Текст книги "Well of Souls"

Автор книги: Ilsa J. Bick

Соавторы: Ilsa J. Bick
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Текущая страница: 21 (всего у книги 30 страниц)

“Well, SI’s got some ideas about that,” said Garrett, hoping her tone didn’t betray a shred of the anxiety she felt. Then she told them.

This time the silence lasted for a good thirty seconds. Kodell broke it. “Cardassian. Space. Cardassian?”

“Oh, this just keeps getting better and better,” said Stern.

“Well, not exactly Cardassian,” said Garrett, with no more inflection than if they were talking about Halak being in orbit around Mars, or somewhere equally benign, and not somewhere in the tinderbox of disputed Cardassian space. “SI thinks. They’re not sure, and they didn’t really get into why they think that he’s even there.”

“You mean, they decided we didn’t have to know,” said Kodell, a man who, in Garrett’s opinion, never minced words. He was prickly—downright obstinate, sometimes—but she actually liked him more because he spoke his mind.

“Maybe.” And then because Garrett didn’t like SI anymore than Kodell did: “Yes.”

“Ah,” said Glemoor, “then they want to play, how do you call it? Russian roulette. Only we are the ones pulling the trigger of our own pistol.”

Bat-Levi frowned. “What’s Russian roulette?” When Glemoor explained, she made a disparaging noise. “That’s a stupid game. You could end up getting killed.”

Kodell looked baleful. “Which is why they’re sending usin.”

Garrett eyed Kodell. “You have a problem?”

“Frankly, yes. With all due respect, Captain, we’ve just come through a run-in with a black hole. We’re lucky there’s only minor hull damage from radiation pitting, but the inertial dampers are just a little cranky, and our gravity could use some work. I’m not happy with the antimatter injectors, either. Now you’re talking space that’s in dispute between the Federation and the Cardassians. We all know about the Cardassians. Shoot first, and shoot later. Now, we’re being asked to go in covertly. How long before the Cardassians claim we’re making incursions into their territory, and do the same to us? We show up without authorization, we spark a conflict, and if we’re forced into a fight, I can’t vouch for the ship.”

“Well then, you’ll be pleased to know that our orders are notto fight. Our orders are not to engage the Cardassians. Our orders are to locate Commander Halak, period.”

Kodell was undaunted. “You mean, evade the Cardassians, find Halak, and apprehend this Burke and Sivek, or whoever they are because if Halak’s there, so are they. That’s the real agenda, Captain, and that’s business for Starfleet Intelligence.”

“But Halak’s one of us,” said Bat-Levi.

“I know that,” said Kodell. “I’m just pointing out the risks involved, and it’s justification I’m asking about. Why doesn’t Starfleet Intelligence just send their people after Burke and Sivek, retrieve Halak, and then go from there? Personally, I don’t think they care one bit about Halak. All they care about is what happens to their own.”

“And it comes down to that, doesn’t it, Mr. Kodell?” asked Garrett. “Caring for your own people? Normally, I’d agree with you on SI cleaning up after itself. To tell the truth, I intend to file a formal protest with Starfleet Command, after.Batanides hasn’t been on the up and up. No intelligence agency ever is. I accept that, but I move on, Mr. Kodell, because it’s my job.Make no mistake. Until we understand the whole truth, I’m unwilling to throw a member of mycrew on myship to the wolves.”

She spared Glemoor a brief admonishing glance: Don’t ask.Now, she reasoned, was not the time to explain the vagaries of aphorisms. “This is not a debate, Mr. Kodell, nor is it a democracy. We have our orders. If it were captain’s discretion, I would make the same decision. We get Halak. Then we decide what to do after that.”

Kodell wasn’t put off. “And the Cardassians, Captain?”

“Ifthat’s where Halak is, and ifCardassians show up, we don’t fight. Period. Nothing provocative.” She didn’t add that she understood their presence was likely provocation enough. “We defend ourselves, if need be.”

Kodell looked displeased but said nothing more. Shortly after, Garrett dismissed them with orders to rendezvous with the U.S.S. Blakely,also in that sector, and transport the survivors from the colony ship to that vessel before proceeding. Except for Stern, the rest filed out without conversation—at least, within earshot.

Stern waited until the briefing room door hissed shut. “He hit it on the head, you know.”

“Please.” Closing her eyes, Garrett pinched the bridge of her nose between her right thumb and index finger. Her head was raging. Concussions, she concluded, were worse than any migraine. “Not you, too. Glemoor’s bad enough.”

“I see we’re on the same page,” Stern said, straight-faced. “Isn’t it nice that I don’t have to explain every idiomatic expression?”

“You hanging around for a reason, or just on general principle?”

“Two things. Want the bad news, or the observation first?”

Garrett groaned. “What?”

“I told you I asked Mac to do some digging around. Damn good thing he did; it alerted Batanides to check up on Burke. But here’s another thing he found: those autopsy reports on Thex and Strong.”

“Halak’s crewmembers from the Ryn mission. And?”

“Thex’s autopsy results were consistent with death as a result of his injuries.”

“Oh.” Garrett blinked. “Well, that’s not bad.”

Stern held up a hand. “Wait. Strong’s results were a little more problematic.”

“No explosive decompression?”

“Oh, no, there was that.” Stern made a face. “You don’t tend to miss that, air-filled spaces like heads and guts and lungs popping tending to be fairly splashy.”

“But?”

“Buta more detailed analysis of Strong’s intact tissues does not demonstrate persuasive evidence of a preexisting hypoxia.”

“Jo, in English.”

“Rachel, he wasn’t suffocating. He had plenty of air. Halak said Strong popped his seal because he was desperate for air. Halak’s story fits, ifyou’re hypoxic. People do the damnedest things in those situations. But the evidence says that Strong wasn’t that far gone. In fact, Halak’s tissues demonstrated a more severe and sustained hypoxia than Strong’s, and that doesjibe. Strong’s suit wasdamaged and Halak said that he gave the lion’s share of Thex’s air to Strong to compensate. But the bottom line, Rachel: When Strong died, he had plenty of air. Strong had no reason to pop that seal. Absolutely. None. Burke, or whoever she is…she was right.”

“Oh, hell.” Garrett exhaled, closed her eyes. “Hell.”

“Told you it was bad.”

“Damn it, Jo.” Garrett fixed Stern with a despairing look. “Where is the truth anywherehere?”

“Beats the hell out of me. But that brings me to my observation. Since when did we volunteer for the espionage business?”

“When Starfleet Command volunteered us.” Garrett sighed. She was so tired of lies and subterfuge. “Look, I know Kodell’s got a point. I even agree: Starfleet Intelligence isn’t being straight with us—not that anyoneis, it seems. Burke and Sivek—I guess I’ll just call them that until I know who they really are—they’re only part of the equation. There’s something else SI knows, or suspects but doesn’t want to say. Something the Cardassians have, or SI thinksthey have.”

“Like?”

“Theory? The Cardassians are into expansion. We know that. So maybe they’re developing a new weapons system. Cloaking technology, maybe. I don’t know. I’ll tell you one thing, though.” Garrett looked grim. “This isn’t about drugs, not anymore.”

“If it ever was,” said Stern.

Garrett made a vague gesture with one hand. “Oh, Starfleet cares about the Qatala, and the Orion Syndicate, but they’re much smaller headaches compared to the Cardassians. In the end, the Cardassians are a bigger threat than all the red ice the Qatala or Syndicate can deliver. Starfleet’s out to prevent a war before it can start.”

“Well, let’s hope we don’t give the Cardassians an excuse.” Stern scraped her chair back and stood. “You know, Rachel, you said you didn’t want to throw Halak to the wolves. I’m with you on that, if for nothing else than I want to understand what’s going on once and for all. But you sure as hell didn’t say anything about a lion’s den.”

Chapter 28

Stewing in his own juices: that’s what Dalal would’ve said. This was apt, seeing as he hadn’t showered in two days or changed his clothes. Halak had turned things over so many times in his head, his brain felt like a bruised apple. Things just didn’t compute. First, Starfleet Intelligence showed up. Then they produced records. Some of them were true. Most of them weren’t. They claimed Dalal never existed and that Arava was gone. And then to top it all off, after disgracing him in front of his captain and crewmates, SI wanted himto do thema favor. Actually, blackmail was more like it. They needed a fall guy, pure and simple. So they’d picked Halak, just as they’d done before.

A fall guy.Halak lay on his back, hands clasped behind his head, staring at the ceiling of his tiny quarters, finding nothing of interest there and not expecting there to be anything of interest in the near, or distant future. He had nowhere to go, no place to be. Well, not yet, anyway. Soon enough: Burke said they’d come out of warp within the next five hours. Then things were bound to get dicey, and Halak probably wouldn’t have time to ponder an obscure idiom that so neatly summed up his situation. Glemoor would have been pleased.

First scenario: If anything went wrong—if the Cardassians discovered him—he’d be the one who took the blame for Starfleet Intelligence. He’d be painted as a rogue officer who’d escaped while in custody and gone off on some personal vendetta.

Or second scenario: If he didn’trun into the Cardassians but managed to end up getting himself killed in the process—by one of Qadir’s men, say—Starfleet Intelligence still came up smelling like roses (an idiom even Glemoor understood without requiring an explanation). Getting himself killed would tidy things up considerably for Starfleet Intelligence, actually. It might even be preferable because it would prove SI’s theory that Halak had been in on Qadir’s network of operations all along.

Either way, it was win-win for SI, with Halak the loser in any scenario except one. He just might succeed.

“Are we absolutely clear on this?” Burke had asked after she’d explained what Starfleet Intelligence wanted. “Do you understand exactly what you’re supposed to do?”

Halak had nodded. After recovering from the initial shock of Burke’s overture, Halak had listened, very carefully, as the Starfleet Intelligence agent outlined the mission. So he understood the implications, perfectly. “No problem on the details. I think the gist is that I’m supposed to do something fairly illegal. Trespass into disputed territory, secure the specs and schematics of this intradimensional portal, or whatever you call it, then manage to get back to the T’Polwithout getting caught by the Cardassians, or murdered by one of Qadir’s men who you claim are, at this very moment, crawling all over the same area, looking for a portal that may, or may not exist. I just don’t get why you think this portal exists at all. On the basis of what? A couple of legends about a race no one knows for sure existed?”

“The fact that the Qatala’s financing this operation tells us something,” said Burke. “Money may not mean anything to us,but there are many to whom it does. It comes down to this, Halak. If the Hebitians were on this planet, then they got there somehow. Ships, maybe. But a portal is much more likely given what the Cardassians believe about them. The Cardassians have never, so far as we know, found any artifacts consistent with a spacefaring race. So if they’re Hebitian ruins, they got there through a portal. It’s the only explanation.”

“What if they were seeded?”

“By what? Some benevolent god-race? Those are just stories, Halak. Anyway, even if there isn’t a portal, there may be a tomb, and if all Qadir finds is a bunch of jevonite, gold, and jewels, that’s still worth his time and effort, particularly when he’s not the one risking his neck.”

“But Starfleet Intelligence thinks there’s more.”

“Absolutely. Why would the Cardassians bother patrolling a planet where there’s nothing of value? Sure, the space is disputed, but they pay particular attention to that particular planet, and get very touchy if any Federation vessels request a flyby. In fact, I don’t think any Federation vessel is allowed to get close.”

“So, by a process of elimination, assuming it’s not a research facility, you’ve decided that the most likely scenario is some artifact the Cardassians can’t use but want to keep to themselves until they can.” Halak had cocked his head to one side. “Okay. A little tautological, if you ask me.”

“But I’m not asking you, Commander.” Burke had given him a dry look. “I’m telling you.”

“I noticed. But why me? I’m a killer, right? Murder my crewmates at the drop of a hat? Plus, I’m supposed to be in cahoots with Qadir, or want to take over, or something equally inane. Whatever I am, I’m most certainly notan agent, despite anything I got volunteered for in the past. Why not send trained personnel to infiltrate Qadir’s network, or a couple of operatives to this planet?”

“You’re an intelligent man, Commander. You tell me.”

“Easy. Plausible deniability.”

“Disavowal is more like it. You get caught, you were acting on your own.”

“How did I get here then? Wherever hereis.”

“You overpowered SI agents escorting you to Starfleet Command. Being in Qadir’s network and having recently visited Farius Prime, you knew of his plans and so decided to take it upon yourself to secure a piece of whatever it was Qadir was after.”

“But, unfortunately for me, Qadir’s people got the better of me, or the Cardassians caught on, and Starfleet is off the hook.”

“As good a story as any.”

A good story. Discounting the fact that Burke was Starfleet Intelligence (all intelligence agents were trained liars), Halak knew: Burke was a liar. Halak didn’t know howhe knew, but he did.

Staring at the ceiling, Halak felt the ship change around him and knew, without having to be told: They’d dropped out of warp. Halak pushed up on his elbows and swung his legs over the edge of his bunk. Burke would come soon. They’d go over the plan; she’d give him a chance to study the drop area and decide how he wanted to attack the problem of locating Qadir’s men and the portal, if it existed.

The faintest of vibrations. Footsteps. Halak heard the blip-blap-bleepof someone keying in the code to unlock the door to his quarters.

“I brought you something to eat,” Burke said. She held a phaser in her right hand, the tray balanced on her left.

“Thanks.” Without being asked, Halak jumped down and backed to the far corner as she slid the tray on to his bunk, keeping her eyes—and the phaser—trained on him the entire time. They’d gone through the same ritual twice a day for almost the last week, so Halak had it down. Odd behavior for someone who considered him a confederate, but Halak would have taken the same precautions. After all, it’s not like I volunteered.“I could use a shower, too. A change of clothes.”

“No problem.” Phaser still pointed in his direction, Burke backed toward the door. “I’ll have Sivek see to both.”

Looking over the items on his tray, Halak made a face: same monotonous, indigestible Vulcan tripe. “May I ask you a question?”

“Sure.”

“We’ve talked about the Cardassians and Qadir, what will happen if I get the specs on this portal for you,” said Halak, still inspecting what passed for food arrayed on his tray, “but what about Arava?”

There was a pause. Then: “What about her?”

“What will happen to her? If I cooperate, that is.”

“If?”Burke’s eyes were flat. “You having second thoughts?”

“No. But it seems to me that if you know so much about me, then you might know where she is, and how important she is to me.”

“And if we did? Know either? Both?”

“Can you get her off Farius Prime? Since I’m risking my life and all that, you know, for the greater good.”

“You’re risking your life and all that for your career,”said Burke. “Let me give you a suggestion. Do your job and don’t worry about anything else right now. You get those specs. Then we’ll talk.”

“But you’ll consider it,” Halak pressed.

“It’s not my decision.”

“You could put in a word or two. I’ve been cooperative.”

“As would anyone with the business end of a phaser pointed in his direction.”

“Yeah, but that’s now.How do you know I won’t try something later?Warp off, or give you phony specs, or something?”

“You won’t warp off because Sivek will be with you. I’m not stupid, Halak. And you stay with us, in Starfleet Intelligence’s custody, until we’re satisfied that the specs are genuine.”

“Fair enough. But you could still ask your superiors. Ask Batanides about getting Arava off Farius Prime. Otherwise, I won’t budge.”

“I don’t think you have many choices.”

“Screw that.” Halak slid back onto his bunk and crossed his arms. “And screw you. You get Arava off, or I don’t work. Period.”

Burke’s cheeks flushed. Her phaser-hand twitched. “You will.”

Halak laughed. “Or what? You going to shoot me? My career’s over, remember? Whether you shoot me now, or I get myself killed, or I refuse and get court-martialed and put in prison, it’s all the same. But if you lose me, you lose plausible deniability. So, manus manum lavat.One hand washes the other, in case you’re not up on your Latin,” said Halak, privately tickled that having Glemoor around was proving to quite advantageous. “You agree to my terms, or it’s no deal.”

Her brown eyes sparking, Burke stared at him a long minute. Halak returned the stare. Burke blinked first. “I’ll have to take it up with Command.”

“Great, you do that. Then I want to see a copy of those orders.”

“That may not be possible. We’re supposed to be in a communications blackout, Commander.”

“Don’t give me that. You’ve got narrow-band, secured channels. Use one. Hey,” Halak gave a disingenuous smile, “this is the missionwe’re talking here. Yeah, sure, it’s my career. But it’s yours, too, Burke. You screw up, and I’ll bet you don’t get to play secret agent again any time before the next star in these parts goes nova.”

The small muscles along Burke’s jaw jumped. She backed up, toward the door, and Halak saw her left hand come up, the fingers move as she keyed in the combination for the lock. “I’ll see what I can arrange,” she said then cursed when her fingers slipped, and she botched the combination.

Good. He was making her angry, and that was good. Anger made people feel pressured, and people who were pressured made mistakes. “That’s not good enough.”

“It will have to do.” Burke’s look bordered on venomous. She jabbed at the combination again, blew out when the lock double-bleeped, and the door hissed open. “I will talk to Commander Batanides. Perhaps we can arrange to get Arava and her son, Klar, off Farius Prime, and maybe not, Commander. One damn thing at a time, all right?” Without waiting for a reply, she stepped out.

The door slid shut. Halak stood quite still, hardly daring to breathe.

Klar.She’d said Klar.But she couldn’t possiblyknow about Arava’s son, orhis name. Halak had nevermentioned Klar—not by name, or in any of his personal log entries. It was too dangerous. But Burkehad known about him. Could one of Burke’s sources have told her? Someone who had infiltrated Qadir’s organization?

But wait. Her information was bad. She’d gotten things wrong about Arava. Yet she’d known about Klar, a boy about whom only three people, other than Arava, were in the know: Dalal, Halak…and Qadir. No one else knew. No one suspected. So the only way Burke could have known there even wasa Klar was either for her to have gotten to know Arava, very well—or to have set eyes on him herself. Or both. But she’d said to Garrett, at the inquiry: I’ve never been to Farius Prime, Captain.

My God, he thought, she’s lying. I knew it! She says she’s never been to Farius Prime, but she let slip about Klar.

“So what else are you lying about, Burke?” Halak whispered, out loud, to thin air. “Just who, or what, areyou?”

Putting conditions on things now, huh?Thumbing on the safety of her phaser, Lieutenant Laura Burke—whose real name was Talma Pren, a person with no rank in anyone’s military—jammed the weapon into a holster hugging her hip. Not going to do what he’s told?Talma stalked the short corridor from Halak’s quarters to a gangway that led to the warpshuttle’s bridge. Well, Halak wasn’t making the rules. Shemade the rules, and he’d damn well do as he was told.

Check with Command, my eye.She smirked; fine, she’d check with Command.

So, Talma Pren, should we get that witch Arava off Farius Prime when her staying put is ever so much more convenient? After all, she is a little bit of a traitor now, isn’t she? Oh, true, true, she’s working against Qadir; that counts for something. Still, someone has to take the blame when Qadir’s precious moneyand portal disappear, right?

Why, Talma Pren, I couldn’t agree more.

There. Talma clambered up the short stretch of gangway to the bridge. She’d checked with Command. Now all she had to do was manufacture the forged confirmation from Starfleet Intelligence– Dear Halak: Anything for you, darling. Love, Marta.Thank the heavens, she’d had the foresight to know this might come up and had accessed Batanides’s personal authorization codes from the records of the real—and very dead—Laura Burke.

Tsk-tsk, Laura, how many times have I told you:Always lock your door when you go to sleep aboard ship. You never know justwho might break out of her quarters in the middle of the night and leave a nice, bright, shiny, and very sharp souvenir in your back.

Vaavek– no, Sivek, he’s Sivek for the time being—sat with perfect Vulcan poise over the pilot’s console: back straight as a titanium rod, the seal-skin black of his hair gleaming in a soft white light that suffused the bridge from a bank of lighting panels recessed in the ceiling. Talma Pren paused a moment, eyes roving the bridge, her body reveling in the pristine orderliness of Vulcan engineering. She’d been on many ships in her lifetime. Some she’d stolen. (Well, actually, she’d stolen mostof them. Maybe she’d bought one, two at the most.) She’d had Klingon shuttles, Starfleet shuttlecraft, even a Cardassian two-person trimaran liberated from a hapless Cardassian trader floating somewhere between Farius Prime and the Malfabrican Sector—and not many people living who could make that claim. (Cardassians didn’t take kindly to people liberating anything.) But in terms of ships, the Vulcans won, hands down. Their ships were so much more streamlined, so functional; they eschewed luxury and favored steely blue hues and well-lit workspaces. Not as fancy as Starfleet shuttles: Starfleet loved those delicate, homey touches so pleasing to the eye but with no functional purpose. The Klingons made suffering a virtue, so their ships were not only ugly, they were no fun at all; and the shadows that fell through the grills and latticework on Cardassian ships always reminded Talma of a prison cell. But the Vulcans knew how to build ships. Surveying the bridge, Talma gave a sigh of appreciation. Play her cards right, and she could buy herself a whole damn fleet. Why, she might even buy Vulcan.

“What’s our status?” she asked, slipping into the copilot’s chair. Again, not luxurious but padded just enough and sensibly proportioned, with a high back and a lumbar support. (For those long space flights: absolute murder on your lower back.) “Any Cardassians around?”

Vaavek’s head swiveled so smoothly it might have been oiled. “None, but I suspect that will change within the next twenty-four hours when that Cardassian scout comes through on patrol.”

“What’s our position?”

“On the perimeter of the system; 600,000,000 kilometers from the neutron star.” Vaavek’s sensitive fingers played upon his console. “Magnetic field is quite high, but one would expect that of a magnetar. Accreting gas from the remnants of this system’s supernova as well as the weaker brown star of the binary are being forced to flow along field lines to the magnetic poles of the neutron star. That shouldn’t pose much of a problem for us, but because the magnetic axis and rotational axis of the star aren’t co-aligned, the star’s an accretion-powered pulsar, with X-ray pulsations sweeping out once per rotation. Those pulsations combined with random gamma ray bursts from the star itself and a strong stellar wind from the brown star make more detailed sensor resolution quite difficult.”

“Mmmm,” Talma murmured, not really listening. Science always had given her a headache. She indulged in a stretch, arching her back and finishing with something very close to a purr. “Less technobabble, if you don’t mind.”

Vulcans were not known to smile, though they would, on occasion, give the ghost of a smirk. One touched Vaavek’s lips now. “There are two stars. One’s brown, and the other isn’t. The one that isn’t is stealing matter from the brown one. That means, there’s a lot of junk floating around out there, and that makes it very hard to see anything. Right now, we’re far away from the planet. At long range, our sensors and communications aren’t so hot, but then again the Cardassians will be blind as Torkan cavefish, too. At best, they’ll see sensor ghosts, or nothing at all. At worst, their sensors may be able to resolve a signature, but they will still have to rely upon visual.”

“Why, Vaavek,” said Talma. “I never knew you had a sense of humor.”

“It is always advisable to know the ways of one’s adversaries.”

“But we’re working together.”

“Precisely.”

Talma gave him a sidelong glance. “What about Chen-Mai?”

“He should have no idea we’re here. We’re early for the rendezvous. He won’t even begin to look until he’s ready to leave the planet’s surface.”

“Yes, we do want to keep that nice element of surprise.”

Vaavek arched his left eyebrow (a feat Talma never could master, though all Vulcans seemed capable of it from birth). “I doubt Chen-Mai will share your enthusiasm.”

“Likely not,” Talma said, pulling her features into a look of mock regret. “Well, he won’t live long enough to worry much about it.”

Chen-Mai had been the perfect choice for her scheme. The man had been in Mahfouz Qadir’s employ for the last seven years, and he’d never once been suspected of skimming. Talma knew. She’d been the one to bring him into the Qatala network. For her glowing reports to the Qatala, Chen-Mai always paid her extremely well and Talma adjusted the take she reported to Qadir accordingly. A beneficial arrangement: collateral built up against the day when Talma made her move. Today, she had decided, was as good a day as any. She had no intention of parting with whatever Chen-Mai and company had found, whether that was specs for a portal, or lots and lots of treasure. (Jevonite didn’t exactly grow on trees.) Likewise, she had no intention of letting Chen-Mai—and whomever he’d been careless enough to leave alive—get a day older.

And that,though he didn’t know it, included Vaavek. Sivek. Whatever.

“Well,” she said, her tone bright and cheery, “then let’s get on with it, shall we?”