Amidst the swirling clouds of the Vadlox gaseous anomaly, the science ship Hypatia struggled to withstand the force of the gravimetric distortion wave that had gripped her seemingly out of nowhere. With her engines charged to pull the ship full astern, she groaned beneath the counteracting forces that threatened to rip her apart.

Just a few hundred kilometers from her port bow, the sudden and violent distortions foreshadowed the formation of a second tunnel entrance which this time threatened to engulf the ship and drag it to the depths of, well, anywhere, if her crew could not find a way to anchor themselves or escape the anomaly’s grasp.

“Impulse engines are at full reverse, but we can’t maintain this,” Maddison Burton declared from the CONN, her dancing fingers trying their best to keep the mighty Sutherland from encroaching further towards the anomaly.

“Onsas! This is no bastard wormhole,” Kauhn shouted over the din of alarm bells and grumbling deck plates, his knuckles white as he gripped on for dear life, determined to resist this particular white knuckle ride with all of his might.

“The odds of two wormhole’s opening randomly in the same spatial phenomenon are astronomically high,” Matheus Ren glared across at the science chief, both deputy and chief alike flying their fingers across their terminal to provide the information the captain needed to get them out of the situation.

“You think?!” the Xelliat brute scolded his underling. Still, his readings didn’t lie. “I don’t know for certain what these things are,” he bawled over the din, “but they are insanely similar to a wormhole, Captain.”

“And we’ll end up who know’s where if we don’t get the hell out of dodge right fucking now,” Tharia interrupted before Kauhn could answer the science chief. “Engineering! Get us some more gods damn engine power NOW,” she bellowed over the comm, struggling to her feet and grasping the back of the helm officer’s seat for support while glaring at the flight chief’s actions.

“As much as I wish I could,” the voice of the Vulcan engineer was louder, more ruffled than usual, “it is illogical to ask for more of something that I am already giving you maximum of, Commander.”

“Engines at maximum,” Tharia nodded, “why didn’t you just say so?!” he countered across the airwaves.

“I believe I just did…” the Vulcan argued back, before ending the call on his end.

Tharia growled and cracked her neck. “I really hate that Vulcan…” she whispered, just loud enough to illicit a smirk from Maddison in the chair before her, which then drew the briefest of smiles from the XO before another, more violent shockwave threatened to send her barrelling across the bridge at speed. Had it not been for the Ops chief just a meter or so away, grabbing Tharia by the arm and pulling her to safety, almost sitting the XO in her own lap, the Andorian would have been severely hurt.

“Come on people,” Giarvar inched forward in his chair, checking on his XO’s condition, who simply nodded that she was ok. “I need options. How do we get out of this?”

“What about some specifically targeted torpedo detonations. They could break the wave’s hold on us,” Peri called from the tactical station, glancing back only briefly to make eye contact with the captain before returning to her panel.

“The detonations would be too close to the ship at this distance,” Onsas argued, “but we could try an anti-graviton beam from the main deflector. A powerful enough resonance blast could break us free.” He turned in his chair and appealed to the captain for one last chance to prove he was right.

“Get it done,” Giarvar nodded, trusting in his science chief just as he had during the Frontier Day debacle.

Onsas let out the briefest of grins, and nodded his thanks to the captain for his support. “Lieutenant Ruas,” he then called out, “I’m about to send you some adjustments for the deflector. We need to be set to the exact field harmonics or this won’t work.” Spinning in his chair, he nodded to his assistant and got to work.

As her crewmates waited for the adjustments from the Xelliat, Hypatia rumbled from bow to stern one more time, only this time, the distortion broke the grip of the impulse engines.

“Forward momentum increasing!” Burton reported from the helm. “Impulse engines are simply slowing us down at this point.”

“Onsas!”

“Sending adjustments… now.”

Ever the impatient one on the staff, Italia was in action before the schematic adjustments had even got to her stations. Having access to the full range of deflector control systems meant no long treks to the facility on deck fifteen. Within seconds, and with the help of Hypatia herself, Ruas was ready.

“Activating anti-graviton beam now,” her thick Italian accent couldn’t hide the relief in her voice as she finally activated the beam.

Flickering to life, Hypatia’s deflector unleashed a massive, continuous beam of anti-graviton particles into the aperture ahead of them. If the emergence of these openings had been described as lightning storms, then what transpired next had to be something akin to a storm compounded by some form of nucleogenic explosion. Blinding flashes of light filled the bridge as the anti-gravitons mixed with nature’s own forces in an epic battle for supremacy.

“Its working!” Maddison yelled happily from the CONN just a minute later, “Forward momentum is slowing.”

It was as if her words were a curse, for as soon as she had said them, Giarvar spotted something on the viewscreen that caused him great concern. At the focal point of the beam, its intense reaction with the gravimetric distortions of the aperture, coupled with the nebulous gases surrounding them, an enormous explosion erupted, sending a massive surge back down the length of the beam.

“Brace for impact!” his voice echoed across the ship, but it was a fraction too late. The feedback from the explosion hit the main deflector and sent Hypatia into an uncontrollable spin towards the very opening they’d sought to avoid. Across the ship, people and possessions alike mirrored the movement of their starship, resulting in casualties across her many decks. Not that anyone could report their injuries with communications just one of several systems immediately affected.

Those in the command center who had managed to stay in their seats tried their best to stall the ship’s entry into the aperture. Engines, warp and impulse alike, were one of few systems that surprisingly remained functional. Maddison, in conjunction with her colleagues at ops and tactical, tried everything at her disposal to stop Hypatia entering the anomaly. She engaged every thruster, every engine she could, but nothing worked.

Grasping hold of the rail to the right of her command chair, sh’Elas managed to drag herself to her feet just in time to watch as their ship tumbled into the mouth of the wormhole. But instead of any real damage being sustained once they entered the wormhole, the gravimetric distortions seemed to abate quite quickly. Hypatia seemed to level out quite smoothly and normal lighting was soon restored. The sudden, unexpected respite allowed the crew to gather themselves and tend to their wounded. Matheus was soon stepping into the shoes of a medical officer, performing scans and providing minor treatment in the absence of any ability to call for medical personnel.

sh’Elas, with the help of Lieutenant Ruas, guided the captain back into the safety of his chair, and used part of her uniform sleeve to tend to a wound on his right temple. “Come on guys,” she called out, “lets have some status updates.”

“Deflector offline but not too severely. Maybe an hour or two to get it back. Some other systems, such as communications, also offline,” Ruas answered in her thick accent. All things considered, she was pretty pleased.

“Shields and weapons operational,” Peri reported from tactical, “sensors are damaged and limited to short range only.”

“Where are we at with engines?” Tharia asked between dabs of the captain’s head. The Trill nodded his thanks and took the torn part of his XO’s uniform, allowing her to continue with running the show while he got the medical attention he needed from Matheus.

“All propulsion systems are online,” Maddie retorted, never taking her eyes off her display for a second. “Sensors show we are in a wormhole of some sort, but I’ve got no way of finding out where we are, or where we are headed,” the helmswoman grew frustrated.

“Curious…”

Tharia turned on her heels and looked towards the tactical station where the Bajoran officer in charge was deep into her analysis of something.

“I’m picking up minor pockets of debris strewn throughout the corridor,” the Commander reported to the Andorian, ”some of it pertaining to starships, some of it organic. One thing is for certain, some of it is old. Like, really old.” She waved Onsas over to her station, the hulking brute happy to oblige and help her in her analysis. Meanwhile, Tharia turned back to the CONN.

“Do what you can to avoid these debris fields,” the Andorian instructed.

“Don’t worry Commander,” Maddison smiled, eyes trained on the helm, “I don’t want to hit them anymore than you do.”

“Judging by the decay rates on some of the fragments we’ve scanned, we’ve got debris that’s been here for anywhere up to and including a decade or more,” Onsas grew more intrigued as he shared a glance of curiosity with the tactical chief. That curiosity was quickly replaced by a look of concern.

“What is it?” Tharia asked, antennae drooping and head cocked to one side.

“One of the debris fields we just scanned,” Peri turned in her chair to look towards the XO, who had made her way to the chair beside the captain, “it had a Species 8472 biosignature.”

Just mentioning the one species that was, perhaps, more deadly than the Borg themselves, drew the captain back into the present. He spun in his chair to look at the tactical chief and his scientist, looking at them with a singular raised brow. When they nodded their confirmation of their findings, he planted his left foot and spun back to the front of the command center.

“Maddie, find us a way out of here. We need to return to normal space and ascertain our situation,” Giarvar instructed, looking towards his XO for support. Tharia, however, looked torn. “I know what you’re going to say,” he frowned at her, “but the further we go, the further away we are likely to be.”

sh’Elas listened to the captain’s reasoning, and it was sound in logic. Pulling them back to normal space would also allow them to conduct needed repairs and better evaluate their situation. She didn’t like the unpredictability of where they might be. Letting out a sigh, she nodded in agreement.

Smiling at the XO, he thanked her for her support and turned his attention back to the CONN. “Maddie,” the captain reiterated his earlier instruction.

“Sensors are detecting an aperture ahead. Unsure of where we’ll be on the other side, however,” the human confirmed the XO’s suspicions but was happy to acquiesce to the captain’s request.

“I understand,” Giarvar nodded between sharp intakes of breath, very much still suffering the aftereffects of his fall. “Take us out at the earliest opportunity,” he added.

“Aye Captain,” the commander told from the CONN. “Exit aperture ahead. Exiting the wormhole in 5… 4… 3…”