Star Trek: Voyager

Restless

Written By LockBox22

o0o

Pain. It exploded into his waking mind and he gasped, eyes snapping open. He was lying on his back and when he tried to raise his head, the room spun almost causing him to black out again. Something hard slammed against his chest and he fought to breathe.

"Keep him still!" A woman's voice snapped.

His hands felt like iron weights and he tried to push at whatever was holding him down, to get away from the pain. Strong hands grabbed his arms and wrestled them back to his sides. He fought it and managed to raise his head this time.

A dark head was bent over his lower body, hands deep in his abdomen. "What..." He tried to force his dry lips to speak.

The woman's dark eyes snapped his way, forceful and almost angry. Her tone however was cool, professional. "Unless you want further damage to your organs, I suggest you keep still."

He stopped moving and laid back down. The pain lessened slightly and the pressure on his chest was relieved. He focused on the room. It was plain, shabby, with tan walls and wooden beams across the ceiling.

"Give him more pain meds." The woman's voice said. "He'll need it."

There was a tiny prick in his shoulder and then he floated away on a cloud of lightness.

o0o

He awoke later, arms lashing out as if to rid himself of the nightmares that clung to him. His elbow hit something hard and a crash followed. He shot up in the bed, pain lancing through his lower belly. The room was different this time, smaller, more intimate.

He took stock of the situation. He was naked from the waist up, missing his comm badge, and his shoes. What he gained however was a small palm size scar across his lower abdomen. He threw back the light blanket that covered his legs, preparing to swing himself to the floor, when he saw that in addition to the scar, a light brace made of metal had been placed around his left leg.

He looked at the floor, wondering how to get down when he saw what he had hit.

A young woman lay on the floor, a tray of broken dishes nearby. He hesitated, not knowing if he should call out. He slide to the floor, mindful of his leg. His bare foot landed on the warm sand that served as the floor. He bent over the woman, checking her pulse, which was strong. She was just knocked out.

Suddenly tired, he sat down beside her and leaned against the wall. He decided that it was the drugs they had pumped into him. There was no way that he could be feeling this out of shape, not with the drills that Tuvok had been putting them through lately.

Voyager. Kathryn. He tried with a foggy mind to put together the piece of how he'd ended up on this planet. Something nagged at him, something important that he was forgetting. He gently touched his stomach and winced. How'd he ended up with that?

The woman on the floor stirred and slowly raised herself into a sitting position. She touched her lip which was bleeding from the force of his elbow. She looked up at him, dark eyes meeting his, and then scrambled backwards, away from him.

"Don't, please." He said, reaching out a hand towards him. "I won't hurt you."

She stopped and looked over at him. She touched her lip again, brushing away the blood.

"I'm sorry about your face." He apologized. "It doesn't look that bad."

She didn't answer him, her eyes were full of suspicion, and curiosity. He hoped her curiosity would enable him to connect with her. A thought occurred to him.

"I hope you can understand me." He said aloud. "My name is Chakotay." She titled her head and frowned, but there was no response.

"I have device that will enable us to communicate. It looks like this." He motioned for her to look at the sand and started to draw a picture of the comm-badge. Hopefully it hadn't been damaged or stolen while he had been unconscious.

A soft hand gently stopped his hand from continuing and he looked into her bright eyes. "I know this device of which you speak." She said softly. She let go of his hand and stood up. He tried and failed to follow suit.

She turned around from the dresser and in her hand was his comm-badge. She knelt on the sand in front of him and brushed away the half drawing he'd attempted to make. "It is better to not leave such things lying around." She told him.

He held out his hand. "May I?" He said indicating the comm-badge with a slight nod.

She refused and looked down at the device. "I have not seen such a device before. Is it military?"

"In a way, yes." He replied. "It's a communication device. My friends will want to know I'm alive. Please?" He indicated to the comm-badge again.

"Friends? In the city?" She asked.

"Sort-of. Please, I must contact them. It's important." Desperation fueled his strength and he pushed himself to his feet despite the pain. Quick as a flash, the woman also rose to her feet and pointed a weapon at him.

This one was different then the one that had almost killed him, older, cruder, but he would guess just as deadly. He realized that the world was looking like one of the old holodeck programs that Tom enjoyed and he put out a hand to steady himself.

He missed the table he was aiming for and would have went crashing to the ground if the woman hadn't grabbed him by the arm. She shoved her shoulder into his side and helped him over to the end of the bed. He sat, noticing the weapon had mysteriously disappeared. Most likely into the folds of her clothing.

"Thank you." He said as she let go of him and stepped back again.

"You need to rest for at least twenty more cycles." She told him. Her tone was more brusque then before. He had heard the Doctor use that tone on almost a daily basis. "If you insist on getting up before you are ready, it will only mean more dizzy spells." A small device appeared in her hand. "This will help you sleep."

"No, I..." She had already injected him before he finished protesting. He experienced the same lightness as last time and she firmly guided him back against the pillows where the darkness welcomed him with open arms. He succumbed to it and this time he dreamed.

o0o

The whispers in his dreams became reality as he returned to the waking world. This time everything hurt. The painkillers must have worn off. He kept his eyes closed as the people in the room continued their discussion.

"He used his given name to introduce himself." The woman he had spoken to before was speaking. "That is not usual for a member of the military. There is something not right here, Dale."

"It makes no difference." This voice was male, presumably Dale. "They are outsiders, they don't do things the way we do. He is a military officer that much is clear by the uniform he was wearing. You should have left him to die."

"His injuries would have made it a painful death." A male voice, this one younger then the other. "I couldn't leave him to suffer."

"You may have trained as a healer, Roland; but the rest of us have been fighting a war since you were a child. A soldier is a soldier, no matter where he comes from." Dale was angry.

The woman spoke again. "That is no reason to treat him like a prisoner, Dale. This is a place of healing, not a Section. My apprentice may have made an error by bringing him here but now that he is here; I can't turn him away."

The voices became softer. "Dale, you are no longer fighting with the Rebellion. Please, let us not make any rash decisions regarding our guest's future. Roland, you will in charge of our guest while he is here. Whatever we decide, he is injured; his care comes first."

"I respect your decision, Haja." Dale said, his voice softer then it had been before. "But you must be prepared to do what is necessary. If they find him here..."

There was a rustle of cloth. "I know." Her voice was so low that he had to strain to hear it. "We'll just have to make sure that doesn't happen. Roland, let us attend to your patient."

Chakotay heard them walk closer to the bed. He forced himself to lay still. A hand touched his bare shoulder and gently shook him. He opened his eyes. A young man about twenty stood over him. Chakotay sat up. He could see the woman standing in the doorway, watching them.

"Hi." He said, suddenly finding that his mouth was dry.

"My name is Roland. How do you feel?"

"Sore." He admitted. "I could use something to drink."

The man nodded. "I can imagine. You have quite a few drugs in your system." He reached for something and Chakotay realized that the tray that he had knocked to the floor earlier had been replaced. "This will help with the pain."

Chakotay started to pull away from the syringe.

"It will not make you sleep." Roland was quick to assure him. He quickly injected him and Chakotay felt the soreness and pain disappear. It was a welcome relief.

"How long was I asleep?" He asked.

The woman, Haja, was the one to answer him this time. "This time, a cycle and a half. It is just past mid-afternoon. Would you like something to eat?"

"Please." He said taking the glass of liquid that Roland held out to him. "This time?"

"You have been unconscious for almost seven cycles." Roland said. "You do not remember?"

"No." He took a drink from the cup in his hand. It was water, warmer then he was used too, but wet and wonderfully sweet. He drank half the glass before he realized that they were still watching him.

Haja turned away from them. "He is well enough for some fresh air." She said over her shoulder. "It might help him remember."

o0o

Several minutes later with Roland's help, Chakotay was attired in an earth colored tunic and pants not unlike the ones that Roland wore. Haja had worn something similar, though in a faded sky blue with the addition of a blue colored head scarf.

He looked from the brace on his leg to the doorway. "I don't think I'm going anywhere."

Roland picked up something from a dark corner of the room and held it out to him. It was a cane. Chakotay took it. "You.."

That elected a smile from the other man and he made a motion with his other hand. "This is not my first leg injury. Come."

Chakotay stood and slowly put pressure on his bad leg. There was nothing, no pain, but when he took his first step he realized his mistake. The painkillers were blocking the pain, but the leg itself had not healed yet. Roland caught his arm before he could fall to the floor in a heap.

"You must go slowly. The drugs will dull the pain, but the breaks remain."

"Breaks?" Chakotay asked as he steadied himself with the cane. He took a slow step and found that it worked. He took another, heading towards the door. "Can you tell me what happened?"

"I only arrived after the riot. The doctor could tell you more about..."

"I asked you." Chakotay said quietly. He took another two steps and was at the doorway. The next room was a covered common room with table, chairs, and couches. The windows were on the roof instead of on the walls which meant that the sun shone brightly into all corners. To his left was another doorway, leading to the outside.

He headed towards the open doorway, Roland walking beside him.

"Your injuries only tell me what happened to you, not the events." Roland cautioned. His hands made another gesture. "That you must remember on your own if you want to heal."

"I think I'll just work on walking at the moment." Chakotay replied with a small grin. Roland looked confused. "Go on." Chakotay told him.

"Your kneecap is shattered as well as your lower leg. This injury is common when Security Services try to break up a riot. They break the rioter's legs to control their prisoners more effectively. You were lucky that someone forgot about you. You could have ended up in a Section. They do not give their prisoners medical attention unless the injury is life threatening."

By now they were outside. Chakotay had to shield his eyes from the intensity of the sun, but when his vision returned, he was amazed at what he saw. From the sand on the floor he had been expecting a desert. But what he saw was far from a desert.

The trees and bushes were lush and full. The pathway leading from the house through the garden was sand, but he didn't expect that there was a desert lurking beyond that path. "Is your entire state like this?"

Roland shook his head with a grin. "No." He pointed to the right. "The town is over that way. It is all desert between here and there. This is our healing garden. We've cultivated it for years." He motioned to one of the sand paths. "There is a bench a meter in that direction. The view is most pleasant."

By the time they reached the bench, Chakotay was tired. He realized that if they did decide to treat him as a prisoner, he wouldn't get too far if he tried to escape. Roland helped Chakotay sit down on the bench in the garden and then sat beside him.

"And that groggy feeling I keep having?" Chakotay asked.

"Effects of the treatments." Reba responded. "We have ways of speeding up the body's natural healing abilities. Your concussion vanished overnight, but the effects must have left you with some memory loss."

Chakotay nodded. "So I remember my life, but not the riot or how I ended up on this planet."

Roland inclined his head. Chakotay took that as a yes. "You remember that you are a visitor to our world?"

"I remember a lot of things." Chakotay replied, looking around at the flowers that bloomed from the vines around the garden. "I remember coming down to the surface, meeting someone in a red robe. There were people yelling..."

"Our Minister." Roland replied. "You met with him when you first arrived."

"How do you know that?"

Roland laughed. It was an unexpected sound. "You arrived in a starship. Everyone knows that the visitors met with the Minister. It is our custom when one comes from far away. Are the people of your world kept in the dark by soldiers like you that they do not know about a public event?"

"I'm not a solider." Chakotay corrected. "We're just trying to get home. We don't belong here."

Roland nodded in agreement. "No, you don't. But I have known men such as you my entire life. You are a soldier."

Thee two men looked up as a rustle of cloth came from the pathway. Haja stood in the sand, watching them. "Dinner is ready. Come and eat." She said before turning around and going back the way she had come.

o0o

Dinner that night was quiet. In addition to Roland, Chakotay learned that there were five other students living within the compound. All six of them were learning the healing arts from Haja. From what he gathered, it seemed that most of the women in this culture were the teachers and scientists. Maybe it was just him, but is also seemed that the men in this culture were the talkative ones.

Roland and the other two male students took up most of the conversation that evening. They tried to draw him in, but Chakotay was content just to listen to them banter and discuss that various going ons around the small town.

He watched as they made silent gestures to one another while talking and eating. One of them made a circling motion that he'd seen Roland do earlier that day.

"Why do you do that with your hands?" Chakotay asked Roland as the conversation moved on to other things.

Roland took a spoon full of his dinner. He was still smiling from the comment that the other had made. "Do what?" He asked.

Chakotay made the circling motion.

"Ah." Roland nodded. "Amusement." He responded.

Chakotay was still confused and obviously it was showing. Roland put down his utensil. "We have different motions for different thing while speaking. One indicates amusement, another grabs attention from an elder, or person of respect. We don't touch one another unless we are familiar. See?"

Chakotay nodded and resumed eating as the conversation quieted down. One of the men got up for another helping of food and it became silent. Chakotay sensed this was his opportunity.

"I was wondering if I could get my communication device back."

Haja looked up from her bowl. This was the first time all evening that she had looked his way. He wondered if she was always this distant. Chakotay felt the tension in the room. The rest of the apprentices lowered their gazes as if sensing the conflict.

"Not tonight." She said quietly. "You do not need to worry. It will be returned to you as soon as you are well."

"Look, I don't care what you have going on here. I just want to get back to my people." No one answered him. Haja went back to eating her stew. "If it's Security Services you're worried about, you can just drop me in town. I can contact my people from there. I won't tell them about you."

Haja looked up and this time put her bowl down on the table. "If Security Services ware all we had to worry about I would have contacted them when Roland first brought you here. They would have gladly return you to your people."

"I don't understand." Chakotay said.

She stood up from the table. "You do not understand because you are a visitor. You will stay here until you are well enough to make the journey into the city. You will talk to no one outside this house and you will not contact your people. This is not up for debate."

She gathered her dishes from the table and disappeared into the kitchen.