Chapter 8

I wake up on the ground beneath the panel with a loud ringing in my ears. Above me, through a haze of smoke, I see sparks coming from the panel to my right. The ringing in my ears coalesces into the clear voice of the computer.

'Warning, life support failure in eight minutes, 25 seconds. Warning, life support failure in eight minutes, 20 seconds.'

My first rational thought is that the warning makes sense, because the panel that exploded is connected to life support. I mentally shake myself awake; I have to fix this, not lie useless on the floor agreeing that it's all very logical! I haul myself up, wincing at the pain in my head, and get to work. I have less than ten minutes before life support shuts down. As I set to work, I silently thank myself for bringing along the toolkit Chakotay and I were using. I'd be useless without it right now.

I'm hard at work bypassing a fused relay when a hand lands heavily on my shoulder, startling me out of my concentration. I whirl around to see who it is so fast that I have to blink away stars before I see that it's Chakotay. He's looking at me with a decided frown.

'I thought I told you to go to sickbay,' he criticises me angrily.

'And let us all die when the life support gives out?' I huff back in annoyance. The voice of the computer strengthens my case by choosing that moment to remind us there's only three minutes, fifteen seconds left. Who programmed this thing? The intervals are downright bizarre. I shove that thought aside when I see Chakotay open his mouth again. I don't want to hear it, so I say 'don't just sit there, hand me an ODN recoupler!' and turn back to the panel. He huffs, but does as I say. With Chakotay's help, the work goes a lot faster. Luckily, because time is running out. Until now, I've let Chakotay take the lead when we work together, careful to match my skills to his and not let on how much more I know about ship designs, but he easily falls into step with me too. We work well together. We can't fix everything, not from here and certainly not with the time we have left, but I hope others are working on it too. They can hardly miss the computer's warnings. Only one minute left. Chakotay and I exchange a grim look, we still have two relays to replace and then we have to recalibrate. Without even discussing it, he takes the relay on the left while I take the one on the right. We work in practiced harmony, almost synchronous, and finish almost simultaneously. We can't do the recalibrations together, but before I can say a word, Chakotay gets out the tools and hands them to me. The message in his eyes is clear 'go ahead, you can do it.' Fifteen seconds, the computer reminds us. I go as fast as I can. Chakotay is flawless, handing me the different tools the second I need them. Ten seconds. Nine. Eight. I curse the countdown, but keep my eyes on my work. Four. Three.

'Done!' I drop the tools, letting out a relieved breath. The silence from the countdown is bliss.

I glance at Chakotay to see him smiling broadly. 'Good work,' he says, 'you just saved our lives.'

'Glad to return the favour!' I shoot back. Then I'm laughing, full on head thrown back laughing I'm so relieved. Chakotay's deep chuckle joins me and then we're hugging and smiling at each other like maniacs, just glad to be alive. I'm about to make some joke about saving his sorry behind when he suddenly stiffens and looks at his hand. I follow his gaze. There's something dark and glistening on his fingers, could it be -?

'You're bleeding!'

'I am?' I carefully prod the back of my head where his hand was just a moment ago. I hit a painful spot and can't hold back a wince. My hand is splattered with blood. Before I get over my surprise, Chakotay is pushing me toward the access hatch.

'We have to get you to sickbay,' he says. I follow his lead and quickly crawl back to the hatch and out into the corridor. I wait for him to catch up, but the moment his feet are firmly on the ground he gives me a dark look, mumbles something about reckless women and picks me up.

'What the hell do you think you're doing?!' I shout at him as he runs down the corridor. The movement makes my head hurt and I push against him. He doesn't budge.

'I'm taking you to sickbay, where you should have been all along.' I bristle. Who does he think he is?

'If I'd gone to sickbay instead of stopping to fix the life support we'd all be dead right now!' He doesn't even respond. How dare he treat me like a child after I just saved our lives!

I hate to admit it, but the edges of my vision are becoming a bit blurred and my head is pounding. He's probably right when he says I need to go to sickbay, but I'm too angry about the way he completely disregards my voice that there's no way in hell I'll say so. I do stop struggling, however. I don't want to fall. But to let him know I don't agree with his actions, I glare at him for all I'm worth. I'm not sure he notices.

Chakotay is fast and before long we're in sickbay. The moment we enter the room, Chakotay starts shouting for a doctor. He makes it sound as if I'm seconds away from death. The moment he comes to a stop, I struggle out of his arms and push him away from me, giving him another glare for good measure.

'I'm perfectly capable of walking on my own, Mister Chakotay.' I say in my iciest tone, straightening myself fully. I've never hated my short stature more. I'm sure I'd be far more intimidating if I didn't literally have to look up at him. As it is, my glare doesn't seem to affect Chakotay at all; he glares right back.

'I don't know why I bother to save your life. You're in a dance with death and it's clear you won't stop until he wins!'

My retort dies in my throat. His words have a ring of truth to them, and it renders me speechless. How many trips to sickbay have I made in the past few days – even disregarding my visits to Captain Paris? How many times have I escaped death? What if my luck runs out? Before I regain my voice, Mora steps between me and Chakotay. I wasn't even aware she was in the room. Chakotay's words are still ringing in my head. What if I die before I make it back home? How long before my family knows? Will they even realise I was here, with the Maquis, or will they think I died in the Cardassian attack where we were captured? I'll just be one more Starfleet officer registered as missing in action. If they never find out what happened to me, what will that do to my mom? To my dad? Will he blame himself for encouraging me to follow in his footsteps and join Starfleet?

A flash of pain brings me out of my head and back to sickbay. Someone is behind me, probing the bump on my head. Before I can turn around to see who it is, I hear Mora's calm voice, apologizing for hurting me. I realise she's the one behind me, trying to heal the blow to my head. But where's Chakotay? I try to look around, but all I see are patients and a medic or two. Mora stops me before I can turn any further.

'Will you hold still please? I send Chakotay away to calm down. Everyone's jumpy right after a run-in.'

'What happened?'

'We ran into a hostile ship, but managed to disable it and run.' I notice how she says disable instead of destroy or defeat. Is that true? Wouldn't they destroy a Cardassian ship if they ran across one? Could they, in this old piece of junk? And if they did, could I blame them? I'd been in that prison camp, I've heard the Captain's screams. Don't the Cardassians deserve it? I only have to look around this sickbay to see what atrocities they're capable of. My eyes linger on the improvised screen that hides the Captain´s bunk from view.

Then again, I don´t know why they targeted the people in that camp. The Captain and I were caught spying on the Cardassians. If Starfleet caught a couple of spies, they´d interrogate them too. But they wouldn´t torture them. Would they?

Mora's voice interrupts my thoughts. 'Every time we go into one of those camps, I hope we find my sister. The Cardassians took her during the Occupation. I joined the Maquis to try and find her. I'm luckier than most, I still have that hope.' She pauses as I weigh her words. I was only with the Cardassians for what… a day? And so was the Captain. I don't want to know how we'd come out of there after a week, or a month. If we had gotten out. If we'd wanted to. Would it be better, I wonder, to know that your family could be in one of those torture centres? Wouldn't they be better off… dead? Mora continues before I have to delve into that thought further. 'When you lose people, it changes you. Some stop caring, even about themselves. Others are braver.' I hear a chirp from the regenerator before Mora steps around me so she can look me in the eye. 'Doesn't mean they're not afraid.'

'Bravery is not the absence of fear, but rather the assessment that something else is more important than fear,' I quote an old Earth president. Mora just smiles. She doesn't say another word on the subject and neither do I. But her words stay with me. What would I be like, if I lost people I cared about? Would I be as brave as Chakotay and keep caring about others?