“Doesn’t matter now,” Paris said. “They cleared us and gave us our course.”
“Is there any chance this course leads directly into a mine?” Cambridge asked. “Watching us blow up is certainly less labor intensive than engaging us, on the off-chance they saw through our disguise.”
“Are you this cheery on all of your away missions, Counselor?” Paris asked.
“In my experience he’s usually much worse,” the Doctor offered.
“Ti’Ana, initiate another sensor sweep. Maybe we can detect something from inside this field we couldn’t get from Voyager.”
“Aye, sir.”
For the next several silent minutes, the shuttle continued forward on its erratic course. Each correction turned Paris’s stomach, but he kept his fears to himself.
“Sensors show nothing new, Commander,” Ti’Ana finally reported.
“That’s all right, just a few minutes more . . .” Paris said, the thought trailing off as he realized that their current course was going to bring them in range of one of the largest orbital platforms and its array of phase cannons.
“Ti’Ana, pull up a display of all of the other courses followed by the Rilnar vessels that have passed that checkpoint.”
“Why?”
“Now, Ensign.”
“Sorry. Of course, sir.”
When the display appeared, Paris took note of two patterns that intersected with their current course but ultimately broke off in slightly different directions. One of them would take the shuttle quite a bit farther from the platform. Paris didn’t honestly believe the Rilnar were intentionally sending them to their deaths, but he couldn’t ignore the possibility. His instincts told him avoiding that platform was important enough to risk a course alteration. With less than thirty seconds to spare, Paris manually overrode their current course and set the shuttle on a new trajectory, following the path traveled by another Rilnar transport vessel.
Ten seconds became twenty, then thirty. When a full two minutes had elapsed, Paris decided he had chosen wisely.
“We’re going to make orbit in six minutes,” Paris advised his team. “We’ll initiate a sensor sweep and once we have the location of the Rilnar command center, the Doctor, the counselor, and I will transport down. The data the Nihydron shared with us suggests that the command center will be shielded. We’ll be taking pattern enhancers down with us. Our subaural transceivers will replace our combadges for the duration and all of our communications will be monitored by Voyager. Our first goal will be to find a way through the shielded perimeter. Double-check your packs to make sure you have rations for . . .”
Paris couldn’t say what triggered his internal alarm. It might have been the sudden faint sluggishness of the helm. Most people wouldn’t have noticed the shift but Paris flew more by feel than data. As there was no way to know what a safe direction might be, the commander simply reversed course, intending to take the shuttle back along the same path it had safely followed thus far.
“Commander—” Ti’Ana began.
A clap of thunder and blinding light that sent the shuttle spiraling down into the atmosphere of Sormana told Paris that his course correction had come too late for the shuttle to avoid the subspace mine it had just triggered.
5
VESTA
Janeway sat in Captain Farkas’s ready room reviewing the grim spectacle of the shuttle’s uncontrolled fall toward the surface of Sormana. Their sensors couldn’t penetrate the atmosphere at this distance, so they had no way to determine the away team’s fate. Farkas stood behind the admiral, and Chakotay’s face stared back at her from half of the data panel.
“Do we know why Commander Paris altered his course?” Farkas asked.
“Not yet. But I trust Tom’s instincts. He must have had a good reason,” Chakotay replied.
“Have you been able to raise them on their personal transceivers?” Janeway asked.
“Negative. Something on the surface is jamming our signal,” Chakotay advised bitterly. “How do you wish to proceed, Admiral?”
Janeway placed both hands on her forehead and aggressively massaged her temples with her thumbs. A direct assault would bring both the Rilnar and the Zahl ships in the area down upon the Vesta. She might be able to hold out long enough to give Voyager enough cover to run the blockade. From orbit they could locate the shuttlecraft—or its debris—quickly enough to transport out any survivors.
Only the estimated yield of those subspace mines kept her from giving the order. Vesta’s shields might protect them from two or three direct mine impacts. Voyager’s smaller mass could sustain one or two at the most. The number of course corrections taken by every ship that had safely traversed the field suggested there would be more than a dozen along any path taken to orbit and back.
“We come clean,” Janeway said. “Initiate contact with the Rilnar checkpoint and advise them that we have lost a ship and intend to mount a rescue operation.”
“And if they say no?” Chakotay asked.
“I can see them refusing us,” Farkas said, “but what about the denzit?”
“Beg pardon?” Janeway asked.
“We throw one of their uniform jackets on you and you make the contact. You pretend to be her and you order them to allow us through the minefield,” Farkas clarified.
Janeway considered the possibility. Depending on the Rilnar security protocols, it might work. Then again . . .
“Let’s see what they do with Captain Chakotay’s request first,” Janeway decided.
“How many shots do you think we’re going to get at this?” Farkas asked.
“If they refuse,” Janeway said, “I’m not going to bother trying to fool their perimeter guard. I’m just going to demand an audience with the denzit. I have a funny feeling she’ll take my call.”
SORMANA
A good pilot might have been able to pull the shuttle out of its free fall. Only one like Thomas Eugene Paris, who had made a habit in his younger days of courting destruction during the most hazardous emergency situations imaginable, could have landed the shuttle in one piece.
Paris remained conscious after the mine exploded. As Ti’Ana reported their damage, including a small hull breach where the port impulse engine had been lost, the commander had busied himself rerouting power to emergency forcefields and stabilizing their remaining engine. The next priority was scanning the area the shuttle was about to impact. Fortunately, they were headed for the desert twenty kilometers from a large installation Paris hoped belonged to the Rilnar.
Sheer nerve carried Paris through the roughest landing sequence he’d endured in years. When the Tuccia was once again on solid ground, she was no longer space worthy, and much worse for the wear, but her passengers were alive.
Once everyone had confirmed they were okay, apart from Cambridge, who’d commenced retching as they’d landed, Paris initiated scans of the area.
Sensors showed that two small surface vessels were already approaching their position from opposite directions. Paris had no idea if they were Rilnar or Zahl, but those en route from south-southwest were going to arrive a few minutes before their counterparts.
“Perhaps they will be so busy fighting one another that we will be able to escape undetected,” Ti’Ana suggested as she studied the scans Paris was seeing.
“We don’t have enough power left to raise our shields and we’re in the middle of desert,” Paris replied. “Not to mention the fact that we didn’t come down here to add to the body count. Unless they kill one another to the last man, we surrender to whoever gets here first.”
“It will be the Zahl,” Cambridge said as he wiped his mouth and sealed the cloth in one of the few medical supplies that was handy—a biohazard bag.
“You can’t know that,” the Doctor insisted.
“Of course, I can,” Cambridge retorted. “Anything else would be a lucky break for us, and I’m afraid that’s just not the kind of day we’re having, Doctor.”
VOYAGER
“I’ll make this quick,” Chakotay replied. “I dispatched a team to the surface of Sormana a few hours ago. Their shuttle impacted a subspace mine and as best we can tell, crashed on the surface. We intend to mount a rescue operation and hope you will be willing to assist us.”
“That’s quite a tale, Captain. A moment, please.” Rileez abruptly closed the channel but did not leave Chakotay in suspense for long. Less than a minute later his face, pasty white apart from the Rilnar’s characteristic ridges and mottled flesh running from his hairline to his cheeks, once again filled Voyager’s main viewscreen. “I have checked our logs and confirmed them with the rest of the Colonial forces. We have no record of a Federation ship entering the minefield and our surface scans reveal no debris. I apologize, Captain, but we cannot permit you to pass beyond the perimeter to rescue this non-existent vessel. High marks, however, for creativity. It is clear you intend to reach the surface of Sormana. I wish we could accommodate you. However, for your safety, and ours, I must refuse.”
“I see,” Chakotay said, keeping his face and voice neutral despite the taste of acid in the back of his throat and the raw state of every nerve ending in his body. “Is there any chance you could put me in touch with the Rilnar leader on Sormana, the denzit?”
Rileez appeared taken aback. “It is doubtful she would trouble herself to speak with you,” he replied. “I will certainly convey the substance of this conversation to my superior, Tilzitar Deet, in my next status report. If he finds cause to question my actions or reaches a different conclusion, we will contact you at once.”
“Let me be clear,” Chakotay said. “I’m going to determine the status of my crew with or without your permission. There is no reason for this to devolve into aggression between us. We have no fight with you, nor any desire to interfere with the engagement on Sormana. Starfleet’s first general order, the Prime Directive, restricts us from doing so. But I will not abandon my people. Is this really how you want to do this?”
Chakotay was surprised to see Rileez’s face soften. “I will speak with the tilzitar as soon as possible, Captain. That is the best I can do. What you choose to do in the interim is entirely your call. Any action you take to breach the perimeter, however, will force my hand. Do you understand?”
“I do,” Chakotay replied.
“End transmission.”
SORMANA
“Just admit you were wrong. Surely you’re man enough to do that,” Paris said softly.
“I hardly think the respective length of our reproductive organs is relevant to this discussion,” Cambridge replied directly into Paris’s transceiver.
After a brief skirmish, in which the Rilnar had emerged victorious, the away team had been brought to the installation Paris had detected. The settlement was, despite Cambridge’s pessimism, a Rilnar outpost. The team had been immediately separated, locked in private cells located within a warren of tunnels beneath the base. Finally left alone, they had checked in with one another through their transceivers. For some reason, their transceiver signals were strong enough to allow them to communicate with each other but no longer able to reach beyond the planet’s surface.
A few hours had passed by Paris’s internal calculations. None of them had been interrogated yet. Their captors had confiscated their gear and had probably already brought the shuttle in for analysis. Its holographic projectors had failed even before it landed. But it seemed that their Rilnar disguises and faked identities had earned them reasonable treatment: cells with bunks, blankets, and a small supply of fresh water. Paris wondered idly what kind of reception captured Zahl prisoners received.
Paris had considered ordering the team to observe comm silence. Their transceivers had been adjusted to allow a constant open connection between all four of them. It was likely that everything they said was being monitored and an observer might realize quickly that they were in communication with each other. The team had limited their words and their few “conversations” had been brief. This contact had been essential in maintaining morale as the minutes ticked by. It was good to know that they were all well and accounted for.
Paris rose from his bunk at the sound of approaching footsteps. The entrance to his cell was composed of a single metal door with a large transparent window—a sturdy one, Paris had already determined—set within a thick stone wall. Two guards appeared.
“Move to the corner and face the wall,” one of them ordered.
Paris lifted his hands in a universal sign of compliance and did as he had been told. The prospect of allowing a pair of armed men into the cell and offering them his back to shoot was disquieting, but he really didn’t have a choice in the matter.
“Are your prisoners offered legal counsel?” Paris asked as he moved toward the corner, sneaking one last look at his captors.
The voice that responded was cold enough to send ice pouring down his spine, but its familiarity had the opposite effect.
“I don’t think that’s going to be necessary,” the deep, rich voice of Kathryn Janeway replied.
Paris turned automatically as she stepped past the guards into the cell. He hadn’t seen her face during the Nihydron meeting, but Chakotay had prepared him for it. Apart from the Rilnar uniform—a long forest-green jacket belted at the waist by wide taupe bands and matching pants that were tucked into knee-high brown boots—she was Kathryn Janeway’s doppelganger. Her eyes were the same clear blue. Her hair was cut shorter than Paris had ever seen it in a straight bob that barely reached her chin. The flesh of her neck had been scarred, burned perhaps, though it was hard to tell in the faint light cast by two small rectangular sconces embedded in the rear wall of the cell.
The sight of her was disconcerting and oddly comforting at the same time.
Her next gesture confirmed for Paris that however impossible, this woman was Kathryn Janeway. Crossing her arms over her chest and lifting her chin slightly, she said, “Mister Paris, we really have to stop meeting like this.”
VOYAGER
Lieutenant Harry Kim refused to remain seated at the conference table. He had first risen to examine the viewscreen embedded in the wall displaying the minefield. The closest he had come to a chair was to squeeze the headrest of his assigned seat in frustration between fitful paces.
Captain Chakotay understood and let him be. Had the current briefing consisted of a larger group, he might have taken issue, but allowing Kim to pace was better than having Kim calculate firing solutions on the Rilnar vessels standing between him and the away team.
“I can try to use the data we have already collected by observing the routes of the other ships that have entered the field to extrapolate a course for us,” said Ensign Aytar Gwyn, Voyager’s alpha shift conn officer and best pilot, short of Tom Paris. She had recently begun exploring different hues of hair color. In the past she’d moved through a dozen shades of blue. Today, Gwyn’s short, spiked locks were a violent shade of chartreuse.
“The Rilnar will follow us in,” Chakotay retorted. “And they undoubtedly possess a detailed map of the subspace mines. Their firing solutions might force us into course corrections that would lead us directly into the path of a mine we don’t know is there.”
“Are we close to being able to detect them?” Kim asked.
“Seven is working on it,” Chakotay replied.
“And we don’t have an answer?” Kim asked.
Chakotay shrugged.
“I say we take our chances,” Gwyn said. “I’ll get us around those mines. If the Rilnar follow us in and suffer for it, that’s their problem.”
“The Rilnar are not our enemy,” Chakotay reminded her. “This is their territory. Yes, they are being obstructive to a degree I find unwise, but let’s be careful how we frame their position.”
“She’s right, though,” Kim said. �
��We could—”
“Bridge to Captain Chakotay. Ornzitar Rileez is hailing you.”
“Keep at it,” Chakotay ordered, rising from the table.
Rileez’s face was already on the viewscreen when Chakotay entered the bridge.
“Have you spoken with your tilzitar?” Chakotay asked by way of greeting.
“I have, Captain. And much to my surprise, this matter has already come to the attention of the denzit. She has requested that you, and you alone, transport to the surface of Sormana immediately.”
Chakotay released a sigh of relief. “I’d be happy to do so,” he acknowledged. “But the planet’s surface is a little beyond our transporter’s range from this point. If you can provide us with a course that will take us into orbit—”
“The denzit has authorized us to send you down using our transport system,” Rileez advised. “It is an extremely rare protocol, established only for the use of our diplomatic envoys.”
“You have transporters that can safely cover twenty million kilometers?” Chakotay asked dubiously.
“I can personally attest to our system’s accuracy and safety, Captain,” Rileez replied. “And I can assure you that none of us would willingly risk the denzit’s displeasure by failing to bring you safely to her presence.”
Chakotay believed him, but remained skeptical. “How do we do this?”
“I will provide coordinates for rendezvous with my vessel. You will transport aboard the Golant and be sent to the surface from here.”
“Send them now,” Chakotay said, “and we’ll be under way as soon as we can lay in our course.”
“Very good, Captain. End transmission.”
6
RILNAR COMMAND CENTER—SORMANA
The denzit stood at ease, awaiting the completion of the transport reintegration sequence. It seemed to be taking longer than usual, but that was probably just her impatience talking.
Once she had dreamed, day and night, of a moment like this. As she stood, waiting for the appearance of Captain Chakotay of the Federation Starship Voyager, she wondered if she could make him understand. She wondered why it suddenly meant so much to her that he should understand.
Star Trek: Voyager: A Pocket Full of Lies Page 7
