Seven of Nine - Christie Golden [69]
At that moment, the sun went out.
Seven had dropped to the ground and was curled up in a tight ball. She leaned against the cool comfort of an ancient stone wall, out of the way, for the moment, of trampling feet. She shuddered, and clutched her knees to her chest. Her eyes were squeezed shut, but behind the closed lids she saw the scene play itself out.
She had the company of thousands in her mind.
A pocket full of rye...
Screams of terror exploded from the crowd in the hot darkness. As suddenly as it had descended, the darkness lifted, but natural sunlight did not return.
The illumination came from a single glowing orb-a sphere that Janeway recognized. Hovering in the air was Tamaak Vrs, the dreadful weapon clutched in his arms.
As the wonderful scent of brewing coffee hit her nostrils, Janeway realized what was going on. The sun hadn't really gone out, nor was Tamaak suddenly able to fly. This was Skedan mind manipulation, and Janeway wondered if everyone assembled saw the same vision that she did or if the experience was different for each individual. The event was being recorded, and the Skedans could not alter that. When this was over, if she survived, she would be able to see what had actually transpired.
"Xanarit!" she yelled. "The Skedan-it's a trick!
He's planning to kill the Emperor!"
Xanarit looked at her, startlingly calm given the hysteria surrounding him, and merely nodded.
"What Captain Janeway has said about the destruction of Skeda is the truth!" Tamaak's voice boomed forth like the voice of God on Judgment Day another illusion, but a frighteningly compelling one.
"You have even seen the oh-so-noble Emperor Beytek the Seventh confess to it! He has shamed his ancestors and the people he dares to call subjects. He promised to send ships to defend us-none came. And then we were even cut off from any assistance from other quarters. Left to die, and be forgotten, save as foul plague spreaders to be shunned for as long as we lived.
"But you cannot elude justice, Beytek. It will find you. It will seek you out. I am one of the last of my people and we have long dreamed of this day. Fear, Beytek. Your hour has come at last. Behold the orb of judgment!"
Seven saw it all. Saw the illusion of the flying Tamaak, the naked terror and cowardice upon the Emperor's features, the calm visage of Xanarit, the anger and fear for another's safety that shone in Janeway's face. Inside her mind, thousands of voices cried out for justice, and twenty-three birds shrieked wildly.
Four and twenty blackbirds baked in a pie...
With a cry, Tamaak lifted the glowing orb above his head, then sent it hurtling downward. Janeway felt a useless scream of warning tear from her throat. She ran forward, though she didn't know what she hoped to accomplish. It was pure instinct, an attempt to try to stop the inevitable.
Surely it was a bomb of some sort. It would be the last thing she saw before death finally claimed her and she would truly be exploring that most final of frontiers. She'd looked death in the face so often it was almost difficult to believe it had finally come.
Part of her was enraged that Tamaak would so slay thousands of innocents. She had thought more of him than that. But here was the proof, falling slowly toward the stage to crash and explode at the Emperor's feet.
It crashed. It did not explode.
The orb shattered like glass. Shards flew everywhere and a radiant mist rose upward like smoke-smoke with a life of its own. It twined and writhed, and as she watched it headed straight for Beytek. It forced itself into his nose, eyes, and mouth, almost raping him. He bent backwards, taut with agony, but was utterly silent.
And then he was not.
His mouth yawned open almost impossibly wide, and the most dreadful sounds Janeway had ever heard, ever dreamed, issued forth. They pierced her very soul. Janeway