by Melanie
She was totally unprepared for what happened next.
The figure illuminated by the blue lights rushed over to her and spoke in a voice she knew. "Captain? You all right?"
"Tom?" She squinted, trying to make out his familiar features. All she could see was the vague outline of his body and uncustomary shaggy hair.
"Yes. The tricorder says you're hurt, but not badly." Passing her the extra combadge with one hand, he caught her free hand with his other and drew her with him towards the corridor. "Help me get these two inside."
Together they dragged the guards inside the cell. After both were inside, he used Harry's trick to disguise the Captain.
"Put these on," he ordered, thrusting the clothes of the smaller of the two greys at her. "They'll still be way too big, but they'll have to do."
As he locked the sleepers in the cell, she hurriedly dressed and he stuck the key in his bag.
"Without a key, it'll take them a while to get them out and know for sure you're gone. That should give us a head start. Let's go before these two wake up and raise the alarm."
Finishing rolling up the last pant leg, she sprinted after him.
-------
I'Nu rushed into the "quarantine" rooms and was confronted with Nru and Ksu lying on the floor. Moving closer he could see the shimmering pools of blood collecting on the floor under their bodies. He was down on one knee, checking for signs of life when the door across the room opened and the big Rachar known as Plwa quietly entered, showily rubbing sleep out of his eyes.
"What happened?" I'Nu demanded.
Wide-eyed, the Rachar shrugged and shook his head.
"Check on Harry Kim."
Plwa walked through the room and into Harry's bedroom. A minute later, he returned with an even greater look of surprise on his face.
A sinking feeling forming in the pit of his three stomachs, the Gherop pushed passed him and strode into the next room. "Go alert-" Turning, I'Nu found he was alone. "He must have gone for a medic."
'I have to tell E'Arte immediately. Too bad there's not someone else who could give E'Arte the bad news,' he thought, whipping out his communicator then stopped. 'Of course by the time I trudge all the way back up there to see him, he will have calmed down considerably. Maybe.'
-------
"Sunfire, come in."
"What is it?" Janeway whispered from behind Tom as they continued up the stairs.
"I can't raise Sunfire," he murmured back. "I haven't been able to for a while but I figured it was the minerals in the rock and the depth that was blocking the transmission. Now, I'm not sure. My tricorder says were at the sixth level. Even without contacting her to tell her to beam us up, she should have done it the moment everyone was within transporter range."
"Everyone?"
"The plan was for me to set the enhancers to boost the signal lock on the crew, find you and Harry then all of us would beam out at the same time. Less risk of becoming trapped once the alarm was-"
At that moment, a loud din began issuing from speakers in the ceiling above them and the regular lighting snapped on.
"Obviously they know Harry's on the loose. Sunfire, come in."
Still nothing."
By now they had reached the fifth level and he led her down a corridor, not further up the stairs.
"Where are we going?"
"Up the same way I came in. I'm going to get you started for the surface then go back for the crew."
The moment the coast was clear, he slipped into the shaft ahead of her then held open the grate for her to join him. He was replacing the metalwork when he heard the sound of footsteps coming down the hallway towards them. They remained huddled there, silently, until the greys passed and it was safe for them to move without fear of being heard.
"Here," he said softly and handed her the wrist lamp from his pack. "I'll go first. There's a maze of dead ends ahead that I'll have to lead you through it then you'll be on your own to the surface. Don't touch the walls. This place's unstable."
They climbed in total silence for a long time then he came to a halt when the tunnel ceased branching off in all directions.
"This is where we part," he said. "Keep going ahead and you can't miss the surface. The exit's mostly blocked but there's a breech to the left si-"
There was an ominous creaking above them. Recognizing it for what it was, he wrapped his arm around her and more or less dragged her along with him towards the surface seconds before the ceiling partially collapsed where they had been standing. Keeping them moving, he swore under his breath.
"I guess you're not going back after the crew," she whispered, mindful it might have been the vibrations from their talking that had brought the ceiling down.
"Not that way anyway. Let's get to the surface and see if we can contact Sunfire from there." Releasing her, he gave her a nudge to precede him through a narrow opening.
It was a while before Tom risked talking at normal sound levels again. Normally, he would not have risked talking at all, but he needed to encourage the tiring Janeway. To get her mind off of their situation, he told her of the first time he could remember going mountain climbing. As expected, she laughed at his having become so tangled up in the line his climbing partner had to haul him up to the plateau and spend the next hour untying the muddle, all the while laughing his head off at "little Tommy's" predicament.
"With that he more or less torpedoed any chances he had with Moira."
"He was a boyfriend of your sister's then?" Kathryn panted.
"And the younger brother of my sister Kathleen's boyfriend. The four of them had thought how cute it would be to have him and Moira matched up. Two sisters dating two brothers. There was even a younger sister for me when the time came. But when we made it home and Kathleen's boyfriend heard his brother's story and laughed at me that was the end of the four of them. It was okay for my sisters to laugh at me, they were family, but 'may the Gods protect any non-family who dared make fun of our little brother!'"
The last bit was delivered in a high soprano, clearly meant to be impersonating one or both of his sisters. Janeway began to laugh. Unfortunately it was the wrong time for her to be doing that. She was attempting to squeeze through a hole in the debris clogging the shaft. Tom heard the tell-tale sounds of cracking and the dust beginning to drift down from the ceiling. Instantly he gave her a good shove through the hole and she flew clear just as more of the ceiling caved in precisely where she had been.
"T-" A coughing fit overtook Kathryn before she could finish calling his name as the dust began to settle. "Tom?" she croaked when the fit was over.
"Are you okay?" came the muffled question.
She tested all her limbs. None appeared broken. There was a bump forming on her forehead and from the stinging she could tell there was some major scrapes and scratches on all of her exposed skin. "Yes. You?" She swung the wrist lamp around in the direction of his voice. "Where are- No!" The opening through the rubble was gone. "The hole's filled in." She began swinging the light around again. "We'll have to find something to use to brace the hole open again while you-"
"Never mind me. Get to the surface."
His voice was growing softer. She moved as close to the "wall" as she dared, straining to hear him. Finally, she ended up prone in the dirt so she could listen through a small gap at ground level.
"There's a forest you can hide in until Sunfire or Voyager find you. You'll be-" He had a coughing fit of his own. "You'll be in the open for a while, but it is night's fallen so it will give you an advantage."
"How will you get out?"
Another coughing fit was his only response.
Shifting sideways a little, she shone the wrist lamp through the hole. Immediately on the other side was a hand, blue and covered with a coating of dirt, rock fragments, and something suspiciously dark and wet. "You're hurt!"
"Don't worry about me. Get yourself out."
Instead of listening, she shoved up a huge sleeve and slowly slippe
d a hand through the hole to touch his pinkie with the tips of her longest two fingers. She could reach no further.
Tom started at the unexpected contact then his finger shakily pressed against hers.
"If the rocks shift, your hand will be trapped."
"How bad are you hurt?"
"Been worse," he dismissed.
"You're lying. We need to get you-"
"*You* need to get *you* to the surface and back to Voyager. They need you."
"I can't leave you."
"Yes, you can. I'll still be here after G.I. Janeway's... finished kicking some alien posterior."
Again, there was a fit of coughing and its sound scared her. Her coughing from the dust had been a dry one. This was a classic example of a wet, fluid-building-up-in-the-lungs cough. Suddenly, the coughing trailed off and the finger touching hers slackened.
"Tom? Tom?!"
After a minute of calling to him, pleading with him to say something, to let her know he was alive, she withdrew her hand. There was nothing left for her to do but do as he had instructed -- go kick some butt and come back for him as soon as she could. Shucking off the grey's garments, she ran for the surface.
-------
"That should do it. I still don't understand why they failed, but that's the cloaking device, comm system, and now sensors in working order," B'Elanna announced. "Now to go back to Voyager and try to put her back together." She gave the Engineering room an appreciative look. "This is amazing. I've never even dreamed about anything like this. When this is over, I'd love to-"
"You need to return to Voyager," Sunfire said sharply, cutting off B'Elanna's voicing of her dream to investigate the new-to-her technology that was Sunfire.
B'Elanna felt her hackles rising. The entire time she had been here, the ship had been terse with her. At the ship's design, the only communication between them had been that which was strictly necessary. There had not been any answers to her questions as to where Tom was other than "on the planet" and nothing else said except instructions on how to replace vaguely familiar parts in totally unfamiliar systems and brief updates on the battle with the enemy ships. Every time B'Elanna had tried to be friendly, the ship rebuffed her.
Angrily snapping her kit closed, B'Elanna opened her mouth to demand an explanation of the ship's hostility only a scream came out inside and she fell to her knees, clutching her chest.
Instantly, Sunfire beamed her to Voyager's Sickbay.
Minutes later, the patient passed out without the EMH ever finding anything wrong with her.
-------
Dtu and Jmi had felt the ground tremble and seen the clouds of dust issue forth from further down the tunnel. At once, they had stopped to huddle in a natural crevice in the wall, their lantern going out as they did.
"We should turn back," Jmi whispered through the scrap of cloth he hastily brought up to over his mouth and nose against the dust.
"No," Dtu insisted through her own makeshift mask. "We have to find out where this leads. If it goes where I think it might, we might be able to get inside the Gherop base. Now, quiet. I'm trying to listen."
But they were too far down the shaft from the one in the Gherop clothes to hear what she was saying or to whom and there was no where to hide if they were to leave the crevice to go closer to eavesdrop. Abruptly, the female gave a cry, calling out a word over and over, something they did not understand, and receiving no response that they could hear anyway.
Then she was up off of the ground, shucking off the Gherop garb she wore, exposing an outfit of red and black beneath. She ran passed them and up the tunnel without ever noticing them.
"We should follow her," Jmi said.
"No, Lta or Pmka will follow her. We must check to see who it was she was talking to. It might have been the traitor."
"But-"
Ignoring him, Dtu was switching on her lantern once more and running down the tunnel. Jmi had no choice but to follow his foolhardy friend.
-------
Dismissing the despised B'Elanna's condition from her concern, Sunfire focused her attention back onto the planet and detected a Terran life sign exiting the tunnel. Automatically, she beamed it up and the Captain appeared on her Bridge, minus the few insectoid "hitchhikers" she had picked up in her cell on the planet.
"Where...?"
"Sunfire," the ship answered. "Where's Sunbird?"
"He didn't make it."
Both females fell into a silence, only to be roused from it by another hit from a Gherop vessel a second later.
Janeway automatically jerked into Command mode. "What's our situation?"
Sunfire outlined the battle and the damage both ships had been subjected to. Lastly, she imparted Harry's little piece of news -- the true identity of the "greys."
"Clearly they were holding back in our previous encounters," Janeway grimaced.
"Much more damage and I don't think we'll win."
'Which leaves only one logical course of action,' Janeway realized, 'the needs of the many had to outweigh the needs of the one. They had to leave Tom's body behind so they could save themselves.' "Patch me through to Voyager," she ordered.
-------
"Engineering, report," Chakotay called.
"Things don't look good, Commander."
"Carey? Where's Torres?"
"Still on Sunfire, sir," he reported, not knowing she actually was in their Sickbay, puzzling the hell out of the EMH. "Any chance of us getting out of here? Much more and we'll lose the shields."
"Paris still hasn't got the Captain out. Do what you can to hold the ship together. Bridge out."
"We may have to leave before they return, Commander," Tuvok informed him. "Sensors are picking up a much bigger Gherop fleet on its way here."
"How big?"
"One ship twice the size of Voyager and a dozen smaller ships half the size of Voyager. The first of the smaller ones will arrive here within an hour. The rest and the larger ship are over a day's travel away yet."
"Great."
"Commander," Harry called out, "incoming transmission from Sunfire."
"Go ahead."
Kathryn Janeway appeared on the main viewer surrounded by Sunfire's Bridge. While in reality she was battered and dirty with damp streaks down her face telling she had been crying, she looked like a goddess to the Bridge crew, especially her First Officer.
"Kathryn!" Chakotay exclaimed. "Are you-"
"Tom's dead," she overrode in a monotone. "Have Voyager retreat to the co-ordinates Sunfire is sending you. Warp 9."
"Yes, Captain," he nodded and the screen returned to the view of the approaching vessels. "Baytart?"
"Aye, Commander," the pilot said in a small voice. "Warp 9."
The two ships leapt to warp leaving their colleague's body behind.
-------
"Dtu, Jmi? What is this the others tell us?"
Dtu excitedly picked herself up off of the dirt floor and hugged her father. "A pale colored female alien in red and black in came out of here and there's a Rachar on the other side of this." He gestured to the debris. "If you look through there you can see a hand. I think he or she is dead though. We can't get any answer to our calls."
Her father's mind was still on the alien. "Pale as in skin?"
"Yes."
"And red and black clothing?"
"Yes."
"One of the ones from Voyager, Kni?" another of the two adults suggested.
"Perhaps, Mksa," Dtu's father nodded, lowering himself to the ground. "When did she come out?"
"Only moments ago. You should have run into her."
"Lta and Pmka said they saw someone of that description running from the opening but they lost sight of her somehow."
"This transporter technology we have heard about?" Mksa wondered.
"Or she could have just vanished, not ducked behind a tree or something?"
Kni shone his own lantern through the gap and saw what Janeway and his daughter had seen. He also saw a slig
ht twinge of a finger. "It's a male, I think, and still alive." He got to his feet. "We'll need braces. I want to try to clear as much of this as we can to get him out without bringing the ceiling in on us."
"What if it is a trap? What if the children are right and he is a traitor?"
"It is a chance we'll have to take, Mksa. Kle," he called to one of the other adults, "go back to the village. See if any of our contacts have any information. If one of the Voyager aliens has escaped, I want to know. And take the children with you."
"Ah, but-" Dtu began to complain.
"It is for your own safety. Now, go."
Though she did not want to Dtu obeyed and went.
-------
A desktop computer was flung at the wall in rage. Voyager and undoubtedly Sunfire were gone. Immediately, he had contacted the fleet in their hiding place far removed from Rachar and transmitted Voyager's heading, but they were too far away to stop them before they travelled out of range. All the fleet could do was follow their projected course and scour the area for them. It was a long shot given the lead Voyager had on them.
The irate Gherop grabbed a chair, sending it after the computer. But even if they could capture Voyager, all of his plans were ruined. The ship would not be easy to take without incurring heavy damage and that still would leave the problem the had experienced before with the systems locking them out.
A tray of datacrystals were sent to see where the computer and chair had gone. This was supposed to be a glorious culmination of all his hard work. Instead, it was a humiliating debacle. Easily, this was the worst day of his life since he had inadvertently slighted a favored second cousin of T'Do and been assigned to this backwater as retribution. There was no way it could become worse.
"Ship approaching," a young officer tremulously announced. "It is the T'Do T'Nar. They're requesting contact with you, E'Arte."
E'Arte froze. The T'Do T'Nar was the lead ship of T'Do's escort fleet. The escort fleet always remained with his personal ship, the T'Do R'Tu, on the Homeworld unless T'Do had decided to make one of his rare forays into the Universe outside of the Homeworld's rarefied atmosphere. If the escort fleet was coming, it meant he was coming.
He had been wrong. The day could get worse.