Precipice

by David Mack

  “Well, I’ll be damned,” Quinn muttered to himself. “The little one-eyed kook wasn’t kiddin’.”

  The scientist carried the dodecahedron to a pedestal in front of what looked like an altar at the center of the double-arched platform. As the crystal was lowered into a pentagonal indentation on the pedestal, the glossy black surfaces of the Conduit rippled with indigo light, and a deep rumble shook the earth beneath Quinn.

  Goddamn, he wondered, what the hell is that thing?

  Just when Quinn figured his day couldn’t get any worse, his gloomy train of thought was derailed by a smug voice that he had hoped never to hear again for as long as he lived.

  From behind him, Zett Nilric said, “Hello, Quinn.”

  Quinn lowered his binoculars and twisted slowly to look down the dune at Zett, who stood holding his disruptor level and ready. The jet-skinned Nalori bastard flashed a grin of coal-black teeth, and even though he was standing in a desert, he was dressed to the nines in a spotless white suit, pale gray shirt, off-white tie, and shoes made from the hide of some ivory-colored reptile.

  “Lookin’ good, Zett,” Quinn said.

  Zett shrugged at the compliment. “I do my best.” Lowering his chin at Quinn, he added, “Long time no see.”

  “Not long enough.”

  “Imagine finding you of all people here,” Zett said. “I have to confess, I’m curious what you’ve been up to all this time. Last I heard, someone mysteriously settled all your debts with Ganz. And just like that”—he pantomimed huffing a feather from his fingertips—“you vanished. Quite a trick.”

  “Yeah, it’s a beauty,” Quinn said. “You should try it.”

  “Oh, I will, soon enough.” He widened his grin. “So tell me: What are you doing here, Quinn?”

  “Same as always,” Quinn lied. “Lookin’ out for number one.” Nodding over his shoulder toward the temple, he asked, “What about you? Working for the Klingons now?”

  “Yes and no,” Zett said. “I take their money for the occasional odd job, but that’s hardly the same thing as being on their side.” A twitch of his thumb changed his disruptor’s power setting to maximum. “Of course, I didn’t go to the trouble of safeguarding a major heist on Vanguard just to see you screw up the deal by sticking in your nose on this backwater rock.” He raised his weapon to eye level. “And killing you won’t be business—not like bombing that transport on Vanguard or setting up the hit on Reyes. No, eliminating you will be my pleasure.”

  Quinn was relieved to know this was about nothing more than Zett’s psychotic old vendetta. At least I know my cover’s not blown, Quinn told himself as he got to his feet. That means Bridy might still be safe. Standing up halfway down the dune, he said to Zett, “Okay, get it over with.”

  “I’ll shoot you if I have to,” Zett said. “But I’d prefer to take my vengeance one cut at a time. And because I’m such a good sport when it comes to murder, I’ll even give you a chance to defend yourself.” Gesturing with his disruptor, he added, “Drop your sidearm and grab a knife.”

  It took all of Quinn’s self-control not to smile as he unfastened his belt. As he let it and his holster slide to the ground, he recalled the words of Napoleon Bonaparte: “Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake.”

  He drew his hunting knife from his boot sheath, tucked its flat edge against his forearm, and held it edge-out and ready to draw blood.

  Zett holstered his disruptor, drew his curved yosa blade, and prowled up the slope toward Quinn. “I’m going to enjoy this,” he said with a sneer.

  “Not as much as I am,” Quinn replied.

  The assassin was still a few meters from Quinn when the smooth slope of the dune behind him heaved upward. As Zett spun toward the hush of spilling sand, more shapes rose from the ground on his flanks. In less than a second he was surrounded by Lirev and four of her nomad clansmen. Each pointed a wide-bladed sword at Zett, whose expression of horror was even more satisfying to Quinn than he’d hoped.

  “Meet my insurance policy,” Quinn said.

  The nomads lunged to attack.

  Zett pressed a button on a bracelet around his wrist and vanished in a crimson swirl of energy. Lirev and her people slashed at the transporter beam’s afterglow until it faded away.

  Rubindium transponder, Quinn realized. Linked to an automatic transporter recall. He recognized the setup from one of his first meetings with Starfleet Intelligence. They had been very excited to entrust him with one until he had pointed out the Rocinante had no transporter.

  Lirev sheathed her sword and approached Quinn, followed by her clansmen. “Did you see the gemstone?”

  “Yeah,” Quinn said. “I did. It’s just like you said. Now I gotta get back to my partner so we can plan our next move.”

  The nomads murmured among themselves, and then Lirev asked Quinn, “Does this mean you will help us liberate the temple from the invaders?”

  “We will, if you’ll vow to stop attackin’ the Shire people and help us fight the Klingons.”

  A buzz of protests began to rise from the other nomads until Lirev turned and silenced them with a frown. Then she turned back toward Quinn and said simply, “Agreed. On behalf of the Goçeba, you have my word. Peace with the Shires, and alliance against our shared foe.”

  “All right, then,” Quinn said, moving at a quick step back toward their melluls. “We’ve got work to do. Let’s ride.”

  41

  The playback from Quinn’s holographic binoculars was projected a meter above the deck in the main compartment of the Rocinante. McLellan ate her dinner from a scratched metal plate and watched as Quinn enhanced the image to clarify the details he had recorded of the temple’s interior.

  “I reckon we’re talkin’ about a hundred and twenty, maybe a hundred and thirty troops,” Quinn said as he finished fiddling with the projector’s controls. “Looks like they’re usin’ a virtual perimeter to keep the workers from runnin’ off. Nothin’ we can’t bypass to get in.” Pointing at the scientists in the recording, he added, “Only a few of these labcoat guys. Don’t think they’ll be a problem.”

  McLellan swallowed a bite of her vegetable wrap—the least disgusting option from their remaining rations—and said, “I think the real problem is your old pal, Zett. Are you sure he said the object in the temple had been stolen from Vanguard?”

  “Not in so many words, but that was the gist,” Quinn said. “Look, don’t worry about Zett. He seems to think I’m here work in’ an angle, which means our cover’s safe.”

  “I’m not worried about our cover,” McLellan said. “I’m worried about you getting killed by an assassin with a grudge.”

  Quinn shook his head. “Ain’t gonna happen. He got the drop on me once. Now that I know he’s here, I’ll be ready next time.” He motioned toward the holographic projection. “Let’s focus on this. We’ve got less than forty-eight hours before your Starfleet buddies get here. If we want off this rock, we need to do everything we can to put the lobster-heads in a twist.”

  McLellan shoved the last bite of her wrap into her mouth and studied the projection while she chewed. “Okay,” she said at last. “Whatever that glowing thingamajig is, if the Klingons took it from Vanguard, we need to find a way to take it back.”

  “Hang on,” Quinn said. “Smackin’ a bees’ nest is one thing. Stickin’ your hand in to steal the honey is another.”

  Lifting her hands in mock surrender, McLellan said, “If you want to play it safe, let’s talk about lying low till our backup gets here. But if you want to make a difference, we need to find a way to get that gemstone. Because if the Klingons bug out and take it with them, we might never get another shot at it.”

  He unleashed a disgusted sigh. “Goddammit,” he muttered. “Fine. Last I saw, they had it patched into the Conduit through some kind of pedestal. If it’s still there in the open, we might be able to draw their forces away with a hit-and-run attack and then slip inside to make the grab.”

  Back
ing up the holographic playback, McLellan pointed out the image of the scientists taking the object from a shielded case. “What if they store it in there between experiments?”

  Cocking his head and frowning, Quinn said, “Pickin’ the lock’ll take too long. We’d have to grab the whole case and make a run for it.”

  “But then the grab’s not a one-person job anymore,” she said. “And sneaking two people inside increases the risk.”

  He shrugged and flashed a grin. “You knew the job was dangerous when you took it.”

  She shook her head. “We need more intel. I have to know whether they leave the stone in place or pack it up.”

  “So we’re talkin’ about another recon op,” Quinn said. “Gettin’ that close to the temple won’t be easy unless we ask Lirev’s people for help. And this time we’ll need to keep a better eye out for Zett.”

  “Y’know, I lied before,” McLellan said. “I am worried about him talking to the Klingons. Whether he knows we’re with SI or not, if he gives them a heads-up we’re out here, it could mean big trouble.”

  Quinn nodded. “True, but I don’t think that’s his game. He’s waited a really long time to cap me himself. If he goes and gets the lobster-heads involved, they might get all gung-ho and kill me before he gets a chance to gloat.”

  “Yes, that would be a shame,” McLellan deadpanned.

  “Just callin’ it like I see it,” Quinn said. “Still, no point gettin’ sloppy this close to the finish line. We should assume he’s workin’ with ’em, and that they know I’m here.”

  McLellan nodded. “Sensible. So how do we play it?”

  “The only way I know how,” Quinn said. “Head-on.”

  42

  September 10, 2267

  Night had fallen, and Pennington and T’Prynn were still walking.

  Two moons had risen as the sky dimmed. One had climbed above the horizon shortly after dusk; the second rose as the first stars appeared, and it pursued its sibling in slow degrees across the dome of the sky.

  Progress across the desert had been slower than Pennington had expected. On Vulcan the paths had been mostly across the flats, or through rocky passes in the L-langon mountain range. Here he and T’Prynn struggled to find solid footing; each step in the loose sand was followed by random sinking and sliding.

  Since leaving the ship, T’Prynn hadn’t stopped once—not for food or rest—and Pennington hadn’t been able to muster the courage to ask her for a break. Nothing on the horizon ahead of them promised any respite.

  As they descended another balance-challenging slope, T’Prynn broke the silence with a softly spoken question.

  “Why were you unfaithful to your wife?”

  Delivered without provocation or preamble, the question caught Pennington by surprise. For a moment he thought about deflecting her inquiry with a glib remark, but he felt the tug of his conscience and knew he was overdue for a frank personal accounting.

  “I wish I could say I had a good reason,” he said. “The truth is, it was just the latest in a long series of mistakes I made with Lora, starting with getting married.” T’Prynn slowed her pace and sidestepped to allow him to walk beside her as he continued. “I probably never should have married her in the first place. When I started dating her, I stole her from some other bloke, just to see if I could. But as soon as I had her I started sabotaging the relationship. Making passes at her friends. Flirting with girls I’d meet while traveling for work. A couple of those turned into flings.”

  Casting back through the muddy currents of his memory, he struggled to make sense of his own actions. “On one level, I think I wanted to get caught, to be let off the hook. But I knew how much Lora loved me, how much she trusted me. I told myself I had to hide what I was to keep from hurting her, but the truth is I knew I’d never find anyone else who’d love me the way she did, and I was afraid of losing her.”

  T’Prynn asked in a nonjudgmental way, “Did you do this because you feared being alone?”

  “I don’t think so,” Pennington said. “I was selfish more than anything else. I wanted the comfort and security of a committed relationship with the excitement of fresh conquests and new romances. Even when I was asking Lora to marry me, part of me was screaming, Don’t do it! I knew I was getting married for the wrong reasons, but the only other option was to give her up, and I wasn’t strong enough to do that.”

  A cool night breeze tousled his fair hair and pulled a few strands of T’Prynn’s raven tresses free of her long ponytail. The desert was eerily quiet except for the hush of the wind.

  “Did you ever love your wife?”

  The question drew a bittersweet smile from Pennington. “Yes, I did. For a time, at the beginning. Just like I loved all the women I’ve been with: for a time.” The smile left him. “I’ve always been this way. There’s something broken in me. I only ever want what’s denied me; if I manage to possess it, I don’t want it anymore. I get bored.” He felt T’Prynn looking at him, and he turned his head to meet her gaze. “Some part of my psyche confuses love with sexual conquest. I can only stay interested as long as it’s a chase.”

  They crested another dune and began the next careful descent. T’Prynn asked, “Does this self-knowledge help you control your behavior?”

  “I thought it would,” Pennington said. “But it doesn’t. I just make the same mistakes, over and over. Sometimes I think I’ll never really connect with anyone, not like others do. Or if I do, I won’t be worthy of it.” Throwing another sheepish look at T’Prynn, he added, “I’m a lonely wanker, but when I think of all the stupid things I’ve done, I guess maybe I deserve to be.”

  A long silence fell between them. Two moons continued their slow transit of the sky. The wind whispered over the dunes.

  Pennington confirmed with a sidelong glance that T’Prynn remained at his side. A question nagged at him, and he had to give it voice.

  “Why did you set me up with that fake story about the Bombay? Did you know it’d ruin me as a journalist?”

  She bowed her head. “I was aware of the potential negative consequences,” she said. “At the time I believed such harm was necessary. Because you had a reputation for competence and fairness, being able to discredit a story written by you would discourage other, lesser reporters from pursuing the matter.”

  “And you think that made it right? Wasn’t there some other way you could have persuaded the Council not to go to war?”

  She inhaled deeply and looked toward the horizon. “Yes.” After glancing in his direction, she added, “I took the easy way out by using you to expedite my task. The Federation Council needed to cast doubt on what was an otherwise incontrovertible fact: that the Tholians ambushed and destroyed a Starfleet vessel without provocation or just cause. It might have been possible to devise other explanations, but they all would have required more time than we had, and they would have entailed a greater number of variables subject to falsification, thereby increasing the risk that our deception would be exposed.”

  Holding the reins on his anger, Pennington said, “I see.”

  “I am not telling you this to excuse what I have done,” T’Prynn said. “After telling so many falsehoods, however, I feel I owe you the most truthful account of my actions.” She bowed her head again. “With a combination of threats and violence, I coerced your friend Cervantes Quinn into planting the false evidence about the Bombay that I had prepared for you. And those offenses are in fact the least of my sins.”

  Halfway up the side of a sand mountain, she stopped, and Pennington halted beside her. She turned to face him. “I have extorted and blackmailed others into my service,” she said. “I have inflicted serious harm on unarmed persons. I have condoned acts of sabotage and assault against our enemies that, if they had been exposed, could have led to war. And I have killed.”

  She looked away as she continued her confession. “For decades I was imbalanced by Sten’s katra. My logic was impaired, and too many times I let fear or anger g
uide my actions. When others tried to help me, I obstructed their efforts. That is why I tampered with my Starfleet medical records, to hide my mental illness.”

  T’Prynn met Pennington’s gaze with a cool, unblinking stare. “The tragic irony of my situation is that I face court-martial charges not for my most heinous violations of personal liberty, privacy, or sovereignty; not for my acts of violence or for the life I took; but for the comparatively minor and self-serving crimes of altering my medical file and going AWOL. My greatest transgressions have been all but sanctioned by Starfleet Command.”

  “So what does all that have to do with us walking through a desert in the middle of the night?”

  She resumed climbing the slope with Pennington by her side as she replied, “If our mission here is a success, it might be enough to expiate my recent, minor offenses and redeem my career as a Starfleet officer. But to atone for my true crimes …” She frowned and added, “That will be the work of a lifetime.”

  Pondering his own shameful history, Pennington replied, “Yeah … I know what you mean.”

  43

  Quinn fought the urge to look up. With the help of Lirev and her band of free nomads, he had disguised himself as one of the enslaved Denn workers and infiltrated the excavation site at the temple ruins in the desert.

  The midday sun felt to Quinn as if it had been focused through a giant magnifying glass and aimed straight at his head, which was hidden by a deep-hooded cowl. He carried a full backpack on his shoulder and kept his eyes on his feet and those of the worker in front of him as they marched inside the temple as a single file of laborers. As he’d expected, the Klingon sentries paid no mind to the slaves trudging past them.

  A few meters beyond the main entrance, Quinn spied an open doorway to a dimly lit staircase. He slipped out of line and stole up the narrow flight of steps. Though he took care to tread softly, his feet scraped on the stairs’ covering of fine desert sand, and the dry sound echoed off the rough stone walls.