"Two twelve, but that's not the point. Benjamin Maxwell. Doesn't that name mean anything to you?"

Rodriquez shook his head slowly. "Should it?"

"The Phoenix? Killed a bunch of Carda.s.sians back before the war with the Dominion? Years before anyone had any idea what they were up to?"

"I have a vague recollection," Rodriquez said. Higgins was sure he was lying. "And I also recall it wasn't as simple as that. You're making it sound like Maxwell was prescient or something, but the way I remember it, he was just . . . angry. Or traumatized. Something like that. And the only reason you recognized him is because you've always collected these kinds of stories."

"What kind of stories?"

"Sob stories."

Higgins waved away Rodriquez's ambivalence. "The point is that that's him." He pointed at the holo. "Jockeying some freighter, except he's not anymore, because he saved a bunch of people doing a crazy stunt that not one helmsman out of a thousand could pull off, but he feels bad about it. Don't you think that's the sort of thing I should maybe report up the line?"

"Why?"

"Because he disappeared. I checked. The contact information he left was totally bogus. And here's another thing: if you look up his record, a lot of it is redacted. Someone's covering up for him."

Rodriquez rose from his chair. "You're crazy. No, worse-you're bored and making up things. Stop it or you're going to get in trouble."

"I'm not going to get in trouble! There's something hinky here. Maxwell has completely disappeared."

"People are ent.i.tled to be anonymous," Rodriquez said, leaving Higgins's cubicle. "I think we actually fought a war about that once."

"No, we didn't."

"I think we did. Look it up. Apparently you don't have a problem wasting time not doing your job for other reasons."

"C'mon, Javi. This might be important!"

"Believe me: it isn't."

Higgins stood up so he could see over the low wall between his desk and his friend's. He felt like there was still something to say on this topic, but wasn't sure what, so he settled for, "You want to get dinner tonight? Maybe go to the club?"

"Sure," Rodriquez said without looking at Higgins. "As long as you promise not to talk about this all night."

Higgins weighed his options. Decided. He filed his completed report, closing the case. "Sure," he said. "Whatever you say."

January 9, 2386 Ops Center Robert Hooke "What's he doing?" Nog asked, pointing at the suboptimal image on the display. Finch ran his hands over the controls for what he grandiosely called "the security console," but the resolution became neither better nor worse.

The klaxon was still blaring, though Finch had found the volume control and managed to crank it down from mind-numbingly loud to simply annoying. Nog's sensitive inner ear ca.n.a.ls throbbed in time with the alarm. He had been so close too, so very near the exit door, or, at least, the lift door. The pitch had been deafening. Finch was turning it down.

Then the alarms started ringing.

And the calls started coming in.

Training and instinct had kicked in. Nog sat down at the communications console and began to field questions from distraught scientists, all of whom had the same basic questions: What the h.e.l.l is going on? Why was I transported to the hangar? And, really, what the h.e.l.l is going on?

Nog replied, "I don't know, but keep calm. I don't know, but keep calm. I really don't know, but keep calm." Sometimes he followed up with, "We'll get back to you as soon as we know anything."

And now, like any good officer, Nog attempted to collect intelligence.

About a non-Starfleet research station that he was visiting for a couple of hours.

With Chief O'Brien, whose idea it had been to come here.

Who had left him forty-five minutes ago.

Why do these things always happen to me? Nog wondered. It's not that I don't want to have an interesting life. I just don't want it to be so interesting.

"I don't know what he's doing," Finch said. "Which is to say, I don't know what he's already done. This is a playback, we must speak in the past tense."

The images flickered and scritched, footage from a low-resolution sensor. Sabih Ali had entered Finch's lab sometime in the past ten or fifteen minutes and was carrying a hand tool of some sort in one hand and a canister or sample collection device in the other.

The Mother swam contentedly in its tank, unaware of Sabih's proximity. It's unaware, Nog thought as he watched, because it's devoid of intelligence. It's a ma.s.s of tissue and nothing more. And yet, Nog could not rid himself of the impression that there was something in the Mother's movements. Expectant, even. She . . . it . . . seemed to float closer to Sabih as he approached its tank. He held a tool near the tank's locking mechanism; an aubergine tentacle flicked out and tickled the tank wall.

"Look here," Nog said, pointing at the security system readouts, which was playing back its logs as they watched the vid. "He overrode the locking mechanism. The top of the tank is open."

"I see," Finch said. "But Sabih missed an important . . ."

At the edge of the image's field of view, security doors slid out of the walls and covered the two stairwells. Cracks appeared in the tank walls as the air pressure dropped. Vents opened and the atmosphere was blasted out into s.p.a.ce.

Sabih dropped to the deck clutching his head and chest. Nog thought he saw liquid flow from the young man's eyes, nose, and mouth, but then he dropped out of sight behind a console. Mercifully, there was no audio.

In the tank, the Mother's writhing tentacles seemed to freeze in place, but then Nog realized that it wasn't the Mother, but the playback. Exposure to vacuum, bafflingly, had damaged the cameras. The screen went blank.

"What happened?" Nog asked, suddenly finding that the tips of his fingers and the lobes of his ears were numb. Nog had been in battles, seen beings killed more often than he cared to think about, but he had never before witnessed anyone die in such a senseless fashion.

"Exactly what was supposed to happen," Finch said blandly, leaning back in his chair.

A chill ran down Nog's spine. He glanced at Finch from the corner of his eye, somehow afraid to look at him directly. "What do you mean?"

"I mean," Finch said, folding his hands over his ample middle, "that the security system responded exactly as intended. Antiseptics were sprayed. Atmosphere vented." He looked down his nose at a readout on the console in front of him. "Hmm. No radiation blast, though. For some reason, it didn't activate."

"So, the Mother might still be . . ."

"Of course not," Finch said. "Don't be ridiculous."

"So what should I tell all these people?" Nog pointed at the communications console. "And what's happened to all of them? None of them seems to know . . ."

"They're supposed to board the transports," Finch said. "The Wren and the Aubrey. They were all briefed when they signed on. Or should have been." He waved his hand dismissively, seeming to banish any thought of the researchers. Then he stroked his chin while staring fixedly at the blank screen. Nog was surprised to see that Finch's eyes were shimmering moistly. "They'll be fine there." He pulled on his whiskers and repeated in a hoa.r.s.e whisper, "They'll be fine."

Nog realized he was fundamentally alone in the room. Finch had gone away. He needed reliable intelligence. He tapped his combadge. "Nog to O'Brien"

"O'Brien here."

Nog suppressed the desire to scream, Every time! Every d.a.m.ned time! Why does this happen every time I go anywhere with you? Instead, he said, "I'm in ops. Doctor Finch is . . . preoccupied. Sabih tried to break into the Mother's tank and activated the security measures. He's dead, I think. I'm pretty sure most of the station personnel have been beamed into the hangar bay."

The chief did not reply, but Nog could hear a quick murmured conversation, presumably with Ben Maxwell. O'Brien's next clear statement was, "We have two options: tell everyone to get off the transports and go back to work, or send them on to DS9. One idea appeal to you more than the other?"

"DS9," Nog said, thinking about his cabin. "Definitely DS9."

"Agreed," O'Brien said. "Could you contact the transports and send them on their way? We'll meet you up in ops after we make sure the station is cleared out. Then we'll get back to the Amazon and call it a day."

Nog turned to look at Finch, who was still staring at the screen and pulling on his beard. Tiny clumps of hair littered the front of his shirt. "Hurry," Nog said.

"We're on our way."

Chapter 9.

Hangar Deck Robert Hooke Nita Bharad thought, Panic sounds the same in every language.

She spoke six languages fluently and could muddle through another five or six, enough, at least, to order tea or get directions. Bharad had lived in a dozen cities or towns on ten different worlds and had heard this sound, this cacophony, how many times? Four? Five? It seemed like it should be more, but she couldn't think clearly at the moment.

Instead, she pulled Ginger closer to her chest and felt the arachnoform wrap her limbs tightly around her torso. Neither Ginger nor Honey particularly liked being touched, but they tolerated their creator in the rare moments when she violated their personal s.p.a.ce. At least, for now. No telling how they'd behave when they had pa.s.sed through their adolescence.

The rest of the mob-the yammering, pulsating, querulous mob-pushed and pulled at each other, trying to make room, trying to make sense, trying to talk, either to each other or on their various communication devices. She heard the same words spoken over and over again so that they almost sounded like a chant at a sporting event, "Ops? Finch? Ops? Finch? What's happening? What's happening? Whatshappening?" It sounded like a children's song, or a nonsense rhyme, or a riddle.

If anyone came too close to Bharad, they backed away when they saw what she carried. She stroked Ginger's head and worried about Honey, despite the fact that she was much more sensible than her sister. Honey would find her way to safety, one way or another.

Beside her, someone screeched and stumbled, fell to the ground, knocking the legs out from beneath two others. Bharad reached down to help lift up the fallen, a young man whom she didn't recognize, but the youth cowered back, pointing up past her head. Bharad turned and looked up. "Honey!" she called as the arachnoform descended on a slim thread, her chelicerae parting and closing, parting and closing, the thinnest thin stream of mucus dripping down.

Honey stopped a few centimeters above Bharad's head. Her calm demeanor was a sham, Bharad knew, since Honey only ever drooled when she was anxious.

The young man who had fallen scrambled to his feet and pushed his way back into the mob, gibbering incoherently about invaders. The more-seasoned members of the community glanced up at Honey and then turned away, once again intent on their communication devices.

"h.e.l.lo, sweetheart," Bharad murmured, reaching up to stroke the ridges over the arachnoform's eyes. She didn't have to speak loudly; Ginger and Honey both had excellent hearing. "Thank you for finding us." Her wrist abruptly began to buzz, spooking Honey, who climbed a few centimeters out of reach. She glanced at the name on the display of her wrist comm: Ben. She tapped the ball of her thumb with her middle finger, answering the call.

"Are you safe?" Maxwell asked without preamble. He wasn't using visual, only audio, and he sounded like he was exerting himself-running, most likely.

"I think so," Bharad said. "Safe as anyone. Ginger and Honey are with me."

"Good," Maxwell said. "Someone from ops should be contacting everyone in a minute, explaining what's happening, but I wanted to make sure." He panted hard, obviously climbing or pushing past something heavy. He didn't continue the thought when he came back. "We're evacuating the station. Something may have gotten loose."

"One of Finch's?"

"Of course."

Of course, she thought. No one else on the Hooke was working on anything dangerous enough to merit a complete evacuation. Well, almost no one. She worried about some of the things Mireault on deck four had been talking about: alternate dimensions and vibrational frequencies. Poppyc.o.c.k. Pseudoscience. She clutched Ginger closer to her breast. "Are you going to make it down here in time?" she asked.

"Don't worry about me," Maxwell said. "I get to ride in style with Miles and his friend. They have a runabout parked nearby. We'll probably be to the starbase before you are."

"Starbase?"

"Deep s.p.a.ce 9," he said.

"Federation," Bharad replied, wincing. "They'll quarantine us. They'll try to take Ginger and Honey."

"Don't worry about that," Maxwell panted. "We'll make sure-" Again, he broke off. This time Bharad heard another voice asking, "This way?" and Maxwell replied, "Yes, yes." When he came back, he said, "Sorry. I have to go. Listen, make sure you get on the Aubrey."

"Faster?"

"Better seats."

Most of the mob had quieted down and were listening to their devices. Bharad looked over their heads and saw the twin hulls of the two transports, side by side in their bays. Hatches were opening on both and lights were coming on inside.

"Which one is the Aubrey?" Bharad asked. "Left or right?" But there was no reply. Maxwell had signed off. Better seats, she thought. Like anyone will want to sit! She looked up at Honey, made sure she had her attention, and then pointed at the right, the farther of the two transports. Most of the mob would pile into the closer.

Honey bobbed on her thread in acknowledgment and began to climb. She would make her way back to the ceiling, cross to the transport, and meet her creator at the hatch. Ginger struggled, asking to be released, but Bharad resisted. Ginger just wasn't as trustworthy. If she were released, she would just go find Ben.

The crowd began to move in a slow, steady fashion toward the transports, no longer a mob. Bharad found herself thinking of New Delhi and the train platform near her apartment where she had lived after university. If her time on the Hooke was over, she thought, maybe she would move back there. Ginger and Honey would like the city.

Maybe Ben would visit them. She was mildly surprised how much the idea pleased her. She hugged Ginger to her breast, which made the arachnoform struggle.

The doctor pushed her way past the clump of humanity that was predictably forming around the nearer transport and slipped into the much less frantic queue that was threading into the hatch of the second. Glancing up, she noted the name painted on the hull: the Wren. I should call Maxwell and let him know. But she decided, he was probably busy, and, after all, they'd see one another soon enough.

Ops Center "What's our status, Nog?" O'Brien asked, stepping through the hatch. O'Brien's calves and thighs ached after climbing six decks' worth of stairs, but pride wouldn't let him reveal his discomfort in front of Maxwell.

His former captain glanced briefly at Finch, but then marched from console to console checking the readings. "Nice job, Commander," he said, nodding to Nog. "You didn't take any time at all to stabilize the reactor. Those gas exchangers are fussy, but you didn't seem to have a problem."

"Not too different from the system we had back on Deep s.p.a.ce 9," Nog said, waving away the compliment. "The old one, not the current one. Actually, I recognize a lot of these sub-"

"Great, great," Maxwell said, walking to a console on the other side of the room. "You do that." Nog fell silent, and his face sagged in disappointment. Maxwell continued: "They've loaded up the shuttles. Engines are primed. Autopilot programmed." He glanced at O'Brien. "You sure this isn't going to be a problem? Two dozen somewhat cracked pots all showing up at the same time?"

"If this is the most interesting thing that happens this week," O'Brien began, but then felt surprisingly awkward about being flippant while Nog looked so downcast. "It won't be," he finished awkwardly. Maxwell wasn't listening in any case.

Tapping a control stud, Maxwell spoke calmly: "Everyone settled in?"

The first transport pilot said, "Uh, I guess so. Yeah, Wren is ready."

"Aubrey is ready, too."

"Good. Cycling the atmo. Bay doors should be opening."

"I think . . . yeah, they are. Thanks, Ben."

"No worries. Should have you on your way in-"

Klaxons whooped. Lights on a dozen separate panels flashed. O'Brien lurched toward a console, temporarily hobbled by the unexpected cramps in his legs. "What's happening?" he asked as he collapsed into the nearest chair. Even Finch, who had seemed all but insensate, was leaning forward and checking monitors.

"Hull breach," Nog said. "Deck four. Lost all the atmosphere in a lab . . . I can't read this schematic."