Constellations

by Marco Palmieri

  The Fort Fed compound was dark and moonlit when they strode back to the commander’s sparsely furnished office.

  “Captain,” Wilder said, “we can’t let this go unanswered. I don’t know if they’ve even read the book, but they’re using it on us: Attack the enemy where he’s unprepared…appear where you’re unexpected. Today it was smoke and noise to distract us, next time it could be real ordnance with real shrapnel slicing off real limbs. Picture that street littered with bodies torn apart, including ours. They crossed a line. Whoever’s responsible, we have to go get ’em and destroy ’em.”

  Chekov finally spoke up, in a tentative voice. “Doesn’t Sun Tzu also say, ‘Whoever is first in the field and waits for his enemy will be fresh for the fight’? How do you get the upper hand when you’re already behind?”

  “Boys,” Kwan said, “you can argue Sun Tzu till the cows come home. Sometimes you gotta make your own rules and improvise.”

  Improvise…the word made Chekov wince.

  “Captain, permission to speak freely,” Wilder said, a statement rather than a request.

  “When have you not? Sure, go ahead, Commander.”

  “The gloves come off. This detainee is our only source of intel. This situation warrants use of aggressive, extreme tactics.”

  Chekov stared in disbelief. “You’re talking about…torture?”

  “Grow up, Ensign.” Wilder sneered. “There’s a whole catalog of coercive strategies.”

  Chekov glanced at Kwan and noticed with a flicker of horror that she actually seemed to be considering the idea. “Captain! Torture violates everything Starfleet stands for! It violates Federation law and every civilized code of conduct! And in practical terms, it almost never gets prisoners to give up truthful information!”

  “If they won’t let us take the battle to the enemy out there,” Wilder argued, “then we have to do it here, where we’re in control. How do you know they’re not torturing McCoy right now?”

  “I don’t,” Chekov shot back. “But that’s still no justification—”

  “Morality’s a relative thing when you’re in the trenches.”

  “That’s enough,” Kwan said, her voice barely above a whisper. “Morality should never be a relative thing, Commander. They caught us napping down in that street. If they’d wanted to kill us, they could’ve done it then and there. They took McCoy for a reason, and that makes me believe he’s alive. And we’re gonna find him, without selling out who and what we are. Is that clear, Commander?”

  Wilder hung his head, just a little. “Aye, Captain. Clear.”

  To Chekov’s great relief, extreme interrogation was not an option, after all. Despite the late hour, Kwan decided to get the leader of the planetary council, Prime Minister Obrom, out of bed and demand permission to round up suspected dissidents and sympathizers for questioning, in hopes of shaking out some useful intelligence on who took McCoy and why, and where he was being held. If Wilder had doubts, he kept them to himself for the moment. Kwan left the outpost and drove down to the council chamber in the city.

  Chekov sat alone in the mess hall, picking listlessly at a chicken salad platter and wondering if coffee might not be the best beverage right now, considering how late it was and how jangled his nerves were. On the other hand, since he was too wired to fall asleep anyway, the caffeine might be helpful. Kwan had been gone almost two hours—was that a good sign or a bad one?—and he prayed she’d produce a miracle to end this whole nightmare.

  He kept thinking he should contact the Enterprise, just to report the situation. But he knew what would happen—Kirk would turn the ship around and speed back to Tenkara, because Chekov clearly was unqualified to be entrusted with a trash detail, much less a shuttle mission and the safety of a fellow crew member. Chekov didn’t know if he could bear the disgrace. But maybe that would be best: just admit failure and let others clean up this mess. At least then he would be stripped of all responsibility for what might ultimately happen to McCoy. Not that he really had any responsibility, or authority for that matter. Nobody listened to him, nobody cared what he had to say. Not that he even had anything to contribute, beyond colossal incompetence. As he took an indifferent sip of lukewarm coffee, he knew the taste of shattered dreams.

  A distant howl of what could only be blinding pain jolted him out of his misery. One gruesome scream became a series, and Chekov bolted toward the sounds coming across the courtyard from the next building, from the brig. Not knowing what he’d find, he instinctively grabbed his phaser and confirmed the stun setting. When he reached the cell where the prisoner had been, it was empty. The inhuman shrieks led him to a storage room at the end of the corridor. Two burly young guards stood at the entry, one with dark hair, the other a blond Asian, their backs turned toward what was going on inside. The prisoner Apek hung upside down, wrists and ankles shackled to structural support beams. Wilder held a modified surgical laser tool and he used it to deliver burning shocks to the prisoner’s body. Chekov also saw a barrel filled with water and an unzipped body bag; he didn’t even want to guess how Wilder planned to use those, and he stood momentarily immobilized and speechless.

  “He is violating direct orders from Captain Kwan,” Chekov finally said to the guards. Their sullen expressions and unwillingness to look Chekov directly in the eye made their distress clear, but they said nothing and held their ground.

  “They have their direct orders,” Wilder called. “Nothing they see here leaves here. If they or you report this, I will deny it, and I will see that your Starfleet careers are ruined.”

  Chekov shook his head. “How can you do this? Kwan told you—”

  “Kwan is a great commander. Like the book says, she stands for wisdom, sincerity, benevolence, courage…that’s why she can’t do what I can do. We are going to get McCoy back, but we don’t have the luxury of being delicate.”

  Chekov took a step forward. The guards shifted to block his way. “This is wrong.”

  “I decide what’s right and wrong, Ensign. You can stay, watch, and learn about real life. Or you can get the hell out.”

  With a deep breath, Chekov nodded. “All right. I’ll watch, and learn.”

  The guards edged out of his way and Chekov entered the torture chamber. Then, though he had a feeling he’d probably end up regretting it, he quickly drew his phaser and shot Wilder, who crumpled to the floor. A second later, before Chekov could brace himself, both guards fired their phasers and he collapsed in a heap.

  Chekov woke to find himself on a brig cell cot, locked in by a force field, still feeling the vaguely nauseating aftereffects of getting stunned by phaser fire. The rest of the building was quiet now. Whatever Wilder had intended to do was apparently finished. Beneath the revulsion he still felt toward Wilder, Chekov detected something else—an irritating internal voice nagging him with questions he did not want to answer: Was Wilder justified? Was this the only way to rescue McCoy? If I were in Wilder’s boots, would I be capable of…that?

  He heard approaching footsteps and rolled to a sitting position in time to see a grim Kwan turn off the force field. Without a word, Kwan turned and walked off. Chekov followed her back to her office where Wilder already sat. Even though his head was spinning, Chekov remained standing as Kwan looked from one to the other, then sat at her desk.

  “Where to begin,” she muttered. “My meeting with Minister Obrom was…unsatisfactory. He’s a bureaucrat who excels at finding reasons to avoid action, no matter what the provocation. He rejected my demands. The notion, as he put it, of Starfleet personnel spiriting Tenkarans off to a dungeon, well, that simply would not do. He was more concerned about being perceived as a puppet controlled by an occupation army than he was about the total withdrawal of Federation and Starfleet support if anything happens to McCoy. Or the potential for the overthrow of his non-puppet government, once we’re not here to prop it up.”

  “I told you,” Wilder said.

  “Shut up, Commander,” Kwan snapped. “He did agree
to have the uniquely inefficient Tenkaran police bring in suspects for questioning. As you can imagine, I was not happy about that. Then I come back to find a severely beaten detainee in my brig, courtesy of you, Mr. Wilder, who became a barbarian in my absence. And you, Mr. Chekov, had the good sense to try and stop him…but failed to do so in an effective manner.”

  “When do you get to the part where I succeeded?” Wilder asked.

  Chekov’s eyes widened. Wilder smirked at him. Kwan sighed. “So,” she said, “we do have what we believe to be actionable intel, including a location and tactical data on what kind of resistance we’re likely to face. Ensign, if you’re in command, do you or do you not use this information, no matter how it was obtained, to rescue our missing man.”

  Chekov frowned, but he honestly didn’t know what to say. “There…are…arguments for both, Captain.”

  “In debating class, yes. In the real world, no. We have no idea if this intel is sound or bogus. But we have nothing else to go on, and no way to know if time is running out. So we will mount a covert rescue mission using the information extracted from the detainee. We depart at oh-six-hundred hours.”

  Wilder jumped up. “Thank you, Captain. I’ll get the squad saddled up.”

  “No, you won’t. You’re not going.”

  “But, Captain,” Wilder argued, “I’m the one—”

  “—who violated direct orders and Starfleet regulations,” Kwan said, cutting him off with a disdainful look. Yet, somehow, her voice remained level. “There will be an inquiry later. You’ll wait here for the other shoe to drop. Only five of us know what happened to the detainee—you two, two guards, and me. For now, until I figure out what to do, it’s going to stay that way. Is that clear?”

  Wilder nodded. Chekov squared his shoulders. “Request permission to go with you, Captain.”

  “Denied. I need people I can trust, and neither of you fits the bill. You both stay here.” Kwan shook her head. “And stay out of trouble until we get back.”

  Before dawn, Kwan and thirty combat troops boarded the company’s ungainly armored personnel flyer. Chekov and Wilder watched as it lifted off from the center of the compound, headed for an abandoned mining facility in rugged volcanic mountains. And then they waited, unable even to monitor telemetry or communications, since Kwan wanted absolute signal silence to avoid even the slightest chance that their approach would be detected.

  When the APF returned, limping in for an unsteady landing four hours later, Chekov’s stomach knotted as soon as he saw the scorch marks pocking its hull. The engines powered down and sighed into silence. Chekov glanced over to catch Wilder chewing his lip in a rare moment of anxiety. Then the hatches hissed and opened, but instead of triumphant troops returning from a rescue, bloodied soldiers climbed out bearing stretchers. The company medic, a sturdy, dark-haired woman named D’Abruzzo, jumped down to the ground and shouted for all medical personnel to report to sickbay. No one stopped for explanations, and Chekov saw no sign of McCoy or Kwan.

  Once the wounded had been moved to sickbay, D’Abruzzo caught sight of Chekov and Wilder and came over to them, her face grim and her jaw tight. Chekov tried to squelch that terrible sinking feeling in his gut. “They knew we were coming,” D’Abruzzo said. “They were ready for us. Eight wounded, two dead. Captain Kwan…she died on the way back.”

  Wilder didn’t react. Maybe he couldn’t. “What about McCoy?” Chekov said.

  D’Abruzzo shook her head. “We never got close. If he was there, which I doubt, no way we could’ve gotten to him. Sorry. I’ve got patients to take care of.” Then she headed for sickbay.

  Chekov gave Wilder a contemptuous look. “It looks as if you’re in command now…sir.”

  Still, Wilder said nothing and his face revealed nothing. Chekov shook his head in disgust and turned away. He’d done his medic’s rotation on the Enterprise just last month, so he went to sickbay to see if he could help, and to keep himself busy. He didn’t want to think about what was going to happen here next, with Kwan dead—nor did he want to think about facing Kirk when the Enterprise returned.

  D’Abruzzo turned out to be a skilled and efficient medic; under her direction, the wounded were stabilized and getting necessary treatment swiftly. Fortunately, none of their injuries exceeded the capacities of the outpost’s sickbay. After two hours of nonstop work, D’Abruzzo finally collapsed on a corner cot. Chekov brought her a fresh cup of coffee. She took it with a nod of thanks.

  “What happened out there?” he asked.

  She shrugged. “I don’t know if it was an intentional trap, or they just got lucky. But we were sitting ducks. The intel had to be bogus. Do you know where it came from?”

  Chekov looked away. “Uhh, no, not really.”

  D’Abruzzo brushed her sweat-dampened hair off her forehead and exhaled a long, weary breath. “The captain was wounded, but she kept giving orders. She’s why we got away without more casualties. Man, she was the best. I thought if I could just get her back here…” Her voice trailed off and she tried to swallow the lump in her throat. “Posthumous medals disgust me…as if a ribbon could ever make up for a life. But she damn well better get one.”

  Chekov patted the medic’s shoulder and left sickbay. He found Wilder in the commander’s office, sitting at the desk with a blank expression on his face. His eyes were red. It took him a few seconds, but he finally looked up at Chekov.

  “Whatever you’ve got to say, Ensign, it doesn’t even matter,” Wilder said, his voice as hollow as his stare. “I sold out what we believe, what we’re supposed to stand for…for nothing. Kwan’s dead…because of me. This whole disaster…my fault.”

  Chekov really wanted to unload all his pent-up frustration and hatred at Wilder and blame him for everything. But he hesitated. Wilder looked crushed, defeated, and Chekov had his own ethical standards to uphold—he didn’t want to kick a man who was already down, despicable as that man might be. So all he said was: “It was Kwan’s decision to go, not yours. The commander is ultimately responsible. That was her. Now it’s you. What are you going to do?”

  Wilder took deep breaths, as if trying to resurrect his shattered soul. “I need to make this right. I need a chance to make sure Kwan didn’t die for nothing. I need to keep this going, for her, in her memory, the way she tried to teach me…not my way.”

  A chill ran down Chekov’s spine. “What are you talking about?”

  “What happened in that brig room…it stays there. Kwan said it—only five of us knew. Now it’s four. And I outrank you and the guards. What I said stands. If any of you tell anybody, I will bury you.”

  “You’re crazy,” Chekov whispered. “What makes you think I won’t report everything that really happened?”

  Wilder stood up and loomed over Chekov, toe to toe, jaw muscles twitching and fists clenched at his sides. “There’s no record of what happened, so you have no proof. Whose word are they going to take—a decorated combat commander or a rookie starshipper flyboy?”

  Chekov gulped. More than anything else, he wanted to stand up to Kwan, but he wasn’t sure how, or whether it would do any good. And not for the first time on this mission, he found himself wishing he could be anyplace else in the universe. At this point, he just wished the Enterprise was already here to take him away. He needed some time to weigh his options, so he simply backed away from Wilder and left the office. Let him think he’s won…for now.

  Back outside, Chekov hunched his shoulders and hiked the perimeter of the compound under the afternoon sun. How could so much go so wrong in a day’s time? Four words kept rattling around in his mind: It’s not my fault. And, objectively, it wasn’t. None of it, up until now. But commanders take responsibility for what happens on their watch, and he was the commander of this mission, in name at least. In practical terms, he had no idea what that meant, how much damage these events—largely out of his control—would inflict on his already tarnished reputation. Would he be court-martialed for dereliction of duty? Or would
Starfleet simply send him packing with a general discharge, or worse?

  It’s not my fault. There it was again. How would a court-martial panel assess all this? The attack on the clinic certainly wasn’t something he could have foreseen. McCoy’s abduction? Well, that happened under Kwan’s command. He tried to stop Wilder from torturing the prisoner, even to the point of shooting a senior officer (for good cause). He didn’t make the decision to use questionable intelligence—the unfortunate Captain Kwan did that. None of that was my fault.

  Letting Wilder get away with a cover-up? Now, that would be my fault.

  But who would know? That, after all, was the whole point of a cover-up. But did he want to live the rest of life hiding that kind of secret—that kind of personal failure? There was no other way to describe it. Before Chekov could travel any further down this depressing hypothetical road, he heard shouts coming from the front gate of the compound and he ran toward the commotion. He got there just as Wilder did—and Chekov was nothing short of shocked to see McCoy ambling toward them, escorted by two armed and armored perimeter guards.

  Chekov broke out in a huge grin, surged forward, and wrapped the dusty but uninjured McCoy in a bear hug. “Doctor! I am so glad to see you!”

  “Well, I’m glad to be seen,” McCoy said as he wrapped an arm around Chekov’s shoulder.

  Chekov stepped back for a look. “Are you all right, sir?”

  “I’m a mite parched, but other than that,” McCoy said as he patted his own torso, “I’m in one piece.”

  Wilder stood in their path. “Chekov’s right, Doctor. We’re thrilled to have you back. Do you need our medic to check you out?”

  “No, Commander, I’m fine. Really. A sandwich and a tall, cool drink, I’ll be good as new.”

  Wilder nodded. “Good. Let’s get you what you need, and then let’s debrief you.”