Unworthy - Kirsten Beyer [80]
Seven felt weariness descending upon her. She realized that intense mental effort was required on her part to sustain this faint control, but now that she had found a path, she knew she could locate it again. Chakotay had been right. All it would take was more practice.
She raised her hand to once again engage the inhibitor and felt a sharp pain streak through her head as a blinding white light flashed before her eyes. Instead of touching the inhibitor, Seven grabbed the sides of her head with both hands, attempting to hold back the searing heat in her mind.
Her stomach began to turn as images cascaded frenetically into her mind: humanoids blown to bits by crude energy weapons, screeching bugs scrambling over rocks as explosions erupted all around them, pools of silver fluid cascading over small scampering creatures, desperate to evade them, and through it all a sense that she was drowning, suffocating in a gaseous haze.
As Seven was bombarded by these sights, she fell to the floor and curled into a whimpering, shuddering ball. Shaking, frantic hands searched the back of her neck until her fingers found the inhibitor and after frustrating, painful seconds, she finally reengaged it.
Lying in the darkness, her heart racing and her breath coming in gasps as her mind grew mercifully blank, Seven tried her best to find the starfield again, but failed to, as faint red and blue flashes streaked across the darkness.
A few hours later, she awakened in the same position, curled uncomfortably on the floor of her cabin beside her bed. A distant shriek echoed in her mind.
Her first thought was to wonder what she had witnessed before losing consciousness. In the absence of their visceral assault, the images were easier to analyze and quickly identify as belonging to the various Indign species. But they had not come from her research or observations. They had not come from anything the Indign had shared with the crew about themselves or their history.
Seven broke out into a cold sweat as she wondered if she might not somehow have witnessed the future of the Indign, should Voyager simply leave the system as they had requested. As she weighed the possibility, the consistent shrieking grew louder. Still groggy, she pulled herself up and was almost overwhelmed by the need to retch.
Finally part of her mind understood the loud, repetitive sound. Now that she was fully awake, she realized that it must have been this sound that had pulled her back to consciousness.
Klaxons were wailing throughout Voyager.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Eden entered the bridge less than a minute after the alarm had sounded, calling “Report!” She was surprised to note that the viewscreen was blank. The bridge was awash in pulsing crimson light and it seemed that the periods of darkness between pulses was growing longer with each iteration.
“Restore normal lighting,” she called.
Commander Paris was already on the bridge, standing over Ensign B’Kar at ops.
“We are experiencing multiple simultaneous systems failures, Captain,” Paris advised her evenly.
“Are we under attack?”
“No, Captain. We are trying to get the sensors back up. Our last reading showed no hostile vessels approaching. As best we can tell, this is an internal problem.”
Best to be grateful for the little things, she reminded herself, though she immediately wondered how long it might take the Indign to realize that their ship was not operating at full capacity and whether or not that would encourage them to make the most of an opportunity to rid themselves of their unwelcome Federation guests.
“What’s the status of Hawking and Galen ?”
“Our comm system is down,” Tom reported.
“Their last report indicated that all systems were functioning normally, Captain,” Kim added from tactical.
“How many systems are we talking about?” Eden asked, as she moved to stand beside Tom, probably adding to B’Kar’s