“Fifteen seconds, sir,” Lavena said, sounding more than a little apprehensive.
Riker glanced at Akaar, who continued to glare down at him from the upper bridge. Before the admiral could say what was obviously on his mind, Riker touched his combadge as he crossed back to his command chair.
“Commander Ra-Havreii, stand by to warp out of here at my signal.” Riker took his seat, staring resolutely forward as the Red King entered what appeared to be its death throes. He reached to his left and squeezed Deanna’s hand.
Good-bye, Chris. Ranul. Tuvok. Damn!
“Ready, Captain,”the Efrosian engineer said.
“Ten seconds,” Lavena said.
“Captain!”
Jaza’s unexpected cry braced Riker, like an adrenaline injection delivered directly to the heart. Still seated, he faced his senior science officer. “Jaza?”
The Bajoran’s words came in rapid-fire succession. “Romulan warp signatures, just inside the cloud. Seventeen, no, eighteen of them, on roughly our heading—along with a large, rocky body.”
Riker noticed that a handful of bright stars had become visible through the expanding, still-attenuating cloud. Dozens of other small, starlike shapes moved quickly in front of those distant suns, as warp-powered vessels towed a single larger one, along with the two dozen or more of their fellows that had crippled themselves in order to pull the rift closed while passing through interspace. The orderly procession moved as one in a graceful arc, like a descending swarm of meteors.
Even as the Red King effect grew ever larger and more transparent, revealing the indifferent stars that lay behind it, a hard realization struck Riker: there was absolutely nothing further that either he or Titancould do to help the convoy escape the Red King’s final agonies.
Vanguard and her escorts would either survive now, or they wouldn’t.
“Mr. Ra-Havreii, Mr. Lavena: Ahead, warp six.”
IMPERIAL WARBIRD VALDORE,STARDATE 57047.6
It had been an extremely rough ride. Donatra thanked every god she could think of that the convoy had emerged from the waves of interspatial turbulence essentially intact.
“The Bloom is… gone,Commander,” Liravek said, though it clearly wasn’t necessary for him to say so aloud. But the centurion’s aquiline features revealed such a study in astonishment that Donatra was inclined to overlook his lapse.
From her command chair, Donatra gazed back at the starfield being displayed across the front of the Valdore’s bridge. Except for a few wispy, vestigial remnants of what had once been the blazing, energetic ferocity of the Great Bloom—the enormous celestial maw that had swallowed the fleet she had once been so foolish as to hide within its fringes—space had resumed its familiar empty aspect. It now appeared black and infinite, intermittently bejeweled with local stars, distant galaxies, and ordinary nebula and dust clouds—just as it had for the billions of years preceding the detonation of Shinzon’s thrice-cursed thalaron weapon.
Also discernible among those ancient stars were several dozen other small, steadily moving lights: her fleet, and the enormous life-bearing rock it continued to tow away from the now-vanished spatial rift.
Still another purposefully moving pinprick of light appeared, heading quickly toward the Valdore.Donatra intuited its identity immediately.
“Titanhas just dropped out of warp, Commander,” said Decurion Seketh, who was running the main operations console. “She’s on an intercept course, five-hundred k’vahrudistant, decelerating and closing. Captain Riker wishes to speak with you.”
No doubt,Donatra thought as she rose from her chair. Her body felt heavy with fatigue, and her old wounds stung and burned her. “I will take it in my ready room, Decurion.”
Once she was alone inside the small, private office adjacent to the bridge, she glanced down at the carpet. She noticed the tiny greenish-black spots spattered there. Suran’s blood stared up at her in silent accusation.
Crossing to the desk, she activated the computer that sat atop it and dropped into her seat.
Riker’s face appeared immediately. He was clearly furious.
“You blew up Captain Tchev’s ship while the convoy was passing through the rift.Why ?”
“Captain Riker. It’s so good to see you again, too. Is your channel secure?”
“Of course, Commander. Nobody can hear our conversation but the two of us. Now: Why did you destroy theDugh ?”
Donatra schooled her face carefully until she felt certain it was free of any display of either guilt or innocence, anger or amusement. A Vulcan would be proud,she thought wryly.
“A great deal can happen inside a phenomenon like the Great Bloom, Captain.”
“Are youdenying it, Commander? I trust I don’t need to remind you that I have a Betazoid on board.”
She sidestepped his question, and his anger, lest her own be roused. “We have been allies, Captain. But I am a Romulan, loyal to the Star Empire first and foremost. And the Klingons are our sworn enemies, the Dominion War alliance notwithstanding. You know this as well. So I ask you: Would you really believe anythingI might tell you about the Dugh?”
“I’d believe the truth, Donatra. Governor Khegh is going to demand nothing less of me.”
Donatra waved dismissively. “Governor Khegh won’t want to admit in polite company that he sent a cloaked vessel to follow our ships into the Bloom in the first place. Anytruth is therefore moretruth than that fat, inept, Klingon ryak’nadeserves.”
“So youare admitting it.”Riker looked disappointed, and Donatra found that this disturbed her even more than his outrage.
She retreated behind a shield of righteous anger. “I admit nothing, Captain. And as long as we are discussing truth, I must remind you of the promise you made to me.”
“Promise?”
“Your pledge not to reveal that I was forced to cripple the majority of the ships in my fleet as part of our joint effort to neutralize the Bloom.”
The human captain’s brow creased into a perplexed scowl. “What the hell does that have to do with theDugh ?”
“Everything, Captain—that is, if I’m truly guilty of the charges you’ve leveled at me. If Khegh becomes as convinced of my treachery as you evidently are, he could very well figure out why I supposedly did this thing.”
Riker paused, considering. “Because Tchev would have reported that about half your ships jettisoned their cores inside the rift. And Khegh and the Klingon High Council might have seen that as an exploitable vulnerability.”
“Precisely. And Khegh would therefore decide that I would have had ample reason not to allow the Dughto pass through the Bloom intact.”
“So you’re admitting you had a motive. You’re making my case for me.”
“Nonsense. Motive alone proves nothing.”
“You also had means and opportunity, Commander.”
In spite of herself, her anger began burning hotter than her wounds. “I’m not on trial, Riker, and you don’t stand in judgment over me. Take carenot to tread so heavily on our alliance. Don’t forget, I control the Romulan fleet. That ought to make me someone you consider quite dangerous to trifle with.”
Riker fumed in silence for a lengthy interval, clearly angered at having been so deftly outmaneuvered. Federation humans,she thought, her anger receding. The best of them are so earnest and honorable. As well as naïve and tractable.
“I won’t lie for you, Donatra,”he said.
“And I wouldn’t dream of asking that of you, William. All I ask is…your discretion regarding the current vulnerable condition of my fleet. At least until a few weeks of repairs are behind us. We have deadly enemies on our doorstep, and the Empire’s internal political stability remains in question, in spite of your noble efforts on our behalf. Surely you can appreciate the need to be…selective, at the very least, about what you decide to tell Khegh.”