The Battle of Betazed - Charlotte Douglas [54]
Beverly pulled open Vaughn’s coat to get a better look at the wound, then retrieved her medical kit from the folds of her own coat.
Scowling against the pain, Vaughn looked up at Troi. “Nice work, Commander. I knew you’d come through when the chips were down.”
“Quiet,” Beverly snapped.
Data shifted slightly, allowing Deanna to view for the first time the full extent of Vaughn’s injury. All the skin and part of the muscle had been burned from the commander’s right shoulder and upper arm by the phaser burst. She found herself wondering how much worse it might have been without the beam-resistant S.O.B. uniform.
“You’re in way too much pain,” the doctor told him after checking her tricorder. “I’ll have to sedate you.”
Vaughn raised his good arm and blocked her hypospray. “Wait.” He turned to Deanna. “I’m turning command over to you.”
Deanna stared. “You can’t be serious. Data’s the logical—”
“You know the prison and the planet,” Vaughn said through his teeth, cutting her off. “And you’re the best judge of how to handle Tevren. Leave me. I’ll only slow you down. Now get out of here.”
He dropped his hand, and then Beverly administered the hypo. The doctor, her face grim, looked to Deanna. “His wounds are life-threatening. The phaser blast cauterized the wound, so he’s in no danger of blood loss, but the beam was set on the highest setting. The damage to his central nervous system is considerable—there’s no way I can treat it with a field medkit. He’ll die if we leave him.”
“I have no intention of leaving him,” Deanna said. “He risked his life to save Tevren—no, to save Betazed. I won’t abandon him to the Jem’Hadar.”
“I can carry him,” Data offered, “without impeding our progress.”
“What about me?” Tevren had moved out of his corner into the hallway, but his hands shook from his close call with death. “You’re still taking me with you, aren’t you?”
“Oh, you’re coming all right.” Deanna threw off her coat and unstrapped her phaser rifle, taking off the safety and focusing her anger on the monster whose life Vaughn had saved. “And if you make one peep or slow us down a fraction of a second, I promise you, I’ll succeed where Lanolan failed.”
While Beverly applied a field dressing to Vaughn’s shoulder, Deanna ordered Data to place the director on Tevren’s bunk. “Search his pockets. He always carries a key that controls the corridor force fields.”
After he and Beverly had shed their coats, Data retrieved the key, moved into the corridor, and activated the force field, trapping Lanolan in Tevren’s cell. He handed the key to Deanna and hoisted the now-sedated Vaughn over his shoulder. Beverly gathered her medical equipment, slung the kit across her back, then readied her own rifle.
Sprinting down the corridor in front of her team, Deanna deactivated the first force field, waved the group out of the maximum security lockup, then reset the shield.
“What are you doing?” Tevren asked nervously.
“One dangerous prisoner is all I’m prepared to loose on Darona today,” Deanna told him.
The group raced down the corridor toward the administration building, but when they stopped at the next force field, a prison guard on the other side caught sight of them. Worse, he recognized Tevren. Without hesitation, the man hit a panel on the nearest wall, and alarm klaxons blared throughout the facility.
Deanna hesitated. The guards were Betazoids, not the enemy, and just doing their very necessary and dangerous jobs, and she hated having to fight them. She didn’t have time, however, for lengthy explanations or philosophical arguments. However much she might regret her actions, she knew what had to be done.
She dropped the force field and