by Greg Cox
“You were very lucky,” Kes said. She ran a dermal regenerator over Torres’s arm. “This could have been a lot worse.”
“I don’t feel lucky,” Torres grumbled. She glared at the ravaged flesh of her right arm. Beneath the healing influence of the regenerator, the cracked and blistered skin began to regain its normal appearance. “Is this going to take long?” she asked impatiently. “I have to get down to that damn beach.”
“The beach?” Kes looked up from her work. A chill worked its way down her spine. Torres’s interest in the beach seemed out of character. Kes seldom socialized with B’Elanna, but the half-Klingon engineer had never struck her as the type to enjoy sunbathing. Kes felt her psychic intuition tickling the back of her mind. This is important, she thought, taking a deep breath. “Why are you so interested in the beach?”
“Never mind,” Torres responded brusquely. “Just fix my arm and let me get back to work.”
“I thought you wanted to go to the beach,” Kes pressed her. “Do you have work to do—at the beach? Please, B’Elanna, I really want to know.”
The urgency of her tone got through to Torres. She gave Kes her full attention for the first time since entering the sickbay, eyeing her suspiciously. “Why do you ask? Is there any reason I shouldn’t go to the beach?”
“Maybe,” Kes confessed. Having shared her fears with both Tuvok and The Doctor, as well as with her beloved Neelix, she hardly considered them top secret. “I’ve been having some strange . . . feelings . . . about that beach. I think there’s something there, something we haven’t been told about.”
She saw a spark of recognition in Torres’s eyes. B’Elanna knew something about the beach, Kes realized. She had her own questions to answer, her own mystery to solve. “I think we should compare notes,” Kes suggested.
Torres inspected Kes carefully before answering. The Ocampa imagined that she must look frail and unimpressive by Klingon standards. I may be no warrior, she thought, but I can take care of myself
Finally Torres nodded her assent. “You may be right,” she said. She rolled down her sleeve. Aside from some slight reddening, her arm looked good as new. She glanced at The Doctor, who was still busy repairing the damage to Erin Jourdan’s vulnerable human shell. The ensign appeared unconscious but alive. “He could probably use some help,” Torres said. “Meet me at Transporter Room Two at sixteen hundred hours.”
“I’ll be there,” Kes said. She couldn’t wait to find out what Torres had learned about the zealously guarded secret of the beach. She knew she was zeroing in on the answer.
CHAPTER
10
CAPTAIN JANEWAY WOULD HAVE FOUGHT AN ENTIRE HIVE of Borg for a strong cup of black coffee. She had not felt so exhausted for a long time, nor spent so much time in her best dress uniform. I’m going to need a week’s rest in a holodeck just to recover from this “vacation” on Ryolanov, she thought. Still, it was worth all this endless diplomatic chitchat if it meant some much-needed relief for her valiant-yet-homesick crew. Janeway felt personally responsible for ensuring that each and every crew member, Starfleet or Maquis, did not suffer more than necessary from the consequences of her decisions. If that means another banquet or reception, she thought, so be it.
Right now sunset was approaching and she was already late for her next appointment with Varathael. Her weary legs protested with annoying aches and pains as she quickened her pace through a maze of corridors within one of Ryolaler’s many pyramids. She needed no Ryol functionary to guide her; at this point she practically knew all their government offices by heart. Turquoise carpeting, decorated with intricate swirls of gold and red, cushioned the path beneath her boots. Satiny rainbow-colored tapestries hung from smooth marble walls while an elegant arrangement of mirrors and windows brought the scarlet sunlight indoors. As she rounded yet another corner, Janeway spotted an elderly neffaler diligently polishing a reflective plate in the ceiling with a brush attached to a long pole. The dwarfish creature did not look at her as she walked past him; he kept his large black eyes on his job.
Janeway frowned. Despite the apparent generosity and good natures of the Ryol, it was hard to ignore that their treatment of the neffaler bordered on cruelty. Over the centuries, the Federation had evolved stringent guidelines to distinguish between the legitimate employment of domesticated wildlife and the willful exploitation of minority species; she suspected that, under close examination, Ryolanov would not qualify for Federation membership.
That was not the issue at hand, however. For better or for worse, the Prime Directive meant that the relationship between the Ryol and the neffaler was none of her business. And yet, she thought, I would never dream of working my dog the way the Ryol work their pets.
Her path led her to Varathael’s private chambers, located at the dead center of the pyramid. Only a hanging curtain of thick velvety fabric separated the Elder’s residence from the wide corridor that led up to his door. Janeway was again impressed, as she had been the first time she visited Varathael in his chambers, by the startling lack of visible security. It said much about the peacefulness and stability of Ryol society that their leader apparently had no need of guards, locks, or even a receptionist. The Cardassians could take over this city in an hour, she thought, feeling vaguely guilty for even thinking in such militaristic terms. Then again, it was probably only a matter of time before the Kazon, the Vidiians, or some other hostile species stumbled onto Ryolanov. Perhaps I should say something about this to Varathael, warn him not to be so trusting, she thought, or would that cause him to think of humanity as warlike and paranoid? She sighed silently at the prospect of one more thing to worry about, but stayed resigned to the inevitability of this and future dilemmas. First contact was never easy, but always a tricky business, requiring plenty of caution and forethought.
Muffled voices passed through the heavy burgundy-hued curtain. Janeway paused before the doorway, unwilling to interrupt the Elder’s business. According to plan, she was scheduled to meet Varathael here before proceeding to a ceremonial inspection of the sotul vineyards. She wasn’t entirely sure what the ceremony involved, but she imagined that it involved a lot of newly pressed wine and long-winded toasts. She made a mental note to herself to keep an eye on her wine consumption; sotul wine was strong stuff, she had learned, almost as potent as bootleg Romulan ale, and it wouldn’t do for the captain of the U.S.S. Voyager to end up tipsy in front of foreign dignitaries.
And dignitaries didn’t get much more dignified, for that matter, than Varathael of Ryolanov. Janeway was grateful that, if she absolutely had to spend so much time schmoozing with the local authorities, that the Elder was such pleasant company. She could think of a lot of alien leaders, not to mention a few Federation bigwigs, who made diplomacy an exercise in tedium. Like that Andorian prime minister, she recalled, who once spent an endless afternoon extolling the aesthetic advantages of blue skin to her entire graduating class at the Academy. By contrast, Varathael seemed genuinely charming and intelligent. Indeed, aside from their somewhat disturbing treatment of the neffaler, and Janeway was very reluctant to make any hasty moral judgments on that issue, she liked the Ryol and she hoped that she and her crew had given them a good first impression of the United Federation of Planets. Someday, she mused, other explorers will come to the Delta Quadrant. It would be nice to think that Voyager had, at the very least, laid the groundwork for future peaceful relations between this quadrant and our own. If some positive good can come from our long journey home, then all our efforts and hardships will not have been in vain.
The voices on the other side of the curtain grew louder. She thought she recognized one of the voices as Varathael’s, but there was a menacing tone to it that she had never heard before. She couldn’t quite make out the words, nor was she really trying to, but the Elder sounded extremely angry. Janeway was puzzled; it was hard to imagine what on this tropical paradise of a planet could have upset Varathael enough to make the benign Elder raise his voice in rage.
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br /> The second voice struck her as familiar as well, but she couldn’t place it right away. That voice seemed less angry than desperate. It sounded pleading, even frightened. Frightened of Varathael? Janeway wondered. That seemed unlikely, and yet . . . she found herself remembering what Chakotay had told her of his recent nightmarish vision-quest, of the malevolent unseen presence haunting his inner landscape. Could there in fact be a dark side hidden behind the sunny face of Ryolanov? She didn’t want to believe that, but it would be foolish to ignore the possibility.
Wait, what was that? She wasn’t certain, but she thought she heard the word Voyager among the heated words coming from beyond the curtain. Uncomfortable about eavesdropping on their hosts, she stepped away from the curtain. Perhaps I should come back later, she thought, or simply turn off my Universal Translator. Instead she walked softly up to the curtain and placed one ear against it. Good manners be damned, she thought. If this affects my crew, I need to know about it.
Now that she was concentrating on the discussion in the adjacent chamber, she identified the second voice as belonging to Naxor. Oh, Tom, she thought, what have you gotten into now? Somehow she knew, even though she hadn’t heard his name mentioned, that Lieutenant Paris had to be involved in whatever matter was vexing the Elder and his most obnoxious underling, which probably meant Harry Kim was deep in this mess as well. At least I know Neelix is busy fixing lunch right now, she consoled herself, and that B’Elanna is busy with her engines . . . I hope.
Janeway’s body was coiled like a spring, ready to leap away from the doorway if anyone approached. Her hand hovered over her commbadge, just in case she needed to beam up fast to avoid an embarrassing scene. She was not prepared, however, for the ear-splitting scream that suddenly erupted from the chamber beyond the velvet curtain. Her heart pounded at the sound of unremitting fear and suffering in the cry she heard. My God, she thought. That doesn’t even sound sentient!
Adrenaline raced through her system as the scream awakened her body’s primal fight-or-flight response. Janeway knew she had to act; there was no way she could ignore the torture she heard. Phaser drawn, she yanked aside the curtain and beheld a shocking tableau:
Amid the lush furnishings of the Elder’s chambers, beneath the mirrored chandelier and in front of his polished wooden desk, in the center of a complex multipatterned carpet that tastefully matched the brightly dyed fabric on the couch and handmade chairs, Naxor writhed in torment beneath Varathael’s hands. Naxor was on his knees before the Elder, who stood behind the younger Ryol with his reddish-brown hands gripping Naxor’s bare shoulders. No obvious violence was visible, but Naxor screamed as though Varathael was yanking out his very soul by its roots. The young man’s eyes had rolled upward in their sockets so that only the whites could be seen, his mouth gaped open as his agonized howl pored from his core, and his entire frame shook with palsy. Janeway could barely believe what she was seeing, but the Ryol began to physically decay before her eyes. His cruelly handsome features grew lean and haggard. Dark shadows filled the hollow sockets that formed beneath his eyes. The rich maroon color of his flesh became tinted with gray, even as his once-muscular physique appeared to liquefy and evaporate, leaving behind a skeletal frame barely covered by stringy tendons and dry brittle skin. In a matter of seconds, Naxor looked like he’d been starved for weeks in a Cardassian slave-labor camp, and yet he kept on screaming the unending shriek of the damned.
But as horrific as the stricken Ryol became, the look on the face of his tormentor was even more terrifying. Pure animal exultation transfigured his expression, so that the wise and gracious Elder suddenly resembled some bloodthirsty demon out of Klingon mythology. His teeth were clenched together in a feral grimace that threw into sharp relief the contorted lines of his face. The graying tips of his mane grew lush and golden just as Naxor’s formerly tawny fur became coarse and dry. His brown talons sank deeper into Naxor’s withered flesh, drawing thin trickles of watery-looking blood. Beneath arching yellow brows, the Elder’s pale green eyes had been replaced by voracious whirlpools of darkness that seemed to open upon an endless empty void. Caught up in his inhuman rapture, his ruby gemstone dangling from his neck, Varathael was oblivious to Janeway’s presence.
She could not remain silent. “Stop it!” she cried out. “You’re killing him!”
Varathael’s empty eyes turned on her. He released his grip on Naxor, who slumped gracelessly onto the carpet. Janeway could not tell if the younger Ryol was still alive. Varathael struggled visibly to regain his composure, his features forcing themselves back into a more serene and civilized mien. His voice when he spoke was thick and guttural.
“Captain Janeway,” he said. “I am so sorry that you had to see that.” He took a step toward Janeway, who instinctively backed away. His eyes were still as black as the shores of Ryolanov. “Please, do not concern yourself with this. You have so many other things to worry about, so much upon your mind. You must not be troubled by things you cannot understand. Let me lift this burden from your shoulders. Permit me to deal with my people in our own way. Do not be alarmed. Do not think of this at all. . . .”
The tone of his voice was soothing, almost hypnotic. Janeway felt herself being lulled by the rhythm of his words, and by the gravitational pull of those darkened eyes. What the Ryol did to each other was not her concern after all, she thought. Surely the Prime Directive released her from any obligation to intervene. Didn’t it? Varathael took another step closer, then another. Her fears seemed to dissolve in the voracious nihility of his gaping orbs. It would be so easy, she thought, just to do as Varathael suggested and forget this whole thing. Naxor couldn’t really be in danger, could he? Varathael could never be so merciless.
The Elder’s hand reached out toward her. She felt the pointed tips of his fingernails graze her cheek.
No! Janeway flinched and stepped backward. Snapping out of her trance, she tapped her commbadge decisively. “Janeway to Voyager. One to beam up—immediately.”
“Wait!” Varathael shouted, lunging toward her. His calm expression slipped from his face, exposing a look of frustrated malice. “Let me explain!”
Varathael vanished from Janeway’s sight as the transporter took her apart.
• • •
Janeway marched onto the bridge. A turbolift had brought her straight from the transporter room. Chakotay stood up and surrendered the captain’s chair to Janeway. “Captain,” he informed her. “The Elder is hailing you.”
“I’ll bet he is,” Janeway said. “Commander. Mr. Tuvok. I want to see both of you in my briefing room at once. Mr. Paris, you have the conn.”
Tuvok walked away from his console at Tactical. “Actually, Captain,” he said, “I suggest that Lieutenant Paris join us. He was involved in an incident you should know about.”
Taking a closer look at the young pilot, Janeway noted the purple bruises on Paris’s face and neck. He looked like he’d been in a fight, and she had a pretty good guess who the other combatant had been. “Naxor?” she asked Paris. He nodded.
Naxor again, she thought. Perhaps this was why Varathael was punishing him. “Very well,” she said to Tuvok, directing a relief officer named Zon Kellar to take Paris’s place at the conn. “I have a lot to tell the rest of you as well.”
“Captain, what should I do about the Elder’s hails?” Kellar asked.
“Stall,” Janeway said.
Less than five minutes later, Chakotay, Tuvok, Paris, and Janeway were seated around the conference table. She gave them a quick description of her encounter with Varathael, then listened carefully as Tom Paris summarized the fight on the beach. Comparing notes, she determined that Paris’s violent confrontation with Naxor and his allies had taken place shortly before she witnessed the Elder’s horrifying attack on his aide. Now that she knew the whole story, or at least more of it, she couldn’t blame Varathael for disciplining Naxor. Even so, however, Naxor’s offense hardly seemed to justify the brutal, possibly fatal assault that Varathae
l had subjected Naxor to. “It’s hard to imagine,” she said, “any crime that warranted such dreadful torture.” Nor the obvious joy, she thought, with which Varathael administered the punishment.
“For myself,” Tuvok commented, “I am less concerned about why both Varathael and Naxor took aggressive action than with the manner in which the attacks were implemented. The Ryol clearly possess abilities beyond those of most humanoids.”
“And a dark side,” Chakotay added, “that they have taken pains to conceal.” Janeway knew he had to be remembering the ominous nature of his recent vision.
“As do most intelligent species,” Tuvok said, “particularly when encountering an alien civilization for the first time.”
He has a point, Janeway thought. I would not introduce humanity to another species by telling them about, say, the Eugenics Wars or the Spanish Inquisition.
“All I know,” Tom Paris said, “is that these people are a lot more dangerous than they let on. Naxor nearly sucked the life out of me, not to mention Harry and Susan.”
“How are the other two?” Janeway asked, afraid that Naxor might have harmed Kim and Tukwila as badly as Varathael appeared to have damaged Naxor. The thought of Harry having all his youth and boyish enthusiasm drained from him made her sick.
“They’re in the sickbay,” Chakotay reported, “but The Doctor isn’t too worried about them. Both of them are exhausted, and somewhat anemic, but The Doctor expects them to recover. There doesn’t appear to be any permanent injury.”
“That’s good to hear,” Janeway said. She looked around the table at the solemn faces of her officers. “The question, then, is what do we do next? How many of our people are currently down on the planet’s surface?”
Chakotay consulted his padd. “Approximately fifty crew members are on shore leave at this moment.”
“Fifty-seven, to be exact,” Tuvok said, “all of whom are potential hostages. I recommend that we beam them all back to the ship immediately.”