Chapter 5 – Paso Doble

Kalpak Station, Deep Space

The bar on Kalpak Station was one of those facilities found in most space stations or spaceports, usually saddled with names ranging from the unimaginative to the preposterous. The Snowflake Lounge was a clear example of the former. In a place like this, the quality of the drinks, the clientele and entertainment on offer - and the likelihood of getting phasered in the back, or not – tended to be a direct function of the nature of the trade routes the station served, or of its proximity to the nearest conflict zone.

Mike Ayala had seen a wide variety of space station joints during his years in the colonies, the DMZ and the Delta Quadrant; this one seemed positively classy by comparison. There was an actual bar with overhead racks of glasses and stools; the tables that were scattered around the central stage looked almost clean; and the patrons looked reasonably well-heeled. They had to be, given the steep entrance fee and cover charges. Tervellyan concurred that charging people just to get in was a new approach for him, too – the result of privatization of space assets? Owners looking for profits wherever they could find them …? But they had their orders, and so had paid up without much hesitation.

Half a dozen cheap mechanical waiters buzzed through the crowd on hover pads, balancing multi-coloured drinks that jingled and sloshed precariously each time a heedless customer made a sudden move or stumbled drunkenly in their path. The logistics of moving through the room were impeded somewhat by a small, raised stage at the back wall around which the majority of tables - and patrons - were clustered.

Kalpak may have been beyond the edge of Federation space, but given the recent appetite in the Narov system for expansion of both its trade and political connections, the station seemed to be picking up a lot of through-traffic, both of the commercial and diplomatic variety. Entrepreneurs from all walks of life, intent on opening up a new area for investment and ensuring that they would get their share of the opportunities, were here mingling with the crews of commercial freighters.

A pack – a greed? - of Ferengi were jabbering away near the bar, while a small group of Andorians, whose members were visibly deferential to one particular male dressed in sumptuous robes, was holding court in a corner. From the snatches of conversation Ayala picked up as he wove through the crowd, pausing occasionally to listen, the virus pandemic in the Narov system was a topic of considerable interest. Many of those in the bar, including the Andorians, groused about having been unable to conduct their business thanks to the strict quarantine rules.

Still, the noise level was relatively low, as patrons awaited the advertised entertainment: "The Sensuous Saleena and Her Sisters! They will have you writhing in pleasure with each dance…!" The name featured in numerous conversations, usually accompanied by explicit suggestions of what the speaker would like to do with the entertainer or her 'sisters', singly or jointly, if the opportunity arose. Ayala readily surmised that herein lay the origin of the exorbitant charges: people who came to the Snowflake Lounge didn't just come to drink. They came to be entertained, and extravagantly so.

Occasionally, shouts erupted from a couple of apparently equally popular Dabo tables, located in a well-lit room off the back that was open to the main bar. Ayala went over to have a look, and thanks to a reflective glare in the corner was able to take notice of a number of discreet holocams that were trained on the tables as well as the entrance way. The fleeting thought came to Ayala that if his Captain were here, he'd likely make a face for the viewers' benefit. Similar cams seemed to be stationed at strategic corners around the bar; now that he was aware of them, they were evident everywhere.

Judging by the amount of latinum that seemed to be crossing the table each time the wheel was spun, supervision was well advised. The security officer silently nodded his approval, even though it was not clear to him who was supposed to be kept in line – the customers or the employees. Probably both. Even in the dim light it was obvious that both the Dabo girls were Orion though, and there his approval ended.

"Watch the wheel, not the girl," was a well-known adage among those inclined to gambling, but with Orion females at the table and emitting their particular brand of distracting … scents, not to mention their provocative body language, that would be a damn hard thing for most males (and for many of the female customers). Had one or more of the dead women on that freighter been destined for this place, to make an easy, if questionable living on a busy and growing space station where money flowed freely?

Ayala's internal antennae went up, and he was beginning to see why the Captain had asked him to accompany the First Officer on what the latter had described as a "basic recce". There was an undercurrent here, something he could not quite put his finger on. Quark's bar on Deep Space Nine this was most definitely not: He looked around carefully to see if he could find someone who looked like he or she might be the proprietor, and failed. Whoever ran this place stayed in the background.

Tervellyan clapped him on the shoulder. "Might as well get a drink, Lieutenant. The boss wants us to scope the place – what better way than blending in, with a glass of Romulan ale in hand? Come, let me get you one."

Ayala almost frowned. He never drank real alcohol on duty, and as far as he was concerned, this was duty – bar or not. "Synthale please, sir," he said.

Tervellyan shrugged. "Suit yourself. I tell you, after what we found on that ship, I'm ready for a real drink. Why don't you find us a table by the stage? May as well see something while we're here."

He headed for the bar, leaving the Lieutenant a little baffled at the cavalier attitude the First Officer seemed to be bringing to their task. Then again, he recalled that his Captain tended to approach things in the same off-handed manner, only to display a coiled-steel intensity when the moment called for it. Paris and Tervellyan had attended the same command training course; maybe that was the style they taught there?

Taking full advantage of his height, Ayala allowed his eyes to scan over the available seating. Choices appeared to be limited, especially around the stage. Must be a popular act, those Saleena siblings. Finally,he spotted a Tarkellian inserting a credit chip into one of the waiters' card slots. His face indicated that he was doing so on someone's orders, rather than on his own accord. Ayala headed for the man's table without hesitation, looking over at the bar to see if he could get the XO's attention.

Tervellyan, who held two drinks in his hand, seemed to be in intense conversation with a patron who was seated on one of the stools. He looked up and caught Ayala's eyes on him. Smiling, he waved his drink and set it down beside the other man before heading over to where Ayala had taken his seat, a second glass in hand.

"Here's your drink, Lieutenant. Listen, I met someone I know from my Academy days; he's a civilian now, duranium trader. Been here a few times, he says, and I think it might be a good opportunity to chat him up and see what he knows about the comings and goings in this place. Better done one-on-one though; some people don't easily open up to strangers. You don't mind if I leave you alone for a few minutes? I think it'll be worthwhile."

He put the glass of synthale down in front of Ayala, who frowned a little. The Captain's instructions had been for the two of them to stay together, but he supposed that being ten or so meters away and in visual range at the bar still qualified as "together".

"I'll be back in a few minutes. In the meantime, feel free to sit or wander around. See what you can pick up." Tervellyan clapped Ayala on the shoulder and headed back to the bar, where it did not take long before he was engrossed in his conversation again.

Taking a sip of his synthale, Ayala contemplated his next move. He considered himself to be a fair tactical officer with pretty good reactions in a fight, but he had never been a man of many words. Making small talk with strangers, trying to draw them out to gather intel, wasn't really up his alley. Why had the Captain insisted he come along again? Ah yes, Delta Quadrant instinct for sniffing out bad vibes. Well, if Tom Paris - the same guy who had gone through all kinds of personal hells on behalf of the Maquis – had asked him to collect information, who was Miguel Ayala to say no to opening a conversation? Mike sighed inwardly, swallowing his aversions in the process. Small talk it would have to be. He scanned his immediate vicinity for a likely target.

The Iridian at the table next to his seemed temporarily alone, his companion having headed for the facilities after one too many Circadian Moonbeams. Ayala willed the man to look over for a couple of minutes, trying to catch his eyes. When that failed, he reached over and tapped him on the shoulder.

"Hey. That Saleena any good? Sure is pricey."

The man turned around, and swayed a little as he tried to focus on the big Lieutenant. Clearly the bright red drink in front of him was neither synthetic, nor his first. His eyes narrowed as he took in the Starfleet uniform and two pips. Ayala noticed, and sat back a little, the faster to have access to his phaser, if required. But the Iridian's response was polite enough, and Ayala relaxed again.

"Oh man, you've no idea. Hot enough to melt the roof struts, when she gets going." He mimicked the shaking of singed fingertips, blowing on them before taking another sip of his drink. "Gets a real a rise out of the customers, if you know what I mean. Lucky ones get to take one of them to Deck Three with them for a bit. Not me, though. Can't afford it."

Having evidently decided a spot of conversation was preferable to sitting alone, he posed a question of his own, even if it wasn't exactly friendly banter. "So what's Starfleet doing in these here parts? Federation run out of worlds to conquer?"

Despite the lilting sing-song of his accent, the Iridian's voice carried an ill-disguised mistrust, and a challenge. Something to build on; people with a chip on their shoulder usually didn't hesitate to share it.

"The pandemic," Ayala offered. "Bringing some medicine into the sector. Should help, but people seem to be suspicious of our motives. Can't see why. Not like we're trying to poison people or anything."

The Iridian snorted contemptuously into his drink – an impressive sound, given the extra-wide nostrils his race was endowed with. "Yeah, right. Help. Sure. Selling your drugs to the highest bidder, more like. That'll make you a lot of friends here, I bet."

Ayala was intrigued. "Strictly humanitarian freebies. What makes you think we're selling?"

The man gave another snort, his disposition souring with the speed common to those whose mood had been chemically enhanced to begin with. "The commissary on Deck Five is administering shots to anyone headed into the Snowflakes. Half a bar of latinum a pop. Starfleet containers are still sitting in the corner, lest there be any doubt where the stuff comes from."

He rolled up his sleeve and showed off a small, reddish bump near his wrist. "You're lookin' at a week's wages, buster. Stings like a Tyronian blackflea bite, too. So don't sing me no songs of altruism, Starfleet. Screw you."

He turned his back on Ayala again and grabbed his drink with his un-inoculated hand, as if to make a point. His companion was weaving through the crowd to rejoin him, and the conversation was clearly at an end.

Ayala shrugged off the man's hostility – and his slight amusement at being called Starfleet, as if it were the insult he himself had once thought it was - and took a sip of his drink. Should he wait for the Commander to return before passing on this interesting tidbit of information? He looked across to the bar, where Tervellyan seemed deeply absorbed in discussion with his old acquaintance, human with a bit of something else in him, from what Ayala could see across the room. He couldn't see the Commander's face, but judging by the set of his shoulders, the conversation was an intense one.

Seeing no signs that his XO was about to disengage himself, Ayala hit his comm badge. The noise in the bar was such that it would drown out his own voice to anyone listening, not that anyone was paying him any attention.

"Ayala to Voyager."

Tom's voice came on. "Paris here. Go ahead, Mike."

"Captain, I just heard a claim that some of the medication we've been delivering has found its way here, and is being sold by the station commissary. I haven't been able to verify the claim yet."

"Is it worth going to have a look?"

"I think so, but I'd have to leave the Commander, sir. He's in a discussion with someone he knows, someone he thinks he can get some intel from." Ayala cast another glance at the bar, where Trevellyan was leaning into his conversation partner, listening intently to what he was saying. "Doesn't look like he'll be finished anytime soon."

There was a momentary pause, and silence in the comm link. Ayala could practically see Tom Paris chewing his lip as he always did when thinking hard.

"You think it's safe to split up?"

"Place doesn't seem so bad, Captain. Someone runs a pretty tight ship here. Surveillance cameras everywhere."

"Fine then, Mike, go ahead. Keep in touch as needed. Paris out."

….

Back on Voyager, Tom released his lip from his teeth and, with a note of determination in his voice that reminded him oddly of his father, commed Sickbay.

"Paris to the Doctor. Doc, can you transmit the nanoprobe signature to Ops? We're ready for our first proper scan, I think."

He didn't wait for the reply, instead turning to Asil. "Lieutenant, you'll be getting some data from Sickbay in the next few seconds. Please enter it into main sensors, then do a max resolution sweep of the station. Route to the main viewer."

Asil raised an eyebrow at the request; whatever data link the Captain was requesting from Sickbay had not been briefed to the senior staff. But orders were orders, and no doubt he had his reasons. What appeared on her console was a coded sequence of something she recognized immediately as being of Borg origin.

Nanoprobes, the Captain had said to the EMH; her father had told her about them, and the various medical uses the Voyager crew had put them to in the Delta Quadrant. Her Vulcan mind raced through what she knew, and came to the logical conclusion even as the outline of Kalpak Station appeared on the screen at her command.

"May I assume then, Captain, that the Doctor marked the antigen with nanoprobes?"

"Yes, he did," Tom replied softly as the screen lit up with dozens of moving single pinpoints of light, as well as a couple of larger glowing blurs that he figured must be central distribution or storage sites. A small smile ghosted across his face.

"And it worked, too. Look at the bundled signals in the centre of the station – that must be Ayala's commissary."

He checked that the comm link to Sickbay was still open. "Doc – you may want to come up here and see the results of your and T'val's handiwork. It's quite impressive. Permission to gloat."

Baytart pointed to the largest glowing area, off to the right on the screen. "What's that? It doesn't seem to be attached to the main station. A docked ship, perhaps?"

"Overlay display with the structural schematic of the station," Tom ordered, with barely a glance over his shoulders. A few taps from Ensign Roberts, who had been left in charge of Tactical during Ayala's absence, and a fine grid showing individual decks and docking areas superimposed itself over the dark outline produced by Asil's earlier image. Tom noted with fleeting satisfaction that his guess regarding the commissary had been correct.

"It is indeed a spaceship, sir," Asil confirmed matter-of-factly. "Docked in Bay 16 Alpha. A commercial freighter, Whorfin class. Federation signature, Rigellian in origin."

"Switch scan to reflect biosigns, Lieutenant, and magnify."

Asil entered a few commands into her console as the screen zoomed in on the ship. "Seven bio signs. The ship is licensed for a crew of ten; not all may be onboard. Of those who are, there are two Rigellians, three Orions, and two Narovians. "

Tom nodded in acknowledgement of the caution, and then whistled tonelessly at the list. "That's quite the alliance," he said grimly, to himself as much as to anyone listening. "Starfleet seems to have under-estimated just how far inter-planetary diplomacy has advanced within the private sector."

The turbolift swished open, and the EMH entered. A smug smile spread across his features as he watched the display on the screen. "Ah," he said, his comments directed at no one in particular. "My guess is that this would be our first shipment, from Nemoth."

Tom looked up from his scrutiny of the ship's specs. "Well yes, that makes sense. We've had two additional drop-offs since , so there would have been enough time for that shipment to get here before us. Too bad we can't tell the difference to confirm, though."

The EMH looked, if anything, even more satisfied with himself. "As a matter of fact, we can, Mr. … Captain, provided we can obtain an actual sample."

Tom cocked an eyebrow. "Actually, we're well on our way to doing just that. Care to enlighten us what that will tell us?"

The Doc preened a little. "I considered that it might be helpful to refine the tracking system you suggested by enabling us to distinguish between shipments. Yet another page we took from those aliens that had … you and Commander Torres so excited, back in the Delta Quadrant. You will recall they left something like bar codes on the DNA strands they altered."

Tom glared at him briefly, but curiosity and the need for strategically useful information won out over the temptation to put the Doctor in his place. "So what'd you do, carve little numbers into a few of the nanoprobes? One, two, three? Or something more … sophisticated?" He raised a challenging eyebrow.

The Doctor had the grace to look a little flustered. "Well, as a matter of fact … Yes, that's exactly what we did. We thought things were best kept simple."

Tom was already moving on, weighing his tactical options based on what he had just heard. With the confirmation from the sensors, there was no need for Tervellyan and Ayala to remain on the station; Mike, moreover, would have acquired his sample by now.

He tapped his comm badge.

…..

It had not taken Ayala long to locate the Commissary, where a couple of Narovians and a Rigellian were busily exchanging hyposprays for eighths of latinum, from behind an apparently well-secured counter; the outlets for force fields were patently visible to his trained eye.

The place was swarming with customers. Ayala counted representatives from at least eight or nine different species, almost evenly divided between those coming from member planets of the Federation and those from outside. Among the latter, he noted several Narovians and Iridians, a couple of Rigellians, a handful of Ferengi and one solitary Orion whose job it seemed to be to open boxes and check off the inventory.

The price the vendors asked for the hyposprays with the antigen was considerable, but the Captain – apparently based on experiences gained during that mission on Andoria – had insisted that the away team went to the station well supplied with funds. He had, over Tervellyan's vague protests, even appointed Chell as the unofficial Ship's Purser, a position that was non-existent elsewhere in Starfleet; the XO had not been comforted by the fact that the appointment was apparently based on the Bolian's long-standing experience as "Jenny Delaney's second in the betting pool". The Captain's only nod to propriety had been a stern reminder that they'd have to file expense claims if and – but only if – they actually spent their funds. If they were returned untouched, the transaction never happened and there was no need for paperwork. Tom Paris was many things, Ayala had learned over the years, but a bureaucrat was definitely not among them.

Less than two minutes after his arrival, and thanks in no small part to his intimidating height and grim face, Ayala had navigated the unruly crowd in the commissary and held a hypospray in his hand. Having been inoculated against the Magellanic blood virus prior to Voyager's departure from McKinley, he gruffly waved off the offer to have it administered on the spot, citing lack of proper hygiene standards in the facility.

The complaint gave him an excuse to scrutinize the place with an expression of contempt he did not have to fake. The commissary appeared to be one of a franchise that had been spreading slowly into stations across the Quadrant, to sell wares that could not easily – or not legally – be replicated. All the chain's shops were characterized by their trademark non-descript grey walls and a penchant for selling holovids of scantily-clad individuals, mostly women, of varying races. The extensive wall where the vids were kept seemed to undulate, thanks to the moving images on the covers. These in turn had been designed to appeal to low-brow appetites from across the entire spectrum of humanoid … tastes, and equipped with special codes that made it impossible to replicate them.

Ayala wasted no time looking at the store's wares, focusing instead on the individuals who were serving the crowding, jostling customers. He noticed that the hypospray business seemed somewhat divorced from the regular sales section. A lone Narovian woman sold the access codes for the two public replicators, as well as supposedly "original" local trinkets and a fairly extensive collection of firearms. She seemed oddly deferential towards the three men who were running the obviously far more profitable antigen sales. The big Lieutenant wondered briefly what might be available for sale in the back rooms, but he had gotten what he had come for and decided to leave before his scrutiny of the place could attract undue attention.

When Ayala returned to the bar, flashing his low-tech entrance stamp to the big Nausicaan doorkeeper, he found the atmosphere to have changed dramatically. The lights had dimmed, and coloured lights that lashed and stabbed across the ceiling were reminiscent of the inside of an active inversion nebula – jarring, jolting, electrifying.

By contrast, the air in the room seemed to have gotten heavier. The scent that now seemed to permeate the room reminded Ayala vaguely of something – what was it? Oh yes, the fumes emanating from the sweetgrass smoked during certain spiritual ceremonies on Dorvan IV, and of which Chakotay had still had a reasonable supply during their early days in the Maquis. Ayala shook his head to clear it and willed his body into taking only shallow gulps of air through his mouth. But he also noticed that no matter the impact of the fumes on his mental acuity, he was clearly far less affected by them than others in the bar. The Iridian he had spoken with earlier gave an audible moan, and his eyes were starting to roll back in his head in approaching ecstasy.

Music that had previously only punctuated the background as so much white noise now assaulted the eardrums without mercy, and could be felt strumming through the metal plates in the floor. The blend of ethereal, pipe-like sounds and an unfamiliar-but-gripping percussive rhythm was hypnotic; patrons were swaying in time to whatever moved them.

It was obvious to Ayala that there was something very calculated in the overall concoction of sensory experiences being unleashed inside this bar, something intended to prime the patrons for whatever would follow. The cocktail of scents in the air in particular caused him to catch his breath and set his body to tingling with an anticipation - of what? – that was almost akin to full-out physical arousal. In some of the customers, it clearly was having precisely that effect.

After a few minutes of the sensual barrage, and thanks to a clever streaming of the lights, all eyes were being inexorably directed at the door to the small stage at the back wall, including those of the Commander. Tervellyan was still standing beside his acquaintance at the bar, apparently no more – but also no less – affected than Ayala himself, and had turned to the stage as if pulled by invisible strings.

The entrance started to pulse with a different light, flashing across the green-blue-purple spectrum and back, faster and faster. Suddenly they blurred into a bright whiteness that was almost painful in its intensity. Ayala shut his eyes briefly against the glare, but the pulsating light was inescapable, even through closed lids.

He reopened his eyes in time to see three green-and-white blurs spill from the opening and onto the stage to the approving roar of the crowd, many of whom were obviously familiar with what was about to happen, and had been anticipating it with raucous shouts. The small knot of Andorians in the corner had stopped talking; their principal sat back in his chair, any attempt at maintaining his dignity betrayed by his antennae, which were rippling and swaying in movements that were clearly beyond his control, their quivering tips pointing towards the stage.

The three Orion women took up their places on the stage with a fluid grace that nearly robbed Ayala of his breath. He had heard of their performances, of course – they were known across the galaxy as the supreme embodiment of sensual and carnal delights – but had never seen one of them. His first experience with Orions had been … that ship; the contrast between what he had seen there and what was before him now could not have been greater.

Beautiful to behold the so-called 'slave girls' had been in death, but alive they exuded an almost animal magnetism. Hot desire, made radiant mantis-green flesh; moist lips, open, inviting. Cloud-soft copper hair, crying out to be grabbed and held, to bring its owner close enough for a shared breath. Their glittering eyes raked the audience, seemingly able to bind everyone of the patrons to their spell, daring them to look away.

The pheromones carried by the women's siren scent would drive men out of their senses, and it struck Ayala that perhaps this was why he and Tervellyan were less affected by the sudden … sultry heaviness in the air than those around him: they had been immunized against it. The regular pre-mission cocktail of inoculations provided by Starfleet had probably included the antidote to that fabled weapon of Orion womanhood, given where they were headed and its proximity to Orion space.

For a moment the three women – one of them barely more than a girl - stood as immobile as sculptures, legs slightly apart and arms off to the side. The posture allowed the watchers to drink in the curves of their bodies, which were in no way concealed but rather accentuated by bits of a gossamer white fabric that was evidently designed to flow with any movement, even as it clung like a second skin when still. Strategic slits and dips left nothing, and everything, to the viewers imagination.

Ayala felt the eyes of one of the women come to rest on him with a laser-sharp focus that he found disconcerting, and difficult to read. Surely he was not that obvious a mark, for whatever attentions she expected to lavish on selected customers after the performance?

While he was relatively shy in these matters, he was not unaware of his physical attractiveness to women – tall, broad-shouldered, superbly fit and ruggedly handsome. But he would not flatter himself into thinking that a professional like this Orion beauty would prefer him over, say, the Andorian dignitary in the corner, who visibly dripped ice diamonds and latinum and was practically drooling in anticipation. As for Ayala, his uniform should be a warning flag to her that he was under certain … constraints when it came to mingling with alien women on a space station, even if she had not noticed his superior officer standing at the bar.

But when the three women started dancing, it was as if she, the one in the centre, the object of desire of much of the room, danced only for him. Did every man in the bar feel the same way? Every twist and turn, every undulation seemed to bring her emerald eyes back to Mike Ayala, and he found himself supremely glad of whatever immunity to the famous Orion pheromones his inoculations had bestowed upon him. Who knew what havoc her attentions would have wrought upon him otherwise? As it was, he found it difficult to tear his eyes away from her, to focus on and observe the other patrons as per his orders; instead, he felt himself drawn closer and closer to the stage as if by invisible magnetic forces. At least he knew he wasn't missing any snatches of interesting conversation around him. All conversation in the bar had stopped; even the Commander and his acquaintance had stopped their intense discussion to watch.

But no matter how dry his throat was getting, and no matter how other parts of his body were starting to respond to what he saw, Ayala didn't like the feeling of manipulation he sensed behind the performance. He deeply resented the deliberate efforts to play to his baser instincts, however objectively skilled the three women were at what they did. He could admire their superb professional skills in the abstract, but some things, this son of conservative farmer-colonists firmly believed, were best left to private quarters, and closed doors.

And yet … The lure of the one dancer, and her apparent singular focus on him, almost left him breathless. He found himself giving a sigh of relief and gratitude when his comm badge chirped and offered a welcome distraction. His Captain's voice cut through the fog.

"Paris to away team. Please report back to the ship as soon as possible. We've got some news from our end."

"Understood, Captain." Shaking off what remained of the cleverly engineered near-trance he had been fighting, Ayala headed over to the bar, turning his back to the dancers with a determined set of his shoulders. Brushing aside a number of utterly oblivious and blissed out patrons as he made his way through the increasingly dense crowd, he approached his XO, who had given him a questioning look and a shrug across the room at their Captain's hail.

"You ready to leave, Commander?" Ayala asked, not bothering to hide his curious scrutiny of the man who had kept Tervellyan so engrossed for the better part of an hour. The man had appeared to be human, but if from the distance Ayala had not been able to put his finger on what other species might have had a hand in his genesis, in close-up he appeared to be at least a quarter Rigellian. The prominent, high cheekbones and residual skin markings certainly were consistent. He was in civilian clothing, well-dressed, clean finger nails – a mover rather than a doer. Ayala gave him a respectful nod.

Tervellyan nodded at Ayala in response. "Yes, Lieutenant. We were just finishing our discussion. Just give me a minute."

Understanding a dismissal when he heard one, Ayala found himself at a bit of a loss as to how exactly to kill that minute. It didn't seem right to leave early and head back to Voyager without his XO – that might be interpreted as showing off. There was also the Captain's edict for the team to stay together. But how not to seem like he was listening? The solution was simple, if not perhaps entirely wise. He turned to watch the dancers some more, like everybody else.

Sure enough, the eyes of the woman who had seemed to be so intent on him before had evidently tracked his progress across the room. While moving as smoothly as before, and in almost perfect sync with the partners who flanked her on either side, Saleena – he was certain she was the one after whom the act was named, given that she seemed to be playing the central role, and holding the most eyes – now appeared entirely more focused on him than she was on the dance. Her undulations looked almost rote, distracted even, but judging by the leers and lewd comments he overheard beside and around him, Ayala was the only one to notice. And it still didn't make any sense to him.

"I'll be in touch," he heard Tervellyan say to his acquaintance, before calling out, in a slightly louder voice, to his Lieutenant.

"Ready to go, Mike?"

Ayala turned back towards his XO, glad to be able to break free from his musings, and the spell the luminous green siren seemed intent on weaving around him. "Aye, sir." Tervellyan tapped his comm badge.

"Away team to Voyager. Two to beam up." Both men straightened in anticipation of the transport signal.

As the familiar tingle began to creep across his skin, Ayala felt rather than heard the displacement of the heavy, scented air as something came hurtling towards him from the direction of the stage.

The small gasps emanating from the crowd receded into nothingness as sound stopped travelling into the in-between space he was entering, and as all other sensations ceased. The last thing Mike Ayala felt before losing molecular cohesion altogether was the impact of a solid body on his back, and the iron grip of two hands clutching at his neck.