The Escape by Dean Wesley Smith, Kristine Kathryn Rusch Read Free Book Online Page B

closed and body tilted backward as if he had been pushed.
    Once he materialized, he fell back against the clear walls of the transporter.
    Kim appeared a moment after that, his dark eyes wide. He stood in full military posture, looking more like a Starfleet officer than Torres had ever seen him. Then she realized that he had dealt with their imprisonment with the Ocampa the same way; she just hadn't realized that his reserve had military components. Of course, then she had not been thinking, she had been reacting.
    Here she was thinking.
    And wondering why the three of them were such a spectacle. The room's inhabitants stood around the transporter, five deep, staring at Torres, Kim, and Neelix. The stone room was hotter than the communal deserts on Hafir Minor, but that didn't stop the small crowd from wearing three layers of clothing-all black with white trim-collars up to their chins, sleeves that buttoned around their wrists, and leggings that tied below the ankle. Torres had noted a few people wearing these outfits in the great hall, but she had never noticed the shoes before. The shoes were frivolous-they were sandals made 57 of the same clear material as the transporter walls, only the clear material had been treated with a black stain. The bottom of the shoes came to points beneath the toe and the heel, and required a tremendous amount of balance for the wearer to stand upright.
    Those shoes had to add at least six centimeters of height to the wearer-and gave a tremendous advantage to anyone trying to run away from these odd folks, as long as the person running away was wearing sensible shoes.
    Torres made note of the clothing in the second after she materialized. Then she looked beyond the people to the room itself. The room had no doors, although an entire wall seemed to be missing on the far side.
    Computer stations were scattered around tiny pine trees that grew out of the dirt that composed the floor. Only a few chairs existed at all. Torres suddenly felt sympathy for all these workers. They wore those shoes, and spent all day on their feet.
    Toward the open wall the trees changed from pine to a variety that Torres had never seen before.
    The broad leaves and ribbed bark made the trees look tropical. They disappeared into the opening leading somewhere. But since she didn't know where she was, and since these people could anticipate her every move, she couldn't make a run for it yet. Their guard materialized beside her.
    "Thank goodness," Neelix said, the human expression sounding natural on his lips. "I thought for a moment we would be abandoned to the whims of fate." Both Torres and Kim shot him warning glances, which he seemed to ignore. "After all," Neelix said to the small crowd before them, "you good people would never treat guests the way your orange-suited colleague does. He doesn't say hello, which I grant you is not custom in every culture, but it does, in most, signify politeness. He arrests visitors, and he makes up rules as he goes along. I ask you, is that any way to make people feel welcome?" "Neelix," Torres hissed.
    No one else answered him. Their guard stepped out of the transporter as if he hadn't heard Neelix at all. He pushed his way through the crowd-Torres was amazed that no one toppled over on those shoesand then stopped at the open wall.
    "I would advise you to follow me," he said.
    "Where are we going?" Torres asked.
    "To Control," he said.
    "I thought this was Control," Torres said.
    "They don't look mean enough," Neelix whispered. "I don't know," Kim said. "Those shoes-was "Ensign!" Torres said. The last thing she wanted was for Kim to pick up Neelix's bad habits.
    "This is not Control. This is merely a stop along the way," the guard said. "Come along." Torres glanced at her companions, giving them a silent order to follow her, then led the way through the crowd. A few people brushed against her, not too accidentally, she suspected. A few others made eye contact. "Very few people go to