The Long Mirage

by David R. George III

  “Once you pass through the Anomaly, how do you intend to traverse Federation space?” Odo asked.

  “Peacefully,” Weyoun said.

  “Yes, peacefully,” Rotan’talag agreed, but then he added, “If possible.”

  The last sentiment concerned Odo, not just because of what it could mean in terms of casualties on both sides of the equation, but because it could possibly spell the end of the amazing strides that Rotan’talag and Weyoun and the others had clearly made.

  “I need to speak with Commander Stinson,” Odo said.

  “Of course,” Weyoun said. “Right this way, Founder.”

  As the Vorta led the way to the communications station, Odo wondered just what he would tell Stinson.

  ix

  * * *

  Ro paced alongside the conference table, feeling like a caged animal. Because I am caged, she thought. Federation Security might have put me in a conference room, but it’s not as though I can just leave this ship if I choose to.

  After appearing at the inn where Mayereen Viray stayed, the two Federation Security agents had escorted Ro, Quark, and Morn back to the spaceport, with the Lurian in restraints. Viray had come along as well, though Corvok and Toulet had not taken her into custody. The hike back through the city had taken place in silence, though Ro sensed the normally talkative Morn ready to burst from all he wanted to say; she assumed he didn’t speak for fear of unintentionally incriminating himself.

  Quark, on the other hand, seemed like he might never speak again—at least not to Ro. As tense as their journey from Deep Space 9 to Mericor had been, the barkeep’s sullenness as they tramped through the city felt like something even worse. Ro didn’t know if it had to do with Morn’s arrest, or with discovering that his latinum had not been stolen and would therefore not be returned to him, or even with the dissolution of their romantic relationship. She also didn’t know how she could help to bring him out of his choler.

  When they had reached the spaceport, the Federation Security agents had led them to an auxiliary craft. The small Starfleet vessel, Brinks, took them into orbit, where they rendezvoused with the interceptor Balju. While Toulet ushered Morn to a holding cell, Corvok separated Ro and Quark—perhaps not the worst thing for either one of them—and asked them to wait, pending the confirmation of their identities. Ro guessed that they would also want to know about their relationship with Viray and Morn, not to mention why she and Quark had traveled to Mericor in the first place.

  Eventually, the door to the conference room slid open. Ro stopped pacing as Agent Corvok entered. He held a padd in one hand. “Please forgive the delay, Captain Ro.”

  “You’ve confirmed my identity, then?”

  “We have,” Corvok said. “We’ve also verified Ambassador Quark’s identity.”

  “Then you’ll be taking us back down to the spaceport?” Ro said.

  “Of course,” Corvok said. “But we do have some questions for you, if you wouldn’t mind staying aboard a bit longer.” He gestured toward the conference table. Ro made a show of considering what to do, and then she took a seat. Corvok circled the table and sat down across from her.

  “I’m happy to cooperate,” Ro said, “but I have some questions of my own.”

  “Of course,” Corvok said. Ro had difficulty reading the Vulcan’s response. Did he mean that he would answer her questions, or did he mean simply to confirm that she had questions? “Do I understand correctly that you and Quark are traveling together?”

  “Yes,” Ro said. “We came here directly from Deep Space Nine.”

  “What is the nature of your relationship?”

  Ro could not help but laugh. Off of Corvok’s puzzled expression, she said, “We’ve known each other for ten years. We’re . . . close.”

  Corvok nodded, and Ro thought he was debating whether or not to pursue the matter further. Instead, he asked, “For what purpose did you come to Mericor?”

  “To track down Mayereen Viray,” Ro said. She explained Quark’s hiring her to track down Morn, and how the barkeep had become convinced that she had essentially stolen his latinum.

  “Why did Ambassador Quark hire a private detective to find Mister Morn?” Corvok asked.

  “Strictly as an act of friendship,” Ro said. “Morn spent a great deal of time on the original Deep Space Nine at Quark’s establishment there, and then after the destruction of the station, at his bar on Bajor. But Morn seemed to be depressed, and when he left Bajor without a word sometime after that, Quark was concerned about him.”

  “There was no business arrangement between them that motivated the ambassador to find Mister Morn?” Corvok asked. In truth, Ro didn’t know, but despite her position as a Starfleet officer, she believed that Quark would have told her if she had volunteered to accompany him to Mericor on illegal business.

  “No, they had no business arrangement,” Ro said. “Quark will tell you that he was searching for Morn because he was the best customer he ever had and he wanted him back in the bar, but it was really an issue of friendship. When Quark thought Viray faked her own kidnapping, he decided to come after her to try and recover the funds she took from him under false pretenses.”

  “To be clear,” Corvok said, “Ambassador Quark thought that Agent Toulet and I abducted Miss Viray.”

  “He did say he recognized you at the inn,” Ro said. “He obviously didn’t know you were with Federation Security. But speaking of that, I’m assuming that you didn’t kidnap Viray?”

  “No, we did not abduct Miss Viray,” Corvok said. He glanced down at his padd, activated it, then turned it so that the captain could see it. The display showed Ro’s Starfleet record. “You have sufficient security clearance for me to give you information about our operation, but it is not to be repeated.” Ro said nothing in reply, choosing not to dignify the implication that she might violate her security grade—though, of course, she had done so in the past. “Federation Security has been looking for Mister Morn for some time. Several months ago, we learned that Miss Viray was also searching for him, and so we placed her under surveillance, hoping that she would lead us to him. It is unclear how, but Miss Viray became aware of our efforts and worked to elude us. She did so several times, which required considerable efforts to locate her again. After the last time we found her, on Janus Six, we obtained legal authorization to take her into custody for the purpose of questioning her. We wanted to make sure that she played no part in Mister Morn’s scheme, and once we did so, we requested her assistance in leading us to him. She agreed.”

  That explained to Ro why Corvok and Toulet hadn’t arrested Viray, but it still left a lot of unanswered questions. “You told Morn you were arresting him for the possession of restricted technology,” Ro said. “Did he steal something?”

  “No, not precisely,” Corvok said, which might have been the most equivocal statement Ro had ever heard a Vulcan utter. “We believe that Mister Morn cobbled together, from a number of sources, plans for a device based on the existence of certain classified technology. He then commissioned the construction of the device, and recently took possession of it.”

  “But you just arrested him on Mericor,” Ro said. “Is the technology restricted here as well, or just in the Federation?”

  “That is a legal question to which I am not prepared to respond,” Corvok said.

  “That’s enough of an answer to suggest that Morn hasn’t actually committed a prosecutable crime,” Ro said.

  “The issue will clearly need to be adjudicated,” Corvok said. “The most important part of our operation was the recovery of the illicit device. A scientist we brought with us from Jupiter Station has corroborated the purpose of the object we confiscated from Mister Morn, though she has been unable to confirm if it actually functions as intended.”

  Ro wondered about the nature of the device, but she knew better than to start asking questions about a pi
ece of restricted technology—particularly aboard a Federation Security vessel. “Is there any other information you need from me?” Ro asked.

  “No, though as a matter of procedure, we will attempt to substantiate what both you and Ambassador Quark have told us.”

  “Then we’re free to go?” Ro asked. “You’ll take us back down to Mericor?”

  “I’m afraid we can’t do that just yet,” Corvok said. “Because of the nature of Mister Morn’s illicit device, we have been asked to secure your voluntary cooperation to stay aboard our ship until an agent from another Federation department has arrived to question you.”

  “What?” Ro said. “You want to ‘secure’ our ‘voluntary cooperation’? That sounds like an oxymoronic concept.” Ro pushed away from the conference table and stood up. “What if Quark and I withhold our ‘voluntary cooperation’?”

  “I am asking you not to withhold it,” Corvok said. He looked down at his hands, which he folded together, then back up at Ro. He seemed as emotionally uncomfortable as any Vulcan she had ever seen. “The agent coming to speak with you and Mister Quark is from the Department of Temporal Investigations.”

  Ro sat back down.

  x

  * * *

  “They didn’t kidnap me,” Viray said. “They forcibly broke into my room in Geopolis and arrested me.” She walked across the room to where Quark sat on the edge of the bed, then leaned down until her face was only centimeters away from his. He heard the click of her jaw in its socket as she spoke. “They arrested me.” Quark didn’t want to believe Viray, but he found that he actually did.

  You’re not thinking clearly, he told himself. Too much has happened.

  After he and Laren had been separated aboard Balju, Quark had been taken to a small cabin. While not strictly speaking a holding cell, and while the door had not been locked, where could he go? The interceptor orbited Mericor, meaning that even if Quark somehow managed to get to an unguarded transporter room, he couldn’t beam through either of the spaceport or city domes, and he couldn’t set himself down anywhere else on the surface of the planet without first donning an environmental suit. The chances of him being able to make his way to the vessel’s shuttlebay and commandeering one of the auxiliary craft seemed even less promising.

  So Quark had waited. Agent Toulet had eventually arrived, informing him that Federation Security had confirmed his identity. He asked Quark questions about his visit to Mericor, and then about his business with Viray, and finally about why he had tried so hard to locate Morn. Even though the Rules of Acquisition preached that a good lie is easier to believe than the truth, he hadn’t had enough time to fabricate a convincing falsehood, nor had he had the opportunity to coordinate it with Laren.

  Oh, and also, I didn’t do anything illegal, Quark reminded himself.

  He answered Toulet’s questions as best he could, and then he had tried to ask some of his own, to no avail. He assumed that, as a Starfleet captain, Laren would have been told more about the situation than he had. He resolved to ask her.

  Not that she’s been all that interested in telling me anything lately.

  Quark had waited in the cabin for somebody else to appear and give him more information. He attempted to order some food from the replicator, but not only had it not been programmed for slug steak, toasted tubeworm, or beetle puree, it wouldn’t even give him a simple bowl of tube grubs. He ended up settling for a plate of lokar beans.

  Then the door signal had chimed, and when he’d called for the visitor to come in, Viray had entered. She told him that she wanted to clear up any misconceptions he had about the work she had done for him. She went into detail about her efforts to find Morn, and explained how, one day, the normal precautions she took during the performance of her job had revealed an unknown party surveilling her. She took steps to lose them, only for them to find her again and again.

  When Quark had asked Viray why she hadn’t told him about any of that, she’d said that none of it had concerned him. Even if the people watching her did so because of an interest in her finding Morn, she didn’t feel that should impact whether or not she accomplished the task she had been hired to do. But then, according to Viray, Federation Security arrested her.

  “On what charge?” Quark asked.

  Viray stood back up. “Abetting the possession of restricted technology,” she said.

  “And?” Quark asked. “Did you?”

  “Did I what?” Viray said. “Abet Morn? Of course not. I didn’t know who Morn was until you hired me to locate him.”

  “And you didn’t find him at some point and make some other deal with him?” Quark didn’t think that Viray had done any of that, but his foul mood drove him to lash out at her.

  “No,” Viray said. “I’m a private detective, and I take pride in my work. I agreed to help Federation Security because it made more sense than having them follow me and potentially unravel anything I tried to do. But remember, they wanted the same thing you wanted: to find Morn. So I kept doing what you hired me to do.”

  “What is it Federation Security is after?” Quark asked. He knew that, for the most part, Morn operated his shipping business legally, with only the occasional transport of contraband. He could not imagine the Lurian doing something so serious that Federation Security would track him out of UFP space in order to arrest and extradite him.

  “As best I can tell—and Federation Security doesn’t know I’ve learned this—Morn traveled all over the quadrant visiting various scientists,” Viray said. “Some of them operated on the fringes of the law, while others had been largely discredited. Still, Morn apparently managed to use them to formulate plans for a piece of technology—”

  “A restricted piece,” Quark said. “What was it?”

  “I don’t know,” Viray said. “I haven’t been able to find out, but I do know that Morn hired an engineer on Tendarri Four to build the device. Federation Security arrested him and searched his lab. They couldn’t find his creation, but they did find the plans, which they confiscated. In order to obtain a reduced sentence, the engineer admitted to constructing a single device, and gave up the identity of the person who provided him the plans and paid him to build it.”

  “Morn.”

  “Morn,” Viray said. “I never tried to con you, Quark. In fact, I have done an exceptional job for you. I not only tracked Morn across the Alpha Quadrant—and twice into the Beta Quadrant—I ultimately got him to agree to meet me here on Mericor.”

  “And what would you have done if I hadn’t shown up when I did?” Quark asked.

  “I would have let Federation Security arrest him,” she said, “then I would have told you what detention facility they had taken him to. That was part of my agreement with Corvok and Toulet: I would assist them in finding Morn, but they would tell me where he would be held so that I could complete my contract with you.”

  Quark had to give her credit. Trying to accomplish a tough task made even more difficult by the interference of law enforcement, Viray had still managed to fulfill her contractual obligations. Among other things, that meant that Quark had no recourse to recover any of the funds he had paid her.

  And why should you get any of your latinum back? Quark challenged himself. She gave you what you wanted: Morn. Except that Quark had really wanted his friend back in his bar, planted on a stool, drinking like an Ophiucan five-bellied water lizard, and regaling all and sundry with his jokes, stories, and epic poems.

  And it’s not about him reestablishing his bar tab, Quark admitted to himself. He simply missed Morn.

  xi

  * * *

  The night had grown long. Ro found the hum of Balju’s warp drive almost hypnotic, and as she sat in the interceptor’s conference room for the second time that day, she thought that she could just fold her arms on the table, lay her head down, and fall asleep in no time at all. Ro still wanted more answers about M
orn, and she thought she could get them, perhaps paradoxically, by replying to questions asked of her.

  After her earlier conversation with Agent Corvok, at the end of which he’d told her that the Department of Temporal Investigations would be getting involved, she had been taken to the ship’s mess, where she had been reunited with Quark. Over a meal, the two didn’t talk much, other than for Quark to complain about the quality of the food aboard the ship. Ro tried to tell herself that they didn’t speak much to each other because they both assumed that Federation Security would be listening in on their conversation, but she suspected it had more to do with everything that had happened between them.

  Once she and Quark had finished eating, Corvok had asked them if they’d completed their business on Mericor. Since Quark had been wrong about Mayereen Viray taking his funds under false pretenses, he and Ro had no reason to continue their visit there. Corvok then offered to bring them back to Deep Space 9 aboard Balju, since the Federation Security vessel would be heading there anyway; they would all be met on DS9 by a DTI agent. Ro wanted to say no, not only because she dreaded having to meet with somebody from the Department of Temporal Investigations, but because she wanted a little more time alone with Quark so that she could begin repairing the damage she’d done to their relationship. They wouldn’t resume seeing each other, but she wanted to try to ease the pain she’d caused him. Quark jumped at Corvok’s offer, though, and Ro did not argue.

  Agents Corvok and Toulet had then accompanied Ro and Quark back down to the spaceport aboard Balju’s auxiliary craft. Ro and Quark took Quark’s Quest into orbit, with Corvok joining them aboard the small scoutship. Considering that Federation Security had confirmed their identities and supposedly cleared them of any wrongdoing, it disquieted the captain that Corvok felt the need to travel with them from Mericor back up to the ship. In orbit, they loaded Quark’s Quest into Balju’s shuttlebay, and the interceptor set course for DS9.