Страница 54 из 81
This isn’t good. If even the Cardassian people are believing the worst of the government, then the Romulans’ work is being done for them. A Federation death won’t help matters. Cardassia needs to get out of this conflict. Perhaps we can use the Romulans’ hatred of Klingons to give Dralath the very war he seems desperate to fight and also restore some of Cardassia’s lost lustre.
As he waited for his stew, Entek finished his mental composition of the sedition report, and began to compose his report to his supervisor—and to Enabran Tain.
Chapter 27
Deep Space Station K-7
Lorgh wasn’t sure why simply walking the hallways of this ancient space station made him tense. Perhaps it was the odd looks that the station’s denizens—mostly humans—gave him. Perhaps it was simply the reputation that this place had in Klingon history. After all, it was here that the infamous tribble infestation got its start, a plague that had menaced several Klingon worlds until the foul species was finally eradicated like the vermin they were.
Still, this was the ideal meeting place—close to the Federation–Klingon border, administered by civilians rather than Starfleet, and sparsely populated these days—for his meeting with the human Vaughn.
He entered the drinking establishment where they were to have their meeting. The diamond-shaped door slid open slowly, briefly stopping halfway before finally opening all the way. That, sadly, set the tone for the entire place. The décor was no doubt the height of human fashion eighty years earlier, but it also looked like it hadn’t been maintained in almost as long. The tables were cracked and balanced unevenly on legs that had fallen off and been given inadequate replacements, the cushions on the chairs were split open or missing, and the trays on which the bored-looking servers brought the drinks were worn and gray.
One of those servers gave Lorgh a sharp look upon his entrance. “Can I help you?” she asked in a snide tone. She wore a pink outfit that revealed more than it concealed. Lorgh found the sight of so much soft, human flesh to be nauseating.
“I’m meeting someone.”
Her face indicated a mind that was torn between not believing Lorgh and not caring much one way or the other. The latter apparently won out, as she shrugged, indicated a table in the corner with her head, and said, “Have a seat. I’ll be with you in a minute.”
“I’ll have a—”
“I saidI’ll be with you in a minute.” Then she turned her back on him.
Lorgh knew that wasn’t an insult to quite the same degree among humans as it was among Klingons, but he decided to accept it as such in any case.
It was considerably more than a minute before the server finally came to take his order. Knowing that this establishment was unlikely to have any proper drinks, he ordered an Altair water.
Just as she brought it over, the diamond door slid hesitantly open once again, and Elias Vaughn entered. Lorgh noted that the human was walking gingerly, which made sense, given the gravity of his injuries on Raknal V months ago. What impressed Lorgh was that he was walking at all. If a Klingon suffered a like injury, the legs would not have been salvageable, and would have been amputated. A Klingon warrior—or I.I. agent—would probably insist on Mauk-to’Vorat that point, since one ca
Vaughn had proven to be a valuable resource. They had first met aboard the Carthageduring the Betreka Nebula incident, and they had remained in contact on and off in the decade and a half since—each had found the other a useful font of information at times, and the constant exchange had served to allow both of them to do their jobs more efficiently. Neither of them had informed their superiors or colleagues that he used the other as a source. I.I. knew only that Lorgh was visiting one of his confidential informants; he assumed that Vaughn’s own people knew exactly as much.
Lorgh wondered if symbolism as much as practicality entered into Vaughn’s reasons for choosing this as a meeting place. Deep Space Station K-7 was the nearest Federation outpost to Sherman’s Planet, one of several border worlds in dispute during the hostilities that led to the Organian Peace Treaty. Under the terms of that treaty, the Klingons and Federation had to show who could develop Sherman’s Planet most efficiently; the Federation won that battle a year later. The Great Curzon had used Sherman’s Planet as one of the precedents for his Raknal V solution at the Betreka Nebula. Now Vaughn, coming off an injury sustained at Raknal V, was meeting here with Lorgh, a contact he first made near that world.
Then again, this human has never struck me as one to appreciate that type of symbolism.
It didn’t take Vaughn long to spot Lorgh, even in the corner—he was one of only half a dozen customers in the place, and the only Klingon—and so he immediately walked over and took the seat opposite Lorgh.
“You seem to be recovering nicely.”
“I suppose,” Vaughn said. “It’s good to see you again.”
Sipping his Altair water and trying not to gag, Lorgh said, “I feel the same. Especially now that you have finally grown a beard. It is unfit for a warrior to be without one.”
“I’ll take that as a compliment.”
The server came over; Vaughn ordered something that sounded like t’qIla’,which turned out to be a clear liquid that came in a very small glass.
“I believe you requested this meeting,” Lorgh said by way of getting the conversational ball rolling.
Vaughn sipped his drink. “Yes, I did. The incident on Raknal V was the result of sabotage by Romulans.”
At that, Lorgh’s eyes narrowed. He’d been investigating the Romulans for months, and learning some disheartening things about the direction their government was taking, but this was a new wrinkle.
Lorgh chose his next words carefully. “I take it by the fact that the official report listed the building’s collapse as an accident means that either you wish to keep the Romulan involvement a secret, or that you have no proof.”
“The latter, believe me.” Vaughn sounded especially angry. Lorgh remembered that the Starfleet officer who died in the building was a comrade of Vaughn’s. “If we could expose their involvement, we would. Unfortunately, they had an agent on-site who dropped a building on Commander Troi and myself and made off with our evidence. Bringing accusations of Romulan sabotage into Raknal without anything to back it up will only make a disastrous situation worse.”
Lorgh tapped the glass that held his Altair water, which he had no intention of finishing. “You brought me this information for a reason, I assume.”
“You know as well as I do that Qaolin is furious that we didn’t blame the Cardassians for sabotaging that building, even though everyone assumes they did.” He snorted. “From what I was hearing on Raknal before the Carthageleft, half the Cardassians on the planet thought Monor orchestrated it, and they’re on hisside. Meanwhile, the Cardassians know they didn’t do it, and are blaming us for spreading the rumors.”
Gri
“What I need to know from you is what the High Council’s position is.”