A/N: here's chapter 3, for those of you who follow. Which reminds me, thank you very much to those people who have followed, faved and reviewed, it's deeply appreciated and it makes me glad that others enjoy my rambling :) hope you continue to enjoy it, because I know I do.

Thanks again, folks, and please review if you wish.


The darkness of the DaVinci's main engineering room was brightened momentarily, as a dozen teleporter beams coalesced into the forms of Lydana and her crew. Almost immediately, T'Vrell and Yatsai pulled out their tricorders and began scanning the area, while Zarva and her engineering team began inspecting the equipment in the room.

"Zarva, see about restoring some power first," Lydana said quietly, as if she was worried about disturbing the dead. "We need to get the emergency force-fields working so we can examine the rest of the ship."

"On it, sir," the Bolian called, already commanding her team towards that goal.

"Then try and get life support back to normal, the air's pretty thin in here," Lydana added, before moving through the gloom and debris to conduct her own scans.

"I'm not picking up any lifesigns," she announced, examining her tricorder's read-out. "Whoever attacked this ship seems to have been pretty thorough."

She stepped over some fallen wiring and technological detritus, making her way over to one of the few consoles that hadn't blown out during the attack. It flickered intermittently, occasionally lighting the gloom with its sputtering display, and Lydana attempted to access its information. It emitted a few grumbling bleeps, before finally dying completely, and the young Lieutenant sighed.

"Zarva, how are we doing with the power?" she called, certain she knew the answer.

"We've only just started, sir," the Bolian shouted back, no doubt already up to her neck in ship's innards. "What I wouldn't give for a ship with bio-neural circuitry right now, instead of...this."

"I love it, myself," Lydana answered, "it has a quirky design and-"

"And it's an antique, like the Steadfast," Zarva finished, and Lydana chuckled.

"Maybe, but she's our antique." She paused and turned to T'Vrell, who was conducting some scans near the reinforced bulkhead that opened onto the rest of the deck.

"T'Vrell, what's the rest of this deck like? Is it survivable?"

"Affirmative, sir," the Vulcan woman replied, closing her tricorder and turning to Lydana. "Provided we can get this door open without power, of course."

"There should be a manual release near the bulkhead," Yatsai purred, her exotic accent lending her voice a sultry quality. The three of them examined the surrounding wall, until eventually T'Vrell discovered the manual release mechanism. After some effort, the door finally opened part way with a reluctant grinding of actuators, and with some more effort the three women forced the door open wide enough for them to exit the room.

The corridor outside of main engineering wasn't in a better state, if Lydana was being honest. As they explored, the same story was told across the deck - consoles blown out, debris fallen from the ceiling, and the bodies of the crew scattered around the deck.

"Who would do this?" Lydana asked, apropos of nothing. "These ships aren't even heavily armed, they're purely science vessels."

"Not unlike yourself, in that respect," T'Vrell stated, testing a nearby wall console.

"I suppose not," Lydana muttered, and suddenly the few remaining lights in the corridor flickered into weak life.

"Zarva to Lieutenant Kassai," her engineer's voice said from her comm-badge, "we've got limited power back. I can't get any more, there's been too much damage, so I'll have to monitor your progress from here and move the force-fields as you move."

"Understood Zarva, good work. See what you can find out from the engineering data, we're going to head for the bridge."

"Aye, sir. Zarva out."

"Come on then, ladies," Lydana said, gesturing to her officers. "If we're going to get any answers, they'll be on the bridge."

She led the way to the operational heart of the ship, almost scared of what she was going to find.


It took far longer than it should have to make their way to the bridge, since they were hampered by having to wait for Zarva to move the force-fields and, as they got closer to the bridge, grievous battle-damage that forced them to take the Jefferies tubes to get around the destroyed sections. Eventually, however, they made it to the bridge, and that was in the worst condition of all.

The immense wound that Lydana had pointed out back on the Steadfast actually cut across the roof of the bridge, and just looking up turned the young Bajoran's stomach - the thought that only a thin field of light and energy was all that stood between her and being sucked into oblivion was nerve-wracking, especially on a ship as badly damaged as the DaVinci was. The main viewscreen was a wreck, nearly all of the consoles had exploded, and the less said about the state of the bridge crew the better.

"Look around, see if you can find anything that might explain what happened here," she ordered, and the other two women did as instructed. Lydana was impressed - T'Vrell had adapted well to being commanded by a classmate, but Yatsai was new to the ship. The Trill woman had been transferred to her crew after they had returned from Vega colony, and had shown no problems with Lydana's leadership - despite the fact that at least one of her previous lives probably had far more experience.

While the Trill busied herself at the helm, trying to see where they had been going to and from, Lydana found a mostly-operational tactical station. She couldn't understand all of what she saw, but it was enough to make her worried. She frowned at some of the data, then tapped her comm-badge.

"Kassai to Steadfast."

"Flores here. What is it, captain?"

"I'm sending over some data from the DaVinci's tactical station, I need you to look it over for me. You can probably make more sense of it than me." She finished typing the commands into the console, and she was rewarded with the display showing an upload in progress.

"We've got the data, sir," Flores announced after a moment. "Am I looking for anything in particular?"

"Yes, anything that tells us who attacked this ship and why. Kassai, out." She sighed heavily, rubbing her temples with her thumb and forefinger, wondering why this duty had fallen to her. It was a path her mind had taken frequently since she inherited command of the Steadfast, and she didn't expect it to change any time soon.

"Yatsai, anything?" she asked, in an effort to distract herself.

"No sir, nothing out of the ordinary here."

"Lieutenant."

T'Vrell's simple announcement caught Lydana's attention immediately, and she walked over to where the Vulcan woman was scanning the massive scar across the top of the bridge.

"Are you seeing the same readings I am, sir?"

She pulled out her own tricorder and made the same scan, frowning at the data it showed.

"That can't be right," she muttered, typing in a command and scanning again. "How is that possible? And why? Why would this happen?"

"Sir?" Yatsai asked, sensing the rising panic in Lydana's voice. The lieutenant didn't respond, instead hitting her comm-badge and hailing the Steadfast again.

"Flores here."

"We've just done a scan of some of the damage here, and we have a much bigger problem," she told her First Officer. "The energy signatures match up, and I expect you'll find the same - the ship that did this was Federation."