"On screen, please, Lieutenant," Freeman replied, as he stood and a took a few steps forward from his command chair towards the viewing screen.
Once the background stars were replaced by an image of a Romulan bridge and an angry looking Romulan commander, Freeman spoke up. "Romulan vessel, you have violated the integrity of the Neutral Zone and are dangerously close to Federation space. I must insist that you withdraw immediately!"
"We are merely responding to an incursion by your ship, Federation Captain. Your ship attacked and destroyed one of our unarmed probes! That will not be tolerated," the Romulan commander replied tersely.
"Nor will lying be tolerated, Commander. For an unarmed probe, they sure had a lot of people on board," Freeman retorted.
"So you admit to destroying the craft?" the Romulan asked.
"Only after it destroyed one of our ships in a surprise assault," Freeman responded. "Which came first, Commander, the chicken or the egg?"
"I do not understand that reference. Therefore it is of no consequence. You have exactly thirty minutes to surrender yourself so that we may escort your ship to Romulus to stand trial for the willful destruction of a Romulan ship, and violation of the Neutral Zone," the Romulan ordered. "Failure to do so will result in your destruction."
"And you, Commander, have thirty minutes to power down your weapons systems and leave the Neutral Zone. With or without your scout ship's crew, it doesn't matter to me," Freeman smiled. "They're still sitting in that asteroid, using up what precious air they have left in their space suits."
The Romulan Commander looked genuinely irritated as he spoke again, slowly, "Thirty minutes, Captain." The communications were then severed and the viewscreen replaced the Romulan's face with the image of the two Romulan warbirds on a background of stars.
"Captain, I'm detecting an energy surge from one of the two ships. They're cloaking," Ivanovna reported even as one of the Romulan ships disappeared from the viewscreen. "I am unable to track them."
Freeman grunted sourly. "Are there any Federation vessels nearby?" he inquired of his tactical officer.
Her fingers flew about the controls for a brief moment, then stopped. "The U.S.S. Aallera, a light cruiser belonging to the Blue Fleet, is about two hours away at maximum warp."
"Send the Aallera an encoded message and advise them of our situation. Request assistance," Freeman ordered. "Also, send an encoded message to Starfleet Command and advise them of our status."
"Aye sir," Ivanovna replied even as she made preparations to do so.
"Captain," came Perriman's voice over the intercom, "I have a report regarding the super-dilithium."
"Go ahead, Commander," Freeman replied, as the attention of bridge crew shifted to his conversation.
"It's a fake, Captain," Perriman said simply. "The rock in that asteroid is a close copy of the structure we received, close enough to fool casual scans. However, anyone trying to channel power through it would in for a nasty surprise."
"That was quick. You have the data to prove this?" Freeman asked somewhat suspiciously.
"Aye sir. I ran some computer simulations. In my opinion this rock is worthless," Perriman replied.
Freeman frowned and scratched his chin for a moment. "Commander, will you join me and the senior staff in the Observation Lounge?"
***
'Bright light,' Yilaan thought to herself. 'Very bright light.' Yilaan refused to open her eyes, though her extra efforts to squeeze them tightly shut were enough for Doctor T'Paya to notice she was conscious.
"My apologies, Commander," T'Paya said, moving a mobile observation light so that it was no longer shining in Yilaan's face. "I hope that is more comfortable."
Yilaan warily let her eyes open. "Yes, thanks," she replied as she tried to get up. Instead of rising to her feet, she groaned in pain and grabbed at her back, lying back down quickly.
"Commander, stay in bed," T'Paya said, placing a firm hand on Yilaan's shoulder. It was not a request. "You have some internal damage I haven't yet repaired from the force of that shot that penetrated your air recycling tank and slammed it into your body." Yilaan's puzzled expression caused T'Paya to stop and appraise her. "Do you not remember that?"
"I'm afraid not," Yilaan said, rubbing her head with her free arm. "The last thing I remember was Bradley beaming over," she replied, pausing to think. "And we were attacked." She looked up into the calm, expressionless face of her doctor. "How are Bradley and the others?"
"Ensign Lu is dead," T'Paya told Yilaan, causing the first officer to close her eyes again. "Chief Engineer Perriman is uninjured, as is Lieutenant Bradley, physically."
Yilaan opened her eyes again. "What do you mean, physically?"
T'Paya glanced around the room briefly before looking back down at her patient. She answered, but without spoken words. {I believe that Lieutenant Bradley is in a state of mental shock. Something that happened has injured her . . . emotionally, perhaps.}
Yilaan's eyes widened as T'Paya's thought was projected gently at her. "Something wrong, Commander?" T'Paya inquired.
{It's just been a long time since I've communicated in this way,} Yilaan thought back at her. {It's not among my favorite forms of communication.}
T'Paya raised one eyebrow. "Fascinating," she said aloud.
At that moment, Ivanovna's ship-wide summons of the senior staff to the Observation Lounge came down over the intercom. Before Yilaan could reply, T'Paya was already addressing the bridge. "Captain, Commander Yilaan is still too injured to move, and I must stay here and attend to her."
"Understood, Doctor," Freeman's voice replied. "We'll pipe the conference down to you."
***
Captain Freeman, Lieutenant Ivanovna, Lieutenant Hathaway, and Commander Perriman were gathered in the Observation Lounge looking over Perriman's data. Freeman was shaking his head in disbelief.
"So it was a Romulan trap after all," Ivanovna said after a few moments.
Freeman cast a glance at his security chief. "On the surface, it would seem to be," Captain Freeman replied. The captain walked over to the lounge's windows and looked out at the stars. "However, something tells me they were lured into this, just as we were."
"But Captain," Hathaway objected, "they were lying in wait for our shuttle, cloaked, and waiting to spring the trap!"
"Indeed. That's certainly what it looked like to us," Freeman agreed. "But just suppose for a moment that we're wrong, and look at the situation again. Isn't it just a bit odd that the Romulans attacked with a scout ship?" The room was silent, so Freeman continued, "We've known the Romulans to go all out with their plans, to leave no stone unturned, yet why would they send a scoutship to lay in wait for us? Why not one of their warbirds? They had no way of knowing what ship we would bring, or for that matter, that we would arrive at all, I don't think."
"They must've been after the same thing we were then," Yilaan inserted over the intercom. "The super-dilithium."
"Which, as our new Chief Engineer has deduced, is really a fake," Freeman noted. "No doubt that cloaked ship has just gone and retrieved their away team and their samples and are now reaching the same conclusion."
"It may have been a trap for both of us then," Yilaan added. "But by whom and why?"
Freeman left his position by the window and sat down at the briefing table. "Very good questions, Commander. For motive, my guess is whoever this is was trying to start a war between the Federation and the Romulan Empire. Both of us arrive at about the same time, find the other in the Neutral Zone, shout accusations and fire main phasers. It very well might've worked."
"It still may, Captain," Ivanovna replied, referring to the hostile Romulan ships in the area.
"Who would want to do such a thing?" Yilaan said. "Someone sure went to a great deal of trouble to pull this off."
Freeman nodded to himself. "Someone out there is playing a very dangerous game. I want to find out who."
Go back to the list of Trek stories, go on to the next chapter, or go back to the previous chapter.