by Kem Antilles
PLAYING FOR KEEPS
Jake and Nog have hit the jackpot playing holo videogames in the Amusement Arcade. An alien name Kwiltek has offered them jobs helping him run remote-controlled mining operations on a distant planet where dull mining is turned into a thrilling video game. In the “gaming room.” teams of kids work together monitoring the operations by remote control, loading cargo and defending against the most frightening “threats” they’ve ever seen on-screen. Now Jake and Nog can show their stuff! Soon they’re competing with other alien kids to see who can haul the most ore.
It’s the ultimate game—with pay! Until the night Jake and Nog slip into the command center and see a roomful of screens displaying real-life images of a devastated world where desperate natives are under attack by fighters that look very familiar! Suddenly the game is over—and the nightmare begins….
Cover art by Alan Gutierrez
Interior Illustrations by Todd Cameron Hamilton
“Do something,” Jake cried. “Anything!”
The Cardassian launched another volley of his plasma weapons.
The engines of the Ganges stuttered to life, and the ship nudged forward … then the power died again. Cardassian plasma bolts came in at full power. Jake and Nog had no shields, no mobility. There was no escape.
“Hang on,” Jake cried as a sound like exploding thunder rammed into the back of the runabout.
“We’re hit!” Nog said, screaming over the din.
A second, stronger bolt crashed into them, and Jake had only an instant to spin around in his pilot’s chair before the back bulkhead of the Ganges erupted in blue-hot flames.
The engine exploded, igniting the antimatter core. The entire runabout disintegrated into an expanding tidal wave of glowing energy that surrounded Jake with a brilliant glare that gradually faded….
—leaving only the terrible, bright green words hanging in the air of the Arcade holosuite:
GAME OVER.
But the real game had not even begun…
Star Trek: The Next Generation
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This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
A MINSTREL PAPERBACK Original
A Minstrel Book published by
POCKET BOOKS, a division of Simon & Schuster Inc.
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Copyright © 1996 by Paramount Pictures. All Rights Reserved.
STAR TREK is a Registered Trademark of Paramount Pictures.
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Cover art by Alan Gutierrez
Printed in the U.S.A.
A million thanks to Lillie E. Mitchell for her typing;
Richard Curtis for his agenting skills, and Lisa Clancy
for her editing skills; and my friends Kevin J. Ander-
son, Rebecca Moesta, Mark Budz, Manna Fitch, and
Michael Paul Meltzer, without whom this book could
never have been written
STAR TREK: DEEP SPACE NINE
Cast of Characters
JAKE SISKO—Jake is a young teenager and the only human boy permanently on board Deep Space Nine. Jake’s mother died when he was very young. He came to the space station with his father but found very few kids his own age. He doesn’t remember life on Earth, but he loves baseball and candy bars, and he hates homework. His father doesn’t approve of his friendship with Nog.
NOG—He is a Ferengi boy whose primary goal in life—like all Ferengi—is to make money. His father, Rom, is frequently away on business, which is fine with Nog. His uncle, Quark, keeps an eye on him. Nog thinks humans are odd with their notions of trust and favors and friendship. He doesn’t always understand Jake, but since his father forbids him to hang out with the human boy, Nog and Jake are best friends. Nog loves to play tricks on people, but he tries to avoid Odo whenever possible.
COMMANDER BENJAMIN SISKO—Jake’s father has been appointed by Starfleet Command to oversee the operations of the space station and act as a liaison between the Federation and Bajor. His wife was killed in a Borg attack, and he is raising Jake by himself. He is a very busy man who always tries to make time for his son.
ODO—The security officer was found by Bajoran scientists years ago, but Odo has no idea where he originally came from. He is a shape-shifter, and thus can assume any shape for a period of time. He normally maintains a vaguely human appearance but every sixteen hours he must revert to his natural liquid state. He has no patience for lawbreakers and less for Ferengi.
MAJOR KIRA NERYS—Kira was a freedom fighter in the Bajoran underground during the Cardassian occupation of Bajor. She now represents Bajoran interests aboard the station and is Sisko’s first officer. Her temper is legendary.
LIEUTENANT JADZIA DAX—An old friend of Commander Sisko’s, the science officer Dax is actually two joined entities known as the Trill. There is a separate consciousness—a symbiont—in the young female host’s body. Sisko knew the symbiont Dax in a previous host, which was a “he.”
DR. JULIAN BASHIR—Eager for adventure, Doctor Bashir graduated at the top of his class and requested a deep-space posting. His enthusiasm sometimes gets him into trouble.
MILES O’BRIEN—Formerly the Transporter Chief aboard the U.S.S. Enterprise, O’Brien is now Chief of Operations on Deep Space Nine.
KEIKO O’BRIEN—Keiko was a botanist on the Enterprise, but she moved to the station with her husband and her young daughter, Molly. Since there is little use for her botany skills on the station, she is the teacher for all of the permanent and traveling students.
QUARK—Nog’s uncle and a Ferengi businessman by trade, Quark runs his own combination restaurant/casino/holosuite venue on the Promenade, the central meeting place for much of the activity on the station. Quark has his hand in every deal on board and usually manages to stay just one step ahead of the
law—usually in the shape of Odo.
CHAPTER 1
As the runabout Mekong shot through the Wormhole at top speed, young Jake Sisko fought with the controls of the small craft.
“Hang on!” Jake called to his Ferengi friend Nog, who sat in the copilot’s seat. “It’s going to be a bumpy ride.”
The bald-headed Ferengi boy tugged on his huge, scrolled ears and squinted at the tactical station. “I’m prepared for anything he said in his raspy voice. His blue-nailed fingers danced over the buttons, prepping the weapons system controls. We’ve got to get back to Deep Space Nine before the ceremony starts, or we’ll be in big trouble.”
In front of them, the swirling flashing colors of the Wormhole opened up like a giant round doorway into black space. The Mekong streaked through heading back toward home.
“Look out!” Nog cried.
Directly across their bow, a cloud of cratered rubble appeared, suddenly springing into crystal focus. Jagged lumps of rock flew through space, crisscrossing their path, ready to destroy anything that crashed into them.
“A meteor storm! Use the phasers, Nog,” Jake shouted. “I’m taking evasive action.”
“Our shields are almost at zero from that last Orion attack,” Nog said. “We can’t take much more.”
The runabout plunged into the swarm of deadly meteoroids, dodging and spinning. Jake switched the command controls to manual and rolled the spacecraft between two tumbling boulders, each the size of a cargo transport. Jake could see the pockmarked, stony surface below him as the runabout scraped by. “That was close!”
Nog punched the weapons controls. “Targeting phasers now,” he said.
An icy meteoroid hurtled in front of them, directly on a collision course. Nog fired twice. The red-orange explosions from the phasers cracked the rock. A third blast turned the meteoroid into a cloud of glowing space rubble.
“Good shot!” Jake said, laughing.
The runabout crashed through the debris cloud with scattered thumps and clangs as the rock fragments battered the smooth white hull of the ship.
“Give me a damage report,” Jake called.
Nog punched up one of the tactical screens and scanned a diagram of the Mekong. “Could have been a lot worse. But our shields are failing—and we’ve got to make it back to DS9, or else!”
“How much time do we have?” Jake asked.
“Only about one standard hour,” Nog answered after checking the chronometer. “If we don’t use the talisman to stop the ceremony, that bomb is going to blow up the whole station!”
“We’ll make it,” Jake said in a low voice, gritting his teeth. “We have to.” He didn’t let himself relax for a moment as he punched the impulse engines, adding a burst of acceleration. He looked out the right cockpit window just in time to see another broken meteoroid streaking toward them.
“To the side!” Nog cried.
With their shields weakened, Jake’s only defense was to dodge. He rammed the engines to maximum speed and the runabout jerked forward. Jake and Nog both cried out as the immediate acceleration shoved them against their piloting seats, but the meteoroid came on—too big and too fast.
The Mekong almost escaped … but the careening rock clipped the port engine pod, sending the ship spinning out of control. The stars cycled around them like a whirlpool of white streaks outside the front ports.
“Stabilize, stabilize!” Jake cried.
Nog, his small eyes wide open in terror, pounded the control board. “I’m trying,” he said. He hit more buttons. “Major damage to the starboard warp nacelle.”
The runabout wheeled out of control, and the scattered stars in the sky made Jake feel dizzy. His stomach tightened as he used every ounce of his piloting knowledge, firing short bursts from the impulse engines to stop the runabout’s dizzying plunge through the meteor storm.
“Doesn’t look good.” Jake said, flashing a sidelong glance to Nog at the tactical station. “We’re crippled. It’s going to take all of our skill just to crawl back to Deep Space Nine. And that bomb is still ticking.”
The Ferengi boy took another glance at his tactical screens and froze. “Uh-oh,” Nog said. “Look who’s coming out of the Wormhole!”
The Wormhole flared, dilating and spilling out one of the deadly Orion ships.
“I guess we didn’t get away from him after all,” Jake said.
“I’ll bet he’s mad at us,” Nog observed
“We’ve got to squeeze all the speed we can out of these engines. If we get close enough to Deep Space Nine,” Jake said, “they’ll turn on their shields and protect us.”
“Unless the station blows up first.” Nog said, his voice tinged with panic. How are we going to move with only one engine?” Nog checked his screens again. “The Orion is powering up his weapons! We’re doomed!”
Jake slammed the impulse engine controls past the red-line maximums. The Mekong responded sluggishly, but he did not dare let up trying to maneuver around the flying debris at the edge of the meteor cloud. “The Orion’s got to come through this meteor shower just like we do, right?”
“But his shields are at full strength—unlike ours!” Nog said. “If you hit one of those rocks, we’re done for.”
“And if we let that Orion catch us,” Jake said, “we’re just as done for. He wants to destroy that talisman at all costs.”
“Surrender and prepare to be boarded,” came the threatening voice of the Orion commander. “You are doomed.”
“Should we call for help?” Nog said. “Maybe your father could—”
“No!” Jake shouted. “We can do this ourselves.”
The Orion fired a plasma burst from his ship, but the bolt went wide, striking one of the nearby meteoroids.
“Too close,” Nog said. The patter and thump of blasted meteoroid chunks struck them again. “More hull damage, a couple of microleaks,” Nog continued. “Our shields are completely gone.”
The ship swooped down on them, powering up its weapons systems again. A second plasma burst sizzled past, burning so close that Jake imagined he could feel the ionization crackle through the hull of the Mekong.
“We should surrender,” Nog said. “We don’t have a chance.”
“What’s the point in surrendering?” Jake said. His voice grew high-pitched with tension. “Don’t give up on me now, Nog. The whole station is at stake if we don’t get out of this.”
The Ferengi boy took a deep breath and nodded.
“Look, I’ve got an idea,” Jake said, punching down on the controls. “See that fringe of the meteor cloud? We’ll go toward that, hide and seek. It’s our last chance for cover.”
Nog looked out the front port windows, seeing the forest of space rocks. “You’re going toward the meteors?”
“Yes,” Jake said, drumming his fingers on the control panel. “I’m going to jettison our damaged nacelle and detonate it. Maybe the Orion will think we crashed into one of the meteoroids and blew up. As soon as the nacelle detonates, I want a full shutdown. Turn everything off. We’ll hang dead in space.” He swallowed nervously. “There’s a chance he won’t notice us.”
“But there’s a chance he will,” Nog said.
“I didn’t say it was a very good chance. Besides, we don’t have any better choice,” Jake answered. He changed course, arrowing toward the scattered rocks.
The Orion ship increased speed to pursue, weapons systems glowing and ready to fire. Jake knew the ship wouldn’t miss a third shot.
When the last of the meteoroids swept past them, Jake dodged as best he could with the sluggish controls. As soon as several of the rocks came between him and the other ship, Jake jettisoned the smoldering warp nacelle from the bottom of the runabout. The Mekong spun out of control.
Jake shielded his eyes as he saw the cylindrical engine pod tumbling in a sparking arc toward the meteoroid.
“Three … two … one,” he counted—and just as the Orion crossed over the fringe of the largest meteoroid, the war
p nacelle blew up, showering space with flying shards of metal and glowing debris.
“Full shutdown, while his sensors are blinded!” Jake cried. Together, he and the Ferengi boy frantically switched off their running lights, shut down their impulse engines, and removed all trace of their energy signature in space.
“Now, we wait,” Jake said, sitting in the darkness. The cockpit of the runabout was lit only by the starlight. In the distance, he could see the glittering lights of Deep Space Nine, impossibly far away. Meanwhile, the hidden doomsday bomb on the station continued its countdown, and only Jake and Nog had the power to stop it—but first they had to escape.
“We’re like sitting waterfowl,” Nog said.
“Not if we manage to fool him,” Jake said, keeping his fingers crossed.
But, as they watched, the Orion continued on course, straight toward them. The firing ports of his plasma weapons glowed, ready to fire.
“No good!” Nog said.
“Get those engines on again!” Jake shouted. “We have to make a run for it.”
“I can’t start the engines cold,” Nog said. “They won’t work.”
“Well, do something,” Jake yelled. “Anything!”
The Orion fired his plasma weapons. The engines of the Mekong stuttered to life, and the ship nudged forward … then the power died again. Orion plasma bolts came in at full power. Jake and Nog had no shields, no mobility.
There was no escape.
“Hang on,” Jake cried as a sound like exploding thunder rammed into the back of the runabout.
“We’re hit. Jake!” Nog screamed over the din.
A second, stronger bolt crashed into them, and Jake had only an instant to spin around in his pilot’s chair before the back bulkhead of the Mekong erupted in blue-hot flames.
The engine exploded, igniting the antimatter core. The entire runabout disintegrated into an expanding tidal wave of glowing energy that surrounded Jake with a brilliant glare…
