Vectors 29

Nessick's antennae twitched with pleasure as he set the last datapad down on the neat stack. Soon, very soon, he would be back among his own people... and soon after that, they would be on their way to loose the new weapon against the Borg.

He looked around the cluttered laboratory, considering. Time to blank the computers? It scarcely seemed worthwhile... the listening post was still providing valuable information, it might be useful in the future. If Tuarak did not destroy it in a fit of pique, when he returned to find it empty. Nessick shrugged. He was not going to miss Tuarak.

A discreet chime sounded from one console. He turned towards it, touched the controls. "Nessick," he said.

"This is battlecruiser 219-67-C," a voice replied. "Approaching for pickup."

Nessick sighed inwardly. The ship had a name, there was really little point in being so guarded on a secure channel... but, there was no use arguing. "ETA?" he asked.

"Sixteen minutes."

"Excellent, excellent. I will transmit the schematics now, and you may transport the specimen of the device once you enter range... but, I think it is preferable if you dock and I transfer the protomatter fuel by hand. One does not wish to take chances with such a volatile substance."

"Best not to risk the transporter," the voice agreed.

"Quite, quite." Nessick slotted a datapad into the console, tapped out a sequence of commands. "Schematics transmitting over your data channel now. We have a location for a first strike?"

"We have identified a Borg communications node. It is not strongly guarded - we will infiltrate, and proceed along the lines you have described."

"Yes," said Nessick. "Yes, that should prove most satisfactory. How long to reach the node?"

"A matter of - " The voice broke off. Nessick frowned.

"Battlecruiser. Battlecruiser, respond, please," he said urgently.

A long pause, then the voice came back. "We have sensor contacts inbound."

Nessick hurried to another console. "I have tactical telemetry and will transmit," he called out.

"Two inbound. Identifying now -" The voice cut out, abruptly, with a discordant squawk of sound. Nessick muttered under his breath. He keyed in urgent commands on the tactical console.

The display formed as a spray of random visual noise at first, signatures of every scrap of solid matter or energized plasma in the nebula. Then it steadied, and the computer assigned identifications to the objects on scan - and Nessick groaned aloud.

The Octanti battlecruiser was crippled already, warp drive wrecked, shields down, escape pods spitting from its hull. Some short distance away, two sleek elegant shapes were still pounding at the cruiser with white-gold flashes of corrosive plasma fire. Hazari. Nessick's mind raced. Of course, he had had dealings with the Hazari - he had had dealings with half the powers of the Delta Quadrant, it was part of his role - but how had the Hazari come to him, now, like this?

Not just Hazari, he thought, but hostile Hazari. And there was only one reason why the Hazari might be hostile to him.... Somehow, Tuarak must have let something slip, and now Ge'Sirn was here. Nessick was thinking faster than he had ever thought in his life, and the conclusions he was reaching... appalled him.

But there was no help for it. Nessick turned his attention to another console, where a communications icon was flashing urgently. He touched the control. "Nessick," he said.

"This is Ge'Sirn," the Hazari's voice answered. "You've got something of mine. I want it back."

Nessick's hands moved on the control panel. Status lights blinked on and off, changing. Several rooms away, the constant humming of a force field abruptly stopped.

"You have damaged one of our cruisers. Please assure me that you are doing everything in your power to rescue my compatriots from their escape pods. We Octanti are so few in number -"

"They'll keep," Ge'Sirn's voice snarled. "Or, if they don't, what the hell do I care? I want the actualizer. Now."

"You do not have schematics for it? Careless of you, most careless."

"I need the protomatter. And I don't want you to have it. Now transport it, or I open fire."

"No, no," said Nessick, "you will not do that, because if you do, the protomatter may be destroyed in the barrage. Indeed, I am quite certain that it would be destroyed. I am in a position to make sure of that, you see."

There was a brief pause, then Ge'Sirn said, "Then I'll board your station and get it."

"Will you, now?" Nessick knew he had to choose his words carefully. "My station is not large, but it is... complex. I know it well, and you do not. You would have to search a long time to find all my hiding places, a long time indeed."

Another pause. "You've got transporter inhibitors engaged,"said Ge'Sirn. "OK, so I can't beam troops onto your station. But there's nothing stopping me doing a straightforward board and storm. In force. I will flood your little rathole with troops, and there's nothing you can do about it. You better be waiting at the airlock for me, with the protomatter in your hands, because that is the only way you stand even a chance of surviving this, you treacherous little -"

"Yes, yes, you make your point forcefully," said Nessick, "but, nonetheless, I do not think I shall comply." And he cut the channel before Ge'Sirn could answer.

He peered vaguely about the room. He had to be very sure he knew where everything was, now, and there was much to do. The clock was ticking. Two clocks were ticking.

---

The indicators on the airlock extension glowed green. Hard seal. Ge'Sirn smiled grimly.

The door slid open, revealing a docking hatch. It was one of several such dotted about the crazy little conglomeration of modules that was Nessick's listening post. Right now, N'Drask would be connecting up to a similar one, somewhere a couple of hundred metres above and to Ge'Sirn's right - if he had the plan of the station clear in his head.

"Checks out OK," his science officer said, beside him. "Locked, but I think I can get a standard override through the control bus. No radiation or toxins on the other side, either, at least not that I can scan -"

"He won't poison his own breathing air," growled Ge'Sirn. "Let's have it open, then."

"You sure? I mean, this is only a basic unit, and he's got some sort of sensor spoofing going on in there -"

"Open it." The Octanti wanted to hide himself, so much was obvious. Ge'Sirn's grim smile broadened. He couldn't hide from this force.

"All right," he said, turning to face his crew. "We are going in as soon as the doors are open, we will set up a secure perimeter in the space beyond this lock. Looks like some sort of receiving area for cargo, and it communicates with the docking port N'Drask's on. Once we've linked up with N'Drask, we cut the ships loose with a skeleton crew so Nessick can't slip past us and get aboard. Then we sweep this place, section by section, corridor by corridor, room by room."

"Till we find him?" someone asked.

"We find him, or we find his damned transporter inhibitors or whatever sensor jammers he's got out. Take those out, and finding him gets a lot easier. Or we can just find the protomatter, take that, and blow the whole station on our way out. I'm easy."

There were muttered grumbles of assent from the ranks. "OK, then," said Ge'Sirn.

"Door's opening," the science officer said.

The hatch swung inwards, revealing the barren metal chamber of an airlock beyond, another hatch in the wall ahead. Ge'Sirn stepped through, armed troopers crowding after him. "Think that inner hatch is locked on a separate circuit," the science officer called out. "Opening now."

The inner hatch opened, and Ge'Sirn saw - a wall, beyond it. A metal barrier, a simple barricade. Useless. He raised the stubby corrosive-plasma gun in his hands, took aim, fired. The metal burned away in white-hot, flaming droplets. Ge'Sirn kept firing until the barrier was comprehensively destroyed. He waited a while before leading the way over the hot, smouldering deckplates.

The receiving area was a vast empty space, loading gear stacked neatly against the far wall. The Hazari troops formed up, weapons ready, their eyes vigilant. Ge'Sirn looked about him. There was no movement in the room -

He frowned. Was there a voice, though? He thought he could hear some kind of voice - somewhere, at the edge of hearing -

There was a very definite boom and crash from somewhere close at hand. He looked up. A catwalk crossed the room, a little below the vaulted ceiling, and N'Drask was on the walkway now, leading his own crewmen into the station. "He blocked the damn door!" he called to Ge'Sirn in aggrieved tones.

Ge'Sirn looked round again, spotted a ladder up to the catwalk, gestured to N'Drask to take it. He was charting the exit points from the loading area in his mind's eye. The station was complicated - but it was not so large, after all. They would keep this room secured as a base, and spread out slowly -

"Told my ship to stand off," N'Drask said as he joined Ge'Sirn.

"Me, too." Ge'Sirn glanced at the science officer, who nodded. "OK. So there's just us, until we get the transporter inhibitors down." He looked at his own crew, and at N'Drask's. "Think we've got enough here to deal with one Octanti."

"Damn sure we have," said N'Drask. "Though I guess all we want's the protomatter, right?"

"And I don't want Nessick to have the designs for the actualizer," said Ge'Sirn.

"Yeah," said N'Drask, "but by now he'll have looked it over, he'll have some idea how it works -"

Ge'Sirn lifted the plasma gun in his hands, looked at it pointedly. "So he will."

There was a pause, during which he could hear N'Drask gulp. "All right, then," N'Drask said, reluctantly.

"Just so long as we're clear on that," Ge'Sirn said. He frowned. He still couldn't shake the feeling that someone was whispering.

"I've got some idea of the layout," N'Drask said. "He had to be talking to us from some control centre, right? Now, there's a bunch of modules with serious electronic hardware in them -"

He stopped. Ge'Sirn was looking straight past him, at something else. An intercom panel on the wall. A panel with an alert light flashing.

Ge'Sirn strode over to the panel, flipped the switch. "This better be surrender," he said.

"Ah, regrettably, no," Nessick's voice replied. "I just wanted - well, I suppose, I wanted to see how things were progressing. And to apologize. I do regret, I most deeply regret, what I have been forced to do. But you left me no choice. No choice at all."

"Where are you?" Ge'Sirn demanded. Nessick's voice had sounded strange and faint, over the rising buzzing in his ears.

"Ah, I am on my way to take control," said Nessick.

"Control of what?"

"Oh, this situation. And your ships. You should not judge all Octanti by the standards of an academic like myself. The survivors from the battlecruiser are spacewalking to your destroyers now. They are highly competent soldiers, they will easily overwhelm the few of your crew left aboard."

"Like hell! They won't have time to take control of the systems before I knock down your transporter inhibitors, and once my crew get back aboard -"

"That will not happen," said Nessick. "It is something, as I say, that I regret bitterly. But it had to be done. I wonder, what sensory cues have you been perceiving? I understand that some people feel a tingling in the flesh, or smell strange odours, but the most common sign of infection is an auditory one. Have you been hearing anything, Ge'Sirn? Voices, perhaps?"

He was hearing voices. A torrent of voices, growing louder and louder -

"I monitored many sources of information." Nessick's voice was fading in the rising storm. "I even had some devices of our most deadly enemy. Working with those, now, required precautions, many precautions. I have disabled those precautions, especially for you. I repeat, I do regret this, most sincerely, most sincerely indeed. I would not willingly have given even one living soul over to them -"

Ge'Sirn was no longer listening. His face was turned towards N'Drask, and it was growing pale, not with shock or any emotion, but as part of the process, the process which was making dark lines of circuitry spread under suddenly pallid skin, was drowning his own consciousness in the roar of a billion voices in his head -

The being that had been Ge'Sirn faced the one that had been N'Drask, and they spoke in unison.

"We are the Borg."

Vectors 26

Nessick's listening post was a haphazard collection of domes and modules clinging to the side of an asteroid in interstellar space. The docking tube extended like a spidery limb from its side towards the Bereit.

Nessick met Tuarak in the docking tube, watching as Vaadwaur crewmen manhandled the actualizer on its AG float pallet towards the post. At first, the Octanti scientist barely glanced at the Vaadwaur commander, but then he turned and studied Tuarak more closely.

"Things did not go entirely to plan, then, I see," he said.

Tuarak turned to glare at him. One side of the Vaadwaur's face was streaked with fresh scars, stretching from cheekbone to jawline. "Not entirely," he snarled.

"I have dermal regenerators, if your own medical supplies are insufficient -"

"No," Tuarak spat. "I will have this dealt with, but only once I have the pelt of the animal who did this in my quarters for a rug."

"Quite so, quite so," murmured Nessick. He nodded in the direction of the actualizer. "That is undamaged, though?"

"It is. I do not entirely trust its protomatter components, not enough to subject them to the transporter beam, at least. But the device was captured intact, and has remained so."

"Protomatter, yes, that requires careful handling." Nessick turned to stroll along behind the float pallet, ignoring the Vaadwaur crewmen who looked daggers at him as they laboured. "Substantial, substantial," he muttered. "Too substantial to be a mere component of the whole... a complete system in itself. Yes, you have done well, well. This will repay careful study."

"Oh, I am relieved to hear it," said Tuarak.

"You are angry," said Nessick. "Yes, I can understand that. It is irksome when things do not go to plan. You did not capture the Hazari himself? The maker of the device?"

"Not yet." Tuarak glowered. "That one offended me. Once I have him, make sure you have all that you need from him, because he will not outlive his usefulness."

"He offended you? Unwise of him, most unwise. He may not prove necessary at all. That device is complete, I may well be able to ascertain its workings without his assistance. I should make certain of this, though, before you exact your vengeance.... Well, let us proceed, first, to the isolation laboratory. Protomatter, yes. It requires careful handling."

"Direct my crewmen as you see fit," said Tuarak. The Vaadwaur crewmen looked sullen, but voiced no complaint. "I have other matters to attend to. Many other matters." He turned abruptly, his long coat swishing around his legs, and stalked off down the docking tube, back to the Bereit.

Nessick watched him go, and shook his head. "He is angry. Well, well, I suppose it is only to be expected." He turned back to the glowering Vaadwaur crewmen. "The isolation laboratory is not far. Then you may rest, while I labour. I hope we will achieve something that will lighten his mood, no?"

---

The situation aboard the Bereit was chaotic. Work crews were swarming through the corridors, clearing debris and repairing damage. The air was heavy with the smell of hot metal. Tuarak stalked across decks illuminated only by the glare of welding torches, and none of his crew dared speak to him.

He went first to the bridge, received the report of the watch officer with a silent glare, and retreated to his ready room, sealing the door behind him.

It was some hours later when Sarn walked up to the closed door, took a deep breath, and rapped sharply on the metal. For a moment, there was no response, and then the intercom clicked on and Tuarak's voice said, "Who is that?"

"Sarn, sir. I have reports for you."

Tuarak said nothing more, but the door unsealed with a clank and a hiss. Sarn squared his shoulders and stepped through.

Tuarak was sitting behind his desk, a litter of datapads spread out before him. Sarn stepped up to the desk, cleared his throat, and stood at attention. Tuarak looked up at him through bloodshot eyes. "Well?" he said.

"Repairs to the drives are completed. All hull breaches have been sealed, and the armour brought back up to combat standard. The Bereit is spaceworthy once more. But, sir -"

"But what?"

Sarn swallowed. "As your executive officer, sir, it is my duty to report my concerns to you -"

"Concerns," said Tuarak. "What concerns?"

"Our supplies of spares have been seriously reduced, below establishment minimum in many cases. Sir, we must acquire more replacements, and urgently."

"It will be attended to," said Tuarak.

"Sir, we do not have authority to indent for repairs at the Supremacy's shipyards -"

"It will be attended to," Tuarak repeated. "Nessick will earn his keep by replenishing our stocks."

"Yes, sir." The Octanti's own supplies were irregular and unreliable, Sarn reflected bleakly. Now was evidently not the time to mention that, though. "There is another matter, sir."

Tuarak growled, deep in his throat. "Well?"

"Casualties, sir. We have suffered substantial losses. Three engineering compartments were breached to space in the battle, with no survivors from their complements. Troop shuttle two was shot down by the Hazari, also a total loss. And... the ground battle did not go according to plan. Several of our units were not able to evacuate their deployment areas before the railgun barrage hit them. Friendly fire casualties, sir. It... affects morale."

"Oh, they are unhappy, are they?" said Tuarak. "They are not alone in that. You are my executive officer, the minutiae of discipline are your preserve. Deal with it."

"It would be useful to know, sir, if we can expect crew replacements." Tuarak's brows gathered in a frown. "From the viewpoint of maintaining order and discipline, sir."

"We can expect nothing from the Supremacy military," said Tuarak. "But there are many Vaadwaur, now, who have become detached from their original units...."

"Dregs and deserters, sir!"

"They can redeem themselves in my service. We shall make Nessick work for us, again, there - he hears news of such groups. Vaadwaur, selling themselves as mercenaries to the lesser species...." Tuarak shook his head. "It is positively our duty to reclaim them."

"Standing orders from the Supremacy are that deserters are to be returned to central authority -"

"The Supremacy has cut me loose, Sarn. Me. They have chosen to treat me like that - Well. For this purpose, my authority is central enough. I doubt you will find the deserters disposed to argue on this score."

"No, sir." Sarn's expression was carefully blank.

"Well, then. If that is all -"

The communicator on Tuarak's desk buzzed. Tuarak glared at it. He jabbed at the intercom button and snarled, "What is it?"

"Sir." The communications officer's voice was nervous. "I have Nessick on comms - he wants to speak with you -"

Tuarak sighed. "Put him through."

There was an audible click, and then the Octanti's voice said, "Tuarak? Tuarak, are you there? Tuarak?"

"Speak," said Tuarak.

"Ah, you are there, good, good. The device. Yes. I am greatly afraid that there is a problem."

"A problem," said Tuarak. His hand clenched on the edge of the desk. "I do not need any more problems, Nessick."

"No, no, quite. No more do I. But the device - I have made a certain amount of headway with it, to be sure, but several of the functions cannot be accessed without both a deciphering key and a biometric signature. The Hazari's, presumably. Yes, yes, I can think of no other explanation. The Hazari, Ge'Sirn. We will require him, after all. It is regrettable, I know -"

"No," said Tuarak. "I would have sought him out in due course, anyway. I have plans for Ge'Sirn - So. I must advance my timetable. Very well."

"I shall provide you with all the current data concerning the Alphans and the Hazari -"

"Do so. Begin the data dowload to my ship now." Tuarak turned his gaze on Sarn. "We are spaceworthy, you say?"

"Yes, sir, but -"

"But nothing." Tuarak stood. "We have the measure of the Alphans - and Ge'Sirn is nothing without his device. Alert the crew, Sarn. We hunt."

---

From an observation cupola some distance above the main laboratory, Nessick watched the interdictor cruiser as it pulled away from the asteroid. His eyes tracked it steadily as it dwindled among the stars, marked the flash as it jumped to warp speed.

"Satisfactory," he said to himself, "most satisfactory."

He left the cupola and made his way down a number of ramps and accessways, along a number of corridors, until he came to a sealed door. He studied it pensively for a while, calling the access code back to mind. It had been some time, he reflected, since he had last used this facility....

He tapped in the code on the keypad, nodded with satisfaction when the door swished open.

Beyond it was a small room, dominated by a communications console with one seat before it. Nessick slid into the seat, touched a biometric ID pad, waited as the console sprang to life.

"This is Nessick at facility 2387-Delta," he said, and a greenish glow within the console showed that his words were heard. "I have acquired a new technology, and it shows promise. I have a plan to deploy it against the Borg. Requesting, now, the following support measures -"

Vectors 16

The man in the chair was Kadirian, and he was shackled to it, his arms chained behind his back, his feet in fetters. He was staring in utmost horror at an identical chair, in which another man was confined. A short while ago, that man had been identical, too. Now, he was so no longer.

"The holo-simulation is really exceptionally detailed," Tuarak purred, "and that, of course, affords us all sorts of possibilities." He stalked over to the second man. "As a basis, of course, we used the advanced stages of the Vidiian Phage, but that was only the start of our simulations. We added Mendaran spotted plague, Shukalian leprosy, and an interesting one from the Alpha Quadrant, a thing called yaws. The results - well, you may see for yourself." He smiled. "Now, you may ask, after the loss of his vocal tract and most of his hands, was there any point in our continuing the interrogation? And the answer is yes, for two reasons. Firstly, it still provided data which my colleague here -" he nodded towards Nessick, who was bent over the controls for the holo-projector, in the corner of the laboratory "- is using for his researches. Secondly, and much more importantly, it entertained me. I find interrogations very tedious - all this refusal to answer questions, all this repeating of 'I don't know', it is really so dull - so I positively need my little indulgences, now and again."

He crossed the room with three quick strides, to stand by the unharmed Kadirian. "I think, my poor friend, they made you too well. Oh, yes, your survey missions, they demand ingenuity, they demand flexibility, they require the use of self-aware holograms such as you. But, to give your simulation the ability to feel so much pain, to be corrupted to such an extent -" He shook his head in mock sorrow. "I inflict the pain, but your creators gave you the capacity to feel it. So who is the worse monster? Me, or them?" He bent down to whisper in the hologram's ear, "The correct answer, of course, is me."

He straightened up. "You should feel proud, you know. You endured -" he waved a hand at the disfigured shape in the other chair "- all of that. You held out, you did not talk. Such courage, such fortitude, I cannot help but salute it. - Of course, it means that my friend and I must be even more creative this time around. And if you still persist in obdurate silence, we will simply restore you from the backups and start again. Until you talk, or some version of you talks. Or until my colleague obtains enough data to decompile and deconstruct your holo-matrix, and thus obtain access to everything you know. I imagine that will be inexpressibly painful for you, like being dissected from within." He bent down and grinned into the captive's face. "You will let me know how much it hurts, won't you?"

The hologram's eyes were wide open, bulging with fear. Finally, he found his voice. "What do you want?" he whispered.

"And so, it begins," said Tuarak. "Every time, it starts the same way, with an apparent effort at intelligent cooperation. You are so predictable. I suppose it is the result of your programming." He rose to his full height and glowered down. "What did you do to the Kobali?"

The hologram struggled against his bonds. "We spoke with them! We discussed the biome of the colony world!"

"Try again," Tuarak snarled. "After you spoke to them, they died. Does that happen with everyone you speak to?"

"They died?"

Tuarak sighed. "Yes, for - what is it, the fifth time now? - they died. Five times. The four previous versions of you have exhausted my patience, but not my ingenuity."

"Ah." Nessick spoke up, unexpectedly, from the projector controls. "That is interesting. You appear to have triggered a new decision tree in its subroutines."

"Oh," said Tuarak, "how fascinating, I am gratified."

"You should be. You should be. It means that the hologram is motivated to explore new thought processes, in response to your questions," the Octanti scientist said.

"You mean, I may get some new answers?" Tuarak smiled. "Well, then, that is good news. So, then," he said, turning back to the hologram. "My friend says you are racking your imaginary brains, trying to come up with answers for me. Let me hear them."

"I -" The hologram swallowed. "If the Kobali were - were killed - it would have been a policy decision - not something for us - the organics would have made that decision, you should question them -"

"We did," said Tuarak. "They proved intransigent. Intransigent and fragile, an unhappy combination. Try again."

"I don't know!" the hologram wailed.

"And here we go again," said Tuarak. "Let me try to phrase things in words of few syllables. You spoke with the Kobali. The Kobali died. Does this happen with everyone? Answer, yes or no."

"No. No, of course not, we -"

"No. Very well. What was different about the Kobali?"

"Only - only that they were Kobali, and not Nafsadians, or Talaxians, or Kezzkreen, or -"

"Oh, do not give me a complete list," said Tuarak. "One or other of us would not survive to the end of it, believe me. Were there any variations in your procedures? Did you do anything differently?"

"Ah," said Nessick again. "Another spike in the data analysis subroutine activity. You have touched another nerve."

"Not literally," said Tuarak, "not yet. - So. You did something differently. What was it?"

"We, ah, we used a secondary actualizer."

"A what?"

"On the probe. We used a secondary actualizer to increase our range and physical persistence. It is a new device, we got it from our Hazari escort. It amplifies the holo-matrix - I do not know if you have the technical background to follow the details -"

"I do," said Nessick. "Intriguing. We must talk about this, from a purely scientific and theoretical point of view."

"Yes, you must," said Tuarak, "any time I am at least a parsec away. This secondary actualizer, where is it now?"

"It was - we integrated one with the probe's circuitry, and also with the ship's projector system -"

"Interesting, interesting," said Nessick. "Tuarak, did you not say that the security holograms were resistant to the EMP grenades you used?"

"They - they were distorted, incapacitated, but not destroyed by the first one I threw, certainly," said Tuarak. "I ascribed that to exaggeration on the part of the Hierarchy salesperson who instructed me on their use - Are you suggesting that the security holos were reinforced by this - gadget?"

"A secondary actualizer. Something that makes holograms more real. Intriguing, intriguing. Where are your records of this device?" Nessick asked. "I do not recall seeing anything in the computer logs we downloaded."

"We, ah." Somehow, the hologram looked embarrassed. "We did not discuss it with - with the organic crew. The Hazari approached us. It affected us primarily, after all -"

"I think I understand," said Nessick. He touched the controls of the holo-projector, and the hologram froze into sudden immobility.

"I put it on pause," said Nessick. "So that you and I can discuss, without interruption... and we can unfreeze it as we go, if we need any more questions answered."

"I think we need many more questions answered," snapped Tuarak. "How could this device affect the Kobali colonists, for instance?"

"Ah," said Nessick, "there, I have already formulated a hypothesis. Yes. But we will need the device itself to confirm my suspicions.... It was an error, I am afraid, to destroy the Kadirian ship after you had taken the prisoners and the downloads."

"I did not want to leave forensic traces for the busybodies of the Benthans or the Alphans to find," said Tuarak. "Besides, Kadirian technology is not worth keeping."

"Usually, no, I concur. But in this case.... We need a copy of this secondary actualizer."

"Well, that should be easy enough to obtain. My sensor log will identify the Hazari escort, I will approach them, and I will - negotiate."

"As you say, as you say. I would advise peaceful negotiations, to begin with. The device might be destroyed in crossfire, otherwise -" Nessick glanced to one side, and stopped speaking. He walked to the wall of the laboratory, peered through the small circle of a viewport.

"There one goes again," he said in peevish, complaining tones. "I wish you had cleaned them up properly."

Tuarak crossed the laboratory floor to stand by the Octanti, to look out on the contorted, frozen form of a Kadirian, drifting in the vacuum beyond. He snorted. "If only we had known that those organic ones had no clue," he said. "It would have saved time."

"They are making my station look untidy," Nessick grumbled.

"Oh, very well, I will detail some defaulters to clear them away and incinerate them," said Tuarak. "While we make my ship ready - for the hunt."

Vectors 5

"You and I," Nessick said, "need each other."

Tuarak leaned back in his seat and regarded the Octanti from behind half-closed eyes. The man was edgy, agitated, pacing back and forth across the small laboratory with rapid steps. Unreliable, Tuarak thought. Definitely, unreliable.

Aloud, he said, "I am not accustomed to the idea of needing any of the lesser species."

Nessick whirled and stabbed an accusing finger at Tuarak, the antennae beside his nasal ridges quivering with emotion. "You need me," he hissed. "You need my scientific knowledge, the intelligence you gain from this listening post. Without me, what are you? What is your standing now in the Vaadwaur Supremacy? Well?"

"My... difficulties... within the Supremacy will be smoothed over, in time," said Tuarak. "I was not to know that my commanding officer was infested with one of those - creatures."

"Do you think any of your rivals cares what you did or did not know? Your name is mud among the Vaadwaur - among what remains of the Vaadwaur."

The folds beside Tuarak's throat flushed and engorged with blood as anger rose within him. "Have a care, Octanti."

"You will not kill me while you need me. And you need me. Unless you have a bluegill in you, now, to tell you how to operate my equipment? No? I thought not."

That a former Overseer of the Supremacy should have to tolerate this! - But Tuarak forced himself to swallow his anger. The damnable Octanti scientist was right... whatever influence Tuarak could gain, now, it came from the intelligence provided by Nessick's listening post.

"Very well," he ground out. "We need each other. As you say."

"As I say. As I say." Nessick resumed his nervous pacing. There was barely room to pace, among the litter of technology that filled the laboratory - Tuarak was no expert, but he recognized Hazari subspace transceivers, Hierarchy computers, among consoles and devices from worlds and cultures he had no names for. There was even, behind a constantly humming force shield, a green-glowing mass of wires and tubing that could only be a Borg device. "You need me. And I need you. This place -" he waved a hand to encompass it all "- is our ears and eyes. Your interdictor cruiser is our hands and our feet. We need both together -" he brought his hands together and interlaced his fingers "- if we are to accomplish anything."

"Accomplish what?" said Tuarak. "A little information gathering, some light commerce raiding - enough to keep my crew from outright mutiny, I grant you, but hardly what I need to regain my rightful place in the Supremacy. What are we accomplishing, Octanti?"

"We need a coup," Nessick said. "We need something big - something that will serve both our ends. You need to restore your standing. I need... something similar. A weapon against the damnable Borg."

The Octanti obsession: Tuarak sighed inwardly. But weapons... weapons were always useful. "And have you found something?"

"Perhaps... possibly... perhaps." Nessick turned to a sleek console, one whose design Tuarak didn't recognize. "They do not know I have this, yet," the Octanti almost crooned. "Until they do, and Delta Command updates its encryption protocols... until they do, I have ears to hear the Alpha Quadrant's incursion forces. A Klingon ship responded to a distress call - a Kobali colony. Too late. All were dead."

"Oh, those poor people, my heart bleeds," said Tuarak. "Who cares if the Kobali ghouls die, again?"

"Not I, certainly," said Nessick. "But the Klingon ship's commander is evidently baffled - has no idea what they died of. And Klingons are familiar with many kinds of death. One that they do not know - well." The Octanti half-smiled. "I think it is a situation that would repay careful study."