The Kevalushook against the impact of a particle beam. At first, Ocett wasn’t sure whether to be angry or amused, but the tac officer’s next frantic report put any notions of laughter out of her mind.

“Forward shields down! Emitters have overloaded! They’re recharging weapons!”

Ocett’s eyes widened as she leapt to her feet. “Fire at will! Helm, hard about!”

Letting fly with another salvo from its disruptors, the Kevalupivoted to port, turning its exposed bow away from its quarry. Explosions ripped open the Bajoran vessel’s hull and the ship broke in half, sending debris luminescing through the plasma field.

Ocett let out a breath. She was a little rattled; the confrontation had not gone at all as she’d expected. The Bajoran ship had been underpowered and should have been no match for the Kevalu.

She whirled angrily upon the tac officer. “What happened, Glinn?”

The young man swallowed. “It was the Denorios Belt, Dalin. Our shields were already taxed protecting us from the plasma field. Taking a direct hit on top of that overloaded the forward emitters. Perhaps if we had not—”

“This is a Union vessel!” Ocett snapped, cutting off whatever impertinent suggestion the glinn was about to make. “More than that, it is a Union vessel under mycommand, and I will tolerate no incompetence from its crew. You and the chief of engineering will begin work immediately to upgrade our shield emitters so that this unacceptable system failure never happens again. Do you understand me, Glinn?”

“Y-yes, Dalin,” the tac officer stammered. “Permission to leave the bridge?”

“Get out of my sight.”

Ocett waited until the glinn had departed, then discreetly exhaled again. “Helm,” she said as she retook her seat. “Take us out of the plasma field and resume original heading.”

The Kevalubucked gently as it maneuvered through the Denorios Belt, and Ocett considered how narrowly she had escaped humiliation. Her failure to capture the Bajorans was galling, but at least their vessel had been stopped, and damage to the Kevaluitself was minimal. Still, she was acutely cognizant of the fact that any misstep in her early years as a shipmaster was potentially one from which she would never recover.

It was an unusual choice for a woman to join the military; few ever did so, tending to pursue more traditional careers in the judiciary or the sciences. Most personnel in those professions could remain close to home, be with their families. But since Ocett was unable to have children, it was unlikely that she would ever find a permanent mate. Family was the highest ideal in Cardassian society, and a woman who could not bear children was considered undesirable. Ocett knew that many women in her position would have been bitter, considering themselves condemned to a life of solitude. But Ocett had perceived her situation as an opportunity for a career that would otherwise be closed to her. She had the freedom to travel as far away and as often as the military required, and she had no familial obligations to keep her from dangerous duty. But she was still a rarity. It spite of her recent promotion, none of her crew seemed able to forget it—a situation that required constant reminders, in no uncertain terms, of her absolute authority aboard the Kevalu.

It was with that thought that the gil at sensors, a male named Veda, spoke up. “Dalin, I’m picking up something unusual on midrange scanners.”

“Less preamble, Gil.”

“Yes, Dalin. It’s an object in the plasma fields, about the size of a cargo container. Refined metal, and a faint power signature.”

“Something from the Bajoran ship?”

“Negative. It’s too far from the debris field, and the metallurgy is inconsistent with anything produced by Bajorans or Cardassians.”

Ocett rose and went to the sensor station to see the readings for herself. What she saw gave her pause. Veda had definitely understated the matter: the ship’s database seemed not to know what to make of the object, as apparently nothing like it had ever been recorded by a Cardassian vessel. And there was something else.

“This reading here,” she said, indicating a specific segment of the datastream, “what is it?”

The gil frowned, apparently seeing it for the first time. “I’m not sure.”

Ocett sighed. “Enhance your scan and report,” she ordered. Men. No head for the sciences. It’s a defect of the sex—not inquisitive enough.

While she waited for Veda’s report, she considered her options. All things being equal, she would prefer not to have to interrupt her patrol to investigate an anomalous object, particularly one within the proven hazards of the Denorios Belt. But of course all things were not equal. Since the ship’s automated logs would show that something had tripped the midrange sensors during its patrol, it would be inadvisable to ignore the object. She could file a report of the discovery, but since she wholly expected her superiors to pay significantly more attention to her reports than to any of the men’s, she knew that if she overlooked a single thing, it would invite questions regarding her prudence. Her last option would be to beam the object aboard and conduct a proper analysis. She would almost certainly be accused of being overly zealous if she were to do that, but she felt it was favorable to the alternative—carelessness earned rebuke, especially for a female.

Veda made a puzzled sound. “Well?” Ocett said expectantly.

“Perhaps you should look at this yourself, Dalin.”

Ocett’s eyes narrowed as she leaned in. She arched an eyeridge. “There’s a small fluid mass suspended in the center of the object,” she said aloud, failing to disguise the surprise in her voice.

That caught the pilot’s attention. “Some kind of weapon, then,” he volunteered. “A volatile compound, or a biogenic device.”

“No, I don’t think so,” Ocett said. “It’s not exhibiting the properties normally associated with such materials. It’s almost as if…” She looked up at the pilot. “Helm, take us within transport range of the object, speed one-quarter impulse.”

“Dalin—?” the pilot began, but then reconsidered whatever he was about to say against Ocett’s withering glare. “Acknowledged. One-quarter impulse.”

Ocett pressed her comcuff and alerted the engineer in transport. “Gil Kretech, this is Dalin Ocett. Sensors have registered a small object of unknown composition. As soon as we’re within range, you’re to beam this object directly to the decon chamber so that it can be scanned and logged into the ship’s database.”

Her request was met with a brief pause. “Dalin, if I may say so, our mission is not one of exploration. We are not a science vessel. I recognize that curiosity is a uniquely feminine trait, but—”

Ocett cut him off swiftly. Males never had to tolerate such impudence. “I would advise you to forget my sex and carry out my orders, Gil,” she snapped.

His answer held the appropriate measure of meekness. “I will report back to you as soon as transport is complete, Dalin.”

“See that you do. Bridge out.”

Twenty metrics later, Ocett and Veda stood before the decontamination lab’s observation window while the gil deftly manipulated the remote instruments that were separating the object into its constituent parts: an unadorned, roughly cylindrical capsule that turned out to be a stasis apparatus of some kind, and a small spherical module. But while the alien technology was of considerable interest, it was the contents of the sphere to which Veda directed Ocett’s attention.

“There’s nothing like it in the database, just like the container,” Veda said as he studied the results of his new scans, which were flashing before them on the window as he worked. “But there’s no question that your suspicion about the reading was correct, Dalin. The liquid is organic.”