"Time to intercept?" Katie asked glaring at the main viewscreen.
"Thirty two seconds till we enter weapons range…or what would have been weapons range," Phil said adjusting the Pershing's trim. "But they're still at warp. If we don't find a way to slow them to impulse, there's no chance of stopping of them before they reach the system center."
"Scharr!" Katie screamed into the intercom. "Where are my torpedoes?"
The chief engineer was barely able to tap his comm badge to answer. Ten decks below, he was hanging upside down in a jeffries tube junction furiously repositioning isolinear chips in a power relay.
"You don't think I'm not moving fast enough?" he shouted back angrily. "You're welcome to come down here and help! I've got twenty crewmen all over the ship working on it. Another hour, at least."
"I'm open to other suggestions," Katie announced to the rest of the bridge.
"An inverse graviton burst…" T'les said as her eyebrows perked up. "We can quickly reconfigure the main deflector. It will destabilize all warp fields within a million kilometers."
"If you're gonna do it, do it quickly," Phil said looking at the viewscreen. "We're less than two minutes from the Derna perimeter at this speed."
"Get the pulse ready T'les!" Katie yelled. "We'll initiate as soon as we drop the cloak." Katie reached down and keyed the shipwide intercom.
"All hands, this is the captain. Standby to decloak! It's gonna get real rough, real quick, but we're not gonna let those Cardassian through! Brace for emergency deceleration!"
"Deflector dish primed and ready," T'les said from behind her.
"Phil, put us right into the middle of their formation. As soon as the cloak drops, initiate the burst."
Phil guided the Pershing right between the two lead Cardassian cruisers.
"It's now or never," Katie said taking a last deep breath. "Gleeto, drop the cloak!"
The Pershing suddenly appeared, catching the Cardassians completely off guard. A brilliant flash of white light appeared from underneath their saucer, surging out in all directions. All five ships dropped from Warp 9 to sub-light speed instantly as their warp fields collapsed.
On the Pershing's bridge, everyone held on for dear life as the inertial dampeners desperately tried prevent them from splattering against the viewscreen. Katie flew out of the captain's chair and nearly landed right on top of Phil. The Cardassian ships spun out of control and Phil was barely able to avoid a collision.
"Report!" Katie said climbing back into her seat.
"All Cardassian ships have dropped to impulse. They're beginning to assemble into an attack formation."
"Shields are up and stable," Gleeto said catching his breath. "Still no phasers or quantum torpedoes."
"Well, we've got them stopped," Katie thought to herself. "Now what do we do?"
****
"It's the Pershing!" Laria shouted seeing the new sensor readings. "They've initiated a graviton burst! All the Cardassian ships are at impulse."
"That's what I'm talking about, Katie!" Tigranian yelled as he moved to a tactical display along with Kira and Rhaan.
"I don't see what you're celebrating for, Captain," Rhaan said shaking his head. "The Cardassians will be able to resume their course within ten minutes and your ship still has no weapons!"
"Suvlu'taHvIS yapbe' HoS neH, General," Tigranian replied confidently.
"What the hell does that mean?" Rhaan asked.
"Brute strength is not the most important asset in a fight. Katherine Stone and the rest of my crew will find a way," Tigranian said.
"The Cardassians are moving to engage the Pershing," Laria shouted. "And they're still closing at impulse speed. Range 300 million kilometers to Deep Space Nine."
"They'll be here in less than fifteen minutes," Annabeth said doing a quick calculation in her head."
"Is there anything we can do?" Kira said nearly bashing her fist into a console with frustration.
Laria's eyes suddenly grew wide.
"This is a Cardassian station…" she muttered looking around OPS.
"Wow, you really are the intelligent one," Rhaan muttered in reply.
"Cardassian dynamic power relays!" Laria said diving over her console and running toward the subspace control junction. She furiously ripped off the metal cover and began pulling out power cables.
"L, what are you doing?" Annabeth asked very concerned.
"I'm doing something to save my planet!" she screamed in reply.
****
A Cardassian disruptor blast slammed into the Pershing's shields sending a shower of sparks across the bridge.
"Shields down to 82 percent!" Gleeto shouted from Tactical. "Ablative armor is holding."
Phil was furiously maneuvering the starship, trying to keep the Pershing between the Cardassians and their path to Bajor, but only meeting limited success.
"Tractor beam!" Katie said. "Lock a tractor beam onto each one of them. We can at least act as an anchor."
"With four beams at once, we won't be able to get a very solid grip, Ma'am," Gleeto said preparing to execute. "Plus, if they go to warp, they'll rip the tractor emitters right out of the hull."
"It's better than nothing," Katie said shaking her head, out of all other ideas.
"Aye," Gleeto said pressing the display in front of him. Four blue beams locked onto the Cardassian hulls, slowing them to a crawl. However, their shields deflected most of the energy. The Pershing started to lurch and sway violently. Main power started fluctuating and the entire vessel seemed about to tear apart.
"We're being dragged!" Phil said trying to adjust the impulse engines to compensate. "The Cardassians are gunning their engines trying to tear free."
"Hold on!" Katie commanded. "Every second counts here!"
"Emitters are at one hundred fifty percent!" Gleeto shouted. "They'll burn out in less than a minute."
"Hold on!" Katie repeated.
"Bridge! This is Scharr!" the Andorian shouted through the intercom. "You've got to shut down the tractor emitters. If you don't, we'll blow out the entire main power grid and getting the weapons back online we'll be the least of our worries!"
Katie realized that they didn't have a choice. "Shut'em down!" she said losing hope that they could stop the Cardassians. Gleeto hit the kill switch and the enemy cruisers were free to move towards the planet again. They would be able to re-engage their warp drives in less than eight minutes.
"What's the blast radius if our warp core breaches?" Katie asked quietly.
"What?" Phil said turning over his shoulder.
"You heard what I said!" Katie spit through her teeth.
"Captain," T'les said calmly from behind her. "If our warp core breached, everything within thirty thousand kilometers would be vaporized."
"That's good enough," Katie said shutting her eyes. "Mr. Lexington, lay in a collision course. Prepare to engage at full impulse power at my command…"
"Captain…" Gleeto said trying to dissuade her.
"There are over six billion people on Bajor." Katie said opening her eyes again. "And everyone back home seems to think Starfleet can do without a warship…"
Without another word, Phil entered the coordinates into the helm.
"Course laid in, Captain," he said calmly. He looked over his shoulder and silently mouthed the words, "I love you."
Katie fought back tears as she silently mouthed back, "I'll see you on the other side."