startrek76

Suddenly there was a lot of yelling and shouting of instructions, orders, and counter orders which drifted out into the Axial Core from the Enterprise side of the wormhole. Chief O'Brian came through the portal and headed for the field transmat's controls. He was so preoccupied he did not notice the two boys.

"DUCK!" Wesley hissed.

"What?" Boxey asked, confused. He wondered what Wesley wanted with an aquatic water fowl at a time like this. Wesley grabbed the Colonial boy and pulled him in behind a new group of Star Fleet containers of various sizes and types. Boxey flattened himself on his stomach and cautiously peered out from between two storage crates. From the Galactica side came the sound of men running -- a lot of men. An instant later, a dozen or more Colonial marines in full combat armor and armed to the teeth, boiled into the room.

Boxey glanced at Wesley, and the Federation boy looked back. The expressions on their faces convinced the other that something unusual, and from the look of the marines, perhaps dangerous was going on. Boxey recognized Sergeant Major Orion, the Galactica's top enlisted marine.

Boxey elbowed Wesley, "That's Orion," he pointed out the marine to Wesley. "He's the marine strike leader."

Another group of people had entered from the Enterprise. Wesley pointed out Commander Ryker to Boxey. The Enterprise people were discretely armed with phaser pistols slung in magnetic loops on their belts. Commander Ryker and Sgt. Major Orion meet in front of the transmat portal, while Chief
O'Brian is working on adjusting something in the transmat field emitter coils. Commander Ryker handed Orion a universal translator and the Colonial marine quickly sliped it into his ear.

"So," Orion began. "This transmat thing can access other ships besides Enterprise."

"Yes, all it takes is readjusting the exit aperture in space-time," Ryker said. "I understand that the Klingons have captured someone your people want pretty badly."

"That's the word I got," a menacing smile slowly spread across the marine's craggy face, but it never touched hi eyes which remained flint hard. "The traitor Baltar."

Boxey gasps, almost too loud. Baltar, here?

"Who's Baltar?" Wesley whispered to Boxey.

"Baltar is the one who gave away military secrets to the Cylons that caused my home planet to be destroyed ... and he's responciple for killing my mother!"

"Whew, a heavy duty traitor."

"Treason, nasty business," O'Brian muttered as he made adjustments to the field transmat's control surfaces.

The portal from Enterprise collapses and O'Brian snarled something in Klingon into his communicator.
Wesley's military translator picked it up but not the civilian version Boxey has. "Ready to receive wormhole." Wesley translated the Klingonaase for Boxey.

"Stand by, Galactica." Seconds later, the Transmat frame again glowed, this time with only red and yellow dots of light. More and more sparks of laser-pure red and yellow light appeared, seemingly winking into existence out of nothingness. At a certain point the wormhole reached a critical mass and the Klingon generated wormhole broke through into normal space-time, exactly within the
boundaries of the transmat frame. A flash of light and a kawhoosh of displaced atmosphere molecules heralded the completion of the transmat link between the Galactica and the Klingon flagship. Unlike the Federation transmat event horizon, which was completely transparent to visible light photons, the Klingon transmat was totally opaque, its surface a boiling volume of red-yellow light, reminiscent of a sunset on a planet with a very dusty atmosphere in orbit around a red giant.

Almost immediately, two Klingon warriors stepped through, they are armed with disrupter rifles and took up position off to the right and left sides of the transmat wormhole, facing each other. One of the Klingon's barked something in battlespeak into a communicator and two more warriors, armed
with what Wesley recognized as pain sticks, come through the transmat, next was a short man in a
large cloak.

"Baltar," Boxey shivered.

"That's him?" Wesley whispered.

"Yeah, the most hated man in this century."

"Kinda like Khan Noonian Singh," Wesley muttered.

"Who?" Boxey asked.

"Another traitor, except from ancient earth. He started a war, called the Eugenics War, that killed almost a billion people."

The entire Klingon guard contingent was through the transmat now. Baltar's four Klingon guards and the two advance guards ringed him and poked at him with their pain sticks. Baltar looked a little worse for ware. It seemed that the Klingons had ruthlessly interrogated him before calling Adama. Last through the transmat portal was Commodore Kevar himself.

"Where is Adama," Kevar roared.

"Right here, Commodore," Adama had just entered the alcove, flanked by Col. Tigh and Athena. The Colonial marines snapped to attention.

Commander Adama," Kevar begins, "In the name of the Emperor Kahless, I present to you your enemy, Baltar." Two of the Klingons give the one-time Cylon Chief Executioner a rough shove which sent him to his knees in front of Orion.

"Baltar," Orion snarled. "My wife and children send their greetings from beyond the grave, traitor."

"Sergeant Major, arrest Councilman Baltar and conduct him to the brig," Adama says in a low dangerous voice. "Commodore Kevar, the Colonial Republics are in your debt for this act of justice."

Kevar nods and issues a terse command to his troops. The Klingon soldiers snaped to attention and marched back through the transmat portal. Kevar turned to Adama just before stepping through the portal. "Kaplaugh, Adama of the Council of Twelve."

The Colonial marines have snatched Baltar to his feet, put him in leg irons and handcuffs. One of the marines gave the traitor a "dope-slap", for which no one admonishes him. "Guyius Baltar," Sgt. Major Orion intoneed an ancient ritualistic phrase, "I arrest you for the crimes of genocide and
high treason."

And with that Baltar was hustled away at a marine doubletime. Within a very few minutes, the transmat portal to the Klingon ship had collapsed to be replaced by the wormhole to Enterprise. The alcove emptied out, and is again very still.

"Well, I guess I'd better get back to Enterprise," Wesley said. "My mom will be wondering where I am."

"Yeah," Boxey says. "I gotta get home too, Grandpa will be wanting a report on the visit exchanges soon. See you at 2100?"

"You bet!





To Be Continued.