Chapter 19

IT HAD BEEN A LONG NIGHT, but Li Wu was only moderately tired. A night of brisk business always energized him. The rain had cleared up shortly after Libby Webber had given up on her date—Li would never stand her up if he were dating her—and the Green Dragon hummed with activity well into the small hours of the morning.

Wang had gone home around eleven-thirty, after bidding the last guests good night. Li Wu had stayed to make sure the kitchen was properly cleaned up, the dining area spotless in anticipation of the crowds that would start showing up tomorrow for lunch, and that in general all was in order. He had closed up the shop and was about a quarter of the way home when it started raining again.

He swore. He’d left his umbrella in the ceramic, dragon-shaped stand by the door. Stupid San Francisco [241] weather. Sighing, Li turned up his collar against the cold splash of the raindrops and half-ran back to the restaurant.

He had just opened the door and was reaching for the umbrella when the Green Dragon exploded.

When Janeway entered the prison’s sickbay, she was prepared for anything, except what she got.

She and her entire crew had been treated with suspicion and thinly veiled hostility. Only the command crew had been informed as to why they were arrested and brought in, and they had been ordered to secrecy. She was pleased that Montgomery seemed a bit embarrassed, but not mollified in the slightest. In fact, she was outraged. If any crew in Starfleet had reason to hate the Borg and to want to keep them away from Earth, it was Voyager’s. They were being treated like common criminals, summarily hauled in and grilled. It was the opposite of what should have been done. There were three people in prison who knew the Borg better than anyone, and one of those had more medical knowledge than any other ten doctors combined.

There were too many things she didn’t know, either, and that angered her as well. She knew that somehow, Kevin Johnson had been turned into a partial Borg, and that he and his family had disappeared. Where, she didn’t know. Allegedly they and Molly were under quarantine, but she wasn’t sure if she believed that.

She didn’t know if Kevin was the only one, or if Borg were spontaneously popping out of every gopher hole from San Francisco to China. She didn’t know [242] why Seven and Icheb were suspected or if they would ever be released.

So when she walked into sickbay, it was with her head held high, her eyes narrowed in defiance, and a chip on her shoulder the size of a small shuttlecraft.

The doctor had his back to her when she and her “escort” entered. “I’ll be with you in just a moment,” he said, holding up his left index finger and finishing entering data with his other hand. He turned around and his eyes lit up as he recognized her.

“Admiral Janeway! I’ve so wanted to meet you.” The light in his bright eyes faded somewhat. “Although not under these circumstances. Thank you, Lieutenant, that will do.”

The burly guard left, and the admiral and the doctor stood regarding one another. Janeway had to admit he was strikingly handsome, with his thick, curly dark hair and intense blue eyes. A strong, masculine face with a sensitive mouth was framed by small dots disappearing into his collar. A Trill, then. He extended a hand and indicated the biobed.

“Please, Admiral. I don’t like this any better than you do. I’m sure I won’t find anything to report, so let’s get this over with quickly.”

“Oh, why the rush?” said Janeway acidly. “I’m in no real hurry to get back to my cell.”

“If I don’t find anything, Admiral,” said the doctor, “then you’ll be released.”

Janeway raised an eyebrow, trying not to hope too hard. “In that case. ...” She hopped up onto the biobed.

“Thank you.” He picked up a medical tricorder. “My [243] name is Jarem Kaz. I’m very sorry for what you and your crew has had to go through, but it really was necessary.”

“Was it?” she challenged him. He didn’t meet her eyes. “The command staff was informed that the Borg are somehow involved,” she continued, watching him closely for his reaction. “I don’t suppose you’d care to fill me in on any further details about what’s been going on.”

Kaz smiled, ruefully, Janeway thought. “I wish I could, believe me. What’s happening here is frightening on a variety of levels.”

“You speak pretty freely for a top-level security clearance doctor,” Janeway said.

Again, Kaz smiled, his eyes on the instrument. “One of my former hosts was the equivalent of a Poet Laureate on Trill, and the one after that was a Maquis. It’s a combination that leads to lots of lyrical free thinking.”

Their eyes met, and Janeway liked what she saw in their blue depths. She returned his smile.

“I gather that all those you’ve previously examined have been permitted to be released? Or did you find a few Borg in my crew?”

“Besides Seven of Nine and Icheb, you mean?”

Janeway stiffened. “They have been liberated from the collective. I’d bet my life that they are not being manipulated by the Borg in any way.”

“And I agree with you a hundred percent,” said Kaz, surprising her. “I’ve said as much to Admiral Montgomery, but my opinion doesn’t seem to be enough to [244] bring about their release, or even get them a regeneration chamber.”

Janeway decided to take the risk. “You said you were a free thinker, Doctor. Are you enough of one to do what’s right?” she challenged.

“Admiral, you know I have my orders.”

“If they involve holding people you know to be innocent who could help you stop a Borg infestation, then they’re stupid orders,” she said, bluntly.

“I’m not privy to everything. There could be logical reasons why Starfleet is proceeding in this manner.”

“Do you really think so?”

His blue eyes told her all she needed to know. The seed of doubt had been planted.

Kaz sighed and stepped back. “Your blood pressure and your heart rate are slightly elevated—no surprise there, considering the circumstances. Your cholesterol has dropped slightly from its baseline. Apparently prison agrees with you.”

“I don’t agree with it,” said Janeway. “As a matter of fact I’m—”

The door hissed open. A guard rushed in. “You need to see this. Both of you.”

He touched the screen of Kaz’s computer, and an image of Oliver Baines appeared. He was in the middle of a speech.

“... I deeply regret,” he was saying. “But there are always victims in a war, even the most just war. Holograms are not like those who made them. We—they—obtain no pleasure in murder. All of the attacks last night were on buildings that we believed to be empty. If [245] the Federation had responded by calling a council to discuss holographic rights when the HoloStrike first began, as we requested a full three weeks ago, there would have been no need to escalate to violence. We grieve the loss of life, but it will not slow us down. A deleted hologram has the right to be mourned as much as a slain organic. Until we have equality, we will not rest.” He smiled, as if at a joke. “We don’t need to.”

His image disappeared. Janeway whirled on the guard. “He said something about loss of life. What’s happened?”

The guard didn’t reply at first, looking uncertainly at Kaz. Kaz uttered an expletive and said, “I’ve given her a clean bill of health, she’s about to walk out of here a free woman. Talk to us!”

“Yes, sir,” said the guard. “There was a coordinated attack on hundreds of buildings across the world last night. The HoloRevolutionaries under Oliver Baines have claimed full responsibility for it. Eight people were killed. They say that they assumed that the buildings were empty at the time. They were restaurants, theaters, sports arenas—places that used to have holograms but now have living people providing the entertainment. Apparently the attack was not supposed to have resulted in casualties.”

“Intention is all well and good, but when there are dead bodies it goes out the window,” Janeway said, pressing her lips together. “Dammit. Baines should have listened to the Doctor. He’s now a murderer, intentionally or not. Starfleet might have ignored a strike, but they’re not going to ignore corpses.”

Kaz looked troubled. “I agree with you, Admiral.” [246] He turned and regarded her intently. “And I fear for your Doctor.”

So did Janeway.

Libby was surviving on strong coffee and catnaps.

In the time since the conversation between Covington and Montgomery had taken place, she had downloaded every scrap of information she had access to. It was a lot. Grim determination buoyed her at first and kept sleep at bay, but as the hours stretched into days, she found herself surrendering to twenty-minute naps to keep from lapsing into deeper, more time-consuming sleep. She’d need stimulants if she had to keep this up much longer.

She had reread Covington’s report on Montgomery, going over it with the figurative fine-toothed comb, and found in it more than enough circumstantial evidence to damn Montgomery to a lifetime in prison for treason. But the odd thing was, when she tried to cross-reference the information using other documentation, almost everything fell apart. A few hours ago, she’d summoned all her computer training and successfully accessed the less-secure levels of Montgomery’s own office. Nothing there helped her case against him, either.

Even worse, the deeper she dug, the more she found discrepancies. Covington’s report had Montgomery in one place, supposedly meeting with his Orion Syndicate contact, when Libby knew for a fact that he’d been elsewhere. Still other things were supposed intra-office memos that Libby found no record of in Montgomery’s own computer systems. What was going on?

[247] She leaned back and rubbed her gritty, red eyes. Maybe she should take a break, have a good, long sleep and a solid meal. She knew from experience that sometimes working too hard made one careless, likely to overlook something that was right under one’s nose. But time was passing too quickly. Montgomery was now in charge of several projects, all so conveniently interlinked, and if he were allowed to get away with it—

Her console chimed softly. Someone was trying to reach her. Covington again, no doubt. Maybe she had more information.

Wearily Libby touched the controls, and her eyes widened to see the face of Harry Kim.

“Harry!” she cried. She almost said, They let you go! But just in time said instead, “Where have you been?”

He smiled, looking as tired as she knew she must appear to him. “I’m not permitted to say, but I’m back now. I’m sorry I stood you up. If I’d been able to contact you, I would have.”

“I know, honey,” she said. “Whatever it is, I’m sure you had a good reason.”

He looked solemn. “Did you hear about Li?”

She bit her lip. She wasn’t given to hysterics, but she’d had so little sleep recently and the thought of poor Li—“Yes, I did. It’s horrible.”

They fell silent. Then Harry blurted, “I want to see you.”

Libby had a brief, violent war with herself. There was so much more to read, so many pieces of a puzzle [248] to put together. And yet, she was so tired that she knew she wasn’t thinking clearly. “I’ll be right there,” she said softly.

“Any news?” Irene Hansen’s face, normally so bright and cheerful, looked aged and gray. Janeway felt for her.

“I’m sorry. They’re not going to release her or Icheb any time soon, but they’re being well treated.” It was a partial truth. Seven and Icheb’s unique part-Borg nature required unique treatment, which they weren’t receiving. Thank God Dr. Kaz was a sympathetic man.

“Will they let me see her yet?”

Janeway shook her head. “I’m afraid not, Ms. Hansen. How are you holding up?”

Irene sighed deeply. “Well enough, I suppose. The house is so empty without her, Admiral.”

“Please, call me Kathryn.”

“Then I’m Irene, dear”

“Irene,” said Janeway, “I’m going to send Lieutenant Commander Tuvok to your house. We’re going to transport you somewhere a little less well known.”

“No,” said Irene, her firmness surprising Janeway. “This is my home. I’m not moving. Seven needs a safe place to come home to.”

Janeway chose her words carefully. She was, of course, forbidden to reveal what she knew of the encroaching Borg virus. But if things continued as they had, soon the world would know. And if the public knew, then prison would be the safest place on Earth for Seven and Icheb.

“I have some information that leads me to believe [249] you might be safer elsewhere for a little while,” Janeway said at last. “I ask you to trust me on this.”

Irene Hansen lifted her head and narrowed her eyes in an expression so familiar that Janeway almost laughed. How often had she seen Seven do exactly this?

“I appreciate your concern, Kathryn. But I’m fine where I am.”

Janeway inclined her head, acknowledging defeat. “If you feel threatened by anything, at any time—”

“Then I’ll know who to contact,” Irene finished. “I do appreciate it, dear. Really, I do. But I’m not ready to leave yet.”

“As you wish. Take care, Irene.”

The next on Janeway’s extensive list of people to contact, rouse to action, or annoy sufficiently to assist her was “Red” Grady. He smiled when he saw her, but his eyes were sad. He didn’t look like he was getting enough sleep.

“We’ve got to stop meeting like this,” he joked.

She smiled without much enthusiasm. “Hello, Red. I don’t suppose you’ve been able to get anywhere with Montgomery.”

“It’s like talking to a stone wall,” Grady acknowledged.

“You should have been chosen to lead the project,” she said sincerely, “and God knows I wish you had.”

He shrugged. “It’s an old and honored tradition for war heroes to be promoted to important offices, whether or not they’re suited to it. At least he’s not Grant.” For a brief moment, his impish grin made his [250] face glow; then it faded. “He’s dug his heels in and it’s now getting to be a matter of pride to him.”

“The lives of three people hinge on a man’s pride?” Janeway said, outraged.

“I’m sorry, Kathryn, but he feels they’re a security risk, and he outranks me. At least they’ve got a good doctor looking out for them.”

“They’re lucky to have Kaz,” Janeway agreed. “But they need to be released.”

Grady sighed. “I’ll keep trying, but if I push too hard he’ll stop listening to me altogether. And Kathryn—this is going to get worse before it gets better.”

When Libby returned to her cottage much, much later, she still hadn’t slept a great deal. But she was feeling refreshed, calmer and more centered.

Harry would never have made it as a covert agent. His face was too open, too honest, and while he would never deliberately reveal in words the secret with which he had been entrusted, every plane of his body cried out that he carried the burden. His sweet face was shadowed, his body taut and tense. Libby wished she could tell him that she knew where he had been, what he had undergone, and, most likely, exactly what information he harbored, but she couldn’t.

So she had held him through the night, and they had spoken in soft voices about things that had nothing to do with holograms, Borg, or Voyager.

She took a shower and reluctantly turned her mind back to gnawing at the problem. Covington wasn’t a fool, however prickly around the edges she might [251] be. Libby mentally started reviewing what she knew.

One: There was a mole leaking information and technology to the Orion Syndicate. Two: It would have to be someone placed sufficiently high enough to have access to that information. Three: The juiciest bit of technology around today was Voyager. Four: Montgomery, who was on the initial list of suspects, had suddenly been given access to Voyager. And not only that, but because of his position as head of Project Full Circle, the HoloStrike and the Borg infestation now had also come under his command.

But where was the evidence? Not only was Libby coming up dry with evidence that could point directly to Montgomery, but all the evidence Covington had provided to her was falling apart.

Suddenly, Libby’s mind flashed back to the conversation she had been permitted to overhear between Covington and Montgomery. There was someone Covington had working for her that Montgomery wanted on his “team.”

Wanted back on his team.

One of the first tenets she had learned about espionage was to follow the trail, even if it seemed to double back on itself. Current information was yielding nothing useful. The trail had grown cold, so Libby had to pick it up where it was still warm. If this scientist Trevor Blake had worked with Montgomery, he might be worth finding.

Libby felt a rush of excited calm settle over her. This was what she was good at. She wasn’t trained as an expert to access computers, or dismantle weapons, or break codes. Her strength was in analyzing people and [252] being so harmless in the process that they let their guard down.

Libby stepped out of the shower and looked at herself in the mirror. She’d been blessed with physical beauty, and while she wasn’t arrogant, she was aware of how attractive she was. Her natural personality was open and friendly, and women didn’t see her as competition because they quickly warmed up to her. Men liked to look at her. It was a reality she had learned to deal with long ago, and one she had turned to her advantage. To the Federation’s advantage.

She’d find this Blake fellow, talk to him, and see what she could pry out of him. Perhaps he could give her the one thing she needed in order to make Montgomery a real suspect, someone charges would stick to, instead of just a slippery phantom.