Chapter 29: "The Kelvin Incident" Pt. 2

Yay, new chapter! Sorry for posting late, had to celebrate my birthday a few days ago, which itself took several days to prepare so I didn't have much to work on this. Oh well :P And you guys gave me a wonderful gift too: we reached 1 Million views! Woohoo! You guys are the best! Anyway, onto the revieeeeews!

ThatTallGuy: Hmm, Last Crusade sounds good. Could make the last brother Ozpin with a very long beard. Be pretty funny to see actually.

MichaelMyers1234: That's true, though I might be borrowing a few things from T-Salvation for the Arcs. The autonomous motorbikes looked pretty cool, and I gotta have something to go against Atlas' robot fetish (no giant robots though).

Kaiser The Challenger: Oh my god, I forgot about that movie! Mama Arc gonna be pissed! That movie was so~ cute! My favorite scene was when those kidnappers got their asses handed to them by a caged gorilla. Don't know if I'll make the full movie, but I hope to do a few scenes.

TrueMetis: Yeah, I've been told that. But I gotta ask, in the original series, why would they keep those uniforms on when going planet side on potentially dangerous worlds? Wouldn't wearing something less flashy be the norm in that case? That's why I'm confused, sorry, not much of a Star Trek fan. And while the two may not be the same rank, they're still ranked officers and targeting either would be a major blow to command.

Eliphas-Chaos: You and me both. And I am planning on doing something for LotR, just not any full movies, which is why it's not on the list. It's a secret project I'm working on though, so I won't spoil it.

Supersandwiches: the movie Logan (and the X Men) are dead. Had them worked out for the most part, down to its last scenes, but the crash deleted all my progress.

TheGreatSeeker: live action. Didn't even know they made animation sequels, or a cartoon show. I only watched the 3 movies (the second one was shit in my opinion), and I thought that, plus the book, was it.

BlackPhantom247: Bwahahahaha! Oh man, that image is gonna be stuck in my head for a good long while! Got it, thanks :)

Hecseferblade: Huh. That's actually not a bad idea, might make that in an AU one day. Sounds adorable.

Lonely Boy: I have something planned for Jaune with characters from Bleach.

Lord Dominusautem Tempus: Glad you liked the inclusion, wanted to give the viewers something to smile at. The Titanic: they would cry, again, at the sinking scene. I tried to react Aladdin, but I scrapped that when I read more of the script. Haven't played Bioshock or watched Sonic (I assume the movie?).

BusterBlue12: Yeah I'm planning on taking some stuff out, like the Gorgo scene (damn it Snyder, I know that was yours). No elephant charge, no monster goat… thing, no gunpowder (those things were grenades, NOT magic), and no Theron!

Lightning Lord Kaji: Trying to do something with that, but only a specific scene or two, so it's not on the list of full movies.

JustAnotherGuest: First off, thank you for the name. Already have something in mind for a movie regarding Morgan Freeman: "Velvet, I am God." "When you leave this building, you will be endowed, will all my powers." I'll give three guesses where those quotes came from, as well as who's playing Freeman ;)

DentingZero4: Hmm, hadn't thought of that, but it sounds awesome!

Guest: I actually have no idea, it just popped up one day and now everyone does it. I think it was mentioned in the show that Jaune likes dinosaur chicken nuggets, but I don't know. And if that is the case, does that mean that dinosaurs are a thing in the RWBY-verse? And if they exist, wouldn't Grimm versions too? The rabbit hole just goes deeper and deeper with these questions.

bagus joy: Because Hans said that they weren't terrorists, and I could think of no other villain that could make that argument. Plus, a lot of others are gonna be her crew. Adam: Crazy brother, Raven: Agent Smith (Qrow's the other one), Watts: computer hacker, Blake: younger dead brother; so on and so forth. Plus, I want Sienna to have her time to shine, and what better way than one of the most smooth-talking villains ever?

GhostRipperD31H: First: thank you for the review, really made my day when I read it. As for reactions, I don't know anything about The Punisher, sorry; and I'm already in the process of having Jaune be a villain again in several possible future. One is going to be more focused on his daughter as she wants to create her own mark on the universe, I just need to make Stargate first so that some of what the audience sees makes sense. Another is where he's a very dangerous, and pissed, dragon. The last one I have in the works is a baby Jaune angry at a dog with Qrow's voice over money he'd owed.

Perseus12: Already working on their characters, just need the proper opportunity to show them. Got the mom, dad, and two of his sisters (which make 3 out of 7).

I've also read a bunch of similar reviews regarding this topic, so to answer all of them at once: the Jumanji I'm planning on reacting to is the original one from 1995.

There, hoo boy that was a lot of reviews to go through. The glitch temporarily happened again. Couldn't get any of your guys' responses past July 8th, then suddenly I just got a HUGE review dump the day before I posted this. That was fun. Anyway, onto the show!

Disclaimer in the prologue.

"What are we seeing here?" Ironwood spoke, his tone demanding information.

"Captain, the only thing that makes sense from these readings is that this phenomenon is showing visual signs of a singularity forming. But the sensors' data are not correlating with what we are actually looking at. Even the current gravitational readings is too weak for a 'black hole' of this size." the very alien-looking science officer with a large crustacean head and beady black eyes working at his station spoke up in a warbling tone. Ren frowned as he glanced over the officer's shoulder at the display.

"…What?" The audience couldn't make heads or tails of what that guy said. So they just ignored that, and instead looked at the alien dude with awe. 'Another alien! Cool!'

Watts and Terra could understand bits and pieces of it, but it still went over their heads. Something that pissed off the former very much.

"I concur. However, as we are not experiencing the intense effects similar to other singularities we've encountered in the past ,even at this distance, I hesitate to give this one a similar term."

"What?" Nora was confused by what her hubby '*Squeal*' just said, and looked to him for answers.

Ren shrugged, not getting it either. 'I got a bad feeling though.' He hugged Nora closer to him in worry, not seeing the large smile on her face nor blush on her cheeks as he did so.

"So, this is leaning strongly toward not being of a natural occurrence." Jaune spoke up as his kept his eyes trained on the growing phenomenon. (Coco: "Ok, that I understood. Thanks Jaune.")

"It's also likely not of Klingon origins, Lieutenant Commander." Ren replied as if to cut off Jaune's train of thought regarding any Klingon threat. Captain Ironwood glanced over at the black-haired man.

"Please elaborate, Lieutenant Ren."

"From what we know of the Klingons, they are more focused on imperialistic expansion and increasing their overall military might. Any scientific and technological advancements were usually the results of them pillaging from other alien species, including us, in the past. They have little interest in research and exploration, a field that we can safely say the Federation is vastly superior at this time. Any research involving singularities would just be too advanced and esoteric for them. This location near their border is very likely a mere coincidence." Ren explained concisely as Ironwood nodded his head in acceptance. It made sense for the moment.

Ruby and Yang had swirly eyes from the explanation, their brains hurting. Coco sighed, as did Velvet.

Blake and Weiss were a bit annoyed that they couldn't understand what was being said, cursing their world's limited scientific scope on the universe.

Nora just grinned, ignoring the explanation, and just marveling at how smart her Renny was.

The older heroes didn't like the methods which these Klingons went about advancing their technology.

"So, we're seeing a black hole, but not feeling it?" Jaune summarized easily enough.

"Maybe we're looking at the back of it?" Neptune spoke up with a weak chuckle, knowing he was making a stupid joke (Yang: "Booo!"). Several crew members, including Jaune, smirked for a moment However, that was enough to get Ren's attention, and he stepped up next to the captain's chair, his magenta eyes focused completely on the 'black hole' with the gears in his mind spinning rapidly. (Nora: "Go smart Renny!" "Heeyy.")

"That's actually a good suggestion, ensign. Only that we're not seeing its 'back', but rather we're likely looking at what the actual singularity somewhere else far away may be spitting out here."

"Wait, I was right?!" Neptune blurted in disbelief, getting brief chuckles from most of the bridge crew.

The children giggled at the man's confused face.

"You are implying that this could be a wormhole, lieutenant." Captain Ironwood exclaimed incredulously as he leaned back into his chair and steepled his hands in thought. As far as he knew, they never recorded one that looked similar to a 'black hole' before.

James blinked, "What's a Wormhole?"

Jack smirked, just knowing that no one would understand this. "A 'Wormhole' is the broad term used to describe any tunnel running through the space-time continuum that could go instantly from one point in space to another many thousands of lightyears away; or to a different time period in rare cases. Wormholes are supposed to be rare, usually unstable, and hard to research." (1)

Just as he thought, no one understood a word of that. Though a few like Penny were trying, 'Oh, now that's just precious~'. Susanoo chuckled at what his master did.

"For now until something changes, that's what I believe to be a plausible theory, captain." Ren answered. Ironwood shifted his gaze from Ren to his science officer.

"Ensign Aar'yna, begin a deep scan of this phenomenon on every possible spectrum. Record every single bit of data you can grab."

"On it, captain." the alien immediately responded as his clawed hands moved around his console in almost a blur.

"Many Starfleet scientists will be very grateful for a chance at analyzing this, captain." Ren spoke with a small smile, getting a nod from Ironwood.

"I guess something like that would be like a birthday gift for those nerds." Roman mocked, earning a swift kick to the shins by Lucy while Neo laughed.

Watts glared at the man, very much wanting to know how the phenomena works and the potential applications.

Penny and Terra blushed. 'I very much would like to go over their research.' They thought.

"I don't really have the mind for science, but even I can see how this might advance our understanding of the universe; even if it's by only a small fraction." James admitted with an unsure shrug.

"It'd still be a small fraction more than what we've had before." (Ozpin: "Any amount of knowledge can be useful.")

A quiet but excited chatter filled the bridge as the crew worked to try to learn more about the phenomenon, until Jaune had to speak up a minute later with a worried frown on his face.

"So...is there going to be anything coming out on this end?" his question, directed at Ren, was enough to quiet the room into a nervous silence (Penny: "That is an excellent point considering what Jack explained."). Ren took a moment to gather his thoughts and was about to speak when a loud beep came from the science station, along with the science officer's yelp.

"The gravitational readings are spiking! They're off the charts!"

Everyone became to worry about that.

"That does not sound good." Mercury murmured.

Yang had a terrible feeling settling in her gut. 'Please, let it not be what I think it is.'

To accompany that, the deck under their feet began to vibrate violently and loud rumbling spread throughout the entire ship. At the same time, the black hole on the now flickering viewscreen suddenly expanded to a massive size, and the lightning around it went wild. Then, something began to emerge from its dark center.

"Captain, a-are you seeing this?" Neptune choked out, his eyes widening. Everyone else on the bridge were having the same reaction to what was happening on the viewscreen.

"Brothers…" Ironwood breathed out in disbelief as he watched what looked like many enormous, long, and sinister-looking metallic spires come into existence, and there seemed to be no end to them as more and more of them kept coming out of the black hole. The ship's vibrations continued to intensify, seemingly knocking Jaune out of his trance first before anyone else.

The heroes grew more and more terrified as whatever was coming out of the wormhole just didn't seem to have an end to it. Even the villains couldn't help but feel small at the sheer behemoths that were still spilling out. Though Saphron and Salem twitched at the mention of the gods.

"Captain, we need to move to ready state at least!" his firm shout seemed to knock Ironwood out of his daze as well.

"Yellow alert! Shields up!" he ordered sharply, sending the bridge into controlled chaos as people rushed to their stations and all nonessential crew members immediately left the bridge. Strips of yellow light began blinking on bulkheads and corridors throughout the entire ship, alerting its crew to follow their training and get to their designated zone. Meanwhile Jaune put on a comm headset and manned the weapons station, while Ren took a free seat to brace himself.

The blonde's hands blurred across his console, first activating the ship's shields with a loud burst of static that could be heard in the bridge. An instant later, there were some slight whirring and clunking felt by everybody through the deck underneath their feet as the Kelvin's impressive armament of phaser banks and photon torpedo launchers came to life just under their covers all over the ship, ready to pop out and unleash hell if needed.

Everyone was surprised by the number of weapons being readied. Though Ruby wanted to go over and see what kinds of guns the ship had.

"Isn't that ship supposed to be a science or civilian vessel of some kind?" Winter asked in shock with James nodding in agreement. Both remembering the expecting mother still on board. 'Why would they allow a pregnant woman onboard a military ship if that wasn't the case?'

Jack raised an eyebrow, "What's your point?"

Winter felt her eye twitch at this Qrow-esc response while said drunk just laughed.

Out in space, while the USS Kelvin's crew were busy scrambling to their stations, more of the massive spires was still emerging from the black hole at an agonizingly slow and dread-inducing pace. The audience could see how the hole had the object still emerging from one side, while there were absolutely nothing on the other. It seemed to prove Ren's earlier theory of this object possibly coming here from somewhere else.

Finally, the entirety of what the audience now realized was a single object came into view with the hole closing up and disappearing as if it wasn't even there in the first place. It was enormous and egg-shaped at about eight kilometers long, easily dwarfing the USS Kelvin like an elephant looming over a gnat. If size was all it had, it would have been a terrifying sight to face, but its many black and evil-looking spires extending from its dark mass at its aft like a fierce-looking squid was enough to push the initial terror into true despair.

It took a moment for everyone to realize this sinister and organic-looking object was actually a ship. And an enormous one at that.

The audience was silent, absolutely terrified by the sheer size of this ship. 'That thing's a ship?!'

Ruby hugged her mom in fear, while Yang fought a lump growing in her throat.

Nora was hugging Ren in fear, perhaps a bit tightly as the poor boy was feeling his spine creak.

The other students were shivering in their seats while the other heroes were staring at the colossal monstrosity in fear.

The children went the Ruby route and hugged their mothers for protection.

The villains wanted to crawl under their seats. Salem, while a bit afraid, wondered how to create a Grimm likeness of this for her uses. 'If everyone, including myself, are afraid of this thing now, I can only imagine the people of Remnant reacting to a Grimm version.'

After a few minutes trying to regain some level of composer, everyone finally calmed down enough to actually feel the atmosphere of the nexus returning to bleak. 'Great…'

The view of both ships with the red dwarf in the background showed the audience just how hopeless it would be for the Federation starship if the new ship turned out to be hostile. ("Those guys are boned." "Shut up Merc!")

Back inside the bridge, everyone was dead silent for a long moment, everyone seemingly holding their breath at the sight of the new ship filling the viewscreen. A few even thought it was like looking into the toothy maw of an eldritch-horror version of a giant metallic squid.

"Comms, be ready to send a distress signal to Starfleet." Captain Ironwood whispered, as if trying to not startle the beast in front of them. Behind him, Yatsuhashi gave a loud gulp in answer as his stoic expression broke to allow some nervous sweating. His slightly shaking hand hovered over the call button. (Coco: "Crap, even the big guy is scared!")

An alarm blared loudly, startling everyone into action.

"I have a reading!" Neptune announced sharply. "They've locked weapons!"

"Oh shit." Qrow said, dreading how powerful that thing's weapons were. A few were offering prayers for who they saw were doomed men and women.

"Red alert!" Ironwood declared, now sending the entire ship into battle mode.

"Torpedoes locked on us at 320 degrees, mark 2!" Jaune announced as his hands flew over the console to prepare the ship's phaser banks for point defense. On the viewscreen, many phaser banks and torpedo launchers popped out all over the bow of the Kelvin's saucer-like hull, charging up to fire. Meanwhile two random points on the massive ship's spires flared with flash fire as its own torpedoes had already launched with insane speed. "Incoming fast!"

Pyrrha blinked in shock by how many weapons this small ship had. "That's a surprising number of weapons."

Ruby scratched her head. "Yeah, it is. But why is the scary ship only firing from two points when it should have enough to just overwhelm them?"

Yang glared at her sister. "You want my hubby to get overwhelmed by weapons?"

The girl shook her head as her eyes widen, "N-No! I, I just meant that a ship of that size should've just unlea- I-I'll just shut up now." She blushed and looked back at the screen when her dear older sister's eyes flashed red.

No one missed the term the girl used, but ignored it for the battle playing out before them.

"Arm torpedoes for return fire!" even as Ironwood ordered this, he and Jaune could tell the enemy fire would hit their ship long before they could fire anything off. With that in mind, he shouted a follow-up to Neptune.

"Evasive Pattern Delta-Five!"

The ensign quickly obeyed as the ship turned sharply to starboard and down, trying to get out of the torpedoes' path (Velvet : "Wow, that is some sharp maneuvering."). Everyone braced for impact while Jaune was desperately trying to aim the searing red phaser beams at the approaching torpedoes to knock them out of space. To his horror, the two torpedoes suddenly split into sixteen smaller warheads that sped up even more while nimbly avoiding the frantic phaser fire (Yang: "Shit! There were multiple torpedoes inside?!"). Some missed due to the Kelvin's evasive maneuver, but the rest still impacted and exploded all over the port side of the saucer-like primary hull, punching through the shields easily.

Even with the shields at full power, the bridge gave a violent lurch almost knocking everyone out of their seats with some consoles sparkling all around them. Throughout the ship, fire ripped through entire corridors and rooms engulfing some unfortunate crewmen, and the entire engineering section seemed to be going up in explosions with screaming bodies being tossed everywhere.

A lot of people were afraid to ask how those torpedoes were able to severely damage a ship whose shields were at full power. 'Just how powerful were those things?' Many thought as they saw multiple hull breaches.

Meanwhile, down at the sickbay, Yang yelped in fear as she curled up on her bed and wrapped her arms around her swollen belly for the baby's protection while the entire ship shook violently around her with the overhead lights flickering ominously. An instant later, Doctor Laxi and Velvet burst into her room with a wheelchair. ("I forgot about my sister and niece/nephew!" "My baby and grandbaby!")

"We need to prepare for possible evacuation." Laxi spoke calmly even as her large and expressive brown eyes displayed clear tension. Velvet was at Yang's side, helping her move off the bed.

"W-w-what's going on?! Is my husband alright?!" Yang strained to say as she dropped into the chair.

Laxi shook her head. "I'm sorry, but we don't know. Right now, our priority is the safety of you and your child. We'll figure out what's happening when we're not in immediate danger." She replied as she and Velvet rolled Yang out of the room into the large sickbay.

Yang could see the bay's staff were preparing to evacuate and receive any possible causality. Not even five seconds later, the sickbay's door slid open to admit a coughing soot-covered man she knew in passing as Fox Alistair carrying someone in a fireman's carry. Both Yangs gasped when the second man was laid down on a gurney to reveal almost half his face nearly burned off. She had a good feeling that wasn't going to be the only casualty the sickbay would be dealing with.

The children looked away from the grisly sight, some green in the face from the image.

The heroes who remembered that universe with the evil Jaune shivered at the sight, James especially felt sick from the indirect reminder of his other self.

Whitley turned to the side and threw up, his mother joining soon after. Klein and Maria got up and immediately went over to help the two.

Kali and Frigga gasped at the sight, their husbands (after Odin finally woke his ass up) hugging them close to their chests to block the view.

Yang hoped that her other was wrong, but she knew that it was impossible.

They were proven right only a moment later as more severely injured crewmen began to file into the sickbay at an alarming rate. She desperately hoped her husband wouldn't be one of them. She desperately wanted to call up Jaune on a comm, but she knew her regulations: keep personal calls to a minimum during a possible hostile situation to avoid distractions. 'Damn these fucking rules!' She thought angerly, but tried to calm herself down (Tai: "Yeah, calm down! There's nothing you can do in your condition!"). She just needs to be patient for now, but someone else had different plans.

"Oh!" she groaned harshly in pain, her hands clutching onto her belly. Velvet snapped her attention to the blonde at the sound.

"What's wrong, Yang?" she asked calmly, hoping that wasn't what she thought it was.

"The baby! I think it's ready to get out!" Yang panted out as she gritted through another sharp contraction. Velvet and Laxi exchanged gazes behind her. Their stunned expressions shared one single thought about this incredibly poor timing.

'Oh shit!'

Yang gulped, nervously rubbing her own belly in worry for the child her other was carrying. Tai prayed that his grandkid would be safe.

The mothers were afraid for the child, knowing that any number of complications could arise with the battle waged all around her.

Raven, Summer, and Tai were afraid for their grandchild, silently pleading for Yang to survive, and the birth to go well.

Back at the Bridge, "Damage report!" Ironwood spoke into his chair's armrest intercom as everyone in the bridge quickly recovered from the hit and got back to their stations.

Down in the engineering section, Sun, the chief engineer, was covered in soot, grime, and sweat as he rapidly read over the ship's status on his console's screen even as the entire area was aflame around him (James: "He is one damn good engineer."). He spoke into his handheld communicator.

"Warp Drive's gone with that hit, captain! Never seen anything like this!"

Despite herself, Penny couldn't help but ask "What is a Warp Drive?" But no one cared to answer at the moment.

The stomachs of everyone on the bridge dropped like lead bricks. Without Warp Drive, there was no escape from this massive ship. Jaune whispered a despairing "No." as he immediately thought of his wife and child in danger on this crippled ship (Tai: "If you were that worried about her, then you shouldn't have let your pregnant wife onboard!" [2]). Ren closed his eyes, wondering if he would ever make back home to Nora and their unborn child.

Ren was wondering the same thing, when his face was grabbed by a pissed off Nora.

The mad bomber glared at Ren, "Don't think like that, Ren. Trust in Jaune, he will make sure to get you home." She leaned in a bit, whispering "And to me."

Ren smiled, and lightly kissed her on the lips, the two of them blushing like mad as their hearts beat a bit faster. "Thanks Nora, I needed that." The girl smiled, and snuggled his neck. The two comforting each other as they went back to viewing the screen.

"Torpedo tubes are down for the moment, but phasers are still working! Shield's down to 38%! We'll get the torpedoes back up soon enough!" Sun reported before signing off to try to fix the damages with his men.

James swore, knowing that without torpedoes, there's little the ship can do to retaliate. And without this Warp Drive device, they cannot escape.

Before anyone could say anything, another alarm blared.

"They're firing again!" Neptune shouted as he tried to move the sluggish ship out of the way, but it was too late. Two more torpedoes were already launched and halfway to the Kelvin.

"All power to forward shields!" Ironwood barked as he braced himself in his chair. Jaune, now more aware of the torpedoes' capabilities, began firing the ship's phasers much sooner to try to knock them out before they split. The audience were amazed by the firepower the smaller ship still possessed despite the damages it sustained.

He managed to get one as it exploded harmlessly in space, but before the audience could cheer, the other one had gotten close enough and splintered into several more warheads that whizzed around the more frantic phaser fire, before they strafed over the bow part of the saucer section in more fiery explosions.

"And this is only with a few of those torpedoes." A pale Penny whispered, calculating as best she could that the enemy would certainly decimate an entire fleet with that weapon system alone. 'And who knows what else it has still hidden from view.'

Most were hoping that no one else was harmed by this latest strike.

One unlucky yeoman, Mercury, was in the wrong place at the wrong time when the bulkhead behind him was vaporized from the latest barrage. Unfortunately for him, this exposed the corridor he was into open space. He screamed as he grabbed and tried to hold on to a metal beam while the vacuum sucked everything around him out, before he lost his grip a second later. There was absolute silence as the view followed him into vacuum, his now deceased body slamming into a phaser bank on the saucer's hull as it fired more beams toward the enemy ship, before careering off into the vast emptiness of space.

Mercury paled as he not only witnessed the sudden death of his other by decompression, but witnessing first-hand that in the vacuum of space of this reality, no one could hear his screams as he flew off into oblivion. (3)

Emerald and Cinder actually felt bad enough for the guy, that they placed a hand on either side of his shoulders in support. To not hear a man's death screams as he floats away into the dark expanse, it was too chilling for even Cinder to not shiver in fear.

Back in the bridge, it was pandemonium as many crewmembers were shouting reports over each other.

"Atmospheric stabilization has been lost!"

"Were our shields even up?!"

"Oxygen falling on decks seven through thirteen!"

"We have confirmed casualties, sir!"

"Shields are at eleven percent! Ten. Nine. We're still dropping Captain!" Jaune reported as he turned to Ironwood.

As more reports were announced, everyone felt more and more helpless. Jaune's report of the shield strength had his friends wishing that they could go and at least pull him out of there.

James, Winter, and Ozpin knew that the ship was done. It fought as well as it could, but now James' other needs to think of the survival of his remaining crew and order the evacuation. 'The question is would the enemy allow them.' They all thought. 'With the ship sustaining so much damage, and the enemy still at full strength, there's little they'd need to do to destroy any escape shuttles.'

"Reroute all remaining power you can get to forward shields." James ordered. "Prepare shuttles for evacuation."

"I've never seen technology like this before." Ren whispered as he stared in horrified fascination at the ship filling up the viewscreen. Surprisingly, it wasn't taking any further action.

All the displays in the bridge became staticky for a moment, catching everyone's attention. Someone was hacking into the ship's comm system, and quite easily too! (Blake: "That cannot be good.")

"Captain! They've jammed all subspace communication in the region. I did manage to get a distress signal out beforehand, however brief it was." Yatsuhashi announced, getting a grim nod from the captain.

"Oh no!" Pyrrha and Ruby gasped in horror.

Coco growled, "Damn those fuckers, now the ship's stranded, and without a way to call for help!"

Saphron prayed, "Sacred Pillars, please watch over them." She knew that there was little chance of any of them surviving now.

"Shit!" Yang cursed. Then she heard Saphron's prayer. 'Please, to any gods that's listening, protect my Jaune.' She began to tear up, her mind going back to the beginning of the view, where her older other was so excited at being a mother, and how happy Jaune was at being a father. She remembered the crown that she asked for, and took it off. 'Anyone…' She looked at the thing, thumbing the symbol of the Arcs in the middle of it, just above the jewel. 'Sacred Pillars…'

Everyone then noticed the main screen in the bridge screeching for an instant, before a grainy video feed popped up on it to show an image of a pale, bald, and unshaven male with pointy ears and tribal-like tattoos across his face. Many in the bridge glared at the screen, recognizing him as a Romulan; a species that the Federation has had rocky relations with in the past like the Klingons.

The heroes and some of the villains all glared at the screen, at this man, for firing unprovoked and killing so many people and endangering an expecting mother.

Ironwood rose out of his chair with a menacing scowl.

"Hello. My commander requests the presence of your captain in order to negotiate a ceasefire. You will come aboard our ship via shuttlecraft." the Romulan declared in a tone that said he knew he had everyone by the balls. "Refusal would be...unwise." (Neo: "Such a fucking asshole!")

The feed abruptly shut off at that ominous threat, and the entire bridge fell into tense silence as all crew stared anxiously at the captain standing alone by his chair. James Ironwood looked contemplative as he stared ahead for a long moment, before he seemed to accept a decision. He glanced down at Jaune by his side.

"Walk with me." he requested in a quiet tone as he turned to leave the bridge. Jaune stood and walked after him, exchanging a worried glance with Ren as he left the bridge.

"He's actually going to do it?" Ilia asked in shock, feeling like this whole thing was a trap.

Sienna shook her head as she stroked her daughter's hair, "He has no choice, the ship cannot survive another hit from those torpedoes." She too felt that this was a trap, with Eve nodding in agreement. None of the White Fang liked the Romulan for his attitude after attacking a ship of a government that succeeded what they fought so long for.

They walked in silence through the corridor toward the turbolift for a few seconds before Ironwood began speaking.

"If I don't report in fifteen minutes, evacuate the crew." (Eve: "Smart, for a Human.")

"Sir, we could issue…" Jaune tried to speak wanting to prevent his captain, a man he respected very much, from giving himself up. They were also breaking around twenty Starfleet regulations involving a captain putting himself into a hostage situation alone.

James smiled a bit, a bit happy that his other was this respected, but he knew his duty. 'I need to think of the safety of the crew. And if one life is needed, even if it's my own, then it's a price I'm willing to pay.'

"There is no help for us out here." Ironwood rebuked firmly. "We have to save everyone on this ship and if this is the only way to buy us more time, then this is what I need to do. It's a blessing they specifically asked for shuttle transport; beaming over wouldn't have given us any time at all."

"Captain, you're dead the moment you set foot on that ship." Jaune stated bluntly. He knew the Romulans' 'ceasefire negotiations' were bullshit; that wasn't going to take place at all. They wanted something specific from Ironwood, and he would outlive his usefulness when they got it.

"I'm aware of that." the Captain stated as if he already accepted his fate. His expression and voice never wavered as he stepped into the turbolift and turned around to look Jaune in the eyes. (James: "His life isn't worth the lives of his crew, he knows this.")

"Use autopilot, and get everyone the hell off this ship."

Jaune straightened up, and gave a small salute. "Aye, Captain."

Winter saluted the man onscreen, followed by the other Schnees, Huntsmen, students, children, and strangely White Fang. They know that he's going to the enemy, expecting to die, but they couldn't help but admire his bravery.

"You're the Captain now, Mr. Arc." James declared as if this wasn't a temporary command. The Kelvin truly was Jaune's to command now for however long its life remained. Jaune understood this, and accepted the baton pass with a resolute nod. (James: "You have your orders, Mr. Arc. Make my other proud.")

Ironwood nodded back with a calm smile, knowing his former crew were in good hands now. The turbolift door closed.

Jaune stared at the door for a long moment, his expression changing into a determined glare. He had to save everyone still on this ship, including his wife and child, and he would accomplish that goal no matter what.

James and Winter smiled, knowing the people would be in good hands. Though the latter did blush a bit by the man's expression.

With that single goal in mind, he turned back toward the bridge, until he stopped a few feet from the door. His hand twitched, wanting to reach for his communicator so he could call up Yang and personally confirm that she and their child were safe. He shook his head of that desperate need, understanding that someone would've contacted him if anything happened to his wife already. He'd just have to trust the sickbay staff to do everything they could to keep her safe.

Taking a deep breath to expel any self-doubt, he straightened his uniform. With focus of his duty at hand, he continued forward.

A moment later saw Jaune strode back into the sparking and smoke-filled bridge. Every eye in the room shifted to him upon entrance as he stopped by the Captain's chair and stared at it in silence for a moment. With a nod, he took his seat with a smooth movement like he had been doing it for years. No one in the bridge rose an objection; they all understood he was in command as of this moment, and would follow his orders. Ensign Daichi was already relaying the change of command to all departments on his console with no hesitation.

His friends were amazed at how the people just accepted Jaune's place as their Captain so easily. The teachers were impressed, seeing the trust in everyone's eyes for the young man.

Ren stepped up to his side, silently offering his support. Jaune glanced up at him briefly, before smirking slightly.

"Ren, you're not even supposed to be here with us; you should've been preparing to evacuate with the others by now." he pointed out in a quiet tone. Ren shook his head with a small smile.

"I know, but I want to help an old friend out for a little while longer, Jaune " he whispered back.

Ren nodded, "You can't get rid of me that easily, Jaune."

Nora and Pyrrha nodded in agreement. The former grinned, "JNPR to the end!"

Jaune nodded his thanks, before glancing around at many of his crewmen as they awaited his words.

"At this moment, Captain Ironwood is boarding the enemy ship to buy us time. I'm under no illusion that this 'ceasefire' will last long, so we'll be preparing for full evacuate just in case they start attacking us again. That said, Ensign Vasilias, I want you to prep the autopilot to ensure that this ship stays between our evacuating shuttles and the enemy's fire no matter what." He shakes his head. "Don't even think about evasion; just make sure this ship absorbs as many of those torpedoes as it can."

Oz nodded, "A good plan."

Qrow grumbled. "At least the saucer shape would be good for something."

Neptune nodded his head and began preparing the automation program on his console. "Yes, Captain."

Jaune tapped the armrest intercom on his chair.

"Bridge to engineering, update status?"

"Warp drive's smashed to bits with no chance of recovery, Captain. At least we got the torpedoes working and the shields are back up to around 40%, sir." Sun's voice replied dutifully. Jaune nodded.

"Forget the warp drive and divert all power from nonessential systems to forward and dorsal shields. The hanger must be protected at all cost." he ordered, making sure to vaguely imply over the possibly-hacked intercom that they were preparing to evacuate by putting emphasis on the word 'hanger'.

The heroes winced at the state of the ship, but at least it had its weapons online and the shields were at least ½ strength. 'But will it be enough?'

"Aye, captain!" After his quick affirmative, Sun disconnected the intercom to do what his Captain ordered with a renewed determination.

Turning off the intercom, Jaune glanced back at Yatsuhashi. "Ensign Daichi, initiate the visual alert for general evacuation throughout the ship, and make sure the saucer section is emptied first."

The large man replied with a "Yessir!" as he tapped a few buttons. At that moment, the strips of blinking red alert lights throughout the ship began to blink a bright yellow, white, and red in an alternating pattern. Most of the ship's crew immediately began preparing to evacuate in an orderly fashion, awaiting the final command to shift into action soon.

James hummed in approval. "Clever, a visual alert for evacuation instead of an alarm. Would certainly help limit the chances of the enemy finding out if they hacked their communications again." Winter nods, already taking notes for future trails when they get back home.

"Good idea with the visual alert, instead of announcing it over the ship's intercom, Captain." Ren spoke with a knowing tone.

"They hacked into our comm system and could be listening in now, so I'd rather not give them any reason to attack us early if they think we're breaking this so-called 'cease-fire' first." Jaune explained as he glanced over at the science officer.

"Ensign Aar'yna, was that deep scan procedure still active when the ship came through?"

The alien-looking officer nodded his head almost excitedly. "Aye Captain. We have every detail of that ship, almost down to the individual atom before it attacked."

"Good. Load every single bit of that data, and everything about the wormhole too, onto a probe. Program it to launch when the shuttles begin evacuating. That probe must get back to the Federation no matter what." Jaune ordered, making the ensign nod rapidly as he began copying the data. The blonde then glanced back at Ren.

"I take it you've looked over some of the data?"

Ren nods, "Yes. From what I managed to discern, that vessel is a mining type, or it used to be one."

The audience was shocked. A mining ship? This vessel with such powerful and advanced technology had been handed its own ass by a MINNING ship?!

Ruby stuttered, "T-That's not possible."

Penny gulped, "Maybe it was heavily modified?" If it wasn't, then she didn't want to think about the power of a dedicated warship.

A few others prayed that was the case, otherwise the Federation may not survive.

Jaune stared at his friend incredulously for a moment.

"So we got our asses kicked by a Romulan mining ship?" he choked out quietly, and Ren gave a helpless shrug.

"Based on the scans, just over a third of that ship's mass is made up of an enormous spool used to lower and energize a powerful laser drilling system. It is a typical equipment of any ship designed for deep atmospheric mining from orbit. Clearly, it has been heavily modified; likely an experimental prototype considering we're only seeing one active weapon system on it." he explained his reasoning. Jaune and the audience sighed, the latter in relief.

"Well, they only needed three of those torpedoes to reduce us to this state. Just how the hell did they manage to advance their technology so much without us noticing? Last I checked, both the Romulans and Federation were about dead even." (Glynda: "That is worrying.")

Ren frowned. "I'm not sure if they're the Romulans we usually know. So far, the ones we've met before today were militaristic, stoic, and disciplined. The Romulan we saw on the screen a moment ago displayed none of those traits with how he looked and acted. In fact, he looked to be a part of an independent crew." He explained with his eyebrows furrowed in thought.

"An independent crew with a ship that could take on the whole of Starfleet?" Jaune pointed out flatly, and Ren nodded with a grim expression.

"It certainly is worrying." (Emerald: "Yeah, no shit.")

"Alright, we'll figure out who they are and why they attacked us later. What's important right now is the evacuation. We need to slow that ship down however we can. Any ideas?"

Ren looked out the viewscreen in thought. "A ship of that size cannot be fully shielded without multiple power cores." He slowly explained. "So far, we've only detected one. It is powerful compared to ours, but it is still impossible to adequately shield a ship of that size." He reported.

"So most of those spires are unprotected, while the shielding would be at its strongest around the main hull at the aft." Jaune concluded with a nod, before he glanced at Neptune.

Several people blinked at the man's fast deduction.

"Man, Jaune is smart." Coco said, the other students nodding in agreement.

Pyrrha and Yang grinned with pride.

"Ensign Vasillas, can you identify where their torpedoes would be fired from on those spires?"

"Yes, Captain. I have them all on sight." Neptune replied as he typed a few commands, and the HUD overlay on the large viewscreen began pointing out multiple launchers all over the massive ship's many spires.

Everyone grimaced at the multiple launchers displayed on the ship. If 3 torpedoes were enough to severely cripple one ship, then with the number of launchers shown it could destroy an entire fleet with little difficulty.

"When you're done with the ship's automation, program our launchers to aim two photon torpedoes each at as many of those you can target when they begin firing again. We should be able to knock at least a few out, giving us more time before they destroy this ship. Lastly, have all phaser banks focus on swatting any incoming torpedo out of space." Jaune ordered, getting an affirmative from Neptune. The blonde then leaned back into his chair, and glanced at his friend standing to his side.

James nodded, it was a sound plan and one he might have made if he was familiar with the technology of the ship.

Everyone hoped it would be enough.

"Am I doing everything right, Ren?" he whispered, making sure to avoid demoralizing his bridge crew any further with his nervousness and self-doubt. Ren gave a small smile.

"In my opinion, you're already doing fantastic with what we currently have at hand. Don't doubt yourself, Captain." he replied, making sure to address Jaune with the proper title to show his confidence.

Ren and their friends nodded in agreement. "You're doing fine so far Jaune, don't doubt yourself."

Jaune nodded and steepled his hands on the chair's armrests, now forced to wait on whatever happens with James soon.

"A shuttle's launching." Neptune softly announced a moment later. Everyone on the bridge stopped to see a small boxy spacecraft come into view on the viewscreen as it approached the huge and imposing ship. They watched in solemn silence, understanding that their Captain likely wouldn't be coming back from this one. A few stood up to give a salute as they see the shuttle disappear into the shadows of the enemy ship's spires. It was like watching a small defenseless creature walking willingly into the toothy maw of an enormous beast.

The Huntsmen gave a quick salute to the brave man as he flew off to his likely death.

After a moment of grim silence, Jaune had to speak.

"Ensign Daichi, bring up Captain Ironwood's vitals."

Yatsuhashi replied in the affirmative as a few button presses bought Ironwood's biometric feed into view in the bottom corner of the viewscreen. At the moment, the former Captain was reading as nervous but controlled.

James sighs and nods, "That's sounds about right." He tried to leave the thought of his other likely dying again when a stray thought hit him. He blinked, "Wait," he looks at the screen in shock, "the ship has a way to view emotions?"

A few others looked at the screen in shock. Coco gaped, "Seriously, just how many toys does the Federation have?"

Ren's mind was going into overdrive, wondering how that was possible, and at such a large distance. 'This could be extremely helpful for law enforcement.'

Everyone was going over what Coco said, wondering what other technology the government had. They didn't know they were trying to use this as a coping mechanism for what they all knew was coming.

END

Woo, another chapter done. Yeah, it's a shorter one, but I really felt this was a good stopping point. And again, sorry for the late update. Good news, for me at least, was I got to have ice-cream cake :) ! Anyway, thank you guys for the wonderful gift, and hope to see you next time!

List of current Jaune's children in the Nexus:

Neo: Lucy

Emerald: Peridot & Garnet

Vernal: Amber

Raven: Robin

Sienna: Altani

Glynda: Alice

1. While wormholes would be rare in normal cases, keep in mind that their future is Stargate, where wormhole/time/dimensional travel are a common thing.

2. I never understood why they didn't send their non-essential personnel (like a pregnant woman) to a nearby world before they went to check what was causing the anomaly. I can sort of understand that the guys in charge didn't know what it was, and they didn't have much time. But they were also going near the border of the Klingon Empire, an interstellar government that the Federation is in a recent Cold War with. Don't know about you, but I thought sending them into a potentially hostile environment like that without dropping a few people off first was a stupid idea.

3. I know that in the real emptiness of space, sounds can't be heard. Which is what I love about this scene as mean as it is to admit, but keep in mind that the Stargate Universe (and several others) doesn't adhere to this particular rule when it comes to screams and explosions.