"Every time you speak," he attempted, plumbing for more information, "I still have no reason to believe what you say."

"Believe because you can be in charge of this whole sector instead of just one weak and troubled planet, and I will be in charge of you. You will have more power, more comfort, more stability than ever you dreamed on the day you were happy to become a jail guard, the day you were astonished to be made warden, or the day you realized Zevon was right about predicting the Constrictor and that he would be silent for you. This is easy for me because you have already seized power here. With Zevon dead or ill, you will be my wealthy, powerful little puppet. Number two is still very high. Do this, and you will be sector governor when the Romulan Empire falls. Don't, and I will kill you now and find someone else~ I don't care. Is this difficult?" "No."

"Take the vial. You no longer need Zevon. Killing him is better. I will be happier. lf you cannot kill him, infect him."

The small undecorated bottle was slightly warm, as if it had been kept heated. He noted the temperature and planned to keep it insulated. If he was going to do this thing, he would do it right. "Needle?"

"It must go in the body. Skin contact is not enough. Only Zevon's DNA will absorb the virus. Get it into him any way you can. Report to me on this frequency when you have succeeded. The Romulan family dies, you become sector governor and get more than your dreams. You're a small and greedy man, Orsova. But take no insult... I need small and greedy men."

Orsova tucked the vial deep into his jacket, against the warm skin of his chest, and looked up to the faceless persona that promised him glory. "Small and greedy governors;' he corrected.

"Something weird's going on. Why wouldn't they want help? The Constrictor still comes-it's obvious from the architecture. And that pig's no provost or magistrate. I don't know how he got that kind of power, but he's nothing but a glorified jail guard. You saw how he acted! n.o.body runs a planet honesty and forthrightly and then turns down help."

"He did seem somewhat cross-purposed."

"He's got some kind of racket going on here. How else in h.e.l.l could a brutal superficial lout like Orsova end up in control of a whole planet?" "How could a corporal become Fuehrer?"

Stiles felt his face pinch. "Who?... oh. How's your leg? It's still bleeding?"

"Yes, it seems to be." The amba.s.sador turned his leg for a better look at the wound. "You were right. I should have left the projectile embedded." "Let me wrap it up."

Forcing himself to put Orsova aside in his mind, at least long enough to open the first-aid kit they'd been given, Stiles knelt beside the cot where Speck was sitting. The smell in here was so familiar-that combination of dust and moisture that never quite goes away ....

Speck pressed his hands back on the cot, tightened up visibly, and endured the stinging pain as Stiles cut the trouserleg away from the wound. The puncture bad clotted some, though blood and tissue still leaked from it. Stiles tried to remember how big the projectile had been. Details failed him. All he could do was apply antiseptic, then pressure, both of which caused Speck to stiffen noticeably. Typically Vulcan, Speck was suppressing both the pain and any appearance of it. Stiles wondered if he could do that well if somebody put an arrow through part of him.

"At least they gave us a medical kit," he muttered as he gauzed the leg. "They may have an ulterior motive," Speck suggested. "You mean they want us to escape?" "Possibly. What do you think?"

Confronted with having to cough up an answer, Stiles felt as if he were back in grade school and hadn't done his reading a.s.signment.

"If anything made sense, I'd have something to think. Orsova as a planetary leader, no sign of Zevon... all sorts of technology and architecture that wasn't here ten years ago... that composite beam reaching out of the atmosphere and grabbing a ship as big and powerful as a CST-even Starfleet can't mix those properties that way. How could the Pojjana do that in just ten years?"

"From what you tell me," Speck contemplated, "Zevon knew what every civilization needs to make its quantum leap. Energy. Yet, to build and use high energy, he would need to influence the use of resources and manpower on the planet. If somehow he obtained influence, gained trust... yet how does an alien, particularly a Romulan, come to gain trust in a culture as xenophobic as this?"

"He couldn't. Something else must've happened. Orsova would never let us get past him to talk to anybody else... he kept everything to..."

Everything he'd seen, the inconsistencies and irritating facts, stewed under his skin. He thought of those last few hours with Zevon, with Orsova, the last beating that had been auctioned to an alien-hating Pojjana. Bruises nearly rose on his skin as if by habit, summoned by the nearness of those old miseries. Suddenly, as if being tapped on the shoulder, he remembered what he had said to Orsova during that last beating.

"That's it! Orsova as planetary leader makes no sense at all unless it finally sank through that iron skull that Zevon really could predict the Constrictor! I told him myself! I tried to convince him! If after I left he decided to check it out and Zevon convinced him, Orsova could've taken that message to the government, succeeded in warning the planet, saved a bunch of people and parlayed that into power "Grasping his head to keep it from blowing off, Stiles raved, "That's got to be it Orsova's getting credit for Zevon's work!"

Speck stretched his leg, thinking. "Why would Zevon agree to such an arrangement?"

"Oh, he'd agree in a flat minute," Stiles tossed. The familiarity rushed back. "Zevon didn't want power. He was never afraid for his own life. He wanted to redeem himself in his own eyes by saving more people than he killed when his team's experiments started the Constrictor"

"A composite graviton-traction beam with polarity that high, as well as the phaser-resistant envelope the CST encountered, can only be generated with very delicately balanced quantum charge generation. They plainly have warp energy, but it seems to be planet-bound."

"I know why" Stiles said. "Zevon wasn't interested in s.p.a.ce. He'd been there. If he'd had influence and resources, he would've turned all the energy he could control to saving the planet from the Constrictor and other outside threats. Looks to me like the Pojjana turned out to be pretty sharp, at least sharp enough to follow instructions, learn physics and engineering... even Zevon couldn't do this by himself. They still don't have ma.s.sive warships or anything, but in spite of that we were in for a real surprise when we got here."

"If Zevon is the real genius behind the planet's sudden advancement," Spock continued, "and I agree that is likely, then Orsova is in constant danger of his secret's being found out."

Stiles looked up. "He sure wouldn't want you and me blabbing it around, would he?"

"No. Nor would he want Zevon taken away. No deal or favor from the Federation could be as beneficial to him as hayhag Zevon here, with a pact to remain behind the scenes."

Coming to his feet, Stiles paced a few steps. "If all this is fight, then if Zevon leaves or dies, the jig is up. Orsova couldn't keep up the illusion of being brilliant all by himself."

"Sounds like a threatening symbiotic relationship," the amba.s.sador surmised. "Zevon has managed to bridge the Pojjana through this period of Constrictors which otherwise would have killed vast numbers of them. Instead, they thrive despite the Constrictor."

"They thrive. Orsova thrives. Zevon's here somewhere, alive, working for Orsova. And we're here, locked in a stone crate."

His words fell to the floor. With nothing more to do for the amba.s.sador's leg, Stiles sat on the other cot against the other wall, and descended into captivity as naturally as into a warm tub. Its arms folded around him. They'd been waiting.

The walls around them, stone and mortar, lichen and leakage, uttered their opinion. All the old perceptions came rushing back. Someone was using an autovac on a floor one story up. Water ran through the pipes. Other prisoners, probably, taking showers in the next wing. A flicker of the lights. Circuits needed adjustment. He stared at the opposite wall.

"Somehow I knew," he murmured. "I knew I'd end up back here. It's been like one of those nightmares that won't quit coming back. Look at me... I can't breathe right, there's no blood in my hands... I used to get like this before academy exams. Or before meeting you."

Across the cell, the amba.s.sador observed him as if he were watching bread dough rise, which annoyed Stiles right to the hairs on the back of his neck. Kicking at a loose stone that had been loose ten years ago too, Stiles vented, "Did it ever happen to you that you didn't know what to do next?"

Spook did not venture an answer to that. Instead of the amba.s.sador's voice, Stiles heard a thousand voices from the past speaking to him, echoing against the hard-learned lessons of a young officer, the struggles of living with crewmates, and finally learning to live with himself. He seldom looked in this kind of mirror any more. He'd never liked the reflection when he had. Today, though, he didn't look away.

"Funny;' he began aloud, "when we were about to die because something grabbed the ship and we had thirteen minutes to live, I wasn't afraid. Standing up there looking at Orsova over the top of that big desk... I about c.r.a.pped my pants."

"I'm glad you restrained yourself," Spock commented lightly.

"Ship disasters don't scare me" Stiles said, keeping on his track. "Disastrous people scare me."

It seemed there was something just around the corner, just beyond his grasp, a whisper in the fog.

After a few seconds, Stiles found himself asking, "Did people scare... him?"

The last word, revered somehow all by itself, came out as a pathetic sigh, a comparison that shouldn't be made if any progress was ever to be accomplished. Instantly Stiles regretted that he'd asked.

Spock's answer took some time coming. "Helplessness scared him."

For the first time, Stiles felt a steely connection forged in the cool cell. "Did he ever think of himself the way I think of myself?. Like I don't belong where I am?"

Veiled contentment settled over Mr. Spock as the past opened briefly before him for viewing and he enjoyed what he saw. His voice was low, even soft, yet carried a scolding tone.

"'He'... was an exceptional man. He was also my friend. As such, we had our disagreements. We saw each other's uglier moments. The mission logs fail to show those aspects." Stiles looked up. "Are you saying the logs are inaccurate?" "Not at all. We simply left things out." "Like what?"

Spock paused to think a moment. "The logs, the legends, the tall tales, the song and story-these are spirit-charging powers for us. But legend is selective and usually written by the winners. The legends of the first Enterprise... they reflect the heroic, not the human aspects, of our life together in those years... Jim Kirk, Dr. McCoy, the others, and myself. Legend is a great filter. The traits that shame us most, the ones we leave out of the stories, are often the flaws that give us texture. Without them, we would be only pictures."

Speck leaned back on an elbow, maneuvered his leg to a better position, and considered the past through scopes in his own mind.

"I have come over these many years to understand what it means to be a captain not so much in rank but in manner. There are captains of rank, captains of ships, and captains of crews. A few men are all three. I once commanded the Enterprise as her captain. I was capable of giving the proper orders and expecting proper behavior, but I was never captain of the crew's hopes and devotions. That is a different pa.s.sion. A different manner of man than I."

At first it seemed Spock might be selling himself short, judging the past too harshly-but no. Stiles knew too well the symptoms of that, and didn't see them here. This, instead, was a kind of personal honesty, a stunning depth of self-respect.

He wanted it. He wanted to know how to do that. Spock was so graceful at understanding subtle differences that mattered, and didn't recoil from knowing his talents and limitations.

"Different how?" Stiles asked, somewhat abrasive.

Spock tipped his head in thought. "I see chess," he said. "You see poker."

Broiling with envy and impatience, Stiles rubbed his cracked hands on his trousers. He didn't understand that, exactly, but something about it lit a fire under him.

"We've got to get out of here," he announced. "It's time to go. We've got to do something." "Then you have decided to act?" Spock asked.

Bitter, humiliated, and angry about it, Stiles held back the answer that bit at his tongue. He looked up, met the amba.s.sador's keen eyes. If only he could slap back the undercurrents of mockery and deserve better!

Spock gazed at him with sharp-eyed significance. "Eric, you underrate yourself and it makes you hesitate."

"I hesitate because I get things wrong so much," Stiles said. "And I don't want to get things so wrong it gets somebody killed. Or a whole lot of somebodies." "That is what everyone likes about you." Stiles looked up. "Huh?"

"Your reputation among the captains of frontline ships is well known. Every service commander knows you are a Medal of Valor winner. You could have pushed, jockeyed for position, used your commendation to leap over the heads of everyone on the promotions list. Even in civilian life you might have used your hero status to become a senator or gain other power. You could easily have become one of those people with much rank and little experience, but you chose a wiser and less vainglorious way. You went back out into s.p.a.ce for more experience, working your way up rather than forcing your way up. You may not realize it, but you are deeply respected and liked by the people who get all the attention. They speak of you fondly. They hope Eric Stiles is the one who comes to repair their ships."

Astonished to his socks, Stiles gawked in complete stupid amazement. His men had said things like that to him, but he thought that was in-house loyalty and dusted it off with the debris of a day's work.

"Sir," he began, "there's something the history tapes don't show about you."

"What would that be?" Stiles voice was low and sincere. "You're a nice person." Though Spock's face remained pa.s.sive, his eyes dropped their guard. "A supreme compliment," he said. "Thank you. Now I suggest we vacate this ceil." "I'm ready," Stiles said. "How do we do it?"

Offering a moment to absorb what they had said to each other, the amba.s.sador raised a brow in punctuation. Then he brought his right hand to his ear and pressed the skin just behind his earlobe, and said, "Spock to Saskatoon."

For two or three seconds there was nothing. Then, out of nowhere, the very faint buzz of a voice, unmistakably human, spoke up from thin air, sizzling as if on a grill.

"McCoy here. What are you clowns waiting for? We've had you located for a half hour! Why'd you wait so long to signal us? You always did have lousy Vulcan timing."

Touching his ear in a different place, Spock tilted his head to clear the signal a little more. "The comm link has been charging, doctor." "Have you found that Romulan yet?"

"Not yet. We have been incarcerated, but will be remedying that momentarily and effecting a search. Are you and the ship under cover?"

"You bet we are. You can track us with this signal, can't you ?" "Yes. Stand by. No unnecessary signals." "Standing by. McCoy out."

Astonished all over again, Stiles squawked, "How'd you do that! How could you contact-"

"A micro-transponder embedded in my cochlear cavity." Spock gestured to his right ear as if to display something that couldn't possibly be seen.

"But the guards scanned us!" Stiles asked, "How'd they miss something with a broadcast range?"

"The mechanism was nonactive. Dr. McCoy was under orders to activate a charge by remote after two hours had pa.s.sed, with short-range microburst-" "Remote? From the ship? Wouldn't it get interference?" "The good doctor has many connections on this planet who owe him favors. I suspect he had the signal relayed through several private sources." "You 'suspect'?" "He delights in not telling me." "But can't the Pojjana key in on an outside signal like that?" "Why should they?" Spock pointed out. "Until today, there were no Federation frequency combinations being used on the planet. Why would they militate against it?"

As he spoke, the amba.s.sador firmly gripped one of the symbolic polished stones on his jacket. The large stone unscrewed as if it were the top of a jar and came off in Spock's hand. He turned it bottom up. In the center of what had looked perfectly well like a real stone was instead a molded chamber, and in that chamber was a black mechanical nugget which Spock plucked out and examined.

Overwhelmed, Stiles stared at the black nugget and recognized it, the little green "charged" light glowing against his skin. "You've got a utility phaser!"

Surveying the little palm-sized weapon with satisfaction, Spock said, "Like the comm link, it needed time to charge. Enough time for us to beam down and clear all the security scans. If we had allowed ourselves to be captured with the link and weapon charged, the Pojjana guards would've detected the active energy. Also, I supposed the shield might neutralize them if they were precharged "

"So you're saying you knew they probably wouldn't deal with us. And you knew that ahead of time."

Spock eyed him cannily. "Of course, Mr. Stiles. One hopes for the best, but prepares for the worst"

At the sounds of those casual words, put across so matter-of-factly by one of the last living pioneers of s.p.a.ce exploration, shock descended upon Eric Stiles as if he were under a collapsing bridge. It pressed the breath from his lungs and displayed a shame within him and a smoldering anger that for much more than a decade he had suppressed. Now, today, finally, it sparked. Prepare for the worst. He leaned forward on the rusty cot, gazing downward at the empty floor. His knees before him might as well have been distant planets. What had he done all his life? Revere the best, expect the worst, and be prepared... for neither.

His skin felt tight, preformed. He drew another breath, huffed it out.

Across the cell, Spock pressed against the brick wall, moving slowly from place to place. He seemed to be listening for outside activity. Listening... trying to decide where to aim the phaser, how to break them out.

His own breath rumbled in his ears. Just outgoing, in huffs, short and hot. Dry lips.

As if in a dream he watched Spock prime the freshly charged little palm phaser. Green light, blue, yellow...

The Vulcan now stood sideways to present a narrow profile to the blast field, and extended his arm to aim at the portion of the wall he had chosen as their best bet to open an escape route without bringing the building or the Pojjana army down upon them. Orange... red. "Sir!" Stiles bolted to his feet. The amba.s.sador hesitated and held fire. "Something?" Shadows lay across Spock's Vulcan features, harsh limited light on the other side, a life-size paper doll of ideals Stiles had thought were bigger than life.

"I'm sorry about this," Stiles announced. He met Spock's gaze without flinching. "From now on I'm thinking ahead." "What does that mean, specifically?" the Vulcan asked. "It means you don't have permission to open fire."

This time both of Spock's brows went up. "I beg your pardon?"

Putting out a cold hand, Stiles noted that at least now he wasn't trembling.

"So you've got a phaser. So what? Once we get out of the cell, they've got energy detectors, tiers of fences, guards, weapons. We'll never get through." "You have a suggestion for me?" Spock asked.

"No, sir" Stiles said. "I have an order for you. This is a military mission. I'm the ranking Starfleet officer here. This is probably the most boneheaded thing I've ever done in my life, and I don't know if... yes, I do know. I've been deferring to you for half my life whether you were there or not, and it's time for that to stop. They're expecting us to escape but, sir, we're not here to escape."

Another step brought him right up to Mr. Spock, face to face, man to man.

"I've been acting like a kid ever since I first saw your face on a history screen. It's time for me to start acting like the commander of this mission." He turned his hand palm up and did not lower it.

Standing before him in what appeared to be amazement and a few other emotions Stiles couldn't quite ident.i.ty, Spock pa.s.sed the next few moments without moving so much as a facial muscle.

His eyes moved first, shifting down to the phaser in his grip. He gazed at the nugget-shaped weapon for several seconds as if it were the mean center of the universe.

Then, quite accommodatingly, he placed the weapon in Stiles' open hand. "As you wish."

Stiles found himself in the middle of a prison cell, holding the center of the universe.

Limping back a step or two, the amba.s.sador gave Stiles room to use the phaser. There was a particular quality to his voice as he asked, "What is your plan, Commander?"

As he checked the phaser to be sure it was set where he thought it was, Stiles felt suddenly warm 'all over, and strong.

"Orsova thinks he's being cute putting me back in the same cell. He's an idiot. I spent years here. I helped rebuild this place after my first Constrictor. I know more about it than he does or any guard ever did. It's his big mistake. I'm not a twenty-one-year-old kid anymore." "And this is an epiphany for you?"

Stiles blinked at him. That look was back on the Vulcan's face, that almost-smile, with the sparkle behind the eyes. Amus.e.m.e.nt? Or something else?

"Your men knew their lives were in danger," the amba.s.sador said, "yet you gave them confidence without deception. You marched them past the frozen moment that kills so many, and gave them a chance to fight for their ship and their lives. Against the checklist that counts more than legends, with all flaws and hesitations understood as cells of the whole... you are a captain." Had the lights changed in here? Was it warmer?

Both peeved and flattered, Stiles shifted his weight and waved a hand at the cot. "You mean, all this time you believed in me and you let me sit there and snivel?"

"It was never enough for me to believe in you," Spock said handily. "You had to believe-"