Captain's Table 02_ Dujonian's Hoard - Michael Jan Friedman [35]
I tried to restrain him, but it was no use. Barreling past me, the lieutenant bared his teeth and went for Corbis.
What’s more, the Pandrilite was ready for him. When Worf smashed him in the face, he staggered but didn’t fall. The Klingon tried to connect with a second punch, but his adversary warded it off then struck back with a hammerlike blow of his own.
I tried to get between Worf and Corbis, but the Thelurian leaped on me from behind and dragged me down. Digging my elbow into his midsection as hard as I could, I freed myself of his company and got to my feet.
However, my freedom was short-lived. Corbis’s other friend, the Oord, bowled me over. By the time I stopped rolling, he was on me again, trapping me beneath his bulk.
I struck the Oord once and then again, but it didn’t seem to faze him. If anything, it made him hold on to me that much tighter.
By then, much of the crew was cheering, though I wasn’t sure whom they were cheering for. Perhaps they weren’t sure, either.
Worf, meanwhile, was standing toe to toe with the Pandrilite, trading one devastating blow after the other. Both fighters were bloodied, but neither seemed likely to yield until he was knocked unconscious or worse.
“That’s enough!” cried Red Abby, her voice cutting through the emotion-laden atmosphere in the cargo bay.
She kicked the Oord in the side with the toe of her boot, doubling him up. With a hard shot to his jaw, I got him to roll off me.
Next, Red Abby tried to separate Corbis and Worf. After all, she was still their captain, still the one to whom they had given their allegiance. It was her job to maintain order.
She might as well have tried to stop a matter-antimatter explosion. The Pandrilite dealt her a backhanded smash to the shoulder, spinning her around so hard she reeled into the bulkhead.
It occurred to me that I might have stopped Worf, at least, with a direct order. However, our comrades didn’t know I was his commanding officer and I sincerely wished to keep it that way.
Gritting my teeth, I resigned myself to the physical approach. Needless to say, I had little faith in it at the moment.
But before I could throw myself into the fray again, the door to the cargo bay opened and a handful of armed Cardassians stepped inside. A hush fell over the prisoners.
Worf and Corbis didn’t seem to notice. They kept pummeling each other, making the cargo bay resound with the crack of their blows. That is, until Gul Ecor walked in and gestured to his men.
I cried out a warning, but it was too late. The Cardassians hit my lieutenant and the Pandrilite with a couple of seething, white energy beams, sending them flying off their feet.
For a moment, I feared the beams might have been lethal. Then I saw Worf and Corbis stir, if only feebly, and I knew the Cardassians’ weapons had been set merely to stun.
I went over to Worf and knelt beside him. He looked up at me, disgusted with the way the combat had ended, but remarkably lucid for a man who had taken the kind of punishment he had.
“Well,” said Ecor, “it seems I’ve stumbled on a disagreement. I do hate to see a lack of harmony amongst my prisoners.”
I wondered why he was there. Clearly, not just to break up the fight. He could have sent an underling to do that.
Ecor turned to Red Abby. “I just discovered something interesting,” he told her. “At least, I found it so. As it turns out, we have quite a celebrity in our midst.”
Red Abby and her men looked at each other. No one had the faintest idea what the Cardassian was talking about.
Suddenly, Ecor turned to me. “Isn’t that so … Captain Jean-Luc Picard of the Federation Starship Enterprise?”
There was silence in the hold for a moment. Shocked silence and I was perhaps more shocked than anyone. I felt all eyes upon me, reinterpreting my presence there, and Worf’s as well.
Corbis cursed colorfully beneath his breath. “A damned spy, after all,” he rumbled menacingly.