Friday, July 26, 2013
{{Otherwise known as the Chapter from Gre'Thor, or the Chapter that Fek'lhr ate. This Chapter was an absolute bitch to get through. Momentum ground to a halt, and I found myself struggling to flesh out everything I wanted to have happen. Transitioning from where things were heading to where they needed to go. I'm still not entirely satisfied with how it turned out, and more than any other Chapter, this one will probably be edited in the future, if not rewritten outright. That being said...there's a lot of confluence of plot threads here, which is why I think I lost some steam, as I was juggling a lot all at once. Everyone's patience was certainly appreciated, and hopefully after this bastard has been birthed, I can get back in my groove and finish this.}}
Kanor hated the Bender ship as soon
as the transporter process had completed.
The Bender ship was a cold, moist
environment, and a thin fog seemed to perpetually exist above the deck up to
Kanor’s knees. The lighting was dim even
to Kanor’s heightened sight, and didn’t really seem to come from any particular
source at all. Worst of all, the ship’s
interior seemed excessively open. Kanor
couldn’t see where the one wall stopped; other than the solid surface they were
standing on, which was obscured by fog, it seemed to simply be there. There were no other walls. He narrowed his eyes, trying to make out some
sort of ceiling as he glanced above, but couldn’t discern one. He turned his head to the left to glance at
Skid, scuffing a boot purposefully on the deck.
The sound was distorted, but seemed distinctly metallic. The deck itself was a little slick, but
seemed oddly textured in a way that made passage easy enough. To the best of his ability, he couldn’t
detect anything else in the vicinity.
“Ai said the interior seemed
cavernous; she wasn’t jokin. And I can’t
see worth a piss in here. Lights!”
Kanor scowled; he didn’t want to
have to rely on artificial lighting to see in a situation like this, and was
irritated it would draw attention to their position. It couldn’t be helped, however. He wasn’t sure about Ullian eyesight, but
everyone else in their group would be having difficulty if he was. He reached over to activate the light in his
gauntlet, but hesitated; with the rest of the Team’s lights turning on around
him, he could see just fine. He left his
off.
“Permission to do a quick recon of
the immediate area?”
Skid’s brow furrowed as she noted
his lack of active lighting, but she nodded at him; she had her tricorder
flipped open in her right hand, her phaser still held at the ready in her left.
“Everyone hold position while Kanor
takes a peek around, lights to each side along the path of the wall. Immediate only, Youngblood, make it fast.”
Kanor nodded, adjusting his grip on
the bat’leth as his left hand drifted down to unclasp the strap of his Varon-T
holster. Keeping the wall behind him, perpendicular
to his direction, Kanor moved forward, his eyes narrowed as he tried to pick
out any details in front of him or find an end to the area they were in. The place had a slightly musty scent that
made his nose crinkle in distaste.
He had gone about nine meters when
his foot stepped out onto nothing. His
sense of balance faltered, his arms flying out as he attempted to counter the
unexpected end of the surface beneath him.
He cursed, managing to recover and take a few steps back as he shifted
his gaze down. He stabbed the light
button on his left gauntlet and directed it down, where he could see the fog,
now, seeming to lazily disappear a few meters ahead. No guard rail or ledge to indicate the end of
the deck; it simply stopped. Hesitating
only a moment, he directed the light directly forward, sweeping it around a bit
before shining it up.
Nothing. No opposing wall, still no visible
ceiling. The fog seemed to continue out
a bit from the ledge, but the air beyond it seemed fuzzy. Just a slight haze that seemed to permeate
the air. His scowl deepened even further
as he switched the light back off and turned back to the group, who were still
standing in the circular pattern, their backs to each other, they had beamed in
with. He explored to the right and left
of the team as he came back, but couldn’t find anything significant beyond the
reach of their beams of light. Skid had
her back to him, pointing her phaser and the light affixed to her wrist up the
length of the wall.
“Well?”
“The deck ends about nine meters
that direction, no warning or protection.
I can’t even see a ceiling or opposite wall.” He followed her gaze, the sound of her active
tricorder slightly distorted in the moist air.
“It looks…weirdly organic.”
The wall was heavily textured;
long, prominent ridges and valleys randomly spread over the surface that created
multiple deep, dark shadows big enough for a person to disappear into. All kinds of unease screamed at Kanor as he
imagined them doing just that; hiding things.
“Yup. Pretty sure it’s metallic, but definitely not
like anything I’ve ever seen. Ilara, picking
anything up?”
Kanor glanced at the Ullian woman,
who was standing next to Skid. She had a
vacant, distant look in her eyes that was disturbing to behold; her eyes not
appearing to be focused on anything. Her
voice was soft and just as distant as her facial expression, which didn’t seem
to change.
“No…”
Skid seemed satisfied enough with
the response. She holstered her phaser,
and withdrew her communicator, shaking her head with an annoyed expression as
she flipped it open, her eyes not leaving her tricorder screen.
“Skid to Kaz. Go.”
Moments later, the space beside
their group along the wall shimmered with blue energy as Kaz’s team transported
over as well. Kaz stepped up to Skid
after glancing around, a look of displeasure on his face.
“Well, this is certainly
ridiculous.”
“No contact as of yet; Ilara
reports everything fine and dandy. Kanor
discovered the deck we’re on has a drop about nine meters away from this wall;
other than that, it just seems…open.
Tricorder readings are a pain in the ass, and it’s damn nipply in here.”
Kaz nodded, glancing over his
shoulder to indicate his team should activate their lights as he switched one
on upon his right wrist.
“It’s a wonder Ai was able to
determine this place was stable enough for us to transport into.”
Selorus, his tricorder already open
and scanning, spoke, though he didn’t look up.
“This area of their ship is the
closest point of their ring’s interior to the Enterprise; I believe that may
have something to do with it. While the
physical structure of the ship seems relatively stable, we have witnessed them
literally alter its geometry and dimensions.”
“And yet…it’s in a state of flux,
just like the structures we discovered on the planet, and the crystalline
samples?”
Selorus nodded at Kanor, turning as
he continued to scan.
“Indeed. Chemical composition, temperature, density,
even…even molecular structure seems to change; though outwardly, there does not
appear to be a physical difference.”
Lars interjected, his voice thickly
accented, though not difficult to understand.
“How is that even possible?”
Selorus shook his head, looking up
at Kaz, his eyebrow quirked upward.
“I do not know.”
Kanor was surprised to see Kaz only
seemed to have a clipboard and stylus in his hand; he saw a tricorder along his
belt, but no weapons. Kaz seemed to make
some sort of notation on his clipboard.
“Alright, then, everyone, let’s
stay about four meters out from the wall at all times, and remember there’s a
ledge in the other direction just waiting for you to fall off of. And need I remind everyone our insurance
doesn’t cover hazardous falls? I don’t
think so. My team will go that way,
Skid’s the opposite. Skid, I’ll expect a
check-in fifteen minutes from…now.”
Skid tapped her tricorder display;
presumably to initiate a timer.
“Gotcha.”
“Just remember, the faster you get
my Girl free, the faster we can put HAL back under restraint.”
Skid snorted derisively as Kaz
turned to head off with his group, taking the lead beside the blonde security
woman. It wasn’t long before even their
light sources were out of sight.
“Alright, we’re headin off in the
following fashion. Kanor and I will have
point, followed by Ilara and Lars.
Ulric, Dago; you two bring up the rear.
First thing I see I think Lars and I can crack into, we’re stopping.”
“And make sure you keep an eye all
around; including above.”
Skid nodded in agreement to Kanor’s
additional comment, then, tricorder in hand and beeping steadily, she headed
off in the direction Kaz had indicated.
Kanor made sure to position himself on what he considered the outside of
their procession, between Skid and the yawning chasm he had nearly fallen
into. No telling what could come from
that direction, and this way he had more room to maneuver.
“I really have no idea what I’m lookin
for…I hope they have recognizable machinery.”
Skid was mostly paying attention to
her tricorder as she walked beside Kanor, though he noted she kept her left hand
on the butt of her phaser pistol when she wasn’t inputting directions to the
device. He wanted to draw his Varon-T,
but wanted to ensure both of his hands were free for his bat’leth.
“If it’s anything like the planet
we beamed down to, nothing really looked like machinery at all. My touch seemed to activate the door that led
down to that room, and Kaz is pretty convinced it was due to latent telepathic
ability mostly. I looked around, I
couldn’t even tell where the door disappeared or withdrew to, it was simply
just not there all of the sudden.”
“Well bugger…Ilara, you sensing
anything you can…I dunno, manipulate or something?”
“No…”
Kanor glanced behind them, where
the Ullian woman was walking slowly behind Skid. She seemed to be almost in a daze; eyes
unfocused, kind of shuffling along behind without really appearing as if she
were aware she was doing it, holding her phaser loosely. He shifted his gaze back forward, out into
the beam from Skid’s light and the fog it shown out over. He lowered his voice a little.
“Is she usually this…I don’t know,
catatonic?”
Skid shot him a sly smirk for a
moment.
“Tonad indicated they might be
pretty distant because of the duress they’d most likely be under. Remember, she doesn’t HAVE one of these nifty
thingies on her noggin.”
“It’s odd the Benders
haven’t…stopped by to say hello in any fashion yet. They must know we’re all here; if nothing
else, they have to sense Tonad and Ilara.”
Skid shrugged, directing the
tricorder around as she glanced upwards.
“Enjoy it while we can,
Youngblood. Maybe they haven’t, maybe
they’re preoccupied with something else.
Hell, maybe this is actually an empty ship and you killed the last
one! What matters is getting what we
came here for; if the Bendies want to stay out of our way while we do that, I’m
not going to complain.”
They continued for a while in
silence, without any interruption or change in the design of the corridor, best
as Kanor could determine. Skid would
occasionally shine her light directly at the wall, or reach out and touch it
for a bit while she studied her tricorder as they moved, but she gave no
indication she was getting much from the device. They checked in when Skid’s alarm went off,
and received the news that Kaz’s group was encountering pretty much the same;
although his team had discovered a small viewport in the wall that showed the
Enterprise off in the distance, still entangled in those cables inside the
now-spherical bubble of the Bender’s ship.
“Proceed as planned, report back,
same time. Kaz out.”
Kanor looked over at Skid as they
continued from where they had stopped to rest.
She still had her tricorder out, and was frowning down at the screen.
“Still no change?”
Skid shook her head, making a noise
in her throat.
“Not a damn thing. I can tell ye roughly where we are in their
ship in relation to the Enterprise-it would appear we ARE moving along through
the original ring area of the ship we initially observed-I can detect the
atmosphere is breathable, our lifeforms, and the lifeforms of Kaz’s party. I’ve even managed to determine there seems to
be some sort of…energy collection going on in the wall beside us. It seems responsive to light and heat.”
Lars chimed in from a few meters
behind Kanor, close to Ilara’s left side.
“It hard to be certain, but I think
ze wall is designed to absorb energy from ze outside, as well; ze area facing
ze Enterprise.”
Kanor looked at Skid with
understanding.
“That’s why you were doing that…”
“Yup, but I can’t figure out what
it’s doing with that energy or HOW it’s absorbing it; I can’t even determine if
it’s siphonin the Enterprise somehow we just haven’t picked up yet. The entire wall seems to soak it up and
redistribute it evenly until it fades away, though. Still no luck findin any sort of blatant devices
or machinery itself. You said you just
touched the floor on the planet and the door appeared…?”
“Yeah, all I did was touch it. I mean…I suppose I did kind of…I don’t know,
envision a door right where it appeared before it appeared…? I guess I never really thought about that,
but I did, subconsciously.”
“Ilara, can you maybe focus on
envisioning some sort of control panel or something right about…oh, in front of
my hand here?”
“No…”
“Ilara, do you love Jax?”
“No…”
Skid stopped in her tracks,
whirling around as she drew her phaser pistol and crouched down slightly, her
left leg out in front of her right.
That was also about the time Kanor
heard a phaser go off right behind him.
He spun around, his bat’leth at the
ready in front of him, his stance shifting to present a narrower profile to an
attacker, only to see the giant hairy human Lars tumble to the deck like a felled
tree. Ilara, demonstrating a feat of
acrobatics Kanor wouldn’t have expected from an Ullian scientist, was in the
process of leaping over the falling engineer; her body gracefully contorting
and spinning within the horizontal plane mid-air so that she would land feet
first on the other side of Lars, her body facing the wall. He saw Dagoberto and Ulric bringing their
phaser rifles to bear upon Ilara, but shouted out to them even as he shifted the
grip on his bat’leth in preparation.
“Hold your fire!”
He bent his right knee, dropping
the arch of his swinging right arm he had put force behind for a quick blow.
The curved outer tip of his
bat’leth sliced through Ilara’s legs about mid-calves, as she was in the middle
of immediately flipping back away from where she had landed on the other side
of the fallen Lars. Twin arcs of liquid,
presumably the Ullian’s blood, trailed through the air momentarily before Kanor
watched her disappear amidst the fog, along with a solid whump.
“Dammit, Kanor!”
He ignored Skid as he charged
forward to where Ilara had disappeared in the fog, finding the fact she hadn’t
made a sound upon being struck odd. He
found her soon enough, the bleeding and apparently disabled woman using her hands
to frantically pull herself along the floor towards the chasm. She tried to fire her phaser at him as he
closed in on her, but he was able to kick the weapon out of her hand before she
got a bead on him. It clattered off into
the fog, the sound echoing more than it should have as it grew fainter. He must have kicked it off of the ledge,
which had to be close. He bent down
against Ilara’s back, his knees pinning her to the deck.
“I’ve secured her!” he shouted,
looking over his shoulder.
Skid was crouched beside the spot
Lars had gone down, Dagoberto and Ulric on either side of her, looking towards
him while warily keeping an eye along each direction of the corridor. Skid’s mane of flaming red hair tossed
through the air as she looked up at him, her emerald eyes blazing.
“Did ya have te bloody fookin CUT
her?!”
Kanor scowled.
“She was going to get away unless I
acted immediately; probably suicidally so!”
“I COULD have stunned her if ya
weren’t in the damn way!”
“And we have no idea if she would
have truly been stunned and stopped, in her current state.” He paused a beat, his jaw tight. “What about Lars?”
Skid made a sound of agitation as
she stood back up.
“Just stunned, he’ll be fine. You two stay here.” She stalked over to where Kanor was keeping
his weight on the struggling Ilara, who still hadn’t uttered a word. Kanor noticed Skid’s hand was still holding
her phaser pistol, ready to fire. She
had reholstered her tricorder at some point.
“Ilara, are you okay? Talk to me, darlin.”
The Ullian didn’t respond at
all. Her eyes, wild-looking, shot back
and forth from Kanor to Skid rapidly.
“How did you know something was
wrong with her?”
Skid’s lips were tight as she
crouched down on Ilara’s left side, opposite Kanor.
“She hasn’t said a word other than
‘no’, in that same tone, since we’ve beamed over. She’s also had a huge crush on our beloved Helm
Jockey for as long as I’ve known her.
The Benders must have overwhelmed her mental defenses.” She shifted her position, slipping the phaser
into her holster as she pressed her hands against Ilara’s shoulders. “Let her up so we can turn her over and I can
see what you’ve done to her.”
Kanor frowned at the accusatory
tone of Skid’s command, but did as she instructed, helping her turn the struggling
Ullian over onto her back, then pinning her down again so Skid could examine
her. Ilara was still struggling to free
herself from their grasps, though her efforts were weakening. She still hadn’t said a word, not even a
sound of pain, even though blood was pooling under her rapidly.
“Dammit, Kanor, you did a number on
her…”
“I believe, given the assumption
the Benders are in control of her body, they’re unable to communicate
verbally. It must be a completely
foreign concept to them.”
Skid looked up from the tricorder
she had pulled out again as she examined Ilara with a strange expression on her
face, aimed at him. She shook her head,
then glanced over at Ulric as she holstered the tricorder again.
“Ulric, get over here.”
The security guard came over,
looking at Skid attentively.
“Put pressure on her legs…here, and
here.”
Ulric did as she instructed, then
Skid took a deep breath and closed her eyes.
Kanor’s eyes slid over to look at her more specifically, wondering what
the redhead was up to, when she reached her empty hands out and placed them
against the Ullian’s wounds. A soft,
green light seemed to come from underneath Skid’s hands briefly, then it was
gone.
“What the hell…?”
Without responding to Kanor, Skid,
her eyes still closed, reached into her toolkit, withdrew a sharp instrument,
and proceeded to rip off the bottom edge of her uniform tunic. Kanor, his gaze dropping to study Ilara’s
legs intently, noted the blood flow seemed to have stopped; in fact, though he
couldn’t be sure from this angle, her wounds looked partially closed, even.
“How the fu…”
“Shut up. Soon as I’ve wrapped her legs, I’m sending
Ulric and Dago back to the beam in point with Lars and Ilara.”
Skid looked paler than usual, and
her voice sounded suddenly weary.
“What was that green shit; did you
HEAL her somehow?”
“I had to stop the bleeding, but
she still needs proper medical attention, and Lars is going to be out cold for
a while. We’re not turning back.”
Kanor realized abruptly Ilara had
stopped her resistance. When he tore his
eyes away from Skid, who was cutting her tunic into strips for makeshift
bandages, he saw the Ullian’s eyes were closed.
He tentatively shifted a hand to press against the side of her neck,
testing for a pulse. It seemed weak for
a Ullian, but it was still there. She
seemed unconscious.
“Ulric, you and Dago can carry
these two back to the beam-in point no problem?”
Ulric seemed a bit insulted.
“Of course, sir.”
Kanor didn’t like it, but saw no
other option.
“Keep your weapons drawn and ready,
be prepared for an ambush. Is your
phaser set to stun?”
Ulric looked at him quizzically.
“Sir?”
Kanor reached out, took the
security guard’s phaser, checked the setting, and promptly turned to shoot
Ilara in the chest at point-blank range.
“Was that REALLY necessary?!”
Kanor glanced over Ilara’s now
certified unconscious body at Skid as the engineer was wrapping the Ullian’s
legs as best as she could.
“An assurance to make sure our
unconscious enemy was truly unconscious?
Yes, that was quite necessary.
Always double shoot.”
“Ilara is NOT our enemy, she’s our
friend!”
“Possessed as it seems like she was
by the Benders, she is our enemy.”
Skid’s teeth flashed as she scowled
at him darkly, but she didn’t respond further, and simply finished securing the
bandages to Ilara. Replacing her gear,
she looked Ilara over, then stood up.
Kanor, who had kept a hand against Ilara’s shoulder this whole time,
even after shooting her, reached out for his bat’leth, which he had left on the
deck beside him, and got to his feet as well.
Skid’s midriff was now bare, which Kanor found exceedingly alluring,
despite the situation.
“Ulric, Dago; take your charges and
double-time it back to the coordinates as best as possible. Check in every ten minutes and when you
arrive.”
Skid shot Kanor a glare as Dago and
Ulric settled Lars and Ilara over their shoulders, got to their feet, and began
heading back the way they had come at a quicker clip, their phasers drawn. She withdrew her communicator, the device
chirping as she flipped up the grill.
She sounded tired.
“Skid to Kaz.”
There was no response, so Skid
repeated her page as her brow knitted together in growing concern.
“Skid to Kaz, respond please.”
The sounds of phasers came through
the speaker of her communicator, as well as sounds of Kaz’s communicator being
jostled, before the Commodore responded finally.
“Just a sec!”
Skid’s eyes met Kanor’s over her
communicator as the clear sounds of a fight came through, Kanor desperately trying
to distinguish what sounds belonged to who and what could be going on over
there. More jostling noises, more phaser
fire. The sounds seemed to die down for
an extended moment, only to be followed by a strange sound that caused both of
their eyebrows to rise and the transmission to crackle and snap erratically. There were a couple more solitary phaser
shots, the odd sound and its effects on the transmission were repeated again a
few seconds later, then a brief silence.
“Who the fuck was that?! Selorus, check on her to make sure she’s
alright. Amanda, report!”
They heard a breathless female, the
blonde security guard who had been at the front of their team with Kaz, shout
off from afar.
“Tonad secured, sir! Rej…Rej is gone.”
Several explicatives spewed from
Kaz’s lips, followed by a deep exhalation.
The communicator jostled again.
“Skid, what is Ilara’s status?”
“That’s why I’m calling, sir. Ilara seemed…affected by the Benders. She attacked us, Kanor…immobilized her, but
not before she stunned Lars. I’ve just
sent Ulric and Dago back to the beam-in site with them both. Ilara needs medical attention; can Marcie
meet them back there? And what the bloody
hell is going on?”
“Sounds like the same. Tonad randomly attacked Marcie, ripped the
telepathy nullifier from her head, then…”
Kanor interrupted, his grip
tightening on his bat’leth, the leather grips creaking.
“Is she alright?”
“…she screamed and collapsed on the
deck clutching her head. She seems
unconscious at the moment; Selorus is checking up on her. Some…individual appeared in a flash of light
and crouched over her for a few seconds, but they’re gone again.”
Skid jumped in.
“An ‘individual’? One of the Benders, one of our own…?”
“Neither, far as we could
tell. They were humanoid, dressed all in
black, but we were still trying to subdue Tonad. Amanda and Selorus got off some phaser shots,
but they didn’t seem to connect. Rej
fell off the ledge into the chasm during the struggle with Tonad.” He sighed.
“Stay where you are; going to assess the situation and call you back.”
Skid’s frustration showed on her
face, but she kept it out of her voice.
“Understood.”
Skid closed the communicator
grille, growling.
“This doesn’t make any fookin
sense!”
“I agree. We’re on their ship, and yet we’ve yet to see
a single Bender. Why haven’t they
attacked us?”
Skid snorted.
“Tonad and Ilara weren’t enough for
you?”
Kanor’s brow furrowed and he shook
his head.
“That seemed more like spying than
anything else. If the Benders broke
through their mental defenses shortly after we arrived, why didn’t they do
something sooner?”
Skid frowned as she mulled that
over, her right hand reaching up behind her head, followed by a quick burst of
sound as she popped her neck. Her left
was still clutching the communicator.
“Ya know, even when she was
discovered, Ilara seemed more intent on escaping than actually attacking us…”
“But why? She had the element of surprise; she could
have easily taken out the both of us before the rest of the group reacted. We’re on their turf; they know this ship a
hell of a lot better than we do. Why
aren’t they doing anything about us helping ourselves aboard?”
“Either they can’t, or they
won’t. Both of which lead to
‘why’.” She glanced over in the
direction of the gaping chasm, obscured by the fog pooled over the deck. “It sounded like Tonad was making a beeline
for that drop off, too.”
“The only real avenue of
escape. We’d follow them if they ran
down the corridor either way; if they attempted to scale the wall, they’d be exposed
to us, and we could potentially follow.
Which only leaves that way.”
“Which would seem to imply it’s not
as bottomless as it seems; there’s gotta be something down at the bottom.”
“At least they would know where
they’re going, however; we don’t.” Kanor
briefly considered having Cypher ping the Bender ship, since they aliens knew
they were there. It would mean revealing
Cypher’s presence, however; not only to the Enterprise crew, but most likely
the Benders, and the HAL unit in control of the Enterprise currently. All of which Kanor wasn’t comfortable doing
at the moment. “What about that other
figure who appeared?”
Skid strode over to the wall as
they talked, putting away her communicator to withdraw her tricorder
instead. Her lips were tight as she began
scanning the wall again, this time reaching out her right hand to touch it
experimentally.
“No idea. Scans showed we were the only ship inside
this…cocoon the Benders have put the Enterprise in. There haven’t been any lifeforms other than
ours this entire time on our scanners.
Kaz said it was humanoid, though.”
“Someone else on the ship,
then? Or someone from outside the
Bender’s sphere? Is the Independent
sending backup?”
Skid grumbled, shooting Kanor a
glance over her shoulder.
“Does it look like I know,
Youngblood? I can’t even find a bloody
power outlet on this damn scow!” She
punched her hand against the wall, closing her tricorder with a loud clap. “Kaz sent out a distress call; there should
have been some ships on standby, but even if they’re out there, we can’t
contact them. The Bender ship cut us off
from the outside as soon as it closed around us, you know that.”
Kanor, who had been keeping an
attentive eye around them as Skid attempted, again, to get some sort of
information from the Bender ship; glanced at her as she slammed her tricorder
closed.
“Sorry, I tend to…speculate aloud
sometimes.” He pursed his lips, his eyes
shifting to sweep over the expanse of wall.
“How about…”
Skid’s communicator chirped just
then, Kaz’s voice sounding out in the cavernous corridor; muffled, like
everything else, by the fog around their lower legs.
“Skid here.”
“Change of plans. I’m having trouble reaching Bennet aboard the
Enterprise, though HAL assures me transporter functions are perfectly operational. Rej was…unrecoverable. My team and I are heading back to the beam-in
site. We’ve re-affixed the Bender
nullifying device on Marcie, but she still appears unconscious. We’re going to leave Marcie and Tonad with
Dago and Ulric, who are going to beam back aboard the Enterprise, while
Selorus, Amanda, and I meet up with you and Kanor. We’ve got to secure a way to free our ship.”
“Agreed. Kanor and I are still working on it, without
success.”
“Keep at it. We’ll be there as soon as we can, don’t leave
that area. Kaz out.”
Skid sighed as she closed the
communicator and replaced it in her holster.
“Well, I suppose it’s time for us
to memorize every nook and cranny, we’re going to be here a bit. And I don’t have the slightest idea what else
to do, other than start firing.”
Kanor couldn’t help but grin at
that.
“As much as I would love to do
that, I had a different idea we haven’t tried yet.”
“Oh?”
Kanor guided the bat’leth behind
his back and secured it with the straps there.
“Why don’t I give it a try? Touch the wall and try to summon us up a
control panel of some kind or something.”
Just like the subterranean room on
the planet, Kanor was able to cause a reaction from the wall as soon as his
skin came into contact with it. He held
the glove he had taken off in his left hand as he fanned the bared fingers of
his right against the weirdly textured surface.
It was surprisingly warm.
“Bloody hell, would ye look at that…”
Skid murmured.
Kanor had closed his eyes, trying
to call forth some sort of panel by picturing it in his mind. He heard Skid activate her tricorder beside
him; heard her breathing accelerate in pace, her excitement evident even with
his eyes closed. His brow drew closer
together as he struggled to keep that mental image sharply focused in his head,
not really sure what he was accomplishing, but assuming it was something, based
off of Skid’s uncharacteristic silence.
It didn’t last long.
“You’re doin it, Youngblood…not in
any language I recognize, but I’m not going to be picky…”
Skid’s tone was hushed, almost
reverential. She was leaning in,
reaching past him to manipulate whatever had been formed from the wall. His nostrils flared as he caught a whiff of
her wild, earthy scent…the smell of a forest after a hard rain. The tricorder beeped along far to his left; Skid
trying to take as many readings of the phenomena as she could, most likely, even
while she was fiddling with the wall in front of him. There was a distant, thunderous booming sound
far off in the structure, followed by a tremor passing through the deck plating
Kanor felt through his boots, and an almost vibrational hum that made the hairs
on the back of his neck stand on end.
“Well, I don’t THINK that was me…”
A sweat abruptly broke out on Kanor’s
forehead, though he wasn’t really sure why.
Something seemed…wrong, somehow.
From the Bender ship…?
“Quickly, Red, something…something
isn’t right.”
Skid muttered an unintelligible
string of curse words, and he heard the tapping of her fingers in front of him
pick up in pace. Her tricorder stopped
beeping as she closed it, the casing scraping against the material of the
holster.
“Even I can’t really make heads or
tails over this blasted thing…!”
That thunderous boom again, from a
different direction this time; and again with the tremor, again with the hum.
“Dammit all to hell!”
Kanor felt Skid’s body shift beside
him, then heard and felt a meaty thud against the wall in front of him. The wall seemed to ripple outwards around his
hand. Had she punched it…?
“Well THAT seemed to cause some
blinkin…”
“Kaz to Skid!”
Kanor growled, starting to
distinctly feel his pulse hammering within his skull.
“Skid, I’m not a telepath, I can
NOT keep this up…!”
The beeping sound of Skid’s
communicator as she flipped it open.
“Skid here; make it fast,
Commodore, we’ve got…”
“She’s free, Enterprise is free!”
Skid let out a loud, exuberant
noise, her hand reaching out to clap him on the back.
“Way to go, Ka…fuck!”
Kanor sensed something about the
same moment as Skid’s exclamation was uttered.
His head flew upwards, and he found himself staring into the eyeless
gaze of one of the Benders directly above him.
Its mouth flew open in a soundless scream, and then Kanor felt talons
just pierce his flesh through his light armor as he was yanked up off the
floor.
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