Star Trek - DS9 Relaunch 04 - Gateways - 4 of 7 - Demons Of Air And Darkness

by Keith R. A. DeCandido

  So after that, he made sure that all the information he gathered was all in one unimpeachable source. He had spent all the money he had and more on a special padd that was genetically coded so that it could not be used by anyone but him. The information on that padd was sacrosanct, and could only be traceable to him. He upgraded the padd every chance he got, making sure that its security was the best that money could

  buy. And, with the information he gathered on it used to his own ends, the amount of money hi question soon became considerable.

  Still, no security was perfect, and Malic had been careful to guard the padd with his life. He'd never let it out of sight in the near-century that he'd owned it except when the upgrades were performed. Besides a record of all his transactions and business arrange­ments, the padd contained dirt on several other promi­nent syndicate members, half a dozen officials from virtually every major Alpha Quadrant government, most of the people Malic had done business with over the years, and Malic himself.

  So to not feel it in his pocket now ...

  While quickly checking his three other pockets, he whirled and bellowed, "Loga! Turn on the tracer for my padd, now!"

  Loga nodded and operated his console. Then his face went almost yellow. "Uh—you're not going to like this."

  Clenching his fists hard enough that he could hear his rings scraping against each other, Malic said, "Where is it?"

  Turning to Malic, Loga said, "You're really not going to like this."

  "I like your procrastinating even less," Malic said in a low, menacing tone.

  "It's on the Bajoran ship."

  Several thoughts went through Malic's head at once, from disbelief to outrage to anger. That damn dabo girl, whoever she truly is. She had knocked the wind out of him when she tackled him, and had ap­parently managed to make off with his padd. If she is

  Starfleet—or if she turns it over to Starfleet—it will be the end of me.

  Looking at the communications console, Malic said, "Vincam, add this to the message regarding the penalty for any harm coming to Treir: the pilot re­sponsible for disabling the Bajoran ship and bringing its contents directly to me will be rewarded with a hundred bricks of gold-pressed latinum."

  Vincam's eyes went wide, and it took him a mo­ment to recover his wits enough to send the message.

  Malic then left the bridge, ordering the turbolift to the conference room. Initially, he had been concerned with how to conclude these negotiations in light of Quark's sabotage. However, the Ferengi, damn his ears, had actually negotiated a good deal for them. True, the actual process had taken longer than neces­sary—and Malic had his suspicions as to how that was accomplished—but the deal itself was a solid one.

  This new wrinkle about the gateways, however, gave Malic a concern regarding the Iconians them­selves. From the first time they approached him two weeks previous, Malic had never gotten the feeling that they were as—well, old as they said they were. Admittedly, one could hardly judge what a member of an ancient civilization would truly act like—Malic hadn't met all that many, after all—but something about these Iconians felt wrong.

  Let's see how they react to this latest news.

  He arrived at the conference room to see Werd and Snikwah standing on either side of the doorway, Klingon disruptors in their hands, though lowered. That was on Malic's instruction—he was taking no chances. The head Iconian, Kam, and his aide Pal,

  were standing in the same spot in the back of the room where they had been when Malic left. The Fer­engi Gaila was currently at the buffet table, stuffing tube grubs into his mouth.

  "Would you care to explain," Malic asked the room in general—he didn't care if it was Gaila or the Iconi­ans who answered, as long as someone did, "why the gateways have all gone offline?"

  The Iconians's facial expressions were as bland as ever, but Gaila's eyes went wide. "What?" he said through a mouthful of grabs.

  Kam spoke up quickly. "It is nothing to be con­cerned over. We wish to conclude these negotiations."

  "These negotiations will not be concluded until I have a satisfactory answer as to why the gateways are all dead."

  Smiling a small smile, Kam said, "We said from the beginning that we would not reveal all the secrets of the gateways to you unless and until you consum­mated the deal."

  "And I'm telling you now that no deal will be con­summated until you explain to me why a relative of your negotiator has sabotaged your product."

  Gaila, who had by this time swallowed the tube grubs, actually smiled at that. "If you're referring to young Lieutenant Nog—why would you assume that our family relation is meaningful?"

  "For the same reason you assumed that his relation­ship to Quark was meaningful. You proposed that as sufficient reason to discredit him as my negotiator—I am starting to wonder if it is equally sufficient to dis­credit you."

  "Malic." It was 'Vincam's voice.

  "Excuse me a moment," Malic said. "I must speak with my bridge. In the meantime, see if you can con­coct a compelling reason for me not to have all three of you shot."

  With a nod to his bodyguards, Malic moved toward the exit. As the doors parted, the two large Orions raised their weapons, and Malic could hear Gaila gulp.

  Malic went to an intercom. "What is it, Vincam?"

  "The gateways just came back online. They were only down for about ten minutes. As far as Logo can tell, they just seemed to reboot."

  "Very well."

  "There's more. We've been monitoring the Iconian ship. They've been doing the exact same thing we've been doing—examining it with sensors. And they've been in constant contact with the two in the confer­ence room."

  "That's to be expected."

  "Yes," Vincam said, and Malic could hear the pride in the younger man's voice, "but we finally were able to break their code."

  For the first time in several days, Malic smiled.

  "Kam, the gateways are back online."

  "Good work."

  "It wasn't my work! I think they just rebooted and came back online."

  "We'll take what we can get. The Orion is suspi­cious of us. We have to inform him that this was our intention all along."

  "How you coming along with that code, Ychell?" Ro asked the question as she maneuvered the

  fighter through the asteroid belt. Already a skilled pilot, she had learned every trick in the book for evad­ing capture during her time with the Maquis—and, in fact, had taught them a few tricks before the Jem'Hadar all but wiped them out.

  Memories of a raid on a Cardassian supply depot came unbidden to Ro—piloting that ancient crate that was called the Zelbinion for reasons no one in her cell could adequately explain. They had been chased into an asteroid belt then, too, the depot's guard ships fly­ing around in a standard search pattern while Ro kept the Zelbinion out of their sensor field.

  That in turn led to another memory, of piloting an­other ship—one that didn't even have a name— through a field of antimatter mines laid by the Jem'Hadar en route to Osborne's World. They lost a lot of good people on that mission. In fact, if it hadn't been for Jalik's sacrifice, they all would have died...

  Ychell suddenly spoke, forcing her to put those bad memories aside. "I don't think I can do it, Lieu­tenant," she said.

  "You need a code broken?"

  Ro looked back briefly to see mat Quark had moved to stand between the pilot and copilot seats, then turned back to her console as she said, "Quark, get back in the rear."

  "I need something to do, Laren. Besides, I'm an ex­pert codebreaker."

  Ychell made a dismissive noise. "Expert? I spent most of my time in the resistance cracking Cardassian codes."

  Quark waved a hand dismissively. "Any idiot can crack Cardassian codes."

  Before Ychell could respond, Ro said, "Sergeant, let him have a shot at it. We've got nothing to lose, and I'd really like to know what's in all the com traf­fic we're picking up."

  Glowering at Ro, Ychell said, "Fine. I'm tra
nsfer­ring access to the com systems to the aft panel." With a sneer at Quark, she said, "Have a party, Ferengi."

  Quark gave her an equally mocking smile back and went back to the aft compartment.

  "Why do you allow him such familiarity? Hell, why do you let him stay in business? He worked for the Car­dassians—and for the Dominion when they took over."

  "You should know better, Ychell. He was part of the resistance movement that kicked the Dominion off the station," Ro said as she maneuvered around one particularly large asteroid. Sensors said it had a high enough magnetic content that it should confuse the hell out of the Orions. "And his bar serves an impor­tant social function."

  "If you say so. I never went much for the type of socializing that goes on in those establishments." She checked her console. "I'm picking up two Orion pur­suit ships nearby—the others are still outside the as­teroid belt."

  Ro studied the sensor readings. "Well, if they've found us, they're hiding it well. That's a pretty stan­dard search pattern. We ought to be okay here for a few more minutes at least."

  "I broke the code!" came a triumphant voice from the rear of the fighter.

  Ychell whirled around. "What!? That's not possible!"

  "Let me rephrase," Quark said as he bounded tri­umphantly back to the fore. "I broke one of the codes.

  That's why you were having trouble, Sergeant, there were two different codes there—the Orions' and the Iconians'."

  "Which one did you break, the Orions'?"

  "No," Quark said, to Ro's surprise, "the Iconians'. You should be getting a translation of the last five min­utes' worth of com traffic on your panel, Sergeant."

  Ychell looked down. "Looks like it, yes. It—" Her eyes went wide. "Interesting."

  "What?" Ro asked.

  "If I'm reading this right, Lieutenant, these aren't the Iconians at all."

  Ro repeated, "What!?"

  "They're still transmitting—I'll put it on audio."

  "You're lying."

  Kam had just spent several minutes explaining what had happened to the gateways, that it was a sim­ple maintenance cycle, and Malic's reaction had been those two words.

  He stood between Werd and Snikwah in the confer­ence room. The bodyguards had their disruptors trained on the two Iconians and the Ferengi, who were now all standing against the wall together. The Iconians looked as unconcerned as ever, but Gaila seemed a bit panicky.

  "I don't think you even were the ones who opened the gateways," Malic continued. "I think this was all part of an elaborate plot on the part of the two Fer­engi, the Bajoran Militia, and perhaps Starfleet to un­dermine the Orion Syndicate. Well, your accomplices will be captured soon enough." They had better be, at least, he thought, remembering his stolen padd. "And we have our weapons trained on your ship."

  "There's no need for these hostilities," Gaila said. Malic could hear the Ferengi attempt to keep his voice calm, but he was failing. "We can discuss this like rational beings."

  Malic snorted. "The time for discussion is over. It's obvious that you withheld intelligence on the gateways, not as a bargaining tactic, but because you didn't have that intelligence. It's also obvious that you didn't know about the gap in the gateway lattice in the Bajoran sec­tor—otherwise you wouldn't have dispatched a ship there as soon as we brought it up. And it's equally ob­vious that you have no idea why the gateways went off­line, nor why they came back online. You've lied to us. The syndicate doesn't appreciate being made fools."

  "We haven't made fools of you!" Gaila said quickly. "It was Quark! He made fools of all of us! He's a crafty one, my cousin. But I can assure you—"

  "Be silent, Ferengi. I have learned the hard way not to trust the mournings of anyone from your wretched species." He turned to the Iconians—or whatever they truly were. "Well, Kam? Have you nothing to say for yourself?"

  Kam simply regarded Malic with the same calm ex­pression that never seemed to leave the alien's face. "Are you familiar with subvocal communication?"

  Frowning, Malic said, "No."

  "We perfected it some time ago. I have been in con­stant communication with my ship while we have been speaking. They have armed their weapons. You will allow us safe passage back to our ship and then allow us to leave the Farius system, or we will destroy you."

  Malic didn't need a century of experience in busi­ness to know when someone was talking a better

  game than they could truly play. "Don't be fooled by the fact that this vessel was constructed by pacifists, Kam. It is more than armed enough to eliminate your ship." He turned to Werd and Snikwah. "Kill them all."

  Then the lights went dead.

  The darkness was short-lived, as the room was lit by a rather spectacular explosion from one of the walls. Malic heard someone scream, but he couldn't tell if it was the Ferengi, one of his own people, or one of the aliens.

  Vincam's voice sounded over the speakers. "We're under attack! "

  "We've got to save Gaila."

  Ro turned in surprise at Quark's statement. "I beg your pardon?"

  "He's still on that ship," Quark said, pointing to Ro's tactical display. "The Orions and the Iconians— or whoever they are—"

  "They're called the Petraw," Ychell put in, "based on these corns we've been intercepting."

  Nodding in acknowledgment, Quark said, "They can kill each other for all I care, but we have to save Gaila."

  "Not that I disagree with the sentiment or anything, Quark," Ro said, "but why this sudden outburst of compassion? Gaila was the one who betrayed you in there."

  Quark just shrugged. "That was just business. He's still family."

  "Isn't there a Rule about how family should be ex­ploited?"

  Smiling, Quark said, "And how am I supposed to do that if he's dead?"

  "Lieutenant," Ychell said, "the pursuit ships are breaking off—they're heading back toward Malic's ship. Probably to help out against the Petraw. That firefight is getting worse. Both ships have taken heavy damage."

  Ro looked down at her own console. As it hap­pened, the most direct course from their current posi­tion in the asteroid belt to the gateway—which had gone back online only ten minutes after shutting down—involved going straight through the battle be­tween the Petraw and the Orions. The only way to go fast enough to escape their notice would be to go in a straight line at near-lightspeed. So that works out fairly nicely anyhow...

  "Sergeant, can this crate do a near-warp transport?"

  Ychell whirled toward Ro. "You're kidding, right?"

  "I'm dead serious."

  Snorting, Ychell said, "Bad choice of words, Lieu­tenant." She took a deep breath. "I suppose it's possi­ble, but I've never done it"

  "I have," Ro said confidently. Of course, that was on the Enterprise—a top-of-the-line Starfleet ship that was designed for those kinds of maneuvers. In fact, the operation had been performed at least once before she'd signed on. In addition, back then she'd been working in concert with Miles O'Brien, an ex­pert in transporter technology.

  She set the course she'd need to take in order to make this work. I just hope the gateway doesn't wink out on us again. "Can you get an accurate life-form reading from the Orion ship?"

  Ychell nodded. "Scanning for Ferengi life-forms now." A pause. "Got him."

  "Good," Quark said, "let's move while he's still alive."

  Without looking up, Ro said, "Quark, get back aft. The ride's gonna be a little bumpy. You and Trek need to strap in."

  Quark didn't look terrifically pleased by the notion of a bumpy ride, but said nothing as he moved back aft.

  "Course set," Ro said and looked over at Ychell.

  'Transporter standing by."

  Ro took a deep breath, and remembered something one of her Academy instructors always said right be­fore flight simulations. "Here goes nothin'."

  Gaila ran.

  He had no idea where he was running to, but he thought remaining in a dark room waiting for one of the two moon-sized Or
ions to shoot him was not in his best interests. So he made a dash for where he re­membered the door being, was favored by that door opening at his approach, and proceeded to run down the hallways, which were now lit only by green emer­gency lights.

  Escape pods, he thought. That's what I want. They have to have them here. No self-respecting Vulcan would build a ship without escape pods. Wouldn't be logical.

  Gaila did not allow himself to think that getting rid of them might have been one of the (several) modifi­cations Malic had made to the ship.

  This is all your fault, Quark. Every time I turn around, you 're there to thwart me.

  A small voice in the back of Gaila's head reminded him that it was Gaila's own actions that led to this particular state of affairs, in his attempt to take his re­venge for Quark's indignities. After all, if it hadn't been for Quark, Gaila would still own a moon. But if it hadn't been for Gaila, the Orion ship probably wouldn't be falling apart around him right now.

  And then there's the Iconians. If they really are the Iconians. Not only did I break the Sixth Rule to get re­venge on Quark, it's looking like I broke the the Ninety-Fourth as well. Cost me a perfectly good client, too.

  Or maybe not so perfectly good, if Malic's suspi­cions were right. Frankly, Gaila didn't really care much one way or the other if they really were the Ico­nians or not. They'd paid him half up front, and that— along with most of the other seven bars of latinum he'd gotten from Zek—was safe in a depository. All I need to do is live to get off this ship, and everything will be fine. I'll live without the rest of Kam's fee. I won't live if I stay here any longer.

  He turned a corner to see a male Orion who looked like he'd been worked over by a particularly cranky Klingon standing there.

  Regarding him with two eyes that were half-swollen shut, the Orion asked through his split lip, "What're you doing here?"

  'Trying to find the escape pods. Didn't you hear the order to abandon ship?" The first sentence was truthful, the second somewhat less so.