Chapter 8

When Kathryn woke up, she noticed a few things. First, while she was only semiconscious and her eyes hadn't opened yet, she noticed that her bed felt different, less comfortable, rock-like actually. Eyes still closed, she rolled over and noticed that her clothes had changed. When she decided that she needed a nap, she put on the nightgown, but whatever dress she was wearing now was definitely not that. Finally she opened her eyes, and that was when she noticed that she was no longer in her quarters. She wasn't even sure if she was still on the ship, unless she was on some sort of holodeck. Where ever she was, it had the appearance of a cave. Someone must have changed her clothes, because she was now wearing the original burgundy dress. That was a little too creepy to think about, so she allowed her eyes to sweep the room again. This time, she noticed that she was not alone, and the figure splayed across the floor was undoubtedly…

"B'Elanna!" Kathryn whispered, and dashed to her friend's side, praying she was only asleep. Brushing the hair out of her face, she found a nasty cut on one of her ridges, but she was breathing, and after a few nudges she was awake.

At first, B'Elanna was dazed, but her eyes quickly focused on the face hovering over her. "Captain!" she gasped and sat herself up. "Are you alright? How did you find me? Where are we?"

Now that she was sure B'Elanna was alright, she remembered to be angry. "What were you thinking? I thought I ordered you to leave!"

"Captain, you know we'd never leave you to die," B'Elanna interrupted.

"Kathryn!" Kathryn corrected through her teeth.

B'Elanna ignored her. "Neelix told us about a flaw in their sensors, so we figured we had a good chance. It would have worked too, if I hadn't run into Kartok at the last second. I suppose that's why I'm here," she mused, mostly to herself at this point. "He must have thought I was working with you, so that's why you're here."

"But he'll destroy Voyager!" exclaimed Kathryn. It was getting more and more difficult to keep her voice down when all she wanted to do was scream out her frustrations. She wanted to be out of here so badly, but not at the cost of her crew! She jumped to her feet and paced, trying to calm herself down. She wandered towards what she hoped was an exit, but she wasn't that lucky. A force field stopped her before she could get around the bend. She was just about to channel more of her fury into B'Elanna when she heard someone coming and stepped back.

It was Kartok, and he didn't look happy. He opened a panel, punched in some numbers, and the force field flashed once before going out. He strode towards Kathryn, and before she knew it she was on the floor, his slap ringing in her ears. B'Elanna started towards her, but Kartok pulled out a weapon.

"You should know that in all likelihood, only one of you will survive this encounter. One more step, and it will be certainty." B'Elanna stopped dead, and he turned to Kathryn. "You promised. You said that as long as I left your ship alone, you would do whatever I wanted. I kept my side of the bargain, but you didn't. You contacted your ship, gave them our coordinates. It was a foolish hope, and you should be the one to pay the price of this mistake." Kathryn bowed her head and didn't answer, and he raised his weapon.

"Wait!" said B'Elanna, and everyone turned to her. "She didn't send for us, we chased after you! One of our crew members is Talaxian, and he told us about how to find you."

Kartok looked intrigued at this. "Talaxian? Really? But I thought their world had been destroyed?"

B'Elanna looked a little relieved at his change in mood. "Well, he was on their moon, Rinax, at the time, so he survived."

Kartok nodded with understanding, a perfectly calm and conversational expression on his face. "Oh, I see. So then, I guess I should kill you." And he raised the gun again.

"She's lying!" called Kathryn. "I hacked into the ship's communications system and sent them a signal while you were at your shift. I knew they would be able to trace it back to our location."

"Oh and I suppose whoever was monitoring communications just didn't notice your message?" replied B'Elanna sardonically.

"Morse code tends to sound like pretty normal interference."

"Does anyone even know Morse code anymore?"

"You would have known it was taught at the Academy if you hadn't gotten yourself kicked out!"

"And I'm sure everyone paid a lot of attention in that class!"

"Well even you could recognize a simple SOS B'Elanna!"

They stopped their battling abruptly when they heard something they had never expected. Kartok was laughing. His gun was at his side and he was looking at them with a very amused expression on his face. "Your race is most unusual. Instead of fighting for your own life, you are fighting for each other's. For now, you amuse me, but know that tomorrow I will return, and someone will have to tell me the location of your ship."

He walked out, still laughing, turning on the force field behind him. The two just looked at each other, until Kathryn asked "Why can't he find the ship?"

"That's what I was trying to tell you," answered B'Elanna, "Their sensors can't detect a ship when it has its shields up. Voyager isn't very far, but they will never know where, because I don't know where it is either." She sighed, and thrust her hands into her pockets. Suddenly she looked shocked, then turned towards the wall in a heap. Kathryn suddenly became mothering again and rushed to her friend's side.

"Shh… it's okay," she said, but then noticed that B'Elanna wasn't actually crying, and that she had something in her hands.

"I wasn't sure if there were cameras, but I didn't want them to see this." She was holding a phaser. "I added pockets to the dress earlier, and I had left my phaser in them while I looked for engineering. They must have thought the tricorder was the only thing I brought."

Kathryn's countenance now showed her first smile since she had arrived. "Whatever your plan was, you're going to have to fill me in. We might be able to complete it after all."

A/N: Only a few more chapters left, possibly only one! I'll try my very hardest to get it out in two days, but it might need three.

In the meantime, keep reviewing!