofhis head. Her striking blonde hair, hanging just along the line of regulation, her piercing hazel eyes lit with fire, her slim figure accented by her form-fitting Starfleet uniform. Vanick whistled softly and turned back to the monitors visual pickup. “I take it all back, Brice, you’re in trouble. Lorissa’s going to kill you.”
Leaning back in his chair, Kellin blew a sigh between his teeth. His wife Lorissa of more than seven years, former Starfleet officer herself, had reitired when their daughter Allana had been born, was definitely the jealous type. And given the fact that she was still on Earth until Allana finished school for this term, meant that Kellin was given that much more of an urge to stray. He loved his wife. Passionately. He’d never thought of anything like this. Adolescent hormonal responses to a beautiful woman were not his style.
But when he thought of Danella.
“So when will Yorktown be headed back this way?” he asked, trying to regain his composure.
“We’re due to return ot the Federation in about three weeks,” Vanick said. “We’re scheduled to be at Beta Thoridore in a month to begin trials of our Slipstream drive.”
“I wasn’t aware the Yorktown was fitted with one.”
Vanick looked uncomfortable. “Sorry, it was classified and when we shipped out you were still in civies, Captain. The slipstream drive was installed at Seran just before we launched.”
“What about bumping up your trials and heading to Bajor, I’m sure I can find a good excuse for the need for a ship of your class.”
“Forget it, Brice, you’ve been back in the Fleet for three minutes and you’re trying to corrupt me. I’ll see you in a month. I promise. Once the slipstream trials are complete, I’ve authorized a month’s leave for the entire crew. I’ll headed straight for Bajor once the tests are done. Behave yourself, Brice. Don’t do anything stupid.”
“Thank you my friend,” Kellin said. “Keep in touch.”
Vanick nodded and the communication was terminated.
“I’m still in trouble,” Kellin said, checking his calendar. He was scheduled to meet Commander Valtane for dinner at Quark’s in forty minutes. He only hoped he could control himself.
Chapter:
Brice Kellin stole one last glance in the holographic mirror, ran his fingers through his rapidly thinning hair and headed into the corridor.
“Bridge to Captain Kellin.”
“Yes, Captain,” he asked of Walter Schumacher, commander of the USS Thunderchild, the Akira-Class vessel he was currently traveling aboard.
“We’re through the Bajoran security checkpoints, we’ll be docking at Deep Space Nine in seven minutes.”
“Excellent timing,” Kellin replied, “I’m on my way up to the bridge as we speak.”
He tapped his combade, terminating the link and continued his march towards the nearest turbolift alcove. A lot had changed in his life over the past ten years and here he was, returning to that one point in the galaxy that seemed ooze destiny from it stars. Bajor. He’d served under Benjamin Sisko for a number of years and new full well the god-like status the Bajorans had bestowed him with, naming him their emissary. Kellin, while not quite a god, had so far experienced one of the strangest careers in Starfleet history. He was now taking a new step, back into the fleet that had cashiered him out nearly three years ago. After the incident with the Efobi in the distant corners of the Beta Quadrant, Starfleet had been forced to court-martial him for the loss of the USS Saratoga, the first ship he’d ever commanded.
Kellin recalled the days after the ship’s loss. Only himself and Commander Vanick, his trusted right hand had been spared, when the xenophobic Efobi, had passed their judgment and declared the Saratoga and her crew to be trespassers and obliterated the ship with a single burst from their neutronium cannon. They had spared Kellin and Vanick, allowing them to return to the Federation to tell their own people to stay away from that particular corner of the galaxy.
The problem was the Saratoga should never have been anywhere near that sector. They had been on a routine mapping mission in the Dakoran Cluster when they’d picked up what had appeared to be a distress signal. It turned out to be faint radiation but Kellin had been sure it was the sign of a temporal transponder. Starfleet had decided given his temporal incursions that he posed to great a threat to Federation security to remain on active duty. They’d trumped up charges against him and threw him out.
He still remembered the look in Admiral Cerjak’s eyes when he’d removed the pip’s from Kellins collar and denounced him with a dishonorable discharged. It’d hurt like hell and for many years, Kellin wandered. His wife and daughter were living in San Francisco at the time and were crushed. They knew what his career had meant to him. He’d wandered for a while. He worked for a Ferengi company, doing tech work, he’d spent some time on Farius Prime helping root out bad debtors and the filth of the Orion Syndicate for Farius Security. But nothing had fulfilled him.
Until six weeks ago when Admiral Cerjak had beamed to his front lawn in Buffalo, New York and pleaded Starfleet’s case. Captain Kira Nerys of Deep Space Nine was stepping down. She’d married and was retiring to the farms of Dakhur on Bajor. After ten years as commander of the station, she was losing her edge she said and wanted a change. It presented Starfleet with a huge problem. For the past six years the Bajoran system had been the spot of increasing terrorism by Cardassians, still reeling from their defeat twelve years earlier in the Dominion War. Bajor had essentially been locked down. It was feared Cardassian operations were trying to reach the Gamma Quadrant to reestablish their old ties with the Dominion. With the Great Link gone, and only the Vorta and the Jem’Hadar left to run most of the quadrant, protecting the wormholme had once again become Starfleet’s number one objective.
“And let’s face it, Brice,” Cerjak had said. “You’ve been out there, you know the players involved and you know what it takes to fight them back if it does come to war. You’ll be fully reinstated; rank of captain, and the station and the Defiant will be yours,”
Kellin had waited no time at all in accepting. He was once again going to make a difference.
The turbolift doors hissed open to reveal the spacious bridge. He took a few steps in, and remained on the aft quarter deck near the tactical station. On the main viewer, he saw his former and future home growing ever larger against the sparkling eddies of the Denorias Belt.
Welcome Back they seemed to say.
Chapter:
The cog-shaped airlock rolled into the bulkhead and the familiar scents of old permeated Kellin’s nostrils. He dropped down the two short steps and smiled at Captain Kira Nerys, waiting for him a few steps away.
“Welcome to Deep Space Nine,” she said with a polite bow.
“It’s good to be back,” he replied, taking her hand firmly. She’d aged since he’d last scene. Her once robust red hair and darkened, and there were definite lines around her eyes. The fire was still there though. The Resistance fighter who’d driven the Cardassians of the plenty was ever present in her.
She gestured down the stretch of corridor. “If you’ll come with me, I’ve set up a few things in my office we can over and try to get you settled. My chief of security has set up quarters for you on Level 22, Section 41 Delta. They’re actually Captain Siko’s old quarters.”
Kellin matched her stride as the neared the turbolift. “How is the captain?”
“Well,” Kira said. “Enjoying retirement. He’d been on an extended leave of absence, but he grew to love the Bajoran countryside too much. He, Kasidy and little Rebecca, who’s now eight by the way, are still living in the house the captain designed.”
The entered the lift and rose through the docking ring and up the central core towards ops. They emerged in the command center and made their way to Kira’s office. The doors closed with a click and KIra stopped short. “I believe this is your desk now,” she said.
Kellin rounded the rectangular, polished table and dropped into the Cardassian eelphin leather chair. “Lot of history in this chair. Not all of it good.”
Kira shot him a quizzical look.
“Unless I’m mistaken, this was once Gul Dukat’s chair.”
“Actually,” Kira said with a smile, “Captain Sisko had Dukat’s chair removed the day he took command. He didn’t want to sit in the chair of a man who’d ordered the deaths of five million Bajorans.”
“I never knew that,” Kellin said. “But still, this chair has seen the Alpha Quadrant through the Dominion War and the current problems with the Cardassians. I’m surprised this old station is still up to the task.”
“It’s the Prophet’s will,” Kira said, taking a seat across the desk. She picked up several data pads. “Here are the crew rosters. Let’s see.. since you were here last, Commander Vaughn has finally retired, Ezri Dax is now captain of the Aventine, taking Sam Bowers with her. Dr. Bashir and Lieutenant Commander Nog are still here and loving it. And of course the Ferengi embassy is thriving under the care of Ambassador Quark.”
Kellin leaned forward and felt the weight of the world press firmly on his shoulders. “Looks like I’ve got a lot to learn. Let’s get started.”
The door chime sounded. Kellin peered out through the glass to see the lithe form of a female Starfleet officer. “Come,” he said.
The doors parted and Kellin’s life changed forever.
“Captain,” Kira said, turning around, “this is my.. I’m sorry… you’re first officer, Commander Danella Valtane.”
* * *
“I’m in trouble,” Kellin said.
On the desktop monitor the smiling face of Captain Kelso Vanick glowed. Commander of the USS Yorktown, Vanick had been at Kellin’s side since their academy days. After Kellin had been court-martialed, Vanick had been given command of a Sovereign-Class ship, quite a feather in his cap. But now he was out near the edge of the quadrant, and Kellin needed him here, now, on Deep Space Nine.
“Come on, Brice, it can’t be that bad.”
“Damn it,” Kellin spat. “this woman walked into my office today and I fell in love. We spent three hours going over crew rosters, cargo manifests, boring day to day operations of running a starbase and I couldn’t take my eyes off her. I was infatuated with everything she said and did.”
“Maybe that’s all it is,” Vanick said. “An infatuation that’ll pass.”
“Pass by working closely together every single day? Hardly. Makes me want to send the Defiant out to rendevouse with you, to see what your response is.”
“Come on, Brice, what’s her name? I’ll see for myself.”
“Danella Valtane.”
Vanick turned to another computer screen on the bulkhead and asked the compouter to display Valtane’s file. Her image appeared. Kellin felt his heart skip a beat. There she was again. The image he couldn’t get out ofhis head. Her striking blonde hair, hanging just along the line of regulation, her piercing hazel eyes lit with fire, her slim figure accented by her form-fitting Starfleet uniform. Vanick whistled softly and turned back to the monitors visual pickup. “I take it all back, Brice, you’re in trouble. Lorissa’s going to kill you.”
Leaning back in his chair, Kellin blew a sigh between his teeth. His wife Lorissa of more than seven years, former Starfleet officer herself, had reitired when their daughter Allana had been born, was definitely the jealous type. And given the fact that she was still on Earth until Allana finished school for this term, meant that Kellin was given that much more of an urge to stray. He loved his wife. Passionately. He’d never thought of anything like this. Adolescent hormonal responses to a beautiful woman were not his style.
But when he thought of Danella.
“So when will Yorktown be headed back this way?” he asked, trying to regain his composure.
“We’re due to return ot the Federation in about three weeks,” Vanick said. “We’re scheduled to be at Beta Thoridore in a month to begin trials of our Slipstream drive.”
“I wasn’t aware the Yorktown was fitted with one.”
Vanick looked uncomfortable. “Sorry, it was classified and when we shipped out you were still in civies, Captain. The slipstream drive was installed at Seran just before we launched.”
“What about bumping up your trials and heading to Bajor, I’m sure I can find a good excuse for the need for a ship of your class.”
“Forget it, Brice, you’ve been back in the Fleet for three minutes and you’re trying to corrupt me. I’ll see you in a month. I promise. Once the slipstream trials are complete, I’ve authorized a month’s leave for the entire crew. I’ll headed straight for Bajor once the tests are done. Behave yourself, Brice. Don’t do anything stupid.”
“Thank you my friend,” Kellin said. “Keep in touch.”
Vanick nodded and the communication was terminated.
“I’m still in trouble,” Kellin said, checking his calendar. He was scheduled to meet Commander Valtane for dinner at Quark’s in forty minutes. He only hoped he could control himself.
Chapter:
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