The Farther Shore - Christie Golden [2]
Her feet started to blister at the end of the second day. She rubbed them with mud to soothe them and started to think about what she could use to create makeshift shoes. Her first try, wrapping large leaves around them, was a complete failure. A half-hour’s worth of walking on not-very-rough terrain shredded them. She realized that she was going to need something sturdier than plants.
She was also going to need something more substantial to eat than roots and grubs. Torres began walking at [6] first light and didn’t stop until dusk, when she would search for shelter and make a fire. She was burning calories like mad and was starting to feel weak and shaky.
Reluctantly, she came to the conclusion that she would need to make a weapon. Boreth was rich with all kinds of wildlife. A single maasklak would provide both food and clothing. It was a logical deduction, but the thought made her feel even sicker. Torres took no pleasure in killing. She fought when she had to, and had killed in self-defense more than once, but that was a long way from deliberately setting out to take a life, even an animal’s life. She imagined that for most Klingons who undertook the Challenge of Spirit, coming to grips with killing an animal was probably the least of their worries. But it disturbed her greatly.
She’d talked to Chakotay once about hunting, back in the early days when she was first getting to know him. He was, as she ought to have expected, quite philosophical about the whole thing. He seemed to have no qualms about it in theory or in practice, if there was a need.
“But you’re a vegetarian,” she had pointed out.
“I have access to a replicator,” he had countered. “I don’t need to go out and hunt my meals.”
“But you would if you had to?”
“Absolutely.”
“Without batting an eye.”
He’d smiled then, indulgently. “Hardly. My people have elaborate rituals to prepare for hunting. We make ourselves worthy of success in the hunt by purifying our minds and body through meditation and bathing. [7] We call on the spirits of the animals we are about to kill, asking permission to take what we need. And when we do make a kill, we thank the creature’s spirit. Nothing is wasted, not bone or sinew or flesh or horn or hide. It is all viewed as a gift from the animal, and it is part of the cycle. But in today’s world, there’s no need to take a life when we can program the replicator for everything from stuffed mushrooms to chocolate cake.”
She supposed he had a point, and had thought no more about it, even as she often asked the replicator for a thick T-bone steak, extra rare. Tom liked his steaks medium, with a baked potato and—
Just that quickly, Torres was crying. She had deliberately pushed thoughts of her husband and child to the back of her mind when they arose, because she instinctively knew she couldn’t spare the energy of missing Tom and Miral. There had only been a handful of days over the last seven years when she had not seen Tom. He was a fixture in her life even before they had gotten married, and she had carried Miral within her, brought her forth into this universe, and now keenly missed feeling the child nursing in her arms. By her count, Miral was nine weeks old today. Nine weeks. Torres suddenly realized she had been away for two-thirds of her daughter’s entire life.
She had really had no choice but to leave them behind and embark on the Challenge. Intellectually she knew that, and even in her heart, she knew that. But a part of her, the part that was wife and mother, deeply mourned the abrupt severance. The tears were hot as they trickled down her face, and B’Elanna knew they [8] were making pale furrows in the gray ash that was her mask.
At least they were safe. Tom was probably with Harry Kim right now, relaxing and joking, while Miral slept peacefully in her nursery. The Doctor, no doubt, would be making a sarcastic comment or two, but she