Pathways

by Jeri Taylor

  The guard had almost cleared the storage area when he stopped, hesitated for a moment, then looked back. He seemed to scrutinize the ground in puzzlement. He lifted his feet and inspected the bottoms. Then he stared back at the ground, where his single set of tracks stretched behind him.

  He stood like that for a full minute, shaking his head in seeming bewilderment. Finally he turned and moved back out of sight.

  Neelix was still frozen in place as his mind reeled with indecision. Had the guard realized what had happened? Or was his brain so addled by narcotics that he was incapable of deducing why his footprints had disappeared?

  He was certain the group was in more peril now than at any other time since they’d arrived here. They’d better accelerate their plans before they were uncovered. He wished he had his combadge in order to alert the others, but it had been taken to provide tuning circuits for the transporters.

  He waited another few minutes, then casually emerged from the woods and took another antigrav sled, guiding it at his side, tinkering with it as though he were preoccupied with its performance. As he moved through the storage area, another deposit of dust appeared and settled to the ground, obliterating both his footprints and those that the guard had left.

  The next hour passed like a week. Neelix kept sneaking looks at the guard who’d thrown up, trying to figure out if he was behaving as though he was suspicious. He didn’t seem to be, sprawling lazily under the rock ledge, somnolent and dulled, staring out with hooded eyes at the activities of the miners.

  Neelix had considered the possibility of feigning illness in order to be returned to the camp before the day was out. But he decided against it on several counts: it might draw attention to him and arouse even more suspicion; and the Subu guard, who didn’t seem particularly leery about his experience, had settled into a torpor. There was no reason to panic.

  The workday ended and the prisoners were herded together for the walk back to the camp. Neelix was eager to get back and see how close they were to putting their plan in motion. Four guards usually accompanied them, one ahead, one behind, one on either side. But today, as the group started out, the guard who had visited the storage area gestured to another one, and then, to Neelix’s horror, began leading him back toward the stored sleds.

  He had noticed! If he didn’t understand what had happened, he had at least realized something was odd, and was bringing the other guard to inspect the area, to offer his opinion as to how it could be that footprints could disappear from one moment to the next.

  And of course when they returned they’d find no footprints at all, and would probably stand there long enough to witness one of the cyclical materializations.

  Neelix forced himself to be calm, walking in a measured stride with the other miners, resisting the impulse to look over his shoulder and see if the two guards had returned from the storage area. The walk back to the camp seemed interminable, and by the time they got to the wall that surrounded the stockade, Neelix was panting, not from exertion, but from apprehension.

  One of the guards gave a signal, and the huge gates rolled open and the miners entered the camp. Neelix walked briskly but calmly toward their shelters, trying not to run, adopting as casual a mien as he could. Finally he was there and he ducked inside.

  “Commander!” he called, and Chakotay rose and came to him. “I think the guards may have seen some of the ore dust materializing. They may not be able to figure it out, but I think they’re suspicious.”

  Chakotay turned immediately to B’Elanna and Harry, who were tirelessly operating the transporters. “How soon?” he asked tersely.

  B’Elanna shoved her hair out of her eyes. Her face was grimy and sweaty, and dark rings under her eyes testified to her fatigue. “Without going down there, I can’t tell. There might be enough room now.”

  “I think you should check it out.”

  “All right. Harry—set the coordinates and get ready to energize.”

  Harry worked his transporter briefly, then looked up at her and nodded. “Ready.”

  B’Elanna took one of the three remaining combadges, retained for just this purpose, and attached it. “Send me down,” she told Harry.

  Torres shimmered briefly and then dematerialized. Moments later, they heard her voice. “Bring me back up,” she ordered, and Harry did so.

  She was back in seconds, looking pleased. “It’s a little snug,” she reported, “but we can get two people in there. It’s going to work.”

  Chakotay walked to the opening of the shelter and looked out. “It’ll be dark soon. We won’t wait until the place has completely bedded down, but I don’t want to move out until we have the cover of darkness.”

  “We should wait to receive our nightly rations,” offered Tuvok. “Our absence at that time would be noticed.”

  “Agreed.”

  And then Chakotay gathered them all around, going over the plan one more time so that everyone knew what was expected of them. Harry Kim listened quietly, already having gone over the strategy a hundred times himself. He wasn’t concerned about the logistics of their maneuver, but he was worried about something else. When Chakotay had finished, Harry approached him.

  “Sir? Can I see you outside?”

  Chakotay looked quizzically at him, then nodded and they both exited the shelter. The temperature had fallen quickly as the sun dropped lower, and there was a vague stirring in the camp as the heat-induced lethargy was relieved. Neelix was at the Rai’ shelters, making something for dinner, keeping to his nightly routine even on this most urgent of nights.

  “What is it?” asked Chakotay.

  “I don’t know what you have in mind, but I’d like to take Coris with us.”

  Chakotay was quiet for a moment and Harry, fearful that this signified his reluctance, hurried to fill the silence. “I know she isn’t Starfleet-trained, but she’s bright and quick and she wouldn’t hold us back. I’ll guarantee it.”

  Chakotay smiled slightly. “Of course she’s coming with us,” he said, to Harry’s great relief. “I’d never leave her behind.”

  “Thank you, sir,” said Harry, feeling immeasurably lighter.

  Then they heard the sound of the gates rolling open. Harry looked toward the wall, expecting to see the antigrav units bearing the nightly rations, but what he saw was armed guards emerging from all sides. The prisoners instantly fell into their self-conscious activity, studiously avoiding the presence of the guards.

  Harry and Chakotay exchanged a glance. What did this impromptu visit mean? Suddenly Neelix was in front of them, holding a bowl of liquid, looking a bit pale and rattled. “Commander, will you try this soup? It needs a touch of something, I think.”

  He poked the bowl toward Chakotay, who took it as Neelix leaned in to him, and whispered, “Something tells me we’d better get out of here now.”

  Chakotay peered over the edge of the bowl at the guards nearest them, about fifty meters away. Three of the Subu were upending a shelter, ripping aside walls of a meager lean-to, tentacles pawing through all the possessions of the hapless prisoners, who stood back anxiously, trying without success to look nonchalant.

  Harry estimated there were perhaps a dozen shelters between the guards and Voyager’s people. At the rate the guards were going, they would be rummaging through the Starfleet shelters in ten or fifteen minutes, and they’d find the transporters.

  It was time to move.

  Harry, Chakotay, and Neelix swung into the shelter, Chakotay snapping orders as they did. “Harry, get ready to beam down to the chamber. Vorik, go to the other shelter and let them know what’s happening. Tell everyone to start drifting over here one at a time, slowly, without any urgency.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “We have to start this process now. Ready, B’Elanna?”

  She nodded grimly and glanced at Harry. He picked up the second transporter and held it tightly. “Let’s do it,” he said, and noted that his voice sounded hollow.

  “Energizing,”
said Torres, and at that moment a sudden movement in the back of the shelter caught Harry’s eye; it was Coris, looking frightened, and Harry realized he hadn’t let her know she’d be coming with them. The notion threw him slightly off balance and he took a step forward to keep from reeling. Then he felt the momentary disorientation that always accompanied dematerialization, the brief blackness when his molecules had been converted to pure energy.

  When he rematerialized he began screaming. A pain so excruciating he thought he might lose consciousness was searing his right foot, and he couldn’t move. Desperately, he fought against the pain, forced himself to stay conscious even as nausea welled in him.

  His right foot, with which he had stepped forward at the moment of transport, had rematerialized inside the rock wall of the chamber, crushing the bones of the foot.

  Harry gasped for air and switched on the small hand beacon they’d constructed from parts Neelix had cadged. Perspiring heavily, chilled, fighting nausea, Harry set the transporter to beam him out again, back a bit farther in the dank chamber. He was able to key the controls just before he blacked out from the pain.

  He came to on the floor, with Chakotay’s voice coming over his combadge. “Harry! Harry, answer me! Do you read me?”

  Groggy, pain-riddled, Harry struggled to a sitting position. “I’m here, Commander,” he said through clenched teeth.

  “Did something go wrong?”

  “No, it’s fine. Start sending people down.”

  “Tuvok will be first.”

  Harry glanced around the chamber and realized he’d have to be standing if two people were to fit here. It was a rectangular space no more than a meter across at its widest point. Painfully, his right foot throbbing, he pulled himself upright on his other foot.

  For a moment he was afraid he was going to pass out again, but he bit his lip until it bled, and his head cleared. In the next instant, Tuvok materialized in front of him.

  “Okay, sir,” he rasped, “I’m putting you outside the wall, about three hundred meters into the forest.” He began working the transporter controls.

  “Ensign, have you been injured—” Tuvok began, but he was gone before he could complete the sentence. Seconds later, his voice over the combadge announced that he was successfully in the forest, well outside the walls of the prison camp.

  Harry found another part of his lip and bit down again. This was going to be a long night.

  Above, in the shelter, Chakotay announced the order of descent: “Seven, Tom, Gabrielle, Neelix, Coris, Brad . . .” As he spoke, everyone was aware of the increasing hubbub outside. Coris sneaked to the opening and peered out as a clamor of shouting erupted, punctuated occasionally by screams.

  “They’re getting close. But they must’ve found something illegal in someone else’s shelter. They’re punishing people—burning them with the acid that comes from their tentacles.”

  Chakotay remembered vividly what that felt like, and felt sorry for the poor wretches who were suffering it now. But he had to stay focused on the current task. “Keep going, B’Elanna. Send them as quickly as it’s safe.”

  Seven was dispatched, and moments later, Tom. The others were lining up in an ordered and disciplined fashion, even though worry was etched on their faces.

  Gabrielle Allyn dematerialized. Then Neelix, his spots pronounced against a pale face.

  “Coris, you’re next,” said Chakotay, looking around for the small girl.

  Coris wasn’t there.

  • • •

  Coris of Saccul moved with purpose through the crowded camp, circling around to come at them in a direction different from that of the Voyager shelters.

  For once in her life, she would accomplish something. It had been an undistinguished life so far, noted mostly for its misery and disappointments, but a tiny flame of determination was burning in her now and she fanned it eagerly.

  Finally she understood some of the things her mother’s mother had told her when she was small. Her beloved Gammi, the only creature on Saccul that cared whether she lived or died, who had taken her in when her own mother had abandoned her, choosing instead to become a camp follower, lying with soldiers in return for crumbs of bread and spoons of soup.

  Once, Coris had dreamed of grand and glorious accomplishments: she would sing as beautifully as the night birds of her planet; she would study the heavens and uncover their dark mysteries; she would become a priestess and guide young people in the intricacies of spirituality.

  Those dreams were gone by her ninth year, when Gammi died at the hands of drunken soldiers and the greatest aspiration Coris could imagine was simply surviving for one more day.

  Her own capture and imprisonment by the Subu reduced the circumstances of her life not at all, as she believed she would have died soon had she remained free. Dying in this prison camp was no different.

  Until the Voyagers had come along.

  She had never met such people, never even imagined them. Gammi had taught her that in the life after death there were such great beings, full of goodness and joy, but never had she thought it possible for people of this dimension to embody all those grand qualities.

  She was ashamed that she’d been introduced to them because of trying to steal Harry’s boots, but she was still grateful to have met them, to have sat with them and listened to their stories, to hear of their strength, their generosity, their selflessness. Night after night she had sat quietly, discovering in them a nobility that both fascinated and intimidated her.

  She finally felt that she knew why one was born into low estate, into pain and squalor: it was so that one could transcend those circumstances, could toughen and hone oneself against adversity and in so doing, become noble and selfless.

  She hadn’t thought her opportunity would come so quickly. She’d hoped to go with the Voyagers when they made their escape, so that she could continue to learn from them, could grow stronger and more certain of herself.

  But she hadn’t the slightest doubt that fate had given her the very opportunity she sought right at this moment.

  At the rate the Subu guards were moving, the Voyagers would never be able to move everyone out of the shelters before they were discovered. Something had to slow them down, and that was what Coris intended to do. The tiny flame nicked higher, warming her with a feeling she’d never had before, something she couldn’t even identify, but which she knew she must follow.

  The old transtator was heavy in her hands. This was the very first component the Voyagers had procured; she’d been with Harry when he found it and traded some food for it. It turned out not to be functional, even though it sparked and hummed and emitted a weak beam of light.

  But tonight it would become invaluable.

  She had now circled around so that she was ready to intercept the guards from a direction well away from the Voyagers. A few minutes was all she’d need, and she was sure she could endure the attack of the Subu tentacles for a few minutes. Pain was familiar to her, and surely in her young life she’d suffered worse.

  She noticed that a few puzzled prisoners stared after her as she marched through their midst, ordinarily an undertaking fraught with danger. But with the presence of the guards, no one would think of doing anything to draw attention. She was safe from the unwanted attention of prisoners.

  The guards were only a few meters away now, rampaging through a small encampment of the Yottins, who shrank in terror from the guards, their monstrous weapons, and their deadly tentacles.

  Now.

  She planted herself directly in front of the guards as they moved away from the Yottins and lifted the transtator, pointing it directly at them. The thin beam of light wasn’t visible in the daylight, but now that night was almost on them, it shone right at the first Subu guard.

  He stopped in utter bewilderment. Then took a step back, hand raised to stop the others.

  His orifice opened slightly, an expression Coris had never seen on these creatures. It looked almost like a smile, but sh
e couldn’t imagine these beings smiling.

  It occurred to her that it must be a strange tableau, she, a small girl, holding the heavy transtator pointed at the guards; they stopped in their tracks, uncertain, caught unawares by her strange behavior.

  The guard stretched out a tentacle. “Give me that,” he rasped, but Coris shook her head.

  “It’s mine.”

  “Is that the machine which turns ore to dust?”

  So they did know what had happened. Coris felt her heart quicken with urgency, but her voice was clear and strong in the night air, now unnaturally hushed as the prisoners waited to see what the guards would do.

  “No,” said Coris, “it’s a machine which will insure that you never father children.”

  There was an astonished gasp from the onlookers, and a heavy moment passed, charged as though in the instant before lightning strikes. Then Coris saw the guard’s tentacle snake out and rip the transtator from her grasp, then pass it to one of his fellows.

  Then the tentacle came whipping back for her.

  Her voice, when it began screaming, seemed disembodied, a high keening that came from somewhere far away. She’d been wrong; this pain was worse, far worse, than anything she’d ever experienced. By the time blackness came, she’d forgotten her purpose, her quest for nobility, even who she was and why she was here, writhing in this crucible.

  Chakotay and B’Elanna were the last to go. When the screams began, he had run to the opening of the shelter and saw Coris twisting in the deadly embrace of the Subu guard. There was nothing he could do for her now. He moved back to B’Elanna and signaled her with a nod.

  He was beamed to the underground chamber thinking of Coris, whose sacrifice had undoubtedly bought them the time they needed to complete the transports.

  When he materialized, it was in front of a Harry Kim who looked as though he was about to pass out.