It was around 0330 hours in the morning when Wallace had came to the bridge, because of a call from the delta shift. The Arizona had entered the area where the relay station is located. Wallace walked over to tactical II and looked at the scanners. They were in the heart of the New Dominion Territory.
"All hands red alert. Senior officers to the conference lounge. " Richard looked down at the new helm officer who was very nervous. "It'll be all right. We've had worse orders."
Chief Murphy, and Commander's Loran and Mallory. Were sitting at the conference table waiting to see what was going on at nearly 4 am. Wallace and Razek walked in followed by Sovick.
"All right we are here at the relay station. It's a communication network that spans over 3/4 of the Dominion territory we take it out they will be blind for nearly 5-9 weeks before they build another one.
"Lieutenant Sovick will launch three tricobalt torpedoes. The explosion will be big. Problem is there is 13 Jem'Hadar attack ships protecting the relay station." Wallace paused for a few minutes to let Chief Murphy speak.
"Sir the Sensor hiding system should hide us. "
"We don't know what Kelly did for all we know he told the Jem'hadar how to find us. So we must assume that fact. All of you will be on the bridge. Including you Chief Murphy. For some reason I think we're going to be having a hell of a ride. All right lets get moving. And blow this damn thing up."
Everybody left the conference lounge for the bridge. Most of the crew on the bridge were the senior staff. Except for three Ensigns manning the back up stations. Wallace and Garek walk down to their seats and took them. Mallory sat near the spot that counselors usually took.
"Ahead full impulse power. Lieutenant Sovick load the tubes. "Wallace said sitting back, but not relaxing.
"Sir we are 23,000 meters from the relay station." Razek said.
"Sovick lock tricobalt torpedoes. I want a 12 second delay." Wallace said turning towards Sovick.
"Yes sir." Sovick locked torpedoes, and was waiting for the order. "Fire" Wallace ordered as the Arizona began it's run near the relay station. Two blue streams of lights flew towards the station and hit the coolant system exhaust port. The explosion started at 12 seconds exactly.
The explosion was bigger then predicted. The Arizona was not yet at full impulse when the shock wave struck the Arizona and rocked her hard to port. Conduits started to spark and everyone nearly fell to the deck. The shock wave passed the Arizona and she was adrift. Sovick quickly got his wits and started to check for damage and saw four Jem"hadar attack ships approaching fast.
"Sir, four attack ships approaching at bearing mark 045 mark 3. Time to intercept 1 minute. The sensor masking system is down we can be detected." Sovick said not knowing what Wallace was going to do.
"Murphy, get the sensor masking system back on line. Ensign Bannon get us out of here warp 4.5" Wallace said standing up out of his chair as phased polron beam was fired at the Arizona's aft section. And explosion was felt through out the ship.
"Warp drive is off line." Razek said as Bannon was starting to freeze up.
"Sovick lock phasers on the lead Jem"hadar. Murph how long before the warp drive is up and running."
Murphy ran his fingers over the engineering console and didn't like the findings."The main eps conduit is down 20 to 26 minutes." Murphy said as another explosion erupted.
Damn I guess we try and fight our way out this. Wallace said as he turned towards Sovick.
"Sir I am reading 9 Attack ships that'll be joining the attack." Sovick yield as the ship rocked from another hit.
"Razek, any where we can hide to get repairs done?" Garek yield as the ship rocked again.
"Yes a nebula about 34,000 kilometers infront of us. We'll be able to hide from the Jem'hadar they won't be able to find us on sensors. And the same with us." Razek said as a torpedo stuck the forward section the Arizona causing some damage.
"Shields at 65%."Sovick yield as another torpedo struck the ship disabling the reactive shielding. Wallace turned to see the conduit running by tactical I explode and send a piece of the wall flying off taking Sovick's head with it. Sovick's body stood motionless for a few seconds and then fell to the deck. Oh shit.Wallace thought to himself.
Another explosion shook the ship even harder. Wallace grew angry, and yield. " Some one get over and man the god damn tactical!!"
The Arizona was taking a beating and was starting to leak plasma out the starboard nacelle. She also had a hull breach on deck 4-5. The ship was starting to loose main power. Commander Mallory ran over to Tactical II and got off a few quantum torpedoes destroying on Attack ship. She locked on to another and fired and disabled the attack ship.
Chief Murphy was trying to reroute power to vital areas to the ship as it kept taking a pounding. Then an attack ship fired a shot hitting the area 5 meters behind the bridge. Wallace was standing behind his chair when the explosion hit. Two ensigns were behind him the engineering display blew up sending debris , Wallace and the other crew members flying over the three center chairs. Wallace landed hard and hit his head.
Commander Loran ran over to see if Wallace was ok. He sort of got Wallace to his feet. Richard looked around and saw the bridge was burning and a mess. He quickly began giving orders. "Razek status report?"
"Shields gone ablative armor starting to buckle. " Another explosion came and took out the helmsman throwing her face forward over the station. "Garek take the helm." Wallace yield as the Arizona entered the nebula. The firing ceased, and Wallace looked around and say his bridge was badly damaged. Richard went to tap his comm badge and felt a pain in his right arm. He looked over to see a piece of metal sticking in his bicep, and his fore arm tore open.
"Chief we need a damage report." Wallace said bending done to check the two injured ensigns.
"He's down Captain, injured."Mallory said checking his pulse.
"Garek get done to Engineering and see how bad were hurt." Garek stood up and walked over to Wallace. "Sir you need medical attention as well."
"Damn it I gave you an order get the fuck to it now. Or I'll find someone else capable for Christ sake." Wallace had never spoke to any of his crew like that before. Of course he never saw his ship so hurt or his crew so hurt either. Garek gave an angry scowl.
"Yes sir!!"
Razek tapped his comm badge." We need a medical team up to the bridge badly. Mallory went over and checked some of the other injured bridge officers. Wallace went over to where Bannon fell and sat next to her and started to talk to her seeing she was still breathing.
Over the next 3 hours Wallace refused medical attention and over saw the Damage control effort. The surviving members of the Senior staff walked in to the senior lounge where Wallace was getting his arm put in a sling. Garek was dirty and tired look on his face. Doctor Varl was covered in blood from his hours of having to perform surgery.
"Alright Commander Loran what's the Arizona's status?" Wallace asked showing no signs of pain. Just anger.
"I have her coolant leak contained. Here phasers won't be on line any time soon. I suspect maybe 3-5 hours on the shields. 9 hours main power will be restored. 4 hours for Warp 1." Garek said sliding a PADD over to Wallace.
"All right doc your time."
"15 Critical but stable patients, 12 dead. 6 injured. "
Wallace took a few minutes to think the situation over. He knew they were in a Kobashu maru synro. And he hated it. "The Jem'Hadar will be waiting when we leave the nebula. How long of a fight can we put up?"
"Are you crazy Captain? We can't even out run them let alone fight them." Garek said slamming his fist down.
"What you suggest Commander?" Wallace asked getting rather gruff in his voice.
"As your Executive officer and link between you and the crew. I must suggest surrendering the Arizona crew." It was quiet for a few minutes nobody dare ever bring that up to a Captain let alone one like Richard Wallace.
Richard leaned back and shook his head in disgust. He hoped to have never even be suggested that in his command career. "Garek you know what the Jem'Hadar do to their prisoners. They will kill all wounded prisoners the doctor. Use tactical and security officers for tactical exercise.
I will not condemn my crew to a slow and horrible death. If we die I want to take some of those bastards with us. We will fight it out and then ram them.
Garek fix the weapons and defensive systems. We leave in 13 hours to met our fate. Dismissed."
The staff left feeling a sense of gloom of sorts. However some the crew believed that Wallace was right and it was a quick death. Mallory finally understood Wallace's ways. She knew now he wasn't one just for fighting but for his crew's safety. He was putting aside a few days of life for himself, for a quick and meanful death for the rest of his crew.