Star Trek: Terra Alpha

The vast emptiness of space stretched out before them. This far out from the center of the Milky Way Galaxy stars were sparse, and the Alpha Quadrant had an unfamiliar alien feel about it light years beyond the Klingon Empire and all known charted space. The star maps were sparse for one simple reason: there wasn't anything to map, and a Federation ship hadn't explored this region in over a hundred years.

"I'm reading elevated neutrinos," Astrid said shock in her voice. It was the first time the sensors had read anything in days. "Sensor readings are consistent with a wormhole."

Arthur looked up from his PADD containing Mary Shelley's "Frankenstein." Standing he walked to the operations station and peered over Astrid's shoulder, "Bearing?"

"At the precise location the Q told us we'd find it," she said with an incredulous note to her voice. "Apparently this isn't some sort of a joke."

"I never took it to be a joke," Arthur said simply. "Q seemed... Well, this Q seemed genuine."

"Well at least the trip gave us time to fix the ship. It felt so good to shower again." Karina said as she walked onto the bridge in just a silk robe. "Replicators are still iffy. " she shrugged her shoulders and sat at a tactical station and put her feet up and shook a small tube with nail polish and began to paint her toenails. "And my sister is annoying the shit out of me, she's STILL in the shower and then she locks the damn quarters. I go out for like two minutes to go to Diana's quarters and get the nail polish and the shit locks me out!" she rolled her eyes. "At least I'm on the bridge when I told you I'd be here. Hey Astrid, looks like your asshole relation is still trying to tail us. Should we try to lose him again?"

"If I know Pete he certainly will be following us. He's nothing if not persistent."

Lilith looked up from the helm, "There's no place to hide. In this area a spare electron sticks out like a sore thumb. We should have installed a cloak... It was shortsighted of me not to get one before we left Talaria."

"We were trying not to make a big deal about our departure," Arthur reminded. "No paperwork. No requisitions, and no paper trail."

"Yeah.... but what good is being the empress when you can't get things you need no questions asked?"

"About as good as being the kids of the president of the whole damn Alliance. Everyone has their rules."

"Well Grandfather NIck did give us plans to build one, but it takes time." Alex said as he walked onto the bridge shirtless and sweaty. "I got that warp field scatter thing set up, let Vogler try to track us..." she glanced at Lilith. "Although one thing we should all have learned, just because they say 'no' or 'not at this time' doesn't mean 'never'." he sat down at the secondary ops console near the helm. "By the by... Empress... you do remember what happened the last time we played fast and loose. Your twenty first birthday. We 'borrowed' that Administrative shuttle. Had what was it? Fifty police shuttles following us and we were all just so blasted out our minds we let them chase us all the way to what was left of Gorvan Prime?"

"Oh God... don't remind me. I still can't look at Blackberry flavored home brew the same way." Karina said as she made a face. "I actually twerked on some cop that was arresting me... although in my defense, dude was totally into it... we all did some messed up stuff together. Except for Seraphina, she was always the 'good girl'. Diana too. Except when Simon's around and then she turns into someone on spring break. No offense Lil, but I'm struggling to picture how that would physically work with a short girl like Di and a giant like you and your brother. Course... I dated a couple of Jena's Orion friends. It's... interesting."

"If you and Simon marry, he cannot become emperor if I were to die without a child," Lilith said. "You are not Narlin or even Hylon which is allowed but frowned upon. He cannot serve in the House of Lords, and your children will not inherit any titles. We abolished the caste system a millinia ago, but the nobility still adhere to the old rules." She shrugged, "And he would gladly give it all up. He's just waiting for me to marry and have a child for him to ask you."

"Really?" Diana said with a smile. "Honestly, you know your people could simply adopt a similar government to Terra Alpha, actually elect your leaders. Who needs to be an Empress? As if you got any real power anyway... as if any leader has any true power. Oh sure they can muster the military and call for action but seriously..." she giggled. "Dad jokes about how he can't even go hunting without getting the okey to shoot a turkey as President." she sighed. "Although I am entirely shocked you haven't found someone, you're hotter than any of the other Narlin 'royalty', after all Grandma Angel taught us both how to dress and move and look our best when the situation calls for it. I think I love your brother because I know he's not just looking at me because I'm related to the Ryder Clan and sorta Alliance royalty."

"Yeah, that does kinda suck sometimes." Karina agreed. "I've got boyfriends but half of them expect that means they can get favors from mom or Grandpa Nick. Or like I'm some kind of prize "bagged me a Ryder chick!"

"I just have them wanting me to not use protection so they'll have a kid with powers." Alexander said with a shrug of his shoulders. "They should have met my siblings when they were younger, they'd change their mind. Or when I was a kid. I was a holy bloody terror as my dad called me."

"That's because you Xenexian kids are like feral until you finally can Homebrew yourselves into mellowness." Diana teased.

Arthur smirked, "You and Kim. I swear you two were evil geniuses give your respective parents regular heart attacks."

"We all did," Lilith said without looking up from the helm. "I'm pretty sure the four of us are to blame for Trinity's and Kat's premature gray. Yeah, I know about the hair dye under the bathroom sink."

"That's actually for dad." Diana teased. "Mom has nanites in her scalp for the grey and oh yeah she's pure grey now. So's Grandma Angel, but they look weird like that. Honestly, Asian don't raisin as Auntie Liv tells me all the time. We're going to be youthful until we're old crones, then we'll like age super fast. Look at Great-grandma Anjali."

The helm bleeped. "Here we are," Lilith said briging up the expanding swirls of blues and yellows as the event horizon of the wormhole explanded to reveal itself.

Arthur glanced at Dianna and settled into his seat. He took a deep breath and said, "Take us in Lilith."

The ship plunged into the wormhole. The ship was buffeted, and Lilith's fingers danced over the controls. "Trying to compensate. There that should give us a smoother ride."

Moments later the Phoenix emerged from the wormhole, and the blue swirls vanished in an instance to leave only the blackness of space. "Sensors are picking up a nearby star about four light years off our starboard bow," Lilith announced. "Computer identify the nearest star."

"C'dron. A binary system located in the Andromeda galaxy, based on the 23rd Century deep space telescope survey of the Andromeda galaxy," the computer replied.