Star Trek: Voyager - 043 - Acts of Contrition

by Kirsten Beyer

  “I’ll be in the commander’s ready room if you need me,” Janeway said. “Decan.”

  Glenn’s ready room was small, like everything else aboard the Galen. The furnishings consisted of a desk and two chairs placed before it. Janeway looked automatically for a replicator—a cup of coffee was definitely in order—but did not find one. The only personal touch present in the room was a small mat tied in a roll in a corner behind the desk.

  “Decan?”

  “I will report immediately to the mess hall and return shortly,” her aide stated. In their years together, the Vulcan had never admitted to extraordinary telepathic abilities. He simply displayed them flagrantly on a daily basis. “Will half a pot suffice?”

  “For now. Thank you,” Janeway replied. “Remind me where we’re scheduled to go next.”

  “Evening observation,” Decan said. Off the admiral’s puzzled brow, he clarified: “Church.”

  Chapter Twelve

  GOLDENBIRD

  “If you’d like to catch some sleep, there are three bunks in the back. Feel free to take your pick,” Lieutenant Samantha Wildman suggested to Doctor Sharak as soon as she had engaged her small vessel’s warp engine. “We’re a good nine hours out from Coridan.”

  “You are most kind, Lieutenant Wildman,” Sharak said. “I am sufficiently rested at this time.”

  The soft-spoken lieutenant, who Sharak had learned was a xenobiologist, wore her shoulder-length blond hair loose. Unruly strands obscured the side of her face, so it was hard to tell if the glance she shot toward him in response was one of acknowledgment or trepidation.

  “You must be a very good friend of Commander Paris,” Sharak said.

  “We served together on Voyager for seven years,” Wildman said. “We’ve been through a lot together.”

  “It is good fortune to serve for so long with those you respect,” Sharak said.

  Wildman’s face scrunched in confusion. “I would not call being stranded in the Delta Quadrant good fortune, Doctor.”

  “No, I did not mean . . .” Sharak began, then sighed. “I do not envy the circumstances that brought you together.” One achingly pleasant conversation with Ratham had temporarily realigned his divided mind. For a brief time, his thoughts and words had been one. Now he must force them again into opposing camps.

  “I’m sorry,” Wildman said, clearly regretting her tone. “I’ve never had the pleasure to meet a Tamarian before. I understand our language does not come easily to you.”

  Sharak smiled. “But like every new experience, it brings its own rewards.”

  Wildman smiled shyly.

  “This ship has such a lovely name. It is more poetic than most given to Starfleet vessels,” Sharak said.

  Wildman’s smile widened. “It’s not a Starfleet ship anymore. It was decommissioned before my husband acquired it and renamed it.”

  “Your husband does not serve Starfleet?”

  “He did. Gres—Greskrendtregk,” she clarified, carefully enunciating each syllable, “is also a scientist. He specializes in evolutionary biology. When Voyager returned to the Alpha Quadrant the first thing we decided was that we were never going to be separated again by our jobs. He resigned his commission and works with several civilian labs. He still travels from time to time, but only when he chooses to. For the most part, we spend our time on Earth, where I’m stationed, so we can both be close to our daughter, Naomi.”

  “How old is she?”

  “She’s almost twelve, but for a Ktarian, or half-Ktarian in Naomi’s case, that’s more like eighteen human years. She’s in her first year at Starfleet Academy.”

  “You must be very proud.”

  “We are.” After a short pause, Wildman added, “Gres named this ship for her.”

  “Goldenbird is his pet name for her?”

  “A nickname. It comes from a Ktarian song—from my husband’s homeworld—a really beautiful one, particularly when played on a lal-shak. Gres missed the first years of Naomi’s life. Since then he’s tried to teach her about the Ktarian part of her heritage. She resisted at first. It was a lot of change to accept at one time. But she fell in love with The Song of the Golden Bird. It brought them close.”

  Sharak was oddly touched. He had listened for so many years to the words of people of the Federation. Few had taken the time to tell him their stories. Those he’d had to seek out on his own. They were readily available in written form, less frequently simply shared.

  “Thank you, Lieutenant Wildman,” he said.

  “For what?”

  “The Children of Tama are taught to think and speak in stories. Proper nouns followed by descriptions of locations or actions provide all of the information required for communication. Many of your words are impossible to translate into Tamarian. But the lovely story you just shared with me would do so beautifully.”

  Wildman smiled again. “How?”

  “Greskrendtregk of Ktaria. Greskrendtregk and Naomi. The Song of the Golden Bird.”

  “Oh, I see,” Wildman said, her eyes dancing in delight. “You’re right. That’s lovely. I must remember to tell Gres.”

  “Humans also tell a story of a golden bird. Do you know it?”

  “No.”

  “It is quite ancient. I first began to learn your language by reading your myths and legends. I believe this one is a fairy tale.”

  “About a golden bird?”

  “It is about a young prince, the youngest of three brothers, who is sent to find a golden bird that has stolen precious golden apples from his father’s orchard. Several times, he meets a wise fox. The fox always speaks the truth to him, and when he follows the fox’s words, he succeeds. When he does not, he fails.”

  “Does he ever find the golden bird?”

  “Yes, and much more. He finds his life. He finds that to live, he must heed wisdom, even when it is found in unlikely places or contradicts the counsel of his heart.”

  “The moral of the story is to always listen to the wise fox?” Wildman asked.

  Sharak nodded.

  “I think Gres would like that story too,” Wildman said, smiling. Turning her seat to face him, she said, “Tell me more.”

  “Temba. His arms wide.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “What do you think it means?” Sharak asked.

  Wildman smiled in faint self-deprecation. But after a moment, she rose to the challenge. “I don’t know who Temba is. But, his arms wide. He could be reaching for something.” The lieutenant extended her arms as if to reach but quickly realized they were too close together. “Temba. His arms wide,” Wildman repeated. Opening hers, it suddenly hit her. “Temba is ready to receive something.” Slowly she closed her arms until her hands rested over her heart. “Give me something? Tell me something? Tell me more,” she said, nodding.

  The next nine hours went by much too quickly for both Sharak and Lieutenant Wildman.

  STARFLEET MEDICAL

  Twenty-eight code variations had been translated into programmable algorithms. None of them had altered a single catomic molecule. As she began her work on number twenty-nine, Seven pondered futility.

  She did not consider herself to be a quitter. Many times since she had been severed from the Collective their paths had crossed, and they had promised that resistance to them would prove futile. Each time the Borg uttered these words, they believed it to be a statement of fact. No matter how many times they had been proven false, the words retained an eerie power: a suggestion that no matter how any particular encounter ended, eventually, the Borg would prevail.

  They hadn’t. But they had slaughtered billions of life-forms on their way to learning that lesson.

  Seven wanted to believe that her effort to unlock the programming of her catoms was not destined to end with a similar body count. But each day that passed with no word from the Commander cemented her belief that nothing she did here was going to be of consequence when it came to curing the catomic plague.

  She nee
ded to speak to the Commander.

  Axum murmured quietly in his room. This behavior did not trouble her anymore. She knew his loneliness now in a way she could not have imagined when he had only spoken of it.

  Physical intimacy was no longer a mystery to Seven. Her first true experience of it had been with Hugh. Those instances, while intensely pleasurable, had not prepared her for sexual relations with Axum. With Hugh, she was conscious of her body’s responses to him. Though his might be inferred from the satisfaction she saw on Hugh’s face, as well as his verbal assurances, she was forced to accept on faith that he enjoyed their coupling as much as she did.

  With Axum, there were no questions. She did not know if their catoms somehow heightened the experience. But they must be responsible for the many new layers of sensation that flooded her body when they initiated physical contact. As powerful as her responses were, they paled in comparison to Axum’s. To be with Axum in that way was to feel his need, his hunger and his release along with her own and as if they were her own. It was the same for Axum. Her fears, doubts, and, yes, desires became his, even as they tempered his. There was nothing for them to learn of one another. Everything thought, every breath, the slightest touch moved seamlessly into the next, propelled by absolute certainty of one another’s desires. Complete satisfaction was a foregone conclusion as they moved deeper into one another, beyond their bodies and into a place where they alone existed, perpetually intertwined, woven together into one being. As a Borg, Seven had sought perfection. As a human, she had recognized the futility of such a pursuit. Hugh had once said that it must be awfully boring once achieved. She had thought him wise. Only now, as something not Borg, not human, and not quite Caeliar, did she understand that perfection sustained might be impossible, but experiences on a regular basis with another who could also understand it as such was, at the very least, intoxicating.

  She wished she had anticipated this possibility when she had last spoken with Hugh. She had never intended to deceive him. Seven knew well that what she had now experienced with Axum was a betrayal of Hugh, one for which she could not expect, nor would she ask, forgiveness. But in the strangest way, her life now seemed entirely separate from her previous existence. Some part of her knew that someday she would be forced to leave this place and that when she did, Hugh would still be there for her. She could not imagine being without Axum any more than she could imagine willfully choosing not to breathe. In this place, that was true. But somewhere else, she still belonged to Hugh.

  These thoughts were not constructive.

  She needed to speak to the Commander.

  Abandoning the workstation she had made her own in Axum’s lab, Seven moved to the patio. The night air was pleasantly cool. A single light now burned consistently in the quarters above that balcony. But no one had ever accessed the balcony, so Seven had no idea to whom those quarters belonged.

  A strange determination flooded her. The Commander might not wish to speak with her. But his were not the only feelings that deserved consideration.

  Seven reentered the quarters she shared with Axum. There were three doors accessible from the living area. One led to the lab. The second led to Axum’s bedroom. The third . . .

  That’s the ’fresher.

  Axum’s soft warning the first day they had been reunited returned to her.

  But it couldn’t be. If it was, the only access to the rest of the facility would be the patio, and there were no doors present at ground level there.

  Confused but undeterred, Seven moved to the third door. It did not open when she approached, nor did it move when she applied pressure and attempted to slide it open. A small control panel was embedded into the wall at the door’s right. She tried several codes, but none of them worked. Finally, she pressed her hands onto the door’s surface and attempted to slide it open manually. A faint alarm began to sound. Seven increased the pressure of her hand and, seconds later, the door slid open.

  Seven immediately stepped into a hallway with unadorned gray walls. To her right, it ended after a dozen meters. There were no other doors present in that direction. None were visible to the left either, but, given the lighted balcony’s location in relation to her current position, she knew that she must go left if she hoped to reach it.

  Following her instincts she soon came to a T-junction. Again she turned to her left. A few meters beyond she was surprised and delighted to find a flight of stairs leading up. She took them and found herself in a wider hallway, this one bearing several doors on either side.

  The area felt deserted. She had seen no one since she had left Axum’s quarters. But the first door she came to on her left should have led to the lighted room.

  When she reached it, the first thing she realized was that there was no control panel on the outside she might use to alert the occupant of her desire to enter. She raised a hand to knock but, as she did so, the door slid open.

  Why her heart began to pound as she crossed this threshold, she did not know. Ignoring it, she stepped into yet another hallway, this one dimly lit. The only source of light came from the wall, several meters ahead. When she reached it, she understood the odd effect. It was not an open doorway but rather a window—transparent aluminum unless she was mistaken.

  Beside the window was a single door, but peering through it she saw that this door was the first of two. There were two rooms visible to her. One contained a large control panel with several unusual manual configurations. Beyond it, visible through a second window and accessed by a second door, was some sort of exam room.

  An individual in a biohazard suit stood in that room. Lying on the room’s only biobed was an alien female. Her skin was a light shade of purple. Long black hair flowed down over the side of the bed.

  Seven watched as the individual in the suit placed a small case on a shelf beside them and removed a hypospray from it. The woman’s lips moved at this, but Seven could not hear her words. She must have received a response because her features settled as she was injected with the hypospray.

  For a moment, nothing happened.

  The woman’s head turned and she appeared to see Seven standing there. An odd smile, almost of recognition, crossed the woman’s lips before they parted in a silent scream.

  Seven stepped back automatically. The flesh that Seven could see on the woman’s face and arms contorted strangely. Dark black lines began to streak down it as it continued to ripple and then melt away from her bones.

  Seven looked at the backs of her hands and saw the same odd rippling effect begin. The tingling she had experienced before returned. She thought she knew what would follow, but she was mistaken as not just her hands but, instead, her entire body was suddenly clenched in a spasm of agony. There was nothing to reach for, nothing Seven could use to steady herself. She took a few steps back as her body folded into itself, searching for a place to hide from the pain. Her spine hit the wall behind her as her feet came out from under her.

  Then, as it had before, the pain was lost in a wave of fire so fierce it should have incinerated her on the spot.

  She could not remember beginning to scream. She knew only that when a pair of strong hands found her and began to lift her from the floor, she was still screaming.

  There was only one way for Icheb to access the quarantine area in which Seven was located. Over the last few days, while he waited in vain for Seven to contact him directly as he had requested, he had assessed the operating procedures for inventory control and formulated a relatively simple plan to use them to reach Seven. Acting on that plan would be to step firmly outside of the stark lines that proscribed the limits of acceptable behavior for a Starfleet Academy cadet.

  Icheb did not feel he had a choice. Seven had not contacted him. Icheb could not shake the sense that once Sharak had apprised her of his wishes, Seven would have done so had she been able. Something was wrong. Still, Icheb had not settled on his present course of action until he learned that, as of this morning, Doctor Sharak had been granted severa
l days of leave from Starfleet Medical. He was no longer available to assist Seven, should she require aid.

  That was now Icheb’s responsibility.

  Icheb had been disheartened to learn that supplies were not forwarded to the quarantine area manually. Like many organizations as vast and complex as Starfleet Medical Headquarters, many mundane tasks were automated. Inventory dispensation was done by transporter. The central computer system performed transports that were deemed hazardous, and any item coming in or out of the quarantine area was designated as such. As many transports contained living organisms, even cargo transporters within the facility were rated for human use.

  Locating an appropriate transport vessel had not been an issue—he had chosen one used for the transport of biohazard suits—nor had installing biometric shielding that would prevent the computer’s sensors from detecting him within the suit. It was more complicated to program the shield to emit scans that would identify the contents as requisitioned items of the appropriate weight, but this certainly was not beyond his abilities. He had records of everything that had been requested by the classified division over the last several days and he was able to prepare a falsified manifest. The last step was to enter the container into the queue for inventory transport, don the suit, position himself inside the container, and wait as it was picked up by the appropriate duty officer and taken to central inventory control. He anticipated it might take several hours for this to transpire. To his relief, he had waited within the container for less than twenty minutes before he felt it being lifted onto an antigrav unit.

  The only question was whether or not anyone would be present to receive the transported items or if they would be automatically routed to the appropriate storage room when they arrived. That challenge he would deal with once he knew the answer.

  He had drifted into a light doze when he felt the familiar sensation of transport take hold. A check of the suit’s chronometer indicated that less than two hours had elapsed. As soon as he rematerialized, he felt the container being lifted by an automated control arm and removed from the transporter padd. He immediately stilled his breath to eliminate the reverberations of his own respiration. The indistinct sound of conversation confirmed that officers were indeed present and coordinating receipt from their end. Less than half an hour later, the container was again moved, and this time, when it came to rest, it remained undisturbed for more than an hour and the sound of voices had vanished.