Star Trek: Outerzone
Assassin
Episode 6
by Peter Wildash
(PWildash@Channel4.co.uk)

Episode 6 - Assassin

TEASER

SS FANTASY, CAPTAIN'S OFFICE

Captain Christian's eyes snapped open - the dream had ended abruptly this time, although most of the main features had been there, as always: his parents, the stage on which they had died, the Medusan murderer, his colleagues from the USS Venture, and the mysterious figure dressed in black. Looking straight up from his prone position, the subtly carved ceiling of the SS Fantasy's Captain's office seemed more intricate than he had noticed before. Its linear, mock wood and plaster panelling casting deep shadows in the dimly lit room, the design standing proud in the atmospheric low lighting.

He blinked long and hard and mentally composed himself for another stressful day. His neck felt crooked from his semi-upright sleeping position and his left foot, hanging outside the blanket, felt cool. Small beads of cold perspiration plastered his hair to his forehead. Beyond his exposed foot he could see a small fire crackling in the hearth - but he could neither hear it nor feel its heat. Someone had obviously got the hearth's holo-programme working, but not entirely. There was one other light source in the darkened room, and he craned his head back toward it.

The desk lamp shone brightly onto the ebony wood of the Captain's desk some distance away, its glass shade glowing a vibrant spring green colour. The radiance bounced off the brass lamp fitting and a dozen uniform grey padds scattered on the desk's leather surface into the engrossed face of Yeoman Lirik, leaning forward over them with great intent.

"Yeoman," Christian called. The diplomatic aide did not respond. "Mister Lirik," still no response. The Captain glanced at the floor beside the couch and saw an open tricorder silently flashing and across its keypad what looked like an old fashioned Starfleet communicator - also flipped open.

The Captain reached down and closed the communicator, immediately collapsing the dampening field around him with a dull 'pop'. Yeoman Lirik looked up.

"Ah, you're awake," Lirik half-grinned in a friendly manner.

Christian swung his blanket-shrouded legs over the side of the handsome antique couch on which he'd slept for the umpteenth night.

"Why was there a dampening field around me and what," Christian dragged a heavy hand down his face, trying to make it feel more awake, "what the hell are you doing in here?"

Lirik didn't outwardly react. "I'm working. Or at least, I am now - you were snoring and shouting in your sleep quite a bit so I erected the field for a bit of peace and quiet," Lirik smiled, knitted his hands and leaned forward. "You were so fast asleep I didn't want to wake you, but not to worry, I've got a head start on things here," Lirik nodded down at the padds.

"What time is it?" Christian rubbed his eyes.

"0700 hours. We've got plenty of time to get some work done before you address the survivors at 0900," Lirik fiddled with the padds, assembling them in order.

"Just how long have you been in here?" Christian hadn't the faintest idea whether he'd said anything embarrassing in his sleep that Lirik may have heard.

Lirik pouted and looked up. "About forty minutes - I had an early breakfast with the Commodore-"

"Come to think of it, why are you even here in the first place?" Christian interrupted; not sure he was being treated with the respect he deserved as the survivors' leader and ship's self-appointed Captain. Then again, Christian considered, Lirik was a part of the Starfleet Annexe known as The Diplomatic Corps, and they notoriously barrelled over standard Starfleet etiquette.

"At the Commodore's request," Lirik licked his drying lips. "Seems she thinks you need me - in my illustrious past I served under several Captains and Admirals as personal assistant, and I'm fully appraised of all the duties involved in running a starship. So I'm here to offer you all the support you need," Lirik smiled that sickly smile again.

Christian was unsure how to react given that the Commodore had endorsed Lirik's actions. The chubby Englishman continued, waving the particular padd he'd been working on: "I've scheduled your day and the next few weeks based on your notes and what we know needs urgent attention." Lirik held up three padds: "Priority list of requests from team leaders." A stack of eight was pushed forward: "Personnel evaluations gathered so far, broken down into origin and allegiance." Another padd was added to the pile: "Personal requests and concerns from some of the more...er... vocal civilians." Another two padds: "A list of recommended routine meetings and a prioritised list of protocol requirements."

Lirik held up another padd: "And um... oh yes," Lirik tossed it to Christian and he effortlessly caught it with one hand: "Captain's log - overdue by over a week, if you please, Sir." The Yeoman grinned; a reflex that was dropped when clearly not taken with the intention it was given.

Christian didn't even look at the object, dropping it beside him and rising to his feet he approached the desk with some ire. The blanket dropped away to the floor as he moved and Christian stood wearing only his standard issue underpants in front of the Yeoman. Undeterred, Christian spread his hands on the desk and leaned toward Lirik.

"I don't need an assistant, Mister. That fad for personal Yeomans was phased out years ago and besides," Christian leaned even closer, "if I was going to pick someone to assist me I certainly wouldn't pick you!"

Lirik held his composure, instead leaning back with confidence. "This is about your parents, isn't it?"

Christian straightened, suddenly aware of his near-nakedness and lowered his voice. "Get out."

"I know what happened to them," Lirik assured, "and I can quite understand why you associate me with the Medusan who killed-"

"YOU are disMISSED!" Christian shook as he shouted, causing the Yeoman to recoil slightly. Lirik stood, composing himself, and quickly walked toward the door.

Stopping in the opened doorway he turned for a departing comment, but seeing Christian's rigid, unfriendly back and hung head, he decided not to say anything, letting the doors swoosh closed behind him instead. As he ascended the ramp to the bridge, Lirik allowed himself a private smirk at the sight of the arrogant Captain shouting at him wearing only his briefs. Back inside the office, Christian looked up through the rear windows at the perpetually moving stars slowly shrinking into the distance at just under sub-light speed. He was trembling, and not satisfied at what had just happened. How could he have so easily lost control and embarrassed himself like that? Lirik was partly right: as a half-Human, half-Medusan he was a constant reminder of the pain he had suffered at the hands of the rogue Medusan entity.

Act I

COMMAND SECTION, MAIN SHUTTLE BAY

Standing alone in the corridor outside the shuttle bay, Christian felt exceptionally nervous. Unlike his parents had once been, he didn't feel comfortable speaking in front of very large groups of people, so he was keen to get his address over with as quickly as possible. Yet what was beginning to disturb him more than the duration of his speech was making eye contact with all those poor souls gathered in the adjacent area.

He and the other Starfleet officers had accepted the risks of danger and death when joining the service, but these innocent civilians had not made any such commitment. If anything, most had been hoping to escape the ravages of the war with the Cardassians and the Dominion by coming to the Outer Zone.

Many had expressed extreme bitterness at the facts of their ensuing situation. Rather than finding peace and the opportunity for a new start here, they had instead been plunged into the middle of a widespread, violent political coup. Now they were cut off from help by the Tholians and on the run from the K'Tani, the hostile militaristic alien race who had assumed control by destroying the newly discovered wormhole to Federation space and any potential threat.

Understandably, they carried a lot of hate and were blaming all and sundry at their predicament. They blamed their individual governments for not warning them of the potential dangers awaiting them in the Outer Zone. They blamed the Federation for being so slow to identify a precarious situation and they particularly blamed the hallowed Starfleet for not protecting them. Not that Starfleet had been the only guardians of peace in the Outer Zone. Many other races had sent a visible military presence there, (even their enemies from the other side of the wormhole), and Christian knew with hindsight that they had all been kept in the dark by their new-found Qovakian friends.

Having studied the facts, the Captain understood how everyone was easily duped by the Qovakians, and how they managed to keep things quiet about their chequered past. But, he thought, try explaining that to someone who has lost their nearest and dearest and suffered as the civilian survivors of the coup had.

In the rush to escape the devastation of Helub, the majority of the survivors had been forced to abandon colleagues and loved ones. Being a seasoned officer, for Christian the loss of colleagues and friends had become a sad but inevitable cross to bear during his career. Christian tried to convince himself that the loss of his parents, coupled with the loss of so many friends during the war, had hardened him somewhat. But there was no doubt that the sheer devastation he saw across Helub as they left orbit meant that casualties were very high indeed, and he couldn't begin to imagine the massed pain of the people he was about to speak to.

Their only professional medic, Lieutenant O'Hara, had hinted at the level of shock and overall psychological condition of the witnesses to such horror, but Christian hadn't spared any thought on that subject, concentrating instead on the rush to get the ship moving and away from the K'Tani. He only hoped the survivors had been more resilient than the Lieutenant feared.

Christian thought back to the particular padds Lirik had left earlier that morning that contained details of many of the survivors' backgrounds. Some of their stories were truly moving: children alone, having been separated from parents and siblings; partners who had lost their spouses; and parents who had lost their offspring during the K'Tani attack. The detailed accounts had left Christian feeling slightly sick: if multiplied by several million, then he would begin to have a feel for what damage the coup had truly done.

Despite his earlier altercation with the diplomat, Christian had swiftly settled into scanning through the rest of the data. Lirik had certainly done a most proficient job of organising the Captain's time, and in the process saved both him and the Commodore hours of additional painstaking work. He hadn't had an opportunity yet, but reminded himself to thank the Yeoman on a professional level, no matter how uncomfortable the man made him feel and how unorthodox his manner. (He decided that he would nonetheless enable a locking device on the door to his office to keep further unwanted intruders out.)

Christian glanced down at his tattered uniform and felt his belly rumble from hunger: they were all on strict rations, and so far hadn't had any creature comforts save for a short sonic shower, despite what the kindly Helan people offered to share. Because of the swiftness of the attack, not only had the survivors' families been split apart, but most people had also lost everything they possessed except for the very clothes on their backs. Now they were facing much hardship, possibly even more loss - or worse, capture and potential suffering at the hands of a powerful and ruthless enemy. Christian's task as leader was to now face these people and give them the encouragement and support they needed to be able to move forward. As the ship's commanding officer, it was also his duty to insist that they all accept the difficulties of the situation they faced and, most importantly of all, request that they each help in the task of making their home, the SS Fantasy, more habitable and better protected.

The double doors hissed open, breaking the Captain's reverie. Jackson's face peeped into the corridor. "We're ready for you, Captain."

Christian glanced quickly at the padd containing the main points of his address, then straightened and walked quickly through the doors and directly up the pile of crates to the makeshift platform that had been erected by Lirik and his team of Vulcan and Helan helpers a short time before. As he rapidly ascended to the stage, he noticed that Jackson had managed to convince the previously appointed acting department heads and team leaders to stand in a neat semicircle in an 'at ease' stance. As he stepped onto the stage, Jackson nodded to the group and they stood to attention as one - well, almost.

It made the Captain smile inwardly, and he felt warmed when Jackson threw a private encouraging wink at him. Christian was impressed - in just 30 minutes she had got the assembled team of disparate volunteer officers to set an example to the gathered crowds who he now turned toward. Already he could pick out familiar faces amid the throng - the Klingons, the medical staff and Judge Madison, who, it seemed, was also standing to attention.

Christian was surprised at the sheer number of people gathered here. The several hundred survivors near filled the entire shuttle bay. The action of the command crew's drilled performance caused the crowd's murmuring to die down and now all the faces - of all ages and races - turned their eyes and receptors toward the stage. Christian cleared his throat again, then remembered to turn and nod to Jackson - who in turn got the team to stand at ease with a single hand movement.

"For those of you who don't know me, I am Captain Christian of Starfleet," Christian's voice was loud and clear, his projection skills having been developed by a mother keen for her son to follow in his parents' footsteps, despite his innate stage fright.

"Following our escape from the K'Tani I have assumed command of this ship and therefore I am now responsible for everything in it - including all of you. You have all endured a great deal over these past two weeks, and you should be proud of that fact alone: getting this far wasn't easy. We may have lost a few people along the way, but rest assured that I as your Captain, along with the senior officers gathered here," Christian gestured behind, "will do everything in our power to honour their memory by keeping the rest of you safe. We will also endeavour to work out a way of helping all of those we left behind in Vekarian space. We have been compiling a list of our people who are either missing or presumed killed. It is important for us to know everything about the time leading up to the attack - where missing people may have been, what ships were in the region and where they were deployed - if we are ever going to have a hope of finding them all again. We need to build as big a picture of the situation as possible, and we need your help in gathering this information."

Christian shifted slightly and rubbed his nose. "You will have noticed by now that this ship is far from conventional. Be aware that there is a great deal to be done to bring it up to spec and provide a safer, more habitable environment. It is still a dangerous, unknown place. For these reasons I ask that for the present, you all stay within the designated safe areas and do not venture beyond unless accompanied by a recognised member of crew. Although the ship's black coating may render us invisible to most sensors, we cannot rely on that alone to protect us. However, we currently have no defensive capability and no weapons. I have therefore decided that we are to continue on our course away from Qovakian space, along the Tholian border and, with luck, out of harm's way. We may meet other ships who fled there from the initial K'Tani attack, and distancing ourselves from the militarised area provides us with more chances to make repairs and take on supplies."

Without warning he faltered. Christian couldn't remember his next line and his face flushed. He brought the padd up and refreshed his memory, listening to the awkward coughs and shifting limbs, tentacles and hooves of the crowd during the pregnant pause.

"As I mentioned, this ship is not yet up to spec. What you took for granted before coming aboard may no longer apply. For one thing, replicators are non existent, so our food preparation, water supplies and waste processing needs to be strictly managed. Medical supplies and facilities are also limited. For the present time, rationing of all supplies will continue. Aside from having no shields, no weapons and no transporters on line, the central computer core is also far from fully operational. We have discovered only finite deuterium reserves. Navigation, sensors, communications and life support are currently under repair, but at the rate we are going, it could take months to fix..."

The crowd was murmuring disbelief and shock, their faces worried. Christian motioned for them to hear him out and waited until the noise had dulled.

"I am disclosing to you all of the facts because you need to make an important decision. You see we few here - along with those volunteers among you who have helped us so far - simply cannot do all of the necessary repair and maintenance work alone. A ship of this size in this condition simply cannot be kept in good working order with such a small crew. We therefore need each and every one of you to participate, to do your bit. That will mean learning new skills or going beyond your normal capabilities. It will certainly mean you will all have to learn safety procedures and damage, fire and evacuation protocols: from the youngest to the oldest of you. Undoubtedly, everyone in this room will have to make sacrifices, me included. Understand that I intend running this ship the Starfleet way - which in itself will be hard for many of you to adapt to. Sometimes you may disagree with decisions that myself and the other officers will make. But be warned, whether you agree to contribute or not, the chain of command will be strictly adhered to. Simply put, if you are given an order, you will obey - whether you are crew or civilian."

Several short bursts of retaliation erupted in the crowds and Christian exchanged a worried look with Jackson. She remained impassive, not wishing to step in and upset the chain of command that Christian had now established. This was his duty, Jackson decided, and as such he needed to take full responsibility, particularly if he was to be credible in the eyes of these people.

"What about the children?" a young human woman holding a baby shouted up at the stage, causing another murmur of support.

Christian nodded. "Like I said, each of us will need to do our bit. There is of course a need for people to work as engineers, security officers, repair crew et cetera, but we as a group clearly have more specific requirements. With no replicators we need cooks, cleaners and waste processors. With so many children we need carers and tutors. We will very soon need to take on supplies, and that in itself will be a major challenge - we may not be able to find supplies free and readily available, so that might mean trade or an exchange of knowledge or services. Frankly, there's a wide range of functions we need filled - and each of the senior staff here will be recruiting and training for different positions. Each of us will also be giving you the health and safety training essential to survival on a starship."

"What's the master plan, then, Captain?" the Tiburonian male who had been hostile to him all that time ago back on Helub stood with his arms folded at the front of the crowd, apparently just as objectionable. "Are we heading back to Federation space?"

The crowd murmured louder than before and many heads bobbed up and down, turning to face each other in agreement.

Christian had prepared for this question. He turned his back on the audience and held his padd aloft, projecting from its small but powerful lens a large image of a computer simulation onto the high, plain wall of the shuttle deck. Commodore Jackson took the padd from him so that he could turn back to face the survivors.

"This is a proportionate representation of the Galaxy." The image zoomed in. "The yellow flashing area is the Federation. The green area next to it is Tholian occupied and this blue wedge, this is Qovakia." The image tumbled end over end, showing the full width and depth of all three areas. "As you can see, Tholian space is huge, despite having retracted its borders. Even at maximum warp, traversing those borders would take several years, and we have no idea what we could encounter on the way."

"What about a subspace message?" an unidentified baritone voice cried.

"Even if it could be heard, it would still take a very long time to reach Federation ears," Christian stepped forward, almost to the edge of the stage. Whilst he hadn't wanted a full-on question and answer session, they seemed pretty well behaved, and he didn't want to be too hard with them just yet.

"Unfortunately, the Tholians not only prevent people from crossing their territory, they also prevent communications from passing through. All subspace transmissions from outsiders are analysed and jammed as a matter of course. Nevertheless, once safely out of reach of the K'Tani, we will endeavour to negotiate with the Tholian Assembly - try and get them to make a special exception and carry a signal for us. I won't lie to you," Christian paused, "I won't hold out much hope of them helping."

"On the other hand, won't the Federation be trying to get a message through to us?" Judge Madison bellowed.

"Very likely," Christian said. "A lot of important people were on Vekaria when the attack occurred and I doubt that any of the governments will let the disappearance of so many of their people slip quietly into the background. But don't forget there is a war on in our own part of space. And even if some manpower can be spared from the military campaign, there is little room for negotiation with the Tholians. Aside from artificially creating a wormhole that spans Tholian space, or developing a stable slipstream drive, I don't see there is much Starfleet, the Federation or anyone else can do for us."

"Do you think they know what happened to us back home?" a teenage Betazoid boy shouted bravely from amongst a group of younger kids.

"I'd like to think so, son. It is possible some ships escaped before the wormhole collapsed. But if the Federation doesn't know what happened in Qovakia by now, it's unlikely they will for some time. I'm sure other races will be equally keen to break through to Qovakia - either by force or by signal. But my considered view is that it would be unwise to rely on the hope of any cavalry coming to our rescue, not as long as the war continues and there are Tholians in our way," Christian could feel the wave of despair from the crowd. He told himself the next item on the list would either get their adrenaline going or push them over the edge completely.

Christian nodded to Jackson to change the image to a series of several he had been able to randomly capture from the runabout Hudson, and their tricorders.

"You have all met the K'Tani face to face. These are just some of the images of their uniforms and their ships we've gathered so far. In order to stay alive, we will need to know as much as we can about them. The Helan here," Christian nodded to the delegation of Helan people gathered to the left of the stage, "along with the Vekarians and other Qovakians in our group will be vital to this process. They will be able to provide us with local knowledge, and hopefully put us in touch with potential allies in this part of space. If anyone has anything to add to our investigations about the K'Tani or this part of space, please talk to any one of the senior officers."

Jackson changed the image back to one of Qovakian space. Little fizzling blobs filled a large part of the central region.

"One other thing; when the K'Tani destroyed the wormhole, they managed to create many smaller conduits throughout this region. That means the K'Tani are in a position to take total control of Qovakia, if they haven't already - and it's another reason why we're heading away from there. That said, if the K'Tani possess the technology to manipulate wormholes, then we may be able to acquire that same technology and utilise it for ourselves. We know the K'Tani were in league with other races before the coup, and we must assume that they will be again. That means that our intelligence efforts are vitally important if we are going to survive, let alone have any hope of rescuing our people."

The room fell silent as Christian indicated for Jackson to change the image to a holographic image of a young Bajoran girl. Christian's expression became serious.

"This young girl was in our midst when we came aboard, but no-one seems to know who she was with. She went missing several days ago and it is vitally important we find her. However, we believe she may be a K'Tani agent, so do not approach if you see her-"

Several small cries rang out, cutting him off. One mother of a perturbed child spoke up. "My daughter played with her several times - she's just an ordinary child."

"Yes," this time an elderly gentleman spoke out. "I looked after her and some other kids, she couldn't possibly be dangerous."

Christian raised his hands, glancing at Lirik who looked more than a little worried. "Please, believe me, she is not what she appears to be. If you do see her, do not approach her. Just make her whereabouts known to a member of the crew."

Christian took the padd from Jackson and fumbled in his pockets for something. "Until we sort out our clothing issue, each officer will be wearing a bandanna just like this," Christian held a white rag aloft, tied it into a knot and pushed it up his arm. Lirik picked up a container from behind the officers and began to hand out one to each person on stage.

"I'm sure you have many, many questions and requests," Christian stepped to one side. "All of these can be dealt with by our senior staff. My First Officer will introduce each person and their responsibilities. If you have particular skills to offer, please proceed into the adjacent shuttle bay at the end of this session and make yourself known to the relevant department head. Commodore."

As Jackson stepped forward, the Captain noticed that despite her starship inexperience, her very rank and seasoning as a desk-based command officer exuded from her as an air of confidence and maturity. Coupled with her braided uniform, her rotund shape, senior years and rectangular glasses enhanced her commanding appearance.

"It may be wholly unconventional, but I have agreed to be the Captain's Executive or First Officer. I will second for the Captain in any given situation and take command in his absence. I will also be responsible for the conduct of all senior staff and for carrying out the Captain's orders. Our department heads, from left to right, are as follows: Lieutenant Commander Leonard, our Chief Engineer. Ensign Souveson, Head of Security. Lieutenant O'Hara, Chief Medical Officer. Commander Struckchev, Head of Bridge Operations. This is Reb, our principal Helmsman. Ambassador Narli has agreed to be our Head of Supplies. Professor Karnak is our Bridge Science Officer and Miss Hedrik is the person working on our computer and transporter problems under Mister Leonard," the Commodore stopped as she heard Hedrik giggle - a sharp look quietened the young green skinned vamp, but caused a flutter of amusement from the crowd. Leonard flushed a deep crimson in response and he didn't know where to look. Christian, O'Hara and Lirik had to supress smiles of amusement at the German's obvious embarrassment.

"Finally, this is Yeoman Lirik," Jackson walked over and stood beside the portly man who merely glowered at the crowd. "He will be heading the teams exploring the ship, and will be organising all routine services as well as non-operational staff and activities. He will also be assisting the Captain and myself in our executive functions. If you do not volunteer for duty, it is Mister Lirik you need to speak to about any concerns you may have. To reiterate the Captain's earlier instruction, anyone not volunteering will, without exception, be obligated to follow instructions given by any member of the crew."

Jackson noticed that Lirik didn't look comfortable. He had seemed happy in his function assisting the Captain and herself in command duties, but not, as he put it, with 'babysitting a bunch of whining civilians who couldn't be bothered getting of their arses to help'. Lirik remained preoccupied with the disappearance of Bajoran girl and had insisted Christian take the opportunity of his public address to try and find her. He also seemed mightily miffed at Struckchev being given what appeared to be a senior role for some reason not yet known to her. The Commodore wound things up.

"Important information will be posted to general areas or passed on by word of mouth," Jackson continued. "Please listen for important announcements over the intraship comm system - you may be instructed at any time to evacuate to a certain location or to adhere to a certain procedure. You'll be addressed in smaller groups later, but for now, that is all. Anyone willing to volunteer for duty please make your way now into the standby shuttle bay area to your right. Thank you."

Jackson swept her hand to her left and smiled that authoritarian smile which bordered on an intolerant grimace of encouragement. To both the Captain's and Jackson's surprise, only a small number of the people began to shuffle toward the smaller adjacent shuttlebay area. Souveson had to jump down from the stage and corral several children back as they enthusiastically stepped forward to volunteer; Jackson had made it clear that no one under cadet age would be accepted as a member of the crew.

The Captain gave a worried look at Jackson, who nodded an indication that he should speak again. He stepped forward once more.

"Please, if you have any skills to contribute, anything at all, step forward and speak to our staff, we can't do this without you." Christian worried that he may have sounded a little too desperate, but continued regardless, indicating for the senior staff to alight into the standby bay. Lirik remained where he was.

Seeing that only a further handful of people were joining the small group of other courageous volunteers, Lirik stepped forward and whispered something to Jackson - inaudible to the Captain. Christian saw the Commodore reluctantly nod in agreement. She looked up at the Captain and gestured to stand back. Lirik stood in a wide stance, hands on hips.

"RIGHT!" he shouted, causing a few to jump and then giggle. His stern expression at their reaction caused silence to fall once more. "That leaves just us, then," he said, nodding for the Captain to join the others in the neighbouring hangar. Christian felt Lirik bristle with invisible but sickening Medusan energy and quickly left the stage, herding the senior staff and volunteers well into the standby bay. He was appalled at the blatant use of dangerous energy and shocked that Jackson approved. The move also reminded him of his recurring nightmare.

Feeling the ambient Medusan energy leaking out through Lirik's shield, another ten or so people toward the front of the crowd pushed their way to join the others. Lirik could see that well over three hundred people (more than two thirds of their entire number) still remained. Some people who had already been helping out had now, it seemed, changed their minds. Apart from those who were truly bone-idle or ignorant of the extent of work that needed to be done, Lirik could only assume that the rest were either too frightened, or truly thought that they had nothing worthwhile to contribute.

Lirik glanced to his left. On the bulkhead's threshold Jackson appeared to be having a whispered argument with Christian over allowing Judge Madison to join the group. Madison, awkwardly fumbling behind them, had been among the first of the volunteers to step keenly forward, but Jackson didn't want anything of it. The Yeoman caught Jackson's eye and she lowered the dividing bulkhead, separating the 'crew' from the rest of the survivors. The final 'shunt' of the door gave a sense of doom and the room hushed. Lirik had no idea what their reactions would amount to in the hours ahead.

Two Vulcan males joined Lirik on stage carrying armfuls of padds and, amazingly, still wore their skimpy red and gold uniforms. A wolf-whistle came from the back of the crowd and a rush of laughter swept forward.

"That's enough of that," Lirik commanded, not certain who among the smiling faces was the perpetrator. Inwardly he was laughing himself - he could quite see why the muscle-bound Vulcans prompted such a reaction.

The men's black boots seemed the only conventional item of clothing on them. Little red panty-type briefs hugged their muscular hips and these were partly covered with a pleated belt-come-skirt of gold and a translucent material, cut slightly longer at the back as like a shirttail. Two long bands of gathered red and gold chiffon crossed their chest from their waist (held in place by a ceremonial IDIC broach) and fell over each opposite shoulder. On the back, the bands were then intricately criss-crossed and fixed to the belt with a metallic pin. Lirik noticed that these men were not wearing the matching traditional head dress (a multi-spiked velveteen white and red tiara affair) or the black cuff bands denoting their status.

Lirik recognised the men as Vavoth and Sulin, both of whom were unmoved by the reaction they were receiving. The Yeoman considered that only Vulcan males could wear such feminine attire without feeling embarrassed. These 'disciples of logic' were a strange breed. To those who understood the intricacies of Vulcan culture, they were regarded as the brawnier, less intelligent of the species, having spent a greater amount of time in physical training and meditation than on developing their intellect. Their bodybuilding was as much to appear daunting to off-worlders (who were used to equating size with power) as to build on their inherent Vulcan physical prowess.

The Me'Ltran'Di Precinct, as their order was known, were the well-established supportive body to most field-based Vulcan ambassadors and statesmen. Though adequate pilots and spacefarers, they spent most of their time assisting their ward in whatever endeavour they pursued - in the case of these men, as science lab assistants and analysts to Professor Karnak. In their role as protectors, the Me'Ltran'Di were trained extensively in fighting arts and survival techniques, but they were also renowned for their excellent valeting skills. Lirik shook his head. Their uniforms couldn't be more inappropriate to their position, but like a lot of things Vulcan, they were traditional and ritualistic rather than practical.

Lirik dropped his hands from his hips, his gaze wandering over each part of the restless crowd before him.

"First of all, people, I must say that this is really poor show," Lirik wasn't about to mince his words. He truly felt that if he were to get respect from such a diverse mix of people, he needed to come across as forthright, honest and open. They needed to know exactly where they stood from the outset. The crowd didn't sound too happy about his insulting remark.

"There is no way that few number," Lirik stabbed a finger towards the bulkhead door, "will be able to repair and maintain this ship. I strongly urge the rest of you to reconsider your decision. I am in no doubt that each and every one of you has a role to perform, whatever you might think. You might not like the part you have to play, but at least you would be making your own and everyone else's lives that much more comfortable and safe by contributing."

The murmuring had risen to a low babble, but thankfully not one of them challenged Lirik directly. He was glad when O'Hara entered and took her place on the stage next to him.

"How's it going?" she softly asked.

Lirik watched one of the large tanned Vulcans bend over to pick up a padd he had carelessly dropped. "Oh, just peachy," he replied with a smirk. O'Hara offered a brief smile, wondering about Lirik's personal preferences, then decided it was none of her business. Lirik clapped his hands to get everyone's attention.

"Okay, now I want all children under cadet age to accompany O'Hara for health and safety training," the Yeoman watched as the older orphaned kids filtered the information to the younger ones and gradually a group of about 60 youngsters gathered to the left of the stage. "People with young infants, you go along as well," he nodded to the dozen or so people carrying babies. Those young families who were still lucky enough to be intact kissed the briefest of partings to one another and separated.

Some children clung on to their only remaining parent or to the kindly people who had since taken them under their wing, not wishing to move. O'Hara moved in swiftly, and gently reassured the children and guardians, eventually guiding them all out of the shuttle bay in one straggling herd.

As the doors hissed closed behind them, the core group of potential crew now remained, carrying on copious whispered conversations and observations. Lirik wanted to burst their bubble, (and frankly pop one or two on the nose for their insolence and obvious misplaced boredom), but Christian and Jackson had been quite clear not to rile any of the survivors if it could be helped.

"OKAY!!" Lirik bellowed. "Now listen up! I want you to form into groups of six." There was a pause as no one moved. "Come on!" He snapped sarcastically, clapping his hands and causing his shield to ripple. "Double quick! We haven't got all day!!"

People scrabbled: some quickly, still giggling, some of the more stubborn types hardly turned their heads, or cruelly smirked from superior embarrassment as they were knocked to and fro by the others. After a minute or so, people finally began to make up the many small groups. Lirik finger pointed one group at the front to form a line of six people side by side. Immediately next to them, he directed two other groups to line up on either side, forming one long line of 18.

"Okay, sticking with your groups," that were now bartering exchanges, switching and swapping over, he noticed, "fall into ranks behind these three here." Lirik enjoyed this kind of commanding pep drill.

From his vantage point the Yeoman was pleased to see almost neat rows of people forming, even if they did have slack posture and attitude. He nodded to the Vulcans who descended to the shuttle bay floor and gave three padds to the person at the end of each row.

"Each of these padds contains recorded demonstrations of Starfleet emergency procedures and safety protocols, take one per group of 6. Each group will shortly break away and review these details together, after which you will select one leader and one second, then record personnel details for every person in the group using the forms provided within the padd. To make you all easy to identify, I'll be giving each group a unique designation - please remember this as you may need it later. Understood?" There were a few nods and the odd murmured response.

Lirik broke a smile. "You don't have to say "sir, yes sir!" to me, but some form of group acknowledgement would be appreciated. Like: 'aye sir'. Understood!?"

"Aye, sir," came the half-hearted reply, though Lirik could tell a lot of people had merely said 'yes' or 'yeah' or merely tutted at the bossy Yeoman.

"Okay, fall out into your groups. If anyone has a question, please raise your hand and be patient while you wait," Lirik found he was standing, legs apart, with his hands clasped behind his back. The Vulcans returned to the stage and stood together behind him, silent as ever.

Lirik watched the small groups huddling together more closely as the noise level slowly began to rise. Most groups began to talk to each other or bicker over who was going to be in charge. Some more orderly groups viewed the safety demos first, as instructed, and many faces turned to look at him at least once during the session. Other groups decided instead to gossip and make suppositions amongst themselves. Lirik decided that, after his altercation with Christian this morning, it was turning into a very long day - and it wasn't even ten hundred hours.

* * *

COMMAND SECTION, STAND-BY SHUTTLE BAY

In the adjacent hangar space, the mood was less haphazard and almost upbeat. People formed lines having quiet conversations with their neighbours as the senior staff gave everyone brief interviews. Christian caught the eye of nearly all the senior officers, except Reb, who seemed uncomfortable.

Hedrik milled around behind Leonard, letting the still blushing man do all the talking. Reb hung impassively behind Struckchev, the veteran determined to conduct the interviews by himself. Jackson was interviewing the 'don't knows' and helping Professor Karnak to identify necessary science roles that would be useful: not surprisingly, a large number of mineral prospectors had ventured into the Outer Zone, some looking for new resources, others for the opportunity to work on mining or processing plants. The sour-faced Professor was having a hard time relating to the swarthy prospecting types, and didn't immediately see their potential in a ship-bound role.

Both Souveson and Cadet Yip were moving down each over-burdoned line taking advance details, and Narli, the Captain saw, instead moved from Qovakian to Qovakian, establishing contact with any possible traders, merchants or those with supply-related knowledge of the local area.

Wheezy was taking details of possible medics on behalf of O'Hara, the others in her team either returning to the beauty spa-cum-sick bay or milling around the volunteers taking medical history details. The ever-competent Helan had returned to the bridge and engineering on his instruction in order to keep things going, leaving the officers to sort things out down here.

Christian sidled up to Jackson. "I'm going back to the bridge, I'll leave you in charge here."

She nodded while entering details of a volunteer Bolian onto a padd but did not speak or look up. Christian caught a snapped conversation to his right - it was Commander Struckchev having a private 'word' with Reb, by the look of things. The Captain considered Struckchev to be the best candidate for Second Officer, despite his remote attitude, but until things settled down, he had decided not to hone down a strict chain of command.

Christian exited the standby shuttle bay and turned toward the turbolift, then changing his mind, deciding he would first pop his head into one of the corridor's briefing rooms to see O'Hara and her group of children and lend his fatherly/Captainly support. As he lifted his head, he saw a small figure at the end of the corridor. The light around it was dim, and he couldn't make out its features, but as it raised its arm toward him, Christian's sixth sense kicked in, throwing him to one side.

The energy blast licked past his left arm, slightly scorching the material of his increasingly damaged jacket and he thudded into the corridor wall. Another blast successively passed his ear, but only close enough to feel hot.

At the sound of the phaser fire, almost in unison Lirik, Struckchev, Jackson and O'Hara had appeared, tentatively peeking out of their respective doorways. Christian could see the figure had already headed off out of site down an access corridor.

"The Bajoran girl," Christian was puffing with excitement and physical exertion nodding toward her last location.

Lirik immediately gave chase, but Christian caught his leg. "Not you, Yeoman," the Captain hauled himself to his feet and pointed toward the shuttle bay. "You have your own responsibilities now." Lirik scowled, but held his tongue. Without further argument, he stormed back into the shuttle bay.

Struckchev and a belated Souveson had instead taken up the pursuit. Shortly they returned, the bitter looking Ensign closing her tricorder. "We lost her, Captain, sorry."

"She obviously sees you as some kind of threat," Jackson commented to Christian.

"Perhaps," the Captain said. "Or maybe I just happened to be the unlucky one who crossed her path." He could hear children playing loudly out of sight behind O'Hara's opened doorway.

Jackson frowned and rubbed her eyes under her spectacles. "Surely sabotaging the ship would benefit her more."

Leonard had appeared in the doorway, behind him the large crowd of volunteers pushing their way forward to see what all the commotion was about. Ambassador Narli chinned his face above someone's shoulder: "Perhaps that is still her intention?"

The Captain nodded. "We're most vulnerable in engineering and command areas," Christian examined the burnt sleeve - his arm smarted around the blast area. "Ensign, the Command Section's main engineering is your main priority. From there I want you to organise guards to all relevant areas. We don't yet have internal sensors, so you'll also need to form search parties. Check with other department heads if you need extra people, but use any of the non-assigned volunteers you want, I want to flush this little bitch out once and for all."

Commander Jackson flinched at his cursory remark, but underneath her maternal instinct, she was just as concerned about the agent's true intentions.

Christian winced slightly from the pain in his arm. "I want each guard posting to arm themselves and stay sharp. Lieutenant O'Hara, finish instructing the kids in basic survival procedure, then place them with the other survivors in the shuttle bay under the care of Mister Lirik. Everyone else, please return to immediate duty."

"Okay, you people who don't have assignments, come with me," Souveson shouted to the majority of helpers.

"I'll get my medkit," the Lieutenant said to Christian, hopping back into her room.

Jackson didn't move as everyone else criss-crossed their way through the corridor, most making their way to the turbolift, or ascending through the jeffreys tube. The Commodore stood in front of Crhsitian. "Lirik may be able to help with the search," she advised him.

He moved his head close to hers, so as not to be overheard by the few remaining in the corridor. "Pardon me, Commodore," the Captain snapped in a hushed but annoyed tone, "but what the hell is this? The bloody Medusan fan club?" He saw Jackson's expression harden. "I don't give a damn what special skills that poor excuse of a man may have, we already agreed Lirik's duties, and in this case his responsibility is the welfare of the survivors. Understood?"

"Loud and clear, Captain Sir," Jackson said sarcastically and joined the departing group in the turbolift bound for the bridge.

Christian glanced around to see if anyone had overheard the exchange and found O'Hara standing in the doorway with her bag, staring at him hard.

"Something to say, Lieutenant?" Christian barked. O'Hara didn't flinch, but merely raised her eyebrows and walked towards him in silence. O'Hara gently eased aside the ripped jacket and undershirt material and activated the skin regenerator. Normally she would have used it with a pain inhibitor, but there was none spare, so she knew there would be brief discomfort.

The Captain didn't want to show her how much it hurt. A few moments later, Christian relaxed, comfortable with her hand gripping his arm firmly. It was nice for someone else to be looking after him for a change, rather than the other way around. In his experience, relationships between a CMO and his/her Captain were always close because of this physical intimacy that regularly came about. Often they would be closer to a commanding officer than an Exec. O'Hara finished her brief treatment and returned to the room of noisy kids without a single word of argument or protest. Christian was impressed at her restraint.

All at once he was left in the corridor alone again and feeling a little exasperated. He took a couple of seconds to shut his eyes and regain some sense of poise. His conscience nagged at him, asking if indeed he was being unfair to Lirik because of what had happened to his parents. He wrestled with the idea, walking quickly to the turbolift door.

Everything about Lirik was beginning to annoy him. His plumpness and his receding hair. His unrefined English accent, that bloody whiter than white turtleneck of the diplomatic corps and his ever-neat appearance. And the over-accentuated efficiency. Even the man's title grated on him: Yeoman. It was a word that up until recently he had associated with a submissive junior NCO, and yet had now been transformed by Lirik into someone of status and power, just outside of his jurisdiction. Before their contact with the Ere, he had even received a verbal affirmation from the Yeoman himself that his orders would be followed in future, but how could the half-Medusan guarantee it? He was a diplomat and used to working alone.

"Bridge," Christian said, then remembered the voice interface of the turbolift car was still faulty. He pressed the correct key and the system gave an acknowledging 'bong'. The Captain reminded himself that in many ways, Yeoman Lirik had been one of the key people to be of assistance so far. Christian ran a hypothetical scenario of the events since the K'Tani attack without Lirik's presence. He realised that without him, they may not have even escaped from Helub, let alone Vekarian territory.

The turbolift car juddered and stopped. Christian glanced around at the flickering lights on the car's wall and ceiling and his mind's eye visualised his position high up a vertical shaft within the ship. He stabbed at the lcars panel, but it wouldn't respond. Abruptly the car began to descend - albeit not out of control. Violently, it halted and proceeded quickly along a horizontal course before slowing to a stop. The doors slid apart to reveal blackness.

Christian looked at the car's blank indicator screen - he had no idea where he could be, but it seemed there was heat, pressure and atmosphere in the dark corridor. The dimmed light of the car spilled out into the immediate space, but there was nothing to indicate location or function, just the standard grey-tan thin carpet of the command yacht section. All he knew was he was below Deck 1 somewhere, probably within the Command Yacht.

Without warning, the car began to vibrate. Fearful that it would shake itself free of the runners and plummet to the bottom of the shaft the Captain jumped out into the corridor, only to find the vibrations were reflected there as well. It appeared the whole ship was encountering some kind of turbulent imbalance. He slapped his commbadge, hoping the network would pick up his signal on this deck, despite the apparent lack of local power. "Captain to Bridge!"

There was no response. Without warning, the turbolift car doors slid shut and Christian was plunged into total darkness. He hit the car call button, but nothing happened. The ship's vibrations jumped to a new level, throwing Christian violently to the floor.

* * *

COMMAND SECTION, MAIN SHUTTLE BAY

Lirik was trying to calm the stumbling, tumbling groups of survivors. They were screaming, crying out, especially the children whom O'Hara had deposited not several minutes earlier.

"Stay calm!" the Yeoman tried in vain to reassure the crowd above the noises of grating metal and thunderous internal engine sounds.

Emergency lighting had kicked in, and the red strips of alert status winked on and off all around. Steadied by his scantly clad muscular Vulcan assistants, Lirik made his way to a wall mounted console to try and contact the bridge, before a final lurch sent everyone flailing across the deck. The ship, it seemed, was now making a violent roll to the right.

* * *

COMMAND SECTION, MAIN ENGINEERING

"What's happening?!" Souveson shouted above the noise to Leonard, who was managing to keep an awkward standing position against the main engine room's diagnostic table, stabbing at the controls whenever he could afford to let go with one hand. People were rolling and falling to Starboard, one came flying down from an overhead walkway and slammed into the deck, and two were propelled out of site over the guide rail around the warp core and into the warp shaft itself with chilling screams as they disappeared below. The Ensign herself was holding onto a support column, embracing it with all her strength.

"I don't know!" the German shouted back. "None of the controls are responding." Several explosions ripped through the machinery around engineering, and he covered his face from the molten sparks.

* * *

COMMAND YACHT, MAIN BRIDGE

Everyone on the bridge was flat on the floor. Jackson could hardly turn her head, such was the feeling of g-force winning over the gravity stabilisers and SIF. Suddenly her head felt light again, the feeling of force gone. Bright lights came on, and the sounds and noises of the bridge seemed louder than ever before. It was suddenly over.

"What the hell is this?" Reb shouted as much in alarm as to be heard by the others. Jackson was helped to her feet by Ganhedra, the Helan leader, and saw that the bridge was fully operational. Where workstations had previously remained blank, now they were full of data and information.

The Romulan Murak, who was on engineering bridge duty, sat to attention at the engineer's station to her right. "All bridge stations are now active. Many systems appear to be coming on line - impulse and warp power, shields, weapons, sensors ... voice interface and computer functions read normal..." his words were spoken with disbelief.

"That's impossible!" Jackson came up behind him, but evidently the amount of console activity buzzing around them could not be ignored.

"Commodore!" Hedrik called from the opposite side of the bridge. She was crouching over an unconscious Commander Struckchev, his temple bruised and bloody.

"Bridge to O'Hara," the Commodore called.

There was no response. "Bridge to Captain!" Still nothing, so she grasped Murak's bony shoulder. "Are you sure communications are functioning?"

Murak nodded his head. "According to the diagnostic they are fully operational."

"Bridge to engineering," Jackson watched Hedrik trying to make Struckchev more comfortable. There was still no response. She turned to Ganhedra who was intently staring at the viewscreen. "Find a medic, I don't care who."

Murak was busy trying to discover the cause of their apparent return to full power. He blurted out some cursory sounding words that were impossible for the Commodore's commbadge to translate.

"What is it?" Jackson demanded.

"I will show you," the Romulan changed the viewscreen's main image to reveal a distant shot of a chunky vessel, the top half black, the bottom half gleaming white. The legend on the rear portion was clear for all to see: SS Fantasy.

"Zoom out," Jackson ordered. One press of the Romulan's slender index finger changed the image view. Beneath the small vessel, the long, easily recognisable image of the SS Fantasy appeared, but with a hole gouged out of the top rear portion. The smaller vessel above it was pulling away.

"It appears that the Command Yacht has been separated from the rest of the ship," Murak looked up at the Commodore, who was looking in disbelief at the viewscreen.

Murak changed the image back to standard viewer ahead. It was clear from the stars tumbling off to the right that the ship was making a hard turn to port.

"We're turning back on our previous heading," Reb said from the Helm. "But I'm not doing it."

Jackson looked around the bridge, seeing Ganhedra gently guide the woman called Veana over to aid Struckchev. "Turn us about. Take us back to the main ship," she said.

Reb's hands flashed across the helm station, but he shook his head. "I'm locked out. No navigational controls are available."

Murak analysed the ship's systems. "Main power is now being generated from Command Yacht engineering on deck 9 - we're being piloted from there," he said. After a few attempts, he said: "I can't override it." He paused. "We're on a direct heading back to Vekaria."

ACT II

COMMAND YACHT, UNKNOWN LOCATION

Even though the Captain's eyes had become accustomed to the dark, he couldn't see a single thing. Before all light faded away, he had noticed only that the corridor was wide, but the darkness that now consumed him hid any signage or equipment that may have indicated exactly where he was.

On this unknown deck, the floor and walls felt dusty, and the air smelled stale and old. If anything, the heat was a little high. Christian attempted to pop the control panel to the turbolift - thinking he would be able to override the door lock-out. Unfortunately, his human nails were too weak to jemmy open this particular panel, bending and almost splitting with the effort. The Captain's eyes were open so wide, his sockets began to ache, his eyelashes felt as if they were pulled right back, but he still couldn't see a thing.

The thought of exploring an unknown ship in the dark didn't thrill him, but neither was he prepared to sit on his hands and remain where he was - especially as he had no clue as to what had caused the ship to rock so violently. He hadn't a clue as to what was taking place elsewhere. Christian pressed himself up against the internal wall and slowly began to feel his way along. He assumed he was progressing in a forward direction, but he couldn't be sure. A sharp ridge of metal pricked the end of his fingers and he recoiled his hand quickly. Crouching low he attempted to continue, but it seemed the entire wall from floor to ceiling was a twisted mess of metal. It reminded him of the same kind of debris on the Captain's deck.

Unexpectedly, there was a sound. Christian looked around in the pitch blackness, but couldn't hear more than his own short breaths and heart beating. He thought it had come from further back down the corridor, beyond the turbolift: a muffled noise like a young deer stomping on dry, hollow earth. His mind immediately returned to the skeleton of the spider he and Souveson had chanced upon. "Where there's one, there's more..." he heard the Ensign's foreboding words echo in his head.

"Keep it cool, Christian," the young man whispered to himself, licking at the trace line of salty sweat above his top lip.

He stepped into the middle of the corridor, and progressed with his arms outstretched, taking small steps - each one made only after his pointed foot had swept a gentle arc for any obstructions. Several metres later, he angled his way back to the wall. It was smooth again, and he could continue on his way. He hoped to reach a jeffreys tube or some device he could use to either signal his shipmates or generate light from.

'Thud-thud-thud-thud'. The muffled heavy footsteps again. 'Definitely not human', Christian told himself. At command school, Christian and the other trainees had been subjected to many bravery tests. In fact, nearly all simulations involved some kind of risk - either to a ship, an alien race, crewmen under their command or to themselves. Their metal was truly tested, and some trainees couldn't handle the pressure - less than half of the original group that had made it through basic training passed out at the end of the course, though many had not been quite ready and were fully expected to return again.

Christian drew on his experiences, remembering the pounding repetition of basic training his tutors had ingrained in him. Putting aside personal risk, he pressed forward with greater urgency, keen to get out of this situation as quickly as possible while hoping that his haste wouldn't be his undoing.

* * *

COMMAND YACHT, MAIN BRIDGE

"Commodore."

Jackson turned toward the voice coming from the rear of the upper bridge. To her surprise, it was Professor Karnak calling to her. "What is it?"

The Commodore turned back to watch Murak's attempts to override engineering control as the slender olive-skinned woman replied out of her view. "Sensors are detecting masses of localised ion radiation in this sector. It is not possible for this vessel to proceed at warp speed for at least two hours."

"Good," Jackson wrung her hands. "That gives us some time to regain control."

"However," the Vulcanised human female kept her tone neutral and steady. "I am also detecting what appears to be a score of ships thirty seven point five minutes away on a direct intercept course."

"K'Tani?" Jackson demanded.

Karnak shook her head. "Unknown at this range and with the amount of ionisation around us."

"Great," Jackson thought aloud, regretting her display of emotion immediately after she had spoken. She wondered if her first time in the command seat would also be her last. "Who was down in the Command Yacht engineering area?"

Murak looked up. "Commander Leonard despatched Miss Warnerburg and Mister Hostas. I believe they were accompanied by one of the Klingons for protection, I'm not sure who."

"It was Kluless," a large voice bellowed from the rear of the bridge. Jackson (surpressing a smile) turned to face Karless, the strongest looking of the three Klingons who had come aboard. He noticed her suppressed amusement. "In our language it is an honourable name," he almost warned her.

"Of course, I'm sorry," she composed herself.

"My other jup was in main engineering back on the Command Section of the ship." The man stepped forward, one gloved hand gripping his belt, the other clenching and releasing restlessly. "Be assured, he would not have allowed a small... girl to get past him." He had bared his crooked teeth on the word 'girl' and finished with the same snarling look.

Jackson scratched her chin with a delicate finger. "That remains to be seen." The man twitched, but did not challenge her words. "Would you lead a team down to engineering to investigate?"

"I require no assistance, I shall proceed alone," the man strode towards the turbolift.

"Hold up, there. I don't want anyone going anywhere on their own," the Commodore awkwardly pushed in front of the huge man.

"But Commodore-" the Klingon began, attempting his most polite tone, but clearly growing impatient. His platitudes were swiftly arrested by the Commodore's upheld hand, once discreet nail varnish now chipped and totally indiscreet - almost akin to a Klingon woman's, the Commodore fleetingly thought.

"I'm in command here, mang," she said firmly, fixing her eyes upon his. "Murak and Reb, go with him, see if you can regain control."

"Oh, joy," the half Ferengi was now thoroughly depressed. His only thought was that if this K'Tani agent had managed to get past a Klingon warrior, a stringy man such as himself would hardly have any hope of protection. Added to that, he had never got on with Klingons (they all hated Ferengi in his experience) and he just plain didn't trust the Romulans.

"On the double," Jackson prompted Reb, who scowled at both his compatriots and noticed Ganhedra nervously slide into his vacated seat as he left. The turbolift doors didn't respond when approached.

"Here we go again," Reb sighed. Looking back at the helm, he watched Ganhedra beckoning over a nearby Helan. The elderly man pulled they young man close to whisper something. The subordinate nodded - or was it a bow - and grabbed two other Helan as he ran forward into the observation lounge.

"Turbolifts are also locked out," Murak said while leaning over the engineering console. He jumped down the few steps leading to the jeffreys tube. Murak's journey was quickly cut short, as he discovered a bulkhead secured inside the shaft, just beneath deck one.

"Somebody doesn't want us to leave this deck," he commented.

"We'll never shift those," Reb advised, peering over Karless's big shoulder into the jeffreys tube below. The Klingon shot him a violent look for standing too close and Reb rapidly stepped away. Being one of the main routes to the Bridge, Reb assumed the doors would be designed as virtually impenetrable once secured - but they clearly hadn't been designed with Klingon brutality in mind. Boldly scoffing at Reb's words of defeat, Karless squeezed past Murak in the tight confines of the shaft, (almost crushing him as he twisted his heavy frame past) and cut through the circuitry and fluid tubes of the door's control mechanism with his d'ktahg. The thick panels were then easily pried apart with the well-used blade.

A minute or so into their descent, Reb stopped. "Wait, something isn't right here," the half-Ferengi felt the walls with his hands.

"What is it?" Murak halted, causing Karless, underneath him, to follow suit and throw his heavy-haired, multi-ridged head back, looking up at his weakling compatriots.

"Why have you stopped?" the Klingon demanded to Reb more than several metres above.

"He's found something," Murak passed the detail on to the large man beneath him. He was careful not to show it, but inside the Romulan lad was deeply fearful of the Klingons. As a young boy, Murak had heard many stories from his grandfather and great uncles about the Klingons' insatiable thirst for blood and victory. Historically, the two races had never been at peace, and Murak's own family had met them face to face in battle on several occasions - all with the same fatal result.

"This is where deck 3 should be," Reb said, trying to see through the wall itself. "There's a deck beyond these walls, I'm sure of it. But I see nothing to indicate an access hatch or doorway."

"You are mistaken, Deck 3 is further down below me," Karless said, reading the signage beside the exit hatch under his feet. "What makes you think there is a deck there?"

Reb looked up to the exit hatch for deck 2 above him, then looked back down. "Actually, I'd estimate there's room for two decks between the jeffreys tube hatches for decks 2 and 3," he saw the Klingon's face becoming impatient. "The echo off the shaft's walls is well pronounced to my ears." He rapped on the shaft. "There's definitely a deck on the other side."

* * *

In the darkness of his solitude, Christian heard a nearby dull thud, like someone knocking on a wall. He moved toward it.

* * *

Reb climbed a few rungs and rapped again. "See? There's definitely a difference." Murak frowned, not hearing the difference, despite his acute Romulan hearing.

* * *

Christian heard the noise again, and moved closer still.

* * *

"Bah!" Karless continued to descend. "We have no time for this, come on."

Murak glanced up at Reb, then followed swiftly behind. The half Ferengi felt along the ribbed walls of the jeffreys tube, he was sure there would be a way through. A 'psst' sound from Murak concluded his investigation for now.

* * *

The noises had stopped. Christian felt the walls for a doorway, but only discovered conduit housings sparsely arranged along the smooth walls.

"Hello..?" he called into the wall, half-heartedly at first. "Hello!" he shouted louder, his voice echoing slightly off the corridor walls around him.

There was no response. At last, a few paces further along the wall, he found a signage plate. Luckily, the writing was in relief and he slowly, carefully traced each of the letters with his fingertips: LIFE SUPPORT SWITCH ROOM BETA FLANK. The last two words made no sense, though he assumed they were a location reference of some kind. Normally they would have displayed a deck and section number respectfully, but neither Beta nor Flank were helpful without a frame of reference.

His fingers found the door beside the sign, but unfortunately it was made of a single plate, its edges buried behind the wall on either side. Strangely, there wasn't even a manual override. There was no way he could get it open.

Thud, thud... thud. The sound again, and it seemed to be following him. His flesh crawled, his imagination creating all sorts of theoretical beasts in his mind. "Shut up!" he told the creature as much as he told himself in order to concentrate on finding light or a way out.

* * *

COMMAND SECTION, ENGINEERING

Souveson's heart was pounding. While all around her main engineering was a hive of activity, she herself was now very much elbowed into the side-lines. She'd determined there was a major problem. The flickering emergency lights and showers of sparks from expelled cables indicated power was clearly fluctuating.

As soon as the ship had stopped its violent roll, the young French Canadian Ensign had helped to extinguish fires and make casualties comfortable. She had then been distracted by a nearby wall display flashing and bleeping loudly, conveying a graphical representation of the Command Yacht detaching from the rest of the vessel. The remaining Command Section on the display was flashing red, indicating a state of emergency, though the forward 'dead-weight' passenger section it was attached to still remained grey and lifeless.

In trying to hail the bridge, she'd discovered comm systems were off-line. She'd also heard someone shout that life support systems were quickly failing. Now, the ship was gently rocking from time to time, as if adrift. Leonard had managed to use thrusters to stabilise their trajectory and slow the ship, but not completely.

Two engineering volunteers had been carried away to the beauty spa come sick bay, both unconscious, and another four were screaming with pain from a variety of broken bones and lacerations. Wheezy the Jetraleker had arrived to sort them out. Leonard had despatched a team of three Helan along with Lieutenant O'Hara to the lower decks to try and find the two casualties who had fallen down the warp shaft - one could still be heard crying out from far below.

Out of the corner of her eye, Souveson caught a glimmer, like sunlight reflecting off sheer satin. It was Lirik.

"Where are your charges?" the Ensign asked curtly.

The Yeoman, who was surveying the general melee turned and quickly glowered at her. "They are safe in the medical area," he snapped, then added almost as an afterthought: "And drop the attitude, Ensign, we have a critical emergency in progress in case you didn't notice. Commander," he strode towards the warp pit where coolant and an unknown inert gas were beginning to billow from beneath, clouding their view.

The Ensign trotted to catch up, eager to not be kept out of the picture. As they both reached the rail surrounding the warp shaft, Leonard emerged as if an ancient Arian blacksmith from the ether of a magical forge, standing on the narrow grille of the pit that surrounded half the core. The German had now ditched his jacket revealing his dirty vest, his strong pecs and muscles sucking the material close to his body with sweat, neat curls of blond nesting out from under the straining seams.

"The Command Yacht has gone," the Ensign quickly informed him.

"Obviously," Lirik scoffed.

"We have got a major problem," Leonard tried to be heard above the increasing hissing sounds. "Warp and impulse engines have both taken a pounding. Neither system had been safely isolated before separation took place, so the Command Yacht essentially ripped itself free. There must have been a massive, uncontrollable feedback through the Command Section's interconnecting power junctions - it's blown main power and ruptured plasma conduits on deck 8 and eps taps throughout the ship. Worse than that, the feedback came as far as the reaction control assembly and caused the dilithium crystals to be superconducted. They are practically burnt out - I don't think they'll last more than 30 minutes, maximum and now re-crystalisation isn't possible in their fragile state. We were lucky the injection valves shut off or the whole core would have gone into meltdown." In between swirls of mist, Lirik caught a glimpse of the charred and damaged core and surrounding shaft.

"Lucky...?" Souveson didn't think the word applied.

Leonard ignored the youth. "I recommend we switch to generators and initiate low energy consumption protocols effective immediately, try to conserve as much power as we can."

"Can't we switch over to the emergency warp system, or use its crystals?" Lirik nodded over to the emergency unit at the back of engineering. It was partly in order to not look at Leonard. They had got off to a very bad start back on Helub - but since he'd known the German, he'd come to like him more, and his awkward, unorthodox and often annoying manner was belied by his exceptionally handsome appearance. It was becoming quite disarming.

"The EWS is almost impenetrable for security and safety reasons - it has to contain a small matter-anti-matter reaction core and the whole associated plant in one sealed unit. There just hasn't been enough time to look into how to safely open it since it was last used," the Commander explained. "Besides, as it's only designed for short bursts of warp speed, the components would fall short of being suitable replacements for main engineering systems, including the dilithium," he scratched his left pec and saw Lirik and Souveson looked blank. "It wouldn't suffice."

Lirik nodded. "How do you wish to proceed then?"

The Lieutenant Commander swept his hair back across his head with his big left hand and adjusted his glasses, casting a disturbed look down into the shaft. The casualty's cries were growing weaker.

"As you know the generators have been in use already for over five years, at least as long as the Helan have been on board. Consequently we only have several hours of generator power in which to make repairs, and even then I can't guarantee success. The reaction chamber was stressed beyond safety parameters when the crystals were superconducted, so it's a lot more fragile than it was before. I should be able to shore it up, but even then re-initialising the core won't be possible until we can find suitable replacement crystals." The German snapped his fingers, "Although we could use the ones from the Hudson as a stop gap."

Lirik raised an eyebrow at this, but he realised there was no current alternative. "One of the Vulcans is guarding her, he can help me remove the crystals. Switch to generator power, then, and make best your attempts to repair the core."

Souveson puffed her cheeks and shook her head. Lirik decided not to challenge her, though both men had clearly understood her apparent inexperienced misgivings. Leonard acknowledged Lirik with a nod and returned beneath the fog.

"Ensign," Lirik turned to the smaller woman, who, he noticed, tensed as he spoke. "As we are, this vessel is not secure. I need you to establish whether or not the K'Tani agent is still on board. Even if she isn't, she may have left boobitraps or sabotaged critical systems."

"But surely she was the one who took the command yacht?" Souveson frowned, sure of her reasoning.

"Possibly," Lirik wondered if the Canadian was up to the position Christian had given her. "Nevertheless, we can't be certain, can we? I want you to make a deck by deck search, leave no stone unturned."

The Ensign's mouth dropped. "There's hardly anyone available," she said looking around at the volunteer engineers. "It could take days."

Lirik carried on. "So go to the beauty spa. Conscript anyone you like - tell them it's Captain's orders. Tell them their lives depend on it. I don't care what, but just get them to help. "

Souveson shook her head, though was careful not to directly refuse. "Unarmed?"

The Yeoman placed a hand on his hip. "What do you want, Ensign? I should go and replicate you some phasers? Er, sorry! No can do. Arm them with sticks if you have to."

Licking her lips, the Ensign still felt daunted. "Wouldn't it be easier to just take the runabout, go after the Command Yacht instead?"

Lirik was growing infuriated by the Ensign, but his initial instinct had been the same. With no other source of dilithium resource available, though, the runabout's crystals would now have to be used.

"No, the safety of this ship and its people are more important. The Captain and Commodore are aboard the Command Yacht amongst others - I'm sure they will do everything they can to return to us. But in case they can't, we have to make the assumption that we're left to fend for ourselves."

The Ensign's face visibly dropped, belying her restraint once more. "What if the Commander can't repair the core? We're dead in the water, aren't we?"

Lirik touched his top lip with his tongue, thinking of an appropriate reply. His pause said enough. "If we don't find an alternate means of power, things could get a little static, yes."

As if heralding what was to come, the lights in engineering dimmed and died, as did all computer and mechanical noises. Lirik and Souveson observed the almost complete silence in the dark as Leonard initiated the switch over to generator power. A heartbeat later, the sounds began again, and the light gently warmed to a full brightness. Many consoles, until now either redundant or frozen in one mode came to life all around them. The computer voiced an automatic checklist.

"What's going on?" Souveson asked Leonard who was leaning over the diagnostic table and dripping beads of sweat onto the glass surface.

"It seems that when I activated the generators, we regained access to key systems previously unavailable. They're not on-line yet, but I could probably get them that way."

"How did that happen?" Lirik thought aloud.

"I can't say for sure. Hedrik had been working on command functions in the computer core. I imagine that the generators have initiated independent regulation protocols - perhaps back-up systems that were previously dormant are now fully active," the Commander seemed as confused as he sounded.

"We've seen evidence of the duplicate and triplicate back-up systems on board already," Leonard tapped on the main computer interface panel. "The computer core seems to be co-ordinating management of the systems perfectly well, despite the fact it is running on only 55% capability," the blonde German half-laughed, pushing the glasses up his nose. "There's potential to increase to 100%, even without many of the control chips in place," he laughed quietly - obviously an engineering irony, Lirik though. "In many ways we're better off than we were before."

"I doubt that, Sir," Souveson said under her breath.

"But we still don't have drive systems, do we?" the girl called Vostaline stepped up to the table out of the shadows.

Following his conversation in the runabout Hudson with Souveson, Christian and Jackson, Lirik had become increasingly intrigued by their Helan fellow travellers. As she stood directly opposite him in the bright light, he was briefly distracted by the intricate designs applied to the clothes she wore. Even though the overall garment was understated, the detail and craftsmanship of the beaded patterns were obviously very high. He wondered why such skill would be afforded upon such a simple dress, wondering if she had either 'inherited' it in some way, or someone had gone to the painstaking effort of making it just so for her.

"No, that's still a physical problem we have to resolve," Leonard smiled warmly - the German liked the younger girl and her polite but forthright manner, and it showed to Lirik.

Lirik cleared his throat authoritatively. "Okay, Ensign, organise your security cover as we discussed. Mister Leonard, I'll go get your crystals. Once the core is repaired, see if you can bring internal systems fully on line, I want to know the extent of our computer access and the systems available. Sensors would be good. Weapons and shields, as well, just in case the Captain and the others don't make it back," the Yeoman disappeared into the corridor with Souveson, casting a final glance back. He locked eyes with Vostaline who was intently watching them go - she looked like she had made an important decision by the look on her face, he thought.

Alone with Leonard, Vostaline looked over the Commander's smooth, naked shoulder as he patched into the mainframe and called up the available diagnostics programmes. Behind him, she turned away, glancing up and around - looking through the deck above as if suddenly distracted by something beyond calling to her.

* * *

COMMAND YACHT, UNKNOWN LOCATION

Christian was sweating profusely. He had discovered an open doorway on the opposite wall and stepped slowly over the threshold. He clapped his hands, deducing that the light but fairly long echo indicated a large, mostly unfurnished room. He still wasn't sure where he was exactly; sweeping his arms and hands around he found no wall mounted devices or equipment of any kind.

As the Captain traced along the blank, inside wall to the immediate left of the door, he quickly hit a corner and proceeded along the second wall, perpendicular to the last. Eleven paces later he reached another corner. As he turned on this one, presumably opposite to the entrance, the wall disappeared and he almost lost his balance. His foot found that the wall was still there, but only up to knee height. Reaching down he followed the metal surface over the smooth corner beside his knee onto a horizontal ledge. Abruptly, the metal gave way to something that felt a good deal colder.

This smooth surface arced up and slightly away from him for about a metre and a half, and then graduated back in toward the ceiling. It ended just above his head with the warmer-feeling surface again. He reached out from side to side - fingertips finding struts at regular intervals, about a metre and a half apart.

"Windows," he mused out loud. He guessed that either some kind of shutter or the black substance on the rest of the ship could be covering the windows, blocking out the starlight.

Then, although he didn't hear a noise, he instinctively turned, sensing a presence in the room. His heart beat faster, for in the darkness, he believed he could see two very faint points of illumination in the doorway. He peered hard into the darkness, his head instinctively inching forward to see what they were more clearly. A shiver ran down his spine - it dawned on him that they were positioned almost like tiny, round eyes. They were level with his waist - about the same height as the dead spider he'd seen.

Christian swallowed, ordering himself to remain calm. Slowly, quietly, he inched away, concentrating on not making a loud sound or a sudden move. Fear began to take hold when he discovered no alternate exit from the room. In the farthest corner from the door, he decided to remain where he was, hoping that the creature would walk away. He clambered onto the low ledge and pushed as far back as he could into the space between the cold window and the corner wall. As he looked over again, he saw the distant faint eyes still staring intently at him...and they looked as if they had moved a little closer.

* * *

COMMAND YACHT, ENGINEERING

Karless peered around the corner toward the entrance to engineering. All seemed remarkably quiet and undisturbed, but there was no sign of Kluless - who should have been on guard in the corridor outside.

The warrior stepped forward and Murak followed closely. Reb felt quite scared, and couldn't help looking around all the time - determined that he wouldn't be taken from behind while bringing up the cowardly rear. The three halted just outside the shiny black room, gaining a clear view inside through the open doors.

"No-one's there," Reb pointed out the obvious in a loud whisper. Cautiously, Karless edged into the doorway and peered inside. To his right, he glimpsed the bulkhead that had exploded and killed the merchant a fortnight ago, now taped off with yellow/black hazard strips. He wondered if the enemy were crouched behind one of the console units or support struts.

Before he could proceed with an appropriate strategy and to the Klingon's surprise, Murak broke formation, pushing past him, and made his way swiftly into the centre of the room, stopping at the master control board. Karless thought he was either totally brave or totally stupid, but no attack came.

Murak tried several consoles in rapid succession, but each bleated negatively. "I still can't gain access to controls. There's some kind of complex security authorisation code in place. It's adaptive."

Karless moved beside him, trying to understand the garbled codes flashing across the screens while Reb hung back, stopping to peer into the gaping, damaged wall.

"Can you break the code?" the Klingon demanded.

Murak shook his head, though continued to try and gain access via the myriad newly available computer systems that were now on line. "I may be able to gain access to related systems, but navigation and drive controls are sealed tight."

Karless seemed frustrated by this news, and approached the doors leading into the warp core area beyond, deciding upon a more direct, hands-on solution to the problem. They didn't open for him.

"Perhaps the K'Tani agent is on the other side?" Murak wondered.

"You!" Karless shouted to Reb, who physically jumped. "Assist me!"

Reb swallowed hard and joined the strong smelling Klingon beside the door. Despite having accessed the override controls, they refused to budge. Karless applied his trusty blade, but this time the mechanism refused to give way.

"We need to find another way in," the Klingon said, sounding almost logical. "One of those Jefferson Tubes."

"Jeffreys Tubes," Reb corrected him, then wished he hadn't.

Karless looked over at the charred wall and noticed that its spliced innards revealed the impossibly narrow and damaged remains of a horizontal crawlway running along the edge of the room toward the warp core. Reb followed his gaze, then noticed the large man was looking down at him, just one tooth pushing out from between his lips in a slight smirk. He realised what Karless intended.

"Oh, no," he began to protest. "No way."

The Klingon began a low snarl.

"You are smaller than either of us," Murak pointed out logically.

* * *

COMMAND SECTION, ENGINEERING

Lirik hovered beside the warp pit, watching Leonard prepare to install the runabout's crystals into the chamber housing. The German seemed to be having a difficult time with the damaged articulation frame.

He also realised there were no more sounds coming from the warp shaft, the casualty presumably having fallen unconscious - O'Hara's party would be there any minute now. The Yeoman glanced over at Vostaline who Leonard had left at the diagnostic table to see what systems had come one line as per Lirik's request. For a people that had lived off generator power, oblivious to the ship's warp capability and computerised potential, Lirik thought, she was showing remarkable adaptive skills at using Federation standard controls.

Ensign Souveson rushed into Engineering with a flurry. "Sir," she approached Lirik almost with respect. "This isn't going to work. I only managed to persuade thirteen people to help and there are just too many places someone could hide. We're finding many storage crates, anti-rooms and what even look like covert storage spaces. Some rooms are sealed off, and some areas of the command section are just too inhospitable to search."

"Maybe I'm going about this the wrong way," Lirik thought aloud. "Commander, do we have internal sensors yet?"

The German didn't answer, he was busy concentrating, straining with the relatively small and delicate dilithium chamber.

"Commander?" Lirik leant over the rail.

"Grrr!" the German was frustrated, trying to get something to lock into place, the muscles on his arms flexed control into his long fingers, their tips attempting to shift misaligned rods into place. Instead of clicking home, though, the device unexpectedly snapped, and the dilithium crystals fountained up into the air and scattered onto the grille on which he stood, falling through the relatively wide spaces in the grate and down into the deep warp pit below.

The sound caused everyone in engineering to turn and stare. Some gathered around the rail, hearing the crystals tinkle into the distance as they fell from the pit down into the shaft below.

Lirik and Souveson were stunned into silence. After a brief second of numb disbelief, Leonard cried out and smacked the already damaged walls of the pit. "Shit! Shitshitshit..." he screamed, then shook his head angrily. He looked straight up, hands on hips, wondering why everything seemed to be going wrong. "Mein Gott--!"

"Whoahwhoahwhaoh!" Lirik pushed his palms toward the Commander, uncontrolled rage and self pity wasn't going to help any.

"Who would have built such a ridiculous platform!" he cursed at the grate he stood on and kicked the shaft wall.

"What's done is done," Lirik reassured. "We can find them again with tricorders."

Leonard picked up the pieces of the housing case seal and articulation frame that had snapped clean off and shattered respectively, and he shook his head with doom.

"The crystals are no longer the problem. There's no way I'm going to be able to fix this in time. This damned ship!" he continued to curse under his breath.

Souveson swallowed a lump of fear. "Can't we repair the impulse engines instead?" she asked.

"They've been too badly damaged," Leonard hung his head. "The warp engine was our only hope."

The Ensign stared at Leonard, who didn't seem to have a plan. Lirik it seemed was deep in thought.

"What are we going to do now?" she managed to say, wondering how a senior ranking engineer could have been so stupid and clumsy.

"Commander, the computer," Lirik softly spoke, "do we have internal systems on line?"

The German grunted, scanning the grill in vain for any of the lost crystals. "I've not had a chance to personally check, but from what Vostaline says we have regained most internal controls - well, only for whatever still works on this bucket of bolts."

The group quickly marched over to where Vostaline was slowly, methodically checking systems, apparently unconcerned with the current drama. "We may have more apparent computer access," she informed them, "but with only generator power, many are still off line."

Lirik's hands flashed across the diagnostics table. "Let's see: communications, gravity and life support, turbolifts, ah..." he quickly interfaced with the ship's schematics, "...library files." Several bleeps later, he called up a series of deck plans. Simultaneously, Souveson took up a position opposite, next to Vostaline, and patched into the security system.

"I have internal sensors. I even have some images." She scrolled through various shots of empty corridors and darkened rooms on a small display screen. "There are quite a few sections devoid of power, a few others we're still blind to," she looked up at Lirik.

Lirik finished his quickly typed commands with a flourish of a finger and a 3D image of the SS Fantasy (in its entirety and its original gleaming white livery) materialised above the diagnostic table. A small crowd of volunteers and intrigued survivors 'oohd' and gathered around the perimeter, all eyes focussed on the holo image and whispering comments to each other.

Pressing a single command Lirik split the ship into its three main sections, eliminating the command yacht that had now gone. Entering another command and he stripped the outer 'skin' of the rest of the ship, revealing the detailed interior of each deck. Two more commands and the decks began to break apart vertically, spacing out so that they could all see original rooms, dividing walls, conduits and furniture.

"According to the file, this image is about two overhauls out of date," Lirik said. "But it's still basically the same ship."

Souveson networked into Lirik's active program, and green dots began to flash all over the occupied decks.

"I've overlaid life signs into this programme," she said proudly. Her pride was short-lived as two obvious blips were flashing red at the bottom of the warp core.

"The people who fell..." Vostaline murmured. "Are they still alive?"

Lirik honed the scanners on the relevant blips and immediately saw that the readings showed no signs of life. "No," he said quietly, and a couple of sharp intakes of breath followed by sobbing erupted in the background somewhere.

The Yeoman could see on the holo image that O'Hara's search party were not far away from their objective - just two decks above them, apparently trying to find a way in to the shaft. "Do we have transporters?" he asked generally.

Leonard scanned the systems, not seeing Vostaline shaking her head beside him. "No, that technology was stripped out from what we've already seen."

Lirik located the intercom panel - now active - and entered the relevant corridor designation. "Engineering to Lieutenant O'Hara. According to internal sensors our casualties are two decks below your current position. We aren't getting any life signs here, but the system could be malfunctioning. Please acknowledge."

Twenty seconds later, the Helan named Fraxon located an intercom panel on the wall. "Acknowledged," came the voice over the engineering speakers.

"Ensign," Lirik turned to see the Canadian was flushed, upset at the death of yet two more innocent civilians. He thought she was additionally uneasy surrounded by so many worried and sad faces. "You can use this interface to search the ship. You might even be able to erect low level force fields around key areas. Use it to monitor systems as well, I'm going to leave you in charge until we get back." Her jaw dropped at this, and even Leonard's attention was gripped.

"In charge?" she said, not understanding.

"I'm senior officer here," Leonard said defensively. "Who ever said you were in command?"

A couple of people in the crowd tutted their disapproval at the untimely power struggle taking place.

"Where are you planning on going?" a human teenage girl chipped in, hoping to break up any argument before it started.

"The passenger section," Lirik announced. He tapped the console and revealed on every other deck of the holo image the rectangular positions representing the bulkheads between the two sections of the ship.

"We don't know what state the passenger section is in, we could be wasting both valuable power and time," the Commander objected rudely.

Lirik's mouth dropped open in mock-disbelief. "You know, I should really put you together with Rebbik. You'd get along so well."

"O'Hara to Engineering," the Lieutenant's voice sang out through the overhead speakers, cutting off Leonard's returning line. "I'm sorry, but your two people didn't make it."

There was a low moan of affirmed disappointment. The Lieutenant asked further: "Do we have all main systems back on line?"

"Not all, Nurse," Souveson answered. "And those that we do are only temporary. We're running on generators that will only last about another two hours so we're trying to find an alternative means of power."

"Thank you, Ensign." At the bottom of the blood-spattered warp shaft, balancing on the antimatter injector plant, O'Hara closed her eyes and counted to ten at the 'nurse' comment. "May I request that we send a search party into the passenger section, I need to know if there is a medical bay there."

Lirik glanced up at a glowering Leonard and tapped out a search. In the centre of deck 6 on the holographic image, the relevant medical facility flashed an olive green - it was some one hundred and twenty metres forward of the dividing plane.

Leonard's heart was beating fast, realising the potential of the library interface and conducted his own search. A large engineering area on Deck 20 began to flash amid the holo image. "Engineering..." he said, beginning to see the sense in what Lirik suggested.

The Yeoman licked his lips excitedly. "Lieutenant, are you free to accompany us?"

"Are you kidding?" her voice came across the speakers, causing a few to smile and the tension of the group surrounding the diagnostic table to relax. "I'm on my way," she said. From her own personal point of view it was the best news the Lieutenant had heard all day. She was growing tired of having to use sub-standard equipment to keep people alive, and still held out some hope that there may be vital medicines and life saving equipment in the passenger section.

Lirik faced Leonard, not speaking, but nodding an indication that he had control. The German picked up the discarded command baton and ran with it awkwardly.

"Okay, we'll split up into two teams, one will proceed to engineering, the other to the medical facility," he almost smiled at the Yeoman. "That sound okay to you?"

The half Medusan grinned.

* * *

COMMAND YACHT, BRIDGE

Commodore Jackson paced the bridge. Several computer trills, out of sequence, seemed to herald an invisible change in status. The turbolift to her left suddenly opened and Narli, along with three Helan, stepped out, catching their breath and wafting their shirts to try and cool down.

"Ambassador!" she said in surprise.

"We were sealed in the turbolift, didn't you hear our cries for help?" the big blue man snapped.

"No," Jackson sighed.

"What in Andoriban's name happened to us?" the Ambassador felt the bump on his thigh from the violent ship movements earlier. Jackson filled the Andorian in on the current situation. As she finished, the turbolift doors opened again. Murak stepped out.

"Commodore, engineering was unoccupied," he walked over to the engineering station and tapped out a combination of commands. "We have been unsuccessful in our initial attempt at regaining navigational control. An adaptive command code is locking us out of all drive systems, but others have somehow come back on line. Karless advised me not to use the comm system in case it was monitored. As you can see, Turbolifts are also back on line."

Jackson leaned on the back of his chair. "Where are your two compatriots now?"

Murak raised an eyebrow - he hadn't considered either man to fall in that category yet. "Karless and Reb are attempting to break into the engineering plant. From there we might be able to regain control manually," he remembered Reb's pained expression as he squeezed into the tight conduit, barely wide enough for humanoid access. "If we can't regain control that way, our only alternative will be to destroy the engines."

"That won't help us much," Jackson objected. "Professor, any further detail on those ships?"

Karnak haughtily turned to her consoles. "I am now able to generate a visual," she announced.

All faces turned to the main viewscreen that switched to from the starscape to a sea of static. Gradually, as Karnak manipulated long range sensors, the haze cleared to reveal three groups of four ships, each in diamond formation, flying at impulse toward their position. There was no doubt in anyone's mind, they were a mixture of the same type of K'Tani ships that had attacked Helub - each wing comprising a troop carrier flanked by three fighters. "At present speed they will intercept us in twenty five minutes."

"So, at least we know that like us they can't travel faster than maximum impulse amid all this ionisation," Jackson summised. She turned to the Romulan. "If we manage to shut down power, how much time would that buy us?"

"Ten, perhaps fifteen minutes," Murak suggested vaguely, much to the Professor's annoyance.

"And how quickly could we get underway again?" the Commodore placed a hand on hip, the other fiddled nervously with her chin and lips.

Murak thought for a moment. "It depends - if we are prudent in how we disable the engines, then possibly only a few minutes. But there is no guarantee we would retake computer control when we power up again. We could find ourselves facing the exact same situation."

"Sounds to me like regaining computer control is the best solution," Narli commented, casting a sideways glance around for Hedrik, but she was no-where in sight, presumably she was still with the Commander.

"That is not a wise course to pursue," Professor Karnak objected, standing from her work on analysing the code. "The Command Code lock-out in place is highly complex and virtually unbreakable."

"Nevertheless," Jackson said. "We don't have another choice. We might be able to circumvent the code and regain control another way," Jackson stepped up to the Captain's chair.

The Professor came closer to her, leaning over the tactical rail. "That is a preposterous suggestion, Commodore. There is no way that you could-"

"Thank you, Professor," Jackson held up a halting hand. "But this isn't an academic debate." She paused - enough for Karnak to back down. "Murak, I want you to return to engineering. Keep on trying to regain manual control, but think of a way in which we could stop the ship with the minimum of damage, just in case. In the meantime we will attempt to find a software solution to the problem." She checked the time display on a nearby console. "You'll only have about twenty minutes to prepare, so get moving. Good luck." Murak nodded and disappeared into the turbolift. "Professor, Ambassador, I want you to try and regain computer control."

"Commodore, I must insist! What you suggest is an impossible task," Karnak whined.

"Miss Hedrik may be able to help," Narli said, much to the Professor's annoyance.

"Of course," Jackson said, moving around to tactical. "I'm going to see what shape our shields are in."

The move displayed much bravado, as the Commodore hadn't been near a tactical console since her command training days. She had been graded high at rapid lcars commands, having had the fastest trigger finger in her group. She only hoped that this display of dexterity would help cover up her unpracticed tactical knowledge.

Act III

COMMAND YACHT, ENGINEERING AREA

Reb shook with trepidation, pressing his face against the mesh at the end of the crawlway, trying to see through into the space beyond. His hands, face and clothes were all smudged with black soot from the charred insides of the narrow tube as he'd inched his way toward the warp core anti-room. He'd scraped his arms and legs while squeezing past the broken shards of plastic and metal, and each scratch felt sore.

The half Ferengi sniffed at the air. Laying in the crawlway, he could see from the floor level position the wild lighting effect of the warp core bouncing pink and purple colours off the deck and the surfaces of the surrounding atrium. In fact, this engineering space was a lot larger than its adjacent shiny black control room, and he wondered if it had been designed that way so that only the sleek, ultra-modern room would be on display to any fare-paying passengers who had taken a tour of the command yacht.

The core was several metres away, pulsating in the centre of the room. On the other side of the wide vertical tube, he could make out what looked like the missing crew. A naked, slightly wrinkled arm, human, lay upturned to the left of the core, and sticking out from the right were the legs of a Klingon, wearing the distinctive pointed iron boots - the rest of each body and the third crewman were presumably obscured by the core itself.

Without warning, a face suddenly materialised in front of the grille, only inches away from his own. "Peekaboo!" it chirped.

"Yeaagh!!" Reb couldn't help but cry out with surprise and fear and bumped his head hard on a crawlway support strut.

The face of the Bajoran girl on the other side of the mesh merely smiled and giggled. "Have you come looking for your friends?" she asked and gently released the panel. Reb realised he was as good as trapped, but still tried desperately to shuffle back away from her. The girl was quicker and reached into the crawlway, gripping his collar with alarming strength and hauling him out onto the floor of the warp room. She stood to her full metre and a bit height, slamming the grille closed with her foot.

"They didn't want to play with me," she snivelled, looking over to her right. Reb propped himself up on his elbows and followed her gaze. Behind the core he now saw all three crewman, either unconscious or dead - there was no blood or signs of obvious injury. "Do you want to play with me?" She smiled drawing closer to him.

Reb formed a fist and lashed out with all his might. His hand smacked clean across her hard face, bruising his knuckles. The girl only slightly turned her head, a lock of hair falling over her eyes that were now fixed upon him in a menacing stare, her perfect teeth slightly bared. She was a freak, he decided, not at all like a little girl. Her face in the light of the warp core seemed false - gnarled at the edges. Suddenly she whirled around, as if aware of something behind her. A second later, the computer chirped a warning. The little girl skipped over to the console, with her back to Reb, completely unperturbed by his attack.

The half-Ferengi desperately looked around for either a way of escape or a weapon of some kind. He noticed that the door leading to Karless and Murak was only a couple of metres away. If he could just get there and release the lock, the Klingon could enter and take care of the rest.

"They are trying to regain computer control," the girl commented to no one in particular, then whipped her head around to face Reb. "Computer!" she shouted, staring right into his eyes as if reading his thoughts. "Maximum impulse, go beyond all safety limits," she smiled that sickly sweet smile of a dumb little girl again. "Authowisation code Epsilon Five Nine Eight Six." The computer trilled and Reb felt a brief shudder through the deck as the engines complied.

* * *

COMMAND YACHT, UNKNOWN LOCATION

Christian felt the ship shake itself to a greater speed - his instincts told him as much, but he couldn't figure out why that would be the case. Perhaps they were being pursued by K'Tani, he wondered. The eyes staring at him hadn't moved for a while. Christian toyed with the idea of making a break for it, but something stopped him from moving, suspending the action until he felt ready.

* * *

COMMAND YACHT, BRIDGE

"What was that?" Jackson asked. The ship was still vibrating slightly.

"The Command Yacht has increased speed," Ganhedra called solemnly from the helm. "According to the information displayed here, impulse engines have gone beyond recommended safety parameters."

As if to signify this, a singular circuit blew high in the ceiling of the bridge, sending a short shower of sparks to the deck.

* * *

COMMAND YACHT, WARP CORE, ENGINEERING

"Who are you? Why are you doing this?" Reb asked pathetically. It was the first thing he could think of, desperate to divert her attention from beating him up.

Unfortunately, she leaped over to him in a single bound - an impossible movement for any Bajoran, no matter how young and fit. As she stared into his face with large, perfect blue, round eyes, he knew then that she was far beyond anything humanoid.

"It speeeaks!" she shrieked with delight and squeezed his cheeks with both hands, pushing his lips together in a vertical pout. Her hands felt cold and totally hard, not like flesh and bone at all. "Say something else!" she demanded.

"I shed, why are ooh doing dish?" he forced out. She threw his head back, almost breaking his jaw with the flick of her wrists.

"I didn't say repeat yourself!" she screamed, and looked as if about to cry. Reb just stared at her in terror and disbelief, and seeing this she managed to sniff herself quickly into composure. She half smiled at him - almost wanting him to not be afraid of her, Reb thought.

"What is your name?" Reb decided on a different approach. The girl hesitated, flicking her hair back.

"Pim," she replied efficiently.

"Pim...?" he pressed.

She shook her head, smoothing the material of her tunic. "Just Pim, that's all."

"Were is home, Pim? Are you K'Tani?" Reb managed a few bum wriggles backwards in order to get closer to the door while she stood and walked away from him, preening herself. By her previous actions, Reb realised that she was both fast and strong, and he was neither, but perhaps by stealth he could let Karless in before she could stop him.

"No, no, no!" she giggled. "I'm not anything like them, or you, or anyone else on board. I am a... singular sensation!" she giggled again.

"Are you a changeling?" Reb forced out.

She cast a sideways glare at him, frowning, then burst out laughing. Reb used the opportunity to sidle even further towards the door. Eventually, she calmed down enough to speak.

"Nothing quite as fragile as that," she said cryptically. The computer trilled again, causing her to rush back over to the terminal. "Those nasty little...," she said and promptly rippled away into thin air.

Reb glanced from left to right - she had vanished. He wasn't sure, but seeing it for a second time, he thought it had looked like a cloaking effect. Regardless, something illogical in his head told him that if he couldn't see her, then she wasn't there. He leapt to his feet and launched his hand toward the release panel of the door.

Instead of connecting with the console, however, he connected with a shield. The energy setting was such that it gripped his entire body, launching him into the air backwards, and crashing him violently into the deck unconscious.

* * *

COMMAND YACHT, BRIDGE

Hedrik laughed. "I don't believe it," she said, cutting through the atmosphere.

"What have you found?" Jackson walked over to the bosomy Orion who was using the Operations console as an interface to the computer.

"I was seeing if there might be a back door way of shutting down power to the engines without causing any damage. Look at these power distribution levels along the secondary and tertiary plasma funnels," she pointed at the gobbledegook that was the engineering read-out.

All Jackson could see was a streaming list of circuit references and corresponding output levels. The columns flashed ten sets of figures for each row, and each number was rapidly fluctuating by the half-second, changing between mauve and orange depending upon whether it was an increase or decrease. Professor Karnak joined the Commodore.

"The output is unusually high for secondary and tertiary level power supply," the Professor summised. "What could be draining that much power?"

Narli sat at the engineering console. "The engineering diagnostics says that all levels are functioning normally within those systems. Engines and other main systems are unaffected by the power drain, despite our increased speed."

"Where is all that energy being focussed, then?" the Commodore asked. "And why does the computer think it's normal?"

Narli shook his head. "I can't access the mainframe. My station is being locked out."

"It's happening to me too," Hedrik said. Quickly, her delicate green hands flashed over her console. She dumped the current application and set up an isolated link to a random circuit location. The readout flashed up for several seconds before disappearing along with life from all other bridge stations.

"Too late!" a little girl's voice rang out over the ship-wide intercom.

"Did you see that?" Hedrik asked.

"Who is this?" Commodore Jackson demanded. There was no reply. "Computer, where did that last signal originate?"

"Unable to comply, that function is restricted access only," came the calm maternal voice.

"Computer, re-initialise bridge workstations," Narli requested.

"Unable to comply, that function is restricted access only," the voice repeated.

"Commodore-" Hedrik began.

"Not now," Jackson turned toward the others. "Time to alien ships?"

The Professor walked calmly back to her station. "Seventeen minutes, fifteen seconds," she stated.

"Bridge to Murak," Jackson shouted. There was no reply. "Hell!" she cried, and smacked the tactical rail behind the command chairs. She swallowed hard, deciding what to do next.

"Commodore, please," Hedrik pressed.

"What is it?" Jackson snapped, annoyed that her train of thought was being interrupted.

"The circuit power outage readings, they looked the same as holographic projection rates," the Orion woman said.

"What does that mean?" Jackson didn't quite understand.

The Professor walked down to the engineering workstation, leaning over Narli's shoulder. "I have a theory. It may be that the holographic systems are being used as a bridge to previously inoperative machinery."

Suddenly, the bridge around them rippled, consoles dying once more. In seconds, the bridge was as it originally had been before departing the main section.

The Commodore couldn't be certain which was real - the broken bridge or the fully powered one. In her mind there was only one course of action.

"We're out of time," she turned to her two female compatriots. "Miss Hedrik, Professor: I want you to round up the survivors and make your way to escape pods. Standby to eject, but not until we bring her to a complete stop."

"Stop?" Narli quizzed her.

"You and me are going to help Murak to stop this ship once and for all," she said, and boldly headed toward the Jeffreys tube - secretly hoping that she wasn't making a big mistake at calling for such drastic measures.

* * *

COMMAND SECTION, SEPARATION PASSAGE

"Now opening the bulkhead," Souveson's voice rippled across the poorly lit deck and simultaneously into the helmet speakers of the assembled, suited-up search parties.

As the bulkhead ahead of them opened a fraction, air hissed into the dark space beyond. The girl who had introduced herself as 'Penge the Philosophy Student' gasped, wondering if there was vacuum beyond, but the more experienced space travellers knew that the suction would have been more powerful if there was. The rectangular bulkhead in front rumbled upwards and the group of twelve suited volunteers stood their ground, ready for anything.

As the dim light from their own section spilled into the no-man's land space beyond, they saw a wide, high ceilinged transit corridor, about four metres long on the other side of the doorway. A second thick bulkhead door, narrower at the top than at the bottom, lay across the end, a tiny red light winking on and off beside it at hand height.

Lirik, standing apart from the rest of the group so as not to allow his Medusan ambience to affect anyone instinctively took point, stepping into the space and psychosomatically feeling slightly cooler as he did.

"Remember, people," he advised them for a second time, "treat this the same as a space walk - there may be no gravity, no air, no heating or power of any kind in the passenger section. You've all done walks before, that's why you've been selected. God only knows what we will find, but we're on a time limit here, so no hanging around. Stick to the matter in hand. No-one takes any unnecessary risks either, and I want you all to keep together at all times."

The Yeoman reached the second door and pressed the red flashing button. It turned green as his finger pulled away and the bulkhead began its slow ascent. Another puff of air was sucked into the space beyond. This time, the group could all see the two sets of thick double doors that represented the sheering plane of separation between the Command and Passenger sections of the ship. Lirik bravely stepped into the second corridor, now almost 6 metres away from the group.

O'Hara noticed the distinct increase in Lirik's pulse and respiration on her visor readout set to monitor group lifesigns. "Everything okay?" she asked.

Lirik smiled at her concern, though no one saw. He ignored the question and tapped his wrist-mounted scanner. "I'm now officially in the passenger section," he said. "Automatic systems appear to have activated here. I'm reading low-level life support in the passenger section ahead - gravity too. Let's hope the rest of the ship is as hospitable."

The final bulkhead leading into the passenger section had a huge bird carved stylistically into relief on the surface. Lirik activated the inner door control.

The bulkhead rose more quickly than the previous two and the space beyond seemed pitch black. Lirik glanced back to the group some ten metres behind him as, gradually, uplighters grew in luminescence in the corridor ahead.

From O'Hara's distant viewpoint, the sight was more than a little bizarre. In front of Lirik, the corridor was slightly wider. Thick carpet of a rich crimson, gold and black pattern lined the deck. The walls were plain cream to hip height, then flock wallpaper of similar colours to the carpet hung from the mid level trim up to the cream coloured, softly moulded ceiling. Brass and opalescent glass lamps hung at intervals along the walls and glowed a warm light on the whole setting. Another four metres or so ahead of Lirik, a pair of opaque glass doors began to grow in luminescence from behind - the space on the other side presumably coming gracefully to life.

"Wow," Lirik voiced their combined feelings and thrust his sensor arm forward. He stepped over the final bulkhead into the soft corridor and saw on the wall, integrated into a large black splash of flock, a discrete, dark glass panel. Touching it, a standard old style Starfleet readout showed that emergency power was active. Flashing below was the message 'Warning: Battery Power Levels At Minimum. Life Support Failure In 00:59:35:09' - the last two digits were whirling round, indicating a countdown in progress.

Lirik took off his helmet and breathed the air. Curiously, he could smell fresh paint. In fact, with his unshielded eyes it looked to him like the whole place had been recently decorated. He ungloved his hands and retrieved a thigh-mounted tricorder, sweeping it around. Everything looked stable.

"Okay!" he called and waved everyone to proceed into the passenger section. "Emergency battery power has kicked in - we've got just under an hour before it runs out. Keep your suits on, just to be safe. You can unhelmet or unglove to conserve your suit's energy, but keep them with you just in case of a loss of atmospheric pressure."

The group caught up and together, they all began their walk forward. Lirik, Leonard and O'Hara led the way, side by side.

"Will you get a load of this place?" O'Hara casually announced as they swung the doors aside and stepped into a wide, square precinct. The carpet bled into a border that surrounded an ornate marble floor, intricate in pattern and highly polished. The ceiling was higher here, slightly domed, and painted with heavenly scenes of a romantic style.

The group made their way into the wide area, spreading out. On each side of the 'foyeur', were four turbolifts, each entrance surrounded with gilded metal frames. The doors to the turbolifts themselves were constructed of milky glass held within a fretwork of shiny metal.

Four corridors twisted away from the 'foyeur' on the opposite side of the square, two flanking each side of a massive staircase that dominated their view, launching upward, then forking in two, disappearing to the left and right. Each of the floor level corridors were signposted with a simple, polished wooden plaque indicating specific areas they would lead to.

"Waterpark?" Leonard mused to Lirik, standing at the corridor immediately to the left of the stairs. The corridor ramped down and then veered right, under the stairs.

"If you think that's strange," O'Hara said from the corridor to his left, "this one says Holopark, Mall and Arboretum." None of these were visible either, as this corridor quickly snaked off to the left.

"Let's not get side-tracked," Lirik advised. "Can anyone see signs for sick bay or engineering?" The group all shook their heads or muttered 'no' into their collar mikes.

A "ping" caused the group to turn toward Vostaline, the Helan leader's daughter, standing in front of a turbolift. The doors slid apart to reveal a luxuriously padded car with a recessed seat for two. "Wouldn't these be quicker?"

Lirik wasn't sure, but time was ticking by. "Very well, but each team is to split into two groups, just in case there is a problem with the turbolift system. If you become separated or lost, head back to the Command Section." He gripped O'Hara by the arm. "Check in with me every five minutes. Understood?"

She raised her eyebrow at his assumed superiority, but seeing Leonard was not paying much attention, she nodded and made for a turbolift.

* * *

COMMAND YACHT, ENGINEERING

Jackson and Narli entered engineering. Lying on the floor just inside was the unconscious form of Murak.

"He's alive," Jackson said, crouching to feel his pulse.

Jackson was about to enter the room and investigate further, but Narli gripped her wrist hard. "We should get back to the bridge," he said.

"What?!" Jackson tried to protest, but already he was guiding them out into the corridor and away. The Commodore tried to struggle free, but his hold was too tight.

"Shh!" he instructed, almost in a whisper as he frogmarched her round the corner. Upon reaching the turbolift, Narli stopped and looked back down the corridor, letting go.

"What the hell was all that about?" the Commodore demanded in a hoarse whisper, following his line of sight.

"Someone was in there," the Ambassador informed her, then pointed to his antennae. "The image was very faint, but in such a confined, dark space it was like a beacon."

"The agent?" Jackson was half excited, half scared to death.

Narli nodded. "She was using some kind of personal cloaking device, it looked a lot like the ones the Jemm Hadar use."

Jackson was about to ask if he was sure, but decided not to second guess him. "Do you think she's a Changeling?"

"A Changeling wearing a cloak? What would be the point? Why not just become a console or blend into the floor?" Narli couldn't deal with the thought of battling a Changeling, they were too slippery. He pulled out a phaser from under his robes.

"Cloak or no cloak, we're out of time," Jackson snatched the phaser from him. She proceeded back the way they came, closely followed by the Andorian.

The Commodore strode up to the small engineering room and stopped over the threshold, bold as brass holding the weapon at the ready. She pulled the Ambassador into the room with her and closed the doors.

"Is she still here?" Jackson asked Narli, who nervously stood behind her.

"Yes," he said, "in the far left corner."

Jackson pointed and fired - knowing full well the girl would probably get out the way. "Now that I have your attention," the Commodore set the phaser to overload. "Perhaps you want to stop this ship now, before we all die?"

The girl materialised on the far side of the room, scowling at the Commodore. "What? Not having enough fun, yet?" Pim shouted. "As if I'm bothered by your little toy."

The phaser was emitting a low noise, slowly growing in intensity. Jackson held the Andorian device up, examining it. "This is a Type..." she read the minute label with ease using her new spectacles, "X9 personal phaser. Being Andorian-made I imagine it is one of the most powerful known to the Federation."

"And highly unstable," the Ambassador cautioned her.

"No doubt," Jackson grinned wider - her game of bluff needed to be convincing. "I couldn't begin to tell you the blast radius..."

"Vapourisation effect to about eleven point five metres," Narli prompted helpfully.

"Hm," Jackson regarded the device with renewed admiration. "Enough to take out this room and a good deal of the adjacent engine room as well. Perhaps even the warp core itself?"

The girl threw her head back, flicking her hair violently out of the way. "So you want to kill yourselves, so what! Why should that concern me? You're as good as dead already."

The noise of the phaser was rising steadily. The Ambassador assumed it was beginning to get too hot to hold, but the Commodore was determined, it seemed.

"Disable the security lock-outs and I'll shut it down," Jackson offered. Narli thought the Commodore had played her ace too soon.

"Ha! In your dreams," Pim grimaced as her left wrist shook uncontrollably. She had to use her other hand to steady it.

"What's the matter, feeling a little nervous?" the Commodore stepped forward.

The girl bit her lip, her right eye flicking open and closed uncontrollably. "What do you hope to achieve by this? Prove how courageous you Starfleet types all are?" she walked back a pace.

Jackson took a couple more steps towards her. "Why not? You've been determined to show us how clever you are - and how determined you are to get your K'Tani friends aboard."

The girl backed up against the doors to the warp room, her whole body was visibly shaking. "The K'Tani will prevail," she said as a statement of fact rather than bravado.

"Isn't that funny," Jackson smiled - this almost felt like reasoning with a real child. "I was just thinking the complete opposite. If I know my fellow Humans, they'll be resisting the K'Tani up to their dying breath."

The phaser noise was quite loud by now. The little girl turned and entered several commands into the door panel - it wouldn't open. She glanced back at the Commodore, this time with a little fear.

"You are a lot like the K'Tani," was all she shouted above the din before entering another command and the door finally swished open.

As soon as the doors split apart, the Bat'Leth came crashing down on the girl's skull without any announcement, embedding itself to about three inches.

In the nano-seconds before contact, Jackson's expression had dropped, her mouth open in horror at what she was about to witness. She knew in that fragment of time that she would not be able to give any warning - Karless brought the weapon down with such force and accuracy.

Narli appeared more composed, matter-of-factly expecting to see the Bajoran's head split in two, but instead the point sunk into the head with a loud "chink". Blood and a clear liquid bubbled and seeped out, but only slightly. The girl's torso and limbs began to flail wildly, like a rag doll being shaken violently.

Smoke and sparks flew out of the wound and Karless quickly let go of his weapon, stepping away from her. The weight and odd angle caused the girl's head to rock back slightly, pulling her down backwards onto the deck - but the blade remained firmly in place. Jackson could see through the doorway that Reb was coming to in the room beyond and stared in a mixture of horror/pleasure, flinging his hands against his ears from the deafening roar of the phaser.

"An android?" Jackson was shocked, her words unheard under the tremendous noise. Narli grabbed the red hot phaser from Jackson and disarmed it, dropping the hot, quietening object to the floor immediately after.

"No time to waste," Narli prompted and stepped up to the main control. "What are we going to do about these lock-outs?"

"Time to intercept?" Jackson urged, approaching the calming girl, her chest rising and falling with machine-like rhythm, still impaled under Karless' weapon.

"They'll be here in several minutes," he announced. "Commander, the lock-outs?"

The Commodore crouched so she was at head-height with the prone Pim. The girl's eyelids suddenly flashed open. Rather than cute blue irises, her cornea was awash with a grey-blue milky mass. "You...think you have won...?"

"Let's make a deal," Jackson said. "If you give us the security code I promise we'll not destroy or dismantle you."

The girl tried to smile, her voice became echoey and creamy fluid trickled out of the sides of her mouth. "I am not K'Tani," Pim stated, almost inferring that the K'Tani would be persuaded in such a situation. Or, the Commodore thought, she might be saying that the K'Tani were all machines as well...? After a pause Pim spoke: "I do not wish to cease functioning. You... will...promise to let me go?"

"Of course," Jackson's heart was racing.

The girl swallowed. "Five, five, five, five, five, Delta, Five..." her right eye cleared and looked at Jackson. "It was meant to be my age," she said.

"We're in!" Narli exclaimed from behind Jackson. "Accessing navigation, turning us about." They all felt the slight wobble as he simultaneously slowed the ship and spun it on its access, accelerating away in the opposite direction. The ship rocked.

"We're being fired upon, some kind of long range missiles," the Ambassador was once an honoured pilot in one of the Andorian Defence Squadrons, but his knowledge of this ship was limited. He had only managed to use the helm controls because Murak had left that function frozen on the screen, and the simple navigation display showed the brief glow of the explosion behind the Command Yacht.

"Do we have shields?" Jackson walked up to him. Reb eased his way past the android, resisting the urge to kick it. Pim's eyes locked onto his as he passed by and he felt quite queezy. He found a free workstation and ran his fingers across it.

"Shields activated," Reb understood the basics of Starfleet and most other Federation computer systems and easily replaced a subsystems monitor to function as a standard emergency bridge console. In its compact, intricate setting he could access any of the major areas within two spans. The ship rocked again. The computer warbled a protest.

"Aft shields down to 45 per cent," Reb stated.

* * *

COMMAND YACHT, UNKNOWN LOCATION

Christian fell off his perch. The ship had shaken for the second time and dislodged him. At the same moment, he heard the heavy thud-thud-thud footsteps coming nearer. The eyes seemed to be only a few metres away now.

* * *

COMMAND YACHT, ENGINEERING

"Do we have any weapon?" Jackson asked. The ship shuddered.

Reb looked lost. "

* * *

UNKNOWN LOCATION

Christian felt like a long human hair had fallen on his face. He brushed it aside, but felt nothing there. The rest of his exposed skin began to feel similar - it felt like being gently caressed by many strands of delicate hair.

* * *

COMMAND YACHT, ENGINEERING

"Aft shields now at 30 per cent," Reb said, calling up the tactical mainframe again. He frowned. "Phaser access is off-line. Reinitialising." His hands danced over the controls - it seemed there was a separate, crew-only system beneath the main systems. None of it was active, so he had no idea why the phasers were routed through it, or indeed what other functionality was there. It was a weird set up, even by his standards - nothing on the ship was straight-forward. As he activated the sub-system a whole panel came alive on the adjacent work station. On the main diagnostic slaved to the small wall-mounted display behind him, Narli watched the side elevation as decks drew apart, revealing other 'hidden' decks in between. The ship rocked again.

* * *

UNKNOWN LOCATION

Christian saw a faint glow in the distance, it was framed by the black outline of the door, but he still couldn't see anything immediately around him. Without warning, the lights in the room suddenly came on.

He froze for a second, his eyes tightly clamped shut by the unexpected brightness, but he forced them open just a fraction to see where he was. First he noticed the room was whitish-grey and unfurnished. His eye muscles resisted, and tears welled up in his pained lids, but there was no mistaking - something black and shiny was on the floor a few feet in front of him. He smeared the tears away and found he could open his eyes more easily. The sight was a shock and he sat bolt upright, though unable to cry out.

As he jolted up, the spider - about two metres from toe to toe at its widest - shuffled back with its multiple thuds, turned and galloped out of the room with tremendous speed. Christian looked down and saw that he was covered in many tiny threads. He brushed them away with revulsion, thankful that the spider appeared even more scared of him.

ACT IV

MEDICAL FACILITY, PASSENGER SECTION

O'Hara's team stepped out of the plush turbolift into a plain, domed circular area, about ten metres in diameter. A couple of seconds later, the doors of the turbolift entrance to their left also opened to reveal the other half of her search party.

The floor, walls and ceiling before and all around them were white, as were the outside turbolift doors. There was a large, multi-coloured starburst floor mosaic in the middle of the open area - O'Hara immediately recognised it as the insignia of the Federation's United Medical Association. Low lighting came diffused from every other of the many vertical recessed panels running around the circle's pelmet, casting light downwards.

Looking around, O'Hara saw there were four sets of lift doors in total, spread around her half of the circular area. Halfway across, wide corridors bled away left and right - both devoid of light and power. The wall on the opposite side of the circle was dominated by an unidentified darkened object in the middle that stretched from floor to ceiling, flanked by two large rectangular entrances, both unlit.

"Let's go," O'Hara moved them all forward. As they proceeded, lights beyond the two darkened entrances ahead began to wink on. The curious object in the middle glowed into life, backlit by red neon with golden light beamed onto its front from above - it was an impressionist sculpture of the standard Federation medical symbol; two serpents coiled around the winged penitent . Beneath was some kind of memorial placard with the words "I place my trust in God".

Flanking the statuette were two arches that led into the medical facility. The area on the right was very obviously the crash medical treatment area as O'Hara could see treatment beds just a few metres inside - though a moveable solid screen it seemed could be dragged across the front in order to hide any gory scenes from the passengers. The entrance to the left, slightly wider and more inviting, gave way to a large reception console and waiting area, with plush consultation bays and corridors leading onward beyond. At first, everything looked intact - it seemed to be a huge facility compared to most sick bays she'd visited, comparing more to small Starbase medical facilities.

"Okay, Hensil - your group search the area to the left. You know what to look for - medicines and any useful treatment devices," the Lieutenant eagerly trotted into the right hand area.

The first thing she noticed was that the sensor cluster above the main diagnostic bed was missing, optical cable ends and twisted metal dangling down from the concave housing. On the bed below it, the main treatment assembly was also removed. The other surrounding beds appeared to retain their integral status displays, but all the LCARS screens were blackened and inactive.

Her group spread out, moving into the space beyond - O'Hara could see at least two wards of eight beds, and corridors and offices leading off to her right. Ahead was the ICU staff office and beyond that a wide corridor with signs to various departments. The helpers worked fast, opening drawers and cupboards of the scattered units. There were many storage spaces but, it seemed, very few contents.

The Lieutenant stayed where she was and let her people bring the items to her for analysis. Ironically, a dental pick was the first item to arrive, and she glowered at the volunteer who had brought it. It was hardly something she could treat people with - though reminded herself that long-term, dental treatment would become a necessity. She cast the thin metal strip to one side. A complicated eye lens application device arrived next - its power cell missing: such devices were normally used for cosmetic purposes only, and again O'Hara couldn't think of an immediate use for it.

The girl called Penge brought a more encouraging looking armful of thin plastic boxes, and the contents of one scattered onto the floor. She crouched to help pick them all up: medical history cards - hand-written - by the look of it, although there was one square box that contained sachets of something. Hoping to find medicine, O'Hara pulled one sachet out, reading the label in astonishment.

"Herbal tea?" the Lieutenant flushed red and Penge just shrugged and trotted away into the first of the wards. O'Hara would normally have found it funny, but reminded herself that her shopping list of necessities might barely be touched.

Hensil came up behind her, carrying a very large, very heavy metal storage case, strengthened by a ribbed frame.

"This looks more like it," O'Hara became excited. Hensil heaved it on to the diagnostic bed with the Lieutenant's help and she released the catches. Opening it, the Lieutenant's face dropped. Inside was a standard LCARS user-interface panel and display screen in the 'lid'. There was a space for the insertion of data chips via flip-down side access, and ports for networking with mainframe systems. O'Hara activated the power cell and the splash page faded into life.

"A portable medical database," she stated blankly. "What the hell am I going to do with that?" She realised Hensil had taken it personally and patted him on the arm. "Not your fault," she half smiled.

When he'd gone, she realised no one else had paid her a visit for a while. Things did not look good. She moved behind the diagnostic bed and over to a workstation, wondering what computer capability the area had. She pressed the panel, but a singular message flashed up: 'Medical Interface Unavailable, Please Contact Main Bridge For Service. Battery Power Levels At Minimum. Life Support Failure In 00:51:23:03'. The countdown was whirling around.

* * *

MAIN ENGINEERING, PASSENGER SECTION

Leonard's and Lirik's respective groups had to vacate their turbolifts some distance ahead of their goal, finishing the journey on foot. The limited computer interface advised them that engineering was deemed inaccessible to humanoid life and so wouldn't grant them access via turbolift. Indeed, as they approached, they found a thick fog of coolant spewing into the corridor, and had to don helmets and gloves to get through it.

The fog thinned slightly as they stepped through the main archway into engineering, but visibility was still down to just a few metres as the gasses lingered in the stagnant air. Lirik kept the volunteers together while Leonard searched the space for the manual vent controls.

"This place is huge," Leonard said through the helmet speakers. "I can't even find the damned warp core." There was a pause, then Leonard whistled - causing a few volunteers to wince from the loud sound suddenly in their ears. "I think I just found it."

Lirik was growing impatient. He noticed several wall-mounted read-out displays within walking distance and shuffled over to them, the others wondering what he was doing. "I've found an active computer terminal," Lirik announced. "It's a standard status display - shows deuterium tank levels... there's not much here. It's practically down to empty, in fact."

"If I know this ship, and I'm beginning to understand it a lot better now," Leonard said almost proudly, "we should be able to supplement that by tapping into the Command Section's tank. Oh, how quaint. I found the atmospheric controls. Ugh!"

"What is it?" Lirik looked around, concerned by Leonard's outburst.

"Just...the damned...lever," he said then exhaled loudly. Lirik could hear the 'clunk' of the lever's movement echoing around the engineering deck through his helmet. A loud hissing grew in intensity, and the mists began to swirl around. Gradually, the layer of cloud thinned and Lirik could make out the stylised design of the main engineering area. It looked like a strange fusion of Earth's industrial age technology and 24th Century technology. Overall, the space was laid out in much the same way as Starfleet engine rooms, but the feel of the place was more in keeping with the engine room of an ocean-going steam vessel of the 20th Century.

No bright glossy surfaces here, but dark thick-looking metal surfaces bordered with brass and chrome tubes and pipes. Each wall panel was riveted and the deck was not carpet, but a mixture of wooden floorboards and linear metal grilles. Metal galleries ran along both sides overhead, and industrial lights were distributed along the walls and ceilings. While there were lcars interfaces here, they were discretely contained within period-looking furnishings. To add to the antiquated feel, supplementing the modern computer display screens were old fashioned brass guages, valves and dials. Lirik's gaze fell upon the large figure of Leonard just a few metres away, standing next to a bank of two metre long levers thrusting at different angles out of the floor.

The floor ahead of the main controls dramatically dropped away to form a huge bowl shape and within it there was the huge reaction assembly - a warped hour-glass shape with its ribbed casing twisting like candy-cane around the core. It was far more intricate in design than the assembly of the Command Section. Here, it graduated from the floor of the 'bowl', coning up like a slender, twisting volcano, to a small 'bubble' (the dilithium chamber) and then funnelling out again, twisting up until it was flush into the concave ceiling. There was no visible shaft either above or below - it seemed fused into the walls of engineering itself.

The assembly's power transfer conduits shot out of the back of the bubble - thick shafts of dead-looking glass were wrapped in thick straps of metal, bolted together by what looked like huge rivets.

"This place looks more like the Titanic than a modern starship," a deep, manly southern accent commented at the evenly spaced huge columns that supported the vaulted ceiling, and the smooth edged, chunky moulded workstations.

"Don't take your helmets off just yet," Leonard advised. "Air supply won't be ready for a few minutes." The big German was looking for a way to get up to the reaction chamber. He had thought the warp pit of the Command Section strange as access to the chamber, but he couldn't see how on earth it would be practical to have this assembly with the chamber raised so far off the deck.

A squeeking sound from the right gave him the answer as Vostaline wheeled a portable gangway over. Lirik approached, both eyebrows raised. Leonard made the quick ascent up the metal steps and gripped hard as Vostaline manoeuvred the contraption closer to the chamber. Leonard found a small four-button control clipped onto the top rail and selecting the appropriate command a short plank extended from the gangway, stopping just under the dilithium chamber. Leonard carefully walked forward, scared that his bulk would cause the plank to snap or the gangway to topple over, but it held (the structure in fact weighted with heavy with Troxian Lead).

"Thank God," Leonard exclaimed, having opened the drawer - although no crystal was in place, the dish underneath contained six fat ones. Just to be sure, he tricordered them - they were perfect. Quickly clipping the largest into place, he closed the drawer and ran down the steps and over to the main controls, housed in a cross shaped hip-height console.

The display read: ' Battery Power Levels At Minimum. Power Failure In 00:46:18:00'. He looked up at Lirik, his face flushed. "It will be a push, but we should be able to start up the core before battery power runs out."

"Oh, that is good news," Lirik was relieved - though it sounded like sarcasm. He tapped his communicator. "Lirik to O'Hara."

Static replied. Leonard touched his arm and pointed to the console - specifically a small square comm panel. Lirik pulled off his helmet and pushed the panel, coughing once. "Lirik to Sick Bay," he said.

Some distance away in the medical facility, O'Hara touched the nearby comm panel in response. "This is O'Hara, how are you doing?"

Lirik took a few breaths from his helmet. "Mister Leonard is going to attempt to re-start the passenger section's engines." He coughed again twice.

"I hope he has better luck than us," O'Hara stated, holding up a box full of used surgical tights and saline capsules.

* * *

UNKNOWN LOCATION, COMMAND YACHT

Christian peered into the corridor - no sign of the creature. He spied a comm panel winking on and off and walked toward it. "Captain Christian to the Bridge!" he said.

"Captain?!" Jackson's voice shouted in surprise. The ship shook again. "Where are you?"

The Captain smiled to himself. "I have no idea. What's going on?"

"Well..." Jackson cocked her head, not sure where to begin.

"Shields down to 15 per cent and falling!" Reb's urgent voice cut off any further explanation.

"I'm on my way!" Christian shouted.

"Captain! Come to Engineering," Jackson said.

Christian was thankful when the turbolift responded and the doors parted - he was even more thankful seeing the small blue voice-interface indicator bright blue and alive. "Main Engineering!" he ordered.

The computer responded. "Command Yacht is in separation mode, access to Main Engineering is not possible."

Christian frowned. "Is Yacht Engineering available?"

"Affirmative," the Computer responded efficiently and shunted the turbolift car on its way.

Presently, Christian stepped through the doors and turned the corner toward the small engineering area. He was pleased to see Narli and the groaning, moaning, head-hugging injured figures of Murak, Warnerburg, and some other person he hadn't met yet leaning against a wall in the small space. The two Klingons Kluless and Karless stood on either side of the short passage between engineering control and the warp core, apparently watching over something.

"Last thing I know is I was on my way to the bridge," Christian explained.

Jackson licked her lips and summarised the situation. "The agent tore the Command Yacht from the rest of the ship and took us on a heading back to K'Tani space. We were supposed to rendesvous with a group of K'Tani ships, but we managed to regain control in time - those ships are now in pursuit and firing at us."

"'Agent?'..." Christian saw Jackson's eyes flick toward the Klingons and he stepped around the support column to see their bizarrely impaled captive.

"An android..." Christian whispered.

"Ha!" the girl tried to laugh with a mechanical echo, still leaning back precariously with the Bat'Leth sticking out of her head. Her other eye was beginning to clear now as well, and she seemed to Jackson to be sounding a lot less hurt.

The strange site did nothing to deter Christian as another volley hit the Yacht. "Tell us their weaknesses," he demanded.

"I'll do no such thing," the girl retorted. After a pause she said: "I see she didn't eat you then?"

"Eat me?" the Captain went a little ashen.

Jackson didn't understand, and thought it best not to ask right now, nodding toward the agent. "I made a deal with her. Her freedom for the command codes."

"You're Kidding?!" Christian couldn't believe it. He remembered his crew and the survivors and looked around at the small group. "Was everyone else left on the main ship?"

"No, the other bridge crew are standing by in escape pods," Jackson said feebly.

"Look, I hate to break up the little reunion, but our shields are down to 8 per cent," Reb huffed his protest.

"Do we have weapons?" Christian asked.

Narli shook his head and glared at Pim. "We can't be sure, she used the holographics on board to make it seem as if the ship was in full working order, although now it seems we've regained partial control for real. This readout says there are no phasers."

Murak and Warnerburg were huddled around a control console. "Sir, I think we can shut down all holographics now."

"Do it," Christian demanded. Bleeeep dah bleep blip. Nothing seemed to change. "Anything?"

Warnerburg bit her lip and shook her head in uncertainty. "I really can't be sure without running a full diagnostic."

The ship rocked. Reb cursed, looking at the display showing the positions of the pursuers in relation to the Fantasy. "I'm all out of evasive moves - they've spread out and got every angle covered. Two or three more shots and our shields, such as they are, will collapse."

"Keep up those evasive manoeuvres, mister," Christian yelled, running out of the room.

Reb was flummoxed once again to be left 'in charge', but took the helm, navigation, shields and every other control in check.

Christian waved Jackson and Narli to assist him as he jogged to the turbolift. "Computer, where are the aft phaser arrays?"

The doors opened.

"The aft phaser turret is located on deck 6."

Hauling his companions into the turbolift and closing the doors using the iconographic button on the control panel. "Computer, take us there."

The turbolift bonged and they were away. The ship rocked slightly, and Christian thought to himself: 'two more hits and we're done for'.

* * *

COMMAND SECTION, BRIDGE

Lirik stepped out of the turbolift onto the small bridge deck for the Command Section along with Vostaline and Souveson. The area was already known to be fully functional and intact, so they had decided to travel there rather than to the Passenger Section's unexplored turret-mounted bridge.

"Very chic," Lirik commented at the Deco décor.

The Ensign made her way to the power room as she had several days previous - she was at first shocked to see the switch was no longer in isolation mode, but she then remembered it was Hedrik who had turned it off only to be confronted with the holographic K'Tani.

Walking back onto the bridge Souveson's eye was distracted by the tapes in the Captain's office to her left. She was very keen to go exploring, but so far their situation had always taken priority. She hoped it wouldn't be for much longer.

Lirik had sat himself at the helm, while Vostaline sat at engineering. Souveson made her way to the science station, thinking that would be the third best interface to help her continued search using internal sensors. Initial sweeps had shown no trace of the agent and she was wondering if, after they ramped up the power from the passenger section warp core, she would be able to refine the search parameters.

"Plugging us in," Lirik said, selecting the relevant power mode panel on the helm board. With one touch it switched the bridge from standby into action, lighting up each workstation. The local subprocessors quickly tapped into the mainframe network, the computer core filtering back what systems were available.

Three displays lit up on the same right hand area of the Yeoman's forward workstation showing the warp network, the control network and the comparative primary indicators for both sections of the ship. Lirik could see that Leonard had already rigged the warp power network to originate in the Passenger Section with fuel taps from the Command Section. Moving to the second panel, Lirik touched their current location, and instantaneously the entire control network was centralised to their position. The patching seemed over-simple for a ship that had proven thus far so complex, but in minutes the essentials to running the ship (and navigating it) were flashing 'standby', ready for warp power to come on line and feed the power-starved areas of the ship.

Lirik said: "Not long to go now, girls."

The Ensign raised her head at this, thinking the remark not only inaccurate but highly sexist. As the Yeoman pressed the command to prepare to switch from generators over to the eps network feeding off the Passenger Section, the ambience of the bridge changed.

"Leonard to Command Bridge," the voice spilled out over the speakers impatiently.

"Lirik here, Commander," the Yeoman tapped his way casually through the systems that were available, and noted that the Passenger section was down to 22 minutes of emergency power. "Sounds like you don't need your helmets any more."

* * *

PASSENGER SECTION, ENGINEERING

A dozen or so unhelmeted volunteers buzzed around the German engineer as he surveyed the situation onto the emergency systems board, inset into an ornate round wooden table, raised at an angle. He scanned the read-outs.

He seemed relieved to hear the Yeoman's English accent. "Oxygen tanks are now fully operative in this area, so things are a little easier down here," the Lieutenant Commander said, thankful to be breathing processed air rather than his own recycled breath.

He continued: "Power-up sequence is proceeding to schedule, though we've had a few problems. For one, the CS to PS taps were not functioning, so we've had to pump the deuterium through from the Command Section manually. Dilithium crystal alignment was off by a fraction, but I've managed to rectify that also. We're now raising engine pressure, it'll be about another twenty minutes before it's all on-line."

"Commander," Lirik's English voice clipped the word harshly, "In twenty minutes you'll be out of emergency power."

Leonard smiled. He loved it when the Yeoman was proven wrong. "That's a negative, Bridge. I've re-routed Command Section generator supply to this engineering area only, so that should give us a few minutes more. But it would help if we could shut off life support in the medical facility as well. Can you get O'Hara's group out of there?"

"Acknowledged," Lirik's voice signed off.

* * *

PASSENGER SECTION, MEDICAL FACILITY

"Bridge to Lieutenant O'Hara," the voice echoed around the white walls of the sterile area.

O'Hara had left Hensil in the reception area to screen the equipment brought by the other scavengers while she had gone on a little walk-about of her own. She was mightily impressed by the extent of the facility. Originally she had thought it just a few wards and labs off the two main reception areas, but behind these she had found a warren of treatment rooms and specialist surgeries that spanned across to another reception area on the other side of the facility. She hadn't had an opportunity to search the north and south 'wings' yet, or follow the signs to the maternity and paediatric areas on the deck above.

The Lieutenant vacated the second of three sparsely furnished dental treatment rooms into a main corridor and located a comm panel. She received a light electric shock as she depressed the button.

"OW! O'Hara here," she sucked the hurt finger.

"Mister Leonard needs to conserve all available energy, could you now make your way back to the Command Section?" Lirik's voice sounded more of an order than a request.

"We haven't searched even half the facility yet," O'Hara tried her best not to sound too moany, but no medicines of great help had as yet been located.

In a few private moments since Christian's morning address, she had considered that, should they manage to get the ship working and have some semblance of order over the next few weeks/months, she would be required to behave just as any full-blown Chief Medical Officer would. That meant the routine care and specialist/emergency treatment of everyone on board. Moreover, she was probably going to be responsible for this large facility and the management of all its staff and needs - and as a part of the Command Crew, she had full accountability. So upsetting the Chief Engineer wouldn't be a good start, despite the fact her party had so far been so unlucky.

"Can you give us ten more minutes?" she asked. As she finished speaking, a brief spell of nausia washed over her and she had to swallow saliva several times.

"You've got five, ma'am," Lirik signed off casually but without any further discussion.

O'Hara leant forward, bending over and placing her hands above her knees. She breathed deeply several times. Several tresses of red hair dropped from its pinned back place.

"Are you not well?" a voice came from behind. It was Kidron, the old Klingon warrior who had been sent as one of two 'protectors' of the medical search party. Not a few minutes earlier, the ancient grey haired man had discovered what looked like a bejewelled fishtank. It was sited off one of two bare surgery theatres and patched into main power, but without the sufficient energy to run local systems, no one had been able to identify what it was.

"I'm fine," O'Hara straightened and felt a little giddy. "Tell the others we've got five minutes."

He nodded and walked away. The Lieutenant swallowed and licked her salty dry lips. "It can't still be a reaction to the Ere, surely," she said to herself and then put it down to lack of food and nervous tension.

* * *

COMMAND YACHT, DECK SIX (AFT)

Exiting the turbolift, the first thing Christian's party saw was a large storage recess in front of them, its containment shutters pulled back to reveal piles of broken equipment, and some larger items covered with dustsheets. Christian logged them for future reference, but broke right in a quick jog to the back of the vessel. Passing by a set of toilets on his right and storage facilities to his left, just ahead was a thick-looking door with the words 'Aft Phaser Turret: No Unauthorised Entry', standing alone between two distant escape pod entrances in corridors left and right.

The door would not respond when approached, so Jackson dramatically phasered the lock using Narli's borrowed weapon. It took the combined strength of all three of them to heave the large door aside. Beyond was a large room empty of anything, save an almighty looking contraption of years far more senior than the Commodore and Narli put together. Indeed, it was even covered in a thin layer of dust, but seemed surprisingly intact for something its age.

Christian climbed up onto the back of the turret, a five metre high slightly tapering structure of a granite-looking material that angled and curved its way into the rear wall. It reminded the Captain of an enormous bishop chess piece that had been embedded into the wall of the room itself. The gunnery pod's entry hatch was un-secured and Christian pulled it aside, peeking around first before clambering in. All systems seemed intact - a much-worn leather chair hung from the ceiling along with eye-level displays on angle-poise arms, and a wide, arc shaped display thrust out from the wall to hand height above a set of manual directional pedals. If Christian was correct, the entire pod would move in sync with the guns themselves. He checked the warning signs clearly positioned on either side of the chamber's walls indicating the maximum ranges of the turret.

Christian heard Jackson's curses as Narli tried a third attempt at hauling the large Commodore up onto the entry ledge. The Captain slid into the plastic seat and activated the internal power via a capped flick-switch in the centre of the main controls. Immediately the workstation glowed into life, the other lights inside the turret and in the outside room dimming. The displays flickered on to reveal targeting grids and sensor read-outs as simultaneously a thin slit opened at eye level in the pod itself. The layers of twin-plated flexiglass allowed Christian a physical view of the outside; he could see the slowly moving stars, but not any K'Tani ships - they were too far away for Human eyes, though were still rapidly approaching according to the sensors.

"Oh, shit," Christian cursed.

"Problem?" Jackson, slightly dishevelled looking, eased her large body into the turret and stood behind the Captain's chair. There was just enough room for Narli to enter also.

Christian pointed at the phaser power cell status - even Jackson could see the four bars for each 'gun' were only fractionally charged. "It would take too long to charge them," he dropped his head. "So we've only enough for four, maybe five shots."

"Then we have to think of something else," Jackson said encouragingly. Christian cast a brief glare at her.

"Look!" Narli pointed at the shield status. "Murak must have somehow ramped up the shield power, it's crept back to 20 per cent."

"That won't hold forever," Christian suddenly had an idea. He turned to the Commodore. "I have a plan, but I won't know if it will work until I see for myself. Stay here and keep your eye on the display, but don't shoot until you see the whites of their eyes." He grinned.

Jackson didn't appreciate the humour, but squidged her wide seat into the small chair as Christian climbed over her to get out, pulling on Narli's arm to accompany him. "We don't even know if they have eyes," she mumbled in protest.

In the corridor outside the room, Christian pointed to the right. "Check and see if the escape pod is intact."

The Captain checked out the one to the left - still there and in working order. Narli called down the corridor: "It appears fully operational."

Christian beckoned to the Andorian Ambassador to join him in the nearest storage area. It contained many crates, most of which were empty. Signage on the wall gave directions to other stores areas nearby, and the Captain noted the 'Samples Research Lab' and mineral and chemical stores. He tipped his top lip with his tongue and nodded their journey onward. Around a corner they found a bay full of crates and containers, many with 'poison' or 'caustic' warnings. Christian spied at the farthest end of the store room a wall-mounted frame for pressurised cylinders - a huge honeycomb affair of narrow, deep tubes, some of which were occupied.

"Help me look for anything highly combustible," Christian ran over to the wall, stumbling as the ship shook.

The Ambassador located more than a few differing cylinders containing a variety of gasses and began to point them out.

"Actually, bring them all," was all Christian said as he found an antigrav trolley and began loading it with the cylinders.

* * *

COMMAND SECTION, BRIDGE

Several Helan had arrived on the Bridge and were having a private, rather animated discussion with Vostaline. She was protesting about something, but the rest of the group seemed to be in agreement with each other and winning the argument. Carefully, one of the older men placed his arm around her - she violently shrugged it off, but still allowed them to guide her away to the turbolift.

Only one Helan remained - a young woman who smiled an unconvincing disarming look at Lirik as she took up the engineering console.

"What was that all about?" Lirik asked, curious about the aliens again, yet remaining conscious of the time ticking by.

"She is not well," the woman said. "But she is too proud to admit it. My name is Bedrilla, I have some engineering experience."

Lirik thought that Vostaline had seemed fine to him, but then again knew of many such similarly overly dedicated types in the Diplomatic Corps - himself included.

"Okay, Bedrilla, you know who we all are?" he indicated the small team of helpers. The woman nodded and turned to her workstation.

Lirik pulled a ponderous lower-face grimace at the over-protective Helan, and the cock-sure replacement, but turned back to the viewscreen to the matter in hand. Long range sensors had picked up a group of objects travelling at high impulse toward their general position, but the ionic interference was wreaking havoc with any kind of accurate readings.

Leonard had had over 25 minutes now and the Yeoman knew they only had a matter of minutes left. Lirik ground his teeth in frustration then decided to hit the commpanel and interrupt the engineer again. "Bridge to Engineering."

* * *

PASSENGER SECTION, ENGINEERING

"Bridge to Engineering."

Leonard cursed for the umpteenth time in as many minutes at the incessant voice, but continued working with his current task. He happily forgave the engineering volunteers for their constant questions and cross-checking of details with him as they were inexperienced in such matters, but Lirik was another matter entirely.

"Repeat, Bridge to Passenger Engineering!" the English accent echoed around the unusual engineering space.

Leonard grunted and slapped the comm panel with the sharp end of his torque dilation wrench, almost fracturing the plastic coated lcars surface. A few heads turned away from the increasingly frustrated German, another decided against their asking him to repeat the prep list for nacelle calibration for now, turning on their heel and walking in the other direction instead. Most of the volunteers had at first considered him quirky, but more recently he'd shown signs of easy irritation and an occasional nasty temper.

"What is it?? I am very busy down here!" he snapped, completing the job and walking over to the main table to check his alterations.

"Just tell me how long," Lirik asked casually across the speakers.

Leonard shook his head and checked the pressure build up - they weren't quite there yet, but it would be soon.

"Maybe five minutes," Leonard trotted over to the dilithium monitoring station - thankfully everything looked set. Dashing back to the antimatter injector controls Leonard checked the flow - all set there.

"Maybe you could do with some help," Lirik stated; he was obviously very keen to get things moving.

"No!" Leonard shouted. "We're fine, I'm starting ignition countdown from T-minus 180 seconds: mark!" 'That should get Lirik off my back', he thought.

* * *

COMMAND YACHT, AFT PHASER TURRET

Narli waited patiently for Christian to pre-set the flight controls of the second escape pod. Once finished, he turned away from the console and nodded at Narli. The two men stood back to back, gas cylinders were lined up on the bench chairs on either side of the pod, all nozzles pointing in towards them.

"Ready?" Christian didn't look around to check. "Three, two, one, go!"

Instantly each of them began to twist open each nozzle in turn, working back down the pod towards the inner hatch. Gasses hissed and spewed into the small space, clouding their vision.

They were quicker this time, only 25 seconds. Christian pushed Narli out into the corridor and sealed the pod's hatch, then the corridor hatch. They both gasped for air, though some gas had leaked into the corridor and caused Christian to cough heavily. Quickly they made their way back to the phaser turret and found Jackson intently looking at the screen.

"Where the hell have you been?" she almost screamed. "Our shields have finally collapsed, but they've stopped firing at us. They've increased their speed to get closer - looks like they intend to board us." She paused and said in a more controlled voice: "No whites of eyes as yet, Captain."

"Very good," Christian said encouragingly. Contrary to his supportive statement, he firmly grabbed her arm without explanation and heaved her out of the seat. He hit the manual comm panel, selecting connection with Yacht Engineering.

"Mister Rebbik," he tried to sound calm. "How are you doing?"

* * *

COMMAND YACHT, ENGINEERING

"Now that they've stopped firing at us, I'm fine, Captain," Reb replied, shifting his standing posture and glancing round at the others.

"I have a request for the engineers," Christian said. "Any chance of a warp speed pulse?"

Warnerburg exchanged a worried look with Murak - it wasn't standard procedure for any space traveller, whether Starfleet or the Romulan, to try it within such an extensive area of ionised space.

"That isn't possible," the Romulan stated curtly.

"Not so fast," Cally Warnerburg had both positive and negative experiences of going to warp in ion-soaked space. "He said he wanted a pulse, not sustained warp speed. Right, Captain?"

"That's right, ma'am," the Captain's voice sounded pleased.

Cally called up navigational displays and set an automated sensor search for a large enough region in which to initiate the pulse. She explained to the baffled Romulan: "Ionic radiation doesn't cover every cubic metre of this space. If we find a large enough pocket of unaffected space, we can slow the ship enough to carry out the manoeuvre within it. The ion around us will soon collapse the field, but we would have already jumped far enough to put some distance between us and them."

"Very impressive," the android girl hadn't moved from her pinned position. "They won't think you stupid enough to try that."

"What does she mean?" the unnamed engineering volunteer asked, bemused.

"Because in the time it takes us to slow down they'll be right on top of us," Karless held back a smile - he hoped the Captain had a way of preventing their capture.

"We've got a little surprise in store for our pursuers, Mister Rebbik," Christian's tone was eager across the intercom. "As soon as Ms Warnerburg has found the pocket, I need you to make the shortest possible slowing distance to put us near-stationary inside it. Count me down if you have to. When I give you the order, initiate the warp manouevre - and head us back toward the rest of the Fantasy."

Reb licked his lips. "Okay," he said unconfidently.

Several seconds later, Warnerburg shook her head, frustrated. She tapped the comm panel. "Captain, there's not much choice here, we're looking at pretty heavy saturation. The nearest available pocket is fifty seconds away. But it's not very big, so we'll have to come to a full stop to stay inside it long enough to complete the manoeuvre."

Reb looked at the dimensions of the pocket on the display - the space wasn't much larger than the Command Yacht itself. He patched the co-ordinates automatically into the helm controls. He could have worked it out in his head, but it was so full of fear and trepidation that he felt the computer would be more reliable. It flashed the answer instantaneously. "Okay, I can emergency brake six seconds before the event."

"Count us down to a full stop," Christian ordered and signed off.

Reb cocked his head back and smiled broadly, trying to look sure, even though he felt totally uncertain. By the blank looks around him, everyone displayed an equal and obvious lack of confidence that he could pull it off. There was less than a twenty metre margin for error, and most of them present knew that an emergency stop could run on for a lot longer than calculated due to variable anomalies.

* * *

COMMAND YACHT, AFT PHASER TURRET

Christian looked up at Narli, who had been whispering an explanation about what they were trying to Jackson during his conversation. Jackson had her eyebrows raised in astonishment.

"What?" the Captain prepped his station, but made sure not to scan any targets or power up weapons until the last moment.

"You are sure Rebbik can do this?" the Commodore asked.

Christian slapped his forehead comically. "That's what was bothering me," he said. Then screwed his mouth up sarcastically. "You trust me, don't you?"

Jackson stepped back and braced herself against the circular pod wall. "Actually, no. But I don't have much choice in the matter."

Christian bit his tongue. Narli was laughing at him.

"What's so damned funny?" Christian didn't get Andorian humour - ever.

"You take her so seriously, don't you?"

It was true, Christian realised. The Commodore had a sense of humour bordered on three sides by sarcasm, insolence and downright obvious truth. He allowed a private chuckle and shake of the head as he saw on the time indicator that they were about to know once and for all if the joke would be on them.

Reb's voice energised the moment. "Counting down to braking manoeuvre in five..."

Christian glanced at the display, the K'Tani had matched their course as they had veered toward the pocket and still retained their diamond formations.

"Four..."

Christian called up the auto-eject control for the two adjacent escape pods.

"Three..."

"Pray for luck," Christian said.

"Two..."

"Luck won't come into it," Narli observed with a gentle smile.

"One..."

A brief moment of almost total silence.

"Breaking now," Reb shouted excitedly.

The entire ship lurched and Jackson fell into the back of Christian's chair - intertial dampners were screaming to keep up with the violent stopping manouevre. From her position, embracing the back of the chair she could see the structural integrity readout peaking also.

"Six seconds to full stop..." Reb's voice stated.

Narli grasped at the rim of the entry hatch, but had to quickly let go as the door came crashing closed. They could hear the strain of the ship as Reb fired all breaking thrusters in an attempt to stop in time.

"Three..."

"Arming weapons," Christian stated.

"Two..."

"Ejecting escape pods," Christian pressed the flashing key and they heard the shunt and splitting cracks of the holding bolts exploding. Through the slit in front of them they could see the pods tumbling into the distance, then auto-navigating themselves into position.

"What the hell was that?!" Reb screamed, but saw before anyone could reply. "It's given us extra forward thrust!"

Christian flushed red - the ejection of two such large objects had worked against the breaking force, marginally cancelling out the breaking thrusters. He glanced at the screen and saw the pursuing ships also slowing, but not yet breaking formation. On the navigation screen he could see the Command Yacht was entering the pocket, but too fast.

* * *

COMMAND YACHT, ENGINEERING

Reb had no choice, he ran his hands up the breaking thrusters and reaction controllers and fired all systems at full pelt. He watched the perimeter of the pocket get closer: ten metres, nine, eight, five... the ship was finally slowing at a greater speed: four metres, three... twoone. That was it - they had stopped, but only just.

A snapping noise broke any chance of celebration, and Reb glanced round in time to see the android (who had slid back into the warp core room during the violent braking manoeuvre) reach behind her head and snap the Bat'Leth clean off. A part of it was still sticking out of her mishapen head, but she was now up on her slightly wobbling legs and throwing Kluless effortlessly across the room.

Karless had pulled a small boot dagger and approached her with glee.

Reb couldn't believe what was happening, and fought to remain focussed on his job. Tripping the pre-set sequence, he armed the warp engines to come on line. He hit the engage button, but it failed. "Oh, shit! We've got a stall in the core." It would be several seconds before pressure was up to a warp-capable level again.

A warning sound ominously started up.

The old veteran engineer was onto it. He caught her shocked look as she punched the intercom. "Oh my God, they appear to have the ability to transport through ion radiation. I'm reading multiple transporter locks throughout the ship!" Warnerburg shouted.

* * *

COMMAND YACHT, AFT PHASER TURRET

"Come on, come on..." ignoring the words of warning, Christian was intent upon his own job. He saw that most of the K'Tani ships had stayed in formation. Half of the ships had their shields down and were initiating a transport. They hadn't bothered with the two small pods coursing at great speed towards their midst.

Christian instantly armed weapons and locked onto the two escape pods, now suddenly being scanned frantically by the enemy ships.

"Gotcha!" he laughed at them and fired two volleys at the pods. Both exploded in a double white blast of energy, instantly taking out all the unshielded ships and badly damaging four more. One of the worst off was in relatively close proximity to most of the others and Christian guessed it could not stop another phaser blast. As the others pulled away from it, cleverly sensing it was a sitting target, Christian fired and managed to take out three of the damaged ships. The other damaged ship was now critical, and though the final two were now also damaged, they had extended their shields around the third. Christian fired off his final shot, but it was easily absorbed by the shields.

"That's it, no more juice!" He punched the comm panel. "Go to warp - NOW!"

"Nearly there, Captain," Reb's voice nervously chuckled over the speakers. Christian was all out of ammo, and it appeared his enemy knew it, for the ships had dropped their shields and begun another transport. Christian saw on the tactical display multiple transporter signals coming from all the surviving K'Tani vessels.

* * *

Reb nervously stood his ground, hoping his death would be quick. Warnerburg could see he had taken his eyes off the controls, but she was ignoring the bloody fight taking place in the warp core, trying not to think about the K'Tani now starting to materialise in their midst. Signals were in the green and she initiated the pulse rotation. As the warp field activated, the materialising forms flickered, about to be left behind. "No!" the android shouted, sensing the ship was about to jump to warp and take her with it. With impossible speed she backflipped over the resilient Klingon and dived into the fading transporter beam of the materialising soldier as the ship jumped to warp speed.

To Cally, it was like looking at an after-image, seeing the materialisation effect blurred and then quickly disappear into the aft until nothing was left.

A warning sounded - the field had collapsed, but they were now beyond the K'Tani sensor range, the ion radiation adding to their camouflage. Reb snapped out of his suicidal reverie and brought them to a full stop. He could see that a relative short distance away, the rectangular blip of the Fantasy lay ahead, unmoving in space.

Murak checked the internal sensors. He was smiling and Cally saw for the first time the cute dimples in his Romulan cheeks. "Captain, the android's gone."

"Any intruders?" Christian asked apprehensively.

"No, sir," he replied, relieved but confused.

"What happened to them?" Jackson's voice asked.

Warnerburg chuckled, as did the injured Klingons, and to Reb it seemed a little harsh considering what they had just done.

The old veteran absorbed the impact of a friendly Klingon slap on her back. "It was like the reverse of a near-warp transport, Commodore - we engaged engines while they were still beaming, so they must have rematerialised in open space."

* * *

Just beyond the small pocket of non-ionised space, the damaged ships gently rolled adrift, energy seeping into space from a variety of gaping orifices in colourful sparkle trails. The remainding two, limping around the masses of debris, silently called off the pursuit, hanging back to pick up any survivors. Floating amid the still hot wreckage were a hundred or so bloody corpses, chests ripped asunder and secreting globules of blood.

Only one figure was moving - a curious, multi-limbed object flailing about amid pellets of blood and clear fluid. The android Pim had been caught in the transport beam, her pattern breaking down and then re-materialising throughout the unfortunate K'Tani soldier, fusing her positronic systems with his flesh and blood. Though the unit was unrecognisable it still functioned at a primary level. Though she would never be repaired physically, Pim's memory algorithms were still perfectly intact.

There was only one thought on her mind: revenge.