A/N: Hey guys, this is just a brain fart i came up with one day, i'd like to hear some comments on it before i tidy it up and proceed with the story line
thanks
Evan.
Captain Benjamin Sisko of the United Federation of Planets sat silently contemplating the anomaly that was currently forming before his starship. "Is it dangerous?" he asked, directing his question to the beautiful, very old, and very wise woman that sat at the helm to his right.
"Sensors are unable to penetrate the anomaly, but its putting out a hell of a lot of energy, I wouldn't suggest getting any closer" Commander Jadzia Dax replied.
Kira Naresse paced behind the captains chair "Excatly how does studying this anomaly help us with the war against the Dominion?" she asked, clearly irritated that they had been diverted from a strategic mission to investigate this anomaly.
"I'm as anxtious to join the war efforts as you are Major, but Starfleet is more about exploration and studying new phenomena than it is about fighting. We cannot just ignore anomalies such as this, just because we're in a war!" Sisko answered.
"Well, I'll be sure to tell the Dominion that, when they break through our lines while our best warships are out exploring" Kira retorted "Why couldn't they send a science vessel?"
"Because, we're the closest ship with a type 7 sensors array, and according to the preliminary scans, the anomaly will dissipate in less than an hour" Dax stated just as the anomaly began to surge with power. "I'm detecting a massive energy wake coming from the anomaly!" she yelled as her control panel lit up with new sensory data.
"Shields!" Benjamin shouted.
"Shields are up" Ensign Nog replied.
"Sir, the energy spike is not being directed at us, it looks like the energy is tearing into the fabric of space time!" Dax stated.
"Space time? How the hell is that possible?" Chief Miles O'Brian asked as his fingers danced across his control panel, regulating energy flow throughout the ship.
"I don't know" Dax answered "we know that space exists in layers, and it's possible to jump from one layer to another, that's how we can go to warp, but I've never seen a case where the very fabric of space and time is penetrated, I mean, who knows what lies beyond the universe?"
The crew sat in stunned silence as the anomaly now churned like a vortex, and a point of darkness appeared at the center, gradually expanding in size.
"Can sensors penetrate the anomaly now?" Sisko asked "what is that dark point?"
"Sir, there's so much energy in the anomaly that sensors are basically useless" Dax answered, just as the silver metallic outline of a haul appeared at the center of the anomaly, and began to emerge.
"It's a ship" Warf shouted "I am unable to identify its configuration, but it is defiantly not Dominion"
"Sir we are being hailed!" Nog stated, anxiety clearly in his voice.
"On screen" Sisko ordered.
Immediately the image of what appeared to be a human male, roughly in his mid twenties appeared on the screen.
"I am Evannotharn, commander of the Lantien Arc Light Cruiser, Genesis… If you have the ability to generate a Polaric Inversion Pulse I suggest you target the vortex immediately!" The newcomer stated "In Thirty seconds an energy pulse will follow me through the vortex and reduce both you and I into constituent atoms!"
Sisko looked at the figure before him, the figure looked far too young to command a starship, and he had never heard of the Lantien's. But then again, the vortex did pierce through the fabric of space time, these Lantien's may be from an alternate reality, or timeline.
"Worf, reconfigure the main deflector and target the anomaly" Sisko ordered "Dax, lock on to his ship with a tractor beam and pull him clear"
"Aye sir" both Worf and Dax replied simultaneously.
Outside the Defiant locked on to the Lantien cruiser and moved the vessel aside while Its main deflector charged and fired a beam into the vortex. In seconds the vortex collapsed in on itself and the remaining energy dispersed in wake that shuddered both vessels.
"Thank you" the figure on the screen smiled "You have saved my life and my ship, I am in your debt"
"You are welcome, I am Benjamin sisko of the Federation Starship Defiant, do you need help with repairs? I can beam a repair crew onboard immediately?"
"I would be greatful, my vessel has taken some major damage, most of which was contained within the hyperdrive, it will take many hours before I can initiate faster than light travel"
"Then I would suggest we tow you back to one of our starbases, we're currently on the boarder of a very hostile race"
"Again I thank you and await your repair crews"
With the Gensis in tow, the defiant set course for the federation starbase, it would take just over a week as they were limited to warp 3 by the added mass of the Genesis. Meanwhile Chief O'Brian had transported himself over to the Genesis to do a preliminary scan of what would be needed to bring the ships Hyper drive back online, he assumed and hoped that the hyper drive was similar to the warp drive, little did he know how wrong he was.
Miles and Julian were both escorted into the engine room by Evannotharn, who had agreed to be called Evan for the sake of the human crew. The ship was amazing to say the least, the interior was a brilliant white and all the controls appeared to be made of crystal.
The engine room looked very different from the Defiant. It was only one level, and was triangular in shape. At the center, instead of a warp core stood a triangular device that was about a meter in length on all three sides and stood about a meter in height. Evenaly spaced across the surface of the triangular pillar were three circular notches that receeded slightly and glowed quite brightly.
"This is your core?" Brian asked, astounded at the compactness of it. He pulled out his tricorder and began actively scanning the core, and was met with surprising results. "This is impossible, according to this your cores outputting the equivalent energy of 3 G type stars!" he almost shouted in awe.
Along each of the sides of the pillars were crystal consoles that sloped out and down, Evan tapped a sequence of crystals and then removed one of them and inserted it into an opening at the top of the console. Almost immediately, the 3 recessed groves gave way to 3 odd looking modules that rose up out of them. The modules had a circular top, roughly 20 centimeters in diameters and contracted towards a sharper tip, they glowed with an odd red color.
"These are zero point modules" Evan explained pointing to one of the red modules "They extract their energy from the vacuum that expands between matter"
"That's impossible" Miles cried, and turned to Julian who had a quizzical look on his face "Zero point energy lies just under the fabric of space time, it tends to bubble through which causes spatial expansion. But its not an energy source you can just tap into!"
"Why not?" Julian asked.
"Because, tampering with Zero point energy is tampering with the curvature of space time, you can never predict the results. A science station in the Varnoth star system attempted to extract zero point energy once" Miles replied
"The Varnoth system? I've never heard of it"
"Of course you haven't, its now the Nadriian expanse, the region is so unstable that anything entering it gets torn apart. That's why the federation abandoned research into zero point technology over a century ago"
"Do not be concerned, my people also failed in extracting zero point energy from our space time continuum" Evan replied "These modules extract energy from regions of our universe contained within subspace fields"
"You mean, universes in a bottle?" Miles questioned
"In a bottle?" Julian asked, again perplexed.
"They've taken portions of normal space and somehow shoved them into subspace thus isolating any side effects from Zero Point energy taps, Its amazing. I mean the power needed to push entire regions of space into subspace, not to mention the side effects of warping the space time continuum…." Miles began to mumble and then stopped and stared at Evan with shock "How many of these do you have?"
"This vessel operates on 3, however, This ship was intended to aide an evacuation fleet to another galaxy, I am carrying over 20 additional modules in storage. I do not know if the fleet will make it to Pegasus now, hopefully only a few vessels will need to be sacrificed"
"Why where you evacuating the galaxy?" Julian asked, intrigued by this little discovery.
"The wave that would have followed me through the vortex was simultaneously generated throughout my home galaxy. Every planet and everything in space has been washed away, reduced to dust." Evan replied with a hint of sadness in his eyes.
"Who would do such a thing?" Julian asked, clearly outraged at the prospect of billions of sentient beings being reduced to dust.
"We did" Evan admitted clearly shocking the two Starfleet officers.
Two hours later Miles and his repair teams were still trying to figure out the Lantien technology. Julian had just finished his biological analysis of Evan in the Defiants infirmary. And Benjamin Sisko had just entered the infirmary with Dax to question Evan about the aliens possible involvement in an act of genocide.
"So doctor, how is your patient" Sisko smiled as he entered the infirmary accompanied by Dax.
"Well he's in perfect Health, and oddly enough almost human" Julian admitted.
"Almost human?" Dax questioned
"Well physiologically he's almost identical to humans, one heart, two lungs, that sort of thing. However, genetically, he's very different, and to top it off his neurology is completely off the scale. The amount of brain activity he's outputting would kill a normal human in a matter of hours. But other than that I'd say he's in picture perfect health for a 28 year old human male." Julian reported then paused for a moment a turned to his patient "You are 28 years old right?"
Evan smiled "Yes, give or take a few years"
Sisko caught Evan's smiled and realized the doctor must have been very wrong about his estimate "Exactly how many years are we talking here?" he asked.
"Guess" Evan answered.
"3 years?" Dax piped in, and Evan shook his head.
"Seven years?" Julian asked, and Evan shook his head.
Evan then turned to Sisko "care to guess my age?"
Benjamin shrugged "100?" he asked, but again Evan shook his head.
"100 Ben, are you crazy?" Dax stated, and walked over to Evan side and sized him up "He cant be more than 40" she finally stated.
"I'm afraid your captain was closer" Evan turned to Dax, admiring her spots and wondering exactly how far down they went. "I'm One Million, Eight hundred and twenty three thousand, two hundred and sixty four, of your years old"
"That's impossible, no biological life form can live that long!" Bashier almost shouted.
"Well you look good for your age" Dax stated in a slightly flirtatious voice.
"It's quite possible doctor" Evan retorted while still sizing up Jadzea's figure as she strolled away from him and back to the captain "As you may have noticed my people have increased neural capacity, which comes with it certain abilities. One of which is to regenerate our own bodies"
After the encounter in Sickbay and the debriefing in which Evan volunteered all the information he had about his home universe, Sisko made his way back to his office and had ordered Miles to come see him as soon as possible. Encountering Evan and his vessel could prove to be a pivotal turning point in the war with the Dominion. His technology, at least that which he was willing to explain, was thousands, perhaps millions of years more advanced than anything he had seen. Just then Miles entered the room.
"You wanted to see me sir?" miles asked.
"What can you tell me about his ship, and his technology?" Sisko asked.
"From what I can tell, its way beyond anything I've ever dealt with" Miles answered honestly.
"Do you think we can reverse engineer the technology?"
"Not without Evan's help, the entire structure of the technology seems to be based around crystals. The crystals themselves can be easily replicated, but the method of data transferring, processing and storing within the crystalline structure appears to occur beyond the sub atomic level. That's a level of manipulation I can't even comprehend."
"What about his engine core, bashier mentioned something about it being small enough to carry around"
"Well that's true sir, the primary energy source is roughly 50 centimeters in length and about 20 in diameter. And sir, You do not want to be close to that thing if it explodes!"
"that powerful huh?"
"Think super nova"
"I want you to work with Evan on upgrading the defiant systems with Lantien technology. After you've completed repairs on his ship of course"
"Understood captain, we should finish up repairs on his ship in about half an hour, I don't really know why he's letting me hang around, his ship has sophisticated repair systems that are regenerating most of the systems automatically"
"Well according to him we've saved his life so he's forever in our debt, he's also expressed an interest in staying with us for a while even after his ship is repaired.
"Well I hope he does, he seems like a good enough fellow at any rate"
After the meeting Miles returned to the Lantien cruiser and alongside Evan completed their repairs just as an urgent communication from the starbase came through. Starfleet had received a transmission from deep space nine reporting that the cardassians had found a way to bring down the mine field. Shortley afterwards a fleet of over 600 ships was assembled to take back deep space nine at all cost, and keep the Dominion reinforcements from coming through the wormhole.
Now that the Genesis no longer needed to be towed, the defiant made its way to take lead of the fleet while the Genesis adapted itself for warp traveled and followed closely behind.
Evan was remote piloting the Genesis as he helped Miles O'Brian upgrade the Defiants weapons, armor and shields. If one thing could be said about the Lantiens it was they're ingenuity. With completely alien technology before him, Evan was able to increase the defiant energy output by a factor of 50. He adapted the pulse phasers and torpedoes to use quantum phase shifting technology to bypass the enemy shields and haul armor. The weapons could now pass through the external layers of the ship and detonate directly inside the reactor cores. The ablative armor now had micro replicants dispersed throughout the ship that could materialize new armor in place of the used ablative sections. And the shields were now 10 times more powerful and could take far greater damage before causing feed backs into the primary emitters. After her upgrades the defiant was now the most powerful ship in the federation, possibly in the entire alpha quadrant. And right now she was at the head of the fleet heading towards deep space nine.
"I'm reading dominion and cardasian vessels dead ahead" nog reported as they approached what was to be the battle grounds for one of the most pivotal battles in the entire Dominion war.
"Take us out of warp, have galaxy wings slow to half impulse, have our fighter screens accelerate to full impulse… how many ships?" Sisko asked?
"Over 12 hundred" Nog replied.
"That's more than 2 to 1" Bashier commented.
"Well with our enhancements I'm sure we're going to do a hell of a lot of damage" O'Brian stated.
"Even with our enhancements we're gonna take a beating, and what about the reset of the fleet, one things for sure, we're going to loose a lot of them" Kira piped in.
"How long until fighters are in range?"
"5 minutes sir"
"Captain, I believe the time has come for me to repay my debt to you" Evan stated dully.
"I don't understand?"
"You wish to punch a hole through their defenses so that you may continue towards deep space nine unimpeded?" Evan stated.
"Yes"
"My vessel can make that hole for you"
"One ship, against over a thousand, even with your shields you wont survive under that much firepower for very long" Miles piped in.
"I will survive long enough" Evan stated then turned to the captain, as his fingers danced across the surface of his gauntlet. "I have transported my supply of Zero Point Modules to your vessel"
"You don't have to do this, this isn't your war" Sisko shouted.
"I have a debt, and one thing you must know about my people is we always pay our debts" Evan replied just as he vanished without a trace.
"Sir, the Lantien vessel is moving ahead of the fleet, he's out running the fighter screens" Nog informed as the view screen changed to show the Lantien cruiser at its heart and quickly approaching the densely packed enemy ships."
"how long until he's in their weapons range?"
"Thirty seconds sir" Dax replied.
The seconds passed slowly as the entire bridge seemed to hold its breath, and then the space in front of the cruiser erupted with fire.
"Sir they're firing…. He's not even moving to evade them"
"Sir, I examined his shields, though they are extremely advanced I doubt they could last more than ten minutes of sustained bombardment" Miles stated flatly.
"The fighter screens are still 3 minutes away sir, and his ships come to a complete stop right in front of one of the Jem Hedar Cruisers"
"what is he doing?"
"He's just sitting there sir"
"MY GOD" Dax shouted "I'm detecting a massive energy signature coming from his ship, I think they've breeched his shields and he's loosing containment…. Wait, the energy isn't dissipating uniformaly, its controlled somehow…"
"Controlled?" Benjamin asked just as the view screen zoomed in to see the Lantien cruiser surrounded by a field of glowing energy balls. The balls looked like a school of millions of squids erupting from the cruiser and plowing into the Dominion cruiser, and from there jumping to the next cruiser and the next, in an endless chain. In their wake nothing but exploding wreckage remained.
"Sir each of those… squids, are caring the power signature of a quantum torpedo, they're moving in a organized fashion targeting the dominion heavy cruisers and the Cardssian ships primarily, every so often smaller schools seem to break off from the primary bunch and take out the smaller ships.
"Sir the fighter squads are requesting orders, their primary targets have been destroyed" Nog yelled.
"Sir I think we've got a bigger problem!" O'Brian interrupted "The jem Hedar ships are making suicide runs at the lantien ship, it might survive one or two but I doubt much more than that. If that ship blows sir, its power cores will overload and vaporize everything within at least four light days of here, and severely damage anything about 2 light years away."
Just as Miles finished up his speech Evan materialized on bridge "Order all your ships to jump to warp right now, my shields are failing and I've set the cores to overload"
Sisko wasted no time and ordered the entire fleet to jump to warp around the Dominion fleet. The remaining 3rd of the Dominion fleet that survived the alien weapons were stunned to say the least, and began prepairing a pursuit coarse, but they had waited to long and the alien vessel exploded in a blaze that would've extinguished several solar systems. The gravimetric shockwaves generated by the detonation could be felt for several light years, throwing astroids and small moons out of orbit and dispersing much of the plasma clouds that formed the delirious belt.
Shortly afterwards, with the news of the failed stand against the federation task force, Dominion Occupied Deep Space Nine, began preperations for taking down the minefield. In a matter of minutes Dominion Reinforcements would come through from the Gamma quadrant and lay waste to the federation fleet.
Meanwhile the Defaint, pumping as much energy as it could, into the engines, blazed ahead of the fleet, exiting just in time to watch the minefield explode. Sisko, believing it his only hope, ordered the ship straight into the wormhole.
The bridge crew sat patiently, awaiting the invetiable arrival of the dominion reinforcements, while Evan and Sisko encountered the Prophets.
Evan was taken by surprise, when he was no longer standing on the bridge of the defiant, instead he found himself at the command center of Atlantis. All around him stood members of his family, and council members each looking at him with fascination.
"You are not of Bajor!" one of the apparitions stated flatly "But you stand on the edge of our existence"
Evan looked at the apparition, perplexed, and then he realized who and what these beings where. In his universe a minority of the population learnt to shed their physical bodies and exist purely as energy. As beings of pure energy they existed on higher planes of existence, and communicated with others through visions. Evan realized, due to his own knowledge of artifical wormholes, that anything living within the wormhole would have no meaning of time. Putting two and two together, he realized that these creatures were ascended Bajorians who, by creating and inhabiting the wormhole, would have no perception of linear time.
Almost as If reading his mind the entities gathered around him "You understand our existence, yet you do not share it. Why?" the entity that had taken the form of Dax questioned.
"I chose my path for it was mine to choose" Evan replied. "Return me to the Defiant!"
"The path you choose will lead to your death, you will cease to exist, your knowledge will be lost to the universe. You must join us, teach us what u know of your universe!" The beings urged.
Evan closed his eyes and concentrated, gathering all of his energy into a single point and releasing it. Though he had chosen to remain mortal, he still retained the knowledge of ascension, and how to achieve it on his own. He could now feel his body dissolve, shedding his mortal coil and emerging into the higher plane of existence. But what greeted him in this plane was not what he expected. It was barren, devoid of life, he could not feel the Bajorans, or any other ascended beings. He looked around seeing the wormhole through ascended eyes, feeling the crew of the Defiant, feeling the Dominion forces and finally feeling the Entities.
"So that is why you wish me to join you" Evan stated flatly to the entities which he now saw in their natural forms. "You probed my mind as a mortal, you know my kind have reached a level of existence much higher then your own, and you wish me to bring that enlightenment to your kind"
"Show us the path" the entites cried, releasing Sisko from their midst and all gathering around him.
"I cannot, ascending your kind would unmake your very existence" and with that statement Evan floated into the Defiant bridge, reforming as a solid being to interact with the others.
"It doesn't look like the prophets are going to help us" Sisko stated flatly, he was in the middle of pleading for their help when they had unexpectedly returned him to the Defiant. He had just gotten the words out when he realized Evan was no longer on the bridge.
The crew fell silent as a glowing white specter appeared on the view screen and floated towards the bridge. In moments it had passed through the view screen and now glowed a brilliant white on the bridge before taking the form of Evan.
"Evan, what just happened?" Sisko asked.
"I ascended to interact with the entities inside this wormhole. I had assumed the others would exist in your universe but it seems that plane of existence is vacant here" Evan replied.
"I don't know what ascension is, but you best take a seat the dominion fleet will intercept us in less than a minute" Nog yelled from the helm.
"I'll take care of the Dominion" Evan replied, just as a massive energy storm swept through the wormhole obliterating the Dominion fleet.