Assault at the Expanse

The **Assault at the Tetrahedron Expanse** was an Alliance assault led against the Na'kuhl's key command facility within the Outback. The battle is believed to have been crucial to mitigating the Na'kuhl's influence in the region and their attempts to manipulate the course of the Outback's history through temporal alterations.

# Background

After an assassination attempt on Admiral Kenzi Alenis, The 26th Fleet entered into a conflict with Na'kuhl forces located in the Outback and wielding 29th century technology. After multiple false leads, an anonymous tip led them to the Na'kuhl's primary command center within the extremely hostile region of space known as the Tetrahedron Expanse. After a reconnaissance, Admiral Kenzi Alenis, now returned to active duty, organized an assault on that base with all the resources at her disposal to neutralize the Na'kuhl threat.

# The Battle

An officers briefing was held aboard the 26th Fleet flagship, the USS *Kendra Valley*, during the final approach to the Tetrahedron Expanse. The objective was to capture the base in order to learn of any Na'kuhl plans and other ships within the area. Elements of MACO Group 9 aboard the USS *Ramillies* were prepared to directly assault the base once an assault path had been secured. As planned, the navigation through the expanse itself was organized and scouted by the USS *Franklin* and USS *Europa* supported by the USS *Opportunity*, and allowed the fleet to approach the target area without incident. The fleet split into two forces, known as Hammer and Anvil. The staging area was set as OB-222, where ships could retreat to effect repairs and receive additional aid if they became unable to continue fighting.

## Hammer

Hammer consisted of the following ships:

* USS *Ascension*
* USS *Axalon*
* USS *Tavistock*
* USS *Europa*
* USS *Admiral Kuznetsov*
* RRW *Isha s'S'Task*
* RRW *Aehallh*

Hammer encountered resistance as soon as they entered the asteroids. The Na'kuhl utilized delaying tactics and fixed defenses to slow their advance. The USS *Acension* was the first engaged by a decloaking Na'kuhl vessel. It's ambush did significant damage to the *Ascension*, disabling her aft shields and damaging her shield grid. *Ascension* moved to protect her rear flank while USS *Tavistock* and USS *Kuznetsov* quickly intervened, forcing the attacking ship to change focus. *Ascension* rejoined the battle, maintaining her distance to avoid an outflanking maneuver and supporting with long range fire as firing solutions presented themselves.

The Na'kuhl vessel, now heavily damaged, had nonetheless succeeded in drawing Hammer into an entrapment of fixed weapons systems mounted on the asteroids, which promptly fired upon Federation starships entering weapons range. Her duty done, and with escape no longer an option, the Na'kuhl vessel came about with what speed remained and set a collision course with the USS *Europa*, though broke apart before she could reach the *Europa*. An off-target Na'kuhl torpedo acquired a new target in the *Ascension* and struck amidships, though her shields took the brunt of the blow, with the plasma explosion causing only superficial hull damage. USS *Axalon*, meanwhile, fired a pair of VATA weapons into the asteroid, destroying it and silencing the Na'kuhl guns.

Hammer pressed on, quickly finding that they had cruised into a Na'kuhl defense nest. Further weapon emplacements on asteroids began firing, while proximity alarms warned of small, metal objects drifting with subtlety toward them, quickly identified as mines. Some ships began targeting the mines from a safe distance, but despite the dangers, elements of Hammer quickly moved in to engage the defenses directly. Observing this, the *Ascension* and other ships soon followed, engaging in point defense fire to remove the mines as quickly as possible. The attack was ultimately a success, with the Federation starships quickly proving their evasive and targeting training. At the suggestion of Riov Havraha tr'Valorium, the *Europa* utilized her main deflector dish to incite an artificial gravity well from the dark matter of the Tetrahedron Expanse in the center of the minefield. Lacking the propulsion systems and inertial dampers to contend with the sudden gravity well, the minefield quickly collapsed inward and was destroyed.

A Na'kuhl battlegroup, potentially having been recalled from another area, then came around an asteroid and engaged Hammer. Led by a science vessel, the Na'kuhl used tractor beams for combat purposes, though their locks were evaded. *Europa* responded in kind, but with success, latching onto one of the Raiders and inhibiting its movement. During the continued fighting, a devastating strike of quantum torpedoes fired by *Axalon* opened craters on the larger Na'kuhl vessel, leaving it a broken hulk in space. Hammer quickly dealt with the remaining enemy combatants and moved to rendezvous with Anvil at the target.

With shields severely depleted and engineering unable to bring them back up to acceptable levels in time, Commander Jay Hayes elected to withdraw the *Ascension* to the fallback area, accompanied by the USS *Europa* and RRW *Isha s'S'Task*.

## Anvil

Anvil consisted of the following ships:

* USS *Kendra Valley*
* USS *Nautilus*
* USS *Ramillies*
* USS *Indefatigable*
* USS *Fire Dragon*
* USS *Hakaishin*
* USS *Sophia*
* USS *Franklin*

Anvil was led by Admiral Alenis herself from her flagship in a force of mainly cruisers and the *Jupiter*-class carrier USS *Nautilus*. As they moved through the asteroid field, Anvil was first attacked by a series of fixed defenses placed on an asteroid. The *Nautilus* fighter wing quickly struck, using torpedoes to destroy almost a third of the asteroid, sending the defenses scattering. Now able to cleanly lock onto all targets by their power source, the USS *Fire Dragon* used her point defense weapons to quickly destroy any guns which survived.

On two separate occasions, the fleet was attacked by Na'kuhl battlecruiser battle groups, each decloaking and launching an attack on the *Kendra Valley* as priority target in spite of these attacks putting them in close weapons range to the majority of the task group each time. Both battlecruisers were quickly overwhelmed by Anvil's superior numbers and firepower.

The first battlecruiser initially attempted retreat upon being overwhelmed, but turned inward in an attempt to ram the USS *Indefatigable*. Accurate fire from the fleet disabled the ship's engines and many its other remaining systems. The *Indefatigable* was able to avoid the now adrift starship with ease. As an assault was being mounted, the Na'kuhl ship was suddenly scuttled by self-destruct.

The second battlecruiser and its escorts attacked in similar fashion, focusing on the 26th Fleet flagship, but Commander Alcione Millenia interdicted their attacks by palcing the USS *Hakaishin* between them and the *Kendra Valley*. At the same time, the USS *Jupiter* fired a trio of photon torpedoes initiated by Ensign Mel'for, a new tactical officer. Unfortunately, these weapons went off course and instead acquired the *Kendra Valley* as their intended target and struck accurately, though without major damage to the *Kendra Valley'*s shields.

The second battlecruiser traded fire with the *Hakaishin* before it was also overwhelmed, losing weapons to a photon torpedo fired by the USS *Franklin*. Instead of retreat, the battlecruiser initiated a Plasma Wave attack on the cluster of ships defending the *Kendra Valley*. The *Hakaishin*, located at the front, took the brunt of the plasma wave, heavily damaging her saucer section and other key systems.

The *Ramillies*, having evaded the plasma wave by racing past the battlecruiser, retaliated with a full salvo from her aft photon torpedo launchers aimed at the battlecruiser's exhaust ports. Her salvo was accurate, and destroyed the ship with immediacy by warp core breach. Having elected to stay on course to avoid spoiling the firing solution, *Ramillies* was punished by the battlecruiser's escorting raiders with an attack run on her port side. Her port shields held, but only just with the majority of the shield emitters in that area blown out from the intensity of the attack, damage which would come back to haunt *Ramillies* later in the battle. The raiders themselves were just as quickly destroyed by the rest of Anvil.

*Ramillies* was unable to restore her port shields to combat levels. *Hakaishin*, meanwhile, utilized a saucer separation to evacuate the damaged saucer section to the fallback zone for damage control and medical assistance, while the captain pressed on with the lesser damaged stardrive section. *Indefatigable* accompanied the *Hakaishin* saucer section as escort, having taken some damage herself from the Na'kuhl's plasma wave.

## Citadel

Citadel, formed of the starships of Anvil and Hammer which remained ready for combat, consisted of the following ships:

* USS *Kendra Valley*
* USS *Nautilus*
* USS *Ramillies*
* USS *Fire Dragon*
* USS *Hakaishin* (stardrive section)
* USS *Sophia*
* USS *Franklin*
* USS *Axalon*
* USS *Tavistock*
* USS *Admiral Kuznetsov*
* RRW *Aehallh*

Hammer and Anvil rendezvoused, forming task group codename Citadel, in orbit around the primary target, a planetoid with the well-defended Na'kuhl base located on its surface. The fleet gathered in orbit to prepare for orbital bombardment and the planned MACO assault. Once gathered, the Na'kuhl fired a full spread of torpedoes from multiple launchers, with at least a hundred torpedoes counted. The fleet initiated a series of evasive actions, while the USS *Fire Dragon* focused her efforts on the space around the USS *Kendra Valley* through a combination of point defense and electronic warfare.

Of the damage suffered, the worst damage was to the USS *Ramillies*. Having placed herself on the starboard side of the fleet to protect her port side, she, during the chaos, was forced to turn to starboard with the rest of the fleet to avoid collision, exposing her still severely depleted port shields to what would be four direct hits. The first hit breached the shields but detonated prior to hull impact only meters away, knocking out a secondary phaser array and damaging the Ablative Armor. The next three torpedoes struck the port nacelle and strut with catastrophic results. The port nacelle exploded in a large fireball of plasma, with the remains sheering away from the force and the breaking of the main nacelle support pylons, with feedback from its destruction threatening an overload in the warp core. The USS *Franklin* immediately locked a tractor beam onto *Ramillies* and began to pull her away from the battle as urgent damage control continued.

After recovering from the attack, the rest of the fleet began an immediate bombardment of the planet surface, exchanging fire between them and the surface defenses. Beneath the heavy shields of the facility, a power buildup was detected of unknown source. Another battlecruiser battle group also came up from the surface to join the battle, with some ships of Citadel being delegated to engaging, splitting fire, and was eventually destroyed. *Ramillies*, meanwhile, had restored partial main power, and Captain T'Molina had her remain on station, though in the back of the formation avoiding further combat due to her shields being offline, in order to launch her MACO assault teams once the base's shields were down.

That eventuality never came as the fleet failed to break through the facility's shields. The overload proved to be a self-destruct designed to create a massive explosion which destroyed the base, much of the planetoid, and swept across space with enough power to cause substantial damage to the orbiting fleet. Some ships managed to escape with a small warp speed hop, while the *Ramillies* managed to avoid what would have surely been a lethal blow by taking cover behind a sufficiently large satellite asteroid. *Nautilus*, whose *Calisto*-class light escorts were unable to withstand the blast, lost four *Calistos* when they were unable to escape in time, along with their crews. USS *Sophia* suffered the worst, crippled by the blast wave and was nearly completely destroyed.

## Fallback Ambushed

Fallback consisted of ships too damaged to continue, their escorts, and ships kept in reserve for the expected triage and damage control:

* USS *Mary Black* (Medical Support)
* USS *Minerva* (*Mary Black'*s escort)
* USS *Ascension* (Damaged)
* RRW *Isha s'S'Task* (Escorted damaged ships)
* USS *Europa* (Escorted damaged ships)
* USS *Indefatigable* (Damaged)
* USS *Hakaishin* (Damaged saucer section)

As the fallback group was received and tended, a Na'kuhl cruiser stalked them under cloak. Once repair and medical teams began being beamed between ships, the cruiser decloaked and attacked, first targeting the badly damaged saucer of the *Hakaishin*. *Ascension*, having only just restored her shields moments ago, launched an immediate counterattack with the *Europa*. A wing of Na'kuhl strike craft decloaked soon after, coming from the flank. Commander Hayes ordered a roll maneuver to protect *Ascension'*s relatively exposed sides.

By pure luck, a microtorpedo from one of the fighters managed to pierce the *Ascension'*s dorsal shields into the shuttlebay where it struck a Type 6 shuttle being prepared for launch to inspect the damage to the *Hakaishin*. The shuttle was destroyed within the shuttlebay itself, causing massive collateral damage and sending the shuttlebay into a raging inferno of plasma fires. Secondary explosions spread before the shuttlebay crew, many dead or severely burned, could recover and react. The duranium hulls of exploding shuttlecraft became fragmentation explosives, piercing bulkheads and damaging other nearby systems, most notably severing the primary flight control data conduits, gravity and inertial dampers, and EPS conduits, causing more plasma fires. For a time, *Ascension* was left spinning out of control, but once her situation became apparent to the *Europa*, Commander McDonald ordered a tractor locked onto the *Ascension* to stabilize the ship.

Although *Ascension* was now in critical condition, the Na'kuhl cruiser soon found itself in no better shape. The RRW *Isha s'S'Task*, which had remained under cloak itself the entire time the Fallback group was being observed, decloaked on the cruiser's rear quarter and inflicted major hull damage with her full arsenal of firepower. For the Na'kuhl, a warp core breach was now imminent, but as she continued to close with the Fallback group she stood to take some of the alliance fleet with her. Realizing the situation, Riov tr'Valorium ordered his ship, the RRW *Isha sSTask*, to lock a tractor beam onto the overloading cruiser and forcibly remove it from the field at substantial risk to his own ship. *Isha* released her tractor beam at the last possible moment and withdrew rapidly, escaping the warp core breach with miraculously little damage. The rest of the fallback group suffered even less. The fighter threat was forced back by the intervention of the USS *Minerva*. At this point, the Na'kuhl facility had been destroyed and the remaining Na'kuhl fighter pilots, faced with no option to escape and no further opportunity to engage the weaker ships, seemingly elected to take their own lives rather than surrender.

# Aftermath

The Na'kuhl presence in the Outback dropped off immediately with the loss of several of their ships as well as their base of operations. Thus far, no further activity has been identified, though with no captured data it is impossible to know if all of their ships were accounted for. The Na'kuhl are believed to have been focused on killing Admiral Alenis for reasons unknown, with a secondary objective of causing as much damage to the fleet as possible. Indeed substantial damage was done, with several ships forced to drydock to effect major repair. Meanwhile, the Futara Union continued its rhetoric against the Federation, issuing a formal protest that the fleet passed through their territory illegally in order to conduct this attack.

## Damaged Ships

* USS *Kendra Valley*

Although the USS *Kendra Valley* was focused by the Na'kuhl on multiple occasions, the ship held up remarkably well and repairs were completed in drydock within 48 hours.

* USS *Indefatigable*
* USS *Hakaishin*
* USS *Europa*

Although left in need of significant maintenance, her captain insisted that the repairs could be performed without drydock.

* USS *Ascension*

*Ascension* suffered extensive hull damage, but was seen to immediately. Major repairs were completed in just six days, and *Ascension* left drydock soon after for trials.

* USS *Ramillies*

In many ways *Ramillies* came out in better shape, but the complete loss of her port warp nacelle left her without warp drive and thus rendered her unfit for mission duty until the extensive drydock effort to replace it could be completed. Unfortunately, there were no spare *Sovereign*-class warp nacelles within the Federation, and the request for one sat in pending at the end of Starfleet's very long queue in facilities which could perform the necessary construction. A novel means of repair was identified in the starship USS *Destiny*, which had been decommissioned after taking major hull damage at the end of the Iconian War. *Destiny'*s port warp nacelle was assessed to be intact and in good condition, it could be cut from *Destiny* at the strut and spliced onto *Ramillies* with only minor internal reworking.

* USS *Sophia*

The worst damaged ship in the fleet, suffering critical system failures and heavy casualties.

Other ships suffered only light damage which their own crew was able to correct without the need for drydock.

# References

* After Action Reports
* News Report