Title: Twist of Fate: A Force To Be Reckoned With
Author: Whoa Nellie ([email protected])
Series: Voyager
Rating: NC-17
Codes: C/f, K/7, crew
Synopsis: When Voyager sets down for maintenance, they
discover that they've been lured into a trap.
Originally posted to ASC on January 14, 2007
Author's
Notes: Feel free to archive to any
pertinent site. This story does stand
on its own, not necessary to have read the previous stories except for more
detailed background information on Ceshlyta and how she got there.
Previous
stories from the Twist of Fate storyline (in order): Blessings of the Sky Spirits, Wyrd, What Comes Naturally, Fresh
Perspective, Culinary Delights, Chaos Theory, Unforeseen Circumstance, A Matter
of Definition, Love and Copulation, Million Kilometer High Club, Comings and
Goings, Bare Necessities, Vulnerability, When in Rome, Reporting for Duty,
Rights and Wrongs, Proportional Response.
Background: Ceshlyta is Chakotay's wife and
soulmate. She is descended from the
Inheritors through a different tribe and was joined with Chakotay in a wedding
at the Temple of the Sky Spirits before they put her on Voyager. She was a Professor of Botany on Earth when
the Sky Spirits joined their souls, intertwined their life paths and put her on
Voyager. Her nickname, used by most of
the other crew members, is Sassy.
Acknowledgements: Paramount owns all the marbles, we just have
a lot more fun playing with them.
Feedback
is always appreciated, posted or
e-mail.
Whoa
Nellie's Romance Star Trek Fan Fiction Stories
http://whoanellie.fortunecity.com
A
FORCE TO BE RECKONED WITH
"Doctor, glad to have you back,"
Sassy greeted the EMH as she stopped in the doorway of his office in Sickbay.
The EMH looked up from the reports he was
reviewing. "Professor Ceshlyta,
I've been meaning to stop by the garden.
I delivered your message to your family; needless to say they were quite
overjoyed. Mr. Barclay is arranging for
them to get a message into the next data stream from Earth, but your father
asked me to tell you 'Blessings and love follow you on your new path'."
"I included a letter to them in this
month's data stream," she said; "but I am grateful that you talked to
them personally, thank you. There is
actually another reason that I stopped by, though, a medical reason."
The Doctor immediately reached for a
tricorder. "Have you talked to Mr.
Paris about this? What are your
symptoms?"
"I know what it is," Sassy waved
him off and made herself comfortable in the chair across from him. "At least I'm pretty sure; I just need
you to check everything out before I tell Chakotay. I've been waiting for you to get back since there's nothing Tom
could have done regardless."
Sitting back in his chair, he shot her his
most supercilious expression. "At
some point you will need to be more precise about the nature of 'it'."
"Pregnancy," she replied. "By my guess, I'm more than seven weeks
pregnant. I've been waiting to be sure
before I say anything to Chakotay. I
know his first concern will be the health of the baby--especially genetic, so
I'd like you to run a full scan. He
will know whatever you find no matter what, I just want to have it already in
hand when I tell him so he doesn't have to spend any time worrying
needlessly."
"Sensory tremens," the EMH
acknowledged the issue she had skirted.
"Go on out and hop up on a biobed.
I'll be right out and we'll get started."
................................................
Sassy was already in their quarters when
Chakotay got home after his duty shift.
He paused to drop a perfunctory kiss on her lips. "We've found a place to set down for
maintenance and the modifications for family quarters. You'll need to secure the garden for a
landing, but we've got plans in place to keep the garden powered up while we're
on the ground. We'll be landing day
after tomorrow so that we can be back up in time for the next data stream from
Earth."
"Hi, sweetheart, how was your
day?" Sassy asked with an amused smile.
"Mine was fine, nice and quiet."
He hung his head with a chagrined
look. "I'm sorry, everybody on the
bridge has been excited about this since they returned our transmission and talked
with Captain Janeway this afternoon."
"So it's an inhabited planet,"
she surmised.
"Yes, it was in the information we
got from Vog Nevane's people. They call
their planet Arakne and they've got a landing area that they've designed and
set aside for large ship maintenance.
It's sort of a space port except it's on the ground. Nevane's ship couldn't land so they didn't
know much about the landing area, but they noted that the Arakneans were very
friendly and traded fairly with them while they were in orbit. They were very excited about our
arrival. The landing area is not in use
by anyone else right now and they've extended an invitation to us for as long
as we need."
Sassy picked up the PADD on the coffee
table. "That sounds nice and it's
timely, too."
"What does that mean? Is there a problem with the garden?" he
asked.
"No," she toyed with the
PADD. "I saw the Doctor
today."
He couldn't help but grin. "Voluntarily?"
She chuckled at that. There were very few people on Voyager she
didn't get along with and the EMH was one of them. Things had settled down as time passed and a professional
civility had developed between them.
The Doctor had been kind enough to deliver the message to her family
while he was back in the Alpha Quadrant, but her avoidance of Sickbay for
anything other than absolutely essential visits was not exactly a secret. "Yes, I was a big girl and went to the
Doctor all by myself today."
Picking her up from her seat on the couch,
he sat down with her on his lap. His
fingers combed through the silky, long, black hair hanging loose down her
back. "Are you all right? I know you've been a little tired
lately."
"I'm pregnant--almost two months
pregnant," she told him, caressing his cheek and the dimple that
immediately appeared with his broad grin.
"I started to suspect a couple of weeks ago, but I wanted him to do
a complete analysis to make sure everything was all right before I told you. He finished just a little while ago; your
son is perfectly healthy."
The words 'perfectly healthy' echoed in
his ears as his lips claimed hers in a deep, passionate kiss; he was going to be a father. His arms cradled her, her body snuggled
comfortably against him and her arms wrapped around his neck to hold him close
to her. Adrenaline surged through his
body, excitement at her news hardening his body with desire for her as well as
the family she was giving him. Something
else she said suddenly broke through and he pulled back to search her face. "Son?"
"The genetic analysis included the
sex of the baby," Sassy said.
"I wanted to know; I hope you didn't want to wait and be
surprised."
"No," he couldn't seem to stop
smiling. "The only thing that
really matters is that it's --he's healthy;
but it's nice to know." His
hand moved to her abdomen and slipped beneath her top to tenderly caress the
smooth, tanned flesh there.
Arching into the pressure of his hand, she
let out a soft sigh. "You know, we
could take this conversation into the bedroom."
"Can we?" he asked stilling the
motions of his hand. "I mean is it
okay?"
"I'm pregnant, not dying; it's
fine. I'm perfectly healthy and so is
the baby; unless you'd like to call Sickbay and ask the Doctor's permission
to--"
He cut off her reply with a deep, dizzying
kiss and stood up, cradling her. She
snuggled against his chest with her arms draped loosely around his shoulders,
completely at peace in his arms. He
wanted to make a ship-wide announcement, yell the news in the center of the
mess hall or something and yet he also wanted to celebrate the good news with
the woman he carried into the bedroom and laid gently on the bedding. Tenderness sapped his desire of any urgency
as he stripped off his uniform and watched her dispense with her clothing. Climbing onto the bed, he stretched out
beside her and propped his head up on one hand, studying her body for cues that
showed her pregnancy. Her breasts
looked fuller, the stiffening nipples larger and more inviting, so his head
dipped down to nuzzle the lush mounds.
They were more sensitive, too, at least judging by her swift, passionate
reaction.
Arching into the warm, moist pressure of
his tongue, she whimpered at the intensity of the sensations. Her body was definitely changing in response
to the pregnancy hormones; her nipples were hard and throbbing with just the
barest pressure from his mouth. Streaks
of fire shot from her breasts down her body and coiled in the pit of her
stomach, the pressure growing with each passing second. Her hips began rocking in a simulation of
what she desperately needed. His
fingers drew a tantalizing trail down her torso and her body twisted up to meet
them, groaning aloud when they dipped inside her body to fan the flames of her
desire. His mouth was suckling her as
his fingers slowly and patiently drove her to the point of carnal
insanity. Her hands gripped his
powerful shoulders, her anchor in the passion swirling through her body. She cried out Chakotay's name as a satisfying
release shot through her. Before she
even had a chance to catch her breath, he was settling himself between her
thighs and she welcomed him eagerly.
She wrapped her legs around his waist and pulled his body close, sighing
with pleasure when he buried himself deep inside her.
There weren't any words that could
describe how he felt in that moment.
Intimately ensconced in the warmth of his wife's willing body, the body
that was giving him a child, his heart soared.
Gently stroking in and out of her, his hands skimmed along the length of
her torso in a feather-light caress of her soft, tawny skin. His spiraling desire was tempered by the
tenderness of his emotions in that moment and he wanted only to feel their
bodies together. She was squeezing her
legs around his waist in frustration, gasping and panting for more from him so
he cradled her against him and rolled to put her on top. The position gave his hands freedom to touch
and fondle the lithe body now riding him.
Her fingernails dug into the flesh of his chest as she braced herself
against him to drive herself down onto him faster and faster. With his hips twisting up to meet hers, he
trailed a finger between her breasts and down her torso, pausing to rest his
hand against her abdomen. His heart
contracted with the emotion of the moment and triggered his release, his body
consumed with more pleasure than he ever imagined. Sassy's body tightened around him several seconds later, his
orgasm triggering hers. She laid down,
snuggling against him as their heart rates slowed back down. He cradled her in his arms with her body
still cradling him intimately and in no hurry to move. Moisture dripping against his chest drew his
attention. "Is something wrong,
aalm?"
She shook her head no. "Everything's perfect, sweetheart;
they're happy tears."
Chakotay kissed the wetness from her
cheek. "I know exactly how you
feel."
...................................................
Janeway sauntered into the garden swinging
her fencing foil. Voyager was on the
ground and all of the planned work was underway. The landing area was surrounded by a beautiful, forested area and
a campsite had been set up beyond the landing pad where Voyager sat. Chakotay and she had made up a schedule
that allowed the crew ample time to enjoy some down time while they were on the
surface and she was hoping to take advantage of that for herself. She found Sassy back in the coffee tree
grove picking ripe coffee berries.
"If you aren't too busy, I thought we could both do with a
break. There's a small clearing not too
far from here where we could do some sparring with the foils; I'm still having
some trouble with that last combination move you showed me."
Sassy nodded enthusiastically. "Chakotay's busy overseeing the
interior modifications to create the two-bedroom suites, so I'm all yours. I just need to stop by and pick up my
foil."
"I've got Tom, Harry and Seven
modifying the Delta Flyer to do a baryon sweep of Voyager while we have the
opportunity," Janeway said.
"I'll check in with them on their progress and meet you
outside."
"Baryon sweep?" Sassy
asked. "Is there anything I need
to do with the garden to prepare for that?"
"No, baryon sweeps are dangerous to
flesh, so we'll need to make sure that all personnel are evacuated from the
ship during the sweep, but there's no reason to worry about the plants. I'll see you outside in a few
minutes."
....................................
Harry was approaching the Flyer from the
campsite that Neelix had set up for crew who wanted to sleep outside. He had a lunch basket in his hand and was
whistling until he saw Janeway walking toward him from the direction of
Voyager.
"At ease, Ensign," Janeway
said. "I was just coming by for an
update."
"We've finished the
modifications," he told her.
"It's all ready to go whenever you want, so Seven and I were going
to go on a picnic. With your
permission, ma'am."
"By all means," she
replied. "Enjoy."
Harry found Tom and Seven reviewing the
final diagnostic on their modifications.
"I ran into Janeway outside," he said. "I told her that we were
finished."
"And we are," Tom replied.
"The diagnostic revealed no anomalous
readings from the modifications," Seven informed him. "It will take approximately seven hours
to complete a thorough baryon sweep of Voyager."
Harry held his arm out to her. "Right now, it's lunchtime. Let's have that picnic; see you later,
Tom."
With her arm nestled in the crook of his
elbow, Seven walked alongside Harry in a comfortable silence. Over the course of their relationship, they
had both grown more familiar with each other's personalities. He made noticeably less idle conversation
with her than he had in the early days of their relationship and she had found
herself making more conversation about non-duty-related subjects than she had
prior to the initiation of her relationship with Harry. She had also learned a great deal about how
he thought; the fact that he did not invite Tom and B'Elanna to join them on
their picnic indicated his intention to engage in activities of an amorous
nature either before or after lunch.
Holding his arm a bit tighter, tingles of anticipation began fluttering
in her stomach. "Perhaps we should
take this picnic back to your quarters," she suggested.
Shooting her a suggestive wink and grin,
he shook his head no. "There
aren't many opportunities like this one.
I want to take advantage of it and introduce you to the wonders of nature."
"You wish to take advantage of
me," she corrected him, a smile playing across her lips. "Is there not a risk of being seen or
heard by others?"
Harry stopped and pulled her in front of
him, his hand resting at the small of her back to press her closer. "I'm not the one who announced the
status of our sex life to a room full of people once."
"So you have already informed them of
your plan to copulate with me," she said; "Or do you wish me to make
that announcement?"
"No," he replied with a soft
chuckle. As she matured and grew
comfortable with him and their relationship, she was developing a wicked sense
of humor. She knew enough about human
behavior and figurative speech to push just the right buttons with her teasing,
although she didn't do it often; as far as he knew, she only teased like that
with him. He liked it. "No on both counts; nobody else needs
to know. The risk is part of the fun,
but I've also found a place where the risk is low enough for my comfort; I'm no
exhibitionist, even after that time in Arboria."
Seven licked her lips at that memory; two
weeks in a region where men were not permitted to wear clothing. "I greatly enjoyed that time."
Nuzzling her cheek, he whispered
softly. "So did I."
He dropped a quick kiss on those full, tempting lips and grabbed her
hand. "This way."
She followed Harry through the woods to a
patch of dense branches and underbrush blocking their way. He released her hand and pulled the foliage
aside to reveal a small, hidden dell completely surrounded by trees and
brush. She entered ahead of him,
anticipation flaring into desire. Lush,
green grass covered the small clearing like a thick carpet inviting them to
make themselves comfortable. Taking the
blanket that Harry had tucked into the basket, she found a good place to spread
it out. She had started wearing her
hair down shortly after that time in Arboria in addition to a change to a more
comfortable, loose-fitting jumpsuit and low-heeled boots which she now kicked out
of before reaching for the fastening of her jumpsuit. "I do not wish to wait until after lunch."
"Your wish is definitely my
desire," he said as he pulled off his own uniform and joined her on the
blanket. It was a beautiful, sunny day,
not too hot and the light breeze wafting across their bared skin raised tingly
goosebumps. His body hardened in
response, the sensation of the wind against him not nearly as tantalizing as
the sight of Seven stretched out on the blanket completely nude and waiting for
him. He knelt, picking a flower from
beside the blanket before stretching out beside her and bracing himself on his
elbow. Tickling her nose with the
flower petals, he followed the teasing caress with a deep, demanding kiss. His tongue penetrated her lips, stroking in
an erotic imitation of their desires.
Throbbing in time to the motions of his tongue, his hardness grazed the
side of her hip, further stimulating his already painful need. He pulled away and took a deep breath to
slow things down. Seven was squirming
beneath him, but she didn't try to hurry him along and her unquestioning trust
of him over the course of their physical intimacy was always a precious
gift. Sometimes she took control,
especially more recently, but most of the time she allowed him to take the lead
in their mutual pleasure. He swirled
the flower along the side of her perfect face and watched her eyes drift shut
in response. The bright blue of the
flower was even more vibrant against her smooth, alabaster skin. When the petals of the flower tickled the
hardening nubs of her breasts, she gasped and reached for him but instead he
captured her hands and drew them up to hold them over her head. Draping a leg across hers to hold her still,
he continued his attentions, following the flower with his mouth.
Out in the open it felt different, she
felt more exposed and yet she had no desire to cease the immensely pleasant
activity. The light caress of the
flower was followed by the heat of his mouth sucking on her nipple and sending
sharp streaks of fire directly to her hips.
With her arms over her head, her breasts were thrust upward and she
arched toward him, wanting more. He
always seemed to know how to make her feel good and she had never regretted
entering into the relationship with him.
His hand swept the flower down across her abdomen while his mouth moved
to her other breast, the soft strokes of the flower petal mingled with the
strong pressure of his mouth and tongue creating an erotic dichotomy of
sensations that sparked and flowed through her body until she couldn't tell
what she was feeling or where. Pleasure
emanated from every point where their bodies touched and she arched toward him
whimpering softly. He was licking his
way lower and she knew before his mouth enveloped her exactly what he was going
to do. While he shifted to a more
comfortable position, she spread her thighs and reached for him as soon as he
released her hands. She tangled her
fingers in his short, dark hair and held him close, pushing the wet, pulsing
juncture of her hips toward the sweet movements of his tongue. Biting her lip to hold back the cry of
pleasure, her body shook with the spasms of release.
Harry kissed his way back up her body,
settling himself between her legs and finding her lips for a passion-filled
kiss. As his tongue sought hers, he
joined their bodies, burying himself deep inside her. He pulled away and thrust back in slowly, repeating the action in
virtual slow-motion. The feel of her
body still spasming around him in the aftermath of her orgasm was a pleasure
he'd discovered with Seven and he
frequently brought her to a release before entering her body just to
enjoy it. When the spasmodic clenching
began to subside, he increased the rhythm of his body, driving into her faster
and faster. Her legs were wrapped
around his waist pulling him toward her every time he drew back. She was biting his shoulder, probably trying
to stop herself from crying out but he barely felt anything beyond the need
forcing their bodies together over and over.
When she collapsed beneath him, he allowed his desire free rein. His hips slammed into her several more times
before his own orgasm ripped through him.
Groaning with sated pleasure, he rolled to his side and cradled her
sweat-dampened body against him.
After several moments he looked down to
realize that she hadn't come around.
"I guess I don't have to ask if it was good for you," he
chuckled. He combed her hair back from
her face and gave in to the temptation of her kiss-swollen lips. It was then he realized that she was barely
breathing. "Seven?" Frantic and completely mindless of their
unclothed condition, Harry reached for his communicator to call for medical
assistance. His communicator was
unresponsive so he found hers but it wouldn't work either. Panicked, he kept calling her name as he
grabbed his uniform and quickly dressed.
Awkwardly pulling Seven's
jumpsuit on her, he carefully gathered her in his arms and started back toward
camp as fast as he could go with his precious, unconscious bundle.
..........................................................
"Time out," Sassy gasped. She collapsed onto the grass breathing
heavily.
Janeway dropped down beside her with a
chuckle. "This is a switch;
normally I'm the one needing a rest period.
Either I'm getting better or you should see the Doctor."
"Already done," she panted. "I'm fine, just tired, which is to be
expected during pregnancy."
"Pregnancy?"
Sassy sat up, wiping her face. "The Doctor just confirmed the
pregnancy and the health of the baby a couple days ago; I'm surprised that
Chakotay hasn't mentioned it yet."
Giving her friend a warm hug, she
replied. "This is wonderful, how
far along are you?"
"About seven weeks," she said,
"with a boy. Before you ask, I'm
fine other than having a little less energy than usual and some
queasiness. I've already got herbs in
the garden that help with that, but at some point I may need an extra hand or
two in the garden. Chakotay is already
looking at working it into the duty roster; he's been very excited."
"I can imagine," Janeway smiled.
Sassy cocked her head, listening. "Do you hear that?" She tapped her communicator to call Chakotay
but nothing happened.
"What?"
"Screams, fighting," she stood
up and gripped her foil tighter.
"It's coming from the direction of Voyager."
Janeway hurried over to where her uniform
jacket hung on a tree branch and tried her communicator. "Janeway to Chakotay; Janeway to Tuvok,
respond."
Sassy and Janeway exchanged glances during
the silence that followed and both of them broke into a run back toward
Voyager, their fencing foils held at the ready. Just before they reached the landing area where Voyager sat, they
encountered a group of men wielding clubs and swords attacking a group of
Voyager's security forces who were trying to establish a defensive
perimeter. The two women attacked from
behind, their light blades slashing through the clothing and skin of the
attackers but too flimsy to do much real damage. Caught between the security personnel and Janeway and Sassy, the
attackers soon broke off and fled toward the mountain.
On the other side of the landing area,
Harry stumbled into the fight as he neared Voyager's position. He carefully laid Seven at the base of a
large tree and positioned himself to defend her. Two men attacked him, both wielding large clubs. He sidestepped the closer attacker, shoving
him into the other man. Several small
and medium-sized rocks on the ground provided him with projectiles which he
threw at the attackers to keep them on the defensive. They split up, forcing him to divide his efforts and then
attacked him from different sides. He
chose the smaller of the two men to take on first, barely managing to block a
blow from the man's club which would have most likely rendered him
unconscious. He didn't entirely block
the shot and winced at the glancing blow it struck on his shoulder. He ignored the pain and pivoted into the
attacker's momentum to deliver a hard elbow to the man's midsection immediately
following it up by slamming the back of his fist into the man's face. Wrenching the club out of his grasp, Harry
swung it toward the second man's legs and landed a solid blow to his knee. A yell from the direction of Voyager sent
both men limping and scrambling away, into the woods heading toward the
mountain. It took a moment to catch his
breath, but Harry wanted to get the still-unconscious Seven back to the ship;
so he hoisted her over his shoulder and grabbed up the club with his free hand
just in case those men came back.
...........................................................
Janeway looked around at the members of
her senior staff, all of them bearing signs of the recent battle. "All right, what's the situation?"
"Doc's offline," Tom offered
first. "We can't even get his
mobile emitter operating and Seven is comatose but I can't tell you any more
than that without a tricorder."
Chakotay shook his head. "Nothing is working at the moment;
every bit of equipment went down at the same time, from the warp core right
down to our communicators."
Tom nodded. "Sassy is doing what she can for the wounded with stuff from
the garden, but those plants aren't going to last long like this."
"Dampening field?" Harry
wondered aloud. "It would have to
be pretty powerful to take Seven's cortical node offline, but it would explain
everything."
Chakotay concurred with him. "They attacked not ten minutes after
the everything went down and, for a technologically-advanced race, they
attacked with non-energy weapons."
"Almost as if they knew that
energy-based weapons wouldn't be working," Janeway followed along the
train of thought. "I'm getting the
feeling that we've been led into a trap of some sort. Dampening field seems like the most likely explanation."
Tuvok spoke up. "May I suggest that we prepare a defense in the event that
those men return in greater numbers?"
"Good thinking," Janeway
acknowledged. "I want everyone to
gather anything that could be used as a weapon; we need to inventory what we've
got to work with. Tuvok, I'm assuming your
security people have already been posted as lookouts."
"They have."
"All right then," she
replied. "Let's get to work."
.........................................................
Chakotay nodded to the man Sassy was
working on. She was slathering some
salve on a nasty-looking gash before wrapping it in a make-shift bandage. "How are you doing, crewman?"
"Fine, sir."
Sassy checked the ties one last time. "I'd tell you to take it easy with that
arm, but given the current situation I think I'll save my breath. You're good to go."
"Thank you, ma'am. Excuse me, sir."
After he was gone, Chakotay pulled her to
him, holding her nestled against his chest.
"How are you doing, aalm?"
"Fine," she murmured, snugly
ensconced in his arms. "What's
going on?"
"It looks like this was a trap,"
he told her. "Nevane's people
couldn't land so they had no idea.
There's probably a dampening field neutralizing our technology; we're
gathering anything that could be used as weapons in case they come back. I'm heading to our quarters, but all I've
got there is my carving knife and boxing gloves. What do you have?"
Sassy thought for a second. "I've got my foil here with me, the
broadsword, sabre and epee are in their sheaths in the top of my closet and the
dagger I picked up on Techora is in the bedside table on my side of the
bed."
He chuckled softly. "My civilian, pregnant wife is better
armed than I am. I'm guessing Captain
Janeway has almost as many sharp objects as you do."
"Except for the dagger, yes--"
Tom interrupted them. "Pregnant? You're pregnant?"
Sassy eyed him in bemusement. "If you're talking to Chakotay, then
no; but if you mean me, yes."
"You can't have a baby," Tom
said, his eyes a bit wild, "not now, not here; I can't deliver a baby
here."
Sassy forestalled any further comments
from either man. Chakotay had visibly
tensed at Tom's outburst and she realized that he was just connecting the fact
that they had no doctor with the impending birth of his son. "Relax, both of you. I'm not even two full months into this
pregnancy. I am going to be pregnant
for about thirty-one more weeks, give or take, and the Doc just gave me a clean
bill of health before we landed here. I
am fine and I will be fine as long as you all fix this situation in less time
than the baby has left to
gestate."
Chakotay dropped a kiss on the top of her
head. "That's a promise."
"That goes double for me," Tom
echoed. "I am not delivering any
babies."
.........................................................
Janeway surveyed the meager collection of
weapons. Sassy and she each had four
swords of various types plus Sassy's dagger.
Olandra Jor also had daggers, two Cardassian daggers she had
obtained back in the Alpha Quadrant;
Neelix had collected the knives from the mess hall which could be
distributed. Tom and Harry both had
their hockey sticks, Tom also had his bat'leth and Harry had the club he'd
taken from his earlier attackers. Tuvok
had a couple of ancient Vulcan weapons and was already working on fashioning a
bow and arrows for himself and arrows for Ensign Lang who had an old crossbow
that had belonged to her father. She'd
never fired it at anything other than a stationary target and hadn't used it in
years but Tuvok had pronounced it fit for use.
Jenny Delaney's bullwhip had raised a few eyebrows but an impromptu
demonstration on a nearby tree had assured them of its effectiveness in a
fight.
"I've been thinking about this
dampening field," Tom said after the inventory of weapons was
completed. "When we approached,
the Arakneans directed us to look for the pillars at each end of this valley;
they said that they were guide posts."
Tuvok finished another arrow and set it
aside with the others. "They could
contain the technology necessary to emit a dampening field, but this is a large
valley for only two emitters to be effective."
"Not necessarily," Harry
interjected. He knelt down and quickly
sketched an outline of the valley in the dirt, pinpointing the location of each
of the guide posts and Voyager.
"With those mountains all around us, if those two pillars interlink
with each other they could essentially blanket the valley with a dampening
field. They're really only creating a
small bubble and using the existing geography to force us under it."
"If that's the case," Chakotay
said, "then taking either of the pillars out should eliminate the
field."
Harry nodded. "Yes, sir and this one here would be the closest." He drew a circle in the dirt around the
closer pillar on his rough sketch.
"All right then," Janeway picked
up Sassy's broadsword and handed it to Chakotay. "Commander, I want you to take a team and disable the
nearest pillar. Without an EMH, I'm
going to need Tom here and I'll also need to keep Sassy and Tuvok to help
defend Voyager in the event of another attack.
Take what weapons and any other crew members you think you'll need to
take it out."
Chakotay accepted the sword and looked at
it dubiously. "Aye, Captain."
Janeway couldn't resist. "Aren't you glad your wife and I play
with swords so often?"
.......................................................
Tom handed B'Elanna his bat'leth. "You be careful."
"Thanks," she hefted the weapon
a bit distastefully. "Maybe I
should take the hockey stick and you hang on to this."
Tom leaned in and covered her lips with
his in a deep, dizzying kiss. He pushed
the bat'leth to the side and pulled her into his arms holding her close. "I mean it, B'Elanna, be careful out
there. I wish I was going with
you."
"So do I," she sighed.
Across the compound, a similar
conversation was taking place.
"You be careful," Sassy told Chakotay as she showed him how to
grip the sword and a couple of basic moves.
"You, too," he replied, sliding
the sword into the sheath slung across his back. "I wish you were coming with us, you're probably a better
woodsman than I am."
"Of course I am," she
winked. "Unfortunately, there
aren't many of the crew who know more than the basic fighting skills they teach
in the Academy. Voyager can't fall to
the Arakneans before you disable this dampening field. I can do more to help here."
"I don't want to think about you and
my son in the middle of some free-for-all battle," he whispered.
Sassy rose up on her toes to crush her
lips against his; mindless of their location, she forced her tongue into his
mouth, deepening the kiss. After a long
moment, she reluctantly pulled away and found his left hand to place a
lingering kiss on the wedding rings in his palm. She caressed the mark with her cheek before clasping his hand
with hers, pressing their markings together.
There was nothing to say; this was a desperate situation with no easy
way out. When your home was being
invaded, everyone who could fight had to do their part and they both knew
that. "Who else are you taking
with you?"
"Harry and B'Elanna to figure out how
to disable their technology," he said, "and Jor, Ayala and
Dalby. They have the most hand-to-hand
experience against Cardassians so they'll be good to have if we have to fight
our way to the pillar."
"Harry's over saying goodbye to
Seven," Sassy told him. "Give
him a minute; I'll send him over to you."
Chakotay leaned in for another kiss. "I love you; be safe."
"I love you, too, mi aalm," she
replied. "Come back to me."
Harry heard someone approaching and knew
he'd have to leave soon. He was
kneeling beside Seven wishing there was some way he could talk to her, tell her
goodbye, tell her that he loved her, anything.
She just laid there, pale and fragile-looking; he combed her hair back
with his fingers and gently placed a kiss on her forehead. "I love you, Seven."
"It's time, Harry," Sassy said
softly.
He nodded and reluctantly stood. "Take care of her for me, okay?"
...................................................................
It was only a couple of hours later before
she saw them coming. Carefully
descending from her perch near the top of a tree where she'd been keeping a
lookout, she dropped the final meter or so to the ground and immediately braced
herself against the tree trunk as a wave of nausea rolled across her
stomach. "Not now, little one,
mommy's a bit too busy to be sick."
Idly she wondered if telepathic women could actually have such
conversations with their unborn children.
"Are you all right?" Janeway
asked.
She took a deep breath and nodded. "Fine, just got a little queasy there
for a second. They're coming, but
they're being a little more cautious this time around. There are large groups coming from two
directions; it's hard to get an exact count with groups that large but I'm
guessing eighty to a hundred coming from each direction.
"Boxing us in," Janeway said.
"Chakotay and his team are a little
higher up, right at the base of the mountain," Sassy told her. "They should be able to slip right past
them. I'd say we have about an hour and
a half, maybe two before they get here."
.......................................................
Chakotay held the group up when he saw
Ayala signal his return from scouting ahead.
They all dropped to the ground and kept their voices low. "What is it?"
"Hostiles," he reported. "A good-sized company of them a little
ways ahead of us and moving this way.
If we move up further on the side of the mountain, we should be able to
get past them unnoticed."
Jor reached out to get Chakotay's
attention. "We might be able to
help the crew back at the ship out a little here," she offered.
"What have you got in mind?"
"Those rocks," she pointed. "If we trigger a landslide we might be
able to slow them down; if we're lucky we could even take some of them
out."
B'Elanna echoed Jor's plan. "As soon as we take out the dampening
field, our people will be able to use phasers to defend Voyager. If we can slow down the Arakneans, that'll
buy us a little more time."
"All right," Chakotay
agreed. "The main group needs to
keep moving; Ayala, you and Dalby stay here and do that then catch up. Just trigger the landslide, do not engage
them. Understood?"
"You got it, chief," Ayala
acknowledged.
.........................................................
Tuvok signaled his sighting of the
approaching enemy across the clearing to Lang.
The two of them were in the trees to provide cover fire and break up any
trouble spots if it looked like Voyager's line of defense was weakening. With his bow and a good supply of arrows he
could cover a large portion of the field.
Lang's crossbow had a longer range, but with her limited Starfleet field
experience he had his doubts that she would be able to provide more than a
scattering fire. Firing at a living
being, even in defense, was not as easy as shooting an inanimate target. He waited for her to acknowledge his signal
and relay it to Janeway. The instant
Captain Janeway gestured, he fired at the man leading the attackers nearest his
position and watched him fall. Across
the clearing, Lang should have been making a similar shot at the group advancing
from that direction, but Tuvok kept his focus on the task at hand.
Janeway saw the signal and gripped her
foil a bit tighter before giving the silent command. The foil and epee were both more difficult weapons to wield than
the saber and broadsword, so she'd kept those two weapons with her, allowing
other crew to use the rest of her weaponry.
Sassy had opted to only hold onto her foil and had spent a brief bit of
time showing Vorik how to wield the epee based on his limited experience in
ancient Vulcan weaponry at the Vulcan Defense Institute. They were quite the motley crew and many of
the crew were wielding nothing more than rocks that they'd collected to throw,
but they were all determined to hold fast.
The children had been placed inside the Delta Flyer in spite of Icheb's
insistence that he could help. All of
the crew were wearing hand phasers to use as soon as they got word that the
dampening field went down. Once power
was back on, Icheb had instructions to raise shields around the Flyer to
protect the children until they'd finished mopping up outside.
The first yells were more of surprise
after Tuvok and Lang fired the first volley of shots into the two main
groups--they'd surrounded the clearing from a distance and were slowly closing
the circle, but they had maintained two large phalanxes to divide and cut
through Voyager's defensive line.
Janeway had assigned Tom to hold
one line with Sassy to help him and she was holding the other. She met the attack head on, slashing fiercely
with both weapons trying to injure the attackers enough to give the crew behind
her any advantage she could. Any
exposed bit of skin was a target for her blades and one attacker fell to the
ground holding the gash she opened across his throat. A length of chain whipped around and slammed into her shoulder;
she staggered, the arm numb and the foil dropping to the ground.
...............................................................
Chakotay sketched out the area around the
marker in the dirt with his team huddled around. "We've got ten guards; Ayala, Dalby, Jor and I will go after
them. Harry, you and B'Elanna go
straight for the marker and disable it as fast as you can. Yell as soon as it's done and we'll finish
up with the phasers."
"Yes, sir," Harry whispered.
Chakotay gestured to Ayala and Jor. "You two circle around and come in from
here, go for these guards. Dalby, these
two are your primary target and I'll take these over here. Harry, you and B'Elanna hold back until I
clear a path to the marker and then make a run for it while we keep them
occupied."
Ayala stood. "Give us five minutes to get into position."
Chakotay nodded and watched them disappear
among the rocks that littered the ridge where the marker stood. Dalby left just after that to find a better
vantage point to surprise his targets from, leaving Chakotay, B'Elanna and Harry to wait and watch in silence.
.....................................................................
Sassy was trying to pick and choose her
targets to maximize injury without the risk of death but the mayhem around her
was making it difficult. It wasn't like
she'd never killed before, but it was something she wasn't keen on repeating if
she could help it. Turning the foil
grip in her hand, she drove the hilt into one attacker's jaw and smoothly spun
to meet another. A sound behind her
sent her whirling around to see an Araknean with his own weapon raised to
strike her; her heart jumped at the realization that she didn't have time to do
any more than watch his hand fall. Just
then he stiffened and dropped his weapon, falling to the ground with Tom
hefting a blood-spattered hockey stick behind him. She nodded her gratitude which he returned with a small smile
before they both turned to rejoin the battle.
Across the battlefield, Janeway barely
managed to block a blow. Her right arm
was still useless and she'd sustained several other cuts and bruises in
addition to what felt like a dislocated shoulder but she'd continued to fight
with the epee in her left hand. From
what she could see, Voyager's line was holding but at a bloody and brutal
price. A club drove into her knee,
sending her to the ground. She rolled
in an attempt to avoid the follow-up blow that she knew would be coming. A hand caught the club in mid-air, just
centimeters from her face and wrenched it away to turn it on the Araknean. Two hard blows to the man's head sent him
reeling back and she looked up to see Tabor, breathing hard and bleeding from
several wounds of his own but wielding
the club to protect her from the fighting going on around them. He extended a hand to help her up, reaching
back down to retrieve her epee for her.
......................................................................
Just before Chakotay got up to clear the way, he pulled B'Elanna closer
and whispered softly, "watch Harry's back."
B'Elanna just nodded, all of Harry's
experience outside of the Academy was aboard Voyager and hand-to-hand combat
was not something he'd had much experience with.
"Wait for a clear shot to the
marker," Chakotay whispered to Harry.
"As soon as you've got the marker disabled, start trying to contact
Voyager to let them know."
Harry stopped him with a hand on his
arm. "With a dampening field, it
might take a minute or two for the communications system to
re-initialize."
"Let's hope not," Chakotay
replied. He sidled over to a better
position before checking that the rest of the team were at their designated
positions and ready to go. At his nod,
the four of them launched themselves at their targets, trying to create as much
confusion as possible. The fighting was
intense, chaotic and brutal. From the
corner of his eye he saw Harry and B'Elanna running toward the marker and one
of the Arakneans saw it, too. Chakotay
gave a vicious slash of the broadsword, cutting the man down before he could
yell a warning. He recoiled from a
heavy blow, his boxing experience the only thing keeping him on his feet until
his head cleared.
Harry reached the marker just before
B'Elanna but it took them both several harried seconds of searching to locate
the access panel for the controls.
B'Elanna found it and Harry lifted his hockey stick into an attack
position to watch for any of the guards that might try to stop them. "Hurry up," he hissed.
"I'm working as fast as I can here,
Starfleet," B'Elanna grunted back.
Finally, she found the catch that released the cover but had to duck as
an Araknean stumbled into her following a solid check from Harry and his hockey
stick.
"Can you see a power supply?"
Harry asked when a quick glance over his shoulder told him that she'd managed
to open the access panel.
B'Elanna peered inside, squinting to see
into the darker recesses of the marker.
"I'm seeing a lot of things, I'm just not sure what's what."
Harry stopped long enough to look over her
shoulder. "If we smash the whole
thing we might eliminate any chance to shut it down. We need to figure out where the power's coming from."
"No kidding," B'Elanna snapped
back in frustration. "Massive
power needs means this thing probably has an underground power source so the
energy feeds should be leading down."
Harry nodded. "Right."
B'Elanna grabbed Harry's arm, jerking him
off his feet and sending him sprawling a meter away. With her other hand, she swung the bat'leth toward an approaching
Araknean. It wasn't a strong blow; it
just glanced off his forearm, but it gave her time to re-position herself for a
better blow. "Get to work,
Starfleet, and make it fast."
Harry scrambled to his feet and quickly
began mentally cataloguing the conduits and connections inside the marker. In the back of his mind visions of Seven,
comatose and getting weaker by the moment, urged him to use his hockey stick to
smash the controls but her voice with its analytical perspective stayed his
hand. It was an unacceptable risk to
smash controls that he might need or that might cause an explosion; it was more
logical to isolate probable power couplings and disengage them--less
statistical chance of an error. A smile
played across his lips at the thought of Seven's eyebrow arching as she made
such an observation. He ignored the
smaller connections as unlikely to be carrying power and focused on the larger
conduits. Buried behind a tangle of
wires and cable was a large tube warm to the touch and almost pulsing in his
hand. Unfortunately the connections for
the tube was beyond his reach at either end.
A club glanced off of B'Elanna's shoulder and grazed his head; the
recoil sent his forehead slamming into the rim of the access panel. With blood rushing down his face, he gripped
the tube in both hands and pulled upward as hard as he could. The connection held tight for several seconds
and then snapped, uncontrolled energy shooting through the pillar. Harry screamed as his hands and arms were
burned in the instant before he could pull them free.
B'Elanna jerked the bat'leth out of the
body of one man and turned to check on Harry's progress when she heard him
yell. As soon as she realized what was
happening, she pulled him away from the pillar, dragging him several meters
away in case it exploded. Relieved when
the pillar flared for several seconds
and then went completely dark, she tapped her communicator and heard the
tell-tale chirp. "It's down,"
she yelled to the others as she drew her own phaser. "B'Elanna to Tom," she kept repeating into the
communicator, hoping for a response.
..........................................................
Sassy was struggling to stay on her
feet. The adrenaline rush that
accompanied the early stages of the battle had long worn off and fear for her
own safety as well as her baby was all that was keeping her going. The pregnancy was taking its toll on her
endurance, however, with her legs threatening to give out and her movements
with the foil getting shakier by the minute.
A whining noise in her ears made her wonder if she was losing consciousness
when she realized that the Arakneans were falling to the ground all around
her. She looked around to see Janeway
coming up behind her, taking aim with her phaser and yelling to the Arakneans
to stand down from the attack. Giving
in to her exhaustion, Sassy dropped where she was standing.
................................................
Janeway boarded the Aeroshuttle after a
long meeting with the leader of the Arakneans.
As much as she wanted to just collapse onto the nearest seat, it
wouldn't be a very captainly display to her security detail boarding the
shuttle just behind her. In addition to
the phasers that they all wore, Janeway had worn her broadsword in its sheath
slung on her back and her security detail were both carrying sabers. Even the security officers left to secure
the shuttle had been sporting bat'leths, not really out of necessity and she
wasn't even sure they knew how to wield them effectively, but it made for an
intimidating sight. She unbuckled the
scabbard and laid it across the console in front of her, patting it with a
light chuckle. All of the hours she'd
spent with Sassy learning to use the various types of swords had come in
handier than she could have ever imagined.
She'd bet a week's replicator rations that Tuvok would be submitting a
proposal for primitive weapons training for his security officers within the
week.
"Ready for take-off, Captain,"
Ensign Lang reported.
"Acknowledged, let's go home,"
she said. Of course the Arakneans had
disavowed any knowledge of the dampening field or the 'renegades' who had
attacked them, but she didn't intend to stay any longer than absolutely
necessary. It would take hours to get
Voyager ready for take-off and a security team was holding position at the
downed marker to ensure that it wasn't re-activated in the meantime. A Class R planetoid in a nearby comet would
be less comfortable for the duration of maintenance and the baryon sweep, but
it would be safer.
....................................
Harry woke with a start and immediately
regretted the sudden movement. His
entire body was throbbing in pain; it took him a moment to re-construct the
events of the past day.
"Seven."
"I am right here; you should lie
still," she told him, pressing him back down on the biobed. "You have suffered severe
injuries."
"You're all right," he sighed in
relief.
Seven caressed his forehead, brushing hair
from his face. "Obviously as I am
sitting beside you. You, however, are
not all right. I have been worried
about you. The Doctor has instructed me
to tend to your injuries as Tom and he are quite busy. Would you like a drink of water before I
continue?"
Harry nodded yes and tried to raise his
head but he couldn't manage more than a few millimeters before giving up. "Maybe that's not a great idea,"
he gasped.
Sliding her hand under his head, she
gently lifted him up enough to sip from the glass she held up to his
mouth. "I am here to take care of
you, Harry, just as you were there to take care of me before. Tom told me how you carried me all the way
back and defended me from attackers while I was unconscious; thank you."
"Given when you passed out, you
should probably be slapping me instead of thanking me," he remarked
ruefully.
Seven settled her lips over his in a
tender kiss. "I love you, Harry
Kim. I am glad that your injuries will
heal; I could not imagine losing you."
"Same here," he replied even as
his eyes began drifting shut.
"Sleep now," she instructed
him. "I will be right here if you
need anything. I will continue working
on your wounds while you rest."
Chakotay rushed into Sickbay and rapidly
scanned the room, searching for his wife.
The Doctor was now back on-line and even with the help of Tom, Samantha
and Seven, the Sickbay was overflowing with injured. There had been one fatality among their crew, Terry Milner, an
Engineering crewman and many Arakneans had been killed in the fighting; but
otherwise Voyager had escaped relatively unscathed. Janeway had informed him of Sassy's collapse as soon as he'd
returned with his team, but with getting Voyager ready to get underway while
the captain met with the Arakneans, this was the first opportunity he had to
come find her.
"I think the person you're looking
for is sitting in the Doctor's office," Tom informed him. "We needed the beds."
"Is she all right?" Chakotay
asked.
Tom nodded, motioning for his patient to
wait a moment and led Chakotay to the office door. "She collapsed mostly from exhaustion, she needs to rest and
take it easy for a day or two but her and the baby are both fine. She had a few minor injuries but they've
already been tended to. You can take
her home now, the Doc just didn't want to release her without someone to walk
her back to her quarters--just in case since she's not really steady on her
feet quite yet."
Chakotay paused at the doorway, giving
Sassy a smile before turning toward Tom.
"How's Harry?"
"Stable, but he'll be here for
awhile," Tom said. "He got
burned pretty badly not to mention the shock to his system. Seven's tending to him so he's getting
plenty of TLC in addition to perfect medical treatment."
"I'll stop in and see him
later," Chakotay said. He stopped
Sassy from standing up, instead moving to sweep her up in his arms. "Tom said you're not steady on your
feet so I think it's best if I just carry you back to our quarters."
Sassy slid her arms around his shoulders
and snuggled against the broad expanse of his chest. She dropped a quick kiss on his cheek. "It's good to see you too, sweetheart."
Once they had left Sickbay and were
heading for the turbolift, Chakotay gave in to the urge to capture her lips
with his. Her lips were pliant beneath
his mouth but he didn't move to deepen the kiss, content for the moment to just
hold her. "Do you have any idea
how precious you are to me?" he asked huskily after breaking the kiss.
"I love you, too, mi aalm," she
whispered back. She rested her head on
his shoulder, nuzzling his throat in contentment.
"Deck Three," he instructed the
lift and shifted her in his arms.
"I promise to never again make fun of Kathryn and you playing with
swords. I might even have you teach me
a trick or two."
"Closing the barn door after the
horse is gone is wasteful," she intoned and planted a kiss along his jaw.
"Life is both giving and
receiving," he shot back. "If
you show me how to use your sword, I'll show you how I use mine."
Sassy leaned her head back to arch an
eyebrow at him. "Isn't your sword
what got me in this delicate condition to begin with?"
**FINIS**