Chapter 2 – Two People
The search party staggered up the steep slope, drawing on their last reserves of strength to make it back to the camp.
Ayala ran towards the two men leading the small team. "Chakotay? Tuvok? Did you…?"
"We found Mort and Cavendish. We buried them," Chakotay said, his face drawn by fatigue and hopelessness. He turned away, his shoulders sagging.
Tuvok was feeling only slightly less drained than his commanding officer. "We searched the banks for many kilometres downstream until we were stopped by a large waterfall we could not negotiate. We saw no others. The devastation from the flash flood is substantial. It is conceivable the rising water levels have erased all signs of the Captain and young Wildman reaching the shore."
He did not see fit to add that the likelihood of anybody surviving the massive surge of water and detritus which had hit the campsite was very slim. The bodies they'd discovered lodged among broken trees the size of starship girders had hardly been recognisable.
"What have you done with them?" Chakotay shouted at the brown waters churning below the cliff, a few feet away from the two men.
Ayala made a move towards his friend, but Tuvok's strong hand stopped him.
"How is Ensign Wildman faring?" asked the Vulcan.
The younger man swallowed, then followed Tuvok's lead and left his friend to his sorrow. "Physically better. Kes has managed to bring her fever down, but she is very distraught, as is the rest of the crew."
The Vulcan nodded his understanding. It was unfortunate the Kazon had seen fit to strand the crew on an unknown planet with no medical help and no ship. It was in dreary circumstances such as those that the Captain's leadership and compassion shone the brightest. The crew needed Janeway's words of encouragement. He himself had drawn some of his fortitude from hers in the past three weeks. Her belief that Lt Paris would come back with help had never wavered, even when Tuvok had pointed out that the probability the pilot had escaped the Kazon ships and would get help was extremely low.
"I have every confidence that if somebody can pull off a miracle, Tom is our man," Janeway had said, while she and Tuvok were making their evening round among the groups of people huddled around small camp fires.
"Miracles are hardly a proven basis for good planning, Captain. Our knowledge and skills are what will help us through the days and weeks ahead," he had countered. "See this arrow that Mr Ayala made for me based on my instructions. It will fly true because of his expert technique and my knowledge of archery, not because we are hoping a miracle will propel it to its intended target."
Janeway took the arrow in her hand and lined it up with her eyes. "The craftsmanship is superb. The shaft is straight and well balanced. The four vanes will help stabilise its flight. I would have used three to reduce drag, but the result is the same. Weapons like these will see us in good stead over the days ahead."
She gave him back the arrow and excused herself. Putting her hand on a crewman's shoulder, she spent a few minutes thanking him for helping his companions during the day. Tuvok watched as the man's face lightened and his back straightened when they departed.
"However," Janeway said, making her way to another group, "there is more to survival than knowing how to light a fire, string a bow, or make a spear go further, old friend. And while you might be right that the odds are not in Tom's favour, I want to make it clear to everyone that we expect to be rescued and that we are not stuck here for the rest of our lives."
She turned towards him, out of earshot from others. "What the crew needs foremost is a sense of hope. Our job is to survive until help arrives."
On this note, she'd left him to seek Chakotay's advice on sending out scouting parties the following day.
While it was fitting of the Captain's character and will that she had disappeared, presumed dead, while attempting to save the life of their youngest crew member, it did not make the loss of both his friend and that of baby Naomi any less disquieting. The river had taken an exacting toll, leaving the survivors diminished in both numbers and spirit.
Now, four days after the flash flood, Tuvok watched as Chakotay contemplated the canyon they'd escaped by the barest of margin.
"Anything else to report?" the Vulcan asked Ayala who had been waiting at his side, his face forlorn.
"While you were away, we dried the meat from the animal carcasses we found and cleaned up their stomachs to carry water. We've also made new bows, and replaced the spears and some of the tools," Ayala said, adding, "it's getting cold."
The storm had heralded a turn in the weather. The hot days they'd faced during the first weeks of their sojourn had gone, the chill of the night now stretching well into mid-day. Winter was rushing at them like the flood which had grabbed their comrades.
Crew members were approaching, having heard of the return of the last rescue team.
"What are your orders, Commander?" Tuvok said in a loud voice.
Chakotay unclenched his fists and breathed in slowly. He had held up hope over four frantic days of searching for any flash of red over black, his eyes alert to minute clues the Captain and the baby had made it alive. But now the time had come for the decision he had so far avoided.
He knew what Janeway would have done. What she had done every time this planet from hell had taken one of their own away — Hogan killed by that beast in the caves, Smithy and Arkantel who had fallen into a lava flow. She had made it clear that the crew would not be split up. That despite their losses, they would remain together to look for for a better place while waiting for a rescue.
Taking off on another search which might well last for many more days or even weeks would leave the others too vulnerable in this treacherous land. His job was to stay with the crew, but asking them to remain in this desolate place was no longer an option. His duty lay south, away from the river, away from the woman he had come to regard as a part of himself.
He walked back to the men waiting for him. "We'll move out tomorrow morning."
"The Captain is resourceful," Ayala said quickly. "If she and young Naomi are safe, she might return here. We should leave signs at regular intervals to indicate where we are going. In any event, we will be travelling slow and she might catch up with us."
Chakotay said nothing. After finding the other two crew members, their corpses bloated and torn apart, all he had wanted to do was to save her body from rotting under a foreign sun. He had not even been able to do that.
He was the last to leave the dreaded place, committing the surroundings to memory before turning around, following the dust raised by the one hundred and thirty people who counted on him. His eyes doggedly surveyed the chain of smouldering mountains stretched along the far south.
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The woman hobbled, tracking the group of people who had taken the baby from her. They left plenty of signs of their passing: upended rocks, footprints in the mud, the sharp smell of stale urine where they relieved themselves. She saw all those and trudged past.
Her world narrowed to the sound of shuffling feet onto gravel, the feel of the rain on her back, the hunger at her heels. From time to time, she stopped, eyes closed, hands tightening around the solid staff she'd found thrust in the sand at her side, mornings before. The skull-splitting nausea faded away to a low throb, and her eyes re-opened, reflecting the daze of her mind. Except for shadowy images she did not understand, finding the baby was the only goal that ruled her thoughts.
By the time she stumbled into the natives' empty camp, it was early afternoon. She found half a burnt fish among the cold coals and devoured it eagerly. Then she hoisted herself up and walked some more until dusk then night came, and soon she could not see beyond her hand.
Exhaustion and pain led to an uneasy sleep, fragments of black and red clothing and grey smooth walls pervading her dreams. A face lingered, worried dark eyes with charcoal markings on the side of the forehead. Wisps of a name came to her lips, but it was gone from her mind when she woke up, shivering.
She was on her way by dawn.
The family group was moving slowly south-west, she noted without analysing where her knowledge came from. She followed in their footsteps. She lived, she walked.
Every day, the coals of the camp fire she came across were a little warmer. She ate the overcooked roots and charred meat from among the refuse, picked up an abandoned shawl with more holes than thread. Discarded skin of small animals became footwear to replace boots she did not remember losing in the river. She collected sharpened stones rejected by their makers, building herself a small trove of tools.
Her chest healed, and the head wound stopped weeping. The dizziness abated, although headaches still blindsided her from time to time, churning her stomach.
She started to put some weight on her injured leg. At first, she had to rest every few steps, the harsh pain a reminder the break was too new. But soon only a marked limp gave any indication the bone was not healing straight.
The urgency to see the infant took over and she hurried. The baby was her responsibility even as the others, the ones she'd been following seemed to have better catered for its needs. She wondered if she was even its mother, her body giving no clues she had given birth or fed a baby recently. When prodding her past, she repeatedly bumped against walls of deep fog, blind beyond the past few days.
One late afternoon, she paused at the top of a low hill, the setting sun illuminating the vast plain at her feet. The light wind carried the smell of cooked meat and a thin band of smoke revealed where the group had settled for the night. She had caught up with them after long days walking alone.
They stared as she limped into their camp. The two women moved behind the man who had held her down many nights before. He picked up a spear and let out a challenge, his wide chest thrust forward. She held her ground.
The elder man put his hand on the spear, pushing it down while berating the younger male. He then walked towards her, arms opened and empty handed. When he reached her, he shook her shoulders, grinning. Sounds flowed out of his mouth and wrapped around the woman's head. She took no notice of them, oblivious to their meaning.
The man beckoned and one of the women came forward, smiling shyly. She carried two babies in a backpack, one with dark skin and hair, the other one with wide blue eyes and three small knobs on the forehead.
The woman with no name and no past held out her hand and touched the warm soft cheek, tears running down her face.
