A/N: This is a re-write of a story I did a while back.
I decided to submit "the Silver Bird" to a contest on a website called Inkitt, after touching it up a bit. However, the "touch up" expanded into almost a re-write, as there were a lot of things that needed fixing and ironing out. It wound up needed so much attention that I couldn't get it into the contest on time, so I held back another month to submit it to the next fanfic contest. (I've no intention of winning, though; if I did, I'd be submitting a story based on a franchise more people are famliar with.)
If you've read the old version, this one will read pretty much the same, but with a few new scenes, and changes in details. Think of this as "The Silver Bird: Director's Cut."
I do not own "Star Trek: Voyager."
Parts of San Francisco were almost as busy at night as it they were by day. Even at one-thirty in the morning, Harry had to weave through a maze of busy streets and brightly lit buildings until he found the quiet alley where his contacts would meet him. He was the first one there. Harry wasn't a guppy (whatever his associates said) but this was the first time he'd arrived in a situation like this alone. Had he been a smoker he would have lit up a joint to calm himself, but Harry liked to take care of his body. So he merely leaned against the wet brick wall, and dropped his hands into the large pockets of his trench coat, feeling the pistol he'd brought. His fedora did little to protect his face from the misty drizzle that sprinkled San Francisco tonight, but Harry didn't mind. It was kind of relaxing. For a few moments, he lost himself in the glistening puddles and the distant sounds of cars.
A choked rumble exploded in Harry's ears, and he jumped back just before an ancient Chevy screamed into the alley. Pressed flat against the damp brick wall, Harry stared as the old car sped past, sputtered down to a stop, and slowly backed up, finally parking in front of him. The lunatic driving that thing should be arrested, Harry thought, if for nothing else, taking such poor care of his car. It was an ugly blockish thing from the '30s, missing one headlamp and in dire need of a paint job. When the door flew opened, Harry feared it would break right off.
Out of the car hoped a lanky white guy about his own age, with sand colored hair under a battered fedora. The driver was dressed much like Harry, but his coat was a lot rattier, and opened. Underneath, his suspenders were visible over his white shirt—not vest or suit top. Pinned to one suspender strap was what looked like the face of a rusted old wristwatch. The guy didn't even have a tie. As the driver swaggered over to him, Harry saw him drop a little bottle into an inner coat pocket.
The guy dipped his hat. "Evening, partner."
"'Partner?'" Harry repeated, keeping his hands in his pockets.
"Just got back from seeing a Western with a breathtaking blond," the guy bragged.
"Ah."
The driver glanced around the alley, before turning back to Harry. "Are you the man with the Bird?"
"No." Harry said. "I work for Indiana. I uh, assume you're driving the getaway car?" He eyed the old automobile dubiously.
"The one and only." The driver dipped his hat again.
Harry noticed a few funny trinkets stuck in the brim of the guy's hat: a Joker card, a winged U.S. Air Force pin, and a long pheasant feather missing chunks of its bristles. Harry wondered if there was any significance behind the items, or if they were just for show. He had a hard time believing this clown had ever served, but who knew; maybe he just was better at flying than he was at driving.
While Harry sized up the driver, the other man stared back, half-consciously retrieving the bottle from his coat and unscrewing the top. He and Harry continued watching each other, as he took an indulgent swig, before apparently realizing with embarrassment that he was drinking in front of a coworker.
Before either of them could react further, a sound made both men turn towards the opposite end of the alley, the driver's lips still on his bottle. The street lamp was casting the long shadow of a man in a thick coat coming up the stone street.
Stashing his booze, the driver called out into the night, "Hey Claude Rains, if you're the man with the Bird, you can get over here and cough it up."
The fellow who stepped around the corner redefined "ugly." His face was so scared that it looked like little more than a bumpy mess. Underneath his bowler hat, clumps of untamed gray hair stuck out in bizarre shapes that gave Harry the impression of a cartoon dynamite cloud. And it was hard to tell in this dark, but Harry could almost swear the man's skin was orange. Whatever drugs this freak was dealing, Harry decided never to get involved with them. The man's mouth was stretched into something almost resembling a smile, but not the welcoming kind. It was more the type that said I'm about to cut you.
"You're the men Indiana sent?" the gangster asked, in a sneering voice.
"That's right," the driver said. "Kitty Indiana paid me to pick up the Bird tonight. I assume Shortie here's got your dough." He thumbed over to Harry.
Harry threw the driver a look, unsure how he felt about the nickname, but decided to brush it off. "Yeah, I've got it." Harry rummaged through his pocket and produced a wad of bills. "Miss Indiana extends her highest thanks to your boss Mickey Kazon for your time, and cooperation."
The gangster reached for the cash, but Harry quickly withdrew his hand.
"Ah-ah-aaah," Harry extended his free hand. "First, we make sure the statue's genuine."
The gangster reluctantly opened his trench coat, and pulled out a bundle roughly the size of a football, wrapped in newspapers and tied shut with string. Harry took the package, and carefully undid the wrapping. The driver leaned over for a better look, treating Harry to his cold whiskey breath. Harry glanced over his shoulder, but the guy didn't take the hint. Harry made a face, and continued unwrapping. When he was done, he had to stop and stare for a few moments.
Harry had seen this statuette in photographs, but seeing it in person was something else. It was a slick silver sculpture, shaped like an abstract representation of a falcon in flight. At first glance, one might mistake it for some kind of space ship from a science fiction serial, like "Flash Gordon." The spread wings and tail feathers ended in sharp curved points, as did the beak. The bird lacked feet, its underbelly flat for sitting on a table or pedestal. Along its back, and cutting through its wings, were tiny stones of red, turquoise, and indigo, forming thin geometric patterns. Looked like something from Mexico, Harry thought.
The driver whistled. "Looks real to me!"
Harry momentarily pocketed the cash for the wild-haired gangster and fished out a quarter, which he tapped gently against the Bird. A distinctive ring echoed through the alley.
"That's silver!" the driver confirmed.
The gangster held out an orange hand. "If you please."
Harry put away the coin, and handed the guy his money. After sticking the cash in his pocket, the gangster continued to fumble around for a few seconds, and then his hand came back out with a pistol.
"And now, I'll be taking back that Bird."
Behind Harry, the driver gave a short laugh. Harry turned to see his comrade sticking his hands on his hips, inside his coat. "Am I going deaf…" and then the driver whipped out a gun of his own, aimed between the ugly gangster's eyes, "…or are you actually trying to rip off Kitty Indiana?"
In the few seconds the driver had the gangster distracted, Harry had time to draw his own pistol.
"Two against one," Harry warned. "I think you'd better just be grateful for what you were paid, and get lost."
"Two against one?" the gangster scoffed. "No, Chink. I think it's more like two against...six."
And as he was speaking, five more men stepped into the alley, weapons drawn. Two had Tommy guns, the rest sporting pistols or handguns. And they all looked like they were using the same drugs and hairdresser as the first fellow.
"Well," the driver laughed. "Since you put it like that."
He swiped the Bird from Harry, and swaggered over to the gangster, who smugly held out his free hand. But instead of giving the statue over the driver used it to smack the gangster's gun out of his grip. Harry winced as the driver let the statue clatter to the stone street, to free both hands so he could pull the gangster into a hostage position.
"Now beat it, all of you," the driver warned, "or he dies. Ah—!" he cocked his gun, stopping one of the other gangsters from going for the statue on the ground.
Harry quickly scooped up the Bird and checked to make sure it wasn't damaged. Looking up at the ambushers, he asked, "What's more important, your friend," he nodded to the man being held hostage, "or this lump of tin?"
The alley was silent.
The gangsters exchanged subtle glances. The one being held hostage widened his eyes in terror. Harry saw the driver squint and swear silently, as the gangsters' weapons came back up.
The driver hurled his hostage into the shooters just as the bullets broke out, then grabbed Harry's sleeve and yanked him down the alley, and into his car. Harry managed to pull the car door shut before any bullets got in, but both men had to press themselves flat against the seat as bullets began passing through the windows. Harry blinked, shielding his eyes from the falling glass. The driver stepped on the gas, and they took off with another deafening screech. Harry's stomach lurched as the driver launched them into a madcap race through a maze of brick buildings.
"Take my gun!" the driver yelled, as they tore around a street corner.
"What?" Harry's hands were still clasped over his own pistol, the silver statuette trapped between his knees. "I've got—"
"Use both!" the driver shouted, his eyes stuck fiercely to the road. "I'm driving!"
Harry was about to ask how five men on foot would catch up to a car anyhow, but was cut off by the sound of more shattering glass. Their enemies were behind them now, in a Volkswagen Beetle. Harry ducked just before the two Tommy Guns began pummeling the car with bullets.
Shit.
Harry didn't even bother rolling any windows down. With a gun in each hand, he leaned over the seat and began firing through the back windshield, wincing with every shot. He did most of his aiming with his right hand, the left serving more as a distraction. The entire time, his driver was taking the car all over the road, sharply swerving in and out lanes, as if he was trying to drive like a maniac. It made Harry dizzy, and his stomach was having a hard time keeping up. He squinted over the seat as he continued shooting, struggling to focus. How the hell did people in the movies shoot continuously like this without blinking? Harry managed to get one guy in the head, sending his machine-gun clattering onto the road. But that was it.
"Don't aim for the drivers," his new friend yelled. "Aim for the—"
The driver's voice was drowned out by another round of bullets from the remaining Tommy gun. After returning a few shots, Harry yelled back, "Aim for the 'highers'?"
"TIRES!" the driver hollered. "SHOOT THEIR TIRES! ON THEIR CAR!"
Harry understood, tried to take aim, and found he couldn't from this position. He frantically rolled down the window. He stuck his head and hand out, then quickly withdrew before another round of bullets burst forth. Watching through the back windshield, Harry saw the man with the Tommy gun pause, and check his weapon. Apparently it had jammed. Harry took the opportunity to stick his head back out the window, aiming at the other car's wheels. One of the men in the other car had the same idea. The two shooters locked eyes, and then the other man raised his pistol, aiming at Harry's face.
Before the shot went off, Harry's car swerved out of the way. And then he understood why his friend was driving the way he was. He was making their tires' movements impossible to predict. The remaining Tommy gun was now showering the street behind them with bullets, just missing their back wheels. Somehow, Harry's driver was managing to keep their car just ahead of the spray of lead.
They turned onto a main road, causing several pedestrians to jump back. One blond woman grabbed her face and screamed almost theatrically as the battling cars roared past.
After few more sharp corners and a close scrape with a trolley, Harry finally thought he had a shot at one of the enemies' tires…and neither of his guns would fire.
"I'm out of bullets!" Harry hollered.
"Good timing," the driver replied, taking them towards a dark tunnel. "Listen, when I say three, we both roll out! Don't forget the Bird!"
"What?"
"Trust me! On the count of—Get the Bird!"
Harry looked at his useless guns, then tossed them to the floor and scooped up the statue.
"On three. One…"
The car shot forward into the tunnel, which was pitch black. Weren't street tunnels supposed to have lights? Harry couldn't even make out his hands gripping the silver statue in front of him.
"Three!"
Harry felt a kick in his side, and he smacked into his door. He fumbled with the knob, and tumbled out onto the rock-hard street. Their car roared down the tunnel without them. Seconds later, he heard another engine scream past. Harry was in too much pain to try standing up. The arm he'd landed on was in agony, and the statue had stabbed him in the chest. Well, maybe "stabbed" was an exaggeration. But it had definitely pierced skin.
He felt hands on him, pulling him to his feet.
"You okay?"
Panting, Harry replied, "Well I ain't dead."
"Which is probably more than can be said for our friends."
Harry nervously followed the driver down the dark tunnel. After who knew how long, they finally saw the stars again. Harry almost waltzed right out of the tunnel, but his friend stopped him with his arm.
"Wait." The guy carefully led Harry against the wall, and they crawled to the edge of the tunnel. "Look."
Harry looked down. The tunnel was a bridge, and the bridge was incomplete. It was in the middle of construction. In the water below, both cars were sinking, and a few of their attackers were floundering in the water. A few of them.
"I suggest we go back the way we came," the driver advised.
Harry moved his head to nod in agreement. But as he did his supper, too, decided to leave the way it had come. Harry barfed for what seemed like a good thirty seconds, finally finishing with his new friend patting him on the back.
"Come on, we gotta get out of sight."
Harry let the guy lead him blindly back through the tunnel, tucking the statue under his coat. The trek back through the city was almost as nerve wracking as the car chase, with all the people at pay phones, and police cars already arriving at the scene. Harry was positive they'd get caught, but the driver steered him right passed the cops, who paid them no notice.
"My apartment's on the other side of town," Harry finally whispered. "I'm not sure how late the subways run."
"Mine is too. Don't worry, I know a place not far from here where we can lie low for a while. Friend of mine runs it. Chez Sandrine's. Ever heard of it?"
Harry shook his head.
"You'll—" the driver seemed about to say love it, but after eying Harry up one more time, instead finished, "you'll be okay there I think."
Chez Sandrine's was a small but classy bar, run by a female French immigrant who dressed like a man and refused to give up the makeup style of the '30s. The blond hostess poured drinks for her patrons in a pantsuit and a tilted top hat, eyes aglow under thin arched eyebrows, smiling with bow-painted lips.
"I always had a thing about the French," the driver said as he and Harry approached the counter.
"And the French always had a thing about you!" Sandrine lifted her top hat in greetings. "Tommy, aren't you going to introduce me to your friend?"
"Oh yeah! Sandrine, this is…."
Both the driver and Harry suddenly remembered that neither of them knew each other's names yet.
"Harry," Harry glanced at the man standing next to him. "I'm guessing you're name's Tommy?"
"Or just Tom. Either one works." h
Tom ordered two drinks from Sandrine for himself and Harry.
As the hostess left to fill their glasses, Harry whispered, "This is 'lying low?' Everyone here knows you!"
"Everyone here exists outside the law Harry," Tom whispered back. "We're here to drown our stress as much as hide from the coppers. Lighten up, meet some people."
After being introduced to "Gaunt Gary," "the Giggilo," "Strider," "Jimmy Hook-Hand," and all of their molls, Harry finally managed to convey to Tom that he wasn't especially interested in getting to know local gangsters, and Tom found them a table in the back corner.
"No offense," Tom said, starting his third drink that evening (not counting the whiskey in his jacket), "but you seem new to this business."
"I'm a bit sheltered," Harry admitted, glancing around the smoky bar. "Spending half your teenage-hood in an internment camp will do that to you."
"You're Japanese?" Tom asked. "I was gonna guess Korean, or maybe Chinese."
"I'm all kinds of things," Harry picked up his drink. The whiskey wasn't great, but Harry forced himself to take another gulp. "God, I hope my parents never find out about this. Especially my mother. It would kill her." He stared out the widow at the glowing city. "She wanted me to play the clarinet. I wanted me to play the clarinet! Or at least work in a garage or something. But who's gonna hire a Jap kid with no experience."
"Kitty Indiana?" Tom suggested.
Harry nodded. "Kitty Indiana. She hired me the day she met me, as a repairman and to play in her band on the side. My qualifications being—and I quote—'Why not.'"
The guy slammed his empty glass onto the table, and followed it with a short belch. "Beautiful story."
Harry stared down into his own whiskey.
"Well," The driver suddenly leaned forward, extending his hand to Harry. "Guess now's as good a time as any for a proper introduction. Tommy Chicago."
Harry had to crack a grin, because he used exactly the same kind of stupid alias. "Harry Kimitsu."
Tommy Chicago shifted in his seat, fumbling with something in his coat. "Well Harry Kimitsu, you've got one more qualification for Miss Indiana." He unpinned the watch face from his suspender. Up close, Harry saw it was an old Bugs Bunny watch, that looked like it hadn't been working in some time. "No one expects a little green guy like you to be such a hell of a shooter." Pinning the trinket to the brim of Harry's hat on the table, Tom finished, "The worst tricksters are the ones who look harmless."
With the warp core offline and the ship's systems on reduced power, the brightest light in Engineering came from the tiny screen on the console where the events in the holodeck were being displayed. Lt. Tom Paris and Ensign Harry Kim were chatting and drinking in "Sandrine's," oblivious that they were performing for a crowd. The Doctor watched pensively, with a holographic fist pressed to his face. Ensign Vorik, who stood at the controls of the console, exchanged a glance with the EMH. Behind them stood Lt. Miguel Ayala, the highest ranking security officer after Tuvok, and Ensign Samantha Wildman, the ship's xenobiologist.
"That was wicked!"
All heads turned to see two of the ship's youngest crewmembers, Naomi Wildman and Icheb, standing in front of the lifeless warp core.
"Naomi," Samantha's eyes jumped from her daughter to the former drone. "Icheb, where did you two come from?"
"We already had that talk," Naomi joked.
Samantha gave her daughter a look.
Icheb answered, "Naomi contacted me after you left your quarters, to ask if I was growing as restless as she was about the current situation. We agreed to investigate for ourselves."
"Why didn't you tell us the senior staff was performing for the whole crew?" Naomi asked.
"Because they aren't," the Doctor said. "What you just saw was not rehearsed. We have a serious situation on our hands."
Naomi's shoulders slumped. "A holodeck malfunction again?"
"It's not funny Naomi." Samantha snapped. "The safety protocols are off! They could've been killed!"
"They may still be killed," Vorik warned, "if we don't find a way to free them from this program."
"Or at least restore their memories," the Doctor added.
Lt. Ayala, as usual, said nothing. The security guard watched the panel with alert black eyes, avoiding participation in the conversation.
"Is this like that time we were all trapped in World War II France?" Naomi asked her mother. "Have they had their memories replaced by holodeck characters?"
Samantha's expression melted into something almost guilty. "Naomi, I keep forgetting that you're half-Ktarian. You're not gonna be a little girl much longer, are you." Glancing at the Doctor, the xenobiologist suggested, "You were there, Doc. You can probably explain it better than I can."
The hologram's eyebrows bobbed. "Well, you and your mother were in the Mess Hall earlier this evening when we were discussing Mr. Paris's new program, weren't you Naomi?"
"Yeah, but I didn't get the whole conversation."
"Then I'll summarize."
The Doctor left Sickbay at 1700 hours to meet the rest of the senior staff in the Mess Hall. It felt strange to see the place so sparsely populated; being denied the luxury of eating, the hologram normally only saw this deck during special occasions when the entire crew was crowded inside, or when he was called there during an emergency.
He was pleasantly surprised to find Seven of Nine behind the counter, with an apron over her sapphire-blue biosuit. Neelix appeared to be coaching her in making his famous Marsupial Surprise. Seven had taken up the culinary arts as a recent interest, which the Doctor had welcomed as a sign of the former drone finally embracing her humanity. But Seven's social improvements had recently taken a hit, when the Doctor had discovered the Borg "failsafe" device in her brain, a malicious piece of technology programmed to act as a firewall against certain emotions. From the way she was so smoothly working with Neelix tonight, one would never guess the turmoil she'd been through only weeks ago.
Not wanting to cut ahead in line, the Doctor occupied himself observing the rest of the mess hall. Near the back of the room, against the windows, Captain Janeway and Tom Paris were pulling tables together, for the senior staff's get-together. B'Elanna Torres was standing nearby, conversing with Harry Kim. This far into her pregnancy, it was no surprise the chief engineer wasn't being asked to help move the tables together.
"Doctor," Seven greeted the hologram from behind the counter.
"Seven!" the Doctor grinned. "I'm glad to see you decided to join us after all."
"Mr. Neelix appealed to my vanity, and I was forced to comply."
The Talaxian made an innocent face, chopping some long blue root. "All I asked was whether the Borg were as capable of inventing new recipes as they were at replicating ones in the database. I'd have never thought to add Brunali kel-cider to the Marsupial Surprise."
"I'm glad to see your away mission went well," the Doctor said.
"Oh, Seven was a huge help in finding edible plants on that planet. And we had a very deep heart-to-heart. I convinced her it would be a good idea to try socializing with the crew again. You know it was also Seven who saved my ship? A Talaxian freighter should normally have no trouble piloting through an M-Class planet's atmosphere, but ever since those Quarren inspectors practically disassembled her, the Baxiel just hasn't been herself. We almost got stranded in a dormant volcano, but Seven managed to remodulate the—"
"Yes, Mr. Neelix, Seven told me all about your adventures on the planet, during her follow-up exam."
"I find culinary preparation to be a great test of precision," Seven commented.
The Doctor made a face. "Just remember Seven, that the primary mission tonight is to exercise your social skills."
Seven didn't say anything right away, and when she finally did, it was to ask Neelix where she might find the Talaxian sugar.
The Doctor sighed, and resumed looking around the Mess Hall. Seven years and a photographic memory allowed the Doctor to recall every name and face he saw.
In one corner, stellar cartographer Jenny Delaney was helping Icheb with an Astrometrics report. The Doctor knew it was Jenny, by her green uniform; she and Megan were identical twins, and constantly changing their hairstyles, making their uniforms the only distinguishing factor from afar. And sometimes they'd switch colors just to prank people. The entire ship envied the Delaney twins, along with Sam and Naomi Wildman, for being the only crew members with a relative on board.
Over in the sitting area, Tal Celes and William Telfer were eating dessert. The Doctor tried to avoid Telfer's gaze, but the hypochondriac noticed him, and his brown eyes bulged. Tal quickly put a hand on his wrist. The Doctor couldn't hear what the Bajoran was telling her friend, but she was probably reassuring Telfer that the Doctor was just here for the senior staff's get-together, and not to diagnose him with some fatal disease.
The Doctor's gaze moved to a table near the center of the room, where Crewman Angelo Tassoni was in a deep conversation with Crewman Chell and Ensign Brooks. It was good to see the former Equinox officers finally integrating with the rest of the crew. The crimes they'd committed aboard the rogue Federation ship were now almost two years behind them, and all five of the Equinox survivors had proven their worth to aboard Voyager. The only thing the Doctor disapproved of now was the bubbling purple liquid he saw Tassoni sipping.
"Hey Doc," B'Elanna greeted, approaching the counter to pour herself a glass of Bolian necter. "Something wrong?"
"Your engineer, Mr. Tassoni. He's still drinking that ry'loth like a fish! I've told him numerous times, that energy drink is a power substance for the Klingons it was meant for. It should not be taken by humans except in the smallest of doses!"
"Believe me Doc, I've told him. It's a lost cause. Tassoni's a workaholic. All the Equinox five are trying to make up for what they did under Ransom's command. Gilmore did it by adopting the Borg baby, Lessing takes the nice-guy routine to maximum warp, and Tassoni does it by taking every shift he can get his hands on." B'Elanna shrugged. "What can you do."
Janeway, finished setting up the tables, joined the group near the counter. "Evening Doctor."
"Captain," the hologram nodded. "Are we just waiting on Commander Chakotay and Mr. Tuvok?"
"Seems like it." Janeway began pouring herself a cup of coffee. "Tom's going to explain the program in a bit more detail to us over dinner."
Samantha and Naomi Wildman were reaching the front of the line. The Doctor hadn't even noticed the xenobiologist and her daughter enter the mess hall. Naomi, having entered another growth spurt, now looked almost twelve. Many of the humans on board found it easy to forget that the half-Ktarian was less than six years old.
"You guys are trying that program tonight!" Naomi said excitedly. "It's another Tom Paris feature, isnt' it?"
"Yep," Tom said, joining the crowd with Harry Kim. "Me and Harry wrote it."
Harry cut in, "Well, 'wrote' is a loose term here. We did an awful lot of plagiarizing if you ask me."
"All art takes inspiration from somewhere else," Tom argued. "Anyway, it's set in Earth's twentieth century—"
"Like that War program we were all trapped in, by the Hirogen?" Naomi said, serving herself some Marsupial Surprise. "I still remember seeing out the attic window, all those Klingons fighting the Nazis—"
Tom was shaking his head. "No, no. This is post-World War II, America. No Nazis, no Frenchmen, definitely no Klingons besides my wife. This is what's called 'film noir.' Gangsters, detectives, femme fatales…"
"So this is sort of a test-run?" Samantha asked.
"That's right," Janeway blew on her coffee. "And we're the guinea pigs."
Naomi pouted, "Why can't I be a guinea pig?"
"Everyone will get to play the program," Tom promised, "But the senior staff's gonna test it out first. Actually, this is sort of an overdue celebration for getting into contact with Starfleet. Neelix suggested the senior staff do something together, and it's only taken until now."
The doors hissed opened, and Chakotay and Tuvok entered. For a moment, it almost looked as if two counterparts from a parallel universe had stepped into the mess hall. The commanders almost looked like their usual selves, wearing their usual uniforms, but Chakotay's hair was flattened and parted on the side, with some new streaks of silver on the sides of his black hair, and Tuvok sported a thin pencil mustache. Naomi and her mother instantly suppressed a giggle at the Vulcan's facial hair. Seven's eyes fixed on Chakotay, and for a moment the Borg chef stood frozen behind the counter, mid-chop. The Doctor feared, irrationally he realized, that her failsafe device might act up. Commander Chakotay invoked the most dangerous emotions for Seven of Nine.
Janeway simply raised an eyebrow. "I thought we weren't putting on costumes until after dinner."
"This is the first time I get to be a character in a program where I'm not the bad guy." Chakotay said. "Or brainwashed." He was referring to two long-passed incidents with the holodeck. "I'm going to enjoy myself dammit!"
"And you Tuvok?" Janeway asked her oldest friend on board. "I like the mustache!"
"The Commander insisted," was the Vulcan's only explanation.
"Is everybody here?" Tom asked. "And dinner's done? Let's eat! Come on Seven, Neelix. Off with the aprons!"
Naomi watched the senior officers curiously. "Who's gonna be the femme fatale?"
"Neelix, naturally," Tom called. "Tomorrow, Naomi. I promise!"
"Come on Naomi," her mother joked, "The senior officers want to be alone now. Don't want to spend time with us peasants."
The Doctor followed the senior staff to the line of tables. Seven was careful to pick a seat as far away from Chakotay as possible.
"So," Tom asked eagerly, "What are your characters?"
"Tom," B'Elanna smacked her husband's arm, "It's supposed to be a surprise!"
"Well just share a few hints," Tom urged.
"I'll be a club owner," Janeway said, "And Seven's going to be my lounge singer."
"That's original." Tom turned to Chakotay. "How 'bout you big guy? Let me guess, the Tattooed Terror, heavy weight champion?"
"Not a champion. Just an unknown underground boxer," Chakotay grinned.
The Doctor gave the first officer a disapproving look. His irritation increased when he caught Seven looking intrigued at the idea of Chakotay engaging in such a violent sport.
"If there are any medical conditions no one's made me aware of yet," the Doctor said, "now's the time."
Tom scoffed. "Doc, you've given us all checkups today! Don't you think you're being a little paranoid? We're just going to the holodeck."
The hologram was unperturbed. "Three people at this table still have some residual Borg technology in their systems from the Unimatrix Zero incident, that will take another full year to fully flush itself out. Something I shouldn't need to remind my assistant, whose wife is among them." Janeway and Tuvok exchanged a glance, while B'Elanna gave her eyes a small roll, and sipped her drink. "And if Seven is any indication, Borg nanoprobes can be unpredictable in freed drones. No offense, Seven. One of us is also pregnant, to say nothing of all the alien planets some of you have recently returned from."
Baffled, Harry asked, "What's any of that got to do with the holodeck?"
"Maybe Mr. Paris is right, and I am just being 'paranoid.' But it wouldn't be the first time an unexpected problem arose from the holodeck. After almost seven years on this ship, I can think of a number of possibilities. A hologram could get accidentally downloaded into someone's cortical node. An alien might find its way onto the holodeck and kill Ensign Kim again, or pray on Commander Tuvok's fragile Vulcan mind…"
"Hey now," B'Elanna pointed at the hologram, "Let's not start hurling racial insults Doc."
"I should warn you all," Tom leaned over the table. "This program's gonna have a lot of racism, homophobia, sexism, classism, and probably every other kind of –ism you can think of. It's the 1940s."
Chakotay shrugged. "Better than just pretending it wasn't there. The way some of these classics became classics was by addressing social injustices. I'd assumed you'd be taking a leaf out of 'Casablanca's' book."
Tom softly hit the table with his hand. "I knew I forgot something. I was gonna watch that movie, so I could work some references into the program." He shrugged, picking up his drink. "Ah, well. I can always tweek it later."
The captain stared at Tom. "You haven't seen 'Casablanca?' You're writing a film noir program, and you haven't..."
The Doctor muttered, "It's like someone who's never seen 'the Magic Flute'..."
"What," Tom asked, "is it now a crime not to see a famous movie? I could probably piece together the entire plot just from the quotes everybody knows. Girl walks into his jin joint, kid gets looked at, usual suspects are rounded up, they'll always have Paris, roll credits."
The debate over Tom's film repertoire continued for a good seven minutes, until someone finally managed to turn the subject to Seven and Neelix's recent away mission.
Less than two hours later, the senior officers were on their way to the holodeck, in full costume. Naomi and Icheb made sure to be standing behind a corner nearby, for a full view. The captain seemed amused by the looks she and Seven were getting as they clopped down the hall in their twentieth-century heels. The captain had given herself a smoky make-over, along with a red lacy eye-patch. Beneath her no-nonsense coat and hat, Seven looked as glamorous as she had when she'd "played" a lounge singer in the Hirogen's program. Janeway glanced at Seven with a lopsided grin. Seven returned the look with apprehension.
The rest of the crew was already there, most covered in coats from the era. The Doctor looked exactly as he had when playing the President of Earth in "Captain Proton," complete with the glasses. Tuvok was also wearing spectacles, and coupled with the thin mustache he might have been unrecognizable, if not for his Vulcan ears and eyebrows.
Chakotay's black eyes darted under his fedora, jumping between Janeway and Seven. "When I suggested an eye-patch I was joking, Kathryn."
"I know. But once you put the idea in my head and it got stuck there."
Chakotay's eyes moved to Seven, who avoided his gaze determinately. "You look good in earthy colors Seven."
The comment might have been a jab at the time the two had recently spent stranded together in a forest on an M-class planet. Seven's human eyebrow moved in an unreadable gesture.
"It's polite to say 'thank you' when you get a compliment," Chakotay nudged.
Almost meeting his eye, she said reluctantly, "Thank you Commander."
"Everyone ready?" Without waiting for a response, Tom keyed opened the holodeck doors.
The doors opened to a brick street in the middle of a brightly lit city. San Francisco, judging the iconic bridge off in the distance.
"So now what," B'Elanna asked, shaking out her red hat. "We just sort of wander around until the plot forces us back together?"
"Pretty much," Tom replied. "Shouldn't take long."
The Doctor watched Seven and the captain head down the road. As aesthetically pleasing as his pupil was in her costume, he wanted Seven to practice social skills on her own this evening. Turning in the opposite direction, the hologram decided to see if there was any high culture in this era. After less than five minutes, the Doctor's paranoid fears were confirmed, when he saw Neelix standing in the middle of the street, staring obliviously at the scenery.
"Neelix!" the Doctor grabbed the Talaxian by the shoulder of his coat and dragged him out of the street, just before a taxi came sputtering by. "I think you too two years off my program."
"I'm sorry Doctor. There's just so much to look at here! It reminds me of an era on Talax, our industrial revolution. But our cars looked a lot different. They only had three whee—"
Neelix suddenly cringed and doubled over, pressing a spotted hand against his temple.
"Neelix?" The Doctor hit his combadge. "Doctor to Transporter Room 1, beam Neelix to Sickbay!"
The Doctor instead found himself transported to Sickbay, with no sign of Neelix. Ensign Wildman, who was filling in for Tom and the Doctor, stared at the hologram, her hazel eyes moving from his brown hat to his glasses. The Doctor angrily slammed his hand over the combadge under his lapel. "Transporter Room 1! I said beam Neelix to Sickbay! Though I suppose I'll want to be here too."
"I'm trying sir," Crewman Marina Jor said over the comm., "But something's blocked off the entire holodeck."
"Then how did you beam me out?"
"I didn't. Your program was automatically transferred."
"Doctor to Security, get to the holodeck!"
The Doctor and Samantha waited tensely.
Finally, Lt. Ayala's voice came over the intercom: "The holodeck doors are sealed. My security code isn't working."
The Doctor's face fell, while Sam rolled her eyes.
Under her breath, the Xenobiologist hissed, "Why do we even have that goddamn holodeck?"
"…and here we are." the Doctor finished.
"So someone tampered with the holodeck then?" Naomi asked. "Or it's just a malfunction?"
Her mother folded her arms. "If the latter, it's a damn specific malfunction."
"Neelix reacted the way the senior staff did to the Hirogen's neural interface three years ago," the Doctor said. "Either the Hirogen's programming has somehow been reactivated by accident, or someone is deliberately using the same trick. And didn't want me interfering."
"Nor the safety protocols." Vorik reminded him needlessly.
"We can't get in," Samantha's eyes returned to the small screen on the console, where Tom and Harry were finishing off another bottle of whiskey. "They can't get out, we can't communicate with them. And from the looks of it, none of them have any memory of who they really are."
Naomi leaned back against the warp core railing, staring ahead pensively. "It is like France, then."
"France?" Icheb gave her an inquiring look.
"France." Naomi repeated. "I've told you about it before Icheb. The time the Hirogen took over Voyager, and trapped some of us in the holodeck."
Her friend nodded. "You and your mother believed you were fugitives, hiding with Neelix."
"We were Jews, hiding in out with a French Resistance member—Neelix. I was too young to really understand the politics of it. I just remember being so scared, because my friend got sent to a concentration camp—not a real friend, but you know, in my fake memory. Then the guy hiding us disappears, and we're on our own in that attic. And then, we hear this weird language out the window, and I thought it sounded like Scandinavian or something. But instead there's a bunch of Klingons in the street, chopping up Nazis with bat'leths! I didn't remember what a Klingon was at the time, because I was brainwashed, but it was still really cool. The whole thing just feels like a big weird dream now."
"A bad dream," her mother finished. "But at least that time the Doctor knew exactly what was wrong with us. This time…"
The hologram's frustration was beginning to show. "The ship is normally capable of scanning the crew's brainwaves from any location, but the shields around the holodeck are preventing us from accessing any information beyond basic observational footage."
Vorik began to remind the Doctor, "We've sent Crewman Jor to—"
"Yes Ensign, I remember what's transpired in the last twenty minutes. But the observations of a quasi-empath hardly hold a candle to a simple scan, in this case at least."
The Vulcan engineer tapped his combadge. "Vorik to Jor, report."
A soft feminine voice came over the comm. "Nothing, sir. I can barely sense anything even pressed against the holodeck door. All I've picked up was basic fear."
"The car chase," Icheb said unnecessarily.
Vorik exchanged a glance with the Doctor, then told the woman over the comm., "You may return to Engineering, Crewmen."
The Doctor urged, "We should tackle this one problem at a time. Focus your efforts on finding a way for me to scan the senior staff in the holodeck so I can diagnose what we're dealing with."
"In that time we might instead find a way lower the forcefields around the holodeck," Vorik argued calmly.
"With all due respect Ensign, I am a senior officer."
"But as a medic you are not a command officer. And unless someone knows Captain Janeway or Commander Chakotay's authorization codes, you cannot be transformed into the Emergency Command Hologram. Lt. Ayala is the default command officer in this instance. The decision is therefore his."
It took Ayala a second to realize that everyone was now looking at him. The security guard was an immensely reserved man, to the point that some crewmembers joked that he lacked the ability of speech the way his Vulcan superior lacked emotion. Ayala had taken command on occasion, but never before in a situation like this.
"Vorik," Ayala finally said, "is there any possible way to allow the Doctor to scan the senior staff's brainwaves, with main scanners down? We can watch them on visual after all."
Vorik seemed to give it some thought. "It's an intriguing puzzle. I only wish we had more time in which to—"
"Sir?" a Bajoran ensign, Tabor, approached the group. "We might be able to reconfigure the visual monitors to work like a medical tricorder. It would be tricky, but I think it could work. In the Maquis we built a lot of our ships up from junk, and we sometimes had to install old programs from one computer into another. But for this we'd have make adjustments to the medical tricorder's programming, so it'd be compatible with ship scanners."
Crewmen Marla Gilmore timidly joined in. "I remember a few tricks we sometimes used to use on the—on another ship I served on." It was obvious which ship the former chief engineer of the Equinox was referring to. "Tabor's idea could work, with some creativity."
Vorik arched one tufted eyebrow. "An ingenious proposal."
Ayala nodded to Vorik. "Let's get on it then."