Lines of Fire

Posted on Thu Jul 23rd, 2026 @ 7:35am by Lieutenant Commander Maximo (Max) Vero & Lieutenant Vireya Talvaren

3,182 words; about a 16 minute read

Mission: Season 1, Episode 1: Ashes of Wolf 359
Location: Tactical Systems Training Suite, Earth Spacedock

The doors to the tactical systems suite opened on the low hum of an active simulation.

Vireya stepped inside with a PADD tucked beneath one arm, her attention moving at once to the wireframe model of the Genesis suspended above the central display. Eight amber arcs marked the coverage of the Type-10 phaser arrays across the Nebula-class hull. Two photon launchers sat fore and aft, while the dorsal mission pod remained deliberately unconfigured. Whatever Starfleet eventually placed there would change the ship’s tactical profile considerably, but there was little value in training around weapons they did not yet possess.

The Class-10 regenerative shielding was active around the model, drawing power from the simulated grid each time the blue field brightened beneath incoming fire. The system was impressive. It was also consuming enough energy to make an engineer develop a nervous condition.

Someone had already begun working through the tactical package.

Commander Max Vero stood at the console, his attention fixed on the shifting display. Curly dark hair, olive skin and a lean build that carried more strength than his height first suggested. Vireya recognised him from the personnel file, though the image had flattened something about the depth of his eyes.

She slowed as she approached, giving the simulation a quick inspection before looking towards him.

“Commander Vero.”

Vireya set her PADD beside the console. On the display, the forward shield grid flared under another simulated strike while the port phaser array continued drawing power from the same distribution network.

Her eyebrows lifted slightly.

“I see you’ve already discovered the first rule of the Genesis tactical systems.” A faint smile touched her mouth. “She can defend herself in almost every direction.”

The power reserves dropped another three per cent.

“She just objects when you ask her to do all of it at once.”

He nodded. "I am as they say .... getting up to speed. The systems have moved on in leaps and bounds."

He had read several files and she did look familiar. She worked in security from the uniform and the fact she was where he currently was but he had read so many things. Had so much information levied at him over the last few weeks and a fair few things they didn't want to share as well as they evaluated he wasn't a threat, he was starting to wonder where one piece of information began and another ended.

"I'm sorry I should know your name but I have met so many people. So many people in the last few weeks. Its a wonder I remember my name some days," he offered. "You have me at a disadvantage."

Vireya’s expression softened.

“I think remembering your own name after the last few weeks is achievement enough,” she said. “Lieutenant Vireya Talvaren. Chief Security and Tactical aboard the Genesis.”

She offered him her hand.

“Vi is fine, though. Unless we’re on the bridge and someone’s shooting at us. Then I’ll probably answer to almost anything.”

Her glance returned briefly to the simulation.

“And you’re not at a disadvantage, Commander. You’re ninety-seven years behind the reading list. I’ve only got one ship to learn.”

Max nodded. No matter how many times he was reminded of this some days it still didn't feel real till you walked round a corner and saw something far slicker than had ever been on the Oberth or back home in his time.

"Then you must also call me Max," He offered in return.

It was a kindness. Vi was easier to remember at present. He made a mental note to try memorise all the senior crew again. He had to get all their names straight. No one expected him to remember every crew member but the ones he would no doubt be around the most were priority.

"Is this an upgrade since the Cube aliens attacked?" he asked curiously.

Or was it always the system? He thought. Perhaps they could in this time do something that quickly. In 3 weeks? Analyse a battle, an aliens attack style and work out better defence. Everything else was faster.

Of course no one had yet told him more on these cubes. He wondered if now he was back in active duty had they lifted the information ban. On Earth lots of subjects had been locked down. He figured they suspected the Oberth was a enemy spy or something. Perhaps now he was posted here, that meant they trusted him.

Vireya’s expression changed at the words Cube aliens. Not dramatically, but the humour in it faded.

“The Borg,” she said. “That’s what they call themselves.”

She turned back to the display, bringing the Genesis shield grid and power distribution into sharper focus.

“And no, this wasn’t built in three weeks. Most of these systems were already in development. Wolf 359 has simply made Starfleet far less patient about getting them into service.”

Her eyes returned to his.

“What Starfleet knows is still limited. We encountered them directly less than two years ago. One cube. The Enterprise barely escaped.” She paused, choosing how much to place in his hands at once. “They’re cybernetic beings linked through a collective consciousness. They don’t conquer in the way you’d understand it. They take people, ships, knowledge, technology, and absorb all of it into themselves.”

“Assimilation,” she added quietly. “That’s the word you’ll hear.”

Vireya touched the console and replaced the Genesis model with the fractured tactical reconstruction from Wolf 359.

“Their shields adapt to repeated weapons fire. Their ships repair themselves while they’re still fighting. They use tractor and cutting beams, and the cube you saw had access to Starfleet’s own tactical knowledge.” Her mouth tightened slightly. “They’d taken Captain Picard and used what he knew against the fleet.”

For a moment, her attention remained on the cube.

“My people knew them long before Starfleet did. The Borg destroyed El Auria in 2265. My parents survived because they were among those who escaped. Most weren’t.”

She looked back at Max.

“So when I tell you they learn quickly, I’m not repeating a briefing.”

Vireya let the reconstruction fade and brought the Genesis back between them.

“These shields won’t make us safe from them. Nothing Starfleet has can promise that yet. But they give us more choices, and sometimes a few more seconds to make the right one.”

A gentler note returned to her voice.

“We’ll finish getting you comfortable with the tactical systems first. Then I’ll give you the full Borg briefing.” A small pause. “You shouldn’t have had to ask.”

That was a lot and a lot more horrible than he had been conjuring up in his head wondering. When she mentioned her planet he assumed, had been destroyed by these Borg it made it a far more frightening. Perhaps he shouldn't have opened this door yet but he had too. What if they encountered them again. This was his ship now, his crew.

"I'm sorry about what happened to your people," he said softly.

There was some silence for a minute, him not sure what else to say but he had to say something.

"I think... they do not trust me," Max said it out loud. "Either that or they are concerned too much information too quickly I suppose. It is strange that my ship was flung 97 years to your time by those Aliens. I do not know why, they do not know why.

Perhaps enough of this right now" he indicated the display, "and you could give me a tour of your department? And if I may ask, answer a further question? If I am not prying too much. I do not seek to make you uncomfortable. I am just …" he was frustrated. "Not familiar" still with a lot of things."

Vireya’s expression softened at his apology. She lowered her eyes for a moment, accepting it rather than brushing it aside.

“Thank you,” she said quietly. “I was born long after El Auria was lost, but it was still home in every story my parents told. That kind of absence has weight.”

When he spoke of trust, the frustration in him shifted the room more than his voice did. She could feel it beneath the careful phrasing, the strain of being examined while everyone around him decided how much of the world he was permitted to understand.

“I don’t think they’ve decided what to do with you yet,” she said. “That isn’t necessarily the same as not trusting you.”

Her mouth tilted slightly.

“You disappeared for ninety-seven years and returned in the middle of the worst battle Starfleet has ever fought. People are going to ask difficult questions. Security officers especially. We’re an imaginative and deeply suspicious breed.”

Vireya collected her PADD and closed down the simulation.

“A tour sounds better than staring at tactical diagrams until one of us starts resenting the colour amber.” She gestured towards the door. “There isn’t much of my department to see yet, but Space dock has given us offices, training facilities and enough temporary storage to lose several junior officers.”

She waited for him to join her.

“And you may ask whatever you like, Max. I’ll tell you if you’ve crossed a line.”

As they stepped into the corridor, she glanced at him.

“While we walk, you can tell me about the Oberth. Not the anomaly report. The ship as you remember her before all of this happened.”

It sounded conversational because it was. It would also tell her far more than another formal interview ever could.

“What did you want to ask me?”

"I am not familiar with your species," Max said simply. "I never meet an El Auria until now. Would you tell me some more about your people and its culture?"

Also," he found himself joke. It was rarer these days but what she said earlier had tickled him a little. "Security officers were imaginative and deeply suspicious even in my time. Somethings, they do not it change it seems. Even the CMOs. Terrifying you no cross them si?"

Vireya laughed softly as they walked.

“Doctors are worse,” she said. “Security officers only threaten consequences. A CMO has access to hyposprays and your medical file. I try not to provoke them.”

She glanced at him, the humour lingering before her expression settled into something warmer.

“As for El Aurians, the simplest answer is that we live a long time and remember a great deal. We tend to listen before we speak, or at least we’re raised to. Stories matter to us. So do music, food, family, and the small rituals that make somewhere feel like home.”

Her gaze moved ahead along the corridor.

“We were scattered for a long time after El Auria fell, so our culture survived in pieces. Different families carried different parts of it with them. Some became scholars, some diplomats, some wanderers.” A faint smile touched her mouth. “Some became security officers with very little patience.”

She looked back towards him.

“But I know just as little about Argelians beyond what Starfleet files like to summarise in neat paragraphs. What did that side of your family mean when you were growing up in Bologna?”

That surprised Max. She had clearly done her homework on him. Usually no one was ever that interested in that side of his biology. He figured that the fact his father was as famous as he was eclipsed his mother.

"It meant growing up adopting a pacifist way of life. Or certainly at my mothers urging. It would put you sometimes in internal war with the more hot headed Italian blood of the other side of my biology something that can still happen now in situations. Sometimes to please her I had to walk away from fights. That got you teased at school when young. But not bullied. They all thought my mother a tesoro. You learnt to ignore where you can and if there's no peace go for neutral. I'd be lying if I told you I always manage it,

I only knew one Argelian really, my mother. She was beautiful. She was titled, the Lady Arylana. She didn't speak much about it. She knew things though. Had a 6th sense. If you believe in that sort of stuff.

But for a race all about peace her family sure didn't take to dad. There was one trip to her planet. I was three so I remember very little. Big buildings, fashionable and colourful clothing, they liked having fun and taking pleasure. In some respects very similar to the Italian culture. Its strange they didn't get on that well. I take it things didn't improve as a further trip was never mentioned. I intended one day to make the trip myself older. I still intend too.

Mother did go back though. I decided to look up my family finally last night. Dad died of a heart failure about 10 years after I disappeared. She journeyed back and didn't return. Remarried apparently."

Vireya listened without interrupting, though something in her attention sharpened when he spoke of his mother’s intuition. The rhythm around him had changed as he moved from childhood memories to what he’d discovered the night before, warmth giving way to something quieter and less settled.

“I believe in considerably more than six senses,” she said, a faint smile touching her mouth. “El Aurians perceive things Humans often don’t have useful words for. Time. Resonance. The way a person or place changes before anything visible has happened.” She glanced at him. “So no, I don’t think your mother was imagining it.”

Her smile softened as they continued along the corridor.

“I’m sorry you had to learn all of that from a record. Ninety-seven years reduced to dates and a few lines someone thought were important enough to preserve.” She let the silence breathe for a moment. “She may have returned because Argelia was the one place that still felt familiar after losing your father and all three of you. Remarrying doesn’t mean she forgot what came before.”

Vireya adjusted the PADD beneath her arm, her gaze drifting ahead.

“What interests me is the pacifism.” There was no challenge in her voice, only genuine curiosity. “You’ve chosen a uniform that may require you to order weapons fired, and now you’re the Executive Officer. There may be times when walking away isn’t possible, and neutrality would leave someone else to pay the price.”

She looked towards him again.

“How do you reconcile that with what your mother taught you?”

Max stopped walking and looked her right in the eyes. He knew she likely meant it not to sound like she doubted his ability or was evaluating his ability to do his job but he had endured weeks now of people evaluating him. Labelling him. Deciding they knew better what he was capable of or should be doing. And it really was beginning to grate and actually it was none of her business how he reconciled everything in his head. He hoped that this was going to be the last time he had to say these words.

"Let me assure that if I am in a situation where I have to shoot, I will shoot," he said firmly. "Just because I have when I was younger walked away from some fights due to my Argelian background, doesn't mean I walked away from all of them or am not willing to be in one. I am acutely aware peace or taking a neutral stance although it would be my preferred route if possible, its unlikely to be the actual route I have to walk in many situations.

Vireya felt the shift in him before he finished speaking. Not anger exactly, but the raw edge of someone who had spent weeks being weighed, questioned and quietly judged by strangers.

She stopped too.

“Max,” she said, softer now. “I know.”

She let that sit for a moment rather than rush to defend herself.

“That came out wrong. I wasn’t asking whether you’d fire when you had to. I don’t doubt that for a second.” Her gaze stayed with his. “I was asking what it costs you to carry that part of the job when peace is the thing you were taught to reach for first.”

A small breath left her.

“I’m not a pacifist, but I don’t want violence just because I’m prepared for it. Most of the time, I’m hoping there’s another way right up until there isn’t.”

Her expression softened.

“You’ve had people picking you apart for weeks. I should’ve heard that before I added one more question.”

A faint, rueful smile touched her mouth.

“That one’s on me.”

She glanced down the corridor, then back to him.

“For what it’s worth, I don’t think you’re here by mistake. And I don’t think you’ll walk away when your crew needs you.”

"No its on me too. Sorry that may have come out a little more harsher than I intended.

"If the cost was too high," he said more to himself now than her rationalising. "I wouldn't still be in Starfleet. I had the chance to get out. Again I won't lie I was tempted. I'm some sort of fossil now," he grinned so she knew he was making light of things.

"But as the Captain said, I can still make a difference. This can give me purpose still despite everything. I promise you I have no intention of walking anywhere. Actually, where would I walk too? I know barely anywhere these days and anybody.

If I were ever to be such a man you I can see are the type of woman who could easily find me and kick my arse to kingdom come. And I give you full permission."

The grin helped. Not enough to hide everything beneath it, but enough to tell Vireya he was trying.

She let out a quiet laugh.

“I do have a knack for finding lost things,” she said. “People included. Though I usually try conversation before kicking them anywhere.”

They started walking again, her expression softening.

“And you’re not a fossil, Max. The century changed. You didn’t stop mattering.”

She glanced across at him.

“Purpose is a good reason to stay. So is making a difference. Just don’t convince yourself you have to prove you belong here every hour of every day.”

A faint smile returned.

“And should you ever wander off dramatically, I’ll find you. The arse-kicking can stay on standby.”

"Good to know," he said somewhat amused. His hands went to his bum comically as if to check he was currently safe.

"Lets finish this tour then and this full debrief."

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