“The Cutlass has been destroyed.”
Just visible in the distance, the sixth cube recommenced its attack on Alonis.
Some sense beyond failure clutched at Sisko, and another question occurred to him: Why am I still alive? He knew that beneath the violet seas of Alonis, in beautiful underwater cities that he had never visited but had read about, genocide threatened. It made no sense that he should be there, a willing combatant, subdued but not killed. It felt wrong, and yet it also made him feel less isolated.
Tentatively, he reached into his mind, into his spirit, for that which he had known before. When nothing came to him, he discarded his caution and opened himself up completely. And still, nothing came.
I am alone, he thought, not for the first time.
On the viewer, the last two Borg vessels continued to rain destruction down upon the populace of Alonis. Sisko thought to switch the screen off, to spare himself and the crew the horrible sight of the extermination. When the Borg had completed their task, he had no doubt that they would also take the time to finish the destruction of New York and James T. Kirk.
Still a Starfleet captain, Sisko issued the orders he knew he must. “Back to work, people,” he said as gently as he could. “We have to get this ship moving if we can.” Slowly and deliberately, the crew returned to their jobs, though Sisko would have been surprised to find a single one of them who believed that they would live out the day.
Five minutes later, unaccountably, the Borg ended their attack.
3
The great hall bore no name. Assigning it an appellation would have run counter to the nature of its purpose. Any members of the Hundred called to a summit knew where and when to assemble, details closely guarded by clan elders and passed on to younger generations only as needed.
Durjik made sure to arrive early—not so early that the camouflaged approach and entrance had not yet been opened by a gatekeeper, but far enough before the gathering that he could observe most of the attendees enter. He sat nearer to the entryway than not, in one of the outer rings of seats. Arranged concentrically in the circular space, the chairs sat divided into quadrants by a pair of perpendicular aisles that crossed at their midpoints, where a small platform allowed for the elevation of a single speaker at a time. The place smelled slightly sour from disuse, a combination of dust and stale air that would take more than the occasional meeting to diffuse.
At first, members of the Hundred arrived sporadically, in twos and threes. Durjik noted wryly that although none came clad in expensive or regal garments befitting their station, most nevertheless bore themselves in a manner that would have permitted even a casual observer to identify them as belonging to one of the five-score families whose wealth and power had controlled the Empire for millennia. In a sense, they reflected their surroundings: deep in the hills surrounding Ki Baratan, hewn out of solid rock, the vast room impressed not by its negligible trappings, but by its very character. Modest wall hangings and floor coverings served only the practical function of reducing the echoes off stone surfaces, but the extent of the space, the height of the ceiling, measured well out of the ordinary.
Large casements set into the top of the eastern arc of the room provided the only illumination, most brightly at a specific time of day, shortly after dawn. Sunlight streaming through the windows would describe a golden box high on the curve of the wall opposite, which would travel downward as the hours wore on, until it at last reached the floor and then disappeared entirely. Even on overcast days, the box of light, though barely visible, would define the span of the congress.
Eventually, Durjik saw the hall filling almost to its capacity of five hundred. Though for most assemblies, clans dispatched one or two members to represent their interests, it appeared that for the current meeting, many families had sent four or five of their number. Durjik’s own clan, the Rilkon, had settled on the intermediate figure of three. As the start of the summit neared, he saw his great grand-father, Orvek, dodder through the room’s single doorway, accompanied by Orvek’s daughter, Selten. Durjik made no attempt to draw their attention, and they ended up sitting in another section, some distance from him.
Of all those gathered, Durjik saw no face he did not recognize—at least visually. He understood, though, that some of the attendees wore miens designed to conceal their additional, hidden identities and their true interests; they acted not only for their clans but for the praetor, or for the Tal Shiar, or even simply for themselves. Durjik himself served more than one loyalty, including that of the Rilkon, of himself, and of his new allegiance, though, in the end, he would argue that with respect to his political actions, he undertook all that he did for the sake of the Romulan Star Empire itself.
As the flow of people into the hall fell to a trickle and then stopped altogether, Durjik glanced up to the crown of the western wall. What had begun earlier as a thin line of sunlight had grown into the large rectangle of light that would demark the beginning and end of the forum. The room quieted as a sense of communal anticipation swelled. Durjik, too, waited to see who would rise first to speak.
Over the course of the past eight or ten days, word of the summit had propagated throughout the Hundred, though, unusually, neither who had called it nor why. But as the news circulated that Tal’Aura had committed Romulan military assets to the Federation’s war with the Borg, the opinion prevailed that the praetor herself had set the meeting, probably so that she could seek out validation and support for her actions. Her decision to fight alongside Starfleet and Klingon forces had proven unpopular, with many thinking it traitorous.
Durjik believed something different. While he despised the imperialism, duplicity, and hypocrisy of the United Federation of Planets, he had also educated himself enough about the Borg threat to know that the Collective would not stop at the UFP’s borders. Especially given the current divisions within the Empire, Romulus could not hope to stave off assimilation or destruction if it stood alone. Durjik hated the Federation, and he distrusted both Tal’Aura and Tomalak—their intentions and their competences—but he felt no compunctions about backing the temporary alliance to which the praetor had agreed if it meant the continued existence of his people.
The creak of old, overtaxed hinges reached Durjik’s ears. He swung his gaze back to the door to see the gatekeeper, an older man from the Vorken family, pushing the large stone slab closed. Just before it shut, a lean figure sidled lithely through the opening.
The door shut with the loud scrape of stone against stone, followed by a definitive thud. Durjik watched with some amusement as many heads turned toward the sound, then slowly swiveled as they followed the progress of the man who’d just entered. He strode purposefully down an aisle toward the center of the room, seeming to take no notice of the wealthy and powerful figures massed about him. Unlike his prospective audience, and in violation of convention, the man wore aristocratic clothes: a silver-and-black suit, cut broadly across the shoulders and adorned with senatorial ensigns, which seemed intended to convey the impression of both the martial and political skills of its wearer.
Tomalak reached the small platform at the center point of the hall and stepped up onto it without hesitation. “My friends,” he said at once, his voice raised to a volume sufficient for the entire audience to hear. “And my enemies,” he added, rather disarmingly, Durjik thought. “As must be obvious, I have come to you today not only as a member of the Hundred, but as proconsul to our praetor.”
Some rumblings went up, and Durjik heard a woman two rows in front of him mutter something about Tal’Aura not being her praetor. He understood the sentiment. More than a year earlier, Tal’Aura had been one of the few legislators not present when Shinzon had launched his attack on the Senate, decimating it and declaring himself praetor. Durjik had been both appalled and impressed by his hubris, and had sympathized with his desire to take the Empire to war against the Federation. But Shinzon, a clone of a human starship captain and raised in the brutal conditions of the Reman
mines, had grown unstable, and he’d failed in his crusade.
As the most powerful senator left alive, Tal’Aura had stepped into the power vacuum. Suspicions about her possible complicity in assassinating the bulk of the Senate had gone unproven, and had mostly faded away as she held the government together with laudable tenacity. In due time, her de facto status as the accepted leader of the Empire had become a matter of law, by her own declaration and with only meager opposition.
“It was Praetor Tal’Aura who called for this meeting,” Tomalak continued, turning slowly so that he faced everybody in the hall. More rumblings coursed through the assembly, louder. It did not appear to trouble the pro-consul. “Our praetor has sent me here to assure you that she wants what you want, what all Romulans want, no matter the world on which they live or who proclaims to be their leader.” A few shouts of support rang out, but most stayed quiet, their skepticism evident.
The reference to Commander Donatra—Empress Donatra—lacked subtlety, but Durjik assumed it achieved Tomalak’s objective. After Shinzon’s death, Tal’Aura’s assumption of power, and the Remans’ successful quest for independence from Romulus, Commander Donatra and the considerable military faction loyal to her had taken control of the Romulan breadbasket worlds. The maneuver had failed to wrest Tal’Aura’s authority from her, instead resulting in the sundering of the Empire. Donatra, under the title of empress, had declared the worlds her forces held to be their own sovereign nation, dubbed the Imperial Romulan State.
Durjik could not imagine that any Romulan—whether a member of the Hundred, an officer in the military, or merely a civilian—approved of the fissure. Although life in the Romulan Star Empire had calmed of late, the limited availability of foodstuffs, the vulnerability brought on by a seriously reduced military, and the uncertainty of a government still considered provisional by many, all kept the population on edge. Tomalak—and by extension, Tal’Aura—clearly aimed to take advantage of such fears.
“Praetor Tal’Aura wants a strong and secure Romulus,” the proconsul went on. “Our people should not know privation, should not live afraid that they cannot be protected from foreign attack, should not be separated brother from brother and sister from sister because planets once our own have been taken from us.” Tomalak’s voice rose as his words met with a number of cheers. “The praetor wants the Romulan Star Empire to climb once more to preeminence, to stand as the undisputed power in this region of space, safe and inviolate.”
Political applause lines, Durjik thought, and indeed, the words produced the obviously desired effect. But surely Tal’Aura had not sent Tomalak to the Hundred in an attempt simply to elicit this brand of mindless, nationalistic support. Though even the ruling class could engage in such insipid flag-waving, anybody at all could ring the bell of blind patriotism; inciting such fervor would not necessarily translate into sustained, reasoned backing, and the praetor must know that.
On the small stage, with all eyes upon him, Tomalak waited for the ovation to fade. When the hall had grown quiet again, the proconsul lowered his voice, lending a subdued weight to his next words. “Praetor Tal’Aura has a detailed plan to achieve these goals, and to do so quickly.”
Durjik felt his eyes narrow involuntarily. While he assuredly subscribed to the vision of a strong and united Romulan Empire, he saw no ready means of accomplishing this anytime soon. As a result, Tomalak’s claim gave him pause. The silence around him implied that others shared his uncertainty.
“Our praetor has taken steps to ensure the return of Romulus to galactic prominence,” Tomalak said, engaging in a bit of hyperbole; the galaxy was a big place, much of it far removed from the Romulan Star Empire. “But because some of what Tal’Aura proposes is unprecedented, she feels that she cannot, that she should not, take further action unilaterally. She therefore seeks the cooperation and guidance of the Romulan Senate.”
Durjik blinked. Had Tal’Aura, through her proconsul, just offered to share her autocratic power? Had she actually requested it?
“For some time now, Praetor Tal’Aura has shouldered alone the burden of responsibility in governing the Empire,” Tomalak said. “She has done this selflessly and without complaint.”
Durjik allowed himself a small grin at the notion of an altruistic dictator.
“If the praetor must, she will continue to lead alone,” Tomalak said. “But she would prefer that the Hundred reconstitute the Senate.” Murmurs spread immediately through the hall. So much time had passed since the mass killing that had bled the Empire of Praetor Hiren and almost all of its senators that the idea of repopulating the Senate had long ago lost any sense of urgency. At first, after Shinzon and then Tal’Aura had taken over, few had any appetite for placing themselves in what had so recently before become a killing field—and those who had such a craving had been quickly silenced, in one way or another. Once Donatra had cleaved the Romulan state in two, plunging the Empire into a condition of rampant nutritional deprivation and overall hardship, the ruling class had found even fewer reasons to lead; hungry and scared, the proletariat would have welcomed a new group of men and women to blame for their woes.
If Tal’Aura truly does want the Senate reseated, Durjik thought, is that why? So that she can deflect responsibility for the present state of the Empire, for the deep wounds inflicted upon the Romulan people?
On the central platform, Tomalak waited for the whispers to quiet. When they did, he said, “The praetor submits to you, and to all the members of the Hundred, that public confidence would rise greatly from a fully functioning government. Further, Tal’Aura herself needs the help of the Senate to follow her vision and to make Romulus whole again.” Tomalak turned slowly once more, as though endeavoring to emphasize the importance of Tal’Aura’s proposal. Then without another word, he stepped from the stage and paced back down the aisle along which he’d entered. Normally, the hall remained sealed during the course of a gathering, but by the time Tomalak reached the door, the gatekeeper had already pulled it halfway open. The proconsul slipped sideways through it as agilely as when he’d entered.
Durjik surveyed the room, looking for the members of Tomalak’s own clan, whom he’d seen earlier, but he could not spot them. He wondered if they or someone else would stand and take the platform, and whether that speaker would champion the praetor’s entreaty or rebuff it. Surely we must meet her challenge, Durjik thought. No matter Tal’Aura’s agenda, he could conceive of no reason short of madness that would have her call for the resumption of the Senate, only to destroy it again. And while the praetor did not lack for ambition or a talent for treachery, she did not strike him as mad.
Still, Durjik found it difficult to credit the motives Tomalak had attributed to her. He didn’t know what she really wanted, but he thought he needed to find out. Once, long ago, Durjik had been selected by his family to serve in the Senate, which he had done for some years. Perhaps, he thought, I need to make that happen again.
4
Spock awoke with a suddenness that startled him. Even asleep, even unconscious, the Vulcan mind marked time. But he retained no sense of the past minutes—or hours, or days, or however long it had been since his last waking thoughts. He’d been unaware and then aware, with no feeling of transition whatsoever.
Anesthesia, Spock surmised, opening his eyes in darkness. He flexed his fingers and tested his surroundings, finding that he lay supine atop a soft, flat surface, no longer facedown on the hard, uneven ground of the tunnels beneath Ki Baratan. He recalled the attack on him, as well as his narrow escape. He’d lost consciousness, likely the result of blood loss brought on by the knife wound he’d endured. The fact of his continued existence implied that he’d been found and his injuries treated.
Carefully, Spock tensed and moved different parts of his body. He felt a general stiffness in his muscles and an overall weariness, but no pain. His clothes had been removed in favor of a light smock, and a blanket covered him.
With even more caution than he’d utiliz
ed with his physical self, Spock examined his mind. Though he’d passed out after the assault, he would not have become entirely insensible. Sounds, scents, and tactile sensations still would have impressed themselves upon his brain.
Spock closed his awareness to the input of his body—the darkness before his eyes, the damp chill against his face, the undercurrent of putrescence assailing his nostrils—and searched for whatever perceptions had reached his unconscious mind. He went back to the tunnels through which he’d walked, back to the attack. Memories of his bodily distress replayed, and the ebb and flow of his consciousness during the confrontation returned to him, as did the struggle afterward to get away. He felt himself collapsing to the ground and waited for what came next. Pain and weakness prevailed, his mind a diminishing speck of light in the blackness of encroaching death. He faded to a point where it seemed impossible that he would continue to live for even a single moment more.
And then confronted by the threat of eternal night, a sound, a hum, somewhere along the limits of discernment. Perhaps an artifact of memory, an aural impression from the past. Spock pursued it, grappled with it in an attempt to bring it into even the barest focus.
Corthin, he thought, hearing his comrade’s voice uttering a lone unintelligible syllable somewhere in the emptiness. But then even that paled, vanishing into the void. Spock floundered, the recollections of his unconscious mind not merely unapproachable but invisible, hidden in some recess of his brain that he could not access. He felt frail and unfocused.
“Spock.”
He whirled in the barren landscape of his being, hunting for the remembrance, grasping for it without knowing its source. Only then did he realize that the voice had come to him not from within, but from without.
“Spock,” the voice repeated.
He opened his eyes, emerging from his mental shadows and, at last, into light. Corthin crouched beside him, her position telling him that the bedroll upon which he lay rested on the ground. Past her shoulder, he could see a panel suspended from the stone ceiling, providing the small cave with dim illumination. A black curtain hung across the room’s one small opening.
Star Trek: Typhon Pact: Rough Beasts of Empire Page 4
