"You can't be serious. This ship is home to a thousand people, you can't seriously expect to hold it with, what half a dozen?" Picard stared me down.
"Eight," I told him, ignoring Otten's protests. "Us, and then three in engineering. And no, we don't. I expect we won't be able to hold off security for more than 10 more minutes. That's why we need your help."
"You obviously don't know anything about the Federation," Will snapped. "We're not..."
He trailed off as I sagged against Otten. "Damnit," I muttered. I was already feeling woozy. "I need to sit down," I gestured back to Riker's chair. "Keep your phaser on them." I took a few hobbling steps forward and glared at Will until he stepped to the side. Almost to the chair, I felt my leg buckle and I instinctively reached out for Will's arm as I fell. He caught me by the waist and I stared up at him as half held me up, not sure what he would do. I really didn't want him to punch me again. He stared back, his eyes mirroring my surprise and confusion.
"Tasha?" he asked.
"I think I need Beverly," I told him, my vision blurring a bit. I managed to stand under my own power but Will didn't let go. I looked over at Picard.
"Captain, I know you don't have any reason to trust me or even believe that I'm me. But I'm begging you to help us, just for now. I can explain later, but if we don't let those delegates over in the next few minutes, all the shapeshifters on Sandor could suffer."
Picard just looked at me for a second, his eyes hard. I didn't know exactly what we would do if he didn't agree. I hadn't lied when I told him we couldn't hold the ship on our own, not if I wasn't willing to hurt someone.
Picard reached up and tapped his badge. "Picard to all security personnel," he said. I felt Will's grip on my waist tighten. "Stand down from Engineering and the Bridge. The ship is in no danger. Beverly Crusher, please report to the bridge."
I backed away from Will and he let me sink into the chair, but stayed standing just a little too close.
"Thank you, Captain. Otten, it's your turn."
He nodded. Once again, the captain of the Fury appeared on the screen. I barely shifted back to Moira's form in time.
"We're ready for you to beam aboard," he said. A few seconds later, the captain and two of the other officers appeared in front of the captain's ready room. The captain stared down at Moira's prone form.
"She got my leg," I told him and he turned to where I was sitting, wearing Moira's face again. "You didn't tell me she was so dangerous."
"I'm sure Dominic will make sure your leg is seen to. What's the situation?"
"We have engineering and the bridge." Otten stepped forward. "I made sure the transporter's locked out. The ship's yours."
The captain looked pleased. "I have to say, you all made the right decision. Dominic will be very happy. You'll get your planet, as promised, once all this is over."
"I think we should go to the observation lounge." Otten pointed at the door. "We've had trouble holding security off, we can let Jaime and Dean take care of it so we won't be interrupted."
"Very good. I'll contact Dominic to let him know it's going smoothly."
The three of them followed Otten into the lounge without another word. I watched them go and heaved a sigh of relief after they had left.
"Explain."
I looked up to see Picard standing over me. I suddenly felt very small, surrounded by the captain and towering first officer. I swallowed.
"I..." I took a breath, not sure where to start.
"First convince me you are who you say you are."
"Oh. You asked me to come here to help negotiate about the wormhole. I was waiting tables on Karos VII." Picard's expression didn't change so I wracked my brain for something small enough that Dominic wouldn't bother to learn. I turned to Riker. "When I first met you, you thought I was a cat for a week. I was stowing aboard." Neither looked convinced. "You sing '20s pop songs when you shower?"
A definite shade of red rose under Will's beard.
The turbolift doors opened and I looked up to see Jaime stepping toward Beverly, phaser raised.
"She's fine! She's the doctor. Both of you just relax." I glanced over at Matt, who was standing near the door to the observation lounge. "Jaime, keep an eye on Moira."
Beverly slowly strode down the ramp, her eyes traveling from the two men with the phasers to the captain and then myself.
"Doctor, this is Tasha," Will said. He sounded convinced. He stepped back to give Beverly some room and the captain followed suit. Beverly didn't question it, instead kneeling beside my chair and pulling out her tricorder.
"You've lost a lot of blood," she said. She carefully pulled up my blood-soaked pants leg, earning a whimper of pain. I gritted my teeth as she examined my leg. "What did this?"
"Lion," I grunted.
Beverly pulled out a hypospray and pressed it to my neck before I could protest. The pain instantly disappeared and, while I was marveling at the difference, she produced wand-shaped device and began running it over my leg.
"Miss Lawrence, your help against the Romulans last time you were aboard was appreciated, but you do not have the right to commandeer this ship for your own purposes. I'm willing to give you a chance to explain but my patience is wearing thin."
Now clearer headed without the throbbing pain of my leg, I turned to the captain.
"Minister Grey and his second in commanded Dominic are holding about a thousand shapeshifters in a prison on Sandor. When we beamed down, he deflected your signals but took me there. He was putting them through training exercises, teaching them how to shift faster and be stronger, but they didn't know why. But then Dominic took eight of us and said he wanted us to bring him the Enterprise."
"He expected eight of you to take the ship?" Will demanded. Beverly packed up her bag and rose.
"You should really come down to sickbay," she said. "You need blood."
"I can't. You should go though, you can't be up here."
She looked to Picard, who nodded. "Give this to her if the dizziness returns," she said, handing the Captain a hypospray. "And make sure she gets help as soon as possible." She glared at me for a second, as if daring to protest, then turned back to Picard.
"Thank you, Doctor, I'll explain the situation later."
When she had returned to the turbolift, I answered Will. "I have no idea. I don't know what his end game is. All I know is that he promised us a colony of our own, for all the shapeshifters, if we did what he wanted. If we failed and survived, he'd just send us back to the camp, but if we tried to defect or run... There's over a thousand shifters on Sandor. I don't want to think what he'd do to them."
"What were you supposed to do with the Enterprise?"
I shook my head again. "I don't know. He doesn't trust any of us and he seems to hate me most. Sebastian kept asking about the Federation's firepower, and the Enterprise in particular, I think he thought I knew something but I don't know what they were looking for. It doesn't make any sense."
"You saw the Prime Minister?" Picard demanded.
I looked down at my hands in my lap. "I did. He...he's an old friend." I started again before Picard could ask more. "I know what you must think, Captain, and I know you don't really have any reason to trust me. I don't care what happens to Sandor, but there's people back in that camp who could die because of me. I can't let that happen. There has to way to keep them safe and for the Federation to get their wormhole. It's a miracle we got this far, Dominic obviously wanted me out of the way without having to explain it to Sebastian, that's the only reason he let me out in the first place. I guess he thought I'd be dead before I had a chance to explain any of this and no one else here would be willing to ask for your help. But I am."
I could tell I sounded desperate but I didn't care. I was tired and scared.
"We both know I can't hold the Enterprise if you want to keep her." I glanced up at Will for a second, wondering if I would be willing to even try.
Picard clasped his hands behind his back, the hypospray tight in his grasp, and paced to the Ops station where Data was still slumped over. I rested my chin in my hands, another wave of dizziness washing over me. Apparently whatever Beverly had given me hadn't completely accounted for the blood I'd lost.
"Alright," Picard said finally. "I'll allow you to continue this charade until we determine Grey's plans. If he is making a play for the wormhole, it may be beneficial to wait until he is more secure to disrupt them."
"Thank you, Captain."
"But understand, I cannot risk the lives of the people on this ship. If I believe them to be in danger, I can't allow this to continue."
That was more than I had hoped for.
"I understand."
"What happens now?" Picard asked. He fiddled with the hypospray again and then handed it to Will.
"Otten's in there telling them we have it all secured. We're hoping he can get them to tell him what their plan is." I rubbed my face, trying to clear my head. "Understand, we came up with this plan in the time it took to fly from the surface to here. We have to assume that Dominic is in contact with the captain, to make sure everything's alright. And since he knows we can shift, they probably have a way to tell if it's actually the captain or just someone pretending."
"Will they want hostages?"
I turned to Will. "I doubt it. They don't work that way. They don't really care about you, they just want the ship. I don't think they've even thought of ransoming you to the Federation."
"Well that's something," I heard Picard mutter. I knew he wouldn't let this go on if they started demanding hostages. "Alright. So we continue this charade and give control to the Sandorian captain until...something happens."
It was all I could do to shrug again, I felt so swamped in weary helplessness. "I think that's all we can do."
"Very well." He turned to look at Dean and Jaime, who still held their phasers, and my attention jumped to them.
"Okay, guys, we're going to need to hang onto the phasers." I pointed to the lieutenant and Worf. "Jaime, can you check on them? Dean, check the ensign."
Riker stood and knelt down to look at Data. I watched him apprehensively, hoping no permanent damage had been done. I had not seen what my team had done to Data to knock him out, but I knew it had to be something extreme to have disabled him. I breathed a sigh of relief when he rose to his feet. He looked around uncertainly before settling his eyes on the captain.
"Apparently the situation is more complicated than it appeared."
"Put them in my ready room," Picard commanded. The three unconscious crewmen were unceremoniously carried into the captain's office and Data joined them.
"Dean, watch that door. Jaime, stay back there." I looked around. "Alright. I don't know what else to do." In fact, it was all I could do to think straight and not focus on my leg. The lack of pain didn't mean I could ignore the fact that it was definitely damaged. That was the least of my worries at the moment though.
"Otten to Moira."
I fumbled with the controls on the side of Riker's chair until I activated the com. "This is Moira.
"Come to the observation lounfe."
I rose to my feet and was relieved to learn that I could stand on my own. I avoided the captain's gaze as I hurried up the ramp. I tried to avoid the four pairs of eyes that met me and instead sat next to Otten before looking at the captain.
"Otten asked you to be here. I don't know what kind of hierarchy you weirdos have going on, but he said the other ones listen to you as much as him. Whatever. I just need you to keep doing what we say and then you can get back to whatever it is you do." He waved a hand dismissively and then pushed a button to bring up a 3D map. I couldn't make any sense of the slowly spinning model until he started pointing out landmarks. Then I recognized it as a map of the Sandorian system, complete with the Enterprise and wormhole. My eyes snapped to the wormhole, which was surrounded by a bright swarm of small ships.
"We've got two dozen ships at the wormhole now," the captain commented, and I could plainly hear the swagger in his voice. "The Federation has two, and the Enterprise. Which means they have two... The ones at the wormhole are smaller with lesser weapons capacity than the Enterprise. With the Enterprise, they won't stand last five minutes."
My gaze jumped between the captain and Otten. "You can't be serious," I exclaimed before I could stop myself. The four men at the table turned to look at me as I tried to regain my composure. "You're going to take the Enterprise in and attack?"
"Of course. What is the point of a warship if you don't start a war?"
I stared at the captain, unable to believe it. I had assumed taking the Enterprise was a power play, a show of strength from the belligerent Sandorian government in a last ditch effort to show they weren't to be trifled with. To actually use it to fight the remaining Federation ships was insanity. Not only would they be unable to hold the Enterprise, even if we were sincerely on their side, but they would start a full out war with the Federation, one that they could not hope to win. What were they playing at? I looked to Otten for some kind of answer but he looked just as lost as I felt.
"How are you going to do that?" I asked, trying to think of options.
"You told us that you had taken the ship." This was directed at Otten. He shifted in his seat and I had to bite my lip to keep from answering. Luckily, his thoughts had followed the same train mine had.
"We have temporarily control but we don't know how long that will last. The security on this ship is...it's crazy, to be honest. We might be able to use threat of force to keep them in line but not if we're trying to fire on their own ships."
"I trust I'll be able to manage," the captain answered coolly. "The bridge seems secure and any assault on engineering will have to be fought off. In fact, why don't you go down there? Take a hostage. If anyone breaches engineering, kill him."
I stared at the captain, mind racing. I didn't want to leave the bridge but this was an opportunity for free roam of the ship. I couldn't pass it up. If I could get Picard off the bridge, we could find a way to keep up the farce while preventing anyone from getting hurt.
"I'll go down there with the captain," I said as I stood but the captain shook his head. "Take the first officer, I need the captain to keep the ship under control." He stood up and the rest of the table followed suit. I let them pass and followed them out onto the bridge.
"You two," the captain said, pointing to Picard and Riker. "Get over there in the corner."
I stepped forward. "I had the rest of them taken into the ready room. They're still unconscious."
"Good. And Lawrence?"
"Her body, too."
"Good. Get going."
I pulled out my phaser and pointed it at Riker. "You're coming with me," I said. "Otten, can you get us down to Engineering?"
Before Riker could protest, I stepped beside him and we were gone from the bridge. I stumbled a little as we materialized in an empty area behind the warp core.
"What the hell is this for?" Riker demanded. I raised my hands yet again in a symbol of innocence.
"The captain told me to come down here and take you as a hostage. I am supposed to help keep engineering secure if security tries to take it. I'm sorry, I couldn't explain anything. I wanted to take the Captain, but he wouldn't let me..."
Riker sighed and ran a hand through his already disheveled hair. "This is a mess," he said.
"I know... I'm so sorry, Will." I looked around engineering in despair. Otten had put us down in an empty spot behind the warp core but I could hear voices out in the main area. I should get out there and see what was happening, I told myself. "I didn't know any of this would happen and now I don't know how to stop it."
"We'll figure a way out. But this plan, it's..." He shook his head. "I can't talk to you when you look like that."
"Oh, right." I blinked and switched back to my normal shape. "We need to move."
I lead the way out from behind the warp core and out into the main engineering. I was met with a group of four wide eyed people standing in a tight circle in the middle of the room. Samantha was standing with a phaser trained on them while Matt was facing the door. I didn't see Jasper but I assumed he was guarding another entrance to Engineering. The entire group looked up as Riker and I entered.
"Is everything okay down here?"
"It's fine," Sam answered. She bobbed the phaser as she spoke. "I had to stun a few of them but the rest aren't trying anything."
I scanned the room in alarm and found Geordi and a young woman slumped against a console. Sam followed my gaze and must have read the alarm on my face because she said, "They're fine, I already checked."
"Good... Sam, this is Will Riker, he's the first officer. We were sent down here to make sure no one tried to take Engineering. Technically he's my hostage but...can I have that phaser, you're making me so nervous."
Sam looked like she was going to say No for a moment but then she handed it over.
"Okay, everyone, listen. The Captain announced that everything is fine and that's true, we're not here to hurt any of you." I looked between the engineers and found myself encountering a combination of anger and stubbornness in every one. "I... Will, can you talk to them? Here, look." I handed him the phaser and walked over to Matt. He looked fidgety.
"How was it?"
"It was fine," he said. "The shuttle bay was easy and once I got here, they already had everything under control."
"Great...Where's Jasper?"
Matt pointed across engineering. "There's another entrance back there, maintenance I guess."
By the time I got the three shapeshifters together and filled them in and Will had convinced his officers that the ship wasn't actually, technically under attack, we had lost the better part of ten minutes since teleporting down.
"Can we hurry this up?" I demanded as Will was talking to what looked like a lieutenant. "I need to talk to you." I lead him off out of earshot.
"We have a problem."
"What is it?
"They aren't just using the ship as a threat," I said slowly, wondering for the first time if I should actually be telling him this. The thought scared me and I forced myself to continue. "They're actually planning on firing on the two Federation ships."
"They're WHAT?"
"Quiet down! Look, I just found out. They aren't doing this just to make a statement, they really mean to start a war! I told him it wasn't possible, that posturing was one thing and actually shooting people was another, that Picard would never let his ship be used like that, but he didn't listen!"
Will stared at me, his eyes hard. "We can't let that happen."
"Obviously!"
"Tasha..." He paused. "If we have to choose between the people on these ships and the shapeshifters on Sandor, we have to choose us. We can't let the Enterprise be used as a weapon against our own ships. The shapeshifters here..." He glanced over at Samantha, Matt, and Jasper. "They can apply for asylum of course."
"What, the seven of us?" I demanded.
"I wasn't counting you," Will said, frowning, but I ignored him.
"There's got to be thousands of them down there," I said, ignoring him. "I don't think Dominic will kill them but...he can make their life a living hell. You don't understand what it's like down there."
"I know. I'm sorry. And once this is over we can find a way to help them."
"No, you won't!" My voice raised of its own accord. "You won't do anything, just like you didn't do anything when I was down there. They locked me in a cage and they took away my shifting. Do you even know what that feels like? They have them all locked down there like animals and the worst part is that most of them don't even care because they're used to so much worse!"
"Tasha," Will cut in as I took a breath. "We weren't going to leave you there."
"Weren't you?" I demanded. For the first time since escaping, my feelings were boiling to the surface and I had to ask what I had been wondering since I arrived on Sandor. "Really, Will, what would you have done? You have the Prime Directive and you have orders to follow. And you'll do the same thing with those people down there."
"Once we get the wormhole, we can work something out with Sandor. They won't have a choice."
"They won't listen. And when they don't, you'll leave a ship here to watch the wormhole and as long as it isn't bothered, you'll never think about Sandor again. You won't do anything. If I hadn't made it out, if you'd gotten the wormhole and everything like you wanted and I was still missing, would you have done anything? Look me in the eye and tell me you would have come for me." I looked at Will, really looked for the first time, and I felt my insides twist as his eyes flickered away from mine.
"You wouldn't have," I whispered. "You know it. I'm collateral damage."
"No. You're not."
"I am. I'm not Federation. I'm Sandorian. They have every right to me."
Will didn't answer and I had mine. "Right..." I glanced back at our companions, who were watching us somewhat apprehensively. "It doesn't matter. We need to figure out what to do now."
"We do. We can let this continue as long as we can, but we can't let them hurt anyone. I need to be back on the bridge."
"I don't think I can do that..." I took a breath. I hadn't planned for this. I hadn't wanted any of this to happen. "We have some time. How long does it take to get to the wormhole?"
"About 15 minutes."
"Great... So we have maybe 5 minutes left?"
"That sounds about right..."
"Well... Shit." I looked at Will for a minute. He looked tired, I noticed. His eyes were red and dark circles draped below them. His hair was sticking up in a few spots. I wondered if he had slept recently, at all. I took a long look at him, wondering if I would see him again after today. If I had to guess, the answer was no. "Alright then." I stepped forward to pull him in a hug. He froze for a second but then raised his arms around me. As he did, I slipped the phaser from his belt and pulled back.
"Tasha?" he asked, but I was already rushing back towards the group. With a gesture, I stunned the four conscious engineers. "We're taking the ship. For real this time. When we get to the bridge, stun everyone except our people." I tapped a last button on the panel and raised my phaser again. My last sight before transportation was Riker slumping down to the ground. Then we were on the bridge, phasers raised.