The Word Painter
Chapter Two--Acquainting Opposition
by D'Alaire
Acquainting Opposition
"In truth, it required the darker woman two moments to earn that fist..."
Walking around them, brushing a jot of dust from his black and gray tunic, Commander Hychar cursorily glanced over the four standing before his barricade. There were two males, two females--two couples, by their associations and positions.
Though affected by the heat as all newcomers to the camp were, they appeared strong and healthy. A delicateness and non-committal stance about one of the pairs that was acceptable. On the other end, one of the men, with vain protectiveness, claimed responsibility for them--Hychar grinned to himself at that--and stood by the ugly woman who squirmed and scowled like a child.
The delicate two were better off indoors--they were prettier, smaller. They would work well in smaller, prettier places. They would make good sales, would likely train easily with supervision. Perhaps they could ease his last debate with Commander Frouwid as well. They would make a good gift.
The market would be more lucrative, he decided again. He was an officer of good regard throughout his society, for both his generosity with his drasks and for his high recycled ore output rate. His offerings at the bazaar would bring good yields.
As for the others, the woman's eyes were disgustingly defiant, and the rest of her was marred by her gross, inappropriate skull and sickly skin. Even her hair, which might have had some redemptive value, had been mutilated. Had she less proof of female glands, he would not have named her as a woman. Beside her, the man was rude and straight, thin haired, squint-eyed and obviously had poor judgment for his protecting that other creature.
Her markings...Nothing disturbed him more than that, glaring out at him like the wild fire streams of Gozhor, the curse of his people from the days of myth. Certainly if a myth might live, that female would certainly be the embodiment of it...
He controlled his distaste for the practical there, however. Their bodies seemed strong, their health looked very good for the time being, they likely had technical training if not a full education, and Hychar knew he and his people could tend to any difficulties they might cause.
Naturally, Commander Hychar also knew that those drasks, though they appeared as did unmarked Desalians, were unlike any beings he or any Unar had known before. They might be rather obstinate, for all he knew; they could sicken easily or be prone to physical difficulty or may require too much food.
Still, he also knew, considering where they were reportedly from, that he had plenty of time to learn what he'd been delivered. They could not be certain precisely where the four had come from due to the inept handling of the small and badly damaged craft from which the drasks had been collected--a matter he still needed to attend to. The Desalians were uneducated enough about outer-Barrier space after two generations in service to be of no assistance to his curiosity.
It would indeed be interesting to see how the drasks fared.
"What the hell does he think he's looking at?" B'Elanna whispered. She was still halfway behind Tom, per his advice not making herself any more obvious than she already had. Even so, she couldn't keep herself from sneering at the contemptuous looks the hairy, long-nosed official was giving them--especially her.
"Just be quiet," Tom whispered, almost inaudibly as the man turned away for a moment to contemplate the thin, dusty onlookers within the fence. "Diplomacy's not doing it, so we'll have to find our own way out. But it looks like he doesn't like you--or me--so let's not make that any worse."
"Like this could get worse," she muttered, feeling her heart hammer inside her chest. The "inspection" was making every nerve in her body scream for action--escape. She tried to will that down, though, tried to think... "At least they don't seem interested in our comm badges. If we get to keep them, we'll set them to let our a dis--"
"Silence!" bellowed a guard nearby them, hiking up his weapon and pointing it at her.
B'Elanna closed her mouth--and clenched her teeth behind it.
A little dizzy from the heat and sun and sweating profusely, Tom felt his already alert pulse jump another notch when her growl found his ear. Despite of because of that, he kept his feet planted. He knew that like her, he wanted to do some damage and get out of that worsening situation, get off that hellish world entirely. At the same time, he silently prayed she wouldn't move. To some small relief, she didn't.
Some moments later, Commander Hychar turned back to them, seemingly unbothered, and raised a casual finger towards Nicoletti and Bendera. "Purchase." Then towards Paris and Torres: "Labor."
He then turned to leave.
The guards took Nicoletti and Bendera by the necks and Paris immediately rushed up on them. "No way! You can put us in here, but we go together! I'm responsible for them--you can't--"
"Your responsibility is dissolved, drask," Hychar said, barely looking back. "You now are Unar property and therefore have no responsibility but to commit to your sentence."
Tom tried to keep his wits together as desperately as they were fleeing him. Suddenly things were happening again: Bendera and Nicoletti were already returned to the barricade path, the commander was done with them all and he was running out of ideas. "We're willing to cooperate with you! We come from the same ship and we can't be split up."
"Then I will destroy them and send the remainder--you and that creature--to work," Hychar told him. "I need laborers more than household staff to sell."
Nicoletti turned white, looked from a struggling Bendera back to Paris. "Lieutenant--I--uagh!" She coughed hard as the guard's huge hand squeezed her neck.
"Then why not have us all work together?" Paris swiftly offered. "We know how to work as a team--been doing that for a long time."
Standing by the gate, Hychar looked back to reconsider the squirming woman in Sentry Tbonek's hand, tilting his head. "I think the bazaar at Horaaet would find placement of them yet."
"The hell you will!" Torres snarled on the heels of her complete disbelief at what had been decided for her two people, who were essentially immobile under the large guards' grips. "They're my people--you have no right!"
Hychar wrinkled his face in distaste. "Mask your female, drask, before we silence her by our own means."
"Who the hell do you think you are?!" Torres demanded. Finally breaking her footing, she moved across to back Tom up, only to be cut off by another guard. She didn't balk, though, at the man glaring down at her. His glassy gray eyes, tufted black hair and pasty skin weren't creepy enough to shake her. Rather, the way his stare darted over her in disgust did little but fuel her. "We didn't mean to fall into your territory," she continued, jerking a stare at the leader there, "and we didn't do anything but try to turn back around. We are not for sale!"
"You are in Unar territory now," Hychar replied and motioned at the delicate ones again. It would be a shame to waste the two for those others' ignorant disrespect. "Take them to the Akjohl."
Torres blew her breath, forcing herself to calm down and think--quickly. "If you'll just listen, all of this can be worked out. Just let us conta--"
With a sweep of the guard's gloved fist, she hit the hot ground with a thud, a lance of pain shooting through her skull from the blow. The next thing she saw was a boot land in front of her face--and she heard him above, hefting something upwards--
"Stop!" cried out Nicoletti. "We'll go with you!"
"You were going regardless," Hychar replied.
--But before B'Elanna could even think to avoid it, she felt a body rush up behind her and two strong arms yanking her back. At first, she struggled, but then she realized it was Tom again. He turned her in his arms and immediately stared down at her forehead then winced at the sight.
Their eyes met for a moment, but without warning, he grunted and slammed into her--and she glimpsed the heel of the guard's rifle completing its swing as they hit the hard, hot dirt together.
To the side, as Paris hacked for breath above her, she heard Nicoletti again, calling out--and Bendera yelling, "Keep it together, Torres! We'll do the same!"
Her eyes blinked quickly, fighting the dizziness that threatened to overcome her for the second time that day. She felt blood trickling over the slight ridge of her temple...
"Just keep it together!"
Tom heaved himself up to shoot a look towards where their crewmates' voices were coming from, but across the disturbed dirt, he only saw a puff of dust--and coughed hard when he sucked it up in a gasp.
When he looked up again, he couldn't hear them, either.
They were gone.
Commander Hychar also exited the barricade, holding a hand out to another who would walk with him as he disappeared. The last thing Tom saw was the man's thin smile.
B'Elanna felt her heart pounding in tune to the fire in her temple as she glared blankly at the place where Nicoletti and Bendera had vanished. Gone to god-knows-where under the control of those beasts--her team, her friends...
"Up, drask!" ordered a guard, who grabbed her before she could think to obey on her own terms. The alien lifted her almost above her own feet, hanging her precariously by her sweat-soaked collar as he flung her around to face the camp. She reached for the ground with her toes as the guard all but carried her and Paris towards another barricade, a charged, crisscrossed forcefield.
Behind it, a throng of onlookers backed away, not necessarily in fear, but in deference. They did not interfere, but gradually went back to their various assignments, seemingly indifferent.
Tom grunted again beside her, but when she looked to see him being led in about the same manner, she also caught only his warning stare--and she knew what it meant: "Say nothing, do nothing, let them finish their jobs and go away."
She had no other choice: Even if she could flail her arms--or for that matter, if she thought she could wrestle one of their rifles from them--her feet found no purchase and the guard's thick hand was all but choking her.
Within the force field was a wide plain of scarlet dirt, dotted with various structures on the ends, the center serving as a court for general passage. To the left sat a sort of refinery and a large structure with what looked like mine entrances. To the right stood a long, concrete wall with what looked like vending slots built into it. Ahead of them sat what was best described as a collection of short, permanent shanties, to which they were quickly heading.
The cloaked people on either side of them still did not look, only paused.
The guards holding them walked straight into the crooked rows of structures, swerving around and through them, their prisoners hanging in their grips like clumsy puppets. Upon a sudden stop, they opened a shack and tossed their burdens inside.
"Sleep. Food will appear at dusk; the drasks will show you where. You begin work tomorrow."
"Thanks," Tom muttered beneath his breath as he turned a look back up at them.
He'd opened his mouth to say something else, but it died in his throat when he saw one of the Unar regarding him and Torres with what almost looked like compassion. Or maybe it was just curiosity. The man's smooth, white face was set in a emotionless mask, while his sunken gray eyes drifted over them without glaring. He even met Tom's eyes, blinked once before glancing to Torres again.
Whatever it was, neither guard bothered to close the flap when they left them there.
Their quarters. In but one glance as he coughed for breath, Tom had memorized it as nothing more than shelter.
He turned his attention to B'Elanna, who was thrown harder into the cubicle and now lay deadly still on her stomach. She waited as if she didn't dare move else kill something. Every muscle in her body was rigid.
Tom waited until he could no longer hear the guards' heavy footsteps, just in case and taking another useless look at the filthy metal walls until he saw her shoulders twitch. "You okay, B'Elanna?" he finally asked.
"No, Paris, I'm burning in hell," she growled between clenched teeth, "in case you've forgotten."
"Sorry," he returned blankly and opened his tunic. True to B'Elanna's sarcasm, it was even hotter and as painfully dry in that shack. Maybe that's why the guards left the door open, he thought, his mind still reflecting on the look that one guard had given him. "I'll ask around, see if I can't get something for your head."
"Forget about it," she replied. "We've got to get out of here--find Kurt and Nicoletti and find some way to get back in touch with Voyager. Or just find Voyager and then them."
"I have a feeling that the plasma field is blocking the signal," Tom told her. "I remember losing contact with Voyager right after we fell into that first wave. And that's not counting the forcefield outside."
"We'll have to find a way through it then," she said.
Tom watched her pull herself up then scoot her legs around to turn over. There was barely enough room to roll. Already covered with red dirt, some of the dust had caked into the wound on her forehead--and that above her solidly infuriated stare. He couldn't blame her that. They'd bruised a couple of his ribs, but he knew it couldn't feel as bad as she looked. She's probably feeling it a lot more than she'll ever admit, too, he knew.
"It'll have to wait until you've got that cleaned up a little," he said. "We don't have Doc here."
"I'm fine," she insisted, getting to her knees to crawl out of that tiny deathtrap, but Paris grabbed her shoulder before she could leave. Instantly, she balked and jerked her shoulder away. "Hands off, Paris! You might want to kick back, but I don't plan on staying here any longer than I have to!"
His eyes narrowed. "Who the hell said I wanted to be here?!" he retorted. "And you're the one who's already bleeding! So sit down and let's plot this out. I don't feel like dragging you back to Voyager dead."
He had a point there. She knew that any action on her part would probably get them in even more trouble. It was clear that those Unar didn't like her already. She could feel it, knew from experience how to spot prejudice. They'd taken one look at her and decided she was trash, and Tom was too for defending her. She and Tom both knew it.
At least she wasn't alone in their hatred.
So, she sat--fell to her hip and crossed her arms. "Fine," she muttered, challenging him with her glare instead. "So, what do we do, hotshot?"
"First," Tom said, ignoring her tone and tying the arms of his tunic around his waist, "we check out the other people here, see if they have anything for that knot on your head. Or at least get some water to wash it." He turned a quick look up at her. Thankfully, she was only chagrined at his insistence. But he had a reason for his concern: That guard had really torn into her skin with his glove, and her eyelids were fluttering, maybe for a slight concussion.
He continued, "Then we see if there's any way to get out of here, maybe hunt around that facility we passed on the way in. If there's no weaknesses they know about, we'll have to come up with something ourselves. But for right now, we'll see who else is here, get that wound taken care of then see if there's any cracks in the wall. The way this place is barricaded, it probably won't be easy."
"You're a regular tactician," she said dourly.
"I know what it's like to be inside a forcefield," Tom replied.
She said nothing to that likely truth, his being out of prison not that long ago, and he didn't think to confirm it when she felt her head start to sting again. She breathed against it with some success. "At least we still have our comm badges," she said, detaching her own to squint down at it.
"Whatever you do, it'd be better if you kept it in your pocket," Tom warned her, tapping his own hip. "You never know."
She nodded. "Good idea." She looked around the small space, searching for a loose wire or part, and then exhaled when she found nothing--not that she expected much. It was just a rag-tag of scraps put together for cover, nothing more. Hell's a mild word for it, she thought first, and then she wondered what she had left to curse that day.
She'd cursed Paris for flying them in--even though she'd been the one to tell him where to go. She'd cursed her team--and herself--for not being able to reverse their course once they were in. She'd definitely cursed their attackers, who'd sailed up and plucked them off the asteroid they'd crash-landed on, transported them into a holding cell while they were still disoriented and unable to fight anything.
Now, her team had been dragged away and she was stuck in an alien prison with Tom Paris without any real means of escape. More, her head felt like it'd been imploded. What was in that glove? Gravel?
She took another long, deep breath, fighting her twitching eyes. The pain was getting worse, too.
"You think the people here might help us?" she asked him. "Or maybe we can find something, somewhere--I'll need at least something close to a compositor to boost the signals. When Voyager comes after us, they'll need something to go on."
"That's assuming the Unar haven't set up those force fields to disrupt subspace transmissions like the ones ours generate," Tom returned.
"It'd explain why they weren't interested in taking them," she acknowledged, none too gladly.
"Maybe we can find something closer to the barricade--if we can get close to it sometime. As for getting any answers from the natives, from what I saw, those people seem to be in the same boat we are. I even saw a few teenagers. If anything, they'll most likely want to avoid trouble for themselves."
"In other words, we're on our own," B'Elanna concluded.
Tom grinned to disagree. "I never knew any prison that didn't have some people who were willing to help someone screw the system. It's only that they won't want anyone else to know about it. Or maybe we can persuade them somehow."
B'Elanna eyed him, not necessarily trusting his optimism. Still, though he was already pretty messed up, she could tell that all his instincts were at the ready. His stare was intent. Their capture had made him focused, made his mind work quickly and his voice strong and serious. He'd barely even tried to crack one of his usual jokes since they spotted the ships on what little was left of their sensors...and in between thoughts, she wondered where the shuttle was.
Of course, he wasn't joking around when they were fit to be made into organ donors not too long ago, either, she remembered well. He'd been just as serious and responsible, from start to finish...
"Okay," she said, taking a reassuring breath and wiping the back of her hand lightly on her temple to at least dab off the worst of it, "we'll go and get acquainted, see what we can't do something with what's here--and we'll stay out of trouble...But what if we don't find anything? I don't think we have anything to 'persuade' these people with, either."
He offered her another grin, this time with concern as he regarded her head. "Then we'll find another way," he said. "Better, Voyager might get here before we have to." Thinking a moment more, he pulled his tunic loose again and turned the arm inside out. Pressing the sleeve gently to the wound, he caught her dark stare, holding it as steady as the cloth. "One way or another, B'Elanna, we'll get out of here."
Again, Tom was completely serious. Maybe unsure of how they would escape, but he meant what he was saying. His eyes, bluer in the useless shadows of the shack they'd been callously assigned, were pinned on hers, pressing his belief silently.
She wanted to believe it; seeing his equal need, she finally nodded. "Think the natives can get us some water?"
He smiled--his first real smile since they left Voyager. "Thought you'd never ask, Chief," he said, warm with relief.
It was enough for her.
"Yet as it was decided to move amongst the others, bring themselves cautiously from their shack, there were possessed in them equal portions of right and wrong. Far more to acquaint themselves with than they could know awaited them..."
"You may trust us, fair newcomers," breathed the hooded man they had neared.
Almost immediately after the words were spoken, they felt two sets of protective, robed arms around them, leading them away from the court and back into the rubble of shacks. But instead of being taken towards the middle, where they were assigned, their guides led them around and behind, through the maze of trenched dirt paths between the shanties, near to the water dispensers and well away from the barricade.
"You arrive among friends," said the other, a wiry woman no taller than B'Elanna, her heavily trilled assurance quick from deep within her sand-colored hood, "for we are as one within the gates of Uillar, as in all things."
"I'm Tom Paris, this is B'Elanna Torres," Tom whispered gratefully, having not expected such a sudden, hospitable response from at least two people they hadn't even greeted yet.
"I am called Dalra. Beside you walks my bondmate, Miztri."
Tom gave them both a quick nod.
"Your companion has found injury," Dalra noted as he looked at Torres, "yet little medicine is available to us, only balms to soothe and waters to cleanse. I should not suggest you be near the guards. They have no care for the unusual."
B'Elanna shot a glare at him, even if she knew he was stating the obvious.
"My intention is but truth, good lady," Dalra explained. "Unar have little tolerance for your difference, and it is a reason to pity them, not to blame my words for what is plainly known."
"Just pity?" B'Elanna muttered.
Miztri, who held her, squeezed her lightly. "Our spirits are not the ones poisoned, good lady," she smiled. "Yet it is well enough they let effect curdle them. Let us rather procure healing for your wounds and leave Unar aside."
"It's not that bad."
"I am not deceived by you, little kini'isi," Miztri scolded lightly. "I was trained upon my arrival to the sensation of Unar gloves--and I feel you now tilting in my arms like a jow-tree, as I had in your place."
Torres didn't know whether to give it up or be annoyed by the woman. She kept reminding herself how much they needed their information--and a little water and food wouldn't hurt, either. And she had to admit that the woman's strong hands still held her just tightly enough to guide her.
"I meant that you don't have to 'procure' anything for me. I'll be all right."
"My thanks," Miztri replied. "Yet I shall tend you regardless."
Tom saw the engineer's jaw tense and quickly picked it up. "So where are we? What is this place? They didn't even tell us when we came here."
"They bear no cause to speak to you at all," Dalra confirmed. "I found surprise in their addressing you once. A moment yet and we shall speak in full. The guards care not what we speak of, yet there is ease out of the full sun."
"I'll bet there is," Tom agreed.
"Its moons bring equal cold," Miztri added. "We shall procure what we might to assist your acclimation and with personal articles you may require. Items remaining from former prisoners have been retained and mended. Cloaks should be accepted immediately lest this sun burn you too severely; the other components require only solar charging--which you may note is little burden here."
B'Elanna sighed. "You don't have go through that much. What we--"
"Is it a convention in ways to refuse generosity among your people?" Dalra asked.
Tom grinned briefly. "In a way, yes."
"Ka'eb." Peering over at B'Elanna, he said, "I should think your manners might be put aside for this place, good lady. You shall require assistance. Many have found their ancestor's spirits in Uillar's elements. It would please should you accept what we give, and it would be necessary."
B'Elanna exhaled again, but held herself back. They were trying to help, after all. None of it was their doing. "Thanks. But we lost two of our people when we came here--"
"They shall enjoy more fortune than you and your companion," Miztri told her, easing their pace as they came to a large covered area with folded blankets and cargo cases set neatly around the outer perimeters.
Gently, the woman helped her patient onto a pile of cloth within the long overhang, which looked like a makeshift dock for both storing supplies and gathering. While breathing relief at the shade and slight breeze there, B'Elanna also noticed the blankets she was sitting on didn't look replicated, but had been woven from strips of old cloth. They were slightly tattered even then.
"To be sold into the services is safer," the woman explained as she drew off her cloak and straightened the cloth braided into her thick, red-blonde hair, "and offers more ease in living. Your friends shall be cared for should they bear any wisdom."
"At least we know they're probably all right," Tom said, only partly relieved. "But it's still service. We're a pretty independent people."
"Yet sense, I have noticed, is also present in you," Dalra said, looping his long robes over his arms and lowering himself to sit on his heels. Pulling his hood off, he revealed a set of gold-brown eyes. Above that sat a hint of grayed dark brown hair, cut short and mostly hidden by his boxy, wrapped headdress. He motioned Tom to take a seat between himself and B'Elanna, on another pile of homespun blankets.
"Should they be well enough," Dalra continued, "it is likely they shall be bought into freer service in little time. The Antral often take such burdens of training their own--their means of retaining what small freedom they have. Your people would be treated well by them when it is seen that they are not of this place."
"If that's the case," B'Elanna pointed out.
"It is as likely as any outcome, should they bear some presence of mind."
Miztri meanwhile had opened a case nearby and brought out a high cushion, which she propped behind B'Elanna's back. "Rest, as it shall soon please you to," she told her, wrapping her long scarves and hair around her neck so they would not become tangled in her work. "Water shall soon be brought."
B'Elanna grudgingly reclined, rather more disposed to asking about the factory she'd seen. Tom was playing it so subtly, she was sure it'd take all day to get any answers. But of course, he was also getting their needs taken care of, too, so she did remind herself to be patient. Even so, when Miztri began pulling at her boots, she yanked her feet away.
"Look, this is all very nice, but--"
"Be not stubborn, girl," Miztri cut in firmly, her smile dissipating. "Should you take infection, you shall not enjoy a speck of such strength to defend your low pride. You would rather take yourself unto the ancestors and have Unar spread your remains over their drask gardens to eat you with the harvest?"
That mental image was effective. As soon as B'Elanna leaned back again, Miztri started on the boot again, scowling at the lack of hooks or ties. "You are warm and contain much water; you shall perspire away any applied balm as you sit at present. It may be your wish to remove your...coat."
B'Elanna didn't mind agreeing there. She felt her heat escape her skin when she parted her tunic. "Okay. But I can handle my own boots."
Miztri's grin returned as she yanked the second shoe off. "There is a fault in exceeding self-reliance. In that, the boots are done--with more ease than you would allow. So, child, your stockings may now follow by my hand or as a further proof of your independent spirit."
"What about this place?" Tom picked up, for his own curiosity as well as to distract B'Elanna from her annoyance with the busy woman. "Uillar, you called it? Is there any way out?"
B'Elanna's attention was immediately back on them. About time he asked. "Are there any weaknesses in the force field they're using?"
"For escape? That we are aware of, none," Dalra said.
"Do you know what generates it?"
"Geothermal laridium," Miztri said, "a source fed and stabilized by a unit's sub-particle field stabilizer." She smiled at the younger woman's responsive stare, though she didn't address that. "The power well lies not near. It is directed from an assembly on the opposite continent. There is no disruption of it--and the guards would not be bribed so far unto their own imprisonment and disgrace to be corrupted any further than now."
B'Elanna growled a sigh. "Then you're convinced there's no way out?"
"On occasion," Dalra said, "when they need not our present number of workers for a time, we have been known to be sent away, and some arrangements have been made in trading one for another. In my ten revolutions here, I have traded myself for others twice to remain with Miztri. We may hope the resistance rebuilds itself enough to distract a while, bring them to trade again."
B'Elanna perked up. "Resistance?"
Miztri folded B'Elanna's socks into her boots and set them aside with her tunic. "To think my spirit's partner and I came to be here through such crimes might surprise you," she said and nodded to both sets of eyes. But her smile weakened as she continued, "Ka, this is truth. We found ourselves with a Koba group when circumstances dug our path there. For this, we were parted of our two surviving children. We know not where they lie, or had they with their siblings passed onto our blessed spirits."
"And yet we persist here," Dalra quickly added, "in hope."
"I hope it'll be okay," Tom told him understandingly. "Just that you've stayed alive this long says something."
"Trying it has been," Dalra admitted. "Yet with time, with patience, with acquaintance, despair eases and purpose surfaces. So it shall be for you, I would believe."
"But what about your resistance?" B'Elanna asked. "Is there any chance they'll know we're here? We'd be willing to help them out for a favor--like helping us get out of here--if there's something we can do."
Dalra furrowed his brow. "I have little belief an underground faction would offer any assistance at Uillar, good lady. Too much danger resides in such an effort with no promise of success and less need to bring themselves into a conflict for but a collection of drasks during a time of peace among Unar. In time, perhaps they or another Unar sect shall distract matters here into another shift, yet I should not expect that very soon. The previous sect scourge was but three years past."
"Unar sects are historically combative," Miztri explained. "Once these were but philosophical debates; past their militarism, the debates evolved into skirmishes. There have been reorganizations and weakened territories because of this, always one shall lose when another gains. Many Desalians and Koba have found their spirits in these struggles. We should rather retain our patience. With patience, as my bondmate has said, I should believe your days shall speed."
B'Elanna said nothing, noticing Tom's equal unease. In that glance, she could tell he was about as pleased as she was with the idea of getting used to that place they'd been stuck in--or waiting for a resistance that wouldn't be showing up any time soon. Of course, she also knew that the resistance wasn't the only thing they could hope to wait for. Voyager would come after them soon enough--if they could get past the Unar. She and Tom both knew from experience that Janeway would not leave without corpses.
Yet before B'Elanna could bring that thought to the fore, small, deeply hooded female slipped into the shade of the overhang and bowed to the host and hostess, drawing a circle on her temple with her fingers as she rose.
Miztri, seeing her, stood with her cloak and whispered a few words to the lady as she passed. "I shall procure water and balm," she said behind her, disappearing a moment later.
The other woman knelt before Dalra and reached inside her hood with her bony fingers to touch her face.
"S-zo...hoi ye-szaah-ek?" she said in a voice that in comparison to Dalra and Miztri's thick accents was heavily slurred--and unlike the others' odd speech, hers was totally untranslatable.Dalra understood her well enough, however. "They bear good spirits, good lady--friends, now, who shall need care for time, yes."
"Vh-heil aac-ei sab yh-ap?"
"Gye," he replied. "Let it be seen whether she shall require it. Do not take yourself."
A single nod and the woman immediately turned to crawl nearer to the new people. Pulling off her cloak, there appeared a woman somewhere in her twenties, with long brown hair braided with thick scarves and skin tanned where her cloak could not fully cover her. Below it, a faded purple gown and leggings powdered with red dirt decorated her small-boned body. Like Dalra and Miztri, she had a fan of fine, dark blue markings on her temples and patterns on her left hand.
With that tan, calloused hand, she touched her temple again as she bowed her head, looking at both the aliens when she came up again. Her eyes, hazel like Dalra's and bright with curiosity, held them each for several seconds. More noticeable than any feature, however, was the scar on the corner of her small mouth, which extended deeply into her cheek and was apparently the cause of her badly affected speech. "S-zha wastn-a," she said to them, smiling on one side of her mouth. She patted her own shoulder. "Sa-sah-nai-ee i'e."
They looked at Dalra. "This is Sashana'i of Allanois," he told them.
Sashana'i returned her gaze to B'Elanna, darting it to her forehead. Her smile flickered, but didn't fade, as she reached out to it.
B'Elanna jerked back at the prospective touch. She couldn't deny anymore that the wound really was starting to nag at her--probably swelling more than she could guess. The thought of someone putting pressure of any kind on it tightened every fiber in her body.
"Nice to meet you," she said, trying to be nice and yet warning the lady, too.
Sashana'i immediately saw the woman's hesitation and stopped her move. Instead, she let her thin hand fall to B'Elanna's cheek, which she touched gently. "Ma'ay-sse swa tsa fah-wam ank i'a," she said softly, as if to comfort her. Turning her attention to Tom, she bowed. "Ah-ka-whohh yhui-ahd zsha."
"Uh, I'm sorry..." Tom said and turned his eyes to Dalra, who had already chuckled at her words. "What's she saying, Dalra?"
The man pointed with a chin to Torres, who was also curious. "She says your lady's eyes show a good spirit beneath her pain and that you shall be tended well." Not paying attention to B'Elanna's peculiar grin to that, he looked at the other woman again. "Miztri shall say so as well, that you require rest, good lady."
"Vh-heil aac-ei so'a yh-apag?"
Dalra tensed at her repeated question, though he remained kind. "It as yet does not require you to procure more," he told her. "You have only had this sun and must think of yourself and your bondmate. Let us cleanse it. Miztri shall have D'viti's balm."
Sashana'i shook her head, motioned to B'Elanna. "Gye. Aht gu-aafahr hsu'i-gye kall asp-om."
Dalra caught her gaze, held it seriously. "Let us yet bear patience, Sashana'i. Let the better wisdom of your bloodlines guide you."
The young woman sighed, shrugged then relaxed a little more into her place. Suddenly curious again, she pointed at B'Elanna. "Aga'i o'a?" she asked and looked at Dalra.
"What is your calling, lady," he hinted.
B'Elanna grinned at the woman above her. For Dalra's tense protectiveness of the younger woman, she was glad to change the subject for a while. "My name's B'Elanna."
Sashana'i seemed both intrigued and amused with it. "Bay-gah-ha?"
B'Elanna smiled more, even as she felt sorry for the woman's handicap. "Umm, not exactly. It's--B'E-lanna."
"Bay-na-hna?"
"B'E-lan-na," she repeated. "It's okay if you can't get it."
Sashana'i tried again anyway--and again--but finally grunted with a moment's sourness and put up her palms in compromise. "Be'i?" she asked, obviously wanting to decide on something easy.
"Close enough," B'Elanna decided generously. They wouldn't be there long enough for it to matter. "At least I'll recognize it."
With some trepidation, Sashana'i then turned her gaze to the tall, fair main beside the lady. "Wi-i'oa?" she asked, pointing with but a lift of her finger that time, her brows raised.
He grinned. "Tom."
The young woman released her breath in relief, making all within the shelter laugh. Sashana'i nodded gratefully. "Toma."
Furrowing his brow at her choice, he shook his head. "Uh, no, it's--"
"Good man," Dalra said quietly, stopping him with a hand on Tom's arm. "Indulge our good lady Sashana'i. It is a well-meaning name."
"But it--"
"Your future introductions shall proceed with more ease," he added. "Names among Desal are traditionally gender specific to ending sounds."
"Yeah, well... I guess it's fine," Tom relented, giving the young woman another nod and a shrug, and then finally a chuckle. "Toma it is."
Sashana'i looked pleased and gave him a firm nod. "Ka-zsha ko'i, Be'i, Toma," she said before darting her eyes back to B'Elanna, who wasn't paying attention to them any longer. Rather, she winced and swallowed her breaths as she tried to make herself more comfortable. The younger woman looked at Dalra again, more pressingly. "Dah-wha."
"You shall wait, good lady," he insisted.
Rather than respond, Sashana'i seemed to lose herself in thought for a moment. "Se-a'aw-ab duk ye'i ehmbw-a," she whispered then quickly turned when she heard a stirring behind her. It was Miztri. Taking a good breath, she gave Tom and B'Elanna another full nod then patted B'Elanna's bare foot. "Zshaw-ye," she said. "Kah-webha."
Dalra almost interjected, but the young woman had already pulled her cloak back on and scurried out.
Miztri replaced her by B'Elanna's side. "Where does she take herself?" she asked.
"She takes herself to procure medicine," Dalra quietly told her then leaned over to help his woman part the bundle she had carried in. He handed Tom a flask of water and a wet cloth.
Tom used both without hesitation, and he didn't know which to feel more relieved at--the water in his throat or on his skin. "Thanks," he breathed.
"Adjustment shall find you in time," Dalra told him. "I bore my first breaths within the moist thrush of Maha'aje, thus I bear knowledge of the change for you. The dry here shall retrain your thirst. You must recall time to drink."
Tom grinned. "I don't think that'll be a problem."
Meanwhile, Miztri soaked a cloth for B'Elanna and pulled a tube from the folds of her robe. Glancing up to her, she offered an apologetic smile. "This shall not proceed with easiness. Dirt has imbedded itself in the wound. You shall take water after. You may find illness should it be fed before."
"I can take a little pain," B'Elanna assured her.
Miztri gave her a look, decided not to argue as she tapped some of the contents of the tube onto the wetted cloth. "The ground of this land is not beneficial to the bloodstream," she told B'Elanna, "not like other worlds. Infection is not uncommon with simple injuries. With proper care, it shall heal, however. I--and Dalra with me--have recovered from similar."
"That's a plus," replied the engineer dryly.
Peering over to Tom, Miztri motioned him to come closer. "You shall observe and care for her wound as I do. The balm must be applied each third moon in upward half-circles move the cloth."
"Each third moon," he repeated, brow raised.
Dalra touched Tom's arm and pointed outside. "Three moons pass overhead each quarter at regular intervals, four turns daily. They are quite visible. Your tending must be diligent, good man."
Tom caught B'Elanna's eyes and saw them darken at the contact. She obviously wasn't enjoying being tended to more with every minute. When B'Elanna's eyes blamed him even in silence, he decided to have her accusation over with and moved closer to Miztri. "Okay."
B'Elanna took a breath and blew it out, indeed impatient for them to just go ahead and clean it, since they'd insisted. Certainly, she'd had worse injuries before and got by with a lot less attention. Those people--Paris included--were probably just being careful to save her feelings, which she knew was kind. Then again, they couldn't know that she had a rather high tolerance for--
"Shit!" she screamed as Miztri pressed the balm to her skull.
"Embrace her legs," Miztri ordered.
Tom immediately scooted around and pressed B'Elanna's knees down. Holding her eyes that time, he saw her glare in his direction. "It's just going to make it better, B'Elanna."
"What?! Acid?!" she cringed, clutching at the blankets she sat upon.
"It washes out slowly," the woman above her said. "It has sunken deeply; the combined water and balm shall persuade it otherwise." Gently as before, she swabbed the younger woman's forehead, meanwhile distracting herself by examining the pattern of--Bone? she wondered--within the young lady's forehead. "When you have found recovery, we shall take food."
"Wonderful!" B'Elanna gasped, balling a lump of blanket in her fist.
Miztri sighed and pulled away the bloody cloth to clean it and start over again. "Zhall ye'i," she said quietly.
Feeling the sharpness of the pain recede as the woman pulled away, B'Elanna gradually caught her breath. "What did you say?"
The woman smiled sadly, her eyes turned down as she squeezed scarlet water from the cloth into a shallow metal basin. "I have asked your forgiveness."
B'Elanna's stare darted away. "It's not your fault," she said tersely, though sincere.
The older woman nodded and prepared a second swabbing.
Though her face and tone had briefly softened, Tom watched B'Elanna's eyes widen with caution when Miztri approached again, saw her really prepare herself that time.
"Easy, Torres," he breathed and felt her nearly kick his whole weight off when the cloth made contact.
B'Elanna could have screamed at him directly for that one. Who was he to tell her to take it easy? He wasn't the one who felt like chlorazine was pouring through every vein in his skull, down into his neck and shoulders, scraping every nerve and muscle...
She'd almost gotten a good enough breath to get a yell in, too. But then her breath caught, her eyes rolled back....
The sun seemed lower, the air more stagnant, when B'Elanna's eyes opened hazily upon the robed woman... Miztri, she recalled. Spotting another form, she noticed the Sashana'i sitting nearby, tying scraps into a blanket and staring eerily at her.
Miztri regained B'Elanna's attention as she stroked her hair. "You shall find wellness, good lady," she said softly.
"What happened?" B'Elanna whispered, noticing the pain in her head again.
"Mercifully, unconsciousness claimed you," Miztri told her.
"Ugh," was all the reply B'Elanna could muster. Yeah, I handled that wonderfully, she thought. Rolling onto her undamaged side, she shut her eyes again. "I don't think I've had a worse day," she muttered. "And I've had some bad ones."
Miztri couldn't help but laugh at that. She yet was careful not to be loud, to prevent furthering the headache she knew the girl would have. "Yet, you remain among the living and bear all your teeth."
B'Elanna snorted, shook her head. "That helps."
"You have been well tended in your life," the woman noted when B'Elanna turned over again, eyes still closed. "You bathed regularly, likely, took healthful food, clothed yourselves in that which was not of the passed, bore technology at your hands and your wits to use at your wish: You both deservedly have enjoyed proper indulgence. That your fates have brought you here, I feel sorrow, good lady."
"Well," B'Elanna replied, trying not the feel the enormity of Miztri's honesty, "so do I. But maybe tomorrow we can start to see if we can't find some other way out of here."
Opening her eyes, she looked at her hostess. She was not very old, probably in her mid-forties, but the effect of that world on her was obvious, even without having known her before. Hard, dry lines had set into the crevices of her thin, heart-shaped face; her light hazel eyes seemed to be set into a permanent squint. The hair that was visible around her neatly tied scarves was like a parched strawberry. Her gown and leggings were stained with red dirt; they probably were blue at one time. Everything about her seemed prematurely aged.
And she was doing all she could for them.
"Thank you--for helping," B'Elanna said, more gently, then. "I know you don't have much. It was generous of you and I guess I've been...difficult."
"This is understood," Miztri responded, stroking her hair again, sad and motherly. "You have undergone a terrible trauma, with the loss of your ship, your friends. There may be some comfort in knowing they fare better than you. You have only yourself and your companion to think upon in light of relative safety."
"Well, if Voyager manages to get past the Unar, we'll have less to worry about."
Miztri drew down her brow. "Your ship would venture through Irllae? I should hope it is well-protected?"
"It's a powerful ship and we've gotten through a lot of scrapes so far. Tom hasn't said anything about it?"
"He has voiced no details. Rather, his preoccupation has been with the immediate--your care, food and water and tending items. He has taken himself with Dalra to warm your space with blankets. --Ah, you need not refuse this. We have kept them for this use, and you shall be tended well by him, I should believe."
B'Elanna sank back, pursing her lips at the grin that curled one side of Sashana'i's mouth. "Just so you know, Tom and I are just friends--crewmates," she said to both women. "We don't usually...sleep together."
Miztri laughed aloud at the pale stare the girl had given her, quickly covering the noise with her bony hand. "Of course we bear knowledge, dear lady!" she snickered. "Sashana'i implied your union and our good man was certain you should harm him should he allow any to believe other than what you have just said."
B'Elanna rolled her eyes. "Paris--always the gentleman."
"You need not worry," Miztri told her, still giggling. "Had I any sense that your friend was poor or degraded, I would have you on my own bed." She patted her shoulder. "However, I sense nothing less than good in his intentions--and the companionship when the evening arrives shall be required, I assure you. Bitter cold resides in Uillaran dark and your injury requires care."
"I can tend to myself."
"Gye, you can not," Miztri countered. "Cleansing your wound until it heals shall require another hand and a watchful eye. Why distrust you so to have a man by you that you would sleep cold, alone and ill? --And in that, I should say there is not a Desalian population that does not suffer crowding, so I would not expect you might have that wish as it were. Yet, I do not feel you should despise Toma, so, that you should wish it."
B'Elanna smirked. "Toma?"
She shrugged. "It is a proper name. Sashana'i chose well for him. Yet you do not answer me, good lady."
I should've known I couldn't get away on this one, B'Elanna sighed. "It's not him."
"Ka. It is not."
Sitting up, she faced the other woman. But then, opening her mouth to speak, she saw the woman's wise stare and decided against her first response. "Okay," she admitted, "you're right. I mean, we're trained to handle situations like this. I guess I hadn't thought about sleeping with Paris. --Never mind. Don't ask."
Despite that, B'Elanna grinned again to think of the look on Tom's face when the topic was brought up. She almost wished she'd been awake for it. She could hear him explaining it away all too clearly.
Again, Miztri giggled. "Closeness to such a tall, warm man appears to be odd for your independent people. I have seen youths take to their own bonding with less trepidation than you and Toma have accepted sharing blankets and five walls."
Or maybe it was better I was out.
"Tsa-ashy wa-e't Soti Gabwa wi?" Sashana'i suddenly said, putting down her scraps at last to look at Miztri.
"It is trine-twice past sunset," the older woman told her.
Sashana'i motioned to B'Elanna. "Be'i-Toma na'oi k-hetaf aa."
B'Elanna looked at Miztri. "What? What's going on?"
"There is to be a bonding ceremony on the sixth sunset from this sun. Sashana'i wonders whether you shall bear enough wellness to attend."
"Well, I hadn't planned on being here that long," B'Elanna said. "But I wouldn't say no if we are."
Neither woman replied to that particular optimism, only nodded.
B'Elanna continued, "I think Voyager will try to contact us by then--or break through their shield grid--as soon as they've repaired the ship enough to come after us. Our captain's a very determined woman. She won't let us go."
Sashana'i looked curiously at her. "Vo-hya-gah...ad hiwaget ihs-hwaew wasaw aw-od?...Misti?"
Miztri shrugged. "Toma has told us their ship undergoes repairs in a nebula past the Zi'ihar Ralle, as far as can be ascertained."
Sashana'i looked thoughtful at that, glancing to B'Elanna as if she wanted to say something more. But she turned her eyes back down.
"It didn't take us long to get here, so it can't be too far," B'Elanna told the older woman. "Even so, I think as much as we couldn't see through the plasma field, neither could the Unar. How far does the Unar's territory stretch?"
Miztri bit her lip. "I ask your forgiveness, good lady. We bear little detailed knowledge of what once was Desalian territory, far less still of our neighbors'. Worlds and features are known to us, yet little more. It is a shame I must accept."
B'Elanna didn't complain. Miztri did seem to regret that. "Do you know anyone here who would know?"
"There are matters of which you are unaware," Miztri said with a sigh and continued in a hushed tone, "At the onset of Unar occupation, our great scholarship was all but completely annihilated, and they and our word painters are this sun suppressed and hidden, our combined knowledge scattered. They are our only knowledge left to us, yet there is no complete telling or science from any known to me. Only the most essential skills to make us scholars--our spiritual training--is taught now, and that in secret. I bear deep sadness for this. Our scholarship once bore greatness and beauty; it was a balance of both that mental training and an extensive education in a chosen trade." Miztri shook her head to herself, knowing she had diverted from the topic. "To answer you, good lady, there may be few answers available in all of Desal and no more here if unanswered already."
"But you were in the resistance and traveled in this region," B'Elanna said. "You wouldn't have known about a sustained sub-particle plasma field near to an asteroid belt?"
"I bear knowledge of its presence. There are three nebulae in that area--and the plasma field you speak on is a force to be avoided for its destructiveness to ship and life. Not one of our ships could enter it were it desired. More, it is heavily patrolled by Unar, who protect that energy source from wandering tradeships and other sects."
"Would anyone else know?"
Miztri bent her bead slightly. "Dalra and I are the most traveled of the population here. There are Antral, Iaskeb and Koba traders--yet not here, as they cannot survive the elements. The remainder of Irllae is not permitted any fine technology, even in service. We have little, good lady. I would have more for you, had I wishes which might bear truth."
B'Elanna sighed, but nodded, too. "Sounds like something I knew about where I came from."
"Dov? You have?"
"The Bajorans," she answered, grinning slightly to explain it. "They're an ancient, peaceful culture whose world was overrun by a race called the Cardassians. They were also made into laborers, had almost everything but their religion taken from them. But they formed a resistance and fought the Cardassians--and eventually, they began to weaken the hold on their people. With a little help, the Bajoran resistance succeeded."
Miztri smiled, too. "And so they now live in prosperity? Free of their strife and growing among themselves in spirit? It has always been a dream of our people that someday, when our contrition for Desal's past is served, that our people may live as such again."
B'Elanna stilled a bit, deciding not to ask what the Desalians might have done to deserve their subservience--much less the rest of the people who'd been affected. Instead, she admitted, "Well, they've had trouble since. But for the most part they're free and their territory is theirs again."
And they're having internal wars with their provisional government, struggling to get their trade going; they're under the hand of the Federation and the Maquis are fighting the Cardassians instead, she silently added.
Taking a deep breath, B'Elanna turned her eyes down thoughtfully. "In any case, I guess we're on our own for now, at least until Voyager can make some repairs. Captain Janeway's not the kind of person who gives up without a fight."
"I should hope your people would not find with Unar too much to ail them and rather would find cleverness their guide," Miztri told her. "Yet I should like to see you in your home again, among your friends."
"With any luck," B'Elanna said trying to sound hopeful for her hostess alone that time, "we will be--and so will you."
"Be'i ka," Sashana'i finally joined with a grin of her own. A moment later, however, she returned to her blanket extending--as the lady's companion was a rather tall man--her fingers trembling slightly as she willed her smile from becoming any broader.
Tom tucked the last of the blankets into the corners of the shack, practicing his apologies well ahead of time. He knew well that Torres wouldn't take kindly to the fact that they had little choice but to stay there together.
Of course, it's only temporary, he knew. She'll like to hear that for more reasons than one. Well, for that matter, so would I.
Dalra bent and crawled into the cubicle to attach a pouch to the wall. "For the keeping of your medicines and tending items," he explained.
Tom nodded his thanks, wiping his forehead with the back of his arm. "Well, at least we can cure infections, comb our hair and have a shave with...whatever that thing is--"
"I have said I shall show you the using of our items in the dawn."
"But we can't get a bath," Tom finished. "Hell, I could use one right now."
"Each tenth sun, Unar allow us enough to cleanse ourselves cursorily," Dalra corrected him.
"Sorry," Tom said with a sigh, shook his head. "Guess I'm just not...I don't know. We're setting up shop here and everything you're doing is more than I expected. But I don't want to have to stay here long enough to use any of it. You know?"
"Ka. I also hope you shall find little use in it while yet among the living."
"I'll have to thank Sashana'i again for the medicine--and Miztri for the balm. They really did the trick on B'Elanna."
Dalra nodded shortly. "You yet are required to attend to her wound."
"I know. But the swelling went down right away with that medicine. Where'd she get it, anyway?"
"Bribes," Dalra said, turning his head back down to his work. "It is not the common way, yet is a necessary function here. Sashana'i is one the Unar guards shall deal with, mainly for her own culpability by association--and their self-given curse as well."
Tom looked at him. "How so?"
"They among them lacerated her tongue, under Hychar's orders when she spoke out to him. She was but a teenager."
Dalra sat back on his heels, staring outside with reflection. "She is a fifth heir of the Allanois Regency and carries within herself what remainder of it there could be: The memories of her blessed ancestry, Desal as it had once been through the eyes and minds of those who tended it. She was born upon Cezia as another refugee, yet was private educated by her grandfather, Dulla. Indeed, her education was greater than most among Desal at present, and she was traditionally intended to what spirit's partner she chose upon maturity--our good Aratra. When Unar re-cleansed the city of Sacezia, she was their primary target. When she was found, Aratra arranged to accompany her here, and they were bonded upon this ground by Miztri and me, who claimed them as our spirit-children.
"Yet she had youth, was outspoken and unwise. Hychar despised her alone for her lineage, much less what she bore before him." Dalra looked at Tom again, continued with relative dispassion, "In a moon of much illness, she bowed to them, relinquished her lineage publicly in supplication for supplies. She submitted in the name of the Allanois. In the night, however, Hychar ordered his guards to take her and cut her tongue--mutilate the remaining voice of our once blessed regency. That was his answer. Her spirit and Aratra's might have met our ancestors' for it.
"Matters here are less difficult than in past suns, yet the guards recall the stain of her blood upon them. While she must bribe them, in their manner of cleansing they shall deal with her. We yet would rather her not, for the danger to her."
Tom barely knew what to say to that--the brutality of it, though not surprising, was bad enough without knowing how solicitous of B'Elanna and himself, Sashana'i had been. Sashana'i--the Desalian equivalent, it seemed, of an outcast princess.
"I should hope to see her solemnize her bond and take her name of scholarship someday," Dalra added wistfully. "It would be a blessing to our honored spirits, those regents who had been good and ones among us. Her spirit, like the still, clear pond, reflects them." He grinned. "So perhaps I assure her safety."
Tom chuckled. "Uncle Dalra sounds about right," he said.
Dalra laughed, pushing himself to stand as he did. "Ab, Toma, food shall be doled out for a period and for you to meet others here would be to your benefit. Tsid ka'e, to gain knowledge of our own before you begin at the detail shall be a blessing."
Tom stood, his cheer disappearing at the reminder. He'd easily almost forgotten about it with everything else that had happened that day, their friends made, B'Elanna's injury and treatment, preparing their shelter. "What kind of work is it?"
"For a person bearing your education, it should be mindless. I would believe you would be put not to mining, but to processing. --I would not think too quickly that you might procure any useful parts there. There is nothing that can build but more structures in it."
Tom frowned. "Why would they do something that convenient?" he said dryly. "I'd like to keep my eyes out for anything helpful, though. I know you worked on a ship, Dalra, but Voyager's sophisticated--and B'Elanna's pretty innovative when she sets her mind on something."
"There is a blessing to be had in optimism, Toma. Yet I would not build a full dream upon it. You shall find but disappointment in hoping for the impossible." As they crossed through the shanties, the older man gestured around to the other rickety metal structures and the people that moved around them with a well-tanned hand.
"This region is one of small hopes among people now small," he told his new friend, "It did not bear the same quality sixty-two revolutions past. Yet these are not those suns and Desal is a changed people. We do not wish the grandness again which ruined us, but seek to live humbly, to balance our destructive past--and take lesson in it as well. Even our current criminal status was built upon a need for food and supplies, and no more. To defeat Unar was never our thought."
"Why not?" Tom blurted, taken off guard by Dalra's admission--not that the rest agreed with him personally.
"Food and equipment were so desperately required and possible to be had. Thus, we few agreed to assist our Koba neighbors."
"With enough people working together, you could probably get rid of them," Tom told him.
"You speak as one independent man," Dalra said, reaching out to touch another in passing, bowing politely as he did. "What most be done is done to pass forward what we can and wait. The Unar shall ruin themselves with time and continuance on their path of rightful domination of our people."
"Rightful domination?" That time, the pilot was almost insulted for Dalra's sake. "You believe they have the right to do this to you?"
"Ka," Dalra answered truthfully. "Our people earned the disgrace it bears this sun. Yet we recover our truer spirits in healing and humility as Unar degrade. They reached their pinnacle with the taking of Desalia and may--and have--only weaken henceforth."
"But that could take the rest of your life, if not more," Tom pointed out.
Dalra smiled. "My pure and bonded spirit shall find it pleasing, then, when another generation shall take hold of the future. I shall wait in peace, lest I become that which I wish would be ceased. Thievery was a bend of our ways in enough degree. Yet it was the choice between two torments and we were meant to choose the lesser consequence, sacrifice our peace of mind for others, gain but in giving."
"So you could still die with your conscience in tact," Tom said blankly. His lips turned inward as he took in the wrecked landscape, the slum housing and the thin, dirty, lightly robed people traipsing over it with weakened gaits. That horror alone made him wonder what they could have done to deserve to live like that. He almost didn't want to know.
Even he didn't feel so guilty about his own past that he would ever humbly accept living like that.
"Guess that's the best one can hope for, huh?" he said unconvincingly.
Dalra felt the meaning well. "And shall you continue to hope, Toma of Voyager? For this fate you seek to mold with your own hands?"
Tom raised an eyebrow to the man's observation, keenly put and yet as friendly as before. "Maybe."
"Listen to the lessons of the wise and find respite in the good of your spirit," Dalra said simply. "The past, let into the wind to scatter in memory. The future's matters, leave unto fate's balance, as they are not of our control, but only the result of all that came before. We may only pray to the spirits, who have lived the path of past's nature, who have seen the way, for our hope. From their way, we lessen our want for guidance. It was my learning."
"Sounds easy enough," Tom replied, looking over the camp again, seeing the people milling at one end.
"I should think you behave well now, yet do not release that which you are powerless against," the older man observed. "Your youth proves such. It would be a burden relieved should you learn someday."
Tom grinned through the twinge he felt at that truth. "No fair, Dalra. You're too good at this wisdom stuff."
He laughed again and patted Tom's back. "Let us find our meals then, good man. I would think you have enough to contemplate with our lady Be'i in your bed this moon and forward."
"You're too good at that, too," Tom smirked and steered easily away from that. "And come to think of it, I am pretty hungry. What's for dinner, anyway?"
Dalra wisely remembered his own words of letting free remainders, and so only retained his smile for response.
Tom didn't tempt him further.
"Dalra of Maha'aje!" called a man as he hurried through a row of shacks and up to them. "Have you been present with Sashana'i?"
"Aratra, ka. She lies well with this man's companion."
He blew his relief and nodded across to Tom as they continued again toward the edge of the shanties. "You are the most recent to bring yourselves here," he said, quirking a funny grin as he looked Tom over. "I should welcome you to our Desalian blessing, though this is sparse welcome to languish in."
Tom grinned. "It's not so bad," he said, responding immediately to the other man's humor. "A little grass here, a lake over there, maybe a restaurant or two, it'll be just like home."
Aratra laughed. "I am certain now you are not of this place, good man."
"You could say that."
Dalra gestured to Tom in introduction. "Toma--according to your bondmate."
"It is a good meaning name," Aratra said, smiling when he saw the man in question purse his lips for want to comment. He bowed again to the elder man. "My gratitude for your seeing to Sashana'i, Dalra. She is like the kyep in the leaves with all her doings."
"Ah," Dalra sighed, "yet I can never hold her wings. Toma's companion found injury."
Aratra quieted, raising his brow to consider that. But a moment later, he drew another breath, returned his attention to Tom. "Your companion--the lady who resisted Officer Maghet."
"Yeah," Tom said, studying Aratra's tan and lightly freckled face, and seeing within his hood short, bronze-colored curls popping out of a headdress that was much like Dalra's. He seemed at first younger than Sashana'i, but then much older once Dalra had mentioned B'Elanna's injury... Sashana'i's bribing the guards, the danger, he reminded himself. "But she'll be okay now, thanks to that medicine."
"Then her effort pleases," Aratra said with a quick look ahead as they neared the far wall. "Bring yourself. Your lady, I should think, may be seen now, Toma."
Before Tom could even glance that way, Aratra was gone, jogging lightly ahead. A moment later, he vanished into the crowd of robed figures, who patiently awaited their portions, whispering amongst themselves.
When the food dispensers activated, they moved slowly to it--even if every one of them could qualify as underweight. Their robes hid their frames to some degree, but every face that turned in the longer shadows of the sunset revealed sunken cheeks and slim necks. Only a few women there were B'Elanna's height or more, and B'Elanna still wore her issue boots. Not one of the men were as tall as Tom. By contrast, the Unar were at least a head taller than he was; they towered over the Desalians. Even Sashana'i, who met with Aratra and moved back to the overhang with him, was very petite and on the edge of gaunt. Only her curious eyes and swift movements asserted her vitality.
They're probably used to their routine, Tom thought, having half-expected some excitement at the prospect of food. He was growing hungry, himself. But the crowd showed no hurry at all. They may as well have been Vulcans at a bistro.
He felt Dalra's hand on his arm, leading him into another group. Once there, Tom finally saw what Aratra had--one obviously healthy, dark-haired female with thin netting over her head wound, staring around at the people with a blank, cautious stare.
As they neared, Tom couldn't help but grin at the look on her face when she peered into someone's bowl in passing...but then he saw its contents, too.
"Well, at least it's not leola root soufflé," he quipped when he came close enough.
Torres turned. "Something tells me I'm going to miss it, the way that stuff smells."
"Let's just not get sentimental and take a sample back with us," Tom added. "Neelix might just like it and use it in a stir fry."
B'Elanna just shook her head. "I don't know how you can joke sometimes, Paris."
He shrugged. "I didn't think you'd mind. It's been a hell of a day and we have a few more ahead of us at least."
"I guess so."
He eyed her. "They've told you about our sleeping arrangements--that it'd be better if we stuck together, right?" Her gaze was pointed away as her head dipped once in acknowledgment. "Hope you don't mind."
"I didn't say anything about it before, did I?" she replied curtly, letting that half-lie stand. She looked up to see him nodding. "We're professionals, Lieutenant. I think we can handle it."
He smiled, letting her have that one since it made her feel better. "Yeah, you're right. I just didn't know what you'd think about that. I'm glad it doesn't bother you. And besides, it's just temporary."
"Exactly," B'Elanna said as she turned. If he wanted to be in a good mood about it--which certainly didn't surprise her--that was fine. Just as he said, it was temporary.
They were near the front of the line, and Tom moved up to the slot next to hers. When they pulled out their allotted meals, they looked at each other then back to the lumps in their bowls. Both their mouths twisted downwards to avoid saying the obvious.
Behind them, Dalra and Miztri also shared a look then pressed down their grins as soon as the new people turned towards them again.
A couple hours later, the pilot and engineer looked at each other again, their stomachs surprisingly full, yet their bodies feeling the cold of the night, finally descended.
They'd put their tunics back on as soon as the sun had set, but B'Elanna still shivered much of the way back to the shack, not as bothered as before with the idea of sharing the "shelter" with Paris. Rather, she was too tired to care. All she wanted at that point was a warm bed and sleep.
Dinner was more palatable than it smelled or looked, they both discovered. The overripe aroma dissolved for the most part once the food was eaten, making the finished product tasteless. It filled their stomachs, but that was about it. Better by far was the company of the Desalians, all of whom had welcomed them without complaint or a hint of selfishness--rather the opposite.
Tom was notably relieved by it, and even B'Elanna couldn't find it in herself to distrust it. The Desalians seemed like an intelligent but innocent people whose only crime, if any, was not fighting back more against their oppressors. Instead, they were thankful to the Unar for the few freedoms they were allowed at Uillar, which hosted one of many of the forced labor camps in their region.
"They had far more care about our daily occupation upon our arrival nearly seven rallkle past," Aratra told them when Tom became curious about where the guards were. "Greater lenience has been shown to us of late."
"Maybe because they know you won't try anything," B'Elanna thought aloud.
"Kaes-awk, ub wa'iap," Sashana'i said, staring at the fire. She had tired greatly since that afternoon. Idly, she fingered the scar on her cheek, moved her cloth-shoed foot in the dirt like a fumbling child. She seemed to have something else to say. Instead of trying for more words aloud, however, she whispered to Aratra, who nodded and spoke for her.
"They are falling out of their ways, as once our regency did," he told them. "They shall fall within themselves, as it seems to be meant, according to what has been before."
"And so you just wait for that?" B'Elanna asked. "You said before that you've waited--how long?--sixty years? What if they become strong again?" She shook her head. "Sorry if this sounds judgmental, but where I come from, right now is the perfect time to fight back."
Sashana'i's eyes came up at that. But her lips remained shut.
At the same time, Dalra laughed quietly. "Your birth is of a determined people, Be'i. Your companion spoke of the same just today. That cannot be our way here, not without ships, not without but what basic technology that should keep us among the living and--with far grater importance--not without accepting their poison in our spirits. To win our resurrection in such a manner, their lives would need to be taken by us. I shall not take such a sin against my spirit for any reward. I have told Toma already, little choice is ours but to wait and pray our spirits would not be corrupted again by their degradation."
He was kind, but he meant it. And he said nothing more, letting his point sit and his people agree with him.
Miztri then began to speak, easily distracting the others from her bondmate's correction. Soon, she gravitated into a story about a man who tended a mountainside--or something like that. Half the words were lost in the translators and Desalian syntax was too much to bother with just then.
So B'Elanna said nothing more, thinking that Chakotay or Tuvok, being more spiritually and culturally centered, would probably have been a lot more suited to their situation than she and Tom were. How interested and intelligent they would probably be there: She could picture them in front of the fire asking questions and having some valuable experience. B'Elanna felt another small stab of humiliation that she just couldn't be like that.
She had also noticed that Tom was eating steadily when Dalra had spoken. He showed no reaction afterwards, but simply leaned back and watched as Miztri told the tale. His eyes were filled with thought, though, as he looked at the people with an observant concern. A couple times, he raised his brow, but turned his eyes away, still silent. It was strange to B'Elanna, who had the impression he'd always talked too much. There, he was downright reticent.
Seeing the abject conditions for the Desalians outside of that circle, knowing they'd been there for years without even trying to escape, B'Elanna had a feeling she and Tom were thinking about the same thing. Thankfully, they weren't her people, even if she felt for their decidedly hopeless situation. She couldn't be there long enough to change any minds there, as if she even had the right to.
The thought of where Voyager might be in her repairs played in her mind yet again. Their conducting repairs without her or Nicoletti or Bendera, too, might take even longer.
She decided again that she and Tom had to get out of there--sooner rather than later.
After dinner, Miztri had cleaned her wound once again and injected another dose of the medicine Sashana'i had procured. Then she pressed Tom to retire them both. They would begin the detail tomorrow and would need the rest.
Though the swabbing was thankfully not nearly as painful as before, the medicine, by Miztri's admission, would make her sleepy. Indeed, B'Elanna didn't fight Tom's hand when it gently helped her to stand. Even so, she insisted on walking alone as they followed Aratra back to the shack they'd been assigned and waited for the man to leave before turning to Paris again.
"After you?" Tom asked, holding open the door.
B'Elanna nodded, bent to get into the flap then immediately to her knees and onto the blankets. When Tom hung the small glowglobe he carried on the slab wall, she looked around. Not only was it "furnished" a little, but it also had been cleaned. It smelled faintly of mint and the walls were no longer stained with... She shook her head to herself. She didn't want to know about that.
"You and Dalra did some work in here," she said without much emotion.
"Dalra did most of it," Tom admitted. "I guess they know the place well enough. Dalra was pretty insistent about it being warm enough--and he was right about the cold."
"No kidding. It's like the dark side of a moon out there."
Tom watched B'Elanna crawl into the corner with her head and shoulders slumped, a posture unlike what he knew of her. "You think you'll be all right?"
"Of course I will," B'Elanna responded, not looking at him as she tugged a few blankets into place. "I'm not an invalid, Paris. I'll survive. You can tell all our other 'friends' here that, too."
Tom opened his mouth then closed it. He was too tired to feed into her frustration. It would do nothing but remind him of his own, which he'd not forgotten, but had willingly prioritized. They could look around the refinery tomorrow, figure out again how long Voyager might take--if they couldn't find a way to contact them or find a way out. Nicoletti and Bendera... Tom didn't want to think about what they might be going through at that point, only hope they were holding their own, too, and that Dalra and Miztri were being honest about their assignments.
He knew she was probably thinking about the same, but with their capture, her injury and all the fussing over her had left her understandably terse and tired on top of that. She still wasn't admitting to any pain, either.
So he said, "Okay, Torres," and left it at that.
B'Elanna sighed through her nose, trying to block out the plans spinning in her mind, trying to relax. Her head had begun to sting and throb again, even while her eyes gladly closed. "Good night," she said quietly and pulled a blanket over herself.
She'd gotten herself nicely into that corner, he noticed, so that there would be more room for him--a lot, really, since she really didn't take up any room at all. Turning down the globe, he took that space and covered himself. He knew he wasn't going to sleep as easily, though his body gladly accepted his new position.
He fell to sleep not long after settling his eyes on the pitch-black ceiling.
Tom awoke with a start, hearing a clicking noise near to him. Shaking the webs from his mind, he remembered where he was. He hadn't fallen very hard to sleep and thus didn't have much trouble getting back. What he didn't recall was the clicking sound.
Groping around the wall for the glowglobe, he found and activated it.
It was B'Elanna--her teeth were chattering, her body trembling in tune.
Moving to his knees, he peeked out of the shelter, bracing against the shot of cold that greeted him in the shack, which needed no help cooling off. What was it? Every third moon? And how the hell am I suppose to know which one's the third when I haven't seen them before? Wishing uselessly that he had at least a tricorder, he closed the flap again.
Thinking it'd been about long enough, he turned again to B'Elanna, who was huddled in that same corner, her short hair bunched up against her head. He couldn't see her face, but he could already imagine her hard-pressed frown.
Tom sighed, rubbed his hands briskly together then took out the balm and cloths Miztri had given him.
The light sleep indeed hadn't done much for him, and so he didn't hesitate as much as might have when he took B'Elanna's shoulder and rolled her onto her back. The half-Klingon didn't even stir, only continued to tremble and take short breaths.
She must be more sedated than Miztri said she'd be, Tom surmised. Miztri was a perceptive woman who figured B'Elanna wouldn't take kindly to sedation, either. The Desalian lady's care was a good thing, too. As he pulled back the netting and cursorily examined the exposed epidermal layers, he could see it was definitely starting to heal. With a few swabs on his part, it was shiny again with the thick, orange oil.
Cleaning it didn't take long, and after applying a fresh layer of bandage and wiping off his hands, he drew himself down behind B'Elanna and pulled all the remaining blankets over them, covering their heads as well.
He breathed his relief into her tangled hair when he felt her shivering decrease and body relax when he draped his arm around her.
Despite the return of those thoughts that'd kept him staring at the ceiling earlier, he joined her repose in only a few minutes.
"Zsha-ab wah!"
Tom rolled over. "Not yet," he muttered and threw his arm over the pillow he was leaning on. "Go aw-- Oof!" He suddenly doubled for a Klingon-strength elbow in his gut.
"What the hell?!" B'Elanna sat up and yanked the blanket off her head--scraping her forehead and making her suck a sharp breath. "Ah!"
"Damn, B'Elanna!" Tom gasped. "You could give a guy a little warning!"
She spun to see the pilot indeed beside her. "What the hell were you doing making yourself so comfortable, anyway?!"
"Keeping you warm!" he retorted. "You were freezing last night, so I combined the blankets. Maybe I should have just let you freeze, so you'd have come to me."
"Not a chance, Paris."
"So much for being professional."
"I don't see your cozying up to me without my permission as anything official."
"Damnit, Torres, it's not like I tried to get in your pants! Take it easy!"
"Screw off!"
Suddenly a growl sounded from above them and two small feet landed on the blankets. The glowglobe activated, revealing Sashana'i, who turned a scolding stare to both of them. "Oah-gask as-i'im!" she told them, but shook her head to the rest, knowing well they wouldn't understand her. She leaned down and grabbed Paris' arm. "Awah-twa, Toma tih-mon-e'ih!"
"Good morning to you, too," he said as she drug him up and shoved out of the shack. Stumbling to a stop outside, he flushed below his still sleepy eyes to see both Dalra and Aratra grinning at him in the warm, early dawn.
A moment later, his 'razor' and comb followed him, clanking to the dirt and stopping near his feet.
"It is our way to tend our needs then feed our good women, Toma," Aratra chuckled, "--even while yours might send it back to you in spittle."
"You think?" Tom replied, bending to pick up his items. "I thought I was starting to get the hint."
"Be'i proves not to be the warmth of sunshine upon waking?"
Tom chuckled against his will, grunting from his bruises of the day before and the ones B'Elanna had just added. "More like the heat of a plasma injector."
Dalra was also laughing. "Food shall settle her flares--and your own, I should hope. Ab."
Tom rubbed the stubble on his chin and staggered after them. "Guess there's no chance at getting some coffee, is there?"
Both men looked back quizzically, but laughed again as they escorted him onward.
Meanwhile, Sashana'i took the balm out of the satchel and began to prepare it. B'Elanna shook her head tersely. Her first morning on that godforsaken planet had been bad enough in the first minute without people poking at her again.
"Look, I really appreciate this, but--"
"Be'i--gye'ak," Sashana'i said and turned with the prepared cloth in her hand. Pressing the engineer by the shoulder against the wall with a firmness that B'Elanna hadn't expected, Sashana'i cleaned the wound, swabbed it swiftly and covered it again, ignoring the small growl and flinches from her patient.
In but a minute, she finished and turned an "I told you so" look to her chosen charity.
B'Elanna crossed her arms, her lips turning up. "Okay. You win--this time."
The other woman grinned and cleaned off her hands before digging in the wall pouch again. Taking out a thick comb, she then pulled some thick ribbons from her pocket and reached for her hair.
B'Elanna held up a hand. "Sashana'i, I know you're trying to be nice, but this isn't how I usually start my--"
"Be'i bwuh-ke," the lady answered immediately and scooted up enough to easily take a portion of B'Elanna's dark locks, still bunched with sleep. Before B'Elanna could think to argue with her about it, Sashana'i had combed and deftly braided a side back with a ribbon, dropping the other one into B'Elanna's hand. She wordlessly moved to the other side to finish the job, plucking up the second ribbon as she started, and then tying the ends together in the back.
Again, her stare dared the other woman to disprove its usefulness.
To her own surprise, B'Elanna cracked a laugh. "You really are a snotty little brat."
Sashana'i smirked. "Be'i ka'i-wahn eko-wvuw," she said, running her finger over her temple then into the loop of B'Elanna's braid, flicking it upwards.
An hour later, she understood the reason for the Desalian's insistence.
Her day's "work" was leaning over a sheet of wrecked metal, helping another woman, a dark skinned, russet-eyed lady called Kepri, push it into a refinery slot for recycling. Across the row, Tom and Naja--Kepri's bondmate--lifted another sheet on from a pile left there for them.
Worse, she and Paris had no chance to shore up their plans aside from their mentioning it at an otherwise quiet breakfast between them. Rather, at the call for detail, they went directly from the meal across the red, cracked court to the lines of their assigned details, silent only for Dalra's insistent instruction at their meal to wait until the heat of day to inspect the place if they so insisted.
They would have the opportunity to when their pile was done, they figured. Aratra had mentioned that the Unar would take their time to bring another. It sounded like a good time to them.
"I again advise you wait," Dalra had whispered to them as they paced across the court. "Unar may be distant--yet remain a danger. You are noticed."
"We'll be careful," Tom told him, a daring little grin pervading his poker face. "We've been through this kind of thing before."
"You have little awareness of Unar. Brutality is not beyond their method."
"So we've noticed," B'Elanna smirked. "We're just having a look, and like Tom said, we've got some experience in sneaking around. Besides, anything's better than just sitting here waiting." Her tone bit that point, not caring what anyone thought about it. "Right Paris?"
"Yes, ma'am," he intoned with a bow her way as they turned into the refinery.
From there, they went to their duties feigning a slightly insulted compliance. They'd agreed on that much, even if it was harder than the work itself proved to be.
Forcing herself to keep going without looking around too much yet, B'Elanna helped Kepri turn the sheet, push it in, wait for another. She ignored the pain of her wound, worse with the heat and the perspiration trickling down her back.
She ignored as well the occasional passings of the Unar guards, though she felt their eyes burning through her, sneering. Her eyes caught Tom's a couple times then; his begged what she already knew--to just let them go, not mess around, make any trouble, attract any attention. They'd get their chance later.
She was starting to get sick of his reminders.
Thankfully, the officers went away soon enough.
Once there were no other distractions, she managed to get into the mind numbing routine of the work. It kept them busy enough to think about what they were doing--they had to cut the scrap pieces down just enough to fit through the slab opening at the end of the small conveyor. But it was unimportant and repetitive enough that it didn't allow too much thought.
It only served to make her itchier. She was a chief engineer of a starship and a damn good one. She knew that without too much conceit. The work she had beneath her, cutting and pushing metal, was suited to...
Prisoners.
Determinedly, she started calculating exactly where Voyager probably was in their repairs. She considered the lack of staff and supplies, and then recalled the energy signals of the Unar's shields, which she had foggily glimpsed on the flickering panel before they beamed her and the others to their brig.
Their ships were nothing special, small and clumsy even while sleekly designed, she remembered. Their shields were decent--though less powerful than the shuttle's had been; their weapons were ancient compared to Voyager's. She wondered if the Kazon knew about the Unar. She did know that Voyager could get past them. Finding their away team would probably be more of a challenge.
Hoping the Unar's communications were as nominal, she'd adjusted her comm badge to set off a distress beacon and left it hidden in the shack. Tom still carried his in his trouser pocket. When Voyager came and if--when--they narrowed their signal down, they would know.
"That's the last of it," Tom grunted as he and Naja lifted the last of the hulking metal onto the conveyor. With that done, the men leaned against the wall. Naja took a slug of water from a pouch, handed it to Tom, who gratefully drowned his thirst, swished the thickness from his mouth.
Watching him, B'Elanna noted how pink his skin was--overheated, probably. Even with her Klingon blood and in the shade of the flimsy roof, she found it relentlessly arid. But Paris looked miserable. Anxious, too. The latter wasn't too bad to see. She was anxious to slip away, as well.
The metal slab pulled in front of her and she jerked her eyes back to Kepli's. With her nod, they cut down the piece enough that they could get the piece through the refinery slot.
Naja handed B'Elanna the water pouch. "I should think a respite might help our good lady. --B'ei? You are very warm? Officer Tozswak should not be replenishing our supply until some time passes."
She smiled when she finished gulping down the warm but relieving water. "Thanks, Naja."
"We shall wait here and call you should more arrive. Toma, you may assist her with her balm."
"Almost forgot about that," Tom said, nodding his thanks to them both as Torres moved around the small assembly they'd been working on all morning. His grin increased to see hers: She had been intense and silent in their "mindless" toil and perspired only a little less than he had. But then, with the chance to do something more to her specialty, her eyes had brightened considerably, her pleasant determination back in check.
He responded in kind.
"Take yourselves with care," Kepli said, her wide eyes shining out from her fawn hood as they turned for the inner corridor. "You live dangerously in this."
Tom smiled back at her. "Just part of the job, Kepli," he quipped and moved to catch up with B'Elanna, already on her way into the gray grated corridor behind their stations.
Within only a minute, B'Elanna found an access junction and squinted carefully at it. "This looks like only a minor relay--a power node," she said thoughtfully as she ran a fingertip over the isolinear bundling.
Tom, keeping the watch at her side, glanced over and nodded quickly. "Think we can use it?"
"I'd like to see if there's anything farther in," she said slowly, still wrapped up in her mental schematic deductions. "In itself, this isn't going to help us."
"You've got the lead, Lieutenant," he said lightly.
"Thanks a lot," she replied, also grinning as she closed the hatch. Drawing her eyes farther into the hall, she spotted a cross corridor. "Let's try this next section, try to get behind these nodes. There'll be a shunt unit somewhere in here."
"I'm right behind you."
"You'd better be," she said. "The way my head's hurting right now, I'll need my nurse."
Tom stared down at her, surprised to hear her say it. "Maybe I should look at that now, get it over with since it's bothering you."
"Later," she said, quietly brisk. "I can deal with it, and I really want to find that junction." Without waiting for his agreement, she started moving again, to the next corridor. There was no one in sight, so she turned a nod back to the pilot.
The half-lit corridors grew smaller with each turn they took, and B'Elanna took to whispering, sympathetic with the space.
She was sure she was making progress in finding the main junction, though. From there, she told Tom, they could probably access the Unar's systems, if not get into their command pathways. Each power grid was successively more complex and thankfully unguarded, thus easy to study at relative leisure.
"Convenient as this is," Tom breathed to her as they found yet another empty cross-corridor, "I don't think I trust this."
"Like how it's this unguarded this far in?" she asked, peering back to him, but nodded before he could answer. "I know. But they said the Unar weren't too cautious. The Desalians aren't aggressors, so they probably don't give the Unar anything to worry about."
"They're pretty insistent about their ways," Tom agreed.
"Dying with their spirits in tact is still dying under lock and key, Paris."
"You're selling to the vendor, Torres," Tom grinned, squinting around another corner before allowing them to pass it. "Though, I have to admit, dying with my soul in working order doesn't sound that bad."
"That's assuming you have one," she smirked.
"Spoken like a true zealot," he returned, trying not to laugh as he let her have that one. It felt good even to get insulted by the half-Klingon at that point. She liked to throw jabs, he knew, when she was feeling clever or just proficient--which he understood pretty well. Being on the hunt for parts had definitely put B'Elanna Torres in that sort of good mood. It was good to hear.
B'Elanna found and pulled open yet another hatch, her lips parting slightly as her eyes flickered over what she found there. "I think we're getting somewhere," she whispered, almost to herself.
"I hope so."
"This is a secondary relay. I'm willing to bet the primary junction should be inside the next corridor."
Tom nodded. "Yeah, but I'm really starting to get a bad feeling about this. Call it instinct."
"I've got the creeps, too, but we have to go on. We have to see if we can get in touch with Voyager somehow."
He took a deep breath, averted his eyes. "Agreed."
Her full mouth twisted upwards. "Scared, Paris?"
Tom snorted quietly. "Damn right I am."
"Well, if you want to go back--"
"And let you grab all the glory? No way." He'd smiled at that, carelessly, egging on her wit purposefully, as he followed her around the next passageway.
In truth, they both knew that despite their "chills," they knew they wouldn't sleep without seeing everything they could.
For that matter, they might not have as good a chance another time.
And in all honesty, that kind of excitement in itself wasn't that bad. He knew he was as much an addict to it as she could be, too.
Commander Hychar knew that.
Or he had at least glimpsed that brightness when they came around the final corner. Then, when they happened to look up and see two guards and the commander who had granted their internment, their expressions were...interesting.
They were stunned, frozen for a moment in their recognition; then they seemed insulted, and then they waited for his response. They straightened, knowing their guilt, knowing there would be consequences. Even a moment of their shame shone through. Or was it humiliation?
He hadn't expected so much from them.
With that passed, the two filthy, ungainly aliens were ready for the lesson to his test. They stood unmoving, and even held their heads high to him.
He was even more impressed that they did not run. It spoke of pride.
Pride was not their place, though.
Hychar said nothing to them, but simply moved back, revealing his two officers in full. "Discipline," was all he said; then he turned to walk away, his heels soft on the metal floor.
Tom instinctively moved in front of B'Elanna, but he felt his throat in a clutch before he could complete his move. His responsive hand was swatted away hard enough that it bounced off the wall behind him.
"Bastards," B'Elanna spat behind him and let out a grunt when the glove grabbed her tunic and yanked her forward. Her body slammed into the grate a moment later.
The pilot almost turned to see, but he too hit something before that move was even begun.
Hychar crossed into the main complex, and a strangled yell and several hard thumps echoed behind him. A shuffle, then sharply exhaled groans, and then another thump...
He closed the door and returned to the pleasing silence of his post.
Some amount of time later--pain made that impossible to gauge, though the sun was starting its descent--the smaller of the new prisoners was thrown onto the blankets of the shack, heaving in vain for breath, coughing, choking.
I think I still have my teeth, thought B'Elanna as she braced herself and tried hard to breathe normally.
Aside from that, she couldn't even think for everything she felt, bitterly, swelling quickly--and could almost have been numb in the shock of that much sensation. Tasting a free flow of blood in her mouth, feeling too many parts of her body to count pounding in rhythm to her banging heart, she drug for air, swallowing the bile behind it, gasping to catch up. That wind was knocked out of her again when a long, lifeless body was thrown atop her, knocking her re-injured skull against the back wall.
That time, the flaps were slammed behind them.
Neither was conscious enough to notice.
Some distance across the court of the camp, Sashana'i looked to her bondmate with knowing eyes. They had all seen the purpled, limp figures being drug by their gray collars out of the processing center and to the shanty rows--displayed for all to see.
They had all stared in silence and sadness.
Looking to Aratra, Sashana'i touched her temple markings, then his own, allowing his spirit, his love for her, to fill her. She would need it all for what she knew she would arrange, would need his strength, even if part of that strength was fear for her.
Glancing only for a moment to Dalra, the young woman pulled her hood well over her brow and slowly set off across the parched red ground. The hot breeze did no favors for her but to liberate her loose robe and hide her path as she quickly disappeared into the barricade rows.
Aratra could only watch her, and then turn to ask Dalra and Miztri.
If she passed to their ancestors, his only comfort was that he would go with her.
"Not so much anything as much as their pride, their hope, their power to act, found injury that day. It is remembered how they barely saw what the young regent had desired, in recovering them, them to see..."
"They bear themselves with such quietness," Miztri noted, spreading out the ginhra cloth around the short center pillar, peeking back to the couple then up to her bondmate. "It is not natural in them."
"Their injuries," Dalra said, piecing through the kraja box, "their failure and their wait. They bear determination which cannot be."
"Have you no belief that they shall be returned to their own?"
Dalra drew a thoughtful breath. "I would not answer for lack of knowledge. I would wish it."
He was a little too certain in his last statement, Miztri thought. "It pleases that Sashana'i and Aratra were able to bring them tonight."
"It should be brighter than their healing has been," he agreed.
It had only been five days since Unar disciplined them, Miztri knew, but dark ones indeed in many ways. They had gone too far within the walls despite their warnings, their advice of waiting. But the two were an active sort, terribly curious, well educated and intelligent--perhaps too much so. Anticipating this nature to assert itself, Hychar ordered his officers to beat them well enough to give them great pain, but carefully enough to keep them alive.
Through this, Unar had yet again proven their corruption of spirit, which troubled Miztri more than the newcomers ever could. She had long dreamed to see in Irllae a restoration of what once had been. Her spiritual scholarship had given her a new awareness of what had been taken from her people, and it strengthened her desire to see their fate rectified. It seemed too bleak and impossible sometimes to believe, however. More, the alien woman did speak some truth during their first dinner together. Desal's want for Unar's eventual dissolution might not become truth. They may well resurge their evilness through another sect and continue their way. The last sect scourge changed little, Miztri knew.
Though troublesome to consider, what choice did Desal have but to watch and wait? It was not in their power to choose their fate, but aspire to follow and accept the destiny laid out by the events of their lives--to follow their nature and ways with an open mind and good spirit. For that matter, the Unar indeed had taken every physical means of resistance and advancement and continued attempting to stifle the remainder.
So she prayed the spirits might show that nature would have them shift towards a kinder fate for Irllae. There was no sin, after all, in hoping for goodness.
Dalra sighed, feeling his bondmate's dilemma tricking at her mind. "Perhaps they yet shall find what they desire, my spirit."
Miztri's lips turned up briefly. "Perhaps for but wishing, they shall have it. Yet I see their hope threatened."
"Humility is a difficult trade to master," Dalra replied with a sigh then touched her arm. "For the present, they might be benefited by the laridium chips I have stored. There is no use for such an energy among us."
Miztri smiled at him. "You have purity in your way, my spirit. It may well buoy their hope a time. Yet what shall happen should that not assist them?"
"Then they shall have healing before their difficult understanding," he replied. Caressing her arm, he sighed at her stare. "They are troubled spirits, Miztri, who trouble me in their thoughtlessness. They are good and shall receive what help we may offer, however. This is our way and I bear no caution for this much."
All those who came to the circle that night might well have felt the same. They had supported Miztri when she slipped out of her work detail as soon as the guards had walked back away from the shanties, followed closely by Dalra. The others covered their work inside the refinery, making their absence all but unrecognizable.
With what they possessed of wiry strength, the two extracted those lifeless forms from the shack then called some others to come and help carry them to the overhang. The newcomers were, after all, well-fed and solid in body, thus quite heavy.
Had there been proper instruments and medicines, they might have healed the two more efficiently, but for their broken ribs and fingers, his broken nose, her broken nose bridge--as Miztri had decided to call it--there were only wraps and splints for those injuries. For their bruises, only water and the cool of night would help the swelling.
The lady had awoken first, screaming and resisting those who pressed her down. Miztri had held her head in both hands and stared hard into the young woman's roughly swollen eyes, telling her where she was, what had happened, that her companion was also recovering. The patient remained angry and short-tempered despite the comforting. She still balked at too much attention, cursed often--and glaringly.
Miztri tried to understand her and the young man's seething sarcasm when he too awoke. Their pride, seemingly as inherent to their people as their freedom, had been battered equally well. Or perhaps it was the pain.
No, their sort was not accustomed to losing in their intent.
Sashana'i, after recovering as well from her own dealings with Unar, had come to stay by them. She seemed particularly endeared by the two, and complied with them enough that they did rest. Nursing them while allowing them their dignity, she let them bear their broken pride and their anger without interfering. They seemed to require the vent. During those five days, Sashana'i had also managed to buoy them enough to come to the bonding ceremony of Suoti and Jabra. She had even found proper cloaks--and convinced the stubborn pair to wear them.
Though good spirits, they did bear qualities few Desalians would attempt without great fear of reprisal, Miztri knew.
Again, she thought how shameful it was that Unar had targeted them. Miztri, knowing Unar, knew they likely thought the outsiders were hideously distasteful creatures. Commander Hychar would indeed think it an interesting challenge in his unholy life to train them. He likely waited at present to see how his new prisoners would behave at the work detail after a disciplining, when they finally returned to it.
The indignation in their hurting visages was palpable when Dalra informed them of that possibility.
But perhaps, she thought, they would gain a finer strength and resist Hychar's manipulation as they recovered and acclimated to Uillar. That night, not in so much pain, finally released of her care and perhaps seeing the beauty of the ceremony would offer them some ease in their sleep. Sashana'i had expressed such hopes.
Miztri, having come to know their moods, doubted it as much as she wished it.
"They're watching us again," B'Elanna muttered. Her mouth was still bruised.
"I know," Tom replied, also slurred. "They're still worried."
"At least they didn't get into trouble because of us."
"Yeah, the Unar have some discrimination of taste," he muttered. "But for how long are they going to be nice?"
She blew a breath, continuing to watch the older Desalians prepare the center, where the ceremony would take place. They didn't have much, but some had managed to carry very pretty cloths and ritualistic items with them to Uillar. In their own simple way, they were getting by, continuing their lives, almost as if they weren't in that horrible place.
She noticed Tom had quieted again. He'd lost a back molar during their punishment. But she didn't think that was the entire reason. He'd been in turns as rigidly silent as she had been, and colder than she'd even known him to be when he did speak. Probably pissed off and embarrassed as hell, just like she was, and she wouldn't blame him if any portion of that was pointed at her. As for herself, she couldn't describe the humiliation she felt every time she remembered that she'd led them both right into Hychar's trap.
She gritted her teeth, and then decided not to do that again when her temples and nose screamed in reaction.
The Desalians began to gather and sit; surprisingly, they greeted the new people there with genuine and gentle smiles. B'Elanna suspected they'd all seen what'd happened to her and Tom. Aratra told them how they'd been taken across the court during the work pause.
As fires began to replace the heat of the sun, the circle formed, row upon row, leaving only two adjacent paths into the center.
Dalra and Miztri came close, also pleasant as they knelt by their bundles and replaced their everyday clothes with finer robes and sheer scarves. Dalra pulled on an old, knee-length red coat, adjusted his stained, white headdress then knelt to get his waist sash tied properly. Miztri pulled on a dusty green coat with ornate silver embroidery at the hems. She hooked it at the waist and brushed down the sides, where deep slits in the skirt revealed the gown and leggings beneath. Then she pulled the bulk of her hair loose of its braid, letting it fall long in the back before draping a set of soft, white scarves around her head and behind her to her knees. Around the top, she wrapped two rows of braids around like a crown, tucked the ends under and pinned it all in place.
With another greeting smile to their sullen guests, they returned to the center, ready for the ritual to begin. When they found their places, they waited together, watched the sun set.
Meanwhile, Sashana'i and Aratra returned to their seats next to Tom and B'Elanna. Crawling over to B'Elanna's side, Sashana'i gently pulled back her new friend's hood, revealing the crown of her dark hair.
B'Elanna looked up at her. The woman smiled down at her with a regard that almost made her nervous. To her credit, she didn't flinch, even when Sashana'i touched her temple.
"My bondmate admires your beauty," Aratra told her and nodded when B'Elanna looked to him for confirmation. "You are different and in that she finds appreciation."
"Thanks, but I don't exactly feel fetching right now," B'Elanna replied.
"Ka," Aratra agreed, "you bear more the appearance of sipreg fruit than an appealing lady, yet Sashana'i sees beyond Unar, as do I. There shall be healing, Be'i."
Looking up to Sashana'i again, B'Elanna shook her head. "What I don't understand is why you do so much for us. I know it's difficult for you--"
The lady placed a finger on B'Elanna's swollen lips. "Gye'awi-Be'i," she said softly, bringing her fingers up to her own temple markings, and then her sternum. Then she motioned between them all, catching Tom's curious eyes as well. "Shi-h aw kwet ye'o."
"We are all one in life," Aratra translated.
"Awah-twa," she nodded back to him.
He continued, "One in life, that which surrounds us, that which precedes us, and that which shall be--all in the living are what we are, equal and undying, bound in time for only time. We are brought from the spirits, and are completed in eternity, one among all, having tasted the soil and water. --It is a Desalian prayer."
"It's beautiful," B'Elanna said quietly and turned her attention out to the center. Small fires had been lit within rocks, lighting the area with a warm, bluish glow, and a rhythmic melody began from somewhere within the audience, catching on like the fire, fed by the cooling air.
They were trying so hard to make that night special, she could tell. Dalra and Miztri were going to connect a young couple's "spirits" together, using what selective telepathy their race did possess when one was specially trained to use it. It was a holy ceremony to the Desalians, one Aratra had described as sublime and joyous.
But beyond the ginhra cloth, the unforgiving red dirt remained ready to poison them all.
She shivered; beside her, she felt Tom moving closer. With a soft grunt, he pulled his cloak up enough so that he could sit behind her and double up her coverings with his own.
"We can handle it, Lieutenant," he whispered humorlessly as the singing, combined with a percussion somewhere across, grew in volume. "We're professionals, right?"
She didn't look back. "Right," she replied with an equal etching of sourness.
"Good," was his only reply. He really didn't feel like being there in the first place, would have tried harder to evade it if it hadn't promised to be warm. He was rather in the mood to stew in the way he knew so well--and knew he had the right to. At the same time, he was sick of feeling cold.
He felt like hell, stupid and careless for letting Torres challenge him into going so far within the Unar corridors. He felt stupider still every time he recalled Hychar's smug grin. Just waiting for them. Tom cursed himself for not knowing better--or at least for not listening to himself--and cursed B'Elanna for getting him so excited about the possibility, even if he knew he wanted to do it as much as she had.
Knowing himself as he did, he knew he would've probably gone on his own if she'd been unable. Right into their trap.
Stupid, stupid, stupid...
...Dalra and Miztri opened the small kraja box, wherein was laid the same-named marking tools. With their fingertips alone, they lifted the instruments, placed them on the stump between them. The singing continued, the melody traveling gracefully through the rhythm, a chant with a lilting beat.
The kraja tools properly arranged, Miztri offered her hand palm-up on the small table. Dalra placed his fingertips within it. Their eyes became heavy, watching towards the path, towards the remnants of the sunset...
Though it'd been by B'Elanna's persuasion, Tom had indeed followed her. He'd always been an impulsive person. That and selfish arrogance had gotten him into every other ounce of trouble he'd been in before. Tom suddenly wondered what the Desalians would think about that, in their search for spiritual goodness, his own friends' deaths in his record, his breaking with his father and getting wrapped up in the Maquis, blind drunk and drifting off to nothingness by his own will, until someone just happened to be fast enough to lock him away.
Oh, yeah, they'd really like to know about that, too.
Because of his continued disregard, B'Elanna looked like hell, her face and neck purple with ripe bruises and a series of hard knots down her side where the guards had kicked her. He knew they both could've been less selfish, a hell of a lot less gung-ho and a lot more patient to give the Unar a little time to get used to them. They could have used more of the brains they knew they had.
Sashana'i, sitting in her heavy gown and well-braided veils beside them, seemed a proper bondmate to the casually dignified Aratra. Seemingly more willful than any Desalian there, she had risked herself again to save two strangers--stupid strangers. The princess, Tom mused.
And Voyager probably wouldn't come for another week, according to their original calculation.
...The young couple, Suoti and Jabra, both dressed in fine, long coats and draped with embroidered scarves, walked at an equal pace down the paths left for them, each guided by an attendant, who led them by the fingers to the center, where Dalra and Miztri moved to accept the two there.
The elder two knelt before the couple then straightened to take their hands. To the beat of the song echoing around the hard court, Miztri led Suoti, dressed with an elegance that seemed inappropriate there, around the young man and her bondmate, bowing and turning the bride in a sort of brief dance before repeating the course. The Dalra took Jabra around the women in the same fashion...
B'Elanna felt the warmth of Tom's arms around her, but he wasn't holding her. Aratra was holding Sashana'i, intermittently kissing her behind her ear as they smiled upon the ceremony, probably remembering their own, not too long ago. On occasion, Sashana'i met her eyes, smiling with unaffected sweetness; B'Elanna felt an unwanted stab of jealousy, not for the man so much as deserving such attentions. Her Desalian acquaintance seemed so untroubled--in that place.
Conversely, B'Elanna knew she looked like a monster and sat with a man--well known for his flirtatiousness and friendliness--who wouldn't so much as touch her. Tom only rested his arms around her enough so that his cloak could cover her. His bandaged hands remained unmoving on her knees, impotent there.
"We really didn't know," she'd told him a couple days before, "we didn't hear or see any--"
"I don't feel like rationalizing it," he interrupted, his voice muffled and thick. "We both know what happened there, Torres. I'm not going to bother trying to explain this away."
"Well, thanks a lot, then, Paris," she snapped. "Just go ahead and sit in your shit for all I care. I was trying to say--"
"There's nothing to say, B'Elanna! Just leave me the hell alone!"
"Fine!"
She stopped feeling sorry for him then and there. At the same time, she couldn't blame him for being angry with her--mainly because she was angrier at herself. Nearly a week had gone by way too badly, mainly because of her.
...The four celebrants were soon surrounding the table, and then kneeling gracefully on the ornate ginhra cloth. They spread their handsome robes and scarves outward, like a four-sided fan.
The hosts of the bonding spoke, but their words would not translate. Even so, it was clear enough what was generally occurring as Suoti responded first by offering her palm to Jabra. Another phrase, and the young man placed his hand in hers. His face shone with dignified joy. Her simpler smile spoke a world full of feeling...
Tom's sore eyes closed. At least the Desalians knew how to be patient, to use what they did have. What had he and Torres done but waste their chance? Humiliate themselves?
"You must not let them see you like that again," Dalra had warned when he helped the man to the latrine that morning. "They shall tempt your conscience, now that your vulnerability is known."
"I know that," Tom said shortly.
"It should be good for you to know patience, Toma."
"What if I don't want to, Dalra?" Tom countered. "What about that?"
Dalra sighed. "Then pain and hatred shall guide you instead, and you would be pitied as are Unar."
Nothing new in that, he thought. It'd just be another thing to look back on and cringe silently about years later. But the idea of being anything like the Unar--the idea that Dalra would compare him to them--hurt more than he expected, turned like a knife in his mind.
...The singing quieted. Dalra and Miztri spoke a few phrases in unison, then Suoti wrapped her fingers around Jabra's. She spoke softly, yet passionately, her eyes nowhere but in her chosen's. The man then spoke the same, and in the same way...
At that distance, B'Elanna could see tears in both the young couple's eyes, above the smiles. They were happy--there, under those conditions, their wedding clothes probably borrowed from those who had died in that horrible place, their life together probably doomed to Uillar until they also died, and yet they were still happy. B'Elanna just couldn't get over that, couldn't believe it.
They were attractive and rather young, probably not yet twenty.
Suoti allowed Miztri to take her hand and press her finger into her palm. Their eyes met and locked; they seemed to lose focus for several seconds. The young woman's head lolled slightly, but she managed to remain straight.
Dalra did the same with the Jabra.
The chant's rhythm became the dominant sound, mesmerizing, pulsing softly through the air. B'Elanna felt it in her heart, lulling her, almost. Her eyes blinked heavily.
Dalra and Miztri's hands met again, but then they slid their center fingers into each other's palms. With a small jolt between them, they stared at each other, suddenly lost in each other's eyes. Not long after that, they reclaimed the Suoti and Jabra's hands, repeating what they had done before.
Yet that time, the young couple was lost in each other's eyes, fighting to keep their heads up, breathing hard yet silently as the ritual continued. Dalra and Miztri seemed to be taking their time, smiling kindly while still concentrating on their task.
When they finished, they joined the new bondmates' hands again, whispered something to them. The young couple's eyes closed.
The music ceased; everybody waited...
Between his arms, Tom felt B'Elanna shift. He looked over at Aratra and Sashana'i. That time, they did not return his attention. They were fixed upon the couple, for minutes, it seemed, utterly still as the air that surrounded them...
"She truly believes in giving and the wind of fate, Toma," Aratra had said as they watched Sashana'i skip from out of the overhang and across the main walk to the water dispensers, bottles in hands. "Should there be a one who would skirt the wave of ethic, it would be my bondmate. Yet her birth gives her that."
"You seem to go along with her," Tom commented quietly. "Or do you just follow, like the others?"
Aratra chuckled. "I should like some chisak to soften your sour tongue, my friend. You see Desalians as drinking in the punishment they have not earned?"
Tom said nothing.
"Have you certainty that we have not earned it, then? The deprivation of spirit in our recent predecessors should be cause for retribution. Their children and our own may need to cleanse the way."
"How very Klingon," B'Elanna said dryly from her pallet. Tom's bad mood had been enough to deal with, but Aratra--whom she'd liked before--was starting to annoy her. "How many generations are going to have to go through this crap before you regain your stupid sense of honor, Aratra?"
"What crap do you mention, Be'i?" Aratra grinned back at her. "No Desalian here stepped into Unar aggression as you have."
"No one but your wife," B'Elanna replied.
"She is of regent's blood."
"What does that matter?"
"It matters in that she was bred with and inherited spirits of righteous empowerment," he replied. "And I follow her for my trust and knowledge of my bondmate and for the legacy we two share as a result of our bonding. As our spirits are one, some of her will is of my own source, as well, yet we our place in Desal's contrition is accepted fully. As heirs of the regency alone, this is known to us."
"But don't you ever feel like resisting what goes on here?" Tom asked.
"Each moon that passes over our heads," Aratra said, for a moment reflective. But then he laughed a little. "Yet should I attempt a thing, it would bring me and Sashana'i to our ancestors far more quickly than her fair visage. Unar despise my face, too. --Should fate bless a path to our freedom, however, I shall follow it. You may trust this."
They weren't like the other Desalians--but they were Desalian without a doubt.
...They spoke again: The new couple finally drew an audible breath and spoke, first the lady then the man. They offered their hands to their hosts a third time, smiling and still staring at each other, almost in relief.
The singing began again, that time in a happier melody, punctuated by claps throughout the gathering...
Only the day before, they'd had a funeral for another who hadn't been as lucky at staving off the infection, who didn't respond to the medicines that Sashana'i had procured for having gained a tolerance to them.
Both he and B'Elanna had finally agreed to give each other the silent treatment when they happened to see the Desalian, pasty orange and fatally swollen with infection, clouded eyes and pale mouth open, being carried past the overhang.
Tom and B'Elanna had stilled at the sight.
Aratra hurried to cover the person's head with a scarf.
They burned the body and celebrated the life.
It could have been them, they both knew.
...Looking over, Tom saw Aratra and Sashana'i had joined in the rhythm of the singing as well. Unconsciously, he too moved his hands to the beat, settling on tapping Torres' upraised knees. When he realized what he was doing, though, he stopped.
B'Elanna noticed that.
...The kraja tools were chosen and, sharing a smile, Dalra and Miztri, began their work.
B'Elanna watched them begin to mark a series of patterns into Suoti and Jabra's left hands...
She tapped her fingers within her crossed arms to the beat around them.
...The newly married couple stood, spoke to their audience graciously. They spoke with joy and welcoming, as far as B'Elanna and Tom could see and hear. They were joined, their memories and senses bonded, and they would meet their "spirits" together someday...
One among the living, they were also a part of each other for eternity.
Despite their circumstance and their likely future, they were happy to be alive...
B'Elanna watched it, saw its beauty and how devoutly it was being celebrated, but could barely think about it without feeling a sharp pain in her chest.
Without wanting it to, it disgusted her.
"I don't understand how they can live like this," she said suddenly, breaking the silence between them. Outside the fire lit circle, the temperature dropped drastically. As she fought her shivers, she'd walked with her arms crossed high on her ribs--mainly so not to push on her tender lower ones. "At least in the Maquis, we knew a crap situation when we saw it--and we did something about it."
"This is their life," Tom replied. "They won't do much about it."
B'Elanna turned her eyes down to the path, dimly lit by the glowglobe Tom held. "Obviously. I don't know if I could've gotten by as they have. They're sitting here with no technology, their people dying from simple infections, in forced labor--at the same time, they're praising their ancestors and getting married. Are they actually thinking about a life?"
Tom blew a breath of heavy fog into the night air. "Look, Torres, you can stop angling--I know you want off this planet. So do I."
She shot a look at him. "I wasn't 'angling'! I was just saying--"
"What? You can't live like this?" Tom faced her. "If you'd lived like this, you'd be right along with them. You're just looking in, talking like someone who's trapped here just like me. But I can't do anything about it--less now than before!"
"I never expected you to!" B'Elanna seethed and turned around, shaking her head.
"Sure doesn't sound like it!"
"I know this is my fault, Tom, but you don't have to rub it in my face."
"I'm not," he responded. "The truth is, you and I are just a couple of idiots who believed we could just walk right up to the Unar central pathways, open up a terminal and beam ourselves out of here. --You and I together..." He caught her eyes. "Now look at us."
She said nothing as she gazed up at his pulpy, distorted face, suffused further with his anger. Before they'd set foot on that hellhole, she knew Tom Paris was a handsome guy. There, he was hard to look at without flinching. She was sure she was much the same.
"Some stupid idea, B'Elanna," he growled as he continued walking. "These people are right not to hope for anything. --No damn wonder they're able to be happy. They don't expect so much that they get the crap beat out of them!"
Staring after him for a moment, B'Elanna finally decided to catch up to him. "That doesn't make it right," she said. "They're still here because they never fought back. Now they expect we'll be staying here, waiting for nothing to happen."
Tom sighed impatiently. "It's not that they don't want to go back to their homeworlds, but they'd have to do some serious damage to do it, and they're afraid for their...hereafter--whatever."
"It's a pretty good excuse to play it safe," she added.
"I'm not arguing with you on that. But I'm not about to tell them to give up their own sense of peace just so we can have some."
"I never said they should!" she returned. "You're putting words into my mouth."
"Then what the are you talking about, Torres?" Tom demanded. "We've been through this before: You're criticizing a people for not acting. At the same time, you're saying you couldn't be so much like them--and not angling your way out of here. What's your point?"
What am I saying? she suddenly wondered, but couldn't answer it. Her shoulders drooped slightly; she looked away. "I was just saying I couldn't survive like this and accept it."
"Looks like both of us are going to have to for now, though, doesn't it?" he concluded. "We sure as hell aren't in any condition to pull any maneuvers for a while."
She twisted her tightly closed mouth, tightening her crossed arms.
"Come on," she heard Tom say as he started moving again. "We should at least get back before we freeze to death."
For that she was indeed cold--and no other reason at that point--she followed him with the same tight expression until they finally returned to the shack they'd been given, crawling in when he pulled open the flap. That time, he made no mannerly quips.
Carefully settling herself upon the blankets, she scooted back into the corner. He came in behind her, careful not to bump his head on the low ceiling and shutting out the black sky beyond that hellish world with a decided yank on the makeshift door. Lowering himself against a wall, he closed his eyes, sighed out his breath. He didn't hang the glowglobe up just then, but tried hard to relax in the eerie yellow glow.
"It's as much my fault as yours," he told her. "You didn't see me arguing with you about going in there--and it was my idea to get a peek around in the first place."
B'Elanna fought back her first reaction by leaning against the wall as well--but then she cringed and sat up. Her ribs still didn't like that position. She noticed him breathing hard again, could hear a slight clogging sound in his lungs, and saw him flinching with that simple respiration. He was hurting. He was tired.
"We were both wrong," she finally said.
He opened his eyes, leaned forward and hung the glowglobe up. Then he reclined again.
"I think we should just keep our eyes open from here on," he thought aloud, "wait for Voyager--or maybe even Nicoletti or Bendera will find a way out. Who knows?"
"What?" she snapped up. Whatever calm she'd attained disappeared as her eyes narrowed. "You expect me to just wait here--for how long? What the hell's wrong with you? Desalian passivity gotten to you already just because we got a few bruises?"
Tom glared at her. "Haven't you listened to a word I've said? They led us into an easy trap, beat the shit out of us and left us to bleed, Torres! And now the Unar have their eyes on us. They're waiting for us to do something again. We can't give them another chance like that."
He was right.
"That doesn't mean we have to lie here like sheep," she returned stubbornly.
"Then you can get yourself killed!"
"And you can also let me freeze to death tonight and get it over with!" she shot back, her fists unconsciously clenching. "Just stay the hell away from me from now on if you want to sit here and rot!"
He said nothing; as his face jumped with tension, the silence filled the shack again. Blowing a slow breath, he leaned back.
For lack of anywhere else to look, she watched him, watched his darkened eyes, worse still in the putrid light, drift shut again; then his chest rose again with a shudder. His hands, still splinted, rested listlessly at his sides despite his outburst. Unwillingly, she remembered how those hands looked as they danced over a conn panel, the last time she noticed it. She could see it so clearly, how his face looked when his eyes fixed upon the astral horizon...in his element...
She realized how much then she missed her work, her bed, the ship, her friends...how much he did, too.
She sighed, shaking her head of it.
"I don't want to fight with you, B'Elanna, not here," he said quietly, breaking the still within the close walls. "I usually don't mind your temper--envied it sometimes, really. And I'll admit it's fun raising your hackles. But on Voyager, we can get away with all that. Not here. Like it or not, we need to keep each other alive until Voyager comes, not kill each other. I'd rather survive this place. And I'd rather not survive alone."
She blinked slowly. "I don't want to die here, either."
Tom's head bobbed once in acknowledgement. "Truce, then?"
"Fine," she said, not as hostile and concluding their conversation. Frankly, she was too tired to argue with him anymore, though she managed a smirk with her next thought... "I'll think about it."
A short, mirthless laugh escaped him. "Thanks, Torres. I really needed to know you cared."
"Who said I did, Paris?" she jibed flatly, watching his lips flicker upwards again for a moment.
There was nothing left to say. So finally, she drew a breath, resisting the threatening chills, and crawled down into the blankets. She took the appropriate moment to adjust to the blood rushing back into her face. It hurt like hell. She shivered and tightened, clutching the covering to herself.
In a pause, she heard his unsteady breathing. He still hadn't moved, even when she turned herself onto her side, close to the wall. For what seemed like minutes, she stared at the rivets in the metal that hooked the whole contraption together--though not very well. She could still feel the little drafts coming though them, hear the slightest whistle when the breeze picked up.
B'Elanna knew she'd only get colder--they both would. Very cold.
"How's this for thinking about it, Lieutenant?" she sighed. "We'll go to sleep and I'll even let you keep me warm without gutting you in the morning."
Tom looked at her. She didn't look back, said nothing more. But he didn't need the explanation. He didn't even know if he wanted one at that point.
"Gladly," he replied and moved to join her.
"The hot sun and cold moons dark passed as such, many times. Time, however, brings adjustment. With adjustment is brought a slow, yet assured loss of hope, to be replaced by hopes of another kind. Yet those ones were known well already as among the stubborn..."
"More speed, drask!"
B'Elanna coughed as she hit her hands and knees; a puff of dirt flew up into her face. "Asshole," she hissed.
Tom swooped down and got her onto her feet again. "Don't give them an excuse," he whispered in her ear, his brief gaze upon parting communicating the rest.
She read it well. Pulling herself free as she resumed her pace, she glared back at the guard. "I'm moving--happy now, sir?" Stepping back around to Tom's side, they doubled their pace to rejoin the detail lines.
Miztri shook her head with a snicker as they arrived beside her. "You shall earn more Unar gloves than any other, Be'i, with your delicate tongue."
She snorted. "They can go to hell."
"They were not always as such," another Desalian said from behind them. "They once bore pure spirits, committed to learning and community among Irllae."
"I don't give a damn what they were, Bolmra," B'Elanna returned. "We're here now."
Beside her, Tom grinned widely. "Did I mention she's been studying to be our ambassador?"
B'Elanna laughed aloud and smacked his arm. "Shut up, Paris."
Miztri continued to chuckle at them. Dalra rolled his eyes--though he did also grin at their strange humor.
Fifty-six suns had passed since their first day there, and the two, once strangers, had quickly gained a reputation for their "passionate spirits," as Sashana'i had decidedly labeled it. Though some still sought to correct them at times, most agreed with their young regent, that the two simply had been born with spirits Unar would not subdue and that they should be accepted as such.
They still bore damage from their injuries: Her thin nose bridge had bent in and a bit askew from a difficult mending; he bore a long, jagged scar along his cheekbone, among other breaks and scrapes. They continued to stand proudly before the guards, however, almost daring Unar to lower themselves again. They let them push--but not enough to let them fall.
Though the Desalians believed they could not follow such ways, the small resistance became interesting to them.
"Station," said the detail officer.
"Gee," Tom droned, "All our own? And I didn't get you anything."
B'Elanna swiftly stepped around the conveyor, the corner of her mouth tucked firmly in and upward. "We'll have to give them something real nice sometime, won't we?"
The guard's eyes narrowed, though, as usual, he said nothing.
They had also returned to the detail with increasing vigor. Gradually acclimating to the heat, they had accepted a set of lightweight day cloaks so they could work free of their heavy short coats and high-necked shirts. With that better ventilation, the two called Toma and Be'i worked as hard and long as their fellow inmates, going so far as to organize the scraps they recycled so that they, with Kepli and Naja, finished their scrap piles more efficiently than any other unit. They did not seem to mind that their piles increased in size as a result.
"Work," said another guard as he completed the transport of that morning's pile.
"You sure about that?" Tom grinned as he moved to his post. "I thought I was up for shore leave."
"Work," the Unar repeated then turned away, breathing hard between clenched teeth, obviously holding back the rest of what he wanted to say.
The pilot and engineer met each other's glances with that.
"Hychar must not like us," B'Elanna sniffed. "I'm hurt."
"I'll be your friend, B'Elanna," Tom returned, giving her a wink before leaning over to help Naja.
B'Elanna rolled her eyes and pulled some rags out of her cloak pockets. Unfolding one with a shake, she wiped her dirty face a bit then began wrapping her hand and wrist. Though the rags made her hands even hotter, they prevented cuts from the sharp metal, a far greater evil there.
Voyager had not come. It had been more than a month past their estimate, and though they'd stopped expecting it, an unspoken hope lingered. Even so, she saw that as they recovered, Tom was increasingly determined to get through their discouragement with a smirk on his face.
B'Elanna willingly joined him in it. Sarcasm in duet was proving useful for releasing her internal pressure valve a little, preventing her blowing up on any of the other poor souls trapped in that hell. Oddly, it made her understand Paris' attitude when she first knew him on Voyager, with him just out of Auckland. It also made her see her own verbal edginess more clearly. Before, she'd never really thought about it.
They were a survival instinct, those little clips. They hid the fear neither wanted to admit to but knew they shared. At the same time, they knew they didn't have the luxury of accepting that weakness, anyway. Left with nothing else to do, even fight the way she wanted to fight back, B'Elanna quickly found the familiar sardonic strain a comfort. Taunting those hairy, white-faced guards just enough to get their ire up was indeed satisfying, sometimes even entertaining--and did a lot more than fuming at Tom, who'd never really deserved it. Naturally, Tom was glad for the change.
It would have to sustain them until they had some news of Voyager, since there was nothing they could do. Keeping their eyes open had only revealed that there was no escape. The watchfulness of the Unar over them was much easier to see once they knew what to look for.
Meanwhile, time was passing, day after day.
Tom and Naja were separating the metal chunks, which sat in a sloppy pile next to them as B'Elanna and Kepli wrapped their hands. The latter man furrowed his brow as he gave up on lifting one, waving at Tom. "Might you assist us, good ladies," Naja said. "Some pieces remain attached."
"Sure," B'Elanna said, moving around as she tucked the end of her hand rag through the middle and yanked it tight on her palm. She stopped opposite Tom to help him balance the thick, gray sheet. "Try it again," she told him. Naja pulled at the stuck piece again and grunted. Despite his wiry strength, the piece wouldn't budge.
"It shall not give itself to you, it seems," Kepli sighed, also peering under the chunks.
"It is as stubborn as my friends here," he smiled tightly.
"Maybe I should bring the laser over and cut it there?" B'Elanna suggested. "It looks like it's hooked on a corner below it."
"Good idea," Tom replied. "Think it'll reach?"
B'Elanna looked briefly over to the laser unit's permanent mounting and power link. "Maybe. Kepli, let's help them drag it over. I'd like to have some leeway."
They did, managing to pull the chunks a meter or so towards the conveyor. B'Elanna let go and pulled down the laser drill. "Pull it up as I go," she ordered, crouching down beside the sheet. Holding an edge, she deftly sawed through the juncture and nodded.
Tom reached down close to her face and pulled the freed sheets up. "A little help, Naja?"
Together, the two men finally managed to extricate the slab and heft it aside. Watching it settle on the rest of their day's work, Tom was ready to nod away that small victory when he heard the laser drill snap back into its bearings with a whack.
B'Elanna had let it go.
When he turned, she was staring blankly at the part that had been stuck.
"What..."
He silenced when he saw it. He felt his heart lurch to a stop.
Kepli and Naja shared a glance then looked at their friends with concern. "Toma? Be'i?" Kepli asked. "Is there trouble?"
B'Elanna shook her head in shock. Tom let out his breath, looked away.
The uncovered sheet was clearly marked in small, square letters: "74656 USS-Voyager."
They were recycling their shuttle.
B'Elanna stepped back. With a couple hard breaths, she flew to the nearest wall, throwing her clenched fists against it and letting out a yell--and then another as she kicked and punched her wall again. "Damnit!" she screamed, coughing up phlegm as she sucked another breath. She spat it hard onto the dirt, remaining bent for a moment, as if she needed to cough more. Instead, she just held the wall, shaking her head again, dragging in gasps for want to break down further. "They bought that here for us," she finally choked. "Waiting for just the right time..."
She stopped, just stopped.
Tom's eyes shifted outside to the court. There were no guards there, surprisingly enough, none even at the barricade. "Wonder why they're not watching the show?" he asked loudly, to acknowledge the Unar's sick sense of humor. "Took enough time to bring it here, why not enjoy it?"
The Unar did like their little games. Once, for a few days, the officers decided to return the same scraps they'd taken apart--each piece restored to its original condition--to see if they'd notice. Tom and B'Elanna had seen it immediately, but remained silent for Kepli's wise advice. Another time, they cut half the power to the laser drill B'Elanna used, making it twice as hard for her to saw the metal. That did manage to frustrate her at first--before she realized it wasn't a problem with the drill itself.
That latest one was the best yet.
"Maybe they've installed surveillance," Tom sneered. "They knew they'd get us good this time."
B'Elanna remained pale, continuing to interpret the meaning of the Unar's action. "They know who to look for, Tom, our capabilities," she pointed out. "If they were able to restore the main computer..."
"Whatever survived the crash, they have it," he concluded grimly.
God knows what they know about us, B'Elanna realized. Or Voyager.
That lousy possibility stuck in her head, she straightened, struggling to get a firm breath. So, if they knew what they're dealing with--why give them any more? By the look of him, Tom was about to. He looked like he was preparing to either cry or kill something. Thankfully, he held it back with every bit of nerve he had left.
In a way, she was glad he still felt that frustration--could feel it. She was glad she did, too. But they couldn't take it any further than that. The Unar wanted to see what they would do...
Moving over to him, she put her hand on his arm. He tightened at the touch, but then relaxed slightly.
"Let's just do it," she said, almost forcing the words through her throat. Once she said it, however, she committed to it. "They want to hurt us? We'll show them how much they'll get to us. See what they think about that."
Tom stared at her that time. Her expression was fired with what she'd suggested--her eyes and mouth both were firm; even the way her hair stuck out from her hood seemed to denote her determination.
He shook his head. "Just scrap it? B'Elanna--"
"It already is scraps," she pressed, "like every other ship that comes through here."
"B'Elanna, it's all we've got left. We might be able to salvage--"
"They know you'll say that," she said, meeting his eyes solidly. She squeezed his arm. "You know that. It's scrap hull, Tom. They probably destroyed the shuttle weeks ago and just thought to send the shell to us. There won't be anything in there. For that matter, I wouldn't be shocked they've contaminated the tritanium just to see if we take a memento. I hate it, too, but we need to get rid of it."
Seeing her sense, Tom caught himself--cursed himself for almost falling for the trick despite his awareness of their tactics. "Should've known better than to hope for more," he relented, looking away.
Hearing his finality, she sighed shakily. Feeling more like hitting that wall again, she instead gave his arm a supportive tug. "There's nothing wrong with hoping a little."
Her words were empty, but she had said them. Catching her eyes again, he saw she understood.
Tom reached up and pressed B'Elanna's hand gently in return, holding her gaze a moment longer before moving back. "Naja," he said dully, "want to help me with this?"
The other man nodded sadly and bent down. "This is part of your people's ship?"
"Nope," Tom replied, not bothering to lighten the hard edge of his tone as he lifted one side of the hull sheet. "It's the Unar's now."
Trying desperately to ignore that, B'Elanna pulled down the laser as Kepli adjusted the scrap. Staring at the signage, the engineer activated the instrument and sawed through it.
Tom watched as the two women pushed the scrap down the belt and into the recycling unit. Then B'Elanna cut down the other, all business, her mouth pressed tightly shut.
Moving around her, Tom put his hand on the sheet, met her blank stare. Pausing but a moment, he drew a deep breath and shoved it in behind the other.
He closed his eyes when he felt her hand pat his arm again, but offered only a nod in return before going back to the remainder their day's work.
They had a hell of a pile that day. The extra that'd been given was probably a part of the damned joke.
"Maybe..."
She'd whispered in the darkness, the pitch-black cold of night that she'd somehow, unwillingly gotten used to. She'd gotten used to the blankets, which smelled of both their bodies and an earthy mint. The Uillaran form of soap was a soft stone they rubbed on the cloth when they had their brief water rights and could bathe and rinse their clothes and blankets. She hadn't liked the mineral odor at first, but it was better than what preceded it.
She'd gotten used to sleeping in front of Paris, too, with his arm draped over her, his breath warming the back of her head. His particular odor was quite familiar to her by then, which was rather strange, once she realized it. She'd never been with a man nearly long enough to get to know his scent as well as she did Paris'. She didn't mind it as much as she ever thought she might, though. In a way, it was a comfort.
Thankfully, he was nowhere near as annoying as she'd expected, though he definitely had his moments. Rather, he was familiar, deceivingly relaxed in a way that, once she got to know him better, made her relax, too. She'd needed that seeming confidence--not to mention his watchful protection, as the guards liked to target her more often than the other prisoners. But he never stood up for her in a way that suggested she could or would not defend herself, but as just a part of being there.
Frankly, he'd been a damn good friend to her--a better one than she could have wanted. She'd tried to be the same. Though he put on airs that suggested he didn't mind, she could tell he needed it too and deserved as much.
"What?" he asked softly, lying still behind her.
It was as comfortable as it could have been in that place. --At least it was okay when they weren't feeling cross or overtired, and better when they'd been able to bathe, which they recently had. Drying off after sunset didn't always take care of their odor, even if his nose was getting less sensitive to that, too.
Sharing quarters with B'Elanna hadn't been anything like he'd expected, or what she'd almost lived up to in the beginning. In fact, he found her pleasantly warm and a deathly still sleeper. The latter surprised him, considering her Klingon half. He'd expected her to thrash around, steal the covers, growl more or something. Of course, he'd expected to see her angry more often, too. But like him, she'd pulled back into a different shell, frustrated but smart enough to hold back and wait.
The only thing difficult about their sleeping arrangement was ignoring the occasional physical reaction he naturally had to pressing up to her small, well-formed body. Friends or no, he wasn't dead; it was no secret to him that he'd always thought Torres to be attractive--damn nice, actually. However, she was also damn near the most unattainable woman on Voyager and certainly uninterested in anyone, it seemed. Or maybe it was how she'd trained her distance from people, how she'd buried herself in their work.
Even on their work details, there on Uillar, she bore that undefeated efficiency and determination, though she was just cutting up scrap metal...
Like that day, too, before they saw their shuttle.
She felt him take a harder breath.
"Maybe that was their way of saying Voyager's gone," she finally said.
In that darkness, Tom closed his eyes. "It's been two months."
"Yes."
Silence followed, and nothing outside the shack broke it for them.
He let his arm pull in to hug her. "I don't want to think about it, either."
She inhaled, let it go, forcing herself not to cough the last of it out. The dust there had gotten in their lungs, Miztri had told them. It was common--and best to resist the hacking, lest it rupture anything and allow the red dirt any farther into their bloodstreams. Ironically, B'Elanna had been affected more than Tom had, and being unaccustomed to illness, she had to think hard not to cough.
"Do think Voyager's moved on?"
He did not move. "I like to imagine them just looking for us."
"But what do you think?" She asked more firmly. She didn't want to hear about his imagination. She had enough of her own to contend with.
"I think they will once Captain Janeway believes we're dead. But we don't know if they've even gotten that far."
"You're still not answering me," she whispered.
"I think you already know what it is, B'Elanna."
"Why don't you tell me, then--just in case I'm wrong?"
His mouth closed, though in his mind he could see it: Janeway with that hard sigh, unwillingly setting their course again. He could see the bridge, Harry, Chakotay, Tuvok, maybe even Kes, or Neelix...He could see them all looking strongly ahead, because they had to. He could hear the crack in Janeway's voice as she gave the command. He could see the starfield distort as warp speed engaged...
He felt B'Elanna's arm shift, could practically feel her expectant stare burning out the back of her head. She was cornering him into admitting it, not even with a challenge. Maybe she needed to hear him say it, if only so she could justify her own feelings.
Why is it so hard? I've been thinking it for weeks now.
But the words stuck in his throat. Even with their shuttle's diced hull melting in the refinery nearby, he didn't want to admit it. Not yet.
"Goodnight, B'Elanna," he whispered thickly.
She didn't move; she felt a muscle in his arm jump. He sighed out his breath behind her.
"Goodnight," she answered, closing her eyes.
"A'aght," Sashana'i said, holding up her utensil.
B'Elanna glanced up from her breakfast to the other woman. "A'aght. --Spoon."
Aratra grinned. "Spon? Among Desal, that is a fuel--ferranide, a commodity, in fact."
"Well, it's close," Tom quipped quietly, leaning on an arm as he picked at his own morsels. The lack of taste made it edible, but definitely not enjoyable. He almost wished it tasted bad.
Sashana'i was thinking quickly, waving her tattooed hand distractedly in the air. Then, she pointed between herself and B'Elanna--"Li"--and then between Aratra and Tom--"La."
B'Elanna repeated the gesture with her spoon--her a'aght--as a pointer. "Li...La...Woman and man--or female and male? The second is more technical."
"Ka," said the other woman with a small bow and a touch to her temple. "Woeh-mah-n, mayh-n." When she rose again, her crooked smile showed her small teeth.
B'Elanna felt her grin widen. She couldn't help it. Sashana'i was contagious when she was pleased. Strange as it was on Uillar to feel that particular emotion, it felt good all the same.
"Detail!" came a booming echo from the barricade far down the row, and the Desalians all slowly moved to their feet.
B'Elanna straightened at the sound, but only her eyes moved towards it.
Tom covered his bowl and set it aside with some others' leftovers. "There goes breakfast," he said and reached down for B'Elanna's hand. "Come on. Might as well see what else they've got for us today."
She snorted and grabbed his wrist. "I can't wait."
Once on their feet, they swung on their cloaks and pulled the hoods far over their heads before leaving the overhang. They'd already been badly exposed and were careful not to repeat the experience. Tom doubled back for their water pouch, making sure it was full before joining B'Elanna again. He'd forgotten that one day, too, and never did again.
As usual, the walk in the morning sun was orderly and quiet, save the chatting between some of the people as they finished their conversations from breakfast. Tom and B'Elanna, side by side, followed Aratra and Sashana'i and fell into a natural pace beside Dalra and Miztri.
They turned the corner around the end of the shanty rows to cross the center court for the refinery. Once there, Dalra and Miztri would descend into the plant. Sashana'i and Aratra would go straight into processing. Tom and B'Elanna split off last for the ground level preparation isles, where they would meet Kepli and Naja.
As they neared the refinery, they saw Commander Hychar in their path.
He stood, ostentatiously watching them, relaxed but observant and all but oblivious to the others. His black hair hanging down around his paste white face, his silver-gray stare did not deviate from the objects of his study.
Others moved around him as though he were a stone in the stream.
A low growl rumbled in B'Elanna's throat.
Feeling his pulse jump, Tom unconsciously put his hand on B'Elanna's back--letting her know he was there as much as he needed to feel her there.
Hychar's brow rose slightly at the move.
Tom's fingers, on B'Elanna's robe, unconsciously clenched.
They moved slightly to the left to go around him. Tom met the commander's stare with a narrow frown, holding back his tongue and his body, telling himself not to give them more than they had.
He hated every second of it, imagined a thousand other things he'd rather do, as they paced slowly past...
Suddenly, B'Elanna sucked up a thick breath, looked up and spit in Hychar's face.
"Shit," Tom hissed. A moment later, he caught her in both his arms when she cried out and flew forward. She grabbed his arms, bracing herself and scrambling for her footing, determined not to fall. When she looked up again, Tom saw that Hychar had efficiently re-broken her nose.
"It was worth it," she choked, reaching up to catch the gush of blood.
Tom glared up at Hychar, who was quickly wiping away the alien woman's phlegm from his pasty skin. "Hope you feel important now, you asshole," he shot. "I hope her spit sinks into your 'poisoned' soul and rots it!"
Around them, the Desalians still moved, albeit more slowly. A couple drew a quick breath at the curse.
The commander literally flushed: His jowls turned orange as his eyes twitched. Tom's lips pulled into a thin smile for that.
"Maghet," Hychar said unevenly, trying in vain to remain composed. The ugly woman's bile on him was indeed upsetting. And the man's omen...
Miztri slowed more and almost turned to go back to them, but Dalra begged her to move, invoking Toma and Be'i's strong spirits. Reluctantly, she touched her temple and went with him, looking back all the while.
Hychar began to shake visibly. The rituals he would have to undergo to unburden their disgrace from him would take weeks, and to have the disgrace put upon him in front of his own officers...
He started quickly to the gates, calling behind him, "Discipline them."
Maghet appeared almost instantly, pushing through the Desalians and moving up upon the two...
But before he could touch them, Sashana'i had stepped between the alien companions and the man.
"Gye," she stated. "Ye a'i sew-ehbek."
Aratra had returned, too, and stood a couple of meters away as his bondmate pressed the guard further. Glancing at him, Tom saw a look of pure despise on his friend's face, a look he'd never seen on a Desalian, though it was completely understandable. Nevertheless, Aratra did nothing.
Hychar had not yet gotten out of the court, but Sashana'i would not relent with the Unar. "I'a Unah bwut ak iwitv-he ya'a."
Her robed arms spread wide before her friends, her words had effectively stopped the large Unar man, her upright stare kept him there.
Finally, Maghet looked at Aratra. "Take them to detail, drask."
Sashana'i straightened, letting her breath out in relief, then drawing another. Turning, she gave a single nod to her bondmate, meeting his eyes with an intensity that made Aratra draw a deep breath of his own and finally nod back.
He moved forward and collected Tom and B'Elanna. "Say nothing," he whispered and led them back into the lines, urging them on--not looking back.
But B'Elanna did look back as she held her nose; she saw Sashana'i turn and move toward the shanties with Maghet. "Damn," she whispered and looked at the young man by her. "Aratra, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to get her--"
"She bears herself by her spirit's guidance," Aratra cut in with a conclusive sigh, "and her spirit sees yours as bearing importance." Trying at a grin, he glanced at them. "Yet trouble does find you appealing. You bear more blood on your cloak than stitches."
Tom also looked back. Sashana'i had almost disappeared in the wake of the other Desalians. "Where are they going?" he asked.
"Away to their arrangements." He pulled some cloths from his pocket and handed them to Tom, who still supported B'Elanna around the waist. "My spirit's partner bears strength like your own: It shall not be destroyed by base Unar. Feel no regret for your actions."
"This is my fault, though," B'Elanna said, accepting one of the cloths from Tom and wiping her face hastily. "If she--"
She was cut off by Aratra's long, dry fingers upon her mouth. His hazel eyes light with his inward smile. "Do not regret, Be'i. Sashana'i has wished the same act upon Unar for all her twenty-four rallkle--as have I." He shrugged. "It is not the way to wish such things, yet it is truth. Be well."
With that, he moved quickly away.
"...and when my tola returned to me, he queried of my crying. From my piles, I wept. 'Tola, I have soaked all these in the wrong bath,' I told him. 'The supervisor shall have them all of me now.' Yet Tola laughed--and there was some displeasure in me for it. Yet he said to me she should have my hair, too." Gresbri giggled, placing her marked hand on her head. "In the fury of my attempted self-correction, dye strips dropped themselves also upon my hair, striping it like a brroz cat!"
An echo of laugher poured from Dalra's overhang as Tom and B'Elanna entered with their evening meal. Hearing Gresbri's last lines, they both grinned, too. The woman loved to speak of her childhood mischief.
Sashana'i wasn't there, B'Elanna noticed as she and Tom found their usual places. Aratra was also gone.
"A full rallkle it took to grow away the evidence!" Gresbri laughed and continued with her meal.
"The supervisor--what had she to say?" Gihetra asked as he moved to discard his bowl.
Gresbri laughed again. "I found reassignment to the sorting room somewhat less troublesome."
In a flash, B'Elanna wondered if Sashana'i was hurt and her bondmate was helping her. She had not seen the woman since she left with Maghet.
The usual patrons of Dalra and Miztri's open space seemed unbothered by the troublesome aliens when they came in with their food bowls. They laughed with Gresbri, offered their usual bows of hello and found comfortable places on the folded blankets without a hint of negativity
B'Elanna could only glance at their greetings, puffy, purpled nose, eyes and all. She'd really wanted to fight back somehow--and she knew Tom probably would've at least said something if he'd been as close--but as satisfying as it had been to watch Hychar shrink back into the barricade as he had, she was regretting it more as the evening grew and she silently worried about their friend.
Though she barely understood a word Sashana'i said, they spent a good deal of time together and had formed a funny friendship, one based on perceived understanding, gestures, expressions and Atatra's amused translations. The young woman still came most mornings to help B'Elanna up and walk with her to their first meal while the men got their food. She remained close to them at those meals and on their walks to and from detail. Most recently, with Aratra and Miztri's help, she had been teaching B'Elanna and Tom the basics of Desalian language--and seemed curious about theirs, too, even if she couldn't pronounce anything which required moving the front half of her tongue.
Thinking about how that must have happened made B'Elanna angrier still at the Unar.
But again, none of the Desalians under Dalra's overhang seemed to look as concerned as she felt that night. As they ate and chatted, they turned no glances her way and whispered nothing on the sly.
She still felt self-conscious, felt like she deserved their stares--as if she wasn't enough of a sight.
When Dalra entered with his meal, she looked up at him, wanting to ask--asked with her eyes first. He indeed showed her the displeasure she had expected. Frowning, the man sighed and moved to his usual seat, with barely a nod of welcome. Miztri, catching her bondmate's poor manners and B'Elanna's unanswered question, however, offered a small smile and a nod.
B'Elanna blinked her thanks, glad despite her guilt that Miztri was kind enough to tell her what she needed to know.
"She's probably just off with Aratra," Tom said hopefully, having seen the relay of silent messages as he brought their food and took his seat by her. "They haven't hurt her yet that we know of."
"They're the same people who made her mute," B'Elanna said quietly. "I don't like it, Tom. Remind me next time just to swallow, okay?"
He grinned. "Personally, I think you bugged Hychar today more than anything else you could have done. You didn't see how he reacted. You polluted him."
B'Elanna's lips turned up, realizing the truth in that. "I was wondering why you said what you did. You shouldn't have. You almost got the same as I did--again."
Tom shrugged. "We're in this together, Lieutenant."
She looked up at him. "Thanks."
"Anytime."
"I just hope Sashana'i is back in the camp by now. It's late."
"Me too. But we'd have heard something by now if anything had happened, right?"
She nodded. "Yes, you're right."
He patted her arm. "I know. I've been wondering, too."
"We have had a tale," Dalra suddenly started, "yet it should be thought more could be told."
Studiously avoiding Tom and B'Elanna's direction, he looked out among his people. He did not wish to address the two he had taken into his company of late--not yet. Or at least not until he and Miztri had settled the division of their own opinions in that matter.
"I would speak of what is known to me," he began in his rich tenor, "what was taught in our scholarship of the beginnings as taught in the ancient way. I am no word painter, yet I shall humbly attempt to practice the art a short time, as once I did for my children."
Attention turned to him at the promise of more talk that night and the older man's mouth curved pleasantly.
"To my blessed young, I spoke of this story," Dalra began quietly, "as it was to me by my nali, Prahchi...
"There was in past Desal--as was said by stories old--a man in youth called Bihla, who stood without companionship of the plain of Ksorllad. Borne of the stars, whose power collided and made life called spirit, he knew none but consciousness until the stream of his life-force crossed that which blocked his unguided path.
"When awareness touched him, he found himself in form, in physical life, and he discovered also the living place where his life would need remain. For this, he reveled in his consciousness. Much was there to see and to experience.
"Yet his eyes, like the deep sun, fell over the empty place, and so he cried for the hunger of his given home. He wished other energies collide and be brought forth as life. He wished so that he may share it and adore it as all things of spirit.
"And so he prayed to all stars that the land might also find life, as he had done. In suns that passed, his spirit was answered, growths appearing upon the land, spreading and diversifying with each passing light. He loved this life dearly and tended it well. It enriched him in return. For this gift of the stars, Bihla felt joy and sought to know all of its blessings. He set himself across the land of his answered prayers, thankful for each new form he saw.
"In a sunrise, his paces brought him to a strange land, teal and cool and rolling in the wind, rushing forward and back upon the land of his blessing. Yet Bihla found himself uncertain of this place, doubting it was life of his wishing. His world was of stalks and sprigs rising from the land, warm carpets of greens and reds. This foreign land before ran vast and drew in what rested upon it.
"Yet now he saw on that land another life, more like his own than any other he had discovered, reclined along the waterside, on the threshold of the strange plain.
"To her, he spoke: 'Why lie you there without intent? Bear you life?'
"As wise answer, she said: 'I found birth here at Mivrle, and as Sa'alli, I indeed bear life.'
"'What is this land?' Bihla then asked.
"'It is water, and it feeds the life you implant upon the land, which in turn enriches it. As it sustains and burrows your growth, you may partake of it.' And she offered to him the water as her gift.
"Bihla came forward and tasted the water Sa'alli held to him. It pleased his throat and brought clarity to his senses, so he offered to her the food of his land. She took it in humility and gratitude and felt her body grow with nourishment.
"'Let us share our lands in life,' said Sa'alli and marked herself upon him--a press of her fingertips beyond his eyes. Bihla made the same indent, drawing the stalks of the land through the plain of her temples. Then, on the threshold of both lands, they joined his outward life to her vast and liquid depths.
"In their joining, there was joy, and so they wove their life-forces together, their spirits as one, and then they marked each other with the assuredness of their union, which sprang from giving hands. From his wished seed and her borne water came children of both plains of life, and marked were they as blessed of both lands and of all things living.
"In celebration, wished they for greater things for their children, for the mountains at Faha'ar, for the streams passing over them, for the blessed rains which wet the land and brought it richness, for the flora and groves and the balance in the desert. All things of Desalia were meant for their wishing of these blessings.
"Desal became soon the wish of many stars, who shed upon the lands their light and spirit, bringing lives in abundance to that place. To the waters came fishes, eels and precious crustaceans; to the land were creatures of fur and feather, scale and skin. All forms of spirit found life to have there and made Sa'alli and Bihla's wishes richer still.
"As this beginning time came to be of the past, the lives of their giving and bearing and gift grew and prospered. They took both lands as theirs for caring and loved it as their own lives, for they were yet one, from that which came from one.
"Yet in this growing time, Bihla and Sa'alli found by nature's fate their lives upon that land to be closing, their return to the stars eminent. So they prayed for continuance there on Desalia, so to have always the joy and blessings of life which they had created. They did not wish to sacrifice the gift they had been given; they wished their bodily existence to be as their native eternity.
"Yet no gift but fire struck down to answer their selfish misunderstanding--and from the flames grew one called Prihar, who swore to taunt and tempt the children of Bihla and Sa'alli. In fear, they retracted their wishes, yet Prihar had slipped itself into the life-well there, ever lurking to scald the children with its selfishness and greed.
"Some children it did consume, and they fell into the abyss of Prihar's domain, burning into the darkness of regret and bitter memory. Yet others continued to follow Bihla and Sa'alli, of love and life, dedicated to the true spirits that bore them and the path of their true fate, though aware always of the fire which may spring around them in any instance, and that they themselves may inspire it.
"Bihla and Sa'alli bore sorrow for their fault and yet they moved unto their spirits with their last wish in selfishness--that they may collect there with them as many of their children again in their love of them and protect them as best they could, purer and unblemished in the realm of the stars. And upon their arrival at Tsa'aitsa, the children would be embraced in love and welcome.
"In time yet to be, the children would embrace their own as well, freed from the threat of Prihar, exalted in their having shared Bihla's and Sa'aili's lands and building upon the memory of the blessing, which is eternal.
"For this, we yet hope to find our spirits there, someday. Zha hevrra."
B'Elanna blinked as Dalra's invocation died away and the others thanked him for the tale. She realized belatedly that during his children's story, she'd nibbled up her entire meal. His smooth, kindly voice had kept her attention the entire time.
"Done already?" Tom asked, taking the bowl for her. "I'll get you some...water--though I think that's your place, right?"
She grinned and almost flipped him a properly smart response, but then she noticed Sashana'i and Aratra at the edge of the overhang, about to make their way to their usual place. Sashana'i was wearing her warmer cloak; even in the firelight, B'Elanna could see her face was pale, her eyes tired, and that Aratra remained close to her. Still, she was pleasant, greeting Tom when he returned.
When the lady spotted her,B'Elanna gave her a quick grin and almost turned away. Sashana'i was already moving towards her, however, and knelt to take her hands.
"Zha-a hye-awa'i," she said, not even blinking at her friend's beaten facade. "Me-w-hasib e'ivas."
Aratra plunked himself down beside his bondmate. "She has said all is well with her and you must not concern yourselves."
"I still got us into it," B'Elanna told her.
Tom reclaimed his seat, nodding. "And I wasn't much help," he said. "I hope you didn't go through too much trouble again. We'd feel worse about it if you did."
"Gye. Ye'i a-wah."
"No," Aratra translated, "Sashana'i insists it is her given duty, her responsibility."
"And responsible again because of me," B'Elanna pressed, narrowing her stare when Sashana'i continued to wave it away. "Look, can't you just let me be sorry and feel bad for making you feel the need to risk yourself? Dalra's pissed at me and Miztri's playing middleman and you, by the way, look awful, though I probably have no right to talk. I'm sorry that had to happen."
Sashana'i looked as though a thousand other words hid behind her quizzical grin, words she simply chose not to express rather than couldn't articulate. Instead, she leaned forward to kiss B'Elanna's temple. "E'iag o'en ah-t'ka Sa'alli v-hwew Bih-wa."
At that, Aratra laughed. "Miva ka'i!"
"What?" B'Elanna asked, surprised by the kiss.
Aratra was still chuckling. "She bears great truth, I would believe: You and Toma are determined to bear the guilt of eternity for what is but natural--as Sa'alli and Bihla did. I should think this accepts their lesson too well."
B'Elanna shared a look with Tom then turned her face back towards the fire. "I don't think we're taking it that far," she said. "Regardless, I'm not going to get in their way--at least for a while if I can help it."
Sashana'i looked a little disappointed to hear it, but shrugged to dig into her robe pocket instead of argue. "Be'i i'a-k."
The other woman's hand curled into hers, and then pressed her fingers closed. Staring down, B'Elanna sighed to see the small, disposable hypospray in her palm. She almost spoke, but Sashana'i only held her hand to any response, her eyes shining with her lopsided smile.
B'Elanna said it anyway: "Thank you."
Miztri had injected the third of B'Elanna's treatments carefully into her shoulder and covered her again, but even the tiredness the medicines caused didn't stop B'Elanna from sitting right back up when she heard Tom mention he was going to pay Sashana'i and Aratra a visit. They had been absent from the work detail that day and had retired early the evening before, so B'Elanna was curious to see them, too. Calling out to Tom, she grabbed her cloak and boots, ignoring Miztri's wishes for the mean time.
"After everything she's done for me, I'd like to know if she's all right. Okay?"
Miztri finally sighed and began to clean up her work. "Cover your head, Child. The sun yet looms."
"Yes--mother," B'Elanna returned, closing the flap of her second boot. She then pulled her hood over her forehead and pushed herself to her feet.
"Only bear awareness..." Miztri started, but shook her head of the rest of it, offering her a small smile. "Bear your proper feelings, Be'i, yet live with acceptance."
B'Elanna furrowed her brow at the odd statement, but decided to ask later.
Glad to see the older woman had relented, Tom gave Miztri a nod and took B'Elanna around the waist to help her.
She snorted at his familiar move. "Afraid I'll lose my balance again, Paris?" Then again, a hard fall wouldn't surprise her, considering her luck in that place.
"Nah, just taking advantage of a good thing while I've got it," he returned and escorted her around a row on the uneven dirt.
"Good answer," she smiled, moving with him around the shacks.
For a reason she could blame only on her engineer's mind, she still thought about how much better their scant housing would be with just a few supplies and a couple tools. Combining the spaces, sealing the joints and arranging the shacks in rings rather than sectioned rows--not to mention putting simple heating units in each of the shacks... It all could be easily built if they could smuggle more parts than scrap metal from the refinery...
Of course, she knew that the camp was made for work and sleep and not much else. The crooked little shacks would stay in their haphazard layout with well-trodden dirt trenches for pathways in between, and it would always be cold at night within those all but useless shelters.
And those shelters would always be too small, like Aratra and Sashana'i's, which B'Elanna immediately ducked to enter once they got to it. But she stopped as soon as she spotted the scene inside. Tom, still near her, froze too.
Sashana'i was huddled over Aratra's knees. Her small, tan fist was reaching around him, clutching his loose shirt. She was in a pause, shaking miserably--only suddenly to buckle and retch again. Aratra held her firmly, whispering soothing words, holding her long brown hair behind her. Crying out in either pain or with a curse, Sashana'i retched without end.
"This is the effect of your action," came Dalra's low voice behind him. B'Elanna turned to find the man's sad eyes aimed down at her. "You act and thus does Sashana'i--and this is what she is brought to, expelling the Unar filth she takes in herself to procure and abate."
B'Elanna felt her blood drain from her bruised face as she took in everything that meant.
Bargaining... B'Elanna suddenly wondered why it shocked her. Nobody there had anything to trade and even she'd known of many cases where women... But she hadn't thought--hadn't wanted to think that the young woman had gone that far for two strangers with even less to offer. A puff of breath escaped B'Elanna's lungs as her stare darted to the dirt. "Oh my God."
"You have no belonging here," Dalra concluded regretfully then moved to pass her.
Her attention snapped back up, B'Elanna grabbed his arm. "No. Let me help."
"You bring only conflict. I should not have your influence confound her spirit further than it has since your arrival here."
"Wait a minute, Dalra," Tom said. "We didn't know what was going on here--and we haven't started most of the trouble we've gotten in."
"Your fate procures exceeding amounts, regardless of what consideration you have learned."
"Then let me make up for that!" she insisted. "I don't know how guilty I'm supposed to be for this, but she's my friend and I want to help her."
"You would assist by containing yourselves now," Dalra told her.
"B'Elanna's right," Tom said. "At least let us do what we can while she's suffering."
"Gye, To--"
B'Elanna didn't let go of him. "Look, Dalra--"
"Be'i, gye'i ak!...No!" Dalra cried out in exasperation. "You and Toma have been brought to this place and dissention had ruled us ever after! Others who would practice your rebelliousness! You spread seeds we know not how to tend! Such ways have caused too many to suffer without need--I have seen and felt these things! Desal lies in the condition you curse for the same ignorance. I cannot permit it here! Not again!"
"Dahwa--gye'av skov." Within the shack, they all turned to see Sashana'i staring back up at them. Lying on her side, bloated and pale, she pleaded with her stare, and then, "Hamu w-ehak Be'i-Toma i'o sa'am. Dahwa...gye'ogapah, ye'i-o ahw-ahkee."
Dalra drew a firm breath. "I cannot watch you suffer, Sashana'i. Choose it as you may, your place and blood would seal your greater importance. You must not be lost lest Desal lose so much more, our remaining history, our people's legacy. You bear awareness of ages precious to us, both great and cautionary. So few of you remain."
B'Elanna sighed, shaking her head, looked at the other man there. "Aratra, please let me help. I didn't intend for any of this to happen, but I'm sorry it did. I..." She turned up her dirt-stained hands then let them fall as she looked away.
She felt Tom's hand on her arm and she let her posture fall. When her head came up, their eyes locked. She nodded. That sad awareness of his was a look she'd come to know too well lately.
"Be'i ka'e."
B'Elanna turned back to see that Aratra had risen from the blanketed floor to dispose of a covered bowl. Turning the bowl over on the dirt, he faced the three, met their eyes in turn, held B'Elanna's a moment longer. An odd determination settled on his face as he gestured with his chin to the interior.
"Be'i, you shall sit with my bondmate and comfort her. Take yourself. It is wished."
Relieved, B'Elanna moved to the doors, opened her mouth to thank him--
"You would have what brought your bondmate's disgrace comfort her?" Dalra demanded. "I would contest it!"
"You should find little peace in the rebuttal I would offer in the same forum," Aratra responded. "I have fairness in my way, my elder, yet you should not claim domain over my house and my bondmate. --I would have you know your place more completely in that."
Tom shifted, looked back at B'Elanna's equal surprise. Suddenly, the debate had become a sort that certainly hadn't cropped up in any of their quiet evening meals.
"Be'i ke'aws i'ab," Sashana'i whispered from inside.
Interested as she was in Aratra's proud stance at his door, B'Elanna finally passed him and knelt into the blankets by her friend. Pulling her hood away, she had to swallow against the stench that greeted her. The small space's odor--though Aratra had removed the cause--reeked badly enough that it assailed her senses despite her swollen nasal passages.
Still, she did not hesitate to take Sashana'i into her arms and met her bleary stare. "You've had to do this?" she asked her. B'Elanna shook her head, stroked her friend's hair. "How could you let those monsters even look at you, Sashana'i? It was incredibly brave, but you didn't have to do that for me."
Sashana'i gestured with a trembling hand to herself and shrugged. "Desal e'i ye'i asawit," she said and touched her temple markings with her knuckles. "I'a wawis-pe fassu ye'o kah-sa."
B'Elanna pieced together enough small words to guess her meaning, but didn't want to believe it. "You put yourself in that situation because you're the regent? To be responsible for your people?"
In response, Sashana'i only leaned down onto B'Elanna's knees, embracing her there, closing her eyes against her tears. "Ye'i pe-ha'at," she whispered.
"And us, too." B'Elanna swallowed the lump in her throat and stroked the other woman's back, willing down her anger about what the Unar had demanded from her friend. To make it worse, Aratra had likewise accepted the necessity of her self-inflicted duty. "Sashana'i, I am so sorry."
"Your curse on our friends has always been for their rebelliousness," Aratra told Dalra from the doors, seemingly oblivious to the others who had gathered at the unusual sounds of contest there. "For the loss of your own children, you have grown too cautious for those others you see as similar. Yet you rebel as well, my friend--you rebel against me, my house and against the better wishes of Sashana'i, the last of the Allanois, who not even a scholar bears more wisdom of the true Desalian spirit than you.
"You claimed us for our protection and for the hole you wished to fill, left of your children's quick absence. Sashana'i, filled with our pasts, bears a blessing of right action not all have survived. Yet it would be hers to risk at her discretion. And I--in spite of what you name disgrace--have understood, as her bondmate, her need to follow our ancestors' wisdom with true humility. She has given everything of her body's life but life and spirit itself for Desal!"
Tom raised his brows, glanced in the shack to B'Elanna's response. The other Desalians watching seemed intent on the public pronouncements. None interfered--and Tom wasn't about to, either, seeing how Aratra had risen up proudly and how Dalra immediately backpedaled.
"I took her within my walls," Dalra said. "As an elder here, I had right to claim her and you and share the teaching I had in me. There was no ambition but that."
"True--yet not to claim her spirit, which burns with truth and progress, not with the preaching which preserves your life in mere waiting, and not to claim my house, given by her to me when I was accepted as her bondmate."
Aratra moved completely from his shack and into the afternoon sun. Not tall by any means, he seemed to tower over Dalra just then. "And let us again speak on your rights in claiming. As our friend, I love you and thank the blessed spirits for all your goodness, that you have protected us. You bear much responsibility for us all. Your right was but kindly given by my bondmate, however, not through declaration. This we did to fill your loss and Miztri's."
"Yet my house was given for her," Dalra told him, "and you, child orphans but intended, without a living house. As one who bonded you, I have glimpsed your memory, felt your spirits."
"You have glimpsed," Aratra allowed. "Sashana'i yet names herself daughter to Lrrili and Sa'osha, granddaughter to Aneschi and Dulla and bearer of the Allanois, not only containing our golden past, but also the last voices of our sorrow-taught Regency, given in full to her upon Dulla's passing."
"This is truth, good man."
"Then think you there is no wisdom in what he gave her that you, descended from river vendors and scholars none before you--would know better of her decisions? What we carry was seen, yet not retained, by you and Miztri, as is the way in the bonding. Yet you behave as though you may direct her way. Sashana'i has shown patience with you, indeed.
"Now beneath this sun you counter my place, though as her bondmate, I share her spirit in full? While not countering the claims Unar have placed on all Desal, which they would dispose of as it pleases them? You have the fight within you, Dalra of Maha'aje, yet your dispute lies with the wrong people."
Dalra did not speak at first, both properly humiliated at Aratra's claim of position and knowing the correctness of his lesson. He had indeed stepped beyond his place--and beyond humble generosity.
He still shook his head. "I have sought the safety of our people," he sighed, and then motioned to Tom. "These two...they have stirred unexpected feelings in me. They have inspired the dissent in me through their ways and have thrown Sashana'i into perpetual distress. I am greatly troubled for this, for their inability to follow. Their effort is known, yet more often seen is their failure. I wish their strife not to follow a path I have seen too well. The fate of my eldest children could not be changed; I now must choose prudently in my house for my spirit's peace."
"Your bondmate finds little agreement in your decisions," Aratra pointed out.
"This has been an ache I shall not easily mend," Dalra agreed.
"Then I shall mend it for you," Aratra told him, looking out at their witnesses as he traced his markings with his dirty fingers. "Zahi'ibrrle! Your claim is dissolved, Dalra of Maha'aje; Sashana'i and I are no longer your burden. Your bondmate may decide which guests she takes, as shall you from this sun."
Dalra bowed to him with a sigh. "It must be accepted," he said. "Yet the others? I may not maintain them." He looked at Tom, still watching wide-eyed from the side. "Toma, your spirit and Be'i's are good; our care for you is truth. Yet I may not claim you. You bring great unrest to my being, which is not reconciled with time. It is a greater sin than any I have committed, yet it is a truth I must accept."
"Then I shall claim them to my house," Aratra rejoined. "You need not trouble your nature further." Looking at Tom then back inside to B'Elanna, he gave them a grin. "From this sun forward, should you be asked, you shall be known as members of my house and family--the Allanois."
Tom stood speechless. Aratra had not only expertly pulled rank on Dalra while putting the elder man in his place--which Dalra accepted with a compliance that was just as unnerving--but had, without even thinking it was anyone's decision but his, swiftly adopted him and B'Elanna.
Registering that, Tom grimaced and said, "Uh, thanks Aratra. But were we 'claimed' before?"
Aratra chuckled. "Informally. Dalra cannot bear such strong sprits in his gentle house, however. This is not dislike, yet a result of difference, Dalra ka?"
Dalra breathed through his shame, bowed to Tom. "It is suitable to you both. I shall continue my prayers for your peace, ever able to be attained, I would believe."
Still taken aback and a little confused, Tom looked between the two men, finally managed, "Thanks, Dalra."
Finally giving the other Desalian onlookers his full attention, Aratra pulled back his hood to show his face completely. "Zha hevrra," he intoned. "This day I take those called Be'i and Toma into the Allanois and Shi'achku lines and rightfully call them Allanois by name. Let no life or spirit mistake my lawful claim."
Within the walls of Aratra's rickety house, the young matriarch, still lying in B'Elanna's lap, drew her arms around her friend and embraced her again. "Z-swa'i ka," she whispered.
It pleases, B'Elanna translated, feeling a pull in her chest. A common phrase among that population, it was even more meaningful coming from their friend. In turn, Sashana'i could not know how familiar--and how important--Aratra's act was to her, surprised as she was by it.
Bending forward despite the rush of blood to her wounded face, B'Elanna returned the embrace. "Ye zal," she whispered, hoping the grammar was correct.
She had a feeling Sashana'i would understand either way.
"Correct me if I'm wrong, but did we have a choice in the first place?" Tom asked as he swabbed balm around B'Elanna nose.
"I don't remember being asked," B'Elanna smirked. Clearing her throat, her chest rumbled. She coughed, making him pull his fingers away momentarily. She nodded, and so he continued. "I guess Sashana'i already talked to Aratra about it. But you have to admit, Tom, it's a big honor they've paid us."
"I picked up that much. I just wonder why."
B'Elanna shrugged. "Well, they have been pretty good friends and protective of us. Maybe that's just their way, since we're outsiders. They put a lot of importance on belonging to a family, and since we don't have that here, they must assume it's necessary. So Dalra tried us out, but he couldn't handle us."
"Sounds all too familiar," Tom grinned wistfully.
"Tell me about it."
"Both of us, I'd think," he replied, squinting as he moved the swab nearer to her eye, "trying things out and not handling it as well as we wanted to."
She blinked, both for his statement and for the proximity of the cloth. He'd nailed into her words probably better than he intended. "Dalra was nice about it though," she hedged. "I guess we can't blame him. We are pretty different."
He responded with a slow, single nod, continuing his work with a gentle touch. B'Elanna tried to be tough--was tough much of the time. But he also knew, even before they landed on Uillar, that she could be just as sensitive. She looked like she should have been that night. Her skin was blotched and sallow and her eyes had become so red that they had fogged over the dark brown of her iris.
She watched his face as he dabbed at the scabs on her nose. One of his hands was braced against the side of her head, both holding her still and securing his own balance. He was so careful she sometimes barely felt the treatment.
Finishing, he laid the usual netting over her nose to keep the dirt out. "Okay?"
She nodded.
He nodded back and turned to put the balm and the satchel away.
"What about you?" she asked him, scooting back into the corner and pulling the blanket over herself. She didn't want to sleep just yet, but still felt her mind turning with their unusually eventful day. "How are you doing?"
His lips turned up briefly. "Hell if I know," he said with a breath of a laugh, making himself busy in the wall pouch.
She watched him there, nervously trying to do something when they both knew there was nothing more to take care of. He did that sometimes, occupied himself uselessly while on an evasion course. With no jokes to make or place to go, his attempts were pitifully transparent. She knew she was guilty of the same. She threw herself into their daily and despised work most days just so she could be exhausted later, and thus make it seem as though she didn't have the energy to talk. Even in her work on Voyager, she'd often buried herself for about the same reasons. Her mind spun with desire and frustration, either way--more so there. So much more so there...
"Tom," she said softly.
"Yeah." He'd only acknowledged hearing her, but she didn't prod him again, just stared until he turned. Tom finally gave up the pouch and leaned against the wall. "I just don't know what to do anymore," he said. "We've survived this long, but how long are we going to keep living like this?"
"I don't know," she answered with a sigh.
Again, Tom half laughed and shook his head. "If we weren't so damned busy trying to stay alive, I'd have gotten really bored with this." She grinned at that, but he continued, "Day after day, just waiting for a sect war? The only break in the routine is hitting the dirt and Sashana'i selling herself for medicine. No wonder Dalra was pissed off at us. I hate myself for it, too."
"He might have told us what was going on, though," she pointed out, "instead of being so damned wise and paternal."
"Yeah." Tom sighed heavily, leaning his head back. The glowglobe's cutwork casing threw little patterns on the ceiling, patterns he'd stared at so many nights; he often fell to sleep still seeing them behind his eyes. "So, now we can't act or speak out at all without thinking about the consequences... You said it a while ago and you were right. We can't survive like this and stay sane. I frankly don't know how Dalra's done it this long--how any of them have."
She was very still. "I know."
Tom grinned humorlessly. "What I wouldn't do to get out of here and be on Voyager again."
"To be anywhere again," she joined with an equally mirthless laugh.
"I really hate this place, B'Elanna," he muttered in a thick throat. "Really...hate it. I hate Hychar, Maghet--appropriate name. I hate the Desalians' situation and their goddamned passivity that makes me want to scream sometimes. --Of course, I can't even do that without getting a lecture of how useless it'll be. Problem is, Dalra's right about that much. Hell, I even hate Janeway for leaving us here, for whatever reason they couldn't get us. I'm sure it wasn't her choice, but..." He cut off there, didn't bother to finish.
"Maybe they were convinced we were dead," B'Elanna suggested emptily, not having a word to disagree with in the rest of his frustrated lament. She didn't even know if it was a relief or painful to finally hear him admitting Voyager wasn't coming for them. "Maybe they did try to get us but Hychar or one of his people convinced them otherwise. God knows they had our shuttle scraps to prove it. And we still don't know anything about the capabilities of the barricade."
"Maybe they couldn't get through the field--or the Kazon found them and they had to leave."
"Maybe the Unar attacked when they did come through and..." She cut off, obviously not wanting to think the rest.
Nor did Tom fill it in. "At this point, I just hope Miztri was right in the beginning about Bendera and Nicoletti."
"I do too," B'Elanna said, turning her eyes down a moment in thought--and some measure of guilt for not having thought about them in a while. Their lives there had been so immediate, the routine indeed numbing enough, that she simply didn't think about anything but getting by.
"I miss it," he told her. "Every damn day, I miss...all of it. I even miss you sometimes."
"Me?"
He shrugged, peering at her askance. "Do you know what you look like?" he asked her. "You've had the hard end of those gloves, B'Elanna."
"I guess I'm pretty filthy, too," she admitted. "And pretty stupid looking with this thing on my nose."
He said nothing about that, but continued to regard her, almost in appreciation despite the work there. "I remember what you used to look like--in your uniform, nice and straight, shiny boots..." He grinned. "You always had your hair just right, a couple touches of makeup--that plum lipstick, or the rose one. You looked so crisp and pretty, every day."
B'Elanna's eyes widened to hear it. "I didn't know you noticed that much," she said.
"I noticed, and I wasn't the only one." His squint-lined eyes still held hers. "But despite what they've done, it'd take a hell of a lot more to make me not notice you."
With an effort, she didn't avert her gaze from Tom's foggy, bloodshot eyes, or dry, tan skin, nor from the shadows that seemed permanently etched into his thinned face, and the scars...
He noticed her returned examination. "Guess I look pretty bad, too, huh?"
She blinked, almost shrugged. "You look different."
"Maybe because I am now," he said, coughing slightly when he adjusted his position against the wall. "This place... God, was I stupid back then, to think I had problems. I wish I had them back."
"I know the feeling."
Again, he didn't comment--or perhaps the slow blink in the yellowy light was his acknowledgment. The wind outside picked up, rattling a loose section on the back of the shack; the rest of the shelter creaked as the breeze died away. But he didn't move aside from the blink until he spoke again.
"All my life," Tom whispered, looking up again at the glowing patterns above him, "I just wanted to do something well--really well...and, well, maybe I took that too seriously. A lot of it, I guess, was about my father. He was pretty demanding, had the family reputation to uphold. He didn't take well to weaknesses or excuses; unfortunately, I had a slew of them, and I didn't really want to be pegged into the Paris career track. It felt like a trap--like it wouldn't be mine, you know? Anyway, I wound up trying to prove I had more than I did...and everyone knows how that turned out."
That time, B'Elanna said nothing.
"So, I wind up here and you know what? All of that's gone. No father, no Starfleet, no lost chances to redeem. Now I wish I had it back." He grinned at that. "I used to wish that I could start over again, start from scratch, no baggage or preconceived opinions--my so-called reputation. I was just starting to do that on Voyager, too--not from scratch, but doing something that meant something to me and was finally right. Now this comes along. In a way, I got what I wanted, but I can't do anything with it but try like hell to stay alive. Sometimes I don't know why I bother, except that I don't want you to have to be alone here."
B'Elanna drew a deep breath, held it while her lungs tricked at the action, and then slowly let it out. "I know," she said, "I've called you some things, and we haven't always gotten along, but... You're a good person, Tom. I know that--I've really come to believe that."
He looked at her. She nodded, turned her gaze downward.
"I found out how much before we got here," she said softly, "when you protected me and tried to save Durst in the Vidiian mines. Remember that?" He gave a nod, looked down to his hands. "I'll never forget it, how you stuck up for me. And what you said--about being dealing with fear--meant more to me than you know. You've done the same thing here, Tom, even if I'm not half of myself now, totally off guard. You've stuck by me, even when I was pissed at you for it."
Tom grinned. "You haven't been that bad."
"Thanks," she said, her lips flicking up briefly. She caught his stare again. "All my life, I blamed everything on my not being able to stay in control of things--no big surprise, right? Though, I was the only person who could say that about me. Every time I got myself into a good situation, I got impatient or angry or had some kind of problem and ran away from it--and cursed that while knowing my stupid temper--my Klingon side--got me into trouble again. It's why I left home, the Academy, how I got into the Maquis.
"The whole time, I thought I was controlling it. Now I don't know if I ever had...I was mad as hell when we got on Voyager because I couldn't leave it, I couldn't control it at all--and I really did hate it at first."
"God knows what you really think about getting stuck here."
She gave him a look. "I think you've got an idea."
He laughed quietly. "Yeah, I think so."
"Anyway," B'Elanna continued, "things started going right--I got my rank, became chief engineer. Even when I screwed up, I was given the chance to get past that--and it was my choice to take it. I couldn't escape it, and after a while, I didn't really want to--well, with being an officer, at least. Like everything else, I wanted to have some control over things. If I'd been able to handle our situation out there in the nebula, I wouldn't have been cramming for a fast way out--and we wouldn't be here."
"B'Elanna, it's not your fault."
"It wouldn't have happened without me being so damned...ambitious," she returned, biting her last word. "And I'm paying for it here." She waved her fingers slightly in the air. "I can't do anything about this. There's a fight, but we can't fight it. I can't be angry and resist, because then I'll really pay for it. So I guess we're both sorry for wanting more than we could deal with at one point or another."
Tom thought about that, all her words--which were more than she'd ever said to him before. Of course, he wasn't often confessionary, either. But on Uillar, he figured, maybe it was a good idea to let go of one's demons when one could.
"Maybe that's our biggest problem," he thought aloud. "We can't even fall back on our favorite vices. Like it or not, we have to take it--and it's worse now, especially in that it's...so relevant, all of this. It's life or death, every day. That's what we've got left here."
"And we might have to stay here for the rest of our lives."
The reminder put a chill in Tom's spine, even as he smirked at it. "So much for the positive," he said. "Worst of all, we can't think for ourselves anymore, either, not as long as Sashana'i keeps doing what she has to keep us from dying of infections in this damned place."
"I still can't believe she's been doing that," B'Elanna breathed. "I...I couldn't have gone that far. But again, we haven't been here long."
Tom nodded. "Dalra had every right to be worried about what we were doing--and not just because of Sashana'i. I had no idea he felt so...personally about us."
She sighed. "We really have stirred things up."
"Sometimes I think that's a problem, too," he said.
"How so?"
"The fact that we couldn't sit here and deal with it. Much as I really believe I still can't, it really proves how selfish we've been." Tom stared at her. "We actually thought we could fight Hychar and the guards off. What've we been doing?"
"We've played as many games," B'Elanna concluded for him.
"For something to do about it. And now Sashana'i's in her blankets sick as hell and Dalra's worried about Unar retribution on everyone he's worked to protect since he got here."
B'Elanna sighed on that. Leaning back against the wall, she let her tiredness start to take her. "So, what do you want to do?" she asked.
"About what?"
"About all of it." She shrugged, looking plainly up to him. "You wished for better but got stuck here and you can't do anything without risking someone else, Sashana'i in particular, who we both know will go out again if she has to. The guards target us and you're tired and sick. I have the same problems. So, what now?"
He shook his head slowly. "I don't know. Have any ideas?"
"If I get one, you know I'll say so," she told him, trying to be light about it and failing.
He also grinned, but it drifted away unfelt. With the silence, his eyes followed a similar path.
After nearly a minute, Tom moved to settle them to sleep. She tacitly agreed, scooting down into her usual place as Tom carefully arranged their coverings, pulled the layers over them one by one then lowered himself behind her.
Neither spoke again.
"And so it was upon Uillar, the suns to pass, suns and moons following one another, the waking and work, meals and talk, none more so than another day--a routine in turns made unique by the taunted guards. Yet Hychar was not to be touched by any of those suns. This absent form sowed suspicion among our people--and grisly hope in Toma and Be'i.
"Yet cast aside were such idle thoughts as the Uillaran winter grew to its yearly being, returning Hychar to his familiar lair. His preying eyes upon us once more, it became a time of hibernation--and winter creatures..."
"No. I meant it. Cut it off."
"Be'i gye oh-gaht kopa aw-hes."
B'Elanna sighed shortly and took the scissors from Sashana'i's fingers. "Whatever. I'll do it."
Sashana'i yet held her friend's hands, staring at her. "Owaah, ye-wahsi'e gwall tyo ife'i!"
"Sashana'i, you're being ridiculous. It's only hair."
Sashana'i swung around and pleaded silently to Miztri, who kneeled nearby as she combed out her long, red-blonde locks, still dripping from the brief wash. The elder woman only raised her hair and comb-filled palms and shrugged. Miztri was beyond trying to convince Be'i to change her will--and much longer ago had stopped with Sashana'i. She was rather disposed to letting the sisterly creatures fuss it out themselves...and because she did secretly smile upon it.
Seeing Miztri's neutrality, Sashana'i then chose to beg. "Be'i gye! I'aw-hes gepwu kopa ha'a."
"It's not like I'm cutting off my fingers, Sashana'i," B'Elanna told her. "It's getting too long--and especially in this heat, I want to keep it short. Now come on, we still have our clothes to wash after the guys are done."
"A'av yi--"
"Fine!"
With a decisive yank away from the woman's hands, B'Elanna whipped the scissors upwards and cut a chunk off her curls, doing as much damage as she could so that the rest would have to be done.
Grinning triumphantly, B'Elanna then handed the instrument back to her flabbergasted friend. "Do the back for me?"
Outside the overhang, Aratra chortled and shook his head. "My bondmate, I would think, loves our good lady Be'i more than she should. She would have every piece of her retained undiluted."
Tom grinned, grabbing his satchel as they headed out for their weekly bath. "Undiluted B'Elanna? Sashana'i's never known it."
"I have not heard that you drink the pure waters of Be'i, Toma," Aratra replied wickedly.
"If I tried, my red waters might be named Lake Uillar and you'd be having some weird ceremony to bless that," Tom returned.
Aratra was shocked. "You share with a lady of such passions a bed this third and feel no temptation?"
Tom snorted. "Are you kidding? The last thing I'd like to do is sleep some nights, but I won't do anything she doesn't want to do. And she sure as hell hasn't mentioned it. Besides, it's good enough that we're getting along...most of the time."
"Ah, my friend, you and Be'i must be more Desalian!" Aratra proclaimed. "You must make yourself known to and claim the lady you wish, then worship at her temple with much pilgrimage. A lady with such spirit as Be'i's should not disfavor such a thing, I would think."
Tom put his arm around the other man's shoulder. "Well, when we're done down there and I stop smelling like a waste reclamation unit, maybe you'd like to talk her into taking a mate."
Aratra looked back. His bondmate was still gaping and stammering as their alien friend plucked the scissors away again and stubbornly continued to slice into her wavy locks--telling Sashana'i all the while it was bad enough they didn't have a "decent sonic shower" on a "dirtball a Ferengi wouldn't even try to sell" without also looking like a "wild targ."
Whatever that might have meant.
He turned another grin over to Tom, who only offered back a raised eyebrow.
"Well, I think these have just about had it," B'Elanna said and cleared her throat, managing to stave off the itch in her chest for the time. She'd been coughing more often, but had learned pretty well how to swallow it back. The temptation gone, she continued to shake out her freshly dried clothes. Her socks proved to be all but useless, though. "Might as well give them over to Gresbri tomorrow for her scraps."
Tom looked over, sighing. "Well, I'll give you credit, they lasted longer than mine did."
She grinned crookedly, but didn't reply. She didn't have to. Tom knew where she'd have gone.
He spread their newly cleaned and dried blankets out, slipping them under her feet as she lifted them. Bath day was also a day without work. The Unar cleansing day meant no guards were available, so they were able to enjoy the early evening there in some relative comfort.
Of anything Unar, they were not cynical about that privilege.
The season had changed, somewhat for the better. The sun of full daytime was still searing, but it left at least a comfortable hour or so before the even colder nights set in. Just then, in that rotten little shack, it was nice. The sun was fading just enough that it merely warmed the roof but was still warm enough to negate the cooling breeze.
Of course, they'd also acclimated to the heat of the place. Constant perspiration from hard physical work and a low sodium diet had drained their excess water and consequently shed kilos from them both. It made the nights more difficult, though.
Looking over at B'Elanna, bent over the lump of laundry once he had finished carpeting their space again, Tom noticed, not for the first time, how wiry she'd become. Beneath the plain gown she wore when not wearing what was left of her uniform, he could clearly see the lines of her ribs and hipbones. Her half-exposed shoulders were leaner, showing the lines of her muscles. Her face was hollower and angled a little differently since her nose had been broken twice and she had no cosmetics there. Her skin was tawny and dry, though she was much more cautious about keeping her cloak in place and her hood pulled up than he was. Her bloodshot eyes had circles beneath them that spoke of her respiratory problems.
She looked frail. Sometimes, when her coughing was bad, she was frail.
He wondered if she realized how much she'd changed.
He wouldn't know his own changes, except the view when he looked down. His skin had tanned considerably, even under his clothes. After a while, it'd decided to stop burning. His hands were rough with dirt-stained calluses and his body had grown quite lean. Otherwise, he hadn't seen his reflection since before he last reported for bridge duty about four months ago. Considering the abuse he'd taken and their severe conditions, he wasn't anxious to see it.
And Voyager... Tom fingered his COMM badge before setting it aside on the wall shelf he and Naja had put together from smuggled scraps. He still carried the little badge, but no longer in hopes of hearing anything come through on it. They'd deactivated everything but the universal translators in them a couple months before, kept them charged with some rigging and Dalra's small supply of laridium for that purpose alone.
Besides, he just wanted to have it with him--just in case. He'd noticed that B'Elanna had done the same.
Looking at her again--she was trying to neatly fold what little she did have--Tom sighed.
"Of course I don't expect them to come," she said outright as she closed her eyes against the thick blanket. He'd asked her so tentatively, she didn't have the heart to get angry at him for it, even if she really hadn't wanted to talk about it again. "I thought we'd already said they weren't--and they aren't."
He could tell, though, by her tone. "I'm sorry."
B'Elanna nodded then let out her breath. She knew she'd been just as guilty of imagining Voyager breaking through the atmosphere--and tossing a torpedo into the Unar stronghold. "I just don't know what to do about it," she said. "There's nothing here, Tom. Some days..."
She stopped, cleared her throat. But that time, lying down, she couldn't hold it back, coughing until she felt Tom's palm whapping gently on the outside of her tunic, under the blankets. She finally expelled the phlegm with that help, spit it into a cloth she kept nearby then tossed it outside the blankets, towards the door.
"Okay now?" he asked.
"God, I hate that," she said, still catching her breath. "I'm fine." She said that for his benefit. Every time that happened, her lungs felt like they were on fire. Not for the first time, she sniffed at the fact that where once her Klingon lung capacity had been a very good thing, it only caused twice as much trouble there. Like everything else.
Turning onto her back, she didn't bother opening her eyes. "Some days, I wonder if it's worth it, staying alive in this hellhole." When she got no reply, she breathed a small, ironic laugh, knowing what he must have thought. "It's not like I want to die, Tom, but..."
She stopped. It was a very old topic.
"I know," Tom breathed, repositioning himself by her. "Hell, just a cup of coffee would be nice right now."
B'Elanna laughed quietly. "God, I'd love a good cup of coffee. Thanks for reminding me." More reflectively, then, she said, "I feel so sorry for everyone here, too. They've been at it a lot longer than we have. I hate that we..." She shook her head.
"Hate that we can't whisk them away to some better place and get ourselves home?" Tom asked, nodding. "Dalra once told me Desalians were people who hoped for small things because they were able to be gotten. There's no use in wishing for the impossible."
"In itself, that makes sense." Her tone didn't exactly agree with the statement, however.
Tom paused, nestling himself by her, finally closing his eyes. "Well, call me selfish, but I want more--and their Prihar can just come and get me. I'll always want more."
B'Elanna's lips pulled inward for a moment and she turned onto her side again, scooting back so they were spooned up together as before. Instantly, his arm fell into place over her and his cheek rested on the top of her head.
"Glad we agree, Lieutenant."
"Well, look what slithered back in," B'Elanna mewed, peering aside her work as Hychar made his way across the barricade.
"Our old buddy," Tom acknowledged, "back from vacation." He yanked a sheet of metal up onto the flat, pressing the scanner button. "Looks like he didn't have a very good time."
"Well, let's not rectify that," replied B'Elanna, giving Latsari across from her a grin. "He's a big boy. I'm sure he'll manage it somehow."
"Oh, Be'i," Latsari snickered, touching the back of her callused hand to her lips before moving to their next flat. The comely young woman seemed to appreciate the new work partners' sarcasm, though she resisted joining in it.
About a month ago, B'Elanna and Tom had been reassigned without explanation--the Unar never had to give one, of course--to the front disassembly dock, where they separated metal types into piles to be transferred to their old processing station.
Latsari and her bondmate Bolmra assured them that it was not a promotion, a fact they quickly learned when they were reassigned to that detail several months ago. The couple, only twenty and arrived at Uillar from Llatso'a shortly after their bonding two years before, had replaced two who had died of infections due to injuries procured at that station. Likewise, Tom and B'Elanna had been sent there to replace bondmates who had passed from the other common ailment commonly caused by exposure to ore and dissolution lasers--eye disease. Worse, the work was even harder and better guarded.
That was not surprising.
Hychar had turned to them, his eyes narrowing upon finding what he sought. Then he turned away.
"Oh shit," Tom muttered. "Wonder what he's up to this time."
B'Elanna pursed her lips then pulled another flat into place. "Time will only tell."
"You may wish not to play into known practices," Bolmra said quietly. "I would advise compliance for this time."
Tom smirked at the same time B'Elanna did. "True," he said, his tone not as light as the grin implied. "We can really piss him off that way."
The officer grabbed the sleeve of her cloak and she merely stopped; her eyes pointed ahead as the others passed. She felt the guard remove Tom's hand from her waist and did nothing. The guard turned her and she forced herself to only look at the black leather strip at the mid-torso of the man's uniform, and then at the hard red dirt when he moved.
He removed her cloak, exposing her to the sun. He slid it off her arms, folded it and put it in her arms. He did not dismiss her.
B'Elanna did not move until he did--over twenty minutes later. When she turned, already feeling the slight burn on her face and arms, she saw Tom standing several paces away, staring at her from within his cloak.
Only when they got back to their shack did she allow herself to kick the wall, scream then shake her head at the blankets. Once she quieted, Tom gently took her shoulder again and gave her a wet cloth for her face.
Tom stumbled forward, but didn't dare fall. Damning himself if he did, he ran a few steps ahead to catch up with himself, ignoring the cry of pain in his back where the guard's glove hit him, willing himself not to cough. He knew if he started, he wouldn't stop.
Then he felt a small, strong hand grab his arm and pull him upright. He caught B'Elanna's eyes as he got his feet under him again, grinned his thanks briefly.
Her hand remained clutched to him the rest of the way to the work detail.
The evening sun was as it always was, the walk the same, their exhaustion felt in every bone and muscle, their bodies starving for water they'd already drained from their pouch.
Hychar was waiting inside the line, staring at them, waiting for them. Like a demonic apparition, he loomed, neared as they walked.
His black hair blew in the seasonal breeze against his face and shoulders; his gray eyes were pinned on the reasons for his waiting.
To B'Elanna, the familiar sight made her chest flutter with a combination of fear and readiness she'd become accustomed to since their first disciplining.
She could feel his eyes burning in her. She could feel the blunt studs in the glove ripping across her skin, the whiplash in her neck when her head was thrown in that inertia. She could feel the solid thud and loss of breath when they threw her against the wall, hear her own strangled cry...
Tom's hand found her back. It was trembling just slightly.
Sashana'i peered back for a moment from within her deep hood, feigning to scratch an itch on her cheek.
Straightening, B'Elanna turned her eyes downward as they shifted slowly to the left and passed Hychar by.
He did not follow.
Tom kept their pace, thinking to breathe again once the view was gone. B'Elanna blinked slowly to ward off the tears that treacherously cropped in her eyes. Neither of them looked back.
Her knees and hands hit the ground at the same time. Feeling the hot dirt on her shins, she suddenly knew she'd probably have to patch her trousers after that scuffing. They'd been mended too many times to count. At the same time, she wondered why she bothered. They were too hot, anyway.
"Proper," Hychar commented from behind her.
Swallowing every ounce of reply, she felt a small trickle of blood on the back of her exposed head. She remained, waiting to be kicked or prodded with the rifle butt. Moving her eyes alone, she saw the tips of Tom's worn, torn boots, likewise unmoved.
"Rise," came Maghet's voice.
She didn't bother, as his hand had already clenched her cloak collar and pulled her to her feet. She stood utterly still. She didn't even glance to Hychar, moving around her.
The others walked around them, heading back to the shanties. Many looked back, more slowed, but none interfered. For once, Tom was glad they didn't.
"You believe I am evil, do you not, drask?" said Hychar as he slowly circled, purposefully tempting her eyes to follow.
"Yes," B'Elanna answered honestly, resisting any sarcasm.
"Why?"
"Because of what you've done to the people here," she said, training down the bite in her tone.
"And what should you think if I told you the same? That I believed you were a truer evil, an example of filth and eternal corruption among that which is sacred to Unar?"
B'Elanna swallowed the itch in her lungs. "I'd wonder why you've bothered to keep us here this long," she told him, a little hoarse for her effort.
"Your work has been good enough to keep you alive," Hychar told her. "Do you think I am foolish enough to let my resources go to waste?"
She didn't answer.
Hychar smirked at her, and then turned to Tom, who was waiting some paces away but visibly at the ready. "And you, as disgusting as this creature: What think you of this? Of my belief in your filth?"
"Then I'd guess you're right," Tom said, his tone twisting with derision, "considering you don't let us get a bath but once every ten days. We stink like hell."
"Do not use base humor with me," Hychar warned.
"I wouldn't do that," Tom said condescendingly. "It's the truth. As for our abstract filth, I guess I'd say we've got a major difference of opinion."
The Desalians had all finally passed them--slowly. Tom let out an unnoticeable breath to see them gone.
Hychar's face went unchanged. "You, drask," he said, motioning at B'Elanna's head, "are an abomination. Your grossly sacrilegious markings I would have destroyed were it not for the use I have for your life. Your continued efforts to be repulsive seal your abhorrent behavior. You will die upon this land someday, and I will scatter your remains in the dung heap of Metrab should I have any control of the matter."
What, no flowers? popped into her head even as she felt her heart drop at the thought--and her temper rise sharply enough that she could feel herself blushing against the scalding sun.
Hychar looked at Tom. "As her willing companion, you will join her, drask."
Tom pressed his lips firmly shut, fixed his eyes blankly on nothing.
Without another word, Hychar moved away, as if caught on another breeze. "Maghet, your company."
The officer blinked, but continued to stare down at the aliens. Then he glanced to where the Desalians were disappearing. His pale mouth parted...
"Maghet!"
With another look, Maghet complied and left the two there.
Tom and B'Elanna were left in the afternoon sun, waiting only for the two Unar to disappear. When they finally did, B'Elanna fell back to her knees and threw her fists into the unforgiving dirt. Tom slumped, letting out his breath, shaking from pent up nerves.
B'Elanna coughed--hard, hacking until she was able to clear her lungs a little and spit the bile away from her. Then she gasped back her breath. "I hate him, Tom," she growled, knowing it was redundant but just having to spit the words again. "I want him dead. I want to kill him."
Nodding, he bent and put his hand on her shoulder. She grabbed it, gave it a squeeze. "Come on," Tom said quietly.
"You have shown exceeding patience with Unar in their diligence," Dalra said as he set aside his dinner dish and leaned back into the pile of blankets he occupied. "These past nine suns, they have shown much attention, more than of recent."
"They're testing us again," Tom told him quietly.
"Your success is impressive."
B'Elanna put down her portion as well, but leaned up to the host. "You think we like this, Dalra? What I wouldn't do to beat the crap out of that son of a bitch, you probably couldn't guess."
Dalra sighed. "Unfortunately, this is understood. You bear passionate spirits and are not of Desal. This is why you are of Aratra's house." He looked up at her solid gaze, so willful, yet vulnerable at the same time. "Unar tests are not unique to you. Why would you think I remain here? Their test for me came with their attempting to tempt me away from Miztri."
"And though we're all happy with your choice, they won," Tom pointed out.
"You think of it as win or loss--that is a portion of the dissatisfaction and unrest you feel."
"And you don't," B'Elanna replied plainly, "which is why nothing's changed here."
Miztri raised her brow. "And yet you do not fight now, too."
"Because they're trying to see what we'll do--and we know it." Casting a quick look to Sashana'i and Aratra, listening nearby, she added, "Among other things."
"Yet shall you relent always?" Miztri responded. "I should not think it natural to your way."
B'Elanna sighed, still peering at her friends, who seemed intent on the conversation, even if it wasn't a new one in Dalra's overhang. The older man had continued to press their compliance even after Aratra had claimed them, which was almost as troubling as the Unar sometimes.
"I don't think we could, Miztri," B'Elanna finally said.
"Then you would seek all our suffering," Dalra replied.
"I don't seek it," B'Elanna returned. "They're the ones pushing our buttons, and they don't involve you in our 'discipline.' --And for that matter, you're the one with the good soul guaranteed to go to your heaven, so what the hell does it matter to you?"
He did not take that as an insult. "It matters that I would wish to remain here for the others in need of me, and that your strain bears also upon me and the others, regardless of your family."
Tom shook his head. "We understand that, Dalra. And we don't want anything to happen to any of you, either. That's the last thing we'd want. But you can't accept who we are and expect us to lie down for the rest of our lives. We'd rather die now than live like that." Glancing to B'Elanna, he grinned. "A people where we come from believe that to die for your beliefs in a great struggle is a very honorable death. I've come to really appreciate that philosophy here."
B'Elanna smiled, knowing that Tom had cleverly left out about everything else Klingon, which would probably have turned Dalra white with shock and nausea.
"One of these days," Tom continued, "we'll get our chance. We won't do anything rash for the time being, but when the time comes, trust me, we'll be ready to fight. I need to believe that right now, Dalra. It's all I have left to believe in here."
"And yet you shall deprive others of your presence while leaving your mark as one among us," Miztri commented and looked again to B'Elanna. "I do not fear the exaltation of my spirit and Dalra's, yet my duty is clear: It lies with those still bound upon Uillar."
"I'm not disagreeing with that," B'Elanna said. "It's just that I'd rather go out like Tom said, struggling for my beliefs, than lying around like sheep just waiting to be put to the slaughter by a people who pick you off at will like some sick game--or worse, just let you rot away of infections because they can get more where you came from. That's no way to live."
She returned her attention to the host of the overhang. "I'm sorry, Dalra, but Tom's right. Right now, yes, we're being patient because we know they're playing with us and we don't want anyone else to be hurt. But we can't do that forever. You might believe we're all one in this existence, but you also believe in individual desire. Well, you know what ours are--and we'd might as well be dead if we don't live up to it, because that would be the death of our spirits."
Dalra had listened; his mouth closed at her conclusion. Finally, he bowed his head deeply. "You speak of your spirits, Be'i, Toma," he told her. "Your sincerity cannot be doubted. I should only pray for a swift end of their 'games,' and with great pause."
B'Elanna nodded. "So do I--and some."
Across from them, Sashana'i's hand slid from her lap and into Aratra's. Holding it warmly, she continued to watch her friends, slowly showing her satisfied smile.
"God, is that a cool morning breeze?" Tom asked as they swerved around a row of shacks and waved to Aratra, hurrying along with Sashana'i's hand on his forearm.
"Amazing," B'Elanna grinned, looking up to him as they breathed the air. "If only it'd stay like this."
"Better enjoy it now while we can."
She snorted. "Enjoy it! So to speak, Paris." She breathed again, swallowing the usual coughs that followed it; then she nodded her greeting to their other approaching friends. "You were right about the weather, Aratra. --Morning, Sashana'i."
But Sashana'i just sighed a breath and yanked back B'Elanna's hood when she got close enough. "Be'i, i'awk-sa gask efi'ir wash!"
B'Elanna rolled her eyes. "I woke up late. Now we don't have t-- Ow! Damnit!"
As they walked quickly to the rows, Sashana'i deftly braided back B'Elanna's short locks, grinning all the while.
Tom tried not to laugh too much at B'Elanna's resistance. In itself, it wasn't a bad thing, considering the past couple weeks. Any diversion at that point was welcome, and Sashana'i's pulling B'Elanna's hair out never failed as one. Sashana'i was ridiculously obstinate about certain "tending matters," and rarely allowed the object of her attention to get away with less.
They were much alike in different ways.
Of course, that was the fun part about watching them.
"Well," Tom grinned, "at least she's efficient."
"Shut up, Paris," B'Elanna smirked as she grudgingly leaned into Sashana'i's service. "Or I'll send her after you tomorrow morning."
Tom reached into his hood and mussed his fluffy hair. "Guess tonight's as good a night as any to trim it," he grinned.
The growl she returned did nothing but make him smile more.
By the time they came to the detail lines and began greeting their other friends, B'Elanna's hair bore nest plaits on both sides and Sashana'i looked pleased with her efforts, bowing low to her meal hosts before moving back to Aratra's side.
Miztri giggled at B'Elanna's chagrin and patted her back. "It was seen that Toma brought himself later this sunrise to the meal giving--and disappeared with both portions. Have you wellness?"
B'Elanna shrugged. "Just that cough. It kept me up. Tom's got it too."
"It should pass once you acclimate to Uillar completely. My sorrow for that this shall take more time, however."
"You don't have to be sorry," B'Elanna told her, trying for a good breath as her eyes diverted. "It's not your fault."
"I have meant for the time."
"I know. But it's been...a little easier, I guess."
Miztri nodded kindly. Glancing to her bondmate, who spoke with Traco'a, she gave B'Elanna a long look. "One moon, then, my friend, I should wish to hear the stories of your people--of your life. You and Toma bear nothing of them but mention--and it is known why this is. It would honor me to accompany your missing them."
B'Elanna did sigh that time, touched the woman's robed arm, feeling its thinness beneath the cloth. "Maybe sometime."
Looking over, she saw Tom had heard the exchange, but his reaction was unreadable. She'd come to know that look, but had never figured it out, even if--
"Submit!"
B'Elanna gasped out as her hood was yanked at the neck and she felt herself flying back and out of the line.
Tom had to blink before he realized what was going on--it'd been that quick. But a second later, he jumped out the line, following them step for step into the court. "Where are you taking her?!" he demanded.
"She is to be disciplined by the order of Commander Hychar," the Unar officer said blankly.
"For what?!" B'Elanna choked, and then hacked to finish it. "Da-- agh!"
"The hell she will!" Tom retorted. "She didn't do anything!"
The officer only stared back.
Sashana'i moved forward too, but Dalra instinctively grabbed the back of her cloak before she could leave the line.
"Gye!" she yelled, both at Dalra and the Unar. "Gya'o kah-wobak!"
"Dalra, you shall release my bondmate!" Aratra demanded.
"You're not taking her anywhere," Tom warned, taking another step toward the guard. Glancing down, he could see B'Elanna was actually scared--she was struggling for breath in coughs, her feet were barely on the cracked ground, her fingers were trying desperately to loosen the pressure around her throat. "Not without me."
The officer smirked. "You wish to share in her cleansing?"
B'Elanna shook her head at Tom, her eyes wide and begging him not to say it...
"She's not going anywhere without me," Tom repeated firmly, standing his ground. "Yes, I'll share it."
"Gye!" Sashana'i cried again and twisted herself out of her cloak. Scurrying around the others, she flew to the scene. But the officer only raised his palm to meet her chest with a shove--sending her down and skidding across the ground.
Aratra gasped and paused, but then he scrambled to the ground to collect his woman, who still clutched the dirt. Growling loudly, B'Elanna reached up and found some purchase in the guard's hair, pulling it as if to rip it out. Her feet flailed, trying to strike him, knock him off his balance.
Before Tom could rush up on the two, the guard spun B'Elanna around to make her release his hair. As soon as she reflexively brought her knee up, the Unar grunted and swung his hand around, swatting her head with a loud crack.
As B'Elanna stumbled back, Tom grabbed the officer's collar and threw his fist directly into his jaw--and the guard swung back into Tom's twice fractured ribs. They cracked on contact. Tom's elbow answered it, striking him in the throat just as the officer threw another punch into his chest. Tom flew back, gagging to try to catch his breath.
Miztri darted a look back to Dalra, who was set to move along with the others, yet slower that day. Her bondmate gave her a weary gaze in return. Silently begging her, he almost moved to grab her.
"Your fear is known, my spirit," she whispered, but then turned and hurried to retrieve B'Elanna, still swaying on her feet in shock. Grabbing the young woman in her arms, B'Elanna gladly fell into them, holding on, coughing through her uneven breath.
The officer, a bit bloody from the blows he had been delivered and holding a part of his scalp which had indeed been ripped out, gestured to a younger guard, who came across the trench to give a short--albeit surprised--nod. The officer glared at the group still in the dirt.
"Contained discipline," he muttered, each syllable like acid, then turned to march back to the barricade, fighting to keep his breath steady.
The younger guard moved up on Tom, who stood slumped with his arm over his ribs in front of B'Elanna and Miztri...
"GYE!" Sashana'i cried as Aratra managed to yank Tom out of the guard's path. "Ye a'iw sew-eh bek'a! --E'esaaf!"
Dalra had not yet moved. He stood with Sashana'i's cloak still in his fist, in shock at the scene, with his wife cradling the bleeding, dark-haired Be'i as if she were their child...who still clutched Miztri's sleeve, trying to remain conscious.
"Ye'i akw-his-w!" Sashana'i demanded.
The other men stood on either side of his once chosen spirit-daughter, yet again facing Unar--who likewise was facing her... "No, Sashana'i," he whispered, moving forward.
Tom knew, too, where it was going. "Sashana'i--"
"Toma gye ak!" she interrupted, unbroken in her stare at the guard.
Likewise, the Unar guard held hers, considering her, and then the others. His bright gray eyes then turned outward in his decision, briefly to the barricade, into which his superior had already disappeared.
"Maghet o'a gy'e-a mu'ewh," she told him.
Slowly, the officer raised his chin. "Gye'a," he said soberly.
She just stared at first, disbelieving. Then, Sashana'i's breath released in defeat; her shoulders and head fell.
Moving away, the guard stared at the others milling slowly by, and then to some others who had almost stopped. "Detail!" he ordered loudly.
"Z-shaw ye'e," Sashana'i breathed.
The guard moved his eyes over the unmoved group again, taking them each in, pausing on the injured woman, the gasping man, the young regent, bowed in defeat. Then, glancing back to the barricade once more, he drew a deep breath. "Quarters."
Sashana'i's head came up to stare at him again. "I'i?"
"Quarters," he repeated. With only that, he stepped back, blinked a nod to them then continued on with the work detail.
Tom, holding his ribs, looked upon the changed scene with a furrowed brow. He looked to Dalra and Aratra as if for confirmation of the guard's decision. Aratra was visibly surprised, as was Sashana'i, whose head turned numbly to watch the man pace evenly away. B'Elanna, semi-conscious in Miztri's arms, asked where the Unar had gone.
Even when the guard disappeared and none came to replace him, Tom still didn't know whether or not to believe what he'd just seen--not that he dared regret it.
He felt a hand on his shoulder and turned to see Dalra, straight-faced but holding no disapproval. "I should think your intent and protection were correct in this instance, my friend," he said.
Tom's head bowed in thanks. "Hychar's going to know you stayed, too, Dalra."
"My bondmate knew this risk. It is acceptable, as Miztri and I shall find our eternity together...and for it is a just resistance."
His lips creasing slightly, Tom gave the man another nod then knelt with a wince by B'Elanna. Taking her hand, he said softly, "Let's get back to the overhang, get you washed up."
"I...I'm--"
"Shh," he breathed. "No arguments. You're hurt--and you can't tell me you're anxious to go sort scraps in the sun."
B'Elanna's red, puffy eyes found a kindly pair in Tom Paris, whose quirky grin was a bittersweet sight she might have expected. Then her focus weakened. She blinked in slow flutters, cleared her throat. "I wasn't...going to argue with you," she whispered.
Aratra moved down to them and positioned himself to take B'Elanna up with Miztri's assistance. "You require wrapping as well," he told Tom. "I shall carry her."
Tom mouthed his thanks, gently stroked B'Elanna's hair before managing to push himself upright with Dalra's assistance. He could barely breathe before, and he had to swallow his bile several times as he straightened. Glancing at Dalra, whose eyes questioned him, he said, "I'll make it."
Sashana'i looked again to the young guard, well along his way to the refinery, then to Aratra as he picked their friend up. When he caught her eyes, her own widened slightly, became intent for a moment. "Wa'hal Gai-sak imak osw-na."
Aratra blinked, looked to Tom as they began their way back to the shanties. "There shall be trouble soon, she believes."
That news made him perk up. "What kind?"
"It is not known. Officer Gychak disobeyed orders without a bribe and by his own volition, however. There is dissent within the walls."
Miztri's eyes flew to him as even Dalra stared back at the guard. "There shall be a trade, perhaps?" she asked, grabbing her bondmate's hand.
"We might provide a method to smuggle your house from this place," Dalra suggested.
B'Elanna, still conscious, smirked as her head lolled into Aratra's softly robed arm. "Wouldn't that be one hell of a rebellion, Dalra?" she whispered.
Dalra moved so that the young woman could see him, even if it was evident that she could see little by then. "You, Be'i, and Toma, among Sashana'i and Aratra--whom we have planned to smuggle away from Uillar for some time--you are spirits all who must have freedom. It is acceptable to procure for you your way, should the time arrive."
"I had a feeling," B'Elanna breathed hoarsely, "you'd come around."
At that, Dalra chuckled. "Let us heal the further trouble you have attracted, child. Then we may argue the nature of change."
"What about you and Miztri?" Tom asked.
Dalra's grin faded slightly, but did not disappear. "We shall await the blessing of the spirits, yet we shall not pray too much, Toma. That would be our way."
"Then I guess I'll have to learn how to pray that extra bit for you," Tom replied and turned with Aratra when they entered the shanty rows.
He turned onto his back, eyes opening to the all-too-familiar sound of the gargled breathing beside him. He felt like he'd slept perhaps a minute, it'd been how exhausted and sore he was when they finally felt safe to let B'Elanna rest, had settled her into the blankets and himself by her.
Sucking a sharp breath as he sat up, Tom reached out for the glowglobe, tapping it to brighten the light. They'd pretty much drained the cell that evening, he knew. But there was enough power to work by.
He didn't have to study the sky to know it'd been enough time between treatments. Through a crack in the wall, he saw the reddish light and knew which moon it was. Shivering at the cold outside the thick layers of blankets and B'Elanna's warm body, he found the balm tube they'd managed to borrow from another host's overhang and a few clean cloths then turned back to uncover her just enough to clean her wound again.
He did and gently turned B'Elanna over. "Shh," he said as he prepared the ointment, though he knew she wouldn't hear him. No matter what her condition, she still slept very deeply. "Just going to get this..."
He moved so that the light would shine on her, so he could see--and froze.
B'Elanna's eyes were wide open, clouded over and unresponsive as she gurgled short breaths of air. Otherwise, she was deadly still. Her skin was... He didn't know what color that was. Even in the dim light, he could see the wound was infected. B'Elanna's entire face was beginning to swell...
Tom's heart lurched. For a moment, it might have stopped.
"Oh my god oh my god," he breathed and leaned over to pat her cheek. "B'Elanna? B'Elanna!" He patted harder. "Torres!"
Not seeing any reaction--none--he covered her again and grabbed his cloak. Moments later, he was sprinting through the shanty rows in the fading moonlight towards the center. He swerved around one row, into another, knowing exactly where to go in the rows between the shacks, his breath puffing out in clouds behind him.
He finally got to the rear quarter of the shanties and darted into a thin alley of shacks. Throwing himself upon the doors of one, he smacked the thin metal, gasping for breath lest he cry for it.
"Aratra!"
The occupants were not the only people who stirred at his yell, but within seconds, the door opened and a familiar set of eyes peered out.
"It's B'Elanna," Tom rasped without his asking. "The wounds are infected."
Aratra immediately straightened and told Sashana'i behind him. "She shall be taken to Dalra's space for fire and water."
"But it's freezing out here!" Tom protested. "B'Elanna's not good with the cold."
"Hear me and obey now," Aratra told him. "It is all that can be done."
Sashana'i collected her cloak and some blankets, and then handed her bondmate's cloak to him as she stood at the door. Giving Tom a firm stare and a nod, she slipped out of the space and hurried away into the row.
Aratra yet held Tom back a moment. "We shall do all in reach of this life, Toma. Now let us take her."
Tom tried to calm himself with a deep breath of the hard air, ignoring his lungs' protest to the cold. "Let's go."
Miztri stirred at the clanging in the overhang, the talking back and forth, and knew she should investigate. Rising from her warm space by Dalra and looking out to Tom's pale, anxious face and the young regents hurrying around a quickly growing pile of blankets, she immediately knew her patient. She sighed for the sting of it before spinning around to don her warmest clothes.
"Dalra," she said, seeing his eyes open when she activated the glowglobe, "Be'i ails with Uillar."
The man rose and confirmed her words--and her fear--in her face and mind. "There lie spare coals in the shallows," he reminded her.
Miztri nodded quickly and sat back to wrap on her boots. "I shall not lose the child," she told him, her mouth turned down with determination. "We need not the vials of the cause. We shall not be lost of her."
"I should hope this is her fate," he said as he pulled on his long tunic and laced it to his neck, "as we bear nothing now but its guidance. Yet we shall accept what power we may, Miztri."
"And more might I have it," she replied.
By the time Miztri and Dalra appeared, Tom and Aratra had built a coal fire and set water to boil upon it. Sashana'i had piled three walls of folded blankets and covered it with a thin metal sheet and another couple throws to seal the front. Seeing Dalra move to their underground storage space, Miztri wrapped her loose robe over her arms, and with but a glance at the young matriarch, she got to her knees to crawl inside.
She could see nothing.
"Sashana'i," she called behind her, "take yourself to my bed and retrieve the glowglobes there, my knotted gown, leg wraps and my satchel."
"Misti ka."
As she heard the young woman scurry off, Miztri felt her way up B'Elanna's tiny frame and caressed her hair. "Fear not, Be'i. Your fate is not to find the spirits here." Hearing only a choked breath in response, Miztri smiled gently, though she knew B'Elanna would not see it even were the room lit. "Ah, you need not be independent now. We shall care for you regardless. And I shall have your boots should I wish it, little kini'isi."
What remained of her grin disappeared when Sashana'i came with the glowglobe and her medicine bag. Taking the extent of B'Elanna's illness in, the older woman steeled her breath and set herself to work.
Tom paced as the Desalians outside the overhang set their bowls aside. Detail had been called, and so like every other day, they shuffled and started to the labor detail. Many passed before him, offering a bow and a sincere touch to their temple markings. Kepli and Naja stopped a moment to offer their hands, as did Gresbri, Gihetra, Plicta and others they had come to know. Latsari and Bolmra stopped, too, taking his hands and promising they would not be missed on the detail as long as it was necessary and offering their prayers for their friend's health.
Tom accepted it all but barely felt it. He was too worried to feel anything but for her, his only real companion there, and he cursed that selfish side that simply didn't want to be alone in that place. He just couldn't think of staying there without her.
He glanced over to see Aratra lifting B'Elanna gently from the blanket shelter as Miztri followed, holding her head. Beside a steaming basin, Sashana'i awaited them.
B'Elanna's eyes had finally closed--because of the swelling, which had affected all her limbs. At least her color had faded to a pale yellow, unlike that indescribable tone from the night before. Still, dressed in one of Miztri's warm gowns, her curly dark hair braided back in tight plaits, her forehead and temple covered with bandages, Tom wouldn't have recognized B'Elanna without a good look if he didn't know better.
Sashana'i accepted the burden into her lap as Miztri lowered B'Elanna's head into the small bath. After removing the bandages, Sashana'i dropped some cubes into a cup and filled it with the heated water. When the water fizzled, she poured the mixture over B'Elanna's wounds, letting it drizzle off into the basin.
"It shall digest the infection," Aratra told Tom as he joined him. "It has been known for its effectiveness."
"She's been pretty sick with the dust, too," Tom said.
Aratra nodded, but also offered a small smile. "My bondmate shall not allow Be'i's spirit to pass so soon from us, Toma, nor shall Miztri. Have assurance of that."
"Isn't there anything the guards would be bribed with besides...?" Tom shrugged, not wanting to place that much of a reminder on Aratra.
Aratra understood. "Not often--and likely very little shall tempt them. That my bondmate at present cannot sway them is significant."
"I don't know what's worse," Tom muttered.
"These times, should they be as Sashana'i says, there might be something to sell had we a thing and should salaries be held for sect incursions. Yet they would offer for labor in personal service."
Having heard Aratra, Dalra joined them. "I would take myself, Toma, had I a thing I thought would trade."
"I know you would. Thanks."
"Yet sadly, I know Unar quarters are staffed in full. They accepted Veda and Dyarsa the past evening."
Aratra raised his brow. "They have? Why have I not received this news? Where have Likpa and Perrellga taken themselves in their round's completion?"
Dalra bowed respectfully. "They are taken to our ancestors, friend."
"Zha hevrra," Aratra intoned with a sober nod. "Tsa'all kochi'o."
Tom blew bitter laugh and walked away. "God, I hate this place!" Throwing up his hands, he shook his head, turned around to the other scene in the overhang.
Sashana'i had looked up from her pouring; Miztri caressed the water down B'Elanna's soaked hair. Suddenly, he couldn't look at it, at them, at B'Elanna like that. Not then.
"I can't believe you people," he spat.
Walking out into the sun, he glared at the barricade. It was nothing to look at but the same crisscross of bluish energy he'd seen every day for five months. The breeze blowing puffs of red dust against it made it spark and sizzle briefly. It barely attracted his eye anymore.
Five months. Sashana'i and Aratra have been here almost seven years. We'll never survive that long...
A guard on the other side, just a dot in that distance, paced slowly, almost casually.
Tom breathed, feeling the rage fluttering in his chest, wanting to scream again, wanting to hit something, burn it off somehow--run laps around the compound until he was exhausted. Anything.
But it was useless. Anything he did would ultimately produce nothing. He needed to be of some good, more than ever, to do something. But he couldn't do anything for her anymore, either...when she needed it most. When he needed...her.
He needed her.
Just then--finally, perhaps--he realized the full meaning of that as he let the sun pour down onto his dry, tanned face and stared out to the barricade, despising that neat, pale, clean officer just going about his duty.
More than getting home, more than getting back to Voyager at that point, he needed her with him, even if only his friend. He would gladly take that rather than nothing, though he now understood that he wanted more.
The irony of that turnaround in his life, he knew, would make him a very bitter man if worse came to the very possible worse--and likely a dead one soon enough.
"Bring yourself within, Toma," said Aratra from the shade. "Dalra must prepare for tomorrow's ceremony. We shall lie out the globes for regeneration. They shall be required past sunset."
Tom looked back blankly to see Aratra's understanding gaze. He suddenly envied the younger man's solace, his confidence, and he heard himself asking, "How do you find peace in this, Aratra? In anything that's happened to you here? How the hell have you and Sashana'i survived this place?"
The other man grinned, shrugged slightly. "With hope--hope for the end of suffering and belief in that possibility without placing our entire being in that prayer--a balance of sorts. It is similar to your own, in its way."
"I don't know about that sometimes."
Aratra nodded. "Much like us all. Yet it is how we recall that we have had any faith, when that absence of hope is so painful." He held his hand out. "Ab, Toma. Hope shall not be lost this sun. Be'i bears great strength. She shall continue."
Tom's eyes turned down to the cracked dirt at his feet. "She'd better."
He watched from the side of the overhang, leaning with arms crossed against the support pole as Dalra and Miztri helped oversee the ceremony blessing the passed spirits of Likpa and Perrellga. Tom had barely known them.
He did know that Perrellga, an orphaned and unbound teenager, had come seven years before from Azlre, the second of but two cities on the Deslian colony of Cezia. Sashana'i and Aratra had been aware of the young man's family on their birthworld, but they had never met until Uillar. The regent heirs were from Sacezia, the capital city of that same Desalian colony.
Lipka was from Mo'igeth, traded to Uillar by an Unar not pleased with his household work. Tom could understand why. What he remembered of the man was his geniality and activeness, much like Aratra. Even so, he was very compliant--well trained. But Hychar killed him, too, when he was done with him.
Tom knew Hychar would likely dispose of him and B'Elanna as well, when he became bored with his game. Neither of them had bought the commander's "good worker" statement.
Without wanting to, Tom found the "passing ceremony" beautiful, the circles drawn into the ground, which Dalra and Miztri moved upon in rhythmic steps, their clothing wafting in the air as they recited in tandem words Tom could barely translate to himself. Others around the circle sat upon their knees tapping the rhythm on their legs, humming an intricate melody that sounded nothing like a dirge.
They looked...happy. Dignified, but at peace.
He could never feel the same about such a thing.
Tom shook his head to himself. Every time he thought he was getting used to those people, every time he started feeling some sort of community with them, they'd turn around and make him feel like he really was from a planet sixty thousand light years away with no way of getting back.
He'd heard in passing, on his way to the food dispensers, some of the Desalians comment that Likpa and Perrellga were blessed in their fate to find the spirits well, that they would be honored in their courage and humility. Yet in the same breath, they said Unar had taken their rightful claim.
He had turned back around, his hunger suddenly gone.
He suddenly remembered that he hadn't eaten lunch, either, that day.
"Toma." It was Sashana'i.
He turned away from the funeral to another waiting to happen...
He shook his head again, cursing his pessimism. Being realistic, he knew it was a possibility, more likely than recovery. He just didn't want to deal with that, needed to give it every chance. Everyone else seemed to be but him. Or at least that's what it felt like sometimes.
"Ab," she said simply.
He did, moving back into the overhang. Upon arriving at Sashana'i's side, his gaze went immediately to B'Elanna. Her mouth was open, pale inside. She didn't move but to breathe, and barely so. She hung limply, her bony, yellowish chest bobbing slightly with tiny breaths.
If he ever thought she looked like hell before, it didn't compare to what she looked like then. Dead. Just another damned victim of that poisonous planet...
He blinked, feeling his eyes moisten and warding it away. "What do you need?" he asked.
With her gentle, tattooed hand, Sashana'i gestured to him to come down. When he did, she moved B'Elanna to him. Understanding what she was doing, he sat back and crossed his ankles to hold B'Elanna in the ring of his legs, as Sashana'i had done.
"Wah-ta," she said softly, handing him the cup. She dropped another two cubes into it for him then gave him the tray. "Eta fiw-awk'o, eta'a t-sm'aw."
"Two of these, how many times?" With her gestures to the fresh water, he nodded. "Every fourth pour, two of those things."
"Toma ka'a." Sashana'i touched her temple then his, holding him in her eyes for a moment. "Tsa'a yi s-zha."
"Zhra'a ka, Sashana'i," he said.
She smiled more at his gesture, and thought for a moment before responding, "Yeu weh-caam."
He grinned back despite himself.
When she stood away, he reached out to pour some warm water into the cup. Carefully adjusting B'Elanna's head so that it tipped back enough, he brought the cup up, began to pour slowly, as Sashana'i had done before.
"You hear that, B'Elanna?" he whispered, numb to the lightness he tried into his tone. "We'll be having her recite warp parameters in no time."
Crossing back to Aratra, who waited with her headscarves in his hands, Sashana'i looked back to see their friend following her directions, slowly pouring the water over B'Elanna's head, talking quietly to her. His voice was tightly controlled, but he managed to continue uninterrupted.
"Toma Be'i pe'a-a ma'i," she said quietly.
"Ka," Aratra said, his lips upturned but his eyes dark with concern. "Va'itsa ma'a tollyad a'i."
"Vaa." With that, she wrapped her scarves quickly on, into her braids and draped around her head as was proper. Then, she reached out and straightened her bondmate's headdress with a little grin. He smiled back. Placing her fingers on his forearm, she let her bondmate escort her out to the celebration of those recently passed to the ancestors.
The coughing sounded more like a death rattle that wouldn't quit, and the women's busy voices seemed too shrill to him as he sat before the coals with Aratra, half awake. Dalra had finally turned in not long before.
Tom stared at the small flames, thinking...probably about nothing at that point. He'd gone beyond worry. He just waited, dreaded the end of that noise that kept him awake, even as he couldn't stand the sound anymore.
It'd been three days. Miztri gently reminded him that her coughing was dangerous and they would seek to loosen it more, lest they allow the infection to spread. The steaming pails they would take into the sickroom would help.
That wasn't very comforting. Then again, nothing was at that point.
For some strange reason, as he watched the coals radiate and throw their wafting flames, as he listened to the hacking continue behind him, he could hear Torres' voice ringing out to him, saying "Lieutenant" in that slightly derisive way she always had on Voyager. He couldn't get it out of his head, that challenging stare B'Elanna used to give him, arms crossed with her weight tilted askance...
It seemed like a million years ago. Another life ago. And yet, they were both a part of that memory.
...Or, the sight of her up to her arms in Cochrane pieces the very day they'd gotten the okay to start working on the transwarp experiment. It was only a couple weeks before they left Voyager. She snapped at him as she bent down into the nacelle core, saying that he wasn't being much help. The glare she shot back when he gamely replied, "Just enjoying the view, Lieutenant," was priceless.
A twitch of a grin found Tom's mouth, lasted a moment longer than he felt it.
They were hitting her back again, within the warm confines of the blanket hut. He'd seen them do that earlier. Miztri probably had B'Elanna over her knees while Sashana'i urged the phlegm out with firm and rhythmic fists chopping against her back. B'Elanna remained limp and gagging throughout the procedure, but it did help loosen up her chest after a while.
Tom huddled in the knotted blanket, pulling it forward on his head. Idly, he wondered how many days they had left until they had water rights and could bathe. He'd forgotten. Looking down to his trousers--stained with dirt, worn nearly through at the knees and ragged where they'd been sewn--he knew he'd need another pair soon and made a mental note to ask.
If he felt like going on like that.
"Miztri survived the infection, many years past," Aratra said quietly. His fair hazel eyes had opened again; he had been watching him. "Her illness was a similar degree to Be'i's and also similar was the cause--an Unar glove. Dalra would not admit too freely that Miztri did earn the strike she suffered for by protecting one of the youths here."
Tom blinked. The fire was very warm despite the night's distraction from it. Curls of blue rolled over the rocks, hypnotizing. "I don't think I'll stay here alone, Aratra."
"This is understood."
Sashana'i came from the blankets to grab another pail of boiling water from the coal grate, replacing it with the one that had cooled. She said nothing when she came, or when she returned and crawled back into the shelter.
Tom took a breath. "She's tired," he said without emotion.
"She shall persist. As she may not work with bribes, she shall labor in every other manner. It is the way."
"I'll have to thank her tomorrow."
"You would do so again," Aratra told him, grinning slightly. "Take sleep, Toma. When Miztri calls at daylight, your duties shall begin again."
"They didn't stop at sunset," Tom replied. "I just can't do anything else right now."
Despite it, he leaned himself back and covered himself completely. It was already very late; he would need to sleep, since Dalra and Miztri would be returning to the detail in the morning. At that point, there was nothing to do but wait and tend. Three people were plenty for doing only that.
So, Tom settled himself, trying to block out the beating and choking noises behind him...
But as soon as his eyes closed, they opened again.
Duty.
He shivered hard as the frigid wind cut its way through his cloak and hood. Crossing the court, he moved in long steps to the illuminated barricade then down the row towards the refinery.
It was all he knew of, all he knew that he could do, but finally, he had indeed found something he could do. It was all he had except B'Elanna, who was worth a hell of a lot more to him...and he hoped she wouldn't mind her unwitting addition to the pot.
If she noticed. She only wore her tunic at night anymore.
No, he knew he'd have to tell her.
There was no other choice, he reminded himself as he turned away from a blast of frozen dirt and forced his teeth from chattering. What was it, anyway? Nothing that really mattered. Nothing that would make much difference if he succeeded. None of that mattered there. Only she did.
Then he wondered why he'd thought it a big deal in the first place.
When the wind ebbed, he moved again, thinking surely there would be at least one Unar watching the refinery at night in spite of the Desalians' honesty and whatever trouble Sashana'i was sensing of late.
Finally, he spotted one--at the end of the row on the other side of the barricade, pacing slowly in the moonlight. The Unar's face, lit in the glow, was even more ghostly there than under the sun. His silvery eyes were on the building.
Tom cleared his throat, continuing forward.
The officer merely turned and stared.
Approaching more slowly then, he steeled himself. The sentry was the same guard from the other day, who had sent them to quarters. Maybe...or maybe not.
"Trade," he said tightly.
The officer smirked for want of a laugh.
Rolling his eyes, Tom offered his frozen hand.
The Unar looked down to the gold pieces then met the cloaked man's eyes again. "These?"
"It's the only trade I can make," Tom admitted without shame--the guard already knew he had nothing, after all. "The only one I will."
The other man grew thoughtful, examining the trembling and intent prisoner. "You are desperate," he commented. "Your woman is untreated and requires this trade."
Tom blinked, surprised to hear an Unar guard talking to him in a full sentence. "Yeah--both. She doesn't know I'm here, though."
"You would give away the ornaments of your former leadership, your identity, for her?"
He was even more surprised to hear that.
The guard continued, watching the prisoner in every move, "I was one of those who took you to your present quarters, drask, when you first were interred here. I saw your pride, your strength, and your attempts in your ignorance to speak out and claim position. It was still upon your lips, it seemed, when we put you and your lady into residence."
It seemed like ages ago, but it came back in a flash, that curious stare--one unlike any given to him by an Unar then or after. "You were the one who was looking in?"
"I was," the guard replied. "Like many others, I wondered how long you would remain alive, if you would continue to be as rebellious as an Antral. It is interesting how you have adjusted to both climates."
Tom's stare narrowed with that one. "My people have a tendency to adapt to their conditions."
"And now the conditions you cannot overcome have brought you to give away that which symbolized your power, so to save your other, the female? You have yet weakened in Uillar that you would come to me with such fear in your eyes."
Blowing a breath through his nostrils, Tom willed down his despise of those people and their games. "How nice of you to notice. Trade?"
"Were it not for your diligence, Commander Hychar would seek the death of your other for her abhorrent markings and distasteful airs--and you for your near equal disrespect and disgracefulness."
Tom held his tongue.
"But you have withstood him, resisted him."
"We've tried."
"And now you come to sell your identity so to resist him in the future--by her side still?"
"That sounds about right. Trade?"
The guard's eyes squinted with thought; a curious grin curled his mouth. "Hychar may hear of this. He would be very pleased to think you have relinquished the symbols of your rank, community and prestige."
Tom tilted his head. "Then again, he might not hear about it."
"He suspects her illness, for her absence at detail," the guard informed him.
"Yeah, well, I frankly don't care what he knows at this point. You can say whatever you want to him, too. That's your right--as Unar, if I'm not mistaken." He offered his hand again, forcing his facade to remain steady, damning himself if he even blinked. "Trade, Unar?"
Again, the man looked down to the various pieces, his eyes flickering over them more concertedly. He met the prisoner's stare again, held it several seconds before parting his lips for a slow breath. "You require?"
"Antibiotics. Whatever you can get--whatever these will buy. I'm willing to trust you."
"Because you have no choice," the guard clarified.
"Thanks for the update. Deal?"
"Gold?"
"Pure. Coating duranium."
The guard turned his chin in acceptance. "Separate the mechanism from the plate."
Tom did as told, popping the front piece from his comm badge, and then removing the beacon chip with painfully cold fingers. He wondered how he could do it even as he was succeeding.
"Pass the items between the beams." Carefully, Tom obeyed again. "Remain in that shadow."
Tom looked over to the dark space of the dock where he and B'Elanna usually worked. The guard was already slipping away into a nearby building. Moving himself as ordered, Tom crouched down by the flat, huddling himself closely in the corner and waited.
He waited until the next moon was almost overhead, well over an hour.
He did not move.
The shadow had crept away, leaving only a slim area of darkness between the light and his convulsively shivering body. He still waited, trying to convince himself that he'd not just given their insignia and his comm badge cover away for nothing. The experience in his life said that he'd just been too damned impulsive and desperate, and that he'd been stupider than usual, totally selfish for not sending Sashana'i or Dalra. Now he was probably paying for it, freezing to death on the edge of an alien forced labor camp.
At least he'd get it over with...
But what if B'Elanna survived?
He continued to wait.
The guard appeared, strolling out as if he was on his usual path, oblivious to anything inside the barricade.
Then his hand came away from his tucked rifle to toss a fist-sized cylinder between the illuminated field grids.
He continued his patrol undisturbed.
Tom stared at the cylinder above his chattering teeth until the guard had completely passed. When it was clear, he scrambled up to the forcefield to snatch up the trade. Stuffing it in his pocket and pulling his hood close to his neck, he got to his feet and ran back across the court to the rear row of shanties, his shadow but a blur in the third moon's pre-dawn light.
The warmth of the blanket shelter hurt Tom's teeth when he crawled in unannounced. Sashana'i awoke slowly to watch Miztri crawling over to him, putting her warm hands on his cheeks.
"You shall procure your own plague," the woman whispered. "Bring yourself closer to the kettles, exchange places with--"
"No," Tom managed, rooting around for his pocket opening. Finally, he found the cylinder and pulled it out, displaying it.
Sashana'i moved herself upright, staring at the tube, then Tom, then the tube again. "I'i?"
"I bribed a guard," Tom said, coughing a laugh. "The gold from our uniforms--everything except my translator matrix and B'Elanna's comm badge. That should be in here somewhere, in her trouser pocket. --Just tell me it's the right stuff."
As Sashana'i opened the tube, Miztri leaned up and embraced the younger man. "Your spirit truly bears goodness, Toma."
"It'll be better if it works," he said, moving closer to the generator, to B'Elanna's side. Reaching down, he touched her cheek, quickly pulled away when he recalled how cold he was.
Sashana'i was already holding the small vials up to the light, examining the label plates. "Si'a awm, pu-hi, k-whega'o," she muttered to herself.
"It is okay?" he asked behind him.
Sashana'i smiled back. "Toma ka," she breathed and set the vials down on B'Elanna's stomach to prepare the subdermal spray unit. "Za'ov appwib. Z-sha'e ka ikowt Unah pahwa'us."
Miztri grinned and moved to rub Tom's arms from behind. "Your gold made purchase of well more than B'Elanna shall require. The Unar was in need. A good sign of different trading can be seen in this, Toma."
Tom watched Sashana'i expertly fill one of the spray units, tapping the side to check the level. "Or maybe I'd given him more than that without meaning to. Who knows?" He looked back at Miztri, a small grin curling his lip. "I'm sure you'll find good use for the rest?"
Miztri hugged him again, putting her chin on his shoulder to watch Sashana'i inject the medicine into B'Elanna's paled skin. "I shall, kini'isa va'i."
He'd only just lain her on their own blankets, which all had been aired, refolded and added to for her continued warmth. He pulled Miztri's old coat, a very warm one, she promised, up to B'Elanna's thin neck then turned to pile on her blankets.
As he turned back, he caught her swollen gaze, half open.
She drew a breath. Her lips twitched upwards. Then her eyes closed again. Her breathing was regular that time, albeit congested.
Smiling, Tom pulled the remaining covers up to her chest and began to prepare the other stacks.
The first thing she felt was someone stroking her hand. When her eyes lazily fluttered open, the first thing she saw was Tom, lying on his side, propped up on an elbow, gazing at her. He must have known she was waking up, was waiting for her to. His expression said it all.
The second thing she saw was that he looked terrible...worse than usual.
"Hey," she breathed; then she swallowed.
"Hi there, Chief," he whispered.
Her stare didn't waver--he wouldn't let it go. She saw small tears in the corners of his dark-circled, bloodshot eyes, glistening for the morning sun pouring into the half open entrance. His smile was tired and his lips were pale; the dry hand that caressed hers was tender but oddly cool.
"How long was I out?" she asked in a rough breath, clearing her throat to take another.
"Five days. You were pretty sick back there, Torres."
"I remember..." She blinked heavily, swallowed another thick itch in her unused throat. Slowly, she felt her wits coming back to her, her blood beginning to circulate--though she suspected that if she tried, she wouldn't be able to sit. Without having to think about it, she knew she'd never felt so weak. "I remember," she managed, still breathing thinly, "you running away. I heard you...calling my name. I couldn't answer. You threw the blanket over me. I heard you slam the door, run away."
"Yeah, well, you scared the hell out of me. But you're okay now."
She blinked again, moved her tongue around in her sticky mouth before parting her lips again. "Got some water?"
He nodded and turned for the bottle they shared at detail, but set it aside for the moment. Taking her carefully under the arms, he pulled her higher up on the blanket pile behind her. She didn't resist the new position, even if her blood drained a little for it.
"Be easier this way," he said, popping open the water jug and thinking how much paler she looked upright. Or maybe it was how the light was hitting her pasty skin. Miztri had already told him it would take some time for her to recover fully.
Averting her eyes from Tom's examination, B'Elanna jerked to hold the water bottle herself. But the move quickly aborted itself and she ended up barely touching his leg. Unbothered, he eased the liquid between her groping lips until she nodded.
He pulled back, gave her time to swallow and her stomach time to accept it, too. "Okay?"
She gave a bare nod. She breathed some more as she felt the water drain into and coat her empty stomach. It stayed there, woke her up a bit more, too. She nodded again. "Another?"
He positioned the jug at her lips again, and when she had finished two larger drinks, he set the bottle aside. "Let that settle first, then you'll have more." Almost unconsciously, he reached out to stroke her hair, encourage her as she continued swallowing after the fact. "You might even get hungry soon."
"I'm hungry," she admitted, "but I don't feel like eating yet."
"How do you feel?"
"Like shit."
Tom chuckled. "Leave it you to speak your mind."
B'Elanna coughed a little laugh, too. "Yeah," she whispered, "but you like that about me."
"I just might," he grinned. His fingers flexed into her scalp, penetrating her locks to massage in little circles. Her eyes closed slowly, fluttered open again; she drew more air into her little used lungs. Encouraged, he shifted his attentions to her crown, pressing gently.
Then her eyes opened and blinked quickly. He suddenly realized he'd rubbed over a small cranial ridge beneath her hair. He jerked to stop. "Sorry about that."
Before he could pull his hand away, she looked up at him. "No." His fingers did not move, and she smiled weakly, almost shrugged. "Actually, that feels good. Keep going."
With another glance her way, he did, and she found herself both relaxing and becoming more alert for the attention, which she realized she'd never had before then. She found herself liking it a lot, really, the soothing pressure and warmth, the hypnotic rhythm of his movements. After a couple minutes, he turned her head away so to run his massage all the way down the back, working in small, slow circles with his fingertips.
She stared at the metal wall through her half-closed eyes, feeling little tingles of sensation in her neck when he rubbed lower. "Guess this is the closest I'll have to a bath this week," she smirked.
He played along, even if he knew better about the last time she'd been doused with water. "Guess so. God knows what I'll find in here."
"Well," she breathed, feigning seriousness, "if you find something, don't tell me."
Tom laughed, embracing her scalp a bit before continuing around her head, slowly flexing into her thick locks, massaging deeply, thoroughly, until he was certain he could hear her purring.
"You're pretty good at this, Paris. I should get sick more often. I could get used to this kind of waking up."
"I'm not going anywhere," he returned quietly.
Her stare turned aside.
He eased around the places where he knew she'd been bruised, rubbed around the still swollen areas to where he'd begun. His lips curling up, he picked at a couple strands of her hair.
"Let me get that," he said lightly, pretending to throw something away. "Don't worry--it was nothing."
She snorted softly, would have shook her head and said something smart in return if she'd been any more in her own mind. Looking up to him again... His expression changed when she did, creased upwards as a little gleam touched his gaze. His hand moved to cup her head, stroked her hairline with his thumb. She was sure his look alone might have warmed the shack in the dead of night. Her own smirk she bravely held on to, though.
"What?" she asked him.
"That smile," he said softly. "I haven't seen it in a while. I missed it."
B'Elanna had no reply at first. She could see he was as relieved as he was tired. He never touched her so much and so tenderly except to clean her wounds. This time, he seemed as if he didn't dare let her go. She'd caught his sincere glances once and a while, but never such...warmth, aimed at her.
She suddenly realized that he'd just gotten back his best friend. She likely had almost died.
He wasn't saying anything about that yet, but she could tell by the circles under his eyes that he'd probably been up all those days. The intensity of his stare was like a life's worth of unspent emotions pouring into her.
A little taken by it, she compensated with the same smirk and as narrowed a stare as she could manage just then. "Are you flirting with me, Paris?"
He, of course, took it in style, switching his gears and facade with an ease that she both expected and was glad to see.
"You could say that."
She breathed a laugh, rolled her eyes.
"After all," he continued, jaunty for her unspoken coaching, "you're available and in no position to say no right now--or at least you can't hit me very hard. Might as well get it while I can."
She giggled deep in her throat. "You can be such a pig, Tom."
"Yeah," he softly returned, "but you like that about me."
With some effort, she pulled her fingers up to touch his yet unmoved hand, give it a slight squeeze--the best she could do. "Thank you," she said sincerely, "for everything."
Tom responded by carefully leaning forward and pressing his lips upon the crown of her head. "Anytime, Chief."
Only a few meters away, Sashana'i pulled her hood forward and shook a finger at her bondmate, tucking her hand into his arm as she swiftly guided them back in the other direction. As they walked, she leaned the cheek of her lopsided smile upon his shoulder.
When she'd first come from her sickbed, they almost seemed in awe of her. It was as strange as it was surprising.
With Tom's arm around her, B'Elanna maneuvered the trenched path around the shacks, slowly but surely, en route to Dalra and Miztri's space. During their journey, every Desalian they passed greeted her, many warmly, some bowing deeply in respect. "Tsad ta'i Be'i, havre zhiba'o tsi'i," they said many times.
B'Elanna could roughly translate that as "B'Elanna has a strong spirit, her fortunate fate blesses us all." Just out of her sickbed, she wasn't feeling all that blessed.
They called her a good omen. She didn't believe that, either. Miztri explained that it wasn't often that people there survived infections, especially ones as severe as hers had been. B'Elanna shrugged it off anyway, mainly because she could. She didn't recall any of that time, and she didn't see much of an incredible personal achievement in getting better. The medicines and her friends' care--and maybe a little of her Klingon resilience--was what pulled her through.
Regardless, the Desalians seemed to believe otherwise. --Then she swatted Tom for teasing her about earning her reputation on her back. The cocky pilot was still pretty quick on his feet despite his slight diet, she learned. Either that or she was still very weak.
More strange was that none of the Unar guards had queried after her, demanded she and Tom join the detail. In several days, they'd not so much as glanced at her, even when they came close enough to see she was indeed not coming with the others.
Odd though it was--and possibly another of Hychar's plots--the present arrangement suited Tom just fine, as he insisted B'Elanna still needed time to recover.
Much as she hated to admit it, she knew he was right. She still did feel off at best and tired easily even then. So if Hychar wanted to play games elsewhere for a while, she wouldn't complain about getting her strength back.
As Sashana'i thought more about that, she professed that there was trouble within the Unar stronghold. Aratra agreed, and even Dalra seemed to be tuned into the atmosphere, seemed more watchful of the guards than Tom and B'Elanna had ever known him to be.
While that was good to see, every Desalian they spoke with seemed sure there would be danger to them all if the trouble increased or a sect scourge broke out. Still, B'Elanna and Tom agreed that any activity, even mere expectation, was better than the routine they'd all but become numb to.
"Even so," B'Elanna told Aratra as she pulled three rows of binding cloth taut and began turning them into braid knots, "I don't want to get my hopes up just for a feeling. I know Sashana'i believes it--and I can tell everyone's been cautious lately. But...I don't want to hope too hard, you know?"
A moment of silence met her statements.
"Dulla was a good man," Aratra then said, unstopped in his simple weaving as their conversation turned. "He presented himself to Unar as a humbled servant, and yet he possessed great cleverness. His presence was that of both authority and charm; his voice was deep and clear with the timbre of a large drum. He was not a man easily ignored, even while his life required of him both discretion and relative solitude. Indeed, at the Satrif camp, he learned great sagacity, and not once neglected it throughout his time among us. It was believed by many that had he been fated to inherit the regency properly, Desalia would not have fallen, and his legacy would have been most honored of all for having resurrected our corrupted culture. However, his fate was not so. He instead turned his attention to Sashana'i, taught and loved her as would the blessed when her parents found their spirits. She had but six rallkle then. He was a teacher to me as well."
B'Elanna's braiding slowed to look out onto the food row, where Sashana'i and Tom were gathering water into their storage sacks for Dalra and Miztri. Sashana'i had suggested they return some small service for their hosts' assistance, including weaving them some blankets from the "empty pile"--clothes of the recently passed that could not be repaired.
Sashana'i looked so vital despite the poor conditions she'd lived in for the last seven years. Her skipping step, cheerful laugh and breezy gestures allowed few clues to the life she'd lived. Only rarely did she exhibit any fatigue or frustration, particularly among the general population there. For them, it always seemed she tried to be an example.
"So her grandfather wasn't a regent?" B'Elanna asked, continuing with her work.
Aratra nodded then said, "He was the heir, yet he was not within power. He had but sixteen years when Desalia was usurped." Aratra's eyes kept to his rows as he continued, "His father was Troka, an unstable man corrupted further by the splendor he was born into. This education was given by his father, M'hida, who once had fairness, yet was impulsive, expedient and fell into ways of paranoia and unnaturalness. In his last breaths, our once blessed regency had been transformed into a dictatorship in response to the strains of nearing Unar incursions. He had sent regions of his own into exile to protect his policies, banished thousands for their public callings for action against Unar, all against the will of his bondmate, Da'ili, who was in truth the blood regent. She had great intelligence yet no force of character; thus, M'hida's nature could not effectively be balanced with proper opposition, or even persuasive council. Rather, her prayers were for hope, for that fate would yet turn their way back to gentleness and balance. She met the spirits with M'hida and many desperate hopes, indeed, which she understood would not grow from M'hida's chosen heir, their eldest son. --No daughters graced them. Troka held the regency but ten years before Desalia was swept into the Unar's dominion."
Aratra's eyes turned down, close to the memory, it seemed.
"The spirits blessed Dulla, however, with his mother Yusi, whom Da'ili had grown to rely on--and correctly, for Yusi's wisdom and strength was both Dulla's salvation and her sacrificial end. Dulla's manhood came upon him in the first waves of desolation, with him and Yusi imprisoned at Satrif, where she bore unto him the legacy in her final hour. Past his reassignment and eventual release, he was deposited at Cezia and remained at Sacezia. One rallkle past his arrival, he took the girl who had at first had nursed him to health as his bondmate. Her calling was Aneschi. He secretly earned scholarship through a prichava called Watsha, and encouraged hidden scholars to find promising youths and pass on the way of Desal--the way of the scholarship. His urgent whispers spread throughout our former colonies with the aid of his Antral contacts; it was for this Dalra and Miztri earned their spiritual scholarship at Maha'aje.
"Many rallkle past those beginnings, Sashana'i was made to know of the archived memories within him in paintings; they were bequeathed to her in full some rallkle past that. It was too soon, as she likewise had but sixteen years, was only cursorily prepared for the legacy and remained far from desiring the scholarship. Yet Aneschi had weakened quickly. Little choice remained but to give the Allanois legacy to my bondmate."
B'Elanna finished a braid row and handed it to Aratra then took another few strips of cloth up. The more she learned about Desalian history, the more she could see why they were so careful--too careful, she yet believed. But at least she was beginning to see the roots of it. Desalians believing themselves all a part of one great source would naturally see the leadership's crimes as their own, twisted as that was.
At the same time, she understood better Sashana'i's decided way about that 'wisdom' she'd been given.
"Do all Desalians...pass on their memories, outside of marriage?" she finally asked.
"It was a practice of families since the first development of our scholar's ways, millennia ago, ka, passing family histories through the lines. Yet, it is a historical art which all but fell with Desalia, when our scholars were separated from our citizenry and sent to their passings; those who escaped were hunted. Unar sought to control all Irllae's advanced knowledge, relegating our vast majority to ignorance and necessary compliance. Those scholars who have survived and successfully hidden have become Desal's only true underground movement, teaching but the basics of our spiritual training to those they feel may bear it well, remaining in seclusion from society otherwise. For this practice of transferal, however, Sashana'i does bear wisdom of the Unar movements. Though certainly not a scholar, she sees them well through elder eyes--as do I."
"Well, whatever they do, I hope something happens," B'Elanna said. "I really hate this place."
Aratra laughed. "What surprise you give me, Be'i! I believed you had grown to enjoy life here so!"
She laughed, too. "I don't know who's worse, sometimes--you or Tom."
"I heard that," Tom said as he came in. Pulling back his hood, he dropped to his knees beside her, offered a game smile. "Personally, I think I'm much worse."
B'Elanna rolled her eyes. "Of course, you're right, Paris," she replied.
Taking her seat beside her bondmate, Sashana'i snorted and grabbed a rope of cloths. "Toma ya'i o'awn vaka'od-sha'eft."
Tom laughed. "Thanks a lot."
Some minutes later, as the four quietly sorted, braided or wound the scraps, the unmistakable sound of the refinery grinding down for the day echoed across the camp. Finishing their rows, B'Elanna and Aratra set aside their work for later. Tom and Sashana'i stood to drag the remaining scrap piles away.
Returning, he helped B'Elanna--who still got dizzy with changed positions--to her feet. Nodding her thanks, she moved to bring flasks and wet cloths as the others continued to clean up.
"Far too much, Be'i, you do," said Miztri when she came into the overhang and all but fell onto a blanket pile to remove her cloak.
"You'd be worried if I didn't," she countered and handed the woman a flask. Looking out at the row, she offered a wave to the other Desalians passing en route to their shacks. "Aratra, tell me if you see Latsari. I brought her gloves today."
"I shall."
Miztri steadily drank her water, drawing a long a breath after. Loosening her headscarves next, she aired the nape of her hair in the undecided breeze. "The weather cools, yet remains dry."
Tom chuckled. "Yeah, summer's a veritable rainforest here."
"How I have recalled rain," Dalra sighed wistfully, pulling off his own clothes, revealing his tan, lean-muscled chest. "In youth, Miztri and I danced in rain on Maha'aje when we were lovers. On the stones of Divtyada, we partook of each other's pleasures the first time, slow yet anxious, so desiring, and drank droplets from each other's cool skin."
"Niadra was made by us in the rain in such a way, I recall, my spirit," she smiled, that smile turning sad moments later. "I so would wish for rain before our passing, to feel its blessing bathe this poor body in its joy."
"In the realm of our blessed ancestors," Dalra said gently, "there shall be all the rains of a million rallkle, among the stars which bore us. --And I shall yet partake of your nourishing flesh."
B'Elanna spread Miztri's cloak out to dry and cool, smiling at their talk, so intimate and gentle. The memory of rain refreshed in her mind, too, she mused, "I remember when I was growing up, I used to love listening to thunderstorms. I don't know why, but they used to help me sleep."
"Why should your respite in storms not surprise me, child?" Dalra said. But catching her stare, his smile warmed. "I found enjoyment in them as well, Be'i. I bait you, is all."
"I know," B'Elanna responded with a scolding smirk as she plucked his cloak and shirt out of his hands and sat back on her heels to air them out. "Seems to be the fashion around here lately."
She'd opened her mouth to add a jab at Tom and Aratra, but she straightened and turned her head instead.
It was so far in the distance...
Tom saw her, felt his chest flutter. Almost a distant memory, but he remembered it well, that expression of sudden, instinctual readiness... "What is it B'Elan--"
She held up her hand to him, cutting him off wordlessly. The others, also noticing her, quieted. Stretching out her fingers towards him, Tom got that message, too, and helped her to her feet. She walked to the edge of the overhang, listened another moment. "Speaking of thunderstorms," she whispered, but then turned to the others.
Together, they listened again. That time, Tom blinked, felt his heart beat hard in an echo. "Are those torpedoes?"
"Here?" Dalra asked, rising as he spoke.
"What were the Unar like today?" Tom asked quickly.
The older man shook his head. "Distracted, as they have been in increase since Commander Hychar's return."
"I know I heard it," B'Elanna insisted. "I've been in a lot of battles, Dalra, more than you'll ever know about. I know the sound--and I have very good hearing."
"I heard it, too," Tom joined. "Would the Unar sects fire on each other's camps?"
Dalra looked at Tom, to B'Elanna again, and then back to his bondmate and to Aratra and Sashana'i. All were looking on, knowing, yet expecting and waiting for his words. "They would," he finally answered. "They have."
"Damn," Tom breathed, paling at the thought. There would be nowhere to go...
"There is danger, indeed," Dalra abruptly told them all. "We shall clear the housing, line this near wall. It is the only safety, I would believe. Should they arrive here, we shall have no guard but on the feeding row."
"There's not nearly enough room for us all there," B'Elanna protested.
"This is known," Dalra responded grimly as he turned for his shack, "yet there is nothing else."
Another rumble echoed, catching the attention the other Desalians in the backcourt. At the other end of the camp, the forcefield flickered.
"The main power assembly," Miztri breathed.
As Aratra stepped out to warn the other Desalians there, Tom and B'Elanna took a collective breath, stared at each other.
"You up for this?" he asked.
"Let's get to it," she nodded.
Miztri had already scrambled with Dalra into their shelter to retrieve dry clothes and reappeared moments later. Dalra opened a holding case and handed them glowglobes. "When the first moon brings itself--and only should you require light. Take yourselves to the front division, Toma, Be'i, for it is known to you. --Aratra, Sashana'i, you shall take yourselves back. I shall move to the refinery rows with Miztri. Be with the spirits, within yourselves, my friends."
"Be careful," Tom told him, pocketing the glowglobe in his cloak. "That'll be one of their targets here--the refinery and the main base."
Miztri pulled her hood forward then reached out for Tom's as well. "Yet targets are we all, good man," she told him, gazing into his eyes. "Swiftly take yourselves with our good lady, else I shall meet you among the ancestors, Toma."
Closer yet, the next strike sent a tremor through the ground. They all braced themselves.
Tom nodded anxiously, knowing what Miztri meant. "Good luck to you, too."
The older woman grinned, embraced B'Elanna then dashed off with her bondmate.
Sashana'i hurried up to them, kissed B'Elanna and Tom in turns. "Ag yi'a zhuw-ah," she said.
"You bet we will," Tom grinned gamely, patted Aratra's shoulder.
"Take care," B'Elanna told them and drew a steady breath as they disappeared in the opposite direction of Dalra and Miztri. Seeing it twitch in her direction, she then accepted Tom's hand to head toward their section of the shanty. "Here we go," she said then started with him into the waning sun, around the overhang's perimeter and into the crooked rows.
On the darker horizon, several land ships lifted from the Unar stronghold and roared away. Tom hurried himself and B'Elanna into the thick of the shacks, even as he told a few of their friends where to go. Looking down another row, B'Elanna did the same when she saw a few people turning around confusedly. Catching up with him, she could see Tom's jaw muscles tighten with another boom in the distance.
"I know we've been anxious for this," he said, "but they could've at least waited until after dinner."
B'Elanna choked a laugh. "Only you would think of food at a time like this, Paris."
"That's a relative term here, remember?" he returned, guiding her around a narrow turn.
"It's always been a relative term to you," she quipped back.
Everyone still out of doors now noticed the unusual sounds and vibrations in the camp. Some others had appeared from their shacks as the rumbling continued, and soon the thunder of torpedo fire could easily be heard. Stopping every person they saw, they repeated the Dalra's orders and told them to gather others as they immediately obeyed. "Then get to the dispenser wall--grab a blanket if you have to and collect all the water and food you can when you get there in case the systems go offline."
"Zha tsa ye'o," many responded as they moved.
"E'o av tsa," Tom replied when he could. May whatever spirits be with all of us now, he thought as he caught B'Elanna when she tripped over the trench. Much as he'd waited for that moment, he wasn't joking about the Unar's rotten timing. Just that he hadn't been talking about food.
For that matter, it'd been several months since he'd felt as much a rush in a looming danger, in spite of its constancy there--and had as bad a feeling about--
"TOM!"
He spun and saw it too--a thin cruiser skirting up the horizon, its power systems whining upward...
"Take cover!" He screamed and grabbed B'Elanna's arm, yanking her ahead--hoping the ship would pass them somehow. "Everyone, go forward!"
Those who could hear him scattered, but B'Elanna caught up with him as he darted them into the middle rows.
The cruiser paused--its power systems climbed higher.
"Naja matsa'i!" came a yell from behind them and B'Elanna turned and saw Kepli leaning, looking over others, her dark hands reaching out from her dirty dove gray cloak, starting to move but caught in the opposing traffic of prisoners--
"Kepli! Go with them!" B'Elanna yelled hoarsely.
"Don't look back!" Tom yelled.
"Kepli!" B'Elanna called again, pulling back. She saw Naja running towards her--she was waiting for him...
"Shit!" Tom had also looked back. "Kepli! Damnit--run!"
The cruiser dropped slightly and fired a phaser blast...
When Kepli disappeared within the blast, Naja collapsed.
The entire section of the camp filled with screams and a scattering of Desalians still alive. Some fell as Naja did, tripping down others, who scrambled back to their feet to sprint towards the food slot wall.
Tom grabbed a breath and jerked B'Elanna along. Shaking herself, she swallowed her reactions and nausea and caught up with him again, cursing as they circled back, ordering whomever they could find. She felt her blood pounding--and her eyes tearing with both sadness and fury for the loss of their friends. Clawing for her breath, she met Tom's direction pace for pace.
"Get to the foot slots!" she screamed at another group.
"Be'i! It is too far!"
"It's the only sure shelter--Dalra said so!"
"Be'i ka!"
Opening a familiar flap, Tom found a sickbed and immediately grabbed another Desalian passing outside. To his relief, he knew the man from the overhang and detail lines. "Gihetra, carry her--she's too weak to walk yet."
The man obeyed without hesitation. "I shall, my friend. --Ka, I see her medicines. I shall be quick."
Tom only glanced inside at J'vishi as Gihetra entered and grabbed the wall satchel. The young lady's yellow skin and fever had only begun to be treated with the reserve he'd given Miztri.
Tom blanked her likely fate out of his mind, even as he gave J'vishi a grin, a bow, and then turned back to continue with B'Elanna.
"I'm sorry, Tom," B'Elanna told him when they slowed a bit.
"Yeah," he said, turning them into another row, his eyes pinned hard on their path alone. "So am I."
Fire from the looming craft filled the air with a deafening boom and screech, and screams followed. The refinery and processing unit belched scarlet flames from its center moments after the hit.
B'Elanna turned to look at it--and for a moment, she was glad to see the structure's destruction. But a moment later, she was running again by Tom's side, damning her sore lungs, swollen eyes and threatening exhaustion. One by one, they ripped open every shack--she took one side, he took the other--to vacate anyone who might have huddled inside.
Another strike on the refinery row wall and then at the rear shook the ground and knocked both Tom and B'Elanna off balance.
A hazy, black smoke began to fill the small rows as the Desalians ran away from that destruction, all for the direction of the opposite wall.
"Take that side!" Tom yelled and pointed, though he could barely see her as a puff of smoke passed between them.
B'Elanna spun to another structure and opened the flap door--then hung onto it for a moment to regain her equilibrium. Adrenaline only went so far, she reminded herself, especially without that dinner Tom had been right to miss and a growing thirst in the sooty air. Being only a week past near death just made it that much worse.
Squinting at the form inside the shack, though, she blew a hard sigh. "Suoti, come! You have to get out of here!"
The young woman shook her head, kicked herself tightly into the corner, staring at the wild-eyed lady. "Yet Jabra--"
"If he dies, so do you!" B'Elanna snapped. "--And vice versa. Come on! NOW!" Suoti didn't budge, but shook convulsively in the shadows.
"B'Elanna?!"
"I'm here, Tom!" she called back, but moved inside to grab the other woman. "Suoti, you must come--they're firing on the housing!"
"I cannot! Do not--"
But B'Elanna had already grabbed her sleeve and yanked her up with what strength she did have in reserve.
"B'Elanna!" echoed Tom's yell again.
"Be'i!" She turned to see another Desalian man pass her to take hold of Suoti. "Jabra awaits you in the rows, good lady. We have sent all others ahead."
B'Elanna caught his quick stare over Suoti's shoulder. "We're all living on our spirits now, Plicta," she told him in thanks.
"Be'i ka," he smiled bravely in return and whisked Suoti out with him.
Removing herself from the shack, she immediately coughed. The sunset had well begun and the smoke poured thickly through every row. Both made seeing increasingly more difficult.
"Tom!" she called out, hearing only a distant reply. Moving quickly towards it, she heard the rumble of the cruiser again, circling the installation.
"Be'i!"
"Sashana'i?" B'Elanna spun around, but couldn't see anything beyond the scattered motions of cloaks in the red and black haze. There were fewer, then. They had cleared who they could.
There could be more, she yet knew.
She could barely breathe, her head spun harder than it had all week. Her heart still pumped hard, though, and all her instincts were at the ready. It had been a bit too long since she'd felt it, she realized.
She didn't know where she was for all the smoke.
The cruiser turned--and another joined it. Suddenly the two crafts shot up into the atmosphere.
The refinery exploded again--but only the glow appeared, on the far side...
"TOM!"
"B'Elanna!" His call was around a couple of corners now, and within the screams, fires and explosions, she didn't know at first which direction to look... "I'm near our shack!"
"I don't even know where I am!" She inched forward, hoping it was the right way. The fire found new life behind her, roaring up. Behind me...move away from it...towards the right...
"Well, use that redundant eardrum of yours and follow the sound!"
Slowing to spit a throat full of soot, she tripped and fell against a corner--but held on. "Very funny, Paris!"
The whine of cruisers zoomed overhead, blasting through the lower atmosphere.
"Still there, Torres?!"
"You won't get rid of me that easily!" She coughed out the last part of that and sucked air only to cough again and harder.
"Well, at least my big mouth can come in some use now! Sashana'i's just been here--Aratra's gone to look after the people on the wall!"
She felt her way into another row, grabbing every breath she could. She could feel the soot sticking to her sweating skin. "What about Dalra and Miztri?!"
"Aratra said they're going for the comm center while there's still power! The force field's down and the Unar are pulling out!"
"It's about time something went right around here!"
"Damn right! And you're getting louder!"
"So are--Agh!"
"You have brought this scourge--and in your companion's curse," came a hiss in B'Elanna's ear as her breath cut off completely.
Her thrumming heart dropped, her blood drained.
Her smoke-stung eyes cut back to see the glowering, white face of Commander Hychar.
Her heart froze.
He was holding her cloak collar. She was rising to her toes...
I'm dead.
"B'Elanna!?"
Oh God, Tom, don't come!
"My life is obliterated--but not before yours," Hychar growled.
Hanging by her throat, she felt her hood rip back and Hychar's large hand clutch into the back of her hair. She opened her mouth in an airless scream when he pulled it, almost out of her head, spun her.
"Maghet," Hychar said behind him, "the leader is yours."
In the haze, the fire loomed. A puff of wind and movement, she saw the shack wall coming closer...
"B'Elanna!"
Oh God, I'm sorry Tom. I've killed us both...
"Your corruption ends now, drask!"
Make it quick, you asshole, she prayed.
To her shame, she felt tears. She cursed them--cursed Hychar, cursed the Unar, cursed Voyager and Janeway for stranding them out there, cursed her own mother for giving birth to her--making her the one that got them stranded there, got her killed by that Unar scum...
"B'Elanna!"
She saw the wall--felt the strike...
It's over...
...then the next and the next--her skull grating under the force, in the unrelenting metal--and the next blow, and...
"No!" Tom screamed as the tore across the row and tackled Hychar onto the darkening dirt, taking B'Elanna with them. She fell loosely to the dirt, raising dust.
In a glance, he saw the bloody pulp that was her face--unmoving...
With a cry, Tom threw his fist into the Unar's sternum. Hychar immediately rolled them, but Tom scampered out from the trap, spinning to kick the other man in the face.
Hychar was thrown back, dazed momentarily, but recovered enough to stagger to his feet and turn back to the demon's companion...
Tom, gasping, crying, was ready for him.
Hychar lunged and Tom struck, directly below his collar and to the left--where he'd been told an Unar's heart was. Hychar struck back, cracking an upper rib. Tom feinted when another jab came at him and whipped back elbow first into Hychar's nose--cracking it on impact.
"That's for B'Elanna," he snarled and followed Hychar back, readying for another blow.
But Hychar somehow got his hand up first and used Tom's stronger momentum to grab his cloak collar and swing the drask around and into the shack. Thrusting the man against the rippled metal, Hychar doubled the impact with his fist.
Feeling his wind crashing out, Tom felt next a heavy impact in his jaw--then on the back of his head when the white-skinned, rage-twisted official slammed him against it. Turned, another strike fell into his kidneys...
Then a clean, sharp sensation tore into his side. Tom felt it, like a draining, barely painful. And suddenly, there wasn't any pain. He didn't think he needed to breathe all the sudden, but felt as though he were floating...
He felt himself looking down, looking at B'Elanna, closer...then closer....
"You die, Tom Paris of Voyager, with your filth. I die, but I die purified."
The words were a universe away...But she was nearing....
Hychar dropped the man's body by the female's, straightening with some effort.
The cleansing of her filth had not been successful, once the ministers had come to know the level of her disgracefulness. He had learned this after weeks of ritual; upon returning to his post, he knew the Kahseht enemies who long were poised to strike his sect would hear of his vulnerability.
They learned quickly. They acted swiftly upon it.
But now, dead before he, the female would not follow him, would trap him no longer. The companion drask's curse died with him. There was some redemption in that.
Hychar staggered back, feeling the hot rush of blood pour down his thin face, over his lips. He wiped at his nose. The companion had indeed been a difficult foe...who had been intended for...
"Maghet?"
He turned into the wafting smoke and soot, and he heard again the roar of fire in his refinery--now gone to his enemies. The industrial complex all but destroyed, his years of work and dedication to the Unar mission had been reduced to flaming stone. Publicly disgraced, his existence was ended.
All for the curse of the abomination.
He stepped forward into the row, and as he neared it, he began to recognize the lump of cloth on the ground--and then the open-eyed death mask of Maghet, torn at the throat.
"H_how?" he stammered, looking back to the bodies he had left. "The...The Gozhor female...could not..."
"Gye."
Hychar's head snapped around only to see the glint of gold-specked eyes glaring into his--and two small hands wielding a sharp scrap of metal...
"Pwihah!" Sashana'i cried, searing into his ears and thrusting the makeshift spear up into Hychar's throat. Tearing into his tender white flesh and driving him back then downwards, she did not stop her move until the Unar was pinned to the red and soot-stained dirt.
He lay frozen in his shock.
Sashana'i gasped for air, her small, thin hands still locked on the broken beam, now stained with the blood of two Unar, as was her spirit...by her hand...by her will.
"Pwihah ye'a osw-ke'o, Hyshah," she whispered hard in her throat, staring with wetted eyes at the quickly dying man. "Guw-hyaw e'o ah Desawea. Sashana'i a'izh, Duhwa anai os pahag, va'i Ahwanois."
She wanted him to know that he indeed would rot--and why, and how.
He did not move, but she knew he had heard her.
She released the beam when Hychar's last breath seeped out. Then she stepped away and around the corpse.
Stumbling across as the fires still blazed, as the smoke continued to pour across the rows in blackened puffs, she fell to her knees beside her friends, touched what she could of them with shaking fingertips. She opened their cloaks, touched their still warm bodies with utter care, knowing what she must do. Her fingers drifted downward.
Little sobs choked her as she probed things she knew she should not have, when she touched the lady's palm for a moment, and then the man's...
The darkness had begun to bring the cool, so she opened her cloak. First pulling out her glowglobe, then Tom's from his pocket, she activated and suspended them.
Leaning over Hychar's victims, she spread her cloak over them then once more embraced their spirits in the only way she knew--albeit barely so. These were her predecessors' memories she worked from, after all. She certainly had no experience or training. But what other choice was there? Collecting them into her mind and maintaining them there, she prayed for Aratra to come with all the gifts their bonding had leant her, and prayed to all her ancestors that somehow, somehow, she had not lost the hope she had finally found in her desperate life.
She had prayed before and the two had come of that. Her sin had brought their fate. That fate could not end upon Uillar. She could not--would not--let them go. So, bent like the butterfly over precious blooms, Sashana'i waited, tears from both the smoke and her own reeling spirit trickling down her nose as she prayed for Toma and Be'i.
For the future, they must live. I have sacrificed my body and spirit to all the flames of Prihar, yet I must demand their continuance. My ancestors, grant me this wish, only this one additional wish...our wish, for Desalia, all which you have placed upon me.
And she prayed the descending cold would be as swift and effective as the night and smoke and fire were not.
I need them.
(continued)
July, 1999
© D'Alaire M.