"We're on our own!" shouted Garek Loran.
"We have to do something!" hollered Lee Carter back to him.
Together, they ran toward the Ba'ku meeting hall. Carter was very worried. The fact that Max Vasser had apparently been shot down was definite cause for alarm.
Max had a special gift that she used with lethal effects during combat. Somehow she always knew exactly what her opponent was going to do or where he'd be -- usually before her opponent knew! By some sixth sense or something, it was like she was able to get a glimpse a split second into the future. The eggheads at Starfleet had tested her and had given her unusually high ratings on her esper scores, which measured extra-sensory perception.
Carter had never totally bought into the whole ESP thing, but she knew that Max was the best pilot she'd ever met, whatever the reason, so the fact that she'd been taken by surprise was bad news.
They skidded to a stop on the cobblestones in front of the entrance to the hall. Having heard the commotion, Sojef and Anij, the two Ba'ku village leaders, were just coming out the door to see what was going on.
Seeing the alarm on the faces of the Starfleet officers, the two Ba'ku darted a worried glance at each other, then Sojef asked Garek, "What is it?"
"We can't be totally sure," started Garek, "because we've lost contact with our ship, but it looks like there's a Son'a ship heading this way. It'll be here in under five minutes."
"Coming here?" This from Anij. "Why? What could the Son'a possibly want here?"
"Why do you think they're coming?" asked Carter.
Anij nodded in understanding. For a very long time, the Son'a had wanted to take this planet as their own. Whatever their quarrel with the Federation, it looked like they were going to use the opportunity to strike a blow against their sundered kin as well.
Meanwhile, Garek was still talking to Sojef. "We have to get all your people to safety," he was saying. "Away from the village. Mount your defenses--"
But Sojef was shaking his head. "There isn't time to evacuate everyone. And as far as our defenses are concerned--" at that he pointed angrily at a nearby pile of pitchforks and shovels, "--THOSE are our defenses!"
Garek pressed the issue, "Well, you'd better to do something, because one of our ships has already been shot down and the Arizona is twenty minutes away!"
At that, Anij stepped closer to her companion and said, "Sojef, don't you think--"
"No!" snapped Sojef. "We will not speak of that!"
Carter and Garek looked at each other. Something was being kept from them here, and whatever it was could spell the difference between their making it through this in one piece, or the entire village being razed and everyone killed.
"Speak of what?" asked Carter, stepping forward, her eyes demanding an answer from the Ba'ku leader. "What aren't you telling us?"
Sojef met her gaze and held it unflinchingly. He would not tell this offlander anything -- he would not betray his people, even if that meant their destruction at the hands of their very offspring. Technology went against the ways of nature and the universe; his people had forsworn it; and he would have no part of it now.
Carter could see the determination and conviction in Sojef's eyes, in the set of his jaw, and she respected it. She knew that because of his deep-held principles, he'd never reveal what he was keeping from them. Still, she had to plead -- the lives of over six-hundred Ba'ku and reformed Son'a depended on what happened here in the next few seconds. "Please, Sojef. For your people...."
But the Ba'ku leader wouldn't be budged. Again, it was Anij that spoke up. "Sojef..."
"No. I forbid it. We are not interested in such things."
"And to whom will you forbid things when we are all dead? Hm?" She turned to the two Starfleet officers and said, "Come. I will show you." She turned and walked back into the Ba'ku meeting building. Sojef didn't interfere when Carter and Garek followed, but he himself remained alone outside.
Their eyes adjusted quickly to the dimly lit interior of the building. Surprisingly, the room was bare of all furnishings, and behind them the doors slid shut on their own with a muted hiss and muffled thud. Garek, ever the engineer, stopped to wonder at this. These were the first automatic doors he'd seen on the Ba'ku planet. Carter had wandered further into the room after Anij, and now Garek hurried to catch up. Anij had stopped facing the far wall of the room and now seemed to contemplate something that only she could see.
Carter and Garek stood by, wondering what she was doing, and when was she going to show them what she was going to show them, and if they had time for this. Apparently having decided that she'd found what she'd been looking for, Anij reached out with her right hand and touched a blank spot on the wall. Immediately, the wall directly before her segmented into several irregular geometric shapes and slid into the surround wall. Satisfied, she stepped through into the darkness beyond. With nothing else to do, Carter and Garek followed a few steps behind her.
They emerged into a much smaller chamber. It was dark, but Anij had walked over to a bench and waved her hand over it, and suddenly the room was filled with light. Carter and Garek blinked in surprise against the glare until their eyes adjusted again, then they looked around them in wonder.
It was a control room!
Anij was standing at the opposite end of the room, in front of what Carter assumed must be a large viewing screen. The layout of the room was not unlike a typical Starfleet starship bridge. Before the view screen was a console and a chair -- the pilot? Behind the pilot were two more consoles, one to his rear right and one to his rear left. Behind those was a larger chair with controls in the armrests -- the captain? Around the circumference of the oval room were screens and display panels of every sort. At the very rear of the room where Carter and Garek still stood was the door through which they'd come.
Anij saw the astonishment on the faces of the two Starfleet officers at what they were seeing. The artifact they were standing in was a well-kept secret. The older Ba'ku all knew about it, of course, but the younger generation, those like Artim, did not.
She spread her arms to take in the surroundings and addressed the two offlanders, "This is our last starship. Hopefully it will suffice?"