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	Harry adjusted the sensors yet again, sighing in frustration, "I've tightened the beam to precisely match the Captain's comm badge signature and I've scanned every centimeter between the First Counselor's Residence to the cave entrance of the Font. Nothing. And the nearer I sweep toward the cave, the less I get on any comm frequency."
	Commander Tuvok replied, "Then I suggest that you widen the beam instead and run a standard sweep for Stephem band emissions. I assume you have already scanned for human biosignatures."
	"Yes, sir. I did that right away. The results were inconclusive. Apparently, the Narati biosignature contains a number of markers that are remarkably similar to human. Isolating one human female from among Narati females is not possible with the calibrations I have available right now. The Doctor is researching the problem and devising a more precise set of markers."
	"You have advised the Commander."
	"After his initial request? No, sir. He said he knew of no problem and he was…well….he..um." Harry looked beseechingly at Tom for help.
	"Tuvok, we've entered what data we have in the night logs. Chakotay was just being…. Chakotay where the Captain is concerned."
	"Indeed." Tuvok, for someone without emotions, could pack an enormous amount of sarcasm in a single word. "Elucidate."
	"You know how he is when she's on shore leave. He hovers around her like a mother bear and gets just as grouchy if she gives him the slip."
	"Need I remind you that even without evidence of a discernible danger, the Captain is out of contact. Commander Chakotay should be advised of even the lack of progress at regular intervals, so that he may take appropriate actions. I will be in the ready room examining the night log. Lt. Paris, you have the con."
	Tom shook his head at the retreating back of the Vulcan. "I should have known better than to try to explain away one mother bear's concerns to the other mother bear. If it were up to those two, Captain Janeway would never get to leave the ship at all."
	"Tom, I can't get a fix on Chakotay either. His comm signal has disappeared too." He gave Tom a bleak look. "And Tom, it gets worse. I'm picking up a whole range of strange emissions issuing from that cave, including this one."
	Tom looked at the data Harry had sent to his monitor, returned Harry's look with his own, hit his comm badge and said, "Commander Tuvok, we have a problem."
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	Jareem, Vasik's aide was in the heart of his own storm. The Residency had felt the shock, as had much of the surrounding area. Communication lines were filled with concerned people demanding to know what happened. Damage reports cascaded in. His staff tried valiantly to keep some order in the chaos, but only added to the din. The Vulcan Commander from the Voyager was on a priority line demanding the immediate location of his officers.
	Jareem answered, "Commander Tuvok, we understand your concerns. We have people missing too."
	He was trying to restore order and implement emergency plans, while mollifying the insistent Voyager Commander when Salaari and Vasik, covered with dirt and scratches, burst into the Prime Counselor's quarters, stumbling over each other and their words trying to describe what they had experienced.
	"Salaari! Vasik! Are you hurt?" He turned toward a technician. "No! Don't close it. Keep the link to Voyager open. They have the right. This affects their people too." He turned back to the exhausted duo. "Can you tell us what happened? Where are the others?"
	Salaari and Vasik accepted the waiting chairs gratefully, assured their friends of their well being and related what they knew. After leaving Nareeb, Chakotay and the Lady Captain at the entrance of the cave, Salaari and Vasik had started walking back to the Residence when they were knocked off their feet by what felt like a vacuum pulling at them. They looked back toward the cave and couldn't believe what they were seeing. The cave and the ground before it rippled, mutating and changing shape before their eyes. Rocks around the entrance became rougher, sharper, as if they had never know a stone mason's hammer. Stones shimmered and sparkled as they shifted in shape. Ripples of ground, vainly trying to accommodate the swiftly changing shape of the mountain, tossed them from side to side.
	Then the two on the ground heard a large whoosh and the vacuum pull reversed and exploding outward, raining rocks and dirt onto them. They rolled off the path and under the bushes, trying to protect themselves from the fall out. When they looked up, the entrance of the tunnel had collapsed. Scrambling to their feet, they ran back toward the cave, looking in vain for any evidence that the three people they'd left behind hadn't entered the cave. There was no sign of any of them. Salaari and Vasik feared all three were trapped inside the cave or buried beneath tons of rubble.
	Tuvok directed Ensign Kim to expand the sensor sweep as they listened to the Naratis' story. Kim shook his head, he was unable to pick up any humanoid signs. He continued to refine his search. The mountain resisted Kim's efforts to penetrate it. Multitudinous emissions surrounded the mountain, but it stood, in the center of the scan, blind, mute and hidden.
	"Jareem, we have been unable to scan the interior of the mountain from orbit. With your permission, we would like to continue our scans closer to the source. May we send a technical team to the cave entrance? You will have whatever what ever assistance we are able to provide to you in this emergency. Our doctor is available to you, as are our medical facilities. Our chief engineer stands ready with a team to aide you in excavating the cave."
	"We welcome your help, Commander. Please have your team join us here. We have found that some of the ores in the mountain interfere with the efficient performance of our machines. Your team will need to be briefed on the geological properties of the region before they proceed."
	"A logical suggestion. We will prepare a report of our scans and report on what we are able to interpret at this point." Tuvok turned to Harry as the Jareem's image faded from the screen, "Prepare an analysis and assemble the relevant staff in the ready room in one hour. Send the data you have assembled to my office."
	"Aye, sir." ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
	The children were the first to spot movement high upon the the Great Water's Beak. When Yitre ran to pull the little ones back from the foaming water's edge, he too saw them. It was he who summoned the others. The People stood in awe at the three beings high above them. They were formed as the people were formed. The female was small and slender and wrapped in a tattered skin unknown to the people, the men were taller, more muscular, manhood uncovered. The female, if it was a female, was hairless, as was one of the men. The other man, standing apart from the intertwined couple, seemed to have hair like the people, though darker in color. The People were uncertain on what to do next. They knew not even what to call the three. The children named the strangers 'the Danoushi', People of the Rainbow, for at that moment, the sun rose above the precipice, catching the mist in it's rays and encircling those high on the Beak with color.
	Zahenan, the eldest child, ran along the shore to get as close as possible to the cataract. Yasay and Nepa, quickly followed, as they always did. There was nothing for Yitra to do but call to the others and follow the children, fearing, that in their enthusiasm, they might fall into the raging torrent themselves.
	The rest of the People stood in stunned fascination, as the trio high upon the cliff, began their descent. The hairless man decended first, the other man lowered the woman into the waiting arms of the first man and then decended himself. The woman seemed unable to find safe footfalls herself and had to be passed from one man to the other until all three decended to the lower Beak. There they could proceed no further.
	So engrossed were the People that no one noticed that Zahenan had run off again, this time back to the drying racks, where he was frantically throwing the fish to the ground. Yitra was again the first to spot the errant child, but even for Zahenan, this seemed an odd reaction. Suddenly, Yitra understood. The child was attempting to unweave the racks so that the ropes could be used to aid the strangers. No one else had even thought to assist. Frantically, the child tore at the racks, calling to the others.
	Yitra ran instead to the nets, "The ropes would be better but it would take too long to dismantle the drying rack and resplice the rope. The nets, if we twist them, will be almost as strong. Go! Get the others."
	Zahenan and the two younger boys ran to alert the rest of the men. As the men worked to prepare the nets, Zahenan scrambled up the escarpment path to 'Stand Forward Rock'. From this outcropping, he could look down on his Danoushi. If he could make them see the way to the Claw, Yitra might be able to reach them with the nets. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~**~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
	Chakotay and Nareeb looked around at the lower ledge in disgust. They had come as far as they could. From this point the rocks beneath them fell away and the rent torn in the waterfall by their rock sealed itself beneath them. They hung suspended on a petramorphic bubble floating in a sea of foam.
	Chakotay stood at the edge, watching the men in the far distance gathering up the nets, "I think they are going to try to help us. Look, they are hauling the nets up the cliff."
	Nareeb sighed in disgust, "How will that help us? Do you see how far we are from either shore? How far do you think these people can throw ropes? No, we should try to climb back up to the top ledge and retrace our path through the cave. We might be able to find a way out. "
	Chakotay disagreed. They had no light, the cave probably wasn't stable, they were already too chilled. At least it was marginally warmer out of the cave. Nareeb countered his arguement. The men were already shouting at each other to be heard over the waterfall, but now, as their disagreement escalated, hand signals and head shakes were added to the increasing volumn.
	Kathryn listened to them argue until their voices melted into the drone of the waterfall. She listened to the waterfall, tilting her head and trying to focus on the little boy running up the cliff. The children and Chakotay were still the only things she could see clearly. Everything else was a blur. She wandered away from the men, feeling for the rocks beneath her feet carefully. One of the children was jumping up and down on overhanging rock on the far shore, pointing and yelling. She could hear nothing he said over the waterfall and he couldn't hear her or she would have ordered him to get down from that rock this instant.
	She took a few hesitant steps. The little boy continued to point to at something toward the back wall of rock where it nestled closest to the cascading water. As she turned she precieved a difference in the roaring sound of the water. She steped toward the sound carefully. She was sure. There was an echo, a hollowness in the roaring of the water from that direction. The little boy seemed beside himself with excitment now. The hollow sound was also more apparent. She took another step. The child on the far shore stilled his jumping and watched her, pointing and gesturing that she should continue. She stepped again, rubbing water off of her face. She was so close to the edge that the mist from the waterfall felt more like a shower, and what little she had been able to see was now a watery blur. Kathryn turned toward the sound, listening carefully. The child on the far shore kept pointing toward the waterfall. It leapt forward like a bridal veil flowing around the face of a bride. The echoing sound issued from behind the water, she was sure of it. Sliding carefully, feeling the slick rock against her feet, Kathryn slowly walked toward the sound.
	Chakotay turned away from Nareeb in disgust. He'd let the man try it alone before he'd allow him to drag Kathryn back up that cliff and into an unstable cave. He turned again to confer with her. She was gone! She'd disappeared from his side. There! He spotted her on the far side of the ledge almost into a plume of the waterfall. Screaming in a panic, he lept toward her, grabbing her and pushing her against the rock wall. "What were you thinking? You can't see the end of your own hand and you just decide to take a stroll? Do you have any idea how close we are to the waterfall?"
	"OW! I was being careful and I'm more likely to come to harm from being beat against these rocks! For your information, while you and Nareeb were having one of your quaint, little conversations, I was following the little boy's directions."
	"What boy?"
	She gestured vaguely toward the cliff, "The little one that was on the overhang on the starboard cliff."
	His gaze followed her pointing arm and his mouth fell open in amazement. "Kathryn. There is a passage behind the waterfall. I can see a light on the other side of this plume." He gestured to Nareeb to join them. Carefully, they slipped through to find a shallow chamber behind the falls. The rocks were slick with mist and a blue algae-like slime. A chaos of boulders tumbled throughout the cavern, the leavings of innumerable rock falls, but it did seem possible to walk behind the falls. They had no idea how close they could approach the far shore but the chamber was quite long and the dim light seemed marginally brighter on the far side.
	They picked their way over the rocks, almost overcome with the noise. The roaring filled them. Even their cells vibrated to the thunder of the water until each felt their hearts had ceased to beat but instead pulsed arhythmically to the cacophony of the water in front of them and the echoes surrounding them. All there senses were assaulted. The pools beneath their feet teamed with eel like creatures. Each time they stepped forward, eels would erupt beneath their feet. There was no where to rest their eyes. Light prismed through the veil of water shattering into thousands upon thousands of weird, disconcerting rainbows dancing over and around them, reflecting off walls, boulders and the swirling mists, as chaotic as the echoes. Wind and mist swirled about them, the mist so heavy that each breath choked them with its water and the wind pushing and pulling at them from every direction. Only the faint, dim light hung relatively steady and calm amidst all the chaos, at the far end of the chamber. They pushed on, climbing and crawling over the slime. After some time the patch of light grew stronger. With relief they saw a break in the waterfall on the far side of the cavern. Chakotay could just make out the blurred figures of the boys jumping and scampering on the cliffs as he peered through the swirling mists. Finally, they climbed out from behind the waters to find themselves on another small ledge jutting like a table over the falls, tantalizingly close, only twenty meters or so from the shore, agonizingly far, too far to jump.
	The two men looked about them. Their little table rock was placed even more precariously than the ledge they'd left. The ceiling of the cavern projected only a few feet over the ledge. From there the ledge jutted forward and above a jumble of rocks that deflected the waterfall behind them. The spray from the crashing water threatened to wash them from their precarious perch. They were less protected from the wind. They were cold. Soon, they would be dangerously cold. They held onto rocks piled up at the edge of their table and watched as the men on the far shore joined the nets into a long rope and tried to throw it in their direction. There was no other way forward and little point in returning the way they had come. Without light they would never be able to find their way back through the cave. If the people on the far shore couldn't help them, they would die of hypothermia before the day ended. Chakotay laughed to himself, comforted by the thought that at least they wouldn't starve to death.
	Again and again the men tossed the net rope. Again and again the toss fell short. The rope would drop into the cataract almost pulling their rescuers into the deadly cascade. One of the men tied a rock onto the edge of the nets and flung it around his head bollo-fashion. Finally, the nets were flung close to the table rock. Chakotay leapt for it, barely catching an edge. The force of the water hitting against the rope pulled Chakotay half off the ledge. Nareeb tackled his legs while Kathryn lodged herself between two rocks and held onto Nareeb. Slowly Nareeb hauled Chakotay further back onto the ledge until the net rope was suspended in air between the men on the cliff and the two on the rock. Each side fastened the makeshift rope to rock outcroppings. Chakotay and Nareeb looked at their fastenings with some trepidation. Everything was covered with a patina of the slippery blue algae and wet with mist. The only rock within reach with a protuberance that they could tie the net under was also sharply jagged. Kathryn had donated her towel claiming that it was so ragged at that point that it would be more efficient at protecting their only means of escape than protecting her modesty. Even so, parts of the net rope would rub against the rock.
	They decided its more logical for Nareeb to try to cross first. He was the lighter of the two men, though much heavier than Kathryn. If the rope held his weight, it would hold Kathryn's. Kathryn privately thought is was far more logical that she, the lightest, try the rope first but she had already come to the conclusion that when those two men were trying to best each other, it was fastest to just pick a side and move them along.
	Nareeb flexed and rubbed his cold, numb hands, trying to warm them up enough to feel the rope. Kathryn gave him a quick hug, Chakotay a nod as he lowered himself over the ledge and grasped the net rope, sliding one hand forward and then the other to meet it. The rope shifted and slipped, but held, creaking with each hand hold. The net was already slick from the water and several times Nareeb almost lost his hold on the rope. After what seemed like hours he make it to the cliff.
	Now it was Kathryn's turn. Chakotay had been rubbing her hands, he grasped them tighter as she turned toward the rope. Smiling, she extracted her hands, laid one gently on his chest. "I believe I'm next."
	"Kathryn,....Kathryn....you can't see. I could carry you over. You could hold onto my neck and..."
	She dropped her hand and took a determined step back, "Chakotay, no one can see in this mist. I appreciate your continued efforts to overprotect me, but I'd hate to trust this rope to hold our combined weights. I'll do the same thing Nareeb did, I'll feel my way across. Now...let me go before I loose feeling in the hands you've so nicely warmed."
	Giving in to her logic, he helped her over the ledge and onto the rope. She started off, hand over hand. He held onto the rope, determined to protect her if it broke. He could see where some of the netting was already giving way. Half way across Kathryn stopped. He held his breath. She started to swing. The rope creaked ominously. Another strand broke. She swung until she caught the rope with her legs as well as hands and crawled, upside down, the rest of the way across the roiling chasm. He started to breathe again, shaking with relief and the cold.
	He checked the rope, hoping that the netting wouldn't be cut through before he could cross. He remembered the monkeys he had seen traveling through the tree tops when his father had taken him to Earth. He visualized their movements, quickly dropped off the ledge, grabbed the rope and swung across in great, leaping hand holds. He could feel the rope shifting and tried to keep his visualizations on the monkeys and off the rope breaking strand by strand. With one last swing, he landed on the cliff, pulled forward into the waiting circle of his benefactors.
	The men surrounded them, talking, gesturing, shouting at each other over the thunderous falls. The children kept touching them, stroking an arm or leg then darting away. The eldest of the trio was boldest. He kept trying to clean off the blue slime that coated their legs with leaves. When he got to Kathryn's upper thigh she decided she could just wear the patina of slime and he could keep his little hands to himself. The child stepped back and gave them a long calculating look before wandering away. Kathryn huddled against Chakotay, as much for warmth as for modesty. They tried to get the people herding them off the cliff to understand that they needed covering of some sort.
	Through all this Nareeb looked completely befuddled, "I can't understand a thing they are saying. The words sound familiar. I keep thinking I should understand them, but I'm just not recognizing anything."
	"Why did you suppose you could speak to them?" asked Kathryn. "We've already surmised that we may not be in our own time. If we haven't traveled in time, it is possible that we are in a different dimension. In either case, I would imagine the language would be far different from modern Narrate. At the moment the only thing I want to communicate to them is our need for covering."
	"That's just it. This whole idea seems preposterous, but if we've gone back in time I should understand these people. I'm my world's leading linguist. A facility for languages is a prerequisite for my position, and my skills border on remarkable. Haven't you ever wondered why we can communicate without your little badges?"
	One of the Narati men took a large bundle of something from the little boy that had been pestering Kathryn earlier. He approached them and offered each one a blanket of some sort of joined pelts. Each gratefully wrapped themselves. Kathryn moaned in relief as she burrowed into the blanket. It smelled of smoke and fish but it was warm. The man that gave them the blankets smiled and urged them to keep moving down the escarpment. Kathryn and Nareeb continued, still absorbed in trying to communicate with the men.
	Nareeb continued, "It only took me days to learn your language once I had a lexicon and oral speech samples for comparison. I am fluent enough in your Standard that you never even noticed that we aren't using comm badges. I should understand this. I've done extensive studies of ancient Narati languages. There are clues here that suggest that of your two preposterous theories, we are more likely to be in a different time, than a different dimension or place. Their clothing, those hide boats below, the nets...all these are consistent with the archeological evidence we've discovered at this place. I recognize the place. Even with the changes, there is only one waterfall of this magnitude on Narat."
	Chakotay left them to their discussion and drifted back, scanning the environment around him. Language wasn't the only way to communicate and this wasn't the only 'first contact' they'd had without the benefit of language. The men clustered around Nareeb and Kathryn. Actually, he noticed, they clustered around Kathryn. While the men where polite, courteous and interested in Nareeb and him, they seemed entranced with Kathryn. They would reach out to touch her head or take her hand. She smiled at all and managed to keep from being mauled to excess.
	As the men tried to gently herd the three of them back from the cliff edge and down the escarpment, two of the little boys darted in and out pulling on the men's arms and pushing at them. The men were too engrossed in the newcomers and brushed the little ones off. Chakotay watched. The children seemed more agitated than excited. They kept trying to hold the men back. The third child, the precocious one, wasn't with them. Chakotay looked around trying to determine what that one was up to. He looked back toward the waterfall and saw with horror that the child was trying to cross to the waterfall on the rope netting. He ran back up the cliff yelling as he did so.
	Kathryn heard his yell over the general din. "Nareeb! Look!" She fought her way free of the crowd and started back to the cliff. The men followed then overtook her as they too finally saw the danger.
	Chakotay had reached the cliff's edge and was trying to urge the child to come back. The rope gave a bit and the child froze, too scared to go forward or back. Praying the rope would hold for just a bit longer, Chakotay lowered himself onto the ledge and carefully worked his way toward the boy. The rope sunk lower and Chakotay felt the snap as a strand gave way under their weights. He wrapped his legs around the boy and tried to urge the child to grab him.
	The child was too frightened to let go. Chakotay carefully slid his hands to touch the child's own. He forced one hand off the rope and placed it against his neck. The child grabbed at his neck with the freed arm and then quickly let go with the other hand and flung it around Chakotay's neck as well. The rope creaked and Chakotay could feel another strand snap. He swung his legs up over the rope as Kathryn had done and worked his way back toward the cliff, the child flat against his chest. Another strand gave.
	They came closer, closer. A hand reached down and hauled the child off his chest. Another reached out for him. As Chakotay dropped his legs from the rope, it snapped completely flinging him against the cliff. His shoulder hit hard against the rocks, then his head. He lost his grip on the rope, fell against rocks below, bounced and fell unconscious to the next ledge. He hung there with his head and arm hanging over the rock and the blood from his head wound falling drop by drop to mingle in the whirlpools of water below.
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  Part Six: Threading the Needle

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