“Your Honor,” Desai said, and Reyes heard the pleading in her voice, but he ignored her. He had long since tired of the proceedings, angry that it was taking so long to just get to the heart of the matter.
“Did I disobey orders by revealing that threat?” he asked. “Yes. Did I conspire with anyone else? No. This is entirely on me, just as the responsibility for all of those people who’ve died since I took command of this station is mine. If only one good thing comes out of this trial, it should be that no one else should have to die because we didn’t do our jobs.”
Turning toward the bench, he glared at the board members. “And if the price for protecting the people we’re sworn to defend is my head on a platter, then take it. Take it, and jam it down whoever’s throat you have to back at Headquarters, and make them listen. If this circus can’t even accomplish that, then do me a favor, and either throw me in a hole or out an airlock right now. I don’t want any part of any organization that can’t understand how badly we’ve turned everything out here into a pile of shit.”
Silence engulfed the courtroom, except for the constant warble of the station’s power generators far below their feet. Though he forced himself to stare once more at the base of the bench rather than at any of the board members, Reyes still saw Sereb in his peripheral vision. The Tellarite’s expression was not one of triumph or smug satisfaction. Instead, it was unreadable. After a moment, the prosecutor cleared his throat.
“No further questions, Your Honor.”
It took Moratino a moment before she said anything. Her own features had hardened into an implacable mask, though Reyes refused to move his eyes to look directly at her. Finally, she said, “Captain Desai, do you wish to redirect?”
Her response so low that Reyes could barely hear it, Desai replied, “No, Your Honor. The defense rests.”
40
Standing alone in his private quarters aboard the Omari-Ekon,Zett Nilric studied the arrangement of clothing he had removed from his closet—the ensemble he had chosen for the next day’s wear—and nodded in satisfaction. Every line in the tailored dark blue suit was perfect, every crease a razor’s edge. The black shoes he would wear were polished to a high sheen, his reflection clearly visible in them.
It was part of his self-imposed regime to end each day preparing for the next. No matter how crowded his schedule might be and without regard to the lateness of the hour, Zett never retired before updating himself on the coming day’s events, completing his own grueling physical training regimen, and ensuring that his appearance would be in keeping with the high standards he set for himself. Though one might argue that such strict adherence to established routine made one predictable to friends as well as enemies, Zett knew better. His habits were his own, shared with no one. He offered no insights into his private life, not to his employers and certainly not to anyone else on Ganz’s staff. It required ceaseless discipline to maintain such a well-ordered life and yet keep every detail of that life to one’s self, and discipline was the one trait Zett valued above all others. Those who lacked that control were weak, he knew, easily exploited. Fortunately, he was surrounded by such people, offering him numerous opportunities for advancement and personal gain simply by taking advantage of the chaos with which those people lived their lives.
All of that from pressing a simple suit and shining a pair of shoes?Zett smiled as he regarded his obsidian countenance in the small mirror affixed to one closet door. He examined his rows of gleaming teeth, searching for any hint of discoloration or the slightest particle of food that might have remained after his last meal. He saw only perfection, just as he expected.
Perhaps Ganz is right, and you do take yourself too seriously.
Dismissing the errant thought, Zett turned from the wardrobe, approving his own work as he crossed his quarters to the well-stocked bar in one corner. With his daily schedule completed, he now was free to relax, enjoying the single drink he would prepare from his personal supply of exotic liquors and other spirits before going to bed. As he poured a generous serving of a green-tinged liquid into an octagonal glass, he considered his options for the remainder of the evening. Would he listen to some music with his nightcap? Perhaps watch or read something from his considerable personal library? The music, he decided.
Drink in hand, he moved toward the ornate desk in the opposite corner. Carved from a single piece of dark marble, the desk was, like Zett himself, flawlessly organized. Free of clutter, its top hosted nothing more than the simple black portfolio that Zett carried with him each day and a computer terminal from which he could access his personal files, all of which, of course, were encrypted and protected from unauthorized access. Reaching for the workstation, Zett stopped short when the terminal’s monitor flared to life, displaying a simple message.
Secure transmission incoming.
Zett glanced at the wall chronometer above his desk. Who would be contacting him at this hour? Not Ganz, certainly. His employer always reached him via their personal communications devices, rather than the Omari-Ekon’s comm system. Looking to the display’s lower right corner, Zett noted that the transmission was accompanied by a Klingon encoding schema. Most interesting.
Using the terminal’s keypad interface, Zett requested information on the communication’s encryption and came away only mildly surprised that it was one with which he was unfamiliar. He would have to accept the transmission in order for any decryption to take place, after which his own library of data-capturing processes could begin the task of examining and finding a way to break the encoding algorithm. For a moment, Zett wondered if this communication was being tracked by eavesdroppers on the Starfleet space station. Surely, they would be curious about the source and reasons behind a Klingon communiqué being directed to a private Orion merchant vessel in this manner. He dismissed that thought, knowing that the Omari-Ekonwas at this moment traveling beyond the range of Starbase 47’s sensor capabilities.
They will learn nothing,Zett decided, and neither will you unless you accept the transmission.He keyed the control to complete the connection.
On the screen, the simple text was replaced with the visage of a Klingon. Dressed in the standard black and gold uniform of the Klingon military, he appeared to be QuchHa’,which was what the Klingons called members of their society descended from those who had suffered an odd genetic mutation that had plagued many Klingons more than a century earlier. Such individuals did not possess the prominent cranial ridges that typified the warrior race. However, while this Klingon at first appeared to be descended from that unfortunate stock, Zett still saw a subtle pattern of ridges on his bald dome. Indeed, the only hair on his head was a dark, thin mustache and an accompanying beard, which only covered his chin. Black, calculating eyes regarded Zett as they peered out from the monitor.
“Greetings, Mr. Nilric,”the Klingon said, a small smile playing at the corners of his mouth. When he spoke, his words carried a clipped, precise diction that Zett found unusual for a Klingon soldier. “My name is Chang. I trust I have not caught you at an inconvenient time?”