Equinox - Diane Carey [10]
"Ensign?" he encouraged.
The woman shuddered visibly, vulnerable and crushed back into a cove of anxiety. "Who ... ?"
"I'm Commander Chakotay. U.S.S. Voyager."
In very slow motion he moved the jagged-edged barricade aside and extended bis hand, then waited for her to take it rather than grasping her before she was ready.
"But..." Her voice was shattered. "We're the only humans in the Delta Quadrant..."
Offering her a sad smile, Chakotay said, "That's what we used to think."
A comforting arm around her shoulders sent a chill
through her that Chakotay could physically feel running its course.
"What... what are you ... doing ..."
"Here? That's a big question. We have a lot of questions for each other," he said as he drew her gently to Paris.
"Well, what's this?" Paris began, trying to sound upbeat. "A stowaway?"
"I... I'm... Gilmore. Engineer's mate."
"Engineering. What luck." Paris gestured back toward the main core deck. "You can tell us something about that refit on your core-"
"That can wait a few minutes, I think, Tom," Chakotay told him. Paris looked surprised but got the message. Keeping his arm around the terrorized woman, he quietly asked, "How long have you been in the Delta Quadrant?"
"F-five years, seven months ... two days."
Chakotay smiled again. "You sound like a Vulcan. Should I check your ears?"
His reward was a trembling grin. "I keep a diary." Her large eyes crimped sadly and a sob choked her back. "It's not... very nice reading."
"I'd like to read it anyway," Chakotay offered. "Let's get you to our sickbay."
Her shoulder suddenly hunched against his ribs. "This isn't real, is it? I'm hallucinating, aren't I? We're losing ... They got in. The shields ... we lost, didn't we? You're not here. I'm dying too. I'm dying! Poor Rudy ... don't tell him I died... don't tell him."
Tears drained as her eyes crushed closed. Her arms
hung limp as she sobbed. Chakotay pulled her around to him and handed his phaser to Paris so he could get both arms around the girl. Paris' fair complexion grew russet with empathy as he met Chakotay's sad gaze. They wanted to have arrived a day earlier, to be more than just clean-up detail for this sorry and desperate crew of fellow Starfleeters. This should've been a better story.
Over the oily fluff of blond scraggle, he gave Paris a little nod. "Keep looking."
Unencouraged, Paris simply nodded back and moved past him.
Chakotay ushered the destroyed girl away from her prison barricade, which she had taken to be her tomb. No point letting her see this area until it was cleaned up. Later, much later. She had fought to her last straw, and even that had finally cracked.
They all had. He could see that, written in the phaser scorch lines all over the ship's pitiful interior.
Taking her out of the core salon into a passageway at the base of a Jefferies tube, where the bleeps of Torres' tricorder were softened by the sound-absorbing carpet, Chakotay paused and let the girl's racking sobs run their course. He didn't offer any comfort-it would've all been lies. She was destroyed, not stupid.
Voices? Where was his phaser! He almost called for Paris to come, then he realized that the voices were those of Harry Kim and Seven in the tube's secondary-level access conduit. They must be searching up there. Good idea. If he were going to hide, that's where he'd go.
Usually-but what was the Equinox crew hiding
from? That's what determined a good defense, and he saw no sign of the enemy here at all, except for the pure demolition of the ship's guts.
"Under here!" Harry Kim's sharp shout made Chakotay wish he were up there. He gripped the girl gently and listened.
Kim again. "Hang on... we're getting you out