by Greg Cox
The young neffaler peered at Torres, looked down at his whistle, then back at Torres. Her attempts at communication attracted Neelix’s attention. “What is it?” he whispered, lowering the wineskin from his lips. “What are you doing?”
“Do you really think he can rescue us?” Kes asked.
“Sssh!” Torres hushed them both. She kept her gaze locked on the neffaler’s wide-eyed stare. “Starfleet,” she repeated. “Find Starfleet now.”
A rock smashed into the sand in front of the neffaler’s feet, sending bits of sediment flying. “Get away from them, you miserable vermin!” came a voice, sounding both quavery and furious. The neffaler screeched in alarm and bounded away, fleeing faster than Torres had ever seen any neffaler move before. Another rock crashed into the ground behind the neffaler’s heels, barely missing the escaping creature. “Run, you flea-bitten piece of garbage! Run while you can!”
The irate voice broke off suddenly, replaced by a harsh racking cough. Torres yanked her gaze away from the frightened neffaler to see who chased him away. Blast it, she cursed silently. I was getting through to him. I know I was!
Varathael approached her, accompanied by a surprisingly sickly-looking specimen of Ryol manhood. Old and feeble, the other Ryol clutched yet another rock in his thin knobby fist. At first, she didn’t recognize the man walking a few paces behind the Elder. His gaunt body, partially covered by a thick black shawl draped over his bony shoulders, was positively scrawny compared to the robust physique of a typical Ryol male. Streaks of gray tainted his stringy golden mane, matching the lifeless pallor of his once-bronzed flesh. He treaded slowly over the sand and coral-strewn floor, moving with obvious pain and difficulty. Torres wondered briefly why she had never seen an elderly Ryol before, then spotted the thin white scar running down the old man’s face and remembered Tom Paris’s vivid description of his enemy among the Ryol. “Enough, Naxor,” Varathael said scornfully. “You are foolish to expend your remaining strength on such a pathetic and unworthy creature.”
Naxor? Could this frail and pallid creature be Varathael’s infamous assistant? Torres wondered. What could have possibly happened to him? The only explanation she could think of was that Naxor must have fallen victim to some ghastly form of Ryol cannibalism. Strangely, this evidence of infighting among the Ryol only heightened her sense of dread. Even the Vidiians, she thought, don’t prey on their own kind.
“Please, Elder,” Naxor begged. His voice was thin and whiny. Withered hands drew the shawl more tightly about his shoulder, apparently intent on protecting his trembling frame from the dank chill of the cargohold. “I need to restore myself. Please let me feed upon one of the new neffaler.” Watery green eyes fixed on Torres. He licked his cracked and bleeding lips. “Just one, that’s all I ask.”
“Later,” Varathael said curtly, dismissing his aide’s entreaty with a wave of his hand. He stopped in front of Torres, looking down at her with his own pale green eyes. “I am told,” he said to her, “that you are responsible for maintaining the technology that powers your starship. We shall have need of your services in the days to come.”
Torres climbed to her feet, determined to confront Varathael face to face. “It doesn’t look to me like you’re going anywhere,” she said. She kicked disdainfully at the rusty hull beneath the sediment. “I don’t know what you’ve heard about my abilities, but I’m no miracle worker.”
“Oh, I am fully aware that this ship will never fly again,” Varathael said. “But once we have your Voyager, we shall leave this pitiful hulk far behind.” He glanced upward at the distant ceiling. Cobwebs drooped from the jutting support beams like desiccated flesh hanging on to broken ribs. “You need not fear the tide, by the way. We have repaired the flood doors you burned your way through.”
Torres could care less about any damage they’d done to this underground prison. “What makes you think you can take Voyager?” she challenged Varathael, half afraid of what his answer might be.
Varathael laughed in her face. “Even as we speak,” he declared, “my daughter and several of her most trusted followers are seizing control of your ship.” He put a deceptively friendly hand upon her shoulder. “Voyager is a bland title, don’t you think, for such a magnificent vessel? I think I shall rename her once we are under way. Something more impressive. The Revenge, perhaps, or the Terror. What do you think?”
Torres jerked her shoulder away from Varathael’s grip. A growl formed at the back of her throat, but struggling to keep her Klingon fury under control, she swallowed the snarl before it could escape. “Under way where? Just where do you think you’re going?”
“To freedom!” he exclaimed passionately. “We have been marooned on this world for too long, forced to sustain ourselves on the diminishing life-force of the pathetic creatures we found here. There was a time, ages ago, when we prowled the starways at will, feasting on the souls of kings and emperors. A thousand worlds feared our hunger.”
Varathael’s lips peeled away from his smile, revealing gleaming white canines. His voice deepened as he became caught up in a spell of his own making. “That time will come again,” he intoned. “Our mighty new ship will carry us throughout the cosmos, unleashing our hunger upon countless new worlds and civilizations. We shall taste the life-blood of the universe and drink deep. Who knows? Perhaps someday we will even consume the distant worlds that birthed you and your fellow travelers.”
Inwardly, Torres felt a thrill of horror at the idea of the Ryol preying on the Federation and, yes, even the Klingon Empire, but she took care not to betray her true feelings. “And where do we fit in?” she asked defiantly. She heard Kes and Neelix stand up behind her, adding their support to her own paltry show of resistance. Neither Varathael nor Naxor looked at all scared.
“You and yours,” Varathael promised, “will play a most important part in our glorious destiny, as both servants and sustenance to the future masters of the galaxy. History will remember you as our liberators as well.” He shook his head sadly. “I fear its judgment will not be kind.”
Torres had heard enough. If only she still had her phaser! Her eyes focused on the ruby gemstone hanging around Varathael’s neck, the same device that had earlier protected the Ryol from her phaser blasts. Despite herself, she was both impressed and intrigued by the gem’s capabilities; even after decades of research and experimentation, personal shields remained impractical according to the standards of Alpha Quadrant technology. The energy demands alone had defeated the best efforts of generations of Federation scientists, not to mention their counterparts among the Klingons, Romulans, and Cardassians. A device like that, she thought, could revolutionize future warfare. Or grant the Ryol an easy victory over the Federation.
“I see you are interested in my jewelry,” Varathael commented. He tapped the gem and the crimson radiance surrounded him once more. He pressed it again and the glow disappeared. “A useful artifact of bygone days, although sadly unique. I’m afraid the knowledge behind its creation was lost in the crash. Perhaps, with your help, and Voyager’s vast scientific resources, we will finally be able to duplicate this treasure many times over, although I confess I shall regret losing the prestige of having the only one.”
Torres felt a twinge of scientific curiosity. Part of her would have liked nothing better than to take the Elder’s gem apart and see how it worked. The rest of her knew better. “Forget it,” she said. “I won’t cooperate with you, and neither will any of the others.”
“That’s right,” Neelix said. “We won’t help you. We know who you are. The Empty Ones.”
“Ah,” Varathael said, “I haven’t heard that term for what feels like centuries. How nice to know that we are still remembered.” His charming smile slipped away as his voice took on a darker, more ominous tone. “If you know the old stories, then you must realize that no one can defy us for long. If you are wise, you will not waste your energies trying to resist us.” He glared at Neelix. “We need some of you to help us master your ship,
but not all of you are essential. Do not think you are not expendable.”
“Yes!” Naxor broke in. He slid past Varathael to stare hungrily at Neelix. “Please, Elder, let me feed on this ugly one!”
“Ugly?” Neelix protested. “I’ll have you know that I am considered stunningly handsome among Talaxians.”
Naxor ignored Neelix’s words. The shrunken Ryol kept his gaze upon the indignant morale officer. Empty black circles began to dispel the teary green orbs in his sockets. Torres felt her muscles tense in anticipation of an attack upon the Ryol. All her aggressive tendencies came to the fore; she had to bite down on her lower lip to keep from growling. What do I do now? she wondered desperately. If Naxor really intended to kill Neelix before her eyes, was there any way she could stop him?
She quickly surveyed the potential battleground. There were only the three of them confined in the hold, being guarded by about a dozen unarmed Ryol, plus a handful of monkeylike neffaler tending to the Ryol and their prisoners. The odds were in her favor—if you didn’t count the extraordinary powers of the Ryol. Unfortunately, she couldn’t figure out a way to eliminate those powers from the equation. Think! Torres ordered herself, even calling upon her hated Klingon heritage for an answer. What would a full Klingon do in a situation like this? What would Kahless do?
“In fact,” Neelix continued, “as a child I was considered so adorable that—” His defiant words seemed to catch in his throat. A choking noise burbled past his lips. Kes let out a cry of alarm, then threw herself between Naxor and her lover. Was it even possible, Torres wondered, to block the Ryol’s attack that way? She didn’t wait to find out. Springing at Naxor like an enraged panther, she knocked him to the floor, throwing up a cloud of dust and black sand. The Ryol’s brittle bones snapped beneath her weight. His fetid breath escaped his lungs in one convulsive gasp.
“Stop!” Varathael demanded, but Torres was beyond restraint now. Pure killer instinct took over and she reached out automatically for a weapon, any weapon. Her fingers closed around the semi-petrified leg bone of one of the original victims of the Ryol conquest of the neffaler. Before anyone could stop her, before even Torres realized what she was doing, she drove the jagged point of the bone deep into Naxor’s chest.
The emaciated Ryol let out a terrifying shriek before dying. Viscous yellow fluid gushed from the wound, staining Torres’s hand and sleeve. She froze, shocked by her own actions, her fingers still locked around the length of the bone. She heard Kes gasp behind her, heard also the sound of Neelix breathing once more. I saved him, she thought. I think.
“How dare you!” Varathael shouted. He grabbed her by the collar and flung her away with one hand. The back of her head collided with the tall stone rising up through the floor. The impact rattled her teeth and blurred her vision momentarily. For a few seconds, she thought she was about to pass out. Then she only wished she had. A throbbing pain drew her hand back to the base of her skull. Her fingers, still sticky with Naxor’s blood, felt a fist-sized bump forming beneath her thick black hair.
Varathael gave her no opportunity to recover. Leaning over her capsized body, he thrust his face at hers until his bared teeth were less than two centimeters away from her eyes. The Elder’s urbane expression had given way to a look of unmitigated rage. Even his features seemed different, the jaw larger and more pronounced, his teeth longer and more sharp. The tips of his ears poked out from beneath his golden mane. Torres realized she was only a breath away from being eaten alive.
Then, at the last minute, Varathael seemed to regain control of himself, at least partly. He drew away from Torres, straightening his spine, his fists clenched at his sides. His voice when he spoke, however, remained full of barely contained fury.
“Thank your barbarian gods,” he snarled, “that your skills make you valuable to us. Naxor was an impulsive fool, but he was still superior to you and your kind. His life was not for you to take.”
Other Ryol, male and female, came running to the scene of the uproar. Torres saw their claws extending, their menacing green eyes growing darker. What are you? she thought urgently, dismayed by growing horror of the true nature of the Ryol. She tried to summon the strength to fight back, but the pain in her head made it hard to concentrate.
“Stand back,” Varathael called to his guards. They circled around the Elder and Torres. Peering through their looming bodies, she glimpsed Kes helping Neelix down onto the ground. The Talaxian looked shaken, but unharmed. “The crisis is over,” Varathael informed the other Ryol. His features resumed their former civilized pose.
You can’t fool me, she thought angrily, her Klingon temperament not yet fully doused. I’ve seen your real face. For once, she did not feel ashamed of her savage ancestry. There were worse things in the universe than Klingons.
Far worse.
• • •
“If the anesthezine hadn’t worked,” Janeway explained, “we were just going to beam in, phasers blazing, and try to retake the bridge using sheer brute force and surprise. I’m glad it didn’t come to that.”
“You’re telling me?” Paris said. With a fresh red uniform over his injured back, he looked none the worse for his recent ordeal at the hands of Laazia and her bestial companions. Tuvok had used a specially prepared hypospray on Paris to counteract the effects of the sleeping gas. Janeway silently thanked The Doctor for his foresight.
She glanced around her. The bridge still showed signs of wear and tear from its recent occupation. Durafoam padding poked out from the vicious gashes that Laazia’s talons had left in Captain Janeway’s chair; she could feel the spilled padding brush her back every time she shifted her weight. Shreds of velvet and silk, scattered about the floor of the bridge, also bore evidence to Laazia’s destructive rampage—and shocking transformation. Janeway took comfort in the fact that the Elder’s shape-changing daughter, along with the rest of her boarding party, was now safely locked away in a security cell guarded by the strongest forcefield Tuvok could arrange.
Susan Tukwila’s body had also been removed from the bridge, to await an examination and autopsy in the sickbay. Janeway winced at the thought; she felt personally responsible every time a crew member died on their long journey home. I’m sorry, Susan, she thought. I wish I had never heard of this terrible planet.
But there was little time to mourn. Although she had regained control of her ship, Janeway was acutely aware that three hostages remained on the planet below. Paris had brought Voyager back within transporter range of Ryolanov, but rescuing the trapped crew members was easier said than done.
“I don’t get it,” Paris said, seated at the conn station. “If the Ryol DNA is so weird, then why don’t we just set the transporters to distinguish between them and our own people? That should work even if their commbadges have been taken.”
“It is not that simple,” Tuvok declared. The Vulcan officer occupied the starboard aft security station. “Even if our transporters can overcome the Ryol defensive shields, there will be considerable delay.
“The moment we start beaming out the prisoners, the Ryol will realize what we’re up to. They might react by killing them before we can complete the transportation.”
Seated in his chair alongside Captain Janeway, the first officer looked more battered than the rest of them. Although some quick first aid had stopped the bleeding from the wound on his cheek, his face was badly bruised from his battle with Laazia. At the moment, though, he seemed oblivious to his own injuries and more concerned with the safety of B’Elanna and the others.
At least, Janeway thought, I have almost all of my senior officers on hand to cope with this emergency. Even Harry Kim, fully recovered from Naxor’s attack by the shore, manned his usual station at the operations console. Janeway knew she could count on them all to do whatever they could to resolve the crisis.
“As distressing as such a choice would be,” Tuvok said, turning around on his seat to face the front of the bridge, “I feel obliged to point out that, logically, Lieut
enant Torres is the most valuable crew member among the hostages. She is, after all, our chief engineer.”
Janeway shook her head. “I’m not ready to start practicing triage just yet. We need another solution. Mr. Kim, is the Elder still hailing us?”
“Yes, Captain,” Kim said. “On all channels.”
“Probably expecting a message from his daughter,” she commented dryly. “I think we’ve kept him waiting long enough. Mr. Tuvok, Chakotay, I’m going to confer with Varathael, find out what his demands are, and basically stall for time. In the meantime, I want you two to put your heads together and find a way out of this mess. Consult with The Doctor as well. Understood?”
“Perfectly, Captain,” Chakotay said. He rose from his chair and walked toward Tuvok. He had a definite limp, Janeway noted, although he was trying hard to conceal it.
“Mr. Kim,” she said. “Put the Elder through.”
Several minutes passed before Varathael’s face actually appeared on the main viewer. Janeway wondered where exactly he was and what he was up to; she didn’t recognize the chamber behind him, although it appeared old and dimly lit. “Captain Janeway,” he said. “As I stated earlier, before your transporter snatched Lieutenant Torres’s communicator from my hand, we have much to discuss.”
The Elder looked as handsome and regal as ever. Janeway tried to imagine his face metamorphosing into that of a ferocious beast and found it surprisingly easy to do. The monster was always there, she reflected, beneath a thin patina of charm and culture; all you needed was to know what to look for.
“Much indeed,” she agreed. “Including your daughter, I imagine. May I assume that you were aware of her attempt to seize control of Voyager?”
