XI

 

A sense of foreboding descended upon Seven as she approached her objective; Talarum's pleasure space yacht, the Resolution. Something was going to go drastically wrong. For a moment she contemplated giving up on the entire thing.

 

Irritated she shook her head. Since when did she fall prey to superstition? Their plan was sound and had a good probability of success. Naturally there was always a chance things could go wrong but both she and B'Elanna were aware of that. She checked her readings again. So far, it seemed, their approach appeared to be completely undetected by both the Resolution and Risan Planetary Control.

 

It had been her idea to inform Planetary Control of the contraband being smuggled aboard the Ferengi's ship, so that their attention would be elsewhere. B'Elanna had argued that it would also probably alert Talarum, Villamer and their cronies. However Seven had realised this and had timed the message so that it would be sent just as the boarding of the Resolution began. By the time their enemies learned of her escape, she would already be aboard their vessel.

 

They had really been fortunate in acquiring this ship. B'Elanna had outfitted it with the same sensor-dampening field as had been on board the cargo freighter, rendering the ship virtually undetectable. They had tested it out with the freighter's sensors, and it had worked nicely.

 

No, at this stage detection was not her biggest worry, infiltration was. She had fully functioning transporters available and with the Resolution docked as it was, its shielding would be no problem. However there was no telling what other security measures were on board.

 

The Resolution was docked at the end of the west-docking pylon of a small orbital space station. From the Ferengi's database Seven had learned that this space station and several like it served as transport stations for unloading and restocking the space vessels docking and visiting Risa.

 

No other vessels were anywhere near the Resolution. Seven recognised that the vessel was aesthetically pleasing as far as ships went. Only slightly smaller than Voyager and having the same basic form. There the similarities ended.

 

Nunk's file had supplied them with no details of the security arrangements on the Resolution, nor had it given a schematic of the ship. However, it had provided them with Nunk's verbal description of the vessel. Everything on board had been designed with luxury in mind. The vessel had three holosuits, two swimming pools, a massage parlour; the list was endless. It was basically a mobile holiday resort, up to and including the staff.

 

Seven had chosen to transport into the crew quarterdeck. It was the uppermost level, situated well away from the areas in which the owner and guests spent their hours, therefore she had surmised that it would have less through traffic and be frequented by fewer security personnel.

 

She was hovering under the vessel now, she should still be undetected, unless someone happened to look out of a nearby porthole at that exact moment. Positioning her ship immediately under the Resolution, at about half a metre's distance, she programmed it to remain stationary, and initiated transport.

 

As she dematerialised her last thoughts went to B'Elanna.
`Take care Bey, I want you back in one piece.'

 

Re-materialising in an unfamiliar room Seven quickly looked around. She had transported herself directly into someone's quarters, which were presently unoccupied. She hoped the room's owner would stay away long enough for her to finish her business in there.

 

The room was very small. Just large enough to contain a single bed, a well-padded chair and a few personal effects belonging to its regular occupant. In one of the walls was located a built-in replicator and computer console.

With two strides she made her way to the computer panel and called up the ship's schematics. It took only a few seconds to memorise the layout of the vessel. With her eidetic brain she could now recall every detail revealed by the computer. Shifting through the newly acquired data she determined were the engine room was. The best way to ensure the villains would not go anywhere was to make certain they could not go anywhere.

 

The schematics revealed that, like most vessels, the Resolution had an extensive maze of Jeffries tubes through which she could make her way to engineering. The trick would be to get to the entrance to the maintenance tunnels undetected. The chances that she would not encounter anyone on such a busy ship were small. Maybe it was best to just walk trough the corridors as if she belonged. With a little bit of luck the crewmembers would assume she was a new crewmember or just a visitor. Surely that would not be an uncommon occurrence on the pleasure planet.

 

Seven rarely spend much of her time worrying about her looks but she had enough experience in her humanity now to know that most humans found her appearance aesthetically pleasing. And also knowing humanity a bit made her assume people would 'know very well' why she was there regardless of what she was wearing.

She took a look at her outfit. After the dive through food filled trays had ruined her own clothing, she had replicated a plain green coverall. She hoped that if she did run into someone it was nondescript enough to avoid drawing attention to her.

 

But luck was once again with her. Although the walk to the Jeffries tube entrance was over two hundred meters long, she did not encounter anyone.

The sense of dread she had felt earlier returned. She could not believe things were this easy. Irritated she shook her head, where did this feeling come from? It was not based on anything that could be logical explained. Maybe she should just be thankful that everything was going smoothly so far.

Arriving at the entrance to the Jeffries tubes, she quickly opened the door and crept inside. She needed to climb down the ladder nine decks and then crawl trough the tubes to the end of deck six. After that she would somehow have to overwhelm any crewmembers that were on duty, and sabotage the engines. Then if everything was still going according to plan she could proceed with the next phase of the operation.

 

Her internal chronometer told her it had taken over an hour to reach the engine room. Carefully she opened the hatch. Spying through the little opening she saw nobody around. She opened the hatch wider. Still no personnel.

 

Once more the feeling of dread descended on her. Was it typical for a vessel of this size to have nobody on watch when they were docked? It certainly hadn't been on Voyager. She realised she was not on Voyager, had not been for years, but in her opinion any Captain worth his insignia would have someone on watch in Engineering at all times. It was, after all, the nerve centre of the ship.

 

Musing like this was wasting valuable time. Getting out of the tube, she knew from her memory of the schematic just where she wanted to be. It also helped that most engine rooms were of a standard design. The warp core was in the centre of the room, with all the other consoles and engineering panels located around it.

 

She positioned herself in front of the panel that contained the controls of the warp core, her assimilation tubules immediately accessing the warp core systems.

 

"How nice of you to finally join us, Ms Hansen." A male voice from behind her stated. Seven, who had more or less expected to hear it ever since she came on board, did not turn around. Instead she concentrated on disabling the engines.

 

"Uh-uh, we cannot have any of that," the voice sounded almost amused. Before the stun blast hit Seven she thought irrelevantly, 'what is it with captors and amusement?' At least she had managed to complete what she had set out to do before she succumbed to unconsciousness.

 

XII

 

Seven came to in a very luxurious room. She was lying in a reclining chair, unable to move. Moving her head she saw the restraints that held her in place, two simple looking straps but made out of a very strong material. Even though it would be difficult for her to free herself, she did not think it was impossible with her Borg enhanced strength.

 

However, for now it was necessary to play the helpless captive. She began to examine her surroundings. The room was the epitome of opulence. Expensive looking sofas were dwarfed by the large area. Portholes were draped by lavish curtains and ancient 19th century oil lamps dimly lit the room. Real books lined the walls and a lush red carpet covered the floor. Sculptures and paintings dotted the walls.

 

"Ah, sleeping beauty has awakened," came the cheerful voice again. Seven craned her neck as far as she could but could not see the owner of the voice.

 

Her captor chuckled and moved from behind the reclining chair to stand in front of Seven. The man was of medium size, with black hair, brown eyes and a goatee. The man smiled at Seven but the expression did not reach his eyes.

 

"My name is Villamer, but I suspect you knew that already."

 

Seven looked at him a few moments before answering. "No I did not. The Ferengi's logs only gave me your designations not your descriptions."

 

"Ah, obviously we were correct in our assumption that those foolish Ferengi would prove incompetent, and lead you straight to us."

 

"You were expecting my arrival?"

 

"Of course, our profilers predicted that the Ferengi's plan had a fifty percent chance of success. That meant an equal chance of failure. Barring failure on Nunk's part we were ninety-eight percent certain you would manage to find out about us and would come after us. It all fits your personality profile. And on the off chance you would decide not to come after us, well, nothing ventured, nothing gained. Ms. Hansen you have made me and Dylan very happy people indeed."

 

Now Villamer smiled a real, satisfied, smile. "However we had not allowed for you alerting Risa's authorities. When we found out about that we had to make haste to get away. By alerting them you made a mistake, we knew by that you were on your way to us, but I must say I was impressed with your entry on the Resolution. We did not even notice you were on board until you triggered an alert upon opening the Jeffries tube hatch. All we had to do is follow the path of the alarms you set of and within minutes we knew what your destination was. We cleared engineering and all security had to do is wait for you to make your presence known there. And yet you almost managed to disable our engines."

 

To himself Villamer thought, 'Veslek made a mistake in letting that happen.' The man Talarum had hired to captain his ship and to arrange their security had never made such a mistake before. And Villamer could not help but wonder why he had done so in this matter. Even a green behind the ears Starfleet recruit would have known to hide his people in engineering itself. There were plenty of consoles to hide out of sight of the Jeffries tube hatch from which the Borg woman could make an appearance. If such was even necessary, you could not look through the hatch, all Veslek had needed to do was wait outside the hatch wait for it to open and pull the Borg out. Of course it paid to take extra precautions where a Borg was concerned but to wait for over a full minute outside engineering just did not wash with Villamer. And even though Veslek's records so far had been spotless this was definitely a mistake that would be investigated when they got home. To bad Talarum had almost a hundred percent faith in the guy.

 

A frown appeared on his face as he continued talking to his captive, "As it is we are only able to achieve warp 1.7. We left the docking station as soon as you were on board but we aren't making good time. I don't suppose you would be willing to enlighten our Engineers as to just what you have done?"

 

"No." smirked Seven, pleased she had accomplished this much. It was more than she and B'Elanna had counted on. They had relied on Seven reaching Engineering but not on doing any actual damage. As it was, the former Borg had even managed to lock the Resolution's engineers out of all the engine's systems with Borg encryption codes. She doubted any engineer unfamiliar with Borg systems would be able to break them. In fact she believed B'Elanna Torres was one of the few unassimilated people in the Alpha Quadrant who could manage it unaided. She wondered how the Klingon was doing.

 

Villamer shrugged. He had not expected an affirmative response to his request. And he knew better than to threaten or coerce this woman into helping him. His profilers were clear enough on that fact. Besides he was confident enough that the ship's engineers would be able to get the engines back to peak efficiency in no time.

 

"How long have I been unconscious?" asked his captive, causing him to stop his pondering. For a moment he considered not answering the drone's questions. Then he shrugged to himself, what did it matter? The woman was not going anywhere.

 

"Long enough for us to find some answers to our questions. By the way thank you for returning our vessel to us. We loaned it to those bungling Ferengi figuring we would loose it. Quite ingenious, how you outfitted it with sensor dampeners to fool our instruments. I am certain our employers will be eager to adapt that particular trick. We only found the ship because we knew there had to be some way for you to get on board the Resolution. It is now safely back on our shuttle deck. And to answer your question, you have been k.o. for approximately three hours."

 

Three hours! What was B'Elanna doing?

 

"Now, Ms. Hansen, please relax and take it easy. In a few hours we will begin with the extraction of your nanoprobes."

 

Seven merely raised her eyebrow and stated baldly. "You will not succeed in this endeavour."

 

Now the pleasant expression dropped from Villamer's face. "And just how do you think you can stop me Borg? You think we did not take your Borg enhanced strength and skills in consideration? I will remind you of the fact that you are not dealing with Ferengi now."

 

Seven grinned evilly at the man, visible relaxing herself. 'That may very well be but I doubt you have taken my Klingon's strength in consideration.'

 

For a moment Villamer was taken aback by Seven's reaction, then he dismissed it. The Borg was just trying to throw him off balance. Without a backward glance he walked out of the room, leaving Seven to worry about B'Elanna, unable to do anything other than think about B'Elanna.

 

***

 

B'Elanna decided she had waited long enough. She had been able to monitor Seven via both an open sub dermal comm. link and an exographic targeting sensor, enabling her to keep an eye on her friend at all times.

 

The use of a sub dermal communicator was not new to them. They had used it on Voyager several times and it had not taken them long to replicate one for each of them and, with the help of a simple dermal regenerator, embed them. The exographic targeting sensor was something B'Elanna had discovered while selecting a weapon from the Ferengi's collection. One of the projectile weapons she had inspected had come with a few extras, one of which was the exographic-targeting sensor; the other, bullets with micro-transporters attached to them.

 

At first the Klingon had not known what the ETS was for, though she quickly determined it was meant to be placed in front of her eye. Curiously she had done so and, on activating it, she had found that she could look through several layers of deck plating. After a little practise she easily found Seven, who was still on the bridge. Realising she had found her weapon of choice she had grabbed the rifle and taken it with her.

 

At that very moment that same rifle was lying next to her, pressed against her body in the tight space she was lying in. For the past three hours B'Elanna had lain in a very compact compartment in the Ferengi's smuggler's vessel. Not the most comfortable of places but it hid the Klingon well.

 

With the comm. link placed directly behind her ear and the ETS over her eye she could follow nearly everything that happened to her friend. So far everything had gone according to plan. Seven had made it even farther than they had anticipated before getting captured. It really was a shame she had not been able to completely disable the engines. That job was now on B'Elanna's shoulders.

 

Realising that taking on the entire crew of the Resolution was too big for just the two of them they had decided to sabotage the vessel as much as they could. Figuring that the Resolution would make a run for it as soon as the Ferengi failed to contact them, Seven had felt it would be the most logical approach.

 

By sending three separate messages to Risa Planetary control they were fairly certain help was on the way. The chances of all three messages being intercepted by agents of the Orion Syndicate were small. B'Elanna felt more confident knowing that help was probably on the way. Even Risa had Starfleet personnel stationed on it.

 

B'Elanna had agreed to wait in her compartment till she knew Seven was captured. It had taken an exhaustive amount of persuasion on Seven's part to convince the Klingon to do so. If their opponents believed they had captured their objective they would be less likely think to look for someone else, giving B'Elanna more freedom of movement.

 

B'Elanna had waited right up until the moment Seven was shot down. That was something they had not taken into account and the Klingon's heart had skipped a couple of beats in panic. Thankfully someone in Engineering said that the Borg woman was only stunned and ordered her moved someplace else. Not willing to waste any more time B'Elanna started to remove the panel she lay behind. Hidden there only to give the impression Seven had arrived at the Resolution alone, B'Elanna thought, and after two hours of doing nothing, it was time to come out. Nobody had discovered the smuggler's vessel yet.

 

If the engineer had come out of hiding a few seconds earlier she would have been spotted. However just as she was about to do so the vessel was moved and she quickly withdrew behind the compartment panel.

 

Growing pretty stiff by this time she decided to play it safe anyhow and remain where she was just a little longer. Which was just as well. Shortly after the ship was landed on a shuttle deck, the cargo room was cursorily checked.

 

B'Elanna thanked whatever god was out there for finding the exographic sensor. With that little device she could keep her eye on everything even if it meant she had to temporarily take her eyes off Seven.

 

Even though the search of the smuggler's vessel was perfunctory it was a while before B'Elanna felt safe enough to venture out of her hidey hole.

 

When she finally did crawl out she took a few moments to loosen up her cramped muscles, and decide what her best course of action would be. She had already located Seven and would regularly check up on her friend. However she would also need to scout ahead which meant she could not keep her eyes on Seven the entire time.

 

For a second B'Elanna contemplated simply beaming into Engineering but with the exographic sensor she quickly determined that there were several people present now. And where they had intended for Seven to be captured they had also agreed that B'Elanna should avoid detection as long as possible.

 

By now B'Elanna had surmised that the Jeffries tubes had detection sensors in them. How else could those people have known just were Seven was headed. They had been waiting for her, of that there was no doubt in the Klingon's mind. She prayed she would be able to disable the alarms. The maintenance tunnels where still her best option of getting around the ship undetected.

 

First things first, slinging the rifle onto her shoulder the Klingon checked the shuttle deck as thoroughly as she could. A man and a woman were stationed near the exit, both intently bent over a console. Having also located an entry to the tubes B'Elanna figured the risk of detection was minimal. The entry hatch was practically next to the vessel but, with several metres of empty space between, there was always some risk of being spotted.

 

Just before exiting the vessel the Klingon took one last look at Seven. The former drone was still unconscious; she looked almost angelic, lying there as she did.

 

'Right, Torres!' she thought to herself, 'payback time.'

 

She reached the entry hatch without being seen by either crewmembers, the 24th century F16 incarnation hid her from their view. She quickly ran her tricorder over the entryway. Sure enough there was an activated detection sensor hidden in the hatch itself. Well not really hidden, it was a pretty standard security device, requiring her to enter a specific code to open the hatch without setting off any alarms.

 

She wondered why Seven had not run across one of those but shrugging, she decided she should not waste any time on that. The half-Human did not have many tools to work with, but she had an unbelievable affinity with all types of machinery, and she was also a master of improvisation. A few quick commands on the tricorder and the small device sent out an electronic signal, the hatch automatically opening without setting off any alarms. Hurriedly she crawled into the Jeffrey's tube, remaining undetected.

 

Slowly moving forward it did not take long before she spotted the next detector, but she dealt with that one just as easily. As she progressed further towards the engine room she forgot how much time had passed and, because of the silence in the Jeffries tube, she was slightly startled when she suddenly heard a male voice directly in her ear.

 

"Ah, sleeping Beauty has awakened. My name is Villamer but I suspect you knew that already."

 

Followed by Seven's crisp reply: "No I did not."

 

B'Elanna let out a sigh of relief as she realised Seven was awake. Good, now the evidence collecting could begin.

 

The reason Seven had let herself be captured was basically a simple one. All the evidence they had, implicating Villamer and his people they had was from the Ferengi's logs. Which was in and of itself pretty circumstantial. Even if the authorities should arrest Villamer and Talarum it would only be the Ferengi's word against theirs. It simply was not enough to get a conviction in the courts.

 

For the same reasons there was also the possibility that the authorities would not issue a search warrant for the Resolution based on those logs. Especially not if the Orion syndicate had a hold over them.

 

Not even certain that their opponents had computer files of their actions on board, they had determined the need to collect the evidence themselves. The moment Seven had boarded the Resolution a minuscule recording device had started to log every word spoken in her vicinity.

 

B'Elanna took a few seconds to listen to the conversation and quickly started smirking. They were collecting evidence al right. Straight from the horse's mouth.

 

Berating herself for wasting time in this manner she quickly resumed her crawl through the maintenance tunnels

 

When she finally reached engineering she had to decide on a course of action. The direct approach would be a 'go directly to jail card' as Tom might have put it. But it could prove to be her only option, for, no matter how good she was at improvisation, there was no way she could sabotage the engines from the Jeffries tubes with only a tricorder at her disposal.

 

The matter was further complicated by the fact that there were now four people working in Engineering trying to undo the damage that Seven had wrought. B'Elanna sighed, in retrospect maybe it had not been such a good idea for Seven to disable the engines.

 

Even at warp 1.7 the Resolution would be some distance away before the Risan 'cavalry' arrived to help them. On the other hand had Seven not succeeded, that distance from the planet, and subsequently the time before support was likely to turn up, would have been greatly increased.

 

As she contemplated how to tackle this situation she suddenly had the urge to smack herself on the head. Why the hell had she not thought of this before! She could have dealt with this problem from the shuttle deck instead of wasting valuable time crawling to engineering.

 

Damn! She could kick herself for being so stupid, but now was not the time for self-condemnation. She couldn't afford to waste more time. She un- slung her rifle from her shoulder and took careful aim. It had been at least four years since she fired a weapon but with this rifle it would be difficult to miss her target. At least under ordinary circumstances. This time however, she had to aim with the help of the exographic sensor and, even though she had grown quite comfortable with the device during the last few hours, targeting a very specific area was not something she had ever done before.

Activating the bullets' micro transporters with her tricorder, she took very careful aim a few moments later, counting herself lucky that she was an engineer and knew precisely where the weak spots of a warp engine were located. At the same time relying on that the people working in engineering having very healthy levels of self-preservation otherwise she was killing herself along with everybody onboard the vessel.

 

Snorting, to herself she just knew that these cowards would not even try to erect a containment field around the warp core when the alarms started going off. She was betting that they would eject the core within 30 seconds. That would effectively shut down the Resolution completely. It would also create one hell of a diversion and they would most likely blame the entire thing on Seven's earlier sabotage of the engines.

 

And when everybody was busy dealing with his or her problems B'Elanna could start looking for other incriminating evidence against the Orion syndicate.

For a short time anyway, her first concerns were for her friend.

Okay, there it was, the matter-anti matter converter. Pop a bullet into that and it would set off a chain reaction that would do some serious damage. The Klingon made her shot, and then fired another immediately after just to be certain, and all hell broke loose on the Resolution.

 

Alarms blared, people in engineering were shouting, panicked and over the top of the chaotic noise a male computer voice stated: "Warning, core breach imminent. Two minutes until warp core breach. Warning, core breach imminent…"

 

A terrifying thought suddenly hit B'Elanna. What if Seven's encryption codes made it impossible for the ship's engineers to dump the warp core? Why the hell had she not taken that into consideration? How stupid could she get?

 

Readying herself to jump out of her hiding place to rectify her mistake, she held her breath while one of the Resolution's engineers gave the order to dump the warp core.

 

His commands worked without a hitch and the core was quickly ejected into empty space. The explosion it made was enough to rock the Resolution severely and B'Elanna was thrown around violently in the confines of the maintenance tunnels.

 

Realising she would be sporting quite a few bruises within the hour, as well as a nasty gash on her head from hitting the wall none too lightly, B'Elanna nevertheless felt as though she could weep with relief.

 

Not able to suppress a very heavy sigh of relief B'Elanna continued to berate herself for her stupidity. Her number one objection to helping Seven had been that she did not want Miral to grow up without both parents, and now she had nearly orphaned her daughter herself.

 

Then a devilish little voice inside her head said: 'But it worked…'

 

It had indeed and better than she had hoped. A grin appeared on the Klingon's face. No sense in crying over spilt milk, at this point all that mattered was that her idea had paid off pretty well.

 

Moving back through the Jeffries tube, and growing heartily tired of all the crawling, she figured the next thing for her to do was locate either Villamer or Talarum's quarters. Should they have any records of their plans then undoubtedly they would keep them in their private rooms. And if not, it was as good a place as any to start searching.

 

**

 

When the alarms and klaxons started to sound, Seven's questions as to what B'Elanna was doing were partially answered. And when the shock wave caused by the exploding warp core rocked the Resolution she knew precisely what the Klingon had done, if not exactly how.

 

A satisfied expression appeared on her face and Seven decided that, as everyone was undoubtedly busy trying to figure out what was going on, now would be a good time to join the fray herself.

 

Under the belief it would be a simple matter to sever the bonds that kept her tied to the chair, Seven surged forward.

 

"Oungh," came the surprised exhalation as the bonds did not give way. The movement hurt quite a bit as she forcefully rebounded into the chair. Trying and failing again, Seven struggles to free herself became more frantic.

Suddenly a male Seven had not seen before entered the room.

 

"What the hell did you do to my engines?" he demanded angrily of Seven.

Guessing, correctly, that this man was Talarum, the former Borg deemed him unworthy of a reply. She stopped her struggles and looked passively at him.

His blond shoulder length hair hung in front of his eyes and Seven could barely make out that they were brown. A small nose above average lips made for a pretty unremarkable face.

 

The male grabbed Seven by the collar of her overalls.

 

"I asked you a question, Borg! What did you do to my ship?"

 

Seven simply smirked in his face, completely un-intimidated by the man's anger.

 

Talarum was now positively radiating fury and for one moment it looked like he was going to hit his captive.

 

"You are going to regret this, Borg. You are so going to regret this." hissed the man. Letting go of Seven he was about to say something else when he was interrupted by the ship's intercom.

 

"Bridge to the captain."

 

Obviously irritated Talarum quickly walked to an intercom unit inside the room, spurred on by the urgency in the speaker's voice.

 

"What is it Veslek?"

 

"Sir, sensors have picked up several vessels. At their current speed they will intercept us in approximately two hours."

 

Smothering an oath Talarum asked a question he already knew the answer to.

 

"Can you identify the vessels?"

 

"Yes, sir. According to their warp signature they are Starfleet vessels."

 

"Dammit," he balled his fists, throwing an angry looked at Seven. "How many?"

 

"Two sir, our files have identified them as the USS Saturn and the USS New Sydney."

 

Talarum threw another angry look in Seven's direction. He knew that his own associates would not be able to reach them in time to help. With full knowledge that the Resolution couldn't fight off two Starfleet vessels on her own, Talarum decided to cut his losses and abandon ship. He started barking out orders.

 

"Contact Villamer and have him meet us at the shuttle deck in half an hour with the Borg. Veslek, prepare the shuttle, we are getting out of here. You are piloting."

 

Veslek was one of the few people in his crew who knew that they were members of the Orion syndicate. And of those few, Veslek was the only Talarum trusted. The man had helped him out of a scrape or two in the past and after that he had started to rely on him more and more.

 

"Aye sir, I trust you will be joining us as well."

 

Talarum did not bother to hide the irritation he felt at such a stupid question. "Of course, I just need to get a few things from my quarters and then I will join you there. Now get moving. Oh, and shut those stupid sirens off, I can't think straight with all that blasted noise."

 

"Aye sir," said Veslek again.

 

Talarum turned to Seven again and repeated: "You are going to regret coming here bitch. Count on it."

 

At that he turned around and hurriedly left the room.

Seven let out a sigh. It had not been as easy to control herself as she would have liked. Before, she had been under the impression that she could free herself from the chair whenever she desired but this was not the case. Now she was truly helpless. She was completely dependent on B'Elanna for her rescue and could only wait and hope that it would come in time. And that B'Elanna did not get hurt in the process.

 

XIV

 

B'Elanna had quickly managed to find Talarum's quarters although she was unaware they were his. The layout of the Resolution appeared to be similar to Voyager's as far as the engineer could determine she had gambled on the fact that the most luxurious quarters would be on deck three, where Captain Janeway's quarters had been located on Voyager.

 

Keeping tabs on Seven she knew she did not have much time to rummage through the rooms. It had been difficult and time-consuming to gain entrance to the room and then access the computer files, but she figured she had better move her ass over to the shuttle deck in case Seven needed her.

 

In fact something quite urgently pulled at her to leave these rooms immediately. Not really understanding where those feelings came from B'Elanna decided to heed them and moved towards the door.

 

Before opening the door the Klingon hybrid used the ETS again to check out the hallway and found a solitary male making his way directly to the quarters she was about to exit.

 

Frustrated at the delay, but recognising that it would not pay for her to get caught, the half-Klingon woman hurriedly looked around for a place to hide.

Even though the room she was in was fairly large, the furnishing were rather Spartan. The only two places that would conceal her out of line of sight of the man about to enter the room, were a couch and a stylish desk in one corner.

 

Deciding on the couch, which would give her a better view of the quarters, B'Elanna rushed behind it.

 

**

 

Talarum approached his quarters he in thought. It had seemed such a simple plan when the Ferengi had first approached him with it. The Borg had been in the Alpha Quadrant for four years now and it would only be a matter of time before they would get their hands on the nanoprobes. Their scientists had hypothesised that careful harvesting and adaptation of the nanoprobes would ensure a long and vital life.

 

But things had not gone as planned. Not only was he about to lose his ship but, thanks to the Ferengi, his connection to the Orion syndicate. Starfleet might not be able to prove anything against him and Villamer but he knew that from now on he would be under constant scrutiny, not only from Starfleet but his Orion associates as well. Members of the Syndicate did not make mistakes such as this and live to tell.

 

His only ace was that he had the Borg in his possession. The extraction of her nanoprobes would ensure his future in more ways than one.

However before he abandoned ship and went into hiding, he had to complete a few things to ensure he could run his business in exile. It was imperative he download the information about his slightly less than legal projects into his PADD and erase all trace of the data from the ship's computers.

 

Not wasting any time, he entered his rooms and walked directly to his workstation. It did not take long for him to complete the transfer to his PADD however, just as he was about to order the computer to delete all record of the files in question, files he heard something hit the floor.

 

Without hesitation he grabbed his phaser, hidden directly behind the workstation, and fired in the direction from which the sound had come.

B'Elanna cursed silently, manoeuvring behind the couch had loosened the tricorder clipped to her tunic, causing it to fall to the floor. Realising she had given herself away she simply acted and, rising to her feet, aimed her weapon at the man with every intention of ordering him to surrender.

 

But the male responded as quickly and fired wildly in her general direction. Unfortunately, one shot grazed her left side. Not immediately aware of this B'Elanna dived to the floor and used the only option left to her.

 

She did not miss, despite the awkwardness of shooting the rifle at such close distance. Several bullets went straight through the human's legs, and he fell to the floor with a loud scream, his phaser landing near his head.

 

Becoming aware of the fact that she had been hit B'Elanna simply clenched her teeth and hastily made her way to her adversary, who was reaching for his weapon that lay just beyond his reach. With a snarl she kicked it away.

 

"Who are you?" asked the man, barely maintaining consciousness, his tone revealing utter defeat.

 

B'Elanna recognized the voice as belonging to Talarum. 'Not bad,' she started grinning.

 

"I am Seven's partner and when you kidnapped her I became your worst nightmare. You would do well to remember that!"

 

The half Klingon did not bother to conceal the satisfaction in her voice and the last thing the male saw before he passed out was the terrifyingly fierce expression on the woman's face. He welcomed oblivion.

 

Despite her hatred for the human male B'Elanna could not find it in herself to let the sleazebag die, also there was the small matter of closing her own wound. It would do neither her nor Seven any good if she were weakened due to blood loss.

 

Cursing at the loss of precious minutes she walked to the room's replicator. About to verbally order a dermal regenerator she changed her mind at the last minute. Entering her order manually instead, she stripped off the top half of her coverall, eyeing with distaste the left side of the material that was now soaked with blood.

 

The phaser shot had really only nicked her and, in her opinion, it was not bleeding that hard, but the condition of her clothing made the wound appear more serious than it actually was. Not to mention the fact that it made her garments stick to her skin, a feeling she had never enjoyed..

 

For a second she considered replicating new clothes but immediately shrugged it of as unimportant.

 

Kneeling down beside Talarum she fixed his wounds just enough to stop the bleeding. Since her medical knowledge did not extend much beyond the use of a dermal regenerator it was all she could do.

 

And when she used the regenerator on herself a minute later she was glad the doctor was not there to comment on her skills. They still were not much better than those of a first-year student nurse.

 

After doing the best first-aid she could on herself and Talarum she replicated the necessary materials and secured her still unconscious opponent to his workstation, his hands fastened behind his back and his mouth gagged. She did not truly believe he posed any threat but she was not willing to take the chance. It would not do for him to give verbal orders to the computer and call for help when he woke up.

 

Even without Seven's ability to keep track of time, sometimes she believed the Borg woman had an inbuilt chronometer, B'Elanna knew time was running out. She had to get back to the shuttle deck.

 

Crawling through the Jeffries tubes again was not an option, she was too far away. Simply walking through the corridors wouldn't work either. After a warp core breach, red alerts and two Starfleet vessels in pursuit security would definitely be on their toes.

 

That left only one option. An unauthorised transportation would surely set off more alarms but, if she timed it just right it would also create a useful diversion. That would help her and Seven to disable Seven's guards, grab a shuttle and get the hell out of there. Maybe she could programme the transporters to initiate a few false transports that would certainly confuse the Resolution's crew.

 

B'Elanna put the ETS to her eye again to check on Seven. Ascertaining that her friend was still alone and in the same room, she sat herself behind Talarum's workstation. She accessed it to try and determine how difficult it would be to activate the transporters from there.

 

It proved to be tricky, even for her, but not impossible.

She wished she could just transport herself and Seven to the shuttle deck, grab a shuttle and fly the hell out of there. Unfortunately she did not see how she could sabotage the Resolution's transporter systems before Villamer could use them himself to simply beam Seven back. She just could not risk it. She probably could have figured something out if she had more time but that was not the case.

 

Her eyes fell on the PADD Talarum had been holding and curiously she picked it up. She started browsing through its contents, all the while keeping an ear on Seven. When the contents became clear to her, the Klingon bowed sarcastically towards the unconscious male. "Why thank you so kindly, dear sir, for giving me exactly what I came her for."

 

She put the PADD under her shirt, wincing as it came in contact with her sensitive left side. Then her attention was drawn back to Seven as she heard voices over the sub dermal communicator.

 

**

 

As Seven heard the distinct sounds of both phaser and rifle fire through her sub dermal communicator her attempts to get out of the chair became frantic. What was happening to B'Elanna? The only thing that kept her from breaking their agreement not to contact each other was the fear it would distract B'Elanna from whatever she was doing.

Seven was discovering that it was far easier to be physically involved in a dangerous situation yourself, than stuck somewhere not knowing what was happening, especially when you were helpless to free yourself.

 

At that moment a man walked into the room and put something on a small side table that stood close by Seven's chair. The former drone turned a fraction of her attention to the young man but never once let her awareness shift from her half Human engineer. And as the young man just stood there looking curiously at her but saying absolutely nothing Seven ignored him completely and focused on the communicator.

 

She recognised Talarum's pain filled voice as he asked: "Who are you?"

 

Never had she heard anything sweeter than B'Elanna's voice when the Klingon answered. However Seven was a Borg and details never eluded her. She could tell from a very slight quaver in her friend's voice, that probably only she would ever pick up, that something was wrong with B'Elanna. And there was nothing she could do but hope it was nothing serious. She would never forgive herself.

 

Then the Klingon's words hit her and Seven could not stop a beatific smile from appearing on her face as she realised just what B'Elanna had said.

 

'I am Seven's partner.'

 

It did not last longer than a few moments before Seven concluded that B'Elanna probably only meant that they were partners in this particular venture. But for a few blissful seconds Seven had experienced true happiness.

 

Watching as Seven's face expressed such depths of emotion the young man who was still standing by her side became entrance by the woman's beauty. He was supposed to wait here for Villamer and subsequently had ample time to look at their captive.

 

Veslek wondered what had caused the Borg to smile so angelically. He could say without a doubt that she was the most heavenly creature he had ever seen. He was absolutely captivated by the woman.

 

As her expression became one of sadness he was actually tempted to try and comfort her, but at that moment Villamer arrived. The man was in an undisguised hurry as he demanded: "Did you bring the items I requested?"

 

Veslek did not speak, afraid that his distaste for his boss would clearly show through his voice, but simply nodded at the items he had placed on the side table.

 

Villamer ran his tricorder over the objects, everything appeared to be there. The Resolution's First Officer had passed his little test. Maybe Veslek's earlier stuff-ups were genuine mistakes after all. He had brought all the relevant materials with him himself as well just in case the man thought to double-cross him. He also had a few personal guards standing outside the room as additional back-up.

 

Finally he turned his attention to Seven. "Well my dear it seems we are going on a little trip in one of the shuttles. I am afraid we can't have you trying anything that would upset our plans further."

 

At those words he picked up the hypo-spray that Veslek had put on the side table. "This is a very useful drug. It won't make you sleep, it won't drug your mind but you will be unable to resist any orders people give you."

 

Becoming irritated with the fact the Borg bitch still did not show any fear of him, something that had never happened before, he started to press the hypo-spray to Seven's neck.

 

Seven might not show her fear, she would be damned before she gave him that satisfaction, but she still felt it. Nevertheless, as the hypo spray touched her neck, she looked her captor straight in his eyes, taunting him.

 

For a second Seven indeed lost control over her own body, she was unable to even blink her eyes. The sensation lasted only a few moments, before Seven felt she could command her own muscles again. She was confused but decided to wait and see what happened.

 

Villamer ordered Veslek to untie the Borg. This was the opportunity he had been waiting for. His boss turned around and walked to the door, calling in his guards. Veslek bent over Seven and whispered,

 

"Please play along until we reach the shuttle. Our chances will be better there."

 

Seven gave no indication she heard the man, not trusting him one bit. She would do whatever she had to.

 

XV

 

B'Elanna watched as Seven was drugged and led towards the shuttle bay. She momentarily puzzled over Veslek's words but paid them little heed. He was probably trying to pull some low trick on Seven.

 

Seven was accompanied through the corridors by Villamer, Veslek and three guards; two males and one female. The woman and one of the men walked in front of Seven while the others followed behind the former Borg.

 

For a second B'Elanna contemplated shooting them from her current position inside Talarum's quarters, but she could not risk it. Should she take out the first one or maybe two the others could very well believe that Seven was responsible and hurt her before the half Klingon had a chance to shoot them all. The exographic sensor was a very handy tool but it did take a certain amount of time and concentration when aiming.

 

No, far better to transport herself into the scene, use the advantage of surprise and take the guards attention off Seven by presenting herself as a possible target.

 

She would use Talarum's phaser to stun them. With a little bit of luck she would take them out within a few seconds, reach the shuttle and get the hell out of here.

 

By now Seven had reached the shuttle and B'Elanna, deciding it was high time to get the fun underway, transported herself to the shuttle deck.

 

***

 

As the party arrived at the shuttle deck they walked directly to the shuttle that was closest to the decks exterior exit. The entry ramp in the rear of the shuttle opened as soon as Villamer entered the access commands.

 

A couple of chairs were lined against the sides of the shuttle's back compartment and Veslek directed Seven to one of them. Villamer and one of the guards walked further into the shuttle through a partition that divided the fore and the aft of the shuttle. Villamer ordered Veslek to join him there at once and, with a last glance at Seven, Veslek followed him to the front.

The ramp was still open, awaiting the arrival of Talarum, whom Seven knew would not come. Slowly moving her head she saw that there were only two guards near her now. It would be the perfect opportunity to escape. And, because she had no doubts whatsoever that B'Elanna would arrive at any moment now, she decided to give her friend a bit of help.

 

Before she had a chance to make any move Seven saw phaser fire out of the corner of her eye. The guard nearest to the entrance ramp fell to the floor at nearly the same moment, never knowing what had hit him.

 

Seven had just enough time to jump to her feet when B'Elanna rushed inside and aimed her phaser at the second guard. The female security officer was only able to register her surprise at the intrusion before Seven knocked her out with one graceful and very effective kick of her right leg.

 

Letting Seven deal with the female guard B'Elanna switched her aim to guard number three who came rushing out of the forward compartment. His weapon drawn in front of him, he did not notice the half Klingon warrior, believing Seven to be the cause of the mayhem. Intending to shoot the Borg he was hit by a powerful phaser blast from B'Elanna's weapon first.

 

Villamer did not rush back into the rear of the shuttle but instead took a position behind the partition. As he watched his last guard go down he reaised his phaser and took aim at the Borg bitch responsible for ruining all his well-laid plans.

 

Several thoughts flashed through Villamer's mind. Subconsciously he realised Talarum would not join them. And he would have to harvest the nanoprobes from a dead body. So much for trying to keep her alive. Gods, how he hated her. Nanoprobes or not he would enjoy killing her.

 

Just as he fired Veslek rushed him, causing him to miss his intended target. However the surprise attack did not manage to disarm or disable him. With anger powered strength he wrestled Veslek for his phaser.

 

"You goddamned traitor. How long have you been working against us?"

 

Veslek had all his attention on the phaser and did not even hear his opponent's angry question. However he did feel the knee Villamer unexpectedly and forcefully placed in his stomach. Forced to let go of the weapon he instinctively put his hands to his stomach, turning away from Villamer.

 

Immediately realising his mistake he tensed, waiting for his life to be ended. When nothing happened he turned around again, just in time to see the crime lord crumble to the floor with a grim looking Seven of Nine towering over him.

 

Seven did not know why Veslek had helped them. Undoubtedly he was following his own agenda. She was not going to take a chance with the man; if he had betrayed his own employers he could very well betray them.

 

So, while holding his attention, she told him: "Thank you for your assistance." And then applied the Vulcan neck pinch on him.

 

With Veslek now safely unconscious she turned around and rushed towards B'Elanna. The Klingon was lying on the floor, bleeding profusely from her left side again. Trying to stop the bleeding with her hands as well as she could B'Elanna idly wondered if her left side had some kind of phaser magnet in it all of a sudden. How the hell had she managed to get shot in the some place twice in one hour?

 

Seven knelt beside the woman she held in such high regard. It was impossible not to see the blood streaming through the half Klingon's hands. For a second the usually level-headed Borg did not know what to do other than state the obvious.

 

"You are injured."

 

Noticing Seven's behaviour and to have her friend focus on something other than her B'Elanna hissed through clenched teeth: "No kidding. Seven will you get us the hell out of here."

 

Seven heard B'Elanna's words but her eyes had fallen on the supine female guard and she quickly stood up and forcefully removed the woman's upper garments.

 

Ordering B'Elanna to press the clothing to her wounds Seven reluctantly left her side and closed the entry ramp. As she passed the engineer, who was fighting to stay conscious, on her way to the cockpit she was unable to resist gazing at her for a brief moment as she thought.

 

'I love you.'

 

And she knew for a fact she always would.

 

After this Seven powered up the shuttle, left the Resolution and was met by the USS Sydney ten minutes later.