by Greg Cox
For a few brief seconds, the entire bridge seemed to take on the same greenish hue as the Ryol’s eyes. Then everything went black.
CHAPTER
15
PHASER FIRE LIT UP ENGINEERING. THE HISS OF A DOZEN phaser rifles firing sounded like a basketful of angry snakes. Captain Janeway took shelter behind a sturdy pylon while she fired her own hand phaser over the heads of the security team guarding the entrance to Engineering. To her surprise, a couple of identical beams came hissing at them from the turbolifts beyond Engineering. Blast, she thought angrily. They have phasers, too. Probably stolen from the bridge, she guessed.
Six uniformed officers armed with high-powered phaser rifles formed the first line of defense. They fired their weapons from kneeling positions so that another line of security personnel, standing immediately behind them, could fire their phasers over the first team’s heads. Janeway, Tuvok, Kim, and various members of the engineering staff made up a third line of defense, directing their beams from elevated platforms and ladders and any other available perch. Crimson beams of energized light crisscrossed in the corridor beyond Engineering, forming an intricate and impenetrable web of destructive radiation. At least, Janeway hoped it was impenetrable.
The attack had begun minutes ago. Without any warning, a pack of unarmed Ryol—she had identified at least four of them—came charging out of a turbolift at the other end of the corridor. Her security people opened fire immediately—with mixed results.
The Ryol were clearly resistant to phaser beams, but not entirely immune. Concentrated fire from the phaser rifles succeeded in driving the assault back toward the waiting turbolift, but so far there were no Ryol bodies littering the corridor. A red-hot beam of energy missed Janeway by several centimeters, leaving a blackened scar on a bulkhead behind her. Fortunately, the inexperienced Ryol appeared to be lousy shots.
“Keep firing,” Janeway ordered her troops. They couldn’t afford to lose the offensive lest the Ryol put their psychic abilities into play. What was the maximum range of their parasitic effect, she wondered, and could they exert their strange powers even while under fire? She suspected she was about to find out.
“Captain, look!” Harry Kim exclaimed from his perch only four or five meters away from her.
Kim wasn’t the only crew member caught by surprise. Involuntary gasps of shock and amazement escaped the ship’s defenders as the Ryol discarded their humanoid facades in favor of a far more threatening appearance. Thick golden fur bristled all over the bronzed flesh of the Ryol, which seemed to absorb additional mass from the empty air, growing larger before the crew’s astonished eyes. Nails lengthened into talons, pearly teeth transformed into fangs over two centimeters long. A cacophony of ferocious roars and howls assailed Janeway’s eardrums, blending with the constant sizzle of the phaser beams to add an oppressive new element to the dire scene unfolding before her. She recalled The Doctor’s comments about Naxor’s DNA and nodded knowingly. “Metamorphic abilities” indeed.
“Interesting, Captain,” Tuvok commented, while firing careful shots with his own phaser. He had taken shelter behind a pillar across the way from Janeway’s. “Shape-shifting species are extremely rare.”
“Not rare enough,” Janeway said. Although she couldn’t be sure, she guessed that she was now seeing the true form of the Ryol for the first time; it certainly seemed to suit their actual nature. Then she remembered Chakotay’s description of his vision from a few days back, and she knew that she was looking upon the same malevolent entity that had haunted Chakotay’s spiritual journey. No more masks, she thought grimly. Now I see you as you really are.
Scorch marks from over a dozen phaser bolts marred the walls of the corridor. The hum of the weapons assailed her eardrums. We’re driving them back, Janeway thought, vaguely surprised that the Ryol had proved so easy to repel. Then Lieutenant Stevenson, one of the first row of defenders, toppled over, collapsing from his kneeling position to sprawl face-first onto the floor. His phaser rifle dropped from his fingers, a deadman switch cutting off the beam shooting from its muzzle. Next to Stevenson, Ensign Rodriguez’s rifle wobbled slightly, as if the security officer was having difficulty holding on to her weapon. Another officer, at the other end of the row, seemed to be drooping as well.
Janeway felt as though the other shoe had finally dropped; the Ryol were obviously using their parasitic abilities at last. Looking past the stricken guards, she spotted a furry-faced Ryol peering around the entrance to the turbolift, his striking black eyes fixed upon the men and women guarding Engineering. Janeway aimed her own phaser directly at the malevolent face, feeling a thrill of satisfaction as her beam blasted the Ryol right between the eyes, sending him flying backward into the confines of the turbolift.
“An excellent shot, Captain,” Tuvok observed. He coolly directed another phaser beam at the turbolift doors.
“Practice makes perfect, Mr. Tuvok,” Janeway replied, glad to have struck back at the inhuman creature attacking her crew. Let my people alone! she thought, half-hoping the Ryol could read her mind. Her angry thoughts would burn them faster than any phaser ever could.
But her target was not the only Ryol launching a psionic attack upon her crew. As she looked on apprehensively, she saw one guard after another succumbing to the debilitating effect of the strange powers of the Ryol. Shaky security officers stood on trembling legs, wiping the sweat from their brows while they fought to keep standing beneath the unnatural exhaustion induced by the Ryol invaders. Fresher guards rushed to replace their comrades, as yet another Starfleet or Maquis crew member sank to the floor, their weapons abruptly unmanned and useless.
A groan escaped Kim. Glancing up, Janeway saw the young ensign tottering upon one of the upper railways. “Oh no,” she heard him whisper. “Not again!”
“Watch yourself, Ensign Kim,” she barked. “Hang on to that rail,”
“I’ll try, Captain,” Kim said, gasping. He clung to a rail with one hand while firing his phaser with another. His face looked pale and clammy.
Looking away from Kim, Janeway saw a human technician, more accustomed to engine repairs than to combat, snatch up the rifle dropped by a Bajoran marksman and start firing at will, the scarlet beam leaping like lightning to strike the exposed chest of a snarling were-creature charging at the fallen guards. She smelled burning fur as the phaser beam seared the Ryol’s shaggy coat and sent him running back toward the safety of the turbolift. More beams chased after him.
This is turning into a war of attrition, she thought. So far, her troops had managed to keep up the barrage of phaser fire despite their losses, but how much longer would they be able to hold the wolflike Ryol at bay? The Voyager crew had the advantage of numbers, but the ratio of defenders to attackers was diminishing every minute. Thank goodness that the ship was now out of transporter range of Ryolanov; Janeway suspected that she had Chakotay and Paris to thank for that bit of good news.
Still, the battle could not continue the way it was now going. She glanced at Tuvok; even the Vulcan’s stoic expression betrayed signs of fatigue. His lips were pursed tightly together. Beads of sweat dotted his brown forehead. At this rate, the Ryol would eventually overrun Engineering after they had drained the energy of enough of the guards. It was time to add another factor to the equation.
“Mr. Carey,” she called out, still targeting the Ryol with her phaser, “have you managed to rig up that apparatus we talked about?”
“Almost,” Carey responded. Behind the front lines of the conflict, Carey and a small team of technicians were scurrying around Engineering, adapting preexisting equipment to an entirely new purpose. “It’s a little trickier than I thought.”
If only B’Elanna was here, Janeway thought, and not still a prisoner on Ryolanov. Still, Carey was probably the second-best engineer on Voyager, not counting herself. She watched as another charge by the Ryol was driven back, barely, by what remained of her defenders; this time, the invaders made it almost to the first row of guards
before retreating. The Ryol were making far too much progress and far too quickly, Janeway thought.
“With all deliberate speed, Mr. Carey,” she ordered. Voyager was running out of time.
• • •
What the hell was that? Tom Paris thought, waking slowly to a throbbing ache in his temples. He felt like a ton of latinum had been dropped on his head. Every muscle in his body felt sore and depleted, and the rest of him didn’t feel so hot either. At first, he couldn’t remember what had happened to him. Then slowly he opened his eyes and realized where he was: flat on his back on the bridge.
He tried to sit up, and discovered that his wrists were bound together behind his back. His restraints felt like cloth, but that hardly mattered; as fatigued as he was, they might as well be rhodinium. The floor of the bridge was a lot less comfortable than it should have been. Clearly it had not been intended for sleeping on.
“Welcome back,” came a familiar voice. Twisting his neck, Paris saw Chakotay, seated on the floor only a meter or so away. The first officer was also a prisoner, Paris recalled, as all the details of Laazia’s assault on the bridge came back to him. The shields, he remembered. Had he managed to deactivate all the forcefields? He thought he had, but glancing around, he didn’t see any security teams beaming in to reclaim the bridge. Surely the captain would have taken advantage of the shields coming down, unless she were unable to. Had something happened to Captain Janeway while he was unconscious? He needed to find out.
Rocking back and forth on his spine, he managed to work himself up to a sitting position, just in time to feel an angry hand smack against his face.
“Idiotic creature,” Laazia growled at him. The Elder’s daughter loomed over Paris and Chakotay, fury in her malachite eyes. She had reassumed her humanoid disguise, sort of. Glaring at her, his cheeks still stinging from her slap, Paris saw that Laazia had actually evolved into some sort of intermediate state between her humanoid and lupine identities. A thin layer of golden down, much like that which had previously covered only her skull, now spread out all over her body, which was scarcely concealed by the torn and shredded remnants of her turquoise gown. Although her elongated snout had retracted back into her usual refined features, her ears remained sharply pointed, as did the ivory fangs filling her mouth. The better to eat me with, Paris thought.
“You disappointed me, Tom,” Laazia accused, her vibrato still more husky than usual. “I feigned attraction to you quite convincingly, I thought, and still you betrayed me. That was a very bad decision, Tom. I fear it may have a negative effect on our relationship.”
“That’s a matter of perspective,” Paris said, anticipating another slap—or worse. He glanced around the bridge. Assink and Krevorr were both out cold, their motionless bodies littering the open area in front of the main viewer. At least he hoped they were only out cold. “I had to betray somebody, and I’m afraid my first loyalty is to my captain and my ship.”
None of Laazia’s associates, he noted, had returned from their mission to capture Captain Janeway. That’s encouraging, he thought. Maybe capturing Voyager had proved harder than Laazia had anticipated.
“Neffaler!” she hissed at him, the ultimate insult, apparently. Turning her back, she stalked away. Laazia had discarded her purple cloak, he observed; the voluminous garment was draped over the back of the captain’s chair. Striding past the command area, she approached the conn. Paris felt a surge of irrational anger at the sight of the Elder’s daughter taking possession of his personal station.
On the main viewer, Ryolanov remained just a tiny speck against a backdrop of distant stars. Laazia looked from the navigational controls to the viewer and back again. Paris was relieved to see that the Ryol temptress seemed baffled by the unfamiliar controls. Not much of a pilot, he guessed. He wondered if any of the Ryol knew anything about flying a starship.
“Ship,” Laazia announced imperiously. “Return us to Ryolanov.”
Good try, Paris thought, but Voyager’s automated systems weren’t quite that easy to operate. You need a cooperative pilot, he thought with more than a little spiteful satisfaction. You need me.
Chakotay must have been thinking along the same lines. “Good to see you’re still on our side,” he said quietly.
“Oh, come on,” Paris replied. “You didn’t really think I’d sell you all down the river for a pretty face and a nice pair of legs?”
“Well . . .” Chakotay said.
“Okay,” Paris admitted. “Maybe I gave you some tiny excuse for jumping to that conclusion.” He let his breezy tone drop for a minute. “Seriously, Commander, you can count on me. I was gone for a while there, but I’m back now. I promise.” He lowered her voice. “What’s going on with the captain? Do you know?”
Chakotay shook his head. “Laazia’s boarding party took off for Engineering and haven’t been heard from since. I have to assume that’s good news.”
“Silence!” Laazia snarled, proving that her pointed ears were fairly remarkable as well. “You!” she said, pointing an extended nail at Paris. “You spineless excuse for a male. Tell me how to command this vessel.”
“Do I look like a flying instructor to you?” Paris said sarcastically. “Why don’t you ask the captain . . . oh, that’s right, you still haven’t managed to get your hands on her.” He made a production of craning his neck to look around the bridge. “Say, what’s happened to your entourage? Run into a bit of trouble, have they?”
Laazia’s face contorted with rage. He’d obviously hit a nerve. “Computer,” she commanded loudly, “locate Captain Janeway.”
It was an innocuous request, on the surface, so the ship’s computer obliged her instantly. “Captain Janeway is currently in Engineering,” came a friendly female voice. Laazia smiled triumphantly at this minor victory over Voyager’s impressive technology.
Uh-oh, Paris thought. She’s getting the hang of this. It was entirely possible, he realized, that the ship might prove far too user-friendly for their own good. Remember, he told himself, we don’t know how advanced the science of the Ryol really is. There might be someone in Laazia’s entourage who knew a lot more about operating starship systems. He couldn’t just sit back and wait to see what happened next; he had to throw a wrench into the works somehow.
Laazia was in a hurry, too. Evidently unwilling to wait until her team returned, she walked slowly and deliberately over to Paris and grabbed him by the chin. Lifting his face toward hers, she addressed him in a low and seductive tone.
“You know that I will learn whatever I wish eventually,” she said. “Why not tell me now and spare you and the others so much suffering.” Her green eyes darkened ominously. Paris felt his hard-won resolve slipping away. Oh no, he thought. Not again! “You cannot resist us,” she purred. “Surrender to your inescapable destiny. Show me how to command this ship the same way that the Ryol have always commanded whatever we deigned to control. Tell me now, tell me everything you know.”
Paris tried to speak, but his mouth was dry. Swallowing hard, he managed to produce just enough saliva to say what he needed to say.
“Computer, deactivate Universal Translator. Bridge only.”
• • •
The too-bright beams disappeared. The obnoxious humming ceased. Rolop, the chief deputy to the Heir, peeked out from behind the entrance to the turbolift and inspected the aliens’ defenses. His milky green eyes widened in surprise as he saw the portal to the engine rooms lying open and abandoned. He let out a howl of victory. The neffaler had retreated at last!
Barking out a command to his followers, he loped down the scorched hallway toward their newly captured territory, holding a captured phaser in one clenched paw. His powerful body sung with all the vitality he had stolen from their pitiable opponents. After days spent maintaining the shape of a hairless simian, it felt liberating to inhabit once more his rightful form as a hunter. He sniffed the sterile artificial air of the starship; if he tried very hard he could almost smell the fear of his fleeing p
rey.
Manow and Shiila caught up with him, yelping and yowling at his side. They left another hunter, Paayra, unconscious on the floor of the turbolift. She had not managed to absorb enough strength from the new neffaler to resist the potency of their energy weapons. Later perhaps, Rolop mused, he would allow her to restore herself by supping on the last dregs of essence to be found in their defeated foes.
A handful of fallen humanoids littered the floor at the other end of the corridor. Rolop sensed some life remaining in the inert bodies, but he urged both his followers to pass them by. There would be time enough to feed on leftovers once the captain was captured. He pounced over the alien casualties, wondering where and when the rest of the neffaler would choose to make their last stand.
He found his answer just beyond the gateway to the engine rooms. Captain Janeway and roughly a dozen of her crew stood guard in front of the tall translucent pillar that dominated the center of the chamber. Banks of machinery surrounded the base of the pillar, while nonorganic energy flashed and flickered within its shadowy depths. Rolop, who had studied starship technology, guessed that the imposing structure played some key role in the matter/antimatter reactions powering the ship’s warp drive.
A steel catwalk ran around the top of the pillar, several lengths above their heads. Rolop peered up at the scaffolding, half-expecting an ambush, but saw no humanoids upon the catwalk. The only aliens in sight were the ones standing directly in his path. He recognized Captain Janeway at once. The stern-looking female stood in the center of the assembled neffaler, flanked on both sides by armed guards in yellow uniforms.
“Turn back,” Janeway said, “or we will resort to deadly force.”
Rolop’s lips peeled back, exposing his fangs. Was this creature suicidal, he wondered, or merely deluded? Hadn’t they already demonstrated the overwhelming superiority of the Ryol when compared against the aliens’ meager attempts to defend themselves? Rolop felt the strength and endurance of countless neffaler burning within his breast. He did not fear the humanoids’ weapons, as annoying as they were. No neffaler could last for long against the power of the Ryol. They were nothing but food, after all.