The Escape (2 page)

I just-was "You need parts for the engines of this ship?" Neelix asked. Apparently he hadn't understood what they had been talking about before. "Captain, you should have said so. Didn't I promise to take care of YOUTI "Yes, Neelix," Janeway said, trying to keep the amusement out of her voice. "But you said that you weren't certain what type of ore we needed-was "Ore." He made a chopping motion with his small, mottled hand. "I'm not talking about ore.

You need parts for your ship and I know a place nearby where you can get plenty." As if on cue every head in the room turned toward the short alien. He smiled and seemed to grow some under the attention. Kes proudly patted him on the leg.

"Do go on," Janeway said.

Neelix laughed and squeezed Kes's hand.

"I'll take you to Alcawell. If you allow me to give you the coordinates, Captain-was "Alcawell?" Paris asked. With that one word he managed to imply all sorts of questions. He also made II it clear that the captain would not take coordinates until those questions were answered.

Janeway leaned back. The interaction among the crew had become predictable, and helpful.

Neelix never minded having the floor.

"Alcawell translates roughly into the Station. But it's not a station. It's a planet. Many races in this area believe it to be sacred, a sort of home of the gods." He put an arm around Kes, almost as if his performance were for her and her alone. "But I've been there. It's no home for anyone." "What's there that would help us?" Janeway asked. "A lot of old ships. A looootttt of ships." Neelix smiled. "More ships than you have ever seen in your entire life." "I doubt that," Paris said softly.

Neelix turned toward him, as if he needed to convince everyone. "Alcawell's been abandoned longer than any race in this area has been traveling space. They have so many ships that I'm sure one will help us. We can go in and take the parts we need out of the old wrecks. Or, perhaps, get the metals we need to make our own parts." Interesting, but dangerous. Janeway leaned her head back on the chair. "You're telling us that you know of an old spaceport with a few abandoned ships? And no one has touched these ships?" Neelix shrugged. "Who can tell if anyone has been near them? There are more ships than you can count. Believe me, a few parts won't be missed." "We do not steal," Chakotay said. The firmness in his voice made Neelix shrink a little.

He frowned as if considering, then grinned.

"Once you see the place I doubt you would call it stealing. More like salvaging." "Under your definition of salvage?" Paris asked. "Or ours?" This time Neelix ignored him. Neelix fixed his catlike gaze on Janeway. She, at least, wanted to see the station.

"To what race did this base belong?" Tuvok asked. "I don't know," Neelix said, "but they've been gone for centuries." Ilivok templed his fingers and tapped them against his lips.

"If it's such a good place to salvage," he asked slowly, "why haven't you gone back there?" Neelix pulled Kes closer. She watched him in her calm, intent way. When it looked like he wasn't going to answer, she nodded at him to continue.

He tilted his head, raised his bushy eyebrows, and shrugged again. "Honestly, I-was He sighed and dipped his head so that they couldn't see his expression.

"I think the station's haunted." Paris snorted and sat back in his chair as if he had expected something like that all along. Tuvok didn't move, but Janeway could sense his sudden dismissal of the plan.

Only B'Elanna still looked interested. "But there are a lot of old ships." Neelix brought his head up. "Yes." "Abandoned ships." "Yes.

"Captain," B'Elanna said. "If we-was But Neelix interrupted her. "Captain, if there aren't 13 more ships abandoned on Alcawell than you would care to count, you can leave me behind with the ghosts." "And me too," Kes said softly.

"Thank you, my love," Neelix said, squeezing her hand. He turned to the others.

"Isn't she remarkable?" Janeway made a decision. They couldn't afford to overlook any opportunity. "I think we should see Alcawell for ourselves. What say you, Mr.

Tuvok?" "I would agree, Captain." Janeway glanced at her first officer.

Chakotay nodded in agreement. Satisfied, Janeway stood. "Neelix, give Lieutenant Paris the coordinates for Alcawell.

B'Elanna, I would like to get there quickly but without further damaging the warp engines-. What do you recommend?" "Warp one," B'Elanna said.

Janeway turned to Paris and nodded. "Get us under way, mister." Paris slid his chair back and motioned for Neelix to follow him onto the bridge.

As they left Janeway faced her remaining officers. "Salvage or not, we need the parts. At this point we're in no position to be proud." Then she smiled as she stood. "Besides, who's afraid of a few ghosts?" CAPTAIN JANEWAY SAT AT HER DESK IN THE READY ROOM, going over reports on a padd. At times, she wished that she could jettison the busy work associated with the captaincy. But for each bit of routine that she dispensed with, a bit of home went with it. She had already made decisions that would never have been made in the Alpha Quadrant.

Occasionally she glanced at the long windows showing a view of the stars. Sometimes she wished the positions were familiar. Sometimes she was pleased they were not.

"Captain." Ensign Kim's voice broke her concentration. "We are over the Station." "Excellent, Ensign," she said.

But he didn't wait for her comto finish. "And I think you need to take a look at this." She smiled at the tone of fascination and awe in Harry Kim's voice. Perhaps there was something to Neelix's wild claims. She hoped so.

Voyager had limped to Alcawell and Janeway had worried that she was using the last of their power for a wild chase after nothing.

She placed the padd on her desk and stood, brushing her hair with the heel of one hand, making certain not a strand was out of place. Then she left the ready room and stepped onto the bridge.

Paris sat immobile at conn, Chakotay was sitting on the edge of the captain's chair, and Tuvok stood at his station in tactical. All stared, transfixed, at the main viewscreen. Her gaze followed theirs, and her mouth opened involuntarily. She shut it quickly, glad no one had seen her. But the feeling that had caused the reaction remained. Row after row, kilometer after kilometer of ships filled the viewscreen. They went off the edge of the screen in all directions.

She made herself limit down her focus. Each ship seemed to be identical to the others, round with three slender tripod legs, as a sort of landing gear. The ships were spaced an even distance from each other. She pulled her focus back to the entire screen again. The rows of ships seemed to go on forever in all directions. How was this possible? She was having real trouble grasping the scale of what she was seeing. They looked almost like children's toys lined up neatly, Yet they were all real. Very real.

- "Captain." Kim was standing in operations, his fingers poised over the screen controls. "From what 1 16 can tell, this is the largest of four-ah, I suppose you could call them bases. Or maybe ports? There seems to be a base or port in the middle of each of the continents on this planet." "Are there life sips?" Chakotay asked.

Kim looked away from the screen, tapped the ops panel before him, and read the results. Then he shook his head. "Nothing above rodent size." "Captain," Tuvok said. "There are extensive remains of a humanoid civilization scattered over the planet, but nothing as preserved as these ships appear to be. There are also large building ruins scattered between the ships at regular intervals. No ship is very far from what was once a building. A very efficient design and use of space." "What's the size of this?" Janeway asked, not taking her gaze from the screen. "I have comno sense of scale." Tuvok nodded. "This facility alone is twice the size of the Federation's Luna Station. One-eighth of Vulcan would be covered in these ships if all four bases, as Mr. Kim called them, were combined." "This base, or station, is square," Janeway said, trying to put this in a perspective she understood. "You're telling me, Tuvok, that if we put the northwestern comer of this base in Federation Headquarters in San Francisco, the edges of the base would stretch south to the center of Los Angeles and east to Reno?" Paris whistled.

"Yes, Captain," Tuvok said, "although I doubt the ships would line up a tilde neatly on Earth." He took a deep breath. Janeway recognized the pause. He made one just like it each time he imparted information that had an element of speculation to it. "And one more thing. These ships were never meant to fly, at least not by any means we know of." "What?" Janeway spun to look at Tuvok.

His steady gaze met hers. He understood her sudden excitement. Neelix had led them to a technology they hadn't seen before. Janeway slapped her comm badge. "B'Elanna, ard you studying the ships onscreen?" B'Elanna had spent the trip in Engineering, coaxing all the power she could out of the warp engines. "Yes, Captain." "Do you have any idea what they were?" "Not from here, Captain. Without a hands-on inspection I couldn't even tell you what their power source was, let alone what their function might have been. But I can confirm that the metals in the ships" bodies and engines are ones we need for repairs." "Captain." Kim had moved to the science station.

"The ruins around the ports are layered as far back as I can get readings. And this is a very, very old planet." "So," Janeway said, turning back to stare at the incredible sight of square kilometers of ships parked side by side, "we're talking about the home of a very old race that moved on, or maybe died out a long time agoTs "It would seem that way," Chakotay said.

"Things are not always as they seem," Tuvok said.

66 Go on." "There is no logic in this situation," Tuvok said. "The ships are obviously quite old, yet they are in a better state of repair than any of the surrounding Is ruins, including the buildings spaced evenly throughout the port." "Your conclusion?" Janeway asked.

"I have no conclusion," Tuvok said. "But it is possible that the owners of the ships and the inhabitants of the ruins may not be one and the same." Janeway nodded.

She paused a moment, then made a decision. She again tapped her comm badge. "B'Elanna, I would like you to study one of the ships firsthand." "Aye, aye, Captain." B'Elanna sounded eager. Janeway smiled. She envied the Engineer her mobility. Janeway herself would have loved to be the first to visit Alcawell.

She turned to Ensign Kim. "Find Neelix.

I want the two of you to join her." Beside her Chakotay nodded at her choice of away team in agreement. Kim would keep Torres level.

Neelix would go along for local information in case they found anything on the old ships he might recognize. Kim headed across the bridge for the door. He too clearly felt the same excitement. If this station was a's promising as it looked, they might discover some new technology to help them find a way home. Or clearly at least give them the raw materials to make repairs. "And Mr. Kim." He stopped and turned to face her. "Yes, CaptainThat' "Your job is to guard her back while she works and keep Neelix out of trouble.

Understand?" He smiled slightly. "Understood, Captain." Janeway said to Tuvok, "You have five minutes to search that haystack down there for a working ship. I Is want you to be ready to send them to that ship when they gather in the transporter room." Then she turned back to stare at the viewscreen.

Ships, parked in neat rows, extended beyond visible range. Thousands and thousands of ships. "They're never going to believe this when we get home," she said.

THE TRANSPORTER DROPPED THEM ON A HARD, CONCRETE-LIKE surface near the south edge of the Station. Cold wind cut at B'Elanna's uniform and bits of sand nipped her face. The air smelled stale, and her mouth dried almost instantly from the total lack of humidity. The entire place had a feeling of age and death that chilled her far more than did the biting wind.

She glanced quickly around, then just stopped and stared at the parked ships in complete amazement. One after another, side by side, the ships stretched into the distance like images in facing mirrors. At first glance they all seemed to be exactly the same, and she could tell from the dozens that towered around them that they were very, very old. Some had weathered the 21 years better than others in the constant wind and sand. To her left one had tipped slightly where its short, stemlike landing gear had given way. When fully upright, the ships were held about four meters above the ground on tripod legs. A fairly gentle-sloped ramp extended down from the center of each ship like a giant tongue. They'd have no problems getting inside the ships, because they were all standing open. She looked slowly around, studying the wrecks. One ship had a small hole in its side that looked as if something inside had exploded and ruptured the gray hull. But all in all the ships had lasted much, much better than the ruins of a building a hundred meters away. She couldn't tell for sure, but she thought she could see faint markings on the concrete surface scoured by the years of sand. The markings seemed to lead from the bottom of each ship's ramp toward the building.

The view from Voyager had given her a sense of scale for the station itself, but not for the ships. Each ship was about two times larger than a Federation shuttlecraft. They were like slightly flattened round balls. Even on their short legs they towered over her. The landing legs alone were twice her width, yet under the weight of the ships they looked thin. She did a slow, full circle turn just taking in the ships that hung precariously above and around her and stretched off into the distance in all directions. Large alien machinery, toppling under the pressure of time and wind, in a very alien setting.

Drifts of sand had formed around the bases of a few of the nearby ships and the ramps leading up into them. The wind made a strange whistling sound that sent shivers down B'Elanna's back.

She flipped open her tricorder. Ensign Kim did the same. The best way to fight the oddness of this place was to focus on work, and that was exactly whateashe would do.

"Ghosts. Spirits. The undead. The past walks here,"" Neelix said, almost shouting to be heard over the wind. "Can't you feel it?" He wrapped his arms tight around himself. "I don't know why I'm even here. And it's cold. Very cold. Maybe I should beam up and get us all coats." "You're staying with us," B'Elanna said, her'voice discrisp. She didn't need any distractions.