Star Trek®: Mirror Universe: Shards and Shadows

by Marco Palmieri

  Actually, the captain only looked human. However, she didn’t bother to correct him.

  “Now,” said Morgen, “we end this little rebellion of yours before it gets started.” He raised his disruptor until the captain was looking down its barrel. “Starting with you.”

  She didn’t believe he would kill her—just stun her, so his Klingon friends could interrogate her. And from what she had heard, they were good at interrogation, skilled at obtaining even the most closely guarded answers.

  The kind that could cut out the legs from under a rebellion before it even got started.

  The captain had to do something—and quickly. Fortunately, she still had a single card up her sleeve, a single option that might work. But would it be enough?

  Melekh leaned forward in the captain’s chair of the Tlhab, a place in which he felt increasingly comfortable with each passing moment.

  “Fire!” he told his weapons officer.

  Once again, a series of pale red beams stabbed at the fleeing form of the transport. And once again, the transport managed to elude them.

  But it hadn’t fired back in some time. More than likely, its weapons array was down, and its shields couldn’t be far behind. Still, it would be wise to obtain confirmation.

  “Report,” he told his tactical officer.

  “The enemy’s engines are intact,” came the response. “However, her weapons have been disabled, and her shield capacity is down to eleven percent.”

  Melekh smiled to himself. The transport had led them on an interesting chase considering the vast disparity in their tactical capabilities. An interesting chase, indeed.

  But it was over.

  Savoring the moment, as might a hunter who had come in sight of his prey, he watched the transport weave through space. Then he gave the order.

  “Destroy her,” he snarled.

  Dutifully, his tactical officer established a fresh disruptor lock. He was about to stab the “fire” stud with his forefinger when the bridge was flooded with a gravelly and all too familiar voice, that of their commanding officer.

  “Stand down!” it demanded.

  Melekh made a face. He didn’t understand.

  The commander didn’t offer an explanation. All he said was, “Let the cargo vessel go!”

  There was a bitter taste in Melekh’s mouth, like that of meat that had gone bad. But he couldn’t disobey his commanding officer. After all, the penalty for disobedience was death.

  Unless, of course, he wished to challenge his superior’s fitness to command. But he wasn’t ready to fight that battle at this time, especially over such a trivial matter.

  “Aye,” he said reluctantly. Eyeing his tactical officer, he echoed the commander’s words: “Stand down.”

  On the screen, the cargo transport began to diminish with distance. It wasn’t nearly as fast as the Tlhab. They could give it a head start of several minutes and still manage to catch up with it.

  But that would only happen if the captain changed his mind. And judging by the tone of his order, Melekh didn’t consider that likely.

  He pounded his fist against his armrest. Then he sat back in his seat and wondered what had prompted the captain’s change of heart.

  Ben Zoma was still wondering why the Klingons had discontinued their pursuit when Garner announced that the captain was trying to raise them.

  “Put her through,” said Ben Zoma.

  “Come get us,” said the captain, her voice taut with urgency. “We’ve got a window of maybe five minutes before the Klingons come back.”

  “Picard’s gone,” Ben Zoma told her. “He—”

  “I know. He’s down here with me.”

  Ben Zoma didn’t get it. But then, he didn’t have to. The captain would fill him in once she was back onboard.

  “Are we beaming up the Daa’Vit as well?” he asked.

  “No. Just our people and Picard. And bring a med unit down to the cargo bay—Ulelo will need it for sure. Wu and Joseph as well, maybe.”

  She hadn’t mentioned Pernell. Ben Zoma had a bad feeling that he knew why.

  “We’re on our way,” he told the captain, gesturing to Gerda Idun to bring the ship about.

  Melekh stood on the barren brown slope amid the remains of what had once been Klingon and Daa’Vit warriors and shook his head. He had heard his captain give him an order to withdraw. He could not have imagined it.

  And yet, quite clearly, Druja could have used his help.

  “Survey the area,” he told his men. “See if the enemy is still present.” But he didn’t think they would find anyone.

  Kneeling beside his captain, he surveyed the damage that had been done. Druja’s head was twisted halfway around, but there were no other signs of violence. Clearly, it wasn’t a directed energy weapon that had killed him.

  It was something else.

  Melekh swore beneath his breath. Something stank worse than the corpses on the slope. Snapping open his communication device, he barked into it the name of his tactical officer.

  “Aye, Commander,” came Ruunek’s response.

  “Access your files. Find Captain Druja’s command to us to withdraw. Then analyze it for—” He didn’t know what to say. “Anything unusual.”

  “Why?” asked the tactical officer. “Is there something—”

  “Do it!” growled Mehlek.

  “Aye,” said Ruunek, and cut the link.

  Rising to his feet, the commander brushed himself off and looked around again. He would allow the bodies to remain where they had fallen. With their spirits gone, they were no more than refuse.

  “Commander Melekh!” called one of his men.

  He turned and saw a warrior gesturing from farther down the slope. He was standing over one of the Daa’Vit.

  “What is it?” bellowed Melekh.

  “This one is alive!” the warrior called back.

  Melekh made his way down the incline, raising a cloud of dust. When he reached the surviving Daa’Vit, he hunkered down beside him.

  “What happened?” demanded the commander.

  The Daa’Vit had broken his leg, probably ribs as well, and Melekh wouldn’t have been surprised if there were a skull fracture, too. But, being a warrior, the Daa’Vit found the strength to speak.

  “It was a creature,” he groaned. “Like nothing I have ever seen before.” And he went on to describe it.

  A creature, Melekh thought. But their survey had shown no animal life. And if it had been there wreaking havoc so recently, what had become of it?

  Just then, his comm device beeped.

  “Melekh,” he replied.

  “Commander,” said Ruunek, “I have analyzed Captain Druja’s communication, as you asked—and it was not he who gave the order.”

  Melekh felt the blood rush to his face. “Then who was it?”

  “I don’t know. It sounded like Druja. But it doesn’t match the record of his voice in his security file.”

  Melekh felt a chill crawl up the rungs of his redundant spine. Not Druja? Who, then?

  And why had he not bothered to check the authenticity of the captain’s voice? Why? His hands clenched into fists. By the blood of Kahless, why?

  Without another word, Melekh left the Daa’Vit behind and walked back up the slope. To be alone. To think.

  After all, the High Command would be expecting a report on the matter. It would want to know how Morgen and his comrades had lost their lives, how the Tlhab had lost its captain, and how its first officer had lost his prey. Of course, Melekh was the one who would have to provide the answers.

  And take responsibility for what had happened.

  The captain of the Lakul entered her briefing room, where the shapechanger who had taken Picard’s identity was waiting for her.

  “Tea?” she asked.

  He shook his head. “Don’t like it. Thanks anyway.”

  “I appreciate your helping us,” she said. “If you hadn’t, we would have been on our way to the Klingon homew
orld by now.”

  “I’m glad it worked out.”

  “So…who are you? Not Picard, evidently, unless he has talents none of us knew about.”

  “My name is Sestro,” he said. “I am an Iyaaran. My home system is beyond the area of space you have explored, but not by much.”

  “And you gave us a hand because…?”

  “My people have been monitoring your space rather closely of late, following the growth of what you call the Alliance. We have concluded that it presents a danger to our civilization and that it would be in our best interest to destabilize it. Hence my involvement here.”

  “What about the real Picard?”

  He shrugged. “Somewhere else, in the real Stargazer. It is a big galaxy, after all.”

  The captain nodded. “That’s true.”

  The Iyaaran frowned. “I still don’t understand how you and your comrade overcame the Daa’Vit. It seemed to me they had you dead to rights.”

  She smiled. “Apparently, I’ve got more tricks up my sleeve than you give me credit for.”

  He looked at her archly. “In other words, you would rather not say. I can accept that—for now. But if your people and mine are to work together, it would be best to have as few secrets between us as possible.”

  “That sounds like an offer of help,” said the captain.

  “It is. And from what I have observed, you need all the help you can get.”

  She couldn’t argue with that. “Sorry about your ship.”

  The Iyaaran shrugged. “A necessary casualty. Don’t be concerned. My people have access to others.”

  That offer of help was sounding better and better. “You should rest. You took quite a beating down there.”

  “I did,” he conceded. “Thank you.”

  “Thank you,” said the captain.

  She watched the Iyaaran leave the room, remembering the way he had deceived her. In fact, she had been deceived twice in one day, if she counted the way the Daa’Vit had pulled the wool over her eyes.

  And she admired deception.

  After all, she wasn’t the real Guinan any more than Sestro was the real Picard.

  Alone in the conference room, she relaxed her powers of concentration and allowed herself to regain some of her natural features. A long reptilian tail emerged from beneath the hem of her robe. Ah, she thought, that feels good.

  She would have given up her humanoid guise entirely except for the fact that her crew didn’t stand on ceremony. Any one of them might walk in unannounced.

  If they did, she didn’t want them seeing her for what she was: a shapechanger, just like the Iyaaran, except from a different part of the quadrant.

  A denizen of Daled IV, she possessed the ability to transform herself from her original form into a host of other guises, some of them capable of crushing a handful of Daa’Vit—or merely to transform her vocal cords so as to mimic a Klingon voice. And her people, too, wished to “destabilize” the Alliance, though she wished she had thought of the word before Sestro’s people did.

  It had a certain elegance.

  The real Guinan, whom she had temporarily replaced on the Lakul, was recuperating from a serious injury back on Bering’s World. When she returned to her ship and her crew, Werreth—for that was the Daledian’s real name—would slip away. The exchange would leave a slew of questions, no doubt, and perhaps in time Werreth would answer them.

  After her people decided to establish contact with the rebels.

  Considering the antipathy between the real Guinan and the real Picard, it was ironic that the beings impersonating them might end up working together. But then, Werreth mused, revolutions—even incipient ones—made strange bedfellows.

  The Sacred Chalice

  Rudy Josephs

  HISTORIAN’S NOTE: “The Sacred Chalice” takes place in 2371 (ACE) as the human rebellion against the Klingon-Cardassian Alliance is on the rise (“Through the Looking Glass,” Star Trek: Deep Space Nine), just after Jean-Luc Picard decides to join the rebellion (Star Trek Mirror Universe: Glass Empires—The Worst of Both Worlds).

  Rudy Josephs was first exposed to Star Trek at a young, impressionable age, but it wasn’t until the launch of Star Trek: The Next Generation that he truly got hooked. He suspects that it was mainly because he was the same age as Wesley Crusher and he figured if that kid could do all that he did, there was no telling what Rudy would achieve. Sadly, Rudy is still waiting for an interstellar traveler to come whisk him away from his boring life.

  Betazed.

  The most desolate hellhole of a planet Andrul Taqut had ever visited. Dead shrubs had overrun the landing area where his father had set down the family’s private shuttle, a long walk from their mysterious destination. Andrul was not accustomed to traveling by foot for any distance. On Cardassia, he’d had a personal vehicle and driver assigned to him since birth. He still didn’t understand why they couldn’t simply beam down to the planet that wasn’t even listed as M Class on star charts. His father had muttered some nonsense about planetary quarantine buoys, which only caused him more confusion over the purpose behind this impromptu trip.

  Had his father learned of his massive losses betting on the underground slave fights or one of his many other secret endeavors? It seemed unlikely. If his father were going to kill him, it would have been done in public and with all the bells and whistles accorded such family conflicts. That was the best way to keep face in the Klingon-Cardassian Alliance. Children secretly disappearing only led to gossip and scandal that could affect Gul Taqut’s position. Open filicide was the preferred method of dealing with a disappointing child.

  Surely, the excuse of Andrul’s entering into the Noran Tuk, the time of a youth’s transition into manhood, was not the actual reason for the trip. That was a more formal gala filled with all the pomp and revelry traditional to the most archaic rituals. It was something that would be overseen by his mother. Certainly not something to be partaken on some long-abandoned world.

  Empty husks of buildings lined the street of the once city. Andrul’s history lessons had never mentioned any ancient civilizations in this corner of the universe. Not that the Alliance-approved texts weren’t heavily edited, particularly regarding the former Terran Empire. If he’d known where his father was taking him, he would have done more research, but this mystery excursion didn’t allow for any preparation, a fact, Andrul was certain, his father had intentionally planned.

  A set of rusted metal doors stood at the end of a minor thoroughfare. The doors seemed neither particularly welcoming nor formidable, but Andrul’s father proceeded directly toward them without hesitation. As they approached, Andrul watched as his father slid back a stone in the crumbling wall beside the door, revealing a modern keypad that clearly was installed after the planet was discarded. His father pressed a sequence of commands on the device.

  “State your business.” A static-filled, curt voice came out of the panel.

  “We are an envoy of the Klingon-Cardassian Alliance seeking refuge from our travels,” Andrul’s father answered, confusing his son even further. How long was this planetary journey going to be if they were seeking refuge so soon? What was their ultimate destination?

  “Greetings, Gul Taqut,” the voice—now considerably friendlier and static-free—replied. “Welcome to the Sacred Chalice.”

  The huge metal doors swung open with a swooshing sound that was nothing like the grinding of rust or straining of metal Andrul had expected. Even more surprising was the lush garden waiting on the other side. Rows of exotic flower beds bursting with color lined the walkways. Flowing fountains and wooden benches dotted the greenery. Dark green vines climbed the interior walls, which looked much more heavy-duty inside than out. It was an oasis in the middle of a hellhole.

  The landing party stepped hastily inside as the doors swooshed shut. An older woman in bright purple robes came hurrying toward them. She appeared Terran, but when she reached them, Andrul saw that her eyes were completely black. His expe
rience with Terrans was limited to their household servants, so he did not know if this was a unique trait. But he was far more intrigued by the kind of business his father could have with some planetary squatters.

  “Gul Taqut,” the woman said, taking Andrul’s father into her arms in a highly inappropriate manner for a servant of the Alliance. “How lovely to see you again. And so soon after your last visit. I suspect that this strapping young man can only be that son of yours you’ve so often spoken about.” Andrul doubted his father had ever said anything more than a passing reference, but the woman was clearly adept at masking true appearances, as the gardens around them indicated.

  “Ambassador Troi,” his father replied. “This is, indeed, my wastrel of a firstborn.”

  “Ambassador?” Andrul openly scoffed. The idea of this woman being the ambassador to a dead planet was the most amusing comment his taciturn father had ever made. Which was why it was surprising when his father smacked him across the face.

  “Do not be disrespectful, worthless wretch,” his father scolded. “Ambassador Troi serves the Alliance more honorably than you ever will.”

  “Now, now, dear,” the woman said as she dared to take Andrul by the arm, leading him through the lush flora. “To be sure, Ambassador is more a ceremonial title. But we discourage acts of violence on the grounds of the Sacred Chalice.”

  Another set of doors with woven metalworks far more elegant than the first stood on the far end of the gardens. The ancient building they opened into was in far better shape than any they had passed out in the streets. It was likely the one structure on the entire planet that had been kept up.

  The clouded glass and metal doors swung inward as they approached, revealing a grand entry hall with a winding staircase. At the foot of the staircase stood a row of scantily clad women. Andrul realized immediately the purpose of this place and why his father had brought him under the precepts of becoming a man.