Equinox

by Diane Carey

  "You could say that," Ransom told him. "It's time we find another way home."

  Burke came out of his chair. "Another way!"

  "We're going to cooperate with Janeway. If she's willing."

  Gilmore and Thompson now turned also to stare at him. He understood-he was the only one among them who had never flinched, never broken, not for a moment.

  "Rudy," Burke began, "with all due respect, have you lost your mind?"

  "Just the opposite."

  As Burke stared in unshielded amazement, an alarm rang on Gilmore's board.

  "They're within range," she reported, her voice shaking. "They're charging weapons!"

  Ransom ignored Burke's glare. "Hail them."

  "Belay that order!" Burke snapped. "Raise shields!"

  "You're relieved of duty, Commander," Ransom said. He'd actually been ready for that. Burke probably really did think his captain was losing his grip. He was trying to help him hold on to it.

  Suddenly glazed with sweat, Burke drew his phaser and pointed it at Ransom. On stun? Or something else? "I'm taking command. Anyone who isn't with me, speak up now!"

  No one said anything. Obviously anguised to a breaking point, Burke grabbed Ransom's phaser. 'Take him to the brig!"

  Apparently Gilmore also thought the captain was cracking. For what she probably thought was for his own good, she drew her own phaser and moved toward him.

  "I'm sorry," she said. But come with me. Ransom went.

  "What's the status of our weapons?" Burke was asking.

  "Full complement of torpedoes," Thompson said. "Minimal phasers."

  "Open a secured channel to their sickbay. Stand by weapons."

  "I'm here." That was The Doctor.

  "We're going to need your help, Doctor. See if you can find Voyager's current shield frequency."

  "What's their range?" Burke asked.

  "Eight hundred kilometers."

  "Arm torpedoes. Fire!"

  "Direct hit, her port shields. They're holding. They're firing on us!" "Brace for incom ing!"

  The lift doors breathed open. Without even looking, Ransom stepped out, following the backs of Gilmore's legs. The ship shook under them, causing his arms to flare, and he looked up.

  "This isn't the brig," he pointed out. Instead, they were in the engine room.

  "I know," she said. "I'm with you, sir. Let's find a way to end this."

  She lowered her phaser.

  Slightly reinvigorated by that, Ransom felt his heart divide between his crew, some loyal to him, others loyal to the other him. How could he fault any of them?

  It'll be all right, Max. We 'II all clear our heads.

  He moved to a station. "We'll need to access transporter control."

  "I'll do it."

  Ransom touched his combadge. "Doctor, this is the captain."

  "Yes?"

  "How's Seven?"

  "I'm about to detach her cerebral cortex implants-"

  "Don't do it. I want you to put her back the way she was. We don't need the information anymore."

  "You have the data you need from her? After all my work?"

  "Yes, I don't need it anymore," Ransom fibbed. "I want you to reestablish her integrity. How long will it take?"

  "Well... a matter of minutes. She was much harder to take apart than she will be to..."

  "I want her as good as new, right away."

  "You're an interesting man, Captain."

  "Do the work. I'll explain later."

  He didn't wait for a confirmation. He hoped The Doctor thought Ransom still had the bridge and didn't call to check with Burke or anyone else. As the seconds ticked off, he held his breath for Seven's recovery.

  "We're dropping out of warp," Gilmore said, off her monitors. "The port nacelle's venting plasma. Voyager's still in hot pursuit."

  Ransom checked the nearest monitor. 'Tap into the bridge comm. I want to eavesdrop."

  She worked a panel. Almost instantly, the voices of all the familiar players began to boil through the engineering speakers.

  "Doctor to Equinox! I've got their shield frequency! I'm transmitting it to you now!"

  "They'll try to remodulate. Keep monitoring."

  "Aye, sir!"

  "Slow to one quarter impulse. Launch another torpedo."

  At her station, Gilmore followed the drama. "We're launching another one ... Voyager's put full power to her forward shields. Direct hit... deck four. They've got a hull breach."

  "Bet she's wondering how we broke through her

  shields," Ransom commented. "She thinks that doctor is her doctor."

  "They're moving out of range. I'm reading a remod-ulation of their shields. Rudy, Max is taking a pursuit course."

  "Oh, Max, why..." Ransom's groan rattled in his throat.

  "Voyager's lost impulse power. There goes their weapons array ... They're rotating their deflector frequency every few seconds, trying to get them to stay up."

  "This can't go on," Ransom muttered. "Hail them from down here, Maria. Find Janeway for me."

  "Go ahead. I think I've got them."

  Ransom drew a cleansing breath, then leaned toward the comm. "Captain, I'm prepared to surrender the Equinox, but I'm no longer in command. Max decided to stage a little mutiny. I think I can stop him. I've isolated transporter control... I can beam all of us to Voyager. You might want to have some guards standing by. Not everyone here's going to be happy to see you."

  Janeway was silent. Probably shocked. Why? That a man could change so suddenly?

  Wasn't all that sudden.

  "Proceed," Janeway spoke, keeping her tone even. "Bridge to security."

  "Thank you for not gloating," Ransom said lightly.

  "/ have no right to gloat, Captain. None at all."

  "I know what you mean, believe it or not. Maria, wide-range transporter beam."

  "Ready, sir."

  "Begin with the bridge crew."

  As she worked, Ransom continued to listen to the bridge activity.

  "Someone's trying to beam us off! Forcefields!"

  Gilmore worked furiously. "They're deflecting the targeting scanners."

  So much for getting the bridge crew off. The rest of the crew wouldn't be able to pull such a trick, not from the other parts of the ship.

  "Then beam the others to Voyager," Ransom decided. "Yourself included. I'll deal with Max."

  As Gilmore did as she was told, Ransom moved to another station. "Computer, give me access to the shield grid."

  It worked. The computer was still functioning under the assumption mat he was in command.

  "Maria," he called at the last second, "here."

  He tossed her a remote computer cartridge, especially encoded.

  "That's Captain Janeway's doctor, with his ethical subroutines restored. When you get to Voyager, tell her the doctor over there is ours. Have her upload him back into their system. Her own EMH will be able to take back bis sickbay."

  As the transporter beam began to hum, Maria's sad eyes embraced him. "Rudy..."

  Typically, once his decision was made, he never gave it another thought. He waved a hand to her and offered a fatherly grin. "Go. It's all right. I'll be right over."

  "The Doctor's not transmitting anymore!"

  Thompson's call of panic sent a jolt of desperation through Max Burke. They had to get through this and get Rudy back here on his bridge where he belonged, without the guilt put on him by that calculating woman over there.

  "Burke to Doctor! Report!"

  The Doctor's voice came, but the words were all wrong. "I'm afraid your physician's no longer on call."

  Burke felt his stomach constrict Everything was falling apart.

  "Max, this is the captain. I've just dropped the shield grid, everywhere except the bridge and my current location. Vital systems are exposed. I suggest you beam to Voyager while you still can."

  Slamming his hands to his thighs, Burke shuddered with anger and disappointment. This was maddening
. Rudy was poisoned.

  Fissures!

  They began opening all over the bridge!

  Beneath them, the ship trembled with a violent power drain..

  "The core's overloading!" Thompson called from the engineering station, over the whine of entry tones. "We've got to get out of here!"

  "Where!" Burke roared. "Voyager's brig?"

  "It's better than being vaporized!"

  "We've still got a working shuttle!"

  Thompson abandoned his station and whirled to face him. "The shuttle bay's two decks down!"

  Burke snatched up a phaser rifle and fired into two of the opening fissures.

  "Sir," Thompson fitfully began, "the aliens-"

  "We'll make it!"

  Everyone on the bridge now rushed for the lift, drawing phasers as they ran. Thompson, Burke noticed, joined them at the last minute. What choice did he have?

  They burst out of the lift two decks down, firing freely the instant the doors opened, and continued firing freely as fissures broke before them, behind them, and at their sides.

  Fight! Keep fighting! Never give up! Rudy had taught them well. If only that damned Janeway had butted out!

  "That way!" he called, and angled down the port corridor, around the corner-

  Screams broke behind him-human screams. He recognized the tenor and didn't turn to see his shipmates die. When the alien tone broke, he whirled and fired at the sound, collapsing two more fissures. More screams.

  A gurgling gush at his left side ... that was Thompson. Gone now.

  Was anyone left?

  He kept shooting, wildly now, frantically. The whole corridor was hidden now behind opening fissures. There was nothing to stop the aliens. Not even nominal, struggling shields.

  When he turned to run forward again, he came face to face with his past and future. A green bony skull, fanged lips, claws out of a children's story.

  He squeezed the trigger, but his phaser rifle sputtered and would not fire. Drained.

  Energy coiled around him, an envelope of icy fingers, shriveling his skin instantly. He felt his bones dry up and his skin sink as he was driven to the deck. His eyes squeezed tight and there was air rushing through his skull.

  Rudy... we made it. Look over there... you did it. We 're home...

  Janeway stood on her bridge, unchallenged, perhaps vindicated in the crew's minds, though not in her own. She summoned all her self-control to avoid calling Chakotay back to the bridge until this played itself out She wanted him here, but that would send the wrong signal. She didn't like this win. It was corrupt.

  "There's only one life sign left," Harry Kim sadly reported. "It's Ransom."

  Only one. / know the meaning of that.

  She worked the nearest console. "Captain?"

  Rudy Ransom's calm face appeared on the screen, scored with dirt and lined with sudden age. His voice played through the starship's comm system like the narrator speaking over events playing out on a screen.

  "Things didn't work out exactly as I planned. But you've got everyone worth getting."

  Her chest caved in at his words-he meant everyone that could serve Voyager. The message was crushing. Burke. That strong, loyal young man. And Ransom himself-

  "We're beaming you out of there," Janeway attempted, feeling a deep need to exercise a little charity, if a little late.

  He shook his head mildly. "No. This ship is about to explode. I've got to put some distance between us. I've accessed helm control."

  "You can set the autonavigation and then transport to Voyager."

  "No time."

  Nausea joined the crushing feeling in her gut. There was plenty of time. The screen cut out.

  On the Equinox, Ransom took hold of a small device and put it behind his ear, then turned some kind of control on it. He spoke over the comm link. "You've got a fine crew, Captain. Promise me you'll get them home."

  Janeway's voice barely made it over the link. "I promise."

  The sound of the alien tone began to break in Equinox's engine room. Fissures opening, the warp core winding up to overload ...

  On Voyager Janeway indulged in a silent moan. This wasn't what she had ever had in mind.

  As they watched, the Equinox raced away from the starship, rushing in a swept arc through the cloud of some past cataclysm. It dragged interstellar matter with it for a few thousand miles, farther and farther, smaller and smaller, until it was only a point of light in the deep distance.

  Booooooooommmmmm

  A wash of light broke, as if a child's finger had

  drawn chalkdust across a blackboard. The tail of dust turned to spark les. Warp residue.

  Ransom had, in the end, confirmed Chakotay's guess that he wasn't out for himself. Even at the last action, he was protecting his crew, if only to free them from having to follow him anymore. He had, with this single decisive action, commended his surviving crew to Janeway's command with his blessing.

  / wonder how long he was ready to die.

  Surrounded by her somber crew, Kathryn Janeway watched the sad repercussion of a day gone bad.

  Quick and crisp. If she could write her own farewell, this would do.

  "Hang on, Captain," she murmured.

  No one else heard. No one else was listening.

  CHAPTER 15

  "THE ALIENS FROM THE FISSURES, IT SEEMS, CAPTAIN,

  have returned to their realm now that Equinox is gone. What are your orders?"

  As he asked his question, Tuvok stood with Tom Paris, Harry Kim, and B'Elanna Torres at his sides, the scene looking incomplete. They were all reserved in their captain's presence. They hadn't quite forgiven her. Understandable, since she wasn't even close to forgiving herself.

  "Secure from general quarters," she said, her throat dust-dry. "Put a team on the shields and get the integrity back up. Damage control should work around the clock, all watches. Make sure The Doctor's program is secure too, no lingering ghosts of the other doctor. Let's not take chances. Have him check Seven thoroughly and make sure she's back to normal. Convene a

  meeting of the Equinox officers and all Voyager officers and department heads in the briefing room in thirty minutes. Have all other crewmen and the deckhands of the Equinox crew watch on monitors. Attendance is required. I want this all resolved in the next hour. It's over and I want it to feel over."

  "Aye, Captain."

  "The rest of you, take your posts. If anyone wants to speak to me privately, I'll be in my quarters this evening. Consider the invitation open. I'd like to hear what you think."

  That alone seemed to relieve Tom Paris. His expression relaxed just to hear her invite them to tell her off. He met B'Elanna's eyes, and Janeway could tell that they were back on track. Quietly, they both moved to their posts. Harry Kim openly smiled at her as he, too, moved back to his console.

  As Tuvok turned to fulfill those orders, Janeway stepped to the upper deck.

  "Tuvok..."

  He turned. "Yes?"

  "Reinstate Mr. Chakotay to his post with my compliments. He can supervise the repair teams. Have the ship's log read that he acted in the best interest of the ship and crew."

  "We will all be gratified, Captain. Thank you."

  "Don't thank me. I don't want to be thanked."

  Tuvok lowered his head once in a passive nod. "Understood."

  And he really did.

  "There. Good as new."

  The sickbay was a reassuring place for Seven of Nine, especially as she heard The Doctor's words telling her she was whole and well again. Somehow that gave her a curious sensation in the middle of her body that did not compute in her mind.

  "I'd like you to regenerate for the next few hours," The Doctor completed. "It'll help stabilize your cortical array."

  "Understood." Seven stood up and allowed him to make a final adjustment to her eyepiece, but the work was done. All balance was restored. All sensations functioning.

  Why, then, was The Doctor hesitating over her? He was no longer
working, but only standing and looking at her in that curious searching way humans sometimes had... and he was not even human.

  "Regarding the ..." he paused, selecting words carefully, "unpleasantness aboard the Equinox... I hope you don't think less of me."

  "Your program was altered," she told him.

  Yet he still seemed troubled. Why? Nothing was his fault. His program-

  "It's quite disconcerting," he went on, "to know that all somebody has to do is flick a switch to turn me into Mr. Hyde."

  His face showed a burden that Seven found deeply troubling. She resisted the reaction and took instant refuge in hardware. "Perhaps you should enhance your program with security protocols," she suggested. "It will prevent such tampering in the future."

  "Good thinking."

  "When I'm done regenerating, I'll assist you."

  "Thanks."

  She went to the door, then surprised herself by pausing, much as he had a moment ago. "You were off-key."

  The Doctor tilted his head. "I beg your pardon?"

  'Third verse," she reminded, "second measure."

  His pride flashed. "That's impossible!"

  "Your vocal modulations deviated by point three zero decihertz," Seven confirmed inarguably. "I can help you with that, as well."

  Was it working? Her attempt at... was it teasing?

  "Really," The Doctor roughly said, with a tinge of challenge. "Holodeck two, tomorrow, sixteen hundred hours. Just you, and me, and a tuning fork."

  Seven felt the sides of her mouth draw outward without her meaning them to.

  "I look forward to it," she said.

  Thirty-five minutes later, Kathryn Janeway paced uneasily before all her officers, and all the Equinox's officers in the briefing room aboard the steadily improving Voyager. Already damages were being repaired. There was more light in the room now. Debris had been cleared away, though the carpet was still filthy and the table scratched. They were stood down from Red Alert.

  A few paces away, Chakotay stood silent, though he no longer averted his eyes from her. She hoped he had seen the recording of what had happened to Ransom, that it was the other captain who made the ultimate

  choice to die. She didn't want him thinking any worse of her than he already did.

  As the two crews settled and stopped fidgeting, Janeway surveyed the Equinox officers with a controlled expression. She didn't want them to think she approved of their behavior, but she also didn't want them to think she hated them or that they would be vilified here. Another thin line.