It’s a big universe. I hope you’ll get another chance at your superweapon—if that’s what makes you happy. Until next we meet, good hunting.
Georgiou frowned. She calls him Gabriel.
The emperor had never been comfortable with her adoptive daughter’s admiration for her chief rival; she hoped it wouldn’t become a problem. Because the purge would inevitably come. Either Lorca would strike, or Georgiou would—and only one of those choices guaranteed her survival.
She saw creation as it was. Filled with enemies, declared and secret, known and yet to be discovered. She would see them fall, every one. A being that wanted to share the universe with her could be her subject—or her victim. There was no third choice. No one would remember Quintilian, Eagan, or even Lorca—but her people would remember her, and what she did to them.
Georgiou had preferred ruling from the shadows; parades and statues were for those who had nothing left to accomplish. So many emperors, Terran and otherwise, had vanished into obscurity, leaving nothing behind but museum pieces. That would not be her. She would never stop fighting—and when it was time, when she had truly earned it, sentients everywhere would glorify her name. She was building the Terran Empire to be immortal; while it was hers, she would be too.
She would never give it up.
Ever.
Stage One DEFIANCE
Few Terran emperors were more brutal—or more mysterious—than Philippa Georgiou. She conquered many worlds, taking titles from those she dominated—yet she preferred to be faceless to those she ruled. She made her presence felt across wide swaths of territory—yet few traces of her legacy survived the destruction of I.S.S. Charon.
It was as if she had simply vanished…
—SPOCK
The Stillborn Dynasty, 2267
5
Thionoga Detention Center
BETA QUADRANT
PRIME UNIVERSE
“You’re a nothing! You’re a zero! Whatever you were, you aren’t anymore!”
The towering alien who had seized Georgiou’s arm shook her hard. It was not the sort of greeting she, as emperor, had been accustomed to upon arriving aboard a space station—and she couldn’t remember the name of her greeter’s species, other than that she had eradicated a fair percentage of its population. But the giant had the advantage of surprise, as well as a hundred kilograms of mass.
Which it used now, hurling her violently to the landing bay deck, knocking the wind out of her.
“You keep your eyes down in Thionoga,” the alien shouted, two mighty feet planted on either side of her as she lay flat on her back, trying to catch her breath. “Snotty little thing. I’m a sentry! You’re trash. Look at me at your peril!”
“I wasn’t looking at you,” she said. “I was looking at that,” she added, vision focused on a spot somewhere above. Distracted, the goliath’s eyes followed; just enough distraction for her to act. Bracing her hands against the deck beneath her, Georgiou rolled back and kicked her legs upward, a springing move that brought her boots into crashing contact with the sentry’s crotch.
She didn’t know the creature’s sex, nor care—but it definitely seemed to place some value over whatever it had down there, judging from the way it howled and doubled over. That gave her the chance to seize the sentry’s collar with her left hand, delivering an open-palmed smash to its face with her right. Grabbing tufts of its bushy hair, she wrenched its head, throwing the brute off balance as she rolled in the opposite direction.
All before she was back on her feet.
Once she was upright, the melee began in earnest, as Big Nasty’s twin joined in, followed by a couple of Nausicaans—likely also guards, judging by their uniforms. They were all targets for her, as she twirled among them, delivering kicks and chops to everyone she came near.
Three were collapsed on the deck when more sentries arrived, carrying long prods. Georgiou looked back to the shuttle that had brought her, only to see its Orion pilot and his disruptor-toting guards in the open hatchway. “What’s wrong with you people?” he shouted. “Can’t you handle a simple transfer?”
The first giant, one hand over a face gushing orange, pointed at her with the other. “She stuck her nose up at me—”
“I was trying to avoid your stench,” Georgiou said.
“You broke my nose!”
“Believe me, I did you a favor!”
A group approached from across the bay: six guards toting tall silver staffs, the vanguard for a squat Denobulan in black. “What goes on here?” he asked.
The shuttle captain pointed to Georgiou. “This one’s been giving us trouble since we picked her up. Even the Klingons didn’t want her.”
“That’s a shame.” The Denobulan seemed to be someone of standing, given the deference he received from the sentries; when he lifted a white-tipped baton, his silver-staffed phalanx sprang forward. They worked to encircle Georgiou, who quickly determined the electrical nature of their weapons.
“The Klingons have a name for these,” the Denobulan said as they threatened her. “Painstiks. I expect they’re self-explanatory.”
Their effect certainly was, when a sentry lunged for her and she sidestepped, redirecting the guard and his weapon into the gut of one of his companions. An electrical shock rocked her victim, causing him to lose his weapon. She scooped it up—next wielding it both as a shocker and a bo staff to deliver harm to her assailants.
She had floored four of them when she saw the Denobulan advancing, his baton before him. Holding her longer staff in his face, she laughed. “Size matters, my little friend!”
“How droll.” Unflinching, the Denobulan triggered something on his baton. A chilling blast of gas launched from its tip, striking Georgiou squarely in the face.
Blinded, she dropped her weapon and fell to the deck, coughing. “That… was… no painstik!”
“Life is full of surprises.”
Still choking, Georgiou was barely able to notice the Denobulan walking up to her—and completely unable to do anything about it when he applied a hypospray to her neck. “Give her a minute—and then take her to accession.” He spun and departed.
Georgiou’s lungs cleared before her vision did. But this time, when she saw the sentries approaching, she felt no urge to do anything about it. Their arms under hers, they lifted her to her feet and marched with her toward a doorway off to the side.
Inside the hexagonal room, she saw the Denobulan settle down into a chair behind a large desk. Save for the side of the room she entered through, every wall had a closed turbolift door of a different color. The guards guided her to the only other furnishing in the room, a small bench across from the Denobulan’s desk. They deposited her on it and departed.
“I am Frietas.”
“You are alone,” she said. That fact was clear, even if everything else still looked blurry. She turned her head toward the exit. “No manacles? No disruptors? I think I’m insulted.”
“There’s no need for theatrics.” Frietas poured himself a steaming brew from a carafe. “The hypospray contained a fast-acting serum, which forces you to answer truthfully. And that gas I dosed you with will keep you docile during the interview.” He stopped pouring and stared across at her. “It’s standard practice—don’t give me any yap about your civil rights.”
“I wouldn’t dream of it.”
“You wouldn’t be in Thionoga if you had any rights left.” He gestured with his mug to the various turbolift doors. “This meeting is about where we’re going to put you.”
“The green one is pretty.” She loved how the portal seemed to glisten as she watched. “I want to go there.”
“I don’t think that one’s for you. It’s for the mentally ill.” He opened a drawer and fished for a data slate.
“I killed someone, if that helps.”
“So it says here.” He read, “Noor Engku, human murderer. Is that your real name?”
“No.”
“It never is. And the real one?”
“Philippa Georgiou Augustus Iaponius Centarius.”
“How’s that again?”
She repeated it—haltingly, each word a carefully prepared meal in her muddled state. “It’s important to me that you get it right.”
“It’s not important at all.” Frietas referred to the data slate. “This merchant you murdered to get here. Did he get your name wrong?”
“No, he got it right.”
“But you still killed him.”
“And his whole fleet.” She studied her fingernails, still shimmering. “I don’t recall how many ships he had, but I destroyed them all.” She sniffed. “In cold blood. Do you have that in there?”
“I don’t see anything here about multiple killings. But it doesn’t matter. We don’t get into the legal processes of the star systems that send us prisoners. If you’re here, your people want you gone—but they won’t pull the trigger. What you did was enough to get you Thionoga.”
“I thought you were trying to decide where I belong.”
“Yes, but don’t get the idea that any one part of this prison is softer than another. It’s not a health spa. A perpetrator is a perpetrator.”
She grinned. “I like the way you think.”
“No, the reason we’re categorizing you is to find out your skills.”
“I kill people. I thought we’d gone over that.”
“This is a penal colony. You must have seen the big asteroid the station’s grappler has hold of. Our inmates do labor. Now, how would you describe what you were before you came here?”
“Ah.” She clasped her hands and leaned back. “Apex predator.”
“Enough nonsense. Did you have a title?”
“Many.” She began to list them.
“Let’s not start that again.” He looked up, aggravated. “Look, it’s a simple question. What was your job?”
“Emperor.”
“Emperor?”
“For a time, people used ‘empress’—but that’s not to my tastes.”
The prison official made a note on his slate. “Emperor. Of what? This place?”
Georgiou looked up and around. “This space station doesn’t exist in my universe. But it is in territory I conquered. Back in ’53, I believe.”
Frietas blinked. “Beg pardon—you said in your universe?”
“That’s correct.”
“You own a universe.”
“A significant part of one.” She frowned. “Or I did.”
“You did.” The interviewer smirked. “This should be rich. What happened?”
“I lost it. One of my rivals staged a coup.”
“A shock, was it?”
“No, it was completely predictable.” She coaxed forth a name that was acid to her mouth. “Lorca. I sent my daughter Michael to hunt him down—but she sided with him instead, and that, I should have predicted. Children make poor decisions.”
“You’re not the first to say that, I’m sure.” The Denobulan looked at her. “So I take it you were overthrown by this Orca.”
“Lorca. No, he was blasted through a rift into this universe.”
“Ah! And this is the person you killed?”
“No.” Georgiou shrugged. “I mean, I did kill him, but he wasn’t the merchant. Lorca returned to my universe, bringing a Starfleet vessel with him—”
“Starfleet just left one lying around.”
“Patronize someone else. I’m being cooperative.”
“Sorry. He came to your universe with a Starfleet vessel.”
“Called Discovery. That’s when I killed him—but not before I tortured him.” She looked around. “You don’t have any agonizer booths here, do you?”
“I’m not sure what you mean.”
“Your warden would like them. They cut down on complaints.”
“Well, maybe we’ll look into that.” His brow furrowed. “I’m not sure I follow your story. If you put down this rebel, you should still be emperor, right?”
“Unfortunately, the episode ended in the destruction of my starship. Whereupon my daughter—”
“Michael, the one who betrayed you.”
“No, not her. The other Michael.”
“You have two daughters named Michael?”
“In a sense. She’s the Michael from your continuum—she came along when Lorca brought Discovery to my universe. And she took me back here.”
“To this universe.”
“Against my will.”
Frietas pursed his lips before continuing. “I’m going to regret asking this, but this universe of yours—it’s different?”
“Very much so.” Georgiou yawned. “Do you know how you can tell that I’m not emperor here?”
“How?”
“You’re still breathing.”
He looked around. “Are you sure you’re in the right facility?”
“I thought that’s what you were here to decide.”
He put down the data slate, frustrated. “They have to start sending me more information.” He forced a smile. “I’m afraid there aren’t any categories of labor on Thionoga that involve dictatorial rule.”
“That’s too bad.” Reminded, she made a sad effort at snapping her fingers. “Oh, yes. I did have a job. I ran a nightclub.”
“Service industry.” He picked up the slate again. “Very good. Where was this club?”
“On Qo’noS.”
“You lived on the Klingon homeworld?”
“Well, first I tried to destroy it.”
“The nightclub?”
“No, the homeworld.” She frowned. “It’s a long story, and parts are classified. The Federation had given me my freedom, but it didn’t mean anything; the Klingons weren’t going to let me leave the planet. Once I knew I was stuck there, I decided to take over a business. For my own entertainment, as much as anything.”
“I take it that mind-altering substances were on offer.”
“I wouldn’t be much of a host if there weren’t.”
Frietas raised his index finger. “Now it’s making sense. You’ve been sampling your own wares.”
“Only when things got boring. Which they did soon enough. It’s hard to market vices on a planet where the natives’ only hobby is beating the hell out of each other. Besides,” she said, crinkling her nose, “Klingons stink.”
He nodded. “We have a few here.”
“Don’t put me with them.”
Frietas made another note. “Look, I get paid by the hour, not by volume. I get to hear a lot of stories. Maybe you can use yours to entertain the perps down on brown level, while you’re all sorting through the toxic recyclables.” He set down the data slate and reached for a small panel of colored buttons on his desk. “There isn’t a lot of joy down there. I’m sure they’ll find your stories very—”
“Agent Georgiou!”
“Hold on,” Georgiou said, rubbing at her temple. “Someone’s talking to me.”
“I know,” Frietas said. “I’m talking to you!”
“Shh. It’s the voice in my head.” He gawked, baffled, as she listened to the implant in her right ear. “What is it?”
“I want you to shut up,” responded a male human voice.
“This is an interview. I’m supposed to talk.”
“Not like—”
“You’re interrupting, Leland.”
“Don’t say my name!”
Frietas stared. “The voice in your head is named Leland?”
“That’s right. He recruited me. And he’s always bothering me.”
“About operational security, you bet,” Leland said. “Next thing you know you’ll be telling him about Section 31.”
“Oh,” she said, reminded. “I hadn’t gotten to that part!”
“Don’t. I thought we’d inoculated you against truth serums.”
“I am speaking to this individual of my own choice—which is the only reason I do anything.” Georgiou looked to Frietas. “I apologize for my colleague’s rudeness. Was t
here something else you wanted to ask?”
“No, I think I’ve got everything,” he said, rising. He pressed a button on his desk console, and the green turbolift doors opened.
Georgiou looked at it. “The mental ward. I thought you said I didn’t belong there?”
“I’m sold.” He gestured to the guard inside the turbolift. “Take her away—and try not to get her name wrong.”
6
Green Sector
THIONOGA DETENTION CENTER
The Vulcan had lost a tooth. Georgiou stepped over it—and then over the bleeding Vulcan—as her jailer, another sweaty-faced Nausicaan, prodded her line of prisoners along the corridor. Up ahead, she saw the tooth-owner’s likely assailant: a hairless alien guard, busy delivering a violent rebuke to one of her fellow green-clad prisoners.
“A refreshing approach to mental health,” Georgiou mumbled so Leland could remotely hear. “The Federation is tied in with this place?”
“They helped found it,” Leland said, “along with a bunch of nonaligned powers out here in neutral space. The Federation can’t make up its mind what to do with criminals, so it pretty much tries everything.”
What Terrans called punishment, Georgiou had learned, the Earthlings of this universe called “corrections.” New methods for it were all the rage—as if anything could be more corrective than pain, and lots of it. But while revolutionary theorists like Tristan Adams had lately earned a lot of attention, Leland explained that the Federation still maintained its investment in Thionoga.
“It’s the reason you and I can communicate,” Leland said. “We installed a lot of the tech here years ago—including the system linking your earpiece to our subspace relay.”
“And you kept a back door into the surveillance system, giving you a way to keep tabs on every political prisoner in the region, held by you or not.”
“We figured it’d come in handy someday. Like today.”
So predictable. The Federation managed to combine self-denial and hypocrisy in ways that both aggravated and amused Georgiou. Clearly, any government worthy of the name required a place where the criminal—or the simply inconvenient—could be smashed against bulkheads a few times a day. If the Federation’s namby-pamby officials ever opened their eyes to the brutality that took place on Thionoga, she expected they’d burst with self-righteousness, immediately ending their participation. But by delegating the bothersome details to Leland and his team, they could remain blissfully blind.
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