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I sought out the source of the beam and saw it was Dunwoody who’d rescued me. But there was no time to thank him for it. Grabbing my phaser, I looked around for a target.

Only a couple of Cardassians were still standing. And as I watched, Astellanax and Sturgis made short work of them. The skirmish over, an eerie silence filled the corridor.

Of the dozen or so Cardassians who had attacked us, none moved. But we had taken casualties, as well. The Ferengi was staring at the ceiling, his eyes no doubt fixed on some celestial treasury. The woman was dead, too, her chest a smoking ruin.

I regretted what had happened to them. Nonetheless, the rest of us still stood, and our goal hadn’t changed.

“Come on,” said Astellanax. He glanced at the Yridian. “Pick up a weapon and let’s go.”

“Go where?” asked the Yridian.

“Engineering,” the first officer told him.

Without further explanation, Astellanax took the point again, advancing to the intersection of the two corridors and looking about. When he saw the way was clear, he went on.

As before, we were right behind him.

Madigoor

“STIRRING,” SAID DRAVVIN.

“I daresay,” Robinson added.

Hompaq didn’t speak. She just growled deep in her throat.

The Captain of the Kalliope looked at her. “You disagree?”

The Klingon eyed him. “A warrior does not set his phaser on stun. A warrior sends his enemies to their deaths.”

Picard returned her gaze evenly. “Perhaps. But I do not fancy myself a warrior, Hompaq. Nor would it have furthered my mission to destroy every Cardassian I laid my eyes on.”

“Nonetheless,” said Flenarrh, “you were fighting for your life. A stunned enemy is one who can rise again and prove your undoing.”

“True,” Picard conceded. “But I was willing to take that chance.”

“And this Dunwoody,” said Bo’tex. “It turned out you were wrong about him. He saved your life.”

Picard smiled. “He did indeed. But again, I find I’m getting ahead of myself. As I was saying …”

The Tale

WE NEGOTIATED THE corridors of the Daring, phasers at the ready, on the alert for the enemy. But, initially at least, all we encountered were a couple more strays.

One was a tall, slender Bajoran named Murrif, who looked uncomfortable holding a phaser even more so than Dunwoody. The other was an Oord, though not the one who had stood by Corbis in the mess hall.

“Have you seen any Cardassians?” asked the Oord.

Astellanax nodded. “We got the best of the encounter. But there are bound to be more of them around.”

“What about the captain?” asked Murrif.

“She’s defending the bridge,” said the first officer. “Or anyway, she’s supposed to be. Our job’s to get to engineering.”

“And get there we will,” Sturgis added.

There were nods all around. As wary as ever, we resumed our journey. After a while, the Yridian came up beside me.

“I didn’t want to fool you,” he told me.

“No?” I replied.

“It turned my stomach,” he went on. “But the Cardassians said they would kill us if we didn’t cooperate.”

I glanced at him. “And now two of you are dead anyway.”

“I’m alive,” he pointed out.

I frowned. But all I said was, “Yes. You’re alive.”

As I turned away from him, I heard a curious sound as if someone were pushing metal over metal. It seemed to be coming from the stretch of corridor directly behind us.

I whirled. At the same time, a half-dozen Cardassians dropped from the ceiling, where they had slid away a series of access plates. Even before they landed, they began firing their weapons at us.

“Back here!” I shouted to my comrades, pushing the Yridian in one direction as I threw myself in the other.

A couple of directed-energy beams sliced past us. Someone screamed, though I didn’t see who it was.

Then Astellanax and the others fired back, and the battle was joined in earnest. The air around me shivered and seethed with barrage after deadly barrage. One even came close enough to blind me for a moment.

As my eyes cleared, I leaned as far into the curvature of the bulkhead as I could and picked out a target. Doing my best to ignore the chaos all about