by Greg Cox
Huge curved pillars supported the rough stone ceiling above them, creating a vast artificial cavern to hold the ruins below. The alien vessel was enormous, nearly twice the size of Voyager, but it was clear at a glance, even to such an inexperienced eye as Kes’s, that it would never fly again. The hull, made of a reflective green material that still gleamed brightly here and there, was breached at over a dozen locations. Great gaping fissures opened all along the ship’s metallic skin, revealing glimpses of the devastation within. At one time, Kes guessed, the ship had been essentially cylindrical in shape, but now its frame was so bent and distorted, with huge chunks of debris jutting out from the hull at unlikely angles, that it was difficult to visualize the vessel’s original contours. Scorch marks and charred, blackened metal provided evidence of long-quenched fires while gigantic patches of rust and corrosion hinted at the length of the ship’s entombment. Cobwebs the size of holodecks stretched across the ragged gaps in the hull. The dust of years, maybe even of centuries, lay upon the grimly breathtaking scene. For an Ocampa such as Kes, to whom eight or nine years constituted a lifetime, the sheer age of the ruins was even more impressive than its size.
“Of course!” Torres exclaimed, scanning the wreck with feverish excitement. “I should have guessed. The ship’s trashed, but there must be reserves of antimatter locked away in the warp engines. Maybe even some dilithium crystals, too!”
“Do you think we can claim salvage rights?” Neelix asked, sharing Torres’s enthusiasm. He probed the broken starship with his spotlight, the incandescent beam darting back and forth over the twisted length of the wreck.
Torres rolled her eyes. “I think the Ryol can reasonably claim that they knew this was here. After all, somebody carved that tunnel, not to mention reinforcing the ceiling up there.”
“Oh,” Neelix said, his bubble only slightly burst. “I’ll bet we can still make a good deal for whatever we need. Trust me on this. I was bartering used and abandoned spaceships while you were still going to Klingon Kiddie School . . . or whatever.”
At the moment, Kes didn’t care about the salvage rights or the dilithium. She gazed down upon the ancient ruins. Is this what happened to you? she thought. Did you all perish in some long-ago crash? Is that why you scream?
“Do you recognize the design?” she asked Neelix. “Can you tell me who they were?”
“Hmmm. I’m not sure.” He used the light crystal to pick out the details of the wreck. “Not Kazon, not Trabe, not Haakonian, not a modern design at all. It bears a slight resemblance to the ships of the old Pahkarpian Empire, but only a little. To be honest, it’s such a mess that I think you’d need an historian, an archaeologist, and an expert engineer to figure out its origins.”
“I see,” Kes said. She couldn’t tear her gaze away from the broken ship. She tried to imagine what the crash must have been like. “Do you think there were any survivors?”
Compassion filled his eyes as he responded to the sorrow in her voice. “I don’t know, sweetie. Maybe the Ryol can tell us. That ship’s been here a long time, though; if there were any survivors, they must’ve died out years ago.”
No, she thought. That’s not true. She didn’t know how she knew that, but she was certain of it. There was more here than she could see now, a tragedy even greater than that implied by the sight of the ravaged spacecraft. The crash was just the beginning. . . .
“I need to get closer,” she said. “I need to go inside that ship.”
• • •
Transporter Room Two was only a turbolift away from the captain’s conference room. Tom Paris spent the brief ride wondering how to cope with his swiftly arriving encounter with Laazia. It should only take a minute or two to send them back home. No problem. I can handle this, he thought—until the doors slid open and he found himself staring into the captivating green eyes of the Elder’s daughter.
“Tom!” Laazia called out, the vibrato in her voice rippling through the air. She was even more stunning than he remembered. She wore an indigo velvet cape over a flowing gown of turquoise silk. The cape fell to her ankles and was held on by a silver clasp about her slender throat. The gown, cut low in the front, shimmered when she moved, attracting his eye to the curving lines of her body. Elegant sandals, dyed the same turquoise hue as her gown, adorned her feet. Silver jewelry glittered on her ears, fingers, wrists, and ankles. Her short blond hair had been streaked with black tiger stripes; it looked good on her.
“Dear Tom, I didn’t dare to hope that you would be the one to meet us,” Laazia said. “What a pleasant surprise.” With a graceful flourish of her cape, she gestured toward her entourage. “These are my friends and associates. You remember Romeela and Sitruua, don’t you? I’m sure your friend Harry does.”
Paris tore his gaze away from the exquisite vision Laazia presented and scoped out the rest of her party. To his relief, he didn’t see Naxor or any of his cronies from the ambush on the beach. Six Ryol had accompanied Laazia to Voyager, three men and three women. Paris thought he recognized most of them from his various excursions to Ryolanov, including the two women from the dance club. Lieutenant Kellar, along with two security officers, stood by at the transporter controls. Paris was glad they were there. Who am I afraid of? he thought ruefully. Laazia or myself?
“Welcome to Voyager,” he said in his best tour guide’s voice. “My name, as most of you know, is Tom Paris. The captain and the first officer are busy right now, but Captain Janeway sent me to welcome you aboard—and to apologize for having to postpone your tour of the ship.”
“Postpone?” Laazia looked surprised. The other Ryol made disappointed noises.
“I’m afraid so,” he said. “I’m afraid Voyager has been contaminated by an unexpected cosmic ray fluctuation. It’s nothing serious, but we have to conduct a complete baryon sweep of the entire starship and you might be exposed to some trace radiation if you stayed.” He sighed. “I know, it’s terrible, but what can we do? I’m sure we can reschedule your tour as soon as we’re sure the ship has been completely decontaminated.”
Are they buying this? Paris wondered. He hoped Laazia hadn’t brought any physicists or radiation experts along on this outing.
He addressed the entire group, but the other Ryol seemed to defer to Laazia. “But we have been so looking forward to this,” she objected. “Surely, this procedure can’t be that hazardous.”
“I certainly hope so,” Paris said with a grin, “but the captain refuses to take any chances with guests of your stature, especially since we know so little about your physiology. You might have a lower tolerance for baryon particles than the rest of us.”
His improvised explanation sounded convincing enough to Paris, but Laazia would not give up that easily. “Please, Tom, can’t we see just a little of the ship? Perhaps just a quick peek at the control center? That is the heart and mind of the vessel, is it not?”
Not a good idea, Paris thought, until we figure out exactly who and what you people are. “I’m afraid that’s not possible right now,” he explained. “First Officer Chakotay is performing some delicate flight simulations and can’t be disturbed.” He shrugged his shoulders. “To be honest, there’s really not much to see there, just a lot of boring people hard at work on their jobs. It’s not exactly a spectator sport.” He hoped he sounded sincere.
“I see,” Laazia said. She stepped closer to Paris, almost enveloping him in the swell of her cape. Her perfume went straight from his nostrils to his brain, sending a thrill up and down his spine. He could feel the heat radiating from her body. “In that case,” she whispered, “perhaps we should go directly to your quarters?”
“Oh,” Paris muttered, caught off guard by Laazia’s frontal assault. Thank goodness I’m not the blushing type, he thought, stealing a glance at Lieutenant Kellar and the security team. Did they hear her? he wondered. What would the captain think? He looked past Laazia at her assembled companions. “Don’t you think it might get a bit crowded?” he asked her.
&nb
sp; “They can wait outside if you like,” she intoned, lowering her already husky voice even lower than he would have ever guessed possible. She laid her bare hand upon his chest. Beneath her long black lashes, malachite eyes seemed to probe his very soul. He couldn’t look away. Her pupils, like miniature wormholes, exerted some sort of gravitational pull on his thoughts, sending them spiraling on a dizzy course to an unknown quadrant of his brain. “They’re very discreet.”
As if to demonstrate, she snapped her fingers with her free hand. Instantly the other Ryol formed a protective circle around Paris and the Elder’s heir. She snapped her fingers twice more, and the six men and women turned their backs on Paris and Laazia, facing away toward the walls of the transporter room. “Lieutenant Paris?” Kellar called out, with an edge of anxiety in his voice.
“Everything’s under control,” Paris reassured him, staring into Laazia’s pale green eyes. I think. Her pupils seemed to be growing larger and more black. That was bad news, he remembered, but he was past caring. It felt like her eyes had forged a direct connection to his nervous system. “You have your friends pretty well-trained, I see,” he said, struggling to keep his tone light and breezy. His own voice sounded strange to him, like a stranger’s.
“Of course,” she said. Laughter bubbled up from the depths of her elegant throat. “No one ever says no to me for long.”
“No one?” he asked, half-afraid of the answer. “Ever?”
She did not waste any more words. Still holding on to him with her eyes, she lowered his mouth to her lips. The kiss hit him like a phaser set on stun. He had to grab her to steady himself. All his resolution and better judgment, along with the better part of his strength, nearly evaporated in the heat of her kiss and the promises it bestowed. He felt his defenses crumbling. What am I doing? came one last dwindling voice at the back of what remained of his mind. Why can’t I stop her?
Laazia withdrew her lips. Paris gaped at her like a fish plucked abruptly from the water that sustained it. “Now,” she said, “your quarters.”
“Yes,” he murmured, confused and disoriented. Hadn’t her eyes been green before? They were almost entirely black now.
• • •
Cobwebs, dusty white and clingy, hung like curtains along the twisted corridors of the broken ship. The air felt musty and old. A heavy layer of dust lay over every exposed surface while small six-legged vermin, resembling a cross between a spider and a mouse, scurried into the shadows whenever the light of Neelix’s crystal fell upon them. Kes heard their tiny feet scuttling beneath the floor and within the walls.
Beneath the webbing and the dust, strange hieroglyphics decorated the walls. Not even Neelix, who was fluent in most of the major languages of the Delta Quadrant, recognized the symbols. Torres recorded the inscriptions with her tricorder; in theory, the ship’s computer could translate the symbols using the same algorithms employed by their Universal Translators. Probably just directional signs, Kes guessed, but it couldn’t hurt to decipher them later.
Dead insects, along with miniature scraps of bone and fur, clung to the webs, but Kes did not spot any larger remains, humanoid or otherwise. “No casualties,” she said. “Do you think they all survived the crash?”
Who were you? she thought. What happened to you?
“Hard to say,” Neelix answered her. He tore through a wide sheet of webbing, clearing a path for the others. “If there were survivors, they might have removed the bodies of any casualties for burial or cremation or whatever their customs required.”
“From the look of things,” Torres said, scanning the surrounding wreckage with her tricorder, “there’s been some attempt to salvage technology from this ship. I’m detecting serious gaps in the communication and energy transfer systems. Somebody cleaned this place out, and probably a long time ago.”
“Except for the antimatter,” Neelix pointed out.
Torres nodded. “Antimatter is dangerous to transport without the proper equipment. It may have been safer just to leave it where it is.” She checked her tricorder again, then pointed toward the rear of the ship. “I think I’ve located the engine room,” she said. “This way.”
“No,” Kes said. “I mean, not yet.” She felt something pulling her in another direction, calling to her from the bowels of the ruined spacecraft. She walked past Neelix with one hand held up in front of her to keep the cobwebs away from her face. Sticky strips of gauzelike webbing fastened onto her uniform, trying to impede her progress, but Kes pushed her way through the webs, following the path of Neelix’s spotlight. Her footsteps echoed down the lifeless hallway. Just up ahead, she thought, although she couldn’t say why. That’s where we have to go.
“What is it?” Torres asked impatiently. She clearly trusted her tricorder more than Kes’s psychic intuition. “What exactly are you looking for?”
“Here,” Kes said. She got down on her knees and brushed away the dust covering the floor. The spotlight fell upon a crescent-shaped gap in the metal tile. She stuck her hand into the gap, feeling the curved edge of a steel plate approximately two centimeters thick. It was a circular hatchway, she realized, only partially open. She tugged on the plate, but it wouldn’t budge. She gritted her teeth and tried again, straining her muscles against the ancient inertia of the hatch. At first it refused to move, but then the hatch slipped just a sliver, sliding under the surrounding tiles and opening a slightly larger crescent in the floor. Kes let out a sigh of satisfaction; it wasn’t much, but at least she’d proved that the hatch could still move.
“Hang on, sweetie,” Neelix said. “Let me help.” He looked around for a place on which to rest the light crystal.
“Never mind,” Torres told him. “I’ll do it.” She squatted in the dust beside Kes and handed Kes her tricorder. Gripping the hatch with both hands, she tried to pull it all the way open. A low growl escaped her lips as she fought to overcome the hatch’s years of disuse. Rusty metal shrieked in protest, hurting Kes’s sensitive ears, but the hatch yielded to B’Elanna’s demi-Klingon strength. A circular portal, roughly three meters in diameter, appeared in the floor.
Neelix stepped forward and shined his light upon the portal. Peering through the circle, Kes saw a spiral staircase leading to lower and lower levels of the ship. Voices from below, silent to all but Kes, seemed to rise up along the stairway, growing ever louder in her head. “They’re down there,” she announced.
“Who?” Torres demanded, wiping her dust-covered hands off on her uniform. “Are you hunting for ghosts or what?”
“Maybe,” Kes said, suspecting that B’Elanna would prefer a more scientific explanation. “I’ve told you what I feel. How would you describe it?”
Torres hesitated before answering. “Maybe it’s just the psionic residue of a past event so devastating that it continues to send psychic ripples through the space-time continuum. I’m an engineer, not a telepath, but I know that psionic energy can have measurable effects on the physical world.”
Kes thought that explanation sounded as good as any other. “All I know,” she said, “is that the screams are coming from below, so that’s where we have to go next.”
Torres mulled over Kes’s words for a few minutes. “Well,” she said eventually, “you’re obviously on to something, or we wouldn’t have gotten this far.” She reclaimed her tricorder from Kes and tucked it into her belt. “I guess that antimatter isn’t going anywhere soon.” She lowered her legs into the open hatch and starting hiking down the stairs. “Let’s go,” she said.
The spiral stairs led to the next level, then onto the level below that. Each step consisted of a metal grille that easily supported the weight of a Klingon, an Ocampa, or a Talaxian. Kes counted the ship’s levels as they descended; one, two, three, four . . . The air seemed to grow colder and damper the farther they went down. Torres led the way, with Neelix’s light shining past her and Kes, casting long distorted shadows on each floor they passed.
Finally, thirteen levels down, they came to the end
of the stairs. The trio found themselves in what looked like the remains of a large empty cargohold. Broken support beams hung like stalactites from the vaulted ceiling of the cavernous chamber; small winged creatures, like frogs but with webbed sails stretching from their fingers to their toes, flapped and glided overhead. The floor of the holding compartment appeared to have partly disintegrated on impact. Sand, rock, and coral carpeted the ground beneath their feet. Jagged formations of stone jutted through what little remained of the ship’s outer wall. Purple moss coated the surface of the boulders.
Neelix searched the chamber with his spotlight, exposing nothing but debris and empty space. “There’s nothing here,” Torres said, scowling. “We’re wasting our time.”
Kes ignored her. Indeed, she was barely aware of anything except for the incessant wailing of the agonized voices crying out to her from the past. Now that she was heartbeats away from the unknown climax of her quest, the screams reached an eerie crescendo, urging her onward. Kes rushed past Torres and Neelix toward a swelling of sand and rock at the northern end of the hold. She felt driven, possessed. It frightened her; she hadn’t felt this out-of-control since she was gripped by her premature elogium.
But there was nothing she could do to resist the compulsion that had seized her. As Neelix and Torres looked on, caught by surprise, she dug her hands into the mound of dirt and started digging feverishly through the gritty sediment covering the fractured floor of the ship. Clumps of sand and gravel went flying as she threw them to the side in her frantic search for . . . what? Kes wasn’t certain, but she knew she had to keep digging. “Don’t you see?” she called to her companions. “They’re not at the bottom of the ship. They’re beneath the ship!”
Then she saw it: a weathered stick of bone protruding from the newly exposed sand. It could have been an arm or a leg or even a rib for all she knew, but the sight energized her even more. She tore into the ground with new ferocity until she had uncovered the upper half of a skeleton lying on its side amid the rubble. A cracked brown skull, smaller than her own but seemingly humanoid, rested only centimeters away from her fingertips. Empty eye sockets, disproportionally large for the dwarfish skull, gazed up at her. I’ve found you, Kes thought triumphantly, sucking down deep gasps of air. Tell me who you are.