Commodore Pike took his seat and Captain Neil took her seat beside him. All bridge personnel were at their stations. Engineering reported all systems on maximum standby; the transwarp drive was ready to go at a moment's notice. Kira Markos was in position at the aft end of the ship. He had drained all his excess energy into the Knight's shield systems and was ready to intercept any attack that might come from the Kelvan Conquest Planet.
The plan was to pour all the Knight's energy into the transwarp drive creating a highly focused transwarp conduit that would rocket the ship away from the planet before the Kelvans could react. The Conquest Planet's damaged drive would be no match for the Knight's powerful transwarp engines. It would be like the fabled race between the tortoise and the hare, except that Pike had no intention of repeating the hare's mistake of becoming overconfident.
Pike suspected that the Kelvan Battle Planet was already crippled more than they suspected. Otherwise there would surely have been retaliation for the raids on the defense moon and the planet's drive. But instead, the planet just hung there, inert, while the Knight's crew prepared their escape to warn the Federation.
Now the preparations were complete, all the indicators were blinking green, everyone knew what they had to do. It was up to Pike now to give the word to begin.
"Engage."
On that single, almost softly spoken word all their hopes hinged. The reports started coming in from all around the bridge. Pike listened to them without saying another word.
"Power buildup released into plasma injectors. Transwarp coils firing...."
"Aft shields at 347%...."
"Course set for Starbase 74...."
"Transwarp conduit forming...."
Then everything turned to chaos.
"Commodore! Energy spikes from all over the planet! Off the scale...!"
Pike sat up straighter. "What...?"
"There's a huge energy buildup in the area almost directly below us on the planet surface!"
"Helm, get us out of here!" said Pike urgently. He hit the intercom. "Doctor Kira, get ready!"
"Commodore! I'm getting massive energy readings from the defense moons now."
"On screen," said Pike.
Everything seemed to happen at once.
Outside the ship, brilliant arcs of energy so huge they dwarfed the mighty starship leapt from moon to moon forming a colossal chain. The spillage from this action washed over the Knight's shields setting them afire like the Aurora Borealis. If it hadn't been for Doctor Kira's energy boost, the ship might well have been destroyed.
Inside, anxious crew members hung on to their seats or gripped control consoles to keep from being tossed to the floor by the buffeting the ship was receiving. The red alert klaxon had begun sounding. "Transwarp in two seconds!" someone shouted over the ruckus.
Outside, the energy chain built to its full potential. Suddenly, the entire moon nearest the transwarp conduit glowed brilliant blue and fired a beam a thousand miles in diameter straight at the transwarp conduit. The conduit sputtered, then burst open like a door that had just been kicked in. It absorbed the energy of the beam and widened to more than 50,000 miles across!
Inside, on the bridge, Pike whispered, "No...." But there was nothing he could do.
Outside, the Kelvan Conquest Planet slid swiftly toward the enlarged transwarp conduit. At the same instant as the planet disappeared through the conduit, the energy buildup that had been detected before finally released its fury on the Knight.
This time it didn't matter that everyone was holding on to their seats or the control console in front of them. When the force of that blast hit the Knight, everyone went flying. Throughout the great starship, crew members were thrown unceremoniously across rooms, against bulkheads and into each other like so many rag dolls.
The last thing Pike saw before he too was ricocheted off the ceiling was the Kelvan Conquest Planet using the Knight's own transwarp conduit to penetrate further into Federation space.
Then all went dark....