Equinox - Diane Carey [65]
As they approached, Ransom and Burke both winced at the condition of Seven on the table. The eyepiece she normally wore now lay on the table's glossy surface. They could see the Borg circuitry in her head, twice as disturbing because this head now turned to look at them with its one human eye.
"Status," Ransom asked, pushing down the insides of his stomach.
"I'm going to extract her cortical array," The Doctor said. "It contains an index of her memory engrains. But once I've removed it, her higher brain functions-cognitive skills, language-will be severely damaged."
"Is there another option?"
"If I had several weeks, but you said time was of the essence."
This wasn't good. Did everything have to be a trial?
He moved to Seven. Please let her be sensible as well as loyal.
'Tell me the codes," he ordered.
"No," she said.
"Janeway was right about one thing. You are unique ... it would be a shame to lose you."
Seven regarded him icily. "Your compassion is irrelevant."
Ransom leaned forward a little. "Do you think this is easy for me? The sight of you on that table... but you're leaving me no choice!"
"No choice," she repeated. "You say that frequently. You destroy Me forms to attain your goals, then claim they left you no choice. Does that logic comfort you?"
His hands started to shake. What she didn't know was that he was beyond comfort. "The codes."
"You will have to destroy me to obtain them."
Agonized by her stubbornness, Ransom also admired her stalwart sense of purpose. He understood it, too. Die if you must, for something worth dying to protect. She spoke of choices-this was one of those.
He nodded to The Doctor, who picked up a medical tool and began working again on the young girl's exposed circuitry.
As Ransom stiffly led Burke out of the room, he heard the bizarre sound of The Doctor beginning to sing. " 'The reticular node's connected to the occipital node'..."
In Voyager's sickbay, awful things were happening. Ugly, unfortunate things. Captain Janeway paused as she came in the entry vestibule, held in place by the argument going on in the medlab. Neelix's voice ... and The Doctor's.
"I heard about this but I just couldn't believe it, just couldn't believe the rumor that our own doctor was committing some kind of vivisection experiments!"
'This isn't vivisection. This is an autopsy."
"Is that what you call it? This alien deserves a decent burial! Or a cremation... or something other than this!"
"Don't you have some pots to clean?"
"The captain won't allow this!"
"It's a medical emergency. Sickbay is my jurisdiction."
Her stomach tightening at the mention of herself, the captain, knowing how that changed the tenor of almost any conversation on board, moved slowly forward and peeked into the medlab.
The doctor was picking up a laser scalpel. On the diagnostic table before him, an alien body lay spread grotesquely, its tail hanging over the edge of the table. The creature was partially dissected already, but Neelix had The Doctor by the arm and was holding him back from continuing, the two engaged now in a primal dance of defiance.
"I can't let you!" Neelix swore.
"Remove your hand," The Doctor threatened, "unless you want it amputated."
"You wouldn't dare!"
As they straggled for control of the laser scalpel, a terrible guilt swarmed over Janeway and she stepped into the room. "Please state the nature of the medical emergency," she said, trying to be wry.
As they halted their actions and stared at her, she saw that her attempt at lightening the moment had failed.
"Captain!" Neelix's face was flushed nearly orange.
"He took these remains from the biolab without authorization!"
"I'm working on a way to counteract the alien toxins," The Doctor flatly explained. "Which means I'll have to dissect a few corpses."
Neelix swung to face him. "What if we find a way to communicate with these beings? We may need to return their