Glass Empires

by Various

  “Theta radiation bursts of this nature are often associated with the production of metagenic weapons,” Selar reported. “By compressing the detection band, I have been able to obtain a directional fix.” She gestured toward a cleft in a cave wall. Inky blackness concealed what lay beyond the opening.

  “Lead the way,” Vash instructed.

  Marching single file, they trekked through a maze of subterranean tunnels and grottoes. Stalactites hung like dragon’s teeth above their heads. Calcite formations encrusted the walls. Vash heard moisture dripping somewhere in the background. Blind, colorless grubs scuttled away from the glare of her searchlight, which cast ominous shadows upon the uneven path before them. Camouflage garb helped the team blend into the scenery. Insulated soles muffled their footsteps. Compared to the arid surface of the planet, the caves were very chilly. Vash found herself walking briskly just to stay warm. The tunnels smelled of bat piss and guano.

  Bagro soon lagged behind the two women. Huffing and puffing, the out-of-shape Tellarite dragged his feet, while continuing to look about nervously. The porcine alien was obviously reluctant to proceed.

  “Get a move on,” Vash urged him. “That secret lab isn’t going to be there forever.”

  “You’re not the one carrying a homemade bomb on his back,” he protested. “I’m walking slowly on purpose!”

  Vash heard a squeal of anxiety in his voice. Beneath his bluster, Bagro was probably more frightened than he cared to admit. She recalled that his entire herd had been butchered by Alliance soldiers when he was just a piglet. Small wonder he got the willies infiltrating enemy territory.

  Good thing I know how to handle him.

  “Is that my problem?” she barked at him, mostly to ease his nerves. A boisterous argument would do more to reassure a Tellarite than any soothing words she might utter; the belligerent attitude was just what he needed to feel at home. “More walking and less whining, mister!”

  “You’re just lucky I don’t turn around and leave the both of you to get killed on your own!” Bagro grumbled back at her. Sounding in slightly better spirits, he quickened his pace to catch up with the two women. His rotund belly jiggled as he trotted after them. “I’d like to see you blow up that nest of vipers without me!”

  Selar sighed loudly, no doubt finding the heated exchange distasteful. “May I suggest that you both lower your voices. Unless I’m mistaken, this was supposed to be a covert mission.”

  Not a bad idea, Vash conceded, even though they were still at least a kilometer away from the alleged location of the underground facility. The party silently made their way through the shadowy labyrinth until they came to a narrow ledge running along the edge of a deep abyss. Sheer limestone walls descended sharply for hundreds of meters. Shining her light into the chasm, Vash glimpsed a forest of stalagmites jutting up from the floor of the pit. Rocky points waited to impale any clumsy spelunker.

  “Watch your step,” she warned the others.

  Consulting her tricorder, Selar confirmed that the theta band emissions were coming from the other side of the ledge.

  All right then, Vash decided. She nodded at Selar.

  One by one, they inched across the ledge, which was no more than thirty centimeters wide at most. Vash pressed her back firmly against the steep cave wall behind her, feeling the cold of the buried stone seep into her bones. Selar led the way, while Bagro brought up the rear, with Vash edging along between them. The Vulcan woman moved at a steady, deliberate pace; if the vertiginous drop concerned her, Selar’s stoic features betrayed no discomfort, only an intense degree of concentration. Bagro had needed to remove his backpack to fit onto the ledge. He clutched the parcel against his chest and muttered grumpily into his beard. Vash just tried to avoid looking down.

  Times like this, she thought, I wish humans were descended from mountain goats instead of primates.

  She was about halfway across the ledge when a wobbly patch of rock gave way beneath her feet. Loose gravel clattered down the side of the abyss as she suddenly felt nothing but empty air below her. Gravity seized her and she dropped like a stone. A mental image of herself, skewered upon the vicious stalagmites, flashed across her mind. She yelped out loud.

  “Got you!” A three-fingered hand grabbed onto her wrist, halting her free fall. The sudden stop wrenched her arm, but that was infinitely better than the alternative. Her body twisted in his grip and she slammed face-first into the wall of the crevasse. Wincing, she looked up to see Bagro holding on to her with one arm while clutching his backpack with the other. Ivory tusks protruded from his lower lip as he strained to support her weight. “Thank fortune you Terran females are so bony!”

  Vash’s free hand and feet scrabbled against the cliff face, frantically seeking purchase. She gripped her searchlight between her teeth, while her legs dangled precariously above the waiting pit.

  “Allow me,” Selar volunteered. Crouching down, she took hold of Vash’s right arm and helped Bagro pull their human companion back up toward the ledge. Vash gratefully threw her elbows over the edge of the crumbling rock shelf and laboriously hauled herself up to a sitting position on the ledge. Her heart racing, she leaned back against the cave wall and took a moment to catch her breath. Adrenaline coursed through her veins. Her mouth felt as dry as Vulcan’s Forge. Selar handed her a bootleg water-pack and she sucked it dry in a couple of gulps.

  “Thanks for the quick reflexes,” she gasped to her comrades, after her heart and lungs had calmed down a bit. She closed her eyes, but still saw the sharpened stalagmites jabbing up at her. “I almost saved the Alliance the cost of a disruptor blast.”

  “Didn’t have much choice,” Bagro said gruffly. He peeked into his knapsack to make sure his explosives were still intact. “The Resistance frowns on operatives losing their cell leaders. You’re the only ones who actually know what’s going on!”

  “Indeed,” Selar concurred. “It was the only logical choice of action.” She rose to her feet beside Vash. “I fear, however, that a more controlled descent is unavoidable.” She shone a beam of light on the stretch of ledge still before them. Vash saw that at least four meters of ledge had crumbled away entirely, making the way impassable.

  Great, she thought wryly. Leaning forward, she peered down into the yawning chasm that had almost claimed her life. Unsettled scree continued to rattle at the bottom of the pit. One way or another, it looks like we’re taking the direct route down.

  She detached a set of fusing pitons from her belt, as well as a coil of sturdy de-cel line. Climbing carefully to her feet, she placed the business end of a piton against the hard granite wall behind her. The push of a button ignited a momentary blue flare and a loud whoosh as the metallic spike fused with the wall on a molecular level. She tugged on the piton just to make sure it was secure.

  It didn’t budge.

  Good, she thought. The Resistance often had to scrounge for its arms and equipment, which could be of highly variable quality. Not another dud.

  While Selar and Bagro donned their rappelling harnesses, Vash affixed one end of her cable to the piton, then tossed the rest of the coil over the edge of the precipice. She clipped the line to her own harness. “Control your speed,” she warned the others, “and watch out for those stalagmites at the bottom.”

  “Don’t worry,” Bagro assured her. “I’m not planning to end up a shish kebab today.” He tested the sturdy monofilament line, assuring himself that it would support his weight. “Meet you down below.”

  Vash was glad to discover that the bomb expert was not subject to acrophobia. Nodding at her team, she eased herself backward and over the edge. The soles of her hiking boots rebounded against solid rock as she deftly rappelled down the side of the cliff face. The sensation reminded her once again of that spelunking expedition with Jean-Luc. Feeling the cable slide between her fingers, she couldn’t help wondering what Jean-Luc and Soong were up to right now. And wishing he were here.

  Have they tracked down the Borg yet? Are
they safe?

  She touched down on the floor of the chasm and unclipped the line from her harness. Selar and Bagro soon joined her in what appeared to be a vaulted chamber at the base of the cliff. A rustling noise, coming from high above their heads, briefly puzzled Vash until her searchlight exposed an enormous nest of Celtran bats hanging upside down from the ceiling. There appeared to be dozens of the insect-eating mammals, their leathery yellow wings folded about them. High-pitched chirps objected to the glare from her searchbeam, so she quickly lowered the light.

  Big deal, she thought. I’ll take bats over Cardassians any day.

  A quick sweep of the searchlight revealed that the spacious chamber branched out into a number of available shafts and tunnels. Vash looked at Selar.

  The other woman checked her tricorder. “This way,” she said, indicating an opening a few meters ahead. It looked like a tight fit, but Vash figured they could all squeeze through, including Bagro. “The theta emissions are growing stronger. I believe we are nearing our destination.”

  “Music to my ears.” Vash drew her phaser. “Let’s do this.”

  They wriggled through the cleft, discovering another warren of tunnels on the other side. Now that they were getting close to the supposed site of the underground lab, Vash kept the search beam lowered toward their feet to avoid alerting any lurking guards. She wished that they could do without the light entirely, but, this far beneath the surface, the only alternative was total darkness. Not even night-vision goggles would do them much good down here. She made a mental note to try to get the Resistance some of those new full-spectrum visors….

  Selar stopped and extended her arm, blocking the other two rebels. She cocked her head to one side and cupped a hand around an elegantly tapered ear. Vash couldn’t hear anything, but then again, she didn’t have a Vulcan’s hypersensitive hearing. “Someone’s ahead,” Selar whispered.

  Bagro sniffed the air. “Smells like a Cardassian.”

  Vash took their word for it. She repressed a twinge of envy; it was unpatriotic, but sometimes having merely human DNA was a pain. No wonder our empire fell, she thought. Almost every other sentient species in the galaxy has extra abilities, and lives longer to boot. Maybe the notorious Khan Noonien Singh had been right after all. Would the Alliance have conquered us if we hadn’t banned human genetic augmentation?

  She wondered what Jean-Luc would think of that question.

  Clicking off her flashlight, she gulped involuntarily as utter blackness enveloped them. Vash couldn’t even see the proverbial hand in front of her face, let alone her fellow freedom fighters. It was like staring into a black hole—not a single photon of light escaped the darkness. She laid a hand on Selar’s shoulder, counting on the Vulcan’s tricorder and superior hearing to guide them the rest of the way. Bagro shuffled closely behind them.

  They crept stealthily through the dark. After a few minutes of squinting uselessly into the blackness, Vash spotted a glimmer of light up ahead. The lambent glow appeared to be coming from just around the corner of an upcoming intersection. This must be it, she guessed. The illegal bioweapons facility.

  Her heart pounded as she squeezed past Selar for a better look. Peering around the corner of a rocky partition, she spotted a solitary Cardassian soldier pacing back and forth in front of a closed metal hatch built into a solid stone wall. Plasma lights were mounted on the ceiling above him. A disruptor rifle leaned against the sentry’s shoulder. His booted footsteps beat like a metronome against the floor. He hummed a militant Cardassian marching song that quickly grated on Vash’s nerves. He looked and sounded bored.

  Perhaps we can remedy that, Vash thought. She raised her disruptor.

  “Wait,” Selar whispered softly into her ear. She placed a restraining hand upon Vash’s arm. “The energy discharge might trigger an alarm.” She slipped quietly around her leader and handed Vash her tricorder. “Permit me to deal with this obstacle.”

  Vash nodded.

  Selar waited until the unwary soldier’s back was turned before creeping up on the guard as silently as a Romulan shadow assassin. Vash covered her with the disruptor just in case, but she needn’t have bothered. Before the nameless Cardassian knew what was happening, Selar came up behind him and applied pressure to a specific portion of the guard’s throat. His eyes rolled back in his skull. His body went limp.

  She took hold of the unconscious guard and quietly lowered him to the ground. Vash and Bagro came around the corner to join her.

  “A nerve pinch?” Vash teased the other woman. Breaking his neck would have been just as easy. “Getting soft in your old age?”

  Selar was unrepentant. “Not at all,” she said, nudging the spoonhead’s slumbering form with the toe of her boot. “There may be some use to keeping him alive.” She knelt to search her victim’s body. “The logic is irrefutable.”

  History had it that the Vulcans had once been pacifists, but that was a long time ago. Life was cheaper these days.

  “Works for me,” Vash said. She confiscated the man’s rifle and slung it over her shoulder. A good Resistance fighter never let a working weapon go to waste. “But kinder than he deserved.”

  She glanced around, taking stock of their situation. Columns of hardened calcite supported the curved ceiling of a cylindrical tunnel that extended past the metal hatch in two directions. Smooth, polished walls suggested that the tunnel had been artificially widened at some point, perhaps by an enslaved Horta. She searched the corners for security cameras, but no visible lenses looked back at her.

  Just the same, she didn’t want to waste any more time here than they had to. Who knew when the unlucky guard’s replacement was due, or whether he was expected to check in with his superiors at regular intervals? Vash inspected the gleaming silver hatch, suspecting that what they were looking for was on the other side. There was no obvious handle, but a touch-sensitive keypad was embedded in the stone wall beside the door. A combination lock?

  “Any code or key on him?” she asked Selar.

  The Vulcan’s fingers probed the guard’s armor. “Negative.”

  “Damn,” Vash muttered. Selar and her clever tricorder could probably bypass the code in time, but that would be tempting fate. Besides, what if any attempt to hack into the lock set off some sort of alarm? We could use Jean-Luc here, she thought. He was always good at cryptology. “Any ideas?”

  “I could always try to blow it up,” Bagro volunteered. He shrugged off his backpack.

  “That may not be necessary,” Selar announced soberly.

  Something in her tone caught Vash’s attention. She eyed the kneeling Vulcan uneasily. “What do you have in mind?”

  “An eel interrogation,” Selar proposed. She extracted a small plastic vial from a pouch on her camo suit. A slick black organism oozed inside the vial. “Fortunately, I came prepared.”

  Vash repressed a shudder at the sight of the creature. “I don’t know. That’s a pretty evil thing to do to anyone, even a Cardassian.”

  “It is distasteful,” Selar conceded. If Vash didn’t know better, she’d have sworn that she heard a genuine note of remorse in the other woman’s voice. “But I believe that it is our best recourse at this point.” Her eyes held a determined glint. “The Alliance cannot be allowed to develop metagenic weapons with impunity.”

  Without waiting for Vash’s assent, she applied pressure to a nerve cluster at the base of the Cardie’s neck. He instantly regained consciousness, looking about him in surprise as he jumped to his feet. The guard reached for his rifle, only to find Vash aiming it at his skull.

  “Don’t move,” she warned him. “I voted to kill you in the first place.”

  He clenched his fists, seething with indignation. “Rebel scum. You don’t belong here.”

  “Tell me something I don’t know,” Vash replied. Maybe they wouldn’t need to resort to the eel after all. The Cardassian guard didn’t know it, but this might be his lucky day. “What’s the code for the door?”

&nbs
p; He spat at her feet. “You won’t get anything from me. I’ll die first.”

  No, Vash thought. But you might wish you had.

  They couldn’t afford to waste any more time. “He’s all yours,” she told Selar.

  And may history forgive us.

  “Hold him,” the Vulcan instructed Bagro. “He may struggle.”

  “You think?” the Tellarite said sarcastically. He got behind the Cardie and twisted the guard’s arms behind his back. Wincing in pain, the soldier squirmed in Bagro’s grasp, but could not break free. “I’d be climbing the walls by now, and not in a good way.”

  The Cardie gulped. Apprehension started to undermine his arrogance. “What’s happening?” he asked nervously. “What are you going to do?”

  Vash didn’t bother to explain. She just kept the gun pointed at his head. Selar stepped toward the guard, holding the vial in her fingers. The Cardie’s slate-colored eyes widened in fright as he spotted the loathsome creature inside the vial. “Is that…?” The dreadful truth sunk in. “No! You can’t…I’m begging you…!”

  He thrashed frantically, desperate to get away. Bagro grunted as he strained to hold on to the panicked soldier. Vash figured he could use a little help.

  She fired a warning shot into the wall behind the prisoner. An intensely bright disruptor blast seared the solid stone…and reminded the Cardie just how weak his position was.

  “No more of that.” She gave him one more chance at avoiding what Selar had in store for him. “The code?”

  The guard wavered, torn between his duty and his terror. Sweat seeped from beneath his scales. His face twitched as he wrestled with what a Cardassian might consider a conscience. His anguished gaze never left the vial in Selar’s hand, and the ghastly organism inside. For a second, Vash thought he was going to spill the beans, but then his strict military training reasserted itself. He bit down on his lip to keep from talking. His stubbornness would cost him dearly.