The Dark Veil

by James Swallow

  “I am no engineer, merely an administrator,” said Yasil, “but I know our vessel can maintain a cruising velocity of warp seven. And I believe the field matrix is a hybrid model.”

  “You are a very well-informed administrator,” Helek retorted. “It cannot be denied that your craft is an impressive creation. If Romulus and her sister worlds had a handful of vessels like this one, the Othrys’s mission would be redundant.” She let her eyes track back toward Troi and the other Starfleet officers, and her tone became harsh. “All those threatened by the star-death could be evacuated in weeks, instead of facing an uncertain fate.”

  And there it is, thought the counselor, the bitterness and resentment that marbles everything in her manner, revealing itself in full at last.

  Helek locked eyes with Troi, and she was daring her to say something, the need to find an excuse to attack verbally seething behind that glare. A cloak of darkness fell over the clear windows atop the capsule as they reentered the transit tunnels, and it framed the pale woman like a revenant from some gothic holonovel.

  The commanders of the Titan and the Othrys had picked up on the souring of the mood, and both men rejoined the group. Will gave Deanna a slight nod, affirming what she already knew, that he would back her up whatever was said next.

  For his part, Medaka’s silent warning was telling Helek to back off, but she ignored it. “In a way, we are kindred spirits, Yasil,” said the major. “Romulan and Jazari. Both displaced by events beyond our control, leaving our homes behind for other worlds.” At length, she broke eye contact. “The difference being that your species chose to do this. Ours did not have that option.”

  “We will initiate our departure in eighteen hours, Federation Standard.” Zade offered the information unbidden, perhaps in an attempt to lessen the tension in the cabin. “The great ship will follow a sublight vector from orbit and then enter warp velocity on a heading out of this system, toward Sector 743-D.” He glanced at Will. “Captain Riker, you have been granted permission for the Titan to travel with us on a parallel course for forty-seven hours.”

  “Will that be enough time for you to complete your repairs?” added Yasil.

  “I believe so,” said the captain. “Once decontamination is complete, we can start bringing our people back in stages. Then we can… go our separate ways.”

  “Forgive my interruption,” said Medaka. “That Starfleet designation you used, 743-D. That area is known as a zone rife with plasma storms. You are aware of this, yes?”

  “We are,” said Zade. “But to avoid it would add a great deal of transit time to our voyage.”

  “The Star Empire has very precise charts of that region,” Medaka continued, and both Helek and the centurion gave him hard, censorious stares. It was a well-known fact that the Romulans jealously guarded their astronavigational knowledge; just admitting they had detailed maps of regions near Federation space was akin to blurting out a state secret. “In the interests of continued cooperation,” said the commander, “I will place the warbird Othrys at the disposal of the Jazari Governing Sept, and we will escort you through this area.”

  Yasil and Zade both showed that blank expression again for a moment. “A generous offer, but it is not required—” began the elder, but Medaka held up a hand to stop him.

  “Sir. I know that zone well, and it can be treacherous to those unfamiliar with it. If we allowed your ship and the Titan to pass through it unescorted, we would be putting you in grave danger.” He bowed slightly, and as hard as she pushed, Troi’s empathic senses could not detect any pretense beneath his words. “Please. Choose to let us do this.”

  At length, Yasil gave a nod. “Very well. We will extend the forty-seven-hour vector to include the Othrys as well as the Titan.”

  Medaka gave Deanna’s husband a smile. “I have never flown alongside a Starfleet vessel before. It will be interesting.”

  “I have no doubt,” said Riker.

  SIX

  With Centurion Garn in the pilot’s couch, the shuttle from the Othrys moved like a starfighter, peeling off the deck of the Jazari launch bay in a showy takeoff, speeding away and back toward the warbird.

  Medaka remained the picture of indolent calm, even replicating himself a cup of hot solok tea to sip on the short journey. Helek decided that he was acting this part deliberately, in order to irritate her.

  He was succeeding, but she would never allow him to know it. “For clarity’s sake, Commander,” she began, “will you remind me how many elements of your oath you have ignored?”

  He drank his tea and shrugged. “I’m sure you will put them all in your reports, Major.”

  “There is a difference between creative interpretations of the requirements of military service, and naked disregard for them.” She took the seat opposite and fixed him with a measuring glare. “You revealed secrets to an enemy power and a nonaligned alien species.”

  Medaka snorted. “I told them we have a map, that’s all. I did not give them the key to the praetor’s bedchamber or the command codes for our border stations.” He eyed her. “The Federation knows that our charts of the Star Empire’s borders are exacting in detail, even those of areas that by treaty we should never venture into. They ignore that truth the same way we ignore their listening posts disguised as astronomical observation platforms. The veil over these things is a convenience.” He paused, watching her across the rim of his cup. “You would understand that if you spent more time on starship duty and less skulking in dark corners.”

  Helek ignored the jibe. “What does this gain us?”

  He put down the cup. “We avert a potentially fatal contact between the Jazari, the Titan, and a plasma storm. Is that not enough?”

  “And we do this… what is the Terran phrase, from the goodness of our hearts?” She could barely say the words without a derisive snort.

  Medaka chuckled. “Believe me, Major, nothing will confuse them more than a Romulan displaying selflessness.”

  “That is a poor reward for so much risk.”

  He finished his tea as the shuttle slowed to enter the Othrys’s aft docking bay. “Helek, answer me this in honesty, if you can, when I say to you, what is the right thing to do, how do you reply?”

  “The right thing to do,” she repeated, “is whatever best serves Romulus.”

  “We agree on that, at the very least,” he replied. But she had her doubts.

  They disembarked and Hade-Tah was waiting for them, the genderless Taurhai standing stock-still as it waited for the commander to approach. Medaka led the navigator away, talking to it about the ridiculous offer he had made, and Helek glanced up at Garn.

  The centurion said nothing, giving her a mute nod in return, and trailed after Medaka. There were a handful of officers and crew aboard the Othrys that Helek considered reliable, and Garn was at the top of that list. The ship’s taciturn chief of security was known to the Tal Shiar, graded on the trust index of the secret police force as one who could be expected to follow orders instead of personal loyalties. The rest of them were largely at the malcontent end of the spectrum, some pureblood Romulan sublieutenants who nursed resentments at being passed over for alien recruits from allied races, others who would not dare to disobey and risk losing their positions. She could control enough of them, if the need arose.

  And if there was one among the crew of the warbird over whom Helek had complete mastery, it was the gangly, narrow-shouldered scientist who approached her.

  “Major Helek!” Vadrel gasped her name, his pale eyes darting around the shuttlebay. “I must speak with you, it is urgent!”

  “Must you?” He was her age but he seemed old before his years, a skinny and ill-drawn Romulan male in the oversuit of an auxiliary crewman and the tool yoke of a scientist. “Proceed, then.”

  “Not here.” He leaned in conspiratorially. “Somewhere secure.”

  Helek’s lip curled, and she beckoned him to follow her. “I will humor you,” she told him, “but make sure it is worth m
y time.”

  Vadrel trailed in her footsteps. He understood the need for secrecy, but he had no refinement about it. The scientist had the clumsy tradecraft of a civilian, his only redeeming quality being that he was, in his own field, a genius.

  She led him to a storage compartment and shut them both inside, before pulling a masking module from inside her tunic. The device chimed, and emitted a small zero-surveillance field that would temporarily shield them from the ship’s internal security sensors.

  Satisfied the module was working, she gestured at him. “Out with it.”

  Vadrel drew his hands close and they moved as he spoke, his long fingers making complex shapes in the air. “The embedded scanners concealed in your uniforms,” he began, indicating the black metal baldric across her tunic. “As ordered, I monitored the telemetry from them in real time while you were aboard the Jazari craft.”

  Although the Jazari had specifically requested that no sensor devices, no tricorders and the like, be brought onto the generation ship, Helek had paid no heed to that. While Riker and his people had obeyed like the credulous fools they were, Helek had ensured that she would be able to document every second they were inside the alien vessel.

  On the returning shuttle, she had nursed annoyance over the lack of anything interesting shown on the brief tour, but now Helek wondered if that had been premature. “You found something worthy of notice?”

  “Oh, yes.” Vadrel smirked, and it made his appearance unpleasant, exaggerating the heavy northerner’s brow over his eyes. The scientist had not been born with that face, nor with the name he had now; both were the dubious gifts of the Tal Shiar, given when they had provided him with a new identity.

  Helek would always trust Vadrel’s loyalty, not because he was a patriot, not because he was dependable, but because it was held in place by abject fear. Fear of who he had once been, and what he had done in that former life. Fear of what would happen if that information ever became public knowledge.

  “The tetryon drive system they have, clearly that is of strategic value,” he went on, slipping into the lecturing tone he was wont to adopt. “And I did gather some valuable readings from it when you passed by in the travel capsule—”

  “Come to the point quickly,” she demanded.

  “I was quite alarmed at first,” he told her, hands moving as he framed his reply. “I will need to run a deeper analysis of the data, of course, but it appears the embedded scanners detected the presence of multiple positronic energy matrices on board the Jazari craft! They are carrying some kind of artificially intelligent systems in the core of the ship. Deliberately concealing them, I believe.”

  An icy rush ran through Helek’s body. “Are you sure?”

  “As I say, I need to conduct a deeper analysis—”

  She advanced on him, her eyes flashing. “Make certain,” Helek growled. “Speak of this to no one. Conduct all investigations under most secure conditions. I will not hesitate to destroy you utterly if you disobey me, Vadrel. Do you understand?”

  “Of course.” His birdlike head bobbed on his thin neck. “I am aware of what is at stake.”

  “No,” she said, silencing him with the cold menace of her reply. “You are not.”

  * * *

  “¡Madre!” A small, tousle-haired tornado came rushing into the bubble tent, circling around Troi, waving his hands animatedly at the air. “Las estrellas se mueven!”

  She gave her son a level look, putting aside the padd in front of her. “What have we said about knocking before you enter?”

  Thaddeus Troi-Riker stumbled to a halt and took in the collapsible dwelling. “Tenteu ya,” he replied, switching from Spanish to Korean, and then, mercifully, back to Standard. “It doesn’t have a door to knock on.”

  “You know what I mean, young man. Don’t just barge in, it’s rude.”

  Thad’s shoulders slumped. “Sorry. I just got excited.” Then he was bouncing on the balls of his feet. “The stars are moving, Mom! Come and see! Eínai apístefto!”

  “Is that Greek?” Troi sighed and surrendered to the reality that she wasn’t going to get any more work done while her son was so animated, and she let him lead her outside. Thad’s ability for parsing and storing away different dialects never ceased to amaze her. It did sometimes make things confusing, though, when his enthusiasm got the better of him and he started to babble.

  He keeps this up, she thought, Will and I will need a universal translator to talk to him.

  “Look look look!” Thad scrambled up on top of a packing crate and pointed toward the clear dome high above them. Through it, just as the boy had promised, the starscape was slowly drifting past, gradually picking up speed as the Jazari generation ship accelerated through space.

  Troi experienced a moment of giddiness, and she wasn’t the only one. Several of the other evacuees from the Titan had come out of their tents and temporary accommodations to watch the departure, and she heard nervous laughter from more than a few. If one lowered their eyes to the artificial horizon of the Ochre Dome, it would have been easy to believe they were on the surface of a planet, and Troi’s subconscious clearly did so. But glancing upward made the truth apparent. The pocket ecosphere was just a small sliver of life clinging to the hull of a giant starship as it ventured out into the darkness.

  The misty orb of the planet around which the Jazari’s former homeworld orbited passed across the “sky,” and Thad gave a low whistle of appreciation. “Wow. See how big that is!”

  “That is why it is known as a gas giant,” said a precise voice. Doctor Talov approached from the direction of the infirmary tent.

  “Does it smell stinky?” said the boy, in all seriousness.

  Talov pursed his lips. “I am… unaware. I believe the odor would be redolent of certain organic hydrocarbon chains and—”

  “You don’t have children, do you?” interrupted Troi.

  “I have yet to sire any progeny,” admitted the Vulcan.

  “I can tell.” She switched subjects. “How are your patients?”

  “Improving,” he noted, and gestured at their surroundings. “I believe this environment is providing a positive influence on their well-being.” Talov paused, searching for the right words. “It is… not unpleasant.”

  “I agree.” Troi studied the low, leafy trees that surrounded the encampment’s clearing, and the rocky ridges extending away toward the dome’s perimeter. Even if the enclosure was an artificially engineered creation, it felt enough like the real thing. After days of being cooped up in cramped conditions aboard a damaged starship, this place was heavenly.

  “I really, really like it here,” announced Thad. “I think we should stay.”

  “We’re just visiting,” Troi reminded him.

  “But we could build a house.” Her son pointed out past the trees. “I even found a cool place. Near a stream, where we could swim!”

  “Thaddeus,” said Talov. “You and the other younglings should not venture too far from the camp perimeter without adult supervision. Has your mother not made this clear to you?”

  “Lots of times,” said Thad, rolling his eyes. “It’s okay, though. I’m careful.”

  “That is a matter of perspective,” noted Talov. “I have already had to prescribe anti-allergens to some of your school friends after exposure to alien plant life, as well as medication for the disagreeable effects on the digestive tract from eating too much of the local fruit.”

  “Listen to the doctor,” said Troi. “We’re guests here, remember? So don’t go poking around where you shouldn’t. Or eating strange things.”

  “I thought Starfleet were explorers,” Thad said moodily. “I’m just exploring.” He looked down at his mother. “Why can’t we live here? We could ask the Jazari if it was okay. It would be a nice place to call home. And if they did let us, I’m sure I could learn their language and—”

  “Titan to Commander Troi.” Will’s voice issued out of Deanna’s combadge, and saved her from having
to shoot down her son’s big ideas. “How are things over there?”

  “We are in good spirits,” she replied. “Doctor Talov has just informed me that our injured crew are healing well.”

  “That’s great to hear. I’m recommending you remain there until we pass through the storm zone. You may as well make the most of it.”

  “Hi, Daddy!” Hearing his father, Thad called out and waved, pointing back toward the dome. “I can see you!” Troi glanced back up and saw light glitter off a metallic white shape out in the darkness as starlight reflected off the hull of the Titan.

  “Hey, Thad!” Will had a smile in his voice. “Are you getting into mischief?”

  “No!” The boy’s fib was so unequivocal that Troi and Talov both raised an identical, quizzical eyebrow. “I’ve been doing lots of exploration,” he declared.

  “I don’t doubt it.” Her husband knew full well what that meant. “Well, listen to your mom and make sure you pay attention to everything. I want a full report when I see you next, okay?”

  “Okay, Captain Dad.” Thad slipped off the crate, catching sight of some of the other children. He dashed off, leaving the adults to their conversation.

  “Sir, if I may?” Talov spoke up. “What is the status of the ship’s sickbay?”

  “McCreedy’s people are going deck by deck,” he noted. “Sickbay is top of the list for full decontamination, right after main engineering. Our repairs are on schedule.”

  Something else out beyond the glassy roof of the dome glittered in the glow of distant suns, and Troi caught sight of the Othrys. The Romulan ship moved with the Titan, both of them cruising alongside the Jazari vessel in a companionable formation.

  “How about our colleagues from across the Neutral Zone?”