Precipice

by David Mack

  Tater nodded. “Yes. The reverse of how I took it apart.”

  Quinn took a step back and gestured at the mess of metal. “Show me.” The recruit knelt and swiftly gathered up the pieces. Then, as Quinn watched with growing surprise, the young Denn reassembled the weapon in record time. As Tater fixed the last component into place and locked the weapon back into its safe mode, Quinn said, “Present your weapon for inspection.”

  Tater—who’d earned his nickname by having a head shaped like a lumpy potato—held out his rifle with both hands. Quinn took it and checked its linkages. Everything looked right. He took a power cell from his jacket pocket and slapped it into place inside the grip. The weapon powered up with a gentle hum. Its main readout displayed its status as READY.

  Well, I’ll be damned, Quinn thought. “Platoon, it looks like we have a prodigy on our hands.” He removed the power cell from Tater’s weapon and handed the rifle back to the recruit. “Do we have any more mechanical geniuses in our midst?”

  Several of the recruits exchanged wary looks.

  Each man in the platoon began taking apart his rifle.

  Quinn stared, dumbstruck, as all twenty Denn exhibited a skill he had not yet taught them. Almost in unison, they finished their disassemblies. When they all came to rest kneeling before their discombobulated weapons, Quinn said, “Reassemble.” With the same speed and graceful precision, the Denn restored their rifles to working order. Quinn inspected each weapon by inserting the power cell. Every rifle’s display read ready.

  “Quick learners,” he said. “Good. That just saved us a day. If you’re this handy with explosives, we might be ready to face the Klingons sooner than I thought.”

  The Denn recruits beamed with pride.

  Then a female voice cut the moment down to size.

  “You boys should know what you’re really getting into,” said Bridy Mac, who was standing at the entrance to the secret tunnel that led to the Rocinante’s hiding place. She walked toward the line of recruits, who turned to face her. “This isn’t some game you’ve signed up for.”

  Quinn bristled at the interruption of his training. “They know that,” he said.

  “Are you sure?” She addressed the Denn. “The Klingons have conquered hundreds of worlds more advanced than this one. They’re one of the most dangerous cultures in this part of the galaxy. The moment you start any kind of war with them, they’ll take it out on all your people. They won’t care who the fighters are. Men, women, children—they’ll execute innocent civilians until you give yourselves up and the attacks stop. If they have to, they’ll drive your race to extinction.”

  Stepping between Bridy and the Denn, Quinn asked, “Is that what they teach you in Starfleet? The best defense is a quick surrender?”

  She shouldered past him and continued talking to the Denn. “There won’t be any glory in what you’re doing,” she said. “No rewards, no victory. Only pain and death.”

  Stretch looked at Quinn. “Permission to speak?”

  “Step forward,” Quinn said.

  The tall recruit stepped out of the line to face Bridy Mac. “Quinn tells us your people are sending ships and soldiers. They will be here in ninety days. He also says if we stand against the Klingons, we will make it easier for your people to help free us. Is that not true?”

  Bridy glanced over her shoulder at Quinn. Her expression was one of barely contained anger. Looking back at Stretch, she said, “Yes, our people will be here in about ninety days. And the more distracted the Klingons are, the better. But I still don’t think you—”

  “Then we will stand and fight,” Stretch said. “We think Quinn speaks wisely when he says it is better to die fighting for freedom than to accept life as a slave.”

  The Denn’s declaration seemed to leave Bridy speechless. Quinn gently guided her away from the recruits and spoke to her sotto voce. “Look, I ain’t puttin’ these boys into a full-scale ground war, okay? If we time this right, we’ll be lookin’ at maybe a few weeks of harassing the Klingons before the cavalry comes. I’ll stick to minin’ roads, settin’ traps, layin’ ambushes. No standup fights till the end. You have my word.”

  “I’m not the one who needs your promises,” Bridy said, scowling. She walked up the ramp into the Rocinante.

  Quinn turned back toward the men whose lives were now in his hands. “All right,” he said. “Let’s get back to work.”

  24

  July 14, 2267

  Kutal felt the wind in his hair as he dashed through the night. Rain pelted against his naked body, washing the blood from his chest and arms. It ran in a steady stream from the tip of his tempered blade, which was still warm from cutting the throats of four thousand foes in one night.

  Cresting the hill, he threw back his head and roared with mad laughter. Thunder rolled and lightning flashed, and Kutal lifted his d’k tahg in salute to the memory of Kahless and the honor of his own ancestors, who he now was certain would welcome him into the everlasting glory of Sto-Vo-Kor.

  Then the comm signal squawked and stirred Kutal from the best dream he’d ever had. Bleary and bitterly disappointed, he pushed himself up from his bunk with a low growl. The signal buzzed again from a comm panel. Kutal silenced it with the side of his fist and barked, “What?”

  BelHoQ, his first officer, replied,

  “Priority signal from Qo’noS, Captain. It is Councillor Gorkon.”

  Of course it is, Kutal thought. He exhaled with disgust. “Patch it through to my quarters.”

  “Ready on your secure channel, Captain.”

  Kutal switched off the comm and shambled over to a desktop computer screen. As he entered his security code, he wondered what Gorkon wanted this time. More pillows for the Earther? An Orion slave girl to sing the human to sleep with soft lullabies?

  Gorkon had insisted Reyes and the Tholian be treated as guests rather than as prisoners, but Kutal had grown weary of kowtowing to the two aliens.

  The screen flashed to life with an image of the Klingon trefoil emblem, which was replaced seconds later by the face of Gorkon.

  “Captain, I have new orders for you.”

  “I am at your command, Councillor.”

  Gorkon leaned forward and pressed a key on his desktop.

  “I am sending you a classified mission briefing,” he said. Icon for an in-progress data upload appeared along the bottom of Kutal’s screen.

  “Our forces have secured an intact Shedai Conduit on a planet near the Vodrey Nebula. So far, we have not had any success accessing its systems.”

  The data package finished loading. Kutal opened it on an adjacent monitor while continuing his conversation with Gorkon. Reading through the briefing’s top-sheet summary, he said, “I’ve received your mission file. What is the link between this new Conduit and the document you’ve sent me?”

  “That is all our extant research into an artifact we tested on another Conduit in the Mirdonyae system. It gave us unprecedented control over the Shedai technology on that world.”

  Skipping to the end of the summary, Kutal frowned. “It says the artifact was captured by Starfleet, and that the planet was destroyed shortly afterward.”

  “True,” Gorkon said. “However, now that we once again have an intact Conduit under our control, it is imperative we resume our research into this new technology.”

  Kutal met Gorkon’s steely-eyed stare and asked, “Have we acquired another such artifact?”

  “No,” Gorkon replied. “To the best of our knowledge, only the one has been found, and it is currently secured aboard the Federation starbase known as Vanguard. If our work is to continue, the artifact must be recovered with all due haste—and without violating the terms of the Organian treaty.”

  “Councillor, Vanguard is very well defended, and in recent weeks Starfleet has escalated its presence in the Gonmog Sector. Short of launching a full-scale assault, how are we to recover the artifact from the station?”

  Gorkon responded with a thin, evil smile. �
�Ask our esteemed guest, Mister Reyes, to help you. It’s about time he learned our hospitality comes with a price. Make sure he understands that if he doesn’t cooperate, or if he leads us into a trap, his beloved Rana Desai will suffer a most gruesome violation before her untimely demise.”

  That was more like it. Kutal mirrored Gorkon’s diabolical expression. “Understood, Councillor. I’ll see to it personally.”

  25

  July 14, 2267

  Haniff Jackson leaned on the bar in Tom Walker’s place and held ice against his bloodied nose. The melting cubes had soaked the napkin in which they were wrapped, and cold water dribbled over his split lips and bruised chin. The proprietor and patrons of the popular Stars Landing watering hole had fled during the raucous fight minutes earlier, leaving Jackson alone at the bar.

  The front door opened, and Captain Desai walked in. She warily surveyed the room, which was littered with collapsed tables, splintered chairs, broken glass, and spilled drinks. Wrinkling her nose as she stepped through the wreckage toward Jackson, she said, “What a lovely fragrance you’ve invented.”

  “Don’t blame me,” Jackson said, his voice a bit nasal thanks to his swollen nose. “I wasn’t the one resisting arrest.”

  Desai joined him at the bar and stood on her toes to get a better look at his injuries. “Blood and scars become you,” she said with a teasing smile. Looking down the length of the bar, she asked, “What does a lady have to do to get a drink around here?”

  “When that lady’s a captain, all she has to do is ask.” Jackson set down the melting ice, hopped over to the other side of the bar, and spread his arms. “What can I get you?”

  She arched an eyebrow. “Club soda with lime, and a good reason for why you called me down here.”

  “Coming right up,” Jackson said. He grabbed a pint glass from a shelf behind the bar and filled it halfway with a scoop of ice. Then he picked up the carbonated-drink nozzle and keyed the button for club soda. Clear liquid shot from the nozzle and fizzed as it filled the glass. He grabbed a lime wedge from a bowl, garnished the drink, and gave it to Desai.

  The JAG captain picked up the glass, sipped the drink, and nodded. “Thanks. And my reason for being here?”

  He reached for his data slate and pushed it to Desai. “It’s all on there.”

  She picked up the slate. “Does this have anything to do with the Orion I saw your men hauling away in restraints?”

  “Good guess,” Jackson said. “You should be a detective.”

  “I was a detective,” she replied as she reviewed Jackson’s report. “It says here you linked Mister Syanok to Petty Officer Strout, your crooked cargo handler.”

  Jackson nodded. “Comm logs show a sudden flurry of back-and-forth traffic between him and Strout in the hours before the Malacca bombing.” He reached over the counter and pointed out a detail. “Syanok initiated the exchange with a coded message a few hours after the Malacca filed its cargo manifest with the operations center. Shortly after trading these messages with Strout, our buddy Syanok arranged for a last-second shipment to be placed on the Malacca.”

  Desai stared dubiously at Jackson. “And you think that proves what, exactly?”

  “Okay, I admit it’s not rock-solid proof of anything, but it definitely suggests Syanok could have seen the pre-final manifest for the Malacca.”

  Putting the slate back on the bar, Desai said, “So what? None of this is damning enough to charge him with anything.” Tilting her head, she added, “Except for assault and resisting what will probably turn out to be a false arrest.”

  “Are you serious? You really don’t see the link here?”

  “I share your suspicions,” Desai said. “But it’s not enough for a court of law. I need evidence. We don’t know the content of Strout and Syanok’s messages, or that Syanok’s piece of cargo was the one that contained the bomb.”

  Jackson picked up the slate and called up a new forensic report. “Maybe we don’t know for certain that his container held the bomb.” He handed the slate back to Desai. “But we have the cargo master’s log of where each piece of cargo was secured in the Malacca’s hold, and we have a ballistic analysis of the explosion that pinpoints its epicenter to within three meters of where Syanok’s container was placed. The only other pieces in close proximity were official Starfleet cargo—Pacifican seagrass bound for the Daystrom Institute, and an experimental grain called quintotriticale bound for Earth.”

  Desai’s eyebrows arched up. “Okay,” she said. “That’s what I mean by real evidence. Why didn’t you lead with that?”

  He shrugged. “Sorry.” Leaning forward, he asked, “So, can we at least hold Syanok as a material witness?”

  “I’ll do more than that,” Desai said. “Consider him remanded without bail.” She frowned. “But if you’re thinking he’ll lead you to more arrests, I wouldn’t get my hopes up if I were you.”

  Jackson didn’t like the sound of that. “Why not?”

  The JAG officer sighed. “Someone intended for Syanok to be treated as a terminal contact. Odds are you won’t be able to link him to anyone else, on or off the station, besides Strout.”

  “What about the money trail?” Jackson pointed at the data slate. “Syanok had to pay for that shipment on the Malacca. It’s a good bet whatever account he uses to pay his bills is the same one where he gets his money from the people he works for. If we trace that, we take another step up the ladder.”

  Desai handed back the slate to Jackson. “His accounts are with private banks on Orion.”

  He understood what she was implying: that Orion financial institutions would never cooperate with Federation-issued subpoenas. It was maddening, but he knew she was right. His hands curled into fists. “We should at least try,” he said. “Serve them with warrants. If they refuse to give us his records, so be it. But I won’t just give up my best lead.”

  “All right,” Desai said. “Personally, I think it’s a waste of time and effort. Getting intel from the Orions is harder than getting laughs from a Vulcan. But if you feel that strongly about it, I’ll have my staff draft subpoenas for Syanok’s financial records. If we ever get a response, I’ll let you know.”

  “Thanks,” Jackson said.

  “Don’t mention it.” She pushed her half-consumed beverage to Jackson. “Thanks for the drink.”

  “Any time.”

  Desai walked to the door, but turned back and looked quizzically at Jackson. “Tell me, Lieutenant, how far will you go to close this case?”

  “Into the pit of Hell if I have to.”

  She smiled. “Good.” As she stepped out the door, she said over her shoulder, “It’ll be nice to have company for a change.”

  July 15, 2267

  Fewer than twenty-four hours after leaving Tom Walker’s place on a hopeful note, Rana Desai found herself saddled with the unpleasant task of delivering bad news to Lieutenant Jackson.

  She stood near the back of Vanguard’s dark security center and waited for her chance to talk to the security chief. Most of the lighting in the center came from flickering images on the scores of video monitors that covered two of its four walls. Each screen switched every few seconds between multiple feeds, from both inside and outside the station. The wall to the right of the door was dominated by a single master viewscreen more than five meters wide and nearly three meters tall.

  There were two dozen personnel seated at monitoring stations, which were arranged in a U shape facing the monitors.

  Jackson stood on the far side of the U, beneath the main screen. At that moment, it showed an altercation between two groups of civilians near the airlock for a private freighter.

  “Get a quick-response team down to the lower docking ring,” Jackson said. “Slip Four, on the double.”

  The officer behind Jackson nodded and quietly relayed the orders to a security team near the scene of the disturbance.

  “Load screen five, feed two,” Jackson said.

  Desai had no idea who h
ad responded to Jackson’s order, but almost instantly the image on the main viewer changed to show a man standing at a security door and tapping numbers into its access keypad. “He’s been entering numbers for over two minutes,” Jackson said. “Either he’s got the wrong door, or he’s trying to break into that room. Send a team to talk to him. If he leaves before they get there, track him.”

  Another hushed acknowledgment came from the semicircle of security personnel standing between Jackson and Desai.

  Sensing a possible lull in the center’s activity, Desai cleared her throat. No one except Jackson turned to look at her. He lifted his chin to greet her. As he walked toward her, he said to one of his people, “Holmgren, take over.” A blond human woman stepped forward and took his place under the main screen.

  Jackson joined Desai at the back of the room and said in a quiet voice, “What brings you to the cave? Good news, I hope.”

  Her lips tensed into something of a half smile, half frown. “I’m afraid not,” she said, keeping her voice as low as his. “We’ve hit a brick wall with Syanok.”

  “Let me guess,” Jackson said. “The Orions.”

  “Exactly.” She handed him a data card. “It’s all on there, but I can give you the highlights, if you prefer.”

  He nodded. “Sure. Hit me.”

  Desai folded her arms. “His comm logs gave us a partial snapshot of his financial holdings. Some were based on Tammeron, a neutral planet that has limited trade agreements with the Federation. They must want to upgrade their trade status, because they gave us everything they had on Syanok. It looks like he used his Tammeron account to make legal transactions. But most of the funds he deposited to that account came from a major private bank on Orion.”

  “Did the transaction log identify who paid him?”