Tumock and Nige were ducked behind a panel dodging shots coming from the unknown intruder.
"Tumock, don't you think these energy bolts look awfully similar to the ones we saw on the planet when the Protectors attacked."
"I would be forced to agree. It seems that the Protectors have found some way to follow us up to the ship, no doubt to finish what they had started."
"Okay, now, we know what they are. How do we defeat them?"
"Our only option at the moment seems to be to fire back"
"It.... it won't work!" came a voice from behind them. "Phasers...don't affect it" The two of them turned around to see Benson lying on the floor.
"What happened? Are you all right?" asked Nige.
"The--the Protector as you call it, attacked us. It killed most of us, some escaped...." Benson's speech was interrupted as he coughed up blood "... I fired at it after it killed Brock but I... didn't damage it... It just turned around and shot me."
"Try not to talk, you're too badly hurt" said Nige looking over Benson. He had a large chunk taken out of the side of his body. "You're going to be just fine" said Nige. "We just need to get you to Sickbay."
"Nige, I can see Lieutenant Brock. I'm going to try and get to him. Create a distraction."
"What??? are you crazy!?"
"Just do it." Nige waited for a break in the firing and stood up and ran around the back of the warp core. Tumock dived from his position to the other side of the room where Brock's body was lying. "You can get back down now, Nige!" shouted Tumock. Nige ran back out and dived back behind his console. Tumock crawled over to Brock and checked him over. "Nige! He's not dead, however he will be soon if we do not get him to Sickbay."
"I don't think that's possible unless you have some way of getting past this thing."
"Perhaps I do" replied Tumock. He pulled himself up so that he could see the control panel in front of him. Luckily it was out of the line of fire. "If I can just tap into one of the runabouts' systems, I can transport us out of here."
"Can you hurry up!? This Protector is getting angry now! It seems to be getting closer as well!"
"Almost got it.... done!" The dark surroundings of engineering quickly disappeared and the four of them rematerialized in sickbay. Kira and Haakon quickly ran over and got Brock and Benson onto Biobeds and began treatment.
"What on earth happened?" asked Haakon.
"We have reason to believe that the Protectors somehow followed us up onto the ship," replied Tumock.
"They both took an energy bolt from one of those things."
"We'll see what we can do for them," said Kira, "but could you step outside please?"
"Doctor, before we go, where is Dinara?"
"She never got here. Was she meant to report to sickbay?"
"Yes, she was."
"Come on, Nige. Theres nothing we can do about it just now. We'd better get back to the bridge and inform the Captain of what's going on."