Two hours ago, he’d sat in the repair bay with Nog, Bashir and several of the engineering staff, watching computer simulations of Nog’s proposed Defiant defense system. Every alloy Nog had synthesized failed. Most of the femtobots were destroyed as soon as they were deployed beneath the shield envelope. The femtobot defense would have to be scrapped unless a solution could be devised. Attempting to leave this region without protection against the Cheka weapon wasn’t an acceptable risk as far as Vaughn was concerned. Yrythny intelligence had persuaded him that they would be facing additional Cheka weapon deployments indefinitely. With time, we could find an alternative, but next to this raw material we need to make Nog’s scheme work, time is the commodity we lack the most. Vaughn had resigned himself to dealing with L’Gon.
The irony of transacting with the Cheka in order to combat their own weapon didn’t escape him, and he took some satisfaction in the poetic justice of it, but another part of him resented having to pay the neighborhood bully for protection against the bully himself.
When M’Yeoh learned of the deal with L’Gon he’d offered a squadron of J’Maah’s soldiers as backup, reminding Vaughn once again of the double-dealing ways of some shadow traders. The gesture had been appreciated, but Vaughn questioned the judgment of putting armed Yrythny within striking distance of the Cheka suite. Though the Consortium was politically neutral territory, legal declarations meant little in the face of heated emotions.
But Vaughn wasn’t a fool. Knowing M’Yeoh’s estimation of the danger was probably accurate—and having learned that Nog had succeeded in, among other things, restoring Defiant’ s transporters—Vaughn put Bowers and Nog at his back. Defiant’ s tactical officer would accompany him as far as the suite. (Certainly L’Gon wouldn’t consider that a violation of their agreement.) His job was to stay in the corridor, prepared to contact Nog for an emergency beam-out, should Vaughn fail to emerge at the designated time. Bowers treated the task like something out of the old Western vids he loved so much: he would be the gun-toting deputy while Vaughn was the sheriff heading in to negotiate with the criminals. Vaughn appreciated Sam’s enthusiasm, but cautioned him against scratching the proverbial “itchy trigger finger.”
The door slid open at Vaughn’s approach, and he stepped into the darkly lit lobby, clicking on the alarm on his tricorder’s chrono. In half an hour, without word from him, Bowers would send the signal to Nog, and Vaughn would be transported back to the Defiant. And how hot is it in here? If I’d known I was walking into a sauna… He dabbed at his forehead with his sleeve. When his eyes adjusted to the lack of lighting, he realized a robot had arrived to serve as his escort.
“You are expected,” the robot squawked. “Follow.”
Vaughn complied, still not sure if he was walking toward Defiant’ s salvation, or his own doom.
Funny how childhood memories color present expectations, Ezri thought, literally. She stood at the fore railing of the great hydro foil, watching the rise and fall of teal waves garnished in white foam, still surprised that oceans could be any color but purple. She might have been raised around the mines on New Sydney, but extended family on Trill brought her regularly to the homeworld and its violet seas. The first time she’d walked across the Golden Gate Bridge during her Academy days, her eyes seldom lifted to the shimmering cables suspending the bridge above the bay, but focused instead on the dark gray-blue waters, all the while wondering why they were blue. On this world, blue waters would have been too staid; teal waters better suited this stirred-up planet.
The view of Vanìmel from Luthia’s observation decks and windows captured a portrait of a warm, sleepy moss-green world, with white clouds sedately churning through the atmosphere. Descending through the clouds and close in on the surface, Ezri expected a dewy spring day and primeval forest; plants unfurling tender stalks and limbs to the sun’s soft tickle, waters lapping at the seashores with a puppy’s harmless eagerness.
Instead, hurricane force winds forced a bumpy detour away from a storm-sieged landing pad, swerving in and out of the lava-belching volcanoes that dominated the northern continent until finally, the shuttle skidded onto the flat top of a dormant volcano. She questioned the dormant part, seeing as steam oozed out of the cracked ground, the rotten-egg stench of methane permeated the air and she swore she’d felt the earth beneath them trembling. Ashen landscapes extended in every direction as far as the eye could see, the terrain devoid of flora and fauna. None of the Yrythny seemed worried. Vanìmel was a geologically volatile world whose rapid plate tectonic shifts had more in common with a game of checkers than a reluctant, long-simmering buildup that resisted release. As a counselor, Ezri had known those who nursed grudges, simmering privately until some provocation unleashed suppressed torrents of anger, and those who lived daily from eruption to eruption. Vanìmel appeared to be the latter type.
A swift land shuttle delivered them to the port city of Malinal where they boarded the hydrofoil that took them out to sea. By her calculations, they had been traveling for several hours, past kilometer after kilometer of water farms and quaint aquaculture villages mounted on stilts. Village residents tended the plants and animals being cultivated in surrounding waters, or served as lookouts, protecting the spawning grounds nestled along the continental shorelines. Once, the hydrofoil paused at the request of three marine patrol boats. Uniformed naval personnel talked in hushed tones with the hydrofoil captain—Ezri gathered they had been traveling on the border of a military training reservation and the officers wanted to examine the travel logs for security reasons. Later, one of the Yrythny representatives explained that a Cheka spy craft had been detected making several attempts at shoreline penetration; the military wanted to make certain their enemies weren’t gaining access to secure areas with Yrythny assistance. Otherwise, the journey had been uneventful, almost leisurely. Had the circumstances been less formal, Ezri would have been tempted to throw on some sunlenses and sunscreen, sprawl on a deck chair and make shore leave out of it. She had a feeling her hosts might not like that too much, though she wasn’t sure exactly what it was they would have preferred instead.
From the start, the Upper Assembly committee had been vague about what they wanted her to see, plying her with exquisitely prepared food, offering her comfortable seating, and breathtaking views from the hydrofoil’s observation deck. Schmoozing, as the humans called it, was expected in this line of work. In the course of his years serving the Federation, Curzon had been offered latinum, liquor and the company of beautiful women (he’d taken them up on that offer); a little gourmet finery didn’t phase Ezri. She liked the pampering. All the fuss hadn’t totally distracted her—she hoped. Several times already she’d found her mind wandering through the last time she’d done this—right before Risa, when the Federation Council …Scratch that. The last time Curzon had done this. But did it really matter who did what? She was Dax. Curzon was part of Dax, and allowing some of his harmless vices to creep into her own behavior couldn’t be all bad. Besides, she’d already learned a lot during this trip, even if it hadn’t been synthehol in that last carafe of wine. Dax had a good head for liquor, having drunk more than her fair share of unsavory types under the table…Had that been Curzon, too? Or had it been Jadzia? Ezri shook her head, hoping the cool sea spray might sharpen her senses and make her forget her argument with Julian over these very issues.
Unbidden, she remembered a similar conversation she’d had with Dr. Renhol of the Symbiosis Commission during the Europani evacuation—how she’d confronted Ezri with her recent tendency to slip into her past-host personae, blurring the lines between present and past. And it wasn’t like the weeks and months after joining either, where she’d wake up uncertain as to her sex. More like she didn’t feel inclined to reign in Dax’s various personalities. Maybe when she got back to the Alpha Quadrant, she’d return to Trill for her zhian’tara. She could only imagine what it would be like to meet these people she so enjoyed being. Ezri snorted. Who am I now, standing here looking
out over this ocean? One thing’s certain, Lela would be more on task than I am. She could hear Lela’s firm, focused voice. “Time to buckle down, Lieutenant. Start putting the pieces together so you can do the job you were left here to do.” Recommitting herself to the task at hand, Ezri considered what she’d learned.
What struck her most, as she considered the day’s observations, was how lacking in arable land this planet was. It was astonishing that the population had proliferated as well as it had, considering. Yes, Vanìmel had five primary continental masses and hosts of island chains. Faults, toxic levels of minerals leeching into the water sheds from constantly shifting land plates, and geological instability (such as the volcanoes) made utilizing the planet tricky for sentients like the Yrythny, whose life cycles required both land and water. The degree to which they’d adapted the oceans for their use was a tribute to their cleverness. Yet at some point, Vanìmel’s capacity to sustain life would be maximized.
Adding more modules to Luthia or farming more square kilometers of the oceans would work, but not indefinitely. During their first year, Yrythny hatchlings required thousands of kilometers of open seas. Confined spaces inhibited their maturing processes. Consuming ocean acreage to feed a growing population would only bring another level of complications.
Ezri had caught her first glimpse of “newborn” Yrythny about an hour before, when a school of hatchlings swimming close to the surface had been pointed out to her by Jeshoh. Longer tails and the un differentiated limbs indicated these hatchlings had been in the water only for a short time. He’d explained that during the first year, hatchling respiratory systems gradually matured beyond utilizing gills to extract oxygen from the water, to lungs requiring gaseous oxygen. By the time they came ashore as younglings (as Yrythny in their first five years out of the water were called), the Yrythny were dependent on the atmosphere. Vanìmel’s geography made it difficult. Even with the aquaculture villages, Luthia, and other communities built over the water, dry surfaces were difficult to come by. Maybe she’d been correct in her hypothesis, that indeed, caste customs, especially those related to reproduction, had arisen out of a fragile planet’s needs.
When she noticed the hydrofoil slowing down, she turned to one of her Yrythny escorts for an explanation. He had said simply, “Force field ahead,” and left it at that. Ezri guessed that they might be entering a section of the military reservation. McCallum, Candlewood and Juarez, her companions on this trip, emerged from the lower decks to see what had stopped the hydrofoil. Together, they walked over to the port bow. From there, they had a clear view of multistory towers extending out of the water at kilometer intervals directly in front of them. Signal lights on the top of each tower flashed orange. The lights continued blinking for a moment longer, dimmed, and began flashing blue. The hydrofoil moved forward, between two of the towers, across the waters beyond.
A representative Ezri knew as Lesh approached the four Starfleet officers and indicated that she wanted them to follow her. Ezri found she needed to jog to keep up with Lesh’s bowlegged amble. Thankfully, Lesh was impossible to lose in a crowd, her distinctive mottled brown-yellow striping running from her forehead, beneath her headpiece and down her neck, setting her apart from the others. Color and striping, she knew, unlike the distinctive ridges of the Klingon crest, were not necessarily indicative of an Yrythny’s House affiliation. The real test of a returning hatchling’s identity was the distinctive chemical taste of its skin. Hatchlings with the “wrong” taste were raised in the Houses they came to, but as servants.
A Wanderer, clearing dirty plates off deck tables, had coloring similar to Lesh’s and Ezri wondered, not for the first time, how it would feel if you knew where you were supposed to belong, but were unable to do anything about it. “Can’t you simply send the lost younglings home? If a youngling from House Fnoral swims ashore to House Soid, why not send the lost one back to Fnoral?” she’d asked.
Jeshoh had looked at her like she’d sprouted another head. “Because if they can’t find their way home in the first place, there’s something wrong. Isn’t it compassionate that the Houses take in one that’s not their own instead of casting it back out to sea or killing it?” he’d answered. “A thousand years ago that’s what the
Houses used to do: club to death any hatchling that wasn’t theirs. We’ve come quite a distance from those days, Lieutenant.”
As she watched the servant Yrythny scrape food scraps into the recycler, she wondered if the distance they’d come was as far as Jeshoh believed it to be.
Keren offered no explanations as to their destination. They passed the university, the health sciences center and the Aquaria before arriving in a nearly abandoned cluster of offices; none bore signage. Even the nondescript foyer—beige chairs, pale green carpets and white urns overflowing with flowers—provided little hint as to what the facilities’ purpose might be. A flecked-skinned Yrythny female floated across the floor to greet them. Clasping Keren by the elbows, she said, “Come in, come in, Delegate. So pleased to see you. Your presence blesses us.”
“Mresen.” Keren nodded graciously, interlinking her arms with those of her hostess. She indicated Shar. “My companion, Ensign Thirishar ch’Thane.”
Shar proffered the traditional greeting to Mresen. Her bejeweled skirt and the multicolored braids streaming to her waist marked Mresen as a high-ranking Houseborn. Rarely do Houseborn—even Keren’s colleagues—treat Wanderers so politely, Shar thought, puzzled. A glance at Keren informed him that she expected his surprised reaction.
“A beverage perhaps? Take a seat where you’re comfortable—” Mresen fluttered to an armoire, removed a serving tray from a cupboard. A click of her tongue brought a gaunt but more elaborately dressed Yrythny bearing baskets of braided seed crackers and pollen spread. Mresen poured coriander-scented water into the finger basins when Keren halted her.
“Ensign ch’Thane has come to visit our lost ones,” Keren said, gnawing on a cracker.
Mresen clicked her tongue against her teeth, the skin drooping off her jaw jiggling apologetically. “Of course. You know where to take him.” She reached for Keren’s arm again. “Thank you, Delegate. For honoring us.”
“The honor is mine,” Keren replied, bowing.
When they’d left Mresen, Shar wasted no time in questioning Keren. “She’s Houseborn.”
“She is. House Soid, in fact. Her aide is House Yclen.”
“And yet—”
“There are some aspects of Yrythny life even Houseborn and Wanderer agree on. Here we are—” A door hissed opened onto an arboretum, bordered on all sides by water gushing over fish ladders. They hiked up a carpeted ramp to where two rows of invalid chairs, suspended in the air before the floor-to-ceiling windows, provided their inhabitants an unobstructed view of Vanìmel. Where benches might be, Shar saw biobeds and in each, Shar discerned Yrythny patients. Medical attendants shuffled around efficiently, carrying trays with medication and nutritional supplements. Keren searched the residents’ faces, honing in on one specifically.
“Witan!” she exclaimed, brushing her cheek against the ailing Yrythny’s scaly scalp. Squatting down beside him, she checked out the view. “Are there storms in the archipelago today?”
The gnarled figure, prone in bed, twisted toward Keren’s voice and garbled unintelligibly. The loose patient robes failed to hide the twisted vertebrae, the stump where an arm should have been. Witan’s legs splayed limply on the mattress. Around the room, Shar saw Yrythny in similar physical states in every bed and chair. A few had smooth indentions where eyes should have been. Some lacked legs or arms. Others were attached to biobeds by sensors and life support mechanisms. He understood that Yrythny technology hadn’t yet attained Federation sophistication, but he was curious as to why little had been done to surgically correct the maladies these individuals faced. A VISOR transmitting sensory data to an optic nerve could provide sight. Biosynthetic prostheses could replace deformed bones. Even a vocal synthesizer properly im
planted could allow a mute, bedridden patient to communicate. Perhaps we might share some of our medical knowledge with these people, help them ease the suffering of their disabled, Shar thought.
He followed Keren to the bedsides of several patients. The medical attendants—some Houseborn, some Wanderers—recognized Keren and offered her respectful greetings. Keren had personal words for every patient they encountered, all of whom suffered from different maladies. Whatever commonality brought the patients here was not readily evident in their symptoms. In Shar’s Starfleet experience and in following Thriss around the medical wards on Betazed, he’d found that patients were usually organized by diagnosis. He suspected that Keren’s agenda was the unifying thread here.
In a private moment, Shar asked at last, “What selected facts are you presenting me to prove your point, Delegate?”
“These are Yrythny rescued from Cheka research labs. All of them have undergone genetic tampering. The oldest residents were subjected to environmental research—like having limbs amputated or having their legs surgically fused together.”
A wave of nausea squeezed his stomach; his antennae tensed. Although he’d been spared much frontline participation in the Dominion War, he’d seen enough of its horrors that he’d had to learn to cope with them: death, illness, destruction. Defending one’s people or way of life, whether Federation, Klingon, Yrythny or Cheka, necessitated a degree of ugliness. But this…
Speaking softly, her voice coarse, Keren continued, “A few have been castoffs that we found by accident. That group over there”—she pointed to a number of patients suffering from orthopedic maladies—“was discovered left for dead in a damaged ship the Cheka had abandoned. Environmental systems had essentially collapsed. When we rescued them…” She inhaled deeply, sat silent for a long moment. She turned to Shar, her eyes glistening. “We can’t negotiate,” Keren said softly.
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