A Comfortable Chair...
Posted on Wed Jul 27th, 2022 @ 10:45pm by Lieutenant Commander Tiandith 'Tia' Tobru
1,053 words; about a 5 minute read
Mission:
Episode 5 - Objects In Motion
Location: Chief of Security Office
This was her life now, or so it seemed for the time being.
Tia sat in her office. It was strange when she said that out loud. Her office.
It had been so long since she’d had a proper one.
–
Her mind cast back to the ready room on the Cavalry, back in 2372 before it became scorched with the flames of Dominion fire. She had been honoured to receive such a prestigious ship, a promotion to Commodore at the time and placed in command of a task force with the job of defending against Dominion incursions into Federation space.
That’s when they still had hope.
In mid-2374 she is part of Operation Reservoir, a fleet tasked with the job of cleaning up for when Operation Return succeeds should any stragglers get through the lines. Unfortunately Sisko disappears into the wormhole and so to does the hope of men, women and non-binary alike.
The Dominion ripped through the fleet and destroyed everything in their wake. Tia’s urge to want to join them in the fight is high but she knows that she would simply be adding to the wreckage if she engaged at this point. Trying to contact the Admiralty of the fleet failed, communications garbled or simply unable to connect led to Tia taking control of the fleet and ordering a retreat.
Her crew could have staged a mutiny right there with the emotions flying so high the hull might have breached but they trusted her, they’d been under her command for years and deep down knew she’d made a tough call but the right one.
The Cavalry reports some Dominion ships break the line and head for their fleet. With the orders given to withdraw the Cavalry stays put and defends their retreat taking only minor damage and destroying one Dominion Dreadnought.
–
Tia felt her collar, the two pips that sat on it. Suddenly she felt she had fallen from a great precipice.
–
After the retreat of her fleet Tia is promoted to Admiral and as worlds begin to fall she is tasked with defending Vulcan with the Third and Eighth Fleets. The Dominion pressed, hard. Endless fighting led to a hole in the encroaching enemy’s lines and Tia ordered the evacuation of culturally important artifacts and significant works so they could be preserved. This was one of the many times she’d see the Romulans and Vulcans work together so fiercely.
It was also the first time she’d seen the strain on her Vulcan first officer, Commander Xavus. Even in the most emotionless and logical of minds the loss of your world can instill primal feelings of pain, of heartache and deep down she knew Vulcans were as Human as… well Humans.
Eventually they need to pull back to defend Earth.
Tia is joined by Rear Admiral Jean-Luc Picard of the Enterprise-E, himself suffering the loss of his first officer, Commander Riker.
They had some respite and chatted deep into the few nights they had before the dawn of their last day was to come. They connected quickly, Jean-Luc’s love for her people became evident with the mention of Guinan and his interactions with her.
The first wave of Dominion ships relentlessly hit them with all the renewed might of their fleet and the confidence they’d gained from their successes. They barrage the defence fleet and heavy losses are taken.
“Tia…” came the garbled communication from the badly damaged Enterprise. Admiral Picard’s face let out a wry smile through the chaos and mangled metal that was his bridge. “Always look up.” he said simply before the line cut out and the destruction of the now second last Sovereign class lit up their screen.
Their flagship, their beacon of hope and their prized explorer and beloved ‘Captain’ was gone, but with that the Dominion withdrew to regroup. The Cavalry limped towards Utopia Planetia for some form of quick repair before they returned.
Round 2 soon begins and with little resources… exhausted tubes of torpedoes, limited power to phasers. Tia was close to throwing sticks at them… the badly damaged Cavalry fought.
Eventually she ordered the evacuation of her ship. She would be the last to leave, much to the displeasure of her disheveled and disgruntled XO Xavus. Clasping his face she told him to go, to get the crew to Earth and into hiding.
As the crew begins to leave she notices a large dreadnought heading to escape pods, for shuttles. Tia decides that with her last breath she would take it down and set a course to directly impact the ship with the Cavalry.
One last charge.
As the Cavalry sped towards the dreadnought, its size making it hard to move out of the way quickly, everything was thrown at the now unrecognisable Starfleet ship. A nacelle was ripped from its place, the deflector dish looked like someone had taken a fiery bite from it and the hull looked like a near hollowed out pumpkin… if it had been hollowed with fire, photons and phasers.
Closing her eyes as the hulls met she found herself feeling a breeze on her face. Xavus had managed to transport her at the last second down to Earth.
She was grateful, kind of. There was part of Tia that had accepted her fate when she set that course. Now she had more to fight for.
The resistance began here, it began right now. Quietly.
–
However, that was not what happened here. Not in this universe, and this was her life now.
A Lieutenant in yellow once again. In charge of security for a Cardassian built station full of people who never knew how good they truly had life and how it could have been oh so different for them due to one decision made by celestial beings in a wormhole.
Today it was bar fights over the petty squabbles of drunken fools, tomorrow it might be shoplifting or pickpocketing.
Life had gotten simpler, slower and easier.
Although, part of her still worried. The memories she had were going to take a long time to work through and her adjustment to this universe was not going to happen overnight.
Leaning back in her chair she found comfort in it.
A simple pleasure missed was a comfortable chair...
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