The Last Treason 28

"What happened?" Kirza screamed at the blank screen. She rounded on Kuruth. "What is wrong with the viewer? Where is our targeting lock?" She clutched at the armrest of the command chair. "My tactical repeater is blank -"

"Trying to reacquire target," said Kuruth. "Checking circuitry -"

"Sir -" Kingrol began.

"We will be in range of the enemy in seconds!" roared Kirza. "I need sensors! Fix this!"

"Sir -" Kingrol said again.

"What?"

Kingrol swallowed. "There was a surge in the temporal circuitry -"

"A surge? What does that mean?"

"It is possible that -"

Kingrol got no further. A hot wind started to blow across the Hov'etlh's bridge, and the ruddy light was suddenly augmented by a blinding glare that hung in the air -

"You!" Kirza reached instinctively for her disruptor - then let it go with a yelp of pain, as it turned intolerably hot in her hand.

Clefune glared at her. "You caused me personal inconvenience," he said. "More than that, you occasioned me actual physical distress. Actual pain. I had quite forgotten how unpleasant that was."

"Give me a chance," snarled Kirza, "and I will remind you." She bared her teeth at the Organian.

"I have no desire to be reminded further," said Clefune. "And your behaviour has been - has been impermissible. So I have taken action. I have used your temporal device to remove you to a place where you can do no further damage. I will now use it myself, to return to my own time - and I will fuse the circuitry in the process. You will not be able to restore it, I assure you. You may consider this -" he drew himself up, haughtily "- a condign punishment for your disgraceful actions." And, with a final dismissive sniff, he vanished again in a glare of light.

There was a sudden explosion, and a console erupted in a torrent of sparks. Kingrol cursed.

"Status," snapped Kirza, as she stooped to retrieve her disruptor.

"He... did not lie," said Kingrol. "That was a secondary surge in the control circuits. The Nhandesson weapon... it has melted."

"What of our status? Get those sensors back!"

"Sensors are operative," said Kuruth. "The screen is blank only because... there is nothing to see."

"What do you mean?" Kirza demanded.

Kuruth swallowed. "I have background radiation on scan," he said slowly. "Consistent with one source. Proton decay."

"Explain yourself."

"For proton decay to be detectable... we must be in a place where there is nothing else left. A place so old that there is nothing else left. The Organian... he has transported us into the ultimately far future. To the end of the universe."

"Leave out the poetry! How far in the future?"

Kuruth shrugged. "It is meaningless. Quintillions, sextillions of years. So vast a span of time as to be... unimaginable." His voice suddenly broke. "Except that we do not need to imagine it, we can see it...."

"Sextillions of years." Kirza stared into the empty blackness on the viewscreen. The corner of her mouth twitched.

"Some time track where the universe underwent continual expansion," Kuruth continued in a broken monotone. "Vaster and vaster, emptier and emptier, for all eternity...."

"Do you know what this means?" Kirza asked. Her mouth was still twitching.

"No way back," said Kingrol in a dead voice.

"No," said Kirza. "Do you know what it means?" Her voice was high-pitched, on the verge of cracking. "It means we are alone. At the end of time. All there is, is us...." She threw back her head and laughed. "It means I am triumphant! I am the last, the only, the ultimate commander! All hail! All hail Kirza, daughter of K'Var, of the House of Karav! All hail Empress Kirza, ruler of the universe! All hail!"

Kuruth and Kingrol exchanged glances. Quietly, stealthily, they and the other officers left their posts, left the bridge, left their captain alone with the empty screen and her laughter.

The Last Treason 22

Ronnie

“Doesn’t anyone ever get the urge to redecorate?” I grumble.

The mask-like face of T’Mev’s Rigelian exec doesn’t show much expression at the best of times, and this is clearly not the best of times. “Standard doctrine with captured temporal vessels,” Commander Teadoursi explains, “is to interfere as little as possible with the construction or the environmental details. Just in case some aspect of it is… important.”

I glance around at the interior of the Virgo. It’s like every other Na’kuhl ship, at least as far as I know; rounded organic shapes in blood-red colour, like being trapped inside the intestines of some vast creature. In places, rounded domes of control consoles protrude from the floor or the walls, usually glowing green. The diseased and ulcerated intestines of some vast creature. It’s no wonder the Na’kuhl are peculiar.

“So what’s this bit?” I ask. Teadoursi’s face remains studiously neutral. I’m over here, officially, in case I’m needed for information about some aspect of the Priyanapari situation. In practice, I’m pretty sure they want me because, if the temporal interference takes an unhealthy turn in that system, the discrepancies will show up immediately when my memories change. I have a strong suspicion that my previous accounts of what happened have been preserved in some temporally shielded archive, and any new versions I might suddenly remember will be carefully cross-checked and compared. Assuming I don't drop dead or vanish in the process, I suppose.

I don't like any part of this. My entire memory, maybe my personality, could be re-written at the drop of a hat. And I wouldn't know about it. Or the person I would be, who would no longer be me, wouldn't know about it.

So, to take my mind off the whole God-awful business, I asked for a tour of the ship. And since I'm a senior officer, Teadoursi got kind of stuck with showing me around. I don't think she appreciates it much, though, with the Virgo doing nothing but orbiting the blasted ruins of 25th-century Priyanapari, I reckon she should be glad of a distraction herself.

Now she peers at the giant glowing bubble I'm pointing at. "This is the anti-chroniton transmission module," she says. "If we need to send a message to the team in the past - and I do mean need - then this is what we'd use."

I frown. "You'd have to send any messages to the Leacock, then? I mean, they're the only ship that'd have the facilities to receive...." Which strikes me as a weak point, especially since we know someone in that system can knock seven bells out of the Leacock already.

"No," says Teadoursi, "we can modulate the anti-chroniton pulses to transduce them into any pattern of electromagnetic or subspace radiation at the destination point." I'm sure that would sound impressive, if I had any clue what it meant. "For example...." She taps at the glowing surface, and the data scrolling across it suddenly whirls and reorganizes itself. "That's set on Starfleet data-transfer protocols for the twenty-third century," she says. "A message we sent now would be picked up on any open tricorder's data subchannel and displayed as text. That -" she points to something "- indicates the destination time-track and space-time location."

I look where she's pointing, and my one good eye goes very wide. "That looks - very straightforward."

She looks closer. "The coordinates are intelligently resolved by the system - presented in as simple a format as we can manage it. I must admit, the coordinate strings aren't usually truncated that effectively - that's a very short one. And also palindromic, I notice."

"Memorable," I say. Highly memorable, in fact. If I can trust my memory.

"Yes, I suppose -" Something chimes, a loud, urgent, high-pitched sound. Teadoursi's eyes narrow. "Excuse me a moment, sir. There's a temporal flux warning - possibly nothing, but I'd better check -" She stalks off towards another console.

Oh, boy.

I look at the indicators on the glowing dome, and I swallow hard. Something tells me the next few seconds are going to be important.

I flex my fingers.

Technically, I haven't been warned not to fiddle with anything. The assumption, obviously enough, is that fiddling with poorly-understood temporal technology, in the middle of a time-travel crisis, is an idea so intrinsically bad that even I won't have it. Which makes sense. Except where nothing about this whole business makes sense.

I take a deep breath, and start tapping away at the console. I can't deny I'm nervous - so nervous, I'm having to ramp up the controls on my still-Borgified fingers to stop them trembling. But I can't figure out what else I'm meant to do -

On the screen, the simple, brief message takes shape. I take another deep breath. My fingertip comes down on the icon that means send.

---

Ronnie

"You will accomplish nothing here," Luga hisses at me. She looks like she enjoys a good hiss.

I walk around the artifact one more time, keeping a safe distance. Luga follows me, making swearing-under-her-breath noises. The metal - thing - stands out in the Priyanapari night, illuminated by all the floodlights we could beam down and pour on it. The various metal components are spinning and churning, and there is a continuous faint grinding noise. I still can't work out where some of those components are spinning to. This thing extends into multiple dimensions, and it's been hyper-active ever since that Suliban ran into it.

The Na'kuhl aren't answering questions about the Suliban. Or the artifact. Or, indeed, anything much.

I don't know about this situation. The Klingons won whatever fight they were having down here, but that's as far as things went; the Klingon ship and the massive Na'kuhl battlecruiser are still in orbit around the planet, and aren't shooting at each other. Maybe I can chalk it up to my calming influence? - Yeah, right.

"What's it for?" I ask Luga. She glares at me and doesn't answer. "Oh, come on," I continue. "If you don't know, surely you'd be better off pooling your resources with us, so we can both find out? And if you do know, you can tell me why I shouldn't mess with it."

"The technology is quite beyond your limited comprehension."

"Yeah, but you can still tell me what it does. Besides eat Suliban. Or break your guy's arms." One of the Na'kuhl got too close, earlier, and was clipped by a randomly spinning metal rod. Straightforward accident, as far as I can tell, but I've been keeping a respectful distance ever since.

"Under the terms of the Organian treaty, worlds and resources in the neutral buffer zone are up for grabs, to go to whichever side can best develop them. If you guys brought the Klingons in on this, then you've got to let us in, too. Never mind your subsequent disagreements with the Klingons. And just what was it that they grabbed, anyway?"

"That is no longer your concern, or ours."

Cutting their losses? The Na'kuhl clearly need the Klingons for some reason... enough to make them forgive the attack? Or maybe whatever the Klingons took was important enough that they had to forgive them.... In any case, it's quite definitely my concern, but short of knocking Luga over the head and dragging her back to the Harrier for interrogation, I don't see any way to get answers out of her. And Starfleet frowns on kidnapping and torture. Which is fair enough, really.

But all it leaves me to fall back on is... legalisms. And I'd rather fall back on a pile of broken glass. "You've got some agreement in place with the Klingons, yes? And they have to abide by the Organian treaty, so that means you are covered by it as well." I hold up my tricorder, which has the data libraries all cued up. "If you want to see the relevant clauses -"

I stop talking, because at that moment a message pops up on the tiny screen. It's come through on the standard data subchannel - except no one has any business sending me stuff on that channel - and it doesn't have an origin code - and the text simply reads:-

You're not doing any good there. Beam back to the ship, things are about to get busy. Remember this code: AA0702DC-CD2070AA. Trust me, I know what I'm doing. Yer pal, Cassandra.

I have no clue what the palindromic code means, but Cassandra gives me furiously to think. The Trojan prophetess Cassandra, you see, was cursed by Apollo so that she prophesied truly, but nobody believed a word she said... ignoring her always turned out badly. So if Cassandra is sneaking into my tricorder to send me warnings, I am taking them seriously, and the god Apollo can take his curses and get stuffed. Come to think of it, didn't Jim Kirk deal with Apollo, a couple of years back, anyway?

"OK, you know what?" I say to Luga. "Forget it. Forget all the relevant clauses. Me and my team are going to follow your no doubt sound and well-intentioned advice." I turn away while her jaw is still dropping. "Landing party!" I bellow. "Assemble for beam-out!"

I give them their due, they come running and don't ask questions. I pull out my communicator and snap it open. "Grau to Harrier. Landing party requires immediate transport. Confirm and beam us up when ready."

Kara Grant looks a bit mystified, but she keeps her mouth shut. T'Pren has a quirky eyebrow that looks like she'll want some explanations back on the ship, but never mind. "So," I say to Luga, "see you around and about, then. Bye now."

The expression on her leathery face has changed, from startled to suspicious. She can smell a rat when someone shoves it up her nose, she knows there's some reason for my abrupt change of heart. She will be speculating very hard about what's made me run back to the Harrier.

And, as the transporter sparkle gathers around me, that's pretty much what I'm doing myself.

---

Ronnie

OK, so now Teadoursi has an expression, all right. I make a mental note: this is how Rigelians do aghast.

"Trust me," I say cheerily, "I know what I'm doing." Just as I said in the message.

Teadoursi finds her voice. "Do you have any idea what you might have done -?"

I give her a knowing look. "Yeah. Yeah, as a matter of fact, I think I do. That alarm of yours? The temporal flux warning?"

"It - cut out," she says.

"Yeah, it would have done. Because that was the sound of a predestination loop closing. Like the sound of one hand clapping, I guess. The alarm sounded, because the time line was about to destabilize, if I didn't do what I was supposed to do." I point at the screen. "Somebody sent me that message. And I'm damned if I can see who else might have done it. I recognized that damn code of yours -"

I spent ages, puzzling over that code. I never worked out what it might have meant, but it preyed on my mind until I finally gave up on it. To see it, now, after all these years -

Of course, that entire chain of memories might only now have popped into my head. Whatever. The point is, it worked. I think.

"The timelines did stabilize," Teadoursi says grudgingly.

"Of course they did," I say, as smugly as I can manage.

"Please don't do anything like that again, sir. Not without consultation and a cross-check from a temporal observatory." And the way she says that, it sounds heartfelt.

"Relax. I think I've done enough. Probably." I cast my mind back. "Though just after that message, stuff got worrying -"

---

Ronnie

"What's it all about, sir?" Kara asks as we jump into the turbolift.

"Hell if I know. Bridge." The lift capsule hums into life. "Someone sent me an anonymous warning message on my tricorder's data channel. I didn't get where I am today by ignoring anonymous warning messages." Let's not go into how I did get where I am today.

"The nature of this message?" asks T'Pren. I flip open the tricorder and show her the screen. Her eyebrow remains resolutely quirked. Can't say I blame her.

The turbolift doors hiss open. "OK," I say as we make our way onto the bridge, "we definitely need a more nuanced alarm system. This is well past yellow, shading to a pretty ruddy sort of orange, but still not actually red." I can see Win roll his eyes at me as I take the centre seat. "Get me a read on our presumed-hostiles," I say, "and someone get comms up to the Leacock in case we need to yell for help."

"What's it all about, sir?" Win asks.

"Oh, hell, is that question of the day? I don't know. I got a warning message that says there's gonna be trouble. My guess is, it'll come from one or both of those battlewagons - "

"Hov'etlh is moving off station," Stulk interrupts me.

"Possibly that one, then. Where's she headed?"

"Impulse drive is active - reaching hyperbolic speed." She's breaking orbit, away from the planet. Maybe taking her ill-gotten gains back to the Empire? I swallow, hard. "We might need to stop her. And I don't think we can do that all by ourselves. Where's that line to the Leacock?" Because Kirza's horrendously-overclocked D7 will pick its teeth with the Harrier if we get in a fight right now.

My gaze strays to the armrest of my chair, to the slot holding Caird's magic data cart.

"Incoming hail from the Klingons," Kara reports.

Oh, joy. "On screen."

Kirza's face, when it appears, is all one solid gloat. "Captain Grau," she purrs at me. "You are no doubt wondering what artifacts I have recovered from the planet's surface."

"Crossed my mind, yeah," I say. "All well with you and your Na'kuhl friends? Did you kiss and make up?"

She ignores that. "Under the terms of the Organian treaty," she says, "I should inform you of my discoveries. And I take great pleasure in telling you, we have found something that will render the Organian treaty irrelevant. My scientists, and my Na'kuhl friends, have already made headway in deciphering the control interface."

"Control interface of what?"

Kirza's smile is almost too big for her face. "Of a weapon. It was fatal for the culture which built it, but we have more advanced shielding, thanks to the Na'kuhl. By we, of course, I mean the Empire. You have no defences at all."

"Red alert," I snap at Win.

Kirza laughs. "Sound whatever alarms you wish. They will all be useless. Let me give you time to contemplate your situation, Captain Grau. I intend to destroy every threat to the Empire in this system, starting with the most important, and working down. Your pathetic vessel is, naturally, last on my list. I will attend to you after I have finished with the Leacock. But first - Well. The weapon has many interesting capabilities. It can be wielded with finesse. I am even able to identify unique individual targets - a capacity that I will now demonstrate." She gestures imperiously. "Organian! Show yourself!"

There is a hot wind and a glare of light, and Clefune is suddenly standing on my bridge. "Captain Kirza," he says, "I must warn you that you are in grave danger of committing a treaty violation, and that I personally do not appreciate -"

"Enough!" roars Kirza, and makes another commanding gesture.

Clefune stiffens. A strange glow gathers around him, a shimmering aura like cascading rainbows. Then he flares with intolerable light, and explodes.

A shower of sparks falls to the deck where the Organian was standing.

Oh, boy.

The Last Treason 20

Luga had never seen Chrog so angry. His rage had passed through the stage of ranting, and now showed itself as a sort of deadly, white-hot calm. "You have no idea what you are doing," he hissed into the portable communicator.

On the viewscreen, Kirza's expression was unrepentant. "I know exactly what I am doing. We have the Nhandesson weapon, now, and if our alliance is to continue, it will be on much more equal terms."

"You do not know how to operate the weapon." Chrog's tone was almost reasonable. Luga suspected that someone was about to die, very soon. She regretted that the little communications hut offered no space to edge cautiously away from him.

"How true," said Kirza. "Though I fancy we have learned more from you than you suspect - we are not quite so easily distracted with shiny weapons as some would like to believe." Luga hissed through her teeth. "However, given the range and effectiveness of this device, I imagine you would prefer it, too, if we did not operate on the basis of trial and error. The time-space continuum in this star system is battered enough already. So. You are the experts in temporal technology, you will provide us with instruction. I look forward to using this thing. I might start by cancelling out the damned Organians and their peace treaty! - I will give you an hour to compose yourselves and prepare your technicians. Hov'etlh out." The screen went blank.

Chrog took a deep breath, held it for several seconds, then exhaled. "I believe I commented," he said, "on the undesirability of forming partnerships with other species - What are you doing?"

Luga was pawing frantically at her clothing. "A listening device," she hissed through clenched teeth. "The damned Klingon must have planted some sort of bug on me -"

"You are scanned regularly as a security measure!" Chrog snarled.

"For transtator signatures!" Luga screeched back. She held something up to the light; a tiny bulbous thing with a hair-fine dangling antenna - at first glance, it might even be mistaken for a hair. "This, this, it must be -"

Chrog consulted his wrist scanner. "Electronic. A passive receiver, echoing and modulating a background carrier wave in EM frequencies. Ingenious, if primitive. In this time period, of course, the Klingons were very keen on surveillance." He leaned close to the bug and spoke clearly and distinctly. "They must have enjoyed the sight of all those clean, smooth foreheads!"

Luga gave a wordless snarl and threw the bug down to the floor. She drew her chronoplasma pistol, made a swift adjustment, and took aim. "I wish this was your face, Kirza," she said, and fired. The bug flared and vanished, leaving nothing behind but a scorch mark on the floor.

Chrog was continuing to scan. "No sign of any more of those," he said. "Well. Such trustworthy allies the Klingons are...."

"What are we going to do?" Luga asked.

"Stall them. The operation of the anti-time weapon is complex, we can baffle them with science for as long as we like. That does not concern me... unless Kirza grows impatient and starts pressing buttons at random. What bothers me more is the other one."

"Thyvesh?"

"Am I expected to believe it was a coincidence that he chose this moment of distraction to make a break for his temporal portal? We must have that thing properly analyzed. I want to know where he has gone."

"To the Suliban weapons cache, presumably." Luga's face grew thoughtful. "In point of fact... the artifact is under constant observation, though the Klingons' attack may have proven a distraction. But it may be possible for us, now, to extract a temporal signature and - just possibly - to extrapolate Thyvesh's destination coordinates from it."

"You think so?"

"It is possible. And, with that information, we should be able to find our own way to that weapons cache."

Chrog stepped to the door of the hut, opened it a crack, and peered through. "The Federation would seem to be in the way," he said sourly.

"Captain Grau is having a field day, setting up monitoring devices with her science teams," said Luga. She joined Chrog at the door, and they both looked out. The dark Priyanapari night was pierced with the glare of floodlights, as science teams from the Harrier surrounded the artifact with sensor probes and mobile computer workstations. Na'kuhl troops stood around, watching them, their frustration almost palpable.

"Well," said Luga, "they have twenty-third century Starfleet equipment - it will be easy enough to subvert that. Grau may run her sensor analyses, and we will take her results. Since we cannot affect her without risking the wrath of one or both of her invisible companions... she may as well be of some use to us."

"What is the status of those - things?" Chrog asked.

"Unknown. We think the Rift entity is not yet at home in linear time, but we cannot chance being wrong. As for the Organian -" Luga shrugged. "We have no means to track an Organian. Very possibly, as Grau suggested, the creature is everywhere. One might hope, at least, it is spending some time with Captain Kirza. If her threats provoke the Organian into taking direct action... well, it would simplify matters."

"Kirza and the Organian," muttered Chrog. "Neither one worries me as much as Thyvesh."

---

"Thyvesh."

Thyvesh crouched beneath one green-glowing column. His fingers trembled as he took the holo-display unit from its hiding place. There was not much time, now.

"Thyvesh."

The voice - did it sound closer, now? Strange, that it sounded so - different. But, of course, it would sound different, to him. Because normally, he only heard it from inside his own head.

The holo-display unit had a closed compartment in its base. It was a standard commercial model, a thing for storing old messages, old images - souvenirs, mementoes. He opened the compartment.

From a pocket of his ragged clothes, he took a small metal object. A Romulan rank badge, in the form of a raptor... but twisted, deformed by some sort of pressure, and stained with dark-green markings of dried-up Vulcanoid blood.

"I know you are here. And you know that I know - how could you not?"

Thyvesh put the badge into the compartment, closed it, put the holo-display on the floor. He owed it to her, after all, he thought. He had lied to her, about being safe, about his counterpart being unable to get in. A white lie, a necessary lie, but still a lie. He owed her the truth.

Whatever the truth might be.

"I will find you. You cannot hide forever."

Thyvesh reached out, with his hands, with his mind. Alternative timelines, paths through time and space, cascaded through his altered brain. An infinite series of alternatives, he was so tired of them all - He found the line he wanted, focused his mind on it, concentrated. The holo-display shimmered briefly under his hand, and then it was gone.

So. No more reason to delay, then. He heaved a sigh, and stood up.

"Thyvesh - ah. There you are."

He turned around, slowly. His younger self was there, looking - eager, and neat, and efficient, in his military-styled outfit. How had he ever been able to be so neat and efficient? In his hand, the younger Thyvesh held an obvious weapon - a gun, but with a strange parabolic emitter dish instead of a barrel, and a complex control panel behind it that flared out to cover his hand and wrist.

"White-3741," he muttered. "Sairish's neural override weapon."

"You recognize it," the younger Thyvesh said. "That is good. You know what it does. You know what I can do with it. What I will do with it." He raised the weapon and took aim. "You will not die, but you may wish you had - unless you tell me."

He had to go through the motions. "Tell you what?"

"You know what."

"I know. But I remember - I asked me to say it -"

"You asked me." The younger Thyvesh smiled. "I know what you mean. Very well. You are able to use the door - without being in its physical proximity. You can operate freely in time and space. You can go anywhere, anywhen that you wish." For the first time, he looked faintly uncertain. "You seem to have wished to go to some very - grubby - times and places. Never mind. I assume there is a reason, that I will find out in due course. But now, now, you will tell me that secret. You will explain to me how to do it. I can think of - many uses - for the technique." He sighted carefully at Thyvesh, and adjusted the weapon's complex controls.

How was it possible? That he had ever been so - so dynamic, so driven, so certain of himself? It was all a part of his past, now. But the past - the past was never more than an instant away.

"You will tell me," his younger self said, with absolute conviction.

Thyvesh looked him in the eye. "Yes," he said, "I will. I did."

The Last Treason 17

"I burn to destroy her," whispered Chrog.

On the viewscreen, the Harrier was close enough, now, for them to make out the shapes of saucer, nacelles, and secondary hull. Luga turned away, went over to one of the bridge consoles, and started to enter data on the interface.

"Positive indications," she murmured.

"Of course there are!" snapped Chrog. "The Bercera IV incident would not have resolved so quickly without her, so both the Federation and the Klingons would have been weakened by longer war. And without the cooperation forced on both parties by the Siohonin crisis, their future alliances would have been longer in coming, and more prone to distrust. And there is a significant chance that, without her, the Federation might have lost two of its core worlds! Her death, now, at this point in time -"

"Time agents would inevitably respond," said Luga. "We know there is at least one here already. Besides, we must consider the threat posed by the Organian. It is unlikely in the extreme that any Organian intervention would redound to our benefit."

"I know." Chrog turned angrily away from the screen. "The Organians. As with the people of this time - our best chance is to keep the Organians from becoming involved. If there is even a chance they might intervene.... No." He turned once more to glower at the screen. "But you must understand, I am tempted. So very tempted."

"I understand. But it is as you say - the risks are too high. At least for the present situation...."

Luga's tone was thoughtful. Chrog strode over to her console. "You have an idea," he said. "Let me hear it."

"If Captain Grau could be enticed into one of the temporal anomalies," said Luga, "I suspect that the Organian would not follow. We know far too little about the Organians, but it is clear that they are not active in temporal affairs. If Grau were to vanish inside an anomaly, the Organian might allow that it was, as it were, her own fault."

"Hmm," said Chrog. "I wonder.... What of the thing Grau carries, though? The timeloose being that will, ultimately, call itself Sebreac Tharr?"

"In this time zone, it might not have sufficient awareness of linear space-time to be effective."

"Possibly." Chrog pondered for a moment, then shook his head. "But we cannot be sure. The Organians evidently suspect otherwise, or they would not be concerned over it. No. No, I do not think we can take the risk."

"Well, then," said Luga, "what are we to do with her? She will be in transporter range of the planet in another fifteen minutes, and the Nhandesson remnants are the only site of any interest on this world's surface, so that is where she will beam down. How are we to prevent her from meddling?"

"She is in no position to initiate hostilities," said Chrog. "What can she do?"

"Inspect the Nhandesson site, study the artifacts, and make a full report back to Starfleet," said Luga. "Our desired timeline would be hopelessly compromised, at the very least. At the worst, Starfleet would gain access to the Suliban weapons -"

"That cannot happen. Not while Thyvesh maintains control of the temporal portal - there is no way he will cooperate with Starfleet. But we must ensure Grau does not become aware of Thyvesh. We must keep him strictly out of her way.... Where is Thyvesh, in any case?"

"Currently," said Luga, "on our own temporal science deck. I have given him full access to our facilities, so that he may pursue... whatever line of research has him so excited. While he remains there, we can certainly keep him out of Grau's sight. She has no right to demand access to our vessel, even under the terms of the Organian treaty."

Chrog nodded. "Satisfactory. At least, until Thyvesh demands something else, or goes off on some other tangent... I do not place much faith in that one. He is - erratic. Unpredictable." He snorted. "At least your Klingon tool can be relied on to do no more than we tell her."

---

Kirza snarled. "Klingon tool, am I? Easily distracted by shiny weapons too, no doubt." She glared at the intelligence officer, Kuruth. Dark, sleekly handsome, watchful and composed... sometimes, she wondered if the man had some Vulcan in him. A true Klingon, a full-blooded Klingon, would never be so calm -

He watched her calmly, now, as she paced up and down the Hov'etlh's special communications room.

"Klingon tool. Easily distracted." She spat. "They think me a fool, a dupe. They are the fools. That Luga, she has not even suspected -" Of course she had planted a monitoring device on her supposed ally. It was, after all, standard doctrine. The Na'kuhl had not even checked her ridiculous clothing for the passive sensor -

She took a deep breath. Ridiculous clothing, yes - and the Na'kuhl were not the only ones guilty of that. Very soon, there would be an officious Starfleet captain, wearing one of those stupid little dresses that made them look like cheap joygirls, beaming down to Priyanapari to dig and pry -

"Your thoughts," she snapped at Kuruth.

"We are as constrained as the Na'kuhl by the presence of the Organian," said Kuruth. "If this Captain Grau is as important to future events as they seem to suggest -"

"Is she a time agent? They suspect there is one present."

"That would be the captain of the USS Leacock, without a doubt," said Kuruth. "Grau is certainly native to this time frame - well, at the moment."

"What do you mean, at the moment?"

"She was translated into the current century by a time portal. Involuntarily, it seems. She is not, herself, a time agent - but her reports, her activity, will be closely monitored by those who are."

"The temporal artifacts will be identified. The Federation will make representations to the Empire - this world will become subject to joint jurisdiction, or it will be closed off, quarantined -" Kirza slammed her fist against the wall. "And with the thrice-damned Organian to protect Grau, there is nothing we can do to prevent this!"

"Perhaps we can attempt some misdirection of our own," said Kuruth. "We can replicate, for example, archaeological trivia - broken mechanisms, art objects, that sort of thing - and salt the Nhandesson site with those -"

"Easily spotted. Too easily. And Grau is Starfleet, she knows that Klingon warriors do not devote themselves to the study of such trivia - Wait." Kirza's eyes narrowed in thought. "The portal. The portal defied our analysis - it would not have opened, except that Thyvesh was curious about us. Easy enough to present that artifact as an incomprehensible enigma."

"True," said Kuruth, "but the other device, the Nhandesson weapon -"

"Is a weapon. Obviously. Well, we Klingons are easily distracted by shiny weapons, or so I am told. Send an engineering party to the Nhandesson weapon." Her eyes were aglow, now. "With transporter tags and pattern enhancers. We will take this obvious weapon. Beam it to our freight hold - and begin work on integrating it with our ship's systems."

Kuruth raised one eyebrow at that. Vulcan blood, Kirza thought, definitely Vulcan blood. "The Na'kuhl may object to that."

"Why should they? They are our allies. But, in case they do -" Kirza bared her teeth. "Instruct our troops to respond to any objections... with appropriate force."

The Last Treason 15

Ronnie

"What the hell happened to her ship?" I ask.

The Leacock is filling my viewscreen, and she looks distinctly different. There are greyish patches on the hull, and along the sweeping blades of the nacelles - and they are outlined with a faintly glimmering, greenish light, which makes me uneasy. I've seen something like that before. But I can't remember where or when, and it bothers me.

"Whatever it is," says Win, poised over the scanner, "it didn't do her any harm - quite the reverse, I think. Her shield power is reading higher than before... there's something odd about the frequencies, though...."

"Hail from the Leacock," Kara Grant interrupts.

"Put it on screen."

The ship's image vanishes, replaced by Carolyn Caird's face. She looks a bit less bouncy, somehow. "Harrier. This is the Leacock. We need tae hae a wee chat."

"What's up?"

"We got jumped by a Klingon battlecruiser near Priyanapari, an' she was way too powerful fer a standard D7. Ye may hae seen th' fireworks."

I shoot a questioning glance at Win. "We did register some energy discharges a little while back," he says. "Too far away to resolve them, though."

"Fireworks don't seem to have done you any harm," I say to Caird.

"Dinnae believe it. We had tae bug oot an' mak' repairs. Plugged in some upgrades, right enough, along th' way. Point is, yon D7 is bad news." She holds up something in her hand - the square shape of a standard data cart. "I hae some upgrade packages here fer ye, they may help if ye need tae tak' on yon Klingon lassie."

I frown. I'm not sure about plugging a set of unknown "upgrades" into my computer systems - and how good can they be, if they're just a software hack? - and besides, there's the obvious factor to consider. "She's not allowed to cause me any trouble," I point out. "Organian treaty."

"Ah'd guess she's on the look oot fer loopholes, there," says Caird. "Ah agree, she'll no' be able tae claim ye're a Xindi warship in front o' th' Organians, but that'll nae be ony consolation fer ye if ye're deid, am Ah right?"

"What loopholes are there? This is a Starfleet ship, for crying out loud."

"Aye, mebbe, but Ah widnae tak' a chance, mysel'." Caird looks genuinely worried. "Ah'll transport this over tae ye, ye can use it if ye have tae. But we need tae -" She stops, and looks off-screen at something.

At the science station, Win Moorcroft suddenly turns around. "I'm reading a massive energy discharge - and a surge in chronitons. Coordinates seven four mark three hundred, range roughly two two four -"

"It's a temporal portal," says Caird, "an' someone's comin' through. Gie me a visual!" she yells at one of her bridge crew.

"Me, too," I tell Win. "On screen. Best magnification you've got."

Caird's face is replaced by a lurching starscape as Win tries to focus on the disturbance. It settles in the centre of the screen; an eye-wrenching funnel of blue-white light, and something emerging from it - long, red, bat-winged and disturbingly organic -

"Na'kuhl battlecruiser." Caird's voice. "Trouble, but we should be able tae tak' her on. But she's no' comin' oor way -"

"Confirmed." T'Pren is Vulcanly imperturbable as always. "Alien vessel is on course for Priyanapari at high impulse speed."

Oh boy. I'm not sure I'm meant to know about the Na'kuhl, but that's the problem with time-travelling bad guys, they tend to show up in the history books when they're not meant to. "Does your software package give me anything that'll handle that beast?" I ask.

"Mebbe. Or mebbe no'. Dinnae chance it."

"Where'd it come from? Or when?"

"That," says Caird's voice, "is a verra interestin' question. Ah'm gettin' really weird parameters from yon temporal portal - it leads somewhere pretty damn peculiar. Ah wonder...."

"Keep on wondering," I say. "In the meantime, I'm going in. Helm. Set course for Priyanapari, maximum impulse. Comms, broadcast our Starfleet ID and diplomatic privileges." Every Starfleet captain has to be able to act as an ambassador, sometimes, and we at least have comms codes to help.

"Whit?" Caird sounds incredulous. "Whit are ye daein', fer Christ's sake?"

"Going in to find out what's going on," I say firmly. "If the Klingons are doing a deal with the Na'kuhl right under our noses, I want to at least see what they're dealing about. The Federation needs a presence in this - whatever's going on. And the Harrier is the only actual Starfleet ship on the spot, so we're going in." I feel the surge of power as the impulse drive kicks in. "If your magic data cart can help, send it. But we're not doing any good stooging around on the perimeter of the system."

There is a blessed silence, for a moment, from the other end of the comms link. Then a grudging voice says, "Aye, mebbe. But ye're puttin' yersel' at risk. OK. Yon data cart should be comin' through yer transporter room. But listen -"

"They already have you pegged as a hostile. Stay out here, do whatever you need to do with that temporal portal." On the screen, the twisty funnel of light has closed already, but Caird must have plenty of sensors and things that will tell her things about where it was and where it went. I hope. "In the meantime, we're going to have a peaceful discussion with our friends the Klingons. And their friends." And with luck, some of us might still be alive at the end of it. "Grau out."

---

The flight doesn't take long. The flight takes a distressingly short time, in fact. It takes long enough, though, for Kara Grant to go down to the transporter room and return with a palm-sized square of yellow plastic, suitable for insertion into the readers in my command chair. I turn it over, pensively, in my fingers, as Priyanapari swells in the viewer.

"Positive fix on the Na'kuhl ship," says Win. "And - I'm reading the Klingon. ID reads as IKS Hov'etlh, but that is not a standard D7's power signature. No way."

"So chalk one up to the wee Scotch lassie," I say, "that's what she told us to expect. Let's start hailing them."

"Go to red alert?" suggests Win.

"No, we shouldn't, we're meant to be peaceful. Yellow. Go to yellow. Maybe with a bit more urgency... orange? Can we do an orange alert?" Win gives me such a look. "Just keep hailing. They've got to answer somehow." They might answer with a barrage of Na'kuhl chronoplasma weapons, of course... well, I'll just have to risk that. "Anyway. We've got our secret weapon, we should be OK."

"Are you going to use that data thing?" Stulk demands.

I give the Tellarite a sly smile. "Our other secret weapon," I say. Stulk looks nonplussed.

"I have a response from the Klingons," says Kara.

"On screen."

A fierce Klingon face appears. "This is Captain Kirza of the Hov'etlh. Starfleet. Your presence is not required here. You are instructed to depart."

"This is Captain Veronika Grau of the USS Harrier," I say cheerfully. "What the heck, call me Ronnie, everyone does. We're on a fact-finding mission in this neutral system, and we'd like to confer with you and your associates, under the terms of the Organian Treaty. That reminds me, we've got an observer aboard who's keen to make sure everyone sticks to that treaty. Clefune, care to show yourself?"

This is going to be so embarrassing if I'm wrong.

But I'm not. There is a breath of wind across the bridge, and a breath of heat, and then light glares, and fades, and the Organian is there. I figured, if he was worried enough to put in a personal appearance, there was no way he'd just pop up once and vanish back to Organia. He has to be under orders to keep an eye on the situation. Whatever it is.

Kirza's face is a picture. Her mouth works, but nothing comes out of it.

"So there we are," I say. "Harrier will make standard orbit in -" I check the readouts "- fifteen minutes, and then we can all have a nice chat about Priyanapari, under the eyes of a neutral and unbiased observer. I'm just itching to know what it is you've found there, myself. See you shortly. Grau out." I cut the channel before Kirza can think of anything to say.

Clefune can, though. "This is unwise," he hisses at me. "Most unwise. Seriously, you have no conception of how unwise this is -"

"Care to explain why?" I ask.

"There are factors -"

"- of which I am unaware," I finish for him. "Some day, I hope I'll find out what those factors are." The Organian glares at me. I really shouldn't make this super-powered energy being mad at me, I suppose.

But if Kirza, and the Na'kuhl, know he's here... even in her souped-up battlecruiser, with the Na'kuhl ship on hand to help, she's still going to think twice about blasting the Harrier out of space. For now, at least, Kirza has to play nice.

For now.

"Well," I say, "if you're not going to explain your factors... I'm just going to have to use my own initiative, aren't I?"

Clefune is just looking miserable, now. I think he wants to say something... but his better judgement is telling him to keep his mouth shut. There is clearly a lot going on that I don't know about. I suppose I should be worried. Then again, if Clefune knows about these unknown factors of his, maybe I should leave the worrying to him.

I have a lot of questions. Maybe, the miserable-looking planet ahead of me has some answers.

"OK, then," I say. "Priyanapari, here we come."

The Last Treason 10

Carolyn

T'Mev stands very straight and correct at the science station. Me, I'm lounging on the command console. Some day, I should just give in and get some chairs fitted on the bridge. T'Mev's face is thoughtful. I imagine mine looks pretty pensive too.

"The Organians," says T'Mev, eventually. "Their involvement was not anticipated, but it makes a certain amount of sense. The inquiries made by their representative have an obvious implication to us, with our perspective. They wished to know whether the Rift entity was directing Captain Grau's actions."

"Aye," I say, "and we cannae tell Ronnie Grau aboot it, either, or she'll be tryin' tae dig that beastie oot o' her heid wi' a spoon."

"More precisely," says T'Mev, "Captain Grau did not become aware of her... infestation... until the Siohonin invasion, so we cannot inform her of it prematurely, now."

"Ah dinnae s'pose the Organians could be ony actual help?. That'd be too much to ask."

"Q was reluctant to engage the Rift entity in direct conflict. The Organians are of a lower order of power than Q - certainly, an individual Organian would be hopelessly outmatched. Nonetheless, we must assume the Organians' attention is on us." T'Mev actually frowns. "It complicates matters."

"Och, like they werenae complicated enough already," I grumble. "Weel, let's hae th' team back in here, we cannae dae onything wi'oot 'em." I hit the intercom, and it squeals, and the bridge crew start filing back in. Zula shoots me a shrewd glance as she heads for her station.

"Right," I say. "Seems we cannae send in the Harrier wi'oot startin' some kind o' dust-up, so we'll be gaein' tae Priyanapari oorsel's, an' we'll be daein' it slow an' careful. Ah ken it's no' mah usual style, but a change is as guid as a rest, am Ah right?"

Muttered assent, or something like it, from around the bridge. "Was there anything in your little confab that mere mortals like us are allowed to know about?" Bood asks acerbically.

"Och, T'Mev's just bein' careful, dinnae fret, laddie." Bood doesn't look entirely convinced, but he moves to the helm without any more commentary, at least. "OK. We'll be gaein' in fer a quick looksie, in an' oot o' th' system at full impulse, nae bother. If the Leacock disnae get ony notice, we'll signal Ronnie Grau tae come in wi' th' Harrier an' dae a proper survey. If we dae get noticed, weel -" I grin "- we'll no' run intae onything th Leacock cannae handle, am Ah right?"

That gets a slightly more enthusiastic mutter of assent. Fact is, the Leacock is a tough enough customer for almost anything. I picture the ship in my mind's eye, slicing through subspace with the sharp blades of her extended nacelles... which look absolutely nothing like the skids of a "giant death toboggan", thank you so much for that mental image, Ronnie Grau.

And then we stop slicing through subspace, and the streaking stars slow down into hard little points of light, and the bright sun of Priyanapari is centred in the viewscreen, with the planet itself a pale greenish dot over to one side.

"Preliminary scans coming through," says Jidsi. Her voice is as lugubrious as her face - she knows her job well enough, I just wish she'd lighten up, once in a while. "Class M environment, no signs of industrialization... some anomalous chroniton traces, some energy signatures I can't get a read on, yet...."

"Weel, Ah'm no' expectin' miracles, here. We'll get mair information when we get a wee bit closer."

"Course laid in. Engaging impulse," says Bood.

And we wait for more information to come in. I really wish it was the Harrier doing this run, not us - if the Na'kuhl are here, the sight of a genuine in-period Starfleet ship might not ring their alarm bells the way the Leacock would. But if something here is already bothering the Organians -

"Jidsi. Whit's that?" A tiny little blip has popped up on the fringe of the tactical display.

"Working on it," says Jidsi. "Power signature... metallic construction...." She frowns. "Consistent with a Klingon design, but the power curves look weird."

"I'm reading a KDF transponder code," Zula chimes in. Her face is set in serious-professional mode. Which I guess is good, for now. "ID reads as IKS Hov'etlh, D7 class battlecruiser... but Commander Jidsi's right, that is not a standard D7's power profile -" She puts her hand to her earpiece. "Getting a hail."

"OK, then. On screen."

A dark brown, grumpy-looking female face appears on the main viewer. In this time period, the genetic plague affecting the Klingons has left them with ridge-free foreheads and messed up the melanin levels in their skin, resulting in some weird-looking complexions. This one looks like she fell asleep in a tanning booth for about six months, and is permanently angry about it. Hot dark eyes glare at me. "Xindi vessel. This is Captain Kirza of the Hov'etlh. Your presence in this star system is unauthorized, and you are ordered to depart, by my authority."

"Och, hello tae ye," I say. "Ah'm Captain Caird o' th' USS Leacock, an' we're jist stoppin' by tae say hello, in accordance wi' th' terms o' th' Organian Peace Treaty. That'll be fine wi' ye, aye?"

Her scowl deepens. "Xindi vessel posing as a Starfleet vessel... with a defective translator circuit," she says, "your presence is unauthorized, and if you do not depart immediately, I will take action to remove you. No further warnings will be given." And she cuts the channel.

"Yon lassie's spoilin' fer a fight," I say. "Xindi vessel, indeed. Dae Ah look like a Xindi-Primate? - OK, dinnae answer that one. Oh, an' red alert." The D7 has gone to full impulse and is racing towards us. "Jings. Just how non-standard is yon D7? A Klink cruiser is nae match fer an Ateleth, am Ah right?"

"Trying to get a solid read," says Jidsi, "but there's a lot of sensor spoofing...."

"Impulse drive is at least twice as hot as normal," says Zula, grim-faced now. "Shield and deflector frequencies closer to Honour Guard standard than a contemporary D7. That ship's been hotwired, heavily."

By our temporal meddlers, no doubt. "Weel, we've had a few improvements put in, aye? Let's see how they work oot fer us. Shields to maximum, all guns coordinate fire, launch fighters." The Klingon ship is approaching weapons range. The battle cry rises unbidden to my lips. "Creag an tuire!"

Virulent green disruptor light stitches itself across the heavens. The Leacock shudders as her Xindi plasmatic batteries open up in response.

The D7 flashes past us, shields flaming under our barrage, disruptor banks sizzling with savage energy. I snap out orders, and Leacock comes about, faster than you'd expect of a ship her size - but not fast enough to track the Hov'etlh with her forward guns. That ship can move.

And she can dish out the damage, too. One of the big Nusuti fighters is gone already, reduced to a random spray of debris; the others are visibly suffering, shields stripped to nothing, hulls scarred by disruptor fire. Our own shields - twenty-fifth century Aegis standard ones - are wavering around forty per cent. The Klingon came in fast and hard on that attack run, and took a savage bite out of us.

"Sensors, gie me a readin'! Will someone please tell me we hurt them as sair as they hurt us?"

"Those are heavy shields she's got," says Zula, "and her speed's so high, our targeting predictors were off. But she's venting plasma, we must have got a good punch in -"

"No!" Jidsi's voice is unusually firm and sharp. "That's not plasma, that's white-hot reaction mass! She's overloading her RCS and coming back for another pass, now!"

"Aw, crivens. Reinforce aft shields, and get a replacement fighter on the rails!"

The Hov'etlh comes about in a tight turn and streaks back towards our aft quadrant. Again, killing light floods the sky.

Leacock rocks and judders, and there is the flash-bang of a transient overload on one of the bridge consoles - and then another, and another. The lean shape of the D7 passes over us, close enough to graze our shields with hers, and then veers sharply to starboard, evading the barrage which erupts from our forward guns. Something glints behind her, a dazzling pinpoint of light -

The concussion knocks us all off our feet, and the lights on the bridge flicker, fail, come back red as the emergency circuits kick in. Overcharged photon torpedo, must have been. I scramble to my feet and try to take stock. The damage control board isn't happy reading.

"Forward shield is down," says Jidsi. "Attempting to reroute.... Klingon is coming about for another pass."

"Target predictors are updated," says Zula. "But that thing has some sort of vulnerability locator -"

"Aye, an' it bluidy weel works," I say, studying the boards, trying to work out which of my shields is least wrecked, and how to put it between me and the Hov'etlh. "If ony've ye hae got any canny ideas, now's when Ah'd love t' hear 'em."

"Setting up for a feedback pulse on the shields," says Jidsi, her fingers flying over her console interface. Fair enough, this is the sort of thing the Aegis systems are meant for... and the Hov'etlh is putting out so much damage, if we can reflect even part of it back at her, it should be enough to do some serious harm to that standard D7 spaceframe. I hope. If we live through it ourselves.

"Targeting predictors have a lock!" yells Zula.

"OK, great." The menacing shape of the Hov'etlh is coming closer, though. "Hang on, lads and lasses, here she comes!"

Disruptors rip at our shields - and lightning bolts flash back, to spark and flame around the D7's hull. And our guns open up again, and this time the Klingon ship's shields glare and waver in the barrage. But the disruptors are still blazing, and I swear I can actually see the dire glow as the Klingon's forward torpedo tube powers up -

WHAM.

The lights go out. I'm holding on to my command console, but my feet have left the floor - but I'm not falling down, because there is no down, the gravity plating has failed. There is no light except from the sparking and popping of burning circuitry. For a moment, I think we're dead. Then some emergency backup comes back on line, somewhere, and dim ruddy lights come on, and weight returns. I stumble and almost fall, pull myself upright -

There is nothing but a storm of static on the main screen. I slam commands into the console. It flickers, displays a burst of gibberish, then clears. I look at the status display. I'd have been better off with the gibberish.

"Penetrating strike in engineering," gasps Bood. "EPS grid is down -"

I can see that. We're dead in the water - unless, somehow, we hurt the Hov'etlh just as bad as she hurt us. "Jidsi! Zula! Get me a read on the Klingon!"

"Got them." Jidsi sounds like she's got a proper excuse for being miserable, now. "Shields are fluctuating, and she's venting warp plasma and atmosphere... but she still has drives, and she's coming about."

And with the EPS grid down, we've got nothing to throw at her but harsh language. I swallow, hard. We are down to one option, and it's not one I wanted to use. But with shields down, another barrage from that Klingon will blast us to shrapnel -

I hit the button, and pray the partitioned systems have held, pray the last-ditch setup works. "Hold tight, everyone! Emergency temporal shift!"

The bridge, and my body with it, wavers and ripples and fills with a colourless light... and then my vision dissolves, replaced by a sensation human beings have no name for, because we were never meant to experience it. The Hov'etlh is whisked away, and the stars whirl and dance about me, and a void opens up inside me and I fall through it. It takes an instant, and it takes forever.

I fall through the void, and I hit bottom. Normal vision comes back. The battered, red-lit bridge clicks back into place around me. The main viewscreen flashes, goes blank for a moment, then comes back with a view of a safe and empty starscape.

"Get a positional fix," I croak. "Time and space coordinates. An' then Ah'll need full damage reports -" I press my fingertips into my forehead. "Casualty lists."

There is a cough - not someone coughing from the smoke, but a sharp, throat-clearing, attention-getting noise. "We need to adjust our plans," says T'Mev. "Urgently."

"Aye," I say, "th' haggis is in the fire fer sure. We've got to get back to the twenty-third century an' warn th' Harrier, fer a start. An' work oot some way t' cope wi' yon Klingon lassie. Because if Ronnie Grau blunders intae yon system like we did - Ah dinnae care how guid she is in a fight, if she mixes it wi' th' Hov'etlh, she'll be gaein' hame in a long box."

"First, we must establish our position and effect immediate repairs," says T'Mev.

"I've got the position part already, sir," Zula interrupts. "We're getting hails from the Virgo -"

"Aye, we were meant t' snap back tae the twenty-fifth century. At least one bit worked," I mutter in sour tones.

"Virgo is offering assistance," Zula continues. "And - they have an urgent update for us. Seems Admiral T'Laihhae and her Suliban contact have gone missing."

The Last Treason 9

The Klingon science camp was little more than a scattering of lean-tos and prefabricated lab modules. Now, under an awning, the Suliban, Thyvesh, reclined in a folding chair as if it were a throne, and sipped replicated raktajino from a plastic mug with the air of a connoisseur savouring a rare vintage.

Kirza's fingers itched for the trigger of her disruptor, and her face was set in a snarl. The expression in Luga's red eyes, though, was avid, and she leaned forward in her chair, eager to catch any word from their - guest.

"What brought you to this world?" the Na'kuhl asked.

"The temporal anomalies offer... certain advantages," said Thyvesh. "The fabric of space-time itself is slightly worn, here - as a result of the Nhandessons' activities, of course."

"The who?" Kirza demanded.

"The original inhabitants of Priyanapari," said Thyvesh.

"We have wondered." Luga licked her lips. "What became of these - these -"

"The Nhandessons? They built a destructive anti-time weapon, and temporal shielding to protect themselves from it. One research project was rather more successful than the other." Thyvesh smiled.

"They... obliterated themselves?" asked Kirza doubtfully.

"All except the weapon itself, and a few nearby buildings whose structure was quantum-entangled with it."

Kirza's scowl deepened. "Then how is it you know their name?" Inwardly, she shivered. Temporal obliteration... would even Gre'thor receive the souls of these Nhandessons, or would they just be... gone?

"Because," said Thyvesh, "it is my business to know these things - to see possibilities, pasts, futures , might-have-beens and never-weres. The temporal fractures on this planet make that easier, of course."

"Your neural structure is pervaded with chronitons," said Luga. She stared at him. "What does it feel like?"

"Ah," said Thyvesh, "if only the language existed that was capable of describing it.... However. Your Klingon associate is clearly restive, so perhaps we should turn our conversation to more practical matters."

Luga shot Kirza a sharp look, and received a glare in return. "Very well," the Na'kuhl said. "Practicalities."

"We both desire changes to the current timestream," said Thyvesh. "Extensive ones. I do not think our goals need be incompatible, though. The elimination of details such as the Federation... we can all agree on that one, I think."

"Formidable, though," said Luga.

Kirza's lip curled. "And why should we believe you can help us?" she demanded. "You step through a door from nowhere with nothing more than the clothes you are wearing -"

"You need to think," said Thyvesh, "about what is on the other side of that door."

"I do not need to think, only to see for myself. It opened for J4 Red, it will open for others. Or do you think we could hire only one skilled technician?"

Thyvesh smiled, a benevolent, tolerant smile. Kirza ached to punch it off his face. "Your technician attracted my attention. The door can only be opened from my side." He tapped one temple with a long finger. "It requires a certain unique insight."

"Which only you possess, of course," said Kirza sourly. "So what is on the other side of the door?"

"Various... projects... that we thought it best to keep in a state of temporal shift. Our enemies can hardly steal things that do not, technically, exist." Thyvesh beamed at Kirza. "I sense that you would welcome more specific information. So. Let me provide you with an example. Do you have such a thing as a data cart about your person?" He reached into a pocket in his tunic and drew out a small device.

Kirza had a data cart in her own pocket - it held reports on the Hov'etlh's spares and consumables, the sort of detail she usually left to her staff. She pulled it out and handed it to Thyvesh with some reluctance. His fingers brushed against hers; they were rough, dry, cool and repulsive to her. "What is this about?" she demanded.

Thyvesh fitted the device onto the data cart, and tapped rapidly on its command interface. Incomprehensible symbols flickered in the air as a holo-display engaged. "Let me put you a question for a question," said the Suliban. "What would happen if you overrode your safeties, opened all the vents on your warp coils, and flooded your warp core with antimatter?"

"My ship would explode," said Kirza. "Obviously."

"Suppose you also speeded up the power cycles on the EPS grid, to transfer the overload out as fast as it could build up?"

"Then my ship would have a prodigious power output," said Kirza, "for the few minutes before she shook herself apart under the strain."

"Suppose you were to synchronize your structural integrity field to the harmonic frequencies of the EPS grid?"

Despite herself, Kirza's eyes widened at that. "Is that even theoretically possible?"

"Oh," said Thyvesh, "warp drive was theoretically impossible, once." He pulled the data cart off the device and flipped it back to Kirza. She caught it by reflex. "Full details are now stored on that data cart. You will want to check it for viruses and so forth, of course - security is always a good habit to have - but, once you have done so, you will find it will quite significantly increase the power output and overall capabilities of your ship. At least six times your current firepower, for instance."

"The coolant for the disruptor banks -"

"A new formulation is included on the cart. You'll find you can fire your disruptors more than adequately."

Kirza stared at the little square shape in her hand. "If this is true -"

"It's true." Thyvesh cocked his head to one side. "You should probably check it out sooner rather than later. I believe we have potentially annoying visitors on their way."

"Hostiles?" Kirza rose to her feet. "We cannot challenge the Federation -"

"But this will not be the Federation, I think," said Thyvesh. "Or, at least, it will look sufficiently unlike the Federation that you will have - plausible deniability, I think is the phrase."

Kirza turned the data cart over and over in her fingers. "I will check this," she said, and left the shelter at a brisk trot.

---

"Klingons," said Thyvesh, as he and Luga watched Kirza go. "Easily placated with nice shiny guns."

"Are you sure about the consequences of this?" Luga asked. "The disruption to the timeline from a significant Klingon weapons advance -"

"I took the liberty of scanning her ship's warp signature, earlier," said Thyvesh. "The software package is rather specific to her ship. I'm sure the Imperial Corps of Engineers will work out how to generalize from it. Eventually. Perhaps in a couple of hundred years."

"Ah." Luga relaxed. "That is probably wise. Best not to introduce any random variations to the time stream, in case the ones we plan do not succeed."

"Yes.... Of course, the changes I hope to make will render the Klingon Empire an amusing irrelevance in the decades to come. I trust you do not object?"

"They are allies of the Federation for much of their history. As such I would welcome their extinction - but I will settle for amusing irrelevance."

"Mmm." Thyvesh sipped his raktajino. "The Federation remains the primary target. If both our species are to flourish as they should."

"We must consult with my superior officer. I warn you, he is not in favour of alliances with other species. He will need persuading - and with more than simple shiny weapons."

"That is only to be expected. Fortunately, I have a great deal more than that to offer." Thyvesh smiled at her.

"So... what is behind your temporal door?"

"The principal research and development efforts of my people. An armamentarium that is by no means to be despised. We were never content simply to accept the gifts of our... future associate, you know. We engaged in quite substantial research on our own account." Thyvesh's smile broadened. "And, of course, if you have studied our history... you know what was always my people's main weapon."

"I... see," said Luga, slowly.

"You must understand why I am so parsimonious with the details, when it comes to your Klingon friend. She would want more than is safe to have. At least, more than is safe for her to have."

"Quite." Luga's face grew pensive. "But we must keep her satisfied, I think. She is, after all, an ally."

"Oh, yes. For the moment." Thyvesh took another sip of raktajino. "You and I both know that nothing is immutable."

The Last Treason 6

Sometimes Chrog reflected on the elegance of the comms system. His transmitter sent a stream of anti-chronitons backwards in time, modulated by his video and audio input... but the response was a simple recording, made by Luga in the twenty-third century, and left in a secure location on the station. He would talk... and, as the anti-chronitons modified the past, Luga would hear his words, and would reply - or would have replied - accordingly.

Just now, though, the comms system was not foremost in his thoughts. "It is a disaster," he snarled into the screen.

"Tell me," said Luga.

"The planet is gone. Replaced by a class three temporal rift. Something went badly wrong in the development of the anti-time weapon. And, worse, it has drawn attention."

"You have the ship. Deal with it."

"Temporal agents are there in force. They have one of ours - a Daemosh-class - and local help in the form of a Romulan adapted battlecruiser. I cannot hazard the Strange Attractor against both of those." He glared at Luga. "I do not like this. The Rom involvement... Romulans are serpents, they are subtle, they know how to strike unseen."

"If they have detected the temporal rift, they may well decide to make a temporal incursion of their own. I must be on my guard." Luga sighed. "The anti-time weapon could detonate at any point in the next century.... Finding the key event now, to prevent the explosion, will be complex and difficult. And K-22 is occupied in this time zone." She glanced over her shoulder. "I do not know how long I can continue to operate here unobserved."

"Your stealth technology is hundreds of years ahead of them!"

"Even so," Luga snapped, "I cannot remain silent and talk to you!"

"Consult your... ally. Find out what might happen. Set procedures in place to prevent the temporal rift from forming." Chrog shook his head. "Even so, their temporal shielding will permit them to know a rift might form. They know Priyanapari is significant, now."

"They must have known that anyway, from timeline analysis. Chrog, I must go."

"Very well." He snapped off the communicator, stood up, and took a deep breath. The air on the abandoned station was thin and stale. He paced moodily up and down, his footsteps echoing in the dimly lit mess hall.

"Something closer," he said aloud, though no one was there to listen. "We must establish a watching station, somewhere close to the planet... we must have stealth systems, enough to prevent detection even in this century...." He shook his head. "Roms. Roms are stealthy, they know cloaking systems... and they are treacherous...."

---

"A massive explosion," Luga said to Kirza. "Enough to destroy the planet completely."

Kirza struck at the air in exasperation. "So?" she demanded. "What are we to do?"

"Whatever we can." Luga's voice held dry amusement. She leaned against the hull of the shuttlecraft and looked out over the valley.

Sloping gently down from the hillside landing pad, a hastily paved track led to the Klingon's science camp, and... the other buildings. The buildings were hexagonal in plan, with small domed roofs, all apparently made of concrete. Black rectangles of doorways gaped in one side of each one.

"I need specifics," Kirza hissed.

Luga looked at her and shook her head. "I have explained this," she said. "We stand at the beginning of a historical process - any action we make, here and now, can have massive ramifications in the years to come. Clearly, something we have done, or not done, has resulted in a catastrophic failure... now that we know this, we can change our plans, and Chrog, from his vantage point in the future, can report on the effects."

"Oh, I understand this," said Kirza. "It is frustrating.We hold the levers of the world in our hands - but we do not know which ones to pull! " She kicked out at a clod of earth.

"Everyone does," said Luga, "The difference is, we know it.... In any case, let us review our plans and see what changes can be made." She straightened up, and began to walk down the pathway. Kirza followed, scowling at the hairless, leathery scalp of the Na'kuhl's head. Useful allies, she thought, but hardly attractive ones....

The sky above them was a clear blue with just a hint of green; the sparse vegetation on the hillside rustled and stirred in a light breeze. Priyanapari was a pleasant enough world... or would be, Kirza thought, if it were not for its secrets. She shot an uneasy look at the nearest of the hexagonal buildings. They still had no idea when those had been built, or by whom. And in two of them -

She lengthened her stride, caught up with the Na'kuhl female. "We decided to concentrate on one of the - artifacts," she said. "The one you said was the anti-time weapon."

Luga glanced sidewise at her. "We did."

"What if you are wrong?"

"I am not." Luga seemed almost amused. "The technology is alien, true, but its purpose is quite clear. To those of us with the right background."

"What if the other one is something we need? Some sort of balance or control mechanism -"

"It is not. I am not so sure what the purpose of the other artifact is, to be honest." Luga stopped. "You think this might be our failed decision point? Normally, when it comes to alien artifacts of indeterminate purpose, it is best to leave them alone."

"You said the planet will be totally destroyed," Kirza snapped. "How could this make things worse?"

Luga's shrivelled lips quirked in a smile. "A valid point," she said. "Very well, then. Perhaps your mercenary security expert might help."

Kirza scowled. "It is about time that the little grub earned his keep."

---

Kingrol hesitated at the entrance to the building. Kirza turned, irritation showing in her face. "What is it now?" she snarled.

"I - my regrets, Captain." Kingrol stepped through the entryway. "It is just -"

"Just what?"

The big Klingon seemed edgy, even nervous; he shifted his weight uneasily from foot to foot. "Several of the crew have reported - odd occurrences - in this building. Objects being moved, if left unattended - even a sensation of, well, of being watched -"

"Foolishness." Kirza strode deeper into the interior of the building, trying to project a confidence she did not altogether feel.

The buildings were empty, hollow - they were single vast empty spaces inside, like hangars. One of them contained the anti-time weapon, a glittering transparent sphere filled with bluish light, mounted on a heavy toroidal base, and wrapped in superconducting wiring whose intricate patterns looked, somehow, wrong to everyone who saw them. The other artifact was a complicated arrangement of metal rods and square plates... complicated indeed, because the angles, again, seemed out of true whenever Kirza looked, as if the whole massive thing was a section of some larger construction, seen at some unguessable angle from the wrong vantage point. It was unnerving.

She would not let it unnerve her. Neither the artifact, nor Kingrol's wild tales. She snapped her fingers. "You. Forwards."

If the artifact disturbed the security consultant, it did not show. The grublike insectoid shuffled into the room and stared up at the labyrinthine mechanism. Kirza repressed a shudder of disgust. The alien, whose name was J4 Red, had proved useful in the past... and now, she hoped, he would prove his worth again. "Get to work," she ordered.

"What do you wish me to do?" J4 Red replied. His huge sad eyes blinked, once.

"Open it up," said Kirza. "It is a device, a mechanism - it must have workings. Expose them, and we can trace them, find out what it does. So, we start by opening it."

J4 Red's antennae twitched. He shuffled forwards to inspect the artifact, then stood for a while, peering up at it. "Possible," he said in mournful tones. "There is something there that looks like it might be an access panel...." He raised one claw, tapped cautiously at a metallic projection. There was no response, only the dull click of the contact.

"Sir." Kingrol stepped back, shot a troubled look at Kirza. "Should we have security precautions in place? I do not question your orders, but -"

But he did not want to meddle with this thing, Kirza thought. It would be easy, very easy, to agree with him... but it would be weakness. This place - the artifact, the planet itself - posed questions, and she would have answers. She would take answers.

J4 Red had shuffled a little closer to the artifact, and all six of his manipulatory limbs were at work, now, probing at rods and panels. He seemed entranced in the task.

"If it bothers you," she said to Kingrol, "I will assign a security detachment to supervise." She composed her face in an arrogant sneer. "I will attend to this now. You, remain here and watch J4 Red while I deal with this." This place made him fearful? Let him face those fears.

She turned on her heel and strode towards the open exit -

She had gone perhaps three paces when actinic light flared all around her, and a blast of sound rang in her ears, and a hot breath of wind pushed her in the back and sent her sprawling to the floor.

She rolled, cursed, got to her feet and span around into a fighting crouch. The artifact -

The artifact was smoking, as if it had just been struck by lightning. J4 Red was smoking, too, was a charred and battered ruin lying lifeless on the floor. Kingrol was down, groaning and moving feebly, his clothing scorched and tattered, his face red with burns. And in the side of the artifact, a door was opening. A man-sized panel, that had not been there before.

The door swung open. Flickering light seemed to crawl around its edges, and a humanoid figure was suddenly framed in the entryway. The figure paused for a moment, then jumped down, to land lightly on the floor beside J4 Red's corpse.

Kirza snarled and reached for her disruptor.

The humanoid turned towards her and reached out - and, though it was easily six metres from her, it reached out and touched her, its arm suddenly elongating enormously, scaly fingers plucking the disruptor from her hand.

"We will get along better without these toys." The humanoid dropped Kirza's disruptor. Behind it, the door swung shut with a clang of heavy finality. "Hmm. Klingon?"

"Who are you?" Kirza snarled. "What are you?" Her eyes were streaming, from the smoke and the aftermath of the flash -

The figure stepped forwards, into the light from the doorway, and one of her questions was answered. Scaly, green skin, with a triple ridge on the brow - Suliban. This one was wearing a tight, form-fitting bodysuit that gave the impression of being military, though there were no visible insignia.

"Klingon," the Suliban repeated. "Well. There is no reason, I suppose, why I cannot work with Klingons. We may yet be useful to one another, you and I." He smiled. "Let us start with some effort at amity, at least. Who am I? My name is Thyvesh."

The Last Treason 3

The scarlet material of the deckplates echoed dully as Chrog paced over them, up and down, over and over again. The bridge of the Strange Attractor was an unnerving place, Luga reflected; blood-coloured and organically formed, like being inside the stomach of some vast animal. No doubt there was some sound psychological reason for the design. She bent her hairless head over the glowing projection dome of her console, reading the data from the time stream.

"It will work," Chrog announced in dramatic tones. He came to a halt and turned to face her.

"Very probably," Luga said. The probability indices from the temporal analysis seemed... unclear, but generally favourable. There was no point troubling her commander with the details, though.

"We shall take that system." Chrog's right hand clenched into a fist. "We shall take it, and it shall be ours. Ours alone. No venal Vorgons, no treacherous Terrans, no supercilious Tuterians to offer their aid and advice.... above all, no renegade Krenim with overcomplicated plans and incomprehensible grievances. The power of Priyanapari will be ours to command, and ours alone." Luga fancied she could see his eyes glowing, even behind their reflective shields. His bold facial markings stood out in the ruddy light of the bridge, as if his head was gripped by a giant claw from behind.

"Whatever the power of Priyanapari might be," she commented.

"What do you mean?" Chrog demanded.

"I mean," said Luga, "that the timelines around that location are significantly convoluted. There has already been at least one intervention... and, in this timeline, it was successful; there is nothing at Priyanapari and very possibly never has been. But there is, or might have been, more. There are branching timelines, complex alternatives.... Whatever is not at Priyanapari, it was worth fighting over. To someone."

"That is the point," said Chrog. "That treasure, whatever it was, will be ours. If it is worth fighting for -"

"To someone," said Luga. "To us, though?"

"It is power, it is potential, and it will be ours," Chrog insisted.

Luga shrugged. "Turning to practicalities," she said, "the system is deserted and useless in this timeline. Any intervention will have to take place significantly in the past, so that the technology - whatever it is - has time to develop and mature."

"How long?" Chrog demanded.

"Ideally, at least two hundred years. The earliest we can reasonably intervene is when the system was first explored in the twenty-third century. That would allow us to reap the benefits -"

Chrog shook his head. "Too long. By the mid-twenty-fifth century, Temporal Investigations was well-established, critical points like Priyanapari would be patrolled, monitored. Two hundred years is too long."

Luga sighed. "Early twenty-fifth, then? In among all the other madcap schemes...."

"Reasonable. Our efforts may well pass undetected, amid all the other confusion."

"Well," said Luga, "if we are to set up - whatever it is - at Priyanapari in the 2200s, and then skip forward to collect the mature technology in the twenty-fifth century, we will need allies."

"I said this project was to be ours -"

"Disposable ones. In the earlier time frame. Unless you plan to stay behind for a few generations to direct the research project? - I thought not."

"We can leave a team -"

"We are too few. Until we can subvert the timeline sufficiently for more of our armada to escape through the time portal. We are only one ship - a strong one, true, but one ship - and we need our crew. No, Commander. We must have local allies to do the tedious work for us."

"Choose appropriately, then. Someone of... significance."

Luga laughed. "That would hardly be appropriate. No. I have selected an ally already - and it is someone of no importance at all, in this timeline."

---

Captain Kirza sat on the command chair of the IKS Hov'etlh and fumed, silently, as the empty stars slid across the screen.

How? How had they done it? She had spent thousands upon thousands of darseks in bribes, had called in old debts of honour, had cajoled and persuaded High Councillors... and all for nothing. The assignment to the frontier sectors - the leadership of a fleet, with all the opportunities for glory and commerce raiding that implied - should have gone to her, but the debate in the Great Hall had turned against her so swiftly -

It was as if that whelp B'Vat and his backers had known her arguments, her tactics, in advance.

And now, glory and profit would be B'Vat's, while she was - Well. It was, certainly, an assignment to a frontier sector. An assignment to the Federation frontier, where the thrice-damned Organians were watching forever, waiting for some violation of their accursed peace treaty. She had command of a warship... that might be disabled in a trice, if she ever dared use any of its weapons.

She leaned back in the command chair, and rubbed her smooth forehead. B'Vat had said something, once, too, about undoing the genetic plague.... Well, perhaps the whelp could manage that, too: nothing seemed to be beyond him. "Status?" she demanded. For form's sake only. Nothing would happen here.

"Cruising at warp five," her exec Kingrol reported. "All ship systems nominal. Nothing on sensors -" He frowned. "Wait."

Kirza turned towards him. "What is it?" she snapped.

"I am... not sure." He touched the controls on his sensor console. "There is an energy surge - coordinates four seven by eight two. I - do not recognize these readings -"

"Show me," snarled Kirza. "On screen."

The main viewscreen flickered and changed. Kirza's eyes widened. In the centre of the screen was a disc of blue-white fire... no, not a disc, Kirza thought, but a hollow mouth, the round opening to a cavern - but a cavern that led off in some direction that made no sense, that made her eyes hurt to look at it....

And something was coming out of it.

"Maximum alert! Battle stations!"

The thing was vast and red, a bat-winged nightmare of a ship - if that disturbingly organic shape was a ship at all. It turned its sharp prow towards her. Behind it, the blue-white fires of the impossible portal dwindled to a point, flared, and vanished.

Kirza's lips pulled back from her teeth. "What is that thing?"

"Readings are coming in," said Kingrol. "Powered object - a starship - a very big starship. No match for its configuration in our data files. Power levels are -" He swallowed loudly. "That cannot be right!"

"Tell me what it is!" Kirza roared. "I will decide what is right!"

The ship lurched. Kingrol saved himself from falling by clutching the console. "At least six times our warp core output! They have locked on a tractor beam -"

"Sir!" A shout from a young lieutenant at communications. "Hail from the alien vessel!"

"They wish to talk, do they?" Kirza settled herself in the command chair. "Sensors! Find me a weak point in that thing, something we can hit - And, meanwhile, let us parley. On screen."

At least six times the power of her D7 battlecruiser. She would not let that cow her. She would not.

The face that now appeared on the screen did nothing to quell her disquiet. It was hollow-cheeked and leathery-skinned, with burning red eyes, and markings that ran down from them like trails of dried blood. After a moment's thought, Kirza decided it was a female... probably. The near-lipless mouth opened.

"Captain Kirza. Honour to you and your House. My name is Luga, and I am speaking to you from the bridge of the NV Strange Attractor. I have a proposal for you - one which will be to our mutual advantage."