First, the title: IHW is, I freely admit, a tip of the hat to the USN motto and the WWII film of the same name. it seemed only right.

Second, the premise does bear some similarities to some Series V rumours on the net (the 'USS Excellent' ones). This *is* conincidence - I had these ideas rattling around in my head months before I heard those rumours.

Well, basically, the series centres around the USS Victory, a lone Fed ship in the middle of a nasty 'brush fire' war. The Cygnian Alliance is a small-ish power a thousand ly or so from UFP space. A deep space mission ran into them around 2360 and made peaceful contact. It's now 2376, six months after the Dominion War ended. During the war, Starfleet made a secret deal with the Cygnians that they would shelter some Fed ships. If things went badly, these ships could emerge from hiding and mount a small guerilla campaign against the occupying Dominion forces. After the war, these forces were recalled. However, the Cygnians get attacked by some nasty characters, the Barhak, and are getting creamed. They call in the favour the UFP owes them. Trouble is, the fleet is half way home, and won't be able to get there for months.

Enter the USS Victory, a prototype ship with a 'booster engine' that can get them there in two weeks (I do have the tech worked out on that one, but I'll not waste the space on it here). Their brief: save the Cygnians.

Captain Geraint Pendragon: Very aloof kind of captain, seems to spend a lot of time contemplating and meditating. Definitely not afraid to get down to business, though (takes a more direct attitude in combat than any canon captain, for one thing). Was recalled from medical leave on Vulcan specifically for this job. He was on Vulcan to try and rebuild his mind a bit, having nearly gone insane from the horrors of the war.

Cmdr T'Lera: Vulcan former science officer, now XO. Stellar background in the sciences. Transferred to command mostly because of Dominion War casualties.

Lt Cmdr Jade Kelly: Ops, later Strategic Ops. Tough-as-nails type. Nearly top of her Academy class, and has rocketed through the ranks in six years partly because of the war but mostly due to her own ability and effort. Big personality clash with Zjackow (see below).

Lt Zjackow: Chief of Security. Big, looming guy. Grew up on a pretty hostile planet. Originally human colonists, but only the fittest survived. Joined Starfleet as an escape, a little like Tasha Yar, but then quit and went wandering. Along the way, he became a mercenary. Hooked up with Starfleet again for the war. Very, very lethal in a fight, and not the least bit afraid of taking life in messy ways.

Doctor Hiro Nagata: Pensionable age doctor (actually holds the rank of Captain!), a distinguished old gent type. In some ways the 'father of the ship'. Knows Pendragon from a previous assignment. Being CMO, he's the only one on the ship who knows about Pendragon's somewhat fragile mental state at the end of the war.

Lt Patrick McConnell: Chief Engineer, hard to peg down. One moment he'll be tightly focussed on something, then next he'll seem to be daydreaming. Without a doubt highly skilled - even had a part in designing the ship. Picked up mutiple decorations for bravery during the war (diving into flames to rescue crewmen kind of thing).

Other recurring characters include primary and backup helmsmen, the Cygnian liason officer and a Barhak commander.

and the crew seems a bit too human-heavy for modern Trek.

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"Ed Gruberman, you fail to grasp Ty Kwan Leap. Approach me, that you might see." -- The Master

And I realise we've got only 1 pure-blood alien on the command crew. Zjackow shouldn't really count as human - 250 years of 'frontier' existence have given his people quite a few non-human (even super-human) attributes e.g. limited ESP, weather prediction. It would be spoiling to say much more than "No-one is quite what he appears to be." I do have one of the characters remarking on the low ethnic mix at one point - IMO Starfleet would simply shove the best people for the job (not to mention those it can get to the ship in time for launch) on the ship, regardless of any politically correct 'ethnic mix'.