The peace was soon disturbed by a loud banging noise, and the ground beneath their feet shook with every impact. Alonzo began to scan the area with his tri-corder.
“I'm picking up something big a mile away from us, moving at an incredible speed. I've never seen anything that big move that quickly before!”
“Over there!” Danziger shouted, pointing to a spot on the horizon.
Devon could not believe her eyes. It was huge, a mechanical monster the likes she had never seen before. She had only read the files on these machines. She had hoped she would never see one in person.
“What is that thing?” asked Walman.
“All-Terrain Armored-Transport,” Devon replied. “An AT-AT to you and me.”
“I don't want to sound like a coward, but I think we should get out of here,” said Alonzo. “This is way too big for us to handle!”
“I second that!” said Danziger.
Devon was about to activate her communicator when something unexpected happened. From the ground in front of them two humanoid-looking aliens rose, directly out of the dirt. To the humans each were extremely ugly looking. Each of them were carrying some kind of staff, with a round, circular device at the top. They paid no attention to the away team. Their attention was focused on the lurking Imperial transport.
And then it happened. Bursts of energy began to form around the circular devices. When strong enough, these bursts of energy shot out towards the AT-AT, and scored a direct hit. Two more bursts soon followed, and this brought the transport to its knees. A final burst caused a mighty explosion, totally wrecking the AT-AT, and sending those stormtroopers that survived the crash running for their lives.
Then, as quickly as they arrived, the aliens vanished, back into the earth they had come from, leaving no trace of their ever being there, except for the wreck of the Imperial transport.
Devon looked on in disbelief. She had never encountered this race before, and wasn't sure whether anyone had before. She knew that had an ally in this fight, but she didn't know how to speak to them.
In the Operations Room of Babylon 5, John Sheridan sat, pondering, wondering what the hell was going on in the Alpha Quadrant. All he could hear on the communications channels was that some massive invasion fleet was heading out all over the place. While he was pondering the events, Commander Ivanova was making her usual checks, and as she checked the sensors, she found something, something that would affect them as much as the happenings throughout the quadrant.
“Captain, long-range sensors are picking up something. I think you should see this.”
Leaving his seat, Sheridan joined Ivanova at the sensor station. His worst fears were about to come true.
“It's part of that invasion fleet,” he said. “Imperial and Sontarran ships.”
“There's over a hundred of them,” said Ivanova.
“Against that many we wouldn't stand a chance,” Sheridan continued. “Contact Starfleet Command, find out how far away the nearest starship is.”
“I can tell you that without contacting them. The nearest ship is two days away, and that's probably got problems of its own right now!”
“What about Minbauri, or Vorlonn ships?”
“Same there.”
Sheridan began to think. It was likely that this invading force would attack and try to take control of the station, and there was only one possible way of defending the station.
“Launch the fighters. Tell them to form a line around the station to protect it from any possible attack. Then arm all phaser batteries and photon torpedoes. If we are going down then I want to go down fighting!”
On the rim of unexplored space, thousands of light years away from the invasion of the Alpha Quadrant, two strange, dark, lurking ships came into view, traveling at a speed far in excess of anything in the Alpha Quadrant. Suddenly, they came to a halt, to a stop at a 'shimmer' in space. This shimmer only lasted for a few seconds, and then it vanished again. The shimmer resembled a cloaked vessel.
The strange, dark ships were motionless for a few moments, as if they were in contact with the cloaked ship. Then, they began to move off, again at great speed, on a direct course for the Alpha Quadrant.
Magus had now been in Podley's office for ten minutes, and during those ten minutes, the happenings outside and on Altor had meant nothing to the two of them as he outlined his plans to Podley, trying to get his assistance in the rescue of Captain Watt and Commander Sutek.
“It sounds a very dangerous plan, Doctor,” said Podley. “But there is a reason for my sending some of my officers to Earth. The Snake has been sentenced to the New Zealand penal colony. We have to take him there.”
“So you will help me then?”
“Let me show you something, Doctor.”
Podley reached into his desk drawer, and took out an old-style scrapbook. He handed it to Magus.
“As a young boy growing up on the Creon homeworld, we were told the stories of the adventures of the legendary James Watt and Anglo-Force. He became a hero of mine, and I was almost dumbstruck when he visited Altor during his election campaign. When I shook his hand, I was lost for words. I was doing something that I never thought I would do, I was meeting my hero, a living legend!”
Magus began to flip through the pages of the scrapbook. It was filled with old newspaper cuttings, some of them dating back to 21st-century Earth. They told of various campaigns James Watt had fought in, right up to the 24th century. There was a picture of Watt shaking hands with Podley. Magus could tell that he was lost for words on that day. On the final page was a large cutting, from the day of Starfleet One's explosion near Io. Upon seeing this, Magus closed the book.
“What are you trying to tell me, Captain?” he asked.
“It's simple,” Podley replied. “I would have done anything for that man. He was the first one in years who brought any sort of hope to the Federation and the Alpha Quadrant. I would have given my life for his, if I could have. But now, seeing that I can't help him, I will help his family. Like many others here I believe that Captain Watt and his crew were framed by Servalan. I'll do anything to get him out, even go to the cell myself with a phaser!”
“If the plans goes without any hitches, you won't need to, Captain. You will help me, then?”
“Try to bloody stop me!”
The two then shook hands, and a new friendship was born.
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