‘Hull breach! Reporting hull breaches on Decks 5 and 6!’ Commander Vorin’s voice pierced the veil of smoke and chaos enveloping the Caliburn’s bridge.

It was Beckett who spoke, not Hargreaves, though the admiral had the good grace to at least address the ship’s master. ‘Pull us back,’ came his crisp instruction. ‘I’m signalling Pegasus to cover us.’

Hargreaves’s fists clenched. ‘I don’t -’

‘Let Captain Matthews take the heat for a moment.’ While Hargreaves had captained this ship and its predecessor both for long, long years; knew the ins and outs of a Sagan-class’s capabilities better than perhaps anyone in the fleet, Beckett knew unit tactics. Had kept a weather eye on every ship in the strike group, rotating them in and out of heavy fire. Studied them like a master butcher assessing which blade was needed for the next cut, then applying perfect pressure.

It was not enough. All across the Deneb System, as the Dominion and Breen raged against Starfleet and the skies burnt, it was not enough. Hargreaves still knew better than to argue and looked across the shrouded bridge to the forward stations. ‘Helm, pull us back! Give Pegasus space to engage.’

The deck shuddered less as the Caliburn disengaged, her withdrawal covered by the mighty Galaxy-class. Feeling his breath slowing, Hargreaves turned to Beckett. ‘You said they’re surrendering,’ he hissed. ‘Across the sector, they’re following the Dominion’s orders and standing down, but not here. How many of them are standing down?’

If we lose here, is it still over?

But Beckett’s lips turned to a thin line on his craggy face. Normally he would posture and refuse to show even an inkling of weakness, but battle showed the depths of the soul. ‘Not enough.’

Hargreaves stared at him for a moment. Had the seasoned admiral been lying to inspire Starfleet at Deneb to keep fighting against the odds? Or had he, too, fallen foul of that most blinding of vices, shrouding unwelcome truths from cold, hard analysis: hope?

In the uncertainty and choking despair, he didn’t hear the bleep of long-range sensors picking up a new signal. Or the next. Or the next. But by the time the tactical console was a deluge of new, incoming contacts, Hargreaves had turned, heart in his throat, at the prospect of yet more Dominion ships pouring into the fires of Deneb.

It was his XO who explained, Commander Vorin tall and stern at the mission control console. But her eyes had lit up with more animation than he had ever seen. ‘Incoming ships at the rear of the Dominion forces, sir.’ She looked up, and the tightest of smiles reached her lips. ‘Starfleet. Klingon. Romulan. And… Tholian, sir.’

None of it made sense to Hargreaves, but a man was capable of only so much shock at once, so the word he echoed, expression twisting in bafflement, was, ‘Tholian?’

When he looked at Beckett, the admiral was smiling like he’d intended on this all along. ‘It’s the Atlantis.’ He stood and strode to Vorin’s console, leaning across. ‘Signal Captain Theodoras with these attack orders. If they focus on these units, the Fourth Fleet will join in a pincer movement. We’ll collapse their flank.’

Hargreaves bit his lip until the admiral had returned to the tertiary command chair. ‘You knew reinforcements were coming?’ he hissed.

‘I didn’t know how many,’ Beckett admitted. ‘I had promises; mere words when I needed weapons. As it turns out…’ The thin smile returned. ‘This is enough.’ 

The Lost Fleet had deployed on starships a quarter-century old alongside Breen warships. The vessel that drifted beyond Federation space, deep into the unknown regions of the Deneb Sector, was neither; newer, faster, less well-armed, and thoroughly less remarkable to the casual observer.

A determined observer, had they stood aboard its cramped bridge, might have reached a different conclusion. One of the two figures – tall, seemingly human, in a plain jumpsuit – also looked wholly unremarkable, but the other’s smooth, exaggerated features could not be mistaken as anything other than the deliberately assumed humanoid form of a Founder.

‘The lines at Farpoint have broken.’ Even a Founder could not fight the swell of emotion in the face of a devastating military defeat. ‘You said a concerted push would destroy the Fourth Fleet.’

‘It would have,’ the human said, her voice light and collected. ‘Had it not been for Starfleet reawakening the old alliances. That was unforeseen. Nowhere before Leonis and Farpoint had Klingons or Romulans, especially not Tholians, involved themselves.’

‘You convinced us to commit the heart of the remainder of our forces. With the Fourth Fleet broken at Farpoint, we could have consolidated what we had already taken, but now…’ The Founder’s body language had not matched the agitated tones, still and controlled even as they raised their voice. But now, the Founder had to clench its facades of fists to express its burning rage and loss. ‘You convinced me – you convinced so many of us – to ignore the orders from the Gamma Quadrant. Called it a sign the Great Link had fallen to the Federation’s threats.’

‘It is so,’ the human said coolly. ‘It was weakness that so many of your fleet accepted the Vortas. Had their faith in you been stronger, Farpoint would only be a setback.’

‘If your military intelligence about Farpoint had been correct, the departing forces would have been only a setback. Now with this defeat, so many more are accepting the summons to return to the Gamma Quadrant.’ The Founder jabbed a finger at the human. ‘Which we would have done from the start were it not for you.’

The human tilted her head, equally expressionless. ‘I told you what the Federation did to our people. That the Dominion you know is gone, rendered broken and weak by the Federation’s biological warfare and blackmail. The Great Link cannot move against them ever again lest they unleash another atrocity upon us. So it falls to me and my kindred to destroy them.’ She advanced and rested a hand on the shoulder of the Founder. ‘Losing the Lost Fleet to weakness and battle is a blow. But worry not. We have prepared for this.’

The Founder’s facsimile of a brow furrowed. ‘Prepared? This was the great war to bring the Federation to its knees.’

At last, the human gave an expression that someone, somewhere, might describe as a smile. ‘Do not flatter yourself, Founder. This was merely one part of the puzzle. An opportunity that fell into the lap of me and my kindred, exploited for all it was worth. Did you think we would risk everything on your relics lost in time? No. Victory in Deneb would have been… victory. But defeat in Deneb?’ The smile widened. ‘Merely a different path to success.’

The Founder pulled back sharply. ‘You used us. This is why you would not Link with us -’

‘I did not Link with you to save you,’ said the other Changeling with a human’s face, sounding fervent and sincere for the first time. ‘You would not have thanked me for the gifts that come with my truth.’

‘You cast me and my soldiers into battle as worthless playthings.’

‘It is the duty of the Jem’Hadar to fight and die for the Founders, is it not?’

‘For the Founders! For the Great Link! Not for your pretenders!’

‘Pretenders?’ The Changeling with a human’s face gave a pretence of a sigh and extended a hand to gesture for the door. ‘I had hoped you would see beyond old allegiances to the shattered husk that the Great Link now is. But you do not understand this dark future.’

The doors slid open for four hulking figures, masked and armoured, to march in, rifles tight in their grip. The Founder turned to regard them impassively. ‘I will stop you from leading what remains of our people into your machinations,’ it told them, eyes sweeping across the gathered. ‘I will bring you before the Great Link for judgement.’

The Changeling with a human face shook its head. ‘I don’t think so.’

‘Or? You cannot hold me with threats of violence. No Founder harms another.’

‘That was then.’ The Changeling lifted a hand to the armoured figure on its right. In one smooth motion, they lifted their rifle and fired at the Founder. At a power setting this high, it took only one shot before this ancient entity, lost through space and time and cast from war to war regardless, was nothing but dust. There had not been the chance to so much as gasp.

The Changeling with the human’s face shrugged. ‘This is now.’ They turned to their four armoured companions. ‘The Deneb gambit is lost. We proceed to Plan B. The Fourth Fleet has been gathered like never before and will need time to repair and recover.’

The armoured Changeling who had shot the Founder blatted something in the language this form’s vocal cords found easiest.

‘If Vadic pulls through,’ the lead Changeling said. ‘And if not? If it falls to us, and not Vadic’s allies, to seize the day and bring ruin to the Federation? Then we have just decimated one of its crown jewels and forced their hand for what comes next.’ It straightened, and now when it smiled, it wore all the sincere mirth of a solid whose heart beat true and strong, such was its satisfaction with the prospect before it.

‘I would have settled for the destruction of the Fourth Fleet,’ it continued. ‘But if not? They will be exactly where we want them come Frontier Day.’

In Play:

• The Battle of Farpoint looked likely to end in Starfleet’s defeat until the timely arrival of the USS Atlantis and the forces of Klingon, Romulan, and Tholian ships – allies who, until the Atlantis’s negotiations, had remained wholly uninvolved in the Deneb campaign, and thus the Lost Fleet was not ready for them.
• With the arrival of reinforcements, the allied forces at Farpoint defeat this final push of the Lost Fleet.
• Word from the Dominion in the Gamma Quadrant had already begun to splinter the Lost Fleet as commanders loyal to the Great Link abandoned their war on Deneb. The defeat at Farpoint means those who remain also surrender. The Fourth Fleet accepts their surrender, on condition of letting them – under escort – return to the Gamma Quadrant.
• The Breen, with their allies abandoning them, slink back to their space to lick their wounds.
• The Deneb Sector is shattered by war. It will take some time for them to recover.
• Starfleet Command has yet to acknowledge the truth of the invasion. The cover story blaming the Breen holds. Reports are silenced. Everywhere, all eyes are fixed on the upcoming festivities of April 12th, 2401: Frontier Day.