Declassified

“Do I even want to know what system you’ve hijacked now?”

Bridy picked up a data slate and reviewed a schematic of the ship’s internal command-and-control network. “The escape pod, I think.”

“Good thinking. Can’t imagine why we’d ever need to use that.”

She tossed the data slate into his lap. “Just walk me through the patch-in.”

He set down his orange juice, picked up the tablet, and enlarged a section of the schematic. “I thought you could do this stuff in your sleep.”

“On systems I know, sure. But these Nalori circuit relays make no sense to me.” Still clutching the cable, she lay down on her back and shimmied through an opening beneath the cockpit’s operations console. “Help me find the transporter controls’ second auxiliary data port.”

“The transporter? Why the hell are we patching into that?”

“We’re just borrowing its logic processor. Now, where’s the port?”

He tapped at the interactive schematic. “Look for the second row of chips perpendicular to the aft end of the panel. There’s a sequence of three red chips, five green chips, and four white chips.”

“I see it.”

“Directly forward of the center green chip.”

“Got it. Patching in now.”

His i

She wriggled back out from under the console and stood up. “So far, so good.” She keyed some commands into the operations console. “Five-by-five.”

“All right. Now what?”

“We analyze the data you recovered on that Klingon memory card.” She smiled. “Nicely done, by the way.”

“Don’t thank me. I’m sending Starfleet a bill as soon as we get back.”

“Trust me, they’ll call it money well spent.” She tapped a key on the sensor console. “Let’s see what we have.”

Numbers, mathematical formulas, and bizarre alien symbols Qui

“Whatever we’ve got,” Bridy said, “there’s a lot of it.” She entered more commands on the sensor console. “Let’s apply a few filters. See if we can break this into pieces small enough to study.” Seconds later, the tempest of digits on the screen thi

“You lost me right after ‘weird.’ Can you tell me in simple English what any of that actually means?”

Bridy looked perplexed. “Um . . . no, I can’t.”

“So, where does that leave us?”

“We could wait for Endeavourto get here and then hand it over to them.”

“And give the Klingons a chance to track us down? No, thanks.”

She sighed. “Good point. The sooner we unravel this, the better.”

He got up and shouldered past her to get a better look at the display. “Can you freeze it a second?” Bridy halted the steady scroll, and Qui

Then it became clear.

“These are coordinates.” He pointed out strings of numbers. “Look. See how close these sets are? Every eighteen digits, three sets of six.” Entering commands on the console, he continued. “This ain’t meant to be read like a book. This is more of a paint-by-numbers kind of thing.” Keying in the final series of commands, he added, “Your hidden message is software for drawing a starmap.”

The Dulcinea’s astrocartographic matrix engaged and parsed the data in seconds. Qui

Bridy cocked her head at an angle. “A black hole?”

“Don’t think so. Not strong enough, and it’s givin’ off the wrong kinds of radiation. But it’s a gravity well, for damn sure.”

Her eyes widened. “A wormhole!”

“That’d be my guess.”

“Stable?”

“No idea.”

“What’s its position?”

“Don’t know that, either. But I think I know how to find out.” Qui

“And then triangulate the cause of their deviations.”

“You got it, darlin’.” The results of the sensor sweep took shape on his display. He superimposed a number of computer animations detailing the altered vectors of a handful of rogue planetoids, junked satellites, and other small objects that had been previously charted by Starfleet. Seconds later, the computer animation finished plotting the sources of the distorted paths, and more than half a dozen lines intersected at a single coordinate.

Qui

Bridy shot him a mild glare of teasing reproach. “Show-off.”

“It’s why you keep me around, sweetheart.”

She smiled, took his hand, and led him out of the cockpit. “It’s onereason.”

13

Atish Khatami winced at the sound of Ming Xiong’s voice calling out from several meters behind her in the corridor: “Captain! A moment, please!”

The svelte commanding officer of the Endeavourhalted and forced herself to exorcise any intimation of irritation from her face. Then she turned to confront her high-strung guest. “Yes, Lieutenant?”

He caught up to her and stood a bit too close for her comfort. “Why wasn’t I told your crew loaded trilithium ordnance onto the Dulcinea?”

She grabbed Xiong’s arm and pulled him toward the door of a nearby maintenance bay. It slid open ahead of them and she shoved him through the doorway. On the other side, a pair of enlisted mechanics looked up from their precision welding. Khatami’s voice was sharp and cold: “Give us the room.” Tools clattered across the compartment’s workbenches, dropped without question by the mechanics, who were out the door before Khatami had to ask them again.

As the door hushed closed, Khatami poked a finger against Xiong’s chest. “First, nevertake that tone with me on board myship. Next, neverdiscuss classified ops in the middle of a passageway. Last but not least, you weren’t told because there was no reasonyou needed to know.”

“No reason? In case you’ve forgotten, Captain, I’m in charge of all field missions directly related to Operation Vanguard.”

“Unless I’ve missed a memo from Starfleet Command stating that you’ve been promoted to the admiralty, I don’t give a damn what your billet is. My orders are to provide you with facilities, communications, and regular updates, and to offer tactical and material support to SI’s operatives in the field.”

Xiong paced angrily and pushed a hand through his black, brush-cut hair. “We’re so close,Captain. So close to unlocking all these mysteries, all these technologies, all this pure knowledge. The last thing we ought to do is risk blowing it all to hell because some fool with more brass than brains tells us to.”

“I don’t see why you’re getting all worked up over this. It’s no different than the self-destruct package Starfleet builds into every starship and starbase.”