"Here," Sovar told her, "I'll take that." Bending to the task, he lifted the doctor's container and stowed it in a place designed for such cargo.

Crusher eyed the first officer. "Getting me that blood information is as important as anything you'll do down there."

"I don't doubt it," said Riker.

He turned in his seat and surveyed his squad. Storm, Shadowcat, and his four security officers were already seated. As the first officer watched, Sovar joined them.

The doctor sighed. "Good luck, Will."

Riker gave her a rea.s.suring smile. "Thanks. Now if you'll excuse us, we've got some work to do."

As Crusher withdrew from the shuttle, the first officer touched the hatch control. A moment later, the metal plate slid closed, rendering the craft airtight and s.p.a.ceworthy.

Leaning forward and glancing out his observation port, Riker could see the next shuttle over. It was piloted by Lt. Kane, one of the officers on Troi's away team and a fine pilot in his own right.

The first officer couldn't see the counselor herself or the others who accompanied her. But he found some comfort in the knowledge that Wolverine, Colossus, and some of the ship's best security people were with her.

Not that Troi couldn't take care of herself. But when one was entering what amounted to a war zone, one needed all the help one could get.

As he thought this, the shuttlebay's doors slid apart. Only an invisible barrier still held the atmosphere inside the ship.

Riker powered up his engines. "Clear for departure?"he asked the officer in charge of the bay, who was standing at his control panel off to the side.

Suddenly, a shudder ran through the ship and the shuttledeck tilted wildly, sending men and women skidding across its surface. Fortunately, the shuttles themselves stayed put for the most part. Only one pod tipped over and lay on its side like a wounded beast.

It was a grim reminder of how vulnerable the Enterprise was in her damaged state. Riker almost hated to leave her-but like Troi, she was in the best hands he could imagine.

It didn't take long before order was restored and personnel returned to their posts. But it seemed to the first officer that Dr. Crusher would have some new casualties to deal with.

"Clear for departure," came the response, at last, from the officer in charge of the shuttlebay.

Riker worked his controls, lifting his shuttle off the deck while he still could, and nudged it forward toward the bay's transparent energy barrier. Then he activated the thrusters and slid the craft right through it.

A moment later, the first officer found himself free of the ship. He could see the immense, dark form of the Connharakt bearing down on the Enterprise-but with a burst of impulse speed, he powered himself clear of the alien warship. After all, with the Draa'kons' warp drive damaged, the shuttle could move every bit as fast as they could.

Riker's next stop was Verdeen. Still, he lingered for a few seconds to make sure the other shuttle made it out of the Enterprise all right. When he saw it emerge through the barrier and dart clear of the Connharakt just as he had, he nodded approvingly.

Then he headed for the planet's surface.

Worf and his team made their way down the dimly lit corridor, eyeing the juncture up ahead of them. They had to be getting close to their objective, the Klingon observed.

Not that it had been easy. They had run into squads of powerful Draa'kon defenders no less than three times since beaming aboard. And while Lt. Lee remained their only real casualty, they had all been battered and bloodied in hand to hand fighting.

Archangel was no exception. As usual, he was scouting up ahead, out of sight of the away team, though it made him more vulnerable than the rest of them. If not for his uncanny speed in close quarters, the mutant's pinions would have been clipped a long time ago.

Abruptly, the winged man came hurtling around the corner at them. Worf tensed. To this point, Archangel's retreats had meant a firefight was in the offing. But something about the mutant's expression made the Klingon suspect otherwise.

"We made it," Archangel told him. Alighting in front of them, he jerked his thumb over his shoulder. "Their engine room is just around the bend."

Encouraged, Worf picked up the pace. When he got to the juncture, he peeked around the corner at the corridor to his right.

It was empty. But the Klingon could see a grey, heavy-looking archway at the end of it, and beyond the archway there was something that looked very much like an engine room.

"You see?" asked Archangel.

Worf nodded. "I see."

He considered the contingent of armed guards that stood just inside the arch, illuminated by the glare from unseen light sources. The Klingon estimated that there were half a dozen of the Draa'kon. And, of course, there would be engineers and such further within, who might also have access to weapons in an emergency.

Worf turned to Ditko and Kirby. "It will be up to you," he said, "to disable the power transfer mechanisms. Though I do not know for certain, I imagine they will be similar to those you have seen on the Enterprise."

The security officers nodded and rechecked their phasers.

"And what're we t' do?" asked Banshee. "In other words, you, me, and our wee friend with th' wings on his back?"

The Klingon grunted. "We will fight."

The mutant smiled. "Sounds like a plan."

Peeking into the corridor again, Worf raised his left hand-a signal for everyone to get ready. A couple of seconds later, he let it drop. Then he charged down the pa.s.sageway, phaser held before him.

It took a moment or two for the Draa'kon to realize they were under attack. The two nearest guards whirled and took aim at the away team, their shots burning streaks in the bulkheads on either side of the Klingon.

Then it was the intruders' turn. Worf sent one of the guards flying with a ruby-red phaser burst, and Archangel swept the other one's feet out from under him. Two more Draa'kon stepped up to take their places, but Banshee opened his mouth and knocked them senseless.

Chaos erupted as the away team spilled into the cavernous, grey engine room. Green and crimson beams leaped back and forth, the faces of friend and foe alike illuminated in the crossfire.

The Klingon rolled to elude a point-blank blast and cut down his adversary with one of his own. A moment later, he saw his winged ally drive a Draa'kon into a bulkhead face first, then twist up and back along the ceiling to set his sights on another victim.

Banshee was driven to his knees by a two-handed blow from behind. But before his a.s.sailant could finish him off, Kirby skewered the Draa'kon with a well-placed phaser beam.

And so it went.

The engine room echoed wildly with their bellows and their grunts, with the thud of bodies. .h.i.tting each other and then hitting the deck. Worf fired, ducked, and fired again, trying desperately to make out his adversaries in the midst of flickering chaos.

Finally, he saw a sizable flash out of the corner of his eye, and knew by that sign that either Ditko or Kirby had gotten to the power transfer mechanisms. As circuitry sputtered and plasma conduits exploded, the Klingon collapsed another Draa'kon with a phaser shot to his midsection. Then he gestured for his team to withdraw from the engine room.

Laying down cover fire, Worf watched Ditko and Kirby race him to the exit. Banshee joined them a moment later. Last of all came Archangel, half his face bathed in blood from a cut to his temple.

Still, they were all alive, all in one piece. It was the best the Klingon could have hoped for.

Releasing a few last shots into the fireshot confusion in which they had left the engine room, Worf herded his charges down the corridor. After all, his mission wasn't over yet.

And it wouldn't be until he got his team home again.

Through narrowed eyes, High Implementor Isadjo watched the interlopers make their way along a corridor, leaving a scattering of fallen Draa'kon in their wake. Enraged, he cursed in the sacred tongue of his ancestors.

So these were the invaders who had destroyed the remainder of his mighty propulsion capabilities. Isadjo's gill-flaps fluttered. Had the Connharakt's internal sensor net not been damaged in its battle with the Enterprise, he would have gotten a look at them a good deal sooner.

And now that he had gotten a look at them, his mind raced with a mult.i.tude of questions. Who were these beings that they could cut down his soldiers like stands of marsh gra.s.s? Could it be that someone else had seeded a world as the Draa'kon had long ago seeded Xhaldia?

Isadjo was loathe to throw any more of his forces at the intruders, as it barely seemed to slow them down. Yet neither could he allow them to continue on their path of destruction.

Fortunately, he still had another option. "Ettojh," he snapped, "in which section are the invaders?"

His second-in-command consulted his scansurfaces. "Level three, section twenty-two, Implementor. Moving toward section twenty-three."

Isadjo's lips pulled back, exposing his many rows of teeth. "Activate the fire barriers ahead and behind them," he rumbled. "Then remove the air from their corridor."

As far as he had been able to tell, the intruders carried no personal oxygen supplies. With nothing to breathe, even the most formidable of them would turn weak and die.

Of that, at least, he was certain.

Chapter Twenty-three.

WORF PELTED DOWN the corridor, Kirby and Ditko close behind. Archangel circled up ahead, having already scouted the next corridor.

If the Klingon's memory of the Connharakt's schematics served, Worf and his team were swiftly approaching the transporter facility. That was where they would find Data and Nightcrawler, whose orders had been to precede the other teams there and prepare the place.

And if Data and Nightcrawler hadn't made it? If the Draa'kon had captured or destroyed them, and perhaps even set a trap for the other teams in the transporter room?

The Klingon would worry about that when the time came. At the moment, he was busy enough trying to get them to the rendezvous point.

Suddenly, he saw a flicker of yellow light up ahead. Knowing what it might mean, Worf cried out a warning. But before Archangel could heed it, he pa.s.sed straight through the center of an intensifying energy field.

The mutant jerked and twisted in supreme agony, his momentum carrying him through the barrier and out the other side. Fortunately for him, his pain didn't last long. He went limp and lost consciousness well before he hit the deck and rolled to a halt.

By that time, the energy field had stretched from one bulkhead to the other. It reached as high as the dark, rounded ceiling and as low as the floor, and it looked to be airtight into the bargain.

Banshee uttered a curse and tried to go after his fellow X-man, but the Klingon restrained him. "You must not touch that barrier," he grated. "It may knock you out as well."

"We can't just let Warren lie there," the mutant insisted. "Can ye nae see the lad needs help?"

Glancing back over his shoulder, Worf saw that a similar barrier had been erected in back of them. Realizing the nature of their trap, he shook his s.h.a.ggy head.

"What is it?" Banshee demanded.

"It is a response to the outbreak of fire," the Klingon replied, "not unlike those one finds on Starfleet vessels. Force fields drop on either side of the blaze. Then vents in the bulkheads draw the air out of the enclosure."

The skin at the bridge of the mutant's nose gathered in a knot. "You mean they're gonna try to suffocate us?"

Worf nodded. "I believe so."

Ditko looked up at the ceiling, then aimed his phaser at it and unleashed a bright red beam. It didn't even leave a char mark on the metal.

Turning to the Klingon, the officer shrugged. "The field is everywhere, sir. There doesn't seem to be any way out."

"Now that's where ye're wrong, lad," said Banshee. He eyed the barrier in front of them as if it were a living adversary, standing between him and his fallen comrade. "There's always a way out."

Throwing his redhaired head back and opening his mouth, he unleashed a high-pitched shriek. The force field sizzled and sputtered at the point where his sonic blast made contact with it, but remained stable otherwise. And when the mutant stopped shrieking, the barrier looked no different than when he had begun.

What was worse, Worf could hear the hiss of air as it began to leave their prison. The Draa'kon intended to suffocate them, all right. He clenched his teeth, wishing he had guessed wrong for a change.

"Wait a minute," said Banshee. He regarded the Klingon. "What if we were t' work together? My sonic blast and yer phaser, in th' same wee spot? Maybe we could find a ventilation shaft or somethin'."

It wouldn't hurt to try, Worf told himself. He reset his weapon and aimed it at the bulkhead, just to the left of the barrier. "Here," he decided.

"Whatever ye say," the mutant replied.

Again, he unleashed a blast, forcing the field to de-solidify in that one particular spot. A moment later, the Klingon fired his phaser right into the heart of Banshee's handiwork.

And it did the trick.

The phaser beam cut through the barrier and dug a hole in the metal bulkhead beneath it. But before long, the mutant had to stop and take a breath.

"It's th' blessed oxygen," he gasped. "We're losin' it, Worf."

The Klingon could hardly disagree. He was getting lightheaded, weak in the knees, and he was by far the hardiest of them.

"We must try it again," he told Banshee.

The mutant nodded, gathered his resources and delivered another blast in the same spot. As before, the barrier grew muddled. And as before, Worf applied his phaser beam to the center of it.

This time, they dug even deeper, exposing circuitry and power conduits. But eventually, Banshee had to stop, plant his hands on his knees and suck down a breath. And the oxygen was still running out of their enclosure.

Ditko and Kirby sat down to save their strength. But the mutant and the Klingon didn't have that luxury.

"We don't have much time left," Worf wheezed, knowing it was an understatement.

Banshee eyed him. "One more time, then," he panted, "with feelin', now." And he directed yet another sonic blast at the bulkhead.

At the same time, Worf activated his phaser. Thanks to the mutant's valiant effort, it probed beyond circuitry and power conduits, delving deeper and deeper with each pa.s.sing moment.

Banshee screamed a scream of defiance, as if he were daring the Draa'kon's trap to beat them. He dripped perspiration and turned a dangerously dark shade of red, but he refused to give up. And he kept screaming until his eyes rolled back in his head and he slumped to the deck, half-unconscious.

When the mutant's sonic blast stopped, the Klingon's phaser beam became useless against the barrier. Worf muttered a curse and sank to his knees, hating the idea of defeat even more than he hated the idea of death-though both of them seemed unavoidable at that point.

Suddenly, there was a ma.s.sive pop and the Klingon felt a breeze wash over him. Wondering how that could be, he looked at the barrier ahead of them and saw that it was gone.

But how ... ?

And then it came to him. The energy field had to have been projected from somewhere in the bulkhead. Their digging must have damaged one of the projectors.