If Dath'mar in this reality had indeed found the Gorn, he would have avoided them. Had he somehow spoken to them, he would have avoided any area Endeavour was in, believeing that Ford could take care of himself and would live dispite whatever incomvinience Endeavour's damage presented.
Dath'mar is inside the plasma storm, as is stated in my little shorties, to wreak havok among the Ya'wenn. He cannot enter the plasma region directly due to the necessity of crossing the Federation Border, as stated in Story #1, so he had to take the long hard road to avoid Fed space.
His finding the shuttle was blind luck. Had I wanted to spoil the surprise, I would have put in a little scene of Dath'mar deliberating over whether or not to save the shuttle. But I wanted, instead, to make it seem like perhaps a big asterois was about to hit the shuttle and that perhaps Ford risked his crew for no reason at all. In some moods, I might have even written it that way and killed them off. But I'm not done with the main characters of Davenport, Smith and Bronstien.
The ending wasn't rushed on my part, but does come off that way when read. I could tell that myself. I might not have been in the kind of mood to make it real wordy and detailed, and this may be what gives the impression. But this was the ending I had in mind from the get-go.
For the most part, the entire story is a rip-off of an RPG plot I used on La'ra and my gaming crew a year back or so. Only then, when the Klingons picked them up, their commander tortured our Fed heroes and had every intention of killing them before they were rescued.
Perhaps a future re-writing where I tell the last part of the final scene from Dath'mar's perspective might make the ending seem less easy...
anywho...
-thu guv!