I settle the breath mask in place, and step out of Nuru-Or's airlock, onto the ravaged rock of the planetoid.
A core breach in a grounded ship leaves... consequences. The ridge on which the Gamak landed is simply gone, replaced by a crater nearly half a kellicam across. Smoke is still rising from the centre - the ground has stopped glowing, but it is still too hot to approach. Ejecta has been scattered over a wide area; that, and the initial blast wave, demolished the QarS dome. There is significant radioactive fallout, but my personal shield - and the breath mask, another trophy from the Vaadwaur - will suffice to protect me.
Science teams from the Skaldak are busily assessing the damage, salvaging whatever remains to be salvaged - which, I suspect, will be precious little. My crew has orders to assist them if needed. We will need, I think, to present a very complete report on this to the High Council.
I am not here to help them, though. I have my own ends in view. I lope easily over the rocky ground, moving swiftly in the low gravity. And my eyes are on a scorched and battered form, almost blending into the landscape - the wreck of a Toron-class shuttlecraft, one of those left abandoned on the landing pad. Now, it is some distance from the pad.
It could, of course, have been thrown there by the blast wave... but I would expect the shuttle to be much more heavily damaged, even torn apart, if that were the case. Explosions are never entirely predictable, I know... this might be some mere chance, some freak of the blast.... Or it might be what I think it is.
I check my tricorder as I approach the shuttle. It is what I think it is.
The access hatch has lost power, but the hydraulics are intact; I crank it open. The interior is dimly lit by a few surviving emergency lights.
"In the name of the Protecting Powers and the Auspicious Dawning, I ask permission to enter," I say in my own language.
A faint wheezing noise answers me, and then a weak voice. "Enter and be welcome."
I step inside the shuttle. My eyes adjust to the dimness, and I can see him lying among the wreckage. "Your life signs were only detectable from very close by," I say.
V'l' R'st'l chuckles without mirth. "So they should be," he says. "I am dead, Bl'k'. The Grey Dragon ascends to take me even now, I hear the beating of its wings."
I take a step forward. "There is nothing that can be done?"
"I am impaled on a broken stanchion. It passes between my inferior pancreas and my transverse aorta. One or both would rupture if I were to be moved. Even if I survived that, I have been exposed to so much radiation... you could drown me in hyronaline, and it would not be enough."
He makes no mention of his other injuries - lacerations, broken bones. His headcrest is fractured, one side broken away completely; he will never wear the three-cornered hhh-dr'ka again, that is certain. His eyes move, surveying me. I think for a moment, then take off the Vaadwaur mask.
He smiles. "Yes," he says, "it is good to see one of my own people... now, at the last."
"Do you suffer?" I ask. "The Grey Dragon may be called more swiftly, if you desire it. It and I are... old friends."
"No," says R'st'l, "no, let me have the minutes that remain. They will not be particularly comfortable, true, but I would have them."
"As you wish."
"So," he says, "what made you think of me?"
"The shuttle is in the wrong position. Oh, it might have been flung here by the blast... but it was more consistent, in my opinion, with someone taking it, attempting to flee, but failing to reach minimum safe distance before the core breach. What warning did you have?"
"Not enough. A report from my engineer concerning fluctuating readings - it might have seemed nothing, but one develops an instinct, over time. I made for a shuttle at once, but lost precious seconds overriding its security.... You look scandalized. Of course, you are a warrior, you would have thought first of alerting your comrades in arms, of saving their lives - I am a politician, I do not have comrades in arms." He coughs, and blood dribbles from his lips. "Guardian of the Cycle of M'tt'-kk'ri. Do you have a dispensation?"
"No. I am celibate."
"A pity."
One of his eyes is moving, looking me up and down. I regard him coldly. "If you were not dead," I say, "I might kill you for that."
"But I am dead, and a dead man may speak freely." He coughs again, and there is more blood. Some is seeping from the ancillary breathing tubules along his jawline, too.
"Do you wish to speak freely of why you are dead?" I ask.
"I wish I knew. Oh, I suspect certain things, but I can be sure of little. There are younger members of the High Council, and they are impatient for change. They arranged for me to be sent on this mission... it is not impossible that they arranged other matters, too. I had thought that I was too valuable an instrument to be sacrificed in this fashion... but I am not Klingon, and Klingons see me as a tool, only. To be used as required - and, it seems, to be broken at need." His gaze fixes on my face. "The same is true of you. Never forget that."
"I will not."
"You should not. The death of a High Council agent in your presence - that will require explanations, and you may find that no explanations are sufficient. Even though you are innocent. Innocence counts for very little in Klingon politics."
"But you have no specific information," I say.
"I have not. My personal communicator may have recorded the final message from my engineer. Or it may have been wiped by the electromagnetic pulse from the core breach. It may be enough to demonstrate that you were not involved. Or it may not. I can make no promises."
Talking is weakening him. "You can keep no promises," I say.
"This much is true. Will you stay to the end? I will not delay you excessively."
"I will stay. Do you desire a sutra? I may recite one."
He nods. It evidently hurts him. "Do you know the Waters of Life?"
"I do." I clear my mind, and begin the recitation. So often, when I recite, it is simply a noise to those near me; it is good to be understood for once.
"The Waters of Life fall from the sky,
or rise from out of the ground.
From small beginnings they grow to a stream, to a river,
making their own path across the parched ground.
They may gather in still pools,
or rush in spates and torrents.
They may nourish gardens and orchards and the fertile fields,
or they may dash buildings asunder and drown armies beneath their waves.
They take their own path, long or short,
tranquil or raging,
across the lands of history.
But all their paths come to one ending,
as they wend their way down to the sea,
to the great Ocean of Being, whence everything comes,
where everything returns."
By the time I reach the end, his breathing has ceased. I do not close his eyes. My people go to the afterlife with their eyes open and unafraid. I put the breath mask back in place, and go out, to make my report.
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