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In the cargo hold on deck 20, the attack on the Defiant was felt with an even greater intensity than on the bridge.

P8 Blue and Lense found themselves in a hell-storm as cargo containers and equipment across the bay began to shift and tumble in response to the second assault on the ship. The lack of gravity, protective forcefields, and inertial dampening systems only exacerbated the situation as boxes sailed around the room, bouncing off the deck, bulkheads, the ceiling, and each other.

“Look out!” Lense cried, pulling the Nasat out of the path of a cargo crate as it rushed past where she had been standing the instant before.

“What is going on?” Pattie asked as the pair rested against the bulkhead, catching their breath while trying to keep an eye on the legion of errant debris pervading the chamber.

“Somebody’s shooting at us,” Lense said. “Probably the Tholians.”

Pattie looked at the doctor askance. “Why? How can you be sure?”

Cursing for what seemed like the hundredth time at her helmet interfering with her ability to wipe the perspiration from her face, Lense replied, “I don’t know why they’d want to attack us, but I’ve been on ships that were shot at enough to know what it feels like.”

And she’d certainly had her fill of that during the Dominion War, a course of events she had not counted on after graduating first in her Starfleet medical class. Such an accomplishment normally allowed the honored individual to choose their first duty assignment, and Lense had opted for Starfleet Medical Headquarters on Earth. She’d enjoyed that posting for a few years as she concentrated on research before deciding on a change of pace and requesting assignment to the U.S.S. Lexington . But then valedictorian status and personal preference gave way to the needs of the service as war erupted between the Federation and the Dominion. She’d always felt more than capable of handling any situation that life might confront her with, but that resolve had been sorely tested as she faced enough death and desecration against living tissue to last her several lifetimes.

You signed on with the da Vinci to get away from war and the horrors it inflicts on the body, Lense reminded herself. So how did you end up here?

“Unless Gomez can figure out a way to get enough power for the shields,” Lense said, “we’re a sitting duck out here.”

Any reply Pattie might have had was stifled as the Defiant shuddered against a third vicious impact to its hull. The shock from the attack sent the pair stumbling again for something to hold on to.

“Pattie!” Lense yelled out. The Nasat turned in her direction too late to avoid the cargo container careening off the deck and heading directly for her. She was directly in its path, trapped between it and the bulkhead. The tumbling box was moving fast enough and was of sufficient size that Lense feared Pattie would be severely injured if not crushed by its impact.

The Nasat’s eight limbs went out in a futile attempt to stop the wayward container, but could offer no resistance as it struck her full on. Lense saw Pattie’s head snap back, the box having struck her in the helmet and upper body and driving her toward the bulkhead behind her with the container in fervent pursuit.

Lense lunged forward to help, reacting instinctively rather than with any real course of action in mind. As she moved, she looked to the bulkhead that Pattie was about to smash into.

She saw stars .

“No!” was all Lense could shout before Pattie and the cargo container made contact with the bulkhead.

And passed through it as if it wasn’t even there .

For a split second, Lense’s mind refused to accept what she had just seen. The Defiant ’s hull had begun to destabilize around them, and Pattie had fallen outside of the ship itself!

“Pattie? Do you read me?” she called into her communicator, but received no response. Was the Nasat injured, or worse? Had her suit sustained damage in the collision with the cargo container? Was