Gul Terek stepped off the lift onto the deck of his Operations Center on board the Rentak Nor. He stepped down towards the central display station to look at his senior staff. Ever since the phenomenon, that has been given the name ‘Blackout’ among his crew, had begun to occur all over the Alpha and Beta quadrants, the entire system of Chin’toka was surrounded by it. This happened about a week after the Blackout begun.

Due to the loss of communication with Central Command, and the fact that nothing in the Chin’toka system could get any communication out of the phenomenon, due to its intensity being far higher than any other Blackout occurrences that the Union has ever encountered, it did not take long for a small Union force to arrive into the system. Although, that was an understatement. The intensity of the Blackout phenomenon around the Chin’toka system had forced the five Galor class vessels that Central Command sent to check in on Rentak Nor, five days to travel through the phenomenon.

This made Terek’s friend, Kamek, paranoid and insisted that Terek take direct command of the small Union force and order those five Galor vessels to remain in the system. While Terek has tried to sooth Kamek’s paranoia, Terek too felt that this phenomenon, surrounding the entire Chin’toka system, was not natural at all. In fact, he absolutely felt the paranoia that Kamek felt, that this was a strategic assault. The first thing was to eliminate the means of travel, and communication and that is precisely what this phenomenon did.

“Have the engineers been able to finish their modifications to the AR-558 communications systems?” Terek asked his senior chief engineer.

“My team needs a few more hours, but we are certain that once the modifications are complete, we will be able to re-establish communications with Central Command.”

Terek grunted with a single nod of his head. “Unsatisfactory, Chief, although I will accept it. But I must urge you, work faster.”

Kamek’s hands balled up into fists on top of the display as he glared hard at their Chief Engineer. “We should of re-established contact with Central Command hours ago! Why the delay?!”

“Kamek,” Terek’s voice grew slightly louder, but not too loud. He did not want to upset his friend but he did want his friend to hear his commanding voice. “Office. The rest of you, return to your duties.” Terek then headed up the steps and straight through the door to his office. Once he made it around his desk, he watched as the door closed behind Kamek. “You are my best friend, Kamek. But don’t let your position in the Obsidian Order overstep mine.”

A heavy sigh left Kamek’s lips as his hands rested on the top of the chair’s headrest before him and his grip would gradually tighten. “I am not used to being out of contact from Central Command for so long, Terek. While my assignment here is to ensure the security of Cardassian assets, I still like to get updates on the current situations of the galaxy. Before this…blackout surrounded this system, I was reading reports on how this phenomenon was all over the Alpha and Beta Quadrants. Key systems would be engulfed or surrounded by this phenomenon, or entire sectors!”

Kamek took a deep breath and looked hard into Terek’s eyes. “You and I took the same classes, friend. We both know exactly what this means. And yet, you do not have the full squadron on high alert. Why?”

“They are on stand by, Kamek. But I do not need our soldiers and pilots on edge, waiting for something that may never come. When they’re on high alert, and stay for hours, days even, mental exhaustion sets in. You and I both know that mental exhaustion is our worst enemy.” Terek then sat down in his chair and clasped his hands together on top of his desk.

“We have been surrounded by this…blackout for weeks now. For right now, we have exactly what we need here to ensure that nothing can contend with us. Not only do we have a squadron of Hideki ships, and five Galor class vessels, we have this station and an entire asset of orbital weapons platforms. I am not worried at all, Kamek. We will re-establish contact with Central Command, and we will find out that all is well.” Terek smiled but then one of his officers barged into his office.

“I apologize for the intrusion, Gul, but you must see this!”

Both Terek and Kamek left his office behind the young officer and looked at the large view screen above. The visual was split four ways on the screen, showing four different points. One point had the fourth planet off to the side, where one had the scrapyard off to one side, a few of the orbital weapons platforms on the other and finally, one of the pillars of the station on the last. In each of those screens, strange openings were seen and ships came out of them. Lots of ships. A lot.

“Who are they?!” Kamek requested.

“How many?” Terek added to the request.

“We don’t recognize their markings!” Said one of the officers as they would select a ship and magnify a marking on the side of it. “Sensors are picking up fifty. No. A hundred ships!” Said another officer.

“No. That’s impossible!” Terek heard the tone of worry and concern in his friend’s voice, something that he has never heard from Kamek before.

“Who are they, Kamek?” Terek asked, and for some reason, for the first time in his life, he was afraid of asking that question. Why?

“The Obsidian Order ‘obtained’ lots of data from Starfleet Command. Before my assignment here, I had the chance to go over the data with colleagues. The thing that stood out was a mission report from the USS Voyager. The Vaadwuar.” The tone of worry and concern still lingered in Kamek’s voice, who then looked at Terek directly into his eyes, fear present in his. “They are not friendly, Terek!”

Terek looked at his second in command. “Battle stations! Alert the commanders of the Hideki and Galor squadrons! Arm the orbital weapons platforms!” The klaxon sounded throughout the station and in a brief moment, the entirety of the Chin’toka system erupted.

Six hours after the Vaadwuar attacked the Chin’toka system

Raven Reade groaned softly as she slowly began to open her eyes and then began to wonder why her pillow felt warm and like flesh. Then it hit her, at first she was surprised…more at herself really…and then she just let it all go. She gripped the individual’s side while her arm was wrapped around them and snuggled into them with a smile on her face.

“Finally awake?” The man’s deep, hypnotic voice filled her ears and for whatever reason, she just adjusted herself so that the rest of her body pressed into his side while she rested her forehead into the side of his neck. Last touch, she wrapped a leg around one of his.

“Just five more minutes, Nathan, please.” She pleaded while adjusting her arm around him and squeezed.

Nathan chuckled softly and then pressed his lips against her forehead before resting it back on his pillow and stared up at the ceiling. “I still cannot believe the odds that we got assigned together again.”

“I can’t believe that you won’t give a girl her five minutes. You do remember that I bite, right?” She smirked as she kept her eyes closed and her grip on him.

“I am just appalled, that’s all. We both get pulled away from our previous assignment, thinking we would never see each other again, just to be commanding our very own ships, which only intensified our odds of ever seeing each other again…But then!” Nathan chuckled. “Both our ships get assigned to the Sovereign. I mean, to hell with the Sovereign, really! But what are the odds?” Nathan asked as he traced his fingertips up and down her arm.

Raven sighed and then adjusted herself just a bit so that she could rest her head on his shoulder and look up at him. “The odds of me smacking you for not letting a girl get just five more minutes, is getting much higher.”

Nathan was about to tease her some more when the chirp of the comm in his quarters went off. He frowned and sighed, “I swear I told them not to disturb us for another day or two.”

“Sure you did. And now I am going to smack you!” She teased but before she could, the voice of Nathan’s first officer interrupted her assault.

“Commanders. We are receiving a distress signal coming from the Chin’Toka system.”

Both the Echelon and the Decker had been heading for Deep Space Nine under orders from Fleet Captain Gerald Hunt, to hopefully find the Sovereign at Deep Space Nine and assess their situation. If the Sovereign was not there, they would of had to travel through the wormhole and provide whatever assistance the Sovereign needed. Unfortunately, this phenomenon, the Blackout, begun to sprout all over the Alpha and Beta Quadrant.

While they were under orders from a Fleet Captain, Ford and Reade wanted to investigate as they were curious as to why this phenomenon was occurring and why it was happening at specific locations. If they were strategists, they would assume that it was a prelude to something, so then their mission to find the Sovereign would become more imperative. But they were not strategists, at least they were not thinking in that way. They were thinking more scientifically, wanting to learn more about the phenomenon than worry about what it meant.

Problem is, the Blackout had also screwed their flight plan to Deep Space Nine, forcing them to basically fly in a zig zag line, to avoid affected regions and maintain high warp. Unfortunately, even at max speed, the constant change of course to avoid the affected regions had added more and more days to their travel time. One of the course corrections had them passing very close to Cardassian Space. Very close to Chin’Toka itself.

“The strangest thing is, I believe it is coming from that Dominion Communications relay. We’ve tried to respond, but none of our subspace communications can break through the Blackout that surrounds Chin’toka. And Commanders, this Blackout is intense.”

With both Ford and Reade on their way to put their uniforms back on, Ford had to ask. “What are our chances of getting through that phenomenon and into the Chin’toka system?”

“It would take five days to cross, sir. But our Chief engineer has been working on something. They believe that if we perform…perhaps…two warp jumps at maximum speed, we could cross it in an hour. The problem is forcing the engines to create a stable warp field. Which is why it would take an hour. Chief has to do it right, or we risk fusing the warp coils.”

Ford looked at Reade and then zipped up his jacket. “Have our Chief collaborate with Decker‘s Chief. Let’s get it figured out fast. Plot a course to the Chin’toka system.”

Reade put her hand on his arm. “Should we really be doing this? What about our orders?” She asked softly so that his first officer wouldn’t hear her.

“Per Starfleet regulations, we are obligated to answer distress calls. And, Raven, this is our chance to show the Cardassians that we, Starfleet, did not give up on them. And I hope they understand that we never will, regardless of political bull between our governments.” Ford explained to her before he headed into the corridor, Reade right behind him. “You best return to your ship, Commander. Get your ladies ready for anything.”

“You think we’re going to be flying into fire?” She asked him.

Ford stopped to turn and look directly into her eyes, his mind racing at the new possibilities of what the Blackout truly meant. “I think we’re plunging into the jaws of an unstoppable inferno.”