Turning back to his instrument panel, Hawk grinned. “Looks like it worked. And their cloaking field is down as well.”
“One of the Romulan Empire’s most closely held secrets is now on display for the entire Chiarosan electorate to see.”
“Maybe they’ll petition Ruardh to hold a recall election over it,” Hawk speculated.
Picard shook his head wearily. “First Protector Ruardh has her own difficulties with the Federation at the moment,” he said, recalling the still-unresolved custody battle over Grelun. “And I wouldn’t be surprised if there’s not enough left of that singularity to prove that the Romulans were ever up to any mischief here in the first place.”
Hawk realized that Picard was probably right. “The Tal Shiar would probably see to that,” he said quietly.
The captain shot a stern glance at him, and for a moment Hawk feared that he had said too much. Had Picard begun to wonder how much Zweller had told him about Section 31’s secret agenda in the Geminus Gulf?
Some spy I’d make, Hawk thought, chiding himself.
Whatever the captain’s thoughts, all he said was, “Set a course for the Enterprise, Mr. Hawk. Best possible speed.”
And then, to Hawk’s shock and chagrin, the captain’s expression suddenly went slack, and he fell face forward across the instrument panel.
Koval and his two guards sparkled into existence in the warbird Thrai Kaleh’s principal transporter room. A centurion awaited him there, a youthful but able officer whose name escaped Koval at the moment. It occurred to him that he had been having entirely too many memory lapses of late, and made a mental note to consult his physician about the problem at the first convenient opportunity.
The young centurion was out of breath, and looked nearly panic-stricken. Koval had never had much patience with useless emotional displays. “Out with it. What is wrong?”
“Chairman Koval, the subspace phenomenon . . . the containment facility . . .”
Koval grew uneasy. “Yes?”
“Sir, they are both gone!”
That can’t be, Koval thought, shoving past the centurion and repeating the words in his mind like a mantra until he reached the central control room. The viewscreen there graphically confirmed the centurion’s improbable story. Koval stood in the center of the chamber for the next several minutes, quietly contemplating his next move.
“The Federation vessel is obviously responsible,” Subcenturion V’Hari said from behind one of the weapons consoles. “I respectfully suggest that we attack the Enterprise immediately.”
Such an action struck Koval as perhaps futile and certainly counterproductive. To fight over a secret thing, even a secret vanished thing, was to admit that it had existed—and that it had been a threat to one’s adversaries—in the first place. Another factor to consider was that the Chiarosans would probably soon learn of the singularity-containment facility, as well as the efforts of the Romulan Star Empire to conceal it from them. Who knew how these barbarians might react? The revelation of a hitherto covert Romulan military presence might make the Empire’s newest protectorate almost impossible to control. Unless the Tal Shiar covered things up very carefully.
“No,” Koval told his subordinate. “I have an alternate plan. Please contact First Protector Ruardh immediately.”
Picard’s eyes fluttered open, revealing the muted blues and grays of the Enterprise’s sickbay, which were broken up by the dull orange glow of an overhead sensor cluster. He looked down past his chin and saw that he was lying on his back, his chest covered by a clamshelllike piece of equipment which he recognized as a surgical support structure. A quartet of figures wearing scarlet masks and gowns worked with feverish efficiency over the device, performing intricate maneuvers, manipulating tricorders, fetching, using, then discarding various surgical and diagnostic instruments. Though his vision was distorted by the azure glow of a sterilizing medical forcefield, he quickly recognized the lead surgeon’s flashing green eyes as those of Dr. Beverly Crusher.
“He’s conscious, Dr. Crusher,” said a member of the trauma team. Picard recognized the gruff voice of Dr. Gomp.
“Thank God,” Crusher said quietly.
“No brain damage,” someone else said. “I think we got to him in time.”
“Just in time,” Crusher responded. “Let’s get him stabilized. Then I need to know the extent of the damage to his heart.”
“Done,” said Ogawa, who was staring intently at a medical tricorder. “The heart’s bio-regulator looks to be completely fused, but it seems to be the only component that’s suffered damage. I’m already downloading the replicator specifications for a replacement.” Then she headed for one of the adjacent labs, the Tellarite physician accompanying her.
“Beverly,” Picard said, his voice a parched croak. He was mildly surprised to find that he could speak at all.
“It looks like you beat the singularity after all, Jean-Luc. Despite having ignored your kindly doctor’s advice.” The surgical mask couldn’t conceal her smile.
“How are Hawk and Data?”
“Hawk came through the mission just fine, though I think your injuries scared the hell out of him. Data was . . . shut off somehow. Geordi thinks he entered some sort of protective shutdown mode while linked to the scoutship’s systems. But he also thinks he’ll have him on his feet again in a few hours.”
Picard nodded, relieved; he owed much to the two officers who had braved the singularity’s dangers at his side. With the immediate peril behind him, he felt exhausted, and was sorely tempted to rest. But even though his throat felt as dry as the Chiarosan Dayside, there were still questions he needed to ask.
“The referendum?”
“From what Deanna told me, everything’s over but the shouting down on Chiaros IV. The long and short of it is this: We’d better have our bags packed within the next twenty minutes. Or else.”
Grelun, he thought with an inward groan. The matter of the rebel leader’s asylum plea had yet to be resolved.
“Have Admiral Batanides and Commander Zweller returned to the ship?” Picard said as Nurse Ogawa returned, a small electronic device in her hand.
Crusher shook her head. “No. But I think their shuttle is due back any time now.”
He silently cursed his immobility. He wanted to leap up and run to the shuttlebay, but he knew that this wasn’t an option while his chest cavity was clamped open beneath the sterile surgical field. “I need to see them as soon as they’re aboard. Particularly Commander Zweller.”
“What you need,” Crusher said sternly, “is to sit absolutely still for the next few minutes so I can repair the damage you did to your artificial heart.”
Picard sighed with frustration, then relented. “Fine. But after that—”
“No promises,” she said, interrupting him. It occurred to him that Crusher was probably the only person on the entire ship to whom he allowed that privilege. “After the operation, we’ll see.”
His dry throat made his next words come out in a sandpapery rasp. “Doctor, I’ll be damned if I’m going to let you confine me to sickbay.”
“I don’t negotiate, Jean-Luc,” she said, holding up a hypospray admonishingly. “Why are you in such a hurry, anyway?”
“Beverly, Corey Zweller and I once took a foolish risk by fighting a trio of very hostile Nausicaans. That’s why there’s an artificial heart in my chest today. Forty years later, Zweller is still running foolish risks. Only now, he’s gambling with the lives of his colleagues. Whole sectors of space. An entire civilization. Had the Romulans succeeded in keeping that subspace singularity, his political gamesmanship might even have jeopardized the entire universe.
“But no more. It ends today. And I have to be in the shuttlebay when he arrives so I can tell him that.”
Crusher looked at him for a moment before nodding her assent. “All right, Jean-Luc. I think I can have you good as new—and out of here—in maybe an hour.”
He smiled gratefully. “Thank you, B
ev—”
“If,” she said, once again interrupting and pointing the hypospray at him, “you will promise to swear off taking any more foolish risks yourself for at least a week.”
Picard managed a smile as Crusher gently applied the hypospray to his neck. “Cross my heart,” he whispered, and then slept.
The shuttlecraft Herschel vaulted away from the Chiarosan asteroid. Zweller watched as the battered, rocky worldlet dwindled on the viewscreen. He sincerely hoped never to look upon its meteor-scarred face again.
The cockpit had been devoid of conversation during the minute or so since their departure from the planetoid. In fact, neither Zweller nor Batanides had uttered a word to each other since the meeting with Koval had concluded. Zweller supposed it was because neither of them was overly eager to contact the Enterprise—and to hear from Will Riker that the Romulans had killed their oldest friend.
As she adjusted the small spacecraft’s course for its rendezvous with the Enterprise, the admiral broke the uncomfortable silence. “Was it worth it, Corey?”
The question struck Zweller as a peculiar non sequitur. “What do you mean?”
“I mean that the Romulans have what they wanted: the Geminus Gulf.”
He was willing to concede that to her. Although the referendum votes would still be gathered for about the next five minutes, most of the voting districts had already reported their results. The few that had yet to transmit their tallies couldn’t possibly alter the overall result—which was the official ouster of the Federation from the Chiaros system, and thereby from the entirety of the Geminus Gulf.
“The Romulans have what they said they wanted,” Zweller said. “Who can ask for more?”
“And you have what you came here for: a list of Romulan spies for your dirty little rogue bureau. So, was all the blood that was spilled here worth it?”
He knew she was talking about Johnny as much as Tabor. Anger sparked within him, for both men had been his friends, too. “My ‘dirty little rogue bureau’ has saved the Federation more times than I can count.”
She looked unconvinced. “How about a recent ‘for instance’?”
“All right. Are you familiar with an intelligent, protowarpera carnivore species called the Nizak?”
“It’s a big galaxy,” she said, shaking her head. “Should I have heard of them?”
“I admit, they’re probably obscure, even to most intelligence officers. But you’d remember them if you ever ran into them. Big, scaly, conquest-bent, and mean as all get out.”
“That sounds like a fairly subjective appraisal.”
“You might not think so if any friends of yours had ever been on their dinner menu. Their own history shows the Nizak to be conquerors and predators by nature. Our exosociology branch concluded a long time ago that the Nizak constitute a clear and present danger to over a dozen nearby Federation systems.”
Her brow furrowed. “I thought you said these people were ‘proto-warp-era.’ ”
“They are,” Zweller said, a mischievous smile involuntarily creasing his face. “For the moment. Unfortunately for these fine folk, their most brilliant scientists and engineers can’t seem to keep their prototype warp ships from blowing up on the launch pad.”
She raised her eyebrows incredulously. “Section 31 is monkey-wrenching the Nizak’s warp experiments.Trampling on the Prime Directive.”
“That’s one way of looking at it, I suppose,” he said with a shrug. “But no one else from Starfleet can prove that without making extensive contact . . . and risking committing violations of the Prime Directive themselves.”
A frosty expression clouded the admiral’s features. “You’re saying that Section 31 is in the business of . . . neutralizing entire civilizations?”
“We only do what’s necessary to protect the Federation. No more, and no less.”
“And exactly how far does ‘what’s necessary’ go, Corey?”
“I’m not sure what you mean,” Zweller lied.
Her eyes narrowed. “I mean this: Starfleet has encountered hundreds of intelligent species over the past couple of centuries. I can think of at least a few that haven’t been heard from since shortly after we made first contact with them. Your bureau wouldn’t have anything to do with that, would it?”
He looked away from her penetrating gaze and stared instead at the forward viewer. After a brief pause, he replied, “It’s like I already said, Marta. We do whatever’s necessary to fend off threats to the Federation. No more, and no less.”
When he looked back toward her he saw that she was studying him grimly, her jaw clenching rhythmically. “What’s happened to you, Corey? The Federation has never sanctioned these kinds of actions.”
He’d heard this argument often, and had long since grown weary of hearing it. “Of course it doesn’t, Marta. It won’t. But the Federation exists in a universe that often means it harm. I know it’s no fun facing that fact, but it’s the cold, hard truth. Surely, as an intelligence operative, you understand that.”
“Corey, I understand that without the rule of law, the universe is even more dangerous than any adversary even the most paranoid Section 31 agent could ever imagine.”
She fell silent then, staring hard at him for what seemed like an eternity. Then he saw the anger in her eyes slowly draining away, to be replaced by something else entirely. Was it pity?
The thought rankled him. He glanced away from her under the pretext of monitoring the helm panel. A glance at the chronometer reminded him that he might as well call the Enterprise—and finally learn whatever fate had befallen Johnny’s captured Romulan scoutship.
Batanides evidently had just had the same thought. “Do you think Jean-Luc made it?”
Zweller wanted to say something hopeful, though he truly didn’t feel that way. It wasn’t that he lacked faith in Picard’s abilities; it was simply that he knew very well that when Koval wanted someone dead, that was the way that person usually ended up.
“I suppose there’s only one way to find out,” he said, then touched a control, opening a channel to the Enterprise.
He was surprised and pleased to see Picard’s face appear on the viewscreen. Zweller noted that his old classmate looked haggard and tired. He was dressed in a robe and appeared to be speaking to them from his quarters.
“You’ve looked better, Johnny,” Batanides said, grinning slightly.
Picard smiled weakly in response. “A lingering aftereffect of winning a brawl against a subspace singularity. It’ll pass. How did your mission go?”
Zweller held up the data chip, displaying it triumphantly. “The only downside, in case you haven’t heard already, is that all Federation personnel are now considered personae non grata anywhere in the Geminus Gulf.”
Picard hesitated for a moment before answering. “I’m already well aware of that,” he said finally. “But I don’t think the Romulans have any cause for celebration, either. Without the subspace singularity, they no longer have any rationale for being here.”
As Picard signed off and the craft approached the aft shuttlebay, Zweller smiled. Everything was going to work out well after all—despite the fact that the singularity’s destruction could be as big a loss to the Federation as it was to the Romulans. But with the singularity gone, the Romulans would probably abandon the Geminus Gulf of their own accord soon enough, and Section 31 would be waiting patiently. By that time, the Chiarosan people would surely see the Romulans for the devious manipulators they were, and would welcome the Federation with open, triple-jointed arms. A full investigation of Ruardh’s pogroms would almost certainly result in her ouster, if that result wasn’t imminent already. Peace might come to Chiaros IV at last.
Zweller leaned back in the copilot’s seat, his fingers laced behind his head. Yes, everything was working out very well indeed.
Still, he avoided looking at Batanides for the rest of the flight.
As Batanides and Zweller stepped from the Herschel onto the Enterprise’s main shu
ttlebay, the admiral wasn’t surprised to see Dr. Crusher and Captain Picard—the latter now dressed in a light-duty uniform—already waiting there to greet them. What the admiral did find surprising was the pair of brawny security guards who stepped forward, bracketing Zweller and taking him into custody.
“Thanks for saving me the trouble,” Batanides said to Picard as she confiscated the data chip. Zweller seemed remarkably unconcerned about what was happening.
“If you’re thinking of using the information on that chip against us, you might as well not bother,” Zweller said as one of the guards manacled his wrists and the other scanned him for weapons, finding none. “I’m the only one aboard this ship who knows the encryption key.”
Damn! she thought, gripping the data chip tightly. She knew that the xenocryptography specialists in Starfleet Intelligence could no doubt crack Corey’s encryption key, given enough time. But by then, the data chip’s contents would most likely be useless.
“I’m sorry I’m forced to do this, Corey,” Picard said in staid tones. “But you have deliberately interfered with the internal affairs of a sovereign government. Your actions demand a trial before a general court martial, which you will face after we remand you into the custody of the nearest starbase.”
“You’re assuming, Johnny,” Zweller said, his expression enigmatic, “that we won’t have any unscheduled detours between here and there.”
Batanides was once again struck by Zweller’s unaccountable calm. What was he up to?
As the guards escorted Zweller away, Batanides listened to the sound of their bootheels reverberating across the cavernous shuttlebay. A deep chill slowly ascended the length of her spine as she contemplated Corey’s words, and wondered just how long his rogue spy bureau’s reach really was.
In the meantime, Picard and Dr. Crusher had walked a few paces away, apparently conferring privately about something urgent. The doctor seemed to be greatly concerned about the captain’s health, and indeed, he appeared slightly unsteady on his feet. After a quick exchange of tense whispers, Crusher strode toward the exit and a careworn Picard returned to the admiral’s side, a resolute expression on his face. Batanides couldn’t help but notice that neither of them appeared satisfied with the outcome of their deliberations. She wondered why it was that ships’ doctors always treated their captains as though they were delicate Barkonian glass sculptures.
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