by David Mack
The lead scientist, Dr. Gorig, took a cautious half step forward. “All data points suggest a previously undetected error in the data we received from our spy inside the Regula I lab.” He glanced over his shoulder at his colleagues, as if to invite them to participate in the briefing, but they only nodded at him to continue. “A key value in the formula must have been wrong, resulting in a massive instability as soon as we brought the Genesis-wave generator online.” In a tone of aggrieved self-righteousness, Gorig added, “This entire disaster could have been averted if only we had been given the time we requested to verify the Terrans’ formulae before we tried to—”
Gorkon leaped from his throne and thrust his d’k tagh into Gorig’s chest before he uttered another word of seditious accusation. Giving the knife a savage twist, Gorkon coaxed out the gray-bearded scientist’s last breath. Then he tore his blade free and let Gorig fall to the floor.
Standing above the corpse and its swiftly spreading pool of magenta blood, Gorkon glared at the other two scientists and said, “I trust I’ve made my point.”
The slain man’s colleagues nodded.
The Regent stepped back onto the dais and took his throne. “I don’t want excuses,” he said to the scientists. “Our planet is dying. Find a solution—while we still have a world worth saving.” He dismissed them with a wave and a growl.
Alakon escorted the two scientists out of the Council chamber. At a nod from Gorkon, Indizar declared the Council adjourned until recalled.
Sitting with his fist pressed against his mouth, Gorkon watched the members of the High Council file out of the room. They muttered bitterly and cast pointed stares in his direction as they departed.
No doubt they’re each picturing themselves on my throne, he mused. Every man wants to wear the crown until he feels its weight on his brow.
Eyeing the dead man at his feet, Gorkon knew the scientist had spoken the truth. Impatient to power his new war machine, Gorkon had rejected calls for caution and denied pleas for more time to test their stolen technology. His hubris had brought the Klingon people to this grim moment in their history.
As surely as I’ve killed this man, I have killed Qo’noS. History will have no alternative but to lay this travesty at my feet and call it mine own.
There was no undoing what had been done. Praxis was gone, shattered into rubble and fire, its radioactive debris propelled by a subspace shockwave that had turned lush Qo’noS into a bleak and barren orb. Deserts sprawled where forests once had grown; oceans that once fed billions were now toxic, watery graveyards.
Gorkon knew there was only one way to prevent this disaster from becoming his epitaph. With whatever strength and time he had left, he needed to write a better end to his reign, one worthy of song.
He needed to become a conqueror.
45
The Architects of War
Marlena walked alone across the frozen gray expanse of the ocean. Thunderous rumbles trembled the ice under her bare feet. Great fissures cracked open the snow-dusted horizon, which churned with dark water like blood erupting from a wound.
As she walked, the glaciated terrain was cleaved beneath her, and jagged shards of ice sliced into her heels. She clutched the bundle in her arms, its cargo more precious than any she had ever held before. Warm against her bosom, safe in her embrace, the fruit of her womb was all that mattered to her now in this desolate, frigid wasteland.
Fire on the horizon. The figure of a man robed in flames. Reddish-gold against the grayish-white emptiness that seemed to have no horizon, surrounded by widening gulfs of black seawater. A silhouette, a gaunt outline of a lanky form, burning bright in the falling gloom, ushering her onward against the bitter wind.
She trudged across bobbing ice floes, her torn feet leaving bloody prints. The man in the flames was her father, François—it had to be. He was waiting for her, waiting to see her son, to reach out and give his blessing to her child. All she had to do was traverse a treacherous sea of broken ice.
A short leap, then a longer one. Deep cracking sounds, like the breaking of a giant’s bones, filled the dreary dusk. The faster Marlena tried to reach her father, the more quickly the ice broke apart, the farther the pieces drifted.
I have to hurry, she knew. Time is running out.
From the back edge of a long strip of ice, she took a running start. Her final step, the push-off, dipped the leading edge of the floe under the inky surface of the sea.
Aloft, airborne, floating weightless on a breeze, Marlena drifted through the air. The ghostly vapors of her breath ringed her like a halo, a maternal blessing of mist. Below her yawned the bottomless ocean, darker than the deepest hours of the night, colder than an unforgiving heart.
Marlena landed like a feather at her father’s feet. She looked up at the pillar of golden fire surrounding him. Trapped inside his incandescent cocoon, her father resembled a dark statue, as unyielding and mysterious as he had always seemed to her during her childhood.
She extended her arms and held out her swaddled son. “Look, Daddy,” she said. “My son. Your grandson.”
Her sire of shadows looked down and spoke with disdain. “I see nothing but broken promises.”
“No!” she protested. “He’s your grandson! Look at him!” She pulled away the outer fold of the blanket, then the next, and the next. With every unfolded corner, she expected to reveal her glory, the heir of Spock, the offspring she had borne into the world … but then the blanket tumbled from her hands, completely undone, fluttering empty to the icy ground.
The wind howled in mourning. Bitter tears ran hotly across her frost-numbed cheeks. She collapsed onto her knees and pawed helplessly at the child’s blanket, at its frayed edges. A low tender cry strained to break free of her chest. Looking up to her father for mercy, forgiveness, and comfort, instead she beheld Spock, frozen and one step removed from real, a sculpture chiseled roughly from ice. She reached out to touch it. It broke apart at the grazing brush of her fingertip, collecting itself into a mound of ash and snow.
Nighttime edged across the sky, swallowing the light, and Marlena was surrounded by the widening ocean, eternal and fathomless. She was alone in the world, with no one to hear her weeping. Hers was not the maudlin sobbing of a madwoman, but a funereal wail made all the more terrible by its clarity.
Stinging cold water bit her hands and knees as the ocean claimed the floe beneath her. There was nowhere to run to, no one to beg for rescue. Marlena fell forward and surrendered to the irresistible pull of the sea. Her arms and legs numbed on contact with the frigid water. As she slipped under the waves, she made no effort to hold her breath. She exhaled, felt heat and life escape in a flourish of bubbles. Pulling the sea into her lungs, tasting death in all its briny coldness, was easier than she had expected.
The scant light from above the water’s surface was deep blue, then blue-black … but only as Marlena felt herself vanishing into the darkness did the last, desperate spark of terror ignite in her soul—lonely, afraid, not ready to let go, not ready to be extinguished … but darkness had no mercy, and its grip choked away her final cries for help. …
A gasp and a shudder, and Marlena was awake in her bed, her heart pounding. Musky sweat coated her face and arms and chest. She stared at the ceiling of her bedroom in the imperial palace. Every undulating pattern of shadow on the walls and ceiling seemed infused with sinister intent. Her breathing was rapid and shallow. You’re hyperventilating, she told herself. Calm down. Force yourself to breathe.
Beside her in the bed, Spock lay on his right side, facing away from her. As she turned her head to make certain she hadn’t disturbed him, he rolled slowly onto his back. He was awake. “Nightmares again?” he asked.
“The same one,” she said, and he nodded. The journey across the ice was a dream that had plagued her intermittently for more than a decade. She had discussed it with Spock after its third repetition, but he had offered no analysis. As much as she had hoped merely sharing it would be enough to
exorcise it from her thoughts, it remained with her, its naked symbolism growing more painful with each passing year.
Spock seemed to sense tonight’s recurrence of the dream had left her more agitated than it had before. “Perhaps you are concerned about the upcoming conference,” he said.
“Of course I am,” she shot back. She had told him she feared someone would try to assassinate him at the interstellar summit two weeks hence. “But I know what this dream is telling me, Spock, and it’s not about Khitomer.”
With a stately economy of movement, Spock sat up in bed and folded his hands on his lap. “I know this topic distresses you,” he said. “For your own sake, I urge you not to pursue it.”
“But you’ve never told me the truth, Spock. Not once. I’ve asked you a hundred times over the years, and you’ve given me a hundred different answers.”
He raised his right eyebrow, which she knew was a prelude to his taking her exaggeration-for-effect and rebutting it with a precise fact that would utterly miss her intended point. “If memory serves,” he said, “we have discussed this subject precisely forty-three times, including tonight. Our most recent previous conversation of this matter was—”
“Damn you, Spock,” Marlena said, verging on tears. “Just tell me the truth—the real truth, not just your latest excuse. Why won’t you have children with me?”
Her entreaty was met with aggrieved silence. Spock would not lie to her, she knew that just as certainly as she knew he loved her—or, at least, that he had loved her once, long ago, before he became Emperor. But though he would never lie to her, he also was supremely talented at saying nothing at all.
Determined to force the truth from him, she pressed him harder. “Is it that you don’t love me anymore? That you’re sterile? Or do you simply have a concubine you prefer instead of me? A Vulcan woman?”
“I assure you,” Spock said, “none of those is true.”
Unable to hold back her tears, she took his arm in her gentle grasp and begged, “Then tell me. Please.”
“The reason is simple,” he said. “I do not want children.”
“But I do,” Marlena pleaded. “I know you don’t need an heir to the throne, but why shouldn’t we get to be parents like everyone else? Why can’t we have a son or a daughter to call our own?” Spock got out of bed and walked toward the balcony. Marlena cast aside the covers and moved to the edge of the bed. She watched him stare out into the night for what seemed like forever. “It’s been more than a year since you’ve touched me,” she said in a timid voice. “I miss you, Spock.”
He turned back to face her. As always, his expression was unreadable, but for once his voice was gentle. “The burdens of rulership weigh on us both,” he said. “It was necessary for me to put matters of state ahead of your happiness.” In slow steps he returned to her. He took her hands and helped her to her feet. “I apologize,” he said, and embraced her. “Never doubt that I love you, Marlena,” he whispered into her ear. “But for us to have children would be a mistake.”
Struggling not to succumb to overpowering sorrow, Marlena clung to Spock’s shoulder and whimpered, “Why?”
“You know why,” he said. “Events are moving quickly. We are less than a year from ending the Empire and creating the Republic. But we must not delude ourselves, Marlena. The future of the Republic will be brutal and short-lived. And when it comes to its premature and violent end, it will claim us along with it. I will not sire children only to see them share our fate.”
The truth was ugly and terrible and indisputable. But still, there had to be a solution, an escape. “What if I went into exile?” she said. “I could leave before anyone knows I’m pregnant, go into hiding—”
“Our enemies would seek you out,” he said. “They will not rest until they have eliminated us. If a scan shows them you have borne children, they will seek out your offspring. They must be convinced we represent the end of our dynasty, or they will lay waste to the worlds of the Republic searching for what has been hidden from them. In so doing, they could potentially destroy all I have labored to set in motion for the future.” He tightened his embrace and ran his fingers through her hair. “I am sorry, Marlena. Duty demands a different path for us. This is how it must be.”
She sobbed against his shoulder, dampening his nightclothes with her tears, mourning for their children who would never be. She knew he was right, and there would be no changing his mind. His decision was final; she would have to live with it. But it would torture her and haunt her until the end of her days, this hunger of her body to bear him children. It was an empty, tragic yearning matched only by her longing for his affection, which she knew would always be held at a remove, veiled behind logic and custom and protocol.
For her love of who Spock was, she had married him; for her love of what he stood for, she would die childless. All the lavish trappings of the imperium were cold comfort as she confronted the chilling finality of her situation: When I’m gone, not one little bit of me will remain. I’ll just be gone.
Spock held her as she wept; he was stoic in his compassion.
When the well of her tears at last ran dry, she looked up through the kaleidoscope of her burning eyes into his serene face. “This is how it must be,” he said.
“I know,” Marlena said. She took his hands in hers. “I accept that I can’t have your children, but promise me that when the end comes, you’ll be with me—that I won’t be alone.”
“I promise I will be with you,” Spock said. “But in the end … everyone is alone.”
The assassin’s armor felt only slightly heavier than it had the day before. The field agent from Starfleet Intelligence had said as much when he’d delivered it, though his assurance had sounded too convenient to be true. Feeling the armor slide into place, however, there was no denying how remarkably lightweight and unobtrusive its trilithium lining was. Less than four kilograms was dispersed throughout the suit of polymer armor: some of it in the shin guards, some of it in the cuirass of the lorica segmentata, some of it in the red-plumed helmet. It felt perfectly balanced and was so evenly distributed that it was hardly noticeable. And when the time came, it would be enough to vaporize the Forum chamber and everyone in it.
But this was not that time.
A barked order from the captain of the guard—“Attention!”—and the members of Spock’s elite guard snapped into formation inside the hangar bay, their plumes aligned, battle rifles shouldered, eyes front. One among many, anonymous in the ranks, the assassin stared ahead, careful not to betray the mission with a wayward glance or a moment of lost focus.
The door slid open, and a procession of diplomats and cabinet officials entered and marched quickly toward the open aft ramp of the personnel transport docked in the bay. Then Empress Marlena walked in. She was followed closely by Emperor Spock, who stopped, turned, and faced his troops. Torov, the captain of the guard, saluted the Emperor. As if acting with one mind, the rank and file of the elite guards saluted in unison a moment later.
Spock returned the gesture, then said to Torov, “Have you secured the landing site?”
“Yes, Majesty,” Torov said. “And the transport has been inspected. We stand ready to depart on your word.”
Spock dropped his voice to speak privately with Torov, but the assassin—and very likely every other Vulcan in the guard detail—heard their conversation clearly. “Armed escorts,” Spock said, “will not be allowed inside the conference center. Furthermore, my agreement with the Klingon Regent and the Romulan Praetor limits each of us to no more than one bodyguard inside the meeting chamber.”
Above the bridge of Torov’s nose, a crease of concern betrayed his profound alarm. “Such measures will put you at risk, Majesty,” he protested, careful to keep his tone steady. “Klingons are highly adept at disguising weapons as parts of their uniforms. If they should move against you—”
“Highly unlikely,” Spock said. “With their homeworld in ruins after the explosion of Praxis, provoking
us to war would not be in their best interest.”
Torov seemed unwilling to concede. “Are the other delegates equally constrained, Majesty? What incentive do the Romulans or the Cardassians have to respect the armistice?”
“The Romulans are recluses,” Spock said. “I suspect they accepted our invitation solely to gather intelligence. As for the Cardassians, they are a fledgling power. They are ill-equipped to challenge us directly.” The Emperor’s answers seemed to mollify Torov somewhat. “We need not commit to a decision now, Torov. Have your platoon accompany me aboard the transport. We shall make our final arrangements when we reach the surface of Khitomer.”
“Yes, Majesty,” Torov said, bowing his head. Spock walked away toward the Starfleet transport ship. With a crisp snap of one boot heel against the other, Torov straightened his back and shouted the platoon of elite imperial guards into motion. “Move out! Single file, double time, hai!”