Chapter 3

What just happened ?

Ben Sisko slowly awoke to find himself looking up into the beautiful face of Jadzia Dax?

" Ben, can you hear me ?" .... " Wake up " ..... " CAPATIN" Each time Dax tried to wake her Captain and best friend, her voice grew with more concern.

Slowly, but still groggy, Sisko got to his knees. As he looks around he sees the rest of the Ops personal doing the same, with Bashir leaning over the Chief, a deep cut across his for head.

" What the hell just happened ? Give me a systems status report ? " Sisko demands, anger at the effect the shock wave had on his crew, and briefly wondering if any other section of the station had faired the same, or worse.

Dax and Kira quickly made there way to their stations and began accessing their various controls. Sisko heard subdued but persisent voices and turned to see the Chief and Bashir talking quietly, but starting to become loud enough to overhear.

" Look, Miles, your head needs to be infirmary. It will only take a minute "

O'Brien started to protest, but that was all Sisko needed to hear,

" Chief, you heard the man, but report back her on the double "

The Chief wanted to stay and argue the point, but inside he was feeling awful, so he simply said

" Aye sir, " and then left with Bashir in tow.

" Captain, I've just been reviewing the sensor logs as the wormhole sent out the shock wave " reported Dax, " A ship of unknown origin came through the wormhole, apparently out of control. It drifted towards the station and then, 10 seconds before impact appears to have gained manoeuvring control and altered course to avoid hitting us. The ship itself is roughly one third the size of the station. It appears to have no external marking, but does have considerable damage to its outer hull, including what appears to be a large weapons strike on the bow on the ship."

Dax pauses, and appears to be frustrated with the console's readouts.

"Sensors we unable to penetrate it's Hull, and then the entire array failed due to secondary relays failing as a result of the shock wave. I don't know where it is, and I can't locate the Defiant until the array is repaired "

" Dax, go over the sensor images before the sensor suite failed, see if you can get me a picture of what the ship looked like " Sisko orders, after a moments thought

Now it was Kira's turn " Captain, the only systems that are still operational are the on-board systems, life support, internal comm's, and computer memory recall. They are not controlled by the main computer which has a partial failure. As far as that ship is concerned, right now that ship could be sat 5 meters from the hull, or they could be 5 light years away " Frustration was evident in the first officer. " We just have no way of knowing "

Before Sisko can answer Kira, Dax interrupts DS9's two most senior officers

" Ben, the only visual image I can get is coming on screen, I'm afraid that its not much "

All eyes in the room fix themselves upon the main screen. Dax starts the playback. The wormhole opens a lot quicker than it normally does, but instead of the circular entrance being blue, its pure white. The brightness increases, just as it had done originally. Dax then pauses the playback.

" In one second the shock wave blocks all sensor readings, but if you look here " Dax quickly zooms in on a section of the blinding white light. Everyone strains and there is a small black silhouette of a vessel emerging from the wormhole.

" Magnify " Sisko says to Dax

The screen focuses on the strange ship. From the angle of view, the vessel appears to have a main body at the rear of the ship, and three long forward sections, two smaller ones either side of the ship, and a bigger main prong emerging from the middle. The two outer sections had a long curved support bar connecting the tip of the bow section to the upper rear of the main hull.

Sisko ponders the problem

" Dax, get me all the details you can on that ship, I know that it wont be much. Kira, get repair crews to make the main computer the top priority."

As his officers turn to leave Sisko then taps is communicator

" Sisko to Bashir "

" Bashir here sir "

" Report "

" The chief is on his was back to you already, but we have reports coming in from all over the station, mainly knocks and bruises. A couple of workers were outside when the wormhole, er did whatever it did, and they both are blind, nothing permanent. We are lucky that the station is so empty right now. "

" Understood, Sisko out "

Just then the turbo lift reappears carrying Commander Worf,

" Captain " The big Klingon says in way of a greeting, relieved that his Captain was uninjured.

Sisko gets over his surprise of seeing the Klingon in ops rather than on the Defiant.

" Mr Worf, make your report "

" Sir when the Wormhole discharged it through out an incredible amount of gamma radiation, which blinded our sensors. I gave the command to return to the station. We have to literally pilot the ship visually using the main view screen. It was only through using the navigation log that we were able to return to the station at all, but I would like to put crewman Pitt forward for recommendation for advanced manual piloting, she seems to have a natural talent. The sensors on the Defiant are still being recalibrated, the Defiant will be ready to depart again in two hours."

Sisko had realised that he had been knocked out for so long.

" I don't want the Defiant re-deployed as of yet. A large ship came through the Wormhole and without our sensors we don't know where it is, its capabilities or intentions. "

" Understood, but Sir, we could deploy the Runabounts to check the system. Their systems would not have been effected as they were powered down during the phenomenon "

" Good point Mr Worf, issue the orders "