“I’ve got a definite fix,” Massey said, her eyes darting between the graphic on her screen and the main viewer. “Bearing seven-two-seven, mark three.”
“We should be right on top of it, Skipper,” Chris Thayer confirmed from ops.
“All stop,” Walsh ordered, his face impassive. Nick Locarno stood nearby, his presence on the bridge conspicuous, though he remained quiet as the captain called the shots. “Mister Harlow, any changes in the contact?”
“Negative,” the ship’s engineer replied. Tristan Harlow remained on his feet, leaning over his console as he searched through the dizzying array of energy patterns emanating from the cloud. “No changes in aspect ratio, or any disturbances to indicate active propulsion. Whatever’s out there, it’s dead in the water.”
Walsh turned back to tactical. “Defensive posture?”
“No shields or weapons lock,” Massey said. “But we don’t have them either. Too much interference in the surrounding area.”
“Pay your money, take your chances,” Walsh muttered, as Reed slipped in next to the command chair. She gave the captain an affirming nod, which he returned with a wry smile. “Z-axis thrusters, Mister Thayer. Minus three hundred meters.”
Thayer nudged Celtic downward, a slow push marked by a quickening series of pings from tactical. In those moments, Reed felt her heartbeat move in perfect synchronicity with that sound, as if it had become the pulse of the entire ship. She leaned into the viewscreen and the mists that buried the heart of Korso, eagerly anticipating a revelation as that ghostly fog lifted.
Locarno ambled in next to her, brushing an arm against hers as he did the same thing, his expression transfixed. In a space packed with other human beings, his was the only presence Reed felt—and then just barely. Everyone was beyond the confines, out there in the eddies and currents of the Spanse, each wanting to be the first to see what had brought them to the most frigid regions of space.
And, like the sins of old, it manifested itself to them.
It arose, a leviathan coming up from the depths, lumbering into view as Celtic descended upon its motionless mass. They dropped in so close that the object quickly filled the entire screen, the details of its surface little more than a blur in the strange haze of volatile gases that enveloped it. Even so, the shapes and lines exuded a strong familiarity to Reed—a feeling mirrored in Locarno’s reaction, which turned ashen with realization.
“Reduce mag on viewer,” Walsh said.
“We’re already at one-to-one,” Thayer replied. “This is real size.”
“Christ, she’s big,” the captain whispered.
“Trying to get a configuration on her now,” Harlow added. “Sensors are still giving us problems, Skipper. It’s nearly impossible to get a consistent reading through all that terminium.”
“Then give us some distance,” Walsh said to Thayer. “Let’s see what we’re looking at.”
With a command from ops, Celtic’s thrusters pushed her away from the object. As its massive dimensions receded, more of its overall design became apparent—and the déjá vu of its initial appearance gave way to a stunning confirmation. Reed followed its structure from bow to stern, starting with an enormous round spaceframe that tapered into an obvious saucer section. That primary hull was mounted on a smaller ventral secondary, which had two elongated engine nacelles that flanked its entire length—a tight, compacted structure topped off by a large weapons pod. The ship listed sharply from Celtic’s point of view, making it impossible to spy her markings from this angle, but of one fact there was no doubt.
This was a Federation starship.
“It’s a Nebula class,” Locarno announced, his features rigid as he recited the vessel’s specifications from memory. “Better than four hundred meters long, three hundred meters at the beam. Seven hundred and fifty officers and crew.”
Reed blinked at him in surprise. “A hobby of yours?”
“Once upon a time,” Locarno replied, his eyes drifting back to his study of the ship. She was upturned from Celtic’s relative position, which gave an even greater impression of a derelict, her running lights as dark as the viewports that looked in on her lifeless decks. Thayer slowly rolled Celtic over until the two ships matched orientation, then assumed a parallel position on her starboard. Electrical discharges enshrouded the larger vessel in eerie backlight, concealing all but her most obvious features. “What are you doing all the way out here, my friend?”
“Looks like she’s dead,” Massey said, reading off her panel. “No active power output, no residual energies—just that intermittent signal the Feds picked up.”
“Can you isolate it?” Walsh asked.
Massey piped it in over the speaker. In between bursts of static, a pattern emerged, like some kind of alien Morse code, though nothing like Reed had ever heard.
“What is that?” she asked. “A distress call?”
Locarno shook his head. “It’s a seeker signal—a generic broadcast trying to establish a link between computer systems.”
“Is that standard for a Nebula?”
“No,” Locarno said, his tone latent with suspicion. “Not for any Federation ship.”
A grave concern washed over the captain’s face, though he showed no signs of backing off. “Mister Harlow, what’s her condition?”
“Intact, as far as I can tell,” the engineer replied. He frowned curiously as some of the readings finally began to appear on his screen, profiles that he compared against schematics for that vessel class. “Some alterations to her structure, though.”
Walsh got up to take a closer look, with Reed and Locarno in tow.
“Right there,” Harlow explained, running a finger along the starboard nacelle. “The support pylons have been reinforced, probably for improved warp dynamics. And here,” he continued, pointing at the weapons pod mated to the aft section of the primary hull. “The module should be housing a torpedo stack or phaser array, but that looks more like a large, single emitter.”
“Maybe she’s experimental,” Reed suggested.
“I don’t think so,” Locarno said, turned toward Walsh. “I know Starfleet designs, Skipper. This doesn’t look like anything on their drawing boards.”
“She’s obviously undergone a major refit,” Reed persisted. “How else can you explain the modifications?”
“I can’t,” Locarno admitted. “All I know is that they weren’t done at any Federation shipyards.”
Walsh took it all in, then returned to his command chair. He stared at the viewscreen for a few moments, as Celtic passed into the shadow of the larger vessel, taking an even breath while he decided what to make of her.
“Open shutters, Mister Thayer,” he said. “Light her up.”
Two concentrated beams of light split the darkness between the two ships, falling upon the Nebula class’s ventral hull. Celtic then began a slow pass, her searchlights carving out the way ahead of her, casting revelation in flickering, tantalizing glimpses. It could have been an optical illusion, but Reed immediately noticed how odd the keel plates looked. Their meshy texture extended all the way forward to the main deflector dish, as if the entire surface was covered in a second skin.
“What the hell is that?” Locarno asked.
“You got me,” Reed answered, shaking her head slowly. “It’s almost like an ablative shield coating.”
As the beams diverged they moved down the length of the nacelles, illuminating more of the same. The Starfleet insignias near the forward end were almost completely obscured, the registry markings little more than a smear. On top of that lay a complex matrix of exterior piping—conduits grafted onto the exterior of the ship that spoiled her graceful lines, hinting at some unknown purpose beneath.
“What have they done to you?” the captain asked quietly.
Thayer poured on more thrusters, increasing speed. He then maneuvered Celtic up and over the Nebula’s saucer section, at the same time bringing her searchlights to bear. They traced a path from the ma
in shuttlebay over the bridge, tiny bright spots crossing over each other until they finally found the large registry number emblazoned across the front. It was visible only in patches, nearly erased beneath a patchwork of shielding and welded plates, but as Celtic swung around, the identity of Evan Walsh’s prize finally settled into focus, emerging from the broken bits and jigsaw pieces:
NCC-66874
And above that, her name in a former life:
U.S.S. Reston
“Oh my God,” Locarno whispered, circling around Walsh and then launching himself at the tactical station. He shoved Massey aside and took over the console himself, holding her off with one hand as she yelled at him to stop. “Skipper, you need to divert all available power to the weapons systems,” he said, cutting through Massey’s protests. “I mean every last thing you’ve got. I’m calculating optimal strike points right now.”
“Wait just a bloody second,” Walsh retorted as he snapped up from his chair. “All of a sudden you want to destroy a Federation starship? What the hell is going on here, Nicky?”
“We have to,” Locarno insisted, with such intensity that the entire bridge crew shot glances back and forth between the two men, wondering what they should do. “The last anyone heard of that ship, her status was listed as missing and presumed destroyed.”
“Presumed,” the captain said. “Obviously, that didn’t happen.”
“She went missing at the Battle of Sector 001, Evan.”
An abrupt silence dropped over the bridge. Nobody here needed a lesson on the significance of that battle, or the implications of Reston’s presence here. Locarno, however, needed to make it real for all of them. He needed to say it out loud.
“That ship was captured by the Borg.”
Some of the crew had been there. They had shown up after the fighting, hoping to scrape together some easy salvage before Starfleet could calculate their losses—but the sight of so much carnage had been enough to make even the most jaded privateer tremble. Most couldn’t bring themselves to pick off the bones of the thousands who had died there, and hadn’t spoken about it since, except in the hushed tones that Reed overheard from time to time, with words that conveyed the very essence of fear.
The same fear that now permeated the bridge.
“The Borg are finished,” Walsh scoffed, trying to break the spell cast by the mere mention of their name. “No more conduits, no more jumping out of the Delta Quadrant.”
“According to Starfleet,” Locarno cautioned. “Do you really believe they told everyone the full story, Evan?”
The captain bristled at the sudden challenge to his authority, looking at his first officer to back him up. Reed didn’t like the way Locarno handled it, but she grudgingly agreed with him. “There are standing laws regarding the discovery of any Borg artifact,” Reed said, treading cautiously. “They are to be destroyed immediately—no exceptions.”
“That would be well and good if we followed the law,” Walsh pointed out, “but we don’t now, do we?” He then walked up to the engineering station, where Tristan Harlow stood by with an expression that was a mask of doubts. Walsh burned through them with a single fiery glimpse, poring over the console for himself. “Have you detected any sort of life signs coming from that ship, Mister Harlow?”
The engineer cleared his throat. “No, sir.”
“Has she reacted at all to our presence?”
“Not that I can tell, Skipper.”
“Then is it your best judgment that the ship is dead?”
Harlow paused before answering, not wanting that responsibility on his shoulders. Reed, in fact, was shocked that Walsh would put that kind of burden on him. Never before had she seen the captain abdicate his position like that. She just hoped that no one else saw the move for what it was—cheap desperation.
“That seems to be the case,” Harlow finally replied.
“Very good,” Walsh said, patting him on the shoulder. He then turned to face the rest of the crew, as if finishing a performance. “All of us understand the sacrifices we’ve made to get here—all of the toil and treasure we’ve spent to make this operation possible. So before any of us start thinking about throwing it all away, I ask you to take a look out there.” He pointed at the viewscreen, as everyone followed his direction. “That, my friends, is a starship—fully loaded with phasers, warp drive, computers, and every other thing you could imagine. And she’s intact. You could spend ten lifetimes and never come upon such a fine piece of salvage—and she’s ours for the taking.”
Rayna Massey spoke up with her characteristic bravado. “What about the Borg?”
“What about them indeed,” Walsh answered, pacing the bridge slowly, personally engaging each one of them. “The Borg mean weapons. The Borg mean advanced technology. The Borg mean untold secrets. Just think about it.” He paused for dramatic effect, allowing it all to sink in. “Nobody has ever salvaged a Borg vessel, because nobody has ever gotten this close. God only knows what kind of wonders we might find on board, or what kind of price they’ll fetch, once we tear them from her.”
Walsh smiled as he spoke those last words, getting the others to nod in agreement—and that was when Reed saw it: a steady progression of collective greed, displacing the trepidation that had held sway only moments before. They were hungry—and once aroused, that hunger demanded satisfaction. Even Reed, who knew better, felt it stirring deep within.
“We still have forty hours,” the captain said. “I say we make the most of that time. If there’s anyone here who doesn’t agree, it won’t be held against him. I’m sure the rest of the crew would be more than happy to partake of his share.”
Everyone laughed. It was all the affirmation Walsh needed.
“Then let’s get moving,” he concluded, returning to his chair as the crew resumed their duties with a newfound confidence—all except for Locarno, who turned and left the bridge without saying a word. Walsh seemed rather smug about it, at least in Reed’s view, like an old man playing cutthroat with his son.
“He’ll get over it, Jenna,” the captain said.
Reed decided not to press him on it.
“I’m sure he will, Skipper.”
“Nicky doesn’t understand our business,” Walsh explained. “He’s a loner by trade. The risks he takes are his and his alone—and so are the rewards.”
She kept staring at the hatch where Locarno had gone, feeling suddenly alone, as if she were the only remaining voice of reason on the bridge. Walsh, however, quashed that voice before she could allow herself to raise it.
“Organize a boarding party,” he said. “Take Harlow along and see if he can get Reston maneuvering under her own power. If not, we’ll have to rig her for towing.”
“That’ll slow us down quite a bit, Skipper,” Reed cautioned. “We’ll be lucky to make three-quarters impulse power hooked up to something that big.”
“It’s good enough to get us out of the Castis system before Starfleet arrives.”
“What then?”
“We stow her someplace while I figure that out,” he snapped, losing patience with her. “Any more questions?”
Reed lowered her eyes. “No, sir.”
“Good. Then carry out your orders.”
“Aye, Captain.”
Her team had already assembled in the transporter room. Three of them—Thayer, Massey, and Harlow—had left the bridge with Reed, taking just enough time to suit up and load weapons before heading down to join the others she had selected for the boarding party. James Casari, a mate from engineering, was there to assist Harlow with Reston’s critical systems, while Nicole Carson came over from sickbay to handle the medical emergencies that Reed prayed would never happen.
“Thanks for coming on such short notice,” Reed said to everyone as she entered, trying to lighten the mood. A few of them attempted a smile before immersing themselves back in their preparations, checking their gear packs and zipping up their envirosuits. “Sorry there isn’t time for a full briefing, b
ut I think you all have a pretty good idea what we’re dealing with. Everything else we know is on your padds, along with your assignments. From what we can tell, there is some atmosphere on board, probably left over from when the ship went dark—but until we can get life support fully functional, everybody breathes through their packs. I don’t want someone opening a door and walking into a vacuum.”
While Reed was talking, Carson started making the rounds with a hypospray. She used some unlabeled vials from her medkit, attaching a single dose for each person and injecting it through their necks before they put their helmets on. “It’s a combo stimulant and immunization booster,” the medic explained as she injected Reed. “I wasn’t sure what might be floating around in there, so I added protection against every bug I could think of.”
Star Trek: Seven Deadly Sins Page 37
