by Alys Landale
Guiding the ship in between the torpedoes, he ordered, “Meylin, fire a torpedo at grid 449 by 883.”
She looked puzzled but followed orders. Punching in coordinates, her shot found its mark deep inside the aft hull of the Imperial ship. A series of explosions ensued after that and then the Bonthos’s flight pattern turned erratic as it began to fall towards the planet below.
Kail let out a roar as the ship fell towards the planet. *How the Hell did they break through our shields?*
“Pull the nose up,” he ordered his helmsman. “Try and make the impact as soft as possible.”
He and Takma clung to their seats as their ship plunged through the atmosphere of the planet. Soon they would come in contact with the tough soil below. He didn’t want to think about what would happen after that.
Harry couldn’t believe what he saw. The other ship was falling toward the planet’s surface and now the enemy vessel was growing ominously closer.
“If it’s a fight they want, I don’t think we should let them down,” said the captain. “Evasive maneuvers. Tuvok, fire at will.”
Xara thought she should be terrified right now but somehow she wasn’t. She knew they would get out of this because Rune was here now. He had saved her life and defeated a band of Parvanian guards. If he was here, nothing was going to happen.
Paris on the other hand, saw things a little differently. They had shot down the Bonthos but now Voyager was left to deal with. He dodged the first torpedo just barely as Voyager shot at them but the second penetrated his ship’s shielding and sliced through his hull.
Energy surged through the computer system as the explosion rocked the ship. He shut his eyes in pain as the force of the electricity lashed throughout his body. Forcing the pain back, he fought to maintain control.
His voice was on the verge of cracking as he said, “Meylin fire at will.”
Four shots rocked the shielding of Voyager but weren’t able to penetrate. The fifth one did.
“We’ve lost shields!” yelled Harry.
“Evasive maneuvers Mr...” Janeway’s sentence was never finished as the floor suddenly flew out from under her as a sixth shot ripped through their hull.
“Damage!” she called from her position on the floor.
Harry lay unconscious over his console. Chakotay also joined in his reprieve from where he lay on the floor. Tuvok answered the captain’s question.
“Decks nineteen through twenty one have sustained severe damage. There are no fatalities yet reported but I am getting readings from sickbay indicating numerous casualties.”
She tried to get to her feet. “Do we still have weapons on line?”
“No captain.” he replied. “We have lost all weapons and tacticianal. I am also reading severe damage in Engineering.”
B’Elanna fell to the floor as another explosion destroyed the tenth Jeffries Tube already. She cursed in Klingon. They had sustained massive damage in this attack. It was all she could do just to keep the warp core stabilized. And she wasn’t even that successful. Deep down she knew she was fighting a losing battle but her Klingon side wouldn’t let her admit that.
“Joe I need some help here. Joe! Joe!” It wasn’t until a few seconds later that she realized he wouldn’t be of any help. He lay unconscious just outside of one of the collapsed Jeffries Tubes.
“Someone help him!” she barked out. Another ensign then pulled him out of engineering. With all the damage they had sustained, there was no hope of using transporters. B’Elanna stayed with her work. She couldn’t just abandon it now. Another explosion blew up a console near her. The force of the blow sent her falling to the floor. Instinctively, she pulled her hands over her head. As she got up to survey the damage, she realized that there wasn’t anything she could do. The outlet she had just been working on was completely destroyed. That was when the bad news really came.
The warp core started to fluctuate and then destabilize. *No not again!* she thought.
This had happened before on her Day of Honor. It couldn’t be happening again.
She cursed once more as she finally let it sink in that there was nothing she could do.
“Everybody out of here now!” she yelled. “We have to dump the core.”
Ensigns ran past her, as she made sure everyone was out before leaving. Once at a safe distance, she jettisoned the core away for the second time in her career.
Slumping to a wall, she finally noticed a trickle of blood running down her forehead.
Everyone on Paris’s ship had smiles plastered across their faces as they watched the ship jettison its main propulsion unit. Everyone except Paris. He was struggling to stay conscious.
“Well, come on, let’s go for the kill.” shouted Sargon.
Tom shook his head. Something told him not to destroy that vessel. His insides just wouldn’t let him do such a task.
All on the bridge were so preoccupied with their double victory that they failed to notice the haggardness in Tom’s voice as he said, “They’re disabled that’s enough. Let’s just get out of here.”
He turned the ship around and drove it out of the area at Warp 6. Meylin looked astounded. “We should have destroyed them once and for all. Every ship that we allow to live is another that will attack us again.” Getting no response from Paris, she further implored. “Well, explain yourself.”
The only answer she received was that of Paris’s body slumping onto the console. His Borg-like tentacles retracted from their grip on the computer as he fell into unconsciousness.
Aria was the first to run over to him. She turned his body over so that she could get a clear view of his face. His eyes were squinted in pain and his face had a pale look to it.
“Satira get over here.”
Naomi Wildman had been inside sickbay during the battle. Samantha had remained with her daughter in an attempt to keep her calm, but now Naomi was even more frightened as crewman after crewman was rushed through the doors and escorted to either a biobed, or, after those were gone, a place on the floor.
Sam helped the doctor with the patients.
“Get me an ostioregenerator,” he told Ensign Wildman. The EMH couldn’t believe what he was seeing. This had to be one of the worst battles they had ever been involved in. He didn’t think crewmen would ever stop flowing through the sliding doors.
He was working on Joe Carrey at the moment that B’Elanna Torres was brought in. Handing the regenerator to Sam, he turned to the unconscious half Klingon.
“She passed out a while ago,” said the ensign carrying her. “I think she might have internal bleeding as well.”
“Here, put her on the table. I’ll try and stop the bleeding.”
Janeway stood on the bridge in quiet contemplation. Tuvok had assured her that Harry and Chakotay had nothing more than a slight concussion, but they had been taken to sickbay nonetheless. She now stared into the direction in which their attacker had fled.
She thought for sure that they would have stayed for the kill, but they hadn’t. Luckily, for her there had been no deaths yet but she didn’t know if that would last. At any rate, she was assured that it would be a considerably long time before Voyager was back on her feet again.
She wondered if anyone on the Bonthos was still alive.
Takma pulled herself up off the floor, followed by a much slower Kail.
She looked around at her surroundings. So far, she, the general, and one more officer were the only ones alive on the bridge.
Putting a hand to her aching side, she walked towards the door leading outside the bridge. She might as well see if anyone else was still alive.
******************
A day later, all three crews were still recovering from their ordeal. Takma stood aboard Voyager as she tried to get a diagnosis of the ship’s predicament from her. From what she could tell, it would take months worth of repair to fix the wounded ship.
Harry Kim, who had just recently recovered from slight head trauma, gave her the details.
“We’ve lost all our primary systems. If it wasn’t for your help Takma, we wouldn’t even have life support.” Takma’s husband had come to the rescue yet again.
Having come for the ship placed in the concentration camp, he was surprised to find him at a loss for his treasure and the founder of two crippled ships. Now his lead ship was hooked up to Voyager to give it life support. Takma and Kail had suffered from minor injuries from their accident and almost half of their ship was dead. Harry continued, “I’ve also run a scan of our computer memory. It seems that the damage to the ship erased some of the programs we had saved in its matrix. We lost certain Holoprograms, sensory data, as well as most of the Starfleet history information. The one thing it seems that was untouched is the data Seven and I have been going over for the past few days.”
“Data?” Takma asked.
“Yes, we recently acquired some data from a space station just outside this sector. So far, we’ve been able to translate most of it, but there are still some things we haven’t got to yet. By the way the ship is looking; it doesn’t look like we ever will.”
Takma was speechless for a while. *They actually downloaded information from that station. Maybe it has encrypted codes telling about some of that Borg-like technology.*
She turned to Janeway. “Captain, I feel partly responsible for this. I should have taken you directly to the safety of the interior of the Empire. Please allow me to give you a research station to work at. I can guarantee you a safe location and provide you with people to help you rebuild your ship.”
Janeway seemed stunned. “I don’t see how I could pass that offer up. I’ll have to discuss it with the rest of my senior staff but thank you.”
Takma smiled. Perhaps this wasn’t for nothing after all.
B’Elanna lie in sickbay asleep. The doctor walked over to monitor her condition. So far, he had been lucky, no one had died.
And he was going to keep it that way.
So far, his patient appeared to be dreaming. He walked away to let her sleep in peace.
B’Elanna felt Tom near her. He was standing right next to her. She leaned up against his muscular frame as he entwined his arms around her waist. She could stay this way forever.
“I love you,” she whispered to him and nuzzled her face into his chest.
She felt the warmth of his kiss as he placed his lips on her forehead. “I love you too,” he said.
B’Elanna raised her eyes to the face of the man she loved. He looked back to her with equal compassion, but there was something different about those sky blue orbs. Instead of the ever present light of vivacity and life, they were now replaced with a duller glow and a deep pain that she had never seen before.
She placed a hand to his face. What had happened to him?
Her dreams were ripped away from her just like before as a ruff wind swept away all her fantasies and disposed of her on the biobed in sickbay.
Torres awoke with a start. The dream had been so real. She still couldn’t shake the image of Tom’s eyes; they seemed so much colder than usual.
She shook the image from her mind. Dreams of the dead shouldn’t preoccupy her mind now. She still loved him more than life itself but he was gone now and there was nothing she could do. Rising from her bed, she wondered how long these dreams would last. They seemed to be her only solace on her lonely nights. If she couldn’t see him on this plane of reality then perhaps another plane might be a likely substitute.
*
Aria walked over to Paris’s biobed in the sickbay of Kuran. Once they had arrived at the base, she had ordered an emergency transport for him to sickbay. Since she was the only one present who knew anything about the man’s internal systems, she had been the one to take care of him. Satira, lending a hand whenever needed, had stood by her side the whole time. From what Aria could tell, a power surge had fried his internal organs whole he had been linked to the ship’s computer. While she tried to fix whatever she could, his own body seemed to be at work just the same. It was now only up to him on when he would wake up.
She placed a hand on his face. He appeared to be dreaming. A few seconds later, his eyes slowly opened to the sight of her standing over him.
“I see you finally decided to join us,” she said softly.
He smiled. “Yes I suppose I did. How long was I out?”
“Oh not too long, just a day.”
He took this into consideration. His mind was still preoccupied with the dream he had just experienced. The same woman was in it as well. But he pushed this away and struggled to get to a sitting position.
“Wait a minute there,” said Aria. “You can’t just expect to get up right now.”
She tried to push him back down to the bed but he resisted. “Look, the way I see it, I was out for a whole day, so that’s a whole day I have to try and make up now. So I had better get started now hadn’t I.”
She realized she couldn’t argue with him. Satira then came up and took her place.
“You can forget whatever thoughts you have of leaving here Rune. You are in no state to be going anywhere,” stated the doctor.
Tom turned to Satira, “You just watch me.” He got up from the bed and strode towards the door. Satira went over to a console and pushed in a few commands. A forcefield then appeared over the doorway to sickbay. Tom stopped.
“Now come back over here and get in bed,” she ordered.
Paris took another look at the woman. She had her hands on her hips and looked like she meant business. Tom just flashed her an impish grin and walked right through the forcefield as if it had been nothing but air.
Aria laughed to herself. She could already see that Satira was destined to have a lifelong battle of keeping that man in sickbay.
After leaving sickbay, Tom went in search of Xara. He found her nestled in Aria’s quarters. She sat on the bed in quiet solitude. He came up from behind her.
“Well, I was wondering what happened to you.” he said light-heartedly.
She turned around and ran into his arms. “I’m so glad to see you!”
He laughed a little as the child squeezed him even tighter. “Hold on now, you don’t want to send me back to sickbay with a few broken ribs, now do you?”
The smile on his face had grown. Xara could brighten his mood no matter what. The little girl’s innocence and youthful emotions just flooded off of her in waves. It was a relief to him to be with someone who was still so energetic and full of life.
He picked her up and took her into the living room. Then he asked his big question. “Do you have any family that I should notify? I’m sure we could find them.”
She looked a little downcast at this. “My parents died a year ago when the Empire attacked our ship.”
He hadn’t really expected for her to have anyone out there but somehow hearing it from her, made his heart break even more.
“Well, I’m sure we can find you some place to stay. I could speak to Consul Maris and he could let you have a room here.
You’d be safe.”
She looked up to his eyes. “Will you be here?”
He sighed. “I don’t know where I’ll be.” He looked at her expectant eyes and knew what she was trying to ask. “My life’s pretty strange right now, but if you want to come along, I’d be glad to have you.”
Her eyes lit up and she hugged him even tighter. “I want to stay with you.”
“Well, Squeaker,” he said. “You can stay with me as long as you like.”
That was how Aria found them when she walked in a few minutes later. They were on her couch in a big hug. She stood in the doorway and watched the scene for a few minutes before coming in.
“Well, Rune, if you keep staying in my quarters as much as you do, I’m going to have to start charging you rent.” She said as she walked over to the two.
“Oh come on Aria, you know this is the best room in the house. How can you not expect a few guests every now and then.” he teased.
“Yeah,” said Xara.
<
br /> Aria laughed. “I see you’ve got someone else on your side, now.”
Tom smiled. “Yes it looks like I do.”
*Can I talk to you for a minute* asked Aria silently.
Tom nodded and turned to Xara. “So Squeaker, do you mind if Aria and I talk for just a minute.”
Xara looked at the other woman, but nodded in agreement. “Just a minute,” she said and then walked into the bedroom.
Aria raised an eyebrow. “Looks like she’s already giving you orders.”
“Yeah, looks that way.” He then opened the conversation up. “What is it you want to talk about?”
She sat down next to him. “I was just wondering where you’re going to go now.”
He exhaled deeply before answering her. “That’s just what I was wondering. There isn’t really any place for me now. I suppose I’ll just have to go find one.”
She leaned a little closer. “There’s a place for you here.”
He looked into her violet eyes and knew what she was trying to say. “Thank you,” he said. “But you’ve seen how trouble is attracted to me. You...”
She put a finger to his lips. “I don’t care,” she said. “I can arrange something with Consul Maris. He can put you on a ship.
We can...We can be together.”
She knew the last part was more than she should have said, but somehow it just slipped out. It was her job to help this man and protect him. It wasn’t her destiny to be with him. The Fates hadn’t commissioned her to do that.
