My first writing assignment is going to be my last. Maybe if i write to the journal and explain. Dear editors, thank you for the confidence you expressed in me by accepting my proposed profile of dr. Julian bashir. Unfortunately. Do you follow . Sort of. Good. Thats the key. The protein anomalies. S. Who cares about anomalies . People want stories about things they can relate to life and death, good and evil. An outbreak of cartalian fever the brave doctor battles the deadly virus. Listen to me im actually rooting for a plague. Of quantumscanning each and every peptide bond i thought id begin to make. beeping its a distress call from the federation colony on ajilon prime. Theyre under attack. The klingons have landed troops. So much for the cease fire. The main hospitals been damaged. What are we waiting for . Its too risky. The hospitals only 50 kilometers away from the front line. You put yourself into dangerous situations all the time. But thats not like putting you into one. Dont worry about me. Youre too young to die. Im 18. You know what i mean. Ive been on the station when it was under attack plenty of times. I can handle myself. Im a sisko. There are lives at stake. These people need you. I hope i dont regret this. Well be there in just under an hour. I can only imagine what your fathers going to say. Hell understand. Ill get you out of there as soon as reinforcements arrive. Besides, i wouldnt w wt you to miss the deadline on your story. Do you think theyd want a picture of me . Anyway, about those quantum scans i was telling you about. Surgery under fire. Now were talking. [captioning sponsored by the u. S. Department of education what is it, quark . The chief asked me to come up with a decafafinated raktajino for kira. Im thinking of marketing it. Ugh ugh oh, thats awful. Give it a chance. laughs drily let me taste it. Quark. Has plagued bartenders and restauranteurs for centuries. You cant expect me to solve it overnight. Well, im not paying for that. So much for quarktajino. I wanted to get her off caffeine not poison her. You make me sound like some kind of addict. She has ybe two raktajinos a day. I just dont want my son to be born with a caffeine habit. Youre being ridiculous. Why does pregnancy always make men hysterical . Excuse me. This is not the first baby ive had. Excuse me. Keiko had molly. Its not up to you to tell kira what she can and cannot do. She is carrying his child. He should have some say. As the lessee, he does have certain rights. Back home, pregnancy is considered a rental. Both rental . Something wrong, captain . I just talked to dr. Bashir. To answer a request for medical assistance. Jakes with him. Klingon Ground Troops have captured two settlements in the northern hemisphere. Half the colonists are still trapped on the planet and there are no ships in the area to evacuate them. Were three days awayt best. The farragut will get there the day after tomorrow. Bashir says that he and jake will leave once the relief teams are in place. That means theyllbe home by thursday. Doesnt give you much time to snoop through jakes things. Ready to beam down . No, we cant leave the runabout in orbit. Not with the klingons around. Besides, the colonists moved what was left of the medical equipment underground when the hospital was destroyed. And theres magngnite in the rock face. Looks like theres a clearing about a kilometer away from the main settlement. Jake. Things could get a little rough down there. Theyve got a lot of wounded. Ill be e l right. Weve got more wounded coming in ill need that plasma woman are you bashir . Resource said you were on your way. Watch it. Watch it this is the last i. P. His pulse is thready. He must be bleeding somewhere. We are losing him dr. Kalandra jump in, standard triage. Give him 15 milligrams inoprovaline. What should i do . Just keep out of the wayayplease. The arterys severed. Her b. P. s bottoming out nurse 02, three liters. Somebody, this man needs some help help me somebody, help me let me take a look. Ive been hit. Took a disruptor blast, real close. I need that blood d asma lets get you on the table. Theres nothing we can do. Hes too far gone. Doctor groaning it doesnt look that bad. I was stepping over a klingon. I thought he was dead. He caught me right in the foot. Ah you People Better get out of here while you still can. The klingons. Ththes no stopping them. What are you talking about . just sit tight. Well. Get to you as soon as we can. Its not a phaser burn it was a klingon. You werent there. You dont know what its like. The klingons had us pinned down. We were done for. We all knew it. Hendriks and pajal, they got scared. They ran. They ra then sully got hit in the leg. And the medics pulled him off the line and all i could think was. I wish i were him. And i took my phaser. sobbing oh, god find someplace else to stand. No problem. Triage the sorting of the wounded forces decisions that. Got to get a grip. Focus. Decisions that test what it means to be a doctor. Hey, you give me a hand. your Insurance Company wont replace the full value of your totaled new car. The guy says you picked the wrong insurance plan. No, i picked the wrong Insurance Company. With Liberty Mutual new car replacement . , you wont have to worry about replacing your car because youll get the full value back including depreciation. And if you have more than one Liberty Mutual policy, you qualify for a multipolicy discount, saving you money on your car and home coverage. Call for a free quote today. Liberty stands with you . Wait, wait, wait. This way. Over there. Hey, watch it. Watch it nice catch. Here you are, sir, a nice private room with a view. One, two, three. grunting well, you can count. Youre hired. Lets get you dressed. Id like to try an aortal graft. All right. Theres an extra surgical table in the back. Hes dead. sighing come on. Lets get him out of here. One, two, three. groaning sighing partys over. So soon . And we were just starting to have fun. Since you two arent busy, would you mind carrying me to the nearest replicator so that i can get something to eat . You wanted to see me, captain . To the infirmary. snorts ill be fine. The only permanent damage was to my pride. What happened . Quark wanted me to keep an eye on two yridians who he suspected were cheating at dabo. Turns out he was right. I could see from the second level that one of them was using a miniature gravimetric scanner to predict where the ball would land on the wheel and signaling the information to his partner. Ingenious. Go on. To make the arrest. One of them spotted me. They bolted. I pursued. Im afraid i got a bit carried away. And jumped off the stairs. grunts i was planning to change form in midair and become a tarkalian condor. Ah. That would have been impressive. I thought so. Een a solid. snorts solid i wonder why my people use that term. Humanoid bodies are so fragile. Yes, they are. And there are a lot of ways you can get hurt. Youre worried about jake. That dr. Bashir is looking after him. It seems. Just yesterday he was five years old. Clinging to me, because hed just scraped his knee and i was the only one in the world who could make it better. I remember, sometimes getting up in the middle of the night and slipping into his room and id sit there and watch him sleep and id think to myself that no matter what i wasnt going to let anything bad happen to this child. And now hes a sector away in a war zone and theres nothing i can do to protect him. Try not to worry, captain. It wont do you or jake any good. Cant help it. It comes with the territory. But jake is 18 years old. Does your father still worry about you . Oh, all the time. Ah. I never realized how stressful it is to be a parent. I have to say, i dont think its for me. Thats your choice, but you dont know what youre missing. door beeping yes . What about ajilon prime . Without reinforcements. Dax, youre with me. Here you go. Thanks. How you holding up . Okay. Well, you handled yourself well today. Im impressed. Im starved. Think ill start by making a lateral incision across the thigh joint. Uhoh. Hang on. Out we go. Pass the salt. How do you feel . The fresh air did me good. You remember that ensign, the one who shot himself . How could i forget . Whats going to happen to him . Hell probably be courtmartialed. He said that some of the people in his squad got scared and ran. It happens. But theyre starfleet. Theyve passed psychtest. Theyve spent hundreds of hours in battle simulations. Simulations cant prepare you for the real thing. Nothing can. Some people say that you dont know what youre really made of until youve been in battle. There are many situations in life which test a persons character. Thankfully, most of them dont involve death and destruction. Dr. Kalandra is looking for you. Something about that aortal graft you did. Oh, thanks. Um. Ill see you later. I put your tray back in the replicator. I didnt know how long youd be gone. How is he . The grafts holding. Blood throughput is almost 100 . Nice job. Thanks. You have a good team. My o. R. Nurse was as sharp as they come. We do the best we can, considering. The circumstances. So, are things any better for us . Last i heard, starfleet had pulled out of the arcanis sector. Well, the fleets regrouping for a counterattack. Oh. Do you have any idea what ships are involved . We dont get much news here. The klingons have been jamming the subspace traffic. I think, um, the rutledge and the tecumseh are heading things up. The tecumseh. , believe me captain raymond is one of the best there is. He saw the tecumseh through the cardassian wars. I dont think hes planning on losing her now. No. I dont suppose he is. Doctor . Theyve prepped that spinal trauma. Were ready for you in surgery. Ill be right there. Theyre keeping you busy. Yes. It helps keep my mind. Off things. Its good to see you got your appetite back. I have a pretty strong stomach. Most of the time. Dont worry about it. Same thing happened to me my first day. You know what i heard . That ship starfleet sent the farragut the klingons intercepted it. Starfleet will send another one, wont they . Wont be here for days and in the meantime were looking at a ground war which is just what the klingons want scramblers online that we cant beam troops anywhere. What about using hoppers . He says the klingons have been shooting them out of the sky left and right. Unless something changes, he figures the klingons will take the settlement the day after tomorrow. Did you see all the batleth wounds today . Klingons get mad, they forget about their disruptors, go hand to hand. If you ask me, theyre looking to get even for what happened on ganalda four. What happened . They had to retreat. Klingons hate that. At least we dont have to worry about them in here. Oh, dont be so sure. Medical personnel are fair game, as far as klingons are concerned. Theyll even kill wounded right in their beds. They think theyre giving them an honorable death. So, howd you wind up here . I, uh. Im writing an article about dr. Bashir. Youre a journalist . No. Not exactly. U know, fiction. I wonder if kirby knew that the whole time we were talking all i could think about was how close the klingons were. He didnt seem that worried. No one else seems to be losing sleep over it so whys it the only thing i can think about . Ive been on the station when it was under attack plenty of times, but somehow the danger never seemed as real as it does here. Maybe its because i spent all day or maybe its because, for the first time in my life my fathers not here to protect me. explosion what was that . The klingons. They must have taken out the reactor. Shes fibrillating. If we dont get power back soon well lose half the ward. Kidney failure, hes going into renal shock. I just talked to resource. There must be some portable generators we could use. Theyre using them to keep the shields up around the settlement. Theres a portable generator on the runabout. Where is it . About a kilometer south of here. Ill need help carrying it though. Youll have to take the east tunnel. That lets out beyond the perimeter. Ill show you. We set down just over that ridge. Yeah. It looks familiar. Get down stay close. Whatever happens, one of us has to get that generator. Stick with me. Come on, jake panting yells groaning medkit. Over there. Now hypo