21
"Well, Orb, we're finally here," Cathi remarked as the Headwind finally dropped out of hyperspace for hopefully the last time. According to the starmaps the system the Ferengi had sent her to was less than three thousand light-years away from where they had intercepted her. At the speeds their ships traveled at, the trip would have taken over a month. Normally, back home, the trip would take a day at most depending on the route chosen. But there were no routes in this galaxy, so she was stuck making short hops through the voids between the stars.
At least in theory, that is. She had looked at the charts and told them she could do it in a week, but as usual things had not gone anywhere near the plan. It seemed like every other jump she had calculated wound up dropping her out of hyperspace with a gravity well alarm, even in regions of space that were supposedly totally devoid of stars. So far, the trip had taken almost two weeks to complete. She just hoped that the customers would still be there when she arrived.
"Actually, we are not quite there yet," Orb replied. "We still have to cross the system at sublight speed."
Cathi leaned forward to take a closer look at the navicomputer. "Not if we make a short hop over to the planet."
"I believe the Ferengi were quite insistent that we remain undetected," Orb said. "The radiation of a hyperspace jump would be too obvious that close to the colony."
"Not if they don't know what to look for," Cathi retorted. "But if we just go in slow, we'll be seen for sure. What ships are in the system, anyway?"
"There are two energy sources that stand out," Orb replied. "Both are in orbit of the fourth planet."
"That could be tricky," she remarked. "Let me see."
Orb called up a schematic on the holoprojector, which showed the planet and two blue blips flying around it.
She reached out with her finger to point at the moon orbiting the planet. "Look, they're both on one side of the planet. We could come in behind the moon."
"And if they have sensors there?"
She frowned. "That could be a problem. Well, how about this. We could calculate the jump to come in right on top of the planet's atmosphere. It would be risky, but I've done it before. Then we just come in midway between the moon and their ships, and we should be low enough that the planet should block us from their sensors."
"What if it does not?"
She shrugged. "We'll just have to make sure this works."
"I do not find that reassuring."
Cathi brushed the comment off. "Oh, relax. These idiots can't possibly be worse than Corporate Sector goons and you know how many times we had run-ins with them."
"That is even less assuring."
She leaned forward to the navicomputer and started entering in the destination. Once she was satisfied, she pulled back on the activation levers and Headwind shot forward, entering hyperspace just for the moment it took to cross the system.
Then the ship felt as if it had slammed into a brick wall, For a brief instant Cathi thought she had actually hit something before she recognized the cherry-red glow of superheated plasma outside the cockpit, and realized that she had just hit the atmosphere at a much higher speed than was normally safe.
At least the shields were up, she thought as she shoved the throttle controls into full reverse to drop the ship's suicidal speed before the atmosphere got any thicker. Finally the plasma glow disappeared, and minutes later the atmosphere darkened to a beautiful shade of azure blue.
"How far are we from the colony?"
"According to the map of the planet, the colony is almost six thousand kilometers from our position. Both of the alien ships are holding position within observation distance of it."
"Damn it," she cursed uselessly. "Well, we still have that swoop bike aboard, don't we?"
"Yes. You're not going to ask me to ride on that deathtrap, are you?"
She laughed. "Of course not. I'll just bring a comlink so you can translate for me. But you have to watch the ship."
They were now skimming through the lower atmosphere, and the viewports went white for a moment as the Headwind dove through a thick cloud bank, emerging below in a vast sea of green treetops. Spotting a small gap in the trees, she flipped the YT-2400 sideways and slid the small freighter into the gap, settling it down on the forest floor some twenty meters below.
"Get out the camo netting," she said, double-checking the atmospheric readings to make sure she wouldn't be opening the ramp to something dangerous. Once it had lowered, she stepped out into the crisp, cold winter air and took a deep breath. "Wow. Really nice out here," she said to nobody in particular.
"Here is the net, Mistress Cathi," the droid suddenly said from behind her, causing her to jump slightly.
"Since when do you walk quietly?" she asked.
"You never asked if I could before," Orb replied.
She harrumphed. "And here you were complaining about how your servos are noisier than normal. Sounds like they're fine to me."
"They're 0.5 microns out of tolerance."
"Give me that net," she said, taking the ungainly bundle out of Orb's hands. She fumbled with it, trying to untangle the four repulsorpods at each corner from the massive bundle. "Where's the remote for this thing?"
"There's a remote?" Orb asked innocently.
"Go back and see if you dropped it while I straighten this damned thing out."
"Even if I did," Orb retorted, "you should know by now that my design prevents me from bending completely to the deck and thus I would be unable to retrieve the remote."
She threw a glare at him. "Then I guess I need to get a new droid."
"But I like having you as my master."
"Then quit complaining and go find that remote. If you can't grab it, you can at least tell me where it is. Unless you want to untangle this mess of a net while I get the remote."
"I will look," the droid replied after only a moment's pause. "Excuse me, Mistress."
By the time Orb returned, she had finally managed to get the last of the spherical repulsorpods disengaged from the netting and was in the process of spreading the net out. The powercell charge on the repulsorpods was still quite high, so at least she didn't need to recharge them.
She stood up and followed Orb back inside the ship, returning a moment later with the remote control. The net activated with a quiet hum, lifted up several meters in the air by the pods. Then she steered it in position over the ship and slowly lowered it into place. Finally, she activated its built-in holographic grid, and after a few flickers the Headwind seemed to fade away with the exception of the landing struts and the lowered ramp.
She snorted softly. It was't actually a true holographic shroud; those, in particular the personal ones, tended to be obscenely expensive. Instead Tarv had purchased a knockoff model from some trading post they'd stopped at. The net essentially took a snapshot of the surrounding scenery and reproduced as much of it as possible. It wouldn't fool an active sensor scan, but it would defeat most passive attempts at observation.
Besides, there was a sensor scrambler aboard, although she wasn't sure how well it would work on whatever sensor systems they used in this galaxy.
It took much longer for her to unpack and drag the swoop bike out of its place in the packed cargo hold. After quite a few minutes of swearing and cursing, she finally managed to switch on its repulsorlifts and push it down the ramp.
"Alright, Orb. I'm going to drop off a comlink repeater a few hundred meters away. I'll target the ship with a lasercomm. Should be pretty hard for anyone to detect."
Damned ships in orbit, she silently cursed. It was going to take almost a full day at the swoop's maximum speed to cover the distance to the colony, to say nothing of the return trip and how was she going to get their weapons out to them? She just hoped they had some way of moving equipment over such a distance.
She strapped herself into the bike, put the enclosed helmet on, and slowly began moving through the forest in search of a suitable place for the repeater. It turned out that there was a split tree within line of sight of the ship that the repeater neatly fit into.
"Orb," she said, switching on the lasercomm. "Do you copy?"
"Loud and clear, Mistress."
"Good. Only call me if there's an emergency."
"Of course," the droid replied.
After double-checking to make sure her comlink was properly linked with the repeater, she got back on the swoop bike and raised it up to the treetop level. Then she set the inertial navigation system and cranked the bike up to full power, rocketing out over the trees at close to three hundred kilometers per hour.
Some four hours in, a red beam lanced out of the trees, just narrowly missing the swoop. Cathi cursed and killed the throttle, juking the bike down into the trees and grabbing her own blaster out of its holster. Moments later, she was down at the forest floor, looking around to try and find the shooter.
She pulled the helmet off and stuck it back into its storage position. There was a slight rustling noise in the forest and she spun around to look, but saw only a couple of branches shaking. Slowly, she eased the swoop bike over in that direction, still unable to spot anything.
Then four humanoids emerged from the underbrush around her. Two of them she could have sworn looked like perfectly normal humans, while the other two had some distinctive bony ridges and pale, grayish-colored skin. All of them were dressed in loose-fitting military-style clothes with patterns that matched the undergrowth of the forest. The apparent leader, a human man, put up his hand in the relatively universal gesture for "stop" and said something that she was guessing meant the same thing.
"Orb?" she quietly muttered into her earpiece, "Did you get that?"
"Not enough context," the droid's voice replied in her ear.
"OK, then translate this into Ferengi for me: Who are you?
She turned the speaker up so that the humanoids could hear Orb's translation. They paused, glanced at each other for a moment in evident confusion, and then their leader replied in Ferengi.
"They say they are just colonists and are wondering who you are, since you are obviously not from this planet."
"I'm a merchant," she replied, "looking for the colony."
"They say the Dominion does not permit any merchants and want to know how you got through the blockade."
"I'm afraid I can't reveal that."
"Are you a Founder?" one of the gray-skinned ones asked. It took Cathi a moment to realize that they had asked the question in Basic, likely because the accent was off.
"What's a Founder?"
"Who sent you here?" their human leader asked, completely ignoring her question.
"I have a shipment for the colony, from the Ferengi," she replied.
"It's not supposed to be here for another two weeks."
Cathi shrugged. "I was passing through and ran into the Ferengi. They hired me to get this to you. Now you're going to complain that it's early?"
The four looked at her suspiciously. "Where are the goods?"
"Safely inside my ship," she replied.
"And where is your ship?"
"Why should I tell you now? How do I know you're not going to hold me hostage and force me to hand the shipment over?"
"We already have you hostage," the gray-skinned one replied. "Unless you would like us to shoot you while you try to escape on that bike. Now drop your weapon and step away from the hoverbike."
"Fine," Cathi said with a sigh, tossing her BlasTech aside. She still had a holdout blaster hidden, and hoped they wouldn't search her. "But I'm still not going to tell you where the ship is until we can put the weapons aside and negotiate like civilized people."
The leader waved at the other three and they lowered their weapons slightly, although she noticed their hands were still firmly wrapped around the grips. "They have shapeshifters, so we have to take extra precautions." He pulled out a small scanner of some sort and held it up; it began making quiet beeping noises.
"Well?" she asked after a moment had passed. "Am I human or not?"
He put the scanner away, walked over to where she had dropped her blaster and then handed it back to her. "Sorry about all that. I'm Jon Boyd."
"Cathi Riclin," she replied as she slid the blaster back into its holster.
He pointed to the gray-skinned humanoid on his right. "This is Delak, my second in command." He then gestured to the other gray-skinned alien. "Silar, our engineer, and Marina, our sharpshooter." The last person was a tall, lanky woman with short-cropped reddish blond hair.
"Pleased to meet you," Marina said with what might have been a small wink.
"So," Jon broke in, "what do you have for us?"
Cathi closed her eyes for a moment to remember. "Several crates of food and supplies, two photon grenade launchers, fifty grenades, sixteen Cardassian disruptor rifles, and thirty type two phasers, plus one slugthrower of some sort."
"A Barrett?" Marina asked, her face brightening.
"I think that's what it was," Cathi replied. "I'm not quite sure."
Jon stepped forward. "That's good. We're very low on supplies right now anyway. So, how far away is your ship?"
She pointed back in the direction she had come. "About two thousand klicks that way."
"Klicks?"
She caught the confused look on their faces. "Oh. Kilometers."
Jon let out a low whistle. "That's pretty far. Do you think you can bring the ship any closer?"
"I don't know," she said with a shrug. "Do you think they'd detect me if I did?"
"It depends," Delak said. "What kind of ship do you have?"
"A YT-2400 light freighter."
The four humans and aliens looked at her with puzzled stares before Jon spoke up. "I'm not familiar with that model. Where's it from?"
"Corellian Engineering," Cathi replied.
They exchanged glances before Jon spoke again. "I don't think we should chance it. Delak, wait here with Cathi while I go get the jumper."
When they had left, Cathi turned to Delak. "Jumper?"
"Short for puddle jumper," the alien replied. "I think it's an old Earth term."
"I see. Is that where you're from?"
The gray-skinned alien let out what might have been a snort. "No. I am a Cardassian."
Now it was Cathi's turn to frown. "The Ferengi told me that the Cardassians were allied with the Dominion."
"Officially, yes," Delak replied. "Our government is nothing more than a puppet. When they began purging the Maquis colonies here, at first we thought it would finally be our chance to reclaim our territory. Then the Dominion began treating us no better than the humans. We are third class citizens in the Dominion... we might as well be slaves. So a number of us began to fight alongside the Maquis."
"In this case, Jon and Marina?" Cathi guessed.
"Yes."
"How many Maquis are there here?"
The Cardassian looked around as if suspicious. "I am not at liberty to say. We have had many losses to the Jem'Hadar since this began. Hopefully the weapons you bring will be enough to let us make their hold on this world painful for them."
Cathi nodded. "I can see why you would want revenge."
"It is not revenge," Delak replied. "It is my desire to see a free Cardassia once again. That is why I fight." He looked her over. "How well can you handle a weapon?"
"Just fine, thank you," Cathi said in a somewhat clipped tone. "But don't think that I'm going to get myself involved in your war."
"It is not a question of whether you want to be involved in this war," the Cardassian stated in a monotone. "You are already involved."
"No, I can leave at any-" Her protest was cut off by a loud thundering noise. Moments later, a small, dagger-shaped craft streaked over the trees above followed by a deceptively slow-moving, large and ungainly craft with extended outriggers that were glowing an unnatural shade of violet.
"The Jem'Hadar have found us," Delak stated. "We will not be able to meet the others here. Can two ride on your hoverbike?"
"It's a swoop," Cathi corrected him, "and yes. Where are we going?"
"A safe location," Delak replied. "I will direct you."
"Great, I love backseat driving," she deadpanned. "Get on, let's get the hell out of here."
As it turned out, the safe location was a cave hidden in the hills to the north of where they were. Cathi flew the swoop as fast as she dared in between the trees, not wanting to break the forest canopy as she had before.
When they were about halfway there, there was a loud explosion and Cathi saw a reddish glow coming from the forest nearby.
"That wasn't the jumper, was it?" she asked.
"No," Delak replied. "I believe they were able to make it. The Jem'Hadar have likely cleared an area of forest to land their assault craft and begin a ground search."
"Wonderful," Cathi said. "You know, it's almost hopeless if you remain tied to a planet like this. Don't you have any way to escape if necessary?"
"We had a Cardassian shuttle that we stole," Delak said. "We would usually use it to get supplies. Then the Dominion changed all of the Cardassian authentication codes several months ago. We lost the shuttle and one of our best pilots."
"I'm sorry to hear that," she replied.
"I thought you did not want to become involved?"
"I don't," Cathi answered. "But it doesn't look like I have much choice right now. I can take you off-world if you want."
The Cardassian was silent for several moments. "That would be a decision for Jon to make."
Moments later, she pulled the swoop inside the entrance to the cave and shut it down. The dagger-shaped jumper she saw earlier was parked inside as well, with smoke rising from several fresh scorch marks that ran along its skin. On the aft wing surfaces, there were two cylindrical bulges with air scoops and if she looked at just the right angle, she could see the turbine blades hidden deep inside. Idly, she wondered if it had been manufactured locally or if it was mass-produced somewhere.
"This is bad," Jon said as he emerged from the depths of the cave. "One of the beetles landed a few klicks away from us. The other one's flying overhead, so we won't be able to use the jumper any more or we'll reveal ourselves."
"So what are we going to do?" Cathi asked. "If we stay here, they'll find us, won't they?"
Jon glanced back and forth between her and the foliage outside. "They will, eventually. Which is why we need to take the fight to them."
"How many ground troops do they have on each ship?"
"Over forty," Jon replied.
"Ten to one..." Cathi mused. "Not very good odds."
"We'd have better odds if I had that rifle," Marina suddenly said from behind Jon, causing him to jump slightly. "Then we could thin them out first."
"That presumes they will not be shrouded," Delak pointed out.
"Which is why I wanted a laser rangefinder on it," Marina replied. "The readings on it go crazy when you hit a shrouded Jem'Hadar."
"Well, forget that," Cathi interrupted. "What do you have right now?"
"Just type 2 compression rifles," Jon replied. "And a few power packs, but that's not going to be enough to take on a shipload of hardhats."
"I've got some improvised explosives," Marina added. "We could set claymores in the forest."
"That would take out a few of them," Jon said, "but it would also just piss the rest of them off. I wouldn't be surprised if they just fire a torpedo at us as soon as they locate this cave."
"It sounds like no matter what we do, we're screwed," Cathi observed. "Why can't we just use the jumper under the forest canopy? It looks like it'll work."
"It might, but it'll be really slow." Jon sighed and walked to the front of the cave, looking out at the dense forest beyond. "To get back to where you parked your ship, it'll take days at that speed. The reason we're in this cave is because there are minerals in the rock that effectively block their sensors. Once we leave the cave, we'll be wide open."
Cathi looked back and forth between Jon and the jumper several times. "When you went overhead, this looked like it was faster than the Jem'Hadar ship. Why can't we just outrun them?"
Jon exchanged glances with the Cardassians, then shrugged. "We've never really tried before. I suppose anything's better than just sitting around in this cave waiting for them to kill us." He turned to the open ramp at the side of the jumper. "Let's load the valuable stuff up, then get out of here."
The rest of the Maquis team dispersed quickly, returning minutes later with computers, weapons, and food. With Jon's help, Cathi pushed the swoop up the ramp into the jumper.
In less than twenty minutes, the Maquis had emptied everything they considered valuable from the base into the jumper and secured it with webbing inside. Cathi followed them up inside and began strapping herself into an open seat while Delak sealed the hatch.
"Everyone ready?" Jon asked. After everybody acknowledged, he powered up the jumper and the cabin was filled with the loud noise from the aft turbines. "Here we go..."
Cathi was slammed back into the seat from the sudden burst of acceleration as the jumper rocketed out of the cave. Evidently, the small craft didn't have any kind of inertial dampening system.
"Beetle at three o'clock," Marina reported a moment later.
"Re-configuring shields for hypersonic flight," Jon said. "Going to full power."
Once again, Cathi was slammed back into the seat with the renewed acceleration.
"The Jem'Hadar are falling back," Marina said. "Hang on... Looks like they're going to try a sub-orbital hop over us. I think it'll take them about twenty minutes."
"We'll be there in ten," Jon replied.
True to his word, ten minutes later the jumper was settling down in the clearing next to the Headwind, although Cathi had to warn him to keep him from setting down on the hidden freighter.
Almost before he had settled down, Marina and the two Cardassians had unstrapped themselves, opened the hatch, and began unloading the craft.
"I'll set the autopilot as a diversion," Jon remarked from the cockpit. "Maybe that'll throw them off for a few more minutes. How long does your ship take to warm up, Cathi?"
"It's already prepped for takeoff," she replied before she unstrapped herself and started down the ramp. Then she tapped her comlink. "Orb, drop the ramp. We have guests and we're in one hell of a hurry."
The droid acknowledged and moments later, a landing ramp seemed to appear from thin air in the forest clearing.
"Your ship is cloaked?" Marina asked in surprise. "I thought only capital ships could carry cloaks."
"It's just a cheap active camo net," Cathi replied as she steered the swoop out and toward her ship's ramp. "It can only fool the most basic sensors."
"Still, that's pretty useful," Marina remarked. "I can think of plenty of times I would have killed to have something like that."
"Don't get any ideas," Jon said.
Marina threw him an offended look. "You don't think I would really be dumb enough to do that now, would you?"
He shrugged. "Would you?"
She stuck out her middle finger at him before marching up into the Headwind with an armload of explosives.
Shaking her head at the exchange, Cathi went up into the ship behind Marina and stepped into the cockpit, where Orb was seated in the co-pilot's chair.
"Who are they?" the droid asked.
"The customers," she replied. "We were attacked by the Dominion. We're just going to take them off-world somewhere."
"For free?" Orb asked.
She was in the middle of checking the status displays when Orb asked the question. Her mouth opened and then closed as she considered it. "Well, no. I just haven't discussed payment yet."
"Therefore it's free," Orb replied.
"That's not what I said."
Orb tilted his head at a slight angle. "It has been my experience that it is almost always impossible to ask a customer for payment after services have been rendered if you did not first inform the customer of the cost."
"Fine time for you to pick up good business sense," Cathi shot back. "Well, try this one. There are two corvettes, filled with soldiers, that are hunting us down. If we don't get off this planet in the next five minutes, we are dead. Therefore, we don't get paid anything."
"I will start the pre-flight checklist," Orb said.
Cathi stepped out of the cockpit and nearly crashed into Delak. "We have loaded everything," the Cardassian said. "Jon has sent the jumper away but it seems the Jem'Hadar have not taken the bait and will be here in two minutes. Are you prepared to take off?"
She stepped around him for the camo net's remote, activating the repulsorpods and sending it down to the floor of the clearing. Once she had finished winding it up, she walked back into the ship and sealed the hatch.
"Can we help with anything?" Jon asked.
"Do you think you can run one of the laser turrets?"
"I'm not sure if I could," Jon mused, "but I think Marina and Silar could figure it out."
"Good." She pointed down the tight access corridor. "Second opening on the right, take the ladders up or down."
While Jon headed back to the acceleration couch in search of Marina and the Cardassian, she dashed into the cockpit and hurriedly strapped herself into the pilot's seat. True to his word, Orb had already run through most of the pre-flight checks. She flicked the repulsorlifts on, disengaged the throttle interlock, activated the shields, and then grabbed the intercom. "Everyone strapped in?"
"Yeah. How do you turn this thing on?" Marina's voice came over the comm.
Cathi tried to visualize the controls. It had been a while since she'd actually been in the turret. "Lift the upper right cover, then flip the red toggle. That's the power. The switch under the upper left cover arms the guns. Then just use the two sticks to aim the gun and pull the triggers to fire. There's a targeting grid in the center that should show you what you're aiming at, just try to get the target into the box. It'll automatically compensate for range."
"Got it."
She glanced up through the viewport, and not seeing anything overhead, slammed the repulsors to full power. The YT-2400 shot up like a rocket, breaking through the forest canopy and rocketing into the upper atmosphere.
"Hold up," Jon said breathlessly as he came running into the cockpit.
"I thought you were strapped in!"
"I was."
An alarm began beeping on the panel and Cathi checked the scopes. Sure enough, the Jem'Hadar ship was bearing down on them.
"Well hang on then!" She grabbed the throttle controls and pushed them as far as they would go. The ship surged forward, with only the barest hint of acceleration thanks to the inertial compensators. A violet-hued beam lanced through the atmosphere where the ship had been just seconds before.
"It only takes one or two hits like that to take out a shuttle," Jon warned.
"That's what I'm afraid of," Cathi replied. Another beam shot past and she put the ship into a series of twists and turns.
"We'll be clear of the atmosphere in a few minutes. Where are we going?"
"There's a planet in the Badlands that we should be able to go to. I'll get it for you once we go to warp."
"What do you mean, once we go to warp? I need the coordinates now so I can calculate the jump!" Cathi replied, throwing the ship into another barrel roll as more violet beams sizzled past the small freighter.
"Weird ship you've got," Jon muttered as he pulled out his PADD.
One of the shots managed to graze the side of the ship, and a new set of alarms went off in the cockpit.
"That tickled," she remarked, grabbing the intercom. "Marina, Silar, I hope you're ready on those cannons. We're going to make an attack run."
"We're what?" Jon blurted out.
"Well, I have to do something while you get those coordinates!"
"I'm ready," Marina reported.
Cathi yanked back on the controls, throwing the ship into a hard upward turn before suddenly pitching it back down. The Jem'Hadar corvette behind tried to mimic the maneuver and she then put the freighter into a wide barrel roll before punching straight down. As soon as she could tell the Jem'Hadar took the bait, she cut the throttle and ran the repulsors back up to full power. The ship suddenly came to a stop relative to the planet, practically bouncing off of its gravity well, and then it shot straight up through the atmosphere.
Not expecting the maneuver, the Jem'Hadar corvette continued past them before attempting to slow down. Cathi idly noted that its large bulk gave it terrible performance in the atmosphere, and as she lined the freighter up with the corvette's stern, both Marina and Silar leaned into it with the twin lasers. Two staccato streams of red bolts began spraying all over the larger ship, causing its shields to flare brightly where they impacted.
"Those don't look like lasers," Jon remarked in surprise.
"Yeah, I really have no idea why they're called that," Cathi replied.
Now on the defensive, the Jem'Hadar ship began accelerating up in an attempt to get out of the speed-robbing atmosphere. Holding onto the controls, Cathi stuck right behind it as they continued to hammer away at its aft quarters.
Just as it was clearing the atmosphere, there was a brighter flash from its aft shields and suddenly she could see small explosions as the shots struck armor plating. Marina gave an exuberant shout over the intercom and continued pelting the larger ship with fire.
Now free of the atmospheric friction, the Jem'Hadar craft began spinning around, probably to point its main weapons at them.
"Kriff," Cathi exclaimed, grabbing the controls and pushing Headwind into a dive below the Jem'Hadar ship. "Jon, you have those coordinates yet?"
"Yes."
She glanced over at the droid in the co-pilot's seat. "Orb, calculate the route, will you?"
"Yes, Mistress... but we are too close to the planet to execute a jump right now."
"I'm aware of that!" she snapped. Trying to stay aft of the Jem'Hadar craft, she pointed the ship perpendicular to the planet and ran the engines and repulsors back up to full power. "How much longer until we're clear?"
"Two minutes," Orb replied.
The cockpit was suddenly illuminated by a flash of violet. "Well, I guess they have their guns aimed at us again," Jon remarked.
"Thank you, Captain Obvious," Cathi snapped. "If you don't mind, I'm trying to keep us from dying here."
The seconds counted down agonizingly slow as Cathi continued making evasive maneuvers, all while trying to put more distance between themselves and the planet below. Then the ship suddenly seemed to buck, and the shield indicators on the panel all flashed red at the same time.
"We're doomed," Orb moaned.
"Pull yourself together, you overgrown rustbucket," Cathi retorted. "How much longer until we can jump?"
"Thirty seconds."
When they were down to ten seconds, the Jem'Hadar ship scored another solid hit. The shield indicators briefly flashed red before going out entirely, and Cathi cursed as the acrid stench of burning electronics drifted into the cockpit. Just what I need now. Battle damage.
"Everyone alright back there?"
"I need a fire extinguisher," Silar's voice replied.
"Look for a panel with big red arrows next to it, and push," Cathi replied.
Then Orb announced that they were clear of the gravity well, and she grabbed the hyperdrive controls. As always, the stars seemed to blur before being replaced by the usual mottled tunnel look.
Jon, on the other hand, looked out the viewport in confusion. "What happened?"
"We just jumped to hyperspace," she replied. "Relax. They can't follow us."
He considered what she had said for a moment. "So this doesn't have a warp drive?"
Cathi shrugged. "I don't even know what that is."
Jon threw her a perplexed look. "How could you not know? It's faster than light. Everyone uses it."
"Well, where I'm from, they call it hyperdrive."
He stood up and looked forward. "This isn't warp. I've never seen anything like it." Then he let out a sigh. "Forget it. I just hope you have enough food on board, because it's going to take us the better part of a month to get to the Badlands."
She pulled up the map she'd gotten from the Ferengi and had Orb overlay the coordinates for their destination on it. "Well, normally I could get you there in a few hours, but with all the stops I'll have to make it's probably going to take a few days. By the way, why do they call it the Badlands?"
"How is that possible?" Jon asked, ignoring the question. "Even Starfleet can't get there that fast."
She shrugged. "You're telling me. I've never seen a warp drive being used, so I don't know how they work or what they do, or even how fast they go. Who's Starfleet, by the way?"
Now Jon gave her an even more confused glare. "You really aren't from around here, are you?"
"What made you think I was?"
He slumped back in his seat. "I don't know what to think any more. You've got some weird hyperdrive that you claim is faster than anything Starfleet's come up with, laser cannons that aren't lasers but are powerful enough to take out Jem'Hadar shields, and all of this is stuffed into a ship smaller than a Federation fighter. And you act like you don't even know what Starfleet is. Just who are you?"
"I already told you," she replied. "I'm just a smuggler."