A Time to Die

by John Vornholt

  Totally smitten, the hulking Orion peacefully held her hand as they were transported inside the Jem’Hadar derelict.

  Captain Picard tried not to stare at their new surroundings, but it was difficult not to gawk when a Jem’Hadar transporter room had been turned into what appeared to be the rowdiest bar in the sector. Scantily clad emerald-skinned females danced on almost every table, but the number of Orions in the place was relatively few when compared with the plump Pakleds, weaselish Androssi, boisterous Hok’Tar, and ape-shaped, scaly Kreel. Two slovenly Pakleds in stained aprons were manning a makeshift bar and dispensing what looked like Romulan ale, while raucous music roared from dented speakers in every corner. The door to the outer corridor had been blown open and was now just a jagged hole large enough for two Orions to enter at once…and here two now staggered in, arm in arm, singing off-key to the wild music. Smoke hung as thickly as on a Klingon bridge.

  Picard was shoved by Vengus onto the dance floor, but he managed to keep his feet. “Human!” someone cried out, and at once he was bombarded with flying mugs and sloshing ale. Picard dove under a table to protect himself—an action that was greeted by uproarious laughs and jeers, hollering that he was a coward and several other things that were not as kind. Nobody is going to recognize me here, he thought, because they probably won’t let me live long enough for that.

  The captain heard thuds above him, and he realized that the Orion slave girl was still dancing on top of the table. He looked around for Christine Vale but didn’t see her; he did, however, see Colleen Cabot step off the transporter platform, and she looked as if she had her escort, Hidek, well under control. The way he glared at the other males made it clear that he would fight for the right to traipse behind the counselor as she sauntered into the room.

  “Hey, Jean!” she called cheerfully, crouching down to wave to him. “Is this a blast or what?”

  “I need a drink!” Picard shouted back. That wasn’t far from wrong.

  Just then, he heard a howl and a mammoth Pakled dropped to the deck at the end of the bar, a black sword sticking out of his back. Standing over him was an Orion who was trying unsuccessfuly to look innocent. Since he also was holding a struggling Christine Vale in his arms, it was clear what had ini-tiated the deadly brawl. One of the Pakled bartenders drew a pistol, and the Orion responded by holding Vale in front of him as a shield.

  Picard crawled out from under the table and jumped to his feet. “Stop!” he shouted, pointing to the Pakled. “Don’t fire!”

  Slowly the Pakled turned the weapon on Picard. Hidek had to step between them. “Hold it, Morgo! You want revenge, you know what to do. Drop that weapon before we tear this place apart. Our new ship has photon torpedoes, and we left our weapons officer on board.” He tapped the medallion as if to summon aid.

  “Ah, forget it!” shouted the Pakled jovially. “One less greedy mouth to split profits with.” He went back to pouring drinks, as Picard breathed a loud sigh of relief.

  Incredibly, only a few customers in the riotous tavern even paid any attention to this exchange. Nobody bothered to pick up the dead Pakled, who continued to bleed profusely onto the deck. The captain went up to Hidek and said, “Thank you.”

  “You want to thank me, drag that body out of here,” ordered the Orion.

  Picard looked forlornly at the beached whale of a Pakled and nodded. He didn’t have a lot of choice if he wanted to make himself useful.

  Tugging on the corpse didn’t move it much, so he asked the pilot, “Can my shipmate help?”

  The Orion was just served a frothing mug of ale, and he didn’t have enough hands to grab it. He released Vale, who glared at him with abject hatred. “Come on,” Picard said, “help me move him.”

  “Yeah, make yourself useful,” snapped the Orion just before he filled his mouth with ale that spilled all over his verdant chest. “There’s an airlock just down the corridor. Don’t go past the forcefield if you value your lives.”

  “We’ll try not to,” answered Picard. “Hey, this is some headquarters you’ve got here.”

  “The clubhouse, we call it,” he grumbled, “for the syndicate. Move it, you puny humans!”

  He tried to kick Picard, but the captain sidestepped out of the way. With Vale pulling for all she was worth, they managed to drag the dead Pakled a few meters. Hardly anyone even got out of their way as they maneuvered around tables, chairs, and dancers.

  “I think the artificial gravity is set higher here than we would have it.” Vale groaned. “Compared to this bunch, we are puny humans.”

  “You’ll get no argument out of me,” said Picard through heavy panting. As they struggled with the body, he looked up to see what Cabot was up to. Sure enough, she seemed to have a whole table full of customers entranced. He looked closer and saw that she was performimg card tricks for Hidek and his friends. Colleen pulled a card out of his tight britches to much laughter. Her sleight of hand was very impressive, and that was good, because Picard felt they could use a trick or two. Colleen glanced his way but kept a buoyant grin on her face as she enchanted their captors.

  Leaving a trail of purplish blood on the deck, Picard and Vale finally dragged the deceased Pakled out into a blasted corridor, following a path of spills and similar smears to an airlock hatch at the end. Just beyond, two portable forcefield emitters kept the oxygen atmosphere intact, as well as the prisoners in. Drunken customers were loitering toward the other end of the corridor, where a foul-smelling room had been turned into a makeshift latrine. No one paid much attention to them.

  With backs straining and sweat dripping, Picard and Vale finally dropped the dead weight near the hatch. The captain barely had enough energy left to punch the wall panel and open the door, rolling the monstrous body into a horrible garbage dump. The two looked up at an outer door that led to space, where a potpourri of debris was drifting past. Making sure their burden was entirely inside the compartment, they backed out and shut the hatch to the corridor.

  “That could be our way out of here,” whispered Vale, still panting. “What do you think, Captain?”

  “Call me Jean, like Cabot does. We would need EVA suits with propulsion systems. The transporter would be a better choice, because we’ve got to get to our ship.”

  “You there!” growled a Kreel, waving his long arms at them. “Hurry back here! We’ve got more for you to do.”

  Picard nodded and hit a second wall button, which had warning signs all around it. That opened the outer hatch, and the Pakled corpse was blown out into space.

  “We’ve missed our check-in time,” muttered Vale as she walked back down the hall.

  “I know.” Picard realized that the Enterprise was probably crashing through the Ontailians’ line of defense and into the graveyard right now, and that frightened him more than their own predicament.

  “No word from the Skegge,” reported Data at the combined ops and tactical station. “They are five minutes and nineteen seconds late.”

  “I know,” snapped Riker, jumping to his feet “Data, if Ensign Brewster had shown up in my ready room twenty-five minutes ago—even though that’s impossible—and he told me that the away team wouldn’t check in because they’d been captured by Orion scavengers, would you be inclined to believe him?”

  “If what you say occurred, Ensign Brewster cannot be a normal human being. If the first part of his information is true, it stands to reason that the second part may also be true.”

  Riker slammed a fist into a beefy palm. “Brewster told me not to do anything…that he would rescue them.”

  “This is a great deal to take on faith,” said the android. “Then again, Captain, we have no idea where they are. Merely getting into Rashanar is problematic.”

  “I’ve been thinking about that too,” mused Riker. “When we were here before, everyone was worried about impostors posing as Federation ships to get into the boneyard, and with good reason. What if we could doctor the Enterprise to make it seem as if we were actually imp
ostors doing a bad imitation of a Starfleet ship? That way, it won’t get back to Starfleet if we’re spotted.”

  “La Forge could try to alter the warp signature,” suggested Data, “a subterfuge that is never fully successful. I could do an EVA and alter some of the markings on the ship.”

  “Let’s do it,” said Riker, making an immediate decision. “That will give Brewster, or whoever he is, extra time to rescue the away team and contact us by subspace. Conn, we’re out of Ontailian space, aren’t we?”

  “Yes, sir,” answered Kell Perim.

  “Prepare to come out of warp.”

  His top-heavy torso lurching and his knuckles almost grazing the deck, the Kreel scavenger led Picard and Vale down the corridor of the crippled Jem’Hadar battle cruiser. Hok’Tar, Pakled, and Orion looters laughed at them as they passed, and Picard soon guessed why. Judging from the foul smell, they were about to clean the latrines. As they neared the door, where a mass of flies were inexplicably buzzing, the captain had to breathe through his mouth and cover his eyes. That forced him to stop, but the muscular Kreel grabbed the butt of a pistol weapon and pointed inside with a grunt.

  Cristine Vale appeared as if she would throw up.

  The captain looked at his taskmaster, who could only vaguely be called humanoid. “What do we clean it with?”

  “Your clothes!” blared the Kreel, causing the bystanders to erupt in hysterics. He roughly shoved them inside and loped in after, shutting the door behind him.

  The stench and the sight of all this intergalactic bodily waste was almost enough to make Picard faint, as he gave some serious thought to attacking the Kreel bare-handed. They outnumbered the alien two-to-one, although it became fifty-to-one in the transporter room beyond. Vale swooned from the odor, and Picard had to catch her, effectively ending that desperate plan.

  “Captain,” whispered the Kreel, “it’s me, Brewster. Give Vale to me.”

  Wide-eyed with surprise, Picard didn’t know how he knew that this savage was Ensign Brewster, but he somehow placed the unconscious lieutenant in his rangy arms. She was already starting to come to, and the Kreel glanced nervously at the door. “Listen,” he continued, “both of you. I’m taking you back to our ship one by one. Captain, take off your shirt and start cleaning.”

  Fully regaining consciousness, Christine Vale tried to pull away from the scaly brute. Before Picard could reassure her, the two of them disappeared. It wasn’t even like a transporter beam—it was as if they were never there. A pounding fell on the door, and he instantly stripped off some clothing and got to his knees to clean the muck.

  “I’m cleaning!” he shouted. “Wait a minute!”

  There was low grumbling, but the door didn’t open. Only a few seconds passed before the big Kreel appeared again, materializing out of foul air.

  “Colleen is so charming, I can’t get her away from them,” it snorted, “and that big Orion won’t let her out of his sight. I’m going to get you to the Skegge, Captain; then we need a major diversion. Get ready to launch, fire a torpedo right at the guard-post. Wait for us. With any luck, it will only be a few seconds.”

  “How are you doing this?” The captain waved off his own question. “Never mind…later.”

  The Kreel grabbed his arm. In an instant they were crouched on the deck of the Skegge. Through the viewport, the captain could see a dozen other scavenger ships nestled in the forcefield corral under the battle cruiser’s mammoth nacelle. He turned to thank his savior, but no sooner did the alien let go of his arm than he was no longer there.

  Vale gawked. “I didn’t believe it, but now I do.”

  “Ensign Brewster is a man of many talents,” said Picard, rushing to the pilot’s seat. “They took that tractor beam off us, didn’t they?”

  “Yes, sir.” Vale dropped into a seat at the other working console. “But we’ve still got the guard and the forcefield to deal with.”

  “I hope we can take care of both of them with one torpedo.” He continued to work his board, going through the prelaunch checklist, arming and aiming weapons, and finally raising shields. He gazed out the viewport, but the guard in the hollowed-out gunnery position under the nacelle didn’t seem to notice their activity.

  “We still have full power in the engines, such as it is,” reported Vale.

  “Don’t turn anything on until we fire.”

  She pointed to the crumpled Jem’Hadar battle cruiser. “Our friend…is he going to get the counselor?”

  “I certainly hope so,” said Picard grimly. “I’m ready. This should be interesting.”

  The lieutenant braced herself in her seat. His jaw clenched, the captain fired a photon torpedo at a dead ship full of merrymakers less than sixty meters away.

  Chapter Eight

  IN A FORCEFIELD CORRAL shimmering under the nacelle of a blackened Jem’Hadar battle cruiser, a dozen little tugs and salvage scows drifted peacefully. A vast maelstrom of destruction whirled around this island of calm. Laughter echoed in the transporter room inside the forlorn derelict. This unearthly peace was violently ruptured when a grimy tug suddenly launched an avenging torpedo, which streaked from its underbelly like a comet and slammed into a hollow section of the nacelle. The guard in the gunnery had no chance. The explosion ignited a riotous rippling of energy spikes that spread outward across the Rashanar Battle Site. Within seconds, the dazzling arcs had turned this section of the graveyard into a new war zone.

  “Hang on!” shouted Picard, trying to maintain control of the Skegge while other vessels detonated all around them. Sparks flew as the tug slammed into another scow.

  Vale sat grim-faced at the other console. “The forcefield is down! Let’s get out of here!”

  “Not yet.” Picard looked worriedly at the Jem’Hadar ship, which was suddenly lit up like the grand opening of a used-spaceship lot. “Where are Brewster and Cabot?”

  Large chunks of wreckage went crashing around the corral. “Shields are weakening!” warned Vale.

  “One more second,” replied the captain through gritted teeth. One of the other salvage ships managed to escape, its thrusters scorching a third vessel as it roared into the darkness.

  Suddenly a brilliant white beam blasted off the remains of their shields, and Vale yelled, “They’re firing phasers at us!”

  “From where?” The captain peered through the smoke, flames, and debris into the heart of chaos. He could see that they had missed a second gunnery position in the hull. A cloud of rubble drifted between them, and that was their only protection.

  “Let’s go!” said another male voice, and Picard looked back gratefully to see Ensign Brewster holding an unconscious and bloody Colleen Cabot in his arms. He leaned on the trimpots, and they zoomed away just as another phaser blast grazed their stern and sheared off a winch.

  “That was more diversion than we needed,” muttered Brewster, laying the wounded counselor on the lower bunk at the rear of the cabin. He grabbed the first-aid kit and took out a bandage, using it to dab the blood from Cabot’s forehead.

  “Give her ten cc’s of lectrazine,” said Picard. “It’s in the kit.” He spared no time glancing over his shoulder or at his incoherent scanner readouts—all he knew was that the Skegge had to flee at top speed.

  “We need to get word to the Enterprise as soon as possible,” remarked Vale.

  “I’ve taken care of that,” answered Brewster as he prepared the hypospray. Deftly he administered the medicine, but he still fretted as he looked down at Colleen’s unconscious form. “Her pulse is strong, but I wish my mother were here.”

  “Your mother?” asked Picard suspiciously. “Who are you really, Ensign Brewster?”

  “He’s a shapeshifter,” said Vale.

  “No, I’m not.” The ensign shook his head, and his plain, dumpy features began to morph into a more handsome, youthful visage attached to a tall, slender body.

  Picard gasped and forced himself to pay attention to his controls. Hoarsely he said, “Wesley—” />
  “Hello, Captain. I’m sorry for the subterfuge,” said the young man, still gazing worriedly at Cabot.

  “I only set out to help you a little during your inquiry…but I guess I got carried away.”

  “Wesley?” asked Vale with a dawning realization. “Not the Wesley? But you aren’t human.”

  “I’m all too human,” he admitted. “But I’ve spent the last eight years training to be a Traveler, and I was finally born into the fellowship. Do you know what a Traveler is, Lieutenant?”

  “I know it’s something pretty darn special with what you did back there.”

  “Beverly must know,” said Picard with a smile. “That’s why she’s been so damned cheerful.”

  “Yes. Colleen knows, too, and so does the Commodore Korgan.”

  “I’d like to know,” said Vale. “My education must have been limited.”

  Not wasting words, Wesley described the remarkable existence of a Traveler as simply as he could, ending with the confession: “But I’m not sure how much longer I’ll be a Traveler.”

  “Can you look like anyone?” asked Vale, entranced by this exotic young man.

  Wes brushed a strand of blond hair from Colleen’s forehead. “Yes, I suppose I could look like someone specific, but I would have to practice their mannerisms and voice. It would be difficult. We’re taught to blend into the background. You know, someone you can’t remember five minutes after you met them. We’re only supposed to observe and record for posterity…which is not what I’m doing now.”

  “And you got word to the Enterprise?” asked Picard. “What are they doing?”

  “I don’t know for sure,” admitted Wesley. “But I told them not to invade the boneyard just because we missed our check-in.”

  The counselor groaned and shifted on the bunk. Wesley anxiously gripped her hand. “Colleen? Don’t try to move—just lie still.”