Breaking Bones

Chapter 21: Necessary Sacrifices

After changing out of their flight suits and making the proper introductions, Jim, Khan, Scotty, and Ana carefully navigated their way through the ship and towards the bridge. Ana had to admit, the ship was very impressive, they had hardly run into any crew members along the way despite the ship's massive size. It truly was a more efficient model than anything else in Starfleet. As the group neared closer and closer to the bridge, Ana felt a less than thrilling feeling overwhelm her system, causing her to stop dead in her tracks. 

"Jim, wait." 

"What, what's wrong?" 

"Something doesn't feel right about this. I don't think we can trust Khan." 

"Of course we can't trust Khan. Which is why as soon as we get on the bridge, you're going to drop him. Sound good?" 

With still some slight hesitation, Anatalia nodded and the pair continued on and met Scotty and Khan already waiting at the bridge doors. 

"Can we get in manually?" 

"Already set to go on your order, captain."

"Alright. Khan and I will go in first. Ana, cover us." 

With everyone in agreement on the plan, Jim gave the signal to Scotty and the group went charging in, phasers blasting from both sides of the bridge.  Thanks to Khan and Ana's skills in particular, Admiral Marcus' crew went down with relative ease. Jim made his way right up to the admiral, phaser locked and loaded, keeping Marcus trapped in his captain's chair. Kirk looked to Anatalia in his peripheral and gave her an almost imperceptible nod which Ana returned in kind before shooting Khan unconscious on the deck of the ship. 

"Admiral Marcus, you're under arrest." 

"You're not actually going to do this, are you?" 

"Why don't you ask Commander Tonks." 

Before now, Marcus had barely even registered that anyone aside from Kirk was even in the room. But as his eyes turned slowly to Anatalia, who now also held her phaser pointed at the admiral, more recognition came onto his face. 

"Tonks. Your reputation really does precede you. You should've been dead twice by now." 

"I'm sure you'd have heard from my mother by now if that had been the case."

"Ah, so you're all caught up I see. It's a shame your mother was never able to see reason. She was one of our top admirals. Might have even taken my place if she weren't so damn short-sighted. But so long as I'm in charge, she'll never see a real Starfleet base ever again." 

"Good thing you won't be in charge much longer, asshole." With no hesitation, Ana pulled the trigger on her phaser, sending a shot directly into Marcus' chest just beneath the right shoulder. Both he and Kirk looked back at her in shock. 

"Ana! What do you think you're doing?"

"Don't worry. I'm not going to kill him. That's for Khan to do." 

"What?"

Before Jim even had time to process it, Anatalia turned her phaser to him and sent a stun shot directly at him, sending her captain to the ground. As she did so, Khan stood from his position on the deck, formerly having pretended to be struck down by Anatalia as planned by the two before even ever leaving the Enterprise. The fear on Marcus' face as Khan made his way to the captain's chair brought an almost terrifying smile to Talia's face. 

"Tonks. Tonks, you can't allow this. You are a Starfleet commander and I order you to stop this man. It goes against everything Starfleet believes in."