She nodded. “The Jinoteur Pattern. Last time I saw it, I was with you on the Sagittarius. All traces of the pattern vanished after the Jinoteur system was swallowed by an artificial wrinkle in space-time.”
Khatami arched her brow. “Well, it’s back.”
Klisiewicz added, “And we don’t know how or why.”
Xiong met Bridy’s stare. “Whatever produced these readings is of major importance. We need to track them back to their source, but there are too many gaps in our data to triangulate the coordinates.”
Grim anticipation made Bridy crack a thin smile. “You want me and Quinn to sneak aboard the Orion freighter and steal its sensor logs.”
“Precisely,” Khatami said.
Stano added, “The good news is that the Gorn don’t seem to be aware of the Shedai or the significance of this energy pattern, and we’d like to keep it that way. The bad news is that we have reason to believe the Klingons have already sent someone to retrieve the Orions’ data. It’s imperative you get to it first.”
“And that you make sure the Klingons never do,” Khatami added.
“How sure do you want to be? Should I destroy the Treana?”
Xiong winced. “Not exactly what we had in mind.”
Klisiewicz held up two data cards. “The yellow one is blank. Use it to download the sensor data. The red one contains a worm that’ll erase the data from the Treana’s memory banks and then erase itself.” He handed the cards to Bridy.
“Got it.” She tucked the cards into a pocket and looked at Khatami. “What about Endeavour? Will you be close enough to provide operational support?”
Khatami shook her head. “We can’t risk approaching Gorn territory. The cease-fire negotiated by Captain Kirk is barely holding, and we don’t want to tip off the Klingons about our intentions toward the Treana.”
“Knowing the Gorn,” Stano said, “the Treana’s probably docked in the segregated ‘alien quarter’ of Tzoryp, Seudath’s principal port of call. The Gorn patrol that part of the city, but they tend to be hands-off when it comes to policing aliens. Keep the collateral damage to a minimum and they should ignore you.”
The captain held up one hand in a cautioning gesture. “Move fast and keep a low profile. If this goes according to plan, no one should know you were there.”
Bridy chuckled. “Since when does anything ever go according to plan?”
“Good hunting,” Khatami said. “Meeting adjourned.”
Cervantes Quinn stood beneath an open panel on the fuselage of the Dulcineaand listened. Behind the rich purr of the ship’s primary power coupler lurked a high-frequency warbling. It was elusive to Quinn’s ear. Each time he thought he had a bead on its source it faded, leaving him staring into the guts of his ship with no idea which component to tear apart first.
No one else had ever confirmed hearing the noise, no matter how many times Quinn had tried to point it out to people. Bridy had dismissed it as “transient tinnitus,” despite Quinn’s assertion that the sound was not imaginary. None of the technicians on Vanguard or the Endeavourwho had inspected Dulcinea’s internal systems had reported hearing anything unusual. Quinn didn’t care what they said. It was his ship, and he was certain the warble was in there, waiting to be found.
In the months since he had taken possession of the ship, he had come to know many of its idiosyncratic details. Its meal slot always clicked three times before serving solid food but only once before vending a beverage. Its air purification system had a curious rattle in the filter above the main corridor, just outside the cockpit entrance. One of the otherwise pristine metal deck plates in the main compartment was marred by a single, deep gouge; judging from the brightness of the exposed metal, Quinn suspected the damage was fairly recent, probably having occurred within the past couple of years.
Each day brought him a new discovery about Dulcinea. Every time he dared to think it had run out of surprises, some new imperfection revealed itself.
He heard a door swish open behind him. Looking over his shoulder, he saw Bridy crossing the shuttlebay. She waved. “How’s it going?”
He shrugged. “Same as always.”
“I’m sorry.” She joined him beneath the ship and looked up at the exposed section of its underbelly. “Still looking for that pesky noise?”
“I think I might flush out the plasma conduits.”
“Will that fix it?”
“Couldn’t hurt.” He wondered why Bridy had taken a sudden interest in the repair of a problem she didn’t believe existed, and he surmised she was avoiding discussion of something else. “How’d your debriefing go?”
She ambled toward Dulcinea’s bow. “Fine.”
“Were they pissed about the casualties?”
“More than somewhat.” Bridy stroked her hand along the ship’s ventral hull.
Quinn wondered what she was thinking. “What’d they say about the Shedai that got away from us?”
“Not much.”
“So, no court-martial?”
“Not yet.”
“Good.” He followed her. “Any chance we’re free for a while? I heard about some easy-money jobs hauling gray-market cargo to Pacifica—which, as it turns out, is a mighty fine place to kick back on a tropical vacation.”
“Sounds great.” She mustered a sad smile. “But we have new orders.”
“I was afraid you’d say that.” Tired and disgruntled, he breathed a heavy sigh. “What is it this time? More monkey-wrenching? Or another monster hunt?”
“A classic heist job—just your style.” She smiled. “You’ll love it.”
Her appraisal of the op was far too upbeat for Quinn’s comfort. He had learned to be suspicious whenever Bridy sounded optimistic. She followed him as he paced around the port side of the Dulcinea,inspecting the hull. “Are we expecting competition on this job?”
“Some, probably from the Klingons.”
“Great.” He used his arm to buff a dark scuff off the ship’s hull. “Do I even want to know where we’re being asked to commit this ‘classic heist’?”
“In a port called Tzoryp on a planet named Seudath.”
“Never heard of it.” Passing under the wing, he realigned an off-center aileron with a light upward jab of his fist. “Where is it?”
“The Gorn-Klingon border.”
Quinn stopped, turned, and regarded his partner with a mirthless smile. “I admire the casual way you just said that—as if it weren’t an omen of doom. Pray tell, which sideof that border is it on?”
“The Gorn side.”
He shook his head. “Days like this make me sorry I gave up drinking.”
“Could be worse. At least we aren’t dealing with the Tholians.”
“The Gorn aren’t much better.” He led her up the ramp and inside the ship. “Remember that guy we met in the cantina on Deskereb? He’d just come back from Gorn space—said they’re the most cold-blooded bastards he ever met.”
“Well, they arereptiles.”
“Dammit, you know what I mean.” He took off his tool belt and draped it by its buckle from a hook inside the open equipment locker, then continued on his way toward the cockpit. “The Gorn see the law as something for themselves only. They let their border worlds run wild because they think aliens are little better than animals. As long as no Gorn get hurt, they’ll gladly stand by and do nothing while offworlders shoot each other all to hell.”
He sidled into the cockpit and slumped into his seat to start the preflight check. Bridy leaned over his shoulder and fixed him with a dubious stare. “Don’t you think you might be exaggerating just a bit?”
“Like hell I am. If this goes south, we could wind up in the middle of a goddamned free-for-all down there.”
Bridy smiled. “That’s what you have me for, honey.” She kissed his cheek, patted his shoulder, and added, “Let me know when we’re ready to take off.”