Star Trek: Brinkmanship (14 page)

“Don’t bother asking,” Dax said bluntly. “I’m sure he’ll be able to tell you with complete honesty that he knows nothing about any Tzenkethi operatives within the Federation, or within any of the Khitomer powers. I doubt he’s been briefed with such information.”

As she watched Heldon digest this, Dax thought back to the conversation she’d had with Alden the night that the
Aventine
had been redeployed to Outpost V-4. She took another breath and hoped that this wasn’t pushing too hard. She glanced at Bowers, who nodded his encouragement.
Push on. Push harder.

“Allies spy on each other; you know that, Heldon. In all likelihood there’ve been Tzenkethi operatives on your world for some time now. Observing you. Learning about you. Seeding ideas.” She watched Heldon’s face closely. “And doubts.”

“Doubts?”

“Doubts about us.”

Heldon shook her head.
“We already had doubts about you, Dax. About your reliability, your trustworthiness.”

“But you were not hostile toward us. Yet somehow what were straightforward doubts—and, yes, I admit, reasonable doubts, given how we failed to continue negotiations with you to enter into the Federation—somehow these reasonable doubts have turned into something that’s brought you to the edge of outright war with us—”

Heldon recoiled at the word.
“We have no interest in war!”

“Perhaps not. But war might have an interest in you.”

There was a pause. Across the table, Bowers seemed to be holding his breath.
“Is that a threat, Dax?”

“A threat?” Suddenly Dax felt all of her nine lives. She was weary, sick of this game and angry at how this conversation had to be. She liked Heldon, plain and simple, and yet they were talking as if they were on the verge of becoming enemies. “Of course it’s not a threat. It’s the truth. It’s a hostile galaxy out there. Not everyone means me and my compatriots well.”

“Now you sound like your colleague Alden.”

Dax sat back in her chair.
Do I?

“I am sure you’re aware of this already,”
Heldon went on,
“but Peter Alden is a troubled man. His fearfulness, his suspicion, his sense of dread when our friends the Tzenkethi are around—and these even manifesting themselves as physical symptoms. Within the convention,
people exhibit such symptoms only rarely, but when they do, those closest to them, who love them the most, don’t shy away from telling them the truth about themselves. Peter Alden would be encouraged to put aside his day-to-day life. He would go away and rest for a while, relieve his mind of whatever worries are making him so fretful, so agitated, so out of kilter with the world.”
She shook her head sadly.
“Why is he here, Dax? Why was a man suffering like that allowed to come on a mission like this? Not only is it counterproductive, it is unkind
.”

Dax put her hands to her face and rubbed her forehead. “I’ve been asking myself the same question.”

“I thought maybe you had.”
Heldon paused for a moment to gather her thoughts before continuing.
“I’ve only been able to observe you for a few days, Dax, but it seems to me that there’s a sickness gripping your Federation. A sickness caused by terrible fear . . .”

“Well, it’s been a difficult few years, Heldon.”

“I know that. And I’m afraid that the convention will learn this way of being from you
.” She stopped, catching her own words.
“Yes,”
she said.
“Already, I am afraid.”

“I swear, it’s not us you have to be afraid of.”

“Are you sure about that?”

I’m not sure of anything right now,
Dax thought. “Watch your back, Heldon,” she said. She reached out to cut the comm, but before she did so, she took one last risk.

“I’ve liked dealing with you,” Dax said frankly. “I think that in another time we could easily be friends. I really regret that time isn’t now.”

“So do I, Dax. So do I.”

“Then please consider my request to come back to your medical facility and carry out further inspections. Consider why I might be asking you to let me do this. Consider why I have to ask you for proof. Why I can’t just be satisfied with your word. Please try to put yourself in my place.”

“I’ll try. And I’ll get back to you in due course
.”

The comm channel closed. “She’s right about Alden,” Bowers said.

You’re just saying that because he snubbed you,
Dax thought in irritation—then caught herself.
I’m seeing base motives everywhere. Even Sam—loyal, dependable Sam
.

“I’m afraid you may be right,” she replied.

•   •   •

Twenty-three skyturns before her extraction was due to occur, Neta Efheny boarded a water shuttle bound for a set of well-known coral caverns that lay forty skims to the north of the city. They were a popular destination for Ata workers who had been granted time away to restore their bodies and thus apply themselves better to their functions when they returned. The caverns also happened to be close to Efheny’s pickup point, chosen precisely because she could reasonably find a reason to be traveling that way but far enough from the cities to lie outside the main cover of the planetary security nets.

The journey to the caverns took a quarter of a skyturn. For most of the voyage the shuttle had to travel
across the open water of a large lagoon. The other Tzenkethi on the shuttle hid beneath the canopies covering the decks designated for their use, chatting with their companions. Most of them were Ata-Es who worked in maintenance units like Efheny’s, some of them in the same building complex. The whole of the Department of the Outside was now off-limits to anyone below an Ata-B grade. The Ata-EEs had been redeployed to other tasks, but everyone else had been granted restorative leave for the duration of the closure. Although the break from work was a gift to Efheny, allowing her a legitimate reason to travel to her pickup point, it also unfortunately meant that when Corazame asked if she could accompany her to the caverns, Efheny couldn’t think of a good reason to say no. Still, Efheny didn’t doubt that it would be easy enough, when the time came, to slip away from her friend and go off on her own. And in the meantime, she would take these few days to rest, like her workmates.

Near the end of their journey, the shuttle left the lagoon and entered a narrow passageway that eventually came out into a complex of tiny roofed caverns. The mood of the voyagers changed, becoming more cheerful and unrestrained. As the shuttle meandered through the maze, the canopies were thrown back, and the holiday makers oohed and aahed at the intricate beauty of the caves through which they were passing. The walls were set with mosaics of stone and coral, and the daylight, entering through filters in the roof, refracted into countless colors on the stonework and the ripples of the
water. In various discreet corners, they could glimpse Ata-EEs hard at work, reminding the travelers that they, at least, were free from their tasks for a while and reaffirming their sense of the order of things.

Efheny, sitting beside Corazame and trying hard not to think about what the next few days might bring, watched her fellow travelers with mixed feelings.
Do they not even wonder why they’ve been allowed this holiday? Or is that too much for them even to consider? Do they have to tell themselves all the time not to concern themselves with the business of superior grades, or is it purely instinct? Surely
some
of them must sense that there’s something going on. That their whole diplomatic corps is in an uproar. Their empire could be at war for all they know. Even now, fleets could be massing at their borders, getting ready to invade, or their Rej could be making the decision that would send his own fleets out to invade someone else’s territory . . .
But then, she reflected, most of them didn’t even know that there were worlds beyond the Tzenkethi system. That information was reserved for grades higher than these Ata-E followers. Most of them knew only what they were told in their E-grade lessons and bulletins, what they needed to know in order to be able to perform their life tasks. But surely
some
of them must wonder if there was more.

Efheny knew that this puzzle lay at the heart of her fascination with the Tzenkethi. It was why she could happily sit and watch them forever. On the surface, everyone behaved as they were supposed to behave: said the right words in the right order, used the appropriate
dialects, tempered the natural glows of their bodies to the appropriate hues and levels. But she never knew for sure whether they had entirely internalized these beliefs. It was a matter of endless speculation for her. If your function as a Tzenkethi didn’t require much thought, did you then train yourself not to think? She knew that sometimes hours went by when all she had thought about was her deck work, whether she was wasting time or gel or nutrients, whether Karenzen or Hertome would be satisfied with her efforts, whether she would be praised or chastised. Did you forget to think? Or did you just pretend? Was everyone here pretending as much as she was?

Beside her, Corazame was singing softly to herself. Away from superiors, Corazame’s skin was a beautiful radiant golden color that she was rarely able to reveal in her day-to-day life.
Even Cory, who on the surface seems a model Ata-E, has her secrets,
Efheny thought.
Even she carved a small space for herself that the screening and the tests and the enforcers couldn’t find. And even after her love ended, the memory sustains her in some way.
She glanced around the deck.
But what about the rest of them? Do they have their secrets too?
Tired, worried, anxious about what the coming days might hold, Efheny suddenly felt envious of these happy, singing people.
I wish I could be like them. I wish I could switch myself off entirely, give myself over fully to this life. No more worries. Only do what I was told, day after day, never have to think again because I know someone is thinking
for
me . . .

She realized that Corazame was no longer singing.

“Maymi,” she murmured. “Look who’s here.”

Efheny looked up, then quickly dropped her gaze. Hertome Ter Ata-C was standing there, looking down at them both in amusement.

“Mayazan Ret Ata-E,” he said. “And Corazame Ret Ata-E.” At their names, they both gestured their thankfulness for his attention and then, when he signaled to them to remain seated, indicated their gratitude to be recipients of his consideration.

“Well,” he said dryly, “what a
pleasant
surprise. I hope that you’re both benefiting from this period of restoration that you’ve been granted? I hope you will return to your functions restored?”

“Very much, Ap-Rej,” said Corazame, who had dimmed her skin again to her customary deferential hue. “This one offers her Ap-Rej thanks for his kind interest and assures him of her desire to use her time here to the best of her ability.”

“This one too,” said Efheny, “offers her Ap-Rej gratitude for his interest. She gives assurances of benefiting from the time she has been granted here.”

There was a pause. Corazame sat with her hands folded and her eyes down, and Efheny did the same. “Ret Mayazan,” said Hertome at last, adopting a form of words that reaffirmed his status and implied a forthcoming admonishment, “you must come with me.”

Obediently, Efheny rose and followed him at a respectful distance, her head bowed and her hands tucked behind her back. She heard some of the other
travelers murmur at the sight of them, perhaps wondering what the Ret had been doing to attract the attention of a Ter. Glancing back briefly over her shoulder, she saw Corazame give her an agonized look, and she made her skin emit a soothing pulse.
Hush, Cory. Don’t worry about me.

Hertome led her to a quieter part of the boat. When they were out of earshot, Efheny gestured her submission and her willingness to please. “How might this one assist her Ap-Rej?”

“Will you drop this crap?” Hertome said roughly. “We don’t have time for these games anymore. There’s something going on. Something big. Something serious. You’re leaving, aren’t you?”

Efheny did not reply. She hung her head and stared at the floor, hoping that any observer would see an unsatisfactory Ret receiving correction and instruction from an Ap-Rej.

“One of my colleagues has been arrested,” Hertome said. “I think the Tzenkethi are going to close our embassy. They’ve expelled four diplomats already, and I think they’re going to expel everyone. I can’t get through to anyone. And if I can’t get through to anyone soon, I’ll be stuck here for who knows how long. I can’t stay here much longer, Mayazan. It’s driving me mad!”

He cut himself off quickly. Efheny said nothing, only wished that she could close her ears to everything that he was saying. What if she was taken? The only defense was to know nothing. She fixed her eyes on a rivet in the floor of the boat.

“You’re leaving, aren’t you?” he said again. “That’s why you’ve come up here. You’ve got to take me with you. If they’ve got one of us, there’s a chance the whole network will be rolled up, and it won’t be long before my cover’s blown.” He paused. When he spoke again, his voice was low and stripped of the dry humor that had hitherto laced all his exchanges with her. “I’m desperate, Mayazan.”

The walls and roof of the cavern now felt uncomfortably close. Efheny stared down at the ground. If she didn’t listen, she wouldn’t know what he was saying. She wouldn’t have to
think
about what he was saying.

“But I can see that doesn’t matter to you, does it?” he said. “You’ll play by the book and do your duty and damn the consequences for anyone else. You know, I’m amazed you want to leave here. You’ve got no more initiative than that stupid little floor scrubber who’s always dangling at your elbow. You fit right into this damned place! But you have to understand that the choice isn’t really yours.” He gripped her wrist. She shuddered. “Make no mistake about it, Mayazan, you
are
going to take me with you. Because if I go down, you’re going down with me.”