Spirit Walk_ Enemy of My Enemy (Book 2) - Christie Golden [1]
Ellis watched them go. Delight was warm inside him. It was all going according to plan. There’d been a slight glitch when Chakotay had unexpectedly decided to follow regulations regarding the away team, but Ellis had recovered. After some quick thinking, he’d been able to lure not only the human captain to the planet, but his sister as well. His Cardassian ally would be so pleased.
He followed his creatures as they walked to a seemingly solid boulder and passed easily through. It had been difficult to convince them they could safely walk through something their eyes told them was solid. Eventually, though, they became familiar with the holographic illusion. Now Ellis followed them down the rough stairs carved into the rock. He couldn’t wait until Chakotay awoke.
Lieutenant Devi Patel loved the sciences. She practically romanced them, sometimes to the exclusion of less intellectual attachments. The only pain her passion for science had ever caused her was at the Academy, when she had been forced to choose a field of specialty. She wished there were such a thing as a “generalist.” Even after choosing biology, she had taken a staggering number of extra courses in other fields to the point where she was practically an expert in all of the sciences.
She had decided, reluctantly, to let medicine be one of the fields she could bear to part with. She’d never felt drawn to be a healer, but rather an explorer. She had an insatiable curiosity that had gotten her into trouble more than once, and a peculiar blend of cheery optimism and logical intellect that had gotten her out of most of the tight spots in which she’d found herself. During her first assignment, aboard the U.S.S. Victory, she had been given the nickname “Fearless.” She wasn’t sure if it was appropriate. Patel had always associated “fearless” with “heroic,” and she certainly never felt heroic. She just was almost always, in any situation, more curious than afraid. The universe was full of scientific wonders and marvels, and her brain automatically snapped into that mode rather than get me out of here.
This planet, actually, was rather boring from a scientific viewpoint. She’d spent her free time on the trip here analyzing the data Marius Fortier and the other colonists had collected, and it was pretty standard Class-M stuff. While as always there were interesting variations on things, such as a new strain of orchid or arachnid, there was nothing startling or amazing or wondrous. Still, she had her tricorder out and was analyzing it intently. Who knew but that something exciting and unusual might register and she would be the one to—
Patel took a swift breath and her eyes widened as she stared at the tricorder.
They were enormous, mammalian, bipedal—
And heading right for her.
This was such a beautiful planet, Lieutenant Harry Kim thought as he strode toward the center of the colony, which had been designated as the rendezvous point. No wonder Fortier and the others wanted to return. He wondered if they would indeed still want to resume colonization of the place, now that they knew there were no survivors among the colonists who had chosen to stay behind.
He wished that hadn’t been the case, and hoped at least that they would be able to find the colonists’ bodies and give them a proper burial.
He crested a slight ridge and looked down at the group of buildings nestled in the valley. What was the word he was looking for? Pastoral? Bucolic? Either would do. It wasn’t quite a rustic farmland of the eighteenth century or anything like that—Fortier and his friends certainly didn’t eschew the benefits of technology—but the little town that lay before him had an aura of simplicity about it that made him want to walk its streets and sit and watch sunsets by its lakes.
Kim made his way down the hill, stepping sideways now and then to avoid stumbling on grass still slick from the recent rain. He looked again at the little square