String Theory_ Fusion (Book 2) - Kirsten Beyer [77]
When they arrived at the door to what had been Phoebe’s cabin, Chakotay dispatched Paris to get the unconscious Ensign Kim to sickbay and ordered a deck-by-deck search of the ship for the captain and her sister. All security personnel were placed on alert.
Part of Chakotay knew that he had to get Voyager off of the array as soon as possible, and now he could. But there was absolutely no way he would do so until Kathryn had been found.
When B’Elanna decided that she was finally at a point where she could begin recompiling the Doctor, she initiated the process, stood back, and held her breath. She wasn’t sure how much longer she could endure the presence of his less-evolved replacement.
At that moment, the door to sickbay slid open and Tom entered, gently guiding a disoriented Ensign Kim to a biobed.
B’Elanna caught Tom’s eye and he gave her a familiar half-smile and a wink. Crossing to them, B’Elanna helped him assist Harry, and in the process Tom reached for her hand and gave it a firm squeeze. She should have been comforted and reassured. She wasn’t.
She loved Tom. In the past such a simple and familiar gesture would have buoyed her spirits immeasurably. But this wasn’t the first time in recent memory that she had been strangely unable to lose herself in the comfort of his love for her. There was something dividing them. She couldn’t put her finger on it, but she was acutely aware that whatever was creating that distance was her doing, not his.
Releasing his hand, she asked, “What happened?”
Harry answered her question with one of his own.
“Where is the captain?”
“We don’t know,” Tom replied.
B’Elanna turned on him more fiercely than she intended.
“What do you mean you don’t know?”
“She’s been missing from the ship for almost ten minutes.”
“That’s not possible. Why would she board the array after I told her about the parasites?”
“What parasites?” Tom asked with alarm.
“It was her sister,” Harry interrupted as Tom dutifully ran a medical tricorder over him, verifying that he had suffered no permanent damage when he was rendered unconscious.
B’Elanna was puzzled. “What does Phoebe have to do with this?”
“It’s not Phoebe. Phoebe’s an alien, probably a Nacene,” Harry replied. “Phoebe Janeway has never been on Voyager.”
“But… I remember…” B’Elanna started to say.
“Your memories were altered. Everyone’s were. The captain figured it out.”
“What parasites?” Tom asked again.
Before B’Elanna could answer, Chakotay called over the comm, “All senior officers report to the conference room immediately.”
Tom turned to Harry.
“Are you up to it?”
“Absolutely,” Harry replied, trying to jump down from the bed and almost stumbling into Tom’s arms.
“Harry, maybe you should stay,” B’Elanna suggested.
“Not a chance,” he replied.
At that moment a chirp from the computer alerted B’Elanna to the fact that her recompilation process was complete.
“Tell Chakotay I’ll be right there,” she said as Harry and Tom headed for the door. She took a moment to recheck the diagnostic display and turned to the Doctor.
“Computer, deactivate EMH.”
The backup Doctor turned on her, alarmed, and vanished. Taking a deep breath, she brought the remaining restored subroutines online, then called, “Computer, activate restored EMH.”
The Doctor shimmered into existence beside her and said, “Please state… wait a minute.” Turning to B’Elanna, he demanded, “What happened? There was a woman here. The captain called her Phoebe. She said it was her sister but…”
B’Elanna raised a hand to silence him. “We know. It’s a long story.”
“Give me the short version,” he said sardonically.
B’Elanna turned him toward Tuvok.
“We’ve had an intruder aboard, possibly another Nacene, who altered the crew’s memories and pretended to be the captain’s sister. As you can see, we’ve recovered Tuvok, but apparently he’s been infected by an alien parasite. An earlier version of you who has been running for the past few hours doesn’t believe he can be saved. We’re still aboard the array and there is reason to believe that more parasites may be out there.