Hell's Heart (8 page)

Thirteen

A
s Valandris expected, resistance had stiffened as her ship's site-to-site transporter delivered her and Tharas from one
Enterprise
transporter room to the next. They were one team of several, but they had made short work of their primary and secondary targets and were working on the tertiary now.

As with the Orions, the Federation had been surprised by their transporter technology. Like everything else used on their mission, it had been a gift from the Fallen Lord, who in his wisdom had seen the power it would grant them. And he had also told them how and where to strike
Enterprise
, from inside and outside, so as to render the ship unable to aid those on Gamaral for a few minutes. That was all the time they needed.

But the Fallen Lord had also demanded that the Federation casualties be kept to a minimum. That had made no sense to Valandris, but while her leader's ways were often inscrutable, she had not found a reason to doubt him. Tharas had slipped earlier, incinerating an attacker in self-defense, but she had not killed so far.

Not that the Starfleeters weren't offering up temptations. Phaser fire blazed in anew from outside the doorway. There was little cover to be found in a Starfleet transporter room, and while Valandris's armor had dispersed the energy from the shots she'd taken, it wouldn't protect her from a barrage. Valandris fired her disruptor rifle at the deck and walls of the hallway repeatedly, clearing the aperture long enough for her to see one of her attackers peeking out from cover.

It was that woman again. Valandris didn't know enough to tell whether she was human or Vulcan, but she was definitely
tenacious. She was the one who had shot at Valandris in the first transporter room she'd beamed into. Then, as now, Valandris had been tempted to put down the other guards quickly so that she might battle the resolute woman hand to hand.

But the Fallen Lord would not approve, and this transporter room was finished. She slapped her wrist control and saw coruscating light surround her—

—rematerializing, alongside Tharas, on a shuttlebay deck. One of the cargo transporters was here. It wasn't clear the devices could be used to transport personnel, but
Enterprise
's engineers were intrepid, and she didn't put anything past them.

Before she could start her mission of sabotage, she heard Hemtara shouting over her helmet comm.

“We're taking fire from
Enterprise
,”
Hemtara said.
“Cloak holding, but we can't keep this up for long.”

“We don't have to. What of the surface teams?”

“Still working. Some of the targets have fled to the woods. We will have them shortly, as soon—”
Hemtara stopped speaking abruptly.

“As soon as what? What is wrong?”

“It is Kahless and Worf. They have left the bunker.”

“Running?”

“Attacking. One of our wounded has already transported up.”

Valandris turned to face the cargo transporter—but in her mind's eye, she was picturing the worsening situation on the planet below. It could be the ruination of everything the Fallen Lord wanted.

Worf was there, evidently at Kahless's side and fighting back. That tracked with everything she had ever heard about Worf, and she had heard quite a bit.

Perhaps some of it was true.

Turning away from the transporter, Valandris slung her rifle. “Wait,” she announced.
“Hemtara, get us out of here.”

“What?”

Tharas looked back at her, startled as well.

“You heard me. Put us down on the surface—
now
!”

T
HE
C
IRCLE OF
T
RIUMPH

G
AMARAL

Kiv'ota still breathed but was a dead weight, and a heavier one than Picard would have thought possible. All the celebrants at Gamaral seemed to have lived well. Picard only had the Klingon lord halfway down the steps when he saw light and movement down the stairwell.
“Captain!”

It was Å mrhová, a SIMs beacon attached to her phaser rifle and lighting the night. The security chief was bruised and breathless, her uniform ripped and soiled as if she'd just run through a jungle at full tilt. “You can't go that way, sir.”

Picard's eyes widened. “What?”

Two more security officers, likewise panting, appeared behind Šmrhová. They turned just before they reached her and knelt, shooting into the darkness in the direction from which they'd come. Someone returned fire, with disruptor shots ripping through the night. Šmrhová slung her rifle and knelt to help Picard move Kiv'ota. With the powerful woman's aid, Picard lugged his body to a spot halfway up the steps, clear from the firing.

The security chief reached into her holster for her handheld phaser. She gave it to Picard and pointed back into the tunnel behind her. “Fifteen, maybe twenty attackers. They came in from the woods, ambushed us.” She anticipated Picard's next question. “I guess they were already here before the transport inhibitors came online.”

Your initial security sweep missed them, you mean.
But the time for recriminations would be later. The captain looked back up the steps. “It's carnage up there—we must do something. Are the inhibitors down now?”

“Deactivated as soon as I got your code word. We've been hailing
Enterprise
—and we've been running.”

Since sending Šmrhová the code word, Picard had been too busy with Kiv'ota to contact
Enterprise
. Still, his crew above was sure to know of events on Gamaral, so he was surprised not to have seen a response. He clapped his combadge. “
Enterprise
, this is Picard. What's going on?”

Glinn Dygan responded.
“We're repelling multiple boarders.
Enterprise
is under fire. Shields are up. Boarders are attacking the transporter systems.”

Picard's eyes locked in the darkness with Šmrhová's.
What the hell?

“
We're returning fire and working to secure a transporter room. Chen says we should have one in two minutes. Stand by.
Enterprise
out.”

“We
can't
stand by,” Å mrhová called out, justifiably angered by events. “Boarders?” she asked Picard. “How did they beam through the shields?”

“Maybe the same way they got through your transport inhibitors. Maybe the attackers
weren't
here already.”
Partial absolution.
Picard shook his head and started scaling the steps. “In two minutes there won't be anyone to save. Come on.”

“Captain, wait!” Å mrhová yelled for her team down the stairwell to disengage from their defensive attacks and join her. They were falling back anyway, Picard saw. The chief directed them to him. “Protect the captain.”

“It's protect me or protect Lord Kiv'ota,” Picard said, pointing instead at the motionless Klingon on the steps. “Those people out there are coming for him, not me.” It was just a surmise, but it made as much sense as anything in the past few crazy minutes. “Beam him up the second
Enterprise
is able and follow us.”

“Negative.” Å mrhová moved to block the captain's way. “That's not how it works.”

“Worf and Kahless are up there, Lieutenant. We're past regulations.”

“We're
never
—” she started to say, but Picard was already pushing past her. She followed him up the steps toward the flickering light.

The pedestal Kiv'ota had stood upon was intact, but the sides of it were scorched by disruptor blasts. No one was firing at them now at least, giving them a chance to creep alongside the platform.

The scene beyond was horrific. The bodies of Klingon guests were strewn across the plaza. Some had emerged from the stands to challenge their attackers hand to hand—and had been gutted. In the stands on the left side of the plaza, two black-suited assassins were still at it, struggling with the nobles who remained. Before either Picard or Šmrhová could react, one of the assassins fired a disruptor shot point-blank, disintegrating the noble she was struggling with. The sound hadn't stopped echoing when the other assassin drew a blade, slicing his victim's throat.

Flames still burned in the braziers atop the columns, casting the charnel house scene in eerie light.

“Over there!” Å mrhová yelled.

Picard craned his neck to look. Near the central dais, Worf and Kahless scuffled with one of the assailants. Kahless, with his
mek'leth
, swiped at the figure from the left—allowing Worf to strike from the right with some kind of metal post. The blow struck the assassin's disruptor, knocking it cleanly from his gloved hands. Kahless threatened again with the
mek'leth
, while Worf dove after the disruptor.

Å mrhová was already in motion, heedless of the disruptor shots coming from the newly unoccupied assassins in the stands. Picard saw them and fired his phaser. “Aneta, watch out!”

He didn't strike either of them, but the act was well timed, causing the snipers to miss the security chief until she reached the cover offered by the central platform. Šmrhová, phaser rifle raised, quickly advanced toward where Kahless stood challenging the disarmed assassin.

“Not so brave now, are you?” The emperor gestured toward the knife in his foe's scabbard. “Come on!”

Seeing Šmrhová on the plaza and Worf going for the disruptor, the attacker decided against further combat. He pressed a button on his wrist and was instantly enveloped within a cylinder of energy. The column dissipated just as quickly as it had appeared—and the assassin was gone.

Picard had to blink. He hadn't seen a transporter effect like that before. But now he saw it again, as across the plaza the two assassins in the stands vanished.

“Are we clear?” Å mrhová asked. She was already at Kahless's side.

Picard scanned the stands all around. He saw no one in motion and could hear nothing now but distant shots in the forest. That, and a low mournful moan from behind one of the other pedestals.

Phaser raised, Picard beheld a bloody smear on the ground, making a trail around the platform. Carefully, he worked his way around—but all caution left when he saw the pile of bodies behind the dais. A figure in dark robes was sprawled atop, facedown.

Picard recognized the outfit. “Galdor!” He reached down, afraid to injure the
gin'tak
further by moving him. But as soon as his hand touched Galdor's back, the mass of bodies gave way. Galdor's limp form started to slide off the pile, exposing his blood-soaked robe. Picard sought to arrest the Klingon's roll off the mound.

But Galdor, his eyes still closed, suddenly sputtered and coughed. “Not . . . my blood . . . Picard.”

Picard saw at once what must have happened. Galdor had dragged two figures behind the platform and smothered them with his body. Where the
gin'tak
had lain, the captain now recognized the bodies of Lord and Lady Udakh tangled together in a fatal embrace. Both had been stabbed in the gut.

“Tried . . . to stanch the flow,” Galdor said, forcing his eyes
open. He appeared in a daze. There were other corpses nearby: the Udakhs' daughters. He started breathing fast. “It is Kruge's blood,” he said, choking back tears. “They are all his blood—and they are all gone!”

Picard hit his combadge. “
Enterprise
, we need everyone off this planet, now!”

Fourteen

U.S.S. E
NTERPRISE
-
E

O
RBITING
G
AMARAL

L
a Forge had seldom heard the captain speak so gravely or with such urgency. The engineer's stratagem had worked, driving off several of the unseen attackers outside—but he desperately needed good news from inside
Enterprise
.

He got it.
“This is Chen. Emergency transporter room four is secure.”

La Forge skipped to the next question
.
“How long, Lieutenant?”

“We'll need a minute to reboot the systems—the saboteurs took some shots before we ran them off. And there's enough emitter pad damage on the hull that we'll have to bring people up one at a time.”

“Understood. Tactical, prepare to drop shields in sixty seconds,” La Forge ordered.

Konya looked over at him, alarmed. “Commander, we're still taking fire—”

“If they were trying to do heavy damage, they'd have done it by now,” La Forge said. “Lower shields.”

T
HE
C
IRCLE OF
T
RIUMPH

G
AMARAL

One moment, Valandris and Tharas were in
Enterprise
's hold. The next, they were on the surface of Gamaral—transported onto the Circle of Triumph, just meters from the central building with its rostrum above.

They had been deposited a short distance from a pair of Klingons. One, she saw in the dancing light of the burners, was
instantly recognizable: the clone who called himself Kahless. He held a
mek'leth
and now turned to face them.

“More. Perhaps you will stay to fight!”

In the stands on the far side of the colonnade, Valandris could see personnel in Starfleet uniforms heading in her direction. But they could not fire their phasers while Kahless was in the way.

“Kahless, stay back!” It was the other Klingon, rising from the ground. Younger, with a ruddy complexion and deadly serious demeanor, he held one of her companions' disruptors, which he now raised in the direction of her and Tharas. “Put your weapons down, or I will shoot!”

“Shoot them anyway, Worf.” Kahless bared his fangs. “They struck as cowards. They deserve no better.”

Worf.
Valandris had known he was here, of course—and had seen images of him. But seeing him in the flesh was startling. She felt she knew him, knew more about him than any Klingon alive—save one. Worf had never been part of the Fallen Lord's plans; he wasn't even mentioned. She had her orders, and they did not include Worf.

It only took a moment's thought for her to decide. She was not going to lose this opportunity. “Do your duty,” she said to Tharas over her internal helmet comm.

Rifle in hand, Tharas started toward Kahless. Over Worf's shouted protestations, Kahless lifted his
mek'leth
high and charged in response. Only Kahless's war cry stopped abruptly when Valandris fired her disruptor at the ground, just to the left of where the clone was about to step. Blinded by the flash, Kahless stumbled to the right—again blocking Worf's shot. Tharas lunged, but did not fire, instead jabbing the off-balance Kahless in the jaw with the barrel of his rifle.

As Kahless faltered, the blade of the
mek'leth
struck the plaza surface and stuck, embedding itself in a crack between stone flooring sections. It slipped from the clone's grasp in that
instant, and Tharas used his momentum to knock Kahless over.

Worf had been in motion since Valandris's shot. He fired at her in response, the blast going just wide of her head. He could not be allowed another shot; her armor could handle phaser blasts up to medium setting, but not disruptor fire.

But Valandris had something else up her sleeve—literally, in the form of a flash grenade. It was a device she had used to hunt cave-dwelling beasts on her homeworld. Here, against an opponent at night that lacked a helmet visor like hers, it was decisive. Light exploded at Worf's feet. Blinded, he took his right hand off the stock of the rifle by impulse—

—and found Valandris almost on top of him. Her rifle tossed to the ground, she delivered a high-kick that caught the underside of his left wrist, causing him to fire wildly. Worf had the advantage of weight, and he barreled forward—which was exactly what she wanted. Safely past the rifle's muzzle, she wrapped her arms around his torso and touched a control at her wrist.

The last thing she saw on Gamaral was a bald human advancing, phaser in hand. And then she was gone, with an unsuspecting Worf along for the ride.

•   •   •

When the two new attackers had materialized on the plaza, Picard had left Galdor with a security officer. With a still-­objecting Šmrhová just footsteps behind him, Picard had closed half the distance to where Worf and Kahless were struggling when Worf and his assailant vanished together in a coruscating cylinder of light.

Stunned, Picard looked to the right, where meters away, the same happened to the emperor and the assassin he was struggling with. They were gone, leaving only the disruptor rifle the female combatant had dropped—and the ceremonial
mek'leth
, standing askew where it had been plunged into the ground.

And a second later, Picard felt the effects of a transporter beam himself. At last—and much too late.

V
ALANDRIS
'
S
E
XPEDITION

O
RBITING
G
AMARAL

Still struggling with Worf, Valandris materialized in one of her ship's personnel transporter rooms. Three of her black-clad companions, waiting just off the transporter pads, pounced. Within a second, they had separated the two, forcing Worf down onto the deck.

Enterprise
's first officer yelled in anger as he bucked against the deck, trying to force his way free. Valandris pinned his arm with her whole body, wresting the disruptor rifle from his hands. Only now did she see Kahless, to their right, similarly pinned by Tharas and two others. Designed to transport six soldiers, the area had ample space to accommodate both brawls—and yet, astoundingly, it didn't seem as if there were enough people present to subdue both Worf and Kahless.

“I need more people on deck four,” Valandris called into her helmet comm.

“Release me!” Kahless yelled. His next words were muffled, as Tharas shoved a black bag over the clone's head. Her companions were showing no mercy to the pretender, Valandris saw without surprise. Hearing boots pounding in the hallway, she readied to release her hold on Worf.

The increased numbers were too much for Worf. Forced facedown, Worf wrestled in vain as Valandris moved to bind his hands.

“What did you do?” one of the new arrivals asked her. “We were only supposed to have taken Kahless.”

“Don't you recognize him? This is Worf, son of Mogh.”

“
Worf
?
”
His name gave everyone present pause. Their hel
mets hid their expressions, but Valandris could well imagine what people were thinking.

“I had heard he was attending,” one of the newcomers said.

“Yes, but he shouldn't be
here
,” Tharas said. Over her shoulder, he held another shroud like the one Kahless now wore. Valandris edged aside as Tharas grabbed the pinned Starfleet officer's head by his hair and whisked the bag into place. “Valandris, our lord said nothing about—”

“That's right. He gave many instructions about Gamaral, but none about Worf,” she said. “His lordship may command us as he wishes—once we reach home. But until then, I will not kill Worf until I have a chance to speak with him.”

Several of her companions yanked Worf from the floor and pushed him toward the doorway, where a bound Kahless was already being forced into the hall. Worf spoke muffled words as he passed her. “You will regret this.”

Perhaps
, Valandris thought. But for what Worf represented, she was willing to take that chance.

U.S.S. E
NTERPRISE
-
E

O
RBITING
G
AMARAL

Winded but unable to rest, Picard burst from the turbolift onto the bridge. “Status.”

La Forge was relieved to see him. He vacated the command chair. “Boarders have transported off
Enterprise
, and the attacking vessels have disengaged. We think.”

“They have Worf and Kahless,” Picard said. He did not sit down.

“We saw them being transported from Gamaral on the sensors. It's the same effect our people saw here when the boarders dematerialized.”

The sensors,
Picard thought. Only now did it dawn on him that live images of the events on the Circle of Triumph had
gone out to spectators across the Klingon Empire. But it could not give him a sicker feeling than he already had.

“Search for any means to track those vessels. Presume they are departing.” It was a needless command for Picard to give; La Forge was already at an engineering station, huddled before the interfaces with two assistants.

Enterprise
couldn't leave in pursuit anyway. The starship was still beaming people back from Gamaral, and more all the time, as transporter rooms were being restored. Crusher's medical teams were on the surface already—under heavy guard, in case any assassins remained—doing triage in the hopes that some of the victims could be saved.

“These boarders—did we take any alive?”

Konya answered, “None, sir.”

“How many intruders did we kill?”

“None, sir.”

Picard's throat went dry. There was only one other question—how many survivors remained among the guests. No one had that answer yet.

But he was pretty sure he already knew the number.