Distant Shores - Marco Palmieri [87]
Alerted by quick footsteps from behind, Seven spun to see a machete flashing toward her, wielded by red-furred Lieutenant Aglar. Even as she saw it, she realized that it was coming too fast for her to get out of the way.
It was in that space of time that Zolaluz toppled into the path of the blade.
Pitching herself in front of Aglar, she caught the full force of the blow intended for Seven. The machete plunged through the sleeve of her cloak and deep into her upper right arm.
“No!” Seven howled, lashing out, striking Aglar with enough force to hurl him across the room.
As a Borg drone, Seven had witnessed countless atrocities. Still, the sight of Zolaluz lying there with her arm nearly severed shook her to the core.
“Your captain,” gasped Zolaluz. “Her breathing is weak but steady.”
Seven dropped to her knees. “You should not have done this,” she said harshly, tearing a strip from her cloak to use as a tourniquet. “I would not have asked this of you.”
Zolaluz grinned. “What makes you think I did it for you?” she said, clutching the onyx pendant at her throat.
With the help of Zolasova and the other zolas, Seven managed to stanch Zolaluz’s bleeding and revive Janeway. Under cover of the battle that Zolacroy had started between factions of the militia, Seven, Janeway, and the zolas escaped from the camp and made it back to Bahuzola.
A day later, Voyager arrived, on the trail of the energy signature of the downed Hazari ship. At last, the crew had managed to outfight and evade the Hazari fleet that had hounded them since Captain Janeway’s abduction.
Homing in on the signal from Seven’s combadge, Commander Chakotay led an away team to Bahuzola. The rescue did not go exactly as Seven had hoped, however. Despite Seven’s protests, only she and the captain were beamed aboard Voyager.
Though she argued forcefully that Zolaluz should be treated in sickbay, where it might be possible to replace her limbs and undo the damage wrought by the duluzola, the idea was overruled by Janeway as a violation of the Prime Directive.
The cultural damage done by the appearance of spacecraft, alien beings, and high-tech weapons among the Saladana had been confined to a small, war-torn region. Explanatory cover stories could be planted, and all technological artifacts left on the planet’s surface could be recovered or destroyed by Voyager away teams. In Janeway’s opinion, however, leaving behind living, breathing evidence of miraculous medical technology could dramatically alter the development of Saladana.
To counter this opinion, Seven reminded Captain Janeway that without Zolaluz, they both would be dead. Seven pointed out that Zolaluz had given a limb and would have given much more, would have given her life, to save Janeway, someone whom she had only just met in the line of fire.
But in the end, Seven and Janeway had left Zolaluz in Bahuzola, waving goodbye with her one remaining arm as they walked off toward the beam-up site. More experienced at removing limbs than reattaching them, Seven had been unable to save Zolaluz’s other arm… to do even that one thing for her.
Not that it seemed to matter to Zolaluz. Her smile as she waved to them was as bright as ever.
Once aboard Voyager, Seven again spoke to Janeway on behalf of Zolaluz. An appeal to Chakotay bore the same fruit.
With next to nothing to call her own, Zolaluz had done everything for Seven. With all the resources of a starship at her disposal, Seven could do nothing at all for Zolaluz.
Days later and light-years away, as if she had not done enough, Zolaluz managed to give her one more gift.
Before Zolaluz, the secret heart of Seven of Nine had not been much of a secret.
Fueled by regret, self-pity, resentment, and despair, it had gone from deeply to barely hidden, from dormant to dominant. It had begun to color her every perception, erode her concentration, persuade her to withdraw.
Darkness had filled her and begun to spill over. Her shipmates had helped it along by avoiding her.
For