by Peter David
She turned to Soleta. “How is Lieutenant Shimura?”
“Not good. The tricorder readings indicate a subdural hematoma. It is possible that a skilled surgeon might be able to treat this problem with the limited supplies we have available. It is quite impossible for anyone presently on this planet to do so—unless one of the Romulans in that transport is a doctor.”
“Unlikely,” Worf said with a sneer. “And even if one was, I would not trust such a creature to operate on the lieutenant.”
Tobias almost physically recoiled from the bile in Worf’s tone. She knew, of course, that Worf was the only survivor of the massacre on Khitomer by Romulan forces, which claimed his parents’ lives. Her own father had been the chief engineer of the U.S.S. Intrepid, the vessel that rescued him. And she had certainly seen Worf angry in the five-plus years they’d known each other. However, the level of pure hatred he was giving off now was palpable.
“That would be unwise,” Soleta said dryly.
“Let’s just hope the Aldrin heard our distress signal and is heading back,” Tobias said ruefully.
“Even if they are,” Soleta said, “the soonest we can expect them is in twenty-three hours, four minutes, assuming they followed a standard search pattern and received the distress call when the attack began, and then proceeded back to Kalandra Minor at maximum warp.”
Worf asked, “Can you keep Lieutenant Shimura alive until then?”
“It is beyond my means to keep her alive, Worf,” Soleta said with as much incredulity as she was ever likely to display publicly. “I can keep her comfortable indefinitely, until the hematoma becomes serious enough to endanger her life. Then she will die.”
An idea suddenly struck Tobias. “What about the Romulan ship?”
“What about it?” Worf asked.
“If you are inquiring as to whether or not they might have medical equipment that would aid us,” Soleta said, “it is unlikely. Golgaroth-class vessels were not equipped with sickbays or dispensaries—the best we could hope for is a medikit similar to the one we have, and it would only be equipped for Romulans and perhaps Remans and other Romulan subject species. It is unlikely to be of any use for treating a human.”
“And even if it did,” came a voice from the doorway, “it wouldn’t be intact.”
Tobias turned to see Wheeler enter the building, blood staining the part of his uniform over his left shoulder. Behind him, Sookdeo was carrying Balbuena in a firefighter’s carry—Balbuena was covered in burns.
“What happened?” she asked even as Worf went to assist Sookdeo in setting Balbuena down next to Shimura on the far side of the room. Tobias wondered where Pak and Melnyk were.
Wheeler looked like a spring about to uncoil. His teeth were practically clenched as he gave his report. “The Rom ship was completely trashed. There’s nothing in there we can use—not even the comm systems. Unfortunately, its passengers weren’t trashed, and neither were their disruptors.” The deputy chief shook his head and looked away. “They vaporized Melnyk, and Balbuena and I took a couple of glancing hits.”
Balbuena looked like she’d taken considerably more than that, but Tobias said nothing.
“One of them got away, but we captured the other one. Pak’s keeping an eye on him in the brig.”
Soleta walked over to Tobias. “Balbuena has several burns of varying degrees. I can do little for her here. Like Lieutenant Shimura, she needs either a trained physician or the Aldrin’s sickbay—preferably both.” She ran her tricorder over Wheeler. “You, Chief, need a microsuture and a dermal regenerator, and you’ll be fine.”
“I’ll handle it myself,” Wheeler said, teeth still clenched. “Where’s the medikit?”
“That would be illogical,” Soleta said.
“I don’t give a damn about logic right now, Ensign. Those bastards killed several of my people. I can lick my own damn wounds.”
To Tobias’s surprise, Soleta snapped. “Forget logic, then, Chief—that would be incredibly stupid. You have a shoulder wound. You would have to treat it one-handed, which would be awkward at best.”
Quickly, Tobias added, “At least have Sookdeo do it.” She gave the guard in question a quick look, and he quickly grabbed the medikit off the floor and approached Wheeler with it.
“Fine, whatever,” Wheeler muttered. “But we need to get out after that other one. We found half a dozen crates in the wreckage. Most of them were just as trashed as the ship, but they had labels and manifests that were from all over the place. Cardassian, Lissepian, Asfar Qatala, a bunch I didn’t recognize—I’m thinking smugglers.”
“That would explain their presence so far from Romulan space,” Worf said.
“As well as their use of an old, civilian-issue vessel,” Soleta added.
Tobias bit her lower lip. “Mr. Wheeler’s right—we need to find the other one.”
Worf scowled. “If we are to conduct a proper search, we must utilize all remaining personnel.”
Wheeler nodded, shaking off Sookdeo, who was putting the finishing touches on his shoulder. “The ensign’s right. I think it’s safe to say that these guys have been using this planet as a base of operations. Probably got pissed that we horned in on their territory. That means we’re going to need a search party of at least eight—and since there are only nine of us left…”
Again, Tobias bit her lip. Normally, this would be a job for security, but their numbers had been cut in half. She remembered enough of her tactical training at the Academy to know that, in this terrain, four two-person search parties was the most efficient way to search the island.
“All right,” she said. She thought a moment. Three security guards, three engineers—best to double them up. “Chief, you and Mattacks go north. Sookdeo, take chuLor and head west. Have Pak take Schechter east. Worf and I will handle the south. Soleta, you stay here and keep an eye on Balbuena and Lieutenant Shimura.”
“Someone needs to guard the prisoner,” Worf said emphatically. “He cannot be allowed to escape.”
Wheeler said, “Worf’s right.”
“I will guard the prisoner,” Soleta said. “If Shimura or Balbuena’s condition deteriorates, there is quite literally nothing I can do. However, I can guard the prisoner, and also interrogate him.”
Disdainfully, Wheeler asked, “What the hell do you know about interrogation, Ensign?”
“I know that it is best conducted in a dispassionate, logical manner, and that I am the best candidate for such a task.”
“No, those of us with training are best suited.”
Soleta raised an eyebrow. “As I recall, Chief, your exact words a few minutes ago were, ‘I don’t give a damn about logic right now, Ensign. Those bastards killed several of my people.’ Hardly the statement of an objective interrogator.”
Wheeler moved closer to Soleta so that he was staring right down at her. “So what’re you gonna do, tell him he’s stupid and hope he cracks?”
Speaking with a violent fury that Tobias would have sooner expected from Worf, Soleta said, “Chief, remove yourself from my immediate vicinity, or I will show you how painful a Vulcan neck pinch is on someone with an injured shoulder.”
“That’s enough!” Tobias yelled. “Soleta’s right, we need someone to interrogate the prisoner, and I’d rather all three security personnel were involved in the search. Does the brig have a monitoring station?”
It took Wheeler a moment to realize that she had addressed the question to him, busy as he was staring daggers at Soleta. “Yeah—yeah, there’s one.”
“Good. Soleta, keep it trained on this room so you can monitor Shimura and Balbuena.” Tobias stared at Wheeler, whose gaze remained fixed on Soleta. “Is there any particular reason why you’re still standing here, Chief?”
Wheeler shook his head, as if coming out of a trance. “Uh, no, sir.”
“You’ve got your orders. Move it.”
Quickly, Wheeler departed, Sookdeo right on his heels. Well, if that isn’t my command face, i
t was obviously good enough, Tobias thought with satisfaction.
Then she turned to Soleta and Worf and let the command face fall. “You know, I keep waiting for an instructor to walk in and say, ‘Computer, end simulation.’ ”
In a tone as gentle as her words to Wheeler were harsh, Soleta said, “This is why we went through those simulations, Tania.”
“I know.” She exhaled a long breath. “C’mon, let’s do this.”
Soleta felt a pang of shame as she entered the brig. Pak was already there, along with Schechter from engineering. They departed to commence their search for the other Romulan, leaving Soleta alone with the prisoner.
The structure included a small workstation with an old-fashioned viewer protruding upward from the computer console, and three cells framed by forcefield generators. The cells included modest toilet facilities and an uncomfortable-looking bench.
In one of them sat a Romulan.
Soleta’s pang of shame was because she lied to Tobias. Pak’s “they” would insist that Vulcans never lie, of course—but what kind of a pedants would we be if we did not? She did not wish to interrogate the Romulan because she was best qualified for the job, or because logic dictated that she be the one to do so, though those were both true.
No, she wished to interrogate the Romulan because she’d never seen one before.
What she saw in the middle of the three brigs now was a sight she never imagined: a Vulcan with a vicious, nasty smile on his face.
He wasn’t Vulcan, of course, but one could not discern that upon first glance, any more than one could tell a human from a Betazoid on first glance.
Except for that smile. The smile branded him as a Romulan, for Soleta could not believe that even the most undisciplined of Vulcans, one who had utterly discarded the teachings of Surak and the ways of logic, would ever be capable of so contemptible a smile.
“Well well well,” the Romulan said. “A Vulcan. A pretty one, too. And young, based on that single pip on your collar. Pretty young Vulcan—very nice, yes. You’re much prettier than that human bitch I had to teach a lesson to. Yes, that one.”
This last was added as Soleta activated the viewer and programmed it to transmit from the main base, specifically Balbuena and Shimura’s prone forms. She also placed her tricorder on the workstation and set it to record everything that went on in the room. The brig’s security system was doing likewise, but her tricorder was of more recent vintage, and therefore more likely to provide a useful recording.
“She shot at me. I don’t like it when women shoot at me. Women are meant to be subject to men’s whims, after all.”
“If you are endeavoring to get an emotional reaction out of me, you are bound to fail.”
“You think so, do you?” The Romulan laughed at that. It was a vile sound that made Soleta nostalgic for Pak. “I may change your mind about that.”
“Unlikely.”
The Romulan leaned back on the bench, resting the top of his head against the wall. “I assume you’re not here to provide me with entertainment, Ensign—which is a pity, as I suspect you’d be very entertaining—so you may as well get to it. You want to know who I am and what I’m doing here, yes?”
“And why you fired on this outpost.”
Grinning, the Romulan said, “Oh, that’s easy. We fired on you because you were trespassing on our property.”
Soleta raised an eyebrow. “This is a Federation outpost.”
“Correction: an abandoned Federation outpost. You people haven’t come anywhere near this place in a hundred years. So it’s ours by any reasonable interpretation of interstellar salvage law.” He leaned forward. “You know, I must say, I prefer this version of the Starfleet uniform over that maroon atrocity you people wore for so long. This skintight look is much more flattering—especially on you. Admittedly, it doesn’t leave much to the imagination, but I prefer reality to imagination in any case. Now I know exactly what to expect when I have you.”
The Romulan continued to speak in a natural tone of voice, not varying in the slightest when he modulated from his discourse on salvage rights to his positive opinion of Soleta’s physical form. She asked, “Do you truly imagine that you will get that opportunity?”
“V’Ret is still free. We’ve been avoiding Starfleet for sixty years, I can’t see that changing now.”
Soleta allowed herself the tiniest of smiles. “I would say that your vision is limited.”
Again, he laughed. It was no more pleasant the second time. “Oh, very good! And here I was worried!”
“About what?”
“Do you know what we say on Romulus about Vulcans?”
“I am quite sure that I do not.”
Rising from the bench, the Romulan said, “That the sundering of our people from yours came about because we found you so insufferably boring. But you are not in the least bit boring, Ensign.”
Soleta turned to look at the monitor for a moment, then turned back. “You said your comrade’s name was V’Ret. What is yours?”
“Rajari.”
“You provide this information with surprising ease.”
Shrugging, Rajari said, “It’s of little consequence. Besides, I want you to scream my name when you—”
“You are pathetic,” Soleta said suddenly.
Rajari’s eyes widened. “Oho, what’s this? Is that a bit of vitriol I see seeping through the cracks of that Surakian façade?”
Tamping down the anger that built in that inner volcano of hers, Soleta said, “Hardly.”
“Oh, you can’t fool me, Ensign.” He walked right up to the edge of the forcefield, a few wisps of his black-and-gray hair rising and moving toward the field from the static electricity. “There’s a monster lurking in your heart, just like in every Vulcan. You may have spent centuries trying to bury it, but it’s there. You’d be much better off letting it loose.”
Considering that she’d spent a lifetime burying it, Soleta was hardly likely to take that advice. The conversation was, however, providing fascinating insights into the Romulan psyche.
Sadly, that was not her purpose here. “What is your business on this planet?”
“Ah, back to the dull interrogator.” Rajari started to pace the cell. “Such a pity this forcefield is here. The first thing I’d do, of course, is remove that hairpin and let your hair down. You have lovely hair, Ensign. Although, I must say, I like the pin, too—it reminds me of someone.”
Soleta’s eyebrow raised. “An IDIC symbol reminds you of a person?”
“No, the hairpin itself, actually. You see, while I am the first Romulan you’ve ever encountered—and don’t try to deny it, Ensign. Even through your attempt at a cool exterior, I could see the eagerness in your eyes. ‘One of our evil cousins has been captured! I can study him!’ ” He shook his head and continued pacing; given the cell’s small dimensions, he turned around quite a bit. “Vulcans. In any case, while I am your first Romulan, you are hardly my first Vulcan. You’re not even my first Vulcan woman wearing an IDIC pin in her hair. The other one was this magnificent woman on Cor Coroli IX.” Scratching his left ear, he looked pensive for a moment, staring at the side wall as if it would provide insight. “That must have been, oh, twenty, twenty-five years ago now. No, twenty-five—definitely, it was right after we stole that Klingon shuttle. V’Ret was off on some other mission, and I was in a one-person ship that crashed on Cor Coroli. It was a small Vulcan colony, only a few hundred people on it.” He laughed sadistically and resumed his pacing. “There was this scientist who came to my aid after the crash, a gray-eyed beauty named T’Pas. She had a pin in her hair just like yours, with that silly symbol on it. I removed it, of course, along with her clothing. She put up a fight, but it was to no avail. Men are superior to women, after all, and Romulans are superior to Vulcans. Most don’t appreciate how weak Vulcans are, since their strength is greater than most, but strength without passion is no strength at all.” He grinned. “And I had plenty of passion. So did she, eventu
ally.” Turning to look back at Soleta, he finished, “I can assure you, I succeeded in getting an emotional reaction out of her.”
Soleta—who was born to T’Pas of the Cor Coroli IX colony two and a half decades previous—stared into the eyes of the man on the other side of the forcefield.
Eyes that were the same deep black as her own.
T’Pas, as Rajari had already noted, had gray eyes, as had Soleta’s maternal grandmother; her maternal grandfather had green eyes. T’Pas’s husband, Volak, had brown eyes, as had both his own parents. Soleta had never met a relative with such black eyes as her own. She had also never given it much thought, assuming to have inherited them from a relative of whose eye color she was unaware. Having grown up on Cor Coroli, she had met very few members of her family in any event.
A rage beyond anything Soleta had ever felt in her life, even as a child before she had been old enough to know the mental disciplines that all Vulcan children were taught, started to build within her. Reaching deep down within the recesses of her being, Soleta summoned all the years of discipline, of training, of experience in suppressing the emotions that were always far closer to the surface than her teachers seemed to think they should have been, in order to keep her reaction to this news from showing on her person.
Somehow, she managed to simply raise an eyebrow and keep her voice controlled as she said, “Indeed?”
Rajari threw his head back and laughed. “Perfect! Exactly the reaction I expected! I describe the brutal rape of one of your people, and all you can do is that damn thing with your eyebrows. Do they teach that at schools on Vulcan, I wonder?” He sat back down on the bench. “No matter. You obviously aren’t interested in turning this forcefield off, so I have nothing more to say.”
On the contrary. I want very much to turn the forcefield off, so I can beat you until my fists are green with your blood.
“Besides,” he added, now lying down on the bench and closing his eyes (his black eyes, his eyes that he passed on to the daughter he didn’t even realize he had, his daughter who was standing right there in front of him), “V’Ret will likely kill you all off and free me in short order.”