Declassified

No one was sure what to make of what they saw when they went through the door.

In dim corridors that had obviously suffered recent and extensive structural damage, Arkenites and Klingons worked side by side to effect repairs, shoring up load-bearing walls and compromised support columns. The Klingons were all military, but they wore bulky utility vests over their uniforms. Kits and crates containing tools too big to fit in the vests sat on the floor.

“This isn’t an occupation force,” Fisher heard Ga

Fisher watched the Arkenites. The ones they passed all seemed healthy and in good spirits. None of them appeared to be in distress. This wasn’t forced labor. It was willing cooperation.

The Dauntlessofficers were eventually led to a door marked with a sign in both Arkenzu and Federation Standard: ADMINISTRATOR DUVADI. The Klingons ushered them through the door, then followed them inside.

The office was more spacious than Fisher expected for a mining colony, but he quickly saw why: it doubled as a conference room. The center was dominated by a table big enough to seat ten, with a desk at the far end of the room.

From behind the desk came a shout: “My God, you’re Starfleet!” To Fisher’s surprise, the speaker was not an Arkenite, but a human—an auburn-headed man of average height, though to Fisher’s eyes he seemed pale and a little gaunt. As the Klingons took watchful positions in adjacent corners at the opposite end of the room, the man came out from behind the desk, unmistakably overjoyed. “They told me they wanted me to meet with someone, but they didn’t say who it would be. I can’t tell you how glad I am to see you!”

Reyes moved toward him and shook his hand, clearly wanting to keep their conversation as far from the guards as possible. “We’re glad to see you, too, Mister . . . ?”

“Doctor Philippe Latour,” the man said. “I’m the deputy administrator of Azha-R7a.”

“Captain Reyes of the Starship Dauntless. My first officer, Commander Ga

“Better late than never, I suppose,” Latour said with a nervous laugh as he glanced at the guards across the room. “Dare I hope you’re here to relieve our current benefactors?”

“We’re working on it,” Reyes said, and then gestured toward the conference table. “All right if we sit down? There’s a lot we don’t understand about what’s going on here, and it was our hope you could shed some light on it.”

“Please,” Latour said, taking the seat at the head of the table while Reyes sat down on his left. Ga

Fisher set down his medkit and opened his tricorder. “Mind if I run a scan on you while you chat with the captain, Doctor?”

“I guess not. So, uh, where would you like me to start, Captain?”

“What prompted the distress call?”

“There was an explosion near our energy reactor, at one of the power distribution nodes. A majority of the colonists were trapped in a sealed sector of the facility with a toxic coolant leak. Our transporter was out, and we had only hours before the coolant would reach lethal levels. The Klingons arrived just in time, but they offered their assistance on the condition that the colonists swear loyalty to the Empire.”

Fisher glanced at Ga

“The Klingons gave assurances that we’d be well treated and see little change in our day-to-day lives,” Latour went on. “Doctor Duvadi—she’s our chief administrator—she didn’t take long to agree to the Klingons’ terms on behalf of the entire colony. There were children at risk during the crisis, entire families, and there was no way Duvadi would let them die. The Klingons sent work crews in, sealed the leak, freed the people who were trapped, and coordinated with our miners and engineers to repair the damaged areas. So far, they’ve been true to their word.”

Reyes’s eyes smoldered as he listened. “True to their word or not, Doctor, I can assure you that no agreement your people made under duress will be allowed to stand. I’m not about to permit Federation citizens to be blackmailed into becoming subjects of the Empire.”

“Captain, I can’t tell you how relieved I am to hear you say that,” Latour said, “but I have to warn you, it isn’t going to be that simple.”

“Doctor Latour, are you aware you’re anemic?” Fisher asked as he closed his tricorder.

“What? I am?”

Fisher tskedand opened his medkit to prepare a hypospray. “I can just imagine what the dietary deficiencies are in a place like this. I’m going to give you an iron supplement, if you have no objection.”

Latour shrugged and nodded his assent.

“Doctor Latour,” Reyes said, “what exactly did you mean when you said it wouldn’t be that simple?”

As Fisher’s hypo hissed against the deputy administrator’s shoulder, Latour said, “I don’t know how much experience you have with Arkenites, Captain, but they have very strict ideas about the repayment of debt. It’s a cultural thing, deeply ingrained. None of them wanted to leave the Federation or cooperate with the Klingons, but their code of ethics doesn’t permit them to do otherwise. Every Arkenite here feels an obligation to repay the Klingons for their assistance, in spite of the way it was offered. I’m sorry to say it, but your biggest problem in this mess may not be the Klingons.”

Fisher reopened his tricorder and ran another scan of Latour.

“Where is Doctor Duvadi?” asked Reyes.

Latour shrugged. “I haven’t seen her since she was summoned to the laboratory wing thirty hours ago. The Klingons set up their command post there and locked it off right after Duvadi agreed to their terms. That’s when they put me in her office.”

“The lab wing,” Reyes said. “Where is it, exactly?”

“On this level. Not that far. I could show you, but it wouldn’t do any good. It’s off limits.”

Reyes nodded to Fisher, who touched a specific control on his tricorder—one that Lieutenant Sadler had reprogrammed before they’d beamed down. A prolonged hiss from Fisher’s Sadler-modified medkit was the only obvious sign that anything had changed. The Klingon guards reacted to the sound, drawing their distruptors as they started toward the humans, but both fell unconscious before they could go three steps.

While Ga

“Sadler here,”came the response. “Orders, Captain?”

“Send in the troops, Mister Sadler. Mine level sixteen, zone yellow.”

“Acknowledged. . . . Troops away. Shall I beam you up?”

“Negative. Restore shields and stand by for further instructions. Reyes out.”

Ga

“Don’t you need one?” the doctor asked.

She held up her other hand, revealing a third disruptor. “One of the guards had a spare.”

“Swell,” Fisher said as he reluctantly took the Klingon weapon, hoping he’d be able to find its stun setting.

Latour looked at the Dauntlessofficers in abject confusion. “I don’t understand. What’s going on? Why did the guards—?”

“Anesthetic gas,” Fisher explained quickly. “Packed in liquid form among the medicinal vials of my medkit, and triggered from my tricorder to be released as an aerosol.”

“But why weren’t we—?”

“The three of us were immunized before we left the ship,” said Fisher, and then gave Latour a friendly pat on the shoulder where he’d applied the hypo. “You were immunized a few minutes ago.”

“But what good is that going to do?” Latour asked as he turned to Reyes. “This level is still full of Klingons, and you had your ship send troops to a level that’s currently empty of—”