Making Do

Rampart circled the transporter room, checking it for weaknesses.  There had to be a way out of here.  He stopped at a seam-line in the wall-plating, felt it with his fingertips.  As a test, he wrapped knuckles on the wall.  Solid.  If he had the tools, or use of his nanites, he'd dismantle it, though it might take hours – and with no idea of what waited on the other side.

"I am wearing comtacts," Stasia said.

Rampart started.  She was wearing comtacts?  Then, deflated, as she continued: "But I haven't been receiving any input on them for a day or so," he realized it didn't matter, if whatever was disrupting their subspace links remained in effect... which, apparently, was the case, or they wouldn't be stuck here.  And it wasn't exactly like she could loan them out, if they would have done much good – comtacts were nanobonded to the wearer's eyes, so that they couldn't fall out or be removed.

Returning to the operator's console – a console, but no operator – he licked the inside of his teeth and made a face while Stasia spoke.  About to ask if she brought an extra toothbrush – his own, which he had hand-crafted, sat in his hut back in the village, wherever it was – he stopped as she told him about his wife.

Rampart looked at her over the console.

"Rahnie's missing?"  He digested this news in a moment of silence, face gaunt in its gray-haired frame.

Wasting no more time, Rampart dropped below the console.  The earring, made for him by one of the village people, dangled in his mane of hair, almost as thick as he remembered Vor'ana's being.  He touched it, removed it, and examined the pirated shapes of components mixed with woodcarvings.  The villagers were scavengers when it came to abandoned technology – they, who abandoned technology.  He'd never really understood it.  Understood it, and didn't.

Breaking the jewelry down into its components, some of which would be useful as tools – Stasia didn't say she brought any, and he hadn't asked, but assumed he didn't have to, so assumed she didn't – he used one to pop a panel.  Instead of fiddling with the controls up top, which had proven useless, he started fiddling with the innards.

"Huh," he said, trying to remember how to wire these things.  "I was on a Cardassian ship in the war.  Swore I'd never be doing this again."  Power flowed into the console, from somewhere.  It had occurred to him that they might be able to use that.  Beside him on the floor, he placed Stasia's transponder within reach.  "Maybe I can modulate it to send a signal."

A conductor sparked, burning his fingers.

"Ow!"  He yanked his hand, and licked his finger.  "Damn Cardassian tech..."  Over his shoulder, he threw a glance at the Bartokian, sitting against the wall.  "You want to help me?"

She got up, and did.  Rampart rotated beneath the open panel to allow her room.

While they worked, they talked.  Rampart tried not to think about the situation, the odd course of events which brought them to this.  Someone wanted him out of the way?  Who?  Why?  "And you don't have a clue who that might be?"

Stasia responded in the negative.  "Some leads, but nothing definite."  She related what Midak had revealed to her, via complant – before losing contact with her Cardassian crewmate, stationed back at the planetary dataplex – regarding the runabout's origins.  It should not have existed at the time that it did.  The most sensible explanation was that someone in the future had instructed someone in the past on how to build it.  Then, whoever that was, flew it to Cardassia for some reason, where in 2374 they tried to bury it in the jungle of the Pleknareth.

None of it made the least bit of sense to Rampart.  He couldn't wrap his head around it, so he wouldn't even try.  He just knew they couldn't sit here.  Someone else might be sitting, somewhere else – and nothing more – and he didn't see how that was helping.  They had to help themselves, to escape.

After a while, they slid out and sat up.