CHAPTER 3: And a Star to Steer It By

      CHAPTER 3 : AND A STAR TO STEER IT BY

Captain's Log

Stardate : 87628.4

These are the voyages of the starship Horizon. Her mission; push farther out the final frontier... and live once again the ideals of the Federation: to seek out new life and new civilizations in the spirit of universal peace and brotherhood.

These are the voyages of a crew of over two thousand from a hundred worlds, united in this spirit and focused toward that goal. They are the best and they are led by the best; brave veteran Commander Neil Redding of Earth; highly resourceful Commander Oseno Jureth and heroically steadfast Lieutenant Commander Joseph D. Sisko, both of Bajor; vastly knowledgeable Lieutenant-Commander Snowfire K'Leysha of the Illythirii; uniquely competent Doctor 011 and 110 of Bynar; singularily dedicated Lieutenant Sarah Corcoran, also of Earth; distinctively efficient Lieutenant Elisha Leône of Orion... On the eve of our first voyage, these exceptional people will boldly blaze the new trails of discovery and achievement for the United Federation of Planets.

The Horizon is about to implement it's final trial run. We will push her new, unique and revolutionnary transwarp drive to it's limits to see if it matches the promises of her crew. A new page of History is about to be written by them and this new, Lotus class starship. New wonders and new challenges await. We are ready.

Captain Kheren closed the intraship channel once he got the signal that everything was in order. He used his first log to help in the final test of the system and to tell the crew where they stood, what he felt... and that the time was now.

His command chair was at the same time elegant and sturdy, allowing him to swivel in any direction effortlessly to address any bridge officer. The entire room was almost identical to the time -honored Galaxy class design that had proven itself so efficient on large vessels like this one.  accoustics of the ship's command center was especially designed to compensate for his Andorian rear deafness so that even the tactical station behind and over him, manned by Chief of Security and Tactical Sarah Corcoran, and the Science and research auxilliary stations behind where Science Chief Snowfire K'Leysha sat with her chief assistant, Norbert Baoule,  were perfectly audible to him. There was environemental and engineering stations on his left, currently oversee by chief engineer assistant Robert Baoule and ops officer Thannkhuun Cheonghi as chief engineer Sisko was down in main engineering to directly monitor the stardrive. The Medical Command Chair lay between them and the Andorian commanding officer, where sat one of the Bynar doctors. With his unique computer connection to his twin coupled with this special station on the bridge, Doctor 110 was able to constantly maintain contact with sickbay as well as all departments of the ship and any away team even if all internal communications went down.

Sweeping his gaze from left to right, the commanding officer of the largest and most advanced starship in Starfleet recognized the Ops station and the Orion woman supervizing all the final preparations for departure. On the right of Elisha Leône sat the chief pilot and navigator Aguk Snow at the helm station and, on the right bulkhead of the bridge, the support stations completed the control consoles of the vessel, with chief counselor Lyrya and security assistant Tyvya helping the main departments in their final pre-launch duties.

On the bridge also stood Yeoman Meeramanee Blackbird behind and to the left of the medical command seat and Commander Oseno Jureth, the Bajoran Strategic Ops officer slighlty behind Lieutenant Corcoran, so as to have a complete overall view of the tactical display, the bridge layout and all it's three turbolifts doors, captain ready room and bridge head accesses and the huge main viewing screen at the other end.

On the large computer-imaging system, everyone could see the vastness of space calling to them, beyond the elegantly simple curved structure of the starbase they were still anchored at. Only part of the titanic structure could be seen from the external docking ring where the huge starship could only be welcomed.  At over three kilometers in diameter, the starbase was large enough to shelter the Horizon inside... but the access doors were a few hundred meters too narrow to allow her entrance... and once inside, it could only have come out from  the other door directly on the other side; especially if there were even but one other vessel inside, like the USS Alsea currently under repair, the Lotus-class giant could not maneuver at all once inside except go through in a straight line from entrance to exit.

And so, they were already outside... and the call of the final frontier was even louder to them all as they felt the immense starship fretting at it's tether in anticipation of it's launch, like some huge stallion eager to bolt free.

Those who rode her certainly felt the same trepidation despite their cool, professional exterior, most notably her captain. It could be heard in the strength of his deep resonant voice.

" All department heads; report readiness for departure."

"Understood captain" Redding intoned with a kind of exaggerated seriousness, any hint of the playfulness he had shown earlier disappeared while on duty. "Corcoran, Leone, status on all systems?" And walked over to Corcoran as he said it. Redding was never one to be content with another's observations and tended to check their work from time to time.

As the XO interacted with Corcoran and the Orion Ops chief Jureth scanned over the readouts coming from the Polaris on his console. Her warp core showed stable, and was available on command, security sweeps were clean and the roving patrol had reported all clear as well. His feed from the tactical sensors showed green as well, but he would let Corcoran handle that, it was her job after all. He did however speak up for his department

"Captain, Strategic Operations is at one hundred percent readiness, and USS Polaris is fully operational and at your disposal Sir."

"I expected no less, Commander," Kheren answered.

There was no way to fathom if he was saying this as a pleasant banter or a serious answer... or amazingly both He used his lack of facial expression to good advantage in keeping his officers on their toes, yet relaxed, in a curious mixture of it with his modulated tone of voice.

Snowfire wasn't - quite - bouncing in her seat as the order was spoken. There was nothing quite like the first launch of a newly commissioned vessel, the feeling of a young ship around you, ready to leap out across the stars. Even with her own people's ships being far more...actively young, perhaps...then Starfleet's, there was still that feeling here. Newness and renewal in this case too, for it was not a new name to the roster of Starfleet. The Horizon had been a name for vessels of the Federation for a long time, but never like this. This was special. A test of the beginning to an ability to cross the stars in a way the Federation had always strived for but found so difficult to attain. She tapped a few short commands into her console, a surface-layer systems and response test, and smiled as all the on-duty heads confirmed status. Excellent.

"Science is at full readiness and can't wait for something to cut their teeth on." She said happily - not for her the jitters of nervousness, more 'I haven't felt this happy in over a century'. "We're ready, Captain."

"I am counting on you to gather all sensor data about our transwarp jumps for further analysis and reference, Lieutenant-Commander. Should help grind your teeth for awhile."

Again, there was that odd mix of seriousness and levity only a few her were now starting to get accustomed to. Kheren had a reputation of being a By-The-Book commanding officer because he had never broken a rule; except once, when he had launched the USS Artemis at full impulse right from inside the starbase, where maneuvering thrusters only were allowed... But even then, as his Board of Inquiry had confirmed, he had done so by using another emergency rule to justify it. His psych-profile showed clearly that, despite outward appearances, he was not a conformist at all; he only did things that made sense to him, regardless of who or what stated them; and to him, Federation values and Starfleet rules made most sense... so far.

Those who knew him well, especially those who had witnessed his bewildering inventiveness in combat situations, they knew that, the day those rules would not, in his judgment, provide the correct answer, he would simply ignore them and come up with a new one. 

This complex attitude was quite perceptible to counselors and other astute people... but not all that easy to understand. Once he had even lost a chief engineer who simply had no clue at all about it and tought him a stuffed bureaucrat and a tin soldier. But to that, Kheren had one simple answer; I prefer to die misunderstood than waste my whole life explaining myself.

And fortunately for him, he was the captain; now, he didn't had to explain himself at all.

But on the other hand, he was just as prone to reassess his own judgment as he never failed to listen to his officers, like now as they were reporting readiness status.

Jureth acknowledged the captain's reply to his report with a curt  nod and swiveled away from his console for a moment to watch the Horizon's exit from spacedock on the viewer. As the other officers reported Jureth looked at the young Lieutenant Corcoran standing at the tactical station, and for a moment Jureth felt some longing. Despite the fact that he no longer felt the sense of dread being in a command position part of him wished he were standing back at a tactical console. To know a ship's weapons systems inside and out, to know what she was capable of, and to know what her enemies were about to encounter when they attacked was a feeling that few things could replace. Granted, commanding the Alsea had instilled in him the realization that the center seat was equally as exhilarating but the tactical position brought with it an excitement that Jureth had no realized he would miss. His time had passed however, he knew, and he now needed to focus on his new position. Captain Kheren had high expectations, and Oseno Jureth would deliver on them if he could help it.

As Lieutenant Elisha Leône sat behind the operations console confirming her readiness, utilizing her peripheral vision she also gazed around at all of the officers preparing their stations as well. She listened attentively to the responses provided by her fellow bridge officers and considered herself blessed to be stationed where she was at this moment. In her mind, the odds of actually serving on this ship as the chief operations officer given her prior circumstances and particular heritage were astronomical at best.  

Nevertheless, after breathing in deeply and slowly for a moment, she turned back to face the Andorian commanding officer and reported to him with a gleam in her eyes and professional, yet warm smile on her radiant face.

"The Operations department is now optimal and ready for departure Captain." 

The call for each department to report readiness for launch came through to Main Engineering as well, where Lieutenant Commander Joey Day Sisko was busily checking over each readout personally around the massive warp core. It required him to move at a light jog when he wasn't climbing up and down ladders, and he reflected on the fact that a position on this Lotus-class ship would put him back into the best shape he was in since his Academy years.

"Sir, there seems to be a slight variance in the tachyon matrix of the transwarp drive," called out Lieutenant Patricia Blakely from a position next to the very same device. Her expertise in transwarp theory was surpassed only by Mister Baoule who happened to be at the bridge station at that moment, and Sisko himself, so he would have her manning the station until their actual first test. He jogged over to take a look and said, "Keep an eye on it, but I think we can put that a low priority. We're going to have to do a level 1 diagnostic on the transwarp drive before any tests occur anyway."

"Yes, Sir," she responded and turned back to her work.

"Is everything at nominal?" he called out to the entirety of main engineering and a series of "Aye" and "Yes Sir" rang out.

Joey tapped his combadge and said, "We're good to go in Engineering, Captain."

Doctor 110 was able to simply connect into the thoughts of her counterpart, and said, "Sickbay is prepped and ready for any emergencies, Commander Redding."

With a satisfied nod to each reporting officer Redding turned back to Kheren.

"Captain, All bridge stations report ready. At your word sir." And took his seat beside his commanding officer.

"Thank you, Number One. Doc, please open a channel to the starbase. "

"Communication established," confirmed de Bynar sitting in the seat left to the Andorian who then spoke with a dry, official tone.

"Starbase Flight Control, this is the Horizon. Request permission to depart."

"Flight Control to USS Horizon; Permission granted. Light breeze to your sails, Captain Kheren."

And as those somewhat unorthodox words were spoken, something flashed on the small monitor screen of his command panel on the left arm of his command chair.

It was a copy of Starfleet Rules and Regulations, pointedly opened at the official starship launch protocol.

Kheren laughed. He knew for sure then that Allen Samji was at the transparency of his control room, looking out at the gigantic starship docked at the outermost part of his base and thinking of the last time the Andorian captain had taken a ship out of dock; at a full seventy-five thousand kilometers per second... from inside the structure. And then, it had been but an almost century-old, refited Ambassador class...

"All hands, this is the captain; we are launching... now."

"Heading, Sir?" asked Aguk Snow without turning from the helm.

"Starfleet already plotted and authorized a nice, safe parabolic course within Federation Space, away and back here but far from any planetary bodies and distant enough from any inhabited area and traffic lane that the possibility of us harming anyone in case of a catastrophic failure is effectively nullified, " informed science assistant Norbert Baoule from Science Station 2. "

"But our explosion would make a nice if short-lived shooting star visible out from all surrounding sectors," added his twin brother Robert from the engineering console.

"Success or failure, we will go in a blaze of glory then," concluded Kheren with his usual straight face. "Mister Snow, heading 144 mark 345. Once at safe range of a thousand AU from the starbase, we will start our transwarp engine tests. "

"Aye, Captain. Heading 144 mark 345."

"Take her out, Number One... standard launch protocols... please."

Redding nodded.

"Helm! Engage, but mind any catastrophic  ending to this endeavor if you please"

"Aye aye, Sir. I will do my best to keep the starbase astern," answered Snow with nothing but seriousness in his coppery face and in his low, nasal voice. But his black slanted eyes betrayed him.

There were several bleeps and ligths on his console and the required reports from the other departments before he went through the mandatory description of undocking procedure.

"All engines fully operational and ready, Commander," then reported engineer Baoule from the Engineering station as chief engineer Sisko and his team signaled all green from main engineering.

"Deflector array at full intensity, " conformed his brother at Science 2 as his superior officer, Snowfire K'Leysha, was occupied with main and secondary sensors workings and data feeding at Science 1.

And then the Inuit helmsman finished the pre-launch sequence.

"All hatches closed and secured. Magnetic clamps retracted. We have cleared all tractor beam moorings. We are floating free and we are clear to navigate. Departure orders confirmed and logged, trajectory plotted and laid in. All thrusters at the ready."

Sitting deep and calm in his command chair, Kheren watched with keen interest his bridge crew at work and especially his First officer directing the launch of the vessel. This was a pretty routine task but then, it was through such apparently inocuous moment that you could learn a lot about an officer; his relationships with others, his grasp of ship operations, his style of leadership, his handling and thus attitude towards rules and proceedings, his care for ship and crew, his respect of the command structure, his concentration, nervousness, confidence, experience...

Indeed, quite a lot. The Andorian was thus as much attentive to the people around him and most of all to the man at his right side as to the moment itself.

The flagship... his ship... was about to depart.

Following the First officer's instructions, the helmsman took the ship away from the outer ring of the station in a slow, graceful arc at 1000 kilometers per second before activating the impulse engine. because this was to be a tial run, he started at minimal impulse for 30 seconds before going to half-impulse and, another half-minute later, bring the huge vessel to full impulse.

"Viewer astern," ordered Kheren.

At one quarter the speed of light, the starbase was receding very rapidly on the main screen and, when it was nothing more than a point of light amidst the tapestry of stars, the captaincame forward on his chair, his elbows on his knees as he looked with all four oculars at the large screen.

"Viewer forward."

They now saw the field of stars before the prow of their ship barely moving despite the already enormous speed they were flying; such was the vastness of the universe around them.His next order  came when everyone was holding their breath in anticipation.

"Warp 1."

"Warp 1, aye Sir," answered helmsman Snow.

Instantly, the stars seemed to stretch out around them into infinity and their was a blinding flash of light before they moves like specs of dust in a wind tunnel before their eyes. But this was an all too familiar sight for Starfleet officers. 

"Holding steady at warp 1, Sir, all systems nominal," confirmed the Inuit pilot.

There was a short moment of tense silence before the words they have all been waiting for finally came out of the Andorian ship commander's thin lips. 

"Standby for transwarp."

"Captain." Redding said calmly. "Should we give a ship wide announcement, not only is this a special event but there is an element of danger to the crew."

Watching the look of excitement in the Andorians eyes brought a slight smile to his lips. When was it things like this started to become routine to him? Deep down he hoped he hadn't lost his sense of wonder.

Kheren gave a nod of appreciation to the Exec for his toughtful consideration of the crew and signaled the Bynar doctor to open the shipwide internal communication channel and keep it open for the entire ship complement, to allow everyone to follow what would happen on the bridge. Every monitor and screen throughout the immense starship would also be connected to the main viewer, if not already dedicated to any of all the numerous variables involved in the event.

"All hands, this is the captain; standby for transwarp. We will increment it in progressive stages that will follow an elliptical trajectory from Starbase Lotus at transwarp 1 to space Station Echo 3 at transwarp 2, which will take sixteen days; then from there to Deep Space Station 9 at transwarp 3 twenty-one hours later... and then one and a half hour later to Starbase G6 at transwarp 4. We will finally get back to Starbase Lotus at transwarp 5, which will take an estimated time of twelve minutes... and so test the new propulsion system to it's limits."

He made a pause to let everyone evaluate the entire journey. This was all in all a trip of four flights each of roughly forty-six light years within the heart of Federation Space. At warp 9, this was a forty-four days trip accross a hundred and eighty-four light years. If all went according to expectations, even at such progressive speed stages, they would do it in around a third of that time. As astounding as this was already, most were able to calculate however that, at a sustained safe speed of transwarp 4, it would have taken for the entire journey a mere six hours!

"All departments, prepare flight analysis, level 1 diagnostics of all systems and crew evaluations and submit report for every phase of the test run to  the First Officer at each destination. Each base will also monitor our flight and there will be comparative studies at each point before going on to the next. Remember that, with each report, you will be writing History. All hands look alive..."

The old Earth navy expression might have surprised a few, especially coming from an Andorian, a species known for their fear of deep open waters, but it was familiar to all who had served under him. And it mean that he was expecting their best. The excitement could be felt almost from the ship itself and was clearly audible even through the perfectly professional tone and words of the helmsman.

"Transwarp at your command, Sir."

The figure of Lieutenant Robert Baoule turned away from his Engineering station to the right of the Captain and XO in the center and said, with a concerned look, "Sir, we haven't received the go ahead from Main Engineering yet. It looks like they are still running some sort of diagnostic on the transwarp drive."

The Andorian's head fell between his flexed arms. There was a short sigh and he lifted his head back up again.

"Alright... let's not unfurl our sails before the bo'sun says they are well attached to the mast. After all, we will get there soon enough. All hands, standby."

Any ship commander would have been impatient to flex his new ship's muscles. Kheren was no different than any of them. But he had been through enough crisis to curb his eagerness and let his people do their job properly before hurling them all with him into some unknown.

Still, it was not easy to wait. But the safety of his crew always came first and last in his mind. And so, he waited.

"This reminds me of when I.. served aboard the USS Response, we were testing a new long range warp shunting device." He had paused before saying '..when I was captain of..' It just didn't seem appropriate at the time. "Our Tellarite engineering specialist took almost 2 hours rechecking everything before letting us try it. It's probably the same thing here, triple checking what they double checked before." Then settled back  in anticipation of a long wait.

"Fortunately for us, Mister Sangliar is still on the starbase and we have a Bajoran in the engine room, "commented the Andorian with antennae curving in good natured banter. "They are most expeditious and I expect only double checks of single checks... Mister Sisko know his job so... since we could not trick him, we will have to find another, more creative way to blow up this ship. "

He had to say it. The pain of losing the Artemis was still there in him, and facing it, even in jest, was a much felt mneed for him to cope with it. But it did sound a bit wearisome to a few of the bridge officers knowing that nothing could not be expected from him... especially not the unexpected.

The voice of Chief Engineer Joseph Sisko came over the comm. "Sorry to take the wind from your sails, Captain, but there's a variance in the tachyon matrix. If we don't correct it, simply failing to open a conduit will be the least of our problems."

"Understood, Engineer. We will throw lines and fish a bit until you give the word, " Kheren said with his usual straight face.

The tachyon matrix was responsible for creating a transwarp conduit within subspace, so the calculations had to be perfect to achieve a transwarp field. What he didn't say, but was implied to Captain Kheren was at best, they could create a tear in subspace, similar to what the old polluting warp drives did half a century ago and what had contributed to the very anomaly the whole Fleet had previously fought. At worst, they could create a massive rift that would swallow up the entire Horizon and possibly even threaten Lotus Starbase. He wanted to make sure every reading was at the exact nominal figures quoted by Captain Paris himself.

Sisko turned and approached Lieutenant J.G. Patricia Blakely and said, "The Captain has pushed up this test much earlier than I had previously expected. I apologize for not taking your previous report as seriously as it warranted. Regardless, now it's our job to fix it."

Blakely nodded. "It's nothing you could have anticipated, Sir. I think if we decrease power to the transwarp deflector we can smooth out the variance, but at that power level, we can't risk going over Transwarp 1."

"That's all we need right now," Sisko replied. "Let me see your calculations."

She handed him the PADD and he reviewed them, nodding with satisfaction the whole time. "This looks good. Make the changes and run a simulation. I'm going to the Bridge to report directly to Captain Kheren."

"Aye Sir," Blakely responded and turned in her seat to begin inputting the agreed upon commands.

A few minutes later, Sisko strode into the Bridge and stood in front and just to the left of Captain Kheren. "Captain, we're running a simulation to test some changes that I'm confident will result in being able to achieve Transwarp 1 in fifteen minutes. However, that will be our maximum for at least thirty-two hours."

He estimated they could easily get the variance removed entirely by the end of the day, but he always followed the old Engineers' adage popularized by Mister Montgomery Scott: "Always multiply your estimates by a factor of four".

"Knowing usual engineering calculations, I could tend to act as the typical impatient captain, " answered Kheren. "But if this stardrive works half as good as it is supposed to be, we will still be back before anyone could really realize that we had any delay. So let us erre on the way of caution. carry on as you plan, Lieutenant-Commander. "

As the Orion female attentively listened to the conversations volleying back-and-forth among the key officers of the ship as she worked, Lieutenant Elisha Leône silently agreed on siding with a cautious approach.

No sense launching a vessel of this size and complexity in haste she thought to herself, but would not dare utter to anyone this early in the commission to her position. 

"We can reassure Mister Sisko that we will not brutalize his brand new engines, " Aguk Snow then offered with a smile, " since the first leg of our journey at transwarp 1 is planned for twelve times his... estimated time of safe travel."

"Excuse me," then asked Chief Counselor Lyrya from behind the Medical Command Chair but I'm not a pilot. Why that long?"

"You already know that warp travel is calculated as the cube of it's factor in light speed," then started to explain Norbert Baoule from the auxilliary science console behind her. " Warp 1 is thus one times one times one the speed of light... or effectively the actual speed of light; warp 2 is two times two times two or eight times the speed of light, warp 3 is twenty-seven times light speed... and so on until warp 10 wich is defined at the end of the scale as infinite speed; being everywhere in the universe at the same instant. Until recently, this was considered the ultimate speed limit, much like the speed of light was before the advent of technologies that could warp space to shorten the distance through subspace instead of trying to simply accelerate."

"Until we found knew ways to trick the universe," now continued helmsman Snow with a wink. " Quantum Slipstream Drive creates a quantum field, a tunnel if you will, between two similar quantum resonances and propel the ship from one to the other at three hundred light years an hour. Coaxial Induction Drive folds space in a way much more extreme than standard warp technology, reconfiguring subatomic particles to basically teleport the ship from one point to another. Graviton catapult technology sends the ship into what is called null-space long enough to reemerge it hundreds if not thousands of light years away after a few hours. Lieutenant-Commander K'Leysha's people here are said to also have some kind of hyperspeed technology, although I don't know much about it except that it is based on the manipulation of gravity. And of course, you know that the Borg contructs artificial wormholes to achieve transwarp speeds."

"And this... Great Experiment of ours?" inquired the Aenar while everyone listened as they waited for the chief engineer's signal to proceed.

"The problem with all those mentionned technologies is that you can neither maneuver nor observe the material universe while in travel," explained the Inuit pilot. "You get there mighty fast but you miss the entire journey... and you can't change your mind much until you're done. The applications for scientific exploration and strategic and tactical situation is quite limited. But then comes the great Experiment; true transwarp."

At this point, engineering officer Robert Baoule took over.

"Just like warp speed is light speed times the cube of it's factor, our transwarp drive, by creating a warping of the already warped space around a ship... and beleive me, it's not as simple as it sounds in actual technological application... brings us to the cube of it's factor applied to warp speed itself; hence the name transwarp. So, for example, warp 5 is one hundred and twenty-five times the speed of light; the maximum attainable speed of this ship is transwarp 5, or  warp 5 times warp 5 times warp 5..."

"That's... nearly two million times the speed of light!" calculated Lyrya with her blind eyes wide in astonishment.

"As fast as Quantum Slipstream," confirmed the black-skinned science officer, his own voice sharing the awe of the couselor. "And as you can guess, with the potential to even go faster..."

"But..." then insisted Snow with a smile of obvious pride, "we still stay in contact with normal space and can fully maneuver, even fight, just like we can at warp speed... just much, much faster. "

"More or less," then specified Tyvya from the security station behind the tactical one. "We still don't have 'transwarp torpedoes' or any offensive capability that can match those speeds, so we need to drop back to at least warp speed to actually fire, just like we used to drop to impulse in the old days when we needed to fire phasers, because energy beams could not fire beyond light speed... That is, before the Borg taught us, hard, that it was possible to create warp funnels around the actual energy stream to send it beyond that limit. But we're not up to that yet with transwarp speed."

"However, thanks to QSD technology, we at least do have sensors able to," added Norbert Baoule in turn. "We use the same type of time-dilated sensor signal to navigate safely at those high velocities, which therefore also allows us to keep monitoring the universe around us. We might not be able to fight at transwarp, but we can certainly travel and discover more of this universe without having to pop in and out like the other hyperdrives would force us to do."

"If we ever get going," now commented Snow, his fingers drumming near his helm controls.

"So... if we can go that fast... why sixteen days between here and Space Station Echo 3?" asked Lyrya.

"Recall the calculation, Counselor," said Norbert Baoule. "Transwarp 1 is warp 1 times warp 1 times warp 1..."

"Equals... warp 1; the speed of light... ," she then understood. "So, transwarp 2 is... the same as warp 8?"

"Exactly," confirmed the junior science officer. "So yes, up to there, we can still monitor, maneuver and fight just like any other starship without switching drives because we are still within standard technology capabilities. It is starting at transwarp 3, nearly twenty thousand times the speed of light, that we get to the tactical problems Lieutenant Tyvya warned us about."

"So that becomes our transwarp cruising speed... if we ever get going..." impatiently complained again their helmsman.

"Captain" Redding leaned over to Kheren "If you'd like I could go down to engineering and see if I can move things along, as safely as possible of course." In truth he wanted an excuse to see the Transwarp system up close and while they were still working with it, and try to compare it to his brothers work.

Although his first officer never said anything about it, Kheren had quickly noticed the gleam in the man's eyes when the chief engineer had come up to report. The attentive look, the forward posture... the man was indeed a builder, an engineer at heart, just as his record said. And then, the Andorian captain could not help but recall that it was an inspecting tour of an other experimental stardrive that had him in his present condition; out of time, out of his own life, out of himself...

He who forgets the past... 

But then again, was it not also said that when you fell from a mount, the first thing you had to do was to get right back up there?

"No real use for us to be both up here anyway... " agreed the Andorian. "Mister Redding, you may... indulge yourself. "

He then looked at his chief engineer.

"Mister Sisko, I want you to reassure you that I am not letting the first officer go down there to look over your shoulder. He will observe and report, not touch anything... unles you ask him to of course. "

He hoped what he said would come out as light hearted and casual and not as expressing any lack of confidence of his own part towards Redding. Although he was slowly but surely getting used to Human jest, he was still far from mastering it.

With a grin Redding got up and headed over to the turbo lift. "Thank you sir, I promise I'll try not to be a part of any more accidents.. if at all possible." and left the bridge. "Main engineering" he said out loud.

Redding mused over the situation. It seemed that he and Transwarp systems were some how linked together through time and space. From the Excelsior project and the USS Response to the latest accident and the Horizon's new engines, he was there to see them all in one form or another. He'd almost come to rely on its presence to assure him that there was some continuity to his life.

A short time later, the door to main engineering opened and Redding walked quickly in but didn't make a display of himself. He would rather not get into anyone's way. He moved about the overly large main engineering giving a quick nod of the head to his fellow junior officers until he found a ranking one.

"Anything new to report?"

Patricia Blakely turned her blonde head to him, blinked her widening blue eyes and stood straighter when she noticed one full pip more on his collar than on hers. She hadn't met Neil Redding before and she was immediately impressed, almost intimidated, by the man's stature as much as by his reputation.

"Commander Redding Sir. Aye Sir, the testing simulation on the tachyon matrix is done and the results are positive. We are rechecking those results with the modified deflector variance before confirming full readiness to chief enginner Sisko. We should be fully and safely ready to implement transwarp 1 momentarily, Sir."

Redding smiled and nodded. "Excellent news, the captain is practically chomping at the bit up on the bridge, Lieutenant..."

"Blakely, Sir, Patricia Blakely." She said trying to sound professional.

"Blakely you say?" And seemed to think something over. "We had a Lieutenant Wilbur Blakely in engineering aboard the USS Response.. He was a Transwarp field specialist as I recall, good man." Then it occurred to him that Wilbur Blakely had disappeared along with the ship more than 80 years ago. Too many questions might come up after just saying 'hi there' He thought.

"In any case I'll just wonder around until it's ready, carry on, Lieutenant Blakely" And walked over to some display readings.

His apprehension soon became justified, For a moment, the young woman just looked at him, eyes blinking in confusion. Wilbur Blakely had been the name of her great grandfather...  an engineer declared missing in action before she was even born, when his ship was lost with all hands... the USS Response...

How could this man, barely in his thirties by the looks of him, speak of him as if he had known him? How could he speak of having served aboard a ship lost almost a century ago?

She did not inquire further. After so many time-related events experienced under Captain Kheren since the time she had been assigned under his command on the Artemis, she knew  there were things here that raised questions she might not be able to get any answer about... or like  them even if she could. And so, Patricia also went back to her work without a word.

Meanwhile back on the bridge, Lieutenant Elisha Leône applied her full aptitude and skills while meticulously surveying all available internal system controls, one-by one, from her Ops station, while making subtle corrections and adjustments along the way. The ships status was changing continually as preparations continued toward initiating transwarp speed and she wanted to be certain that there were no surprising glitches manifesting themselves throughout this precarious process; but especially when they began to engage the transwarp drive.

As she completed her diagnostic evaluation and adjustments, she quietly notified her commanding officer.

"Captain, ship resources are allocated accordingly and are now operating within designated parameters. Currently, local sensor readings are reporting in as normal."

The somewhat shy Orion young woman then added unassumingly "From an Operations standpoint Captain, we appear to be ready for Transwarp drive."

"Thank you, Lieutenant, well done, " Kheren answered with obvious satisfaction in his voice. "Keep close contact with Mister Sisko's department on this. "

Jureth merely listened to the individual conversations happening around him on the bridge. Everyone, including the captain seemed to be anxious to get going, and Jureth was as well, but at the moment, he felt rather useless; though with Commander Redding leaving the bridge, Oseno supposed he had better stay despite contemplating returning to his office and mulling over some operational scenarios in which the resources under his command could be used, including hostage rescues, hostile boarding actions, and covert infiltrations. Then there was the Polaris. Jureth wanted to stretch her legs and test her capabilities, but he supposed that would have to wait until the Horizon's transwarp drive was tested fully. So, for now, he would simply listen, monitor the Polaris, and be ready to assist the captain as needed.

As if aware of his Strategic Ops Officer's inner fidgeting, Kheren looked over at the Bajoran.

"With Mister Redding down in engineering overseeing the technical status of the ship, that leaves you to act as Exec here regarding crew and department readiness. Step down here, Commander. "

With a callused hand, he indicated the Executive chair.

Jureth was surprised to have the captain call him to the command area, and as Bajorans were generally known as emotional beings his face probably showed it. All the same, he acknowledged the captain's request

"Aye Sir,"

Jureth locked his terminal and stepped down with measured steps to the Horizon's command area, and as he did he surveyed the forward portion of the mighty flagship's bridge including the viewer showing the expanse of space in front of them. As he stood next to Captain Kheren a feeling inside him stirred, it was the same feeling he'd felt while commanding the Alsea, the Bajoran equivalent of what humans called an adrenaline rush along with the feeling that he knew he could make a difference just as James Kirk had once said. He glanced at the XO's console and with the exception of engineering all the departments were reporting ready.

"The board shows green Captain," Oseno stated, confirming what Commander Redding had already reported "once our engineering adjustments are completed Sir we are ready."

The Andorian simply nodded. Again, he sat antennae pointed forward with his elbows on his knees, edging forward on his seat as if this would move the entire ship faster just by doing so.

And then, he waited.

Lieutenant Commander Sisko continued to monitor the simulation while the conversation went along around him. Unless someone communicated with him directly, or gave an order, he tended to get lost in his work and did not realize how much they were talking about his work... and waiting for the results.

The sound of Lieutenant Blakely's voice then came over the comm. "Sir, the simulation has run with a 99.7% predicted chance of success. I think we can count this as a win, Sir."

"Aye, Lieutenant. If we wait around for a 100%, we'll all be going grey by the time that happens. Thank you for the report."

Before turning around to report to the Captain, he mused about what this all was about. Something as simple to them as moving at the speed of light was complicated again when adding in the factor of this new Transwarp drive.

"Sir, engineering is ready to go," Sisko reported to the anxiously awaiting Andorian. "Sorry about the wait, Sir... when you cube the warp factor you're bound to cube the amount of problems to deal with as well."

"On my way back to the bridge captain, Redding out." But paused at Blakely "Nice work lieutenant, lets hope it's trouble free from here on." gave her a smile and headed back to the bridge.

It occurred to Sisko that he might want to write up a paper on this Transwarp drive and the pitfalls he encountered as they went along their journey. He knew that this drive, along with QSD and some other technologies would start to find its way into many Federation starships just as the other technological advances related to warp speed travel they had engineered over the past 250 years. It would be worth it if he could save just one ship from being crushed within a transdimensional rift of its own making.

They were on the pilot craft of such amazing technology, and with that weighty achievement came an equally huge responsibility: to ensure that the technology was used safely from that point forward. He decided there that it was his own personal mission... aside from the mission of the ship, and aside from anything the rulebook had to say about it.

The Turbo lift doors opened up and Redding strode into the bridge. "Wouldn't want to miss the big moment captain."

Seeing the XO return to the bridge Jureth ceded the executive officer's chair to the commander and returned to the auxiliary station on the upper part of the bridge, and checked once again on the Polaris systems and security sensor sweeps before turning his attention to the start of the transwarp test.

Kheren didn't move a muscle but his voice plainly showed how much strain had been released with the final announcement of readiness from his chief engineer. He very well knew the man wanted to be cautious about this new thing they were about to attempt, even if it had been already used once; and the Andorian was not going to fault him for it, regardless of his own eagerness to proceed. In his own heart and mind, the safety of his crew was paramount to anything else; always had been and always would be.

Still, there was no mistaking the feeling in his voice as he stated accross the entire ship:

"Attention all hands; we are going to transwarp speed. "

His four oculars then fell on the screen before them all.

"Mister Snow... transwarp 1. "