“Excuse me, Officer,” she said. “My name is Kay Eaton. With whom am I speaking?”
At last, the policeman raised his head. He peered at Eaton with dark eyes. He had an expressionless face and deep-set eyes. For a strange second, Eaton thought she saw his features begin to melt, but then realized it had been a trick of the light. “I’m Sergeant La Dotio,” he said. “What can I do for you, ma’am?”
Before Eaton could reply, she saw a streak of motion to her left, followed by a loud thud. She looked in that direction and saw a jagged piece of plaster where it had landed on the floor. “What the—?” she said, but then a second, larger piece fell beside the first.
Eaton looked up. Two frayed holes compromised the dull white ceiling. As Eaton watched, a third piece of plaster came hurtling down and crashed on the floor. Beside her, she heard Johnson yelp.
Eaton felt a tug on her coat sleeve. “Come on,” Johnson called to her over a sudden roar that seemed to surround them. “We have to go.”
Eaton looked back up in time to see an entire third of the ceiling come plunging down to her left. Beyond it, she saw no sign of the building’s second floor. Instead, she saw stars.
And among them, a bright light that moved.
It’s the Temple, she thought. The spaceship from my story.
“Come on,” Johnson screamed, using both hands to try to pull Eaton toward the door. “We have to go now.”
Calmly, Eaton peered at the rest of the ceiling, which bowed and appeared as though it might collapse at any moment. She looked down at the dust rising from what had already fallen, and over at Cassie Johnson. And in that instant, Eaton knew that they had to stay, and that somehow, everything would be all right.
And still, Johnson yanked at her arm. “Come on, Miss Eaton!” she yelled. “We have—
—to go,” Kasidy called.
Kira blinked, uncertain of her location, either at that moment or in the one preceding. She still felt a tug on her arm. She also heard a voice—Kasidy’s voice—and she turned her head to see her friend pulling her toward the hatchway that led to Xhosa. Kira tried to focus on Kasidy.
“Come on,” Kasidy said. “The ship’s full and we have to go.”
“No,” Kira said, not even loud enough for her to hear the word herself. She cleared her throat, and tried again: “No.”
“What?” Kasidy said. “Nerys, let’s go.”
Running on instinct, Kira quickly took hold of her friend’s arm. Kasidy started to duck inside the hatch, but Kira stopped her and said again: “No.”
“Nerys, what are you doing?” Kasidy said, her sense of urgency plain. “We have to get off the station.”
“Kasidy,” she said, “there are still people on the station who need our help.” Somehow, though Kira spoke the truth, she knew that it was not the whole truth—the vital truth. For now, she thought, it’ll have to do.
“Nerys, I want to help people too,” Kasidy said, “and we’ve already gotten people away from here and over to Bajor. But I have a daughter to raise. I just left Rebecca with Jasmine back on Bajor, and I need to get back to her. I can’t stay here.”
Kira stared deep into Kasidy’s eyes. “Yes, you can,” she said. “And everything will be all right. I promise.”
For the first time, Kasidy hesitated, and so Kira pressed. “People need our help.”
Kasidy seemed to think for a few seconds more, then she let out an exasperated breath. She took one step back through the hatch and called out. “Luis, we’re done loading out here,” she said. “Get the ship going.”
Past Kasidy, at the other end of the hatchway, Kira saw Xhosa’s acting first mate appear. “Well, then, get inside.”
“There are still people who need help here,” Kasidy said. Without waiting for a response, she hurried past Kira and down the ramp. García Márquez offered Kira a confused shrug, then reached up inside the ship. The hatches on both Xhosa and Deep Space 9 closed.
Kira turned and joined Kasidy at the base of the ramp. “Now what?” Kasidy asked.
“Come on,” Kira said, leading the way to the door of the cargo hold, and beyond it, to the rest of Deep Space 9. But even as she ran with her friend to help with the rest of the evacuation, Kira knew that she had no idea what would come next.
41
Jefferson Blackmer flung himself out of the turbolift and raced down the steps into ops. Ahead of him, he saw Captain Ro and Colonel Cenn at the situation table with other officers, clearly monitoring the evacuation and the efforts to disarm or displace the explosive devices.
“I’m getting a peculiar reading not too far from the station,” Dalin Slaine said as Blackmer arrived. “It looks almost like a radiation source, but not quite.”
“And you don’t think it could be a cloaked ship?” Ro asked.
“It doesn’t read like any Klingon or Romulan cloak I’ve ever seen,” Slaine said.
“Well, keep an eye on it for now,” Ro said. “I don’t want to take the Defiant away from the wormhole. Once the Canterbury is done, we’ll have them take a closer look.”
Into the pause that followed, Blackmer spoke up. “Captain.”
“Chief,” Ro said. “We’re almost there. The Canterbury just started off-loading its latest group of evacuees on Bajor. One more trip back to the station, along with the runabouts and a few of the civilian vessels, and we’ll be clear.”
“Captain,” Blackmer said, “can I speak with you?”
Ro gazed at him, and he could tell that she understood the urgency he felt. She pointed up the other set of stairs. “My office?”
Blackmer followed the captain up, then waited for the doors to close behind them. Ro swung around to the other side of her desk, but she didn’t sit. “What is it?” she asked.
“Captain, I’ve been listening to the bomb techs,” he said. “To their estimates of yield and potential damage, and I’ve been examining the placement of the devices.” He reached forward and deposited a padd on her desk. “I don’t think they’re designed to destroy the station.”
“What?” Ro said. “We find four bombs planted in the station’s reactor core, and you don’t think the intent is to destroy Deep Space Nine?”
“Look at my simulations,” he said, pointing to the padd. “If any of the bombs detonate, and if they’re as powerful as the bomb techs think, then reactor containment will definitely fail. But even if all four bombs go off, and even if containment fails on all the reactors, there would be time to eject them.”
“Provided the explosions don’t damage the ejector assemblies,” Ro pointed out.
“I thought of that,” Blackmer said. “But the bombs were all planted on the opposite side of the reactors from their ejectors.” Ro reached down and picked up the padd. As she studied its display, Blackmer said, “Whoever planted the bombs—the Treishya or whoever it is—definitely wanted to cripple Deep Space Nine. But it doesn’t look like they wanted the massive loss of life that wiping out the station would cause.”
“I don’t know, Jeff,” Ro said skeptically. “It sounds as though you’re trying to ascribe benevolent motives to terrorists.”
“Believe me, I have no interest in being an apologist for whoever did this,” Blackmer said. “But I think we need to understand what they’re trying to do if we’re to—”
“Ops to Captain Ro,” came the anxious voice of Colonel Cenn. “The wormhole is opening.”
Transitus
In ops, Ro Laren and her crew peered up at the main viewscreen, which showed the spinning blue-and-white vortex of the Bajoran wormhole as it wheeled into the visible aspect of its existence. The captain held her breath, her fists tightening, as she waited to see what sort of ship—whose ship—would arrive from the Gamma Quadrant. With the explosive devices found aboard the station, as well as the recent interference with transmissions through the communications relay, Ro felt she had good reason to worry just who or what might emerge from the wormhole.
In the center of the dazzling maelstrom, a small, da
rk shape came into view, its contours curved and uneven. “Magnifying,” said Colonel Cenn from the general-services console, and the shape grew to fill the screen. A vessel, its rounded, asymmetrical form distinctly marking it as of Breen origin.
“It’s a freighter,” Cenn said.
“Its navigational beacon identifies it as the Ren Fejin,” Dalin Slaine reported at her tactical station.
Cenn worked his controls. “Records show that it entered the wormhole two and a half months ago,” he said.
“Look at the charred areas on its hull,” Chief Blackmer said, pointing toward the viewscreen. “It looks like it’s been in battle.”
Ro initially hadn’t seen the burned patches on the Breen ship, but once Blackmer called attention to them, she did. “Why would anybody fire on a civilian vessel with virtually no weaponry?” she asked. “And how would such a vessel survive an attack like that?”
As though in direct response to her question, a spread of narrow blue beams streaked across the viewer. The image on the screen quickly changed, reverting to the previous, more expansive vista. Defiant appeared off to the side, slowly approaching the maw of the wormhole and discharging the blue beams from its forward emitters.
“The Defiant is projecting a multiphase tachyon detection grid,” said Slaine. Since Typhon Pact vessels had first entered the Gamma Quadrant a couple of months earlier, Ro had added to the list of high-alert procedures a check for cloaked ships—including phase-cloaked vessels—traveling through the wormhole. Before the discovery of the explosive devices in the lower core, she had called no such alerts.
On the viewscreen, the Breen freighter passed through the blue tachyon beams, completely unaffected by them. Seconds passed, and Ro began to relax as the Defiant crew’s attempt at detection revealed nothing. But then the focused particle beams reflected off a surface that, the instant before, hadn’t seemed to be there.
“Shields up!” Ro called out.
“Captain,” said Blackmer beside her, “if the bombs should detonate while the shields are raised—”
“If that cloaked ship fires on us without shields,” Ro said, interrupting the security chief, “the energy discharge to the station could trigger the bombs.”
Blackmer said nothing more, and Ro peered over at Dalin Slaine.
“Shields are up,” said the tactical officer.
Prynn Tenmei sat on the bridge of Defiant, at the bowed forward console that combined the conn and ops functions. She kept her eyes focused on the main viewscreen as Lieutenant Aleco launched a tachyon spread from his position at the tactical station. The Breen cargo vessel passed through the bright blue beams without incident, and Tenmei waited for the wormhole to close so that they could be sure that no cloaked ships had followed from the Gamma Quadrant.
The instant that a tachyon beam bounced off an invisible surface, Tenmei sent her hands swiftly across her control panel. Even as Lieutenant Commander Stinson called from the captain’s chair for a tractor beam to capture the unknown ship, Tenmei prepared Defiant for what might come next. On the viewer, as the wormhole folded in on itself to a bright speck and disappeared, she saw the tachyon beams replaced by the white rays of a tractor field. They reached for the target and found it, but then the entire mass of the invisible ship faded into view, like the materialization effect of a silent transporter.
A Romulan warbird appeared within the tractor field.
“Evasive!” yelled Stinson, even as twin green streaks leaped toward Defiant.
The tractor beam disengaged as the disruptor blasts landed. Defiant quaked as Tenmei brought the ship about, anticipating the order for weapons—“Fire forward phasers!” called Stinson—but knowing that there wouldn’t be time for a weapons lock before the warbird fired again. She turned the ship sharply, wanting to offer its narrower lateral profile as she gained Aleco a few seconds to employ the weapons to their fullest advantage. The helm seemed sluggish, but Tenmei realized that a combination of fear and impatience had heightened her perceptions. Defiant moved, and it moved fast, and she thought that the ship might elude the second attack.
It didn’t.
Defiant shook violently as another set of disruptors pounded into the hull.
“Shields down to eighty-one percent,” said Aleco. “Firing phasers.”
Tenmei heard the pulse of the weapons as they discharged, and imagined the deadly, red-tinged yellow beams surging toward the Romulan starship.
“Direct hit on their port wing,” said Aleco, but the satisfaction Tenmei heard in those words lasted only until his next one: “Incoming!”
Seconds later, Defiant pitched violently to starboard, and Tenmei slammed hard into the side of her console as the inertial dampers faltered before stabilizing again. Amid the cacophony, she heard cries of pain behind her. The overhead lighting died, replaced a few seconds later by the red glow of emergency lights.
“Shields down to sixty-nine percent,” called Aleco over the tumult.
“Fire quantum torpedoes!” yelled Stinson.
Tenmei felt the rumble of Defiant’s torpedoes as they tore out into space, seeking the hard, green metal of the Romulan warbird. But then the ship bucked again. Tenmei heard a mix of voices issuing orders and shouting reports. Only one word meant anything to her—“Evasive!”—and she worked to move Defiant out of the line of fire.
When Ro saw the Romulan warbird appear in front of the wormhole, she knew that they had all been deceived: she and her crew, the Federation Council, President Bacco, everybody. If the warbird turned out to be the starship that had accompanied Enterprise on the joint mission, then it had clearly left its Starfleet counterpart behind. Probably in pieces, Ro thought grimly. If the ship turned out to be a different warbird, then some other Imperial Fleet vessel had illegally stolen into the Gamma Quadrant. Either way, events seemed incompatible with the idea of the Typhon Pact genuinely seeking peace.
“Ready all weapons,” Ro said as the Romulan ship exchanged fire with Defiant.
“Phasers and quantum torpedoes armed,” said Slaine.
“Concentrate on their engines,” Ro said. “I want that ship stopped. Fire!”
The station rumbled as weapons launched from up and down the docking pylons. On the ops viewer, Ro watched bright blue packets soar away from DS9 and toward the Romulan warbird, the quantum torpedoes seeking their mark. Golden streaks of phaser fire followed.
They were all intercepted.
Another ship appeared in the line of fire as though out of nowhere, a great silver, teardrop-shaped vessel that Ro recognized at once as a Tzenkethi marauder. The ship shuddered beneath the assault of the station’s weapons, its shields flaring, but then brilliant white filaments flashed from a dark recess on the otherwise smooth hull. Deep Space 9 lurched as the plasma cannon landed its salvo.
“Shields down to eighty-seven percent,” Slaine called out.
“Target the Tzenkethi’s weapons,” Ro told her. “Fire at will.”
On the screen, the captain saw the station’s phasers slice through space, picking out the dark hollow from where the plasma cannon had attacked. A trio of quantum torpedoes followed, causing the Tzenkethi ship’s shields to flare even more brightly. In the distance, flashes of blue and yellow and green marked the battlefield of Defiant and the Romulan warbird.
“Cenn,” Ro said. “Emergency message to the Canterbury. I know they’re off-loading evacuees, but tell them we’re under attack and require the earliest possible assistance.”
“Yes, Captain.”
Ro watched the plasma-cannon emplacement to see if it would fire again, but instead saw a second section of the Tzenkethi ship’s hull retracting, revealing another recess. White fire seared from within, landing another plasma blast on the station. Ro almost went down as DS9 shook, but she grabbed the side of the situation table.
“Shields down to sixty-one percent,” Slaine said.
Suddenly, a pair of golden phaser beams rocketed into the Tzenkethi ship, precisely at the locatio
n of the second plasma cannon. A second later, Ro saw a runabout dart past. As she watched, it launched a volley of micro-torpedoes.
“Four runabouts have returned from Bajor,” Cenn said.
“The marauder’s shields are on the verge of overloading,” Slaine said.
If we can just hold out until the Canterbury gets here, Ro thought. For the moment, it seemed at least a possibility.
But then Lieutenant Commander Candlewood said, “Another ship is decloaking.” He peered over at Ro from his sciences station. “It’s Breen.”
Ro couldn’t believe it. For months, the Typhon Pact not only had spoken of peace, but had seemingly taken an active role in trying to make it happen. And now they’re attacking us? she thought.
But she couldn’t concern herself with the politics and treachery of it all. How many people are left on the station? Thirteen hundred civilians, nine hundred crew? Somehow, she had to keep them safe.
On the main screen, the runabout raced back into view, joined by a second one. Both fired phasers and torpedoes in concert, all of them striking within a small locus on the marauder’s hull. Again, the Tzenkethi vessel’s shields flared, this time more brightly than ever. Its tapering tip spun around as the ship started to move away. As it swung around, it struck one of the runabouts, carving through its hull with ease. The shattered vessel twisted through space, out of control. It clipped the side of a cargo ship, changed direction, then erupted in a fiery explosion.
And then Deep Space 9 rocked again.
“It’s the Breen ship,” Slaine said. “Shields down to forty-nine percent.”
“Fire on the Breen,” Ro said. “And show them to me.”
The scene on the main screen changed, bringing the Breen warship into view. An assembly of arcs of different sizes and opposing orientations, the powerful vessel had wasted no time in attacking. Even as DS9’s own weapons struck the ship, multiple disruptor bolts lashed out and slammed into the station.
Ro flew from her feet, pain screaming through her body as her arm caught beneath her when she landed on the deck. She cried out, but immediately pushed herself up with her other arm. But the station shook again, and she fell backward.
Star Trek: Typhon Pact 06: Plagues of Night Page 42
