"I'm just a starship Captain. Not an Admiral," Krystal replied. "I don't have that kind of authority and you know it."
She sighed and sat down again.
"All the weird stuff? I just happened to be there," she admitted. "I have no special powers or anything. I'm just... lucky depending on how you look at it."
Nat walked over and put his hand on Krystal's shoulder. "Go back. Don't say anything, else their nanites in the alternate me or Sarah will detect it. Warn the other admirals, and come up with a plan to fight off their surprise ambush. We'll have forces of our own to support you."
"Well... considering I told Admrial Quinn I don't trust your mirror counterpart... probably would be a good call to go on alert just in case anyways," Krystal replied before thinking about something. "If we were able to use an Anti-Tachyon pulse... would that drive them back?"
Nat replied. "Probably, although it would take one powerful pulse to drive their armada back. No ordinary ship could generate such power. I, however, have alternative power sources that can."
Nat replied. "Sounds good to me. You guys go ahead with your plan. Go to the meeting, but keep an eye out. My people will be ready for when the time comes."
"Actually..." Krystal replied. "I want to know why. First the, I'm assuming, attempt at recruiting me. Then turning against the Federation, and... well... everything else. If your intentions had been good from the get go... why all this?"
Nat looked down a bit. "You don't know of the future, do you? I do. I always have. Hell, I knew about the Iconian War before it even happened. Could I do anything to warn the Federation, or better prepare us for them? No. Now look how many people have died for it. I could have saved them. Eventually... I guess I just got tired of letting people die."
Nat walked around a bit. "Eventually, I found out that our intelligence officer, Patar, had been working with T'Ket and other military forces in order to form an Alliance with the purpose of, to put it simply, militarizing everything. I realized that if I worked with them right, I might be able to make them work for us when the Terran invasion came around, so I gave them an ultimatum for the intelligence I'd acquired on their various base locations and various other things, and they agreed to submit to me. Everything had been going as I hoped until the Philadelphia got themselves involved when they installed anti-Undine devices on ESD, and I realized that if they had similar devices to repel Iconians, our very attempts to help protect the Federation from the Terrans would be pushed away and Earth lost in the first battle, so I took prisoners. That, sadly, was the turning point..."
Nat didn't look very happy, either, as he continued. "They tried to escape, so we ended up killing half of them and eventually recapturing the others. I realized when Sarah was after me that trying to reason with them wouldn't work, so I took off. Then, the Infamous got himself involved..."
He stopped for a moment, looking over at a dead body in a chair at one of the bridge stations frozen in time, and pushed it aside, sitting down. "That was when everything took a turn for the worst. Having a Q working against me was too much, so I tried to overpower them. Hell, I succeeded by becoming even stronger than all the Q combined, but even with that, I couldn't take him out head-on, so I gave him an ultimatum by going after Earth. I never intended to destroy the planet, you know. It is my homeworld, after all..."
"Of course Jim had to come after us, which ruined the plan entirely. Me and that AU Sarah lost our powers to Q-power draining and containment systems I had designed and built into the Firestorm, and ended up being rescued by some of old crew who got their hands on a Bird of Prey somehow. Eventually, we moved on to a better ship and ended up finding a way back to The Alliance, so I took it. I knew the AU Sarah was crazy and definitely not trustworthy, so I opted to leave her behind, returned to The Alliance without her, and got to work preparing for the only logical backup plan, hence now."
Nat stopped for a moment, sighing. "Speaking of which, I think those anti-Undine devices on ESD could use some improvements to repel mirror universe invaders as well. We should get to work on that, in secret. We can't let anyone else know, else one of mirror Nat's nanites in any number of people would inform him of my plan."
"You could try asking, considering you're technically not a Starfleet Admiral anymore," Krystal countered, crossing her arms across her chest. "If you do... I can't guarantee anything regarding your counterpart's assignments, but I can get the ball rolling on defenses. We're already skeptical about your Mirror self's intentions so it wouldn't be difficult to have an ace in the hole."
For some reason... it seemed as though Krystal had more of a commanding presence now, almost equal to Nat himself, yet she seemed unaware of it. Something had changed since they last met.
Nat walked over. "Actually, I am a Starfleet Admiral. It's in the uniform. Still, that would be wise, although I'll have a fleet of my own is position ready to counter them, and believe me, Starfleet won't even know it was me."
He couldn't help but notice how Krystal seemed more commanding then before. "You know, with an attitude like that, you could make admiral too, just like everyone else seems to have been doing lately..."
"I think you lost your Admiralty when you turned against the Federation, good intentions or not," Krystal pointed out. "As for me being an Admiral... that would take me away from the one thing I love. Command of a starship. Captain Kurland was right about me after the whole time displaced Dominion Fleet situation. I'm not one to cool my heels on a space station."
She sighed and ran a hand through her hair.
"If I had gotten those codes... I could bring another fleet in to help..." she said. "Almost had them... but Eli..."
She shakes her head. Elihu was apparently a bit of a sore spot for her for some reason.
"Doesn't matter anymore I guess. You just keep up your end, and I'll do what I can on ours."
Nat replied. "Doesn't matter, I call myself admiral anyway. Besides, you don't have to cool your heels on a space station. I personally spent all my time on the Firestorm myself."
Nat continued. "Where were the codes? Who knows them?"
"Just means we gotta do what we can with what we got," Krystal replied with a shrug. "If there's one thing I admire about humans... its the inginuity. Back's against the wall... they MacGyver a solution."
Krystal nodded.
"While I may not have your resources, I have seen some of your Mirror counterpart's tech, and know a few things. I kinda had to help him get data off the ISS Lexington regarding the rifts Leeta's been using in the Badlands. He's got Temporal and possibly Omega weapons, and... I think he convinced my own counterpart to side with him," she said. "If there's anything else I might have missed... I can't think of anything."
Nat continued. "Interesting choice. If it's using actual 29th century technology, it'll prove a match for most of the ships I could throw at it... unless I bring out a special surprise."
Oh, to the contrary! He snapped his fingers and Nat and Krystal were in a holodeck, which soon changed to a bridge not unlike the one on the Chronostorm. "We've captured a few of these ships. Show me just where you've been on this ship?"
She sighed and sat down again.
"All the weird stuff? I just happened to be there," she admitted. "I have no special powers or anything. I'm just... lucky depending on how you look at it."
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"There's still one thing I don't understand," she said, looking Nat in the eye.
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Nat walked around a bit. "Eventually, I found out that our intelligence officer, Patar, had been working with T'Ket and other military forces in order to form an Alliance with the purpose of, to put it simply, militarizing everything. I realized that if I worked with them right, I might be able to make them work for us when the Terran invasion came around, so I gave them an ultimatum for the intelligence I'd acquired on their various base locations and various other things, and they agreed to submit to me. Everything had been going as I hoped until the Philadelphia got themselves involved when they installed anti-Undine devices on ESD, and I realized that if they had similar devices to repel Iconians, our very attempts to help protect the Federation from the Terrans would be pushed away and Earth lost in the first battle, so I took prisoners. That, sadly, was the turning point..."
Nat didn't look very happy, either, as he continued. "They tried to escape, so we ended up killing half of them and eventually recapturing the others. I realized when Sarah was after me that trying to reason with them wouldn't work, so I took off. Then, the Infamous got himself involved..."
He stopped for a moment, looking over at a dead body in a chair at one of the bridge stations frozen in time, and pushed it aside, sitting down. "That was when everything took a turn for the worst. Having a Q working against me was too much, so I tried to overpower them. Hell, I succeeded by becoming even stronger than all the Q combined, but even with that, I couldn't take him out head-on, so I gave him an ultimatum by going after Earth. I never intended to destroy the planet, you know. It is my homeworld, after all..."
"Of course Jim had to come after us, which ruined the plan entirely. Me and that AU Sarah lost our powers to Q-power draining and containment systems I had designed and built into the Firestorm, and ended up being rescued by some of old crew who got their hands on a Bird of Prey somehow. Eventually, we moved on to a better ship and ended up finding a way back to The Alliance, so I took it. I knew the AU Sarah was crazy and definitely not trustworthy, so I opted to leave her behind, returned to The Alliance without her, and got to work preparing for the only logical backup plan, hence now."
Nat stopped for a moment, sighing. "Speaking of which, I think those anti-Undine devices on ESD could use some improvements to repel mirror universe invaders as well. We should get to work on that, in secret. We can't let anyone else know, else one of mirror Nat's nanites in any number of people would inform him of my plan."
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For some reason... it seemed as though Krystal had more of a commanding presence now, almost equal to Nat himself, yet she seemed unaware of it. Something had changed since they last met.
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He couldn't help but notice how Krystal seemed more commanding then before. "You know, with an attitude like that, you could make admiral too, just like everyone else seems to have been doing lately..."
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She sighed and ran a hand through her hair.
"If I had gotten those codes... I could bring another fleet in to help..." she said. "Almost had them... but Eli..."
She shakes her head. Elihu was apparently a bit of a sore spot for her for some reason.
"Doesn't matter anymore I guess. You just keep up your end, and I'll do what I can on ours."
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Nat continued. "Where were the codes? Who knows them?"
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"While I may not have your resources, I have seen some of your Mirror counterpart's tech, and know a few things. I kinda had to help him get data off the ISS Lexington regarding the rifts Leeta's been using in the Badlands. He's got Temporal and possibly Omega weapons, and... I think he convinced my own counterpart to side with him," she said. "If there's anything else I might have missed... I can't think of anything."
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It's a Mobius class Temporal Destroyer, isn't it?
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