Spirit Walk, Book Two Page 19

  Chakotay, you damn well better be all right, Tom was thinking. You’ve just got to be.

  Janeway’s thoughts: I think I’d know if you were dead. Hang on, Chakotay. Hang on, we’re coming for you.

  Chakotay realized that this powerful communication was largely one way. He could sense their thoughts, but they could not sense him.

  There was one more person he needed to check on—his friend Kaz. He brushed the mind of the Trill and for a moment was bombarded with thoughts—the thoughts of every one of Kaz’s hosts. But he focused, and it was easy enough to concentrate and home in on Jarem.

  Chakotay and Sekaya seem to be all right, Kaz was thinking. I just hope they have time to do whatever they need to do.

  “I’ve got to let them know I’m okay,” Chakotay said to Wesley.

  “Then do it. This is all so much easier than you think, Chakotay. You’re making it much harder than it has to be.”

  The young Traveler was right. Chakotay felt the reassurance, the calmness, and knew that his friends had received it.

  “It’s time,” he said, not knowing how he knew, but knowing that it was urgent.

  Wesley smiled. “Good luck, Chakotay. Maybe I’ll see you around.”

  Chakotay closed his eyes. He was ready now; each encounter had given him a gift of love, confidence, or understanding, and he knew he was, finally, mentally prepared to claim his heritage fully. He opened himself to the powers that came with the Sky Spirit DNA. He felt them flooding him, warming him, lending him strength and clarity and a power that came from a pure, strong, sweet source.

  He felt himself falling, but knew no fear; he was falling into his body. And when he bolted upright in Crell Moset’s lab, seeing the Cardassian and Kaz staring at him with open mouths, he realized he had not returned from his spirit walk alone.

  Beside him on the bed, body taut and alert, was an enormous black jaguar.

  Chapter 22

  AKOLO TARE HAD STARTED to move toward the conn when the storms first hit. She stumbled and clutched the railing. Tom cursed, but realized if it were him, he’d be doing the exact same thing. He’d want to get close to the conn, close to the pilot navigating the ship.

  “Hang on!” he cried, nodding his head in the direction of the chair. She surged forward and grasped the back of his chair. Probably better this way, he thought. If I bash my head against the conn, she’ll be able to take over.

  The storms were vicious. Kim had briefly filled him in about the Sky Spirit connection, and Paris had no trouble recalling the storm that had threatened to make them all stains on the back wall. They’d come very close to death that day, everyone on the ship. But at the last minute Chakotay had been able to convince the Sky Spirits that humans were peaceable creatures, that Voyager came on a friendly mission, not to terrorize and conquer. That was a legacy of the past, not the present or the future.

  But down on the planet were no peaceful aliens thinking they were simply defending themselves. On Loran II was a Changeling who had demonstrated that he was quite capable of cold-blooded murder, and who had no compunctions about using his technology against Voyager.

  Still, in the back of his mind, Tom thought that the storms weren’t quite as bad as he remembered. He was actually able to get through them, which was little short of a miracle. Bad, yes; manning the helm and navigating the vessel at the moment was hardly a walk in the park. But it wasn’t impossible.

  “Almost there,” he called to Kim. “Brace yourselves.” And indeed, it was quite likely the bumpiest landing he had ever made. Voyager thudded heavily onto the soil, rocking violently as she settled into position. Paris heard a thump beside him and saw that Tare had landed in a heap on the floor. She’d cut her head and blood matted her thick, dark hair.

  “You okay?” he asked, reaching down to help her up. Something flashed in her eyes and she recoiled—there was no other word for it—from his touch.

  “Yes, sir. Thank you sir, I’m all right.” Unsteadily she got to her feet.

  “Status report,” Paris ordered Campbell.

  “Damage reports coming in—there’s damage on decks four, eight, and two,” Campbell said. “Engineering reports the warp engine is off-line. Twenty-three injuries, four severe. They’re transporting to sickbay.”

  “Activate the Doctor,” Kim ordered. “Tell him to prepare to receive injured.”

  Tom had a brief disconnect. He was about to say, “The Doc doesn’t need to be activated anymore,” but realized that the new holodoctor was a slim, attractive African male with a gentle bedside manner, not the cranky, arrogant, balding, and beloved Doc he’d gotten to know.

  The thought fled before the more pressing need. “Lieutenant, I’m going to lead an away team. You’re to assume command of this ship until we get back.”

  Tom saw in his eyes that Kim wanted to lead the team. He was, after all, chief of security. But Paris out-ranked him right now, and he wanted Kim right where he was in case something happened out there. Kim, ever the good Starfleet officer, nodded. “Aye, sir,” he said.

  It didn’t take long for the team to assemble in the docking bay. Since Kaylar and Niemann had been part of the original away team, Paris asked them to join him. They’d know the layout of the place the best. Along with Ashton, the third-shift doctor, he figured that would be sufficient.

  He briefed them while they checked their phasers and equipment one last time. Tom had requested they all don special raingear and helmets equipped with goggles that provided infrared vision. The storms were still fierce, and their task was going to be hard enough without squinting in the rain. Ashton went a little pale at the mention of a Changeling, but her hands were steady as she checked her medikit.

  “Our primary mission is to get Kaz and Chakotay, if he’s still alive.” Which you’d better be, you…“It’s likely we’ll encounter resistance from the creatures. Phasers on stun; remember, these things were once human and hopefully will be again. We’re going to try to lock on to human and/or Trill life signs and head straight for them. Failing that, Niemann and Kaylar will take point position and lead us to the settlement where we’ll regroup and assess the situation. Any questions?”

  They shook their heads.

  “Let’s go.”

  The docking bay doors opened to gale-force winds. Tom lowered his head and pushed forward, trying to stay on his feet despite the buffeting and the torrential downpour. He was grateful for the protective gear.

  He was even more grateful for it when something loomed up ahead of him. Something big, and red, and moving really, really fast.

  Paris fired, and the creature fell to the ground. All around him, his team was emulating him. Still the things kept coming, and Tom started to taste fear in the back of his throat. Between the storms and the horribly mutated colonists attacking them, progress would be slow. How much time did Chakotay have?

  Kaz didn’t dare breathe as he stared at the big cat. It graced him with a quick glance, its lambent yellow eyes seeming to see right through him.

  Moset, too, stood stock still. Chakotay smiled. He seemed…different, somehow, to Kaz.

  “Don’t worry,” Chakotay said. “She’s with me.” He glanced over at Sekaya, lying still on the bed. “How is she?”

  “She’s fine,” Kaz said. “We’ve been monitoring her.”

  “What did you…how did you…” Moset, ever curious, began. Suddenly the black panther was on its feet, its hackles raised, its ears flattened against its head. A low rumble issued from its throat. It stared directly at the door, and both Kaz and Moset shook off their shock and refocused. Their eyes met and Moset nodded.

  “We’ve worked out a plan,” Kaz said, quickly telling Chakotay. Chakotay nodded. He turned to the beast that he had somehow brought back with him and their eyes met. Graciously, the big cat inclined its head. Silent as a shadow, it melted into the darkness behind a jumble of discarded equipment. Kaz and Chakotay lay back down on the beds and closed their eyes.

  This has to wo
rk, thought Kaz.

  Moset was excruciatingly nervous. He liked to operate openly, honestly. His work was never for nefarious purposes, but for the good of all. Now it was all going to hinge on how well he could fool his former friend.

  The big cat had heard the approach of Katal before any of the humanoids. Or maybe it’d sensed it, who knew. Regardless, now Moset himself could hear the sound of footsteps coming down the corridor. He realized his hands were shaking as he filled the hypospray with the medicine that would be their hope; his hands, which had operated on countless thousands—

  “Moset!” The Changeling wore the face of Andrew Ellis again. Moset knew the Changeling despised that face, yet he always reverted to it when tired; it took the least energy for him to maintain. “What are you doing? I thought you’d have everything ready by now. I brought some help.”

  Moset’s heart sank as he saw three of the creatures standing at attention behind Ellis. They obeyed him, they served him…they loved him. The Cardassian’s first thought was worry, that they might get caught in what was about to happen, but now he steeled himself against the wave of paternal affection that washed through him.

  They were made to be the Changeling’s creatures, not the Cardassian’s. Moset would simply have to regard them as casualties of war.

  He cleared his throat. “I know it doesn’t look like it, but I have been preparing for our departure. First, pick a form and let’s stabilize you in case we run afoul of anyone.”

  Frowning, the Changeling waved the hypospray away. “Get that thing out of my face,” he growled. “I need to be able to change, I’ve got a few more people to talk to.” He turned to the creatures. “Start taking equipment to the ship,” he told them. Obediently they lumbered to a corner.

  Ellis sighed. “Look, I know you hate closing shop like this, but it’s necessary. Let’s put these three in stasis and…”

  Moset followed the Changeling’s gaze and his innards clenched in horror.

  “Why are their restraints undone?” On the alert, the Changeling plucked his phaser from his belt. At the same time the creatures were acting strangely, hooting softly and staring at the corner.

  With a cry that really was almost sufficiently chilling to freeze blood, the spirit cat leaped from hiding.

  Chakotay felt like a toddler learning how to walk. The knowledge of so many things was now encoded in his body. All he had to do, he knew, was understand that code and use it. At the sound of Black Jaguar’s cry, he bolted upright. All of a sudden he was bombarded with power akin to his own—power that, he knew, came from beings who, like he, had Sky Spirit DNA.

  But this was as far a cry from the uplifting, invigorating, yet calming energy he had experienced on his spirit walk as could be imagined. For a moment Chakotay was paralyzed, gasping like a fish out of water as his mind struggled to make sense of the cloying, dark tendrils of insanity that closed upon him and threatened to drag him down.

  This, then, was what it was like to be “gifted” with Sky Spirit DNA when the receiver had no idea what it was all about. The colonists—for it was indeed they whom Chakotay was sensing—were lost indeed, and their powers were base and primal and all linked with the simplest of needs—survival.

  Fight it, Stone Keeper! came the voice of Black Jaguar in his mind, slicing through the haze of terror and confusion like a laser. Remember what you learned on your spirit walk!

  With an enormous effort Chakotay wrested himself free, at least for the moment, and saw clearly what was going on. Black Jaguar, manifested in this physical world as a physical being, was locked in battle with the three creatures who had once been human. He saw her muscles ripple under her glossy black pelt, saw her trying to fight and yet not wound, for she knew, as he knew, that they were not the real enemy, but tragic beings lost to darkness, perhaps forever. All four combatants had an aura about them that was quite clearly visible to him. Black Jaguar’s was a rich indigo hue, vibrant and clean. All three of the colonists emitted auras that were various shades of sickly yellow and muddy brown, shot through with angry red.

  I can see their souls, Chakotay thought with a rush of wonder.

  Slowly, as if he were moving through water, he turned and saw Moset dive for the Changeling, frantically trying to press a hypospray to Ellis’s throat. Chakotay knew that if Moset were successful, the Changeling would be locked for a time in true human form. And if he was human, he could be hurt. Moset’s aura was a color that ranged from a healthy, forest green to a putrid, rotting hue. Even the Changeling had one—inky black with hints of rust.

  Moset has done evil things, but he isn’t an evil person. But the Changeling is almost lost. Chakotay was surprised how much this mattered to him.

  Snarling, the Changeling blocked Moset’s clumsy attack with ease. He shoved the Cardassian back forcefully. Moset stumbled and his head struck the side of one of the beds. At once his aura shifted hues. Unconscious, not dead, Chakotay thought, somehow knowing that if Moset had been killed, the aura would have vanished.

  Out of the corner of his eye he saw Sekaya lying on the bed, not moving, but enveloped in a warm golden color that told him she was all right. Kaz, his aura shifting from blue-green to rust-orange and back, lunged for Ellis, wielding Moset’s chair. But the Changeling saw the Trill coming and darted out of the way in time. Kaz slammed into the table. Vials and other pieces of equipment went crashing to the floor.

  I’ve got to help them! Chakotay thought. He tried to summon the powers he knew lay within him. But there were so many clamoring to be used…and how did one grasp them…?

  Yes. This was how he was to use it. Just when he thought he’d captured one of the slippery things, the Changeling cried out, “To her!”

  Like creatures of a single mind, which in a sense they were, the colonists abandoned their attack on Black Jaguar and raced toward Sekaya.

  “No!” screamed Chakotay, reaching out with his powers in shock and desperation. He was too slow, too late to stop them. The mental blast he fired sent the huge creatures flying through the air, but not before one of them had leaped onto Sekaya’s bed and slashed her body with both powerful forepaws.

  The lovely golden aura that had swaddled his sister disappeared. Chakotay stared at the grisly sight of several gaping wounds across Sekaya’s torso.

  “Sekaya!” he cried. He jolted stubborn, sluggish limbs into action, tried to move toward her. Surely there was something he could do. But before he could reach her, Arak Katal was upon him.

  And it truly was Katal now, the familiar face from years past filled with hatred and a cruel amusement. Alerted by his heightened senses, Chakotay turned in time to meet the threat, roaring in fury. But even as Chakotay closed his hands over the throat of someone he had called “friend,” he realized his error.

  Katal wasn’t a full Changeling with all its attendant abilities, but he wasn’t a human, either. Chakotay couldn’t hurt him, hard as he tried.

  Only your thoughts and your spirit can cripple him. Black Jaguar lurked in the doorway, tail lashing, her eyes fastened on Chakotay. Yours, and that of those he has so cruelly abused.

  It was hard to detach from the heat of grief and fury; hard to cease trying to physically subdue his enemy and instead back off and try another tactic. But it was the only option Chakotay had.

  Still holding on to Katal, as much to protect himself, Kaz, and the still-unconscious Moset as anything, Chakotay gathered his thoughts. He leaped backward and issued a mental command. It was obeyed. Every item in the place that was not securely fastened down was lifted and brought crashing down on Katal. Cursing, the Changeling went down under the barrage of chairs, equipment, tools, and cabinets.

  But it would not hold him for long. Chakotay retreated into himself, ignoring the part of him that wanted to panic, wanted to somehow avenge the murder of his sister. He reached out instead to the chaotic minds and spirits of the colonists.

  This time he knew what to expect, and he walked inside their minds with no fear, but w
ith a deep compassion. In the swirl of emotions and thoughts given shape and color, he stretched out his thoughts and sent a message of calm.

  It’s all right. It’s all right. Remember who you were, who you still are. See yourselves as you once were. This isn’t a curse, it’s a gift, but it’s one you can refuse if you don’t want it.

  The swirls shifted hue. Curiosity, hope. Chakotay continued to urge them on. He changed his focus from Katal, trying to dig himself out as Kaz kept pummeling him with broken pieces of equipment, to the creatures who now stared raptly at him.

  “Attack them!” cried Katal. The creatures ignored him. They were engrossed by Chakotay’s thoughts, by the bright possibility he dangled before them.

  “Chakotay, look out!” Kaz’s voice pierced Chakotay’s deep state. He turned, again feeling as if he were moving through water, and saw that Katal had managed to find his phaser. His teeth were bared in a grimace of pure hatred. He lifted the phaser and fired.

  Everything slowed down. He saw Katal’s finger tighten, saw the yellow beam of phaser fire crawl from the opening. It crept toward him. Sudden, swift knowledge filled Chakotay. He didn’t have to obey the laws of the physical world if he didn’t want to. This phaser blast, this lethal stream of energy—it was nothing to him. Time and matter were his friends; they would obey his whims now. Chakotay did not move out of the way of the blast. Instead, he understood, really understood, that the only way this would harm him would be if he let it. He stood and watched as the phaser blast reached his chest, passed harmlessly through him, and blasted a hole in the wall on the other side.

  Kaz now moved to grab Katal’s hand, and Chakotay shook his head dazedly. He suddenly felt terribly weak. The colonist’s thoughts had changed from tentative queries to a bombardment. Without Sekaya to keep him anchored, he was beginning to succumb to the burden of Sky Spirit DNA as the colonists had done.