The Three-Handed Game 37

Tylha

I scramble to my feet. The bridge is a chaos of flames and screaming alarms - and screaming people.

A foul smell catches my nostrils, and I turn my head. F'hon Tlaxx is lying by the comms console, his torso torn open by a jagged piece of metal, astonishment in his dead face. F'hon - he's been with me since the start, since the very earliest days -

No time to think of that now.

"Biochem alert!" I scream at the top of my voice. "Bolian blood in the atmosphere! Clear the bridge! Move!"

I don't know who's still alive. The bridge is a wreck, the artificial gravity is fluctuating, the lights are down to red emergency, and even they are dying. I grab someone, hustle them out into the corridor.... The corridor is just as bad.

I look at the person whose shoulder I'm holding. It's Anthi. I'm briefly heartened to see her still alive.

"Sir -" she says, and stops.

I have to take charge. Somehow. "Get to aux control and take stock," I tell her.

"That was the Siohonin warp cannon -"

"I know. Get to aux con! I'm heading for main engineering - try to stabilize the situation - let's go!"

She stumbles off into the smoky corridor, hesitant at first, then moving with swift confidence as her military background kicks in. I wish I had some of that myself.

I turn the other way, begin to run towards Engineering. The corridor looks skewed, somehow, twisted out of true - what I can see of it, in the smoke and the dim lighting. I run. My feet leave the floor as the gravity plating wavers, sending me gliding along the deck, a dozen metres with every stride. Alarms are screaming. There are explosions, distant and close, and the terrible moaning wail of a massive atmosphere leak.

In my mind's eye, a merciless picture emerges, a picture I've seen so many times before; a starship, rolling helpless in space, wreathed in flame where escaping air mixes with escaping warp plasma, armour shattered, hull breached, until the brilliant flash of an exploding warp core puts an end to it all -

No. Not me. Not my ship.

The turbolifts are down, but I know the King Estmere so well by now, I find a route, down side passages and auxiliary Jeffries tubes... all filled with smoke and red light. I still don't know who's alive and who's dead. No point trying my combadge.

I slide down a Jeffries tube and into the hell that is Main Engineering. No shortage of light, here; the glare from the madly pulsating warp core brings all the wreckage into sharp relief.

Dyssa D'jheph, my chief engineer, is on the deck, face down and moaning. Nearby, the two Jolciots, Thirethequ and Jeroequene, are struggling with consoles. Jeroequene is hammering at the fire suppression system, and finally it comes online, and cold mist blasts into the air around us, quenching a dozen small blazes around the big room.

Jeroequene turns to me. "Noble Admiral!" she cries, her purple face suddenly alight with relief. "It is indeed felicitous to have your inspiring presence in this perilous situation!"

Nothing, apparently, can stop the Jolciots from using flowery language. "Situation report," I snap at her.

"It is most grave, esteemed leader. The warp core is heavily damaged and destabilizing. Ejection is not possible, since the structural integrity field has failed under the reprehensible suddenness of the Siohonin assault. System failures are endemic throughout our mighty vessel."

Thirethequ is slamming commands into the emergency warp core management console. The Jolciots are good, but maintaining a damaged warp core is beyond anyone's ability. If structural integrity has failed, the ship will come apart in short order -

I'm thinking faster than I've ever thought before, and a solution comes to my mind. "Jeroequene. I'll need you."

"At your orders, most excellent commander!"

I leap for one side of the engineering room, aided again by the failing gravity. I grab a cover hatch and wrench it free. "Primary SI links." Tholian design is weird, a whole bunch of essential systems run closer to each other than I'd like - normally. "Jeroequene. That one there." I point to another cover. "We're going to be violating a couple of hundred safety regs -"

"In a good cause, I doubt not," says Jeroequene. "And besides, a desperate stratagem is clearly called for in this situation." She frees the hatch cover with one jerk of her long anthropoid arms. The stocky, long-armed Jolciots have immense physical strength. That's one thing I'm counting on.

"Main SI field inductors." I yank a handful of sparking leads loose from the hatch. "Need to link them in to -"

"Ah! I perceive. Bold, but innovative!" Jeroequene grabs the leads from me. "The safety interlock will engage mechanically, though -"

"That's why I need you. Stop it."

"I shall attempt it to the uttermost limits of endeavour!" And she braces herself, while I make the cross-connections.

Blue sparks a metre long flash about us, amid an acrid reek of ozone. The circuit breakers trip, and meet Jeroequene's long arms. The little engineer groans and strains, and the servos whine against her tremendous Jolciot strength, and finally fail. I ram the last connection home.

The deck shifts under my feet - and steadies. Jeroequene and I exchanged stunned looks. "Success!" she cries.

I hurry over to the console where Thirethequ is working. He glances up at me, his bearded purple face gleaming with sweat. "Magisterially ingenious, revered commander!" he says. "But ejection is still blocked by the lamentable disarray of our vessel. Section thirty-one has shifted and is obstructing the ejector tube -"

Section 31. Oh, that would be the one that kills us. "Keep trying," I tell him, and hurry over to Dyssa.

She is trying to stand, getting to her hands and knees and then falling again, and when I look, I can see why. Some random piece of flying metal has crushed her left antenna. Losing one is painful enough, but a crushing injury... it floods the brain with pain and disorientation.

I steel myself. There are plenty of cutting tools available in engineering. I find a laser cutter and I use it.

Dyssa screams. I wrap my arms around her and hold her tight, ignoring the pain as she hits me, fists thumping my back over and over. "I'm sorry," I whisper to her, "I'm sorry...."

After a minute or two, she calms down. I let her go, and she turns her homely face towards me, now twisted with pain and streaked with tears. "What the hell did you do?" she asks in a hoarse voice.

"Cross-patched the SI fields to the EPS network." Essentially, running the structural integrity fields through the electro-plasma conduits - tying the ship back together with its own power system.

"But -" Dyssa's face screws up further. "That won't work, the EPS net can't take the load, the conduits will fuse -"

"Yes, eventually. All I've done is buy time for real repairs. Come on, Thirethequ is trying to stabilize the core."

Dyssa clambers uneasily to her feet. With one antenna gone, her depth perception and balance will be off, until it grows back. Not to mention the pain. I support her as we go back to Thirethequ.

"It does not look hopeful, sirs," the Jolciot says. When even Thirethequ can't get as far as three syllables to a word, things have got to be bad.

"Dilithium focus assembly is shot to hell," Dyssa mutters. "Crystals fractured, way out of alignment...." She looks up, towards the top of the shuddering warp core. "We have spares. But there's no time to fit them. Not before -"

With no way to channel energy out of the warp core, our power system is down to the auxiliary batteries. And those batteries are being drained, steadily drained, by the core itself. The biggest single need for power, now, is the antimatter containment system. The antimatter in the core has to be kept contained, or it will come into contact with normal matter... and we will have energy in plenty. Like a sun going nova in our faces.

So, we need an alternative source of power, before the battery is completely depleted. I check the energy levels; that will be soon. "What about the auxiliary fusion reactor?"

"Offline," says Dyssa. "I'll... I'll try to get it on."

"Do that. What about running a line to one of the Mesh Weavers?" If we can connect a frigate's power supply to our own, we can sustain containment with its reactor while we repair the core.

"Hangar bays are breached to vacuum," Thirethequ reports. "I have no details on the status of the frigates themselves." He is obviously stressed. Jeroequene reaches out to him and takes his hand.

My combadge chirps at me. I hit it. "Shohl."

"Sir." It's Anthi's voice. "I'm at auxiliary control. Sir, we've been punched clean out of the Rift, we have massive hull breaches and systems failures. I don't know what you did to stabilize us, but it's helped a bit. We're still non-operational, though. I have lines to some decks, some facilities -"

"Can you give me ship-wide address?"

"I can put you through to most decks, sir."

"Try it."

"Yes, sir." A pause. "You're on, sir."

"This is Vice Admiral Shohl to all crew." My voice booms back at me through the speakers in Engineering. "King Estmere has sustained critical damage. Engineering is working to rectify the situation, but we must prepare for the worst." There's a lump in my throat; I talk around it with difficulty, trying to stay calm, trying to project control and confidence. "All personnel, report to your assigned disaster stations. Make pickup on injured crewmates wherever you can do so without jeopardizing your own safety. If you cannot reach your designated escape pod, report to the nearest one with available seating space. Abandon ship. I repeat. Abandon ship."

"Admiral." Thirethequ has recovered some of his composure. "It is of the highest degree of unlikelihood that I should be able to traverse the route to my assigned departure station, Main Engineering being so deeply ensconced within the ship's architecture as it is. With no wilful disobedience to your wise and compassionate orders, therefore, I deem it my duty to remain and assist. With your permission, estimable leader."

"I - Glad to have you. Thank you, Mr Thirethequ."

"Where my beloved remains," says Jeroequene simply, "I remain."

"Glad to have you both," I say. "Let's see if we can help Dyssa get the fusion reactor back online."

But Dyssa's face has fresh tears gleaming on it. "No good," she says. "It's no good." She sobs.

"What's the problem?"

"The fusion initiator. It's gone." She sobs again. "I can see it on the video link. It's come free, dropped out of a hole in the aux power room. It's gone."

I think, for half a second. Then I turn and run for the equipment locker. It's been half crushed, a girder is sticking into it. I grab the warped door with both hands and wrench it loose, then dive in. Smashed gear confronts me, and I sort through it frantically.

One suit. We still have one intact EV suit. It will have to be enough. I start to struggle into it.

"What are you going to do?" Dyssa asks.

"The initiator's outside the ship, right?"

"It fell through the hull. What are you going to do?"

I fasten the suit, pull the helmet into place. "Go out there and get it."

---

The ship's corridors are still in chaos as I lumber grimly down them. My trick with the EPS network has steadied things a little - the grav plating is no longer flickering on and off, the emergency lights are steady - but the ship is still leaking air at a frantic rate, and the situation is still desperate.

Dyssa's right, the EPS net can't take the load, it will melt in a few hours. It's academic. The auxiliary battery will give out a lot sooner, and when it does, containment goes in the core, and the ship blows. We could drain remaining auxiliary power from other sources - and gain an extra thirty seconds or so, at the expense of what's left of life support, command and control, communications....

I just hope enough people are reaching the escape pods.

My way is blocked by a collapsed bulkhead. I swear, and turn down a side passage. I need to get outside the ship... I might not need an airlock for that. Ahead of me, I can see stars; a hull breach, this one covered by an emergency forcefield. At least some of them are still working.

I turn to a control panel in the corridor wall, gloved fingers clumsy, punching in the commands. I can't worry about losing another corridor's worth of air. I press the last button, and the forcefield blinks out, while another one powers on behind me. The tug of air pulls me off my feet, hurls me out through the gap in the hull -

I am outside the ship.

I spin slowly in space, getting my bearings, trying to assess the situation. King Estmere is turning listlessly, trailing streamers of fire and smoke, still, from more hull breaches than I can count. Her gleaming hull is scored and warped and shattered, she is surrounded by a cloud of debris. As I watch, there is a stab of flame as an escape pod launches from somewhere above me. Maybe they can clear the blast radius before the warp core goes. Maybe. I hope so.

I have my own problems. A mechanical voice chirrups in my ear: "Auxiliary battery now at thirty per cent capacity. Warning. Depletion rate above normal permitted parameters." The voice sounds almost cheerful about it. I hate it.

I engage my suit's thrusters, and start to turn. I know what I'm looking for. The suit's sensors are good enough to pick it up. The thrusters should have enough reaction mass to move it. I hope.

I angle down, swooping through space, dodging the fragments that have spilled from my ship's wounds -

Something comes towards me.

My eyes widen, my breathing stops. It's a body. It's one of my people -

The corpse drifts past me, limbs splayed out against the backdrop of stars, sightless eyes covered with a film of frost. I recognize her. Zazaru. My chief science officer since I don't remember when - I think of the sights those soft brown eyes of hers saw, and my own eyes fill with tears at the thought that she will never see anything again.

With an effort, I put it from my mind. I have work to do.

"Auxiliary battery now at twenty-five per cent capacity. Warning. Depletion rate above normal permitted parameters. Warning. Reduce power drain before critical level is reached."

The fusion initiator is in front of me, now. I can see it. The module hasn't travelled too far from the ship - it is moving slowly, slowly enough that I can stop it with my suit's thrusters, can push it back into place, can reconnect it, fire up the fusion reactor, get power back online, save the ship.

I can do this. I have to do it, so I can do it.

The initiator is a bulky truncated cone, basically, about four metres high, about five metres base diameter. I circle it, trying to size up the situation without burning too much reaction mass. The initiator is massively heavy, but it is moving slowly. I can generate enough delta-v to push it back into the ship.

I program the line I need into the suit helmet's head-up display, find a likely couple of handholds, and fire the thrusters.

Simple. Straightforward application of Ytsay's Third Law of Motion; every action has an equal and opposite reaction. Except... there is give in this system, the flexion of my body as the thrusters fire. The initiator slows its motion, comes gradually to a halt, starts to drift, at a few millimetres a second, back towards the ship.

But the line on my HUD is off, way off. I grit my teeth, shift position, fire the thrusters again and try to hold my body absolutely rigid. The initiator swings around... the line on the HUD flashes green, then amber, then red again. Off, in another direction. I grind my teeth in frustration. I can get this right - given time. But the auxiliary battery is steadily draining, and the reaction mass in my suit's thrusters is limited, too. I have to start getting this right, first time.

"Auxiliary battery now at twenty per cent capacity. Warning. Depletion rate above normal permitted parameters. Warning. Reduce power drain before critical level is reached. Warning. Reserve power now below regulation permitted level."

Suit thrusters have fifty-seven per cent remaining capacity. It's got to be enough. Unless I rupture the suit and use the escaping air to push me - but if I lose consciousness, there's no one to reconnect the initiator -

Someone taps me on the shoulder, hard enough that I can feel it through the suit.

I look round in astonishment, and my heart nearly stops. For a second, the dark-haired figure in science division uniform, floating beside me, looks like Zazaru's ghost. Then the electronic panels in the cheeks register, and the eyes - the eyes are metal, not frozen. Amiga. The android motions to her combadge. I click on the suit's short range comms.

"I'm glad to find you, sir," says Amiga's voice. Her lips don't move while she's speaking. It seems strange.

"Can you help with this?" I ask.

"I believe so, sir. I made my way to Engineering shortly after your departure. Since I don't need to breathe, I don't need an EV suit either."

"Do you have thrusters? We need to move this -"

"I found some hyperfilament cable in the equipment locker, sir. I've rigged lines from the hull breach over the fusion reactor. If we can link them up, we can just reel this thing in."

Damn it, that's the sort of solution I should have thought of. "OK," I say. "Can you tie lines on to the grip bars? We've got limited time."

"No problem, sir." The initiator is, at least, well provided with handholds and attachment points. Amiga scoots off, moving from one handhold to the next, quick and mechanically efficient. "My hands aren't gloved, sir, so I'd better handle the knots."

"How did you get here, anyway? I didn't know we had any portable thrusters -"

"We don't, sir. But, well, every time you visit New Romulus, you seem to pick up another can of insect repellent, and there are plenty of those still in the equipment locker. Or were."

"You're flying around on cans of virhanen repellent?"

"Don't knock it, sir, it works. Those cans need plenty of pressure to knock out those bugs. If you can give this thing a nudge, sir, on vector, umm, nine five two from your position -"

I line it up, fire the thrusters. "If it's any help, sir," says Amiga, "I doubt I could do that on the insect repellent." Well, it makes me feel marginally less useless, at least.

"Engaging winch motors," says Amiga. She rigged up powered winches, as well? I should retire, I'm just taking up space.

The initiator starts to glide, slowly, towards the ravaged bulk of King Estmere. "We'll need to give it some more nudges along the way, sir," says Amiga. "The ship is rotating slightly."

"OK," I say.

"By the way, sir," says Amiga, "I was with your uncle in weapons bay two when we were hit. He's all right - I just thought you'd like to know."

"Thank you." Uncle Kophil is all right. At least someone is. "Did he get to an escape pod?"

"He didn't try, sir. Last I saw, he was trying to reinitialize the power couplings for the plasma arrays."

"Stubborn old fool," I mutter.

"With respect, sir," says Amiga, "I don't see you rushing for an escape pod, either."

"Of course not," I snap. "This is my ship."

"Yes, sir."

---

By the time we ease the initiator through the gap in the hull, the warning voice has taken us down to ten per cent. I think the drain rate is fluctuating. Perhaps Dyssa is working on some way to stabilize the core by itself - I don't know, I can't find out, the patchy communications don't work this far from Engineering.

Gravity is out in the fusion power room, so shifting the initiator module back into position over the fusion reactor is... well, not as complicated as it might have been. With the main force of my thrusters, and Amiga's patient work on the motorized winch, we swing it into place, using more hyperfilament cable to replace the sheared docking latches, tying it in place.

There remains the job of reconnecting the wiring and restarting the fusion reactor, and I am painfully aware that time is ticking down. Very nearly the last gasp of my suit thrusters takes me to the wall of the chamber, and I fumble with a console, manage to reactivate an emergency forcefield over the hole in the hull, and engage repressurization. I can't do this in gloves.

Air puffs out of my suit as I release the catches and draw off the gauntlets. The pressure in the chamber is very low, and my hands are bitterly cold. I kick off from the wall and float over to the initiator.

"Skip the safety checks," I order Amiga. Either it works first time, or we're dead. The unit is robust, it's meant to take a pounding... it's had a pounding, though. I open the main inspection cover, start toggling in the start-up sequence.

"Positioning checks out," says Amiga. "I am skipping the auxiliary circuitry, and reconnecting the EPS main directly."

"OK - wait!" I yell.

Too late. There is a brilliant flash, and Amiga is hurled away from the unit, to slam into the wall of the chamber. For a moment, I think she's out - damaged or dead. Then she twitches, pulls herself off the wall, and jumps carefully back to the unit. "That was unexpected," she says.

"The SI field is running through the EPS conduits," I explain. "There was an energy surge when you re-linked -"

"Ah. I see. Ingenious, sir." The android looks faintly rueful. "I will endeavour not to be caught like that again."

"It's worked... so far. Running initialization now."

The unit shudders. Amber lights flash on the panel... no red ones. Good enough. Fine adjustments can wait, we just need to get the fusion reactor up and running -

"Alert. Alert. Auxiliary battery drain now at critical level. Disengage all power drain or reinitialize external power supply. Alert. Alert." The mechanical voice no longer sounds smug about it.

"We're out of time. Skip all remaining checks and hit it."

"Yes, sir." Amiga's hands move over the controls faster than I can follow them.

The fusion reactor groans and shudders. Red lights flash on the panel now. "Hold it!" I yell. "Something's out of alignment...."

"Checking." Amiga's metal eyes are faster than mine, too. "Coolant unit. Piping is out of true. I'm on it, sir." She scrambles across the unit's housing, opens an inspection cover. "I think I can -"

She grips the pipes and squeezes, her hands moving with micrometer precision. "- bend it back into shape," she finishes. I can hear the squealing and grinding of the metal as she works her way along the duct. "Try it now, sir," she says, inspecting her shredded fingertips with distaste.

I punch in the initialization sequence. The lights on the panel flash - green and amber -

Then the lights in the chamber come on, and gravity suddenly snatches at me. I'd forgotten, or maybe I never knew, which way down was in this room.

Amiga snatches for me, and I feel her fingertips brush mine, but not close enough. I fall -

I slam into the floor of the chamber. The suit takes some of the impact, and the gravity plating isn't back to full power yet, but the blow is quite bad enough. I feel something snap in my chest, and a roaring tide of black pain surges up to engulf me.

But the lights are on, the gravity is on, the power must be coming from somewhere - the reactor is online.

Amiga is scrambling down the wall to reach me. I fight back the blackness, call up the details on my suit HUD.

"Plenty of time," I mumble. "Seventy-three seconds left... before the battery failed... couldn't even make a good holovid drama with a margin like that... plenty of time...."

"Lie still, sir." I wasn't going to do anything else. "I'm calling medical - there may be someone who can answer." She bends over my chest, reading my medical status on the displays there. "And actually, sir, you are a couple of decimal places out. The battery was 0.73 of a second away from total depletion." She pauses. "Still an ample safety margin by my standards, of course."

If she says anything else, I don't hear it, as the blackness rises up to take me away.

The Three-Handed Game 36

Ronnie

"Max evasive!"

Even as I shout the order, I don't know if it will save us. The Warhammer moved so fast, so incredibly fast - a ship that size can't turn like that. Not unless it had help…

King Estmere is gone. I still can't believe that.

We have one chance. Maybe. "T'Pia. Steer two two seven mark three niner five, then go to max impulse. Jhemyl, keep us between Mur and the Tapiola." Because if Enteskilen Mur decides the little ginger Vulcan isn't funny any more, she is dead meat.

"What's the plan, sir?" Tallasa asks. Oh, like I have a plan.

"Try to lure the Warhammer into the glowies. I don't think Mur can see them."

"Can they harm him?"

"Dunno, really. Let's find out. T'Pia, let's both roll some web mines, round about now."

Web mines tumble from our launchers as our ships sweep out of Warhammer's range - or what I think is Warhammer's range. That ship can move.

*/*give it up---
you can run but you can't hide---*/*

Put a sock in it, you.

"I have a firing solution for the aft tetryon arrays," says Tallasa.

"No!" She looks shocked. "That's what Mur wants. We open fire, he engages his warp mirror thing, we wind up blowing our own nacelles off. No. Indirect fire weapons only."

T'Pia, bless her, has come to the same conclusion. The Tapiola is generating holograms, an impressive battleship and a couple of mean-looking fast tactical escorts. They curve around and close in on the Siohonin ship -

They don't last seconds. Mur isn't messing around any more; he engages his kinetic lance, and the holograms pop like bubbles.

*/*pretty bubbles in the air*/*

Is she singing, now? Damn it, I don't need this.

*/*i know what you need---
and you don't---
hahahahaha---*/*

Unbelievable.

Mur's ship moves into the web mines, and the first pair triggers, and the Warhammer is caged in golden light. Try warp mirroring your way out of that, laughing boy. It won't be enough to do him any serious damage, but it buys us time -

"T'Pia." I sketch out a course on the tac console. "Is Tapiola up for that?"

"I believe it is within our capabilities," says T'Pia's voice. Frankly, that unruffled Vulcan calm is very soothing, in the circumstances.

"Good. We're going to be right behind you every step of the way. I'm hoping Mur will try to take a short cut along the curve of our path."

"Which would, I presume, bring him into contact with the invisible energy fields."

I could argue about invisible, there, I can see the damned things just fine.

*/*well, lucky, lucky you, then---*/*

"That's the idea," I say, firmly ignoring the Borg gibbering in my head.

"We still have no certainty that -"

"If you've got any better ideas, let's hear them!"

"I accept the point," says T'Pia with perfect calm. "Proceeding along the indicated course."

I'm pretty sure an unmodified Tholian ship couldn't handle the manoeuvres I've outlined, but T'Pia's Orb Weaver has a lot more under the hood than any unmodified Tholian -

*/*so had the King Estmere, much good it did them---*/*

"Will you just shut the hell up!" Heads turn around the bridge. "Sorry. Not you. Not anyone here. Lippy Borg problem. Sorry."

The force fields on the web mines have collapsed; Mur is on the move again. He spots the second set of mines, and fries them at long range with his disruptor arrays. The disruptors are standard Klingon style technology, and, actually, they are poorly deployed - the Warhammer is nearly weapons-blind in its forward arc, because that huge dominating rounded prow blocks the firing arcs of the ship's conventional weapons. Of course, since that dome is stuffed full of unconventional weapons, that doesn't help us much.

*/*nothing's going to help you now---*/*

The Warhammer lunges forwards, turning to bear down on our ships. What happens next... is beautiful. The Siohonin ship drives straight into one of the glowing auroral veils, and stops as if it's hit a brick wall. Lightnings flare and flicker all over its hull.

"If it's any help to you, sir," says Tallasa, "I can see that."

"Looks good, doesn't it?" I say. "Any damage reads on them?"

"Superficial only." T'Pia's voice. "They appear to have lost motive power, but their weapons arrays are still active and their shields are up. There is other activity that suggests their exotic weapons are also still functioning."

"We can't go back and finish them off," I say. "OK. Let's put some distance between them and us - and more glowies, bless 'em - and then let's put our thinking caps on and come up with an approach that will work."

"The Warhammer," says T'Pia, "though dangerous, is only a distraction. Our primary objective remains to neutralize the Rift entity."

"It's the same thing," I say patiently. "You can't sling a fat battleship around like a fighter without something finagling in the background. Mur's ship is supported and powered by the Rift entity, and if we solve one problem, we solve the other."

*/*you should be so lucky, lucky lucky lucky---*/*

Ignore her. "I suggest we do this." I sketch out another path on the tac display. "Puts us in the middle of a nice knotty set of energy fields, and it'll take Mur ages to get at us, he'll have to go through practically at walking pace. Gives us time to come up with something."

"I hope you are correct. So far, the problem has proven intractable. Still, we will follow your course directions. Tapiola out."

*/*got to admire her optimism---
pity it's unfounded---*/*

Can it, you. Whose side are you on, anyway?

*/*why are you even asking?---
my own, of course---*/*

Yeah, and which one's that? I wonder, as we move along the course I've mapped out between the glowing veils of light. What happens to Two of Twelve in these situations? And why? That hateful Borg voice in my head barely sounds like a Borg any more....

*/*oh, and why might that be? ---
use your head, why don't you, Ronnie?---
don't mind if I call you Ronnie, do you?---
after all---
everyone does---*/*

Waitaminute, what? What is this?

*/*what is this?---
only the voice in your head---
telling you it wants to move out---
shouldn't you be glad of that?---*/*

"Guys," I say aloud, "something distinctly freaky is going on."

"Sir?" says Tallasa.

*/*that one puts up with soooo much from you, why does she stand for it?---*/*

"I'm opening up some sort of a... dialogue... with Two of Twelve. Or she's opening one up with me. How far to our sort of safe haven out there?"

"Two minutes, sir," says Jhemyl.

"Tapiola still with us?"

"On course and speed," says Jhemyl.

"Right. Right. So... what about Mur?"

"Warhammer is still enmeshed in the energy field, sir," says Saval. "No sign of them restoring motive power yet."

"All right. We've got a breathing space - I hope. I'm going to be carrying on the, um, the conversation with my other half. And I'm going to be doing it in my out-loud voice, so you guys can listen in on my half, at least, and maybe get some idea what's going on. We cool with that?"

"Is this a good idea, sir?" asks Tallasa, with no it isn't written all over her face.

"I don't know. I'm going to find out. Something makes Two of Twelve go all peculiar, here and at Tiaza Zephora. I think we need to know what it is."

*/*you already know---
or you should do---
isn't it obvious?---*/*

"It's not obvious to me."

Tallasa starts to say something; then she cottons on to what's happening, and stays shtum.

*/*come on, Ronnie---
use your head for something besides a hatrack---
do I sound like a Borg?---*/*

"You've got... Two of Twelve's voice. And if you're not a Borg, what are you?"

*/*Two of Twelve's voice? Must be force of habit.---*/*

"What do you mean, force of habit?"

*/*not my habit---
yours---
you hear the voice you're used to hearing---*/*

"If you're not Two of Twelve, who are you? Damn it, when did I get someone else living in my head?"

And then I stop. And then I realize.

The voice doesn't say anything. It doesn't need to.

"When did I get something else living in my head?" I ask the question in a strangled whisper. "Way back, a long time ago... right here."

Oh, says the voice, penny's finally dropped, has it? It really doesn't sound like Two of Twelve any more.

"How long have you been there?"

Since your first trip.

"Since I was first in the Rift? How come I haven't realized it before? Why have you never spoken?"

I didn't know how, at first. This... temporal... existence of yours... it was confusing. Confusing, but exciting. A whole new dimension, you might say. It took multiple trips before I... bedded myself in.

"So how did you take up residence? What brought you here?"

You crossed the Rift. You entered, briefly, for one timeless instant, into our... awareness. I noticed you. I saw the new sensations, the different world that lay in your awareness. I moved myself to a - a vantage point - in your consciousness. So that I could learn. So that I could understand.

"You just... moved in, when I passed through. OK. So... what did you learn, and understand?"

Everyone on the bridge is staring at me, now. Except Jhemyl, bless her, who is moving the ship to station keeping. Professionalism. Got to love it.

I learned how this universe works. Ordered time, sequential, cause and effect in rigid succession. I learned how to tell the time. And I learned....

"Learned what? What else? Tell me!"

I learned... to be me. To be an individual, instead of a facet of pure timeless consciousness. I learned that from you. How to have an identity. And I learned something else, too.

"What else? What, besides how to be a, a person?"

I learned how powerful I am, as a disembodied timeloose consciousness in this universe. I didn't just learn how to be a person, Ronnie. I learned how to be a god.

"You learned how to be a god? Oh, no. Sebreac Tharr."

A name. It means a lot to Enteskilen Mur. It means nothing to me, but if he wants to call me by it, what have I to lose?

"Wait." My head is spinning. "What about the other one? At Tiaza Zephora? The one that used Martin Hudson?"

I chose you. Another chose Hudson. The other was... less efficient.

"Martin said you were cleverer than his - parasite. But what was going on at Tiaza Zephora?"

The other needed my help. He had a complex, erratic, inelegant way of binding himself into this reality. It was in danger of failure.

"In danger of failure? It did fail." A thought strikes me. "Did you help it? Or hinder it?"

I gave help... to some extent. But, even if I had tear ducts, I would not have wept when my brother failed.

"You let Tylha and Rrueo get through with the neutralizing compound. Because you don't want to share your... godhood. You want to be top dog."

I already am. All I need is -

"What? All you need is what?"

To secure my access point to this world. As my brother tried to do. Enteskilen Mur... I reached out to his mind. He was a desperate man, derided for his faith in a god no one else believed in. I became that god, for him. I used my power. And, in gratitude and in faith... he will let me use his body and being, as I am now using yours.

"So why not just... do it? Hop out of my head, into Enteskilen Mur's?" The answer comes as soon as I put the question. "You can't, can you? Whatever powers you've got, you're still stuck inside me. You picked me, now you can't get rid of me."

There is a way to make the transfer. Enteskilen Mur will do it. Then... I will be in this world, with the full partnership of a compliant intelligence. Not a fractious and erratic one like yours. My will and my physical body will be as one, and nothing will be impossible to me.

"Fractious and erratic? I've been called worse. What happens to the rest of us, when you make the transfer?"

What happens to the rest of you? Anything I choose!

"What if I say no? Keep you inside my head?"

Enteskilen Mur will compel you.

"Mur will compel me? Why won't you compel me?"

You are... too close... for me to control. It would be like you trying to affect your own brain stem. The transfer has to be initiated some other way. By something external to you and me.

I twist around in the command chair, grope for a PADD. Without looking, I scrawl a message on the surface with my fingertip - without looking, because I don't want the thing from the Rift to see through my eyes. I hold up the PADD, facing away from me, and hope Tallasa can make out the words phaser pistol.

"You can't affect me directly because I'm too close. Like the glowies, maybe? The glowies are, like, inside of you, you can't see them."

You can see them, because you are a parasite inside me right now. Just as I am a parasite inside you. Confusing, isn't it? The voice laughs.

Tallasa presses the cold slick shape of a phaser into my hand. It feels like salvation.

I don't want to die. But... Sebreac Tharr, the Siohonin invasion... it's a matter of one life against maybe millions, and that's not even a choice at all.

"So you can't stop me doing what I want. You can't prevent me -" I raise the phaser, switch the setting to maximum. "If I jam this against my skull and fire, we both go, right?"

I won't let you do that.

"You can't stop me. You admitted that."

I - might be able to block the beam. It would be... difficult. I can't stop you, directly. But you will be stopped.

"How? Who by? My crew will let me do this." I let my gaze fall on each one of them in turn. "My crew will let me do this."

You're really arrogant, you know. If I have to, I will undo something I did, a little while ago now.

"Undo what?"

Arrogant. You really believe you liberated yourself from the Borg? I tolerated the Collective for a while, but it was dull, so dull. But even dull is better than suicidal -

*/*cranial transceivers online---
reconnect--- priority--- reconnect--- reconnect--- reconnect---
reconnecting---
--- 18%
--- 39%
--- 61%
--- 88%
--- complete
reconnected---

Downloading required updates.

Suppressing local personality
--- 22%
--- 47%
--- 71%
--- 98%
---complete

Commencing systems check.

Reactivating control systems.

Assimilation complete.

We are the Borg. */*

The Three-Handed Game 35

T'Pia

Our initial probe of the Stygmalian Rift is proceeding, albeit slowly. Ronnie Grau is showing an unexpected degree of caution. I suppose, in many ways, it is understandable. Ronnie's previous experiences with the Rift have been sufficient to make any reasonable being cautious. And she is, in her essentials, a reasonable being.

So, we follow her lead, and veer away from obstacles only she can see... and I make my scans, and collate my data, and it obstinately fails to make any kind of sense. Raw data we have, now, on exotic particles and energy fluxes and strange vibrations in space. But I am unable to impose any theoretical framework on it, to develop any hypothesis that would account for the observed behaviour.

It could be argued that the simple explanation is that the Rift entity is taking a hand. But this is to miss the point. It is possible to determine, scientifically, how the entity is affecting events - what means it employs, what energies it harnesses, to manipulate reality. We cannot simply declare it a god-like entity and dismiss all thoughts of enquiry as to how it operates. Even among religious believers, theologians are dedicated to finding out how, exactly, God works.

And the Rift entity, though it is enormously powerful, is not a god. Indeed, if it is actively supporting the Siohonin, and if their society functions in the manner than T'Laihhae describes... then the entity is worthy, not of our worship, but only of our contempt.

Our ships have come to a halt, hovering near some wall in space that only Ronnie can see. I am increasingly having to repress feelings of frustration as my data remains incomplete and inchoate.

Yielding to an impulse, I signal the Falcon, to see if perhaps Ronnie has any further guidance to give. It is not Ronnie who answers the hail, though, but her Andorian executive officer. "Vice Admiral Grau is resting, sir," she tells me. "We convinced her she needed some sleep."

"I see," I say. "Sleep is certainly a requirement. How is Vice Admiral Grau?"

The Andorian grimaces. "She... could be better, sir. Her residual Borg consciousness is causing problems. Something about the Rift is causing it to develop a personality of its own."

"I see." I consider this. "It might be helpful if you could transmit any non-confidential medical information relating to this. If it is associated with the Rift, this might at least provide additional data points for my analysis."

"I'll get on to that, sir. I'm sure she won't mind."

"Thank you, Commander. Tapiola out." The screen goes blank, then shows the starscape of the Rift. I sit thinking for a while.

"You should probably get some rest yourself, sir," says Twosani Dezin. She has evidently detected my perplexity with her empathic abilities.

"Yes," I say, "I believe you are correct. First, though, let me contact King Estmere." Before I rest, I would like a status report, at least, from the carrier.

Tylha Shohl's face, usually severe, is positively bleak when she appears on the screen. "My science teams are taking readings and passing the collated data to you," she says. "If we have any insights, you'll be the first to know. On current showings, I'm not too hopeful. I've got good people here, but this is not their area..."

She seems troubled. "Do you have any other cause for concern?"

"While you science types have been running yourselves ragged," Tylha says, "and Ronnie's been freaking out, I've had time to keep up with the news. And the reports from Starfleet Command don't make for cheerful reading."

"Specify," I say.

"Okeg let the Siohonin deadline expire without making any official response - buying all the time he could, I guess. Now the Siohonin war fleet is advancing in a body into Federation space. They've already either blown out or bypassed the sensor net left by Sixth Fleet, but not before we got indications that their fleet is vast. Starfleet and the KDF are scrambling for every ship and every ally we can get in response."

"To defend Tellar?" I ask.

"They're not getting as far as the Tellarite home world. Best guess is, we're going to meet them in a holding action somewhere near Lambda Cygni. But I'm worried...."

"What are your concerns?"

"We're having to commit a massive force to this. If we lose... neither Starfleet nor the KDF will have enough forces left to meet their normal strategic obligations - never mind stopping the Siohonin." Her voice is increasingly bleak. "It looks like... if we don't stop them now, we don't stop them at all."

It is, at the very least, a disturbing thought to sleep on.

---

It is only a few hours later when I am awakened. As per my standing instructions, the communications officer puts the call from the Falcon directly through to my quarters.

"Wake up, ginger-nut," says Ronnie Grau. Her face is a ghastly sight, even more cadaverous than it normally is. "Shake a leg, rise and shine. We got company."

"Specify," I say, as I clamber out of bed.

"Wish I could. Something with a big warp signature just headed into the Rift. It's nothing familiar, so my guess is, bad guys."

"A Siohonin warship, travelling in advance of their main fleet?" I dress hastily.

"You got it. That's the safest bet, at least. I don't know anyone else who might be interested in the Rift, anyway."

"I see." I shrug into my uniform tunic. Irrationally, I feel more composed, now. "Do you intend to move towards it, or away from it?"

"Generally speaking, towards. We don't learn anything, running away. Besides, it's kind of not my style."

So I had gathered. "Transmit relevant information to my bridge, please. I will join them shortly."

It is not my policy to run - it may cause unnecessary alarm among the crew - but I certainly reach the bridge at a fast walk. The tactical display is live on the main screen when I arrive, and a conference call with Falcon and King Estmere has been set up. I make a mental note to commend communications appropriately for their efficiency.

"We don't have very good reads on the Siohonin capital ships," Tylha is saying, "but what we've got is consistent with that warp signature out there."

"OK," says Ronnie, "OK, so... it'll be loaded for bear, I guess. Siohonin special weapons out the wazoo, wherever the Siohonin keep their wazoos. So, what I'm thinking is, we need to bracket it between us. Any one of us has enough oomph to take out a single Siohonin ship, and they can't have special weapons going in all directions at once. Or at least, if they can, then all bets are off."

"Even so," I say, "we need to evolve a strategy to minimize the risks."

"Already got one," says Ronnie. "Damn, I'm good. The Siohonin are after me, right? We know that much. Therefore, they can't risk destroying the Falcon. Therefore, Falcon goes in on their forward arc, and you two hit it from flank and rear. If we can - and hey, I'm an optimist, I say we can - we try to disable it and take some prisoners. Sound good to you guys?"

"If we can," says Tylha. "But we can't take too many risks - they might have additional powers from the entity, here in the Rift itself."

"So are you saying we should run?"

"I'm saying," says Tylha, "that we keep our fingers on the triggers, ready to destroy that ship if we need to. Yes, it would be nice to have some prisoners, and some answers. Just not at too high a cost, that's all."

"OK, point," says Ronnie. "Look, I'm sketching in a probable course on the tac map. It's only a rough sketch, because the glowy whatevers out there are moving, slowly, and I do not want to chance running into one -" She winces. "Sorry. Never mind."

Her Borg half, Two of Twelve, is evidently continuing to cause difficulties. I study the course projections on the screen. "You are assuming that the suspect vessel will continue on its current heading."

"We got to start with some assumptions somewhere. Anyway, if he's coming for me, chances are good he'll let me come to him, right?"

"He's already slowed to sublight speeds," says Tylha. "Heading... more or less straight towards us. Not that he necessarily knows it's us - we might well be the only interesting thing on his sensors. Siohonin science sensors don't seem to be any too good."

"Hmm," says Ronnie, "now, that is interesting. There are glowies between him and us... either he can't see them, or he can see them and knows they won't bother him. Which shall it be, Passworthy? One of them's better for us than the other."

"We have no direct knowledge," I point out, "that the - glowies - will have any adverse effect on us"

"Yeah," says Ronnie, "and I aim to keep things that way. Let little Ronnie steer you straight, guys, and she will keep you from tangling with any invisible alien energy fields, OK? Now let's move."

The android Pascale has the helm, and she moves us out with nerveless machine efficiency. The Falcon and the King Estmere dwindle in the distance as they move on divergent courses, through the complex network of invisible shapes that only Ronnie can see. The alien ship is a brilliant, enigmatic dot on my sensors. I refuse to think of it as an enemy ship. Not yet. Not without proof.

Long-range sensors construct a visual profile. The ship is a massive cylinder, more than half a kilometre long, with an immense domed prow and four warp nacelles in cruciform arrangement. Visually, it conforms to what we know of the Siohonin warships. Reluctantly, I concede: there is proof. This is the enemy.

"Hail coming in on subspace," reports the communications ensign.

"On screen. And patch in Falcon and King Estmere."

The viewscreen goes blank, and then a new scene appears on it. It shows a ship's bridge, of unfamiliar construction, but not very dissimilar from several Klingon designs. A man is seated on a command chair at the bridge's centre. He is obviously elderly, with wild grey hair and beard, and a pair of immense horns, cracked and seamed with age, growing from his head. He wears robes of black and white and red, with the symbol of a golden flame on his chest. A similar symbol is on the tip of the rod he holds in his right hand.

He stands. "Are there no males I can speak with?" he demands, in an unexpectedly strong and resonant voice.

"I am Vice Admiral T'Pia, currently commanding the Federation starship USS Tapiola," I say. "My colleagues and I represent the most senior Starfleet officers available at present. Please identify yourself."

"A female Admiral. Well, the antics of the unbelievers should not surprise me, I suppose. I am Enteskilen Mur, Theocrat of the Siohonin and High Priest of the one true god, Sebreac Tharr, aboard the Theocracy warship Warhammer."

"I see," I say. "Then you are responsible for hostile acts against Federation citizens. Please stand down, surrender your vessel, and prepare to be taken into custody."

He laughs at that, long and loudly. "Oh, you are priceless," he says. "Perhaps I will keep you, as a pet. Where is Veronika Grau?"

"Right here," says Ronnie's voice, "coming at you from the front. If you think T'Pia's demand for surrender is funny, wait till you get a load of my tetryon banks. You'll just die laughing."

"Veronika Grau." Mur lifts up his shaggy grey head, and his eyes shine with some sort of desire. "You are to surrender yourself to me. Now."

"You're not even going to buy me dinner first? Besides, you're not my type," says Ronnie.

"Laugh while you may, Veronika Grau. You will surrender yourself."

The tactical display shows that Ronnie's plan, so far, seems to be working. The Warhammer is bracketed neatly between Tapiola, Falcon and King Estmere. All three ships will be within weapons range in less than a minute. It is difficult to see how Mur can hope to prevail, even with the Siohonin weapons.

"Red alert," I order.

"Oh." Mur has overheard me. "The amusing Vulcan is making a noise. Still... I must consider this situation. Grau cannot surrender herself if she is dead... and I have decided to keep the amusing Vulcan... so...."

Weapons range.

And the Warhammer spins in place, its speed of reaction unbelievable in so large a ship, and something spills from the domed structure at its prow. It is a sparkling blur, that corrupts and shatters our sensor images - the interference from what we now know to be the Siohonin warp cannon.

When the interference clears, King Estmere is gone.

The Three-Handed Game 34

Ronnie

The Rift. My mouth is dry, my heart is pounding. The Stygmalian Rift. Damn it, I thought it was gone, I thought I was done with the damned thing.

But apparently not. "Approaching the perimeter of the Rift's coordinates now," says Jhemyl crisply.

"Right," I say, "right. All stop. Dead stop. Hold us, umm, as close as you can get without getting us in it." I tried that once before. It didn't work. Damn it.

"Sir," Tallasa asks, "are you all right?"

"Yeah, sure," I tell her. "Never better. I'm on the top of the world looking down on creation. Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead, and all that."

Tallasa stands up, comes up to the command chair, and puts her hand on my shoulder. "Ronnie," she says, "are you all right?"

"Of course I - waitaminute, what?"

She never uses my name. She always calls me "sir", usually with a subtext of I am about three seconds from outright mutiny unless you get your head together, but always "sir". But now she's calling me "Ronnie", and she's looking at me with honest to God concern in those icy Andorian eyes. I suddenly feel about three inches tall. What the hell have I ever done for Tallasa, that she should care about my feelings?

"I'm... OK," I answer her, eventually.

"It can't be easy for you," she says in a quiet voice. "I mean... we all thought it was over and done with. And for it to - to come back, like this -"

"You went through it too," I say.

"Yes," Tallasa says, "once. And I'd already lost everything - well, except Jhemyl." She glances briefly at her sister, sitting prim and alert at the helm as usual. "We might even have gained from passing through the rift - the family scandal was half forgotten after twenty-four years. But you -"

"I lost everything the first time through," I say. "The next ones... sort of didn't matter. Well," I tap my Borg eyepiece, "except for this, of course. Didn't care for that bit much at all."

I'm lying, of course. I think Tallasa knows it. But she doesn't call me on it, and I'm grateful for that.

I twist around in the chair and look at Saval. "What about you?" I ask. "What do you think about being back here?"

He doesn't so much as blink. "In some respects, the situation is disagreeable. Our previous encounter did have deleterious effects on my personal relationships. In other ways, though - well, sir, I have always had an abiding curiosity as to what it was that you saw in the Stygmalian Rift. I appreciate that the Tiaza Zephora incident gave me some incomplete idea -"

"Curiosity," I say. "Know what that did? Killed the cat."

"So I have been told, sir," says Saval. "I am given to understand, though, that satisfaction brought it back."

And it's evidently time for me to gawp again, because that is perilously close to being a joke. Saval with a sense of humour? Tallasa being concerned for my feelings? What's next, Two of Twelve cocking out with a speech in defence of the rights of the individual?

*/*don't hold your breath---*/*

Uh-oh. "Tell Zodiri to get up to the bridge," I say.

"What's wrong?" Tallasa asks sharply. Oh, the scolding tone is back - that's actually a relief.

"Plenty. Two of Twelve is growing a personality again. Last time that happened, it was down to the Tiaza Zephora entity - somehow. Zodiri ran medical scans at the time, I want to know if they match up to anything that's happening now. Leo, get me a channel to King Estmere and Tapiola."

"Uh, the channels are on hot standby already, sir. Bringing them on now."

"Very good, Leo, you are learning. Tylha, T'Pia. Things are starting to happen."

There are two faces on my viewscreen, now, and both of them look concerned, too. In T'Pia's case, as concerned as Vulcans ever get, granted, but still concerned. Whatever I'm doing to encourage all this support and affection, I should bottle it. I'd make a fortune.

"What's going on?" Tylha asks.

"Two of Twelve is getting sassy on me. I think it's the proximity of the Rift, or maybe of the Rift entity. If anything else weird starts kicking off, I'll let you know. What are you guys planning on, anyway?"

"Same as you," says Tylha. "Holding station at the perimeter of the Rift."

"We are conducting intensive long range sensor scans," says T'Pia. "So far, the results are not useful, but of course we have had no time to process and integrate the data."

The turbolift doors hiss open behind me, and Zodiri comes in. The sour-tempered Trill medic barely nods at me before she starts waving a medical scanner over my temples.

*/*hey, that tickles---*/*

"Keep it up," I tell her, "it's annoying Two of Twelve." Zodiri rolls her eyes at me theatrically.

"Are you suffering from a medical condition?" asks T'Pia.

"Well, of course I am, we're talking about me here. But not half as much as I'm suffering from my doctor," I add, with a glower at Zodiri.

"Getting the usual problems from her combination of mule DNA and a head full of rocks," says Zodiri. "I'll process the rest of my results down in sickbay. I'm not seeing anything unusual yet, but then I didn't see a whole hell of a lot at Tiaza Zephora -"

"Oh, god," I say, and start fiddling with my chair's controls. The faces of Tylha and T'Pia disappear, to be replaced by the starscape of the Rift. "Seeing. Seeing. You reminded me -"

The sky is filled with rippled veils of light, an aurora frozen in motion. "The visual aberration you got in the, umm, the whatever it was - spatial anomaly - in Tiaza Zephora orbit?" asks Zodiri.

"Is it back?" asks Tallasa.

"You tell me. What can you see?" I wave a hand at the screen.

"Stars, sir," says Tallasa bleakly.

"She's right," says Zodiri. "Nothing but stars."

"Then it's back," I say. "My own private light show. Whoop-de-doo."

"Ronnie," says Tylha's voice. "You're seeing the same things you said you saw -?"

"Yes," I say loudly. "And when T'Pia asks, yes, same bloody thing. I'm seeing what looks like... veils, curtains of light." I frown. "It looks almost like they're folded into some sort of... pattern. This time."

"The logical course of action," says T'Pia, "is to advance into the Rift according to your perceptions, and to try to correlate those with sensor readings of actual conditions in the region."

"Sir, that didn't work before, in the anomaly," says Tallasa.

"The comparison is inexact," says T'Pia in a carefully neutral voice that somehow manages to be completely crushing. "The anomaly at Tiaza Zephora was a manufactured situation managed entirely by the Rift entity. The Stygmalian Rift itself, on the other hand, is a real location with real phenomena. It is entirely possible that real phenomena will be more susceptible to analysis than the phantoms produced by a Rift entity. I do assure you, any real phenomenon can be examined by the Tapiola's sensors and science teams."

So that's science division putting us humble tactical officers in our place, then. "We're going in then?" I say.

"It would seem the available logical course," says T'Pia.

I look at the frozen folds of light on the screen, and the more I look, the more they seem like the petals of some vast, poisonous, alien flower.

"OK," I say, "so we're going in. But do me a favour, will you? Follow my lead, and go carefully."

The Three-Handed Game 33

Tylha

Andorians don't have fixed sleep cycles, so when we sleep, we sleep deeply. It takes a while for the nagging warble of my bedside communicator to penetrate the fog and wake me up.

I hit the button on about my third attempt. "Shohl," I mumble.

"Skipper." F'hon's voice. "I've got Vice Admiral Grau on the line for you. Sorry, skipper, but it sounds urgent."

I sit up in bed. "Put her through," I say.

"About time," Ronnie's voice says. Her spell in Orion captivity doesn't seem to have harmed her natural... energy... any. "What the hell have you been doing? Sleeping?"

"Yes," I say.

"Sleep is for tortoises!" I think I'm going to hit her if she says that again. "Now, listen, kiddo, I've just had a tactical alert come in from Starfleet, and we are in trouble with a capital T and a lot of rubble. I reckon you'll be getting confirmation of this in about ten minutes anyway, but I'm giving you and ginger-nut the heads-up first, all right?"

"Ronnie," I say, with as much patience as I can muster, "what the hell is going on?"

"It's not going on, it's breaking loose," says Ronnie. "Sixth Fleet just ran into the Siohonin and got its head handed to it. Gref's missing in action. The Siohonin are advancing on Dioclema Station and there's no earthly reason to think they'll stop there. Got your attention yet? Good. Quinn wants us back at ESD for a top level security briefing. So let's move."

---

Hobbled to the speed of the Tapiola, it takes longer than I'd like to get back to Earth. But we wind up cooling our heels, still, for a day and a half while other "essential personnel" - to quote Admiral Quinn - make it in.

By this time, the news media have got hold of the story, and the rash of Siohonin conquests has been splashed across every holovid station in the Sol System. I can feel the tension rising on the huge station.

When we're finally called in to the meeting, it's almost with a sense of relief - until I see who's in it. Ronnie, T'Pia and I are the most junior ranks present - a distinction we share with one other; T'Laihhae. The Romulan gives me one of her trademark brief flashes of smile, but her eyes are haunted, and there are marks on her forehead as if she's had some kind of hasty surgery.

The others in the briefing room are enough to make anyone worry. Obisek is there, his scarred nightmare of a face dark and brooding; J'mpok is there, and beside him is a silent Klingon in a uniform carefully devoid of insignia - an Imperial Intelligence spook, and possibly a very high up one indeed.

And sitting beside Quinn is a small, dapper figure in civilian clothes, with quiet reptilian calm and lambent golden eyes. Aennik Okeg. If the President of the Federation and the Chancellor of the Klingon Empire are here... things must be getting very bad indeed.

"To begin," says J'mpok. "The Siohonin are - or, rather, were - a minor client species of the Empire. Their rise in rebellion has been sudden, unexpected, and... unwarrantedly successful." He glares around the room. "They are getting highly advanced technical assistance from somewhere. Of that much, we are certain."

The nameless Klingon spook speaks up. "We took the opportunity, when the Siohonin extended their operations into Republic space and threatened their interests, to recruit assistance from Republic Intelligence. Vice Admiral T'Laihhae has recently spent much time among the Siohonin. Her report is... disturbing reading. Vice Admiral, would you care to summarize?"

"I will attempt to." T'Laihhae draws in a deep breath. "Until recently, the Siohonin consisted of a vast bulk of disenfranchised workers, ruled by a tripartite aristocracy - military, administrative, and religious. Until recently. Then, a single cult among the many Siohonin religious factions gained... total ascendancy. They have destroyed all the other religious groups, and have established, in effect, a theocratic state, ruled over by the head of the cult."

She pauses. "It has happened with... shocking speed. A year ago, the cult of Sebreac Tharr was a minor one, a historical anachronism, based on the worship of a fire god that was outdated and absurd even by the standards of the Siohonin. Today, the high priest of Sebreac Tharr is the undisputed ruler of the Siohonin - and their increasingly numerous subject worlds. The explanation -"

She stops. She takes a deep breath. "The explanation is simple, but terrifying in its implications. The cult of Sebreac Tharr has attained its total ascendency because... its god is real."

Everyone stares at her. "What?" J'mpok shouts.

"I am not saying it is a god, in any religious sense," says T'Laihhae. "What I am saying is that the priests of Sebreac Tharr are able to interact with some entity of immense power, and they can request it to perform actions on their behalf. Usually destructive actions," she adds, dryly. "Sebreac Tharr is a god of fire, and most of the so-called miracles performed in his name are related to that quality. The priests can target destructive effects, usually involving combustion or extreme heat, virtually at will. Enteskilen Mur, the new theocratic leader of the Siohonin, apparently incinerated every rival priest in the Dolsulca system, all at once. His subordinates do not, as yet, show such wide-ranging powers... but they can target individuals and destroy them without having line of sight, or any detectable sensor data to locate them. It poses something of a tactical problem in ground combat. The Siohonin are technically inferior, still - we have better guns, but they have... magic wands."

"The problem is equally apparent in space combat," the Klingon spook continues. "Our experiences, and Admiral Gref's ill-fated conflict with a Siohonin fleet, show three massive technical advances on the Siohonin side. Firstly, all their ships are equipped with a devastating kinetic lance that can simply bypass shields. Secondly, any capital ship, or any three frigates acting in concert, can generate a subspace pulse that throws an opponent half a light year away, usually wrecking them completely in the process. Thirdly, the Siohonin capital ships - and, we believe, trios of frigates also - can create a warp mirror effect, inverting a region of space between themselves and an attacker - the attackers, therefore, shoot themselves with their own weapons. This last accounts for the loss of many Klingon capital ships, and the disabling of the USS Taras Bulba in Sixth Fleet's battle with the Siohonin." His voice softens a little. "Admiral Gref fought well in that battle, and it is largely thanks to his efforts that we have this information. But we are, as yet, no nearer to having a counter for these weapons."

"In the meantime," says Quinn, "the Siohonin are advancing on all fronts, and we have to find some way to stop them, before it's too late."

"A suggestion," says Obisek. "And I withdraw it immediately, so as not to offend Federation sensibilities... but if this priest Enteskilen Mur is so central to the Siohonin's sudden expansion, one wonders how they would fare if he were to meet with some fatal accident."

"If it could be arranged," says T'Laihhae. "Enteskilen Mur is defended by the military forces of the Siohonin, and, most likely, by the entity he worships. He is not an easy target."

"OK, hold on." Ronnie speaks up suddenly. "What makes this thing god-like? And how do the Siohonin weapons work? Only thing I can think of - that fits with why we're here - is this." Her pale face is screwed up in concentration. "It can manipulate cosmic forces at any range - heat, subspace, kinetic effects, whatever. The Siohonin weapons must just be, well, channels for this thing. Like, like antennae that can tune in on its power, sort of thing." She shoots a glance at me. "No offence. Second thing is, it gets the uses of this power right. It targets what it wants to target, even though it can't see what it's shooting at. What that suggests to me...." She is speaking very slowly and carefully, now. "… is an entity that can see the outcomes of possible actions before they happen. Like, it knows that a burst of heat here and now means a happy Enteskilen Mur later, and it sends them accordingly. An entity that perceives time and space from an outside perspective. A timeless thing. Like one of the Bajoran Prophets." Her voice turns steely, and she looks straight at Quinn. "Or like the thing from out of the Stygmalian Rift."

Quinn looks at her, steadily, and he nods, slowly, once.

"Is there further activity from the Rift?" T'Pia asks.

"Yes," says Quinn, "and it's increasing. That, and Q's apparent involvement in this, suggests that you three need to be out at the Stygmalian Rift as soon as possible. If it is the source of Sebreac Tharr's power... we need some way to stop it, and you three seem best placed to do that."

He doesn't suggest how. And I have no ideas.

"Something else we must consider." Aennik Okeg's voice is very quiet, but everyone listens to him anyway. "I have received a communication from the Theocracy of the Siohonin. It lists... certain territorial demands. They include the region of space surrounding the Rift."

"Hang on," says Ronnie. "I'm no great shakes at galactography, but, well, isn't the Rift in the old Tellarite sectors? And aren't the Siohonin, well, the other side of 61 Cygni from there?"

"You are quite correct," says Okeg. "Essentially, they are asking for Tellar. And all the Tellarite sectors... but, most importantly to the Federation, Tellar itself." His lipless mouth quirks into a sort of a smile. "In a sense, they are doing us a favour."

"A favour?" snarls J'mpok.

"Oh, yes," says Okeg. "There are always cries and arguments for appeasement, in times of crisis like this... but this is a demand that clearly cannot be met. It leaves us with no alternative. We must fight." His voice drops. "I only hope we can win."

The Three-Handed Game 32

Daniella had no idea where she was. The Siohonin had put her aboard one of their freighters, and they had travelled - not for long, it hadn't seemed to be any great time - and, when they brought her out, it was into this vast cavernous underground space, where she was set to work.

It might, she thought, be one of the Reman mining colonies. The lighting was dim, and a lot of her fellow prisoners were Remans. She had tried to ask, at first, but conversation was quickly and brutally discouraged by the guards. The Siohonin military guards were bad, vicious men. The robed ones, the priests of Sebreac Tharr... they were far, far worse.

It was from fragments of conversation among her captors that she gleaned the little she knew so far. The priests moved with the arrogance of new conquerors, ready at any moment to deal pain or death with their flame-tipped wands. Even the Siohonin soldiers lived in fear of them. And they spoke, sometimes, of the "great work", of the "building of the tabernacle". It seemed to be going well. Danielle hated them for that, hated herself for helping them, however unwillingly.

The work occupied eighteen hours of every day, so by the time she fell into her bunk in the common dormitory, she was too tired to ask questions, even if it had been allowed. Huge slabs of black crystal were deposited before her by a robot loader, to be shaped and polished to exacting standards with a sonic probe. If the piece, once finished, met the Siohonins' quality tests, she ate - basic ration bars, but it was food, at least. If it failed - and many did - then she began again, with a new block. Too many failures, and the errant prisoner was given to the guards for punishment. Danielle had witnessed a punishment... and she had resolved not to make too many mistakes.

So she worked, and she watched and listened when she could, because she owed it to them, to Thom and Maury and all the others. She owed it to them to survive, and somehow, to make things right.

She was a Federation citizen, the product of a utopian social order, but more and more she felt the word revenge coming to her mind.

---

One day, one of the Remans cracked. She hard turned in four blocks of crystal, and each one had been rejected; the Siohonin soldiers were standing behind her, speculating loudly about what they would do to her when she was sent for punishment. First, theirs were the only voices, and then the woman's voice made itself heard over the rumbling of the loaders and the whirring of the sonic probes: a thin wordless wail of outrage that grew to an unearthly screech. She flew at them, then, the sonic probe in her hand her only weapon - that, and sheer fury and desperation.

One soldier stepped back, astonished, when she came at him, and tripped over a loaded cargo hopper, and fell. The Reman swung her sonic probe at another, and there was a snarling buzz of weird harmonics as the tool hit his skull, and suddenly he was down too. Three more soldiers rushed her in a body, and for a few moments there was a confused jostle, and then the sound of shots.

The Reman had seized a laser pistol from one of her attackers, and was blazing away with it indiscriminately. One soldier dropped screaming, another silent; the third turned and fled. The Reman sent more shots in all directions, some perilously close to other prisoners - and then everyone was running, Daniella among them, fleeing from the woman's crazed fear and desperate anguish -

Then she gave one last shriek, and blazed with fire, and was gone. One of the priests, Daniella thought, he had seen the disturbance and taken it in hand. Those damned wands - they didn't even need to see you, to use those damned wands -

From high above, a mechanical voice boomed out. "Prisoners will cease from disturbance and return to their work. There will be no more warnings. Prisoners will return to their work."

One by one, the prisoners left their hiding places and trooped dejectedly back to their workstations. More Siohonin soldiers were arriving, picking up their dead and wounded, making threatening gestures at the prisoners... but they were concentrating on the Remans, and there was just a moment when Daniella was unobserved.

Just one moment.

She was standing by one of the cargo hoppers, and it was full of blocks that had been approved by the Siohonin, that were on their way to... whatever the Siohonin were doing with them. She still had her sonic probe in her hand; she drove the tool hard into the black-gleaming surface of one block, pressed the activating stud. The noise was drowned by all the other sounds in the cavern; there was no visible change in the block. Daniella went meekly back to her place, began her work again. She didn't know if she had made any difference. She hoped she had.

The Three-Handed Game 31

"Grand Marshal," said Nyredalit Amm.

"Your Holiness," Gamariden Tal replied, turning the Glaive's command chair to face the priest. "You are comfortable in your new quarters?"

"Oh," said Amm with a chuckle, "quite like old times, thank you." He stepped forward, and looked around the bridge. "Impressive."

"Suitable, I trust," said Tal, "for the flagship of the Theocracy." He laughed, nervously. "It will take time to get used to that."

"Well, look on the bright side," said Amm. "Unlike the priests of the false gods, at least you and I have the time. Where am I to sit?"

"I have given orders for an observer's chair to be added to the bridge," said Tal. "You will have full access to the tactical displays - you will not, of course, have input into the network. Your blessing, Your Holiness, we require; your military insight -"

"Yes, quite," said Amm. "On the whole, better not." He strolled around the bridge, his eyes avid. "So much nostalgia," he murmured. "How much we would have given for equipment like this, back in the old days!"

"The frigates are still very much in the old style," said Tal, "except, of course, for the special weaponry."

"Tried and tested?" said Amm.

"And easy to replicate. Our fleet grows daily. The losses incurred in the battle with the Federation are... trivial."

"And mostly drabs, anyway," said Amm. "I must say, we have been glad to learn from the military in that... matter. We have so many, ahh, vacancies to fill - in the administrative functions of the former priesthood, you understand. As High Pontiff, it devolves to me to... smooth over the difficulties."

"You are training drabs to perform basic priestly functions?"

"As you train them to push buttons on starships. They are so biddable, so eager to advance their lowly status... it makes them easy to train. In basic functions, within their capacity. And in devotion, in obedience to the doctrine of Sebreac Tharr."

"As it should be," said Tal. "The true god brings us victory."

"And he asks so little in return," said Amm. "Only our devotion, and the occasional material symbol.... It is of this that I must speak. Work is progressing on one of the true god's requirements - the shipments of labourers from the Federation and the Republic have proven adequate to the task. But another requirement is not yet met - oh, do not concern yourself unduly, it is not you who has failed, but our agents in Klingon space. Had the Klingons not dealt with General Ssurt summarily, it would have been the god's pleasure to chastise him. Still, though... the god has needs. And so our lord the Theocrat has requirements."

"What does Enteskilen Mur require?" asked Tal.

"Transportation, essentially," said Amm. "He has decided to take a personal hand in certain affairs. To do this, he needs a starship. A frigate, obviously, is unsuitable for his station - not to mention affording inadequate protection against, ahh, disaffected elements...."

"Are there any such fools left?"

"Oh, Sivetalin Aun and his brethren are leaves that blow with every wind, but there are rumblings of discontent in some quarters - and besides, there is Starfleet, the Republic Navy and the Klingons to consider. So... how difficult are these magnificent ships to reproduce?"

Tal laughed, shortly. "We shall have all we need. Tell the Theocrat that he may take the Warhammer, with the military caste's grateful thanks for his guidance and his leadership."

Amm bowed. "I will send word at once. He will be gratified by your devotion."

"Will one ship prove sufficient? I can detach others, or provide a frigate escort."

"With the god on his side, the Theocrat will content himself with a single ship. The Warhammer. It sounds a fittingly aggressive name." Amm bowed. "I will, with your permission, withdraw and inform the Theocrat now. He is anxious to depart on his errand."

"Of course. You need no permissions from me, Your Holiness."

Amm smiled, bowed again, and left the bridge. Some day, Gamariden Tal told himself as the turbolift doors closed, some day I will kill that man.

The Three-Handed Game 30

"We have sensor contacts," reported Lieutenant Commander Scargill. Admiral Gref just grunted, and shifted irritably in the command chair of the Taras Bulba. Sensor contacts... well, of course there would be sensor contacts. By now, a mouse couldn't squeak in this star sector without alerting his web of satellites and sensor buoys.

"A number of sensor contacts," Scargill continued, his voice becoming high-pitched and excited. "Energy signatures confirm... sir, it's a Siohonin fleet. Reading... that can't be right."

Gref turned in his chair. "What can't be right?" he growled.

"I'm reading - well over a thousand ships, sir. It's immense. The fleet, I mean, sir."

Gref shrugged. "They have industrial capacity. And those lightweight frigates of theirs are a throwaway design - replicators can churn them out by the gross. What about heavier units? Serious starships?"

"It's hard to get a reading, sir, with all the noise... but at least three."

"Three," said Gref thoughtfully. The Siohonin frigate wolf-packs seemed to travel in large clusters, with a single command and control vessel at their centres... three such capital ships suggested a particularly large force, indeed. "What's their heading?"

"They're currently travelling sublight," said Scargill. "Overall bearing seems to be... coordinate vector one seven four by two zero three.... Sir, that'd put them on course for the Dioclema trading station."

Gref grunted. "Give me fleet communications," he ordered.

"Channels open, sir," the comms yeoman called out.

"Gref to all ships. Siohonin fleet has been detected, destination appears to be Dioclema. These people have already attacked a number of Federation and Allied worlds, and we are not going to let them do it again. All ships to battle readiness. We are moving to intercept. I will try negotiations, but you people know me, and the Siohonin are less reasonable than I am. This is going to get rough - but I know you people can do your jobs, and that's all we need to do today. Gref out."

"Setting course for the Siohonin fleet," said Lieutenant T'Nen at the helm.

"Good." Gref muttered darkly under his breath. The Siohonin... it would be better, really, if they did negotiate. But the aliens were drunk with their victories over the Klingons, their conquests of scattered Federation worlds... this was going to end badly for someone, Gref could feel it.

"Sir," said the comms yeoman, "I have Vice Admiral M'Azzur on hail."

Gref groaned silently. The Caitian and his damned carrier... he would have been happier with Ronnie Grau, even, in that space on his fleet roster. The damned furball was too keen, that was the trouble. "On screen," he said, with no enthusiasm.

M'Azzur's face, whiskers twitching, green eyes shining, appeared on the viewer. "I'm ready to take Tiger's Claw in first, sir. I reckon, if we deploy a fighter screen fast, we should make even that number of frigates think twice about tangling with us. What do you think, sir?"

Gref considered. If there was going to be a fight - and he was pretty sure there was - M'Azzur's Atrox carrier would be a lot more use with its fighters already off the launch rails and its considerable armament ready to support them. Gung-ho he might be, but M'Azzur had decent tactical senses. "Very well," he said. "Take point, and get the cruiser elements to back you up - tactical plan Delta Seven."

"Yes, sir! M'Azzur out." Too damn keen, Gref thought.

He consulted the tactical display. "That," he said, "is a whole lot of ships." No one answered him. "Open hailing frequencies," he ordered. "Let's at least give them a chance to talk."

But the face that appeared on the main viewer now was not that of a man disposed to talk. "I am Third Marshal Amaranuk Tem, aboard the Theocracy battleship Bardiche," the Siohonin commander announched. He was blond-haired, blond-bearded, and his horns were long and filed to needle points. "We are conducting military operations in this star sector. Do not attempt to impede us."

"Admiral Gref, Sixth Fleet, aboard the USS Taras Bulba," said Gref. "If you're conducting military operations in Federation territory, be aware that this will not be permitted. Your people have already attacked Federation worlds, but I'll let the diplomats sort that out - for the moment. Right now, I want to see you and your ships turn around and head back to Siohonin space."

"Brave words," said Tem. "And where, in the view of the mighty Federation, is Siohonin space?"

"The details aren't my business," said Gref. "Your home system, maybe? In any case, not here, and not Dioclema station either. Turn back, Third Marshal."

"The Theocracy does not take orders from the Federation," said Tem. "No more than we do from the Klingons.... You are too accustomed to thinking of yourselves as a galactic superpower. Times are changing, Admiral Gref. Learn to bend with the wind... take your fleet home."

Gref rose to his feet. "Take my fleet home? This is Federation space, Third Marshal, my fleet is home. And we will defend it. Make no mistake about that."

"I grant you leave," said Tem,"to try." And the channel went dead.

"Siohonin ships are changing formation," Scargill reported.

Falling into an attack pattern, Gref decided. A basic one, a wall of battle across the sky, seeking to use their numerical superiority to outflank the Starfleet ships and overwhelm them from all angles. Gref engaged his tactical console. "Gref to fleet. They're trying to wrap around us. We're going to punch through and split their forces." He considered. "Attack plans as given, concentrating on vector three seven mark six three."

"Sir," said T'Nen, "that will put us very close to the Bardiche."

Gref grinned. "Damn right it will. In weapons range, in fact. Weapons free."

"Vice Admiral M'Azzur on comms, sir."

"Tell him - oh, put him through."

The Caitian was grinning from ear to ear. "Going in, sir. Looks like you're aiming for their flagship? We'll go after one of the other heavies."

"All right," said Gref. "Stay alert, keep moving. Try and stay out of the way of those kinetic lances, and watch for their other special weapons."

"Yes, sir. Don't worry, my boys and girls will clean up those frigates, no problem."

"Let's hope," Gref growled.

"Fleet in engagement range," Scargill reported. "Weapons fire exchanged... conventional disruptors only from the Siohonin, so far. Lots of it, but individually, not heavy."

"Stalkers going in," M'Azzur reported. The Caitian was practically bouncing with excitement.

"Targeting solution for the enemy flagship!" shouted a tac officer.

"Phasers to maximum," Gref ordered. "Let's give him a nudge he won't forget in a hurry."

"Phasers locked." The tac officer turned, a puzzled frown on his face. "Sir... he's making no evasive manoeuvres. His shields are up, but... he's making no attempt to avoid action."

Gref snarled. Suddenly, he felt a deep inner disquiet, and there was no way to dispel it but immediate, violent action. "Fire as they bear, as soon as we enter range."

"Yes, sir." Light was slashing across the starfield, now, green light of Siohonin disruptors, golden-orange of Starfleet phasers. Were his ships holding their own against the Siohonin onslaught? Gref thought so....

"Enemy in range. Firing phasers."

Taras Bulba trembled as the phaser banks fired -

- and then the ship rocked and lurched, and the bridge was full of the crash-bangs of exploding consoles, and the lights failed and flickered and came back red. The terrific impact hurled everyone to the floor. Alarms screamed. The surviving console displays were unintelligible with static, the air was filled with smoke and fire and noise.

"Damage report!" Gref roared. "What the hell -? What hit us?" He clambered groggily to his feet, and stared at the scene of chaos which was his ship's bridge. T'Nen was slumped inert over the wreckage of the helm console - the tac officer on phasers was nowhere to be seen -

"Coming through now," Scargill's voice croaked. He was staring in horror at his screens, ignoring the blood that ran freely from a gash on his scalp. "I don't understand - we were hit by a phaser barrage!"

"Damage report," said Gref firmly.

Scargill swallowed. "It's - bad, sir. Six per cent structural integrity, hull breaches all decks, main deflector is offline, shields are down."

"Trying to get a line to main engineering now," the comms yeoman chimed in. "Sir, Vice Admiral M'Azzur is hailing -"

"Can you get him? On screen!" Gref shouted.

The Caitian's face appeared, shot through with static, on the main viewer. "Sir," he said, "we think we know what happened -"

"What?" Gref demanded.

"They - somehow, they inverted the region of space between you and their flagship. Turned it, and everything in it, through a hundred and eighty degrees. Your own weapons, sir, they were reflected back on you."

Gref groaned. "Warn the other capital ships!" If they could do that - No wonder the Klingons hadn't got proper reports back on this weapon. Klingon capital ships emphasized firepower over armour, if they were caught like this, their own barrages would blast them to flinders. Even his ships -

"We can fight this, sir." M'Azzur's face was grim, now, and determined. "Come in at multiple angles - they can't use that defence in every direction at once, they'd cut themselves completely out of normal space-time. My fighters can engage them and swamp them."

Gref studied his half-wrecked tactical board. "Try it. You have fleet command. I can't run tac coordination from Taras Bulba now."

"Yes, sir." M'Azzur saluted.

"I'm getting some telemetry back," Scargill said. "Sir - the Siohonin are firing their kinetic lances. The fleet is taking heavy damage." His voice suddenly cracked. "Oh, God - Warspite is moving to engage one of their capitals -"

"Comms! Get a warning through!" If the dreadnought Warspite fired her phaser lance, she was done for.

"Stalkers engaging," M'Azzur said fiercely. "We'll make them pay for -"

And then his voice stopped, and his image vanished from the screen. "What happened?" Gref yelled.

"Trying to get a picture," said Scargill. "I'm patching stuff through, but -"

Disjointed images were appearing on the viewer. Gref groaned aloud as Warspite fired - and the brilliant beam of the phaser lance doubled back on itself, and in one horrifying flash the dreadnought was gone. He could see cruisers taking a savage pounding from the Siohonin lances... the light enemy ships were suffering too, but they had the advantage in numbers, had done from the start. The Caitian fighters were inflicting damage, but without the support of the mother ship - what had happened to M'Azzur, damn it?

"I don't believe it," said Scargill. "Sir, I - I'm picking up the Tiger's Claw."

Gref rounded on the man. "Where?"

Scargill swallowed. "It's... it's at one of our remote sensor buoys, sir. About half a light year away. The Siohonin weapon... it's some sort of overloaded, focused warp field. It physically picks up the target and throws it through subspace. That's where all the interference comes from, that's why the targets just seem to vanish...."

"What about the Tiger's Claw? How soon before they can get back?"

"I'm sorry, sir." Scargill's tone was bleak. "The field must generate a massive gravimetric turbulence. All I'm getting from the buoy is the Tiger's Claw's ID transponder... in among the debris."

Gref sagged back into the command chair. "Do we have any comms channels at all?"

"Can get you fleet-wide on unencrypted only, sir," said the comms yeoman.

"It will have to do. Set it up." Gref took a deep breath. "All ships, this is Admiral Gref. We are outnumbered and outgunned. All ships, scatter and retreat. I repeat, scatter and retreat. Flagship out." He turned to glare at the yeoman. "Get a secure link-up to the buoy network. Send a signal to Starfleet. They have got to know how the Siohonin warp weapons work. There's plenty of redundant bandwidth in that system, work with it. That message has to get through."

"Sir," said Scargill, "I don't know if we - we're massively badly damaged - I don't know if the ship can generate a warp field."

"I do," said Gref. "She can't. Taras Bulba will cover the fleet's retreat for as long as she is able. After that -" He snorted. "I suppose we get to see how the Siohonin treat prisoners of war."

The Three-Handed Game 29

Ronnie

"Excellent." The kindly old Orion gentleman beams at me. He beams nicely. He is small, and thin, and inoffensive, you can't possibly help but like him. That is, after all, rather the point.

"Now," he continues. "What about the more recent history of the House? Shall we start with something simple? Can you tell me the name of the twenty-seventh Matron?"

I shut my right eye and make a concentrating sort of a face. "Twenty-seventh... that'd be... Lynoshea, yeah?"

"Very good." Another beam. I've seen fewer beams in a space battle. "Were there any... complicating factors... in her accession to the title?"

Well, of course there were, ownership of even a minor Orion House doesn't change hands without plenty of blood as lubricant. In this particular case, Lynoshea had to beat off a challenge by her business rival, cousin, and same-sex partner, and yes, now you come to mention it, they were all the same person. Busy lady. Something tells me it isn't going to be politic to go into details, though. Orion history, more than most, tends to be written by the victors. "I think there was a challenge to the claim," I say, "but... I don't remember the details. Sorry."

He purses his lips, looking disappointed but still kindly. "Well, I suppose the story does become a little involved at times." He rises, rather stiffly, to his feet. They ought to let him bring a chair into the cell, they really ought. I let him sit on the mattress, but it's not good for a man of his age, sitting cross-legged like that.

"Read some more," he advises. He stoops, and puts the datapad down on the mattress. It's the datapad I've been studying for what seems like weeks now.

*/*actual elapsed time---*/*

Shut up. Time passes very slowly when you're reading the official history of the House of Vuon, believe me. The old guy beams at me again and heads for the door. It hisses open as he approaches, and clangs shut after him with depressing finality.

I pick up the datapad. I slump down on the mattress and make a show of reading it. It's textbook stuff, really, brainwashing 101. You want to make your victim immerse themselves in your culture, your ethos, your way of thinking, so you set things up so they have to memorize some vast slabs of text telling them about it. Indoctrination. In my case, the damn datapad is the only thing I've got by way of entertainment anyway, and the beaming old man is so nice, you just can't help wanting to please him when he does his pop-quiz routine.

It's not going to be quite so successful with me, of course, because hey, Borg implants. One run through the datapad was enough to get it captured and recorded on the implant over my left eye, and now I can just play it back as I need to. I don't have to think about it. And that leaves me free for thinking about other things. Jailbreaks, for instance.

Up to now, a jailbreak has seemed pretty pointless, on account of I was pretty sure I was being held on a spaceship, and breaking out of it and into hard vacuum didn't seem like the smartest move. However, when I woke up this morning, the gravity field was .02% stronger, and there was a little dent in one wall of the cell that wasn't there when I went to sleep. Conclusion: while I was asleep, I was transported out of one cell and into an identical one, somewhere else. It might be another spaceship, true, with fractionally more powerful gravity plating. But my guess is, I am on the House of Vuon's homeworld, wherever that is, and getting outside this cell is now looking a much brighter idea.

The problem is actually doing it, of course. I don't think hiding behind the door and ambushing the guard when he comes in to investigate will do me much good. Not in this age of surveillance cameras, and I am damn sure I'm being monitored continuously. Feigning appendicitis, or waiting to hit the incoming guard with a chamber pot, just won't cut it in today's world, unfortunately.

So. I have one resource, effectively, and it's the datapad. All I need, really, is to draw some attention with it. I look at it, weigh it in my hand, and then hurl it, hard, against the far wall of the cell.

It bounces off, clatters, and skims back across the floor towards me. I go over and pick it up; it's still working. They make these things tough. I throw it again.

I throw it half a dozen more times before they get bored watching me, or something, and the cell door hisses open. "Well, hey, there, Tiny," I say.

"Do not mistreat the Matron's property," the big guy says. He's looking very big just now, and his fingers are already on the controls for the shock collar.

"And why the hell not?" I ask. "I'm bored rigid with this Orion family history already. And as for your Matron -" I've spent some time picking an apt quotation "- may she marry a ghost, and bear him a kitten, and may the High Lord of Glory permit her to get the mange."

And that is the big guy's cue to hit the shock button. Which is my cue to leap into action, starting by throwing the datapad at his head.

"Thing about liberated Borg," I say, as he fends it off, and I duck beneath his guard and start hitting him, "is this -"

Huge hands come down on my shoulders. I shake them off. With my small hands and my enhanced strength, getting hit by me hurts, it's more like a rap with a hammer than a blow from a fist. But there is a lot of fat and muscle on him to soak up the impacts. "We've still got loads of Borg neural circuitry -"

He tries for a hold. I kick him hard beside his left kneecap, and try not to get squashed as he stumbles. "And when you give Borg nerves repeated shocks -"

He flails around, trying to keep his balance.

"- they adapt," I finish. And with that, I release all the charge I've been carefully building up in my capacitors, in a neural blast that will take down any huge Orion you care to mention, and his big brother too. This one goes down in a wobbly green heap, and I lean against the wall, taking a moment or two to catch my breath.

OK. Phase one of the plan is done. But I'm still in the cell, and what's more, the big guy is not going to be a happy bunny when he wakes up. I could, of course, try to hold him hostage and bargain with his life. It's just possible, if I tried that, the Matron might hurt herself laughing.

So I don't bother. I delve into those eidetic memory implants again, for the stuff about Escaping From Orion Slavers 101, the sort of thing they cover at Starfleet Academy, the details of which you always forget. Unless you're me. The control wristband is a standard design, a bit of fiddling with it, and my shock collar comes off. Phase two. OK, maybe that's optimistic, call it one and a half.

Big guy has a disruptor pistol, I wouldn't expect different. It has a biometric lock, and I wouldn't expect anything else there, either. However, despite all the advertising from the security firms, the cold fact is, soldiers on the battlefield often have to scavenge a fallen comrade's weapons, and so popping loose a biometric ID chip is not, in fact, that much of a big deal. My resources are going up. I have a weapon, now, as well as a datapad and a vast heap of Orion suet.

The disruptor won't have enough charge to slag the cell door, or burn through the wall. That's OK, little Ronnie has a plan. It does pack enough punch to carve a hole in the metal plating around the door... enough to expose part of the locking mechanism. By now, whoever else is watching me - I can't believe Tiny here was the only one - has finished laughing at Tiny's predicament and is starting to think seriously about doing stuff. Work fast, Ronnie.

I shove the shock collar into the locking mechanism, grab Tiny's wristband, and retire to the proverbial safe distance. A little bit more finagling, and the collar's electronics are told that it should be securely around my neck, but it isn't around my neck. The explosive charge goes off with, frankly, a worryingly loud bang. I don't have that thick a neck, surely?

I run over to the door, throw my weight against it. It resists for a moment, but it's just inertia; the lock is gone, the hydraulics holding it closed are ruptured. A bit of shoving, and there is enough of a gap for me to shimmy through.

Out of the cell. Phase three, or maybe four, complete. I dunno, I've lost count already. I wasn't sure of getting this far anyway. The corridor outside looks like, well, a corridor. If I was Sherlock Holmes, I would deduce a safe way out by a study of the scuff marks on the deck plates. Since I'm only me, I pick one direction and leg it.

I don't leg it very far before I run into an intersection and another Orion, this one normal sized and armed, with a purposeful Ronnie-finding gleam in his eye. I lash out with my hand before he can aim his weapon, catching him in the throat, putting him down on the ground, hard. He doesn't get up. I might have crushed his throat, or even broken his neck. Never mind. If he's the only corpse I have to step over on my way out of here, I'll have done well.

I think for a second. The direction he came from - that, presumably, might be the place my cell is being monitored from. And there are a lot more cell doors along this corridor. As a Federation officer, my duty is clearly to liberate those who are suffering in cruel Orion bondage - especially when the confusion might help me escape.

So I make my way a bit more cautiously along the corridor. I wish they'd sound alarms or something. You know where you are with a screaming klaxon or six. All I know right now is, I'm in trouble, and I don't know how deep.

The corridor ends in another blank metal door. This one, though, slides open as I approach, my captured disruptor in my hand. The room beyond is full of screens and consoles. Jackpot. I think. It also contains a tall, sneering Orion security type, who looks at me, picks up a Ferengi-style energy whip from the top of a console, and says in pitying tones, "You will find that our weapons have biometric trigger locks."

As last words go, they're not the best. I lower the disruptor and look around carefully. That guy obviously just wasn't paying attention.

He was the only one there. There are seats for three, and screens enough for a whole film festival. One of the seats is very wide, and looks like it's been reinforced. Tiny was here. I check my cell on the monitors; he's still out for the count. I fiddle around with some controls until I'm reasonably sure I've unlocked every cell door and slave collar in the joint.

There's a PA system, and I use it. "Hi, everybody! This is Vice Admiral Veronika Grau, call me Ronnie, everyone does. Just to let you know, I've gimmicked security around here, and if you can get out, well, this might be an ideal time to do that, OK? Good luck." Then I step back, and start shooting things with the disruptor, until the entire security centre looks interestingly broken.

Confused sounds start issuing from the corridor. There's another door out of this security room, and I take that one, for the sake of variety if nothing else. Another corridor confronts me, and... is that natural light, at the end of it? If it is, I'm going out in it, and I don't care what the weather's like.

I'm about half way down the passage when the alarms start going off. Klaxons, bells, the works. Actually, it all seems a bit over the top for a generic mass escape. I start to worry - well, worry some more. If I was designing an alarm system, I'd want it to provide some very basic information, like what's wrong. The different alarm noises suggest one of two things - lousy alarm design, or two different alarms going off simultaneously. In short, something is happening that I don't know about.

Natural light is coming from a flight of stone stairs, leading up. I take them at a run.

And, suddenly, I'm outdoors, and breathing fresh, clean, cool air. Mountain air. This - base, whatever it is - is built into the side of a mountain, and there are mountains all about me, towering into the sky, gleaming pinkish in the light of either a rising or a setting sun. A shuttle landing pad has been constructed here, sticking out of the mountainside on huge slanting stanchions. And, joy of joys, there are a couple of little Kivra shuttlecraft, standard Klingon designs, perched neatly on the pad. I can crack security on one of those, no problem. OK, breaking in will breach its atmospheric integrity, but that's OK, I'm not going into space, I'm just going to head out, get my bearings, reach help or go to ground.

I raise the disruptor, set it to a cutting beam, and aim it at the hatch on the nearer of the two shuttles. The metal smokes and starts to glow under the assault... and then the beam flickers and fades and dies, and the glowing spot on the metal dims and goes out.

"Out of charge," says a voice from behind me, "and out of luck."

I turn around. The Matron is standing there, a nasty-looking disruptor pistol in her hands, two even nastier-looking goons beside her, pointing heavy assault rifles at me. The Matron's face is twisted in a snarl. "I do not know how you arranged all this, Grau," she says, "but you will suffer, now. You will suffer worse than my inefficient security staff. You will -"

And another sound makes itself heard, the very distinctive snap of sonic antiproton fire. Scarlet bolts slam out of the stairwell and blow the two goons' heads off with pinpoint accuracy. It's a bravura display of shooting - normally, you'd need two people for a stunt like that. But there's only one person coming up the stair, now, a sonic AP pistol in each hand, silvery eyes moving independently... tall, thin, with dark green face, shaggy hair, an elaborate bony headcrest... just about the last person I'd have expected to see, but I think she's a welcome sight.

"Vice Admiral Grau," says R'j Bl'k'. "We have been looking for you for some time."

The Matron springs towards me, and her pistol is suddenly jammed against my skull. "Come no closer!" she hisses at R'j.

The tall */*species 10118*/* looks distinctly unimpressed. "Matron Khevnitra," she says. "My troops are taking possession of your facility now. Resistance is utterly futile. Do not waste my time."

"It is not futile while I hold what you want," the Matron replies. I weigh up my chances of breaking free before she can fire that disruptor, decide they're not so hot. "Drop your weapons!"

R'j looks at the pistols in her hands as if she's never seen them before. "As you wish." She opens her hands, and the two guns clatter harmlessly to the metal plating of the landing pad. The mountain air seems very cold and unfriendly, somehow, now.

"Good," says the Matron. She relaxes her grip a little. Enough? I'm not sure.

"But I swear to you," says R'j, "that you will not succeed in this endeavour. I pledge my honour as an Adept of the Seven Greater Dodecagons, and - most especially - as a Harbinger of the Grand Maelstrom."

"What is this nonsense?" The pressure is definitely off, now - her disruptor is moving warily between me and R'j. "Adept? Harbinger? What does this mean?"

"Allow me to demonstrate," says R'j, and the air before her seems to thicken and glow. The psychokinetic bolt catches the Matron full on. A disruptor bolt spears wildly into the sky, and then she is flung over the rim of the landing pad, and there is nothing to mark her passage but a long, descending wail.

R'j picks up her pistols and holsters them, then strolls casually to the edge of the pad and looks down. "A matter of simple prudence," she says. "I always check."

I find my voice. "So, did she bounce or splat?"

"A little of both, I think. S-s-s-s-s. I am relieved to see you. We have been searching for some time."

"Yeah, well," I say, "I'm just hoping that you're on the side of the angels these days."

"Let me convince you," says R'j. She reaches into a pocket of her leather jacket, takes something out, and flips it towards me. I catch it in my right hand, look down at the familiar blunt arrowhead shape. A Starfleet combadge.

R'j touches her own wrist communicator. "R'j Bl'k' to USS Falcon," she says. "I have located Vice Admiral Grau. Lock on to her combadge, and beam her up."