Nothing moved in or around the shuttles, but through the forward viewing port of one of those nearest the forcefield Linavil saw interior lighting. A ruse,she thought immediately, an attempt to draw her into an area upon which Federation weapons must even now be trained. But though Linavil ached to meet the intruders, to deal them punishment for their attempted theft of Tomed,she had a different duty to fulfill right now. If the comm systems of all the shuttles had not been damaged, she would send a message to all Imperial Fleet vessels, and to Romulus; otherwise, she would take a shuttle and, as Admiral Vokar had ordered, deliver word of the Federation deception in person. Either way, the effort to steal the Romulan flagship would go neither unrevealed nor unpunished.
Ignoring the interior lights of the one shuttle, Linavil ran to another of the craft, the one farthest away from the first. She reached to the small panel below the name of shuttle— Liss Ornahj—and pushed it. It clicked, and then hinged open, allowing access to the door controls—
Movement flashed above Linavil, and she looked up to see a figure crashing down on her. In the last fraction of an instant before she was struck, she jerked her head to the side, and even as she tumbled to the deck, she understood that the small shift had been what had kept her from losing consciousness. And that, she assumed, had also kept her from losing her life at the hands of the enemy.
Vaughn resisted moving until he heard the click of the access plate opening, not wanting to risk divulging his presence too soon.
Just a few minutes ago, as he had worked on the deflector interface aboard Liss Riehn,the passive sensors had told him in quick succession of a lone Romulan nearing the shuttlebay, of the reinstatement of the bay’s forcefield, and of the reintroduction of an atmosphere here. He had checked the shuttle for weapons, but he hadn’t found any, and he hadn’t had enough time to improvise. Without waiting for the air to finish completely filling the bay, Vaughn had exited Liss Riehnand sprinted to another of the shuttles, Liss Ornahj— Fire Hawk—and had climbed atop it.
The move had been a gamble. If the Romulan had come into the bay and approached one of the other shuttles, then Vaughn would have had to jump down and cross the landing stage in pursuit of them, a risky proposition since his disruptor had been blown out into space when the forcefield had dropped. But Vaughn had relied on the perception and intelligence of the Romulans to lead them to the understanding that, in order to foil the commandeering of their ship, they need only let the Empire know what had happened aboard Tomed;he counted on the Romulan entering the bay and avoidingcontact with him until after they had broadcast a message.
And so Vaughn had lain unmoving, facedown, atop Liss Ornahj,listening intently to the footfalls of the Romulan as they had entered the shuttlebay. Vaughn had kept his muscles tensed, prepared to move. He had defied the strong impulse to lift his head and follow the Romulan visually, but with the loss of his disruptor, the only weapon he possessed now was surprise, and he could not chance losing that.
The click of the control panel opening sounded unnaturally loud to Vaughn in the otherwise-silent bay, like the unexpected crack of a whip. He surged forward, pulling himself along and swinging his legs around, aiming his feet toward the door of Liss Ornahj.As he cleared the top of the shuttle and came down, he saw the Romulan look up at him at the last moment before the heels of his boots struck her head—a hard but glancing blow, and not the full contact for which Vaughn had hoped. The woman collapsed onto the deck. Vaughn, knocked sideways by the impact and his circular momentum, landed lengthwise, his arms coming up before him to cushion his fall.
He pushed himself up at once and whirled toward the woman, set to rush her. She’d already risen to one knee, he saw, and she peered about, obviously searching for something. Vaughn looked too, and caught sight of a disruptor lying beside the shuttle; the weapon must have been knocked loose from the woman’s hand or uniform when she had tumbled to the deck. Vaughn lunged for it, but too late; the woman had spied it as well, and she grabbed it up and started to bring it around toward him. He planted one foot and kicked with the other, the tip of his boot striking the woman on her wrist. Her arm flew backward, and the disruptor sailed from her hand, arcing high and far, the view of its landing among the work pods obstructed by the body of Liss Ornahj.
As Vaughn brought his leg back down, attempting to find his balance, the woman charged forward. Her shoulder hit Vaughn just below his solar plexus, and he plunged backward. He struck the deck hard, but he allowed his momentum to carry his legs upward, at the same time grasping the Romulan’s shoulders and lifting with all of his strength. The woman flipped over him, and he heard a grunt escape her as she landed on her back.
Vaughn rolled over as quickly as he could and then rose to his feet. The woman stood up too, her chest heaving as she gasped for air, the wind apparently forced from her lungs when she had slammed onto the deck. He noticed a smear of green on the side of her face, and he saw that the upper tip of her ear had been ripped partially through, probably by the heel of one of his boots.
The woman—a tactical officer, according to the pale green coloring of the right side of her uniform shirt—squared off opposite Vaughn, and he wondered how he could defeat the greater strength of a Romulan when he did not have the benefit of a weapon. Surprise no longer seemed the asset he had needed it to be. As though offering proof of that, the woman charged again. Vaughn waited as long as he could to move, then threw himself sideways, hoping to escape the attack. But the woman’s arm reached for him, and she grabbed hold of the black-and-silver mesh of his Romulan uniform before he could get away. She continued forward, carrying him backward and heaving him against the side of Liss Ornahj.Now Vaughn felt the air rushing from his own lungs, and he heard himself begin to wheeze as he tried to breathe.
Before him, the Romulan’s face looked flush, streaks of bright green crawling up her cheeks. With her eyes wide and her teeth gritted, her rage appeared pure and unstoppable. She brought her fist up, and all Vaughn could do was push himself away from the shuttle so that his head would not pound back against the metal surface when the punch landed. The woman hit him hard, her knuckles darkening his vision as they rammed into the center of his face. He felt his knees weaken, and he chose to let them fold. He dropped onto the deck, the Romulan’s fingers still clutching the chest of his uniform.
Vaughn tried to fall backward, but the woman would not let him go. Instead, she reached down with her other hand and took hold of his arm, then hauled him upward easily, as though the artificial gravity of Tomedhad been suspended for her. She let go of him with one hand and raised her fist again, cocking her arm back. Concerned that if she hit him again, he might pass out—dooming Commander Gravenor and Captain Harriman, as well as the mission—Vaughn swung his arm up and frantically reached for the side of the Romulan’s head. His fingers found her wounded ear, seized it, and pulled. The flesh and cartilage came away with a sickening, carnal sound, and blood spurted from the coarse wound.
The woman cried out, her voice seeming to carry less pain than anger. She released her grip on him as her hands reached for the side of her head. Vaughn started to sidle away, but the woman stepped forward and dropped her hands, took hold of his upper arms, and heaved him into the air. He soared several meters before crashing onto the deck.