A Call to Darkness - Michael Jan Friedman [92]
And then, no matter how efficient the android was, there was one obstacle even he couldn’t surmount: the fact that some of the Mendel’s crew-and perhaps some of their own people as well-were already dead. Already beyond rescue.
Riker hoped with all his heart that his friends weren’t in that number.
It hadn’t been easy for Pulaski. Her feet were killing her, she was cold and the wind had rasped away patiently at her facial burns until they stung like the devil. Also, she wished that she’d taken some of that food herself.
But she had managed to find the Klingon, and then to keep him in sight without being spotted. That made all her smaller problems seem a good deal more tolerable.
What’s more, her memory had come back-all of it. Not just up to the moment when she vanished off the Mendel, but also all the events that had transpired since then-first in the Klah’kimmbri installation where they’d apparently blocked out parts of her memory, and then, later, her experiences as a med.
She remembered how the flash of light from the destruction of the flying monitor had brought everything to the surface again-after a brief period in which she couldn’t seem to remember anything.
And she recalled, as well, the straits in which she’d left the Enterprise-at the mercy of a disease that had the potential to be devastating. She wished she had her communicator, or that she could somehow get word to the ship-for she believed she had a cure.
She couldn’t be certain, of course. But in all the time she’d spent here-wherever here was-the disease hadn’t touched her. And if she was right about the bacterium’s capacity for mutation into something contagious, she should have felt the symptoms by now. In fact, the disease should have killed her. Hell-it should have killed anyone that she’d come in contact with after her initial exposure to Fredi; without knowing it, she would have been a carrier.
Yet she was alive, unafflicted. And so, apparently, was Worf.
Something in this environment had to be protecting her. Something that she and the Klingon had in common.
Pulaski thought she had a handle on what that something might be. Unfortunately, the Enterprise could become a plague ship before she got a chance to test her theory.
Which only made the pursuit of Worf that much more critical. In the three or four hours since she’d left the transport train behind, she had been thinking up ways to approach the Klingon-and discarding them. She knew it wouldn’t be enough to just tell him she was a friend. Or to try to explain the situation and ask him to help. At best, he’d take off, leaving her to fend for herself in this ungodly wilderness. At worst, he’d silence her for the danger she represented-as someone who could draw attention to him.
Recently, however, she’d come to see another possibility. Based on her observations of his progress, it seemed to her that Worf had a destination in mind. He was far from lost.
More than that, she had a feeling, he was not on his way to link up with other warriors. In the enclosure, her patients had kept their armor at their bedsides, and they always put it on before they left.
The Klingon, on the other hand, was missing parts of his protective garb-most notably, his helmet. No enemy would have taken that from him. The only other conclusion was that he had thrown it away himself-as an act of rebellion.
Knowing Worf as she did, and knowing his force of character, she wouldn’t have been surprised if he’d decided that these battles were somehow beneath him-somehow contemptible. After all, even without his memory, he was a Klingon-and Klingons, he’d said often enough, placed honor above everything. How honorable could these combats be, if the behavior of the marshals was any indication?
Was it possible, then, that he was deserting-and that he knew a way out of here? That if she just hung on a little longer, he would lead her to some sort of civilization-where she had a chance of contacting the ship?
There was no guarantee-but she hoped so. And until she