Glass Empires

by Various

  He soon came to a junction of three tunnels, branching out in different directions. Just as I expected, he thought. If these catacombs were anything like some of the other tombs he’d encountered before, this was only the beginning of an elaborate maze designed to foil unwanted intruders. An unprepared grave robber could easily end up lost forever in the subterranean labyrinth ahead.

  Fortunately, Picard knew what he was doing. Crouching before the triple portal, he carefully brushed away the dust of ages to expose an inscription chiseled into the floor.

  “ ‘As in all things,’” the tricorder translated, “ ‘let the Mind be your Guide.’”

  Picard rose to his feet. The Sakethans, he recalled, had been an ascetic sect that had prized the mind above all things. Their mazes were often based on the distinctive convolutions of the Vulcan cerebral cortex, which they had believed to be the seat of the katra, a Vulcan’s spiritual essence. The cryptic inscription implied that this maze was no exception.

  He called up a diagram of the cortex on the tricorder’s display screen. Assuming that the initial corridor represented the brain stem, the diagram suggested that he proceed down the central pathway. Tricorder in hand, he took off down the tunnel, certain that he was heading in the right direction. More junctions followed, and he used the brain map to guide his way through a winding path that continued to slope steadily downward. The deeper he descended, the more the temperature in the tunnels decreased. He shivered from the cold, wishing that he had put on a jacket before entering the tomb. The air was thin and musty, and he was soon breathing hard.

  Time for another pick-me-up, he realized. New T’Karath’s sparse atmosphere was better suited to Vulcans than Terrans, so he injected himself with a tri-ox compound before continuing his trek through the underground labyrinth. The weight upon his chest lifted and he quickened his pace. By his estimation, he had to be nearing the primary burial chamber at the end of the maze. But would his prize be there as he expected? That was the real question.

  The beam from his tricorder shone upon the age-old walls of the catacombs. Recessed niches held a number of katric arks, polycrystalline vessels that supposedly held the disembodied souls of departed monks. The presence of the arks provided yet more evidence that this particular burial mound had never been looted, making Picard all the more eager to reach the central crypt.

  Rounding a curve, however, he found himself confronted by what appeared to be a dead end. The mummified body of a robed Vulcan monk stood at attention within an upright stone sarcophagus that appeared to have been carved out of the very walls of the cavern. The monk’s right palm was held up before him, as though signaling Picard to halt. The mummy’s shriveled features bore an inscrutable expression. Dust muted the color of the monk’s tangerine robe.

  Puzzled, Picard stopped in his tracks. Had he taken a wrong turn somewhere? He consulted his map of the Vulcan cortex, mentally retracing his steps. As nearly as he could tell, he had followed the convolutions exactly. I can’t be mistaken, he thought. There has to be a way past this barrier.

  He scanned the sarcophagus blocking his path, but the tricorder’s sensors were unable to penetrate the dense limestone. Damn kelbonite! He was sorely tempted to blast his way through with his phaser, but the archeologist in him recoiled from the idea of vandalizing the historic site. Putting his tricorder aside for the moment, he ran his fingers around the edges of the sarcophagus, searching for some sort of hidden lever. Maybe there’s a secret passageway, he speculated, like the one in those ruins on Camus II.

  Despite his best efforts, though, he was unable to locate any concealed latch or trigger. Frustrated, he stepped back to take another look at the dead monk in its sepulcher. His restless gaze fell upon an inscription above the sarcophagus. He didn’t need his tricorder to translate the timeless salutation:

  “Live long and prosper.”

  Another clue? The optimistic greeting seemed singularly out of place in this funereal setting. A thought occurred to Picard, and his keen eyes zeroed in on the mummy’s upraised palm. Could it be…?

  Approaching the sarcophagus, he reached out and gingerly took hold of the mummy’s fingers. As he pushed the third and fourth fingers apart, forming a traditional Vulcan hand sign, he heard a delicate apparatus click at the junction of the two digits. “Eureka,” he murmured, grinning. He parted his own fingers in response. “Open sesame.”

  The rumble of concealed machinery filled the gloomy corridor. Picard backed away from the mummy as the ponderous sound of stone sliding against stone violated the hushed atmosphere. Ancient gears engaged and the entire sarcophagus swung outward, exposing a darkened chamber beyond. Picard retrieved his tricorder and hurried forward, not even waiting for the swinging barrier to come to a complete stop.

  I knew it! he thought. Just like Camus II!

  The spotlight from his tricorder revealed a circular burial chamber at the very center of the maze. Rows of dusty katric arks lined the walls while a pair of unlit braziers flanked another up-right sarcophagus directly ahead of Picard. The mummified remains of a Vulcan high priestess resided within the polished stone sepulcher. Picard’s eyes widened in excitement as he spotted what looked like a carved granite octahedron embedded in the center of the mummy’s brow.

  That’s it, he thought. It has to be!

  Something glittered dimly above the mummy’s head. Lifting the beam of his searchlight, he was momentarily taken aback by a snarling face with six-inch fangs and blazing green eyes. His heart missed a beat before he realized that the face belonged to the head and shoulders of a sculpted marble sehlat. The beast’s vicious fangs and foreclaws stood guard over the dead priestess. Emerald bloodstones served as the animal’s eyes. A final inscription was engraved between the sehlat’s paws:

  “The guilt of a thief weighs heavy upon the heart.”

  Maintaining a safe distance from both the mummy and her ur-sine guardian, he scanned the eight-sided stone die lodged in the priestess’s forehead. The degree of terikon particle decay corresponded with the spectral signature he was looking for. A perfect match, he thought triumphantly. That’s the real thing.

  The precious artifact called out to him, but Picard resisted the urge to run forward and pluck the relic from the mummy’s skull. His own brow furrowed as he pondered the ominous inscription above the sarcophagus, which resisted easy interpretation. Did the moralistic adage contain some hidden message?

  A quick scan of the twin braziers assured him that their contents contained no deadly toxins. In deference to the crypt’s solemn history, he used his disruptor to light the braziers. Dancing yellow flames cast flickering shadows upon the curved wall of the burial chamber. The scent of incense suffused the air. Picard felt as though he had been transported a hundred years into the past. Before the fall of Vulcan, he reflected, and the rise of the Alliance.

  Deep in thought, he listened to an errant breeze as it whistled through the hushed catacombs outside, while his eyes remained fixed on the tantalizing artifact only a few paces away. He waited several moments before finally striding forward and reaching out for the granite die. This is too easy, he thought.

  “Not so fast, Picard!” A harsh voice intruded on the scene. “Step away from the mummy!”

  Picard spun around to confront a disruptor pistol aimed at his skull. A dwarfish figure, wearing a garish piebald suit, scuttled into the crypt. Elephantine ears framed a leering orange face. Picard recognized him at once.

  “Sovak!” he spat. The unscrupulous Ferengi was a long-time rival. Picard scowled contemptuously at the newcomer. “I thought I’d shaken you on Yadalla Prime.”

  “You should be so lucky!” Sovak’s beady black eyes stared down the barrel of his disruptor. His bulbous nose wrinkled disdainfully. “Lose the disruptor.”

  Picard grudgingly dropped his own weapon on the floor. Keeping the human in his sights, Sovak scurried forward and kicked the discarded disruptor across the room. “Back away from those fires and keep your hands where I
can see them,” he instructed as he sidled toward the sarcophagus. He chortled with avaricious glee. “Thanks for leading the way, Picard. I could’ve never made it this far without you!”

  “You’re welcome,” Picard said dryly.

  The Ferengi’s greedy fingers closed around the treasure in the dead priestess’s brow. Before he could wrest it from her skull, however, the sehlat’s eyes glowed brightly, targeting Sovak with a pair of brilliant emerald beams. He jerked his hand away from his prize, but it was already too late for him. His flesh sagged downward as though yanked by an intense gravity field. Bones cracked audibly as he crumpled to the floor. Collapsing lungs managed only a single high-pitched squeal before falling silent. Flesh and bone were pulped to jelly. His disruptor imploded. Within seconds, all that remained of Sovak was a flattened puddle of orange goo. The artificial super-gravity had indeed “weighed heavily” upon the thief’s heart.

  “And thank you,” Picard said, lowering his hands. The scheming Ferengi had uncovered the crypt’s ultimate deathtrap, just as Picard had anticipated. He recovered his disruptor from the floor and blasted the sculpted sehlat right between its luminous eyes. A concealed graviton projector exploded in a shower of sparks.

  So much for that, he thought. Taking care not to step in Sovak’s liquefied remains, he firmly took hold of the granite die and pulled it free from the mummy’s forehead, leaving an empty socket behind. He held the relic before the light of the flickering braziers, admiring the intricate hieroglyphics inscribed upon the artifact. The markings confirmed the object’s identity beyond a shadow of a doubt.

  “The Stone of Gol,” he whispered aloud. Or, to be more exact, a crucial fragment of the legendary Vulcan weapon. According to myth, the fearsome artifact had been destroyed by the gods when the ancient Vulcans first found the way of peace. In fact, Picard had deduced that the Stone had been divided into three inter-locking components, which had then been hidden throughout the galaxy. He had tracked down the first piece of the relic on Calder II several months ago. Now only one more fragment remained lost to history, at least for the time being.

  Two down, one to go.

  He carefully wrapped the die in several layers of cloth and tucked it safely into the pocket of his trousers. A good day’s work, he concluded. He couldn’t wait to examine the Stone back aboard his ship. He took a deep breath of the crypt’s pungent incense before heading for the door. Stargazer awaited him.

  He left the goopy orange residue as a puzzle for the future archeologists.

  2

  C eltris III was a barren class-M planet located deep in Cardassian space. The Alliance maintained a solitary outpost along the planet’s equator. Rumor had it that the Cardies were secretly developing new metagenic weapons at a hidden laboratory somewhere within the sprawling military installation. Picard didn’t know anything about that. He didn’t want to know.

  His ship touched down at a commercial spaceport on the outskirts of the base. The landing was bumpier than he would have liked;Stargazer was a run-down, secondhand runabout that had definitely seen better days. Picard scowled as the rough landing jolted his bones. He would have to see about having the thrusters repaired before he embarked on his next expedition.

  Times like this he wished that he actually had a crew to see to such matters, but that was just a ridiculous fantasy. Not in this universe, he thought sourly. Stargazer had a crew of one, and he was lucky to rate that much. Most humans could only dream of being at the helm of their own ship. He glanced around at the modest cockpit. Such as it is.

  Shutting down all systems to save energy, he tucked the Stone of Gol into a canvas shoulder bag and exited the ship. As always, the oppressive heat of the equatorial base hit him like a solar flare. The temperature was uncomfortably warm by human standards, although ideal for Cardassians. He raised a hand to shield his eyes from the harsh morning sunlight. Sweat began to soak through his clothes.

  “You there, Terran! Just who do you think you are?”

  The bellicose query came from one of a pair of Klingon guards who appeared to be patrolling the spaceport. The uniformed warriors stomped toward him. An ugly white scar streaked the face of the speaker. His partner was a hulking brute whose cranium was just as bald as Picard’s, albeit a good deal craggier.

  Picard didn’t recognize either guard. They must be new here. He wondered whom they had offended to get assigned to Celtris III. Perspiration shone upon the soldiers’ bestial features. They looked bored and irritable. A bad combination, especially where Klingons were concerned.

  “Can I help you, Officers?” he asked. The strap of his carryall was slung over his shoulders, freeing his hands. A patch on his lapel bore a stylized portrait of Earth, marking him as a Terran. He reached beneath his jacket for his ID. “I have my identification disks right here.”

  The Klingons invaded his personal space. “Keep your hands where I can see them!” the scarred warrior snarled at Picard, his face only inches from the unarmed human’s. His rank breath, which reeked of stale bloodwine and gagh, assailed Picard’s nostrils. The outnumbered archeologist stepped back, only to bump into the armored form of the bald Klingon directly behind him. The hairless soldier growled in his ear. He roughly shoved Picard forward. The bag bounced against Picard’s back, causing Picard to worry about the safety of the artifact therein. Had he wrapped the precious stone in enough padding?

  “What’s your designation?” the bald warrior demanded, roughly frisking Picard from behind. The human was glad that he had left his weapon back aboard the ship. Alliance soldiers didn’t take kindly to armed Terrans walking the streets.

  “Lambda,” Picard volunteered. His elevated designation entitled him to privileges denied most other Terrans, but did not necessarily spare him from this sort of harassment. “Like I said, I have my identifica—”

  “Is that your ship?” the first Klingon interrupted, nodding at Stargazer. Drawing a dagger from his belt, he jabbed the tip of the blade into Picard’s chest, not quite hard enough to draw blood…yet. “What’s a Terran doing flying a ship like that?” His sneering tone turned “Terran” into the vilest of insults. “Answer me, you cur!”

  Picard bit down on his tongue, holding back an angry retort. Even after all these years, he still hated being treated like dirt by the likes of these arrogant barbarians. Still, he knew better than to pick a fight with Klingons. He was all too aware of the knifepoint pressing against his breast, and of the potentially fatal consequences of provoking the guards any further. After all, it wasn’t like any Alliance doctor was going to waste an artificial heart on a mere human should the scarred Klingon take it into his lumpy skull to stab him.

  “Actually, the ship belongs to my patron,” Picard said mildly. Swallowing his pride, he raised his open palms before him. He kept his voice and expression carefully neutral. “Gul Madred.”

  The Klingon blinked in surprise, caught off guard by the name of the outpost’s commander. His partner grunted and backed away from Picard, making him feel a little less trapped. “Khone?” he asked the other Klingon uncertainly.

  To Picard’s relief, Madred’s name seemed to give the two guards pause. “Will you be needing me much longer?” Picard asked, pressing his luck. “The gul is expecting me.”

  The scarred warrior, Khone, frowned and stepped aside. “All right, Terran. Go about your business.” He sullenly thrust his dagger back into his belt. “But watch yourself, Earther. Don’t forget your place, or we may just have to remind you…the hard way.” Glowering darkly, he turned and stalked away from Picard. “Come on, Gwarz!” he called out to his comrade. “I’m sick of breathing this human’s stench.”

  Picard waited until he heard the Klingons’ heavy boots recede into the distance before letting out a pent-up breath. Tension drained from his body, although the encounter left a bad taste in his mouth, reminding him of just how low humans ranked in the overall scheme of things. He couldn’t complain, though. That could have gone much worse, he reminded himse
lf.

  “Stupid Klingons!” a new voice piped up. An adolescent human scrambled out from behind one of Stargazer’s landing struts. He grinned mischievously at Picard. “Way to go, Luc! You sure showed those slime-devils who was boss.”

  Picard’s mood lifted a little. “Hello, Wesley” he said warmly. He was fond of the scrappy young urchin, whose pluck and en-trepreneurial spirit had managed to survive the Alliance’s best efforts to crush it. Fascinated with starships and warp technology, he often hung about the spaceport. He had even helped Picard adjust the engines a few times. “I’m not sure that was quite the victory you’re making it out to be, but thank you nonetheless.”

  “Any time a Klingon walks away without one of your vital organs counts as a win in my book,” Wesley insisted. A fraying cotton jacket hung in tatters upon the boy’s lanky frame. The patches on his soiled trousers had patches. “You heard the one about the Klingon short-order cook?”

  “Maybe another time,” Picard said. Madred had surely been notified of Stargazer’s arrival by now. He fished a handful of coins from his pocket and lobbed them into Wesley’s eager hands. “Keep an eye on Stargazer for me?”

  “You bet!” the teenager enthused. “Just like always!”

  Leaving the spaceport behind, Picard walked quickly to Gul Madred’s headquarters at the center of the outpost. Arched pylons rose above the forbidding stronghold. A Cardie lieutenant escorted him to an antechamber outside Madred’s office. “Wait here,” the soldier said curtly. He did not offer Picard a seat. “The gul will be with you at his convenience.”

  The door to Madred’s inner sanctum was slightly ajar. Agonized cries and whimpers escaped the chamber; apparently, the Cardassian commander was interrogating a prisoner. Through the open crack, Picard glimpsed a nude human figure hanging suspended from a pair of steel manacles. A member of the human resistance movement? Picard had heard rumors of Resistance activity in this sector.