“And if the system is beyond repair?” B’Elanna asked.
“Your job will be to help them attain momentum that will put them on a trajectory close enough to Monorha that a rescue is feasible,” Seven said.
B’Elanna nodded her head approvingly.
Seven could guess what she was thinking: As long as we’re not repatriating them on Monorha and getting bogged down in regional politics again.
“You’ll need to wear environmental suits,” Chakotay said. “The ships are flooded with radiation. I’ve allotted you three to four hours to assess the damage and make the repairs. Beyond that, we’ll give them a little push and be on our way. Fair?”
“Will Voyager continue traveling toward the rift?” B’Elanna asked.
Chakotay nodded. “But we’ve determined we don’t need to go much further for the probe to be successful. We’ll only be a few thousand kilometers ahead of you.”
“So we can return to Voyager to resupply or treat wounded…” B’Elanna said.
“If that’s what Tuvok orders, yes. Satisfied, Lieutenant?”
When B’Elanna didn’t object, Chakotay wished them well and started back toward the bridge.
As they stepped into the turbolift, B’Elanna asked Seven, “Who else is coming with us?”
“Crewman Luiz will be your medic and Ensign Tariq will pilot the shuttle. Neelix will be coming along—” Seven paused, searching for the words.
“To make everyone feel better,” B’Elanna said, as if it were obvious why this was important.
“As you say,” Seven replied. Under the current circumstances, Seven questioned the necessity of squandering resources on emotional needs when providing medical care, breathable air, and a functioning ship were vital. But what did she, who had been rescued from a collective with the capacity for total galactic domination, know? Perhaps if the Queen had consulted with her unimatrices before she launched assimilation efforts, her drones might have felt better about their brutality.
There were aspects of being human that Seven would never understand.
Seven continued, “Commander Tuvok will command the mission and provide security.”
“And Chakotay wouldn’t mind having him off the ship for a while,” B’Elanna muttered under her breath.
“There is that too,” Seven said.
The women exchanged a look and for the first time in what had seemed like the longest day in Seven’s memory, B’Elanna responded with the barest hint of a smile.
“Hey Seven,” B’Elanna said softly. “I have a favor.”
“Yes?”
“I finished my work on the probe. It’s ready to transport to the launch tube.”
“You want me to go over what you have done to verify that it works properly.”
B’Elanna shrugged. “In a word, yeah. But there’s something else…She stopped and looked Seven in the eye. “You have to find the Doctor and bring him home. If we’re going to put all our lives on the line, do whatever you have to to pull this harebrained scheme off.”
“I will,” Seven said.
They stepped out of the turbolift, into the shuttlebay. Seven lingered behind, watching B’Elanna greet her teammates, then procure her gear. My presence is no longer required, Seven thought. She pressed the button to call the turbolift. A thought occurred. “Lieutenant,” she called out.
B’Elanna twisted around to look at Seven.
“Good luck,” Seven called out.
A broad, full-mouth smile transformed B’Elanna’s face. The engineer gave her a thumbs-up, then hustled up the ramp into the shuttle.
Tom needed all of a few seconds in his new locale to know that Q had sent them to a fun spot. The flashing lights and the tangle of alien bodies writhing to a percussive beat left no doubt in Tom’s mind.
“Where in the hell are we?” Harry said, sounding vaguely panicked.
Tom shrugged. “As places Q could have sent us go, this is pretty damn pleasant.” Humid. And a little spongy, he noted, bouncing lightly on his toes. But pleasant.
“But what if we’re, like, dinner or something?” Harry’s eyes zoomed back and forth across the crowd with a rapidity that made Tom dizzy.
“The best way to avoid being dinner is to find Kol,” Tom said. “You saw that image of him on q’s desk. You have a better idea what he looks like than I do.”
“Cue ball head. Dark black-brown goatee. About your height,” Harry said. “The fact that he has a humanoid appearance would make him a stand out in this crowd.” A trickle of liquid dripped onto Harry’s face. he wiped at the ooze with his finger, held it under his nostrils and inhaled deeply. Wrinkling his nose, he pronounced, “Smells like overripe fruit. What is this place?”
Tom examined the walls and ceilings of variegated pinks and reds, the rounded contours of the chamber sloped and curved without any perceptible pattern. “Some species use organic building materials. We’re still in the Continuum—I think—so I suppose anything is possible. Stay focused, Harry.”
Both of them paused to study their surroundings. The crowd was in constant flux. Maybe three or four hundred occupied the room, though counting heads (since several aliens had multiple heads) didn’t give an accurate measurement. On sight, Tom couldn’t identify any of the alien species schlepping around and from appearances, neither could Harry. None appeared humanoid, which didn’t bode well for their search. Many had no discernable sense organs or faces, making it difficult to tell whether they minded having their party disrupted because indeed, a party had been under way when they’d arrived.
“If Kol has Nacene abilities, he could change forms,” Tom said after several minutes of unsuccessful searching.
Harry groaned. “We’re dead.”
“Have a little faith, Harry,” Tom said, draping his arm around his friend’s shoulders. “We just need to work the room, do a little recon and figure out how to find Kol.”
“I’m supposed to search the room for someone who, theoretically, could be anyone.”
“You make it sound so impossible, Harry. You’re a clever guy. You’ll figure something out.”
“And what will you be doing?”
“q said that Kol was into node racing—whatever that is. I figure I’ll start by finding the racers.” He wished Harry luck and the two parted ways.
As he watched Harry disappear into the sea of bodies, Tom paused to assess the pros and cons of their current situation. On the con side: Q had sent them off into parts unknown without giving them any idea of what they were supposed to do. Should they fail to find Kol, Tom suspected that Q wouldn’t hesitate to damn them to eternity as single-celled organisms. How they’d find the Keeper of the Light among all these aliens escaped him. Especially if the Nacene hybrid was hiding from Fest the loan shark, from the Continuum, and from the Nacene. Tom suspected that the punishment described by Fest was only the beginning of the suffering awaiting Kol—the Continuum never did anything halfway, and he imagined that Q punishment wouldn’t be pretty. Kol had a vested interest in not being found.
On the pro side: He glanced down and felt reassured that Q had the decency to dress them for the occasion. Cobalt blue had always been his color. At least he’d face his doom looking like he’d just waltzed out of a Risan fashion show. He’d have to remember to thank Q for the suit if he lived through the next, oh, say fifteen or twenty minutes.
Probably the single most important factor in their favor was the fact that Q had sent them to a party. There were a lot of things in the universe that Tom Paris didn’t know. But parties? Tom knew parties like Vulcans knew self-control.
It never ceased to surprise him that no matter where his travels took him, from the backwater worlds frequented by the Maquis to the far reaches of the Delta Quadrant, the best parties among all species always had three key ingredients: music, intoxicants, and thrills. The formula never varied. Only the Borg didn’t follow the formula because the Borg didn’t throw parties—a fact, Tom believed, that was part of their problem.
Taking a deep breath, Tom set off in search of the node racers. If they were like most pilots, they’d be gathered where the action was. He scanned the room, trying to discern who might be interested in more than the common delights of partying. Time to turn on the Paris charm and work the room.
From the minute he’d appeared in the crowded chamber, he’d barely been able to hear himself think over the noise, never mind eavesdropping. He swore the place vibrated with a steady bass thump-thump-thump. Even a live band would have to put out major amps to make all the walls shake simultaneously.
Part of the challenge of finding Kol was navigating the irregularly shaped chamber; the ceiling height varied from two meters to as high as six and the floor, Tom discovered after nearly skidding down a slope, dropped off without any warning. His first thought had been that the chamber had once held some kind of fluid, but further examination of his surroundings reminded him of the anthills that sprouted up in his parents’ backyard every summer—only squishier. Tunnels and hallways branched off in every direction. Tom felt like a fish trapped in some bizarre aquarium.
Tom walked along the perimeter of the room, the moist walls quivering visibly, a gelatinous ooze accumulating on the surface. Multicolored lights never ceased flashing geometric patterns on the ceiling. He squinted through the weak, ever-changing lumination to discern anything of use and found his efforts thwarted. Several deep inhalations of the pungent air had induced woozy numbness in Tom’s brain. Definitely some recreational chemistry going on in this place. Two or three steps away from resigning himself to failure, Tom noticed that a large, noisy crowd had gathered about five meters in front of him. Shouts and cheers continually came from their ranks. At the very least, I might be able to escape whatever drug is circulating in the air over here.
He wiggled past buffet tables and more dancers, discovering that the objects of his search were gathered around large openings in the walls—similar to observation windows—though he couldn’t tell what was being watched. In this section of the room, the deafening music wasn’t quite as potent nor was the smell quite as brain-numbing. Tom breathed deeply and leaned back against the wall; clarity gradually returned. Resuming his search, he noticed that several dozen aliens perched on chaises and deep-cushioned lounge chairs. A game of chance was under way—tetrahedral dice being shaken and tossed onto a table; chits exchanged hands.
Abruptly, the crowd around the observation holes tightened. Vaguely claustrophobic sensations squeezed his head; Tom considered leaving for more open climes when he noticed, through a gap in the crowd, several egg-shaped, transparent capsules appearing to be constructed of a membranous exterior enclosing congealed goo. Suspended in the midst of the goo was the pilot—no chair, no gear. The capsules jetted past the window, out of sight, then back in front of the window. Each capsule appeared to be a one- or two-man craft with no discernable engine or guidance system. His previous thought—of being inside an aquarium—had proved to be a good instinct. The party locale seemed to be surrounded by fast-moving currents of viscous liquid, though not water. No surface light could be discerned at this depth. Below the window, maybe thirty meters, he saw the bottom, though of what, he had no clue; it didn’t look like any ocean floor he’d ever seen. Thankfully, Tom wasn’t claustrophobic.
“You ever seen a node race before?” came a gravelly voice.
Tom turned away from the window, glanced behind him to see the speaker, and saw empty air. Dropping his gaze, he discovered a coral skinned tree-trunk quadruped whose forked tongue flicked rapidly in and out through a circular opening outlined by rows of sharp, pointy teeth.
Not knowing where the creature’s eyes were, he spoke to the toothy opening. “What’s to know?”
The alien bounced up and down on two of his legs while he spoke. “Two racers are selected. Wagers made. Winners get rich. You want to get rich?”
Tom grinned. “Who doesn’t?”
Reaching a tentacle behind Tom’s shoulders, he nudged him through a circle of long-necked avians where he would have a better view closer to the window.
“So what’s a node?”
The quadruped continued bouncing. “Dark clots—round. Go very quickly. Irregular movement. Pilot hooks one. Races through the stream. Faaaast—” As he drew out the word “fast” his bounce rhythm increased proportionately.
“Say, you ever heard of a racer name Kol?”
The quadruped bounced emphatically.
Tom took that as a “yes.” “Is he here?”
The circular opening whirled closed like flower petals tightening at the cold; he leaned slowly from side to side, and then the opening spun open. Tom sensed without having to be told that he’d asked a dangerous question. “Can’t say. Watch for now,” the quadra-ped said, his volume diminishing to a near whisper.
A bright green light beam shot through the water. The capsules zinged off in the direction of several nodes approaching the vicinity. Hazarding a guess, Tom supposed they had to be going several thousand kilometers an hour—easy. He imagined the rush of going that fast with little more than some plastic wrap between the pilot and the liquid outside and his heart rate leaped.
Tom Paris was smitten. Utterly.
What wasn’t to love about a sport where the pilot steered a capsule into the node’s wake, launched the equivalent of a grappling hook into the tissue, and then was dragged around behind the node as long as the hook held. Skilled racers, Tom guessed, could actually alter the speed and trajectory of the node; he watched dumbfounded as one of the racers jumped out in front and guided the node around an obstacle course. The quadruped informed him that a successful run meant the racer navigated around an aqueous environment, over, under, and through every obstacle (fields of tall coral-like tubes, waving back and forth with the currents, for example) without the grappling hook dislodging or the capsule spinning out of control and killing the pilot.
The race currently under way began in a field of free-standing chunks—not unlike asteroids. Nodes wove in and out, taking a zigzag course through the dark, craggy objects. Beyond the bobbing chunks, the first racer gained ground navigating between clusters of massive semitransparent gelatinous globules fringed with numerous fronds. Tom watched admiringly as the pilot executed a series of tight turns that he doubted he could manage with the best shuttlecraft in Starfleet. When one pilot brushed too close to the fronds, the globule pounced on the capsule and sucked it into its interior. A spate of groans rose from the crowd at the sobering sight of the pilot being dissolved alive. Tom shuddered.
The last leg of the course appeared deceptively simple: a few larger floating chunks followed by shooting down a deep, dark red opening at the bottom of the course. The racers disappeared from sight when they dove into the tube, explained one of the onlookers. The first one who appeared back at the party won.
Tom realized, however, as his favorite racer—the leader—approached the tube that the node veered dangerously from side to side. The torrential pull of the current would be brutal, especially on an apparently lightweight object like a node. A miscalculation of flow and the capsule would crash head-on into the bottom. Tom pressed closer to the observation hole, crouching down on the ground so he could watch unimpeded. Behind him, he felt the quadruped bouncing gleefully.
Imagining himself in that capsule, swinging wildly in the node’s wake, Tom’s gnawed his lip, eyes narrowed as he studied the precise motions the pilot took. He curled his fingers around the edge of the observation hole, the squishy substance coating his palms. The racer was coming in at the wrong angle. Back off, back off, Tom hissed through gritted teeth. A collective gasp sounded on all sides. He winced, hunching his shoulders up around his ears—
In a split second, the node smacked into the surface, bursting on impact. The capsule followed shortly as the pilot hadn’t had the chance to release the tether. Upon impact, the capsule suffered a similar fate as the node; the pilot floating off into the variegated steam flow, tentacles waving frantically
as he vanished from view. Probably drowned, Tom thought, sitting back on his haunches, still wide-eyed at the spectacle.
And boy did he want to give it a try.
Whoever this Kol was, Tom felt a huge respect for anyone who could successfully make runs like the one he’d just observed and live to tell about it. He suspected, however, that being a pandimensional being might be on the list of required qualifications for spore racing. Beyond lassoing nodes to race, how could a mere human like himself possibly steer one around a race course? He was, however, on a mission for Q. With any luck, he’d been given a little something extra to make his job easier….
“You asked about Kol,” the quadruped whispered. “I know someone.” The smooth-skinned, squatty creature waved a leg toward an exit. “What can you offer?”
“Offer?” To Tom, the word sounded suspiciously like “bribe” or “bet.”
“Kol is off limits. No offer. No talk.”
Tom didn’t hesitate with his next comment. “I’m a damn good pilot. One of the best anywhere, anytime.”
“A racer?” The creature took a long, slow bounce.
Tom answered with a smile few had ever resisted. From his mother to Academy professors to starship captain to his lover B’Elanna Torres, he’d weaseled his way out of a lot of conduit scrubbing duty by turning on the full wattage of the Paris pearly whites.
The tree-trunk alien seemed satisfied. “Follow me.”
Following behind his new associate, he maintained a vigilant watch on the crush of shimmying aliens surrounding him, searching both for danger and Harry’s whereabouts. The two were typically linked. Tom had no doubt that someday Harry Kim would be among the best officers Starfleet had ever trained. In the meantime, the universe seemed determined to teach him every lesson the hard way. So far, he noted no screams, stripped off clothing, drawn weapons, or other indications of trouble. Tom breathed a little easier. Obtaining legitimate intelligence about Kol would go a long way toward getting them home, never mind saving the universe.
String Theory, Book 3: Evolution Page 19