It started, as it so often did for a Starfleet captain, with a distress signal. Teodor Borodin had answered a thousand in his fifteen-year career; cries for help from civilians who’d had an accident, from fellow officers under attack, from starships on the brink of disaster. While each and every one was different – a different victim, a different threat, a different response – some things were the same every time. Like the tightening in his throat. The sweating of his palms. And, above all, the weight falling on his shoulders that didn’t push him down, but grounded him.

Someone needed help. Duty demanded he respond.

‘Priority Two distress call, USS Ranger, to any Starfleet vessel. We’re trapped in a decaying orbit around a spatial anomaly. Warp drive’s offline, and we’re maintaining position on impulse power, but fuel reserves are limited. We’ve got… days, a week, not much more before we’re out. No casualties. Requesting assistance, but be advised: local subspace distortions are wreaking even more hell in the Synnef Nebula. Expect interference with long-range sensors, warp fields, and navigating. It’s hell out here. Oh, this is Captain Yves. Over and out.’

There was a lyrical quality to the pre-recorded distress call as Captain Yves’s voice rippled around the bridge of the USS Scylla. She’d sounded determined, at first, professional, but her voice had picked up speed. A mixture of fear and anticipation. And the sign-off – he’d remember the sign-off. Like she was leaving a message for a friend who so obviously would have guessed her identity, but back-tracked to introduce herself, anyway.

Borodin sat in the command chair, chin propped up under his elbow and fist, listening with a furrowed brow. As the last echoes of Captain Yves’s voice faded, a hushed silence fell on the bridge crew. They were veterans all, and most of them he’d served with for years through fire and blood. This was a Starfleet ship in distress, and there was no question they would respond. The only question was how.

He straightened and looked to his operations officer, her hands poised over the controls that had played Yves’s message. ‘When was that sent?’

‘It might be six hours old,’ Commander Varel admitted. ‘Navigation and communication in the Synnef Nebula are bad at the best of times, and there’s no nearby subspace communication buoy to bounce off the signal.’

Borodin nodded and turned to his XO, sat at his right hand. ‘Any other ships closer to the nebula?’

‘Constantinople,’ said Commander Solheim, his weathered face particularly grave as he studied their sensors on his armrest display. ‘Two light-years out from the nebula.’

‘The transmission included a data package for a location of the Ranger and the route she took,’ said Varel, her black Betazoid gaze intense as she turned from her screen back to Borodin. ‘Their entire mission was surveying the state of the nebula so we can, you know, see anything in it. I can’t pick them out on long-range sensors. A Steamrunner’s going to be spun round like a…’ Varel paused, eyes going up. ‘Spinny toy. That one got away from me, sir.’

Everyone else on this bridge, Borodin had served with for years. Varel was the exception, an officer foisted on him to make up for losses he’d suffered at Frontier Day. He respected her officiousness, and could never criticise her work, but he was still finding his feet with her witticisms. More than that, he could read the implication in her eyes: she worried he was passing the buck to someone else.

‘At this distance, we’re faster,’ Borodin said brusquely, and stood, straightening his uniform. Scylla was a sprinter; one of the fastest ships in the fleet in an emergency. ‘In the nebula, we see better. And we’re more powerful than the Constantinople if we have to pull the Ranger out of trouble.’

Solheim gave the faintest clear of his throat. ‘And our patrol, sir?’

‘Our Republic friends will have to walk the picket without us. Helm, set a course for the Synnef Nebula, maximum warp. Varel, send a message to Gateway Station and inform them we are en route to assist.’ Borodin turned away, then paused and glanced back at his operations officer. ‘Can we reply to the Ranger?’

‘We can try.’ She shrugged. ‘Can’t guarantee it’ll get there. And there’s a delay on the transmission until we’re much closer.’

‘Send them this message.’ Borodin straightened and nodded when he was ready to speak. ‘This is Captain Borodin of the USS Scylla. We’ve received your distress call and are on our way. Hold tight. Help is coming.’

He retired to his ready room once they were underway, the deck rumbling at the thundering energy needed to bring the Scylla to a full gallop. Across his wall, he’d projected images and documents: everything he could get his hands on about navigational conditions in the Synnef Nebula, that phenomenon which had demarcated the end of Federation space in this corner of the sector for centuries, far better than the Neutral Zone ever had. A hive for pirates and smugglers, only in recent years had Starfleet ventured into its depths. Ranger was the first starship to conduct a committed study.

Erik Solheim had been his XO for some time now. Despite the difference in rank, Solheim had nearly twenty years’ experience on him, but had long established himself as one of nature’s first officers, the man to be relied on. That skill included knowing his captain, so Borodin wasn’t surprised when he’d been given maybe thirty minutes to stew on his studies before there was a chime at the door, and his XO came in.

‘Commander Ivilae has confirmed the task group is back underway on the patrol,’ Solheim said by way of greeting, clasping his hands behind his back as he stood before the desk. ‘He insists he and his ships can handle it. He didn’t need to point out that this wastes the entire point of drilling with the Romulan Republic if we’re not… with them.’

Borodin sat in his chair, pushed back an unusually relaxed few inches, gaze fixed on the wall display. ‘You think we shouldn’t respond to the Ranger’s call?’

Solheim shook his head, dolorously thoughtful. ‘We never leave a ship behind. We should just be aware: we’re leaving the Republic border detail exposed.’

A beat. Borodin worked his jaw. ‘There’s always a sacrifice to be made, Erik. But you’re right. I’d rather we were the ones in the position to make it.’

The acknowledgement made Solheim’s shoulders loosen. Just as the weathered XO knew to let his captain cook with his thoughts for a time before interrupting, Borodin knew the older man sometimes just needed his opinions acknowledged. It helped that he was rarely wrong.

‘We can’t have the Ranger pay it, anyway,’ Solheim agreed, padding towards the display of the nebula.

Borodin nodded, lacing his fingers across his midriff. ‘They’re just a survey ship.’

‘Don’t underestimate an Intrepid-class, sir.’ That came with a wry chuckle. ‘They’re tougher than they look.’

‘Is their captain?’ This was the sort of concern he’d never express in front of the bridge crew, but now Borodin turned to Solheim, thumbing a command on his PADD to bring up a new projection: the service jacket of Ranger’s skipper. She was about his age, but much newer to command, the picture showing bright blue eyes framed by dark locks and an exuberant grin he’d never allow one of his officers to share for such a formal picture.

Solheim still hesitated, even in the privacy of this room, to voice his clear apprehensions. ‘I’ve not met her.’

‘Me neither.’ Borodin harrumphed gently. ‘Exogeologist background. But there was a gap in her service record about ten years ago. I pried a little. She spent six months in the Musgrave Rehabilitation Care Facility.’

‘Rehabilitation?’ Solheim squinted. ‘Disciplinary issues?’

‘Addiction. Substance abuse.’ Borodin found himself spitting the words. ‘And now, months into her first command, she’s responsible for the lives of one-hundred-and-seventy souls in a crisis.’

Solheim took a minute to chew on this. Then he clicked his tongue. ‘It’s in crucibles like this that character is formed.’

‘And tested.’ Borodin banished the projection, Juliette Yves’s face disappearing, that shining smile vanishing to sink the room into a deeper gloom of him and his studies of what lay ahead. ‘It’s going to take us a while to get to the Ranger. Days. The nebula’s going to force us to a low warp factor. Navigation’s hell in there. We’re have to hope they can hang on long enough.’

‘If the Ranger is days into the nebula and sending out a distress call, they know they’ll have a wait,’ said Solheim. ‘Let them keep themselves alive. We worry about getting there.’

Borodin’s eyes raked over the display. At the records of ships gone missing in the nebula, at the report from Endeavour getting turned around before they were helped to navigate out, at the whispers of pirates and exiles lurking in the depths of a phenomenon where Starfleet had not dared set foot for centuries.

He gave a tight sigh. ‘I can worry about both.’