Tucker stared. “Your assistance? Haven’t you already cozied up to the Ware’s creators?”
“As I said, I have information you lack. For instance: There is no way the beings aboard that ship are the Ware’s creators.”
Tucker found himself staring along with everyone else. “What?” he finally mustered.
“Oh, they are the ones distributing it to Vanot and other worlds. I had hoped that by contacting them, I could learn the secrets of the Ware and gain true control, rather than being at the mercy of its procedures and its . . . appetites. But I see now that the Pebru are merely one more set of customers. They aren’t nearly intelligent enough to have created the Ware and have no idea how to reprogram it. I assume they simply managed to institute the planetary seeding program to give it a source of living brains so they themselves would be spared.” He sneered. “Or maybe it simply demanded a better class of brain than they could provide.”
He turned to examine the equipment. “You, on the other hand, are on the right track. If we cooperate, pooling your technology and my experience with the code, we may be able to gain root access and take control of the Ware at last.”
A disbelieving Tucker asked, “Why the hell should we believe you’re on our side when you put Travis back into hell, when you come here with hostages?”
“As for Mister Mayweather, the procedure was quite painless. As for Mister Sangupta and Miss Zeheri . . . Well, why do you suppose I convinced them to let me bring two hostages?” He touched a control on his bracelet, and Zeheri’s collar popped open. “I knew you would require a show of good faith. Miss Zeheri, thank you for your cooperation, and I apologize for the inconvenience.”
Zeheri gingerly dropped the collar to the floor and let Sangupta pull her away toward the others. Rubbing her slim neck, she asked, “What are you up to now, Vabion? You can’t expect us to believe you’re suddenly an altruist, not after it was your idea to put Travis and those Andorians into those machines in the first place.”
“Altruist?” Vabion gave a dry chuckle. “No, Miss Zeheri, my motives are exactly what they’ve always been. I want to understand this technology, to gain control over it rather than being controlled by it. If the Pebru had been able to provide me with that, I would surely still be with them. But instead, you are the ones who offer me the best chance of gaining control. And since you cannot do it without my knowledge and experience, that puts us on an even footing.” He turned to Tucker. “We need each other, Mister Collier. And time is of the essence if you wish to rescue Mayweather and the others. I suggest you think quickly.”
“You know what I’m thinking?” Tucker told him. “That you overestimate yourself. Maybe you’ve spent a lot of time studying these systems, maybe you’re a genius by Vanot standards, but you’re centuries behind us on theory. So don’t make the mistake of thinking we’re on anything like an even keel. Now that you gave up your hostages, you’re all out of advantages.”
“That’s where you’re wrong, Mister Collier. Because I always have a contingency plan. And that means I can offer you the key to accessing the Ware’s root levels. A key I’ve already put into place.”
U.S.S. Pioneer
Pioneer was all but out of the fight. Propulsion and weapons were barely functional and Liao was contending with more than a dozen casualties in sickbay, fortunately none fatal as yet. But Flabbjellah and sh’Lavan were crippled with several fatalities each, Kinaph was barely staying in the fight, Thelasa-vei had lost its portside engines and a quarter of its engineering crew, and the damn drones kept repairing their own shields and weapons. Grimly, Reed gave the order to the other captains: “At all costs, take out the control ship. It must be destroyed completely.”
The two Kumari-class cruisers and Kinaph grouped for the attack on the command ship. Reed ordered Tallarico to join them in the attack and Williams to ready whatever remaining weapons she could muster, “even if it means opening an airlock and throwing spare parts at them.”
But moments later, one of the drone ships strafed them again, and when the smoke and thunder cleared, Pioneer was down for good. “Propulsion is totally dead,” Williams reported. “Only one cannon’s functional and we can’t maneuver to aim it.”
“Even long-range comms are down,” Ensign Grev added. “We’re close enough to talk to the hub complex, but the battle group is already out of range.”
As if Grev’s words had been an invocation, a hail came in from the complex. “Malcolm, it’s Collier,” came Tucker’s voice. His old friend quickly filled him in on the events aboard the hub. “We may have a way into the root command levels. Vabion says that when he plugged Travis into the data core, he modified the interface. He rigged it to give him access. Captain, he set up Travis as his back door into the root command level!”
Reed traded a stunned look with Williams. “Do you believe he’s telling the truth?”
“He’s got a motive I trust, let’s put it that way. But we need time to get it to work. You have to order your ships not to target the command drone.”
“I’m afraid that’s not possible,” Reed told him grimly. “They’re already attacking the command ship, and our long-range comms are down. We can’t tell them to stop. Whatever you’re going to do . . . you’ve got to do it fast.”
24
June 3, 2165
U.S.S. Endeavour
ON THE BRIDGE’S MAIN VIEWER, Admiral Gardner looked as livid as any human Thanien ch’Revash had ever seen. He’d heard the slur “pink-skin” used against humans in the past, finding it rather inaccurate in the majority of cases, but now Gardner was shading past pink and toward bright red. “A Starfleet admiral and captain taken hostage on a founding planet of the Federation! This is an outrage! You’ve got to do everything you can to find these terrorists before they kill Archer and T’Pol!”
On the other side of the split-screen viewer image, First Minister Kuvak spoke with strained patience. “My people are devoting all their resources to the search, Admiral. With all due respect, V’Las’s revolutionaries pose an imminent threat to the lives of far more than two people. The brazenness of this strike suggests that they are prepared to commit far worse violence—perhaps even make good on the rhetoric of armed revolution they have propounded.”
“But I don’t believe Admiral Archer and the captain are in imminent danger of execution, sir,” Thanien said. “Had the intent been to kill them, they could have been struck with another missile. Instead, the purpose of the missile attack seems to have been to lure them into the open so they could be captured.”
“That’s even worse,” Gardner cried. “They could be torturing our people, mind-reading them for Starfleet secrets. Just how far do they plan to take this revolution anyway?”
Lady T’Pau stepped forward to stand alongside Thanien. “Admiral. V’Las’s first preoccupation appears to be Vulcan. As administrator of the High Command, he spent his career pushing the Vulcan people in a more militant direction. Now, he clearly seeks to resume that manipulation, to transform us back into what we were before Surak.”
“That doesn’t rule out the possibility that he’ll target other worlds, First Minister. He’s certainly done it before.”
“That is true.”
“First Minister Kuvak,” Gardner said after a moment, “I’m ready to send a Starfleet task force to help contain this coup. All due respect to you, Commander Thanien, but Endeavour alone doesn’t seem to be enough to handle a problem this large, certainly not with her captain missing and her security chief on the disabled list.”
“That would be most unwise, Admiral,” T’Pau countered. Gardner goggled in shock that such a young woman would chastise him like a recalcitrant grandchild. “V’Las seeks to inflame our people’s pride and resentment of outside imposition. A show of force from Starfleet at this stage would serve to provoke rebellion, not subdue it.”
Gardner answered her through clenc
hed teeth. “Then what do you propose we do, First Minister?”
T’Pau lifted an eyebrow. “Everything we can reasonably do is in the process of being done. The logical option at this point is to await results.”
Frustrated, Gardner clenched a fist in midair, then half-heartedly let it thud against his desk. “Sit and wait, while the galaxy may be falling around us. Thank you for the reminder of why I’m so eager to retire.” He met Thanien’s eyes. “Commander . . . please continue to do everything in your power to bring Jonathan Archer back safely—so that he can put up with this madness from now on instead of me.”
* * *
“Any change . . . Skon?”
Of course, thought Hoshi Sato, taking Takashi Kimura’s remaining hand as she sat beside his bed in sickbay, two partitions over from where the Vulcan professor lay in his healing trance. Even now, his first thoughts are for others. “There’s no change. Phlox says that might be a good sign—but maybe he’s just trying to be reassuring.”
“Phlox . . . tells like it is.” He sounded confident—though not without more complex feelings, for Phlox had been very blunt about the challenges Kimura would face in his recovery. In modern society, with technological assistance and the support of a caring community, Takashi would still be able to lead a rich, full life—but it would not be the life he wanted, and he would not be quite the man he was. He could focus on the here and now well enough, carry on conversations with his usual charm, but the words didn’t come so easily. Sometimes he grew frustrated, and Sato didn’t know whether it was because he struggled to find the words to convey his thoughts or because the thoughts themselves were more muddled. The grasp of strategy and planning that had made him such an effective armory officer, and such a keen poker player, was probably gone forever.
But his regard for others proved he was still the man she loved. “Vulcans . . . good at healing minds,” he said. “Surel . . . proved with me. Skon just . . . need time in his head . . . put house back in order. T’Rama won’t . . . be alone.”
“I hope so,” Sato said. “A boy deserves a father. Vulcans no less than anyone.”
He squeezed her hand. “He’s alive. Could be worse. Could always be worse.” He shrugged. “Why I’m not bitter. Always . . . was always ready . . . make sacrifice for crew. But thought . . . it meant dying.” He chuckled. “See? Could be worse.”
She sniffled. “You don’t have to play strong with me, Takashi. This is going to be hard. For both of us, but especially for you. We have to . . . we have to face that honestly, so we can deal with it.”
“Be fine. I . . . have family. Sapporo . . . take good care. But you . . . here without me.” He frowned. “Is . . . what you want?”
Her eyes widened. “No! I don’t—I mean, the last thing I want is to end it. Certainly not now. But . . . what I do here, it’s . . .”
“Important. I know.” He met her eyes evenly. “Is a way. Be together. Actually easier now . . . not on the same ship.”
“What do you mean?” she asked, hushed.
Kimura smiled. “Marry me.”
The first coherent thought to enter Sato’s mind after a long, stunned moment was, So much for not being able to plan ahead. He’d clearly been thinking this over during his long hours lying here with little else to do. But the proposal overwhelmed her with a flood of questions. Yes, not serving on the same ship would remove the greatest obstacle to marriage, but what about the other obstacles? The distance, the separation—and yes, admittedly, the burdens of caring for Takashi over the years ahead were a daunting prospect. Could she devote so much of herself to another person’s needs, when her life was devoted to Starfleet now? Could she bear to give up Starfleet? Could she commit to raising children when her husband would be almost as dependent upon her? And what if his condition took a turn for the worse? She envisioned T’Rama, mere weeks from giving birth, unsure if her mate would survive to greet their son.
Before she could formulate any kind of reply, she realized that Phlox was shaking her shoulder. “Hoshi! The bridge is calling. You’re needed there on an urgent matter.”
Kimura nodded to her, encouraging her to go. She hoped he couldn’t see how relieved she was to retreat from his bedside.
* * *
The signal from the Kel Province had been fragmentary, but once Thanien had caught a static-filled glimpse of Professor T’Nol speaking with unwonted urgency, he had considered it important to know why she was hailing Endeavour. He had little doubt that she had been associated with V’Las’s radicals all along. But her signal had been rerouted somehow to make it more difficult to detect—and since the Anti-revisionist leader had clearly wanted to contact Endeavour, that suggested she was trying to conceal her transmission from someone else. Possibly even her own allies.
Once Commander Sato took over the communications station, she swiftly cleared up the signal, showing the gaunt professor seated at a console in a sparse room, a closed doorway the only visible feature behind her. “This is Commander Thanien of Endeavour,” the first officer announced. “We read you now, Professor. Please repeat.”
“I believe V’Las has gone mad,” T’Nol said. “The violence he plans is not logical and will harm Vulcan. That is why I tell you this—not for your own benefit, but for Vulcan’s.”
“Yes, understood,” Thanien replied, reining in his impatience. “Can you tell us where Admiral Archer and Captain T’Pol are being held?”
“First you must be aware that your vessel has been sabotaged,” T’Nol told him. Thanien’s antennae pulled back, and he saw shocked reactions among the rest of the bridge crew—immediately giving way to action as they began to run diagnostics and alert their respective departments to stand ready for instructions. “V’Las intends your vessel’s destruction to signal the commencement of an armed takeover of Vulcan, using military vessels and weaponry concealed in secret facilities.”
“Can you describe the nature of the sabotage?”
T’Nol shook her head. “I was not privy to that information. I recommend you evacuate T’Pau and all Vulcan nationals at once and remove your vessel from spacedock.”
Such great compassion for non-Vulcan life, Thanien thought. But his response was more calculated: “Professor, we have no reason to trust your word. As a show of good faith, I suggest you tell us where we can find Archer and T’Pol.”
“Very well, if you insist. They are here, in this facility. We are located in Kel Province, on the—”
Her words broke off into a choking gasp as her rail-thin body convulsed. She fell forward onto the console, a smoking hole in her back. In the now-open doorway stood Commander Zadok, holding a particle weapon. He strode forward angrily and spoke into the pickup. “It is too late for you—and your admiral!” The transmission cut out.
“Hoshi, jam all incoming signals. Don’t let any trigger pulse get through.”
“On it, Commander.”
“It may not be remotely triggered,” Cutler said from the science station. “There may be a timer or a fail-safe.”
“Any sign of an explosive device aboard?”
“Scanning now.”
“Commander,” Sato called. “I’ve backtraced T’Nol’s transmission, using what she told me. They’re in southern Kel Province, near the Burning Lake. That’s a nuclear wasteland with electromagnetic anomalies that block sensors, like Vulcan’s Forge on a smaller scale.”
“Notify Vulcan security,” Thanien ordered. “Mister Curry, prepare a rescue squad. Let’s get the captain and the admiral back.” He only hoped it was not too late to save their minds.
“No anomalous energy readings or excess masses,” Cutler reported. “But a bomb could be masked somehow.”
Thanien struck a control. “Bridge to Engineering. Are you monitoring, Commander?”
* * *
Tobin Dax wished he’d chosen a different time to confront his fear
s. He’d barely taken his first tentative steps into Endeavour’s primary engine room—mercifully not identical to Pioneer’s, for it was larger and located in a vaulted three-story chamber in the Columbia-class vessel’s secondary hull—when the report of sabotage had come down from the bridge. Temporarily frozen in place, he’d ended up backing into the corner near the chief engineer’s workstation on the upper level so he wouldn’t get in the way. So he was able to listen in clearly on Michel Romaine’s conversation with the bridge. “Yes, Mister Thanien,” the stout, middle-aged chief replied in a light French accent. “Engine diagnostics read clean, but I can’t rule out all forms of sabotage. We’ll have to check every system.”
“Simpler to shut down the warp reactor, surely,” Thanien suggested.
Romaine shook his gray-templed head. “Depending on the nature of the sabotage, that could set it off. Interrupting a matter-antimatter reaction is as delicate an operation as maintaining one. If a key step goes wrong—”
“Understood, Michel. What about moving the ship? If we get far enough from spacedock, we could eject the core if necessary.”
“Again, until we know what was sabotaged, even that would be risky. If it’s some gradual, progressive damage, the thrust or a power surge could trigger it to fail sooner.” He blinked. “Sir, the spacedock personnel could tow us into space.”
“One of the spacedock personnel most likely sabotaged our ship. We don’t know who to trust. This is up to us, Commander. Find that sabotage quickly, so you can tell us how to respond to it. Have someone check the security feeds for any unauthorized personnel, anyone from spacedock doing anything suspicious.”
Dax stepped forward, lowering the hand whose nails he’d been chewing on. “Um, I could do that.” He looked at Romaine and the commander on the monitor sheepishly. “I, I want to help if I can.”
“Appreciated, Doctor. Get to it.”
Romaine stepped back and gestured to the console, indicating Dax was free to use it. But he looked at his fellow engineer in sympathy. “You can help a lot more than that, you know.”
Star Trek: Enterprise - 017 - Rise of the Federation: Uncertain Logic Page 30