Vanguard,BookOne

by David Mack

  “No, it doesn’t.” He gave D’Amato’s hand a final squeeze, then let go. He couldn’t think of anything else to say. To Kirk’s relief, before the awkward silence became uncomfortable D’Amato ended the visit with a simple declaration.

  “I’d like to be alone now, sir.”

  Vanguard, on its best days, wasn’t what Cervantes Quinn would call a “festive locale.” Naturally, then, he took little note of the dour mood that lay like a shroud over Chief Ivan Vumelko, the Starfleet customs officer who greeted him and the Rocinante in its remote, deep-lower-decks hangar bay. It rang of business as usual.

  The paunchy, bug-eyed man scribbled glumly on his log sheet. “What’s your cargo?”

  “Don’t have any,” Quinn said.

  A suspicious stare. “No cargo?” Vumelko eyed the Rocinante, then cast his leery gaze back at Quinn. “You left two weeks ago—without any cargo, then, either.”

  “I went for a joyride.” Affecting a deadpan delivery through a mishmash Texas-Alabama-Louisiana drawl wasn’t easy, but Quinn made it sound like it was.

  “That’s a good way to go bankrupt,” Vumelko said.

  “It’s one way. I know quite a few.”

  “I’ll bet you do.” Vumelko ducked and walked under the nose of the Rocinante, then turned and headed toward the gangway into its aft compartment.

  “Hang on, there,” Quinn said. “What do you—”

  “Snap inspection,” he said. “Checking for contraband.”

  Quinn was going to argue about it, but then he remembered that his cargo hold was emptier than a Tellarite etiquette manual. “Suit yourself,” he said. “I’ll be in the bar if you need me.” He started walking toward the hangar-bay door when it swished open, and a pair of armed Starfleet security guards stepped inside and blocked his exit. He smiled at the two familiar-looking men. “You’re slowin’ down, gents!” He pointed at the floor behind him, then held up three fingers. “Three whole steps! Time to lay off the Tarkalian ale, Chuck.”

  “Just sit tight a minute,” said Lieutenant Charles.

  Tapping his foot with impatience, Quinn counted away the minutes while Vumelko rooted around inside his ship. Amid the shuffle of empty crates and the hydraulic whispers of cargo panels sliding open and shut, a sudden loud crashing of heavy metallic objects echoed inside the ship, accompanied by a rage-inspired string of compoundly modified profanities.

  “That’s all right,” Quinn shouted up the gangway. “Just leave my tools wherever. I’ll put ’em away later.”

  After another minute of foul-mooded grumblings and the occasional ping of a kicked tool rebounding off a bulkhead, Vumelko slouched down the gangway, looking more than a little worse for wear. He initialed his inspection form, then handed the clipboard and a stylus to Quinn and pointed to a small box at the bottom. “Sign there.”

  “I know where to sign.” Quinn scrawled his mark on the page, then handed back the form and stylus. “Have a nice day.”

  On his way up to the park a few minutes later, Quinn was grateful that no one in Starfleet had yet thought of making people sign requisitions to use the turbolifts. He suspected, however, that it would only be a matter of time until that depressing prophecy came to fruition.

  Stepping out onto the broad paved walkway that separated the core shaft from the greensward of the terrestrial enclosure, he was taken aback at the absence of…well, fun. He had grown accustomed over the past few months to the sound of music from the band shell during the artificial evenings, to the hubbub of competitive sports on the lawns, to the splashing of water in the communal swimming pools.

  Tonight, however, a leaden calm lay over the park. Although the synthetic environment lacked wind, Quinn half-expected to see a lonesome tumbleweed roll across the deserted lawn. Alone in the towering vastness of the enclosure, he felt like an insect intruding on the playground of giants. He had planned to stroll across Fontana Meadow—named for the brightly lit jetting fountain plaza in its center—and treat himself to a late-night snack at the outdoor café, but he hesitated when he saw that the fountain was turned off, and the lights in the café were dark.

  The obvious sunk in: Something very bad is going on. He pressed on into the central zone of Stars Landing and boarded a turbolift. A young woman rode upstairs with him. He smiled at her. She didn’t smile back.

  The same pervasive mood of gloom greeted him around every corner and on every face. No music issued from Manón’s club; conversation in the recreation areas was subdued or nonexistent. People passing by in the hallways seemed to be turned inward.

  When he arrived at his usual watering hole for a drink, he understood why. Adorning the huge mirror behind the bar counter was a hand-painted message on the glass—a simple outline of the Bombay’s ship emblem with a black band across its center. Above it was the Latin inscription In Memoriam. Below it, in capital letters, was stenciled U.S.S. BOMBAY.

  “Sweet lord in heaven,” he muttered. The sentiment sprang from him without warning, like the shock that had provoked it. Though the ship’s crew had been strangers to him, he was overwhelmed by a sudden sense of kinship and bereavement for the fallen Starfleeters.

  He sat down at the counter and nodded to the bartender.

  “Tequila,” he said. “A double.”

  The bartender eyed a long row of bottles on the shelf behind him, then looked at Quinn. “What kind?”

  “Anythin’ cheap that ain’t green.”

  Anticipation kindled on his taste buds as the aroma of agave liquor reached his nose. He imagined savoring the sweet and sour notes on the sides of his tongue and the warmth of the alcohol in the back of his throat. Memories of fine tequilas in years gone by were stoked by the promise of a new drink….

  A beefy hand clamped down on Quinn’s left shoulder and clenched shut like a vise. From his right a slender, glossy black hand gently plucked the double-shot glass of tequila from his grasp. The diabolically polite voice of Zett Nilric was alarmingly close to his ear. “Welcome back, Quinn.”

  Quinn remained still as Zett’s hulking Tarmelite enforcer, Morikmol—whom Quinn had once barely survived describing as a “walking life-support system for a pair of fists”—spun him around on the rotating barstool to face the white-suited thug.

  Zett was grinning. That was never a good sign.

  “We were beginning to think you weren’t coming back,” the archly condescending Nalori assassin said.

  Fingering the man’s lapel, Quinn said, “New suit?”

  Morikmol grabbed the back of Quinn’s jacket collar and hefted him several centimeters off the floor. Zett lifted the glass in a mocking toast, then downed the double in one gulp. He put the glass back on the bar. “Mr. Ganz is expecting you.” Without waiting for Quinn’s next retort, the slender man walked toward the exit. The enforcer let go of Quinn, who landed on his feet. The hulking thug gave him a push toward the door. Taking the hint, Quinn squelched his impulse to order another drink.

  The Omari-Ekon’s gambling deck was just as Quinn had left it a few weeks earlier—noisy and full of losers who had yet to figure out that this house always won. Zett led the way up the curving staircase to Ganz’s oasis, and Morikmol followed close behind Quinn, his heavy footsteps sending tremors through the otherwise solid stairs. Knowing the routine by heart, he ambled to his spot between the two obelisks, which he had seen disintegrate a few people over the years, though none so far while the ship was docked at Vanguard.

  “Mr. Quinn,” Ganz said. “You’re late.”

  Quinn shrugged. “Complications.”

  The muscular Orion boss took a pull from his hookah nozzle, savored the smoke a moment, then exhaled two thick plumes from his nostrils. He reminded Quinn of a green Brahma bull, except twisted and cruel. The lazy coils of smoke lingered, spreading an odor of burnt cherries with an acrid, metallic bite.

  “Complications don’t concern me,” Ganz said after puffing out his last mouthful of smoke. “My merchandise does.”

  Though Quinn
couldn’t see the assassins gathered behind him, he heard the soft rub of several leather holster straps being loosened. He kept his hands steady and open at his sides. “Hence the complication,” he said.

  He fully expected the next thing he felt would be a pair of disintegrator beams tearing him apart molecule by molecule.

  Instead, he watched Ganz formulate a reply. Though he spoke quietly, no one ever missed a word the Orion merchant-prince said. “The explanation you are about to provide had better be phenomenally good.”

  “The device was too large to move by myself,” Quinn began.

  “You should have brought help.”

  “So I separated the valuable part from the worthless part,” he continued, ignoring the interruption.

  “Clever. Where is it?”

  “I tripped and it fell…” He mustered all the contrition he was capable of emoting: “…and it broke.”

  Ganz’s voice took on a dangerous edge. “You dropped it?”

  Behind Quinn the crowd moved closer. The heat of their collective breath and attention was oppressive. He tuned them out. “People were shooting at me.”

  That seemed to pique Ganz’s interest. “Who?”

  “Judging by the phasers they were using, I’d say they were Starfleet security.”

  A nervous susurrus of whispers circled the room in both directions and lapped itself. Ganz passed the moment by taking another long drag off his hookah and blowing a lazy smoke ring in Quinn’s direction. “How did they detect you?”

  “Cutting the device’s power supply tripped an alarm.”

  Tsk-tsking and waggling his index finger like a reproachful grandmother, Ganz said, “You should always scan before you cut.”

  “I did scan,” Quinn said. “Nothing showed up—it was a sensor screen. Wouldn’t be much good if it let you scan it to see if it’s on.” That got a few stifled chuckles from the crowd.

  “True,” Ganz said. “Did they identify you?”

  “Considering I didn’t get arrested when I landed an hour ago, my guess would be no.”

  Ganz put down his hookah nozzle and sprawled across his mountain of brightly colored cushions until he found a more leisurely pose. “Quinn,” he said, shaking his head. “What am I going to do with you? You’ve put me in quite a bind.” Having learned not to put questions to Ganz, Quinn kept his mouth shut and waited for the green man to elaborate. “The sensor screen would have fetched a nice profit on the black market. I already had inquiries from potential buyers.” Oh hell, Quinn thought. He’s going to make up some insane imaginary number, call it his lost profits, and put me in debt for the rest of my damn life. Ganz slowly folded the fingers of his right hand, one at a time, beneath his thumb and pressed down until each knuckle made a satisfying pop. “But my real disappointment is that I had big plans for that pretty little machine. Plans you just ruined.”

  “I can’t begin to tell you how deeply sorry I am, sir.” It was the truth; Quinn couldn’t tell him, but only because he wasn’t really sorry at all. It was a botched job, part of the game, and everyone knew it. Unfortunately, people at Ganz’s level of the game, Quinn had learned, rewrote its rules to suit themselves whenever they saw fit.

  This, apparently, was going to be one of those times.

  Ganz sat up, stood, and walked slowly toward Quinn. “Let me tell you how you’re going to make this right,” he said. “You owe me a debt. Not money—a favor. A job to be named later. When I ask it of you, you’ll do it, no excuses.” He stood mere centimeters away from Quinn, towering over him, his dark eyes glaring down with cruel intensity. “Do we ‘reach,’ Mr. Quinn?”

  “Sure. How can I refuse?”

  “You can’t.” Leaving his warning implied, Ganz turned and padded casually back to his mountain of comfort. Reclining into its lush embrace, he snapped his fingers, and a pair of lissome young women—one human, the other Deltan—sprang to his sides and began doting affectionately and silently on him.

  Choking back the bile of his envy, Quinn stood and waited patiently for his dismissal. After a minute or so frolicking with his sylphlike courtesans, Ganz made an exaggerated show of noticing that Quinn was still there. “One last thing,” he said. “In case you think you’re getting off easy…you’re not.”

  Oh, no.

  Closing his eyes, Quinn braced himself, and the beating commenced. A sweep kick took his legs out from under him, dropping him on his back. Punches rained down, battering his face and knocking the breath out of him with a few well-placed gut shots. Someone pulled him to his feet and held him steady, but he knew not to say “thank you”; he had taken enough stompings in his life to know they were propping him up only to use him as a punching bag. His vision was hazy and bloodred, so all he saw before each new jab or cross to his head was a dark blur. The hands gripping his arms released him, but he didn’t get his hopes up; it just meant whoever had been behind him was moving out of the way, for the assailant who now kicked him in the groin. Nausea swelled inside him, and he dropped to his knees, which probably was very helpful for whoever it was who pistol-whipped him across his temple.

  He flopped sideways onto the floor, a thick stream of bloody spittle gushing from his split lip and loosened teeth. Blinking slowly, he fought to see through the heavy swelling around his eye sockets. He recognized the bespoke white fabric of the pant leg standing in front of him.

  Overcoming the hideous pain in the vertebrae of his neck, Quinn turned his head slightly and looked up at Zett. “Nice shoes,” he gurgled, causing red-tinged saliva bubbles to froth over the corner of his mouth.

  “Thank you,” Zett said. Then he pulled back his foot, snapped it forward, and broke two of Quinn’s ribs.

  “That’s enough,” Ganz said, and the beating ceased. Morikmol gingerly lifted Quinn’s disheveled, sagging bulk into a crude facsimile of a standing position. He turned him toward Ganz, not that Quinn could see the Orion boss—or anything else right now, for that matter. Ganz’s foghorn of a voice resonated in the tense hush. “If anyone should ask…”

  “I slipped in the shower,” Quinn said.

  “Very good…. We’ll be in touch.”

  Borne away in the hands of the Tarmelite, Quinn’s exit from Ganz’s ship was a swish-pan of blurred vision and an ordeal of pain. The corridor lighting was harsh and bright after the dim, smoky haze of the Orion’s lair, but squinting stung his swollen eyes. He was actually grateful when his chin struck the deck back in Vanguard’s docking wheel, and he heard footsteps recede back inside the Omari-Ekon. The hatch scraped shut. I’m alone, and I’m still alive, he realized. It took a few moments for him to believe it. He rolled slowly onto his stomach and drew one shallow breath after another.

  He crawled forward. Every muscle and joint burned. When his arms and his legs and his back all finally gave out, he slumped onto the deck for several minutes, then peeked around himself to gauge his progress. To his dismay, he had moved less than twenty meters. Marshaling the atrophied vestiges of his youthful survival instinct, he forced himself to put one hand in front of the other and go on dragging himself forward.

  It’s a long way to the bar, he told himself. Keep crawling.

  Diego Reyes gazed out into the endless void beyond the main window in Dr. Fisher’s quarters, and he wished for a moment that he could just lose himself in all that comfortingly silent darkness. “It’s just been one of those weeks,” he said.

  Behind him, the doctor sat on his sofa, sipping at the gently spiced, half-decaf coffee he had brewed for the commodore’s impromptu, late-evening visit. “Meenok’s disease is about as bad as it gets,” Fisher said. “I wish I could put a silver lining on your mother’s situation, but…well, I’m just damn sorry, Diego.”

  Reyes glanced at Fisher’s reflection, half-spectral against the stars on the other side of the transparent aluminum window. The older man’s heavy-lidded eyes projected serenity. It was an emotion that Reyes could only envy this evening.

  “I spent the last four days think
ing about how awful it must be to get a death sentence like that,” Reyes said. “To have a few months to contemplate the end of your life…. I just couldn’t get my head around it. Then we lost the Bombay.”

  “Two months or two minutes, doesn’t make much difference,” Fisher said. “No matter how ready we think we are for death, no one’s ever ready. Not really.”

  “Maybe not. But there’s a big difference between getting a terminal illness and getting killed in an ambush.”

  “You sure about that? Are there degrees of dead?”

  “I can’t take revenge on Meenok’s disease. I can hunt down the bastards who attacked the Bombay.”

  “Hang on, Diego. You shouldn’t jump to conclusions.” Over the years, Reyes had learned to heed Dr. Fisher’s advice. The old physician, despite being an irascible curmudgeon, was known to dispense some fairly sound philosophy in his spare time. Regardless, tonight his notes of caution sounded naïve.

  Reyes’s voice simmered with anger. “It was a milk run, Zeke. Simple as it gets. Except they aren’t coming back.”

  Fisher leaned forward with a soft groan of effort and rested his mug on the antique cedar coffee table. “That’s the job,” the doctor said, the gritty edge of his drawl a bit more pronounced than usual. “Sometimes things go wrong. But it doesn’t matter how many times life knocks you down; what matters is how many times you get back up.”

  “Spare me the pep talk, will you? I know risk is part of the equation,” Reyes said, the twin demons of doubt and regret wrestling in his gut. “But the Ravanar system was well charted. No anomalies.” In one gulp, he downed the rest of his own mug of black, unsweetened coffee. “If this wasn’t an attack, why is my ship missing?”

  Fisher folded his hands together. “A lot can happen to a starship, even under the best of circumstances. There’s still a lot of things in this galaxy we don’t understand.”

  “Here’s what I understand,” Reyes said, turning away from the window. “A good ship with a great captain isn’t coming home.” He stalked into the kitchenette and poured himself another cup of coffee. A faint scent of cinnamon and nutmeg rose on its wisps of steam. “As far as I’m concerned, the only question on the table is, who did it? The Klingons or the Tholians?”