Текст книги "Catalyst of Sorrows "

Автор книги: Margaret Bonanno

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“Of course it would!” Sisko said plaintively, turning toward her, stroking her cheek, cradling her head tenderly in one of his big hands.

He kissed her then, and for a long time neither of them said anything.

“You said yourself you don’t know where you want to go in your career,” she murmured later, snuggled against his shoulder. “Maybe this mission will help show you the way.”

“I just miss you,” he said, much calmer, settling down toward sleep at last. “Even when I’m with you, I miss you.”

“A man obsessed!” Jennifer repeated with a smile. She waited until his deep breathing told her he’d gone to sleep before she too closed her eyes.

The next morning, Benjamin Sisko scooped Jake up in a bear hug and danced him around the room.

“And how is Captain Jake this morning?”

“Going to kiddergarten!” Jake announced seriously in spite of being spun around and in grave danger of being tickled.

The elder Sisko stopped spinning and matched Jake’s seriousness with his own.

“Kiddergarten, eh? That’s a very important assignment,” he said, lowering Jake to the floor. “Are you fully prepared, Captain?”

Jake stood up as tall as he could. “Aye, sir!”

“Well, then, we’d better get you there at warp speed!” Sisko announced, scooping him up again and carrying him out of the kitchen at a run, amid much whooping and giggling.

Chapter 8

She’ll never get out of dock!was Sisko’s first thought. As he brought the shuttlepod around to view the ship in all her ugly entirety, he tried not to let his despair show on his face.

She was a merchanter, of a class that he thought had been decommissioned nearly a century before, mainly because its designers, desperate to maximize interior space for cargo, had routed far too much of her workings to the exterior, making her vulnerable not only to weapons fire, but even to casual space debris.

She looked like a gigantic horseshoe crab, her engine nacelles tapering aft from the curve of the forward hull into ridiculously narrow finials which, Sisko recalled from a tech manual subheading on how not to design a ship, also doubled as weapons ports. Now there was a brilliant idea! Run your plasma weapons off the same outtake conduits as your matter/antimatter flux and hope every time you fire you don’t blow yourself up in the process. But Sisko assumed the weapons had been deactivated, possibly even removed, for the sake of cover. They were supposed to be peaceful merchants dealing in dry goods and machine parts, not the contraband runners these ships were clearly designed for. Somehow the distinction didn’t cheer him.

Sisko maneuvered the pod under the hulk’s keel, shaking his head in dismay at the number of conduits, holding tanks, and jury-rigged components he could identify, right out there in the open. Talk about a soft underbelly! A kid with a slingshot could damage this ship. It was a flying bomb. Couldn’t Starfleet have done better? Or was that the point—to make this ship seem so hopeless she wasn’t worth investigating?

“Permission to speak candidly, Mr. Sisko,” Uhura said quietly beside him. She’d been watching the play of emotions on his expressive face, and could sense the steam rising under his collar.

“Those stabilizers have seen better days, Admiral,” Sisko remarked tightly, containing himself, his expert eye noticing hairline fractures that would have to be sealed before this thing went anywhere. “And if I had the time and the resources, I’d customize the retro bafflers and do something about streamlining her prow.”

“But since you have neither, you’ll make do,” Uhura said dryly. “You also don’t want to defeat the purpose of this mission by making this thing look like anything other than a hunk of junk. Which, as you’ve obviously surmised, is what it’s meant to be. We want any Romulan who picks her up on long-range and comes alongside for a look to dismiss her as not worth getting his hands dirty. Shall we go aboard?”

It took Sisko a moment to find the docking port amid all the shadows and odd angles and, once he did, he eased the pod up to it as gently as he could, as if afraid a sudden jolt would cause the entire ship to cave in and disintegrate into flakes of rust. Not surprisingly, the airlock groaned when he activated it.

Uhura led the way, and Sisko followed her into the cargo bay, glancing wistfully forward toward the conn, which he’d wanted to check out first. Alternatively, he’d have liked to head straight for the engines, which would be where he’d want to spend most of his time before departure. But for whatever reason Uhura wanted him to see the cargo bay first. Well, all right; it was her show.

At least the cargo bay, unlike the gangway, was big enough for him to stand upright without ducking his head. But when Uhura stopped in the middle of one of the narrow aisles formed by several rows of monolithic gray containers as if awaiting his approval, Sisko didn’t know what to say.

“Look around you, Lieutenant,” she said off his puzzled expression. “What do you see?”

“Containers, ma’am,” Sisko answered, hoping he didn’t sound sarcastic. Obviously he was being tested. He glanced at the padd readouts on the nearer ones. “Containers whose manifests tell me in Standard and what I assume is Romulan that they’re carrying grain and bolts of fabric and machine parts.”

“And, being a pragmatist,” a voice issued from the direction of a narrow, rusting catwalk Sisko just now noticed running around the upper perimeter of the cavernous space, “you believe exactly what you’re told. No one would ever accuse you of uncertainty.”

The voice belonged to a lanky older man with snow-white hair, dressed in civilian clothes but with a vaguely Starfleet air about him. He took the treacherously narrow steps down from the catwalk lightly and with extraordinary speed for a man of his apparent age and strode jauntily down the narrow aisle to join them. He had an infectious smile, and that smile was directed at Uhura, though he was sizing up Sisko as he approached.

“He’s young,” he remarked as if Sisko weren’t there.

“So were you once, Heisenberg,” Uhura replied warmly. It was obvious these two had known each other for a long time. “Care to show him what you’ve got here?”

Activating a device about half the size of a communicator concealed in the palm of his hand, Heisenberg pointed it toward the manifest padd built into the side of a container near the end of the aisle, and the container began to move. Actually, it unfolded. The top slid sideways and down, fitting snugly against the rear wall of the container. Then all four sides lowered gracefully to the deck like the petals of some huge metallic flower, revealing not the machine parts the manifest declared, but what looked like a section of a modular medical laboratory.

Countertops slid into place, lights lit up, instrument panels continued a conversation with each other that they’d obviously been conducting in the dark, rows of beakers and retorts evidenced bubbling activities Sisko could only guess at. Transfixed, he barely noticed that Heisenberg, with a spryness that belied his age, was moving among all the containers in the bay, though effecting the same magic on only some of them.

“Some of them are empty,” the old man was explaining, his voice echoing as he periodically disappeared from view, “designed to telescope into themselves to make room for the lab modules, which have been randomly distributed among containers that actually do contain what they say they do…”

As he explained, the containers, as if on cue, did exactly what he said they would do. The choreography was so complicated that even to Sisko’s engineer’s eye it looked like magic.

“I’ll provide you with a schematic, Mr. Sisko, which you will commit to memory before departure,” Heisenberg was saying, his voice nearing and fading as he hopped out of the way of each opening container like an antic spider. “You’ll also guard this little gizmo—” Indicating the tiny control unit. “—with your life. From my hand to yours, and no one—repeat, no one—else’s.”

“Yessir…” Sisko said vaguely, unable to keep himself from gawking as the transformation was completed. An ordinary cargo bay inside the ugliest ship in Federation space had become a compact medical laboratory, its components fitted into a single module, as complete as that of any starship’s sickbay. The whole thing was an engineering and logistical marvel.

“Dr. Selar will be continuing her research on the virus while you’re in transit,” Uhura was explaining. “You and Lieutenant Tuvok will be collecting air and soil samples on the planets you visit, looking for contaminants in the water, the food supply, anywhere, while Selar attempts to get tissue samples from anyone reporting an unexplained illness. All of that comes back here at the end of the day for analysis. There are facilities to set up a small field hospital, including a reversed air-flow room and a full-spectrum decon beam to screen incoming personnel for anything contagious that might be clinging to their skin or clothes.”

“I see,” Sisko said, half listening, moving not quite as quickly as Heisenberg, examining the internal configuration of each container in growing amazement. Uhura, pleased that he was now with the mission in soul as well as body, let him woolgather.

One last module opened to reveal an apparatus even Sisko couldn’t quite identify. He was about to examine it when he suddenly realized who had created all of this.

“Dr. Heisenberg?” he said, not even attempting to keep the awe out of his voice. “TheDr. Heisenberg? The man who single-handedly kept refining Starfleet’s sensors to counter improvements in the Romulan cloaking device?”

“The same, I’m afraid,” the white-haired gent acknowledged, containing his admiration for his own work long enough to join his guests. “Although we have little knowledge of what improvements have been made in the cloaking device since the Tomed Incident. Love to get my hands on one. Damn clever, those Romulans.”

Sisko turned slowly, absorbing the whole gestalt.“This is incredible, sir! I’ve studied some of your designs, but I’ve never before seen one in action. But, I don’t know how to say this, sir…I thought you were dead.”

“Ah, well…” Heisenberg began, scratching one ear contemplatively. “There are reasons why we want the universe at large to believe that I am.” He and Uhura exchanged glances, and Sisko thought he understood. Heisenberg was an SI operative, designer of brilliant gadgetry for agents to use in the field, whose notoriety in a previous career made it necessary for him to be invisible.

“Of course, sir,” Sisko said, a trace of hero worship lingering in his voice. The urge to tell Jennifer about his encounter would have to remain just that, an urge. “These modules are incredible!”

“And the beauty of them,” Uhura explained with a kind of maternal glow at Heisenberg, “is the double reading. Go over them with the most sophisticated scanner, and they’ll show you what you think is inside them.”

“How—?” Sisko started to ask Heisenberg, then examined the thickness of one container’s sides and figured it out for himself. “False walls. You’ve installed bafflers in the intramural space.”

“Programmed to emit molecular readouts mimicking what ought to be inside each container,” Heisenberg acknowledged.

Sisko grinned. “Brilliant!”

“Heisenberg is, shall we say, an expert on enclosed spaces.” Uhura added with a twinkle.

It was obviously an in-joke that Sisko didn’t get. Did Heisenberg actually look embarrassed?

“I assume, Mr. Sisko, that you’ll want to see what makes her tick?” he said.

Sisko’s face lit up. “I would indeed, sir.”

The engine room was as grimy and rundown as he’d expected, but he found himself rubbing his hands together in anticipation. Jennifer was right; he spent too much time in the realm of theory. Here he would finally get a chance to practice some of the things he’d only dreamed about. He would take this hunk of junk apart and put her back together and have her purring like a kitten in no time.

Sisko stopped himself. Only if you can do it on the fly, fool! The fact is, you have no time. According to the briefing Admiral Uhura gave you on the way up here, you’ve got to get this beast up and running and out of here by tomorrow and fly her into the Neutral Zone, if you have to hold her together with spit and paperclips in order to do it.

As he poked and prodded her, grimacing at the cramped space he’d have to work in, hearing sounds he didn’t like, aware that one of the atmospheric converters was overheating even sitting in dock, and wondering where that drip was coming from, he saw that Heisenberg was watching him appreciatively.

“How fast will she go?” Sisko asked at last, wiping his hands on a rag he’d found wrapped carelessly around an atmospheric conduit, ducking his head and following Heisenberg forward to the conn. Admiral Uhura was no longer with them, and he assumed she’d stayed behind in the cargo bay, possibly receiving more incoming from the rest of her team.

“Guess,” Heisenberg said with his characteristic twinkle.

“I’m guessing warp 4 flat out,” Sisko said.

Heisenberg was scratching his ear again. “Not quite.”

“You mean she’s slower than that? With all due respect, sir, why don’t we just paint a target on her side and have done with it?”

“Actually,” Heisenberg said diffidently, “she can manage warp 7 or even a tad more if you speak to her nicely.”

That rocked Sisko back on his heels. “You can’t tell me this ship can go that fast.”

Heisenberg shrugged. “Don’t need to tell you; I can show you. Computer: Engine specs, code ‘Uncertainty.’ ” A schematic appeared on the heretofore blank forward screen. “Modifications here, here, and here.”

Sisko whistled appreciatively.

“I’m hoping no one but an engineer would notice them,” Heisenberg said. “There’s also a set of blind controls double-rigged on her impulse controls to conceal her special skills from prying eyes. But I guess, being a pragmatist, you’ll have to take her out and discover all that for yourself.”

“But she’s not built for it,” Sisko objected. “And with all those exterior components, she’ll rattle apart.”

“Will she?” Heisenberg seemed surprised at the thought. “She didn’t the last time I took her for a spin.”

“You’ve reinforced her bulkheads as well,” Sisko guessed. “How, without it showing up on scanners?” He thought about it. “Oh. The same way you’ve double-hulled the containers.”

“Bright lad!” Heisenberg said. “Truth is, with all the modifications, she weighs almost twice what she’s supposed to. But unless the Romulans—or even one of ours—can actually haul her into a spacedock and put her on a scale…”

“One of ours?” Sisko repeated, but Heisenberg was headed back to the cargo bay.

“The outer hull is also equipped with bafflers programmed to feed back the same readings as the manifests on each individual container. Scan the ship from the outside, and you’ll see rolls of Tholian silk in the most alluring colors, replacement parts for Romulan food replicators, a consignment of blue corn destined for the Draken colonies, assorted cams and stem bolts. One container actually holds medical supplies, but none worth stealing. More of the take-two-aspirin-and-call-mein-the-morning variety, but they may come in handy for trade.”

The lab modules continued their humming, blinking, bubbling conversation with each other. As Sisko had guessed, Uhura was waiting for them here, sitting primly on a stool behind a medical console that twinkled like a Christmas tree, looking like a schoolgirl on the first day of biology lab. Heisenberg, still in lecture mode, concluded his talk.

“Someone would actually have to board the ship and manually breach the containers—since you won’t let anyone take the control unit from you—to find the lab modules or the transmitter.”

“Which brings me to a question, Doctor,” Sisko said. “If we are stopped and boarded, by the Romulans or, as you say, someone from our side—because once we cross the Zone we’ll be in violation of treaties on both sides—but someone with enough clout comes aboard and demands to see the cargo bay, how quickly can these modules—”

He never finished his sentence. In the time it took Heisenberg to wink at Uhura, who, knowing the floor plan, wisely stepped out of the way, the containers began to reverse their initial opening dance, refolding and sealing themselves with such rapidity that Sisko almost didn’t know where to duck first. When the show was over and everything had been put back into place in an uncannily brief amount of time, he tried to recover his dignity.

“And what if someone’s inside one of the modules at the time?”

“We’re assuming they’ll hear the commotion you and Mr. Tuvok are creating in the control cabin trying to keep the invaders out, and manage to step away in time,” Heisenberg explained. “If not, I’ve programmed in just enough space for an average-sized person to conceal themselves—not comfortably, but safely—and enough breathable oxygen for about thirty minutes. If you can’t subdue your attackers in that amount of time, the assumption is they’re going to take over the ship and your cover will be blown and your crew captured regardless of what I’ve done to prevent it. The bottom line, Mr. Sisko, is that technology can only do so much. The rest is up to you. And now, just one more thing…” Heisenberg motioned toward the mystery apparatus in the final container. “A little joint venture on the part of the admiral and myself. This one amazes even me.”

It was the module that had mystified Sisko when he first saw it. Heisenberg allowed him to puzzle over it for several minutes.

“I give up!” Sisko said finally. “What is it?”

“Only the most amazing holotransmitter not yet known to modern technology,” Heisenberg said. “It’s a little bit of transporter technology grafted onto a great deal of communications wizardry. With this, the admiral and her medical team will be able to accompany you on your journey.”

With that Dr. Selar “appeared” at one of the lab consoles. She glanced up at the three of them as if it were they who had appeared in her space and not the other way around.

“How goes it, Selar?” Uhura asked.

“Progressing, Admiral. We have been able to track some samples of the pathogen by sound using wave transmitters, and consequently to increase the accuracy with which we detect mutations.”

“Excellent…I think,” Uhura said. “I’ll get back to you on that. We’re just testing the holotech at the moment.”

“Understood,” Selar said as she shimmered out of sight.

“Holograms,” Sisko shrugged, unimpressed for the first time. “Fun to play with at close range in real time. But impractical for long-range transmission. They’d be detected immediately.”

Heisenberg and Uhura exchanged glances.

“He’s young,” Uhura admitted.

“O ye of little faith…” Heisenberg shook his head. “You did not hear me say what I’m about to say, but SI’s best comm people and I have created a kind of piggy-back technique that rides existing carrier waves and is virtually undetectable.”

“It’s only a prototype,” Uhura explained. “It’ll be decades before it’s standard issue, but what we’ve developed so far will be tested on this mission. You, Tuvok, and Dr. Selar will physically be on the ship inside the Zone, but with the help of Heisenberg’s wizardry, Dr. Crusher and Dr. McCoy will ‘go along’ as consultants. And I’ll be popping in from time to time as well.”

Sisko looked from one to the other of them. They seemed to think this was the most brilliant bit of technology aboard this old ship, but he was still unimpressed.

“I can’t see how that’s going to help,” he began tentatively. “Or how it can go undetected…”

Heisenberg motioned him toward the controls. “Run a diagnostic right now and tell me if you detect any stray transmissions.”

Sisko did as he was told and, not surprisingly, came up with nothing. “Not now, sir. You’ve shut down the transmission to Dr. Selar. There’s no reason why there should be—”

“Tsk, tsk, tsk!” Uhura said as she shimmered out of sight.

“What the—?” was all Sisko could manage.

Heisenberg was chuckling. “You reported to her office, walked together to the pod bay, got in the shuttle and came all the way up here together. Or so you thought.”

Sisko said nothing.

“She’s been walking through the choreography in her office, son. She was never here. And neither am I.”

Now it was Heisenberg’s turn to disappear.

“But…” Sisko suddenly had to sit down, but he wondered, if he did, whether any seemingly solid surface around him might not also disappear. If the entire ship suddenly vanished out from under him at this point, he wouldn’t have been surprised.

“All right, that may have been a little over the top,” he heard Heisenberg’s voice behind him. The old man—or his holo; who could tell anymore?—came toward him, the same smile on his face, the tiny control for the containers still half-concealed in the palm of his hand. “No more tricks, Mr. Sisko, I promise. This is the real me.”

He held out his hand and Sisko shook it.

“The real me has been running this from the forward cabin until now.”

“But Admiral Uhura—?”

“Never left Earth.”

As if on cue, she reappeared, beaming at them both.

Sisko didn’t realize he’d been holding his breath. He let it out now in a great sigh of exasperation. Then he began to laugh.

Heisenberg was fiddling with the holotransmitter. “I think that means we did good,” he told Uhura. He handed Sisko the tiny control unit. “She’s all yours, Lieutenant. Be good to her.”

With that he winked, gave Uhura a sloppy half-salute, and made his jaunty way along the gangway, ducking his head to get through.

There was a long moment of silence as Sisko studied the control in his hand and considered everything he’d just seen. Uhura was so quiet he all but forgot she was there, until he remembered she wasn’t. This comm thing was going to make him dizzy if he thought about it too hard.

Uhura watched him glance up at the deck plating above them, assessing conduits, listening to the old hulk breathe. Finally he found his voice.

“Does she have a name, Admiral? The ship, I mean?”

It was something Uhura hadn’t considered. “Not as far as I know, Lieutenant. Registry’s got her listed by number, but I don’t believe she ever had a name.”

“Well, she does now,” Sisko said with a grin. “I hereby dub her Albatross,because while she’s not exactly hanging around my neck, I know she’s going to come to haunt me. How long can I spend with her before departure?”

Pleased at his enthusiasm, Uhura smiled back. “The away team meets in my office at 0800 tomorrow. You’re set for departure at 0900. I expect you’ll have this bird in shape to fly by then.”

“Yes, ma’am!”

With a spring in his step, grinning like a kid with his first treehouse, Sisko headed for the engine room.

“Numbers,” Koval said. “Give me numbers.”

“How am I supposed to do that?” the voice on the other end protested. “They’re changing literally by the hour; where the seeds have been activated, entire populations are dropping in their tracks. Why are you asking me? The transmitter you gave me doesn’t have that much range; you’ve got access to more accurate numbers than I possibly could.”

“Not the numbers of dead, you fool!” Koval snapped. “The numbers of seedings necessary to achieve critical mass.”

“Oh, forgive me. This thing is getting on my nerves. I thought by now we’d…here…Green Sector, one hundred four, all activated, Blue Sector, forty-one released, eight activated so far. Inside the Zone—”

“Make that forty-two,” Koval said.

“Say again?”

“Forty-two on the Federation side. One little seed has escaped the main pod all by itself and drifted across the Zone without any help from us.”

There followed a long silence.

“Should I be pleased at that information?”

“Considering where it landed, you should be thrilled,” Koval said, then interrupted before the other could speak. “You won’t lose your nerve now, I trust? I have not cared for the tone in your voice of late.”

“I’ll be fine as soon as I can release my data. When can I release my data? If this thing spreads too far, even the medication won’t stop it, and knowing the Federation, they’ll spend months questioning my data until somebody important dies…”

“Are you squeamish?” Koval wondered half to himself. “Does the thought of all that death weigh on your conscience? Or is it just that you’re greedy for all the accolades that will come your way once you announce your cure? Remember, the disease has to have a name first. It has to kill enough people to be seen as a threat before you can offer a cure.”

“How much longer do you intend to let this go on?”

“Don’t question me.” Koval’s voice, never warm, went colder still. One finger hovered over the toggle that would terminate the transmission. “I find it unpleasant. I don’t believe I need to remind you that you don’t want to give me the least bit of unpleasantness.”

“It wasn’t supposed to happen this way,” Cinchona muttered to himself, forgetting how acute the woman’s hearing was. “If he’d targeted a planetary leader, someone visible. It should be over by now…”

Boralesh paused in her kneading. “What’s that, husband?”

“The universe, my sweet,” he answered quickly. “The universe is against us. Some of us believe that there is an innate rightness in the way things work. That all we have to do is work hard and we will be rewarded for our labor.”

Boralesh dusted her hands with more flour and began to work the dough anew, repressing any rude comments she might be inspired to make. “Work” and her husband were not two words she could put together in the same sentence.

“The universe will reward you as you deserve, husband,” she said dryly, knowing her subtlety would elude him. “Give it time.”

“Got to release my data,” he murmured. “He has to understand; I’ve got to release my data…”

Boralesh smiled secretly. The morning light in her cheerful kitchen was kinder to him than it ought to be, softening his chronically furrowed brow, his lipless mouth and suspicious squint into something almost attractive. She reminded herself that if he hadn’t wed her no one would have, and she ought to be grateful. And yet, she’d grown up among the healers of her own country and had seen how their work shaped them. They became more open, more beautiful as they became more evolved in the practice of their craft. The saying “heal others and you heal yourself” had proven true among her own kind.

But the more her spouse labored over his mysterious methods in the cave below the village, the harder, the more shut down, the more furtive he seemed to become. He thrashed and moaned and ground his teeth in his sleep, his digestion troubled him, and even her best herbs had no effect.

She had crept to the mouth of his secret cave more than once and heard him speaking in tongues. Sometimes he seemed to be communing with some god or gods, because there would be silences and then he would answer. Whenever he returned to the house after one of those sessions, he was silent, moody, more impatient than usual with the children, and he couldn’t eat or sleep at all for days.

Did she love him? Boralesh wondered. Or did she cling to him because without him her children’s lives and her own would be meaningless? It was not a question she could answer. As her hands worked the dough for the homemade bread he loved so much, she added some herbs from her secret store and bided her time.