[posted 4/9/99]


A YEAR IN THE LIFE 
Part Four: August By: Lauren Taylor

^In bridges he burned 

Or the way that she died^ 

"B'Elanna!" Harry called after her. She stood up, and wiped dirt from
her  hands. 

"What is it?" she questioned, raising her hand in a somewhat salute to
block  the sun out from her eyes. The sweltering heat on this planet
was beginning  to get to
her, she was feeling a bit groggy, and didn't feel too much like 
carrying on a conversation. Neelix had discovered a good supply of
plants on  the surface of a class
M planet, and had recruited Harry and B'Elanna to help  him gather
them. Due to some problems with the transporter, they had flown  the
Delta Flyer down to the
surface. 

"We're headed over this way, Neelix thinks we'll get more just on the
other  side of that hill." he told her. She sighed, brushed her hair
back, and  followed him. 

Walking was tough, the surface here was rocky, and she was constantly 
tripping over the stones. While walking down the hill, she slid
slightly, and  had to grab onto
Harry's arm in order to stay up. 

Near the bottom of the hill, she lost her footing again, and slid to
the  bottom. When she had expected to stop, with nothing more than a
few bruises,  the ground
below her gave away, and she landed, hard, about twenty meters  down
in some sort of a hole. 

She came to her senses only a few moments later, and looked around.
There was  barely room on either side of her for anything, the rock
walls were less than  half a
meter away from her on all sides. 

"B'Elanna? Can you hear me?" Harry called out. She looked up to see
Harry and  Neelix looking down at her. 

"Yeah, I hear you." she replied, her entire body aching just from
speaking. 

"Where are you hurt?" he asked. 

"Everywhere." she answered as she coughed. 

Harry turned to Neelix and spoke quietly so that B'Elanna wouldn't
overhear. 

"I'm going to go to the Flyer and contact Voyager. You stay with
B'Elanna and  keep her talking. This is looking pretty bad and if she
stops talking, she  may lose
consciousness."

Neelix just nodded, and Harry got up and ran as fast as he possibly
could  towards the Delta Flyer.

"Away team to Voyager." Harry demanded the second he got to the comm
panel. 

"Are you all done down there, Harry?" the Captain asked a few seconds
later. 

"No. We had an accident. B'Elanna fell into a hole, she's hurt pretty
bad. We  don't have any way to get down to here, there's not any room
for another  person. We
need to beam her out." he explained. 

"How is she?" he heard Tom ask. 

"I can't tell yet. How long until we can get the transporters
working?" 

"Engineering just told me at least two hours." Janeway responded. 

"I don't think that's enough time, Captain." he told her. 

* 

"She says the most they can get the repairs down to is an hour and
fifteen  minutes. We have to keep her conscious until then." Harry
said in a hushed  whisper to
Neelix. 

"I know you're talking about me, Harry." B'Elanna said. 

"They're getting the transporters repaired, B'Elanna, we'll have you
out of  there soon." Neelix called down to her.

"Water?" she asked them. 

"If you think you can catch a canteen, we've got water." Harry
answered, then  turned to Neelix, "There's some canteens of water in
the Flyer, go bring one  back
along with a med kit."

"Tell me about you and Tom's honeymoon, Maquis." Harry said once
Neelix had  left.

"I am not telling you about my honeymoon." she replied, managing a
little  laugh.

"Just the general details." he told her. 

"We went to New York City. It was the 1930s, can't remember exactly
which  year. We took a carriage ride around Central Park, went rowing
in the pond,  saw a
show called "Crazy for You" on Broadway..." she explained, as her
voice  grew quieter.

"Tell me more!" he yelled to her. 

She didn't answer. 

* 

"Voyager to away team." Tom's voice called out. 

"Away team here. How are the repairs coming?" Harry asked. It had been
about  forty-five minutes since the fall, and she wasn't doing too
well.

"I don't know, I'm not working on them, but I think they'll be ready
in about  twenty minutes. How is she?" Tom asked, sounding scared to
death.

"She's been drifting in and out of consciousness. She's asleep right
now. I  got a faint scan on her, it's hard to get anything else from
so far away, and  she's broken a
lot of bones." Harry responded.

"Tom?" she whispered faintly. 

"She's awake, Tom. Want to talk to her?" Harry asked. 

"B'Elanna? It's me. We're working as hard as we can on the
transporters, you  just need to hang on. I know you can do this,
you're a fighter. Can you hang  on for
me?" he pleaded. 

Harry looked back down at B'Elanna. Her eyes were closed, and she
wasn't  moving at all. He reached behind him and grabbed the
tricorder. The scans  were hard
to read, but after looking at them for a few moments, he knew.

"Harry, what's wrong? Why isn't she saying anything?" Tom asked
quickly. 

"She's dead, Tom." Harry answered regretfully. 

"Oh, God..." he heard Tom whisper. 

"Tom, I know I'm not a doctor or anything, but I think that if we get 
B'Elanna up to sickbay soon, you and the Doctor could probably revive
her."  Neelix
suggested. 

"I'll get working on it. Paris out." Tom said quietly. 

He sat up from where he'd been sitting in their quarters, and headed
towards  sickbay to get everything ready for her. He couldn't
concentrate on anything  else but
her. He'd already been kicked off of the repair crew because of  being
a bit too nervous to even get anything done, now the matter was
urgent,  and there was no
way he could help. 

It was August twenty-third. That left eight and a half months that he
had a  chance of going through without her. It seemed as though he had
such a short  time to live,
but, without B'Elanna, it would be an eternity. 

"Paris to transporter room." he said as he hit his comm badge. 

"Transporter room. What is it?" he heard Nicoletti ask. 

"We need the transporters up as soon as possible. If we can get
B'Elanna up  here soon, we can probably revive her." Tom told her.

"We're working on it. I'll let you know when they're up and we'll beam
her  straight to sickbay." she assured him.

* 

Eleven minutes since she'd died. God, what was going on? Why were they
taking  so long? Tom was pacing sickbay, much to the annoyance of the
Doctor. 

Twelve minutes. 

"Nicoletti to sickbay. Transporters are up and functioning, we'll
beam  B'Elanna, along with Neelix, straight to you. Get ready." she
informed them.

She appeared on the biobed, motionless, broken and bruised. Tom fought
back  every urge he had to just break down and sob at the sight of
her, but he knew  he
had to be strong if they were going to save her. Neelix moved away
from  the edge of the bed, prepared to answer any questions they might
have. Harry  had stayed
down on the surface and was going to bring back the Flyer. 

For the next five minutes, Tom and the Doctor worked dilligently at
their  life-or-death task. Sickbay was so silent that you could have
heard a pin  drop. Finally,
some noise. A beep. Another one, and another, all in  succession. 

A heartbeat. 

Tom choked back a sob as Neelix gave him a congratulatory pat on the 
shoulder. 

They weren't going to wake her just yet, it would be safer to let her
rest  for awhile. Tom took her hand in his, and held it close, until
she finally  woke up.

TO BE CONTINUED 

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