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“No,” Koval said. “But it makes matters more interesting, doesn’t it?”

It seems self-evident to describe space as three-dimensional, but it’s something to keep in mind when talking about tactics. During the Romulan War, analogies to submarine warfare were often drawn, but they could help only so much. Yes, two submarines can confront each other up-to-down as well as sideways-to-sideways, but both would still be dependent upon the planet’s gravity for maneuverability, and could never have approached each other upside down.

But there is no “up” in space.

Cultural historians often found it interesting to study old twenty-first-century space operas and note that two ships or even two fleets facing off for battle inevitably arrived at the point of confrontation right side up. No one ever dropped out of warp upside down or perpendicular relative to the observer.

In this particular instance, those on the warbird saw Okinawa emerge from the void at a 45-degree angle. If the warbird hadn’t been cloaked, she would have seemed from the point of view of Okinawa to be listing acutely to starboard. From Sisko’s perspective on Albatross, they were both askew, but his mind adjusted for it even as the ships themselves corrected for the discrepancy. What worried Sisko more was that Albatross had ended up smack in the path of both of them.

“An interesting tactical dilemma,” Tuvok observed. “On the one hand, the warbird could simultaneously incinerate us and give Okinawa a glancing blow. But in doing so, she would have to decloak, and leave herself open to return fire from Okinawa. If we attempt to escape the line of fire, we risk giving the Romulans a clear shot at Okinawa; however-“

“Save it for the debriefing,” Sisko said tightly, racking his brain for a tactical maneuver that would solve this. “I’m getting us out of here, and then I’m going aft to see where that alarm is coming from.”

He threw the ship into a dive that structurally she shouldn’t have been able to manage, and the clumsy bird juddered and groaned and squawked in protest, but she somehow managed it.

“What do they think they’re doing?” Captain Leyton wondered. He’d been just about to hail Albatross when she suddenly began to plummet like her namesake after a fish. A glance at the energy distortion just behind where Albatross had been gave him his answer. “Oh, I see.”

He began issuing orders calmly. “Yellow alert. Send standard challenge on all frequencies. Raise shields. Weapons at ready; stand by. And let me know if Albatross slows down long enough to engage a tractor beam.”

“I can give you something for space sickness,” Selar suggested, seeing all the color drain from Zetha’s face as Sisko pulled the ship out of the dive, under Okinawa’s belly and, in a roller coaster ride of evasive maneuvers, out of the line of fire.

Zetha shook her head. “I’m fine. Tell me again about the test results. Is it really true?”

“Affirmative,” Selar said. Battened down or not, she had completed an analysis of hilopon, and was now downloading all the data she had gathered on this mission into her tricorder, in the event they needed to abandon ship. “We have a potential cure, and perhaps the rudiments of a vaccine as well.”

Despite her terror, Zetha managed a weak smile. “But if we die here, without letting the admiral and Dr. Crusher know…”

Selar had no answer. They had the Romulan datachips, and she would continue to copy her research in hopes of transferring both to Okinawa. Worry was illogical.

Too many Romulan commanders are trained only to fight, not to negotiate. Admiral Tal was not one of them. Looking daggers at Koval, he instructed his comm officer to answer Okinawa’s challenge at once.

“I can’t help thinking that that starship is here because of you,” he remarked to Koval as Comm fiddled with codes and frequencies, “I don’t know what you did on Renaga, but I do know where you went. It seems to me that ever since we crossed into the Outmarches, my crew and I have risked our lives for the privilege of becoming an interplanetary incident