Hector scowled at her use of slang, but Margarita's glare stopped him from commenting. She braced herself, and acknowledged the comment. "On Belay? On tight? I'm ready."

Most of Kanicha's weight was borne by the pitons she had already inserted, but the drag of the rope was strong against Margarita's anchor. She held her belay station, her hand on the simple equipment, ready to break a fall.

Kanicha returned to the crack safely, looking up at the bottom of the ledge. "Ok, it's clean. I've got a chocolate bunny there, and I'll burger up now."

"In standard, please, Kanicha." Hector requested.

"I've got the piton inserted, it looks solid, but I might be wrong, the tone of the rock isn't changing the way it has on the rest of this face."

"That's a chocolate bunny?"

"Yes. It means it might be solid, but it might be hollow and pull out."

"Then put another in."

"I can't. No space. No cam, no bolt. I'll trust it long enough to burger the farmer."

"Burger the farmer?" Margarita tried to stifle her laughter.

"Flip over the outcropping." Kanicha's sigh was audible. "Do I have to explain everything?"

"Only if you refuse to use Standard, Chica," Margarita replied. "I don't climb much anymore, and not with people who used food as metaphors for the climb."

"Too bad. They're lots of fun. The last crew my dad and I took up was from California. They had lots of slang. It was lukewarm hanging toes with them."

Kolopak repeated her words. "Lukewarm? Hanging toes?"

"Lukewarm - good family feeling, doesn't require a lot of effort to be friendly or work together. Hanging toes - climbing."

While she spoke, she neatly flipped herself over the outcropping, most of her weight on the rock when the piton gave. She lost her balance, and started to slip down, head first, off the ledge.

"Kanicha!" Hector called, and Margarita felt a surge of adrenaline to deal with the new pull on the ropes.

Kolopak was rigid with fear. He had distracted her with his questions. He could see Kanicha from his perch, above him, looking like she was going to take a long dive down the ravine. She was swinging her arm, trying to regain her center of gravity, and her belay rope was getting caught in it.

Suddenly, her swinging stopped, and her hand connected with some rock. Whatever strength she had, she used to brace herself, and the hold on the rock was stable enough to push her up to a catlike position on the ledge.

Her breath was heavy, her voice husky when she activated the comm-link. "I'm safe. On belay."

Safe but not yet secured. She took a few minutes, attaching herself to the ledge with several knots and pitons. "Off belay."

Everyone took a breath and released the tension that near fall had caused them. She turned and looked over the edge at Kolopak, some four meters below her. "Wanna come up?"

"Not really, but thank you for the offer," he replied courteously. He knew he didn't have the skill or strength to have pulled off that stunt. "Where's the ledge we're heading for?"

Kolopak shrugged. "I think we might be wiser to get to the top. I can get there on the way back down."

She pondered that. "How far are we?"

"Hector, how are we doing?"

Hector looked up at the team, then at the location Kolopak had indicated. "Forty meters. But if you go up the way you want, Kolopak, you're going to miss it by a mile."

A mile being a distance with which Kolopak was completely unfamiliar, he looked up carefully. "How do you recommend?"

"Me, I'm not saying anything. I've never been good at rock climbing. You look at the face and you tell me." Hector replied.

"I want to get to the top before the mists get in. If we need to, we can spend the night up here."

"Kolopak, we need to get back down as quickly as possible."

"I know, Rita. I know." The grimness in his voice distracted them from his use of a nickname. Is there some other grazing nearby that we could get the llamas to, extend our trip another day?"

He knew that another day meant another chance for someone to fire the grove, but that information was still privileged from Kanicha and Hector.

Hector spoke up. "There's another small campground about half an hour from here. I could take the llamas over there for the night."

Margarita rested while Kanicha rested. "Let's get you to the top. It will be easier to get the pump on the way down, you're right."

The next hour was very fast. Kanicha and Kolopak met within minutes of his scramble up the incline, and assessing the climb, both felt they would finish before the mists returned. They covered the distance quickly, and turned to watch the evening mist begin to roll in as they reached their goal, the trail to the Eye.

"Belay off," they said together.

"Off belay." Margarita's voice sounded relieved. "We've got mist in about ten minutes."

"We can see it coming. I think we'll be staying here for the night." He could see Margarita's clenched jaw in his mind's eye. "We have enough rope to toss down for a blanket, if you would be so kind."

A peculiar sound that Kolopak associated with his baby cousins came through the link. "Margarita out."

He sat down beside her, where she had flopped to the ground, her hammer clanging on the rock. He pulled off the helmet, and looked at it gratefully for a moment. He felt for his hammer, and realized it was gone.

"I wonder when I lost it?" he murmured.

"Lost what?" she asked, her eyes closed.

"My pickax."

"I don't know." She stretched out her arms above her head, wincing at some bruise's complaint. "They'll find it again."

"I will name my first son Chakotay." He said it solemnly, and took a piece of rock and banged it on the ground.

She laughed at him. "Swearing by the rock? You intend to go back to Trebus, don't you? The rock won't be able to witness your oath."

"I'll take it with me, then," he said, putting it carefully into his shirt pocket.

She looked at him through her eyelashes. "Why don't you stay here?"

"No. I came here for a reason, to climb this mountain. I want, I need to get to that cave."

"Why?"

When Margarita had asked him, he had refused to answer, but now he showed Kanicha a face of hope and faith. "I had a vision, many years ago, that I would go to that cave to find something important."

"Find what?" she asked.

"I never knew what I would find, just that I had to make the journey. I've been saving for over ten years for this trip. It's a great, powerful thing, to be given a quest in a vision. Many people helped me to come. I must return."

She was quiet as he talked. "I understand. I always come back here. My mountain, my cave. All the trips I help my father guide are just excuses to come up here."

"It's a sacred place. Caves are symbols of death; they are very strong, very powerful. We return to them because we are drawn to them, to understand our lives, to keep in mind our deaths."

She thought about that for a few minutes. "I think you may be right. I've never thought about why I had to come here, just that I did."

"What's in the cave, Kanicha?" he asked, his breathing finally back to normal.

"It's a volcanic lava cave. There are ten or twelve small offshoots of the main corridor. Most of them are pretty boring. It's wet in there. I think there might be bats, but we take people in there so often that I think most of the local wildlife stay away."

"How often do people come up here?"

"In the dry season, close to weekly. We're really not far from the Pan-American Trail. Lots of hikers and climbers. There's a great class five point eight climb on the other side of the mountain that leads to one of the cave openings. This time of year, someone's almost always up here."

"Do you know of anyone right now?"

"I don't think anyone's climbing here right now. There's a world-class competition for climbers in Costa Rica this week. If you're into climbing, you're there."

"You're not there."

"No, I'm here. I'd rather be here, despite what I told my father a month ago. This has been one of the greatest experiences of my life." She gestured widely at the vista below them. "It's amazing. I haven't seen this side of the ravine before. It's so amazingly wonderful to find a whole new part of my mountain that I've never seen before."

"Did you think you'd seen it all already?"

"No," she replied seriously. "I was pretty sure I had seen the best, until now. There's another place I've heard about, up above the tree line. I'll get there someday, too."

Margarita's voice interrupted them. "Ok, Kolopak, we're ready. We'll be starting to climb up in about 30 minutes. Hector will be following your trail; I'll used Kanicha's. Look for an anchor up there."

"You're coming up?"

"What, you thought I'd just throw the blankets up to you?"

Kolopak lay back against the ground, somewhat relieved that they wouldn't be alone, somewhat sad at the same time.

"Watch for the snakes, Margarita," his eyes dancing as they met Kanicha.

She snorted. "I don't recall hearing either of you mention them. Don't try to scare me off. Thirty minutes." She closed the connection.

Resigned, they stood together and evaluated their surroundings. Two good anchors were easy to find, and once the ropes were tied, they each visited a private spot. Asking a climber to stop mid climb for the belayer to take a dash to the nearest bush was not only rude, it was uncomfortable for the climber. While they waited, he pulled out the tricorder that he had rescued on the trip.

It was sleek, a shiny stainless steel case that had repelled water and insects alike. An ornate seven-pointed star was engraved on the cover. Kanicha looked at it curiously. "I know that mark," she said, puzzling over it with her fingertips.

He noticed her hands were badly torn up, and put down the tricorder to pull out the tape to bind her hands. "What is it?"

"I don't remember, but I know I've seen it somewhere."

"In the village?"

"Yes…no…I don't remember where I've seen it." She extended her hand and he poured a bit of clean water on the abrasions. "I don't remember," she repeated.

"It will come to you," he encouraged her as he taped her fingers.

As he cut off the last of the tape and wound it around, she leaned over and gently kissed him on the cheek, her soft lips pressing the corner of his mouth. "Thank you."

He smiled in return, and shifted so that she would not see his physical reaction to such an innocent gesture. Despite his darker skin, his blushes were always too visible.

The mist rose around them, separating them from the rest of the world. "Kolopak?" Margarita's voice called.

"Yes?"

"Get a fire going up there, will you?" she asked humorously. "We'll be up in a little while."

"In this mist?"

"It will be a lot faster for us. The route is already roped and belayed. Stand by for belay on."

"But the route, how will you know where you're going?"

"If you don't think we have your routes memorized, you're nuts. We've been watching you two for nearly three hours. We know our way up."

Hector's voice interrupted them. "On belay?"

"Belay on," he responded automatically.

It was a very public visit to Qo'NoS. Three of the great Voyagers, Captain Chakotay, Lieutenant Paris and his wife, Commander Torres, were honored as special guests of Commander Worf, the special ambassador from Starfleet Command to the Klingon home world. Several holoscans were taken and played on the galaxy's media giants. B'Elanna Torres was honored with one of the highest awards given to a Klingon - the Flaming Sword of Kahless, shining with diamonds and rubies, was placed on her breast by Martok himself in an Empire-spanning presentation.

Her mother stood by and watched with honor as her daughter stood without movement as the blood poured from the slash made on her forearm, and while B'Elanna recited the words of the oldest oath of the Klingons. Her family was given tribute, too, a seat on the Lower Council, with expectations that Miral would follow her mother's footsteps and bring the family up into the High Council before she reached Sto'voKor.

Privately, B'Elanna was less compliant. If it hadn't been absolutely necessary that B'Elanna, Tom and Chakotay been given the cleanest alibi they could come up with, the last thing she wanted was more attention put upon her daughter. Young Klingon men were already approaching Tom with offers to link their houses through marriage. Three members of the High Council offered to put away their wives, if Miral would be pledged to them.

B'Elanna quickly had the cuts on her arms repaired by the Doctor, ordering that no scars should remain.

Tom accepted the invitation of Martok's wife, Sirella, and the entire family moved to his estates outside the capital, and daily pictures of their activities were posted on the Klingon news gates.

It was all a fraud.

B'Elanna kissed Miral goodbye, and put her into her mother's arms. Her face was strained and pulled, and only Tom's grasp held her up and propelled her to the Bird of Prey Mark'vok. Chakotay was already aboard, the Doctor's holo-emitter safely tucked into his pocket, watching B'Elanna turn back and yearn for her daughter. Sirella patted Chakotay's arm reassuringly as she left the ship. "That's how babies get brothers, Captain."

But they boarded, and Miral played with her grandmother's hair as the ship took off, enjoying as only a nearly two-year-old can the thrill of grandmothers who tell silly stories and feed you chewy sweets when Daddy wasn't around. Chakotay whispered a prayer to his ancestors that they would all return, and Miral's arms would wrap around her own mother's as she was now wrapped in the arms of her grandmother.

The Mark'voh was Martok's personal ship, predating his service in the Dominion War. She had been retired with due honors, but Martok never let her fall out of repair. He called her his mistress, and on most days, his wife agreed with him. Even the name Mark'voh was attributed to Sirella's tolerance; it meant "endurance with grace" in the Old Tongue. But a new name had been inscribed on her side now. Q'plah, Success, was chosen as a talisman name for the expedition.

Meeting them just beyond Bajor was a small craft, with only one person on board. The pilot had left Deep Space Nine that morning, filing a flight plan for Sepphora VII. Even now, she spoke via subspace to a blond man who looked at her with sad eyes.

"The conference on Sepphora will start next week. I could still meet you there.'

Annika touched the view screen carefully, tracing her hands across the image of his face. "Reginald, you cannot leave the beacon project in the middle of testing. I will return as quickly as possible."

"Three weeks is too long, Annika." In his emotion, he began to stutter. "Promise me you'll be back soon."

She smiled at his demands. "After Sepphora, I must go to Vulcan for the meeting with T'Pag."

"Then you'll come home."

Home. For the first time in two years since she left the Delta Quadrant, the word meant something. It was the quiet quarters where Reginald and Annika hosted their friends from PU and McKinley Station. It was the little shuttlecraft that they had rescued from recycling off Titan, and jetted around the solar system, trying out modifications that B'Elanna and Tom recommended. After shopping for exotic foods on Mars or Lunaport, they could go home and make glorious meals and watch the passing stars and talk about their future together. Many of the things that Captain Janeway had given her while she lived on McKinley Station were incorporated into their quarters on PU, and on her trips to various councils about the Borg or engineering conferences, she picked up a few other things. Her new portable regeneration unit was now integrated into their bedroom behind a blue Andorian wall hanging that made her giggle every time she looked at it. Not that she had any explanation for that, it just tickled in some uniquely Annika way.

Reginald, in some way reminiscent of Chakotay's gentle care, had nurtured her and given her something very special in her life, and this time, no Admiral from the future would be interfering with it. She had Captain Janeway's promise.

"Then I'll be home. Annika Hansen out."

She saw him blow a quick kiss before the picture faded, and she turned with reluctance back to the pilot station. Sepphora VII's destination was logged to standby and new coordinates were entered. It didn't take long for her to rendezvous with the Q'plah.

Knowing the plan as she did, she still was disconcerted when Chakotay's voice came out of a Cardassian face when he responded to her hail. Behind him she could see Tom, at least, she thought it was Tom. B'Elanna was looking a little grey herself as she looked at her husband.

The Bird of Prey's shuttle bay was too small for the Delta Flyer, so she locked onto a boarding lock and was quickly beamed into the bridge. An amused Klingon sat at the pilot's position, watching B'Elanna with undisguised lust. She was dressed as a Klingon warrior, the battle armor giving her the breadth of being that the Starfleet uniform never conveyed.

"Seven," and she looked up quickly at the name. It had been several months since anyone called her by the Borg designation. "Seven, any problems?"

She shook her head and tried to resolve the dissonance of Chakotay's voice coming out of that face.

"Daq tho toomood, E'vet. Glinn, e'cho fellatan vro." Annika heard him, but the words were senseless.

"Good Cardassian. Who taught you?" Tom asked.

The Cardassian Chakotay grimaced. "Seska. She said it would be good for me to know, so that we might be able to do some infiltration. I've always wondered why she really wanted me to know it."

"Not to break into a Cardassian prison camp," B'Elanna said dryly, and every one laughed.

According to the information from Cardassia, there were two serious problems. The energy shortage resulting from the Dominion War still wreaked havoc with every system on Cardassia Prime, and would continue to do so for years to come, even with the Federation help. Cardassia could barely feed its own, much less the hundreds in the prison camps.

The second problem aggravated the first. Klingon traditions concerning a beaten enemy were not merciful or compassionate. As Tom called it, it was free pickings for anyone who wanted to take on a Cardassian trader. The Klingons did just that, and hundreds of tons of food and supplies were diverted from Cardassia by so-called pirates. Complaints to Martok and the High Council were listened to with deep serious regard, and laughed at after the harassed Cardassians left the chamber. "What can I do?" Martok had asked, not even hiding his smile. "They are not my armies, they are not my fleet. If you believe they are pirates, then you deal with them as you should."

In the end, the Cardassian prisons were overcrowded, undersupplied and looking for a way to get rid of prisoners. If nothing else, starvation was reducing the ranks quickly enough. Since Chakotay's return to the Alpha Quadrant, twenty-seven more Maquis prisoners had been reported dead to the Federation's Red Cross outpost on DS9.

Garak had waved off the expressed concerns of the humanitarian agency. "You feed them, if you must," he said with uncharacteristic bluntness.

Chakotay intended to do much more than that. Garak's signature guaranteed them the chance. Now he needed to capitalize on it.

The two Klingon officers were respectful of B'Elanna, contemptuous of Tom, silent before Seven. Chakotay had the sense if Martok himself had been here, he would have been treated as poorly as everyone else. Madot'h and Kang were surly and crass, and while it only took one word from B'Elanna to shut them up, the rest knew that the rescue was best finished quickly before these two got out of hand.

It was a simple plan. The Cardassians might be able to penetrate the latest in Klingon cloaking technology, but the Q'plah was fifty years out of date. Her cloaking technology was new when Kirk and the first Kang met, but had never been modernized. The Delta Flyer was able to hide under the Bird of Prey, not truly cloaked, but too close for the Cardassian sensors to pick her up as a separate ship. She would be able to beam up the Maquis to her cargo bay, cloak herself, and leave for a rendezvous with another ship that stood off DS9. A total of perhaps twenty people on board would stress the life support, but B'Elanna's engineering figures told her that they could support everyone for about ten hours. Chakotay assured her that it would be enough. If the other ship, a small cargo ship he had commissioned out of Sextus, wasn't there, they could set the prisoners down on Bajor until she arrived. Bajor had already agreed to look the other way.

B'Elanna's role was crucial. Managing life-support on the Flyer was critical, as well as keeping the Flyer under the cloak, but not in such a way that the transporters would fail. Seven would manage the prison shielding from control codes given to her from Chakotay's Cardassian source. If the Cardassians discovered the plot, she would override their shields and pull out Tom, Chakotay and every other human she could get. The codes were only good for seven days. This was day five. It would be unlikely that that they would have another chance.

The key to the plan was Chakotay. The Doctor's surgical modifications were extensive, but Chakotay, as the only one who spoke Cardassian, had to be the one who would enter the Cardassian compound and present his orders for the release of all human and Maquis prisoners. The commandant, Gul Folat, known to the Bajorans as a stickler for paperwork and sly and underhanded, was likely to be suspicious. Why would so many prisoners be needed for interrogations at this point? The lack of a Cardassian ship in space nearby for transport could tip him off. If Tom, posing as Glinn Dor, opened his mouth, Chakotay, now Gul Akret, would immediately be exposed as a fraud. A month of rigorous study hadn't given Tom mastery of any part of the Cardassian language, and muteness would not be an acceptable excuse. Chakotay had to be sure that no question was posed to Tom or that he would be expected to present any information or contribution to a conversation. Rehearsals with Martok had given them an opportunity to practice using his unexpected questions as a test of their skill.

Any beginner transporter officer would have noticed immediately after their beam-down to the Plo-dok Prison Camp that they had not come from a Cardassian ship, but no officer stood the watch.

"Odd," the silent look between the two men said. No officers came to greet them as they entered the camp, and it didn't take long to understand why.

The camp was a disaster. Hundreds of Cardassians walked along the perimeter, pulling down wood from flimsy fences, rolling up some nasty-looking wire. The season was midsummer, but no plant or vegetation grew in sight, only dirty piles of garbage and rags that had been strewn by the wind rested against primitive shacks.

A drunk Cardassian officer approached them, attempting a snappy salute that wavered where it should have stayed firm. "You Gul Akret?"

Chakotay nodded, a sneer on his face. "I am."

Before he could introduce Tom, the officer swung around and pointed to a building nearby. "He's in there. He's waitin' for ya."

Picking a quick pace, the two men strode to the office, but took the opportunity to scan. No humans were in sight.

The office door opened for them, the first sign they had seen that anything in the camp was functional. As it slid open, Chakotay took his orders into his hand. The shorter time they were there, the less likely they were to be caught. Fumbling in the data pocket of the unfamiliar uniform would be suspect.

Gul Folat dropped his feet from the desktop, and placed his data pad on the table. "Gul Akret?"

Chakotay smelled the smoky stench of the drug as Folat stood. "I'm Gul Akret." He handed over the orders. "Where will I find the prisoners?"

Folat waved his hand toward a chair, but Gul Akret refused to sit. "Where?" he repeated.

"Where will I find them? I want to get out of here as quickly as possible." Akret smiled with evil intent. "I want them now."

Folat smiled back. "As soon as I clear these orders."

Akret spoke several words under his breath, which the universal translator hidden in Tom's shoulder ridges and the Borg-implanted aural device in his ear gave Tom a greater respect for his senior officer. He hadn't heard words like that come out of the Commander's mouth in nearly 10 years of service together.

The lack of dexterity slowed Folat's ability to code in the orders to his database. An unconcerned look at Tom, and he asked "Would your Glinn like to do this for me?"

Akret stared Folat down, smiling coldly, waiting.

The orders were confirmed, and Folat pulled a small keypad from his desk. "The pad will open their pen. You have twenty minutes to get them out of here. The shields will go back up whether you're done or not. Mid-beam, if necessary."

It would be a quick death.

The pad directed them to the holding pen of the humans.

Akret hid his disgust and the foulness of the situation in his gut, and opened the gate. Forty-seven men and women, mostly human and Bajoran, all in various states of illness, decay, nakedness and shame stood before them.

Chakotay opened his Cardassian com-link to the Delta Flyer. "We have twenty minutes. There are fifty to beam up."

The link had been modified that no sound would come from it in response to his commands, but Tom got the reply.

"FIFTY?" B'Elanna yelled, and Tom winced.

At the front of the crowd stood four young men, trembling, but standing with some backbone before a being they saw as their destruction.

The first wave of six disappeared.

Four Cardassians, one of them the drunk glinn joined them at the pen. One took out his knife, and began to delicately pare his fingernails, his eyes focused on a young woman, who warily moved behind another man.

The second wave. A Cardassian officer, dressed in medical fatigues, came and stood at the gate, nodded silently, giving some kind of encouragement to an old man. The human stood a little taller, and saluted before the beam took him up.

The third. Folat wandered over to the still group, sucking a vile smoke into his mouth thru a crusty pipe. "Why are you doing it like this? We could beam all of them out using our transporter."

The differences of the Federation transport beam and the Cardassian were visible indoors, indistinguishable out. It would leave their destination coordinates in their computer. Akret did not look at him. "We do it this way."

None of the Cardassians moved.

Tom and Chakotay did not speak. It took every bit of self-control not to vomit.

The fourth took a few more minutes to go up. Chakotay could only imagine where B'Elanna and Seven were putting them. The Delta Flyer's energy stores could not hold them in computer stasis and continue to beam them up.

Several more officers joined the Cardassians. One held out his hands toward one of the women, who turned away from him. The fifth wave took her, holding the hands of two small children, both of them half Cardassian.

Tom Riker stood before Chakotay, a lazy grin on his face until he focused on Chakotay's face. The men looked at each other, the grin fading and some horrified glaze covering Riker's face. Chakotay itched to signal him, the light touch on one side of the throat, a Maquis recognition code.

Tom Riker disappeared in the sixth wave and the Cardassians began to grumble. "Why do you have to take them all?" they asked. "No one left…" another left the sentence unfinished, but another growled, underscoring the sentiment. The next wave came forward for the transport, two Klingons, toothless, hairless. Behind them stood two wretched looking women, holding a third between them. She had no feet. Another officer joined them, a Fleet officer, well groomed, indifferent to the surroundings. "Gul Akret? We've not met…I'm Gul Karmor, of the ship Emprell."

The seventh wave would include Tom or Chakotay. They had less than three minutes by Chakotay's reckoning. He pointed to the empty spot and said to Tom in Cardassian, "Get up there."

"Yes, Glinn, get up there and supervise that mess." Folat pulled on his pipe. Tom pulled out his weapon and stood beside the handicapped woman. They trembled, but did not move.

As Tom disappeared, Folat moved in front of Chakotay, his eyes narrowed. "Your orders were for sixteen - and yet you took them all."

Gul Akret did not reply. He hoped his contempt for the officer was visible in his eyes. It could not come out of his mouth. There were no words.

"And just where did you take them? Only six at a time? Most transporters will take five, or seven, but you took six. Every time."

"Not every time, Gul Folat." The medic pointed out.

The profanity telling him to shut his mouth was a new one to Chakotay.

Karmor said his name again. "I'm Gul Karmor." He was expecting an answer. Chakotay moved his eyes to examine this officer. He had one minute, according to the pad, before the shields would be brought back online.

Beneath his arm, a small silent alarm rumbled. B'Elanna was prodding him, waiting for the final signal.

He strode to the place in the pen where the others had stood for their transport. Karmor followed him, a perplexed look crossing his face. "Just where are you taking them, Gul? You're beaming them up, but my ship's scans didn't show any ships."

The words drawled out of his mouth as Chakotay disappeared.

And reappeared on the Klingon ship.

It made sense, in some way. There was no space for so many on the Delta Flyer, but this meant that the Klingon ship had decloaked for the transport. If Emprell was nearby, she would be seen, instantly.

The ship rocked as the phaser blasts hit the ship, knocking everyone over. Chakotay had no time to waste; he stepped on or over as he had to, to get to the bridge.

B'Elanna sat in the captain's chair, wearing the Klingon armor, her arms gripping the chair. She addressed the screen. "I have no interest in talking to you, Cardassian."

She cut the link and with clenched teeth said, "Fire."

Kang blasted out the torpedoes as Madot'h reported, "Our shields are gone."

Four bolts shot from the Bird of Prey's wings, two of them cleanly hitting their targets. The other two were less effective, but in any case, the Emprell was going nowhere.

She turned to Chakotay, but did not leave the captain's chair. He did not approach her.

An erratic picture on the screen of the Emprell's bridge flickered on and off, blending occasionally with the starscape view. From his position, he could see that the communications was one-way; Emprell could not see the Klingon bridge, and he doubted they could see behind them, rising slowly, was Enterprise.

"Q'plah," came a familiar voice. "Do you need assistance?"

The starscape screen showed a flickering Delta Flyer streaking away, suddenly there, suddenly not.

On the screen, Commander William Riker was poised and concerned. B'Elanna pointed to the communication station, where Chakotay ran and opened a secure channel. "We have a lot of people on board who need to get out of here," she said.

"Stand by, Q'plah."

All of the humans from the Q'plah shimmered out in a matter of minutes, followed quickly by the other Maquis. Even Chakotay in his Cardassian form, found himself in a cargo bay on Enterprise, but surrounded by several security guards, phasers pulled and set to kill. He put up his hands slowly. "I'm human," he said.

"I've heard that before," a woman said with a sneer, and nodded toward Tom.

B'Elanna was not with them.

Aboard the Q'plah, two Cardassian officers beamed to the bridge, weapons pulled. The three Klingons stood with their own weapons.

The Cardassians thought it was a standoff. Surely these three Klingons were smart enough to surrender, caught in Cardassian space. Four more Por'veb class ships would be there within moments.

"We know that you transported the prisoners. We want them back."

"Prisoners?" she spat the word. "There are no Klingon prisoners. Klingons fight and die. They do not become prisoners."

"We have scanned your ship…" he looked at her oddly. "You're B'Elanna Torres."

She stared at him. "I will not allow you to honor me with the name of the greatest hero of the Klingon Empire by calling me by her name."

He shook his head. "You are B'Elanna Torres, of Voyager. Of the Federation."

"You are a fool," she said, and tore the sleeve of her shirt off. "B'Elanna Torres swore by the flaming sword of Kahless, shed her blood so to bear the scars of battle. Do you see any scars here, Cardassian?"

His eyes filed down to slits as he stared at her. "I say you are B'Elanna Torres. You have taken the Maquis prisoners. I have a scan that shows that they are here."

William Riker walked onto the bridge. "You might have a scan showing me here…not your prisoner."

They turned and looked at him, puzzled. One pointed his scanner at Riker, and using his thumb, pressed a button. "The scans match. It's Riker."

"Of course I'm Riker. I'm William Riker of the starship Enterprise. Your prisoner is my duplicate, known as Thomas Riker."

Another blast hit the ship, but this time, the Q'plah was seriously damaged. Smoke and gasses filled the bridge as the stand off continued. "I know my prisoners were on this ship!" yelled the Cardassian.

The room quickly became hazy, and the Cardassians began to shout, more noise above the sounds of the fire and circuitry popping. Riker grabbed B'Elanna and pulled her to the back of the room, hitting his comm-button. "Energize," he said, and as they faded from the room, the two old Klingon prisoners came into the room carrying weapons.

B'Elanna and Riker reappeared on the bridge of Enterprise, where they could see the bridge of the Klingon ship, the noxious gasses quickly venting from the space. The two Cardassians were lying in pools of blood, the toothless, hairless Klingons standing over them, silent in vengeful rage. The other two Klingons, both injured, one gasping for air, pointed to a console. Kang pulled himself over, and tried to push a button.

"Get out of here, Data!" William Riker practically vaulted over the tactical console. Picard was nodding even as Data increased the thrusters to maximum. On the screen, the starscape now showing a spectacular showing of the old Bird of Prey's weapons, firing unpredictable shots, some creating more damage to the Emprell, some missing entirely. Emprell, for all her damage, returned fire, but even as Q'plah's last lucky shot was fired, she burst into an inferno and exploded into a ball of flames that did more damage to Emprell. She looked to be dead in space, blazes and explosions consuming her hull.

Picard had a sad look on his face. "Will, you said your source told you that the peace treaty would be effective next month."

"That's what Chak… I mean, my source told me."

B'Elanna's eyes slid over to Commander Riker. It wasn't like a Starfleet officer to slip like that.

"Captain Torres?" Captain Picard extended his hand. "Welcome to Enterprise."

The second climbers, not only more experienced than Kolopak but also guided by the ropes, managed the climb in something less than an hour. As he reached out to grab Hector's hand, he felt that same gush of relief that they had no doubt felt for him when he reported he had completed the climb.

"It's not a bad climb, really," Hector said as he caught his breath. "I hope the trip down is as good."

"I hope we find what we came up here for," Margarita grumbled. She had dressed in a dark pair of tight climber's tight pants for the climb, and she pulled at a hole where a bloody knee was exposed.

Kolopak offered her some water, which she used for a quick drink before pouring on her knee. "I didn't pack the dermal regenerator."

"What did you bring?"

"Blankets and pillows. I hope we can get comfortable here tonight, I don't want to try that," she said, indicating the cliff with her thumb, "until the morning. Kanicha, it's your turn to feed us."

Kanicha smiled brightly. "I know just what to get." She was off in a matter of seconds.

"What did you do with the llamas?" Kolopak asked curiously.

"I took them down to the next campsite and used the perimeter wands to pen them in. Not a lot of room to frolic, but fresh food to graze. They should be fine till tomorrow, if we don't make them wait too long."

"How did you get them to move so fast?" Kolopak took back his water bottle and took a drink himself.

"Peanut speed. I made sure that Felix and Romeo saw me put peanuts in Groucho's pack with the flap open. They know how to get the peanuts out of there if Groucho will stand still. Then I pulled the Grouch at running speed to the new campground. They followed right along, trying to get their noses into the pack. Caffey was laughing at them. He ambled right along with us, and every so often he would butt up against Felix to speed him up." Kolopak laughed as Margarita's story. "I think he's on to my trick, but he was pretty good-natured about it. I gave him a handful of peanuts and he was happy."

"You've done this before?"

"Many times. That Felix is such a slowpoke. He's probably got his nose inside that pack right now, looking for more." She looked around carefully. "Do you know where your flash was now? Could you place it again?"

Kolopak nodded. "I need to drop over there, about 4 meters from here."

He pointed to a ledge covered with ugly purple flowers and some nasty looking boulders. Their ragged edges were sharp and uninviting…and wrong. There were no other boulders around the top of this climb, nor any across the ravine on the top of the other side. He walked over and carefully pulled a few flowers away from the rocks. A long, thin, black plastic tube was lying beneath them, falling down off the side of the ledge, still hidden by the falling plant growth. Leaning over the edge slightly, he could see that the dark tube was easily missed; it blended so well with the shadows and the plant growth. He tried to follow it down with his eyes, but lost it quickly. He turned to follow the tube upward, and found in the middle of the boulders a large glass globe.

"Margarita, come here," he called peremptorily. "I think I found something already."

She knelt unsteadily on top of one of the jagged rocks, her hand on his shoulder for balance. "What?"

He tried to lift the globe, but it was affixed to the rock with some type of adhesive. Inside the bowl, he could see the workings of a simple passive solar pump. "What is this?" he asked.

Her face paled and she began to tremble. "It's an Incan fertilizer."

"Incan?"

"Yes, it's commonly used by farmers in the Andes. That long tube allows for feeding significantly lower beds without the farmer having to risk going down to the lower field."

"I didn't know the Incans had glass?" Hector said skeptically.

"No, they didn't, they used ceramics to make the globe, but the technique is exactly the same."

Kolopak and Margarita looked at each other, and then she dropped her head into his shoulder. "I know," he soothed.

Hector was bewildered. "What do you know?"

"It seems that someone has been setting up Margarita. That she knows what this is means that it's someone that knows her very well, and wants her to be held responsible for the damages to the grove for the last ten years."

"Who would want to do that?" Hector demanded.

Stepping down off the rock, Margarita closed her eyes. "We need more evidence."

"But you know who you suspect."

"I do now." She waved at Kanicha behind the men. "Supper's here. Leave the glass. It's not going to do any more damage in one night."

Hector was getting angry, but he swallowed the harsh words forming in his throat. "Ok, Margarita, but I want the details. This is my grove we're talking about, I deserve to know."

They returned to Kanicha's feast, and Kolopak handed the tricorder to Margarita and Hector. "You know this symbol?"

Hector shook his head. "I don't think so."

Margarita took it and looked at it for a very long time. She turned and looked at Kolopak, and sighing, put it back into his hand. "Did you find anything else?"

"I found this," he replied, and pulled a rooted plant from his pack. "I liked the smell of it. Do you know what it is?"

Tiny lavender-hued flowers with a delicate scent on a rooted stem were presented to the two women. "It's a coffee plant, Kolopak," Hector said, puzzled. "But the flowers are the wrong color."

Margarita took a leaf and delicately bit into it. "It's coffee all right. But what's it doing up here? And why are the flowers purple? And what's it doing blooming in March?"

No one had an answer.

A heavy misty cloud settled on the mountain as they quietly ate their meal, and the crew found themselves tired and a bit bad-tempered. An early night found them sleeping through the howlers' indignant shrieks, and in the morning, they rose late, stretching and feeling a little creaky after the strenuous day's work from the previous day.

The mist was thick and gave an eerie feeling to their breakfast. Kolopak and Margarita made frequent eye contact, he would look at her, she would look back, they would look away. Hector grumbled about his restless night, but otherwise was silent. Kanicha, filling the silence, babbled. "And there's a path over there, someone must have cut it a long time ago, that we can use to get over to the Eye."

"Do we need to go to the Eye?" Hector mumbled around a squishy bite of something tantalizingly rich to the tongue and the eye. Its spiral of green and peach colors on the bumpy skin was worthy of praise by itself, much less its fine taste.

"Kolopak asked to see it yesterday," Kanicha lied easily. "I told him I'd take him over after you got the pump."

"If Kolopak has to go down part way to get the pump, why would he want to come back up just to get a look at that?"

"Good point," Margarita conceded. "Let's get Kolopak over to his cave, and then we can all head back down." She wiped her hands on the broad leaf she was using for a plate, looking distastefully at the sticky juice that remained. "What adhesive would you use up here, Hector? Something that would withstand the constant humidity?"

He considered for a moment. "Something epoxy, I think. Why?"

"Because I want to get that globe and take it with us. Your father will need to see it to believe what I'm going to tell him."

Hector's face immediately became interested. "What are you going to tell him?"

She looked sadly at Hector. "I'm going to tell him that your mother has had a hand in the sabotage of the grove."

Kanicha and Hector stopped chewing for a long minute. "How do you know?" he asked quietly.

Kolopak gently explained his theory, but Hector watched only Margarita. "You think she's done this, you think she's done this to me? Her own son? All the evidence points to you, not to her."

"You're right, Hector, except for one thing. That tricorder? The symbol on the outside is the symbol for your Uncle Robusto's coffee grove, Seita Estella grove. The seven pointed star was just adopted by them as their logo four years ago."

Kanicha picked up the tricorder. "Why don't you turn it on and see who it belongs to?"

She handed it to Hector, who reluctantly took it. "Very well."

The click seemed to be swallowed by the mist surrounding them, but both Hector and Margarita flinched at the sound of the man's voice recording a business deal. He paused it carefully, and placed it on the ground before him. "Uncle Robusto."

Kanicha picked it up. "I know where I've seen this. We had a group of men come through last summer, wanted to hike up to the Eye. Poppa wouldn't let me come with him. He didn't trust the men; he got Tio Miguel to help him guide the trip. One of them wore a shirt with this symbol on it."

Margarita looked slightly nauseated at the thought that Kanicha had been so close to someone who did not hesitate to poison so freely.

Kolopak looked around, but the mist was too thick. "Where's the Eye?"

Kanicha pointed off behind her shoulder. "That way to the bridge path, past there, it's not too far."

He couldn't see anything.

Hector tossed his leaf into the bush behind him. "Let's go get Kolopak to his cave. I don't think we should leave the llamas any longer than we need to."

It didn't take long for Kolopak and the others to find the cave. The entrance was huge, easily three times Kolopak's height. The mist blocked all the direct light.

"What are you looking for, Kolopak?" Margarita was examining the old hieroglyphics on the wall with an interested eye.

He didn't answer, just took the flashlight and started walking down the wide tunnel. The lava cave was at least two kilometers long, with several side passages. There was little debris, just the constant drip and flow of condensed water.

"No one ever sleeps in here," Kanicha said conversationally. "It's way too wet."

Kolopak knelt down to study a series of glyphs on the wall. "Do you know how old these are?"

"I don't think anyone's ever tried to date them," Hector responded. "Most people don't even notice them, do they, Chica?"

She nodded quietly, holding her light for Kolopak to examine the engraved painting. A series of lines and dots ran down the side of one passage. He touched each one, then moved down the corridor to the next doorway. Hector and Margarita turned down one corridor and began to reminisce of previous visits, but Kolopak and Kanicha continued quietly on his quest.

The fourth opening was oddly blocked by a fallen boulder, the only one they had seen so far, but it was the one that Kolopak had been looking for. He wouldn't be able to move it, but he was barely thin enough to squeeze in, and Kanicha followed him, still silent.

The vision struck him violently. Searing heat scorched his lungs, the acrid smoke stung in his eyes, blurring the sight of the inferno's flames. His tongue blistered as he tried to breath through his mouth, and the cacophony of the roar of the blaze and the screams of other people filled his ears. He knew that he loved those who were shrieking with indescribable pain, but the thundering echoes in the cave consumed his answering cries.

Kanicha's soft touch on his arm dissipated the vision, and he was in the dark chamber, cold and shivering in the dank, close air. "OK?" she asked, her voice sounding concerned.

What little voice he had said yes, he was fine, but the pounding of his heart compounded the terror in his mind. This cave was surely Xibalba, the palace of the god of the dead, and Kolopak feared that the god would demand a sacrifice of blood before he would be satisfied.

Their flashlights showed angled cuts on the far wall, and some dark drawings on the green walls. Sputters of paint smeared where the rough crystals had broken up the smooth strokes of the painter's brush. Kanicha's light drifted down, and a small clay pot lined with a black residue sat on the floor, as if the painter had left if, expecting to return shortly.

Kolopak dipped his finger in the water that puddled on the floor, and then into the dried pigment. With a shaking hand, he spread a small amount of paint on the wall close to the low ceiling, writing a character similar to the hieroglyphs found on the wall below it.

He smiled with bravado. Perhaps the god would be satisfied to wipe out his name.

Kanicha pulled out a small pocketknife and cut one of her fingers, and made a stylized K on the wall next to it. In the low ambient light, he realized that she too had felt the oppression of the room, if not in a vision, her soul still understood some of the mystery here.

She pointed to one of the paintings on the wall, a face in profile with a series of curved marks over the eye. "I've seen people like that in Brazil," she whispered.

He scanned the rest of the wall, but none of the other markings meant anything to them, and they heard Margarita's excited call from the main corridor.

"The mist is rising. Are you ready to go?"

Kolopak smiled down on her with a very satisfied look on his face. "Very much so."

They abandoned the rest of the cave and returned to the pile of rocks. Hector looked distastefully at the ravine before him. "Tell me why I came up here again?" he asked of no one in particular.

"For the adventure of it," Margarita replied dryly. "Because it's there."

"Because I'm stupid is more like it," he replied bitterly. "I hate rappelling."

Kolopak had already pulled the harness on. "Have you figured out how to get that off?" He indicated the glass globe between his anchoring rocks. He needed to follow the black tubing down the side of the ravine, where Margarita insisted he would find yet another glass globe, this one with three or four tubes coming out of it. "It's a standard design. I can walk into any farming supply from Chile to Costa Rica and buy this. It's efficient, it requires no monitoring, and it never fails because it's so simple. The worst thing that happens to it is it might break if the ambient temperature gets low enough while the inside stays warm. But I don't think I've ever heard of one doing that."

"You know this kind of pump?"

"No one in coffee grove management in Columbia or Brazil doesn't know it. It's as much a standard piece of equipment as a pruner is to you." Margarita looked at it curiously. "But how did they get it attached here, and why did they bother? They're bottom heavy, they don't roll around."

Kanicha finished examining his rope meter by meter. "You're good, Kolopak. Get the lower pump and see if you can pack it. Otherwise, I'll run two more lines and let Margarita and Hector sling it between them."

Kolopak focused on her face for a moment, and then grabbed the lines she offered. Threading it through the karabiner, he tied a secure knot at his waist, and waited patiently for both Kanicha and Margarita to check it. "Going down," he called, and stepped off and down, careful to keep his feet away from the black tube.

The secondary pump was much larger than the first. Four lines stretched out into different directions beneath him, and knowing that all the water on this cliff ran into the single stream at the bottom of the ravine, he wondered at the redundancy, but he skillfully lifted it and was able to strap the globe into his back pack. "Going down," he called again, reassuring them he had the globe safely stored. The remaining drop was simple and quick, and within minutes, the four found themselves back at their campground.

Hector and Margarita immediately began to hike to the llamas, while Kanicha and Kolopak collected their equipment. Pulling it out had been the work of a few minutes, storing it again was a task on which they spent over an hour.

Kanicha looked up as she noticed the height of the sun. "They should have been back by now."

Kolopak was looking through the rough bushes at the bottom of the ravine for his lost hammer. "What?"

"I said they should have been back by now." She stood and turned to the path, squinting inquiringly.

Kolopak gave up his search and returned to her side. "Take me there," he said, and they set off on the path.

They found them at the next campsite, but something was terribly wrong. Margarita was kneeling by Caffey, her arm stretched down his long neck as she held his head in her lap. Hector stood looking off the side of the mountain, and Kanicha came to stand at his side. "What happened?" she asked in a horrified voice.

"It looks like a green viper. Caffey laid down on top of it, or stepped on it, and it bit."

Caffey's head was loosely held in Margarita's hand as she sang a little song, humming words when her voice broke.

"There was nothing we could have done. Even if we had been here, it's unlikely that we would have had enough or even the right kind of antivenin. It looks like he just went down into a cush, and fell asleep. There's no sign of a struggle, and the other animals aren't spooked."

Kanicha stepped over to Romeo, and he agilely danced up beside her, his shoulders twitching for her to scratch. Her normal silly-llama talk was unspoken as tears ran down her face. Hector slung the halters onto his shoulder. "We should get going. There's a problem down there."

Kolopak looked up from his steadfast gaze on the dead llama and his mistress. "What?"

"There's a fire down there."

"Fire? Where?" Kolopak whipped around.

"Down the mountain. Near the coffee grove, I think."

Kolopak's stomach contracted. "How long will it take us to get down there?"

"Straight through? Two days, generally. With the llamas, we might make it in one, if we abandon some of our gear. We can stash it behind some boulders at the bottom of the Arrow." Hector looked worried. "We can get started and make a quick camp at the ridge for tonight, and be in the grove in the early afternoon. Or we could wait here and leave in the morning."

Hector knew what he wanted the team to do, but he deferred to Margarita to make the decision, and at that moment, she was incapable of doing so.

Kolopak looked at the black and white llama, so uncharacteristically still in her lap. "We have to go. Margarita and I are afraid that we know what the next attempt at sabotage will be. I think, and it's only speculation at this point, that it will happen quickly, since all the attacks take place when Margarita's in the village. Since it's probably not well known outside the village that Margarita's here on the mountain, Liber-," he paused and gave ground to Hector's feelings, "someone might use the opportunity to continue the attacks."

Hector gave a huge sigh of relief. "I'll get the other llamas ready." He gestured sadly to Caffey. "What should we do about him?"

"What can we do? We can't bury him, we can't take him with us."

Hector turned to gather the llamas as Kolopak came to stand behind Margarita. She was no longer singing, just wiping away tears as they fell from her face. His hands rested gently on her shoulders, and she dipped her head so that her face rested on one. "I've lost other llamas before. I lost Chico, I lost Frances, I lost Andy. I really should be able to handle this."

He answered with a squeeze to her shoulder.

"I love all my boys, Kolopak. I think I loved Caffey the best, though. He was the best natured beast I've ever met. He knew his limits, but when it was absolutely necessary, he would try to do what I asked. When he failed, I knew it was my fault for asking something I should have known better than to try to get him to do in the first place."

"He was a fine animal, Margarita. He loved you, too."

"We have to leave him here, don't we?" she asked, sobbing again.

"Yes, we do." He sounded heartless in his own ears, but she seemed to gather strength from it. "Hector's rounding up the others, he'll take them back to the other camp and we'll pack up. We should be able to leave within a few hours."

She looked down at the llama's face again. "I'll join you later. Can you pack them without me?"

"I think so. Without the food, we're already a good hundred kilos less than we started out. I think we can abandon some of the equipment, if we have to. Hector thinks we can take it back behind the boulders at the bottom of the ravine, and he can come back to get it later, if we need to."

Kolopak knelt beside her, and stroked the soft llama fur. "You were a great soul, Caffey. I have been honored to know you."

Above the grove about a kilometer, four very tired humans and three exhausted llamas were unable to continue their trek. The fire scorched earth was still hot, and while Hector was certain that the fire would not break out again at this point, he didn't want to try to cross the ashen field in his fatigued state. His stomach was already heaving at the thought that his heritage, the work of the hands of his father and grandfather, smoldered in the smoky haze.

Hector stood on the ledge, looking down. They had no words to comfort him; the women could barely comfort themselves.

From their view above the field, it was obvious that the fire had started not far from where they camped, and the winds combined with the dead understory had fueled the fire right across its largest expanse. Perhaps fifteen percent of the grove was untouched.

Kolopak took over the duties for the night. He pulled out a dinner that required no fire and served it without fuss. The llamas were penned with the perimeter wands, and for reasons he didn't really understand himself, he expanded the range to include their campsite.

Margarita studied the burned grove carefully, and then slowly turned away. She had no ownership of the grove but that of a woman who had put a lifetime's work into making it as productive as possible. She had grown up in its shadow, played and picked from the trees, frolicked with her llamas here. That the fire might have been inspired by her writings revolted her. On top of her grief for her llama, the destruction was unbearable.