Title: Stronger 2/4
Author: quew
Please see part one for disclaimers, archiving info, warnings and other stuff.
Rating: R
#
'Please tell me you are joking,' B'Elanna breathed, straining her own hearing.
'The Borg are not known for their sense of humour,' Seven said, her porcelain features showing the first hint of worry.
'Shit, shit,' B'Elanna swore as her ears picked up the far off hum of a 'lift car heading their way. Looking around, she spied the emergency ladder�on the other side of the wide shaft. 'Couldn't you have jumped the other way?' She mumbled, trying to work out how they were going to make it in time.
'I am sorry, Lieutenant,' Seven said, her voice sharper than B'Elanna had ever heard it. 'Next time I will stop and ask you which side you'd prefer before I save your life.'
'There won't be a next time,' B'Elanna growled, realizing with a sinking heart that she now owed the ex-drone big, and her Klingon honour would not allow her to ignore that debt.
Still, she reasoned, she had more important things to worry about right then than her honour - her life, for example. She and Seven began to carefully climb around to the ladder, going as quickly as they could whilst still making sure their handholds and footholds were secure.
'We gonna be fine,' B'Elanna said, her breath starting to come in pants as she shifted her grip. 'The turbo-lifts have proximity sensors all around them - once the ones on the floor pick us up, the lift'll stop.'
'And you think these will be�' Seven paused, climbing another half-foot to her right. 'Operational?'
'You don't?' B'Elanna said, glancing at her climbing partner and grimacing as the turbo-lift noise became louder still. She followed through on that thought process - if the lift had malfuctioned accidentally...why had the communications and site to sites been turned off? Was it...sabotage?
'We have approximately thirty seconds until we find out, Lieutenant,' Seven said, her voice tight and her face hard.
'Shit,' B'Elanna said again, feeling the strength try and leave her muscles. Forcing herself onwards, their climb became ever more desperate in an effort to out run the 'lift. If the site to sites were off...were they off only on this deck?
'We're not going to make it to the ladder,' B'Elanna said through gritted teeth, feeling the first stirrings of displaced air on her face. 'We gotta think of something else�' Her mind raced as the running lights on the bottom of the 'lift came into view far above them. 'Quickly, Seven, how fast do those things go?!'
The ex-drone told her, and B'Elanna grinned as a rush of adrenalin gave her a burst of strength. Looking up, she measured the distance between them and the rapidly approaching turbo-lift. She had less than ten seconds to make her move, and deciding that it was the only chance they had, she grabbed Sevens' ankle and wrenched the ex-drone away from the wall in one wild movement. For a moment, Sevens expression plainly showed her absolute horror, and then she was gone, tumbling down into the darkness. B'Elanna glanced up nano-seconds before the lift smashed into her and, taking a deep breath, pushed herself away from the wall backwards.
For one horrible moment, she thought the lift would catch her up, its floor only inches from her paling face. Her eyes widened and she placed her hands up, gritting her teeth and preparing to brace herself against the floor, but then the ships gravity caught her in its grasp and she began to tumble away.
Her luck turned for the worse again seconds later when she had the breath knocked out of her, a heavy weight hitting her back with punishing force. She realized that she had fallen into Sevens' longer, less aerodynamic body, and the knock had forced them closer to the floor of the turbo-lift. She felt the air resistance pushing them closer still, threatening to flatten them against the floor of the machine, and she did brace herself this time, her fingertips shaking with muscle tension as they held them away from the machine. Taking a chance, she allowed them to get a little closer and then pushed away as hard as she could. The trick worked, and they began falling just ahead of the lift.
She tried to angle them downward, but Seven had frozen, gripping B'Elanna in a hold so hard the half-Klingons' bones complained as they were compacted. B'Elanna's eyes widened as the turbo-lift approached once again, seeming to slow as it did so. At the last moment, seconds before the lift touched them, she managed to streamline the pair of them somewhat and they held their own, free-falling at such speeds that the breath was drawn out of their lungs.
They seemed to have been falling for hours but it could not have been more than a few seconds. The walls were blurred, passing so quickly that had they rebounded from them, serious injuries would be a risk.
With a feeling of rising panic, B'Elanna looked down - the bottom of the shaft was approaching fast, too fast. She fought against the wind resistance and tried desperately to reach her com-badge, her arm shaking as she tried to touch the little metallic object. Suddenly, Seven reached around, grabbing the Lieutenants hand and adding her formidable strength to B'Elannas'. Together, they hit the badge and although they could not hear the distinctive chirp against the raging wind, the half-Klingon assumed it was working and screamed,
'Computer! Site to site transport to sickbay!'
The command seemed to take eons to process, and B'Elanna watched in fear as the shaft bottom approached. She tensed her body in horrified anticipation, feeling Sevens grip on her get tighter still. Just as they reached the bottom and B'Elanna started to let out a defiant scream, blue sparkles overtook their vision and she closed her eyes in relief.