Chapter 7

B'Elanna was awakened the next morning when the lights were turned on. That could not have been more than three hours, she thought. Her eyelids would not stay open; if she wasn't careful she would fall asleep again. She tried to collect her thoughts as she sat up and rubbed the sleep out of her eyes. She heard the footsteps of a guard going into the room next door, and suddenly she shot out of bed. She grabbed her gear out of her dress and shoved it under the mattress just before someone came in, took the dress away and shoved some sort of time table at her. When the door closed again, she let out a sigh of relief; she would have to be more careful.

Now she looked at the paper in her hand. The times made no sense to her, but there was a digital clock on the wall that the numbers on the paper corresponded with. Fortunately, these people seemed to also work on a 24 hour system, or close enough anyway, so she had no trouble interpreting her schedule. Apparently, she had an hour before she got some food and went to her work shift for six hours. More food after that, followed by endless hours of down time which she supposed were to allow people used to a different time to adjust.

A plan was beginning to form as she stared at this piece of paper. It was a long shot, but if it worked she might just be able to complete her mission with a day to spare. She would need some of that down time to make it work, though. And the sewing kit.

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Kathryn's schedule didn't match up with B'Elanna's, so while she was working, Kathryn was trying to write a diary entry. She missed having a personal log to use to collect her thoughts, and fortunately Kartok had provided paper and pen. Problem was, all she could think about was B'Elanna, and she couldn't let that fall into the wrong hands. But looking at the clock, she found she had hours before Kartok arrived, and by then the entry could be ripped into tiny pieces and flushed down the toilet.

So she tried to convince herself that she was seeing things, that the stress was too much for her, that she wanted to be rescued so badly that her mind was imagining she would be. But with it all on paper, it seemed more and more likely she was wrong. Chakotay would want to rescue her; even though he was Maquis, they had become very good friends. Therefore, she would naturally imagine Chakotay if anybody. Ahh, but one side argued, He would never willingly send a member of his crew into danger. He would go himself. This was true. But if B'Elanna felt that she was the one to go, she could convince him, the other side put in. A smile tugged at the corner of Kathryn's mouth as she realized that this was also true. Trying to win an argument against B'Elanna was as futile as…well, as trying to resist the Borg. You would almost rather be dead. And so she battled with herself on paper for an hour, changing her mind this way and that, taking up three full pages until finally she was fed up and disposed of it properly.

Her final conclusion: Thinking about it wouldn't change the situation anyway, and changing sleep schedules had left her in need of many naps. She decided that sleep would be the best thing for her worn out mind. As her eyes closed, she thought of an old 20th century proverb: what will be, will be.

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When B'Elanna was shoved back into her room, she did not jump right into her plan. She took a shower. That had been the most manual labor she had done in a long time, and her lack of sleep didn't make it any better. She pulled out the sewing kit afterwards, while her hair dried. Her plan was relatively simple. She would sew pockets into one of her dresses to hold her phaser and tricorder. It probably wouldn't matter that her seamstress skills were practically nonexistent, how hard could a simple stitch be? After she finished that, she would only have to trick the guards into opening her door. They looked stupid enough, so it probably wouldn't be very hard. Then it would be a surprise visit to engineering and a quick transport out.

She did end up encountering a problem, though: apparently sewing was harder than it looked. After a few restarts and some insulting of the thread and scissors, makeshift pockets were present in a casual green dress.

She put the dress on, still hating it. What was this association with girls and dresses? Pants worked much better, and they were more comfortable. Besides, now the pockets bumped awkwardly against her legs. But eventually, she was situated, and so she put her plan into action.

She screamed. Not like a yelp that human females emitted when surprised by a mouse, but a shriek of pure terror. She hoped it was a close enough estimate; her only references were classic horror movies that she was sometimes forced to watch, having never actually made such a sound before. Not even half-human Klingons would show that much fear. That said, it was oddly satisfying, a good way to relieve stress. She would have to try it sometime when she really wanted to punch someone.

As expected, two guards rushed into the room, so she implemented part two. She fainted. This part was not so hard to fake; she just fell to the ground in a heap. Also as expected, one of the guards picked her up and carried her outside. She looked around through half open eyes until she was sure that there was no one else around, after which she pulled her phaser out of her pocket and fired. The unconscious ogre was dragged out of the way, and B'Elanna pulled out her tricorder to scan for bio signs. None appeared to be coming towards her, not any which matched the guard anyway. The bio signs of the prisoners were interfering a little with her scans, but as long as she only focused on the Thayn's body signs, she would be fine.

Getting into the turbolift wasn't a problem, it was just her safety for the few minutes that she was in there that would be challenging. She pressed the button for engineering, but was sure she didn't have the time to reprogram the turbolift to allow no one else to enter. All she could do was pray that no one chose that particular time to run for a quick snack or something.

Fortunately, no one did, and there was no one in the hall where the doors opened. She only had to turn a few more corners and she would be in engineering, she could see the congregation of bio signs about a hundred meters away, and there were no recognizable bio signs between there and here. She prepared for the upcoming battle as she turned the first corner, heart pounding. And then she stopped. Because there was an exception to her assumption that all people in charge had the same bio signs. And he was standing right in front of her.

A/N: I know, cliffhanger, I'm sorry. Don't worry though! I was going to predict that I needed until friday, but i'll be home from school tomorrow so the next chapter might be done by thursday after all =]

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