The hum of Framheim Station had a steady cadence now: air recyclers, soft chirrups from the ops pit, the faint clank of maintenance teams finishing their work. Ensign Mira Elenko kept her eyes on her console’s feed from the long-range sensor array, mug of coffee in one hand as the other sifted through the survey data.

There was little that was definite, and a lot of maybes.

A faint metallic signature in a dense asteroid population – tagged VORETHI: LIKELY INDUSTRIAL MINERALS. A persistent magnetospheric distortion on a desert world – K’SHAR: TRANSPORTER INTERFERENCE FROM STORMS? An icebound ocean world – THALOR: SUBSURFACE THERMALS.

She had identified them, catalogued them, gone over the analysis models on lonely Beta shift hours. For months, the transwarp conduit had hung open in the dark, letting transports bring the skeleton of Framheim to be assembled around them. Yesterday, the last lockouts had cleared, the temporary power couplings removed. Today, the first expeditionary task groups were due.

‘Ensign Elenko.’ Captain Amira Sayegh’s voice carried enough to cut through the ops chatter. She stepped to Elenko’s station with hands clasped behind her back, gaze already tracking the sensor feed. ‘Any updates?’

‘Nothing of significance, ma’am.’ Elenko shook her head. ‘Minor variance on Thalor’s thermal emissions. That sort of level.’

Sayegh inclined her head. ‘Good. Better to give the explorers mysteries to solve. They hate it when the advance post already has all the answers.’ Her attention flicked to the sensors monitoring the conduit. ‘Timing?’

‘Conduit aperture nominal. Ops confirms first arrival window in five minutes.’

The turbolift doors slid open, and Captain Kurnath, son of Morok, only didn’t look like a one-Klingon boarding party because he was grinning so broadly. ‘I am told our guests are almost here!’ he boomed.

‘They are,’ said Sayegh without looking up, indifferent to her colleague’s bombastic arrivals by now. ‘We’re preparing the last survey data package now.’

Kurnath pivoted towards her, but his eyes settled on Elenko. ‘Ensign. You have studied these distant lights for weeks. Which would you choose first?’

Elenko, who wrapped herself in five blankets at the first chill of fall and pulled the blinds down if the sun was too bright, hesitated. ‘I’d… be happy for whatever exploratory posting Starfleet gave me, sir. But I’m more than satisfied running scans from here.’

‘Spoken,’ came a fresh voice from across the room, ‘like not only a scientist, but a diplomat. You’ve trained your people well, Captain Sayegh.’

By now, Elenko recognised the sardonic tones of Commander Taval, Kurnath’s counterpart from the Republic. She flushed as the Romulan approached. ‘I – I just haven’t thought about it much, Commander.’

‘That,’ mused Taval, ‘would show an uncharacteristic lack of Starfleet curiosity.’

‘I do train my people well,’ said Sayegh mildly, ‘and I find they do their best work when they’re not being baited.’

At first, Elenko had found Taval intimidating, seeing judgement behind every jibe. She knew better, now; knew the Republic representative was being collegial in her way, friendly. Unfortunately, Elenko had never coped with teasing, much, either.

She was saved from the indignity of being shielded from mild banter by her captain as a tone rang through ops: the conduit activity alarm. Control systems flared, announcing a routine inbound event – but even routine arrivals by transwarp needed monitoring.

The aperture widened as transwarp wakes blossomed. Signatures resolved on her display panel with quantity and vector.

‘Contact established,’ she reported, keeping her voice even. Routine though this was, adrenaline spiked at every movement. The formation of the conduit had almost wiped out life across a sector, and they still didn’t know who was responsible. Elenko had had nightmares on her first week here of something coming through. ‘Confirm Fourth Fleet transponders, all within expected parameters. Traffic control has them on approach patterns six, nine, and twelve.’

‘Very good,’ Sayegh said, and for once the captain’s tone carried unabashed satisfaction. ‘Confirm who needs to dock and who’s on their way. Dispatch briefing updates to ships that need it.’

Kurnath folded his arms. ‘At last,’ he murmured. ‘We have spoken about this long enough.’

‘We’ll need to keep speaking,’ drawled Taval. ‘Or we’ll just tread on each others’ toes.’ She glanced at Sayegh. ‘But yes. This is where theory meets practice.’

Elenko worked. The world narrowed to data packages and communication signals and the clean lines of a job done right. She’d spent days forming and updating survey packets, even though some had little to confirm other than the mere location of a star. Others, they’d eked out every detail of every sensor sweep, furnishing explorers with clear questions in need of answers.

Icons on her sensor map that had once been lonely tags now gleamed as the assigned ships confirmed their flight trajectories. Soon, vessels would orbit these worlds, teams would tread their surface, diplomats would shake their peoples’ hands.

‘Elenko,’ said Sayegh softly, still at her shoulder. ‘Take a moment. Look up.’

She did. Through the wide viewport at the far end of Ops, ships slid into position far beyond the curve of Framheim’s hull, their lights glinting against the darkness. They had waited for this moment for weeks; planned and prepared to be not just a construction site, but the forward post for this expedition. For this mission of exploration.

Now it was here. They were here.

Beside her, Sayegh’s lips curled with satisfaction. Then she clapped Elenko on the shoulder and stepped away.

‘Back to work.’