Chapter 22
The quarters Streng gave them had not been designed for human comforts. The chairs were all like those in the dining room and the bed a round pad on the floor like in the mining station. There wasn’t even a desk to work on.
Brett plopped onto the pad in the corner, leaning his back against the mud wall for support. As he tried to get comfortable, he took out the datapadd Streng had given him. From what he read, the Serparnian government didn’t have any more information on these renegades than the Orion’s crew.
He tossed the padd away in disgust. A terrorist group couldn’t simply spring out of the ground. Someone had to have funded the group, given them the money to buy the pieces for that warship and to assemble it. Those pieces certainly didn’t run cheap even with the surplus of junk parts from the war.
A knock on the door shook him from his thoughts. Robyn stood in the doorway, wearing the white and gold dress uniform he thought made her look like a waitress at a fancy restaurant. He grimaced when he saw her holding one for him. “Oh no,” he said. “You’re not getting me in one of those. I’m not even an official Starfleet officer anymore.”
“Brett, please, don’t be difficult. We want to make a good impression on our hosts.”
“In that case, maybe I should stay here out of trouble.”
“If you’re not going to do it willingly then I’ll make it a direct order, Commander,” she said, her tone getting icy.
“Fine, if that’s what you want, sir.” He snatched the bundle from her and then closed the door to change. He didn’t know where Robyn had gotten the measurements from but the dress uniform fit perfectly, better than his regular one.
When he opened the door, Robyn’s cheeks turned red. “I see it fits,” she said to cover her embarrassment.
“Thank you. Might I say you’re looking lovely tonight, Captain,” he said, reaching out to kiss her hand in the old style. This was probably against professional etiquette, but he didn’t care. “Where’s Lieutenant Hurd at? Or didn’t you get him one of these monkey suits?”
“I spoke with the chief steward and he agreed to let Hurd browse their archives to look for any additional information.”
“So it’s just you and me tonight?”
“That’s right. I trust it’s not going to be a problem?”
“Of course not. We’re both adults here.”
“Or at least one of us,” she said. She held out her arm for him to take.
They set out together down a narrow corridor lined with more paintings Streng had explained to them earlier. There were also busts of famous Serparnian leaders fashioned from the type of clay mined from Serpalal III. To Brett’s untrained eyes they all looked like snakes.
“What do you think is going to happen?” he asked.
“I think they’ll put an argument but in the end they’ll give in. What choice do they really have?”
“I wouldn’t be so sure. A cornered animal is always the most dangerous.” He looked into the dead reptilian eyes of a former Serparnian leader and shivered. From what he remembered in his biology classes, snakes were both patient and ruthless. They could wait days for their prey, or years in the case of the Serparnian Liberation Army.
All those years the Serparnian with the mangled hood had bided his time, waiting to lure Brett into his trap. If not for the paranoia of a former captain, the trap surely would have worked. These were not the kind of creatures you wanted to tangle with if you were the Federation. They could make things miserable for anyone stupid enough to offend them, like him.
“It’s going to be all right,” Robyn said. “No one really wants a fight here except for the rebels and with any luck we’ll be able to hunt them down before too much longer.”
“Right,” he said without conviction.
The grand hall where they’d entered was now full of dignitaries. Not just Serparnians, but some of the offworlders who remained as well. Robyn steered Brett over to the Vulcan ambassador. “Ambassador T’Yird, it’s good to see you.”
“As it is you, Captain. I heard of the difficulties your ship has experienced. Such violence is not logical.”
“I couldn’t agree more,” Robyn said.
Brett leaned down to whisper into her ear, “I’m going to go mingle.” He pulled his arm away from hers and then drifted into the gathering. If the Serparnians around him recognized him, they gave no sign. The uniform was probably throwing them off; they didn’t expect a murderer to be wearing formal Starfleet attire. He couldn’t blame them if that’s what they thought.
Among the
As his eyes turned away from the Klingons, he spotted Chief Steward Streng leaning into a doorway, whispering to someone else. Probably a cook or the wait staff about more hors d'oeuvres. But something about the intensity in Streng’s gesturing told Brett there was something going on.
He crept closer to the doorway, straining his ears to hear anything. The damned Klingons were talking too loud to make out anything. Not that it would have mattered since Streng was probably talking in the Serparnian language anyway.
Pretending to study one of the paintings on the walls, Brett waited for Streng to finish and dissolve into the crowd. Then Brett eased over the doorway and slipped through to follow whoever had been talking with Streng. A shadow flickered and then disappeared around a corner.
Through the doorway he found another set of stairs, only these led up. He pounded up the steps, trying to catch up with the shadow he’d seen. Ahead, he heard the creak of a door.
The door led to a storeroom for the dried meat Serparnians preferred. Slabs of the meat hung from the ceiling until needed. Brett paused in the doorway to listen for footsteps; he didn’t hear anything. His quarry must have already gone.
Then he heard a squeak and saw one of the slabs of meat hanging from the ceiling move. Whoever he’d followed was still inside. Now more than ever Brett wished he hadn’t beamed down without a phaser. He’d have to do this the old-fashioned way.
The only thing he could find for a weapon was a leg from some kind of animal. He stripped off the white dinner jacket so as not to make such an obvious target. Then, keeping the dried leg out in front of him, he eased into the storeroom.
He slid forward across the floor to make less noise, pausing to listen for any sign of the storeroom’s other occupant. Whoever else was in the storeroom did a good job keeping quiet; Brett couldn’t hear anything but the sound of his pounding heart. The dried leg in his hand became slippery from sweat. I’m a sitting duck, he thought.
Something whizzed past his ear to shatter against the wall. Brett turned towards the source of the projectile. Before he could finish turning around, something heavy hit him in the back of the head. The dried leg slipped from his hand as he pitched forward onto the storeroom floor.
Brett felt someone standing over him and waited for the shot that would finally end his miserable life. Instead, footsteps bounded away from him and back down the stairway. With a sigh of relief, Brett passed out.
No comments:
Post a Comment