"Good
morning," Tarin greeted her bridge crew. As everyone replied with a
greeting of their own Tarin settled into her seat and called up last night's
duty logs. At first glance there was nothing out off the ordinary. The Valkyrie's
captain turned to her XO. "Anything I should know about, Dar?"
"No,
everything is back to perfect working order. I think it was a good idea not to
head back to Trill, once we found out that the damage wasn't too severe."
"We
will have to thank our engineering department for that," Tarin replied with
a smile. She lowered her voice as she continued: "Speaking of good conduct,
how is security doing?"
Commander
Enikal replied in an equally hushed tone: "Pretty good, but Alvarez is
running them through so many exercises I fear they will be spent, next time we
run into any serious crisis. Perhaps one of us should have a little talk with
him. I'll do it, but if you want to take care of it yourself..."
He
left the sentence unfinished, but before Tarin had a chance to reply Moira
called out form the Ops station. "Ma'am, we have an incoming transmission
from Admiral Betar. It’s a priority one signal for your personal attention
only."
Tarin
looked apologetically at Dar Enikal, before turning to the operations station.
"I'll take it in my ready room."
*****
Admiral
Betar's face vanished from the viewer on Captain Veal's ready-room desk, to be
replaced by a list of files that had been included with the encrypted
transmission. Tarin scrolled through the document index and sighed. It was a
good thing the Admiral had briefed her on all the major items; there was a lot
to read in that data package. She singled out one document she thought
particularly important and contacted the bridge while she started to read.
"Veal to bridge."
"Enikal
here."
"We
have new orders. Set a course for 255-Iota, warp nine. Please arrange a mission
briefing in two hours, including you, Commanders Westmore and Tucker, and
Lieutenant Alvarez." Without waiting for a reply she tapped her combadge
off and started to familiarize herself with the information Admiral Betar had
provided.
When
Tarin Veal left her ready room almost two hours later she turned to the forward
bridge stations. “Moira, Rishana, will you two join the mission briefing,
please."
"Dar,
I'll be down in sickbay, but it shouldn't take more than a few minutes."
After
the turbolift doors had closed behind the Valkyrie's captain, Moira
turned to Rishana and lowered her voice. "This should be interesting. You
sure there is nothing at 225-Iota?"
"No
planets at least," Rishana replied. "Could be that we are meeting
someone there. Let's just wait for the briefing."
Commander
Enikal had caught the short exchange between the two Lieutenants and silently
concurred with Rishana Hagen, despite his own curiosity. Tarin had been on the
com with Admiral Betar for over an hour. Whatever this new mission was, it would
be more than just another patrol.
*****
"Sorry
to keep you all waiting," Tarin apologized as she took her seat at the head
of the conference table. "Now, shall we begin?" It was a rhetorical
question, but Tarin nevertheless took her time to look around and make eye
contact with every one of her assembled officers.
"Some
of you may recall that at the time of our Argolis mission the Malinche
had several sightings of a Ferengi ship that managed to elude them. Captain
Sanders has been patrolling the Argolis region ever since and he has kept an eye
out for this mysterious Ferengi, which paid off two days ago, when the Malinche
managed to catch up with them and subjected them to a customs inspection. It
turned out the Ferengi were carrying a substantial amount of contraband,
including military-grade targeting scanners, spare parts for six different
classes of disruptor cannons, and nuclear mines."
Commander
Enikal whistled softly. "Do we know where they were heading for?"
"Yes,
Talkha." Tarin started to hand out padds with the relevant information.
"Talkha?"
Ben tugged at his lower lip. "That's an independent world settled by human
colonists in the late 22nd century. What would they do with a load of military
hardware?"
"They
have been strengthening their military forces, adding privateers to their own
militia. This has been going on for some time, but Starfleet never had reason or
legal grounds to interfere. While the Federation will continue to respect
Talkha’s sovereign rights, we now have at least reason to pay the situation
much closer attention, and not just because of their military build-up."
“Four
weeks ago the Federation concluded a trade agreement with one of Talkha's
neighbors, Alek IX. The Alekians have extensive mineral resources that could be
quite valuable to our shipbuilding, now that the Cardassians and Romulans have
interrupted some of our major trade-routes. Three weeks ago the Talkhan
government decided to extend their already large territorial claims, cutting off
Alek from all direct access to Federation space in the process. The Alekians
could go around Talkha, but that would bring them dangerously close to an area
frequently raided by Cardassian incursion forces and Son’a space."
"That
doesn't sound like a coincidence." Commander Westmore stared down on his
padd, neither voice nor expression giving away any emotion.
"Finding
out if it is a coincidence or not will be part of our mission, but it is not our
first priority." Captain Veal's tone became even more serious. "The
Federation has made several diplomatic overtures to the Talkhan government,
trying to convince them to drop their claims on local space. So far this has met
with no success whatsoever. We are to take over where the diplomats left off and
make our presence known not only at Talkha but to their neighbors as well."
"A
show of force?" Commander Enikal asked.
"Not
quite. There is little we can do but confront the Talkhans with one of our
biggest ships. We won’t put any pressure on the Talkhans. We want the Alekian
trade agreement, but we will respect the independence of Talkha. If they agree
to negotiate with us or not is up to them, but perhaps the presence of a
Galaxy-class starship in orbit around their world will convince the Talkhan
government of the importance this has to us."
“And
if they don’t want to negotiate?”
“In
that case we concentrate solely on our secondary objective - information
gathering. We need to get answers to several questions.” Tarin counted them on
her fingers as she went on. “One. We need to establish the reasons for the new
Talkhan territorial claims. If this is a deliberate attempt to interrupt our
trade with Alek IX we could have legal grounds to send escorts to defend Alekian
trade convoys. So far we can’t do that, as the Alekians have only agreed to
trade deals, not a defense pact. Federation diplomats are in talks with the
Alekians on this, but progress is slow.”
“Two.
If this is not about our trade with Alek we have to know what it is about. Then
perhaps we could find a way to convince Talkha to stop harassing their neighbors.”
“Three.
We need to determine how much military hardware Talkha has and what they plan to
do with it. We don’t know yet how many runs the Ferengi have made to Talkha
and what they may have brought in on other runs. If their last cargo is any
indication Talkha could have amassed quite a stockpile of weapons by now, much
more than they need for their own militia or the small group of privateers in
their employ.”
Commander
Westmore leaned back in his seat, his arms akimbo. “That will be difficult to
determine, unless you want to run very detailed scans of the whole planet. Even
with that there would be no guarantee we could find their stockpile and the
Talkhans would not like it much, I guess.”
"Starfleet
will do their best to cut off any weapon shipments brought in by the Ferengi, so
the Talkhans will have to look for other another source if they want to continue
buying weapons. That will give us a chance to send in a small team disguised as
arms dealers."
"But
why us?" Commander Enikal inquired.
"Because
in this region there is only one other source of illegal weapons available to
the Talkhans on short notice," Tarin answered, looking her XO straight in
the eyes. "Morin Vados."
*****
“I
am worried, extending our territory may be all well and good , but the blockade,
I don’t know. And just now that the Federation has concluded their trade
agreement with the Alekians... I am worried. What if Starfleet moves against us?
Everything we have worked towards could be destroyed.”
“Relax.
We have nothing to fear from the Federation. Starfleet is stretched too thin to
send more than one or two ships against us, but even that will not happen. The
Federation has to respect out independence or lose all credibility with other
neutral worlds. “ Bertram Novak sounded tired of addressing his colleagues
fears, something that was lost on Minister Tretyak as much as the sardonic glint
in Novak’s eyes was.
“No,
we will continue as planned. If we are to succeed we need every resource we can
get, you know that. Once we have gained enough from the blockade we can move on
to the next stage. From there on it’s just a matter of months, maybe weeks, so
will you please relax.”
The
Talkhan Minister of Defense sighed deeply. “I guess you are right, it’s just
those privateers. Some of them are a damn bloodthirsty lot, take this Grelkov
character for example. He and people like him make me nervous, very nervous.”
“Which
is why we hired him in the first place. Not to make you nervous, of course,” ‘but it is a nice side-effect,’ “but to make everyone else
nervous. With his tendency to go after military targets first and bother about
merchants later he won’t cut into our resource gathering operation. On the
other hand his reputation makes all the rest of those privateers look like
saints by comparison. Once a freighter captain discovers he’s up against
anyone but Grelkov he will be more inclined to surrender, because from all the
other privateers he expects mercy. It may prevent more fights than Grelkov
causes and if it doesn’t, we can get rid of Grelkov any time we like.”
Bertram Novak shook his head. “We can’t change our plans now. Just a few
more months and we will have done all we need to save our people and keep our
independence at the same time.”
“I
guess you are right. You are the Minster of Defense after all.” Tretyak was
interrupted by the chirping of his communicator. “I said I don’t want to be
disturbed,” he blurted into his wrist communicator.
“I
am sorry to interrupt your conference, Minister, but I think you need to know
this. We are being hailed by a Starfleet ship, the USS Valkyrie. Her
captain says she needs to talk to you at your earliest convenience.”
The
worried look that had just started to disappear from Tretyak’s face returned
with a vengeance. “I’ll be with you as soon as possible. In the meantime try
to find out more about what she wants.” He worried his upper lip for a few
seconds, then rose reluctantly. “If you will excuse me. I believe this
requires my immediate attention.”
“Yes,
of course. You are our Foreign Minister after all.” ‘So they are sending
in Veal and the Valkyrie. Interesting. Perhaps the Alekian trade agreements are
more important to the Federation than we thought.’
“Oh,
just one more thing.” Minister Tretyak had already opened the door, but
Novak’s voice made him forget about Starfleet for the moment. Novak sounded
concerned, something he almost never did.
“I
don’t want to alarm you, but the CO of the Valkyrie, Captain Veal, well
she is. . .”
“Yes?”
“She
has fought with some success during the Chaos War, defeated the Romulans at
Vulcan, and faced down a whole Cardassian fleet only two months ago.”
“And
you said we were safe from Starfleet. One of the largest ships they’ve got and
with a... with a... killer in command!”
“Oh,
please, I never said she was a killer. I only wanted to apprise you of the fact
that Veal has a certain talent dealing with combat situations. I just
wanted to offer you some information that may allow you to better judge who you
are dealing with, but not to alarm you unduly.”
Minister
Tretyak stared at his colleague for a few seconds before he turned on his heel
and stormed from the conference room, for once at a loss of words.
*****
When
Tarin mentioned the name Morin Vados, Commander Westmore just raised an eyebrow,
but Dar Enikal stiffened and his features formed into a mask of anger.
"Who
is Morin Vados?" Rishana inquired, but instead of answering the question,
Tarin just looked at Commander Enikal. "Dar?"
Commander
Enikal drew a deep breath and ran a hand over his bald pate, trying to fight
down his emotions. Trying to forget he was in a mission briefing and only
speaking to himself helped. "Morin Vados is the blackest sheep Bolarus has
seen in decades. It's nothing we like to talk about, but since the mission seems
to require it. . ." The Bolian propped his elbows on the table and rubbed
his temples as he slowly went on. "Vados was the rising star in the Dytalix
mining consortium, a brilliant manager with an almost supernatural grasp of
logistics and one of the most shrewd businessmen my world has ever seen. In a
few short years he gained a celebrity status on Bolarus that is usually reserved
for great artists or certified heroes. Some even advocated him as our next
Minister of Industry, but there was a darker side to him."
Dar
Enikal paused and gathered his thoughts. "It was quite by accident that
Dytalix discovered Vados was selling mining equipment to bolster his own funds,
but not just any mining equipment. He was selling lasers, explosives and
everything else that could be used as a weapon to... well, just everyone who
could afford his price and had use for illegal weapons."
"But
why?" Rishana Hagen was taken aback. "With the career he had, why
would he do this?"
"Difficult
to answer. Vados evaded capture, so no one ever had a chance to ask him."
Dar looked up and rested his chin on his stapled fingers. "The most widely
accepted theory is, that he looked at his illegal deals as a way to prove to
himself how good he really was; that he was more insecure than anyone thought
and needed that extra success to assure himself he was the genius everyone
thought him to be."
Dar
Enikal looked around, meeting each of his colleague’s eyes. "He vanished
about five years ago, but rumor has it that he set himself up as an arms dealer,
doing a brisk business."
"Not
just rumor, Commander."
Dar's
head snapped around to Commander Westmore, who turned to Tarin Veal. "Captain?"
"Commander
Westmore is right," she admitted. "Starfleet has been monitoring
Vados's activities for some time. Apparently they were more interested where he
bought his weapons and whom he was selling to, but now they decided it's time to
put an end to his business, to give us a chance to resolve the Talkha situation."
She raised her hands defensively at Commander Enikal. "I didn't know about
this myself until two hours ago."
What
she couldn’t tell him was that Vados had played both sides against the middle
for years, supplying weapons to pirates and terrorists and providing Starfleet
Intelligence with information about his customers at the same time. It had
ensured that he was left alone by the Federation authorities, but in the
aftermath of the Chaos War Vados had apparently decided he could cut his
connection to SI and become truly independent.
"But,"
Tarin went on with the briefing, "this gives us the perfect opportunity to
get someone inside the privateer community undercover. The Malinche will
arrest Vados and you, Dar, will take his place."
*****
André
Lafayette followed his crew into the base's common room and closed the
old-fashioned hinged door behind him. He headed straight for the bar, where
Shadira greeted him with just a nod and handed him a mug of Andorian ale. At
times he missed his second-in-command on his ship, but it had been a good idea
to assign her to this task. The Orion did a good job of handling the often
volatile crowd of off-duty privateers, even Grelkov and his thugs. Lafayette
took a long gulp of ale as he half turned on his bar stool and surveyed the
large room.
There
was Grelkov with his crew around the Dom-jot table, their usual place. How they
had come by the gaming table no one knew, but since they had acquired it they
monopolized it any time they returned to base. Later in the evening they would
start to hit each other with the cues - they always did - but for now they at
least tried to play the game. Lafayette doubted that one of them knew even half
the rules, so they made up rules as they went along. They had never asked for
help and Lafayette had never seen any reason to volunteer his services to them.
Who
else was there? Grr'lsta and Captain, or Kapitän as he liked to be called,
Hartmann were deep in conversation. From the Caitian's wide sweeping gestures it
looked like he was telling one of the countless tales of his long life. Everyone
had heard those stories before, many from other colleagues who claimed them as
their own adventures as fervently as Grr'lsta did. How much of those adventures
the Caitian really had experienced bothered no one, as Grr'lsta was a good
storyteller who always found something new to tell in even the oldest tale.
Apparently Hartmann thought so too, as he listened attentively to every one of
the Caitian’s words.
Now
Hartmann, that was someone André had not yet figured out. He had an uncanny
gift to spot a potential prize at a great distance, even if his sensor’s were
not better than those used by the other privateers. That often allowed him
complete surprise, but once he went in, he would strike as hard and as fast as
possible, then break off and reassess the situation, repeating his fast strikes
as often as necessary without engaging in any prolonged close-quarters fight,
even against an inferior opponent.
And
Hartmann was not above letting a prize go, if he thought there was any risk of
an engagement he couldn’t fight on his own terms. The mix of caution and
overwhelming relentless strikes made an odd combination, but it ensured
Hartmann's survival and his success as a privateer. Lafayette suspected he had
been trained by some regular military outfit, perhaps even Starfleet, but
Hartmann had never confirmed nor denied it. Wherever he had learned his skills,
if he kept to his pattern he had a long career ahead of him.
And
then there was Lafayette’s own crew, now mingling with their colleagues,
swapping stories, playing cards, sitting around, eating and drinking and just
trying to unwind. Lafayette realized that his reverie of privateer life was
starting to make him maudlin, but before the emotion could fully develop Major
Kendall stepped to his side.
"We
have been assigned another mission," the Talkhan said. In his immaculate
uniform he looked every inch the very model of a perfect officer. Lafayette had
disliked him from the start, but the Talkhans had insisted on placing an
observer on each privateer ship, 'to facilitate a swift flow of orders and
information', as they had called it.
André
Lafayette gulped down more ale before he grunted. "We just got back. Can't
you send someone else?"
"Relax,
Captain." Putting so much forced politeness and contempt into the
same little word was no small feat, but Lafayette only grunted again. Whatever
the Talkhan thought, he was a real captain, and he had worked hard to achieve
his position. But Kendall was his link to the Talkhan authorities and without
their support he would have no contract, reduced to the life of a pirate instead
of the modicum of safety a privateer's job offered.
"All
right, what is it this time?"
"It's
a simple mission that shouldn't take too long. We are to rendezvous with a small
friendly vessel and escort it and its passenger here. For you it should be a
real pleasure cruise."
*****
After
Dar Enikal had finally calmed down and resigned himself to his fate, Tarin
continued with the briefing. “The Malinche is already on it’s way to
apprehend Vados. We will wait at 225-Iota until Captain Sanders has accomplished
his mission and provides us with every detail on Vados and his operation that
can be learned at his haven. If all goes according to plan we should have this
information within the next six to eight hours.”
Alex
Westmore shot her a worried look. “I hope Sanders and his people know what
they are doing. Vados had a long time to prepare for any eventuality. If he
escapes, the infiltration part of our mission becomes unattainable.”
“I
wouldn’t worry about that, Commander.” Tarin sounded unconcerned. “Captain
Sanders has been fully briefed on Vados and he has a lot of experience dealing
with the Maquis. I doubt Vados will be more paranoid than the Maquis usually are.”
“Now,”
she addressed the rest of her officers, starting to give firm orders with no
room for further debate, “here’s what we will do. Ben, I want you to start
working on the Hawk ASAP. Make sure there is no sign she ever was a
Starfleet ship and be thorough. When you remove the dedication plaque don’t
just remove the plaque, but clear the bulkhead of any sign there ever was a
dedication plaque in the first place.”
As
Ben replied with a nod and a “Got it”, Tarin turned to Lieutenant O’Shea.
“Moira, you probably know more about civilian and merchant vessels than anyone
in this room. Work with Commander Tucker and make sure the Hawk doesn’t
look too sterile. We need a ship that looks like it’s been used by Vados for
at least a year or two. Give it some details, some lived-in look, but don’t go
overboard.”
“Commander
Westmore, you will stand in for Commander Enikal as Executive Officer when
necessary, but in the meantime analyze every piece of information at our
disposal. If Talkha’s new territorial claims stem from anything but brashness
I want to know about it.”
“Dar,
your padd has all the information Starfleet has provided us on Morin Vados.
Familiarize yourself with it as well as you can. It may be a few days until the
Talkhans try to contact Vados, but the sooner you are ready, the better.”
Captain
Veal took a breath and looked to the end of the conference table, where Moira
O’Shea and Rishana Hagen were seated side by side. “Of course we can’t
send Commander Enikal on this mission all by himself.”
*****
Rishana
Hagen rode the turbolift down to sickbay and replayed the last part of the
mission briefing in her mind.
"Vados
likes to conclude his deals in person, but he never travels with a large
entourage. In fact, one traveling companion seems to be the norm. That someone
is not always the same person, but always a woman."
"I
volunteer." It was Moira, who had replied without hesitation.
Before
Tarin had a chance to reply Dar had taken the word. "And now you are going
to remind us how eminently qualified you are for this mission because the
O'Sheas have a tradition in the Merchant Marine that goes back five generations."
"Six
generations actually. And did I ever mention..."
"That
one of your ancestors met Kirk and Spock, way back in the good old days."
"Oh,
did I mention that? But I wouldn't call them good old days. There was at least
as big a problem with pirates then as we have now. Still, I probably know more
about trade and commerce than anyone else in this room. That could be useful on
this mission."
Captain
Veal had shaken her head, a smile playing around her lips. "Thanks for the
offer, Moira. I'll keep it in mind, but I was thinking more of sending Rishana
on this mission."
"Me?
I don't know a thing about undercover work or pirates. Why me?"
"For
two reasons. First of all I want a good pilot on this mission. If anything goes
wrong your only chance will be a quick withdrawal, as the Hawk is hardly
the ship to fight it's way out of a tight spot."
"Second,
you are a telepath. I know, you adhere to the Code of Sentience and don't read
minds without consent, but you still have some advantages. For example you can
communicate with Dar without anyone ever noticing it. That should be a valuable
asset on an undercover mission."
"Okay,
that does make sense."
"I
would like to think that my ideas usually do," Tarin had replied with a
wink.
Rishana
had taken her time to think the captain's arguments through. "Okay, I am
going to do it, but what will be my cover? Pilot, assistant, business associate?"
"Not
quite. When Vados leaves his haven he is always accompanied by an Orion mistress.”
Prologue Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5
Chapter 6 Chapter 7 Chapter 8 Chapter 9 Chapter 10 Chapter 11 Chapter 12
