Taking Wing Page 10

  But Sorok was evidently not ready to relinquish his pessimism entirely. “As I tried to make clear, Captain Riker, it would be foolish in the extreme to count on help from Ambassador Spock.”

  Will smiled broadly at the Vulcan, and Troi noted it was the same smile he reserved for newbies on poker night. “Mr. Sorok, with six rival political factions mixed up in this, it would be foolish to count on anything.”

  Now Troi could sense the caution and trepidation that quietly roiled just beneath the surface of Will’s emotions. But these feelings were securely chained down by his resolve to come to terms with all the complexities of the Romulan political landscape, with or without the help of Spock or his followers.

  He’ll figure it all out on the fly, just like always, Troi thought as she traded glances with both Will and Christine, and then met the expectant, hopeful gazes of each of the other members of Titan’s senior staff. We all will.

  “Now, if there are no further questions. . .” Akaar said, trailing off to signal an end to the briefing as he rose to his full, two-meter-plus height.

  Will rose from his chair as well. “Actually, Admiral, there’s still a bit of unfinished business. I need to know—”

  His combadge cut his query short. “Bridge to Captain Riker,” said an urgent yet tightly controlled female voice.

  “Go ahead, Lieutenant Rager,” Will said after tapping his badge.

  “Sir, three Vor’cha-class Klingon attack cruisers have just decloaked within fifty kilometers of us. They appear to be loaded for bear. And they’re closing.”

  “Yellow alert, Lieutenant, until we know what they’re doing here. I’m on my way up.” Will moved briskly toward the door without waiting to be dismissed. Troi was already up and following him, as were Vale, Jaza, Keru, and Ledrah.

  “Yellow alert, Captain?” Akaar said as he followed Will out into the corridor, ducking slightly to avoid brushing his broad head across the top of the doorway. “Is that any way to greet the rest of our humanitarian task force?”

  Troi now realized that Akaar had just supplied the answer to Will’s interrupted final question. Incredulous at the answer, she could scarcely keep from tripping over her own feet as she raced her husband and Christine Vale to the turbolift.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  * * *

  U.S.S. TITAN

  The sides of the cramped turbolift seemed to close in on the group as the doors whisked closed and the lift raced toward the bridge. Vale suppressed a slight wave of claustrophobia. She was the shortest one on the lift, between Troi and Commander Jaza, with Captain Riker, Commander Keru, and especially Admiral Akaar towering above all of them. Of the others from the briefing not on the lift, Ledrah and Ra-Havreii were on their way to engineering, Dr. Ree was heading to sickbay, and Vale didn’t know, or particularly care, where the trio of Vulcan aides had gone.

  “Care to explain how the Klingons are a ‘humanitarian task force,’ Admiral?” Riker asked, his eyes steely as he looked across to Akaar. He didn’t need to point out that there was no love lost between Qo’noS and Romulus, wartime alliances notwithstanding.

  “We have recently been advised that the Remans have requested assistance from the Klingon Empire,” Akaar said evenly. “These three ships are therefore to be part of the relief convoy that will be traveling with you to the Romulan Neutral Zone.”

  And when were you planning on telling us this? Vale wanted to ask, remembering that just minutes ago, Akaar had attempted to close the meeting without disclosing the information about the Klingons. She left her thoughts unvoiced, though she was wondering exactly what game Akaar was playing with Riker. If he’s testing the captain somehow, this hardly seems like the right time or place. On the other hand, in her newly promoted position, she wasn’t about to openly challenge the behavior of one of Starfleet’s most prominent admirals. At least, not yet.

  “Are there any other convoy ships coming that we should know about?” Riker asked, sounding nettled.

  The turbolift stopped, and the doors opened onto the bridge as Akaar said, “None of which I am aware, Captain. Truthfully, I did not expect the Klingons to arrive quite so early, nor that they would be brandishing their weapons openly on a diplomatic mission such as this.”

  Diplomacy, Vale thought, isn’t exactly the Klingons’ strong suit.

  Riker acknowledged Akaar’s statement with a brief glance, then strode onto the bridge. Per his standing orders, there were no announcements of “captain on the bridge” from the crew, though Vale saw several of them stiffen their posture a bit at their stations. Vale smiled as she saw this; Starfleet Academy grads, even the science specialists, were creatures of habit.

  “Report, Lieutenant,” Riker said crisply as he settled into his slightly raised command chair. The configuration of the bridge was not unlike that of the Enterprise-E, though it was smaller, and the deck sloped between its upper and lower levels. The chairs for the captain, the XO, and the diplomatic officer were all equipped with retractable armrest consoles. The new seats also employed emergency harnesses, in case of a collision or some unexpected failure of the inertial-damping system. Vale knew that Riker wasn’t wild about the restraints, but had been gratified when the captain had acceded to their potential necessity should a battle situation arise.

  Seated next to flight controller Chief Axel Bolaji, Lieutenant Sariel Rager didn’t turn from her ops station as she ran her brown fingers quickly over several controls. On the large central viewscreen, a trio of predatory-looking Vor’cha-class cruisers hovered in formation. “The Klingons have disengaged their weaponry and are standing down,” she said. On the screen, a graphic overlay of a red circle glowed brightly around one of the ships for a moment, corresponding to commands Vale saw Rager giving to her ops panel. “This is the I.K.S. Quv,” she said, then the second ship lit, and she added, “and the I.K.S. Dugh.” The central ship was highlighted now. “The lead ship is the I.K.S. Vaj. Her commander has already hailed us and asks that you return the honor, Captain.”

  As Vale took her seat on Riker’s right, her mind raced to retrieve the Klingon she had studied at Starfleet Academy. She pointed to each of the ships in turn, and said, “I believe that ‘Dugh’ means ‘to be vigilant,’ ‘Quv’ means ‘honor,’ and the lead ship, ‘Vaj,’ is ‘warrior.’ ”

  “That’s got to be the seventeenth ship named ‘Vaj’ that I’ve heard of,” Riker said, half smirking. He turned his head slightly, speaking over his shoulder to address Keru, who was stationed behind him on the upper level. “Stand down yellow alert.”

  “Yes, sir,” Keru said, tapping the tactical panel in front of him.

  “Hail the lead ship,” Riker said, leaning forward.

  The image of the ships shrank to occupy a small portion of the upper viewscreen as the main view switched to show the bridge of the Klingon vessel. Seated at its center was a corpulent, uniformed Klingon, eating messily from what appeared to be some kind of gourd.

  “This is Captain William Riker of the U.S.S. Titan. With whom do I have the honor of speaking?”

  The Klingon handed his gourd to a smaller Klingon nearby, wiped his sleeve across his mouth, belched loudly, and stood. “I am Khegh, son of Taahp, commander of the I.K.S. Vaj and her escort vessels. I emerged the victor in thirty-seven engagements during the war against the honorless Qatlh of the Dominion.” Then, as if to underscore his point, he belched heartily yet again.

  Riker nodded slightly, standing as well, mirroring Khegh. “Then you are a great warrior indeed, General.”

  Vale squinted, and noticed the Klingon’s rank insignia, barely visible underneath a pile of spilled gourd glop. Good eye, she thought, looking back toward Riker.

  “Wars do not make one great,” Khegh said. “Victory makes one great!” He grinned, his crooked teeth looking as though they hadn’t been cleaned in weeks.

  “I appreciate your standing down your weapons after you decloaked,” Riker said evenly. “I’m certain you only had them charged in the event we en
countered some unforeseen danger.”

  Vale sneaked a quick glance at Troi, and imagined the counselor was thinking the same thing she was. Smooth.

  “Either that, or we just wanted to give you a good scare,” said Khegh, punctuating his utterance with a phlegmy belly laugh.

  “We would like to extend an invitation to you, and the captains of the other two vessels, to join us for dinner,” Riker said with an ingratiating smile. “We can discuss the coming mission, and how best to serve the cause of the Remans and the Romulans, as well as our respective governments.”

  Khegh squinted. “We’ll consider it and get back to you.” The screen went dark, and the corner image of the trio of Klingon ships immediately enlarged to fill it.

  Riker turned, his smile quickly fading. “Well, he was certainly a charming customer.”

  Troi put her palm up to her chin, brushing a finger over her lips. “There’s more to him than he’s showing, Captain. I suspect that his uncouth mannerisms were a ruse calculated to make him easy for us to underestimate.”

  “Could you sense any hidden agendas regarding the Romulans?” Riker asked.

  “Not yet,” Troi answered. “Perhaps something will reveal itself if we can have some closer contact with him.”

  “Of course, he’ll already know you’re half Betazoid, so he’ll be on watch for you ‘reading’ him,” Vale said.

  Akaar moved down the sloping ramp toward Riker. “What do you hope to accomplish by sharing a meal with the Klingons, Captain?”

  Riker raised an eyebrow and smirked slightly. “Beyond having an exhilaratingly disgusting dining experience?” A more serious expression replaced the flippant one. “Truthfully, I’m concerned that the presence of Klingon warships alongside us might make the Romulan military nervous, especially if the Klingons are known to be siding with the Remans. It seems very much as if it will be poking unnecessarily at an open wound.”

  “True,” Akaar said, nodding. “Except that you are discounting the importance of having better-armed Klingon vessels riding shotgun alongside Titan and her convoy. You do have a fair offensive capability, but Titan is certainly no warship. You and the less-well-armed aid ships might be more vulnerable without Khegh’s presence if rogue elements of the Romulan fleet decide to mount a sneak attack.”

  “It’s also likely,” Troi said, “that the presence of the Klingons as allies of the downtrodden Remans will pressure the competing Romulan factions into agreeing to treat them fairly in whatever power-sharing arrangement ultimately emerges from the talks.”

  Akaar stepped in closer, lowering his voice. “Regardless, Captain, if any conflagration begins out here, it is better that it be initiated by the Romulans or the Klingons than by a Federation vessel.”

  Riker gazed up intently into the eyes of the Capellan. “If I have anything to say about it, Admiral, neither my ship nor the Klingons’ will be engaged in any battle. As Khegh just said, ‘Wars do not make one great.’ And as the product of a warrior society yourself, I’m sure you must feel the same way, sir.”

  Akaar looked impressed. “Let us hope you are correct, Captain,” he said, then exited the bridge, perhaps to confer with his staff.

  Vale settled back into her chair, at the immediate right of the center seat. She still wasn’t sure what to make of the hostility Riker seemed to harbor toward the admiral, but she felt a surge of new confidence in her CO after witnessing how firmly yet discreetly he had stood up to his superior officer. I’ve made the right decision, she thought. Titan truly is my home now.

  It had taken another day and a half for the Klingons to make their decision about supping with the Titan crew, and a good half hour to decide on an appropriate menu. Then, ten minutes before the appointed dinner time, Khegh had hailed the Starfleet vessel and requested that the venue be changed to his own flagship.

  Seated behind the Elaminite-wood desk in his ready room, Riker was a bit taken aback by the request. “May I ask why, General?”

  “The captain of the Dugh does not wish to eat replicated Klingon food,” Khegh said glibly. “It upsets his digestion and makes him gassy, if the truth be told.”

  “Ah, quite understandable, then,” Riker said, nodding. He was certain that there had to be other reasons, but wasn’t sure it would be worth trying to ferret them out now. “I accept your offer, General. I will prepare my officers to beam over to your ship.”

  “Wait!” Khegh said, his voice emphatic. “I understand that one of your officers is a Betazoid?”

  “My diplomatic officer is half Betazoid, yes,” Riker said. “She is among my most valued—”

  “Leave her on your ship,” Khegh said, interrupting. “I do not trust Betazoids, or Vulcans, or any of the other thought readers.”

  Mental alarms went off inside Riker’s head. What is he trying to hide? But there was nothing to be gained by pushing the point. “Agreed,” he said, nodding. “I will bring along only my executive officer and my security chief. A human and a Trill.”

  “Acceptable, Captain. I hope the three of you have the stomach for gagh and bloodwine in copious quantities,” Khegh said with a leering smile, after which the tabletop screen went dark.

  Riker looked up at Deanna, Keru, Vale, and Akaar, all of whom were waiting there in the ready room, having heard the entire conversation.

  “I don’t like this, sir,” Vale said.

  “Nor do I,” Keru said, nodding. “We could be walking into a trap.”

  “I don’t think they have any cause to trap us,” Riker said, standing. As far as anyone knew, the Klingons had never learned of the Khitomer Accord violations former Federation President Min Zife had secretly committed on the planet Tezwa; therefore, no Klingon general in good standing had any reason to break the Klingon-Federation alliance that had served both peoples so well before, during, and after the Dominion War.

  Riker looked at his wife. “Did you get any better ‘read’ off Khegh this time?”

  “Nothing that suggests danger,” Deanna said. “But I still feel fairly certain he’s hiding something—something I’m intuiting may have nothing whatsoever to do with us. Either he’s being secretive out of deference to the prejudices of his convoy captains, or else he’s doing it out of sheer enjoyment of being manipulative.”

  “Manipulative? Imagine that.” Riker looked directly toward Akaar. “Admiral, is there anything else you may have . . . omitted from the mission briefing that might have some bearing on this?” He knew that he was skirting the edge of insubordination, but the Capellan officer had been getting on his nerves increasingly the longer this mission went on. If he had fully informed Riker of all the particulars before they had gotten under way, preparations for the mission would have gone so much more smoothly.

  Akaar treated him to a stern gaze that acknowledged the insubordination, but then answered him without any rebuke. “Nothing that comes immediately to mind, Captain.”

  Riker clapped his hands together. “It’s settled, then. The only thing we know we have to fear is their cooking.”

  “‘Cuisine’ might be a better choice of words,” said Deanna. “Don’t count on a lot of it being cooked.”

  “That scares me more than any phaser fight,” Vale said, blanching visibly.

  Vale felt her stomach roiling as a boisterous male Klingon set a second mug of warm raskur down in front of her. Following the truly unappetizing dinner of live and wriggling gagh—she was grateful that Riker had warned her to avoid acquiring a persistent intestinal parasite by chewing the nasty things to death before allowing them to wriggle down her esophagus—overcooked roasted targ, and a salad that seemed to undulate under its own power, it was all she could do to keep from heaving the meal back up, blasting their warrior hosts right across their ridged foreheads with gut-churning peristalsis.

  Keru seemed far less affected. Although he wasn’t a joined Trill, she imagined that any species physiologically capable of allowing a symbiotic life-form to join with them via a belly pouch probably cou
ld ingest just about anything. Amazingly, with three tankards downed, he still seemed as sober as a Federation magistrate, even as the Klingons around him got progressively sloppier and drunker.

  Captain Riker was seated at the head of the table, to General Khegh’s immediate left. The task force had entered the Neutral Zone a mere ten minutes ago, and as a strategy session, the meal seemed less than successful. Every time Riker tried to steer the discussion to the arena of the brewing Romulan-Reman conflict, Khegh just as quickly diverted it with boasts, blusters, and heavily embroidered tales of past battles. The Klingon wanted to discuss anything, it seemed, but their coming mission to Romulus. He seemed especially interested in hearing stories about Lieutenant Commander Worf, whom he claimed to have known during his pre-Starfleet days in Minsk, unlikely though that might be.

  Sitting between the boisterous male Klingon commander, Tchev, and a female Klingon named Dekri, who looked as if she were about to spill right out of her bustier-like top, Vale felt a rough hand pressing on the small of her back.

  “So, what do you consider to be your greatest triumph in battle?” Tchev asked, turning toward her with a snag-gletoothed leer.

  Vale’s mind raced. Over the last year alone, she had spearheaded the Enterprise’s rescue operations on Dokaal, led efforts to calm the social chaos on Delta Sigma IV, and had coordinated several ground assaults during the guerrilla war on Tezwa. She wondered if any of those incidents might strike this Klingon as worthy of song or story.

  “While I think I respect honor in combat and life as much as any Klingon,” she said, “I’m not certain that—” She stopped as she felt the hand on her back slip lower, onto her rear.