T’Jul had given the Jem’Hadar and the Vorta only moments to decide. Trok did not know what T’Jul actually would have done if she hadn’t gotten the response she’d sought. Fortunately, the Jem’Hadar and the Vorta had chosen—at least as far as Trok thought—wisely.
“The cargo transporters have been networked to provide for the sizable mass,” said a voice via the communications panel.
“Proceed,” Atreev ordered.
“Commencing transport.”
In front of Trok, a high-pitched buzz filled the massive, empty space. Vertical streaks of bright white light formed at its center and reached nearly to the overhead far above the deck, then spread apart horizontally. Between them, illuminated green veins formed, reaching in all directions to form shapes. A final white line manifested high above, then descended, filling in as it did so the full existence of the transporter’s target.
That quickly, the great mass of equipment Trok had located in an industrial plant had been beamed from the surface of Overne III to the Eletrix’s cargo bay. In the brighter light of the ship, it looked smaller, but it still filled the cargo hold from bulkhead to bulkhead, and perhaps two-thirds of the way up to the overhead. Trok gazed at it almost in disbelief. He had traveled a long, winding path over such a long period to realize his goal.
A hand fell on his shoulder. “Go,” Subcommander Atreev told him. “Make your scans and verify that this is the equipment you need. We may not have much time.”
Trok nodded, then raised a scanner that the Eletrix crew had retrieved for him from Ren Fejin. He worked its controls, taking detailed sensor readings. It required some time, and when he’d finished, Atreev accompanied him to the other cargo holds, where Trok performed new sets of scans on the equipment that had been transported to those sites.
When Trok had finished, Atreev led him to the bridge of Eletrix, where the Breen engineer reported his findings. “We have everything we need,” he told Commander T’Jul, who rose from her chair and stood amid the bustle of her command. “With this equipment, the slipstream drive will be ours.”
“Excellent,” T’Jul said, hearing precisely what she wanted to hear from the Breen engineer. Standing in the middle of the Eletrix bridge, she turned toward the communications console off to port. “Lieutenant Tillek,” she said, “open a channel to the Ren Fejin.”
Tillek tapped at his controls. “Channel open.”
“Eletrix to Ren Fejin,” she said. “This is Commander T’Jul.”
“This is Tomalak,” came the immediate reply.
Under normal circumstances, T’Jul would have enlisted her executive officer to oversee the repair efforts aboard the Breen cargo ship. While she trusted in the abilities of Subcommander Atreev far more than in those of Tomalak, the management of the Breen engineers in the mending of their own vessel had not required much skill. It did, however, allow T’Jul to exile Tomalak from her presence, if only for a short while.
“We are prepared to depart,” T’Jul said. “What is the status of the Ren Fejin?” Eletrix required the smaller vessel for cover. If the Romulan warbird traveled through the wormhole, uncloaked and without Enterprise accompanying it, T’Jul knew that her ship would be stopped at Deep Space 9. If Eletrix navigated the wormhole while cloaked, but by itself, the ship would be unmasked by the suspicious Starfleet crew on the space station when the Alpha Quadrant terminus opened for no visible reason.
“Warp power has been fully restored, and life support brought up to acceptable levels for the journey,” Tomalak reported. “The transporter and the shields are unusable, but that should be of little concern at this point. The cloaking device is in the process of being dismantled. We’re ready to leave at any time.”
“Do you have Lieutenant Torlanta’s flight plan?” T’Jul asked.
“We do,” said Tomalak. “It’s already laid in and ready to execute.”
T’Jul nodded. “That’s good work,” she said, trying not to sound grudging. “We’ll signal you at our departure. T’Jul out.” The channel closed with an audible tone.
Looking once more to Tillek, the commander said, “Lieutenant, inform the Jem’Hadar and the Vorta that we have what we need, and that we will be departing at once. Tell them that we will honor our agreement with them as long as they continue to honor it as well. No Dominion ships may follow us until we reach the designated point, where we will leave the Changeling and the Jem’Hadar we captured.”
“Yes, Commander,” Tillek said, and he started to work his panel. After a short time, he said, “Message transmitted and acknowledged.”
At last, T’Jul thought.
“Lieutenant Torlanta, signal the Ren Fejin that we are leaving,” T’Jul said. She turned, walked to her command chair, and sat down. “Take us home.”
37
Kasidy Yates reached up and brushed her hair away from her eyes, then pushed the antigrav sled forward. The cargo floated out of Xhosa and down the ramp into one of Deep Space 9’s cargo holds. She ran the crate to the right, until she deposited it with the first few that she and her crew had already offloaded.
I hate bio-matter, she thought. At least the unstable kind. Normally, she and her crew could have beamed their cargo directly into the hold, but the volatile material required a transporter system with an adjustable phase-transition inhibitor, something her antiquated freighter lacked. That meant that she and her crew would spend the afternoon hauling crates, which would delay her return to Bajor. I’m definitely going to have to talk with the Petarians again, she thought. She needed to make them understand how much extra time—
“Kasidy,” said a woman’s voice.
Kasidy stopped and turned. Just inside the doors to the hold stood Kira Nerys. She wore the traditional raiments of a vedek—a loose-fitting, earth-toned robe with wide sleeves—and a broad smile.
“Nerys,” she said. Kasidy moved the antigrav sled off to the side, then walked over and embraced her friend. “It’s so good to see you. What are you doing here?”
“I’m on my way back to Bajor from Cardassia,” Nerys said. “A group of vedeks had a conference of sorts with members of the Oralian Way.”
“Oh, I see,” Kasidy said. “Sounds pretty dry.”
“Some of it was, but some of it was actually quite interesting,” said Nerys. “The diversity of thought on Cardassia these days is really something to see.”
Kasidy shook her head. “It’s hard to believe, isn’t it?” she said, recalling the long, complicated history of Bajor and Cardassia.
“It just shows what you can accomplish when you have faith,” Kira said. “So I heard from Captain Ro that you were aboard, and since my transport doesn’t leave until this evening, I thought that maybe we could have lunch. It’s been a while since we’ve gotten to visit.”
“I’d love to, but we’ve got a freighter full of cargo to unload,” Kasidy said. “I’d also like to finish by the time Rebecca gets out of school.”
“Rebecca’s here on the station?” Nerys asked.
“She insisted that I bring her with me on my run,” Kasidy said, then shrugged at her own ridiculous suggestion that her daughter drove such decisions. Rebecca had pleaded to come along, but far more than her pleas had gone into Kasidy’s choice to bring her. “It wasn’t that long a trip, and I think it’s good life experience,” she told Nerys. She heard movement behind her, and she glanced back over her shoulder to see Pardshay lifting a crate from an antigrav sled and onto the stack of delivered goods. At that moment, Xhosa’s chief engineer, Luis García Márquez, emerged through the hatchway. He saw Kasidy and paced over.
“Vedek Kira,” said Luis. “How good to see you again.” He extended both his hands, and Nerys took them in greeting.
“It’s good to see you too, Mister García Márquez,” Nerys said.
“Pardon the interruption, Captain,” Luis said, “but I just wanted to let you know that we’ve finished the systems checks on the engines. Everything’s in solid shape. The new deuterium-flow regulat
or really helps.”
“That’s great,” Kasidy said, pleased at the performance of the new component. She’d acquired it on the secondary-parts market through Quark, and though he’d never actually misled her, she did worry about some of the characters with whom he did business. “Thanks for letting me know.”
“Mister García Márquez,” Nerys said, “I was just trying to coerce your captain into having lunch with me, but she’s claiming too much work.”
“Nonsense,” Luis said without a moment’s hesitation. “Since I’m done inspecting the engines, I can help out with the unloading while you two go eat.”
“Luis, you’ve already been working too much,” Kasidy said. To Nerys, she explained, “Since Wayne’s attending his sister’s wedding on Alpha Centauri, Luis has been pulling double duty as my chief engineer and first mate.”
“And as your first mate, I say go have lunch with your friend,” Luis insisted. “You’ve been working pretty hard yourself.”
Kasidy felt herself relenting. She really did want to visit with Nerys. “You’re sure, Luis?” she said. “It’s been a heavy run, and you’re due for some time off.”
“It’s no problem at all,” he said. “I learned a long time ago that if the captain’s not happy, then nobody’s happy.”
Kasidy smiled. “See?” she said to Nerys, feigning an aside. “I should promote this man to first mate permanently.”
As Luis headed for Kasidy’s antigrav sled, she and Nerys made their way to the doors of the cargo hold. “Do you want to go to Quark’s?” Kasidy asked. “Or the Replimat?”
“Actually,” Nerys said, “I hear there’s a new Argelian restaurant that people are raving about.”
The doors opened before them, and the two women stepped through, on their way to the Promenade.
38
Security Chief Jefferson Blackmer gazed in mute shock at the open access panel before him. For months, he and his staff had been scouring the deepest recesses of the station in search of vulnerabilities and possible sabotage. Even before that, he had spent his own time studying DS9, peering into as many shadowy corners as he could find—and the station had them in abundance.
And in all that time, until that moment, Blackmer and his team had found nothing.
The security chief reached for his combadge and pressed it. The beeps with which it responded seemed far too cheerful for the circumstances. “Blackmer to Captain Ro,” he said.
“Ro here,” came the captain’s reply. “Go ahead, Jeff.”
“Captain, I’m down in the lower core, and I just called in a team of specialists,” he said. “We’ve got a major problem. Per your orders, we’ve been conducting security sweeps throughout the station. I’ve got an access panel open and I’m looking at a device that clearly doesn’t belong here. It’s coated in materials that scatter my attempts to scan it.”
“Describe the device,” she said, her tone serious.
“It’s more or less a small, silver box,” Blackmer said. “It’s affixed to the containment-field generator for one of the reactors. There are characters in relief on the front. I can’t read them, but I’ve been in Starfleet long enough to recognize Andorian writing.” The allegation that Lieutenant Commander Douglas had made against Vakell th’Shant occurred to him.
“Andorian?” Ro said, the concern in her voice evident even over the comm channel. “What does the device look like to you?”
“Captain,” Blackmer said, “it looks like a bomb.”
39
Alongside one of her junior officers, T’Jul peered past the console at which they stood and over at the eight Jem’Hadar soldiers captured from Ren Fejin. A cadre of Romulan security guards had manacled each of them, then escorted them one at a time from their detention cells. After bringing the soldiers in, the security team remained in the compartment, their weapons armed and ready, ensuring the continued cooperation of their captives.
The eight Jem’Hadar stood at attention, ringing the first detainee who had been accompanied there: Laas. The Changeling’s hands had also been bound, though without his ability to adjust his form, he likely posed less of a threat than the soldiers who sought to protect him. None of the prisoners said a word.
“Your time aboard this ship is at an end,” T’Jul told the group. “I know that the crews of the two ships we brought here have carried out what could be considered acts of aggression against the Dominion. We intruded on your territory, penetrated your secure facilities, took the nine of you into custody, and essentially ransomed the life of Laas for the equipment we needed.”
The Jem’Hadar soldiers said nothing, but they all looked about the compartment, perhaps searching for weaknesses, for opportunities to escape. The shape-shifter stared down at the platform beneath him. T’Jul could not tell if even a single one of the group listened to what she said.
Wanting to draw their attention, T’Jul walked out from behind the console. She saw some of her own guards tense as she did so, but she also saw at least two of the Jem’Hadar look her way. “I and several others took these actions upon ourselves in an attempt to protect our peoples,” she said. “We are not acting on behalf of our governments or in any official capacity.” T’Jul doubted that her lie would bear up under scrutiny, but with the crew of Ren Fejin having complicated the mission by getting discovered and caught, the commander felt that she needed to provide the praetor and the Romulan Senate—and even the Breen domo—with deniability, no matter how implausible. Of course, considering the source of T’Jul’s orders, she realized it could be that neither the praetor nor the Senate even knew about the mission.
“Because it has become critical to help us keep the Federation and its allies in check,” T’Jul continued, “we did wish to acquire some of the Dominion’s technology. We did not want weaponry, nor did we take it, even though we could have. We also have not harmed a single citizen of the Dominion. We did not confiscate the ketracel-white that the lead Jem’Hadar possessed, and we allowed him to administer it to himself and the others. We have kept you in custody only as long as we’ve needed to. Rather than leaving you in detention cells, or even killing you, we are now releasing you.”
T’Jul waited a beat for any kind of a reaction, but received none. “We are presently orbiting a world outside Dominion space, uninhabited by intelligent life, but habitable,” she went on. “We have just transmitted a message back to Overne Three providing the Vorta and the Jem’Hadar with the precise coordinates of where we will be leaving you. On the surface of the planet, you will find emergency rations and a means of liberating yourselves from your manacles.”
When she still received no response beyond the apparent attention of two Jem’Hadar, T’Jul stepped forward again. Several of her security team moved to intercept her, presumably to prevent her from getting too close to their captives, who could no doubt be dangerous even with their hands bound. T’Jul waved the guards away, and then she walked up to the edge of the transporter platform.
“We in these two ships will not return to the Dominion,” she said. “Nor will the Romulan Star Empire or the Breen Confederacy, both of which have taken official positions against violating the closed borders of your territory.” In reality, T’Jul did not know if either government had taken a stance on the professed isolation of the Dominion, but she reasoned that the Jem’Hadar and the shape-shifter also would not know.
Having said all she intended to say to the nine captives, and most especially to Laas, T’Jul could have ordered the group beamed down to the planet that Eletrix orbited. But the commander discovered that she wanted more from the Changeling. She found him arrogant and condescending, but the Dominion had waged a formidable war; T’Jul needed to let Laas know that her people wished to avoid a return to the battlefield against the Founders and their armies, but she also felt that she had to demonstrate her strength.
And so she waited.
Moments passed. T’Jul fixed her gaze on the smooth features of the Changeling’s face. In her per
ipheral vision, she saw members of her security staff glancing at her, and some of the Jem’Hadar as well. The lead Romulan guard spoke her name, perhaps in preparation for trying to move her away from the captives, but while still peering at Laas, she held up a hand to silence the man. She continued to wait.
Eventually, Laas raised his head and looked at her. The instant he did, she turned away and spoke to the officer stationed at the console. “Centurion,” she ordered, “signal the bridge to drop the cloak.”
The man tapped at his panel. A moment later, he said, “Subcommander Atreev reports that the cloak is down.”
“Commence transport,” T’Jul said. The man worked his controls, and behind T’Jul, she heard a familiar whirr as her captives beamed away.
Rather than turn to regard the empty platform, T’Jul looked to the transporter operator and raised an inquiring eyebrow. The centurion nodded his head. “T’Jul to Atreev,” she said.
“Atreev here, Commander,” said the ship’s executive officer.
“Contact the Ren Fejin and let them know we’re ready to proceed,” she told him. “Then cloak the Eletrix and take us to warp.”
“Right away, Commander,” Atreev said.
T’Jul headed quickly to the door without looking around at the transporter platform. She entered the corridor feeling satisfaction at what she and her crew had so far accomplished. The original mission of Eletrix in the Gamma Quadrant had, by way of Tomalak, changed considerably, endangering her crew to a far greater extent, but also allowing them to play a greater role in protecting their people.
Star Trek: Typhon Pact 06: Plagues of Night Page 40
