Pennington stood frozen in place, keeping his still tingling hand wedged under his opposite armpit. Staring at Quinn, he noted the odd expression that crossed the pilot’s features.

“Damn,” Quinn said, suddenly appearing as forlorn as he might be upon learning that the alcohol content of every intoxicant in the quadrant had been neutralized. “Ah, shit.”

“What?” Pennington asked, dreading the answer.

“I’m supposed to bring Ganz this guy’s accounting records,” Quinn replied, “and I don’t know where they are.”

Nodding in resignation, Pennington said, “Probably should have gotten that information before you shot him.”

“Thanks for the tip,” Quinn replied as he returned the stun pistol to the inside pocket of his jacket. Looking around the room, he shook his head. “We’ll never find them in this place.”

“You think?” Pennington exclaimed, starting to pace around the perimeter of the room. “What in hell do we do now?”

“Wait for him to wake up,” Quinn said. Nodding in the direction of the door, he added, “If you’re bored, you could try to rustle up a Sniffy-sitter.”

Releasing an exasperated sigh, Pennington shook his head as he considered their current situation, which was becoming more ridiculous with each passing minute. Even if and when they finally managed to get off this godforsaken planet, they still had to travel to the Jinoteur system in order to complete the mysterious assignment Quinn had been given by T’Prynn.

Bollocks.

“We’re never getting to Boam II, are we?” he asked.

Quinn shrugged. “Don’t see why not. To be honest, we’re ahead of schedule.”

“Right,” Pennington replied as he reached for the unconscious Zakdorn’s arm and pulled him to his feet. Dragging Armnoj across the room, he allowed the sleeping accountant to fall without ceremony onto a nearby couch. That done, he indicated the stunned Sniffy with a nod. “You get that one.”

He was sure he saw Quinn’s hand flinch toward his stun pistol.

22

His satchel slung over one shoulder and leaving behind the growing crowd of station personnel who had come to welcome home crew members departing the Endeavour,Xiong made his way with all due haste from the gangway and away from the space-dock’s main terminal. No one awaited his arrival, and he certainly had no desire to engage in any of the emotionally mixed greetings currently being bestowed upon his shipmates.

They’re notyour shipmates,he reminded himself as he stepped along with three other passengers into a waiting turbolift.

Even as the thought surfaced, Xiong pushed it away. While he might not be a permanent member of the Endeavour’s crew, he had stood beside them during crisis and tragedy. Their captain had died saving his life, sacrificing himself with bravery and resolve as he likely would have for any of the men and women under his command. In all the ways that truly mattered, those people were his brothers and sisters, and the grief they endured over their loss was his to bear, as well.

Forcing away the unpleasant line of thought, Xiong instead tried to focus on his surroundings as the turbolift descended into the depths of the station. He waited patiently as the lift slowed to a stop at different levels, allowing the other patients to disembark. Thankfully, no one else arrived to take their place, and he was able to complete the rest of his own journey in solitude.

The lift brought him to a stop on one of the station’s cargo decks, and Xiong adopted a casual stride as he made his way down the corridor, doing his best to affect the illusion of just another member of the crew going about his duties. He maintained the charade until he arrived at his destination, an office marked like those around it with a simple location designator label: CA/194-6.

Entering the room, which was furnished with standard-issue Starfleet office furniture—a desk and two chairs—and featured no extraneous decorations of any kind, Xiong ensured the door was locked before stepping around the large gray desk and without preamble placing his right hand flat against the room’s rear wall. A soft, ruby glow emanated from the wall panel underneath his hand, after which a section of the bulkhead slid aside without so much as a whisper of sound to reveal a pair of red doors. They slid apart, revealing a corridor illuminated in stark, bright white.

Home at last.

His eyes squinting as they adjusted to the sudden shift in light intensity, Xiong stepped through the doorway and into the quite familiar passageway, which extended fifteen meters to another set of doors. These were transparent, offering the lieutenant a view of the hive of activity carrying on behind them. Only when the doors slid aside at his approach was he bathed in the ambient sounds and atmosphere of this, the surreptitious heart of the Vanguard station.

To those who even knew of its existence, it was referred to simply as the Vault.

Xiong entered the expansive laboratory area, not for the first time thinking that if the hallway was a river of white then this place was the milky sea into which it emptied. Floors, tabletops, furniture, and equipment, nearly all of it appearing pristine and colorless. The main floor was partitioned into groupings of smaller rooms, some outfitted with tables and chairs for conferencing while others housed scientific equipment designed for specific and sensitive studies. Nearly all of the sectioned-off areas featured at least two walls composed of transparent aluminum, adding to the lab’s sense of enormity.

More than a dozen scientists and researchers were in view as Xiong moved through the lab, manning assorted workstations and equipment. A quartet of workers sat huddled in one of the conference niches, their attention so focused that they did not notice the lieutenant as he walked past on his way to his private lab and office.

While they and the rest of the twenty-two people working in this facility all were listed among Vanguard’s crew as serving a variety of assignments ranging from stellar cartography to waste reclamation—duties for which they actually were qualified, as a matter of fact—those designations were almost exclusively a cover for their real activities supporting Lieutenant Xiong. Despite their myriad functions, they as well as all of the assets in this part of the station—which included its own self-contained dormitory and dining areas—were gathered here for a single goal: solving the mystery of the Taurus Reach.

Unlike the main lab’s meeting areas, personal workspaces offered more in the way of privacy. Tapping a code on the keypad next to his door granted him access to his office. Ignoring the stacks of reports, data slates, books, computer cartridges, and other detritus cluttering the room, Xiong was barely able to toss his satchel onto the cot occupying space along his workspace’s far wall when he heard a voice from behind him.

“Lieutenant!” came the loud, boisterous call, and Xiong turned to see a short, portly Tellarite lumbering across the lab toward him, dressed in a white lab coat that hung well below his knees. “You’re back!” With large tufts of gray hair sticking out from the sides of his wide, wrinkled face, and moving with a speed that belied his age, Dr. Varech jav Gek offered a wide smile filled with jagged, irregular teeth as he approached with spread arms.

Smiling, Xiong nodded in greeting. “Hello, Dr. Gek,” Xiong said, stepping around his desk as his colleague walked into the office.

“It is good to see you,” Gek said as he dropped without invitation into the only chair besides Xiong’s which was empty of assorted flotsam. “We’ve been hearing many different stories, you know.”

Frowning, Xiong sat down in his own chair. “Stories? From whom?”