Death in Winter - Michael Jan Friedman [38]
Under the circumstances, Beverly would accept a little stiffness. Gladly. It beat losing the arm altogether, which had been a real possibility.
Whoever had administered to her had done a good job-one she could appreciate as a doctor. She made a mental note to thank the person if she ever got the chance.
Rolling onto her left shoulder, she tried to get up again-this time with a bit more success. Wrestling herself off the bed and onto her feet, she experienced a wave of vertigo-a vestige of the punishment her nervous system had taken. She stood there a moment, feet spread wide, until the dizziness went away. Then she approached the energy barrier.
Beyond it was a corridor, also made of stone, also ancient-looking. And all along it were cells just like Beverly’s. But they were empty, their barrier projectors inactive. At the moment, it seemed, she was her captors’ only prisoner.
Looking around, she saw a sensor high on the wall opposite her cell. Obviously, her captors didn’t trust their energy barrier completely. But then, Starfleet personnel had been known to defuse such things on occasion.
And who knew that better than the Romulans?
The doctor felt another wave of dizziness, even worse than the first. She felt like retreating to her bed and lying down until the discomfort went away, but she knew that her captors would be watching her.
It wasn’t wise to let a Romulan know you were hurting. It would only encourage him-or her-to take advantage of the fact. Better to make her think you had your wits about you. Then there was at least a chance she would leave you alone.
It was Jean-Luc who had told her that, wasn’t it? And a number of other things as well. But then, he had had a lot more experience with Romulans than she had.
Beverly remembered surgically altering his features before he left the EnterpriseD to look for Ambassador Spock. How silly he looked with his Romulan brow ridges, though of course she had refrained from saying so….
Just then, she heard something-a clatter of boot heels, echoing sharply from the stone walls. Obviously someone was coming to see her, having taken note of the fact that she was awake.
And Beverly knew who it was, without the slightest doubt. Pulling herself up to her full height, she forced her pain aside and waited-and saw that she was right.
Her visitor was tall, slender but strong-looking, and more fair-haired than any other Romulan Beverly had seen. And even with the shadows in the corridor obscuring the woman’s features, Crusher knew them almost as well as her own.
Of course, back on the EnterpriseD, she had seen that face every day for nearly a year.
“Sela,” she said.
Regarding her from the other side of the energy barrier, the blond woman feigned delight. “I’m so glad you haven’t forgotten me, Doctor.”
Beverly hadn’t forgotten her first compound fracture either. Things like that tended to stay with you.
“You shouldn’t have come here,” said Sela, her tone only vaguely remonstrative. “The last thing the Kevrata need is a human stirring up unrest.”
“I didn’t come here to stir up unrest,” Beverly said. “I came to find a cure for the disease that’s ravaging the Kevrata, which is more than the Romulans have done for them.”
Sela smiled. “Perhaps. But it won’t be difficult to make it appear that you came here to start trouble. That would make you a provocateur. And those convicted of such a crime in the Empire are made to pay dearly for their transgressions.”
“Even if the charges have to be trumped up a little.”
“Even then. And you couldn’t have arrived at a more propitious time. Your death will make the Kevrata see they can’t take Romulus lightly-not even after the reorganization precipitated by the demise of the Reman praetor.”
Now it was the doctor’s turn to smile. “Is that what you call it? A reorganization?”
Sela shrugged. “Call it what you like. It has happened before and it will happen again. The old is burned away in favor of the new. Things change.”
“Some do,” Beverly allowed. “And others remain the same. The