Disclaimer: See chapter one.
Notes: A hearty thanks to splv for the look through and suggestions in the last section ;)
Chakotay followed his guards, not even deeming it worthwhile to ask them any questions. The return trip took longer, though he thought he recognized a few of the corridors from his initial journey to Enlin's rooms…he wondered if the guards were taking him on a circuitous route on purpose, in order to limit his chances of memorizing the way. If so, they were doing a damned fine job of it, much to his annoyance…
His musings ceased as a jerk on his shoulder indicated for him to stop. He complied, but when he tried to turn around to get a look at his escort, to gauge whether or not they were sufficiently distracted, he received a sharp poke in the lower back from one of their disruptors. Gritting his teeth, Chakotay faced the doorway before him, watching the dark, wrinkled hand inputting a code into a keypad there from the corner of his eye.
He didn't know what to expect when the doors parted, but it was clear from the heavy push on his shoulders that the guards had no intention of joining him. This room, too, was overly warm, he noted, the sweat beading instantly on his forehead at the drastic change in temperature from the hallway into the new holding area…
The lighting here was even dimmer than on the rest of the alien ship. He had to strain just to see into the small room as he heard the doors clang together behind him. Taking a deep breath, he peered into the shadows looming before him and took a cautious step forward.
Enlin had said that he'd be taken to "join his friends"…that had to mean that Tom and Harry were on the vessel too, right? So they, and Kathryn, should be in here, somewhere…assuming Enhar could be trusted to obey orders. And if he couldn't and she'd been hurt in some way during his absence, Enahr was a dead man. It was just that simp…
He cursed under his breath as his shin connected smartly with the edge of something hard and solid. The pain exploded through his tibia, sharply biting, and he glanced down at the long low crate, which had been obstructing his path.
He heard a rustle of movement from somewhere in the shadows alongside him. Turning, he whispered, "Kathryn?" as he squinted into the darkened room…
He thought he recognized a flash of a pale face before him for a split second as he struggled to keep his balance…"Tom?" he tried, startled at the figure's sudden appearance and close proximity.
The eyes of the face, which shone in the dim light for an instant, widened considerably. "Commander? Shit, Harry, wait! It's not a guard, it's–"
The vaguely familiar voice was the last thing he heard before a blunt, heavy force struck the back of his skull. He pitched forward into something surprising soft, seeing stars exploding across his vision just before losing contact with the world entirely for the second time in less than two days.
Kathryn estimated that she'd been in the tiny room with Enahr for close to twenty minutes. In that time he'd prodded, poked, and scanned her repeatedly, clucking over her "lack of assets" and musing aloud to himself about how best to "fix" her.
She liked to consider herself not particularly hung up on vanity, but still…she had her pride. His endless taunts began to irk her, digging under her skin and making her even more short-tempered than she'd been on Voyager these past few weeks. She sat with her back ramrod straight, doing her utmost to keep control. But sitting still had ever been her strong suit…hell, hadn't her instructors warned her of this much every single day of command school?
"Patience, Janeway," they'd repeatedly cautioned her. "You must learn patience. Sometimes not doing is the best course of action…"
And over the years, she'd come to amass quite a bit of the precious commodity. She could sit for hours on end, smiling engagingly through one diplomatic meeting after another…could do it for hours, if she had to. But with three of her people potentially in danger, all she wanted to do was to get a nice, firm grip on Enahr's thick neck and throttle the location of her officers from his seedy, smiling face….
Her ankle was not entirely healed, but he'd addressed most of the swelling there, much to her relief. That he wasn't completely incompetent came as something of a mildly pleasant surprise to her…until she'd averted her attention to scanning the shelves once too often while his back was turned.
"Here you are, honey. Something to relax you a bit for this next procedure…"
She'd seen the hypospray far too late. She tried to shift to the side and out of his reach, but within the tiny, closet-like room, it was next to impossible on such short notice. His fingers dug into her jaw, holding her head still, and the hiss of the release valve registered like a blow to her heightened senses…
Immediately, a wave of drowsiness overcame her, sapping her of her considerable ire in no time.
"Bastard," she managed almost conversationally as her eyelids drifted shut, drawn together under the sleepy wave of warmth suffusing her body. Her limbs felt uncomfortably heavy. Simply remaining upright was costing precious energy – energy she was rapidly losing.
So much for rescuing Chakotay, she thought with something akin to mild alarm. It was all she could seem to muster. By now, he should be aware of her reasons for sending him with Enlin and for her remaining behind with Enahr… And at the thought of him seeing this or learning what she'd just allowed to happen to herself through her negligence, Janeway felt the strange urge to laugh. Oh, was he going to be angry.
He's going to kill me, she thought vaguely – rather unimportantly, considering the circumstances. She frowned in confusion at the direction her increasingly muddled thoughts were taking…
Kathryn felt her muscles slacken and then strong hands supporting her as she slumped backwards, unconscious.
Enahr's ever-present grin was the last thing she saw before the darkness claimed her.
Tom Paris circled the still form of Commander Chakotay, staring down at the fallen figure below him. He let out a low whistle, bending to inspect the thick, swelling knot forming on the back of the commander's skull. "Nice one, Harry. Way to go. This ought to have you earning that promotion in no time."
Harry Kim reddened, his annoyance with Tom's "humor" rapidly escalating. "Thanks, Tom. How was I supposed to know it was him, and not one of the guards? We've been here for over a week already with no sign from Voyager…and if I recall correctly, this was your plan, not mine!"
Tom shrugged pitilessly, feeling around for Chakotay's pulse with expert fingers. "You could have at least looked before you swung…hell, a couple of centimeters further and that would have been my face!"
Harry eyed the metal bar on the floor lying where he'd haphazardly tossed it. Thankfully, there didn't appear to be any blood on it. He ran a shaky hand through his hair, distraught at the thought of the first officer having been gravely injured in a place where they couldn't be sure of receiving medical attention. "Will he be okay?"
Tom raised his eyes from the commander's head. "I think so. There's a nice lump where you hit him, and he'll have one hell of a headache when he wakes up, but I don't think there'll be a concussion. Hard to tell without a tricorder, though. Help me drag him back against the wall, will you?"
Harry stared. "Are you sure it's safe to move him?"
The pilot rolled his eyes. "You're thinking of a neck or back injury. I've got his arms; see if you can get his legs."
Together, the two men worked to move the commander over to the far wall, where Harry and Tom had taken to spending most of their time. It took a few moments for Tom to be satisfied with Chakotay's position, but finally he announced, "That's good enough. He should be comfortable for now...though there's nothing I can do for that headache when he comes to, so it's probably best to let him sleep it off. For the moment, anyway."
Harry sat back against the wall, dropping his head against it. Closing his eyes, he sighed heavily. "So much for escape," he muttered dejectedly, his high hopes from scant moments before now lying, dashed, before him. Cracking open an eyelid, he allowed his gaze to sweep over Chakotay's still form with a grimace. "Or rescue, apparently," he added, noting the first officer's state of undress. "Looks like the commander ran into the same trouble we did."
"Looks like it," Paris agreed, moving to reclaim the make-shift weapon his companion had discarded earlier. "However 'natively inclined' Chakotay may be, I can't exactly see the captain letting him mount a rescue mission in his underwear." Returning to the wall, he slid his left hand carefully over a shelf set into the bulkhead, feeling for the small space between them… Finding it, he deftly slipped the bar into its hiding place before moving to imitate Harry and taking a seat on the floor.
Kim grimaced. "If she was in a foul mood before we left, she's going to be furious now," he groaned, rubbing his hands over his eyes.
Tom snorted humorlessly. "Yeah, well…you're looking at the reason for Her Majesty's ill humor as we speak." He was eyeing Chakotay with something like disdain, much to Harry's surprise. "On second thought," Paris continued darkly, "he deserved that blow. Maybe we'll get lucky, and it will have knocked some sense into him."
"Tom!" Harry chastised disbelievingly. "You don't mean that. It's not his fault the captain's been…er…well, a little testy."
Paris snickered. "'Testy'?" He raised an insolent brow. "Come off it, Harry. She's been a raving bitch for weeks now. Not that you can really blame her for it," he added, dropping his head back against the wall and ignoring Harry's scandalized expression.
"What are you talking about, Tom?"
The helmsman shook his head wearily. "Forget it. I shouldn't have said anything in the first place. Get some sleep, will you? You know you're going to need it more than I am. I'll keep an ear out for the guards."
Harry peered at him through the darkness, annoyed and incredulous. "Our escape plan fails miserably. Our rescuer is lying on the floor with a possible concussion, and all you can say is 'get some sleep'?"
Tom shrugged, not even deeming fit to open his eyes again. "You got any better ideas? If so, I'm listening. Otherwise, it's a safe bet that they're going to work you to death again tomorrow. So if I were you, I'd try to get some shut eye while I could."
After a week of constant, forced exercise and near starvation in captivity, Harry's patience was finally wearing too thin to maintain his generally cheery aura of good will. To make matters worse, Tom's sarcasm, mildly entertaining in the best of situations, lately served to grate on Kim's already-worn nerves. "I don't want to sleep, Tom. And stop telling me what to do."
"I do outrank you," Tom reminded him stonily.
"You're threatening to pull rank now? It must be something good. And you know I'm persistent when I set my mind to something. So, are you going to keep dropping your dark hints all night, or will you just tell me what you meant about the commander and the captain?"
Tom, in not much better spirits himself, rolled his eyes disgustedly into the dimness. However dismal their situation seemed to be, he didn't think breaking his superior officer's medical confidentiality was quite warranted…yet. "I have a better question for you, Harry," he evaded skillfully. "What do you think happened to the other member of Chakotay's away team?"
Kim froze. Tom was right. Chakotay wouldn't have come alone. It was against Starfleet protocol to send an away mission comprised of only a single crew member, and the captain was a stickler for that one, too. He swallowed thickly. "There's…always the chance that whoever it was managed to avoid capture." He sat up a little straighter against the wall. "He or she could be mounting a rescue as we speak."
"Or they could be dead, or lying severely injured somewhere."
Harry frowned. "You don't always have to be so dismal, you know. You're such a pessimist."
"How many times do I have to tell you – I'm not a pessimist, Harry, I'm a–"
"Realist, yeah I know, you've told me," Harry groaned, finishing the familiar sentence before the pilot had a chance. "About a hundred times already."
"And yet you keep setting me up for it."
"So…who do you think it was...is," Harry corrected himself, annoyed at how easily Tom's "realism" had sunk in.
"Dunno. Ayala, Andrews, Rollins..." He smiled wanly. "I know I'd happily kiss the first one of them to come bursting through that door right about now – even Tuvok," the helmsman snorted. "I've had about as much of this place as I can take."
"At least they feed you," Harry muttered. "I haven't had a decent meal since we've been here."
"Oh, I wouldn't go so far as to call it 'decent'." Tom shuddered. "The stuff they've been forcing on me is enough to make me miss Neelix's cooking." He leveled a pointed look at his companion. "And it's not as though they're starving you, exactly. In fact, that bread they've been giving you looks a hell of a lot more appetizing than the slop they've been shoveling down my throat." He shuddered again, trying to quell his queasy stomach, still nauseous from trying to digest his latest "feeding". The fatty, gelatinous substance roiled unpleasantly in his stomach and he grimaced, careful not to move even a little. It always took a while for his stomach to begin rebelling against the alien food, but when it did… "I honestly think it's just raw animal fat or something."
Harry kept quiet. He'd had the benefit of sighting one of Tom's "meals". And though he complained, he knew he'd rather starve than be forced to eat the vile-looking concoctions his friend was suffering through on a daily basis. "If it helps," he added quietly, "I think you might've gained a few pounds. Maybe they'll stop making you eat it soon."
Tom closed his eyes tightly. "Let's hope so. In the meantime, if you're not going to sleep, that surveillance loop has to be updated. You're going to have to set it to record again, before they peek in here and realize what we've done. I think it'll be fairly obvious if Chakotay doesn't show on the image at all."
Harry slapped a palm to his forehead. "Damn. You're right. There are three of us now. They're sure to notice if only the two of us appear on the surveillance loop." He glanced over at Tom, who even in the dim light had gone rather pale again. Used to it by now, he knew the best way to help him was to keep quiet and let his friend suffer in relative silence. Forcing him to maintain idle conversation did little to distract him from the nausea anyway. "I'll get right on it."
When Tom didn't respond, Harry didn't press him.
Enahr slipped from the tiny medical room, cradling a limp form in his arms and whistling an off-key tune. He shifted the still figure, freeing a hand to seal the door behind him before taking a moment to study his handiwork. He smiled to himself; Enlin would be pleased. For a first procedure, he'd done amazing work.
She should be angry enough when she awoke to discover his "enhancements". He smiled even more broadly, picturing her reaction. She had quite a temper; that was for certain! Chuckling to himself, Enahr set off down the hall to deposit her with her companions.
These creatures amused him in a way few others had before. Well…that wasn't precisely accurate: she amused him. The others weren't particularly remarkable in any way that he had been able to discern. He thought he was going to miss her when they finally arrived at the auction. Enahr genuinely found himself enjoying her company, and their sparring stimulated his brain in ways he'd missed while playing the simple fool all these years…
Waiting for an opportunity to dispose of Enlin so that he could take over the lucrative slave operation in his absence had been a wise career move, but it had its drawbacks. He was sorely lacking in entertainment. Enlin was inherently vain, occasionally cruel, and fundamentally weak. It was a good thing, having been used to Enahr's complete advantage in establishing himself as second man. But often, it was difficult to bear in stoic silence. Enlin could be insufferable at the best of times, and downright dangerous at the worst of them…
He was concerned for the woman. He knew he shouldn't bother over her, but he'd seen Enlin's reaction to being denied something he wanted…and Enlin clearly wanted Janeway's commander. Enahr thought he had an accurate enough read on the alien by now, and he was certain Enlin's attention would not be welcomed by the man. He only hoped the creature had enough sense not to openly refuse his captor; doing so was likely to get the woman killed out of pure spite. And there would be little that Enahr could do on her behalf in that event…Enlin was just as likely to turn on one of his own men if sufficiently challenged. He knew that from experience…
She stirred in his arms. He smiled again, slowing his pace a little, trying not to jostle her too much. She'd be sore for the next few days, at least…
It didn't take her long. He felt her stiffen suddenly and had to shift her weight, which had gone tense as she'd regained awareness of her surroundings. He waited for it, grinning widely now…
"What the…" Kathryn's words were slightly slurred but clear enough. She pushed against him, almost making him drop her on the deck.
"Hey! Take it easy, honey," he drawled, staggering as he fought to keep a hold of her. "If I drop you on this hard grating, it's going to hurt."
"What did you give me?" she demanded, her voice becoming clearer as the sedative faded from her system. She immediately struggled to sit up, despite his warning. "Where are we? Put me do– what the hell?"
Enahr burst out laughing. He couldn't help it; her stricken expression as her gaze caught on her own chest was too amusing to ignore. The expected look of outrage that closely followed her shock only served to make matters worse. He laughed until his insides hurt. Eventually, he staggered backwards to lean against the wall and had to set her down on the ground before he dropped her anyway. One arm clutching his belly, he indulged in another long, hearty chuckle as he watched her struggle to rise to her feet.
"You can't be serious..." she was muttering, staring at herself and looking aghast as she had to force her shoulders back."I can't even stand straight!" she accused, clearly less than amused by this turn of events.
In fact, the captain was incensed, which she had good reason for: she'd awoken from an enforced slumber to find her body altered significantly – and rather personally, not to mention without her permission. To be clear, her chest was easily three times larger than its normal size. The "enhancements" hurt like hell, too. Her breasts had never been meant to swell to these proportions, and even if some hormonal change had ever sparked such a change naturally, it would have happened over time, giving her body much-needed opportunity to adapt to the increasing size. These…absurd alterations…had been manipulated in less than an hour, if she wasn't mistaken. Her skin hadn't had a chance to stretch to accommodate the extra girth, and as a result felt tight and pushed to its limits. But even that was nothing compared to the feel of the swollen tissue beneath…there was already heavy bruising evident over the top of her now hilariously too-small bra.
To add insult to injury, it was downright ridiculous looking. No one in his right mind (taking in her other proportions) could possibly believe this was natural! There was no way they'd be fooling anyone…!
She sucked in a deep breath (which hurt like the dickens), trying desperately to keep her cool and only half succeeding at it. That he hadn't stopped laughing as he watched her try to regain her composure only heaped more fuel onto the considerable fire of her anger.
Kathryn straightened to her full height. Ignoring the resulting twinge across her chest, she then fixed him with perhaps the most deathly look anyone in the history of the Janeway glare had ever received. "Reverse it," she ordered dangerously. "Now."
Enahr only eyed her appreciatively, his twinkling yellow eyes flashing at her. "Oh, I don't think so, honey. They're easily the best work I've done in ages." He laughed again at her disbelieving expression, propelling himself forward from the wall and taking her arm in a surprisingly firm grip before she moved to dodge him. She did, however, effectively bat his other hand away when it crept too far over the top of her shoulder as he easily spun her around to face the empty corridor in front of them.
Kathryn tensed as she felt her arms pulled behind her, and not just from the discomfort it caused her swollen chest. Remembering Chakotay's precarious situation, she had to forcefully quell the instinct to ram her bare foot straight back into what she assumed would be Enahr's most sensitive area. Instead she stilled, forcing herself to relax as the familiar restraints were slipped back over her wrists and secured there.
"Only a temporary measure," he assured her loudly…much more loudly than necessary, she thought. "I'll remove them as soon as we reach our destination, but I'm not taking any chances with that glorious temper of yours right now." His laughter grated on her nerves like little she could ever remember having done so before. Before Chakotay, that was: he certainly seemed to have a talent for getting under her skin lately, now that she thought about it…and in more ways than one…
"Where are we going?" she demanded coldly, mostly to distract herself from the dangerous path her thoughts were taking; she blamed the sedative for her wandering thoughts, she decided.
"I'm going to let you join your friends now."
Well good, she thought to herself. At least she would be able to see if Tom and Harry were all right.
"And don't worry," Enahr continued, "I've been told your commander's already been placed in your holding cell." Punctuating his remarks with a surprisingly gentle nudge, the alien began ushering her forward.
Relief suffused her at the reassurance that Chakotay was still alive, but only briefly. At the mention of her crew members, Kathryn had paled considerably, very nearly stumbling as he marched her down the deserted, narrow hall.
Hell, he couldn't be serious! Not only was she in her underwear, but now she was going to be thrown into a tiny cell with Chakotay, Harry, and Tom looking like…this? Impossible! If she breathed too deeply (not likely, considering how much the alterations hurt when she was still) it wouldn't be hard to fall out of the scant garment completely.
Her entire body flushing a pure shade of scarlet, Kathryn Janeway was at a loss for words as she allowed herself to be marched silently down the hall, feeling like she was being led to her execution.