Flashback - Diane Carey [67]
Sulu glanced at the empty communications post. "Who's at communications?"
Valtane glanced over there too. "Commander Rand's supposed to be on duty, sir."
Sulu parted his lips to respond, but Valtane's console started yipping for attention.
"Sir," Valtane said, "long-range sensors are detecting three Klingon battle cruisers on an intercept course. They're arming torpedoes-"
"Maintain course."
He sat down, and just then the ship was jolted hard by the impact of a fully armed torpedo.
"Return fire!" Sulu ordered.
Valtane tried, then reported, "They've knocked out our targeting scanners!"
"Switch to manual."
Janeway was tense all over, sitting there like a lump while waiting for poor Valtane to die again.
Another hit launched the bridge into a circus of spewing smoke and sparks. Crew members rushed around to assist each other and make good use of whatever was still working.
Valtane leaped up to the science console beside Tuvok. Tuvok was working exactly as he had before, as if he'd never seen this incident before.
Janeway worried about his mental state as she cannily left her post and hurried across the bridge, camouflaged by the jacket she was wearing and the curtains of smoke puffing from various sites of damage.
"There is a rupture in plasma conduit One-Bravo," Tuvok reported, glancing between his console and Valtane's. "It will not hold much longer. Mr. Valtane, there is a rupture in the plasma conduit behind your console-get away!"
Valtane tensed, but kept working. "One more second ..."
If they were going to fight, they had to have those manual controls. Janeway felt her skin tighten. She'd have done the same thing, and been killed the same way.
"It's about to happen," she reminded Tuvok gently, aware of his delicate mental state. "Try to remember every detail about the next few seconds. Concentrate ..."
"Dimitri, you must-"
The console exploded in Valtane's young face. Pain and empathy crossed Tuvok's troubled expression. He struggled to keep control as his mind continued to disintegrate.
He crossed to the deck and knelt by Valtane, drawing his crewmate into his arms to ease those last few horrible seconds during which no one should be alone.
Janeway's arms were poised at her sides, but she couldn't move. She sensed something-a presence, a mind-not hers or Tuvok's, but a living presence inflicting itself upon her conscious thoughts. A deep sense of survival came over her, a willingness to fight all those around her in order to stay alive.
"Tuvok!"
The child screamed, then screamed again.
His hand was slipping ... he had only her fingers in his grip now. He felt one of the fingers break like a twig in his desperate grasp.
The little girl's face was furious with fear. Janeway looked down at her own hand, holding the child's hand, feeling the finger break, feeling the grip lose its traction . . .
"I see her, Tuvok ... I see the little girl. Stay with it."
"I am trying . . . but my mind is weakening."
"This is our last chance. Go to the precipice. Concentrate on the girl. . ."
"I am trying ... the emotions are making it difficult. I do not wish to relive the memory again . . ."
"You have to. It's an order. One more time, Tuvok. One more time-"
"All right, I've programmed the cortical stimulator. It's working. The mind-meld is almost broken. And the radiation is working on the virus. Increase thoron levels to- "
"Kathryn!" The little girl shrieked so hard that Janeway could almost feel the surge of breath through the tiny body. But she couldn't hold on. The girl was wobbling, kicking.
"The virus is migrating. It's embedding itself in the captain's brain! Cortical stimulator!"
Valtane's body actually smoldered and cast the odor of burning flesh. How much of the pain had he felt? His eyes were open as he gazed up at Tuvok in pitiful plea.
Janeway closed her eyes. The third presence tickled the insides of her skull with a strangely physical sensation. The gopher was burrowing again, trying to push away her own memories